Can I hold your hand?

That's how the quests from lvl80 till 85 felt to me.

Make no mistake. I liked the stories, the cut-scenes and the idea I was part of a story, maybe not always as participant, but I kept a good idea what the story was. I remember that in the pre-zulaman area (when we had to walk till level 40), I often had no idea what the story was about, I just was flowing with the quests, but often not reading further then what to do.

Now I read all the quests I encountered in cataclysm, they where part of the same story, and I read it like a book. For that matter, vanilla was like reading a lot of books at the same time, while cataclysm was reading one book at the time, before you continued to the next book (with the exception of Uldum where two stories walk side-by-side)

Now both TBC and LK where somehwere inbetween. To continue with books. TBC read like you are normally reading comics. Lots of little different stories after each other. While LK read like several books, while sometimes you took a comic besides the book. And yes, in this line, vanilla was like reading your complete comic-book collection at once.... which is a lot for me.

Now the problem ofcourse arises, that if you need to read a book, you normally need to start at the beginning, and read it to the end. There's no way you can skip a part, books are not written that way. And that is exactly the problem with Cata-questing at this moment. The road you need to take is written, and needs to be followed. So if you want to level in Cata, you are only left with two options, follow the questline or level through dungeons.

Yes, I know that you can choose between two 'starting'-zones. But after that you need to take deepholm, and at least a part of either Uldum or Highlands. And yes, for every one out there who wants to raid, doin all of the Deepholm quest is a must, something to do with shoulder-enchants.

Now, this is not that a big of a problem for most players... but... well... if you have altism like me, it can became a drag to do the deepholm quests for the umptied time.

Now, I know the past was not good. The forced levelling through Hellfire was not fine, and I destroyed those portals enough, but at least there you had a choice to skip stuff. Don't like the quest, or the reward, just skip it. In Cata this choice is taken away from you. You need to follow the questline.... no more free will....

Well, ok, I did skip ONE other way to level, through professions. Mining, Herbing and *gasp* Digging, gives experience, and you can level through that I suppose...

On the archeology... 3 BiS-gear pre-raid can be solved by archeology. 1 dorf, 1 Nelf and 1 tolvir. It's all RNG, and for that matter, Tol'Vir digsites are rare....very rare.

Back to the topic, for a fast finish. Luckily levelling from 80-85 is fast. So before you are actually bored, you are level 85. But does the game really begins at 85 then?

...well, I am of, studying raid-bosses....and I just keep digging....

oooh, new and different?

Well... after almost three years, it maybe was time to change a little bit...

And the fact that I am committed to boomkinning at the moment, well...

It does kinda feel strange, I logged into Gowron last night, and put his ceremonial gear on (lvl60-PvP stuff). He has been my main for almost 4 years. even when I was playing around with other alts, I always returned to him. Even making him a dorf for some months. Problem is though, that ever since I left Ghostlands (as a player), Gowron has been lost. Not really bound somewhere, and all his deeds done on another server.

I always remember him as a part of Retribution. Playing with Kemwer,Sceptre, Nagkeen,Rasout and Jorky...

Now, onto my new main.

Mardah, the balance druid. Where did she came from?

Actually, Mardah is one of my oldest characters, she was made in the summer of 2005, just to see the Night Elf starting zone. But, as with a lot of my former alts, left at low level, three if I recall. This was on the server Khadgar. For those who actually followed this blog, you already know that after my raiding-time with XII, Mardah became the character I played. She levelled up, hit outlands, and was transferred of to Argent Dawn to play with friends.

I reached 80 with her, and did some ICC-raids. Nothing much. She became Crusader, played around. The amount of time you have when you are not preparing to raid is actually large. Then Cataclysm hit. And I decided, I could raid again. So I looked around, talked to a friend.... put in an application, got accepted, started preparing for raids.

Preparing for raids... I now have 3 epix. Two from the dorfs, one selfmade. At this moment, some of the BiS-equipment is found by Archeology, the BoA-epix. So that's what I am doing now..... digging.

And this all happened in the last two weeks....

And yes, this name is also Star Trek related. Mardah was the dabo-girl Jake dated on DS9, who later was accepted to the Bajor Science Academy...


edit: Oh, and happy christmas everybody....

...and trial again.

Yup, I am in a raiding-guild again, well, a guild that is going to raid if all are 85. Best part of being in a guild is....

...GUILD-HEROICS.

No more dependant on stupid PuGs, which often dissolve after 1 wipe.

So, last night I did 4 heroics with my new guildies (or about 4). We didn't AoE the trash down, but CC was also not used often. I even got my first heroic achievement: Arrested Development, which needs you to kill the three guys with Corla before you kill Corla (evolving adds).

Talking about Corla.... she still has the bracers I want. The only 346-bracers for resto/balance in the game. Yes, there sgould also be a BoE drop from Tol'Vir...but rumors say they don't drop.

Look now, I am talking about gear, well, I am getting myself ready for raids now.... Today I will get exalted with the Highland Dorfs, so I'll get my first 2 epix :). And I must start hunting Trinkets....the two I want most are from Grim Batol and Blackrock.... so I probably need to que for those before I do a random.

And I need an option for my Justice Points. Don't need them for gear anymore...

And on a different note: read this.
At the end it says: ONLY FOR CRAFTERS WITH SKILL 525, nice...

Get out of the...

So, I have been making lightshows in heroics the last few days. And there are some things that spring to mind.

First off, if I get one boss down in a heroic, I consider it a succes. The number of times wipes occur, or that you are invited into a 'dungeon-in-progress', which dissolves after you zone in. Or the tank that leaves because his shield didn't drop.

Luckily, I just did a streak (with a tank from AD) of three dungeons, where the name of this blog really was true. We wiped some, we learned, we succeeded. It also helped that the tank/healer+ 2 DPS where constantly the same, just changing 1 DPS between dungeons.

So... I got my first Chaos Orb, which I need 5. I got a lot of 346-upgrades, bought the JP-helmet. Reforged to Spirit/Hit and haste (now being .03% over hitcap). Put a very expensive enchant on my 346-dagger. And I think I am ready for raiding.....

...now I only need a guild to do that. Well... maybe... I did put an application somewhere, which hopefully rejoins me with a friend.

Oh yeah... the title of this blog...

Most heroic bosses have the same basic principle. Kill Adds, stay out of bad, and sometimes, get into the good. There is a real big difference to what most DPS are accustomed to. DPS on the boss is not that important. Burning down adds, and your own survival is.

If you have to choose between a damage-spell and a healing spell, the choice is already made. If you have to think about it, heal yourself. Help the healers, stay alive, stay out of bad.

Now, as a Boomkin, I have a lot of stuff to help healers. Healing myself up, popping a Tranquility if needed. Casting a glyphed Solar Beam on trash. Rooting....(My Bear bar is three buttons: Growl, Nature's Grasp, entangling Roots), sleeping if needed. Control the damage.

He who controls the damage, controls the fight.

He got me..

I am no stranger to love...

Yes, we have been rick rolled... well, if you did the Vashjir-quests.

Just a quick recap.

Gowron went Hyjal(complete)-Deepholm(complete)-Uldum (till 84)-Highlands and was 85 last friday-night....

but

I find it tedious to tank, and I feel I don't have the piece of mind to do many tanking at the moment. I did level some alts up after that. My hunter to 81, and my SP to 82, but damn, do I need a lot of ore for those three.

Actually.... I find my lazer-chicken on the allie-side much more enjoying at the moment, has to do something with the Flying Form. I did some dungeons with her, and yes, the last word is not out yet, but they seem a lot more fun than mindless wrath-spamming... and now of to Uldum.

McGoblin?

While questing on one of my now numerous low-level alts, I came across a goblin inn, and found the food-stash in the back, well... I remember something like: you shouldn't sleep with glob-flies... I don't think they should be above your food...



And after a week of long log-in, Argent Dawn got their free transfers of, good new for me. So, my shaman,warrior and warlock, accompanied by my lvl60 undead hunter went to steamweedle cartel, to make room for new alts.

I am Forsaken

Run, run,run, busy, busy,busy,

Yes, it has happened again, the 'one-more-turn'-syndrome, or for WoW-players likely called 'one-more-quest'-syndrome, has struck again.

Wednesday, patch-day, oh, new low-level-quests, undead hunter, here we go.

Gloomweed, or doomweed is still there.
Kill some scarlet crusaders, lots of Flightpaths.
Some nice movies.
He, already honored....
Oh, hi sylvanas and garrosh
He, already revered?
WORGEN, kill 'em all
Gilneas taken/lost/taken....
Dead Sylvanas
Oops... almost no dungeons taken....
Ah, finally dual-wield
I am a NUB???
Nicely redecorated Hillsbrad, and Southshore... and well, everything.
Huh, lvl24 and Exalted with UC??
Oh, the cave-yetis have a BIG leader now.
On to STV, KILL TROLLS
mmm, to many green quest, Hinterlands here I come
.... and thats where I am now...

Level 35 in 15 hours, and everywhere is something new. And I am skipping a lot I know. My hunter is heirloomed to the teeth, and has mining/herbalism. Lots of extra xp, but not enough room to do all quests...luckily. That leaves some for future alts.

Well, of to Kill Shadra I suppose...

Bluffwatcher

To arms, Thunderbluff is under attack. Build the barricades and save the citizens.

Now Playing?

So, here I was, new engineer, new recipes... and a need for a lot of Khorium Ore. I needed 60 of those to make Jeeves and the Turbo-Charged Flyer... problem though, they are freaking expensive, and rare. Not only rare to spawn, but also rare on the AH.

So what to do? Well, farm them myself. Luckily I have dual-screen, so while I was half-looking to WoW I saw a lot of Muppet-shows on youtube.... which made me thinking.

You see, I play on a Mac, and WoW on Mac has a build-in movie-maker.... so at the start of one of my runs, I hit CTRL-[.



Some things I need to figure out, like how to better adjust text in the film.... I felt restrained by iMovie. Text where always 2.05 long and couldn't be placed within 2.05 of each other, which made me not use that many text.... There is probably a way to just put text at random in, just have to find it....

Counting Down.

Whoops, I seem to not have written for a while, and even missing my new project, shots from a month....

So, to start of, what happens if 3 SAN-ers go harass the LFD.....



Yes, the Healer was in for a susrprise :O

Lately I have been smite-spamming with Deathoorth trhough dungeons. Just because it is fun to play with guildies. I just can't seem to hit the LFD-button on Gowron at the moment, although I do think he will be my first 85. But with 10 80's, there is not much to do... I levelled a nelf to 20, just to experience the darkshore-quests once more. Played a little on 20-something rogue killing all of Hillsbrad, made my new priest a miner/engineer, made more alts just to see how low-levels work these days.

One of the Alts is a genuine Holy Clothadin, very interesting how that all works, I wonder though, if their will be some low-level intellect-mail available for my future cow-adin...

While levelling the Pally, I encountered a little quest-chain, I know I did it on Gowron, waaaaay back, but now I actually read the lines.... and I did feel sad afterwards.... I am not going to spoil it, just try to find the named treant.



And, with the coming of Cataclysm, I am making sure to take some nice pictures along the way....



I still remember the first time I was there. This was before I used add-ons, so I was actually using the sign-posts along the way. If you follow them, you actually must climb some of the needles to reach the Flightpath.... you only see the elevators when you have reached the top...

I am ending this post with a picture of one of the most honorable and noble characters in Azeroth.

Level 800 , yes... Hundred.

Over the weekend the last two spots where taken in my army of alts. Whiteyyama, the troll warrior (formerly known as Whiteheart, the dwarf warrior) put asides his two big weapons and cleaned of his stashed tanking-gear. 4 hours later, Ezrila, the shadowy disco priest also reached the end of the road (not sure, but I think she is also an original Argent Dawner)

So, that's a goal reached. A level 80 of every class before cata hits. So what did I do on sunday?


I made an undead rogue.... you should know that my other rogue is parked on Sha'tar, so I actually don't have a rogue anymore on Argent Dawn. But she's more a in between step I guess.

I did some early stuff and I found out some nice surprises while levelling.


Lifeblood, the herbalism special ability, used to be a Heal over Time. Now it is an instant heal (around 1k at 80) and gives you 240 haste for 20 seconds (2min CD/lvl80). Did I miss the notes? This is a nice upgrade, making it a very good profession I guess.

On herbing, and mining (and I guess skinning), that gives xp now. At lvl75-80 it gave Whitey twice as much xp as killing stuff... but but, the flowers got sharp points, and it hurts me???

Oh, and I found some stange greenies. A lvl10 back with 1 agility AND 1 hit rating. And a lvl8 shield with 2 spellpower.... Did Blizzard also changed the variables for green drops in the last patch? I have yet to see a mail piece with spirit... oh, wait, that actually makes sense now.

And I actually had to discover Wailing Caverns, before I could que for that. DM,SFK and RFC where free btw.

And low level rogues in heirloom are OP.... stealth-ambush-dead mob... and they got a self-heal??? Where's the world going to....mmm. Oh Yeah, a Cataclysm (corny I know)

Disco-dps...

After some testing it seems that the next rules apply to Disco-dps

Smitex5 (to get evangilism maxed)
then priority: Penance>Holy Fire>Smite

But, if you happen to get your Holy Fire of CD, with only one GCD left for next penance, it seems to better smite,penance, holy fire then.

Glyphs needed:
Glyph of Penance
Glyph of Smite
Glyph of Accuracy

Problem is, that I tested this with a lvl75 on a lvl70 dummy. And Penance and Holy Fire have a 18% miss chance normally....

So, maybe Smite-spam is the way to go.... mmmm?

Why am I even thinking about this?

4.0.fek-patch

Oh... look who is glaring trough the trees... no there... what do you mean you need time to turn? Surely it doesn't last that long? Does it???

Patch 4.0.something shitty happened. All my addons need re-applying. I can handle that. I have around 12 specs to figure out on all my alts. I can handle that.

But the FPS of 1, yes ONE, in Dalaran, and sometimes in the middle of no-where (lvl25 hunter just outside X-roads), really is shitty. Turning down a lot of graph-thingies, and then dying because the graph of a hellfire-or-something didn't really show up on your screen. Those are things I don't like.

Also the multitude of little graphical errors (little green bars just above the red x on bags for example) are very annoying.

The fact that I have a guild-tag, can see who is in the guild, but get the message 'You are not in a guild' when I try to type in /g is even more annoying. Means I have to /gquit and be reinvited.

But the worst part is, I don't like Tankadinning at the moment. How the hell did those Holy Combo Powerpoint Crap got past the Beta. Do I look like a Rogue/Kitty??? And it is just boring. CS-J-CS-some aoe-CS-SHoR until it hits, rince and repeat. With all the changes we just got another sequence, from 696 to 393.... /rejoice. And with our build-up threat through that getting-hit-for-more-AP-mechanic, one miss-click will hurt. Hope that the DPS don't target the wrong mob, because all your spell will be screwed through different CD's.

And I hate it that I don't have Pursuit of Justice now.

Look, as tank I now have to be completely awake/sober/clear/not-distracted to work. Keeping rotation up, keeping track of threat on different targets, keeping track of what the mobs are doing, current and future, keeping track of healers mana.... and the rest of the freaking stuff that is happening, what mob does what? How to walk... but wait, give us something new... combo points... really, I don't like the point, and I don't like the cast-sequence.

happy now all you OH-NOES-if CS is on 4 sec CD we have empty GCD's...... at least those GCD could be used to throw a Hand or look around...

On the other hand, Smiting Healers are fun :)

NOOES, to many new talents...

Let me see, with all the alts i have, and now every class played till 72, I have a little problem with all the new talents. My next week will probably be spend figuring out how they all work, what they do, how to glyph, and how to reforge... around 13 characters...oh my.

And what is this about 939.... look like 969. I thought and hoped I would be free of the GCD-key-tapping. To have some time to look around... but no... hit Crusader Strike (What? am I ret?), hit another button, hit CS..etc.... And Holy Power, the Paladin-rogues.... or something. Luckily I have a 66-tankadin, to get a feel for it, before I actually see all... or I am shanghaied into a dungeon by fellow SAN-ers.

Now, it's time for (another) mind-quake.

The downfall of chickens?

At this moment I am running around 4 characters between level 63 and 73. On disc/shadowpriest, and 3 tanks, a warrior, a paladin and a dw-frost dk. And I have noticed something that will not be good for the future...

I am, by all means, A TBC-child. I started around 2 months after TBC came out. One thing that was hammered down my throat was, let tank pull, unless he asks other wise (sheep-pulls anyone). A lot of people seem to be forgetting that these days, they just expect tanks to taunt of them, and get angry when you don't... /facepalm.

And then there's the constant AoE-spam that makes my screen light up. Most often casted before the tank has made any AoE-threat, or just a little... and then all the mobs start running to you... geesh, how can that happen?

Now the worst example of this are lazor-chickens. Not all of course, but a lot of them. They have three spells to use in dungeons it seems. Hurricane, Starfall and that knockback thingie, typhoon. A common scenario follows...

I run in, target secondary mob, fire of a spell, target primary target... ooh, falling stars... %$#@, use way to many spells with to few resources at my disposal, while the hurricane-spam is started. Chicken gets aggro (no barkskin whatsoever), and after 10 long seconds I finally have all the mobs back where I want them..... knockback... AAAAAARGH.

Now of course, chickens are a prime example, but I have some very bad feelings about the cata-dungeons. It is said that people actually have to think... O_o. Time for another example... Blood Furnace, the SECOND dungeon you encounter in Outlands.. just before the end, there are some packs with large demons. Do you know what they do?

Well, let's see what happens, tank pulls, 2 demons are hitting tank. All of a sudden one of the demons runs to a party-member 25 or so yards back, and stays there.... tank turns around, hits/taunts the demon back, and then the other one does the same. Healer is healing everywhere, but, no problems the group gets them down. Next pack is two of the same demon, and a warlock. Where do you think the ranged is going to stand?

Most of the time I even say, hug tank/demon, but no.... why listen to the healer/tank who gives a tip... oh, and remember the spell starfall... have fun with 2 warlocks summoning all kind of beasties, and 6 mobs charging every way, and not bothering to check who their angry at....

So, if cataclysm actually demands 3/3 in Common Sense, how will 60% of the players, the ones standing in the green, not learning from mob-abilities, etc., handle those dungeons. And how will the 40% sane-people handle it?

How will I handle it? I think guild-dungeons are back, and the LFD will die...
well, until we all overgear the places again, and AoE everything down.

Justice

Ok, fine, now it is time to really think about cata. Release date has been established, there seems to be a big chance that 4.01 will be around shortly, so now maybe the time to look ahead. But first, I found this nice statement from our favorite crab:


"Right. If you are trying to AE tank and a bad dps is attacking the wrong target and dies, we call that justice."


So... we now have a name for it.... Justice :)

Shots of September

Sometimes, I still run into people/npc's/quests that I didn't do before.... not that often anymore... but that's why 7 december is coming....


Screenie from the PTR, you can't fly, but you can summon....


I still find this picture wrong, it seems off somehow. Maybe because he is still in Thralls room?


Not from the PTR, but one of the most epic dungeons-hubs ever created. I didn't do them while levelling with Gowron, or at least I can't remember. But later alts all had lot of fun in there.

Me-ow

I just wanted to see this for myself, cat-drood is fur fite, at level 8. So off I went through Mulgore. Casting Wraths along the way, I again encountered the most annoying thing of low levels, no bag space. I had to return a lot to sell stuff. But even all that selling was not enough. There's a little problem with druids. They can get the ability to become a cat at lvl8, and have to learn cat-form, and 3 new spells, all costing 3 silver and 70 copper.

Now don't look at it with the eyes as a lvl80 with to much gold. If I hadn't had Gowron transferred to the PTR, I would not have had enough silver to buy all the sweet kitty-stuff. New players will not have the backing of gold, and I am seeing frustration because they can't get the spells. Yes, of course, you could get out and start killing stuff.... but it isn't fun, and confusing for new players.

And there is more confusing stuff coming, but luckily I did had gold-backing.



I leveled on till 10, where I got the choice between the three trees. Your first talent point has a nice place to go, feral swiftness. Something with more dodge, whatever, and 15% more speed while in cat-form, very nice for levelling. I also looked a little at the other trees. Resto is logical it seems, but what is with this Solar Eclipse thing, what is it, what does it do, how does it work. Ok, I know how it works, but again, look at it from the beginning player...

Ok, one good thing are thew tooltips. Below is the one for mangle, which you get for free if you choose to go feral. Very clear what to do with this spell.



So, now I think it's time for some dual-wielding totem-thrower.

10 levels of PTR

So, due some unforseen incident, like forgetting you have your Authenticator hanging on your car-keychain, and then lending your car to a friend, I made a trial-account and went to the strange land of the Public Test Realm.

I looked at all the classes (except DK's) and tried and studied some beginning-stuff. OP-hunter Arcane shots, nice proc-graphics for Arcane Missiles, etcetera. But I of course went for the paladin for a little bit more information. And I started levelling, between heavy lag-spikes (one killed me).

Paladins now start with Crusader Strike and get Seal of Righteousness/Judgement fairly fast. (no, that's not SoW on the screenies). When you can train a new spell at your trainer, and remember no more ranks on them, you get a huge message in the middle of your screen.


Now the first thing I needed to understand is your completely lack of heal till level 9. Paladins used to start with Holy Light, but now, you are on your own when you get damaged. So, I did run into a little where-the-%$#@-did-all-these-guys-spawn-from moment. But it actually was surprising... a new I-am-death-and-completely-lots-my-way button is added.


At Level8 you get to see your Holy Power Bar. It is still a level till you can use it. Word of Glory is instant, costs no mana, and heals you for around 60/HP at level9, which means 180 of your 200-something health at full strength...mmm, at instant speed. That actually means you can take on lvl15 boars as a lvl9 paladin...

And I reached level10, lots of information, lots of new buttons.


After respeccing to Prot, I joined a BG for fun. Which gave me a sneek peak of the raid-frames. the right-frame can be tinied, while the names show the appropriate buffs you can give.


This is the PTR btw. No archeology, no new landscapes/worgen/goblins/quests. Just the old stuff, with new spells. But I am looking forward to level again.

2 November?

Patch 4 on november 2? Background-loader started... so it is viable.

Mmm, maybe now is the time to look at some of the changes.

Not sure what I am gonna do first. Level to 85, or start a Cowadin...

A Tribute to....

Shots of August

Time to picture and roll... August Screenies are here.

RP-GEAR

I finally got around to get some real RP-gear... the level60 PvP-set, combined with BoJ-cape. I could have gone farming the Blood Knight Shield, but instead I opted for this Shield, which does set me apart from the rest of the Blood knights in Silvermoon. Ooh, and that troll... it seems to pop up on more of my screenies.

Thanksgiving?

This is what you get in a 6-week vacation, boredom and chasing strange achievements. This one is from feeding 10 pets food, making them your temporaly pets.

Single Abstract Noun ICC10 - raid

A fully SAN-raid, very relaxed, and my first new boss-kill in 6 months, and also a nice screenie to show my UI.

Tanking ShatH

It has been a while since I tanked Shattered Halls, this time I did it as a warrior. Was a nice flashback... oh, and there's that other troll again...

...the moron of course

While just shooting around on the future troll capital islands, I had to kill zalazane. So I was clearing some mobs, when this figure came along. And I do mean along. He just sprinted past me, shot zalazane (which I almost cleared), aggroed 3 more trolls, killed Z. and ran away. After which he 'thanked' me for helping... sorry to say, but I ain't helping such people. I would have lolled at him if he died... I would have joined Zalazane's trolls at that moment if it could be possible...

A tribute

Remember this, the outpost CampT. Which does want me to make some sort of Tribute-post....

O_o, what did I do.

Did I really write that many in the past 2-something years?

I remember why it started, well, it is post 1. Retribution went Boom, and all my articles I wrote where lost. So I actually made the blog as a backup. Which is a good thing, especially considering XII (where I am probably still the highest poster, even after a year gone).

Back then, I just wrote what came up. Mostly new boss-kills. These days I tend to think a little more about posts, until the moment the idea overflows my head. Yes, I tend to write my posts in one stint, while other ideas continue hatching in my brains. Luckily I never said I would write every day/week/etc. I write the Blizzard-way, when I feel like it is ready. Ok, now and then some short answers/remark-posts are still made, but hey, my blog falls under the Munckin Rules: Owner decides.

So, looking back, I really do write like the underline of my blog. Some alt here, some alt there, always returning to Gowron, the Tankadin. Just my 2 cents on World of Warcraft, and to continue...


What have I been doing the last couple of weeks:

Gowron is a little bit done with Wrath. He is now actually collecting pets... but also 5/12 in ICC10 with fellow-bloggers. That was a fun raid. No rush, no expectation, just a walk in the park.

The threesome Dorf2Noam are gone..... they should be called TrollTree???

I played some evony.... which reminds me of Travian... which I do NOT have the time for.

I went some days without internet. Seeing DS9, playing Arkham Horror, and rediscovering Civ4... which still costs 50+ euro for Mac.

Read a lot of posts about Cata.... but I am not yet going to figure it all out... although Paladins need to relearn their stuff.... again. At least we ain't getting spellpower back.

Still trying to get a priest to 80... chances are big that the priest first has to become a Tauren.

8/10 level 80's now. 6 in SAN, 2 on the Allie-side in WEF (which never came off the ground)

Had 6 weeks vacation, way to long, way to hot, monday work starts again.

Bought fast-flying, and the DK-specific mount for Tamarian. Why? Because I could....

Wondering what to do when Cata comes.... AD is full on chars... take another account?

Oh well, we'll see.... oh, LFD for UK-normal pops up... gief AXE

The return of the.... CC?

Sometimes your mind wanders, tinkers about something. I read Rigtheous Orbs, which is about hard dungeons, and remembered the days of CC, which for a Tankadin stands for Continuous Consecration (although Cons. is a lot less usefull these days), but for the rest it means Crowd Control.

Crowd Control, the tool to keep enemy mobs out of combat for a while, while the party butchered his comrades. Doing this will decrease damage on the tank, and keep the fight 'tidy'. And you needed to mark the stuff, anybody remember these?:


And remember what they stood for?

Skull - First Target
Cross - Second Target
Square - Trap (Hunter)
Triangle - Sap (Rogue)
Moon - Sheep (Mage)... or penguin/turtle, whatever...
Star - Shackle (Priest)
Circle - Banish (Warlock)

Yes, that's how we did it before Wrath, mark mobs, and everyone knew what to do. If you where a mage, and you saw a moon appearing on a mob, you knew what to do. And you'd better knew how to chain-trap as hunter :). Now my current experience in Wrath is, that when you actually put a skull on a mob, it probably dies last ???

I don't get this. If the Tank actually 'wastes' time to put a mark on something, there probably is a reason. He/she may have bad experiences with that mob before, he knows the mob has a dangerous ability, or maybe his threat-generation isn't that high, who knows... and who cares... just Blizzard,Hurricane,Hellfire away... NO, oops, I didn't mean that. FTLoG, please focus fire the skull down, and then go your merry way with AoE. There's a reason for that skull, don't question it, just do it...

Now, back to CC, or better what CC's are out there, and I am going to ignore short spells, we want to take a mob out of combat for at least 15 seconds.

Druid: Hibernate,Entangling Roots
Hunter: Freezing Trap, [Wyvern Sting]
Mage: Polymorph
Paladin: [Repentance]
Priest: Shackle Undead,Mind Control
Rogue: Sap
Shaman: Hex
Warlock: Banish, Enslave Demon, Seduction
Warrior: none
Death Knight: none

I know there also are other options to control mobs. A rogue could stunlock a mob (but preventing the rogue from doing dps), and mobs can be chain-feared by several classes, but as you know, fearing is something you should refrain from in most dungeons, you know why, don't you??? And there are some spells which are spec-specific (wyvern sting/repentance) so not all of that class may have them. And of course they all break on damage.

As you can see, there are a lot of CC's, some are mob-specific, like Shackle Undead, but it seems to me, that a reasonable balanced group at least has 2 CC's to choose from. And as mentioned by our favorite Crab, we will need them again in Cataclysm. So start using them again, pull them out of your spellbook, on to your hotbars.

Now hope you don't get a group with 2 DK's, 2 Warriors and a Holy Paladin.... then yer screwed, lass.

He is coming.....

The fog was just starting to clear,
daybreak was upon them,
but there was a foul stench in the air,
something different.

They heard him first,
the sound of a riding horse
echoed through the valley,
and all looked up.

Between the hills he came,
onwards with a steady pace,
nothing could stop him,
until he reached his destiny.







Now, where did I leave those LotR-DVD's.. or do I even have them...

Dodge this.

First: Beta has a new talent tree up for Paladins. Now I am not going to deeply into it, because it is probably far from finished, but it seems we'll be watching procs a lot more, which I don't like as a tank, procs means chance, so I need to gamble with the the other players present.

Now on to the main dish.

GC has stated that he wants avoidance to matter more then now. One of the things changed is that *gasp* healers have to look at their mana again.

No let me take you back. In the old days of TBC, me first voyages into Karazhan was as Holy (long story). So I actually healed there. I had no add-ons to help me, and I just looked at health bars, and pushing 1 (FoL), 2 (HL) or 3 (HL rank 7). But I got away with reactive healing. Tank (or someone else) took damage, throw a heal at him/her. This meant that I didn't waste mana on healing-not-needed. And still I needed to pop a pot every 2 minutes to keep enough mana for the whole fight.

My Primary spell was FoL, because it was cheap, my second most-used spell was HL rank 7, not the max rank. It was cheaper and filled the gap between HL and FL max ranks. It was all about mana.

Now I also healed sometimes in Ulduar, and my memory of that was very simple. Target tank-->spam Holy Light. Mana-problems? Never, I sometimes had to use Divine plea to get mana back, but I can't remember using a pot.

Now these are two completely different healing-methods, and it also effects how tanks played and geared. If you gear/gem like today, which is pointed towards Stamina and Armor, there maybe a problem. You will take most of the hits, so you need to get healed often, if not always, else you die. Now with infinite mana this is not a problem, healers just spam-heal you, but what would happen with the healers mana, if it wasn't infinite? There would be a good chance that your healer would run oom halfway the fight.

And that's the reason tanks used to look at dodge/parry a lot more in TBC then now. A hit avoided would mean that your healer wouldn't have to heal you, which meant that he had more mana. But there-in lies another problem. If the hits where that big, that 2 would kill the tank, the healers still needed to spam-heal the tank, because you don't know before hand if the hit would land or be avoided. You could cancel the heal just before casting, but imho, that often fails, because of lag or because you took the cast-time to look around to others (or colored ground).

So, for dodge/parry to become important again, healers should again be able to heal reactively, instead of pro-active like now. Because that's how is healed these days, just spam HL, and don't worry how hard the tanks get hit. That would mean that bosses can't 2-shot the tank anymore. A normal hit on a (content-geared) tank should only take of 30% of his health, so healers can react to it, and if the hit is avoided, they don't have to heal the tank.

Back in Kara, I never topped of the tanks, I always had them at around 92%. If I would heal the tank, some mana would be wasted, and the tank had enough health to survive at least two hits. So if he got hit, and was thrown, to say 50%, I could fire off an expensive HL, or use two small FoL. Probably the latter, because another healer would probably also toss a heal, and I could actually save the mana from one FoL. It also opened up the possibility to look at the raid, and use a heal there. If the tank was still above 70%, no heal was directly needed, I could finish of a heal on a DPS orso, and then heal the tank. Chance was he would avoid the next hit, so I had some time, and even if it wasn't avoided, the tank would still be alive and ready to receive some oh-shit heals.

So for the TL;DR version:

If Avoidance should matter for tanks again, boss-hits must be smaller, and the mana of healers should not be infinite.


And for the record, I am still in the mind-set, that my weapon should be enchanted for threat (spelldamage in TBC, agi/crit/hit today), and that one trinket-slot is for stamina, an the other for avoidance, or an on-use avoidance ability.

How not to Halls of Lightning

Sometimes you get real beautiful PuG's.

Halls of Lightning

First Boss:
He has an aggro-range of miles, so by all means healer, go stand there, and pull him. Oh, you only have 5% health left, while the rest needs healing due to Whirlwind... luckily I have lay on hands.

Just after that:
Slags, run through them, round them up, and to be sure, Divine Protection... and yes mage, healers and DK, by all means stand right besides me.... rez-rez-rez....

Just after second boss:
Healer is Shammie, where are my Tremors???

Third Boss:
You know dispers? Well, healer+DK, by all means, don't run... activate DP, use trinket, use Nightmare Seed (yes, I still have some), kill boss. Rez...rez.. oh healer already ran in.

Whirlwinding trash
Bye DK

Lokem:
Oh yes healer+mage, by no means stand close.... LoH the healer, mage dead, healer drops group before ressing, probably because of the 'WTF no heals' from the mage.

Well, at least I was not bored :)

Talented Down.

Inbetween all the realID-stuff, Blizzard did announce something new last week, revamped talent trees.

TL,DR-version:
-At level 10, you choose a talent tree
-You can only spec into that tree until you have 31 points in it-You get some tree-specific cool abilities at level 10
-You get 1 talentpoint/2 levels (down from 1)
-If you don't get a talentpoint, visit your trainer for something new.

At level 10, you choose a talent tree

So let's me look at all this, and start with a question. Which is the best talent-spec for tankadins at level 39?

If you came up with a 0/xx/0 build, you are wrong (imho), the best build for tankadins at level 39 is this. I must say, this comes from a not widly used glyph, the Glyph of Seal of Command. So, not only SoC gives you a lot of snap-aggro on 3 targets, it will also give you mana back, so almost no downtime in dungeons. And a lot of crit, which means more damage, which means more aggro.

Another question, what spec should a 39-protection-warrior have? Well, here is my tree I had at that level. The reason? This spec lets you have a charge without losing rage after changing stances (macro-time), and with the increase on crit from the talent Incite, there's a good chance you have a bleed-DoT on several targets through Deep Wounds.

Now, take in account, that the possibility that you can join LFD a non-protection specced character will probably not be possible any more (would be logic). So, these two specs wil not be possible anymore (besides the fact that you don't get that many points). One is not protection, the other is a dual-spec (15/0/15).

So, whine, whine, not good, let's protest ag... oh wait... Now if you read this, there's a 89% chance that you actually know how the game works. But do new players now this? Can you imagine that a new player will be very confused if everyone says that the best tanking tree for Paladins is not the the Tanking Tree, but the DPS-tree? So, I think this step is a very good one.

You can only spec into that tree until you have 31 points in it

But, but, won't all the specs be the same then? Yes, of course, like they are now, except maybe for 2-3 points. So please don't go that way, cookie-cutter was invented for a reason. It will be the end of some strange specs though. Looking at the past, a Shockadin-build will be impossible, just as my still-much-loved 0/40/21 spec I had in TBC. You need to have the top-talent in your spec, before you actually spec into another tree, which most specs actually do, so...

You get some tree-specific cool abilities at level 10

Think Shaman-DW, Divine Storm. For enhancement Shamans, this means that they can actually BE enhancement Shaman at level 10, instead of waiting till 40 for Dual Wield. This alone is reason enough to make it a good descision. I don't know more specifics about these abilities, but wouldn't a DW-2H warrior be cool at 10?

-You get 1 talentpoint/2 levels (down from 1)
-If you don't get a talentpoint, visit your trainer for something new.
So, every new level we got something new, mmm, are they really going to give us 30+ different spells? Remember, they already said that ranking up for spells you already got will be automatic. Seems a lot to me.

Conclusion: I think I like these changes, although I do have my questions by the 'every level something new'-statement. Also, no idea what the trees will look like. we know the +5% to something talents will disappear, but what about some situational talents we have? Will there only be 31 points to be spend in a tree? Or will we still have some filler-talents for fun (like Unholy DK's Corpse explosion?), time will tell....

Real No Idea

-----> That way (bloglist)

The players won?

Or....

Inscription?

Just before the whole RealID blew up, I again read some posts on Inscription. There seems to be ab oppurtunity there to make a lot of gold. Well, why?

I maybe buy 15 glyphs per char, and keep them a long time. I see no reason at this moment to replace my DP,Sense Undead and taunt-glyphs. And most of the glyphs are only 10g max. That's ONE daily, which is a lot faster then logging on my inscriber, finding the flowers on the AH, smashing them to pulp, making ink, making glyph. Of all my characters who make stuff, my inscriber is only good for making armor/weapon-glyphs, which I have a lot of at this moment. More then enough to make all the enchants I want on all my alts.

Now, maybe if I was a progression-tank, I may carry around a lot of glyphs to switch around. But how many hardcore-guilds will enforce that rule? And how many HC-guilds are there on your server? 4? 5? Off which 70% probably don't need to switch around.

I just don't see why the glyph-business can make that much gold?

Oh, and yes, I am interested in the new talent trees, gief more info on the talents. But paladins probably have to wait till last....

RealID, do we have the power?

Oh, a Tidal-wave is rolling along, let's jump into it.

So, the blogworld is swarming with RealID-posts.

To be honest, personally I don't care that much (at the moment). If you type in my (real) name, you already get a lot of information about me, posts on Magic-forums, posts on trek-forums, travian, Rock wrchter, Hyves (dutch facebook) and some more.

But, that is my choice. It was not forced upon me. And on some forums I posted on (hello Maintankadin) my name is Gowron, Not A**** D****. And I like to keep that choice. we are not living in 1984 here, aren't we?

Now don't expect me to cancel my subscription (oh, from a Doors-song), but I am wondering about a comment I made in a post a while back.

At the beginning, someone known as 'Tamarind', together with someone known as 'Miss Medicina', created something different, a guild for bloggers and readers. And I wondered if we in the future, as voice of all the players, could make a difference...

The Post

...and six.

'Whoops, I did it again.'
(B. Spears)

Cymar is now an 80 Affliction Warlock, I did a long run this weekend, even snatching up 4 frosties and a 232-cloak from Ahune. Coupled with the Summerfestival Swirling Bonus, Cymar hit 80 somewhere sunday late afternoon. So after some althops, some new Ilvl200 gear I went into the LFD for emblems.

Now, with still 2 heirloomtrinkets and the pvp-heirloom staff, I am doing 2000+ dps, which methinks is fairly good. Especially considering that you needed 1500 dps for Patchwerk (iirc). But my my, wat a %#@&heads are around.

Now, my complete ignore-list was empty, there were no real lesser experiences until I hit the Heroic-LFD.


Now, there are several things.
-1: I don't have a real dps-chart, because we only did 2 bosses, and this was OK
-2: This is during Voljaz (last boss) in OK
-3: Dps-meters don't work here, because you only record you own dps during Insanity.
-4: Instead of actually right-clicking on the last mob standing, he actually typed, prolonging it's life.
-5: And to top it off, the healer/tank weren't really better, continually harrassing the rogue (Ghaz) because he didn't know some tactics....
-6: And Gz bear, on needing the spellpowerstaff.....

Within 24 hours, I have seen it all. DPS who just do nothing, because the other 4 in the group want to do all bosses. Swearing, after someone asks politely to do some more bosses. DPS leaving during bossfights, because they are to 'Sexy for their Shirt'. Healers leaving during bossfight, while soulstoned, because someone died (or someones). Tanks just chainpulling, not looking at either the healers mana, or if there is maybe a loose mob. Warlocks getting aggro because of Seed-spam.. oh wait, that would be me :). At least I am talented in aggro->run to tank.

Luckily, vacation is coming, probably lessening the 'Kids'....

You no take Flame.

This Midsummer festival is a good thing to get your City Defender Achievement.

Last Monday, 4 members od SAN where just doing there usual thing, nothing. I got a little tired of all the local defense-spam. So I went to the Flame, and killed every alliance who was so stupid to actually attack NPC's. I was joined by Naofa's Tankadin, Steamynose and Wasmemon's Shammy. And it quickly turned into 'just kill all allies'.

I don't think the flame was stolen for three hours straight, and the bones kept piling up. We also had a good laugh about all the 'Elder Rise is under attack' messages. Apparantly a lot of Allies don't know their way around TB.

We also had a lot of allies that tried to escape by jumping of Spirit Rise, it's called Rise for a reason... a lot went splat below.

Most fun was yesterday. Steamy and me vs. 4-5 alliance that came with the zeppelin from Ogrimmar. We followed them on the boat, and had a Ship-fight, which we won. Outnumbered 2-1 and winning...

But I do have an apology, for the non-level-80's who where caught in the crossfire, or more likely in the 'Alliance-Kill'. And I am pretty sure I killed a former Guildmate from WEF, sorry for that... well, maybe...

Heirlooms

Some news about cata today. Path gone, more glyphs, but I am scratching my head over this one:

The current heirlooms will stop growing after level 80. There will be a whole new crop of heirlooms for Cataclysm.

They will stop growing.... so what? 10% more xp dwarves all other stats, in my humble opinion. Or does it mean that they won't work for lvl81-85? That would be, mm, not cool.

I have a lot of those heirlooms. And the idea behind it was always that I could use them in Cata, and what else to do with all those emblems. But I think Blizzard wants the same with what they did to Northrend Flying. One time without, after that, who cares.

Status-report.

Oh, 2 weeks no blog, mm, probably because the last week of the schoolyear are very busy. So, a little rundown of what I have been doing last two weeks.

First up, more rep-grinding...



Which also means I did the Mag'Har, and the tunnel-one, which gave me a nice speech from Thrall.



And I am also doing some other Outland-rep-grinds, which resulted in me getting a transformarion-trinket....



So... with all those exalted reputations, I visited some quartermasters, bought some mounts, and got a free drake.




And something else happened last night. I was present in a succesfull WG, and thought, why not. I joined a VOA25. After that, about 5 people wanted to do VOA10, including me. RL left because he already did it, and left me with the reigns.... So I raid-leaded again.. well, sort of. It's not that you really need a RL in VOA.

Something different.

The void before a new expansion. It has happened in the past, and it will happen again. So what to do, continue with the reputation-hunts Gowron recently found himself one, but it is boring... Do more heroics, which I already can dream about... Get into a raiding-community... not again.

Last night I toon-hopped, bought a load of BoA-thingies, and according to the tab, Gowron gained about 200000 honor yesterday... yes, let's try something new, Player vs. Player.

Now, I did do some PvP on Gowron in TBC, mainly because the best Tankadin-weapons came from PvP (stamina/spellpower and crit-reducement through resilience). But I never liked it very much, especially because I was Prot-specced, and no dual-specs back then.

Yesterday, I respecced my ret-spec to a more PvP-orientated build, not quit right yet. Bought some 232,245,246-pvp stuff from the honor (and some triumphs), and did some random BG's.

I am sitting at around 420 resilience, which is just enough to not feel to squishy. Of course, against a full pvp-ed allie, I am toast, but I am managing.

Now of course, everybody says Ret-pvp is OP, well, it is, if I have all my cooldowns available. But the moment I just killed someone using my CD's, the next fight will be a lot harder, a lot, and probably a loss.

I did found out some nice tricks, I have three stuns/interrupts. The racial, the hammer, and the repentance. If all 3 are available, I can even take down a tree... if only 2 are up, tree lives.... sigh.

Well, let's see how long I can handle this, before I get crazy.

Hunter Up...

Be carefull...

look where you are going...

because in that shadow over there...

there could be lurkin'...

A BIG RED KITTY

Greetings from Thunderbluff

Me and my friend Steamy met this Paladin in Thunderbluff. We had some laughs, shared some stories, and some booze. I hope the bloke will not get too much grief from his 'better' half.

I have been around.

So, what was I doing, oh yeah:



It took me two days, and in contrary to the Eastern Kindoms, Kalimdor-quests are much harder to find and do in the end. Mostly because of the whole Silithus-scene (more on that later). But, if you look at the screenie, I got the achievement by turning in cloth.... If I would have known that earlier... oh well. So, next up was Northrend:



Not that much work. Apparantly I never did the Nexus- and DTK-quests.. and never been to Shozalar with Gowron. Most of the quests I had already done, and before I knew it... well actually, I did knew it was gonna happen...:



But when I got this, I still needed to Icecrown, where I got stuck on 138/140, with only one group-quest (one you can't solo due to cd's). So, I searched around, and I found that I needed to get a random drop, from a chest, which could only be opened when I was on a Daily... and it involves that Guy who always runs away before we kill him, Mal' Ganis. But, I found it...



So, I got a nice letter from Bloodhoof, a new title and a very ugly tabard, and some pictures.









The last one, is from one of the quests in Silithus when I was working toward Kalimdor. After I completed Loremaster today, I looked at my cenarion circle rep, and thought, what the.. So, of I was, collecting texts and cultist wardrobes. Killing some lesser elementals, and finally I had enough, to summon an old-school 40-man raid boss.



Yeah, well, raid-boss? Somewhere along the line they nerfed these. It had less health then me in my tanking gear. But, it actually dropped something nice, a purple shield. And after besting one of their biggest enemies, the druids of the Cenarion Circle/Expedition/whatever they will be called in cataclysm, bestowed me with a new title:



So, what now... maybe diplomat, or maybe I should do the AT-quests on Gowron... we'll see.