I see Cow... Redux.

So Ulushnar hit level 60 on Sunday. After doing that, he started work on a questline that allows him to summon his Epic Warhorse:



He completed it last night with the aid of friends from CD. Now Outland awaits and the last ten levels or so should pass easily. The mobs in Outland seem to give twice the experience of similar mobs in Azeroth, and the quests themselves give something in the region of 150% of the XP.

I had initially looked forward to levelling with a small group of friends, doing instances and working on my tanking skills. It now seems that two of these friends at least won't be joining me in the run to 70, and several of the other CD alts are currently in the 63+ bracket. This means I now have to grind like a mad thing to catch up to a useful level. Ah well, given the work it's taken to get this far, this stage at least should be relatively straight forward.

Karazhan the Group-breaker

CD's starting to make some decent progression in Karazhan, having killed the first five bosses. As it stands though, we're in a frustrating situation, since ideally we need people in the following roles to do a Kara run:

3 Healers
2 Tanks (ideally at least one is a Tanking hybrid able to take on another role in single-mob enccounters)
5 Damage Dealers

Given the large amount of undead in the instance, then it's preferrable that at least one priest is amongst either the healers or damage dealers.

Currently, CD has the following attuned and willing to go to Kara:

8 Healers
5 Tanks
23 Damage dealers

Allowing for people to have night offs or unforseen circumstances, we barely have enough tanks and healers for two runs, whilst we have more than enough damage dealers for four. If Karazhan was on a 3-day reset timer (like the old 20-man instances) then we might get away with running two groups. Given that it's currently on a 7-day timer, it means that anyone who goes to the instance gets tied there for the rest of the week and can't enter another version.

It all smacks of Blizzard trying desperately to eke out raid content until it could finish the later 25-man encounters. But it's playing merry hell with our group at present.

As a result, our healers and tanks are tied into going most of the time and burning out as a result. Also, a lot of our DPS are being left out of the runs and are similarly getting burnt out and left to feel useless. If this coming summer's anything like last one, then we'll have a lot of folks away/on holiday/enjoying the weather, and those of us left will have to try and muddle through regardless.

Farming FTW

Well last night I didn't manage to get much levelling done with Ulushnar, as I spent most of the night running around the low-level zones picking herbs to increase his Herbalism skill. I have to say, if nothing else then the change to dual gathering professions will dramatically increase his cashflow up to 70. Being able to sell all my herbs, ore and stones usually earns more cash than making items with them and trying to sell them. I may actually be able to get an epic flying mount with Ulu at 70!

As time goes on with Ulu, I'm starting to realise he might not be the best choice to tank endgame raid instances. Palading tank itemisation in the endgame skimps too much on things we need like Stamina and Sheild Block Rating and wastes too many points on things we don't like Mana Regen. To this end I'm considering investing a fair amount of his points in the Holy tree so He can act as a Healer when he's not off-tanking in instances.

I also logged Wulf in for a while to help some folks with a Heroic Instance. The Heroics are still insanely challenging as one wrong pull normally means the entire group dies. Since I'm no longer bothered with doing solo stuff with Wulf, I respecced him to deep Survival so that he can keep mobs well trapped at all times.

More on the weekend.

It was a busy weekend for Ulushnar. He did a lot of quests, both solo and with groups of CDers and a few instances, some with CD members and some with Pickup Groups. My goal was to stick to my rule of "one level an evening, two a day at the weekend". I very nearly broke that goal, since I got within 10,000 XP of level 47 on Saturday night, and I logged off last night with only 30k to level 49. I'll be playing less this week though, so I should still maintain a good average.

I made a couple of changes to Ulu though. The first was to change his talent spec slightly. Previously, I'd focussed on the Retribution tree to boost my damage output after getting 31 points in the Protection tree. Instead, I've decided to put those spare points into the Holy tree, to give me more mana and to reduce the chance that my healing spells will be interrupted. Should enhance my survivability in those multi-mob pulls I love so much.

I've also dropped Jewelcrafting in favor of Herbalism. Improving a crafting profession is a money and time sink whilst levelling, whilst having two gathering professions can help your cashflow and will give me the resources I can give to CD crafters to make potions, armor and gems at higher levels. Of course I've now got to run around levelling Herbalism, but that shouldn't take more than an evening.

Post-weekend Pally report.

Well, last weekend wasn't quite as insane as the one before, but I did manage to get Ulushnar from level 43 to 48. If all goes according to plan, I'll hit level 60 with him sometime next week, and then the hijinks in Outland can begin.

Here he is in all his finery:



More later, maybe.