News and How To Fail To Take Halaa While Still Winning

First of all some news. I did it. Curse me up one side and down the other, but this confirmed frosty mage respecced. As you can tell by my little banners above and below, I am now an arcane/ fire mage. Le sigh. This is what I get for wanting to raid again. Of course my gear is a complete mess, seeing as how I now have to respec my tailoring (too much gold), resocket my gems (too much gold, but plenty needed upgrades anyways) and work on my spell rotations. No more frostbolt + frostbolt + AB + AB anymore. At least I don't run out of mana anymore. Give me raid buffs and send my tiny backside to Kara and Gruul's!

So last night I was in Nagrand, hunting those ever- elusive mineral veins so I can make money off my friend the jewelcrafter. I notice, however, the Horde is attacking it! What luck! Mining can wait. Zball's gonna go do some world PvP. How will the new spec hold up? Just how many are attacking? These questions were running through my giant head and taxing my +5% intellect to the limit. An invite to the raid and... there's 7 of us. That's right. 7 Alliance against an unknown number of Horde.

First things first. Time to take out the wyvern posts. A warlock, a frost mage and I head north of town for the first one. Here comes our first catch of the day! It was a rogue. Our combined DPS turned him into a slick on the grass. Ahhh. I love the scent of undead flesh in the morning. No rest for the weary, however. There's more. Tauren druid? Smear. Another rogue? Stain. Pally? Grr...

A quick aside. Zball hates paladins. Zball doesn't even really like them when they're on his side. And this blood elf? Level 67. Bubble. Run off the cliff. Head to another post.

At this point I realize something. There's only maybe 5 Horde attacking. And they're mostly 67. What? Our guards are gone and these guys just keep giving me tokens. Why? Because they're going to win by losing. I tell the raid leader this and I'm met by a chorus of unbelievers.

"They can win by losing. We're going to get bored. You're going to get bombed and they'll waltz right in here and take the place."

Within 5 minutes of saying that, our raid (which had grown to about 10 folks) was reduced to 4. The Horde attack. We kill them. No big whoop. They wait for their flags to drop, rez and dance. Two rogues, a druid, a warrior and a mage. Uh- oh. Time for the broken game mechanics.

Both rogues stealth and begin sapping what's left of our defense. They don't flag. They can sap until their heart's content. Warrior and druid back out slowly. It's coming soon. Halaa gets really really quiet. No one's there.

Boom! Reinforcements arrive and all the Horde flag up. It's not much, but the surprise resulted in one dead Zball. No problem. I rez and get to killing. The north post gets taken again. Our warlock and warrior and I head to take care of it. A rogue falls from the sky, hits Evasion and runs down the mountain. Zball is smart (+5% Intellect, remember?) and head him off at the pass. I hear the zwoosh sound of Sprint being activated and pop Frost Nova. Poor rogue. Ice lances to the face. Axes to the back. DoTs like we're in the 50's again.

South post now. We run and here comes the pally. Remember the bubble run he was doing? Yeah. He tried it. Zball is smarter. I knew where he was going and he never saw me. He tries to bubble, but I hit him with my Improved Counterspell, Frost Nova and Ice Lances. He finally manages to pop a bubble and tries to hearth, but mis- times it. I smack him again to cancel his hearth.

That's when the raid says, "Zball, let him go!" Scribbledy-whuh? I get distracted and the guy runs away. I am dumbfounded. I wanted that kill. What I wanted more was my talbuk, and the pally would have contributed to it too, if I could've killed him. I run back north, ignoring the pleas of my raid group. One of the rogues is back and I want my talbuk.

I destroy his roost, he lands, vanishes, and begins his stunlock chain. Silly rogue. Zball carries escape trinkets that I didn't let you see before. Trinket out of stun. A couple of Arcane Explosions, Frost Nova, Ice Lance, Blink and here he comes. Please, Goddess, let my macro work. He Sprints, goes all semi-transparent, almost close enough to gouge and WHAM! 5.5k pyro crit to the face. /cheer. /dance. I'm yelling over vent. My raid? "Zball, why'd you kill him?"

No. They. Did. Not. To borrow a phrase from the "leet" masses, I pwned his fayce. I am a god of all things big and 'splodey and you ask why? Because I'm a mage, that's why!