Don't throw in the towel

StreetChief said...
I wish I was as battle hearty as you :( I started playing seriously pretty late in season 2. Wound up getting to around 17-1800's. Oh well. I haven't found a good set of teammates yet. My character's name is Vauch(BWL). Got any tips?

I maintain that my best advice is practice, practice, practice.

it's pretty easy to get really frustrated in arenas. A lot times I end up screaming and yelling a lot and mentally worn down at the end of an arena-thon. Taint is my hardest coach for sure. We don't play coy when it comes to improving our game.

1) you probably won't have the best team matrix and will find that those who do will easily plow you over.

2) until everything is second nature to you in arenas, things will be tough. being unprepared and scared is a huge factor I run into a lot. this is where number of games comes into play...the more you do..the more you know and are prepared for. ie..this lock is probably going to chain fear me when the warrior is at 60% hp. or get ready to counterspell the pally when he goes for flash or holy light when his warrior is at 80%...10 secs is enough to blow him up.

3) you'll know you're starting to get somewere when you're blaming your execution of something rather than the whole WTF just happened?

4) find teammates who share you masochistic lifestyle.. it's no fun when you're practicing and failing...when one of your partners bails because "it's too frustrating or no fun anymore." Odds are you aren't learning anything if you're kicking ass. Failure is where you learn the most.

When I started 2v2s with warrior/pally...it was very very frustrating. I couldn't get heals off, I was constantly being cc'd or obliterated. I wasn't using line of sight right, I was moving to bubble soon enough or sometimes too soon, I dind't know to use seal of justice on a druid, I would panic a lot when I got focused etc...

We lost a ton of games on the first two days when I started to play. But as I kept practicing and getting to learn my class in an arena situation better, things got easier and easier. I started doing things automatically..like when to cast freedom or bop...when to waste the GCD on dispel rather than flash of light...etc

The same thing with my 3v3 team as well. 5v5 games won't teach you to optimize your class as well as 2v2 and 3v3s because you have to depend on yourself more than rely on other people. Often times, people are carried by a good matrix and then get the mindset that they're great at pvp and arenas.

For instance, one of the top 5v5 alliance teams on Boulderfist has characters who have 2v2 and 3v3 teams in the 1600s. This says a lot about them as an individual player...not that they aren't good, but that odds are, most of their skill comes from group dynamic rather than individual.

Practice not only makes you battle-hardened, it makes that group dynamic I just spoke of a work of art. You run up against 2k rated teams and you sware you're watching a coreographed ballet performance. No one fumbles, everyone is in LOS of each other, counter spells, fears, dispels...SPOT on...hamstrings up, freedoms on, heroism at just the clutch moment... no mistakes and TIMING is perfect! That's one of the hardest things about Arenas is finding people willing to put in the time for that level of performance.

Anyhow, I have a long way to go as well. I was happy to push all my teams (2v2, 3v3, and 5v5) to 1900+ last season but for Season 3, I'd like to hit 2k at least once. ;D
It's just a whole new ballgame when you hit that level of play.

Also, playing for fun can be great as well.. if you want to just hit the casual arena scene. From 1400-1650 is my marker for casual arena players. It gives you a decent amount of points for gear and you don't have to get into the nitty gritty of high level competition but just enough competition to feel the excitement.

ps. I almost forgot one of the hugest tips of all. COMMUNICATION. If you're too chicken-sh*t to yell at your priest for not mass dispelling fast enough or your paladin for holding out on BOP or not giving freedom fast enough...or if you're too afraid to confront your warrior for not getting hamstring or too timid to tell your warlock to not dot the rogue so you can sheep a target....you're gonna fall into the polite but fatal category of low growth.

Okay, I'm not suggesting you pick a fight with your team members.. perhaps "yell" is a harsh word. But if you can't communicate what everyone needs to improve on because you're too scared to hurt feelings.. you're probably not going to get very far in terms of group dynamics.

Season 3

Well Season 3 has kicked off. The re-gearing was like Christmas in WoW...which happens every arena season. It's pretty fun.. the re-enchanting is a pain though. We lack shards this season for the enchants so we'll be runnning a lot of heroics etc soon.
We're pretty lucky in that Felicks is the master gem crafter of the guild. I got his last skyfire diamond.. hahaha. woot!

Hunters definitely got the biggest xmas present. They got to buy their season 3 weapons without a 2k rating. Wut up with that Blizzard?

So we were going to spend the night doing heroics to gather shards but we ended up having enough people on our team to do 5v5s. Yeah, we're crazy and masochistic and wanted to eat plenty of dirt. hahaha.

It's quite fun, painful, and interseting getting to go up against some of the most bad @ss teams in the battlegroup. We played for hours...didn't want to stop. We finally cracked 1600 and then called in a night at 2am. lol. Our lowest point was 1496. It was a lot tougher than I thought it would be. We even got to play against some of the top 15 teams from last season. Talk about intense!

Our first line up was paladin, holy priest, demo lock, warrior, and rogue
Second line up for the night was pladin, holy priest, frost mage, warrior, and rogue

Next time, we'd like to try pally, priest, mage, lock, warrior

I told Felix he needs to get 6000 shards in his bank so he doesn't have to stop to get more shards. Apparently two full bags isn't enough when you're on a roll. I wish they would refund shards back to locks after the arena is over.

Well last season we weren't able to break 2k. When we changed our line up, we got up to 1960 but the last week of the season we had to sub in all of our characters into that team so there wasn't anymore progression. :( On a good note though even though we subbed in all of our alts, we still ended with a 1915 rating. Not bad for scrubs. :D

Reigndeer in November

On Sunday, I ended up talking to Britnay and Flipmax about random crap we have in our bags etc. And some how we got to talking about the Christmas treats. Someone said they saw someone on a reigndeer flying mount. I was like, flying wasn't even available last x-mas in WoW.

Turns out 2.3 they activated [preserved holly] to work on flying mounts!! woot!!!
I had debated throwing my 25 stacks of preserved holly out awhile back..I'm sure glad I kept um....

We tried it out and spent like a good 2 hours just flying around Shat.
/console pitchlimit 750
allows you to do flips!! We were making coordinated stunt shows in front of the aldor and scryer bank. It was awesome!!!

Anyhow, hope everyone has a nice holiday!

What's your game?

hahaha.. my guildmate posted the links to the new wow commercials on our forums..
They're pretty funny! Thanks Gravin!

Mr. T

Shatner

I'm just waiting for the Chuck Norris one. lol!

American Pie...wowcast twist

a parody of the song American Pie by Don McLean with a wowcast twist by Spurlock
LMAO!!!!!.. he did it again!

A long, long time ago...
I can still remember
How that podcast used to make me smile.
And I knew if I had my chance
That I might capture a fleeting glance
And, maybe, we could play wow for a while.

But November made me shiver
With every download iTunes did deliver.
Hardly a podcast in the queue;
I didn’t know what to do.

I can’t remember if I cried
When Blizzcon her last cast did deride,
But something touched me deep inside
The day the wowcast died.

So bye-bye, miss alachyiiiiiiiiiiii.
Pointed my browser to her website,
But she only talked about Tai.
And them good old listeners were starting to cry
Writing’, "is the end of the podcast nigh?.
" is the end of the podcast nigh?."

Do you arena three on three,
And will you team your pally with me,
If Blizzard tells you so?
Do you read elitist jerks,
And do you think their strategy works,
And can they teach me how cc warriors?

Well, I know that you are quick on heals
`cause I saw your tank he never ever keels.
You both have paid your dues.
Man, I dig those purple and blues.

I was a level 30 undead lock
Without a mount I had to walk,
But I knew now the game would suck
The day the podcast died.

So bye-bye, miss alachyiiiiiiiiiiii.
Pointed my browser to her website,
But she only talked about Tai.
And them good old listeners were starting to cry
Writing’, "is the end of the podcast nigh?.
" is the end of the podcast nigh?."

Now for two months we’ve been on our own
And without wowcast we feel alone,
But that’s not how it used to be.
When the boys sang a song from Diana Ross,
Their loyalty it did come across
In a voice that hurt the ears of you and me,

Oh, and after Tai described the ice mage path
An emailer pointed out an error in math
The listeners were dismayed;
Respecced the mages they played.
And while Felix talked about molten core,
Only a few thought him a bore,
And fans everywhere cried out for more
The day the podcast died.

So bye-bye, miss alachyiiiiiiiiiiii.
Pointed my browser to her website,
But she only talked about Tai.
And them good old listeners were starting to cry
Writing’, "is the end of the podcast nigh?.
" is the end of the podcast nigh?."

Karazan in a ten man raid.
All ten jae, a guild premade,
Ten bosses pulled and dying fast.
The maiden almost kicked your ass,
The players nearly died in mass,
When Saddin killed the bitch at last.

Now the metaverse talk is sweet perfume
Perhaps some day its discussion will resume.
`cause metalk it kicked some but;
But Spurlock’s mouth he rarely shut.
Didn’t we even talk of smut
The day the music died?

So bye-bye, miss alachyiiiiiiiiiiii.
Pointed my browser to her website,
But she only talked about Tai.
And them good old listeners were starting to cry
Writing’, "is the end of the podcast nigh?.
" is the end of the podcast nigh?."


Oh, and there we were all in one place,
A 25 five man raid lost in space
With no time left to start again.
So come on: Felix be nimble, Felix be quick!
Felix flash heal before the dot tick
Cause plus healing is the pally’s only friend.

Oh, and as I watched him on the stage
My hands were clenched in fists of rage.
No angel born in hell
Could break that satan’s spell.
And as the flames climbed high into the night
To light the sacrificial rite,
I saw satan laughing with delight
The day the music died

So bye-bye, miss alachyiiiiiiiiiiii.
Pointed my browser to her website,
But she only talked about Tai.
And them good old listeners were starting to cry
Writing’, "is the end of the podcast nigh?.
" is the end of the podcast nigh?."

I met a girl who sang the blues
And I asked her for some happy news,
But she just smiled and turned away.
I went to the wowcast site
Where I’d listened to casts all night,
But the page said the casts wouldn’t play.

And in the blog: the posters screamed,
The haters cheered, and the supporters dreamed.
But not a word was spoken;
The hyperlinks all were broken.
And those little things I loved the most:
A courageous, funny and endearing host,
Would I ever see them in another post?
The day the music died.

So bye-bye, miss alachyiiiiiiiiiiii.
Pointed my browser to her website,
But she only talked about Tai.
And them good old listeners were starting to cry
Writing’, "is the end of the podcast nigh?.
" is the end of the podcast nigh?."


So bye-bye, miss alachyiiiiiiiiiiii.
Pointed my browser to her website,
But she only talked about Tai.
And them good old listeners were starting to cry
Writing’, "is the end of the podcast nigh?.
" is the end of the podcast nigh?."

Gruul Heads

So last night we ran Gruul's again. It was our second attempt as a guild. To the shock of everyone, we one shot King Maulgar! Well, I was surprised anyhow because we had a fair amount of new people.

For some reason, we all ended up with pumpkins over our heads. lol! I'm not sure when it happened cuz I was too busy trying to get the raid together. So the goal was to beat Gruul's by the time the pumpkin heads wore off! hahaha.

Okay, so we didn't make the deadline nor did we down Gruul's. We ended up getting Gruul's down to 7% with 24 people (someone had to leave early). And so we were sure we'd get it on the next attempt because we were able to pull in an extra pug to help with DPS. But then we took too long for that last attempt and got respawns that split some of the raid in half....and then there was a resulting wipe..at which point we had to call the raid. I think we did about 5 Gruul attempts. Robbed I say!!! That 6th attempt should have been ours!!

On a side note, my paladin got ditched! hahahaha. We were lacking in DPS during the Gruul fight so they called out my shadow priest to be the...how did they put it?..."mana battery" for the mages. lol. It really did make a difference too because the mages didn't run out of mana after that. It's too bad the battery pack doesn't work on myself as well. I have to chug mana pots to keep up...fix that kk blizzard?
:D

Zul'Aman

Patch day was pretty exciting. We had people crafting new things, making airplanes, getting new cooking recipes, new enchants, new gems..

We also successfully took down the Nalorakk, the bear lord in Zul'Aman tonight. You have 20 minutes from ringing the gong and the gates opening to the first boss to slay him for a chance to save the hostage who will give you extra loot. I was like 20mins my @ss! Maybe for a heavy 25 man raid group to come back in and slaughter this joint..yeah maybe.. lol. [Pauldrons of Primal Fury] dropped...and of course, we had no hunter in our group. :P

We also tried for the Eagle boss but the add-pulls were insane.. wave after wave of birds and elite dudes with no end in sight. We're thinking we might wait another week or so before attempting the rest of the instance. Hopefully more information will be out by then so we don't have to be the pioneers who pay 50g a night doing attempts. :D

Our guild is actually doing Gruul's tomorrow night. I don't have full confirmation on our filler guild but I'm 99% sure it's on...so I'm excited about that.

Patch 2.3, My Highlights

So I always wait to read the patch notes the day the patch comes out. After I finish downloading the patch, I read the notes as it installs. As we all knew, it sure was a big one!

Here are the ones I'm pretty excited about or thought were noteworthy!

1. New enchant available to shields to increase resilience.
2. Soulwell's take less time to make now...yay for warlock's in Arena prep time.
3. Dispel Magic has been increased to 40yrds. Noteworthy for me because I used to gauge Karazhan Prince Shadow Volley by the 30yrd dispel range..now I can't use that as my measuring tool.
4. Engineering recipe from Niobe Whizzlespark in Shadowmoon for Flying device!! woot!
5. New meta gem in Shadowmoon valley that adds crit from Coilskar Siren.
6. Gladiator Gear from different seasons now stack for set bonuses. ah yeah!
7. Apexis shards from Ogri'lla daily quests in larger quantity can now be turned in for global use elixirs. Time to raid!
8. You can now run Heroics with only Honored reputation!
9. There are now Dungeon daily quests from lower city...as well as BG daily quests and a new cooking daily quest! Cha-ching!
10. When you inspect people, you can now see their talent trees. Hehehe.. why did you put points into that moron!!??
11. One mail can now send out 12 items...maybe this is the start to not needing a mail mod.
12. Minimap has upgraded features like showing you who has recently sent you mail and where NPCs are by serch.

Also a ton of class changes...but everyone should read through all of those...some are pretty significant changes that may make you think to respec...*cough*Priest!*cough*

edit: Oooh. more cool stuff. Mages can conjure vending machines now instead of being one! And you can buff for free mana before BGs begin now! Woot!

Portal Wallpaper

Designing for 1%

I'm pretty excited about Patch 2.3 this Tuesday. I'm very happy about the new 10 man instance Zul'Aman. Two days ago, we were running Sadin's lock alt through steamvaults...after we were done, I turned the party into a raid and hopped into Serpentshrine Caverns. WoW. That place is soo cool looking. The art concept was quite unique to what I've seen so far in most raid dungeons.

Then it kind of made me sad to think that less that 1% of our server has probably seen the inside of it. What a waste. So yea, I'm happy about the new 10 man content. We're going to try and give it a whirl on Tuesday...see if we can't get the first boss down.

As for the 25 mans... there is a possibility that our guild could start seeing more of it. I've been trying to work with another small guild to hook up with us to fill in our Gruul attempts. So far, we've only been able to get enough people from our own guild once...and that was like 5 weeks ago.

This week we're going to try the filler guild out and see how it pans out.. I'm hoping there are no issues so it can help us out to see more 25 man content.

PvP bounce

So I have to admit, I've been very hesitant to play my paladin in arenas..I just felt like she wasn't good enough. But last week, Taint finally convinced me to just go for it...and bite the bullet.

So I started up the 2v2 and 3v3s a little more aggressive. It was super rocky at first..mostly with me being yelled at a ton while I was learning how to move and what to do for what class. Can't brute force the heal.. you have to be a NINJA.

I still need a ton of practice of course.. nowhere near enough practice. Can't stress the word practice for pvp. But I was able to jump to 1734 from 1500 something on my 2v2 and we're about 1818 on the 3v3. But we also started practicing 5v5 and today we almost broke 2k rating! Lots of quad dps blew us the hell up though..omg...heroism+mage+lock+shadowpriest+elemental shaman = dead @ss warrior in 2 seconds. lol. flavor of the month teams suck.

Alachia's UI

StreetChief said...
How come we never get to see Alachia's UI?

hehe. That's because there's nothing all that fancy about my UI. About a year ago, I stopped using most UI mods to alleviate the frustration when patches came around.

My must have mods right now are Quartz, Grid, Simple Action Sets, Damage Meters, and Outfitter for normal usage..
and Ora2, Bigwigs, and Big Brother for raiding.

all the buttons on the bottom two rows are pretty much keybound to my keyboard...and the ones on the right side are buffs and professions etc.