Color in some boxes, receive new animal to neglect.

Also grats to Kaowa on his new cutlery. Party outside dorf district.

First and foremost, I want to congratulate all the members of Midwinter who contributed to our success during this tier, including those that weren’t able to be involved in first kills on the last two bosses due to the specific requirements of these fights. The support and patience of the whole raid team was crucial to our overall success.

That said, even though tier 13 tested the resources of a guild and its ability to bring certain classes more than we might have liked, Dragon Soul still offered some memorable and challenging fights. Yor'sahj pre-nerf was very well tuned and required excellent DPS and healing as well as CD management. All things considered, the nerf to this boss was completely unwarranted, and ruined arguably the best fight of the tier. Ultraxion was a good twist on a Patchwerk style fight and made for some excellent nerd screams. And Spine, the most unforgiving fight of the tier, was a massive check on burst DPS and particularly punishing toward mistakes. Although Madness was a bit underwhelming for an end of expansion fight, it had its moments. Requiring high DPS and quick target switching, strict assignments for positioning, and timely usage of healer CDs, the fight hinged on the flawless execution of the fourth platform. The final phase was hectic, but didn't present any significant challenges.

Overall, Cataclysm will be remembered more for its individual encounters than a single tier or the changes to the game it brought. Sinestra, a healer stress test, was one of our most exciting kills thanks to the timely ankh of one of our Shamans. Ragnaros was by far the most epic fight of the expansion and the time invested proved to be too much for many guilds, making it an especially rewarding kill for us. The need to farm the mid-expansion legendary will definitely translate to a greater number of guilds being prepared to do so during Mists. Although the debate between 10 man and 25 man difficulty continues, it's clear that 25 man will remain the primary competitive avenue for raiding that top guilds will gravitate towards.

This expansion was not without difficult moments for Midwinter. Our illustrious GM did an oustanding job recruiting between Tier 11-12 when Midwinter saw some of its highest turnover caused by burnout - a challenge that numerous guilds folded under. New guilds stepped up in their place and joined the furiously competitive race to be a top guild. Even with many new players, we are confident that Midwinter is currently as strong as its ever been. We look forward to Mists and once again competing with the best players in the US.

Midwinter is opening recruitment for all classes in preparation for Mists. If you think you have what it takes to be part of our raid team, please go ahead and apply. We look forward to your applications!

Very nice job by our team picking up a US 5th kill on this boss. This is our highest ranking kill in our six year history, and it comes on the hardest boss of the tier. Big thanks to all the people who had to sit in order to meet the raid stacking requirements of the boss, as well as the people who had to play offspecs and the retired members who gave us a hand. Overall it wasn’t a terrible boss, but having a challenging DPS check based entirely on a 17 second window of burst wasn’t the wisest decision in encouraging balanced raid comps. That said, we’re on to the last fight of the tier, soon to be 8/8.

Definitely the hardest fight of the tier thus far. Blackhorn requires a ton more coordination than anything we've seen thus far, requiring a lot of dps, tons of healing, and lots of frustration from single soaking Barrages. Looking forward to Spine and Madness in the next few weeks! Hopefully we'll be able to finish out the tier as strongly as we started.

Ultraxion is down for a US #10 kill. It may have happened last week but we ended up skipping this fight and working on Warmaster instead to allow for our tanks to get their 4 piece set bonuses. Once we had the cooldowns rotation set up and people stopped dying to Fading Light the boss pretty much just fell over. Still, a tight DPS check that doesn't allow for any mistakes. We were pretty happy to beat the enrage comfortably by about 10 seconds but there were certainly some low percentage wipes.

We're still looking to add another healer to our roster so please apply within!

Very nice job by our team in getting this US 6th kill. This was an extremely intense DPS check with week one gear and only a couple of normal mode clears last week. Moving on to Zon'ozz.

Looking for a healer for the rest of the tier, apply within.

Easy boss, not much to say.