Don't Leave Home Without It

Over my course of playing WoW, I have discovered that blogs tend to be some of the best sources of information that isn't always easy to find. The bloggers tend to go to lengths doing research and tests in order to educate and help readers maximize their potential. I'm not there yet, but someday hopefully.

One of the reasons that I wanted to start a blog about Enhancement Shamans is because as I leveled up this character, I often found it hard to find good information sites. Browsing forums can sometimes get you a good gem but it is frustrating fighting your way through the mire of trolls, flames, and inaccurate information.

It isn't much but here's a start. It is often difficult to compare marginally different pieces of equipment and decide which is better. When I used to play a hunter, I often used Cheeky's Spreadsheet because you just needed to stick equipment X into your profile and see if it increased your DPS. Shamans aren't as easy. I don't know the numbers game very well, I'm not a theorycrafter. However I suppose it is related to the abilities we have available to us, rotations, and all that good stuff. Whatever the reason, there isn't an easy spreadsheet out there. But do not fret, there are options. Instead of just going to one of your capital cities and beating on a training dummy, there is a useful simulator that I often use: EnhSim. This is a very nifty toy that you plug your info such as stats, spec, etc. (I will go there in a second) and it runs a combat simulation and spits out the important info, namely your DPS. You can customize it a lot, even changing boss stats such as resists, etc. in order to estimate how it will affect your DPS. When I first started using it, I found that the configuration could be a little confusing so here's a little step by step for the first time user. Note that this is with version 1.4.6. It may differ slightly for a newer version.

After unzipping, go into "config". The first thing I change is simulation_time, which I put to 10000. A longer simulation will improve the accuracy. There are some options to change in "Rotations and Misc" but I leave them as is. Next is your rotation, which you would put based on how you play. I use a simple five spell rotation:

SR (Shamanistic Rage)
MW5_LB (Lightning Bolt at 5 charges of Maelstrom Weapon)
SS (Stormstrike)
ES (Earth Shock)
LL (Lava Lash)

Based on your situation, I'm sure it will differ. I don't raid yet so I rely on Water Shield whereas a raider will probably be using Lightning Shield for maximum DPS since more mana sources are available. The same goes for Lightning Bolt. Unless it is going to hit multiple mobs, Chain Lightning is too expensive to always use. Prior to patch 3.0, my rotation would include Flame Shock then Earth Shock, but that is no longer the case. Enhancement now dips into Elemental instead of Restoration. The changes to caster stats have given Enhancement Shamans lots of spellpower and spell crit now too. Add in the damage bonus from Stormstrike and ES is much better DPS. But back on topic.

Next are boss stats that you can modify to analyze specific fights. Again I don't raid yet so I haven't done anything with that. Buffs too you can modify based on your common situation. For instance if you are a raider, you will probably enjoy most, if not all of those benefits. If you are a soloist, you can at least get totem and self buffs. Consumables too you can alter based on what you generally have running.

Now into stats. It is pretty self-explanatory. You just copy the stats off your character sheet. Just make a note of some things that may not be obvious if you aren't reading the notes. The hit you enter is the percent, given when you hover over hit rating. Same goes for haste rating, and armor penetration. Also expertise is the rating itself that you get from hovering over it. Here is the one spot however that I am unsure, spell bonus damage and mana regen. I would assume that when entering your stats that need to be unbuffed. Flametongue weapon and Water Shield will boost these stats and they are entered elsewhere. However I do not know if those entries account for these stats or are only there for their procs. If anyone knows one way or the other please let me know.

Next are some more entries: weapon imbues, enchants, weapon type (only matters for Orcs), trinkets, etc. etc. Enter what you have. If you don't have one (enchant or an unlisted trinket for instance), just make it a -. Finally plug in your spec. Yes it doesn't have all talents, namely resto, but those won't be affecting your DPS so that's moot.

Yay, we're all done. Save that up and then run start_simulation. That will run for a minute or so then print out a nice list of anything you wanna know.

I primarily use this to compare different items by plugging the stats wearing one versus the other. Yes it is tedious to reenter all the modified stats but it is the best that I have found to definitively show which piece is better. Still easier than calculating EP (Enhancement Points) also.

Now that that's all said in done, EnhSim does have limitations. The most glaring of which is that you need to be able to equip both pieces to really compare them. Therefore it doesn't help that much if you are contemplating whether or not to roll or spend your DKP on a new piece of equipment. I suppose it is possible if you are a number cruncher but I for one don't know things like how much crit you'll get from X agi. Even if you do, that seems like way too much of a pain. One other limitation is that some item entries do not have all possible options. You may not have the trinket or totem on the list for example. The last update however added several. Perhaps more will be in the future.

Despite those setbacks I think that it is a great tool. It isn't something you can really use to accurately predict your DPS, but it shows an ideal situation where you don't have to move, don't have to toss any heals, and are free from human error. Still, I think it's pretty cool and I have found it useful in comparing equipment. I've recently learned about an addon called Pawn which is supposed to help you make loot decisions based on point systems like Tank Points. I'll try to play with this and talk about it in the near future.

Ol' Salty

Yes, my first real post on my Shaman/Death Knight blog is unrelated to either. As we progress through the lives of Koji and Anguish, you will see that WoW has hooked me in a lot more aspects than just killing things. Two in particular are fishing and achievements.

I can't really explain my interest in either. Fishing I don't find particularly entertaining. It is sometimes boring, and recently (which I will get to momentarily) can be extremely tedious. It does have financial benefits; you can get pretty good money from fishing; but I have lots of money and have nothing to spend it on. Regardless, I am hooked on it (no pun intended... I hate puns). I can't explain it, but I keep on doing it, on both characters.

Achievements are another interesting subject matter. Aside from a few achievements, like the ones that offer titles, mounts, companions, or other little nifty toys, they are just for show, there is really no utile benefit (excepting the black, plagued, and violet proto-drakes, they are 310% speed). I have never really compared mine to other people, though I'm sure there are many who have friendly competitions with them. Regardless, I like aiming for achievements. When they were implemented, I went back and did all the old world dungeons, I did the exploration, and have done a lot of the old world quests for Loremaster, though that's on hiatus for the time being. Regardless, they too have a hook that I can't really explain. Good job Bliz on a creative concept.

Getting back to what this is all about, fishing and achievements. Specifically, the fishing achievement: Accomplished Angler. Reward: just the silly title "Salty". No pretty rod, nothing else. Yet this is an achievement that I have worked a lot on. It isn't an achievement that requires skill at your class, though you do need to know a fair deal of tricks to get some of the more difficult requirements. The biggest thing it requires is patience. You will be doing a whole lot of fishing, a lot just sitting in the same place, perhaps for hours on end, until you get that one rare catch. Worth it? I sure don't think so, but I'm going after it anyway.

I only started really working on this achievement when I won the Stranglethorn Fishing Extravaganza a few weeks ago. I had won it on 2 or 3 old characters but Koji is fairly fresh, I started him only a few months before WotLK (though I already had a shaman in the past). But I digress. I only started then because that is probably the hardest part of the achievement. There is one winner a week, 52 winners a year. That makes it pretty rare. Maybe that is some of the allure of the Salty title.

Just to get our feet wet today I'll be focusing on the few simpler requirements that don't really need a guide. Over the next few days I'll go over them all in depth. Here is what we're looking at.

Let's just go down the line of easy ones.

Grand Master Fisherman: As it says, become a Grand Master Fisherman. You'll be attaining this eventually no matter what, you need that skill for Northrend. Nothing to worry about.

The Old Gnome and the Sea: Successfully fish in a pool. You'll be fishing in pools, most likely a lot of them. Nothing to worry about.

1000 Fish: Hmm, I wonder what you need for this one. If you are starting fishing fresh, you'll definitely get this along the way. If you already had max skill going into WotLK, you'll still definitly get this along the way. I don't think it's possible to have such good luck that you can finish all the achievements without thousands of casts.

Okay yea, that was all blatantly obvious, sorry. I thought I would be able to cover a few more than that without any real thought, but I'm sure you all want a break, this got a lot longer than I expected. No worries, I'll be going into the other ones soon.

Beginnings

So here it goes. Welcome to Ghouls and Ghosts, a World of Warcraft blog focusing on the lives of my two characters, a Draenei Shaman on the Drenden server named Koji and my new Orc Death Knight on the Terokkar server named Anguish.

WoW blogs seem to come in many different flavors. Some are strictly gameplay related, becoming knowledge bases on their particular subject. Some are focused on the roleplaying aspect of the game, personifying their avatar and giving them life. Some are made to bring out the fun of the game and their character and give their readers a laugh. Some may not even be game related at all and focus on the real lives of the players behind the screen. Of course most fall somewhere in between. In this blog I hope to be informative on my subjects to best help out my readers become better players themselves. When I first started reading WoW blogs, it was because I found a particular blog that had volumes of information and guides on the class I was playing at the time (a hunter) and I got hooked. I started reading other blogs of all varieties, as seen from that nifty list to my right. I'll of course be peppering my blog however with some comedy and fun, every blog needs that, and maybe I will occasionally delve into my personal life if I find it relevent or entertaining.

I am certainly not a pro on any subject. I have played WoW since shortly after it's release, and about 8 years of Everquest prior to that, so I've been playing MMO's for a good half my life. I was a hardcore raider in EQ but that hasn't been the case in WoW. I have hardly raided in WoW, but I hope that with WotLK that will change, I've gotten the raiding itch again. Even if I am not the most experienced, I feel that I play my classes well and strive to be the best player that I can be. I do a lot of research on my classes and I'll do my best to pass on this knowledge to my readers. As I become a better player, I will strive to focus on my original work in order to aid my readers.

So readers, thanks for giving my little blog a glimpse. This is my first blog as you may be able to guess. It is currently very rough and so over time I'll try to improve it. Any feedback, suggestions, criticisms, whatever are always appreciated so that I can improve the blog and in turn provide better information and entertainment to you, my valued readers.