Life in the Soul Well

New Boots!

2011-11-28T16:24:00.001-05:00

So I just have to add this little tid-bit. I bought 2 pairs of black boots yesterday. They are in the mail to me...soon. lol When I get them I will share a photo with you. I spent too much money but they were on sale and I don't care, I decided I was worth it.

And they are so hot!!

......Why'd it have to be Pandas?

2011-11-28T15:45:00.001-05:00

As I've said many times I don't do change well. This is one of those times. I am not going to touch on my thoughts of the expansion here but I do want to wonder about the bears that will be coming to Azeroth soon.

When we all first heard that Blizzard had TM'd "Mists of Pandaria", really we all knew that would be the next expansion. And yet, I, not unlike many others, decided it was best to live in denial and hope that maybe this was a joke.

Ok, so don't leave me quite yet I know that many people are excited about them and I'm not going to threaten to quit just because I didn't really think they'd be "cool" enough for WoW. In fact I think it's fine. I played them at Blizzcon and thought they were very well done and am curious to see what the female variety will look like since all my toons are female. Yes, I will probably roll one too. I'm interested in seeing and feeling out the monk healing mechanics. I enjoy Disc Atonement so maybe I'll like this one as well. Not that I actually go out and heal instances on my priest. I am a chickenshit closet healer. I won't go unless I can go with guildies.....

I digress....

What really turned me off was the thought of pandas. I know, we have dogs and squid-faced people, cows and other tusked ani-morphs; pandas are not a stretch. It just doesn't seem right to me. The idea of bouncing pandas doesn't do it for me. It's like throwing in Winnie the Pooh. It's weird.

The lore also doesn't sit well with me. There is really not much in game that tends to lore with Pandas. I know there are lore people out there that are going to tell me I'm way off and they've been there all along. Maybe I just haven't noticed or haven't looked. Should I have to look?

The look of the pandas seems very well done. The animations are cool. I tried emotes but they weren't working or turned on for the demo, which was a bummer. Again, I am anxious to see the females.

I trust that Blizz will make it seem as if they've been here all along but until then I will just...I don't know.
I'm not pissed, I'm not sad or moping or pouting or excited, just...waiting. I have no thrill for the pandas. The expansion yes. The pandas, not so much.

There are no police in WoW

2011-11-22T17:34:00.000-05:00

I'm driving down the road last week and someone did something that makes me think, as we all have, there's never a police car around when you want one. Why this led me to Warcraft I don't recall but it did. I am one of those types that is very rule oriented, and black and white. If you tell me this is the rule I will continue to go by that rule until you can convince me it needs to be changed. I will make inferences and deductions based upon that rule. Therefore, I don't deal with change well and I don't deal with others who "break the rules" very well either. Or at least my view of what the rules should be.

After much inner debate over this subject I have come to the conclusion that the lack of policing in WoW is good. I have had my fair share of assholes over the years, and at times wish there was some secret GM lurking around watching all the unsavory bits that float through trade chat and slamming discipline down upon the wrong-doer, but alas there is not. At least not when we wish they were looking.

So what do we have? Well let's see....

We have the secret police. Those that we turn in via the spam-o-matic button and it's a secret if anything actually happens.

We have the spies. For those of you familiar with the Moon Guard/Goldshire brothel fiasco, Blizz does indeed put people out there to take notes and dole out bans as needed when enough people have complained about a particular area or server.

We have the FBI. Where you can officially turn in a specific person for doing something against the TOS. Usually harassment, bigotry, or hatred remarks. In my 6 years of WoW I have used this function twice to report a specific person.

Other than that, Blizzard has left a remarkably large terrain for us to police ourselves, and given us a set of tools to use.

Turn it Off - you can turn off all or some of your chats including Trade and General.

Ignore - If you have one or two hundred specific people you don't like you can ignore them. One of the additional wonder features with ignore is you will never get grouped with them. Though beware of the alt.

Spammers beware - you can report as spam. This is generally reserved for gold farmers but I have used it when I have reached my limit on anal jokes. I just begin reporting. Sorry, but I use trade and I don't really want to see your ass jokes. If that's the tool I have to get you to stop then I will damn well use it. Hopefully you will get the message and a short ban.

One of my favorite tools tho is the pa-troller. One of those people who love to troll the trolls. We have one in my guild. He does not use foul language or anything he simply changes the subject. It is quite funny to see and I've helped him on more than one occasion. If you get a couple people singing or saying Ninetails for long enough the ass jokes disappear.

This is one of the best examples of self-policing I can give. That there are people who will take the initiative to derail the idiots in trade and make us all laugh for a few minutes. It's priceless.

So there you have it. From the no frills all rules person I say...no police! We seem to be doing ok on our own with the occasional smack down from on-high.

Missing You

2011-11-13T12:29:00.000-05:00

Life is always moving right along isn't it? It's hard to find time to catch up on my blog reading, let alone blog writing, but I miss you. So much has happened and yet these last 5 months I can honestly say nothing has changed. Even in our short lifespans change can be incrementally slow. Sorry, I'm being cryptic. I am still in an unsold house, living with a man I'm trying to divorce who enjoys making it difficult to do so.

My WoW time is limited to a few scant days a week where I try to bury my head in the sand and forget my troubles. It usually consists of PVP, raiding and dailies. I am still working Molten Front dailies, and for some reason dailies right now feel like doing the dishes. It is just something that needs to be done. I normally enjoy the grind a bit but since I am feeling oh so dreary, nothing is appealing.

There is so much to write about lately too and I have been terribly absent. I am trying to keep myself from going off on all these tangents in this post and start talking all the different WoW related stuff I'd like to share. I did go to Blizzcon after all, and have a ton on opinions on a ton of shit but I will save them for their individual rants to come.

Lets just say I will try not to be so absent in the near future but you might have to put up with some personal stuff tossed in. :)

A Day in Orgrimaar

2011-06-05T09:09:00.000-04:00

I have to share this story with you because we just had so much fun!

Last week a guildie from my main guild, Kaldorei Guardians (A), sent me a text and wanted to know if I felt like hopping on. It seems they had gotten a small party of guildies together and were fishing in Orgrimaar. I asked if the Horde were allowing it and she replied that it seemed so so far.

I logged on my worgen druid, who is in nearly a full set of healing pvp gear and they summoned me over. Right to the center of the goblin district LOL. No one seemed to really notice us. I quickly moved the group to the Valley of Honor so that we could work on Old Crafty. After a short length of time other guildmates got on-line and we began adding to our party. I began to invite friends along as well. Once we had about 6 we started to get some notice and hordies were popping up everywhere to come look at us and decide what to do about this Alliance infestation.
Once they outnumbered us they began their assault. I have to say that we did pretty well. We began to gather more people from our guild and wound up with two tanks, three healers and some random dps. Our group grew to about nine people and that group fluctuated throughout the afternoon as people went to do housework or whatever.
We spent the next 2 hours running around Orgrimaar, dieing, running back, rezzing in various areas, and generally trying to be a pain in the ass to the Horde. It was tremendous fun! A bit masochistic it seems but we were having a blast. We took another few hours and traveled about the Horde cities getting Wrath of the Alliance.
Never have I spent so much time in world PVP, being on a Normal server we just don't get this chance very often unless you go out and instigate it. We really had a lot of fun and are seriously considering how to form up a rated battle group. It is in the works and we hope to have a night set up very soon.

I would recommend to anyone that you get a few guildies together and go harass the other faction for a while. You never know what fun and mischief you might get into!

Random Drop - Reading Up on Jane Austen

2011-06-05T08:54:00.000-04:00

Hello there,
So here we are. It's been too long. In an effort to get my house on the market I have been spending a lot of time cleaning. Between that and work there has not been a lot of time for blogging. There has been a good deal of time for reading in between these hectic days. I found my stash of Jane Austen books while packing and have been re-reading them. Oh the joy of books! Jane Austen is rather easy and innocuous. It doesn't take any of my much needed daytime brain power to get through and they are rather enjoyable stories. At least to girls.

But what does this have to do with WoW you might ask? Nothing at all :p, I was just sharing.:)

Ok so the latest WoW stuff...hmmm.
We're raiding very well. For going one day a week we are getting down 3-4 bosses, not the fastest but not bad either. We are adding another day in the near future.

The new LFG (looking for guild) feature is good and bad. I like that so many people are interested in our guild, but it is a pain to sift through. People write the craziest things on applications and we don't even consider anyone unless they put in some comment. With all the influx of new guildies, guild drama has again raised it's ugly head. I am seriously considering a moratorium on new recruits until this batch settles down.

The new ZA/ZG dungeons are fun and a bit complex. I have had too many PUG wipes on them already and I'm not playing a lot. Hmm...that's not so good. The loot that is dropping is 353-359 purple and is very decent. It is good for filling in those missing epic spots you may have left in your wardrobe if you're not raiding extensively.

There are new cooking and fishing dailies in other cities. If you're bored with doing the standard Orgrimaar/Stormwind ones you can go in search of new. You can only choose one cooking and one fishing of the entire set. Such as, if you do the cooking daily in Darnassus, the other cooking quests will not be available to you. Only one a day regardless of which city you do it in.

BLIZZCON 2011!! I haz gots tix! Woot! And an awesome plan. A guildie of mine found a ticket to buy also, and he happens to be the one who got me the room last year. I am so excited!!
My travel buddy will be Fimlys from Twisted Nether and my roommate will be a guildie that I get to drag around with me to all the fabulous shin-digs. I am set to go! Just have to finalize the travel arrangements and we're good. I cannot wait!

Random Drop

2011-04-23T18:44:00.003-04:00

Wow it's been far too long since I've posted. I have something in the works, but it's going to take more brain power then I can muster at the moment.
RL has taken over and when I'm playing WoW it's to escape. However I am making progress all around so here's the highlights.

KG is now raiding current content and we're very excited. We're moving our raid nights around looking for a better time for more people. So far it is looking good.

Kaiote (boomkin) is now 525 skinning/LW which is nice. Now for pattern collection. Lots and lots o' leather needed.

I have finally completed the goblin starting area. I find it quirky but not as meaningful as the worgen area. The way that the goblins are brought into the fold by Thrall seems contrived. In one respect though it has the same feeling as the worgen area; it's all super tightly packed into 12 levels and it seems to move very fast or skip parts of the story or something. Something is missing it seems.

My troll hunter is 84 now. Eventually she'll make it. It's just tedious bringing up yet another toon through these 5 zones. I already feel like I've done it too many times. Cata zones have worn out their welcome for me already.

I've been playing my BE shadow priest a little too. And, so you all don't think I've gone horde or something, my human hunter as well. I am contemplating a dwarf shammy, it's still turning around in the back of my mind.

OK, that's the scoop. I hope to be back to normal in a few months so please don't unsubscribe to me if you can wait it out.

Random Drop

2011-03-05T11:18:00.001-05:00

I feel like writing today but about nothing in particular. So here is the Saturday random drop? lol

Got my druid to 85 and was really excited to take her to Tol Barad. She is a leatherworker and those crocs have just been calling my name. It was a blast but boy I need better gear. She is currently ilevel 308, so we have a little to go yet before heroics. She's about half way through Uldum with only Twilight Highlands left to go after. Then the dailies will strike and we'll see how long I will keep up with her.

My DK, who hit 85 a while ago, is still sitting. So I guess the love has worn off for that one. I enjoyed the leveling and mining for volatiles but almost as soon as she hit 85 I quit logging in. I am so fickle.

Disc priest is sitting around 82 and part way through Hyjal. Her herbing has helped my tailor quite a bit. My warrior is about the same place, having finished Hyjal so she'd be at the same level as my husbands priest so we could play together. Yea, that's not going anywhere at the moment.

Pally is still 80 and sitting in Dal. Shammy is still 64 and is currently filling the role of guild banker; cleaning out the gbank regularly. Mage is still 45 and is sitting somewhere. This one will get deleted eventually I know it. I just have to figure out the profession issues. Hmmm, seems like I am missing one or two in this count.

Zab is doing well with an ilevel that would probably allow her to start raiding. Speaking of, I think the guild is stirring. There may be raids in the forcast.
We are currently running retro raids on our normally scheduled raid nights, getting the achievements from all the pre-Cata raids. It's been fun to run around beating up stuff that I used to beat my head against at one time or another.

Moving in to crafting.... Zab has reached 525 in both tailoring and enchanting. I am making cloth bit by bit and buying all the 525 patterns I need. From what I understand from other guildies though, there is not much after that. Make your bracers and pants (I think those are the 2 epics) and then ... well ... wait for more?

Gotta wonder what's going on these days. Seems the content is very packeted.

I'm doing dailies, leveling alts, trying to find rep to grind out for Zab that isn't mind-numbing, and the occasional heroic. Pretty status quo right now. :)

Daily Quest - RP Moment

2011-03-04T15:47:00.001-05:00

While stealing Gigantic Catfish. I fully expect the fisherman to turn around and make a comment, and smack me in the head with his fishing pole.

- A Fisherman's Feast; brought to you by the fine fishermen of Stormwind. Boy do we have a lure for you!

Be Your Own Advocate (Not WoW)

2011-02-26T10:08:00.001-05:00

I don't post non-WoW stuff very often but I wanted to share something from my life these past few months.

In August I realized I had a medical issue. Nothing bad, nothing that couldn't be taken care of with medication. I went to see a doctor about it and was put on some meds that I will probably have to take for the next few years. Soon after that I began having sleep problems. I mean really weird awful sleep problems. I had a really hard time getting to sleep and when I could finally get to sleep I was unable to stay asleep for more than 4-6 hours at a time. You might think that's no big deal. Let me tell you that after a few months of 4 hours of sleep your brain just does not function the way it should. Add to that I quit smoking in early December and you have a recipe for utter crazy.

To make a long story short I was seriously beginning to question my sanity. I was walking around in a fog, feeling miserable all the time. What little energy I had was put towards keeping my job, what little I cared to keep it, logging into WoW to make an appearance for my guild, writing a bit here and there (and reading a lot). I just lost all interest in most things. I was miserable, tired, cranky, angry, lethargic and pretty much didn't care about what was going on around me.
I can relate this back to WoW in that I was hardly working on the wiki for Twisted Nether. I don't feel I was blogging very much because it felt like I was struggling with it, and I nearly gave up my guild because I felt like I had nothing left to contribute to it, and worst of all I didn't really care very much.

What finally changed was that I realized the medication I was on was not the correct dosage for me. The change I made to the meds was very slight but it made a tremendous amount of difference. Within the first week I was sleeping a full night again and actually didn't want to get up the next morning. (which made me very happy!)

My message to you dear readers: You are your own advocate. Pay attention. Doctors do know what to do but they don't always get it right. Ask questions and don't be afraid to say no or to change something if it just doesn't feel right. Do not be blind, deaf and dumb to the way you feel. The same cure does not always work in the same way for everyone. We are all different when it comes to dosages and the way medications will react in our bodies. If you think something is wrong it probably is. If you think something isn't working don't be afraid to ask for something else or a second opinion. In the end, only you know if something is not right and only you can make the change.

It's Good to Be Nice!

2011-02-23T11:03:00.000-05:00

After weeks of Tol Barad dailies I have come to a conclusion. I am going to be nice. Now I'm not a not-nice person in game generally, though I am a keep-to-myself type player lately. I don't mind grouping for quests or asking for help in general, but I will usually wait and see if I can either manage it myself or hope that someone else comes along who needs the same thing I do.
I am usually nice to others and prefer to strike up at least small conversations in PuG's just to break the ice. I generally try to help others who ask or who are near me and need it.

As I had posted not long ago it feels like there are not a lot of people around while questing. The phasing has thrown us all into our own private Idaho of sorts. So when I turned 85 and started working TB dailies I was quite annoyed at A) all the crazy people pulling everything in sight and B) all the crazy people ganking my mobs. It pissed me off that I had to fight others of my same faction to kill that guy in the tower or grab some stupid fish from a rack. After a few weeks of this I found I hated it and I was beginning to hate all those other players out there who were being crazy asshats. It was a big huge I hate-you fest, with everyone running around trying to get what they needed as quickly as possible and screw everyone else. I also found I was starting to act that way. I was running past people who had gotten caught by a bunch of mobs thinking "hey what a moron" while I grabbed that piece of lumber he was headed for. The problem was, in the next area I would become the moron and wonder how all these jerks could run past me and leave me to die! Ha ha karma!

So I decided to turn the tables and go back to my old "let me help you" self. You see I was always one of the first people in my guild to say yes I'll come help you with that elite or run through that dungeon. I don't mind killing things over and over and I don't mind doing dungeons I've done several times. I enjoy just playing, especially with guildies. It gives me an opportunity to spend time with different people in the guild and get to know them and that's important as a GL. There are boundaries of course, but generally I was the helpful sort. The last few months I've been a bit lethargic and have tended to say "no sorry" I'm doing my own thing right now.

So what am I doing differently?
In Tol Barad:
1) Help anyone else in front of me that is killing something (yes I have even helped Hordies). Even if it's just to throw a dot. Many times I've been in a situation in TB where I've been overwhelmed by mobs and I've watched people run by me and leave me to die. I will not do that to others any longer.
2) Invite as many as possible from my faction that are standing around waiting for one of those local bosses to spawn (i.e. Largo or Wellson) so as many people as possible can complete it together.
3) Take my time. I chose to come here to do the dailies. It is not a race. If I don't have time to do it I shouldn't be here. It is NOT important to run past or over others to get something that will respawn in 7 seconds. It's not worth it. Nor is my blood pressure.
4) It does not make me feel good to be an asshole, so don't do it!

In General:
1) I have a do not ignore policy with my officers. If someone asks for help someone must answer them. Even if it's to say I'm sorry I can't help right now. So at least the guildie asking does not feel like they are being ignored by everyone. I personally also try to offer a solution such as I can in 30 minutes if you can wait. If it's something long-ish I might suggest another day. Then I follow up and show up when I say I'm going to.
2) Be brave in trade chat, and be courteous. If I know answers to questions people are asking I answer them. Respectfully. Many times I will simply whisper them directly. I have gotten responses from others that ranged all the way to sending me 25g for helping answer a question. (I sent it back by the way. I didn't answer for a reward, but I thought it was a very nice gesture.)

My goal is to treat others the way I would want to be treated, and without the expectation that others will do the same. Let me tell you right now...they won't. My intention is not to be nice to reap rewards, but to know that I did it. That is the point. I am doing it to feel better about who and what I am in game and what I want to represent to my community.

Hello My Name is Zab, and I'm an Altaholic.

2011-02-22T17:13:00.001-05:00

I haven't been writing much lately because really there's not much that has struck my fancy to write about. I am pursuing my worgen druid and my troll hunter with a few others thrown into the mix. My priest is 81 as well as my warrior. If I have to do Hyjal or Vash'jir one more time I think I'm going to /wrists! This was not a really good idea Blizz...5 levels and 6 zones do not make for very much diversity here.
My warlock is 85 and doing heroics fairly regularly but I've had more fun leveling others. This is indeed the xpac of the alt.
I'm slowly getting some things in RL wrapped up and caught up so I hope to be here more often, if only just to post some Blog Az shared topics.

Oh...I did join the Rift beta for a day. The only thing I can say is it's very WoW-like in the way it feels, it's easy to just roll a character and start playing. The mechanics and play are a bit slow. One thing it has over WoW though was that you can customize the UI. All aspects of the screen are able to be resized and moved around. I do wish Blizz would do that.

/wave

The WoW Disease?

2011-02-02T13:48:00.002-05:00

Hiya. I've read a couple of posts lately that have gotten me thinking about why I'm feeling so lethargic about WoW lately. I feel it, my husband feels it, and a couple of my other friends. People that used to log on regularly aren't logging on as much it seems. I have been attributing it to RL and other things going on as you might have seen from my posts, but really I do think there is something more happening here.
To see what spurred me on in this post please read The Pink Pigtail Inn - The Honeymoon is over.... and Screaming Monkeys - The Cataclysmic WoW Disease.
There are some others I've run across like this ECTmmo.com - Pondering, End-game Motivation and yet another Screaming Monkeys - WoW Crossroads.
Ok...needless to say there are a lot floating around the blogosphere.

Dis-ease. That is what I feel these days. I don't feel any sense of adventure or urgency when it comes to WoW and I think there are a couple of reasons. What it boils down to is that Blizzard has decided what the path is supposed to be. We are shown the path. Pointed down it with huge landing lights and glaring shiny things. The experience and adventure is removed to make it more "friendly", be it casual or not, to the general public. There are few challenges and fewer choices to make. While I totally understand all the pros and cons it has become sterilized for my protection.
Many of these topics were discussed in the blogs I've noted, either by the author or by comments left by others on the articles.

Bring the Player
I have long since thought that this practice was good in theory but not in game. It's great that we all want to play, and we all want to be thought of as good players. We also don't want to be excluded from a raid simply because our class does not bring a specific buff. I agree with that idea. However that is my play style. I believe that regardless of the composition of a team a boss should be able to be taken down. Now, whether that happens as world first, realm first or after months of working on it is up to the guild. If you are part of (or were part of) a guild that raided full time and had exemplary expectations of its members and their abilities, or if you expected to comply with guild victory comes first, then that is your choice and you expect that you may be benched for a certain fight because of your class choice. I believe that "bring the player not the class" mentality that Blizz began implementing in Wrath was a mistake that led to a range of long term problems. the main one for me being class homogenization.

"Tool Kit" - I wish that healers (for example) didn't all have to have the same "tool-kit". I would love my disc priest to be a wonderful tank healer or raid healer where I could excel at that specific niche.

Buffs - The array of buffs that now override each other or cover such a wide range of things is just wild to me. Take for example Mark of the Wild. The stats this now covers are just across the board. That doesn't leave a lot of room for choice if you have buffs like this that cover everyone. Another example would be pally buffs. Where I used to have to think about what class needed which buff of the four, I now have to put little to no thought behind what I'm casting on whom or why.

I think the idea that we'd all like to bring a person as opposed to a class is great, and might make us feel warm and fuzzy, or that we're making better choices; in the end it just makes us all the same.

I play my warlock because I enjoy that style. I enjoy what I bring to a team. I want to retain that specialness that makes me what I am within the context of the game. By making me like everyone else the specialness is tarnished.

Talent Trees
What I'm referring to specifically is how you cannot put any points into another tree until you have reached the bottom of the tree you have opted in to.

If you are min-maxing or doing any kind of theorycrafting there was always just one preferred spec for each class tree that was out there. For instance if you wanted to maximize your combat rogue there was really only one good way to do it and it was the way everyone else was doing it. Be honest. We all know that when push comes to shove we all went back to elitist jerks to see what we needed to do to maximize our dps. In the end we all wound up the same anyways. Looked at from this point of view, the changes to the talent trees make sense. If we were all doing the same thing anyway then what's the beef?

What this eliminated though, were the folks that wanted to think outside the box. The hybrid specs, and the "crazy" people who wanted to go out and test other ideas to see what they could do, or at least get away with. All that cool crazy weird shammy tank stuff.

You now have a very limited way in which to move through a talent tree, and a limited number of ways to be original if you want to. The "free" talents or "fun" talents aren't really that much different from what we used to pick. I myself have maybe 3 points I can put wherever. But in the end those 3 choices don't add up to a lot either.

Questing - Life in the yellow lane
There is a lot to say about this topic actually so I'm going to try and pare it down. I found that while leveling my druid was quirky and fun it was lacking in difficulty and choice. Blizz seems very very sure that they have found the bestest way to quest through the game. They are so sure, that they have pretty much mapped out your quest experience for you. Something Asa wrote as a comment to Ionomonkey's post that I hadn't thought of was that all the quests are yellow. There are no red or orange quests. There are no group quests. Hell, there are not even any really difficult quests. I found that whenever I had to fight an elite I was given 1 of 3 things. A) a companion(s) that would fight with me B) an object that would reduce the elite to a regular and make them easier, or C) the elite would stop fighting at about 1/2 health and give up, or would begin the fight at 1/2 health. All of these mechanics are there to allow someone to solo quest the entire game. It has also been seen as a definite nerf to anyone questing with another person as a team. You either don't feel challenged or you are getting separated by cut-scenes on a regular basis. Both of these scenarios I've experienced.

Leveling alts can be daunting to say the least. Which is why I found leveling my worgen so refreshing. It didn't take nearly as long and was easy to get through, as well as provided me with new and unique entertainment. I vassilate on this topic because I had fun but somehow it seemed too easy. Is easy ok? Yes sometimes it is. I wanted an easy leveling experience. I think I miss the challenges though. I miss the elite ogres in STV. I miss the difficulty level of some of the quests. I miss having to ask for help in general chat or finding a group to complete something....but at the same time I don't. I have done that a lot in my leveling/questing career in Azeroth, and numerous times. At the same time those are the times that I most remember. Whether with fondness or anger they are forever embedded in my memory banks.

The 80-85 experience is something of a different animal. New places new faces and new mechanics. I have touched on these in a few posts prior but lets go over a few.
Phasing: awesome and not awesome, again I go back and forth. To experience it was really cool at times but as I look around me I realize I can't see anyone else, and therefore have no connection to anyone else. It was also very difficult to coordinate some quests with other people even if you were doing the exact same one at the same time. One of you would inevitably pop into a phase before the other.

Lonely - Generally during my quest experience I would only see 1 or 2 other people and almost always Alliance. I rarely ever saw Horde, it was almost as if they'd disappeared off the face of the planet. The biggest exception to this was Deepholm. The zone hub is both factions and it was common to see everyone hanging out there. Other than that I quested in a bubble. The connections of playing with others now only come from major cities and trade chat and my guild chat. I don't feel I have a connection to the people I may be questing along side of. I'm just making my way along and once in a while I think "oh hey, there's a druid over there doing what I'm doing". For me it was mostly a good thing. I enjoy solo questing a lot. On the flip side it no longer feels like an MMO, and at times it's hard to believe that there are actually other real live people playing. I wonder how the quest experience feels on a PVP server?

Dungeons
Between the forums, Ghostcrawlers "heroics are hard" blog post and the myriad other news and blog sites talking about this one, its easy to understand why some folks are saying "OMG leave me alone!". Let me say I have hardly set foot in any dungeons. I have probably been in a total of 10 heroics. There are two reasons for this. One was my own impression of what they were going to be like. Being a warlock I knew I would be expected to CC. Doing it after not doing it for so long is scary. I love it and I hate it. If you fuck it up it's a horrible feeling of not making the grade. If you succeed there is no better feeling than being able to complete a dungeon well and feeling like you are good at playing your class. Second is the horror stories I hear and read. Both from my guildmates and from other blog and forum posts. The absolute icky-ness of having groups fail one after another is enough to make me wait for nights I can go with guildies.

Time is another issue. I was around during vanilla and I remember how long it took to do a dungeon like Scholomance and I embrace that. I just can't seem to find the time and the inclination in the right amounts at the same time these days. More a problem on my side then Blizz's, I don't mind taking 2 hours to do a dungeon if it's fun.

Fun. Hmm that's a good question. Am I having fun right now? I am if I'm playing around. Leveling alts, seeing zones I hadn't visited in a long time or playing with guildies. Other than that I'm not feeling compelled to do anything. There is nothing driving me forward right now.

One last topic -

Crafting
I have not spent an exorbitant amount of time on this, so perhaps the lack of skill up is my own doing. It's been kinda coming along like my leveling and gear has been. What I've found is you better have a gathering profession, alts with gathering professions, or lots of spare cash floating around for purchasing mats. The amount of volatiles it takes to make some of the higher end items is a little out of control. Specifically the problem I am having is tailoring and being able to make one piece of cloth such as Dream of Azshara. This item takes 30 volatiles once a week. You might say that's not much every 7 days. Without a gathering profession that's a lot of fishing or a lot of money for me. To make the other pieces of dreamcloth it takes 30 of all the other kinds of volatiles out there as well. So now me and my guildies spend our time farming mats and doing dailies. Bored much? I can choose to spend my time this way or not leveling my professions as quickly. I realize that's my choice but it's a strange one. I have never had this kind of a roadblock in my crafting before. Every week so far I've found myself in a position to make one piece of cloth. Needless to say, so far I have 3 pieces total, and the only reason I have those is because I brought up my engineer and my husband has been sending me volatile life on occasion. Either the drop rates for these mats needs to increase to meet the demand that is in the recipes and patterns, or the amount required needs to change. I have a feeling, that like all other WoW endeavors, this too shall be nerfed over time. The question is do you want in on the ground floor or not.

So that's my take on why WoW has become a bit of a drudgery lately. I'm not on the verge of quitting or anything. I'm still logging in nearly every night. My priorities have just changed. I heard on a podcast recently, and I can't recall which one, that this is the expansion for alts. I am beginning to believe that's the basic truth. If it wasn't for all the professions I've skilled up I think I'd delete the remaining four 80's I have and reroll them just to have the leveling experience and enjoy the game. Hey Blizz! I need more toon slots!

Meet the Worgen - Part 2 10-60 Leveling

2011-01-14T17:18:00.002-05:00

I felt like this part of this topic deserved it's own post. I'd like to talk about some of the areas I leveled through, and share a bit of my experience. I wish I'd have had the foresight to share this as I was leveling but I think I was having too much fun.

I chose a rather strange leveling path. I picked particular areas that I was most interested in seeing.

Westfall -
There seemed to be a lot of talk about Westfall so I wanted to go check it out for myself. I was not particularly drawn into the story line of the investigator and the shadowy figure. All in all I found Westfall to be empty to me. The quests didn't hold me and I didn't feel compelled enough. It felt contrived. I was also very put off by all the bums and poor lost souls of Stormwind. If we are supposed to be so heroic why am I being accosted by vagrants all of a sudden? Seriously if I wanted that I'd go downtown. I was disappointed. Notables include lots of flight points that seemed unnecessary and a seemingly disjointed story line.
Redridge -
OMG I hated Redridge. I did it once on Zabine and every trip through there since has just been a trial of patience. You could not complete the quests there unless you found a group, whether it told you you needed one or not. This time around it was quite fun. The quests progressed around the zone in a way that didn't make it feel like I was running really far really a lot. The team of recon soldiers they give you to help you complete the quests were amusing. The last few quests in the gun turret/tank were a lot of fun, plus it takes you through the remainder of the zone where you will get the discovery achievement and the zone quest achievement nearly on top of each other. The only quest I had a hard time with was sneaking around, hitting the orcs, throwing distraction devices and gathering something and blowing up towers all at the same time. This zone did make me think. It wasn't mindless questing all the time and it was quirky. It made me pay attention to what I was doing. Notables include the final quest sequence and tank battle.
Duskwood -
I have always loved Duskwood. Though back in the day it was the first zone in Eastern Kingdoms that I met that was long...and I mean in dimension. The running was horrid. To the graveyard, back to Darkshire...to the graveyard aaaand...back to Darkshire. (and I'm talking back when your first mount was 40). Once you got a mount at 20 it wasn't nearly as bad. I found that the quests hadn't changed all that much aside from a good paring down. And I do mean good. It seemed it was just enough to keep me interested in the zone, just enough of the old quests I remember, and just enough to get me out and moving on. Notables include a flight point at the graveyard and a worgen caravan with vendors right where you need them.
Northern Stranglethorn -
Against my guilds better judgment I have always been partial to Stranglethorn. In fact it's my favorite zone in the game. With the exception of the last 5-6 quests out of Booty Bay when you really got tired of the place, I have always enjoyed it. I chose to go here mainly for the Nesingwary quests. I like the achievements and wanted to see how it had changed. Hmmm....only 1 page is needed for Green Hills of Stranglethorn now. I was a bit flabbergasted. Ok, so I hated collecting all those pages, and the last couple times I did it I just got most of them from the AH but still...ONE?! Big jump from over the top down to one but ok. It's a quest that is now relegated to the small insignificant bring me something quests. I can live with that. The game hunter lines are still there, though the amount of panthers, tigers and raptors you need to kill has been reduced to 10. A very easy to manage number. As with Duskwood I found that STV had been pared down for the most part. Near the end of the zone I frankly couldn't wait to move on and see something with a little more change to it. Notable things in this zone include the changes to ZG and the quest chain with the raptor baby that begins nearly right at the start of the zone, in the rebel camp quest lines. The giant whirlpool that breaks up Northern STV and the Cape of, the quest givers at the southern camp that give you quests to send you to Scarlet Monastery and Gnomergan, and the lack of any Vile Reef quests, which was refreshing. I would be interested in seeing the Horde side of this area since they have a new village near ZG.

From here I decided I would head to the Hero's Call Board and see where I could get into trouble next.

Eastern Plaguelands-
In spite of the fact that I'd heard the plaguelands weren't plaguey any longer this zone seemed to retain a lot of the plague-ness that has plagued us for so long. I believe it's WPL that has sloughed off a bit of it's viral load and is getting a little greener.
The call board sends you right to Fiona, a worgen traveling caravan entrepreneur. The entire quest line for the zone starts here and it's very nice and easy going. Traveling with the caravan takes you to all the towers (quest hubs) and when you complete them takes you on to the next area. Along the way you visit Darrowshire and the Battle of Darrowshire quest chain. It eventually takes you to Light's Hope Chapel where you pick up quest snippets that send you to Stratholme, and generally by the time you're done you will be fairly well off with Argent Dawn. Notables include way too many flight points. I think this zone has the most with something like 8-10 fp's in this little area. Make sure you take Fiona's Lucky Charm as a quest reward. This gives you buff in the zone that enables you to occasionally pick up an extra sack of loot off any mob. About 1/2 way through the zone you are eligible to get Mr. Grubbs from one of these sacks. Mr. Grubbs is a miniature version of the huge disgusting larvae you come across around the zone. I found EPL to be refreshing and pretty cool. Considering this area used to center around group, Argent Dawn and Naxrammas quests and turn in's, it now feels like there is more to do there for the average quester.
Badlands -
I had heard how much fun badlands was and I have to agree. This quest chain actually begins at Light's Hope Chapel with a goblin who rockets you all the way down to the coast of the Badlands for you. From there it's nothing like it used to be. Being Alliance there was never much here anyways. Now there's a very funny story quest line involving Deathwing that you are hard-pressed to miss. Even if you go there on your level 85 this is a must do. Turn on your low-level quest finder and head to the big scar in the center of the zone and you'll have a blast! Other than that there are some goblin quests out of a new village called Fuselight that involve the red and black dragonflights, a minor excursion into Angor Fortress and the Ogre mound to the southwest. It's quick, painless and a lot of fun. Notables include Deathwing quest chain in the center scar and the cool puzzle quests that are found in the newly uncovered archeological areas (also near the center). From here there is a quest to take you into Searing Gorge. Since I didn't want to go there I headed back to the call board.
Blasted Lands-
From level 35 on I also started doing some dungeons along the way, so by this point I was around 53 or so. Hearing that there were friendly Murlocs and overbearing Naga in Blasted Lands, as well as a newly acquired area called Surwich. I headed out to the site of the Dark Portal. Blasted Lands is decidedly different, even though it doesn't appear that way at first glance. The quest lines here are not what I remember them. The terrain is basically the same but the quests have changed significantly. A change for the better to be sure. The only reason I remember going to this zone in the past was 1) scorpid scale farming 2) some quest chain that got you something good at the end of a group quest where you fight a demon (or some such) on a really big mountain you have to get teleported to after fighting a bunch of weird warlocks chained magically to stones around the zone. *breathe* The demon on top of the mountain is still there, and there is a long quest line to get to him but it's much easier to manage, much more interesting, much quicker, and you don't have to have a group to complete it. That line takes up the majority of the western side of the zone. The eastern side concerns helping an enslaved Murloc community, complete with cute baby Murlocs to save. The Surwich area is another chain unto itself that ends with The Downfall of Marl Wormthorn. The only thing about this quest line I can reccommend is have plenty of bagspace. To bring this guy down you have to get a bit grindy and farmy to make a Demonic Vessel. This involves several bat, bear, and cat parts that have to be farmed then combined, then combined again. It took a lot longer than I had expected and got quite annoying after a bit. I did this area with a friend so we were farming twice as much....totally not fun. All the quests in this area seemed to give Gilnean rep, which was definitely a plus. Other than the long farming part it went relatively fast. Also included in this zone are pre-cursor quests from the infantry near the dark portal and then that's it you're done and they're sending you off to Outlands.

Along the way -
I realize this is not nearly all the zones you can see. I took a different path from the one prescribed by the worgen quest givers at Darnassus but I had a lot of fun. I took in a few dungeons as well including Gnomeregan, Scarlet Monastery (all 4 wings), Maraudon, Sunken Temple and Stratholme. Gnomer hasn't changed much. With the exception that the punch cards were no where to be found. Joyous! Scarlet Monastery was fun and easy. The changes were minimal since those dungeons are fairly linear. Mara was a nightmare. It still seemed to have both sides connected as well as the center area with Princess. It took us a while to find her once I convinced my group I knew where she was. This after we'd gone through nearly both orange and purple sides in the never-ending loop of death. Sunken Temple was amazingly cut. I knew it was coming, but really they took it from 3 levels to 1. All the feather quests and troll killing and up this stairway down that one are gone. You have all the green wyrms/dragonkin around the center and all the quests on that "level" are still there. The rest is gone. I only miss it because I spent so much time in there I had learned it and I was fairly proud of that feat. lol Stratholme was relatively unchanged. There is still Live and Dead sides respectively. All the dungeons offer quests at the entrances, which unfortunately have to be turned back in at the same location. Otherwise, like the Cata dungeons, quests are easy, straightforward, and pretty much all-inclusive.

So there it is, my newest leveling experiences. I hope you enjoyed these tidbits of info and perhaps are interested in checking out a zone or two."Have fun stormin' the castle!" :)

Meet the Worgen - Part 1 Race/Class

2011-01-13T17:15:00.003-05:00

This is Kaiote. She is a level 64 worgen druid and she is the new addition to my WoW family, and I am totally in love with her right now. I waited for quite a while for her to arrive. I had started a druid once before but stopped when I heard that worgen druids would be introduced. I wanted to enjoy the entire leveling experience with this new race.

Ever so patiently I chose and saved a name and then, with heavy anticipation, I waited for my fuzzy to arrive. I cannot say I am disappointed, nor can I say I'm completely happy with the worgen race, but it has been a lot of fun to learn a new class and enjoy the new content all at the same time.

Worgen Race:

Everyone is right. The females look a lot like a chihuahua. There are features I don't particularly care for but they don't turn me off either. The forehead is a bit too rounded. They don't hunch over or look vicious like the males do, which I find a bit disconcerting. Her eyes are a bit large but they don't bother me very much. She doesn't have a tail, which I find strange. The posts and forum threads I have read on this topic have pretty much nailed it. The drawings I have seen would be improvements. All that being said, she is mine and I love her. **here I was going to link a thread to the forums but I can't seem to find the single post out of the many that are out there; go to the forums and search "worgen female"** As I mentioned in a previous post, I would really like her to NOT laugh like a chicken. I'm disappointed with this particular bug as I thought that it would be a fix that would happen relatively quickly. It's been a little over a month and I am still a chicken. Though in moonkin this seems oddly appropriate. The male worgen look pretty cool but I haven't really stopped to look at them that often. The new helms on the male worgen look like muzzles, and in some cases just make me laugh. In other cases look like they've been committed to an asylum. The males seem more feral and worgen-like and I wish they had taken those same elements to the females. However, in typical Blizzard fashion the girls and guys do not always look like they are from the same race. I.E. trolls and draenei. General characteristics are there but all the females have boobs and curves and are more "pretty" compared to the males. No difference here and it shouldn't be a big surprise to anyone either.

Worgen leveling: (includes minor spoilage)

The first 5 levels are spent as human and you're helping to defend the city and help the city-folk evacuate because of the worgen invasion. Then...you are bitten. There is a totally awesome, brought tears of joy to my eyes, cut scene. I had seen this scene before but some how in the midst of the quest chain it became very powerful to me. It was well thought out and well placed in the quest experience. From level 5-10 you are all worgen. You are now helping to evacuate villagers from the surrounding countryside both from earthshattering events (phasing), and from Sylvanas and the Forsaken who are trying to take the area as a strategic location. I didn't feel that the night elves played a tremendous role, though they were evident in the areas as you progressed. I didn't feel like they had come to my rescue as much as expected. For the most part I felt the 1-14 worgen leveling was good. (you actually end somewhere between levels 12 and 14) The story was very well put together as well as the quest chains. Leveling was fast paced and fun, but at times I was left wondering what was going on. It was so fast at times that I felt like I was being shoved through and had missed something. I'd like to take some time to go back and do it again. It may have been due to the fact that there were several others playing through at the same time. At the end you are taken to Rut'theran Village and prompted to begin questing from Darnassus to Darkshore to continue.

Druid Class:

I am running boomkin and quite enjoying it. I have not really played a druid before. The first druid I had I took to level 29 or 30 before I deleted her in anticipation of worgen. I remember having a hard time with cat/bear and it didn't feel good to me. It seemed like at that level that was your only choice was cat and bear. This time around, with the new talent tree system, when I began casting wrath it felt great. Even though moonkin form didn't come for another few levels it still felt like a balanced druid and felt good to play. I didn't feel like I was waiting for spells to come at higher levels so I could feel like I was playing my chosen spec. As I've progressed and my spell book has expanded I find I'm really enjoying the lunar/solar eclipse mechanic. The only problem I have is figuring out which way I should be going and getting my fingers tangled up once in a while, but usually after a few minutes it's easy to get into the swing. Coming from playing a warlock I am used to having a wide range of button choices in my arsenal. Having a toon you need to think a bit more about has kept me interested in exploring rotations and spells.

I do have to say though, aside from my warlock, alts are a passing fancy for me. I have rarely stuck with any one of them, though I have professed to loving them all at the time I was leveling. I enjoy the leveling and play but don't necessarily enjoy the end-game play style. But, I'm going to stick it out and see if this is just puppy-love or a true blown romance with the druid.

Your Slip is Showing

2011-01-13T14:10:00.000-05:00

A quick foreward..... I have been wanting to post for a few weeks now but I have so many topics floating around I haven't been able to pick one. That being said, this is something that is not one of them. lol

What do you do when you've run out of hutzpah, gas, determination....just the plain ole' will to keep playing? I have hit that little wall. I have not been stirred up or excited about Cataclysm since I was at Blizzcon. I've run out of steam a little bit, and I'm just not feelin' it this time.

Life in general has been, well...crazy for me. Not hectic, but just head crazy. I am going through some personal medical things which tend to drag me down. I am also on my 6th week of no smoking. I am trying to give myself some space on this one (at least 6 months) before I worry that I've lost my mind completely. Just these issues alone have left me feeling rather inadequate. All those horrid feelings of self-worth that were tied up in cigarettes suddenly come out. Needless to say I have avoided dungeons for the most part. I am quick to anger and quick to feel hurt. The thick skin has thinned a bit and I don't want to put myself or my fellow players through that. After all I've read and heard about how horrible heroic dungeons have become I am not able to put myself in that situation with any sort of comfort. Frankly, I'm scared out of my mind to attempt it right now. It makes me anxious and self-conscious just thinking about it.
In that same vein, I am a guild leader. I feel that I'm not leading at the moment. Serious consideration has been given to stepping down simply because I feel I'm not being a strong leader. Not to mention that I feel I'm not actively engaged in the game or the guild. I am lucky in that I have tremendous officers who are there, and supportive. One or two of them know what I'm going through and still think I am awesome, and still believe the guild is the best it's ever been. Which of course makes me think I must be missing something or it just must be me feeling the funk. Unfortunately my mood, attitude and self-esteem fluctuate daily. One moment I'm fine and the next someone does or says something that triggers me, and all of a sudden my brain is on fire and I hate everyone and I'm sitting on my hands desperately trying not to go off in gchat. Whether my personal issues have any bearing on how I feel about the expansion, I'm not sure. It is very probable that real life is just spilling out all over the game and coloring how I feel about it.

Right now I don't know what to do to "fix" it. I have learned that when I feel I need to fix something it means I'm not in a place where I can make a good decision about anything at all. It is a knee-jerk reaction to feeling inadequate in some way and is a defense mechanism that I normally handled with cigarettes. So what I'm left with is; the best course of action is inaction. Let it ride. Which also stresses me out. I am, after all, a fixer at heart. So I am learning to let it go and trust that I will make the right decisions when they need to be made. Whether in RL or ingame.

I hope to get my ideas sorted out and structured enough to make some decent WoW posts. It just might be another few weeks.

And...Here We Are

2010-12-16T12:50:00.002-05:00

Its been about a week since Cata launched and I have been quite wrapped up in it. I have taken a few days off work to be immersed in my favorite subject and these are my impressions.
Initial install and day 1 play was relatively smooth. I had no problems logging in on launch morning and was up and running fairly quickly. I am always very shy about heading into new content. I tend to kinda linger. I take my time reading quests and try to let the initial onslaught of players wing by me so I can go at my own pace. It looks like the leveling is extremely quick. Not at all what I expected. When they said these 5 levels should take as long as the last 10 they lied. Even my slow pace has left me sitting on the cusp of 84 not 9 days from launch. Usually it takes me a good 1-4 months to level through, and I enjoy that pace. For me leveling is part of the fun of the game and I get bored easily once I hit cap. I enjoy raiding but it's not my only reason for playing. Someone in my guild hit Loremaster of Cataclysm last night. Now she doesn't know what to do with herself. If I hit that point this soon I'll end up quitting. That's ridiculous, and that's half the game Blizz. Do you really want people blasting through the content that fast then being bored out of their minds? That is a sure fire way to lose your customer base in 6 months.
For me it's all been rather surreal. I have made it through half of Hyjal, all of Vash'jir and I am about 2/3's of the way through Deepholm. I have been mostly impressed with the quest chains, very impressed with the artwork and left kinda wondering with the lore. There are minor quest bugs all over the place but they are few and far between. The questing has been fast and well centralized. Rarely do you have to wonder where you're going next. On this note it is very quick. If you don't enjoy questing then this is definitely for you. I haven't felt like an area is particularly overwhelmed by other players either. I see them around, but for the most part we aren't ganking each others mobs and I feel relatively left alone which has been nice. Though I look around and wonder where everyone else is every once in a while. The only time I ran into a mob of people was in Hyjal the very first day and even then after about a dozen quests the oodles of questers seemed to break up quite a bit. I attribute that to if you want to go fast you can, and you pretty much will zoom by others in the area and then you never see them again. You won't continue to run into the same people unless you're questing at the same pace.

There are big guild achievement bugs. Speaking of...I am terrifically pissed off at the guild leveling and achievement system as well as personal guild reputation. Blizz reneged some stuff, on launch day of all things, and removed guild achievements from contributing to guild leveling. They have capped the daily amount of leveling that can occur as well as capped the weekly or daily personal reputation you can get with your guild. While I am informed that I am still getting guild reputation in my chat window, my bar is not moving?! grrrr
I understand that this was established so that small guilds are not penalized. WHAT? My guild had come up with a plan of attack in regards to achievements and guild leveling and on day 1 we had to just chuck it out the window. I don't care about smaller guilds not getting it fast enough. Life is not fair, get over it! If we as a guild can level faster then that is just the way the cookie crumbles. Why should my guild be penalized because smaller guilds cannot level faster? Why should large guilds be penalized because my medium sized guild doesn't have the numbers to churn it out as fast? This was one case where the product did not meet the promises. I have been really disappointed in this aspect of the expansion.

New races are very cool. Ok, well the one I've played. I am totally in love with my worgen even though she's broken. There are a handful of emotes she can't do including laugh. Which is really quite annoying when you LOL in an instance and sound like a chicken. Her howl when she's in running wild doesn't work and she does the howl visual with a growl sound. In other words her /mountspecial is broken. There are a few other minor ones that I can't remember right off the top of my head. The worgen jokes are really weird, and as is Blizzard's style, pushing the limit at times. All in all I think they're very cool and can't wait for these small issues to be corrected, eh hem. I haven't tried a goblin yet but plan on rolling one soon so I can at least experience the starter area.

All this leaves me feeling a little behind the curve as far as leveling has been going. So here's the rundown as of today.
Zabine (main) level 83 - less than two bubbles from 84 and mostly done with Deepholm
new worgen druid level 35; I guess this has been my time sink
level 80 alts: one has gotten her training and is settled into Stormwind. The others still sit in Dalaran and are clueless except my DK. She is doing Argent Tourney dailies in anticipation of moving on once she gets the tabard, and that will be a while.
Level other alts: still sitting at level other and being contemplated for deletion or race changes.
Horde main hunter is still level 79, and as of yesterday is doing some Winter Veil quests. I have no plans for her at the moment. All other horde alts including new troll druid are sitting patiently wondering if the world was shattered or not.

I think with all the toons I have I'm feeling a little overwhelmed. I'm not sure what to do next or with what toon. We have many 85's now in our guild now and one guy who has gotten a couple of his toons to 85, one after another. I think he's on his third now. Crazy I tell ya!!

WoW and Addiction

2010-12-03T10:05:00.000-05:00

This is a topic that people have written copious amounts on. I would like to briefly touch on it, perhaps circling back around further down the line. We have all heard the stories or had an experience where ourself or a guildie was given an ultimatum to quit the game or lose a spouse. Or when someone comes to the realization that they play to much, or is spending to much time in-game and not enough time in real life (RL). I myself recently lost a guildie to the first. His wife finally said its WoW or the marriage. He was a smart man and said goodbye to us, if even for a period of time. We haven't seen him in about 3 months. I wish him well, and hope he's able to return some time down the road. The podcast The Instance recently covered this briefly in Episode 210 regarding a caller that was looking for suggestions on how to get his wife into playing WoW before it destroyed their relationship. They didn't spend a great deal of time on the topic but they brought up some great points around the subject of balancing game and RL. I'd suggest a listen if you have the time.

Before I go any further, I am not a licensed psychologist. I have not treated anyone, and I do not claim to have the answers. I am simply delving into a topic I find interesting and presenting my own hypotheses and opinions. If you find any of this "rings true" with you, or you feel you need to talk with someone or need help, please contact a professional.

So let's get down to brass tacks. What is addiction? I am going to give you my definition of what I believe addiction is. This comes from my own studies as well as my own personal experiences.
Addiction is a set of behaviors that a person creates to cope with a percieved negative situation. These behaviors can develop over time, usually from childhood. As the child grows up the behaviors they learned to cope with stress or other situations modify and may become ritualized around a central idea or theme, culminating in a sense of gratification or relief. The rituals become ingrained through repetition until the process becomes the "normal" response to a negative stimulus. The person then becomes "addicted to", either emotionally or physically, the process and subsequent fulfillment, and cannot become un-enmeshed from it. The end goal, or fulfillment can change but the process usually stays the same for the individual.
There are lots of ways to break down those few sentences. Behaviors are usually learned in childhood or early adolescence and become response patterns to negative stimulus such as adversity, discomfort, pain and anxiety. Defense mechanisms. I describe it as a process of learned patterned behavior because I have watched addicts move their addictions from one thing to another, while retaining the same patterns and reasoning.
By looking at it from this perspective it is easy to understand how people can become addicted to not just drugs and alcohol, but sex, gambling and even video games. The behaviors are developed to alleviate stressers that the individual may never have been equipped to deal with. Such as violence in the home at a young age, or simply having parents that were unable to adequately protect the child. In other words, the child is not taught how to appropriately care for themselves emotionally or physically, set boundaries, or deal with life stressers at an age appropriate level. The process or ritual can be days, weeks or months in preparation and is usually where the "high" is developed. It is the anticipation of the act. The ritual or preparation then culminates in the use of, or fulfillment of the act. The process becomes more refined as the addiction develops and eventually the ritual part may be thrown out completely to get right to the fulfillment stage. This is where you would find severe drug addiction or alcoholism. This is also where you might find people who "act out" instead of doing normal everyday things such as working, sleeping, eating and bathing. It is controversial whether or not brain chemistry plays a part in this process. I believe that it is a combination of the result of repetitive ritual and the fulfillment of that, and the chemicals we create in our brain that tell us it is pleasurable while we are experiencing the ritual and culmination (endorphins, seratonin etc).
Let's break that down into something simple. I had ice cream last night. I like ice cream. I think about ice cream during the day and about how I'm going to have it when I get home from work. The idea of having the ice cream creates a sensation of pleasure culminating in eating the ice cream. Now when I feel anxious at work I think of ice cream to illicite that pleasurable response. I create the ritual by thinking about getting the ice cream and how I will prepare it and eat it. Now multiply that. Every time I feel anxious, worried, upset or sad I now revert to that idea of ice cream and eating ice cream. I now want it all the time and it becomes a means to an end so to speak. Every time I feel upset ice cream or the thought of ice cream becomes my way to assuage those fears and make myself feel better. I will even now create negative sitatuations so that I can enjoy my ice cream. After a fashion I will begin to skip the ritual of thinking about the ice cream and I'll make sure I have it handy. Now I am an emotional ice cream addict. Now if that ice cream contains chemicals like cocaine or nicotine, or I have created a chemical response in my brain through this process, I can also develop a physical addiction to it and my body as well as my mind will no longer be able to live without ice cream.
That is really over-simplified but that is the basic idea.

Putting addiction in these terms you can see how World of Warcraft can be seen from that perspective. If an individual uses it to fulfill a need they are not otherwise equipped to deal with, it can become a substitute for real life. Or more to the point, for dealing with real life.
The addict will use a substance, in this case video games, as a release from stress on a regular basis, and continue to turn to it regardless of the consequences.

World of Warcraft, and video games in general, offer many situations and stimuli that are very appealing to an 'addictive personality', and are the things that keep us all coming back time and time again.

Instant gratification - I get a quest. I complete it. I return and turn it in. I receive a reward immediately.
Power - I am a hero. I have powers not available in real life. Magic, shape-shifting or great strength.
Accomplishment - I can defeat obstacles of what appear to be immense proportions. I can save the world.
Physique - I am beautiful, muscular, smart, charismatic etc. I have attributes that I do not possess in real life.
Social or Solo - I can choose who, when, and where I want to hang out with. If I don't like you I don't have to talk to you or anyone. If I want to be alone I can. Conversely, I can create or find a team of people I do want or choose to spend time with.
Availability - If I am not in game I can listen about it in a podcast, watch videos about it on youtube or read about it in magazines or on-line. I can fuel my ritual.

With these attributes it's easy to see how WoW can be become addictive in the true sense of the word. I know that when I have a bad day I can't wait to log in, catch some battlegrounds, and kick some ass! I have also used the game to procrastinate. Like I said, who wants to do the dishes every day. Blech! I have also used WoW as a way to avoid. Last year my husband had open heart surgery after a sudden trip to the ER. When I was not at the hospital, eating or sleeping, I was playing. Just to give my mind something else to think about and do. Otherwise I would have either sat mindless in front of the TV (to do the same thing), or worried myself silly. It helped alleviate my stress a little and gave me something else to focus on. It also gave me a few people to talk to and therefore kept me from isolating myself and generally being miserable. Well...more miserable.

So from my own experience it's easy to let a video game take over once in a while. In fact, I'm betting that we have all done it at one time or another. Played when perhaps we should have been taking care of something else. I believe that is normal and necessary. It is important in our lives to have play time and laugh time. We all want relief from our normal everyday lives or from our normal everyday stress. Every person finds their own way to decompress and escape. Some people work out, some read books, some go to movies and some play video games.

Do I believe that World of Warcraft can become an addiction? Most definitely. It has the appeal and is innately constructed to draw us in. Do I believe that every time we play or that every time we use it to escape is dangererous? No, absolutely not. I do believe that the potential for someone who has already developed, or is in the process of developing patterns of addictive behavior, WoW can become a problem

As for my opening statement? WoW and spouses? I would have to agree with Scott and Randy. If there is a problem with a spouse and WoW then there is something else going on that needs to be addressed, and WoW is just a symptom of bigger things. The issue can be with either spouse, and does not necessarily mean there is a problem with the person playing World of Warcraft. Begin talking about it or seek help. Either way nip it in the bud before it becomes bigger than it needs to be. There's nothing wrong with a little counseling. Everyone needs a little help sometimes. We were not born with the tools to make it through all the wierd, crazy and wonderful things life can throw at us.

WoW gets a bad rep. I believe it's because it's such a niche world. It takes a great deal of time and devotion. It has it's own language (leet-speak). It involves technology (geek/nerd). It is generally singular or small group in nature. It is not seen as contributing positively, such as working out might be viewed. (Which by the way can be an addiction) These are things that the general population still kinda scoffs at. Think of movies like "Revenge of the Nerds". WoW is a video game, the operative word being GAME. That word alone reminds us that it is something that is done to pass the time, not take time. I'm happy that games in general are accepted as more mainstream these days. UnfortunateIy, I believe gaming is still seen as a childs past time, or a waste of time.

In the end we all have times when we'd rather play than work. The trick is balance and the old adage, all things in moderation.

Now go kick some ass!!

Leveling in the New World...of Warcraft - What are the new zone levels?

2010-12-03T08:53:00.002-05:00

I, along with several guildies, have been caught in a strange predicament. If you were leveling anywhere in Azeroth (1-60) prior to 4.0.3a you are probably in the same situation. Where should you now be questing?

I took a little trip over to Wowhead and found a leveling map and guide. Found here.

I couldn't find just a list of where to go at what level so I have put that map and area guide into a handy dandy list of leveling ranges by zone. I thought I'd share it with everyone.
I think I got every thing. If you see something missing in the level 1-60 areas please let me know.

Eastern Kingdoms
1-10    Dun Morogh (A)
1-10    Elwynn Forest (A)
1-10    Tirisfal Glades (H)

1-10    Eversong Woods (H)
10-15  Westfall (A)
10-20 Ghostlands (H)
10-20 Loch Modan (A)
10-20 Silverpine Forest (H)
15-20 Redridge Mountains (A)
20-25 Hillsbrad Foothills (H)
20-25 Duskwood (A)
25-30 Wetlands (A/H)
25-30 Arathi Highlands (A/H)
25-35 Northern Stranglethorn (A/H)
30-35 Cape of Stranglethorn (A/H)
35-40 Western Plaguelands (A/H)
35-45 Badlands (A/H)
40-45 Eastern Plaguelands (A/H)
45-50 The Hinterlands (A/H)
45-55 Blasted Lands (A/H)
45-55 Searing Gorge (A/H)
50-55 Swamp of Sorrows (A/H)
50-60 Burning Steppes (A/H)
50-60 Deadwind Pass (A/H)

Kalimdor
1-10    Azuremyst Isle (A)
1-10    Teldrassil (A)
1-10    Durotar (H)
1-10    Mulgore (H)
1-12    The Lost Isles & Kezan (H)
10-20 Darkshore (A)
10-20 Bloodmyst Isle (A)
10-20 Azshara (H)
10-20 Northern Barrens (H)
15        Moonglade (A/H)
20-25 Ashenvale (A/H)
25-30 Stonetalon Mountains (A/H)
30-35 Southern Barrens (A/H)
30-40 Desolace (A/H)
35-40 Feralas (A/H)
35-40 Dustwallow Marsh (A/H)
40-45 Thousand Needles (A/H)
45-50 Tanaris (A/H)
45-50 Felwood (A/H)
50-55 Un'Goro Crater (A/H)
50-55 Winterspring (A/H)
55-60 Silithus (A/H)

WoW Psychology & Philosophy - Intro

2010-11-26T15:00:00.001-05:00

For a while now I have been putting a great deal of thought into this topic. I'd like to take my field of study, psychology, and start to put it into a WoW perspective. It always seems weird to put words like "games" in the same sentence with "psychology", "sociology" or "philosophy", but the more I play and read the more I find it fascinating.

My first inkling of this almost made me quit playing the game altogether. I was doing dailies and thinking about how I should be cleaning my house instead of cleaning my bank. My reaction was immense. I was appalled. I thought, if we can live our lives through this game does that mean I'm foregoing my responsibilities in life, and instead, playing at my life through WoW? We can cook, clean, do chores (dailies), and slay dragons on the side. All from the comfort of one chair. That was when I really evaluated my play time and began deliberately taking time from the game to make sure I was taking care of life and not avoiding it. My second head turning point was when I went to see the movie "Surrogates". The premise is people that live their lives through robots or surrogates. They stay at home and lay on a couch or bed and send their surrogate out to do their daily work, go to the store, interact with others, or whatever else, and they essentially live through them vicariously. The general "feeling" of the movie was that these people had quit understanding what it was to BE human. They no longer experienced every day life and human interchange in person. The surrogates were immune to disease and death and allowed the user to feel superhuman. All the while the real people became depressed, unhappy, and antisocial. They thought that being a surrogate was living and found they weren't really living at all. It was a really interesting exercise in social networking taken to the extreme. I found the ideas behind the story very relevant to my MMO experience, and how and why we play. We have the ability to live vicariously through our avatars. I'm sure this path has been explored a number of different times so I'm not going to go any further with that topic in this post.
My third and the deciding factor in me actually starting to blog about this topic is the book I read two months ago, "World of Warcraft and Philosophy - Wrath of the Philosopher King" (bibliography can be found at the end of this post). What this book did was pave the way for me. Yes it might be crazy, but people do write about WoW in terms other than DPS, XP, boss strats, and how long it will take you to grind Ebon Hold rep. There is a need to understand. On the side of the developer who wants to know what makes their game keep our attention, to the player who may want to know why this is a time sink, or what they really GET from an MMO. What brings us in and what makes us come back. The answers are easy, you can probably think of a few reasons right off the top of your head. They are also deeper. Reasons we give such as I want to play with my friends also has greater meaning to us sociologically.

What I'd like to do is take a couple of posts and delve into some of these topics from my perspective and my own experience. I'd also like to take some examples from the book and add my own take to them. If you ever have an opportunity it's a short read and is not to terribly mind-taxing. You don't have to have any experience with philosophy to grasp the concepts.

Works Cited
Cuddy, Luke, and John Nordlinger, eds. World of Warcraft and Philosphy. Chicago, IL: Carus, 2009. Print.

The Shattering - Some quick thoughts and observations on 4.0.3a

2010-11-26T14:20:00.002-05:00

I mounted up and decided to go on walk-about across Azeroth. In no particular order.

Stormwind is pretty awesome (so is Orgrimaar for you Horde folks)
There are way too many flight points. I thought there were too many in Wrath, this is ridiculous
The horde in the Argent Dawn recruits in Eastern Plaguelands really threw me for a loop
Ashenvale and other Kalimdor/Night Elf areas are very vibrant now, and the trees are beautiful
The scars in both Badlands and the Barrens are nearly impossible to get across on foot
Get all the tabards
Gnomeregan is not a city, I was disappointed
Everything that has been given tops (like trees and buildings) looks really cool
Winterspring has not changed much...thank god, this zone holds a special place in my heart
There are a TON of critters now, and they are everywhere
The world dragons have been nerfed and it is very sad
Speaking of nerfed...my warlock is down 12% across the board and my warrior is down 17%. I hope they know what they're doing : /
What happened to Darkshore and Southshore makes me sad
Feathermoon is eye-popping
Tanaris land changes are very cool
The strip-mining the Horde have done in Ashenvale and Northern Felwood is atrocious
Along the same lines...the oil fields in Azshara and Southern Stranglethorn are also nasty
The Forsaken are way out of control in Silverpine and I'm surprised the Horde have let them stay
Loremaster does not mean you don't have to redo all the quests in each area to get those achievements too...I think I'll save this for when I get bored
Did I mention there were a lot of flight points?
Dalaran is empty
Remote quest turn-ins are cheap and lazy; it makes the quests feel meaningless
Gilneas is accessible though empty. The heights gave me that stomach tightening feeling I used to get crossing the chains in Black Rock. It is also very rainy. I hope it's not like that ALL the time.
The Goblin areas in Azshara are both cool and disturbing; the highway is a nice way to get around the zone
Stonetalon is hardly recognizable and confusing to navigate at the moment
It's too bad this patch dropped in the middle of Pilgrims Bounty. It is now really tough to find rogues of the opposite faction
I did the quest for the Brazie's Sunflower. It was fun but a little buggy yet
Badlands is neat, the holes in the ground and the quest to punch Deathwing are pretty cool

All in all I have had very strange sensations and emotions while running around these last two days. I did a few quests and went through a low level dungeon just for fun. I am saddened by some of the changes and excited by others. I am worried that Blizz has gotten a bit too carebear now and hope that Cataclysm brings challenges. I am reluctant to say I'd leave the game but if it presents nothing in the next expansion I will be left with little else. What I did find is that I'm very attached to the game, to the lands, and to the inhabitants. Some of the changes just left me feeling empty. It was very strange.

Normally a new expansion makes me feel a little scared, but scared in a good way. That "Oh! What's around the next corner?" feeling. This one elicited a whole bunch of new emotions I thought I'd never feel about a game. I don't know if that's good or bad lol. I'm certainly not used to it. We'll see how this goes in another week or so eh?

4.0.1 Random Thoughts

2010-11-08T10:48:00.004-05:00

Some of it is awesome some of it I just don't understand. 4.0.1 has turned a lot of things upside down. My lock is full of awesome fiery goodness. I love feeling like I'm burning the hell out of things again! My warrior is totally weird. I've had some conversations with another prot warrior about stats and such and I'm trying to re-tune my brain to the new stats and it's just not sinking in. I think I'm just over tanking. Speaking of, I have had a lot of asshole tanks lately. I don't know what it is. Perhaps they think they can ramrod through instances still, I don't know. Perhaps it's because the toons I'm taking into instances lately are not tier 10 geared like most of these folks are. Either way its been pretty fucking annoying.

My poor new 80 healer is still trying to catch up. I'm just starting to figure out disc again by the way. Very weird concept of damage=healing and mana regen. It works but I'm still working out rotational stuff. I am doing this blind. I know what's going on, but I am not looking up rotation info anywhere so I'm making it up. Seems to be coming along, albeit slowly. I am enjoying the challenge for the most part but my husband has had to listen to me yell at tanks a lot more these last few days. I'm taking the hard road I know, don't tell me please :p

Let's see...what else is up with this patch? The glyphs are pretty cool, though I have found there can just be a tremendous amount of choices. That is good and bad. I wonder if I'm picking the "right" one. I'm sure some asshole will tell me eventually what the "right" one is.
Talent choices in some trees seem limited and in some others don't. For example, my warrior seems to have a lot of choices in fury or arms trees that would help with prot. My warlock does not seem to have as many cool things for destro in other trees. She also doesn't seem to have as many cool glyph choices as say my priest. I think it's more difficult to get diversity out of the pure dps classes then it is the hybrids or partial hybrids. Warlocks, mages, hunters and rogues are going to find they are more limited in, as Ghostcrawler says, "cool choices" to make.
All in all I am excited about the patch. With the changes to threat reduction talents in dps and the promise of CC down the line, I can't wait to get my claws into some new instances.

Blizzcon 2010 - Short and Sweet

2010-11-01T16:43:00.001-04:00

Since I'm writing so late about this I figured most everything you could want has already been covered. So I'm just going to include a short article I wrote that was read on TNB Blogcast episode 106.

I don't have much else to add. It was great to attend the panels, walk around the vendor booths and be at Blizzcon in person. There is not a whole lot of Cata news to share that isn't out there already.

When Fim asked me to write about Blizzcon for the show I was at a loss as to what to write about. It didn't take very long for me to narrow down the topic. I found that the best part of Blizzcon for me was meeting everyone. Not only Fimlys, Nibuca and Hydra, but oodles and oodles of people that all wanted to do the same thing. Talk about and experience Blizzcon, Blizzard and WoW. I am lucky to have a husband who plays, as well as some friends at work. I always have people around to "geek out" with. Blizzcon though, brought a whole nother level. Walking down the streets of Anaheim and listening to people espouse about ganking or being ganked, nerfed or buffed was a unique and awesome experience. Knowing that I was surrounded by 25,000 other people that think and speak the same way I do, and are as excited about WoW as I am, was something I will never forget. I remember turning to my husband and saying..."It's meh people!". Truth be told it really is. Rarely have I felt as much a part of a community as I did that weekend.
I think what made the experience come together though, were the plans and meet-ups that happened off the convention floor. I don't think I would have had as much fun if it wasn't for the rest of the Twisted Nether crew. If you ever have a chance to go to any of the meet-ups, and I mean any meet-up at all, do it!! Fight the nerd urge to be shy or introverted and go. You will not regret it.
Blizzard didn't have much news for us WoW'ers this year. The panels were kinda lackadaisical, and all the info and trailers for Cataclysm are already out. There was nothing there that could not have been bought on-line somewhere or viewed over the webs or satellites for a nominal fee. What you couldn't get any other way was the camaraderie.

What's In a Name - Blog Azeroth Shared Topic

2010-10-06T15:11:00.001-04:00

Hello there. This post is based on this week's shared topic at Blog Azeroth.

What takes the longest to choose, is the first thing people see, and is the one thing they always remember about you and your character?

Your name.

How did you decide upon the name for your character(s)? Did you delve into Norse, Greek, or Roman mythology? Did you choose a name from one of your family members? Did you mash the "Random" name generator button in vain until you stumbled upon something you liked? Is your name a play on aspects of your class, using spells or other traits? Did you play around with syllables, vowels, and consonants until you found something that you loved?

How long did it take you to come up with your name? Do all of your characters share the same 'theme' or naming convention? Have you ever run into someone who had a similar name? How did you feel? Does your character have a partner with "the other half" to your name (such as "Salt" and "Pepper"). Do any of your characters have a "themed" guild that goes along with your name? Do you have a nickname that your guild, friends, or significant other has given your character?

Has your character name become your online persona, or maybe the other way around?

Do you have any tips for naming your characters in WoW, or any other game? Resources, name generators, mythology websites, sources of inspiration, etc.

If you are an avid roleplayer, how was your name decided upon by family/friends? Did your character choose the name later in life or were they given it at birth? There are whole stories behind naming/birthday celebrations that I am sure are floating around out there.

So much can be said about names. What does yours say?

I have had wonderful times creating character names and was really excited to contribute to this weeks topic. Here is where my bountiful list of names derived from.
Normally, if I don't fall across a name I like, I run through the random name generator to see what Blizz thinks that races name characteristics should be, such as the double "i" at the end of draenei female names. Every once in a while I will seek out translations of words, as you will see.

Alliance
Zabine - human warlock, derivative of Sabrina and the German Sabine. Wanted to give her a decidedly unique flair and went with the "Z".

Moondream - NE warrior, I thought this followed the standard last name convention already established in the game. This is actually her last name and her first name is, as yet, a secret. I felt that a last name reference made sense for a warrior.

Naohm - dwarf paladin, Irish Gaelic for holy, which she is. I have found that this seems to be a male name but I like it, and pronounce it Nah-ohm instead of Nome.

Brennii - draenei priest, a combination of Brenwyn which I had used on another server for a dwarf priest along with the double "i" from the draenei name generator.

Sephyrea - draenei mage, this is a derivation of zephyr and Sephyra, the dragon from...omg I can't remember the movie!.... fail. Sephyra and other derivatives were taken so this was my change up.

Lynei - draenei shaman, this is actually taken from my middle name Lynn, and is the closest to my actual name of any of my toons. This toon was created during a particularly difficult time when my husband needed open heart surgery and I needed something easy (like a new toon) to keep focused on when I wasn't at the hospital.

Bluhighway - human death knight, I'm actually not so happy with this one. My idea of her was as a rebel so I really wanted either Blue or Highway but both were taken. This was my concession.

Horde
Vashee - troll hunter, this name came from the naming convention for trolls that I'd seen around and I really wanted it to be Va'she. Blizzard doesn't allow you to use apostrophe's or other punctuation in the name so I opted to add the extra "e" so it would be pronounced the way I thought it should.

Erfrieren - orc death knight, the name is German and it means "death by freezing". I thought it was pretty cool. I had simply looked up a translator in German for death and came up with several verbs.

Maica - orc warrior, love this name and its one of the few that came directly out of the name generator with a minor change in vowels.

Rozwyn - undead warlock, this one was a name I had bouncing around in my head for some time and was seriously considering using it for a dwarf. An undead seemed just as good, kind of old fashioned but with a twist again with the "z".

Zallania - BE priest, this name was just a random one I quick thought up at the moment. I was looking again for a "z" name and took the last half from the naming conventions through the random generator.

All in all I am partial to names that are names and not Oneshotyou or something like that, with a few exceptions. I tend toward unusual letters such as "z" or different spellings while retaining the elegance and look of a name. Lately I've been trying to find the shortest name possible and have one set aside that is 4 letters long. I also have a name set aside for a worgen. I appreciate names that have double meanings or are true to their race. Of course that is pretty subjective.

So that is what's in my names. :)

A Guild in Motion Tends to Stay in Motion

2010-10-05T18:29:00.032-04:00

I have to thank Matticus for his great guild advancement post, which can be found here. I'm sure others have done it before but this seems to break down the guild advancement system into something simple and straight-forward. Even though that is what inspired this post, it is not why I'm here.

Actually it's shameless self promotion, kinda sorta. I was thinking about the end of his post where he suggests to look for a guild now. A nice stable guild that has weathered the End-of-Wrath-Blues. This line of thinking of course let me to my own guild, and how in spite of my lackadaisical attitude over the last few months, has managed to put together a post-cataclysm incentive package to boost our guild reputation as fast as possible.

This is not the first slow down that our guild has suffered. We have weathered the storm between all the previous expansions. From vanilla to TBC and then on to WotLK we have managed to maintain a relatively healthy guild.

The secret is not really a secret at all. It is simply the momentum of the guild as it was established. KG is not any particular type of guild so when things drop off such as raiding we simply move into other areas. We do that as a group for the most part. Right now its been finishing Lich King and getting some PVP in on the side. Some of us are doing some intense rep grinding and have been going together or, at the very least, supporting each other while we whine about it. We excite each other in a sense. It's not just about the loot but the people. When you have a reason to show up it's not so hard. Granted it is getting boring, and we're all dragging our proverbial feet, but at least we're dragging together and in the same general direction.

I have one person in particular to thank for taking on a huge job. Our fan-tabulous raid leader, Kaerras. I'm very glad that when some of us (namely me) have been unable to hold up our end of the bargain, that he and a few other brave officers have picked up the slack. He has taken the time to create a post-Cataclysm plan specifically for boosting our guild rep as fast as possible, or at least giving it a really good jump-start.

I just want to take a moment to publicly thank the officers and others of KG for the perseverance and leadership they have shown over the last few months. I couldn't have had a better group of guys and gals to lean on.

Rorac - right hand man and guild papa
Kaerras - tankadin, raid leader extraordinaire, and uber planner

Laridoris - 2nd to none but Kaerras in the raid, unless his bike breaks down ;)
Rickyboby - confidante during rocky times
Feorah - shoulder and sounding board
Celeste - one of those behind the scenes couldn't do it without your support guildies and cheerleader
Holysnapx - Ficus and laugh track, thanks for being a good kid, we appreciate you :)

With all my heart I thank you for being, doing and generally putting up with everything. And still coming back day after day and week after week to play this crazy game with me.

Love ya,
Zab~*

PTR and Guild, Warlock & UI Changes, Some Interesting POI.

2010-09-29T09:05:00.031-04:00

I'm going to go ahead and post this and then hopefully get some screenshots inserted so you can see what I'm referring to.
I was having a meltdown about warlock changes. That combined with what seemed to me to be a lack of warlock info coming out of the beta, I decided to download the PTR. This was purely to satisfy my neurosis that I would never be able to play my lock again and WoW would be forever dead to me. Something I dread actually.

2 attempts, exceptional band-width hogging (which my husband was NOT happy about), 25 hours of downloading and a video card driver update later I was finally on.
**by the way I highly recommend that you update your drivers before Cataclysm**

I appeared in Feralas right next to Thousand Needles. From my Dire Maul farming (see previous post). Immediately the first earthquake hit. I was excited and terrified at the same time. I am standing at the spot that is supposed to be flooding! Holy Shit! I have to get out of here! Back in reality my brain processed the info and realized that there are no land changes going on here. After that the earthquakes were just really cool to experience :)

I took the long way and trotted my ass to Theramore to take the boat. My goal was IF and a target dummy.

First, no add-ons. Arranging my screen to be a little closer to my normal button mashing skills became first priority. I understand you can copy your add-on folder to the PTR folder, but after all the hassle I had gone through just to get this thing going I'm not worried about it.

Feeling Up Your 'Lock
Finally in IF. Second was training. Discovering what I had and what I needed. Warlock training and profession training.
After that target dummy practice. I got a feel for the spells I still had, and the new ones I had acquired. I am not a theorycrafter. I don't crunch numbers. I'm sorry I can't give you any specifics regarding spell mechanics and all the ins and outs of what's going to be great and what's going to suck. I can throw out a few things here though.
My second night on the PTR I did hit an instance. It was nice and calm and was probably the longest H Nex I've run in a long time. That was perfectly ok with me. I think we were all just feeling it out. Soulburn; using a shard to impact a spell. I didn't use this much. I think I'm still used to being shard-conservative. At 80-81 the number of spells you can affect is actually pretty small. I think there were 3 uses for it, none of which I found very useful right off the bat. Soul Harvest; The spell you cast to get shards back, looks and acts just like mage evocate. Bane of Havoc was OK. You cast it on one target then hit others. Kinda interesting, but because it's working on another target I didn't get a "feel" for it. It was off working its magic while I was doing other things. I hope this will get more fun as I get used to it. The thing I really got a kick out of was the proc for Soul Fire. Being Destro I don't use it much. I have no proc for it and the cast time and use of a shard have kept it out of my rotation. It was cool to be able to use it again. Along with that comes a Power Aura type screen flash. There was also one for Backdraft. I found the graphics for both to be unobtrusive and kinda cool looking. All fiery and stuff. So I'm happy. It will not replace your Power Aura though. All in all I found that my rotation did not change considerably and the feel is still quite similar. That was what I had set out to do. The only thing I was not happy with was the loss of spell power conversion on the Glyph of Life Tap. The new glyph lowers the cool down. There is no more spell power gain. Booo!

UI
So I texted a friend I knew was on the PTR and asked him to come play. He gave me his toon names and I hit "O". Nothing. Hmm ok how do I get the social up, the friends list, all that jazz. I finally typed /who and the box came up. I still don't know what letter is supposed to bring that up. When he came on I did a shift-click to see where he was and got this with his name "Hunters". So I say what's that? Are you more than one? He says that's my guild. Oh Guild!! Yes gotta get me one of those. I joined the "Warlock" guild, local 357 I'm sure :) and hit shift-G. Nothing. WTF how do I get my guild social up now...grrr. I find it on my bar and upon mouse over discover that it is "J" not "G". What? Weird but ok, random alphabet choices. As I recollect you can still hit "P" for your professions and your spell book,"N" for talents and glyphs, and "C" for your character sheet. I told you I was a professional button masher.

The Guild UI is now a separate entity. It is no longer connected to your friends and raid tabs as it is now. It has 2 tabs currently, one for guild members and one for MoTD and other information. There is also a handy sort to sort by professions and other things. All very useful. I am hoping to speak to the "Warlock" GL about some of the guild leader options as well as the calendar and event options. I don't know how much is currently implemented.

Guild Interface (Achievement, Professions & MoTD)

The Social now only has friends, chat, raid listed...and no button to bring it up yet lol. Yes this stuck with me. I don't know how many times I pushed the button to try and get the window up and nothing happened.
(edit: You can pull this up using "O")

Social (Friends, Who, Chat & Raid tabs)

The Character sheet I found to be really cool. It now has a box that slides open to the side with all your stats. Each stat section can be moved up or down the line depending on what you want to see, or can be closed down if you don't want to see it at all. Pets and mounts are no longer here. I missed getting this pic for you :(

The Profession sheet or spell book I found the most confusing. It now contains tabs for your professions, mounts, pets and other miscellaneous things. It seems to be the place to put things that don't go anywhere else. The professions tab was a bit confusing at first, but I attribute that to the fact that while it said I had them they were not available to use until the second night I got on. Then I had to re-train all my cloth and enchantments to make them active. Time consuming and something I hope we will not have to do with Cataclysm. It was also a huge money sink, so I wouldn't expect so. It was probably just a PTR thing. The button to open my enchanting book was there. It is no longer located on the first page of the spellbook. I did find it handy that all my professions, including secondaries, were all on the one tab by themselves.

Spellbook (Spells, Profs, Pets, Mounts & Companion Pets)

All in all I found my time on the PTR to be worth the headache of the download. I assuaged my warlock fears and found that the majority of the changes coming are very clean and useful. I also found that the changes were not so drastic that I couldn't figure it out fairly easily. The jump from the current UI to the new will seem minimal. I think we will all be happily plodding along in Cataclysm in no time.

Are you Exalted?

2010-09-25T14:24:00.001-04:00

So I'm wandering around Dalaran and I see this title I've never seen before, "the Exalted". I'm thinking hmmm. I like unique titles I wonder what that is? After a quick look up on WowHead I found it is the title granted for 40 factions to exalted reputation. Exalted So I look to see how many I have and low and behold there I sit at 32. I'm thinking 'I'm not too far off...what can I do?' Thus began my new crusade!
I begin by checking to see which factions are closest that need the least amount of work. Let's see....

Oracles, ok I can finish that up
Skyguard, ew hated that one but it might be a bit easier at 80
Ogri'la, ok this one was really "ew" so we'll have see
The Steamwheedle Cartel quadruple are all sitting at revered...possibilities perhaps
The Consortium
Zandalar Tribe
I also began looking at easy-to-turn-in-for-rep grind factions such as Thorium Brotherhood and Darke Moon Fair.

Now, about 3 weeks later I am slowly making my way there.
-Oracles done. This was mostly completed. I just needed about 3 days worth of dailies to finish it up. I had just been dragging my feet.
-Skyguard done. This was 3-5 days of grinding. Kill the birds (each kill gives rep). Get shadow dust. Turn in the dust for the shadow potion (each turn-in gives rep). Kill the birds under the influence of the shadow potion for the pages. 10 pages at a skull pile to kill one of the mid-level mobs (easy at 80 and gives rep). And, if you have enough people (2 at least), kill the big guy at the center skull pile. My grind also included doing the dailies at Skettis and Blades Edge which all give Skyguard rep. The dailies in Blades Edge will give Ogri'la rep as well. Oh, and kill the tree guys wandering around, they are actually worth 33rep a piece. Bear in mind I'm human so I think that equates to 30 rep for everyone else.
-Consortium done. Farmed insignias near Area 52 and used the Etherium Prison keys whenever I had them.
**35 exalted**
Steamwheedle Cartel - all 4 factions are now between 35-50% through exalted; these include Booty Bay, Gadgetzan, Everlook, and Ratchett. This one has gotten monotonous but it seems to be the best way to grind all of them at once. I am doing the Free Knot! and Gordok Ogre Suit quests at Dire Maul that were recommended on WowHead. If everything drops in the dungeon, such as the shackle key, I can turn in both for approximately 470 rep per run. Each run takes me about 10 minutes and that works perfectly for the 5 instances per hour cap. I will usually make a run to Feathermoon to dump stuff in the mail about every 4th run. Each run puts me about 2.5% closer. So at that rate I figure I've had to run this at least 100 times. It is starting to wear me out but its 4 for 1 in my opinion, and it's better than killing pirates for 3 rep a piece. Now that's a lot of friggin' pirates!
Zandalar Tribe - 36% through exalted. This is from mount farming and coin turn ins. I'm also buying a few when I find them at a decent enough price. I have had some wonderful donations from guildies who have had them tucked away and decided they aren't going to use them.
Thorium Brotherhood I was able to get to honored. Once you reach honored the rep turn-ins become based on Dark Iron Ore stacks and all the cores from Molten Core. Unless I'm farming MC they are hard to get ahold of, or I can spend a small fortune on them in the AH. All of them run about 50g each on average. I have more or less given this one up. Perhaps one day I'll come back to it.
I should be able to complete ZG and Steamwheedle before we have a Cataclysm hit.

Because I'm grinding Steamwheedle I've had a couple people ask me if I'm going to do Insane. I can't see running all these only to turn around and run them back down again so right now the answer is a resounding "no! not on your life".

Until next time, off to Dire Maul...

My Stash of Junk

2010-09-06T09:00:00.000-04:00

This weeks topic at Blog Azeroth is about what random item(s) we keep and why we've kept them. Regardless of how much bank space my trinkets and baubles take up I have a propensity to keep many things. Just about every holiday garb piece I have made or bought is in there. The tier 1 warlock set, or what I have of it, because it's cool. Every tabard I could get my hands on, seriously we need a rack for those if Blizz intends for us to collect them, and assorted other stuffs. But that's not what I wanted to talk about. The items that I can't seem to get rid of are the keys. I AM the keymaster! The random items you had to have to get into a dungeon or raid or to make something happen while in there.
Top of my list is the Drakefire Amulet. The key to Onyxia's Lair. This quest chain was so horrendously long it literally took me months to complete. It also took a lot of cajoling of guildies to help me with it, and picking up groups whenever I could to get the next leg completed.
Second would be the Seal of Ascension. The key to Upper Blackrock Spire. Another long quest line that involved having a dragon melt the seal and several trips into the dungeon. A hunter friend of mine lost her rare pet while doing this quest at the time. :(
The memories associated with doing those two quest chains are just too awesome for me to let them go. I worked hard for those keys and spent some fantastic time with friends while doing them. I think that's why I keep them. They are like trophies now. While you no longer need them for the dungeons they were intended for, they represent all the work I had to do to get them. They also represent all the people that helped me along the way.
In that vein there are a few others I'd like to share that I have stored away.
Mallet of Zul'Farrak reminds me of Solbiane. He is the one who helped me get up the mountain to get it forged.
Scepter of Celebras back in the day when you had to have it to kill the Princess. OMG the memories of being lost in Maraudon.
And finally the Spectral Essence. Not a key per se. This one represents all the trips to Scholomance. Which is still by far my favorite instance.
When I hit my 50's during the vanilla wow era I was finally one of the "big kids". The 60's began taking me into dungeons with them. All these items represent that time of my wow playing where it WAS totally epic. You had to strive and slog through long quest lines to get something so you could advance in the game. I do miss those epic lines. While we see them now as very long tedious pains in the ass, when I look back I have really fond memories of them.
While I miss them I don't think Blizz will ever be able to put them back in the game the way they were. The Black Temple and Serpentshrine Cavern quest chains I think were the last of the epic lines we will see. Even the Wrathgate line, which was long and epic, did not involve the steps you had to take back then that involved multiple dungeons and long convoluted quest chains and keys.
With the exception of the Spectral Essence, none of the items I have listed from my bank actually function as they were intended to. All the keys have been removed and those quest lines whither away and die. It is all I have left to remind me of my epic journeys.

General Doings with Wrathgate

2010-09-06T08:04:00.000-04:00

Not much going on in WoW and way too much going on in life these days.

Work has been kicking my ass for most of the year really, but these last few weeks have been nothing but nose to the grindstone. I've hardly had time for twitter it seems. This past week I have been sick with a cold, so I've been hitting the couch or bed almost as soon as I get home. Stress is a wonderful thing....not.

My priest hit 80 last week. That is my 5th toon. That makes me a cringe a bit. Apparently I don't have a life. To prove it, my house is a mess and my mom comes to visit this weekend. It is time to kick myself into gear and get a move on. Today will be spent mostly house-cleaning and shopping...I hope.

So why am I here you may ask? To share a small tidbit about what I did yesterday. I spent the majority of the day on my horde troll hunter. She is now 72. My goal was to get the Wrathgate quest line done on the horde side. I heard that quest line may be leaving once Cataclysm hits due to some semantics in the, well in the everything. It sounds like quest lines beginning at level 1 will be skewed toward the fact that we've defeated Arthas and the Burning Legion. That leaves the Wrathgate line slightly out of balance. I have a feeling that's not the only one.
Back on topic...I did complete the entire chain. It is very cool to see how the Horde and Alliance differ. On the Horde side I was left feeling very defeated, and felt so bad for the horde. Especially for Thrall. Thrall expected to find peace with the Alliance somehow and this event completely dashes any hopes of that.
I recall when I completed the Alliance side for the first time I was very angry at Varian for holding on to his spitefulness.
Regardless of which side you're on, there is no doubt that the Horde and Alliance were being steered toward inevitable ongoing conflict, and all out war. I remember feeling very "Oh My God!" the first time I saw it, and coming to that realization. That there was no turning back from the hate. The Wrathgate event alone is the catalyst for the setting we will find ourselves in during Cataclysm. Now, more than ever, the two factions want to annihilate each other, and this time it's personal.
Prior to seeing that quest chain for the first time I wanted to believe that the two factions would find some sort of peaceful resolution. But then who wants to play a game where all you do is pick flowers for each other all day. We want BLOOD!

LMAO in a PUG

2010-08-28T09:39:00.001-04:00

The other night I had a terrific karmic moment. While the PUG didn't go all that smooth there was one moment that just made it all worth it.

The group was comprised of myself on my warrior, doing dps instead of tanking this time. My hubby on his holy priest, a prot pally, an unholy dk and a hunter. The instance: Oculus (heroic).
The tank was very congenial and asked up front if everyone was staying before we started. Then he immediately stopped talking and just stood there. It was clear to me he'd DC'd. The hunter jumped around and went and pulled the first group. The DK and I ran up and took them out. The tank still wasn't moving. The hunter jumped around some more then pulled the next group. Now I'm slightly annoyed and ask they wait, the tank isn't with us. This is what happened.

Vote to kick tank
me: No
Vote to kick tank
me: No
Vote to kick tank
me: No
/sigh (now more annoyed)

In my mind you should be able to give people more than 2 minutes to get back. If this guy, who seemed pretty damn nice, is having a problem he deserves the benefit of the doubt and at least 5 minutes to get his issues worked out. I have no problem with this. I have system issues all the time unfortunately, but once they get sorted out things are fine if people can just hold their panties on.
By now, if you haven't, I have decided this is a huntard. He's one of those idiots that thinks it's ok to just run around and nuke everything without regard to the rest of the group.
Tank returns after only 3-4 minutes gone stating his power went out. I'm thinking poor guy ok lets go.
The rest of the instance is fairly normal, though my respect for the tank goes down through the course of the instance as I watch him let the hunter set the pace.
We take down the 2nd boss, Varos, and then procede up to the next ring. The huntard has decided he's going to drop right down onto the guy before the mobs spawn and stand there. He nearly dies that first pull. We move to the next ring segment. All of a sudden the hunter goes off the ledge and dies. My husband thinks he was knocked off somehow then we see the tell. "disengage is right next to misdirect on my bar". That is where I just laughed my ass off. This guy, who apparently thinks he's the shit, had disengaged himself off the side of the ledge. I LOL'd extensively at him and just chuckled to myself through the rest of the run.

Somehow, that one little moment made all the annoying crap he was doing up until then, worth it just for the laugh.

T-shirts for BlizzCon

2010-08-23T17:11:00.000-04:00

My mom loves embroidery. Has a terrific machine and everything. I asked her to make me some shirts with our guild name and logo for me for BlizzCon.

I think they're awesome and so I'm going to post some pics here for the guildies to view. :)

Immediate Future...

2010-08-10T19:04:00.000-04:00

That was just a clever title. I have nothing much to mention these days so here's a recap of the last week or 2.

I have been on my first ICC25 PUG. It was good, we got as far as Rot & Fester, which is about as far as I've done on 10man.

I have been finishing up my humanities class, which I passed with a B. Not the best but not as bad as I thought I was doing.

I have leveled my horde hunter another 3 levels, pushed her leatherworking to 350 and got her ass out to Northrend. At 69 she is doing well in Howling Fjord. woot!

The weekend 10man has gone once out of 3 weeks. I'm ok with that. We should be good to go for another run this weekend.

I have bought my own domain currently being supported through google so it is similar to this. It also requires me learning more about web stuffs. I am reluctant to post it here as there is not much to it at the moment but what the heck. craniumflotsam.com

Other than personal stuff going on in RL that's about it. No beta yet, nothing grand to report...doing dailies and biding time I suppose. Leveling alts and losing my mind. (almost sounds like a bad country song lol)

What has WoW taught me?

2010-07-23T08:20:00.001-04:00

Hello all. This is a week late but I really wanted to get in on this Blog Azeroth Shared Topic.

Prologue:
It seems that my life and WoW have been kinda moving along the same direction. As I have moved up in my guild I have moved up in my job. Strange but true. Coincidental? I don't think so. So, here's the list of things I learned from WoW. In no particular order.

1) How to manage people and still be friends with them.

2) How to let things go. People and ideas come and go. The ones that stick around are important. The ones that don't needed to go their own way.

3) Weighing the one vs the many is freakin tough!

4) All girl toons are not girls. I still mess this one up.

5) Time management. Real Life can really get in the way sometimes. : /

6) I am really happy I rediscovered my gamer side.

7) I have met some wonderful terrific friends that I never would have met any other way.

8) You can make your own place in the world with a little grinding and farming.

9) Time is as much a commodity as anything else. I have found that the time I have invested in game is priceless to me. I don't think I could ever delete my toons, even if I stopped playing.

10) Leet-speak. I remember the first time I heard someone say "respawn". I thought that was the weirdest term I'd ever heard. Now it seems I can't speak anything else. ;)

11) A new way to spend time with my husband. Where else can you enjoy each others company and kill things. A couple that slays together stays together.

12) I have discovered a whole new group of interesting people that came out of WoW via podcasts, twitter and blogging. I love this community, they all really support each other and have fun.

13) Anonymity can allow someone to be really stupid, weird, annoying, and generally an asshat. Actually I already knew this, but I can't believe the number people that act like total jerks some days.

14) Just because something didn't work doesn't mean that I have failed.

What Type Are You? Guilds in WoW and Finding the Right Fit.

2010-07-22T09:53:00.001-04:00

The type and style of guilds have changed as the game has changed. I remember when the difference between a hard-core guild and a casual guild were miles and miles apart. These days you can have guilds that are a combination of both and everything in between. Definitions of what is "hard-core" vs what is "casual" have changed as well. I've seen descriptions of guilds ranging from raiding casual to social non-stress. What does that mean these days? Depends on you and what you think they mean. Everyone has a different idea of what all these different definitions are. I'm sure that if I polled my guild I would get several different answers depending on the person, how long they've been playing WoW, what level they are, and how long they've been in the guild.

So how do you know what guild is right for you? First and foremost determine what type of player you are and what you want to get out of the game. This website, The WoW Headhunter, is really cool. Even if you don't use it to actually find a guild it can give you some insight into the type of player you are. It covers a wide range from introvert to extrovert, goals, and game play style. Do you like to stop and chat with people? Do you like to help others? Do you want to plow through content and get down to the brass tacks of killing monsters? Do you want to kill other players? These are serious and very realistic things to take into consideration when looking for a guild. I think the mistake most new players make is getting into the game and taking the first guild invite they get without knowing what they're really getting in to.

Long term goals. One thing I think is important to determine is what your long term goals may be. I know for many people this seems far off in the distance, but it's something to think about. Are you looking for something that will help you now such as a leveling guild? or are you looking for a guild that you want to invest time in. Are you interested in joining a new guild or forming a new guild so that you can help shape and determine that guilds growth? or are you looking for a place where someone else determines the path and you are happy to follow along? If you raid or want to raid it's important to determine a few additional things. Your raid times. When are you available and how much time can you commit? How "hard-core" are you? What this means to me is, how much effort do you want to put in. This may sound crazy to some but it's very important. It is best for both sides if you determine your level of commitment and playstyle before you start applying. If you are looking to be competetive and join top raiding guilds on your server you must be willing to put in the time both in and out of game, making sure you are up to par on your class and class stats. That includes gems, enchants, and weapon and armor choices. This may also include theorycrafting and min-maxing. If that is something you're interested in and can put in the time, there are guilds out there looking for you.

Change. The best laid plans will never prepare you for life changes and how that affects your game play. For some people this isn't even a consideration. It's a game and it is enjoyed while it's there. I know when I started playing I never thought that I'd be doing as much as I am in my life or in the game as I am now. Needless to say though, life creeps in and things change. In a nutshell, at some point in time the game for you is going to change. Somewhere down the line us addicts will have to re-address our level of commitment and time to WoW. This will have an impact on your guild or guild choices down the line, and it's inevitable. You may find you've outgrown your guild or the guild has outgrown you and it's time to think about a move. That can only be determined by you with a little toon-soul searching.

I hope I've given you some food for thought, whether you are a long time player or new to the game there's a guild out there for you that you'll fall in love with.

Raiding is EVIL!!

2010-07-13T21:41:00.001-04:00

As mentioned in a previous post I have been working long and hard to get my guild raiding. Today my guild is raiding without me and I'm pissed off! I have spent years working and pushing and trying to find the right officers while not alienating others in the guild. I worked long and hard fighting to make sure that the guild is great all around, not just a raiding superstore. Where we can do it all. Have fun, quest, pvp, be social and fit in raiding on a regular basis. Much easier done now in the days of Wrath then at any other time in WoW history. I am not raiding tonight because I can't stay up that late and continue to stay sane and awake and functional at work. It's my choice and a choice that I had to make but I am not happy with it.

In fact I'm pissed! I can't go.
All the hard work I put in and I can't go! Yes, it's great that the guild is going and I'm glad that they are. But I can't GO!!
Yes, the reason I did what I did was so that EVERYONE could raid and still feel like if they messed up, or if they couldn't make it that week they wouldn't be kicked to the curb. But I can't go!!
Me! The one who put it together, made it happen, pushed and kicked and pouted and screamed!! Made enemies of friends to promote people into positions that would benefit the majority.

The horrible awful side is that I don't feel I have the power to say "Hey, you need to make it work for me too." to the rest of the team, when I'm the odd man out. I am the one who said it doesn't work for me, not everyone else. Who am I to ask 9, 12 or 20 other people to change to accommodate me? But man...have I told you? I can't fucking go! and I really want to.

I can't bring myself to be that selfish so I'm screaming here. Maybe it's because I know that some guildies read this and maybe, just maybe, someone will rally for me. Honestly that is passive/agressive, and I know it. So I'm just ranting.

I know, that sometime down the line I will find a solution. At this moment I'm hurt and feel like I'm starting from square one.

When should a healer let someone die?

2010-07-10T18:00:00.002-04:00

This is from the shared topic on Blog Azeroth. If you are a blogger and interested in joining this wonderful community please stop by.

When should a healer not heal?
I have a holy pally and my newb take on this is I heal everyone as long as I can. I have not been healing long enough to be able to discern if you're an idiot and let you die. Which by the way I agree with. I don't yet have the balls to do it. If you are the dumb-ass dps standing in the crap or pulling aggro you deserve to die. In most cases I have found that if they're doing that I can't get them healed in time anyways. They are not my first priority.
I have nearly let tanks die that have decided that running waaaay ahead of the group and pulling mobs is ok. Especially while their healer is either A) looting or B) drinking. Extremely annoying.

When should I, as a dps, not be healed?
This is more up my alley. Being a crit happy lock I have a tendency to pull aggro. Just a tad. ;) I have learned how to monitor and control it. Occasionally I get out of control or don't pay attention. As I have told my friend and guildmate who is a healer, if the choice is between me or anyone else, save the anyone else first. I have ways of getting myself out of a mess and getting back some health. I also think that, as a dps, I am expendable in a group, particularly 5-mans. A healer's priority has to be themselves and the tank. If things get hinky that is what I expect them to be focusing on.
Second to that, I'm a bit lazy. If the healer survives I get a rez. If they don't I have to run my behind back to the instance. Let me couch that by adding that I think everyone should have to run back. If the healers have to run then by god so should the rest of you idiots. It's only fair. To lay there licking the floor and wait for someone to come get you is just downright disrespectful.

RealID and Me

2010-07-09T13:13:00.002-04:00

So I guess its time to weigh in on the RealID thing. First let me set myself up here.

1) I use Twitter
2) I use facebook
3) I have a blog, obviously, and do strive to have some sort of internet "presence"
4) I have only mildly been concerned with internet security as far as how much I am "out there"

I have had some concerns. I'm not ignorant, and have tried to safeguard myself against identity theft and other associated on-line evils.

Then this shows up. My gut feeling after reading at least 100 random pages of the now over 2400 pages from the original post is fear. (Please stick with me here though). original forum post WoW 7/06/10 However that is from reading all the horrific and "OMG! We're all gonna get attacked by a psycho if we post anything" mentality that is peppered throughout the posts. This, folks, is why I don't watch the news. I despise the hype and the "we're all gonna die!" "save the planet NOW" hoo-ha that the news has become these days. But that's a topic for another post I suppose. That pervasive "OMG" and the fact that after discussing this with my husband I find that our government is interested in de-anonymatizing (if it's not a word it should be) the internet has made me quite aware and yes afraid, of what dangers I may potentially be subjecting myself to, and what limitations may be put on my freedoms. Again, a topic for another time.

eh hem...I digress...

After contemplating all this for a few days and letting it all settle down in my head this is really what I think about RealID. And I will try not to ramble.

1) Ingame RealID is fine for letting me find people I became friends with but have lost touch with. I have one of those. I don't like the friends of friends feature and really wish I could turn it off. People do not need to know I am friends with her. It bothers me. Aside from opting out completely there is no way to do that right now. I will monitor her friends list and if it gets excessive I will cut ties.

2) Up until now I have been able to choose how much information I wish to disclose to people. Those that know me know how to find me in and out of game. I don't need a system in place to tell them. I understand the logic behind social networking and the idea is very appealing, as I said I do enjoy the networking myself.

3) Privacy ingame. I am a guild leader. There are times when I would like some space and time to wander aimlessly by myself. A few people that need to know, know where to find me. I don't really have any "secret" toons, just toons not accessible to the guild in general. As an example, my facebook status is always set to off/invisible. If you are looking for me you can find me but I'm not comfortable with broadcasting where I am all the time. Frankly I think that is inherently silly, and the only people that would WANT to know where I am all the time are NOT the ones I would want to know.

4) RealID will severly cramp customer service. The bottom line is that adding real names to the forums will not stop trolls, it will only make me seriously consider if I want to post on them...ever. I realize that is my choice, but if this is how Blizz is going to handle their customer service I have serious misgivings. I believe this will seriously impede the flow of information in the forums by stopping many people from posting honest questions. It will stop me cold from posting. And it could potentially put an end to people being able to contact Blizzard at all. From what I have experienced, read and heard there is practically no way to get an answer from a human being directly except through the forums these days, and now that line of communication is quickly failing.

5) WoW is an RPG. I enjoy the game in part because I can immerse myself in the world and be another character. It actually shocks me when people use my real name in game. I play with a good friend I work with in RL. Ingame she is always Feo and I'm always Zab. I don't really think of it any other way. Its kinda RP. I like it that way. In fact I would say that's the way it's supposed to be.

I am not terribly worried about my employer. They already know about WoW. I am a woman, but I'm not terribly worried about being harrassed ON the forums themselves. I just really don't want another tie to my name out there. In my opinion, my real information is between Blizzard, myself, and those I choose to give it to. It is not between me 11 million random people. Those 11 million other people should just know me as Zab.

I am not overly concerned about safety, as in I'm not freaking out about it. I do have an occasional oh shit! moment. I do realize that the chances of stalkers or otherwise unstable persons showing up at my door are slim. Though I am concerned about children's safety in the forums. This is not about whether you know me or can find me. For me it is an inherant ideal in the game that Blizz is choosing to throw away. I feel cheated in some fundamental way.

I would also like to refer you to this post. Which I find takes the words in my head and arranges them in a much more palatable way then I have been able to.
Shades of Grey

And for your reading pleasure....as if my rambling on the subject just isn't enough.
Primetime Casual
The Barrens Chat

Now, as I'm finally ready to post this Blizz has conceded and will not be showing real names in the forums. Power to the people!
WoW Forums 7/09/10 RealID M Morhaim

The World of Warcraft Blues

2010-06-26T11:58:00.000-04:00

Are you bored yet? Are you looking for something to do? Are you level 80 and tired of doing the same old stuff, be it farming or fishing, dungeons or raids?

It's that time folks. The time at the end of an expansion when everyone is, for lack of a better term, just plain over it!
I keep hearing it in podcasts and lately I've been feeling it a bit myself. Do I really want to log in and do this again?

So the question is...what keeps bringing me back? Truthfully it's the same thing that kept me logging in from the beginning. I don't have the same goal every day. Sometimes I want to wander around and look and sometimes I just want to kick some ass!! Depending on how I feel, what I've been doing, listening to or reading will determine what I'll be doing in game for the day. Sometimes what others are doing will determine where I go. So I don't get bored very often. There is ALWAYS something for me to do. The only time I get really bored is if I've been doing the same thing over a couple of days, then all of a sudden I will have to step away from the game for a day. I believe Blizzard must be employing some sort of social psychologist or they have some extremely smart game developers. The idea of creating multiply areas of play is what is allowing them to rake in the bucks. WoW can appeal to anyone, and I mean anyone. Like puzzles? Do quests. Like art, walk around and inspect the architecture and style of the world. Like to talk to people? There are plenty standing around in the cities just waiting for you to stir their pot. Want to beat people up? Well hell, you can do that too! Yes! You too can be an asshole, battlegrounds and arenas are just a click away. Or you can join a PVP server and grief people all day long! Co-op or challenging? Dungeons and raids of all levels and types await you! How can you NOT like this place?
(disclaimer: I like battlegrounds and pvp and am in no way assuming PVP'ers are assholes. I'm just saying you can be one if you want to)

Those are just a few of the things out there to do. And when you get bored with doing them on one toon you can start something else and see how the other half live. Are you a tank? Start a priest. Caster? Find a melee class to try. Not sure? Grab a hybrid such as a druid, paladin, or shaman and you can try all 3, or 4, or 5 different play-styles.

So there you have it, that's what keeps me going during the long slow dreary days of waiting for the new expansion.

What keeps you coming back?

Stack Your Tank

2010-06-22T11:05:00.002-04:00

Hi. Since my post about maximizing dps I have learned a few things about stacking for tanks I'd like to share.
This will not be as extensive due to some time constraints at the moment.

I had an opportunity to off-tank ICC a few weeks ago and learned some great techniques. Though what I'm going to share is primarily for prot warriors I'm sure there are many that can be utilized for other classes.

Glyph - specific to prot warrior is Glyph of Blocking. Increasing the block and duration of your shield slam.

Next is to either use Greater Rune of Warding or even Lesser Rune of Warding. Either will give you a small amount of damage absorption. And remember, anything is better than nothing, no matter how small.

Third is potion stacking. The potion most useful seems to be indestructible potion.

Use Shield Slam whenever it becomes available, or right before you taunt when you're swapping tanks.
Follow this with the potion during critical times in a fight can make the difference between a wipe and a successful boss kill. Such as during the 3rd inhale in the Rotface encounter. I learned the hard way on this one.

I'm sure there are other tips and tricks that can be applied but so far these are the crucial new ones to me I wanted to pass along.

Happy Hunting!

What's in a Guild?

2010-06-12T17:34:00.002-04:00

The time has come. I have been meaning to put some guild ideas down on paper...er computer...and I have not been able to decide where to start. I've opted to begin with my philosophy of what I think a guild should be. Let me start from the beginning.

The Beginning
When I first became guild leader I was overwhelmed and I must admit a bit panic-stricken with the idea of being in control of this thing that was made of so many other people and personalities. I was voted in, and accepted the nomination thinking I probably wouldn't be able to cope with it for very long. I have a strong dislike of conflict and am really quite afraid of confronting people. Even though I seem to put my opinions out there freely and I will admit, I have a big mouth and sometimes a big attitude to go with it, I will shy away from confrontation.

My initial ideas were based on what the guild had been when I joined. A collection of people that wanted to have fun and play together. I must say, that core idea is what keeps me on the straight and narrow today as far as guild leadership. At first I read a lot. I went to the forums and perused the guild management threads for ideas on how and where I should lead this group of individuals. I read up on types of guilds and guild leadership and all that. I prepared speeches I gave to my officers on what we should be striving for. Looking back, all this was in an effort to find myself and my style, and the style of the guild.
The next months were rough as we found a new footing. It was toward the end of BC I think and guilds, like now at the end of Wrath, were having to redefine themselves to hold on to members or to pass the boredom of the pre-expansion blues. People came and went and the guild turnover was high. I took it very personally at first. It took a long time for me to realize that these people are here because they want to be. If I tried to make sacrifices to keep people that didn't belong or didn't want to stay I would only hurt everyone in the end. I have learned to develop a bit of a tougher skin when it comes to people coming and going. After all, just because they leave doesn't mean they won't be back or they won't continue to be friends. Change is good, right?

After a fashion I began to take ownership of the guild. I was determined to move forward on my terms and see what happened. I read other guild charters and re-wrote ours several times. It's a bit overdone now, but it helped me formulate what I wanted KG to be and how I wanted it to get there. I wanted to define what it meant to be in the guild, and I wanted every member to know that. Yes, hindsight, I was probably a little overzealous and maybe it was all a bit over the top, but I don't think it was for nothing.

In the end, the core values we agreed on in our charter are what shapes my decisions and leadership today.
Respect. Respect for guild mates and respect for others in the game. In guild channels and in public channels. Reading over all our core ideas it is all based on respect and treatment of others around you. Don't do to someone what you would not want done to you. Next to that is responsibility. Be responsible for your actions in game. Don't be a jackass. But, the biggest thing we all believe in is It's just a game! Yes we are serious about it, and yes we love it and get excited about it. In the end WoW cannot replace our real lives and our real friends and family and duties like paying the bills and going to work. We know and respect that each of us have things to do in our lives that take precedence over the game, and we all think they should.

Establishing Leadership
The next step was putting in place a group of wonderful people that wanted to help lead this menagerie. I used to be one of those people that thought "If you want something done right, you have to do it yourself.". I still do that sometimes and I am most certainly fighting the urge to micromanage all the time, but one thing WoW has taught me is to not. Do not be that person that has to have everything your way. It will not work. There is no incentive for people to stay in a guild where they have to do things other than the way they want to. My first task for myself was to give it up. I knew that if I put up this "I AM" mentality that I would first, be hated and second, be very very overworked. I already have a full time job and life. I was not going to make WoW another job. That was the trick. To turn guild management into not so much of a job job. I did that by empowering my officers to do whatever they felt was best if I was not there. I am lucky to be surrounded by officers I trust. I am not always the greatest decision-maker and I believe that without them KG would surely be a shambles. So I gave all the officers access to just about everything, and the ability to make decisions. I also, hopefully, gave them the knowledge that I would stand behind and help them enforce their decisions. So we all stand together.
Because of that, I have to say that when someone is singled out as an officer it means something to me. I have to ask myself, is this person reliable? Do I trust them? Would I want them to make decisions about who stays or who goes? Can they handle conflict or will they handle conflict if it shows up when they are the only officer on? In the end it does come down to personality fit and do we like them. As long as we can be honest with each other we can work out the kinks as they come along. At least that's my hope. :)

Bringing it Together
All the decisions I make surrounding the guild are based on these core values. Normally when ideas come my way I chat them up with a couple of the officers. Sometimes at length. Feorah, who works with me in RL, gets the brunt of my discussion and has been a totally awesome and very patient sounding board. The idea has to pass my strict code of my inner voice. Will it benefit most or the majority of the people and how. Yes, my inner voice is extremely socialist and overly democratic. All guildmates must be able to benefit from something. If we are planning an event can it be held in an area where level 30's attend, that sort of thing. Raiding is a strange exception to that rule. I strive to keep it out there that everyone once they reach the right level of experience is eligible to join in a raid. They will not be excluded from the "group".

Family and Friends
In the end, what I would like to believe is that I've taken KG to a place where we can all have fun together. This guild is now a wonderful collection of family to me. I have met several in person and chatted to many others. It's where I go when I want to be in my "Cheers" place. Where everyone knows your name and are always there with a "hey how ya doin today?!". Even when sibling squabbles come up and we might pout to each other after a fashion, we all will stick together in the end.

So that's it. Be nice, be strong, surround yourself with brilliant fun people, and above all have a good time!

Blizzcon

2010-06-11T09:42:00.001-04:00

I hadn't had the chance to share this yet....I got tickets!!! woot!

Hope to see everyone and anyone at Blizzcon 2010 :D

(this is where I spent 20 minutes trying to find the logo and insert it here. As you can see, it didn't work all that well and I'm out of time)

Dumb and Dumber

2010-06-10T10:47:00.001-04:00

Dumb
Feeling all full of myself I offered to help a guildmate who was running regular Azjol-Nerub and was in need of a tank. I logged over to my prot warrior and joined the group. I promptly proceeded to wipe the group several times on Hadronox. How you may ask? Well...let me tell you.
We took out the first boss ok fine. A little messy. Sometimes you forget how the aggro radius is on a 72. Ah well, moving on.
Everyone gets in position and I pull the first mob to begin the event on Hadronox. The other 2 melee dps run down to join me, aggroing the other mobs close by. I drag them all up the web to get away from anything else and we take them out. We pull another group, I don't know where that came from and are almost done when they suddenly disappear on me. I'm standing in the area where the first mobs spawn and they're gone. Weird but ok. I've seen people bug out this encounter recently so I figure it is bugged. I move down the web ramp halfway around the spiral heading to Hadronox and the rest of the group follows me. Spiders begin spawning at the top heading down to Had and they KEEP spawning. Oh shit this isn't right! I am now tanking about 15 spiders, the healer is healing her little ass off and everyone is wondering (including me) what the hell is happening. We wipe. K now I feel totally stupid. I explain I thought it was bugged, don't know what is going on etc. The Shammy restores herself right there and rezes me first. Before she can get up the rest of the group the spiders start spawning again. Again I find myself tanking a shit-ton of them while everyone desperately tries to keep alive. We wipe again. Now I'm done. I apologize and leave along with my guildmate.
I have never felt so stupid in my little WoW life as I did at that moment. Here I was going in to save the day and completely fucked the entire encounter up.

Dumber
I was listening to a podcast the other day and I was so flabbergasted by what this guy did that I feel the need to repeat it here. The podcast is Wowphiles. I've been listening to them since their 2nd show and was really excited to see others out there in the podcast world trying out new things. Now I don't ever know if I will listen to them again.
Jason, the main host, was asked to start a guild by his listeners. After long thought he decided it would be a fabulous idea to start a guild on another server on the opposite faction. His tale starts off innocently enough. He rolled a level 1 NE druid and proceeded to run to Darnassus. Where he then began a begging spree that has left me with my jaw on the floor. From begging a mage to port him to SW to begging everyone for 10s to start his guild charter and then begging people to sign it. I am just astounded that an adult person, who had at least one level 80, has played the game for over a year, and I would expect to have some sort of sense in his head, would stoop to the level of a 10 year old noob. Really tell me you're joking. I had to turn off the podcast right then and there and I don't know if I'll ever be able to turn it on again. That was truly the stupidist thing I'd ever heard anyone do. At least anyone who has had any substantial time in the game.
Let me add. I told this story to a friend of mine who does not play WoW. Even she was amazed and had come up with another plan he could have used instead of begging.
I hope he enjoys his time on his new server where half the population has already put him on ignore.

To Cat or Not to Cat?

2010-05-29T10:46:00.003-04:00

Seems these days you can't get away from anything Cataclysm. Not that I would want to mind you :)

However it begs the question....How much do you really want to know?

I am terribly torn. This year I decided I wanted to spend more time making a difference in the community, doing something. I began blogging more seriously (well, except for lately; blame work :P), and I started helping a podcast with their wiki. How much help I'm actually being is left to be said at the moment since I have given them about as much time as my housecleaning. Which is to say, slim at best. So my thoughts turn to what can I do ingame that would make a difference.

Living in Florida and far from California, getting a job is more or less out of the question. So the next best thing is the PTR and the Beta. There I can test the new things and give my opinions and feel like I'm lending the proverbial helping hand.

So far I suck at it. I have not joined the PTR once. Yea I'm a slacker...or really, I'd rather play my current toons and play with my friends, then play with total strangers that might point and laugh at me.

I have not yet made up my mind about the Beta but I'm getting closer and closer to going to Blizzard.com and setting up my opt in features. Currently, there are more reasons why I shouldn't then why I should. But I've always been a rebel. ;)

In the mean time, there is all this information floating around out there, and yes I've taken a peek or two. I dove head first into all the class previews that Blizz posted on the Cataclysm forums and have taken to checking out the screenshot of the day. I picked through some of the pics and info on MMO Champ but I take all that with a grain of salt. I don't like the way they do things and I'm surprised every time when they come up with what they do and still have a website and their pants.

In the end I know I will be moving through this content over and over. Do I really want to add another time? My first time? Do I want to blow that awesome factor when I first experience it by doing it with total strangers?! And answering questions about it?

I still don't quite know if I'm willing to go that route but I'm going to go do the opt in anyway and see what happens. I may change my mind. I don't know if I'd mind going through the leveling content and the starter areas to see how that plays. I'm addicted to 1-20 anyway.

Maybe I'll see ya there. :)

It's All About the Damage Baby

2010-04-23T10:28:00.003-04:00

Maximizing your DPS
There are a few things I have learned relatively recently that I'd like to share. Some of these will have a decidedly warlock twist but you'll just have to put up with it.

CLIPPING -
Clipping DoT's is the term for casting a damage over time (DoT) spell or ability onto your target before the previous one has finished its complete damage cycle. I was amazed at the change I saw in my dps when I started paying attention to my ticks. A tick is how often a DoT does damage or when a DoT does damage. Not allowing your spells to fully complete a cycle on your target wastes your time and mana, and stops that spell from getting that last bit of damage out. It can also take valuable time away from casting other spells or abilities in the interim, or stacking on what you've just started.
Optimally you want to place your DoT back on the target just as it's wearing off. I am using a mod called in-line auras along with the built in bar timers that come with Bartender, and can see how much longer (in nice large easy to read numbers) each spell has left on it. The number displays right over the spell on my bar along with the GCD timer. Taking into consideration casting time, I will begin casting my next spell as the one that's on my target reaches 2 or 1 second left. For instant cast the time will differ of course. That will insure I get all the ticks out of my DoT and, if done correctly, will keep the damage flowing without missing a beat.

ROTATION
I had always heard about and looked at rotations and tended to follow one myself. Lately, while investigating more in-depth, I have seen a lot of information that leans more toward priorities rather than rotations. I first encountered this when I was looking for prot warrior information.
Since then I have seen it quite a bit and have come to believe that everyone functions on this system. Based on your spec, glyphs and what you may be wearing at any given time, spells and abilities change and fluctuate. Every change in gear can mean your timing changes. Perhaps you have more haste than hit or vice versa. That can make a big difference in how your rotation FEELS. And that is the key. Have an understanding of your spells enough to be able to make those subtle changes as you adapt to changes in your gear or your environment. This is where priority comes in. Priority becomes important when you get into the maintenance phase of your dps. What I mean by that is you're in the middle of a boss fight. You have applied your openers and are now in a state in which you maintain and increase your dps for the remainder of the fight. As DoT's end and fall off you are re-applying and then using some sort of maintenance spell in between your DoT's and your major abilities while they are on cool down. You make that decision based on what ability becomes available next and if more than one does, what priority those need to be re-applied in. Basically, your rotation is your opener. Your priority will determine your maintenance during the fight. This is of course barring other elements occurring during the fight such as moving out of the goo on the floor. Those elements will cause you to reevaluate your priorities during the fight.

RACK 'EM, STACK 'EM AND PACK 'EM
This is twofold. First, if you have spells or abilities which benefit from each other you should know what those are and how they work. It is like buffing your spells. As an example this is my opening rotation for my lock.
Life Tap
Hit my trinket
Corruption
Curse of Doom
Immolate
Conflagrate
And then I begin my maintenance with Incinerate
I have Glyph of Life Tap
Looking at all these elements you can see how they stack on top of each other. Life tap with the glyph converts spirit and buffs my spell power followed by popping the trink which adds even more. I then cast my DoT's which will tick with a greater intensity and CoD will time out with more damage. This will also boost my Immolate. Conflag damage will then get a boost off my Immolate. I have Glyph of Conflagrate which allows my Immolate to keep ticking, while the Conflag itself gives me burst damage and causes Backdraft to start. Backdraft gives me a haste boost going into the beginning of my maintenance phase. Basic priority then becomes which of these come up first, but stacking them correctly as they time out is what makes the difference. Usually this specific casting list comes up in my rotation every 2-2.5 minutes (taking into account reaction time), when my trinket goes off CD. In the mean time it is balancing which of these elements becomes available and stacking them appropriately. Life Tap is kept up continuously, as well as Immolate and Corruption (no clipping). In between is Conflag, Incinerate and Chaos Bolt when it becomes available. In that order to get the most from each spell.

The second part of this is the finish. If you've run in any kind of raid or large group and have been on vent you may have heard your Raid Leader suddenly shout out "Blow all Cool Downs!!". For the longest time I would look down at my spells and think "what cool downs, I'm in the middle of them all already.". For the most part this is true but I have begun potion stacking during the more intense portions of a boss fight or towards the end when your raid partners are dieing and you are racing against an enrage timer.
Once that call is made, as soon as I can I begin the above rotation again with the intention of maximizing everything available. This time along with the Life Tap and trinket I will also pop one of these potions; Wild Magic or Speed. I carry both with me. I also have begun stacking in Flame Cap. Since you can only pop one potion per fight I try my best not to use Health or Mana potions and when in a bind go for my Healthstone first. A Warlock should NEVER be without one.
Throwing in all 4 of my spell buffs; LT, Trink, Pot and Flame Cap followed by the additional haste and damage bonus with Conflag can be awesome. If you can time it on top of Shammy Heroism/Bloodlust you have a winning combination.
The "trick" is to get all the boosting items you can that will stack on top of each other. Flame Cap is a BC herb that I used to use but had dropped a long time ago thinking it was outdated. Truth is it still offers an additional 80SP that I didn't have before. Considering that my large damage spells are all flame based this was an obvious choice to include. It probably would not help anyone else except a Pyro Mage or possibly Elemental Shaman. In addition it is good for 1 minute and can be used again during a single fight after the CD. I can pump out a lot of spells in 1 minute :)

How do I do this?
Regardless of your dps class or spec these tips will help you get more out of your abilities. The first thing to do is to look at your talent trees. Read up on what tree you would like to pursue, then do some research on what talents will help you get the best out of that spec. I have always enjoyed Destro so I had to go out and find the best way to talent and play that spec.
A helpful beginner site is WoW Poplar. This site not only provides the most popular specs but the most popular glyphs, enchants and gems for each one. If you want to get into the number crunching try Elitist Jerks (EJ). If you want more class specific websites go to WoW Wiki. In the search box type in your class/spec such as Arcane Mage or Combat Rogue and down at the bottom of the page is usually a list of websites dedicated to that class or spec. I use The Warlock's Den to get into more class specific discussions.
Second, open up your talent tree. Mouse over and read what your talents do. Moreover, have an understanding of them. So often these days we race to 80, grab a spec that works and then expect to just play it. Without a basic knowledge of what you're doing and how each ability works and is applied you will fail. Case in point, I am horrible on my ret pally. Why? Because I have not taken the time to understand what I'm doing, I just hit buttons. Yes, I admit it. That's her off-spec so I don't pay much attention where I should.
Third, understand your rotation and priorities and why. You have to know what ability benefits from another before you can apply them correctly. Again, refer to my ret button-mashing mentioned above.

I know some of this is basic information, and perhaps common sense. I am one of those people that has to understand the pieces to see the whole picture so it took me a while to really get it. I only hope that some of the knowledge I've gleaned can help someone else along the way.

Ain't I Pretty? Gemming your Destro Lock

2010-04-22T18:11:00.003-04:00

I put this together because I was losing track of what I had and what I needed. It started as a rather strange looking outline lol.
This is by no means the end all be all of gemming, but I have found this works for me. It's a little clunky in this format but it works well enough.
As with anything WoW, as your gear changes you will have to re-evaluate all your gem choices and slots seeking the best combination.
While Hit is normally my #1 priority followed closely by Haste and Spell Power, I have found I'm giving up some Hit for Spell Power lately. I guess it's all about the burn ;)

This will of course change when Cataclysm comes out. But until then...happy gemming!

For Meta socket --> Chaotic Skyflare Diamond

START

Warlock Preview - Cataclysm....The Wait and See Approach

2010-04-17T14:18:00.001-04:00

All right... so being a warlock I feel like I should have something to say about the preview that was posted. (click the header for direct link to the forum post) Albeit a bit late.
Truth is, I don't have much to say.

Let's see....
New spells;
Fel Flame, looks kinda cool. I love the fire ;)
Dark Intent, sounds similar to the focus a mage has. Might be interesting and another proc to work off of. I've always been interested in contributing more to a group in terms of buffs so this might be something to play with.
Demon Soul...ok I have a beef with this. First, the Demon Soul was an item in many of the WoW books that the orcs used to control the red dragonflight and Alexstraza. It was created by Deathwing himself to take over and rid the land of all but the blacks. Seems like a terrible waste of a name for a class spell. Second, the explanation doesn't make much sense to me. I guess until they release what demon will provide what type of "self burst cool down" (whatever that means), we will just have to wait and see.

Soul Shard Overhaul. Pfft. Until I see it and exactly how they implement it I really have no idea. Right now it sounds like a version of the DK runic system. This makes me unhappy. So I'm going to pretend I don't know anything and wait and see.

Curses turned to Banes?? Ok yea I guess.
Demon mechanic changes; Sounds like that combined with the dev chat from last night means more CC. I'm good with that and hope it's interesting.
New Talents; some interesting stuff but nothing great. Shortening CoD would be pretty cool since I use it during all large boss fights.
Mastery; nothing more than I expected.
Fire Direct Damage Increased. Sounds good to me.

Really, in case you couldn't tell, I'm just gonna see how it turns out. All I wanted was stacked soul shards and they're changing the whole damn system around! How happy I am with it will depend on how it changes my game play. I am really worried about being a mage with a pet. I want it to continue to have it's own distinct class feel and all I can do is hope that Blizz will make the right choices.
Only having seen bits of info here and there I hesitate to make any guesses about how it will all work out.

Twitter Dev Chat

2010-04-17T08:02:00.001-04:00

Twitter Dev Chat from last night is posted. Here is the forum link. Not a whole lot of new info but some insight into what they're trying to get out for Cataclysm.
(click on this posts title to go to the site)

Busy Bee

2010-04-15T08:58:00.002-04:00

Hey! It's been way too long but life has happened with a vengeance.I have had relatives visiting and then out of town to visit other relatives. Not to mention work is a bitch and is driving me crazy.

In game our guild has gotten all the way to Festergut and we should be downing him tonight. yay KG!!
We seem to be having issues with raid combination for Saurfang. Since we are normally melee heavy we have been having to swap out people for the Saurfang fight. I am not happy about that. I don't like to bench people or bring in people for just a fight or 2. The problems we face are that we don't have a usual raid group. We have a core that is almost always there but there are about 4 spots that end up rotating depending on who shows up. The bane of being casual I guess. We just don't have folks that can show every night. That means that the raid composition changes nightly and sometimes we are having to start from scratch explaining fights.
I am trying not to be too annoyed because really I'm happy we're going at all. But it is hard to stay focused and not get frustrated when we are explaining a fight for the 10th time and wiping on something we should have down better by now. Maybe my expectations are too high? I don't know...I do know that some nights I am part of the problem, so who am I to talk. It's always easier to point fingers at other people or factors right?

It feels like I haven't had much time to do anything but raid and prep to raid these last few weeks. I can't wait to have a Pajama Sunday this weekend. It's been like 3 weeks. Get some farming done, level some stuff, do some JC on my warrior. Yea yea, that's the ticket. :) Have some fun with the guildies...though I have to say that raiding these past few days have been the most fun I've had all week with work being so shitty.

Future plans:
1) Spend some time with the TNB Wiki and get some work in.
2) Start guild info blogging stuff....still formulating plan
3) Review warlock cataclysm preview, though really I don't have much to say but I'm sure I'll find something

Oh hey, I have found a WoW meet-up group in my area. Totally awesome way to find others in the community I think. Looks like someone is trying to plan a Blizzcon meet-up as well.

Here is the Orlando Meet-Up group site. WoW Meet-Up
All I did was Google WoW, my area, and "meetup" to find them.

C'yaz

Love for the Guild

2010-03-26T17:44:00.000-04:00

To some who raid regularly this might not seem like a big thang. For anyone who's been there you may understand the pride I feel for my peeps.

We have been raiding randomly for years. For years we have tried to get enough people and time to put together a group that could go.

Without giving tons of back story we have had quite a roller coaster of no go's and fails over the long history of KG. At one time we were raiding regularly and stuck in Kara only to lose a significant portion of people due to egos and the want to raid too often. I know, its an oxymoron, but let me say our guild is casual. We have people of all levels and I expect as their leader that everyone gets time. I expect guild members to go out and help other lower level toons or new people. I refused to let a raid group trash that idea. They were not interested in the rest of the guild, they wanted to raid only and wanted to be treated better or different because of it. Now there is nothing wrong with that, it just doesn't fit who we are. So they took off. S'ok by me. 'Nuff said.

So anyway...here we are many years later and we have a system that works. We have finally found enough people that feel the same way. They want to be part of a family guild, they want to pvp, they want to run others through dungeons, they want to quest and stand around in Dal and chat, but they also want to raid at a higher level. This means that we don't raid regularly. Sometimes for weeks on end we simply get the weekly done and that's it. The best thing is that we're all cool with that as long as we are still moving forward, albeit slowly, toward something more. Trying something new, even if we don't succeed at first.

So to quit blathering on. We are moving through ICC! Amazing but true! Completely awesome! Having a blast! We are moving slowly. We have a 10man and right now in the last 2 weeks we've made it to Sauerfang. Now mind you, this is raiding 1 maybe 2 nights a week if we can get everyone together.

It ain't the top but man it ain't shit either. We have enough people that have taken the time to get the gear needed. They have taken the time to gear, gem and enchant their hearts out. They have spent some time learning the fights. All this amongst kids, family, jobs, loss of jobs, and all the general RL bullshit that comes down the pipe we have managed to stick by each other and make it work.

You might ask why? Why spend all that time? Why not bail for a guild that is raiding instead of waiting? Well, simply put, I like the people I run with and I enjoy my guild. I have a deep seeded loyalty that some of you may think is crazy, but that's ok. I have RL friends in my guild and have met in person a handful of others. I consider them friends. You don't just take off on your friends because they have hit some hard times. So I guess in that respect it's more personal than anything to do with the game itself.

I am so proud of my guild. The wonderful and vast range of people that make it up, run it and stand by it. If I could, I'd give them all a /hug, and maybe a /kiss too.

This is a Test...

2010-03-24T11:58:00.004-04:00

this is a test

Green Linen Shirt

Wow cool, I have now figured out how to add pop out mouse over tool tips into my blog.
Been working on that for a week to find the information and finally found someone who had actually written down enough steps for me to understand.

If you would like to do this too I will add it to my blogger help page but you can also follow this Blog Azeroth link here: Blogger How To and read all of the posts...that was my first mistake, not reading all the way through.
Thanks to the contributors for their help :)

A Little Love

2010-03-20T10:54:00.003-04:00

Hey guys,
So I've decided to spread the Zabby love and put myself out there a little, as well as dedicate some time to some other WoW areas of the community.

I have volunteered to be a wiki-brarian for Twisted Nether Blogcast which is a podcast about their blog site about, of course, WoW.

I have also added myself to their Big List of Blogs as well as submitted an introduction at Blog Azeroth.

Both links I have included. If you're interested in reading more than just me, check it out.

If you found me through them I welcome you to my world, and as everything else around here...take it with a grain of salt and know that I do not proclaim to be exceptionally knowledgeable about anything in particular. Just highly opinionated. :)

The Twisted Nether Blogcast
Blog Azeroth

Are You a Fanboy....er Girl....um, Person?

2010-03-18T11:36:00.000-04:00

1) Fanboys play the game more than they actually work.
ME: not quite but close

2) Fanboys read every scrap of literature they find.
ME: almost, I don't read the comics and I only read a few blogs

3) Fanboys listen to every podcast ever made about WoW.
ME: I have 11 and growing...scary

4) Fanboys follow everyone on Twitter.
ME: yep!

5) Fanboys argue over gaming mechanics, specs, stats and anything else they feel strongly about.
ME: kinda...I will engage in light debate

6) Fanboys talk about WoW incessantly.
ME: whenever I can :P

7) Fanboys think their class is teh best, their guild is uber l33t, and all others are stupid.
ME: no never...well, hardly never...almost never??

8) Fanboys organize "game sessions".
ME: nope, unless you call "Pajama Sunday" organized

9) Fanboys troll the forums to point out how everyone else is a loser.
ME: not on your life...I'm usually one of the losers

10) Fanboys are geeks, nerds, freaks, dorks and generally crazy.
ME: yep totally, at least 4 out of 5

11) Fanboys go to conventions to meet other geeks, nerds, freaks, dorks and generally crazy people.
ME: would SO do this if I had more cash to splurge on that sort of thing

12) Fanboys know the devs by name.
ME: most of them yes, at least the key players

So what does this mean? I am very nearly totally a fanboy. Yea it's hard to admit but there it is. I just love this game!
So I am trying to look past the crappy lowlife hanger-on connotation of the word, and have decided that being a fanboy is ok in moderation. :)

**Disclaimer: This post was meant for fun. If I have insulted you in any way it was completely and utterly fabricated in your head.

Leveling the Old Fashioned Way.

2010-03-12T09:16:00.001-05:00

I remember leveling my main. It was fun, interesting, always felt like there was something to do, and it was long.

It used to take 10 levels to get through a zone, and I'm talking vanilla WoW, and now BC.

You know what? I really liked it that way. I realize that I am probably in the minority these days. I hear a lot about how great it is to bring up alts really quickly, at least to 68.

But...

This is my dilemma; I am raising a new "main" so to speak, on a different server. My horde toon is 65 and I have stopped playing her over the last week because I've run into an issue or two.

I would like to move through the content progressively and be able to see all the story-lines and lore available. That is the main reason I created a horde toon to begin with. Right now I feel like I've skipped a great deal in Old World story and am now in BC and hitting the same problem. I have completed Hellfire Peninsula and have moved on into Zangarmarsh, but as I said I'm 65. At this rate I will not get to see all the BC content either before it's time to head to Northrend. I'm bummed about that.

Second is professions. My leather working skill is so low that I will be spending a huge chunk of time simply grinding out leather. I do hate farming.
I had decided to do the Venomhide mount quest for the Venomhide raptor mount and took that time in Un'Goro to get my leather working at least to 303 so I could begin in Outlands. What am I going to do but farm to get out of BC? I am not looking forward to that.
Cooking didn't seem to be much of a problem but my fishing is STILL around 27.

Third is gold. Being this is my main toon on a new server I have no other toons to give me a leg up. I do not have regular flying skill and am just reaching a point where I will be able to afford it soon. I do have to say though, that I distinctly remember there being a gold shortage the first time around. Azeroth it seems is broke, or at least very cheap when it comes to paying their heroes. But in WoW's defense, the first time around we didn't fly until we were 70. By that time you had the cash.

All these add up to a not so great experience with leveling. Had I started WoW now, during this expansion, I don't know if I would have enjoyed the leveling process as much as I did way back in the day. All my friends would be even further off in the distance than they were then. 80 seems really far away when you're 14 or 27 or even 52.
The experience of going through all the zones and seeing everything has been so decreased you can literally skip whole areas of content and still level. Whole story-lines and ideas are just missed completely.

So that leaves me with my question. What do I do? Do I just continue, level and say screw the story and the content I want to see so badly and "start over" in Wrath? Do I continue leveling through BC as normal? At that rate I will be 75 by the time I move on to Northrend. This dilemma has stopped me short and I have not been able to decide where to go from here. I understand there is a great story in Nagrand so should I skip the rest of Zangar? What about Terrokar and Shadowmoon Valley? All those quests in Shattrath? Aldor or Scryer?? OMG!!

Ok...take a breath...in with the good out with the bad...

For me a great portion of the game is about playing the entire game not just end-game content. I bring up alts to explore new areas or to re-explore old quest lines I enjoyed or had forgotten about. I do not bring up alts to do heroic dungeons at 80 or to help my guild down a boss in TOGC. I am a firm believer in playing a toon for it's own enjoyment and not necessarily how much you can contribute to a raid group. Don't get me wrong. I know that that certainly has a place in the game and I enjoy my raiding. It is just not all there is to the game for me.

I still don't know what to do, and my toon still sits in Swamprat Camp waiting for me to make up my mind. /sigh
Nothing is going to get done this way.

Random Stuff About Me and My Toons

2010-03-06T14:22:00.000-05:00

So I was writing my about page...finally I know. And I kept having to hit the backspace. I found I had just a bunch of silly tidbits of info I wanted to include for some random reason. So here is the list of silly little things you may or may not want to know about me ingame.

1) Zab was the first toon I ever created and she remains my main to this day.

2) I have 4 level 80's, each has maxed main professions.

3) I WILL get a horde to level 80. Currently she is 65 :P

4) All my toons are female.

5) Most all my toons have a backstory. All my high-level ones definitely do.

6) I have at least one toon of every race and I have tried every class at least once. The only ones I found I didn't care for are rogue and mage. I think it's because I'm just not that quick on the trigger.

7) I have RP'd in game and in more ways than I care to disclose in this post.

8) I always play with the game sound and when possible with a headset. I love the music and the immersion. Only once have I listened to my own music while playing. I was farming at the time.

9) I would rather farm the mats for something than buy them, I have not figured out why I do this.

10) I love to complete things. Achievements are the bane of my existence as I now have a built in "to-do list", and I feel the need to check them off. lol

That's it for now. If I think of any more possibly interesting things I'll edit or post another.

Cataclysm - Some Stat Changes Announced

2010-03-02T10:32:00.007-05:00

First and foremost, for the full blue post please go here Forum Post

Read it once, read it twice and then lets talk about it.

My initial response on the first read through was;
"Well Hell! Let's just all get a shield, wear mail and call it a day." The stamina stat changes lead one to believe that we shall all be equal. Or equal-ish. And..."Crap, those poor elemental shammies and balanced druids will have to do the same thing my warlock does now with spirit to spell power conversion, except it will be spirit to hit. Haven't we just moved the problem to somewhere else then?" I disagree with the spirit to anything conversion, having had to do it for all of Wrath. I felt stupid looking for spirit at first but have now gotten used to it. Frankly, converting one stat to another is frustrating. There must be an inherent gearing problem here somewhere that no one is talking about. Perhaps spirit itself IS the problem? I thought we were eliminating those this time around?
Finally, after the first read through I find I am terribly disappointed. These changes seem somehow so much more homogenizing than I expected. They also seem, at first glance, to be just as confusing as the stats we're currently working with. Block rating?? I had to scroll back up and reread what the hell that was in the first place. It's 30% plus something??

Ok so now I'm going to take a break. Go have some lunch. Let the initial shock wear off of seeing not at all what I expected to see. Then I will be back and reread this and see if it makes a bit more sense.

And Poof! We're back!
I have taken the afternoon to think about all this and have reread the post. My initial reactions still hold pretty much true. I read this out loud to my husband and the questions he through out were very close to what I had rolling around in my cranium.
Rather than rehash the whole kit and kaboodle, there are brief areas I'd like to look at.

Stamina - Because of the way we will be assigning Strength, Agility, and Intellect, non-plate wearers will end up with more Stamina than before. Health pools will be much closer between plate-wearers and other classes.

AND

Armor - The way Armor mitigates damage is not changing, but the Armor stat has been rebalanced to mirror changes to the armor curve in Cataclysm. As a result, bonus Armor will go down slightly overall. We are also changing the mitigation difference among armor types so that plate doesn’t offer so much more protection than mail, leather, and cloth.

Lead me to believe that I WILL be a tanking warlock! Now, where did I put that sword?

Block Rating - Block is being redesigned to scale better. Blocked attacks will simply hit for 30% less damage. Block rating will improve your chance to block, though overall block chances will be lower than they are today.

What IS this? I guess I'm going to have to wait for EJ to find out what the formula is? Or how/what this means to me?

Being Removed from Items

Attack Power - This stat will no longer be present on most items as a flat value, though it will still show up on some process. Strength and Agility, which will be present on items, will grant the appropriate amount of Attack Power (generally 2 Attack Power per point of Strength or Agility) depending upon which stat a particular class favors. Agility may provide less Crit than it currently does.

Spell Power - Spell Power is another stat that you'll no longer see present on most items. Instead, as mentioned above, Intellect will grant Spell Power. One exception is that caster weapons will still have Spell Power. This allows us to make weapons proportionately more powerful for casters in the same way they are for melee classes.

Armor Penetration - This stat will no longer be present on items. Armor Penetration will still exist in talents and abilities.

Shield Block Value - This stat will no longer be present on items, since the amount blocked is always proportional to the amount of damage done. Talents and other effects might still modify the damage-reduction percentage from 30%, however.

OK, so either get rid of them or don't get rid of them. This "It doesn't exist but it does" shit, doesn't cut it for me.

Going Away Completely

MP5 - This stat will be removed from the game completely. Holy paladins and Restoration shaman will be redesigned to benefit from Spirit.

Defense - Defense is being removed from the game entirely. Tanking classes should expect to become uncrittable versus creatures just by shifting into Defensive Stance, Frost Presence, Bear Form, or by using Righteous Fury.

Spell Ranks - Spell ranks will cease to exist. All spells will have one rank and will scale appropriately with level. The levels at which you can learn certain spells are being changed in order to fill in some of the gaps, and we will be introducing some new spells to learn along the way as well.

Weapon Skill - This stat will be removed from the game completely. Classes will start with all the weapon skills they need to know and will not need to improve them.

Happy with all of this but Weapon Skill. So I was just born knowing how to wield a mace?

If you are a Balance druid or Elemental shaman:

You will still share gear with Restoration druids and shaman.

Your gear will have Spirit on it. It won’t have Hit on it.

You will have a talent that converts Spirit to Hit. We will adjust talents accordingly so that you want about as much Spirit as, say, a warlock wants Hit.

Hit on rings and other such gear will still benefit you.

Raid buffs will no longer boost Spirit, so you shouldn’t find yourself unexpectedly over the Hit cap because of buffs.

I can only say, "I'm sorry". Having had to put up with the spirit to spell power conversion throughout Wrath I can only wish you the best with this one. My opinion of the gear issues stated above still stands.
In my mind I see a big chart on a wall with diagrams and arrows and stats and gear all over the place. There, right on the bottom right edge is a hole. Oh? We'll give that to balanced and elemental. The warlocks got moved to this (pointing at chart) gear spot over here with intellect and cloth gear. we're going to lump them in with mages until we can get this crazy shard UI figured out. Now what do we do with mail again? <scratch scratch>

OK. Now that I'm done being Negative Nancy over here....I had an expectation of a very pared down system harkening back to the days of vanilla wow. Where the core stats modified everything and all this mumbo jumbo didn't exist so much. Or was that all in my mind? It's possible after all that I'm romanticizing the pre-BC days. I really didn't spend any time raiding in them so I could be way off base here.
This is what I pictured.
Stamina = HP, possible defensive additions
Strength = defensive of some sort, block, melee crit
Agility = attack power, melee haste (after all what does agile mean?)
Intellect = mana pool, spell power, spell crit?
Spirit = mana regen
That's it. That's all that resides in my little brain. Hit can go away along with haste. Make it all a base modifier such as the 2 Stam=1AP.
I understand the need to boost through gear and I'm not trying to be dumb. However, in some cases the current proposed changes seem dumbed down to me. Scaling armor differently is a prime example. So much of what I am, what I do, and where I stand in relation to my group and mobs/bosses is based on my clothie status, that I'm kinda left without words. (You can now stand in the stupid, stupid. Oh god, I didn't just say that did I?)
No, I'm being overdramatic here. I don't expect this to be that massive that we can all go tank. But it sure reads like that at first glance.

In the end I am relying on Blizzard to make the right choices, and in a way I trust them to. I fear that they may be heading down the long slow road to death and I pray that is not the case. Truly I do. I hope that this glimpse is just a small piece and that the puzzle it fits into is much greater than the sum of it's parts.
Ever the optimist in the end.

*All excerpts are from the original post by Eyonix on 03/01/2010 and are the property of Blizzard Entertainment. The post, in its entirety can be viewed through the link provided at the beginning of this post.

CC Oh Playmate

2010-02-27T14:17:00.003-05:00

This is one of those posts that is going to start as one thing and lead into another...just to warn you :)

I have been wondering why no one uses CC any longer? I've been contemplating this for a few days now and have come up with a couple of reasons.
1) Time - It takes much longer on the front end to coordinate target marking, it also takes time between mobs to coordinate pulls. In BC, unless you were with a group that knew all the pulls you were left explaining every mob to every one, or, to one person. Many times this just became frustrating. Now with LFG, it is almost a gimme that an instance will last no more than 45 minutes if that. Many now are reduced to 15-20 minutes per run and people have gotten used to that. Instances that run longer are seen as a waste of time.
2) Ability - We now have the ability to pull whole mobs or multiple mobs at once. Tanks have been given the skill set to deal with large groups as opposed to single targets.
3) Skill - In my opinion, due to the increased leveling time frame, many classes with CC abilities just did not learn how to use that particular skill in a group situation.

When I first started my Wrath path I got into groups with new guildies. Those that had just leveled their toons in this expansion. I tried running groups where we taught hunters how to chain trap and mages to sheep etc. It was not a great success. I wonder if it's a long lost art at this point.

On the flip side, we ran Old Kingdom a while back and decided that everyone would CC if they chose. It was fun. However, being that that was my first tanking experience with CC, I myself found it uncomfortable and was unsure what to do. I was hoping that the CCer's would pull the mobs far enough away, and had to mentally force myself not to cleave, thunderclap or shockwave in that direction in order to not break it. It was challenging but it was a cool exercise. I would love to try it again just to learn more about functioning in that situation.

So this line of thinking took me in another direction. I remember, long ago and toward the end of BC I got into a PUG for a heroic Shattered Halls. I think I got picked up simply because I was a warlock with AoE capabilities and fairly decent gear, though not tier. The tank was a pally. For the first time we did an entire AoE instance. Even the dreaded 7 pull was pulled all at once and me and a mage promptly AoE'd them down. No CC! It was so cool! I really don't care much for Seducing with my Succubus. I never thought I was very skilled at it, though I can do it successfully. It was refreshing to just do damage and not have to juggle several tasks at once.

Looking back on this instance I wonder how we did it? I don't remember who the players were but this is my take on it. OP. We had enough gear, damage, HP and heals to pull it off.
So how does this translate to today? It seems that Wrath was designed that way. The class changes that occurred in Wrath have allowed us to do it. We have higher HP in proportion to the mobs we're faced with. We have a higher damage output that allows us to be able to run through instances and wipe the floor with our adversaries.

What does this mean now? In order to keep progressing with gear and spells and HP pools we need to redesign and tool down a bit what we have. To keep the obstacles as obstacles Blizz has had to make bosses that are so overpowering that the fights become totally out of whack. A prime example would be the debuff you get in ICC that I believe reduces dodge. The debuff was put in because in order to get around how often a dodge occurred yet still make the boss bossy they had to pack a ton of damage into one boss attack. Thus making it nearly impossible when the boss did land a hit to heal it and continue. From my understanding the encounters were so damage spiky they were too tough to complete.
It seems I have come to my own conclusion in a round about casual way that I think Blizz has reached. In order to continue on this path stats have to be modified. We cannot continue to be OP or the fun will leach out before we even realize it.
Honestly, we all want to go in and blow away raid bosses. Realistically if we one-shot everything we would literally be done with the game. The fun is in the battle, and the logistics. Figuring out how to win and feeling like we've worked for it. How many of us would get bored very quickly?

To that end I wait with baited breath for Cataclysm if only to see how this all comes out. I am excited about the stat changes, (not only for the math aspect) but to see how it resets all of us. Will we be doing more CC in the future? Who knows. Sometimes I miss it and sometimes it's nice to just faceroll through an instance. I don't think Blizz will be able to go back though. We've all been spoiled by the 15 minute instance. If we are now forced to take the long road the forums may light up with QQ. (LULZ)

Someone took the words...

2010-02-18T08:50:00.000-05:00

Right outta my mouth....

World of Matticus - Raiding 101

If only we were as prepared as we should be. The amount of preparedness should not be left solely to the raid leaders. It is something everyone is responsible for.

When I began to set up Ulduar everyone who signed up received a message from me. Go check out the fights, with references to WoWHead, Tankspot and YouTube. I had set up an expectation that everyone be prepared. I was pleasantly surprised by the amount of references that were thrown around in guild chat shortly after, and happy with the results when we did make the attempt.

Anyone can tell you what to do, but don't you think you should know?

RP Moment

2010-02-10T13:56:00.001-05:00

Whenever I have to go into the water in Northrend I always think, "OMG, that must be cold!"

-this RP moment brought to you by Icecrown Icecubes Ltd. because everything here is frozen.
"Don't mind the eyeball dear. It will melt."

And the QQ Follow Up......

2010-02-09T13:19:00.001-05:00

Since I started this rant I might as well finish it up with some prot warrior QQ. Yes I know.... Then I'm done.
Really I am.... promise.

Who the heck decided that there should be no CC in Wrath?

That's the gist of it really. Warriors have a heck of a lot more to do when it comes to tanking than pally's or DK's from what I can tell. Now, I'm not an expert on either tanking or pally's or DK's but man I have to put in a lot of work, and you people sure know how to keep me on my toes. AoE is going to drive me insane. I cannot speak to druid tanks at all. I hardly see them and I understand there is an issue with gear scaling and all that, as well as everyone seems to think that resto is the way to go. I don't know, I don't own a druid personally and can only rely on second-hand or make wild ass guesses. So, sparing myself further embarrassment, I won't.

Also, I'm tired of running around, quit pulling. You may think it's because I don't have enough threat (see previous post), I say it's because you are over eager and over zealous and are not paying attention.

OH! And now that I've been tanking, when I'm not tanking I'm watching you. All you other tanks out there. I wonder what you're doing, why you're pulling that way instead of this, and sometimes....I wonder what the heck you're doing. That seems to be another down side. In the back of my mind I'm criticizing others. I will never say anything because everyone does their own thing their own way, and I just let it go. As long as I'm alive we have conquered and that's really what it's all about.

That's it. Just had to throw in that 2 cents. Maybe when I've been tanking for longer than 3 months I'll have more to say.

Who Left My Lock Out in the Rain?

2010-02-05T09:38:00.004-05:00

I have never really bitched about my class before. I am not one to QQ a lot. I believe that Blizzard is always trying to do the best they can with class balance and believe that eventually it will all even out. What is a nerf for you today will be a nerf for me tomorrow and that sort of thing.

However, this has gone on far too long and I've something to say about it!

Back during BC I noticed this trend. For some reason people decided that warlocks were just too OP. Fears and DoTs were just too much for everyone else to handle I guess and the complaining began. I guess those rogues in AV just couldn't stand it any longer. Hah!
Thus the steady decline of the warlock began.

Now I look around and I don't see very many of us. All hail the mighty paladin, the cunning rogue and the ever lurking shadow priests.
Alas, where did all the warlocks go I ask?

So let me share with you my little story from this past week that has led to this verbose and exasperated post...
With the ready availability of tier gear I had decided that now was the time to truly delve into my evil destructive lockiness and really attempt to pull some higher dps.
I began to really read up on stats, gems and enchants.
Hit vs Haste. Haste vs Crit. Int or Spir. How much spell power is enough?! (ad infinitum actually)
After all this research I went out and applied my knowledge. I ground my little warlock ass off and procured a tier 9 set of my own. I laid out gold by the hundreds for the right gems, the right enchants...the right food for god's sake!
And I tweaked! I read some more, and tweaked some more til I my head was full of visions of warlock goodness and my eyes were full of the grand numbers my crits would be throwing up on my screen!
Do you know what? It sucked. I stopped. I stopped for a week or so and thought. Then I went back to reading. Back to hit caps and spirit. Back to trinkets and gear and 4 piece set bonuses. Until at last I thought I had it figured out....again.
But no. Oh FUCK! (and lots of other cuss words...oh and some stomping and desk pounding in for good measure)
I backed up to step one. Visiting videos for new warlocks. Pouring over my spec point by point. Believing that if I really understood what each talent point gave me I would be better for it. And really I was, there is always something new to learn...but...FUCK!
The only thing I have not done at this point is start theorycrafting and crunching numbers. Frankly I hate numbers and it's not going to happen. I rely on those of you that have the patience for that to help us poor misguided math losers. Oh, and I haven't done anything like plug into a SimulationCraft. (article about said program here)

Ok so...after all this munching and crunching and chewing on information I went back and looked over my toon. I realized some basic things that were a little off and again replaced gems. Some gem guy on my server has made a ton of $$ off me. Though some I have been able to make myself on my warrior. Luckily the enchants are free huh?
2 days ago I went to Exodar and found the practice dummies. It is nice and quiet there and I don't have to worry about some random warrior coming along and standing in front of me.
I'm working here, shove off!
I pulled up the stopwatch, added my normal fel armor, a firestone, and a food buff, and turned off recount so I would focus. Then I proceeded to wail away on this dummy for 2:30 sec. Enough time for my CoD to proc twice. Then I stopped. I waited for it to finish its 3rd kaboom...so we're talking 3 minutes and a bit here. Then checked the numbers. (thinking back I should have recorded my number right then or finished up the 3 minutes completely)
I was devastated. Barely 3k! So I'm standing there pouting in guild chat, and thinking I've had it! I can't believe I can't produce decent numbers, and what the fuck are all these people talking about with 4-6k dps? WHAT IS GOING ON?! I just must be a totally crappy player! Against a target dummy!
If I have followed all the recommendations and all the proper this and thats. If all my attention to every fucking detail was not paying off then it must be me...it has to be right? I am one of those people that Blizzard doesn't think you should be playing with.... oh god nooooo! Not after all this time, and all this MONEY! Are you kidding me? All that stuff about you can lead a camel to water....and isn't there some saying about a thoroughbred or show dog or something? I don't know. /sigh

In the mean time....

There were other wheels turning. I had listened to an episode of The Instance, where they talked about this.

This is a chart that Blizzard created showing an average of dps during the Festergut fight in ICC. I don't know if it is 10 or 25 but I'm going to assume 25 because of the numbers.

16th!! Would that make YOU happy? Surely not.

Now, I don't think that I can reasonably expect to be doing that kind of dps in a 5 man heroic, but apparently I can't reasonably expect to be anywhere near the top in any raid situation either. I should expect that 15 other specs will beat me out. So in a 25 man I might come in before the tanks. If they're not pallys that is.

In the mean time back at the target dummy fuming....
I begin to solicit my guildmates help.
"Please" I beg. "You must help me figure out what is going on!!" I am reviewed. My armory data is scrutinized. The result is there is no reason why I should not be putting out wonderful stupendous flames of dps goodness, and thoroughly burning the shit out of anything in my path. So again it must be me right?

Actually...somewhat is the answer.

*First, I learned that I clipped my DoTs and that doing that is very very bad. And I did it a lot! Not allowing that extra tic is tre importante. (No I don't speak French or Spanish but it worked in my head so let it go)
*Second, I never set recount to merge me and my pets dps. In my head it seemed logical to keep my imps info separate. I guess that is not right. The end numbers did show a difference worth mentioning.
*Third, I wander. My fingers wander, my mind wanders, my toon wanders. I do not always keep everything flying at a steady rate. When I need to be there I am, but in the mean time I might miss cast something, clip something etc.
These things do add up to a significant portion of missed dps, but when you're flying through a heroic it doesn't much matter. When I spend the majority of my time in 5 mans I am not as regimented as perhaps I could be. Am I a lousy player? I say nay nay. Is there room for improvement? Absolutely.

So what does all this rambling add up to? In the end, I think that my class as a whole is just not able to generate the numbers that come so easily for a few others. I think Blizz has some work to do and I want, no I DEMAND! some Warlock love.

I hear wonderful snippets of promise coming from Blizz about this for Cataclysm. I am hopeful and afraid at the same time. The complete overhaul of the shard system has me shaking in my demon booties. I do not want to be a Death Knight in cloth. I really really hope this system doesn't turn into a runic type one similar to DK's. But OMG I will be so thankful to get rid of a bag of purple things. Really would love to have a bag back, gee wouldn't that be nice. /sigh

Please please Blizz, make me a blazing bad-ass again that everyone thinks is OP and everyone wants to be! I really do miss the days of "oh shit its a warlock".

Feeling Threatened?

2010-01-29T08:42:00.002-05:00

Lately I've been hearing a lot about dps and threat management. There seems to be a theme running through all the podcasts I've been listening to so I thought I'd drop some lines about it.

I have had an opportunity to get a different perspective on the 5 man group. Since Blizz made it very easy to level I know that many folks have had this same opportunity to try something new. Either dps, tank or heals, melee or ranged, we've all gotten to see how the other side lives. Has this changed your perspective? Do you have more or less respect for the job others do in your group?

I have been playing my warlock now for nearly 5 years. When I began I was not a big add-on fan so I shied away from them. I played by feel. What that means to me is that I just began to get an idea of where I was on the threat meter by what I was doing. I knew that if I threw out one more shadowbolt I'd be over the top so I would back off. I got a sense of the feel for the dungeon and the mob I'm hitting and what it would take to peel it off the tank. I knew where my threshold was and it became instinctual, for lack of a better word. I now use quite a few add-ons one of which is Omen. I find I don't look at it very often. Occasionally I glance down to see where I'm at and how quickly my threat is building.

The first thing I do when I join a group is put the tank on focus. That allows me to always see what the tank is focused on. Most mobs are not marked, though some tanks do mark the first target off on occasion. I maintain single target dps. I follow the tanks target and build threat gradually. When that mob is dead I will usually grab the next one the tank does unless he's trying to pull threat off of someone else. My rotation begins with curses before I whip out my larger immolates and conflags. Once I know how the tank is working I may switch it up, or if the instance is something like VH where the targets are fast I might hit mulitple targets, again depending on how the tank is handling threat. If the tank is predisposed to run through the instance mopping the floor with every mob I may convert to AoE damage and bust out SoC, or during certain mob fights like the rock guys in HoS. I have found that pally's tend to do this. They have the ability to hold mob aggro much better than other classes and I can let loose. I get frustrated when I'm in a group where everyone is AoE'ing and its obvious mobs are flying everywhere and yet they don't stop. I don't believe AoE is the best solution in every fight and I don't think it benefits the group unless everyone can handle it.

As a prot warrior I don't generally put focus on any one member of the group. I use grid to help me determine if someone else has pulled threat. Being a warrior I don't have a particular rotation but do rely on some basics when first pulling a mob such as TC, SS and Shockwave. My ideal is to get them all into a nice neat package then stun them. I have a nice macro that will grab the next target and throw a few things at him, when I hit the macro again it will grab the next target etc. Being a warrior I don't have as much to throw on the floor to grab their attention so I do have to make sure I'm hitting everything. Cleave comes in handy here too and I tend to use that towards the end of gathering them up as it helps maintain threat and is a good rage dump. My biggest pet peeve as a warrior is AoE. No surprise there huh.

I remember back in the day (here we go) when we used to have the 3 sunder rule. Before everyone used Omen. I have kinda come back to this. Not necessarily waiting for 3 sunders, but waiting a little. Count to 1 or something. I realize that there is no reason to be in such a fired up hurry. Giving the mobs a little time to find the tank more charming than the dps. On both sides I have found that if I relax a little, give it a second, the results are much better. There is no reason for the dps to start banging away right off.

So who is responsible for threat? Everyone. We are all responsible for managing our own threat and for being aware of our threat. How it accumulates, what it takes to build and maintain it and what we need to do to dump it if needed. I see it as a line in the air. The tank is supposed to keep threat, keep that line up as high and as best as possible. This is it, this is the line don't go over it. I am the tank and I have said THIS is the LINE! The dps' job is to down the mob or boss without going above that line. Now we all wish we had uber tanks that could hold a mob just by staring them down. Everybody limbo now.

Reality is that is just not the case. Everyone is different. Not just classes but people. Everyone is at a different level/ability, has different gear, or has a different way of thinking. Everyone has an idea about what is best. How best to build a rotation as a dps or to build threat as a tank. If you think you have the only way you are wrong.

The fact is what I've been hearing and seeing around the interwebs these days about dps, is that they have gone mad. They believe that for a tank to be good they MUST be able to endure everything a dps can through at the mob as fast as possible.

Let me end with a personal experience. In trade chat just last week someone was bragging about how they got kicked out of a group because they continually pulled threat off the tank, and how they must be a great dps, and that tank just sucked. That person thought it was funny that they would be kicked for such a thing, and thought that trade chat would get a good laugh along with them. I was happy to see some people tell this guy he was full of shit and deserved to be kicked. So I know there are others out there who know what their jobs are. The problem is, they seem to be few and far between these days. Apparently that huntard that had no idea what he was doing in BRD is now in tier 9 and trolling LFG.

PTSD 3.3 and WTF Have You Been?

2010-01-21T08:37:00.000-05:00

So, where have I been what have I been doing? So much and its been way too long to enumerate.

I'd like to start with 3.3. A little late (ok a lot late) but there has been so much going on it's crazy.

I haven't done ICC raid but have done the 5 mans both on my lock and on my warrior. I am not to crazy about them. Mostly because everyone just zips through. It wasn't until the 3rd or 4th time in I actually had an opportunity to see/listen to Jaina and try to decipher what we were supposed to be doing. I think the dungeons are nifty in appearance but really lack some content. All 3 put together would make a great dungeon. Separate they drive me batty. 2 bosses and some crazy mobs. Lots of casters which suck for a warrior tank mind you. Not impossible but not easy to round up either. PoS is the most interesting. That was until everyone found the easy way to bypass most of the mobs and run through it. Sheesh. Folks slow down a little, would it fucking kill you?
I have heard a lot about the portion of the raids that are open from the podcasts I listen to. I'm afraid I have not experienced any of it. Sad to say.

My big gripe is the LFG system. Really thats where all my crankiness comes from. I have been in so many groups where they can't even say hello. I have been in so many groups where people were just asshats. I'm tired of hearing about gearscore and I'm tired of badges. I'm tired of looking like everyone else in Dalaran too. I ran my ass off the first couple of weeks and both my toons have pretty much tier 9 gear or equivalent. I think it wore me out. I got so excited about being able to run from dungeon to dungeon and getting badges and titles and pets that when I stopped to look around I realized I was missing the game. I wasn't playing anymore I was racing. When I stopped to take stock of what was going on it just pissed me off. Realizing that these random groups didn't even speak to each other was just making me more angry. Here we are in a social game and we can't even stop to say hello to the real people we're playing with. I don't think the LFG did anyone any favors.

So I took some time away from my mains. In fact I took some time away from my faction. I have some hidden Horde on another server. Ok so before you say I'm a traitor...I have heard said many times that if you just play one side you are missing half the game. My intent was to at least see what is going on on the other side. I do take issue with having Horde and Alliance toons on the same server, and I have no toon space left on Kael'Thas anyway, so my horde are all relegated to another server. My highest toon is now 55. I don't spend oodles of time there but since I have such an interest in the lore I thought it was a good idea to see how the other half live.

Between getting back to "playing" the game and the holidays and being sick AND the great washer fiasco of 2010 I just found it best to step back from everything and take a break from the "race" I was in.

Lately, I have found that I get on and do my thing. Daily JC, farming, cloth CD's etc. Do a daily H on Zab and Moon, or try to, and get back to playing my way and enjoying the game.

I do have to say that I'm liking the new gear though *smirk*. It wasn't all a waste. lol

Tanked

2010-01-21T08:22:00.002-05:00

I finally got up the nerve to do a Random H LFG PuG on my warrior. I have realized that the fear of screwing up is keeping me from doing it. So I just decided to hit the button last night and give in and just do it (doo eeet!). After I got passed the initial "oh shit! I'm tanking" syndrome it was fine. Nice easy H VH, no wipes. I wasn't the greatest because I was more worried than paying attention, and there were definite times when the group saved my ass but I did it. Or more to the point I DID IT!!
I know what I'm doing I just can't get past the fact that I don't want to deal with people telling me I suck or something. Even though I really don't.

I visited Tankspot.com and picked up some hints from their prot warrior guide. I backed out my view all the way which is weird for me, and set up vigilance and intervene with clique so I'd actually USE them and low and behold I'm making a better tank of myself for it. Thank You Areidan where ever you are. Even those few tips about situational awareness helped. One baby step at a time right :)

Where I Came From

2009-11-20T09:58:00.003-05:00

Introductions are in order here I think. I began playing WoW about 5 or 6 months before Burning Crusade came out. I hit 60 almost exactly 30 days before its release. I can't remember when that was, I think July 2006. At least that sounds right. which means I'm going on 4 years.
I was down, very down in the bottom of the dredges of the dumps. I was going through a nasty time in my marriage and was simply not a happy person. A very good friend of mine had been playing and invited me to her house where she pulled up World of Warcraft, loaded up her toon and said here, sit down. I now realize she was in Tanaris and even what quest she was doing at the time (yes I'm crazy, see previous post plz). She was in Gadgetzan and she got on her mount and said pulled up the map and pointed. "We're going here" she said. She showed me how to steer and told me to head in that direction and just don't run into any monsters. That was it, that's all it took. She let me make a character on her account and play around for maybe half an hour or so. In the process I saw this wonderous thing! A flaming horse! That was how I decided to play a Warlock. It was all about the flaming horse, lol. I think within the next 2 days I had bought and installed the game.
I got her on the phone and she helped me through the installation and got me on the correct realm. I joined the guild at level 1. She trotted down to Elwynn Forest and gave me 3 gold for training and I was off and never looked back.
You must understand, I have always loved video games but never played an MMO before. I am a bit (she would laugh at "bit") of a co-dependent, and for me to go out and just buy a video game with a huge commitment like a monthly subscription without first talking to my husband was unusual for me. Quite unusual. I needed something that was mine. That I enjoyed doing by myself but could still interact with others. Something I started on my own. It was awesome. I had control, I had power, I had autonomy. I could take out my agression on small animals! lol
I made wonderful friends and some not so wonderful friends. You know how WoW is, just like life its full of every kind. I think I found them all at one time or another.
Zab was my first toon I rolled that day and I've not had another main. Loved her from the minute I created her, not knowing a damn thing about warlocks. She wears a permanent scowl. A fine testament to her moment of creation I think. And she forever represents to me the unyielding, fiery, I'm gonna kick some butt mentality I couldn't find anywhere else in my life at the time.
I loved leveling and still do. I take my time, I read the quests and I go out on my own and seek adventure. I love it. To this day I love taking a new toon and just leveling by myself. This is my altoholic hook. It sounds very RP to me, but to wander out into this world and look around is the most facinating and riveting part of the game.
Needless to say this little game I was playing didn't go unnoticed by my husband. I think he started playing when I was around level 25. He went out and bought and installed it. He didn't want to join the guild. In fact he had a hard time with the game. I found it so easy and it just made sense to me. He fought it. We didn't play much together then. He got a toon to 50-something I think. She did eventually join the guild too. One day he lost it, deleted his toons and uninstalled the game. Ok no biggie. We didn't play together so to speak. We would play at the same time in the same room, but rarely did we group or play together. I kept playing. hahaha! I wouldn't give up my new addiction.
He returned to WoW not long after. Maybe a month or so. We started playing together. We made Draenei and leveled together. Now, years later we are happier than we've ever been with each other. WoW didn't have anything to do with it. That was therapy lol. So no, this isn't a WoW brought us together story. We now have a few toons, some are dedicated to playing together only. We've swapped a few and have created new duo's. The last was my warrior and his priest. We put them together about level 77 and hit 80 together and have been having a blast. We are a perfect set and can get an instance in a heartbeat with that team. It rocks.
I have a gazillion alts both horde and alliance now. I don't have them on the same server, it doesn't feel right to me. LOL. Yes you'd think I'd be on an RP server with all that talk.
My first love, Zabine, is still my favorite. I have a unique affinity with her I think. Born out of a bad time in my life she kept me going, along with all the wonderful people in-game that have lent me an ear and a shoulder over the last few years.
Yea I guess it's a bit sappy, but thats me :)
I am now the guild master of the very guild I joined at level 1. I think that is a great accomplishment these days and a testament to my friends and the guild they began. On several occasions I have thought of moving her on. We are not big time raiders. We raid 1 night a week and it is currently spent in OS, Nax and an occasional try at some others. We aren't great but we have fun. There are times I hook up with friends and run larger raids. I have the gear and sometimes I yearn for the challenge. In the end I will never pull her out of KG. Even if I relinquish the Leader spot, which I've also contemplated, I don't think I could move her out. I am far too committed and too co-dependent. But then, we've established that.

So much to say, so little time.

2009-11-20T09:28:00.000-05:00

Over the last week or so I've come up with so many topics I wanted to discuss and haven't gotten here to post them that I'm lost for what to write about. I get stuck in wondering if I would have anything useful to say. My strong suit in WoW seems to be my unwavering memory. I have an uncanny ability to remember quest chains, locations, names of cities, towns and flightpoints and other useless information. Well, ok. Not useless. Perhaps useless here in a blog but definitely not in-game. If you need an answer on how to find something I can usually spout it off in chat without missing a beat. Many times I'm concerned that I come off as a know-it-all. Recently I have tried to slow down my responses and give others a chance to speak up. Then I notice an great uncomfortable silence in gchat and I am back to my old ways, expounding on the many different places you can go and how you can get there. Giving names, times, flight paths and in some cases NPC's.
The question is, how does that help me here? It doesn't at all. Unless I'm going to start taking questions from people (highly unlikely), I don't feel I have a bunch of information to contribute in this format.
Lately though I have found that this interesting yet annoying memory of mine has come into play in a terrific way. I have started tanking a bit more with my warrior. Remembering all the encounters and pulls has come in quite handy. Perhaps I've found a new niche in the game hmmm?
On that note lets start there. My warrior. Hmmmm....I feel I should step back and talk about my main here too. See, I'm just a crazy person when it comes to topics. Easily distracted...oh look something shiny!

Isn't it enchanting?

2009-11-12T10:32:00.004-05:00

Being an enchanter I wanted to share my thoughts on the new instance change that will be coming in 3.3.
As long as there is an enchanter in the group, the group will now be given a selection to greed for DE. If that is selected the item being rolled for will automatically be disenchanted and the shard will go to the highest roller.

I think this is taking my profession and making it everyone's profession. I have been playing for 4 years. I have spent my time and my money leveling MY profession. This now gives everyone access to use my services without asking me, without me offering, without my approval, and without me reaping any benefit from it.
The reason this angers me is because I do not get the same benefit from other professions. If I need mats for something I need to go to the AH and buy them. If I need a gem or a gem cut I expect to pay for services rendered. Now the lowest asshole in the group, the idiot who may not be pulling his weight or taking advantage of the group. Some jerk I wouldn't help if they asked in trade, now has access to my profession without my consent.
If Blizzard intends to do this I would ask that any leather that is skinned, ore that is mined or herbs that picked in the instance also go up for a roll. It would only be fair right? Should I now be asking for rolls on profession based items that others pick up? Should I think that I have the right to your leather or cobalt, or any gems that might come from mining that node? I don't and the general population doesn't.

I understand that this change comes from the caveat that there will be no trading items in dungeons except conjured items. Thus eliminating gold sellers and players from trading high level items and gold in dungeons. How they'd do that in a random dungeon I don't know, but I'm sure someone would figure it out. I respect that. So now I have questions.....
I am a warlock, I carry water on me for just in case and what if the healer in the group forgot and is low on water? Or only came with 5 and it turns out that the group was having some problems on a mob or boss and they find they need more? I have plenty...I cannot give my extra water to my healer? I cannot give food that might help them do their job better, thus helping to ensure the success of my group? What if I don't have a feast to put out but I have some other type of food?
What if, I am in a group with 2 other guild members and I want to give them something to help them while in the run?
Blizzard has offered a solution. It seems you can hearth out and be ported back into the instance but come on! I want to move on! I have stuff I can give to move along and help out the team! Why can't I use them?!
Next, as mentioned above, why then can I not roll on ore, herbs or leather gathered by others?

My solution. If you insist on making this change, don't make it with the stipulation that only if there is an enchanter in the group will this option appear. Make that option part of the normal roll selection whether there is an enchanter in the group or not.
This does not make me feel better about it but it does make me feel like I'm not being taken advantage of, and that my profession is being used without my permission.

You Know You've Played Too Much WoW When....

2009-11-12T08:22:00.001-05:00

This was on my guild's forums and I loved it and thought I'd bring a blast from the past and post them here.

The question:
You know you've played too much WoW......

You wake up on your birthday and scream *DING* -Syladaris

You are hungry and look in the fridge. You think to yourself "Darn, I don't have all the mats to make that club sandwich." -Syladaris

You think of your job as PVE and your significant other as PVP. -Syladaris

When you consider a conversation with your significant other as faction aggro. -Rorac

When you are dieing of thirst and want a drink of mana. -Darlenea

When you talk on the phone to someone and exclaim that you mined ore, killed people, and escorted the princess from the tower last night and realize you are at work and everyone just heard you loud and clear! -Feorah

When you dig in your back yard and think to yourself that you are leveling your mining skill. -Randombeast

When you realize you are sending emails at work that include words like thot, ppl, omg, lol and faces (emotes). :) : / etc -Zabine

When you start referring to things in your life as being a level... for example we were level 34's working on our level 52 Elite house and it was kicking our butts until we brought out the level 58 sledgehammer. -Zabine

You refer to tasks like taking out the garbage, laundry and loading the dishwasher as doing your dailies. -Rorac

When you get called into the supervisors office over the radio at work....(think now what have I done) and he starts to ask you how and where to go to level up his toon and how to kill this or that. -Darlenea

When you find yourself daydreaming at work about how you can obtain that primal nether and gee, only if you could give it to someone for you cool new hat...wouldn't it be nice! -Sheebaquen

When you find yourself dreaming about healing people with rejuvenation in the hospital. -Sheebaquen

This weekend we were at a restaurant with a dock shaped like a cross. As I walked on it towards the water I found myself thinking that if i go straight, it'll take me to Exodar, left goes to Menethil Bay and right goes to Darnassus.
The sad part about it was that I shared what I was thinking with my Eline [daughter] and she completely understood without a more detailed explanation. -Randombeast

When you look in your closet to pick out what to wear that day and wonder what stats that blue sweater has, and is it socketed. -Feorah

When you wish you could shift click on an outfit to see how it would look on you. -Feorah

When you see someone you don't like and automatically yell out for your pet to attack. -Draugcuron

When you wonder how your WoW family is doing ... and do they have enough potions... -Darlenea

When you realize you have 3 FREAKIN LVL 70's in the guild. -Rickyboby (now he has 3 80's..or is it 4??)

When you realize you're IM'ing people and using slash commands to communicate. /smile /sad -Zabine

Hope we made you smile :)

R U A Jackass?

2009-10-31T10:35:00.001-04:00

Check it out. Funny reading and not bad info. Encourage all to use. New jackasses go out on Twitter if you follow.

WoW Jackass

What are you doing?

2009-10-31T08:50:00.000-04:00

After the family stress that has gone on it was no surprise when I caught the...well something. I won't call it the flu because honestly, I'm not sure what I had, er have. I still have it yet. Could be just a cold that decided to keep me down a bit longer than 24 or 48 hours.
I have the distinct feeling that I'm missing two months of my life. From mid September to now it has been a blur. I've been ensconced in a hospital parking structure for what seems like an eternity. When you start giving directions to others you know you've been there too long. On the flip side when not traveling back and forth to the hospital or being bed-ridden myself I have managed quite a bit in my WoW life. It's amazing what a little stress will drive you to do to avoid it. And yes folks, I used WoW to get away; and really my friends in game became my outlet for my grief, stress and fears. Thank you all for being there. Even if you didn't know it, having someone to talk to when I was alone at home made it much easier to move through it I think. I am a dweller. Be it past, present or future I will worry myself to death over something given half a chance. To have something to divert my focus helped me cope a bit better.
So what have I been up to you might ask? Quite a bit.
Zabine is now Crusader with Argent Tourney. After putting it off I've finally completed all 5 factions and opened up the crusader dailies and am nearly exalted with Silver Cov. Those dailies are incredibly boring. I finished them just in time to get my next toon started.
Moondream, my first alt and warrior has now begun the argent dailies. I have finally been able to finish some more of Stormpeaks with my husband and opened up the Hodir dailies. Let the polishing begin! The only problem I am having on her is getting her JC up to par. Doing the dailies for tokens is getting to be a pain. I think the daily cooking quest has spoiled me. Everything is right there in easy reach so having to trek all over Northrend is tedious for me. I'm trying to work it in with the Wyrmrest dailies and get into the Hodir and Argent tourney ones but when trying to run 2 toons thru the dailies its a pain. She also has Oracles yet to do but I really didn't care for those the first time around with Zab, who is not yet exalted with them either.
Next up is Bluhighway, my DK. She is now 450 engineering and just needs the rep to get the Chopper pattern. Yes folks, you know what that means!...more dailies to grind out. She has become my ore farmer at the moment. Being engineering it's very easy to troll for eternals while hunting for the elusive titanium node. I don't have much of a desire to play her though I am seriously considering going back to unholy, regearing her weapon from 2h to 1 and bringing her out a little more. After that is my Pally. Currently sitting at level 78 I have gotten her BS high enough to open up the titansteel cooldown and the titansteel armor. She is 440 and just waiting for mats to start crafting all that wonderful epic gear. I'm not sure how I feel about leveling her but with only 2 left to go it seems like a waste to not do it. However, as you can see from the others, I've been busy busy busy. Next in line is Brennii, my disc priest and alchemist. Right now at 65 her alchemy has reached 350 and she will soon be hitting Northrend for training. Though whether or not she will level any further is hit or miss.
Let me sidestep here for a second and say that my husband plays. We have alotted a couple of toons which we play together and as we level different ones different toons get paired up. His priest and my pally played for a bit until 77 when I realized it was time to bring up the warrior. Once Moon hit 77 we changed it up and the warrior priest combo went the distance to 80 together. My priest and his shammy have been together (Draenei) since they were "born". So the leveling on them falls into certain criteria. When we both want to play, play those toons, and play which each other. So, they don't get moved all that often. For a time, Brennii was the guild banker. She sat in Ironforge and cleaned up the guild bank and sold off extra items.
During this last month of RL avoidance time I created a shammy and she is level 25 or 26, somewhere in there. I wanted to check it out. She is fun and I will play around with her in the future I'm sure. She was a very nice distraction from GM/guild stressors and I love playing the first 20 levels and starting areas. Now she waits ... lol.
In the mean time I have several other toons not in the guild or on another server that I use to get away. I have a 38 mage which is currently holding a one-man guild and bank for some of my storage. I have a bank alt/mule that is strictly AH in another guild I share with a guildmate that is his bank, and I have a toon in holding for Cataclysm. I had begun a druid but now I've decided to wait with her until the new quests open up.
On another server I have some horde toons. Having once heard that you have only seen half the game if you've only played one faction I wanted to see how the other side worked. Those toons reside on Shandris with some horde toons of some other guildies. We've created a guild over there and once in a great while I visit. I am pretty much the only one too lol. I have a level 50 hunter, a level 30-something shammy, a DK who is still 58, a shadow preist who is not yet 30 and some miscellaneous others that I havent touched in months.
What I've found that I'm doing is consolidating, getting all my toons back in order and getting my head back into the game. Sleepwalking through WoW is as bad as sleepwalking through real life. Both are boring drudgery and it's time to get back into the fray. Back into the fight!
That's it. Now that we're all back up to speed let's go play some WoW!

Onyxia

2009-10-09T14:15:00.001-04:00

Hello folks its been a while. RL has taken its toll on me these last few weeks and I haven't felt like writing much. Unless you want to hear of my family troubles.... lol
So, to that point and with the most recent patch I'm going to hit some lore. While there is plenty out there to find I'd like to take a shot at the wondrous Black Dragonflight.
From what I can tell Onyxia first appeared in patch 1.12 or very close to that. She began as a forty-man raid for level 60. With the new patch 3.2.2, she has been updated to bring 10 and 25 man raiding back to the Dragonmurk area of Dustwallow Marsh.
The attunement for her used to be long and arduous for us Alliance folks. Beginning in BRD with the release of Marshall Windsor it takes you back and forth to Winterspring before you finally reveal Onyxia's true form in Stormwind. There is no longer an attunement for Ony, however the quest chain is still available.
Onyxia is the daughter of Neltharion (aka Deathwing) and his one remaining consort Sintharia (aka Lady Sinestra).
Ony thrives on creating dissension and political upheaval in the mortal races around her, and took on the guise of Lady Katrana Prestor, an advisor to Anduin Wrynn, while the King was being held captive. Her brother is Nefarion, the infamous last boss in Black Wing Lair. It is said that she worked with the Defias Brotherhood in orchestrating the capture and detainment of Varian Wrynn so that she could press her interests in Stormwind and the Alliance. She would use her political clout to pit the various factions in the area against each other, and to keep them away from herself and her brother Nefarion.
Neltharion is promised to make an appearance in the upcoming expansion, Cataclysm, as the reason why all the upheaval in the world of Azeroth takes place. I can't wait to see it actually. Lady Sinestra can be found now in Outlands in Shadowmoon Valley where she makes a brief appearance to the orcs on the Netherwing Ledge asking for more Netherdragon eggs to be delivered to her. According to the lore laid out in the book "Night of the Dragon" she resided in Grim Batol for a time, bent on creating a new dragon race to take over the world.

If you are interested in doing the quest chain:
Alliance begin with Marshal Maxwell at the Morgan's Vigil fight point in Burning Steppes, the quest is "Marshal Windsor" and it is to find Marshal Windsor in BRD (Black Rock Depths). At one point after he is rescued the chain dies and you need to find the quest "A Crumpled Note". It is a drop from mobs in BRD, usually around his jail cell area.
Horde begin with Goretooth who is located in a tower in Kargath in the badlands. That quest chain is called "Warlord's Command". Having not done it I can't give specifics about the chain.
Doing a search in WoWHead for either of those quest chains will get you started.

For further info on Onyxia lore any of the main wow sites can be accessed. Here are a few links:
WoW Wiki
WoWHead
There are also a few books out there in the Warcraft series that deal specifically with the Black Dragons. "The Demon Soul" from the trilogy "War of the Ancients" covers Deathwings rise and fall as well as the first encounters with the Burning Legion, the beginnings of Alliance, druidism and of course Queen Azshara and the "Sundering". "Night of the Dragon" covers Lady Sinestra and her plots. Both of these books also have the stories of Korialstratz (Krasus; the red dragon consort to Lady Alexstrasza) and Rhonin and Vareesa, the two figures now residing in the Violet Citadel in Dalaran.

For me, the Black Dragonflight family has always been very interesting. Perhaps because of the evil and secrecy surrounding them.

9/11 [not WoW related]

2009-09-11T08:54:00.002-04:00

Just want to take a moment to remember this day in our very recent history.
When Sept 11, 2001 had come and gone I had written a story of what I was feeling, where I was, and what I was doing that day. I was thinking of posting it here but I don't know. Who wants to read about the first 4 hours of my day, so far away from what was really going on.
I've just reread it. The feelings I had that day. The fear and panic I experienced come flooding back. We are so lucky in this country that we don't have to feel that fear of invasion and war in our backyards. There are no bombs blowing up our homes, no soldiers taking our loved ones away. But I can imagine it. I can put myself in that place and feel that fear and wonder why, or more to the point how, we can do these things to each other. That people have decided that others should not live because they believe in something different or live differently. It angers me.
Then I remember it is human nature to wage war on someone or something. To band together for a cause, be it real or imagined. Regardless, it still boggles my mind how we can treat each other so horribly. Not just I don't like you, but I will kill you for it. Not just words but sticks and stones.
/sigh
"All you need is Love"? Beatles - All You Need Is Love
Wishing the world a better day xoxo

MIA

2009-09-04T09:26:00.000-04:00

Hello there...if you're following this and wondering where I've been in game lately (Ror). Work has been kicking my ass. Over the next month I am covering for my boss, changing my days off, covering my co-workers, working with incoming HHN (Halloween Horror Nights) and have an upcoming vacation with relatives visiting. When I get home from work my brain is so fried from listening and talking and processing information that all I can do is sit and stare at the TV. And I'm perfectly happy with that :). Every brain needs a rest and sometimes even WoW takes too much thinking to get in to.
I find that I tend to be the guild cheerleader so I hope they don't suffer in my absence. On the other side, I miss everyone.
I will probably not be on as much through the month of September.
C'ya soon.

Cataclysm - items and stats

2009-08-31T18:19:00.001-04:00

Hi all,
Sorry for the delay between posts but its been, as usual, a heck of a week. Work, the guild and life in general, always seem to find a way to change my plans.
This installment is from the Blizzcon Class Items & Professions Panel discussion. The biggest piece of news to come from this panel was the change in item statistics. In game items will no longer have the following stats on them:
MP5
Spell Power (SP)
Attack Power (AP)
Defense
Armor Penetration in the same form
Block in the same form
It looks like we are harkening back to the days when items (gear and weapons) contained the core stats such as Intel, Spirit, Stam etc and those stats modified the secondary stats listed above. Here's the lowdown.
MP5 (mana per 5 seconds) will be controlled through Spirit. Spell Power as well as mana regen will be modified by Intel. Attack Power will be based on Agility. Defense and Armor Pen will come thru the talent tree and the new mastery system. Block, while I dont claim to understand it, will become a mitigation for incoming damage, and was described as being similar to Dodge. In the same vein, Stamina will no longer have anything to do with Spell Power, Attack Power or Defense. In essence Stam = health and its possible for plate wearers and clothies alike to have similar it not the same HP.
Haste, which essentially caused casters to push buttons faster, will work the same for melee. It was also stated that it may possibly increase regen of rage, energy, focus and/or runic power. It very much sounded like it was still up for discussion as to how exactly it will work.

Very short and to the point which was nice. This panel was very quick, leaving a lot of time for Q & A.

I think this is awesome. I always wondered what prompted the Blizz think-tank to come up with more math for one stat than the average CalSci classroom. It has always seemed like an annoyance. Hit, Crit, AP, Def all seem this convoluted mess that only a dedicated math wiz would tackle. In the end, for me the average Joe, I just stacked whatever seemed best or whatever the latest trends told me was the right way to go. I did do some research on my own, but I was rarely ever able to scratch the surface. I don't know if converting back to the "old days" will make any difference to me as far as the math goes. I can say with certainty though, I seemed to be able to understand it better when 1 stat like Spirit, modified 1 or 2 other stats like health or mana regen. I could measure those effects myself by simply taking off and putting on gear and looking at the numbers. After some simple calculations, if I recall correctly, 1 Stam = 20 hp, or something along those lines. I could look at it and understand what the gear was modifying. I may not have understood all the mathematical ramifications but I could get from A to B and look at C and say, "Oh ok I can see how it works", even if abstractly. Now it seems like every time I change a piece of gear it becomes an equation and balancing act if I want to maintain the stats I think "might" be the right ones for me. I have regemmed more gear just from changing one piece of armor than ever before. I am hoping this will make my personal math hell a little easier. So all I can say at this point is /cross fingers. ;)

Cataclysm - races/classes

2009-08-25T17:15:00.005-04:00

Hi,
I'm tired today so I'm going to do the next bits in installments. Here are the new race/class combos. I am not going to go over the new racials, but the plan is all current racials are being looked at to make sure they are all at the same level of cool.
The biggest changes will be to Hunters and Warlocks as far as class changes.
Hunters will no longer be on a mana system but will be utilizing Energy/Focus instead.
Warlocks shard system is being revamped and shards will no longer take up inventory space. The system is not yet completely fleshed out for either class so to speculate would be a little premature.

	DK	Drui	Hunt	Mage	Pal	Pri	Rog	Sham	Wlk	Warr
Alliance
Human	X		NEW	X	X	X	X		X	X
Night Elf	X	X	X	NEW		X	X			X
Dwarf	X		X	NEW	X	X	X	NEW		X
Gnome	X			X		NEW	X		X	X
Draenei	X		X	X	X	X		X		X
Worgen	X	X	X	X		X	X		X	X

Horde
Orc	X		X	NEW			X	X	X	X
Tauren	X	X	X		NEW			X		X
Troll	X	NEW	X	X		X	X	X		X
Undead	X		NEW	X		X	X		X	X
Blood Elf	X		X	X	X	X	X		X	NEW
Goblin	X		X	X		X	X	X	X	X

Crazy Weekend - Blizzcon & my thoughts

2009-08-23T00:51:00.000-04:00

This is my intermittent post. It has been a crazy Blizzcon weekend. Even though I was not able to attend I did totally geek out via DirecTV, Twitter and Ustream.
I am currently sitting on Ustream waiting for the wowinsider show to start with their wrapup for the day, after listening to the instance ustream just about all day while the PPV covered SC2 and D3. As well as starting up this blog.
So this is my chance to put my own thoughts down. Cataclysm is gonna be freaky wild shit. I am so excited to be revisiting old world content though I am terribly sorry to see some of it change. When they said that Southshore is gone and Auberdine is a wreck my jaw dropped. The changes will be so beyond different from what I leveled up in 4 years ago, and have lived in just about every day since. Its like an old friend and it feels kinda lost to me at the moment.
I am excited about the worgen but unsure about goblins. Goblins never struck me as allying with any particular faction but I can see the logic. At least it wont mess with Booty Bay, Gadgetzan or Everlook. I truly can't wait to explore it all and FLY! Have been dying for that since flying came out in BC.
I do have to add that these announcements, for me, really convince me of how much Blizzard seems to care about their product. While we all bitch and moan about this thing or that thing they seem to show an unending patience to weed through all of it and to try and make it right. Even if that means nerfing DK's to create more balance.
I am excited to see how the patches before the expansion will play out. I really had tons of fun with the zombie invasion, even when I had to hide in the back of the IF vault to DE items from the mail to keep from getting the plague. It was still great fun and I spent a lot of time hanging with friends and guildies in game just stomping around killing zombified people. It is truly the small moments in WoW that make it the most enjoyable for me. Laughing with people I like to hang with. Ok enough sobby stuff.
I am not sure how I feel about the new warlock shard system but really there's not much to say until I play it. The new talent trees look much easier and much more fun. The ancient glyph system seems pretty accessible and I'm really interested in what the paths are and mean to everyone. Each path must have a theme of sorts right?
I am most happy about the guild management, guild achievement, guild currency stuff. As a guild leader I'm excited to bring my guildmates into guild decisions such as talents etc and possibly solidify the group more as a whole. I can envision guild-wide meetings. I also really like the idea of being able to invite other guilds to your events. It will make coordinating with our sister guild much easier.
Speaking of...I'm gonna pop on and play some for the first time in several days :) while I listen to WoWInsider do their wrap up. Which hasnt started yet by the way. lol

Cataclysm - WoW land, map and quest changes

2009-08-22T20:25:00.004-04:00

Hi guys,
I'm not quite sure the best way to break up this info but I'm going to give it a go. I am not going to cover specific stats. I am more of a lore person myself so the story lines and ideas are what I tend to focus on. For all my sources please also take a gander at my first post to see where you can find more in depth information.
Cataclysm is the next WoW expansion set. While there is no hard release date it sounds like we can expect to have it in hand some time next year before the next Blizzcon.
There are several story lines taking place, as with all WoW xpac's there is not just one focus. This expansion will be revamping the entire original game. The main event takes a little lore explaining. There are a series of WoW related books surrounding these events. Warcraft "War of the Ancients" Trilogy can best explain events leading up to Neltharion's (aka Deathwing) growing madness as well as Queen Azshara, the Burning Legion and the original sundering episode which also leads up to Burning Crusade. They also explain Ronin and Vareesa, who are now NPC's in Dalaran. It was very cool to see them there by the way.
Neltharion is the black dragonflight leader and the aspect of earth. He is driven mad by whisperings of the old gods in his head and tries to detroy the other dragonflights or aspects. We have met them all now, Red, Gold, Blue and Green in Northrend. Neltharion is eventually imprisoned by his peers. Cataclysm picks up where Neltharion bursts from his prison under the earth and causes great upheaval throughout the lands of Azeroth. Great volcanoes, floods and sundering of the land is expected to take place. In keeping with Blizzard's past earth changing and expansion events I'm hoping we will see some of this as it enfolds across the land just prior to the expansion coming out. Please know that whether you purchase the expansion or not the world of Azeroth as we know it will change. You do not have to have the expansion to see all these changes. Some of the artwork can be seen here:WoW artwork

Here are the maps of what to expect.

(screenshot of current map)

Map with new ares for Cataclysm- not to scale (Wow.com)

There will be 7 new zones.

Gilneas

Worgen starting area, levels 1-15. Neltharion bursts thru and the great destruction creates a break in the Graymane wall. The citizens emerge and join with the Alliance.

The Lost Isles

Goblin starting area, levels 1-15. The flooding of the great cataclysm has left survivors out on forgotten islands. The Horde befriends these lost souls and they join with the Horde.

Mount Hyjal

One of the 2 new starting zones, level 78-82. Malfurion Stormrage has emerged from the Emerald Dream and has again joined forces with the Children of Cenarius to help protect the World Tree from Ragnaros.

Sunken City of Vashj'ir

One of the 2 new starting zones, level 78-82. Azshara has been ruling under the waves in this underwater city. This area will contain two 5-man dungeons called the Abyssal Maw. Underwater flying mounts were mentioned in conjunction with this area.

Twilight Highlands

All leaders must have followers. Here lies Deathwings new lair along with his devoted Cult of the Twilights Hammer. This area will contain two 5 man dungeons and Grim Batol (raid).

Uldum

The great wall has come down during the destuction of Azeroth exposing a city of the ancients, and a new race, the Tol'vir. Two 5-man dungeons and a raid will be here. There is purportedly a great weapon of destruction buried here that all factions want to get their hands on.

Deepholm

The original location from which Neltharion sprang. It will have an entire underground area which will be tied to a new instance/or instances located in Blackrock Spire, Deathwings Decent.

All together there are several new dungeons planned and 4 10/25 raids. This area will also be a hub of sorts for all the new zones. It will contain portals to all the other new areas.
Level Progression by Area
There will be 2 "starter zones" to choose from
Mount Hyjal and Vashj'ir --> Deepholm --> Uldum --> Twilight Highlands

All other zones throughout the Old World will be affected to some degree or another. Many will receive almost complete new looks. Here are some area changes that were mentioned.
Barrens will be torn in half and become northern and southern. Lush tropical areas instead of desert.
Desolace will also be transformed into a more lush area.
Darkshore will be wrecked as the Night Elves are forced to move North and the Horde become more entrenched in that area.
Stonetalon, the Charred Vale becomes "the more charred vale". The Talondeep Path is no more. Torn out by the Goblins in the area it is now a valley between the two areas.
Azshara will be changed to a level 10-20 Goblin area and new Goblin camps move in.
Dark Whisper Gorge will become part of Mount Hyjal and become a gateway to that area.
All major cities will be getting revamps to allow for flying.

Along with area visual changes there will be reconfiguring of all the quests and quest areas to provide for a better flowing experience. Most areas will be reduced to about a 5 level gain, and will offer good progression through the zones. In other words, you will not be stuck in STV for 15 levels.

Along with the new zones there will be one PVP area similar to Wintergrasp named Tol Barad. The battle will begin at intervals and the winning faction will have access to a dungeon and more daily quests and rewards. This Island has not been completely fleshed out as to its location, but was reputed to be off Southshore & Wetlands inside that bay. In addition to this PVP zone there will be a new battleground, Battle for Gilneas, and new arena(s).

Upcoming patch info

2009-08-22T17:16:00.000-04:00

Hi again,
Here is some basic upcoming info just given up in the raids and dungeons discussion panel which includes some releases prior to Cataclysm. I wanted to cover these for guildies in case they were looking for the info.

Patch 3.3 Release scheduled for November some time
Onyxia returns in an updated raid
Onyxia herself will be updated with a few new spells and abilities but for the most part sounds to be very similar to what she used to be at level 60. Deep Breath and whelps will still be part of the fun. I dont recall if this will be available for both 10 & 25 groups.
Her loot has been updated to fall in line with current boss loot drops but what is great is it is her old loot but given new stats. All the tier 2 helms and weapons will be available with upgraded stats. They have also rounded out her loot table to include some items that were previously found in MC (Molten Core)

The following information will be released before Wrath is finally complete and we move into Cataclysm. Though with what patches and when was not completely divulged.

Cross Realm LFG. That's right. If you have an alt and you're trying to run Stocks and can't find a group you can look across realms and play with others. This system will only be implemented for 5 mans to begin with and will start with realms within your battlegroup. There will be rewards for using the system. One example; leading a group you will receive an additional reward. What that is was not disclosed.

Ice Crown
3 new 5 man dungeons will open up in Ice Crown all heavily related to the Lich King. You're first time through you will be following a quest chain and the dungeons will have to be done sequentially. Once the quest chain in completed you can go into any dungeon at any time.
Ice Crown Citadel and the final raid. Yes you will finally be able to kill the Lich King. No he will not drop Frostmourne but will drop a legendary Axe named Shadowmourne. There are currenty no stats avail on this drop. This raid will consist of 12 bosses in a wing type instance.

Thats the new news. Please share and enjoy.

Hello

2009-08-22T13:34:00.000-04:00

Good morning and welcome. I am moving my current blog to this location. Currently it is located on our guild's guildportal site. This is the old blog site http://kg.guildportal.com/Blog.aspx?Blog=373802 if you want to see any of my older posts.
There are not many, maybe a dozen. I think over time I will be moving that info here anyway. It covers leveling for the most part as well as my thoughts on raiding, keeping your wow account safe from hackers and my introduction.
My plan for this is to post in the next few days all the info on the new WoW expansion that has been announced at Blizzcon.
All the info I have is from the PPV, live feed and a number of people that are also posting and blogging on this. I am planning on getting all the info here in one spot if possible. My sources include:
wow.com (wow insider and their on-scene bloggers)
rawrcast.com (stompalina and their crew)
info from the WorldofWarcraft.com website
howiwow.com (Shaun Coons and Patrick Beja)
all of them are on twitter and can be found as people I am following on my twitter at Twitter.com/Zabbylocks
I think I've covered my sources and will give them credit as I go. Right now I am getting ready to watch the next live broadcast on Directv, where you can also watch a live feed on Blizzcon.com that is also a PPV. If you buy one you don't have to pay for the other.
That's it for now. In the next few days I hope to have all the info ready to post.
Thanks for joining me. :)