Weekend Update: Alts and Aunts and Availability

• My little brother and his wife had their baby on Saturday. It’s a girl, and her middle name will make her my namesake. (No, incidentally, “youfuckingbitch” will not be her middle name)

• I absolutely love having my DK as my farm toon. She’s working her way through the Ebon Blade faction (hey, nice boots). I did do a heroic with her, but man, I am no damn good — or rather, I’m fine for entry-level heroics in entry-level heroic gear but my ego won’t let me feel good about doing less than 2K dps. I think I’ll stick to solo questing and harvesting on her and bring out the healers when it’s time to play with other people. I should upgrade my weapon — I think that’d help immensely — but the Titansteel mace is so ugly. And I really needn’t have purples to do dailies.

• I ran Naxx-25 on my druid on Saturday evening. I’d forgotten how much I loved raiding on her, and good grief, it’s so easy. Her gear is mediocre at best — she’s done Naxx 10 once, OS25 once, and maybe half a dozen heroics — but she was top of the healing meters. (Healing meters take on far more significance when you can pwn them, I reckon.) I’m glad I performed well as I think folks expect that when they see my guild tag. We didn’t clear the zone — only three quarters complete — and I didn’t win anything. But it wasn’t as horrible to go back to Naxx as I feared it might be.

• June marks some serious “oshit” time at work for me, and I expect my availability to WoW and to blog about WoW will diminish substantially over the coming weeks. I see lots of bloggers are closing their doors, and I see lots of gamers looking elsewhere for their pixellated recreation. I’m not going anywhere, and I’m not quitting. But sadly for me, I get to be a dedicated employee rather than a hardcore raider til July. Ugh.

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Charged, Destined, but Not Upgraded

Frikkin’ New Egg.  Your open-box deal on a new graphics card was apparently too-good-to-be-true, as when it came my turn to open the box, I found the card had a little white mailing label attached and the words “physical damage” scrawled on it.  Several other little pieces — important pieces?  I dunno — lay in the bottom of that super-protective plastic baggie they ship computer parts in.  Bastards.  Now I have to deal with shipping it back in order to get a refund, and I have to weigh how badly (pretty badly) I want to upgrade my video capabilities.  I did manage to add some RAM to my computer, but meh.  I want to raid with something other than Mario Brothers settings.

Unable to raid then, K- and I helped my brother with the last bit of his Paladin mount quest.  I’ve only done Scholomance maybe once or twice, so it was a bit of a clusterfuck.  Caution:  don’t let me tank.  I’m horrible.  Despite several deaths of K-‘s poor priest (level 61 Scourge really hate level 50 Night Elves), we managed to complete the zone, getting my brother not only an armored pony but his first epic:  Destiny.  (K- and I both rolled on it, because we’re shitty like that, but gave it to my brother nonetheless.)  My brother’s subscription runs out today, and Baby #2 is due any day for him, so I’m not sure if he’ll keep playing.  If he does, I think I know a good guild for him, because he managed to consistently stand in the zombies’ Green Cloud of Doom last night.

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(Long) Weekend Update (Long Overdue)

Yikes!  It’s been a while since I blogged!  But there’s nothing like being back in the office to prompt me to ignore the 200+ emails in my inbox in lieu of a quick update here.

In a nutshell:  This weekend was glorious.

I have no gear upgrades to boast about, no insight or tips-n-tricks on healing.  I have no kills to tout or raid anecdotes to share.  

This weekend, K- and I played alts:  my DK hit 80 and his priest hit 50 (gaining almost 10 levels over the course of the long weekend).  We ran Sunken Temple at least half a dozen times and Stratholme and BRD twice.  We (finally) helped my little brother on the Stratholme and Dire Maul parts of the paladin mount quest.

It was a good break — from raiding, from Khaeli, from a really shitty IRL job — and it was a good chance for K- and I to refuel.  Time with each other, time with family — these get lost in the shuffle of a busy work- and raid-schedule, and it was so nice to be able to game together, to relax, to laugh.

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Random observations, brought to you by some of the “excellent” artists on my iPod

Faster Pussycat Kill Kill

Despite a slow start to the raid last night, we’re moving through Ulduar-25 substantially faster each week.  We took down Flame Leviathan, XT, Kologarn, Auriaya, Hodir, Thorim, Freya and Razorscale, with a quick trip over to Emalon before calling it a night.  I feel a Yogg kill is in the works this week.

KC & the Sunshine Band

Each time we return to Ulduar, we notice more and more nerfs.  There was less trash on the way to Freya, and she didn’t seem to spawn the green-seeds-of-Doom during her final phase.  I see from MMO-Champion that the mobs leading to Ignis will no longer cast Unquenchable Flames and that the Ice Turrets en route to Mimiron will do less damage.  And the void zones spawned when one of Auriaya’s cats dies no longer insta-gib you.  Not remotely.  I discovered this last night as I was feared through one, briefly had some weird camera-spin-mouse issue, ran back through the void zone — and barely took any damage.

Dead Milkmen

Despite the nerfs, there are people who die consistently.  I’m going to start keep score, because going back through my WWS reports, I swear there’s at least one person who’s never lived through Hodir.  Not once.  

Arrested Development

When I was nearing the level-80 mark on my druid, I knew it was important to have her raid-ready (or at the very least heroics-ready) as soon as possible.  I set my sights on gathering the necessary gear from the AH and from crafters so that “Ding 80!” could mean “Level 80 Resto Druid LF Raid.”

Now that my DK is almost 80, I’m approaching the level cap quite differently.  Khiiya won’t raid.  (Not that Khrii has really, either.  The release of Ulduar has made alt runs through Naxx non-existent.  Not that I’m in any rush to go back there.)  Unlike the gold I was willing to spend on getting the druid geared, I don’t want to invest one copper on the DK.  Instead, she will make due with gear from quests, from factions, and from the odd heroics.  She will just be my farm toon, assigned to do dailies and gather herbs.

When K- encouraged me to roll a DK, we purposefully chose the spec that is (/faceroll) least gear dependent.  Upon 80, I won’t bother to spec out of On a Pale Horse.  I won’t enchant my gear, unless it’s via enchants that help K-‘s priest level the profession.  *Gasp* I won’t min-max.  I won’t care; I won’t have to.  As an Unholy DK, I’ll still be able to (/faceroll) do just fine.

Right Said Fred

Mid-raid, my little brother whispered me.  “So…” he said.  “I need to run through Dire Maul, Scholomance, and Stratholme for my paladin mount.  Can you and K- help me?” he asked.  He’s been pestering me about a run through Scholomance and Stratholme for a few days.  And I want to be helpful and supportive, really I do.  But ewww.  Ewww.  I’d rather send him the gold to just buy the damn thing, to be honest, but he loves lore and loves questing and even though I keep saying “Go to the Outlands,” he’s determined to finish up his questing in the old world.  So in evil-big-sister mode, rather than responding, I enabled my auto-response with DBM, and figured if he asked again he’d get the “Khaeli is fighting Freya.  Leave her the hell alone” message — and he’d just pester K- instead.

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Weekend Update: Things Done and Undone

Raiding:  This weekend was my first foray into 10-man Ulduar, and I am absolutely thrilled we were able to clear the zone — our guild’s first Yogg Saron kill.  Friday night, we did Flame Leviathan (one tower up), Ignis, Razorscale, Deconstructor, Kologarn, Iron Council (medium mode), and Auriya.  Saturday afternoon, we did the rest of the zone up to Yogg Saron (including what I believe was the server-first hard-mode kill on Thorim), and regrouped Sunday morning for the clear.  Achievements aside, I was really thankful for the opportunity to experience all the encounters on 10-man, if only to give me more practice for the 25-man raids (We still haven’t killed Yogg on 25-man).  I had some new and different roles on 10-man — launched onto Flame Leviathan, healing those folks inside Yogg’s vision — and I feel like I have better insight now into the zone’s various encounters.  I don’t think any paladin / priest / warlock tokens dropped the entire weekend, and so I’m still just sitting with one piece of tier-gear, purchased with badges.  I did win a ring for Khaeli, and I accumulated enough badges of valor to buy my druid her epic wrists.

To Do: Clear Ulduar 25 on Khaeli. Run Naxx 25 on the druid so she’s in better stead if ever needed for Ulduar. Run 10-man Malygos on the druid so she can complete the quest for the neckpiece.

Leveling: The hours spent inside Ulduar meant no time for other endeavors.  The shaman did hit 60 a couple of nights ago, and thanks to my little brother via the Recruit-a-Friend program, no longer suffers from what K- calls “elephant butt.”  Go go zhevra mount.  The DK is still 78, as most of the time when I play her it’s to power-level K-‘s alt.  K- and I did manage to run Halls of Lightning with me on the DK and him on the hunter.  But it involved much dying, sadly.  And each time I released to the graveyard, I went on autopilot back towards Ulduar, rather than into HoL.

To Do:   Powerlevel K-‘s priest.  Make him spec holy.

Argent Tournament: I haven’t had any time for the Argent Tournament either.   Khaeli and Kaleyen became Champions of Darnassus last weekend, but we haven’t done the dailies since then.   My druid and my DK should really do these quests too: Khrii for the “of Darnassus title” and the Tendrassil Seedling pet, the DK for the epic weapon (the titansteel weapon is so damn ugly; I must avoid it at all costs).  I really suck at jousting, however, and if I have half an hour to quickly do dailies on alts, the last thing I’m going to opt to do is struggle to defeat those punkass valiants.

To Do:  Dailies.

Professions/Farming:  The time spent raiding has limited my time for farming.  Herbs are harvested from the auction house, for example, making those folks who are engaged in frost lotus extortion quite happy, I’m sure.  Thankfully, the druid is an alchemist and a cook and a fisherman, and so she’s able to keep Khaeli and Kaleyen fed and flasked.

To Do: Profit… or at least break even.

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Très Chic

Thanks to the good folks at talentchic, I now have a good idea of how to spec and glyph my shaman for both Elemental and Restoration.  And phew! — I was putting the points in the right places already.  (Minus the Improved Ghost Wolf option, which I’ll dump when I’m done leveling.)  Yay me.

Of course, the excitment of the Outlands wore off almost instantly when I realized yesterday that the speed at which I tore through those zones on my DK would not be matched by a mana-using toon in bloobie gear.

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Another Toon Hits 58

I like playing my shaman, although admittedly, I don’t often get to.  She’s lingered in her 50s for a long, long while — in part because I have been busy raiding, farming for consumables, and playing toons that, well, aren’t stuck in their 50s.  The journey from 50-58 is dreadful, I think.  The instances are long, and it’s hard to find a group.  The quests are monotonous.  The rewards are mediocre at best.

But she’s 58 now.  So through the Dark Portal she goes.  Outlands v3.0.

Now, of course, I have to figure out what the hell I’m doing on an elemental shaman.  My gear is bad, really bad, embarassingly bad.  I am not sure I’m specced correctly. When K- powerlevels me, the mobs are dead before I can get a shock off, let alone place totems, so I have no idea  if I’m able to DPS worth a damn.  (I installed a DPS meter — step 1 in figurin’ shit out)

I’d like to dual-spec this toon, but the 1000 gold seems a bit of a steep investment for a character that has been untouched for months.

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Weekend Update: A Half-Assed Post, because It’s a Monday

I hit 80 on the Resto Druid Saturday evening, and as I’d hoped, was able to equip some decent starter gear to hit surpass that magic 1500 spellpower mark.  

On Sunday, Kaleyen and Khrii ran a few heroics, an experience that was in stark contrast to Khaeli’s as a fresh level 80 healer.  Of course, Kaleyen’s 4K dps makes any heroic a helluva lot easier as the mobs tend to die before the group members can and/or before the druid can run out of OOM.  We did DTK (omg, easy), UK (omg, easy), and then (/gulp) UP (wow, easy).  We joined a PuG 10-man Naxx to cap off the weekend, and Khrii walked away with several pieces of loot as well as the Key to the Focusing Iris.

Oh, and she topped the healing meters.  Ha.  

More thoughts on druiding versus priesting and the whole “bring the player not the class” mularkey later…   

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We interrupt this priest blog to bring you an update on the druid

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Gearing Your [Alt] for [Raids]

When Kaleyen and Khaeli leveled to 80, they dutifully completed enough quests to earn each zone’s achievement before moving on.  

Now that I’m taking Alts 1 and 2 through Northrend, I feel far less compelled to quest so thoroughly.  I do a few quests in an area, grab any instance-related quests, run that dungeon, and ding!, move on.  I don’t feel obligated to pull my hair out struggling to complete quirky vehicle quests or locate the mysterious hundredth quest in Zul’Drak.  

That being said, my druid and DK will hit 80 in far less good graces with the Northrend factions than Khaeli did.  And when planning to make an alt raid-ready ASAP, this limits my access to some nice pre-Naxx gear… as does my solemn swearing never ever ever to run Occulus — heroic or otherwise — again.

What my druid and DK will benefit from, however, is a main toon with rather deep pockets.  So here’s my pre-Naxx gear wishlist for Khrii, who with a bit of effort should hit 80 this weekend.  This is an Auction House / piss-poor faction gear / stockpiled Honor Points / regular 5-mans / crafted loot list, as honestly, I’ll push to hop into 10-man Naxx runs as soon as I can.  By no means are these items best-in-slot, but rather they were selected based on ease of acquisition.  (Several of these items have been sitting in Khrii’s bank for quite some time.)

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