As the new year rapidly approaches, I look back and see that both WoW and I have made significant changes over the year; some good, some bad. On the not so good side, I went from being a regular raider to a rarely raider as my guild drifted from a casual raiding guild to a less casual progression guild. Now that some of the most hard core raiders have moved on or aren't online as much now that the last boss of the expansion has been downed, we'll see how things go raiding-wise in the new year. I also had to put two thirds of my alt army on temporary hiatus when I cancelled my subscription on my other two accounts for fiscal reasons. The last "bad" thing was the constant changes to classes to balance them. I've had to constantly change specs to meet peak performance, usually taking a longer adjustment period than I would prefer. It's not too bad when you only play one class, but I play all ten and trying to keep up with the nerfs and buffs is a nightmare. Combined with the difficulty of the heroics when they were new, it made asshattery in pugs a lot more common. It got to the point where I stopped doing heroics unless it was a guild group.
The good, though, does outweigh the bad by a fairly large margin. Although I am no longer a regular raider with my guild, I can and do raid two nights a week. With the LFR feature, I can raid on my own schedule and I have been able to see and complete the final raid of the expansion. With this new tool, I'll also be able to raid on my alts - which is something I wasn't able to do at all during this expansion and just barely did in the last. I missed out on Firelands, but look forward to the new raids.
With my alt army sidelined, I've had to focus on my current ten. One of my sidelined toons was my main blacksmith/jewelcrafter and another was my scribe so I added those professions to my current characters. Even though I had most of the needed materials banked, it still took a lot of gold to get past some profession bottlenecks. I had the foresight to craft the big three red gems before my account was put on hold, and I made a tidy profit from all the raiders that didn't get epic gems for their new gear. I was also able to move some glyphs, although my main purpose for having a scribe is so I can create my own glyphs for my characters.
I'm still trying to manage all the changes to the various classes and specs. While I'm doing quite well on my hunter, I still struggle with some of the others. I've gone from Beast Mastery to Survival, Survival to Marksman, and now back to Beast Mastery. This spec is still viable even though Survival is now back in the "top" spot. I finally have a stable full of spirit beasts, and I like having them around. I'm still first or second in heroics, and usually in the top five in the raids so I'm not changing anything spec-wise.
I think I spend more time in online resources than I do in game! There are some great bloggers out there, and only a fraction of them are on my blog roll. Some of the greats have retired, but many more have stepped up and the 'verse is still thriving. Wowhead, EJ, Zeherah, Ask Mr. Robot, and other online tools have also been a boon to players everywhere. I would be clueless and frustrated with my alts if these resources weren't around.
Last, but not least: this entire expansion. While there have been some that disliked Cataclysm, I have enjoyed it immensely. From the new 1-60 changes thru the new zones, I've had a blast. I've finished every new zone except Twilight Highlands on my main, and I enjoyed them all. From the lore to the pop culture shout outs, this has been a fun expansion. There were constant improvements throughout, from small quality of life things like putting quest givers in all the instances to the looking for raid tool. With everything available in the game, I have a hard time not finding something to do when I log on.
10x85
No progress this week, I've been having too much fun with LFR and between gearing up some of my alts and doing the Winter Veil daily (got the shiny dagger! RNG likes me again!) I haven't even played my lowbies.
Hunter 85
Deathknight 85
Rogue 85
Priest 85
Mage 85
Druid 85
Warlock 85
Warrior 72
Paladin 70
Shaman 45
Friday, December 30, 2011
Friday, December 23, 2011
Happy Holidays
With the holiday crunch at work and home, what better way to spend my little free time than the holiday crunch in WoW. Running eight characters through the Greench daily takes up a considerable amount of time. Most of the downtime during the flight to Chillwind Camp is used for taking care of real life things, so at least I get something accomplished while waiting for my usual reward of a racer or paper zeppelin.
I now have difinitive proof that the RNG hates me - I have gotten two of the pets from the daily, and both were on the same character (not my main). The wonderful peeps at Blizzard have decided to make these BOP instead of BOE like the other holiday pets, so I will still have to grind out the daily. I am hoping that fortune will smile upon me and land me one of those nifty new daggers for my rogue!
I did manage to somehow trick the RNG in my second LFR run, and was able to get rid of my last blue piece when I won the roll on the tier shoulder icon. My main is now fully epic! I did run into my first official asshat in the raid. I can understand checking recount and calling out those who are doing nothing at all, but to troll about DPS on the spine fight (which is NOT a DPS race) is a bit low. After several wipes on the last fight, he dropped group. We got another healer and finished Deathwing on the next attempt. I guess the weak link was finally removed...
I did play some of my 10x85 toons - I managed to get my paladin to 70 and suited up in my new crafted gear. I tanked a group through Utgarde and then healed a few runs on my shaman. Hopefully I will get some more free time over the holiday to play more. Or get a copy of SWTOR for xmas!
10x85:
Hunter 85
Deathknight 85
Rogue 85
Priest 85
Mage 85
Druid 85
Warlock 85
Warrior 72
Paladin 70
Shaman 45
I now have difinitive proof that the RNG hates me - I have gotten two of the pets from the daily, and both were on the same character (not my main). The wonderful peeps at Blizzard have decided to make these BOP instead of BOE like the other holiday pets, so I will still have to grind out the daily. I am hoping that fortune will smile upon me and land me one of those nifty new daggers for my rogue!
I did manage to somehow trick the RNG in my second LFR run, and was able to get rid of my last blue piece when I won the roll on the tier shoulder icon. My main is now fully epic! I did run into my first official asshat in the raid. I can understand checking recount and calling out those who are doing nothing at all, but to troll about DPS on the spine fight (which is NOT a DPS race) is a bit low. After several wipes on the last fight, he dropped group. We got another healer and finished Deathwing on the next attempt. I guess the weak link was finally removed...
I did play some of my 10x85 toons - I managed to get my paladin to 70 and suited up in my new crafted gear. I tanked a group through Utgarde and then healed a few runs on my shaman. Hopefully I will get some more free time over the holiday to play more. Or get a copy of SWTOR for xmas!
10x85:
Hunter 85
Deathknight 85
Rogue 85
Priest 85
Mage 85
Druid 85
Warlock 85
Warrior 72
Paladin 70
Shaman 45
Friday, December 16, 2011
Raid Finder FTW
I hit the new 5-mans, and got a ton of upgrades. I managed to replace almost everything, except these damn blue shoulders which seem to want to hang around until the next expansion. I logged in last night with an item level of 371 - just one point shy of being able to do the LFR queue. I queued up for another dungeon, and when I zoned in I noticed that I didn't complete the quest in the Hour of Twilight dungeon. A quick conversation with Thrall netted me a new belt and a 272 item level! After breezing through the dungeon, I socketed and gemmed my new belt, picked up some buff food and a few flasks, and queued for the new raid.
After a whole eight minute wait, I was at the start of the new raid with no bosses killed. I've read up a little on the fights, but this was my first time seeing them. Things went pretty smooth - there was a lot of people coming and going throughout the raid, but bosses were dropping. I managed to snag a tier helm, along with finishing every boss in the first half of the raid! Even though I didn't really know the fights and had the bare minimum gear level, I managed to stay off the bottom of the damage meter.
I picked up my new helm, gemmed it, and picked up the arcanum for it. I queued for the second half of the raid. Another fairly fast queue (compared to a LFD queue, anyway) and I was in the second half of the raid - again with no bosses killed! This raid did not go as smoothly as the first one, however. We had several wipes on the first boss, due to the tanks not performing the mechanics right. They left (or were kicked) and two new tanks joined up, along with what seems to be the common ebb and flow of raiders in this new pug raid. We downed the boss without a wipe and moved on to this raid's "lootship". We one-shot that as well, and jumped down to Deathwing's back.
We had another wipe, mainly due to people not knowing or not caring about the mechanics of the fight. The fight was explained in raid chat, and we tried again. After another wipe, kicks were initiated against those that did not follow the directions. After a slight pause to fill the raid back up, we succeeded in grounding Deathwing. We had a few more wipes while people were getting used to the strategy, but in the end - Deathwing was destroyed. I managed to stay in the top 10 DPS throughout the raid, finishing at number 4!
I really enjoyed the new LFR, and I can't wait to do it again next week after the reset. I'll do one more heroic pug on my main tonight just to cap my valor points, and then work on my last three lowbies over the weekend. Speaking of which, I hit 68 on my Tauren and shuffled off to Northrend. I did some of the starter quests and dinged again. I have all the new armor for when I hit 70, and then back to tanking I go! My warrior is currently wearing my DPS heirlooms, so I queued as DPS while leveling my skinning on the rhinos in Northrend's tundra. I just respecced my second talent build to fury from arms, so it took a bit of getting used to. When they changed the dungeon quests in Outland and Northrend to the "inside the dungeon" model, they must have changed the quest ID as well. I was able to accept and "redo" the UK quests, and picked up some DPS pieces instead of the tanking ones I got last time. And I dinged 72 on the last quest turn-in as well!
10x85:
Hunter 85
Deathknight 85
Rogue 85
Priest 85
Mage 85
Druid 85
Warlock 85
Warrior 72
Paladin 69
Shaman 43
After a whole eight minute wait, I was at the start of the new raid with no bosses killed. I've read up a little on the fights, but this was my first time seeing them. Things went pretty smooth - there was a lot of people coming and going throughout the raid, but bosses were dropping. I managed to snag a tier helm, along with finishing every boss in the first half of the raid! Even though I didn't really know the fights and had the bare minimum gear level, I managed to stay off the bottom of the damage meter.
I picked up my new helm, gemmed it, and picked up the arcanum for it. I queued for the second half of the raid. Another fairly fast queue (compared to a LFD queue, anyway) and I was in the second half of the raid - again with no bosses killed! This raid did not go as smoothly as the first one, however. We had several wipes on the first boss, due to the tanks not performing the mechanics right. They left (or were kicked) and two new tanks joined up, along with what seems to be the common ebb and flow of raiders in this new pug raid. We downed the boss without a wipe and moved on to this raid's "lootship". We one-shot that as well, and jumped down to Deathwing's back.
We had another wipe, mainly due to people not knowing or not caring about the mechanics of the fight. The fight was explained in raid chat, and we tried again. After another wipe, kicks were initiated against those that did not follow the directions. After a slight pause to fill the raid back up, we succeeded in grounding Deathwing. We had a few more wipes while people were getting used to the strategy, but in the end - Deathwing was destroyed. I managed to stay in the top 10 DPS throughout the raid, finishing at number 4!
I really enjoyed the new LFR, and I can't wait to do it again next week after the reset. I'll do one more heroic pug on my main tonight just to cap my valor points, and then work on my last three lowbies over the weekend. Speaking of which, I hit 68 on my Tauren and shuffled off to Northrend. I did some of the starter quests and dinged again. I have all the new armor for when I hit 70, and then back to tanking I go! My warrior is currently wearing my DPS heirlooms, so I queued as DPS while leveling my skinning on the rhinos in Northrend's tundra. I just respecced my second talent build to fury from arms, so it took a bit of getting used to. When they changed the dungeon quests in Outland and Northrend to the "inside the dungeon" model, they must have changed the quest ID as well. I was able to accept and "redo" the UK quests, and picked up some DPS pieces instead of the tanking ones I got last time. And I dinged 72 on the last quest turn-in as well!
10x85:
Hunter 85
Deathknight 85
Rogue 85
Priest 85
Mage 85
Druid 85
Warlock 85
Warrior 72
Paladin 69
Shaman 43
Friday, December 9, 2011
Lions, Tigers, and Dragons...
I spent most of the week running my army of alts through the new Darkmoon Faire. Blizzard did a nice job on it, and my main is much closer now to exalted status with the DMF. I also tried out one of the new 5-mans. All three were through the random dungeon finder, and all three were the first dungeon. On my first one, I managed to die fairly early on the Sylvanas encounter when I did not get out of the bad fast enough. The rest of the group managed to down her though, and I got a shiny new bow! I also got new gloves and a ring from the quest rewards. Overall, a very good pug.
The next run was a mostly guild run, and surprisingly it had the most wipes. The healer was the only one not in our guild, but I don't think his performance was the deciding factor in most of the wipes - there was a lot of avoidable damage that wasn't avoided, and that caused the majority of the wipes. I lost the roll on the trinket from Murozond on that run. Had this been a full pug run, I'm sure there would have been rage quits due to all the wipes.
The last run I did was with another all pug group. We basically stomped the place in record time, and I got a new pair of boots. After gemming and enchanting them tonight, I should be back on top of the DPS meter. The blue bracers I replaced with a JP purchase should help as well. Hopefully I can get to the next dungeon and pick up some new items to push me into the ilevel needed for the pug raid. Actually, just getting through all three new dungeons gives me a chance to finally get rid of these blue shoulders and weapon. I'd be happy just for that.
Not much work on the 10x85 this week with the DMF in town.
10x85:
Hunter 85
Deathknight 85
Rogue 85
Priest 85
Mage 85
Druid 85
Warlock 85
Warrior 71
Paladin 67
Shaman 43
The next run was a mostly guild run, and surprisingly it had the most wipes. The healer was the only one not in our guild, but I don't think his performance was the deciding factor in most of the wipes - there was a lot of avoidable damage that wasn't avoided, and that caused the majority of the wipes. I lost the roll on the trinket from Murozond on that run. Had this been a full pug run, I'm sure there would have been rage quits due to all the wipes.
The last run I did was with another all pug group. We basically stomped the place in record time, and I got a new pair of boots. After gemming and enchanting them tonight, I should be back on top of the DPS meter. The blue bracers I replaced with a JP purchase should help as well. Hopefully I can get to the next dungeon and pick up some new items to push me into the ilevel needed for the pug raid. Actually, just getting through all three new dungeons gives me a chance to finally get rid of these blue shoulders and weapon. I'd be happy just for that.
Not much work on the 10x85 this week with the DMF in town.
10x85:
Hunter 85
Deathknight 85
Rogue 85
Priest 85
Mage 85
Druid 85
Warlock 85
Warrior 71
Paladin 67
Shaman 43
Friday, December 2, 2011
Hacked!
My account was hacked! Fortunately it wasn't my WoW account, just my Staples Rewards account. This is the second time that this has happened, and both times it entailed having a new account created. Their security is quite laughable, perhaps they need to switch to an authenticator or something.
I haven't done any of the new 4.3 content yet, but I'll jump into that this weekend. I also didn't do anything with the rest of my alts except logon to get my new mount from the annual pass deal. I did check out the archaeology changes, and it seems pretty good. I was getting between 5 to 10 pieces per dig, with the majority being 6 or 7. I need to max out on this alt for a chance at the dragon, as my main does not have alchemy as a profession.
I haven't done any of the new 4.3 content yet, but I'll jump into that this weekend. I also didn't do anything with the rest of my alts except logon to get my new mount from the annual pass deal. I did check out the archaeology changes, and it seems pretty good. I was getting between 5 to 10 pieces per dig, with the majority being 6 or 7. I need to max out on this alt for a chance at the dragon, as my main does not have alchemy as a profession.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)