Loading ...Am I ready for …?
The gang 5 mans Attumen for fun.
I am constantly reading the WoW forums, tanking blogs, emails, etc and I see the question, “Am I ready for [insert random instance here]?” pop up all the time.
The Answer is Yes.
I could link you to hundreds and hundreds of threads with people asking “Am I ready?” flooded with responses like Yes, Yup, Definitely, etc and a couple tips on what they can do improve their gear if they want a little edge. The fact is that 99% of the time when someone has finally built up the courage to ask the question, they are ready. In fact, often you out gear the content you are asking if you could possibly do!
Maiden dies to an overgeared team of 5 as well.
This is especially a big question for those anxiously wondering… can I do Heroics yet? How about Karazhan? Consider this, even if you just completed my “I just hit level 70″ gear guide, you already have better gear than those that completely every Heroic and cleared Karazhan before the instances were nerfed. And this isn’t to try to demoralize you if you are struggling. Heroics and Karazhan ARE difficult when you are first starting them and your whole raid doesn’t grossly outgear them. Simply learning the mechanics of each fight does take time, but make no mistake…
May 20th, 2008 at 9:43 pm
Very well said Vene, and I totally agree. And if you’re part of that 1% that actually isn’t ready, you’ll soon find out. At which time, revisit the “I just hit 70″ gear guide referenced in the post.
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May 20th, 2008 at 9:50 pm
Who’s the ugly orc in the parrot helm?
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May 20th, 2008 at 10:11 pm
Sooo Venny. Am I ready for Brutallus?
=P
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admin reply on May 20, 2008 11:02 pm:
No.
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Rochelle reply on May 21, 2008 10:33 am:
Killing Brutallus in three easy steps:
1) Insert Consumables
2) ???
3) Profit
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Kavtor reply on May 21, 2008 12:17 pm:
I was rocking a pretty sweet Gruul shield, so it was a little more exciting.
Kaz’rogal finally coughed up the goods though, so we’ll see how things go now.
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Rochelle reply on May 21, 2008 2:58 pm:
I feel your pain. I have been sporting Kaz’rogal’s shield for what feels like an eternity. But first up on tonight’s schedule is Felmyst and he WILL drop a shield for me.
The best advice I can give for Brutallus is dodgedodgedodgedodgedodge. There is no way to beat him with Effective Health. And make sure you have a cooldown rotation for stomps just like people had to do before Kael’s shield could be removed with an arcane shot.
May 20th, 2008 at 11:59 pm
You should make an addition to your articles on how to maximize your threat:
“Stop taking screenshots during boss encounters.”
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Spaz reply on May 21, 2008 1:22 am:
I want to know if he had this in mind when taking the screenshots, or if he took them just for the hell of it, but later found a use for them. =)
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Hydrix reply on May 21, 2008 3:09 am:
Maybe he made a macro that takes a screenshot with each shield slam
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Pippy reply on May 22, 2008 12:00 am:
wouldn’t recommend it…I used to have a crit ss taker…my system’d always freeze as the ss was taken…doing that would HAVE to seriously impact threat. Not to mention that a ss every 6 sec would fill up your drive pretty quickly
Veneretio reply on May 21, 2008 10:48 am:
I had the article wrote ahead of time then Skel got the crazy idea and I was like… this is perfect for my new article!
BTW I really gotta see if such a macro is doable! (I definitely nearly wiped the dps crew a couple times cause screenshots locked up my screen momentarily resulting in 0 threat lewl)
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May 21st, 2008 at 12:47 am
Where was the Maiden pic? That was a fun time, we do have to go back and kill Moroes!
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Skeletaur reply on May 21, 2008 6:40 am:
Shackle 2, Felguard tanks Skull while Vene tanks X and Moroes (or trap X while Vene gets Skull and Moroes)
Kill Skull then Moroes, have the Felguard take the blinds (or Vene can read http://www.tankingtips.com/2007/06/05/solo-tanking-moroes/
)
I bet we can beat the 2:17 kill for Maiden…
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May 21st, 2008 at 7:27 am
So true. If I was some crazy internet hacker guy, I would reroute every the warrior forums to this post.
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May 21st, 2008 at 8:47 am
About time someone said this :p, ty vene.
There are so many great tools for working out what went wrong in a fight, my advice on the matter is. Give it a go, worst that happens is you get saved for a fight you can’t do anyway nd maybe 50g repairs if u keep going at it.
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May 21st, 2008 at 10:45 am
Hehe I ask myself this question once in a while but about BT/MH. Our guild is still clearing SSC/TK but so far, boss hit like pansy (thx badge gear).
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Veneretio reply on May 21, 2008 10:46 am:
The Answer is Yes
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May 21st, 2008 at 11:38 am
I’ve been using Be Imba to see what I am ready for as well as other guildies. It seems to do a good job of ranking your gear. I like checking on guildies once a week to see if they are making progress or if they are stuck.
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Spaz reply on May 21, 2008 11:46 am:
Never heard of that until now. Am checking it out as I type this. Thanks!
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Spaz reply on May 21, 2008 11:53 am:
Okay, that was pretty cool, but I guess I shouldn’t use it after having logged out in my grind gear. That didn’t help, lol. =(
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Tankette reply on May 21, 2008 1:16 pm:
That is a downside of inspecting others. They could have logged out wearing who knows what. For example, our guild’s main tank always wears a dilapidated cloth hat when he’s not actually killing something.
Veneretio reply on May 21, 2008 12:18 pm:
Interesting tool… however the following assessment annoyed me:
Overcapped Expertise: 8% > 5.6% (safe to free up 36 ER)
This assumption that the Expertise Cap is 5.6% (23 Skill) is completely incorrect.
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Kavtor reply on May 21, 2008 1:21 pm:
It also feels the need to warn you about having too much defense, despite it being a perfectly good avoidance stat once you’re crit immune.
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Tankette reply on May 21, 2008 1:23 pm:
I don’t think it is perfect and there are things like you mention that stand out. I think it is a better tool for those wondering if they are Kara worthy or say SSC worthy. It has helped me make better gear decisions for myself and others though.
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Vrathmat reply on May 21, 2008 1:36 pm:
Yeah, I’m also 36 ER “over the cap.” A lot of people have been trying to get the admin to stop showing that warning. http://be.imba.hu/forums/viewtopic.php?id=208
It also tells me my bracers are “misenchanted” because I have the +9 STA instead of the +12 STA enchant. Really? I would call it a “notice” of me being cheap, and yes, 3 STA can make a significant difference sometimes, but I wouldn’t go so far as to classify it as “misenchanted.”
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Djiss reply on May 23, 2008 7:23 am:
Yeah, like everything we have to take what it say with a grain of salt.
What’s sad is those too lazy to learn the value of stat and how they work will prolly miss the point with that kind of “false” info. But again, maybe they deserve it
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May 21st, 2008 at 3:11 pm
Thanks Vene, this is exactly what I wanted to hear
As an alt I never get a chance to tank 25-mans (except one lucky time I got pugged for a Mag run) but with my trusty S2 shield and something like 450+ badges (and mah uber tauren-haxx) I always wondered if I was ready for the first few bosses in BT/MH.
Suppose I am
Now I just have to convince my GM we have enough hunters and need another raid tank. Hmmm…
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May 21st, 2008 at 4:14 pm
Nice post Vene, and so true. About the time I was wondering if I could tank Gruul or not I got thrown into it and tanked him to 18 grows…
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May 21st, 2008 at 11:02 pm
Am I ready, to be ready?
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Rochelle reply on May 22, 2008 8:18 am:
ARE YOU READY TO ROCK?!?
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Blackavar reply on May 22, 2008 3:33 pm:
Heaven or Hell?
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May 22nd, 2008 at 5:07 am
Does it matter if you are ready if the rest of your raid most certaintly aren’t.
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Namthe reply on May 22, 2008 8:14 am:
True. However, tanks, especially warriors, are the most gear-dependent of all roles.
If you’re ready, chances are the rest of your raid will be too, if you’ve been running the same content.
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May 22nd, 2008 at 12:49 pm
Veneretio: The Tony Little of World of Warcraft
YOU CAN DO EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEET
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Spaz reply on May 22, 2008 1:16 pm:
I thought that was Rob Schneider.
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Hao reply on May 22, 2008 4:59 pm:
ah ya.. waterboy..
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Speidel reply on May 22, 2008 5:01 pm:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRH15i-1K38
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Spaz reply on May 22, 2008 11:13 pm:
Eh. Rob Schneider is funnier.
May 23rd, 2008 at 9:42 am
So, continuing on with the “5-man Kara”…
Last night we went in to do a bit more of it, cleared Moroes and Opera. Actually, we 4-manned Romeo and Julianne since our shadow priest pulled agg right off the start and went SPLAT!
Veneretio = overgeared for Karazhan!
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May 23rd, 2008 at 9:51 am
Well anyways, back to the “are you ready” question. Our guild is quite the opposite. We have all these ppl wanting to tank but just aren’t ready… Heres one exchange I had a month ago in guild chat. Perhaps a bit scripted, but this captures the gist… H=hao,W=warrior.
W=How come I can’t go to Kara with you guys?
H=Whats your defense?
W=480.
H=hmm.. whats your resilience?
W=50.
H = That might be ok.. I’ll check later. Whats your wep, armor and stam?
W= Armor is 14k, stam is 11k.
H=eh.. that might work.. our healers are all geared out so they should be able to keep you up. Whats your tanking weapon?
W = *links blue dagger with 12 stam*
H=uhh……. Thats probably why… Have you done the Cipher chain to get Gromtor’s charge? I can help with the chain if you want.
W=WTF. *Undecipherable ranting and raving about daggers are perfectly credible for tanking because the speed rating is much better*
*the warrior in question logs off soon after never to be seen again*
I don’t know about his arguments, but I have never seen a tank use a dagger for tanking… Oh well…
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Kavtor reply on May 23, 2008 11:01 am:
Julie’s Dagger was one of the best pre-TBC threat weapons.
Dagger’s aren’t optimal by any means, but that’s no reason to say they can’t work. A lot of us first started Kara in pretty terrible gear.
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Hao reply on May 23, 2008 11:27 am:
Interesting. I thought there was a trade off where a dagger, with its speed, didn’t do enough damage to produce enough threat with revenge and devastate compared to a 1H..
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Rochelle reply on May 23, 2008 11:54 am:
I tanked with http://www.wowhead.com/?item=28524 until I got Mallet of the Tides. To this day I have never seen a Sun Eater drop and I have only seen King’s Defender once and it was while I was playing my priest.
Daggers are far from perfect because of the normalization that daggers have screws with devastate damage, but if the dps is high and the stats are good then you can certainly make do. Off the top of my head, I think devastate is the only thing a tanking warrior would use that would be screwed up by having a dagger.
Ivanstone reply on May 23, 2008 3:39 pm:
Dagger’s are the best until Blizzard stops being silly and puts sockets on other 1Handers. How can any tank not want to use an Umbral Shiv with its glorious 60 stamina? It even has hit rating.
Khrushchev reply on May 23, 2008 11:37 pm:
I wouldn’t call daggers “the best”. You’re gimping your threat by using a dagger.
Rochelle reply on May 24, 2008 11:12 am:
The may not be the best, but they aren’t completely terrible either and I think that is the point. People see a dagger and they freak out and think that their tps will drop 500 the moment they equip it. But you are really only going to be losing a little damage from devastate and everything else stays the same. So if the dps is high and the stats are good, a dagger can often be better than a sword or axe.
May 23rd, 2008 at 10:26 am
Well… it is rare to see ppl tanking with dagger, but i dont see any problem on it.
Actually i have the Sun Eater, that i uses in my avoid set
And this dagger http://www.wowhead.com/?item=34606, that i uses to deal more threat.
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May 23rd, 2008 at 11:28 am
and yes.. Now that you mention it Kav, i remember starting off in kara in transcendence gear, blues and greens as my priest….. =X….
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June 5th, 2008 at 11:23 am
i´d like to see a SS of Nightbane 5 manned…
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June 5th, 2008 at 12:12 pm
Nightbane’s pretty easy to 5 man, it just takes a while.
I had a Nightbane with 5 players heading into the 50% air phase, and 3 players coming out of the 25% air phase. 25 minute kill.
Decently geared, a tank, 2 healers, and 2 DPS could handle it pretty easily, so long as the DPS are smart enough not to get themselves killed.
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