Wednesday 26 August 2009

Cataclysm- Brilliant Strategy

Brilliant Strategy

You should know that World of Warcraft is old, 5 years, that's ancient for computer-games. A lot has happened the last 5 years on games, better engines, better graphics to name but a few. And for that reason alone, WoW is ancient. Players still have the same-looking toons as 5 years ago, old-world stuff almost looks archaic. Almost every new game has better graphics then WoW, but why do a few million players still play this? Because they know how it works, they have some friends... and it is addicting.

After 5 years, Blizzard should really bring out World of Warcraft 2..but.. If they do that, they will loose players. Why? New game means, so long to your current characters. And a lot of people will turn away from the game then, they will try at the start, but a lot will leave.. so how to keep all those players, and still make a new game???

Patch 4.0 - Cataclysm

This is WoW2. The complete levelling-path will be re-written. It has to... no way to find Mankrik's Wife now, she is in the lava-stream. And that's just one of the things. I don't think there will be many scorpids in the Desolace, beinf desert-creatures more then forest-creatures... So every player can level a new character with new experiences, while still keeping their old 80's...rrr..85's. You even get to play with race-class combination not seen before (yes, I always wanted a Cow-adin). They also bring two new races forth, with even more levelling-experience, and the complete old-world is opened, Uldum, Mount Hyjal, Grim Batol. And you can even fly over it.

And they listen to players. You can do SFK/DM at around level 20, and do the heroics when you reach 85. That's the thing that mostly surprised me.. level-cap raised to 85... why not 90?? Well, I think there is some psychological crap about reaching 100, and then the end. If Blizzard now only raises the cap with 5 each Exapnsion, they can make three more, which means that around 2018, in patch 7.0, World of Warcraft will probably end... that are 8 more years!!! So Blizzard has actually secured WoW for a long time.

Patch 4.0 is World of Warcraft version 2... and I think they gonna pull it off...

Brilliant Strategy


Now give me resto-druid troll-form, either a palm-tree or a cannabis-plant :p

(ok, last joke didn't come from me, credit goes to Kemwer)

Wednesday 19 August 2009

Water Shield?

Water Shield and cheaper shocks at level 20 rule...

Yes, I started another alt, Space-Goat Shammie, Enhancement.

Saturday 15 August 2009

Two Word - combinations

Human Hunter
Orc Mage
Night Elf Mage
Dwarf Mage
Blood Elf Warrior
Dwarf Shaman
Undead Hunter
Tauren Paladin
Tauren Priest
Gnome Priest
Troll Druid

aparrantly for patch 4.0... why are we actually trying to figure out what happens in a year :p, and seriously, Tauren Paladin?? And is a Night Elf mage not a Blood Elf?? Undead Hunters?? Here buba, take some food *undead tears old flesh from own carcass*...

But, euhm... can we now have please more character-slots per server???

Friday 14 August 2009

more patch-news

So, Moonkin-form gets less damage when stunned...mmm, nice if I ever gonna PvP I guess, and the knockback on typhoon has been changed...KNOCKBACK???

Knockback is probably the most irritating thing there is. I really detest people using it in groups. The tank has everything piled up nicely, inside DnD/Cons/Whatever and then knockbacks lets the mobs fly all over the place. Ok, sometimes this can come in handy when the tank gets a few damage-spikes after each other...but..most of the time, the knockback knocks mobs back into other mobs...or pets butt-pull other mobs... very irritating. That's why Mardah has the Glyph of Typhoon, no knockbacks, mon..

Tankadin-threat is being nerfed.. a little. Instead of stamina, strength now gives spellpower. Which probably means most tankadins loose around 100 spelldamage. And Righteous Fury's threat-multiplier goes from 90% to 80%. Well, with the recent buffs to threat, I don't think you will notice this.

There's one thing that does seem strange. They just recently changed BoSanctuary to give stamina. The problem is, Kings gives also agilty, strength and intellect. Now intellect isn't that great, but it still gives you some spell-crit, and more mana-regen from Replenishment and Divine Plea. Agility gives a little threat through crit, and of course some armor. Strength gives more Block-Value (mitigation.threat), more Attack Power (threat) and now more spellpower (threat).

BoSanc of course gives more stamina, damage-reduction and mana-regen. However the change made to BoSanc was made so tankadins could take that Blessing without loosing the stamina, so they would favor it over Kings normally... and I think tankadins are back to the old debate now, Kings or Sanc....

Oh, and the CD on Hammer of Justice is being changed... pfff, so what. I almost never used that.


Oh, and guess what also gets changed:
Wailing Guardsman: Screams of the Past will no longer have multiple applications on a target. Recast time has been increased.
Yes.. finally..uhm wait... These are the undead mobs just inside the room of the what? third boss in SHADOWFANG KEEP...WTF? I never really had a problem with those :p, and the fact that Old-world and TBC-instances are hardly run these days, mostly because they are not getting slots on the blizzard-server...well...how did they get to this idea?

Yes, apparantly Wrath-heroics have priority for getting server-slots, and maybe there are even saved spots for them, while old-world instances are getting..well.. nothing...

Maybe it's time for World of Warcraft 2 : After Arthas ;p. Let everyone start a-new :p. The whole game is now sometimes just ridiculous. Lower levels, so new players, have a hard time. They miss half the stories because fast-levelling, and if they meet some one nice in a group, big chance that person is sporting 1 or 2 heirlooms, and will out-level the new player that fast, playing together is not an option

Most of the people I have played with on Ghostlands, I met during levelling, that is the way friends are found, and Guilds are formed..oh well...at least I had the oppurtunity to level 2 characters ' normally'.

Oh, and I did try Kitty, but I play this game to relax :p, and keeping up a good kitty-rotation is not relaxing. And the fact is that I got very good resto-gear at the moment, where I just change some gear for more hit when boomkinning. So Boomkin goes faster...

Thursday 13 August 2009

MORE DOTS

OK, so, Onyxia in 3.2.something, as a 10/25 man-raid.

So, are we Tankadins gonna tank her INSIDE the whelp-cave :p

Oh, and Mardah is trying out Kitty. I got an addon...which tells me what to hit. Kitty-dps is ineteresting. Keep Savage Roar,Mangle and Rake up. Try to squeeze in Rip and Ferocious Bite. Use Tigers Fury/Berserk, and shred... lots of cooldowns...

Lots of DoT's



STOP DOTS!

Tuesday 11 August 2009

Tank-discussion... again

I know have read more of the posts GC commented on... my my, warriors and DK's are really screwed it seems. They all feel they can't MT because of less Effective Health or mitigation... well...

mmm... nah nah nah nah nah (sorry, couldn't resist)

My opinion is simple on this matter. The MT of a guild is not the one with the highest Health/mitigation/whatever. He is the one the whole raid trusts. I have been the main tank for XII for over a year, in TBC, where tankadins had lower everything except AoE-threat. So why did XII raided with a Tankadin? Warriors where still better suited for almost any boss, so in theory making them easier. It's called trust.

In all those raids we did, I may have made five mistakes...and the reaction of the raid was; 'yeesh, he is human after all'. I was the MT, becasue I knew the fights, I let other tanks do some bosses, but every time I said 'I want to tank this', no one complained, even if the boss was a nightmare for tankadins (Maiden anyone??). The raid knew I would do it, they may had to heal me a little more, but never was that the reason for a wipe.

The Main Tank, does not need the best possible mitigation/health/threat, he has to inspire people, be trustworthy, and be very confident about what he can do. Main Tanking is a mind-set, always be the best at what you do, but also you need to watch out for over-coinfidence, and you need to watch out to not become a dickhead. Remember, every tank wants to MT a boss, so be carefull to let them do that. That way you will generate a Tank-Team. And if all the Tanks in a guild are good friends...poor pixel-bosses.

31 Bosses???

A Ghostcrawler comment

Ok, I was directed here by Bananashoulders, and I didn't read the thread, but there are 2 things in this response. First, does he say Tankadins are still shafted???

Second, and I agree with Bananashoulders, this would be the reason for exteneded raid-locks, 31 bosses for a raid... lol...finally something to get your teeth in. That will take a while to being farmed in 1 day :p

Saturday 8 August 2009

Trial of the Champion

ToC as a Tree

Boss 1 - The three stoo..rrr..champions.

You start the encounter om a horse, jousting away. Not that hard, if your horse dies, get a new one. But now comes the catch, if all three champions are down at the same time, everybody will dismount to start an 'old-school' encounter. But...there's a 75% chance you will die after dismounting. Because the three bosses are probably spread out, it takes some time for the tank to pick them up, throw ONE heal, and you get aggro from something that WTF-pwns you. Hope you get a paladin who throws a BoP.

The healing is very heavy at the beginning, sometimes poisons are being thrown around, so just go all out, let Rejuv tick on everyone, use Wild Growth continuously, and nourish/swiftmend the tank. when one of the bosses is down, you can relax a little.

Boss 2 - Either a Pally, or a Priest

The Pally-Not that hard, mostly normal tank healing. He will stun (hammer of Justice) and damage (Hammer of Wrath) one party-member sometimes. But that can be easily healed up, mmm, HoJ is magic, maybe a pally can cleanse it. The other ability is an AoE-blast which will take everyone down to around 40% health.. if they are looking at the boss... your character for that matter, so you can turn the camera around, as long as your toons back is to the boss (tanks should run through them). Be prepared that some PuGger won't turn around (loose of their Imba-DPS), so be ready to throw a nourish.

The Priest-Ok, the priest does VERY LOW melee-dps, I read somewhere she can be tanked by an enhancement-shammie. She does however throw a lot of Smites to random members. So very easily healing, if she is alone. She however summons a past Nightmare (Hogger/Prince/Onyxia and more) which makes the figh more interesting. The add should be tanked/killed as soon as possible. Why? Because he does an AoE-fear.. so keep rejuv/Wild Growth ticking on everyone, because he sometimes forgets the tank. If he is down... time to relax...

Boss 3 - The Black Knight

Hey didn't we.. oh well. I'LL BITE YER LEGS OFF (sorry :p). This encounter has three phases, in which you need to heal differently. In the first phase, he's a wimp. A Rejuv for the Tank, and a Wild Growth for some minor AoE damage is all you need. There will be an add jumping around, so a rejuv on yourself could come in handy.

Second phase is different. He know has about 10 adds, so hug the tank so his AoE-threat will keep the little buggers of you. There's a lot of AoE in this phase, but not that much direct-tank damage. So Wild Growth/Tranq will help you, together with a Barkskin for healing-aggro in the beginning. But... don't stay to close to the tank for long. The Black Knight will explode his adds, doing a lot of damage, and probably one-shot you. Don't worry if one or two adds will follow you away from the tank, even if they explodem it's survivable.

The third phase has no adds, just a Black Knight hitting very hard, so focus on Tank.

Gratz with you 3 Conquerer-emblems, 3 Champion Seals and some Tier8-gear (Ilvl219) if you did this on heroic, else gratz on the Tier7-gear (Ilvl200) (and maybe some PvP-emblems). Only difference between the two difficulties is that the bosses hit harder on heroic.

Oh, and if you are dead.. run back. Graveyard is very close, and you can run in... any dps begging for a Brez should be laughed at. Typing the sentence and finding the time to cast it, takes longer then running back.

Friday 7 August 2009

of The Exodar

Well, Mardah got rep-crazy, went to Auberdine to do a lot of darnassus-rep quests, and to Exodar and surroundings for those. She now is 'of Darnassus' and 'of the Exodar', and riding a green elephant :p. Next up is Gnomer, for which I'll do the dailies for 10 days, so she will be exalted with them through the dailies, and then I can instantly become 'of Stormwind' because Mardah is already exalted with those.

I did the new dungeon, Trial of the Champion (ToC, not CoT :p) several times now. It drops purplez :p, and I did get some nice new gear from it...but... can we please speed up the dialogue, it's getting boring. I also logged into Gowron last night, after dps-ing and healing it, I wanted to tank it...man, am I rusty with tanking. Well, no wipe thanks to the healer I guess.

I also did the dailies, and am now 4/25 for the Triump-idol, the other stuff from that is just to expensive to actually look forward to, unless I start raiding...which is not my plan at the moment. I am saving for the T8-pieces with the conquests-stuff, but it's hard to find a group for non-ToC now :(

I purchased the wintergrasp-heirloom-leather-shoulders, and smacked them on a new character of mine, Mariandel Enhanvement Shaman :p. Drop Strength of Earth, cast a shock, drop Fire-totem, hack away... Well, in 6 levels she'll get a hors...rrr..elephant, so I suppose the questing will be a lot faster...

Ezrila, now 71, can fly in Northrend...mmm making questing a lot faster, because normal flying now has a speed of 150%, no more slowpoke :p. So, I have been busy, but with Mardah almost BiS pre-raiding, it would be logicical to start up a new alt...

Oh well, one more week of vacation, and then students need teaching again... and to make it funnier, I will then teach students, and be teached at the same time... Bachelor in Education...

Tuesday 4 August 2009

Faster

And there it is, at least, tomorrow there it is :p I read through the patch notes, and here are some changes.

-New Druid Bear and Cat forms...
Where are the Moonkin/Tree-forms???

-All Dungeons except the new raid-dungeons will now drop Emblems of Conquest.
Nice, Mardah just has 1 Heroism left, and tomorrow she can start to get those EoC for T8-equivalent loot. I also suspect that there will be a lot of groups be forming... and that the time to enter dungeons will be BAD.

-Daily Heroic Dungeon Quest will reward 2 Emblems of Triumph.
Well, 2/day for running a dungeon... that'll take a while.

-Rogues can use axes.
TBH, can't there be a quest-line when you reach, say exalted with a faction, to learn a new weapon-skill? Or would that be to much homogenization.

-Mount at lvl20, Epic Mount at 40, Flying at 60 (150%, not 60%), Heirloom Northrend Flying and rep-reducing cost for epic flying.
All Nice, only thing is, the rep-reducement is from the OL/Northrend main faction. Anyone Exalted with Thrallmar??? Well, time to unequip the tabard in dungeons.

-Replenishment now replenishes 1% mana
Nice, more mana-regen...like Mardah ever gets oom.

-Wolvar and Gorloc orphans have arrived in Dalaran and need your help!
mmm, SO? Wolvar?? Gorlac?? I wonder who orphaned them.... :p

Oh well, and a lot more. At least now I look a little bit more forward to levelling a shammie. Wolf-form at 16, riding at 20. That will save a lot of time. And Ezrila will get the heirloom at 70. And no more slowpoke whit normal flying.

IT IS ALL GOING FASTER