They Think It’s All Over…

Surprise!  No, I’m not back at the wheel yet, but this newfangled internet thing seems to have actually found its way onto Her Majesty’s Ships, so while I can’t play for another month I can at least write about playing.  A poor second best, but beggers can’t be choosers.

One fact that hasn’t escaped my attention is that it’s just over a year since I was last stuck in some godforsaken military outpost with little to do other than read WoW Blogs, all of which inspired me to start my own, the results of which you can see before you.  One year later, two facts leap to mind.  The first is that Pew Pew Lazerz is a year old and I hadn’t noticed.  The second is that there’s nothing written on another blog that I can’t shamelessly rip off and use as inspiration for my own!

So, drawing “inspiration” from one of the posts at Egotistical Priest I’ve enjoyed reading on those long night watches, my question to you is this:

If you could sit down with a WoW developer over coffee and bagels for a half hour, what would you ask them to change about the game?

I’ll kick off with a few examples.

1.  Remember at Blizzcon before WotLK was released when the devs said Mages were going to be the undefeated, unparralled, unrivalled masters of AoE damage?  Apparently what they meant by that was they were going to give everyone an AoE ability that was just as good as anything we had.  Except for those classes that already had better AoE than us.  Obviously.  So what I’d ask for is something, anything, that mages could do better than, or at least as well as, anyone else.  Just a friendly word of warning before someone shouts “portals!” or “Gief cake!”  We have very long memories, we hold grudges and we can set you on fire by just thinking about it.

2.  This next one I read over at Egotistical Priest and I think it’s awesome.  Make Consecration heal any friendly target standing in it.   There may be a dozen different reasons why this is never going to happen, but I don’t want to think of any of them because the idea is just so awesome.  It doesn’t have to be a massive heal, let it tick for the same amount that Consecration already does damage.  Paladins won’t care, they’ll be too happy to finally be able to heal more than one person at once without a bandaid or a glyph.  It even makes sense from a lore perspective.  Take a good look at your nearest Holy paladin.  More armour than the USS Missouri and a shield you could block the Death Star’s exhaust port with.  WHY is he/she standing at the back with the squishies?  Alexandros Mograine, Tirion Fordring, Uther the Lightbringer…  these names ringing any bells?  When the brown smelly stuff hits the air recirculation unit, these were not people you saw at the back, hiding behind the priests.  Get the paladins into battle where they belong!

Except Galadan, obviously.  He’s too pretty to get his armour dirty.

3.  Make flying mounts work everywhere.  Yes, I know it would mean a crapload of effort that could be used making new stuff instead, and I know it will never happen.  But we can fantasise.

4.  Let Calli be a Gnome.

5.  Get someone who’s actually been to Scotland to do the Dwarf female voices.  Please.

So.  What would your choices be?

So Long And Thanks For All The Fish

Well, I must take my leave of you all, I’m off to the South Pacific for two months and I’ll be in a Warcraft-free zone until mid-August.  I’m getting withdrawal symptoms already and I don’t leave until Monday!  I have a day in the air courtesy of Iberian Airlines to look forward to, a five hour Naxx 25 fail PuG sounds good in comparison.

So until August, may all your loot be epic, and all your raids be wipe-free.  Take care!

Nerf Deathknights!

So.  Now that Calli is a Crusader I’m doing the Argent Tournament dailies on Sithica, my brand spanking new level 80 Deathknight.  I tend to do the Battle Before the Citadel quest then head a few dozen yards north to Malykriss to mop up some Scourge for the Field Training quest.  Because Malykriss is one of the more heavily phased locations in Icecrown you can usually count on not seeing many other players there despite its’ proximity to the heavily farmed Court of Bones location.  A major plus point for mages is that the abominations there are one of the few in Icecrown who won’t drag you towards them with scourge hooks!

A few days ago was no exception.  The only people in Malykriss were myself and a lone Blood Elf hunter.  There are upwards of 30 mobs in this area at any one time, and the most you need to kill for the Field Training quests are 15.  Combine that with the fact that the mobs in Malykriss respawn at a ridiculously fast rate and the two of us sharing the place was really no problem at all.  In point of fact, even if we started at both ends and worked towards the middle, there is no way we could have killed everything in there without respawns appearing before we were even close to halfway through.  So, no reason to get competitive for kills, right?

*sigh*

This fruit elf obviously thought differently.  As I was dealing with an abomination he came running over, dragging the two geists and one deathknight he was already fighting with him, and proceeded to aggro the other three abominations in the area I was working, plus the two deathknights that patrol there.  He then feigned death, let his pet tank, and started to aoe them down.  I finished off  my abomination and watched, bemused, as his pet dropped like a stone under the combined assault of the eight mobs he’d aggroed and he was forced to flee the area, losing aggro as he phased out into the Court of Bones.  After they’d safely reset and I was killing the final abomination I needed for my quest, he phased back into the area, /spat on me, and rezzed his pet.

Let’s just say there are some things in this game that I will just never understand.  This is one of them.  Just to put things into perspective, he actually came over from where he was fighting other mobs and put himself at risk for no other reason than to screw me over.  He even failed at that.  I just don’t get the motivation behind that mindset.

Other things I don’t understand are the people in chat looking for “more dps for Naxx10, must have good gear and do 2500+ dps”.  Newsflash guys, if you’re doing over 2500 dps, you don’t need to be in Naxx 10 anymore.  Or you’re a Deathknight.

Seriously, Sithica facerolls all over quests that Calli wouldn’t even think of attempting alone, and Sithica’s been 80 for about five days.  Calli meanwhile, is wearing three pieces of Tier 8.5 gear, best in slot headpiece, trrinkets and shoulders and has the life expectancy of a mayfly against anything that can’t be snared.  You know those flesh giant elites in Icecrown you need a spinal cord from for the Basic Chemistry quest?  Calli can’t even look one in the eye without a tank around.  Fingers, my Rogue, can kill one providing he has a health pot and all his cooldowns are ready.  Sithica was taking them on two at a time the day she hit level 80 and not dropping below 50% health.  She soloed the battle at Valhallas at level 79, only needing help from a Ret Pally for the last boss.

This weekend, the day after dinging 80, I managed to get her into a Naxx 10 raid as an offtank. I know, I know…  I am quite wierd amongst Deathknights in that I’m actually prepared to tank for my supper.  Sithica’s gear was a mixture of crafted epic and reputation faction blue tanking gear, fleshed out with some Auction House and crafted blues.  Nothing special, in other words.  In this “nothing special” starter tank gear,  she has almost as much health and 6000 more armour than my Ulduar10-geared Warrior tank, Gorn.  Go figure.

Well anyway, it was a good raid.  I was pretty lucky in that the Main Tank was an overgeared Protection paladin who was just running Naxx for a laugh, and didn’t have to actually do much serious tanking except on those bosses where two tanks are required.  Thaddius for example, is always a fun tank fight.  Aaaaanyway, we get to Kel’thuzad himself and I prep Sithica to stand aside nice and safe in phase 2, ready to pick up and offtank the Guardians of Icecrown in phase 3.   All went according to plan, the Big Bad reached 40% health and summoned his Guardians, I taunted one and Deathgripped another, then stepped aside to tank them safely while the raid nuked Kel’thuzad down his final 40% health.

It was at 37% when the Main Tank got bored and alt-tabbed out to check Facebook.  At 35%, a shadow fissure opened underneath the Main Tank and he dropped like a stone.

I’m not making this shit up.

So.  I’ve been level 80 for two days, I’m wearing quest rewards and crafted tank gear and I’m now tanking not only the two Guardians of Icecrown, but after the fastest taunt you’ve ever seen, I’m also tanking Kel’thuzad himself.  It got a bit emotional.  What it didn’t get, is messy.  I tanked him and the Guardians the final 35%, Kel’thuzad died, the Guardians retreated, we grabbed the loot, and I realised that Deathknights really, REALLY need a nerf.

Missed Me?

Well it’s been a busy month and I apologise for the lack of updates but I’ve been away on a number of courses and spending evenings at home playing rather than writing about playing.  There have been a number of things I wanted to do with the blog, especially in the light of changes in patch 3.1, in particular an update of the profession changes is due.  Yes, Lightweave Embroidery no longer sucks, in fact it’s a good reason to retain tailoring now that it gives a 250 spellpower proc!

In other news, since spirit is also a moderately useful stat for mages after 3.1, I’ll also have to update the Pimp My Mage posts to take this into account.  I think Blizzard are still in a state of denial with their mage itemisation choices, though.  They went through such a song and dance about forcing mages to accept spirit on their gear then they give us the Conqueror’s Kirin Tor Gauntlets, Leggings and Collar of the Wyrmhunter.  Not that I’m complaining, just bewildered.  It could be a lot worse, I could be a feral druid.

Speaking of Ulduar gear, I’m enjoying the boss fights in that place, both in 10 and 25 man mode.  It’s nice to have boss fights that you can’t faceroll your way through again.  And yes, I include Flame Leviathan in that category, because hard though it may be to believe, according to some statistics I saw the other day, 49% of guilds manage to wipe on him.  Really.

So I raid Ulduar 25 on Calli, my mage.  Ulduar 10 in two seperate raid groups on Gorn (warrior tank) and Aluriel (priest).  It’s fair to say I’ve seen the fights from just about every perspective, although Gorn’s group hasn’t progressed past any Keeper other than Auri…  Auria..  Auriy..   Crazy Cat Lady.  But the 25 man raid has started on Yogg-Saron and Aluriel’s group have downed Mimiron, so, things are going nicely.

But enough of that, I have something funny to tell you.  I’m levelling Sithica my Deathknight at the moment, and she just hit level 76.  A few nights ago I’d blasted through the Wintergarde Keep quests to get to the Wrathgate and Battle for the Undercity, and after my Wrathgate achievement was announced to guildchat, I got a whisper from one of our druids who was also about to do the Battle for the Undercity and wanted to group up with me.  For those of you who don’t know (or play Horde) here’s how the quest line works for Alliance:

Participate in the Wrathgate, speak to Alexstrasza.  She gives you a quest to return Highlord Fordragon’s shield to King Varian in Stormwind.  Varian goes nuts, Jaina Proudmore asks him to hold fire until she can find out from Thrall what happened.  She asks you to accompany her and go to Ogrimmar, and she opens a portal direct to Thrall’s council chambers.  After speaking to Thrall, she portals you back to Stormwind where Varian has gone off the deep end and organised an assualt on Undercity, to which Jaina opens you another portal.  You attack Undercity, slay High Apothecary Putress, yadda, yadda, yadda, save the day, blah blah..   it’s all very exciting stuff.

Anyway.

I whisper our druid friend back and say sure, I’d be happy to do the quest with him, I’ll meet him in Stormwind.  He says he’s already done that part and will meet me in Ogrimmar instead.  I’m now a bit confused.  Because of the way phasing works, his comment didn’t really make a lot of sense, until I shift-click on his name in chat and see that he’s in The Barrens.

Let’s just go back to that part of the quest recap where I said Jaina Proudmore opens a portal direct to Thrall’s council chambers. More specifically, opens a portal to a phased instance of Thrall’s council chambers that exists seperately from the rest of the game world and doesn’t prevent Horde guards from chopping your liver out if you don’t take the portal but instead fly to Menethil Harbour, catch a boat to Theramore, run through Dustwallow Marsh, head north into The Barrens, cross the river into Durotar and get your dumb ass pvp flagged trying to walk into the front gates of the Orc and Trolls’ capital city.

Oh how we laughed.  Well,  I did.

And then it ocurred to me.  I’d done something equally as dumb myself.  Calli is the mage that all the mage alts and new mages in the guild tend to ask about specs, gear etc.  A week or so before, while in Ulduar 25 on Calli, one of these mages (very competent now, I hasten to add) whispered me asking why, since I was now a Fire/Arcane mage, did I still have the Glyph of Frostfire equipped?  Was there some sneaky mage trick I was keeping to myself for imba dps?  Er no.  I’d just..  you know..  forgotten to reglyph after 3.1.

I think I got away with it.

And now for some screenshots!

New mount!  Sure, she’s a bit slow, but how can you not love her?

Yeah ok, you can probably take chasing achievements just a little too far.

No, not a naked raid, but one of the better graphics bugs.

Jingles’ Big Adventure

Once upon a time, there was a handsome young gnome named Jingles.  Jingles was a small gnome with big ambitions.  It was Jingles’ ambition to take over the world, send all the males to work in the Salt Mines and all the women to his harem.  But first, Jingles was going to have to gain enough power to make sure that those few foolish enough to object to his master plan could be squished as an example to the others.  So Jingles became a Warlock.

Amazingly, this in itself wasn’t enough to achieve world domination.  Muttering under his breath about warlock nerfs, Jingles set off to Northrend to seek his fortune.

He met lots of interesting people, and while certain mages might want you to believe that he pooped his pants, Jingles was obviously only acting scared of the Lich, Kel’zan, in order to lull him into a false sense of security.  Yeah, that’s it.

The one thing Jingles noticed about transportation in Northrend…

Is that while the methods and modes are rich and varied..

They’re all uniformly unreliable!

So if you absolutely, definitely have to get around in Northrend, get a Magnificent Flying Carpet.  It’s a very fast Rug!

In Sholozar Basin, Jingles met a very strange gnomish couple.  The husband seemed relatively normal…

But there was something odd about his wife that Jingles couldn’t quite put his finger on…

Clearly, Hemet Nesingwary knows talent when he sees it.  The Mighty Jingles will allow him to have Sundays off from the Salt Mines when he takes over the world.

And these three Dwarves owe him BIG favours!

Accepting the inevitable, Thorim the Stormlord bowed down before his new Master.

But Darkrider Arly played hard to get.  The little minx!  She will be mine, oh yes!

And before very long, The Mighty Jingles reached the pinnacle of his powers (and level 80) and the road to world domination was complete.  If all males could please report to Thorim for your Salt Mine labour allocation, and females report to Darkrider Arly for your nightgown fitting, that would be lovely.  Thanks.