Entries in knowing your spec (1)

Questing: Holding Your Own In Battle

The Eighth Wonder Of The World!
You know those discussions you have with friends or guildmates about PvP.  The conversations were you tell a story about how you, and possibly some buddies, took on X amount of the opposing faction with only Y amount of help?  You know the stories I am talking about.  It's the speech type, the ones you stop listening to instantly just so you can gather your thoughts to tell your own awesome story.  Everyone has them, heck, everyone has dozens of them.  They are the experiences in video games that we won't forget until they are replaced by something that much cooler.  That's what today is.  Just be kind enough to read my version of the battle before you jump into yours.  Thanks. Solidsagart has seen most of my playtime recently thanks to a little predicament.  Even though I have slowly been leveling her since my rogue hit level 80, the amount of time spent on her is limited to minutes at a time.  Therefore, I have never truly got the hang of, well, pretty much anything.  With rookie Shadow spec skills activated I began to light up Coldarra's army of quest mobs.  Thanks largely to my inexperience I pulled a couple of mobs in a row.  Not to worry, with Power Word: Shield, Inner Fire and the occasion healing spell, I was able to handle the one or two guys who came at me like I dissed their mother.  Then another pair pathed in my direction unseen to me.  Now I was just minding my own business, collecting XP with four guys wailing on me. It became obvious that the replacement rate of Vampiric Embrace's healing was less than the incoming damage.  In my further ineptitude I decided to Fear the mobs after a round of DOTs so I could heal in peace.  Any knowledgeable priest knows how bad an idea that can be in crowded areas.  I was left in solitude with only a pair of mobs hoping to spread my brains across the snowy landscape.  Upon his (one mob died from the DOTs) return he brought a few buddies along with them.  Five fresh mobs to be exact. Gulp. It took five and a half incoming mobs before I knew I had botched it.  I would be popping into Spirit Form and need a repair any second now.  But I wasn't going down without a fight.  I fired off my Shadowfiend, drank a pot, clinched my belt, through out another round of DOTs and feared once again.  After a few volleys of Mind Blast, Mind Flay, shield refreshes and yet another personal heal I had it down to three guys.  Then two.  And finally only one lowly Mage Slayer remained to have its face melted and skin later flayed. The great battle of casters, eight died without Sagart leaving combat, was one of those rare occurrences in WoW where you actually fear for your life outside of an instance.  Rarely do we feel that our demise is immediately at hand when PvEing for quests, or just grinding for loot, but I certainly thought I was going to bite the dust during the excursion.  Sure, it would have been easier to accomplish with some familiarity to my second spec, but I thoroughly enjoyed the heart racing, fear-filled, learning experience and wish that it would occur more often.  Only next time I hope it is not due to my own ineptitude, but as part of the punishing world we take part in. Ok, now that I have recanted my none cyclical battle story, no 2-3-4-5-6-7-wand this time, and you politely sat through it, cheering me on of course, you can hit me with yours.  What was your greatest moment of survival in the environment?  How about some unbalancedPvP destruction on the level of OrangeMarmalade? The sad fact, I would have Vanished on my rogue so fast as to make your head spin.

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