Friday 29 August 2014

Heroic Shamans and Malkorok down.

Sunday evening, Innovation started at Juggernaut HC as a warm up before we would try the Shamans for the first time. We had the peptalks, the new things that would happen, and then the timer went of. the pull was a little bit messy, and we had some things to get used to, so we wiped... at 20%.


Wiping on a first try is nothing new and/or strange, but at 20%?? We went in again, everyone now attuned to the new things happening, and they went down with almost no problems, a little anti-climax I would say. As one of us said; "Maybe we should have done this a few weeks earlier."


After this sudden kill, we made quick work of the Orc, and looked our second not-yet-killed boss in the eye, Malkorok. We already had one week of wiping on him before, and after all the excitement on sunday evening, well, nope, would not happen.


Tuesday was another sparring-night with him, and we did get him under the 20%, but little mistakes kept crawling in. And with Malkorok, it doesn't matter if the mistake is early or late in the fight, you can just see the raid crumbling under too much pressure after that. This one is really in the catagory: Frustrating Boss fights.


The raid was extended to thursday, and luckily after 5 wipes, the mistakes were not big enough, and we had a second P2 with 90% alive (at least), so after 68 wipes orso, Malkorok went down, bringing Innovation one heroic boss further then last end-tier  ;)





Thursday 21 August 2014

Leave your guilds now?

Innovation's last raiding week can be explained with one Picture:

Heroic Malkorok - finally with 25 men.
A whole week of trying to get Malkorok down on Heroic. To be honest, only tuesday with a full team. The fact that we didn't got a full team till tuesday is strange, but more strange is the amount of new names. last week Innovations website started to produce several potential recruits. How did that happen?

Well, our raid started a little late last Thursday, about 20 minutes, something to do with that date we all have now, 13th November. And suddenly the whole World of Warcraft had a deadline. Whatever you are doing now, everything changes on that date, better prepare.

And for some, that means leaving their old 10-man guild, and try to find a 25-man guild. One of the recruits even stated that was the main reason behind looking for a new guild. They don't believe their current guild will recruit enough people before WoD, or not enough able people. While Innovation already has a working and running modus operandi.

If that pays of for them, or for us, is a question for the future. At the moment Innovation has more cannon-fodder to throw at bosses, and with Malky close to death, we are on track to do the same as last expansion, ending 8 heroic bosses in. Although last expansion only had 8 in the last tier.

I am wondering though, how many guilds have problems now, either the 10's for loosing members, and seeing their guilds dissolve, and for the 25's, who struggled the last few years to keep 25, and now suddenly everyone wants to join?

Also, malky close to death may seem strange, considering we didn't get him below 40%, but, to cath a phrase, through wiping, we learn. The moment we have no deaths first three minutes, it will be done. Rince and repeat-boss.

I also decided that I will continue playing boomkin for now. That glyph of flapping wings is hilarious. And on the alt-front, well, I now have Five cloaks, so legendary....

Timicin has his cloak.

Thursday 14 August 2014

10 Years/ 10 Questions

One thing about the summer is vacations. I am working at a school, so I really have a long summer-vacation. And this one has been busy. 2 weeks I was in South-Wales, and 2 weeks where spend on the Innovation-Guildmeet.


I missed a lot.


I missed a lot of the Malasian Airplane that went down over the Ukrain. Although some of that emotion did reach me, not as huge as it was in the Netherlands though. I also did not raid for 5 weeks (well, except one night). I was also not able to participate in Beta as much as I wanted. And now I am back, my blogroll is full of 10/10 things.

Alt:ernative over at www.alternative-blog.net is asking players to fill in 10 questions for a series of podcasts. It is WoW's 10th anniversary soon, so this seemed a good time to do that, and here are my answers.

1. Why did you start playing Warcraft?

There were two reasons I started playing World of Warcraft. I had started a new Job in januar which meant that instead of a 60+ hours/week working at irregular hours, I now only had to work 32 hours, on very regurlar hours. So I had some time left. Second, there where rumors of a Star Trek MMO:RPG coming, and I had hardly any experience with RPG's or MMO's, so in febraur 2007, in my first vacation working at a school, I started playing World of Warcraft try-out version.

2. What was the first ever character you rolled?


Mendak, Dwarf Hunter with his bear Ursa. I played this character in my first week of try-out, no idea what I was doing. But I did like the game, and after a week I bought it. At that point I also made my second character, a Blood Elf Tankadin named Gowron.

3. Which factors determined your faction choice in game?


I have no idea anymore why I started with Alliance. maybe the trailer I saw with the dwarf hunter in the snow influenced me. After a week playing, and doing some more research, I thought I would like the paladin class, and because I already did some Alliance, I opted for Horde, to see what was on the other side.

4. What has been your most memorable moment in Warcraft and why?


This has me thinking. I have enough memories of won fights due to actions I did (wrong trinket on Hydross ; solohealing an ICC-boss), and enough memories of close bosskills. I could go for the moment I actually hit the wow-download button, but to be honest, I don't remember that. I think the most memorable moment in WoW, is when I really stepped into raiding Hardcore.

The fun part is, it was outside the game. I was at my friends house (Kemwer/Gunho) and we where both part of XII. Both of us where officers, and we where talking about the lack of focus and direction or something. At the end of the evening we decided on a radical step. I opened the calendar, and put a raid in on every day for the next month. At that moment, XII became a 'Hard-Core', as did I...

5. What is your favourite aspect of the game and has this always been the case?

Overcoming obstacles, and it really doesn't matter if that means killing that Elite-bird in Winterspring, doing some Black Prince related quest, or a Raidboss after 50 wipes. Just that feeling of  'I/We did this'. And with an obstacle I mean something that does not go down on the first tries, ...through wiping, we learn.

6. Do you have an area in game that you always return to?


Thunderbluf would be my first instinct, but then..it has been a long time since I was there. I think this really depends on the expansion. There is not really a place where I would go to just do nothing.

7. How long have you /played and has that been continuous?


Since I started playing in februar 2007, I have never unsubbed. At this moment I don't even have to add time, it is all automatically, no mid-raid end-of-subscription moments for me.

According to Althoholic, my current time played of a characters still existing is 539 days, 10 hours and 56 minutes. Although during checking I removed at least 14 hours of gameplay, and I now I have deleted characters before...  so my estimate would be upwards 560 days played at the moment.

Which, is a about 5 hours a day since I started playing.....

8. Admit it: do you read quest text or not?


Yes, I think. I am a fast reader, so I scan the text for big clues, and fill in the gaps of the story the first time around. My raiding character must reach max level... With the next few alts that pass the quests, I will read it more thoroughly, after that I skip it.

9. Are there any regrets from your time in game?


Not really, considering where I am now, regretting something that happened, which may change where you are now feels a little strange. Your successes and your mistakes make you what you are today. The only thing I may regret, considering it would not change much, is disenchanting all old gear on my Paladin, because I could never use that again..  damn you Transmog.

10. What effect has Warcraft had on your life outside gaming?


A lot. I am one of those people that will try no to plan anything on the raiding-evenings. I see it the same way when I was playing a sport. Three times a week I go to that sport, either to train, or to play a match. So I try to plan non-WoW stuff on the other four nights, does not always work, but most of my friends now that Su-Tu-Th is taken for me. And this is not even the biggest Impact WoW has on my life.

Somewhere during a guildmeet 2 years ago, I fell in love with Innovations Healing Lead.
So yeah... that has some effect on my life.