Or' The Ramparts

So last night I logged in Honorshammer. I was basically hanging out waiting to see if the Kara group from Wednesday would reform and get back into Kara.


While I was waiting FallenAngel asked me to help him with a group quest in Western Plaguelands. Mowbray was also able to help out. I did a little mining and was able to snag a Large Opal and some Thorium to make Hummer a Simple Opal Ring. +12 agility which is nice, but he can't equip it until level 47.


Nothing much was happening in the guild, so I was preparing to go to Shattrath and start working on Dailies. I've decided my new goal is to save up enough gold to get my epic flyer. Currently I'm at 1200g.


As I was preparing to head off, I got a tell from a Mage named Synefeld in the guild <>. They were putting together a Heroic Hellfire Ramparts run and needed a tank. He had been the PuG mage in one of my Shattered Halls runs. He had been impressed with my tanking and wanted to see if I would go.


Our group was me (Prot Paladin), Litterbox (Holy Paladin), a Rogue, Synefeld (Mage), and a Warlock from the guild <>.


We start clearing the trash. The Rogue attacks the wrong target and gets one shotted. Welcome to Heroics. I had heard that this Heroic was particulary difficult. Many mobs in the opening stretch spam disarm on the tank. This would be a serious problem for a Warrior tank as many of their abilities don't function without a weapon. Disarm to them is akin to mana burn for a Paladin. Druids win again here as they are not affected by either Disarm or Mana burn.


We had a couple of bad pulls. One that was humorous was the Mage saying in Party Chat, "Oh yeah! I'm good." The words weren't out of his mouth good when he pulled a pat and wiped us.


We got to the first boss. We CC his two adds and then burned him down. We continued moving on.


The roughest trash pack was 4 Warlock type casters surrounding a hard hitting melee. We would CC 3 of Warlocks leaving one Warlock and the melee. The uncontrolled Warlock would hang back by his buddies so I couldn't Consecrate, and he would Shadow Bolt the party.


I should have pulled with Avenger's Shield, but this was a PuG without vent or marks. As the tank, I should have taken over, marked the targets and set up the pulls. If I ever find myself in Heroic Ramparts again (unlikely), I will do just that.


We finally make it to the 2nd boss, Omar the Unscarred. His deal is that he summons Fel Hunters throughout the fight, who, you guessed Mana Drain! I would pick up most of the Fel Hounds with my Consecration, but some got through.


We had him down to 5% with just me, and the Rogue left standing. This qualified as an "Oh Crap" moment. Paladin's have very few tools for these moments. Healthstone and Super Health Pot were on cooldown. If I bubble and heal, he'll go for the Rogue and it'll be lights out. I activated the Dawnstone Crab. I get hit anyway, and I'm at about 1000 life, while the boss sits at 4%. Next hit will probably kill me and we'll wipe. Rogue is averaging 400 dps, he only needs about 10 more seconds to finisht he boss, so I Lay On Hands, instant 13k heal, lol. That gave the Rogue the time he needed to finish off the boss.


Finally we take on the last boss. He starts flying around, and then he fights and then his dragon. I'm not sure what triggers the dragon landing. On our successful attempt, we had the rider almost dead when the dragon landed, so I could leave the rider and go straight for the dragon. I ran Fire Resist aura to help with the damage. Instead of being lootable, he leaves behind a chest, and NO BADGE! BOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!


All that time and effort and two badges is all I have to show for it. G ma fricking G. I don't think I'll be going back to Heroic Ramparts anytime soon. I'd be better off doing Slave Pens or Botanica, more Badges for the time put in.