Gone Fishin’ & Holy Kara!

After grilling out, my husband and I sat down for a little bit of WoW. Since it was still relatively early and sunset (and fireworks) were many hours off, we joined the majority of our guild in a bout of fishing. Actually, all of us were finally getting around to leveling up our fishing skill. Several were fishing in Orgrimmar while some of us were skilling up in the Outlands.

Much of my fishing consisted of running from pool to pool to grab the lovely Golden Darter which makes Golden Fish Sticks. I give them to my husband, Guineach, as he has a resto druid that actually raids; he was quite pleased to get almost 50 fish since the Golden Darters have skyrocketed on the AH as of late.

Our fishing was interrupted by a guildmate asking Guin if he wanted to go on a Kara run. Normally, he’d go without me, and I don’t mind. Today, though he told our guildmate that he’d go if I could go. (I think he figured we needed to spend time together because it’s a holiday.)

Turns out that it was a PUG group with four of our guildmates, and the tank was from what some would call a hardcore raiding guild from our server. You know, the kind that doesn’t want a noob shadow priest dragging them down on a Kara run but will take her because they really want the resto druid in great gear.

I was in the group no less than a minute and the raid was informed that anyone not pulling their weight and doing more damage than a specific druid by the time we reached Maiden would be kicked from the group and replaced. Did I understand the reasoning for this? Yeah, I did. You’ve got serious raiders who want a fast Kara run and don’t have time to waste taking a lesser geared character in Karazhan because it slows everything down. Been in situations like that with Bansidhe. The only difference was that I always went with guildmates so you deal with the lesser geared character because he or she is your guildmate. The rules change completely with a PUG, and I understand the thinking of the raid leader.

I, however, wasn’t sure if I could outdps the druid even if he was just tanking. He was from a guild in Hyjal with stellar gear, and I still was wearing two greens. I know my DPS limits, and it didn’t make sense to me to lock myself into a PUG Karazhan only to find myself booted after the third boss. I politely stated I couldn’t keep up and didn’t want to be saved to a non-guild run and left the raid. Guin decided to leave, too, because he wanted to spend his evening with me.

Fate works out pretty well, though. One of our tanks was forming a Kara run seconds after I left the PUG, so Guin and I joined that. The other two guild members who were with us in the PUG Kara also joined the guild run and off we went for a badge/shard run.

Attumen was a pushover and was kind enough to drop Spectral Band of Innervation. I was the only priest (in any form), and the two other clothies had immensely better gear. New ring for Slainte!

Moroes was easy, and I was the sole shackle. I have to say that I love shackling on my priest and banishing on my warlock. I like having to keep an eye on the controlled mob while still dpsing the other ones. It appeals to my mild ADD. ;) He also dropped the Nethershard Girdle.

Maiden was third as usual. I was excited to try decursive, but during the fight, I noticed nothing was popping up for the people with Holy Fire and my panic level was high. Luckily, our holy paladin was on it. I’m going to have to play around with that mod after I update it. She ended up dropping Bands of Nefarious Deeds, and my lovely green bracers bit the dust.

Some people had to go due to holiday festivities, and we gained an off-tank. Dankstonia is a great tank, so Romulo and Julianne went down without any problems. I was hoping to get rid of my green pants, but the two lovers were not willing to appease my desires. One day.

Here’s where I get a little muddled. I’m used to doing Curator then the Shade, but this raid did it a little differently. Although I can’t recall the specific order now. I just know that Shade was a little later then I was used to, but it was fun to see how others do Kara.

It ended up being a full clear of Kara, and I ended up with a lot of gear because the other casters had better. I also ended up with a lot of healing gear for an offspec because they would rather see the gear used for that then disenchanted. By the end of the night, I picked up Aran’s Soothing Sapphire, Jade Ring of the Everliving, and Nightstaff of the Everliving. With all the new gear and the old gear in the bank, my bonus healing is now 992. This doesn’t bode well.