Eminence

It's the special blend of 11 nerds and retards that makes raiding with Eminence so good.

The perfect balance of hopless wannabees and social misfits leaves you wanting more from your very first bite. You may have tried raiding but you haven't truely raided until you've raided Eminence style.

There is a saying that "time flies when you're having fun" and in my experience whoever coined that phrase is pretty much spot on.

If I didn't know better, there is no way I would ever have guessed that I had been leading Eminence into battle for so long. I've got to the stage now where raiding tiers have coalesced into a single blurry campaign of bloodshed and destruction. I wouldn't have it any other way.

Four years ago I added my name to the charter that created this crazy melting pot and as the sun starts to set on my time at the helm, I look back and can honestly say I have loved every minute.

Happy Birthday, Eminence.

It's been a busy time for us just recently. Having come to the conclusion that Dunemaul simply doesn't offer us what we need, we decided it was time to find a new home.

The officer team searched high and low to find exactly the right combination of elements to become our new center of operations and finally settled on a new realm. Excitedly they announced their findings to the guild and it was universally rejected.

So here we are on Tarren Mill, the "plan B" option.

The dust has settled, we've unpacked (nearly) everything and we only lost one soul in the move (although some would argue his soul was already a lost cause). Our attention is now firmly back on our campaign through the heroic Throne of Thunder encounters.

To that end, we finally knuckled down and put Horridon to rest. Here's a little movie of the kill from our very own pusher of penance, Zolaaris. Enjoy.

Another night of solid progression, this instance just continues to deliver. It's really engaging to have trash packs that actually matter rather than simply exist to provide flavour but by far and away it feels great to have normal mode encounters that put up a challenge and demand strategy.

TORTOS
A good night's sleep sees yesterday's insurmountable obstacle become merely a bump in the road. Sent into permanent (well as permanent as anything is in this game) hibernation on the second pull the team co-ordination was superb. Having missed most of the progression learning of this encounter I struggle to have an opinion but the little I did experience showed me that actually "being there" is a completely different story to watching from the safety of someone's stream.

MEGAERA
My preparation for this fight indicated that it was nowhere near as complicated as some guides were trying to make it and I was determined to not let it become more than it is. We very quickly arrived at a solid strategy and it simple boiled down to an exercise of optimising our toolkit to see us through the final Rampage. I never really like strategies where one of the core mechanics can be brute force ignored but we take every advantage we can, so I'm secretly hoping that the Frost Head becomes a significant element in the heroic version, the interplay of the mechanics on this encounter is too good to be wasted.

Awesome first week into the new instance (guild politics and hardware issues aside).

Son, I am NOT disappoint.

I can count on one finger the number of times I have missed a raid due to hardware failure. Damn in fact, holidays aside, I'd struggle to need two hands to total how many raids I've missed in the three and a half years that Eminence has been rolling the instances of Azeroth. So with Mothering Sunday upon me and complacency firmly planted in my pocket, it was a cosmic certainty that the technology gremlins would pay me a visit. And so they did, with gusto.

Despite this, and with suggestions of a submissive relationship with my mother-in-law, Eminence once again stepped into the Thunder King's lair to lay waste to the denizens within. Though in retrospect it may be been them who laid waste to us;

COUNCIL OF ELDERS
A shaky start lead to a confident kill in very few pulls. Control and co-ordination being the key.

TORTOS
This mountain sized brickwall literally wiped the smile of our faces. A total clusterfuck of mobs, ground effects and constant movement; we struggled to make any sort of impression on the overgrown bastard in a half-shell. As always, it was the last attempt of the night that looked the best and was shaping up to be a kill, yet our course was steadfastly set for disappointment. Raid over, we went to bed alone with our tails between our legs.

But then, there is always tomorrow ...

It's no exaggeration to say that my anticipation for the new raid was high. Having the entire raid roster to choose from at invite time and the inevitably large bench, proved the excitement wasn't limited to just me. Being on the bench at any time isn't the best and especially on the first day of a new raid it can be particularly distasteful, big thanks to those who kept it warm.

First impressions count for everything and I was not disappointed, the Throne of Thunder looks and feels amazing. From the very start I felt like I was taking part in the infiltration of a giant fortress and as we progressed deeper into the citadel that sensation compounded.

The soon to be infamous "bridge boss" and bucketfuls of trash was a welcome distraction and stopped the night feeling like a mindless procession of skipping from boss to boss. Speaking of which ...

JIN'ROKH
The entry level boss and he certainly felt like it. A couple of tester pulls to shake out the misinformation from our strategy and we downed him without much fuss.

BRIDGE BOSS
"Don't stand on The Dude"
"Keep behind the tanks! Keep ... behind ... the ... FML"
"Are they ... actually ... pathing together now? Oh shi...."
"You slalom-ing motherfucker"
"Stack on Koe. Stack on Koe. Stack on ... err ... go the other side. THE OTHER SIDE!"

'nuff said.

HORRIDON
Damn, did I enjoy this fight. It's refreshing to have a challenge from the second boss of the instance and Horridon definitely gave us that. Tuned nicely and demanding a solid strategy with consistent performance from everyone, the satisfaction from killing him was palpable. Props to Noirelle for suggesting the tactic that made the difference.

COUNCIL OF ELDERS
A single taster pull with little strategy discussion to see how the encounter played out and it didn't seem too bad. Will probably live to regret those words.

I already can't wait until Sunday. Good stuff Blizzard, good stuff.