I’m snowed in this morning. The good thing is that I’m on holiday until January 5th, so it doesn’t really matter. The bad thing is that I’m not done my Christmas shopping yet. Oh shi…
I had a couple of interesting “firsts” on my (then) rank 33 Warrior Priest yesterday afternoon in WAR. These occurences both happened back to back, and both were definitely eye-openers as to how I could probably spend my time in WAR better. Or at least, more efficiently.
The first thing was that I happened to luck into a guild-run AoE (or area of effect, for those not in the know) grinding group and was able to participate in it for about an hour or so. Now, I’ve been in AoE groups before. I’m not a complete noob, although I’m leveling relatively slowly in WAR. :) I leveled up eight characters to the cap in Dark Age of Camelot and after the first two, I think all of the others participated in AoE groups to level once they got over around level 30-35. It was just the way things were done back in DAOC (redcaps, liches, etc.) and yet, I haven’t really taken advantage of the same opportunity in WAR. I think this mainly has to do with the lack of contiguous time that I can commit to play — AoE groups require a good hour or two (at least) of straight dedication to not moving (away from your desk) and participating in the AoE grinding. The older I get, the more I can’t do this — I always seem to have something I have to get up and leave for after a half-hour and then log back in afterwards.
Anyhow, sorry for the tangent. My guild on Skull Throne, Morr’s Law, had an AoE Public Quest-grinding party (including one non-guildie) that I was able to join in on. I had been wondering how our highest-ranked Knight of the Blazing Sun (who was rank 34 when I got back on Wednesday, and was 39, almost 40, by Saturday) was leveling so quickly. Now I know the answer. I haven’t seen XP roll that fast since my days of playing DAOC — I managed to go from rank 33 to rank 34 in under an hour (when at that stage, it normally takes me a good hour to do 10-15% of a rank.) The advantage WAR has over DAOC, here, is that not only can you AoE grind huge packs of mobs, but since most static, high-respawn rate groups of mobs are in Public Quest areas, you can farm influence for whatever PQ you’re in and get the gold bags and influence rewards for them, as well. Pretty sweet!
The guild group was setup in Chapter 22 of the High Elf storyline at a PQ in south-west Caledor. As naive as I was, I didn’t even realize that the chapters went past 20 until I got there (I thought there was one for every two ranks… I was wrong.) I won’t go into the details of the mob-grinding as it was pretty monotonous (well, it’s still fun with 30 or 40 mobs on your tank while you all AoE them down and heal like the dickens to keep everyone up), but our group setup was as follows:
- 38 Knight of the Blazing Sun (main tank – Vigilance/Glory spec for maximized reflective damage)
- 34 Warrior Priest (Salvation spec)
- 32 Archmage
- 32 Bright Wizard
- 33 Warrior Priest (me — I’m full Grace spec right now)
- 34? Rune Priest (not in guild… can’t recall her level)
It worked pretty damn well. We only had one death the entire time I was there, and it was due to our Archmage going AFK for a couple of minutes without letting anyone know. It made for a good laugh as we didn’t really miss the healing power at all while he was down, having four healers in the group. It makes me want to do it again — all the time. I wish the guild ran these types of groups more often; if it did, I’d be 40 in a jiffy. Maybe now that it’s the holidays, I can get in on some more of these activities. Going back to solo grinding or running scenarios and quests alone to level up seems like unnecessary drudgery now…
Mind you, I’m not sure how this type of group would work without a KotBS as the main tank; they hold aggro amazingly well with all of their reflective damage abilities. I think the only other tank that might cut it as a replacement would be a Hoeth-spec’d Swordmaster. Good thing my 26 Swordmaster fits the bill. :)
The other interesting event (although we didn’t complete much of it) was that I participated in my first guild group in Bastion Stair, a dungeon aimed at players between ranks 33-40 (from what I’ve heard.) There are three wings to the dungeon, and I believe we went with the easiest: the Trail of Carnage. I was, unfortunately, a WAR dungeon virgin walking in, so I had no idea where Bastion Stair was (it’s in the Chaos Wastes.) The dungeon’s wings appear to be broken down into a series of PQs, each somewhat independent of each other. Your influence bar, however, is shared for the entire dungeon.
We spent the hour and a half or so of our first run (they went on another after I had to leave) doing the quests from the dungeon’s “lobby” and PQs, and I got a couple of decent blues but I think it was more a learning experience than anything. I really liked the visual design of the dungeons — very dark, bloody and atmospheric, sticking nicely with the WAR lore. I managed to complete the first (basic) influence portion and got the first influence reward for the area; I also discovered from a guild-mate that each pip you complete on your influence bar unlocks an new boss somewhere in the dungeon. An interesting mechanic.
What I found a bit odd about the dungeon’s design was that while it was instanced, there could be other groups/warbands in the same wing as you, and you often have to compete with them when completing PQ bosses. This seemed kind of lame; we killed most of a boss, with a little interference from the other group, but since they had been in the wing longer, they got most of the loot bags and only one of our group members got one (on the first kill.) I seems odd that an instanced, isolated dungeon wing that seems to be doable by a single party (though I guess a single warband would work fine, too) allows multiple, independent groups to attack the same monsters. I found that a little irritating. Wasn’t avoiding this kind of problem the reason MMO developers implemented instancing in dungeons in the first place?
Before I had to go, we took down a Lord in this huge arena-type area. I’m still not well-versed enough with the dungeon to know what’s what, but I believe it was Azuk’Thul (though we had a little help from another party that was in the dungeon at the same time.) It was a tough, drawn-out fight that lasted a good five minutes or more. I’ll admit that I felt a little weak — not due to my low-ish level (rank 34), but because I was forced to stand back with the other two healers in our party and not melee for the duration, which meant no Righteous Fury (RF) generation without using Supplication and Smite from a distance. It convinced me that no matter what my Warrior Priest’s spec, I need to have a 1-hand hammer and tome in my bag in case I get called on to play pure healer — especially since the changes in patch 1.06 that added passive RF generation to tomes.
All told, I had a killer time yesterday afternoon, and really participated in guild events for the first time (I tend to solo a lot, and playing late-evening/night Pacific time doesn’t help either.) The AoE grinding was amazing XP, I got well on my way to rank 35, and the Bastion Stair run was an eye-opener and a lot of fun (though not the greatest XP — though the gear drops were okay.) It’s really helped me get a better feel for what the PvE endgame in WAR is like, and what I can look forward to on my (endless?) quest towards rank 40.
