Felt Great. Felt Empty.

At the end of the previous night of ZA with a guest uber tank (T6/Sunwell geared main tank for most advanced alliance guild on the server), there were a few mutterings of a desire to return and finish off the dungeon.

We normally don't raid on tuesdays, so the concept just sorta died there.

But the idea festered overnight, and most of the team was online and thirsty for blood.

Aside: was also cool to see a bunch of guildies doing an in-guild PuG of Kara on an off-raid night. We took Kara off the official guild schedule and its nice to see that ppl who still want to get in there can do it without looking outside the guild.

Onward and upward, or something like that.

Waltzed in and sat the Hex Lord Malazras down on his ability-stealing rump in one shot. Actually, I think he died face down, but we forgot the screenshot, so who knows. Or cares.

Secret to the fight: three healers - two resto shammies, one tree druid.

Not sure if its a secret or not, but the dual chain heals during those Spirit Blasts were clutch. We also had some peeps put on some stamina gear pieces for added survivability.

Other secret: Keep a Priest waiting outside the instance. Have him buff the raid with fortitude, spirit, and shadow resistance. Kick him from the raid. Repeat after any wipes.

This little trick felt like cheating. The T6 guys said it's standard operating procedure. Whatever.

The fight went pretty smoothly, 'cept for when Amava died and received a timely combat rez from her friendly neighborhood Druid. Then died again with boss at 1%, along with half the raid. lol, dead boss, FTW.

On to Zul'jin. Naturally, never saw the fight before. Not planning on raiding on a tuesday, I hadn't read about the fight at all either. Quick read of the WoW Wiki article, quick description from our visiting tanky tank.

Couple wipes, having a really rough time with that Phase 3 and its damn Tornados and "you take damage when you cast spells" thingie.

I looked at my combat log after a wipe, noticed that Tornado is Nature Damage. Aspect of the Wild, FTW. I split the two Hunters into separate groups, and also the Warlocks, resulting in each party receiving an AotW nature resist buff and a Blood Pact stamina buff.

Bingo!

Dead Zul'jin

Zul'Aman cleared for the first time.

Felt great. Felt empty.

Nice accomplishment for a team mostly in T4 stuff. Gotta repeat it without the uber tank to really feel satisfied.