Elementally, My Dear Reader.
The end of Big Bear Butt’s post from a few days back kind of struck a chord with me.
In the end, my biggest advice to you is; if you want to meet someone, you are not going to do it by solo questing. You are going to have to get out there and actually meet and greet, do what it is you are interested in, and chat with the other people who are doing the same.
It can be scary, I know.
In the past, I have been in the position of wanting to have enough friends to run the 5 man instances, wanting to be in a guild that raided the 10 mans, and wishing I knew where to go to find one.
But my mistake was that I did not enter the instances on my own. I didn’t take the initiative to go PUGing. I waited to be invited into a guild, expecting to then start doing a lot more group activity.
And the truth is, the core problem I had was that I was intimidated by doing the instance. The time I expected it to take, knowing that I was going to be committing myself to be in a single run lasting an hour and a half, with other people depending on me not to screw up, was a big looming scary wall.
His post was in regards to getting yourself a nice girl guild but was relevant for me as, although I’m in a nice, cushy, wonderful guild - their level of progression is way beyond my alts and not many of them are willing to run normal instances on a regular basis. Not five guildies at the same time anyway.
So, I got out there and did it. (Headings included for those who hate reading about instance runs - y’can just skip on past them.)
Sha’tar Rep Runs
I signed onto Avarix and decided that come hell or high water I was getting myself some Sha’tar rep. For once I actually got a guild group but there was a problem. There weren’t really enough alts to make a proper run - three of us were resto/holy. Oh well, thinks I, I was going to spec elemental for a week or so to go grind some rep - so I did. A newly full elemental Avarix got his first run of the day (I’ve never before specced for Totem of Wrath. It is yummy!) Right after that run, two of the guildies had to go but we managed to grab another guildie who had just logged on and a healer from LFG. He was not the best of healers but our druid took up tanking and our other paladin offhealed the harder bits.
This is where things start to get scary (for me). I had to log off for a bit and when I came back on I couldn’t bug people into going again so I signed into LFG. Got an invite pretty soon - another two-pally group with one tanking one healing this time. Wasn’t a great group - again the Paladin healer was a bit weak for all of the splash damage mobs and this time I had to back-up heal a lot to keep us going. The paladin tank didn’t seem to remember he had buff buttons or a res button or any healing buttons at all - I’m used to our guild Prot Pally helping get everything back up and running after a wipe / boss - not some wannabe warrior who thinks he doesn’t need mana to tank… We got to Laj and the tanking Paladin whined about not getting whatever it was he wanted. Ran in to do Warp Splinter - he ran out, reset him, and hearthed. What the hell?
Couldn’t get another tank so we called it quits and I got invited to the fourth group of the day. Wow, once more dual paladins! Tank and healer combo. This time when I asked in guild chat one of the admins offered their mage. PVP specced but still way more pew-pew than me (and I had been top dps on every run so far). An awesome guildie rogue offered to join and came along but got DC’d (his internet has a habit of falling over at about the same time every couple of nights) and we grabbed another mage from LFG. Two CC + high dps for the instance meant one of the fastest runs I’ve ever done… even when the two paladins and myself died at one part. I self-ressed and healed the mages whilst they cc’d the excess mobs. Popped Earth Ele totem to tank the one uncontrolled mob and healed that big chunk o’ rock as the mage’s pewpew’d each add in turn. Yay.
Of course the day wouldn’t be complete without me telling how I was at one point (at least) an idiot. My not being used to caster dps is the only excuse I can offer for what was got to be one of the most typical, stupid mistakes to make in Botanica. Lets make this simple… Trinket + Elemental Mastery + Lightning Bolt (double as Lightning Overload procced) + Spell reflect = ? Yeah. Self-Splat… /facepalm.
DING Revered!
Lower City Rep Runs
Time for Lower City rep, I figured. Mostly uneventful runs except the last two. Now, I hate Shadow Labs usually because I’ve always been melee or a healer and both have un-enjoyable parts in that instance for me. Pugs also usually end up falling apart when you get to Vorpil or you have to change in people three / four times just to get through the place.
However, by the second run with the same group when you’re saying things like “…Just pull all 8, we can handle it.” you know you’re onto a good thing. The healer was a druid I’d grouped with earlier in the day and, working together, we’d healed through some dicey situations. Now, with a good tank, nice dps, etc. we were having a whale of a time.
DING Revered!
Swag Bag
So, I’m now Revered with the Sha’tar which means I get to pick up:
[Enchant Weapon: Major Healing]
[Xi'ri's Gift] and
[Glyph of Power] for when I get a good enough headpiece to put it on.
Revered with Lower City netted me:
[Recipe: Elixir of Major Shadow Power]
Not so much from Lower City Rep but the prayerbook is something I’ve been hankering over for some time - though now I have to decide whether or not to swap it for my 10mp5 trinket for healing since, at the moment, I’m horribly under mp5′d. I might shuffle a few things out elsewhere as that +70 healing is just so juicy…
On Being Elemental
Wow, just…. wow. Last time I tried this spec I kept myself far enough into resto to get Nature’s Swiftness. I had specced resto the moment I hit 70 and hadn’t really collected much elemental gear (that which I had being gemmed/enchanted for resto purposes) so my dps sucked and I felt that there was barely any point in me being elemental if I hardly did any more damage than when resto!
Of course my resto gear is more.. resto now and my elemental gear has gotten a boost through various lucky drops which noone else wanted as well as a few pieces I’ve picked up on the earlier runs this weekend. So now.. I pewpew. It’s been pretty nice to be able to do a bit of grinding or a few dailies whilst doing groups - things I’d pretty much stopped entirely due to it just taking too long whilst specced resto. PvP is a den of certain-death for me now, though, with all of the cloth gear I’m wearing so I picked up an Exorcist’s Mail Helm and a Swift Starfire Diamond to put in it with the spirit shards I’d picked up whilst doing my LC rep.
I might just stay this spec for a while - at least long enough to grind myself a little bit of Consortium rep (only need 3 hand-ins until revered) and maybe some Kurenai rep as Draenei + Talbuk = tall!
Oh and all of this means I can cross one of the things off of my list. Kind of. Still need those Shattered Halls runs but at least I’m not scared to go looking for them!
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I’d had a horror of PUGs until I rolled my priest. Although I was levelling as shadow, I intended to go holy at 70 and I wanted to learn how to heal along the way. I started off with the Dead Mines and PUG’d all the way to Tempest Keep. It was certainly a baptism of fire! Some PUGs were fantastic, a fair proportion were a nightmare and most fell somewhere between the two. As a healer it was great experience and from a learning point of view the worst ones were probably the better learning experience. Those were the ones where I learned what my limits were, where I figured out how to cope when things got really hairy etc. Amongst the friends I’ve played with for the last few years there have been very few warlocks and rogues (and since tBC, shaman) so it was good to see what those classes can do too.
Man, you must have much better luck with the PuGs than I do. I’m in a guild that’s a lot like yours on my druid, so I’ve been trying to PuG more and more, lately. I join the LFG interface and all that, but I find that even as a solidly-geared tank, I get very few opportunities to run. Or, alternatively, I join a group with 3 DPSers and spend 2 hours trying to find a healer. What’s your secret to actually find a group??
Thanks,
~Rhoe
@Hulan: I’ve got to agree - sometimes it’s the not-so-good pugs which teach you how to play at your best, especially as a healer. Frustrating, yes, but way more valuable than a cushy guild run with your well-geared MT.
@Rhoelyn: Hmm that’s a tough one. I guess the biggest part of it is that Bloodhoof is a well populated server and I’m in a guild from which I can often drag someone to fill a ‘last spot’. Oddly, now you’ve made me think on it, Bloodhoof pugs do only rarely fall apart before entering the instance and generally manage to find 5 members within about 30 mins unless it’s really late at night. This is opposite to the experience I had on Spore (low pop server) where groups often didn’t make it to the instance.
Only thing I can think of is that each group only needs one tank and one healer but three dps. I did find it easier to get groups as elemental with Avarix - I’ve had to leave pugs before because the invited me without looking at the huge ‘RESTO’ tag I’d put.