Field Report - We're not in Kansas anymore

I've planted my ass pretty firmly into my new guild by now, and things seem to be running along smoothly. I even managed to salvage an old guildie to join me! (Yeah I know I am jinxing it...). The guild managed to give me what probably is the best welcome I've ever had, in their own special way, and that is saying a lot considering the last guild I was in consisted of mostly irl friends. I felt right at home straight away, and considering they're all raving psychotics, that probably says a lot about me. It's not without problems of course, most 10 man guilds struggle with being able to bring the proper setup for the more difficult fights in current content, and lack of signs have forced us to cancel a couple of raids (partially my fault because of my retarded work schedule). But even so, I am having loads of fun and can honestly say I am not bothered by a single one of my guildies - something that is unprecedented in my WoW-history. Eventhough I have already been tea bagged, loot ninjad and called phat more often than I can count (and that's just from one person!). I am definitely having a lot of fun.

Just a regular evening in guild chat.

The raiding is fun, even when we're having wipe nights (I've never been much bothered with wiping on progression) and most people seem to have the patience needed for it. Loot and setup distribution has so far been very sensible and fair, with progress in mind. You might think I am trying to suck ass for a promotion here, but after all the bad news and whining I have been feeding you over the past... well, for way too long anyway - I thought it was time for something positive. I've even started up a fresh collection of alts! Currently I am leveling a resto shaman, feral druid and prot paladin, a dk will probably soon see the light of day.

Healing in Dragon Soul is lots of fun actually. I never really did get bored of Firelands, mostly because I never really got into it, but I can still say that I definitely enjoy the DS fights a lot more. I know people stare at me in horror and wonder who replaced my brain with a cackling maniac when I say I really love healing Zon'ozz and Blackhorn. It might be because I feel like that is where priests (discipline in particular) really shine. So since I smoothly got us into talking about priest healing... *cough*

I really enjoy priest healing at the moment, both discipline and holy. I do have a guilty conscience over not spending more time with my holy spec, it's like it's staring at me with huge guilt-filling puppy eyes whenever I open my talent tab. "YES YES, I WILL PLAY WITH YOU SOON!". And it's not like I don't try... At the moment I take it out for a stroll every now and then in a random heroic. But being geared fully towards one spec will undeniable gimp you, ever so little, in the other spec and I feel like I lose my full potential. And when I feel like I can't do it properly I usually go "ah what the heck" and go lazy mode, aka disc. It's sad really. The difference in stat priority between discipline and holy has never been this thin either, so it's really a bad excuse. It doesn't help that I am eyeing my shadow spec every now and then too, although it does make me feel like I am cheating on holy. Damn, I really do have too intimate a relationship with my priest, don't I?

Interestingly enough, and I really never thought I'd say this, I feel like my shiny moment are in fights that require a lot of running around. I can only attribute it to the fact that shields are really strong compared to other healers instant casts, and I am no longer afraid of spamming my shields when they're needed. We are good aoe healers as well, but obviously don't stand a chance at a Radiance spamming holydin. They've really turned into the arcane mage of healers, poor things. I really don't envy them. Since I got rid of my fear of over-indulging in Flash Heal, I feel like I'm not too shabby at point healing either. Priests have returned into their comfy role of the allround healer - don't excell at anything but do everything pretty good. And all those juicy cooldowns... Priests are definitely in a good position at the moment and I am thoroughly enjoying it.

We're good at Morchok, Zon'ozz, Warhorn, Spine, Madness, decent on Hagara, slightly weaker on the stationary spam heal fights like Ultraxion and Yor'sahj (and I am talking about disc now). I feel like I get good use of most healing skills in my spell book, there is still a lot of Prayer of Healing and not many Heals, and a whole lot of shielding, but the distribution is a lot more interesting than it seems to be for some other healers at the moment (did I mention Radiance spam?).

I am really hoping they'll release an Old God end boss kind of raid dungeon before MoP, because I was somewhat disappointed from the Deathwing encounter. Funnily enough, Spine and Madness are probably the two fights I dislike the most in DS, because they're really not much interesting (especially not Spine). Now we need something epic, truly epic, to see us off this expansion. ICC was a good end for Wrath and Cataclysm needs something similar. A fight similar to Yogg'Saron is what I am asking for!