More maintenance, VP changes, and some butterflies

First to Saunder - man, that would suck to have maintenance occur at that time.  It is too bad that the Oceanic folks don't have servers that are a little closer to an AUS timezone.  I mean, even if it was just a little closer that might be better.  Of course you live in Australia/New Zealand - and imo that's just the cat's meow - so you don't really have anything to complain about.  Man I loved visiting Kiwi land.  Friendliest people I've ever met.  Heck, they make Canadians look like the guys from Deliverance.

More Maintenance

Again, sypmathies to the Oceanic folks, as once again the servers were down for maintenance to repair some issue with Honor points that were supposed to go out yesterday.  These points were Blizzard's attempt to make whole the people who bought the new honor gear at the end of last season, only to discover a week later that a whole new tier of equipment had been added for the same costs.  I would have been upset myself, but the fix seems to be a general bandaid instead of actually adressing the issue.  While it probably could have been addressed faster, or cleaner, it's at least something other than a giant middle finger.  

Elegant?  No.  Efficient?  Yes.  Well, other than that whole second day of maintenance thing.  

VP Changes to T11

Also updated this week (or hotfixed in, though why they wouldn't wait is beyond me), T11 bosses now award 35VP each, allowing you to pick up 420VP if you do all 12 T11 bosses.  I don't know if the BH boss was included in this or not.  While there's certainly those that think this is a "Slap in the face" to raiders in Firelands, becuase now you can get T12 without actually doing T12 content - this really doesn't change anything.  You're not going to get more VP than before, it's just another way of getting it.  Maybe this will save you from the ZG run I had, where one DPS would AFK, the tank was sloooowwwww, and his 2nd DPS buddy was pulling 6k.  I had been 85 for like 12 hours and was doing better than that.  I think that run took 2.5 hours to complete, but time slows when you're that numb from pain.

So what does this really do for you?  Well, to start, if you're not raiding, you can cut out 1/2 (or even all) of your troll dungeons if you're actively clearing 12/12 in normal T11.  The upside to this is standard heroics take less time, have a greatter margin for error, and may even have faster queue times.  Granted, you have to run 2 regulars to equal one troll, but some days it may be worth it.  Too bad you can't queue for either/or at the same time.

My butterflies

Last week after Team Intensity broke up (or at least stopped raiding and started seeing other people), I had an opportunity pop up that I've managed to make work.  I moved my Warlock, and have been raiding on him - or trying to.  I hit 85 about 5 days ago, burned through about 15k in gold to powerlevel alchemy and buy some BoEs, slapped on some VP bracers and JP boots, and a whole lot of enchants.  So after being 85 for less than a week, I've got 4 pieces of BiS gear, almost got myself a new neck (have I mentioned my distaste for dailies?), and even managed to snag myself a nice dagger upgrade.

The problem is, last night was my first raid with my new guild.  While I only had one death that I would attribute to my failure (I ran between two lava sprinklers on Alysrazor), my DPS numbers were (in my opinion) low for the gear I'm sporting.  Some things will come with a bit more practice (choosing BoA vs BoD, manually keeping my pet on one target instead of having them run around, when to apply CoE vs leaving it off, life-tapping on the run, etc), and others will come as I get used to the rotations.  

Right now there are three, maybe four, things that I'm going to focus on tonight to try and boost my DPS.

• Take my pet off assist, and have them manually attack the target that will live the longest/move the least.  Watching my Felhound/Felgaurd run around chasing Riplimb made me sad.
• Less chasing targets to apply DoTs.  I spent a lot of time moving when I should have just planted and casted, waiting for the target to get back into range.
• SWITCH TO SOULFIRE AT 25%.  This alone, especially on bosses or adds that live longer than 8 seconds, will push my DPS way up.  Soul Burn for the instant at 26%, and away we go.  Of course I have to keep my DoTs up while doing it, but still.
• Immolation Aura and Shadowflame.  When I can, get into melee and get these rolling.  Great for Alysrazor and Beth where you're stacked up on them.  Less so on Shannox where there's traps everywhere.

I've also been tempted to pick up Destro as an off-spec.  I know it's a few % lower than Demo according to the fine folks at EJ,  Bane of Havoc looks to be pretty nice for those fights where it's a little tougher to get in ranged of that 2nd or 3rd target.  Affliction might also be an option.  I'll have to spend some time this weekend playing with the two builds to see which I like best.  The only reason I lean towards Destro is that the defensive CD is pretty amazing.  I certainly appreciate whenever someone can reduce the amount of healing they need due to unavoidable damage.

So we'll see what happens.  Right now I'm just practicing my rotations and trying to stay out of the bad.  Oh, and if anyone knows of some decent Warlock blogs, that'd be awesome.  Don't fear, my Paladin isn't shelved forever, and I'm still going to write about Pallies (especially now that even Kurn is on board with Mastery) - but there's going to be some Warlockery thrown in from time to time as well.