Friday, April 29, 2011

Radiant, H-Maloriak, and breaking some rules

This week saw a lot of chaos thrown into our little raid group.  Our MT and Spriest were basically raiding from boats due to the rain they've been getting.  Our rogue and shaman are in Alabama, and had some tornado scares.  Oh, and our Boomkin is traveling for work.

What this boiled down to was a 4 hour raid week, which isn't much.  We did manage to get some things accomplished though, and break a few of our own rules along the way.

First - Radiant

I had a chance to look over my logs from last night, and what I'm seeing about Radiant isn't blowing my hair back.  Now don't get me wrong, 540 Spirit for 6 seconds is great, but as I mentioned earlier this week, it's not enough to even cover the cost of the spell.  What you're really getting is a lower cost to your Holy Shock, not a full time buff.

On average I was getting a 60% uptime on Radiant.  This means I'm not casting HS off every CD, but that's to be expected.  There's no point in casting it if no healing needs to be done, and sometimes you just don't want to use your GCD for that.  Say right after an electrocute on Nef.  I'm going to be pumping out Divie Lights, not worrying about getting Holy Shocks out.  Now once the raid is stabalized, I'll go back to that setup.  While the 2 heal combo punch of HS/WoG is great, sometimes I need more than that.  It's a decent bonus though, and I'm hoping I can nab some shoulders off Cho'Gall to give me that 5th piece so I can have options. 

Oh, and on that note.  Hunter/Shaman/Warrior tokens need to stop dropping.  Our shaman, who we picked up maybe 2 weeks ago, now has all three shoulder and helm sets.  It's annoying.

Breaking some rules

I don't know if they are rules, so much as guidelines, but originally we wnated no more than 10 raiders in the guild.  What has happend though is that between RL stuff, patch days, etc, we've had maybe one full raid week every month since we started raiding.  So Monger snagged us a backup DPS, and maybe a backup tank as well. We don't have (in my opinion) a backup healer on par with Monger or I, but we do have three other players that "can" heal.  Our boomkin does a smashup job on healing Nef and Halfus (and she's done H-Chimaeron), and our shaman is putting forth some decent healing as well.  I question our Spriest, but in a pinch he's ok. 

So hopefully adding these players gives us options and not drama.  We'll see.

H-Maloriak

We finally pushed this guy over last night, though I managed to die to an ice-ball AFTER he was dead.  WTG nub.  We three healed this fight (Disc, Shaman, Pally), and it worked out well.  While it's possible that we could cut a healer on this, I don't know that I'd want to.  Personally once we find a pattern that works, I'm loathe to change it.  Plus if you get a healer frozen in the blue phase, you're probably in real trouble.  

The black phase is all about your team moving out of the goo.  You can't heal through them standing in it for more than a second or two.  The fight is REALLY long though, so you have a lot of time to use cooldowns.  You can generally get a Divine Plea off between cauldron colors as well.

I really like the fight, though him clipping his own casts for releasing the adds does suck.  It can get a little hariy for a few moments.

Next week I'm hoping we can put the double dragos down.  Mmm.

Day 17 - My Favorite Spot (in game or out)

Like my other posts about favorites, it's tough to nail down just one.  I used to spend a lot of time hanging out on the bank steps in Dalaran, but now that we have flying mounts I usually just log out hovering over Org.  I don't have a spot that makes me think "oh man, this, this is the view - I need a house right here" or anything like that.  I suppose if I had to pick just one spot, it would be this.

Over the body of a new kill.

I'm not talking about "oh hey, H-Chim for the 10th time".  I'm talking a new raid boss, Heroic or otherwise.  That feeling of accomplishment that the group came together and pulled it off.  We don't do a lot of kill shots any more, though we still get the sandbox tiger from time to time.

On my mountain

This is my favorite spot outside of WoW, other than maybe my couch.  There's a hike I do once or twice a year that takes me to a secluded hilltop out in the Alaskan wilderness.  A sunrises makes the mountains look like they are on fire, and that's where I go to recharge.  I've only ever seen one other person out there, though I have run into a few bears.  It's close enough that I can drive down after work and hike in by 2AM or so, then have my sunrise and cofee, and be home by dinner. 

That's one thing I love about Alaska though.  In 15 minutes I can be on a trailhead, and in an hour I can be completely out of civilization.  Plus, we don't have tornados.

Up next - my favorit outfit.

Wednesday, April 27, 2011

New Tier 4 bonus - Good, bad or ugly?

With the arrival of 4.1, we finally see the change to our Holy 4pc T11 bonus.  I commented on this back in March, but I though it'd be worth touching on again in case someone missed it. In short, the 4pc bonus now grants 540 Spirit for 6 sec, every time you cast Holy Shock.  Since we should be casting Holy Shock every time it's off CD (assuming we're healing) this will be a nice boost for us.  Since realistically you're probably looking at more like a 50% cast time, it's still a nice bonus.

Show me the math

So the formula for calculating mp5 is rediculous, and I'm pretty sure that I screw up the order of operations half the time, but here it is.

.0025 + SPI * sqrt(INT) * .0083625   Of course I've also found this formula .016725 * sqrt(INT) * SPI

Either one makes my head hurt, but what I do know is this.  I get about .33 mp5 (in combat) per point of spirit.  So a bonus of 540 SPI will give me about 178 extra mp5.  This of course is calculated by dividing the bonus mp5 I get from Spirit by the mana regen I get while in combat.  So this number is probably wrong as well. 

Either way this should, at a minimum, provide a minimum of 270 SPI for the duration of the fight, and that's nothing to sneeze at - especially if you aren't getting the heroic drops.  You can certainly push the SPI return up if your HS is consistantly cast as soon as it comes off CD, but the math makes that tough.  Even with a 2 sec cast on DL, as soon as you use an instant your ability to cast immediately after it's available will be tough.  It would have been nice of Blizzard to make the duration say, 8 sec, so we could keep the buff up full time.

So is it worth getting?

This goes back to the debate about the T11 in general.  With the small buff to Mastery in 4.1, I think the T11 gets a little more love, though I'm still not crazy about our Mastery.  Personally I'll be swapping to my 4pc, at least until Chimaeron drops my shoulders (Heroic version) - and then it'll be time for some serious math. 

Day 15 and 16 - My desktop and things I miss

I'd include a screenshot of my desktop, but I'm afraid to shock you all.  I will describe it for you though, if I can find the words.  I believe it is called "Windows.jpg" - it's basically the standard blue Windows desktop background, with the little flying window in the background.  That's it.  When I first got my desktop there was an Alienware logo on the desktop, because that's how the folks who built it had set it up.  Once I rebuilt the machine though, that went away.  I even got crazy once and set my desktop to all black (no not the All Blacks), but to be honest I just don't care.

See, I don't spend a lot of time staring at an empty desktop.  If I'm at my computer I'm either working or gaming, what do I care what the desktop looks like?  If I want to look at a picture, I'll open that up - otherwise I just don't care.

Things I miss post Cataclysm

Uh - a Worgen PC free world?  The cries of gnomes everywhere that wished they had a capital city that wasn't overrun by troggs and irradiated gnomes?  Jousting (just kidding)?

I don't really miss anything in the game world, except maybe BoL transferring 100% of my heals.  The game changes, and I didn't spend a lot of time in the Eastern Kingdoms or Kalmidor once BC/WotLK launched.  Call me unsentimental, but there's really no point saying "oh don't you wish it was still like back then". 

Bah-humbug.

Tomorrow - my favorite spots (in and out of the game).  Guess which one will be longer?

Tuesday, April 26, 2011

Day 14 - This upsets you

Ahh, finally a list of things that I can get my teeth into.  This list is certainly shorter than it would have been four or five years ago though, as what I let under my skin has really changed.  Of course I've got my wife completely convinced that I'm practicaly incapable of getting upset about anything short of really bad behavior towards her, or poor customer service.  Of course, she also refuses to play poker with me. 

So in no particular order, here's a list of things that upset me in WoW.

1) Not being respectful of other's time.  This is a big one for me, but it can stem from so many things.  No call/No Show to a raid.  Being unprepared.  Frequesnt AFKs.  Pretty much everything I ever had to deal with as an officer in a larger guild.  Now all I have to worry about is if one raider is out of town for something, and I think we've only had one last minute cancel since the release of Cata.

2) Getting camped.  Now, I'm the first guy to admit that I have no issue with popping a lowbie if I'm in the area.  Once.  Yeah, whoohoo gg lvl 85 mage who popped Icy Veins and TimeWarp.  You totally smoked my lvl 58 hunter self.  Whatever.  That doesn't bother me.  I get upset when they decide that my body is a National Forest, and they set up shop there. 

3) That guy in random BGs.  This guy doesn't upset me so much as just make me want to cry.  I'm talking about that person who doesn't try to coordinate, just says things like "FFS defend!" as he's running off to solo the mine against 3 people.  Or the guy who says "Damn, no healers again" as he's playing a warlock.  Of course he has a Season Nine Super Gladiator healer, and placed in the Arena tourney - this is just his alt on a friend's account.

4) Funky boss mechanics.  I'm not talking about strange things you have to do, I'm talking about things like Atramedes spawning his fire in P2 ON YOUR HEAD, as you're running.  You can't dodge that, or even gong it off.  Chimaeron double attacking and both hits landing in that 4% range that your MT has where it's a pure hit, not a parry/dodge/block/miss. 

5) Douchebags from your own faction.  I don't know why I expect people from my own faction to behave better than the enemy faction.  At least on a PvP server if someone decides to act like an idiot I can attempt to resolve the issue by melting their face off.  It's also typically Gnomes or DKs.  Or Gnome DKs. 

6) Worgen.  I hate the Worgen more than I hate gnomes.  I don't like their cast animations, attack animations (seriously, a summersault with a 2H axe?), sniffing, that running wild nonsense.  You can take the Goblins back too in my opinion.  I really hated the starting zone.  I think I liked the Exodar better.  Forget mourning the loss of Arcane Torrent, Worgen might nust be enough to keep me from faction changing if I ever have to find a new guild.

7) Wireless mice  This is only an issue if you forget to change your batteries before a raid.  Wiping us becuase your batteries died is grounds for a RL ass whipping.  Or at least a creepy late night visit from Lijah Cuu.

8) Losing a comment/post This is more for blogging.  I hate it when I lose a good rebuttle or post, just because I took a 5 hour break while writing it.

I think this is enough for now.  Day 15 is going to be really short, so I might roll that in with Day 16.

I might also have a real content post now that 4.1 has gone live.  Time to play with Mastery some more I guess.

Monday, April 25, 2011

Day 13 - People (players/bloggers) I admire

This is a fairly short list, though I do admire what some folks have put together.  In general, I admire what they've accomplished, not necessarily who they are.

Mido

I have no idea who this guy really is, and I never really faced him in PvP.  What I do know is that he was one of the most feared rogues on Malygos - and it didn't matter which side he was fighting for.  His legend carried into BC, and those rogues in Shadow Labs that would one shot your healers were named Mido in his honor.  To put it bluntly, if Morores had been Mido - he wouldn't have needed four henchmen to take down a raid.  I don't know where Mido is now, but I tip my hat to that level of gameplay.

Legs and Cranius

For those that don't know Cranius, well, let this be a brief introduction.  Cranius is the voice behind Big Blue Dress, The Lament of Captain Placeholder, and others.  Legs does the machinima work.  Together they create some amazing videos, and I admire that.  While I certainly which Cranius would release more, I can appreciate that it probably doesn't pay very well, and doing all that video capture and editing has to take time. 

Matticus

I don't know Matt over at World of Matticus, but I do have a lot of respect for him.  He runs a fairly successful progression raiding guild, that has a decent PvP arm as well.  He maintains World of Matticus, maintains Plus Heal, and is involved with a few podcasts. While I don't always agree with his opinions, I do have to admire the fact that he keeps it all held together.  Even if there really are a string of people in the background working on it to keep the whole thing floating, I admire the ambition.

That's about it

It's tough for me to admire someone regarding the game, especially when I don't even admire a lot of folks in general.  I might admire their gumption, or ability, but as a person?  It's tough.  One of the men I admired most in my life died on Easter morning this year.  My uncle succumbed to a second fight with cancer after beating it for a bit last year.  He was 79 years old, had cycled across most of the world, and could spin a tale with the best of them.  After admiring a man like that, it's hard to follow someone else.

Day 12 - A usual day in my life/online

Fortunately, at least for me, my usual day is fairly boring and routine.  Here's an average day, now that the weather is good and the snow is al gone.

5:00 - Wake up and start my first coffee.  I generally make 6oz of espresso in my awesome Bialetti espresso maker.  I can put the water on, and by the time I'm finished with prepping my oatmeal, I've got awesome coffee.  Personally, I pour it right into the cup and drink it, but I use a Bodun milk frother to make my wife lattes.  Hey, coffee is one of the good things I make, don't judge.

At this point I'm usually either playing on an alt, reading blogs, or (lately) reading some 40k.  I generally try and avoid doing any log analysis during this time, and I'm not a big fan of doing dailies.

6:00 - Make a new pot of coffee and (attempt) to wake up my wife.  This is a process that can take a while, as she is NOT a morning person.

6:30 - Out the door and biking to work.  If I'm in a hurry I take the straight shot on the roads and get to work pretty quick (it's about 5 miles) - otherwise I'll get in a 20mi ride.

7/8:00 till 4/5:00 - Conduct business at an engineering firm where I'm the local IS Manager.  This is where I usually find 15 or 20 minutes to do a blog post at lunch, and go over some WoL reports if I think we're having issues.

4/5:00 - Bike home.

5:00-8:00 - Raid, hopefully, on W/Th/Sat.  Otherwise I do some schoolwork (here's to paying for a degree online through Phoenix) and/or keep working on my mage.  He needs to hit 85 so my guild can kill him.  Dwarf mages are friggin rare!

8:00/10:00 - hang out with my wife and either get my ass kicked at scrabble/Trivial Pursuit, or watch some Iron Chef.

All in all, it's a pretty boring day.  I don't spend a lot of time stressing over WoW anymore, becuase we're either going to raid, or we're not.  I'm not an officer of a big guild anymore, and I don't think I ever want to go back to that point.  We don't spend alot of time online as a guild outside of raiding.  On raid nights, we have some folks that have to get to work right after the raid, or get to bed since they're on the East Coast.  Half our guild raids with another guild on a seperate server on Mon/Tue, and while we all have alts - most of us aren't interested in getting them into raiding or even heroics - they're played for fun.

Right now we're working on H-Maloriak, but I don't think we have a full raid week available till June.  Ah well.

Tomorrow - People I admire (it's a short list).

Saturday, April 23, 2011

Day 11 - Bad habits and flaws

Oh man, talk about looking deep at yourself.  Are my future employers going to be looking at this?  I hope not.  I have a few bad habits that stick out, and I used to have a few more that I've curtailed over time.

1) Drunken raid leading.  I haven't done this in a few years now, but oh man was I ever "that guy".  I'd drink a pint of scotch and MT my way through Vanilla and BC content just screaming up a storm.  Whoo - bad nights.

2) Taking over raids.  I've got a strong personality, and one thing I can't abide is weak leadership.  I've helped hijack more than one raid/guild, simply becuase the leadership was weak.

3) Stressing over the game.  I spend a lot of free time thinking about WoW, the guild, raids, etc.  I do a ton of napkin math and pouring over logs.  It's good, except it takes away from other things.

4) Using CDs.  I'm working on it, but my cooldown usage still isn't perfect.


That's the big ones - though I'm sure others would point out more.

Up next - A usual online day.

Friday, April 22, 2011

Day 10 - Blog/Website favorites

For this question, I'm going to respond with but a single answer.

Google.

Seriously, is there anything that search engine can't provide?  Sifting through the crap can be tiresome, but that is one location I can always count on to eventually get me to where I want to be.  Why would I bother bookmarking anything else? 

Alright, fine.  Here's a few other sties that I visit regularly, outside the standard wowhead and EJ.

Dark Legacy Comics - they're funny because they're true. 

XKCD - I'm a computer nerd who works in an engineering firm, and has Math and English majors for friends.  This might as well be my second home.

And that's really it.  I have a ton of blogs in my blog reader, but none that I freak out about if I miss a day.  Toby gives me all the Warhammer 40k and SW:TOR updates I can handle, and I just don't spend a lot of time on community sites. 

Up next - bad habits and flaws.  I'm gonna need a longer list....

Thursday, April 21, 2011

Day 09 - My first blog post

Two words for you on my first blog post.

Bore ring.
Seriously. My post was the equivelant of the programming script that produces "Hello World", nothing more than me poking my head out of my gopher hole. I'm here to tell you from personal expericence, that it's a dangerous move. More than one gopher has gotten shot with my trusty .22 just for sticking his head up to see what's going on.

Come on, think about it for a minute. We all remember the whack-a-mole game from Chucky Cheese (or whatever your local bad pizza and games site was as a kid), and we certainly make enough references to it in regards to healing. At the very beginning, I'm pretty sure I was more than a little nervous about voicing my opinion out where everyone could read it. I mean, what if they don't like me or agree with me?

And that right there, is what prompted me to write more. Because if I can infuriate just one troll, and maybe help one other person, then it's worth it all.

That, and I need a place to share stories about Old Greg.

*Edit* Fail blogger is bad.  Damn scheduling.

Wednesday, April 20, 2011

Day 08 - 10 things you don't know about me

Oh man - where to start with this one.  From the mundane to the insane - here we go.

1) I'm 1/2 an Ironman.  1.1 mi swim, 56 mi bike, and a 13.2 mi run.  Hooah baby.  Hooah.

2) I once (well, ok more than once) spent a large portion of my time jumping off high objects into questionable pools of water.  Often while intoxicated.  At night.  Yeah, I wonder why I'm still here myself.

3) Despite #2, I'm terrified of hights - like, rediculously frightened.  I get nervous on a step ladder.  Don't ask me how I jumped off a bridge into the White Salmon river, just above some rapids, I'm not quite sure myself.  I'm sure it had something to do with the fact that a) I thought the white water was generally boring (I was once thrown over the high side of a raft - and at 280lbs that was an impressive sight I'm sure) and b) at some point during the trip I had ripped the ass out of my wetsuit - so I spent the whole trip mooning everyone.

4) I used to ride in the rodeo.  I never did bull riding, but I've covered more than one bareback horse, and I used to jump off a running horse onto a steer - just to wrestle him to the ground.  I also did well in the wild cow milking.

5) I've lived above the Arcitc Circle.

6) I once took sixth place in the Arctic Circle Championship sled dog races.  Yeah, there were only six people entered, but they paid out seven places - so I still made money.

7) I hate mystery citrus showing up in my food (you know this if you listened to the TNB while I was a guest).  Nothing ruins a delicious dish faster than a cake fart, but strange orange showing up in my pecan pie is a close second.

8) I share a brain with Wombcrusher.  I swear, I'm Ed Norton and he's Brad Pitt.  The number of times we've had the same thought at the same moment...scary.

9) I have, on more than one occasion, been the only answer to the question of "Who drank an entire bottle of scotch/gin/whiskey/rum/etc". 

10) I did inhale.  I also have used a wide variety of hallucinogens, pain killers, and other mind/body altering drugs.  While I can't condone their use (legally) - I do have some pretty crazy stories from those nights.  Again this begs the question, how am I still alive?

BONUS FACT:
I once took out a barracks window using 100mph tape, a Boones Farm bottle full of Red Man spit (mostly mine), and a half dozen MRE heaters. 

BONUS FACT #2:
Often accused, held overnight, interrogated, and charged - but never convicted. 

Next - My first blog post.

Tuesday, April 19, 2011

Day 07 - The reason behind your blog name

I wish I could say that the name Divine Plea was chosen for some kind of lofty goal or reason.  In all honesty, it just seemed to be the last Paladin spell not claimed.

Blessing of Kings?  Taken.
Avenging Wrath?  Taken.
Righteous Defense?  Taken.

In the end I was left with Divine Plea, and it's worked.  I mean, really - who doesn't want a blog name with the initials DP?  I kind of makes you wonder about the talent to be honest, especially with my raid group.  For example, I would never - ever- say that I'm hitting the DP or taking DP.  Nooooo.  The only thing I say is "Pleaing" - and I'm sure that gets cut off at the pass by some vent lag and Monger just thinks I have a bladder problem.

I also really wish I had come up with Divine Plea because it was an amazingly overpowered talent.  20% healing reduction for a 25% mana bar return, on a 1 min CD?  I laugh at your mana problems.  At least it's had the duration reduced to 9 seconds.  It's so much easier to squeeze one in now - and I'm definately feeling the mana crunch on some of these heroics. 

So there it is - the secret behind Divine Plea.  I was so loate to the blogging party, it's all that was left. 

Oh, and Drunken Raid Leader was taken too.

Monday, April 18, 2011

Ladies and Gentlemen - Gary Busey

So Vonkaiser - aka Gary Busey - has decided to dust off his blog and start posting again. 

Gary is the MT of Team Intensity, and don't let him fool you.  That sucker really is Gary Busey, I know.  Wanna know how I know?  He's mysteriously absent the day before the next episode of The Apprentice.  Coincidence?  I think not.  Oh yeah - I've also seen the piles of coke.

Anyway - go check out the 5th blogging member of Team Intensity at Wrath of the Lightbringer

I'd be impressed that we have five bloggers in our 10m guild, but Eluethera and Monger don't post much any more, and Wombcrusher only occasionally graces us with his love.

Day 06 - My Desk


So here it is, in all its spelndor.  There are a few key elements to the space though, and we'll cover them from left to right.  I apologize if the photo image is terrible, I took the picture with my phone this morning.

The Green Blanket

On the far left of the deak you'll see a green blanket folded up, with a roll of CAT5 sitting on it.  This is ironic, because normally it's my cat sitting there.  She likes to hang out and watch movies with me, or generally interfere with my ability to manipulate the keyboard.   The network cable is usually under the desk, in case I have to string CAT5 across the house because my wireless is acting up. 

The monitors

I actually don't run dual monitors, I run two desktops.  The one on the left is currently showing The Thomas Crown Affair I think - and this is where I run my music or whatever YouTube nonsense we're sharing at the moment.  The center monitor is my gaming screen, and is still too low, even though it's sitting on a phone book and I think the sixth Harry Potter book. 

Monster

I drink more energy drinks than is healthy I'm sure.  Lo-Carb Monster is my drug of choice these days, though really I'll drink whatever is on sale.  I suppose this is a step up though, since three years ago that would have been a bottle of scotch sitting there. 

The mousepad

Probably the last real interesting thing on my desk is my mousepad.  It USED to be a super nice pad I got from ThinkGeek, however it has about a million hours on it, and so all the texture has been rubbed off, and it's now slick like glass.  If you look closely you'll see that there's some white duct tape and some blue painters tape holding another card on top of it.  It's actually the plastic bottom of a shopping bag, but the size was perfect so I just taped it on.  I might get a new mousepad for Christmas, or I might just cover the thing in duct tape and call it good. 

For those wondering, this modification (much like the running of the CAT5) was made mid raid, after I'd had one too many incidents where my mouse wouldn't track vertically. That's dedication for you right there. 

Tomorrow - The reson this place is called Divine Plea

Friday, April 15, 2011

Day 05 - Favorite item in game

Again - too many that I love to really choose a favorite.  Some of these I've had, some I've just seen used, and others are only really fun because of who uses them.  So here, in no particular order, are my favorite items in game.

Thunderfury 

I'll come right out and say it - I loved this weapon.  Besides being a huge guild acievment, it was just an amazing weapon.  I thought it looked great with my T2 and my ERB (still my favorite shield), and I used it until it was completely useless.  I really regret making my warrior a Tauren now - so ugly.

Noggenfogger Elixir

This item isn't my favorite to use, but our Boomkin has a 22 slot bag full pretty much for every raid.  There's something about seeing a mini-Boomkin just tearing it up that is pretty damn funny.

Parachute Cloak

This might be one of those, favorite moments items instead, but I think fondly on jumping off AB or into the mine with my wonder twin Toby.  It's tough to tell a Retadin and a Holy pally apart when they're both rocking the same looking gear and weapons.  I don't know how many times carrying a two-hander has gotten me ignored while I just sit back and heal. 

I may take the weekend off - so Monday will be day 06, a shot of my desk. 

Thursday, April 14, 2011

10m H-Halfus - with no mage

Last week we lost our mage (if anyone sees a panel van in the greater KC area where the driver is constantly screaming "YOU DOCTOR YET!!?!" at every Asian male he sees, call me) and were forced to go out and find ourselves a replacement.  While we didn't land a mage right away, we did pick up a shaman who seems to be fitting alright - at least he has an active desire to learn.

Catching an interrupt

Traditionally on H-Halfus we used our mage to blink out of the AoE stun and get his interrupt off on the shadow nova.  As long as Crathia (our hunter) wasn't being an idiot and releasing the wrong drakes "But guys, it has an X - it must be right!", this worked every time.  As long as we lived through the first two drakes, the the fight was in the bag. 

Now, not so much.

Things we tried

First thing we did was send Crathia out for a spanking new Nether Ray.  Supposedly you can talent them for a 30% stun reduction, and they have an interrupt.  Now I don't know if it is because the pet wasn't lvl 85, if the stun duration wasn't enough/talented, or if it just doesn't work any more. 

We also had our shaman - who was resto - put in a stun duration reduction meta gem.  That plus the Orc racial (that's right, he didn't sell out and go Goblin) should have been enough to give him time to get a wind shear off.  But that didn't work either. 

We finally resorted to a pally bubble rotation.  Fortunately we have three Paladins, so we were able to bubble through the stuns and get an interrupt off every time.  I suppose we could have used HoP on our Shaman once as well, HoP the shaman, three bubble rotations, then HoP again.  Though I really hope we wouldn't need five interrupts. 

What happened to BTP?

Now I know Bring the Player not the Class has some restrictions on it.  You obviously can't bring all tanks/healers or what have you, and a raid of all melee DPS might have some problems, but this is rediculous.  You could save your potion CD for a Free Action Potion, but then you cut out your DPS boost or a mana pot. 

So I'm ok with having multiple ways out of this, but damn.  Paladins have a 5min CD on their bubble.  Spriest is a 2 min CD on Dispersion.  It's kind of a gong show if you ask me.  I suppose we could have our interrupters get a PvP trinket for the fight, but even that is on a 2 min CD.   /shakes fist

I suppose it is better than Razivus still though - where you HAD to have Spriests for the MC, and back in the 40m raid days you had to bring a whole stable of them.  Speaking of that - was Naxx bigger in the 40m days?  I'm thinking about some of the fights, and damn if it wouldn't be super crowded with 40 people in there. 

Day 04 - Your best wow memory

Coming up with a best memory is really tough.  You could say "these are my top 5 best memories", but that would be pretty silly when you think about it.  I mean, the definition of best is that there's nothing better, otherwise what would be the point of being the best?  That's like when someone tries to say that Infinity+1 is a larger number than Infinity.  It makes no sense because a) Infinity isn't really a number and b) Infinity already covers Infinity.

But I digress.

Instead of listing my best memory, I'll instead list my top memories.  I might even have a screenshot this time. 

So, in no real order (because that would then give weight to the fact that one is indeed the best), here are some of my top memories in WoW.

The /GUIT

Back on Bladefist towards the end of our active raiding, we joined up with a guild to try and do 25m raiding.  Now, you have to picture this - you have a guild of people who want to raid, and 10 of us come in and basically dictate terms and enforce our will on the guild.  Personally if I was the GM I never would have taken the 10 of us on with the demands that I made, but that's his problem not mine.  Now as you can imagine, there was a lot of tension once we came on board, and a lot of the old gaurd didn't like the new swaggar attitude we brought. 

During one particularly tight moment, someone tried to ragequit the guild.  I forget the exact reason, but the short of it was they made this huge rant speech about how everything was going to hell in a handcart with the guild, and then typed in guit.  While I'm probably sure they died of shame after that moment, it was still pretty danged funny and it's a running joke still.

/AMGWEKILLEDRAGAROS!!!!!!111111ONEONEONE

I'm sure I misspelled that, but you get the idea.  This was spammed in /guild after our first Ragnaros kill back on Malygos.  It was back when I was still playing a rogue, but damn if it wasn't a great moment in the game.  I was still a total noob, and this kill opened a huge door into a new level of raiding for me - it also opened the door to tanking as I switched to my warrior soon after.

My buddy and me!

Back when I first started playing, my buddy Mini and I were some total noobs.  I remember trying to do the Deadmines as a rogue/hunter combo - because we had no clue what we were doing.  It wasn't our greatest WoW momeht, but it's definately a great WoW memory. 

Thunder, Thunder, Thunderfury!

This was a really big moment for me, because it was our guild's first Thunderfury.  Getting it was a challenge, and I'm sure Toby thinks I still owe him money from this.  We weren't really even in BWL yet, so we wound up buying the ores from some gold farmer in IF.  It was a big highlight for me, and I do miss being able to just wave it around and have more threat than I knew what to do with.  It also sounded awesome when you used it, and I packed that baby around until the 2nd or 3rd nerf in BC.  Easily my favorite legendary.

Every new bosskill

May sound sappy, but I love new bosskills, especially with my current guild.  Paired with this is every time a BoE epic drops that we can sell for a million dollars (I'm gonna be Oprah rich).  I just love getting new boss kills, and I love not having to grind out any kind of consumable or repair money.  Speaking of, it's about time to make someoen else rich - I need more fortune cookies. 

None is best

So you see, none of these are better than the other - and I"m leaving out a lot as well.  The Starscream incident, every time Twerpinator died, every gnome I've ever killed....

Wednesday, April 13, 2011

Day 03 - My first day playing WoW

I think it was a Friday.  My buddy Mini had come up to Alaska to visit, and we were looking for a new game to try out.  We'd done a lot of Neverwinter Nights, Starcraft, and Diablo - but we needed something fresh.  We'd played Warcraft as a RTS, and there was this new game on the market called "World of Warcraft".  It looked pretty amazing, so we grabbed a couple of copies and loadeded it up.

What a bunch of noobs

So while I don't have my /played or account info in front of me, I'm pretty sure that we started around March in 2005.  I know it was early enough in Vanilla that Scholo and Strat were raids, UBRS was 15 man, and it might have even been before BWL was opened.  Of course, I didn't know what BWL was, what a raid was, or really anything.

What I did know was that I wanted to play a Paladin.  They looked amazing, and I've always enjoyed the Paladin in DND and Diablo II, just without the Lawful Good.  I think this lasted a few days, and then I ditched the Paladin and it took the end of BC to bring me back to it. 

My biggest noob memory

While this wasn't on day one, this is my biggest noob moment from the starting days.  I had rolled a NE rogue and was trying to get from Kalimdor to the Eastern Kingdoms so that Mini (who was a dwarf hunter) and I could level together.  I had no idea that there was a boat in Darkshore, so I started running across the continent thinking the ships would be on the Eastern shores.  Fortunately a kind soul took mercy on me and got me running in the right direction.  /facepalm

Tuesday, April 12, 2011

Day 02 - Why I decided to start blogging

Ah ha!  It's day two, though as Terpinator pointed out so candidly to me last night - I really fail at the whole 'challenge' thing.  So now I'm challenged to stay awake for 2000 hours.  Though not all at once, or individually if I can get my guild to participate. 

Why I started blogging

It's pretty simple to be honest, I like to talk.  Ask Hydra from the Twisted Nether Blogcast - I was chatting up a storm on their show.  I think I'd really like to find a permenant 'guest' spot somewhere.

Back to the blogging. 

Back when I started, I was in a 25m guild doing Ulduar and Naxx.  It wasn't fancy, but I had found myself (repeatedly) writing strats, answering questions about the different classes, guild rules, etc.  So I thought hey - I read a lot of blogs, how hard can it be?  The truth is, it's easy - to get started.  Keeping a regular post schedule is a little tougher though.

The other reason I wanted to start weighing in with my own voice is I saw so many blog posts that were just - wrong.  Or they weren't focused on the heroic end game, but how to gear your starting Paladin.  Sure that's interesting, but I really want to know if that extra .05% haste is worth giving up .02% crit and 50 Spirit.  Those are tough decisions that need more than a "Stack spirit till you die" response.

Why I keep blogging

I enjoy it.  I don't have the writing flair that some do (looking at you Toby), or the graphical style to make it look good - but there's something about writing that actually just 'feels' good.  Who knows.  Maybe it just eats up time at work and that's why I like it.

Saturday, April 9, 2011

Day 01 – Introduce yourself

I'm handling the 20 days of blogging challenge less like a challenge, and more like a chance to get some filler content when I'm not talking about how big the check has to be for me to whore out to the LFD or the state of the Paladin in general.

Introduce yourself

I'm Adgamorix (Hi Adgamorix!) - though that's really just the name my toon happened to have at the moment I decided to start blogging.  If you went back to Malygos in 2007 you would have found me as Tarde in Vanilla, Apokalyptiko in BC (damn name change), etc.  Hell, one of the biggest problems new members to our guild have is that we all use different names for each other.  For example our MT is named Vonkaiser, but we generally call him JM or Gary Busey. 

But this is supposed to be about me I suppose, and not my toon. 

I'm a military brat to start, and I wound up in Alaska working in the oil fields after I got out of the Army.  I'm curretnly employed as a Network Administrator of some type at an Engineering firm, and have been doing IT work for about 11 years.  Way to jump in right after the .dot bomb went off.  I do find it ironic though that I make a rediculous salary for having about nine months of tech school under my belt, while my wife has her masters degree from Notre Dame and takes home about half of what I do.  Funny how shit works out.

Enough about that

Really though, right now I'm Pistonhondo - Holy Pally and one of 10 officers in .  Seeing as we have 10 members, it's not a lot of power.  I've been a guild leader, raid leader, and guild destroyer.  I've gotten server firsts, and missed out on entire raid patches.  Kinda like life I suppose.

Next - Day 02 - Why I decided to start a blog.

Friday, April 8, 2011

They're getting closer

Yesterday Blizzard announced the Call to Arms for LFD, and I pretty much think it's a joke.  John over at BBB flat out states that Blizzard is essentially calling every tank and healer out there a whore - it's just a question of price.

Now I'll be the first to admit that I (and my whole guild for that matter) can be bought.  In Wrath we sold everything we could - from drops in dungeons, Ulduar titles, and mounts - all the way to just flat being working whores in ICC GDKP runs.  It may not be glamorous, but damn if I haven't had to farm for anything in a long time.  This is what allowed me to focus on Archeology and get my little doll in the first few days of Cata, because I just threw down the cash for my Tsunami deck (probably close to 35k).

Entering the other zone

One thing I do enjoy, but rarely get to do, is PvP.  One of the main reasons I don't PvP that often is the barrier to gear that develops, quite similar to the gap between a fresh 85 and someone who's farming Heroic raids.  It's no fun getting blasted in my crafted PvP gear by someone in full Season X PvP stuff.  I'm a tourist, but I want to at least look good while I'm visiting the other parts of the game.

With the announcement today that Coquest and Honor points can be purchased using their PvE equivalents though, I just might be enticed to enter the LFD system again - at least until I get the PvP gear I want.  Given the limits in how quickly you can accrue VPs, it might still take me a few weeks, but it's not like I need any more Valor Boots. 

The problem here though is two fold.  First, this exchange isn't limited to me queing solo, which is what you have to do in order to be eligible for the bonus loot from Call to Arms.  Second, it's a very limited fix - especially since I get a large portion or my weekly cap in VPs from raiding.  This certainly won't entice over players who are raiding 25s.  Hmm - I wonder how this will work for weekly caps?  If I exchange 1000 VPs to Conquest on Wed, can I earn another 1000 on Saturday?

I'm certainly not going to go out of my way to solo enter the LFD with this, but it does give a little more incintive if I'm after a few extra points for the week.  Of course if I don't get into any PvP, it's not really worth it. 

In the end

I think Kurn got a little closer to what really needs to happen to help with the issue in 5 mans.  First, every normal encounter should require the same ratio of tanks/healers/DPS.  I don't think that 'forcing' tanks and healers into the LFD by giving them a stacking buff is the right answer (I forget who had that idea), but if more tanks were required at the end game, you'd have to see more tanks on the way up.

The real issue though is the general asshattery that we see everywhere.  It's not just DPS on Tanks - it's everyone.  Unfortunately the only way I can see fixing that issue involves a lot of geocide - and I don't see Blizzard signing off on that any time soon.

Thursday, April 7, 2011

LFD Call to Arms - I'm going to be rich

One of the disadvantages about living in Alaska and postng when I do is that by the time I get my hands on a piece of 'news', I'm the 7313712 blogger to comment on it.  Fortunately, I don't make a living on reporting breaking news in WoW - this is just my outlet to voice my opinons.  So here we go.

No Sympathy

I've said it before, but I have zero sympathy for anyone who complains about the LFD system que times.  None.  In fact, I think you're a baby just for bringing it up.  Forget the whole "in my day we had to buy our way into a run, and every Scholo was full on rogues" or that things were tougher or longer in Vanilla or BC.  They were just different.  The main difference being that back then you had to scour your guild, friends list, or the /genera/trade/LFG channels to find someone.  You had to run to your instance after taking a taxi, and maybe you'd be lucky enough to have a warlock (though you still needed 3 people to make it work). 

Now you just hit your LFD button and continue to do whatever it is you wanted to do.  I loved it on my Retadin.  I could continue to herb/mine/survey all across the land, and never worry that I wasn't going to get a group.  The only questons were WHEN would I get it, and how bad would they be.  If I really wanted a heroic I could hit up the guild I was in, or put forth the effort to get a group on my own.

But that's where the gear is!

Who gives a ratty-tat-tooy.  If you're trying to gear up to raid, then you should either be in a guild or looking for a group of folks who are also looking to raid and run heroics together.  Say more than 5 words when you get into your random.  I don't know.  Either way, it's not my problem.

Tanks have it the hardest

While this is partially true, I don't buy it completely.  Not putting out competitive DPS?  You'll find yourself LOLNOOBED right out of the dugeon.  Tank decides that facepulling every pack without CC is the way he wants to play?  See ya healer - you obviously suck (especially if you actually need to drink).  Let's be honest with ourselves.  The average LFD group could fit right into the Mos'Eisly cantina. 

I love savings the money

So with the new Call to Arms, which only activates if it detects that there aren't enough of a specific type of players looking (i.e. tanks, heals, lolDPS), how many tanks are actually going to WAIT until the Call to Arms pops up?  Why bother queing if it's down?  You know it'll come back in a few minutes, might as well make some extra money.  This also won't, in my estimation, draw the 359 guild tanks out of the woodwork and into the LFD.  Instead we're going to get FailtankLOLDK number 55.

The only way I see the 'good' tanks stepping back up is if the bags are so full of money and flasks that they never have to farm again.  That's the only possible way I think.  Plus I think in a few months we'll see all the raid mounts added to the stable.  After all, once I get my Deathcharger, why keep going?  Personally, I'd rather just farm Strat instead of dealing with the LFD.

More tank pressure

I think this system is also going to further widen the gulf in the LFD between the trinity.  Why should I worry about dispelling or CCing if I'm a DPS?  You're being PAID to tank this for me.  I expect more than I would get normally.  Or the poor new tank, who really honestly wants to be a tank and isn't just a DPSer in tank clothing.  That guy's life is about to become a living hell.

So, I think this is a terrible idea.  I'm going to milk it on all four tits to be sure, but I don't think thisis going to fix anything in the LFD.

Tuesday, April 5, 2011

Hanging out with the Twisted folks

This Saturday I'm going to be giving a guest appearance on the Twisted Nether blogcast.  You can listen in at the TNB site and participate in a chatroom session. 

It's not quite drunken raid leading, but it could be close.

Saturday, April 2, 2011

Recruiting - One crazy DPS

Real life has struck our merry band of mauraders, and we now find ourselves in the position of having to recruit a full time DPSer.  I'll keep it short and sweet.

Who we are

as a core has been together since Vanilla.  Now we're a 10m guild (literally 10 - no bench) and are currently 4/13 with Magmaw, Chim, Atramedes, and Halfus.  Our roster currently is as follows.

Tanks
Paladin and DK(DPS OS)

Healers
Priest and Pally

Melee
Rogue and Pally

Ranged
Hunter, Spriest (Holy OS), Boomkin (Resto OS)

So our fourth ranged DPS spot is open.  While a mage would be ideal, we're willing to look at any great DPSer.

What you get

All flasks, food, repairs, etc are paid for.  BoEs are sold to fund the guild bank, and it's a profit sharing endeavor. 

Raid times

W/Th/Sat - 6 to 9 PST. 

Interested?

If you're interested, leave a comment, email me, or find us on Stormscale during those times.

Friday, April 1, 2011

Blogspot is being a punk

So blogspot is being a complete POS right now. For whatever reason when I use the compose window, it's not recognizing the carriage returns and putting the

brackets in the HTML code (watch, it'll pick up those brackets right now and bork this post too). This really sucks, because it means that I have to either a) type all my posts in HTML code (f that), b) switch to another hosting service that I can't access from work, or c) deal with my posts just being giant blocks of text. I'm not really keen on the wall of text, since it's difficult to read. I'm really not keen on switching to another host either. I suppose I could type in all the HTML tags, but that just gives me flashbacks to my intro to Web Design class - which I really hated. I suppose it could be my browser or something else (since it seems that bold works fine), but who knows. Now to think up something useful to write about today.