Monday Random Thoughts

- How come it takes longer to herb and mine on herbalists and miners than unskilled players at your garrison?

- The cast time for someone with the skill is 3.2 seconds and for someone without it is 3.0 seconds.

- I know 0.2 seconds is really nothing in the grand scheme of things but it makes no sense.

- Shouldn't someone that naturally has the skill be better at it than someone that doesn't?

- I managed to snag my SS vs TM win this weekend on my first attempt.

- Color me surprised with the alliance actually winning a battleground.

- But all the thanks goes to one person in there that knew what he was doing and took the lead.

- Thank you kind random stranger for making my SS vs TM experience fantastic.

- He said for no one to move, let the horde come to us.

- We, for the most part, listened.

- Horde took the early lead, he told everyone to be calm and stick to the plan.

- We, for the most part, listened.

- We fought the horde in SS and were losing, starting to lose by a fair margin even.

- Then he called out to start pushing the horde back.

- Told us not to lose faith, just push the horde back.

- And we did, we pushed them all the way back to TM with 3 minutes left but were still losing.

- At the two minute mark when we had completely decimated the horde and the score was near tied he called for us to pull back.

- We set down food, rebuffed, and all went in with hero and all our cooldowns blazing.

- With 30 seconds left horde was still up by a very small 9 point margin.

- Then, as if it was being read from prophecy, the score started to skyrocket for alliance and the battleground ended with us winning by nearly 100 points.

- Perfect timing, perfect leadership and people listened to an attack plan.

- I must have entered the twilight zone because this was not the alliance I remember doing battlegrounds with.

- It does fit what everyone that has done it has told me about it.

- Whoever is winning when it starts, always loses.

- And now that I see it in action I know why that is.

- Once the losing team pushes back it is only a matter of time before they overtake the team that was winning because the team that was winning is worth more points per kill.

- So it is a flip strategy.

- Let them build up numbers, become worth more, get a false sense of security, and then pick them off at the end when they are not expecting it.

- Funny thing is, how could anyone not expect it as long as it has been out now.

- I had never done it and I knew how to win it, so anyone doing it surely had to know how it was run.

- Made me wonder, what if both factions just sat at their bases waiting for the other to come.

- Would it be a tie?

- Nah, it would become a who flinches first thing.

- Or the horde would win because they would get 2 or 3 points just from the, at least, one person alliance side that would refuse to work with the battle plan.

- Either way, it was really fun.

- So once again I want to thank the unknown solider for his battlefield leadership, it was greatly appreciated and made the battleground fun.

- Must say I have to love barrage in battlegrounds.

- When we did that one last push with all the horde stacked together and multiple DKs with their army, a few hunters with stampede and other minions, players and NPCs all there, my barrage was massive.

- There were numbers everywhere, it was pure awesome slaughter as my barrage tore thru them.

- Fun fun fun I tell you.

- This weekend I was doing a normal run for some people and a person who was an issue a week before showing up drunk to raid and being a jerk over all asked for an invitation.

- Do I need to tell you that I said no?

- He asked why.

- I told him, last week you left the group because "we will never down it" so this week you can sit out and watch us down it again.

- I don't need drunks, negative people, people acting stupid and / or people saying stupid things.

- If you don't like it, leave.

- Speaking of leaving we had someone rage quit the guild this weekend because someone did not give him a 50K BoE piece they had.

- Seriously, someone got a world drop BoE and asked if there were any raiders that needed it in guild.

- He was not asking for gold, we do not work that way in guild, we help each other.

- So he decided to give it to someone on the regular raid team instead of someone else that said they wanted it that was not a raider.

- So that person rage quit because it was not given to him.

- Lets look at the facts here for a moment.

- The person that found the world drop was a raider.

- He gave it to a raider which helps them and in turn helps himself by making the raid team stronger.

- This other person has been in the guild roughly six months.

- He has never raided with us, he has never done PvP with us, he has never done dungeons with us, he has never offered to be helpful or make anyone gems or enchants when someone in guild asked if someone could make them, he has never offered to help anyone.

- He was basically just a social gamer, in the guild for the sake of being in a guild.

- We might know his name from logging in and out, but no one actually knew him because he never, or rarely, even talked in guild or joined in any content or conversations.

- Yet for some reason he felt he "deserved" the world drop someone else got more than someone on the raid team and rage quit the guild because the guy did not give it to him.

- Good riddance.

- How dare you have the balls to expect someone to give you something like that when they do not even know you.

- And then get upset because they didn't.

- Heck, even if one of the raiders needed it and he gave it to another raider they would have no reason to be upset, it is theirs to give to whomever they want to.

- They could have just sold it on the auction house and made 50K gold.

- They did not even need to offer it to anyone.

- The sense of entitlement from people is incredible.

- Just because you said you wanted it does not mean someone should give it to you.

- I told the person that got the world drop that next time he gets someone like that and he wants to see if anyone on the raid team needs it, to wait until raid night and ask on voice chat.

- Asking people in guild makes some people think it is meant for them, even if you did mention you wanted to know if any of the raiders need it.

- That would be like me being on my horde hunter and someone posting in guild if anyone wanted the lucky double sized coin.

- Would I want it?  Yes.

- Would I ever in a million years even ask for it knowing I rarely am on that character and when I do I am usually pugging and not raiding with the guild?  Hell no.

- I wonder about people sometimes.

- If you were in a guild that you never really did anything with or even talked with much in guild chat would you expect someone to give you a 50K item just because you said you could use it?

- I think not.

- The balls on that guy to expect it over a raider and then to rage quit over him not getting it are incredible.

- Funny part is, if none of the raiders needed the piece, the guy would have given it to him.

- Yeap, he would have given a 50K item to someone in the guild even if he did not know them just because they were a guild member.

- He is really cool that way.

- Maybe he just has not been around as long as I have.

- I've become jaded.

- So many times after all these years I have seen us gear someone up just to see them leave.

- Two expansion ago, new lock joins us saying he does not have much gear.

- I see what he can do on two test runs, and he has skill, just needs gear.

- So we funnel gear to him for the next two runs and people pass for him so he can catch up.

- Then he leaves guild so he can join a more progressed guild because now that he has better gear they want him.

- I've been used so many times in this game I really am distrustful of people.

- No one likes feeling used.  I sure as hell don't.

- Once you see that as often as I have you learn never to trust anyone.

- There is no honor in the game.

- I've been feeling a little off about the game lately.

- I plan to make a post about it soon.

- It has nothing to do with content, game play, or in game design.

- Just something... off.

- I will try to explain some other day.

- Looking for groups the other day I noticed something I want to see added to the group finder which should be easy enough to add.

- Server type.

- Some servers I know if they are PvE or PvP servers, but why can't it just post what type of server it is next to it.

- So you know what you are zoning into.

- I do not mind zoning on to a PvP server, but it is nice to know that it will be a PvP server before hand.

- I put in a suggestion for it saying that instead of saying the group is being formed by Bob on servername it should say Bob on servername-pve.

- Should be easy to add.

- I put in another suggestion I doubt will ever happen.

- Go back to the way the group finder was before.

- I wasted over an hour of my life yesterday and never found a group I felt like joining.

- So many trash runs to weed my way through.

- So many runs listed by people with things like "don't suck" as a description, which is a turn off to joining that group because you already know the guy leading it is a complete douchebag.

- So many runs looking for me to do special duty like on braken when all I am looking for is a quick kill in a pug and not looking to do flamethrowers.

- Sure I can do them, I do them in guild, but there are days I want to do the grunt work and days I just want to sit back and pew pew, I was in a pew pew mood.

- So many runs that were past the bosses I wanted, but otherwise looked good.

- So many runs that looked like I might fit with them, but they only needed a tank or healer.

- Either way, I wasted so much time trying to find a group and gave up without ever even hitting the join group button once.

- I want the old way where I list my name, say what I want, and I can go about and do things on my own.

- Let the people come to me.

- After all, they need me, I don't need them.

- I wanted to run to do something because I was bored and I am always willing to practice my craft as a hunter to get better.

- So I do not need the kills, they need me.

- So why do I need to waste my time seeking them out.

- They should have to come to me.

- That is why I like the old way of doing it where I list what I am looking for and people can come to me.

- Not sure why we can not have it both ways.

- So people that want to look for a group and find a group and click join, while people like myself who would rather go out soloing or reputation grinding or what not can keep busy while someone finds me.

- I am sure that suggestion will not happen, but I can see the server type on being added.

- How hard could it be to add a -pve or -pvp after a server name?

- Not sure why it is not like that to begin with.

- Speaking of the group finder, it is completely broken.

- I swear people make groups just to troll people.

- My hunter is 660 and gets turned down for world bosses over and over.

- Seriously.

- But it goes to show you how badly people need tanks and healers.

- My tanks, regardless of item level and healers, regardless of item level, get instant invites to most stuff just because they are tanks or healers.

- I saw one posting asking for healers, any healers, item level does not matter.

- I joked many years back in a post saying if you want to play warcraft roll a healer, but it is not really a joke.

- It is the truth.

- I can not see me healing much this expansion, mana issues are insane.

- Was doing an LFR on my shaman and looking at the other healers I was wondering how the hell everyone is staying at full mana when I am always oom.

- Either I am doing someone horribly wrong or perhaps the reason I was always oom was because I was the only one really healing.

- Then looking at the healing list I see myself 3rd of 5 healers with two disc priests ahead of me.

- Both of them pulling more heals than I am, not buy much but still more, and at near full mana when I am oom after every single pull.

- This is not fun, not at all.

- So unless they fix mana regeneration a hell of a lot, or it gets much better once I have a few pieces with spirit on them that are not 602 item level, I wil not be healing this expansion at all.

- My bear feels better now that I have it up to 650 and it can take a hit or two before crumbling.

- But I still feel super squishy and very dependent on my healers.

- I don't like feeling that weak, it is not a good feeling as the tank.

- As a tank I should always feel as if "I got this" even if my healer is lacking but on my bear it feels like if my healer is lacking, I don't got this.

- So no healing for me this expansion, no tanking for me this expansion and while I am getting really comfortable with MM finally, I am not liking hunters much this expansion, at least not for raiding.

- So I am left, an elf without a class.

- I guess I will just stick to soloing content and achievement hunting that I can do solo.

- Maybe blizzard can fix healers, with a little more mana regeneration and fix tanks, with a little more self healing, and fix hunters so they feel more like hunters again.

- The fact the cast time on my hunter is longer than the cast times on my casters is insane and needs to be fixed.

- All other classes can jump off a bridge as far as I am concerned.

- I want to play a hunter, I don't want to play anything else.

- Looked at shadow priest DPS over an icy veins and was like WTF?

- This thing reads like stereo instructions.

- I feel like I am reading code, not reading a rotation.

- If this than that but only if this and this and then this instead of that but if this is over 3 and that is less than 2 do this instead.

- Excuse me, could you say that again in english.

- Sorry to whomever wrong the shadow priest article on ivy veins but I have to ask them one question, is this your first guide?

- It has to be, because no one can write a guide that good and that knowledgeable and that in depth and have it be all over the place and expect someone that is not already well versed in the class and how it works to ever pick it up.

- If the person had some guide writing experience they would know that for a guide intended to be used by everyone, including instant boost 90s that just started, it should be written in a simple format and not like advanced code with all the ifs.

- I'd like to consider myself a mildly knowledgeable player and it took me what felt like forever to even find what I should be doing in that jumble of instructions.

- The thing is, if you do not play a shadow priest, what you do depends on what talents you choose and it completely changes the priority of abilities.

- Some talents should not be used if other talents are being used.

- In the guide it seems to try to make one rotation with ifs for everything.

- I think it would have been better designed if they did three completely different rotation priorities instead of trying to bunch them all into one.

- Treat it as three different specs and list the talents needed for each spec.

- Then have the dot version, the dot-less, and the dot light version.

- As it is now they are all listed in the same place and I can easily see how someone that does not know a little about shadow priest to begin with being totally lost.

- Like I said, it took me a while and I knew exactly what I was looking for, the dot-less version.

- I hated that it was cluttered with giving me information I did not need because it was mixed with the other versions.

- I really think for everyone and even more so new players they should treat all three types of shadow priest DPS as individual specs.

- It would sure as hell be easier than trying to pick and choose what you need out of the nested collection of its and buts that the guide is now.

- As it is written I think it would be easier for someone to learn to theory crafting from the beginning and figure it out on their own than trying to read that and understand what is being talked about.

- Have to use the kiss method.

- Keep it simple, stupid.

- Just tell people what is best.

- All those ifs turn what should be a very simple priority into what sounds like an extremely complex one.

- Just my opinion at least.

- I prefer being told straight out what is best, and even why it is best.

- Then once I have an understanding of it I move into the ifs and try to maximize.

- But saying that cast spell A if you took talent C in row T and talent H in row X but if you took talent I in row X cast B but if you took talent D in row T and H then you do spell A2 instead but only if resource Z is over 3. But if you took talent B and Y in their respective rows just remove this step because it is no longer second in priority but seventh.

- See what I mean.

- If there were three different ways ways the rotation could work don't you think it would be better to just show three different rotations than each step looking like that?

- So why was I looking at shadow priest DPS you might ask?

- It was the first DPS proving grounds I had any problem with getting silver.

- So I looked it up afterwards in an effort to try to get better.

- Took me three ties to do it on my priest.

- I was 604 item level at the time, so a little under the 610 minimum it requires, but still should have one shot it.

- I was standing too close to someone I froze in amber and it froze me too.

- I ended up losing with the last mob having like 1% health left.

- If I had not got frozen I would have one shot it.

- Second try I have no clue what I screwed up, but I know I screwed up bad because I did not even make it to the 8th round.

- Got it on the third try.

- But after that was done and as easy as I had it on the other classes, I decided I needed to do a little research on shadow DPS because I suck at it.

- On a lark I decided to try the healing proving grounds even though I did not even have one piece of gear with spirit on it.

- I've always been a better healer on my priest than I was a damage dealer.

- Heck, I never even played shadow until mists and even then I only used it for leveling and questing.

- So without any healing gear I went after bronze and it was hard but I managed.

- Then I went after silver, monitoring my healing as insanely tight as possible.

- I let people sit low sometimes because I had to conserve.

- With some smart choices on what to heal, when to heal it, and basically keeping away from any over healing what so ever as I had no mana regen for that crap I found myself reaching the last round on fumes.

- I made it there and I wanted to finish it.

- My heart was pumping fast with adrenaline waiting on mana and then deciding to cast something as soon as I could or to wait until I could cast something that might be better for me when I had more mana.

- As it turns out I made all the right choices every step of the way.

- 604 item level, no spirit gear what so ever, and a silver healing on the first try.

- Yeah, as I said, I have always been a better healer than I was a damage dealer on my priest.

- It was exciting doing the proving grounds healing challenge with no spirit gear at all.

- But my next challenge would be even more exciting.

- Tanking silver here I come.

- Bronze was a joke.

- Silver stopped me dead in my tracks however.

- Nope, not do to mana issues, I just could not heal past the damage in round 8.

- Too many mobs were up at one point and I started to fall behind healing.

- I only tried it twice, died in round 8 twice, both times with only two mobs left up.

- I know if I pushed it and kept trying I could have done it.

- But I feel it would be easier with some bigger heals, or at least some faster ones.

- It was fun to try however.

- I actually think the tank trial was easier on my healer than it was on my tanks.

- If my healer did damage like my tank did I am sure I would have been able to do tank gold on a healer at the rate it was going.

- Did molten core again for a shot at the pet, I really want the pet.

- Why did I do that?

- Really if you want to lose faith in humanity and learn to hate the game, run molten core.

- It has to be the single worst experience ever in the history of the game.

- I think I am going to go to one of those websites and just buy the thing with real cash.

- It is not worth wasting in game gold on, at least not at my servers prices.

- So if I end up getting banned in the new future you will know exactly what it was for.

- For buying tiny from one of those websites.

- And there is no one to blame for that but blizzard themselves.

- If they made the game, more so MC, enjoyable, I would not feel the need to go outside the game to get tiny.

- But because they made MC hell and the worst gaming experience of my entire life without a doubt, it is either subject myself to hell, way over pay for it on the auction house, or buy it with some real cash.

- So there is only one real option, buy it with cash.

- I just can not do MC again, ever, not with this player base.

- Thanks blizzard, you gave me a damn good reason to break the ToS.

- Congratulations?

- Have a great day.