Okay, we haven't played any games yet... sure... but I can tell you something:



Looks good no matter HOW you cut it... #88 after the first week. The funny thing about Vindication that Guntir and I never knew... there are basically ZERO good horde-side PvP teams. We are the #2 Horde team on Laughing Skull right now... and we finished at about #10 for season 7.

Anyway... Season 8 is STARTING with "LAWL WIZCLEAVES" which is making Rogue+Feral+Disc a tougher setup than in season 7. Hunter+Feral+Disc is still pretty strong against these teams since Hunters can out-rage/LoS a lot of CC options, and since I'm taking the majority of the damage, Guntir is just free-healing me most the time (and luckily, I take 20% MORE healing in Cat Form). We are also seeing a LOT of Rogue+lock+druid teams and warrior+lock+druid... both are tough comps as Rogue+Feral+Disc... but Hunter+Feral+Disc makes it a bit easier for the same reason as Wizcleaves.

We ended the week at ~2050 (as the screen shot showed), but that's only because we were pumping up the rogue and ended with a sub-50% win-ratio (also, wtf... we went 36-38 with the Rogue and gained ~50 rating over with the Hunter alone... not really sure how that worked, but I don't really mind). Bio can't play a lot this week; he is still in school and has an exam on Monday (or something) so we'll just be playing for rating-floating and points this week... which means we're a little short of our goal of 2100 by week 2 (probably... but who knows, we could go 60% win-ratio and end up at 2100 after all... and that would be nice). It will be nice not having to knock out 200+ games this week... something like 20-30 ought to do the trick.

Week 3 is going to be the rough one. If we can get into a good position in week 3, then we can play conservatively for week 4... but if we aren't even 2100 at the start of week 3... then we will likely have another 200+ game grind ahead of us. We are trying our damnedest to hit 2200 in week 4 so we can buy the 2200 weapons the first day of week 5 (along with the rest of the gladiator community), JUST so we can keep competing in the 2200 bracket. I hinted at this in the last post, but the sad truth of the matter is this:

If you don't have a S8T2 weapon in week 5... you won't get one without 1) AMAZING matchmaking luck, or 2) 3-4 more weeks of grinding.

Essentially, week 5 is the point where EVERYONE around 2200 is going to get a RIDICULOUS damage upgrade... and I mean RIDICULOUS. If you don't get one as well, you will be putting out MUCH less damage than them... thus you will be behind in most matches, thus you will lose most matches. This is what is worrying me... we NEED to get into good position in week 3 so we can coast to 2200 in week four... I MIGHT even say that if we manage to hit 2200 in week 3... I'm going to bench the team for a week while we all go get points from a scrubbed 5s team to buy the weapons... and this probably won't go over well since, as you can see in the screenshot, Guntir and I are the highest rated on the team since we're subbing in 2 different players.

What happens if the team is 2201 (which makes Guntir and my person 2200... fuck you blizz... I hit "Queue as Group" for 3v3 battle... it queues us... says "you have left the queue" and gave us a loss for 1pr 0tr... fuck you blizz) in week 3, then Bio and Trake are going to be below that and complain that they want to hit 2200 as well, which MIGHT not happen if we go on a losing streak or something. It becomes a gambling game of "what sounds more appealing": 2/3 of the team has a guaranteed 2200 weapon (one being a healer), or MAYBE 3/3 of the team has 2200 weapons?

... I'd say the former... but I'm part of that 2/3, so I'm probably biased...

We'll see how today goes. If we get in 20-30 games to get Trake's PR up to around the team's rating, and Bio gets some games in for points... MAYBE we could be 2100 or 2150 or so, but we'd have to go on a real tear. I'm HOPING we go on a real tear... it would be NICE to get up to 2150 this week so next week we could just position ourselves around that 2200 mark to make week 4 that much easier.