After our run through the Scarlet Monastery graveyard Earl still had some morning energy in him in Tokyo, while most of us in California were not quite ready for bed yet. Obama was done for the evening, but with the five of us remaining we could go back to a regular group and do something else.
Moronae was still after the staff from the Crowd Pummeler 9-60 in Gnomeregan, so we thought we might as well run back through that. However, a potential return to Gnomer meant a shuffle of the team as both Skronk and Ula had quests to finish there as well. With Skronk healing and tanking covered, I went looking for another alt. The next highest likely suspect was Wilhelm, my retribution pally.
- Wilhelm – level 26 human paladin
- Skronk – level 30 dwarf priest
- Moronae – level 30 night elf druid
- Earlthecat – level 30 human warrior
- Ula – level 31 gnome mage
Again I was way behind level compared to the group, so I had the huge aggro radius issue going against me, plus I wasn’t sure if I was even going to be able to put out any damage worth noting at level 26. But it was that or a 32 hunter, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to go there. Plus we were only planning to go in as far as the Crowd Pummeler, so why not get some time on the pally?
We ran on out of Ironforge and down to the instance. Earl and I shared the quests we had collected between us, so stopped to get the punchcard update and Techbot’s brain.
Some troggs blocking our way to the punch card update
Being melee DPS rather than healing this time around, I immediately started answering the question “Do we get this mob or go around?” by pulling the mob in question with my huge aggor radius. We had to kill all the things on the way in.
Once into the instance we followed the path that Skronk had come up with for our last run which involved bypassing the Emi Shortfuse event and just jumping straight off the walkway to hit the Viscous Fallout. With the jump my aggro radius turned out to be quite the liability as I pulled a couple extra trash mobs our way. I had to lay hands to hold out for a bit, though that amount of healing just bumped up my aggro and I ended up dying.
But with me down the rest of the group was able to hold out, and the Viscous Fallout nicely coughed up the Acidic Walkers, the primo cloth footwear we had been looking for.
Once I was ressed we started our way around to the dormitory and the B model punch card machines. We cleared to that and we able to run into the safe area to use the Sparklematic 5200, which is good for some exp.
After that we were on to the gauntlet run, where I stayed as close to the right wall as possible as we fought our way through.
Battling a sentry bird
I think I still managed to pull somebody out of the side run, but I managed to stay alive. Also, I seemed to be hitting okay. I was in no danger of being top damage, but I was adding as much weight as I could at my level.
We managed to get through that okay and out into the ring that leads to the next boss, the Electrocutioner 6000. As a fight he was straightforward and, in slaying him, both Earl and I got the back door key for Gnomer along with our next punchcard update. The Electrocutioner also dropped the Electrocutioner Lagnut ring, which is what he seems to drop every time for us. It went to Wilhelm as he had empty ring slots, though he would need to be level 29 before he could wear it.
From there it was around to the Crowd Pummeler 9-60. We have been down this path a few times and, aside from the random alarm bot rolling up behind us, it wasn’t an arduous journey. We got to the Crowd Pummeler and took the fight to him with Earl’s back to the wall to keep the fight in one place when it came time to get tossed about.
There we go, in the air again
However, he just dropped the leather boots yet again. The Manual Crowd Pummeler, the weapon that Moronae (and Wilhelm) wanted remained a dream yet again.
With that done I was wondering if we were on our way out. Skronk, Ula, and Moronae had all finished up their quests and Earl had even managed to get the dozen “coke machines” for one of the quests. But we decided to carry on, so went up the tunnel that would bring us to the Dark Iron Agents.
Almost there
As in our last run, we cleared the pair upstream from us first, which was easy enough. Then there was the group of four downstream. Skronk put target markers up on each of them. Earl was going to handle two of them, Ula would sheep one, and I got the last one. I was still level 26, so I was curious as to how I would deal with a level 32 elite, but this was also the test for the group. If we couldn’t get past this group of four then there was no reason to carry on.
But we managed to get past the first four. I didn’t even die holding my guy, though I wasn’t going to be able to carry on much longer by the time attention turned to it. I was running him down the hall to avoid the mines he was dropping.
After that there was another pair, then a second group of four. I had to hold one of the Dark Iron Agents again, though I did ask for a level 32 mob. I was initially assigned a level 33, which seemed like asking for an extra ration of trouble. We managed to dance around them pretty well, along with the alarm bot, though this time Wilhelm went down.
Me down, dead mines about, and one mob left sheeped
That left us with a free run down to the bottom of the ramp where we were able to pick off the mobs at the bottom one by one. Then it was time to open the big door, take the two groups behind it one at a time.
One last group between us and Thermaplugg
After that it was just us and Mekgineer Thermaplugg.
Last time we put both the casters, the ranged DPS, on bomb button patrol as they could stand at a distance and still contribute damage. This time it was going to be Ula and Wil, Ula because she was ranged and Wil because I doubted a level 26 pally was going to inflict much damage on a level 34 boss. I had actually done okay for DPS up until this point, given my level, but this time was probably asking too much.
And so the fight began. The usual chasing around ensued in the middle as Thermaplugg shrugged off attempts to keep him focused on the tank, while on the sidelines I chased buttons.
In the end, I think my main contribution to the fight was basically eating every bomb that managed to get loose on my side, healing myself up between goes, to prevent that additional DPS from landing on Earl or Moronae. I don’t know how much that really mattered, but it was what I could contribute, and we won in the end.
The post fight lineup
Thermaplugg dropped the Electromagnetic Gigaflux Reactivator again, which went to Ula.
Ula and her new hat
And that was it for the run. At Earl’s end there was a meeting he had planned, so he had to go, while it was about midnight local time for the rest of us, which meant we were all off to bed. It was time to hearthstone and call it a wrap.
Time to stone out
And so went another run through Gnomer. We ought to be about done with it by now, having acquired a few of the good drops at least. You can now find Ula doing her relaxation routine with her hat.
Relaxing on the fountain
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