One Priest + Moroes = Hunter Heart Attack

My guild decided to add a third Kara night to the week... at least this week. The secondary goal is to get some new players and/or alternate characters into the instance and clear some of the early bosses. The primary goal was to get *at least* Moroes dead, which clears the way to Opera. This allows us -- with our typical 2 to 2 1/2 hour run times -- to get to Curator on the second night and then *really* push content on the third. We haven't had a real solid chunk of time to try the Shade of Aran, and he's been a thorn in our side so far.

So... we grab just about everyone who's online in the guild last night and summon them all to Karazhan. Seven or so of the attendees were regulars, but a few had swapped to different characters (either for needs or wants) and we had a few relative newbies in the group.

The big loss? Our main healer priest... and his shackle. Uh oh.

Clearing through the trash mobs was fine. We had one unlucky break where the MT missed a disarm on those hard-hitting two-pulls in the banquet hall. This resulted in a couple of deaths, but didn't slow us up too much.

The real fun began with Moroes and his four little friends. I don't claim to be a great hunter, but I usually do OK. With my recent luck with gear, I can bring the hurt and usually do a good job trapping and playing my role. I mentioned on the the guild forums that I thought -- with some backup from a Paladin for fear -- that I could keep a mob trapped for the fight to make up for the loss of the priest. I was right... but it took a couple of tries to get the system down... and it was nerve wracking. *pant*

First pull coming. OK. I'm nervous. Trap down. Cooldown almost up. I give the OK. The pull starts. Pet attacks the "skull". I trap my mob. Blast away! Going OK... skull almost dead... and... the pet dies. The mob is dead, but so's Qantaqa. Dang. That's gonna hurt a bit. So... I watch my trap cooldown like a hawk, reposition myself as needed, and start dropping more traps. The second kill target is down and we're all onto Moroes. Things are OK, but DPS is a little slow. Duh... your pet is dead, dummy. He's 30+% of your DPS. Dang. I'm on about my 6th or 7th trap and I'm up against the cooldown. I barely got that trap down. I warn the raid -- particularly the Paladin -- to pick him up for a fear. He does. Awesome. DPS is still a little light and now I'm a Garrote'd. Dang. Paladin bubbles me because I'm needed as a CC'er (nevermind my DPS), but the fight is taking too long. Too many people have Garrote and can't get it off. Wipe. 10%. Dang.

Second attempt went about like that, except my pet lived this time. Unfortunately, at about 10%, Moroes killed the off-tank, blinded the main tank, and made a bee-line for me. Stabby, stabby. I'm dead. Trap is down, but the tank can't find it to pull the "loose" add onto it. Moroes down to like 2%, but the raid wipes because the tank is taking double hits and a few are already dead from Garrotes. Double-dang.

One guild member swaps from a shaman to a paladin. Gives us one extra way to remove Garrote and an emergency undead fear should both a trap and a first fear break somehow. This time, things are much better. We've got a system down. The first two adds drop pretty quickly and we can shift to Moroes. My traps are holding. Same deal. Get to about the 7th trap and I'm calling for the Paladin to help out. This time, though, Moroes is *much* lower on health than the last time and we've got it. Not sure if we had just a little more luck or if the second paladin really made that much of a difference. I don't recall having to call for him. I think we just "figured it out" with the group we had. Drops were useful to folks. Yay.

For good measure, we went and killed Attumen, too. :)

Mission accomplished. The way is clear to Opera and Curator for Sunday and then a full blown 2-hour shot at the Shade of Aran on Monday. We're gonna get him this week!