The new changes for raiding...
It comes down between choosing 10 or 25man, with 25mans not having better gear, only less. restokin has a nice view about it, and she really delves into the what it will do with the people managing guilds. I have been there.
In 2007, I was the-one-that-did-almost-everything. My RL needed that, an excuse to be alone. And I managed, until my RL changed. Running a guild is a lot of work, or rather, running a 25-raiding guild (although social) who raids 6 days a week. That means you have to have around 45-50 members (social guild) with people attending about half the raids, supplemented with some that did a lot more.
Now, if you have never did this, it's hard to imagine. XII had around 50 members, of which 1 was the GM, and 8 others where officers. The GM was more for PR, and to sometimes make the descision to continue, but was not doing much for the raiding-part. 5 officers where mostly there for inviting, and relaying messages to the other 3, who did most of the work, recruiting, forming raids, guildbank stuff, website... that stuff.
That means 40 other people where mostly just showing up for raids. And like in most guilds, not all where that clever. There have been enough times where I should have kicked people, but to keep the peace, and the raids going, I didn't. But it comes down to the fact that 3-5 people did a lot for the others, which wasn't always seen. It also meant, that sometimes you just didn't know someone good enough.
And everyone was there for the purplez of course, now if 10s are going to drop the same as 25s, I must concur with restokin, who would be crazy enough to do 25s (unless they drop 1.5 times the loot maybe). You can keep the really nice an good people, and ditch the rest. And the fact that the guild wouldn't that be that big, you would know each other better, less turn-over, and better results probably.
There are some concerns though. 10mans favor hybrids. Why? Simple. If one person can do multiple roles, the number of people in the guild can be lower. So one day, you are healer, and the next day tank. So 10-guilds will not have many pure dps-specs, not more then 2, else if one of the tanks/healers is not there, no run. Or you could do it with 16 people in the guild, where a lot of the time 4 people are benched, and it depends on the number of days.
If your 10man would raid 6 days/week, a guild of around 20, with more pure-dps would be possible. But if you only raid 3 days (like most guilds)., 12-14 should be enough, but you need to have a lot of hybrids.
I probably could let loose a lot of statistics, but, luckily, I am not raiding at the moment, so it will not affect me.... maybe.
Monday, 26 April 2010
Tuesday, 20 April 2010
SAN and raiding... O_o
It came up last night in the green. Raiding, and raiding burnout, and how to get back to raiding... in the SAN-chat, that is.
Last weeks, I have only been playing SAN. And as one of them stated, the guild where nothing get done, because we are to busy talking. Well, some do stuff. My friend (now called Steamy) was the first real SAN 1-80 (with heirlooms). I don't know if there already is a non-heirloom 1-80, I am very close though at 75. And last night the raiding was mentioned.
Do we really want so many bloggers raiding in one guild? Well, we could ofcourse be soft-core. But what impact shall it have on the blogosphere? And what power do we actually have...and yes, it may corrupt.
We already saw what a small remark could do, to bring people together, having fun. That's why SAN exists. But what is the 'power' of the blogosphere? If 70% of the blogs out there is going to write the same wish/conclusion/whatever, can we have the power to change the mind of Ghostcrawler for example?
What would happen if SAN, actually started to do some raids, just for fun? One likely outcome is a death Arthas within a month...
But, a lot of SAN has been burned out on raiding, they just want to have fun, no schedules to raid, and no consequences if they just don't play for a week. The after effects of burn-out. Like I have.
I probably won't mind raiding again, but not like I did in the past with XII. Fun and relaxation is my main-goal in WoW at the moment. Log in, do some quests, some dungeons, have some fun with guildies and be afk for an hour because of Torchwood.
I do miss my enterprise, both my enchanter/bs as my miner/jc are alliance. And my 60-warlock is also doing nothing....
Last weeks, I have only been playing SAN. And as one of them stated, the guild where nothing get done, because we are to busy talking. Well, some do stuff. My friend (now called Steamy) was the first real SAN 1-80 (with heirlooms). I don't know if there already is a non-heirloom 1-80, I am very close though at 75. And last night the raiding was mentioned.
Do we really want so many bloggers raiding in one guild? Well, we could ofcourse be soft-core. But what impact shall it have on the blogosphere? And what power do we actually have...and yes, it may corrupt.
We already saw what a small remark could do, to bring people together, having fun. That's why SAN exists. But what is the 'power' of the blogosphere? If 70% of the blogs out there is going to write the same wish/conclusion/whatever, can we have the power to change the mind of Ghostcrawler for example?
What would happen if SAN, actually started to do some raids, just for fun? One likely outcome is a death Arthas within a month...
But, a lot of SAN has been burned out on raiding, they just want to have fun, no schedules to raid, and no consequences if they just don't play for a week. The after effects of burn-out. Like I have.
I probably won't mind raiding again, but not like I did in the past with XII. Fun and relaxation is my main-goal in WoW at the moment. Log in, do some quests, some dungeons, have some fun with guildies and be afk for an hour because of Torchwood.
I do miss my enterprise, both my enchanter/bs as my miner/jc are alliance. And my 60-warlock is also doing nothing....
Sunday, 4 April 2010
More Politics
Wow.com has an interesting set of articles about wow-politics. Here you can read the last installment about Bloodelfs.
Now, last week I wrote something towards that (here).
So, is it time to really shake up the player-base? Will we have Horde (Orcs/Trolls/Goblins), Alliance (Human/Dwarves/Worgen/Gnomes) and some neutral races?
Why are the Bloodelfs and the Undead still in the Horde. What are the Tauren going to do. Will the Night-elves get enough of lesser races? And what about the Draenai? What are they doing in the Alliance?
It will be interesting how Blizzard will tackle this, or will they outright ignore it?
..speculation..
Horde: Orc/Troll/Tauren/Goblin
Alliance: Human/Dwarf/Gnome/Worgen
Northern Alliance: Night-Elves/Blood-Elves/Draenai/Undead
That would really shake up stuff :)
Oh, and with all the new classes to each races, every faction still would have access to all, hurray for Holy Cows, dwarven totem-throwers and worgen druids.
Now, last week I wrote something towards that (here).
So, is it time to really shake up the player-base? Will we have Horde (Orcs/Trolls/Goblins), Alliance (Human/Dwarves/Worgen/Gnomes) and some neutral races?
Why are the Bloodelfs and the Undead still in the Horde. What are the Tauren going to do. Will the Night-elves get enough of lesser races? And what about the Draenai? What are they doing in the Alliance?
It will be interesting how Blizzard will tackle this, or will they outright ignore it?
..speculation..
Horde: Orc/Troll/Tauren/Goblin
Alliance: Human/Dwarf/Gnome/Worgen
Northern Alliance: Night-Elves/Blood-Elves/Draenai/Undead
That would really shake up stuff :)
Oh, and with all the new classes to each races, every faction still would have access to all, hurray for Holy Cows, dwarven totem-throwers and worgen druids.
Thursday, 1 April 2010
April's Fool
Look, some people are way to logical for that.
I had some scholars sabotage the whiteboard, redecorate a classroom in 30 seconds, and of course the old shoe-lace-tricks today. But I am to logical to fall for most, probably because my shoes don't have laces :)
There are a couple of AF-blogs around. Wowwiki has every picture (and some more) turn upside down.
And I just noticed the achievement-rrs-feed.
Cloudcaller Cheesed the achievement...
Cloudcaller Ninjaed ....
Yeah yeah, luckily this day only lasts 24 hours, of which luckily I sleep 8.
And now I am part of a larger community, I probably need to start watching comments.
Yes Zaeni, I find shamans nice to play. Actually, I have a 70-enhancement somewhere.
Oh, and btw, Cloudcaller is still without heirlooms, by choice.
I had some scholars sabotage the whiteboard, redecorate a classroom in 30 seconds, and of course the old shoe-lace-tricks today. But I am to logical to fall for most, probably because my shoes don't have laces :)
There are a couple of AF-blogs around. Wowwiki has every picture (and some more) turn upside down.
And I just noticed the achievement-rrs-feed.
Cloudcaller Cheesed the achievement...
Cloudcaller Ninjaed ....
Yeah yeah, luckily this day only lasts 24 hours, of which luckily I sleep 8.
And now I am part of a larger community, I probably need to start watching comments.
Yes Zaeni, I find shamans nice to play. Actually, I have a 70-enhancement somewhere.
Oh, and btw, Cloudcaller is still without heirlooms, by choice.
Tuesday, 30 March 2010
Blackrock Depths/Temple of Atal'Hakkar
BRD and ST... Cloud has been running those a lot last week. With different succes. There's a real problem with those two... the place of the entrance, the way daily-random-bosses are placed, and ofcoure, their inner layout.
Entrance.
Both dungeons have a maze before their actual entrance, most of the people these days don't know the way back, which ofcourse means that almost every wipe is end of party.
Daily Random-bosses.
In ST you need to kill Eranikus, which is the upper part. In all the runs I have only seen the lower part once. People just skip that part, which is not strange, considering the faxt that you have to click statues in a different order.
BRD actually has two levels. BRD-prison and BRD-upper. Both start at the beginning, so you have no way to know which you are doing. Luckily, prison only needs one boss-kill (2nd hall to the right). So you figure it out fast enough. But now you are in upper... and no one has the key. Not that it has happened to me yet.. Fun part is of cousre you have to die to get the quest. So you have to know how to get to BRD... see the problem arising here.
Inner Layout.
Well, if you only do upper-ST, it is fairly simple, just stay close to each other, else you will loose people.
BRD is something different, let's see from memory.
Enter
Kill 2 mobs.
Enter a big room with lots of hallways.
Take the second on the right, kill all untill boss (Head boss for Prison)
Go back. (1st and 3rd on left just are alternative paths, or for a quest)
Take second hallway on the left (from entering big room).
Clear all, until you find Roccor, or he finds you.
Boss Houndmaster is in the first room on the right side.
Second room on right is the Arena, all enter together, and you'd better not stand behind gates.
(If you took third from the right, the first room on the left is arena...)
After completing Arena, exit the other way.
>>>hold, what about the first hallway to the right? Well it goes to a door, which you can open with the key to enter the same place you are now, see, a little shortcut.
Now this room which you are in, is not big, has 2 levels, is packed with mobs, has 2 entrances (one with key) and two exits. One exit goes even further up, the other one goes around a corner to a half-opened door, which you can open with the key on the lower-part of the room...
Oh at the entrance btw, you can also directly use the key to ge left, to the last boss of lower-city, and then you can go the other way around, back . And in that room just mentioned, just before the half-opened door, you can actually jump down to achieve the same, and then go back... and..
And that's just the start. Very Confusing for people. Hope you have some one who knows the way. After this, it becomes a little bit more linear. But there are a lot of things to watch out for. Especially in the bar...
But, I do like it. Lots of work to do, lots of bosses, lot of things to look at. Just be ready for a good 2 hours of this. I really smile evrytime I see someone asking 'How Long till end?'. And I laugh at the 'Gogogo' and 'Plz Fast'-comments.
Really, never rush yourself in BRD. Almost every dwarf runs away when almost beaten to death. And will pull additional mobs.... and it is really crowdy, before you know it, you have 15 dwarves, 2 fire elementals and several hounds beating on your party...
Entrance.
Both dungeons have a maze before their actual entrance, most of the people these days don't know the way back, which ofcourse means that almost every wipe is end of party.
Daily Random-bosses.
In ST you need to kill Eranikus, which is the upper part. In all the runs I have only seen the lower part once. People just skip that part, which is not strange, considering the faxt that you have to click statues in a different order.
BRD actually has two levels. BRD-prison and BRD-upper. Both start at the beginning, so you have no way to know which you are doing. Luckily, prison only needs one boss-kill (2nd hall to the right). So you figure it out fast enough. But now you are in upper... and no one has the key. Not that it has happened to me yet.. Fun part is of cousre you have to die to get the quest. So you have to know how to get to BRD... see the problem arising here.
Inner Layout.
Well, if you only do upper-ST, it is fairly simple, just stay close to each other, else you will loose people.
BRD is something different, let's see from memory.
Enter
Kill 2 mobs.
Enter a big room with lots of hallways.
Take the second on the right, kill all untill boss (Head boss for Prison)
Go back. (1st and 3rd on left just are alternative paths, or for a quest)
Take second hallway on the left (from entering big room).
Clear all, until you find Roccor, or he finds you.
Boss Houndmaster is in the first room on the right side.
Second room on right is the Arena, all enter together, and you'd better not stand behind gates.
(If you took third from the right, the first room on the left is arena...)
After completing Arena, exit the other way.
>>>hold, what about the first hallway to the right? Well it goes to a door, which you can open with the key to enter the same place you are now, see, a little shortcut.
Now this room which you are in, is not big, has 2 levels, is packed with mobs, has 2 entrances (one with key) and two exits. One exit goes even further up, the other one goes around a corner to a half-opened door, which you can open with the key on the lower-part of the room...
Oh at the entrance btw, you can also directly use the key to ge left, to the last boss of lower-city, and then you can go the other way around, back . And in that room just mentioned, just before the half-opened door, you can actually jump down to achieve the same, and then go back... and..
And that's just the start. Very Confusing for people. Hope you have some one who knows the way. After this, it becomes a little bit more linear. But there are a lot of things to watch out for. Especially in the bar...
But, I do like it. Lots of work to do, lots of bosses, lot of things to look at. Just be ready for a good 2 hours of this. I really smile evrytime I see someone asking 'How Long till end?'. And I laugh at the 'Gogogo' and 'Plz Fast'-comments.
Really, never rush yourself in BRD. Almost every dwarf runs away when almost beaten to death. And will pull additional mobs.... and it is really crowdy, before you know it, you have 15 dwarves, 2 fire elementals and several hounds beating on your party...
Monday, 29 March 2010
Cataclysm - Politics.
I was just reading the books of Lore found all over the world, when my mind started to wander.
We have some information about the politics in Cataclysm.
1. Hellscream will be the new leader for the Orcs.
2. Hellscream will throw out most Blood Elfs and Undead from Ogrimmar.
3. Hellscream will execute Bloodhoof for treason.
4. Night Elfs will 'welcome' some of their long lost High-Elf brothers back.
Let us start with the Horde.
Executing Bloodhoof for treason? The only thing I can actually see Bloodhoof doing, is not wanting to declare open warfare on the Alliance. The Tauren are a mostly peace-full people, only taking up arms if they are threatened. So, how will the executing of their beloved leader fall on all Taurens.... I suppose they will not be very happy.
Undeads and Bloodelfs also will be very distrusting about Hellscream. They don't know him, so why should he be leader of the Horde? And he expels them from the orc-city, not a good base for trust, I would say.
Now let's speculate some more.
What are the Undead going to do, now Arthas, the sole reason they existed is death? And keep in mind, that most of the Undead are in fact risen citizens of Lordearan, former humans that is, and most of them still remember their past lives. Although they do not want to.
The High-Elves are returning. They will join the Night-Elves in a fight for good (I pressume). But, are the High-Elves not closer to the Blood-Elves, then to the Night-Elves. And if the Night-Elves welcome High-Elves back, could that also be the start of getting the Night-Elves and Blood-Elves closer together again.
Will the aggressive path of the new Orc-Leader be the end of the New Horde? I wouldn't be surprised that the Undeads and Blood-elfs would say goodbye, and that the Taurens would seal Mulgore, and let the Orcs, Trolls and Goblins go their way.
It's just, what are the long-term consequences of alienating half of the people in the Horde.....
We have some information about the politics in Cataclysm.
1. Hellscream will be the new leader for the Orcs.
2. Hellscream will throw out most Blood Elfs and Undead from Ogrimmar.
3. Hellscream will execute Bloodhoof for treason.
4. Night Elfs will 'welcome' some of their long lost High-Elf brothers back.
Let us start with the Horde.
Executing Bloodhoof for treason? The only thing I can actually see Bloodhoof doing, is not wanting to declare open warfare on the Alliance. The Tauren are a mostly peace-full people, only taking up arms if they are threatened. So, how will the executing of their beloved leader fall on all Taurens.... I suppose they will not be very happy.
Undeads and Bloodelfs also will be very distrusting about Hellscream. They don't know him, so why should he be leader of the Horde? And he expels them from the orc-city, not a good base for trust, I would say.
Now let's speculate some more.
What are the Undead going to do, now Arthas, the sole reason they existed is death? And keep in mind, that most of the Undead are in fact risen citizens of Lordearan, former humans that is, and most of them still remember their past lives. Although they do not want to.
The High-Elves are returning. They will join the Night-Elves in a fight for good (I pressume). But, are the High-Elves not closer to the Blood-Elves, then to the Night-Elves. And if the Night-Elves welcome High-Elves back, could that also be the start of getting the Night-Elves and Blood-Elves closer together again.
Will the aggressive path of the new Orc-Leader be the end of the New Horde? I wouldn't be surprised that the Undeads and Blood-elfs would say goodbye, and that the Taurens would seal Mulgore, and let the Orcs, Trolls and Goblins go their way.
It's just, what are the long-term consequences of alienating half of the people in the Horde.....
Friday, 19 March 2010
Clouds' on the move.
Well, my idea was to actually write a blog before this, but, alas, playing got in the way.
Cloudcaller is no 36, mostly using the lfd-function. Although I did some questing killing animals for skinning. And like a friend of mine says, he is a bane to all cloth-wearers. well, there's hardly any sp-leather at low levels.
Few things about the last 25 levels, but especially about level 20.
Level 20 gives you some new spells, most importantly is water-shield. This finally gives you the mana-regen you need to not drink that much, or rather almost never. But lvl20 also gives you a quest, to get your third totem. And it is a drag. It sends you all over the world to get water. Tarren Mill, Ashenvale and finally the sepulcher... oh, and it starts and ends somewhere in the southern barrens. At that level it means a lot of travelling, because you probably don't have the flightpaths yet. Luckily you also get a Kodo at level 20 these days. But, it will take you about an 60-90 minutes to do the quests, with not that much xp, so it seems slow.
And there's the problem with glyphs. I actually used glyph of flametongue for more crit until I got Earthliving. And at the moment I am using Water Shield and Healing Totem. I am really looking forward to lvl40, when we get that spell everybody knows of resto-shammies, Chain Heal. And then I should probably re-evaluate my glyphs again. I don't think any other class has this problem.
And, btw, the first tier of resto-talents suck... You got the option between faster Healing Waves, and cheaper totems. Now totems are not that expensive, and the moment you get lesser healing wave, you almost forget about healing wave. And why is my 'cleanse' button a talent? I had to explain to a PuG in RFD that I couldn't remove the debuff from the gong-boss, because I wasn't lvl40 yet...
And on PuGs, I find myself getting more harsh with each level I get. Look, as a teacher, I have no problems helping people. Especially with finding your way around dungeons, or finding the entrance (which happens a lot). But at level 30 you should have a basic grasp what is good for you, so no more needing on spellpower if you are a hunter.
Oh, and I had my first leecher yesterday. It was an armory-run. Our tank d/c-ed so we vote-kicked her, and of course no new tank showed up for the next 15 minutes. But the arms-warrior did a good job, so we just cleared trash, with three people, because the warlock was on /follow. We tried to loose him, but every time we did that, he just moved and put himself on follow again.... and we couldn't kick him, because we already had used our kick.
Neext dungeon, Cathedral, other warlock, but he just went AFK from the start. The moment we where ready for Mograine, he started to move again, but a quick vote-kick by me was passed, luckily... and we just 4-manned it. I hate leechers..
On level 30, you get your fourth totem, this time no long questline, just a quick delivery in 1k needles. And you get a quest to ditch your four totems for a single one, that counts for all, and it is equipable, yeah, more bag-space.
So far for shammie-levelling. To end, my story about last weeks Saurfang. I was a Tree, and my co-healer was a resto-shammie, who kept putting down cleansing totem... oh well, everything died, without many deaths on our side, so.
Now, durng the first three bosses, I had real big mana-problems, and even my new trinket from marrow/lady D.? didn't help me with that. And that problem really was a problem on Saurfang, as both me and the shammie ran out of mana at 30%. Problem: No ret-palyy/surv-hunter/frostmage, i.e. replenishment. So... we had one of our tree mages change spec to frost :)
So gone where the mana-problems, and when Saurfang hit 30% the second time, I still had 50% mana orso, and that was a good thing, becaus I needed it all. Saurfang casted his mark of heavy-sustains-through-death-damage on the shammy. My first thought was, cool, he can heal himself, while I keep focusing tanks. WRONG. I just sw his health going down, and when I finally reached the conclusion that he wasn't going to heal himself, it was to late. So splat went the shammy, and saurfang gained some health. Shammie anked, went splat again and saurfang gained more health... Solo-healing the last 30% of saurfang is hard... but I got it done, with no other deads iirc. I was exhausted after that though, gambling with health-bars for a minute or a half is not fun.
Cloudcaller is no 36, mostly using the lfd-function. Although I did some questing killing animals for skinning. And like a friend of mine says, he is a bane to all cloth-wearers. well, there's hardly any sp-leather at low levels.
Few things about the last 25 levels, but especially about level 20.
Level 20 gives you some new spells, most importantly is water-shield. This finally gives you the mana-regen you need to not drink that much, or rather almost never. But lvl20 also gives you a quest, to get your third totem. And it is a drag. It sends you all over the world to get water. Tarren Mill, Ashenvale and finally the sepulcher... oh, and it starts and ends somewhere in the southern barrens. At that level it means a lot of travelling, because you probably don't have the flightpaths yet. Luckily you also get a Kodo at level 20 these days. But, it will take you about an 60-90 minutes to do the quests, with not that much xp, so it seems slow.
And there's the problem with glyphs. I actually used glyph of flametongue for more crit until I got Earthliving. And at the moment I am using Water Shield and Healing Totem. I am really looking forward to lvl40, when we get that spell everybody knows of resto-shammies, Chain Heal. And then I should probably re-evaluate my glyphs again. I don't think any other class has this problem.
And, btw, the first tier of resto-talents suck... You got the option between faster Healing Waves, and cheaper totems. Now totems are not that expensive, and the moment you get lesser healing wave, you almost forget about healing wave. And why is my 'cleanse' button a talent? I had to explain to a PuG in RFD that I couldn't remove the debuff from the gong-boss, because I wasn't lvl40 yet...
And on PuGs, I find myself getting more harsh with each level I get. Look, as a teacher, I have no problems helping people. Especially with finding your way around dungeons, or finding the entrance (which happens a lot). But at level 30 you should have a basic grasp what is good for you, so no more needing on spellpower if you are a hunter.
Oh, and I had my first leecher yesterday. It was an armory-run. Our tank d/c-ed so we vote-kicked her, and of course no new tank showed up for the next 15 minutes. But the arms-warrior did a good job, so we just cleared trash, with three people, because the warlock was on /follow. We tried to loose him, but every time we did that, he just moved and put himself on follow again.... and we couldn't kick him, because we already had used our kick.
Neext dungeon, Cathedral, other warlock, but he just went AFK from the start. The moment we where ready for Mograine, he started to move again, but a quick vote-kick by me was passed, luckily... and we just 4-manned it. I hate leechers..
On level 30, you get your fourth totem, this time no long questline, just a quick delivery in 1k needles. And you get a quest to ditch your four totems for a single one, that counts for all, and it is equipable, yeah, more bag-space.
So far for shammie-levelling. To end, my story about last weeks Saurfang. I was a Tree, and my co-healer was a resto-shammie, who kept putting down cleansing totem... oh well, everything died, without many deaths on our side, so.
Now, durng the first three bosses, I had real big mana-problems, and even my new trinket from marrow/lady D.? didn't help me with that. And that problem really was a problem on Saurfang, as both me and the shammie ran out of mana at 30%. Problem: No ret-palyy/surv-hunter/frostmage, i.e. replenishment. So... we had one of our tree mages change spec to frost :)
So gone where the mana-problems, and when Saurfang hit 30% the second time, I still had 50% mana orso, and that was a good thing, becaus I needed it all. Saurfang casted his mark of heavy-sustains-through-death-damage on the shammy. My first thought was, cool, he can heal himself, while I keep focusing tanks. WRONG. I just sw his health going down, and when I finally reached the conclusion that he wasn't going to heal himself, it was to late. So splat went the shammy, and saurfang gained some health. Shammie anked, went splat again and saurfang gained more health... Solo-healing the last 30% of saurfang is hard... but I got it done, with no other deads iirc. I was exhausted after that though, gambling with health-bars for a minute or a half is not fun.
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