The Alliance Family Steps Up
Wild was feeling his oats over the weekend. Propped up by his new gear, he decided to take on the Ordon troopers - level 91 elites with heavy fire power. These mobs earn Emperor Shaohao reputation, which Wild is not all that interested in, but might come in handy some day. Mostly, though, he just wanted to know if he could kill these Ordon troopers.
He could, and he did. Wild made sure it was one on one, though. Two or more might make it hard to avoid all the fireballs they tend to throw around.
Having proved his manhood on that account, Wild dipped a little deeper into the ranks of those hostile elites. The Burning Berserkers were quite a bit tougher, with Wild having about a 50% success rate against them.
While all of that killing is a lot of fun, Wild is still really primarily a healer. A healer in a guild that no longer raids, and Wild is really not willing to go seek out some new guild to take him in. And, after looking at the LFR raids he could attempt, his heart just isn't into learning the fights without a guild team to share in the successes and challenges. What would be the purpose?
That situation brought the family to take a more serious look at the Alliance side of the Wild family. The family's Teagreen guild is small, but doing well, and there could be opportunities for an up and coming family member . . . someone like Javajoo, for example. The level 61 paladin could be the family's next level 90, to join with Unbleached and Hcab.
I am going to bring Java over to the active account and begin leveling him. Wild has offered to provide enchants for the plate wearing paladin's heirloom gear before sending those heirlooms to him. There is a complication, though. Level 10 worgen Rakta is still in Gineas and in the way. She has a set of heirlooms, and no mail box to send them back. The intent was to remake her on the other account at a later time, because I don't want to spend another $25 transferring her. Right now, though, I don't know how to get that gear from Rakta (at least not without spending another $25), and I can't move Java until Rakta is gone. Sigh. Is there a way for Rakta to get back to the starting zone, where there's a mailbox? Or for another character to go to Gilneas and retrieve them? The only other alliance I have available is Chaitee, but she is only level 21 and in Darnassus.
Once the above gets straightened out somehow, Java's leveling progress is still going to take time. Not only is the Writer's Conference going to consume the rest of this week (to get ready) and the coming weekend (for the conference itself), we are also planning a trip to visit with relatives on the east coast over Thanksgiving. We will be gone three weeks. Once we're back, though, I hope to be able to put some extra time into getting Java to level 90. Maybe, with Java, I'll finally figure out how to get around as an Alliance, though I bet Java mistakenly walks into horde camps now and then. The poor guy has a lot to learn.
A New Wrinkle - I never learn. I extricated Rakta from Gilneas by just finishing the quest line and then sent her to Darnassus where she turned over all her heirlooms and gold to Chaitee. Then, for the second time in her young life, Rakta was sent home. Java was anxious to get started, so I started the character transfer process. The process failed because for some reason he still has mail in his box. Most likely this is some Blizzard thing, since Java hasn't been sent mail in months. But that means I will have to activate the other account once again. Sigh. Life sucks.
Wrinkles Part 2 - In order to get this done, I bought a thirty day game card for $15 and activated the second account. Even though I will be on the east coast for three weeks in November, I can always suspend the account until I come back. With the account activated, Java was able to check his mail. It wasn't from Blizzard. It was from Sinstaar, a character that no longer exists. The good news is that the mail included some pretty nice enchants and other goodies! Once that was cleared up, Java began his journey to the other account. It will take about an hour or so for the change to show up. I wonder what other issues will arise when Java again comes in game?
Monday, October 28, 2013
Saturday, October 26, 2013
Shiny's Part Two
Shiny's Part Two
The WoW gods must have something truly disastrous in mind for Wild. That's the only rational explanation for all of Wild's good fortune over the past couple of days.
The expected new bounty started with Wild earning the 50,000 coins needed to get his i535 trinket, which will replace an i409 trinket. Or will it? On the same morning that Wild earned his 50k coins, he got a drop called a Timeless Curio. This item, when used, creates an i496 trinket. So, let me summarize the trinket scenario:
Old i409 --> New i535
Old i476 --> New i496
Pretty simple math, right? Well, there is a problem. There are only two types of trinkets available from the Isle that casters use, one called Chi-ji used for healing specs, and another called Bite for DPS spec (that would be balance/moonkin for Wild). Wild's plan was to buy the Chi-ji and use the Curio for the other. I can't use two of the same trinkets, as they are "unique-equipped" so only one can be equipped at a time. There is another, worse issue. Players are reporting a bug that even in balance spec, the Curio will still drop the healing trinket, not the DPS one. Complaints to Blizz about that have fallen on deaf ears. I'm not about to blow 50k coins and a curio to discover I can only equip one of them.
This is crazy.
Wild also has another Burden of Eternity, so I thought, ok, I'll take the i496 DPS trinket Curio and upgrade it to i535. Sorry, trinkets can't be upgraded with Burdens of Eternity.
Wild had already bought the 50k coin chi-ji trinket, but I got so confused I sold it back until I could get things figured out. That was a little scary all by itself. What if I sold it back and didn't get back my 50k in coins? The buy back worked, though, thankfully.
Here is my plan. I checked around on Wowhead, and it appears that the DPS trinket bug has been fixed. So, I will use the curio to get the DPS i496 trinket, which will replace the i496. I will go back and buy, again, the i535 healing trinket to replace the i409. Then, since I still have the Burden of Eternity, I intend to upgrade another piece of gear, probably the helm. That will still leave Wild with one piece of gear left under I496 - his necklace, at i476.
Update: The plan worked. Wild has both the i535 and i496 trinkets now. His gear score jumped from i496 to i505.
Oops, Wild can't count to two. He has two pieces of gear now under i496, not just one: his i476 necklace, and his i476 off-hand. Now, the question remains how and when to use Wild's Burden of Eternity. There is no off-hand gear on the Timeless Isle, so take that off the list. If a necklace were to drop on the Isle, upgrading it from i496 to i535 would add +298 int to his gear. However, Wild already has an unused i496 helm piece. If Wild upgraded his helm to i535, he would gain +536 int, close to double that of the necklace. Seems to be a no brainer.
The upgrade of Wild's Helm raised his gear score to i508. Wild is pretty impressed with himself.
The WoW gods must have something truly disastrous in mind for Wild. That's the only rational explanation for all of Wild's good fortune over the past couple of days.
The expected new bounty started with Wild earning the 50,000 coins needed to get his i535 trinket, which will replace an i409 trinket. Or will it? On the same morning that Wild earned his 50k coins, he got a drop called a Timeless Curio. This item, when used, creates an i496 trinket. So, let me summarize the trinket scenario:
Old i409 --> New i535
Old i476 --> New i496
Pretty simple math, right? Well, there is a problem. There are only two types of trinkets available from the Isle that casters use, one called Chi-ji used for healing specs, and another called Bite for DPS spec (that would be balance/moonkin for Wild). Wild's plan was to buy the Chi-ji and use the Curio for the other. I can't use two of the same trinkets, as they are "unique-equipped" so only one can be equipped at a time. There is another, worse issue. Players are reporting a bug that even in balance spec, the Curio will still drop the healing trinket, not the DPS one. Complaints to Blizz about that have fallen on deaf ears. I'm not about to blow 50k coins and a curio to discover I can only equip one of them.
This is crazy.
Wild also has another Burden of Eternity, so I thought, ok, I'll take the i496 DPS trinket Curio and upgrade it to i535. Sorry, trinkets can't be upgraded with Burdens of Eternity.
Wild had already bought the 50k coin chi-ji trinket, but I got so confused I sold it back until I could get things figured out. That was a little scary all by itself. What if I sold it back and didn't get back my 50k in coins? The buy back worked, though, thankfully.
Here is my plan. I checked around on Wowhead, and it appears that the DPS trinket bug has been fixed. So, I will use the curio to get the DPS i496 trinket, which will replace the i496. I will go back and buy, again, the i535 healing trinket to replace the i409. Then, since I still have the Burden of Eternity, I intend to upgrade another piece of gear, probably the helm. That will still leave Wild with one piece of gear left under I496 - his necklace, at i476.
Update: The plan worked. Wild has both the i535 and i496 trinkets now. His gear score jumped from i496 to i505.
Oops, Wild can't count to two. He has two pieces of gear now under i496, not just one: his i476 necklace, and his i476 off-hand. Now, the question remains how and when to use Wild's Burden of Eternity. There is no off-hand gear on the Timeless Isle, so take that off the list. If a necklace were to drop on the Isle, upgrading it from i496 to i535 would add +298 int to his gear. However, Wild already has an unused i496 helm piece. If Wild upgraded his helm to i535, he would gain +536 int, close to double that of the necklace. Seems to be a no brainer.
The upgrade of Wild's Helm raised his gear score to i508. Wild is pretty impressed with himself.
Friday, October 25, 2013
Shiny's! Wild's Bountiful Harvest
Shiny's! Wild's Bountiful Harvest
Wild has been monopolizing the Timeless Isle for the past few days. He continues to collect coins, kill elites, and complete the daily and weekly quests. Despite a complete lack of gear upgrades, Wild has been taking on and killing some of the higher level elites. He admits the reason for it is that the easier elite mobs are often totally cleared out for minutes at a time, giving Wild the opportunity to take on other elites that take more time to kill. Wild has gotten very proficient at killing the snakes, for example. It takes rooting the snake a couple times to heal during the fight, but it gets the job done. Wild has also discovered he can kill the elite crabs along the shore, too. They are actually easier than the turtles, which Wild doesn't much like taking on. He even kills the frogs and tigers when nothing else is available. Slow but steady progress. Wild has over 42k coins now, and at about a thousand coins a day he'll be able to buy the trinket he wants in a week or less.
That brings Wild to last night. A few nights ago Wild got a Signet. Using it would give Wild an i496 ring, and Wild has long been frustrated in his efforts to upgrade his pair of i450 rings. Given how long Wild has been after a ring, he wanted to immediately use it. Wild also figured he might never see another Signet (his luck being that bad), so perhaps he should wait a bit on using the Signet until he could get an even rarer Burden of Eternity, which would upgrade his i496 signet into an i535. Patience, hell! is what Wild really thought, but then the Celestial Court came alive and Wild went after whatever of the four elites of the Court were being stalked and attacked. There is a once a week chance that loot drops from the killing of a Court elite. Most of the time nothing drops, and some of the time minor stuff like motes of harmony drop as a consolation prize. Very, very rarely, loot drops. Fist won an awesome i553 pair of gloves the first time she battled a Court elite. Wild had a few words to say under his breath at that.
Last night it was finally Wild's turn to beat chance. Wild won Grievous Gladiator's Band of Cruelty, an i522 ring. It's a pvp ring, but Wild was ecstatic anyway. One of his i450 rings could now be replaced. Wild briefly thought about going ahead and using his signet, upgrading his other i450 ring to i496, but he got sidetracked. Wild wanted to enchant his new ring, and had to hearth back to Orgrimmar to get the mats he needed. While getting that together he noticed a item in his bags he hadn't noticed before. Low and behold, Wild discovered he had a Burden of Eternity. Wild has no idea when that dropped or how long it has been sitting in his bags.
Who cares! Wild knew exactly what to do. Wild used the Burden to upgrade his signet to i535. Then he used his upgraded signet to make an i535 ring. He now has a pair of shiny new rings.
Wild's gear score bumped up to i496. The trinket, when it's ready, should put Wild over the i500 mark. What a night!
PS - Fist's gear score is i491. Wild has a smile on his face today.
Wild has been monopolizing the Timeless Isle for the past few days. He continues to collect coins, kill elites, and complete the daily and weekly quests. Despite a complete lack of gear upgrades, Wild has been taking on and killing some of the higher level elites. He admits the reason for it is that the easier elite mobs are often totally cleared out for minutes at a time, giving Wild the opportunity to take on other elites that take more time to kill. Wild has gotten very proficient at killing the snakes, for example. It takes rooting the snake a couple times to heal during the fight, but it gets the job done. Wild has also discovered he can kill the elite crabs along the shore, too. They are actually easier than the turtles, which Wild doesn't much like taking on. He even kills the frogs and tigers when nothing else is available. Slow but steady progress. Wild has over 42k coins now, and at about a thousand coins a day he'll be able to buy the trinket he wants in a week or less.
That brings Wild to last night. A few nights ago Wild got a Signet. Using it would give Wild an i496 ring, and Wild has long been frustrated in his efforts to upgrade his pair of i450 rings. Given how long Wild has been after a ring, he wanted to immediately use it. Wild also figured he might never see another Signet (his luck being that bad), so perhaps he should wait a bit on using the Signet until he could get an even rarer Burden of Eternity, which would upgrade his i496 signet into an i535. Patience, hell! is what Wild really thought, but then the Celestial Court came alive and Wild went after whatever of the four elites of the Court were being stalked and attacked. There is a once a week chance that loot drops from the killing of a Court elite. Most of the time nothing drops, and some of the time minor stuff like motes of harmony drop as a consolation prize. Very, very rarely, loot drops. Fist won an awesome i553 pair of gloves the first time she battled a Court elite. Wild had a few words to say under his breath at that.
Last night it was finally Wild's turn to beat chance. Wild won Grievous Gladiator's Band of Cruelty, an i522 ring. It's a pvp ring, but Wild was ecstatic anyway. One of his i450 rings could now be replaced. Wild briefly thought about going ahead and using his signet, upgrading his other i450 ring to i496, but he got sidetracked. Wild wanted to enchant his new ring, and had to hearth back to Orgrimmar to get the mats he needed. While getting that together he noticed a item in his bags he hadn't noticed before. Low and behold, Wild discovered he had a Burden of Eternity. Wild has no idea when that dropped or how long it has been sitting in his bags.
Who cares! Wild knew exactly what to do. Wild used the Burden to upgrade his signet to i535. Then he used his upgraded signet to make an i535 ring. He now has a pair of shiny new rings.
Wild's gear score bumped up to i496. The trinket, when it's ready, should put Wild over the i500 mark. What a night!
PS - Fist's gear score is i491. Wild has a smile on his face today.
Tuesday, October 22, 2013
Of Coins, Gold, and Gems
Of Coins, Gold, and Gems
Yes, this is one of those "Happyface" posts with Fist as a guest commentator.
Fist doesn't have much real use for the Timeless Isle coins that she gets with every kill and quest completion. Sometimes she gets coins just for picking her nose - but let's not go there. She does have a bit of a gambling habit, though, and her new favorite friend on the Isle lately is Kukuru, who lives in a cave full of treasure chests of every size and description. It would be more challenging if gamblers could try to deduce which chests were likely to have the best loot, but, sadly, every chest has the same chance for loot as any other chest. The odds never change.
Fist brought 17,548 coins to her first visit to Kukuru. Each bet she made cost 500 coins. Every bet returns something. There is a 99.8% chance that the "reward" is in coins ranging from a low of 100 coins (the lowest amount Fist received) to - very rarely - a reward as high as 650 coins. It's pretty obvious that this is a losing proposition, although it can be very addicting, since the coins received back can be fed back in again.
The important aspect of this obsession is the 0.2% chance that the reward isn't coins. Fist made 39 bets. Four rewards were for something other than coins. Three of the rewards were i496 gear, the same gear picked up in the moss-covered treasure chests. Those are mostly useless, since Fist, Wild, Philly, JB and even Tiphaine have nearly full i496 gears sets now. Fist also won a pet named Bonkers to add to the families still growing collection of pets for pet battles. Bonkers rewards are fairly common, though.
The one truly valuable reward is a Burden of Eternity. The explanation for what this does is a little confusing, but this is how I think it works. First, you have to have an i496 piece of gear that has not yet been transformed into an equipable item. Using the Burden on that item upgrades the item from i496 to i535. Now that is a tangible reward. One caveat, though, is that doing this makes the item Soulbound, NOT BOA, so make sure the upgrade is done by the character that you intend to use the gear. Early on, Burdens dropped pretty frequently. Now they are very, very rare.
Math Quiz: Blizz doesn't reveal the odds of winning a Burden from gambling with Kukuru. However, I know that Master Li sells Burdens for 50,000 coins apiece. Wild is still trying to get that many coins, himself, for the trinket he wants to buy (he has about 39,000 now). Many players find it easy to amass that many coins over a short period of time. Wild and Fist, alas, don't have the talent for that. Using that value as the base is how I came up with the percentages, assuming that the gambling odds matched the likelihood of a Burden dropped. The odds of that, by my calculation, is 500 to 1 odds.
Way back at the top of the post I mentioned that Fist started with 17,548 coins. When she stopped betting after the 39th bet, she had 10,748 coins left. I expect that she will gamble away those coins, having nothing better to do with them.
The gem market is going through a period of upheaval. For several weeks, the price of gems has been going up, due largely, Happy believes, to all of the gear being dropped in the Timeless Isle. Golden Lotus is the primary ingredient in making a gem, and the price for them has increased from a pretty stable 50g to 65 gold and up, depending how desperate the buyer is, as shortages of Golden Lotus are common. This increase in cost has driven the price of the gems ever higher. In the extreme example, Vermilion Onyx gems went from around 100g to has high as 198g.
Over the past week plus, however, the bottom seemed to fall out. Gem prices plummeted, and the price of Golden Lotus started jumping all over the place, though usually down. Happy has decided to interpret this as good news to buy up the lower prices gems and Golden Lotus. With gem prices down as far as 49g for some, this has the potential of a windfall for Happy should the prices settle at normal rates. Happy could then make a killing. Or, the price could settle at a lower level not worth selling them off. In that case, Happy will pass the gems to JB so she can learn gem enchants using low cost gems. It's all good. :-)
Yes, this is one of those "Happyface" posts with Fist as a guest commentator.
Fist doesn't have much real use for the Timeless Isle coins that she gets with every kill and quest completion. Sometimes she gets coins just for picking her nose - but let's not go there. She does have a bit of a gambling habit, though, and her new favorite friend on the Isle lately is Kukuru, who lives in a cave full of treasure chests of every size and description. It would be more challenging if gamblers could try to deduce which chests were likely to have the best loot, but, sadly, every chest has the same chance for loot as any other chest. The odds never change.
Fist brought 17,548 coins to her first visit to Kukuru. Each bet she made cost 500 coins. Every bet returns something. There is a 99.8% chance that the "reward" is in coins ranging from a low of 100 coins (the lowest amount Fist received) to - very rarely - a reward as high as 650 coins. It's pretty obvious that this is a losing proposition, although it can be very addicting, since the coins received back can be fed back in again.
The important aspect of this obsession is the 0.2% chance that the reward isn't coins. Fist made 39 bets. Four rewards were for something other than coins. Three of the rewards were i496 gear, the same gear picked up in the moss-covered treasure chests. Those are mostly useless, since Fist, Wild, Philly, JB and even Tiphaine have nearly full i496 gears sets now. Fist also won a pet named Bonkers to add to the families still growing collection of pets for pet battles. Bonkers rewards are fairly common, though.
The one truly valuable reward is a Burden of Eternity. The explanation for what this does is a little confusing, but this is how I think it works. First, you have to have an i496 piece of gear that has not yet been transformed into an equipable item. Using the Burden on that item upgrades the item from i496 to i535. Now that is a tangible reward. One caveat, though, is that doing this makes the item Soulbound, NOT BOA, so make sure the upgrade is done by the character that you intend to use the gear. Early on, Burdens dropped pretty frequently. Now they are very, very rare.
Math Quiz: Blizz doesn't reveal the odds of winning a Burden from gambling with Kukuru. However, I know that Master Li sells Burdens for 50,000 coins apiece. Wild is still trying to get that many coins, himself, for the trinket he wants to buy (he has about 39,000 now). Many players find it easy to amass that many coins over a short period of time. Wild and Fist, alas, don't have the talent for that. Using that value as the base is how I came up with the percentages, assuming that the gambling odds matched the likelihood of a Burden dropped. The odds of that, by my calculation, is 500 to 1 odds.
Way back at the top of the post I mentioned that Fist started with 17,548 coins. When she stopped betting after the 39th bet, she had 10,748 coins left. I expect that she will gamble away those coins, having nothing better to do with them.
The gem market is going through a period of upheaval. For several weeks, the price of gems has been going up, due largely, Happy believes, to all of the gear being dropped in the Timeless Isle. Golden Lotus is the primary ingredient in making a gem, and the price for them has increased from a pretty stable 50g to 65 gold and up, depending how desperate the buyer is, as shortages of Golden Lotus are common. This increase in cost has driven the price of the gems ever higher. In the extreme example, Vermilion Onyx gems went from around 100g to has high as 198g.
Over the past week plus, however, the bottom seemed to fall out. Gem prices plummeted, and the price of Golden Lotus started jumping all over the place, though usually down. Happy has decided to interpret this as good news to buy up the lower prices gems and Golden Lotus. With gem prices down as far as 49g for some, this has the potential of a windfall for Happy should the prices settle at normal rates. Happy could then make a killing. Or, the price could settle at a lower level not worth selling them off. In that case, Happy will pass the gems to JB so she can learn gem enchants using low cost gems. It's all good. :-)
Monday, October 21, 2013
FRAPS!
FRAPS!
Late Saturday night Wild was both drunk and bored, a very bad combination. Wild's first thought was to head over to the Timeless Isle, but in his current condition those level 90 elites would tear him into little pieces. Fist didn't fancy having to put him back together and warned him she'd feed him to the sharks if he turned up at the Isle.
Wild wandered around Orgrimmar looking for trouble, and wound up on a blimp headed - well, he wasn't quite sure. The captain tossed him off his boat in Stranglethorn Vale. Some time later Wild found himself at the entrance to Blackrock Mountain, and once inside, to the entrance to Blackwing Lair. Seeing where he was going, I got the screen video capture program going, but my latest tryout failed miserably. The sample video was terrible using a program called SMRecorder.
Wild didn't really care that much. He just wanted to kill things. He was disappointed that the first boss, Razorgore, was already dead, having forgotten he'd killed the dragon a few days ago. No matter, BWL has lots of dragons. And so it began. The second boss in BWL is Vaelestraz. Wild found the dragon to be whiny and he pleaded with Wild to do the deed and kill him off. In Wild's bleary past he was always up on the second floor overlooking Vael's lair; now he was at ground zero. Vael rambled on so long Wild almost dozed off, but at last the dragon was ready and Wild killed him. Forgetting a little spell called Burning Adrenaline, Wild stayed around a little too long and died of stupidity when the spell fried him.
There are five more encounters Wild faced before getting to the final boss. Wild's favorite was the Broodlord suppression chamber. Saddled with devices that slowed him to a crawl, Wild slow motioned around blasting the thousands of creatures that descended on him. It took a very long time, but he finally came out the other end half buried in goo.
Then there were the mobs guarding three more dragons. The dragons were easy, but there these really pesky mages that had the audacity to be IMMUNE to Wild's ranged attacks. So Wild shifted into cat form and purred as he cut them into ribbons. Those mages weren't immune to claws and teeth.
Wild feared the Chromagous encounter back in his level 60 days. Chromagous is the last boss before meeting the baddest of the dragons, Nefarion. Wild needed maybe ten seconds to kill Chromagous.
Wild entered the area where Nefarian will appear. Wild has been there before, though he never killed Nefarian as a level 60. Wild did get his kill, though, with a group of 13 players. I don't recall what level they were at the time, probably our 70s, but we had a blast tearing through BWL and taking on Nefarian. It wasn't an easy fight, and only two players survived the final encounter, one of which was Wild. I'll have to dig up that post. Anyway, as a level 90 not even Nefarian had a chance. Nefarian did force Wild into cat form several times, but that barely slowed Wild down. Wild got his kill.
On Sunday morning Wild found an old friend. FRAPS is the screen capture program I originally used to capture video footage from the screen. I'd forgotten what that program was called until I stumbled over it looking for similar programs. In some limited testing FRAPS worked great. Very good, crisp video with smooth movement. Even better, the company still had my registration on file and the upgrade to their current edition was free. Can't argue with that.
I may send a hopefully more sober Wild back into BWL after the reset to get the video done. And if anyone would like to come along we could make shorter work of that suppression room.
I still haven't found the original video I shot back in, well, 2007 sometime I think. I don't have the posts before 2009 in the blog. I do have those earlier posts, but finding where I archived them will take some digging. One of these days I'll copy them into the blog . . .
Here is a couple of dates. Wild earned his BWL attunement by completing UBRS on 19 June, 2006. He made his first BWL raid with a group of forty level 60s two months later, on 12 August 2006. I was visiting family on the east coast, and I bought my Mom a new computer for Christmas just so I could use her old one for WoW. How's that for commitment?
In the never say never category, I ran across this quote while looking up those dates: Wildshard, on 19 June 2006: "... I can't see me ever spending enough time to get another toon all the way to 60."
Late Saturday night Wild was both drunk and bored, a very bad combination. Wild's first thought was to head over to the Timeless Isle, but in his current condition those level 90 elites would tear him into little pieces. Fist didn't fancy having to put him back together and warned him she'd feed him to the sharks if he turned up at the Isle.
Wild wandered around Orgrimmar looking for trouble, and wound up on a blimp headed - well, he wasn't quite sure. The captain tossed him off his boat in Stranglethorn Vale. Some time later Wild found himself at the entrance to Blackrock Mountain, and once inside, to the entrance to Blackwing Lair. Seeing where he was going, I got the screen video capture program going, but my latest tryout failed miserably. The sample video was terrible using a program called SMRecorder.
Wild didn't really care that much. He just wanted to kill things. He was disappointed that the first boss, Razorgore, was already dead, having forgotten he'd killed the dragon a few days ago. No matter, BWL has lots of dragons. And so it began. The second boss in BWL is Vaelestraz. Wild found the dragon to be whiny and he pleaded with Wild to do the deed and kill him off. In Wild's bleary past he was always up on the second floor overlooking Vael's lair; now he was at ground zero. Vael rambled on so long Wild almost dozed off, but at last the dragon was ready and Wild killed him. Forgetting a little spell called Burning Adrenaline, Wild stayed around a little too long and died of stupidity when the spell fried him.
There are five more encounters Wild faced before getting to the final boss. Wild's favorite was the Broodlord suppression chamber. Saddled with devices that slowed him to a crawl, Wild slow motioned around blasting the thousands of creatures that descended on him. It took a very long time, but he finally came out the other end half buried in goo.
Then there were the mobs guarding three more dragons. The dragons were easy, but there these really pesky mages that had the audacity to be IMMUNE to Wild's ranged attacks. So Wild shifted into cat form and purred as he cut them into ribbons. Those mages weren't immune to claws and teeth.
Wild feared the Chromagous encounter back in his level 60 days. Chromagous is the last boss before meeting the baddest of the dragons, Nefarion. Wild needed maybe ten seconds to kill Chromagous.
Wild entered the area where Nefarian will appear. Wild has been there before, though he never killed Nefarian as a level 60. Wild did get his kill, though, with a group of 13 players. I don't recall what level they were at the time, probably our 70s, but we had a blast tearing through BWL and taking on Nefarian. It wasn't an easy fight, and only two players survived the final encounter, one of which was Wild. I'll have to dig up that post. Anyway, as a level 90 not even Nefarian had a chance. Nefarian did force Wild into cat form several times, but that barely slowed Wild down. Wild got his kill.
On Sunday morning Wild found an old friend. FRAPS is the screen capture program I originally used to capture video footage from the screen. I'd forgotten what that program was called until I stumbled over it looking for similar programs. In some limited testing FRAPS worked great. Very good, crisp video with smooth movement. Even better, the company still had my registration on file and the upgrade to their current edition was free. Can't argue with that.
I may send a hopefully more sober Wild back into BWL after the reset to get the video done. And if anyone would like to come along we could make shorter work of that suppression room.
I still haven't found the original video I shot back in, well, 2007 sometime I think. I don't have the posts before 2009 in the blog. I do have those earlier posts, but finding where I archived them will take some digging. One of these days I'll copy them into the blog . . .
Here is a couple of dates. Wild earned his BWL attunement by completing UBRS on 19 June, 2006. He made his first BWL raid with a group of forty level 60s two months later, on 12 August 2006. I was visiting family on the east coast, and I bought my Mom a new computer for Christmas just so I could use her old one for WoW. How's that for commitment?
In the never say never category, I ran across this quote while looking up those dates: Wildshard, on 19 June 2006: "... I can't see me ever spending enough time to get another toon all the way to 60."
Thursday, October 17, 2013
Classic Raids - Blackwing Lair
Classic Raids - Blackwing Lair
It all started with a fellow called Jonn-Dar. Wild was feeling nostalgic one morning and was leafing through his journal of past raids, reliving the many conquests from years of raiding. He wondered . . . Wild dragged out a large chest and rummaged around in it, brushing aside the annoying spider webs, and the even more annoying spiders he disturbed. Ah, there it is. Wild pulled out a common looking, book sized leather case. It was frayed at the edges and could have used a coat of oil to soften the dried leather. He read the simple lettering on the cover: Blackwing Lair. Wild opened the case. It was empty. Disappointed, but not surprised, he would just have to dig deeper into the mound of keepsakes and other junk that had piled up over the years.
Wild had the inkling of an idea. The missing tome was a magical rendering of one of the last Blackwing Lair (BWL) raids Wild participated in. Wild made a note to find that entry in the journal. Anyway, after the raid was finished and the other thirty-nine raiders had left, Wild stayed behind. The raid had swept the dungeon clear of hostiles, with the exception of the chamber where Nefarian, the final boss, still waited. We had not been able to take him down. As far as Wild knew, Nefarian waited there still.
BWL is a raid dungeon built for level 60 raiders - forty of them. Thinking back to that time, it was an eery place to be with all of his fellow raiders gone and the hostiles defeated and swept away. Wild shrugged off the feeling. Using the magic of the place, Wild recorded each and every chamber, naming each of the terrifying creatures we'd faced down and dispatched, and recounting special battles. Wild even sought the help of an artist friend who agreed to provide original music to further capture the sense of the place.
Wild wanted to go back there. The magic of the original tome had faded over time. He wanted to make a new one, a better one. Could he?
BWL is one raid that was not upgraded to a higher level difficulty. It has survived intact as a level sixty, forty man raid despite the coming of the many expansions that had altered other great raids. The one change made to BWL is that a "solo" option has been added so a player wanting to go into BWL did not have to be in a raid. This did not mean that the raid was easy, even for a level 90 player. Is one level 90 the equal or better of forty level 60s? In terms of pure power - yes. Those old raids bosses, though, had a lot of tricks up their sleeves, and it was designed such that multiple tasks had to accomplished, often simultaneously. It was doable. There was proof of that. But was it doable for Wild?
The first boss is Razorgore. The encounter was intended to test the coordination and team play of forty raiders, which was essential to conquering BWL. A raid that couldn't work as a team would never get past this first boss. Wild doesn't have a very good memory of the details of most of the raids he's been a part of, but with BWL, Wild still has a good sense of each of the bosses. Razorgore is also the toughest boss to solo, because part of the fight requires keeping Razorgore alive (ie, by killing the dragon's attackers) while at the same time destroying the piles of eggs that litter the floor of the chamber. That's extremely difficult for one player to accomplish.
What has this got to do with Jonn-Dar? This rare level 86 elite in the Valley of Eternal Blossoms drops i410 gloves when killed. At least that's what he drops most of the time. However, there is a 15% chance that Jonn-Dar will cough up an item called a Terracotta Fragment. This is a trinket that summons a warrior to fight for Wild. Players attempting to solo Razorgore use the warrior to keep the mobs attacking Razorgore at bay while the player is destroying eggs.
Jonn-Dar is a "rare," but he always spawns in exactly the same place and re-spawns after a kill in an hour or so. If Wild were patient, and not disturbed by others also after Jonn-Dar, he might have a chance to get that trinket.
Wild was blowing some time clearing out the turtles that congregate in the area that Jonn-Dar spawns, and as luck would have it he popped into existence right on top of Wild, who had been lazy and was only at 65% health. Scrambling, Wild tossed off some attacks and went to work of the level 86 elite. After getting over the surprise, Wild quickly figured out Jonn-Dar's pattern of attack, and after that it was a matter of wearing the guy down. He has over 1.5 million health, so it took Wild some time to bring him down. Wild eventually killed him without too much fuss, but a pair of gloves dropped, not the fragment. Well, Wild knew it might take awhile. Wild parked himself in the area and waited. I spent the afternoon watching the baseball game and killed Jonn-Dar four times. No fragment. The Dodgers won it over the Cardinals, 6-4, and lived to play another game. The Missus and I are hoping that the Los Angeles Dodgers (Judi's pick to win) and the Detroit Tigers (my pick to win) end up in the World Series facing each other. The two teams still need to get past their current opponents, the St Louis Cardinals and Boston Red Sox. Sorry, all that baseball talk just sort of slipped out.
On Wild's fifth kill of Jonn-dar, the Terracotta Fragment dropped. Wild needs to put together his plan.
It all started with a fellow called Jonn-Dar. Wild was feeling nostalgic one morning and was leafing through his journal of past raids, reliving the many conquests from years of raiding. He wondered . . . Wild dragged out a large chest and rummaged around in it, brushing aside the annoying spider webs, and the even more annoying spiders he disturbed. Ah, there it is. Wild pulled out a common looking, book sized leather case. It was frayed at the edges and could have used a coat of oil to soften the dried leather. He read the simple lettering on the cover: Blackwing Lair. Wild opened the case. It was empty. Disappointed, but not surprised, he would just have to dig deeper into the mound of keepsakes and other junk that had piled up over the years.
Wild had the inkling of an idea. The missing tome was a magical rendering of one of the last Blackwing Lair (BWL) raids Wild participated in. Wild made a note to find that entry in the journal. Anyway, after the raid was finished and the other thirty-nine raiders had left, Wild stayed behind. The raid had swept the dungeon clear of hostiles, with the exception of the chamber where Nefarian, the final boss, still waited. We had not been able to take him down. As far as Wild knew, Nefarian waited there still.
BWL is a raid dungeon built for level 60 raiders - forty of them. Thinking back to that time, it was an eery place to be with all of his fellow raiders gone and the hostiles defeated and swept away. Wild shrugged off the feeling. Using the magic of the place, Wild recorded each and every chamber, naming each of the terrifying creatures we'd faced down and dispatched, and recounting special battles. Wild even sought the help of an artist friend who agreed to provide original music to further capture the sense of the place.
Wild wanted to go back there. The magic of the original tome had faded over time. He wanted to make a new one, a better one. Could he?
BWL is one raid that was not upgraded to a higher level difficulty. It has survived intact as a level sixty, forty man raid despite the coming of the many expansions that had altered other great raids. The one change made to BWL is that a "solo" option has been added so a player wanting to go into BWL did not have to be in a raid. This did not mean that the raid was easy, even for a level 90 player. Is one level 90 the equal or better of forty level 60s? In terms of pure power - yes. Those old raids bosses, though, had a lot of tricks up their sleeves, and it was designed such that multiple tasks had to accomplished, often simultaneously. It was doable. There was proof of that. But was it doable for Wild?
The first boss is Razorgore. The encounter was intended to test the coordination and team play of forty raiders, which was essential to conquering BWL. A raid that couldn't work as a team would never get past this first boss. Wild doesn't have a very good memory of the details of most of the raids he's been a part of, but with BWL, Wild still has a good sense of each of the bosses. Razorgore is also the toughest boss to solo, because part of the fight requires keeping Razorgore alive (ie, by killing the dragon's attackers) while at the same time destroying the piles of eggs that litter the floor of the chamber. That's extremely difficult for one player to accomplish.
What has this got to do with Jonn-Dar? This rare level 86 elite in the Valley of Eternal Blossoms drops i410 gloves when killed. At least that's what he drops most of the time. However, there is a 15% chance that Jonn-Dar will cough up an item called a Terracotta Fragment. This is a trinket that summons a warrior to fight for Wild. Players attempting to solo Razorgore use the warrior to keep the mobs attacking Razorgore at bay while the player is destroying eggs.
Jonn-Dar is a "rare," but he always spawns in exactly the same place and re-spawns after a kill in an hour or so. If Wild were patient, and not disturbed by others also after Jonn-Dar, he might have a chance to get that trinket.
Wild was blowing some time clearing out the turtles that congregate in the area that Jonn-Dar spawns, and as luck would have it he popped into existence right on top of Wild, who had been lazy and was only at 65% health. Scrambling, Wild tossed off some attacks and went to work of the level 86 elite. After getting over the surprise, Wild quickly figured out Jonn-Dar's pattern of attack, and after that it was a matter of wearing the guy down. He has over 1.5 million health, so it took Wild some time to bring him down. Wild eventually killed him without too much fuss, but a pair of gloves dropped, not the fragment. Well, Wild knew it might take awhile. Wild parked himself in the area and waited. I spent the afternoon watching the baseball game and killed Jonn-Dar four times. No fragment. The Dodgers won it over the Cardinals, 6-4, and lived to play another game. The Missus and I are hoping that the Los Angeles Dodgers (Judi's pick to win) and the Detroit Tigers (my pick to win) end up in the World Series facing each other. The two teams still need to get past their current opponents, the St Louis Cardinals and Boston Red Sox. Sorry, all that baseball talk just sort of slipped out.
On Wild's fifth kill of Jonn-dar, the Terracotta Fragment dropped. Wild needs to put together his plan.
Saturday, October 12, 2013
Rolo's Riddle
Rolo's Riddle
Rolo's Riddle is a Timeless Isle quest. There are three parts to it. Like a scavenger hunt, each part requires finding a hidden treasure chest. I kept hearing how hard the quest was, and how awesome the final reward for completing it. Wild was very excited when he found the quest in a pile of dirt. Part one started Wild off easy, and he found the treasure quickly. Wild got a little gold for his effort, and then he was off on part two. Wild had no trouble locating the second treasure chest, either, but there was a catch. There is a spot on the Isle where there is a very concentrated group of level 91/92 elites. They are quite nasty and attack in groups if you wander into their midst. Wild found that out the hard way when he first visited the Isle. The treasure chest was at the far back of that area. Wild thought he was being clever when he first tried to reach the chest by swimming around to the back. Sorry, but the raised area was too steep to climb. So, Wild went back around to the front, shifted into cat form, became invisible, and walked right through the lot of them to the chest. They never suspected a thing. Wild collected a few more gold for finding the second chest. He could have slipped into the water and avoided another walk through the elites . . . no way, Wild brazenly slipped back through their ranks without any problems.
The third and final part of the quest is the most interesting and challenging. That final chest is on the grassy shore of a high mountain lake that can't be reached on foot or ground mount. Since flying mounts aren't allowed on the Isle, that left them out, too. Those who have the means to slow fall or other method of not DYING when falling from high places can use a trick to get there. It involves swimming far enough away from the Isle to be able to fly again, then rise VERY high up and use a slow fall method of some kind to glide close enough to land in or near the lake. Wild tried that method twice, hoping his cat form's built in damage buffer and a spell called barkskin that hardens him against the landing would suffice. Two tries were enough. Wild could not glide well enough to reach the lake. At least he only killed himself once in the two tries.
The other method sounded like the most fun. Here's how it works. Wild took up a position near the Celestial Court where seagulls occasionally fly relatively close to the ground. It took some waiting, but eventually a gull glided past close enough for Wild to attack it. After hitting it, the annoyed bird flew down, grabbed Wild, and carried him up into the sky. Cool! The gull tracked along the Isle, roughly following the path that leads to the higher elevations of the island. There is a treasure chest on two tall spires of rock that the seagull passes over. Wild saw the first chest, and was tempted to try to retrieve it, but instead let the gull continue on it's way. Completing the quest was the first priority. The seagull flies around pretty slowly, so it's a good chance to get a real bird's eye view other parts of the island.
Eventually, the seagull came over the lake. Wild began attacking the gull again, and as long as Wild kept banging on the gull, it stayed in place. Stop hitting it and it would try to fly away. Wild soon killed the gull, and began to fall into the lake. Wild probably didn't need to slip into cat form or use his barkskin, but it didn't hurt, either, and Wild survived the fall with no damage at all. Wild found the third treasure and completed the quest. While up there, Wild found a pet battle pet that he didn't have and captured it. There are some more unique pets up there Wild will be after some other time. A special elite also spawns in that lake, and Wild had a chance to take it on. What the heck, might as well. It didn't go well for Wild, but it was fun trying. After resurrecting, Wild collected his reward - a chest with appropriate gear for the spec - ie, for Wild, a leather healing item. What he got was yet another pair or i496 bracers, which neither Wild nor Fist have any need of. So, very fun quest, very poor reward. That said, Wild went back to the Celestial Court, caught a ride with another seagull, and soon collected two more prizes from the other treasure chests. Lucky Fist. An i496 leather shoulders dropped, and with that equipped Fist's ilevel reached i483, beating Wild's i481.
Wild has just over 21,000 timeless coins. He's still working to get the 50,000 needed for the trinket he wants. Wild is trying to pick up the pace - with the help of the major league baseball playoffs, I can watch the games and play on the Timeless Isle at the same time. Although Wild isn't always certain who is rooting for who when the cheering starts.
Rolo's Riddle is a Timeless Isle quest. There are three parts to it. Like a scavenger hunt, each part requires finding a hidden treasure chest. I kept hearing how hard the quest was, and how awesome the final reward for completing it. Wild was very excited when he found the quest in a pile of dirt. Part one started Wild off easy, and he found the treasure quickly. Wild got a little gold for his effort, and then he was off on part two. Wild had no trouble locating the second treasure chest, either, but there was a catch. There is a spot on the Isle where there is a very concentrated group of level 91/92 elites. They are quite nasty and attack in groups if you wander into their midst. Wild found that out the hard way when he first visited the Isle. The treasure chest was at the far back of that area. Wild thought he was being clever when he first tried to reach the chest by swimming around to the back. Sorry, but the raised area was too steep to climb. So, Wild went back around to the front, shifted into cat form, became invisible, and walked right through the lot of them to the chest. They never suspected a thing. Wild collected a few more gold for finding the second chest. He could have slipped into the water and avoided another walk through the elites . . . no way, Wild brazenly slipped back through their ranks without any problems.
The third and final part of the quest is the most interesting and challenging. That final chest is on the grassy shore of a high mountain lake that can't be reached on foot or ground mount. Since flying mounts aren't allowed on the Isle, that left them out, too. Those who have the means to slow fall or other method of not DYING when falling from high places can use a trick to get there. It involves swimming far enough away from the Isle to be able to fly again, then rise VERY high up and use a slow fall method of some kind to glide close enough to land in or near the lake. Wild tried that method twice, hoping his cat form's built in damage buffer and a spell called barkskin that hardens him against the landing would suffice. Two tries were enough. Wild could not glide well enough to reach the lake. At least he only killed himself once in the two tries.
The other method sounded like the most fun. Here's how it works. Wild took up a position near the Celestial Court where seagulls occasionally fly relatively close to the ground. It took some waiting, but eventually a gull glided past close enough for Wild to attack it. After hitting it, the annoyed bird flew down, grabbed Wild, and carried him up into the sky. Cool! The gull tracked along the Isle, roughly following the path that leads to the higher elevations of the island. There is a treasure chest on two tall spires of rock that the seagull passes over. Wild saw the first chest, and was tempted to try to retrieve it, but instead let the gull continue on it's way. Completing the quest was the first priority. The seagull flies around pretty slowly, so it's a good chance to get a real bird's eye view other parts of the island.
Eventually, the seagull came over the lake. Wild began attacking the gull again, and as long as Wild kept banging on the gull, it stayed in place. Stop hitting it and it would try to fly away. Wild soon killed the gull, and began to fall into the lake. Wild probably didn't need to slip into cat form or use his barkskin, but it didn't hurt, either, and Wild survived the fall with no damage at all. Wild found the third treasure and completed the quest. While up there, Wild found a pet battle pet that he didn't have and captured it. There are some more unique pets up there Wild will be after some other time. A special elite also spawns in that lake, and Wild had a chance to take it on. What the heck, might as well. It didn't go well for Wild, but it was fun trying. After resurrecting, Wild collected his reward - a chest with appropriate gear for the spec - ie, for Wild, a leather healing item. What he got was yet another pair or i496 bracers, which neither Wild nor Fist have any need of. So, very fun quest, very poor reward. That said, Wild went back to the Celestial Court, caught a ride with another seagull, and soon collected two more prizes from the other treasure chests. Lucky Fist. An i496 leather shoulders dropped, and with that equipped Fist's ilevel reached i483, beating Wild's i481.
Wild has just over 21,000 timeless coins. He's still working to get the 50,000 needed for the trinket he wants. Wild is trying to pick up the pace - with the help of the major league baseball playoffs, I can watch the games and play on the Timeless Isle at the same time. Although Wild isn't always certain who is rooting for who when the cheering starts.
Tuesday, October 8, 2013
Mounting Frustration and General Meanderings
Mounting Frustration and General Meanderings
Wild spent the past two evenings at the Darkmoon Faire, primarily to try and capture a Crow. The combat pet Crow can only be found during the Faire, and are pretty rare even then. Wild never saw a Crow in the wilderness surrounding the Faire, but there were the occasional blowflies (well, I guess they were glowflies, but they're still just bugs). I figured that crows were secondary combat pets, and eventually Wild did capture a poor quality crow (grey), the Speed/Speed version. Wild can upgrade it to a rare, but I'm hoping to get a better power/speed combination and will keep looking until the Faire closes in a week.
Wild's most needed piece of gear is a trinket (i409). He has three overlapping plans to acquire one. (1) Wild is growing tired of the Timeless Isle, and the endless farming of elites and coins. He hasn't seen a treasure chest in days. He'll keep going back, though, to get coins to buy a high powered trinket that can be earned there. Wild needs 50,000 coins, but only has a little over 13,000 so far. (2) Wild has two sets of Darkmoon cards, one of serpents, and one of cranes, both of which make very nice trinkets. However, I am missing one darkmoon card from each set, and without one of them, no trinket. If Wild gets his Darkmoon trinket he might give up on the Isle completely. (3) If Wild gets into an LFR raid, that might also solve his trinket problem, since the bosses in those early Pandaria raids drop trinkets.
Wild is still fussing about, though, dragging his feet and claiming he needed to work on some "things." Wild's ongoing preps for raiding hit another snag when a favored addon went on the fritz. It tracks Lifebloom and Harmony stacks, two critical healing elements that must always be active. It was working (somewhat) last week, but is balking this week. Then, in the middle of trying to work out those kinks, Wild was disconnected from the game. Disconnects are becoming more and more frequent, up to several times a day. I know the drill. If I complain, Blizzard will just link the standard fix-it notes that involve hours upon hours of deleting/scrubbing files and folders. Then there are more hours of rebuilding the destroyed user interface caused by the scrubbing. Even after all that work, the odds that the disconnects were fixed are about 50/50. I'm not sure I want to go through all that.
Fist was embarrassed when she earned an i496 Timeless cloak and forgot to change her spec to get the healing cape. Instead, she got her second DPS cape, which she has no need of. I put in a ticket with Blizzard. Maybe someone will take pity on Fist and swap her a healing cape. We won't mention her two deaths - because she forgot to change back to DPS spec and was battling elites in her healing gear.
Finally, it was something of a pleasure to watch an alliance death knight at work on the Timeless Isle. He had drawn not just one, but two level 91 elites (some kind of moss monster). He was patiently and expertly kiting them across the Isle to the Celestial Court. It was a long, slow slog, and few helped him, which I think is the way he wanted it. It was obvious he wasn't trying to kill them outright, since most of his effort was just to keep himself alive. I soon realized what he was doing. The death knight was kiting the monsters into the path of the non player characters at the Court, who obligingly began attacking the monsters and helping the death knight once he got them close enough. The two elites went down once the npcs came to his aid. Nicely done.
Wild spent the past two evenings at the Darkmoon Faire, primarily to try and capture a Crow. The combat pet Crow can only be found during the Faire, and are pretty rare even then. Wild never saw a Crow in the wilderness surrounding the Faire, but there were the occasional blowflies (well, I guess they were glowflies, but they're still just bugs). I figured that crows were secondary combat pets, and eventually Wild did capture a poor quality crow (grey), the Speed/Speed version. Wild can upgrade it to a rare, but I'm hoping to get a better power/speed combination and will keep looking until the Faire closes in a week.
Wild's most needed piece of gear is a trinket (i409). He has three overlapping plans to acquire one. (1) Wild is growing tired of the Timeless Isle, and the endless farming of elites and coins. He hasn't seen a treasure chest in days. He'll keep going back, though, to get coins to buy a high powered trinket that can be earned there. Wild needs 50,000 coins, but only has a little over 13,000 so far. (2) Wild has two sets of Darkmoon cards, one of serpents, and one of cranes, both of which make very nice trinkets. However, I am missing one darkmoon card from each set, and without one of them, no trinket. If Wild gets his Darkmoon trinket he might give up on the Isle completely. (3) If Wild gets into an LFR raid, that might also solve his trinket problem, since the bosses in those early Pandaria raids drop trinkets.
Wild is still fussing about, though, dragging his feet and claiming he needed to work on some "things." Wild's ongoing preps for raiding hit another snag when a favored addon went on the fritz. It tracks Lifebloom and Harmony stacks, two critical healing elements that must always be active. It was working (somewhat) last week, but is balking this week. Then, in the middle of trying to work out those kinks, Wild was disconnected from the game. Disconnects are becoming more and more frequent, up to several times a day. I know the drill. If I complain, Blizzard will just link the standard fix-it notes that involve hours upon hours of deleting/scrubbing files and folders. Then there are more hours of rebuilding the destroyed user interface caused by the scrubbing. Even after all that work, the odds that the disconnects were fixed are about 50/50. I'm not sure I want to go through all that.
Fist was embarrassed when she earned an i496 Timeless cloak and forgot to change her spec to get the healing cape. Instead, she got her second DPS cape, which she has no need of. I put in a ticket with Blizzard. Maybe someone will take pity on Fist and swap her a healing cape. We won't mention her two deaths - because she forgot to change back to DPS spec and was battling elites in her healing gear.
Finally, it was something of a pleasure to watch an alliance death knight at work on the Timeless Isle. He had drawn not just one, but two level 91 elites (some kind of moss monster). He was patiently and expertly kiting them across the Isle to the Celestial Court. It was a long, slow slog, and few helped him, which I think is the way he wanted it. It was obvious he wasn't trying to kill them outright, since most of his effort was just to keep himself alive. I soon realized what he was doing. The death knight was kiting the monsters into the path of the non player characters at the Court, who obligingly began attacking the monsters and helping the death knight once he got them close enough. The two elites went down once the npcs came to his aid. Nicely done.
Saturday, October 5, 2013
Meitha Calls a Flex Raid
Meitha Calls a Flex Raid
Wild's guild, Meitha, scheduled a flex raid for Friday and Saturday. The target is the new Siege of Orgrimmar (SoO). There are fourteen bosses spread across four wings. Since this is a flex raid, I don't think there is hard requirement for a minimum gear score. The raid leader has the flexibility to invite whoever he wants, and how many he wants, regardless of gear. Of course, gear is an important factor in having a successful raid. Raid difficulty scales in a flex raid, so the more players in the raid, the tougher the content. Raiders with poor gear would certainly hurt the raid. I read somewhere that typical gear requirements were at least in the i510+ range. To be sure, I took a look at those players that had already signed up for the raid:
Raid Leader: Hekktor (i486) - I seriously doubt this is the character the raid leader will use in the raid, considering most of his gear has no gems or enchants in place. I don't recognize the name, so he could be a guildie Wild hasn't met yet, or a friend on an alt I didn't know about. With everyone having multiple level 90 alts these days, it's very hard to keep track. In fact, Hekktor is also Porkkchopp (i497), the guild leader.
Shimmi, friend and superb shaman: (i465), not so good, but again, probably has a better alt.
Sho: (i517), ok, that's more like it.
Vareyne: (i528), looks good.
Adrenalin: (i490), some enchant issues.
Goover: (i530), a good friend who looks ready to rock and roll.
Grommash: (i517) and ready.
I probably can't rely on what character they posted for the raid, although not posting the character you intend to raid with would greatly annoy me were I the raid leader. But, at least it's starting to look like a real raid.
Wild is on the invite list. That's a surprise, although the raid leader might just be casting a large net to see who responds. Wild's gear score has improved since the last report, but it's still only i480, lower than almost everyone on the above list. I can't imagine Wild actually getting an invite, unless the intent is just to see SoO, rather than thinking we could defeat even the first boss. Or the trash mobs, for that matter, assuming there are some. Stay tuned for further developments.
Friday Night - A Raidin' We WON'T Go
Over the glare of the Missus, who had dinner almost ready, I had Wild hang out with the guild for about twenty minutes before raid time. I even checked that Teamspeak was up and running. Back when Wild was raiding the Voice over Internet (Voip) software we used was Ventrilo, but for some reason the guild switched to Teamspeak, which I had never used before. I had no problems connecting to the server or hearing the talk of the other guildies. Of course, Wild doesn't ever actually speak, and I didn't even have a mike hooked up. But Wild was ready.
With ten minutes still to go before raid start time, guild leader Porkkchopp called off the raid. I was surprised. I counted six raid ready players, far less than the ten usually needed, but there was still time to see if others showed up. "We'll try again some other time," the guild leader said. No mention of trying again on Saturday. Meitha's attempt at a raid was over. A couple of the old guard lamented the inability to gather up a raid group from among the over four hundred members of the guild. Honestly, though, there was little enthusiasm, and the group quickly broke up to go do other things.
It was a hard thing to see the decayed state of non-raiding that Meitha had sunk to. It seems like another world now, when "Lady Hunter (Tala)" would cajole, tease, and browbeat guildies to sign up and show up for the weekly raids. If we were short at raid start time, Tala would canvass other guilds and friends, looking to fill in the holes, even when it took us past the start time. Most of the time she was successful, too, so those of us who waited were patient, and were rewarded by being able to raid. Wild's last raid was with G2, on April 18th, 2012. At the time Meitha was "officially" running three raids. However, the G3 raid was listed as "still forming," G1 was "rebuilding," and G2 had lost it's raid leader. It was never the same after that.
Wild had hoped that flex raiding would save raiding. That doesn't seem likely anymore, at least not for Meitha.
Wild's guild, Meitha, scheduled a flex raid for Friday and Saturday. The target is the new Siege of Orgrimmar (SoO). There are fourteen bosses spread across four wings. Since this is a flex raid, I don't think there is hard requirement for a minimum gear score. The raid leader has the flexibility to invite whoever he wants, and how many he wants, regardless of gear. Of course, gear is an important factor in having a successful raid. Raid difficulty scales in a flex raid, so the more players in the raid, the tougher the content. Raiders with poor gear would certainly hurt the raid. I read somewhere that typical gear requirements were at least in the i510+ range. To be sure, I took a look at those players that had already signed up for the raid:
Raid Leader: Hekktor (i486) - I seriously doubt this is the character the raid leader will use in the raid, considering most of his gear has no gems or enchants in place. I don't recognize the name, so he could be a guildie Wild hasn't met yet, or a friend on an alt I didn't know about. With everyone having multiple level 90 alts these days, it's very hard to keep track. In fact, Hekktor is also Porkkchopp (i497), the guild leader.
Shimmi, friend and superb shaman: (i465), not so good, but again, probably has a better alt.
Sho: (i517), ok, that's more like it.
Vareyne: (i528), looks good.
Adrenalin: (i490), some enchant issues.
Goover: (i530), a good friend who looks ready to rock and roll.
Grommash: (i517) and ready.
I probably can't rely on what character they posted for the raid, although not posting the character you intend to raid with would greatly annoy me were I the raid leader. But, at least it's starting to look like a real raid.
Wild is on the invite list. That's a surprise, although the raid leader might just be casting a large net to see who responds. Wild's gear score has improved since the last report, but it's still only i480, lower than almost everyone on the above list. I can't imagine Wild actually getting an invite, unless the intent is just to see SoO, rather than thinking we could defeat even the first boss. Or the trash mobs, for that matter, assuming there are some. Stay tuned for further developments.
Friday Night - A Raidin' We WON'T Go
Over the glare of the Missus, who had dinner almost ready, I had Wild hang out with the guild for about twenty minutes before raid time. I even checked that Teamspeak was up and running. Back when Wild was raiding the Voice over Internet (Voip) software we used was Ventrilo, but for some reason the guild switched to Teamspeak, which I had never used before. I had no problems connecting to the server or hearing the talk of the other guildies. Of course, Wild doesn't ever actually speak, and I didn't even have a mike hooked up. But Wild was ready.
With ten minutes still to go before raid start time, guild leader Porkkchopp called off the raid. I was surprised. I counted six raid ready players, far less than the ten usually needed, but there was still time to see if others showed up. "We'll try again some other time," the guild leader said. No mention of trying again on Saturday. Meitha's attempt at a raid was over. A couple of the old guard lamented the inability to gather up a raid group from among the over four hundred members of the guild. Honestly, though, there was little enthusiasm, and the group quickly broke up to go do other things.
It was a hard thing to see the decayed state of non-raiding that Meitha had sunk to. It seems like another world now, when "Lady Hunter (Tala)" would cajole, tease, and browbeat guildies to sign up and show up for the weekly raids. If we were short at raid start time, Tala would canvass other guilds and friends, looking to fill in the holes, even when it took us past the start time. Most of the time she was successful, too, so those of us who waited were patient, and were rewarded by being able to raid. Wild's last raid was with G2, on April 18th, 2012. At the time Meitha was "officially" running three raids. However, the G3 raid was listed as "still forming," G1 was "rebuilding," and G2 had lost it's raid leader. It was never the same after that.
Wild had hoped that flex raiding would save raiding. That doesn't seem likely anymore, at least not for Meitha.
Thursday, October 3, 2013
The Proving Grounds
The Proving Grounds
The Proving Grounds is a new mechanism that allows individual players to practice in a five-man dungeon like atmosphere. Players can practice damage dealing (DPS), healing, and tanking with four other non-player characters. There are four levels of difficulty: Bronze, Silver, Gold, and Endless. The battles are very similar to that of a real five man dungeon. The Proving Grounds is an instanced dungeon that Wild entered by talking with his druid trainer.
Wild selected the healing scenario. Four non-player characters were added to make up the five man group: Wild, a tank, and three DPS. Wild's gear was automatically set to a standard set in order to balance the event - in other words, the level of gear didn't matter. All of the normal buffs and debuffs that a dungeon group would be expected to have were provided automatically, except food and flask buffs, which Wild would have to provide for himself, but didn't bother with for this first test. By standardizing all of this, the only non-standard factor was the player.
The dungeon challenge was to defeat several waves of attackers (five waves, I think) while keeping everyone in the group alive. Wild could not use his Rebirth spell (to revive a dead player). A single death would end the battle in failure.
Let me first point out that I knew nothing about the above the first time I entered the Proving Grounds. All Wild knew about it was that he could get there by asking the Druid Trainer, and that Wild could "practice" his healing there.
Wild has not healed anyone but himself in many, many months, but he still had his spell bars and stuff, so how hard could it be? Wild smiled complacently at Trial Master Rotun, and asked for the lowest level of difficulty, the Bronze. The battle started after a ten second countdown. Wild's tank died on the third wave. The poor tank apologized to Wild, promising to train harder and do a better job next time. Ok, the tank is nothing but pixels, but I still felt bad for him and my group. I'd failed them.
So ended my first visit to the Proving Grounds.
I thought Wild's healing reflexes would just automatically kick in once I got started. The sad fact, though, is that Wild has lost those reflexes - the hand/brain reflexes that know what key or button to hit without thinking about it or looking for it on the keyboard. I'm not sure how long it will take to beat the rust off of Wild's healing abilities. I know I won't be putting real players at risk until Wild has re-mastered that art and can defeat the Proving Grounds at least up to Gold.
After licking his wounds and bolstering his confidence with a few days of killing elites on the Timeless Isle, Wild made some adjustments and returned to the Proving Grounds. Wild rebuilt his mouseover spell casting into the same mold he used when raiding. The comfort level went up greatly, although I knew I'd still be checking on spell casts visually for awhile, until it became automatic again. Wild also used his flask and food buffs.
This time things went better. The first two waves of mobs are pretty easy, but Wild was nervous and overhealed, which would bite him later. The third wave, I believe, is where the group started getting hit with AoE assaults and Wild had to really pick up the healing. Still not much to worry about - except that I failed to check Wild's mana pool, which had gone down by half before I noticed it and was at the start of wave four. Wild Innervated on the fourth wave to gain mana and managed to keep everyone alive. Wave five was another large AoE assault that just went on and on. Wild shifted to Tree of Life, but innervate wasn't up again, yet, and Tree of Life isn't much good if you are out of mana. The tank was still hanging in there, bless him, but a DPS died, and that's a fail. The scenario ended.
Things Wild did wrong: Waited too long to innervate (check mana often!), so didn't have it available a second time; did not use Nature's Swiftness, which would have saved mana; didn't use swiftmend, another mana saver; did not use efflorescence effects from wild mushrooms, which also alleviates mana and greatly increases healing; waited too long before shifting into Tree of Life. Wild has a minor excuse for the wild mushrooms. Wild is not used to them, and never had them for healing during his raiding days. Wild had just set up a new glyph so that the powerful efflorescence healing effect was procced by wild mushrooms instead of swiftmend. Wild completely forgot about dropping his mushroom to get that effect.
It's sounds crazy, but Wild was as nervous in the Proving Grounds as he is in a real dungeon with real players. I love it, though. Wild can go back into the Grounds over and over, working on memorizing his spell casting and making use of all the abilities Wild has at his disposal to manage his mana and keep his team alive.
The Proving Grounds is a new mechanism that allows individual players to practice in a five-man dungeon like atmosphere. Players can practice damage dealing (DPS), healing, and tanking with four other non-player characters. There are four levels of difficulty: Bronze, Silver, Gold, and Endless. The battles are very similar to that of a real five man dungeon. The Proving Grounds is an instanced dungeon that Wild entered by talking with his druid trainer.
Wild selected the healing scenario. Four non-player characters were added to make up the five man group: Wild, a tank, and three DPS. Wild's gear was automatically set to a standard set in order to balance the event - in other words, the level of gear didn't matter. All of the normal buffs and debuffs that a dungeon group would be expected to have were provided automatically, except food and flask buffs, which Wild would have to provide for himself, but didn't bother with for this first test. By standardizing all of this, the only non-standard factor was the player.
The dungeon challenge was to defeat several waves of attackers (five waves, I think) while keeping everyone in the group alive. Wild could not use his Rebirth spell (to revive a dead player). A single death would end the battle in failure.
Let me first point out that I knew nothing about the above the first time I entered the Proving Grounds. All Wild knew about it was that he could get there by asking the Druid Trainer, and that Wild could "practice" his healing there.
Wild has not healed anyone but himself in many, many months, but he still had his spell bars and stuff, so how hard could it be? Wild smiled complacently at Trial Master Rotun, and asked for the lowest level of difficulty, the Bronze. The battle started after a ten second countdown. Wild's tank died on the third wave. The poor tank apologized to Wild, promising to train harder and do a better job next time. Ok, the tank is nothing but pixels, but I still felt bad for him and my group. I'd failed them.
So ended my first visit to the Proving Grounds.
I thought Wild's healing reflexes would just automatically kick in once I got started. The sad fact, though, is that Wild has lost those reflexes - the hand/brain reflexes that know what key or button to hit without thinking about it or looking for it on the keyboard. I'm not sure how long it will take to beat the rust off of Wild's healing abilities. I know I won't be putting real players at risk until Wild has re-mastered that art and can defeat the Proving Grounds at least up to Gold.
After licking his wounds and bolstering his confidence with a few days of killing elites on the Timeless Isle, Wild made some adjustments and returned to the Proving Grounds. Wild rebuilt his mouseover spell casting into the same mold he used when raiding. The comfort level went up greatly, although I knew I'd still be checking on spell casts visually for awhile, until it became automatic again. Wild also used his flask and food buffs.
This time things went better. The first two waves of mobs are pretty easy, but Wild was nervous and overhealed, which would bite him later. The third wave, I believe, is where the group started getting hit with AoE assaults and Wild had to really pick up the healing. Still not much to worry about - except that I failed to check Wild's mana pool, which had gone down by half before I noticed it and was at the start of wave four. Wild Innervated on the fourth wave to gain mana and managed to keep everyone alive. Wave five was another large AoE assault that just went on and on. Wild shifted to Tree of Life, but innervate wasn't up again, yet, and Tree of Life isn't much good if you are out of mana. The tank was still hanging in there, bless him, but a DPS died, and that's a fail. The scenario ended.
Things Wild did wrong: Waited too long to innervate (check mana often!), so didn't have it available a second time; did not use Nature's Swiftness, which would have saved mana; didn't use swiftmend, another mana saver; did not use efflorescence effects from wild mushrooms, which also alleviates mana and greatly increases healing; waited too long before shifting into Tree of Life. Wild has a minor excuse for the wild mushrooms. Wild is not used to them, and never had them for healing during his raiding days. Wild had just set up a new glyph so that the powerful efflorescence healing effect was procced by wild mushrooms instead of swiftmend. Wild completely forgot about dropping his mushroom to get that effect.
It's sounds crazy, but Wild was as nervous in the Proving Grounds as he is in a real dungeon with real players. I love it, though. Wild can go back into the Grounds over and over, working on memorizing his spell casting and making use of all the abilities Wild has at his disposal to manage his mana and keep his team alive.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
