I'll be the first to admit that I've always been jealous that paladins and warlocks get free mounts. Yeah, sure... it works great in lore and whatnot, but why just those two classes? You could also argue that Druids have a type of increased speed via travel form, but more on that later. This probably shouldn't bother me because I've been past level 40 on the toons that I play for quite some time now. Heck, they've basically all hit 70 and have flying mounts, but that's not the point. So, today, I'm going to look at "mid-level" content and explain the new mounts as I see them. (Yes, this is completely made up; to my knowledge Blizzard is not looking to implement any of these mounts.)
Druid
They already get travel form 10 levels earlier than anyone else. Not sure if this is changing in the next patch since basic riding skill can be learned at 30, but they've enjoyed years of outpacing other people early. Plus, with the instant-cast, it gives them the jump to begin with. But where's the epic travel form? They have a flight form and an epic flight form, but no 100% increase (or say 90%) in land speed at or near level 60. Hmmm... interesting. I could see how this would be extremely overpowered in WSG, but that flag is pretty heavy.. maybe it would slow them down when carrying the flag.
Hunter
Let's start off by saying that Aspect of the Pack and Aspect of the Cheetah are pretty neat, but I wouldn't really call them "mount worthy". So, let me get this straight: a hunter can tame a wild animal to attack all sorts of monsters and enemies, but they can't figure out how to tame a mount? Furthermore, I see almost endless possibilities for these master-tamers. Boar mounts? Wind Serpent mounts? Warp Slicer mounts? Clearly, the Hunter community (all 0.5% of Wow players) have been without these mounts for far too long.
Mage
I'm a freakin' master of arcane, ice, and fire magic. Talented correctly, I can summon a water elemental. I can open portals to various places (still not sure why I can't open portals to pretty much anywhere I've been, but whatever). But I can't figure out how to use my powers to summon some raw energy that will carry me throughout my adventures. Arcane Orb mount? Fireball mount? I truly need to learn more in order to become a true master.
Paladin
You get a mount at 40. Granted it's a long quest chain, but you get another one at 60. Furthermore, you get increased mount speed as well. No more mounts for you.
Priest
Is there really a reason why Levitate (A) requires a Light Feather, and (B) cannot go faster than running speed? By your divine powers, you can levitate. What's to stop these powers from pushing you faster along? So, maybe Magic Carpet mount? lol. Or just no mount at all, but some type of Divine mount.
Rogue
You're sneaky. You pickpocket things. You can even distract. But you can't figure out how to steal a mount from the mount vendors? For shame. Rogues should be able to steal their mounts. Yep, that's right. You rogues are all criminals in my book. Go steal your mounts. Any mount sold at any vendor.
Shaman
Master of Elements, huh? What? Grace of Air can't actually lift you up off the ground? Oh come on! Give them an Air mount! Stop gimping the entire Shaman class. (See what I did there?)
Warlocks
Moving on.
Warriors
This class was a bit more challenging for me. Surely they couldn't fly around on their rage like Mr. Furious. But they can Intercept. So, at level 40, they figure out how to run at 60% speed. At 60, it's 100%. Maybe for the 3 second mounting cast timer, we can let them tie their shoes or something.
Wednesday, July 9, 2008
Tuesday, July 8, 2008
My "New" Push-To-Talk Phone
For those of you that aren't on an RSS feeder, this is my second post of the day. Just thought it was funny, so had to post.
My wife just called and asked me for a password to a website. I was sitting at my computer here at work, trying to guess the password. Then I noticed that I was holding down the "`" key every time I spoke. Yep, you guessed it. That's my push-to-talk key on Vent. Think I've been raiding too much? lol.
In my defense, I was watching a strategy video on Kael (even though I've read it like 10 times), so I guess I was in the groove. Yeah... you're right. There really is no defense on that one, huh?
My wife just called and asked me for a password to a website. I was sitting at my computer here at work, trying to guess the password. Then I noticed that I was holding down the "`" key every time I spoke. Yep, you guessed it. That's my push-to-talk key on Vent. Think I've been raiding too much? lol.
In my defense, I was watching a strategy video on Kael (even though I've read it like 10 times), so I guess I was in the groove. Yeah... you're right. There really is no defense on that one, huh?
Progression Explained
So, after all the progression we've had in Black Temple and Mount Hyjal, we're now moving "back" and starting on Kael in TK. The plan for last night was actually to clear the 3 bosses we have downed in TK. We killed Al'ar, fine. We went and did VR...
Wait, what? VR? We've farmed that bad boy for months, are there really people that still need him? Unfortunately, this revelation didn't hit me until we were about to engage VR, so I didn't bring it up with the other officers. But then I started to really question Solarian.
Sure, there's like 3 people that need stuff from her, but I thought it would be better to move on, and start killing more bosses. So after one pull towards Solarian, we did a U-turn to head towards Kael.
It was already a bit late, and we still had trash to kill, so we only got two actual attempts on Kael. It's a 5-phase fight, so it's super complicated to explain. Our generally long-winded raid leader did a great job at explaining the minimum, and getting us moving. Phase 1 was pretty much a joke, but the legendary weapons fighting us got out of control fast. They wiped us on both attempts. And then we called it for the night.
So, why would anyone care about this? What's my point? The point would be that as guild leadership, you have to determine when is the best time to be moving on. You can wait until 100% of the raid gets all the drops they want, but then you're likely to be boring 24 people every week because that one warlock wants some random item. But if that's your guild rules/guild culture, then go for it.
For us, it's about progression. We want to see new content, kill new bosses. Al'ar, for example was great last night. I saw a number of people running around in their little Broken disguises, so they could continue progressing that quest line. Once we down Kael and Vashj, there will most likely be 25 people that will get an upgraded ring. And yes, there's still a few new people that need VR, but if we waited until everyone got everything, there'd be no way that we'd be in Mount Hyjal/Black Temple now. Heck.. I still need the Mongoose enchant. Let's go back to Kara! lol.
So, Progression for us is about going as far as you can go, as quickly as you can, while learning the necessary skills and obtaining the necessary armor to progress on to the next boss. Do we really, really need Kael and Vashj? No, but it's one of those notches in our belts that we'd all like to see. Give us one full night of tries, I'm guessing we'll down Vashj.
Note: Because we were only doing the 3 farmed bosses, we actually didn't have our strongest squad in there either. A number of people were on alts, etc. So, I see a cleared TK in the near future.
Wait, what? VR? We've farmed that bad boy for months, are there really people that still need him? Unfortunately, this revelation didn't hit me until we were about to engage VR, so I didn't bring it up with the other officers. But then I started to really question Solarian.
Sure, there's like 3 people that need stuff from her, but I thought it would be better to move on, and start killing more bosses. So after one pull towards Solarian, we did a U-turn to head towards Kael.
It was already a bit late, and we still had trash to kill, so we only got two actual attempts on Kael. It's a 5-phase fight, so it's super complicated to explain. Our generally long-winded raid leader did a great job at explaining the minimum, and getting us moving. Phase 1 was pretty much a joke, but the legendary weapons fighting us got out of control fast. They wiped us on both attempts. And then we called it for the night.
So, why would anyone care about this? What's my point? The point would be that as guild leadership, you have to determine when is the best time to be moving on. You can wait until 100% of the raid gets all the drops they want, but then you're likely to be boring 24 people every week because that one warlock wants some random item. But if that's your guild rules/guild culture, then go for it.
For us, it's about progression. We want to see new content, kill new bosses. Al'ar, for example was great last night. I saw a number of people running around in their little Broken disguises, so they could continue progressing that quest line. Once we down Kael and Vashj, there will most likely be 25 people that will get an upgraded ring. And yes, there's still a few new people that need VR, but if we waited until everyone got everything, there'd be no way that we'd be in Mount Hyjal/Black Temple now. Heck.. I still need the Mongoose enchant. Let's go back to Kara! lol.
So, Progression for us is about going as far as you can go, as quickly as you can, while learning the necessary skills and obtaining the necessary armor to progress on to the next boss. Do we really, really need Kael and Vashj? No, but it's one of those notches in our belts that we'd all like to see. Give us one full night of tries, I'm guessing we'll down Vashj.
Note: Because we were only doing the 3 farmed bosses, we actually didn't have our strongest squad in there either. A number of people were on alts, etc. So, I see a cleared TK in the near future.
Monday, July 7, 2008
Filtered Reading Ahead
I've always enjoyed playing the mage class. Sure, from time to time I get frustrated with certain aspects of it, but mostly... I'm a mage. I just like the idea of being a mage.
I understand there are a lot of great players out there that are mages in pvp. I'm not one of them. If it's me vs. pretty much anyone else, I usually just jump off a cliff. (I heard they don't get credit for the kill if I do that.) If it's more like PVE where I have a healer, and a "tank" to help mitigate some damage, I do well. But pure pvp, I'm just not that practiced.
Before TBC came out, I was reading a lot on the official forums. "Mage is broken!" they'd yell. Post after post, that was all I read. And had been enjoying my mage until I had read so many "you suck" posts. So I did what any self-respecting mage would do. No, I didn't re-roll a warlock. I stopped reading. I stopped letting the mob mentality seep into my thoughts. I stopped caring what this mass of trolls on the Internet was saying.
With the next expansion coming up, I've noticed some of the same trends coming up. "Buff this class!" "Nerf this class!" "Make mages king of DPS!" What's wrong with providing constructive feedback, you ask? Nothing, but "you suck" isn't constructive. And while there are a fair number of people that can dps higher than me in my raid, I still enjoy playing my class.
I'll admit that I'm not all that excited about becoming a Living Bomb, but WoTLK is only in alpha. Who knows what will be of the talents when they're actually released. Furthermore, it seems that almost all talents are useful some of the time. Maybe it's one of those that are cooler once you try it. I wasn't super excited about Dragon's Breath either, but when I was fire and I finally tried it, it was a very useful spell.
I understand there are a lot of great players out there that are mages in pvp. I'm not one of them. If it's me vs. pretty much anyone else, I usually just jump off a cliff. (I heard they don't get credit for the kill if I do that.) If it's more like PVE where I have a healer, and a "tank" to help mitigate some damage, I do well. But pure pvp, I'm just not that practiced.
Before TBC came out, I was reading a lot on the official forums. "Mage is broken!" they'd yell. Post after post, that was all I read. And had been enjoying my mage until I had read so many "you suck" posts. So I did what any self-respecting mage would do. No, I didn't re-roll a warlock. I stopped reading. I stopped letting the mob mentality seep into my thoughts. I stopped caring what this mass of trolls on the Internet was saying.
With the next expansion coming up, I've noticed some of the same trends coming up. "Buff this class!" "Nerf this class!" "Make mages king of DPS!" What's wrong with providing constructive feedback, you ask? Nothing, but "you suck" isn't constructive. And while there are a fair number of people that can dps higher than me in my raid, I still enjoy playing my class.
I'll admit that I'm not all that excited about becoming a Living Bomb, but WoTLK is only in alpha. Who knows what will be of the talents when they're actually released. Furthermore, it seems that almost all talents are useful some of the time. Maybe it's one of those that are cooler once you try it. I wasn't super excited about Dragon's Breath either, but when I was fire and I finally tried it, it was a very useful spell.
Thursday, July 3, 2008
Calling It... No, Wait!
On Tuesday night, we started our weekly farming and got through the first two bosses in Mount Hyjal (yeah for more Hearts of Darkness) and then Naj as well. This set us up perfectly for another quick kill on Supremus last night, and then hopefully some work on Shade of Akama.
It took us a bit of time to get through the trash to Shade of Akama. Only afterwards did we realize that we can get teleported through to the middle so we wouldn't have to face some of the bigger, uglier packs (and probably save a ton of time too). We went over a different strategy (needed way more DPS on the Channelers), and then tried it out. It was much better, but a few mobs got loose, and we eventually wiped.
Raise the dead. Buff... Oh wait. One of the tanks isn't rezzed yet. Well, X-perl says that he's been rezzed. "Hey Tank? Did you get the rez?" Crickets. Okay, he must have gone afk. wait a bit. "You back, buddy?" Nothing. One of our pallies, who's his neighbor, volunteers to call him, but he doesn't pick up the phone.
Well, we had another tank online that could come in, but we'd have to wait for the afk tank to get disconnected or else our replacement tank would get the "Instance Full" message. It was getting rather late, and we knew this would be our last attempt, so we didn't really have time to wait for the disconnect. "/sigh. Alright guys, we're going to have to call it for tonight. Sorry about that. We'll get back in here and kill him next week." And a mage opens a portal.
Two people take the portal, and then... Did the tank just stand up?
...
...
"You there, buddy?"
...
...
Our tank starts moving around, and getting in to position. Alright, let's summon back the two people. (Thank goodness for in instance summoning.) We had one attempt... and we practically destroyed him. The adds got a big out of control towards the end, but Shade of Akama was headed straight for Akama, so we knew the DPS race was on. I pulled one Elementalist to try and control him, but quickly got pwned (Mage Tanking ftl). And without even an order from myself or any of the Raid Leaders, I was almost instantly Battle Rezzed. Looking at both health bars, we were way ahead and killing Shade quick.
Yep, Primogeniture is now 3/9 in Black Temple.
It took us a bit of time to get through the trash to Shade of Akama. Only afterwards did we realize that we can get teleported through to the middle so we wouldn't have to face some of the bigger, uglier packs (and probably save a ton of time too). We went over a different strategy (needed way more DPS on the Channelers), and then tried it out. It was much better, but a few mobs got loose, and we eventually wiped.
Raise the dead. Buff... Oh wait. One of the tanks isn't rezzed yet. Well, X-perl says that he's been rezzed. "Hey Tank? Did you get the rez?" Crickets. Okay, he must have gone afk. wait a bit. "You back, buddy?" Nothing. One of our pallies, who's his neighbor, volunteers to call him, but he doesn't pick up the phone.
Well, we had another tank online that could come in, but we'd have to wait for the afk tank to get disconnected or else our replacement tank would get the "Instance Full" message. It was getting rather late, and we knew this would be our last attempt, so we didn't really have time to wait for the disconnect. "/sigh. Alright guys, we're going to have to call it for tonight. Sorry about that. We'll get back in here and kill him next week." And a mage opens a portal.
Two people take the portal, and then... Did the tank just stand up?
...
...
"You there, buddy?"
...
...
Our tank starts moving around, and getting in to position. Alright, let's summon back the two people. (Thank goodness for in instance summoning.) We had one attempt... and we practically destroyed him. The adds got a big out of control towards the end, but Shade of Akama was headed straight for Akama, so we knew the DPS race was on. I pulled one Elementalist to try and control him, but quickly got pwned (Mage Tanking ftl). And without even an order from myself or any of the Raid Leaders, I was almost instantly Battle Rezzed. Looking at both health bars, we were way ahead and killing Shade quick.
Yep, Primogeniture is now 3/9 in Black Temple.
Wednesday, July 2, 2008
Going to Blizzcon
I can't believe I forgot to mention this to all my loyal, loving fans. For those that don't know, I live in Southern California. In fact, I grew up in and live in Orange County, which is the same county that Anaheim is in, which is the city where Blizzcon will be this year (and every year so far).
At any rate, I've kind of shunned going to Blizzcon for the past years. I don't know... I just couldn't justify spending the money to go. And who knows who else would actually go that I know anyway?
Well the seed for going this time was probably first planted by Sirsha (who lives in UT, btw) last year or so. Sirsha used to work with my best friend, Elinor; and the three of us, along with Justicar (Dadguy and another co-worker) and Dargus (Elinor's brother) pretty much leveled up to 60 together, so we all go way back. At any rate, Sirsha planted the seed by saying that him and his brother (another good friend) would come down for the next Blizzcon.
Now, it looks like Elinor will be coming down for the convention. And Dargus and his wife, that now plays, will be going as well. And for my birthday, my wife's present was to watch the kids while I go off and "play" at Blizzcon for two days. The "certificate" said something like (I don't have it hear, so I can't quote it), "Go have fun talking strategy with all your fellow dorks."
So, for anyone that's going, we'll probably have to figure out how to hook up somehow. And if you're my close friends, you've probably got my cell phone number anyway. lol. But come hang out with a fellow dork.
Oh, and Anadori? I love you. Thanks for the awesome present.
At any rate, I've kind of shunned going to Blizzcon for the past years. I don't know... I just couldn't justify spending the money to go. And who knows who else would actually go that I know anyway?
Well the seed for going this time was probably first planted by Sirsha (who lives in UT, btw) last year or so. Sirsha used to work with my best friend, Elinor; and the three of us, along with Justicar (Dadguy and another co-worker) and Dargus (Elinor's brother) pretty much leveled up to 60 together, so we all go way back. At any rate, Sirsha planted the seed by saying that him and his brother (another good friend) would come down for the next Blizzcon.
Now, it looks like Elinor will be coming down for the convention. And Dargus and his wife, that now plays, will be going as well. And for my birthday, my wife's present was to watch the kids while I go off and "play" at Blizzcon for two days. The "certificate" said something like (I don't have it hear, so I can't quote it), "Go have fun talking strategy with all your fellow dorks."
So, for anyone that's going, we'll probably have to figure out how to hook up somehow. And if you're my close friends, you've probably got my cell phone number anyway. lol. But come hang out with a fellow dork.
Oh, and Anadori? I love you. Thanks for the awesome present.
Tuesday, July 1, 2008
Which Way Did He Go, George?
Last night, we stepped in to Black Temple again to go play with our friend, Supremus. We hadn't really had any solid attempts on him. Mostly just one attempt after killing Naj and before everyone needed to go to sleep.
However, last night, things happened a bit too smoothly. We almost effortlessly cleared the trash leading up to Supremus. And then we 1-shotted him in about 1/2 the time of the enrage timer. (15-minute enrage timer.) Previously, we had a hard time in the transition back to phase 2 where the tanks need to pick him up again. And he'd start killing tanks right and left since the healers had run away. So, we tried a different strategy, and needless to say, it worked.
I really hadn't planned to go any further than Supremus. He was kind of the plan for the night. But we killed him so quickly that we had to press on. I had researched the Shade of Akama fight, but it had been awhile. Furthermore, I had no idea how to actually get there or what trash mobs we would be encountering. So, from maps, I took an educated guess, and we moved towards Shade of Akama. We learned as we went, and got through the trash, and had a couple of feeble attempts at Shade of Akama.
Sometimes our guild is just too good. I really need to overprepare for the boss fights so I don't get caught looking like I did last night.
However, last night, things happened a bit too smoothly. We almost effortlessly cleared the trash leading up to Supremus. And then we 1-shotted him in about 1/2 the time of the enrage timer. (15-minute enrage timer.) Previously, we had a hard time in the transition back to phase 2 where the tanks need to pick him up again. And he'd start killing tanks right and left since the healers had run away. So, we tried a different strategy, and needless to say, it worked.
I really hadn't planned to go any further than Supremus. He was kind of the plan for the night. But we killed him so quickly that we had to press on. I had researched the Shade of Akama fight, but it had been awhile. Furthermore, I had no idea how to actually get there or what trash mobs we would be encountering. So, from maps, I took an educated guess, and we moved towards Shade of Akama. We learned as we went, and got through the trash, and had a couple of feeble attempts at Shade of Akama.
Sometimes our guild is just too good. I really need to overprepare for the boss fights so I don't get caught looking like I did last night.
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