my UI

So, like playing with my UI. it’s something that has never felt really perfect to me, and there is always something about my UI of the moment that irks me. I’ve gone through the default UI, I’v done the custom UI with bartender and a host of other adds. I’ve tried SpartanUI (the one i have liked the msot so far), back to default, back to custom. Now I’ve changed it again. I like the current iteration, but there are a few things I don’t like. First, the Screenie (warning: this post has alot of screenshots, if you don’t like the kind of books that have pictures, which are my personal favorites, go away!)

Seriously, Blizzard?

Ok, so two nights in a row, my server, and all of my battlegroup (Whirlwind) have crashed at roughly 10pm EST. Bullshit. Monday night a few friends and I were in the middle of our weekly attempt at the Less-Rabi achievement (yes I know it resets every day, but if I tried that thing daily I would quit WoW out of frusteration) when the server went down. Last night I had jumped in to dps a PuG Naxx10 run on my warrior (he needs the badges) and the crash actually came at a great time! This PuG was total fail. Whether it was healers trying to be on the ground level during heigan to the tanks PULLING Razuvious…yes…he Avenger Shielded the boss AFTER those of us who had run naxx before told him about the Understudies and the crystals. Ugh. Anyways, we were about to head down the Construct wing after giving up on military when poof! “Realm is down” Thank you blizzard for saving me the frusteration of wiping on Patchwerk.

On a more positive note, I was by far and away the highest dps on there (on my Arms warrior) which made my epeen grow a bit. Not as much as Jong’s but…a bit. Of course there was only one other person wearing anything comparable to my gear, and that was our very good Retadin. But I still beat him, even with him running around with Aesir’s Edge.

Shared Topic: Holy Light vs. Flash

So, Ophelie over at the Bossy Pally has a great post about Healadins and their makeup. No, not which shade of lipstick best matches the t10 shoulders…but rather the difference between a Holy Light paladin and a Flash spam paladin. Yes, they are different.

Now, Ophelie was inspired in her post by Ferraro (I’m going to avoid any talk of controversy that surfaced over a month ago, cause honestly, that’s a dead horse) who does a great job of breaking down the differences.

Check out those two if you want to know the breakdown comparison of one vs. the other. That’s not what I’m gonna write about since it has already been done much better than I could have by those wonderful women.

Happy B-day WoW

So, today is officialy the start of WoW’s 6th year. That’s right, 5 years ago, Novemeber 23rd, 2004, WoW was born into the world. Alot of stuff has changed over these 5 years. I know I asked earlier what the worst change was in WoW. But I think it’s even more fitting to ask that today. What do you think was the most SIGNIFICANT change in WoW’s life? Be it positive or negative, world changing or only meaningful to you, what change do you remember the most? I know my sister would say the change of making pets and mounts NOT take up bag space would be her saving grace. I would probably say the change that sticks with me the most was probably the removal of PvP titles. My first toon ever was a Night elf Huntard who was a Corporal. I loved having that rank, I felt like I was actually accomplishing something, even though I had NO idea what the heck I was doing. How about you guys?

Griefing is contagious…

I don’t plan on making a habit of it, but last night I led a small griefing raid. It was the most fun I’ve had in WoW in months.

A little back story. Our server, like many others, used to have epic world PvP battles in the Hillsbrad Foothills, between the towns of South Shore and Tarren Mill. They were awesome. I remember being on my warrior, at level, questing around there, and seeing the massive amount of players fighting each other. We had a guild on alliance, Phalanx of Perdition, who were the only real pvp guild on our server. They would spend most of their days in South Shore, waiting for the Horde to attack. Or if the horde never did, they would attack TM and the Horde would sure enough come down and counter attack. I joined PoP for a short time, only to discover that the Horde guild they always battled ( I forget the name) was actually their alts. They would stage these battles between themselves, half on ally half on horde at a time. To me it was like a 10 year old catching Santa tucking present under the tree only to find out its Dad.

3.3 redux

So, a few weeks ago I went into a nerdrage rant about potential Paladin changes in the PTR. Namely, the changes to Sacred Shield and Lay on Hands. And I forgot the main thing about the PTR: Nothing is guarunteed! So, this time no nerdrage. I like what is going on with LoH on the current PTR build. I havn’t heard much new info on SS, so I assume that is still being nerfed, which I don’t like.

Anyways, what I am extremely excited about with 3.3 is the new LFG interface. Having finished off my Crusader title, there are now very few things I want to get out of the game on my 3 lvl 80’s tht require some rediculous grind or require 4-9 other ppl to help me with. Running 5mans is probably still my favorite part of the game. With the new LFG, if no one is online in my guild, I won’t be so quick to log off and do something else. Now I can log in, get in a heroic or two, THEN log off and find another form of entertainment (right now its a balance between Diablo 2, leveling a priest alt, and reading my ever-increasing stack of WW2 books I havn’t cracked open but want to). This excites me.

Not to mention, leveling an alt will be muh easier. Between my numerous toons who hve hit lvl 60 or higher, I have done every quest in Azeroth I care for, which is why my paladin is still not a loremaster, even though it is on the very short list of things I want to accomplish that I can do solo (along with the netherwing, shataari skyguard and shattered sun rep grinds). So my priest is currently lvling as a pvp-disc spec, and doing about 40% of his XP through quests/mob grinding and about 60% through BG’s. With the LFG tool, I have a higher hope of being able to get groups for the lowbie dungeons so I can lvl as a disc healer, which is more fun, cuz lowbie BG’s SUCK!

“Arenas were a mistake”

So, I spilled water on my laptop last week, and after giving it a few days rest, it seems to have recovered almost completely. Some of the keys are a bit stickier than usual.

Anyways, so, over the weekend Blizzard bigwig Jeff Kaplan (I think it was Kaplan) said during an interiew that the biggest mistake in WoW was the creation of Arenas. His reasoning was that the class balaning tango they have had to constantly change has been a constant headache for player and Dev alike. This I can understand.

One of the reasons that I have heard as to why class balance wasn’t as big of a headache back in vanilla was the fact that it’s alot easier to hide imbalances in a BG or world PvP where any number of outside forces can influence the outcome of a skirmish. This I believe.

And while I do enjoy the occasional Arena night ( except last night. It was horrible. We went 1-12), I do think that the way blizzard has been forced to balance classes not on how they do against raid bosses but rather by how the fare against other players is a disappointment. So, I guess I kind of agree that Arenas were certainly a HUGE mistake. I just can’t bring myself to condemn them as the BIGGEST mistake. Of course, nothing else comes to mind right now as being worse…but I’ll keep pondering and see if I think of anything.

How about you guys? Do you think Arenas were the single biggest mistake in WoW? Or do you think something esle is the bane of your existance?

Tank questionnaire

So, although this is mostly a holy paladin blog, I do have a lvl 80 warrior and DK, both of whom are tank/dps dual-specced. I used to lvoe DK tanking, it was interesting, unique, fun, and pretty intuitive. Since 3.2 I have enjoyed it less and less. My DK seems to ahve very little health comapred to tanks in his gear range, he has less armor than he used to, avoidance is a big issue, and I’ve never been good with cooldowns, which are becoming the basis of DK tanking. So, when given the choice between the two, I have foudn myself re-discovering the joy of warrior tanking, which I hadn’t done since runnign Strath at lvl back in classic.

So, here is my response to the Tank version of Miss Medicina‘s healer meme I answered a few posts ago. This one I saw on Achtung Panzercow.

What is the name, class, and spec of your primary tank?
Llothran, Warrior, using the “new black” as Panzer calls it; 15/3/53. I like it, I find it to be good on threat and survivability.

What is your usual tanking environment?
5-mans mostly, as he is a relatively fresh tank. I hope to get him into Ulduar next weekend. I have tanked Ulduar, Ony and the first encounter in ToCr on my DK.

What is your favorite encounter to tank, and why?
So far I would say Grobbulus. I personally think Kiting is one of my strong points as a tank, and Grobbulus is overall a fun fight, even though he was the bane of my guild while we were working through Naxx.

What is your least favorite encounter to tank, and why?
Thorim arena. I find it very difficult to get aggro on all of the mobs spawning from various sides of the room. Plus having my healers occasionally stunned/spell locked does NOT help.

What do you think is the biggest strength of your class, and why?
I lol’d so hard when I read Panzer say ” Also, all warriors automatically spec 5/5 Improved Badass and 3/3 Irresistable Sexeh, which are talents not available to any other tank class.” So I’ll leave it at that. But yah, single target threat and pretty nice assist abilities are cool.

What do you think is the biggest weakness of your class, and why?
AoE. Hands down.

In a 25 man raiding environment, what do you feel is the best tanking assignment for you?
/cower in the corner. I don’t like 25mans at all, our guild largely avoids them as when we ahve tried them it has lead to nothing but drama and aggrivation.

What tanking class do you enjoy tanking with the most?
I’ll say druids simply because my favorite tank in our guild is a druid, and she is awesome and I would stand in fire w/o a second guess if she told me it would help the raid 😛

What tanking class do you enjoy tanking with the least?
Anyone who has an OCD complex when it comes to threat, particularly a certain OTHER prot warrior in my guild.

What is your worst habit as a tank?
Not using my cooldowns at the proper time. This and when a tank, I always place raid wipes on myself, where as, when I am a healer, I always think it was someone else’s fault 😛

What is your biggest pet peeve in a group environment while tanking?
OCD taunt’s from the other tank. And Knockbacks. Just ask my GM or Coccinelle how I feel about knockbacks.

Do you feel your class/spec is balanced with respect to the other tanking classes?
I think we have amazing survivability, (good) warriors can gen as much threat as any of the other classes.

What tools do you use to evaluate your own performance as a tank?
Omen, recount. If my dps are able to go full burn w/o pulling the boss off me, I’m doing my job. If they can’t full burn w/o risk of pulling off me, I ain’t doing my job.

What do you think is the biggest misconception that people have with your tanking class?
That we can’t gen threat as well as the other 3. While we do require more skill to gen and keep threat up, we are just as capable, if not more so, than the other three (on a single target or 2. 3 or more targets and we fail).

What do you think is the toughest thing for new players of your class to learn about tanking?
Panzer said it perfectly, so I’m jsut gonna stick his answer in quotes: “The priority system that you have to use to maximize DPS and threat. Warriors are, as far as I can tell, far and away the most complicated and active of the four tank classes. We have a veritable metric assload of abilities that we use, and we don’t have a fixed rune rotation like DKs or a “969″ setup like paladins.  We have to make split-second decisions based on what’s off cooldown and what’s lit up.  It’s not hard to learn, but it takes some work for it to become second nature.”

If someone were to evaluate your tanking ability via tools like fraps, recount, and World of Logs, what tendencies would they notice?
Um….ugh….well I like to take advantage of my groups CC when I can…when mobs get lose you’ll see me flying across the room with reckless abandon.

Stamina or Avoidance, and why?
Right now I have gemmed/chanted almost entirely for def, so for now, while I am still gearing up, I’ll say avoidance. Once I start getting my hands on some Ulduar/badge gear I’ll work to put a lil more padding on my green bar.

Which tanking class do you understand the least?
Druids. My paladin was a tank all through BC and up till he started doing heroics in Wrath. My DK was/is a tank and has been as far in Ulduar as Thorim. My poor druid is still lvl 74 and not getting any higher any time soon.

What addons or macros do you currently use to aid you in tanking?
Omen, Recount, Xperl frames, healbot (allows me to put vigilance or to intervene a friendly with the click of a button and w/o switching target) tankmastery (tells me and anyone in /say range if another tank has taunted off me or if a dps has used a knockback) DBM, Parrot.

Do you strive for a balance in tanking stats, or do you stack some higher than others, and why?
Wearign mostly ToCh 5man heroic gear, I’d say I’m pretty balanced. Once I start getting some Ulduar/badge/t9 stuff I’ll probly have room to gem for more Stamina.

 

Faction Champions

So, we FINALLY downed the Faction Champs in 10man ToCr. Man that felt great! We changed up our strategy and group a bit compared to usual. I’m a little frazzled as Twin Valkyr kicked our butts because lazy dps weren’t getting the orbs so there was SO much healing that we ahd to do cuz of all the orbs flying around.

Bright Idea!

So, I had a great idea driving home from a work meeting this morning. One of the new guys at work said that he was also a professional gamer, he plays in Madden tournaments and such where he has won a few of those giant fake checks they give to golfers and such. So I was thinking, gamers of all genres can be “professional” by entering tournies and winning said tournies. From Madden/EA Sports, Call of Duty/SoCom/Halo, to WoW Arena tournies. But what if there was another way? Every gamer has the dream of being able to make a “decent” living off gaming. Now, WoW has something like 13 MILLION subscribers…13 FUCKING MILLION. Thats ( I would imagine) more people than the NFL has fans. If I’m a product rep, PR person, Ad rep etc. of a corporation who manufactures or sells a product that could possibly, conceivably, maybe linked to gaming….I would do everything I could to get my name into the World of WoW. Now, saying this, I don’t mean I want an NPC giving me a quest to go rescue 6 crates of Mountain Dew from some orcs. I don’t want ads IN the game. But, if I’m selling Monster(c) Energy Drinks, why not contact the GM of a top guild like Ensidia or Vodka and say “hey, if you and your officers go to Blizzcon/Comicon/Other Convention related to gaming/fantasy etc, we’ll pay you guys to go and wear shirts that say “Vodka, powered by Monster(c)” WHY HAS NO ONE THOUGHT OF THIS!? 13 MILLION PEOPLE play WoW. Get your damn name out there. Get the top arena players to go to these tournaments wearing a DELL hat/bandana/shirt etc. (Dells suck, don’t buy a Dell. Seriously, I sell computers for a living. Don’t buy a Dell.) And BAM! instant marketing. Not only will you get publicity from these guys wearing your gear, but your guarunteed to get Pub from sites that talk about WoW (i.e. mine or WoW.com). So far, only Mountain Dew (and Hot Pockets i think?) have taken advantage of this. For any other Ad rep/PR dude who reads this….I just saved your job. Give me a cut 😛