That MMO Haze

I was up too late last night, and now I have that old familiar feeling: that MMO haze, the tired feeling you get the morning after staying up later than you should playing an MMO. It usually compounds, too: it's bad enough on the first day, but wait until you've been in the haze for a couple days in a row! The major culprit for causing that MMO haze has got to be group content, especially instance runs; you don't want to let down the group by bailing too early, and that sense of obligation keeps you from leaving when common sense tells you to.

But look at what was accomplished in Blackrock Caverns on Heroic last night, my very first run at a Heroic dungeon in World of Warcraft. Most importantly, I didn't embarrass myself too badly! Rumour has it that the bosses in Blackrock Caverns are not so bad, as far as Heroic Mode goes, but for this n00b some of these fights were tense. I'm an Arms Warrior, so DPS is the name of the game. Anything more complicated than 'point at this guy and wail on him' is pretty imposing, and in this dungeon there are bosses that:

1) Chain up your whole group. You have to attack the chains to break free, and then run as far from the boss as you can, or he'll do a massive one-hit kill attack on you. Don't be That Guy that doesn't know to run away... I wasn't!

2) Use three energy beams to evolve adds into giant scary death-machines. You have to interrupt the beams, but not for too long! As you stand in a beam, a debuff increases on you, and once it gets to a certain level you need to run out of the beam. Once the debuff fades after several seconds, you have to jump back in the beam. It's exciting and dangerous to have three people managing the beams. Great fight!

3) Are all but immune to damage until pulled into a lava fall that superheats armor. But the catch is that it also increases the boss's AOE damage, so you need to keep him in the lava fall, but not for too long, and bring him back into the fall before it wears off, but not for too long, etc.

That last boss dropped the Burned Gatherings, a cloak of item level 346 that I selected Need on, rolled 100, and received not just the cloak but the Needy achievement as well. Awesome! So the MMO haze this morning is in full effect, but you know what? Totally worth it!

And the cycle continues!