Thursday, April 16, 2009

Fish goes both ways. . .

Well, there were two things I was looking forward to in patch 3.1 (noblegarden was not one of them btw): the Argent Tournament and dual specs. Due to my server switching (not really switching as much as returning), I lack the appropriate level to do much of anything with the Argent tournament (and if it is the PvP hell that the sunwell dailies were, I will not be doing it on the horde server). However, I was able to experience the goodness that is dual specs and obviously I have some thoughts on the subject.

My thoughts on picking an off spec:
In general, paladins and druids should probably be a healing off-spec. Obviously individual circumstances will vary, but being able to fill the two most important roles in a group will help greatly. Other tanks (warriors and DK's) if they want an off-spec can go DPS (my choice would be fury for warriors and unholy for DK's, blizz has made blood a less appealing option). Shammies and priests would benefit from a healing spec and a DPS spec, the advantage of these two is that they can use functionally the same gear with very little modification (the only major difference would be hit, not too worried about heals "hitting"). Hunters, Rogues, and Mages: dual spec if you want to, I think it's a waste of cash, but it's your 1k to blow.

My dual spec selections:
I have 2 level 74 paladins (basically one I intend to potentially raid with, and one who'd be better for it if I could find 9 other people I'd want to raid with). My blood elf pally I went protection/retribution, my human went protection/holy. I had originally intended to go protection/holy with both, but as the guild I'm in on the horde side has plenty of heals and more on the way, when I'm not tanking I am kind of standing there doing lousy DPS so ret would be a major improvement. My hordie had to make the biggest adjustment. I don't believe he had been specc'd retribution since the 40's and that was WELL before the sweeping changes they made to make ret more "viable". I spent about a half hour just leveling 2h sword. Its decent, not very comfortable, I will still do the bulk of my questing as prot, but it will be a nice option for instances and when I need to kill single mobs that I can't AoE effectively. I chose Holy on my PvE server because for pugging instances, if I can't tank them, I can almost definately find a spot healing. I healed with this character up through ramps, I don't think it will be a huge adjustment for me, I do need to create some macros (super crit holy shock heal for starters), but I doubt I will even run heroics with him. I intend to do more goofing around and leveling alts on the alliance server.

The verdict:
For me, as a hybrid class player, I think dual specs are great and well worth 1000g (and this coming from someone with no epic flyers due to budgetary reasons). They are great flexibility and make it super easy to change. Obviously, the big winners from this are paladins and Druids, but most classes in the game can gain some benefit.

Friday, April 10, 2009

Blizzard's vision of the future of Wow. . .

Apparently, the first boss fight in ulduar will involve vehicles, I am officially disgusted and losing desire to raid by the second. . .




The have motorcycles now, why the fuck not?

Thursday, April 9, 2009

Things to do besides quest. . .

I did not hit level 73 on my day off yesterday, I did get about 2/3 of the way there. I had a couple things get in the way while attempting to get th rest of the way.

First of all, it was bothering me to no end to see cobalt veins and not being able to mine them. I decided to run to outlands and knock out the rest of my mining to get to at least 350 (I got to 351, and then using some cheap cobalt ore from the AH, got to 371 smelting). Now I will no longer have to pass by those little veins of blue goodness.

Next, I love soloing vanilla instances (havent tried ramps yet, even though I think I could), my GM has been leveling a priest and needed a run through Sunken Temple, and let me tell you it was just what the doctor ordered (to cure my boredom, not thedoctor of WTFspaghetti fame).

I still think level 74 is a decent goal for this weekend, however questing on the PvP server could change that. I refuse to quest through ganking, it takes how long it takes. I have plenty of rested XP to get there, so that really isnt a concern. We'll see I guess. I do have to say, it is either when I'm questing or where I'm questing, I have only been ganked once in northrend on the PvP server. Probably since writing that in the blog, that will change, but it is encouraging to be able to level without distraction, you know like PvE lol.

My only real desire to run instances is to run them with my MAS buddies. The only way to do that is to level my character on a PvP server. I hate pvp servers! No wonder I reached the TBC level cap 2 months before Wrath.

Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Food poisoning is NOT fun for children of all ages. . .

This weekend was pretty packed for me, and as such, not much playing of wow occured.

I did manage to catch wrestlemania at Bw's, but I have noticed the quality has really declined over a few years ago. Note to Vince: the words Mark Henry and Ladder match should never be used together for any reason. Also, this years' had more completely useless wastes of time than I remember previously.

The lowlight of the week also came as a result of the ppv. I got a rather serious case of food poisoning from the BW's which caused my monday to be rather unpleasant to say the least.

On a leveling front, I wasn't able to accomplish too much or run anything, hopefully I'll be able to get to level 73 on horde pally sometime this week so I can stop using the stupid looking nerubian husk and start using a shield that looks like a shield. Yay saronite defender.

Also, I dropped enchanting for mining and while it will probably pay off in the long run, man is it a pain! I don't have an epic flyer yet, so I am reduced to flying around on the normal flyer looking for fel iron. It could be worse, I'm through thorium.

Thursday, April 2, 2009

Two variables of raiding personalities. . .

This is me admitting I was wrong, partially. In my last post I blatantly stereotyped raiding personalities. Like any stereotype, they do apply to people, they're just not absolute (I'm a jew who works in the finance industry, I should understand stereotypes, go figure). I am hereby proposing a modification to my previous statement.

There are two variables to raiding: Motivation and Socialization (call them whatever you want, the meaning will become clear). Anyone who raids, obviously has both because you can't raid by yourself (I don't think) and since you're raiding in the first place, you obviously have motivation.

Motivation is the degree of your desire to improve and experience content. I understand part of this improvement tends t0wards the acquisition of gear. In and of itself, nothing wrong. I personally have a low motivation because, well I like easy tasks, with a minimum of work. There are plenty of players I know with extremely high motivation who are very socially dedicated, so to stereotype was wrong.

The other side of the coin is socialization. How connected are you with people? How much do you put them before yourself. Again, it is a continuum with completely self centeredness on one end, and saintly altruism on the other.

Now, people who have both high motivation and high socialization, those are normally your GM's, super active members of guilds, major players. On the other end of the spectrum are people with both low motivation and socialization, also not a problem, no one really cares if they aren't motivated to improve, they aren't very socially connected. The problem comes when someone is disproportionately high on either area. High motivation but not socialization are the guild jumpers and loot ninjas. High socialization but low motivation are the "please please please run me through everything" players.

I can admit when I'm wrong, it is one of my favorite parts about blogging. I also probably think more clearly with feedback and when not at work.

Two types of raiders. . .

Well, something interesting happened to draw me back onto my old server. There was some drama in the guild that I helped start (by helped I mean I signed the charter, that was about the extent of my contribution). Basically, a lot of the people who had been with us for some time decided to leave the guild for a different guild. Obviously there was a lot of bad feelings and a sense of betrayal (possibly on both sides, but my viewpoint is one-sided). Our guild master decided to combat this exodus by calling in the "originals", and as an original, I left my retirement in Azuremyst to do battle in the harsh reality of the PvP server.

As a side note, that really is how PvE feels to me: retirement. It's fun, it's relaxed, I feel like I can do whatever I want, but it's hard to get anything of substance done.

That wasn't what this post was supposed to be about, but it got me to thinking. I have run with a lot of the people that left. I genuinely liked a couple of them. I know this happens a lot, but why? MAS isn't exactly a "raiding guild". We're more a relaxed group of friends who get together, level and occasionally run some comments. We have 4 G-bank slots and a tabard, pst for invite. . .OK, that last part was totally me kidding. I got to thinking, there really are only two types of raiders.

The first type of raiders is all about improvement. I've nicknamed these people Gear Whores. They'll run with guildies, run with pugs, run 5 days a week, and constantly brag about the "osum l33t perplez" they won from runs. Their runs are endless loops of repetition to get the "best in slot gear".

The second type run because people they know run. They like the game, but normally have a bunch of alts and aren't as concerned with "progression". They are generally more laid back and not as desiring of instant gratification.

I would consider myself in the second group. I want to run with people who are in the second group. I want to put the people in the first group on /ignore. I tried to come up with more classifications for people, but really you either raid for friends/the experience or gear. Anyone who raids for gear is a mercenary and not worth the time of inviting to a group.

/end rant