Lifeshadow

Rez Incoming

gillir — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 16:11:22 +0000

Well, it’s been awhile hasn’t it? Surprisingly I’m still getting views, mostly for a Healing Enchants post I wrote during BC which is outdated now. I thought I’d drop in and do a little update. Maybe I can get back to regular posting, but there are no guarantees.

Since Wrath hit I’ve been tanking, but over the weekend I decided to go back to resto. After healing a few heroics and Vault, I have to say that resto is where Gillir belongs. I enjoy healing with him much more than tanking. Not to say that I wasn’t a competent tank: I was able to tank our guild’s first CoS timed run and I was the hateful strike tank on Patch. I pulled together some good gear and kept the bad guys on me (most of the time). But, as the saying goes, the heart wants what the hearts wants, so resto it is. Thankfully, my guild is very understanding and we really stick to our credo of doing what you find fun instead of dictating specs and roles.

I went with this build: 14/0/57. After pulling together rep gear, LW gear, and pieces I had picked up in runs, I was able to get a little over 1600 healing in tree form. And returning to healing was easy play-wise: the muscle memory is still there, although there are some slight changes to rotation: threading in Wild Growth, using Regrowth a little more to proc Nature’s Grace and Living Seed, and wondering if I should be using Nourish more than I do. The only issue I’m concerned about is my mana regen (as well as overhealing which doesn’t help in the mana department).

So, it’s good to be back to resto and good to be back on the blog. The former will certainly continue; we’ll have to see about the latter.

A Pleasant Surprise

gillir — Sat, 01 Nov 2008 05:04:50 +0000

Imagine my surprise when I logged in earlier this evening to discover this:

I know, I know…another resto druid with Challenger; but still, I’m happy to have it.

Gillir the Tank Debuts

gillir — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 20:07:43 +0000

I should have posted on this sooner, but I’ve been rather busy as of late with mid-term grading. Anyway, the title pretty much explains it: Gillir did his first tanking this past Saturday. We had some folks wanting to run Headless Horseman and none of our tanks were on, so I volunteered to respec and tank for the night. Headless Horseman is not that tough of a fight either, so its ease allowed me some comfort in getting accustomed to tanking. I have to say that I held aggro every fight (10 times we did it since it was everyone’s first night). One mistake I made (once) was not going bear soon enough and so HH hit me in night elf form. Then the one and only time the adds spawned, they got our warlock before I could get them on me. Our healer said I did a great job, so I guess I did. I’m looking forward to tanking again.

Swift Flight Quest No Longer Necessary?

gillir — Tue, 21 Oct 2008 20:36:51 +0000

Whilst perusing the 3.0.3 notes here, I saw this entry:

“The Swift Flight Form is now available on the trainer at level 71, requiring 300 riding skill, and Flight Form learned.”

So there will be those bemoaning how easy this makes the form to get (and that would be a correct judgment). But it does make sense: finding 4 Death Knights who are willing and keyed to run Heroic Sethekk is bound to be a pain. I’m glad I was able to experience the quest line (and doing the run with a warrior and 3 other druids was definitely an exercise in patience and determination). Too bad new druids will probably miss out on the quest line, though.

Gorilla Tankadin

gillir — Sun, 19 Oct 2008 20:14:27 +0000

A guildie needed a run through ZF last night so that provided a good opportunity to test out the gorilla AOE tankage. Now, granted, a 62 hunter and 57 gorilla are obviously overpowered for a low-40s instance, but that also provided for a larger margin of error (which I like to have). The gorilla holds threat quite well. Thunderstomp keeps mobs’ attention and pulls back those that start straying over to me. And we’re talking a 57 pet holding aggro over a 62 hunter, too (although, again, lower-level mobs may be an issue here). Here is his build (from memory, so hopefully it’s accurate): http://www.wowhead.com/?petcalc=0uzG0rMz0z. So, as BRK has argued, the gorilla does look to be a viable tanking pet. After the run, I went and tamed a silverback from Stranglethorn and named him Grodd (and now the names for the gorillas in Feralas make sense).

One more thing…

gillir — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 18:23:39 +0000

Another point I should have added to my previous post: the new Shadowmeld truly rocks. In the past when I pulled aggro, I cast Barkskin and hoped for the best. Now I can actually drop the threat (at least temporarily): about time, especially with the way HOTs always pull adds.

Post-Patch Observations

gillir — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 16:10:58 +0000

The dust has settled and we’re getting used to the new normal. Gillir healed a guild run in Heroic Shadow Labs. Healing is 1022 now (was around 1900 pre-patch). I kept with the traditional rotation of stacking Lifebloom, but would throw in a Wild Growth when there was splash damage. I’m still getting a handle on where W.G. fits in: should it be part of a rotation or purely situational? Here are my numbers from WWS (which is a little wonky because it hasn’t been updated yet): http://wowwebstats.com/1tdeoljks3csk?a=xb8fcd0 (we one-shotted Blackheart instead of the 15 tries listed).

As you can see, Lifebloom made up half of my healing, so that’s pretty much the same as pre-patch. WIld Growth averaged for 353 a tick, a little more than Lifebloom at 318. Living Seed averaged for 1350. Glyph of Rejuvenation averaged for 606 (I should be more mindful of using Rejuv when the target is below 50%.) Moving at normal speed in tree is nice (especially in a fight like Blackheart where folks get out of range a lot). Having roots as a CC indoors=awesome. And Revive: we had two druids and no other rezzes and being able to OOC rez helped out so much, thank you, Blizz! So, my first healing after the patch went quite well.

I got some time to try the hunter out too: I am really enjoying the changes. She’s running with a chimera (named Smaug, I’ll have a screenshot up later). A Cunning pet, which I am liking, DPS looks good, although I do need to get the kitty back out and see how the changes are working for him. No Tenacity pet: BRK is making a strong case for a gorilla, so I might go with that.

And Tsoai has been stuck in the city powerleveling Inscription: he’s at 347, and since 350 is about as high as you can go now, he can start doing other things and try out the enhancement abilities.

So Much to Do, So Little Time to Do It

gillir — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 18:42:09 +0000

When I was finally able to get on last night right before 9:00 the first thing that popped up was “SERVER RESTART 15:00.” Darn it! I had enough time to get Gillir specced and the new action bars (Dominos) fixed. About a hour later, I get back in, spec Outshined, fix her bars, spec Tsoai, fix his bars, get him to Exodar, train spells, train Inscription, then the server goes down. And that was it for the rest of the night. I’ve got stacks and stacks of herbs and am ready to powerlevel Inscription, but need time to do it! Oh well, hopefully tonight will be better.

Addon Hell Tomorrow?

gillir — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 19:15:25 +0000

Supposedly the patch is tomorrow and I am dreading having to deal with the addons. I’m almost tempted to start from scratch with them. I know there are some must-haves, like Grid, but so much of what I have isn’t really necessary. And since I’ve played in Beta with the basic interface, I know I don’t need a lot of what I use. I guess I’ll wait to see what breaks and what works tomorrow.

One Year at 70

gillir — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 16:12:38 +0000

A year ago today, Gillir, my first character, hit 70. Since then, I’ve been on my guild’s first kills of The Curator and up in Kara and 3/4 bosses in ZA. Epic flight? Check. Shaman alt has hit 70 and the hunter will hopefully be there before the expansion. Quite a year.