Thursday, December 31, 2009

Be Safe Out There!

Have a happy and safe New Years Eve and a wonderful 2010 to all!

Monday, December 28, 2009

Satchel of Helpful Goods My Hiney...



I don't know why but maybe someone out there in this vast universe can tell me why this really cool part of the game sucks so very badly. The concept of offering goods for going into random dungeons with people from a huge subset of realms is awesome. The delivery of these goods has left me weighed, measured, and wanting.

What would be the difficulty in choosing an item that, A. You are not already wearing, and B. Something that is acutally "Helpful". How hard would it be to do a quick scan of what you have on, and possibly also scanning what talent spec you are to determine a possible item solution for you? I don't know, but it couldn't be much more difficult then randomly rolling for an item. At least this way you would know what you get can probably be used rather then having a huge amount of items you just have to throw to the vendors. Hey, if I already have everything, maybe some coin? It would save me a step.

The level 80 rewards aren't too bad because you get emblems. With those, you can buy whatever you want for your character and whatever spec you need. Maybe it is time to have some vendors with the lower choices of gear and give you emblems for those as well? Either way, something needs to change here. I am not the only one frustrated by the lack of unique items that they hand you.

I know, Blizz would probably say, "We give em free stuff and they still bitch..." And I would agree, but at least give us something we can use. You don't give a DK a mana potion and you definitely will never see a DK wearing anything with Spirit unless you make Spirit do something for your Runic Power.

I know there are only a few of us out there that care, but if you have any thoughts, please share them with me.

Oh, and P.S. Here is an Interview with that guy I mentioned a few days ago, Gordon Walton along with Rich Vogel, two of BV's favorites to interview from back in the day... Enjoy!

I Busted The Lich King Upside His Head...

And he killed me for it. Part two of why you don't mess with the LK...

**** This is loaded with spoilers, so if you don't want to know about the Fall of the Lich King instances, stop reading here ****

Okay so I mentioned before that you should not shoot the Lich King in the pre Lich King instances, because he really doesn't like it.

Well, not much has changed since the first time me and the LK went rounds outside of the Ice Throne. I don't have all of my experiences in quite perfect order yet, but I have gone through all of the new five man instances with My DK and would like to share my highlights with you.

To start off, there are wondering quest givers in Dalaran that will give you a quest to go in through this "back door" entrance to the LK's lair. Well, as luck would have it, once you get there, you will see the Banshee Queen or Lady Proudmore depending on which side you are on and they will promptly tell you that you should be able to get to the next part of the adventure on your own... What they don't mention is that this means to go on your own with four other people because the two skeleton goons at the front door will kick your head in like a pumpkin smashing on concrete.

After a few attempts at getting past the goons at the door, I decided to send in the pet and run past them. I was thinking maybe things would get better on the other side of that door. Ummmm, nope, they did not. I ran into a whole bunch of spell casters that pretty much ripped my limbs off and passed them back to me through a straw.

Take two, I grabbed my friend Huuna, we used the Dungeon finder to help us, help ourselves. We got a group, and headed through the first part of the dungeon. Now, just to be clear, the first time you go through these instances, you have to go on normal, and perform whatever quests they give you. As you progress to the Halls Of Reflection and turn in each quest, the heroic and regular versions will unlock.

We go prancing along in the Forge Of Souls, on our way to the Pit of Sauron. The most memorable part of this was that the first boss on this journey is the "Godfather of Souls"... The whole time we are trying to kill this guy named Bronjahm, which is some kind of play on James Brown, we can hear music playing in the background. James Brown music as a matter of fact. I had no idea what the music was at first, so I asked the group, and then we all laughed and they told me about an item he drops called "Papa's Brand New Bag", a 22 slot item container. A very cool part of the dungeon indeed, and once we finished him off, it was on to the next guy "Devourer of Souls"... Ohhh Scary stuff.

Actually, the second boss isn't too bad. I don't even remember anything special about him except he is extremely angry and talks way too much for a floating, two-faced head. The only thing I have found that I like about this guy is that he can drop a really cool sword that I can use on my warlock called Seethe. Once you finish this guy, you talk to the Banshee Queen again and turn in your two quests and move on to the next instance.

Now, the Pit of Sauron... This zone almost seems pointless because you don't clear it, but the bosses, I remember vaguely. The first boss, is a big giant that wants to throw Sauronite at you and is basically an overgrown Ogre, but looks like something else. I can't remember, maybe a Yetti or something. Once you clear this guy, you get to deal with a guy named Ick, that drops poison green pools under him, and the tank has to keep him moving around. The guy controlling Ick keeps throwing bubbles of exploding stuff at you to keep your damage high while trying to kill Ick. Not much of interest here, but then you learn that Frostmourne is all alone in the LK's chamber.

Okay, you can mount in the Pit instance, so it is a bit faster to get to the next section. You fight your way into the LK's chamber. All I remember here is that you have to run up a hill, kill about 15 bad guys, and then you hit this cave section which is kind of fun. You are constantly bombarded by falling ice from the top of the cave. If the tank is any good, they will aggro and pull several mobs at a time, only stopping in the middle and the end. Once you get through all of that, you get to face another boss that is really not much to mention, but the story line here gets interesting as you learn a little more about the LK's plans. There is a dragon rider at this point that sounds a lot like Tim Curry, and I thought that was funny.

You have to kill the dragon rider to move on. I don't remember what special attacks he does, but he tells the dragon to kill people the whole time. Once you kill the boss, the Horde guys come out and start talking about how we proved that even in the face of danger, yadda yadda... At the end of this instance, the dragon comes up and kills everyone except for your party because the Banshee Queen pulls you out at the last second. Then, off you go to the Halls Of Reflection. Now, I remember the Banshee Queen's voice reminded me of Rosie Perez. I am not sure if it is her or not, but the voice kept ringing "White Men Can't Jump" in my head, while listening to her long winded chatter with the LK.

Last but not least, we get to go into the LK's chamber and see Frostmourne there floating above a caulderon of skulls. The Banshee Queen tries to speak with the sword, and of course a good soul, Uther the Lightbringer, appears and tells her all of the reasons why we can't just kill the LK. If we did that, then the Scourge would destroy all of Azeroth, and the LK is really this guardian keeping them under controll. We would also have to put another LK in Arthas' in his place, and who could take on such a burden, etc... I am like "Oh, justification of Arthas' existence is unacceptable!"... So, the only way to kill the LK is to go to the Ice Throne. Okay, well we knew that was coming.

After a bit of talk, the LK walks in with his big self and starts to talk his usual Kurgan of The Highlander speak about how you are all going to die and be his slaves etc... Now, the cool part here is that the LK walks over to Frostmourne, his weapon, which is now a living entity, and reaches out to grasp the sword. The LK says that if you want to talk to the souls, you shall, and there is this great flash of light and souls start spinning all around, and Frostmourne goes to the LK's hand. The LK asks his minions to deal with us and bring our corpses to him when they are finished. The LK makes towards the door and the Banshee Queen runs after him yelling he won't get away that easily etc... I am thinking that chick is crazy, and we are left to deal with a couple rounds of souls and two bosses.

Now, on a side note here... I am not a big dungeon person, and I don't know if this is common, but some of these bosses say some pretty freaky stuff to you. One of them is kind of funny, because when someone dies, he says something about the look on your face when you died reminds him of someone, but the other guy... He says stuff like "Despair, so delicious" and then says "Fear, so exhilarating" or something, but it is just wierd to me. He repeats it throughout the whole battle. I get annoyed and want him to shut up, so I shoot faster. Anyways, once you get through these two guys and a whole bunch of attacks, you get to move on to the last part that I like to call the "Run Forest, Run!" ending...

You run down this hall, and you have to kill one more giant skeleton, and then you meet back up with the Banshee Queen sword fighting with the LK. Now, keep in mind, that usually someone needs to talk to the Banshee Queen or Lady Proudmore to get things going, or you will just be standing around watching them fight forever. So, you talk to the Banshee Queen and she continues talking major crap to the LK. He is calmly letting her know, he is not going to be as nice this time as he was last time etc... The group I was with couldn't decide if the Banshee Queen is actually a Night Elf, because she doesn't really look like a Blood Elf, and she is blue, so you go figure that one out.

Anyways, you get to start running away from the LK, as he walks in slow motion, and puts up barriers in front of your party. All the while, the Banshee Queen tries to break down the barriers and the LK throws a bunch of his minions your way that you must kill to get the barrier down. It is important that the DPS is high here, because if the LK slow walks himself to where you are, you die. So, our first experience here was painful as you can imagine. You can in fact aggro the DK into killing you as I did once again by tossing one too many Icy Touches his way. The group did not have a high enough DPS to kill the LK's minions before he caught us at the last barrier, thrust his sword into the ground killing the rest of the group instantly.

The next time through, like a day later, I went in and we made it past the last barrier. Once you do that, the Banshee Queen tells your party there is an opening up ahead, and to run for it. Unfortunately when you get there, it is a dead end. So, the Banshee Queen bears down and says this is where we die. So, everyone gets ready to die... LK strolls in, points his sword at the Banshee Queen lifting her off the ground. Just when you think its over, the gunship from Icecrown comes flying in and shoots down rocks in front of the LK, blocking him from your party, saving you from impending doom! They tell you to get on board the ship, but don't forget to turn in your last quest to the Banshee Queen or Lady Proudmore before you go. Once you do that, all of the instances are unlocked, and you are ready for prime time.

It was a fairly cool set of instances, with a nice progression of getting you to the end. Overall I enjoyed them enough to return a few more times. I am now working on getting my Warlock through the first time instances to get her in tune for getting some better gear.

We shall see how that goes in the future... I have been doing fairly well with my four alts that I frequently mention. The Druid is now 41, my Mage and Shammy are at 40, and the Pally is about 36. I am still having some issues getting the Pally's DPS up to par with the rest, but I still enjoy playing all of them. I have learned much about the games mechanics and have seen many dungeons I missed the first time around, so it has been some fun times.

Anyway, that's all I got for now. If you happen to be on my server, give me a /pst!

Laters.

Take Two On Moon Guard... Still fun!


Well, I want to talk about my Lich King adventures, but first, I just wanted to comment about Tobold's latest post... "Twinking through Burning Crusade"

Anyway, I mentioned that I have a friend that plays Moon Guard, and I just love it there when I have nothing better to do with all of my new toons... Okay I am really pretty busy, but I just wanted to check out some of the level 60 fungeons...

So, I started again with the dungeon finder, only to realize that again, the DK is always getting stuff they just don't need. The first item the bag of useful goods gave me was a necklace with a bunch of Spirit... After blinking several times and trying to figure how this may be useful and asking the other three DK's in my dungeon group what they thought, I sold it. One DK pointed out that it was useful for selling, and even though I wanted to punch him in his eye for being sarcastic, he was in fact correct.

While I was in the dungeons, and doing quests in between, I noticed that the other items I received from the bag of useful goods were way below the standard drop in those dungeons. I picked up some gloves and boots with great stats and gem slots in the dungeons. I was shuttled back and forth between the Hellfire Ramparts, and the Hellfire Blood Furnace. I also finally picked up the Hellreaver, which is something I have wanted forever. Three people "need" rolled on this item, and I was the lucky one this day. The bag of useful goodies, kept throwing me this pair of plate gloves that were like 112 less armor and had nothing of interest to me. I must have received five pair of these junky plate wonders, and I don't see why they can't go one step further and try and at least give me something different, AND useful once in awhile.

In any event. I finally recieved some good gear for that character from doing both quests and dungeons. The only real issue I had with my experience this time on old Moon Guard was that the wait times for a group are significantly higher for the Emberstorm battlegroup. I am not sure if this is the fact that Stormstrike has more PvP servers with starving PvE'er running about or maybe Emberstorm is just so busy that it takes time to service all of the dungeon divers.

I still had some really good fun with those guys, and really love to visit there. Okay, so I promise, it's now going to be story time... Me and the LK get busy!

Saturday, December 12, 2009

The Lich King Is Like An Evil Santa Clause...

I noticed that in the pre Fall Of The Lich King content, ole Arthas is a bit overweight. So, without spoiling too much, I will say that I enjoyed playing the 3 new 5 man instances in Icecrown. There is so much funny stuff too, and I swear most of the voices they used are like real actors. I recognize the voices, but I just can't put names to them.

I pugged a normal level instance just to get a feel for what is going on. Plus, the heroic people are always in a huge hurry and I wanted to enjoy the experience the first time around. I did enjoy it. These are probably the best put together instances I have seen to date. It is a little wordy in some areas, but I think Blizz did a more then fair job of making you feel like there is a story line and you are a major part of getting things done to help out the Crusaders. I've actually done the 2nd and 3rd parts twice. The second time I really started to understand what is happening.

The PUG's have been pretty good to me with a few exceptions of people just going in for a specific item and then leaving or doing another quest and then leaving. Sometimes just leaving because of a wipe, or whatever, but overall, my experience with the instances have been wonderful.

Once you get a good group you can stay with them and do whatever you want, so that is very helpful. You can vote people off the island if you don't want them in there as well. A lot of really good options and things that make this tool a "must have".

I am mostly doing instances with my lower level toons. I used to be a firm believer in doing the quests to level, but since the dungeon finder came out, I am a firm believer in running those random dungeons till my lips fall off. I leveled my mage from 34 to 38 in two days. And in two days, I am talking only about a handfull, maybe 5 or 6 runs in random dungeons. Mostly I ran the Monestary with different groups and today I hit Uldaman.

Some people say they are having troubles and waiting for groups for long periods of time, but I have had just the opposite effect. I have been getting groups that I would never have been patient enough to wait for with the old Looking For Group tool. The LFG tool would let you see things, but the dungeon finder actually lets you set it up graphically and walk away. When they are ready for you, a box pops up and lets you know it's time to go. Not only that, when you are done, you are returned where you were before you left. So, you can hang out in a city in the old lands where the lag is less and still have some fun.

BG's have been hit pretty hard at least so far. Getting in a BG is a huge wait now, and if you do get in, the people that are in the BG's have no clue what they are doing there. It is a farm fest which I hate more then anything in BG's. I still think they need to drop honor for killing other people and just give it to those that make things happen and help actually win the game. I also think they are going to need to do some serious rethinking on the rewards for BG's. As it is now, "fungeons" are the only way to go for loot and experience. The rewards are too high for dungeons and too low for BG's. So, BG's will suffer as a result.

I also believe that questing will take a huge hit. I mean the time involved vs. experience gained sucks anyway. You hardly ever get good loot, so why do it? They need to make all of the systems worth while to players if they want people to choose the path that is best for them. We will always choose the easiest and best way, so why not make them all equal so we can have a choice of easy and great ways to get what we want?

Wintergrasp has also taken a slight hit, and they made some changes that I am not quite able to figure out yet. I know that now the WG lasts longer, and defending on the Hordie side is actually possible now. My server is mostly Alliance, so it is wierd to see Horde defend when they are out-manned. It's interesting that this great change to the game (dungeon finder) is taking such a toll on other great systems. Like I said before, they are going to have to balance the options to make this all work out right.

I will have some stories soon. I just don't want to spoil too much right now. The LK and I have had some fun together, and I'll tell ya all about it next time.

Laters.

Thursday, December 10, 2009

3.3 Gets A Two Thumbs From Fear...

I wanted to touch briefly on the latest WoW patch, the final in the Wrath Of The Lich King expansion. Not forgetting the entire day it took to get the thing working. I would bitch, but I had a date. So, I missed some of the fun stuff.

Although I have not, and probably will not, for some time be able to see the encounter with the Lich King himself, there were some other changes that I am completely tickled about.

The Dungeon Finder was a stroke of pure genius! I mean, they have sold this PvPer on dungeon diving... The system allows you to put yourself in a que similar to the battleground que and then, when it is time, you will be taken to the dungeon you were looking for or they also have a random dungeon feature. Once the dungeon is complete, you are returned to where you were in game previously. When you use the random feature, there is a reward for your character upon leaving. Level 80's get badges, but the lower levels get armor and maybe weapons of superior quality that your character can actually use! Not dumb crap that you have to sell for vendor trash.

You may remember I spoke before about dynamic rewards, and apparently someone at Blizzard also had a similar idea. I can see many other ways they can apply this going forward, and it was a great step in the right direction. You are no longer limited to getting into dungeon groups on your own server. From what I have read it is connected to the same group as your battlegroup. I hope they expand those groups down the road, because the more the better as far as I am concerned.

I would like them to be able to something similar with auction houses, and man, if you could do it with group quests, then the game will stay much more interesting to a much larger group of people for a lot longer. It is such a pain to go into looking for group and wait for people on your own server to decide thats what they want to do, but now, it is too easy and everyone that I have asked about it in my guild and in all of my groups have just said they love this system to death. Way to go guys, this dungeon finder was a great addition.

I leveled my mage from 34 to 36 in three dungeon runs. That in its self to me is a huge plus. It will inspire people to not only build that alt, but that alt will always be geared and always be happy.

The new map is another feature I really enjoy. Sorry to Quest Helper, but they have what I need built right in the user interface. The new map shows you where your quest is and then switches to show you where to return the quest once you have completed it. The only thing they don't have that I really like about Quest Helper is the flight path times. I like to know how much time I have to sit and wait while the damn bird flies me where I am going. If you have like 5 minutes, you can go make a sandwich or whatever. The new map can be maximized if you don't want to see the quests, or it can now be minimized if you want to see the map while you travel. Another great addition by the Blizzard team.

Okay, one thing about doing the Random Quests. Don't jump into a que and then accept when you are in combat. I did this and the only downside is that when I came back, umm, those guys were still there waiting. It was an interesting first run, because they chose my Ret Pally as a healer. I didn't even know that was possible, but we made it through. I almost lost one a few times, because I don't know what the hell I am doing, but it was interesting to be a healer for once instead of a solo entity.

The next time I went out, the group wiped except for the tank and myself on the last boss. It's kind of shameful, but I forgot to heal myself, and then I did die, but the tank finished off the boss and I got my blue treat. I was still happy.

My mage went in a few times and in one group, the tank wouldn't keep aggro or help the healer when he was under attack. So, I ended up getting killed by taking on the aggro to save the healer. I mean, I still got the shiny, so I wasn't that mad, but it is the risk you take going PUG...

I am sure I will find something to bitch about soon, but my last two days have been great. If you cancelled your WoW account, I think you would be wise to turn it back on just to see this. Everyone is getting ready to battle the LK, and as soon as I find a way, I am gonna be right there with em...

Laters...

Tuesday, December 8, 2009

Waiting For The Lich King To Come...

The Original Cardinal Fear

WoW went offline sometime in the early morning around 1:00 AM and hasn't come back yet. The new patch with the final piece to the upgrade we all paid for over a year ago is finally going to be on our door step.

One thing that irratated me about the Lich King expansion is that they didn't even release the most important part of what they claimed they were selling us. I don't read all of the public test server stuff and attend all of the discussion groups. I really thought that the entire upgrade would be included... Did they bite off more then they could chew again? Probably. I didn't agree with the way they released that expansion, and I think it could have been planned better. Throwing us 50 bones on the way to the expansion pack costs you accounts and that means less money.

I guess that if it means to get it out the door on time, you have to cheat the customer, I am not down with that. Hey, call it whatever you want, I feel cheated. Perception is everything, just ask Gordon Walton.

So, while I am waiting for over 12 hours for them to give me my game back, I thought I would come bitch about some stuff.

Okay, who ever thought rep grinding was a good idea needs to DIE! I mean, okay, there are ways to gain reputation with WAY TOO MANY different groups and organizations, but okay, here is an example. You build a DK, and they come with a lot of great stuff, but about zero reputation with anyone. So what do you do? So far my only options that I can see are... Participate in the Argent Tournament dailies, you can gain alittle rep each day with whatever faction you like, or you can go do all of the quests in the earlier zones that pertain to the faction you want to gain rep with.

Now, as much as I hated going back to Silvermoon to run all of the quests, I did have some fun when I found a "Ceremonial Loin Cloth" and a "Dirty Leather Vest". As you can imagine, even naked, my DK can perform quite well even up to level 50 or better. I decided to shed the DK of her massive plate PvP armor, and go with something a little more suitable to the enviornment. I wish I had taken a picture. Running around as a level 80, or a skull to them, in a newbie zone with newbie clothes and weapons certainly gets you a few questions from passers by. I tried to help one young undead get their "Duelicious" acheivement, but he couldn't even damage my DK nekkid. I told her to look me up when she hit 80 and took off. Eventually, I did get myself to exaulted with Silvermoon, and got the title I was looking for etc.

Then I made the mistake of trying to grind reputation for Undercity. I have some serious issues with these guys. Everything they do is trying to wipe out the living, which I am, "The Living". Not only that, they don't even administer their destruction themselves, they make me do it! Here, give this potion to this guy and see what happens... The guy dies.. Whoops! That's great Hazmat, Sylvanis will be pleased. I want to poke that bitch in her eye.

Some of those more questionable quest lines that normally wouldn't bother me, are bothering me now because I know it was happening from the beginning. I originally thought it was something new in the WotLK expansion, but that is not the case. Chemical warefare is pretty gruesome stuff, and I just think the undead could come up with something a little more creative. I guess it could just be me, but I am annoyed with those guys. They are supposed to be "good", hell we are all supposed to be "good", but the undead are not your typical, "cut the head off this guy" sorta folks.

So today, whilst I sit and wait, I offer you a glimpse of the Original WoW version of Cardinal Fear. In all his glory. He never made it past level 6 before I re-rolled him into one of my massive army of chicks. Maybe some day, he will live again on another account.

As far as my main account, I have my mage at 34, my druid is at 40 and holding, my pally is 32, and my shammy is 34. Still enjoying each different character, and it will take some time to get them all leveled, but it keeps me busy and my mind in the game. All of my hordies are still on vacation except Haz, my little money maker.

Enjoy your day people, that's all I got!

Sunday, November 29, 2009

King for a day, err Queen...

Myd On The Throne of Stomwind

I was taking the level 80's out for a spin this week trying to complete all of the achievements for the new Pilgrim holiday quests. I guess they just added these quests this year, but I was thrilled about one thing... You can build your cooking skill to max in about 2 hours.

My Warlock needed the most work in this area, so I started with her. She cooked and received all the acheivements except for Turkinator, Terrokar Turkey Time and Turkey Lurkey. I didn't realize at the time you need about 7 shooters to complete the Turkey Lurkey achievement, so I had to get all the shooters on the next day.

The first day I mostly worked on leveling cooking on any of my toons that were able, and also completed "Turkinator" on a couple of my toons. You have to kill 40 turkeys in either Elynn Forest or Tristfal Glades with 30 seconds in between each one. I did this in Elwynn with one of my lower toons, but once I hit Tristfal Glades with the DK, I decided that I would also take my Warlock there to finish that Achievement or "cheevo". Tristfal is flatter, and they lay the turkeys in a better pattern so they are easier to find.

A couple of days later I started to work on the last three "cheevo's" for both my Warlock and my DK on the Horde side. Pilgrim's Peril was fairly exciting but also very time consuming. You have to go to each enemy capital city and just sit wearing a piece of "Pilgrim Attire". I don't normally travel to the enemy capitals, so it takes a bit of time for me to figure out the best way to manage my running time.

The most interesting things I discovered were that the Alliance capital cities for the most part are easier to get to because the Alliance allows enemies to ride on the boats unmolested. You can not even get on a Hordie Airship without getting the wholey crap kicked out of you. I also noticed that most of the Alliance cities don't make you go automatically into being flagged PvP, where the Hordie cities were mostly all close enough to perma-flag you before you could sit down. I think Ironforge is the hardest to get to because of the narrow path up to the city and the guards crack you in the skull and aggro to you like a swarm of bees. It was also the only capital that I was forced to kill guards to finish the quest.

So, we get to Turkey Lurkey. You have to get these Turkey Shooters from doing the daily quests and then you have to hunt down one of each race's Rogues and feather them with the gun. Talk about fun? Well, is was fun to be able to shoot Rogues without any worry of retribution, but finding one of each one is not always so easy. For me, Dalaran is much too laggy and too much competition for capping one of the Rogues in the hiney. So, I did the next best thing. I went to all of the Newbie Zones for each race that I couldn't find easily and hunted them as level 1. Hey, it worked. Some of those guys are hard to find. Orc Rogue? I don't even know if I have ever seen one anywhere before, but I found em in the Newbie Zone. I also had some issues finding Dwarf Rogues. That one took me sitting in their Newbie Zone for about an hour checking each toon that ran by me and being stared at by tiny characters wondering what a level 80 Hordie DK was doing sitting out there. I would just wave and emote at them, but I don't think they could talk or emote back to me.

After that we went after the hardest of all the Pigrim cheevo's, the Terrokar Turkey Time. You have to kill the last boss in Sethek Halls with a Pilgram Hat and Pilgram Attire, Robe or Dress. So, I go there with the Warlock, and try to solo the instance, and that wasn't happening. I had to call in a couple of friends to help me out with that one. The Warlock is just a bit too squishy even in full PvP gear and a pet for the level 67 dungeon. I got it fairly quickly and then moved on to the DK.

The DK can handle up to about 5, 67 Elites without even having to pop a potion, but after that it gets a bit tricky. I decided not to clear the dungeon but only hit what I needed to get to the King. I knew the way because of doing it with my Warlock, so that also helped. I get all the way in there, and I get to the boss. I potion up, eat up, buff up and get out my Army of the dead to go kill this guy. I whipped him, but then I realized I forgot to change clothes. So, I got to do it again.

This time I invited a friend who also needed the cheevo, and we go in for a second time. We got to the first boss, which actually killed me the first time, because he saw my pet. To which, he brought all his pets and kicked me in the skull. So, this time, I dismissed my pet, and told my partner to go around. He didn't... He got stuck on a pole and got too close, so we had to do the guy anyway. The Pally is pretty tough, and we managed to burn the boss down fairly quickly.

We got to the last boss, and this time I told the Pally to change into his Pilgram garb, and we went for the kill. No problem for 2 level 80's to burn this guy to the ground. I got my cheevo's and my "Pilgrim" title. My partner wasn't as lucky however, he didn't have the hat on, so he didn't get the cheevo or title for Pilgrims. So, he decided he will just finish up next year, and I had to go anyway, so it was all good.

So, while I was doing all of this, cheevo chasing with my Warlock, the Hordies were busy raiding the Alliance Capital cities. I happened to be at a couple of them after the Horde had laid waste to their respecive Kings. I gladly jumped up on the throne and offered my service as the new King in Ironforge, but they mostly ignored me and went back to their business. In Stormwind I had a much better audience because there were about 4 DK's waiting to get the King to pardon them.

So, I jump up to the throne in SW and let them all know I was taking over and asked all of my loyal subjects what their new King could do for them. The first loyal subject asked for a port. I was like, "Umm, I don't do ports, NEXT!" The next loyal subject asked me for a pardon, and I replied that I wasn't quite ready to deal with that yet, but I would talk to my boys (The Guards) about throwing rotten fruit at the loyal subjects. They mostly just stood there AFK or whatever, so I started making jokes like asking them to stop just standing there starring at me. I wasn't getting too much of a response, so I decided to pick on one directly.

Mirkaba, was there getting pelted by rotten fruit and I told her she must have pissed someone off. She asked "What did I do?" and I responded, that I didn't know but I will talk to my boys about spitting on the loyal subjects. Another DK walked up and I tried to get him involved, but again, all I got was silence. I asked Mirkaba if she wanted to be King for awhile and she said "No, I'm fine". I said "I have to go anyway, come on up here and be the King!" So she agreed and I stepped down.

I turned to her, kneeled and said "All hail the new King Mirkaba!" Still, the crowd was quiet. These guys are like dead fish. So, I told Mirkaba that she should have a talk with her boys about spitting on the King, because that is just rude. I offered the King good luck and farewell before I logged for the evening.

I enjoyed myself thoroughly. I wish everyone could be as entertained by me as I can...

That's all I got. Till next time!

Myd On The Throne Of Iron Forge

Tuesday, November 17, 2009

By The Moon And The Stars...


It has been an interesting couple of weeks for the Wow account. First off, I have to tell you all about Moon Guard. Probably the most crazy and interesting server I have ever visited.

I have a friend that said they play on Moon Guard, so I go looking for it, and can't find it on the list. I keep looking, and finally at 4:00 in the morning I decide to scroll all the way to the bottom of the list. Low and behold, there she is, FULL! I was like WTH? Of course I created a DK there and started to play. My goodness, I was just amazed at how many other new DK's there were at 4:00 AM. It was crazy! Not only were these DK's there, but they were actually helping me get through quests faster and helping and stuff. This by far was the best DK experience I have ever had anywhere.

So, I get through to level 58, escape the Lich King, again, and then started to get my things in order with Exodar and of course I had to go see the King, which even going there, I was escorted in by 3 other new DK's.

So, we get all settled, get some potions, get ready, and bam, let's try some PvP. Again, the best time in PvP evar! I go in there in my blues and I started waxing some serious amounts of Hordies. So many in fact that I was the highest in damage several times, which is really confusing to me, because I just ain't that darn good. So, I keep on going, because like this has never happened before and eventually I hit 60. So, I wonder, what the hell is wrong with these Hordies on this Battlegroup? I had to Wiki up the servers and see what the hell was going on. Seems Moon Guard only has 2 PvP servers in their battlegroup as where Stormstrike has 12. Big difference there. I couldn't believe the amount of honor and damage I was getting over there. It was a breath of fresh air to get multiple kills and stay alive without a healer. Alas, it isn't my main server, but I plan to do some more PvP there when I get frustrated on Stormstrike.

So, I decide that after some vicious PvP, I would give the Hordies a well deserved break and go check out Hellfire Penn. Again, I was completely Amazed at how many people were out there at 5:00 AM. My server is mostly a ghost town at this time, so I am just flipping out how much is going on here on Moon Guard. I ran a Wiki on that server and found out it is supposed to be the most popular WoW server. That is not a mistake, this server rocks the socks off of Norgannon. Not only were there many people out there playing the game, there was actual ROLE PLAYING going on! Wholey spukets! I could not believe my eyes as characters were playing up the attacks on Hellfire, and the towers were constantly under siege by both Horde and Alliance.

So, I run some quests, and got some better green and blue gear and went back to PvP in the 60-69 bracket. I was still kicking hiney at level 60. Even ran the Warsong flag a couple of times and made it. I was so happy I could spit! Ahh, the joy of dominating. I felt like a true PvP server guy. I suppose those PvPers in Stormstrike may have a point about the other servers not being as strong, but it feels good to kill them just the same.

So, after a bit, I go to Stormwind to check out the city. Still packed full of people, again I see something strange... More ROLE PLAYING! OMG... I don't know how they do it, but these guys are all walking seriously slow. I mean, I would kill myself if I walked that slow, but they do it. They also go sit around in the park and in the Cathedral and like SPEAK and EMOTE to each other! OMG! I was so happy to see this going on really. I like RP myself, and these guys are full of that. They even had people drinking IN THE BLUE RECLUSE! I have never seen anyone even go into that place on my server let alone RP in there with a fully stocked bartender that is not an NPC. There were several bars, and people yelling about ads for their particular tavern etc. It was one of the best experiences I have ever had in WoW.

So to Moon Guard, I salute you! You guys have a great server!

No worries to Norgannon... I have leveled my Druid to 40, Shammy is at 32, Mage is now 28, and my Pally is 26. Everything is moving along slowly but at least it is moving on.

Servers should be getting off maint soon, so I should go. Gotta get back to leveling the Mage.

Ciao!

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

The DK Collection...

Well, I decided to post my Male collection of DK's I have been running when I can't find anything to do on my own server... Well, not that there is much time for that, but when I get super bored, you will find me running around on one of the other Stormstrike realms. Occasionally I like to see what the other servers are like, and there is no better way then running in with a level 60 and checking out the action.

Plus, if you need to speak to any enemies or allies from those other realms after the BG's that is the best place to do it. Confront them head on I say. Like I said, in BG's often it is worse to read text from your own team mates then it is to hear something from your enemy. Our battlegroup has mostly normal and PvP mixed servers, and you know when the PvP server guys are online. According to them, their elite PvP server skills are unmatched by us low life normal server guys.

I'll tell ya what. I am almost wishing I had started on a PvP server anymore. It is not that bad, and I would rather run with guys/girls that like to do the same thing I want to do instead of hanging with the loot scooping, crazy raiders sometimes.

I see messages in trade now about how you can come on this pug or that pug, but they are rating your gear etc... I am thinking "what is the fun in that?" At the same time I am thinking it is 7 gold a pop for repair each time I die, and sometimes that can be a factor. But I think it kind of takes the fun out of pugging. I have been in raids with guilds that just need a couple pugs to fill out a 25 mix, and they have been the nicest folk on the planet. On the other hand, there are some guilds out there that insult each other to the hilt for not being on their "A" game, so it all comes down to who you hang out with.

I normally tell these guys, and I am sure they can tell by the PvP gear that I don't really know what I am doing in a raid situation. They seem to be all good with that in many cases, because they are so overpowered anyway, that I probably couldn't screw up.

Which reminds me about another topic. Tanks and Healers are the most wanted in raiding and instances because they do have a unique ability to make things happen. I am all about DPS because all I have to do is shoot at anything that moves, and if the Tank is good, then I won't become the target of destruction. But the tank has to not only shoot, but also must keep "all" of the monsters we are engaging interested in fighting only them. So, they play the "keep the threat" game with each monster, convincing them the Tank is the only threat in the room so I can continue my nice and damage free reign of terror. The Healer on the other hand is taxed with keeping everyone alive, mostly the tank, and I'll tell ya, that is not always an easy task. Choosing the wrong types of heals, or healing the wrong guy can cost lives and item repair costs start to skyrocket. I have noticed that there is a serious healer depression on my server, and I think that's just because the pure pressure of that job must be overwhelming.

I have tried being a healer of sorts with my Pally, and I actually do fairly well with a hybrid DPS/Healer. Xina is okay at attacking, but I am still not quite ready for toe-to-toe action there. I am missing the key ingredient "skill" needed to actually cut the competition to ribbons. My healing and distance attacks seem to serve me pretty well.

I have been working on a Horde healer a little bit, even though I find it to be extremely difficult. I know that if I ever get that Healer to 80, people will be throwing gear my way to get me in their raids. It could possibly be the best geared character I will ever have if I can get it together and make it work.

Macros are something I need to work on now. They are becomming increasingly more important in BG's where you need to drop things faster or pull of spell combos etc. I see these Shaman that can drop totems at lightning speed and I am thinking I need to be able to do the same before I get too far along... My Shaman, Leighlou is coming along nicely. So far she is one of my favorites for PvP combat. The Shaman have stopping power that is unmatched by any of my other toons, and can run in wolf form and drop totems as needed. It is definitely going to be interesting to see this character at high levels.

I don't know why, but I have been doing a little bit of the Headless Horseman dailies, and Mydnight is still low in unarmed combat. While I was waiting for all of the other folks to put out some fires for me, I went out and started building her skill in punching. The little level 5 wolves in Goldshire took me way into the 300's before slowing down to a halt, so I only have a little bit more to go now before she can punch her way through a concrete wall. Myd was sporting her Pirate costume, looking kind of cute.

I try to spend some time with all of the characters I am working on, and things are going slow. I have also been trying to level the new characters as PvP rather then doing all the quests, and that seems to be working well. My druid is the highest now at level 38, and my Mage is the lowest at level 22. I have found each class to have something I can use in either PvP or raiding, and I hope to one day have all of my mini-armada ready for Lagaran and some dailies for cash! WOOT!

Well, it's my birthday, so I am thinking I should try and get some WoW action in before the days end...

Ciao!

Thursday, October 15, 2009

One More For The Road...

You might say I am some what hard pressed to have one of everything, so I have went and created my fifth Alliance character, the Shaman into the Mix.

I really loved the Shaman in the level 19 PvP bracket just for getting flags. That's something my Lock rarely ever got to do. Dropping those little totems and running like hell is very fun. Most people forget to shoot the totems first anyway, so it was fun to be on the other end of that for a minute. Now, level 20, we will be taking a break from PvP to move into getting some gear for the level 29 bracket.

I absolutely love the Druid character. She is at level 32 now, and I am getting ready to take her into Theramore for some hard core leveling. The level 29 bracket PvP for the Druid was like mopping up helpless newbies. Probably contributed why I sailed from 28 to 30 in an afternoon. I even got a couple blue items off the Warsong vendor in Auberdine. I had no idea that you could by other gear out there that doesn't exist in the Hall Of Legends. It is the first time I have ever actually found the "real" entrance to a PvP arena, and was rather shocked to know there was other things afoot out there.

I was chatting with someone about the Lock's high-end pets the other day and realized that Blizz is still content with the Ritual of Doom. The quest to get this pet is long and painful. Then after all the pain you can never cast the deamon because it takes 4 people and one of them has to die. After one of you dies, assuming it isn't the Lock, then he/she has to enslave the deamon before he goes balistic and tries to kill everyone. I call BS on this spell. It is stupid to have to involve other people in a ritual where you may die, and why 4? So there is only a 25% chance the Lock will be the lucky one to get killed? I never understood that one, and it is why no one ever sees the deamon. Who the hell wants to pay for repairs for some dude to run around with a pet for 3 minutes? NONE!

I leveled my mage to level 22. This character is probably the hardest one to level, yet very powerful. I think I will like this character more as we move into the higher levels. The PvP for me and the mage wasn't all that grand. I felt like there was just not enough punch yet to go PvP so I skipped it for now. Maybe next round.

I don't really care for most of the races, so I kinda stuck with the ones I have something I like about them. The Blood Elves can silence as a race, and the Draeni can heal a little which is also something I like more then most other things.

Anyway, things are going good... I played a few DK's on some other servers. Maybe I'll get their mug shots for fun. Until next time...

Thursday, October 1, 2009

No Rest For The Wicked...

The thing I really hate about playing both sides of the fence in WoW is the fact is that they can't interact with each other even on the same account.

On the Alliance side I have my level 80 Warlock which has tailoring and skinning skills. On the Horde side I have my level 80 Death Knight which has Alchemy and Herbalism. The problem I have is that if I had those two together, they would make a great team for making money. The DK has all of the essences needed for the Warlock to make the really cool level 80 cloth. I can farm this stuff with the Warlock, but the DK gets them faster. I also need Frost Lotus that sells for almost 40G a piece on the AH that the DK can farm. Plus the DK can make all of the PvP potions and it would be cheaper to give them to the Warlock instead of buying them all of the time. Considering each of the really good potions sell for 25G a piece on the AH, I could save a small fortune.

However, that reminds me that Frost Lotus is the suck as far as farming. I usually have to cruise Wintergrasp for several hours just to get a couple of them. I think my last session of flying the landscape for them yielded me about 7 total. Some of this stuff, the Blizz folks put way too much emphasis on making you fight or spend huge amounts of time farming. For some, I guess it is no big deal to get from a dungeon, but not all of us find raids and dungeon runs that will yield a high volume of materials.

I am toon building more on the Aliance side right now. I am working on a Mage, Pally, and a Druid. The Pally just turned 20, so I went ahead and posted her pic. The Druid is level 26 and the Mage is still just 16. I think the Mage is the hardest of the three to level, but I am getting better at driving the toon doing the "stick and move" tactic of freezing my opponent, running back and then shooting the crap out of them.

I seriously hate leveling, but I now realize that the Blizzard devs back in the day were more sadistic then I could ever imagine. The pain involved in leveling characters in the early levels is horrible. Although, you do level faster, the types of things they want you to do and the "Epic" quests are just too time consuming. The Chistmas tree effect of going to a zone and seeing 20 exclaimation marks just leaves you with the feeling you are going to be in a zone forever. The number of times you are overwhelmed and killed is also a bit high for my liking.

Some zones aren't too bad, but on the Horde side when they send you to the undead zone to level from 10-20, and even with the blood zone in Exodar, you just get the feeling your life is going to end before you ever get to level 20 where they start to push you off to other places to level. Eventually you will all end up in the same places, and the tedium will be more intense as you will have to repeat a huge number of the quests per toon. I don't really like seeing a huge number of quests in one place, and I really hate doing the huge chain quests when you have to see the same guy more then a few times. I like the scenery and the types of things to do be more random and different to keep my attention.

So, for now, I am trying to get more "Alts" in the mix so I can possibly make some cash down the road without having to rely so much on purchasing mats. I have got some time before Cataclysm comes out, and I can't seem to keep up with the ever-changing PvP/Raid gear, so what the hell?

That's all I got...

Friday, September 25, 2009

LTNS


Wow... Looks like I have been too busy to write for some time here. The new Pallys are coming along and I have been working on a Feral Druid for a couple of weeks that I am enjoying somewhat.

It is such a different kind of character that it is a little harder to master then some of my other characters. I do PvP with all my lowbies now, and I have had some fun in BG's even without a mount. I am amazed at how fast the ques are for low level combat. I did seem to like the 19 bracket better then the 29 just because it is much less complicated and the gear is fairly easy to obtain through the AH or whatever. People all seem to know exactly what you need and have no problems letting you know that your gear is not quite up to lowbie par.

Patch day this week was again riddled with issues. You wouldn't know it looking from the outside, but once you log in, you can see the "top secret" notes that they allow you to see while asking you to be patient that there are problems they are addressing. I personally didn't experience too much of the issues, except for some crazy lag at one point. I didn't play that much on Tuesday, but they were still working on it Wednesday.

Anyway, I haven't had too much to bitch about lately, so I guess that is why I have been so quiet. I am sure I had some ideas about writing something, but I don't recall them at this time.

That's all I have for now. See ya in game!

Thursday, August 20, 2009

Top Of The World Ma!



So according to several sources, the next expansion will be a little less conversation and a little more action. As they say in game, Less QQ, More Pew Pew...

Now, I have been bitching a storm about how they need to make the old lands viable again, and sure enough, I guess they are thinking about that too...

You can see the official Blizz announcement and trailer here for Cataclysm...

Quick! Everone re-roll a Worgen! Oh, and they finally gave Horde a "short" race, (Goblins) how sweet... So much for Stranglethorn Vale discounts!

I absolutely agree that the two oldest continents need life put back in them. Fixing things that have been broken forever, and of course getting the high levels back in there is a very good idea. This actually does things two fold. It allows new players a different, but better experience then we had, and it gives us old players a reason to start from scratch again. You can't discount the fact that new players may not really care about the experience we had. They won't miss anything, because they would never have known anyway. Old players will have a reason besides the auction house to get the hell out of Lagaran, and do something more productive. If Bliz finds a way to reward us for helping out the new players, I bet you would see a lot of that going on too.

The ability to fly on the old continents will in fact be a major boon for the game. I can't even tell you how many times I have had to go back and complain about not being able to fly around in the old lands. It again gives us a reason to be there.

The new dungeons and stuff, great, if that's for you. I would rather be able to do the quests and level a lowbie to 80+ as fast as I can doing quests. I never did and probably would never do the dungeons anyway, but I can only imagine that those folks that like that sort of thing will enjoy it.

I have so many friends that level and level, and never even play their 80 characters. To me, changes like that would be excellent.

I still think they need to reconsider doing Outland in that expansion as well. That place is so huge and has a lot to offer, but since the level cap was moved, we have no reason to look at it much past Terrokar Forest. Okay, sometimes I fly around just to see stuff I missed playing my original character, and once in awhile I do the fishing daily, but that's about it.

So, when we get the offical word, I am sure I will have more to say about it.

For now, that's all I got.

Saturday, August 15, 2009

Cross Faction Communication...


In the battlegrounds I have no problem with keeping the talking divided. I also see no reason to force the main channels to have open communication between the two factions. It helps keep things more of a secret for doing major city raids and stuff like that. Not that people don't have two computers or accounts and spy on each other now. Nothing will ever rid you of the spy game completely, and maybe we don't want to do that.

What I would like to see is the ability to communicate with individuals you choose to do so with. I see no reason why we can't open up guilds/parties/raids/whispers and even email to those on the other side we would like to play with. You should definitely be able to email your counterparts on the same account. Getting things accross from one side to the other should not be so difficult. If the "Vision (tm)" is accessabilty, then I think we need to open that up just a bit further.

I mean, war is one thing, but when you are outside of the battlefield, why not allow the Horde and Alliance to talk to each other if both sides decide to do so? Guild, Raid, Party and Whispers are some areas where we can expand. The newer sections of Azeroth are not all about the war between Alliance and Horde. I mean, even in real-time, if I decide to speak to someone we (United States) are at war with, doesn't mean I am some sort of traitor. Outside of military personel, there are simply some people that don't condone or go to war with a particular group just because someone says so. There are other reasons to be friends with people. Be it religion, jobs, relationships or whatever, there are people that could benefiet greatly from the ability to communicate with people on the other side of the fence.

If there is any possible way to cheat this in bg's or whatever then deny access to guild chat if an individual is a member of an opposing faction while they are fighting. But raiding and even grouping together should be allowed.

I think this would promote more of the social side of things and not force people to go to a side that they may not enjoy just because all of their friends are playing that faction.

Thursday, August 13, 2009

A Few Notes On Raiding...


Oh, before I forget... Thanks to Bliz for finally giving us a way to get to the Blasted fricken Lands without flying for eight million years! The picture above shows Myd's excitement when she saw the portal in the Mage Quarter of Stormwind. I have seen the portal on the Hordie side in Org, but forgot to comment on that one.

Hazmat has recently been traveling with a raid guild as a "PUG" and finding out there is a calmer more functional side to raiding. The group is more calm about what you have on and every single move you make. So, I don't really know each piece of armor I need, so I don't roll on items so far. I have mostly been interested in the emblems of conquest, which seems to be the only thing anyone really does with the raids anyway.

The point I am trying to get at is the raiding is a pretty loveless act. Everything is calculated, and everyone knows what is going to happen every single time. The real excitement is finding out if something will drop that you want and you happen to roll high enough on your 100 sided die to actually get to keep the item. It is so systematic and boring compared to PvP which has its own issues, but the game changes constantly. You don't always win, but you don't have to pay a huge price in gold for losing either.

I don't know, I just think there should be a little more fun packed into raiding somewhere. A suprise now and then, and maybe a way to make people go there not just for the gear. I mean, I like gear, but just enough to get me through the onslaught of people trying to kill me. My gear that I have picked up in the auction house and my PvP gear is better then most of the stuff Obsidian Sanctum and Naxx had to offer. I don't know, but it just seems like it can be more fun.

That's all I got...

Monday, August 10, 2009

Play The Isle To Get A Smile... or Get A Grasp on Wintergrasp...

Isle Of Conquest...

The new battleground has still got a few things to be ironed out, but I get a warm fuzzy feeling when playing this bg so far. You can take over several areas on the map such as the docks, a hangar and a workshop which are all needed to make different assaults on the enemy stronghold.

I haven't really figured out everything about this bg yet, but I find that parachuting off the air gunship into the enemy base to be quite exciting. They have siege vehicles for breaking into the enemy base at the workshop, and the docks have 2 vehicles, one is a stealth catapult, for shooting yourself into the enemy base. These move very quickly, and then you just line it up outside the base or inside and then launch yourself in. The other vehicle is a glaive launcher. This one has two modes, the big glaive for killing other units and probably does building damage. The other mode is a burst of smaller glaves that you can shoot at ememy units.

There are also different bombs you can use to brake down the enemy gates and I am sure so much more that I do not even know about yet. Overall I give it a thumb up on an attempt to make something fun in the bgs again.

The changes to Wintergrasp que system are interesting... Basically, they took out the part where we have to ask for an invite to a raid each time and put us into raid groups through the battlemaster. I mentioned in the last update that if you drop connection, the game will ask you again if you want to be in the battle, and failure to answer again will get you ejected outside the Wintergrasp grounds. I think they are going to need to adjust that a bit. Most of the bgs let you disconnect and return if you are quick enough without causing too much of a problem. Sometimes, the Internet just decides to leave you hanging, and there should be a tiny grace period for those of us that need a chance to relog in.

The only thing I don't like about the new WG que is that when the battle is over, I think it needs to remove you from the raid automatically. It is very easy to forget that you have been put into a group like that, and this can cause bugs or issues with daily quests and probably regular quests. For example, I logged in one morning, after being in a BG the night before and couldn't get my daily quests to work correctly. Items wouldn't "sparkle" and there was another where you have to capture Wolvar pups, and all I could do was attack them. After much confusion, I finally realized I was still in a raid group from the day before. I "left" the group, and eveything was working correctly again. Outside of that though, I have been happily collecting my Soul Keeper Shards to get my Black War Mammoth, which I should have by Tuesday on Mydnight. Haz got her Black War Mammoth some time ago, and enjoys it thoroughly...

The changes on the time for Warsong Gulch has left me feeling happy again as well. Now there is a timer on the game so we don't have as much need for screwing around on the battlefield. Also Arathi Basin, and Eye of the Storm have also been shortened up so we can get our marks and move on. So far, I approve of all of these changes. I would still like to see some help for Alterac Valley. Seems like Bliz is at least thinking about these things, so lets hope they will take it a step or two more and make all of the BG's worth playing.

That's all I got...

Thursday, August 6, 2009

First impressions of patch 3.2... (Really early ones)


So, let's just say first off that this patch went off like a nuclear explosion. The game has been mostly unplayable or at least highly annoying since Tuesday. I was unable to even get back on my realm until after Midnight Wednesday morning. This was mostly due to the fact that a large number of servers were not quite ready for patching. I can only imagine how these guys get all of those servers under control so "quickly". Okay, I don't know the exact number of servers they have but when the list of "broken" servers reaches more then ten, I am sure there is some major geek action taking place somewhere.

When I was a network administrator, I had twelve servers. Never did I have to deal with more then one at a time being broken, and just one caused me major stress. These guys must have quite the team working for them to be able to handle that kind of pressure. Lost accounts and lost revenue are never fun subjects with the guys in charge.

The new battleground Isle Of Conquest is interesting, although still buggy. I haven't determined what I am doing in there yet, but I did find some cool vehicles that shoot blades which will actually stick in wood! Oh man, that was the coolest thing evar! There are still some problems with the exit on that game as it doesn't always remove you from your raid group. This can cause problems with questing and such, so hopefully they are on top of that.

All of the other battlegrounds are pretty much dead at this point while everyone learns the new one. The upside is that I actually get to do stuff like carry flags without people attacking me and some fun things I don't normally have the opportunity to do with my Warlock. The DK runs flags all the time, so it is nice to run the clothy like shes got some important business to attend to.

Wintergrasp que system is very nice, and the ability for you to fly when no battle is going on is also way overdue. They switched the reset of the battleground to when the game starts. You get a message that you have been qued for Wintergrasp and are you ready to join. If you don't join the battle, then you are ejected from Wintergrasp. The only problem I have encountered is that besides the huge amount of lag, if you get disconnected, you can be ejected from Wintergrasp if you do not return quickly enough. My first round I was lagged out hard in the keep courtyard, tried to come back, and the que message was on my screen. Before I could answer yes, again, I was disconnected a second time. When I returned I was sitting on a hill out in Icecrown. I tried to fly back to Lagaran to get a another chance, but by the time I got there, the battle was over. Later that evening, I was able to get through the entire fight and it was nice not to join a raid group or even worry about that anymore.

There is also some new item debugger still on that is sort of annoying. Now we see "Creating item NNNNNN" whenever the game makes something. There is also currently major lag issues, and I am sure I can only see a small fraction of the other problems going on. There are also some video issues that Bliz did warn us about, but so far, I haven't encountered any of those.

Okay, so we now have some epic level 80 gems! Oh man, those suckers are expensive right now too. But finally, we have some. I haven't checked the meta-gems to see if those are epic now also, but rest assured, I will.

I hear the Argent Tourney addition is cool, but unbeatable solo. I haven't finished all of the AT quests yet to even get in there, so that will have to wait until I get a wild hair to get Haz in gear and finish.

Anyway, I hope these issues and whatever else is going on will be resolved soon so we can get down to business.

Tuesday, August 4, 2009

Low Tide For The Moment...

There was a comment about Warcraft being at "low tide" on an actual popular blog today and it made me wonder why is that?

Well, in short... We still can't fight the Lich King. We got our other major dungeon Ulduar too late and was basically unbeatable. We got about one-half of the content that should have been released with that patch and I am sure people are a bit angry about it.

On one hand Bliz did some really cool things with the WoLK patch, but there were some major shortcomings. Why did they only release half of the Argent Tournament? Just so we could all get cool titles untill the "real" ending came? I posted before about how that section left me with the feeling of "what's the point?".

There are several other smaller pieces I would have rather seen left out then to get only half of the content and nothing complete. Bliz is just now trying to help out with the Ulduar dungeon so some of us might actually be able to complete it. It's been a really long time though guys, this is not good for player retension.

Hey, here is an idea... How about some PvP spec instances? I mean when we fight the lich king, I am sure he is going to have a lot of DK's running interference. I think there should be some instances designed for those of us that choose to dress as PvP rather then dungeon dwellers. Resillience should be more important then it is for more then just killing on a battlefield.

Another major issue for me and I am sure many of you is this re-spec crap we have to keep going through. I have had to respec the DK about 3 times and my Warlock at least once, and it is just getting to be a big pain in the ass for me. I am a hybrid and dual-spec. It totally sucks to have to spend all that time re-specing over and over and over without me choosing to do so.

The one thing that Bliz has failed on is keeping the older sections in play so we don't have this huge bottleneck in the major high level city. Dalaran is a like walking through superglue! My laptop is not exactly "top-of-the-line" but the lag there is so bad that I will do anything to avoid that place. Unless you play at two in the morning, at which time it is almost worth going in for a quick daily or two.

Everything from the old lands and Outlands are worthless. Unless someone is training or gets a wild hair to use them to equip guildies or something. There is just not a good reason to go back to those places. Auctions only work in the old lands, but there is so much more that could be possible. It is actually just a pain in the arse that we need to go back there just for one thing. It would be nice to have some optional reasons to go there such as daily instances or dungeons. Okay, here are some possible reasons to go to Outland. The fishing daily, because it has "fish hooks" that are easy to obtain the the "glow worms". If you decide to slum around and get some cheevo's you can probably run some of those dungeons rather easy, and possibly rep building, but for gods sake, how borring are all of those? We need some action to go back to or something there to do other then use it for building those ten levels we need to get the hell out of there are run for Northrend.

Ahh we got a new battleground or two and maybe they might be somewhat fun. I don't know yet, the patch is being installed right now, and I am skeptical about the whole thing. One of them seems to be a cross between Alterac Valley and Strand Of The Ancients. I will be interested in seeing how that plays out. AV is one of my favorites, when I am playing Horde.

The cheeze tactics in many of the battlegrounds have to be looked at more carefully. I see they have made some progress in Wintergrasp. Finally no more duels during a WG battle? Goodness, no more twenty-five people doing the fishing daily when we need help? What a concept, get those slackers out of there.

I think there should be higher rewards for completing the battles, and less emphasis on kiling each other. We have arenas for people that just want to kill people. Lets put the strategy back into the battlegrounds where it belongs, and make them fun again.

Alterac Valley should not be everyone running to the other end, killing the General, game over. The strategy needs to be rewarded, not the number of kills. You should get a huge amount of honor for capturing a node, and for the mines, and for setting loose all of the cool defenses that Alterac has to offer. Fighting over nodes should grant honor, not people running around the middle picking off helpless riders and the like. We want to be rewarded for acts of heroism, not cheeze tactics. I didn't even realize we had all these other options in Alterac until one time Horde turtled us and the Alliance guys were like telling us to release this or that defence and upgrade our troops. I mean, there is a lot we can work with in that BG.

Here is an idea though.. People should only gain honor when they are fighting for an objective. For example, you should get honor when you fight at the flag or in the flag room, but not out in the middle of the field. Make it so people can't just farm the honor, but actually have to go to an objective to make any points. It's all great if they want to stop someone out in the field, but that isn't what we are here to do. We have a job to do, and we need more emphasis on doing that job, and not just some random killing. Killing at a spawn point is also, not honorable. They either need to make sure there are multiple spawn points, or give us the option to change them like they do in Wintergrasp.

I just feel like we should have released all the major stuff in WoLK, and left the smaller stuff for these patches. The choices made by Blizz on this release are really hurting them. I don't even play as much now, because the waiting has become too boring.

Wake up fellas, and ladies!

Sunday, August 2, 2009

Cheevo's and Cheezepuff's



The new offical in-game term for Acheivements is "Cheevos", so mark that in the WIKI database for me...

The BG's have been a strange place lately. Whether it is the changes coming down the line in patch 3.2.0 or just because all the good players have fallen off the planet I can't figure it out.

Strand of the Ancients, the newest battleground is an interesting twist on the Wintergrasp battleground. The object is simple, there are two rounds. One round you attack the tiers and move through the battlefield to reach the titan relic, the other round you defend the tiers and keep those pesky enemies off your relic.

Now, before you say, that's just too easy, there are of course defensive guns, and on offence, there are tanks and bombs that I believe are spelled Seaforium.

The trick on offence is to make sure that when the ships pull up to the beach and land, you get off the boat, and grab a bomb. The next thing you do is to see if there is an available tank to drive towards the door. If tank = Yes, take tank, spam the 1 and 2 buttons on your keyboard go through doors, if there is no tank, run with your bomb to the door, drop the bomb. This usually ends in your death at some point, so after you die, look for a bomb, then look for a tank, go to next door etc.

On defense you want to get to the first tier, grab a gun turret if possible, or run out on the beach and start destroying the tanks. If there are no tanks, watch for the guys running to the door with bombs. You can defuse the bombs by clicking them. If the enemy breaks through the door, then you can dismount the turret, and either assault their tanks on foot while falling back to the next tiers guns. If the enemy breaks through a tier, you keep falling back a tier until you get to the relic.

Okay, it is pretty simple, but for some reason, many people do not realize that's how it is done. You go in force with as many tanks as you can, and blow up all the doors to get to the relic. So many people run around trying to honor farm this BG and it is just stupid because while you are jacking around messing with the guys on the field, the rest of us are blasting our way to victory.

Anyway, that's all I got for now.

Wednesday, July 22, 2009

New Patch Comming! Everyone Strap Yourselves Down!



Not a lot new to report except I am looking forward to some of the changes in the next "major" content patch. Mostly there are some fixes for things that were bothering me. Herbalism healing will be better, which is good, and there are some new Battleground changes and a new BG which will give me something more to do.

I still haven't read anything about actually getting to fight the Lich King yet. I wonder if these guys realize that when you make a release with the guys name in it, you might outta actually, ya know, put the guy in the game to fight at the end? It feels like we have been cheated and for what? So, we can wipe our selves silly in Uldar until we are so frustrated you will throw another impossible bone in our faces?

I don't know about the rest of you, but all those millions of people playing must be a little less then pleased that we can't go smack the king in his virtual eye by now.

Hazmat is mostly fully geared with purple stuff, so I have been working more with Mydnight. It is a long process, one I would like to be done with ASAP. I guess the new gear will now be even "harder" to get since they are going to restrict you from doing 2v2 only to get the fancy gear. I guess this means I will just have to stay out of season.

The badge changes for conquest are good. I hate having to use all different types of currency to get what I want. Eveything should have options and I should be able to trade one type of currency for another. I should still be able to get what I want even if it means I have to spend more time doing it.

Anyway, all is cool right now. I suppose the patch will release next Tuesday, but I am not positive. Again, too lazy to go find out, but I know it is on the way. =)

Laters.

Wednesday, July 1, 2009

Changing sides FTW!

I had a pretty well done reponse on this topic over at Lummy's place, but it seems his comment links aren't working this morning so I will go from memory... (Ut Oh!)

Blizzard is coming up with a new way for us to pay more money and be able to change sides from Alliance or Horde.

Really not a bad idea. I think for those of us that have been playing one side for a while and decide that we really needed to be on the other side, this allows that. I can't complain a whole bunch about the microtransactions as I have used them to perform a name change and whatnot. I always wanted to be able to move to another realm or play with different groups, and now that is possible in WoW. In UO, once you were made on a server, that was it. No moving to play with other friends or anything like that. Name changes, gender changes, or any other changes for that matter were out of the question.

Personally, I like the fact we can't speak in BG's... There are a lot less "Rape" comments being made and to be perfectly honest, since the other team can emote things to you anyway, I think we have that area covered.

Your own team mates are more abusive in BG's then I think even the enemy would be. Comments about your performance or how this side or that side always wins, and the constant crying about who's strategy is better and why should we listen to this guy or that guy etc... It's terrible to even have the chat channel loaded, and I bet many people just turn it off. In any event, we don't need to chat in BG's, we are there to kill each other. No comments are needed.

I would like to see commerce, speech to chosen friends, email, and even guilding between factions outside of BG's. I think the early game lended its self to keeping things separated, but as the game has gotten more seasoned, we have learned that to destroy all this evil, we need to work together. I think there should be a way for us to do that.

Right now you can't even buy your own auctions in the common trade Auction House to help your own characters with gold or items. I find this to be most disturbing. You have to go through a completely separate account to even help yourself out if you happen to play both sides like I do. This makes me less then happy, and I can only hope that Blizz will continue to explore this area and some day make all things possible for those of us that choose to use them.

Well, that's all I got for now. Check ya laters!

Thursday, June 25, 2009

Siege Engines FTW!

On my WoW server it is very comon for the Horde to have Tenacity when fighting for control of Wintergrasp. This gives us a bit of a boost in combat because well, we are usually outnumbered 2-1.

There is also some sort of ranking system going on now which I assume makes vehicles stronger depending on your rank or something. I know I probably should look this stuff up, but I am still lazy and shiftless. Anyway, there has been some changes that make the players happy about running in vehicles now.

Typically I try to defend the towers when I run WG because the lag is something terrible when there are 40 plus Allies trying to kill me. Today however, was a different story.

I tried to defend the towers, but Alliance had their ducks in a row today. There was no stopping them from destroying our towers and the time we had available for getting the fortress would drop dramatically. I was forced to just grab a siege vehicle and go for the fortress that the Allies were defending. The funny part about it was that when I got in the vehicle, my camera wouldn't go out far enough so I could see. Someone jumped in the vehicle with me, so I felt like I had to just go for it without the ability of sight, with the exception of around the edges of this huge machine and the mini map.

So, I start following the rest of the siege machines and we get to the fortress. I am pounding the "1" button which tries to push through walls and people with force. We got through the first wall, and another one. We go through the last wall, and I am a little confused because usually the Allies don't let me get this far. I made it to the main chamber door and started slamming it with my vehicle. Suddenly the Allies decided they had enough and destroyed my vehicle. I was forced out and just started firing at anyone that was in range. I stayed alive there for quite some time.

I am not sure if there was a few healers around or what, but all of a sudden, the relic or the item that you must touch to win was visible to me. I just ran to it, and I got it! I mean like I have never even been anywhere near that thing ever, and today I actually made it in and touched the relic.

I of course found this to be completely cool. My guild wasn't as excited, but Hazmat gets so many acheivements, she probably secretly makes them sick. Afterwards we got into a 10 man VOA and actually finished both bosses! First time ever for that as well. Normally half the group will leave on a wipe. Today we didn't wipe, and I got a bunch of those cool badges I have been wanting. I finally got Hazmat the "Superior" acheivement, with all purples in slots with at least a "213" rating, I think.

So, maybe today was just my lucky day. I picked up my Black War Mammoth the other day. People seem to like that when I come rolling into a BG with one of those big suckers. They don't work all that well in the city, but outside, they are great fun and make you feel all tall and whatnot.

I have also been running a couple of new friends through the game, and even though it is kind of boring, I do enjoy teaching them how to play. Gives me some idea of how much I actually know about this crazy game.

Anyway, that's it for now. I just wanted to remember this day. I don't know if I will ever see that relic again...

Thursday, June 18, 2009

Oh And By The Way, Grow Up!

I was reading the latest drama post from Lum about Brad McQuaid returning to the industry after a long vacation and some dirt bike riding. After reading his page and the comments I saw on some of the sites covering this incredibly boring news, I came up with one thought. Grow Up...

Brad's vision as bad as it was, does not make enough of a dent in my mind to blame him for the entire MMOG industry failure and thousands of personal lives he supposedly destroyed in the process. Hey, the guy made some games, I didn't like any of em, but if you got fired from his project and have another job, then shut up. If you got fired and you still don't have a job, pick another career and move on. I am just getting tired of all the whining years later. I have been fired too, and believe me I hate to see it happen, but it does, so just get another job, leave Brad alone, have a coke and a smile. I won't play his games, but I don't need to bash the man into oblivion over it.

Kthx

Something Strange Is Afoot At The Circle K...

The last patch Blizz put out must have given the Warlocks a long overdue shot in the arm. Suddenly there are no DK's in the Battle Grounds, but Warlocks are out in large numbers decimating the landscape. What happened? I don't know but PvPers are up in arms about the new changes to Warlocks.

Speaking about PvP, what the hell is wrong with all these honor farming idiots? It is getting harder to have a game of Capture The Flag when everyone just stands around the middle and kills each other. I was really pissed one night when I personally grabbed and ran with the flag 10 times and no one on the Horde side would help out. When the battle was over, which we lost, The Horde fighters had accumulated a ton of honor above what I had done, but I did the most work to actually winning the game. There needs to be more incentive to carry the flag and protect it then there should be for just kills. There are plenty of BG's where you can and should just kill people, but Warsong Gulch is not one of them.

I guess I should just break out my warlock and upgrade my S2 gear before they put us back in the closet again.

Thursday, June 4, 2009

Remember Where You Came From...

Just a little reminder to myself, that there is a lot of things I may never do in my life, but I was there when the big boys got started. WoW, of course is now lead in the design department by my man Tom Chilton, formerly known as Evocare, who used to do audio shows along with myself and my main man Pete Warner, formerly known as Adrick. Pete is currently working on another soon to be huge hit, Star Wars: The Old Republic. I am so happy for these guys.

Check around, people talk about these games, and I will probably never be mentioned for having anything to do with any of it, but I know where they came from and I am proud of the things we did ten years ago.

Here is the latest from Tobold on SWTOR...

The world would not be complete without the latest WoW drama from Lummy...

Good luck fellas!

Okay Scratch That, Reverse It...

So, I am still fishing and rep grinding for the Kalua'ak or some tribe of Walrus that like to fish and have this really cool fishin' pole that I can get. I made a comment about fishing up monsters the other day, but I have changed my mind. They already have this. It's just that the monsters are already there. In UO, there weren't always hazards around and you had to spawn them by fishing. In WoW, there are plenty of dangerous places to fish including Wintergrasp, which I do fish there to get Terrorfish. Still, I think there is a lot left that can be done for fishing. It takes an incredibly long time to level fishing. Way more then most other professions I have tried. I maxxed herbs in 2 days and Alchemy in about 4 days, but that's because I didn't have enough money to just buy the skill all the way up. I think they are making some attempts to do something with the most mind numbing profession, but more dailies or something to motivate you even more still needs to be addressed.

Hazmat is getting a pretty good rep in BG's lately. Me and Warsong Gultch have had some fun. I keep getting achievements like killing over 100 flag carriers. Which made me realize, I am really aggressive towards those guys. I always hear comments about how I am doing good and chasing those guys (Enemy Flag Carriers aka EFC) until their team gets mad at me and plows me into the planet. I love it when they gang up on me cause I know I made em mad. One guy was so kind as to emote stuff to me about mourning my death and I made sure that the only name he saw in his attack frame the rest of the game was Hazmat! I enjoyed making him suffer, but that's just how I roll... Some idiot from Mal-Ganis was bragging how he was going to ironman the flag because no one could get it and I ran in there and waxed the healer so he could do it. He still bragged how he did it, but did include me as a small help. I laughed.

Anyway, let's see what can I complain about... Blizz had to do several restarts again on this small patch that dumbed down the DK's yet again. No problem though, I am still kicking some hiney and liking it. I still think Paladins are a bit of an issue. Those guys are so hard to kill and I can't figure out what the hell makes them stay alive so long. Any pointers on breaking them into powder would be appreciated.

That's it for now...

Thursday, May 28, 2009

Call me Fishin' Fear...

So, I broke down and decided to give Hazmat a couple of jobs, other then killing Allies. What better job to have for a PvPin', Arena scootin, Raider, like myself? Alchemy! Along with Alch, I took up herbalism to defray the cost of those nasty little herbs.

Then something really bad happened. I maxxed my herbalism in 2 days and I am about 420 in Alch. I decided to take on another profession for grins...

Fishing for teh win! I am actually doing me some fishing dailies, and getting some crazy looking fish in the lakes of Northrend. I still find that profession to be completely mind numbing, but the rewards are getting better. It would be nice to see them to keep enhancing that profession to include pulling a monster on the better loot or something to keep things interesting. Believe me, I have beat the crap out of some people with my fishing pole equiped and that in itself is FUN! Although it takes a hell of a lot longer without the Titansteel Mace. My only major complaint about the rewards is that this fishing daily bimbo keeps giving me "water walking" potions. Just for the record guys, I am a Death Knight! The ability to walk on water is built in! Dynamic rewards for the win!

I have just been chilling out, taking my time and playing as casual as I can. I am still not finished with Argent Tournament and my PvP gear, but if they are just going to keep making me upgrade every season, I don't see the point in going all out.

That reminds me about gear. I think at some point we need to cap the gear off and then just offer different sets of I-level gear. I mean in Burning crusade there was a choice of a couple of different sets and that was nice. I would like to see more of that going forward. Maybe five of each set or something so we can look a little different. Hey! How about letting us gain a skill for tailoring, leatherworking, and blacksmithing that would allow us to pick colors within reason?

I know we did in UO, and I liked it!

Anyway, that's all I got, for now... For the glory of the Sendori!