Tuesday November 23, 2021
Had a great day playing WoW on a recent Sunday. Sundays (as the Bangles put it) is my fun day. Where I don’t have to run day. Early to rise, do whatever chores I’ve assigned myself and then hop on the computer for some TBC Classic adventures.
Tief’s Good Day
After checking mails, I decided to get back on my level 67 Rogue, Tief. He’s been a lot of fun playing lately. Rogue has never been my best class to play, but once I get into the groove of a class, I start enjoying it and want to keep playing. You know you’re enjoying a character when he’s out of rested xp and you just keep playing.
Watching the Lookingforgroup channel, I saw that an Old Hillsbrad Normal group was looking for a dps. I joined and away we went. Being Tief’s first time in OHB, I had to do the escort quest before entering the instance, but a couple others did as well, so that worked well.
The run went very smoothly, I really dig on playing utility when the opportunity presents itself. I focus more on getting the group through the instance more than the just dps meters. Stunning mobs that are being aggravating. Blinding the mob that the tank didn’t pick up. Distracting a patrol to give the paladin tank time to drink before they wander off. Spell interrupts. Things that make a run more enjoyable for everyone, not just seeing big numbers on the damage meters.
At the end of the run, the group decided to tackle Black Morass next. Again, the run went very smoothly, and being Tief’s first run I was just happy to have opened both instances for future runs. Here’s where it started to become a Wylset day. The first drop was the Hourglass of the Unraveller, a pre-raid awesome trinket for rogues. Score! Next the final boss dropped Latro’s Shifting Sword, the off-hand that is one of the BIS for rogues. Score again! Tief also levelled to 68 while questing, so another boon.
Blort Starts Off Well
The day was off to a great start, and I kept my eye on the LFG channel. A Mechanar Normal group was looking for a DPS. I shot the leader a message asking if a 70 Hunter would be useful, ‘Sure’ was the reply. I hopped onto Blort and got the invite. There was already a hunter in the group, which was a bit concerning. I’d been hoping for a Mechanar run for a while, in order to get the Beast Lord set Helmet I was missing. I’d run Karazahn with my guild a couple weeks before and had the Skulker’s Greaves ready in the bank. I already had the 4-piece set bonus going on Blort so I wanted the helm in order to use those leggings as well as the bonus. The other hunter in the party already had that Helmet. Another stroke of good luck. Last boss, the Helm appears. Another Score! The Wylset Day keeps rocking along.
I did feel a twinge of guilt, however, as another guildy with one main character, his Hunter, had been trying for run after run to get his 4th piece. Sometimes you just cannot get things to drop. Sometimes, you can.
Raid Time
The guild was calling for the start of our Gruul’s & Magtheridon raid, I was a couple minutes late due to the Mechanar run, but I got into the run quickly as they were pulling the starting trash. We lined up against High King Mulgar, and the raid lead asked me and our other guild hunter to trade off on Kiggler. Worked out well, except I forgot to keep my pet with me. Both pets were quickly dispatched, a bad thing for a pair of Beast Mastery hunters. Mulgar was one-shotted and we went on to Gruul.
The people we pugged were very kind and helpful, and appreciative that our guild was organizing it. After Mulgar dropped, all the loot came up for rolls. Unfortunately, our lead assist hadn’t set it to Loot Master, but every single one of the 15 or so pug members passed instead of taking advantage of the mistake. That’s a sign of kindness right there. Awesome stuff.
A Bump In The Road
Gruul went down quite well with a one-shot, but I made quite a social faux-pas. A main rule during a raid is to turn off your mic in discord if you’re not calling the shots. I forgot my boom was down, and active, when our other hunter ran across me getting back to his spot for Gruul’s shatter. I said something like “Huntername, you tool”. Oops. After the run the Hunter sent me a whisper about it, and I apologized profusely, being a heat of the battle type thing. Still not sure how he felt about it but I do hope my explanation, and the fact that I’ve tried to be kind and considerate to him and his wife, helps sooth any stupidity I spewed. Magtheridon went down with 1 pull as well, nothing to note. No loot from neither Gruul nor Mags, but that’s ok, fun time had by all.
Blort now had his 5th Beast Lord piece, and I could swap in the Skulker’s Greaves. Gems and enchants, I was ready to go. When I examined Blort there was still one piece he was missing, a decent weapon. He’d had the Valanos' Longbow since he hit 70, and after quite a few Kara attempts, still had not improved on it. I’d been keeping an eye on the Auction House, with the Don Santos' Famous Hunting Rifle in mind. 800 gold was a bit out of my price range, as I have other Alts to keep in the manner they’re accustomed to. This day, however, Wylset’s luck continued. There were three of those rifles on the AH, each one was in the 400g range – less than half price. I snapped one up and slapped a +10 Adamantite Scope on it.
Ammunition. Drat. I had scored the drop for the Adamantite Arrow Maker on my engineer Slapnutz the Paladin a couple weeks ago and had been gleefully cranking out the Crates of Arrows for Blort. Thankfully I had also acquired the Adamantite Shell Machine pattern as well. Slapnutz switched over to Bullet production and had Blort ready with a dozen or so Crates in the mail. Timing, good planning or luck all combined on that to be able to provide the ammunition needed. All that was left was switching from the Worg Hide Quiver to the Smuggler's Ammo Pouch. It’s a rep item from The Consortium, requiring Honored. I checked and Blort was just over the Honored level by maybe 300 points. Wylset’s luck continued.
Blort’s Good Day Gets Better
Busy day, but since it was my day off on Monday, I decided to hit up LFG again, and saw a group looking for a hunter for Kara. I’d not run Blort with my guild that week, so off to Karazahn again. Great group, a guild just missing one dps. Joined the in Discord and listened to a gang that got along very well. Lots of fun banter, and they knew what they were doing so it worked out well. I held up my end and the run went smoothly. A common theme for the day. They were pleased that I was willing and able to get Misdirects on the tanks when called for, especially on Nightbane. My dps was pretty decent, all the new gear was working out quite well. I was able to pick up the Fiend Slayer boots from the Chess Event. Nice upgrade from my blue boots.
Here's where I had forgotten one of the most important pieces of WoW lore. If you really want something to drop from a boss, you have two choices. You can either be patient, run the instances over and over, and hope. Or, you can purchase something close, and sure enough, the WoW RNG gods will reward/punish you by dropping what you wanted the very next run.
So, of course, the Sunfury Bow of the Phoenix dropped off Prince Malchazar and I was the only Hunter. So much for Don Santos’ Hunting Rifle. Back to Arrows I go.
To sum up the day:
Tief got both his Hourglass of the Unraveller, his Latros’ Soothing Sword and a level to 68. Blort got his Beast Lord Helm which allowed him to wear the Skulker’s Greives. Next came the new rifle, which lasted about 3 hours until the end of the Karazahn run, when Blort picked up the Sunfury Bow of the Phoenix.
Everything came up Wylset that day.