Incohesive Ramblings (aka, some more quickies)

This is not a cohesive post. At least less cohesive than usual.

Maybe call it a quickies post? We'll see how it turns out.

[EDIT: as it would turn out, its a mish-mash of Surival Hunting, Naxx Achievements, and other stuff]


1) Survival Performance - Doin pretty well. 4.8K DPS on Patchwerk. If I compare that to my pre-nerf BM best of 5.3K, the result is an approximate 9.4% decrease, which is less than I had predicted (15.6% was the prediction). Sure, I'm comparing apples (BM for 3.5 minutes) to oranges (SV for 2.5 minutes) because I was trying to model the change to BM before / BM after the patch, but I'm trying to make a point here, so sue me.

As a comparison, Brass went from 5.5K BM-best to 5.1K SV last night, 7.3% decrease. So I suppose I feel pretty good about my baseline stand-and-deliver numbers. Not to say I'll just let it stay at that, but also not going to douse myself in gasoline and light the match.

2) Quickwerk - Its not even funny. Our previous best was 3:03. Last night was 2:34, a full 29 seconds faster than the previous attempt. There were 5 players over 5K, and nearly everyone over 4K. If I'm reading what one of our Officers posted correctly, this is the 247th fastest Patchy kill ever, which I find incredibly amusing. Rock on! The improvement is attributed to (A) Warlocks using Doomguards and (B) Hunters adjusting to the nerf and not sucking this week.

3) The Immortal - no, we didn't get it. This one makes me laugh though. You kill three or four bosses with no deaths, and all of a sudden everybody's on the edge of their seats for The Immortal. HELLO, McFLY! THERE'S A REASON YOU DON'T SAY THE WORD "SHUTOUT" TO A GOALIE WHO HAS NOT ALLOWED A GOAL YET, HALFWAY THROUGH THE FIRST PERIOD! Sorry to be shouting there, I'm more amused than angry, I figure this achievement will happen when it happens without any special deliberate attempt, beyond the normal desire a player has to NOT die. Or not.

4) Splitting up the Horsemen - We did the Four Horsemen one where you kill them within 15 seconds of eachother. This one was fun, because it takes some precise coordination between the 4 sub-groups on each boss mob. Fun to see that the Officers want to allow some focus on Achievements. Sure, the Achievements themselves don't mean much, but it is cool trying to do farm-status fights in strange ways. Along the way, I discovered a hidden pitfall for a SV hunter....

5) Sniper Training can sting you in the rear - If you dump points into Sniper Training, you'll generally want to stand very far away from your target. However, along the back of the Horsemen room, if you stand further than 30 yards from your target, you'll still be in range to get the debuff from the boss you just swapped off of. Fail Hunter is fail, dead as a door nail. But we got the achievement, so that works for me.

6) Burst the Webs - Maxxena. Hunters are assigned to break people free of the webs. Explosive Shot, FTW! Very fun to have strong burst damage for this. As a BM, this was actually tough, because you'd not use your pet (since she'd have to run all the way across the room, would be very ineffective), and your personal Hunter burst is ZERO. Webs were being busted faster than you can say "Lock n Load".

7) Professional Madness - I flipped out this morning and decided to start leveling two toon's worth of cooking, and while I'm out there, make a skinner, and using the gathered mats, level a leatherworker. I can tell already that its biting off too much, but I suppose that's Classic Amava in action. If I let myself take time (aka, not force it all to Grand Master level this weekend), I might retain some sanity and sociability (real word?). I doubt it'll work out that way.

8) Uber GF - She's knocking on the door of 80 with 4.5 XP bubbles left. Rock on! Once she dings, we'll enchant whatever she's wearing and head straight on into Heroic Gumdrop to finish off The Elder.

9) Last bit about SV - The "shot priority" style of WotLK Surivial Hunter DPS, versus the "shot rotation" that was king in TBC, is fun. I like slamming my #3 key macro as much as the next guy, but maintaining a priority of Serpent Sting > Explosive > Multi > Steady is pretty cool, especially when Lock and Load procs and you've got to weave things such that you don't overwrite any ES DoT ticks. Mentally taxing, but as I get the hang of it, its kinda fun. Still want a better contribution from my pet, but I'll bet that doesn't surprise you.


I think I'm going to blow off the rest of the day and go drink while it snows the three or four feet that're predicted for the weekend. [EDIT: we did not get that 3 feet. Only one foot on friday. But the drinks worked their magic anyway]