Shackle? Who Needs Shackle?

We went through a period of time where we just could not get anything done. No bosses went down without a supreme struggle, people weren't showing up, people were having peronal issues, on and on the problems went. And then, last night, something miraculous happened.

This miracle did not have an auspicious beginning, to tell the truth. It was raid night, and our raid leader was absent, our guild leader was unsure about whether or not he wanted to go, our warlock backed out. It was shaping up to be a fine mess. I was frazzled, a little frustrated, and a little high-strung. But we decided to do it anyway. We got our people together and headed into Kara. The Hunter CO and I exchanged nervous and slightly pessimistic outlooks on the turnout of the raid.

We had no priest. This shocked people. Our GL (filling in as RL as well) voiced his opinion that we should not move past Maiden. Our team make-up was, as follows:

Two Prot-Spec Pallies
One Arms-Fury PvP-geared Warrior
One Ice Mage
Two BM Hunters
One MM Hunter
One Holy Pally
Two Resto Druids

We wiped early in the beginning on an Attumen pull, as a hunter's pet was feared into another pull and we couldn't hold out. No worries, everyone knew it wasn't anyone's fault. We kept going, and one-shot Atumen like no one's business. Now, we're aware this isn't a big deal, but for a guild who had been having trouble even getting raids going for a week, it was a huge relief.

From there we moved on, Moroes as the second course. We didn't have a shackle and we...were not worried, not much. We're a rather priest-light guild, so we've been working on ways around this adamant need some guilds have to get it done by the book. Then again, we've been using prot pallies since before it was cool, so we're not known for our orthodox measures.

Burn the shadow priest, kite the prot warr. Trap the other two (it isn't really my business to know these; my main goal is to watch the little bars on the left-hand side of my screen). Two hunters on one, one hunter and our holy pally on the other, the pally fearing when necessary. Sorli and Greid tanked Moroes like champs, and he went down with nary a hitch. Sweet deal.

Now, it's Maiden's turn. We weren't worried; after all, we had Sorli with us, the Prot pally in healing gear who saved the whole raid by taking out Maiden's last 1% the last time we'd gone up against the stone lady. Lare, our arms-fury warr, slapped on some tank gear, our protadins, suited up to cleanse, and in we went, ready to make her fall. And fall she did, though once again, no mace has appeared. What a stingy lady. All we do is smack her around a bit.

We're feeling a little more pumped, now, seeing as how our ragtag group full of unorthodoxy is kicking butt without bothering to take names, and we hit the most interesting part of our run. Those nasty duo pulls with the ice shackles. What did we do? Well...hunters might not like this, but we had the two pallies tanking one, and our Warr plus every single one of the hunter pets (with growl turned on) smacking on the other, keeping them off our squishies. Our only casualties of the pulls involving those monsters were myself and one of our BM hunters. Oh, and the pets. They had to be rezzed and treated after every pull. But, we were free! And on to Opera.

Opera was...wow, Opera was interesting. We had Romulo and Julianne. And Julianne got a heal on herself off, no lie, two times, that ended in, no lie, two re-rezzes of Romulo. And we still killed them. My mana was hurting, I felt the pain. But I trucked through it with every trick in my arsenal, as did everyone involved, and they finally fell. And I got this wonderful new dress you see Bellwether wearing at the beginning of the post. The proc on it is called "Love Struck," and I have to say I am quite enamored with it. Last time it dropped, I passed on it so our PUGalicious priest could pick it up. He's helped us out quite a few times, and it was much better for him than me. At the time. Now it's mine! All mine!

We decided, as we have moved through this much without nary a blip, we could continue. So we stormed to the back of the keep and marshalled our way through to Curator. Straight through, with a short break for bio necessities, and it was onto the great construct himself. One-two-three, and our on-again-off-again Resto druid got her Balance t4. I'm so proud.

We called it there, after only an hour and a half in the instance. Hour and a half, and we had taken down Attumen, Moroes, Maiden, Opera and Curator. I feel cleansed.

And oh so pretty.