Legendary and Double Bubble

Oh man, it was a busy weekend/week so far!

The guild completed its legendary staff from Firelands.  Congrats and thanks to all the members of the guild who supported, assisted in, or otherwise encouraged the completion of this staff.  It took great effort from the regular Fri/Sat raiders to start this process and many of them participated in the off night runs to finish it up.  I was sad that I could not be online at the time the staff was completed.  Real life just gets in the way like that sometimes.  I am happy though that I was able to get myself a minipet.  

The announcement of the Classy Challenge has been met with good response!  We had a couple race changes and a couple others start focusing on alts to complete the challenge.  Dwarf warlock was completed first after a race change and couple handfuls of quests to get to honored, and one week later a worgen DK completed honored as well.  Elgar is out 10000g.  Ha!  We have left now the worgen priest and worgen warlock.  The priest, I was informed, will be completed today, 03/15/2012.  Then it’s just the worgen warlock, who is on his way last I heard.  This will be an easier achievement to complete now rather than waiting until MoP and it gets pushed to level 90.

On Tuesdays, Crits runs an LFR for the guild and some former guild members, it’s usually great fun and we get maybe 3-8 people.  This week we had between 12-16 people coming to each part!  It was awesome!  Coming together with that many people from the guild and our friends made the runs that much more enjoyable, though I couldn’t bubble just my own members like I usually do.  Ha!  I took Sousa on the first half since I didn’t need anything from part one on Elgar, but brought Elgar to the second half and he won the robes, well, “we” won the robes.  I used to feel bad about rolling for other people, or having people roll for me, but it’s such a standard practice now, I don’t feel very guilty.

This token completed Elgar’s 4-piece for T13.  Yes, it’s just Raid Finder gear, but it’s probably the best gear he’ll get until next Xpac.  Let me say this.  The priest 4-piece set is AMAZING.  100% more mana back from rapture??  YES PLEASE.  That’s 14% of my total mana back as often as every 10 seconds (I think 10 is the internal cool down).  And the best part is that PW:Shield has a 10% chance to absorb 100% more damage!!  I did a random heroic to see how this would work.  I only was able to see one time where it worked (I don’t have an add-on to tell me, so I had to mouse-over—and I’m not doing mouse-over every time) and it said there was 71k absorption left.  That is awesome.  REALLY awesome.  I have to wonder if the glyph is affected as well, the glyph heals for like 10% of the amount absorbed upon cast, so if the bubble is bigger, I assume the glyphed heal will be too.  I’ll have to keep an eye out for this.

So that’s that.  I know, WALL OF TEXT.

TL/DR version:  Crits got its legendary and things are awesome.

Elgar Gets Some Love/Hate

I decided to give Elgar a little play time.  Upon logging in, I realized that I had 3 pending rare items for archaeology and should maybe spend some time on that since I really haven’t in months.  As I flew around I kept a close eye on the Dungeon Finder waiting for the CtA:healer.  It usually pops at least once a night. 

As it was, CtA:healer popped up 4 times and I took advantage all 4 times, giving me a nice little break from the archaeology. 

Stonecore:  One wipe on Ozruk, the mage kept spellstealing the reflective debuff and I was paralyzed all 4 times before finally the tank went down from LOS.  We communicated the need to leave up the buff so I could reflect.  Next time, flawless.

Lost City:  Squisky tank, but manageable.  First boss, DK and melee shaman stand in the bad.  I am struggling to keep squishy tank up and get tossed into the pillar 4 times…yes, 4.  So the DK wasn’t getting much in the way of heals as there wasn’t really time to spare.  Sorry.  But after the fight he says “healer, you need to keep up with heals.”  I say, “Really?”  “Yes, really.”  I then say, “DK, you need to not stand in the bad.  Yes, really.”  The tank went on to defend me and there was probably a vote to kick me, but it didn’t pass.  I stuck it out for the goodie bag. 

BRC:  Corla, has anyone not done this?  All three DPS, “me!”  F—-  We wipe once, but they seem to get it.  Second time, lock goofs up his, but we’re able to hold it together, but the interrupts didn’t happen and we lose it.  Lock drops group, warrior DPS comes in, I take locks beam, we execute it perfectly.  Props to the rogue and hunter for never having seen it and figuring it out pretty quick.

What was the last instance???  Hmm, maybe I only did three.

Anyways, after archaeology and satchels, Elgar, Troutwort, and Rossini all ended up with a new mini-pet!  Elgar got the clockwork gnome, but also had a Captured Firefly and a Tourney Bear Cub in his bags!  Whee!  Trout got the firefly because he has a wasp pet that is the same model, and Rossini got the bear cub because so many of the others already had it.  So a good night for all!  Just a few more and Elgar will have enough JP to buy his T11 robes…yes, I’m behind the times!!  Still sporting that green wand though…

Why I Go Alone

There are people out there that probably haven’t run in a PUG…well, heck, maybe ever.  They would rather not run a dungeon than chance the inadequacies of the random player.  Not to defend the PUG, but I PUG nearly everything and find that 90%+ of my groups are successful with little or no real player error.  And if there is it’s usually not a totally big deal. 

I suppose that being the healer and having a little more control over the group helps as well.  I’m now to a point again where I am comfortable healing and even able to pull off some pretty awesome group saves. 

But there is one other reason that I PUG a lot on my healers.  And that reason is Call to Arms: Healer.  I won’t try to convince you any other way, than with pictures.

 

Ooh Shiny!

I hopped on Elgar to get the new pets from Children’s week.  I already had Veteran Nanny so I got to get the new Legs pet which is adorable.  I also did the SW orphan and Northrend orphan.  The SW orphan doesn’t require as much travel as I remember it originally requiring and the motor bike was pretty fun too!

It took me over 3.5 hours to do all the orphans…SW, Outland, and Northrend.  Why so long?  Well, let’s just say I was really distracted.  Between archaeology dig-sites and stopping to pick way more herbs than I should have, even doing daily fishing and cooking quests…and Argent Tournament…and stopping by the Darkmoon Faire… and killing Ogres in Nagrand…

I was pretty much in “Oh Shiny!” mode last night.  I even did the daily dungeon quest from Shattrah City, which was Shadow Labs, but I am <7000 rep now from exalted with Lower City, so I thought, why not?  And solo’d it on normal.  I thought about trying it on heroic, but man, BC trash had so many silences and stuns and knockdowns!  There were several fights were Elgar as just standing there unable to do anything!  How annoying!  I did get through it all though, pretty effortlessly.  And completed the quest.  Not too bad, I think I made over 100g and got a bunch of rep items (Fel Armaments) for Troutwort to turn in so maybe he’ll get Exalted with Aldor.  I always told myself I should finish those things up, now is as good as ever I suppose!  I will do Shadow Labs again tonight probably, it was actually pretty fun–if Blizz won’t give me solo dungeons, I’ll find some myself!

One thing too I was reminded of was dungeon armor sets.  It was awesome to loot the Hallowed Pauldrons.  It brought back some great memories of those Tier 3b dungeon sets.  Used to fill the gap between dungeons and raids.  Good times–even semi-relavent set bonuses.  Oh, how I miss those.  Would be cool to see those things come back…but doubt that will happen. 

 Tonight will probably be more Ooh Shiny as I do the Children’s week activities on Rossini, Schubert, and Troutwort.  Though if I want to get more than one done a night, I better pick up the pace and stay focused!  Though Elgar already has the meta for Children’s week and I won’t do it for anyone else and he’s my pet collector, I won’t feel bad if others don’t get it done.

Good luck with the orphans!

Holiday

The only real holiday I enjoy is “Holiday” by Madonna.  I suppose that’s not entirely true… but still.  The surge of recent holidays in-game is both fun and frustrating at the same time.  I’ll review them both quickly with my reasons why I do and do not like them.

Noblegarden
1) Pros – Minipets and no requirements for PvP or max level.
2) Cons – Limited egg spawning locations = high competition over just one week duration.  Too much reliance on RNG–my paladin opened over 350 eggs and never got a rabbit foot, tuxedo pants, or elegant dress.  I gave up on the holiday after foolishly spending hours collecting eggs.

Children’s Week
1) Pros – Lots of Minipets!  Adorable bastard children everywhere!  No RNG.
2) Cons – PvP and dungeon requirements for meta-achievement.  If it were simply win or participate in the BGs I would be more satisfied, but because they are asking you to do very specific things that are sometimes easier for one class or one faction than the other(s) it is very annoying.

I’ll spend lots of time getting the mini-pets again this year for Children’s week.  Elgar was the only one lucky enough to finish Noblegarden this year, my druid did it last year.  And Elgar is the only one to have completed Children’s week as those PvP achievements basically made me want to cry so hard last year.  Elgar to this day wears his Patron title because IMO, it was worse than getting Kingslayer.

Victim of Call to Arms

Dear Internet,

I have a confession, I am the person you were worried about.  The person driven by the Satchel of Mysterious Goods (or whatever its name is).  The person who queues for a heroic because they have run Baron so many times that the chance to get his mount outside of Stratholme is very desirable. 

So yes, I queued as a healer for a heroic because it was Call to Arms: Healer.

Now, I will be the first to admit that I have no business healing a heroic.  I am still adjusting to Cataclysm healing styles, working in more smites, etc.  I still seem to really have lots of trouble when melee in particular take lots of damage.  I always lose them first.  But anyways, another reason I shouldn’t be healing is that my gear is still lacking, though the computer says I’m geared for heroics, I still have three greens (gloves, wand, wrists) and I think only one epic (alchemy trinket).  I also am missing a few enchants.  I just hate enchanting gear that in one run (even a normal) could be replaced.  I just don’t seem to get lucky with drops!

I should do more questing to get rep up.  I’ll work on that soon.

So back to the story, so Elgar healed.  And much to my horror, it was HoO.  Now granted it could have been worse, I still have never been to SFK, so if that would have popped it would have been worse since I’ve never seen those fights, even as DPS–I can’t believe I’ve never been randomed to it, even on Rossini.  Anyways, the tank had 188k health.  That seemed like a lot.  So that was good, there was however, no CC used.  I lost the tank twice on trash, once on the first boss (we all died then, tank was last though), and once on one of the elemental bosses.  I felt like it wasn’t going well.  We skipped to the final boss, which was okay with me.  I was REALLY worried about being able to heal through the final boss when he does his mucho AOE.  But it went awesome.  I lost the hunter, but he was out of range.  PROTIP TIME:  Run toward your healer, not away.  But during the AOE everyone collapsed, hid under my PW:Barrier and I spammed AOE heals with PoM bouncing about.  Yay!  Cost a ton of mana, but I had shadowfiend ready once we were out of that attack and all was well.  I was REALLY excited and happy!  I figured if I lost the tank on trash, that was bad, but healing through that final HoO boss and one-shotting him was awesome! 

Ado congratulated me and said do it again!  I told him, it’s best to quit while you are ahead. 

It did feel good, I’m still not really confident in my ability to heal as things currently are.  But at least I know it’s not impossible!  I just need more practice and to really finish up questing/rep gear.  Normal dungeons give decent amounts of JP too, so I can use those to improve my areas of poor gear.

He’ll get there, he’s still my favorite toon, but there are many a day where I wish Elgar felt as good healing as I did in LK or BC.

Thanks for listening, Internet.  I promise not to recklessly join a queue for Satchels too often.

The 4.1

Okay, so today is probably the patch, I am limited to what I can view from work, so I just assume it is going to happen and/or is happening.

I am not going to comment on every little update, but I thought I’d comment on some of the changes that will most directly impact me. 

Elgar – Priest
Elgar is interested in a few things this patch, and number 1 is the additions to Archaeology.  Seven new rare items have been added to the game and there is also less of a chance of getting a dig site for a race you already have all the rares for.  Which means no more endlessly digging up fossils for nothing.  Though they added more fossil rares, so still…fossils.  He he.

None of the changes to the priest class are all that glorious for disc priests, they made it so that you can only remove magic from yourself, but absolution that both disc and holy get make it operate as normal again, so it really only affects shadow priests ability to cleanse others.  Holy Fire now works with Evangelism (yay), nothing big there.  Durations of PW:Shield was reduced to 15 seconds, but Divine Aegis goes up to 15 seconds.  I’m not sure how I feel about this.  There have been times where PW:Shield did last more than 15 seconds, but they are really making it somewhat of an “Oh shit!” button to absorb rather than before where I really felt it was preventative.  We’ll see how this works out…less chaining of shields that is for sure…so I’m not REALLY thrilled about it.

Rossini – Warlock
Dark Intent kinda gets a nerf when placed on other damage dealers but still has the same effect on healers…but really you should have been putting it on your Resto druids anyways.  Seed of Corruption and Rain of Fire have more damage, which is on par with most AOE getting a buff. 

The big change is that Soulstone is a battle rez now, which has pros and cons.  The pro is I don’t have to worry about if it just fell off during a boss fight, but the con is that I have to remember I have a battle rez now if someone drops during combat.  Also we can’t count on it for quick wipe recovery.  I will have to see how this works, I’m not sure I fully understand it.

No real changes to demonology.

Schubert – Mage
Schubert is frost spec primarily, though he has a fire spec too.  So Frostbolt, which is his main spell, getting a 10% damage increase is awesome.  AOE damage from Blizzard is also increased which will be nice too since it basically does like no damage now.  Ha!  Ice lance is getting a nice buff too when used with Fingers of Frost which happens quite a bit if Deep Freeze is on cooldown.

Frost Armor is redesigned and is kinda interesting at least for PvP, it has a slowing effect for attack speed and now works on ranged attacks, I assume this means hunters.  So that must be to counter hunters, who I think already hate frost mages, in PvP.  It will also grant mana regen if glyphed, so for long fights switching armor types during movement phases will help regen mana too.  Good times!

Haydn – Rogue
I only use Haydn occasionally as he’s level 61 and working through Outlands, but he’s spec’d subtlety and so being in stealth is critical.  So the changes to stealth in this patch seem awesome.  First, the cooldown of stealth was reduced from 10 to 4 seconds.  This means when you’re out questing there is no downtime between mobs.  I know it seems like there shouldn’t be, but most combat times take about 4 seconds with a subtlety rogue.  Secondly, the cooldown is reduced by the subtlety tree even further, so there is NO cooldown on stealth. 

Now you see me, now you don’t!

Also, the talent that reduces the cooldown on stealth also increases the stealth movement speed.  I will actually walk/run faster when stealthed, than normal!  CRAZY, but awesome.  I’m excited about that.

And lastly…

Troutwort – Hunter
A few big changes for all hunters:

1)  Tamed pets now match your level – yay!
2)  Happiness system is gone, no more feeding pets – double yay!
3)  Glyph of Mend Pet (that used to give happiness) now makes your pet bigger smaller - okay, not so excited, but I get it.  I will have to get rid of this, I like big pets.

So those things are just kinda novelty things, but makes pet management and taming a little bit nicer for all of those that like to have a variety of pets. 

And that is my little summary.  I guess there’s some new dungeons or something, but meh.  Account bound items are now battle.net bound which is fun for alts on different servers and such.  Yay!  Also there is a new guild recruiting system, I’ll have to set that up tonight too.  We have a pretty attractive guild (I mean good-looking) so naturally people want to join us. 

Happy Tuesday!

My First Heroic

Okay okay, I KNOW that I am a life-long subscriber to “Behind the Times” and “Day Old News”, but I finally had enough courage to try a heroic.  Analogue and Reversion logged on to Vent last night and saw me in there and said they were gonna go on a heroic, did I want to come.  I said, well now’s the time to try!  So I logged over to Rossini (I was on Troutwort doing Argent Tournament Dailies–ha!) and away we went.

Kerick joined us as healer, so it was a guild run and in all weirdness, we got a DPS from our own server, who actually used to be in our guild!  We got BRC and it was the other guys first time there–ever.  But that wasn’t too much of an issue.  All the fights seemed to go almost flawlessly and trash packs were really handled nicely too. 

It was not as scary as I thought.  Now this could have been because Kerick heals raids and is just generally awesome allowing crazy bear to run all over wildly–it could have been the DPS that we got did INSANE damage, or it could have just been that they aren’t as bad as I think.  In the end, I got some very nice new robes and enough Justice Points to purchase some new items, though I think I heard that I will be able to buy Valor Point items next patch with Justice Points, so maybe I’ll just hang onto them.

This really boosted my confidence with Rossini.  I seemed to do pretty good DPS for not having any heroic gear and still a few greens–I think I replaced a green trinket too…I can’t remember.  But I feel more confident with him that I can handle heroics now.  I probably could have anyways, but I worry about my performance too much and it was keeping me away.  I still am not ready to heal yet, but  I am feeling like Maria from Sound of Music on my warlock though…I have confidence.

In other news, I didn’t realize but Troutwort was ONE quest away from being exalted with the Silver Covenant.  Hilarious.  I ran a few out there, the bear pet does so much damage in Beast Mastery spec that even at level 80 soloing Chillmaw which I never would have tried before was almost scary easy.  I got exalted after that quest then picked up the Silver Covenant quests and in the end I have enough Champion Seals to get a new mini-pet.  Which is why I was doing them in the first place.  So Trout purchased an adorable Teldrassil Dancing Tree and sent it over to Elgar who has something like 94 pets and is working towards 100 because I heard it’s an achievement in the next patch to have 100 companion pets and I keep hoping there will be a mini-pet reward for it, though I don’t know for sure.

I then looked and noticed that I am less than 10 Champion Seals away from new pets on many of my characters and should just do a few more dailies out there to finish those up or at least get those Valiant Marks out of my bags by completing the factions…I’m so close on some of them…

All in all a good night, and thanks to the guild for helping me through my first heroic…I feel more confident now and have renewed excitement for Rossini, who I was pretty blah about after I pushed to level him.  Look out Azeroth, there’s a demonologist on the loose!

Here Fishy, Fishy!

So the guild fishing tournament started last night and man, it got off to a rip-roaring start!  I think that the total fish count for the first day was something like 1500+?  Which is crazy!  Someone is going to win some great prizes!  We are probably going to up the prizes too!

I did a bit of fishing in Outland in attempts to get Mr. Pinchy, but he continues to evade me.  I gave up eventually for the night and headed to Vashir for some questing because I need herbs for Alchemy. 

But during my hunt for Mr. Pinchy, I decided that perhaps he would feel better if I made him promises and coerced him with lyrical words.  And so, here is my Ode to Pinchy.

Ode to Pinchy

High above the Terrokar tree,
Lives a tiny creature, who is legendary.
In shimmering pools that sparkle gold,
He lives here, or so I’ve been told.
Mr. Pinchy is this naughty crawfish,
And if you catch him, he’ll grant you a wish.
And so I hunt both day and night,
To find this creature, I pray I might.

He sends his brothers and sisters to me,
Other furious crawfish, there are plenty.
But Mr. Pinchy, please come play,
With me and my friends, you could stay.
We’d have great adventures, near and far,
In Un’Goro, Vashir, and Sholazar.
And if you’re good you just might,
Get to come with, on Raid Night.

I’d take you Dalaran, high in the sky,
And wonderful things for you, I would buy:
A red ribbon leash, and a lovely pet treat,
Then off we’d go, we have friends to meet!
We’d go visit Jaina the wonderful mage,
And even Velen, that crazy old sage.
Karius and Analogue would think you so fun,
So come Mr. Pinchy we’ve plenty to get done!

So alas Mr. Pinchy, I now beg of you,
Please show your face, just once will do.
I’ll be there tonight, above the Terrokar tree,
I’m coming to see you, will you come see me?

Get to work, Hamilton!

Okay….so….I’m gonna be out one $10 bill this month when I can get this adorable guy.

I pretty much want billions of boomkin babies now.