Thursday (16 Jun) - Home Sweet Home

Thursday (16 Jun) - Home Sweet Home

We are home. Happy has had the run of the place for more than a month, and is content with his efforts to build up the Wild Family coffers to cover what will likely be a lot of pent up demand.

There is even a little bit of news to impart.

Two nights ago JB was making some potions for Lao. When she came in game a couple of guildies said Hi, including the guild leader (GL) who was on one of his many alts. He said, "Hi Jezzi!" I answered back, and, recalling that this was the original day I was supposed to be back, I figured he thought I was home. So JB commented back in guild chat, "I'm not really here yet, I'm somewhere in Arizona at the moment - we got delayed, but should be back by Thursday." That got a puzzled response from the GL, asking "Are you on vacation or something?" Hmm, maybe he didn't realize who JB was?

I whispered the GL, this time, telling him "This is Wildshard." There was a long pause while he digested that. It turned out that he thought he was playing his alliance character, and in that guild there is an alliance toon with JB's name he calls Jezzi.

Once we got that straightened out the GL had some guild news to pass along - most of it bad. Wild's Friday raid group with MM is comatose. The raid leader and tank, Fn, took time off to spend more time with his family and was not raiding. One of the healers, Fl, quit the game and is gone. Two other regulars have simply stopped showing up for reasons unknown, including Rs, one of Wild's cabal friends and the other tank. With Wild also out, that left only five regulars available - but it also left them with no tanks and only one of three needed healers. No wonder they weren't raiding.

Sort of on the positive side, the GL was very excited that his regular Saturday raid has been very successful. They are working Blackwing Descent, and last week they downed their fifth boss, leaving them to challenge the final boss, Nefarian. That was exciting! But when I later peeked at the guild's Achievements, it showed only two of six bosses downed. So the raid is led by the MM guild, but most of the raiders in it are not from MM. Go figure. They raid on Saturday, so that won't be one Wild can run.

As for MM2, they have also not made any further raiding progress as far as I can tell since Wild left on vacation. At the time MM2, with Wild, had just downed Conclave of the Wind in Thrones - but nothing else since. Maybe it's time the two guilds considered reuniting - the split does not seem to have helped either guild progress.

Additionally, I was very surprised when looking at the member status of the two guilds. When MM fractured into two guilds on 1 March, the new MM2 guild started with 20 level 85s to MM's 116 (after the exodus). A week later MM's number of 85s dwindled again to 98, while MM2's swelled to 43. Things seemed to settle a bit after that, but what Wild didn't realize was that the trend set in March has continued into June.

As of 16 Jun, MM has 80 level 85s, a loss of 56 level 85 guildies since the split. MM2, starting with no 85s until the initial 20 jumped to MM2, now has 112 level 85s. It appears that MM is fading, while MM2 is at least still attracting new members. Gah.

Speaking of guilds, there is some exciting news to report, too! And for that, Wild will turn things over to Lao, who has found a much better plan for her future than joining Wild's struggling MM guild. Here's the story in her own words:

"Lao has been a bit bored, she has been fishing and killing Alliance to pass her time. Which are a very similar events, except one takes up more bag space. Then the idea hit her, she can infiltrate the Alliance and gather intelligence. Sure she would have to deal with their holier-than-thou honor and airs, but the intell gathered could be very vital to the Horde cause. No more lost BGs, and Tol Barad would be controlled by the Horde at all times! The beauty of the idea made Lao very excited, she even had to un-fog her goggles.

So last night she knew she had to find a shady character to smuggle her across both servers (so no one on hers would recognize her and blow her cover) and factions. But since the goblins came off their island and have now flooded Org, that was not an issue. So after a few hours, a few exchanging of credits, and dealing with goblin odor (they smell a bit like moldy toads), it occurred. It was a bit tricky, but she settled on a disguise as a gnome, since the blood elf and gnome weigh the same.

So in the early hours of the morning a new innocuous looking girl showed up in Iron Forge named Teagreen, and she sent out a letter to someone she identified that might be a sucker to let in and let her infiltration begin."

So it appears that Lao, in disguise, has changed her faction, her server, and even her name for the glory of the Horde! I hope this shady character she speaks of treats her well and never suspects the life that "Teagreen" once led. Best of luck and hopefully there will come some raiding stories to tell.

So far I had not yet actually logged into the game since our return home. So I was very shocked when I finally had a chance to power up the computer and log in to WoW. Everything was fine - except something didn't seem right. Then it hit me. I had logged in as usual, but the login process never asked me for my authenticator code. It logged me in without it.

I don't know what to think about that. I've logged in at a lot of places over the past month and always had to use my authenticator to get access. Suddenly, at home, it's not required. Needless to say, I am not logging on from home until Blizzard figures this thing out. I did put in a trouble ticket. So I still can't play the game, and even Happy is now out of luck until this is resolved. Sigh.