I received my achievement for gaining exalted rep with my alliance guild the other night. Sadly, i had to guild quit shortly after because they leaders/officers had a dispute and decided to take the guild to another realm. Good luck to them.
Before i left, i picked up a lion mount and a dark phoenix mount. also grabbed the minipet too. finally, i took a few screen shots which i'll post soon.
So, if you're in the US Ravenholdt server, and would like two farily awesome dps in your alliance raids (weekends for now), me and my gf are now homeless. You can check my armory to the left. My raiding toon is named Burlésque. my gf's char is similarly geared and somehow does more damage than me. go figure. arcane mages, really. anyway.
On the hordeside of things, my guild, Riskbreakers, is doing well. we recently received an influx of members from some dying guild and are now doing well. we were also dying several months back before we merged with another, also dying, guild. well, thankfully, things worked out and i am hoping to see more weekend raids scheduled to cater to everyone. hopefully i get to raid on my horde toons too. i'd love to either rogue it up or dk it up. but we'll see what happens.
so this is just a quick update. hope you all have a wonderful day.
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
Tuesday, November 8, 2011
Bad DPS
Bad dps is the reason why i dont like to tank using the LFD tool. dsp queue times can be a lot shorter if more tanks wanted to be tanks. but those who actually do want to be tanks often have to deal with bad groups as well as angry mobs. now the angry mobs are one thing, that's what i signed up for. but the bad dps? well i do go into random dungeons with both eyes opened, knowing that i will get these silly low dps, stands-in-bads and do not know how to cc or interrupt kinda guys. there's so many of them and i often as myself if it's really worth the hassle to even do any of these dungeon runs.
Now the problem with bad dps is that it can be masked easily. have 1 bad dps? sure. the other two can cover him. if there's 2, then maybe there's a third, stellar dps who's able to help the tank and healer cc, interrupt, or even *gasp* dps. yes a dps who dps's!! nice.
But the other day, zoning into a dungeon where two shamans, apparently a couple, did not know how to dps well (heroic sfk, 6k dps) nor did they even try to interrupt after i've stated many times to use wind shear (me and my gf were doing 100% of the interrupts). what made it worse was the third dps also couldnt figure out directions. he was a mage who didnt know how to counterspell or spell steal. i doubt if he was even able to sheep anything. all i saw was sub par damage. every once in a while their dps went to 8k, but overall, it was abysmal for heroics anything. gear isnt going to help their bad numbers.
in any case, i want to make this post short. so here it goes. bad dps (not low dps, but bad dps) are the primary causes for long queue times. they discourage tanks to join the lfd queue, even with the satchel of exotic mysterious pleasures, it's not a great incentive to even want to go through with these bad dps folks. the shamans left after a couple of wipes on springvale, in which i've mentioned time and time again to interrupt the adds. people seem to all like to stand in bad, etc. me and my girlfriend, after 3 bosses, were still 100% interrupters.
anyway. here's to hoping for better groups.
Now the problem with bad dps is that it can be masked easily. have 1 bad dps? sure. the other two can cover him. if there's 2, then maybe there's a third, stellar dps who's able to help the tank and healer cc, interrupt, or even *gasp* dps. yes a dps who dps's!! nice.
But the other day, zoning into a dungeon where two shamans, apparently a couple, did not know how to dps well (heroic sfk, 6k dps) nor did they even try to interrupt after i've stated many times to use wind shear (me and my gf were doing 100% of the interrupts). what made it worse was the third dps also couldnt figure out directions. he was a mage who didnt know how to counterspell or spell steal. i doubt if he was even able to sheep anything. all i saw was sub par damage. every once in a while their dps went to 8k, but overall, it was abysmal for heroics anything. gear isnt going to help their bad numbers.
in any case, i want to make this post short. so here it goes. bad dps (not low dps, but bad dps) are the primary causes for long queue times. they discourage tanks to join the lfd queue, even with the satchel of exotic mysterious pleasures, it's not a great incentive to even want to go through with these bad dps folks. the shamans left after a couple of wipes on springvale, in which i've mentioned time and time again to interrupt the adds. people seem to all like to stand in bad, etc. me and my girlfriend, after 3 bosses, were still 100% interrupters.
anyway. here's to hoping for better groups.
Friday, November 4, 2011
Night Elf Druids (lv.11-19)
So far our druid leveling escapades have led us to darkshore, where we learned that Auberdine was destroyed. We're here to help mend the lands, once again. but this time, not from some taint or corruption, but from invaders. Firstly, we went to rescue the wounded and fend off some elementals. Then the story took a turn and we're now facing troll menace from the north. So stuck between a rock and a hard place, we ended up beating the horde and killing the leaders there. then we returned to mending the land and fighting off the twilight's hammer. it was a kind of back and forth sorth of thing that got a little confusing. but oh well. it will lead us to the invasion further in ashenvale. but not yet! we're just about to start the quests in southern darkshore. we're both 19, but that's leveling ready for ashenvale, not southern darkshore. oh well. blizz made leveling super fast that we outlevel content even if we decide not to. im tempted to not rest at the inn.
In any case, Demarionn is now 19 and can take hits a little better. Charlize is also 19 and is doing just fine. I think we'll skip Deadmines and wailing caverns. but starting level 30, we're looking to do dungeons once only. meaning rfk once, sm:library once, etc. once to do the quests given, and that's it. if things for us do not drop. so be it. we dont really need them anyway.
Here's updated screen shots from the armory since i know blog readers like pictures... and not words. for some reason.
I say... awesome low level set. i like the black top and the black staff. it reminds me somewhat of a pool cue stick. as for me, im usually in my cat form so no big deal as to what i look like.
In any case, Demarionn is now 19 and can take hits a little better. Charlize is also 19 and is doing just fine. I think we'll skip Deadmines and wailing caverns. but starting level 30, we're looking to do dungeons once only. meaning rfk once, sm:library once, etc. once to do the quests given, and that's it. if things for us do not drop. so be it. we dont really need them anyway.
Here's updated screen shots from the armory since i know blog readers like pictures... and not words. for some reason.
Thursday, November 3, 2011
I Cried
Guildie i've never seen before gets the polearm i've been wanting for the past four months.
/cry
Monday, October 31, 2011
Special Characters
Blizz has made the announcment that, upon the launch of 4.3, they will no longer allow special characters in names. there has been some complaints, but most are in favor of this change, per reaction in the forums, of course. but i can understand why. there are people who use this feature to find a name that is already taken, not for the purpose of scamming, but simply because they want that name themselves. the current system in wow does not allow multiples of the same names in the same server. perhaps a surname would solve this issue.
but people would change one or two characters in their names to be special characters. i understand the use of this completely. my hunter, Burlésque, and my rogue, Brunö have these special characters because someone already took the original names. anyone with a pulse will ignore the accents and pronouce my character's names without the accents. those who argue about accents are just grasping at straws. what i dont understand, and do not condone, are those who use special characters over and over again. it's not that special and gets quite annoying, really. one example i have for you is shown below. i was looking for my warrior's armory (on Ysondre) and found abuse.
This is why special characters will no longer be allowed:
checking further, this is a level 25 alliance guild with 980 members. nine. hundred. eighty.
Now, i understand if maybe they used all those characters to denote that even the name of the guild is "chaotic" but i doubt that. even then, it is an eyesore and a total abuse of a system. take advantage of the "unenforced" naming policy long enough and we'll slowly get repercussions.
Again, i have no issues with people changing one letter in their name because the original name is taken. blizz has made a concession for that and knows that there might be some abuse. however, with the above name, that abuse gets way out of control. Now looking at the members of the guild, i see very few with special characters. even the guild leader's name doesnt have special characters. but as a whole, the guild bugs me very slightly. very slightly enough to forget this post next week. but for those on Perenolde, and for those who might be in the Cyclone battlegroup, there may be a lot of /sigh when a member of the above guild is spotted.
but people would change one or two characters in their names to be special characters. i understand the use of this completely. my hunter, Burlésque, and my rogue, Brunö have these special characters because someone already took the original names. anyone with a pulse will ignore the accents and pronouce my character's names without the accents. those who argue about accents are just grasping at straws. what i dont understand, and do not condone, are those who use special characters over and over again. it's not that special and gets quite annoying, really. one example i have for you is shown below. i was looking for my warrior's armory (on Ysondre) and found abuse.
This is why special characters will no longer be allowed:
Now, i understand if maybe they used all those characters to denote that even the name of the guild is "chaotic" but i doubt that. even then, it is an eyesore and a total abuse of a system. take advantage of the "unenforced" naming policy long enough and we'll slowly get repercussions.
Again, i have no issues with people changing one letter in their name because the original name is taken. blizz has made a concession for that and knows that there might be some abuse. however, with the above name, that abuse gets way out of control. Now looking at the members of the guild, i see very few with special characters. even the guild leader's name doesnt have special characters. but as a whole, the guild bugs me very slightly. very slightly enough to forget this post next week. but for those on Perenolde, and for those who might be in the Cyclone battlegroup, there may be a lot of /sigh when a member of the above guild is spotted.
Night Elf Druids (Lv 1-10)
Every now and again i will be blogging about my new adventures with my girlfriend. Expect updates on a weekly or biweekly basis, if we continue playing.
Me and my girlfriend started playing new alts just this past weekend. We made two nightelf druids and began questing in Teldrasil. Going through the quests a second time for me are a lot more fun than before. firstly, i have a partner to party with. but secondly, there's things added to the game that makes questing more immersed and streamlined than before.
The quests are a little more streamline--the quest givers are closer together and the objectives arent so far apart. when doing the filling the moonwell quests, i noticed a little bit of story being told by the apparitions that appear at each moonwell. this is quite a nice touch and gets people into the whole story of how teldrasil was made. inside the druid's den, we had sentinels join us, leading the way around the big place. one quest seems to be missing down there, but because there's just so many furbolgs down there and the den is almost like a maze, its a great idea that the quest was gone. but a sentinel sidekick that shows us the way to go? omg awesome!
The second thing i really liked about leveling a druid again is the change to wrath spam. no longer do i have to deal with it for 20 levels. actually, what i did previously was, if i can recall correctly, starfire, moonfire, wrathspam!! if they were tough, and most mobs back in the days were, i'd hit bearform when they reach melee and end the fight as a bear. it was pretty easy, but long. now it's just easy, but if you're not careful with add control, a couple of adds and you can go down quick. My girlfriend found that out the hard way with the harpies in teldrasil. pulling one to us would have been a better option than to root it where it was, aggroing another 3 in the process. well, lesson learned. So getting cat form at level 8 really helped to show what druids are all about. we start off with wrath spams and moonfires, which is from the balance tree. then we get rejuvenation and nourish, quite awesome healing spells already at level 8-ish. finally, we get cat form with several new attacks. we get two levels to play before deciding on whether or not to go balance or feral. restoration may be an option to level, even when playing solo, but who wants to willingly submit themselves to torture?
Now i know why i like my rogue so much. we're all ninjas! cats are ninjas too! i really did like playing as a cat druid and never really connected it to my rogue, or other melee classes until now. so with that said, i know i will be leveling as feral. being feral also gives me a better stealth than the balance druid who just needs to go into catform and stealth in order to bypass some mobs. but even still, the M.O., or modus operandi, for me and my girlfriend will be, especially if we dont have to kill x number of peons before we kill a named boss, will me to sneak past EVERYTHING, and kill the boss. sneak out, turn in quest, level!
Now we're level 10 and just about to leave the starting zone. hopefully we'll get acquainted with darnassus again figure out the map in no time. this time, we'll be able to chill with the worgens as well. hopefully they dont bite or else i'll have to go catform on them. but i hear they're a serious bunch and quite industrious in their old homeland. after that, im really keen on helping my fellow nightelves out in darkshore and ashenvale. hopefully, we can knock back the horde offensive there.
as far as leveling goes, i really do want to keep things as close to night elf centric as possible. i really want to level through the night elf story only (since i know leveling speed is a joke) to get the most out of the story. If anyone knows the best path to take, please let me know. i know for sure that darkshore and ashenvale will probably be our next zones. but after that, i am not sure. possibly stonetalon mtns and feralas? i dont want to go help any gnomes or dwarves or humans, not unless i have to. i dont hate them or anything, and there's nothing wrong with helping them, as they are alliance. but im more into helping the nightelf race solve their own problems first. thanks!
Friday, October 28, 2011
Enough With the Panda Hate.
Tanking is Fun
Today's post is in response, actually not a response, but on the same topic, as gavlon's post found here and the grumpy's post found here.
gavlon states two very important things. One, tanking sucks. and two, to fix this, make all tanking like blood Dk tanking. Grumpy talks about how tanking in raids vs dungeons is like night and day. i agree with grumpy on his opinion. i disagree with gavlon.
Now here's my little input on tanking, why i like/dislike it, and what i could do to make it more fun. Actually, if you read the comments from gavl's post, everyone is pretty spot on in their assessment of tanking in Wow. it's something not many people would want to do, especially for Pug groups (which is why i keep asking my gf to see if anyone in our guild wants to join us). Read the comments. they're very true of why wait times are so long for the dps and tanks are so hard to come by, in random pugs.
Let me explain why my gf is asking my guild if anyone wants to join in our run. We're level 82 and 84, or about there but are on two different realms. i blame the character limits for this. since i am only able to have 10 characters on one realm, making a new character to level with her requires that i make a new character on a new realm and level through instances. you can see just how boring that can be, going through the same dungeons over and over again until, thankfully, we outlevel them, only to be greeted with 20 more runs of another dungeon. So after maybe 82 levels if this, you can see why i soooo would rather party with people i know instead of a bunch of puggers who sometimes decides to act up or try to run the show (and why is it always a mage???).
My gf is lucky. she has a bf tank who knows all the dungeons, pretty much inside and out, knows who to CC, who does the worst damage, how pulls should be coordinated, etc. i know all this because i've tanked all of these instances many times before. going into gnomeregan, blackrock depths and blackrock spire i get comments like, "thank god, someone who knows where to go!" my gf knows she's lucky and she makes me skewered eels for my hunter to show her appreciation. ^_^
Now on to the bad. I dont like tanking. i dont like tanking because i have to be responsible. i have to know the fights, kill order, cc order, react to environmental changes, bad dps, etc. i dont suffer from bad healing becuase, well, i have a pocket healer that does an awesome job. but i really dont want to take on, what seems almost like a job, to play a game where the point of the game is to relax, or at least problem-solve to get my mind off of the real life issues such as work. In-game, i dont want to be responsible for hearding cattle. it feels almost like that sometimes, even if it's just one dps who runs around and acts a fool, it's still a pain to deal with. i play this game to have fun, not to baby sit. This is the main issue of tanking and many tanks have gone to great lengths to simply tank for their guildies, thereby bypassing a lot of the stupid that goes on in random pugs. What is it about LFD that makes it soooo bad? it's because no one has any accountability that they can cause some amount of grief to their teammates and get away with it. i am not saying it doesnt happen before LFD, but LFD made pugs a ceaspool of stupid, rude and arrogant idiots that i hope never to have in my guild, no matter how leet their dps may be.
The good thing about tanking is that, when i do get a good group (and lately i have), things go smoothly and i only have to deal with the in-game mechanics. sometimes i get the occassional lazy dps who doesnt know how to target my own target, or the drone-like dps who doesnt see that they're breaking CC left and right. but those are okay to deal with (i sometimes let the aggro king tank the mob). what i've developed is somewhat of a limit as to my responsibilities. i am not responsible for a mob if it get's pulled off of me deliberately. and not targeting my own target is deliberate. being too lazy to check the unit frames to see who i am tanking is deliberately being lazy. so i let them tank it and not think too much about it. if others decide to pull for me, i can simply let them tank it. and everyone goes at my pace. sounds about right. even the gogogogo baddies get ignored. if they're doing low dps, i dont care.
this attitude works out just fine in the end since most groups consist of at least one guy carrying everyone, especially when all of the dungeons are nerfed to death and people are buffed to kingdom come. i was in violet hold, level 75 instance when i noticed this. pretty much everyone except for rogues were doing 3k dps. 1k on bosses, but settling on 2-3k dps for most of the pulls. now to put all of this into perspective, the dps requirement to do Naxx when Naxx was current content as 1.6k dps. that's the low end and doing 2.0k dps was considered good. Ulduar saw it jump to 3k while ICC saw the minimum (not what people were doing, but the minimum to even be considered) was about 5k dps. in one expansion, the dps requirement went from 1.6k to 5k. that's ridiculous. overinflation i tell you.
we were all doing awesome damage and so it covers for the fact that maybe there's one or two baddies in the group. it's fine. even in vortex pinnicle, black rock caverns and throne of the tides, things went smoothly. it seemed that the boss' health has been dropped to about half of what it was when cata came out. im sad at this. also, many of the abilities arent as bad (except for Commander Ulthok's Dark Fissure, boy does that hurt) so level through them is cake, especially for a tank that knows the pulls. Now, Ulthok did kill me twice with dark fissure, only because there's also a slowing effect somewhere and i ended up not able to run out of it fast enough. he dropped a nice cape for me when he finally did die. overall, tanking has dumbed down a little due to the easy mechanics of the fights now. this doesnt change the fact that i may get some terrible players, or mages who try to lead the group, but at least there is some concession for tanks when they do pug.
Tangent: i dont feel bad about needing on dps gear anymore, but i do watch to see if the dps actually needs it or not. i just do if it has mastery, since mastery is great. it's a universal stat, and if an item has it with crit or haste or expt, i simply reforge the crit/haste/exp to parry. mastery smooths out damage taken, so i'll keep that, thank you very much. so if no one needs it, i'll need it for tanking. this is one thing that i really like about mastery is that it's a universal stat. although some classes might not categorize it as high priority, it has uses for EVERY class in the game. before, i was limited to dodge/parry gear. now i have an option to add mastery gear too.
Besides the random "good" people and the toned-down version of each isntance, problem solving in-game makes tanking fun. what i mean by this is that each dungeon group is varied. although the mobs stay the same, the types of people, the class compositions, and the style of pulling all change and i must adapt accordingly. it is not the same as the Diablo-esque feel where each time you step into the 1st floor of a dungeon, the maze gets reset and the layout changes to make it feel like you're in a new dungeon. it's more of the way i want to pull, where i want to move the mobs, who i want to CC and who does the CC and for how long. each mob has their own unique ability where i may be able to dispel, or a hope that mage who tried to lead knows how to spell steal. or hoping the group just doesnt try to aoe down two mobs. yes, i've seen many mages and warlocks use their blizzard or rain of fire... on two mobs.
The best, and pretty much most important thing that makes tanking fun are the tanking abilities. I have all tanking classes and the most fun tanking class i've ever played is the warrior class. Dks are fun too, so are druidsd and paladins. but high above those three is the warrior. The reason? Charge/intercept/intervene and shockwave/thunderclap. Now the first one is charge, and i will include intercept and intervene in the smae category. it's my charge. i rush in and do damage. mob's somewhere else? charge! healer getting chewed on? charge! mobility is key when tanking, because if im charged (no pun) with keeping people alive, one of the best abilities to have is a gap-closer that will allow me to tank stray mobs somewhere. i found this very useful and very rewarding. what paladins have is a shield that silences to bring mobs to them and dk's have deathgrip, which has a long cooldown. the only other class with this are druid bears who have a charge. however, since i charge to start a fight, my charge cooldown really sucks when, in the beginning of a pull, the objective is to round up all the mobs into one convenient pack. not having an extra charge reders the druid almost unless when rounding up mobs when initiating a pull.
The other ability is shockwave and to a lesser extent, thunderclap. the two things these abilities have in common are it's abiltiy to do some Aoe effect beyond cleave. now cleave is great, as is blood strike, hammer of the righteous and swipe. but only the warrior have something that he constantly uses to basically "stomp" the ground and remind the mobs just how awesome he is. shockwave is a great ability because it stuns the targets, giving everyone time to catch up, pick the right target, and top everyone off. this ability is wonderful because it also acts as one of my interrupts. no other class really has these two abilities although there is similar. dk's have blood boil, but it doesnt have the same "umph" to it, nor does it apply a debuff. paladins have it in the form of hammer of the righteous, but even that doesnt have any "umph" to it, nor does it apply a debuff. also maybe avenger's shield, but it's strange to use it in melee, even if it works. druids, well, nada. i sometimes wish druid bears can get an ability like the rogue's killing spree, where they basically randomly bite several random mobs in front of them for five seconds, but i guess we'll have to stick with the swipe and glyphed maul.
To recap, i really do find tanking fun, especially if it's a warrior tank. i think that, based on the link above, tanks are few because they're boring, have responsibility, requires thinking, and arent engaging as dps or healing. but... with a warrior tank, i find that the tools i have to use make up for some of the negatives. now if i were a bear or a paladin tank, i wouldnt be as enthused. but each tanking class has their own strengths and weaknesses, and offer a lot of utility in different ways. even if, in the end, it equates to the same thing (different spells, same effect). i find warrior tanking to be a lot more fun, simply because of the abilities that i have with a warrior tank. perhaps it's just "flavor" but perhaps it is more than that. as a tank who has played all the tanking classes, i have a different comparison than those who replied with tanks vs. dps vs. healing. instead, i see it as warrior vs. druid vs. paladin vs. dk, and i can see what makes tanking fun based on the various types of tanks available, and hopefully this reason will be a reason that outweighs all the little negatives out there to keep people tanking longer, even in pugs.
gavlon states two very important things. One, tanking sucks. and two, to fix this, make all tanking like blood Dk tanking. Grumpy talks about how tanking in raids vs dungeons is like night and day. i agree with grumpy on his opinion. i disagree with gavlon.
Now here's my little input on tanking, why i like/dislike it, and what i could do to make it more fun. Actually, if you read the comments from gavl's post, everyone is pretty spot on in their assessment of tanking in Wow. it's something not many people would want to do, especially for Pug groups (which is why i keep asking my gf to see if anyone in our guild wants to join us). Read the comments. they're very true of why wait times are so long for the dps and tanks are so hard to come by, in random pugs.
Let me explain why my gf is asking my guild if anyone wants to join in our run. We're level 82 and 84, or about there but are on two different realms. i blame the character limits for this. since i am only able to have 10 characters on one realm, making a new character to level with her requires that i make a new character on a new realm and level through instances. you can see just how boring that can be, going through the same dungeons over and over again until, thankfully, we outlevel them, only to be greeted with 20 more runs of another dungeon. So after maybe 82 levels if this, you can see why i soooo would rather party with people i know instead of a bunch of puggers who sometimes decides to act up or try to run the show (and why is it always a mage???).
My gf is lucky. she has a bf tank who knows all the dungeons, pretty much inside and out, knows who to CC, who does the worst damage, how pulls should be coordinated, etc. i know all this because i've tanked all of these instances many times before. going into gnomeregan, blackrock depths and blackrock spire i get comments like, "thank god, someone who knows where to go!" my gf knows she's lucky and she makes me skewered eels for my hunter to show her appreciation. ^_^
Now on to the bad. I dont like tanking. i dont like tanking because i have to be responsible. i have to know the fights, kill order, cc order, react to environmental changes, bad dps, etc. i dont suffer from bad healing becuase, well, i have a pocket healer that does an awesome job. but i really dont want to take on, what seems almost like a job, to play a game where the point of the game is to relax, or at least problem-solve to get my mind off of the real life issues such as work. In-game, i dont want to be responsible for hearding cattle. it feels almost like that sometimes, even if it's just one dps who runs around and acts a fool, it's still a pain to deal with. i play this game to have fun, not to baby sit. This is the main issue of tanking and many tanks have gone to great lengths to simply tank for their guildies, thereby bypassing a lot of the stupid that goes on in random pugs. What is it about LFD that makes it soooo bad? it's because no one has any accountability that they can cause some amount of grief to their teammates and get away with it. i am not saying it doesnt happen before LFD, but LFD made pugs a ceaspool of stupid, rude and arrogant idiots that i hope never to have in my guild, no matter how leet their dps may be.
The good thing about tanking is that, when i do get a good group (and lately i have), things go smoothly and i only have to deal with the in-game mechanics. sometimes i get the occassional lazy dps who doesnt know how to target my own target, or the drone-like dps who doesnt see that they're breaking CC left and right. but those are okay to deal with (i sometimes let the aggro king tank the mob). what i've developed is somewhat of a limit as to my responsibilities. i am not responsible for a mob if it get's pulled off of me deliberately. and not targeting my own target is deliberate. being too lazy to check the unit frames to see who i am tanking is deliberately being lazy. so i let them tank it and not think too much about it. if others decide to pull for me, i can simply let them tank it. and everyone goes at my pace. sounds about right. even the gogogogo baddies get ignored. if they're doing low dps, i dont care.
this attitude works out just fine in the end since most groups consist of at least one guy carrying everyone, especially when all of the dungeons are nerfed to death and people are buffed to kingdom come. i was in violet hold, level 75 instance when i noticed this. pretty much everyone except for rogues were doing 3k dps. 1k on bosses, but settling on 2-3k dps for most of the pulls. now to put all of this into perspective, the dps requirement to do Naxx when Naxx was current content as 1.6k dps. that's the low end and doing 2.0k dps was considered good. Ulduar saw it jump to 3k while ICC saw the minimum (not what people were doing, but the minimum to even be considered) was about 5k dps. in one expansion, the dps requirement went from 1.6k to 5k. that's ridiculous. overinflation i tell you.
we were all doing awesome damage and so it covers for the fact that maybe there's one or two baddies in the group. it's fine. even in vortex pinnicle, black rock caverns and throne of the tides, things went smoothly. it seemed that the boss' health has been dropped to about half of what it was when cata came out. im sad at this. also, many of the abilities arent as bad (except for Commander Ulthok's Dark Fissure, boy does that hurt) so level through them is cake, especially for a tank that knows the pulls. Now, Ulthok did kill me twice with dark fissure, only because there's also a slowing effect somewhere and i ended up not able to run out of it fast enough. he dropped a nice cape for me when he finally did die. overall, tanking has dumbed down a little due to the easy mechanics of the fights now. this doesnt change the fact that i may get some terrible players, or mages who try to lead the group, but at least there is some concession for tanks when they do pug.
Tangent: i dont feel bad about needing on dps gear anymore, but i do watch to see if the dps actually needs it or not. i just do if it has mastery, since mastery is great. it's a universal stat, and if an item has it with crit or haste or expt, i simply reforge the crit/haste/exp to parry. mastery smooths out damage taken, so i'll keep that, thank you very much. so if no one needs it, i'll need it for tanking. this is one thing that i really like about mastery is that it's a universal stat. although some classes might not categorize it as high priority, it has uses for EVERY class in the game. before, i was limited to dodge/parry gear. now i have an option to add mastery gear too.
Besides the random "good" people and the toned-down version of each isntance, problem solving in-game makes tanking fun. what i mean by this is that each dungeon group is varied. although the mobs stay the same, the types of people, the class compositions, and the style of pulling all change and i must adapt accordingly. it is not the same as the Diablo-esque feel where each time you step into the 1st floor of a dungeon, the maze gets reset and the layout changes to make it feel like you're in a new dungeon. it's more of the way i want to pull, where i want to move the mobs, who i want to CC and who does the CC and for how long. each mob has their own unique ability where i may be able to dispel, or a hope that mage who tried to lead knows how to spell steal. or hoping the group just doesnt try to aoe down two mobs. yes, i've seen many mages and warlocks use their blizzard or rain of fire... on two mobs.
The best, and pretty much most important thing that makes tanking fun are the tanking abilities. I have all tanking classes and the most fun tanking class i've ever played is the warrior class. Dks are fun too, so are druidsd and paladins. but high above those three is the warrior. The reason? Charge/intercept/intervene and shockwave/thunderclap. Now the first one is charge, and i will include intercept and intervene in the smae category. it's my charge. i rush in and do damage. mob's somewhere else? charge! healer getting chewed on? charge! mobility is key when tanking, because if im charged (no pun) with keeping people alive, one of the best abilities to have is a gap-closer that will allow me to tank stray mobs somewhere. i found this very useful and very rewarding. what paladins have is a shield that silences to bring mobs to them and dk's have deathgrip, which has a long cooldown. the only other class with this are druid bears who have a charge. however, since i charge to start a fight, my charge cooldown really sucks when, in the beginning of a pull, the objective is to round up all the mobs into one convenient pack. not having an extra charge reders the druid almost unless when rounding up mobs when initiating a pull.
The other ability is shockwave and to a lesser extent, thunderclap. the two things these abilities have in common are it's abiltiy to do some Aoe effect beyond cleave. now cleave is great, as is blood strike, hammer of the righteous and swipe. but only the warrior have something that he constantly uses to basically "stomp" the ground and remind the mobs just how awesome he is. shockwave is a great ability because it stuns the targets, giving everyone time to catch up, pick the right target, and top everyone off. this ability is wonderful because it also acts as one of my interrupts. no other class really has these two abilities although there is similar. dk's have blood boil, but it doesnt have the same "umph" to it, nor does it apply a debuff. paladins have it in the form of hammer of the righteous, but even that doesnt have any "umph" to it, nor does it apply a debuff. also maybe avenger's shield, but it's strange to use it in melee, even if it works. druids, well, nada. i sometimes wish druid bears can get an ability like the rogue's killing spree, where they basically randomly bite several random mobs in front of them for five seconds, but i guess we'll have to stick with the swipe and glyphed maul.
To recap, i really do find tanking fun, especially if it's a warrior tank. i think that, based on the link above, tanks are few because they're boring, have responsibility, requires thinking, and arent engaging as dps or healing. but... with a warrior tank, i find that the tools i have to use make up for some of the negatives. now if i were a bear or a paladin tank, i wouldnt be as enthused. but each tanking class has their own strengths and weaknesses, and offer a lot of utility in different ways. even if, in the end, it equates to the same thing (different spells, same effect). i find warrior tanking to be a lot more fun, simply because of the abilities that i have with a warrior tank. perhaps it's just "flavor" but perhaps it is more than that. as a tank who has played all the tanking classes, i have a different comparison than those who replied with tanks vs. dps vs. healing. instead, i see it as warrior vs. druid vs. paladin vs. dk, and i can see what makes tanking fun based on the various types of tanks available, and hopefully this reason will be a reason that outweighs all the little negatives out there to keep people tanking longer, even in pugs.
Monday, October 24, 2011
Allods and How I Understand WoW's New Talent System
I spent some time playing Allods Online the other night. "some time" includes the opening quest chain that takes you from your beginning zone to your real beginning zone. they actually make it a little exciting (as opposed to wow's opening, where things seem a little static). The static leveling zone can be found at around level 3, after the intro. Obviously, it appears the intro zone cannot be revisited, so take a look around and breathe in the atmosphere, or whatevers.
Anyway, i downloaded a bunch of free to play games recently so that it will give my daughter of four years something to do on the computer. now i have to problems with letting her play eden eternal or dragon nest, although dragon nest may be a little too advanced for her age, and adding allods online may be a good addition. We started by picking races. She wanted to play a girl toon so we went through several races and classes. But she ultimately chose the faeries or elves of the game. she made it very clear that she wanted the Psionicist faerie. I named it for her but she chose the features (purple hair, etc). Now we go on and went through the entire opening chain quest until we finally hit the official starting zone. it appears to me that the starting chain quests are instanced and we do them solo. the beginning zone we end up in will have interaction with others.
Now here's what i found out about my elven psionocist. She floats. She uses a dagger. she also mind controls. she is hard to kill, even as melee. the intro sequence helped players understand the basic concepts of the game, how to heal, how to assign talents (the act of assigning talents itself, not where one should put talents), how to equip new gear and how to loot, etc. But my first roadblock is this. When i hit level 2 or 3, i got an option to assign my talent points to some stats. now first, i've never played a psionocist before, so having a big window with 20 different stats where i can place talent points (stat points, in this case) to any stat i want is daunting. i was figuratively lost (no, not literally lost. i was sitting in my chair at home. so no, not literally lost at all - more on the misuse of "literally" in another post). Without having played a psionocist before, and having never played this game before, i figured i had to have some background knowledge before i can actually assign a talent point. because people who use mind tricks to win battles probably use magic, i thought maybe add to intelect. but then, i thought, why the hell do i have a dagger? and a wand!??!?!!!.
Welcome to noobsville. Now for those who do not remember, when you first started WoW, it was the exact same thing. No one told me where to assign my talent points (although it wasnt stat points, since the stats are from gear, and some stats increase naturally), i just did it without really knowing or understanding. I did not read many blogs or guides on the internet. My first character was a mage--a frost mage at that. I decided that i needed to give him faster frost bolts and that was it. talent points werent stat points. and that was a great change from some of the other games i was playing. but even with talents points in wow, i can see how people can get confused and not understand them. back when i had 61 talent points to spend, and no talent tree lockout, i had a difficult time figuring out where to put what. granted, my mage only got to level 40, but even there, i was able to assign 31 points already, somewhere in various trees. No one told me that i should focus on one tree first, then move to the next. no one told me that i should focus on certain talents if i was going to quest instead of dungeon. no one told me that i shouldnt worry about this or that, and focus on that or the other. i had to learn this stuff on my own. but i did understand one thing. i knew that my intellect increased every time i leveled. so that was an important stat.
but here, in allods, i felt the exact same way i did when i first started wow. i looked at the stat allocation table and said, forget this. so now i am reading a bit about the psionocist on the internet and understand it a little more. i'll be better prepared to make my character better than i would have yesterday.
When blizz announced that they are going to revamp the entire talent tree system, i believe i understand why. They're not catering to those who have played for years. or those who have switched from other MMOs and understand the talent and stat allocation game. no, they're targeting those who do not care to understand that game. they're catering to those who enjoy killing monsters and complete quests. they dont want to have to stop players from playing because, instead of blowing things up with magic, they're now forced to decide whether they should be a mage with faster fireball casts, or harder hitting pyroblasts. or something. Blizz seem to be saying, we dont want players to focus on little things like cast speed, crit chance, etc. we just want them to go out the and cast the damn spells instead! play the game!
With that in mind, i can see how they want to take a lot of the theory-craft out of warcraft. the talents will come every 15 levels. 15 levels is way more than enough time for someone to get used to a spec/class combination and decide what they value more. let's look at a the hunter's 1st talent choices.
1. Frozen Arrows - Auto Shots decrease mob's movement by 30% for 10 secs.
2. Arcane Arrows - Your auto shots has a 50% chance to restore 5 focus each.
3. Poison-Tipped Arrows - Auto shots causes stacking poisons on your target.
Now all three talents affect one thing: your shots. They effect it in several ways. But the idea here is to kill your mob or opponent before it/he kills you. with frozen arrows, you're given more time to shoot at something before they gnaw at your face. means that, although the fight may just be as long as before, the mobs will not be at your face as quickly or as often, decrease bandage/eating time, increasing leveling speed, though indirectly, and adding more possible gameplay mechanics to your level 15 hunter.
With Arcane arrows. you will end up with more chances to fire off more shots, since you're eventually going to regain enough focus to add an extra special shot. Mobs will still get to you as fast as they would at level 14, but you may have an additional shot, therefore increasing the damage dealt.
With poison tipped arrows, it is essentially like arcane arrows in that it adds extra damage, but the extra damage comes not from a spell we chose when we gained enough focus, but from poison that stacks. for longer fights, both arcane arrows and poison tipped arrows will seem to be a better choice than frozen arrows. some will say frozen arrows is simply for pvp. but i can see how it is also a good talent to take when leveling.
Also understand that hunters usually have pets (or tanks) to tank their mobs for them. if this is the case, frozen arrow might not be needed at all. overall, the idea is this, Blizzard doesnt want you to have to decide whether a talent is good or bad for what you do. they want you to evaluate your play style and decide for yourself which talent is better -- for you. would you prefer to get an extra shot in every 10 seconds? well arcane arrow is for you. would you rather have extra damage instead? then poison tipped arrows works. are you a hunter who likes to run and shoot at the same time, grab five mobs, freeze trap it then multi shot them down because you like how they all die in the same area so it will make skinning them a lot easier with your pet only there as added bonus dps? well frozen arrows will help you do that better!
With the future talent choices, i see it more as playstyle tweakers instead of the talent points we see today. when standing there looking at the extra talent points to use, it can be a little difficult to know exactly what will benefit the class the most. however, blizz new take on talents will definitely remove all such thinking and simply let the player play the game. because, after all, we have many, many little games inside this big game we're trying to play. having complicated talent trees just slow everyone down. who needs that, right?
in all honesty, i do like the current talent point system we have now, minus one feature. you have to use 31 talents in one tree in order to move to a new tree. i remember then days of leveling a paladin and thought going into the first 15 or so points in the ret tree helped tremendously. since low level dungeons weren't that big of a challenge, and anyone with a pulse, and mail gear can tank in those days, adding talents to the ret tree was my best course of action. really, it was only because i was trying to get to one talent, Seal of Command, that made the trek down the ret tree even necessary.
but there it was, a ret paladin tank. but i knew that in dungeons like scarlet monastery, there was really no issues tanking in ret so long as i pulled intelligently (there wasnt even a difference between dps and tanking gear then). for those who are confused, seal of command allowed my seal to hit two other mobs. and since the flavor of the year was aoe tanking, this seal helped a lot when it comes to holding threat on mobs. before this, there was nothing. heck, i dont even think hammer of the righteous was even available before level 60. so besides consecration, this was our only aoe option. now i knew that as soon as i hit seal of command, every other talent point will be going into the protection tree. and when i reach level 60 and am able to get hammer of the righteous, i would then respec into it, in order to have a proper tanking build at level 60ish. this is where having a tanking spec actually mattered. then, i can slowly spec into seal of command again. this required one respec, plenty of planning, and lots of knowledge of how my class, as well as how dungeons work.
So i see a compromise in the works. Bliz will automagically upgrade our stats, that's how it worked before, that's how it will work now. All abilities and/or spells that we had to pick as we filled out our respective talent trees will be added automagically. there will be no more thought to this. also, abilities that we have to go to the trainers to learn will be added automagically as well. i can also assume that this will mean we will learn both our current pve and pvp abilities, since we're not given a choice in picking. so how exactly will that combat rogue sitting next to be be a completely different combat rogue than me? i am a little unsure now.
I do like having a choice. but i also do like having consequences when i pick one ability over another. i do like to be challenged and to think. what i see as the future, as far as talent trees are concerned, is that there really isnt much consequence to picking one of the three, for any situation. it is merely a playstyle preference, and picking one talent over another only goes to improve your own playstyle. on one hand, bliz is really helping those who like to play a certain way from being told they're doing it wrong. however, it is at the cost of dumbing down this game so much that even i wonder if i am playing an MMO Action game as opposed to an MMO-RPG game. Not that i dont like action games. i just have better options when it comes to action games with an rpg element and mmo element.
Anyway, i downloaded a bunch of free to play games recently so that it will give my daughter of four years something to do on the computer. now i have to problems with letting her play eden eternal or dragon nest, although dragon nest may be a little too advanced for her age, and adding allods online may be a good addition. We started by picking races. She wanted to play a girl toon so we went through several races and classes. But she ultimately chose the faeries or elves of the game. she made it very clear that she wanted the Psionicist faerie. I named it for her but she chose the features (purple hair, etc). Now we go on and went through the entire opening chain quest until we finally hit the official starting zone. it appears to me that the starting chain quests are instanced and we do them solo. the beginning zone we end up in will have interaction with others.
Now here's what i found out about my elven psionocist. She floats. She uses a dagger. she also mind controls. she is hard to kill, even as melee. the intro sequence helped players understand the basic concepts of the game, how to heal, how to assign talents (the act of assigning talents itself, not where one should put talents), how to equip new gear and how to loot, etc. But my first roadblock is this. When i hit level 2 or 3, i got an option to assign my talent points to some stats. now first, i've never played a psionocist before, so having a big window with 20 different stats where i can place talent points (stat points, in this case) to any stat i want is daunting. i was figuratively lost (no, not literally lost. i was sitting in my chair at home. so no, not literally lost at all - more on the misuse of "literally" in another post). Without having played a psionocist before, and having never played this game before, i figured i had to have some background knowledge before i can actually assign a talent point. because people who use mind tricks to win battles probably use magic, i thought maybe add to intelect. but then, i thought, why the hell do i have a dagger? and a wand!??!?!!!.
Welcome to noobsville. Now for those who do not remember, when you first started WoW, it was the exact same thing. No one told me where to assign my talent points (although it wasnt stat points, since the stats are from gear, and some stats increase naturally), i just did it without really knowing or understanding. I did not read many blogs or guides on the internet. My first character was a mage--a frost mage at that. I decided that i needed to give him faster frost bolts and that was it. talent points werent stat points. and that was a great change from some of the other games i was playing. but even with talents points in wow, i can see how people can get confused and not understand them. back when i had 61 talent points to spend, and no talent tree lockout, i had a difficult time figuring out where to put what. granted, my mage only got to level 40, but even there, i was able to assign 31 points already, somewhere in various trees. No one told me that i should focus on one tree first, then move to the next. no one told me that i should focus on certain talents if i was going to quest instead of dungeon. no one told me that i shouldnt worry about this or that, and focus on that or the other. i had to learn this stuff on my own. but i did understand one thing. i knew that my intellect increased every time i leveled. so that was an important stat.
but here, in allods, i felt the exact same way i did when i first started wow. i looked at the stat allocation table and said, forget this. so now i am reading a bit about the psionocist on the internet and understand it a little more. i'll be better prepared to make my character better than i would have yesterday.
When blizz announced that they are going to revamp the entire talent tree system, i believe i understand why. They're not catering to those who have played for years. or those who have switched from other MMOs and understand the talent and stat allocation game. no, they're targeting those who do not care to understand that game. they're catering to those who enjoy killing monsters and complete quests. they dont want to have to stop players from playing because, instead of blowing things up with magic, they're now forced to decide whether they should be a mage with faster fireball casts, or harder hitting pyroblasts. or something. Blizz seem to be saying, we dont want players to focus on little things like cast speed, crit chance, etc. we just want them to go out the and cast the damn spells instead! play the game!
With that in mind, i can see how they want to take a lot of the theory-craft out of warcraft. the talents will come every 15 levels. 15 levels is way more than enough time for someone to get used to a spec/class combination and decide what they value more. let's look at a the hunter's 1st talent choices.
1. Frozen Arrows - Auto Shots decrease mob's movement by 30% for 10 secs.
2. Arcane Arrows - Your auto shots has a 50% chance to restore 5 focus each.
3. Poison-Tipped Arrows - Auto shots causes stacking poisons on your target.
Now all three talents affect one thing: your shots. They effect it in several ways. But the idea here is to kill your mob or opponent before it/he kills you. with frozen arrows, you're given more time to shoot at something before they gnaw at your face. means that, although the fight may just be as long as before, the mobs will not be at your face as quickly or as often, decrease bandage/eating time, increasing leveling speed, though indirectly, and adding more possible gameplay mechanics to your level 15 hunter.
With Arcane arrows. you will end up with more chances to fire off more shots, since you're eventually going to regain enough focus to add an extra special shot. Mobs will still get to you as fast as they would at level 14, but you may have an additional shot, therefore increasing the damage dealt.
With poison tipped arrows, it is essentially like arcane arrows in that it adds extra damage, but the extra damage comes not from a spell we chose when we gained enough focus, but from poison that stacks. for longer fights, both arcane arrows and poison tipped arrows will seem to be a better choice than frozen arrows. some will say frozen arrows is simply for pvp. but i can see how it is also a good talent to take when leveling.
Also understand that hunters usually have pets (or tanks) to tank their mobs for them. if this is the case, frozen arrow might not be needed at all. overall, the idea is this, Blizzard doesnt want you to have to decide whether a talent is good or bad for what you do. they want you to evaluate your play style and decide for yourself which talent is better -- for you. would you prefer to get an extra shot in every 10 seconds? well arcane arrow is for you. would you rather have extra damage instead? then poison tipped arrows works. are you a hunter who likes to run and shoot at the same time, grab five mobs, freeze trap it then multi shot them down because you like how they all die in the same area so it will make skinning them a lot easier with your pet only there as added bonus dps? well frozen arrows will help you do that better!
With the future talent choices, i see it more as playstyle tweakers instead of the talent points we see today. when standing there looking at the extra talent points to use, it can be a little difficult to know exactly what will benefit the class the most. however, blizz new take on talents will definitely remove all such thinking and simply let the player play the game. because, after all, we have many, many little games inside this big game we're trying to play. having complicated talent trees just slow everyone down. who needs that, right?
in all honesty, i do like the current talent point system we have now, minus one feature. you have to use 31 talents in one tree in order to move to a new tree. i remember then days of leveling a paladin and thought going into the first 15 or so points in the ret tree helped tremendously. since low level dungeons weren't that big of a challenge, and anyone with a pulse, and mail gear can tank in those days, adding talents to the ret tree was my best course of action. really, it was only because i was trying to get to one talent, Seal of Command, that made the trek down the ret tree even necessary.
but there it was, a ret paladin tank. but i knew that in dungeons like scarlet monastery, there was really no issues tanking in ret so long as i pulled intelligently (there wasnt even a difference between dps and tanking gear then). for those who are confused, seal of command allowed my seal to hit two other mobs. and since the flavor of the year was aoe tanking, this seal helped a lot when it comes to holding threat on mobs. before this, there was nothing. heck, i dont even think hammer of the righteous was even available before level 60. so besides consecration, this was our only aoe option. now i knew that as soon as i hit seal of command, every other talent point will be going into the protection tree. and when i reach level 60 and am able to get hammer of the righteous, i would then respec into it, in order to have a proper tanking build at level 60ish. this is where having a tanking spec actually mattered. then, i can slowly spec into seal of command again. this required one respec, plenty of planning, and lots of knowledge of how my class, as well as how dungeons work.
So i see a compromise in the works. Bliz will automagically upgrade our stats, that's how it worked before, that's how it will work now. All abilities and/or spells that we had to pick as we filled out our respective talent trees will be added automagically. there will be no more thought to this. also, abilities that we have to go to the trainers to learn will be added automagically as well. i can also assume that this will mean we will learn both our current pve and pvp abilities, since we're not given a choice in picking. so how exactly will that combat rogue sitting next to be be a completely different combat rogue than me? i am a little unsure now.
I do like having a choice. but i also do like having consequences when i pick one ability over another. i do like to be challenged and to think. what i see as the future, as far as talent trees are concerned, is that there really isnt much consequence to picking one of the three, for any situation. it is merely a playstyle preference, and picking one talent over another only goes to improve your own playstyle. on one hand, bliz is really helping those who like to play a certain way from being told they're doing it wrong. however, it is at the cost of dumbing down this game so much that even i wonder if i am playing an MMO Action game as opposed to an MMO-RPG game. Not that i dont like action games. i just have better options when it comes to action games with an rpg element and mmo element.
Friday, October 21, 2011
In Before the Announcements
So before Blizz decides to mention what the next expansion is going to be about, i want to get my guess in.
1. The infinite dragonflight and Nozdormu.
2. Panderen Monks (no, not Panda-like people, but actual humans-like nation in some continent on the other side of Azeroth called Pandera).
Since we'll finally get to meet Azhara in the upcoming dungeons, although only for a short time, we do see how she can be a target for the new expansion. However, i think we'll have to deal with Nozdormu first. His dragonflight has been with us for the past three expansions, making us fight in different times just to keep the timelines in-tact. i think this is a more involved story if we end up fighting their corrupted form, the infinite dragonflight. i am sure Noz may try to no more damage in the timelines and we're supposed to correct them before, finally, meeting Noz's dark form.
The panderens, they're monks, they love rice wine, they are kung fu masters. i doubt this will be the next expansion but a lot of people seem to think it is.
1. The infinite dragonflight and Nozdormu.
2. Panderen Monks (no, not Panda-like people, but actual humans-like nation in some continent on the other side of Azeroth called Pandera).
Since we'll finally get to meet Azhara in the upcoming dungeons, although only for a short time, we do see how she can be a target for the new expansion. However, i think we'll have to deal with Nozdormu first. His dragonflight has been with us for the past three expansions, making us fight in different times just to keep the timelines in-tact. i think this is a more involved story if we end up fighting their corrupted form, the infinite dragonflight. i am sure Noz may try to no more damage in the timelines and we're supposed to correct them before, finally, meeting Noz's dark form.
The panderens, they're monks, they love rice wine, they are kung fu masters. i doubt this will be the next expansion but a lot of people seem to think it is.
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