With the addition to easy raiding (LFR) we now have three levels of raiding difficulty. While I like a three level system I think there is still some room for improvement with the raid system. Besides the glaring problem of there being no 10 man LFR version there is something else that can be done to add something more to raiding.
I think two more levels of difficulty need to be introduced. One that fits neatly between normal and heroic and one that comes after heroic. This would effectively give us 5 levels of raiding difficulty to work with and a system that really does have something for everyone.
The way raids are currently being designed with easy, normal and heroic there are a fair deal of people that have found what is perfect for them. Of course, what people consider perfect for them differs from person to person.
My definition of perfect is something that I can work on to get past, it will take a little time, but it always seems attainable. It is not a push over and it is not a wipe 400 times to do it situation. 20 to 30 wipes while learning a boss is what I might call perfect.
For me, an addition between normal and heroic would be nice. Normal seems easy enough, the last few bosses might take a little time but over all once it is done it is done and none of them would ever come close to 20 or 30 wipe affairs to a slightly competent group, even when mildly undergeared. Sure, this is nice but I want to step it up a little. However, I do not want to step it up to heroic level.
At the moment, for me, there is no comfortable raiding tier. Something between normal and heroic would be that level for me.
Then look at those people that work their butts off to speed run the content and finish heroic ASAP. They are done so quick I can't really see how they can enjoy the game. Once you are done you are done and unless you are looking for gear there is nothing left to do, that does not seem like fun to me. That is my opinion only of course.
For those people there should be an insane setting. Something that would require everyone in the raid to have BiS gear, the best connection on earth, jet fighter reflexes and super communication. I would love to see a tier of raiding that puts heroic raids in the same place as the casual raid groups that are the majority of the game.
For example, the average casual raid team can get 4/8 no problem, maybe a high end casual guild can get 6/8. That is where the largest majority of players are in normals. For every one of us there is that downs deathwing on normal each week there are a thousand that have never even seen deathwing outside of the LFR. The average player might never see him until mists, even if the buff gets to 30%. Insane level should make the heroic raiders have that same experience, the same as the majority of the player base. A true challenge for their skill level, one that might mean they never see the end boss at that level.
This would then leave something for every section of the player base.
LFR - Non raiders and bad players can still do it and anyone else with higher skills can blow through it quick just for fun.
Normal - For the casual players. Something that needs some minor assembly and working together but nothing too complex so any group that puts the effort into it can't get it done.
Advanced - This is for the casual raiders. They are more well read about their class and the raids but they are still casual based on their time investment but as such they can handle slightly harder content where the need for knowing the fights and skills of their class will matter.
Heroic - The advanced players with more time. They know their class and the raids and they prepared accordingly and have the time to face harder challenges as a group. They also would usually be the ones that go into advanced tactics and min / maxing.
Insane - For the people that put lots of time and effort into it. The people that being the best is important to them and they will invest whatever time and efforts are needed to do so. They will spend hours, days, weeks, or months, whatever is needed, to perfect working as a team in the ultimate hunt for bragging rights and a true world first.
I think that selection of difficulty levels would greater represent the myriad of players that play the game. Blizzard has said they want everyone to be able to play the game, perhaps they should also think about making it so everyone has a level of challenge that is perfect for them.
Personally I like the idea of three difficulty levels, I just do not think that LFR should be one of those levels without a suitable counter part on the other end.
The three levels, in my opinion, should be normal, advanced and heroic.
If they really want to have a LFR version of raids where everyone can do it regardless of skill, gear, or knowledge then there should be an insane version that (almost) no one could do because it would require a group of people so outstanding at what they do that it would bring it to a level of nigh impossible.
So as I see it, a real third difficult should be added, called advanced and an opposite of LFR should be added, for those extreme players to have a true challenge.
I think we need two more raid difficulties.
Wednesday, April 11, 2012
Tuesday, April 10, 2012
Hunter Soloing in Mists is Looking up.
I often find myself saying "I wish I had a heal".
Oddly enough, that is the reason hunters don't have a heal, because it would make life easier. Too easy really. Sure, marks has the chimera shot, which is a tiny heal but is an every 10 (or 9 if glyphed) seconds thing. BM has some healing as well with a spirit beast. Even with that, over all you can still say that the hunters are not really in a good place when it comes to healing.
Whenever the question of what class is the best for soloing old content comes up the top two answers are blood DK and hunter and there is a reason for that.
Blood DKs put out a fair amount of damage and they can heal themselves all day long, not to mention they have the biggest collection of defensive cooldowns the game has to offer. So why is the hunter in the same league as the blood DK when it comes to soloing if they can't heal themselves all day long and their defensive cooldowns are somewhat lacking?
It is the rest of the tool box that hunters have, the largest toolbox in the game, that makes them beastly when it comes to soloing old content.
With smart use of our tool box we are capable of doing many things that no other class can do and our pet, when speced correctly makes for a serviceable tank. Adding our personal tank to a tool box that would make any other class drool we are rocking it when it comes to soloing content.
Where blood DKs go in with brute force a hunter goes in with finesse. For anyone that has ever tried to solo content on a hunter you know it is more about timing, positioning, setting things up, wearing the right gear, balancing damage done and survival for you and your pet. Hunter soloing is not for people that are not heavy thinkers. You don't just go in an brute force your way through content. Well, not most of the time.
When a hunter enters brute force mode it is usually because he or she does not have healing and there is no other good way to avoid damage so it becomes a battle of can you kill it before it kills you.
Soloing the trash in stonecore heroic is like that. Those packs with milhouse and the other mobs are a matter of can you scare milhouse away and take out at least 2 mobs before they do too much damage to you.
If anything, that pack is the perfect example of the approach a hunter would take to soloing because of their lack of healing. Even if you break the pull into two parts, a brute force part and a finesse part the brute force part still has a bunch of finesse involved.
At the moment you would go survival, for the double CC, CC the two most dangerous mobs, misdirect the others to your pet, which is on passive, and then have the pet charge, so his AoE will not break out the two CCed targets. You will burn milhouse while your pet keeps the other mobs interested. If all goes well you can make milhouse run away and kill at least two adds. You are brute forcing this, not even healing the pet. Once that is done, you feign death and revive your pet and deal with the others left over one at a time, using the finesse only approach I talked about.
The second boss in VP, even on normal if you are soloing it for the mount all the time, is another effort in complete finesse. Heck, even the first boss takes a little knowledge of your class. Did you know that aspect of the wild all but completely negates the damage done when the hurricanes move in? There is a spot the hurricanes will never hit going in or out, stand there. Send your pet in and pew pew. When hurricanes go in, switch to wild, take nearly no damage, when they come back out, go back to normal. Easy fight, if you use your tool box, because that is why hunters are so great at soloing.
Back to the second boss, which being MM makes this fight a million times easier. A hunter has to mix solid damage and excellent timing as well as a well placed turtle pet to get this baby done but it shows you what you can do when you put your mind to it as a hunter.
Place your pet in a good place, so the dragon is facing away from you of course and then get pew pewing. If you are targeted by breath you need to feign death at the right moment, which seems to be about one third cast, and it will cancel the cast. The second breath you use deterrence to eat it. The third one you can use feign again and then hit readiness right away.
Make sure you have used your rapid fire before the readiness for a little extra damage, which I suggest you do immediately after a breath at some point. Forth breath you FD on again, fifth is deterrence again and sixth is FD once more. You are out of tricks now my hunter friend, so lets hope you did enough damage to kill him in that time. Once you get the timing down it is easy as easy can be but getting that perfect timing on FD takes some work. I wiped at least 20 times before I got the timing down, but then again, I am not really the best solo player, but it sure is still fun. Finesse is where it is at here for hunters.
As you can see, hunters have forever found a way to work around not having healing (or minimal healing) and have still been able to hold their place as one of the best classes in the game to solo content with.
So why don't hunters have a heal?
Because if they had a heal then all that finesse, all that skill, all that knowledge of your tool box would not be as necessary as it is. Being able to heal makes things more forgiving, lets you make a mistake once in a while. It just makes things easier. So even if you do not have the finesse, skill and knowledge, you might be able to do it.
If the hunters had a heal, the people that did know their tool box would be unstoppable. It is because the top end players, the ones that solo the LK would be made so much better by it and the mid level soloing players, like myself that can only solo 85 heroics would now be able to do LK too like the better ones. A heal would also mean that doing the stuff I can currently do would be easier for other hunters that never soloed before. Like the second boss in VP would turn from perfect timing of FD on the breaths to what is big deal being you can heal yourself.
When mists comes it will open whole new doors for hunters with the new items we are getting for our tool box. Iron hawk? That is pure soloing goodness. A heal when you disengage? Beautiful. No minimum range? Thank god that will solve problems. Wyvern sting as marks? You can have it. Readiness as survival? You can have that too.
There is so much coming in mists that the future of soloing looks really good for hunters. Damage reduction, heals and attacking for anywhere will make things much easier. All we have to hope is that our tank pets will still be critical immune and we will be okay.
Hell, who am I kidding, we will be more then okay.
Hunter soloing will be so much easier come mists, the great hunters will get better, the good hunters can finally reach greatness, and the ones that always wanted to try can now have an easier time doing it.
The future of soloing for hunters is looking really bright.
The brightest spots for soloing, as I see them.
Soloing (and PvP) for hunters looks like it is heading in a positive direction for mists.
Oddly enough, that is the reason hunters don't have a heal, because it would make life easier. Too easy really. Sure, marks has the chimera shot, which is a tiny heal but is an every 10 (or 9 if glyphed) seconds thing. BM has some healing as well with a spirit beast. Even with that, over all you can still say that the hunters are not really in a good place when it comes to healing.
Whenever the question of what class is the best for soloing old content comes up the top two answers are blood DK and hunter and there is a reason for that.
Blood DKs put out a fair amount of damage and they can heal themselves all day long, not to mention they have the biggest collection of defensive cooldowns the game has to offer. So why is the hunter in the same league as the blood DK when it comes to soloing if they can't heal themselves all day long and their defensive cooldowns are somewhat lacking?
It is the rest of the tool box that hunters have, the largest toolbox in the game, that makes them beastly when it comes to soloing old content.
With smart use of our tool box we are capable of doing many things that no other class can do and our pet, when speced correctly makes for a serviceable tank. Adding our personal tank to a tool box that would make any other class drool we are rocking it when it comes to soloing content.
Where blood DKs go in with brute force a hunter goes in with finesse. For anyone that has ever tried to solo content on a hunter you know it is more about timing, positioning, setting things up, wearing the right gear, balancing damage done and survival for you and your pet. Hunter soloing is not for people that are not heavy thinkers. You don't just go in an brute force your way through content. Well, not most of the time.
When a hunter enters brute force mode it is usually because he or she does not have healing and there is no other good way to avoid damage so it becomes a battle of can you kill it before it kills you.
Soloing the trash in stonecore heroic is like that. Those packs with milhouse and the other mobs are a matter of can you scare milhouse away and take out at least 2 mobs before they do too much damage to you.
If anything, that pack is the perfect example of the approach a hunter would take to soloing because of their lack of healing. Even if you break the pull into two parts, a brute force part and a finesse part the brute force part still has a bunch of finesse involved.
At the moment you would go survival, for the double CC, CC the two most dangerous mobs, misdirect the others to your pet, which is on passive, and then have the pet charge, so his AoE will not break out the two CCed targets. You will burn milhouse while your pet keeps the other mobs interested. If all goes well you can make milhouse run away and kill at least two adds. You are brute forcing this, not even healing the pet. Once that is done, you feign death and revive your pet and deal with the others left over one at a time, using the finesse only approach I talked about.
The second boss in VP, even on normal if you are soloing it for the mount all the time, is another effort in complete finesse. Heck, even the first boss takes a little knowledge of your class. Did you know that aspect of the wild all but completely negates the damage done when the hurricanes move in? There is a spot the hurricanes will never hit going in or out, stand there. Send your pet in and pew pew. When hurricanes go in, switch to wild, take nearly no damage, when they come back out, go back to normal. Easy fight, if you use your tool box, because that is why hunters are so great at soloing.
Back to the second boss, which being MM makes this fight a million times easier. A hunter has to mix solid damage and excellent timing as well as a well placed turtle pet to get this baby done but it shows you what you can do when you put your mind to it as a hunter.
Place your pet in a good place, so the dragon is facing away from you of course and then get pew pewing. If you are targeted by breath you need to feign death at the right moment, which seems to be about one third cast, and it will cancel the cast. The second breath you use deterrence to eat it. The third one you can use feign again and then hit readiness right away.
Make sure you have used your rapid fire before the readiness for a little extra damage, which I suggest you do immediately after a breath at some point. Forth breath you FD on again, fifth is deterrence again and sixth is FD once more. You are out of tricks now my hunter friend, so lets hope you did enough damage to kill him in that time. Once you get the timing down it is easy as easy can be but getting that perfect timing on FD takes some work. I wiped at least 20 times before I got the timing down, but then again, I am not really the best solo player, but it sure is still fun. Finesse is where it is at here for hunters.
As you can see, hunters have forever found a way to work around not having healing (or minimal healing) and have still been able to hold their place as one of the best classes in the game to solo content with.
So why don't hunters have a heal?
Because if they had a heal then all that finesse, all that skill, all that knowledge of your tool box would not be as necessary as it is. Being able to heal makes things more forgiving, lets you make a mistake once in a while. It just makes things easier. So even if you do not have the finesse, skill and knowledge, you might be able to do it.
If the hunters had a heal, the people that did know their tool box would be unstoppable. It is because the top end players, the ones that solo the LK would be made so much better by it and the mid level soloing players, like myself that can only solo 85 heroics would now be able to do LK too like the better ones. A heal would also mean that doing the stuff I can currently do would be easier for other hunters that never soloed before. Like the second boss in VP would turn from perfect timing of FD on the breaths to what is big deal being you can heal yourself.
When mists comes it will open whole new doors for hunters with the new items we are getting for our tool box. Iron hawk? That is pure soloing goodness. A heal when you disengage? Beautiful. No minimum range? Thank god that will solve problems. Wyvern sting as marks? You can have it. Readiness as survival? You can have that too.
There is so much coming in mists that the future of soloing looks really good for hunters. Damage reduction, heals and attacking for anywhere will make things much easier. All we have to hope is that our tank pets will still be critical immune and we will be okay.
Hell, who am I kidding, we will be more then okay.
Hunter soloing will be so much easier come mists, the great hunters will get better, the good hunters can finally reach greatness, and the ones that always wanted to try can now have an easier time doing it.
The future of soloing for hunters is looking really bright.
The brightest spots for soloing, as I see them.
- Disengage heal.
- Wyvern for a second CC available to all specs
- Silencing shot available for all specs.
- Ironhawk reducing all damage taken.
- Camo being able to be cast in battle.
- No minimum range.
Soloing (and PvP) for hunters looks like it is heading in a positive direction for mists.
Monday, April 9, 2012
Monday Random Thoughts
- Noblegarden is always a fun holiday event.
- I must say I love being a rabbit while collecting eggs.
- I collected 586 eggs to get my 500 needed for the mount on my main.
- I ended up with so many extra things it was insane.
- On one mage that I was trying to get the poly spell on I got the mount out of an egg.
- They say random is random but sometimes I think the game likes to mess with people.
- The character I wanted it on had to work for it.
- The character I did not want it on was given it super early.
- In my guild about a dozen people have the mount so far.
- Every single one of them found it.
- Five people I talked to not in my guild that have it, found it.
- All the people on my blog roll, found it.
- I had to buy it.
- The game hates me, it really does.
- Reminds me of when I was grinding the baron run.
- Got the super rare epic sword twice in one day, 5 times over all.
- Still never got the mount.
- I'll bet if I were looking for the sword I would have a dozen mounts by now.
- And no sword.
- I like noblegarden because it is one of the best designed holiday events.
- It leaves everything in the players hands if you are willing to put in the effort.
- You get out of it what you put into it, some random number generator love can make it easier of course, but it is not needed, you can still get everything.
- More of the game needs to be designed like that.
- I hate the random number generator.
- Brewfest mounts? Got them on multiple characters.
- Not on my main.
- Headless horseman mount? Got it on multiple characters.
- Not on my main.
- See why I hate the random number generator?
- This is why I love grinds.
- Tell me I have to do something 1000 times to get the mount and I will do it.
- I like to earn things, not be given them just because I am lucky.
- Not saying I do not have luck, just not on my main.
- My shaman wins everything. Even things I do not want.
- The only thing my shaman has hell with is the healing shield in LFR.
- She has lost it twice to a retribution paladin.
- I keep putting tickets in to blizzard, they basically said it is working as intended even if they did not use those exact words.
- I want to know how a retribution paladin getting a +100 roll bonus on a shield with spirit on it is intended.
- 15 tickets about it so far, still no answer.
- Amazing that there are that many incompetent people working at blizzard.
- Would it really be that hard for one of them to say that it was wrong for the paladin to get the roll bonus and they will look into getting it fixed but to not hold my breath.
- Are they not allowed to tell the truth?
- Back to luck, my shaman has it.
- She wins everything when in randoms. Orb? I always win. Lock box? I always win. Gear I need (back when I needed it)? I always win. Gear everyone is disenchanting? I always win.
- My priest is my only character with a four piece set so far.
- If I play her once a month it is a lot.
- So she has some nice luck too.
- She already has the horseman mount and countless other things my main does not have.
- It is just my main I am not lucky with.
- That is one of the reasons I like noblegarden, you can earn everything, if you are willing to put the time and effort into it.
- It is also good because it does not have any part that is like the school of hard knocks.
- Who was the genius over at blizzard that came up with the idea of sending millions of people into battlegrounds that have never PvPed before and then labeling them by making them have a pet out that screams "I am not a PvPer so come farm me for free honor".
- Someone really had a hard on for non PvPers and wanted to make their life hell.
- Achievement Completed!
- That is the bane of existence of many people going for the meta achievement.
- I know of 2 people personally that only need that one thing.
- Reading the forums you will find countless others, that have everything, for at least three years, and still can not get that one.
- Not to mention, that achievement teaches people the wrong way to play the battlegound.
- You force non PvPers into PvP, make them flag themselves as non-PvPers just there for an achievement, and then try to make them do something that will most likely cause them to lose the battlegound.
- Nice way to get non PvPers into PvP blizzard.
- NOT!
- Change the achievement to something like kill 10 of each race of the opposing faction while your orphan is out and it makes it easier to attain.
- It also makes it so that way they might actually learn how to play the battlegound.
- It also makes it so they have a vested interest in doing well and winning instead of focusing only on doing a task that might cause you to lose the game.
- OMG, doing it in a way that might make non-PvPers get interested in PvP.
- How dare I suggest something like that.
- There is one thing that is hard in noblegarden now that there is no central hub.
- Finding horde characters of the female sex over level 18 is not an easy task on my server.
- While my server is close to the 50%/50% break down when it comes to alliance/horde, it seems they do not like dalaran.
- On a horde you could have gotten females of all alliance races within minutes of getting to dalaran.
- I spent hours there on my mage looking for horde females and could not find them.
- Hell, I could not find many horde at all.
- And I know how to get into the horde area as an alliance character.
- There where none in their area either.
- They must have forgot the way to dalaran.
- Or maybe they do not know that there is a port to org in dalaran.
- Dalaran is just a nicer place to be, not sure why everyone is not back there again.
- I sent my mage on an adventure to find horde females.
- Went by the horde egg areas, only brill was easily approachable.
- Heck, I could hang out in brill with no problem.
- If you are a hordie and want to get eggs, go to brill.
- Spent 40 minutes there looking for a female.
- There were a total of 8 players there in 40 minutes time and never more then 4 at one time.
- I did see one undead female, she was only level 8 however.
- I yelled out, get leveling, find eggs later.
- I don't think she understood me.
- Went to molten front.
- Watched the tumble weeds roll by as it was just me and one alliance character in the whole place.
- Went to tol barad, figured people still do those right?
- The sound of the crickets was near deafening.
- I did see three other people there, all alliance.
- The horde must be all eggs hunting or all afraid to leave org.
- I went past the low level areas again and learned one thing.
- Spring rabbits do not care about faction.
- They will mate with anybodies rabbit, they do not care who owns it.
- It was funny hanging out in brill and having my bunny mate with one of the hordes bunnies.
- It was good for a laugh even if it didn't help find any females.
- That would have been a fun part of the meta achievement to add.
- Instead of just one for mating in your areas have one that also makes you bring your bunny to mate in other areas.
- Back to dal and took a chance and put ears on a troll druid that was just floating there in bat form.
- I love the troll druid flight form, best off all flight forms by a long shot.
- Woohoo, female.
- Not like you could tell with the name.
- What ever happened to the good old days where names actually looked like names and they looked male or female.
- I think half the people that create characters now just slam their head on the keyboard and whatever comes up, that is their name.
- If things keep up like this for the horde they are going to go extinct.
- There are no females to perpetuate the species.
- Outside of that one achievement however, which without dalaran as a hub will be a little work, this is the best and easiest holiday event to get the meta achievement for.
- You can get everything you need just from collecting eggs.
- And collecting eggs turns you into a bunny.
- Reason enough to love this event.
- Have a great day, happy hunting.
- I must say I love being a rabbit while collecting eggs.
- I collected 586 eggs to get my 500 needed for the mount on my main.
- I ended up with so many extra things it was insane.
- On one mage that I was trying to get the poly spell on I got the mount out of an egg.
- They say random is random but sometimes I think the game likes to mess with people.
- The character I wanted it on had to work for it.
- The character I did not want it on was given it super early.
- In my guild about a dozen people have the mount so far.
- Every single one of them found it.
- Five people I talked to not in my guild that have it, found it.
- All the people on my blog roll, found it.
- I had to buy it.
- The game hates me, it really does.
- Reminds me of when I was grinding the baron run.
- Got the super rare epic sword twice in one day, 5 times over all.
- Still never got the mount.
- I'll bet if I were looking for the sword I would have a dozen mounts by now.
- And no sword.
- I like noblegarden because it is one of the best designed holiday events.
- It leaves everything in the players hands if you are willing to put in the effort.
- You get out of it what you put into it, some random number generator love can make it easier of course, but it is not needed, you can still get everything.
- More of the game needs to be designed like that.
- I hate the random number generator.
- Brewfest mounts? Got them on multiple characters.
- Not on my main.
- Headless horseman mount? Got it on multiple characters.
- Not on my main.
- See why I hate the random number generator?
- This is why I love grinds.
- Tell me I have to do something 1000 times to get the mount and I will do it.
- I like to earn things, not be given them just because I am lucky.
- Not saying I do not have luck, just not on my main.
- My shaman wins everything. Even things I do not want.
- The only thing my shaman has hell with is the healing shield in LFR.
- She has lost it twice to a retribution paladin.
- I keep putting tickets in to blizzard, they basically said it is working as intended even if they did not use those exact words.
- I want to know how a retribution paladin getting a +100 roll bonus on a shield with spirit on it is intended.
- 15 tickets about it so far, still no answer.
- Amazing that there are that many incompetent people working at blizzard.
- Would it really be that hard for one of them to say that it was wrong for the paladin to get the roll bonus and they will look into getting it fixed but to not hold my breath.
- Are they not allowed to tell the truth?
- Back to luck, my shaman has it.
- She wins everything when in randoms. Orb? I always win. Lock box? I always win. Gear I need (back when I needed it)? I always win. Gear everyone is disenchanting? I always win.
- My priest is my only character with a four piece set so far.
- If I play her once a month it is a lot.
- So she has some nice luck too.
- She already has the horseman mount and countless other things my main does not have.
- It is just my main I am not lucky with.
- That is one of the reasons I like noblegarden, you can earn everything, if you are willing to put the time and effort into it.
- It is also good because it does not have any part that is like the school of hard knocks.
- Who was the genius over at blizzard that came up with the idea of sending millions of people into battlegrounds that have never PvPed before and then labeling them by making them have a pet out that screams "I am not a PvPer so come farm me for free honor".
- Someone really had a hard on for non PvPers and wanted to make their life hell.
- Achievement Completed!
- That is the bane of existence of many people going for the meta achievement.
- I know of 2 people personally that only need that one thing.
- Reading the forums you will find countless others, that have everything, for at least three years, and still can not get that one.
- Not to mention, that achievement teaches people the wrong way to play the battlegound.
- You force non PvPers into PvP, make them flag themselves as non-PvPers just there for an achievement, and then try to make them do something that will most likely cause them to lose the battlegound.
- Nice way to get non PvPers into PvP blizzard.
- NOT!
- Change the achievement to something like kill 10 of each race of the opposing faction while your orphan is out and it makes it easier to attain.
- It also makes it so that way they might actually learn how to play the battlegound.
- It also makes it so they have a vested interest in doing well and winning instead of focusing only on doing a task that might cause you to lose the game.
- OMG, doing it in a way that might make non-PvPers get interested in PvP.
- How dare I suggest something like that.
- There is one thing that is hard in noblegarden now that there is no central hub.
- Finding horde characters of the female sex over level 18 is not an easy task on my server.
- While my server is close to the 50%/50% break down when it comes to alliance/horde, it seems they do not like dalaran.
- On a horde you could have gotten females of all alliance races within minutes of getting to dalaran.
- I spent hours there on my mage looking for horde females and could not find them.
- Hell, I could not find many horde at all.
- And I know how to get into the horde area as an alliance character.
- There where none in their area either.
- They must have forgot the way to dalaran.
- Or maybe they do not know that there is a port to org in dalaran.
- Dalaran is just a nicer place to be, not sure why everyone is not back there again.
- I sent my mage on an adventure to find horde females.
- Went by the horde egg areas, only brill was easily approachable.
- Heck, I could hang out in brill with no problem.
- If you are a hordie and want to get eggs, go to brill.
- Spent 40 minutes there looking for a female.
- There were a total of 8 players there in 40 minutes time and never more then 4 at one time.
- I did see one undead female, she was only level 8 however.
- I yelled out, get leveling, find eggs later.
- I don't think she understood me.
- Went to molten front.
- Watched the tumble weeds roll by as it was just me and one alliance character in the whole place.
- Went to tol barad, figured people still do those right?
- The sound of the crickets was near deafening.
- I did see three other people there, all alliance.
- The horde must be all eggs hunting or all afraid to leave org.
- I went past the low level areas again and learned one thing.
- Spring rabbits do not care about faction.
- They will mate with anybodies rabbit, they do not care who owns it.
- It was funny hanging out in brill and having my bunny mate with one of the hordes bunnies.
- It was good for a laugh even if it didn't help find any females.
- That would have been a fun part of the meta achievement to add.
- Instead of just one for mating in your areas have one that also makes you bring your bunny to mate in other areas.
- Back to dal and took a chance and put ears on a troll druid that was just floating there in bat form.
- I love the troll druid flight form, best off all flight forms by a long shot.
- Woohoo, female.
- Not like you could tell with the name.
- What ever happened to the good old days where names actually looked like names and they looked male or female.
- I think half the people that create characters now just slam their head on the keyboard and whatever comes up, that is their name.
- If things keep up like this for the horde they are going to go extinct.
- There are no females to perpetuate the species.
- Outside of that one achievement however, which without dalaran as a hub will be a little work, this is the best and easiest holiday event to get the meta achievement for.
- You can get everything you need just from collecting eggs.
- And collecting eggs turns you into a bunny.
- Reason enough to love this event.
- Have a great day, happy hunting.
Thursday, April 5, 2012
Remembering My First... Death
When we play games we always have firsts. First time we did this or that or the other thing. Today I had a nice little flack back to the first time I died.
My first character was a hunter, which all these years later is still my main, and as a night elf his life began in the night elf starting area. In the years since then I have leveled maybe 4 or 5 other night elves, one in cataclysm, and I have made an extra effort to not repeat my first death.
For those that ever rolled a night elf they could probably guess where my first death happened. Heck, I am sure a great many night elves had the first death in the same place I did. There were always a nice collection of bones where mine where, that's for sure.
One of the early quests they give you in the night elf area they send you to the top of the tree to turn it in. No real problem heading up the tree. No real problem coming down either really, if you had taken notice that there are gaps in the floor when you walked up.
My first death came right after turning in that quest and heading out of there to run back down. I made a sharp left leaving the room and found a hole between the path and the tree which lead to my little night elf body going airborne. For a short time at least, just before he went splat.
Some times I think back about how lucky I am that I did not have a pet yet. He probably would have called me a loser and abandoned me and told all his fellow beasts of the world that I was a horrible hunter that had two left feet and could not even walk down a flight of stairs without becoming a casualty.
As I mentioned, since that day when I suffered my first death I made sure to not make that sharp left turn out of there and into the hole that lead to my death. Well, I made sure not to fall until cataclysm came.
For those rolling their first night elf now you will be glad to know, or should it be sad to know, you will never have the experience I did.
Upon rolling a recent new night elf hunter that I leveled this expansion (yes another one now at 85) I noticed that when I turned in that quest I got a buff that gave me slow fall for a short time.
Apparently there were so many night elf deaths from doing the same exact thing I did that they decided to make sure these little buggers never fall to their surprise deaths any more.
Like I said, not sure if that is a good thing or a bad thing. It might have been my first death, but it was a right of passage. It was not some meaningless battle death that I will have millions of other times over my game playing career and it is something I'll remember forever and can still get a laugh out of.
I wonder if I petitioned blizzard to remove the buff you get when you turn in that quest with the tag line "let the baby elves die" would they would go for it?
They would probably call me cruel but I would say I just wanted others to experience a first death they would never forget just like I did and not just some random spider or cat or bird that did you in. Blah, what a boring story that would have made.
Hey, at least when I died I died in style. I went splat. Now that is style.
My first character was a hunter, which all these years later is still my main, and as a night elf his life began in the night elf starting area. In the years since then I have leveled maybe 4 or 5 other night elves, one in cataclysm, and I have made an extra effort to not repeat my first death.
For those that ever rolled a night elf they could probably guess where my first death happened. Heck, I am sure a great many night elves had the first death in the same place I did. There were always a nice collection of bones where mine where, that's for sure.
One of the early quests they give you in the night elf area they send you to the top of the tree to turn it in. No real problem heading up the tree. No real problem coming down either really, if you had taken notice that there are gaps in the floor when you walked up.
My first death came right after turning in that quest and heading out of there to run back down. I made a sharp left leaving the room and found a hole between the path and the tree which lead to my little night elf body going airborne. For a short time at least, just before he went splat.
Some times I think back about how lucky I am that I did not have a pet yet. He probably would have called me a loser and abandoned me and told all his fellow beasts of the world that I was a horrible hunter that had two left feet and could not even walk down a flight of stairs without becoming a casualty.
As I mentioned, since that day when I suffered my first death I made sure to not make that sharp left turn out of there and into the hole that lead to my death. Well, I made sure not to fall until cataclysm came.
For those rolling their first night elf now you will be glad to know, or should it be sad to know, you will never have the experience I did.
Upon rolling a recent new night elf hunter that I leveled this expansion (yes another one now at 85) I noticed that when I turned in that quest I got a buff that gave me slow fall for a short time.
Apparently there were so many night elf deaths from doing the same exact thing I did that they decided to make sure these little buggers never fall to their surprise deaths any more.
Like I said, not sure if that is a good thing or a bad thing. It might have been my first death, but it was a right of passage. It was not some meaningless battle death that I will have millions of other times over my game playing career and it is something I'll remember forever and can still get a laugh out of.
I wonder if I petitioned blizzard to remove the buff you get when you turn in that quest with the tag line "let the baby elves die" would they would go for it?
They would probably call me cruel but I would say I just wanted others to experience a first death they would never forget just like I did and not just some random spider or cat or bird that did you in. Blah, what a boring story that would have made.
Hey, at least when I died I died in style. I went splat. Now that is style.
Wednesday, April 4, 2012
Healers are at the Mercy of Everyone Else
While recently talking to someone that has been a long time player that is just getting into healing it made me think back at my starting days of healing. While going over how I started healing it helped me in my effort in giving him some advice.
It came down to 3 simple tips for the beginning healer which I will not expand too much on much being that is not what this article is about.
1) Always carry drinks and drink often.
- Do not count on there being a mage around ever and do not count on people allowing you to sit and drink. Bring a bunch of drinks and sit whenever you get the chance, even if it is only for 5 to 10 seconds. It will help.
2) Speak up.
- A tank or damage dealer saying "I'm trying my best" while not doing well will usually not go over well but in most cases saying that as a healer you get a little slack, as long as you can bank it up with some facts. I'm trying my best but you seem a little squishy tank. I am trying my best but could you please wait for me to drink next time, I went into that pull with no mana and I can't heal without mana. I am trying my best but people are taking too much damage because of avoidable damage or pulling aggro. As long as you are not a jerk about it "I'm trying my best" as a healer can very well be the appropriate response when something goes wrong.
3) Have thick skin.
- When things go right you will be unnoticed many times but when things go wrong the healer usually gets the blame. If you speak up about your own failures, as mentioned in number 2, politely mentioning why you had an issue you might be okay, but you need to be able to take the remarks. It is hard sometimes, you will be called a lot of things after a wipe, some of them might even be new ones. People love to come up with new and interesting ways to insult people.
Also, while leveling, each healing class goes through phases where no matter how good you are you will not be able to keep up. This of course could lead to a lot of harsh remarks aimed at you. Take them all with a grain of salt and take everything, even failure, as a learning experience and try not to let it get to you.
After I got the basics out of the way I started to go into group dynamics and how the group really makes a difference in your healing. This is something most new healers don't seem to understand. It takes some experience before you notice it. I believe people that are meant to be healers, those with the natural ability for it, pick up on this right away but for others it needs to be addressed. It is something that can be taught if only someone points it out for the new healers, so I try to when people ask me about healing.
If you have a good tank that keeps aggro, your healing becomes infinitely easier. If you have a group with great DPS, your healing becomes infinitely easier.
Healers, in effect, are at the mercy of the group around them.
I explained that as a healer your game is not your own. It never will be. While group dynamics work for all classes they are not as heavy for any one role as they are for healers. A group can cover for DPS issues by pulling slower and smaller. It can cover for aggro issues by waiting on the tank. These fixes are usually easier but when it comes to healers, the fixes require people to actually play better and in some cases, even more so with random people, that is not a quick fix and might very well be impossible.
I gave him a few examples.
Example 1 - In the low level world.
When healing on my priest in a low level dungeon I had a bear tank that was going down in a matter of seconds every single pull. It resulted in wipe after wipe after wipe. The tank of course blamed me, remember what I said about thick skin. He said all I need to do is use heal and he would be fine. I said I don't think so because he is taking way to much damage but I will try it.
He made his next pull and I started casting a heal after putting a shield on him as he was running in, he was dead before the heal landed. He took so much damage it broke the shield and killed him in less then the 3 seconds it takes to cast heal at that level. We wiped, I said, heal has a three second cast, you can not last 3 seconds, told you heal would not work but you wanted to try it so don't blame this wipe on me. Remember what I said about speaking up right? The group was firmly on my side there. The tank pulled again as soon as we were back in and then dropped group. A warrior in the group switched to defensive and tanked them and I kept the warrior up no problem. We got a new tank and never had any problems.
I said to him, see what I mean. While to someone that did not know better it would look like it was all my fault for the tank dying in the end it was just a squishy tank. At low levels without a lot of tools, you can only do so much. Do your best and hope for a good group. A good group means no problems and a bad one means wipe after wipe. Just like that one run showed. 6 wipes with a bad tank, none with a good tank or a DPS warrior tanking. The group makes a huge difference when it comes to healing.
Example 2 - In the max level world
When the expansion first came out I had one hell of a hard time healing on my priest because they where iffy until they got some good gear. My first ever dungeon was an all guild run of deadmines and I had no problem what so ever. I was left to ask how is everyone having so many problems healing. I had heard nightmares about healing deadmines and we walked through and one shot everything. Sure we needed to watch our pulls and CC when we could but it was no problem at all. I thought everyone was exaggerating the difficultly of healing heroics. That was until I tried to do it as a random.
After a few runs with guild and no real healing issues outside of being OOM every three seconds it seemed I thought I would do some randoms and realized why I love guild runs so much. The same deadmines where I had no issues with people that where all in the 335 item level range I could not heal it in a random, with the buff, and people in all 345 item level plus. It was near impossible. No one waited for me to drink. No one used CC. No one interrupted. No one avoided the avoidable. No one watched their aggro. No one did anything and I could not heal it. It was impossible. I tried and tried. I did not give up, that is not my style, I do not give up that easily. I took it as a challenge. Being I have experience healing I knew I was at the mercy of others but in a way it was a great way to learn the harder aspects of healing, by challenging myself in a situation that was near impossible. We lost a few people here and there and got some new ones, as the bad ones left and better ones came we finally made our way through there.
Basically, I was at the mercy of the players. They needed to get better or I would have never been able to do my job. Once better players, even slightly better ones, came in I was able to finish the run. My ability never changed over the course of the run. I did not suddenly get better. The group did by changing people. The people around me dictated the difficulty level I had as a healer.
As an even better example of dungeon runs being dictated by the other players as opposed to the healer would be when the Zuls first came out. I healed them probably 100 times each on my healers and I saw all types of groups but the perfect example of being at the mercy of others are death knight tanks.
If I got a group with a death knight tank it was hit or miss. If they knew how to tank, it was a cake walk. Heck, the first bear run I healed was with a DK tank that I never needed to sit and drink once while healing. Yet another DK tank I had, in better gear than the bear run tank, I had to sit and drink every pull. No exaggeration there at all. I had to drink after trash pulls, boss pulls, even minor pulls, the tank took way to much damage. If it where not for the fact I was in raid gear it might have turned into a wipe fest. If I where a fresh 346 geared healer getting in there it would have been impossible. The tanks ability directly effected my healing and I am 100% certain that a 346 healer, even with amazing skills, could not have kept him up.
Once again, healers are at the mercy of everyone else around them.
Example 3 - In the raid world.
- In my guild we can usually count on people doing the right thing and doing it well. The tanks hold aggro and the DPS can all throw out 30K+. Even the DPS having a bad day can still muster 25K+. Healing a raid with them in no problem what so ever. I can finish quite a few of the fights at or near full mana. I am not kidding. The ability of the damage dealers to make the fight faster makes a world of difference. You can use your expensive heals more often, because you know the fight will not drag on and mana issues will not come up. Heck, you can use your mana regeneration abilities sooner too so you stay at full mana because timing them for the perfect moment is not imperative.
Now go into the same raid a different way. For fun we decided to take a group of undergeared, pvp wearing, lesser skilled guild members in there just to get them some experience and some gear. We knew we would never get past the 5th boss, but for people that are not raiders and not that skilled, it was a good chance to teach them and get them some gear. Not to mention, being we lack 2 lockouts now it just gave us something to do, which was good enough reason.
The DPS that topped the charts was 15K and it was usually me, tanking. Everyone ranged between 12K-15K which with the 15% debuff to the bosses meant we might have a prayer of getting a few bosses down. But that is when the healing problem popped up. The fights where taking forever. Healers were screaming for mana. It was becoming a major issue on every fight. It really put the pressure on them. Heck, it put the pressure on me too as a tank. I had gotten so used to the tanks and one or even two DPS staying on the slime boss the whole time because they where not needed. I don't even recall what the enrage timer was, heck, I did not even remember there was one. We had one wipe sub 1%, to the enrage timer. Doesn't that suck? How the healers managed to get us that far was a testament to their skill and ability, the fight should have never went that far. But when you have 2 DPS that are still not even geared enough to get into Zuls, we didn't do so bad but the example serves the purpose to show that the DPS that is being put out makes a huge difference. We had many wipes that night that just came down the healers running OOM. Word to the wise, you can not two heal anything other then the first boss when your top DPS is the tank.
Once again, the ability of others have the healers at their mercy.
The ability of other healers can make a difference too.
I was in a looking for raid the other week where there was four shaman healers for the second half. I laughed and said, this is going to be a cake walk. After the raid was over I said I had never had an easier job healing in my life. Keep riptide and shield on the tank with the occasional heal and keep healing rain on the ground and no worries. With all those fights being stack up and 4 healing raids always on the ground, there was never a need to emergency heal anyone. It was a cake walk.
I try to enjoy those moments because it is not always like that. I've also been stuck three healing many of the bosses because tanks pull without seeing if everyone is there or because some people just can't heal. On the rare occasion (twice) I have actually seen shadow priests labeled as healers and when they were asked about it they said they signed up as a healer because it was a quick queue and six healers really aren't needed. While that might be true, I gladly kicked them when the vote came up. If you want to DPS from the healer role as a priest, roll atonement discipline, not shadow.
Every step of your healing life you will always be at the mercy of others. Your job will always be directly connected to the ability of those around you. Healing is super easy in a good group and is the hardest role in the game with a bad one.
When doing randoms you get more then a random dungeon as a healer, you get a random experience of how hard or easy it will be.
As a tank you walk in knowing how you will tank it. As a damage dealer you walk in knowing how you will do your rotation. As a healer you walk in only knowing you have to heal. You have no clue what challenges await you because as a healer you are at the mercy of everyone else.
It came down to 3 simple tips for the beginning healer which I will not expand too much on much being that is not what this article is about.
1) Always carry drinks and drink often.
- Do not count on there being a mage around ever and do not count on people allowing you to sit and drink. Bring a bunch of drinks and sit whenever you get the chance, even if it is only for 5 to 10 seconds. It will help.
2) Speak up.
- A tank or damage dealer saying "I'm trying my best" while not doing well will usually not go over well but in most cases saying that as a healer you get a little slack, as long as you can bank it up with some facts. I'm trying my best but you seem a little squishy tank. I am trying my best but could you please wait for me to drink next time, I went into that pull with no mana and I can't heal without mana. I am trying my best but people are taking too much damage because of avoidable damage or pulling aggro. As long as you are not a jerk about it "I'm trying my best" as a healer can very well be the appropriate response when something goes wrong.
3) Have thick skin.
- When things go right you will be unnoticed many times but when things go wrong the healer usually gets the blame. If you speak up about your own failures, as mentioned in number 2, politely mentioning why you had an issue you might be okay, but you need to be able to take the remarks. It is hard sometimes, you will be called a lot of things after a wipe, some of them might even be new ones. People love to come up with new and interesting ways to insult people.
Also, while leveling, each healing class goes through phases where no matter how good you are you will not be able to keep up. This of course could lead to a lot of harsh remarks aimed at you. Take them all with a grain of salt and take everything, even failure, as a learning experience and try not to let it get to you.
After I got the basics out of the way I started to go into group dynamics and how the group really makes a difference in your healing. This is something most new healers don't seem to understand. It takes some experience before you notice it. I believe people that are meant to be healers, those with the natural ability for it, pick up on this right away but for others it needs to be addressed. It is something that can be taught if only someone points it out for the new healers, so I try to when people ask me about healing.
If you have a good tank that keeps aggro, your healing becomes infinitely easier. If you have a group with great DPS, your healing becomes infinitely easier.
Healers, in effect, are at the mercy of the group around them.
I explained that as a healer your game is not your own. It never will be. While group dynamics work for all classes they are not as heavy for any one role as they are for healers. A group can cover for DPS issues by pulling slower and smaller. It can cover for aggro issues by waiting on the tank. These fixes are usually easier but when it comes to healers, the fixes require people to actually play better and in some cases, even more so with random people, that is not a quick fix and might very well be impossible.
I gave him a few examples.
Example 1 - In the low level world.
When healing on my priest in a low level dungeon I had a bear tank that was going down in a matter of seconds every single pull. It resulted in wipe after wipe after wipe. The tank of course blamed me, remember what I said about thick skin. He said all I need to do is use heal and he would be fine. I said I don't think so because he is taking way to much damage but I will try it.
He made his next pull and I started casting a heal after putting a shield on him as he was running in, he was dead before the heal landed. He took so much damage it broke the shield and killed him in less then the 3 seconds it takes to cast heal at that level. We wiped, I said, heal has a three second cast, you can not last 3 seconds, told you heal would not work but you wanted to try it so don't blame this wipe on me. Remember what I said about speaking up right? The group was firmly on my side there. The tank pulled again as soon as we were back in and then dropped group. A warrior in the group switched to defensive and tanked them and I kept the warrior up no problem. We got a new tank and never had any problems.
I said to him, see what I mean. While to someone that did not know better it would look like it was all my fault for the tank dying in the end it was just a squishy tank. At low levels without a lot of tools, you can only do so much. Do your best and hope for a good group. A good group means no problems and a bad one means wipe after wipe. Just like that one run showed. 6 wipes with a bad tank, none with a good tank or a DPS warrior tanking. The group makes a huge difference when it comes to healing.
Example 2 - In the max level world
When the expansion first came out I had one hell of a hard time healing on my priest because they where iffy until they got some good gear. My first ever dungeon was an all guild run of deadmines and I had no problem what so ever. I was left to ask how is everyone having so many problems healing. I had heard nightmares about healing deadmines and we walked through and one shot everything. Sure we needed to watch our pulls and CC when we could but it was no problem at all. I thought everyone was exaggerating the difficultly of healing heroics. That was until I tried to do it as a random.
After a few runs with guild and no real healing issues outside of being OOM every three seconds it seemed I thought I would do some randoms and realized why I love guild runs so much. The same deadmines where I had no issues with people that where all in the 335 item level range I could not heal it in a random, with the buff, and people in all 345 item level plus. It was near impossible. No one waited for me to drink. No one used CC. No one interrupted. No one avoided the avoidable. No one watched their aggro. No one did anything and I could not heal it. It was impossible. I tried and tried. I did not give up, that is not my style, I do not give up that easily. I took it as a challenge. Being I have experience healing I knew I was at the mercy of others but in a way it was a great way to learn the harder aspects of healing, by challenging myself in a situation that was near impossible. We lost a few people here and there and got some new ones, as the bad ones left and better ones came we finally made our way through there.
Basically, I was at the mercy of the players. They needed to get better or I would have never been able to do my job. Once better players, even slightly better ones, came in I was able to finish the run. My ability never changed over the course of the run. I did not suddenly get better. The group did by changing people. The people around me dictated the difficulty level I had as a healer.
As an even better example of dungeon runs being dictated by the other players as opposed to the healer would be when the Zuls first came out. I healed them probably 100 times each on my healers and I saw all types of groups but the perfect example of being at the mercy of others are death knight tanks.
If I got a group with a death knight tank it was hit or miss. If they knew how to tank, it was a cake walk. Heck, the first bear run I healed was with a DK tank that I never needed to sit and drink once while healing. Yet another DK tank I had, in better gear than the bear run tank, I had to sit and drink every pull. No exaggeration there at all. I had to drink after trash pulls, boss pulls, even minor pulls, the tank took way to much damage. If it where not for the fact I was in raid gear it might have turned into a wipe fest. If I where a fresh 346 geared healer getting in there it would have been impossible. The tanks ability directly effected my healing and I am 100% certain that a 346 healer, even with amazing skills, could not have kept him up.
Once again, healers are at the mercy of everyone else around them.
Example 3 - In the raid world.
- In my guild we can usually count on people doing the right thing and doing it well. The tanks hold aggro and the DPS can all throw out 30K+. Even the DPS having a bad day can still muster 25K+. Healing a raid with them in no problem what so ever. I can finish quite a few of the fights at or near full mana. I am not kidding. The ability of the damage dealers to make the fight faster makes a world of difference. You can use your expensive heals more often, because you know the fight will not drag on and mana issues will not come up. Heck, you can use your mana regeneration abilities sooner too so you stay at full mana because timing them for the perfect moment is not imperative.
Now go into the same raid a different way. For fun we decided to take a group of undergeared, pvp wearing, lesser skilled guild members in there just to get them some experience and some gear. We knew we would never get past the 5th boss, but for people that are not raiders and not that skilled, it was a good chance to teach them and get them some gear. Not to mention, being we lack 2 lockouts now it just gave us something to do, which was good enough reason.
The DPS that topped the charts was 15K and it was usually me, tanking. Everyone ranged between 12K-15K which with the 15% debuff to the bosses meant we might have a prayer of getting a few bosses down. But that is when the healing problem popped up. The fights where taking forever. Healers were screaming for mana. It was becoming a major issue on every fight. It really put the pressure on them. Heck, it put the pressure on me too as a tank. I had gotten so used to the tanks and one or even two DPS staying on the slime boss the whole time because they where not needed. I don't even recall what the enrage timer was, heck, I did not even remember there was one. We had one wipe sub 1%, to the enrage timer. Doesn't that suck? How the healers managed to get us that far was a testament to their skill and ability, the fight should have never went that far. But when you have 2 DPS that are still not even geared enough to get into Zuls, we didn't do so bad but the example serves the purpose to show that the DPS that is being put out makes a huge difference. We had many wipes that night that just came down the healers running OOM. Word to the wise, you can not two heal anything other then the first boss when your top DPS is the tank.
Once again, the ability of others have the healers at their mercy.
The ability of other healers can make a difference too.
I was in a looking for raid the other week where there was four shaman healers for the second half. I laughed and said, this is going to be a cake walk. After the raid was over I said I had never had an easier job healing in my life. Keep riptide and shield on the tank with the occasional heal and keep healing rain on the ground and no worries. With all those fights being stack up and 4 healing raids always on the ground, there was never a need to emergency heal anyone. It was a cake walk.
I try to enjoy those moments because it is not always like that. I've also been stuck three healing many of the bosses because tanks pull without seeing if everyone is there or because some people just can't heal. On the rare occasion (twice) I have actually seen shadow priests labeled as healers and when they were asked about it they said they signed up as a healer because it was a quick queue and six healers really aren't needed. While that might be true, I gladly kicked them when the vote came up. If you want to DPS from the healer role as a priest, roll atonement discipline, not shadow.
Every step of your healing life you will always be at the mercy of others. Your job will always be directly connected to the ability of those around you. Healing is super easy in a good group and is the hardest role in the game with a bad one.
When doing randoms you get more then a random dungeon as a healer, you get a random experience of how hard or easy it will be.
As a tank you walk in knowing how you will tank it. As a damage dealer you walk in knowing how you will do your rotation. As a healer you walk in only knowing you have to heal. You have no clue what challenges await you because as a healer you are at the mercy of everyone else.
Monday, April 2, 2012
Monday Random Thoughts
- I wonder if you can kill nef in phase 2.
- Maybe now that we over gear it so much we might go back and try it for fun.
- Does anyone else think it is a little off that many guilds, mine included, are doing DS heroic that never did T11 heroics.
- Yes, even with the gear we have now we have never done T11 heroics.
- Dragon soul is a nice little instance but I can't help but think it really should have been broken into two or three 5 mans.
- Well of eternity should have been a raid.
- Look at that place, it is amazing, it is beautiful, it is well designed, it had a lot of time and love put into it.
- Look at DS and compare.
- Please continue reading when you are finished laughing at how bad the DS design is compared to well.
- Are you done yet?
- Did the darkmoon monthly's on my baby druid yesterday and gained a full level.
- I think they give just a tad to much experience.
- Tad being a huge understatement.
- I would do them for the 5 free skill points even if they had almost no experience.
- Was it really necessary to have them award so much?
- I have a few characters on other servers I never play. I am thinking of logging into them once a month just to do those.
- I can at least gain a level here and there with them for all of 15 minutes work.
- It would feel like cheating, maybe I won't.
- What is black and white and red all over?
- A battleground 1 day after mists is released.
- You giggled, admit it.
- Got to love those panda tails.
- I can already hear all the improper jokes being said on vent.
- I'm thinking that we might end up with a patch raid even if blizzard said we where not going to.
- What will it be?
- Hopefully something more well design and less dragon soul design.
- If the end game raid of cataclysm is set in wrath do you think we will have a raid in mists set in cataclysm?
- Who am I to speak, I wanted to see the final fight of cataclysm set in BC.
- It would have made more sense in my opinion, that is where all the seeds started to grow in the DW story line.
- What little there was of it that is.
- How come when I attack a bear it can parry me but when my bear is tanking it can't?
- My bear, the smart bear, the druid bear, can't figure out how to parry but some beast in the wilderness can?
- Attacked a mob yesterday while leveling on my new bear/cat and jumped behind him and mangled only to see him parry.
- Parry, from behind?
- These low level mobs are amazing, they can do things that can't be done anywhere else in game.
- If we ever run into a wild bear boss we are up shits creek without a paddle.
- They can parry.
- From behind too.
- A friend was talking about his new shield on a plate tank and I said I just got a new shield too for my bear.
- He said, bears can't use shields.
- I said, yes they can, we just call them helmets.
- Speaking of bears, mine finally got the 4 piece set.
- Sadly all raid finder.
- Heck, even with a 380 item level before the 4 piece and before the 15% buff my bear was capable of tanking DS no problem.
- Didn't do the last fight back then, but did tank up to and including spine at that level before the buff.
- Don't tell that to people on my server.
- They would call me a liar, you need at least a 395 item level to even step into DS normal.
- Yes, they are that bad on my server.
- Saw a pug assembled on my server by an ex guild mate that had the person with the lowest item level of 394 not get past the first boss.
- I am not kidding.
- He spend nearly 6 hours in trade assembling, reassembling, trying to get more, going back and forth, and finally after a total of 8 hours spent on a DS raid only had the first boss down.
- Welcome to my server.
- Not everyone is that bad, that is just the worst example.
- For fun and so we can all laugh at him.
- Hey, I will give him some credit, at least he tried to assemble a pug.
- Stuff like that never happens on my server.
- On my server if you are not in a raiding guild, you don't raid, simple as that.
- Yes, even with the easy as cake DS.
- Yes, even with the 15% buff.
- Yes, even if you can basically 6 or 7 man the first 4 bosses.
- My server is just not very pug friendly.
- It reminds me of some of the funny lines I have heard in LFR.
- No no, I can't tell you now, that would ruin a great post to come.
- Check out my old fun lines from randoms if you want a taste of whats to come.
- Linkage here.
- Well, on that humorous note, I'm out of here.
- Have a great day.
- Maybe now that we over gear it so much we might go back and try it for fun.
- Does anyone else think it is a little off that many guilds, mine included, are doing DS heroic that never did T11 heroics.
- Yes, even with the gear we have now we have never done T11 heroics.
- Dragon soul is a nice little instance but I can't help but think it really should have been broken into two or three 5 mans.
- Well of eternity should have been a raid.
- Look at that place, it is amazing, it is beautiful, it is well designed, it had a lot of time and love put into it.
- Look at DS and compare.
- Please continue reading when you are finished laughing at how bad the DS design is compared to well.
- Are you done yet?
- Did the darkmoon monthly's on my baby druid yesterday and gained a full level.
- I think they give just a tad to much experience.
- Tad being a huge understatement.
- I would do them for the 5 free skill points even if they had almost no experience.
- Was it really necessary to have them award so much?
- I have a few characters on other servers I never play. I am thinking of logging into them once a month just to do those.
- I can at least gain a level here and there with them for all of 15 minutes work.
- It would feel like cheating, maybe I won't.
- What is black and white and red all over?
- A battleground 1 day after mists is released.
- You giggled, admit it.
- Got to love those panda tails.
- I can already hear all the improper jokes being said on vent.
- I'm thinking that we might end up with a patch raid even if blizzard said we where not going to.
- What will it be?
- Hopefully something more well design and less dragon soul design.
- If the end game raid of cataclysm is set in wrath do you think we will have a raid in mists set in cataclysm?
- Who am I to speak, I wanted to see the final fight of cataclysm set in BC.
- It would have made more sense in my opinion, that is where all the seeds started to grow in the DW story line.
- What little there was of it that is.
- How come when I attack a bear it can parry me but when my bear is tanking it can't?
- My bear, the smart bear, the druid bear, can't figure out how to parry but some beast in the wilderness can?
- Attacked a mob yesterday while leveling on my new bear/cat and jumped behind him and mangled only to see him parry.
- Parry, from behind?
- These low level mobs are amazing, they can do things that can't be done anywhere else in game.
- If we ever run into a wild bear boss we are up shits creek without a paddle.
- They can parry.
- From behind too.
- A friend was talking about his new shield on a plate tank and I said I just got a new shield too for my bear.
- He said, bears can't use shields.
- I said, yes they can, we just call them helmets.
- Speaking of bears, mine finally got the 4 piece set.
- Sadly all raid finder.
- Heck, even with a 380 item level before the 4 piece and before the 15% buff my bear was capable of tanking DS no problem.
- Didn't do the last fight back then, but did tank up to and including spine at that level before the buff.
- Don't tell that to people on my server.
- They would call me a liar, you need at least a 395 item level to even step into DS normal.
- Yes, they are that bad on my server.
- Saw a pug assembled on my server by an ex guild mate that had the person with the lowest item level of 394 not get past the first boss.
- I am not kidding.
- He spend nearly 6 hours in trade assembling, reassembling, trying to get more, going back and forth, and finally after a total of 8 hours spent on a DS raid only had the first boss down.
- Welcome to my server.
- Not everyone is that bad, that is just the worst example.
- For fun and so we can all laugh at him.
- Hey, I will give him some credit, at least he tried to assemble a pug.
- Stuff like that never happens on my server.
- On my server if you are not in a raiding guild, you don't raid, simple as that.
- Yes, even with the easy as cake DS.
- Yes, even with the 15% buff.
- Yes, even if you can basically 6 or 7 man the first 4 bosses.
- My server is just not very pug friendly.
- It reminds me of some of the funny lines I have heard in LFR.
- No no, I can't tell you now, that would ruin a great post to come.
- Check out my old fun lines from randoms if you want a taste of whats to come.
- Linkage here.
- Well, on that humorous note, I'm out of here.
- Have a great day.
Sunday, April 1, 2012
Character Copy Hitting Live in Mists
I am not completely sure about how I feel about this one. The ability to copy your character over to beta is something I would consider necessary for testing purposes but being able to copy characters from one server to another on live might be pushing it a little too far.
This is one of those subjects where I am sure we will end up hearing a lot of debate and as usual I have my own opinions on it, for better or worse.
Biggest Pro:
Now I can basically copy my main character, gear, achievements, everything, to another server. No longer would it become an issue of I don't want to leave my friends behind just for a shot at a heroic raiding guild or something. Pay my fee, make a copy, and my character is still with my friends and a perfect copy of him is ready to do some heroic raiding on another server.
Biggest Con:
I like leveling, I really do. No matter how much I like leveling however I can't help but believe I would be tempted to just copy a character instead of leveling another one, depending on what the price would be of course. Like the priest I am leveling on another server in a guild of someone I met from blogging. I would have just copied my priest there and been done with it. If I did that, I would have lost two very big things. One, something to do. Leveling takes some time even if not much and it can be a fun way to pass the time and do something different. Two, the chance to get to know the people a little better. While leveling I can talk to them and get to know them as opposed to just saying, oh, you need a priest, poof, here is one all geared and ready to go.
Some questions I have about the system have popped up and I hope to see them answered soon. I know it might be a while being it was just announced but it doesn't mean I don't want to know now.
How much will it cost?
If it is going to be something like 25 dollars then it would be something I would seriously consider. However, I can't see them making it too cheap or it would really remove the leveling process completely for people like me that have one of every class at max level.
How much of what we own will be copied?
Our equipped gear will be copied as will our history in terms of achievements, mounts, pets and such but will everything in our bags be copied as well. If that is the case I can see this being abused, BIG TIME. Even more so if the cost of doing it is very cheap. Fill your bags with the most expensive stuff you can find. Copy it for 25 bucks. Sell off everything. Instant millionaire in WoW money without even trying. There has to be a limit put on what is copied or I see this being abused.
What about Professions?
Another thing that can be abused by someone willing to spend some real life money. Make a few copies of transmute masters and you can start rolling in the gold. This might be harder to moderate. I can see them saying that no items that are not soulbound will be copied, but they can't just say that professions will not be copied. This would surely make it less valuable.
Is this the first step into other controversial pay services to come?
Is class change really that far behind. This might be a horse of a different color being if I max a hunter and copy a hunter I would hopefully know how to play a hunter but what is the next step further. Because I have one maxed character then any character I want I can pay to be maxed as well? I hope it never gets this far. I can support making a copy of what you already have but not making something you don't.
How would this effect the high end of the game?
World first raiding guild could copy and make perfect teams. Copy and make duplicates so one run they gear up the mage another run they gear up the paladin, another run they gear up the priest, etc. Then just delete the carry characters that where there just to give them an extra lock out so to speak. If they are willing to spend money, and I believe they would be, this could completely change the face of heroic raiding for world and server first guilds.
Over all I would say I support this idea. I like the idea that I can make a copy of my main character anywhere I want. I do hold some reservations however because no matter what the good end might be I can see so much bad coming from this as well.
What are your thoughts on the character copy becoming something we can do on live in mists?
This is one of those subjects where I am sure we will end up hearing a lot of debate and as usual I have my own opinions on it, for better or worse.
Biggest Pro:
Now I can basically copy my main character, gear, achievements, everything, to another server. No longer would it become an issue of I don't want to leave my friends behind just for a shot at a heroic raiding guild or something. Pay my fee, make a copy, and my character is still with my friends and a perfect copy of him is ready to do some heroic raiding on another server.
Biggest Con:
I like leveling, I really do. No matter how much I like leveling however I can't help but believe I would be tempted to just copy a character instead of leveling another one, depending on what the price would be of course. Like the priest I am leveling on another server in a guild of someone I met from blogging. I would have just copied my priest there and been done with it. If I did that, I would have lost two very big things. One, something to do. Leveling takes some time even if not much and it can be a fun way to pass the time and do something different. Two, the chance to get to know the people a little better. While leveling I can talk to them and get to know them as opposed to just saying, oh, you need a priest, poof, here is one all geared and ready to go.
Some questions I have about the system have popped up and I hope to see them answered soon. I know it might be a while being it was just announced but it doesn't mean I don't want to know now.
How much will it cost?
If it is going to be something like 25 dollars then it would be something I would seriously consider. However, I can't see them making it too cheap or it would really remove the leveling process completely for people like me that have one of every class at max level.
How much of what we own will be copied?
Our equipped gear will be copied as will our history in terms of achievements, mounts, pets and such but will everything in our bags be copied as well. If that is the case I can see this being abused, BIG TIME. Even more so if the cost of doing it is very cheap. Fill your bags with the most expensive stuff you can find. Copy it for 25 bucks. Sell off everything. Instant millionaire in WoW money without even trying. There has to be a limit put on what is copied or I see this being abused.
What about Professions?
Another thing that can be abused by someone willing to spend some real life money. Make a few copies of transmute masters and you can start rolling in the gold. This might be harder to moderate. I can see them saying that no items that are not soulbound will be copied, but they can't just say that professions will not be copied. This would surely make it less valuable.
Is this the first step into other controversial pay services to come?
Is class change really that far behind. This might be a horse of a different color being if I max a hunter and copy a hunter I would hopefully know how to play a hunter but what is the next step further. Because I have one maxed character then any character I want I can pay to be maxed as well? I hope it never gets this far. I can support making a copy of what you already have but not making something you don't.
How would this effect the high end of the game?
World first raiding guild could copy and make perfect teams. Copy and make duplicates so one run they gear up the mage another run they gear up the paladin, another run they gear up the priest, etc. Then just delete the carry characters that where there just to give them an extra lock out so to speak. If they are willing to spend money, and I believe they would be, this could completely change the face of heroic raiding for world and server first guilds.
Over all I would say I support this idea. I like the idea that I can make a copy of my main character anywhere I want. I do hold some reservations however because no matter what the good end might be I can see so much bad coming from this as well.
What are your thoughts on the character copy becoming something we can do on live in mists?
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