Food glorious food

It's been a while since my last post... again.

Apologies if any of you ahve been waiting with baited breath for the next installment of my rantings. But I doubt there's many (if any) of you.
I've just been too busy at work recently, and with a pending promotion possibility, that is obviously taking priority right now.

But I haven't been neglecting my WoW duties either. More progress in Naxx, the Munquis have reached Kel'Thuzad but, despite tactical changes and hours of wipes, the Positional-Fu was just not with us that night. And we had to give it up. But it's a definite win for next time.

I've been using the rest of my spare time to level up my cooking skills.
Not too bad at all. I'm now on 420 cooking. And it cost me a minimal 400g on the AH to buy all the mats I needed.
Many of which I then re-sold for a small profit, and so off-set some of the cost.

The rest I picked up myself. Which made me even more money, since animals tend to have nice skins, which I also take, and are often surrounded by herbs which I also take, and occasionally they also drop nice items, which I take.
So after almost reaching the max cooking skill, I now have 1500g in the bank (1k more than I started with), and another 1kg sat on the AH. What credit crunch?

As a side efffect of killing all of those mobs, my gorrila also hit 80, and has become a practically unstoppable killing machine. He's more than capable of tanking about 10-12 level 80ish mobs, and since my DPS is high, I can nuke them all within seconds, and we move on to the next batch.

It's got to the point where, if I see a group of mobs close together, I'll even dismount, just because it's so quick for me to kill them, and the rewards are so high.

Unless Blizz bring in a patch that makes them uncrittable I don't think he's going to be tanking any heroics, but he's more than suitable for an overgeared group, or for trash.

It's like having my own personal Paladin. Can't wait until next patch when I can take my DPS pet out, and switch between them without having to visit a stable.

Online with EVE

Well, I signed up with steam for my 21 day free trial of EVE. And then un-installed steam and used the seperately downloaded client.

It was a 1.1GB download but luckily I live in a city, the same one where my ISP has it's head office, so I generally get decent speeds. Last night, my 8Mb connection was actually running at 9Mb for some reason, so it took me about 26 minutes to get the full game. Not bad at all.
So I used the time to finish off another few levels of Army of Two.

Anyway, I installed the game, tweaked a few things, and logged in. After being guided through the setup process, I was dropped into the middle of the universe in a ship. And a little system-shock style computer guided me through a few of the basics.

Before long, I'd destroyed 3 other ships and mined a little ore. And then My other half came home so that was the end of the nights exploring. In total, I think I moved about 30km from my starting position. I guess it's "One small step for man" in this case.

My first impressions are good. It's a nice looking game, but only after much tweaking of graphics settings. At first I had giant black blobs on my screen where something was wrong with the clipping and shadow effects. But managed to get it sorted with only a couple of attempts.

The UI is a bit daunting at first, but I was expecting that anyway. At one point I lost one of my info screens, and never figured out how to get it back up. (The one that shows me what's nearby).
This was probably the most useful screen, so I was a bit lost without it.

The other good news is that at least 2 of the other Munquis also play EVE, and that would obviously make the whole experience much better. And from what I've read, it's much easier to function as a group, and easier to make profits etc...

I haven't made a decision on the game, after my only minimal amount of play, but things are positive so far. Who knows, if things pan-out maybe there'll be a Munqui Corporation?

Don't worry though WoW fans, I'm not planning on hanging up my hunters bow at any time soon. But it's nice to have a change of scenery now and then. And you couldn't ask for a bigger change than WoW -> EVE.

Watch this space... or that space... or any space for that matter, you just might see a player named Smythy flying through it.

EDIT: BTW Brast, I don't know if it's only happening to me, but every time I try to log onto the Munqui forums my Browser crashes. Never done it before. Any ideas?

EVE-HO!

I've been reading up on alot of the other MMORPG's lately, and the one that's grabbed my attention most is EVE Online.
Yes, it's been in the news alot recently, about political assasination, plots to overthrow major corporations, dirty dealings and scandal. But it's apparently all hapenning in EVE too. ;)

Now I don't believe that I'd be dropped right into that whole mess of things from the word go. It obviously takes months, if not years, of practice to become that involved.
But it did open my eyes to the concept of the game. And that appeals to me.

It seems to mirror life in alot of ways, and I could happily see myself as a rogue mercenary cruising through the universe taking out anyone for the right amount of money.
Or as a 'transporter' who moves 'goods' around without asking too many questions.

I know there's a free trial of the game available, and I'm considering downloading it and giving it a go.

I may report back from the far reaches of space in my next post. (or Not)

Long Time No-See

Well hello there, long time no-see.

It's been a while since I updated my blog. I usually write at work, and I've just been too busy recently.
But since I've got a bit of down-time, here's whats been happening lately;

First off, I got my Drake. It's the red one from Wyrmrest, that costs 1600g.
I had to borrow a little gold to be able while I waited for my AH stuff to sell, so 'Thanks' to Funk for that one.
By the way - I hope you got the cash I mailed you back? Haven't seen you online since.

Secondly, I ran a few old dungeons with some other Munquis. they were both in the Caverns of Time. Black Morass (Opening of the dark portal) and Escape from Durnholde Keep. Both are excellent examples of why some of the old content is much better than the newer stuff.
Sure they are both TBC heroics, but they, and some of the pre-TBC stuff are much better designed and much more fun than the average instance these days.

With some of the old dungeons you felt that you had a quest to accomplish, even if it was destroying the world, or rescuing the leader of the horde, or reaching a pirate ship in the middle of a cave. And the sense of achievement when you complete them is much higher than say Utgarde Keep.
In Utgarde you're basically just grinding through mobs to reach the bosses, with no emotion or feeling, and no real sense of what you're doing it for (other than a drop or an emblem).
Being sent into the Deadmines to put a stop to the threat of the pirates, or into the Stockades to put down an uprising... these things felt more epic than "Ingvar works for Arthas. Go and kill him".
In a way, I think attunements should be brought back in. Yeah it's aggravating if you want someone on your team who isn't attuned, but so what, at least you feel more a part of the storyline. And you've actually earned your place on that raid team.

I'll stop waffling on now... Maybe

Thirdly, I've been grinding money, mainly for my new Drake, and mainly in Sholazar.
Just doing circles of one small corner of that place provides me with enough skins and herbs to keep me going. And I can make hundred's of gold in around an hour. It's also a good area to level my pets up. So my Gorrilla (tank) is now almost 80 too.
It was amazing watching how much better he gets just for the sake of a couple of levels.
When he was the same level as the mobs, he was being hit hard, and I pulled aggro constantly. Now he's only 2 levels higher, he's almost unstoppable and it's much more difficult for me to get hit. Which is perfect for grinding.
With his AoE thunderstomp, it's like having a Pally in my pocket. Send him in, get him to round up all of the mobs in the area, throw him a heal or two, and Volley the shit out of anything near him. When there's 10+ mobs in his range, it takes me at least twice as long to skin them than it does to kill them.
It's a shame that Hunters can't cast 'Thorns', it'd make for a proper mini-pally.

I can't wait until Blizz allows me to switch pets without going to a stable, it'll be so much more useful to have a spare tank in my pocket for the times when something more tactical than a tank-and-spank is called for. Or to switch between my Cat and a Corehound for caster encounters, or maybe a Scorpid for when range is essential.

Arms Race

The Munquis ran their 2nd night of official Naxx raiding last night.
It didn't go well. Hours were spent wiping and rezzing took forever, because some of the players had mis-spent their youth, and not played computer games. (You know who you are).

My DPS was top of the charts... Great. It just concerns me a little that I was waaaaaaay out in front last night.
By the end of the run I'd dealt around 1,200,000 damage more than the next nearest person to me (Grenthal - DPS Warrior). And half a million more to the next person below that.
Yes, some of the other DPS'ers were busy with other tactics, but that's just not right. And we only killed 3 bosses.

I'd bought a new scope for my bow before going. Changing +15 Dmg to +40 Crit, I like that change, and I'll stick with it. And I had an Endless Rage potion, which brought me up to 5102 AP (Buffed).

Alot of the bosses in Naxx seem to be more suited to ranged DPS than Melee. That's a bit unbalanaced too.

In case Blizz asks though. I never said that.

*Ducks the Nerf-Bat*

Definitely Maybe

My hunter managed to pick up his new staff from VH the other day. It was incidental, not planned.
I was just grinding emblems for my Pallies XP boosting shoulders. Got them now.

However, there was an ulterior motive. I actually arranged the group to do a CoT: Stratholme run, for another chance to roll on the drake.
Unfortunately, we were nowhere near quick enough. We actually wiped a couple of times. I'd never done that before in Strat.

So the emblems were helpful but no Drake-roll.
However, for the last few weeks, I've been wearing my Wyrmrest tabard. And didn't realise how close I was to Exalted. I dinged during the VH run.

But now I'm in a quandry. Do I just keep running CoT: Strat for the timed Drake. Which depends heavily on the team I'm with, and how many are rolling on it. Or do I spend 1.6k Gold on the Wyrmrest drake. (I'm about 500g short, so will need to save up anyway).????

Decisions, Decisions. Not sure what to do about this one.

Prot-Power

I made my mind up over the weekend. My Pally will be my next lvl 80.
My Hunter is in lockdown now until Naxx. His only job may be to collect another 14 emblems for some heirloom shoulders for my Pally.

Re-Specced my Healadin to a Tankadin. Did some research, figured out the mechanics. I've been a pally tank plenty of times before, but it seems to have changed quite alot since I last did it.

Spent about 30g on the AH, to replace my Kara epic healing gear with stuff that gives Stam & Strength, and I was off into Northrend.

The result? Suprise.

Yeah, I'm not a noob at the game, and I'm no stranger to Pally mechanics, and my Macro skills help alot. But you can't tell me that I'm supposed to be able to ride into the middle of Skorm with mainly healing gear equipped (even if it was epic). Aggro 12 or more mobs and finish the fight with full mana and almost full health?!?!

I'm not complaining, much. It's going to mean my Pally is much quicker to level than even my Hunter was. And when he gets his heirloom shoulders the +10% xp will boost it even further.

Rested xp meant about 2k per kill. Even keeping to 10 mobs at a time, they'll all die easily within about 30 seconds... that's 20k per group, and 40k per minute.
And those mobs respawn fast.
Even allowing time for repairs (because it's a lot of wear and tear on my armor) that means I could do nothing but grind those mobs for just over an hour, collecting loads of trash, cash and loot, and have gained a level by the end of it.

Did someone say "Nerf"?

House Call

I've been reading Tobolds Blog, as I always do.
And one of the comments on "How to spend Gold in Warcraft" has intrigued me.

It suggests a new profession, linked directly to Player Housing.

I think we would all love Player (or at least Guild) Housing to become a reality, and if it ever does, what will you do with that nice new hovel you probably just paid 100,000 Gold for?

Furnish it, of course.

So what about a new LumberJack / Carpentry profession combo? I think that is a great idea (Credit to the original poster).

And to ensure that the profession doesn't dry-up as soon as everyone has already bought their furniture (like Inscription sort of has). How about a durability rating for the furniture?

Over time / use the furniture degrades and needs to be repaired otherwise it will be un-useable.
So the furniture requires maintenance, and materials, which obviously have to be paid for.
This keeps the Carpenters in business, and provides another gold-sink for Blizz.

And what about the combo of StoneMason / Builder, to build the housing in the first place, with a durability rating on the houses themselves?

Or Mortgage Lender / LoanShark to get you the sort of money you're going to need to pay for all this stuff.
I suppose Blizz could do this via an NPC though, and if you don't make your payments on time, they'll make you Bankrupt and re-possess everything you own. Or maybe that's just too much like real life these days.

Seriously though, there's also a few other profession combos that I could see working within the game:

Inker / Tattooist - Collect Inks, maybe from Herbs, or dust looted from mobs. And then Use them to create Tattoos, which augment the body. Stats boosts etc...

Inker / Dyer - As above, but creates Dyes that allow you to re-color your gear, or even Paint your house with them. I'm guessing that a bottle of Black dye would be very expensive.

PackHorse / Mercenarys - If this gets introduced, I think it should be a profession. The crafter uses weapons and armour to kit out a 'New Recruit' NPC. The better the gear, the better the NPC's stats. This could find a use for all those trash blues and greens that drop from heroics / raids. The Mercenaries can then be 'hired' on the AH. As the crafter, you get the bonus of being able to equip your own Mercs with more gear once they are complete, and they don't have a time limit. (Similar to the Diablo II system).
The NPC's obviously couldn't have too much HP / DPS or it would over-balance things. And, for the non-crafters, a time limit of a week. Then you'd have to 'Hire' another one.

Bear with It

I recently decided to roll a new toon. A Druid.
I've always fancied the class, but never gotten round to actually making one.
The theory of being all the classes rolled into one seems appealing, mainly because it gives flexibility to the guild.
Spec'ing Feral would allow me to focus on DPS, but also provide Tanking for guild runs if needed, by using the same talents, but maybe a change of gear.
And when Dual-Spec finally arrives, I'd be a potential DPS / TANK with the bonus Healer option thrown in.

Druids are the only class that can do this. Pallies are excellent. And I still love them, although I resent the fact that I rolled a dwarf. I don't know why, but that seriously irritates me, and puts me off playing it.
But even With Dual-Spec a Pally can only do 2/3 things, because the talent trees are totally seperate. Ret = DPS, Prot = TANK, Holy = Healer.

Only problem is, it means levelling an entirely new toon from 1-80 and I don't know if I have the patience for it.
My Hunter can't really get any more upgrades from the Emblems of Heroism, but has quite a few spare, and will be getting plenty more from Naxx soon.
With just another 19 of them, I can buy a set of the Heirloom shoulders to give +10% XP, then maybe I'll send them to my Pally, and try and power level him to 80.
Only problem there is, If I buy the Plate ones, they'll only be useable by Pallies and Warriors.
I suppose 40 emblems isn't really too hard to get though, if I wanted another set.

Concerning my Druid... I love the theory, but will it pan-out in practice. I don't know.

Knowing me, I'll proabably get the shoulders, and maybe a weapon, and send them down to my Pally to boost him through to 80.
I can live with ONLY being a Tank and a Healer. If DPS is required, that's what my Hunter is the expert at.

Raidical

We did a guild run of Sartharion last night. All went well, I was 2nd in the DPS meter, but it was a very close thing between Grenthal and Myself, with the number one spot changing places a few times.

We did great, took Sartharion with no drakes up, and only 1 death from a semi-squishy melee. Pretty good for a first attempt... a little too good in fact.

My main concern is how easy it all was. It felt no more difficult than a standard heroic. And out chances of failure were very slim.
Having now run the Arachnid Quarter of Naxx, and the Obsidian Sanctum on 10 men, I can safely say that 10-man raiding isn't what it used to be.

These days it seems to be more of a case of a standard heroic, but with 10 men, instead of 5.

Kara used to be a challenge, with a steep learning curve, whether you knew the boss tactics or not, you had to stay on your toes.
With the raids I've done so far, that's not the case.
Sure, there's a bit of positional tactics going on, and a few techniques. But I haven't seen a wipe yet. Only the occasional squishy going down to a random hit.

The Munquis are investing alot of time into preparing for raiding, and to be honest, I'm not so sure if it's going to be needed. The same team that made the run last night would appear to be able to clear Naxx quite easily, or at least with very minimal wipes.
I think we may be over-thinking the whole Naxx thing.

Should it really be this easy? Or maybe we're all just better than we think?

PUG'ing Hell

The other guildies were all busy yesterday, when I logged on.
So I played with my spec for a bit. And re-tuned my glyphs and macros to match.

Looks like I'm on to a winner with my new build design. (See previosu post).
But any nerfs or changes to the global cooldowns could throw the whole thing out of whack.

Anyway, for a bit of field testing I decided to try a PUG.
Yes, you read that right, a Pick Up Group. Anyone who knows me, has a fair idea that I have a very low opinion of PUG's.
Generally I consider it a better idea to do guild runs, and PUG empty spaces if needed. That way, there's usually only 1 slacker to deal with, and sometimes you can be pleasantly suprised with how good they are. A few of the Munquis themselves were picked up in that way.

So Violet Hold is the daily... great... nice and quick, and a possible chance for my staff too.

Luckily enough, I tend to get picked up quite quickly in the PUGs if I post my Attack Power in the Comments... Funny that.

A Pally, a Warrior, a DK, and a Mage. Excellent, no Druid competition for my staff either.
But that's where the good news ended. The Tank was slow in picking up adds, so they were running around all over the place. Meaning I had to use my pet to off-tank when they charged the healer / mage.
And the Mage had a tendancy to let loose before the tank had even started to tickle them, which made the bad tanking even worse.
The DK was also quite low on the DPS meter, so although he/she wasn't doing anything wrong, we were struggling to clear the mobs before the next portal appeared.

Somehow, we managed to reach the final boss but only with 4 men. The DK had died almost 4 portals ago, but there had been no time to rez him, and he obviously felt it was too much like hard work to just run back in.
So the healer got ALOT of greif and was ordered to rez him when Cyagnosia had already spawned. Dumb Shits.

The healer did as ordered, and the group wiped within about 10 seconds. Amazing!

That not being bad enough, the other 3 imediately started to flame the healer as a "Nuub", and not politely.
I gave them some stick back, and told them to STFU, if they thought they would have got as far without him they were wrong. His healing was more than good enough, considering the lack of control on the adds.

Unsuprisingly, the healer quit the group. At which point, I quit too... Badges or no badges, Staff or No Staff, I'd rather live without them, than spend any more time with dicks like that.

I whispered the Healer to try and re-assure him that his healing had been fine, but got no response.
In fact, the healer hadn't said a single word throughout the entire run, other than a "rdy" at the very start.

It's for all the reasons above that I seriously despise PUG's. That healer was a Pally, and good at his job. But with dick-heads like that greifing healers everytime things go wrong it's no suprise that most people don't like to play healers. And the next time I see that Pally, he'll probably be waving a shield and spamming consecration.

PUG-Off

Spec Spending

After the improvement I've seen in my DPS since my little re-spec the other day, I thought I'd do a bit of research on my chosen talent points.

It turns out that many of the tooltips are either a little misleading, or when you do the maths don't really add up to much.

So at some point this weekend, I'm going to try out a new build:
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=cEb0zxxRVu0esuce0bZx00b

(Note: It requires an addon to use this build effectively, such as Track-O-Matique)

Rotation Rotation Rotation

That's the mantra for Hunters.

Mark -> Sting -> Shoot -> Lather -> Rinse -> Repeat

I've been wondering lately why my DPS seems to be dropping, when my gear is getting so much better.
Obviously, the Hunter Nerf had some effect, but I should still be seeing an improvement.
So, having a bit of spare time last night, I thought I'd do a bit of testing on the heroic target dummies. And, suprise suprise, I figured out the problem.
My all-purpose macro's were mis-firing 1/3 of the time. They worked fine pre-patch and blizz didn't mention anything about changing them, but hey... since when do they tell us everything?

So with a bit of tweaking I got things back to normal, and then realised that my Talents were a little mis-placed after the nerf, so also did a small respec.

........35g Later.

I now find myself with 4k Attack Power, and have a spare 103 Hit Rating. So I can re-gem a few things, and increase my Attack Power or Crit even further... Result!

4k AP (with Hawk Aspect), 100% Hit, 25-27% Crit, and 17kHP all Unbuffed... Sounds good to me.
Now I just need to pick up some shoulder and helm enchants (but nothing too fancy - not epic yet) and change a couple of gems to re-use some of that wasted Hit Rating. Arthas here I come.
And still not one item from raids. All this is from Heroics only.

EDIT: Decided to try an pick myself up a Staff of Trickery - Looks like I'm not going to find anything better pre-25 Mans.
It actually already dropped for me once, but I passed for a druid (Tins I think) who needed it more at the time.

Naxxed Out

Its taken me the whole of... well... just a couple of weeks really, and I'm now maxed out in pre-Naxx gear:

Head: Plunderer's Helmet (Heroic Drop)
Neck: Pendant of the Outcast Hero (Emblem Reward)
Shoulders: Spaulders of the Abomination (Heroic Drop)
Chest: Polished Regimental Hauberk (Rep Reward)
Waist: BatRider's Cord (See below)
Legs: Giantmaim Leggaurds (AH 300g)
Feet: Boots of the Neverending Path (Rep Reward)
Wrists: Giantmaim Bracers (AH 300g)
Hands: Handgrips of the Savage Emissary (Heroic Drop)
Ring 1: Dream Signet of the Bandit (AH 50g)
Ring 2: Stained-Glass Shard Ring (AH 50g)
Trinket 1: Mirror of Truth (Emblem Reward - Ignore the tooltip, it procs in ranged too)
Trinket 2: Crusader's Locket (Quest Reward - Green, but no better AP trinkets till Naxx)
Back: Ice Strikers Cloak (Leatherworking BoE - 300g Mats)
Melee: 2x Fang of Truth (Rep Rewards 62g Each)
Ranged: Drake Mounted CrossBow (Heroic Drop)

The only thing I still have to buy is Vereesa's Silver Chain Belt. And a couple of better enchants / gems. But I'm almost out of cash, and epic enough for now.

Be.Imba actually rates me as capable of handling even the hardest 25-man raids.
And all within just a few weeks of starting heroic runs, a bit of research, and very little gold spent on the AH. That sounds like a bargain to me!

So to all you out there who think raiding is only for the 1337 people... I say:
"Bullshit. Pull your thumb out of your arse, make a bit of effort, and suprise yourself."

With the Munquis now making plans to start raiding Naxx, and a few test-runs already big successes, things are looking promising.
Watch the forums for Munqui Raiding info, coming soon.

Naxx the way (a-ha a-ha) I like it

Actually, I didn't, really. I wasn't that impressed by Naxx.

The Munquis made their second venture into Naxxramas last night (Arachnid Quarter).

It was a last-minute raid, we were all planning on doing Heroics when Shirt suggested that given we had about 18 level 80's on, we look at Naxx instead.
Apologies to anyone who felt left out that they couldn't come, but space was limited, and specs were the priority, followed by those who asked first.
Official Munqui-Raids will be much more organised.

Result:

2 Wipes, which were both entirely just the learning curves, and 3 Bosses down.
The run took a couple of hours, but to be honest, we wasted alot of time waiting for people who were afk, and without the wipes, which I doubt would happen next time it would be much quicker. Probably about an hour, or less, to kill the 3 bosses.

The Group:

Tanks:
Vind (Karudan)
Bronze

Healers:
Raq (Diliana)
Amandala
Rolfi (Pinarello)

DPS:
Vedd
Knicks
Babe (Hetebliksem)
Shirt (Shirtimus)
Me (Hunter)

Summary:

I'll try not to name and shame here, but we probably could have 9 (or even 8) manned it. The Tanks both did fine, with the Healers 2/3 were great, 1 did well enough, but not excellent (although he was also leading the group, so we'll let him off).
With the DPS, we had 3/5 that did similar amounts of damage, at the top of the meter (Yes, I was at the very top, but I won't mention that).
the Other 2 DPS'ers were lacking a little, no offence to them. I know that neither of them have been 80's for very long, so maybe they're still a little undergeared. One DPS'er at the top of the table almost counted for both of the bottom 2. But that's not the point.

My Opinion(s):

The point is..... Naxx IS very easy. A little bit too easy in my opinion. It didn't feel like as much of a challenge as I expected, in fact it was as easy, if not easier, than many heroics.
Also, I wasn't keen on the style of the place. It just didn't have the same atmosphere as somewhere like Karazhan, one of the best designed dungeons in the game IMHO. And the boss design in Kara is awesome, lots of tactics to learn, and all different.
I know it's supposed to be the way it is, but it just didn't feel very 'Epic' in there.

I'm not dissapointed... yet. There's still lots more of Naxx to go, and it may improve. But I didn't expect a disorganised group of udergeared first-timers to be able to make any progress. Fingers-Crossed.

Hero-Class Heroics (Part 2)

After teaming with Vind last night I'd like to retract 'most' of what I said about DK's.

It appears that I was just unfortunate enough to be teamed with 3 almost identical UnHoly specced players. UnHoly does nothing for me. Although it does add a % dmg increase to spell casters.

However, Blood spec was a nice addition to the overall party, and I can see the potential benfits from having at least one of them with you.

So my new theory is:
DK's don't suck... but treat with caution.
(Which I suppose is no different than any other class)

Ready2Raid?

Here's the big questions:

Do you think that the Munquis could start raiding Naxx?
My Opinion: Yes

Should they?
My Opinion: No

I'm pretty sure that the Munquis could start doing the 10 mans at this point, but I think it would be a bad idea.
Given the simpler learning curves for the heroic -> raid progression, I think the Munquis should sit back and enjoy the heroic fun.
Epics are available from the emblem vendors, and heroic bosses, and I've already seen that quite a few of us are beggining to build up a nice collection.

Also, quite a few of the usual suspects, for raid teams, have only recently hit level 80, and although they're not slackers (even though I might have teased them about it sometimes) they need to gear up more by spending more time in heroics.

They're not that hard to do, and the progression is pretty fast.

As an example:

In total I've done 10 or 11 Heroics, which isn't many in my opinion. I certainly don't feel like I've been grinding them, as they've all been alot of fun (except for Occulus.. never... ever.. go there)
And in my travels I've collected my 50th Emblem of Heroism, and I've also got a nice stash of Stone Keeper Shards, as well as a few epics Drake-Mounted Crossbow, Pendant of the Outcast Hero.
And the championing means I'm now 'Honored' with Wyrmrest Accord and 'Revered' (and 50% of the way to 'Exalted') with the Argent Crusade.
Giving me 2x Fang of Truth and meaning I'm almost ready to buy 2 more epics for around only 100g Polished Rehimental Hauberk and Boots of the Neverending Path (Leather but excellent for Hunters)

With all these rewards, and fun to be had, why would I want to rush into Naxx?

The Growl and the PussyCat

I've had some stick in the past for leaving my pets 'Growl' turned on when in a party.

Let's get something straight. I cause more aggro than my DPS pet. Much More.
My pets growl is fine, for me, while I'm solo'ing. Because anything I'm trying to kill is usually dead by the time I over-aggro it.
But if I solo an elite, it usually comes running after me just before it dies.

When I'm in a group, the tanks these days generate much much much more aggro than me. So why shouldn't I leave growl turned on.

The chances of the mob focusing on my pet are minimal as long as the tank is up and running.
The chance of my pet over-aggroing are almost Sweet-FA, and I can always use 'Cower' if I notice it getting too high.
But let's say the tank misses a mob, or is stunned, the next one in the threat list is gonna get a fistful of DMG shoved down their throat pretty quickly.
Who would you rather got that DMG?

There's 4 options:

1 - Me - Who's probably 2nd on the Threat Meter, but I have 10k Armour, upto 20kHP can feign, shadowmeld, misdirect, trap etc etc.
2 - Others - Who may / may not survive.
3 - My Pet - Who has upto 20k HP, 12k Armour, an instant rez button, and who isn't usually too far down the threat list, but hopefully higher up than...
4 - The Healer(s) - Alot of them wear paper armour, and most have the survival chances of a chocolate tea-pot in a microwave. They might last a few seconds, but then they're just a stain.

I don't send my pet in to attack until I start attacking, and I always allow a few seconds for tanks to build aggro, as it's pretty easy for me to overaggro at the beginning of fights. Just good practice, and well worth the cost of a few seconds of DPS.

Pet always attacks in 'Defence' mode, but if it goes off the rails it can be switched to 'Passive' and recalled with one click of button 5 on the mouse.

Edit: There are always exceptions to the rule, for example, I switch the pet to agressive when fighting Jodega Shadowweaver in Old Kingdom, simply because my pet starts attacking whichever mob she sacrifices as soon as it's released. And identifies it to the group.

So can anyone give me a good reason not to leave "Growl" on?

Hero-Class Heroics

Last night I did a heroic. "So What?" you're about to say, but unusually the team was made up of 3 Death Knights (Raq, Lurni & Stealths) My Hunter and Rolfi's Priest.

Now, don't get me wrong, we absolutely owned the 2 heroics we did (Utgarde Keep and Old Kingdom) and we should have done. The 3 DK's were wearing quite a few epics each, and had lots of other nice gear.
Rolfi and I have run quite a few heroics together now, and we're both more than capable. He's a great healer.

Note: Ignore all the facts and figures below if you're not into that sort of thing, but I'll try and keep it short.

But I noticed something that concerned me a little. I know my own DPS capabilities quite well. I can easily do 1500 DPS while solo'ing, and much more when I pop my CoolDowns / Trinkets etc..
Usually, when in a party, that increases massively, particularly when there's a Pally tank like Bolle and I don't have to watch my Aggro, I've reached upto 2.8k+ at some points, but often average around 2k - 2.2k across a full run. Last night I managed 1600.

I can imagine some people thinking "WTF is he complaining about... ONLY 1600!" but the fact is, with a different group, I could have pulled off much much more. The +100 DPS is probably mostly down to the buffs from Rolfi.

My pet buffs the whole party for +% DMG when it crits (which it does alot) but even so, I realise the only bonuses I bring to a party are that buff (one part of which is being nerfed in the next patch!) and my CC'ing.
The DK's were all UnHoly specced, and all brought exactly the same buff to the party a +15% Movement speed increase. WOW!

Raq tanked the runs, and the other two DPS'd. Yet every oen of their, and my overall DMG at the end of the runs, was within about 10-20k of each other, and everyones average DPS was around 1600. Why?

Note: You can start reading again at this point if you skipped it.

My theory is this:

Well played DK's are great at doing exactly what they're supposed to do, and very little else. Yes, They're sort of a 'jack-of-all-trades', but a they're 'Master' of none.
Their talents and abilities suit them, and them alone, and they bring very little else to a party. I could have been replaced by a 4th DK or a Rogue, or an Arms Warrior and it would have made no difference.
And I bet the average solo DPS for those guys is around 1500 too. They didn't seem to be sharing anything between themselves that even buffed other DK's.

Imagine that same party, but with one of the DK's replaced with something like a Shaman, or even better a Pally. Their buffs would increase the stats of the entire party, and the average DPS would have shot up dramatically.

I'm pretty sure that a team of 4 DK's + Healer could easily handle any of the heroics I've so far seen. And I wouldn't hold back from teaming with them again, they were more than capable players, there's just something about it that I don't like.

I once ran some level 70 heroics with a full team of Pallies, and it was an awesome scene. But even then, buffs were shared, blessings passed around, and team-work was promoted, as it could make a big difference to the entire team.
With DK's it doesn't seem to matter. Once those guys are fully epic'd I'm sure their DPS will go up a bit more, but then what?

If you were a raid leader who had the choice between bringing a fully epic DK, or a mostly Epic Pally who would you pick?

I'd choose the Pally every time, 1x Blessing of Kings on an entire 10-man raid raid and you get a huge DPS buff.
Or a Shammy using totems which he can change at will depending on the situation.

All the other DPS focused classes have a reliable form of CC / Aggro Dropping / Party Buffs too.
Hunters - Traps, Stings, Kiting, Pet Tanking, Feign, Misdirect, TrueShot Aura
Rogues - Sap, Stealth, Vanish
Mages - Polymorph, IceBlock, Buffs
Warlocks - SoulStones, Summons, Buffs
(Note: The hunter list is probably only longer, because I know more about them)

Raq assures me that +15% movement speed also = more DPS but I just don't see it myself. I can see some situations where it would come in handy, but they're few and far between.
If the DK's had all been different specs, it would have helped with the different auras, but still not as much as other classes would have.

So would you really take a straight DPS'ing DK instead of one of them?
I'm sure the Munquis won't discriminate against the DK's when it comes to raids, but overall I feel that they just lack that special something that makes them a welcome addition to any team.

So, go on, tell me I'm wrong.

Mixing Purple and Blue makes Blurple?

I've been spending alot of time recently fine tuning my build and grinding heroics, for no better reason than... why not.

It's Bolle and Vind's fault. They asked me to come and run Heroic: Culling of Stratholme with them, for the Drake you get to roll on if you finish it within 25 minutes.

Well, we wiped the floor with the place, our final time was something like 19 minutes, we rolled on the drake. And Vind won. I became addicted after that.

Since then, I've run Culling of Stratholme twice more, beaten the timer twice more, and still not managed to get my drake. :(
I've also done Old Kingdom, Nexus a couple of times, and god knows what else.

Resulting in me owning my first level 80 epic, and using the free Stone Keepers Shards to buy a nice shoulder enchant for the shoulders that dropped while doing my heroics.

I'm also well on the way to my Argent Crusade rep, which will open up an epic mail chest, and epic leather boots which are both excellent for me. YAY.

Thanks guys. I'm now Blurple Geared.

Craft of WAR: Blind

I've just seen this video posted on Grimtooths Troops. (Another blog I read quite regularly).
And it's very impressive, defintely worth the few minutes to watch, and the author is obviously very good at what he does.


The Craft of War: BLIND from percula on Vimeo.

Edit: Just to add, that whoever Percula is, he / she is bloody good. Just watched it for the second time, and the Blizz personnel department should be on the phone right now.

Wnt2 Me Tup? 1'm n0t @ PsYcHo... H0n3st!!!

As happens from time to time, the BBC here in the UK come up with a completely off the wall story, and start quoting facts and figures that just don't seem to match up with my idea of reality.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7789494.stm

According to them, 40% of UK internet users have met up in real life with someone they've only met via the internet / online.

Now call me a sceptic, but "Who the hell are they?!?"

As most of the Munquis will know, some of us have met up in real life. And some of us more than once.
But the general reaction from every single person I know, or who even heard about my plans to meet some strange people from foreign lands was total disbelief, or even horror. I'm talking about 100 people who knew that I was doing it. And not one would have done it themselves, and almost all are regular internet users.

I consider the people I met up with, and some that couldn't make it 'Freinds'... that's 'Freinds' with a capital 'F'. Because I don't see any reason to treat them as anything but true freinds.
On average, I spend more time with them than I do with the majority of my real life ones. They help me out, I help them out, we share social occasions, and obviously have similar interests. So why shouldn't I.

I'd love to agree with the BBC on this one, and if it was true that 40% of the UK's online people were meeting up in real life, it would be a great thing. But I can't help getting the impression that the surveying company only took a small sample and it's made those stats appear to be abnormally high.

On the flip side, I can understand the UK's general disbelief of what's printed in the papers. I think that's quite an old-fashioned view now. Those in the older generations, whom I know, tend to believe every word thats written in the paper, or broadcast on the news, no matter how over the top or sensationalist.

I think Terry Pratchett summed it up nicely in "The Truth";

'It says here fifty-six people were hurt in a brawl,' said Mr Mackleduff, who by dint of being the longest-surviving lodger acted as a kind of president at mealtimes. He had bought a copy of the Times on his way home from the bakery, where he was night-shift foreman.
'Fancy,' said Mrs Arcanum.
'I think it must have been five or six,' said William.
'Says fifty-six here,' said Mr Mackleduff sternly. 'In black and white.'
'It must be right,' said Mrs Arcanum, to general agreement, 'otherwise they wouldn't let them put it in.'
'I wonder who's doing it?' said Mr Prone, who travelled in wholesale boots and shoes.
'Oh, they'd be special people for doing this,' said Mr Mackleduff.
'Really?' said William.
'Oh, yes,' said Mr Mackleduff, who was one of those large men who were instantly expert on anything. 'They wouldn't allow just anyone to write what they like. That stands to reason.'

Mistletoe and Whine

Well, Christmas is almost over. (Merry Christmas to anyone that I haven't already said that to).

I've been off on a family holiday for the festive season, and, as usual at this time of year, I won't have much free time until after the new year. I'm missing the Munquis but just don't really have the definite time to invest in playing a MMORPG for the next week or so.
Instead I'm killing my time playing Fable II (much better than I expected it to be), which I can pick up and put down in short stints. But I should be back to WoW as normal either this weekend or by early next week.

Before the Christmas period I managed to pick up my worg pet (and the spider one as a bonus), Vind also tagged along with his DK and picked them up too.
For info, LBRS is quite easily soloable with a level 80 Hunter. I brought my Cat with me, when really I should have used my Gorilla, but still didn't really have any problems. And the run for the worg pups only took 10-15 minutes. I had to clear a little more trash than was really neccesary due to Vinds lower level toon still having a little aggro, but I could almost walk past the majority of the mobs unless they were standing right in my way.

P.S. I'm assuming Brast already knows about it, but the tribe forums seem to be down. Maybe his subscription has just expired again, and there's much more important thigns to pay for at this time of year. (We really should all contribute to that cost).

New Years Resolution: Buy a MunquiWear item, or send Brast a donation to help with the costs?

The Wolfman of Azeroth

I've decided that one of the first things i'm going to do as a proud, and bewildered, level 80. Is get myself a worg-pup pet. I've always meant to get one, but never gotten round to it.

This quest provides one: http://www.wowhead.com/?quest=4729

...and comes with a bonus Spider pet: http://www.wowhead.com/?quest=4862

I'm pretty sure I could easily solo LBRS, but if anyone wants to join in the fun, they're welcome to tag along. Just give me a whisper in-game.

FEAR ME! For I am 80!

OK, I hit level 80 on Tuesday, and I have to say that I barely felt level 79, it went by so fast.

So.......................... What do I do now?

I had the same feeeling I did when I first reached lvl 70 with my Paladin. After all those weeks / months of progression, and feeling liek I'm striving towards something, suddenly, it's over... I'm there, and it feels.... exactly like it did at level 75, 76, 77, 78 and 79 only without a clear goal to aspire to.

I want to raid with my Hunter, but I hate PUG's, and most of the Munquis are still a little bit behind yet, so there's no chance of doing anything too exciting any time soon.

While wandering around aimlessly trying to decide what to do, I spent myself 1.5k gold in the AH, kitting myself in full blues, (I already had a couple anyway) and bought some nice enchants and gems to go with them.

http://be.imba.hu/?zone=EU&realm=Darkspear&character=Smythy

So I'm now the proud owner of about 3000 AP (unbuffed), 15k HP, 11k Mana, and a crit rate of over 20%.
My haste is also good, meaning I'm usually unleashing at least 100 arrows per minute, around 1 crit every 3 seconds. When I crit, my pet crits for the next 3 hits, and when my pet crits the whole party gets a DPS buff, so this means that buff is now semi-permanent.
A bit of testing showed I can now pull off about 1.1 - 1.4k DPS regular damage (just using my rotations), and between 1.6-1.8k DPS when I pop my trinkets and CoolDowns etc...

I'm no expert but I'd say that's pretty good for solo mode. Add in a set of team / raid buffs to that, plus potions / elixirs and raid food, and I wouldn't want to get in my way.

I'm sure a little of my DPS will be affected from the new patch, but generally speaking I should still be kicking ass.

Now, BeImba only rates me as suitable for heroics, but after asking around to some freinds who've been doing 10 and 25 man Naxx, they appear to think I'm qualified enough for at least entry level raiding. Certainly, when their guilds started to raid, they had people lower geared than myself along with them. And, I like to think, that my skill would count for something too.

Also, when I check for gear upgrades for what I currently have, the vast majority is already shown as the highest level of blue available, so epics are the next step up.

I was VERY tempted to replace my Green bow with an Epic gun that was on the AH for 1900g, but decided the money would be better spent on overall upgrades instead.

So I come back to my first question................. What do I do now?

I can't do heroics alone, raiding is out of the question, my herbalism and skinning skills are already maxed. I've still got 2k gold, and don't fancy grinding just to get myself another mount (although a drake would be nice).

I really fancy using Engineering on my Hunter, but that would mean dropping one of my other profs, both of which make me large amounts of money, and the passive buff from skinning improves my crit nicely, so i wouldn't want to lose that. Even if I dropped my Herbalism I'd still have to spend fortunes on mats to level up my engineering.

Do I grind rep, for items that aren't really that impressive? Or maybe I should just spend my time boosting other guildies to get them up to my level quicker... after all the Munqui Tribe is supposed to be 'Social'. Hmmmm, maybe I've found my own answer.

Any other suggestions?

EDIT: Just came across this - http://www.thehuntersmark.net/2008/11/25/your-wish-list-for-wrath-dude-wheres-my-upgrade/ looks like a good tip-off to start doing the heroics.

Can I really do TOO MUCH damage?

Patch 3.0.8 is on it s way, and the notes are now on WoWWiki.
Having a read this morning, it seems that there's going to be quite a few changes to the classes.
There's a nice long list of tweaks for pretty much every class in the game.

One that does worry me though is this: (The Hunter Nerf)

All Hunter pet abilities with a cooldown of 30 seconds or more are no longer
on the global cooldown.
Aspect of the
Wild - This aspect is now raid-wide.
Call
of the Wild: The benefit from this pet talent now applies to only
the Hunter and their own pet.
Deterrence: Design
changed to grant 100% parry and 100% chance to
"deflect" spells coming
from the front, but prevents the Hunter from attacking.
Lasts 5 sec. 60 sec. cooldown.
Improved
Tracking (Survival): This talent has been slightly re-designed. Now
reads: While tracking Beasts, Demons, Dragonkin, Elementals, Giants, Humanoids
and Undead, all ranged damage done to those types is increased by 1/2/3/4/5%.
Kill
Shot – Cooldown reduced to 15 seconds, down from 35 sec.
Kindred
Spirits: This talent now grants only 3/6/9/12/15% pet damage.
The coefficient of Rake (Cat) and Scorpid
Venom (Scorpid) has been lowered.
Readiness: No longer
resets the cooldown on Bestial Wrath.
Steady Shot: Now
gains 10% of attack power as damage instead of 20%.
Serpent's
Swiftness: This talent now grants only 2/4/6/8/10% bonus attack
speed to pet. The hunter attack speed bonus is unchanged.
Unleashed Fury:
This talent now grants only 3/6/9/12/15% pet damage.
Viper
Sting: Now drains a percentage of maximum mana.
Volley: The
damage has been reduced on all ranks by approximately 30% (including attack
power scaling).

Overall that's a pretty big Nerf, and it concerns me. Not for the reason you might expect, yes I love doing major DPS, and I'll certainly miss 30% off my Volley ability.
When I'm in a dungeon with a good Pally tank, Volley has been known to put out up to 10k DPS on its own.

But most other Hunters I've teamed with can't seem to pull off the same level of damage that I can. And most often they've been at least a couple of steps further down the rankings. I'm not particularly well geared, but I use macros, and tweaks, and haste ratings and all sorts of little tips and tricks to ensure that my DPS is as high as it can possibly be. So why should Blizz care if a couple of Hunters like me can pull off impressive DPS, when the average Hunter is usually no better or worse than anyone else?

My build and play-style has it's disadvantages too. I'm almost always top of the rankings in PvE, but I suck totally at PvP. Anyone who's ever duelled me will back me up on that. Its not just that I'm not a PvP'er, my build is designed around doing the maximum amount of DPS from a distance, while my pet, or a helpful tank takes all the punishment.
The few times that I get aggro, and can't get rid of it, I drop like a fat-girl on bungee. Feign Death and Shadowmeld are my only reasons for survival in cases like this. And anything with enough intelligence to ignore my pet and come straight for me is going to own my arse in seconds.

Why is this any different to other DPS classes?

I've seen others who play their non-Hunter class with alot of skill, and despite being undergeared can still keep up with the crowd.

Losing a % point here and there isn't going to cause me much of a problem, I'm probably still going to out DPS many others, and I'll more than likely be level 80 by the time the patch hits, so it's not going to slow down my levelling speed. But I don't really see the need for such a big nerf.

Is the average Hunter really doing that much damage, or is it just a well-played few?

On the Level

Last week, I read one of Tobold's Blogs 'Approaching 80' about levelling speed, and found it interesting. But at the time I was a little sceptical about just how much faster it would be the closer you get to 80.

But he's more than right. Particularly since reaching level 77 and being able to fly again.

I've spent more time fiddling around since hitting 77, just investigating places, finding new pets and maxing my Herbalism skills.
But, already, I'm about to Ding 78. And Vedd, who I was teamed up with last night, is in almost the same position and hit 77 later than myself.

According to my Titan XP addon, my levelling speed is now at around 3.5 hours per level. When I'm not messing about. So If I can get a good solid 3-4 hours of play, I can easily level.
Before flight, this was more like 6-8 Hours.

I'm not complaining, but to anyone out there who is currently hanging aroudn the Mid 70's, thinking they've got ages to go before they're leet again. You haven't. Cold Weather Flying is a must, and Epic flight obviously helps, but you'll be flying through the last 3 levels in no time.

Munqui Boss Notes

OK, anyone who reads this blog, who's not a Munqui, or who joined us after we'd finished our Karazhan phase probably has no idea what this is, so I'll summarise:

The NotesUNeed addon is useful anyway, and it's very minimalistic, doesn't take up much screen estate, low memory usage etc...
My plugin for it adds notes on all the TBC and Northrend Instances, Dungeons, Raids, and World Bosses. Providing strategies and tactics for all of them, mainly taken from WoWWiki.

Now if you're an Ub3r 1337 raider, you're probably not going to need this. But if like most Munquis, you're more of a casual player, who occasionally dips his toe into the world of raiding, this is great.

So here's how you use it:

1) Download NotesUNeed from here:
http://wow.curse.com/downloads/wow-addons/details/notes-uneed.aspx

2) Download my Munqui Boss Notes plugin
http://www.mediafire.com/?sharekey=05a4921c768fb35b91b20cc0d07ba4d2307f94ccec315957

3) Copy my Plugin into your NotesUNeed folder (inside your addons folder) - It might overwrite one thats already there. That's fine.

4) Load the game, open the NotesUneed options, and click 'Import'...

5) All done, the notes are now in your list

You now have all the info you need in-game to down the badass bosses, and can broadcast the notes to party / raid etc.. so that there's no excuse for people not knowing the strategy before the attack begins.

I'll try and keep the strategy info updated, and will post updates on this page.

Big Thanks to Vedd, for finding my old version, so it now includes all the TBC instances and Raids, rather than me wasting time re-entering all the details.

All credit for NotesUNeed goes to it's author 'Telic'. I was going to try and write my Own addon just for this purpose, but his works fine, and has other advantages too.
Originally I did modify a previous version to accept larger notes but, as of now, Telics official version works fine, so any auto-updaters, like WoWMatrix / Curse Client etc... will no longer break things.

Credit for the Strategies goes to the editors and contributors of WoWWiki. I haven't written any of the strategies myself, although I may have added a few additional notes as I've fought the bosses.

There's still a few missing strategies for Northrend, simply because WoWWiki didn't have any at the time of my last update. But these will be filled in later.

If you have any feedback on the NotesUNeed addon, please direct it to Telic. If you have any feedback on the Boss Notes themselves, direct them to me.

Enjoy.

Flights and Fancies

I managed to hit level 77 on my Hunter this weekend.

And since the money gained in Northrend is pretty epic, and I had bought my epic flying before hand, I'm now flapping around the place at epic speeds, and still have plenty of cash left over... Nice.

I also decided it was time for a change of pet. But which to choose?

The obvious choice is going to be Loque'nahak:

But he's a pain to find, and supposedly doesn't pull off the DPS that he's supposed to, just at the moment. Some glitch about his debuff not stacking. If I come across him though, I'll still pick him up obviously. And Gratz to HunterBabe for finally getting him.

So in the mean-time I decided to go for a Wolf and a Gorilla (for DPS / Tanking respectively).

So..... introducing;

Knyghtmare

(Knightmare was a prohibited name for some reason)

And his new freind Munqui

Now here's a strange thing - I haven't done much grinding / any quests since hitting 77, I've mainly just been prancing around looking at new places, and choosing pets. But I've noticed something strange.
Knyghtmare is a Ferocity pet, and therefore all about the DPS. Munqui is a Tenacity pet, and should be mostly about Tanking, and threat generation.

My own personal DPS is quite good, even if I do say so myself... and I do.

Firstly, if I use Knyghtmare, my overall DPS should be higher than when I'm using Munqui... But it isn't.
I barely noticed any significant change when I switched from my old Cat to Knyghtmare (which was expected), but saw a pretty big jump when I switched over to Munqui... Weird... Maybe it needs a bit more testing, but I'm pretty sure that my stats were right. Knyghtmare is still a level or two below me, so maybe things will improve a little once he catches up... but I don't think so.

Secondly, when using my old cat, I could pull the aggro off him if I got a bit over-eager, or got a good crit chain going. But since my pets crit pretty regularly anyway, 99% of the time they got all of the attention.
Knyghtmare seems to be able to maintain this tradition, with the mobs focusing totally on him, and leaving me free to nuke the sh*t out of them. Munqui doesn't.
Almost all of Munquis talent point are spent on improving tanking stats and in threat generation, yet I seem to constantly pull the aggro from him. (He's level 77, so that isn't an issue).

So I've now got a tanking pet that can't hold aggro, but for some reason is improving my DPS.
And a DPS pet that can hold the aggro, but seems to be doing less overall damage than the tank.

Any ideas?

I'd also like to whinge about the amount that Knyghtmare shrank when I tamed him... He looks impressive in the wild, but shrinks massively once he's owned.

A Christmas Carol?

Name that Tune?

You'd better watch out, you might start to cry
But you'd better not pout, I'm telling you why
The Lich King is coming to town.

He's not got a list, and he won't think twice
He already knows who's naughty or nice
The Lich King is coming to town.

Arthas is a'coming to town
Arthas is a'coming to town
Arthas is a'coming to towwwwwn

He'll kill you while you're sleeping,
Or while you're awake
He knows if you've been bad or good
And your soul, his sword, will take.

So you'd better watch out, you might start to cry
But try not to pout I'm telling you why
The Lich King is coming to town.

Arthas is a'coming to town
Arthas is a'coming to town
Arthas is a'coming to towwwwwn

'Twas the Fight before Christmas

'Twas the weeks before Christmas, and all through the house
Not a sound could be heard, but the click of a mouse
Father Blizzard had come early, or late, I suppose
But all of the big kids were awake with the crows
All of the Munquis had opened their box,
And this was one present, that wasn't going to be socks

So while children were nestled, all snug in their beds
With visions of evil, that danced in their heads
Their mothers and fathers gave up all their naps
To begin the big race, to the new level caps
With new mobs to kill, and achievements to shatter
They were aching and tired, but that didn't matter

Off in to Northrend, they flew like a flash
Wiped out the Vrykul, and found loads of cash
The moon over Northrend, and it's new fallen snow
Looked improved, the new graphics engine, started to show
When what, to our bleeding eyes should appear
But a land full of people living in fear

Arthas was rising, with his legions of dead.
And the dragons were rising, to rip off his head.
On Horses, On Tigers, On Talbuks and Rams
On Dragons and Gryphons to ruin his plans.
The armies of Azeroth rose up to the fight
And among them were outcasts, the converted DeathKnight

The armies united to meet the old foe
But some of the tensions still started to show
In the middle of Northrend stands Lake Wintergrasp
Where battles are fought, to kick the hordes ass.
But after it's done, and the battle is lost
They resume their attack on the kingdom of frost

Before this war's over the evil must be found
Down from the north comes Arthas the Lich-Bound
Dressed in plate armor from his head to his foot
And his gear all tarnished with dried blood and guts.
His eyes.. How they flared, with evil so merry
And lands flowed with blood as bright as fresh cherry.

His evil smile was drawn up like a bow
And the colour of his skin was as white as the snow
He had a broad face, and no sign of a belly
And carried an aura that some would call smelly
He was tall and looked strong, in the pinnacle of health
But I laughed when I saw him, in spite of myself

With a wink of his eye and a twist of his head
He soon gave us to know, we had plenty to dread
He spoke lots of words, and then went to work
And in an opening scene, made Mograine a jerk.
With barely a flinch, he stepped out of sight
Saying "Merry Christmas to all, and to all my DeathKnights!"

Phase Two

One thing I forgot to mention in my previous post (Vinds Comment does mention it though) about phasing is the, unfortunate, comedy value of the effect too.
A knock on effect of this same mechanic, is that you can't neccesarily see the same mobs / players that others (even in your team) can.

While in a Munqui group a few days ago, doing the "WANTED" elite quests in Dragonblight, one of our team was a step behind in the quest chains than the rest of us, but offered to help out anyway.
He could see the same elites that we could, but he could also see some other mobs that we had already completed the quest to rid the world of.
This meant that when we rode through a 'clear' area to reach the next boss, he was actually riding through the centre of a big group of undead. Which obviously started attacking him. To us it just appeared as if he was fighting thin-air. Besides a bit of healing, we couldn't help out, because we couldn't even see the mobs.

This seems to be an unfortunate, although sometimes funny, side effect of the phasing system.
But at the end of the day I still give the new effect a MASSIVE thumbs up.

Big Brother is Watching You

I've been reading Tobolds blog for a long time now, and usually his posts are all about WoW.
But recently, he posted something a little bit different, and I think it's well worth discussing.
If you haven't already seen it, read it here;

http://tobolds.blogspot.com/2008/11/you-can-go-to-jail-for-lying-on.html

Phasers on Stun

"He's dead Jim, but not as we know it!"

As spoken by the venerable Dr McCoy (at least in the song). And with the new expansion, that was never true-er.

Phasing has to be the single greatest change in WotLK. But most people I've spoken to haven't even realised it was happening... exactly the way it should be.

For those of you out there who don't know, here's how it works;

Pre-WotLK, when you completed a quest, the world around you stayed the same. Even if you'd just killed the biggest bad-ass boss in a zone, 5 minutes later the same NPC will be standing there harking on about how this boss really has to go. And the Boss will be back where he always was, just as if all your efforts were in vain.

Post-WotLK, that same boss might stay dead. And the NPC would have thanked you, and probably moved on to go and whinge about something else, in some other location..... but only for you.

For you, the boss dissapears. For you, the NPC moves on. For you, the world has changed.
For everyone else, that hasn't done that same quest, it hasn't... the NPC is still there, the boss is alive, etc...

Anyone who has doen the DeathKnight starting area will have seen this in action, even if you didn't realise it. How else do you think Ebon Hold becomes a Haven for you, while still being a Scourge area for those rolling new characters?
You both use the same area, but you see different things, and you probably don't even see each other. You could be stood on top of a newborn level 55 DeathKnight, or even Arthas himself, and not know it.

I've noticed this more and more, but last night I saw an epic version of this in action:

A long, and nicely rewarded, quest chain in Dragonblight ended in a video cutscene (another new experience). In it, the Allies and Horde teamed up to fight Arthas, and everyone was wiped out by a rogue Forsaken who killed everyone. He tried to kill Arthas too, but that didn't work.
High Lord Bolvar died during this scene, and when it ended the whole area around me had changed. Bolvar was still dead, the Dragons that had purged the area were still there, and the whole place was on fire.... But it didn't stop there.

The Dragons then sent me off to see King Wrynn in StormWind, and he set me off on another epic journey, involving me travelling to Ogrimmar and Undercity, and kicking major ass there, with the help of the King Himself, and Jaina Proudmoore. An utterly brilliant storyline, well thought out, nicely done, and very out of the ordinary "kill ten X" type quests.
(The quest rewards were also excellent, as should be expected from a quest of that magnitude).
For me, the world has now changed, Arthas knows I'm coming, Bolvar is dead and I've gained the trust of the Dragons.

The entire quest chain tooko an hour or two to complete, but it's broken into lot's of smaller quests, so there's plenty of scope for completing others at the same time.

Anyone who hasn't done it yet, really should. It starts with a "Strange Device" that drops from a mob you kill, from a quest in Stars Rest. I was level 73 at the time, and had no problem with it.

I'd like to take this opportunity to give Blizz a standing ovation for this feature. It wasn't expected (at least by me), and has added massive potential to the game.

Rather than the next expansion needing an entire new continent, what if they just re-used the Old Azeroth areas? Some of those areas are beautifully designed, and it's a shame they are going to be more and more wasted.

Imagine:

Sargeras returns to Azeroth, and lays waste to the whole place. StormWind is burning? The DeadMines has now been taken over by Sargeras minions? The whole of the Old World zones have been taken over by lvl 81+ Mobs.
To you, the world is destroyed. And all this could happen at the same time as level 1 noobs are still begging "1g Plz!" and level 19's are doing their PvP thing in Goldshire.
Because, to them, things are the same as they always were. And if you want to prove it to yourself, you'd just have to roll a new toon, and go and take a look.

Surely this would speed up the time it takes to release a new expansion too? Which can only be a good thing.

The Show MUST Go On

In case you hadn't noticed, I haven't posted anything on my blog for the last few days. That's mainly because of real life getting in the way of my online time, but not in a bad way.

Things I've achieved in the past few days;

1) Spent some time with my Son
2) Spent some time with my Fiance
3) Cleaned my House
4) Put my Christmas Tree up (Yes, I know it's only November, but it's only 4 weeks away)
5) Cleaned my House again, after all the mess of putting the Christmas tree up.
6) Spent 30 minutes re-wiring the Christmas lights, so that they don't flash.
7) Watched the end of season 3 of Prison Break (I needed to catch up)
8) Spent another 30 minutes re-wiring the Christmas light, because they were still flashing.
9) Planned my budget for Christmas, and decided on the few remaining presents I have to buy.
10) Gave up on the Christmas lights... Yes... they are STILL flashing.

Suprisingly though, one thing I didn't do, was miss playing World of Warcraft. It's strange though, I usually do.
I did log on once, to finish off some input into a Boss Strategy addon, and to re-post some things on the AH, but that was it. I had a quick chat to Bolle, and a 'Hello' to a few guildies, and that was pretty much it.
I have a feeling that tonight will be a gaming night though, especially since I don't have to get up early in the morning, straight to a meeting at 10am, instead of crawling out of bed at 6am.. woo hoo!

So may aim for the night is to hit level 73, or maybe even 74, and to definitely not play on my DeathKnight.

Repeat after me: "I will not play on my DeathKnight and leave my main(s) to rot in level 70-80 limbo... I will not play my DeathKnight and leave my main(s) to rot... I will not play my DeathKnight... I will not play my DeathKnight for too long... dammit!"

Back to the grindstone

My playtime is 'probably' going to be much more limited over the next few days, simply because of real life commitments, but I'll no doubt manage to get a few hours in here and there.
But will it make any difference?

I reached level 71, with myHunter, on the day of release. And I was quite pleased with the levelling speed. However, 71-72 seemed to take me forever, probably almost twice what it took me to get from 70-71. Yet I'm now already a third of the way to 73.
I'm not complaining, and I think I've sussed what the problem was.

I was trying to complete all the quests in one area before moving on to the next. So I think I've finished all but a small handful of quests in the Howling Fjords. But the travelling time, and all the to'ing and fro'ing cost me alot of time.

I've now moved on to Dragonblight, and I'm picking up quests in batches again, and my XP bar is filling up nicely. In future, I think I'll skip to the next area as soon as the quests start to thin out.
Any quests that I miss out on I can either come back to do later or will catch them next time, probably when I level my DeathKnight.

I've noticed though, that most of my guildies are still no higher than level 71. (The vast majority are 'social' players and don't spend massive amounts of time online though).

So what do you think?
Is the levelling speed about right?

Nexus Point

Several Munquis decided to run the new Nexus instance last night.
I'd done most of Utgarde Keep a few days before, so was expecting more of the same Tank'n'Spank style play, boy was I suprised.
I loved style of the place, and the boss encounters were much more 'raid-style' then before, with a couple of them requiring a more tactical approach.

Grand Magus Telestra - Took us a few attempts at this one, it basically came down to a DPS race between how fast we could bring her down, and how many times she could throw us around the room, but my Pet came inhandy here, as for some reason, her magic tentacles ignored it, so it kept up some DPS while we were mostly useless. My hunter was the only man standing by the end of the fight.

Omorok the Tree Shaper - This was almost a straight Tank'n'Spank, but we realised too late that the shards of ice he sends out erupt causing quite high damage, and throwing you into the air. I realised when I saw it happen to my pet and the tank, but while I was typing the message for everyone to avoid it, it happened again, killing our healer (Knicks), and then everyone else. Luckily, I side-stepped it and popped my pets super-rez and spanked him into oblivion. Last man standing, again, and boss killed in 1 shot.

Anomalus - Despite Bronzes (our tank) assurance that this would be a straight Tank'n'Spank, it became obvious it wasn't, when he suddenly became immune after summoning a rift. Logic kicked in, and everyone recognized the Headless Horseman style, and switched all DPS to the rifts. Even so, it took it's toll, and only Bronze and Myself lived through it. 1 Shotted though.

Keristraza - Sounds like a Russian mobster, and is about as freindly as one. This took a few attempts, and mastering the 'hit and run' tactics was not easy. Particularly for the casters, where healing and moving does not go hand in hand. But after a few dry runs, we put her down, and for some reason Knicks (who had often been dead before the fights had gotten half way through) was still standing at the end, although she did die a few seconds later while celebrating, after forgetting to debuff herself. So, again, Hunters rule, And me and my pet sat patiently and waited for the rest of them to corpse run.

Honorable mention also goes out to Hedgerick, DM, and Banak (6 of us because Banak replaced DM mid-run).

I've got to say though, I loved the new tactical stlye of the dungeon. It felt much more like a mini Karazhan than just a higher level of Tank'n'Spank elites. And the learning curve was just right, we were on the verge of giving up on a couple of the bosses, when we finally downed them. That's the way it should be.

EDIT: If it sounds like I'm bragging about never dying in this run, I'm not. I also got my ass handed to me several times.

Fjord Focus

The expansion was released a few days ago, and I took the afternoon off work on the 13th to enjoy the opening day fun.
As my previous post said, I reached level 71 with my Hunter on the first night, but since then my play time has been more limited, due to real life activities.
I did manage to play for a little while, and rolled myself a DeathKnight (SmythKnight) to see what all the fuss is about.

I was very impressed, especially with the opening quests and the abilities. Coinceidentally, I managed to share most of the opening quests with Vindikator (a long-time Munqui, who had rolled a DeathKnight after transferring his main toon to another realm).

It did feel a little awkward at first, given that when you start at level 1 you slowly gain more and more spells, usually giving you time to master one before moving on to the next.
With a DeathKnight, at level 55, you don't really get that luxury, you get a handful of spells to start with, and within 2 levels, you've got a full actionbar, and more spells to spare. But I eventually got my head around it.

What helped, was realising that something wasn't right with my display.
I was struggling to work out why some runes were on cooldown sometimes, and not others. Turns out that Xperl (one of my Ui addons) was preventing me seeing the default blizzard rune bars. I couldn't manage to re-enable them either, but after a very small download, problem solved. And the system makes perfect sense.
So much so, that my level 58 UnHoly-DeathKnight managed to get up to 500DPS (albeit on multi mobs). Mastering the whole 'disease' thing was a breakthrough.
And the correct use of 'Pestilence' means that the potential for DPS with this spec is awesome.

Initially I'd said that the DeathKnight wasn't too overpowered, but if those abilities scale in the same way that other classes do, that's going to make for an immense amount of spell damage by the time the character hits level 70, let alone 80! (And the melee damage on top of that).

I'll probably shelve SmythKnight for now, and go back to levelling my Hunter (Smythy). Returning to the Fjords to finish off the last few quests before moving on to DragonBlight.
I need to catch up with Bolle (another Munqui), who has managed to reach the lofty heights of level 78 already.
I'm assuming he's currently playing while sat on a comode, and with a months supply of military ration packs next to his PC, because he can't have moved far from that screen for a while. :P

"Gz Bolle"

On a side note: I also maxed my Skinning skill and didn't get an achievement for it (although you do just for learning the next level from the trainer). But on the plus side the, new, added crit rating from mastering the profession will come in handy.

Lich Banner

Feel free to steal / edit this, made it up myself out of the official stuff, but it's been flipped and tweaked to fit the style of my blog.

Addiction Affliction

While reading my usual daily intake of World News I came across this article from the BBC:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/technology/2008/11/addicted_to_warcraft.html#comment152

The BBC has been covering the launch of WotLK for the past few days, and their views about online gaming always seemed to be a bit one-sided to me. Particularly always raising the issue of addiction. And generally leaning very heavily towards the 'Games are Bad' side of the argument.

Usually, I just read these things, and scoff at the stupid arguments that people use to try and flame the game itself, and all gaming in general. But this time I decided to post a reply of my own (see the link).

Maybe we're just pioneers of the gaming nations. Because I'm pretty sure that everyone currently between the age of 5 and 25 won't share the same feelings. And it won't be long before the news agencies in general (not just the BBC) will be reporting on in-game events almost as often as real-world ones.

BBC HEADLINE NEWS: November 13th 2020
Darkspear(EU); StockMarket Crashes as Smyth undercuts every item on the AH.
Munqui Tribe leader says; "I love kids, but I couldn't eat another one just yet".
Age of Conan; Final player found locked in a broom closet, medics say he may never play again.
Warhammer; Agrees deal with Activision. World of Warhammer due out tomorrow.
GuildWars; "Honestly! We ARE an MMORPG", exec denies mis-leading advertising complaints.

Or maybe that's just my vision of the future?

Open up and say 'AH'

I've just read that there's not going to be any AH in Dalaran... Why not?

Since TBC, the whole Alliance vs Horde thing is a sort of side issue. We've all got bigger fish to fry.
Now we already have cross-faction Auction Houses courtesy of the Goblins. So why wouldn't those coniving little buggers get in on the action in Dalaran?
Surely, having a cross-faction AH in Dalaran would be ideal. It would open up the markets for all the lovely new Northrend drops, and would fit in fine with the neutral 'Sanctuary' theme of Dalaran.

Surely it would make more sense from Blizz's point of view too?
At the moment, they run at least 3 AH's per realm, and I'm not saying that takes up alot of server power, but why not just hand them all over to the goblins, and merge them into 1 cross-faction AH instead.
I'm sure that if the goblin AH's were located in capital cities, instead of the middle of nowhere, they'd get alot more use.
Anyone with sense wants to advertise their items to as many people as possible, so they'd always choose the cross-faction AH if it was just as conveniently located.

Alternatively, just give all the current AH's the option to also post to a Cross-Faction AH for an extra 'Goblin Tax' (maybe about 10% increase in deposit costs).

But put one in Dalaran, for gods sake.

FPS gets Fragged

If, like me, you're running WoW on a system that hasn't go the latest greatest graphics card, you've probably noticed a drop in performance with the new expansion, so here's a few tips to get it back up (at least a bit);

1 - Defrag your hardrive, you've just installed god knows how many GB worth of stuff, your files are going to be all over the place. This might not help much, but every bit counts.

2 - Turn down your graphics settings, particularly your viewing distance. This is one of the biggest ways to improve your performance, and it doesn't change the experience much. beware though, I've already found 1 or 2 quests that involve looking a long way into the distance, and are impossible on the lowest settings... shame on you Blizz.

3 - Check this: http://www.wowwiki.com/ExtShadowQuality apparently Blizz have brought in a new shadow system, which looks nice, but drops your FPS. I can't find anywhere what the new default settings are, but turn them off anyway.

4 - Disable any programs you have running in the background while you play. Particularly things like P2P programs, and Anti-Virus programs. Don't worry, you can turn them back on later.

5 - If the worst comes to the worst, lower your resolution. I play on 1400x900 (Widescreen), so I accept that my FPS will be a bit lower, dropping it to a lower setting would, usually, improve the performance quite alot.

6 - Disable any addons that aren't essential. They might only be small, but every one of them is doing something in the background. You don't have to get rid of them, in fact, if you download another addon (like ACP - Addon Control Panel) you can set profiles for your addons, and load / unload them as needed. Do you really need Omen or BigWigs when you're solo'ing?

7 - Run a scan for Spyware (Use Spybot S&D or something similar) to make sure there's nothing using your network connection, that shouldn't be.

8 - Check what runs in the background when you turn your PC on. To do this you can either use a 3rd party program, like the free one built into Spybot, or go to the start menu, and type 'msconfig', select the 'StartUp' tab and it will show you a list of what loads. Disable any that you don't need. The advantage of using a 3rd party program to do this, is that they usually give you a bit more info on what they programs do. Don't disable any needed ones, and if you find any problems just re-enable them.

9 - If you're using a laptop make sure you're not blocking any of the vents (particularly the ones underneath). Overheating causes a lot of problems for laptops. The same applies to desktop PC's but it doesn't happen as much.

10 - Reboot - Yeah it really is that simple, sometimes just re-booting your PC solves everything.

Edit: If you're a MAC user, don't start spouting about how much better thay are, just sit there and look smug.

Go Go Vicky-the-Viking!

It's here. WotLK has finally arrived, so how do I feel about it?

The Good:
* Graphics are a bit shinier - I like the new textures on the Vrykul, and prefer the old-style gothic, rather than Outland style Sci-Fi.
* There's 2 new starting areas - I wasn't sure about this at first, but now I think it's a great idea, it reduced the amount of people trying to finish the same quests all at once. Also, when I level my next character I'll use the other starting area, so it won't as much of a grind.
* DeathKnights - They look good, I've only got as far as creating one, rather than playing it fully, but I like the style.
* Trainers in Starting areas - Good idea, my skinning skill is now only a couple of points away from the new max, and my herbalism skill is well on the way too.
* Faster respawn times - I'm guessing this was intentional, but with hundreds of people all wanting the same mobs, this is a very good idea.
* Nice area design - The starting area was huge, so once you were out of the arrival area, you didn't feel like you were walking on top of everyone else.

The Bad:
* Graphics are a bit shinier - Yeah, they look nicer, but they strain the system just that little bit more, so I've had to reduce alot of my video settings. This had an extra problem, read on;
* Unexplained Quests - Some of the quest descriptions could do with a bit more detail, I'm not a lore freak, but I would like to know which area to hand in the Vrykul weapons that one quest asks for, instead of just telling me the name of the quest giver. And when being told to raise my hand at donkeys, I figured it out right away, but it wasn't explained the you have to 'emote' at them.
Also, one quest asks you to use a harpoon to destroy some buildings, no problem, I found the harpoons, but there's only 2 for the entire realm to use, and the quest takes around 5 minutes, so there were queues of people waiting to use them. And, when I finally got to use one, I couldn't figure out what to shoot with it, so after wasting another few minutes I realised that you can't even see the targets unless you turn your viewing distance up... Tut tut Blizz.
* No Auction House - I'm not sure if there'll be one in Dalaran, but it's a bit of an arse that I have to keep my HS set to Shatt, and catch a boat back everytime I want to go to Northrend.
* Glitched Mobs - Almost every mob of one type was glitched (Spores), there were about 30 spawned, but only 2 / 3 worked, so you had to wait for those ones to respawn several times to complete a quest.
* Chat Spam - This isn't Blizzards fault, but I've had to turn of general chat because of the amount of bullshit people are talking in general chat.


The above list looks like I hate alot of things about the new expansion, but I don't really. All the problems are more 'Annoyances' rather than reasons not to play. Overall I love the look and feel of the new stuff, and the first dungeon run 'Utgarde Keep' was a simple Tank-n-Spank run to break us into the dungeon content of Northrend.
I managed to make it to level 71 within a few hours, although some people had been playing since the midnight launch, and still hadn't managed that.. the slackers!
I also got a few nice quest rewards, and one or two drops, which have improved upon the greens that I had left over from Pre-WotLK, and improved my haste rating to the point where, when my Quick-Shots procs which is almost all the time, my shots take only 1 second to cast.
That's the minimum possible time. As soon as my shot is released, the global CD is up, and the next shot is ready to fire, so it maximises DPS.
It was all a little bit too easy, most mobs were level 71 or lower (I could probably just set my pet to aggro, and let it clear the place out) but as I logged off things were starting to get a little bit more challenging... but only a bit.
So, I'm looking forward to playing with more of the new stuff later tonight, after work. And will probably reach 72 by the end of it.
Although I'll probably have to spend an hour at the AH first though, working out how much to sell all my new drops for. Auctioneer will help, but it's not going to be very accurate for a while.

Give us a Lich

I feel like a kid on Christmas Eve. In a couple of hours I'll be off to pick up my pre-order of WotLK, and then straight home from work early, to install it, iron out all the addon bugs that will no doubt plague me, and then grind my way to 80, before re-rolling myself a DK..... Yay!
And I've already booked the time with my Mrs, so she knows I've got a big sign over my head for at least today,and probably the next few days.

We'll have to develop a sort of rudimentary language. She already thinks I'm talking gibberish if I ever mention 'Kara' 'Raiding' 'DPS' 'Pally' 'AFK' or a million other phrases from in-game.
Maybe we'll have to go with 1 grunt for 'Yes', 2 grunts for 'No';

Mrs: "Do you want something to eat love?"
Me: "Grunt"
Mrs: "How about a sandwich?"
Me: "Grunt"
Mrs: "Cheese and Tomato?"
Me: "Grunt!"
Mrs: "Or how about Tuna?"
Me: "Grunt Grunt"
Mrs: "Do you want onion on it then?"
Me: "Oh FFS just make the bloody sandwich!.. Oh, I mean... erm... GRUNT!"
Me: "And can you cut the crusts off... please"

DK, or Not-DK?

That is the question, but what is the answer?

I've spent all this time waiting expectantly for WotLK to arrive, and looking forward to playing in all of the new zones, and facing new challenges, that I've, honestly, alomst completely overlooked the new DeathKnight class.

Every time someone has asked me if I'm going to roll a DK, I said "Yes, but only to reserve the name I want as soon as possible". But having just looked at the new talent trees for them, I'm atually very intrigued. And now more confused.

My level 70 Pally is going to be a tank from now on rather than a healer, but with an offspec of healer - if the dual-spec'ing thing is true.
As a healer it's more a game of watching the Health bars, and clicking them at the right time, while missing the action in most fights. As a tank it's more interesting, but still just a case of watching for the cooldowns and pressing the right buttons as soon as they light up.

My level 70 Hunter is a DPS-Machine, all the way, and I don't see him ever becoming anything but.
Playing my Hunter is now mostly a case of Point->Click->Spam ScrollWheelDown->Win, with the occasional Spamming of the 'T' key for those longer fights or boss encounters, and the casting of 'Serpent Sting' if the mood takes me.

So I was considering rolling a Druid, just for something a little different, just to add a bit more variety in my play style.

But I really like the look of the new DeathKnight, particularly the 'UnHoly' tree (although the 'Blood' tree looks good too).
Unholy looks alot like a Warlock build, but one who can wade in and dish the melee DPS alongside a summoned creature.
I can completely see myself wandering around the world spreading chaos and disease, and raising the dead... albeit in a very benign 'Alliance-Freindly' non-evil, and of course Munqui'ish sort of way.

The only downside of doing that, of course, is that I'd have to start at level 55, meaning that I'd be wading through Outland again before I get to explore Northrend.

Hmm, too many choices... Damn you Blizzard!!!

I Believe I Can Fly - I Believe I Can Touch The Sky!

Who would have thought it?
Only a single day before the release of Wrath of the Lich King, I finally saved up enough to buy my Artisan Riding skill and a Swift Purple Gryphon.
So I'm now 5200 Gold lighter in the wallet, but very happy with my spend.
The feeling of achievement may be short-lived, but for now I'm more than happy with it.

Next goal - Get my ass to level 80 as soon as possible.

On a seperate note, blogger seems to be giving me some issues with background images.
Whenever I edit my layout the background image at the top (which should show a Lich King style banner) dissapears.
Anyone else noticed it missing, or is it just a cache problem for me?