Tuesday, October 30, 2007

Sometimes

Sometimes, when you think your DPS is too low, it will be too low...

Sometimes, Wowwiki is not the be-all and end-all of all Dungeon strats...

Sometimes, we just need to listen and think for awhile as we can't always be correct...

& Sometimes, I just like to be proven right...

This guild is not Death & Taxes nor Nhilum. We will wipe on trash mobs and we will wipe on bosses that should be one-shotted... We can't always have perfect runs but as long as we are having fun, who cares...

They might have better gears and know their class well but really, sometimes, I just prefer runs without them...

Monday, October 29, 2007

Heroics

Not much happened over the weekend, but I had my first (belated) taste of Heroics.

It was only the first boss run for Sethekk Halls, but at least I had the chance to view the trash mob clears which are apparently the real challenge rather than the bosses themselves.

They definitely hit harder and any form of CC would be welcome. Good focused DPS will still be the key though. Without CC, a good tank and healer would be able to compensate. A lot more thinking on your feet will be required since the mobs do tend to have more abilities that will require adaptation.

So, which would make a better tank for Heroics? Honestly, my feel at the moment is Paladin. As long as he can be kept alive, being able to tank multiple mobs looks to be the winner here. My feel is that a Paladin is much more able to front-load Threat, enabling the DPS to start faster and kill faster. However, the Paladin's lower Stamina will require much closer attention from healers.

Other than that, Eld should be finishing off Zangarmarsh soon. To a certain degree, Shev is a bit stuck at the post-40 doldrums (I really hate the 40-60 grind...). Will have to pick up a bit on that slack...

Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Expertise

New in 2.3 as a replacement for the +Weapon Skill bonus.

What it does is that it reduces the chance for your melee attacks to be dodged or parried. Frankly, it seems like a modified +hit which you could collect in addition to the +hit you are collecting. It also seems to be a good way to increase your damage after you've hit the hit cap.

For ranged attack, since the target can't dodge or parry those anyway, this will be replaced by +hit or +crit rating.

For racials, these are all changed to +1% crit.

Edit: The melee weapon +skill racials are changed to 5 pts of Expertise. Ranged remain as +1% crit.

It's a huge buff to the 'casuals' out there since the hit cap is relatively meaningless since you are never going to meet any lvl 73s, so having +1% crit instead is a direct increase to DPS. For the raiders, it's losing +3% hit on bosses which will have an impact. This 3% will now need to be made up for in gear & gems.

Since Gren is hardly even fighting anything above level 71 (the elementals in Nagrand), more crit is great. :)

Friday, October 19, 2007

Woot!

Big night for Mart tonight...

First, managed to get the ring off the Headless Horseman (The Horseman's Signet Ring)... If I had missed it, it wouldn't have been too bad since there is an identical ring but this one with the pumpkin icon is just too cool...

Then, I managed to buy the pattern for the Girdle... Sure it set me back by 1000G but it's not like I had something to do with the money... :)

Now, I really need to get to those Nethers...

Thursday, October 18, 2007

Season 1 Arena Gear

With Season 3 Arena coming, Season 1 Arena gear will be available for 'sale' with Honour Points and the usual trinkets.

The problem with Arena gear is needing a settled group to do this with and that's not always possible... With Honour Points, at least you could grind those out in BGs. Some stuff that I might want to start saving for...

For Lock:
Gladiator's Spellblade (25,200 Honour Points, 20 EotS Marks)

For Hunter:
Gladiator's Chain Helm (14,500 Honour Points, 30 AV Marks)
Gladiator's Chain Armor (14,500 Honour Points, 30 AB Marks)
Gladiator's Chain Gauntlets (10,500 Honour Points, 20 AV Marks)
Gladiator's Heavy Crossbow (27,000 Honour Points, 40 AV Marks)

For Warrior & Paladin:
Gladiator's Shield Wall (15,000 Honour Points, 20 EotS Marks)

Tuesday, October 16, 2007

Powerleveling Professions

Having done the WC run and gotten the scales as required, I changed Tris' profession from Skinning to Alchemy & will be starting the grind of the profession.

Have wanted to link to this PowerLeveling Guides for all Professions for sometime now and this is a good chance to do it. It's a nice list of powerleveling guides for all the professions. I don't necessarily agree that it's the easiest/cheapest for all of them, but it's a good start to work out the best path.

Monday, October 15, 2007

Spell Haste

Information is rather sketchy on this, but I think given is that there is little point in hasting something below 1.5 seconds, which is the Global Cooldown. Also, spell haste is calculated after talents.

Now, a few points to keep in mind.
  • With Bane, the casting time for Immolate and Shadow Bolt are reduced by 0.5 seconds.
  • The only spells I use in combat with casting time are Unstable Affliction (1.5 seconds), Immolate (1.5 seconds with Bane) and Shadow Bolt (2.5 seconds with Bane).
Obviously, it doesn't help with UA & Immolate. With Shadow Bolt, any more than 40% would be wasted. So, Spell Haste only helps one spell. Even though that is spammed during boss fights, I think that +dmg will still be better in the end as that will benefit all spells, including DOTs.

So, for locks (especially affliction locks), I'll rank it about equivalent to +crit. The benefits will be less than +dmg and +hit. Take it if offered, but don't sacrifice those stats for it.

2.3 Badges Highlights

Just to keep an eye on some of the stuff that I should be targetting for 2.3 Badge of Justice turn-ins.

Trinket (75 Badges)
Battlemaster's Audacity

Higher +dmg on equip than the Icon of the Silver Crest. It's good to pair together as both 'Use' abilities have different effect, although Audacity is more survival based, rather than boost to damage. Quagmirran's Eye is still nice, but the difference in +dmg might suggest that this and the Icon are likely to be the two trinkets.

Edit: This is the new PvP trinket. It can also be bought for 30,000 Honour Points and 40 AV Marks

Wand (25 Badges)
Carved Witch Doctor's Stick

Well, better than my current wand, so pretty much a given. The boost isn't that much so might KIV until I've upgraded the rest of the gear.

Hands (60 Badges)
Studious Wraps

Better than the Jaedenfire Gloves of Annihilation so easy decision.

For the rest (mainly the Wrist, Waist & Legs), I need to read up more on how Spell Haste works and if it is beneficial to locks. The off-hand looks to lose too much +dmg compared to the Orb so probably forgo that. The back is a PVP cloak so will skip that.

Edit: After looking at Spell Haste, will be giving the Wrist, Waist and Legs a miss.

I'm a Dwarf wanna-be

Over the weekend, finally got the tickets I needed to get the ram mount. It looks a bit small when Gren is riding, but still quick decent. Something different... :)

Eld cleared some instances as well, mainly BF & UB. I actually had to tank UB which was interesting. It's the first time I really had to tank anything and it's certainly rather interesting. It's certainly more fun than healing, but a bit torn between this and DPS. Of course, this is just the one time and I might change my mind if I had to do it day-in-day-out... lol

Friday, October 12, 2007

2.3

It's on the PTR and patch notes are out.

Early days yet but looks like some nice stuff for sale for badges. Guess Heroics might be back in fashion again.

The engineering mount looks like a gyrocopter. Definitely going to be built. Question now is which to use, this or the drake. The mats are rather reasonable. No crazy nethers or stuff like that.

The CE mount is a Hippogryph. Looks nice. Thinking of grinding CE rep for Shev for that.

They are also tinkering with the Warrior trees. If this is what it is, then Arms will be looking good, with Deathwish & Improved Intercept.

Now, just to wait till it goes live.

Thursday, October 11, 2007

Hunter +Hit Theorycrafting

Interesting read for raiding hunters...

Wowinsider: BigRedKitty Smacking the Hit Cap

Nerf Locks

Sometimes you don't need a smooth run to have fun...

We had a few wipes last night in SL, including a terrible feared mob pull the boss, and wiping to the 6 man trash clear. BUT, the fight with Murmur was memorable.

We had already wiped one time and it was getting late so it was the last attempt. Hunter died early so it was just Pally tanking, Drood was healing and me and mage were DPSing. At about 3-4%, the tank died... Oops... At the next Resonance, the druid & mage fell, 2%... I thought it's game over, since I had already popped my Healthstone and Health Pot. But was determined to go down fighting.

I was fortunate to be reasonably well-topped up with health but low on mana. So Life-tap, activated my trinket and proceeded to DOT & spam Shadowbolts. Another Resonance came in, was still standing (lock Stam ftw!) and Murmur was at 1%. A few more spam and just when I was about to tear my hair out in frustration for being so close, I realised no more black stuff was coming out of my hands and Murmur was no longer targetted... & a huge spear fell from the sky! Woot!

Of course, it was anti-climatic that my jumper cables failed and I spent like 5 minutes waiting for them to dodge respawns etc. to get enough back to summon the rest... But it was fun... :)

Tuesday, October 09, 2007

Staves

Not really a fan of them, since the +dmg from a Main Hand/Off-hand combo will always be higher (at the cost of raw stats).

However, the following might be useful in their appropriate circumstances

Before getting the Off-hand from Heroic badges:
Terokk's Shadowstaff (Sethekk Halls (H), Talon King Ikiss)

Before getting the dagger from Prince:
Staff of Infinite Mysteries (Karazhan, The Curator)

Monday, October 08, 2007

Heroics and Kara Upgrade

Did the research to see which heroic instance contains upgrades for Mart...

Waist: Glyph-Lined Sash (Mana-Tombs (H), Nexus-Prince Shaffar)
Ring: Cobalt Band of Tyrigosa (Mana-Tombs (H), Nexus-Prince Shaffar)
Trinket: Quagmirran's Eye (Slave Pens (H), Quagmirran)

Not much there...

The Cobalt Band is identical in stats to the ring from the Headless Horseman (as it was on the PTR). If I get that ring, then this ring is not that enticing...

The Girdle is also superior to the Sash, but no sign of the pattern yet.

Either way, time to run Shadow Labs to get Revered with Lower City for the key to Heroic Mana Tombs and time to start looking for Heroic Slave Pens runs.

The following gems (if they drop will be good as well)
Yellow/Red: Shining Fire Opal (The Mechanar (H), Mechano-Lord Capacitus, Pathaleon the Calculator or Nethermancer Sepethrea)
Blue/Red: Glowing Tanzanite (The Black Morass (H), Chrono Lord Deja, Temporus or Aeonus)

Similarly, the following are upgrades from Kara.

Back: Shadow-Cloak of Dalaran (Moroes)
Wrists: Bands of Nefarious Deeds (Maiden of Virtue)
Legs: Trial-Fire Trousers (Romulo, The Crone or The Big Bad Wolf)

Main Hand: Nathrezim Mindblade (Prince Malchezaar)

The following are good for the +hit on raids
Neck: Brooch of Unquenchable Fury (Moroes)
Back: Ruby Drape of the Mysticant (Prince Malchezaar)

Key to Kara

Quite lucky to hop onto a PUG for BM last night. Well, it wasn't so much a PUG since the other four members were guildies, but still, found the group in the /2 channel...

Anyway, went like clockwork... We went in, and destroyed the thing. No close calls, no problems. Finished off the required quests and got my key to Kara... :)

Along the way, also picked up the T2 look-alike shoulders. But seriously, the stats on it are crap... The off-hand also dropped. Would have been a nice side-grade (lose some +dmg for stats) but I thought I'll pass on it since I took the shoulders already...

Now, at least maybe once in awhile, I can tag along with West to Kara... :p

Over the weekend, Shev also got her Brewfest dress... :)

Saturday, October 06, 2007

Another Tick in the Box

Thanks to ex-SB'ers, and a couple of PUGs, I finally completed Arcatraz. After turning in the quests, that had actually left me 1000 rep short of Revered with Sha'tar. I was resigned to a run of one of the instances. But when I finished the Akama questline, I had a pleasent surprise with a 1000 rep with Sha'tar. Woot! Revered.

Main thing is this opens the possibility of Heroics for Mechanaar, which looks to be rather easy... :) Badges & Primal Nethers, here I come!

Friday, October 05, 2007

BrewingFest

Last night was a wash-out. The barking quest was broken... So I pretty much figured on giving up on it.

However, Blue posted that it's been fixed but they've given up on the Dark Iron Dwarf invasion thing. In the meantime, they are increasing the reward for the barking quest to 40 tickets and 3 tickets per turn-in of the keg! Hmmm, some hope? :)

Thursday, October 04, 2007

Brewfest

This started yesterday and I was running around trying out the festivities...

Rather interesting, but to get the number of tickets for some of the more interesting rewards will require repeating some rather tedious things (like the racing rams) which will get boring after awhile... Oh well, no choice.

I figure you can safely get the 15 tickets for the daily barking quest. The racing rams need some practise but I am averaging 20 or so tickets for 35 tickets per day. Brewfest lasts for 14 days (2 weeks) so that's about 490 tickets. If I want to get the ram, I'm going to need to camp the dwarf invasion a lot more or find somewhere to do another run (it resets every 12 hours).

Damn...

Wednesday, October 03, 2007

More Festivities

Just as the (very disappointing) Harvest Festival ends, Brewfest begins. Based on the Oktoberfest, it looks like one big booze-fest... Interestingly, some of the rewards available will persist after the event which is always something nice.

One item is a mount which looks fairly similar to the Rams the dwarves get. Frankly, that looks pretty dumb but maybe I'll get it just for laughs... Maybe Gren, since Raptors are just as ugly...

For Shevane, probably get the dress since she is my look pretty gal...

When Halloween comes about, Hallow's End will be here. Usually good for Bobbing Apples (uber food) and party tricks, there is a nice boss being implemented in Scarlet Monastary. Based on the info so far, doesn't look like he's too tough or anything but his loot table includes some really nice drops (like a +35 dmg ring!). Definitely worth getting the guys together to farm this dude.

Tuesday, October 02, 2007

Onwards to 70

Just realised that more runs of Ramparts and Furnace are just going to save me about one run of Shattered Halls in the future so just bit the bullet and went ahead with starting the leveling grind to 70.

So far so good... Gear is being replaced and the only piece of the super old Imperial Plate Set left are the bracers. However, looks like I'll be holding onto it until Terrokar Forest... :p

What I'm beginning to consider is what to do with my warrior. I still prefer my lock and pally but looking at the situation, he could be the only lvl 70 warrior in the guild. While the drood tank has been going ok in 5-mans, I still have doubts about it's viability in Kara, giving the lack of shield blocks. Pallys also suffer from a lack of Stamina. Hmmm, guess we'll see how it goes when Eld dings 70. Maybe by then, everyone has quit again, and no Kara runs... :p

Monday, October 01, 2007

Bite and Claw

Finally peeked at my combat log last night and I realised that after the initial dump where all the abilities, Dash, Growl, Bite and Claw went off, my pet would not Bite again for the duration of the fight. Claw was going off and Growl also done, but Bite was not there. Leads me to thinking that perhaps training Claw is sufficient and the points can be better spent elsewhere.

Not much has been happening. I've been grinding my Hunter's Consortium Rep and collecting her gear. I figured on trying for the rifle. Warlock comes out for the odd instance run. I've also started grinding my Warrior to 70... So many things to do, so little time...

On the downside, Blizz has not fixed the bug which doesn't allow Blood Elves to finish the Harvest quest. Looks like won't be getting free bread till next year...