Monday, October 22, 2018

Resto Shaman to the Rescue!

With very limited time to sit down and play I've had a lot more time to think about what alt I might like to play with in addition to my druid than time to actually try it.  I finally settled on a shaman since I really like resto and also enjoy enhancement.  For some reason druid healing never really clicked for me; I suspect it is the proactive nature of healing over time spells, I prefer the direct approach.  Also I really like the shaman cooldowns like moving while casting and pulling out a big earth elemental.  Oh and I also like the resto DPS rotation.

So I started mucking about with my existing 110 Draenei shaman who I hadn't played, other than leveling, since I raided as resto in Cataclysm.  I wasn't feeling the Draenei for some reason so I played around in the character creation screens for quite some time weighing my options and thinking of cool names.  I finally settled on a Pandaren after working through the starting zone just to make sure.  I really like the race, but other than my monk which I never really got into, I hadn't made any others until now.  Finally got to use that 110 character boost I had been saving for a rainy day, and now I won't be tempted to boost my allied race alts and miss out on that racial transmog armor.


Which brings me to what was my next very important decision, what should my transmog set look like?  Sadly my molten offhand doesn't show correctly on the armory.  I wanted to show off that panda belly (I blame it on expecting a baby in the spring), but didn't want to go all chainmail bikini, so the options were limited.  I also really like greens and earth tones, which suits both druids and shamans well.  And lastly there are those golden accents on Pandaren around the tail and feet, so I wanted to incorporate that somehow so that it didn't look out of place.  Luckily I found some gloves and bracers that when combined both match the rest of the ensemble and poke out just enough of a gold band to add a subtle accent.  I had everything except the gloves and legs and had to spend a half hour or so questing in old content to get those.

On to leveling.  For some reason I must really like Stormsong Valley because I chose that as my first leveling zone again.  I was tempted to start in Drustvar since that is the one zone I haven't completed yet, but I really like the green hills over creepy forest.  After hitting 111, which seemed important to distance myself from my old shaman, I was ready to try healing a dungeon.  I set up my bars, added a few macros (mainly to combine some healing and DPS abilities based on target).

Uh oh, where's my healing weapon?  After all that I just realized the level boost had only left me with a pair of agility fist weapons, which was great and all for melee DPS, but not so great for healing.  It would be nice if the level boost process left you with some starter gear for other specs as well.  I wasn't feeling adventurous enough to just dive in and heal with a single fist weapon (since dual wield isn't a resto option), so I ported back to legion content to quick grab the resto artifact weapon figuring it would be a sure thing and have a decent enough item level.  Pretty quick and painless, and less annoying than waiting for a weapon loot reward to come up again and remembering to flip specs to try for an intellect version.

Finally ready to try for a normal random dungeon.  The queue was around 6 minutes so I went to visit the blood trolls while I waited.  Dungeon was ready mid mini-boss so I quick mopped that up accepted and flipped specs.  Pesky that I start with zero mana, but I wasn't mana limited at all so it wasn't a problem.  Lucky that since a couple of DPS in the group had already pulled.  The tank put the brakes on after that pull so I could drink up, which was good since I wasn't sure how fast I'd eat through mana at the time.

All and all things went pretty well, healing wise.  Our tank dropped group shortly after the first boss since the DPS were pulling half the dungeon and I know that can be frustrating for a tank.  Speaking of the first boss (we were in the Stormsong Valley dungeon), I felt like a hero when the tank got punted off the platform and I whipped out my earth elemental to save the day and we downed the boss minus one tank.  I had done the exact same thing the first time I tanked that one and was also saved by the healer, so I sort of passed it on in a sense.

A new tank popped up pretty quick, the DPS had just continued on with trash sans tank.  I didn't really feel the pain until we got to all the trash with ground effects, pulled way too many, and stood in everything.  I did loose a couple DPS here and there, but I don't feel too bad about not being able to heal through stupid.  We did wipe once on the trash leading up to the last boss, we got the whole bridge and I was getting stunned pretty often.  There weren't any complaints or anything and the second round went a lot better.

We wiped once on the last boss since all our DPS ended up mind controlled, and then me too since there weren't enough orbs up to break myself out.  After a quick strategy refresher we got it pretty easily.

It was a nice break from running the treadmill that is gearing and rep grinding the main.

Tuesday, October 16, 2018

Still Stuck With Item Level 325 Weapon...

I'm sure this isn't as large of an issue for those with more play time (I currently only play 3-8 hours a week and 3 of those hours are spent raiding), but the random number generator has just not been in an agility weapon providing mood.

I've been inundated with item level 340 intellect weapons and off-hands, and even got a 355 strength BOE drop in Uldir, but no agility weapons to be seen.

That isn't to say the RNG gods have not been kind, my average item level is currently at 353; so I am getting plenty of good drops as my gear level is pretty close to those that have gotten better weapons, but a better weapon would be a significant DPS boost.

I've been using my extra roll on Zek'voz every week and have even started running LFR, despite not enjoying it, to try and get the 340 version, but no luck thus far.  Hopefully that weapon will drop for me during tonight's raid...

The most frustrating part of all of this is that the emissary rewards are providing weapon rewards, but they have all been intellect weapons, and I don't have any immediate plans to ditch my teeth and claws for fancy hand waving.