Naofa at 80

Right been 80 for a bit now, thought I'd give a quick update of how I'm doing. As Pilf has said we are doing some heroics as such yes that is the emblem shield in the picture there. Yes I know there is a comparable shield from heroic CoT, but as we haven't tried it on heroic I wasn't sure if I'd get it. Plus at the pace we are going through heroics, I reckon it won't be long before I get all the emblem gear I need or want, including the tier gear.

As to my tabard, I'm still using this one, cos I'm almost to exalted and I'm a vain git, plus how much does the title suit a paladin?

I'd forgotten...

... that when you get to 80 all there is to do is grind, whether it's for gold, mats, rep, badges or gear.

/sigh

I was bitching about levelling wasn't I? I guess the grass is always greener... No seriously, it's actually ok. We've been doing heroics, um lemme see, Utgarde Keep, Nexus (really, how often can you make that the daily?), Drak'tharon Keep last night. We did Utgarde Pinnacle. The gauntlet was bad enough but after about 4 wipes ('keep out of the fucking whirlwind!') we did manage it - the only good thing was the last boss was cake in comparison! We also tried, mmm, Halls of either Lightening or Stone. Yeah that's how traumatic it was! Right after a quick flip to Wowhead it was Halls of Lightening. It was ok up until Loken then it got very not ok. All the comments seem to be along the lines of 'just run away from the AoE lightening', well, either it's not quite that simple or we were doing something very wrong. Either way we were taking such huge crits that we decided we'd come back some other time (with better gear and a fuck ton of nature resistance).

All in all it's been ok. I was having some *issues* the other night and deleted my DK in a moment of toys-outta-the-pram-ness but after grief from Sem (the plan being his drood, Nao's drood and I were gonna level together) I gave in and sent the GMs a begging mail so they re-instated her (with obligatory lecture about 'deletion is supposed to be permanent...') Moral of the story? If you're pissed off stop playing, turn comp off and walk away. The only saving grace was at least it wasn't Pilf that bought it! Second moral? Hormones, winter and feeling generally got at is probably another reason to go away and read a book. Sometimes, I think, things in this game are a lot bigger than they should be /sad face.

And they are nerfing my CoH. Bout I've spouted about that already so I won't again. I s'pect I'll get used to it (You see that??? That right there? That was me being positive, that was !)

This will *never* get old...

And I don't care. I don't care that the world will assume that we're 13. I don't care that when other people do it, it's *really* annoying. I don't care that I'm only in the sidecar (well maybe that's not completely true). And I don't care that I had to lend Sem the last 1k to make it. My new happy place is now officially zooming round Dalaran jumping off steps...

Bring on the Heroics... Oh Wait... Wha?

Cause for big bangs and munchies as both Nao and I hit 80. I'd forgotten (hitting 70 seems like along time ago now) how the actual *ding* moment is similar to the Estate Agent telling you that your sale/purchase is finally complete - you expect utter joy and instead get a 'thank goodness that's over' feeling. or maybe it's just me, I dunno. Anyways yes so we have finally levelled and I, at least have some epix that are useful, and some that only have value for their additional sockets so the meta gem in my hat will work. But enough with the powered by Wowhead linkiness - what happened next I hear you ask?

Well, we were overconfident/foolish/arrogant enough to assume that we could blitz through a heroic now - I mean, how hard can they be? Not very if the content up until now was anything to go by. Um yeah. That was a bit of an assumption though, wasn't it? We went to Old Kingdom, the usual suspects group and oh my goodness did it suck hard. It took us 2 hours to do 2 bosses... At the optional boss, the one we hadn't seen before, we gave up as it was late. I'm trying to remember if the Outland heroics were this big of a step up - opinion seems to be divided between Yes, of course they were, it was just so long ago we don't remember and Zomg are you kidding me? They were never this hard!

Maybe it is just that up until now we've swanned through all the content - Crowd control? Nah let's just pew-pew style thing. Maybe it's that we're way undergeared, though how we can be when we're all decked out in top level regular instance gear and crafted epics? I don't know. Maybe it's that we did get a bit full of ourselves and Blizz decided a smackdown was necessary. Whatever the reason I know that it left everyone feeling a bit shaky and with a list of things to fix. For me, it's the (lack of) mana regen thing. For Nao it's the need-to-stack-stam-now-I'm-defence-capped thing. Sem's about to get his DPS horribly nerfed (and see the ever wonderful BRK for a hysterical response), Blake, I dunno - same for Nip who's just respecced into elemental. So, yes, a learning curve, one might say. Progression others might say. What we say is screw it, we're gonna do these (but we might go somewhere else tonight...)

Speccing (again)

/ sigh. I never manage to seem to get my specs right the first (or second... or third) go. Nao on the other hand is a different story. He spends ages on the Wowhead calculator thingy and as a result doesn't bodge it up. It seems that patience is on the list of qualities that I need to learn...


However I'm having a specific spec issue at the moment. I currently have a hybrid disc/holy 23/46 build which give me my CoH and improved DS. Which is nice. But I don't have (and with my current build, can't get) my oh shit button. And I've read and read and read about the pros and cons of it and now my head hurts. I *think* I'm a pretty capable healer but I do hate having the tank's health dropping like a stone (especially when the melee dps is also dropping...) so the help button would be good. But that means, I think, there's no way I can keep my improved DS. Or possibly even my normal DS. Humph. And I guess with the way RotS is currently going I'm going to be the main priest. Possibly the only one who's really going to actively want to raid. I'm hoping that 10-mans are going to be forgiving enough to have a priest/resto drood combo - which I guess is even more reason to have Guardian Spirit. It *should* be a wipe stopper - shouldn't it?

I suppose that the intelligent thing to do really is to get going on the heroic 5-mans, I'm nearly at 79 as is Nao so a few more days should do it, then play around with my specs to get a feel for what works and what doesn't. But the dynamics of the 'usual suspects' 5-man vs. 10-mans is so different. Admittedly I'm used to healing Nao as a paladin not 'Bane as a warrior which always freaks me out a lot but even with that aside I'm not sure the *ideal* spec is the same. Bah I'm winding myself up badly now. Just I want to really make raiding work this time round. And I really don't want to be the weak link. That said Nao found me a post from the Blue Dudes dissing healing meters which I don't really know what to make of:

"Healing meters are a silly way of measuring healer performance. Often it's when and who you heal that is much more important than how much you heal. But measuring healing is very difficult, so players tend to go back to meters" /squee

See I do rely on my Recount (you may have noticed...) And it's not about comparison with other healers in my party it's about the fact that I like some way of monitoring how I do. And before you tell me that if everyone's alive, it was ok, I know. I really like to know if I'm winning my overheal battle (nope, it'll be an ongoing struggle) or at least if it's dropping a bit. Note to self: comparing overheal with drood HoTs is a fail. That's why I use it. It's not about competition, flexing my e-peen or anything. It's just a measure of self crisisism...

In which Chromie bugs...

And she didn't land (not that Nao and I had the quest - I was about 4 bars from 78 and he was about 6 bars) but Sem and Eloria managed to hand in the quest regardless! Still would have been nice to see her land - we blame Sem for standing right under her as she flew in /sigh.

How much fun is The Culling of Stratholme on a scale of 1 - 1000? 1001 in my book. For the first time since WotLK healing made me think. Having been in Violet Hold and sundry other instances for the last few weeks whilst carrying on at least one conversation via /w I was getting boooooored: PoM on tank, flash heal tank occasional renew on melee dps, rinse and repeat. Not a recipe for extreme excitement. Not that I want to be wiping left right and centre, oh hell no, but middle ground was what I was despairing of. And found here. Plus *zomg* how gorgeous is Mal'Ganis - I had a tantrum at the point where it looked like we might have to kill him - then got bitch slapped for not knowing my lore - of course he doesn't die - he merely fucks off to Northrend like every other fecker on the planet /big cheer and stuff! And ok he didn't drop my lovely trinket but I forgive him anyway. Considering the level of the instance and that Nao and I had yet to reach 78 we did bloody well. No wipes, not even any near wipes and I only stopped breating on, um, two occasions. But that's good. That's what raiding feels like. The panic, the buzz, the big exhalation of breath when the fight is over, that feeling of 'sod the loot, everyone is standing' is what gets me off!

Ans as a quick PS I got my rug. My fast one. I r surfer priesty extraordinaire - huzzah!

Lulz (but completely OT)

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