High Astromancer Solarian, take II (and some takes on Hero Classes for WOTLK)

So I was talking with some Draenei in Ironforge the other day about how the Guild was progressing and they laughed at me and said “it’s nawt dat hard, missy, jus dps-a-go-go”. I slinked back to the Outlands to see what was shaking out & low and behold… Tempest Keep tonight. Praise Farseer Nobundo!

Now that I’ve mentioned ‘Farseer’, that got me to thinking about the Hero Class in Wrath of the Lich King expansion. You know the Death Knight will not be the only Hero Class, Blizzard always tries to ‘balance’ things and only 1 or 2 hero classes will just not be equal to all the hardcore altaholics out there, so I wanted to write down my thoughts on Wrath of the Lich King especially focusing on Hero Classes. Since there will be some siege warfare in the next expansion, I’ve tried to give some mass units control to the Hero Classes. Here’s a list of possible Hero Classes derived from the base class (ordered by the most likely to I-really-can’t-decide).

Class	Hero Class	Abilities
Paladin	Death Knight	Damage dealing tank caster, short range AoE
Priest	Prophet	Heals with near unlimited range, Mass Heal
Mage	Arch Mage	Mass Teleport, Mass Polymorph
Shaman	Farseer	Spirit Wolf pets *cough cc* (i.e. maybe a Banish like effect where the target lives in a spirit world for 30 seconds unless the Spirit Wolf is damaged, mass Bloodlust
Druid	Arch Druid	Starfall, Giant tree of massive damage w/zero movement
Rogue	Warden	Blink and short range Fanstrike AoE
Warlock	Necromancer	Death and Decay, Mass Demon Summon, Shadow Volley
Warrior	Champion	/shrug if I know, Mirror Image, Spellbreaker
Hunter	Ranger	Mass Tame Pets, Stealth, Track Target Until Death, Freezing Shot

My fear is that too many players will charge into Hero Classes and it will end up as a world wide DOTA.

Now back to raiding. The following week we are back in Tempest Keep, locking down the farmable stuff. Solarian wants to chat with us, but we only manage to excite the mage. I myself like this fight a lot, it’s not hard as long as the healers do their job, the Paladin tanks do theirs and people run away quickly when they get Wrath’d by the Astromancer. Piece of cake.

My party:

• Rogue
• Rogue
• Rogue
• Druid (feral)
• Shaman (me)

Totems:

• Windfury Totem
• Strength of Earth Totem
• Healing Stream Totem
• Fire Nova Totem (for Agents)
• Searing Totem
• Tremor Totem (for last stage of fight vs. Solarian the Voidwalker)
• Fire Elemental Totem (for Agents)

A very respectable #6 on total damage. My Dragonstrike is finally paying off.

Buffs gained in battle:

• Shamanistic Rage (Mana) 10,987
• Judgement of Wisdom (Mana) 7,770
• Water Shield (Mana) 610
• Drums of Restoration (Mana) 600
• Focused 35
• Flurry 25
• Elemental Strength 13
• Unleashed Rage 11
• Haste 6
• Lust for Battle 4
• Lightning Speed 4
• Leader of the Pack 4
• Drums of Battle 2
• Rejuvenation 1
• Lifebloom 1
• Heroism 1
• Greater Blessing of Salvation 1

Al’ar is next on the hit list.

Heroic Durnholde

The Thrall escort, the time warping dragons, the exploding buildings, the mounted race from Durnholde to Tarren Mill, the old nostalgic Hillsbrad look and feel are all wonderful tributes to a glorious past.  This dungeon has it all.  On heroic mode, it has plenty more.  I like the “outdoor” dungeons mostly because all players can use their spells at some point during the adventure (i.e. root CC for Druids), and it just doesn’t feel confined in a cramped space like Sethekk Halls or Sunken Temple.

By far, this dungeon is my favorite. Or rather, the normal version is my favorite, the heroic one is tough.  CC is king here and moving and pulls are just done in a certain way to keep you from getting too many patrol re-spawns on you as well as having a back up healer (like a shaman with a +1500 healing set) for the mortal striking 7k hitting 1st boss to the Epoch dragon nonsense at the end.

Party:

• Prot Warrior
• Holy Paladin
• Feral Druid
• Mage
• Shaman

Our mage was serious on DPS, so I used Wrath of Air totem, Mana Spring, Strength of Earth totems for the majority of combat.  Whenever there was an enemy caster, I would Earth Shock the heals from the enemy and also placed a Tremor Totem to keep the incoming Psychic Screams from fearing us too much.

The dog/patrolman duo calls adds (the worst part of getting past the 1st half of this dungeon) and they are on a 15 minute re-spawn rate, so keep moving for Pete’s sake or else patrols will come down on you like a ton of bricks.  Yes, the patrolman cannot be CC w/Polymorph.  Woes to us.  We just sheep the dog and try to burn Patrolman fast, but the adds spawn (4 of them) so just be ready on your crowd control.  Earth Elemental works pretty well to buy you some time, and Frost Shock Rank 1can kite an enemy really, really well.    I used a Frost Shock kiting strategy the other night in Underbog and it worked well too.  The little elementals in there just don’t move very fast to begin with so it’s easy to kite them with Frost Shock Rank 1.

 

I’m so glad I didn’t roll a human female shaman. Look below…. *nice bangs, you use a Tupperware bowl to cut that?*

Some good heroic durnholde notes here and here.

Heroic Mech

Pugged a group for heroic Mechanar last night.  Quick badge run for me, I would like to get 50 Badges of Justice to have when I upgrade, but it looks like some of my current gear doesn’t really need much in terms of Badge upgrading.  I need to get Nether Vortex*5 from the SSC/TK, then I can upgrade my hammer to Dragonstrike.

Pretty fast run, even after the Mech badge running nerf.  I still like the quick kills and how the Destroyers are not nearly as bad w/o Charged Fist.   Basically, whenever I saw Charged Fist on the ole enemy castbar for Destroyers, Earth Shock to remove it!  Let’s see, party was :

• Warrior
• Hunter
• Shadow Priest
• Holy Paladin
• Shaman

So I gave Grace of Air, Mana Spring, Strength of Earth totems for the group. 

We finished all bosses even the 2nd boss with the fast fire elementals.  Everyone except the tank and I died before my Windfury crit smacked her for 1587 damage.