Thursday (28 Mar) - Playing "What If . . ."
The Strat-O-Matic computer game can be played in a lot of different ways, from manually playing the game batter by batter to auto-playing entire seasons in a few minutes. It has huge flexibility. Over the past few days I've put in a lot of work getting the Reality and Promise leagues ready to go for the start of the 2013 baseball season. The two leagues are ready to go. So . . . why not run a test simulation now? I could play the entire seasons of the two leagues to make sure that everything is truly ready to go. That would just be an excuse, though. I'm just really curious to see what the outcome would be. I'm still going to play out the season day by day. The auto-play would just give me another data point for comparison. The only funky thing is that I have to use the 2012 schedule of games. Which means that the Houston Astros will be playing a National League schedule of games even though the team is now in the American League. It probably helps the Padres a small amount - the Astros are about the only team that is worse than the Padres. I'm also not sure how the computer handles auto-playing inter-league games. Since inter-league play has been around awhile, I assume the computer manager knows when to use a designated hitter (DH) and when not to.
So . . . of course I auto-played the two leagues. Here is the result:
Reality League Autoplay Results:
W-L Place GB BA ERA Runs
Reality 84-78 3rd 10.0 .243 BA 3.69 ERA 667 runs
This is reality! This is reality? First of all, it is stunning to see the San Diego Padres pull off a winning season! Ok, so they were ten games out with Arizona (94-68) winning the division and SanFran (91-71) taking second and earning a wild card spot.
So, who came forward to lead these Padres to victory? I'll get to that. One team stat that jumped out at me, though, is the terrible home record (38-43). On the positive side, they gutted out a lot of one run games (36-25). That Houston Street must be one heck of a closer, right? Let's see. Street did have a solid season (5-4, 30 saves, 1.65 ERA). Tops among the starting pitching was Edinson Volquez (15-9, 3.63 ERA). At the other end of the curve was Tim Stauffer (8-15, 4.64). Chase Headley (.268 BA, 38 HRs, 124 RBIs) was awesome, playing all 162 games. Injury prone slugger Carlos Quentin (.248, 14 HRs, 38 RBIs) played only 119 games. Rookie Yasman Grandal, he of the 50 games suspension, didn't do that well (.263, 7 HRs, 32 RBIs, 93 games) but then he's a rookie. And Jed Gyorko? Ah, well (.219, 7 HRs, 22 RBI, 85 games). If this season had been real, Miguel Cabrera (.331, 41 HRs, 123 RBIs) would win another MVP, Justin Verlander (19-7, 2.64 ERA) would win the Cy Young, and Cinncinati's Aroldis Chapman (2-1, 41 saves, 1.19 ERA) would win the Rolaids Relief with his 14.2 Ks per 9 innings. That guy can throw!
Now for the Promise League results. Shouldn't the Padres do even better? Here's the results:
Autoplay Results:
W-L Place GB BA ERA Runs
Promise 80-82 4th 10.0 .249 BA 3.81 ERA 688 runs
Reality 84-78 3rd 10.0 .243 BA 3.69 ERA 667 runs
Well, given that it's a simulation, I'd call that a statistical tie. The Promise team had a home winning record this time (43-38) but failed in one run games (20-30). Did Street stub his toe? He did. Street logged only 11 outings during the season, getting just 8 saves. Lou Gregerson picked up some of the slack with 18 saves. Headley (.278, 26 HRs, 90 RBIs) played 160 games. Quentin (.259, 7 Hrs, 27 RBIs) played in only 99 games, but he shared outfield time with Kyle Blanks, who hit .315 with 12 HRs in 79 games. If only he would do that in real life!
As of Saturday morning, Kyle Blanks was sent to the minors to get some at bats. Tyson Ross made the roster as the fifth starter (Ross is the pitcher I saw play in Peoria). I hope Ross does well, even though his prior major league experience was terrible, which will be reflected in both the Reality and Promise leagues.
It will certainly be interesting to see if the team can reach 80 wins. The real life team, with all those injuries, has their work cut out for them.
Saturday, March 30, 2013
Thursday, March 28, 2013
Wednesday (27 Mar) - Buffy The Baseball Cat
Wednesday (27 Mar) - Buffy The Baseball Cat
A few days ago a cat took up residence in our backyard. In a very bad sign of things to come, Judi has already given him/her a name, Buffy. The cat is pale cream in color with some darker spots on it's face. It looks a whole lot like a paler version of our cat, Jonesie. Last night it peered longingly at our entranced cats on the other side of the patio door. This can't be happening. Who told the feline neighborhood that soon a new enclosed patio would be open for business at our house?
It is a very wary cat. It immediately jumps the fence the minute it sees anyone. But it always comes back. It likes our yard. The problem is that our own cats have gotten used to being able to go in our backyard for a few hours a day. With a stray cat around, that becomes a problem. We're canvassing the neighborhood to see if the cat belongs to someone. If that doesn't work we'll try to trap it and at least have the vet check it in case it has feline leukemia or something else that could infect our cats. After that ... I don't want to think about it.
Let's talk about baseball, instead. In the last post I mentioned how grueling it would be to modify the 2012 rosters of each team to match the rosters of the 2013 teams. I really did intend to just go with the 2012 rosters. But then I got to tinkering, and, well, the process was as grueling as I thought it would be - but it's done. All thirty teams now have 2013 rosters, or as close as I could get to them. There are still a few days before the season starts, but I'm not going to try and keep up with last minute changes, unless there is some big trade or something. And once the season starts, I'll lock down the rosters. Trying to match the daily transactions of thirty teams during the real season is more than I want to manage.
I used a layered approach in setting up the rosters. I start with the team's active roster; ie, those players who have already made the team and are on the 25 man roster. Most teams haven't finalized that, yet, even this close to the start of the season, so not all 25 are listed yet. The next layer is to take a look at the 40 man roster. Obviously, only some of those players will make the 25 man roster, but all of those players have some commitment to the team, so I can use them to fill holes. I also check the 40 man roster because that's where players on the disabled list (DL) show up. All those on the DL will be magically cured at the start of my league, so they automatically get added to the roster. I'll even go back another year, to 2011 stats, if a player missed all or most of the 2012 season due to injury. The Yankees Mariano Rivera is one such player. Finally, I check the list of non-roster invitees. These are players not under contract, but who are hoping to catch on with the team. For the most part I take veteran players from that list as a buffer against the rookies with little experience. I don't want to have some rookie who hit .400 in 25 ABs playing 160 games. I can't stop that completely, but I can mitigate it.
The San Diego Padres get scrubbed even tighter, since I know a lot more about our players than players on the other teams. And I get to be creative in the Promise league, where I'll give the Padres every chance for success. In some respects I don't really help them that much. Almost the entire lineup of the Padres improved between 2011 and 2012, and that roster is almost completely intact in 2013. A few players do get some help by using their 2011 stats: Kyle Blanks (back up 1B), James Darnell (utility infielder), Jesus Guzman (utility outfielder), Nick Hundley (C), Cameron Maybin (CF), Cory Luebkle (SP, was on DL), Tim Stauffer (SP, was on DL). On a 25 man roster, only two in the lineup and two starting pitchers got that favorable treatment. I did make one other adjustment. Jed Gyorko is an all star rookie who made the big league roster and is expected to stick with the team. He has never played in the majors, but I expect he will get a lot of playing time in 2013. In the simulation, maybe not so much, because a healthy Chase Headley (3B) and Logan Forsythe (2B) will eat into Gyorko's ABs. Still, I decided to "guess" what his stats would look like, based on his stellar minor league stats and how that would play out in the majors. Gyorko averaged a .319 BA in three minor league seasons, including hitting .328 at AAA Tucson. The computer game has a feature that will let me create stats for Gyorko and add him to the team, which I've done. I pegged him for a .262 BA and around 20 HRs (if he were a regular), with modest fielding ability at 2B and 3B.
The computer manager (CM) sets up the lineups, pitching rotations, and closer for the teams. I do a quick check: did the CM do something stupid, like bench Miguel Cabrera against right handers; did the CM put a player in the lineup that is listed as a minor leaguer; did the CM leave a lineup slot unfilled; are there five starting pitchers assigned to the rotation. Things like that. In general, everything is satisfactory and there aren't many problems. Now, I do have one beef with the CM, though it's a personal preference issue. The CM only knows one way to make up a lineup. It almost always chooses players with the most ABs, assuming they are the regulars, even if a better, less used player is available. That's often the real life situation, not just stats, so I understand the choices. The beef is that the CM also ascribes to the strategy that the lead off hitter must be someone who can steal bases. Again, in real life, there are a lot of major league managers who follow that strategy to the letter. The Detroit Tiger's lead off with Omar Infante, who is a decent base stealer, but has only average speed and does not get on base nearly enough to be leading off. Better choices would be Torii Hunter or Austin Jackson, two terrific hitters with speed. That would be my strategy. But the CM (and Detroit manager Jim Leyland) follow the same old tired strategy managers have used since the turn of the century before last. Of course, Leyland has been around almost that long. On MY Tigers team, Austin Jackson leads off.
Finally, I want to go over how player game time is managed. In a simulation, I could just make every starter play every game, but that would not be very realistic. So a means to manage that is in place. In most cases these computer enforced rules apply to both the Reality and Promise leagues. The one exception is injuries - injuries can occur in the Reality league, but not in the Promise league.
Lineups - The CM will periodically rest starting players players during the season, which gives backups a chance to start. This does not apply to starting pitchers. A starting pitcher will only miss a start if he became fatigued after his last start.
Overall Playing Time - I can set this one of three ways: no restrictions, limit "overusage" and totally control overusage. I have set it to limit overusage. The best way to describe what this does it to use an example: With no restrictions, that player with the .400 BA in 25 ABs could be put in the lineup and nothing would stop him from getting 500+ ABs. That would not be realistic. With total restrictions, the CM would completely shut down players who had reached their max ABs or innings pitched. Also not realistic. The limit option gives bench players more opportunities to play, but will also allow players to exceed their AB/IP limits. The limit option most closely follows what real managers try to do.
Minor Leagues - A player placed in the minor leagues still appears on the roster, but will not be used in game except when "called up." The CM might do that to temporarily replace an injured player. This is used mostly when there is a hard rule on the size of rosters, and won't come into play here, but it's a nice feature to have available. I could put Gyorko in the minors, for example, and then call him up to the bigs if Headley got hurt. That sort of thing.
Four Man Pitching Rotations - SOM still maintains a setting that allows certain pitchers to start every four days, instead of the usual five. In order to be consistent with past seasons going back to the 1800s, there are many pitchers who have never, ever, pitched in a four man rotation that are rated for it. I made sure that every team pitches on a five man rotation. In today's baseball, starting on just three days rest is very rarely done, and never on a regular basis.
I think that's it. The season starts in four days. I'll explain the day to day management of the leagues when the opening day games are played.
A few days ago a cat took up residence in our backyard. In a very bad sign of things to come, Judi has already given him/her a name, Buffy. The cat is pale cream in color with some darker spots on it's face. It looks a whole lot like a paler version of our cat, Jonesie. Last night it peered longingly at our entranced cats on the other side of the patio door. This can't be happening. Who told the feline neighborhood that soon a new enclosed patio would be open for business at our house?
It is a very wary cat. It immediately jumps the fence the minute it sees anyone. But it always comes back. It likes our yard. The problem is that our own cats have gotten used to being able to go in our backyard for a few hours a day. With a stray cat around, that becomes a problem. We're canvassing the neighborhood to see if the cat belongs to someone. If that doesn't work we'll try to trap it and at least have the vet check it in case it has feline leukemia or something else that could infect our cats. After that ... I don't want to think about it.
Let's talk about baseball, instead. In the last post I mentioned how grueling it would be to modify the 2012 rosters of each team to match the rosters of the 2013 teams. I really did intend to just go with the 2012 rosters. But then I got to tinkering, and, well, the process was as grueling as I thought it would be - but it's done. All thirty teams now have 2013 rosters, or as close as I could get to them. There are still a few days before the season starts, but I'm not going to try and keep up with last minute changes, unless there is some big trade or something. And once the season starts, I'll lock down the rosters. Trying to match the daily transactions of thirty teams during the real season is more than I want to manage.
I used a layered approach in setting up the rosters. I start with the team's active roster; ie, those players who have already made the team and are on the 25 man roster. Most teams haven't finalized that, yet, even this close to the start of the season, so not all 25 are listed yet. The next layer is to take a look at the 40 man roster. Obviously, only some of those players will make the 25 man roster, but all of those players have some commitment to the team, so I can use them to fill holes. I also check the 40 man roster because that's where players on the disabled list (DL) show up. All those on the DL will be magically cured at the start of my league, so they automatically get added to the roster. I'll even go back another year, to 2011 stats, if a player missed all or most of the 2012 season due to injury. The Yankees Mariano Rivera is one such player. Finally, I check the list of non-roster invitees. These are players not under contract, but who are hoping to catch on with the team. For the most part I take veteran players from that list as a buffer against the rookies with little experience. I don't want to have some rookie who hit .400 in 25 ABs playing 160 games. I can't stop that completely, but I can mitigate it.
The San Diego Padres get scrubbed even tighter, since I know a lot more about our players than players on the other teams. And I get to be creative in the Promise league, where I'll give the Padres every chance for success. In some respects I don't really help them that much. Almost the entire lineup of the Padres improved between 2011 and 2012, and that roster is almost completely intact in 2013. A few players do get some help by using their 2011 stats: Kyle Blanks (back up 1B), James Darnell (utility infielder), Jesus Guzman (utility outfielder), Nick Hundley (C), Cameron Maybin (CF), Cory Luebkle (SP, was on DL), Tim Stauffer (SP, was on DL). On a 25 man roster, only two in the lineup and two starting pitchers got that favorable treatment. I did make one other adjustment. Jed Gyorko is an all star rookie who made the big league roster and is expected to stick with the team. He has never played in the majors, but I expect he will get a lot of playing time in 2013. In the simulation, maybe not so much, because a healthy Chase Headley (3B) and Logan Forsythe (2B) will eat into Gyorko's ABs. Still, I decided to "guess" what his stats would look like, based on his stellar minor league stats and how that would play out in the majors. Gyorko averaged a .319 BA in three minor league seasons, including hitting .328 at AAA Tucson. The computer game has a feature that will let me create stats for Gyorko and add him to the team, which I've done. I pegged him for a .262 BA and around 20 HRs (if he were a regular), with modest fielding ability at 2B and 3B.
The computer manager (CM) sets up the lineups, pitching rotations, and closer for the teams. I do a quick check: did the CM do something stupid, like bench Miguel Cabrera against right handers; did the CM put a player in the lineup that is listed as a minor leaguer; did the CM leave a lineup slot unfilled; are there five starting pitchers assigned to the rotation. Things like that. In general, everything is satisfactory and there aren't many problems. Now, I do have one beef with the CM, though it's a personal preference issue. The CM only knows one way to make up a lineup. It almost always chooses players with the most ABs, assuming they are the regulars, even if a better, less used player is available. That's often the real life situation, not just stats, so I understand the choices. The beef is that the CM also ascribes to the strategy that the lead off hitter must be someone who can steal bases. Again, in real life, there are a lot of major league managers who follow that strategy to the letter. The Detroit Tiger's lead off with Omar Infante, who is a decent base stealer, but has only average speed and does not get on base nearly enough to be leading off. Better choices would be Torii Hunter or Austin Jackson, two terrific hitters with speed. That would be my strategy. But the CM (and Detroit manager Jim Leyland) follow the same old tired strategy managers have used since the turn of the century before last. Of course, Leyland has been around almost that long. On MY Tigers team, Austin Jackson leads off.
Finally, I want to go over how player game time is managed. In a simulation, I could just make every starter play every game, but that would not be very realistic. So a means to manage that is in place. In most cases these computer enforced rules apply to both the Reality and Promise leagues. The one exception is injuries - injuries can occur in the Reality league, but not in the Promise league.
Lineups - The CM will periodically rest starting players players during the season, which gives backups a chance to start. This does not apply to starting pitchers. A starting pitcher will only miss a start if he became fatigued after his last start.
Overall Playing Time - I can set this one of three ways: no restrictions, limit "overusage" and totally control overusage. I have set it to limit overusage. The best way to describe what this does it to use an example: With no restrictions, that player with the .400 BA in 25 ABs could be put in the lineup and nothing would stop him from getting 500+ ABs. That would not be realistic. With total restrictions, the CM would completely shut down players who had reached their max ABs or innings pitched. Also not realistic. The limit option gives bench players more opportunities to play, but will also allow players to exceed their AB/IP limits. The limit option most closely follows what real managers try to do.
Minor Leagues - A player placed in the minor leagues still appears on the roster, but will not be used in game except when "called up." The CM might do that to temporarily replace an injured player. This is used mostly when there is a hard rule on the size of rosters, and won't come into play here, but it's a nice feature to have available. I could put Gyorko in the minors, for example, and then call him up to the bigs if Headley got hurt. That sort of thing.
Four Man Pitching Rotations - SOM still maintains a setting that allows certain pitchers to start every four days, instead of the usual five. In order to be consistent with past seasons going back to the 1800s, there are many pitchers who have never, ever, pitched in a four man rotation that are rated for it. I made sure that every team pitches on a five man rotation. In today's baseball, starting on just three days rest is very rarely done, and never on a regular basis.
I think that's it. The season starts in four days. I'll explain the day to day management of the leagues when the opening day games are played.
Tuesday, March 26, 2013
Monday (25 Mar) - The Reality and Promise Leagues
Monday (25 Mar) - The Reality and Promise Leagues
I have devised my own kind of fantasy league for the baseball season this year using a baseball simulation program/game called Strat-O-Matic (SOM). This is the same game that the Sporting News used when it established it's online baseball simulation game, which SOM later took over when the Sporting News dropped it.
The computer based game takes the actual statistics of every major league baseball player for each season and builds game cards representing the players. Unlike most computer baseball games, which are more like pinball where the person playing actually swings a bat and throws pitches, in SOM the person playing is more like an owner and manager. Team rosters are identified, lineups and pitching rotations are assigned, bullpens set, etc. Teams play out the games batter by batter, with the ability to make in game decisions at every step of the way. The only thing that isn't controlled by the person playing the game is the actual outcome. That is handled by the simulation. When it comes time to throw a pitch and swing a bat, the computer determines (based on the actual statistics) what the outcome is - a home run, strike out, fly ball out, steal a base, etc. Every decision on a real baseball diamond can be played out in the game.
Here's what I want to do. Every day, once the baseball season starts, I will check the newspaper for the results of the games played the previous day. Using SOM, I will schedule games that match those played on that day. I'll then play those games and record the results. Over the course of the season I'll be able to compare how the actual 2013 team (and each player) is doing versus what the simulation is coming up with. And I'll be doing it twice. More on that in a minute.
There are some inescapable checks on reality. First, the simulation is based on the actual statistics from the 2012 season. I already know that the wonderful season Chase Headley had in 2012 won't be duplicated in 2013 - Headley is hurt and won't be playing for several weeks. That's reality.
Second, it is possible but incredibly time consuming for one person to manage the day to day games of all thirty teams. SOM has an answer for that, too. It's called the computer manager: A simulated manager to manage simulated games. I still have to set the lineups and the pitching rotations, but the computer manager makes the in game decisions.
Now, back to doing the simulation twice. Three versions of the 2013 season will be played out.
#1: The actual results of the actual play of the 2013 season. This is the "control" team, if you will. This is what really happens this season.
#2: The Reality League. I'll be using the statistics from the 2012 season. The San Diego Padres roster will be based on the actual 2013 team composition. For each game I will use the lineup and starting pitcher that for the actual game played that day. I will also use the actual lineup and starting pitcher of the opponent on that day.
#3: The Promise League. The Padres roster remains the same. However, I call this the "promise" league because I base it on the rosy outlook of spring training that promises everyone is healthy and at their peak. As an example, let's talk about catcher Nick Hundley.In the Reality League Hundley hit an abysmal .157 in 2012. In the Promise league, however, I'm hoping he'll return to being the solid catcher and hitter he used to be. Therefore, I'm using his 2011 statistics, when he hit .288. In this league I don't have to use the actual lineup and starting pitcher, either. And Chase Headley is not hurt.
The overall idea is to compare what really happens this season with what the 2012 teams, using the 2013 rosters, might have done over a full season, and what the team would have done if every player performed at their best.
The most significant caveat to all this is that it is too hard to build current 2013 opening day rosters for all of the other 29 teams. I've done that in the past, and it's grueling. What I will do, though, is adjust rosters and lineups for the team that the Padres are playing that day, and keep the changed rosters in tact for future games. In that way the other fourteen National League teams will, over the course of the season, look more like the 2013 rosters. I'll even make adjustments for the American League teams that play the Padres.
Other issues - One thing I don't have a lot of control over in the simulation is injuries. I can't simply assign a player as injured. I also can't make a player "uninjured" once he's been injured, which is a more serious issue. Things that I can do: I can remove the player from the roster, or assign him to the minor leagues. Neither are perfect solutions. My other option is to turn off the injury feature, and all injuries will be ignored. I intend to turn off injuries and use the minor leagues to attempt to control players who should not be playing. I'll see how that goes. More important is to make sure that players who should be playing get to play.
It won't be a perfect simulation, but I'm really looking forward to seeing how things turn out.
I have devised my own kind of fantasy league for the baseball season this year using a baseball simulation program/game called Strat-O-Matic (SOM). This is the same game that the Sporting News used when it established it's online baseball simulation game, which SOM later took over when the Sporting News dropped it.
The computer based game takes the actual statistics of every major league baseball player for each season and builds game cards representing the players. Unlike most computer baseball games, which are more like pinball where the person playing actually swings a bat and throws pitches, in SOM the person playing is more like an owner and manager. Team rosters are identified, lineups and pitching rotations are assigned, bullpens set, etc. Teams play out the games batter by batter, with the ability to make in game decisions at every step of the way. The only thing that isn't controlled by the person playing the game is the actual outcome. That is handled by the simulation. When it comes time to throw a pitch and swing a bat, the computer determines (based on the actual statistics) what the outcome is - a home run, strike out, fly ball out, steal a base, etc. Every decision on a real baseball diamond can be played out in the game.
Here's what I want to do. Every day, once the baseball season starts, I will check the newspaper for the results of the games played the previous day. Using SOM, I will schedule games that match those played on that day. I'll then play those games and record the results. Over the course of the season I'll be able to compare how the actual 2013 team (and each player) is doing versus what the simulation is coming up with. And I'll be doing it twice. More on that in a minute.
There are some inescapable checks on reality. First, the simulation is based on the actual statistics from the 2012 season. I already know that the wonderful season Chase Headley had in 2012 won't be duplicated in 2013 - Headley is hurt and won't be playing for several weeks. That's reality.
Second, it is possible but incredibly time consuming for one person to manage the day to day games of all thirty teams. SOM has an answer for that, too. It's called the computer manager: A simulated manager to manage simulated games. I still have to set the lineups and the pitching rotations, but the computer manager makes the in game decisions.
Now, back to doing the simulation twice. Three versions of the 2013 season will be played out.
#1: The actual results of the actual play of the 2013 season. This is the "control" team, if you will. This is what really happens this season.
#2: The Reality League. I'll be using the statistics from the 2012 season. The San Diego Padres roster will be based on the actual 2013 team composition. For each game I will use the lineup and starting pitcher that for the actual game played that day. I will also use the actual lineup and starting pitcher of the opponent on that day.
#3: The Promise League. The Padres roster remains the same. However, I call this the "promise" league because I base it on the rosy outlook of spring training that promises everyone is healthy and at their peak. As an example, let's talk about catcher Nick Hundley.In the Reality League Hundley hit an abysmal .157 in 2012. In the Promise league, however, I'm hoping he'll return to being the solid catcher and hitter he used to be. Therefore, I'm using his 2011 statistics, when he hit .288. In this league I don't have to use the actual lineup and starting pitcher, either. And Chase Headley is not hurt.
The overall idea is to compare what really happens this season with what the 2012 teams, using the 2013 rosters, might have done over a full season, and what the team would have done if every player performed at their best.
The most significant caveat to all this is that it is too hard to build current 2013 opening day rosters for all of the other 29 teams. I've done that in the past, and it's grueling. What I will do, though, is adjust rosters and lineups for the team that the Padres are playing that day, and keep the changed rosters in tact for future games. In that way the other fourteen National League teams will, over the course of the season, look more like the 2013 rosters. I'll even make adjustments for the American League teams that play the Padres.
Other issues - One thing I don't have a lot of control over in the simulation is injuries. I can't simply assign a player as injured. I also can't make a player "uninjured" once he's been injured, which is a more serious issue. Things that I can do: I can remove the player from the roster, or assign him to the minor leagues. Neither are perfect solutions. My other option is to turn off the injury feature, and all injuries will be ignored. I intend to turn off injuries and use the minor leagues to attempt to control players who should not be playing. I'll see how that goes. More important is to make sure that players who should be playing get to play.
It won't be a perfect simulation, but I'm really looking forward to seeing how things turn out.
Monday, March 25, 2013
Weekend (24 Mar) - Scratching Together A Few Things
Weekend (24 Mar) - Scratching Together A Few Things
If it weren't for Lao and Sis Happy would be missing out on a lot of deals. First it was Lao, patiently explaining to Wild that there was money to be made making high end enchants for Happy to sell. Naw, Wild said, I still need to finish leveling my enchanting profession. Really? Lao asked skeptically. Wild grunted and climbed out of his hammock to look. Well, what do you know, my enchanting is already at the max skill of 600, he had to admit, a bit sheepishly. But I can't make the most important enchant, creating a sha crystal, because I don't have the recipe. Lao sighed instead of smacking Wild upside the head. Have you checked the enchanting trainer lately? Wild shuffled over to the trainer and, wouldn't you know it, the trainer had the recipe all ready for Wild. Happy, hearing about this, plans to steal Wild's hammock so he'll actually have to do some work.
Then it was JB's turn, and she at least had the courtesy to be embarrassed. JB thought she had completed the training for her alchemy profession, but when Sis asked JB to make some master healing potions for her, JB discovered that she had only reached skill 555. JB didn't need to be asked twice. Over the weekend JB burned up some herbs and got her alchemy profession to skill 600. The Wild family picked up a nice achievement in the process for reaching the max level in five different primary professions.
Wild and JB still officially belong to the guild Meitha. They are listed as casual players now, having given up their raiding status. The guild recently moved the website to a new service and are still putting in the finishing touches. Information from the old website could not be moved to the new one, so there isn't much there yet, and everyone has to re-apply to access the site. I did that for Wild, becoming the tenth guildie to sign up. Wild likes to vicariously enjoy Meitha's raids, so I hope new content starts being added to the website soon.
The 2013 Major League baseball season is almost upon us. The Padres play their first game on 1 April. Given the state of the team, April Fool's Day seems particularly appropriate. It's an away game, though. We'll have fun on our home Opening Day, 9 Apr, against our nemesis, the Dodgers. I expect the game will be our only sell out - that's not counting the three game series in San Diego against the Yankees. I expect those games to be sold out (it's the first time the Yankees will play at Petco Park), but most of the fans in the stands will be rooting for the Yanks. That's not until August, though. The Padres will likely be well out of contention by then, and if the Yankees can't overcome the injury bug they might not be in contention, either.
My writing "career" has been coming along with the help of my writing buddies. The novel in progress has reached the magic number of 60,000 words, which is the litmus test for categorizing a story as "novel length." The final product is going to be much longer, though. So, while there is still a lot of writing to be done, I have to start thinking about the other aspects of writing - the business side of writing. To help with that, I started looking around the San Diego area for a writer's group. Another aspect is making sure my "brand" is up to date, which for me mainly means updating the website and blog I use for writing. My website, http://www.jwalkerbell.com/ has been in place for quite awhile. It's simple, but it has all the expected information. I didn't like the blog feature, however, so I developed my own, which can be linked to at http://jadedwalker.blogspot.com/. That's where you'll find all my secrets.
If it weren't for Lao and Sis Happy would be missing out on a lot of deals. First it was Lao, patiently explaining to Wild that there was money to be made making high end enchants for Happy to sell. Naw, Wild said, I still need to finish leveling my enchanting profession. Really? Lao asked skeptically. Wild grunted and climbed out of his hammock to look. Well, what do you know, my enchanting is already at the max skill of 600, he had to admit, a bit sheepishly. But I can't make the most important enchant, creating a sha crystal, because I don't have the recipe. Lao sighed instead of smacking Wild upside the head. Have you checked the enchanting trainer lately? Wild shuffled over to the trainer and, wouldn't you know it, the trainer had the recipe all ready for Wild. Happy, hearing about this, plans to steal Wild's hammock so he'll actually have to do some work.
Then it was JB's turn, and she at least had the courtesy to be embarrassed. JB thought she had completed the training for her alchemy profession, but when Sis asked JB to make some master healing potions for her, JB discovered that she had only reached skill 555. JB didn't need to be asked twice. Over the weekend JB burned up some herbs and got her alchemy profession to skill 600. The Wild family picked up a nice achievement in the process for reaching the max level in five different primary professions.
Wild and JB still officially belong to the guild Meitha. They are listed as casual players now, having given up their raiding status. The guild recently moved the website to a new service and are still putting in the finishing touches. Information from the old website could not be moved to the new one, so there isn't much there yet, and everyone has to re-apply to access the site. I did that for Wild, becoming the tenth guildie to sign up. Wild likes to vicariously enjoy Meitha's raids, so I hope new content starts being added to the website soon.
The 2013 Major League baseball season is almost upon us. The Padres play their first game on 1 April. Given the state of the team, April Fool's Day seems particularly appropriate. It's an away game, though. We'll have fun on our home Opening Day, 9 Apr, against our nemesis, the Dodgers. I expect the game will be our only sell out - that's not counting the three game series in San Diego against the Yankees. I expect those games to be sold out (it's the first time the Yankees will play at Petco Park), but most of the fans in the stands will be rooting for the Yanks. That's not until August, though. The Padres will likely be well out of contention by then, and if the Yankees can't overcome the injury bug they might not be in contention, either.
My writing "career" has been coming along with the help of my writing buddies. The novel in progress has reached the magic number of 60,000 words, which is the litmus test for categorizing a story as "novel length." The final product is going to be much longer, though. So, while there is still a lot of writing to be done, I have to start thinking about the other aspects of writing - the business side of writing. To help with that, I started looking around the San Diego area for a writer's group. Another aspect is making sure my "brand" is up to date, which for me mainly means updating the website and blog I use for writing. My website, http://www.jwalkerbell.com/ has been in place for quite awhile. It's simple, but it has all the expected information. I didn't like the blog feature, however, so I developed my own, which can be linked to at http://jadedwalker.blogspot.com/. That's where you'll find all my secrets.
Sunday, March 17, 2013
Saturday (16 Mar) - Hot Time in Peoria
Saturday (16 Mar) - Hot Time in Peoria
Last year we decided to become San Diego Padres season ticket holders for the first time. The Padres had deeply slashed their prices and we figured it would be a once in a lifetime chance to do it. We enjoyed it so much, though, that we signed up for the 2013 season, too.
One of the perks of a season ticket holder is that we got a free trip to Peoria, AZ, the Padres spring training camp. We got a free lunch and tickets directly behind the Padres dugout. The Padres brass gave a presentation. The manager, Bud Black, gave us a personal assessment of the team (of course, there were no surprises that we hadn't already read about) and several players dutifully turned up for autographs. It was fun, and I met quite a few other ticket holders, some of which were staying the whole week, instead of just the one game.
One funny moment - and a little embarrassing for the player - was an exchange between one of our group and the Padres team president. The guy asked the team president about pitcher Andrew Cashner. Cashner is a young flame thrower who has been with the Padres a couple of seasons. He routinely hits 100 mph on the radar gun, and loves to throw that heater. The guy told the president that he should get Cashner to throw something besides that fastball, since major leaguers can hit anything when they know what pitch is coming. A big laugh followed that comment, but not because of the question. At that exact moment Andrew Cashner arrived to give autographs. The quick thinking president immediately turned to Cashner and said, "Andy, I want you to start throwing more pitches besides that fastball." He then turned back to the crowd and said, "There, you can't get any faster results than that."
Among the folks at my table I even met a kindred spirit in Fernando, who lives in Arizona now but is trying to get back to California. He trades most of his Padres tickets for cash. He must be good at it, if he can sell Padres tickets at a profit. Our connection, though, is that he was born and raised in Detroit, and we had a great chat about the Detroit Tigers (my childhood team), the old Tiger Stadium, etc.
The Peoria stadium complex is shared between the Padres and the Seattle Mariners. Our game started at 1pm against the Arizona Diamondbacks. It was 102 degrees. There was a breeze, though, and the air is so dry that it didn't really feel that hot. Sitting close behind the dugout was a real treat. I'm not much of an autograph hound, but there were plenty of folks getting balls, bats, jerseys, etc, autographed before the game and in between innings. There was even a couple of groupies (which used to called baseball "Annie's"). Two blondes in tight outfits had seats on the rail near the dugout. Between innings they would get as close to the dugout as possible, holding up a sign that said "I'll show you mine if you'll show me yours." They would call out to individual players. Security would then shoo them back to their seats when the inning started.
I've been to a lot of baseball games, and never got close to catching a ball in the stands. I finally got my souvenir at this game. A high foul ball from one of the team's better players, Jose Guzman, came down behind the dugout. The guy next to me had the best read on the ball, but he chose to go for the two-handed grab. I stretched out one hand out between his and got my fingers around the ball first. He grabbed my hand with both of his and tried to wrestle the ball away, but I had a good grip on it and he had to let go. There were no hard feelings, of course, I'd won it fair and square.
It was a good day for the Padres. We had a 10-1 lead by the seventh inning. By then a lot of substitutes were coming in to get their shots to make the team. The D-Backs rallied back, but the final score went to the Padres, 10-6.
Judi's favorite player, Yonder Alonzo, hit a homerun, but she didn't see it because we had a sick cat at home and she didn't come along on the trip. The most amazing hit of the day, though, came from a Single-A player named Kyle Gaedele. He is a 22 year old non-roster invitee known more for his speed than his power. Gaedele crushed a pitch from top major league D-Backs pitcher Ian Kennedy and drove it over the twenty foot centerfield wall. It must have traveled 440 feet. He got a standing ovation.
The whole day was a blast. We might get a chance to go together once before the season starts. But maybe not. The real season starts in two weeks.
The sick cat Judi was tending to is Mr. Creme. We had him in for a routine check of his diabetes and a senior blood panel. Judi also felt that he was "just a little bit off." We couldn't put a finger on what it could be, though. Mr Creme checked out fine for his diabetes and his weight was still good. He was getting around really well, too. Overall, he was doing fine, for a cat that is turning 13 this week. I'd taken him in to the vet on Friday, and we didn't expect the blood test results until Monday. On Saturday, though, the vet called back with the results. The tests showed that Mr Creme had a bladder infection and she wanted to get him started on antibiotics right away. Judi's "feeling" that something wasn't right was right on target. Mr Creme is on medication and that should clear up the infection, so in 7-10 days Mr Creme should be back to normal. We'll still be keeping a close eye on him.
Last year we decided to become San Diego Padres season ticket holders for the first time. The Padres had deeply slashed their prices and we figured it would be a once in a lifetime chance to do it. We enjoyed it so much, though, that we signed up for the 2013 season, too.
One of the perks of a season ticket holder is that we got a free trip to Peoria, AZ, the Padres spring training camp. We got a free lunch and tickets directly behind the Padres dugout. The Padres brass gave a presentation. The manager, Bud Black, gave us a personal assessment of the team (of course, there were no surprises that we hadn't already read about) and several players dutifully turned up for autographs. It was fun, and I met quite a few other ticket holders, some of which were staying the whole week, instead of just the one game.
One funny moment - and a little embarrassing for the player - was an exchange between one of our group and the Padres team president. The guy asked the team president about pitcher Andrew Cashner. Cashner is a young flame thrower who has been with the Padres a couple of seasons. He routinely hits 100 mph on the radar gun, and loves to throw that heater. The guy told the president that he should get Cashner to throw something besides that fastball, since major leaguers can hit anything when they know what pitch is coming. A big laugh followed that comment, but not because of the question. At that exact moment Andrew Cashner arrived to give autographs. The quick thinking president immediately turned to Cashner and said, "Andy, I want you to start throwing more pitches besides that fastball." He then turned back to the crowd and said, "There, you can't get any faster results than that."
Among the folks at my table I even met a kindred spirit in Fernando, who lives in Arizona now but is trying to get back to California. He trades most of his Padres tickets for cash. He must be good at it, if he can sell Padres tickets at a profit. Our connection, though, is that he was born and raised in Detroit, and we had a great chat about the Detroit Tigers (my childhood team), the old Tiger Stadium, etc.
The Peoria stadium complex is shared between the Padres and the Seattle Mariners. Our game started at 1pm against the Arizona Diamondbacks. It was 102 degrees. There was a breeze, though, and the air is so dry that it didn't really feel that hot. Sitting close behind the dugout was a real treat. I'm not much of an autograph hound, but there were plenty of folks getting balls, bats, jerseys, etc, autographed before the game and in between innings. There was even a couple of groupies (which used to called baseball "Annie's"). Two blondes in tight outfits had seats on the rail near the dugout. Between innings they would get as close to the dugout as possible, holding up a sign that said "I'll show you mine if you'll show me yours." They would call out to individual players. Security would then shoo them back to their seats when the inning started.
I've been to a lot of baseball games, and never got close to catching a ball in the stands. I finally got my souvenir at this game. A high foul ball from one of the team's better players, Jose Guzman, came down behind the dugout. The guy next to me had the best read on the ball, but he chose to go for the two-handed grab. I stretched out one hand out between his and got my fingers around the ball first. He grabbed my hand with both of his and tried to wrestle the ball away, but I had a good grip on it and he had to let go. There were no hard feelings, of course, I'd won it fair and square.
It was a good day for the Padres. We had a 10-1 lead by the seventh inning. By then a lot of substitutes were coming in to get their shots to make the team. The D-Backs rallied back, but the final score went to the Padres, 10-6.
Judi's favorite player, Yonder Alonzo, hit a homerun, but she didn't see it because we had a sick cat at home and she didn't come along on the trip. The most amazing hit of the day, though, came from a Single-A player named Kyle Gaedele. He is a 22 year old non-roster invitee known more for his speed than his power. Gaedele crushed a pitch from top major league D-Backs pitcher Ian Kennedy and drove it over the twenty foot centerfield wall. It must have traveled 440 feet. He got a standing ovation.
The whole day was a blast. We might get a chance to go together once before the season starts. But maybe not. The real season starts in two weeks.
The sick cat Judi was tending to is Mr. Creme. We had him in for a routine check of his diabetes and a senior blood panel. Judi also felt that he was "just a little bit off." We couldn't put a finger on what it could be, though. Mr Creme checked out fine for his diabetes and his weight was still good. He was getting around really well, too. Overall, he was doing fine, for a cat that is turning 13 this week. I'd taken him in to the vet on Friday, and we didn't expect the blood test results until Monday. On Saturday, though, the vet called back with the results. The tests showed that Mr Creme had a bladder infection and she wanted to get him started on antibiotics right away. Judi's "feeling" that something wasn't right was right on target. Mr Creme is on medication and that should clear up the infection, so in 7-10 days Mr Creme should be back to normal. We'll still be keeping a close eye on him.
Thursday, March 14, 2013
Wednesday (13 Mar) - Curious About Class Changes
Wednesday (13 Mar) - Curious About Class Changes
It is normal for see class changes after a significant patch. I haven't paid much attention to that, since I'm not raiding, but I got curious when I saw that the two classes I'm most familiar with, druid and monk, both received pretty extensive overhauls. Even more so was the fact that the two roles I played the most - healing with my druid, and melee with my monk, were the two roles that needed the most tweaking. Monk damage dealing has been below par, and got a lot of attention. A couple of things stuck out for me. First, is the way monks must juggle two resources as well as cooldown abilities in order to maximize damage output. I've always found that cumbersome and inefficient with Fist. Additionally, there were several interesting spells that really didn't fit anywhere and so were rarely or never used. The tweak is to change some spells that relied on resources and make them cooldown spells. The idea is that since these spells are now "free" to use (ie, they won't use resources that I would otherwise save for a better spell) whenever their cooldown is available, those spells will be used more often. Finally, monks were tweaked to improve - slightly - their burst damage. Monks are designed to deliver a steady flow of damage, rather than burst, but what little burst they did have needed to be upgraded.
The second significant tweaking was to what is called fistweaving. This is a combination of healing and damage dealing. The monk is specced for melee damage dealing but is also healing. This is possible because of the way that monk spells are designed. When playing this way, neither damage dealing or healing is as good as a monk just doing one or the other, but it seems that there are many raid situations where a "fistweaving" monk is valuable. I know this from talking with Bloodknuckle, who plays a fistweaving monk, and loves it. I hope the tweaks make him happy.
Druid healing also received an overhaul, getting "an across-the-board buff to healing, as well as mana savings on Rejuvenation." Any time a "tweak" is "across-the-board" you know there are major problems. The rejuv spell has always been the anchor spell of druid healing, and any problems in that area also creates major problems. Designers tried to blame the druid healing problems on discipline priests stealing healing from druids with their shields, but no druid is buying that. To be fair, I checked the changes to discipline priests. In fact, disc priests did get their shields nerfed, along with a number of other changes that likely angered the priest community. Guess I should pay more attention to my discipline priest, Philly, too. Philly, when she was active, played mostly PvP, and in patch 5.2 they were "under-performing." Without trying to dice and slice specifics, discipline priests were buffed for pvp while shadow priests were considered over-powered for pvp and got nerfed.
This is all pretty academic, I know, since no one is raiding or doing pvp. I was curious to see if I could even understand what was going on anymore, and the answer was yes. If I wanted back into the game for real, I could do it. Do I want to? The answer is still no, for now.
By the way, as I write this on Thursday morning, there is another maintenance ongoing that has shut down WoW. Since patch 5.2 came out, there has been a proliferation of maintenance downtime, although most of the time they are pretty short. This one was supposed to last 45 minutes. That time has now been extended to two hours.
It is normal for see class changes after a significant patch. I haven't paid much attention to that, since I'm not raiding, but I got curious when I saw that the two classes I'm most familiar with, druid and monk, both received pretty extensive overhauls. Even more so was the fact that the two roles I played the most - healing with my druid, and melee with my monk, were the two roles that needed the most tweaking. Monk damage dealing has been below par, and got a lot of attention. A couple of things stuck out for me. First, is the way monks must juggle two resources as well as cooldown abilities in order to maximize damage output. I've always found that cumbersome and inefficient with Fist. Additionally, there were several interesting spells that really didn't fit anywhere and so were rarely or never used. The tweak is to change some spells that relied on resources and make them cooldown spells. The idea is that since these spells are now "free" to use (ie, they won't use resources that I would otherwise save for a better spell) whenever their cooldown is available, those spells will be used more often. Finally, monks were tweaked to improve - slightly - their burst damage. Monks are designed to deliver a steady flow of damage, rather than burst, but what little burst they did have needed to be upgraded.
The second significant tweaking was to what is called fistweaving. This is a combination of healing and damage dealing. The monk is specced for melee damage dealing but is also healing. This is possible because of the way that monk spells are designed. When playing this way, neither damage dealing or healing is as good as a monk just doing one or the other, but it seems that there are many raid situations where a "fistweaving" monk is valuable. I know this from talking with Bloodknuckle, who plays a fistweaving monk, and loves it. I hope the tweaks make him happy.
Druid healing also received an overhaul, getting "an across-the-board buff to healing, as well as mana savings on Rejuvenation." Any time a "tweak" is "across-the-board" you know there are major problems. The rejuv spell has always been the anchor spell of druid healing, and any problems in that area also creates major problems. Designers tried to blame the druid healing problems on discipline priests stealing healing from druids with their shields, but no druid is buying that. To be fair, I checked the changes to discipline priests. In fact, disc priests did get their shields nerfed, along with a number of other changes that likely angered the priest community. Guess I should pay more attention to my discipline priest, Philly, too. Philly, when she was active, played mostly PvP, and in patch 5.2 they were "under-performing." Without trying to dice and slice specifics, discipline priests were buffed for pvp while shadow priests were considered over-powered for pvp and got nerfed.
This is all pretty academic, I know, since no one is raiding or doing pvp. I was curious to see if I could even understand what was going on anymore, and the answer was yes. If I wanted back into the game for real, I could do it. Do I want to? The answer is still no, for now.
By the way, as I write this on Thursday morning, there is another maintenance ongoing that has shut down WoW. Since patch 5.2 came out, there has been a proliferation of maintenance downtime, although most of the time they are pretty short. This one was supposed to last 45 minutes. That time has now been extended to two hours.
Wednesday, March 13, 2013
Tuesday (12 Mar) - Wild Family Ignores Thunder King
Tuesday (12 Mar) - Wild Family Ignores Thunder King
As far as the Wild Family is concerned, the latest patch (5.2) loaded up with new content was a non-event. Usually, such a significant change would require updating all of my addons, checking and re-checking changes that would affect my characters, and finding out what interesting things I should be pursuing. Yawn.
The most significant impact the patch has had was the nerf of my Fluxfire Feline combat pet (named Bad Kitty). No longer could it destroy it's opponent with a single blow, and with it's poor survivability, the little fellow has retreated to his cat tree and retired.
Fist continues her farming - that is, literally farming her field of now sixteen plots. She is now Exalted with the farming community called The Tillers and has access to all of the latest farming technology to speed up the management of her field - like automatic sprinklers, a scarecrow to keep the birds away, automated pest control, and, most recently, a special plow to root out the critters that are always getting into my crops. I wonder why I can't get a fence for that. I'm getting to the point of wondering what I'm supposed to do with all of the things I'm growing, however. Most likely it will all wind up with Happy to be sold.
Happy had a bit of a renaissance in sales for awhile after the patch came out, and his profits soared even as his stock rapidly depleted. Prices have remained high on several items, so even with slowing sales Happy is still doing pretty good. However, sales have continued to slip and buyers are getting rare. It happens. There is a rhythm to the AH that Happy knows well. Happy will continue to post his goods while scooping up the bargains from frustrated sellers.
Happy does have one minor irritant. Happy owns the market on a particular jewel bag. No one makes them but Wild, and they sell for 298 gold each. Happy only sells one or two a week at most, but it's a guaranteed sale. I only have one or available at a time. About two weeks ago Happy found that he had a competitor. He was posting only one jewel bag at a time, but pricing it at 135 gold. He can't even make a profit at that price. Happy initially figured he'd by up the guys bag each time he posted, but it was irritating having him just post another one at the same silly price. The strategy now is to just ignore him. Sure, he may sell a bag or two, but more often than not the bag won't sell and Happy is hoping the guy will get discouraged and give up. We'll see. A quick check of the AH shows that the guy has no bag up for sale right now.
So, what am I doing with all that time I have now that Happy and Fist are the only toons doing anything in the World of Warcraft? I'm mostly writing. I have a novel in work that I'm very excited about. I'm up to chapter ten, which is roughly a third done for the size of book I'm aiming for. It's a medieval fantasy novel that has nothing to do with WoW. Ok, it started out with it's roots from WoW, but all of those roots were torn out when I realized I didn't need any WoW underpinning. The novel can stand on it's own.
The Missus promises that a new post on the family blog is coming soon. She's been taking pictures of the progress of our new patio (I'll spill some beans and reveal that the concrete slab was poured on Tuesday) and share the latest news from our four footed household.
As far as the Wild Family is concerned, the latest patch (5.2) loaded up with new content was a non-event. Usually, such a significant change would require updating all of my addons, checking and re-checking changes that would affect my characters, and finding out what interesting things I should be pursuing. Yawn.
The most significant impact the patch has had was the nerf of my Fluxfire Feline combat pet (named Bad Kitty). No longer could it destroy it's opponent with a single blow, and with it's poor survivability, the little fellow has retreated to his cat tree and retired.
Fist continues her farming - that is, literally farming her field of now sixteen plots. She is now Exalted with the farming community called The Tillers and has access to all of the latest farming technology to speed up the management of her field - like automatic sprinklers, a scarecrow to keep the birds away, automated pest control, and, most recently, a special plow to root out the critters that are always getting into my crops. I wonder why I can't get a fence for that. I'm getting to the point of wondering what I'm supposed to do with all of the things I'm growing, however. Most likely it will all wind up with Happy to be sold.
Happy had a bit of a renaissance in sales for awhile after the patch came out, and his profits soared even as his stock rapidly depleted. Prices have remained high on several items, so even with slowing sales Happy is still doing pretty good. However, sales have continued to slip and buyers are getting rare. It happens. There is a rhythm to the AH that Happy knows well. Happy will continue to post his goods while scooping up the bargains from frustrated sellers.
Happy does have one minor irritant. Happy owns the market on a particular jewel bag. No one makes them but Wild, and they sell for 298 gold each. Happy only sells one or two a week at most, but it's a guaranteed sale. I only have one or available at a time. About two weeks ago Happy found that he had a competitor. He was posting only one jewel bag at a time, but pricing it at 135 gold. He can't even make a profit at that price. Happy initially figured he'd by up the guys bag each time he posted, but it was irritating having him just post another one at the same silly price. The strategy now is to just ignore him. Sure, he may sell a bag or two, but more often than not the bag won't sell and Happy is hoping the guy will get discouraged and give up. We'll see. A quick check of the AH shows that the guy has no bag up for sale right now.
So, what am I doing with all that time I have now that Happy and Fist are the only toons doing anything in the World of Warcraft? I'm mostly writing. I have a novel in work that I'm very excited about. I'm up to chapter ten, which is roughly a third done for the size of book I'm aiming for. It's a medieval fantasy novel that has nothing to do with WoW. Ok, it started out with it's roots from WoW, but all of those roots were torn out when I realized I didn't need any WoW underpinning. The novel can stand on it's own.
The Missus promises that a new post on the family blog is coming soon. She's been taking pictures of the progress of our new patio (I'll spill some beans and reveal that the concrete slab was poured on Tuesday) and share the latest news from our four footed household.
Tuesday, March 5, 2013
Monday (4 Mar) - The Spirit Tamers
Monday (4 Mar) - The Spirit Tamers
On Sunday I decided to give the Spirit Tamers a chance to embarrass Fist's Team. The quest is picked up on the balcony at the Shrine of Two Moons in the Vale of Eternal Blossoms. Quite a mouthful for one quest.
The quest offers four legendary Pandaren Spirits, all four of which must be defeated to complete the quest. The reward for beating all four is that one of those legendary spirits can be selected and added to the team.
The closest target is quite near the Shrine of Two Moons, so the team started there. The opponent was the Thundering Pandaren Spirit.
The team made four attempts with varying pets and were roundly routed and destroyed each time. The best attempt took two of the Spirit pets down, but the reality is that we didn't come close to winning any of the battles. Most frustrating was the pet Pandaren Earth Spirit. It usually took two pets to bring it down, and the one pet left could never defeat the two remaining.
I tried the recommended Critter pet (with a preference for snails), and chose the Shimmershell Snail for it's high health and solid power. The problem with this pet, apparently, is that it's too slow. The Earth Spirit starts out with an immobilization move, drops ooze, and then throws several really big, hard hitting rocks. With the snail locked and battered, it was pretty much over by then. I also tried it with the Perky Pug, but the game doggy wasn't faster than the Earth Spirit, either, and the results were pretty much the same. I guess I'm going to have to level a rabbit, rat, or roach of some kind to battle this thing.
The second pet is the Critter, Sludgy. I tried the Mechanical Fluxfire Feline first, but the cat died way too fast. Then I spent a couple of attempts using the traditional Beast with the Alpine Foxling. He was never at his best, though, since he had to face the Earth Spirit, which always survived the first battle. I may try my Cat next time, who is even faster than the Foxling, though not quite as powerful and with much less health. Cat had been napping and didn't want to be disturbed on the first battles.
The third pet is the Beast, Darnak. I used the Flying pet Sandy Petrel, who actually did pretty well, but the petrel spent most of the rounds battling the Earth Spirit or Sludgy instead of his intended target.
Several other pets were thrown in there, as well, but nothing really worked. I even leveled up a cockroach because it was a faster pet than what I was using, but the ugly little bug never got a chance to show what it could do.
I also have two new level 25s, a Cinder Kitten and Lil' Ragnaros. As much as I like them, neither one was really appropriate for the Spirit pet battles, as I would learn that elemental pets really aren't very good against the spirit tamers.
In fact, it turned out that none of my favorite pets were needed against the Spirit Tamers. Later in the day, Fist's team, using sage advice from Sin for each opponent, ran the table on all four of the Spirit Tamers and their legendary battle pets: Thundering, Whispering, Burning, and Flowing Spirit Tamers. That was cool.
As a possible bonus, the bugged quests are still bugged for me. I have two identical spirit tamer quests and both gave Fist's team credit for all four tamers in both quests. I had to cut things short, though, before I could turn in the quests, so I don't yet know if the team will get rewarded twice, or just once when I turn in the quests.
Just as an aside, for each pet battle I read up on the strategies in the Wowhead forums, and frankly, none of them worked anywhere near as well as the strategies Sin suggested. I really think Sin should post his strategies on Wowhead since they work so well!
I finally got a chance to turn in the quests. I made one small boo boo. I blindly followed the directional arrow back to the quest giver - unfortunately, the quest arrow took me to the Alliance quest giver, not the horde quest giver. Fist landed and was immediately set upon by two ugly alliance elites. Fist swears she would have killed them both, but she was already half dead before she realized her error. Ok, and if you believe that ... anyway, Fist died. It took some effort to find a place to rez that wouldn't get her killed again, but she managed. When she got to the right quest giver, the pair of completed quests was down to just the one. So no, I wasn't able to collect twice. Once was fine, though. Fist now has a Pandaren Fire Spirit pet in her stable. Only level 1, though, so it will take a bit before the spirit gets to be useful at level 25.
Finally (is this my second or third "finally?"), I heard that there was a special Tamer at the Darkmoon Faire, which had set up their tents this week. Fist pulled together a team with Lil'Deathwing, Lil'Ragnaros, and Fluxfire Feline. With no coaching from Sin, the team downed the Darkmoon Tamer on their first try.
And speaking of pets, we are starting work today (Monday) on extending our enclosed patio. We "hope" to be able to use it ourselves, but the reality is that it's mostly for the cats. The problem children will get a new playroom, and we get our house back. The work is going to disrupt the cats that sleep on the patio, and I had to figure out new arrangements. One unexpected glitch is that I thought our mama cat, Kiki, and her daughter, Dash, would get along with each other. Dash was happy for the company, but I found out last night that Kiki has completely disowned Dash and can't stand to be in the same room with her. Now I know where Dash gets her mammoth Yowl voice, as Kiki used it and her back claws as well to make her point with me. Sigh. When she's alone she's just the sweetest cat, too.
Patch 5.2 hits the servers on Tuesday. There are many changes to pet battles, and some of my favorites are going to be nerfed. Fist's team will get through that, I'm sure.
Oh, and I guess I have to report that Fist and Sin went at it again Monday night. It was a blast, despite the fact that Sin's team prevailed, winning six of nine matches, with one tie. The final two pets, both with one point of health left, simultaneously killed each other somehow. We graciously called the tie. Or maybe we just yelled, pointed fingers, and called each other cheaters. I forget. :P
On Sunday I decided to give the Spirit Tamers a chance to embarrass Fist's Team. The quest is picked up on the balcony at the Shrine of Two Moons in the Vale of Eternal Blossoms. Quite a mouthful for one quest.
The quest offers four legendary Pandaren Spirits, all four of which must be defeated to complete the quest. The reward for beating all four is that one of those legendary spirits can be selected and added to the team.
The closest target is quite near the Shrine of Two Moons, so the team started there. The opponent was the Thundering Pandaren Spirit.
The team made four attempts with varying pets and were roundly routed and destroyed each time. The best attempt took two of the Spirit pets down, but the reality is that we didn't come close to winning any of the battles. Most frustrating was the pet Pandaren Earth Spirit. It usually took two pets to bring it down, and the one pet left could never defeat the two remaining.
I tried the recommended Critter pet (with a preference for snails), and chose the Shimmershell Snail for it's high health and solid power. The problem with this pet, apparently, is that it's too slow. The Earth Spirit starts out with an immobilization move, drops ooze, and then throws several really big, hard hitting rocks. With the snail locked and battered, it was pretty much over by then. I also tried it with the Perky Pug, but the game doggy wasn't faster than the Earth Spirit, either, and the results were pretty much the same. I guess I'm going to have to level a rabbit, rat, or roach of some kind to battle this thing.
The second pet is the Critter, Sludgy. I tried the Mechanical Fluxfire Feline first, but the cat died way too fast. Then I spent a couple of attempts using the traditional Beast with the Alpine Foxling. He was never at his best, though, since he had to face the Earth Spirit, which always survived the first battle. I may try my Cat next time, who is even faster than the Foxling, though not quite as powerful and with much less health. Cat had been napping and didn't want to be disturbed on the first battles.
The third pet is the Beast, Darnak. I used the Flying pet Sandy Petrel, who actually did pretty well, but the petrel spent most of the rounds battling the Earth Spirit or Sludgy instead of his intended target.
Several other pets were thrown in there, as well, but nothing really worked. I even leveled up a cockroach because it was a faster pet than what I was using, but the ugly little bug never got a chance to show what it could do.
I also have two new level 25s, a Cinder Kitten and Lil' Ragnaros. As much as I like them, neither one was really appropriate for the Spirit pet battles, as I would learn that elemental pets really aren't very good against the spirit tamers.
In fact, it turned out that none of my favorite pets were needed against the Spirit Tamers. Later in the day, Fist's team, using sage advice from Sin for each opponent, ran the table on all four of the Spirit Tamers and their legendary battle pets: Thundering, Whispering, Burning, and Flowing Spirit Tamers. That was cool.
As a possible bonus, the bugged quests are still bugged for me. I have two identical spirit tamer quests and both gave Fist's team credit for all four tamers in both quests. I had to cut things short, though, before I could turn in the quests, so I don't yet know if the team will get rewarded twice, or just once when I turn in the quests.
Just as an aside, for each pet battle I read up on the strategies in the Wowhead forums, and frankly, none of them worked anywhere near as well as the strategies Sin suggested. I really think Sin should post his strategies on Wowhead since they work so well!
I finally got a chance to turn in the quests. I made one small boo boo. I blindly followed the directional arrow back to the quest giver - unfortunately, the quest arrow took me to the Alliance quest giver, not the horde quest giver. Fist landed and was immediately set upon by two ugly alliance elites. Fist swears she would have killed them both, but she was already half dead before she realized her error. Ok, and if you believe that ... anyway, Fist died. It took some effort to find a place to rez that wouldn't get her killed again, but she managed. When she got to the right quest giver, the pair of completed quests was down to just the one. So no, I wasn't able to collect twice. Once was fine, though. Fist now has a Pandaren Fire Spirit pet in her stable. Only level 1, though, so it will take a bit before the spirit gets to be useful at level 25.
Finally (is this my second or third "finally?"), I heard that there was a special Tamer at the Darkmoon Faire, which had set up their tents this week. Fist pulled together a team with Lil'Deathwing, Lil'Ragnaros, and Fluxfire Feline. With no coaching from Sin, the team downed the Darkmoon Tamer on their first try.
And speaking of pets, we are starting work today (Monday) on extending our enclosed patio. We "hope" to be able to use it ourselves, but the reality is that it's mostly for the cats. The problem children will get a new playroom, and we get our house back. The work is going to disrupt the cats that sleep on the patio, and I had to figure out new arrangements. One unexpected glitch is that I thought our mama cat, Kiki, and her daughter, Dash, would get along with each other. Dash was happy for the company, but I found out last night that Kiki has completely disowned Dash and can't stand to be in the same room with her. Now I know where Dash gets her mammoth Yowl voice, as Kiki used it and her back claws as well to make her point with me. Sigh. When she's alone she's just the sweetest cat, too.
Patch 5.2 hits the servers on Tuesday. There are many changes to pet battles, and some of my favorites are going to be nerfed. Fist's team will get through that, I'm sure.
Oh, and I guess I have to report that Fist and Sin went at it again Monday night. It was a blast, despite the fact that Sin's team prevailed, winning six of nine matches, with one tie. The final two pets, both with one point of health left, simultaneously killed each other somehow. We graciously called the tie. Or maybe we just yelled, pointed fingers, and called each other cheaters. I forget. :P
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