Don't Squish My Pet, Bro!

I get that it's cool to have your pet turn into something different each time you change into a Saurok in the Isle of Thunder daily hub, but seriously? A cockroach?

Why a cockroach when people are running around trying to complete this quest?! I don't want people to step on my poor water strider! :(

Home Run

After last week's "I'm a n00b" effort, the end of the raiding week has gone extremely well.

Firstly, I didn't die on the guild's first kill of Tortos until the very last second, meaning my raid awareness has finally decided to emerge from the cave it had been hiding in since Cata. Hooray for progression!

Secondly, not only did I get the guild's first Thunderforged item, I also got a shiny new bow with my bonus roll. It upped my DPS quite significantly, meaning I'm not quite so behind my fellow guildies in gearing level any more.

Thirdly, I was actually reasonably competitive on DPS on the next boss, Megaera. Yes, it's probably the absolute easiest fight for a hunter because there's a lot of movement and it's only single-target, but hey - at least there's one fight in this dungeon where I know they're not just bringing me for pet buffs! :P

Can't wait to see my improvement on last week now that I know all the fights and I have new gear to boot! :D

The Rookie

It's been rather a long time coming, but I've finally decided to try raiding again with a new guild; Infamy.

I have to say, I've never felt more like a total n00b as I have this week.

When I started with Southern Wardens, I was a newbie, so I didn't know any better. The Wardens are a friendly bunch and the hunters especially (there were about 7 or 8 of us rotating in the 40man raid at the time) helped to train me up from bottom DPS to top 5, even being BM spec (which, at the time, was a joke) and a full tier of gear behind the leading hunter.

This time around, I am yet again a full tier of gear behind everybody in the raid (well, LFR to heroic, anyway), I'm dying from standing in fire more often than everybody else... but unfortunately I don't have the excuse of being a newbie anymore and I know it.

Consequently, it's been rather embarrassing - after all, you want to make a good impression on people who have consented to trial you for hire, particularly if you're playing one of the most popular classes where there are any number of hunters who would probably be more experienced in MoP raids than I am.

I'm hoping that by next week I'll have brushed the cobwebs off my raiding skills and got into shape... I can live with being bottom DPS if my gear dictates that I am, but definitely not if I know I can do better!

Solo 10m TotC Achievements

If you haven't managed to finish the Trial of the Crusader 10man Achievements yet, they're a lot easier than I thought they would be.

The only one I didn't manage to do myself was The Traitor King... and even then, I managed to last through 2 submerges before succumbing to the stacking DoT. If I were more careful about kiting, I probably could have done it (I recruited some guildies to help out instead!).

Upper Back Pain was easy, since the snobolds just jump off Gormok's back and stayed on the floor until the end; all you have to do is avoid the fires for the rest of the fight. I managed to kill Acidmaw and Dreadscale within 10 seconds of each other as well.

360 Pain Spike is all about timing - you don't need to leave the Mistresses up for ages, just time your kill just as a second Mistress emerges from the portal.

I already had Salt and Pepper, but the one thing that surprised me the most was how easy Resilience Will Fix It is.

Even with both the druid and the priest healer, I didn't have too much trouble - just equip a PvP trinket, drop traps, send your pet in and blow your cooldowns at the start... and by the time the mobs get through your snakes and you're out of interrupts (Scatter, Silence, Intimidation or Wyvern do well here), you will probably have both healers down. Killing the rest of them takes less than a minute if you have decent DPS.

I also found it helpful to run a timer (which you can pull out of the in-game clock and place anywhere on your screen like I've done in the screenshot below) to keep track of time so that you can wipe it if you're having trouble.

And to think my PvE-oriented guild had so much trouble with that fight! :P

LOLCrystal

I took plunge and accepted the PvP arm of the Kirin Tor dailies the other day.

Here I was, thinking I'd get some World PvP action with this beacon of light shining the way, and what happens? Zip. Nada.

At one point I sat AFK in the outer Horde camp where the wards are installing Mumble and having a long chat in /whispers and no-one even glanced my way.

I suppose I should have remembered the not-so-epic Silithyst fiasco - not to mention that I'm on Proudmoore, one of the most Alliance-heavy servers (particularly at Oceanic peak time) - but still, a rather zzz-worthy experience.

Oh well, back to the PvE set I go! :P

Oondisaster

Oondasta is the most ridiculously hilarious world boss fight I have ever seen.

Because of Faction tags - in that your entire Faction shares a mob tag whether you're in the raid that started hitting the mob first or not - what should be a heroic NPC fight only to be attempted by the server's most progressive guilds turns into a case of fire ants devouring an elephant while it's still alive.

I can only be glad that the rez timer only goes to 2min, because I'm sure mine would have gone up to half an hour as the last arrow hit Oondasta, who by that time was buffed with 30 stacks of Growing Fury.

What made it extra difficult was that no-one could tank from halfway through the fight - there were just too many buff stacks for anyone to last more than 1 hit and Oondasta was spinning around to hit whoever was closest. Even if you weren't in melee range, you would rez, be hit by either Piercing Roar or Frill Blast and be stuck as a ghost for another 2min.

In the end, I figured that the best time to rez was straight after a Roar, Deterrence the Frill Blast and get the most out of your DPS time before the next Roar.

The 26g reward really wasn't worth the repair bill, but the screenshots of the skeleton carpet sure was! :)

Know Your Role - Solo Cheng Bo

I know most people would be well into the new Thunder Isle quest hub, but I figured this might be useful anyway. Better late than never! :)

Know Your Role can be a difficult Achievement, particularly Cheng Bo.

Most people would suggest taking the easy way out and getting someone else to do the killing for you, but hey, we're hunters! Why not solo it instead?

The easiest way I've found to do this is to stand on the hill that overlooks Cheng Bo's hut:

From here, you can clear out the mobs around the hut from a distance without having to worry about anyone sneaking up on you. Always send your pet in first before you start DPSing except when there is an Earthtalker present.

For the Gai-Cho Earthtalkers, I would recommend hitting them with a silence or stun straight off so they dont cast Earthquake. By the time they're able to cast again, they will more than likely cast Healing Wave instead, which you can interrupt again and then finish them off.

You always need to target Earthtalkers first in the pair, because they will almost always cast Earthquake under your feet, even if your pet has the aggro.

For Cheng Bo himself, he comes with two adds, one of which is always an Earthtalker.

I would recommend first parking your pet right in front of the hut, use Misdirection, then send it in to aggro the Earthtalker and quickly pull it back out. The mobs will follow your pet out, where you can stun and silence the Earthtalker from the safety of your hill.

If you want to take a helper, take Protector Yi - he's melee and he taunts, which means he will be well out of your way if the mobs target him.

Remember that you need to not have taken damage on any of the prior quests as well and you're golden! :)

Ai-ya.... Ai-li Hurts!

Not sure when Blizzard decided to change things, but the rare Pandaren mobs around Pandaria (Ai-Li, Ai-Ran etc) that cast Spinning Crane Kick and Healing Mists used to not affect pets when casting the spin, meaning you could leave your pet in melee range and just worry about interrupting the heal.

Now, however, Spinning Crane Kick will kill your pet within a couple of seconds... and just pulling your pet back isn't quick enough.

I recommend saving Master's Call for those spins; otherwise you could probably use Dash.