Jan 9, 2009

Naxx Quick (Almost) Clear

Last night, the Silver Team went back into Naxxramas with a goal of clearing all four quarters in our allotted time. And we accomplished our goal. And even got in two shots on Sapphiron before having to call it for the night. We had a couple of new people with us, so it was awesome to see so many one shots on the night where we gave just the shortest description of each fight. I'm confident tonight we'll quickly clear the Sanctum, Sapph and Kel'Thuzad, and then we'll have some fun on Malygos (a fight I have not yet seen).

Last night, out of the few upgrades available to me in Naxxramas, I got two! First, the Tier 7 shoulderpads dropped from Loatheb (leaving just two upgrades in the game, one drops from Malygos (Heroic) and the other are the Tier 7.5). I also found the amazing Blade of Dormant Memories from Patchwerk. After quickly enchanting the weapon with +50 spellpower, my shoulderpads with the exalted Hodir enchant, and throwing a +16 hit rating gem in, I still dropped due to losing 34 hit on my weapon. Hopefully The Soulblade doesn't drop from Kel'Thuzad tonight because it'd be tough for me to take it over someone else who didn't get the Blade last night. Plus, the Soulblade is a bit more healy with the spirit, but +461 damage is a huge upgrade.

Speaking of damage, after killing 13 bosses, tons of trash, and two tries on Sapphiron last night, I basically tied with the ret Paladin in our group. I output 16.2m damage whereas he had 16.1m. It's pretty funny to see how close we got after all the bosses. For the full run, I averaged 2426 DPS, our Ret Pally 2394 DPS, our Death Knight 2276 DPS and our Hunter output 2241 DPS. We absolutely tore the place apart. Including achieving Arachnophobia without really trying that hard. Though we did have some big AOE pulls, we could have done it quicker.

Jan 5, 2009

Naxxramas (10) Clear!

In just three short weeks (5 days entering Naxxramas), the Silver/Gold Team has cleared Naxxramas. Last night, after quickly clearing the Military Quarter, we hit up Sapphiron for the first time and took him down in 4 attempts. The first couple were us learning the fight, the third was a freak accident where Sapphiron cleaved/swiped just as we engaged and took out our healers, and on the fourth, he was down. Quite an accomplishment as we had heard of other groups of good players from other guilds taking up to 20 tries to learn him in his entirety and take him out.

After that, we quickly hit up Kel'Thuzad and had him under 5% before a freak accident where our tank got frozen which ended up in a wipe as he also had the three Anub'Rekhan looking beetles on him and they couldn't be controlled in time. The second time around though, he posed no issue as we disposed of him very quickly.

Our raid leader/main tank now has the Malygos key and I'm looking forward to the Eye of Eternity. Before Naxx last night, we quickly took out Sartharion with 9 players (just 2 healers) and I'm thinking with a third healer we could tackle one or two drakes up for the fight. The encouraging thing about last night is we have found a good healer replacement for a priest that had to leave for her guild runs, so we're set there and also, during Sartharion, I didn't see anyone get hit by the lava waves, so our coordination is doing quite well (as we could also see with only 3 (real) tries at Sapphiron).

With the recent addition of my Plush Sash of Guzbah, I felt my DPS increase a little last night as I averaged 2400 DPS on Sartharion, 2900 on Instructor Razuvious (I believe this is from the Living Bombs detonating on the two mind controlled mobs), 2460 DPS on the Four Horsemen, and 2730 DPS on Kel'Thuzad (again, probably from Living Bomb detonating on the three beetles that were within range).

With regards to loot, nothing really dropped for me last night. We saw a lot of healy plate items, and there was the T7 gloves which went to the lovely healy tree, Vetarra. Right now, the two piece Tier 7 bonus is doing quite well for me as I usually don't have mana issues, so I can use my mana gems as an extra damage boost (I just have to watch out though because my trinket shares the same cool down, so while I could use the mana gem while my trinket is used, I can't get the spell damage bonus from it while the trinket is in use). So right now I'm not looking for huge Tier 7 upgrades, but I'm looking to get another piece so if I replace my chest piece (hopefully I can get the Gown of Blaumeux off the Four Horsemen at some point), I can retain my 2 piece bonus. Though, from my spreadsheet, the Tier 7 helm, shoulders, and gloves are all better than what I'm currently using, so if I could piece together two more pieces for the
4 piece bonus, I'd be more than happy to have 5% extra crit damage.