WoW - My Month of Naxx

Games
1

I first stepped into Naxxramas on March 5th at the MT and leader of a raid. Tonight, thirty one days later, we dropped Kel’Thuzad. This is sort of a retrospective on my experiences in my month of raiding Naxxramas. I know clearing KT is no big deal; but I’m pretty proud of our little group.

The raid was a joint effort between the guild I’m in with 2 other friends (the Thunder Bluff Royal Navy) and a guild several of our offline friends and acquaintences are in. It was the so-called “B” group, because the other guild had been raiding Naxx for 2 months already. The raid was made up of three or four members of the “A” raid, as well as a bunch of newcomers - myself included.

The first run: 3/5/09
To say things started off rough is an understatement. The A group had spent the previous month and a half or so basically bouncing off of Grobbulus and Gluth - the theory they had was “if we can clear construct, we can do everything.” I had no such illusions, my intention was to do the easy stuff first to get people geared up to take down the harder quarters. We had to PUG a few slots, and we ended up getting started probably an hour late, I’d say.

So there we are, at the entrance of spider quarter. We AOE down the little tiny guys, and then it’s time for the first pull. I go in, in within ten seconds I’m dead. WTF!?!?! Wipe.

We regroup, figure maybe we missed some debuff or poison or something. After all - raiding is hard. We pull again and… WIPE!

I wonder if you can figure out what was going wrong…

After the third wipe we figure “Man, this is hard. Let’s go over to Construct Quarter - half of us have done the early pulls in there already.” I start figuring burn order, there are four constructs ahead of me and I’m soliciting the opinion of folks on which ones to kill first.

“Wait, there’s only supposed to be two,” says one of the group’s old hands.

“You are a fucking idiot!” one of my friends yells into Vent. To this day I think this is the first, last, and only time I’ve heard his voice in Vent - for some reason he’s allergic to microphones.

Figure it out yet? “Out of the instance everyone!” I command. Once we’re all out I set the difficulty away from Heroic, and we head back in.

Trash pulls were suddenly much easier! Before long we were at Anub’Rekhan. We bounced off him once - for at least one healer it was his first time in Naxx, and he underestimated the sheer DPS I’d be taking. For my part - I was really nervous about this fight. I’d been tanking for maybe a month or two total; I’d only done a handful of heroics - I studied up on that one fight more than any other fight in the game. I was convinced I’d fuck it up. I didn’t though - he went down easily on the second try; and I don’t think we’ve wiped on him since.

We were on to Faerlina! We one shotted her; honestly the fight was easy. I went down on the second enrage - again I think the healer wasn’t ready for the level of incoming DPS I’d take. Our OT picked her up beautifully though; and I watched the second half of the fight from the sidelines. It was an awesome thing to see; the OT picked her up beautifully and carried the fight to its conclusion - a theme that would be repeated more than once in our Naxx runs.

At this point we were approaching midnight server time, which was when the raid was scheduled to end. Rather than push on to Maexna, we opted to go try to take down Patchwerk. Trash pulls in Construct Quarter took a while; we didn’t quite make it to Patchwerk before the raid broke up for the night.

All in all I wasn’t unhappy. After the Heroic SNAFU things settled down and went quite smoothly. I was no longer a raiding newb.

The A raid bounced off of Maexna that night before going to drop Patchwerk.

2

The second run: 3/12/09

“We’re the B group,” I told my raid at the beginning of the run. “The B stands for Better than A”. I’d decided that we were going to beat the A group. They had better gear, and more experienced raiders - but that didn’t matter. We’d fight smarter, and we’d clear more than them. And we did. I’m sure my silly pontificating about being better than A didn’t mean much, but I like to think it provided just a little extra motivation.

Back into the Spider Quarter! We one shotted our way through it. We even dropped Maexna on our first try - something that, up to this point, neither raid had accomplished. But that wasn’t enough - it was on to Plague Quarter. This was a first for both raids - none of us had been in there before. Noth went down like the joker he is, and it was on to Heighan. We wiped on the first attempt at the Heighan dance, and dropped him on our second try. That one was lots of fun - about halfway through his health bar we were down to the OT, a healer, and a pair of DPS. They took their sweet time at taking Heighan from about halfway to zero - but they thought of their dead friends, and did us the favor of dancing for our entertainment. Repeatedly with us cheering them on.

The Loatheb Gauntlet intimidated us, so we opted to skip it and go take down Patchwerk before calling it a night. We did so, one shotting Kel’Thuzad’s morbidly obsese buddy - a first time kill for some of us.

The A-group cleared Spider a while after us - we ran ahead of them the whole night. They dropped Noth, but skipped out on Heighan before heading to Patchwerk. Just as I’d assured my group - we were better than A that night. We cleared more bosses, and we cleared them faster.

The third run: 3/19/09

“Someone’s getting their T7 shoulders tonight,” I assured the raid as we began. “I’m not going to say who though, that would ruin the surprise.” Loatheb awaited us.

That third week was a bit rougher than the awesome run we’d had the week before. One of our healers abruptly decided he was done with WoW until December. This left us to PUG a healer, never an easy task. It was nearly 45 minutes into the scheduled run before we got started, and throughout the night we were having DPS drop in and out on us. Spider Quarter went down quickly, as it always does. Then it was on to Plague Quarter. At this point we’d had to find two replacement DPS’s - finally settling on taking a third tank as a warm body (the husband of one of our regular members). We started clearing Plague Quarter - this time only one person died on the Heighan Dance. Then it was on to Loatheb - if you look through the archives, you can find my post pleading for advice on how to handle the Loatheb gauntlet. We wiped twice on Loatheb. Each time was agonizing - we knew our DPS was pretty anemic, owing to a combination of less well-geared players and two more tanks than the fight required. On the first attempt we had him down to about 47% health on Inevitable Doom #18 when we wiped - this one didn’t count though; I’d forgotten the gate would shut and I locked out our Shadow Priest and the Hunter’s pet. Our second attempt was the real heartbreaker - 4.4% health remaining; Inevitable Doom 21 and we went down.

Something was different about the third attempt - he was going down way faster. I don’t really know what we did differently - maybe we were more on the ball about popping spores, maybe we managed our cooldowns better, something. Either way I could tell that this was the one. Loatheb went down - and just as I’d assured my raid, one of us got their T7 shoulders. In this case, it was our Retadin.

B was better than A once more - A decided not to go any further than Heighan.

The fourth run: 3/26/09-3/27/09

This was the prelude to our final clear of Naxramas. Our Thursday run was like clockwork - we got started on time and one shotted our way through both Spider and Plague Quarters. There really was nothing of note here - what can you say when you are chewing through everyone. Even the Loatheb Gauntlet went more smoothly, as we incorported some of the advice we got here on qt3 (thanks guys!)

We hit Patchwerk too that night, and it was a real demonstration of how far our group had come in reacting to adversity. The pull got messed up (by me); I was the Hateful Strike tank and wasn’t in range to take the first one. It landed on the MT (the only person who had any aggro), who promptly exploded. I picked Patchwerk up, but before one of our Druids could get a battle-rez in a Hateful Strike landed on the retadin. By that point the other tank was back up. We recovered, and took Patchwerk down.

Two weeks earlier, that would have been a wipe. On that night, owing to a combination of better skill, coordination, and gear - it was just another one shot.

I was out of town on Friday, but the MT healer (who posts here and will hopefully add his thoughts and impressions) rallied the troops for another go. Raz apparently gave them a bounce while the tanks learned their trade, but they then one shotted Gothik and Four Horsemen.

A group ran two nights as well - I guess they finally realized that the B group was showing them up. But they didn’t bring their A game (hah!) - apparently they bounced off of Raz a few times and gave up, opting to go drop Patchwerk instead.

Like I said, hopefully the healer who posts her can add more.

3

The Fall of Naxxramas: 4/2/09 - 4/5/09

The week before the raid had cleared three out of four quarters of Naxxramas. Only Construct Quarter remained - but we knew it would be our greatest challenge. The original raid group had started raiding in early January, and had bounced off of Grobbulus more times than I can count. And when they got past Grobbulus, Gluth stopped them.

Thursday night we decided to drop Plague and Military Quarters. The reason for this was twofold. First - more T7 gear. Second, we can drop Spider Quarter in our sleep, at this point - I knew that Construct Quarter would be our bane. As usual, we one shotted our way through Thursday night. I was impressed with how easily we dispatched the Military Quarter - those fights are a little funky for the tanks, and we one shotted all of them.

The A group, in the meantime, had finally found its game. They went through Construct Quarter, Spider Quarter, and Noth before the night was through. Two months of banging their head against Grobbulus paid off, as they one shotted Patchwerk, Grobbulus, and Gluth. They moved on to Spider Quarter and cleared it, and then took down Noth for good measure. They were in the lead, and had cleared the hardest wing.

We resumed Friday night at 9PM Server Time. Patchwerk went down in one shot, as usual - a textbook kill. Then it was on to Grobbulus - the first time many of us (myself included) had faced him.

It’s kind of funny what a difference one month makes. I sweated Anub’Rekhan like nothing else. Grobbulus is a far more difficult fight, more demanding of everyone - tank, healers, and DPS - and yet I was confident in the raid. We’d bounce a few times, but we’d beat him.

And bounce we did! It took us five attempts to down Grobbulus. Like the first time we downed Loatheb - on the final attempt, something just clicked. It wasn’t one of those fights were it’s a close thing at the end - we just smacked the crap out of him. I think we had better coordination with dropping poison clouds.

It was time to face Gluth - a boss none of us in the raid had ever defeated. Gluth took us three attempts to down. As is the case for most raids - the trick was figuring out the kiting. We had a mage doing the kiting, and the first attempt ended pretty disastrously. The second attempt was, if possible, worse - tons of zombie chow got through. At that point we flipped around healing assignments, to make sure our burliest healers were on the kiters. We also had two mages trade off kiting, to allow the stacking debuff to wear off. Gluth went down, literally as he hit his enrage timer.

We wiped on the way to Thaddeus - ambushed by a shade who managed to pull a patrol, who pulled a nearby static spawn. Once we recovered, we entered Thaddeus’s chamber. “We’re going to see Sapphiron tonight,” I PMed the leader of the A raid - a good friend of mine. “We’re going to kill Kel’Thuzad,” he replied. By that point the A raid had burned through plague quarter and was working its way through Military Quarter. As much as I hoped otherwise, I knew he was right. Even though the B raid had lead the way, the first Kel’Thuzad kill would go to them.

Thaddeus took us two attempts. I’m sure there’s a raid out there who downed him on their first try - we’re not that raid. Even the second attempt was a typical SNAFU. On a lot of fights where only one tank is required I have the OT tank the boss while I switch into Unholy presence to give a bit more DPS. This was to be one of those fights. Unfortunately, my tankadin friend took a swim. I picked him up, and we began the burn process. It was slow - we lost a few DPS, and as soon as the other tank got up to the platform he was electrocuted to death. We burned him though - a two shot. Now, only Spider Quarter lay between us and Frostwyrm Lair. It was 2 AM, server time. None of us were going to stop before taking a crack at Sapphiron.

Spider Quarter was… a cakewalk. We ripped through it, until Maexna. When we got to her - through some combination of hubris and punchiness (it was nearly 1AM on the West Coast for much of us, nearly 3AM server time where our Retadin lives) we wiped. We recovered, and downed Maexna on the second shot (in record time, according to DBM). The way to Frostwyrm Lair was open.

The A raid had bounced off of Sapphiron a few times, but they’d dropped her. At this point they were doing battle with Kel’Thuzad - wiping on him over and over again. I was exhausted - I’d been playing for six hours at this point, far longer than I typically did. All of us were tired; you could hear it in our voices in Vent and in the typos in Raid Chat. We went over the fight, and stepped into Frostwyrm Lair. Since this was a one tank fight, and I figured we’d need every ounce of DPS, I told the OT to go ahead and take her.

We one shotted her. I mean we just obliterated her - she didn’t stand a chance. The A group was still bouncing off of Kel’Thuzad. We still had a chance.

We couldn’t do it though. We took two shots at Kel’Thuzad that night, both ended when I was caught in a fissure. I was just too tired to pay attention to everything that was going on. During our first attempt, I recieved a triumphant message from the A group’s main tank. They’d done it.

We weren’t going to fail though. We’d come so far - there was absolutely no way we were not going to destroy Kel’Thuzad. I proposed we take him down on Sunday night. All but one of the raiders could make it. We lost our shadow priest, but we got our Feral Druid back - he was normally one of our top DPS, but had missed Thursday and Friday.

4

The End: 4/5/09

“Kel’Thuzad must be stopped. No matter the cost.” So read my guild’s MOTD this morning. I’m a big nerd, and nothing fires me up like quoting Optimus Prime. One month to the day after our Naxx run began, we stepped into the floating citadel. This time we went straight to Frostwyrm Lair, and into Kel’Thuzad’s chamber.

“This is the end of the road, Kel’Thuzad!” I had my toon yell as the battle began. Another Transformers quote. Yeah, it’s from Hot Rod - sue me; it’s the one cool moment he ever had.

I know some raiders who get pissy and frustrated at wipes. I don’t - wiping is how you learn. Every time we wiped on Kel’Thuzad, I asked “what happened there?” I wanted to make sure that we never lost the same way twice. EVentually we’d eliminate all the flaws in our strategy and execution. Our first attempt went quite well - though we lost one DPS quite early on in the fight. We got him down to about 10% health, which was awesome. The final moments of that fight are incredibly hectic - in this case, we’d been steadily losing DPS as the fight went on. To be honest I can’t recall what dropped us - there are so many things that can break you in that fight. We got close though; closer than I’d imagined.

The second attempt was a bit of a disaster. In my opinion (based on fighting Kel’Thuzad maybe a half dozen times) the first 30 seconds or so after Kel’Thuzad goes active are key. If you can drop the final trash and get into position on him, the fight becomes rather mechanical. On this run, we didn’t do that - people were out of position, frost blast chained, and the wipe happened quickly. It was just me, a couple DPS, and Kel’Thuzad sitting at about 76%. “I’ve got him right where I want him!” I shouted. Then I died. In this case, what had screwed us was positioning - the healers weren’t able to cover one another without moving, and when the frost block hits there’s just no time to move.

I screwed us on the third attempt. We lost a DPS early due to chaining frost blocks, but we were doing OK. Until I tripped over a fissure. One of the healers called OOM, I glanced away - to the healer’s mana bar of all things; as if maybe I"d find out he was just joking or something. A fissure popped up, and BOOM that was that. By the time I realized what was happening, it was over.

Before the fourth attempt, I got everyone to pause in Sapphiron’s lair. The big circle there is pretty close in layout to the one in Kel’Thuzad’s chamber. We spent maybe five, ten minutes going over positioning. Rather than everyone find an open spot we decided that we’d just have static positions everyone would move to when Kel’Thuzad went active. I’d call break, everyone would circle up.

Something was different on that fourth run - I could feel it. We were burning him faster and harder than ever before. We lost one person early, but the feral druid smoothly battle res’d. We poured it on to him - 50%, 45% and then the adds came up. The off tank picked them up perfectly, moving into the position we’d deliberately left open for that purpose. 40%. 30%. We lost our hunter. “Tighten up!” one of the healers ordered. I was tanking my heart out the whole fight - rolling every cooldown I had, strangulating and interrupting whenever they were off cooldown to make the healer’s life easier. The less healing I needed; the more healing went to the raid. 20%. 10%. He was going down fast. I glanced up at the OT’s health bar, to see how he was weathering the damage from the Guardians. I knew that so long as they weren’t yet angry enough to really hurt him, we were going to win.

And then - disaster.

It was a fissure - but not beneath me. It was beneath a healer, the one closest to me. He stepped away from it, but in doing so stepped closer to me. A frost block chained onto me. A second later, I was done. Kel’Thuzad was at 9.6% health. The raid was now missing the MT, one DPS, and one healer.

“Jaq, pick him up!” I shouted into Ventrillo. If Kel’Thuzad could be stopped from instantly dropping another healer, we had a chance. As he had so many times before, the OT grabbed Kel’Thuzad beautifully. I watched the numbers tick down. 9.2. 8.7. 8. 7.5. I called them out in Ventrillo, cheering every bit of damage the raid poured on. Another Frost Block landed, this time on one of the healers. The last remaining healer decided it was go time, and focused entirely on the tank. At 4 I knew we had him. I cheered every last bit of DPS, finally giving out a huge shout when he went down. On our fourth attempt of the night, our sixth total - one month to the day after first stepping foot in Naxxramas - we cleared it. I tabbed over to my music player and kicked off “The Touch” and blasted it for about ten seconds. Yes, more Transformers geekery.

Raiding has been a fun experience. I poo-pood the concept for a long time - the incessant grind, doing the same shit over and over just to get a marginal gear upgrade so you can go do some other shit over and over again, DKP nonsense… And maybe the grind will wear at me. But this past month has been amazing fun. The group has grown together - overcoming obstacles, bonding, having a good time. In my mind this has been WoW at its finest.

I think we’ll be taking some time off this week - we’ll probably run Naxx, but not three nights. Week after that it will be back to work. We’ll gear up, start really farming it. Malygos won’t last very long. By then hopefully Ulduar will have landed, and we’ll be able to do it all over again.

5

As the guy who was healing Jeff through all this, as well as having been around for the raid attempts previous to the A/B split, I’ll give a little more from the other side.

I started running with my DPS DK, where, as Jeff said, the thought was to start in Construct to see how well we’d do. We plowed through Patchwerk fairly easily, only wiping a few times while learning the fight. Grobbulus destroyed us, though (I think he’s really more of a gear check than Patchwerk in addition to the coordination aspect) and when we finally got him down Gluth annihilated us.

By that point we had enough folks with 80 toons to split into the two raids. Only a few of us went over to the B raid, and I swapped out to my resto Druid to heal Jeff’s DK since we work really well together. The other healers we got from the pool were also top notch, which really helped because with the exception of our feral Druid Jeff mentioned, our DPS was lackluster, some of the lower end of the guild trough.

One thing that really helped us was some fantastic PUGged members we got. In particular was a DPS DK that we had for several weeks, until she disappeared from the server. There were a few others as well, mad props go to a Hunter who filled in while Jeff was away on the Friday run and filled us in on how to beat Gothik and the Horsemen. Meanwhile the A group had fairly disastrous luck when they had to PUG (which was less often, they typically have a full raid group before we do for various reasons, some of which I’ve complained about), including a spacey healer and a mage who ninja’d some loot and then left the raid.

When we ended up taking on Raz sans Jeff as a tank, I was fortunate enough to have been part of a 25 man run on my healer the previous weekend, and saw how the fight went. Raz is particularly easier on 10 man than 25, not just because you don’t need shadow priests (who aren’t used to tanking) but because you could actually SEE Raz because of the lack of a mob scene around him.

Our run at him went pretty smoothly, especially considering that the 25 man bounced on him (due to a lack of hit-capped spriests). The following week when Jeff was back, we lined up him and our spriest (who had been in the 25 man) to tank Raz as practice. The one majorly key thing that should be taught about that fight is that the Understudy’s taunt is melee ranged! Several times our tanks were saying “I can’t get him off you!” in the first run we did because they were used to having 30-40 yd range on their taunts. Once that misconception was made clear, we ripped him apart on that and subsequent runs.

I’ll just skip ahead to the end, since Jeff’s really gone into some length here, but he’s absolutely right, that last run clicked. Some folks get a little annoyed with how Jeff can run on about planning out a fight and getting into extravagant detail, but us going into Sapph’s lair to practice really made the difference, I think. Between that and having me call out clock positions on the 1st phase adds, we were a lean, mean, raiding machine.

Also, in order to not let Jeff have all the Transformer nerd fun, on the last attempt I got into Vent, and in my best Optimus voice said, “At the end of this day, ten shall stand; one shall fall.” I was off by about 4 in my estimate, but the sentiment was true.

Just before Grimhoof (Jeff’s DK) took that frost blast, our OT healer called out for an innervate. I hit my Vent button to let him know I’d already hit him with one a few seconds before, which involves me taking my hand off my mouse to hit CTRL on my laptop a foot or so away. I had just started talking when he got hit, which made me whip my hand back to my mouse to try to retarget onto Grim and heal him, so my Vent message no doubt sounded like, “Dar, I just hit you with one OH SHI-”

As he said, Jaq picked up Kel and I threw every HoT I had onto her to try to keep her up and running. I couldn’t see the other side of the room because of the two Guardians’ ever-growing bodies in my face. At about 4-5% the OT healer took a frost blast; I only knew because of the DBM warning since he was on the other side of the tanking press. I had the choice of healing him or sticking with the OT, and sacrificed my shammy buddy for the good of the raid, watching those HoT timers like a hawk and spamming Nourish like I’d gotten Mana from a government bailout.

When it was all over I didn’t kick off any music. I just leaned back in my chair and sat there while others worked on rezzing the raid.

We may not have gotten Kel first, but I think we got him (and Sapphiron) best. We started out with a severe gear and experience gap, but 4 weeks later we were a well oiled machine with a solid core of good players. Even the ones who were looked at as being not that great at first really started to shine. And because we’re not a hardcore, competitive, gets-really-frustrated over wiping/failure raid, we got a lot of learning done, and really bonded as a team. I could certainly go back over to the A raid with their better gear and more hardcore players, but I wouldn’t leave the B squad for the world.

A full T7 set awaits!

6

The heroic difficulty thing reminds me of my first trip to Naxx. I spent a lot of time in MC and BWL and a few runs at AQ40 but never quite got to Naxx in original WoW. About a month before the big pre-Lich King patch that removed old Naxx from the game I got a bunch of friends together and we decided to see how much we could clear just for fun before it went away.

We had heard spider wing was the easy one so we gave that a shot but our tanks had problems kiting Anub so we figured we’d give construct a shot. We had some deaths in the first two rooms and then we got to the round room with the little slimes. The one right before Patch’s room. We spent a good hour on this room.

First we tried kiting the slimes around. People said you’re supposed to keep the entire raid in a group and kite them around while AoE types do AoE. We only had a few AoE types and they just got eaten by slimes. Then we tried the “distract them with one person while everyone runs past” method. It didn’t work as well as expected but about 5 or so people made it through to the other side, including a Shaman who managed to raise the others.

Ok, so now five people are in Patchwerk’s room and the rest (maybe 10-15 people) have run back and are on the other side of the slimes. There are a few more attempts to get people past the slime room but lots of people keep dying and we don’t have a warlock to summon them. So one guy switches to his warlock–who is in Zangarmarsh and needs to meet us in Eastern Plaguelands–while we try to figure out a way to get the warlock over to the other side of the slime room. 20 minutes later I end up dying in the attempt so I run back to the instance. I say look, let me try to blow some tank cooldowns and see how far I can make it through the slime room. I run in and stick to the edge of the room.

And I run right through to Patchwerk’s room without drawing aggro.

The entire time we kept having tanks hit the slimes to try and keep them off of the group, we had never considered the fact that at level 70 we just might be able to run around the outside of the room and completely ignore them.

So there we go, that’s my noobiest WoW story. Grats on your Naxx run :)

7

Grats guys. Sounds like you put alot of effort into it. It’s nice to finally see your efforts pay off.

8

In my first go at Gluth a few weeks ago, I was assigned the role of kiting the zombie chows. Retadins are pretty good for this in 10-man thanks to Righteous Fury (which massively increases your aggro), increased run speed, taunts and an AoE undead stun you can use when things get sticky. We finished the fight, I clicked off RF, then we proceeded to Thaddius.

Unfortunately, my buff addon decided that I really wanted to have RF up all the time, and so I ended up in the fight with the minibosses of Thaddius with RF up. I wasn’t paying much attention to my threat meter, as it is a non-factor most of the time, and I ended up pulling aggro right before a tank swap, leading to a wipe. That was embarrassing.

9

We got our first 10 man Naxx clear on friday. I’d been roped in to taking the Druid to heal so my main still hasn’t cleared Naxx :)

Up until the last couple of runs we’d been clearing out the arachnid and plague (finally adding construct) quarters on one night and doing as much as we could on the second.

This time we went in with 2 healers on the first night, cleared everything we thought we could manage and left the 4 horsemen, saph and kel until the friday night and respecced my druid from Hootkin back to Tree to cover the healing gap.

I’ve only done 4 horsemen once before and on the hunter so healing it was a new experience for me Saph and Kel I’d never done and it took us a fair few efforts to get Saph down pat, Kel killed me almost immediately but fortunately the rest of the group managed to down the git. Malygos then kicked our arses good and proper :D

Grats on the Clear Jeff/Rasputin, sounds like you had as much fun with it as we did.

10

Big congrats! Raiding accomplishments are one of the cool things about this game, despite the negativity that non-raiders usually throw at the subject. It’s fun and satisfying at the same time. And Naxx is a surprisingly fun place to raid, even after you master the fights. Herding cats is no easy task. ;)

To keep things fun, our guild regularly has a good laugh doing messed up things like pulling every single group of adds at once, right before Grand Widow, or only having people on only one side when doing the Gothik fight. There are also the evil things we do to each other like blowing up someone at the frogger crossing, purposefully healing a melee dps on the Patchwerk fight, and running across to someone on the other side right after downing Thaddius.

What’s fun is that even when you finish the task (beating Naxx), now you have more challenges if you choose to accept them, in the form of achievements. After raiding Naxx for quite some time I still haven’t gotten the “Immortal” achievement. I can’t wait either. It’s the one item keeping me from a new mount!

11

There’s actually nothing wrong with this as long as you have three tanks for the fight and they’re not like the worst tanks ever. He’ll only hit the three highest people in threat, even if some other melee has more health.

and running across to someone on the other side right after downing Thaddius.
Apparently Thaddius drops loot or something. I thought the only reason we fought this guy was so we could blow each other up at the end.

After raiding Naxx for quite some time I still haven’t gotten the “Immortal” achievement. I can’t wait either. It’s the one item keeping me from a new mount!
Yeah, Undying is the only thing keeping me from the 10 man mount. Last week we lost it on Sapphiron. Turns out there is a very slight lip around the edge of the room and if you stand on it you will get hit by the bomb thing even though you are a gnome and you’re standing behind an eight foot block of ice that is 3-4 times your height. Looks like this week is our last chance.

12

Pretty exciting! Our guild is hitting Gluth now though we are also stalled on the Four Horsemen (our group composition usually is not ideal for that fight). So basically we are two bosses away from the Frostwyrm Lair. Our first run into Naxx was Feb 16th, so its taken us about 6 weeks to get this far (raiding about twice a week).

13

One of our 10-mans tried the Heroic thing, as well. ;-) Grats on your clear!

14

Grats to you guys! That’s an awesome recap! :)

Malygos can be really tricky, but there’s a few things you can do to make it easier on yourselves.

The first is to get a few people together and practice the “Aces High” daily quest in Coldara. The drakes you ride in that fight have the exact same abilities as the drakes you get in phase 3 of Malygos, so it’s best to become familiar with them before you attempt Maly.

The biggest thing that will determine success or failure is how quickly you complete Phase 1 (100% - 50%). You absolutely need to place the static zones on top of each other for a stacking damage boost. If Malygos eats even one Static Charge, you’ll probably wipe.

There’s a really, really helpful video on tankspot that shows how to position Malygos throughout the fight. At a minimum, your MT should watch it, but it also has helpful advice for players of all roles.

Maly is also a 1-tank fight – bringing an OT is pretty much wasting a spot, and you’ll miss that dps when you’re trying to beat the 10-minute enrage timer. Our normal setup is 1 tank, 3 healers, and 6 dps. Better-geared groups can get away with 2 healers/7 dps, but I don’t suggest that setup to start.

Good luck!

15

We went into EoE right after clearing Naxx just to check it out; we got pwned. It was good that we did, though, since we learned about targeting the sparks and such for the future. We really want to do that fight, though, mainly because it just looks so pretty.

But I think we’ve got a few more Naxx clears to go before we’re going to try it again so that we get folks better geared.

16

EoE is also more about execution than gear. Making sure you get the double sparks in P1 and get through P2 ok. P3 is essentially gearless since you are on drakes. Don’t get me wrong, gear is essential for living and doing decent damage in P1. But P2 and P3 is about people doing the right thing.

We do undergeared alt runs through EoE just because we can do the fight blindfolded at this time (hell I did EoE 4 times on 2 80s last week). I got Black Ice for both my Druid and Hunter in back to back runs!

17

gratz on the clear! :)

Concerning Malygos:
You need to bring the right healers for Vortex. We had originally 2 shammies + 1 pally and raid died in there. Once we had alt priest and druid at 80 the fight became manageable because you need some possibility to heal people in that swirl.

Now we go with a priest / druid + shammy and it’s easy but we are over-geared now and people have mure more HP. :)

Good luck!

18

Yes, primarily it’s our DPS that needs some gearing to help out with the execution learning curve.

19

/cry

I tried that quest and fell to my death in a place where I couldn’t retrieve my body. At the time yet another “known issue.” In any case, I’ve been boycotting the quest, which I’d learned to hate even before my mishap. That it’s Malygos prep is bad news indeed.

20

Pro tip: always position yourself over one of the floating rock platforms up there. There are a few between the quest giver and the place where the drakes patrol. You’ll only fall a few seconds, then you can remount and get a new drake in no time.

Failure still sucks, but not nearly as much as it does when you fall for freaking ever and die.