044: 5 worst wipes

A few days ago, Ratshag tagged me to write about my 5 worst wipes. It just so happens that he did this mere days before my worst wipe yet, but I'll chalk that up to coincidence!

It was actually pretty hard to complete this. I don't really get upset by wiping. I honestly couldn't remember many wipes at all, but I suppose that's a good thing! I've picked those that stood out in some way or another, but none of these are what I'd consider awful:


#1: The setting is Zul'Aman with Kamuflasjefylla and everything has been going peachy. I'm starting to remember which boss has what tactics, though the random order we do things in isn't helping much. At any rate, everything goes down like pie and we're standing at Zul'Jin's feet, ready to kick ass yet again. Well, we would have, if the server hadn't decided to begin randomly tossing off 3-4 raid members in mid-fight. And then do it again, after we wiped and corpse-ran. And then AGAIN. We're getting pissed off, people are rebooting and making sure nothing is wrong on their end, but it's not helping. Finally, things seem to stabilize a little and we get ready for attempt number 4 or so. Adagio does a Ready Check and everyone is prepared, awesome, let's go! Hey wait, why is Tairha on the wrong side of the flaming gate? Turns out he'd clicked ready, and then gone AFK. Brilliant! Oh well, we'll just make the best of it, right? As long as everyone stays connected it shouldn't be an issue, we can 9-man this!

I think Dave disconnected once during that try, and since he'd respecced Holy to be a healer for the time being that was a bit of a problem, but he managed to log back on and we managed to keep him alive while he was DC'ed, so all was well. Zul'Jin falls slowly but surely in HP. Phase 3 hits. I can't even begin to tell you how much I hate phase 3. I call it the RP phase, because I can't do anything but /tickle and run from the tornadoes. Any and all spellcasting - healing included - does some nasty damage to yourself so all the DPS casters are forbidden to do anything unless they're at 100% health. Which we never are, thanks to those bloody tornadoes.

Finally, after what seems like forever, phase 4 hits. Zul'Jin transforms into a Lynx and begins charging people. Once he's charged you, hell insist on slapping the bejeesus out of you for a while and there's no taunt in the world that can change his mind. Very risky business for clothies (unless you're lucky enough to be a mana battery and thus BoP priority♥), but our healers are on the ball and whoever the first victim was survived.

The lynx-shaped boss charges his second victim... and it's Tairha. Standing outside the gate. Zul'Jin slaps her around a bit, evade bugs and resets.

The only bloody time we managed to get as low as 25% with all healers having decent mana, everyone alive and at a decent health and no disconnecting issues on the tanks, and it freakin' resets. We try again since we're all alive... and wipe miserably when 2-3 people DC yet again. We fold. Not worth it.


#2: Wiping on Hydross in SSC with a 25man team of Black Temple geared raiders. I wasn't fussed, but everyone else were!, to the point of Tamashi whispering me to assure me they're not usually that bad. Which I thought was really cute.


#3: I've written about this Karazhan run before, but it was so awful it deserves to be mentioned again. We'd just taken in a Holy Priest on trial back in Reavers, and I was raid leading (I think?) our first run with him into Kara. And then we wipe on Attumen trash, and on Attumen, and then on Attumen's trash AGAIN. Talk about embarassing.


#4: I might have mentioned this one before too, but not in much detail I think so here goes! Back in Reavers, a guildie asked me if I could help him out in Blackrock Depths. He'd had a full team but then the healer had ditched them. Well, says I, I've got about +1k healing in my Healbot set, though I'm shadowspecced. Think your party members would be opposed? They weren't. So I trekked all the way over there, intent on being a healer only. Should be cake, right? I'll have no trouble keeping that tank alive! Not so much. My guildie, who was offtanking, disconnects, and the proper tank isn't particularly good. Combine that with two DPS-hungry pyromages and we have a wipe. Hopping back into shadowform and trying to kill things wearing my holy set (and this was before the patch, so there wasn't much +spell dmg on it either) just doesn't cut it. The tank leaves group without a word because wiping with a lvl 70 in BRD is just that appaling, apparantly, and one of the mages 'has to go'.

Their loss, because when I get pissed off I get pissed off. I'll tank this damn instance if it's the last thing I do! Ten minutes after that senseless wipe, I've recruited an Elemental Shaman via LFG who says she can toss on her holy gear and try and keep me alive. There is some discussion on whether Vampiric Embrace + her healing will be enough to hold me up and then I decide bugger this for a lark. Keep your normal gear on, I'll get my Warlock friend to come on his level 70 Holy Paladin, let's rock this casbah.

The guildie disconnected yet again and stayed offline, but I was far beyond caring at that point. We carried that Mage and the stunned (but very happy) Elemental Shaman through the entire instance, killing every single boss we could find.


#5: Last week. My Black Temple virginity had just been popped. I wasn't on Tieryn as she and a couple others are still waiting for another priest to reach 70 so they can all be attuned together, but I was on a Shadowpriest. A friend had lent me his, since he had to go on his Paladin to help heal and why not give me some experience when there's a free slot? It was a scrambled together raid and it really wasn't optimal for BT, but they were game for giving it a go.

About an hour later, the raid was called after we'd wiped spectacularly on trash several times, and, when we were finally ready to take on High Warlord Naj'entus, the maintank messed up the pull and got both adds + the boss on us instead of just the adds.

I still had a ball because hey, Black Temple!


Not much posting from me these days, I reached 3500g three days ago and decided to stop messing about and borrowed the rest. I've got myself an epic bird now, and in 72 hours I've reached Revered with the Netherwing. It's a lot of hardcore rep-farming, but if our estimates are correct I will have my Dragon for Christmas.