Kurn's Q&A Time #2

So I went poking through my site stats again. Let’s look at a few interesting search terms, shall we?

1) holy paladin improved judgements

Please, please, God, please have shown holy paladins to go to this entry:

http://kurn.apotheosis-now.com/?p=317

2) “halls of reflection” heroic howto

Head over to Kurn’s Guide on How to do Heroic Halls of Reflection Without Being Lame and Cheap. Note that I don’t mention the cliff “strat”. That’s because it is, in my mind, an exploit, similar to standing on the ledge in Mandokir’s room in ZG. In other words, just plain ridiculous.

3) addon healer is drinking

Well, now, this could be interesting. I don’t actually know of an addon that lets you see if your healer is drinking, like that pops up with “ZOMG DON’T PULL HEALER IS DRINKING” or something. If one exists, please post in the comments!

Otherwise, keep an eye on your healer’s mana bar. Basically, if they’re above half, you’re good to go on trash. You can also, you know, look at the party portrait of your healer and see if they’ve got the eating/drinking buffs on them, or just watch your healer to see if they’re eating or drinking. But thank you for being considerate of your healer’s mana!

4) can dps use death and decay in instance

The quick answer is yes. The longer answer is, let your tank pick up all the adds, first. While Death and Decay is good damage, it’s also high-threat. You’re going to pull off the tank if you drop it ASAP unless your tank is totally on the ball.

5) does flask of frost wyrm proc with elixir master

Why yes, yes it does. So do all flasks, from Flask of Distilled Wisdom to Flask of Stoneblood. Flasks count as elixirs for some unknown reason. And that’s why very few people were potion masters in BC and now that you can use one potion per fight, even fewer alchemists are potion-specced. I was potions for a long time, given that I use to live on mana potions in a raid, but even I gave that up and went elixir.

6) could a balanced nightseye gem count as two sockets

Yes! It astounds me how few people realize this.

Purple gems (like nightseye, twilight opal, dreadstone) are a mix of red and blue stats. Red and blue make purple. So a purple gem counts for both 1 red and 1 blue.

Orange gems (monarch topaz, ametrine) are a mix of red and yellow stats. Red and yellow make orange. So an orange gem counts for both 1 red and 1 yellow.

Green gems (forest emerald, eye of zul) are a mix of blue and yellow stats. Blue and yellow make green. So a green gem counts for both 1 blue and 1 yellow.

A Nightmare Tear matches any socket AND counts as all three of the gems and so is known as a “prismatic” gem. So if you’re a holy paladin with an Insightful Earthsiege Diamond as your meta (and it should be!), having one Nightmare Tear in your gear somewhere will be enough to activate your meta all on its own.

Also, a note about the Eternal Belt Buckle. This adds an extra socket to your belt. It is a “prismatic” socket, because it can hold any colour gem. You are NOT required to use a prismatic gem (such as the Nightmare Tear) in this socket! I still see WAY too many people walking around with a Nightmare Tear in their belts for no reason other than the fact that they think they can’t have another gem in there.

7) hunter kiting dk icc boss

Ah, on Saurfang, are we? Your job, hunters, is likely to wail on the blood beasts he calls out. Watch your boss mod timers, drop a frost trap near the spawn points and use Distracting Shot to get them to walk over it towards you. Hope your range knows how to focus fire! :)

8) getting a mage geared for icecrown citadel

I’m still a pretty craptastic mage, but for anyone aiming to gear up for ICC, here’s what I recommend:

– 4/5 Tier 9 (232 is okay, but 245 is better and 258 would be amazing)

– All the badge items you can get that are ilvl 245 that actually, you know, help your toon out

– A couple 264 badge items

– Friendly or Honored Ashen Verdict ring

That’s assuming you’re trying to app to an ICC guild. That’s probably what I’d be looking for in terms of gear from just about anyone. Pugging it will probably require full T9 and a handful of ilvl 245 items. On my server, you get laughed at if your “gear score” is under 5000. (I do not like the concept of “gear score”, but it’s become a fairly sad reality on Proudmoore.)

9) pugs having problems with second wing in ice crown

No freaking kidding. Rotface and Festergut and Professor Putricide aren’t a walk in the park like the Airship or anything. There’s a lot of coordination that needs to take place on all of these fights. I haven’t even killed Putricide yet (although I came close on 10-man last night). Hopefully we’ll down him tonight before the new content opens up tomorrow.

10) why are so many dps idiots

Haha, okay, my final search term for the day. Honestly, I wish I knew. I suspect it has something to do with the fact that the DPS has one job — kill stuff. They don’t really need to worry about dispelling stuff (except mages! You should always decurse!!!). They really have very little in terms of responsibility. You lose a DPS on a fight, eh, big deal. You can still down a boss with the remaining DPS. They’re expendable. I think that because they focus on that one job so much, they ignore everything else except their own damage meters. So they don’t care if they pull aggro, they blame the tank. Guess what, buddy? If you pull aggro off your tank, YOU ARE WRONG. If you don’t save the healer’s ass by sacrificing yourself or your pet or something, YOU ARE WRONG. So what if the boss enrages? Gotta be the healers’ fault for letting DPS die, right? WRONG.

DPS has to stay out of crap on the floor, has to down adds, has to beat enrage timers. And sadly, 75%+ of the DPS out there are total morons who wouldn’t know what Naxx looks like because they’re spending all their time in the instance staring at their meters.

Pro tip: Pay attention to your surroundings and your Omen window instead of Recount.