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Spiritual Guidance: The shadow priest's guide to Lord Rhyolith
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Spiritual Guidance for discipline, holy and shadow priests. On Wednesdays, shadow priesting expert Fox Van Allen's massive legs obscure your entire field of vision. Fox encourages all potential prey to follow him on Twitter. We beat Shannox. We took down Beth'tilac. Look out, Lord Rhyolith -- you're next. For shadow priests, Firelands boss Lord Rhyolith isn't an especially fun fight. He's way too big, so if he gets anywhere near you, he'll take up your entire field of vision. He's heavily armored (at least at first), so you get to see some pretty sweet 500-damage Mind Flay ticks if you attack him directly. And while he's got an interesting gimmick, shadow priests typically don't play a part in exploiting it. Still, even if it's not the most exciting fight, there's still plenty for us to do, plenty of stuff to avoid getting hit by, and (best of all) plenty of epics to find inside once you crack him open like an egg.
15 Minutes of Fame: Raiding without their strats on
From Hollywood celebrities to the guy next door, millions of people have made World of Warcraft a part of their lives. How do you play WoW? We're giving each approach its own 15 Minutes of Fame. What happens when you don't study your raid strategies before raid time -- on purpose? Those wild and crazy guys in The Seven Scientists of Runetotem (US) have been raiding without their strats on again ... And that's just the way they like it. "The rule is, don't read any spoilers on a (raid) boss until we've killed it, and if you do, don't talk about them," explains guild member Neminem. "... This way, we actually get to figure out strategy for ourselves, instead of just regurgitating a strategy someone else came up with." In earlier WoW, so-called "blind raiding" has been a badge of honor limited to the few bleeding-edge progression guilds that literally race through beta and new-release content, plus a few, dogged hardest of the hardcore. The Seven Scientists are neither. This 10-man group is entirely composed of real-life friends, and maintaining a tight-knit yet relaxed social fabric takes priority over progression. Despite that -- or as we'll see, perhaps more accurately because of it -- tackling new content without spoilers is simply the way they've come to enjoy throwing down together. Today's culture of PuGs sees a lack of preparation as a social faux pas, at best, or an offense worthy of guildkicks and pug-blacklisting, at worst. The Seven Scientists simply enjoy having a go at the content under their own steam -- no hairshirts, no lengthy rulesets, no pressure ... and all fun.
Shifting Perspectives: An Ulduar class preview, part 4
Every Tuesday, Shifting Perspectives explores issues affecting Druids and those who group with them. This week, another Ulduar boss dies to moonkin nukes, feral claws, and tree slaps.Chase Christian from Encrypted Text recently started a series of guides on doing Ulduar as a Rogue, and I must admit that the relative ease and simplicity of describing the role of a pure DPS while raiding is enough to make me sob quietly into a hanky. Meanwhile, I'm driving myself to the nuthouse trying to describe four entirely different roles for a single class. Pardon my saying so, but this column was the hell of a lot easier to write back when we sucked at everything that wasn't healing. Damn you, multi-spec viability! Damn you to HELL!Before we get started, I'm going to continue what I did with the last Ulduar preview column, link to general strategy guides, and assume you have a basic familiarity with the encounter before delving into more Druid-specific advice. Today we're going to confine ourselves to Freya, as it's one of the few Ulduar fights I have now seen outside of the PTR. With luck, my computer is going to cooperate for a full clear this week plus a few hard modes, so I will be revising (and, as necessary, expanding) our current Ulduar Druid guides to reflect changes that Blizzard has made to the fights and a few notes concerning hard mode issues. Any changes made will be noted in next week's column.
Shifting Perspectives: An Ulduar class preview, part 3
Every Tuesday, Shifting Perspectives explores issues affecting Druids and those who group with them. This week, as other people continue their march through Ulduar, I continue to ask myself if it wouldn't be more cost-effective in the long run just to take my ailing graphics card out behind the woodshed and end its pathetic misery once and for all.Greetings, fellow Druids. There have been a few changes to Ulduar of late which I haven't yet seen play out on the live realms, but most of the changes concerned are nerfs, which should have little impact on overall raid strategy apart from giving you a bit of extra breathing room. Today we're going to address what you can expect from Auriaya and Mimiron. Mimiron in particular was the subject of some concern from feral tanks on the PTR and, well, the mechanic driving that concern is still a problem, but less of one than you might think. I was originally going to include Freya in this installment as well, but noticed that her two erstwhile comrades were starting to consume rather a lot of space. Suffice it to say that trying to describe these two fights is awkward at best, so I'm restricting myself to as much Druid-centric information as possible rather than describing every possible means of handling the fights.Oh well. Batting first for us today is sad spinster Miss Auriaya and her smelly cats, although she's a bit complicated to describe:
Ready Check: Preparing for Ulduar's Bosses
Ready Check is a weekly column focusing on successful raiding for the serious raider. Hardcore or casual, Naxxramas-10 or Naxxramas-25, everyone can get in on the action and down some bosses. This week, we do some homework.With Patch 3.1 and the release of Ulduar fast approaching, it's time to sit down and prepare for the upcoming content. Now, you might be the sort of raider who loves a surprise or two, and as a result you haven't looked at any of the preview coverage of Ulduar; if that sounds familiar, you probably don't want to continue reading this article.If, however, your guild is going to rush into Ulduar as soon as possible, aiming for server or even world firsts, you need to be prepared. Let's take a look at the resources you can use to maximise your chances of success against the unknown.
Shifting Perspectives: Ulduar class preview, part I
Every Tuesday, Shifting Perspectives explores issues affecting Druids and those who group with them. This week, our author pretends to know more about Ulduar than she actually does, which makes a refreshing change from pretending to know more than she actually does about things that are already in the game.Hail and well met, Druids. For the next three Shifting Perspectives columns, I'm going to take a look at Druid class roles on Ulduar fights. If patch 3.1 hits earlier than expected (I'm currently betting that it hits in late April/early May), I'll try to squeeze these in a little bit faster than once per week. But with luck (and, I hope, a parade of annoying bugs for Blizzard to hunt down and squash before they let the patch go live), we should have some information to chew on before we set foot in a live Ulduar. Now watch Blizzard deploy the frickin' patch next week.I have not gotten the opportunity to test all of these fights personally because I'm only on the North American PTR, and some fights -- like Yogg-Saron -- haven't been available for testing at all. What I write here is going to be a compilation of personal experience, details concerning boss abilities available on the PTR version of Wowhead, information I've gotten from pestering various people on both PTR's, and news available around the web, principally from WoW Insider's previous PTR testing, Wowwiki, MMO Champion, and World of Raids. Bear in mind that some things here may wind up being very different when Ulduar actually goes live, so take numbers and conjecture here with a grain of salt. I'm going to assume that basic boss mechanics are likely to remain the same or similar, so let's get started with the first three encounters.
Ready Check: Sartharion plus 3 Drakes
Ready Check is a weekly column focusing on successful raiding for the serious raider. Hardcore or casual, ZA or Sunwell Plateau, everyone can get in on the action and down some bosses. This week, we take on a dragon and his mates. Yeah.Last week we provided an outline of the Sartharion encounter, promising to deliver more detail this week on how to beat the boss with all three of his drake companions alive at the pull. This is commonly called 'hard mode' and, although it's not for the faint hearted, it's by no means impossible either. However, excellent co-ordination and DPS are required in order to keep the fight under control and things can quickly degenerate into chaos. When to attempt 3 drakesIs your guild or raid group ready to even try 3 drakes? There's no hard-and-fast rule that says 'you need to be this awesome to leave three drakes alive'. If you're thinking about trying it, we'd hope that you've already killed Sartharion, probably with one or two adds already alive. You've cleared Naxx and are decked out in gear, you have a diverse pool of people to draw from, and you can communicate with each other. That's all you need, really, although a couple of things can help, including a well geared tank and complementary DPS.
Ready Check: Guide to Naxxramas (Construct Quarter, part 1)
Ready Check is a weekly column focusing on successful raiding for the serious raider. Hardcore or casual, ZA or Sunwell Plateau, everyone can get in on the action and down some bosses. This week, we unwisely decide to give the column to Allison "Oops, I forgot my frost resist" Robert. Not that you actually need frost resist gear for the Construct Quarter...but that's about the time she generally remembers she left hers in the bank.Greetings, folks. Jennie's off for January, so I'll be writing Ready Check this month. Today's installment got a little long, mostly because Patchwerk tends to be a stumbling block to guilds still gearing up in Naxxramas, and Grobbulus is a little complicated to describe. So tonight I'll post on the first two bosses in the Construct Quarter, and tomorrow I'll finish with Gluth and Thaddius. Next week we'll take a look at Sapphiron and Kel'thuzad in order to finish off Naxx.The Construct, or Abomination, Quarter of Naxxramas contains two of the raid's most storied fights in the form of Patchwerk and Thaddius. It additionally contains some of the raid's most storied trash in the form of the Frogger Hallway directly after Patchwerk. As Jennie says, if you want to experience the encounters unspoiled, don't read any further!
Ready Check: Guide to Naxxramas (Military Quarter)
Ready Check is a weekly column focusing on successful raiding for the serious raider. Hardcore or casual, ZA or Sunwell Plateau, everyone can get in on the action and down some bosses. This week, we visit some Death Knights in their natural habitat.Are you a fan of our new death knight brethren? If so, you're in for a treat: there are plenty of them in store for you in this quarter of Naxxramas, as we continue our journey towards Kel'Thuzad's throne. Our whistlestop tour will pop in and visit Instructor Razuvious, Gothik the Harvester and finally the Four Horsemen, whose charismatic yells punctuate the wing as a whole.Remember, if you want everything to be a surprise, don't read beyond the cut!
