There’s not a whole lot to report about in-game this week.  We did Firelands last night and did Death from Above, which was hectic, but pretty fun.  We’re still 2/8 heroic in Dragon Soul, as well, but cleared that fairly handily on Thursday.  This is probably going to be the last week of Dragon Soul at 15% nerf, so we’ll see if we can down another boss, but if not, it should theoretically get even easier soon.

That’s enough about WoW…let’s get to the important information:

Miyoko and I have finally followed through with our plan to create a weekly podcast.  Saturday night we recorded it, and it is now approved on iTunes.  It can be found here:

http://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/untitled-podcast-project/id519524186

It’s a bit rough around the edges, of course, but overall I’m proud of it.  I think we did a decent enough job for our first go at it.  So, feel free to support your guildies, subscribe to our podcast and rate it 5 stars, or you’re kicked out of the guild and we would really appreciate it.

So, you guys want a chart, eh?  Well, here!  Here’s your chart!  I see that’s all I’m good for in your minds.  Next up I’ll make a chart of how you guys make me feel.  It’ll look like a broken heart, jerks.  (Click for full-size.)

Anyway, this chart also has a little dashed line showing what it will look like if when we kill a new boss this week.

Speaking of killing new bosses.  I’ve been thinking…since Yor’sahj is just not going very well for us (we generally wipe somewhere between 75-80%), perhaps we should consider attempting a new boss between Morchok and Ultraxion tomorrow.

Warlord Zon’ozz seems like it could be a decent fit for us, so I’ll throw some tips together and put them on the forum at some point today.  Technically, Yor’sahj is supposed to be the easier fight — more guild’s have killed him than have killed Ultraxion — and is supposed to require less gear, but the same could have been said about Beth’tilac back in the day and we still wiped on her week after week when Baleroc would have suited our strengths much better.

So, let’s get a good heroic group together tomorrow and see what we can do.

Edit:  Also, check out some ideas for finishing up the 2 Dragon Soul achievements we haven’t gotten yet.

Hey there guild.  It’s Monday morning, so time for another edition of the good ol’ Triple-M.

• I did a little research on Holding Hands, the Hagara achievement that keeps eluding us, and think we can get it with a different strategy.  I think what’s causing us problems is that we’re actually too close to each other when making a line down the middle.  It seems that if there is more than one person in range — 10 yards — of any given conductor, it has trouble and bugs out a bit.  I found this image that shows a method that may give us enough room to spread out more:

  

  I’ll tell you what, though…this achievement makes me very happy we’re not a 25-man raid at the moment.  Take a look at this crazy strategy someone made for the 25-man version of this achievement:  http://bossblueprint.com/world-of-warcraft/app/view.php?game=wow&img=58rvD5HPa

• I know you’ve been expecting an updated progression chart, so here it is!  (Click for full-size.)

  

  Remember not to get discouraged if new heroic bosses don’t go down right away.  It took 4 weeks after killing Ultraxion before Blackhorn went down.  It was another 4 weeks before Spine went down.  So, if we don’t kill anything new this week…or the following week…or even the following week, we’re still kicking ass.  Check out previous tiers, in which there were plenty of longer gaps for normal bosses.  So, let’s just get people decked out in more Deathwing and H-Morchok gear, keep trying and getting better, and soon enough, we’ll see even more progression.

It’s official.  We’re heroic raiders.  The sheer speed at which we’re able to down normal bosses means we need to start working on heroics or we simply won’t have anything to do on our second raid night each week.

So, Thursday is now:

THE HEROIC DRAGON SOUL RAID NIGHT EXTRAVAGANZAPALOOZA!

So, instead of the old method of tearing through early bosses the first night and wiping on a later boss the second, we’ll basically flip it.  This Thursday, we’ll work on H-Morchok, and then on Sunday — whether we successfully downed him or not — we’ll move on and clear the rest of the raid.

As far as being prepared for the heroic fights, it’s certainly good if folks can watch a video or two in preparation.  Also, a good gear level to strive for in order to join the heroic fights is around 391.  Most of our regular raiders have surpassed that already, so we’re definitely good to go.

Also, I recently sold off all the crafting mats we had saved up in the guild bank.  The total take was 76,000 gold, so I sent a tenth of that to each of the folks who have been regularly raiding in this tier.  It made me realize that we can probably handle crafting mats better in the future, so here’s what we’re going to do with them come Tier 15 (presumably Tier 14 will use mats from MoP’s heroic dungeons, à la Frozen/Chaos Orbs):

• At the beginning of the tier, our raiders will do a /roll to determine crafting mat priority, much like we did to determine a raiding order.  As an example, imagine the following scenario, where Darth would have first priority on crafting mats:  1)  Darthworgen rolled a 99  2)  Bamshackles rolled an 87  3)  Malkoran rolled an 85, etc.
• We will also take into account the patterns which have dropped for our raid.  So, back to the example above, assume we’ve collected enough mats for a piece, but we haven’t seen any plate patterns yet.  If we have received a Cloth DPS pattern, Bam would get the first set of crafting mats, even though he was second on the list.
• Duplicate patterns will be sold, as long as a reliable guild crafter has already learned it.  Also, any time we have nobody interested in making any crafted pieces, crafting materials will simply be sold.

The idea here is that we can better keep track of who even wants to make crafted items in the first place…that way, excess materials can be sold earlier — instead of sitting around waiting for us to make a decision — which will make us more money in the long run.  That way, the next time I send out random gold, it can hopefully be for even larger amounts.

Look at that goddamned alliteration!  Nothing gets me more excited about the letter M than downing the last boss of a tier.

Ahem…

• We can be sincerely proud of our efforts this tier.  We cleared the whole raid in a mere 10 weeks.  I won’t bother you with a new chart so soon after the last one, but if you really need one, just scroll down, grab a purple sharpie, and draw a horizontal line from our Spine kill over to the end of the X-axis.
• I’ve started looking for some strategies on Heroic Morchok.  The more I look into it, the less I think he’ll pose much of a problem to us.  Don’t tell anyone because this is a secret, but…if we have the right kind of group on Thursday, I just may try to sucker everyone into working on him instead of waiting a week.  As always, Icy Veins has a wonderful guide you can check out.
• Random factoid:  In the fight’s first incarnations on the PTR, Heroic Morchok’s twin was not called Kohcrom.  He was called “Even Morchok.”  I’m still upset they changed that.
• I’d like to give a quick shoutout and special thanks to Locoman, who was technically supposed to raid last night.  He sat out so we could have the dreaded “normal raid configuration” for our first Madness attempts, and so everyone who had worked so hard to get us there could partake.  Hopefully we’ll be able to get him in to kill some giant dragon heads to make it up to him.

Holy shit, guys…Autty and I did way, way, way too much partying this last week.  I miss you all, though, so I’m looking forward to actually logging on to see you all tonight.  I expect welcoming gifts, obviously.  Straight up gold is always nice, although I wouldn’t turn down a gift card to Swords and Things, either.  Hell, I’ll tell you what…help me kill this dragon’s back this week and we’ll call it even?

• It sounds like things went well while I was gone.  Just want to let you all know I’m proud of how much we’ve come together as a team to overcome problems that might have led to a zero-raid-night in previous months.
• I don’t have much else to say since I was gone.  So, uh…how about them Golden Globe awards?  That Ricky Gervais is really something, right?  No?  Oh.  Ok.
• I promise I’ll tell you all about our weekend.  Photos might take a while to surface because they’re not all…appropriate…

As many of you know, I will be missing from the 18th through the 22nd, as Autty and I head out to Vegas to hit up the AVN parties with the lovely Sasha Sweet. Because of this, I will not be around for this week’s raids. I know, I know, but life’s a tradeoff, so try not to feel too bad for me.

In any case, Blackhorn is down! I wish we had a video of that sloppy and hilarious kill but I assume — without having watched it, since YouTube is blocked at work — that it was something like this, except with a few more dead bodies strewn around:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A8IVASo0umU

In case you’re curious, I’ve updated the guild’s progression chart to include our Blackhorn kill, and also made it more accurate overall and added Tier 10 (click to view full-size):

Look how much better we keep getting!  I’m proud of you all, so keep it up.

This is the first time I’ve gone to work on a Monday since November, guys.  This, by the way, is exactly why there haven’t been any MMMs in a while.  What, you expect me to sit around blogging for you people on my day off?  Psh.

Anyway, not a whole lot to report today anyway, so let’s get this over so I can get back to hating Monday once again.

• Still no “screenshot” for Ultraxion.  One day, folks…one day.
• We’re making good progress on Warmaster Blackhorn.  It appears our new strategy of stacking together was working rather well — of course, since it no longer appears that doing this stops the adds from charging, we may want to adjust it just a bit.
• [Some insult towards Galnadir]
• Uh, I dunno…gooch phase.

There.  Cut, print.

Ready for raiding:

• We finally killed the last of Deathwing’s big lieutenants last night.  Ragnaros went down rather handily once we figured out a good strategy for the second transition phase.  Overall, we did a great job, killing him in only three nights of attempts.  That’s a far cry from the amount of time we spent wiping on The Lich King or Cho’Gall.
• The patch seems to be dropping tomorrow with 99% certainty.  Who called it?  That’s right, I did.  I know what you’re thinking…I’m a really great guesser.  Oh, that wasn’t what you were thinking?  How ironic.   : (
• Don’t forget the Linguist’s Guide to Gearing in 4.3.  If you have any questions about how to prepare for Dragon Soul, it can probably help you out a bit.
• Also, you can start studying our strategies for the new bosses here.

There were a couple changes/clarifications to the official loot procedure in the R&P.

• The big one, as outlined in this morning’s State of the Guild post, is that Second Chance Main rolls are now prioritized over all Off-Spec rolls.  This will help the raid group as a whole in gearing faster for the challenges that lie ahead.
• Additionally, I finally added an official priority for BoEs, something I had neglected to address previously.  BoEs will always first be considered for main/off-spec rolls, and will be counted as such if won.  However, if nobody has a main/off-spec need for these items, they will go up for free roll.
• Finally, I clarified that tallies of won items are not held over from night to night.  This has always been the way we’ve done it, but I finally made it “official.”

Ragnaros:

• Progress on Raggy Von Raggerson is going quite well.  It wouldn’t be the last boss of a tier if it didn’t take your average guild a few nights of solid attempts to get him down, so we certainly have nothing to be ashamed of.  Quite the opposite, our best attempt this week was a 38% wipe, so we’re doing better and better each time we face him.
• Our current stumbling block is the second transition.  If anyone finds any good ideas for how to handle it, we’re all ears.  Everything up until that point, though, is going absolutely wonderfully.

Dragon Soul:

• The Dragon Soul raid will either open up on either November 29th — my bet — or December 6th, so it’s time to start thinking about it just a little.
• 374 seems like a decent equipped iLevel to shoot for in order to step into the raid and start downing bosses.  This will, thankfully, be rather easy to achieve once the patch drops, so it’s a great time for fresh level 85s to start raiding.  See our Linguist’s Guide to Gearing in 4.3 for more details.
• I’ve started to work on a Linguist’s Guide to Dragon Soul, as well, written in our standard per-role style.  So far, I’ve got Morchok’s strategy prepared for you here.  (Edit:  I’ve now also added Yor’sahj the Unsleeping.)
• If we have defeated Ragnaros before the patch drops, we will turn our attention to Tier 13 for both of our raid nights, however, if he still lives, we will likely do Dragon Soul progression on Thursdays and Ragnaros attempts on Sundays until he dies.