Honor's Code

Ah Karazhan . I love the place. My favorite nights of the week are the nights I know I'm logging to lead a band of friends and Heroes into the gaping maw of the legions in Kara who want nothing more than to turn our intrepid band into worm food. Our daring crew last night consisted of Me ( Prot Paladin), Aleks ( Prot Warrior), Baconstrip ( Resto Druid), Calexis (Holy Priest), Rhubarb (Holy Paladin), Wichita (Elemental Shaman), Regolos ( Afflication Warlock), Condramous ( Stormwind Portal Mage ), Jagdelf (Beast Mastery Hunter), Origami (Feral Druid). First we meet up with the Maiden of Virtue. I know this will sound strange after my gear rant, but what I really wanted to see her drop was Gloves of the Treemender for Bacon, or even a Shard of the Virtuous for Calexis . But she was giving up neither. Instead, she drops Iron Gauntlets of the Maiden. My gloves! These are even better than my Tier 4 gloves which drop off of Curator. I was so excited, yet at the same time...

Friday night saw Heroes back in Karazhan to continue our run from Tuesday night. This time around it was Me ( Prot Paladin) Zadorr (Feral Druid) Wichita (Shaman, spec'ed Resto for the run) Lakini ( Dreamstate Druid) Baconstrip ( Resto Druid) Agamemgnome (Combat Sword Rogue) Sylvara ( Multilate Rogue) Condramous (Arcane Mage ) Regolos ( Afflication Lock) Jagdelf (Beast Mastery Hunter) Right from the start we can tell this is going to be a very different run from the other night. We wiped on the very first pull. We had some new people in the raid, and I forgot to explain the mobs to them well enough. We managed to clear up to Illhoof room, wiping at least twice along the way. We get to Illhoof and layout our strategy. There were two major problems. One, I couldn't seem to get aggro on the little imps. They were going after our Warlock who was loading up Illhoof with Seed of Corruption. The larger issue seemed to be the Chains. We knew we...

Last night I got to do something I very much enjoy: Help a friend. My buddy Baconstrip wanted to get the epic mount for his warlock alt, Jeyne. Bacon is one of the nicest and most selfless people you will ever meet. He is always going out of his way to help people, and I really enjoyed the chace to do something for him. Our group was me (Lvl 70 Prot Paladin), Regolos (Lvl 70 Afflication Warlock), DarkDescent Lvl 70 Afflication Lock), Wichita (Lvl 70 Elemental Shaman), and Jeyne (Bacon's Lvl 60 Lock alt). The final step of the Dreadsteed Quest takes place in Dire Maul West, which ironically was the instance I had to run on the 3rd step of my Charger Mount quest. In fact, we had to down the boss that releases the Equine Spirit that is part of that quest. Seeing that spirit walking around the instance again brought back some good memories. We cleared to Immothar and killed him. Apparently, he's the twin brother of the summonable Boss in Heroic Mana Tombs. Then Regolos st...

Warning! Rant incoming! I hate drops. I hate them. My entire progress as a tank is dependent on a stupid roll when the mob drops. 10 times I killed Attumen. 5 times I've killed Moroes. 6 times I've killed Maiden. Twice I've killed Curator. No Bracers. No Gloves. No Belt. No Pants. I'm stuck on 11.9k hps. I think every boss should give you a token. When you hit exalted you should be able to buy any drop from a boss whose token you have.. There's nothing I can do. I get one shot a week to improve my gear. I've gotten every Pre-Kara upgrade I can get without changing to Engineering or Blacksmithing. I know this sounds loot focused, but how the h-e double toothpicks am I supposed to tank the last half of Kara or Gruul's when I can't get the upgrades from the first half of Kara. It makes me want to scream sometimes. /rant over Where's my cookie?

A consistent post on both the MainTankadin Forums and the WoW Paladin Forums are Protection and Retribution Paladins posting about how their guild, sometimes rather forcibly, asks them to spec Holy, or won't let them Tank, or DPS. What I never realized was that non Marksman Hunters can face these same issues, too. In a recent post BRK answered an email from a Hunter whose guild was trying to force him to respect out of his chosen Beast Mastery spec and into Marksman . The next time I see one of those posts, I'm going to reply with this: Here, in part, is BRK answer (quoted with permission): "My friend, there is one bit of advice you need to heed. One small tidbit of information that shall put your mind at ease. One itsy bitsy teenie weenie morsel of truth that shall set you free: People are stupid. Unfortunately, too often in our lives we have to deal with People. Friends are cool. Acquaintances are nice. People are dumb. People are ignorant. People are loud-mouthe...

I had the honor of accompaning 9 of my guildmates into Karazhan last night. 3 Hours. 5 Bosses. Everyone is getting to the point where they know the pulls, they know what to do, and they do it. Our group last night was Me (Prot Paladin) Zadorr (Feral Druid) Wichita (Elemental Shaman) Lakini (Balance/Resto Druid) Baconstrip (Resto Druid) Sylvara (Multilate Rogue) Schmedlap and Nemesis (Marksman Hunter, Winterspring Cat) Calexis (Holy/Disc Priest) Rhubarb (Holy Paladin) Condramous (Fire/Arcane Mage) Everyone did an outstanding job. We did not have a single wipe. Dare I say it was "easy"? Schmedlap joined the Teir 4 club. In fact, Curator dropped the EXACT same loot as our first kill. We had quite 3 trash epics drop: Boots of Elusion, the Feral Boots, and a Nature Damage ring. Great, I thought I had problems holding threat off Wichita before. Actually, Wichita is a really good player who manages his aggro extremly well, while at the same time doing incredibl...

Sunday night and my Guild, Heroes Inc, was headed back into Kara. Our mission was to kill Maiden and proceed to make further attempts on the Curator. Our group was Me ( Prot Paladin) Zadorr (Feral Druid) Baconstrip ( Resto Druid) Sameth (Holy Priest) Calexis (Holy/Disc Priest) Condramous (Arcane/Fire Mage ) Schmedlap (MM Hunter) Regolos (Affliction Lock) Ferth (Fury/Arms Warrior) Wichita (Elemental Shaman) I switched out to healing gear for Maiden while Zadorr tanked her. With 2 dedicated healers, and 2 dedicated dispellers , the fight went very well. The Priests group heals really helped after Maiden did her Holy Chain Lightning thing. She dropped the Shard of the Virtuous which Bacon won. Then it was on to Curator. I hate Curator's trash. I hate it. The anomalies absorb all my Holy Damage attacks, and the Mana Feeders drain all my mana out. I usually "tank" the Mana Feeders. It's better that I'm OOM , rather than a healer or M...