Shadowgate

Following the departure of a number of core to SW:TOR and the general lacklusteryness of 4.3, we're suspending raiding indefinitely. We had a good run, just under a year raiding.

Members can continue to use these forums to keep in touch. Who knows, we may end up back together once more when Jade Empire Kung Fu Panda Mists comes out, so keep in touch in-game and via facebook etc. In the meantime feel free to message me, Durindal, through our forums and I'll get it as an email and respond when I can.

On a personal note, I must say that the first few months of raiding in Cata were the most fun I've had in six years of WoW raiding. 4.0 content was the absolute apex of the raid game, easily my favorite endgame in WoW history. Unfortunately, each successive patch made things progressively worse until the ephemeral wheeze of 4.3, which ranks just above 3.2's TOC among the weakest content to date. It seems like decisions are just endlessly being made that remove the challenge and increase the grind, and the wheels have come off the wagon so badly that despite its stellar start, Cataclysm ended up the weakest WoW expansion yet, its straight slope downward averaging lower than the down-up-down of WotLK (which had Ulduar).

I hope for a course correction come MoP, but it seems like the powers that be are taking the wrong message from the precipitous drop in subs and catering to the lowest common denominator to stem the bleed. WoW's raid game has had moments of brilliance in the past, and with a firm hand on the wheel could potentially return to those days. Let's hope.

Though Deathwing threatened to throw us off his back, we managed to stay on.  Shadowgate, on the second week of raiding Dragon Soul, are 7/8.  No pictures because, well, who'd want to take a picture of a dead tauren on a boat, or the back of some dragon?  Still, the victory is not slight, so go us!

Shadowgate is off to a fine start this new patch with the first 4 bosses down in the first raid night of Dragon Soul.  Let the 397 gear rain from the sky!

After many tries on Heroic Baleroc (including some quick thinking and Dispersion), we took down heroic baleroc, making us 5/7 heroic and giving us access to heroic tier gloves.  Horray!

Despite our short raid week, we've managed to take advantage of the nerfs and get down heroic Shannox, Rhyolith, and Majordomo.  Alysrazor and then Beth'ilac are next!

Sadly we didn't beat the wave of nerfs to our kill, but he's still just as dead. After one silly early-phase wipe, we then proceeded to two-shot him, our first time ever seeing Phase 3, with a DPS dead the entire phase, and got the Ragnar-Os achievement. Granted the achievement was sort of a fluke, but special thanks must be extended to rock star Crispyn for kiting FIVE, yes, FIVE meteors at the end. Pic below.

I should mention we're still recruiting one raid spot at this point:

Ranged DPS: Prefer hunter, ele shaman. Boomkin or warlock cool as well. If you're a hybrid and you have a tank or heal offspec, all the better.

I should also mention we have zero mail users in our active roster, so loot is wide open for Hunters and Shamans. Even with that said, most of us have all but one or two pieces from Firelands normal and are looking forward to our heroic kills. Being a little undergeared (e.g. everything JP and Zandas can afford, plus maybe a few VP pieces) is fine, and quickly fixable.

For more info, contact any of our members in-game, contact Rife via PM (click here), or click here to fill out a guild application.

See above.

After a soul-crushing 500k wipe our second attempt of the night, we ate through a string of unlucky pulls to a Domo kill. We then proceeded to a celebratory Seppuku against Ragnaros. Hurrayz!

Also I have been hounded at length to make with the kill shots, so here is what you sick people lurk for:

We dropped Alysrazor on 7/21 and Baleroc on 7/28. The former kicked us around a bit, the latter was extremely easy; about five pulls total, and our first pull of the night.

Next up is Domo, then the big filthy Rag himself.

Haven't had a chance to post, but we took out Beth'tilac 6/28 and 6/29, then spent a couple raids wiping on Rhyolith, finally dropping him 7/12. Boy is that fight RNGtastic when you don't overgear it.

Alysrazor up next.