Just in time for WoD - Mythic Garrosh kill

Last night we finished clearing Mythic SoO with our first Mythic Garrosh kill! Woot!

We had a few attempts on him last week consistently getting to this last phase, but with the adjustments to 20 mans we weren't able to get him. This week we had a handful of tries and got him down.

The loot was sexy, I got the Horned Mace of the Old Ones. He also dropped 2 mounts!

And guess who had a sexy roll! Yours truly! 

SOOOOO I ended up with one of the mounts and not even two seconds later I lost it to Izzy (a self proclaimed mount whore) because I'm a retard and give him everything he wants in-game.

So he's enjoying riding around in it while I sit here with fingers crossed that next week he can win one! Anyway, here is a link to the Mythic Garrosh Kill video if you guys want to check it out!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oa7-4eE771g

Patch 6.0.2 - First Impressions

Patch is finally here and as usual everyone has mixed emotions. Trade is bustling with people trying to figure out where things are, others complaining about their missing spells, and most secretly enjoying the excitement that comes with a new patch and expansion.

First thing I noticed logging on was Rhyannon. I could see the difference in the character model right off the bat and she looks great!

After logging on you get a prompt about the new changes and a way to start the quest line for the invasion in Blasted Lands.

After I accepted my quest I was sad to see all the gaps in my bars :(

As a shaman healer though, I have to say it is kinda nice to have space for things other than totems everywhere!

Then I went off to check my bank and check out the Toy Box.

SPACE!!! Space to fill with more junk! It's really nice to have that trade goods tab too.

The new map with quest is nice and simple to use. I wish it wasn't as large, but I'll get used to it.

And you can't hate on the transparency when you are on the move!

Quick tip in case you are going crazy looking for this as I was. To remove the outlines go to your interface> display> and at the bottom you will see options for the outline. I made mine go bye bye.

Then I grabbed Rah and put him on follow and I did the invasion story line.

And got us a title:

And a cute little pet, which can be caged, by the way, for some extra gold when the expansion comes out.

When not bugging out I got a chance to do UBRS, which gives you a little taste of what's to come.

I noticed the healing changes but it was nothing too overwhelming that I couldn't handle. Most of my gear lost it's spirit and yet I have no mana regen problems what-so-ever. I'm currently at 587 spirit, with 2689 mana regen with a 565 ilvl. I went from having 50% mastery to 103% O.o once reforge was removed. MUST GET CRIT/HASTE GEAR ASAP! Other than the slower cast timese due to my loss of haste shaman healing remains much the same as before. I'm scared to go on my other characters though lol because I know they have not been as fortunate as Rhy.

You also get a chance to grab some 550 ilvl blues in UBRS, which can be disenchanted into the new enchanting mats and are selling for a butt load on the AH.

And last, but certainly not least, the new Horde mount! It's AWESOME! And I love the way my shaman looks riding it!

Over all not a bad patch day, but the day isn't over yet. Raid tonight should be fun and interesting and I'm keeping my fingers crossed for no resets during that time.

How has patch day been treating you guys? What do you love/hate? Let me know!

Bettle.net ap, Flex and Garrosh...

I decided to install the Battle.net desktop app this morning and I have to say it's pretty cool. Here's a screenshot of my desktop so you can see what it looks like:

You can manage your account, get support, change download settings for patches. There is a "news" tab where you can see what's going on with blizzard and all their games. You also have the option of viewing just World of Warcraft updates.

You can see when your Bettle.net friends are on and what game they're playing. There's also a timer showing you how much game time you have left. 

And of course, you have a "play" button, so you can jump right in. I've set mine to launch when my computer starts, so WoW will already be open when I want to sit and play, and the best part is you don't need to log in to the game, it will automatically take you to the last character and server you were playing on! How sweet is that?

I def recommend it, especially if you're like me, who's always going to worldofwarcraft.com to check for updates and patch notes.

In other news, Izzy finally got his Merrymaker and mount yesterday. Of course I had to create 4 characters for him to do Let it Snow to be able to get them! 

We also did flex with the guild and that was excruciatingly painful :( We had a smaller group than usual this week, about 18-20, and a lot of them I don't even know. New members or alts? I have no clue, I was on my shaman and she's not in the guild to check who they were, but it was a mess. Wing 1 was fine, but for whatever reason they decided to Q for Wing 3 after that and that's where the shit hit the fan. After 5 wipes on Malkorok we finally got him down with half the raid dead. The problem seemed to be mainly with dps who, by the way they were acting, were there to get carried and not do a damn thing! I get that it's flex, but please don't make it hard for those that are on their mains to help get YOU gear. Talk about being selfish. Spoils was better but not by much, so I decided for mine and Izzy's sanity not to stick around for Thok. I was getting to the point where I wanted to yell at people, so I decided we needed to go before I went bitch-mode on someone.

Tonight we have our raid and I'm hoping we get to Thok or Blackfude, so we can get as much time as possible on Garrosh. Last week someone suggested we try a new strat, leaving the desecrated weapons up during phase 2 because that would give us 10% more DPS on Garrosh. After seeing how the night went, I've decided to go back to DPSing them down. There was so much running around when we left the weapons up that the 10% we were hoping to gain where lost going back and forth.

If anyone has any suggestions and strat ideas for Garrosh, I would love to hear them. This will be week 3 on him and he seriously needs to die already! We have the heals and we have the dps, but when the empowered desecrated weapon comes out it all falls apart. Our best attempt got him to 17% in phase 2. Any advice you could give me to help our team would be greatly appreciated :)

But they're NOT my characters!

I'm certain that there are a few of you out there that get where I'm coming from here. The last few days I've found myself playing on Izzy's priest more than my own characters! Since he came back to playing I've been trying to get him his legendary cloak, he's on secrets right now and half way through revered with the Black Prince.

Last night we were playing with some guildies, very random stuff like PvPing in Blasted Lands, moved to Hellfire only to end up doing Maly and Grull's. At some point he realized that Winter Veil has begun and after checking his achievements he noticed it's the only thing he needs for his Merrymaker and What a long, strange trip it's been. First words out of his mouth are "you're going to do this for me, right?" >.< /rolls eyes  /facepalm  /wrist

Seriously?

I got mine back in 2008, but the man keeps quitting WoW around the same time every year and always misses his Merrymaker achievement lol. So I literally logged on Kaliapy for 5 minutes this morning to tend to my farm and then switched to Rah when a friend mentioned needing to do the achievements as well. So after spending the day running around trying to get these things done I've finally gotten all of them except for Let it Snow. Which is proving to be a pain in the butt because I can't seem to get ANY snowflakes! These revelers don't seem to like me :P

Between kissing under the mistletoe and running LFRs for secrets that don't want to drop I have done nothing to make gold on MY toons today. Rah hasn't been completely unlucky though, last week he got a Primal Egg which ended up being a Red Primal Raptor, and today he got another! We'll see what it turns out to be in a few days. And because they needed healers for LFR he also ended up with a Phoenix Hatchling in his bags as well.

I complain because I'm a Latin woman and it's one of our specialties :P, but I don't mind it so much. He's working all day and doesn't really have the time to do all these things. So I do it for him to keep him happy and playing WoW :)

Proving Grounds as a Resto Shaman

Let me start off by saying that the NPCs in the proving grounds are retarded some times and you will want to kill them, especially the Mage. This is not an easy achievement to get, so please be patient with yourself as you learn the waves and figure out what cool downs to use and when.

A few things you need to know before you get started:

- Any item above ilvl 463 is scaled down to 463; items at 463 or below are not affected or scaled up.
- Find a trinket of ilvl 463 or above with a good proc for this (I had just gotten Thok's Acid-Grooved Tooth which has a nice healing proc and prov what helped me get those last 3 waves in).
- Tier set bonuses are not active, neither are Sha-Touched Gems, legendary meta gems, or legendary cape procs (if you have any of the above, find a good replacement before you try or you will be very frustrated like I got on my monk before I realized this).
- Stats from flasks, enchants, gems and profession bonuses are not reduced (so buff yourself up!) It's also important to note that mana pots don't work here, keep that in mind as you plan out your CDs.

Now let's talk about glyphs, talents and strategies:

I used the following glyphs: Glyph of Telluric Currents, Glyph of Eternal Earth and Glyph of Healing Wave. TC was useful not only to regen a little bit of mana, but it also helps with dps and in combination with Glyph of Eternal Earth it allows you to stack ES back on the tank without losing mana for it. Glyph of Healing Wave allows you to focus on everyone else. I can honestly say that I barely had to heal myself, with this glyph and standing in Healing Rain, I was set.

I used the following talents: Stone Bulwark Totem, Totemic Persistence (although Call of the Elements would probably be better for this because it would allow you to use your Bulwark, Healing Stream Totem and Capacitor Totem back to back in a pinch every 3 minutes). I also used Ancestral Swiftness (for the stats and that oh shit moment when you need a quick GHW on the tank), Conductivity (can't go wrong with endless healing rain!) and Primal Elementalist (helps greatly when you get behind on DPS and you need a little push to get caught up or simply to Empower your healing.

About the Endless waves:

- The mobs have a buff that adds 1% damage each wave.
- The same set of 10 waves repeats endlessly, but doing 10% more damage each time.
- Each wave is 1 minute long and there is a 15 sec break after every 10th wave where you will be out of combat (so do you're best to get that last mob down so you may sit and drink).

Before you start the actual challenge you will find NPCs that provide you with a few useful items like a soulwell, reforging, JC supplies and stat foods.

You'll want to use the following spells EVERY wave:

- Earth Shield the tank.
- Riptide on CD (if the tank still has his Riptide buff and someone else takes damage, like the hunter, use it on them and let that bring their HP back up, focus on the tank, he's not a brick wall as he claims to be lol).
- Unleash Elements in combination with your Earthliving Weapon to buff up your next direct heal or healing rain by 30%.
- Healing Rain on the group (all should be in your healing rain except for the hunter and sometimes the mage when she's being retarded).
- Healing Stream Totem also helps you heal that stinking hunter back up, I tried to save it for the last part of each wave when all interrupts and stuns have been used to help with the healing.
- Wind Shear when you can, but not at the expense of getting so behind on heals that you end up going oom trying to catch up.
- Capacitor Totem on CD, should use it once every wave to minimize damage and sometimes twice when you can if you're feeling overwhelmed.
- Searing Totem or Magma Totem to help with DPS.
- Stone Bulwark Totem especially when there's a lot of AoE damage going out, again usually towards the end of a wave after stuns and interrupts have been used up.
- Mana Tide Totem around 3rd wave and on CD every time after that.
- Lightning Bolt every chance you get to regen mana, help dps and add ESs back on the tank.

- And last but not least don't forget to pull up your totems at the end of each wave to get that extra bit of mana back. 

Now for the big Cooldowns:

Wave 1: Large Illusionary Flamecaller, Small Illusionary Ripper x2.
     Simple wave, no CDs needed here except for those you should be using each wave.

Wave 2: Large Illusionary Hive-Singer, Large Illusionary Aqualyte, Small Illusionary Ripper.
     If you can interrupt the Hive-Singer with both Wind Shear and Capacitor Totem you will minimize a lot of damage. Just be careful not to lose your tank to all the incoming damage. Clear the debuff as needed.

Wave 3: Large Illusionary Tunneler x2, Small Illusionary Ripper.
     You'll get a few chomps here which will not go away until your target is healed to 90%. This is where you might want to use your Healing Tide Totem.
Chomp goes away at the end of the wave, so if you are feeling the pressure just focus the tank and keep a riptide and healing stream up on the chomp victim.

Wave 4: Large Illusionary Aqualyte, Small Illusionary Aqualyte, Small Illusionary Flamecaller.
     You'll get two debuffs at the same time here, so be aware of everyone's location and choose who you want to cleanse carefully. If it's on you and an NPC, clear the NPC and back away from the group, then you can go back and stand in the healing rain. If it's on the hunter and someone in melee clear the melee, you don't want you're group taking damage and getting knocked out of healing rain. If it's on 2 NPCs in melee clear one and prepare to heal everyone back up. I like using Stormlash Totem here to help DPS these guys down faster.

Wave 5: Large Illusionary Conqueror, Large Illusionary Hive-Singer, followed by Large Illusionary Tunneler.
     I use Spirit Link Totem here when the tank gets low on HP and once the Tunneler comes out I use Ascendance to clear chomps and bring everyone's HP back up to full. I also use my Fire Elemental for that extra DPS.

Wave 6: Small Illusionary Aqualyte, Small Illusionary Flamecaller, Small Illusionary Tunneler, Small Illusionary Ripper.
     This wave can feel a bit overwhelming, just keep focused, be sure to stun every time you can here and hold on till you can use your Healing Tide Totem again. Watch those fires, the NPC can get low on HP very quickly.

Wave 7: Small Illusioanry Conqueror x2, Small Illusionary Hive-Singer.
     This wave isn't too bad just a lot of damage on the tank. Be sure to stun and use your Earth Elemental to get some damage off the tank when possible.

Wave 8: Small Illusionary Flamecaller x4, Small Illusionary Ripper.
     Stuns and healing rain. Ascendance when it's up to get caught up. Watch out for those fires again.

Wave 9: Large Illusionary Hive-Singer, Small Illusionary Tunneler, Small Illusionary Aqualyte.
     You'll want to use Healing Tide Totem again here and your Fire Elemental to help DPS things down. Stay focused cause you'll also be dispelling here and you don't want to clear the wrong target. You can also use your Spirit Link for either this wave or the next.

Wave 10: Large illusioanry Conqueror, Small Illusionary Flamecaller, followed by Small Illusionary Aqualyte.
     The Mage will Lust/Hero here to give you that extra push to get through this wave. Use your Earth Elemental, Stormlash totem and anything else you have in your arsenal to clear this wave fast. You want to be able to drink up the moment the last mob dies. And remember that the next wave will be fairly simple, so you can let the tank take a few hits before you have to get up, so try to fully regen.

Remember that the next 10 waves will be 10% harder than the previous ones. The more you practice, the better you'll get at them. If you can manage to get through the first 4 or 5 waves of each set without using a CD you'll be better prepared for the more difficult waves closer to 20 and 30.

Once you're ready you can talk to Trial Master Rotun to begin.

I hope this helps some healers, resto shamans in particular, out there trying to get this awesome achievement! If you have any suggestions, feel free to comment, I'd be more than happy to add your tips to this guide :)

Happy Friday the 13th!

the Proven Healer!

Since the Proving Grounds came out I've been slowly doing the achievements as I had time, but the last two weeks the only one I had left for healing was the endless (30 waves) and I finally got it done yesterday on my shaman!!!

Around wave 26 I starting getting nervous and excited and the adrenaline was rushing and I couldn't even scream because Izzy had just gotten home from work and dropped dead on the bed lol.

So here is Rhyannon proudly showing off the title she earned!

Makes me realize that I'm a way better shaman than a monk and have every intention of going back to her come Warlords of Draenor. I would do it now, but she's only at a 516 ilvl and Kaliapy is at 557 and my raid team would probably kill me if I tried to gear out Rhy when we're already on Garrosh. That's ok though, this little break has only made me realize how much I LOVE playing her and how well I know how to play the class. So come Warlords you will be seeing a lot more of her :D

I'll try my best to make a post in the next few days on how I did the proving grounds on her while it's still fresh in my mind for anyone that is interested.

Good luck to all the healers out there trying, keep at it, it's worth the trouble, I promise!

WoW Screenshot a Day: Day 12 - macro

Here is a macro that I made and used a long time ago, I just can't bare to part with it. It reminds me of too many good times in Ulduar!

I feel an Ulduar run coming on :D

Another one off the bucket list!

When I first started playing this game back in 2006 I was pretty clueless, as most of us were. I recall seeing a Draenei for the first time, I knew I had to make one, so I immediately went to the store and bought BC. I did the starting zone quests and left Exodar for Stormwind as soon as I could manage! When I finally made it to SW the first thing I saw was a female Draenei on a mystical, blue feathered mount /jawdrop I was in love... I was determined to have one of my very own. Back then Azun could only be summoned by Druids and only if you were on or had done your flying form quest. So I worked my little druid to the bone just for a chance to have the Reins of the Raven Lord even if it wasn't on the character I wanted it for.

I farmed for it everyday with friends who knew of my obsession over it. When the next expansion came out I farmed it on my own, gotta love prowl! But still nothing :( Expansion after expansion and still no mount, I stopped visiting Sethekk Halls as often. It became a weekly ritual and sometimes not even that.

Fast forward to MoP. The last few weeks however I have been running old instances on my Monk for transmog gear, pets, etc. and I decided to do the Karazhan attunement on Möya, crazy I know. If you've ever done it you know what a pain in the butt it is, not because of the instances themselves but because of how many different ones it requires you to do. The first of which is Shadow Labs. As I'm heading there I tell a friend... well I'll let you read it for yourself:

I head in there bypassing all trash, only killing what I need to or agro. I get to Azun and being an OP monk I one shot him with Touch of Death. If you notice my chat window doesn't show loot, rep or any of that other stuff. But I got a glimpse of something I've never seen before while I was auto looting, so I switch over to my general screen to see what I got and THERE IT IS:

I immediately click on it! And BAM!!! ACHIEVEMENT! I didn't know it was a Feat of Strength :)

So now I am as giddy as can be. I've been after this mount since I first saw it when I started playing.

Oh and to make things even better, I was on the phone with Izzy when it dropped. That conversation went something like this:

Me: OMFG!!!
Izzy: What? What happened?
Me: I just got the Reins of the Raven Lord.
Izzy: Fuck you! Click...

Priceless!

I. FINALLY. GOT. MY. MOUNT!!!

All other ground mounts have been removed from my bars, I need nothing else! I am content! I'm not a huge mount collector, but this one, just this one, I have been coveting since my very first days of WoW, and now I can finally say I have it :D

The Lorewalkers...

The Lorewalkers are an MoP faction who's exalted reputation can be easily acquired. There are no daily or zone quests to grind. You can gain reputation simply by visiting monuments throughout Pandaria, completing achievements and listening to folktales. With the organized path I have provided below you can reach exalted in about an hour.

Once you've reached exalted you can buy the Lorewakers Tabard and the Disc of the Red Flying Cloud.

I did all of this on Möya yesterday while I gathered screenshots and found the easiest and fastest path for you to take. So today I'm doing it on Izzy's priest, Rahdiggah, to test my quide :)

Start in the Northern section of the Jade Forest and follow the coordinates. By the time you reach Kun-Lai Summit you have all the achievements completed. Remember, you don't need to dismount for any of these, unless it's in a building of course, all you have to do is be on the ground.

Jade Forest:
Hozen in the Mist - Hozen Speech - 26,28

What Is Worth Fighting For - The First Monks - 35,30
Legend of the Brewfathers - Xin Wu Yin the Broken Hearted - 37,30

The Dark Heart of the Mogu - Spirit Binders - 42,17

Between a Saurok and a Hard Place - The Saurok 67,29
The Seven Burdens of Shaohao - The Emperor's Burden - Part 1 - 47,45
The Seven Burdens of Shaohao - The Emperor's Burden - Part 3 - 55,56Fish Tails - Watersmithing - 65,87

Krasarang Wilds:

Legend of the Brewfathers - Quan Tou Kuo the Two Fisted - 81,11
Ballad of Liu Lang - Waiting for the Turtle - 72,30

The Dark Heart of the Mogu - The Lost Dynasty - 50,31

The Seven Burdens of Shaohao - The Emperor's Burden - Part 4 - 40,56 (inside the second floor of the building. This one took me long cause some alli huntard decided he wanted to PvP, so after trying to get away from him because I was timing this, and him not wanting to let up. I turned around and owned him. I hope he enjoyed that. Wish I had taken a better look at his name, Grimdwarf or something like that, anyway!)

Hozen in the Mist - Hozen Maturity - 52,87

Fish Tails - Origins - 30,38 (can be accessed from outside the building)
Between a Saurok and a Hard Place - Last Stand - 32,29

Valley of the Four Winds:

Ballad of Liu Lang - Wondering Widow - 34,63
Ballad of Liu Lang - A Most Famou Bill of Sale - 55,47

Hozen in the Mist - Embracing the Passion - 83,21

Fish Tails - Waterspeakers - 61,34

What Is Worth Fighting For - Pandaren Fighting Tactics - 18,31
Ballad of Liu Lang - The Birthplace of Liu Lang - 20,55

Dread Waste:

Between a Saurok and a Hard Place - The Deserters - 67,60

Heart of the Mantid Swarm - Mantid Society - 59,55

Heart of the Mantid Swarm - Cycle of the Mantid - 48,32

Heart of the Mantid Swarm - The Empress - 35,32

Heart of the Mantid Swarm - Amber - 52,10 (entrance is at 54,16 and be ready to kill a few bugs)

Townlong Steppes:

The Seven Burdens of Shaohao - The Emperor's Burden - Part 5 - 37,62

The Song of Yaungo - Dominance - 65,49
The Song of Yaungo - Trapped in a Strange Land - 84,72

Vale of Eternal Blossoms:

What Is Worth Fighting For - Together, We Are Strong - 26,21 (be careful flying in here from Townlong Steppes, I wasn't paying attention and got dismounted. Took a nice death on Rahdiggah :P Just don't tell Izzy)

The Dark Heart of the Mogu - The Thunder King - 40,77

What Is Worth Fighting For - Always Remember - 52,68
The Seven Burdens of Shaohao - The Emperor's Burden - Part 8 - 68,44

Veiled Stair:

Between a Saurok and a Hard Place - The Defiant - 55,15 (entrance is at 50,40)

Kun-Lai Summit:

Fish Tails - Role Call - 74,83 (can be accessed from outside the building)

The Song of Yaungo - Yaungoil - 71,62

The Seven Burdens of Shaohao - The Emperor's Burden - Part 6 - 67,48

What Is Worth Fighting For - Victory in Kun-Lai - 63,40

Valley of Emperers - Kun-Lai Summit - 53,46 (entrance at 51,48. My favorite by far, it was all very Indiana Jones like, you'll see what I mean!)

The Seven Burdens of Shaohao - The Emperor's Burden - Part 2 - 43,51 (if you did the quest for the 502 item level boots, you can more than likely skip this one if you took the time to get it while you were up there)

Legend of the Brewfathers - Ren Yun the Blind - 44,53

The Seven Burdens of Shaohao - The Emperor's Burden - Part 7 - 41,42

Hozen in the Mist - The Hozen Ravage - 45,61
The Song of Yaungo - Yaungol Tactics - 50,79

As you can see, Rah started at 0 neutral with the Lorewalkers and with 10,325 Achievement Points. I headed off to the Jade Forest at 9:55 AM.

At 10:59 AM I was finished with all the achievements giving her a total of 10,425 points. That's 100 achievement points in an hour, not bad! Plus each one of those gives 2000+ rep depending on your racial/guild perk.

Once you're done in Kun-Lai Summit you can head to the Shrine to pick up all the mail from Lorewalker Cho. Each one of those is a quest to turn in which will give you 3000+ rep, again it depends on your racial/guild perk whether you get more or not.

Head over to the Seat of Knowledge just above the Mogu'shan Palace to run in your quests.  This will take you a little bit of time because every time you turn in a quest he tells you a story. At this point you can just put you're volume up and walk away until you hear a gong, then come back to turn in the next one. Of course if you like WoW lore than by all means, enjoy!

By the time you're done with all your quests you will be exalted. Rah just happened to also get his 45 exalted rep achievement from this.

Then head over to the Lorewalkers Quartermaster for your tabard and mount! She's on the left side of the room by the sleeping tiger.

So I'm leaving Rah on her flying disc for Izzy to find when he gets home :D

And here's Möya rocking her tabard and disc!

I hope this guide helps you with your Lorewalker Achivements, if you have any questions or find any typos in the coordinates please let me know :)