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Karazhan moves to off-nights.
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"But I still need gear/badges/reputation/that shadow damage necklace that never drops!"
Hey, me too!
Moving Karazhan to off-nights doesn't mean that we won't be running it, merely that I won't be scheduling it as an official guild raid. I realize that this is a disappointment to some, especially those relative newcomers to the guild who still legitimately need the gear upgrades that are so plentiful in Kara. Please understand, there is a method to the madness.
As a guild, we have been running Karazhan with two groups every week for the last five months. While most of us could still benefit from an elusive drop or two, the simple fact is that our core group is geared out and burnt out on the instance.
There is also the point that as members of a determinedly casual guild, many of our raiders have limited playtime and have to choose between spending four hours in Karazhan on Friday and four hours in SSC on Saturday. I would rather focus our collective efforts on progression, scheduling new content on our peak days -- namely, Saturdays and Sundays -- and relegating farm content like Karazhan to offnights, with attendance optional.
Guys: we've cleared Zul'Aman and downed Void Reaver! Lurker's days are numbered so low that even a Murloc could count them. We are no longer a Karazhan guild. We're a T5 raiding guild that can choose to run Kara for fun and badges, and to gear alts and the odd, under-geared Initiate ... but we don't need to run Kara, and shouldn't become distressed by its absence on our raid calendar.
That said, if you're interested in organizing a Karazhan raid, then by all means -- do so! Anyone is welcome to start a group; all that I ask is that you run it on off-nights (i.e., Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday) so it doesn't conflict with our progression raids. I would also strongly suggest using Group Calendar or the forums to communicate with other guild members about possible raid times, as we have the tanks and healers to support two or three decent runs each week but will be stretched too thinly to be effective if too many people attempt to schedule Karazhan raids at their own convenience.
Finally, if you do schedule a midweek raid -- count me in! I refuse to be responsible for filling any more raids than I already am, but I'll DPS my little black heart out for you anytime you need me. (Besides, I really do want that shadow damage necklace. And the Mindblade I keep passing to mages who "need it more," being ... you know ... mages! ;)
<3,
Sarielle |
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Our first venture into Tempest Keep ...
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While we didn't quite manage to down Void Reaver, we came very, very close on our fourth and final attempt of the evening, bringing the second boss in Tempest Keep down to 4% before falling to his enrage timer. While Keaton undoubtedly blames a certain mage ;), I blame the realm itself: if it hadn't been for a series of untimely disconnects and a server lock-out, we so would have had him!
There's no reason to be discouraged because we didn't one-shot the so-called "Loot Reaver" on our first night in Tempest Keep. On the contrary, we should be proud of ourselves for making it this far without compromising our values as a guild. We have sacrificed progression in the past to preserve our "fun and friendship first" philosophy, either by divorcing ourselves from members who were more concerned with their personal progress than with the guild's as a whole, or by committing ourselves to our less experienced raiders to ensure that no one who was both receptive to feedback and able to learn was left behind. This isn't an approach that all or even most guilds would take, but I like to believe that it's one of our greatest strengths as a community.
So by all means -- celebrate the successes! We filled an all-guild group (Yes, Saucinator counts! His warlock is guilded, after all ... and some kind of bizarre pet of Neville's? ;) and even managed to let our part-time Shaman raid on his full-time Rogue without sacrificing healing power, something that we have struggled with for quite some time.
Void Reaver is definitely going down next week! Then, it will be on to Serpentshrine Cavern to fish up The Lurker Below (literally), and deeper into both raid instances as we continue to grow and progress.
My friends: Welcome to Tier 5 raiding! |
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Guild First! Hex Lord DOWN on 2/10/08.
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It took two nights of attempts, but Hex Lord Malacrass and his court -- Slither, Alyson Antille, Fenstalker and Koragg -- died at first light this morning.
While all of our raids are team efforts, this one was especially so: one group cleared the avatars on Friday night, and a second took on -- and ultimately defeated -- Hex Lord Malacrass in the early hours of Sunday morning. Zul'jin's days are numbered ... and he knows it!
Oh, and for the record ... Firstade did not pull a Firstade, but Testybones did (leave it to the rogue!), and summoned the wrath of two dozen of Zul'jin's thankfully non-elite minions down upon us while we were celebrating our victory over the Hex Lord. I didn't manage to get a sceen shot of that, so let me just say that never before have I seen so many pretty yellow numbers explode across my screen at one time! I hope Neville had as much fun as I did with the epic AoE.
Finally, speaking of Neville -- and because a picture is worth, well, 140,000 pixels -- this is why Neville > Radmanwagen:
'Grats again, guys! |
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