Achievement Whoring

Last week/weekend was a pretty nice week for me and my obsessive compulsive achievement gathering. It started on Thurdsay with our 10 man Gold Team run. We cleared ToC in 45 minutes, then quickly cleared VoA and Ony. After that, we had plenty of time to take up our new venture: Ulduar hard modes.

We skipped Flame Leviathan hard mode and went straight to Ignis. After quickly getting through his hard mode (with about 5 seconds to spare - we could have done it quicker, but I tried helping out by frost nova'ing the adds for the off tank when I should have just focused on Ignis), we went on to XT. We were thinking about doing the hard mode, but for some reason, we just didn't have the DPS to get the heart in the first try so we skipped it for the night and went straight to the Iron Council. We wanted to get a data disc so we could work our way towards Algalon.

After a couple of wipes learning the fight, we managed to get Steelbreaker down and retrieve his data disc. Unfortunately, I completely forgot to use my Iron Boot Flask, so I missed out on But I'm on Your Side (which I have in 25 player mode oddly enough).

After that, we called it for the night and gave our Raid ID up to another run in our guild so they could work on Mim hard mode on Sunday night. Fast-foward to our 25 man run on Friday night which involved yet another quick clear of ToC (Hemnetcher was nice enough to pass the trophy on Anub to me, so I now sport 4 piece Tier 9), and then of course Ony and VoA before we headed back into Ulduar with our raid ID from the previous week. We had skipped Ignis, Razorscale, and the Iron Council as we attempted Thorim the week before, so this week, we went back to clear them out.

We started on Ignis, and even though I didn't think we had the raw DPS to do Stokin' the Furnace, we managed to pull it off in one shot. Go team! We then went on to the Iron Council looking to get a 25 man data disc for our intrepid raid leader, Aravic and after a couple of wipes on Steelbreaker, we decided to switch it up and kill Runemaster Molgeim last. He was a piece of cake and Aravic received his data disc. And with that, we called it a night.

The fun continued on Sunday as I was invited to a Black Temple run. I had previously run Black Temple a couple of times in the past with PUGs, but this was a group I had run Sunwell, Molten Core, and other early instances with, so I was fairly certain we would clear the place out. And despite quite a few deaths on my end (because I like to DPS and pull aggro on large pulls), we quickly cleared BT, I got 7,500 Ashtongue Deathsworn rep, and I finally completed Outland Raider:

Back to our 25 man group, as I stated earlier, I got another trophy, so I bought my second piece of tier 9.25. This goes with my two pieces of tier 9.0, so I now rock the 4 piece bonus: Mage Tier 9. It's pretty amazing to get an extra 5% crit and I can't wait to see how it works out in our next raid this week. Additionally, I have paired it with the new helm I received from our 10 man raid on Onyxia, the Netherwind Hood, and if I do say so myself, I'm looking pretty damn good these days!

Another Busy Weekend?

Dang, going back through my screenshots and such, it's quite surprising what I got accomplished this weekend. It started Friday with the Gold Team going to 25 man Naxx. We quickly cleared it, but had some fun when we got to Sapphiron and Kel'Thuzad. On Sapph, we turned off mage armor, frost resist auras, and anything else that would put our frost resist above 100. After one wipe due to the tank somehow dying, we came back in and quickly took care of him, earning Heroic: The Hundred Club.

We then quickly moved to Kel'Thuzad and thought we would keep our achievements going and proceeded to have the most hectic KT fight I've ever seen. We decided to go for Heroic: Just Can't Get Enough and though we lost one person during that, he was rezzed and we continued on. I unfotunately died somehow from a mana blast that hit me for 20,000 damage. I got rezzed (and it was a good thing they picked me up), since at about 20%, he Ice Blocked our paladin who was tanking two of the adds. So those adds got free and we lost a healer before the main tank, Aravic, was able to pick them up. So we had Aravic tanking KT and two adds for a while until the other add tank could peel one off of him. And we continued the fight like that. Then all hell broke loose. With KT and an add on him, Aravic went down. I immediately went invisible to drop all aggro. Let the healers die I say! I quickly returned from invisibility and DPS'ed with all I had. And we did it. Somehow, a few of us DPS remained and were able to take out KT without a tank. We had just enough to power through him as he moved from target to target one-shotting them. We would have gone to Emalon next, but the Horde held Wintergrasp so we called it an early evening.

Saturday took me back out to Icecrown where I became an Exalted Champion of Ironforge. The day also saw me get my 40th Champion's Seal which I used to quickly purchase pet #91, my Mechanopeep. I had hoped to get a 10 seal bonus like I did when I became a Champion of Gnomeregan, but no luck. Apparently you only get the 10 seal bonus on your first Championing, so it will be 8 days from Saturday (next Sunday) until I can get my next pet - I think it'll be the Elwynn Lamb - a nice change from your normal pet. With becoming an Exalted Champion of Ironforge, I also hit 6,000 achievement points.

Later in the day I was invited to the Black Temple, and after some struggles on the later bosses, we made it to Illidan. Unfortunately, coordination was poor and even though we got him to stage 4, we never got him down and after spending 5.5+ hours in there, I had to leave. It was just too frustrating, and in the end, they never got him down.

Sunday of course brought with it Noblegarden so out to collect eggs I went. I found a nice spot in Dolanaar that I was able to camp with 5 eggs within reach without moving. I quickly picked up over 250 and found everything I needed. I got my Tome of Polymorph: Rabbit for 100 chocolates, but found the Spring Rabbit's Foot in an egg and all the clothing except the dress in eggs. I then went out, did the other quests and quickly earned my title of Tiddlywinks the Noble. After doing my daily quests and taking some time off, I awoke late in the night and went to Azure Watch where I found very little egg competition, and on my 2nd egg, I found the dress and completed every Noblegarden achievement. Yay!