Not one, but two worms

So we stepped into the Coliseum today with a full raid, surprisingly, and we did eventually get the bosses down. While it wasn't difficult once we figured out the mechanics it was definitely new and exciting. Here's a quick rundown of what you're gonna be doing as a warlock in the Northrend Beasts encounter.

Gormok

• FIRE IS BAD. MOVE OUT.
• Nuke the snobolds hitching a ride on fellow member's backs.
• Stay away from said fellow raid members.
• Keep a 15yd distance between you and the boss.

Acidmaw and Dreadscale

Here's where things get different. These two worms both do a different type of attack; Acidmaw casts Paralytic Toxin that eventually slow you down then stuns you, while Dreadscale casts Burning Bile, which just does periodic damage. The catch is that they neutralize each other. The easier kill order is Acidmaw then Dreadscale, one gets a 50% damage done buff when the other one dies but it's not much of a problem on the normal mode.

During the first phase Dreadscale will be mobile whilst Acidmaw will be stationary. They both need to be tanked, but the mobile worm will cast his debuff on the tank, and the stationary one will cast it on random raid members. Therefore in the first phase random raid members will be getting the toxin that eventually stuns them. If this is you, you have to run to the tank tanking Dreadscale who'll have the burning bile debuff. This will neutralize the poison.

After a few minutes, both worms submerge and reappear. They swap roles in the way that now Acidmaw is mobile. This means the tank will be getting the paralysis poison. Random raid members will now be getting the burning bile debuff, who have to run it to the tank to get rid of the poison.

Rinse and repeat until they're both dead. Once Acidmaw dies all you have to do is heal through the burning bile debuff as there will be no more poisons.

Oh and stay out of the poison clouds.

Icehowl

Another straightforward, but still enjoyable boss. Force your tank to drag him to the middle and spread out around him. Every now and then he knocks the entire raid to the walls, looks at someone and charges at them. If it's you, you're smart enough to read this blog and know that you have to move. But anyone else is gonna get hit, and die. You could also be a nice warlock and tell people to move, then the boss crashes into the wall and gets stunned. At that point he takes 100% more damage so you can stay on top of the meters. It's a win/win however evil you decide to be.

Ha

So a certain mage in the guild who never admits how aweome I am and links recount to me when he beats be because I was busy thinking of posts for the blog finally admits it. He was having problems, disconnecting as soon as he logged in and such. Now I'll make this clear, I only helped him to stop the login spam, not because I like him. So of course, being the genius that I am solve the problem. I'll give you a warning in advance Chillout. I'm gonna be linking this post to you every chance I get.

Patch 3.2 tomorrow

So it's been confirmed that 3.2 will be applied during the downtime tomorrow, and it wasn't really a surprise after the Frenchies leaked all over the place. There aren't really any interesting warlock changes to boot, none that will change our dps rotations or whatnot. In a way I'd rather there was at least some very minor change that would leave us with something else to do. It'll probably get boring doing the same things we did in Ulduar all over again in the new raid. I actually haven't seen much of the PTR live streams, so I don't know what they're like, but I'm hoping that it won't be the same mechanics over and over again.

The most game affecting change from what I've heard is the resilience one and what it's gonna do to warlocks. I've seen various people starting to whine about how awesome we're gonna be in PvP, and it wasn't worded like that, it was more like "omg you killed me in 1v1 after I've been owning you for the past 7 months, nerf". It's definitely gonna make me try out some battlegrounds again, and by battlegrounds I mean the new Isle of Conquest.

I've been a fan of the whole vehicle combat thing since the release of Wrath. Malygos P3 was awesome. I think FL would be one of the funner bosses in Ulduar if he wasn't so easily tuned. The way they seem to have integrated ground combat with the whole vehicle thing in the IoC seems to be an act of genius and it's probably because one of the developers plays a warlock. How else would you explain it?

The first thing I'll do tomorrow is go to the Alchemy trainer and get the new transmutes, and after that try out the new 5man. We'll be doing the new raid that evening as well, seeing as Wednesdays are raid days for us. Realm Firsts will be out of reach, as I'm sure those 'awesomer' (recruit a billion players at the start of wrath and have 100 people sitting out every night. Yes I'm exaggerating but it's mostly true) guilds will be trying to log on as soon as possible. And there's probably gonna be some more photoshopped screenshots.. like anyone cares.

That's all I have to say really. To all you raiders, good luck in the Crusaders' Coliseum, I'll keep you updated on our progress.

No post today

So enjoy this picture of me dancing as a voodoo cow. With Belfip.

As a sidenote, feel free to send me an e-mail with any questions you might have and I'll gladly answer them. There's a link at the top of the side bar.

Quartz hack you have to get

I guess it's time for me to impart some little secrets of mine.

If you've ever been an affliction warlock for a while you know the importance of cutting your drain soul channel at the right time to get the most out of those beautiful 15k ticks. You might think you're awesome enough to just know it off by heart when your next tick is gonna be, but let's be honest here, only I'm good enough to do that.

As you can see from the screenshot above, this fix puts vertical lines on your cast bar showing you when the next damage tick will happen. Due to server lag you can cut off the channel just a bit before that line, and nukage still happens.

Now that you know what it does, you need to know how to install it. The creator has updated the file a bit so all you have to do is unzip it into your addons folder, so without further delays, here it is.

YOU CAN FEEL THE AWESOME ALREADY

Draenic Pale Ale

For those of you who are part of the Brew of the Month club, you're in for a treat this August. Those of you who aren't, I honestly pity you.. in an evil warlocky way. Go to your local supplier and grab a few bottles of Draenic Pale Ale. Drink them up to your heart's evil content and enjoy the ride ...hic!