True Confessions of a Frost Mage

[Alram]

While many of my remarks concern the Lurker guild on Terenas, there are some items of general interest and so I'm posting it here in the Crossroads.

I have been playing World of Warcraft since last December, and yet I do not have a single level 60 character. My highest level character is a level 58 Frost Mage whom I virtually never play. He languishes in EverLook, Winter Spring buying tailoring recipes and mailing them to my auction alt to sell. Why in the world did I ever take a mage in the first place as my main character? And why am I not playing the mage now?

I started the mage and kept with him for two reasons. First of all I noted that he killed much faster. Secondly the mage addressed my biggest complaint about the game. The lack of waypoints for instant teleportation coupled with the long time it takes to travel from place to place sometimes drives me up the wall. The mage's ability to essentially set four waypoints (three capital cities and a home) were the deciding factors in sticking with the mage initially.

History
In the early days on Terenas in the only lurkers with whom I could quest regularly were either Sir Die A Lot or Concillian. Sir Die A Lot, in fact, taught me the ropes when I was a Newb. At some point, most of the leveling with my mage was done in the company of Concillian, a priest. We worked out an effective method of doing area of effect damage which helped us to level quickly. As there were only two of us, instances always had to be run with pickup groups. Some nights we couldn't get a pickup group started at all for the instance we wanted to run. Occasionally we were in a good group, and other times it was not so good. I never finished Uldaman, Maraudon, or the Sunken Temple, and never even entered any of the higher level instances.

When Vor Lord, Bone Mage, Voiceman and the other Terenas newcomers arrived, I started playing some of my lower level characters so that I could keep them company and run instances together with them. I had a lot of fun and finally one night I brought out my mage for a Princess run. We wiped. Part of the reason we wiped was because of a communication problem between my mage and Vor Lord's priest. At one point while we were fighting Princess, she headed right at my mage, and I had to blink away in order to keep from getting hurt. Vor Lord yelled at me that I was now out of range of his healing spells. Therefore when it was safe to do so I ran back to my original position. However, unbeknownst to me, Vor Lord simultaneously ran toward my new position, so that I effectively remained out of range of his healing. Being completely out of practice with the mage I neglected to cast a barrier when Princess attacked me again a bit later on. The mage died and that led to a chain reaction in which the whole party wiped. I felt somewhat responsible, and that has inhibited me from playing the mage again a party.

Pickup Group Mage Party Play
There aresome interesting differences in the style of party play I had to develop when I was doing pickup groups with the mage from the style of party play demanded in the Lurker group. I therefore have to make several adjustments in my play style now that I will be partying with Lurkers.

Sheep
In a pickup group if they are any melee characters near your sheep target they will often break the sheep. As a result I learned that if a mob had to be sheeped at the start of a pull, it was best if I did the pulling with my poly spell. I also learned that sheeping adds was not always a wise idea because invariably somebody attacks the sheep and breaks it even when they've been told multiple times that I would be sheeping adds.
Area of Effect
I died many times casting area of effect spells in pickup groups. Even after waiting a reasonable amount of time for the tank to lock down the elite mobs, and after informing the healer what I was about to do, sometimes I would still die. I therefore tended to restrict myself to casting area of effect spells only on mobs which did not contain any elites.
Aggro Management
A good warrior can be hard to find. A mage in a pickup group has to be extra cautious in his choice of spells and the timing of spells. Of course even with a good warrior one needs to make sure that the mob has been locked down, but a good warrior sure can help a mage be more effective

Frost Mage vs. Fire Mage
Magead (pronounced mage-ee-ad) is a Frost mage. When he soloes, he kites mobs. His play is very repetitive and predictable. (It can get boring -- another reason I stopped playing him for a while.) He seeks to control the enemy before killing. Kherg's mage, Octord, is a fire mage. I imagine he just blasts the hell out of mobs when he soloes. It is actually kind of neat that we have one each of the two basic mage types in our level 50s Terenas group.

Altitis
Of course another reason I haven't been playing Magead is that I get excited about some other character build which is new to me. Once I master one character build I have a tendency to want to go on to the next.

A couple of days ago in a thread on the Meetings Stone forum I said that I would not be playing Magead anymore in the foreseeable future. In retrospect I think that would be a mistake. I believe the adjustments in play style I will have to make in the Lurker parties will help keep my experience interesting and hopefully I will be able to make a good contribution to the party dynamics and success.

[vor_lord]

Part of the reason we wiped was because of a communication problem between my mage and Vor Lord's priest.  At one point while we were fighting Princess, she headed right at my mage, and I had to blink away in order to keep from getting hurt.  Vor Lord yelled at me that I was now out of range of his healing spells.  Therefore when it was safe to do so I ran back to my original position.  However, unbeknownst to me, Vor Lord simultaneously ran toward my new position, so that I effectively remained out of range of his healing.  Being completely out of practice with the mage I neglected to cast a barrier when Princess attacked me again a bit later on.  The mage died and that led to a chain reaction in which the whole party wiped.  I felt somewhat responsible, and that has inhibited me from playing the mage again a party.   

bonemage and I were quite upset over this wipe, and blamed ourselves entirely. We didn't discuss any strategy before the fight, and did not position the tank correctly (back against the wall). As the healer, I did not position myself correctly or move correctly. Not once did it cross my mind that your mage play was the cause for the wipe. I do not think it was at all your fault and I apologize that you thought so and have been avoiding the mage since then.

A couple of days ago in a thread on the Meetings Stone forum I said that I would not be playing Magead anymore in the foreseeable future.  In retrospect I think that would be a mistake.  I believe the adjustments in play style I will have to make in the Lurker parties will help keep my experience interesting and hopefully I will be able to make a good contribution to the party dynamics and success.
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Please play whatever character you wish -- at the time I suggested it might make things a bit easier to bring Magead (by the way, thanks for telling us how to pronounce that ;) ) I had no idea you weren't liking the mage, or why. I understand that you also dropped your warrior for a similar reason, but I thought you were doing an excellent tanking job and didn't understand that either.

With all this said, I must make a confession as well -- what sounds like a heated discussion (for example yelling about you being out of range) probably isn't what it seems. I apologize for being excitable, but it is all in the interest of trying to do things right. bonemage and I post-analyze all of our wipes and try to identify the cause so that if we see a trend or a tactic that needs changing, it can be fixed. Most often lately if we can identify a person who made a wiping mistake, it has been me. I don't think you start learning much about being a healer until Uldaman, which is the first instance with LoS problems and knockdown effects to worry about. I'm still making adjustments and will continue to make mistakes. I'll continue to cause wipes. So will others -- it's how the game works. I might point out whose mistake it was (especially if it's mine, like vs. Gor'Shak on Friday), but I never want to give the impression that someone has "failed" the group when they make a mistake, or make anyone uncomfortable playing a certain character.

And you didn't even make any mistakes from my point of view -- but to the extent that you thought you did, know that even IF you did, I would never want this to affect what character or role you want to play. I apologize that it has.

And if that made any sense, my hat is off to you for following such a convoluted speech :rolleyes:

I have so enjoyed playing with all the Lurkers and I would take any of you, playing any class, any time, over anybody. In particular, I am very grateful to Alram for taking in our little group of Doomhammer refugees (with a couple of excitable blowhards to boot) and teaching us a lot about the game we didn't know.

/salutes Alram

[Treesh]

My thoughts on this is basically I just want you (and everyone else on my servers) to have fun. You bring whatever character you want to the party, even if it isn't "optimal" for whatever we're doing. Some of the most fun I've had in this game is doing things with sub-optimal groups. It forces you to develop other tactics, other strategies and doesn't get repetitive. :)

About wipes and blames. Most of the time, I look to my own actions first before I start thinking about what "bad" things others have done. Most of the lurkers I enjoy playing with end up doing the same thing so there's tons of apologizing all around. Of course, there really aren't that many wipes to begin with which is good because we'd probably drive each other nuts with too many apologies. ;) I try not to be too critical of the healers in the groups I'm with because I tend to be a bit harsher about healing than about anything else so I keep my mouth shut rather than saying too much and discouraging any budding healers now. Healing is what I know best (despite how little I actually healed in tonight's UBRS run :whistling: ) so I tend to go a bit overboard when I see others healing at less than optimal hitpoints to mana usage. If you play in crappy groups at lower levels (or try to take on more than you really should in small groups ;) ), you will learn more healing tricks well before Uldaman. That's unfortunately something that kind of hurts a lot of lurker healers - we get spoiled from the get-go with people who know how to play their characters. :) Aleri has been doing more with pickup groups lately simply because I really don't have to heal much in the lurker/avarice groups. I even let the warriors stay in berserker stance if they feel like it because it presents more of a challenge. I've even been playing tank priest with her again simply because I'm not needed as a healer and oddly enough, she tanks better than she DPS's. ;) Or maybe I just have more fun tanking with her than DPSing with her. :D

Anywho. The whole point of my post now that I'm done rambling is that if there's anything I can do to make any of your characters feel fun to you again, let me know. It's a terrible feeling (for me) having to shelve a character, especially the higher level ones, due to boredom with them. And sometimes all you need is a short break from them.

[Kevin]

General responses.

Yeah in lurker 5 mans you can expect your sheeps to not be broken and if I had a tank on Terenas I would just let you detect magic on it, charge, clap, let you sheep and then go on my merry way letting you resheep if we still have mobs. Heck if Meowry is tanking it won't be much different. I do remember a few times back in RFK with Mageand way back when.

Aggro shouldn't be as hard to manage. The tanks we have on Terenas are good tanks when I've played with them. I know I've had to adjust my hunter play to not be the tank anymore with him. And of course with all the tanking I do on Stormrage I do have "loose mob tank it!" mentality. So I will zip Meowry over to a free mob when I shouldn't sometimes. I've forgotten to turn growl off and I've stolen aggro for the tanks and I know from when I was tanking how annoying that can been when you aren't expecting it.

It feels very "lurkerish" for everyone to blame themselves for wipes. Well all seem to analyze what happened and find the flaws in what we did. I've caused my share of wipes but I've also saved my share of wipes and I've thought I was the reason for a wipe when I wasn't. I think that is a mark of a good player, but yeah a short discussion afterwards can really help clear things up.

As for what to play. I am a staunch defender of play what you want to and we'll make it work. Of course since I love all my alts I'm also willing to switch out to whatever may be needed. Though some days I will say, no I want to play Gnolack or Taranna or Balador (my 60's on Stormrage). I don't really have the alts in the range of other lurkers on Terenas right now, except for Marn, but that's cool I love my hunters (I still think the hunter is my favorite class but the Stormragers never get to see me play one. :).

But if you ever feel like playing Magead and I'm around (I'm damn alliance scum now though.... ) just holler. If you want to play Rogoll instead that's cool too.

At least you got pick-up groups for the instances. Treesh and I were sadistic and we duo'd many of them. Though when we started playing again we got lucky and there were all you guys in our level range when we came back so we've had Lurkers to finish out SM and the rest after that.

I am thinking about setting aside another day for Terenas besides just Friday because I'm having a blast over there and Marn was my first character (and he used to be my biggest till my problems set in), he should have been my first 60, not my 4th. But I love all the people on Stormrage too. The problems of altitis on multiple servers with good people. It would be worse right now if I had kept up on Tich as well.... :)

Oh well. Just have fun playing that's the key. If it isn't fun don't do it.

[khgerg]

Frost Mage vs. Fire Mage
Magead (pronounced mage-ee-ad) is a Frost mage.  When he soloes, he kites mobs.  His play is very repetitive and predictable.  (It can get boring -- another reason I stopped playing him for a while.) He seeks to control the enemy before killing. Kherg's mage, Octord, is a fire mage.  I imagine he just blasts the hell out of mobs when he soloes.  It is actually kind of neat that we have one each of the two basic mage types in our level 50s Terenas group.
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Khgerg's character Octord is a warlock. I think you were thinking about Xame's mage Yuri.

[kandrathe]

I felt somewhat responsible, and that has inhibited me from playing the mage again a party.   
...
A couple of days ago in a thread on the Meetings Stone forum I said that I would not be playing Magead anymore in the foreseeable future.  In retrospect I think that would be a mistake.  I believe the adjustments in play style I will have to make in the Lurker parties will help keep my experience interesting and hopefully I will be able to make a good contribution to the party dynamics and success.
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Gosh, I cannot tell you the number of stupid mistakes I've made. I call that gaining experience. But, because I play with some very fantastic Lurkers they seldom result in a wipe. In any PUG, they would have. There are some very key positions in a party that have additional responsibility that if done poorly at any moment will wipe the party. Maybe your actions/miscommunications did contribute to your wipe, but you have obviously learned something from that. It only gets more dangerous as you progress into the higher level instances. For example, in one of our last MC forays I blew a few pulls which resulted in additional angst and death, and I learned somethng from that. I also did some brilliant ones.

[vor_lord]

If you play in crappy groups at lower levels (or try to take on more than you really should in small groups ;) ), you will learn more healing tricks well before Uldaman.  That's unfortunately something that kind of hurts a lot of lurker healers - we get spoiled from the get-go with people who know how to play their characters. :) 
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You have nailed Necrali to a 'T'. I have learned most of my 'tricks' when we are trying to do things quite underleveled, or undermanned. I've only done a couple of PUGs (recent 5 man of LBRS is the only real exception, last ones were Scarlet Monastery and half of RFD). I think I definitely could learn some things from PUGs, but it mostly causes me stress and it's not fun for me, so I avoid them. For example, this LBRS 5 man -- not strictly a PUG, all these guys knew one another -- I was the pickup. We had Teamspeak and everything. But when the two mages have half the damage taken with two warriors in the group, it causes me stress. Those mages died. On several occasions. Doesn't take much when they can be two shotted.

But in general I've been spoiled.

Right now I'm stressed as a healer because in BRD so many people are taking damage (darn Fire elementals AoE!) that I never have time to use my standard Greater Heal on the tank. I'm stuck with Flash Heal + Renew and tossing in some PoH. I therefore have terrible mana regen as I'm nearly constantly casting, and so I run out of mana much faster than I'm accustomed.

And I would like to get healing feedback from others too. Someday, when Mogo and Necrali are actually in the same group that's not a raid, you can help me out :)

[VoiceMan]

I am always a bit reluctant to chime in on threads that deal with tactics and possible causes of wipes, as I'm still very new, and still learn a lot each week. However, I can't help but say, that I was present during that Princess run in Maraudon with Magead, and from my perspective, your mage play was excellent. The whole issue of out of healing range, and the subsequent challenges that followed, to me were simply a miscommunication. Teamspeak helps with alot of that, but won't prevent all of them. I didn't see your mage do anything that alarmed me. As for the yelling from folks such as Vor_Lord and Bonemage...well, I'm their older brother in real life, and I know them well enough to know that they're just excitable people. And believe me, they hold themselves to higher standards of play than anyone else. They are very demanding of themselves first and foremost. So while things get exciting at times on TS, it's usually just the emotion of the game fight in progress, and not a direct attack upon you or anyone else.
On a more personal note, I would not be anywhere near where I am in game if it weren't for Alram. I showed up with some good solid advice from my brothers before starting the game, but due to vastly different schedules, I wasn't able to group with my brothers much until we started SM. I took a hunter from scratch to nearly 57 in a matter of 3 months, and I never would have been able to do that without the help of Alram. In the same time frame, I've also taken a warlock to 27, a druid to nearly 32, and another warlock to 21. Alram has become my main duo'ing partner. Our "Dreaded Druid Brothers" are indeed to be feared. We simply run amuck and stomp the Alliance when we're together in WSG. :P I've had limited experience in PUG's myself, as I've been very spoiled, but the few experiences I have had have taught me that I don't want to be in a PUG most of the time. Our horde Terenas guild plays well, I think. Yes, we're pretty structured and precise in how we do things, but that fits my personality, and also fits with my brothers, as we're all cut from the same cloth. It has a tendency to make us rather strict about party play, but probably because most of the time in a five man group, three of us are related and of like mind, so it tends to be the dominant thought process. Having said all of that, in a round-about way, I'm merely saying that I would take you Alram in a group with me any day, any instance, with any of your characters. I know my brothers and I make suggestions on what character ought to be played in a given group, but I also know them well enough to know that it's just a suggestion, not a direct order. :) We're priviledged to have you part of our weekly group, and in our brotherly discussions regarding the game, we're all in agreement. "We NEVER have to worry about the play of Alram". For that matter, we really don't worry much about the play of anyone in our guild. Our Horde Terenas Lurker group may not be huge, but we are all pretty darn good players, IMO. :) Just my two cents worth, if my opinion is worth even that much. :P

[Alram]

Thank you all for your kind words.

khgerg,
Yes I did mean Xame's mage Yuri. Sorry about that.

Gnollguy,
It would be great if you set aside another night for Terenas. In fact, it would be nice if we had another regular instance night--perhaps one devoted to the folks now in their 20s or 30s.
And yes, the 3 of us did a few runs together. Magead is still wearing the belt he received in RFD with Mogo and Marn.

vor_lord,

I understand that you also dropped your warrior for a similar reason, but I thought you were doing an excellent tanking job and didn't understand that either.

My warrior has the best name of all my Terenas alts and for that reason alone I should play him. Actually I stopped playing Agh for different reasons.

1. I have no trouble tanking when 2 or 3 mobs are involved. But when there is a huge gang of them it is tough for me to get a sunder armor on all of them; I have trouble even getting them all selected. The tab key doesn't really tell me which mob is selected and where that mob is, when there is a big pile of them. Manually selecting each mob is close to impossible with a big crew. I find it stressful.

Now my rogue also has target selection difficulties when there is a huge group of enemies. In some ways the rogue's problems are even worse. First of all he has to get behind his target. Secondly if he has already hit one target there is a reluctance to move off it to another because all combo points will be lost. And if he is in stealth he also moves slower to get to the target who might move somewhere else before the rogue arrives in place. In spite of these challenges, the party's success does not depend on the rogue acquiring his target rapidly, and it is just not stressful like I find the warrior's role to be.

2. I don't like Defensive stance. My 1st warrior was protection specced and he was so slow and boring I couldn't stand it. I deleted him. Agh was a blast with dual wielding. Now if I could stay with dual wielding and never have to use a shield or defensive stance as a warrior, I would like that. That is one reason I like playing a rogue so much. Dual wielding with fast weapons really suits my style.

3. Recognizing the need for Defensive stance, I find it very awkward shifting back and forth between the stances because of the rekeying of the hotbar. Now I don't find it awkward with the druid, so maybe I just need to practice it more.

4. I think the warrior is the most challenging party member to play well, and plays perhaps the most critical role. Often it just suits my personality to play a support character than a director.

5. I am not totally allergic to playing a tank. For instance, my shaman has been the main tank in many instance runs. But he also has filled many other roles and that makes him more fun to play. Incidentally Sharc just recently completed his Scarlet set and I will have to give him more play time for that reason alone.


As I type this, I am wondering how my warrior would do in WSG. I will try that one of these days.

Again thank you all for your words of support and encouragement. It is a true pleasure to play with all of you.

[swirly]

Gnollguy,
It would be great if you set aside another night for Terenas.  In fact, it would be nice if we had another regular instance night--perhaps one devoted to the folks now in their 20s or 30s.
And yes, the 3 of us did a few runs together. Magead is still wearing the belt he received in RFD  with Mogo and Marn.
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I'd just like to chime in that the nights I have the best chance of coming to things are wednesday, friday, and sunday. Now we already have things on friday and I've been all of one time I think so even though they are the best nights for me, I wouldn't say to choose them just for me. I'm pretty unreliable. If there are a couple days that people are trying to decide between though and one happens to fit with the days I said, then maybe it can help sway a little. : )

[Alram]

I'd just like to chime in that the nights I have the best chance of coming to things are wednesday, friday, and sunday.  Now we already have things on friday and I've been all of one time I think so even though they are the best nights for me, I wouldn't say to choose them just for me.  I'm pretty unreliable.  If there are a couple days that people are trying to decide between though and one happens to fit with the days I said, then maybe it can help sway a little. : )
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The best times for me are:
Thursday night
Friday night
Saturday afternoon
Saturday night
Sunday afternoon

[Kevin]

The best times for me are:
Thursday night
Friday night
Saturday afternoon
Saturday night
Sunday afternoon
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Well Sundays were a day I was leaning to since that is currently an "open" day on Stormrage and while I'm a football fan I've got a T.V. by the puters again. :)

The problem with Sundays is that Treesh can't really do anything on them because of her work schedule being 10-7 terenas time Saturday - Wednesday. It would have to be a Thursday or Friday for her. So if I do show up then it won't be with any of our duo's we have there (so no Marn or Takishidu though we are thinking of splitting Taki off from the duo anyway and I think we had another be we haven't played the little ones in soooo long). I might play Marn without Mogo once he gets to 60, but on Stormrage Gnolack and Taranna both got ahead of Aleri and Eth after they hit 56 because I had more play time and the guild/alliance needed the help from them and it felt very very wrong to play them. Gnolack I can play without Aleri now and Taranna is OK on raids but I still don't like to play Taranna in a small group or out in the world without Eth. So I'm not splitting Mogo and Marn until later and if I do it will most likely just be for Marn to grind dragonscales/leather or grind for some of the world drop enchanting or leahterworking patterns for one of us.

Though some of my smaller people could potentially hit instances since we both have soloing toons as well.

[Concillian]

1. I have no trouble tanking when 2 or 3 mobs are involved.  But when there is a huge gang of them it is tough for me to get a sunder armor on all of them; I have trouble even getting them all selected.  The tab key doesn't really tell me which mob is selected and where that mob is, when there is a big pile of them. Manually selecting each mob is close to impossible with a big crew.  I find it stressful.
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Fortunately I like being warrior for half the reasons you dislike it... it's action packed, and a challenge in a group. Even a surmountable challenge in a group setting (unlike being a good healer paired with a poor warrior... in that case there is little you can do)

It just goes back to play what you like, and we will figure out groupings around that. I think we all pretty much feel that way.


If you're interested in how I deal with this situation, I thought I'd mention it:

1) Discord Unit frames addon, then make the debuff icons on the target quite large. You can clearly look for sunder (and how many are stacked) while tabbing through. Also that makes it easier to see hunter's mark, which is another thing I look for as either the target to ignore (see #2) or the target I need to concentrate on if I know the other targets have enough threat built up that the healer won't pull them off.

DUF is awesome, I'm very glad that Bonemage and vor_lord introduced me to it. I have different frame setups for each character because some things are important for one and not for another. Like for warrior, target debuffs are important, but not party debuffs... for priest it is pretty much exactly opposite. Warrior I like to see exactly how much mana others have, but for priest it's not so important, but I want to see 'reverse' HP (Max HP minus current HP,) so I can gauge what rank and type of healing is best suited. With DUF you can customize the frame for each character so that it takes up the least space, by minimizing or hiding unimportant information, and enlarging important information.

2) You can't always hold more than 2 or 3, depends on if your group will let you and how much DPS you have going for you. Sometimes you need to choose who to hold and who not to. If I'm in a group with lots of DPS, I'll charge the first target, taunt it to keep it on me for a few seconds, but then let it go so I can be sure I secure the other targets before the heal comes. That first one is being held off the healer by all the damage being done to it, and that's #1 priority. Plus it's getting DPS piled on so fast, it's going to be dead quick.

We have a great group, who knows to hold back on damage a bit, so you can have time to get 4 or maybe 5 stuck to you, then they can go to town. But that's a luxury. With an impatient PUG group, I'm lucky if I get three, sometimes even 2 is a challenge if people try to pull one off me with a growling pet or a voidwalker.

[Xame]

Wow, a long fun thread.

For Yuri as a fire mage, I have a set number of spells but it does change a bit for each mob. I also need to kite like crazy just like you do with a frost mage. But unlike a frost mage my fireblast is very effective (very high crit ~20% w/ stuns and dots). I normally slow the mob down as best I can with frost nova and a crappy cone of cold and wait on my fireblast timer to put down the real hurt. Sequence is something like fireball, scorch, fireblast, frost nova, fireball, fireblast, cone of cold, blink and start kiting.

For a second instance day, Mon-Thurs. Weekends have too much family stuff that I
cann't make it constistently.

BTW. I took Xame my AH mule out on a Wailing caverns run with the Lurkers. I even took video of it. My play was so embarrassing using only 40% of my hunter's abilities. It was motivation for me to rethink and study up how to play with Lurkers. As you point out the play style and role you have in a pub is so different then when you play with Lurkers that it requires almost a new strategy. Xame as a hunter never pulls in a pub, but with Lurkers the hunters are expected to pull when called upon. Simply put, I had no plan and hit my mage hotkeys which didn't do what I wanted (ah, the pain). It was fun and I thank the Lurkers on the trip for putting up with my play. I'm better now, really :P .

Necrali (vor-lord) you asked for comments on healing.....heal the mage :D This has been an on going ribbing of the priest's expectation that ranged dps, ie mages, should never pull aggro and if they do, they should die for it... :P . Nothing like being fifth of 5 on the healing list (1. main tank 2. melee dps, 3. warlock/hunter because they have no good escapes, 4. Priest 5. mage!). I understand, I just don't like it...just remember that it is the mage that gives their life to save the priest and the party!!

Don't change your play with Necrali, just taking every chance to poke you. It's just hard to get use to; from being first with Smite as main tank to last with Yuri as mage and crowd control.

[bonemage]

The Princess wipe was tank failure, and I'll not likely be swayed to any other school of thought. I had sloppily tanked her twice before and we had still succeeded, so I wasn't too concerned with changing my tactics. Her AoE knockback kept me out of aggro range the entire fight, so I was useless. On future fights with her, I properly backed up to a wall, and we've not failed since.

I'm intense, driven, and obsessed with excellent play, both from the entire party, but most especially from myself. However, I also take having fun quite seriously (explain that) and am concerned with whether or not everyone else is having fun.

We have an excellent guild, filled with great people who play well. It's not always easy to tell if I'm having fun on TeamSpeak, but I usually am, in large part because I know that everyone is playing as hard and as well as they can, and they can be trusted completely with their roles. I will often bark out orders on TeamSpeak, but me barking is not an indicator of fault, just as a way to ensure we have a plan. I've played with 4 of Alram's characters, and each one, though quite different, was always played well. One of the best things our guild has going for it is a Guild Leader who is on quite a bit, is loaded with quest/game knowledge, and is always willing to help whoever needs it, regardless of level. If I've stepped on your fun at times, Alram, I'm sorry, but I've never found fault in your play.

On the topic of another night of the week, it's unlikely that I will be able to regularly make another night with adequate time for an instance run. As I'm out of the picture as an attendee, my opinion doesn't matter much, but I do think the idea of a focus on the mid level characters is a good one.

[Alram]

If I've stepped on your fun at times, Alram, I'm sorry, but I've never found fault in your play.

You never stepped on my fun.

[Treesh]

Necrali (vor-lord)  you asked for comments on healing.....heal the mage  :D    This has been an on going ribbing of the priest's expectation that ranged dps, ie mages,  should never pull aggro and if they do, they should die for it...  :P .  Nothing like being fifth of 5 on the healing list (1. main tank 2. melee dps, 3. warlock/hunter because they have no good escapes, 4. Priest  5. mage!).  I understand, I just don't like it...just remember that it is the mage that gives their life to save the priest and the party!!

Don't change your play with Necrali, just taking every chance to poke you.  It's just hard to get use to; from being first with Smite as main tank to last with Yuri as mage and crowd control.
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I've never been one to skimp on keeping the ranged DPS alive. Having a holy spec priest running with a protection specced warrior really shows you just how important having DPS around is. Yeah, we can last for darned near ever, but without the DPS behind us it eventually overwhelmed us because we couldn't kill quickly. When Aleri and Gnolack started doing more with Sabramage and Littledude (two mages), there were many times when keeping the mages up was just as important as keeping up the tank. And with Mogo and Marn, it was keeping the pet alive (even farther down on the healing list than poor mages for most folks) that was a main concern even back when all three of us were offtanking rather than just letting Meowry tank it all now. ;)

Sometimes, yes, you do have to sacrifice someone in order to not have a wipe, but more often than not you can still keep everyone up when Things Go Wrong.

[Treesh]

You have nailed Necrali to a 'T'.  I have learned most of my 'tricks' when we are trying to do things quite underleveled, or undermanned.  I've only done a couple of PUGs (recent 5 man of LBRS is the only real exception, last ones were Scarlet Monastery and half of RFD).  I think I definitely could learn some things from PUGs, but it mostly causes me stress and it's not fun for me, so I avoid them.  For example, this LBRS 5 man -- not strictly a PUG, all these guys knew one another -- I was the pickup.  We had Teamspeak and everything.  But when the two mages have half the damage taken with two warriors in the group, it causes me stress.  Those mages died.  On several occasions.  Doesn't take much when they can be two shotted.

But in general I've been spoiled.

Right now I'm stressed as a healer because in BRD so many people are taking damage (darn Fire elementals AoE!) that I never have time to use my standard Greater Heal on the tank.  I'm stuck with Flash Heal + Renew and tossing in some PoH.  I therefore have terrible mana regen as I'm nearly constantly casting, and so I run out of mana much faster than I'm accustomed.

And I would like to get healing feedback from others too.  Someday, when Mogo and Necrali are actually in the same group that's not a raid, you can help me out  :)
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Yeah, for the longest time Aleri never did PuGs. I take each death of a party/raid member too personally (except for a few where I've let them die on purpose). The first few times through BRD were definitely stressful for Aleri. I would run through so much mana, especially getting to the bar through the groups of 3 elementals. Better gear definitely helped with that; both my own and the tank having better gear. :) Now I throw a renew on the tank and holy fire, mind blast, mind control my whole way through. ;) Well, except for the three elemental pulls. I still play mana conservative in those fights just to make sure no one dies.

And I'll definitely give feedback if Mogo and Necrali ever manage to get in the same group. Raid or not. ;) I just want to make it clear up front that my comments won't be "absolutely must do it this way" deals even if they may sound like it at the time. ;) There are many ways to effectively heal depending on gear and spec. All I can really do is say how my priest plays, silly little tricks I've learned and remind folks about little used skills. Much love to levitate, btw. :D

[VoiceMan]

On the subject of other set days for instance runs, I'm up for that. My schedule is very similar to Alram's. Thursday nights would be a good night for me to do an instance run as well. In fact, Thursdays are better for me to stay up late than Fridays are, as this lazy radio announcer doesn't have to be to work during the week til 10 am, but Saturdays are 7 am. :P
I have a couple of toons in the mid to high 20's who would love to go on instance runs regularly. Saturday afternoons are pretty good as well, for the most part. So I'm good for another night for a run. Speaking of instance runs though..I do have one request. If our instance runs are slated for a 8:30 pm server time start, it would be really great if we could START at 8:30. Not log in at 8:30 and then travel to the instance. With me trying to stay up really late Friday nights, and then getting up at 5 am server time for work, it's already late for me to get started, as our 8:30 server time is actually 9:30 pm for me. But when it takes us a half hour or more to just get ready to begin, it makes it even worse. I understand family/kids/dinner/etc can make it difficult, but I would like to see us as a group (as much as possible anyway) do a bit better at actually being ready to enter the instance at 8:30, not just logging on with the toon that's going. :D But, that's just me. :)

[vor_lord]

The best times for me are:
Thursday night
Friday night
Saturday afternoon
Saturday night
Sunday afternoon
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I can't commit to anything else regular other than Fridays, but I think it's a great idea. We've got so many at 30-40 that more groups in that range should get set up. Soooo much good loot in SM...