A Little Redemption

Hiahotah has a few raid quests outstanding (Kill Gruul, run Heroic Arcatraz and Heroic Shadow Labyrinth) so I put myself into LFG for those three instances and did a few rounds of Alterac Valley (man... The horde is hapless sometimes... They have no hap). About half way through the third straight game where the horde didn't even bother slowing the Alliance rush down, I got a tell asking me if I wanted to do Gruul's Lair. Strangely, my +healing was judged to be satisfactory so I was invited.

After about a half hour of trying to get a raid together, they only needed a couple of tanks. I'd rather do new content as ranged DPS or as a healer - it gives me a better idea what is going on. But the last time I tried this, the group wiped because the tanks couldn't take the beating dished out and I kind of wanted this over. I have a longstanding grudge against this instance: It broke up my Alliance guild. We were falling apart and it was thought that if we could pull off a 25 man raid, we'd save the guild. The High King schooled us and within a couple of weeks, the guild was no more. So I whispered the raid leader that I could respec feral if he wanted. When I told him what my bear stats were, he asked me to respec. Everybody loves a tank.

It took another few minutes to get the raid going and I thought it was going to fall apart (and I'd be out the 25 gold for the respec) but they managed to pull it together. While I was waiting, I started putting my feral talents back where they belong... You're home fellas. Hello Feral Faerie Fire, my old friend. Ah... Mangle... I've missed you so. Then I went out and tanked a few mobs because it had been a while. Then I went back and read my tooltips and put the right mangle in my bear form bar.

The first trash pulls were uneventful (and by "uneventful" I mean "a mage got tired of waiting, pulled the first mob, left the raid and logged out just before I zoned in and I was in bear form so I just picked it up"). I was assigned to tank Olm the Summoner with a paladin OT. I could have done without the fears... But I kept him on me most of the time. The group was pretty balanced (and the warrior main tank was, in a word, godly. His healers were complaining because they didn't leave him anything to do and he had more health than I did - only by a couple hundred but it still counts. He and I were a good 3k above everyone else. It was obvious who the main and off tanks were) and we downed him. Take that "boss who broke up Crucify"!!!

There were some issues with the trash pulls on the way to Gruul (namely, a three pull when we weren't expecting any mobs at all) so we had to rebuff before Gruul. I was assigned to OT to eat something they called the Hateful (actually Hurtful) Strikes. Those tickle (I missed being indestructible). We lost a few people early and I saw an angel of failure in there at one point. I found that the middle was a good place to hang out for the shadows so I mashed flying bear when we got knocked in the air and was only close to the main tank. He got to 15 grows and there were only about 13 people still standing and we had him to 7%. We threw everything we had at him. Calls went out to blow all cooldowns (I didn't pop Bearvasion because I didn't think it would help much) and we managed to get him down. I don't think I embarassed myself - I was second on Omen for the majority of the fight (in fact, the raid leader was telling the ranged they could pass me in threat... I don't think he checked to see how much PvP gear I was wearing. I generate a LOT of threat). He dropped a resto druid helm and no one wanted it, so... I took it. I mean... When I _started_ the raid I was resto. It's a minor upgrade for PvE healing so... What the hell, right?

I also got the last item in the attunement quest for SSC - I just have to get back to the questgiver in Heroic Slave Pens to turn it in. LF4M just need heals and 3 DPS and gtg.