Thursday: 8/8 gr8 r8d m8

No, I’m not sorry for the lame meme. Not much to say about Thursday, though. We 1-shot everything except for G’huun!

MOTHER only had 1 death, to the wind flames. Overall, people were much smarter about using their defensives, and our healers were much more able to boost HP losses after a wall crossing. We had a full raid group once again, so this was an even more impressive feat.

Fetid was our fastest kill yet, at 2:19. Not even enough time for a full DPS rotation!

Vectis is still causing issues with Omega Vector. Nobody died, but people are being too stingy about sharing stacks. If you get over 5 stacks early, step out so someone else can take over. Likewise if you’re under 5, step in! Later we’ll comment about having 10 stacks – again, if you’re over that, step out; if you’re under, step closer. People are creating too many problems for healers by avoiding stacks or letting some player soak too many. Tusker had 48 hits from Omega Vector. A number of people only had 6. This is a problem, especially moving forward into heroic.

Zek’vos was another good run. With only 1 DK, we struggled a bit to get adds in, but coordination on the part of the monks and druids made cleaving the caster adds simple.

Zul was one of our strongest kills yet. We had an excellent balance of add cleave and boss damage, and the boss was moved relatively well in phase 3. Things got a little hectic before and after a tank death, but we took Zul down pretty fast after that.

Mythrax is still suffering a bit from boss-tunneling and lack of interrupts. If you’re not casting any, you’re not coming into Heroics in the future.

G’huun was frustrating. We had a 0%, 36k HP wipe on him. What’s truly frustrating is the number of people – SEVEN – who did not use a healthstone. Imagine 7 people living for an additional, say, 4 seconds. Do you think they could contribute to another 36k damage? Absolutely.

If your name is on the top of that list, but not in the list beneath it, ya done fucked up A-a-ron. It’s a good idea for everyone, regardless of presence on the list, to get yourself something…a weakaura, an addon, I don’t care – that blips that you need to use a healthstone when you go beneath, say, 50% hp. That will get you into the habit of using them routinely.

Thursday Logs

Friday: Heroic Progression

Taloc was the cleanest we’ve had him on heroic. We had very few deaths and everyone moved well together during the elevator phase. However, many people have some low DPS output. Consider whether you should change up your talents or if you’re positioning yourself effectively in the boss fight.

MOTHER was much smoother than last week. We’re starting to get a system down for moving between rooms most effectively and when to start transitioning. People are being smarter with their use of defensives, too. Consider taking extra healing talents, defensive azerite traits, etc, during this boss fight. Staying alive in rooms 1&2 outweighs DPSing!

Since we missed a kill pic last week, enjoy our kill pic this week!

Fetid Devour is a huge DPS check. Our strategy is to only kill 1 of the 2 eggs available at a time. Killing both just wasn’t feasible at this time.  This was also the first time we’ve had to bench underperformers to get through a kill, which should be an eye-opener to a lot of people. However, we managed to get him down within 2 tries after the benches. No kill pic again…whoops.

Zek’voz looks like a VERY doable kill. Instead of clumping and having eyes run out (because people and latency make it unreliable) we spread wide in a crescent for eye beams (cheers to Treeson for the idea!). Then we group back together for adds and other mechanics. We got him down to 10% in 4 pulls and could easily have had a kill if we didn’t bungle add management in the last phase. We raid leads will have to be a bit more aware of Zek’s health and the health of adds so we don’t push phases poorly!

Friday Logs

Raid Changes

Starting October 4th, we’re requiring 355 ilvl for heroics. We may even implement a DPS minimum since frankly, ilvl is easy to acquire given M+ runs, and it’s not a determination of skill. Ideally, you’ll also run with us on normal before heroic, but that’s also not a requirement (yet?).

Speaking of normal, alt runs on Mondays are starting back up. These will be 2 hour runs rather than 3. These will not count against your attendance for Vanguard, but they will count for it, so attending one can only help you. Depending on interest, one of the raid leads might get a lockout so we can skip MOTHER and Taloc and get right into the interesting bosses. Reminder that you’ll see need to follow all the rules & regulations for raiding!

LFR continues to be a success on Saturdays. A lot of people are learning the basic mechanics and we’re all having a good time. Zul trash is easy when you’re this coordinated!

DPS Megapost

If you don’t read this post I might pay Blizzard to delete your characters.

Promotions

Congrats to Neocide, Rwandarousey, and Tusker for making Vanguard!

Thursday: 7/8 again

Taloc, MOTHER, and Fetid were 1-shots. MOTHER had surprisingly few deaths – the majority of which were to Cleansing Purge and not moving into the last room soon enough. We need to work on moving sooner.

Vectis was interesting. We had a wipe on him, due to Omega Vector stacking. With 3 debuffs, 3 groups makes the most sense. However, some people are moving around too much in Phase 2 and then the debuff stacks. Other times, people within groups are not getting the debuff. Those with heavy stacks need to remember to step out and wait for others to catch up on stacks. If you have a stack in Phase 2, don’t move!

For Zek’voz, we had another early wipe due to eye beams. Make sure not to re-enter the group too soon, and please be careful to move out! Eye Beam does NOT put a debuff on you, so if you’re relying on debuffs to tell you when to move, find another method! Eye Beam is a 2-mistake kick from hereon out.

Zul was 1-shot. Tanks did an EXCELLENT job in phase 3.

Mythrax had a wipe in the beginning of Phase 2. We simply had too many people taking avoidable damage and clumped far too close together. It can be hard with a melee comp, but the boss is very large. Spread as much as you can! And remember, interrupt often. If you’re not on this chart as a DPS, you’re not doing your job.

G’huun was disappointing. We had wipes at 2 and 3 percent. Mostly, people were not paying attention to Gaze. Raid Leads cannot call Gaze for you. You MUST pay attention on your own. Gaze is going to become a 2-mistake kick from hereon out.  Remember also that interrupting is important on G’huun. Again, if you’re not on this chart, you’re not doing your job.

Thursday Logs

Friday: MOTHER is a MFer

G’huun went down about as well as could be expected (minus fumbles with the orb on first pull) on a fresh day.

Taloc was a one-shot, but…there were problems. People continue not to move fast enough out of the group with blood in phase 1. A lot of people are starting to run to the right and then quickly readjusting to run left. That time means they dump blood in the group. I’m not sure why people run right to start. Here is a simple thing to remember: If you get a mechanic on Taloc and you’re not sure what it is, run left to start. If it happens to be Static instead of Blood, that’s ok! Keep running left if you have room. Don’t double back. As long as you run it away from the raid, Static can go in either direction.

MOTHER…whoof. We tried a lot of different ideas with groups here. Ideally, we SHOULD be moving quickly in groups of 4, staggered. (Move 2, pause, 2 more, heal up, repeat.) Unfortunately, people are not paying attention to others’ healthbars and are making this fight much harder than it is, so we’re moving in groups of 3 and 4 with less organization. Always, ALWAYS wait a second behind someone else before running through regardless. When it is your turn to run through, try to be “on deck” as much as you can (barring mechanics like laser walls). I know we like to avoid running through during winds, but unfortunately, winds may end up being one of the cleaner times we get to run through in the future.

DPS is less important than surviving. I will repeat this: DPS is less important than surviving. If you need to run to the far end of the room away from the fire in order to survive winds and dodge mechanics successfully, do it. Getting an extra swing or two on the boss but dying to fire or her frontal because you were trying to minmax won’t be doing anybody any favors. We need you alive for room 3!

Save your movement mechanics and defensives for when you need to cross between rooms. Especially between rooms 2 and 3. You may be in a group that has to book it from the far side of Room 2 to a safe spot in Room 3 with laser ceiling openings. Use movement mechanics to get across as quickly as possible so we don’t wind up with groups stuck behind.

We “killed” MOTHER, but didn’t get a photo with her. Guess that means we’ll do it again this week for a new photo op!

Friday Logs

TLDR Parse Interpretation

I found this chart on Reddit and shared it in the Raiding Discussion channel, but am resharing it here. This is an easy break down of your at a glance parse numbers when reading logs.

(substitute Legendary for Azerite and you get the idea)

If normally your overall is less than Blue and your ilvl is less than Purple, chances are you have things you can improve. Some of it’s gear / stat priority, some of it’s rotation. Check out this guide to see what the best of your class and spec are doing and see what you can do to improve!

Congratulations to the following people for attending 5 raids and receiving Vanguard status for the first time:

Miatreeleafa
Nighteld

Congratulations to the following members for maintaining Vanguard status from Legion:

Bellelina
Corignis
Harmesi
Treeson

These fine folks have earned additional gold repair bills from the guild bank and access to Vanguard – only access tabs. If you’re curious if you’re close to achieving Vanguard status, you can check on the Raid Attendance page!

In addition, we’d like to congratulate Miatreeleafa for being granted Twitch Affiliate status! This grants him the ability to receive subscribers, custom emotes, cheers, and other benefits. As a regular streamer of both our Raids and PvP nights, we’re happy to see him continue to grow! You can follow him and watch the streams at https://www.twitch.tv/nfbprototype.

Because Warcraft Logs updated and subsequently broke down for me, we’ve got short logs and a shorter Roundup this week

Thursday: 7/8, what a breeze

You can tell that the group is becoming more accustomed to working together as a unit. Taloc went down with few issues – people are getting better about moving when they have debuffs on them. Elevator is still a bit sloppy – in the future, we will likely mark a tank and expect people to stay behind the tanks, rather than expecting someone to stack behind a melee DPS. MOTHER we wiped a few times. There were rough calls on when to go through (sometimes overlapping with wind), but practice over time made this easier. Remember to use your judgement: if you get a call to move through, and wind starts up, hold off until the wind dies down. Everyone did an excellent job stacking up on their markers, though, making dodging fire much easier. Fetid was another instakill this week – I have a feeling he’s going to be a favorite on normal because of the simplicity.

After Fetid came Vectis. Vectis was problematic. We had multiple people getting multiple stacks of the omega vector debuff at once and dying. Raid Leads will work out a new strategy, but remember not to remain stationary within your group. Move around a little to encourage the debuff to bounce between different players, rather than ping-ponging between the same 2-3 people. Zek’voz was a pretty simple fight and was looking to be a 1-shot, but unfortunately we got too intent on the kill and completely ignored a mind-controlled bear tank, thus wiping the raid with his easily interrupted casts. Remember, interrupts are king and we need to focus MCed players. We also had a player confused 2 similar mechanics that need to be run away. Remember: eye beams sideways, Roiling Deceit back or sideways. Focus down those who are mind controlled or they’ll wipe us! For Zul, we employed the same strategy as last week. Tanks still need to clean up the final phase and Rupturing Blood, but the DPS was much better about managing add cleave and boss health.

Mythrax was another toughie. We downed him in 2 pulls, but people are not interrupting, and fewer are focusing on finishing up adds, favoring boss tunnel-vision. These sorts of mistakes lead to wipes.

Thursday Partial Logs

Friday: Ghuun, Heroic Progression

G’huun is becoming interesting. We wiped at 1% on the first pull, in spite of being down a warlock for portals. Interrupts were good, but could have been better. We made better use of Bloodlust by waiting longer to use it – after the collapsing ceiling and tanks got re-situated gave us a few extra seconds. We’re going to start paying VERY close attention to interrupts / interrupt attempts on G’huun starting this week. Be aware of that.

Heroic Taloc is still messy. Too many people are not reacting quickly to static or blood drops. You should be moving the second a timer goes off. Don’t wait to finish casting. Customize your setup to more easily see these warnings if you must. We’re going to be saving Bloodlust for phase 3, since phase 1 is pretty simple. The elevator strategy we’ll be employing from hereon out is as outlined above – tanks marked, party behind the tanks. Everyone should be CCing the bloods and ranged-killing them asap, while the melee focuses on killing the add stuck to the tanks. We’ll continue to move clockwise, lasers permitting.

MOTHER is getting very close. This week we got unlucky with our healer comp – druid HoTs make for difficult spot-healing on tanks soloing MOTHER on the crossover. Ideally, we’d have a monk or paladin who can keep the tank well-protected during that last crossover, before reaching the safety of other healers. If we don’t, we may be changing the strategy of the last 2 groups.

Friday Logs

Thoughts

Next week we’re going to be auditing interrupt and Healthstone usage. If you don’t use either, you’re likely to be sat from Heroic attempts in the future until you improve in normal. These are very simple things that can make the difference between a 1% wipe (or which we suffered 2 on different bosses last week) and a kill. Those who delay on mechanics like like the Taloc or G’huun puddles will also be similarly benched from Heroic attempts. These show a lack of awareness to your surroundings and will hold back a raid as large as ours.

We were very pleased to have gone 7/8 in 1 night. The sooner we breeze through 8/8 in one go, the sooner we will set up an alt / farm night on normal, to focus on pushing heroic progression for our main raid days. This is good for everybody!

This is also the first week we hit max capacity for raid size at 30 people. “First come, first serve” is likely going to start coming into effect here, and we’ll have to start consider split raiding.

Last Saturday was an LFR run. We had 10 people come, and it was a good time. I got lucky and was made leader of the LFR, so was able to use Raid Warnings to talk to the group. You could see where most PUGs followed directions and minimized the wipe chances we had (some ignored it, as they tend to). If you don’t want to LFR during the week, come on Saturday for a guaranteed easy and relaxing run.

Never raided? Afraid of LFR trolls or PUGs demanding perfection on week 1? No sweat!

We have an event for Saturday 2pm PST / 5pm EST on the calendar for an LFR run!

LFR is a good time to get your feet wet with raiding, and if we can get a decent-sized guild group, it will mean we control the pace of the LFR. We can cover basic mechanics and help pass gear around if it’s needed.

If we get a decent amount of interest, we’ll make this a weekly event (and maybe move the day, again depending on interest). Otherwise, think of this as a one-time go to get drunk and run through LFR with some friends on a weekend afternoon.

Given our general success and progress on Sunday, we’ve decided to see if there’s interest in going after him again on Monday (same time as usual raids).

If you’re interested, please sign up as “confirmed” in game. If you’re not sure, hit “tentative”. 4 raids on one week is a lot but I know there’s excitement since we got him to 8%. We’d hate to lose steam and disappoint anyone taking a look at getting the kill on week 1.

(Reminder: you still have to be confirmed for an invite. Bonus raid nights don’t count towards promotions to Vanguard.)