The Classifieds: The most uber players of the week
The Classifieds brings you weekly updates on guild happenings, raid progression rankings, player milestones and more. Have guild news or a Random Act of Uberness to share? E-mail TheClassifieds@wow.com.
Welcome to the Uber Player Edition of The Classifieds. As you know, we've been building Random Acts of Uberness, a section of the column devoted to shout-outs to the folks who've made your PUG experiences shine. With more and more submissions every week, we're inevitably approaching that time when we'll have to start editing notes for length. But not this week. This week, your stories were so inspirational, your experiences were so uberific, that we simply decided to turn over the bulk of The Classifieds to the Random Acts section and let the uberness run wild and free.
"I'm not to proud to admit it: when we're short on tanks, my husband and I will let our kid tank for us -- our just shy of seven-year-old, who diligently (and with trade chat disabled and parental controls on, his toon parked in our friends-and-fam guild instead of the casual raiding guild our mains are in) ground his teeny gnome warrior up to 80," writes Haelmari of US Eonar-A. "Tonight, we and some guildies needed a random. He wanted to play. Win/win, right?
"We lacked a healer. ..."
The uber resolution of Haelmari's situation, after the break.
"So we sucked it up and joined LFG," Heilmari continued. "Our dungeon master yanked aside the unwitting victim -- I mean, the l33t pro healer we got -- to let him know: the tank was a kid, he was learning, we had another plate wearer right there just in case things went to hell faster than you can yell 'For Lordaeron!' ... Was he okay with this?
"Dear Arkouda from US Gorefiend: you bloody well ruled, man. You made a kid's night. You were beyond patient and understanding. You were encouraging, you cheered him on, you watched what he was doing, you whispered hints and tips. We didn't have a single death, and we made it through HoL heroic in under half an hour with a very, very fresh tank. Thank you. I hope every PUG appreciates you as much as we did." (Haelmari, <Saints of Elune>, US Eonar-A)
We've got lots more Acts of Random Uberness where that one came from.
Mattmatics (US Dragonmaw-H) "I had zoned into Gundrak as a healer, only to find we had a fairly new-to-80 paladin tank. After a close shave on the first boss (said paladin tank was the only one left alive), a few group members dropped.
"This is when Mattmatics came to the rescue. He not only stopped a warrior DPS (from) saying the tank should go and drop group straight away to do normals instead, (but) he also did most of the damage and made it possible for us to defeat the bosses before I tore my hair out at the aggro-pulling, group-wide healing-needing situations. He also answered my inane questions about warlocks ('Err, what's that bouncy green thing between you and mobs?' 'Why, Haunt, of course!'). And his name is awesome. =)" (Risqtish, <Oceanic Guardians>, US Shadow Council-H)
Raeynne <Last Stand of Valor>, US Whisperwind-A "We were in a Vault-25 PUG together and the Wrathful gloves dropped off Toravon. I won the roll, but the raid leader mislooted the gloves to Raeynne. A short tell later, and she agreed to trade them to me next chance she got. It's randomly uber because she could have kept the gloves for herself or just ignored me, but instead she chose to do the right thing. Thanks, Raeynne!" (Urzah, US Whisperwind-A)
Unknown New Level 80 Tank, Rampage battlegroup "I generally play randoms pretty 'heads down.' I focus the tank, assist, misdirect and generally make things die so I can have the group's enchanter give me mats and the last dead boss give me frost badges. This particular run was no different. Trash is dropping, the tank's health never gets alarmingly low (my Recount window slightly covers my focus unit frame, but I was never scared for the tank), and we're progressing at an acceptable rate.
"Just before pulling the boss, someone starts complaining about the tank's gear. I take a quick look and see that our pally tank has 25k health. Turns out, it's the healer complaining, 'You barely have more health than your healer.' The healer had 23k health and almost 30k mana. The tank simply says, 'I wondered how long until I'd get bothered about that. I'm defense-capped, and you get gear from heroics.'
"Trollgore is engaged, and we nearly take him down before the tank goes down and a wipe follows. I was flabbergasted. I didn't pull threat until the tank died and was near (if not on top) of the DPS chart. The healer drops and the tank says, 'Wow, I didn't get a single heal during that fight. Fourth heroic since turning 80 [hours ago], and that's my first death.'
"At this point, another DPS drops and we requeue. I didn't want to wait out the debuff or another DPS queue, and I knew the tank could do it. The other DPS and I are giving the tank our support as the new group comes in. (While waiting for the new members, I checked out the tank's gear; could not have been better for a four-heroic 80. I was really impressed.) We preemptively let the new healer and DPS know that we have an instance-appropriate, geared tank (not over-geared, as per random heroic usual) and we know we can complete the dungeon with no issues.
"The healer wholeheartedly agrees, and we proceed to destroy DTK at current-day heroic speeds. Tank was never in trouble, DPS was good, healing and threat were great. In fact, my thought halfway through the dungeon was that this paladin with 25k health seemed easier for the healer to keep up than a 45k DK tank I'd recently healed on my druid. I really wish I would have noted every toon's name, but it was a great run and reminder for me, so I thought I'd share." (Purloach, US Ravencrest-H)
Around the World of Warcraft
There's something about EU Emerald Dream: Emerald Dreamers, a self-hosted realm forum designed to build community and participation. "We started the site in November last year because we were sick of the forums (official and unofficial) being mostly guild recruitment spam and bots posting porn threads," explain founders Holyshell and Tethane. "We wanted a place to write about interesting people and events on the realm and showcase some talent (we have a web comic and an upcoming machinima featuring voiceovers from 'The Staff,' which should be fun). Of course as time went on, we started to feature more generic posts, too, though all by people from our realm -- so even if it's unrelated, it's still giving EDers a voice."
Do you blog about WoW? Or are you addicted to reading WoW blogs? We may have just the guild for you. Miss Medicina, of the eponymous blog, and Tamarind of Righteous Orbs are nurturing the WoW blogging community with a new guild specifically for bloggers and blog-lovers. <Single Abstract Noun> resides on both the US and EU versions of Argent Dawn realms. As Miss Medicina puts it, "It's almost like the antithesis of Gevlon's Blue Guild ... We have absolutely no real purpose EXCEPT to be social."
You don't have to be a blogger yourself in order to join. Visit Miss Medicina's post for more information about joining the US/Oceanic guild, or pop by Righteous Orbs for deets on the EU version.
Don't forget about WoW.com's own bloggarific guild, <It came from the Blog> on US Zangarmarsh-H. Guild mama Robin Torres runs regular events that players of any level can enjoy, including meetups with many of the WoW.com team. Membership is open to all; visit the guild FAQ for more details.
What a long, strange way to play; this guy must be insane. A duly impressed fan sent in these shots of Owatanka's (US Exodar-H) five-boxed achievement of both Insane in the Membrane and What a Long, Strange Trip It's Been. We're ... speechless.
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Recruiting
Do people even read these things? Apparently, they do -- and reader AQ turned to The Classifieds and its readers for help finding just the right guild fit. "I figured this would be a good place to ask," he writes. "I am looking for a large guild on a PvE server. I'm fine with Horde or Alliance. I'd just like to find a large guild with multiple raid groups and lots of active people. Ideally, it would be something like Serious Casual, the guild for benefactors of Elitist Jerks, or Taint, the GLBT guild on Proudmoore. The problem with SC is that it is on a PvP server and a very lagged and unstable server, and I'm not GLBT so Taint is out for me as well. Do you or any of the readers have suggestions on guilds that would fit the criteria? I'm dying to find a big, social, active and great guild." Anyone in a guild that sounds like a match for AQ? Link your guild web site in the comments and help a guy out!
On that note, if you're LFGuild yourself and can't seem to find the right fit, drop us a line with your Armory link and one or two sentences on what you're looking for.
25-man is where it's at
REBORNE (US Stormscale-H); raids Sat. 9 p.m.; two 10-man teams with openings (another two filled 10s); "mature, relaxed and progression-minded"
Aeternus (US Llane-A); raids Tues./Wed./Sun./Mon. 8:30 p.m.-12 a.m. ET; new hardcore approach, 90% attendance requirement, 5300 GS minimum, no alts
Quarantine (US Proudmoore-H) ; seeks ranged caster DPS, especially elemental and resto shamans; Triumph gear minimum
Here's a 10-man guild recruiting: <B Team> (US Azjol-Nerub-H) raids Mon./Wed./Thurs. from 7-10 p.m. MST. They've defeated Festergut and Rotface and are working on Professor Putricide.
Still building up their 10-mans (with an eye on 25-man content) is <Honorbound> (US Thrall-A). Honorbound raids 7-11 p.m. server time "a few nights a week" plus Saturday afternoons and evenings and is "particularly excited" about ranged DPS and feral and resto druids.
If you're just starting to make friends, <An Epic Family> (EU Darkspear-A) sounds like a good place to start. This "social guild with a twist" focuses on forging friendships with regular guild events and birthday celebrations. They welcome new players. Contact Fawnish or Kesi for more details.
Burning the midnight oil: <Clandestine> (US Greymane-H), currently first on their server in 10-man strict progression, seeks more tanks, healers and ranged DPS for its late-night squad, starting at 10:30 p.m. server time two mid-week nights per week.
Raiding progression
Still slamming against Festergut and Rotface? It may feel like so much still lies ahead, but some people feel that we've already reached the beginning of the end ... Speaking of which, let's see who's managed to make it to the end of the end of Icecrown Citadel this week.
World Hall of Fame Who got there first? Check out the charts to see who won the race to down the Lich King and who's in the process of nabbing the attendant achievements.
25-man Progress The bleeding-edge guilds are working on heroic modes in The Frostwing Halls and The Plagueworks.
25-man Achievement There's a new guild who's cleared the top of the pack this week in terms of achievements: <Cráb People> from EU Talnivarr-H, with 1,480 achievement points.
10-man Progress 25-man guilds <Paragon> and <Ensidia> have both sent in teams to down the Lich King in 10-man heroic mode.
10-man Achievements Ten guilds hold top spot on the list of achievement points earned in this category.
10-man Strict Progress Eight guilds are working on ICC heroic modes now.
10-man Strict Achievements What a hard-working group of guilds! The groups at the top this week are all slaving away at different angles of ICC.
Milestones
Happy fourth anniversary to <RuneFire> of US Eitrigg-A. They're kicking up their heels with a trivia contest, an old-school raid, a level 1 gnome race and raid, and a rousing game of hide-and-seek. Have fun, guys!
And celebrating five years are <The Keepers of the Realm> (US Scarlet Crusade-A). Leaders Asher and Minxee sent us a shout-out to their members: "Thanks to all Keepers, past and present, for their role in making our guild what it is today! /salute"
Also marking five years are the folks at <Sleeper Cartel> (US Perenolde-A). "No, there's no server party planned," they admit, "but we'll be doing at least a little celebrating around the server to mark such a big milestone. (And yes, the next server party IS planned for later on this summer.)" Sounds like a plan!
The Classifieds brings you weekly updates on player and community news, guild recruiting, progression rankings and more. Have news, guild event screenshots or a Random Act of Uberness to share? E-mail TheClassifieds@wow.com. (If you're recruiting or seeking contacts from other players, please include your guild's web site address.)
