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The Light and How to Swing It: Retribution in the Firelands, part 1
Every week, WoW Insider brings you The Light and How to Swing It for holy, protection and retribution paladins. This week, Dan Desmond walks you through the Firelands. Firelands has been out for a couple of months now. Many have gotten their hands dirty fighting against the minions of Ragnaros; a few have even beaten the elemental lord himself. But many more are just rolling up their sleeves, waiting for their friends and guildmates to get bored of playing in the sun (seriously, it's going to be there for another 5 billion years -- I think you can play a little Warcraft here and there and it won't mind). Well then, what better place to start than at the beginning?
Spiritual Guidance: A priest's notes for healing The Firelands, part 1
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Spiritual Guidance for discipline, holy and shadow priests. Dawn Moore covers the healing side of things for discipline and holy priests. She also writes for LearnToRaid.com and produces the Circle of Healing Podcast. Well, class, I'm back. Mr. Matticus said you all were very well-behaved in my absence, and from what I understand, you got through all the work I left with him. Unfortunately, we've still strayed away from the curriculum, and there's quite a lot of catching up to do if you're to do well on your heroic assessment tests. Now, I've put together this study guide for healing through the first four encounters in the Firelands. Does anyone know what those are? That's right: Shannox, Lord Rhyolith, Alysrazor, and Beth'tilac. We'll be having a practice test at the end of the week so I can see what sections we need to work on.
The Light and How to Swing It: Tanking Beth'tilac and Rhyolith
Every week, WoW Insider brings you The Light and How to Swing It for holy, protection and retribution paladins. Protection specialist Matt Walsh spends most of his time receiving concussions for the benefit of 24 other people, obsessing over his hair (a blood elf racial!), and maintaining the tankadin-focused blog Righteous Defense. In previous columns, I've talked about how to tank Shannox and Baleroc, two of the early bosses of Firelands. Three bosses remain before you can cross the bridge to the Sulfuron Keep: Beth'tilac, Rhyolith, and Alysrazor. That latter of the three demands a column of her own, considering the nuances of that fight and the special requirements and responsibilities one assumes when tanking it. But the first two -- a walk in the park, comparatively speaking. Despite the general breeziness when tanking them, they still have their own slate of nuances. Allow me to offer a raft of tips to make your tanking duties as breezy as they should be.
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.
The Light and How to Swing It: Healing against Rhyolith
Every week, WoW Insider brings you The Light and How to Swing It for holy, protection and retribution paladins. Every Sunday, Chase Christian invites you to discuss the finer side of the paladin class: the holy specialization. Feel free to email me with any questions you want answered, like why paladins are so awesome. Firelands and the Molten Core have a lot in common. Ragnaros is the end boss of both raids, with a majordomo in place as his last line of defense. We fight Flamewaker bosses in both zones, and the skinning professionals in your guild will be complaining that nobody is looting the hounds. There's plenty of fire to stay out of, and you'll fall into lava if you leave yourself on autowalk. While the developers don't have any issues reusing old idea, they also create their fair share of new designs. Lord Rhyolith is the perfect example of an encounter that implements new mechanics and forces us to think outside of the box. Every fight has its unique flavor, but Rhyolith (at least phase 1) is nowhere near what we would consider to be a standard tank-and-spank encounter.
Encrypted Text: Rogue tips and tricks for Firelands, part 1
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Encrypted Text for assassination, combat and subtlety rogues. Chase Christian will be your guide to the world of shadows every Wednesday. Feel free to email me with your favorite ganking stories or dictionary definitions of the word "griefing." The best part of playing a subtlety rogue has always been Shadowstep. Warriors have been blessed with Intercept since day one, and feral druids have Kitty Leap built into their default specs. Rogues, on the other hand, are forced into subtlety to match the mobility of our leather-wearing brethren. Shadowstep could be such a powerful tool for maintaining our uptime in raid situations, if only every rogue had access to it. Subtlety rogues don't want Shadowstep to become baseline, because then subtlety loses half of its attractiveness. Even without Shadowstep, rogues have plenty of buttons to push in Firelands. There are plenty of adds to test our AOE potency, utility encounters that stress precision instead of damage, and plenty of nasty spells to interrupt. While we're not fighting against Lucifron and Golemagg again, we can use our experience against Ragnaros' former entourage to help us combat the new crew hanging out around his castle. Just remember to have your Volcanic Armor and Helm of Fire equipped; I hear Rag likes to keep his thermostat set to "crispy."
Ready Check: WoW Insider's Guide to Lord Rhyolith
Ready Check helps you prepare yourself and your raid for the bosses that simply require killing. Check back with Ready Check each week for the latest pointers on killing adds, not standing in fire, and hoping for loot that won't drop. WoW players are not unaccustomed to tackling giant creatures. We've slain dragons, gronn, elemental lords, and even ogres infused with the raw power of the Old Gods. In our time, there have been some big bads that were, well, literally big. Lord Rhyolith now falls into that criteria -- a massive molten lord covered in rocks so thick and so sharp that spells and blades couldn't even think to but dink away at his hide. This royalty of the Firelands is one of the first four "fluid" bosses in Firelands. You can reach Lord Rhyolith by following the road to the right, over the bridge and up the gauntlet ramp. There he stands, out on a platform surrounded by lava, begging for players to come and test their mettle against him. This is going to be one tough nut to crack; are you up for the challenge?
Patch 4.2 PTR raid testing continues tonight
The testing for patch 4.2's Firelands raid content has been moving along at a steady clip, save for Friday's testing period, which got derailed due to server issues. But never fear! The 25-player modes for flamewaker hunter Shannox, spider queen Beth'tilac, and cranky (almost Rossi-like) elemental Lord Rhyolith are up for testing tonight to make up for Friday's lost time. Make sure to check out our impressions of three of the new bosses: Alysrazor, Lord Rhyolith, and Beth'tilac. We're going to retry Friday's schedule, today! Monday, June 6 2:30 PM PDT – Shannox (25 Player) 4:00 PM PDT – Beth'tilac (25 Player) 5:30 PM PDT – Lord Rhyolith (25 Player) As always, the schedule can change at a moment's notice due to issues with the build, server, encounter, or the mercurial nature of designers. The encounters are all a work in progress; there will be bugs and tuning is not final. source The news is rolling out for the upcoming WoW Patch 4.2! Preview the new Firelands raid, marvel at the new legendary staff, and get the inside scoop on new quest hubs -- plus new Tier 12 armor!
Patch 4.2: Firelands lore spoilers and speculations
If you're into the lore of World of Warcraft, then patch 4.2 is already shaping up to have some surprises for you. Having recently been on the PTR, I got a chance to play through the introductory quests on Mount Hyjal that transition into the new daily quests and set the stage for the raid. In less than an hour of gameplay, some interesting new tidbits were revealed. These are all spoilers -- nothing but spoilers from this sentence on.
