Announcements

Words of “wisdom” from Guild Master, Officers, or other leaders within the Ministry of Defense. ONLY posts including this category will show on the homepage!

… name do I pick for my character? What might get you in and get an invite?

Here’s a simple guide (choose 1 or choose all):

  1. Be original
  2. Be funny
  3. Be creative
  4. Be different

I’ve seen all sorts of character names applying to this guild. And we do decline people. Recent guild application declines that have come to mind have had names like Aidsinacan and Fartnuts.

Really?

If you want to be 12, be 12 somewhere else.

We’re all adults here. 😛

This evening, Tiraffe and I peeled through the various defensive azerite traits available for the Mythic raiders for Sivarra. Many (most) of these are great across the board for the raid – many of these are also amazing in M+. Some of the poorly ranked ones may be better for other fights, or for M+, or for PvP. It’s important to be familiar with your spec when making these decisions.

It’s also important to note that many of these abilities require you to actively use specific spells – for example, Ursoc’s Endurance is useless if you’re not using Barkskin! Therefore, if you’re not using some of these abilities either on cooldown or as when is most effective, you may want to stick with the more passive traits listed, even if they’re in a lower tier.

Azerite Traits

A+ Tier:

Resounding Protection (stack when possible – this should be the default trait you look for)
Impassive Visage (excellent for constant damage fights like this one)
Death Knight – Runic Barrier
Demon Hunter – Thrive in Chaos (tank spec)
Paladin – Gallant Steed

A Tier:

Gemhide (tanks)
Death Knight – Cold Hearted
Demon Hunter – Soulmonger (Tank)
Druid – Ursoc’s Endurance, Switch Hitter (resto aff. only)
Hunter – Duck and Cover, Nature’s Salve (IF TALENTED)
Mage – Eldritch Warding
Priest – Sanctum
Warlock – Desperate Power
Warrior – Moment of Glory
Engineering – Personal Absorb-o-tron

B Tier:

Self Reliance (ranged)
Death Knight – March of the Damned
Mage – Quick Thinking (fire)
Rogue – Shrouded Mantle
Warlock – Lifeblood (you can prepot these!)

C Tier:

Longstrider
Hunter – Shellshock, Nature’s Salve (not talented)
Mage – Quick Thinking (frost), Cauterizing Blink
Monk – Strength of Spirit
Shaman – Serene Spirit, Ancient Ankh Talisman?
Engineering – Auto-Self-Cauterizer

F Tier:

Gemhide (everyone else)
Vampiric Speed
Self Reliance (melee)
Bulwark of the Masses
Demon Hunter – Thrive in Chaos (dps), Soulmonger (dps), Burning Soul
Druid – Reawakening, Switch Hitter (any except resto aff.)
Mage – Quick Thinking (arcane)
Monk – Exit Strategy, Sweep the Leg
Paladin – Stalwart Protector, Empyreal Ward
Priest – Death Denied, Twist Magic
Rogue – Footpad, Lying in Wait
Shaman – Pack Spirit
Warlock – Terror of the Mind
Warrior – Intimidating Presence, Bury the Hatchet

Defensive Talents

If you’re not sure what defensive talents to use, you should check Warcraft Logs and see what the top talents for your spec are. While the mythic raiders should already know what offensive talents are the best overall on a per-fight basis, a mythic progression boss might have different defensive requirements than you’re used to. This is also useful for the non-mythic raiders who may be unfamiliar with how to check their class’s top talent builds

Warcraft Logs Mythic Abyssal Commander Sivarra Reports

From that page, select your class and spec from the dropdown. At the top of the list, you’ll see “Top Talents”. You can look on a ‘row by row’ basis to see what most people take. Then, you can look on the right-hand side of the long list to see any variants. Perhaps some people are taking a slightly different talent. You can investigate further as to why. Maybe their group comp requires it, or maybe it’s personal preference.

You can also look at the top azerite essences (which follow the azerite powers, though are on the same row).

For non-mythic raiders, you can also change ‘mythic’ to a different difficulty. You can also change it to another boss (not marked on the image, but should be pretty obvious).

Finally beating the past couple of weeks of procrastination, Tiraffe and Fokola put together a weekly raid roundup for both teams to review. The roundup contains 3 sections; 2 for each raid team and a section for improving an individual’s dps and some other small things to note.

Thursday/Friday Raid Roundup

Sivara (H/M)

Good: Comfortably meeting dps/hps requirement on Heroic.

Bad: Folks still dying to Overflow mechanic. This is happening for 2 reasons:

  1. Not enough people stacking on the Overflow target. 3 or more is recommended for heroic. We should have enough healers/ranged to cover this without having to have the rest of the melee move.
  2. Heavy Defensives/Immunities not being used when there’s mechanic overlap and/or 2 or less people are soaking. This is a direct result of not enough people stacking, since the teams lack a lot of immunity classes.

For Mythic, people need to dodge the overwhelming barrage to avoid getting unnecessary stacks and need to make sure they pop Unstable Mixture at 3 or 4 stacks. Overall damage could be higher. Azerite defensive traits should also be used instead of mobility to increase survivability.

Note: Outside of the start of the fight and whenever Inversion occurs, people should be better on stacking with their respective marks instead of being a continent away. Since Overflow happens more often than Inversion, it should be better to stack until it’s time to spread instead of the other way around. There’s also something about having more than 4-5 stacks at once, but it probably won’t kill by itself on heroic. Everyone that died last week was either soaking by themselves without a heavy defensive or stacked with just 1 other person and still died due to not using a defensive. Continue reading →

Hello super friends, Pasta Fagioli here. After experiencing Mechagon Hardmode myself with Tiraffe, Corig, Jibbles, and Demonestra, I decided to make my own guide to give tips and tricks in case other people want to do Mechagon Hardmode. The guide will cover a lot of ground to help you perform this task; composition positives and negatives, buffs you can get around the island, and certain boss mechanics that cause problems in Hardmode.

PLEASE NOTE: A majority of the bosses in this run are a HUGE dps check, whether it be the first 3 or King Mechagon. The more dps you have, encounters will be much easier. I’d recommend a minimum of 430+ item level for the dungeon, depending on your composition and what utility each class you bring can do.

Hardmode Rewards

Mechagon Hardmode gives 3 rewards in total:

  • An achievement “Keep DPS’ing and Nobody Explodes” to all members of the party.
  • One member gets a 430 azerite helm.
  • One member gets the “Aerial Unit R-21/X.”
  • If nobody dies at all during a single lockout of Mechagon Hardmode, everyone gets the Hertz Locker achievement which rewards Vision of Perfection Rank 4.

Most groups will probably run this over several weeks

Continue reading →

I’m leaving behind the “Raid Wrapup” posts with last tier. More info at the end of the post!

Black Team Progression

I’m still going to refer to Mythic as “Black” team on occasion, because…we’re not always doing Mythic.

This week, Black team ran through 7/8 bosses of normal in 1 night. This is the first time we’ve cleared that many bosses on a difficulty in a single night. The success of Black team the previous tier, and the decision to keep us together, really let us hit the ground running. The Warlords wanted to blast through Normal just so we got the basic feel of the fights before hopping into heroic. Many of our normal kills were a bit of a mess, so we think it was a valuable experience to see before heading into Heroic. We took a few looks at Aszhara, but opted not to spend too much time on her. Instead, we downed the first 3 heroic bosses (staying late to do s0), getting everyone the Reliquarys they needed for the Condensed Life-Force essence.

Heroic Commander Sivara
Heroic Blackwater Behemoth
Heroic Radiance of Aszhara

Red Team Progression

I’m still going to refer to Heroic as “Red” team on occasion, because…they’re not always doing Heroic.

The Red team did excellent. The many new faces worked together beautifully with the old, and it was a very relaxed weekend. The group pulled 6/8 on the first day, one-shotting everything except Queen’s Court. Monday they downed Za’qul and popped into Heroic to start their serious progression efforts. That said, the Red team does need additional healers as well as 2 permanent tanks. We currently have multiple alts from Black filling in, and while that’s fine for a while, it will quickly burn out those who don’t want to raid 4 times a week. Anyone who has a tank or healer, or knows a tank or healer, talk to us! We’ll get you or them up to speed.

The team has a little fun with an orange spraybot in some downtime
Normal Zaqul bites the dust!

“Discontinuing” the Raid Roundup

Life gets busy, and summarizing 2 raid teams takes a lot of effort (especially when I am not present on both teams). As a result I will be “discontinuing” my raid roundup posts.

But never fear! The analysis won’t be stopping. Two of our more active members will be stepping up to the plate to provide insight, analysis, guides, tips, and more on the raid as well as other competitive areas (like Mythic+ or Operation: Mechagon).

Please welcome Fokola and Tiraffe to the posting privileges on the site. They’ve both provided helpful guides and co-written a number of things that I’ve copied onto the site anyway. In essence I’m cutting out the middle man and giving them direct access to the site, for your benefit.

Whether they choose to continue weekly analysis or simply opt to discuss strategies and changes as-needed is on them. We’re giving them the freedom to choose what they want to do, and we think that will benefit everyone.

 

Tiraffe leaps into battle!
Fokola flexes on the opposition!

Limit’s Eternal Palace guide: https://www.azsharaguide.com/

Questionably Epic’s EP Boss Guides: https://questionablyepic.com/eternal-palace/

Azhara’s eternal palace boss info cards: https://imgur.com/gallery/GlsWKxp

Wowhead Raid Gear / Boss Loot: https://www.wowhead.com/guides/azsharas-eternal-palace-raid-gear-azerite-armor-boss-loot

Wowhead AZ loot guide: https://www.wowhead.com/news=292651/find-your-best-azerite-essences-class-guides-updated-for-rise-of-azshara?webhook

Tiraffe & Fokola AZ loot guide: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/19iRol05iiEAOqht6uOvgNrbDj1CDfwLOzGdL5f3RSVw/edit?usp=sharing

Droptimizer / raidbots BIS writeup: https://medium.com/raidbots/droptimizer-4f9c179d2f1

Fatboss:  video guides, wowhead writeup, another wowhead writeup

Longest Powerpoint Ever

EP Weakaura Pack