"Vehicle" Fights

Here's hoping Ulduar doesn't become too "vehicle" heavy.

I came in sort of on the back end of the current raiding curve. The group I run with had kind of done all the legwork. They were mostly geared. While I'm not sure I would consider all the fights on farm, most of them probably were and I was geared up pretty quickly since many items were otherwise going un-used. I think I've pulled my own weight recently. I'm usually in the top half of the DPS list depending on the fight, sometimes even Top-5 or -3. It's fun. I'm not one of those that has to top the meters, but it's nice to see your name up there because it means you're worthwhile to bring along. Healers have to go by other guidelines. Tanks... tank.

I ran my first Malygos last night. I avoided signing up for this for a while. For one, I was nervous as hell. I was *HORRIBLE* at the "Aces High!" quest which is the defacto training ground for Malygos. For another, I felt that others in the raid had earned the Malygos loot table more than me. I also knew that others were really trying for various Malygos-related achievements. A final issue was that the schedule didn't work out very well for me. After spending a LONG time on Tuesday getting through three wings of Naxxramas (because we did two of them 20-man), I signed up for Malygos because it was also going to be a continuation/completion of the Naxx run. Most of my upgrades prior to 3.1 are going to be from Sapph or KT.

I spent forty-five minutes practicing "Aces High!" before the run. That was painful. I finally managed to get a rythym down and was only shot down twice. I managed to chain 4 or 5 kills together at one point before taking a break. Figured I was as ready as I was going to be. Here it comes...

Vehicle fights suck.

There... I said it. I just don't like them. When you're out questing, they're OK. One or two have been fun because you're so overpowered that you can repeatedly screw up and still complete the mission. These boss fights that include "vehicles" are just lame. I realize it's part of the lore and the storytelling that Blizzard wants and they need other ways to make the boss fights different. I just don't like them.

The biggest problem is that you spend all this time learning your class and then suddenly all that is out the window and you're down to a couple of unfamiliar buttons in an unfamiliar environment doing unfamiliar things. For certain classes, it seems even weirder. I guess as a hunter, I'm still kind of doing ranged DPS on the back of a dragon, but it involves combo points (what are those?) and other mechanics (healing?) that just make it feel off. I want to blast Malygos from the sky with my bow (or gun or crossbow) not by burning him to death with my "pet's" breath. Just doesn't seem that epic.

I'm glad to see that the only known vehicle fight (that I've seen) in Ulduar is the first one. Get it out of the way and let's get back to killing bosses the old-fashioned way.

Of PUGs, flight, and de-cursing...

Yes... this is probably the internet's five-millionth, PUG-rant WoW post. Sue me.

My raiding friends decided to put together and alt-based Naxx run on Saturday night. They don't really allow for alts to rotate into their main raiding group -- for pretty good reasons, actually -- so the way they get their alts geared is with 10-mans and the occasional "alt night".

My druid has been collecting dust for a while. I can't seem to get any momentum for in-guild 10-mans, so he's just been sitting in Icecrown doing the occasional daily and trying to complete the various Icecrown quest series. I haven't even been requested for 5-mans lately, so he's pretty dusty.

This alt night was a good excuse to dust him off and maybe pick up an item for him. Mostly I wanted to see how bad my DPS was and hopefully get a decent cat-DPS rotation down. (More on this in another post... maybe.)

So I sign-up and show up on time. There are about 12-15 people signed up or pulled in from the various guilds that make up the raiding group, but there don't seem to be any more online or wanting to go or that aren't already locked to another Naxx25. The raid leader goes the PUG route. This is fine. You can meet some people this way. You can show them how you do things. Sometimes you find that diamond in the rough or you find alts from other guilds with similar policy. Sometimes you get people that know what they're doing and just haven't done in with a particular class before.

*This* was not one of those nights. :)

The first sign that things were going to be rough was that 3 people didn't have flying mounts. Not just epic flyers. Flyers at all. Ugh. You know you're going to wipe a few times with 10+ PUG members in Naxx, it's just a question of how often and how many people you lose after each couple of wipes. Frustration thresholds tend to be very low with many of these folks, even if they are the ones causing the wipes.

Now... I'm not exactly a great WoW player. I know this. I'm fine with this. I don't play as much as some people. I don't have the time to invest in getting every last item and trinket that I can to improve my character. I do try hard, but there is only so much time I can devote to WoW and still be a decent husband and father. Family first. That said, I have 2 80s and a 71. All of them have at least flight. Both 80s have epic flight and Northrend flying. Thinking about that is a little scary, actually. 12,000g! Jeez. That's not counting the intermediate riding skills along the way, the mats for the Warlock quest (which I did do past 60, but still did), and all the other things you have to spend money on in WoW.

So... the comments start in Vent. Most of the raid is not in Vent because the server requires registration and passwords and they're not going to stop the raid and make 10+ PUG accounts. We'll do it the old-fashioned way. A few comments are made (by other PUG'ers):

RM1: "how can you not have a flyer?"
RM4: "dude..."
RM9: "nub"

The answers...?

RM8: "this is my 2nd 80..."
RM3: "how do you make that much gold?"

Wha-huh? Really?!? See the above paragraph. I have 3 flyers and 2 epics. I play a couple of hours a night maybe 3-5 times a week. I raid. I buy consumables. If *I* can have a flyer, you can do it, too. I have no idea what you're spending your gold on, but I can make enough doing daily quests and general at-level-80 questing to earn a basic flyer in a week. Easy.

Anyway... a few wipes ensue as we all knew they would. The warlocks are nearly run out of stones to make "demon flashers" but we manage to clear the Spider wing and head for Plague. This is where it gets really good. We lose two people in the raid and have to find two more PUGs. Wanna guess? Yup... *neither* one has a flying mount, so we're up to 1/5th of the raid now that needs to be summoned into Naxx. I wonder to myself if these people wonder why they have to PUG Naxx. (Yes... I was PUG'ing it, too, but on my second character.)

We seem to have just enough DPS to get the gargoyles down, so we're probably OK for Noth. Seem to have a good class mix. Should be fine. We explain to the off-tanks how we do the pick-ups for the Noth adds, the raid leader gives the mages the heads-up for de-curse, and the rest of the instructions go out.

Pull #1: Curse goes on. Curse does not get removed. Wipe. In about 45 seconds... if that.

Raid leader re-explains to the mages that it's *really* important to get the curse off. If we don't, we wipe. It's not that we might wipe or that it's really healer intensive if you don't de-curse. WE WILL WIPE IF YOU DON'T REMOVE CURSE! (My caps, not his.)

Pull #2: Curse goes on. Curse gets removed from 2 people. Wipe. We might've lasted more than 45 seconds this time. Maybe.

So... in Vent:

Me: "Hey... I'm a druid. I can de-curse. Should I help out?"
RL: "You're feral, right?"
Me: "Yeah... but I think I have that button somewhere... Lemme see... Oh, yeah... that's what it looks like..."
*** I get a couple of chuckles in Vent ***
RL: "Better to have you help out than to wipe, I guess..."
Me: "I'll do what I can..."

Now... I don't have Decursive or anything like that. I just don't use it. I'm Feral, remember. I know -- barely -- how to make stuff mad and smack me in my bear's face. I'm not that good at that, nevermind trying to de-curse a bunch of people. Hey... I have a humanoid form? Cool! :)

In raid chat:

RL: "OK... I'm going to ask the Druid to step out of cat form and help de-curse. We really shouldn't have to do this with TWO mages, but it's better than wiping."
RM1: "He shouldn't have to..."
RM2: "huh?"
*** Other generalized grumbling, mostly from the PUG members ***
Mage1: "what's a curse..."
Mage2: "i'm supposed to do what?"

Remember... we're on our third try now. Raid leader re-explains FOR THE THIRD TIME the importance of de-cursing to the mages and we pull again....

Pull #3: Curse goes on. I frantically mash my de-curse hotkey and we manage to get through the first phase. I was still getting hit by something -- I'm not sure what as I was playing whack-a-mole and watching the curse cooldown and not much else -- but we managed to live. Second curse goes on, I get it off 4 or 5 people, but it's not enough. Blam! Wipe.

Someone's getting testy and posts the "de-curse meter" from the fight:

Me    -- 9 removals
Mage1 -- 3 removals
Mage2 -- 2 removals

OK... that's pretty sad. Again... I know I'm not good, but this is sad. If a guy who didn't know where the de-curse button was on his taskbar can get 9 curses removed without Decursive or much else, what exactly are the mages doing?

*** More generalized grumbling ensues in raid chat ***

Pulls #4 and #5: At this point, the Vent channel is in stitches laughing at the mages. Each time the curse goes up they're calling for me to "Save me!", "Save US!" or "Go, Annai, go!" We manage to live through at least two curses on each pull but I think a few people are still blowing up and the attrition is killing us. After the second curse of the last two pulls, I think I was taking two much damage and before I could heal meself I went down. As we were running back from the 5th or 6th try, the raid leader decided to call it. Without enough de-cursing, there was no way to get past Noth. If we couldn't get by him, neither of the other two wings would have allowed us to fare much better.

The meters for the last two fights were pretty much a mirror image of the above. The mages might have gotten off a couple more desurses, but not many. I thanked them for having me along and they laughed and thanked *me* for trying to nearly single-handedly keep the raid going. At least I managed to get a cool idol and two upgrades for a guild member. It was still absolutely amazing the sheer number of 80s who didn't have enough gold for flying and/or didn't know how to decurse. One of these players was a double-whammy. He couldn't fly *and* couldn't decurse. If I bothered to remember his name, he would have gone on my /ignore list.

I logged off and downloaded Decursive.

Raiding Achievments... Good, Bad, and Ugly

The group that I run 25-mans with recently started to focus on getting the last few achievements some of them need for the Glory of the Raider meta-achievement. They clearly posted this in their sign-ups and asked people to post a list of what they still needed. They indicated that in some cases there would be intentional wipes while we tried to get some of these done.

Sometimes this is kind of fun and interesting and does allow people to better learn these fights. Sometimes it's just frustrating and needlessly delays the raid. Trying to do Heigan with 15 people because 10 are standing outside the door because they "can't dance" (many for reasons beyond their control like lag) is kind of silly. When 5 more people die and instead of wiping you try to nibble away at Heigan, it just becomes silly. The "Shocking" achievement is another one. Be a micro-second behind swapping position on a Polarity Shift and you've just screwed 24 other people. Grrr....

This is a good group -- there... I've said it again -- but I kind of hate these raiding achievements. Ones like "Make Quick Werk of Him" and "Arachnophobia" are actually fun. "Werk" and the "Safety Dance" should be the goal of every raider every time they face those bosses. Others are just ridiculous. The 20-or-fewer just means that 5 people don't get to go. (My group hasn't started this yet.) Others require a perfect execution of fights that really aren't that easy and adds undo stress to content that is otherwise on "farm" status for the most part. Still others require perfect execution of *all* the fights in Naxx for an entire raid lockout.

It's all well-and-good to make the achievements. Make 'em hard. I'll get the ones I can get and the others just probably won't happen. And they won't happen for most raiding guilds, frankly. The loss of enjoyment on some of these comes from those few players who feel they have to have every achievement and if they don't get it, they look for someone to blame. This leads to various tattle-tail mods popping up in raid chat (even when those mods are often wrong) and hard feelings start to show. A small lag hiccup on some of these fights, and you die. Die on the dance and you've blown *2* achievements for the whole group. I died last night during KT to an Ice Block. There's nothing I can do about that but get healed. I didn't. I died. It wasn't the first death to a boss so I didn't blow an achievement for the whole group, but some of these things are just beyond control.

Go for all the achievements you want and have fun with it. Just don't be a jerk about it if -- or more likely *when* -- some of these are simply out of reach for the group you run with.

On Having Two Accounts...

Last March I bought a second WoW account. It was my son's birthday. He's at that weird age where he's hard to buy for. He gets all A's and B's in school. Good kid. Too old for most toys; too young for anything really serious. He had been playing WoW quite a bit and gotten a mage up into the 30s or 40s (at the time) ... I think. But... I couldn't really help him out. Yeah... I could toss him some gold or scan the auction house for an item or two, but not really help.

Enter the second account. It was given as a birthday gift, but it wasn't for his exclusive use. He wouldn't have the password, but it would allow us to play together, run instances (me blitzing mostly), and do some direct helping. At the time, I had my 70 Hunter and my 70 Warlock. My Druid was just a baby. (NOTE: This was all done before Refer-A-Friend was an option.)

So... the second account was created. After some discussion about what to do, we decided to move my Warlock to the second account. The Warlock was a tailor/enchanter so it made sense. Remember this was before the days of enchanting Vellum. Having him on the 2nd account meant that I could directly enchant my own items simply by having both accounts logged in on different computers. Warlocks make excellent low-level instance blitzers. Round up a bunch of mobs with the voidwalker and Seed of Corruption the snot out of them. It was fun making big piles of mobs in places.

As an ulterior motive in this whole thing was my desire to get my Druid up to 70 before the expansion. With that character, I could be either a tank or a healer, whatever the guild needed. (Again... this was before Balance was a "real" spec, so it was just really those two options.) I had tried a Paladin, but didn't like it and couldn't bear -- no pun -- the thought of getting that character to 80. *shudder*

Now that a year has passed, I got to looking back at this experience and learned a few things:

1. I *hated* dual boxing. Putting a toon on /follow and running low-level instances alone for XP is about the most boring thing you can do in WoW. I did it a half-dozen times for my Druid and couldn't stomach it any more.
2. I *liked* helping my son. He and I could rip through places pretty quickly. We had a system down where he'd lock mobs in place with Frost Nova while my DoTs and SoC was ticking. We just tore stuff up.
3. Until the expansion, managing your characters on two different computers sucks. If you have two fast/good computers, it's no sweat. If you have one *really* good computer and an aging laptop, it's a marginal nightmare. You can't really mess with your UI on the laptop because it can't take the add-ons. If you mess with your bars in one place, it messed up the other. Add-ons? Forget it. Macros... they weren't stored by Blizzard, they were stored locally. Another nightmare.
4. If you have a good enough computer with enough RAM, you can run two instances (probably more) of WoW on the same machine.
5. Having one Blizzard Authenticator with two accounts is enough, although kind of a pain. At $6 a pop -- if they're in stock -- I'd probably recommend just getting two and labelling them for the proper account.
   

When WotLK came out, the boy swapped over to a Death Knight. He had gotten the Mage to 63 (?) by then and I thought it was a real waste to start over, but having his own 55+ earned him a character slot in my book. The DK is now almost 71 and he's hit Northrend. The biggest issue now is that we'll probably have to drop another $25 to move characters. His DK is on the first account, and since I got my druid to 80, too, that means there will soon be 3 80s on that account and my lonely 70+ Warlock on the 2nd. Oh... the horror. :)

Just thought I'd get down -- however boringly -- my thoughts on second accounts.

/snore

Rally the Troops!

As previously discussed, I've been doing 25-man raids for a few weeks now with our raiding partner. Once I was comfortable enough -- having seen all the fights with the exception of Kel'Thuzad more than once -- I started putting out feelers within the guild for running our own 10-mans. I didn't want to be the raid leader *and* guild leader, but no one else was stepping up. Response was lukewarm, but I got enough feedback from within the guild and from our other, smaller raiding partners that I put an event on the in-game calendar.

(As an aside, that's really a pretty good tool. I wish I could use it for all my raiding sign-ups but our allies mostly use web-based tools. We used to use a web tool ourselves, but when the former guild leader flipped his wig and shutdown our website with little to no warning and refused to transfer ownership -- oh look! another topic for another day! -- we switched to the in-game tool. The timing was pretty good. It also allows people you don't want to have access to your website to have access to your raid calendar. Anyway... good job, Blizzard.)

Last Monday was our first joint run. Things started off badly. During the week, I had gotten 2 tanks lined up and had 4 -- count 'em *four* -- healers lined up in case there were drop-outs, no shows, or other issues. I had a DPS-spec'd Shaman and a Shadow-spec'd Priest also willing to go and re-spec if needed. Twelve (12!) signups in total and I had 3 other people on the standby-but-not-signed-up list. Woohoo! I could manage nearly 50% attrition and still get the raid going.

Paging Mr. Murphy! Mr. Murphy to raid day!

About a day before the raid was set to go, I got messaged in-game by one of the tanks that they didn't think they could make it. They were going to try, but couldn't be sure. Well... OK... I've still got my main tank lined up and I *should* be able to find an alternate OT. In an absolute *worse* case, I could swap to my druid. By no means ideal, but it could be done. That day I put some more feelers out on some allied forums to try to replace a tank.

For the raid, I was hoping to stay on my hunter because given my rapid acquisition of Naxx25 gear, I knew we could support a few undergeared DPSers and still get by. It wasn't like we were all going to go in with quest greens and blues. Hopefully, we'd get those new folks some gear in the process.

My hope was to get 6-8 guild members into the run and then fill the holes with those left. I was also hoping to pull in some new-to-raiding folks and get them some gear and enthusiasm for the process.

At a half-hour before raid, I started forming up the group. My tried-and-true fellow hunter (FH) and all-around good guy was first into the raid.

FH: Um... bad news, the MT was on earlier and can't make it tonight.
Me: #*(&@(#&$(@&$%#@!
FH: Want me to start looking around?
Me: I had a couple of alternates. Going to try to find them.

/Tells and channel hopping ensues and I miraculously find two tanks. One is probably overgeared for 10-mans, the other will re-spec and off-tank, but has enough gear to be fine. Phew!

I start looking at my sign-ups and looking at who is only. Of 12 signups, 6 are online.

Me: (#@(*&#@(!&@#

Warlock joins. Shadow Priest. Start hitting up my alternates. Holy Priest comes over. He's overgeared, too, but the raid panels are growing and if they're willing to come, at this point I just want the raid to go off. Second healer, another Holy Priest shows up. Death Knight added. Holding the last spot for the GM of the other guild. He's a mage. The decurses will be nice for the Sarth trash. Wait. Wait. Can't wait anymore. Tanks have a Boomkin in their guild who wants to come for Sarth, but can't stay for Naxx. Add him and let's go.

We got the raid going -- finally -- and it was a bit anti-climactic. What I had hoped would be a raid filled mostly with my guild, ended up as 4 from mine, 3 from another, and 3 from a third. All good folks and we worked well together, but only one member of my guild even needed 10-man gear, really. We managed to blow Sarth away quickly. We replaced the Boomkin with another Shadow Priest (4 priests total) and moved on to clear out Spider Wing. With the exception of Maexxna, everything was a one-shot and pretty handily at that. The big spider caught us at a bad time on a couple of web-wraps, but she went down on the 3rd try.

Two more 10-mans on the schedule this week. Time to rally the troops again!

And I was doing so well...

...keeping up with an almost post-a-day pace.

/e slaps his own wrist

Ow!

OK... enough silliness.

My guild (well... OK... 4 of us and some help) made our first guild-sponsored foray into Obsidian Sanctum and Naxxramas last night. We had 3 members each from our wonderful guild allies and did pretty well. Sarth (no drakes) went down very easily. The first two bosses in the Arachnid Quarter suffered similar one-shot fates. Maexxna decided to be uncooperative and made us kill her on the third try, although she was down to 2% on the first go. Frustratingly close. I'd almost rather wipe at 20% than 2%. We lost a warlock earlier in that fight when I didn't manage to break her out of the cocoon fast enough. That was probably the difference.

Our healing lead complained that that fight is all about the random number generator (RNG). He would know better than I. Get a web wrap at the wrong time and have the tank take spikey damage and you're in trouble. When the numbers are kind -- as they were on attempt #3 -- and she goes down with hardly a fuss.

Although I levelled my Druid to 80 first in WotLK, I found that I *really* didn't like tanking. When our 10-mans didn't really get off the ground and I couldn't do enough DPS to warrant spots in raids (with a tank spec, go figure), I quickly got my hunter up to 80 and have been taking him to raids. I would like to start gearing my druid, though.

Wow... this one is boring. Gonna post anyway. I need to keep writing, even if it's not particularly compelling, I'm putting words on digital paper. I'll have something better soon, I promise. I still have a "To Do" list of things to talk about from a while ago like 2nd accounts and a few other things. Only the best WoW bloggers are all that interesting to read. I'm not there... yet.

"Loot Sponge"

I have a new nickname in my raid alliance. "Loot sponge". I'm hoping it doesn't stick. My old one, "Owner of Pets Gone Wild!", comes from my cat going loco one night in Black Temple and wiping the whole raid when he charged off at High Warlord Naj'entus for seemingly no reason. I kinda like that nickname better. (NOTE: It's quite possible that I hit the mark-and-attack macro, but my story is that ol' Qantaqa just went crazy on his own and I'm stickin' to it.)

So... back to the current nickname....

If you ever stress out about "falling behind" other raiders in your guild (or group of guilds), I'm not sure it's something that you should really worry about. Provided you can participate in runs on a fairly regular basis, the shinies will come. Really. They will. If you don't win a roll this week, you'll win another week. Unless you're in one of those hardcore, min-max-or-die guilds (and there's nothing wrong with that for some people) things tend to even out in the end. Even in a DKP system (or maybe especially so), things just tend to work out. That's the whole idea.

I was privately lamenting a bit last week during a joint Naxx25 run about the lack of hunter drops and/or my inability to win a roll. It was mostly that no hunter gear dropped.

This week, the loot tables and the RNG were kind. Thankfully, the raid leader decided to start with the Construct Quarter instead of the de-facto Spider. Yay for decent loot tables! After some fits and starts getting the 25th person through the slime gauntlet -- groan -- Patchwerk went down like the pansy he is.

./e waves to Patchwerk

No goodies and on to Grobbulous. Managed to live this week and even managed not to drop my stink-bomb into the middle of the raid... unlike some people. *cough* Shiny dagger dropped. Left it for the rogues, but another hunter grabbed it. Sort of a slight upgrade, otherwise, but less hit and I'm barely hit capped as it is. Stat sticks can wait and I was sort of "saving" my roll for a real item I needed.

(Loot is handled with a 1-100 roll for the first item upgrade of a run. 2-2 roll for a 2nd item if it's an upgrade and a main spec item. 1-1 for a sidegrade or off-spec item with a 1-100 roll-off for those tied. Often the 1-1 rollers will pass if they see it's a bigger upgrade for someone else. Again... very mature raiders who understand that a bigger upgrade for someone else results in more DPS for the raid as a whole which makes bosses and trash go down faster. Have I mentioned how much I love my raid alliance... today?)

Gluth was a piece of cake. Three hunters in the back dropping traps and an Earthbind totem. The chow never had a chance. Gluth has that weird amalgam loot table and the token drops on this night were horrible. Plate and clothies all night, it seemed. Still nothin'.

I was an idiot on Thaddius. Made it about halfway through the fight and then missed a polarity change. Thankfully I got far enough a way that I only killed myself. He hit 0% with about 2 seconds left on the enrage. Whew! Five people were dead, though, so I wasn't the only dope.

On to Plague, and Noth took a very quick dirt nap. Only one trip to the balcony. This is where it gets interesting. Both the [Strong-Handed Ring] and the [Tunic of Masked Suffering] dropped. Three hunters. I know one is really well geared. I looked at the other at the start of the run and he was pretty well geared, too. Didn't commit his inventory to memory. The call comes to roll on the ring. The "passed" messages were flying by and I didn't even see my roll. I heard a few calls of congratulations, but didn't see a message to go ahead and pick up the ring. Then the joint hunter channel started to have some chatting in it. (RL = Raid Lead and first Hunter. OH = other hunter.)

RL: Annai were you rolling on the ring or the chest?
Me: Oh... I thought we were just rolling on the ring.
RL: Yeah... but I wanted to make sure the chest didn't end up defaulting to you if the ring was an upgrade for someone else.
Me: OK... that's cool... I don't care either way. Both are big upgrades.
OH: They're bigger upgrades for Annai. I'll pass.
RL: Annai, roll on the chest, too.
Me: (Feeling guilty) Um... OK... Should I be rolling 2-2 or a regular roll?
RL: Do a regular roll just to see.

At this point I've lost track of the rolls and the raid is already moving on to clear trash leading to Heigan. I feel like I'm holding up the raid and/or being greedy. It's possible the other two hunters were whispering, but at this point I just was hoping to get one of the items and didn't really care which. Both were major upgrades and arguably best-in-slot items for a Survival hunter.

RL: OH, take the chest. Annai take the ring.
Me: OK... cool!
OH: Nah... I pass to Annai.
Me: (Huh) Really? Are you sure?!
OH: Yeah, man... those are both major upgrade for you.

Guilt sets in. I assumed some /tells have been flying around -- in a good way -- and the raid is moving on. I double-check and he's still cool, so I end up with both items. Wow. Big kudos again for someone realizing that a slight upgrade (or even sidegrade) for them and a major upgrade for someone else just makes the whole raid better. I was pretty effusive with my thanks, and on we go.

Heigan drops pretty quickly and I think only one person died... to a disconnect. *groan* [Leggings of Collosal Strides] and [The Undeath Carrier] fall to the floor. You're kidding, right? Both hunters already had the legs, so those end up in my bag -- and soon thereafter on my chubby Tauren legs. Even un-patched they're better than what I had. I couldn't even bring myself to roll on the staff. Arguably another great Survival item now that the Druid-only status of that item has been removed, the RL already had better. The other hunter won it, though. Again... I couldn't even face rolling 2-2. He won with a 12, I think. :)

Loatheb was a cakewalk. The tiered Hunter shoulder token dropped along with the [Grotesque Handgrips], but again, I didn't even place a 2-2 roll. I think a Shaman ended up with the shoulders with a real roll, which was just fine. I already had the gloves (and the T7.5 ones from a Sartharion kill).

I ended up having to bail here. They cleared the Spider Wing and then called it. Even three items seemed like loot-hogging, but these kinds of things sometimes happen when people in raids have been running them for much longer than you have.

The point of this? If you run with a good group of people, you *will* get the loot you need. It's not going to happen all at once. It's not going to happen on the first time each item drops. But it will happen. Participate enough and do your job and don't be a jerk. Good things come when you raid the right way. In particular, remember the people who were nice to you and try to return the favor if/when you can.

Loot Sponge, out.

Are bots back?

With all the hub-bub over Blizzard's victory in the WoW Glider case, I was surprised in-game the other day with a bot. Not sure what time of day it was, but I was doing my Hodir daily quests on my hunter and ran into this Night Elf hunter running a race-track pattern in the area where the fire elementals spawn. The place where the anvil was before doing that part of the phasing quest(s). You know the spot. They drop crystallized fire at a decent rate. Prime bot'ing grounds.

I watched for a while in disbelief. I tried communicating with the character. No dice. (This is difficult on opposing factions, but not impossible.) I was thinking about attempting some griefing. Feign pulling. Mob tagging. PVP flagging to get it to fight me. I inspected the character trying to glean a little more info. The gear was terrible. +Strength on the bow. I could find no quest rewards. Finally, I'd wasted enough time and effort confirming my suspicions and summarily put in a GM ticket. I didn't just report it, I wanted to talk to a GM.

I had had a *horrible* experience with this same issue back in vanilla WoW. The various fields around Western Plaguelands were rife with this problem back in the day. I had a particular issue for an entire week in Felstone Field. I was rep farming myself and leveling up a pet from very low level, but doing it legitimately by actually playing at my computer. *gasp* This Dwarf hunter -- why is it always Hunters, by the way... as if the typical players view isn't already skewed to the "huntard" stereotype -- ran the same racetrack pattern. Back then, though, the bots were dumber. Or it was programmed poorly. For this one, you could tag the mobs and it would still come by an help you kill it. It was just set to a killing spree. Again... horrible gear choices. Just there to farm. I'm sure it pulled in some good scratch, too. This went on for a week. Every day I would report via ticket the behaviour and the next day it would be the same bot back in the same spot running the same pattern. Not sure if he eventually just got caught or if this was around the inception of Warden, but he finally disappeared a day or two before I was done with my reputation grind.

Back to the present, I had to log off and fully expected to get a canned response via GM ticket in-game. When I was able to log back in a couple of hours later, a GM hit me up almost immediately. (The new UI for talking to a GM works pretty well, by the way.) Well... at least I got to talk to them. They were very friendly and professional in that semi-extra-geeky roleplay way many of them use. He/she indicated they were still getting reports like this occasionally and would look into it. I neglected to write down the character name, but was 99% sure I had reported it correctly. This particular GM had a good sense of humor. After assuring me that they would take the report seriously and take action if warranted:

GM: "Is there anything else I can do for you?"
Me: "Can you spawn me a few dozen Everfrost Chips?"
GM: "I wish I could because I'd be exalted by now."

:)

Loot Niceties and Ammo

(This post started out as one about bag/bank management, but this story is better, I think. Maybe I'll get to the clutter post later.)

My hunter is eagerly awaiting the Great Ammunition Removal Patch of Awesome, so I haven't gone too crazy with him with bag management. I am lugging around way too much stuff, but I usually have enough room to do my daily quests, perform my skinning, and quest-at-80 for gold. Usually. When the hunter's lack of bag space and the ammunition issue comes into painful focus is when you get a weapon upgrade.

Case in Point: I'm just playing along Saturday night and across one of my guild alliance channels I see...

"Off-tank and one more needed for Naxx 10-man. Clear instance."

/whisper "Need another DPS?"

"Sure. Come on along!"

So... I hit the stable, grab the DPS pet (good ol' Humar), and head to Venomspite. We blast through the Spider wing in pretty good order. One-shot all the bosses in good time. I hate the Arachnid Quarter. It's well-designed. The fights are somewhat interesting and technical enough to keep you intersted. It's the loot tables I hate... at least as a hunter. I fully understand what Blizzard did, though. It's the wing most groups start with, so they loaded it up with plate tanking gear and healer/caster gear. No sweat. There are a few nice items, but I've been through Naxx-25 Spider enough that most anything that would drop in there isn't an upgrade. Still... I'm good... picked up a few badges and had some fun.

We move on to the Military Quarter. Interesting move. Usually people hit up Plague next. I'm a little nervous about Razuvious because I haven't seen the fight using the crystals. I have no idea what the loot lists are like. Check up with AtlastLoot. Oh... look at this shiny!

Now... I've had a bit of a problem getting ranged weapon upgrades for a long time. If I'm in a group, either nothing drops or I'm outrolled by another hunter. I've been slowly getting there with my other gear, but weapons have eluded me. I think I have 10+ runs in UtK -- it's practically the *only* heroic I've done -- and still no [Drake-Mounted Crossbow]. It's become an in-guild joke at this point when people see me in there PUG'ing. *shudder*

We get to Razuvious and I say a not-so-silent prayer for the bow. Something along the lines of...

"Dear Mr. Razuvious... Please drop your bow... KThx, Annai."

The other hunter in the group had the Drake-Mounted already and I assumed -- yes -- that he'd not really be after a side-grade. This was an all-guild run with the exception of me and the off-tank, so I was mostly just along for the ride and the 10-man experience. I'm lugging around the ugliest iLvl200 gun in the game, the reputation reward from the Argent Crusade -- the [Zombie Sweeper Shotgun]. (As an aside... really Blizzard?)

Lo-and-behold, Razuvious went down on the second attempt. (Little miscommunication by the tanks on when to release the students caused a wipe.) And there it was! The bow. The other hunter *was* a cool guy, and passed on it. It really is a side-grade. Same DPS. Slightly different stats. Does look cool as hell, though. I almost wouldn't have been mad had he rolled. Almost.

Anyway... this is a long and drawn-out way to say "kudos" to this guy and suggest that others try to do the same thing. Loot comes and goes. In-game friends -- even those not in your guild and maybe *ESPECIALLY* those -- mean a lot more. I'm all for moving along faster in instances and not stressing out over loot, but take a few minutes either during a "brb" break or at the start to look around the raid. Know what the other players are packing for gear and know what that item you might want to roll on is a *huge* upgrade for them but only a side-grade for you. Eventually, if you run raids enough, the gear comes. If not through drops these days, through Emblems alone.

The other point of the post, is the pain a hunter feels when getting a weapon and not being able to use it. :) That bow had to sit in my bag for the rest of the raid, because I had a pouch full of bullets instead of a quiver full of arrows. (No warlocks and I wasn't going to ask the raid to wait for me.) Here's hoping they can make the stacks big enough in the next update to allow for this possibility. And they can work out the haste issue between quivers and pouches, too.

Never did get the 10-man version of Four Horsemen down. Is it my imagination or is that just harder on 10-man? I know a couple of bosses in there are like that.

Eat me, Sartharion...

Oh... wait... you did, didn't you? Multiple times.

I've mentioned my guild alliance before on this blog. Yes... it was probably a year ago, but the back posts don't disappear and the same folks are still around. Good group of people. We've actually had some members of my guild leave for this other larger guild with really no hard feelings. We're casual. They are more hardcore, but still like to have fun and joke around all while getting the job done. Usually. :)

Earlier this week on Tuesday I ran Naxx25 with them and we cleaned out two wings in about two hours. They basically have open sign-ups and when they're short a couple, my guild members are welcome along to fill the ranks. Unfortunately, nothing hunter-ific dropped the this night. Oh well... sometimes the RNG is your friend....

Thursday was supposed to be the resumption of Naxx, but since they had cleared it out already and completed Malygos, too, it was decided to make some attempts on Sartharion + two Drakes. I warned the raid leader that I felt a little undergeared for that fight and had signed up for mid- to late-Naxx, but they don't stress too much about that stuff and felt they had enough of the right mix of classes. I *did* come to the raid fully prepared with as many elixirs and food buffs as I thought I was going to need. (Little did I know.)

I figured the first hour would be pretty painful. Sarth + 2 is a difficult fight even if your entire raid is epic'd out the wazoo. We were not. Although much of the raid is well-geared, there were some newer raiders -- myself included -- still sporting some reputation gear (or worse).

The first few pulls went as expected. People dying to the flame walls. People dying to the adds. People dying to the void zones (which aren't really much more visible than they were before, Blizzard). On one early attempt, we managed to get the first Drake down before the second landed, but things quickly went into the dumper after that.

Two hours in and we still didn't seem to be making much progress and I was out of elixirs. I really didn't expect to keep trying the "+2" fight after ten wipes, but they kept going. Weren't really getting by the first phase. I offered to give up my spot to a more seasoned raider. I was told I was fine and we kept at it. Eventually, we had to clear trash again (always a bad sign) and the grumbling started. We re-cleared, made a few more attempts, but then I had to log. Job and all. It was closing in on midnight for me.

The WWS was posted this morning. While my DPS wasn't stellar, I took most of my solace in being one of the last people to die on pretty much every attempt. I got killed by the flame wall *ONCE* by my count. The painful part, even after I left, was the final tally:

Sartharion 19, Raid 0.

Ouch.

Here's my short list of things to consider when participating in progression raiding.

1. NEVER, EVER, EVER (!) complain in raid chat or Vent about your repair bill! Firstly, if you have a high repair bill from dying, it's because you're all decked out in Epics. Boo hoo. I'm bleeding for you over here. I'm trying to earn some of my own epics. You bitching about how much it's costing to fix your shinies up is really grating. Secondly, it makes you sound like a whiny brat. If you don't like repairing, don't progression raid. Simple as that. Five daily quests and you've earned enough to wipe all night to a new boss. Or at least make the repair bill hit to your bank pretty insignificant.
   
   
2. Bring your bloody consumables. And bring enough to last a good long while. Elixir mats are not generally hard to farm up. I don't know how much they are on the AH (mats or elixirs), as I have an alt and a friendly guild alchemist. There's nothing worse than looking around the raid while waiting for buffs and seeing people who *AREN'T* either flasked or elixired (are those words?). It's even worse if you're wiping below 5% on something. Just a little more 'umph' from a couple more people using proper elixirs/flasks and the boss would already be dead. (This wasn't the case last night, but I've seen it before.)
   
   
3. Read up. If you don't understand the fights -- even the basic mechanics LIKE A GIANT WALL OF FLAME THAT YOU CAN'T GET HIT BY -- you don't really belong in the raid on nights when progression is being pushed. Don't sign up. Don't accept the invite. I was a little bit in this boat myself, but it's because I was expecting Naxx and got Sarth + 2. And I warned the raid leader of that. But if your guild has a known destination, take the time to understand -- at least in theory - what's going to happen in the fights. Some people can only learn by seeing, but if you've at least read up, maybe the learning curve is less when you've read *and* seen the fight.
   
   
4. Shut up. If you don't understand something, ask and then listen for the answer. LISTEN. If you don't understand the fight mechanics, you have no business offereing up suggestions and it makes you sound really dumb when your suggestion would basically wipe the raid. Don't tell the tank to stand in one spot when he's tanking to make your DPS job "easier". Umm... there are these giant dragons trying to eat him and walls of flame that he *must* avoid. Really. He's doing his best. And... your DPS is bad because you've died to the flame wall *EVERY* pull, not because the tank is the problem.

I'm probably forgetting something in that list, but those are the things that jumped out at me this morning. Coffee really hasn't kicked in, but the muffin was delicious.

Once more... with feeling!

It's time to crank this up again and try it ONE MORE TIME. If I fail to keep this thing updated, I'm just going to delete the whole mess and forget about this blogging thing. I think I have some things to say, but that will remain to be seen. I think I'm going to expand this to include my thoughts on guild issues -- hopefully keeping too much detail from seeping in so as not to piss anyone off -- but provide helpful insights for others. Maybe? Also, my warlock is on the back-burner and is currently on sit-in-Dalaran-and-receive-BoEs-to-disenchant duty. The bonus there is that my druid (who actually went to 80 first) is an inscriptionist, so he's been sending over Vellum on a regular basis. Very useful that vellum stuff.

So... here we go again. Don't think I'm going to give BRK or some other prodigious bloggers a run for their money, but maybe I can provide some useful info.

Thoughts on a Friday

Hydross HowTo: BRK has a new video out of HowTo the Hydross the Unstable fight in SSC. Still deciding if I'll devote the time to another transcription. BRK is actually hard to transcribe. He's got some voice quirks and sayings and speaks very rapidly. Makes for a lot of typing. I probably will, but it'll have to be a rainy day project. Too much yard work -- and Mother's Day -- staring me in the face.

Mother's Day: Speaking of which... who the "F" schedules a raid for Mother's Day. Come on. Really? Our guild alliance has done just such a thing. I guess for some (many?) it's not that big a deal. It is in the evening, so many of the festivities will be over. For me, I'm cooking a meal (dinner) for my wife, sister, and mother and all the kids. 12 people. Not a huge crowd, but considering I cook about 10 times a year -- if that -- it's a bit of a task. :)

Wrath Preview: GameSpy has a ginormous preview of Wrath of the Lich King out. There are two fairly amazing new pieces of news.

Blizzard announced that the raid dungeons in Wrath of the Lich King would all have 10-man and 25-man versions, with substantially better gear available to anyone who could organize the 25-man.

...and...

...all the five-man heroic dungeons will be itemized completely separately from the lower-level experience.

That's some really good news. While I've had the chance to do a lot more 25-man stuff (Gruul, Magtheridon, and Serpentshrine Caverns) lately, it's not something that I can devote a ton of time to and I'm unlikely to be able to see the higher tiered raids before the expansion. Knowing that I'll be able to see *all* the fights in the expansion -- even in 10-man form -- is really welcome news.

Making the loot tables for 5-man heroics completely separate from the 5-man normal will breath some life into them, as well. Nothing sucks worse than going into a heroic only to see the same stuff drop. Makes the trip seem pointless and at the rate that badges are gained from 5-mans, that's not really enough incentive to do them regularly for me. I'd rather get 10-15 in one night of Karazhan than spend 3 nights doing heroics.

They also mentioned that most 5-mans would be tuned to allow completion in about an hour. That's pretty quick and welcome for those of us more "casual" types.

There's also more information in the link above including intervies, new videos, new screenshots and more specific and detailed information on things like the Death Knight, flying mounts in Northrend (level 77 to get the ability back), flying in the "old world" (short answer: no), and some other tidbits. Nothing else world-shattering, but a bit more information about most of the things we already knew from Blizzcon and past previews.

Oh yeah... TGIFF.

BRK "Stardom"

So down in my ToDo list in the previous post, I mentioned BRK. For those not familiar, BRK is BigRedKitty, a bit of a hunter guru. He's a well-spoken, big-time proponent of hunters, particularly those of the Beastmaster persuasion. He throws people off sometimes with his "we"-speak (BRK is the team of hunter and pet). He also throws people off with what some consider arrogance. I don't read it that way and enjoy his posts. He's not always right, but then again neither is any blogger. Or *anyone* for that matter.

A few weeks ago, I signed up for an open Serpentshrine Caverns raid being run by a guild on my server who my guild has had a really great allegiance with over the years. It was my first run in the place, and during my preparation for the night, I read up on the fights, watched a few videos, and then read up some more.

One of the best resources I found, was BRK's movie on The Lurker Below fight. While reading the comments for his blog post related to the movie, I noticed a reader towards the end had mentioned being hearing impaired, and while enjoying the movie, didn't get much out of it since she (I think it was a she) couldn't hear it. The movie is a hunter's guide to the fight, complete with where to set your pet on "Stay", what to attack, when to attack it, how to help on the adds, and lot of other good stuff.

I went about my raid and thought that I had performed great for my first time. I was in the top-5 (usually) on damage during the run, didn't pull agro or get anyone killed, and basically did my job. I also was able to snag the Ranger General's Chestguard. I was so happy with how things went, particularly with the Lurker fight and being able to use my pet throughout, that I wanted to say "Thanks" to BRK. I wasn't sure what. Then it dawned on me. Instead of just a "Thank you" e-mail or blog comment, I'd create something that would hopefully be of use to others. I decided to transcribe the video into text for that one person that couldn't get all they wanted out of it just by watching.

So... that's my 15-seconds of fame on BRK's website story. If you're interested, you can find the transcript here. It was just a text file. I thought he might convert it or blogify it, but he posted it as is. It's fine, but had I known it was going to go up directly, I might have sent it in HTML. It looks like hell in Firefox and the text doesn't wrap properly. Hopefully that one person who needed it found it, but if not, it's the thought that counts.

If you're heading into SSC or the Lurker fight for the first time, do yourself a favor and check out BRK's movie. You'll be glad you did.

Shall we try this again?

OK... so I'm sure I've by now lost the whopping two people who were regularly reading and commenting on this blog, but I need to write again. Instead of inflicting myself on my guild's forums, I'll start blabbering here. If anyone finds it again and finds it useful / insightful / mildly entertaining so much the better. I need to write. I like to write. I write good. ;)

Where was I? When was my last post? Yer kiddin'?

Here's a quick rundown of what's happened since I last updated this thing:

1. My guild has Karazhan pretty much completely on farm. I've really stopped going on most of the runs unless I'm needed/wanted. There are pretty much no upgrades in there for me and others need the loot / badges more than I do. Plus... I'm sick to death of Kara. There's only so many times in life you can slog through Moroes trash before you slowly go insane. I'm at that point. I'll go on the first night if they need me and pull my Warlock through there for drops once in a while, but my Hunter is my main and probably always will be. That's that.

2. My server is awesome. We've got some really good guilds with some really great open raiding policies. My guild has taken to co-hosting Gruul and Magtheridon runs on an every-third-week rotation with two other guilds. A fourth guild lends "fire support" in the form of some well-geared (T5-ish) players and we smack around some ogres, gronn, and the occasional pit lord every week. I've managed to get 4/5 on my T4 set. The bonuses are still aweful, but it's cool to have a mostly consistent look to your character and the incremental boosts to stats from Kara-level gear is great.

3. Have I mentioned my server is awesome? That "fourth guild" mentioned above also holds open runs for the Tier 5 instances (Serpentshrine Caverns and The Eye). I haven't actually been to The Eye yet, but I've managed three or four runs into SSC and *really* enjoy that place. The trash is a bit repetitive, but the boss fights have some interesting mechanics that I don't think I've ever seen elsewhere. Hydross' form-switching and Leotheras' "inner demon" spring immediately to mind. I never did 40-man stuff pre-Burning Crusade, so maybe these are re-used mechanics, but they're new to me and I'm enjoying the fights. Again... this guild is pretty well geared up so they bring along new people to introduce them to 25-mans. As such, they like to see gear used instead of turned into the guild's 200th void crystal in the bank. I've managed to pickup an upgrade or new item in almost all of the runs I've been on. It's greatly appreciated. I won't ever be able to be in a big-time raiding guild, but these guys (and gals) seem to have found a nice balance between progression (25-man) and casual-ness... is that a word?

4. At least one "major" patch has been released since December. The 2.4 patch introduced the new island of Quel'Danas, the new Shattered Sun faction, a new 5-man and 25-man, a slew of daily quests with wondrous gold rewards, and a new vendor selling T5 and T6-quality gear for Badges of Justice. The badge gear is among the best available in-game. Pissed of the "hardcore" pretty well, but who cares. Oh... they do. What everyone seemed to forget is that 100-150 badges for *ONE ITEM* is a lot of badges. Doing Kara and the occasional daily heroic might yield you 30 badges or so a week. That's over a month just to get one item. I dare say raiders running multiple instances a week are pulling more than one T5/T6 item per character from SSC/Eye/BT/MtH. Anyway... I got my spiffy new "Frozen Parrot on a Stick" and that pretty much exhausted my badge supply. The addition of badges for all 25-man bosses has helped get that pile back up around 50, but I'm still not sure what to buy or how long to hoard the badges.

5. Just this week, my guild took out the 2nd boss in Zul'Aman (pic above). We haven't been doing ZA much because we've had so much else on the schedule. Two Karazhan nights for badges / gear / alts. One night in SSC. One night in Gruul's and Magtheridon's Lairs. Doesn't leave much time. But... with our better gear from those 25-mans, we were able to take out that stupid Eagle avatar and finally see him eat floor. 'Bout time. We *almost* had the bear during the timer, but a free-running bear on the last trash pull did us in. Next time.

Anyway... I have a bunch of topics I'd like to talk about in more detail, including some of the above mentioned stuff, but I'm going to save those for more posts and hopefully more regularly update this thing. It's almost time to start talking about the new expansion, too. Here's a list of upcoming topics. This is more for my benefit -- since I'm thinking about them -- than yours.

- 2nd Account
- Playing with your family
- Moving from 10-man to 25-man raiding
- Guild Alliances
- New gear
- The expansion
- Blitzing
- BRK "stardom"

OK... that's enough for now.

"The Don"

So I've been trolling various hunter forums looking for information on ranged weapons. Since my Steelhawk Crossbow dropped in Kara, I haven't really had a sniff of an upgrade. We're still not consistently getting to Prince, so the bow is not a given upgrade for me any time soon.

Mostly I've been poking around TKASomething and ElitistJerks. (Not gonna link 'em... feeling lazy today.)

Current wisdom for a Beast Master spec'd hunter seems to be that the gun from the Big Bad Wolf in Karazhan -- the [Wolfslayer Sniper Rifle] -- is the shizznit when it comes to weapons right now, outclassing the bow from the Prince and a few other weapons with higher reported "DPS" values. The problem? It's a low drop rate off a boss that only shows up once in three weeks of Kara runs -- if you're lucky. I haven't seen him in two months. (My guild dropped him this week when I wasn't available. No gun, though, thankfully.)

The issue with the reported DPS on weapons is apparently that faster weapons hit more often and therefore can be more effectively weaved into shot rotations. I tried a shot macro for a while, but it didn't work for me. I still try to use an Auto/Steady rotation for most boss fights, but throw in an Arcane every so often and multi when I can and think it'll do some good. I'm just not a min-max'er and can't be bothered worrying about that perfect rotation. I'm typically 2nd or 3rd on the DPS charts in Kara -- behind better geared rogues, usually -- and am often the top DPS'er when you look at just the boss fights. As it should be, I guess.

In my quest to find a new weapon that I have more control over getting, many of the forums talk about [Don Santos' Famous Hunting Rifle]. Really? The "paperdoll" DPS reported is only 73.7. My silly crossbow from Attumen -- at 79.1 -- beats that, right? Apparently not. "The Don" is apparently one of the best weapons until you start doing SSC and TK and my guild is nowhere close to those instances right now. Even then, the weapons that beat it are from the end bosses, primarily.

Based on all the various reports, the Don Santos' rife and the one from the Big Bad Wolf are neck-and-neck for DPS. The math still hurts my head. The big thing with the Don Santos' is that it has this nifty proc on it which increases RAP by 250 for 10 seconds. That 250 RAP is conservatively, about 17 DPS, which means that the 73 reported by the tooltip becomes more like 90... when the proc is active. Again... based on reports, that happens about 30% of the time, so the real up-time on the proc adds about 6 DPS, which puts it basically tied with the Wolfslayer if you just look at raw numbers.

I'm still not sure I'm even explaining this right, so I think I'll shut up now and leave it up to you to decide. The wonderful "Cheeky's Spreadsheet" can provide a wealth of information, and while it's telling me that the gun is better, I'm not sure the slight boost that it's reporting offsets the cost. I paid 1100g for the gun, but haven't yet soulbound it. WoWHead lists a typical buyout of 1700g, so I figure I got a bit of a deal. I don't spend gold in WoW easily. (I had nearly 6000g when I bought the gun and still don't have my epic flyer.) If you're a hunter out there in the know and can offer any advice about "The Don", please speak up.

PVP Gear for Upgrades...

My guild has kind of been in a holding pattern until this week. We've been getting deep into Karazhan, but either time or bad luck or class composition has prevented us from downing the Prince. This week, that feat was accomplished, albeit without me.

Raid sign-ups have been light enough and my schedule hectic enough -- holidays and all -- that I simply haven't bothered to sign up. I never know when another holiday event will pop up unexpectedly, so I haven't signed up so as not to be a tool and make them hold a spot when I can't come. Monday night, after having spent two previous nights during the week clearing the early bosses, I got bumped by at least two people who either hadn't signed up at all and/or hadn't participated in any of the "clearing" runs. Oh well. One was a healer and was needed. One was a DPS'er and had signed up. My fault for not signing up. Still kinda sucked to miss a guild first after having put in all that time in Karazhan for so long. I'll get over it.

I guess the point of this was that because I had gotten all the purple love that I was going to get out of the bosses that we had on "farm status", I started doing PVP. We formed a 2v2 team and that's going OK. We don't do it much, so we're hovering around the average 1500 score. Still gets us about 250 points per week and in a few weeks, I will have enough to get something. I've also been doing my daily PVP quests (when it's not WSG), and trying to put in two or three rounds of some battleground to get at least 1000 honor per day. I'm up to around 12,000 honor, but I'm short some marks for what I want, so I'll continue to build up a bit of a bank.

Pending what happens in Karazhan this week, I think I'm going to spend some honor/arena points. We won't be doing Karazhan for another two weeks because of sparse attendance during the Christmas/New Years holidays. Here's what's on the list:

[Vindicator's Chain Girdle] - This is probably first on my list. I'm still using a blue belt from Shattered Halls. It's OK, but nothing great. This is a pretty hefty boost, isn't too horribly expensive, and we're not even trying Illhoof yet in Kara, so getting the belt from him is unlikely any time soon.

[Gladiator's Chain Helm] -- This is my 1B option. If Prince goes down and I'm lucky enough to get my T4 token, this can go on the back burner, but I don't really want to wait another month for a shot at a Kara boss while I can be upgrading and earning more honor. If I can acquire about 30K honor *and* don't get the T4 helm, I'm getting both this and the belt. :)

[Vengeful Gladiator's Waraxe] -- This nifty little item showed up on Hunter's "radar" everywhere with the advent of Season 3. It's only 1000 arena points, requires no rating, and is Hunter-only. Pretty nice stats when equipped with a +35 Agility enchant (or +70 AP, I suppose). Not sure I want to splurge and drop 1000 arena points yet, but I'm getting sick of how goofy Legacy looks and this axe is just mean looking. There aren't too many upgrades beyond Legacy in sub-25-man content, so I might just have to get this.

Anyone else using PVP rewards to fill in gear "holes" from their raiding gear? Comment away! :)

Such a deal! Buy two! :P

I suppose complaining about a silly computer is along the lines of "there's no such thing as bad publicity", but I'll do it anyway. Not really complaining, I guess, just surprise. Dell has just announced (as reported over on WoWInsider) a pair of XPS "Gaming" laptops themed for World of Warcraft. $4500. Ouch!

Granted, these puppies sport some neat stuff like SLI video and 2GB of RAM and some sort of LCD panel -- I haven't seen detailed pictures -- akin to the one on the Logitech G15 gaming keyboards. I'm guessing this will show things like who's speaking on Ventrilo or TeamSpeak and be configurable to show other things. Again... I haven't really looked. Once I saw the price tag, I pretty much lost interest.

Wow... they have WoW pre-installed, some neat graphics on the case, and a couple of nice features. For $4500 they should be cooking my breakfast and one-shotting Kara bosses.... at least.

There's no such thing as a "gaming laptop". I bought a laptop about two years ago. I did splurge for a dedicated video card with the intent/hope that I would be able to play games. For some older games, it's perfectly fine. For WoW, which isn't exactly power-hungry when it comes to CPU or GPU, it's marginal. I can play solo fine in most places. Cities are iffy. Raiding is not so good. It's manageable, but FPS are quite low and that can cause enough delay and lag in fights like Shade of Aran or Prince to actually kill you and contribute to wipes. For any newer games, forget it. Granted, I only spent about $1000 on it, but that's still a good chunk of change (for me).

A $4500 computer with dual video cards will *never* sit on your lap. :) You can call it a portable computer if you like, but it's not a laptop, unless you're 100% certain that you're done procreating or have legs made from asbestos. My $1000 laptop is too hot to sit on my lap and it's not putting out half the heat this beast is going to.

For that much money, unless you travel a ton and have to have your WoW fix along with you, you'd be better served getting a *really* extreme desktop PC that would probably be about as portable as that laptop. But... if you buy one and have some spare change, feel free to send one to me. :)

I have a blog?

Oh, yeah... how 'bout that... I have a blog. :)

For my two "regular" readers, yes, I'm still alive, but have been so busy with real life and work that my time to play is very limited. I could spend that time here typing stuff up for the two of you to read, but instead have chosen to actually play WoW, and a couple of other things. Since WoW continues to be mostly Karazhan until we can gear up enough to hit Zul'Aman -- we *want* to go, but don't think we *can* go -- I'll offer up a slight change of pace.

The Orange Box: This is the greatest deal in games right now, particularly if -- like me -- you haven't played Half-Life 2 yet. My machine just wasn't up to the task until recently (see below), so I never played this game. I'm still working my way through the single-player game of HL2 and haven't even dipped into the expansions. Just the 3 Half-Life games are a bargain at $50, but the Orange Box also includes Team Fortress 2 *and* a game called Portal. Portal is a different kind of shooter, in that the only thing you can shoot are portals. It's hard to describe without posting screenshots and you can find those elsewhere. Suffice to say that for $50, this is gaming goodness in a box. With the "silly season" approaching, if you have a gamer friend who hasn't played these titles, you might have a very happy friend were you to pick up this box. :)

Mythos: This game is still in beta test -- invite only and no I don't have any. It's by the same people that made Hellgate: London. I haven't played that game -- and don't plan to -- but Mythos is in beta and will be free. The guys from H:L are several ex-Blizzard employees who were instrumental in bringing the Diablo series to life, including Bill Roper. Mythos is akin to Diablo, but is only played online. Not sure how the zones and such are instanced, but towns are populated with other players and you can group. You'll eventually be able to form guilds and such. It's addictively fun and simple and reminds a LOT of Diablo, which is a good thing.

Crysis: I haven't bought the game yet, but have played through the demo *at least* three times, trying out different tactics and generally ooo-ing and ahh-ing over the graphics and the environments. Me playing *any* demo more than once is a major time commitment, so to do it three times is an indication that it's pretty good. :) If you have a decent machine, it's worth checking out the demo at least. Big download, though. You've been warned.

Anyway... that's a quick update. Hopefully I'll have something more interesting WoW-wise to post in the next few days. Back to Karazhan for Curator and beyond this evening.

Hallow's End events...

Hallow's End is upon us, and there are some fun things to do in Azeroth for the next couple of weeks.

The best new events involve the Headless Horseman, pictured at right with his head still attached. Hmm.... The "newb" event involves being in some of the starter villages of Azeroth (Razor Hill, Brill, or near Silvermoon, for the Horde) when the Headless Horseman attacks. He flies into the town and throws flaming pumpkins onto buildings. You form a "bucket brigade" and help to save the village. It would seem that when the fires are out, he lands and can be attacked. (I'm not sure if this is timed or because of the fires being put out.) After killing him (he seemed to be one-shot when I did the event), everyone in the area can loot his head and it gives some silly items for you to use with very short timers. Have fun with them.

The "uber" event involves getting four level-70-ish friends and heading into the Scarlett Monstary's Graveyard wing. (Its the far left -- northern? -- door for those that haven't been in there in a while). You interact with a pumpkin shrine and a grave and start the event where you need to defeat the Headless Horseman -- and friends -- in order to win the loot.

I won't spoil the details and you can find information about the event on WoWWiki and elsewhere if you really want. It's a pretty fun event and can be repeated daily by each member of your party. It counts against your 10 daily quests. The loot is actually quite good (3 epic rings and an epic plate helm, primariy) and there's the chance for a couple of fun items, including various magic broom mounts (ground and flying) and a Hallow's End-themed non-combat pet.

If you haven't been back to Azeroth in a while, it's worth a trip to have some fun in Hallow's End. Don't forget to trick-or-treat innkeepers, too!

Patch 2.3 PTR Highlights...

Yup... I'm still here. For my few regular readers... sorry 'bout the hiatus. Not sure how much my posting pace will pick up in the next few weeks, but I'll try to get some more info up.

For those that don't follow this stuff until it comes out, I thought I would post my thoughts about changes that jumped out at me from the recently posted patch notes for v2.3 of WoW. These changes are on the PTR now. I'm still in the process of getting my character(s) copied over to have a quick loot. I'd actually like to try to get into Zul'Aman and learn the first boss or two to help my guild prepare.

Now... on with the highlights:

Experience: The amount of experience needed to gain a level has been decreased between levels 20 and 60. In addition, the amount of experience granted by quests has been increased between levels 30 and 60.

Well... this is just awesome. Whether you're new to the game or just waiting to level an alt -- like me -- this is a welcome (and frankly much-needed) change. Reports are that the decrease in experience needed is on the order of 15% and the increase to quest rewards around 30%. Not sure how much that reduces the total time to level -- math is hard -- but it should speed things up pretty dramatically.

Pets will try to get behind their targets when engaging in melee combat.

I can see this being both good and bad. We'll have to wait and see. My guild got to -- but didn't down -- The Prince in Karazhan this week. My pet being behind the Prince put him in range of the Infernals sometimes and meant I had to pull him out of the fight to keep him alive. Not sure what other fights this may affect. Gonna take a "wait-and-see" on this one.

Arcane Shot (Ranks 6 and above) now dispel 1 Magic effect in addition to their normal damage.

This is clearly a boon for PVP'ers. Not sure how much use it has in the raiding world. It's not really in my usual Aimed/Auto shot rotation, but I do pop it off occasionally. May have to start using it more and seeing if it helps. Can't think of any Kara fights where we're dispelling bosses.

Serpent Sting: The total damage dealt by this sting is now also increased by 10% of your ranged attack power.

This same change -- the RAP boosting damage -- is being made to most of the traps as well. I don't often drop traps for the damage they do, so this one is "meh" from a raiding perspective. Again... appears to be a PVP bonus and I'm betting that Survival and even Marksmen hunters are going to like this.

Players can now track fishing nodes. This ability is learned from a journal sometimes found in crates obtained through fishing.

Having recently levelled fishing up to usable levels, this will be great. I've moved on from Terrokar fishing and am into Nagrand, but I still need to fish in Terrokar to get [Golden Fish Sticks] for my friendly neighborhood Priest (and other healers as I have time).

Leatherworking:
* Stylin' hats no longer require Zhevra leather.
* Greatly increased the radius of the Drums of Battle, Drums of Restoration, Drums of Speed, and Drums of War.
* Removed the casting time from the Drums of Battle, Drums of Restoration, Drums of Speed, and Drums of War.
* Slightly increased the radius of Drums of Panic.
* Reduced the casting time of Drums of Panic and added a global cooldown equal to the casting time.
* Drums of Speed and Drums of Restoration are no longer world drop recipes, and can now be obtained from the Mag'har and Kurenai faction vendors with revered standing.
* A new recipe is available from Grand Master leatherworking trainers to create glove reinforcements, providing a substantial armor bonus. Reinforcements are a permanent enchantment and cannot be placed with other permanent enchantments.
* New recipes are available from Grand Master leatherworking trainers to make 20 slot quivers and ammo pouches.
* New recipes are available from the Honor Hold, Thrallmar, and Lower City quartermasters to create 24 slot quivers and ammo pouches.

Leatherworking is 2nd only to Engineering in the needs-a-little-love category, so these are some decent changes. They still need to add a bit more. I'd like to see some stats on quivers maybe that only LW'ers can use or just a little more "umph". I'll stick with it for now, even though re-spec'ing to Engineering is so tempting with their new mount.

The Chess Event chess in Karazhan now has a tap list so it can only be looted by players who were involved in the chess event.

This kinda sucks. In a few cases, we've summoned folks up to be able to loot an item. It's usually a raid member on an alt that needs/wants something. I guess this means more void crystals. Ppphhttt.

Aether rays can now be wrangled earlier.

Thank heaven! Hate getting off a (un)lucky crit and killing the buggers.

Items that have cooldowns will now display the base cooldown time in the item tooltip.

Guess I won't need OmniCC anymore?

You can now send up to 12 items in a single mail message.

Another add-on bites the dust! :)

Corpses that belong to someone in your party, but that you cannot loot will say in the corpse mouseover who has loot rights on that corpse. This will help skinners who want to know who to talk to in order to skin their corpse, as well as master looters when special loot drops on a normal monster. Everyone will then see that there is a monster that the master looter has loot rights on.

As an occasional master looter for my guild, this is awesome. Helps to see if something is sparkly because there's something *I* need to loot, or if someone's just being lazy about picking up their horse tails. :)

What's your favorite change from the patch notes?