WOWCAST BLOG

Final Fantasy XIV Review…it is Awesome

2010-09-12T20:21:00.001-07:00

Breaking this down into Buffs (things I love) and Debuffs (debunking a lot of misconceptions of the game that led me to believe I might not like it) and Curse (what sucks).

Buffs:
I’ll just start with the awesomesauceness of the game.
*The graphics. It has not been since Final Fantasy XI that I have encountered graphics that really impressed me and so it is quite appropriate that it’s FFXIV that trumps the last time I was truly wowed by a graphic engine. The renderings are just spectacular, the details are as crisp as I remembered the last time.

Did I mention the graphics are just awesome? I definitely would not recommend anyone try to play this game without the bare minimum system requirements for sure. You will lag, your screen will look like the original nintendo, and it won’t be worth your money to try to play this game unless you can fully appreciate it.

My system is a Intel Core Duo E8400 @ 3.00GHz, 8GB ram, Nvidia GeForce 260 and the game nearly eats up all my processing power. I’d love to upgrade but am gonna try to hold out but if I could, I definitely would for this game. Also, messing with the config file in the game folder really helped me toggle my graphic settings to match my computers capabilities…and it’s better to play in full screen mode anyhow.

* This game rewards you for exploring and figuring things out as you go. Spending the time to click on the NPCs and talking to everyone often yields really cool stuff you wouldn’t know about. The wiki for this game is still pretty small so I am finding the need for exploration a really fun change from having every zone and NPC memorized.

*Minimal questing. You only get like 8 quests per week and then the rest of your leveling is done through grinding mobs or crafting. I think I hated this in FFXI but now love it having been totally burnt out from quest grinding in WoW. It’s just nice to not have to worry about everyone being on the same quest etc.. just go out, explore, and kill shit that’s within your level. It’s nice because…

*The combat is a lot longer than in WoW for sure. You spend many minutes on one mob which might sound tedious if it weren’t for things like Battle Regimens which require group coordination to perform special debuff abilities on the mob when performed correctly. It’s not easy so far and that challenge alone makes game play not as boring as “spam spam spam spam kill.” The combat system also offers Tactical Points which let you set off special moves as well which break up the spammyness of your typical fights. And you know the game mobs are only gonna get more complex when a simple beginners mob dodo bird can blind, slow, and sleep you. lol.

*Crafting graphics are awesome (not just twisting your fingers around in the air while being hunched over). You actually see saw blades and spin wheels for tailoring etc. And so far I love the actual crafting mechanism too. I actually feel like I’m performing a skill when I’m fishing or doing botany (chopping down wood off trees). It’s like a mini game inside the game.

Debuff:
Problems I heard people have in FF that I didn’t think were bad at all.

*Controls. Movement controls are fine for me but I’ve always used the awsd keys in conjunction with my right mouse click to navigate in WoW. If you are used to the arrow keys, I can see how you might really have a hard time but the plus side is that once you learn to move with your mouse and keyboard, it’s way more fluid and nice…good habit for game play anyhow.

*XP Fatigue. This is the one I’ve heard people bitching about the most but I think it’s probably the most misunderstood mechanism of the game so far. In FFXIV, ONE character can be any class and a class is defined not only as say like a conjurer or lancer but also as a fisher or botanist or miner. You can be all of them if you want. To change classes, you only have to change out your weapon and bam, you are a new class.

XP Fatigue begins after 8 hours of ONE class and then diminishes to zero XP gain after 16 hours (per week). This means you can go to another class and level that up after those hours. They are encouraging people to not just be mono-classed and seriously, who the hell can do more that 16 hours of grinding a fuckin’ wharf rat or doing 16 hours of mining per week.

They did this so you wouldn’t feel guilty about leveling up another class during the week..time you would otherwise pour into perfecting your main class etc. I rather like this system a lot because it frees me up to do other things in the game rather than to level chase and encourages me to try other things in the game than grinding a mob.

There are 18 classes in the game and 18x16 = more hours than in a week…so it’s not like you have to turn off the game at any point for you crazy mmorpg addicts *looks at self*

*No Epic Loot Drops. I guess I actually like that there is no looting in the game. Random crap just goes directly into your inventory and you don’t have to waste time pick up crap off the mob. Gear and weapons are pretty much crafted although some crappy stuff occasionally drops off mobs or are received through quests. The majority of loot you will want though will be from other players in the game who spend the time to gather and craft etc. THIS is what makes crafting in a game actually useful…demand. When awesome crap falls off of mobs, who the heck wants to five days crafting a shield? Not me.

*No Auction House at game launch. This one I can see why people are going nuts but at the same time I still applaud SE for trying something bold with the market wards. Yes, they are laggy and horribly time consuming but at the same time they generate a community that is normally vacant. Secondary class systems have previously just been useless and interaction for trade systems in WoW was rather annoying because of the amount of spamming you had to do. I get the feeling they will bring in an AH system later but for now, they want people active in the market wards. And quite frankly, the awful truth is that if you find yourself saying “I don’t have time for this” then this game is probably not for you..stay far far away. (I spent thirty minutes just looking for the fishing guild on three different levels of an area cursing in frustration the whole way but being so excited when I finally found it…that’s FFXIV)

Curse:
So the stuff about the game that just plain sucks!

*TABing to another window while running FFXIV will crash the game. I’m not sure if that’s just beta or if that will be the case in the title release.

*(my BIGGEST gripe of FFXIV) Software Mouse sucks but hopefully someone will make a mod so we can use the hardware mouse instead.

*/tell Firstname Lastname to talk to friends sucks! there is no /r yet which makes chatting in the game a pain. Maybe they are trying to encourage people to get in a linkshell ASAP.

*Party invite only seems possible when you are physically near each other and can click on the player..seems cumbersome.

-----------TIPS------------
Gonna go ahead an list a few things I learned that might make game play easier for anyone just going in:

*Shortcuts I love:
[Home] = open and close main menu
[C] = Target Lock
[F] = Toggle Active/Passive Mode
[B]= Open/Close Emote
The rest here:

*Talk to everyone more than once…sometimes they have more to give you…ie.. I got my extra spell by talking to the main barkeep in town a second time.

*Macro Guide: http://www.ffxivcore.com/wiki/Macro_Guide

*Like @Ejji says: put everything you know and love about WoW on the shelf before playing.

I set up a bindpoint channel for FFXIV to spam random crap about things we've figured out:
Channel Information
FFXIV
Room: ffxiv
Server: games.bindpoint.net
Handle: Yourname

Sign up here at bindpoint.im

Instructions for Aidum (mac) and Pidgin (pc) here

A Chat with a Mage

2010-07-20T06:54:00.000-07:00

Eh. Need to put in a new post here so the Chinese stop spamming my comments.
Here's an old chat I had a few months ago with Flipmax regarding mages in Wotlk.

Alachia: since playing a mage in vanilla wow, do you find it harder to play a mage in wotlk?
Flipmax: well its a bit more challenging than b4 cuase arcane was never a viable spec until wotlk
Flipmax: compared to fire and ice
Flipmax: which were the main specs in vanilla wow and bc
Flipmax: so harder? id say yes compared to vanilla
Flipmax: however
Flipmax: we done do as much cc compared to the old instnaces either...we used more buttons back then
Flipmax: thru the expansions...everytiem they change talents and trees...mages would suck at the beginning of the patch...like hunters and rouges out dps mages...but after awhile when gear catches up and new set bonuses kicks in they come back on top as you saw last night
Alachia: more buttons how?
Alachia: like counterspell, sheep, decurse?
Flipmax: yea
Flipmax: strategic novas
Flipmax: running around doing specific jobs mages have to do
Flipmax: but there's not much of that anymore. its very point and shoot nowadays
Flipmax: dps is more of a blunt object now in may of the newest fights
Flipmax: the old fights were were always maximizing where we could stand and dps the most time. now there's not much of that
Flipmax: cept for festergut, putrid, and rotface wing
Flipmax: you guys dont even need our portals as much anymore
Flipmax: i can't roulette you guys now anywhere near as much as I could in kara
Alachia: lol
Alachia: interesting.
Flipmax: sounds like im on a podcast interview
Alachia: you are lol
Alachia: so what proc are you looking for the most with arcane?
Flipmax: arc blast
Flipmax: if you look at recounts that's what crits the most
Flipmax: as far as proc...you're alwasy looking for the arc missle proc
Flipmax: it's the most mana efficient thing to use now since it's free
Flipmax: but the challenge is to minimize mana consumption and maximize dps still
Alachia: so you arcane blast until arc missles proc?
Flipmax: for the most part right now
Flipmax: we think that might change once we get 4 piece bonus
Flipmax: since haste is the big stat for this t10 it seems
Flipmax: t9, crit and int were the big stats to get
Flipmax: now that you have haste. your mana is goign down faster. So you actually have to manage mana again. We thought we were going to have to do a lot of management just getting the 2 piece bonus, but not too much yet
Flipmax: getting that trinket that givies us 123 int is the reason mana is really plentiful right now
Alachia: does your counterspell silence mobs now?
Alachia: or did they take that out?
Flipmax: no that's still there

The Fat Lady hasn’t Sung

2010-04-27T15:48:00.001-07:00

So I got this email today asking me some really interesting questions regarding why I pursue what I pursue in all my mediums. It made me really think about what drew me to the form of podcasting in the first place.

And more importantly, it inspired me to sit down and do Episode 46. I forgot how much I love to just ramble to myself. And I thought it’d be a good idea to let people know what the future of the podcast is since I’ve been fielding a lot of questions about its mortality. lol.

Funny note: The background music is Philip Glass Morphosis 1-5 and the lengths of the full set was the length of the podcast. I really love how reflective the music is. Hope you enjoy it too.

Google Buzz Link: http://www.google.com/buzz/alachia.me/g3HXrZr2Ewv/The-Fat-Lady-hasn-t-Sung

Nerd Raging

2010-02-17T20:25:00.001-08:00

So I thought I kind of nerd raged too much at my last raid this week (muted of course) but apparently a few moments of yelling at the screen is nothing compared to the guy who tried to strangle his mother. That’s nerd raging to a whole new level.

I hesitated on posting this or even commenting on this because it obviously has nothing to do with WoW in particular except he happened to be playing the game while the incident occurred. The guy was drunk and obviously has some issues. The whole incident was beyond absurd.

I just HATE news like this because this is where people get really really misleading impressions about the gaming culture. There’s rarely a news article about how WoW united a family or helped a group of friends stay in touch. The media has to report what happens but I’m afraid that’s all non-gamers tend to see and it severely mars the image of those whose lifestyles revolve around gaming.

Full Article on Tomshardware.com here--->

R.A. Salvatore on Questing

2010-02-17T10:49:00.001-08:00

I just loved this tid bit on ReRollz.com featuring R.A. Salvatore:

Rerollz: What do you think is the most successful medium for delivering a storyline inside a MMOG? Is it text in a Quest Log window? Is it dialogue bubbles popping up from NPC’s on screen? Or is it perhaps voiceover work like with what they are doing at Bioware’s Star Wars game?

R.A. Salvatore: It’s definitely not the text bubbles. Of that I am certain. How many people read the text of a quest carefully, compared to those who just read the objectives to get it done? I think it’s a combination of a lot of things: some text, sure; voiceover helps, but even that can get tedious if it drones on too long (the opening of Culling of Stratholme…); cut scenes can do phenomenal things to evoke emotion in the player, if they’re done well; and finally, as I said above regarding Icecrown, the idea that your actions actually change the environment is probably the most powerful thing of all.

Ironforge

2010-02-14T04:34:00.001-08:00

Ironforge
Originally uploaded by alachia

Having pulled a crazy work week, I wasn't sure if I had it in me to hit up the photowalk this evening. I had just told Azyxa I didn't have enough brain juice to do it when I was going through IF to Stormwind to turn in some charms and came across this shot.

At that point, I was mesmerized and had to continue with the screenshots. I am beyond pleased with the photos of Ironforge. I think it has a lot to do with the lighting ambiance and textures in Ironforge. They give you the most amazing glows and shadows.

Out of all the sets so far that I've taken in Azeroth, the Ironforge ones are now my favorite. I have no idea what Catacylsm holds for Ironforge or if we'll even see any changes but I hope to see more areas like it.

One of the things that makes IF so intriguing is how autonomous you feel inside of it. There are just so many nook and crannies and room and shadows that you really feel like it's actual space you can explore. It'd be a great place to play virtual hide and seek for sure.

I also got to visit my old WoW room! Next week, we hit up Wetlands! Woot! I plan to massacre a ton of murlocs in the process!

And the Wind Blows

2010-02-04T14:33:00.001-08:00

What’s more annoying than having two attempts out of twenty left on a boss you were able to down in two attempts the week previous? It had been a long and frustrating night where everything seems to be going in reverse! However, second to the last attempt of Professor Putricide, we had worked out all the crazy kinks we were experiencing. People were finally moving where they were supposed to and focusing on what they were asked to and no one was dead by phase 3.

Just as phase 3 comes up, we get set in position and everyone is hard nuking him and he’s going down so fast (35% to 18%) in just a matter of seconds. He would have been defeated! As I’m loading up a chain heal, bam!!!! Stuck in place! OH NOES!!! Damn internet went out. NOOOOO.

Shatai, the other healer of the group, (holy priest) was able to keep everyone up until the boss was at 4% but then they had casualties. He almost lasted though! That would have been epic! But as anyone dies in that fight, Professor Putricide gains health back so it becomes a losing battle fast as soon as you have casualties.

Sucks. Found out today that there was a lose wiring in fitting that held all the cable wires. Every time the wind would blow, connectivity would go out. Damn wind had to blow at the worst possible second. If it had happened like twently seconds later, we would have had our much needed successful attempt!

Badlands

2010-01-23T10:18:00.001-08:00

Badlands
Originally uploaded by alachia

Today's photowalk was in Badlands. I can't say it's that exciting of a zone. In fact, the rest of the Eastern Kingdom doesn't seem all that interesting until we hit Ghostlands. Kalimdor is where it's at I think.

I did manage to take some nice desert shots though throughout the Badlands. All I can think of in this zone is mining tin. lol. It's also one of the first places you get a trinket, [Nifty Stopwatch].

This is another zone that we all agree we won't mind if they completely overhaul. Sure would be nice to see an alliance town in this area as well.

Reply to: Simplification of Stats is NOT a bad thing

2010-01-20T15:09:00.001-08:00

I was trying to catch up on the Warcast forums today and was reading some commentary (http://www.worldofwarcast.com/forum/showthread.php?p=15872&posted=1#post15872) on the homogenization controversy we keep bringing up on Warcast. I keep getting the feeling after reading a lot of emails and comments that people just think I'm qq-ing over a feeling and not a fact. So anyhow here was my reply to the forum posts. I hope it brings to light more of the point I keep trying to get across. I also had an example about priests I wanted to use to directly speak about stat changes but left it out because the reply was getting too long. This one deals more with class homogenization.

----------------------------------------------------
I think it's really important to look at the over-all picture. I'm not qq-ing because of a few changes over the past months. I'm making an observation over the last five years. And while I have come to terms with these changes (it does take old dogs longer :)), I know for a fact that the homogenization is real. It does make the game simpler but it doesn't mean it hasn't made the game more fun... for some.

A lot of people point to the example of mages when they try to make this argument that the homogenization = more complexity in class play. "back in vanilla wow, all mages did was spam fireball or frost bolt" and now with wotlk, you're seeing mages use mods to monitor arc missile procs from arcane blasts assuming you don't have your four set bonus yet. They have to be careful with their timing and not waste procs. It's more fun for sure. It's more complex than spamming frostbolts for sure and you do amazing pew pew.

However, that's not the whole story. Five years ago, shamans could not decurse and resto tree druids couldn't do it in form. This left the duty mainly to mages who had decurse assignments. In addition to that, mages were always in charge of crowd control. Setting up focus macros to maintain your cc'd target was huge. Counterspell was also very common in a lot of the boss fights which were directly assigned to mages as well. In addition, there were a lot of really fun nova rotations you had to factor in and as well as a few really nifty aoe blizzard or flame strike combos with a mixture of frost and fire mages.

Homogenization has made it less critical for cc, aoe, counterspell, and decurse specializations from mages. Now they are pretty much prue dps soldiers. Shamans do the the decursing and can also counterspell, everyone and their mother can aoe effectively, and CC is almost an urban legend. These used to be part of the arsenal of a certain class and they are all but gone. You can ask almost any mage now that played in vanilla and they'll say, "yeah, it's a little bit more work than spamming one button but we sure as hell have far less buttons to worry about."

It's the tiny nuances that I struggled with losing. I'm not saying it's not for the best as I have submitted that this game isn't designed for the likes of me anymore. I had a great love/hate relationship with unbalanced chaos of class warfare.

And that's fine but I'm not just lamenting over some grand lie about how WoW is shifting to simplifying roles and gear. They are and their blue posts don't try to deny it. Does this free the devs up to create more balanced and fun gameplay for each class? Maybe. But I think the reality is that it's just creating more accessibility of gameplay for a wider audience who just don't give a crap about that stuff and just wanna pew pew and get phat lootz and play with their friends.

Shaman in 3D

2010-01-18T00:25:00.000-08:00

I'm guessing the purpose of the new armory feature is to post your character in your blogs and be able to link what your toon looks like in full 3D model? Avatar Na'vi peeps eat your heart out! This chic is the KING of the floating islands of Nagrand. lol.

I'm a little confused at the new armory change, particularly the select stance style which requires you to log into battlenet to save. There have been so many reports of scams and recent account hacks. Why add a superfluous little item like this that you know people are going to have to do. Everyone loves to customize. I don't know many players who don't. This just seems irresponsible on Blizz's part. It's like giving teens the option of sex and then not making sure they have protection. That being said, check your HTML address like 10 times before you enter your full account info to customize your armory 3D toon.

ICC cont’d

2010-01-10T22:20:00.001-08:00

"ROTFACE"

Well we’re still going with raiding and are currently in ICC. The second wing has opened this past week. Three new bosses. yadayadyada. I’m not that impressed. Why I stopped writing so frequently in this blog is that I’m afraid of coming across exactly how I feel. JADED.

So the videos I’ve seen so far for downing Professor Putricide show three healers and a shadow priest. While we got to the final boss of the new wing this week, we didn’t down him. I get really annoyed when we have to move beyond two healers in our ten man. I consider it like riding without hands but you have training wheels on…not all that challenging.

"FESTERGUT"

I don’t know why I should care too much though considering, I’ve resolved to just see this expansion through to the Lich King and then be done with it (raiding for a bit). I’ll give you a good example as to why I’m a bit jaded by the lack of commitment on Blizzard’s part. Just take the two new bosses before Professor Putrice, Rotface and Festergut. They used the same fucking model to build the bosses. And two of the major trash pulls before the guys include dog like creatures which not only resemble Gluth from Naxarammas but contain his same mechanics like [Decimate] and Zombie spawn.

This is a company that was supposed to pride itself on creativity and surely must have the resources to make things a bit more spectacular for those who continue to work towards the gaming portion of the mmo.

I kind of find myself going through the motions now and I’m really just numb. I can’t decide if I’ve allowed myself to raid too long without a break or if this game is just getting too boring for my particular tastes in gaming? I guess time will tell. My ongoing love for the “game” portion of this WoW is waning but I still think it’s the best MMO out there at the moment.

We Killed Some Orc’s Son or Something

2009-12-09T23:58:00.001-08:00

Saurfang Carrying His Dead Son

Patch 3.3 is out and I once again tricked myself into thinking that we might be able to raid on Tuesday. And yes, I know it’s kind of stupid to schedule raids on a Tuesday but oh well, it works for us…except on patch days.

We spent a good hour and a half trying to get into the instances but all of them were borked and we could never get in. Most of the night was ganking horde trying to get inside and killing them at the instance gate and at the graveyard. lol. PvP servers do have their amusements.

Today we actually got inside Icecrown Citadel and tackled the first wing available for play. I’d say it was fairly easy. Most of the difficulty comes from just not knowing the mechanics of the fight. Even after reading up on the encounters, it never fully clicks until you see it live.

I don’t believe any of the bosses took more than three attempts. That being said, my impression of the instance was that it reminded me of being in an immaculate and cold Naxx type structure. I wasn’t blown away by the architecture or the bosses. I did however find it really nice that they put all the vendors at the front room of the instance. Always nice to see your potential gear before you head in. lol. I think the consensus is that the rogue’s got the shaft this time in terms of aesthetics.

Favorite fight was the airship battle. Two reasons mainly, I get to burn down and destroy the horde airship finally AND you get nifty cool rocket packs to jump from one ship to the other. It was hella fun playing around with that.

By far the BEST thing about 3.3 is the new LFG system. I actually feel like it stands a chance of really working. PLUS, the big bonus is the auto-transport system. As soon as you get a full group, boooooom, you’re instantly teleported into the instance. No more wasting your fucking time waiting around for people to fly their asses out to the instance. And then when you’re done with the instance, you walk out and it teleports you back to where you were before the instance. Great stuff.

As far as I can tell, it matches you up with even geared type players so it seems like the odds are much better now that you will have a successful group. Also, in my case, the fact that I can get matched up with players NOT on Boulderfist is a big bonus. It’s a win/win situation for me as the pugs on my server are of the lowest common denominator. Of course, I’m sure everyone says that about their pugs.

I’m looking forward to seeing how the heroic version of the Icecrown Citadel wing goes. I think the 28 day delay for the new wing is actually good. It gives my raid time to play catch up and maybe finally finish Ulduar (Algalon) in the meantime.

Slash Played

2009-12-01T11:59:00.001-08:00

slashplayed
Originally uploaded by alachia

I saw a cute little twitter exchange between @hawkito and @kathunter about my /played. I have never really done one before so I sat down this morning and pulled up my list of sixteen characters including alt banks.

The total was about 328 days. This did not shock me at all. In fact, it seems like quite a reasonable number for some who has been invested in the game for five years come this Christmas. That's like an average of what? 66 days a year.

If you calculate that the average American works around 245 actual days per year, the truly scary figure is that I only got about 3.5 hrs of sleep on avg for the past five years. LOL. Of course that's ridiculously skewed.

The number I found the MOST fascinating is my mage's play time. 70+ days. That's close to 20 more days than my other characters. The reason it is so shocking is because I played her far less in terms of month spans than the other ones.

I think it's a great commentary on the nature of raiding and gameplay from 40 man hardcore raiding back in vanilla wow vs the 25 and 10man raiding from TBC and WoTLK.

In the few months I raided with my mage, I racked up massive amounts of /played. Compared to my shaman who I have raided with for about a year, I only raided with my mage for about 4 hardcore months. But I nearly put in 35hrs of raid time each week, roughly 4-5 hrs for four week nights and anywhere between 10-15hrs on the weekends.

You can click on the image to go to the flickr site to see the notes regarding which character corresponds with the /played.

Elwynn Forest Photowalk

2009-11-28T12:42:00.001-08:00

Elwynn Forest
Originally uploaded by alachia

Every time I find myself around the starting area of Elwynn Forest, I get very bored but also nostalgic. It's the starting character for a majority of my toons.. including the non human ones. I always get myself teleported here during the start of a new character.

Northshire Abbey, Fargodeep Mine, The Pumpkin Patch, and Hogger are very vivid in my mind as fun early experiences. I have since gotten bored of the entire area all together though... so I will not be too sad if Cataclsym rips the place to shreds.

I think more than anything, I miss being human in the game.

Taking Shots From Places You Can't Reach

2009-11-15T13:21:00.001-08:00

ScreenShot_100209_210910
Originally uploaded by Quest Log Podcast

Posted by Quest Log Podcast on http://www.flickr.com/groups/oldazeroth/

Taking shots from places you can't reach
If you're a Hunter or a Shaman then your in luck, you have the ability Eagle Eye or Far Sight respectively. Like myself you get these abilities early on and forget about them. They allow to select an area and your viewport is moved to there. You can only use this ability outdoors of course. Just remember to zoom in so you don't get the so you don't get the swirling golden light effect in all your shots. And once again a shot I took with the ability.

---------------------------
/facepalm!!!!
I hate it when I read posts like this because it reminds me of how noobish I am when it comes to vanity type spells. For example, there are times where I forget I have sentry totem, underwater breathing, and far sight! Now I'm super excited to take pics next week during the photowalk! New perspectives!

Swamp of Sorrows

2009-11-07T11:28:00.001-08:00

Old Azeroth Photowalk was a lot better at 11am central today than at 9am. I was a lot more awake and able to function my brain. It also helped that we moved from Westfall from the last photowalk to Swamp of Sorrows.

It’s a much more visually interesting zone. However, as we strolled through the joint, it’s apparent there are still not many quests to be had out there.

We did stumble upon a few more alliance quests scattered about but not enough to make it worth coming out here to quest while leveling. At least, not enough to tempt me.

I’m unsure of this zone being touched during the great Cataclysm. Without this zone, Blasted Lands doesn’t have as much of a visual impact. It’s great being able to see the before and after of the area between the two zones after the Dark Portal and the resulting horde rampage into Azeroth.

Next week we head to the Blasted Lands. :)

11am central. Boulderfist PvP US Alliance. /join oldazeroth

I’m also starting to stream it on http://www.livestream.com/wowcast

To see the rest of the Old Azeroth collection:

http://www.flickr.com/groups/oldazeroth

Supersized Panderen

2009-11-05T15:50:00.001-08:00

Supersized Panderen
Originally uploaded by alachia

Two people in our raid last night had gotten the Panderen Pet. One remarked that it was ONLY 10 bucks and the other (who I bought the pet for) said the 10 bucks was a bit pricey for the pet. However, both of them really enjoyed their pet and it got a lot of laughs from the raid.

I tossed a on them and super-sized them both. Man! First thing I thought of was what a shame Panderens couldn't be a race in WoW! Can you imagine the graphics of a panderen rogue? lol. awesome.

Anyhow, it was money spent and everyone who spent it was very happy and everyone in the game around the pets were very happy and amused. Was that not worth the 10 bucks? I spend 15 bucks on a second account I never access anymore so spending 10 bucks on something that actually does entertain in the game was well worth it for me. Would I prefer it for free? Heck yeah!! But I'm not opposed to cutting through the RNG bullshit of waiting on a boss drop (still bitter about the squashling) or buying 20 packs of TCG cards trying to get a Hippogryph Hatchling.

I guess it goes back to time vs money.

Let the Panderen Speak for Itself

2009-11-04T14:21:00.001-08:00

Panderen Monk
Originally uploaded by alachia

This is a film of Jeppy's panderen pet. I didn't buy one for myself. I got one for someone else so I haven't seen what it looks like. He set up in Stormwind and was doing free showings.

It's account bound so you can get it on all characters! It does kungfu, it's fucking awesome. How can ANYONE say this is not worth 10 bucks??? I might have to get one for myself!

sorry for the video quality. all I had was my cam.. can't find my fraps.

Printwarcraft.com

2009-11-02T10:25:00.001-08:00

(played with a portrait poster for Flipmax)

Started playing around with printwarcraft.com (doesn’t work with Chrome FYI). It’s quite good and fun. I will definitely be making a few posters.

At first I thought I might want a landscape poster since they show off backgrounds more…but after trying it a bit, I realized Draenei are too skinny and tall for the landscape portraits.

The customizations are pretty neat. Lots of backgrounds to choose from although I did not see my floating isle in Nagrand. LOL. It would also be awesome if I could change the character name so I could get my original spelling of Alachia.

My biggest problem is deciding which will the be the final poster. I’m so picky and will probably spend a few days tweaking the different possibilities.

No doubt these will make awesome Christmas gifts for friends. I plan on ordering a few as stocking stuffers. The only issue will be with all those alt-aholics out there. hehe.

Dead Man’s Party

2009-11-01T09:41:00.001-08:00

You would have thought I'd learned my lesson by now after missing the [What a Long Strange Trip It's Been] Meta achievement because of one stupid RNG drop.....you'd think.

But here I am on [Dead Man’s Party] doing this one as well. I guess the truth is I'm a glutton for punishment. It did help that this one is easy.

I went to the graveyard of MY racial faction capitol city. Danced with a lady named Catrina. Boom, achievement completed!

In addition, I bought the [Recipe: Bread of the Dead] and the [Orange Marigold]. I had already brought the [simple flour] and [ice cold milk] with me. I then made the bread, used the Marigold to summon the spirits, found the spirit with a quest and turned it in. Now I have a cute little [Macabre Marionette] pet which no one knows is permanent or not. I hope it is.

I put the extra flour and milk in the guild bank so other guildies can hopefully use it. Don't want it to waste :)

Trick or Treats of Azeroth

2009-10-26T11:12:00.001-07:00

I used Astarte66’s guide on the wowhead comments to do my Trick or Treats of Kalimdor and the Eastern Kingdom. Saved me a ton of time. These are the alliance flight paths. Made it easy for me to watch Sunday Football and do my achievements at the same time.

Alliance Kalimdor
1 Teldrassil, Dolanaar
2 Darnassus, Craftsmen's Terrace
3 Darkshore, Auberdine
4 Exodar, Seat of the Naaru (inside the inn, up the ramp)
5 Azuremyst Isle, Azure Watch
6 Bloodmyst Isle, Blood Watch
7 Winterspring, Everlook (careful if you are hated here)
8 Ashenvale, Astranaar
9 Stonetalon Mountains, Stonetalon Peak
10 Desolace, Nijel's Point
11 Feralas, Feathermoon Stronghold
12 Silithus, Cenarion Hold
13 Tanaris, Gadgetzan (careful if you are hated here)
14 Dustwallow Marsh, Mudsprocket
15 Dustwallow Marsh, Theramore Isle
16 Barrens, Ratchet (careful if you are hated here)
Take the boat to Booty Bay and start on Eastern Kingdom

Alliance Eastern Kingdom
1 Stranglethorn Vale, Booty Bay (carefull if you are hated there)
2 Westfall, Sentinel Hill
3 Duskwood, Darkshire
4 Stormwind, The Trade District
5 Elwynn Forest, Goldshire (do quests to put out the fire)
6 Redridge Mountains, Lakeshire
7 Ironforge, The Commons
8 Dun Morogh, Kharanos (outside of Iron Forge)
9 Loch Modan, Thelsamar
10 Wetlands, Menethil Harbor
11 Hillsbrad Foothills, Southshore (compleate quests at Southshore)
12 Hinterlands, Aerie Peak (inside, through the tank room, up stairs)
13 Eastern Plaguelands, Light's Hope Chapel

I am now only waiting on the damn RNG to go in my favor to get my squashling. Otherwise, I miss the meta achievement for whole year. :( *crosses fingers*

Tome of Valor Westfall Discovery

2009-10-10T09:55:00.001-07:00

Westfall
Originally uploaded by alachia

Found this nifty little farm during the Westfall photowalk today. I had never seen it before if you can believe that. I was told by @eljeppy that it's for a Paladin quest called Tome of Valor

So unbelievable that I've leveled in that zone for nearly 5 yrs and have just now discovered something so obvious!

to see more of the Westfall pics, check out: http://www.flickr.com/groups/oldazeroth/

STV Captured

2009-09-19T12:21:00.001-07:00

Kicked off the first Saturday morning photowalk. It was sort of last minute so only a few people were able to join me. Also, smarty pants me decided to kick it off in Stranglethorn Vale in conjunction with Pirate's Day! GANK city.

I barely got my achievement before being massacred. I figured it's nice to get this zone out of the way though. On my PvP server, it's hell and hard to relax while taking shots of everything.

I'm doing these by zones every Saturday around 9am (although I'm questioning my morning strategy because I was quite the zombie today). I figure if I do them one by one, I'll be more likely to upload and tag all the pictures correctly as opposed to a massive undertaking and then trying to convince myself to upload the bulk at one time.

Thanks to @azyxa and @jeppy (Flipmax, Bearfus, and Felix) for taggin' along on the adventures here and there. It was nice not being the sole receiver of a gankage. lol.

I can't say I'll miss Stranglethorn Vale much. The parts I'll miss the most are the Goblin Statue at Booty Bay, King Mukla the giant king kong gorilla, and the Guribashi Arena. Other than that, I probably won't miss this slaughter zone if they plan to destroy it. With my luck, it'll be the one zone they leave in tact.

Old Azeroth Highlights

2009-09-03T09:19:00.001-07:00

Here are some great highlights from the http://www.flickr.com/groups/oldazeroth flickr set. Thanks to everyone for helping to post!

1. Sunken Temples , 2. Dancing trolls!, 3. Thunder Bluff, 4. Hyjal, 5. My WoW House!, 6. Cenarion Hold, 7. Maraudon, 8. Blood Myst Isle, 9. Crystal Lake of Elwynn Forest, 10. Dwarven Farm 2, 11. Felwood, 12. Darnassus

Higher Learning is Hard

2009-09-02T11:40:00.001-07:00

Higher Learning is Hard
Originally uploaded by alachia

I camped the Dalaran Visitor Center for about an hour and got one book so I thought I'd go ahead and try for another book.

I don't think I have the patience for [Higher Learning] lol. I've tried checking after server restarts but the problem is I'm not around most of the time when servers reset. I also can't find the book channel for my server. I'm tempted on getting on my priest to use the Mind Vision guide to the books I read on the WoWhead comments.

/cleartarget
/targetexact [button:1,nomod]Afsaneh Asrar;[button:2,nomod]Sandra Bartan;[button:1,mod:ctrl]Archivist Betha;[button:2,mod:ctrl]Archmage Timear;[button:1,mod:alt]Rhonin;[button:2,mod:alt]Zidormi;
/cast Mind Vision

I hear it works for keeping tabs on all the book locations to see if they've spawned. It'll beat putting my watch on a 4 hour spawn timer or staring at a corner for a couple of hours.

Old Azeroth DB Project

2009-09-02T09:20:00.001-07:00

As mentioned in the last Warcast episode, the Old Azeroth photo database has begun. I created a flickr group called “oldazeroth” - http://www.flickr.com/groups/oldazeroth/

I’m already enjoying looking through the posted pics and seeing some serious old school stuff. Do any of you guys remember that island we got water from for MC?!!! LOL.

Originally Uploaded by iStarman

There are definitely a couple of places I wanted to make sure I get pics of again before anything happens to them. I know there is plenty of time but if you factor in procrastination x 100, I just know I’ll probably forget a bunch. Like the Twin Colossals in Ferelas! Gotta get back up there and buy a parachute for sure. Also wondering if I should try to get the Winterspring Alliance mount before it’s gone or the UBRS key? I already went ahead and got my sprite darter pet this past weekend.

I don’t want to get carried away but I figured these could be good weekend projects. I’m also wondering if the Explorer title will change once the world is different. Most importantly I really just need to get my archived pictures posted to the group.

I wrote up this post for those of you who are like me and have a disgusting amount of screenshots to go through. I’ll do a follow up post to this one later today of some of the great highlights from the Old Azeroth group.

--------------------------------------------------------

Tackling your Large Archives One Step at a Time

If you're a bit overwhelmed like me with archived screenshots that you're going through, here are a few tips.

1) Do not undertake throwing them all up at once. You'll get too overwhelmed with years of screenshots and give up.

2) Take the time to archive your photos by year. WoW stores your photos with this naming convention: WoWScrnShot_122805_001631
"122805" Indicates December 28,2005.

3) On choosing pics to upload, tackle quarter to half years worth of shots at a time only! Make a list and just check off where you left off. When you have more free time, tackle the next set.

4) Use Flickr Uploader! www.flickr.com/tools/uploadr/
It makes naming, BULK TAGGING, and BULK grouping pics soooo much easier. (tagging is key)

Disney-fied….Blizzardized

2009-09-01T13:04:00.001-07:00

You know that term when something has been Disney-fied? It’s a combination of dumbing down the complexity of something as well as making it family friendly. My best example is The Little Mermaid with the cute little Ariel and her happy ending with the prince and her plucky singing companions. The real story by Hans Christian Andersson is often disputed but the gist of the story is extremely tragic and sad.

However, in its Disney-fied form, the Little Mermaid became a house hold name and almost every family with kids has it tucked away on the movie shelf.

I was thinking about it and I feel like Blizzard has the same concept down for the game industry. They know the right combination of simplifying and structuring a game so that it can become household.

The very first time I was told about WoW, the exact wording was “I think you’ll actually like this MMO. It’s a friendlier and easier version of Final Fantasy. You’ll level like a 100 times faster.” And then when you compare the raiding experience of those who played EQ vs WoW, you’ll also see how they were able to simplify down the complexity of group play to make things so much easier.

(Very Old EQ Raiding footage)

And since it’s initial release, we’ve seen even further Blizzardizing of our game. Like I’ve said before, I no longer QQ this anymore. I think it’s great for turning WoW into one of the first fully functional social network/MMOs. I can’t wait to see it’s full evolution.

My theory about Blizzardizing are all focused on the new IP they have yet to announce. The new MMO boasts to be nothing like WoW and they say they are NOT afraid of it eating away a load of the WoW subscribers either. Of course, if you’re blizzard and sh1t more money when you bend over than most countries make in a decade, there is little reason to fear anything. (http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2009/08/blizzard-co-interview/)

I have high hopes that the new IP will be a Blizzardized version of EVE online and the Star Wars MMO. If anyone can harness the epic complexity of fleets, galaxies, and empires, it’s gotta be Blizzard. That’s my prediction anyhow. And if Blizz can nab the Sci-Fi MMO genre, it will have globally take over the fantasy world.

Right now, EVE owns the sci-fi MMO genre and it’s epic nature and quality of real world over flow in terms of economics and politics makes it an extremely fascinating game. Just read here about how in-game economics reflects real world banking fraud (http://kotaku.com/5348223/bank-deficit-freezes-eve-accounts). The lifestyle and culture of this game play into full emersion of global empires and the real intricate and dynamic play for power among corporations. Just reading a few years ago about the underhanded, backstabbing infiltrations and heists that can happen and are designed so they CAN happen gave me chills (http://eve.klaki.net/heist/).

(Eve Online: Apocrypha Trailer)

However, it is also the complexity of this game play can be very overwhelming for virgin gamers. And no matter how much I love the sci-fi genre (one of the reasons I loved Outlands as much as I did) I just can’t wrap my head into existing as a ship. I also find getting lost as a tiny dot in a massive empire to be unappealing.

I have no doubt that if Blizzard’s IP draws from EvE or any other massive Sci-Fi game, they’ll be able to bring its usual appeal of autonomy of individual play and game simplification while still capturing the fascinating draw of the sci-fi world.

3 Trees Freya

2009-08-31T13:12:00.001-07:00

I remember several weeks ago when we first attempted Freya with three trees still up (hardmode). Ground Tremor damage, sunbeams, and f*ck tons of damage all around. Everyone was screaming at me “Uncle! Uncle! No more!” lol.

So we stopped and pushed on to the other hard modes in Ulduar. However, now that we’re all a helluva lot more geared I thought we might be able to give her and her damn trees another go.

It was a three part learning experience for the hardmode. My raid group sometimes takes a little bit of drilling to finally get into the right mode.

First part: Yells for ground tremor means stop casting. No really, STOP!

Second part: Fury and Sunbeam on you or people around you means GTFO!

Third part: Learn to kite the Detonating Lashers (timing how much dps would be enough to not blow them up but give us enough time to nova them, kite away, and finish them off before they moved)

The third was the hardest and the only part that stopped us from downing her in the first hour of the raid. It finally took us gauging how much damage would lower the lashers enough to not destroy them and then timing frost nova rotations perfectly so we could kite away from the lashers before they blew us all up. For us it was 35% HP on the lashers before frost novas and running away and finishing them off with mage aoe.

This would have been so much easier with our hunter but he just happened to be out of town this weekend. LOL.

Now we’re down to one more Sigil before we can unlock Algalon and finally fully clear Ulduar. Of course, the one thing standing in our way is Hardmode Mimiron which we have never attempted before! DOH! Guess it’s time to push that button!

Whose your Daddy?

2009-08-26T14:25:00.001-07:00

Okay the title of the post has nothing to with the topic except it’s a lyric in the video music posted here. I thought it was a hilarious song…goes great with this video. Thanks to LoanzWow for posting it on youtube.

This video is a response to the question I asked myself about the Worgen race. I wanted to know what part of the worgen is customizable. Do you customize your human form or the worgen form. It looks from this video that it’s the worgen form that you tweak.

I was reading that they might end up using just a random human form or a generic human form for the transformation. I’m hoping that they allow human customization. I might have to rethink my desire to be worgen if I can’t make my static Alachia human form. That would be terribly disappointing.

Another kind of WoW play

2009-08-26T11:42:00.001-07:00

Violet Eye Exalted
Originally uploaded by alachia

A few months ago, two of the peeps in Bindpoint started a tradition of running an instance every Saturday morning. It wasn't about XP or Quests so much as it was about just scheduling an activity to do together.

This past weekend we were fortunate enough to get enough people in the morning to run Karazhan for the fun of it. I just love this place and really enjoyed seeing it again. It was a well designed raid instance and my favorite to date. There has been nothing since as intriguing as Karazhan for me.

A part of me would love to see a restored version of Karazhan in the Cataclysm but another part me loves it too much in it's current decayed and dark state. I doubt they'll touch it but you never know.

You know, when we were in there we all tried to get the Worgen book to turn into worgens. Unfortunately, none of us had any luck. Guess we'll just have to wait till the expansion.

Return of Heroics

2009-08-24T21:27:00.001-07:00

Return of Heroics
Originally uploaded by alachia

A month ago, you'd ask in guild or general chat, "anyone want to run the Daily Heroic?" and you'd get the reply "wtf for?!"

However, now that the Heroic Daily Dungeon quest yields you two [Emblem of Triumph]s everyone is once again hitting up 5-mans.

I think this is great as it once again motivates people to group up and gives people a reason to run more of the content (again). To be honest, I thought I was totally done running heroic 5-mans after running the list for [Glory of the Hero]. Oddly enough, I started missing the dynamics of running a 5-mans. They're super intimate and are usually very easy and require little to no concentration so you have a lot of time to goof around and just chatter unlike raiding.

Also on a PvP server, the return of heroics means more ganking. lol. Outside of every heroic daily instance portal you can pretty much expect to see a pile of corpses. If you're lucky, you outnumber the horde but more often than not on Boulderfist, we take a beating trying to make it inside the instance.

Dwarfageddon Achievement

2009-08-24T08:44:00.001-07:00

Dwarfageddon Achievement
Originally uploaded by alachia

In case you ever wanted to know what 100 Steelforged Defenders dying in under 3 seconds looks like. Tharrrr it is!

We had both of our chopper guys gather all of them and we lined up the siege engines and demolishers up near the front without doing any damage. Once they brought the heard of dwarves back to us, we unloaded and WHAM, achievement achieved.

It was pretty impressive though just to see that many dwarves running at you. It's probably the only fun I've had during the Flame Leviathan encounter besides nuking pyrite at the boss and seeing 100,000+ damages going off.

I'm not a fan of vehicle fights... yet.

Human Shaman

2009-08-22T23:45:00.001-07:00

Human Shaman
Originally uploaded by alachia

New racial/class combination? I wish.

Today's daily heroic was the Culling of Stratholme. Whenever you go into any of those Caverns of Time instances, your race is adjusted according to the history of the Lore.

In my case, there were no space ghosts in Azeroth at the time Arthas went medieval on this town. So, for just a short period of time, I get to my very much desired HUMAN SHAMAN!!!

WoW Magazine Lure

2009-08-20T15:38:00.001-07:00

I am a pretty solid WoW player with interest in both the game, game mechanics, art work, slight interest in the lore, and vast investment in the WoW community. That being said, even being as hardcore WoW bent as I am, I’ve spent some time today thinking of what would compel me to subscribe to the upcoming World of Warcraft magazine. (thanks to @hanapa for the link: http://news.cnet.com/8301-10797_3-10312606-235.html?tag=TOCmoreStories.0)

They’ve definitely taken from the ideas of their own game subscription success and have opted to not feature or rely on any advertisement for revenue. This is definitely a plus. I usually gut my magazines that I get of the ads with an exacto blade so I’m left with just the content anyhow.

The cost is also extremely reasonable. US $40 annually, 35 Euros or 30 pounds. That’s about an additional $3.34 a month I’d be paying on top of my two WoW subscriptions. Reasonably priced but what am I really getting?

Future (the world of warcraft magazine) is promising “stunning artwork, behind-the-scenes looks at ongoing development, deep dives into the game's lore, and perhaps even occasional scoops about new features or other WoW elements". But what I want to know is how is this much different than being IN the game art and reading up on WoW websites and blogs?

Are they just banking on fandom to carry them through? I’m not enough of a fangurl to buy into the hype for sure. I love me some Warcraft but only enough to keep paying for actual crack and not the crack pamphlet. Also, you can not buy individual copies of the magazines, it’s subscription or nothing.

So what’s it going to take to get the average player on board with buying a subscription? I’ve thought a lot about it and I’m thinking I know what their ploy is going to be…..

My guess is that it’s going to involve pets or some in-game reward. That’s how they got the trading cards out there in the market of mainstream with NON-TCG players buying those things up by the boat load. Otherwise, I’m not seeing how they’re going to get us to pay an additional subscription for stuff we can get for free.

Obsidian Hatchling

2009-08-11T22:45:00.001-07:00

Obsidian Hatchling
Originally uploaded by alachia

Woot, I often check the AH to see how much pets are going for and I noticed this Obsidian Hatchling for 150g. It was something I had never sen before so I thought...ooooh...so cheap for a rare pet, right?

Then I thought to myself...hmmm..when is a rare pet ever that cheap? It must be a new common pet that someone is trying to rake the AH for. Sure enough, a quick search on wowhead showed me I could go buy this cute new pet from Breanni in the Dalaran Pet shop for 40g!

His proportions are so cute..giant head..iddy bitty legs!

Second Skin Review

2009-08-10T00:22:00.001-07:00

I got a chance to watch the Second Skin documentary this weekend. It is airing on http://www.hulu.com/second-skin until August 13th and I had a meta viewing of it with Bindpoint and twitter peeps via my wowcast livestream. The event was nice and I always find it’s way more fun to view stuff online with other people.

I can’t say any of us were all that pleased with the tone the documentary took on gam ers. I had this fear the first time I saw the trailer for the film when they showed the clip about the guy wanting to commit suicide. Our consensus is that negativity sells more than optimism.

I’m not sure but I have a strong feeling that the writers and producers of this film were not gamers. The stories they chose to cover had few spotlights of good and strong, strong undertones of serious negativity. The negative part is a given because of the stories they chose to focus on.

Most of the people I game with are successful, gifted, talented, smart, creative, and good natured people. They are not hopeless addicts who can’t distinguish “laziness” from “addiction.”

However, the part of the film that really bothered me was the serious missed opportunity the documentary made. Here was a chance to get inside the life of a gamer, to show the meta connections, the actual interactions that happen online. What did we get instead? We got 10 second blips of online characters doing emotes to each other. If a non gamer sees this documentary, they’re going to sum up our online interactions to a silly looking bear charging a silly looking monster and a couple of elf creatures riding horses.

How do you actualize the threads of connections that happen in a game? To document it, you have to really grasp what is happening beyond the computer screen but most of the documentary focuses instead on the imagery of the glazed over look of an obsessed addicted gamer staring at a monitor.

People are going to say I’m extremely defensive about gamer life because I’m one of those hopeless addicts who has no life and validates my existence through these “online experiences.”

But even if I push myself aside, I can’t help but be offended for the other people around me who don’t really deserve to be typecast into this hopeless negative light. I’m not sure why media outlets feel like they need to tell the “dangers of” stories.

I’m constantly fascinated with the stories I hear about other gamers around me and the lives they live both inside and outside of the meta…because it’s all REAL LIFE. Just look at the story of Starman and Renata. That would have been a very nice positive storyline to focus on regarding creativity and community. Instead they get 20 seconds of film time and then the film goes to 10 minutes of two people having a fight while moving in together which really has nothing to do with meta connections but rather the reality of relationships.

And if you go look at the comments on hulu.com about the movie, you’ll understand why threading these stereotypes about gamers is very harmful to our community. It’s easy for people to misunderstand the life of a gamer. The comments go on and on mirroring this notion that spending time playing an MMORPG is a social problem and gamers are referred to as “these types of people” like we’re lepers or something. I just wish there was some film out there that could help people who don’t game understand the reality of who we are.

The best line of the film came from the one real inspirational blip regarding a boy who has a disability that prevents him from speaking. I love this quote:

“Although they are virtual, they are still our lives nonetheless”-Andrew Monkelban

If somehow the rest of the documentary could have focused on that idea, I probably wouldn’t have come out feeling as down as I did. And the irony of it is that I was watching this hopeless idea of gamers unfold via live stream with about 12 other people online. There we were finding a way to virtually connect and experience an event together in the meta.

Oh and after the film was over, there were several requests to rewind to the Starman and Renata bit! It’s around the 42:28 minute marker incase you want to do the same :)

Meet Roo

2009-08-04T17:07:00.001-07:00

Roo
Originally uploaded by alachia

Just adopted Roo today. He’s the cutest oracle you have ever met. I <3 him.

We spent all evening together. I took him to go see the biggest tree in Northrend, took him to play with other orphans, and we visited The Great One and the Dragon Queen. I didn’t even know about the portal from Scholozar to Ungoro. lol.

Roo likes to play with paper zepplins and eat flies…oh and he likes shinies…so we’ll get along quite nicely. :D

my 3.2 Highlights

2009-08-04T09:37:00.001-07:00

New Dungeon Loot Feature

Players will now be able to trade soulbound items with other raid or group members that were eligible for the loot. This system will work like the Item Buy Back system and allow 2 hours for players to trade an item after it has been looted. Players who choose to enchant or add gems to the item will get one last confirmation before losing the ability to trade the item.

Damn, no more “accidentally rolling need”

Druid

New druid art for Cat Form and Bear Form has been added. There are now five unique color schemes for each form and faction. Changing hair color (night elves) or skin tone (tauren) via the barbershop will change the look of one's cat and bear forms.

Having a bear tank for so long, it’ll be nice to see some variation. I’m still jealous that druids get the best staves in the game and for the most part go unseen.

Mounts

The cast time for summoning any ground mount is now 1.5 seconds, down from 3 seconds.
Apprentice Riding (Skill 75): Can now be learned at level 20 for 4 gold. Mail will be sent to players who reach level 20 directing them to the riding trainer.

Yay! Rilletoo and my hunter can ride on!! Alt leveling to commence!

Dungeon and Raid ID Extensions

In order to allow for parties and raids to progress through instances at their own pace, players can now extend an instance ID on an individual basis.

Finally, we can drag out raiding even more! hehe. This actually really, really great for 25man casual raids. I’m actually thinking it might be worth trying to get 25mans together again because of this new feature.

Emblem System Changes
- Both the 10 and 25-player instances of the Crusaders' Coliseum drop a new Emblem of Triumph.
- Any dungeons that previously dropped Emblems of Heroism or Valor, such as Naxxramas or Heroic Halls of Stone, will now drop Emblems of Conquest instead. Emblems of Conquest can still be converted to Valor or Heroism.

I honestly can say, I’m actually very happy about the return of welfare epics. It gives people who are motivated a way to catch up to raiding level gear on their own time.

25-player raids will no longer be referred to as Heroic versions of a raid, as there is a new distinction between normal and Heroic modes for both 10 and 25 player versions of the Crusaders' Coliseum.

I’m glad I’m not the only one who saw this as confusing when referring to raiding 10man hardmode vs 25mans.

Shaman

Earth Shock: Redesigned. This spell no longer interrupts spell casting, but rather reduces melee attack speed by 10% for 8 seconds (exclusive with similar effects such as Thunder Clap).

Restoration
- Ancestral Healing: The buff from this ability now reduces the physical damage taken by the target by 3/7/10% instead of increasing the target's armor

I’m mostly just excited about the 1 gcd for my totem drops. the 4 seconds of gcd before my first heal cast was getting to be ridiculous!

User Interface

The quest log is now double-paned for more easily viewing quest information. The list of all quests a player has will show in one pane, while the quest details of any highlighted quest will display in the next.

This is one of those small changes you always wondered why they didn’t fix in the first patch of the game. period.

World Environment

Wolvar and Gorloc orphans have arrived in Dalaran and need your help! Players can find out more by visiting the Eventide District (completing the quests being offered for this event will not count toward any Children's Week achievements). Players have a limited amount of time to care for these orphans before they take their leave. They will then return again for the regularly-scheduled Children's Week next year.

I’m so there! Baby Gorloc FTW!!!! FTW!!!

Professions

Engineers can now learn to create a portable Wormhole Generator for Northrend. The Wormhole allows them to travel to different locations in Northrend, although the locations are sometimes in dangerous places.

Would be awesome if you could slip a few players into the wormhole with you but beggars can’t be choosers.

Significantly reduced the cooldown on MOLL-E.

Yea, cuz whippin’ out that mail box every 8 hours was seriously OP!! lol.

Gnomish Engineers and Goblin Engineers can now switch profession specializations for a fee.

My FAVORITE change of this patch!! seriously! Now I can finally go Gnomish Engineering and get my [Gnomish X-Ray Specs]!!! WOOT WOOT!

Purple and Shiny

2009-07-27T23:00:00.001-07:00

I had my 10man raid do wish list for me so I could compile a loot list for all the bosses. I figured we’d have a couple of bosses we could start to skip after a few more rounds and then be able to concentrate on the super hard mode bosses.

Turns out, the list is a lot larger than I thought it would be which means EVERYONE is in need of upgrades from Ulduar hard modes. Several still need normal mode loot.

I tried out the site http://gear-wishlist.appspot.com/ and chugged in my toon. I don’t agree with all their best in slot choices but my playstyle is probably different from the general play of 25man shaman heals since I only do 10mans.

It’s interesting just how much of the upgrades are NOT obtainable for me just from running 10man Ulduar. Just looking at my weapon…I can only hope for a side grade of sorts. Nothing about the Ulduar loot table was drool worthy from being fully decked in 25man Naxx gear.

I’m beginning to think this was not intended because I heard they are changing this in the new 10man content. Hopefully we’ll start seeing some decent upgrades.

Onyxia Revisited

2009-07-24T02:53:00.001-07:00

This past weekend, Flipmax and I were wondering if Onyxia was doable with two people. The last time we had tried to take the dragon out was nearly a year ago when all we had attempted it with a level 70 mage and a level 70 druid. It did not go so well.

Curiosity satisfied, it is more than easy to take her out with two people. In fact, I’d she’s easily soloable for a good portion of the classes. Sadly, it was my shamans first time downing Onyxia! And of course the first thing we said as soon as we got into the instance was “odds left! evens right!” and after we downed Onyxia we killed every whelp in the caves. “like one if a F0000uuu***ing Million!” good times.

As we were skipping out of the cave, we noticed a pit of lava below the path out of the instance. I decided to jump in and of course, Flipmax follows thus answer the famous question (if your friends jumped off, would you?). In any case, we got stuck in the lava with no way out!

Turns out, if you get qued into a BG from a pit of lava, you can AFK out and you’ll be transported ALIVE and well at the graveyard. :D

Rusted Proto for Keeps

2009-07-22T13:22:00.001-07:00

After further discussion, we decided not to remove the rusted and ironbound proto-drake rewards for the normal and heroic Glory of the Ulduar Raider meta achievements when patch 3.2, Call of the Crusade, launches, and currently have no plans to remove them in the foreseeable future. However, we will continue to evaluate the situation and if a decision is made to remove these rewards at any point in the future, we'll provide a one month warning so players will have time to make some final attempts.- Blue post from Eyonix

This of course is supposed to be great news for me and my 10man crew who have been chasing the clock ever since they dangled the possibility of 3.2 over our heads. With 3.2, the Rusted and Iron Proto Drake were to be taken out of the game. Now, it looks like we not only do we have plenty of time, we have an eternity.

What this means for us is that we can now go back to concentrating on getting gear for the team instead of pushing the Glory of the Ulduar Raider curriculum.

However, this also means, I’m not sure I give a sh1t about the drake anymore either. It’s sort of a double edged, this news. On the one hand, great news we have more time… on the other hand, who cares about the achievement anymore?

Would the Armani War Bear mean much if it was still attainable? Would the Plague or Black Proto Drake mean anything if you could still grind OS, Maly, and Naxx to get it post 3.1? Not really. Sometimes I really don’t understand the motivations behind Blizzard’s actions.

Chillmaw

2009-07-18T23:52:00.001-07:00

Chillmaw
Originally uploaded by alachia
I've been working on my Argent Tournament dailies for the past week or so trying to get enough tokens to move up to the larger ring to do even MORE dailies.

I finally got to the big tent and came across the daily called Threat from Above. It's a suggested 3 Players daily quest that requires you to kill 1x Chainmaw and 3x Cultist Bombardiers.

I flew out there thinking I was going to be able to easily solo it despite the player suggestion and nuke the hell out of this dragon and be done with it.... Flame shock! Lava Burst, Lightning Bo----- *SMACK* *SMACK*-- the Cultist spawn and boom, I'm dead.

I tried this about 3 times using all my cooldowns including heroism. I was very frustrated. I sat there for a bit trying to figure out how I could solo him and his ads when a horde orc DK came flying down. He pulled Chillmaw down and immediately started dropping down in health.

I must admit I was sort of delighted thinking I was going to get to watch this horde die to this mob that had been kicking my @ss. NO SUCH LUCK. While he hovered at 50% health, he never went below that and proceeded to pwn all the mobs down completing his quest.

This made me extremely pissed off... (you know qq class imbalance and all that). Finally after thinking on it for awhile, I decided to switch my spec back to resto and put on my healing gear.

Sure enough, with a combination of rotating Earth Shield and Water Shield on myself and using Flame Shock and FlameStrike Totem kiting, I was able to down them all by myself. It took me much longer than the DK but I was just happy that I could actually do it.

The next night, I ended up tanking Chillmaw for two horde clothies who cheered me on. /flex Shammy power! yeah, I dunno, sometimes I'm good to horde and sometimes I hate them.

One Toon to Rule them All

2009-07-16T03:25:00.001-07:00

Snarly
Originally uploaded by alachia

After declaring my shaman as my main for WoTLK, I've been extremely satisfied with the results. Yes, I miss my druid a lot and yes I miss the aspect of playing other classes at end game.

However, there has been nothing worse than having to start at ground zero with a character's history for me. Especially when it comes to having keys for instances or not having a flightpath or my favorite unique pets. There are so many things about the history of your character and gameplay that you would have liked to carry with you.

For example, on my shaman, I don't even have the bloody Karazhan key although I have it on FOUR other toons! It is also frustrating as all hell knowing I have two AWESOME unique pets on my priest that I can't pull out while I'm playing now. I even had to go back and kill trash in ZA just so I could get mojo AGAIN!

Needless to say, I'm all for the idea of having one character now that has ONE history. Yes, it comes at the great sacrifice of not being able to play classes you might like on a regular basis. But if it means I don't have to go get attuned to some daily quest in the Outlands just to complete a holiday quest, it might be worth it.

Another great perk to having ONE main toon is that your gold becomes more concentrated so you can splurge on things like a mekgineer chopper :D

And yesterday, I was doing the fishing daily from Shat (trying to get find fish) and I got Snarly from the quest reward!! I was so excited as it was a pet I really wanted back in TBC. A baby croc is just the cutest thing ever...almost as cute as the baby panda.

I guess I'm just going to have to learn to love being a space goat shammy forever. Losing yet another adorable pet would be heart breaking. It still pangs me a ton I never get to see my baby gorilla and baby hippogryph. *sniff*

Crazy Cat Lady

2009-07-15T00:36:00.001-07:00

Crazy Cat Lady
Originally uploaded by alachia

Our 10man is slowly getting its stride back which is great. However, in the next week or two we're going to have another flux due to vacations. Win some, lose some.

We're trying to work down the list for Glory of the Ulduar Raider and after tonight, we have about 5/13 achievements with about four super tough ones left.

Tonight we knocked out another easy one, Crazy Cat Lady which was to defeat Auriaya with her kitty cats alive throughout the fight. Aside from some extra poundage on the OT, it wasn't bad at all.

Then we moved to Thorim hard mode. It's a two part hard mode process for that fight, one being a timed gauntlet run and the other surviving a psychotically horrific lightning/blizzard storm show! We didn't down Thorim HM tonight but we got really close. I have a feeling we'll be getting our first sigil by tomorrow. *crosses fingers*

Episode 45 Supplemental

2009-07-14T03:25:00.001-07:00

Episode 45 is up.

Once again, I fail at doing an intro and outro to the show. I’m still getting used to the new format. I will say I am thoroughly enjoying my sit downs with @eljeppy. I always imagine I have tea and biscuits in front of me while we chat. :)

So this episode was spawned a few weeks ago after I had read this warlock blog: jagoex.blogspot.com about a Paladin Blogger, Ferraro, being exposed as using a fake photograph and claiming to be someone they weren’t.

This of course piqued my interest as to doing with how we perceive meta identities and then lead into a discussion about WoW information blogs in general which then lead into a discussion about elites and casual who use such tools.

What is really interesting is that several weeks after we recorded this episode, the Paladin Blog is back up and seemingly going strong. It laid low for awhile and is now simply chugging along…which sort of confirms one the theories we discussed about how there are no “real” consequences in the Meta.

Anyhow, apologies for the delayed release. hope you enjoy.

The Celestial Planetarium

2009-07-13T21:39:00.001-07:00

Brann Bronzebeard says: Now, this is what we call a nice find!

After we downed Iron Council Hardmode, the Archivum Data Disc dropped which I picked up. I went back this weekend to turn it in in hopes that we’ll start the quest line in Ulduar to unlock Algalon.

So I turned in the disc to Brann Bronzebeard and then he told me to find the doorway to the Celestial Planetarium which I had never been to before. It was in one those sections of Ulduar you never head towards.

I circled around for a good 15 minutes not understanding why I hadn’t “discovered” the entrance yet. I got as close the doorway as I could but it was guarded by Chamber Overseer. Finally, I decided to just make a go for the door and sure enough it completed the quest, just as the mob pwned my ass. lol.

Now, we’re set to try to get Hodir, Thorim, Freya, and Mim’s Sigil to get a Celestial Planetarium Key which will unlock Algalon. dun dun dun. I’ll be happy if we even get half of the hardmode bosses down at this point. :D

IC Hardmode Down

2009-07-12T01:19:00.001-07:00

Iron Council Hard mode has been our latest challenge in progression. Every time we thought we would make a good go at the encounter, something would unfortunate would happen. We’d lose a player that week to work or someone would quit raiding due to blah blah blah.

It’s like every time we take a step forward, we end up taking two steps back. Anyhow, that’s pretty much how my raiding experience has been going this summer. It’s very frustrating always feeling like you’re starting over again.

Tonight we downed IC hardmode. It took longer for us to get all of our raiders in WoW due to Authentication Server Failures for two hours than it took to do our 18 attempts.

We used Prot Pally, DK Tank, Resto Shammy, Holy Priest, and DPS Mage x 2, DK, Hunter, Boomkin, and Rogue. I was actually impressed we had the DPS to pull it off because our new DK is poorly geared as he just started.

I remember the days of 40mans when we used to moan how much easier it would be to find 25 dedicated raiders. Then I remember whining about how much easier it’d be to find 10 committed raiders than 25….. and now, I can’t even keep a static 10man group consistent. GAH!!! If only 5mans raids… hehehe.

Rilletoo Gets a Gig

2009-07-02T22:13:00.001-07:00

Rilletoo gets Paid
Originally uploaded by alachia

Tough economic times in Azeroth. However, Rilletoo was able to find a gig from Grimand Elmore in Ironforge to deliver a crafted weapon to Mountaineer Stormpike in Loch Modan.

He set out of Ironforge and headed north in the snow, definitely regretting he chose to wear sandals. Being sort of a lost soul, he wondered around aimlessly and was easily distracted. For some reason he was compelled to collect every peacebloom and silversage along the way.

About midway to the Northgate Pass, he happened upon Amberstill ranch where he ran into a young female dwarf named Yarlyn Amberstill. Apparently the ranch was down on its luck and she was selling off her pet rabbits to try to earn money to buy feed for the rams.

Rilletoo was not in need of another companion as Thoggak (his voidwalker) was already a hassle to take care of. However, he felt sorry for the lady and scrounged his pockets for the 18 silver pieces to buy a snowshoe rabbit.

A few wondering sandal prints later and a lot more peaceblooms, Rilletoo finally arrived with the package and delivered it to Mountaineer Stormpike. He was paid 7 silver pieces! DOH! The whole trip ended up costing 11 silver!

Outraged, Rilletoo carted around Loch Modan raging curses among the living creatures.

Silly gnome he is...

Negativity

2009-06-30T22:42:00.001-07:00

There are few things that annoy me more than poor attitude while raiding. I’ve been around the block with raiding and have been doing so off and on for years now. Nothing will suck the life out of you or drain you more than poor players and poor attitudes.

The worst of it comes from those who mistake progression for failure. Lately, we’ve been hitting up hard modes in Ulduar which is sort of our first real blocks of progression for this patch. I admit, it hasn’t been all that fun but definitely feels doable. The learning curve is much greater than anything we’ve encountered since Black Temple in my opinion (Naxx, OS, EOE were extremely easy to learn).

Because my 10man group has sort of become fluid due to RL stuff, we’ve have quite a number of alternates now. One of them in particular has been starting to gnaw at my nerves. Every turn we make, there’s a new negative comment.

“we can’t do this with this group”.. “we don’t have the gear for this”..”this isn’t the right make up”…”we don’t have enough people”….”maybe we aren’t ready for this”… blah blah blah. I’m sick of hearing it.

All I want to hear is the sound of people rezzing and running the f*ck back to rebuff and go again. In my experience when it comes to raiding, the people who think they are good enough usually end up becoming good enough. And when you’re hitting up a particularly hard wall, for f*ck’s sake, don’t bring moral down even further with BS negativity. Start pwning or GTFO.

Ahune

2009-06-30T14:13:00.001-07:00

Ahune
Originally uploaded by alachia

This year was my first time with Ahune which means he was easy sauce for me as it's only a 73 elite boss. I heard back in the day it was quite a challenge when the level cap was 70.

I have to say he was an impressive beast.... I haven't been this impressed by a boss since Ragnaros which is ironic because according to the lore, he was designed to take out Ragnaros.

They don't make giants like this anymore in the game...even the bosses in Ulduar don't compare graphically to his epic size and grandeur.

Lucky for me, he is easily two-mannable. I haven't gotten the pet scorchling everyone farms him for yet but I actually like visiting this boss now for the hell of it.

Pole Dancing for XP

2009-06-29T18:31:00.001-07:00

Pole Dancing
Originally uploaded by alachia

Midsummer Festival is probably one of the most useful holiday events of the year. I went around all Saturday pissing on horde bonfires and honoring alliance once. This yielded me a great deal of gold.

Today, I realized you can pole dance to gain the Ribbon Dance buff increasing my alts XP by 10%. The more I danced around the pole the more the buff would stack in time until it reached the max 60mins.

The buff stays as long as you don't die so it's pretty uber.. now is definitely the time to level alts... not to mention all the bonfire nodes give pretty darn good XP.

Broom Broom

2009-06-25T22:07:00.001-07:00

END Northrend Road Trip: Borean Tundra
Originally uploaded by alachia

Got a little pissed off in the real world today...so I decided to buy myself a chopper this evening (which did make me feel a lot better).

It was a lot more fun than I thought it would be considering they nurfed the falling ability. It's still just cool as hell being able to ride around with your friend.

Flipmax and I decided to ride throughout the southern lands of Northrend from Howling Fjord to Borean Tundra with a slight detour up through Sholazar Basin to do some Thelma and Louise action.

It was actually nice riding through a lot of the wowscapes again...most of them I had only seen from the aerial view. Also, we stopped for horde. mwahhaha. Ran a few "cows" over...road kill ftw. I wouldn't mind taking a few more road trips around the older parts of Azeroth as well. I have to convince Flipmax to get one or the Mammoth so I get to call shotgun next.

here's a video of our roadtrip:

Ice Crown Camp

2009-06-25T12:41:00.001-07:00

Ice Crown Camp
Originally uploaded by alachia

I love when you are on a quest and find some obscure added element on the banks of a border. I finally got around to doing the Argent Tournament quest lines and one of them landed me on the northern cliffs of Ice Crown.

The Black Knight is a threat to the tournament or such from what I gathered. My quest was to discover his mater's plan for murdering other tourney players. I snuck into this tent to take back the stolen Tournament invitation as well as the Black Knight's orders.

His plan intercepted, I pwned the Black Knight and now we can all relax and do our dailies. lol.

Looming Date

2009-06-19T02:20:00.001-07:00

Now that we have the in-game calendar, all the holidays loom before us like a ticking time bomb. I was pretty gung ho about the holiday events (everyone wants their violet proto) but ever since the Children’s Holiday, I start to bite my nails when I see an upcoming holiday.

Will I get it done? How long will it take? Will there be the annoying RNG factor to fear like the V-day holiday event? Terrible, no? That something that should be considered a sort of fun thing to do would turn into a bout of anxiousness.

I mostly think they don’t interest me as much because I end up missing the first spree of achievement rallies and end up having to do the quests solo. Hopefully, it’s like last year though and you get to go around pissing on horde bonfires. hehehe.

Yogg Brain Zapped

2009-06-17T23:57:00.001-07:00

Last weekend we downed Yogg. Kind of an interesting fight. Being the last non-heroic bosses in Ulduar, I expected us to be stumped on it for awhile. As it turns out, it was a lot easier than both Mim and General. I was quite happy because this means we can now start to delve into the hard mode aspects of the meta achievements.

The fight was quite fun though. I imagine it’s a lot more fun for the melee than the casters. First phase is avoiding gaseous clouds that spawn mobs. Second phase you kill tentacles as casters while the melee warp into Yogg’s innards and nuke his brain down. Third phase you nuke yogg down while killing his ads.

I can’t say I’m all that enthusiastic about full clear being part of a hard mode set. It’d be nice if hard mode was only tied to the meta achievement but in order to see Algalon, hard mode is a must. They say in 3.2 the meta achievement reward and title will go away. Here’s hoping we’re not in for another rush.

Rille II does Westfall

2009-06-14T01:43:00.001-07:00

Rille got entangled in the business of the SI:7 and some conspiracy involving Van Cleef and the Defias. Rille did not care much about the conflict other than he was promised gold and the opportunity to decapitate someone’s head.

Along his journey, he came across a camp of Gnolls responsible for helping out the thieves of Dead Mines. He had no problems taking on three to four at a time. Rille is awesome like that.

However, a pesky and stinky human priest came through and tried to battle the Gnolls himself. Unable to keep himself alive, the priest fled in a panic thus leading the entire camp to Rille.

Rille was able to battle two more before falling. Rille has a distaste for weakling priests. Silly little human, PWNing is for gnomes.

Rille II

2009-06-12T17:32:00.001-07:00

I fell in love with a gnome named Rille. He’s a gnome warlock on the Fenris server. I first met him through a little Viddler video when all the guys in Bindpoint where introducing their WoW toons.

I don’t even like gnomes! Anyhow, I was so infatuated with this gnome that I made a clone of him on my server and have started to level him up.

I thought for fun maybe I’d make him an RP gnome on a PvP server. I figure his backstory will go something like this….

Gnomish transporter gone awry. Evil twin was created from Rille and thus Rille II was born. He is now roaming all of Azeroth with a vague memory of another half. All he knows is he wants to eat souls and pick flowers.

For Gnomeregan!

Episode 44 Supplemental

2009-06-02T22:11:00.000-07:00

Episode 44: Starman Portals is up.
You can download it here or subscribe to WoWcast on itunes.

I had a really great time picking Starman's brain last Sunday night. He's one of those meta peeps who has opened up portals in the meta in all different realms. The most prominent one being World of Warcast Podcast. It was actually interesting to hear his approach to podcasting and what he's trying to accomplish with his media outlets.

Everyone has their opinions about fragmentations. Lately, I've come to understand that people are very particular about how they culturally integrate in the meta. Some use it as an outlet, some as a media soap box, some as teaching tool, and others to realize themselves or to become something different all together, an evolution per se.

Few things are harder to grin and bear than the feeling of repression. When we can't be who we want to be to the people we care about is much like living in your own personal prison. To tie this in with WoW, go listen to a group of raiders who aren't familiar with each other vs a group of RL friends raiding together. It's night and day really.

I think it takes time to find where you want to be in the meta. I've encountered quite a few people who just can't except this state of living as valid or don't know how to feel comfortable integrating.

Just think about it, how often 10yrs ago would have posted your diary to strangers or been comfortable showing your family album to anyone in the entire world? As Jemimus said last week, "Make no mistake, we are in the middle of a revolution." I totally agree with him, that we do not see the full profound implication of what is happening around us. It will be talked about and studied for years and years to come for sure.

This is definitely a cultural revolution. As we refine how we define ourselves online, it'll become clearer just how we should engage with each other.....right now, you have to realize that most of the proper tools don't even exist yet.

Starman's Push My Follow podcast definitely delves into a lot of the new media tools of today. It's a round table discussion podcast from people who are pretty versed in new media formats of the meta.

Also be sure to check out geekistry.com for more of Starman's mind dumps. It'll be interesting to see what is to come.

Sometimes it's not Enough

2009-05-24T14:00:00.001-07:00

So after a few weeks of 25man frustrations in our guild, I had a chat with a few of the dedicated raiders. We all sort of came the conclusion that hitting our heads up against a wall was NOT FUN for any of us.

We all like challenges etc. but at some point you come to a realization of what is possible and what is absolutely futile. And if you keep hitting up futility just because... you tend to start hating the very idea of even logging on. Suddenly raid nights are a chore and you find yourself getting sleepy and grumpy every time you have to fly out to Ulduar.

I tried to tell my group that 5k dps is now the new standard and us having people still below 800dps is not only ludicrous it's just flat out irresponsible. A lot of them truly didn't believe me when I told them the new standard. 2k dps minimum as a base standards for 25man Ulduar? Try 3.5k.

And I hate it too when it gets to being all about numbers. It's not fun but you have to realize those numbers aren't that complicated actually. To achieve those types of numbers only takes a very minimal amount of research and practice. I truly don't think it's that much to ask for...or expect.

People repeatedly try to play the "gear card" and say "gear" is why I'm not good or can't be good. I'll say it a million times more. Gear can not make a player good. Gear can only make a player better. A good player is good regardless of what they're wearing and trust me, it's evident even when they are gear capped.

Needless to day, pumping all my energy back into our 10 man team has been really fun. As most raiders can attest, there's nothing like the feeling of a well oiled raid gunning there way through progression.

A new 10man team for the under-geared is forming up to help those who are new gear up for 25mans as well. I couldn't be more happy about this. We plan to reassess our 25man situation in about a month or so to see where we all are...

Tonka Derby of Suckage Simplified

2009-05-20T01:14:00.000-07:00

Wow, I wish I had known this earlier! Apparently you can skip all the towers and sh1t and just go straight to FL and activate it and still be on easy mode.

"The trash portion of the fight begins when you tell either Brann Bronzebeard or the Lore-Keeper of Norgannon that you're ready. This makes the vehicles usable, although no mobs will attack you until you leave the starting area. If you speak to Brann Bronzebeard, the fight is automatically set to "easy mode." If you talk to the Lore-Keeper of Norgannon, the fight is set to hard mode by default, and destroying individual towers will remove those powers/benefits from the Flame Leviathan fight. At any time, you can see which powers/benefits Flame Leviathan has by looking at the gemstones in his fight area; those that are lit are activated, with green representing Freya, blue Hodir, yellow Thorim, and red Mimiron." -from http://www.stratfu.com/strats/FlameLeviathan

Can't wait to try this next week. Some of us would like to skip this waste of an encounter and move on to the real raiding content....whoever put that in, BRAVO!

Friendfeed gains Momentum, Thank you Twitter

2009-05-13T09:51:00.000-07:00

(friendfeed gives you more depth and connectivity)

Twitter shat itself a big one last night with the removal of @reply notifications.

I saw this tweet:
"Twitter just lobotomized itself -http://chaoticnerdy.com/?p=293" -@starmike

I totally couldn't believe it!

This basically opened a HUGE door to Friendfeed...massive addage to friendfeed accounts I'm sure happened.
Not only did Twitter NOT publically announce this change, when they finally acknowledged it, they lied at first as to the reason of this service removal. They said it was about usability but it turned out it was actually because Twitter was about to break...so they had to remove the feature.

Had they been upfront about this, people would have been more understanding. Instead, there's a huge movement going on and people are already coaxing their friends to move to friendfeed....
Friendfeed has always had one drawback to its usage.....no one was on it.

"friendfeed seems to be like the social networking equivalent of WalMart - a one stop shop - but without the badly treated workforce..." -@eljeppy

It's like a one stop shop for all your lifecasting but everyone has been twitter stalled. There were ways to make faux copies of your friends on Friendfeed, but to be honest, it's just not the same.
And the beauty is that once you add all social networks and feeds to your account, that's it.. you're done. Sit back and it does all the stalking for you....LIVE!

Why settle for someone's twitters in lag intervals when you can get not only their twitter but their flickr, blog, bookmarks, shares, videos, etc in a live stream?

Added to that the ability to chat live from any of the posts (including gchat integration).
Example:
So @jemimus posts a picture in twitter, from the friendfeed stream or from the desktop client, I can start responding back and he can return a comment back.
@eljeppy sees the convo going from his desktop client notifier and joins the chat via comment. All of this happening live....
NO slow ass @replies form those stagnated twitter haphazard convos.

I know not everyone gets social media. I realize not everyone is as addicted to connectivity as I am. I'm not even saying I hate twitter. It's base functionality is still superb and adequate for what I need.

But the amount of depth you gain from advancing to better media only enriches our ability to share and experience in this space.

So I have to thank Twitter for this little snafoo. Now I can have my twitter and eat skittles too.. no wait.. urr.. sorry no good pun equivalent for this one.

PS. When you create a new Friendfeed account make it public..and lemme know what your account name is so I can add you to my "to-stalk" group. :D (oh yeah! built in groups! forgot to mention that as a major plus for friendfeed as well)

Added comment: While creating my friendfeed account, I chose the public option. But on completion, it was not public. So doublecheck your options after completing registration. -Ashayo

PPS. Duh.. http://friendfeed.com/alachia

LOL UPDATE 4:38pm central May 13, 2009: Twitter Reverses Policy Change, For Now. This is Nuts But Here's How It Works

What the Trek?!

2009-05-12T02:54:00.001-07:00

SPOILERS*****SPOILER ALERT*****SPOILERS

I went to go see Star Trek tonight, on a special DLP showing of the film. The quality was really, really good. But that's probably the only thing I really enjoyed about the experience.

And yes, I know I must be the ONLY person who was quite disappointed with the film. So strange too because I have been longing for the return of Trek since Voyager went off the air. I try to ignore the existence of Enterprise.

When I saw the very first teaser of the new Star Trek movie, I was so in awe of the epic quality of the extremely simplistic shot of the U.S.S. Enterprise. I truly thought the movie was going to bring a new and enriched story to the history of the Federation missions.

This was not the case. It was just another movie about the destruction of earth and some hot headed kids who rallied together to save the planet. Yes. Kids. Why the Federation decides to populate its starfleet with children, I don't know. You would expect someone would have to be more than 17 yrs of age to be in charge of navigating the damn Enterprise.

Character development? Hmmm. A lot of people have been saying that this film brought new life to the original TOS characters but to be honest, I found it all predictable. If you ever watched the original series or any of the original movies you'll see they brought a lot of character development out that far surpassed the shallow attempts at emotional depth this movie provided.

Yes, the characters are pretty to look at. I'll give you that. Spock never looked as delicious and McCoy would have you going to sick bay every at every little sniffle. Another major eye candy I did actually appreciate is the continual advancement in CGI. Computer graphics started its major relationship with Star Trek during the Voyager Series and continued to advance in the movies following.

I'm always awed at the careful detailing the CGI artists go through to keep enhancing the realism of the space stations and starfleets. Earth still looks ghetto as with all the Start Trek movies though. lol. I can forgive that though as the space scenes are quite breath taking.

But the entire epic quality of the original Star Trek teaser Enterprise ship was lost in this film though as it faded into the cluster of action sequences, even during the shot of it being constructed before the 3 Years Later hyper plot jump. And I have no idea why they have Engineering looking like something out of an Aliens movie. I've always admired the simple Engineering bay of the Trek Tv Series, for me it always made up for the plot driven nightmare of jeffries tubes.

Speaking of plot, what the hell happened? Oh yes, I remember. New Hollywood decided to sh1t over the last 40 f*cking yrs of Star Trek history and go full on "tabula rasa"...

First, yes, I know Star Trek has never been strict about its cannon and have deviated from original story lines in the past. This is always a given when you're dealing with space-time continuum and alternate time-line tangents. But what the movie did was to entirely erase the reality that we have known. It's like going for the "I'd wish for infinite wishes," totally base and ridiculously unoriginal thinking. A four year old could have come up with this plot.

AND...How is everyone not completely and utterly flabbergasted and disgusted with the annihilation of Vulcan? I almost threw up. They are my favorite race in the Trek series so to see their entire civilization kaboomed so a new drone of Transformer kitties can get their cheap explosions...GAH!!! Which means no Tuvok? Jeezus, there are no words to describe my utter dismay at this bastardization.

I mean sh1t, if you're gonna just start over with a new history WHY WHY WHY for the love of god did you just not do a new Trek movie and develop characters that represent the best of Trek???? I absolutely hate prequels for sci-fi. Never go backwards damnit with technology. Did all the creative Trek writers shrivel up and die or get tossed into a Bajoran wormhole? You're telling me they can't come up with new sh1t?

Even the sound production lacked depth in the film. I kept expecting the music to crescendo during wider cut scenes or to have the first warp drive send shivers down my spine with added base to the sound effects. Negative. And it's pretty sad when the soundtrack to the TV series are more epic than the movie.

Add to that the overly predictable dialogue and cliche punch lines, I felt like they dumbed the Trek right out of the franchise. All it needed was some Apple product placement to complete the look. iTrek FTL! Hell, aside from future Spock giving Scotty his equation (talk about cheating the NERD right out of him) for the first transport to a ship moving at warp speed, there was very little exciting science fiction aspects to the film.

Over all, the movie was entertaining in the same sense that all Blockbuster movies have been. But it wasn't just "a movie"...it was Star Trek. And for that, I'm truly truly saddened.

World of Podcast Episode 25

2009-05-11T13:28:00.000-07:00

Had a great time on World of Podcast Sunday with @UncleThursday, @Eljeppy, and @Vork aka Jeff Lewis from The Guild.

I'll admit I don't always get The Guild but I really admire their use of new media and their appeal to the geek niche. I think I'm just weird like that or a bit snobbish about my geekdom. Who knows. In any case, it was a huge honor to meet Jeff Lewis. You always expect these types of actors to be all "rehearsed" and "sound bitey" but he was so grounded.

I told him after went off air that I thought he should do a podcast. He has a great voice for it. Also, I'd love to see him in The Office...I bet he'd make a hilarious character.

The really awesome part of the interview was that he was willing to go all off topic with us throughout the show. It's those types of moderate deviations of topic from the normal "so how do you like playing Vork" that I really enjoy.

Being able to geek out about new media was my favorite part for sure. It's my hope that he and others in the cast will help to really allow this new media to take off. Lonely Girl 15 started it, The Guild capitalized on it, and I hope many more creative ventures will follow.

Check out the return of Sam from World of Podcast in this interview: Welcome back!
http://worldofpodcast.org/?p=70

Things You Wish you Could Really Say

2009-05-09T23:11:00.001-07:00

Hi ________,

You suck. You suck. You suck.
OH yeah, and could you be more useless.

Thanks,
Alachia

----------------------------
But yeah, the world isn't that black and white. Master Phayte from bindpoint likes to claim that being the quintessential @sshole is necessary but that's just not in my nature. When your whole guild is about promoting a friendly/casual/family attitude, you kinda face dilemmas when it comes to setting standards.

You can do your best to encourage people to get better and you can write them in-game mails and whisper them about ways to improve but ultimately that's about it. Some people come around after a few weeks and some....probably never gonna happen.

So I guess that's the trade off for not having to raid with @sshole 1337 kitties who are highly prone to nerd raging, Raiding with the undead who can't be bothered to gear, learn their class, or show up.

...And people ask me why I keep saying this will probably be the last viable WoW expansion....

This is Raiding, Do not Adjust your Mirrors

2009-05-06T23:41:00.001-07:00

I've said before that Naxxramas and most of the pre 3.1 content totally spoiled casual raiders. Ten good people was enough to carry the rest of the 25 man team easily. People drifted on auto pilot and never paid much attention to performance. You could afford to play like this. And yes, I say play because I don't think the term "raiding" had anything to do with that type of instance encounter.

In Episode 41, I talked about resto shamans and about healing at that point. I stated it was very hard to talk about healing and methodologies at that time because nothing pushed us to really truly learn our class. It's not until you have challenging encounters that you really, really have to discover the minute fine tunings of your class mechanics.

You start to cut the fat, you learn fights per situation and learn survival vs risk behavior. You can't afford to be sloppy because it costs you time and effort. And it's in this type of mentality that you find real "raiding"....

Casual guilds tend to get flustered now that Ulduar is out and suddenly they are confronted with the evils of the nasty "P-word," PROGRESSION. This is raiding, my friends. It's upping the standards of everyone involved and expecting everyone, even the casual hop-around-Dalaran types to learn how to play their class finally.

In Naxx, you could afford to have only 20% of the raiders bring 100%. In Ulduar, you'll need at least 90% to bring everything to the table. Carrying half the raid is NOT an option.

I just want to say to casuals that are immensely frustrated right now expecting to one shot everything that this is normal. Don't be upset. Get better, play harder. Welcome to raiding.

After all These Years

2009-05-01T12:25:00.001-07:00

bradley45 @alachia after all these years of playing WoW, how do you keep yourself still interested in it? #just-wondering

That's a good question. I think that's one of the greater things about this game. It offers a lot of dimension and you can take from it from multiple levels of game play.

There's a ton of autonomy in the game for doing things on your own or off with your friends. If you tend to play the game on a strict level of grinding gear and instances, yeah, you might run out of "things to do" pretty fast.

In fact, right now, all I've had time to do really is do a few dailies every now and then and hit up Ulduar raiding 10mans and 25mans. To be honest, this does not hold my interest very much because it's what I consider "surface play"...

The real heart of loving the game is when you get that feeling of submersion into the world. That's the only thing that keeps this game sustainable. What I love to do is solo alts by myself as this holds my interest for quite a sustained period of time.

I normally level so fast with my group that I miss out on a lot of the content so going back through at my own pace tends to keep me interested in WoW for a sustained period, especially since I have so little time between raiding.

But I get the how people get tired of this game after awhile. If you don't have good group to play with...forget it. You'll prolly tire or bore after a year for sure. And it's not like there aren't nice distractions out there atm.

A year ago, the meta was kind of sparse in terms of connections and ways to interact. Now, it's easy to see WoW becoming a more outdated form of interfacing with other metazens. Time will tell if Blizzard decides to allow a little more social integration into the game. I hope it does.

Renting PvP Gear

2009-04-25T13:16:00.000-07:00

Man, I've been so out of the PvP Arenas that I totally didn't catch this from the patch. Apparently, you can rent PvP gear from the vendor.

how?

Taint: valor tokens
you can buy shit for 2 hours
and return it
for full refund
pretty funny

Me: awesome

Zoom Zoom

2009-04-25T02:20:00.000-07:00

Check it! I got my chopper!!! just kidding!!! I wish! That's me on the motorbike for the Flame Leviathan encounter. It's fun spreading the oil and picking up the healer and dps when they get thrown off the boss. Zoom Zoom. Probably as close as I'll get to getting a chopper of my own.

Children's Week Charity Auction

2009-04-23T23:47:00.000-07:00

Last night I had this spontaneous twitter contest when I found an un-opened pre-paid 60day card on my shelf when clearing out stuff. I dunno, I just decided I wanted to do a give-away on the spot so I twittered a contest to name at least 3 of my favorite snacks.

One of the first to respond was @eljeppy who said he wanted me to donate the card to theChild's Play Auction. Turns out he only got 2/3 of my favs as many people did. @RevFry won with skittles, cupcakes, and oreos! (my other fav snacks would include nilla cakesters, starbursts, sweedish fish, gummi bears)

I was really glad I did the contest otherwise, I might not have gotten the heads up about Child's Play auction being hosted by one of our own WoWzens! In honor of Children's Week in WoW, Brigwyn from The Hunting Lodge is hosting an auction to help raise money for Child's Play.

The post "Children’s Week Child’s Play Charity Auction Update" has Brigwyn's personal story regarding the issue. I have to definitely /salute Brigwyn for finding a way to integrate a great cause into the next fun WoW holiday event. So even if you don't get your meta achievement, you can still gain something great here.

I was trying to think of something I could donate to the auction but all I could come up with was a nice gaming headset??? Not sure yet. Any suggestions?

Check out the event at The Hunting Lodge blog for more details on the auction and be sure to bid! :D

Ulduar Brings Back Standards

2009-04-22T08:12:00.000-07:00

That's a pic of me on the Flame Leviathan having hopped off my motorcycle into a Demolisher and being launched because our mage died. That was the only fun I've really had on that fight to be honest.

I can't say the first boss of Ulduar has me all that excited. I'm not big into siege weapon encounters yet as I don't think they offer much in terms of game play dynamics. I'd rather see group combo points added to the game to be honest.

If you haven't pugged this encounter yet, it basically looks like three year olds playing soccer. A bunch of little kids rushing at a ball in hopes to lay a foot on it. It takes no skill whatsoever...just know how to spam 3 buttons at cooldowns.

We didn't even bother doing it without one tower up for our 10mans which was pretty easy. I do imagine four towers will actually take some strategy though. I'm looking forward to stepping it up to that. We did Razorscale 10man no problem and accidentally got the achievement but got toasted in Ignis's Slag pot. lol. toasty baby!

I'm definitely not crying for the NERF hammer for sure. I like the challenge.

In our 25man raid, we're still hitting up Razorscale. We did it last night with five healers and still didn't have the DPS to push him down but we got a lot further than we did last Friday. I'm really liking this encounter a lot for the simple reason that it's a great skill and gear check. Plus it pushes progression mentality back on the raid so they understand it's not a free ride anymore. Until the raid gets better, you pay out the @ss with repairs, pots, and food.

Naxx made people lazy and careless so if it takes hitting a wall for a few weeks to get people back into shape, I'm all down for that.

Chef's Hat

2009-04-19T22:27:00.000-07:00

"Chef's hat looks awesome"- Raider

"yeah, pretty bad ass looking" - me

"What Chef's Hat?" - Taint

"It's 100 Cooking Awards" -Raider

"That's a waste." -Felix

"LOL. I'm gonna get it!"- Taint

"Over my dead body!! What's your password? I'm gonna spend all your cooking awards! You know that's like 1000 spices?!!!!" - Felix

LOL

Meh Patch 3.1 highlights

2009-04-14T12:51:00.000-07:00

(lagtastic offers prolonged poses for ultimate screen capture in 3.1!!)

1. The Argent Tournament Begins:
Representatives of all ten faction capitals, from Undercity to Exodar, have traveled to the tournament grounds to find champions among their heroes who will prepare for the inevitable battle against the enemy of all living beings, the Lich King.

haven't heard too much about what this will actually entail but I suppose we'll find out soon enough! Finally we can destroy the gnomes!!! Also this bit caught my eye- New rare and epic items, tabards, pets, banners, faction shirts and mounts. Faction shirts!!! Can't wait to see those! I <3 IF shirts FTW!

2. Due to significant talent tree revisions, all players will have their talent points reimbursed. Several new spells and abilities have been added for select classes. Players will need to visit their class trainer to learn new spells.

so glad I didn't bother respeccing for dailies this week.

3. Players level 40 and higher will now be able to visit their trainer to pay a one-time fee and access the dual talent specialization feature.

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOT!

4. Applying a glyph no longer requires a Lexicon of Power.

No more- Where's the book? WTF is the book!?

5. Gift of the Naaru (Draenei Racial): The heal has been changed to an instant-cast heal-over-time.

all right! a little LESS useless.

6. Mana Regeneration: The amount of mana regeneration derived from intellect and spirit has been reduced by 40%; however, talents that allow for mana regeneration while in combat have been increased. As a result, in-combat regeneration for classes with those talents will stay the same, while out-of-combat regeneration will be lower.

I defer to World of Warcast Episode 79. They said it all.

7. DK changes-- zomg. just when I thought Death Knights were confusing already, they pretty much decided to play hokey pokey with the class. You put your bone shield here, you take your magic dmg reduc out, you add your Improved Death Strike in and you shake it all about!

8. Druid- Tree of Life: Now receives 240% increased armor. You can now use Nature's Grasp and Thorns while within this form. In addition, the discount on heal-over-time spells from this talent is now active at all times, whether or not the druid is in Tree of Life form. Mana cost reduced to match the cost of Travel Form.

9. Hunters- Ammunition: All types of gun and bow ammunition now stack to 1000. All quivers and ammo pouches no longer provide haste. 15% ranged haste is now built into the hunter's Auto Shot.

Sweet. I can finally stop wondering all over the cities figuring out where the hell the damn fletcher is. I'll only need to refill every 10 levels.

10. Hunters- Aspect of the Pack is now raid wide, and radius increased from 30 yards to 40 yards.

ONE SPEED baby!

11. Mages- Arcane Blast stacking effect is no longer considered a Magic effect and will not be dispelled

Ahhh. man. no way to haze the new arcane mages anymore!

12. Mages- Mage Armor: Now grants 50% of mana regeneration while casting

no more blaming the gnome racial Flip!

13. Paladins- Blessing of Kings is now trainable at level 20

Whose got kings? anyone? anyone?

14. Paladins- Exorcism: Now can be used on any target and has a 100% chance to be a critical strike when used on Undead and Demons

BUFFADINS!

15. Priests- Prayer of Healing: This spell now heals the target's party, rather than being limited to just your direct party

Woot. No more having to switch the damn priest in and out of parties.

16. Priests- New Talent: Body and Soul: 2-point talent. When you cast Power Word: Shield, you increase the target's movement speed by 30/60% for 4 seconds, and you have a 50/100% chance when you cast Abolish Disease on yourself to also cleanse 1 poison effect in addition to diseases.

I just liked this one cuz the new talent sounds so 80s.

17. Warrior- Titan’s Grip: While you have a two-handed weapon equipped in one hand, your physical damage done is reduced by 10%.

Welcome back to Arms. lol.

18. Alchemy- You can now sometimes find Alchemist's Caches from bosses in Ulduar. Only players with an Alchemy skill of 425 or higher can loot these secret caches.

secret caches...oooooh!

19. Cooking- A new recipe has been added to cooking trainers for making Black Jelly, using several Borean Man 'O War as ingredients. While it looks disgusting, it restores more health and mana than the highest level food.

yummy. better than mage food.

20. Mining- Northrend deposits now despawn 1 minute after mining them. This change was made to speed up respawning when nodes were partially looted.

That's right you @ssholes who left one Crystalized Earth on a Titainum node. you know who you are!

21. More on Dual Specs--
Options->Interface->Preview Talent Changes
have that enabled if it's not for you so you can modify your talents before finalizing them. Spell bars coincide with your active spec.

22. ALSO! Now with more enhanced lag features! Ultimate lag crashes and prolonged loading screens!

We Did it Jeppy!

2009-04-07T10:57:00.000-07:00

Last Monday, we got our [Glory of the Raider] achievement with the finish of 3D Sarth 10man. It felt good to finally nab it down after the many, many, many wall run-ins we've had. We started trying for the achievement well before any of us had the gear for it. More importantly, I was glad we were able to do finish out with our group of ten.

The whole setup for achievements has been a little more than frustrating when you read the strats that say "dump your melee for all casters" or "dump your shaman for a holy pally" or "trade out your druid tank for a DK"....or even "just get a warlock to have his pet tank it"....etc

And the few guilds on our server who were able to complete 3D well in advance had the sweet luxury of picking and choosing their team. Also, I wouldn't exactly call it picking up "pugs" when you hand pick who you're bringing. The only reason I complain is that these are the same people who mock you for not being able to drop 3D with your static group.

I just couldn't imagine dropping a few of our guys just to get the achievement done..it wouldn't be as sweet for sure. The whole point was that we accomplished this together.

And while the victory was so lovely and a sense of relief washed over me as the little Glory of the Raider achievement popped up, I was extremely sad to look over and see that Jeppy (my dear friend from bindpoint) was not in the vent channel.

For weeks he and Ejji have been listening in on our "WAVE WAVE! VOID VOID! WAVE" songs. Don't ask me why. lol. I thought they were masochists. :) But this week he fell ill and hasn't been able to get online so he missed our green lighting of the vent channel when we busted out the "F-yeah!!!"

So this video is for you, Jeppy. Get well soon!

NE Hunter Desktop

2009-04-06T14:07:00.000-07:00

Damn, I knew I should have rolled a NE hunter! I just came across the desktop today and really love it. It's a bit suggestive but the proportions and coloring are perfect. I just wish Night Elf faces really looked like this in the game instead of the freaky clown look they all have.

I couldn't find the true source of the artist. I wanted to see about getting a high quality image.

Undying

2009-03-30T23:40:00.001-07:00

Last week we finally got [The Undying] which is the 10man achievement of running Naxxramas without anyone in the raid dying during any of the bosses for that entire raid lockout.

It's actually not a very hard achievement as the first time we ever tried it, we almost one shot it. One of our guys just didn't move out of the fissure far enough when KT was at like 20%. It was a real heart breaker. Since then, most of our failed attempts have been due to lag issue or accidental agro negligence.

The night we got undying was no acception at all. During Thadius's first polarity charge, Flipmax disconnected and he was the lone "positive" charge in our "negative" group. Luckily, Taint was able to notice it immediately and we spammed heals on him while the rest of the group ran away from him. That was one of those major "OH SH1T!" moments.

The next one was during Saph right as we started to pull him, we had someone disconnect at the starting area. Luckily, I noticed he wasn't moving right away and called it. Taint was able to reposition his entire group and still heal Saph. It just took a little extra longer to down him but we somehow managed. Also one of our dps had a momentary lag spike during the "block" phase and almost didn't make it behind the blocked person.

It's sort of funny. The hardest thing about that achievement is guaranteeing a stable connection...lame.

Now our only achievement left is Twilight Zone.....the bane of my raiding existence right now. It's also the one wall I look forward to slamming myself against every night. I haven't had a challenge like this since Vanilla WoW raiding days!

Video Games Live Austin

2009-03-30T14:06:00.000-07:00

This was my second time at Video Games Live Concert, the last time being in Houston. I have to say I enjoyed the second showing but mostly because I appreciate the sound of live music a lot.

They never play the same show twice but have about 60 pieces they pick and choose from for each showing. About 2/3 of the show was a repeat of what I had seen in Houston including Metal Gear Solid, Mario Brothers, Zelda, Final Fantasy, Civilization, World of Warcraft, and Kingdom Hearts. The new stuff I enjoyed a lot was the music from Myst and Halo.

More than anything, it's just so exciting to see other gamers so appreciative of the music and arts. It was also a huge treat to see Jack Wall's daughter performing, she's only twelve but sings like she's decades old. It's amazing.

I will say one thing, these kids today love their Halo. I thought the group of kids next to me were going to have a heart attack when the Halo music qued in. They were clutching each other for dear life....there were almost tears. lol.

There were two highlighst of the show. One was the live skype call to Jason Hayes right after they played Legends of Azeroth. The orchestra and choir was so dead on with the piece that it literally sounded like I was loading up the game.

The second highlight you would have thought would be the concert pianist who played a suite of Final Fantasy songs plus a variety of Mario Brother themes. Nope. It was the 16 year old kid they brought up on stage to play Guitar Hero Aerosmith "Sweet Emotions" on expert mode to win a AMD Dell Laptop. He had to score 200k points in order to win...the catch being obvious projector/game sync discrepancy and the music was played LIVE from stage by the orchestra. When he hit 200k, the audience went wild!

I mentioned the absurdity that a kid playing guitar hero would get more applause than a concert pianist to my friends after the concert. Morgan's boyfriend then pointed out something very true. As far as piano goes, a lot of people have no practical gauge of the difficulty because they've never played before. Guitar Hero, however, more people would have an actual appreciation and understanding as they have all played it before. Interesting, no?

My only critique of the show was that I felt they could have done the video portion of the show more justice. If you're going to use footage of the games as sort of a focal point of the performance, I'd expect the video quality to be a lot better than just a low quality projected image. Cheaply displayed videos sort of detracts from the music, I think I'd rather just watch the orchestra at that point.

Otherwise, great show. I'm glad I was able to catch it again.

She shoots! She scores!

2009-03-26T02:22:00.000-07:00

(Woot! Flipmax overslept for our 10man raids tonight so I got to play my hunter)

She shoots! She scores! hehehe. That's right folks, I have not yet caved in and started dual boxing for my hunter leveling yet. I'm honestly just having too much fun doing things on my own with my gorilla. It just feels so empowering having my own personal tank everywhere I go.

I was thinking I'd need to get Felix to help me run through the Altar of Zul to do the Save Sharkbeak quest but I somehow managed up and DOWN the altar by myself.

I didn't like the idea of fighting my way back down the altar so I decided to jump off the cliff and hope for the best. I survived iwth 133 HP and got an achievement to boot! lol.

I also got some account bound gear on her so it's really refreshing to not have to worry about some of the gear. Plus, the shoulder stats are pimp for the [Champion Herod's Shoulder].

Currently, the hunter is 52 and is questing in Felwood but also rocketing around Azeroth for all those spacial quests. One thing I hate a lot about questing in the old world is the quests take you all over the damn place and then back again. Outlands and Northrend were really good about consolidating the questing into succinct zones. So far my longest flightpath has been 11minutes 38 seconds. :P

WoW 'Hammer on the 'Head!

2009-03-24T03:49:00.000-07:00

"Desperately trying to hang on to its fading grasp on the fallen WoW community."

What is Warhammer?

"That is correct!"-Alex Trebek

"Can't Compare" for 800 please.

Tabard, Gnomes, Eggs, and Milkshake

2009-03-23T13:24:00.000-07:00

Back to wearing my [Sporeggar Tabard]. I have finished my four tabard reputation grinds for Northrend. Wyrmrest, Kir'Tor, Ebon Blade, and Argent Crusade exalted if that gives you any indication of how many heroics I have run. lol.

Last night we were trying to catch Tivi up on the Glory of the Hero achievement. She's only missing the easysauce ones now so it's pretty easy. Having a static six group does have it's drawbacks like having to do everything twice but having the flexibility of an extra member has also been nice. Plus, she's awesome. My favorite little thing to do to her now is to pull out a noncombat pet and feed it the biscuits to make it larger and put it next to her. "MY pet is bigger than you!" lol. It's cute.

Also this weekend I finally got revered with the Oracles. So I am not the proud owner of a baby [Reins of the Green Proto-Drake] which will hatch in seven days. I got my first [Mysterious Egg] last night and can't wait for it hatch. The Drake is supposed to be a 1% drop rate of course though.

Last week, a guildy got his first egg and said "It's going to be so awesome when I get my green proto drake" and we all said "keep dreaming" and "enjoy your yolk". Seven days rolled around and his egg hatches and out comes a GREEN PROTO DRAKE! gah!! lucky SOB! He called it and it happened!

I picked up my alt hunter a few weeks ago. HELLO LOVER! I absolutely love this class but to be more specific, I <3 my Gorilla. I named him BabyJae but I think I will be renaming him to Milkshake soon. So I can spam a macro going "My Milkshake brings all the horde to the yard! Damn right! It's better than yours! I'd feign death but I'd have to charge!"

Having a pet is so OVER POWERED. I feel invisible at times. I'm almost sure I'm not even playing the hunter right. I'm spec'd BM but am pumping out only 80dps right now at level 44. Something seems off. However, my gorilla has been making up for it.

It's bloody brilliant. I sit there collecting quest items while he just is bangin' at the mobs for me. I love it! Sometimes I'm checking over my shoulder because I'm like "how is this not an exploit!"

I've decided I wanted to roll her up to 80 to become my ultimate farming toon..just so I never have to quest alone again. It's weird. It's the first character I actually have quite a delight in playing. I look forward to roaming around Azeroth meh pet. The only downside right now is dealing with no flight paths and having crappy gear. This is the first pet class I've actually taken on for realz and I'm sort of glad or else I would never have given up my gorilla to become a healbot. lol.

Dusk at Dustwallow

2009-03-20T03:12:00.000-07:00

(Wallpaper-Dustwallow Marsh)

I wish it weren't so long because then it'd be perfect. (TWSS!) Dustwallow Marsh is definitely one of my favorite places to go now while leveling.

Sometimes after the dust settles and I'm getting play my alt in my own little world, I head off to Dustwallow which I have never tackled before since they added all the quests. It's amazingly huge and filled with a crap ton of quests! LOADS! I've been doing the quest since I was level 37 and am now 41 and it seems like I have a lot left! That's quite unusual for a zone I think except for maybe STV.

The only drawback to the zone is that it's shaped oddly long and requires you to ride a great distances to get back to town. I feel like I might be missing a new flightpath or something. However, it's really nice leveling in another swamp like land, a great precursor to Un'Goro which I can't wait to get back to again.

Also, from the wallpaper picture, you can tell how beautiful it is to see dusk from Theramore.

You Don't Have an Eternity...

2009-03-19T12:54:00.000-07:00

...that's the damn truth. we only have till' 3.1 comes out!

This week we set out to do [The Undying] again. We cleared Construct wing fine and Military. Then we got to Heigan the Unclean which we normally NEVER have anyone die but for some reason this week it went downhill.

It was one of those series of events that just avalanched into total failure. First right before his teleport and the main dance, our rogue had a huge lag spike. His character started jetting out straight for the fissure. We were spamming him with heals to recover as he got hit with a wall. As the dance began, his lag issue seemed fine.

However, just as we were making it to one side of the room, one of our mages got hit and panicked. He slammed his iceblock key which confused the healers. Once you start a healing rotation up that's not just for minor spike ends, you can get easily thrown from your dance rhythm. Suddenly, everyone was sort of in a panic and people weren't moving at their normal pace trying to spot heal everyone who was spiking. Eventually, someone totally lost count and died. It was a panic snowball attack.

It's so frustrating too because this isn't a boss we normally ever have an issue with...just lost control somehow. lol. the plus side is that once we die, we don't have to continue with Naxx since we don't need anything out of there anymore.

So we headed over the Flying Dragon Game of Suck to hit up our [You Don't Have An Eternity] Achievement. We went with 1 healer (disc priest), 1 tank (Prot pally), and 8 DPS. I respecced elemental and only healed after the first vortex drop in phase 1 and right before Malygos breath in phase 2.

It took us 9 attempts but we got it with 6 seconds left to go! So glad to not have to go back there again. Now we're just down to Undying and 3D Sarth, Twilight Zone. Good times.

Serenity

2009-03-18T03:26:00.000-07:00

(walllpaper-borean tundra)

With about five or six people whispering me during raids, people being late, people leaving early, and O-chat blowin' up, I'm always usually mentally tossed by the end of raid nights. It's nothing much to complain about in terms of dealing with the usual blah blah blah.

So it's always refreshing to find a mindless task to do after the raid to wind down. Sometimes I'm super productive and get in a good run of daily quests. I always try to avoid stagnating around Dalaran because then I end up hopping around the bank for several hours being entirely useless.

The other night I was quite productive though. I went on a daily quest run in three different zones with two other guild mates. Afterwards I got it in my head to have Flipmax craft a [Deathchill Cloak] for me. I wanted to give it to a friend as a surprise pressy.

One of the reagents for the tailor crafted cloak is a [Siren's Tear] which I could buy from a murloc vendor in Borean Tundra for 100 Winterfin Clams. So I spent a good portion of the night gathering clams and slaughtering murlocs. And as mundane as that sounds, it was actually really cathartic.

I love the feeling of soloing. It gives me a real sense of freedom I don't normally get throughout the normal WoW hours. I'm free to go where I want, kill what I want, quest as I want, and screenshot all I want. lol.

Episode 43 Supplemental

2009-03-12T13:09:00.000-07:00

(dam right next to Grim Batol)

Episode 43

or subscribe at itunes!

This one is another one of those late night ramblings from the crazyhead mouth of me, Alachia.

Things mentioned:
karass

Eyes of the Beast

Grim Batol

Video Games Live

(anvil spinning in IF)

Do it Right or Die

2009-03-11T13:48:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure how I did it but somehow I pulled off [Gonna Go When the Volcano Blows] the hard way. Apparently, some genius designer thought it'd be awesome to throw these meteors into the fight which you have to dodge while healing/dpsing/tanking and avoiding waves. The most common way people get this achievement is by suiciding at the start of the fights.
Dead toons don't have to dodge. :D

The best method for dodging the meteors is to set your camera distance using:
/console cameradistancemaxfactor 5

scroll all they way out and then angle your view straight vertical like you're playing Warcraft III. lol. You can then see the direction and angle of the meteors a lot better. The only tricky part after that is the last stage of the fight when the meteor shower goes nuts. My advice is to never stop moving. Never stay in one place for more than 2 seconds.

Out there Forever

2009-03-05T11:24:00.000-08:00

Just because you throw stuff out into the void, doesn't mean it's going to stay nested in your personal bubble. One of the hardest lessons I've learned from the past is that once you put it out on the internet, it's there forever. Even after you think you've deleted content, there are these little remnants of your data still floating out there.

Data isn't static online. It's constantly moving and shifting and particles of your data get left behind long after the actual data is gone. If you've never heard of the concept, next time you hit a broken link, hit the cache button next to the actual link. (web cache)

In addition to you leaving your digital eyelashes and skin particle all over the place, you should know that archives are constantly being created of websites. You may not know it but you might already be cloned. There's this whole process going on out there to archive the internet for historical purposes, research, and to preserve for the public. (web archive)

So you may think you have deleted your blog, picture, or website but is it really gone? "But I'm a nobody and no one would care about reading my stuff." It doesn't really matter what your site is about or how little it's visited, if the information is out there, it can be archived or cached.

While the internet is mostly text based communication currently, micro-blogging, blogging, and chatting are all considered public domain. Just because it says "Sally Smith's Personal Blog" doesn't mean the information you put out there deserves lock and key confidentiality. The same goes for instant messaging, micro-blogging services, and community chat tools like Twitter, Facebook, and Bindpoint. All of that information can be logged and re-posted without your permission.

I came across this article about a teenage worker who was fired for posting negative comments about her job on Facebook. "Teenage office worker sacked for moaning on Facebook about her 'totally boring' job" posted at Mail Online.

In the state of Texas, you can pretty much be fired for any reason at all other than discrimination. I actually have two office mates who follow me on Facebook which I'm not too happy about but knowing this has kept my comments completely generic. In fact, I'm very keen to not post anything during the day time hours incase they want to use my timepost stamp on a facebook comment to accuse me of surfing the net during work hours etc.

I do think it's a shame we can't achieve a level of transparency where people just accept that we all have varying degrees of @sshole in us. The problem is you have employers or potential employers out there who aren't going to care to factor in the complexity of social interactions on the internet. In their mind, if you're dumb enough to post a picture of yourself with a bong then you're not worth hiring. Or if you're dumb enough to joke about taking out the company servers through IM, you deserve to get fired.

I suppose if were were all allowed to be explicitly honest, everyone around us would be hurt. Just a good rule of thumb is don't save ANY IM chat histories at work, don't email anything personal from your work email, and don't use your RL name to post things regarding illegal activities or social deviances. And that's if you care about your job. Otherwise, link naked pics right away. :D

Al Gore of the Metaverse

2009-03-02T17:32:00.000-08:00

Someone's gotta think I'm an asshole or else this world stops turning apparently. I can already tell March is gonna suck.

So I'd like to address this comment left on the How I WoW: http://www.howiwow.org/?p=123#comments by Octav regarding my claim to fame being that I invented the Metaverse.

"I took issue with Alachia’s characterization of her relationship to the term Metaverse. She did not make this word up and I felt she very carefully spoke about it in an ambiguous way in order to claim credit for it or at least leave open the idea that she was it’s originator."

And as much as I'd love to be the Al Gore of the Metaverse, I think I shall pass. The reason this claim struck me as totally off-putting is that it goes against pretty much everything I hold of value in the metaverse. The thing that really upsets me is feeling that I might have come across like I'd have an ego large enough to make a claim like that.

Perhaps I misunderstood Patrick's questions to me regarding the idea of the Metaverse. I thought they were asking me what my understanding of the term meant and how I apply it. I am very particular about how I interpret the concept of a modern metaverse.

I actually only became aware of Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash after I started mentioning the idea of the Metaverse on my podcast in Episode 13: The Metaverse called WoW and its Inhabitants (meta)

I got an email from Kitch with a recommendation to read it which I did. The term Metaverse was definitely coined by Neal Stephenson's in my mind but his idea of the metaverse is not what I consider what we currently occupy. His concept was a fiction-based universe much like the Matrix with a lot of sci-fi sensationalism as in the Neo-construct.

My particular view is one that separates Sci-Fi from the reality of social and cultural interactions. We're talking about real life people and real life day-t0-day interpretations of reality as it plays out in simple micro and macro levels online. I wanted to be sure to separate that out from the idea of flying around on hover boards and wearing laser-beam goggles and stopping bullets mid-flight.

Octav is right though, I should have re-interated where I did actually get the term from as I sure has hell did not come up with it myself. The full credit for my interpretation comes from David Wong (my personal hero) and his article "A World of Warcraft World: 10 Ways Online Gaming Will Change the Future." His article completely changed my perspective on online gaming and how MMO games could transend beyond a simplified mechanism of entertainment. David Wong's is my orginator what the Metaverse means to me and the reason why I chose to use that terminology.

"when I say ‘Metaverse’ I mean…” This tells me she is fully aware she did not create the word but is purposely obscurring her answers in order to create the impression she did."

I guess the point is I shouldn't have approached the interview with this idea that people sort of know my history. I did sort of assume that everyone knew where I was coming from and apparently that was a huge mistake. So I'll take this opportunity to disclaim that I had anything to do with the construct of the terminology of the metaverse.

I will however give EVERYONE credit for its creation because that's what it means to me.

Post Raid Activities

2009-03-01T18:07:00.000-08:00

(Malygos Wallpaper)

Some weeks you'll just have the crappiest raids ever and you know a lot of it beyond your control so you have to figure out how to just let it go. One of my largest frustrations is trying to balance out running a semi-decent 25man group while also gaining perspective of how everyone wants to raid. Like this week, one of the college students decided to show up seriously drunk. He was late, he was plastered, and he was obnoxious as all hell.

A part of me wanted to throw him out immediately. A part of me wanted to just gkick him out for showing so little respect for the rest of the guild. Then a part of me wonders if I should just try to see things from his perspective. He's a kid, young, and prone to make stupid mistakes. He's at a time of his life where he wants to have fun and probably won't get to seeing things my way for another 5 or 6 years.
Then I have to think about the rest of the guild as well. How do they feel about a sect of the guild who is only showing up to raids to gear for PvP Arenas. Should I care why people show up so long as they show up? Or should it bother me that they don't really give a damn about the rest of us that much aside from using us to get gear? Does it matter why people chose to play with us? I'm not sure what the correct answer is supposed to be anymore. There are times I think I'm fully aware of what the guild wants and then something will happen that will throw me off completely.

I have people whispering me from the guild trying to tell me who deserves loot and who deserves to be invited. I have people wanting to raid earlier and those who want to raid later. I've got a group who want to push things to a more serious degree and those who want to keep our 25man raids super casual. I have people who want to already start gearing out their alts and those who want to keep it mains only.

So after a few Malygos attempts Friday, people had to leave early. I didn't take the portal back to Dalaran. I just stayed behind with Flipmax. I sort of just sighed. Then I turned to Flip and said, "let's race around this place." So we came up with this game where we had to run around the circle until we hit the portal and then mount and do a cycle mounted and then one more round while running.

I SOOOOOO was winning too but then the bastard cheated at the last minute and blinked to the finish line. I swear, you'll never get a fair racing game with a mage. lol. We then played tag for awhile and got tired of running around. So then we stared at the stars for a long time while talking about mage specs.

I then logged out to upload the combatlogs to wow web stats. When I got back in, we ended up on this crazy errand run through the old world. We ran LBRS so I could get my worg pup and spider pet since my shaman had never gotten it. Then we were gonna run heroic Magister's Terrace because I wanted my phoenix pet (I've gotten two on my other toons).

When we got there though, I wasn't attuned!! GAHHH! DAMN ALTS! So we set in non-heroic to get me attuned. We cleared the whole thing only to find out I forgot to talk to some sleeping dude! DOH! So we ran it again and bam, the phoenix pet dropped! LOL! Holy cow! I didn't even have to run it heroic to get the pet! WOOT!

Afterwards, Flip went off to go do Strat runs for the baron mount and I set off to level fishing. I never thought I'd be in STV again casting my fishing rod but there I was. I went from like 130-225. Now I'm on the fishing quest. gag.

So it turned out that Friday night wasn't so bad after all. Racing, star gazing, pet rounding, and fishing FTW. :D

Flashlight

2009-02-28T14:05:00.000-08:00

The culmination of waiting for a validation to Engineers since they gave us repair bots and goggle equivalents to tier 6 gear, is here!

Folks after waiting nearly a year and a half for the glorious engineering buff, that validation that we didn't just level the most worthless profession in the game has arrived!

[High-powered Flashlight]
Binds when equipped
Unique-Equipped
Trinket
Requires Level 49
Equip: Improves hit rating by 24 (3.04% @ L49).
Use: Summon a ring of light on a specific location that lasts for 3 min. (1 Hour Cooldown)

And it's a good thing they put that 1 hour cooldown timer on the "ring of light" usage because seriously, casting light on the ground in under a 1 hour lockout is just too much OP.

I mean we see what happens with people who have stacks of [Elune Stone], *shudder*, that's just too much power for one person honestly.

:P

Flying Dragon Game of Suck

2009-02-25T23:16:00.000-08:00

So we were talking in Bindpoint the other night about great quotes from forums and Master Phayte had the best one by far. It was in regards to these siege weapon type battles now included in progression raiding.

"If I wanted to play The Flying Dragon Game of Suck, I would have bought The Flying Dragon Game of Suck. I want to play my priest."

Seriously, whoever posted that. AMEN. You ROCK.

And I love a good dragon ride, for sure. It's fun to be able to fly around on them and use them to nuke down things. However, the mechanics of these dragons have nothing to do with skill and nothing to do with any character stats you have spent a TON of progression getting. You can be NAKED and still pwn or suck on these things.

This is all good and well if it weren't for the fact that these Flying Dragon Games of Suck or two of the largest hurdles in Heroic Titles and Achievements which I DO consider as part of progression these days.

I am definitely dismayed that Ulduar is already boasting more of these encounters. And while it'd be great if these were just part of small dungeons and not required for specific achievements, I'd feel they'd find their place in World of Warcraft more welcomed.

I might of course change my mind when they put me in a mech warrior suit one day. hehehe.

By the way, tonight we were off our 6 minute Malygos attempt by 7 seconds and yes, that did suck considering that was our best attempt and we had given it 28 attempts. We were always off by seconds. Things did start to get better towards the end when we went with 8 dps, 1 tank, and 1 healer (holy priest). I went elemental and then healed after vortex and phase 2. I have no doubt if we had 2 more attempts, we would have nailed it.

On a positive note, during our many botched attempts, we were all able to pick up [Denyin' the Scion]! It was fun getting to surf on those discs!

Tivi tastes like Awesomesauce

2009-02-25T00:09:00.000-08:00

Monday night we resumed getting everyone else their completion of [Glory of the Hero]. All three of them needed was something simple from Gun'Drak but Flipmax still needed the [Emerald Void] and the [Amber Void] which if you want to get on the same day, you have to defeat Ley-Guardian Eregos with everyone only on Bronze Drakes.

This is teh uber suckage! And it only took us 2 hours to finally decide to read the actual DPS mechanics of the damn Bronze Drake. We were doing our channeling and burst spells sooo wrong. It got to a point where we had channeling rifts and Shock Lance down to a science. And even to avoid vent lag, I called Taint over the phone to call out when to switch channeling.

The whole premise is to get those channels stacked and then burst at 10 and keep a full rotation of 10 at all times so you're hitting for 100k dmg. In the meantime, you have to approximate a 14 second counter to use Time Stop to prevent him from spawning whelps which will eat your group inside out.

On top of that, you have to do this in stages. It's not just straight fly up their and nuke. You have to run away when he goes transparent and run away from giant pink orbs that follow you before they explode. Then it's back to channeling calls and time stop rotations.

Easy enough aye? Well, in the mean time he's blowing big chunks of WTF breaths on you and at any given agro rotation, you might be less than 13% by the time phase 2 starts and there are NO HEALS.

Well we were going at this for like 3 hours or so and then Felix had to call it cuz his work schedule has him starting work at 6am. Ouch. And as luck would have it, our 6th man (well actually girl) logged in just at that time. We begged her to come and so she offered to help us out. We figured out the channeling rotations after that and had several really, really good attempts. About 40 minutes later though we were on our last leg.

We somehow get a great first phase! We nuke the boss down to like 50% before the orbs spawned. After he respawned, we had the most perfectly timed Time Stop and got our channel rotations going. However, just at that moment, he nuked down Taint and Flipmax! By this time we had him below 20%. Sad, myself, and Tivi were left as we headed into another round of orb explosions and we managed to survive those.

By this time though, the time stops were only being cast as soon as they came up from cooldown so we had whelps spawn. They ended up blowing out Sad when the boss was around 6%.

At 3%, the boss turned to me and his breath took my drake out too.
At this point it was just Tivi left and the boss had just a few stacks of the channel debuff left on him.
2%, I'm falling from the sky out of my drake
1%, we're all screaming "SHE CAN DO IT!"
By the time my body hits the platform, she finishes off the boss!!!

And I exclaim, "YOU ARE AWESOME TIVI! YOU ARE FUCKING AWESOME SAUCE!!!!"
she then typed, "it was the m&ms"
lol

So yeah, that fight is the suck and I am so glad I never have to do that encounter again. We had already done it once a few weeks ago and it took about 3 hrs to learn it the first time and another 3 hrs to get it this second time.

It ranks as the most annoying achievement out of the entire list if you decide to take the all Bronze Drake approach. We're just masochistic so it was only natural we'd find a way to torture ourselves.

Before we did those attempts, I actually stated, "Less Rabi was the worst, followed by this one, and the third being Watch Him Die" but by the end of the night the double Amber/Ember Void made it to rank number #1 Ultimate Suckage.

Glory of the Hero

2009-02-22T22:26:00.000-08:00

Well second time was a charm. We didn't have any major hickups and were able to pick up more achievements for the other mage in our carass. No one spec'd healing but both the shadow priest and myself traded out during different boss fights. It worked out fine.
[Share the Love] didn't foil us again this time as we were sure not to pop treants or mirrors while nuking the boss down after we all had been impaled. The GM who told us tough-sh1t said that might be a reason why we didn't get credit the first time. Major BS poor achievement credit programming if you ask me. Who knows though, they probably added something like that in to avoid exploit??

[Make it Count] attmept was flawless. We straight up nuked every boss down in less that 40 seconds and didn't have any deaths during transitions or trash clears. By the time we got to The Flying Dragon Game of Suck, we had 12 minutes left so we had plenty of time to be careful to be sure to do it right. We went with two ruby drakes, one amber drake, and two emerald. It's one of the safest combinations of dragons to take.

And while I really, really appreciate my [Red Proto-Drake] and am grateful we get that as an award, I'm a little confused as to why yo don't get a title of any sort. I mean you get a title for opening up candy and flying around picking up coins around Azeroth but you don't get a title for [Glory of the Hero]?? lol. Nice Blizzard, nice.

Tomorrow we're going to try and get the rest of our group the title. Three of them are still missing one or two of the random crap.

Less this and More of That

2009-02-22T13:17:00.000-08:00

Yesterday was one of those Saturdays you just roll out of bed, brush your teeth, wash your face, grab a soda from the fridge, plop yourself in front of the computer, and just play WoW all day. It was great.

My group set off to knock out more of our Heroic Dungeon Achievements. I must admit it has take us a lot longer to complete than I thought it would although I think we've only dedicated 3 full days to it. A few of the achievements require you to get lucky with the bosses you get like in Heroic Violet Hold for [Lockdown!]. Another one that takes multiple days is the [Experienced Drake Rider] which requires you to have used each of the different mounts during the final boss.

The four left we had that I was a little concerned about out of all of them was [Volazj's Quick Demise], [Less-Rabi], [Share the Love], and [Make it Count].

We changed our make up a little for Saturday's attempts. We had Felix switch to boomkin instead of feral tank and had Sad stay Prot instead of going retadin. Since the other two dps is myself, elemental shammy, and Flipmax, frostfire mage, it made the msot sense to add a boomkin. It's really good synergy between the three, the mage benefiting the most of course. We also had Taint, disc priest, respec shadow and just put on healing gear during the tougher boss fights.

Because of this, Volazj ended up being pretty easy as we had the DPS to nuke the mother living sh1t out of him. I dropped healing stream to heal the group, popped heroism and we burned him down.

(the dps meters for our Volazj kill)

The reason the numbers are skewed so high is because of the short amount of burst time. It's the same reason some people show 5kdps even though they died right at the pull. Our normal numbers for heroics are usually between 2k-5k depending on the fight.

We then went to Drak'Thuran Keep and picked up those easy heroics for Sad who was missing them. After that we had to go to Gun'Drak and then the question came: To try Less-Rabi again?
"I think we can do it, let's do it!" -Taint
"nooooooooooo...memories...bad memories" -Me
"We have Sad now in the group, he'll show you guys how to do it" -Sad
"Sad, I'll pay you 1000g if we can do it in less than 2 hours" -Felix
"You're on" -Sad

It took us about an hour though but we finally got lucky with latency and simply predicting the exact moment to interrupt his transformation. That achievement is the total suck as it has nothing to do with real player skill. I was elated though to have it done with and yes, Sad is now 1000g richer. lol.

We then got totally cheated out of Share the Love. We have screenshots showing all five of us getting impaled by the final boss but we didn't get credit. We petitioned a GM but all they replied back was "try again tomorrow". grrr! Otherwise, I'd only have one achievement left!

However, Make it Count achievement attempt was messy as hell and we all were using different drakes than we normally do for Occulus. I think we were off by a good 3 minutes including deaths. I have a feeling that one will take a night or so more of practice to get down in 20 minutes.

The quad dps and one tank with the priest switching gear to heal was actually a really great move for us because it allowed us the flexibility of more DPS whenever we needed it. I only recommend this for others if they're tank is really strong and their healer is very smart and knows the fights.

We're hopefully going to try again today after everyone gets through doing Sunday business.

Undying Heartbreak

2009-02-19T00:37:00.000-08:00

SOoooooooooooooooo close! We were just a few seconds away from getting [Undying]!
We had managed to stay alive as a raid not only through the Naxxramas bosses but even ALL of the trash. ZERO deaths.

When we finished Sapphiron, I was like, YES! We have this made! KT is a joke, we got this! We sooo got this! And after sitting upright at my computer super diligently for like 2hrs, I was sort of dancing in my seat with anticipation of that glorious DONG!!! achievement sound.

I even made myself stop poofing in and out of the Bindpoint channel so that I could concentrate on making sure there were no accidental mishaps. Okay okay.. I didn't make myself, my raid mentor Phayte made me do it but I listened! I was soo good! I even had my music turned off and my WoW sounds turned up. I was like on lock down!

Well so we get to Kel'Thuzad and are all set to finally pick up our Undying Achievement and knock our Glory of The Raider list down to 5 achievements. KT is one of the easiest bosses in Naxx IMO so I wasn't even worried at this point. We blew through phase 1 no problem. Phase 2 came along and we were picking up Frost Blasts and Blizzards no problem. Easysauce.

Then I look over to my right and see one of our dps get a Shadow Fissure spawn underneath him. (The fissure will stay inactive for about 3 seconds, after which it will become a beam of purple energy, instantly killing the player if they remain in it.) Just like with everyone in the raid, if I see someone not move in one second while they've got one underneath them, I call it out on vent for them to get out of it.

Well, I don't even really look back at him because he moves right away out of the Fissure to the back of it like we asked all the DPS to do. Only an instant later, I see a grey box appear appear on my grid! I had to sort of muffle my scream. lol. KT was at less than 20%!!!!!!

Apparently he had moved out of the circle but was just enough still on the graphic edge that it counted and he was insta-gibbed.

It was so heartbreaking. And we all knew he felt SOOOOO bad. The first thing he typed in raid chat after that was /shoots self in face. Poor guy. I felt so bad for him. GAH! oh well. Next week it is!

How I WoW

2009-02-18T02:15:00.000-08:00

I had the pleasure of being invited to talk with Shawn and Patrick from HoW I WoW Podcast on V-day.

What was really interesting about it was finally getting to voice chat with someone I've been following on twitter for quite some time. @shawncoons and I had developed this completely twitter-based friendship over the past few months. We even had at one point talked about meeting up with his chainmail wearing wife (total inside twitter joke) at the Texas Renaissance Festival.

That's the completely amazing thing about meta relationships though, they don't require that huge a degree of your time to connect with other people and particularly, unique connections.

So as I was talking to them, I was definitely very nervous to be speaking with Patrick for the first time but for some reason I felt very easy speaking to Shawn. As if we were old friends and he was introducing me to this hip, new cool French friend he'd met. Seriously though, I found it extremely intriguing to sort of experience that dynamic between having a familiarity and connection with someone almost exclusively through twitter and a kodo mount dance incident in Bindpoint LOL vs. only voyeured knowledge of @notPatrick.

In any case, I was very pleased to have had the pleasure of talking to them both. And as podcaster myself, I kept wanting to turn the interview on them and ask them a boat load of questions but I had to keep myself in check. hehehe.

(one minor self correction: highest rating I ever got was 1995 not 1900. I remembered that while listening because I recall it was right before Season 3 started and we hit it the day before the Arenas reset! DOH!)

be sure to check out How I WoW at howiwow.org and subscribe to their podcast to listen for future episodes about how people wow. :D

Charter Flight to Ice Crown

2009-02-17T23:13:00.000-08:00

Now that I'm not obligated to do dailies out in Storm Peaks for Sons of Hodir rep anymore, I'm free to fly about the country. My favorite place is still Scholozar Basin at the moment but for awhile it was Ice Crown. I love doing the flying dailies and of course my favorite daily, King of the Mountain, is out there.

It's really not that far out to get it Ice Crown from Dalaran but Flipmax showed me this neat trick for being lazy if you want to head out in that direction. Go to the landing pad of Dalaran and speak to Officer Van Rossem if you're alliance. He'll charter you a plane right there to the Alliance air ship. I believe there's a similar guy for the horde on the other side of the platform. I just like it because it gives me another opportunity to ride in a plane. hehe.

Twilight Torment

2009-02-16T21:07:00.000-08:00

We got the [Dedicated Few] down this week which means we're down to 6 more achievements till we get of the Nightfall title for our 10 man crew.

The only two left that scare the living shit out of me are [You Don't Have an Eternity] as our fastest time so far has been 8 minutes to clear Malygos. Somehow we're going to have to shave off another two minutes.

BUT nothing "TORMENTS" my thoughts like [Twilight Zone] 10 man. Everything is totally doable until we get to [Twilight Torment] debuff ticking at the 3rd portal. Close to 2k dmg a tick so massive raid healing while also trying to keep the secondary tank up. bleh.... We're gonna have our disc priest respec holy for our next attempt to see if helps.

Another thing we noticed is that none of us has gotten the [Epic] Achievement which means there's still a lot of room for gear improvement. I definitely think we're getting closer but it's gonna take way more practice and a little bit more luck with gearing up.

Who's the Real Fool?

2009-02-15T22:57:00.000-08:00

Saturday I spent all day staring at guards and NPCs watching my Adoration debuff timer go off so I could insert my next love token. Soooo tedious and sooo boring. The worst holiday achievement ever....or so I thought. Apparently the Noble Garden one is going to be quite the suck as well. RNG easter eggs. yay! Looking forward to that.

It took me four bags of candy but I finally got the last piece of candy I needed to get "I'll follow you all around Azeroth"...the rarest candy piece for me. I got about a billion "You're Mine" candies. I never got the Lovely Black Dress or the Peedlefeet pet but I guess that's a given knowing how my luck tends to run. At least I got my Love Fool title and I guess they give you the title of "fool" for a reason. lol.

Twilight Zone Attempts x 40

2009-02-15T13:49:00.000-08:00

We made our first real Twilight Zone (3Drake Sarth) attempt last night with our 10man team.

Druid Tank - 50k raid buffed HP to tank Sarth
Pally Tank- Drake, whelp, lava blaze tank
Resto Shammy - Group healer
Disc Priest - MT Healer
Arcane Mage
FF Mage
Marks Hunter
Crit Chicken
Fury Warrior
Ass Rogue (hehehe <3 couldn't resist)

I think we must have done well over 42 attempts last night. I wouldn't really count the last 15 though because people were hella tired and lost their motivation. (why they claim they're ass-tired and can't go on and wanna quit but then stay on doing Valentine's shit for the next 4 hrs after we call the raid...that's another story. lol)

The basic strat was to have the druid pull Sarth to the front of the square island and the rest of the raid move behind him so that the pally tank had a lot of room to move around to pick up the drakes, lava blazes, whelps, and the next drake. We then had 80% of the island to move around as we needed.

I think the whole night, we sort of kept trying to adjust healing and tanking. How to keep the prot pally with 5 lava blazes on him, 6 whelps, and two drakes. After sleeping on it last night and then going over the wws stats of the 40+ attempts, I'm thinking it's actually the dps output. And it's definitely not about performance either because these guys are chiseled to their craft.

My best guess is that it's gear. The WWS shows our best attemtps and longest attempts occured when the max dps pushed 3500 and minimum pushed well over 2500. All other attempts, I noticed the dps top and bottom was only averaging between 2000-2500.

One thing to note here is that this DPS avg is not your standard tank and spank fight. It's normally higher pushing 4k. There is a ton of movement and repositioning though, so avg DPS is highly effected by this: lava walls, void zones, running to the tank when shit is on you.

In any case, I think a little more gearing and boosting of DPS so that everyone can hit a solid 3k+ every attempt will make all the difference. We got the first drake down several times so I know it's possible. Once you get the first drake down and all the whelps in check, the raid group is pretty much set. After that point, it all goes back to keeping the MT alive with the third portal spawn making breaths hit for 30k. SOOOO can do it.

What I definitely took from last night though is that 25man 3 drake is 100% doable with our group. I'm looking forward to trying that out this coming week.

Sgt. First Class Druid

2009-02-14T18:12:00.001-08:00

Sad just got back from a base upstate helping to support the software training of their latest release in hopes to secure its success in being sent to the field. One of the guys there was in charge of training organization, testing the software and putting it through the ringer for the integration.

He was apparently a hardcore military looking guy. You know the type, rugged pure military looking bloke. He was a Sgt of some sort and was past the retirement age so he had to have been over 37. One of those who are dedicated to the service.

He was the LAST guy in the room Sad expected to play World of Warcraft. Turns out the guy was all into raiding and playing a feral druid. Crazy huh? It's always the people you least expect. Anyhow, after that they hit it off, he said it helped with him being more open to Sad's discussion about integration. So who knew WoW would help with some random associate in the army. lol.

Sgt. Druid, we salute you!

Episode 42 back up

2009-02-13T00:08:00.000-08:00

(with Godzilla's approval)

After my last post, I took down Episode 42 and put this note up on the Episode page: This Episode has been removed due to the ethical controversy of its nature. It shall forever be known as the LOST episode.

But soon after taking it down and right as I was about to start recording a "explanation filler mp3 to replace the full episode", I logged into the game for my hourly trip to get adored (Love is in the Air Achievement task) and got messaged by Godzilla.

Apparently he thought the whole episode was funny and he wanted me to keep it up. The screenshot I posted here is the 2nd out of the 3rd time he said he wanted me to put it back up. I had to ask him several times to assure myself that he meant it and wasn't just saying it.

We talked about the the nature of the episode but mostly it was me being frank to him about his mental instability. He claims I'm mistaking insanity for severely traumatized but I told him I was still 50/50 on the probability of his stories. Possible yes, Probable dunno. No one but he will really know the truth.

I asked him why he thought he was associated with so much drama but he sort of laughed and said he didn't know. He doesn't seem to mind beratement and says he can handle all sort of grief just fine. I forgot to ask him if he really felt that way then why he bothered coming to me at all about his issues with my guild. I guess to let me know my flock had strayed?

Regarding that issue, he said he hadn't had any issues with us since that conversation. So I guess that's good..wether it was a reality or not I'm glad it's no longer plaguing him.

I don't think I'll ever know him well enough to say if he or I was right. I'm glad I took the episode down and I'm glad he gave me permission to put it back up. I added a small blip to the end of the episode to clarify for future listens that I did receive his permission to relaunch the episode.

Mr. Infamy is back.