01-16-2006, 11:30 PM
This writeup is more for entertainment value than strategy, so here it is.
In late October, after the Avarice Alliance started downing Majordomo Executus, I realized that getting a Benediction was becoming a reality for me. I'd actually have a shot at getting the uber Priest staff in the game!
Getting a Benediction involves obtaining an Eye of Shadow and an Eye of Divinity, and then combining them with a Splinter of Nordrassil quest reward item from the Priest epic quest. Back in the day, the Eye of Shadow could only drop from Lord Kazzak, a world boss. Considering Blizzard's idiotic policy of repeating one of the stupid mistakes of Everquest design (world bosses on long respawn timers), it meant that only a rare few Priests on a server could EVER get this staff.
The Eye of Divinity is obtained from Majordomo Executus' chest, and that was considered the "easy" part of the Priest epic quest requirements. So in later patches, Blizzard gave players another chance at an Eye of Shadow, letting it drop from the elite demons in Darkwhisper Gorge of Winterspring.
Unfortunately, they made the drop rate of an Eye of Shadow about 1 in 1000 from these demons. Priests also had the misfortune of being unable to solo these elites. Thus, they'd have to get their friends to come along with them and, in some cases, go through literally hundreds of hours of farming to get one. The Eye of Shadow would appear on Auction Houses for over 1,000 gold, and that's also considering how much more valuable gold was back then.
In patch 1.8, Blizzard greatly improved the drop rate of Eyes of Shadow to something like 1 in 100. Otherwise I would have never even bothered. Many raid guilds had Priests refusing to spend points on an Eye of Divinity before 1.8 came out, because they'd never get an Eye of Shadow anyway.
So, I got some Avaricers to join me in Winterspring in October and, after 70-80 kills or so, got an Eye of Shadow. I figured a Benediction was only a week or two away. Haha!
Fast forward three months...
Sunday night, the Eye of Divinity dropped for the fourth time from Majordomo's chest for our Avarice Alliance. But for the first time, I was the #1 Priest in points (every other time, I was #2). MINE!
The portal to Ironforge hadn't even died out yet and I was on a bird to the Plaguelands. For months, I had the Eye of Shadow, Oils of Immolation, Stratholme Holy Waters, and mental preparation to play The Balance of Light and Shadow - the Priest epic quest. Benediction would finally be mine!
The Priest epic quest, like the Hunter epic quest, is irritating. Blizzard, in their infinite wisdom, made it so if a Priest fails the quest or is interfered with while running it, the NPC that offers the quest despawns for 2 hours. So NOBODY else on the server can try it. The quest is hard. Very hard. So it's not uncommon to be all ready to take your shot at it only to find that some other Priest ruined your chance. Or else, someone came in and interfered with you by entering the area or attacking you (since the quest flags you for PvP). Unlike the Hunter quest, however, only a Priest with the Eye of Divinity can actually SEE the NPC quest giver, and in fact they're the only ones who can see what's going on at all. To all other players, they'd simply witness a PvP flagged Priest running around like an idiot, casting spells at thin air and looking rather silly.
The quest involves rescuing 50 peasants before 15 of them die. The peasants start at one side of a small valley and walk to the other side. In the meantime, they are being shot at by archers (who you can't attack), plagued by the arrows, and attacked by melee skeletons who spawn at regular, quick intervals. You are re-enacting a failed mission of another Priest who, back in the day, could not save these peasants, and their souls are keeping her in limbo.
So I arrived at the quest spot at 12:25 AM and the NPC wasn't there. Oh well, I'd waited three months; I can wait another night.
Sunday morning I logged in at 7:35 AM and the NPC wasn't there. Damn! So I played an alt for a bit to get a few things done, and checked back every 20 minutes or so.
At 8:15 AM I logged in to see another Priest standing there waiting. To protect the innocent, I'll call her Priest V. We started chatting about the epic quest, and I told her I had first checked at 7:35 AM, so the NPC had to appear at least between now and 9:30. Priest V seemed to have a grasp on the encounter, having brought Oils of Immolation and some Engineering bombs. I told her I was going back to my alt - if she played and won the quest, send me a tell on my alt so I could go next. (If you win the quest, the NPC does not despawn.)
Hearing nothing, I switched back to Cleoboltra around 8:50 AM. Priest V was still waiting there, and we went back to discussing the quest. I gave her a few pointers - the melee'ers were fearable, allowing the use of Psychic Scream to buy you time, and using lower ranks of Flash Heal and Renew was a good bet because the peasants don't have much life. I had personally completely re-arranged my hotbar spells for the quest, placing the key spells in easy positions (like my Oils of Immolation and Stratholme Holy Waters), and I recommended to Priest V that she do the same.
We were both wondering when the last attempt was, and who had failed it to cause the 2-hour wait. Priest V assured me that she had never tried this before, and in fact was getting a little nervous about it. After some more discussion, she told me she didn't even have an Eye of Shadow yet, and would be quite willing to let me go first so she could watch. Naturally, I agreed (MINE! GIMME! MINE! Oh, excuse me).
At 9:15 AM, Priest H appeared. Yeah, 9:15; it HAD to be close to the respawn time, and Priest V and I exchanged worried whispers that this had to be the one who failed it earlier - the timing was too good. Our whispers became even more worried when Priest H didn't respond to any of our /say chat to him and gave no indication that he even noticed us. However, Priest H was a member of a major raiding guild on Stormrage, and if he tried to "ninja" the epic quest while being third in line, his guild master would have heard it from me. To his credit, he didn't ninja it - maybe because he was afk, I don't know.
At 9:25 AM the NPC appeared out of thin air, with an exclamation mark over her head. I sat to eat some Clamette Surprise for the stam/spirit boost, doublechecked that all my Priestly buffs were in place, and started the quest.
"Holy crap, I'm finally doing this!"
My heartrate accelerated rapidly. Thump thump thump. I wanted to nail this BIG on the first try without any outside help. Why?
1) I only had 13 Oils of Immolation. Plenty of Firebloom sat in my bank, but I could never seem to dig up the Goldthorn needed to make them. If I were to fail the quest, I'd have to go and farm or spend a lot of gold to get more.
2) I had two other Priests waiting in line to run the quest, and if I failed we'd all have to wait another 2 hours for any of us to have another shot. I'd be letting them down.
3) Ego. I consider myself a hell of a healer, and even if there weren't any witnesses to see me fail, I'D know that I failed one of the great tests of my ability to keep people alive under a great amount of fire. I'd be so embarassed for myself, I'd feel like crap for days. A Priest of my healing spec and gear should not fail this quest - there would be no excuse. Yes, Priests with Holy Nova have it very, very easy here, but having to respec just for this quest? Come on!
You'll see many posts in healer discussions where Priests say the quest "isn't hard." Then it's usually followed by describing how they did it with every buff in the game possible, a Paladin standing around with Retribution aura, a mage casting Blizzard on top of the Priest whenever the Priest is taking damage, and other tricks that don't count as "interference" to the quest but let a Priest cheese it. I remember hearing about one Priest who did the quest with so many buffs that they had 11,000 mana. ELEVEN THOUSAND. Of course, it was "easy"! And don't get me started on the worst transgression of all, partying with another Priest and letting them do the quest for you so you both get credit at the same time...
Anyway...
I swivel my camera view to PvP-mode, with my view looking down on top of my character, and enable "V" mode to see the health bars of the peasants. Since the peasants aren't in my "group," I have no easy way to see their health, and it's a matter of watching the shifting health bars and keeping up with them as they get lower.
I dash for the cave mouth where the peasants spawn. The first wave is cake - there are no melee attackers to contend with, so it's a matter of Abolishing Disease on the plagued peasants and hitting them with Renews and the occasional Flash Heal if they are getting low. No problem. I have no losses in the first wave. Doin great!
Thump thump thump.
We approach the NPC, the "safe point," and I turn to head back for the next wave of peasants. I'm taking too long! The next wave is out already and I run over to them and oh crap the melee'rs are coming right for them I dash in and psychic scream them off to keep the peasants from turning to fight them which is a death sentence and abolish disease off 3 peasants and I renew two more and here come the melee'rs back again I slam an Oil of Immolation and start taking a beating and DAMN a peasant died and I'm taking damage better use a full Renew on myself and the Oil of Immolation ran out! Time for a Stratholme Holy Water because those are on 1-minute timers and I might run out of Oils so I slam them down but more are spawning almost immediately, I better chug a Major Mana Potion now since I've already burned a lot of mana and I'll need to use another before the fight runs out like I do on Razorgore and the second wave is getting to the NPC now.
Thump thump thump thump.
No time to stop! Third wave is spawning and these meleer's won't get off my f***ing back eat some more Oil of Immolation you bastards - more peasants to abolish disease and crap there goes another one! Time to Psychic Scream to lump all the melee'rs together in one pack and oops I'm down to only 800 health so I shield and Flash myself but the peasants are taking a beating while the melee'rs are coming back time for another Stratholme Holy Water and damn they rip through my shield fast ok they all died, time to flash heal some peasants and 4 more of them are plagued now abolish abolish abolish renew renew here come more melee'rs they never give me more than 2 seconds alone use another Oil of Immolation looks like we're getting to the NPC now I'll throw some more renews on and head back, they'll have to fend for themselves.
Thump thump thump thump thump.
Crap I'm low on mana again chug another Major Mana Potion here comes wave four and holy s**t a whole ton of them are plagued and they're all moving slower than before, oh FFS melee'ers give me a break and lay off the peasants there goes another peasant heal heal HEAL another Oil of Immolation die die DIE gotta stop to heal myself again and the archers are just tearing these peasants up! Gotta buy time to heal Psychic Scream and just after I fear here come another batch of melee'rs can't wait or they'll kill me eat THIS Stratholme Holy Water, punch another Oil of Immolation and watch those sons of bitches die now my wife is talking to me what did she just say I missed it looks like I'll get wave four across with only one death I wonder how many have died so far that I didn't see am I close to 15?
Thump thump thump thump thump thump.
Wave five! Mana low! Major Mana Potion on cooldown so I pop a Dark Rune boy I'm happy that people let me greed these in Scholomance because they come in handy so much - slap a renew on myself - abolish abolish ABOLISH disease here come the damn meleers and I'll use another Oil of Immolation and I look down and I only have ONE LEFT!
S**T!
Thump thump thump thump thump thump thump.
Two peasants die and my Psychic Scream comes up say hello to my little friend and get the f**k out of my face you a**holes heal heal HEAL they're coming back Stratholme Holy Water is ready take THAT renew renew RENEW oh man this better be it or I'm really screwed here come more melee'rs there goes the last Oil of Immolation and what is that yellow text appearing on my screen?
The Balance of Light and Shadow (Complete).
Thump, thump...thump......thump....
Priest V whispers: YOU DID IT!!!!!
The whole thing took probably 4-5 minutes. It felt like 10 because it moved so fast and the concentration level had to be so high.
Oh, and if you were paying attention above, Mrs. Bolty was completely understanding - she saw I was playing the epic quest and had said she'd ask me when I was done (not that I caught that at the time). Yeah, I love her. :)
I was still cooling down off of my high when Priest V was getting ready to go. I asked her if she needed anything before she started - she was out of mana pots!
O.o.
I gave her a Major Mana Potion and a Dark Rune, which she accepted with gratitude. I waited to make my Benediction so that I'd keep my Eye of Divinity, allowing me to watch her try the quest.
She handled the first wave poorly, using lots of flash heals and not a single Abolish Disease. I whispered her to cure the disease off the peasants, but I have a feeling that she was one of those Priests who had become so dependent on CTRA or Decursive to cure diseases that she didn't have it set up to cure a disease off a non-party target. As she had to leave wave 1 to get over to wave 2, I watched helplessly as a number of plagued peasants died despite making it to the safe zone, because their disease took them out. If I tried to help, The Cleaner (a super-powerful mob) would appear and kill everyone in the area.
Meanwhile, Priest V was in trouble.
The melee'rs were really pounding her. She hit an Oil of Immolation and killed them off, but didn't have time to heal herself because the peasants were dying. She stabilized the peasants, but the melee'rs were on her again, forcing her to Shield and heal up, and wave three was starting.
She couldn't keep up. Too many diseased peasants put too much pressure on her to keep them healed with Flash Heal instead of Renew, costing too much time while she was being attacked. As the third wave was pulling up to the NPC, she died in an orgy of melee attackers who pounded her flat. Quest failed. NPC despawned, and Priest H cried, never getting a chance...
Priest V was upbeat; she figured it was a learning experience, gave me back the Major Mana Potion and Dark Rune that she wound up not using, and we chatted strategy a bit before I combined my Benediction and took off.
Later that day, Priest V whispered me to let me know that she had tried twice more, and had "really gotten close" the last time. Unfortunately, she had burned a lot of Oils of Immolation on the last attempt, so she'd have to get more.
It's a rough quest. But if you want the "big sparklies..."
![[Image: wow93.jpg]](http://www.lurkerlounge.com/bolty/wow93.jpg)
(Yes, Dwarf females in 1.9 have lopsided shoulderpads - the one pad is always much larger than the other. Nice, Blizzard.)
My only regret is that I won't ever get to play the quest again. However, without the pressure of the 2-hour time wait if you fail and the knowledge that victory gets you the Ultimate Weapon to spur you on, there wouldn't be as much urgency to its execution and I doubt it would feel the same. But boy, that was as fun as the best "oh crap" healing moments I've had in the game. 5 minutes of total gaming excitement in a situation that I crave as a healer - when everything goes wrong, I get aggro, and still have to keep everyone alive. Blizzard, PLEASE ADD MORE HARD SOLO QUESTS LIKE THIS!
-Bolty
In late October, after the Avarice Alliance started downing Majordomo Executus, I realized that getting a Benediction was becoming a reality for me. I'd actually have a shot at getting the uber Priest staff in the game!
Getting a Benediction involves obtaining an Eye of Shadow and an Eye of Divinity, and then combining them with a Splinter of Nordrassil quest reward item from the Priest epic quest. Back in the day, the Eye of Shadow could only drop from Lord Kazzak, a world boss. Considering Blizzard's idiotic policy of repeating one of the stupid mistakes of Everquest design (world bosses on long respawn timers), it meant that only a rare few Priests on a server could EVER get this staff.
The Eye of Divinity is obtained from Majordomo Executus' chest, and that was considered the "easy" part of the Priest epic quest requirements. So in later patches, Blizzard gave players another chance at an Eye of Shadow, letting it drop from the elite demons in Darkwhisper Gorge of Winterspring.
Unfortunately, they made the drop rate of an Eye of Shadow about 1 in 1000 from these demons. Priests also had the misfortune of being unable to solo these elites. Thus, they'd have to get their friends to come along with them and, in some cases, go through literally hundreds of hours of farming to get one. The Eye of Shadow would appear on Auction Houses for over 1,000 gold, and that's also considering how much more valuable gold was back then.
In patch 1.8, Blizzard greatly improved the drop rate of Eyes of Shadow to something like 1 in 100. Otherwise I would have never even bothered. Many raid guilds had Priests refusing to spend points on an Eye of Divinity before 1.8 came out, because they'd never get an Eye of Shadow anyway.
So, I got some Avaricers to join me in Winterspring in October and, after 70-80 kills or so, got an Eye of Shadow. I figured a Benediction was only a week or two away. Haha!
Fast forward three months...
Sunday night, the Eye of Divinity dropped for the fourth time from Majordomo's chest for our Avarice Alliance. But for the first time, I was the #1 Priest in points (every other time, I was #2). MINE!
The portal to Ironforge hadn't even died out yet and I was on a bird to the Plaguelands. For months, I had the Eye of Shadow, Oils of Immolation, Stratholme Holy Waters, and mental preparation to play The Balance of Light and Shadow - the Priest epic quest. Benediction would finally be mine!
The Priest epic quest, like the Hunter epic quest, is irritating. Blizzard, in their infinite wisdom, made it so if a Priest fails the quest or is interfered with while running it, the NPC that offers the quest despawns for 2 hours. So NOBODY else on the server can try it. The quest is hard. Very hard. So it's not uncommon to be all ready to take your shot at it only to find that some other Priest ruined your chance. Or else, someone came in and interfered with you by entering the area or attacking you (since the quest flags you for PvP). Unlike the Hunter quest, however, only a Priest with the Eye of Divinity can actually SEE the NPC quest giver, and in fact they're the only ones who can see what's going on at all. To all other players, they'd simply witness a PvP flagged Priest running around like an idiot, casting spells at thin air and looking rather silly.
The quest involves rescuing 50 peasants before 15 of them die. The peasants start at one side of a small valley and walk to the other side. In the meantime, they are being shot at by archers (who you can't attack), plagued by the arrows, and attacked by melee skeletons who spawn at regular, quick intervals. You are re-enacting a failed mission of another Priest who, back in the day, could not save these peasants, and their souls are keeping her in limbo.
So I arrived at the quest spot at 12:25 AM and the NPC wasn't there. Oh well, I'd waited three months; I can wait another night.
Sunday morning I logged in at 7:35 AM and the NPC wasn't there. Damn! So I played an alt for a bit to get a few things done, and checked back every 20 minutes or so.
At 8:15 AM I logged in to see another Priest standing there waiting. To protect the innocent, I'll call her Priest V. We started chatting about the epic quest, and I told her I had first checked at 7:35 AM, so the NPC had to appear at least between now and 9:30. Priest V seemed to have a grasp on the encounter, having brought Oils of Immolation and some Engineering bombs. I told her I was going back to my alt - if she played and won the quest, send me a tell on my alt so I could go next. (If you win the quest, the NPC does not despawn.)
Hearing nothing, I switched back to Cleoboltra around 8:50 AM. Priest V was still waiting there, and we went back to discussing the quest. I gave her a few pointers - the melee'ers were fearable, allowing the use of Psychic Scream to buy you time, and using lower ranks of Flash Heal and Renew was a good bet because the peasants don't have much life. I had personally completely re-arranged my hotbar spells for the quest, placing the key spells in easy positions (like my Oils of Immolation and Stratholme Holy Waters), and I recommended to Priest V that she do the same.
We were both wondering when the last attempt was, and who had failed it to cause the 2-hour wait. Priest V assured me that she had never tried this before, and in fact was getting a little nervous about it. After some more discussion, she told me she didn't even have an Eye of Shadow yet, and would be quite willing to let me go first so she could watch. Naturally, I agreed (MINE! GIMME! MINE! Oh, excuse me).
At 9:15 AM, Priest H appeared. Yeah, 9:15; it HAD to be close to the respawn time, and Priest V and I exchanged worried whispers that this had to be the one who failed it earlier - the timing was too good. Our whispers became even more worried when Priest H didn't respond to any of our /say chat to him and gave no indication that he even noticed us. However, Priest H was a member of a major raiding guild on Stormrage, and if he tried to "ninja" the epic quest while being third in line, his guild master would have heard it from me. To his credit, he didn't ninja it - maybe because he was afk, I don't know.
At 9:25 AM the NPC appeared out of thin air, with an exclamation mark over her head. I sat to eat some Clamette Surprise for the stam/spirit boost, doublechecked that all my Priestly buffs were in place, and started the quest.
"Holy crap, I'm finally doing this!"
My heartrate accelerated rapidly. Thump thump thump. I wanted to nail this BIG on the first try without any outside help. Why?
1) I only had 13 Oils of Immolation. Plenty of Firebloom sat in my bank, but I could never seem to dig up the Goldthorn needed to make them. If I were to fail the quest, I'd have to go and farm or spend a lot of gold to get more.
2) I had two other Priests waiting in line to run the quest, and if I failed we'd all have to wait another 2 hours for any of us to have another shot. I'd be letting them down.
3) Ego. I consider myself a hell of a healer, and even if there weren't any witnesses to see me fail, I'D know that I failed one of the great tests of my ability to keep people alive under a great amount of fire. I'd be so embarassed for myself, I'd feel like crap for days. A Priest of my healing spec and gear should not fail this quest - there would be no excuse. Yes, Priests with Holy Nova have it very, very easy here, but having to respec just for this quest? Come on!
You'll see many posts in healer discussions where Priests say the quest "isn't hard." Then it's usually followed by describing how they did it with every buff in the game possible, a Paladin standing around with Retribution aura, a mage casting Blizzard on top of the Priest whenever the Priest is taking damage, and other tricks that don't count as "interference" to the quest but let a Priest cheese it. I remember hearing about one Priest who did the quest with so many buffs that they had 11,000 mana. ELEVEN THOUSAND. Of course, it was "easy"! And don't get me started on the worst transgression of all, partying with another Priest and letting them do the quest for you so you both get credit at the same time...
Anyway...
I swivel my camera view to PvP-mode, with my view looking down on top of my character, and enable "V" mode to see the health bars of the peasants. Since the peasants aren't in my "group," I have no easy way to see their health, and it's a matter of watching the shifting health bars and keeping up with them as they get lower.
I dash for the cave mouth where the peasants spawn. The first wave is cake - there are no melee attackers to contend with, so it's a matter of Abolishing Disease on the plagued peasants and hitting them with Renews and the occasional Flash Heal if they are getting low. No problem. I have no losses in the first wave. Doin great!
Thump thump thump.
We approach the NPC, the "safe point," and I turn to head back for the next wave of peasants. I'm taking too long! The next wave is out already and I run over to them and oh crap the melee'rs are coming right for them I dash in and psychic scream them off to keep the peasants from turning to fight them which is a death sentence and abolish disease off 3 peasants and I renew two more and here come the melee'rs back again I slam an Oil of Immolation and start taking a beating and DAMN a peasant died and I'm taking damage better use a full Renew on myself and the Oil of Immolation ran out! Time for a Stratholme Holy Water because those are on 1-minute timers and I might run out of Oils so I slam them down but more are spawning almost immediately, I better chug a Major Mana Potion now since I've already burned a lot of mana and I'll need to use another before the fight runs out like I do on Razorgore and the second wave is getting to the NPC now.
Thump thump thump thump.
No time to stop! Third wave is spawning and these meleer's won't get off my f***ing back eat some more Oil of Immolation you bastards - more peasants to abolish disease and crap there goes another one! Time to Psychic Scream to lump all the melee'rs together in one pack and oops I'm down to only 800 health so I shield and Flash myself but the peasants are taking a beating while the melee'rs are coming back time for another Stratholme Holy Water and damn they rip through my shield fast ok they all died, time to flash heal some peasants and 4 more of them are plagued now abolish abolish abolish renew renew here come more melee'rs they never give me more than 2 seconds alone use another Oil of Immolation looks like we're getting to the NPC now I'll throw some more renews on and head back, they'll have to fend for themselves.
Thump thump thump thump thump.
Crap I'm low on mana again chug another Major Mana Potion here comes wave four and holy s**t a whole ton of them are plagued and they're all moving slower than before, oh FFS melee'ers give me a break and lay off the peasants there goes another peasant heal heal HEAL another Oil of Immolation die die DIE gotta stop to heal myself again and the archers are just tearing these peasants up! Gotta buy time to heal Psychic Scream and just after I fear here come another batch of melee'rs can't wait or they'll kill me eat THIS Stratholme Holy Water, punch another Oil of Immolation and watch those sons of bitches die now my wife is talking to me what did she just say I missed it looks like I'll get wave four across with only one death I wonder how many have died so far that I didn't see am I close to 15?
Thump thump thump thump thump thump.
Wave five! Mana low! Major Mana Potion on cooldown so I pop a Dark Rune boy I'm happy that people let me greed these in Scholomance because they come in handy so much - slap a renew on myself - abolish abolish ABOLISH disease here come the damn meleers and I'll use another Oil of Immolation and I look down and I only have ONE LEFT!
S**T!
Thump thump thump thump thump thump thump.
Two peasants die and my Psychic Scream comes up say hello to my little friend and get the f**k out of my face you a**holes heal heal HEAL they're coming back Stratholme Holy Water is ready take THAT renew renew RENEW oh man this better be it or I'm really screwed here come more melee'rs there goes the last Oil of Immolation and what is that yellow text appearing on my screen?
The Balance of Light and Shadow (Complete).
Thump, thump...thump......thump....
Priest V whispers: YOU DID IT!!!!!
The whole thing took probably 4-5 minutes. It felt like 10 because it moved so fast and the concentration level had to be so high.
Oh, and if you were paying attention above, Mrs. Bolty was completely understanding - she saw I was playing the epic quest and had said she'd ask me when I was done (not that I caught that at the time). Yeah, I love her. :)
I was still cooling down off of my high when Priest V was getting ready to go. I asked her if she needed anything before she started - she was out of mana pots!
O.o.
I gave her a Major Mana Potion and a Dark Rune, which she accepted with gratitude. I waited to make my Benediction so that I'd keep my Eye of Divinity, allowing me to watch her try the quest.
She handled the first wave poorly, using lots of flash heals and not a single Abolish Disease. I whispered her to cure the disease off the peasants, but I have a feeling that she was one of those Priests who had become so dependent on CTRA or Decursive to cure diseases that she didn't have it set up to cure a disease off a non-party target. As she had to leave wave 1 to get over to wave 2, I watched helplessly as a number of plagued peasants died despite making it to the safe zone, because their disease took them out. If I tried to help, The Cleaner (a super-powerful mob) would appear and kill everyone in the area.
Meanwhile, Priest V was in trouble.
The melee'rs were really pounding her. She hit an Oil of Immolation and killed them off, but didn't have time to heal herself because the peasants were dying. She stabilized the peasants, but the melee'rs were on her again, forcing her to Shield and heal up, and wave three was starting.
She couldn't keep up. Too many diseased peasants put too much pressure on her to keep them healed with Flash Heal instead of Renew, costing too much time while she was being attacked. As the third wave was pulling up to the NPC, she died in an orgy of melee attackers who pounded her flat. Quest failed. NPC despawned, and Priest H cried, never getting a chance...
Priest V was upbeat; she figured it was a learning experience, gave me back the Major Mana Potion and Dark Rune that she wound up not using, and we chatted strategy a bit before I combined my Benediction and took off.
Later that day, Priest V whispered me to let me know that she had tried twice more, and had "really gotten close" the last time. Unfortunately, she had burned a lot of Oils of Immolation on the last attempt, so she'd have to get more.
It's a rough quest. But if you want the "big sparklies..."
(Yes, Dwarf females in 1.9 have lopsided shoulderpads - the one pad is always much larger than the other. Nice, Blizzard.)
My only regret is that I won't ever get to play the quest again. However, without the pressure of the 2-hour time wait if you fail and the knowledge that victory gets you the Ultimate Weapon to spur you on, there wouldn't be as much urgency to its execution and I doubt it would feel the same. But boy, that was as fun as the best "oh crap" healing moments I've had in the game. 5 minutes of total gaming excitement in a situation that I crave as a healer - when everything goes wrong, I get aggro, and still have to keep everyone alive. Blizzard, PLEASE ADD MORE HARD SOLO QUESTS LIKE THIS!
-Bolty
Quote:Considering the mods here are generally liberals who seem to have a soft spot for fascism and white supremacy (despite them saying otherwise), me being perma-banned at some point is probably not out of the question.