I’m not going to be able to call myself failDK anymore.
OK, so it’s mostly just an affectionate moniker for my DK, but I don’t have the same comfort level as I do on my mage.
Mage – I am master of the arcane! I shall obliterate anything in my path! Or flirt outrageously with it!
DK – Where the fuck is the back of this mob?
We set forth into ICC 10 again last night and as hoped, I was able to increase my ass-whooping potential.
This time it was a full guild run, no pug hunters telling us to keep vent PG-rated. As if. pfffftttt.
Quick refresher, first trip into ICC, from zone in through two attempts at Saurfang with no kill:
Take two, with 4-piece T9 and winning the Shawl of Nerubian Silk off Marrowgar right off the bat, bringing me up to a respectable level of expertise (on top of the bracers that Tir got for me, I think it pains him to see a DK in crap gear, lol):
This time we 1-shot the entire Citadel and cleared up through the puppies.
My position on the chart didn’t change, but I did see a 1300 DPS improvement.
And I forgot to flask after the first one ran out.
FailDK is failDK.
Now that my expertise is under control, it’s time to work on the next item on my “You’re Doing it Fucking Wrong!” list:
Parries.
Yeesh…
I had 30 for the evening.
I know a certain amount of parry is practically unavoidable in some of the larger clusterfuck trash pulls.
But 20 of my parries were on Saurfang.
Totally my bad (failDK is failDK, remember?) and I failed to notice when the tanks split up, one on each side of Saur instead of being neatly stacked on the door-side like they were when we started. At one point it was like they were waltzing about on the platform and I couldn’t keep track of who was leading.
So my parries were horrible and will be fixed next time.
However!
I did do something right, and have brought proof to show Rurjaos that there are DKs that provide utility!
Mind Freeze is one of the yummiest spells I have on any character.
Mob: I’m going to cast a big, bad, ugly spell!
Inítrí: No! You’re going to suck down this blue-raspberry Slurpee until you feel like your head is going to explode with cold fire!
Or is that a brain freeze?
Meh.
Getting the cloak drop means I don’t have to buy the frost cloak. I’ve got my eye on a ToCr 25 belt… I might be able to just save frost for T10 now…
Looks like I’m getting the hang of this melee crap. After I get parries fixed, what are the other big no-nos that I’m probably doing?
clearcasting 
So…why in the world weren’t your tanks stacked?
Sure, you could have been watching to make sure your tanks were doing their job, but Saurfang is one of the few fights where single target melee gets to own face without worrying about anything else.
Your tanks were the ones who made the mistake.
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Well, I was tanking on Tirael. The OT was standing off to the side of me for some odd reason. I finally just told him to stack on me and things went better. Some guilds I have ran with do have the OT stand off to the side just so people can physically see the tank switch.
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You could’ve watched the tanks. That’s one thing I am going to agree with Randul, besides I don’t have tanks. I don’t trust tanks when comes to doing their actual damn job. I’m fine with the tanks, but Saurfang. Hehehehehe, is a pretty hard to tackle.
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Very well done and that, on top of 2 (TWO) shammies (plus rogue), that COULD do this more often than a DK. Respect!
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BTW, the second DK on the chart was me…and I was tanking.
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Gah, that one set of Servants where you had me on X… I got *just* off on the interrupt cycle, he moved away out of melee range as I was casting the first Mind Blast and I was playing catch up after that. I think he got most of his Glacial Blasts off. WTB shorter cooldown on Strangulate. And failDK forgot he could use Death Grip as an interrupt. /facepalm
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I got it…he’s using your blog to generate hits Arioch. He goes to different blogs that get decent hits and then says absolutely outrageous things so people will go to his blog because they just can’t believe he’s real. It’s a thought.
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I was referring to the Andrew character.
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So, he really is just an attention whore?
That makes too much sense.
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Very much and I’m pretty sure he’s using his referrals to figure out where he comments. He drops a comment on a blog and if doesn’t generate a decent referral rate he moves on. Arioch’s got to be one of the biggest. I get most of my referrals from commenting on her blog.
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You are telling a big lie Raven, I don’t advertise! I just like to chat with WoW players and get some info on WoW. But if they even bother to comment, I don’t care. That’s their choice. Nobody from this blog (Except Arioch) has commented on my blog. So why even bother thinking about something untrue that wouldn’t even work if I wasn’t trying to advertise?
You didn’t make a point Raven, you just made a big mistake. You all call me retarded, gibberish, internet troll or any of that crap. I don’t give a damn about it. But now you just made a pointless regard, Raven.
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Keep in mind…he’s 10. At least according to his blog. I fell into the trap of actually clicking on his name as well.
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Never thought, you could have spoken about me!
Btw.: the 3 blue interupts came from the resto, isn’t it? ;)
DBM: Add enraging! Tranq-shot him!
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Cloak from the Gunship would be good…always drops for us–Hit becomes invaluable in T10, and you should be able to expertise cap easily from picking up Saurfang’s axe.
For T10, hold off on either the chest or legs. A nice chest drops from Morrowgar on 25, or if you have the saronite, craft the legs. It’ll give you a decent amount of ArP to work with =)
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Argh. That gunship cloak has been a sore subject for me. It *never* drops when I’m on my DK. It got to a point where I was wearing 4-pc T10, had 251 weapons for both specs, Whispering Fanged Skull, etc … and was still wearing an iLevel 200 cloak from regular ToC5. Every time an agility-based cloak dropped, there was someone else in the raid for whom the itemization was better. I *finally* replaced that rag with the frost emblem cloak two nights ago.
Ari, I share your love for mind freeze. You know how we mages love to post the recount of ourselves topping the chart on Jarraxus? My night is made when I post the interrupts for that fight and I am the winner. ;)
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I am a royal pain in the ass with this stuff. Hehehehe
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I’ve tried to play melee since TBC when I levelled my paladin and I still have “Where is the back of this mob?!” issues :p
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“Where is the back of this mob!!”
XD
that’s why i stick to backrow jobs…and i guess one tank. Much simpler!
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My mind went so many bad places with this >.>
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So did I….my comment was not worded correctly…thank Koala for reminding me of why we appreciate and like you so much!
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I see how it is. You guys only love me for my perverted mind.
*cries*
And all along I thought it was because of the bewbs
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Well that too. I just didnt want to seem like a dirty old man. :P
trying to keep it PG
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two years older does not make you an old man
*sigh*
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Huh did you say something??
I was too busy appreciating…going to stop before i get in trouble.
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<3
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Aww, only 4 interrupts? Was that for the whole night?
..I am shamed. -_-
To my credit though I usually at least try if I see a cast…. My energy’s bottomed out pretty frequently tho. : /
However, I can maybe offer some semi-useful advice on the ‘goddamnit I forgot to re-flask’ front. If you happen to use power auras you can create a icon or message that pops up when you’re missing a buff.
Since my rogue is an Alchie and I roll with Flask if the North if I’m not on Flask of Endless Wage I just set it to see if I have a buff with ‘flask’ in the name.
If I do then all’s well. If not it puts a big NO FLASK next to my char portrait in big ‘ol ‘you are a a dumbass’ red letters which stays there till I put my flask on.
Same with my MH and OH poisons. Same with Horn of Winter on my miniDK. (when I’m in combat, otherwise it’d get annoying) It works extremely well as a reminder.
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Yup, whole night.
I don’t use power auras. Normally once I flask for the evening I’m decently good about remembering to re-flask as I’m the one handing them out to the raiders. (Remembering to flask in the first place is the hard part, and we usually don’t flask until we pull Marrow but I flasked from the first pull, screwed up my own internal timer.) I saw that it was about to end, made sure I knew where they were on my bar and in my bag… and then spaced. It’s a different color icon than I’m used to having, just need to pay a little more attention.
Also need to add a custom bar for my Hysteria and DRW and Mind Freeze so I can keep a better eye on their cooldowns.
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Cool beans, I just wanted to share. :) I have an abiding and indecent love of PowA.
I want it to have my children.
Well…Not like I want to father children on it.. But, like.. When I get some, I want it to take them.
I don’t like kids that much.
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Sell me on it, what all does it do?
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Everything but give happy endings.
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It’s a buff/proc/CD/JFM time tracker. If you ever watch Alleina’s videos on Tankspot, it is the icons that keep popping up showing CoH and PoM and such off CD. It is a really nice addon.
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mmmm… I found that one distracting.
I just need to pay more attention.
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If the addon doesnt give me a happy ending then i am not happy
and if momma aint happy . . .
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Well, the cliffs notes is, you can cause icons or text (with some animation effects) to pop up on your screen based on different conditions. The icons and text can be in any size, location, color, transparency you like. There is a bit of a learning curve to begin with, but once you get the hang it is pretty easy to set up almost anything you want.
I use it to:
-DK-
• Put half a circle around my DK when I have 40 RP (Enough to dump)
• Put the other half of a circle up when I have 60 RP (Enough to DRW)
• Put a flashy border around the circle when I have 100 RP (I know I’m ‘wasting’ RP by being capped)
• Remind me when I don’t have Horn up
-Rogue-
•Track Berserk procs on my weapon
• Display my Vanish, Cloak, A.Rush, B.Flurry and K.S. availability (as icons) next to my portrait, and cooldown timers in those same positions when they are on CD. (you can see them in the “I’m a rogue!” screen shot on Mill’s site, actually.)
(http://dotsandhots.files.wordpress.com/2010/03/fuckyousaurfang.jpg)
• Display a message when my flask or poisons are off.
-Hunter-
• Make it (very) obvious when I have AotV up on my Hunter, because I forget to switch it off sometimes because I am not smart.
• Track my Trap cooldowns (by category, fire, ice, snake)
• Put a flashing symbol over my pet’s health when it drops below 80%
-Paladin-
• Put a flashing red ‘+’ symbol over my portrait when I’m below 30% health
• Put a flashing blue teardrop symbol over my portrait when I’m below 40% mana
• Tracks availability of Holy Wrath, Ham of Wrath, D.Plea and my 2 taunts next to my portrait.
-Warlock-
• Displays a symbol when I’m in combat without my Life Tap SP buff.
• Displays a spoooooky runed ring around my toon when nightfall procs.
In short.. It won’t tell you anything you wouldn’t really already know by looking at your screen, but if can make things MUCH more obvious, and easier to interpret and in a way that makes sense to you, since it’s more or less totally configurable. You can even import graphics and sounds for it to use.
Basically it’s value is by tracking the core skills and CDs for your class, giving you faster access to that information, allowing you to respond faster, and allowing you to keep your ‘head up’ more. (I.E watch the fight, positioning, etc, rather than managing your character.)
Anyway. I happen to love it, your mileage may vary. :)
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Is it easy to configure?
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On DK-girly:
Blue shield/red crossed blades mid screen, if presence doesn’t match spec or is missing after a respec/tank-dead-emergency.
Blue pulsing snowflake/red pulsing teardrop if diseases are goning to fall off (below 6 sec) this way you can prepare to keep the needed runes up. Useful, if some dps screwed up your initial rota and you wasted a gcd or two on taunt.
On warri:
Flashing symbol when rage > 35.
On schammi:
MW5-readyness-display.
On tree:
Red cross, if +234 SP-Buff from Rejuv is missing.
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PowA Configuration hint:
Don’t try to test your conditions while the config dialog is open, doesn’t seem to work for me… VERY confusing and timeconsuming if not known.
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Mostly!
Hehe…
Umm. There’s a bit of a learning curve and a lot of checkboxes but I figured it out within an hour or two, doing the guy thing and not looking at instructions, etc. If you have someone to help you it oughta be pretty easy to set up. Most of what you do is variations on the same theme.
There’s a wiki for it somewhere…
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