I’ve also gotten my Shadow Priest up to 62, and also worked on his trade skills.  He has tailoring at around 365 and his enchanting is up to about 320.  Two very nice trades to have, and I’m glad I picked them up.

But, as you surely know, I was in Black Temple Saturday night.  It’s time to start working on my main again.

One of the reasons he had fallen by the wayside a bit is that he’s more and more difficult to improve.  It seems the further you go in terms of gear, the more difficult it is to reach that next level.  Well, now that I’m officially in T6 content, the time to refocus is here.

For starters, I’m looking at all the badge gear that’s available, to try and find the best bang for my buck.  The healing leather chest is a nice upgrade, but not game-changing.  There is a nice ring, along with a decent pair of gloves, but neither screams out to me.  I already have the awesome pants that are available.

For pure, huge upgrade, there is really only one choice:  The Gavel of Naaru Blessings. I’ve been carrying the Shard of the Virtuous for, like, ever. I just can’t seem to get lucky with any of the other drops, like off the Prince for instance. I also have not taken Lady V down, and she carried a nice healy mace. I think I finally realized that the Gavel is just the way to go.

It’s high time I start farming badges.  It’s going to take some time to get to 150, though, and I hope I can stick with the program.  I’m sitting at 56 as of now, and the last two days have made sure to do the heroic daily.

The good thing about that is that yesterday it happened to be Shattered Halls.  I’ve never finished SH.  I  have actually only TRIED once — it was long ago, it was a pug, and we didn’t get past the gauntlet.  So it was nice to see content I hadn’t seen before, and I also made sure to pick up the quests there as well.  I still needed the Honor Hold revered head enchant, and I’ve needed it for a long time.  I just haven’t had the heart to beg for heroic HH instance runs.  Heart be damned, I’m going to be begging.

Well-geared Resto Druid LFG — anything that gives badges!

Anyhow…

I don’t know about your server, but over on Whisperwind we seem to be having a bit of a tank crisis.  Take a gander at the LFG channel, and chances are you’ll see multiple groups just looking for one last piece to start a run – a tank.

Let’s face it, good tanks are hard to come by.  It’s a tough enough job running with people you know, it much be semi-nightmaric to try to tank a PUG run.  I don’t even want to get into what a Warrior’s repair bill looks like after a heroic PUG.  Ugh.

Also, in my guild one of our main tanks took a vacation for about 2 weeks and we were short a very important piece.  (Zhen, you’ve got some nerve!)  One of our other main tanks has been suffering from on again off again burnout, which doesn’t help.  Because of all that it’s been difficult to get even guild runs off the ground.

Well, I’ve been considering the unthinkable.  Respecing.  If you’ve read my blog for awhile, you’ll know that I leveled feral all the way, and spent a good 3-4 months when I hit 70 as a feral druid.  Well, I was a little afraid of trying to lead runs at the time, so I was always vying for DPS spots in instances.  That proved to be quite difficult, and my guild was also running a little low on healers.  So it was that Pummra was reborn as a resto druid.

I took to healing like a fish to water (more on that later) and haven’t looked back.  I enjoy my role as a healer, and I’ve come a long way in terms of gear and skill.  In my good healer gear, I’m sitting at about 1900 +heal – not a huge number, but more than adequate for T5 and everything below that.  Since I’ve raided SSC, Kara and Heroics so much, I’ve also slowly been amassing tanking and DPS gear.

I didn’t know how far I had come in that respect until the other night.  I knew I was close to a really good tanking set, but I didn’t know how close.  When I put everything on, I was at 10.2k health, 18k+ armor and 418 defense.  And that’s resto spec’d.  I had kicked around the idea of trying to tank again before, but I just got a couple more recent upgrades to push me over that magical 415 defense number.  I have some fantastic pieces, like the Wildfury Greatstaff from SSC.

So should I take the plunge? I very well might, and even offered to OT Kara Friday night if necessary. I don’t like the idea of paying for respecs all the time, as I still plan to raid as a healer, but I’ll live with it. I’m no longer intimidated by leading or marking on runs, so expect to see Pummra’s Big Bear Butt soon!

About this time,a guildy whispered me to see if I’d be interested in healing a regular MagT run.  I had nothing else specific on my plate, so I volunteered to help out.  I switched over to the druid, and made my way to MagT.

The group was made up of a Warrior tank, 2 kitty druids, a mage and myself, a tree.  We were obviously light on CC for MagT, but it was regular mode and I felt confident enough to heal through most anything in there.  Druids are probably the best healing class for that particular instance, due to the Kael fight at the end.  That fight is just tailor made for a healer that can sling instant cast HOTs and stay mobile.

It started out easy enough, and we got through the first two bosses with no deaths.  We also handled the PVP-esque third boss fairly easily, though it got dicey at a couple of points.  This is one of the few fights I ever have the need to use Cyclone, and it’s actually quite fun.  So chaotic!

We wiped twice on the six mob pull after the third boss, but I’m used to wiping there.  I figured we would wipe at least once due to our lack of CC.  We did get through it eventually, though.

On to Kael we went.  Our DPS had been on the low side all night.  I was the most well-geared in the group, and one of the kitty druids and the tank were alright in terms of gear as well.  The mage and other kitty were a little behind the curve, though, and I thought Kael would give us some issues.  Having two of our DPSers be melee types was bound to make it a difficult fight.  To add to the problems, the mage in the group had actually never seen the fight before.  Not only was it his first time, but he was going to have to try to handle the Phoenix mostly on his own.

That’s a tough job.

So we got going, and wiped the first time due to DCs.  We got set up again and started our second attempt, and this is where it got interesting.

We handled the first Phoenix ok, but it took a little longer than I’m used to.  When Kael got to about 52%, he spawned a second phoenix.  Before we could stop the DPS, we dropped him to 50%.

Uh oh.

In the times I’ve seen similar things happen, it has not ended well.  The gravity shift portion of the fight can be tough enough as it is, what with the constant DOTs and the balls of death floating around.  Now we also had a stray phoenix blasting away at everyone.  The mage died at some point due to the phoenix, and we got through the first anti-grav phase, but that pesky phoenix was still wreaking havoc.  The kitty druids and warrior really couldn’t do much, as the AOE blast would likely take them out anyhow.  The tank wanted to wipe and start again, but I just wouldn’t let him die and we kept on keeping on.

In the next anti-grav phase, I took it on myself to show what Uber Resto Druid DPS™ is all about.  Moonfire, Insect Swarm, Wrath, Wrath, Wrath.  I blasted away at the pesky flaming beast, trying my darndest to get him down whilst avoiding the balls of death and throwing HOTs on the party when I could.

Well, I took him down, but he took me with him.  I ALWAYS forget to heal myself…doh!

Anyhow, the kitty druids then managed to take out the egg, as the anti-grav phase had just ended.  Whew!  No more phoenix.  After the next anti-grav phase, we had Kael down to about 27% and one of the other druids BR’d me.

We would not be denied.

All told, it probably took about 6 or 7 anti-grav phases before we finally took him down.  It was at least a good 10 minutes we spent on the fight, maybe more.  But in the end, we took his sorry butt down.

It wasn’t pretty, but we got the job done.  In a lot of ways, fights like that in which we persevere against challenging odds are far more satisfying than quick, surgical instance strikes.  Sure, I’d still usually take the 45 minute MagT run over the 90 minute version, but I usually find myself more satisfied after the latter.

As far as loot, well, I didn’t need anything anymore from there.  I’ve gotten my Vial, my Phoenix pet, and a few scattered off-spec items.  I was just there for the fun.  And on this night, it was a hell of a ride.

After a few of the starting quests in Honor Hold, I made some huge upgrades by way of quest rewards.  I got the [Shadowbrim Travel Hat], which is both dapper and has some great stats.  Then I picked up a new pair of pants, the [Wanderer's Stitched Trousers] along with a very nice and fancy-looking, animated weapon in [The Staff of the Twin Worlds].  The capper though, was the [Goldweave Tunic], which will probably last me into the mid 60′s.  Wow, just wow.  It’s amazing how quickly you can acquire great upgrades in the Outlands.

To celebrate my newfound power, I decided it was time to give my first Outlands instance a try.  So I went about putting together a group for Hellfire Ramparts.  Awlbiste of Awlbiste’s Thicket offered to come out with her freshly 60 Druid to heal, and bring along her freshly 60 Hunter better half.  We picked up a guild tank, and put out the clarion call for a fifth, which was answered by the guild leader in the form of his 66 holy pally.  So, healer heavy isn’t the first thing you want to hear, but that’s what we were.  Also, the warrior we brought along was very new to the game, the warrior being his first character, and didn’t have much experience tanking.

So we had a group, and it was an interesting one.  Gahrie, the tank, had to use a two hander as his one handed weapon skills were quite low, since he had mostly soloed his way to 63.  He was also unable to fill the role the tank often takes, of marking targets and generally leading.  So, I asked if anyone felt up to taking that task, and noone spoke up.  So I found myself marking and leading the run.

Weird.  I never, and I mean NEVER have to mark targets or lead a run.  My main is a healer, and they hang back and do the same thing no matter what:  keep the party alive.  There was a time, long long ago, when I was feral spec’d.  Even then, though, I think I tanked a grand total of 2 Outlands instances.  So though I HAD marked before, it was only a couple times.  This should be interesting.

As I mentioned before, our tank Gahrie is a very green player, and doesn’t have much tanking experience.  As the leader I had to kind of give him advice and walk him through some basics, though my tanking knowledge is limited.  Gahrie was VERY open to my suggestions, and was eager to learn.  That’s a huge plus in my book, and it made the run easier than it could have been.

Anyhow, it becomes obvious to me fairly early on that Gahrie isn’t great at generating threats on multiple targets.  Of course it doesn’t help that he has to tank with a slow 2 hander, either.  My remedy was to use as much CC as we could, whenever we could.  So I often set up trap targets for the hunter where I often might skip them, and also spent a lot of the instance doing some CC myself — Mind Control.

Ok, though I’ve messed with MC a bit through my leveling process, I rarely used it.  But in Ramparts I had a HELL of a lot of fun MCing targets at any opportunity.  It was great for us because it both took one mob out of play and used said mob to bash on the others.  Of course this killed my DPS numbers on the meters, but frankly I didn’t care.  It was just too damn much fun to MC guys left and right.

Sometimes I threw MC on a caster, and blasted away at his buddies, or I MC’d an archer and launch some arrows.  By far my favorite target, though, was the Bonechewer Destroyer.

They hit quite hard for this mostly level appropriate group, so that was a good mob to choose.  They also had a couple nice abilities for me to use, and, to top it all off, they look badass.  Nothing like using the enemy’s best weapon against them, eh?

Now, the only real problem with using MC is the aggro when it breaks.  I very nearly died quite a few times, as it was very difficult to get a mob off me that I had MC’d.  Still, it was a ton of fun.

So in general the run went alright.  It was a little slow, it was a little messy, but we managed fine with that makeup all the way to the last boss, the Dragon and Rider.  After a couple of wipes, the GL hopped on his 70 hunter just so we could get it done and get out of there.  Without the GL on that run, we would not have fared as well.  He was multi-tasking like crazy as his Pally for most of the instance, and then saved our butts with his hunter in the end.

All in all it was a lot of fun for me, we made it all the way through, and I grabbed the [Witching Band] at the end. Nice, very nice. Our tank learned a lot of the basics of tanking, like pulling with a ranged weapon, and trying to LOS pull casters. The hunter got to practice trapping, a LOT. I got to play around with MC, and the GL, surely, got to laugh a little. It was great to group with a fellow blogger for the first time, and I was glad that we were successful. Then, to end my night on another nice loot note, I also picked up the [Mantle of Magical Might] from the Ramparts main quest.

Needless to say, I’m quite happy to be back in the Outlands, and I’m also VERY happy with the shadow priest at this point. It really is a VERY different playstyle from both my Druid and my Hunter, and a lot of fun. Now to tackle the Blood Furnace! Thanks for reading!

The group was a Druid tank, a Lock, Mage, Hunter and myself, the Tree.  Perhaps a warrior or pally tank would have been preferable, but I’d say that’s pretty close to an idea makeup for that instance.

We started out just peachy keen, one shotting the first two bosses without any wipes.  Things got a little dicey when we got to Delrissa, but we took her down after a couple of attempts.  She was also gracious enough to drop the [Vial of the Sunwell], one of the only drops I was looking for in there.  I’m still not entirely sure how I feel about that trinket, if it had +heal it would be a slam dunk, but I’ll test it out and see how it flies.

That pull between Delrissa and Kael, though, is just plain nasty.  Groups I am in RARELY wipe on five man trash, but that is one case where we did.  Even with the great blend of CC we had going, it’s just a brutal pull.  Still, we took them down in a couple of tries.

Then, the big guy.  Those fireballs he flings around hit HARD!  I made a big mistake in our first few attempts, I was trying to stay out of tree form since I had to worry about the phoenix.  Never again.  It was all I could do to keep the tank up, and if any of the squishies got aggro, forget about it.  2 fireballs and they were down.  We probably wiped on him 5 times before I finally found the error of my ways.  I finally wisened up enough to just stay in tree form and deal with the Phoenix slow feet and all.  That made all the difference, and we took his butt down.  It was a great learning experience for me, as I found that sometimes you just have to stay in Tree no matter what.  The bonus from the aura and the mana efficiency made all the difference in the world.

Oh, and I also ended up picking up the [Phoenix Hatchling].  Woot!

All in all, it was a fun night.  In  the future I don’t anticipate Heroic MagT being a real problem as long as we have a good CC mix.  I also got 2 drops I was looking for, along with 4 badges, and all it cost me was 24g in repairs!    All in all, I’d call it a nice, challenging instance where you can easily get your head kicked in.  I have the bruises to prove it.