No Rest for the Wicked

Well for the few who have read my blog, it's been obvious that I haven't written much. There hasn't been a post in several weeks.

I simply have been so busy lately that I don't find time to post. I'd like to have thoughtful and meaningful posts, which require time and effort. I am working full time in my real job in addition to numerous side jobs that I do. I am making plans to further my education beginning this summer. This also means that I'll be moving so even more time is dedicated to looking at areas and apartments.

I have barely even had time to play WoW, so really don't have time to post about it-I don't even really have anything that I can post about since my playtime is so limited.

So for now, I'm hanging up my writing hat and putting the blog on hiatus. Perhaps I'll be able to start it back up again in the future, but who's to say. To those few who did frequent my blog, I thank you. Hopefully in the future I can at least bring a little bit of entertainment or enlightenment through my musings but for now it isn't in the cards.

Another Off the Bench

So I hinted to it in some recent posts, but lately I have dusted off another old retired character of mine, Zao the feral Druid. I do enjoy Rai. Hunters are fun classes, especially for a player like me, who prefers playing alone. However, I can't always play alone. I like running instances too. If you have a halfway decent group, they can be good fun.

Therein lies the problem that I should have realized a long time ago. It is hard to get groups as DPS. Koji often had issues, I don't know why I didn't consider it for Rai. Add to that the general stigma against hunters. The huntard label continues to stick. It is easy to play a hunter even poorly and breeze through levels. Like every class, it takes skill to play a hunter well. Unfortunately, most hunters fall in the former category so they are often judged negatively from the start. I just frankly don't want to spend all day to get one group that seems to more often than not be a mess.

I'm playing Zao as a kitty now but will likely play primarily as a tank once I hit 80. However, that'll take some time.

It has taken some getting used to playing Zao again. I had retired him even earlier than I had Rai, which was quite a long time ago. It has taken a bit of time getting back into the groove. There's also been plenty of new things to learn. He can charge, swipe, Nature's Grasp, Barkskin, just to name a few things. Tiger's Fury is useful now, I never used it in the past. I can use items, potions, all that, which is quite nice. It seems that as you get even higher they get pretty complex, keeping up dots, debuffs, and buffs during a fight. I look forward to it.

With 3.1 around the corner, there is also the potential of dual speccing resto, which I probably will. I intend to on Koji as well, so that gives me two chances to see if I like healing or not, in two very different styles.

And just a little testament to how much of a nerd I am. I spent probably almost an hour yesterday trying to get Mik's Scrolling Combat Text to play a Mortal Kombat II "Finish Him" sound effect whenever I have 5 combo points. It seems the better part of the time was spent learning that I just had to change the events drop menu from "Incoming Player" to "Notifications". Regardless, I am quite proud of my accomplishment =)

Dragons Aren't so Tough

Yarr, for her to make an appearance that means Malygos be dead. Was quite a fight too. Took several tries, two of which got him to less than 5% before enrage hit. Well he enraged on three, but on the third we managed to eke out the kill. I fell right as he did, it ended with one person still alive! I'm glad that we have taken a nice step in progression. Unfortunately I haven't been able to raid much lately because of work so I'm falling a bit behind gear-wise, hopefully my DPS isn't faltering too much with it.

Here's some food for thought. Alexstrasza has 140 million HP. She's the dragon Queen. She looks mighty fine in her humanoid form. Why doesn't she just come in and smack around Malygos' 20 mil and call it a day?

Shinies!

I'm certainly nuts. I admit it, nothing wrong with it.

Well I guess there could be.

A couple weeks ago I mentioned my efforts to level Jewelcrafting on Rai the Hunter. It was kinda tedious. I made the decision on the fly so wasn't able to stock up on materials or get the best prices. But I did it. I was quite happy when I finished to, and I still am. It has proved to be reasonably profitable, and pretty interesting to say the least. I've never been into production professions. Koji has near maxed Enchanting, though I consider that a little different, even though it is production.

I guess it hooked me because I decided to raise jewelcrafting on Zao, my Druid. And with that, I also started a Death Knight bank alt and raised his enchanting to 350 for disenchanting. You must realize, however, that I don't play Zao. I am considering playing him. So if I turn around and decide not to, well that's that. But I have absolutely no life and too much free time so chances are good you will be seeing his tales soon enough.

Yes, yes, pretty nuts huh? But wait, there's more! Last night, about 1AM or so, I get this feeling. Koji is pretty much just a raider now. I do run some heroics but not like I used to. I certainly don't need any drops, any badges. I do it to help other guildies or try for achievements. His mining sees very little use. Yea I hit a node here and there in my travels but if I'm not questing or anything, it seems rather a waste. I know I'm not clinging to it for the 50 stamina. So, have you guessed where this is going? Yup, I'm going to start jewelcrafting on him now. At least he's already an enchanter so I don't have to raise another one. I haven't started his leveling yet but it looks like it will be much easier; it seems like there are plenty of mats for reasonable prices compared to the other two servers.

Can't say why I'm doing it. Sure the prismatics will help some. My guild already has a few jewelcrafters so it's not like the skill is in dire need. I'm just doing it for kicks. Yup, if not crazy, I'm certainly weird. Not that there's anything wrong with it. Well I guess there could be.

Locked and Loaded

So Rai hit 80 yesterday doing his Sholazar dailies. Hurrah! First thing I did? I logged on Koji and did a couple heroics.

But then! I went to Orgrimmar to get another gift of adoration.
But then! I did jewelcrafting for a little while that I've been meaning to do for maybe a week.
But then! I managed to get to the hunter trainer to get my new skills.
And then! I finally thought of getting my Nesingwary 4000 out of the bank. That one that I worked to get at 77, making myself completely broke in the process? Yea, that one. My funds are doing quite swimmingly now, by the way.
Along with that I grabbed my Dragonscale Ammo Pouch and snagged a few thousand rounds.

The only problem is, I can't remember what level I stopped using a gun. I know that at 70 I started using Valanos' Longbow, and got a Steelhawk Crossbow, which is what I brought to Northrend. I can't recall when I last had a gun, though. So my skill was around 350, and I obviously wasn't doing a lot of damage. Luckily range weapons are easy to raise, easier than melee, and having a gorilladin to take the beatdown makes it even easier.

I finally got around to buying a Heartseeker Scope today, it's in my inventory, yet I haven't gotten around to putting it on my gun. I still haven't gotten a gem, probably sometime today once I figure out what's best, probably something with hit since my gear sucks and I'm not capped.

So, anyone see a trend of laziness?

Not Too Shabby

Since I began raiding, I've been fairly content with my DPS. It's been up there, nothing stellar, not topping the charts, but getting the job done. So that's why tonight's WWS report of Sarth+1, Archavon, and 2 wings of Naxx surprised me a little.

We started with Sartharion +1 drake. The fight can be a little hectic and messy, and you're dealing with a dragon, a drake, whelps, and elementals, so the report may be a bit off, but it was fairly standard.

4th, not too shabby, I usually float around 6th at best to 10th at less than best.

Naxx was a little more surprising.

First Anub'rekhan,

Then Grand Widow,

Then Maexxna,

Then Noth,

Needless to say, I was rather surprised. The rest of the fights was more where I was used to, 7th for Archavon, 6th for Heigan, and an icky 10th for Loatheb. In my defense, Archavon and Heigan are more range-DPS friendly with Archavon jumping all over the place and having to avoid his clouds, and Heigan offering the safety of his platform for the non-dance part of his fight. On Loatheb I got only one spore, so only enjoyed 95% crit for a couple minutes while most probably got a lot more.

On the flip side, I shouldn't get full of myself. BRK was raiding as BM, testing their post 3.09 viability. His DPS was on par with the rest of the raid, though he generally topped it as SV. But I'm sure he'll have more to say on it than I ever could. Also our two other SV Hunters weren't attending tonight, or our top mage. So I guess that all considered would put me back around 6th... well that's kinda a downer.

Now I know DPS charts don't tell nearly the whole story, there is a whole lot more to being a good raider. But I think I performed as I should have. No standing in the fire, no deaths during boss fights. Always rather low on incoming damage and offering a decent spattering of my own healing into the mix. Well there was Archavon...

See, I can tank! I wear mail, that's made of metal, just like plate, so I'm practically a warrior. So not sure if I screwed up there, or it's just that no tanks picked him up after eating the MT, or whatever, I'll play it safe and say it's my fault. But I didn't die, so it's all good.

A Name Change?

So I've been thinking of renaming Ghouls and Ghosts and giving it a face lift. The original concept of the blog was the focus on Death Knights-ghouls and Enhancement Shamans-ghosts(spirit wolves). However, after I got Anguish to 70, I had pretty much lost all interest in him. I had intended to revive him in the future, but I'm currently really enjoying my hunter, Rai, and I'm considering bringing my old Tauren Druid, Zao out of retirement.

So except for Koji, the name isn't all that fitting. So I'm trying to think up something new that can incorporate the classes I now play, an Enhancement Shaman, Beast Mastery Hunter, and Feral Druid. All seem somewhat animistic, so maybe something up that alley. I know I have only a small handful of readers so far, but any suggestions are appreciated =)

The Spice of Life

I forgot to post a few days ago but I finally stopped being lazy and finished leveling up my cooking, completing The Northrend Gourmet and Hail to the Chef, earning yet another title. Too bad it didn't really come with a snazzy hat (or an apron tabard!)

I'm only a handful of recipes away from finishing Chef de Cuisine too, WTB Dig Rat Stew recipe!

Explosions Make Everything Better

There have been bombs in Azeroth for as long as there have been goblins. Most of our experience have been with little seaforium charges to blow up locks and some area damage in a fight. However, Wrath of the Lich King stepped it up a little bit.

I can think of two quests off the top of my head that are certainly making D.E.H.T.A. raise their fists in violent protest, throwing bombs into Worms and running sleds into Mammoths, both leaving a corpse and a mess of meat and gore to be harvested in the surrounding area. There are at least a couple quests where you're blowing up Abominations too. There are probably more that I can't remember.

There are also some less inhumane explosions including a few mine fields in Storm Peaks, as well as bazookas and seaforium charges in Wintergrasp and Strand, respectively.

Death Knights bring even more explosions, what with Corpse Explosion right out of Diablo II and sending your ghoul into the fray only to self-destruct.

Unfortunately, they haven't given up on their obsession with poo either.

Progression, Achievements, Titles!

I need to update more. Too much to say! Though all this happened within two days so guess it's forgivable.

Let's start off with raiding. It seems like we just started Naxx and we've already moved into our first official Naxx-25 last night. It went very smoothly. Our raids only last about three hours so we only had time for Spider and Plague wings and Patchwerk but all went swimmingly. There were no wipes on bosses, just one on trash when we got a little overzealous pulling gargoyles and agroed 3, and then the rest of the room too. I was proud that I didn't die once excepting the wipe. My DPS was, well average. I was only averaging around 3k DPS on fights where you have to actually do stuff, and about 3.5 on Patchwerk where I just stand around and beat on him. I suppose that's pretty decent but perhaps we just have a solid DPS base as I was generally around 11th in DPS.

I guess I need to just keep telling myself that I'm not pure DPS, and it's my nifty tools that's making everyone else's DPS that high.

I did nab a goofy looking beatstick, which is nice. Goes well with my goofy offhand.
Onwards!

Achievements. I got a lot today. Like 10 probably, several of which were towards Glory of the Hero. I still need 18, I likely will never get it, but it's still cool.

With those achievements I got two titles. Two! One was Elder, from the Lunar Festival achievement. It's cool but nothing big, a lotta people will have it, replacing their Hallowed and Merrymakers. I am looking positively stylish, however.
The other was a biggie. Loremaster. No easy feat. It involves doing enough quests to get the questing achievements for every Northrend and Outland area, at least 95% of the quests in each zone, plus 700 quests in both Kalimdor and Eastern Kingdoms (for Alliance). Along the way I also got the Seeker title, for 3000 quests. I'd be surprised if you can get Loremaster without Seeker, though I did more than just the required amount in every area, because I have no life, and quests are interesting.Now I'm an honorary quest giver!
Oh, and if that isn't enough, I finally stabled my Netherwing Drake!

Try Panhandling?

I generally have never had money issues on my characters, in pretty much all the years that I have played WoW. I always have at least one gathering profession and I know how to effectively work in the Auction House to make a pretty penny. So Rai's present situation is a little depressing.

I had originally played Rai in earlier BC, I think I stopped sometime around when Quel'Danas and the Sunwell and all that stuff came out, because I never did those quests on him. At that time I hung up Rai's bow, let my Boar and Wind Serpent get housebroken, ended his heroic exploits, and started up a shaman named Koji (the first, not the present). I hadn't intended to play Rai again, of all the characters I played, I never seriously revisited any after starting a new one. So I pretty much liquidated all my funds to friends and whatnot save for a few hundred gold in the slim chance I ever really did dust off the ol' Troll again.

So when I actually did start playing Rai again, he was flat broke. He was level 70, but didn't have an epic flying mount. I never thought it was worth the investment, and boy how wrong that was. If I bought an epic mount right when Koji turned 70 (and I could have), it would have made a world of difference. The time saved in travel almost certainly would have offset the cost and then some. Besides, my real time is infinitely more valuable then game gold. But I digress.

So when I dusted off Rai, I knew that one of my big goals was to get 5k gold for epic flying. It wouldn't offer me serious benefits until I hit 77 (which I presently am) but that didn't change the fact that I wanted to get it as soon as I can. Rai was a miner and enchanter and through some effort I afforded my epic flying skill at 75 or 76. Some more work, and I scrounged up another 1k gold for cold weather flying at 77.

My original goals completed, I needed some new ones. Two (technically three) came in my sights, all of which I have (and still are) attempting to complete at once.

Goal 1: Nesingwary 4000. This bad boy pretty much blows most range weapons away, I'm not sure if any heroic drop can match it. I don't get my racial bonus and I'm not a fan of loud guns, much unlike Mr. BRK, but you can't deny the sheer allure of that boomstick. I was going to just save up another 1.5k gold to buy one, but I found that it would be pretty cost effective to just get the mats. I already had a frozen orb from some of my investments as well a few Eternal Shadow and Fire from mining. The rest of the stuff I bought, the sun scopes, the gems, the titanium, and about 10 eternals each. I still figure that it cost my no more than 1k gold, probably less. I generally only bought when they were for sale below median. Even though I'm only 77, I managed to get this cobbled together to grace my bank for a few levels.

Goals 2 and 3 are interrelated. Rai was an enchanter, or to be more specific, a disenchanter. I hadn't really intended to level up his enchanting... maybe to get a ring enchant, but not very high. Koji is already an enchanter and didn't want to repeat going through that. I found Jewelcrafting quite alluring both for its utility and potential profitability. However, I didn't want to give up disenchanting, and certainly not mining. So I compromised...sorta.

I started up a Death Knight, got him through all his starting quests. It was pretty quick since I've done them all on Anguish. It was actually pretty entertaining too, now that I've seen most of the questgivers and NPCs in Naxx and other areas throughout Northrend. And so I went on the task of raising up his enchanting for the sole purpose of being a disenchanter. He's almost there. I hit a snag because I couldn't for the life of me find a Golden Pearl but I finally found one today. Hurrah!

However, at the same time, I'm leveling Jewelcrafting on Rai now. I have spent the last week or so buying materials to level it up when I can find them pretty cheap. However still I haven't been able to find everything and I underestimated the expense of leveling it. I'm sitting at about 200 right now, waiting for some mats to be for sale again (I'm surely not going to hunt them down myself).

The issue however is that my funds have completely exhausted. I spent pretty much every gold I have getting the last of the mats for my Nesingwary 4000. If I were sensible I would have just waited until I actually got 80, but that's not my style. But Rai about 20 silver, my AH character has about 10 gold, and my Death Knight has about 50 gold to use towards finishing his enchanting.

I'm sure it won't be long until I have plenty of cash again. A little questing will get me some buffer and I have probably 100 some odd auctions up that just don't seem to want to sell. I have no fears of getting money again soon, it just came as quite a surprise to me that I'm in such a situations, since I've never really experienced it before.

Mr. Bigglesworth Won't Save You

I haven't done a lot of posting about my raiding (well, I haven't done a lot of posting in general). I did a post last week about my foray into Naxxramas and how much I sucked, but I've since deleted that because I don't like being so negative. Now that lag is cleared and I'm a little more raiding competent, this week in Naxxramas went quite swimmingly.

We (that is Aetherial Circle)do two 10-man Naxx raids on Sunday and Monday evenings. We have only done "official raids" for a few weeks. We're not hardcore raiders, we waited until January to do official raids so everyone had proper time to level, gear up, and enjoy the scenery. We've plugged along. Last week we cleared all four wings despite the lag, and as I said, I was quite disappointed with my performance. This week went much better. Both groups cleared the four wings on the first night, leaving only Sapphiron and Kel'thuzad for Monday.

The group that I was in trashed Sapph quite well. 1 shot, our first try. I personally didn't think the fight was difficult at all. Just stay out of the blizzard, position yourself correctly, and hide behind your frozen compatriots.

Kel'thuzad was a little shakier but we got him down in a few tries. It took a bit of time to just work out positioning and whatnot, plus we had some back luck/oopsies. Our main tank once didn't get out of the shadow fissure in time, so kersploded. Twice our add tank got frozen, leading to death. We repositioned our healers and that seemed to fix it. We got him down soon enough, with the second 10-man following suit a few minutes after.

So we departed Naxxramas with only one survivor.

Since it was quite early, we decided to do Sarth-25. We started it last Wednesday but that was before the lag was fixed and it was a bit too ridiculous. The drakes were still dead though so we just cleared the trash and then made short work of the dragon. Hopefully we'll do +1 next week. The only thing about that fight that annoys me is that I can't get the Gonna Go When the Volcano Blows achievement. I keep my spell detail up about halfway on that fight and still don't see the meteors until they pretty much hit and so if I'm in them there's no way that I can avoid them. I'm not sure if there is a better way to see them or what.

So goings are good. I think in a week we're going to start 25 man Naxx, for which I certainly believe that we are ready. From what I hear, a lot of those fights are easier on 25 than 10 and we've got a competent group of raiders so I don't think we'll have issues.

In other news, I'm fudging around with my spec a lot. With 3.08 I got a free respec so tried a spec using Static Shock and lightning shield. It upped my DPS a good deal but my mana suffered way too much. Perhaps once we're always doing 10-mans and I know that I'll be getting Replenishment and Blessing of Wisdom(we have approximately 42 paladins) it will be less of an issue. Though I'm getting ahead of myself, that will be a post in itself.

Gearing for Optimal DPS - Death Knights and Hunters

Okay so I was going to go into a fairly detailed post about Death Knight Pawn values like I did with Shamans, but I opted against it. I didn't come up with these numbers. I originally found this information on Skeleton Jack's website from a post he did a month or so ago. Rather than reiterate what he already wrote, in much poorer quality with worse explanation, I figure it'd be better to just link directly to his post on the subject. So here it is. All credit goes to Skeleton Jack on his post as well as the inspiration for posting this to begin with.

A little disclaimer, however. His post was was done December 3rd. There have been a number of DK changes since then, particularly in 3.08. I don't think that the changes would have a significant effect on the numbers; specific skills were changed mostly, as opposed to the core mechanics of each tree, but I am not sure. Additionally, the Frost numbers are done with 2h in mind, a dual wield spec may vary somewhat. Again, I am in no way qualified to say one way or the other, rather I'm just trying to pass more information out there to those who may not already have it.

Next onto Hunters...

I unfortunately have been unable to find accurate and recent numbers for Pawn for Hunters. If anyone knows of any, I'd gladly appreciate being informed.

All is not lost, however. Hunters have access to a nifty spreadsheet that is very helpful in calculating DPS and comparing changes in equipment, talents, shot rotations, pets, all the shebangabang. Formerly created and maintained by Cheeky until late BC, Shandara has since picked up the project and gives us an iteration for WotLK.

It's fairly simple to use, just plugging in numbers.

Start with the Input tab. The light yellow cells are those to be modified, the rest are locked. You input any pertinent information, your race, class, glyphs, etc. You can also modify things like the target's level, armor, and resilience on this tab if you want to think about a specific fight.

Talents is straightforward enough, you put in your talent spec. You can even have different profiles. The same goes with the Pet Talents tab. Pick your pet of choice and plug in the talents and check off the skills it would use.

Gear is where most of your focus will be after the preliminary inputs. What you have here is a very changeable spreadsheet of each equipment slot with choices of various gear for each, as well as enchants, sockets, and socket bonuses where applicable. The only issue is this: Cheeky did this spreadsheet during BC so most of 70 (and not quite) BC gear is available to choose. There are pretty much all WotLK level 80 equipment as well as many if not all blues from 70 to 80. If you are already 80 that's fine, but it does put the leveler at a bit of a disadvantage, as it doesn't have all the random gear you may find, green quest rewards and whatnot. However, there is a choice for each slot: Custom.

The CustomGear tab (I'm skipping a few) lets you, surprise surprise, customize each slot. You plug in its stats and sockets if applicable and then that is what's used in calculation if you chose a "Custom" slot in any of your gear choices. If you're using the spreadsheet when leveling, it is likely that a number of your slots will be custom.

The Buffs tab shows just that, what buffs you are expected to be packing. If you are a raider, many of those will be enabled. If you're a soloist, only a few self things like food, elixirs, and mana oils will be enabled.

Shot Rotation is a bit more complicated. As I level Beast Mastery, it's fairly simple. I check off what I use: auto shot, arcane shot, serpent sting, steady shot, kill shot, the beast within, and my two trinkets. Depending on your spec and personal situation (like if you only save rapid fire for mana regen, for instance) you will obviously change it to your flavor.

Results, Game Data, Calcs, and PetCalcs are just information. I don't believe there are any cells you can alter. It shows various statistics, such as the stats of various races by level, information on pets and their skills, etc. These are there to look up any various info you may need.

And that, as they say, is that. The spreadsheet is very useful in calculating your estimated DPS as well as comparing gear. Granted, having Pawn values would simplify comparison since you don't need to open up and alter a spreadsheet, but I don't mind it.

One disclaimer for the spreadsheet however. With 3.08, it has been seen now that Survival tops DPS specs, and the best way to play Survival is by trap dancing. The spreadsheet is only concerned with shot rotations, there are currently no options to enable traps or any kind of trap dancing rotation. So I can't say how accurate its use will be if you are a trap dancer.

Gearing for Optimal DPS - Shaman Style

Sorry this took a couple days, I meant to do the followup right away but got rather distracted with other things, and never had the chance to return to it.

Once Pawn is installed and you log in, you can see on your character screen that there is a little button labeled "Pawn" in the bottom right. Click that and you can see a screen with various scales. First delete the default scale because that isn't good for anything. Next click "Import" and paste this into it:

( Pawn: v1: "Enhancement": ArmorPenetration=0.8, MainHandDps=5.9, CritRating=1.7, Strength=1.1, Intellect=1.7, Agility=1.7, ExpertiseRating=2.6, OffHandDps=2.5, HasteRating=1.3, SpellPower=0.9, HitRating=3.1, Ap=1 )

Depending on your stats, this should vary a little. The stats to pay attention to are Hit Rating and Expertise. Those two are weighed most heavily but they both have caps. I'll go a further into hit and expertise in the future but for now I'll just say that until they are capped, they are likely to add the most to your DPS. Hit obviously makes you more likely to hit your enemy.

For now I'll keep it simple. For melee you need 9%, or 295 hit rating. However, Enhancement Shamans have become increasingly dependent on spells for DPS from shocks and 5 charge Maelstroms. So it is recommended to max your spell cap, which is 17%, or 446. You don't need quite this much, however. This is for versus a lvl 83 boss, IE a raid. It is generally assumed that you'd get the necessary raid buffs to lower the needed hit by 3%, so you then require 367 hit. For Alliance it's even lower on account of Heroic Presence.

So to simplify all that. For Horde, you want a spell hit of 14%, or 367. For Alliance, you want a spell hit of 13%, or 341. Until you reach this, or at least very close, I would recommend keeping the 3.1 weight on hit rating.

Expertise is also important. It lowers the chance that you can be dodged or parried. You can only be parried from the front but you can still be dodged hitting from behind. The expertise cap is 6.5% or 214 expertise.

The rest is a little more simple. Agility, Intellect, and Crit are all weighed equally next. Agi adds 1 AP and crit. Int adds mana, spell crit, and 1AP via Mental Dexterity. Crits obviously add more damage as well as affecting Unleashed Rage.

Haste offers a direct percent increase to white DPS. It does not affect Stormstrike, Lava Lash, or spells, since anything you are casting should be instant.

Strength only increases AP. Since your strength is increased by Kings, it is slightly above 1.

Spellpower is less significant as we are still melee, even if we cast a lot. Armor penetration has shown to not have significant effects on DPS. However, the more you have, the greater effect it has. So perhaps if you can stack tons of it, it could be more valuable. I don't think that's at all practical however versus other stats.

So there you go. I unfortunately do not have Pawn values for resto. Well I do, but I don't know how accurate they are, since I have only pinch healed or healed during various gimmick fights and never even specced resto.

Soon I will post more on DPS for Death Knights and Hunters. However as I have less experience with both classes, they may be less accurate and will certainly have less backing than what I could give with Shamans.

Schizophrenia?

Either mages really are completely nuts or just extremely lonely. Could be either when you spend your days cooped up in a tower.

Somebody needs a friend!

Gearing for Optimal DPS

I'm not a min/maxer. I wouldn't go to ridiculous lengths or spend tons of gold to get a little upgrade when something comparable but not quite as good is a lot easier. I play this game to have fun.

However, I play DPS classes. For me doing DPS is fun. Doing better DPS is more fun. I think that anyone would agree that killing stuff faster, easier, and more efficiently is more fun than dieing. That said, even casual players should care about maximizing their abilities and utilizing their benefits.

Nowadays, at least for some classes, it can be very difficult to compare two pieces of gear. It's more than just the basic concepts of stacking Str, Agi, or AP. There's hit rating, haste, armor penetration, expertise, and more. Some clearly benefit more than others. But it is often questionable if x of stat A benefits more than y of stat B.

Most DPS classes are able to analyze benefits based on some sort of equivalency point, or EP. This basically weighs stats in comparison to a base stat. For the classes I play, physical DPS classes, that compares to AP.

This is all well and good, but even great number crunchers can't compute those comparisons on the fly and few probably want to put forth the effort of whipping out a calculator to figure it out.

Luckily, there are addons to do that for you. I'm talking about an addon called Pawn. It's nothing new, you have very likely seen other blogs explain it, but so am I. What Pawn does is it saves the EP values for various stats and gives you the total EP for a piece of gear you are looking at.

Here's a very simplified example. Say a piece of equipment has 30 Str and 30 Agi. Your EP value for Str is 2 while your EP value for Agi is 3. That'll give you a quick calculation of 150 EP. You can easily compare that to a piece of equipment that gives 45 Str and 15 Agi, an EP value of 135.

It's obviously not as simple as that, but that's why Pawn is great, cuz it does the work for you.

I'm going to split this into separate spots for each class to make it easier, since this is getting a little long.

A New Salty on the Way

While I was mired by misfortune on some of the Fishing achievements on Koji, I am equally amazed by my good fortune on Rai. I dusted him off only a few weeks ago but have had surprising luck.

Last week at the Fishing Extravaganza, I was quite surprised to catch a Rockhide Strongfish on one of my first casts. This is among the rarest fish in the game. It is only caught from pools during the Extravaganza, and has a lower catch rate than the rare prize fish. It also happens to count towards One That Didn't Get Away. On Koji, it took thousands of casts in various areas before I had the fortune of catching a 15lb. Mud Snapper, so this came as quite a surprise. I had good fortune on Anguish as well. I got a 15 pounder on him in a few hundred casts, probably between 3 and 500, I wasn't counting.

That isn't the only hard achievement, however. It was probably just the one I had the worst luck with. Another tough one is Mr. Pinchy. On Koji, I think I caught 4 Mr. Pinchy's, using up 10 wishes before I got the pet. Rai, my first pool. And there he is. Of course, I was quite surprised. But remember, there are five potential results of your wish, remember how many Furious Mr. Pinchy's Koji got. How about that. Rai's now sporting a little lobster pet.

Okay, Okay. That's pretty serious luck. There is one achievement however that is certainly the bottleneck of the Salty title. That of course is the Extravaganza. Many have complained that it should be removed from the Salty title and given its own title since it is so based on luck and there are so few who can get it (52 a year). So, here I am. It's Sunday, my 2nd Extravaganza since dusting off Rai.

Yea. I can't really believe it either. All that stands before me now are a number of traveling achievements, like Northrend and Outland Anglers and Scavenger, as well as some very time consuming ones, namely the coin master achievements. Those however require no luck, no skill, just time. Heck. Rai's 72, he isn't even a Grandmaster, he can't fish in Dalaran! Give it a week, I'll probably have a Salty old Troll.

Warning: AE's are Dangerous

Common sense, huh?

You'd think so, but it takes a little getting used to having a pet with a blast radius. Thunderstomp's range is surprisingly large, I don't get how they haven't nerfed this guy yet.

It goes without saying that you have to be a little more careful. If aggressive mobs are close enough to be caught by Thunderstomp, they're probably agro already, but there are plenty of areas with neutral mobs, at least in the lower level zones. You need to be aware of your surroundings.

It is pretty easy to get used to, but you need to think about it also in situations where you wouldn't expect. It makes me a sad panda when Luna kills all the puppies that I had intended to stuff in a sack for a group of hungry walruses.

The Gorilladin Club

So I've been playing Rai a lot over the past couple days, and I have really been enjoying him. It's been a long time, probably a year since I had played a hunter, but I've quickly gotten back in the swing of things. I think for the time being at least, Anguish is officially on the back burner, but I do plan to get back to him eventually, probably when I finish up Koji's quests and am only raiding on him. Besides, he does represent half of this blog's namesake.

Now it's pretty obvious that pets are a huge deal to hunters. No matter what the spec, they are a large part of a hunter's DPS and offers other utility such as tanking, buffs, or debuffs. I cringe whenever I'm grouped with a MM hunter who doesn't use a pet because they 'aren't a big part of their DPS', the huntard title is well deserved by many unfortunately, but those who play their class well prove that hunters can be extremely valuable.

But back to pets. I play BM, so pet choice is especially important to me. Unless you play purely for min/maxing, there is a lot more to one's pet than merely DPS or tanking ability. Aesthetics, personality, all those good things are part of your character's flavor and style, and to most hunters, that is important. Now I do my best to maximize my skill when playing; in most cases that's DPS, but these other traits are very important to me as well. If I wanted max DPS, I'd get a cat, scorpid (though they both are getting nerfed a bit), or devilsaur. I for one dislike all three. Scorpids are bleh. Devilsaurs are big and ugly, and kinda loud. Cats, yea they look pretty, all sleek and whatnot, but they are so blasted common. I'd say a good 4/5 hunters use cats as their DPS pet. I never once used a cat leveling two hunters to 70, and I don't plan to.

So comes the issues of choosing a pet. I had originally started with a ferocity pet. DPS all the way. The faster stuff dies, the faster I move on to more stuff dieing. However, even if these are pretty good DPS, I hit a snag. Agro is quite an issue for hunters. I first got a wasp from Zangarmarsh, they're beauts, and I hoped that Sting would be decent agro, and it would also raise my DPS. Unfortunately, being lvl 65, he couldn't hold agro for squat and DPS wasn't very good either. Yea I could have gone to Nagrand or something and leveled him, but I'm not a patient person. Besides, the Sholazar models are much cooler.

I next chose a carrion bird, hoping that Demoralizing Screech would be pretty good agro. The two new WotLK carrion bird models are cooler than older ones, but they're still condors and pretty ugly. I got the only pretty looking model, a Fjord Crow. I named him Twilight, isn't he cute?

Unfortunately, agro still wasn't that good. He held it better, but I had to use either Intimidation or Misdirect every fight. It's a mana drain and also slows down my killing, making it not all that efficient. Sorry Twilight, but you had to hit the stables. Maybe someday.

So Ferocity isn't working out too well. Luckily, there is a flavor of tanking pets, tenacity. Now comes another issue of who to choose. I already said no to scorpids. Turtles probably make the best tanks with shell shield, but they aren't my style, plus they have no DPS so agro could be an issue. Warp stalkers also probably make good tanks, with their avoidance from warp, but still, no DPS. Crabs. Uh, yea. Pin, no thanks.

Boars. Hmm. I had leveled with a boar on Rai up through 70. I had a cute little black one until about 30 when i got a nicer armored one. Back in the day, boars were king. Charge+growl=crazy agro. That changed though and then they also changed the entire pet mechanics. Today, I think boars are a decent prospect. Gore isn't too shabby DPS. Certainly a consideration.

Crocolisks. Bad attitude is interesting. If you have a lot of mobs it can probably do some pretty wicked DPS. But it's a long cooldown, and I simply hate crocolisks. I don't like their look and their breathing... ugh, I could never listen to that all day.

Rhinos. Very cool. When you think of a "tank", these fit the description. However, therein also lies an issue. They're huge. Stampede also isn't very good. sure it makes for some great videos (Thanks BRK) but practicality is pretty slim.

Worms. Not what I'd think of for a tank, but they can be promising. Acid spit is promising, decent damage and an armor debuff. However it's a ranged attack so they are currently suffering from the spit shuffle or whatever they call it on the forums. This is supposed to be fixed with 3.08. Maybe then.

Bears. They are another pet that actually looks like a tank. Swipe is pretty decent, allowing you to take on a few mobs without worry of agro. They're just so vanilla, though. I find no models at all interesting and I wouldn't really want one following me. If you could tame a War Bear or could still tame a Polar Bear Cub, that may be a different story.

Lastly we come to gorillas. They're tanks. They look pretty cool. Thunder Stomp is absolutely wicked. AoE. Good Damage. Heavy Agro. My only gripe is that pretty much every hunter has one. That's one of my big issues with cats. They only thing is there is really no competition. They tower above all other tenacity pets and no other tenacity pets really have any cool factor. If I am going to have the same tenacity pet as everyone else, I at least need some style. So I moseyed on down to Un'goro to take my chances at finding Uhk'loc, the only albino gorilla in the game (excepting Mokk the Savage who isn't tameable), likely modeled after Snowflake, the only Albino Gorilla who unfortunately died a few years back. He's a rare spawn gorilla that is up only once every 6 hours or so. When I got there, he wasn't up, I wasn't really expecting him to be. It was about 2 a.m. so had no intentions of camping him or anything so I just took my leave and logged off. Since I tend to have insomnia, I found myself awake at about 4:30 and decided to take a look. As luck would have it, there he is strutting through Fungal Rock. Lucky me.

Now a new issue: a name. Some people don't name their pets at all, that's a shame. It adds a little more flavor to your character and the game. A lot of people give their pets goofy names or "pet" kind of names, that certainly isn't for me. I take pride in my pets as noble and loyal comrades. They deserve a dignified name. This is
going to be a tough one.

Edit: I decided to name her Luna. The white fur makes me think of moonlight. I'm gonna go ahead and say that she's female. No I'm not going to go to Wetlands and check. I don't want to spend my time going there, and I especially don't want to spend my time going there to find out that it's really a male. You know it will happen if I do check. So I'm gonna just say it's female. So there.

I first named her Shiro, meaning white, but I thought that was pretty boring and also didn't sound that great. So I bought one of those nifty pet renamers and changed it to Luna. I had also considered Yuki/Yukino or Tsuki/Tsukino, meaning snow and moon, respectively, but I think that Luna is a very pretty name. If I change my mind, I can always cough up 8g more in a week for another certificate.

Weeeeeeeeee!

Giant uh... Giants are great and all, but I need the open skies!

Fresh air, great view, and plenty of speed and mobility. Nothin's stopping me.



Less than ideal...

One More in the Lineup

Koji has been 80 a while now. Most of his reputations are exalted. He needs no more badge gear. There are only a few heroic drops that would be any upgrade at all. I'm working towards finishing up all of the remaining quests in Icecrown, Storm Peaks, and Sholazar Basin.

I will be beginning scheduled raiding with my guild in a week. That is only three nights a week, and I don't see the need to really do a whole lot else on Koji when I'm not raiding. I'll probably still run heroics here and there, particularly to help guildies get more up to speed for raids. I'm still playing Anguish and enjoy him, but I don't know. Lately he just hasn't 'hooked' me, like I want to just keep on going. It seems like I can only quest on him for an hour before I get bored. Which is strange because there is so much to the Death Knight class.

Lately however, I have had an itch to play a hunter. I was almost tempted to start fresh but was able to resist that. I already have two level 70 hunters, one Alliance and one Horde, so I guess that says something about my interest in that class. I have decided to dust off my old Troll hunter, Rai. Prior to my current shaman Koji (not to be confused with my first shaman Koji), I have probably done the most on Rai. I would personally rather play an Orc, which is why I was tempted to restart, but I don't think race is a big enough deal. Trolls are still great hunters, cool, and pretty rare.

So once I finish the last of the quests and loose ends on Koji, I'll probably only play him to raid and will split my non-raiding focus between Anguish and Rai.

So don't be surprised to see this blog branch out a bit into the world of hunters. The name won't change but I may alter my banner a bit. I don't expect to ever post any informative guides or anything like that on hunters, people like BRK and Mania already do way more than I ever could think of doing. But expect to get a fair amount of flavor, lore, questing, randomness, that kinda stuff from him. That seems to be more like what this blog is heading towards anyways, which I hope isn't a bad thing.

Back in His Shoes

I'm warming up to this little ghost kid. Next he sends me to find...a rock. Well whatever. I'm back in Arthas' shoes, this time recreating the culmination of the prince's trek to the Frozen Throne. Yes that's right, his duel with Illidan. It's pretty much as quick and anticlimactic as it was in WC3 too, but still cool. For those who don't know, Illidan was charged by Kil'jaeden to destroy the Frozen Throne while Arthas was away, making it vulnerable. Arthas raced back to Northrend and the duel ensued in the final battle. The result is Illidan totally losing it (yes, he was sane prior to his loss) and Arthas fusing with Ner'zhul to become the Lich King.

This quest also introduced an interesting little snippet of lore. Apparently Arthas cut his own heart out and threw it down that random pit of doom so he would be truly remorseless and evil... a little unusual crossing the physiological heart with one's 'spirit', 'soul', or 'goodness'.

People are speculating that after you defeat Arthas he gets 'redeemed' and you destroy the Lich King... I thought it was possible but when you cut out your own heart, I think redemption would be a little tough.

Another rumor that I think is ridiculous is that Illidan will come back to fight Arthas. I guess it's based on the concept that Kael'thas randomly returned after being 'killed' in Tempest Keep. I guess what people forget is that after you hand in Kael'thas' quest item in Shattrath, he shouts how he isn't really dead. He didn't just randomly appear again.

Silence descends upon Shattrath
A'dal's thoughts invade your mind
Kael'thas Sunstrider has been defeated by and (his/her) allies
The time to strike at the remaining blood elves of Tempest Keep is now. Take arms and let A'dal's song of battle empower you!
Kael'thas Sunstrider yells: Your monkeys failed to finish the job, naaru! Beaten but alive... The same mistake was not made when we took command of your vessel.
Kael'thas Sunstrider yells: All for what? Trinkets? You are too late. The preparations have already begun. Soon the master will make his return.
Kael'thas Sunstrider yells: And there is nothing you or that fool, Illidan, can do to stop me! You have both served me in your own right - unwittingly.
Kael'thas Sunstrider yells: Lay down your arms and succumb to the might of Kil'jaeden!

While Illidan makes it pretty clear that he's dead, at least in my eyes.

Maiev: It is finished. You are beaten.
Illidan: You have won...Maiev. But the huntress...is nothing without the hunt. You...are nothing...without me.
Maiev: He's right. I feel nothing. I am nothing. Farewell, champions.
Akama: The Light will fill these dismal halls once again. I swear it.

Illidan was awesome, my favorite hero in WC3, but face it. He's dead. He's not gonna be a good guy, a tragic hero, or anything like that. He was a tragic hero when he became a demon hunter, embracing the Burning Legion's own power to use against them. He was shunned by his people, becoming The Betrayer. He helped again a little bit teaming up with Malfurion afterward he became a bad guy. Then he became insane. Then he became dead.

Edit: Hah! Knew it!

A Face Only His Mom Could Love

So I forgot to mention, when I fell into that random pit of doom, there was this annoying little ghost kid hassling me. He was going on and on about how my quest is really pointless and I'm nothing compared to the Old Ones. What's he know? He's already dead.

Well I'm minding my own business, building catapults and kersploding more undead, when he comes and bothers me again! Oh, I can kill hundreds of undead but it'll do no good, more will take their place. That's pretty obvious, I was doing it for fun.

Anywho, at least this time he let me have some fun and gave me a glimpse of our old frosty buddy doing the things he does best, killing his own men and raising them as zombies. I'll tell ya, he's not the prettyboy prince who pined after Jaina all day anymore. Too bad he doesn't have a /dance, I think some Saturday Night Fever would have livened him up a little.

World of Lovecraft (Not That Kind of Lovecraft)

So I was strolling through Icecrown, fighting the good fight. During one of my forays into a tunnel I happened to blow myself up. The kersplosion blasted me into an extremely conveniently placed deep pit of glowing green abyss, with an even more convenient pool at the bottom. After a nice swim, I surface to find myself surrounded by the most curious beasts. The faceless ones. Weren't they stuff of legend? A nighttime tale? Oh wait... there was that one guy in Ahn'kahet, and another in some other cave in Icecrown... ah whatever. So they're real. Spooky.

If you played Warcraft III (which you should have) these guys may be vaguely familiar. There were a couple missions as Arthas who, along with Anub'arak ran into these baddies on their way to the Frozen Throne and ultimately fought a Forgotten One. Remember C'thun? He's one of them... well sorta, not really. C'thun's an Old God, so the Forgotten Ones are kinda avatars, or maybe C'thun was an avatar of an Old God... it's really all confusing. But these have popped up elsewhere too. You may remember back in Shadowmoon Valley, the Arakkoa were summoning another, either a forgotten one or Old God.

But I'm rambling... either way this is probably showing portents of a true Old God. I believe back when WotLK was recently announced, they said that there would be the first Old God in the game. Maybe when they bring Arthas in. Hopefully they flesh out this bit of lore a good amount, I find it quite interesting.

Of course all of this is based on some of the stories of H.P. Lovecraft. Hopefully you've read him, you better have at least heard of him. I certainly recommend reading all of his short stories. They aren't easy reads; many are pretty long and his writing style was considered very old fashioned for his time, back around the turn of the century (that other turn of the century, the older one).

A whole lot has been influenced by Lovecraft in World of Warcraft. Everyone's favorite frog-thing, Murlocs are based on one of his stories. Many old world quests, at least Alliance ones are based on his not so supernatural stories, many dealing in undeath and lots of death. It's all good stuff. You can probably find a volume of most, if not all of his short stories at any library, so go do that.

That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange aeons, even death may die.