Soaking up the Sun

Ok, so i found this little gem laying in my outbox, having never been posted. Noboby's gonna give a crap, because it discusses The Burning Crusade, which lets face it, feels like it might as well have been 100 years ago. But for the sake of posterity, here ya go. The events described below took place on the Sunday night prior to WotLK's release.....



To lay The Burning Crusade raiding scene to rest with some panache, the guild decided to visit Sunwell Plateau for our last organized raid before the expansion pack.

Pretty place, if you're into Blood Elves.

Fun place, if you're into repair bills.

Having no idea what to expect, we zoned in. Saw a single large mob. Killed it. Oh, sweet, this'll be a cake walk.

Turn the corner. See two packs of 7 or 8 mobs. Come up with a reasonable strategy. Kill them. See, I told you it'll be a cake walk.

Walk past a threshold into the next room. Another pack of 7 or 8, a roaming pack of 4, plus a Scout who hauls ass and activates a dormant massive guy who's got chain lightning comin out his @ss like he ate a bad batch of Mighty Taco.

Welcome to Sunwell, Baby!!!!

10 wipes of trial and error resulted in what became dubbed as the "Distract - Soothe - Kill (TM)" technique. Rogue Distracts the scout. Priest Mind Soothes the scout. Priest counts down from 5. Everybody starts casting at the appropriate spot in the countdown so that all our shots fire as the countdown hits 1. We Kill the scout.

Using the DSK method, we successfully cleared all the way up to Kalecgos. Took two totally unprepared dances with the Dragon / Demon phases and called it a night. At our best attempt, we had Dragon form at 40% and Demon form simultaneously at 75%.

Not too shabby for a bunch of folks who raid 8 hours a week and only started Kara in January.

Whether you consider it a success for a raid to clear up to Kalecgos and wipe twice or not, we just dont give a hoot, because the team had a blast!

Last night put a cap on an amazing run of nearly 11 months of raiding. Karazhan progression team formed of people who never raided before, most of whom started WoW well after BC was released. Months and months of Kara and Zul'aman, building our reputation, recruiting new players who fit in with our style, reaching the point that we launched into 25-person raids in July. Blasting through T4. Tasting sweet sweet T5. Experiencing success in T6-level content before the nerf. And now, enjoying every dungeon the game has to offer, even if just for a single post-nerf night.

The real accomplishment, which isn't trackable by any Blizzard interface, is that we achieved this all in a relatively drama-free environment, focused on keeping the mood light and the progress steady. Reliably kept momentum up through dips due to personal lives, summer months, back-to-school, impending expansion packs, you name it. Along the way earning the respect of folks on our server, making friends, recruiting a solid membership.

Its a testament of the efforts of each and every Member, and each and every Officer, that we made it all the way to here. I hope the next year of raiding has as much in store for us as our first year did!