When we 2 manned WC, I immediately felt that it was too easy. So I decided to see how far can I get solo. So I started my little warlock (if you see shoulder, chest, weapon or trinket slot empty, it's the place of BoA and it's currently with Koltes). I leveled to 18 and got some gear, then headed to RFC.
As every hard content it needed careful planning. This is the first boss, Oggleflint and his two adds:
I sent Mezzlos (the voidwalker) to the weak add, and after the first torment I sent him against the strong monster (the boss). I myself tanked the caster as the armor of Mezzlos does not deflect magic. I damaged the caster, and while doing that, kept the DoT-s (corr and CoA) running on the target of Mezzlos, using the following macro:
/cast [target=pettarget,harm] Corruption
/dbm timer 0:15 PetCorruption
The second line made a custom DBM warning to refresh the DoT as soon as it's over. I killed the caster, than turned to the boss that was already low, thanks to and Mezzlos + DoTs. Then we both turned against the remaining add. The original 1 torment in this add was needed to keep him on Mezzlos against fel synergy (and in emergency health funnel) healing. The result:
Compared to Oggleflint, the achievement boss, Targaman the Hungerer was easier as he was alone. You can see that Mezzlos was on 50% on the end without health funnel:
Although I was pretty unlucky with crits, I managed to pull awesome 48.8 (+16.1 from pet) DPS:
Then I killed my Searing Blade colleague until I found the quest books:
And finally, the optional quest bosses, Jergosh and Bazzalan hit the ground. They were harder than Targaman, since they had adds, but the tactics listed above worked:
Why did I do it? At first, for fun! I use to completed complicated tasks since they are exercises for the brain. Since I did them many times and found them rewarding, this formed a subroutine in my brain, so now I actually enjoy them.
Secondly, to show you that there are so much content in the game if you seek it.
Thirdly, for the loot!
One more thing: raiding RFC has one more benefit, the repair cost!
PS: Save me that "It's just arbitrary fun for you and no fun for me" comments until Monday.
As every hard content it needed careful planning. This is the first boss, Oggleflint and his two adds:
I sent Mezzlos (the voidwalker) to the weak add, and after the first torment I sent him against the strong monster (the boss). I myself tanked the caster as the armor of Mezzlos does not deflect magic. I damaged the caster, and while doing that, kept the DoT-s (corr and CoA) running on the target of Mezzlos, using the following macro:
/cast [target=pettarget,harm] Corruption
/dbm timer 0:15 PetCorruption
The second line made a custom DBM warning to refresh the DoT as soon as it's over. I killed the caster, than turned to the boss that was already low, thanks to and Mezzlos + DoTs. Then we both turned against the remaining add. The original 1 torment in this add was needed to keep him on Mezzlos against fel synergy (and in emergency health funnel) healing. The result:
Compared to Oggleflint, the achievement boss, Targaman the Hungerer was easier as he was alone. You can see that Mezzlos was on 50% on the end without health funnel:
Although I was pretty unlucky with crits, I managed to pull awesome 48.8 (+16.1 from pet) DPS:
Then I killed my Searing Blade colleague until I found the quest books:
And finally, the optional quest bosses, Jergosh and Bazzalan hit the ground. They were harder than Targaman, since they had adds, but the tactics listed above worked:
Why did I do it? At first, for fun! I use to completed complicated tasks since they are exercises for the brain. Since I did them many times and found them rewarding, this formed a subroutine in my brain, so now I actually enjoy them.
Secondly, to show you that there are so much content in the game if you seek it.
Thirdly, for the loot!
One more thing: raiding RFC has one more benefit, the repair cost!
PS: Save me that "It's just arbitrary fun for you and no fun for me" comments until Monday.
35 comments:
Question: it looks like you have the default UI- wouldn't a min-maxxed and customized UI be better for your playstyle, especially with all your comments about how if people aren't min-madding they're just being lazy and such?
Good to see that you're having fun with this.
I myself don't see any fun from soloing RFC. But hey, I don't call people out for doing so because I understand that different people derive fun in different ways.
@Anonymous: UI is merely for cosmetics, like pets. I don't need my desktop to be "sexy". I keybind the important abilities anyway, so why bother?
So you critisize people who do things "just because" and yet you do this pointless excerise? Care to explain how that makes sense?
if this was a pure fun thing i would have thought you were sick Gevlon. but it isn't is it? It's too see what you can handle, to think in the situations to actually use the brain. same reason why I solo'd dm at lvl20. To see what we CAN. how we can push the brain. As said It's an excerise .
I think posts with a bit higher level "PITA" content that's rarely done while leveling (say gnomeregan) would be more interesting reading because every Hordie knows RFC in and out, but I enjoyed it nevertheless.
My greatest accomplishments similar to this are duoing Gnomer with the girlfriend's feral and my holy priest lvl ~30.
Soloing Loken HC on my DK (15 min long adrenaline rush when he finally bit the dust <3)
Soloing HoL HC on my paladin till Ionar
@Dave: He criticizes people who follow ape-subroutines. He has never criticized people who follow their own subroutines. (Or maybe he has, but that point is irrelevant anyways.)
@Seth: Maybe it was tacked on with the edit (after your post) but he mentioned that he did brain-exercises and so became used to them, now they are 'fun.'
Grats, Goblin! Well played.
Oh, also, my favorite line: "...one more benefit, the repair cost!"
I laughed and laughed - for me, that line means an excuse to play the AH for profit!
Gevlon, I'm sure you've already done the research yourself, but in case this one's slipped you by, here goes.
With the advent of xp turn-off came the concept of so-called "Twink PvE," and a subsection of the old twink community has broken off to concentrate on this new form of content.
Sites like www.twinkinfo.com have a forum dedicated to discussion around what is involved in doing low level instances with lower-than-intended characters.
A word of warning: It isn't as heavily regulated as a site like EJ, and you do have to skim past plenty of chaff to find the useful posts, but there are some good tips there. It is a twink site after all.
Unless of course this new form of content is entertaining to you because it immerses you with it's Try->Fail->Improve->Repeat subroutine, in which case the last thing you'll want is a forum discussing it.
5x lvl 8s in RFC might be fun. i wonder if you could stack enough +hit
probably be more fun in higher level instances though. at lvl 8 every one is either a mage (shadowbolt, smite, wrath, lightening etc) or a warrior (raptor strike, sinister strike etc) not enough real class abilities have kicked in at lvl 8.
Cheers Gevlon!
I've always thought that group play is more fun than soloing. It's a part of what constitutes an MMO. Because of this I find it sad and boring when I find myself on my own, unable to find a group for challenging and interesting content. This post was however inspiring! Once you rid yourself from the notion that you have to "win" something - be it gold, gear or reptutation with faction NN - and once you accept to play on your own, there's still a lot of fun things to do in the game.
Thanks for the reminder!
Maybe the last refuge for people who do something for their own fun instead of e-peen are RP communities... RP events aren't there for better gear, more gold, next 10 achievement points or anything like this, which we could classify as "trying to impress noobz".
Side effect of people collecting for example t2 "for RP" is that we have plenty low level raids forming.
And people aren't bored because of "no content" only because they don't want to do what's offered to them, only complain and complain. Like people complaining there's nothing to "progress their character at 80 solo", it's funny why they choose MULTIPLAYER game to play solo, but still, all those pointless achievements, Oracle or Argent Tournament grinds were made to keep players occupied between raiding or grinding honor...
And well, we don't see people who are busy with the content, only those bored and whining like babies. Some people can be occupied for a week trying to tame one cat in Sholazar... Yes, Hunters are another sort of "pet collectors", however I wouldn't have patience to camp those rare spawns as they do.
oddly upbeat post, who are you and what have you done with the usual grumpy git
Isnt this kind of a "fake" challenge? I mean I get its fun, I've done it a couple of times myself (soloed most part of BFD with my hunter or some high level instances with a blood DK)
But the main point is this is doable because a glitch in the game which made that chars at level 20 are much stronger than intended now with all the new patches and ajustments.
For instance, try doing BRD with a 5 man group of appropriate levels. You'll see that at level 55 a char can pull around 300 dps atm, while the bosses have around 10k health. So that means with a 5 man group a boss should die in less than 10 seconds.
Which brings me to my second point. I believe it is the dev's duty to provide us with challenge. The main Challenge of a game shouldnt be finding a challenge...
If the game lacks it... well find a new one... or something else to do... like I dunno... chess is pretty challenging I heard.
I mean, when I am out of things to do in WoW (or tired of them), DotA makes a nice filler.
Not reading another post until you start proof-reading your sh*t.
I use the default UI as well, big deal...
RFC is fun to solo and it's just as easy on a hunter as a warlock.
I did the same thing on my lock in Stockades ones. I remember starting as level 26 and dinging 27 somewhere during the run. I soloed it only to one particular boss that dropped a great staff for that level. After 2 kills I checked up on the droprate of it, which was horrible, so I gave up.
It was damn hard I remember, but still doable and fun. I remember using eye of kilrogg a lot for path-pulling so I could thin out groups before taking them on, or take them to a safespot so they could run without risk of pulling more. I did have the mass taunt on my voidwalker already, so tanking multiple mobs was somewhat easier, even though 1 healthfunnel was usually enough to pull 'm off. The hardest part was still the runners, who I had to keep under control with curse of recklessness, replacing the curse of weakness I used to keep the void alive as long as possible.
Locks are great for this. I've also soloed the entire paladin-mace quest (involves DM and SFK) with my paladin, that was worse because I did die a few times on the bosses, and I had to wait for the lay on hands cooldown before starting over each time. I don't remember the level of my paladin though, thought it was 23.
I didn't clear an entire instance on either char solo, but still there is a great satisfaction in soloing it to at least the point you need to go.
The latest solo project I had a while back was getting the key to arcatraz on my lock. I got stuck at the final boss of mechanar where I had to stop because of raiding time, then I dropped the plan because of the idea of having to start all over. I nearly killed him though (9k left), but his mindcontrol is a pain. I'm still planning on doing this sometime again, though I don't think botanica can be done solo.
Not sure if you were aware, Gevlon, but heirlooms don't decay, thus never need repair.
Doing challenging solo content is something I enjoy from time to time.
It was a lot of fun to solo Zul Gurub & Onyxia with my blue geared lvl 80 death knight.
@Gevlon. "UI is merely for cosmetics". You couldn't be more wrong. If you play a warlock you need a dottimer. You can further increase your playstyle by centering all the information you need. One quick look at the middle of your screen and you should see all the major cooldowns and other information you need. The default UI spreads the information way too much. Group info on the left, boss hp on the top, cooldowns beneath... It's a mess.
You are impressed that you soloed RFC as a level 18 lock? lawls. If you couldn't you would be terrible.
I used to enjoy soloing DM with my warlock at level 60 in the good old days to see how far I could get, was quite a nice way to make some silver too. I must give RFC a shot with a lowbie warlock.. or perhaps a hunter?
Also, you don't need addons. The human brain is perfectly capable of figuring out and keeping tracks of dots, hots.. its just more HELPFUL to have these addons. I raid end game with a resto druid with no addons what so ever, and do pretty fine, because I have trained my mind to keep track of all my hots and my priority targets.. I also look around me to see who is close and who is too far to be healed. Its not that hard people! Train your minds!
Nice run, Gev!
Though I still think the default UI is ugly and horribly inefficient.
You should just save posting this stuff. It's pretty much a joke with any class at any level with classes that have tank pets (namely Hunters/Warlocks)
What is impressive is your 10 Uld in all blues. Challenge yourself more to those types of deals.
Try solo healing Ulduar Iron Council Hard mode, I've seen it done and it looks like something challenging.
Amusingly enough, I realized this morning that I never did Ampitheater of Anguish on my Warlock.
So I decided to give it a whirl. I died once before the last boss, but mostly it was pretty easy stuff (though Korrak killed my pet and hit me once just as he died).
The last boss, though, has a bug. If you let the mammoth despawn it counts as a failure, even though the boss is still alive and fighting. Problem is... if I get into the mammoth - my pet despawns. If my pet despawns I get all the aggro.
I'm still working on it, but it's a pretty interesting challenge.
"UI is merely for cosmetics, like pets. I don't need my desktop to be "sexy". I keybind the important abilities anyway, so why bother?"
Do you use standard ui on your druid as well? Grid make make you far more efficient. Mouseover macros as well, if you don't use them. I'm not sure if quartz is still worth it, with the new spell queieing system.
What will you do when you get to SM? Soloing cathedral will be very similar to RFC bosses.
Hit post by accident.
I meant to say "all later instances", since most of them are very small deviations from pet tank, you spank. Not until 55+ does it change, and even then it only adds a fear or similar mechanic that is not too difficult. (although you would probably enjoy Scholo, the last encounters are pretty different).
The only reason i still find my feral druid fun is that the fights change. I cannot just sit there in cat and do my rotation. I can do that on a target dummy. Add in thorim's ground lightning, or yogg saron's mechanics, drastically changes gameplay.
Or am i just missing that you are ok with just maxing out DPS/pet tanking, without involving enviromental challenges? I would still say ulduar is harder than RFC at that level, even if it took more presiscion in your rotation to do RFC. The enviromental factors are the challenge in uld, along with the dps/pet healing 'rotation'. Changing enviroment is harder to react to then maintaining a rotation. The change is what makes the difficulty.
Fun. One really can min-max whatever one wants to.
Kind of inspiring really.
As a hunter, I saw a video of a guy soloing Utgarde Keep; he had much better gear than me, still I wanted to try it.
I got to the Prince and died several times. Even so, I had a blast and a bit of a rush from the high level of focus playing this way.
It's been a while and I have better gear. Plus I understand better some of the mechanics of my class and would like to apply them in a unique way (soloing an instance).
Thanks ...I'll go do that!
This exercise is just as useless as getting 100 vanity pets. It is an attempt for you to show us how uber 1337 you are with you soloing skills. In an instance that has no relevance in any way, in content that is intended to level you up.
You say you are challenging yourself. How is this any different than the "challenge" and "fun" that people garner from searching the entire game world for each vanity pet? How is it any different than the person who gets to exhalted with all factions and achieves the "insane" title?
Fun and challenge are relative, not clearly definable quantitative elements. So I really do not see what this post is for, other than to show yourself as another kind of "social".
also about this - "UI is merely for cosmetics, like pets. I don't need my desktop to be "sexy"."
UI is not just cosmetics. It is a user interface. it is how you garner information about the game world you are working in. there are a ton of UI mods that provide info, help you locate things faster and make you more efficient. For example I place y target right under my toon to keep my eyes from having to travel as far across the creep to keep tabs on what health the target is at. I also use these mods for DOT tracking and all sorts of other useful information.
To just blow off UI mods as "cosmetic" is sheer ignorance. And please do not tell me the UI has all you need. the vast majority of UI improvements (threat, multiple action bars, raid frames) came from UI mods that Blizz adapted.
I remember some "advice to newbie tanks" guide, which ended with "and don't be discouraged when you see a pet having more HP and armor than you", that's the world at level 20. If it continues to end game though, like voidwalkers tanking Sartharion, Blizzard nerfs them. If some class is overpowered at "low level" like Death Knight at 60 or Hunter at 20, it will be "game isn't balanced before level cap, shoo".
That's why people don't like levelling Priests, not that they have it hard, but they lack the solo-OPness. No plate, no pet, no mass cc like frost nova to aoe grind, no aggro drop like vanish (fade is only temporary).
Some time ago I needed to get in there for a couple of missions with my horde alter. He was a level 13 Arms warrior and I cleared all the instance alone. Changing stances, using disarms, hoping the attacas was blocked...
Was fun as hell, yeah.
"I'm not sure if quartz is still worth it, with the new spell queieing system."
What spell queuing system?
I've healed just about all of the available content, and tanked a good chunk of it, with my macros, the Blizzard UI, plus DBM and DoTimer. No grid, no healbot, no Quartz, no clique.
These 'omg you're terrible if you don't have your info orgamatized!' posts make me laugh.
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