The Adventure Begins

[Nighthawk38]

Hello everyone,

I am a long time reader of this site, first time posting. After months of reading and absorbing all the information here, I feel I am finnaly ready to take the big plunge. I will be starting up a 5-boxing mixed group today. I have dual- , tri-, and quad-boxed already with varying amounts of success. I want to be able to run Heroics without relying on PUGs, or guildmates who are either "too busy farming emblems" or have better things to do than help a fresh 80 "gear up".

Anyway, after much careful consideration and research, I have finally decided on my team's composition. Ultimately deciding on "play what is fun for you", my team will be the following:

Prot Paladin, Ele Shaman, Balance Druid, Marksman Hunter, and Arcane Mage (Alliance)

I will be "hopefully" posting a regular blog on their trials and tribulations on Vyndree's website.

Any comments, suggestions, or helpful hints are always gladly accepted. This site is full of wonderful and informative people and I look forward to this new challenge.

P.S. Yes... call me crazy, but I am leveling this team from scratch... with NO BOOSTING... and NO R-A-F. lol although i have a few Grand master Craftsmen that will helping out with items along the way....lol

[burningforce]

welcome to the forums:)

I noticed you do not have a healer, I thought healers were needed for instances?

you are not crazy, I am lvling my team without RAF or heirlooms hehe, takes awhile but i am still having fun ;)

[Nighthawk38]

I will be using the druid as my healer until I get the team to Northrend. Everything I've read suggests a dedicated healer isn't necessary until you hit Heroics.

[-silencer-]

I will be using the druid as my healer until I get the team to Northrend. Everything I've read suggests a dedicated healer isn't necessary until you hit Heroics.

With a paladin & 4x shaman, this is true. However, 5 different classes will gimp your dps efficiency a little and might be easier to run later non-heroic instances with a dedicated healer, mainly for reduced threat talents. You could make up for the efficiency hit with better gear.. it's up to you when to respec a healer. Don't do it until you feel you need to anyway. I didn't for the longest time, but it turned early runnings of level cap non-heroic instances from slow, careful, and deliberate into a cakewalk with earth shield, riptide, mana tide totem, lowered healing threat, and various healing talent buffs. :)

[Ualaa]

As far as questing to level, you are correct in that you do not need a dedicated healer at all.
Either the shaman or the druid can be a very effective healer for your team.

If the shaman goes resto, you lose Totem of Wrath and Elemental Oath.
You can replace Totem of Wrath with Flametongue Totem, Earth Shield, Riptide, Mana Tide etc.

If the druid goes resto, you lose Moonkin Aura and Earth & Moon.
You gain Tree Aura and Wild Regrowth.

The druid as a DPS needs to worry about Eclipse procs and casting either Wrath or Starfire.
So it might be easier if the druid is the healer.
I personally love having a Resto Shaman in my group and would go with the shammy as the healer.
But if you do, the druid will either need two dps keys and to alternate between them based on the procs or to accept lower dps from maybe having your click macro cast/refresh Insect Swarm + Moonfire, and then randomly spam Wrath and Starfire.

As far as AoE goes, the druid can Hurricane either spec as the shammy can Magma Totem.
Hunter Volley and either Mage Arcane Explosion or Blizzard, with Consecrate... you'll be fine there.

[Zzyzxx71]

FWIW - I do not run a healer and have a variety of heroics on farm. Warrior+4 Ele shammies.

Either way is doable. I am in my spare time working on leveling up a pally for the group synergy.

[Mooni]

Congratulations!
Due to a little account problem, I had to stop boxing one of my shamans and decided to raise a mixed team while I was raising up her replacement.
Already had the prot pally, and I didn't feel like raising another tank when I like this one, so:

Prot Pally: Buffs and tankage
BM Hunter: They make me run faster indoors. They track crap to save me time questing. Pet is emergency off-tank.
Destro lock: I don't know why I picked destro except I end up spamming chaos bolt and shadowbolt and life tap. They summon the others sometimes. They has an imp and gives me stamina. Maybe Felguard would be better at killin'.
Balance Druid: Eventually gonna only go up to Moonkin and the rest of the points will be in resto. Got a macro in the DPS spam button that says like /cast [stance:0] !Moonkin Form, which means "if you are not currently in another form and I hit you, then turn on Moonkin Form. Otherwise, please ignore this line and move onto the Feral Fire/Moonfire/Starfire/Wrath spam"
Holy Priest: Holy @#$% they're awesome. Got a PBAoE spam macro on this one that switches between Prayer of Mending, Holy Nova, Holy whatever else. For some reason at level 67 this priest is as good as 2 or 3 shamans. Buuuuut no DPS whatsoever even when they try really hard.

So at level 67 I got sick of not having tremor totems, and grinding in general, and ditched the others. Ultimately I'll probably ditch the lock just to get my totems in the game again.
Whyyyy can't the original vision of tankin' shamans be true again? I'd do it in a heartbeat.

[Nighthawk38]

Well,

It's been a week now (more or less), and the team is at level 10. Good thing I'm not trying to break any speed records. lol. I have made a few observations in the trek so far... Number One: Collection Quests SUCK. they were always tedious, but still doable dual- or even tri-boxing. But 5-boxing makes them exponentially more difficult. Number Two: Class quests for races from another "zone" are a significant PITA as well, lol. Having to travel from Elwynn Forest all the way back to Teldrassil to do your hunter pet taming, then to Azuremyst so your Shaman can get a totem.... UGH. Lesson learned... better racial synergy in the future. The group as a whole is doing rather well overall. Now that talents will be in play... and glyphs in 5 more levels, I expect things will get a BIT easier :). In case you are reading this and wondering how it took me a week to only make it to level 10.... 1> i'm a SLOW leveler 2> NO R-A-F 3> NO boosting and 4> I am also leveling professions for the whole group as well... yes.. i'm a masochist. Sorry for the wall of text. Feel free to reply/comment.

P.S. HOGGER IS DEAD !!! that encounter is still fun :p

Next stop... Westfall, the Deadmines, Van Cleef.... and maybe a quick road trip over to Wailing Caverns. Stay Tuned

[Ualaa]

Professions take about as much time with either approach.

You can level them as you're leveling your toons.
Or you can wait until 60th or 80th, and then level them.

The higher levels can pick flowers or skin with relative impunity.
And the faster mount lets you move from one to the next easily.
Not slowing down to pick flowers, mine ore, skin mobs etc speeds up leveling.
But this means you have to go back to the zones even after leveling there already.



Some of the class quests are definitely worth doing immediately.
Others can wait, as your team is strong together even without a totem or a pet.
It is preference really.
When I was leveling 5x dps toons, I'd frequently only bother to train at multiples of 10's.
Of course the team had RAF for faster leveling.
But still they had no problem doing quests for level x9 with spells from level x0.


Collection quests will pretty much always suck if you look at them as collections.
When you view them as short-term grind sessions, with a reward at the end, they're a least tolerable.
Not the preferred method to level on, but not as horrendous either.
When I'm in a grinding mood, I'll definitely have a dvd going for a bit of a distraction.

The only collections you "have to do", are those that open up a quest chain or daily really.
Or if they end up with a very nice reward, which you'll use for a while.
Until you're in Northrend, and are opening dailies, every collection is optional.
It will be hard to level without collections in Northrend, but through Vanilla/BC content, you don't need to do any.

Even in Northrend, you can avoid the more painful collections.
If you do, you'll likely need to hit every zone to level.
And maybe either instance some or battleground some for extra experience along the way.
Definitely try all of the collections, you'll need to do some of them.
Occasionally they're easier then you think.
Especially if every toon can loot the corpse, which is true for some collections anyway.


As far as leveling goes, irregardless of your final spec, I'd spec each toon to DPS.
Once the Paladin has Blessing of Sanctuary and Holy Shield, prot is a decent leveling spec.
Until then, you'll do a lot more damage as Retribution.
All your other toons seem to be DPS spec, which will help you level faster.

[Gadzooks]

I'm running a team close to yours, and I know I'd be sunk without my holy priest. My Boomer is my backup healer, and can throw the occasional heal when I need it, but my Boomer's job is primarily DPS, and she's very, very, very good at it.

If it were me, I'd drop the hunter, and either level another druid and go Resto (UBER group HOT healer), or raise a Holy priest. I'm just starting Heroics, and while you'll have DPS, you'll be getting smacked around pretty hard until you badge them up.

The mixed nature does not have to gimp your dps, as stated above - I have my 3 dps hitting 14-15k reliably in Heroics and 17-19k easily in normal dungeons. That's plenty of dps, and it will go up once I start badging - and I'm going to play with a suggestion made here and throw some shadow spells on the priest's macro for the extra DPS.

My #1 concern in Heroics, even with my pally at 540 def cap, is keeping her alive, and I would lose all of my Boomer's DPS healing her, and I don't think it would be as effective as making her Resto, and switching in a new DPS to replace the priest.

Put it this way, if you put your group together with other players in the game, it would wipe. The typical group is tank>healer>dps>dps>dps. The Boomer can heal, yes, but it's no way as efficient as a dedicated healer.

But that's my opinion. When you get to Heroics, I'd love to see you prove me wrong, that's how we learn. :)

[Nighthawk38]

Hello again everyone,

Sorry for the long pause between updates. RL issues, combined with frustration slowed my updating.

I am still looking for a good place to actually set up a Blog for my team's mis-adventures. Until I find one, you guys are stuck with it here...lol

Well, here's the current situation:

My team was doing wonderfully in Westfall and Redridge, happily rolling over everything in their path while questing. I forced myself to complete the collection quests but I think at this point, I'll cut them off. Unless they are "manageable", meaning... collect LESS THAN FIVE of something, otherwise my patience expires LONG before the quest is completed.

SOOO ... The team hit level 18, and was doing rather well on quests, so I decided to take the plunge. Stopped by the Inn at Sentinel Hill, made a final gear check, looked over my macros, made sure Jamba was doing what it's supposed to (waste of time, because Jamba ALWAYS does what it's supposed to) :) and proceeded to trek on down to Moonbrook.

To make a long story short, I wiped on the first boss. This was after wiping on a couple multi-mob pulls that were unexpected. Discovered that a hunter's pet can be a nice asset or a huge liability, depending on the situation. Rezzed up, went back in, and on the 3rd attempt, finally took down the first boss. Even though I KNEW that patrol was gonna show up, they still managed to get me. It's a learning process, but MAN, it gets frustrating at times.

Anyway, the Druid's DPS is still PATHETIC, and her mana issues are totally disappointing. So I have made a couple decisions. The druid is being shelved, and I'm leveling up a Priest to replace her. I know people have said to drop the hunter and keep the druid, but I just can't drop the highest DPS toon on the team. I am also going to let the team quest to lvl 20 or 21, then re-attempt the instance. Perhaps level 18 was a bit TOO ambitious for a first-time 5 boxed team.

Hopefully, I'll have a more successful update by the weekend.

[Ualaa]

In general, collection quests suck as a category.

By having your slaves assist the main, while the main targets the corpse.
And then hitting your "Interact With Target" hotkey, especially if the slaves have "Click to Move" enabled.
You will frequently find every toon on the team can loot something.
Unfortunately, most of the time, only one can loot an item.

Unless you're fairly sure its a chain which leads to something you want, most collections can be avoided.
The only real exception to this is Northrend leveling, where you will do 1-2 kills, 1-2 collections, 1-2 kills etc.
And skipping collections entirely will lock out 40+ kill quests and 40+ additional collections in the zone.

That is not to say you are required to do collections, even there.
Just that you'll need an alternate source of experience (PvP, Dungeons etc), if you choose to avoid them.

You can also look at them as a grinding session (play music, put a dvd on.. for background distractions), then grind away, with a reward at the end.
If you have a trade skill like skinning, it helps to think you're farming gold not grinding to level.

The only chains I consider essential are those in Icecrown which open the dailies.
Honestly those quest chains were not a pain in the ass, but even if they were...
They open dailies which make me 1100g in an hour - and that's only running 15 of the available 25 dailies each day.




It never hurts to attempt a boss or instance or quest.
You might not be equipped to beat it immediately.
But repair costs aren't that painful - in Everquest, a death could cost as much experience as 3-4 hours of leveling time.

By trying harder content, you discover where your team is lacking.
And then can make adjustments, be it your UI to observe better.
Your macro's can be tweaked for a more efficient team.
Your keybinds can be altered for easier access to more abilities.

I know it can be quite frustrating at times too.
And at times, if you don't have the gear for something, its not going to happen no matter how you tweak what you have.
But even several deaths, at least identify areas that need improvement.




Not every class is equal at all stages.
Blizzard attempts to balance them along the way, but the main focus is balance at maximum level.
For both PvE and PvP, which naturally means neither will be perfectly balanced only as close as possible.

Evidently your druid is not the largest contribution to the team at this level.
That doesn't mean she won't be the strongest at another level.
Possibly the macro or sequence is weak.
Or maybe with additional tools the class becomes stronger.

My shaman (in the mixed team) felt like a gimp in the low 70's.
At 74th, my 71st affliction warlock was putting out twice the DPS on trash.
Once she got Lava Burst, and it was inserted into her click castsequence, none of the others are even close to her DPS levels.
Of course the dps is 75 (Elem Shm), 73 (Arc Mage) and 73 (Aff Warlock), with crap gear on the first two and T5/T6 on the warlock.
Both a balance druid and an elemental shaman massively boost any caster type group.

I personally don't like hunter teams, having played one to 60th (x5, RAF).
The power is definitely there, single target or AoE.
But no matter how I macro them, one of the pets randomly attacks a random target.

Everyone has their own preferences and finds what works for them.