Thursday, August 26, 2010

Magphloin Experiences Utgarde Keep for the First Time

My somewhat fearless pally ran Utgarde Keep for the first time tonight.  In fact, it was the first instance I ran him though since Sunken Temple way back when he was level 47.  It was quite the experience.  I've ran UK several times on my hunter, who was over geared for the instance, so it was a change not only to run it as a melee dps, but at the appropriate level.  In this case, level 71.  I waited a little in order to upgrade from the Outland gear I had, to some Northrend quest gear.  I wanted to laugh at times.  Others I wanted to cry, but overall, it was an experience that was worth it.

I didn't choose it at random.  I had selected it from the list of instances available to me.  After a shorter wait than what I had anticipated, I got pulled in.  I buff everyone in the party, and off we go.  We clear the vrykul at the beginning of the instance.  We get to the first boss, Prince Keleseth.  The mage in the party needed to get ready, but the tank ran in anyway.  It didn't matter, because we took him down rather easily.  So far, so good.  We take on more trash, and got to the second boss: Skarvald and Dalronn.  Not as easy.  The tank had trouble holding aggro, and Skarvald kept going after the warlock in the party.  We wipe a few times on him before everyone in the party, except the mage and myself, leaves.

Replacements quickly replenish the diminished ranks.  We take down Skarvald and Dalronn with little incident.  The new tank was saying he hadn't tanked in awhile.  Well, he was doing a good job.  Problems begin with a fury warrior. I don't name names usually, but I will this time.  Galairn, who I believe is also on my server.  He wanted the spell power chest piece that dropped from the boss fight.  He claimed it had more strength.  Needless, he DIDN'T get it.  More on this guy shortly.

Despite the bickering, we plow on with no issues.  Then we get to Ingvar the Plunderer, the final, and main boss of UK.  Being a melee dps, I had to pay attention more to his attacks than my hunter, who can stay close to the pillars and just fire away more or less.  We wiped on him.  We had few problems on the first phase of the fight.  Come second phase, a different story.  Most of us wiped, except the tank, and shaman I believe, who finished him off.  It was real close, but they did it.

More bickering between the party and Galairn.  He needed on the ax that dropped that had a strength bonus.  The other players wanted me to get it.  As soon as Galairn won the roll, he left the party.  Not shocking there.  He probably could use it.  The dps in the party, myself included, pulled between 700-1200 dps on the fights.  Galairn, mighty fury warrior...  200 dps or so. I wasn't shocked considering this was a player who wanted a spell power chest piece.  I wasn't too upset about losing it.  Besides, I have a BoA axe that I can use up until I hit 80 and start heroics.  I thanked the other players who wanted me to have the axe.  I took that as a sign that they felt I was holding my end of the bargain running this instance. That felt good after solo'ing for close to 25 levels and four months!

Overall, I'm glad I queued up, and remained persistent, determined to finish. It was a good gauge to see how well I'm playing my pally.  Depending on the fight, I was usually on, or close to top of the dps meters, but more importantly; I got to experience an instance at the level it was intended for.  As I mentioned in previous posts, my hunter didn't start running instances until close to 80.  Also, playing melee gave me a different perspective on boss fights (Ingvar in particular), than my hunter, where I just stand back and shoot away.  I've been thinking of tanking with my pally, so watching some of the boss mechanics in action was helpful.

Utgarde Keep was certainly the most difficult instance I've played yet on my pally, but I thought it was a success.

No comments:

Post a Comment