Sunday night we ventured into Kara to clean up the trash - Illhoof, Chess, Prince, and Spite. And clean we did, one shotting the lot other than Spite who took a couple of attempts.

Time…

…to die

Which left us with Nightbane. Aaarrggh. This is certainly the nastiest fight we’ve come up against, and whilst we got through to the third phase once, that was as good as we got. A waaay underpowered PuG healer didn’t help matters, but even so this is one tough hombre.

Dread

The guild is going to have to really step up for this one - though it feels far less frustrating that Maiden once did (remember those days?!). We might have to design a team specifically to take this guy down, as opposed to seeing who’s around on the night. But his time will come, have no doubt, and it will be a great triumph.

A spontaneous raid formed last night to delve deep into Blackrock Spire and tame the best non-combat pet in the game for Neitzsche, Chivdoc, Fugg & Ironbear. Led by fearless (and already pupped) Spencacon & Stroeb, it was literally a blast. Chiv & Spenc destroyed everything in their path with glee, Spenc relishing the MT role, whilst Fugg & Stroeb were merely passengers wiping up the mess.

Spiders!

And the end result is priceless:

New guild requirement?!

There’s a great pictorial guide to getting your own Worg - and the not so charming Smolderweb.

If you’re quick, you can study the combat stats - Spenc putting out 50% of the DPS and taking 50% of the hurt! And Ironbear outhealing Neit - mainly as at 62 he had to heal himself all the way through just to stay alive!

This weekend saw a momentous change in the Guild, when in consultation with Paxmortis, the power & progression raiders decided to leave Midnight’s Children and create Disposable Heroes. As many would have seen from the email discussions, the diverging interests of the progression & casual players meant that a single guild was always going to struggle to contain both. The impending release of WotLK has bought this to the fore, hence the great guild sundering.

Paxmortis and DH Guild Leader Blackheathen have forged a strong bond, and the relations between the two guilds will always remain. I’m sure that DH will welcome with open arms any MC members ready to make the move to more hardcore playing if and when the time comes. All of MC wish DH great success in Northrend, I’m sure they will do their MC heritage proud.

So where does this leave Midnight’s Children?

No doubt everyone has a different answer to this question, but the main emphasis seems to be that MC is a casual, easy going group. We will each want to investigate Northrend at our own pace, with no pressure on anyone to ‘keep up’. If you want to spend your time herb gathering, fishing, rep grinding or power levelling, it’s all xool.

We will try and continue the Thursday night instances as a regular thing, though for the time being we will struggle due to the lack of a Main Tank. The Rahjin Philosophy sounds like a good plan - we will try and schedule some five mans as people move through Northrend, and if you’re at the right level then you can jump in and play.

A MT is going to be a priority, and my thinking is that a Death Knight is going to be the easiest way to get there. Having said that, we have Fugg (currently specced Arms) and Ironbear (specced Resto), both of who could theoretically move into the MT role if they were interested. But again, there is no pressure to do so if that is not the way you want to roll. Personally, I’m interested in creating a DK and playing it MT, but it will be another few months before s/he would be ready to rock.

Given no tank, in the meantime we can do whatever people are interested in. The Brood will continue on it’s merry way, and maybe Thursdays can be dedicated to non-combat pet pickups (Worgs ftw!), achieving achievements, minstancing, etc etc. Something like what these guys are aiming for sounds pretty good. Proposals for Thursday night activities are more than welcome!

As it stands, the guild Elder are now made up of Paxmortis, Fugg, Rahjin, Stroeb, and Neitzsche (welcome back!). Then there are multiple members of the Swarm coming up rapidly, the main three being Ironbear a 63 Tauren Druid, Grizell a 51 Blood Elf Warlock, and 60 Orc Shaman Exemplar. And of course the Brood, hanging around in the 30’s and loving every minute.

So big changes, and the guild chat is a lot quieter now, but MC will continue and hopefully thrive. Bring on WotLK and all those new fish!

Stroeb

A little while ago, Fugg became the first MC member to get an Epic Flying Mount - epic is exactly the right description!

Not satisfied with an Epic mount (see below), Fugg has set out on an insane but brilliant quest. Shattered by being torn apart by the evil Somnus, vengeance called, and now Fugg is taking down Every. Single. Elite. Dragonkin. All of them.

Read the full story in Fugg’s fantastic journal, There Be Dragons.

And Fugg, know that all of Midnight’s Children are behind you on this quest, you have but to ask and we will be there…

Grizell chimes in with a tale of AV domination:

Grizell had an awesome game of Alterac Valley last night. She was doing the daily BG quest finishing “The call to Arms” achievement after five days straight of dailies. She decided to try a different set of tactics this time… Instead of her usual “tie the Void Walker to the flag and lie down pretending to be asleep so that our teams rogues could counter-attack after I died” - Everyone of course knows that old trick in Arathi Basin. She thought that this tactic might be less useful in Arathi Valley so she decided to travel with the the main battlegroup all the way to the Allied Fort. She normally takes her minion Grad’ok the faithful Void Walker but she realised that this tends to single her out as a noob and a cloth armored Warlock. Having a big blue nether creature near you is like having a sign on your back saying “Come Slay Me!”. Her Void Walker is a great tank in PVE but somehow these alliance chaps seem to ignore his “torment” talent and come straight at poor Grizell.

This time she just focused on supporting the Warriors and Paladins and made sure she did not run ahead of the main group. She picked her targets by simply tabbing her way through the enemy. Without the VW to worry about she simple dotted everything that moved with a rotation of Haunt, Unstable Affliction, Manatap, Siphon life and Curse of Agony. When it looked like her comrades were being punished she would fear, incinerate and shadow bolt alternatively hoping to catch up with a druid or use Mana Tap again to replenish her mana. She also decided to not use Rain of Fire which is a great AOE spell but heavy on the mana use. Besides, throwing your hands up in the air in battle and calling down a firestorm is a definite way to get noticed by the wrong crowd.

One of the other great things about this particular battle was the team work. The Horde moved along the valley like a rolling wave sweeping the enemy away… The battle raged continuously but there were moments where the Allies would regroup and someone would type HOLD and the group will slow for a moment. This is when Grizell was most valuable. There is no point running backwards or even moving so all she did was continuously cast. Eventually the Horde graveyard would empty out and the Horde warriors would flood back into smash the Allied frontlines. Then the warcry to charge could be heard and the Horde would surge forward again. There were some amazing spell storm moments where for ten seconds the screen was a wash of bright colours as so many spell were being cast at once that occasionally there was a white-out all around. Over and over again Grizell achieved the highest rank levels simply by standing still in the middle of the battle and cycling down her spells and shifting to the next target. Ranked #2 in the Honorable Kills list for the first time ever… Grizell’s lessons learnt from the battlegrounds: “There’s no point running from the enemy. You’ll just die tired”

Grizell Ranked #2

***Update***
The very next night, Grizell went one better:

Grizell Ranked #1!

After hours of preparation, days of study, weeks of rehearsal, and months of drills, Midnight’s Children finally entered the dread halls of Naxxramas this week.

The call of Naxx could no longer be resisted, so despite Ironbear being /afk, nine brave and foolhardy souls ventured in on our first reconnaissance. Prepped by Grimsong’s brilliant strategy document, we were as ready as we could ever be.

9 Brave Toons

Inscriber led the team through the trash with ease, bringing us to our first ever raid boss, Anub’Rekhan. One of the finest Spider Lords of Azjol’Nerub, now patrolling the Spider Wing at the behest of the Scourge, he is a nasty piece of work.

Grimsong gave the strategy overview: Banehammer MT on the boss, Inscriber OT on adds, DPS positioned, Neitzsche respecced Holy (for the first time in since 70), Rahjin on heal assists, and we were good to go.

Whoa. Not easy! Lots of movement, tricky spawns, locust swarms, learning the mechanics and timing. We got him to about 41% on our first try, 46% on the second, etc etc. Neit switched to just OT healing, Rahjin on party healing. By the 7th we were starting to get the hang of it, but couldn’t get him past that 40% mark before the wipe.

At around midnight we had tried 10 goes, and Grimsong said what everyone was starting to think: we didn’t quite have the firepower to down this guy with only nine of us. So the decision was made to have one last attempt, then call it. Rahjin switched to DPS on the way back in, as his party healing hadn’t been needed as much as expected.

At 40%, we were all still up. Inscriber was picking up the spawns, DPS were smashing them down quick, Grimsong had Banehammer at full health despite the swarming locusts. At 30%, we started to believe. 20%, zomg we may do this. 10% and everyone blew everything they had…%5….1%….DONE!!

Anub’Rekhan - Down

Much wooting ensued, as the Guild’s first true raid boss was down! Deservedly, Grimsong picked up the epic Chivalric Chestguard. We poked around at the Grand Widow for a few minutes, but she will have to wait for next time…

An amazing night for the Guild, as we cleared the Spider Wing for the first time - on only our second trip in. Griz got a virus in his keyboard, meaning we once again nine-manned the first couple of bosses. The main difference in the team this week was welcoming Ironbear back on healing, which cut Neitzsche loose to bring the deeps.

And after our 11 shot attempt on Anub last week, this time we took him down in one! Using Grimsong’s well thought out tactics, Paxmortis took down the scarab spawns and the DPS was through the roof. No deaths, tanks on 100% health at the death, great stuff.

Grim’s ninja-looter meant he got another chest set for his collection, and we headed on to our next foe, Faerlina. A tricky mechanic which bamboozled us last week, this time we got it (almost) note perfect. Banehammer went down on her 3rd enrage, but a brilliant combat rez from Ironbear (and temporary tanking from Fugg) meant the fight continued, for another one shot!

Grim looted himself a nice sword, Rahj some comfy boots, and on we pressed. By this time Griz had finally sterilised his keyboard, which meant we were at full strength for the third and last boss in the Spider Wing - Maexxna. As Rahjin pointed out, being 10 meant we were OP for Naxx…

Not quite! Maexx proved more of a challenge, and we worked through various combo’s of web wrap springers & healers, before settling on an effective combo. Where possible Griz & Pax dewrapped, assisted by others as required, whilst Neit switched to backup heals for the duration. So on our 5th attempt, down she went.

Inscriber and Bane duelled over the skull-embroidered cloak, before Bane took it by Thunderstomping Scribe into submission. That should have been that for the night - but with 20 minutes to go until deadline, we headed deeper, into the Plague Quarter. This was new territory to most, with no Guild Guide to show the way. Nevertheless Inscriber led us faithfully to Noth the Plaguebringer, the first boss, and we once again racked up a one-shot - our 4th for the night and an upgrade (really!) ring for Pax!

Four Naxx bosses in one night - who’d of thunk it?