The Master Looter

Last night I joined in on a Naxx 25 raid hosted by a guild needing just a few more to fill up the group. It was a fun and friendly group, but it seemed that 75% of the time was spent waiting, most of which was unnecessary.

Inspired by StratFu’s Guide to Faster Raiding, and the 3 hours spent in Arachid Quarter last night, here are 7 ways to make Naxx – or any raid – go faster:

1. Keep pulling!  Once you are done with one group of trash mobs, move onto the next unless a good chunk of the raid has died.

2. Don’t stop for loot! Set loot threshold to rare or epic if using master looter, so green items don’t need to be looted by the loot master. Have the master looter handle looting while the rest of the raid continues pulling trash mobs and clearing to the next boss. Spending 5 minutes handing out loot per boss * 25 raid members = Over 2 hours of peoples’ time wasted per boss.

3. Don’t hold up the raid for one person! Don’t wait for one or two people who are not ready unless they are critical to the fight. If someone’s having a computer problem, or is going to the AH to buy stuff, that’s no reason to keep 24 other people waiting. Making 24 other people each wait 10 minutes = Over 4 hours of peoples’ time wasted while someone tries to fix their add-ons, use the bathroom, or change a diaper.

4. Explain the boss fight while clearing trash! If anyone has any questions about the boss, they can be answered while clearing trash mobs. Waiting until you are at the boss to explain the fight is a big time waster. 10 minute boss fight explanation with questions and answers * 25 people = Over 4 hours of peoples’ time wasted per boss.

5. Don’t bring too many tanks or healers! You may feel safer with 7 or 8 healers in your Naxx group, but it’s just going to gimp DPS and make for lazy healers. On my server, there rarely seems to be a problem of having too many healers, but it is still worthwhile to mention. With dual specs now available, this should be a moot issue.

6. Don’t stop for buffing until a boss fight! If you need a buff refreshed, ask in raid chat. People will die during trash sometimes, and waiting for them to get buffed is not necessary. All buffs can be refreshed before fighting a boss. Just because one of your DPS overnuked doesn’t mean you need to have the rest of the raid sit still while they mana up and get buffs.

7. Get your consumables before the raid! It is nice when someone offers to hand out or sell flasks during a raid, but spending 10 minutes doing so * 25 raid members = over 4 hours of peoples’ time wasted while handing out flasks.

The main idea here is that for every 2.5 minutes the raid is idle, an hour of time is wasted across the entire raid!

Most things that cause the entire raid to come to a screeching halt simply don’t have to. Whether you raid seven nights a week, or just two or three, you can get more out of your raiding time by keeping the raid moving at all times!

flux Raiding

Ulduar is coming soon, but for many it’s just not soon enough! If you’re looking to take a break from raiding befiore patch day hits, here are some fun alternatives for how to spend your WoW time:

Grind Old Reputations: Get yourself exalted with the Timbermaw, Kurenai, or any other faction you’re not yet exalted with. At level 80, this is a much quicker process, and you can still make a bit of gold while doing this!

Build Up Your Reserves: Northrend daily quests are a great way to earn gold, and do some gathering as part of your repetoire. The Sons of Hodir give you better shoulder enchants when you are exalted, too. Between Icecrown and the Storm Peaks, you can earn a few hundred gold per day from daily quests!

Run Some Heroics: Get more badges to finish your off spec gear set. Get to exalted with the Northrend Vanguard factions (Knights of the Ebon Blade, Wymrest Accord, Argent Crusade, and Kirin Tor) by wearing the respective tabard while you’re in a 5-man heroic dungeon.

Level Up Cooking and Fishing: If you don’t already have these professions, they are wonderful for leveling hand in hand. Farming your own raid consumables not only saves you gold, but you can sell your surplus consumables on the AH for even more gold!

Read A Blog About Your Class: Learn about theorycrafting, and get to know your class better. There is a wealth of information on the internet that you can use to become a better player.

flux Raiding

One of the best ways to earn the respect of your guildmates is to be self-sufficient. World of Warcraft is a dynamic game that allows you to participate in all kinds of activities: questing, dungeons, raids, professions, and PVP to name a few. Your goals might include leveling to 80, improving your gear, and maxing out a profession. If you’re in a guild, you’re part of a group of people who also have their own goals. We all have only a limited amount of time to work with, and while it’s nice to help others out when able, it simply isn’t feasible to do every single time.

If you are in a leveling guild, or any guild with alts, you know what I’m talking about. Yes, it’s hard to get a group together for Gnomeregan or Sunken Temple, but that does not give you an excuse to beg in guild chat asking for run-throughs. Is there only one tank online in your guild? That does not automatically mean they want to tank the daily heroic for you, or any other instance.

Mount training is expensive, but asking for a handout is not the way to get there. Need 1,000 gold for your flying training? Go out and earn it. It’s a lot more rewarding that way! Grab a mining pick, skinning knife, or whatever implement you need and get to work. They aren’t called professions for nothing!

Being self-sufficient means meeting your goals while helping other people meet their goals. It’s not hard to get to level 80 without taking your guildies away from what they want to be doing. Instead of asking for someone to run you through the Deadmines, it’s a better idea to use the Looking For Group system, or ask if anyone in your guild has an alt that would like to run with you. If you are lucky, someone might offer to run you through anyway. When I see someone constantly asking to be run through dungeons, I am very unlikely to help them.

Another benefit of being self-sufficient is learning how to play your class. When you ask someone run you through a dungeon, not only are you asking them to take time away from what they were doing, but you’re looking to get XP and loot without any effort. This does not give you a chance to improve your gameplay. Yes, it will take longer to complete a dungeon with people your own level, but the experience you will gain playing your class will pay off later on. It’s not hard to tell who has never done a dungeon the “regular way” when you are in a raid like Naxxramas. It’s the DPS who is constantly pulling aggro, the healer who doesn’t dispel, or the tank who can’t find the taunt button. Take the time to learn how to play your class without begging for help, and you will become an experienced player who has earned the respect of your guildies.

flux Dungeons, Newbie Guides

First I’ll define the term ‘PUG Raid’. There is a difference between a 25-man raid formed of experienced raiders and good friends, and a 25-man raid formed with 25 complete strangers. When I say PUG Raid I’m referring to a raid with 25 random people, or pretty close to that. Most of us have been in one at some time or another, whether it’s to raid Naxxramas, the Black Temple, or even a pre-TBC raid. These raids usually fail pretty miserably, and while there’s not much that can usually be done to improve the outcome, there’s several lessons to be learned.

Lack of Etiquette: Bringing unknown people in for their first raid often sets the entire group up for trouble. There’s a lot of etiquette involved in 25-man raids. All it takes is one Leeroy wanna-be to face pull and ruin the experience for everyone. When you have 25 people raiding together, you’re not wasting one person’s time when it goes sour. You’re wasting everyone’s time. At the minimum, any person invited to a raid should at least be known to have manners. When you invite someone to a raid, it is good to make sure at least one or two people know the person isn’t an ass.

Lack of Gear or Skill: Some people will never be able to dodge void zones, death and decay, rain of fire, or any other types of “circles of death” no matter how many epics they are wearing. There’s just nothing you can do. For bosses such as Archavon, if you bring in too many newly-dinged 80s who can’t play their class, you sometimes risk not being able to beat the 5 minute enrage timer. A minimum amount of DPS output and skill is required for raiding. While inspecting someone’s gear won’t tell you if they can avoid circles of death or do a reasonable amount of DPS, it’s the next best thing to having someone vouch for them.

Lack of Strategy Knowledge: If someone’s well versed in raiding etiquette, is a skilled player, and has good gear, this usually isn’t much of an issue. Some people will pick up boss fight mechanics on the first try, and some will need several attempts before getting it down. That’s just how the learning process works. When you bring together a 25 man raid, of which half are new to the fight, it is inevitable that many will not have the patience to wipe several times until the new raiders learn the strategies. For instance, if you have a PUG with half new players and half seasoned raiders, after three wipes on Anub’rekhan you’re going to lose many of the good raiders at the very least. And when you replace them, you’re going to have to teach many of the incoming people how the fight works from the very beginning. The only way to avoid this problem is to make sure the people you invite know the strategies – which often isn’t the case with PUGs.

PUGs work great for 5 man instances. Not so much for 10 and 25 man, it seems. Any raider who knows what they are doing will most likely be inclined to join a guild where anyone who does not possess raiding etiquette or a fair amount of skill is not allowed inside in the first place.

flux Raiding

Rerolling? Bored with your main and working on leveling a new toon? Here are a few ways to speed up the leveling process.

Heirloom Shoulders: These are bound to account, meaning you can share them with any of your same-faction alts.  For 40 Emblems of Heroism you can ship one of these to your brand spankin’ new alt to increase XP gained from killing mobs by 10%. For example, you can pick up a Tattered Dreadmist Mantle and use it for leveling a warlock, a priest, a mage, and even a druid or shaman. When combined with the next tip, this will speed up your leveling a substantial amount!

Rested XP Gains: For every 8 hours spent logged out or in an inn or capital city, you will gain one bubble of rested XP. When logged out at any other location, you will gain one bubble of rested XP every 32 hours. Up to one and a half levels of rested XP can be accumulated this way. Any XP you gain from killing mobs is doubled while you are rested. While taking breaks from leveling won’t level you faster in real time, it will certainly cut down the amount of /played time that you need to endure in order to make the grind to 80. If you are leveling multiple toons, switching between them after your XP bar turns purple can shave off a lot of leveling time.

Refer-A-Friend: Whether you are bringing someone new to the game, or simply using a second account that you are paying for, this is another way to level an alt faster. When you are questing together with your recruited toon, you will both gain triple XP up until level 60. You also get bonus levels you can grant for every two levels the recruited toon gains. You can also summon each other once per hour. For a list of program details and restrictions, visit Blizzard’s website.

flux Newbie Guides, Questing & Leveling

Wrath of the Lich King has been out for about six months now, and I still have no DPS toons at level 80. With two level 80 healer toons, and a smattering of 70ish DPS toons, I just didn’t feel like leveling any of them. So instead, I started leveling a warlock. Revisiting old areas can be fun. But I am definitely not looking forward to doing the Hellfire Peninsula quests yet again!

Here are some fun ways to break up your leveling grind:

Questing vs. Grinding. Some people swear by questing, and some attest that grinding is superior. I tend to do a balance of each. Find an area where you can do a number of quests, and kill all the mobs in the area several times. This way you can get XP and quest rewards from quests, while minimizing your need to travel. This is especially useful at the low levels before you get a mount.

Grouping. Be outgoing and offer those a hand who are questing where you are. You’ll all benefit from faster kills, fewer deaths and less downtime. It’s a great way to make friends, too.

Dungeons. If you can put together a good group, dungeons are a great way to break up the grind while gaining valuable experience playing your class. Depending on your server’s population, it might be difficult to get a group for a low level dungeon, but if you can it’s worth it.

Crafting. Crafting while leveling is a lot easier, and less expensive than power-leveling a crafting profession after you are at max level. Plus it’s a fun and profitable diversion once your XP bar turns purple.

Turn your computer off. This is the best advice of them all!

flux Newbie Guides, Questing & Leveling

My favorite part of leveling is doing dungeon runs, hands down. You get XP, some shiny blue items, and best of all – you get to develop your class/role expertise as part of a group. Whether you are a tank, healer, or DPS, dungeons are the best way to hone your skills; especially if you want to raid when you get to level 80! Here are a few tips to help you on your first dungeon run.

Pick a dungeon that’s suitable for your level. A quick way to find out which dungeons are available at your level is to use the Looking For Group tool. In the drop down box you will be able to see which dungeons are well suited to your level range.

Preparations. Repair. Clear out your bags. Stock up on food, water, potions, and elixirs if needed. Get any or all of the available quests for the dungeon where you are headed.

Bring a tank. The tank’s job is to keep all the mobs from going after everyone else. Protection-specced warriors and paladins, feral druids, or tanking-spec death knights are your friends here.

Bring a healer. Someone has to keep everyone alive, and that’s where the healer comes in. Restoration druids and shamans; holy paladins and priests.

Try to have a good variety of classes. Each class offers its own way to buff the group. Druids can buff Mark of the Wild, paladins have Blessings, mages have Arcane Intellect, priests have Prayer of Fortitude, shamans have Heroism, warlocks can Soulstone, death knights have Horn of Winter, and so on.

Don’t pull aggro off the tank. If you are a damage dealing class, give the tank some time to get aggro on the mobs before you pew pew. If you have any abilities which reduce your threat, such as Feign Death or Feint, use them regularly.

Ask before rolling on gear. A good way to prevent loot arguments is to ask before rolling on an item drop. If nothing else, it shows the rest of the group that you have good manners!

Ask lots of questions. If you are just starting out, dungeons are a great way to learn more about your class from other seasoned players. Ask and ye shall find!

Give constructive advice. If someone else in the party is doing something incorrectly, be tactful and let them know nicely.

Learn from mistakes. We all make them, the best you can do is learn from them!

Have fun!

flux Dungeons, Newbie Guides

Patch 3.1 will bring us Ulduar, a brand new raid dungeon, and with it lots of new epics including Tier 8 items. Item level 226 epics will drop on 25 man, and level 213 epics on 10 man. There’s many ways you can get yourself geared for this new instance:

Gearing Up For 10-man Ulduar

You will want to have level 200 epics or higher if possible. Level 200 epics drop in Naxxramas, Obsidian Sanctum, and the Vault of Archavon. One level 200 epic will drop off the last boss in every heroic 5-man Northrend dungeon. Additionally, level 200 epics can be purchased from emblem of heroism vendors, and crafted through many professions. Some bind-on-equip epics do exist and can be occasionally found – but not without a high price tag!

Gearing Up For 25-man Ulduar

With level 213 epics equipped you are ready to head into Ulduar 25. You’ll be getting these from Naxx 25, VoA 25, OS 25, Malygos 10 man, Kel’thuzad 10 man, as well as emblem of valor vendors.

flux Raiding

What makes World of Warcraft en epic MMO isn’t just the awesome content. It’s the way it brings together many people from around the globe to work together in achieving common goals. World of Warcraft has all kinds of different guilds, organized by the players themselves, to enhance your gaming experience.

Roleplaying Guilds

If you’re into the roleplaying aspect of WoW, RP guilds (and servers) are the place to look. While RP realms are often lacking, there are still guilds out there that offer their members an opportunity to participate in RP.

Casual & Leveling Guilds

These guilds offer a more relaxed, laid-back atmosphere. These are a great way to find people to quest and level with, and run dungeons. Some casual guilds offer a limited amount of focus to raiding as well.

Raiding Guilds

The focus of a raiding guild is end-game content. Whether you’re a tank, healer, or DPS, raiding guilds demand a high level of experience with your role. If you’re looking to take on the biggest challenges available, finding a raiding guild is the way to go. Raiding guilds are often a lot more demanding, though some casual raiding guilds do exist.

flux Newbie Guides

We’ve all had our share of pick up groups gone bad. Still, PUGs are an invaluable tool in WoW. Guildies aren’t always available to help every time, and PUGs are a great way to find people with common goals to work with. With the help of the Looking For Group feature and respective chat channel, you can be on your way to finding a PUG to help get you where you want to go. Here are some tips for having a happy PUG:

Ask in LFG but don’t spam

After joining the Looking For Group system, announce in the LFG channel what you are looking for. Be as specific as possible, with what instance and roles you are seeking out. Don’t spam the channel; a reminder every few minutes should be sufficient. Using all caps is also a bad idea.

LF Healer and Tank

If you’re a tank or healer, this will often help in finding a PUG. Healers usually seem to be in short supply in LFG, and tanks too. If you’re a DPS, having a healer or tank already in tow can help you get a group faster.

Decide the looting rules before you start

Are there several skinners in the party? Is there an enchanter who is going to DE? How will you handle rolling for off spec? It’s a good idea to get these questions out of the way before setting foot in a dungeon.

The fortune’s in the follow-up

If you think someone did a good job, after you are done you can whisper them and ask them if it’s okay to contact them in the future about doing an instance. Usually you will get a resounding YES! Once you establish a large list of PUG friends this way, you won’t even need to go into LFG sometimes. It’s all about who you know, and working with PUGs is a great way to get to know more people. (On the flipside, if there was someone who did a lousy job, you now know to avoid them!)

flux Dungeons