Velah hunt. This time she got mean

[Pwesiela]

Once again, I'd like to thank all who came for the hunt. She proved harder to take down on elite, but all the more worthwhile.








Too bad there wasn't anything a ranger could really use in there....

[MysticRhythms]

For anyone interested, I personally verified that a 40 passes on the save for her dragonbreath but a 37 fails, so your magic number for Evasion is DC 38 or 39.

In a word ... ouch.

I also think that Pwes tried a Greater Dragon Bane bow and the Silver LongBow with a variety of arrows and discovered that the Silver Longbow is the premier weapon of choice because of its accentuated crit modifier.

I also quaffed potions of Fire Protection and she didn't do anything weird to me (or the others) other than ... well ... killing me with bludgeoning attacks.

For anyone curious, our party makeup was, again, mostly pure ranger. Eriik brought along his Ranger9/Rogue3/Fighter2 and we had a Bard6/Ranger7 as well as a Ranger12/Cleric1

Beyond those three, it was all-ranger all the time.

Way to go, Rangers of Thelanis.

[Qzipoun]

Very nice, but only 1 dwarven ranger? Boo!

[MrCow]

Very nice, but only 1 dwarven ranger? Boo!

And of course I had to represent Warforged rangers by being the only one there. Also, take a look at the picture a few times and look at what race is missing.

It was a blast to run the raid and honestly, this was one of the smoothest Vault of Night raids I have ever done (barring the fact that Velah had ranger snacks a few times).

For anyone curious, our party makeup was, again, mostly pure ranger. Eriik brought along his Ranger9/Rogue3/Fighter2 and we had a Bard6/Ranger7 as well as a Ranger12/Cleric1

The Ranger12/Cleric1 never made it in to the raid due to bugging out at the dwarf that let you in the quest. Although we did have one Rouge 1/Ranger X build in there.

[isldur]

Congrats. Nicely done fellow rangers.

Love all the raid party icons.

[Zenako]

For the final kill, which method did you all use? Just curious, since on the last Run I had my Ranger on, we all just rushed Velah, and I got to add "sneak attack damage" as well (12 Ran/ 2 Rog). I was using a Crippling Greater Dragon Bane on her soft underside. She died before the Manyshot expired. (I was handling the traps along the way too...) Actually hava a lot more "fun" than with other characters on that raid.

I noticed you took until 42 minutes...cutting it a little close I guess.

I figured I had three bow choices, Silver, Greater Bane or Transmuting of Pure Good. Too bad we dont have some "easy dragons" to test these thing out on. Those poor threnal giant punching bags have been subjected to sooo much....

[Ringos]

It was a blast, and I thank the group for taking me along and letting me represent the Halflings. Cutting it close? Darn right! She didn't want to die. We used a bit of extra time to stratagize and it paid off. Adjusting stratagy on the fly can be important and this group had some great ideas to get the job done. I will, however, have to ask who those people were that thought we couldn't do it after the first run or two. Come on...we are RANGERS!!!!

Thanks again all, it was great fun!

-JohnDenver

[Uamhas]

OOoooo I din't know JohnDenver (looked just like him) was Ringos! Hey, when are you taking over those ex-xoriats with the hate groove and making the Legion of Silver Waffles? Just kidding, Womp, honest. It wouldn't be Rayzor and his madstone booty if the Legion tag weren't over his head.
Strategy: It started out as the mob/rush and take her down. After 3 tries and her red bar only slightly dented, we came up with a new plan. 3 suckers and a buttload of heros to keep them alive. Or was that 3 heros and a buncha sweeties to keep them breathing? Anyhow, It seemed that with the holy greater dragon bane bow ****ing her off, she put a little extra love into her dragon breath, and burned me for roughly 350-400 pts of damage with each successive rush. It was rather more satisfying seeing her life inch down while I lived (of course, in 4 or 5? lost count, successive rushes, I think I only lived once past the timer on my many shot). FYI Candy canes don't do much damage. Pwesiela did the most damage in the long run, as the sugarlump stayed alive the longest. Sorry, my pictures don't include the herculean effort put in by that one ranging princess and the 9 wand-whippers that it took to crack that nasty auld beast apart on elite, but you can use your imagination.

[Juni]

That was a blast lastnight, just love all ranger groups and to kill an elite dragon just made it even better.

Velah put a little dent in my wand funds for the week but it was well worth it.

Cyas guys around Stormreach.

[Ringos]

Ahhh yes, Ringos is JohnDenver, and vice-versa.With all of the names I wanted being taken, that's about as creative as it gets! I am open to taking in any of those 'quasi-hate filled' Xoriat folks...after the proper screening is done. Their uber gear will be welcome since the Silver Waffle seldom rolls with anything better than a +1 light mace.

The wand-whippin' was something else. It made quite a sound...like the wind whistling through the trees, or maybe like that fancy set of courderoys rustling when your thighs brush together when you walk (or I am I the only one that happens too?).

Nice pics btw!

[MysticRhythms]

Team Cure Serious for the win ...

[Ringos]

Team Cure Serious for the win ...

Cure serious? (geez, I thought we were all using cure light wands!)

[MrCow]

Strategy: It started out as the mob/rush and take her down. After 3 tries and her red bar only slightly dented, we came up with a new plan. 3 suckers and a buttload of heros to keep them alive.

To clarify, the Plane of Night started with about 8 minutes of pillar prep'n and piercing. From there we had 9 people bum rush Velah (and toasting nicely). Then we had a bum rush of 8 people (who toasted, yet again). This is when some time was taken to discuss a new course of action: Do we do it on Normal or keep trying on Elite? This happened somewhere around the 20 minutes remaining mark. At this point we had 3 ranger snacks go in and 9 rangers healing (3 healers per snack). If a ranger snack dropped then the healers simply reallocated where they were healing. We were so impressed with how this went (and how long Pwesiela lived) that we took this tactic in stride for the rest of the quest. Two more times we did this (including some passing out of wands as people ran out) and down Velah went. So in short:

• Pillars go down in about 8 minutes
• 9 people assault
• 8 people assault
• 3 people assault
• 3 people assault
• 3 people assault, Velah went down

... and as a wand whipper (hey, I had bardic scroll and wand mastery ) I ended up leveling off of Velah.

[Pwesiela]

Cure serious? (geez, I thought we were all using cure light wands!)

You know, at times, it almost felt like cure light. But that was probably because she hit me just as you all hit me and it came out about even. Straight up, Solonora had it right the first time: 3 morons and 9 heroes. Never would have been able to do it (that way at least) without the many hits of heal. I can only imagine how many wands I absorbed that run

[MysticRhythms]

I can only imagine how many wands I absorbed that run

Your health bar reminded me of one of those old red LED graphic equalizers on my stereo.

[Uamhas]

*snicker* MORE TREBLE!

Your health bar reminded me of one of those old red LED graphic equalizers on my stereo.

[sirgog]

That was a cool screenshot.

[MysticRhythms]

So I suppose all of us rangers have to go on loot runs to help pay for that last raid now

And I've begun my hunt for Firestorm Greaves and a Bloodstone out in the desert ...

A Greater Fire Resistance item and som Rapiers and Shortswords of Dragonbane might be in order too.

Then there's my favor tome.

One day I'll come back with proper tools