[US Madoran (H)] PP Guild Raid Team for Guild Achievements

[Nataliana]

This is an updated thread, replacing the old "[US Madoran(H)] Raid Team for Guild Achievements" thread.

First, a big thank you for all those that have been participating in this weekly raid so far. Last Friday, we finished off Heroic Mogu'shan Vaults, after banging our heads on the last couple of bosses for more than a week. Turns out, we just put our big raider pants on and overpowered Elegon, to heck with the mechanics. We then meandered down to the final boss, the Will of the Emperor, where we proceeded to be stumped by... the control panel. Yeah, so, that doesn't work the same as in LFR or Normal mode. Starting that fight required a bit of percussive maintenance. Big kuddos to everyone on that encounter, we haven't had to dance that hard since Naxxramas. It was a blast, and it was awesome to see everyone dust off their old school raid skills (crowd control? what's that?!) to get this raid downed.

As an update to everyone else not directly involved in these raids, the reason we're clearing this content is to unlock the guild meta achievement "Guild Glory of the Pandaria Raider", which allows access to Reins of the Thundering Jade Cloud Serpent. With MSV down, we move on this week to Heart of Fear.

An important note: raid night has moved from Friday to Saturday, but we're keeping it at 8:20pm Server Time (US Central), to better accommodate the real life schedule of some of our raiders. This was discussed and agreed upon by everyone present at the last raid. We will continue to raid for 2 hours, as before, so no one is putting in a huge commitment or getting burnt out.

If anyone is interested in joining us as we continue down this path of glory, please send an in-game mail to either Nataliana (in MM) or Okalã (in PP, and the ã is made with alt+0227). People running in this group generally have previous raid experience, but experience specific to these raids and encounters is not required (or expected, not many of us have run these raids on heroic difficulty). Because we don't want to spend weeks and weeks fine tuning raid mechanics or composition, I also request that your gear be ~520 or higher, which helps compensate for lack of experience. There are only two requirements - have a working ventrilo connection and speakers, so you can listen to raid instructions and react quickly when things are happening (you do not need to have a microphone, but it sure helps, and we like to hear everyone's voice), and you will need to have your character in the Pet Peeves guild while we are raiding (you can swap before and after the raid if you want). I try to keep the raid attitude laid back, but serious and focused on getting things done.

I expect we'll be squashing some big bugs this weekend, hope you all are looking forward to our GreenWall spam.

[Nataliana]

Just an update to everyone about our progress on this meta achievement.

A few weeks ago, we finished off heroic MSV. The following week, we discovered that none of us had completed HoF or ToES in normal mode, and therefore couldn't do it on heroic mode yet, so we went ahead and plowed through both in one night. Things were looking up!

Last week, due to some unanticipated and completely uncalled for laptop battery issues, I was unable to get online. The raid group forged ahead as planned, and charged into heroic HoF, where they were met with staunch resistance from the first boss. As anyone who has done heroic mode raiding knows, those encounter mechanics get HARD. The group was able to see the first boss many times, and started to work out a strategy, but ran out of time for the evening.

Last night, we decided to change it up, and ventured into heroic ToES. With a little help from our friends, we were able to put together a capable team, and threw down the gauntlet of challenge to the three fish-faced protectors. They proved they were no bottom-dwellers, laughing at our initial attempts as the raging river mocks the pebbles of the riverbed. However, the scales would tip in our favor in due time, and with much frantic scurrying about, those fish were sushi. Hooray!

We worked on the 2nd boss, dealing with new mechanics, and even swapped characters in for a few tries, but I think the stress of the night was simply dragon us down by the end of it. Progress was made, so I'd call it time well serpent.

With next weekend being a major holiday in the US, we may give a pass on an organized raid night, due to probable lack of bodies. We'll continue to push forward toward our ultimate goal, and keep the rest of the guilds updated. As always, if anyone with the mental and equipmental (yep, made that up) fortitude is looking to join in on this fun, send a message to Nataliana in game, or just be online at 8pm ST on Saturday evenings.