Lvl 70 and flying.. high.

Well through a stroke of kindness (allbeit unexpected) a benefactor stepped in and gave me a quicky loan for a flying mount. I won't mention names not because he doesn't deserve the honor of being so kind, but because I don't want 900 people begging him for gold 'cuz they herd on blog he givz it away'.

His reasoning was sound, he said the daily q's he does on a regular basis are the skyguard q's that involve bombing. So he helped me get there and I have some juicy items ready for AH this weekend that should put me back square with the guy. The bombing q I've been doing awards me about 11g and I had to run around and kill guys in Skettis for another stupid q. Anyway I'm quickly approaching friendly, which is a long way from exalted, but.. I'm a long way from 6,000g or whatever crazy amount the epic flying skill costs.

I need to get logged on early one night and push through my dailies and then rush to karazhan and start my quest to get into that place. The people I prefer running things with will be doing so on christmas break. At this point it would take a subtle miracle to just get HALF the quests done in what is apparently 5 days. I'm willing to give it a go though, and I'll let you guys know how that rolls on later..

The switch Evil to Holy

Well as the name of the blog implies I am a Warlock, I dabble in the forces of evil the same way fat people dabble in buffets...

My favorite, favorite character in all of World of Warcraft is my priest. I started him with the expressed intent to be a shadow priest, and he may well swing around and do that at some point. However I am LOVING healing. I was main healer for 2-4 VC runs, and it was grand. I heard that mana was a big consideration for priests, so I have a lot of spirit (for my level), as well as heal/mana pots on hand, with some good bandages. Basically my intention is to be able to heal myself with bandages/pots.. and my group with my mana and healing abilities. I do almost no damage at all. It's really pathetic. I did find in my last run I was doing more damage than a same level rogue. I took this to mean he sucked. My offensive abilities are described thusly, and are used only when the group has an "oh crap!" moment, or when we are fighting a boss:

1. Shadow Word: Pain
2. Wand (continually, and I'm wand spec'd so I do okay here if I had a good wand anyway)

That's it. I can DoT, and wand, and thats all I ever really do. I have been known to mindblast the runners to see if I can kill them.. but thats about it. DPS is for everyone else.. I heal.. If its not intensive I can do a little DPS but wanding is best (save mana for heals).

Being Dranny I can use a nifty spell called "symbol of hope" which increases mana regen. If you're in a group with a hunter/lock/mage.. they instantly love you for doing this in a fight. So Dranny priests get much love with our extra HoT (Gift of the Naaru), and Symbol of Hope.. we apparently rule all.

I'll try shadow someday, but now..I'm happy healing.

Weekend Questing

Well I FINALLY hit 69 last night, (no applause, please) in doing some random grinding after turning in some q's in Netherstorm. Now for anyone who is a caster, you won't really like Netherstorm, a lot of the mobs are magical resistant. For a mage, this could be terrible. As a DoT-master, it didn't bother me much. The little crab people were shrugging off my shadowbolts, but my drain life/soul was working just fine. I am making a note of this so I know not to run here till I am high enough to really put out damage as a mage (since she'll be probably my next one here).

Wow.. Ok so I hit 69, and immediately flew to shat, port to Stormwind. Ran to the slaughtered lamb and got trained up.

Then I met up with a hunter buddy of mine to do some (group) quests in Nagrand. Personally, I like Nagrand, but everything is spread way the heck out for questing. Nothing is ever just right HERE. Its some here and some on the other end of the freaking zone. The good part is that there is always some elemental something or other patrolling near you. Thats the bad part too.. if you stand still too long.. a big rock elemental will try to pummel you.

Anyway so we meet up and I immediately want to take down durn the hungerer. We knew of a MM hunter to help out so we snagged her, then a priest/druid came to finish off the group. For me, I thought the tank was low (64), but we steamrolled durn in a quick way. I have seen many fights with elites take much longer, but with the BM hunter, the MM hunter and me.. we had a crapload of DPS. I consider myself a big bad dude when it comes to dps.. my unbuffed +dmg is almost 600 now and I'm just 69.

Anyway this night was a grindfest with a good group running through many hard q's (I could've solo'd probably tho). I am now about 3/8's into 69 so not quite halfway, but I'm moving there tonight. Tonight I am pushing through a quest in zangarmarsh for a good trinket to up my damage a wee bit more. Then off to shadowmoon to get acquainted and find the altar of shadows, etc etc... I am not excited about finding a NEW place, but thats just me being huffy. The goal is to level, and then get my gnomey butt to azeroth to finish my mining (I mean once leveling is no longer a point of pressure). I want to get up to 300 so I can round out my mining in outland.

And then I get to push to get a better ranking than my friend Yara.. He's got a big headstart, but we'll see.

WSG-apalooza

So last night when I should have been studying, I took a break and jumped in 3 WSG matches. My record: 1-3. The final score seems much less about me than the rest of the team. I credit myself and at least 2 other folks who I seemed to be running with (even if not on purpose) with allowing the matches to last as long as they did.

I got a total of almost 300 kills, with close to 90 killing blows. And more damage than a raid group of lvl 70's could mitigate. In the end the 3 stooges (what I playfully named me and my running partners) constituted about 7-9 defenses, and 4 captures. So we were doing the bulk of the work for the team. The last game I didn't get my 2 partners with me, I ended up with some crybaby hunter twink (it happens) saying how the team sucked (nevermind that when we started it was me and 2 druids vs 7 horde... Nevermind that they HAD 1 capture before we had an even CLOSE race in manpower.. or that I had 1k more damage than him and 10 more kills). OK the team DID suck, but to condemn the group when you come in for the last 2 captures is kinda jaded. On MY watch they only got 1.. That's my story and I'm stickin to it.

Anyway so I made 5 WSG marks and now with a little over 8k honor for dwarfenstuff. I am still missing the +20 agi enchant for my 1h weapon. To be precise I am short the prismatic shards, and 2 Greater Planar's. So its not a long journey to get that up, and running.. just massively expensive. The goal is (since all the 49 trinkets seem stupid/lame) to get 2 rune's of duty to maximize my health regen and my stamina. I'm about 4 WSG losses(since, I don't count on wins) from getting my other rune of duty.. So that leaves shoulders. I have good shoulders, but they use spirit and not stamina/intelligence, and lately I am running OOM before I can possibly die. I have mana/health pots, but I HATE using them. I much prefer fending off 5 guys and then drinking to get my mana back. I just seem to ALWAYS be in combat.

Now I've been away from WSG for a LONG time, and the new hunter abilities with arcane/aimed shot are now in full effect. I've found a few things that made life easier.

1. warlocks hate me
1. this is due to me leading off with arcane shot (which removes demon armor), and follow that with viper sting. It seems a silly thing to do, but locks can effectively shut people down, and I should know. The best thing to do is handicap them. Locks can/will lifetap to get mana to hurt you.. This is something I use in MY favor. I viper sting them put the pet on them and then just do autoshot. Conserve MY mana while eliminating his. I got deathcoiled like 7 times last night, which I thought was great. Mcgoo's Deathcoil is reserved for what I call "Oh S*^%!!" situations. So the fact that someone used it on me meant that I was considered a serious threat.
2. Paladins hate me
1. this has more to do with me just kiting the live long day out of them. I use my traps for damage and not immobilization. I use my pet to keep pressure on him and I use arcane shot to remove his mojo that makes him tough. He still bubbles/heals, which is fine. That usually drains his mana and makes him a meat puppet for me.
3. Shaman should fear me
1. why? well cause as a dwarf I can ditch their "frost shock" that slows me, AND I can kite them using my pet to chew their sorry butt down to the bone. They can out melee me, but I can out DPS them. I actually went into monkey aspect and finished a shammy last night. With my Agility so high my armor is buffed from it, AND I dodge like every attack.
   
4. Warriors pwn me
1. I don't know if its that I don't know how to respond, or if the warriors last night were just exceptional. They just beat me down, every time. Don't get me wrong they died quickly after cause I leave people WOUNDED. I just couldn't take a warriro 1:1, and after being with Mcgoo where I can 1:1 take anyone but a shaman.. it was frustrating. Charge/intercept, hamstring.. beat down.. that is how it went.
5. Hunters are a toss up
1. depends on who sees who first. If I see them first I am shooting my "wad" at them and trying to make the battle terribly one sided. If they are BM spec, and their pet is on someone, that is just candy. I blaze through their HP before their DPS machine (the pet) gets to me. If MM spec, its a tie.. he can deal out as much dmg as me, probably more if he has an epic bow/gun.. So its just a matter of how much I got off on him when I started shooting him.
6. Mage = +1HK
1. I've just seen nothing that can stop me from annihilating a mage at 49 bracket. I don't know if they haven't come into their squishy goodness yet or what. I just haven't seen one that can roll with the dwarf.
7. Priest = +1HK
1. They Scream to get the pet off them and then realize that I'm going to hit them with aimed shot, all but neutralizing their heals. Shadow priests can't touch me, I drown them in their own blood. I still haven't been pushed by a shadow priest that could take my pushback with either Mcgoo or Dwarf. And aimed shot all but ends the healing goodness from holy priests.
8. Rogue, tossup again..
1. If I see them, they die and its painful. If they ambush me.. well its just a bad way to start from my perspective. Typically Rogues love going after clothies, as it makes them happy to 1-2 shot someone. So I get ignored. I consider it my honor to kill rogues trying to kill my team's mages/healers (locks should pwn rogues at 49, if they don't they might deserve their fate).

So things have changed, either with my new agility adding sauce to the mix, or people just sucking more than they used to. All but the stupid warrior knuckledraggers.. oh well.

burn out

As sure as I channel Hellfire, I am getting burned out on Warcraft. It is terrific fun, but the key to having this terrific fun is to keep pace with friends.

My school, and my week off due to Thanksgiving have made me lag shamefully behind. The momentum I had had before is now gone. I consider Mcgoo a standout warlcok, mostly due to my ability to play him (I mean really, he's in crap gear and he still is 1/2 on the damage meter in an instance with 70's). Now I know for a fact there are better locks out there. I had one help me get my mount, and he was awe-some. He did SO MUCH damage and without really pushing DPS at all. I want to get to that place where I am the warlock that people say, oh wow.. there HE is.. but honestly I don't think that will happen.

Realistically its not that my friends have blown past me in-game, its that I've run out of things to do. I'm not done questing or anything like that.. I've just done all the stuff that I really REALLY wanted to do. I need some new goals or Mcgoo will live out his life as a 68 warlock with an inferiority complex.

My next main is SO going to be a healer..(healyoself)

Almost 67

Okay so I did a bit of playing this weekend and I'm only 8% away from hitting 67. At this point its just a countdown until I hit 70. I need to follow some good advice and start leaving nagrand after I finish a few more quests. I think the zone is great, and good for farming, but I need XP not fun and games. I'll come back after I get 70 and farm the holy crap out of it then.

Next stop is North Nagrand so I can get my mage's battle baton. Its a rediculously difficult series of quests where you kick the daylights out of some instance level guys. I am almost 67 like I said, so its not something I think of as a problem, I just hate finding groups. I know some guys but they are usually raiding and I don't want to wait all day to get this done.

After I get that and a few more things from Nagrand, I'm off to Blades Edge Mountains. According to the Warlock's Den, there is a TON of quests that give me things I should have pre 70 there. Of course its all crap once I hit 70, but it is what it is.. I still need to hit a TON of instances, but that comes secondary to leveling at this point.

Need to do:
Underbog (all the way)
Slave pens
ManaTombs
CoT Durnholde

And thats just to be going into instances at my LEVEL! So I'll let you guys know how each go.. hopefully no more craziness from people. Monday's my night off WoW, so probably no update tomorrow.

After the Tusker!

Tusker, the big snuffalupagus in Nagrand needs to die.

Well I thought, this looks like it could be a problem. Lots of people saying, you need 3 to take him down. So I kept reading..

Looks like Locks have a "easy button". There are some holy-moley felguards over at some forge camp in Nagrand. Numerous entries list that enslaving one, mounting and running like you-know-what will allow you to solo this snuffy with ease. So try #1, I enslave. Suddenly a invisible felcannon blasts me and I take a LOT of damage. I assume it was a felcannon.. cause really I saw nothing. Big green flames, big damage. So I die.

During the ghost run I had to do to get to my body (cause I always forget the friggin soulstone), I thought of pulling with Curse of Shadows and then enslaving the guy. This seemed to work well. Now I'm not really a believer in enslave demon. It always breaks and I die a terrible death. I push this feeling aside for being able to solo a guy other classes can't solo(even some at 70). Now I get there and well, someone (me) didn't read the stupid description from other posters on thott.. There is a ton of other elephants running around here. So I end up just overwhelmed at the base of the rock the tusker chills on. Fighting like 6 elephants. Good news sports fans, I WIN. These felguards are NO JOKE. Mine was 68, but some are 67, and he was vicious. I dotted, and whenthey turned to go to me, I made him hit them. That was the strategy. Well that and howl of terror. Which helped but not a solution in and of itself. So finally the guy and me make enough elephant corpses that we can go up to tusker. and..

and...

He breaks enslave and goes into a "evade" coma. So he's just standing there.. not doing anything, and THEN I get summoned into Underbog.

My second attempt will work. Even if I gotta just totally get a 40 man raid together.. LOL. I'll try this again tonight without the 40 man raid. Really if I could just have dealt with 3 elephants it wouldn't have been a problem. This is really a waste of time if my experience doesn't pay off some good dividends.

Which reminds me, questing experience in outlands sucks. I mean sucks BADLY. I get about 1k xp from each of the kills I'm making at 66. I'm getting about 10k xp from questing all over nagrand. So the nessingwary quests, if solo'd make you more experience in the KILLS than you make in the quest itself. I think this better affirms what everyone has thought for a long time, grinding vs questing is a dumb argument. Grinding +Questing = quicker xp.

Grouping into Underbog (take 1)

Ok so while I was running around killing things in Nagrand a guildy (whom I did not know personally or in WoW) hit me up for a Mana Tombs run.

I've done MT before, and it was just garbage. Cost me 5g to get repaired cause we wiped like a bad case of the runs. Anyway, since then I've been eager to get back in there and really try to do some good. Plus I wanna kill that boss..

Ok, back to the story.. So he invites me to a group and this group is just flip flopping people leaving, joining.. leaving/joining.. Till finally we're in. WAIT A SECOND, I get summoned to Underbog? Well its a new one for me, so why not.. Everything goes well (I was so far on top of the damage charts its silly to even mention, yeah me!). He makes some kinda rookie mistakes, and handles himself in a "not so good" fashion. But that's ok, I mean.. When have I been known to ever be 100% on anything? So then our tank has to dash, his job called him in so he says. (see note). I said.. (notice the quotes) "I know of no one on that can tank for us, do you guys?" followed in 3 minutes by "Well guys with no tank this concludes our night, have fun". Then I hearthed. I wasn't happy, cause really.. I was doing well. Saving the group here and there, and just annihilating everyone with my damage. So I'm standing in Nagrand now, and the guildy jumps me about "wth man? I thought you were into helping guildy's" It set poorly with me, I don't know if its "maturity" or just being old and cantankerous. So I ran the whole thing by another guildy who is a real life friend. He told me to just brush it off.. I checked and this guy is his main, so its likely he's new to the experience of grouping, and guild grouping.

Karma1: I joined for Mana Tombs... Not underbog (truth is I would've done underbog, but I resent being lied to)

Karma2: If we had been at work and he had done this kinda bull, it'd be cited as "Unprofessional". We weren't at work, but still don't be a hose brain.

Karma3: He jumped MY stuff for leaving when no one had a tank. I had other stuff I could be doing beside dancing in underbog.

Apparently he had just GOT a tank, and quickly made amends about jumping me for leaving. So I'm letting this one go. As a side note, I probably will never run with this guy again, unless it is just out of painful necessity. I can't say anything specific, cause I don't want to name names or point fingers.. But he conducted himself in a way that made things "less fun" for me in the group. Ergo, I'll not group with him again. No hard feelings, I'm sure in 3 months he'll be raiding Kara or something.. but not with me.


Note:
Some WoW players are actually so retarded that they thing REAL LIFE should come second to the GAME. These people should immediately commit suicide. My kids/wife/house/job/school all rank higher than this game, and they SHOULD. If any of the aforementioned higher rated issues require me, I'm logging off. If you have these things and maybe they don't love/need you, or maybe you just don't love/need them.. I pity you. Don't dog those of us who have a life outside of WoW, it just makes you seem pathetic.

Epic Mount, oh yeah..

Well last night I had planned on a group to get through Scholomance. Well, at least to the alchemy lab.. Anyway, so I logged on and only one of my buddies was there. So I, reluctantly, put it out in guild chat "any1 wanna go through scholo, to the alchemy lab?". Remember, I'm "new around these parts" for this guild. Most of them are so uber, I don't even understand it.. Nevertheless, before I could count to 10, I had the guild's primary tank, primary healer, a lock who is way uber also, and a druid healer (who spent her time in cat form helping out with dps).

Basically I hosed my buddy. He understood, but I still felt bad. Honestly though, what an experience! To say these guys just straight up wtfpwned this instance would be an understatement. They were unbelievable. We rolled through the mobs so fast I barely had a chance to cast an instant dot on anyone. All in all, scholo lasted.. roughly.. 15 minutes. Tops.

Dig this though.. THEN the lock is so cool, he says to me "DM is next right? wanna go there?".. This would CONCLUDE my mount quest. I don't know that I'm crazy enough to turn down the freakin superfriends in the guild to try to find a PUG to get in later. So of course I ran to BFE where the quest guy is to turn in this part and get the next, and final leg of the quest. The MT, and the healer druid dropped out. So my buddy Yara got on (68 frost mage, atm), and then we got a rogue from the guild (also 70, apparently ALSO a superfriend). And we stormed through DM west. Now when I say we stormed through.. I mean I LITERALLY had to pull with drain soul to get a shard from the mobs. The damage was of the charts, and thats no understatement. So without a tank we steamrolled DM west. Being new to the instance I tried to put a curse on the mobs and then drain soul (for the lodestone to keep the crap moving in the ritual I needed to get my mount). If the lock was doing a fire spell, I put curse of elements, if he was doing shadowbolt, the mob got curse of shadows.

The fight to GET the freakin mount was insane. Not HARD, but insane. I think pre burning crusade it took a bonfide group of bad mofo's to pull this off. Me and the other lock enslaved big felguards and had them run around smacking people. Imps, imps everywhere.. there were 30-40 of those dudes.. I did Rain of Fire as I was just tryin to help while watching the doohickeys to make sure they kept going. This was no small feat, as there was so much craziness on this altar that I could just barely see anything specific about the nodes at all. The Felguards are really what helped out, I think anyway. If we had had a 70 demon lock with us their felguard would've been more powerful.. but really, who cares about THOSE guys.. (j/k demo locks). Anyway so at any time the other lock is droppin dots and shadow bolting.. while also keeping up doohickeys with me. He was such an uber lock too.. I mean, I consider myself good, or I DID until I saw this guy. Its obvious that experience raiding pre/post burning crusade has made him just supremely knowledgeable about what he's doin, and how he's doin it. I on the other hand am just not that serious. In the end we smoked the mount and the stupid demon guy that follows after it.

Victory lap of Shattrath on my new epic mount. Yeah, okay.. so I was the only guy in Shatt that had JUST got their epic and was >64.. I still felt like a bad mofo though..

Now for the flying mount.. argh!

60-69 WSG

Firstly, I'm really REALLY new to this bracket, but seriously... When did all the horde stop doing PvP? If you are on my server or in my battlegroup, then you know how odd this really is. 60-69 WSG hordies are like 20-29 alliance guys.. nearly retarded and all running around trying to do 1:1 and no group cohesion.

Although I was really grateful to smoke some horde, when last time I went PvP at 60, in alterac valley, there were a ton of morons trying to solo 4-5 horde at a time. I'm no coward, but a clothie versus 5 horde guys is going to die. Unless the 5 guys who had more sense than you and are in a group, are all messed up or having keyboard/mouse issues. We got smoked... A lot.

Then I go into this bracket for WSG (never did 60 wsg..) and we just rolled these guys. All the alliance guys stayed in 3's for the most part, and I was in a mini group of friends (65 lock, 67 frost mage, 66 shaman).. Personally we stomped them. I had the top in HK's and #3 in total damage. I didn't see a mis-shaped field either. Everyone I saw was my level or higher. Mostly 69's to be honest. I thought this resilience thing would really play a bigger part in how PvP was going to be done post 60. Now I want to PvP all the time. Winning is something I really enjoy, duh...

Now I'm going to push to 70 with total disregard to the fact that at 70 I'll be up against ppl in their Tier6 who are going to put such a hurting on this little gnome. I doubt I'll ever get that far along until there are lvl 80 folks who want to jump into these instances and see how far they can pull a lvl 70ish gnome lock.

A ssecret to my success in this particular run into WSG was the healers bane.. Unstable Affliction. You can't remove it without being hurt pretty good, and its NEVER the only dot on you (if you saw a guy named Mcgoo run by you, anyway). I was ignored on the field a LOT, which helped. Since I'm affliction, I am a slow damage dealer.. I have enough juice into destruction that I can pop out some damage if need be.. But it would shoot my proverbial wad of mana and leave me standing there with an imp and a glowing stick.. trying to squeeze juice from the little imp and lifetap. I have emotional issues about using lifetap when a Tauren guy with a HUGE flaming axe is running at me, I consider lifetap a last resort in PvP. The only occasions I have known this to not be the case is when I have a druid at my back and I get HoT'd out my wazoo.. which usually means unending mana for Mcgoo. Which in turn means when I die, I'll have either 3 rogues standing over me, right before THEY die.. or a field of bodies. I'm pretty persistant, and just like with Dwarf.. if you ignore me.. you'll die.

Back to UA, and why Affliction is king in PvP... Well there were these 2 blood elf pallies see.. and an undead priest. The priest, pretty much has to pray that he can keep his heals up to live through my DOT's or he's gotta go kamakazi on someone. Either way, he's not a threat on a big scale. Pallies and rogues are the only classes that can ditch UA without getting a smackdown. Pallies bubble removes it without damage, and rogues just suck in general and blizzard gave them an out so they wouldn't cry (just kidding). Anyway, there is this buff marker or whatever you call it after a pally does a bubble. I looked for this and dropped UA on them. Basically their bubble, their defense to this, was on cooldown and I was going to rape them for this. You heard right folks a nobody-knownothing 65 lock schooled 2 49 pallies. This to me meant I must rule the world.. in reality it was just that I was paying attention and I had the skills to take them out of the game.

One pally tried to flash heal himself out of oblivion. This is a smart move, but not when I'm still watching.. I drained his mana and then /laughed at him. When he was in range to do some melee damage, nightfall proc'd. So night night, pally1.

Pally2, on the other hand did a unofficial berzerker rage and rush for me. I don't know if pally's can ditch fear.. but he didn't. So while he's running (I did take some damage, which when a big 2h hits cloth armor it means gnomes take damage).. I drained his life.. then his mana, for good measure.

I don't play a pally above 13 or so, so I'm no the end/all be/all with them... I will say this. I have been hocking some plate that I am cursed to get that is +stam/+int.. why are you pallies not BUYING THIS! Its a known exploit of pallies/shaman.. When your blue bar is gone, usually you die. So make your blue bar a bit bigger.. PLUS I never EVER saw these pallies have an int buff from a mage (poor teamwork).

I run with a mage so I almost always have brilliance or intellect buffed. My favorite is when my buddy buffs my imp (Im affliction and it takes an almost all caster enemy to get me to NOT use my imp).. Any good Affy lock knows this means I have even MORE mana to dark pact away from the little booger. Dark Pact = Love. Thats how that breaks down people.

As I am 65, I have 5 points left for talents. I really think they are going to go to my Imp, and my healthstone. Just figuring that since I use my imp exclusively in instances, and I'm basically a healthstone vending machine, that these would be logical places to put my points. Just checked improved imp as a talent, affects my bloodpact by upping the stamina I get from my bouncy friend to 80-ish. That's right sports fans, 80 stamina that isn't gear dependent! When I get that stuff together I should be pretty versatile for both battlegrounds/arenas as well as raiding.. Guess we'll see

The gnome on the non epic..

In a almost continuous stream of whining and bitching regarding me being both too cheap to buy mats for an epic ground mount AND need to get a group to go through both scholo, and dire maul. I am still refusing to do it, but honestly I'm not even to the point where I can go to diremaul and DO the quest. What I really want is to for a lock buddy to take pitty on me (and a bit of gold) and take me through Dire Maul and help me get this mount.

This seems like its not going to happen anytime soon. Two great problems arise from this. Number one, I cannot get my flying mount until I am both level 70 and have my epic ground mount training (received for free upon quest completion for my dreadsteed). I do not want to be level 69 screwing around on a level 40 style mount while the cool kids are out grinding the last 20g to get their flying mount. My choices are slim, and unappealing. So I am going to have to sit in front of scholo and LFG. Precious little is as boring in the game as going LFG. It is a painful, often unending time upon which my life seems to accrue less value and less meaning. Now my new guild, The Order of Medivh, is wicked cool. Problem is that they are pretty much all doing level 70 stuff. Arena/raiding, etc.. Which means this "FNG" will probably receive less than a helping hand doing some old old level 60 stuff. I am really hesitant to ask for any lock style help either, cause I don't want to look like a schmuck. I have some favors I can call in from some lock buddies, but some of them have quit the game in its entirety. One of those people may not even still have their mount, maybe split the costs? Hm.. sounds better than ditching 250g from the word go just to get my stuff..

Don't get me wrong 250g isn't as bad as what other people farm to GET their mount skill money and mount money. The thing to remember here is, if you want to you can farm that kind of gold in a few weekends. No matter what I do, I NEED a group of people to run through some lvl 60-ish instances with me so I can get my mount. Granted its the shizznit as far as epic mounts go, nothing comes even close. I may buy a mechanostrider too just to run around and look normal, instead of like the uber super bad-mofo that I really am.

Large Prismatic Tard

Well the only things left to do to Dwarfenstuff to put him up to real uber-twinky-ness is his weapon enchants (and something called nethercleft let armor?), and the +150 health to chest. Then if I just want to obsess I could get a libram for his head, and if I get just really nutty.. A hurricane/precisely calibrated boomstick.

I am going for extra twinky-ness and getting Greater Agility Enchants on each of my 1h axes. The mats for this is beyond all belief extensive. Well they are for me anyway.. here's the list

1. 8 Arcane dust (currently I have 37)
2. 4 Greater Planar Essences ( I have 6)
3. 6 Large Prismatic Shards (ouch it hurts, but i have 5)
4. 2 Primal Air (I have 3.5)

So you can tell I am 1 Large Prismatic shard away from cranking out even more agility for my hunter. I need more Greater Planar Essences and a little bit more fun in Nagrand should reap me the remainder of my primal air. As usual, shards are my major pain. To me, everything green that I get is a potential payday from the AH. Some weapons sell better than others, just like some armor sells better than others. Lately I have been putting up an auction for my "less desirable" weps/armor for 24hrs on the weekend, and if it doesn't sell its off to my buddy the enchanter. So far its gotten me a crapload of arcane dust (good, I'll need it later for tailoring), and about 2 greater planars. Never a shard. I realize shards are usually from BLUE items, and I would sooner run Mcgoo naked through ramparts than have a blue DE'd instead of sold for the (incredibly overpriced) outland norm. So, I end up trolling the AH looking for people who are "pricing to move" their shards. Now as a non-enchanter, this seems dumb on their part, but I love them for it anyway.

I may push another 20g over to dwarfenstuff and let him get one of his weapons enchanted. I'm not sure I can wait till I have enough mats for both!! I have always been a force to deal with on the battlegrounds and in duels. Since I basically ramped up dwarf's stamina and agility to the max, shedding almost all other stats.. I have noticed that I:

1. stay alive longer
2. do a LOT more damage

I am hoping there isn't a wall of diminishing returns once I get this extra 40 agility, but this is really my first high level enchant (everything else was really kinda cheaply done). Either way I'm happy to have a weapon that is really top notch along with an enchant that is considered borderline overkill for my bracket (40-49). The libram would be nice, but I doubt the necessity of it, and this nethercleft stuff doesn't really seem to far and away outshine my clefthoof armor I got put on my legs already. No matter what though Dwarf is getting his glowy weapons, and if I happen to have 100g extra sitting around and hurricane or the boomstick show up on AH, I may just swipe them up. I miss not having a gun, /cry.. Bows seem so.. so.. elven. And forget those long eared people!
hehe

PUG's

The PUG is a necessary thing, but not always the ideal situation.

---Firstly if you don't know it, a PUG is a pickup group. Like people who don't know each other just deciding to team up to take on an instance/quest, etc...

My Friend Val, basically wrote a "hey what do you think" post and I'm filling in the blanks.

To ME a PUG is how you get to know people. Almost 95% of my action in game is from PUG's. Oddly the same percentage of things I don't like came from PUG's. This is, to me essentially the reasoning behind PUG's. Learn what you like/hate about groups by doing so with mostly less accustomed individuals.

Like I found, I hate pally healers. I know I know, some of the biggest baddest guilds run all over the dang place with pally healers. Sure. As to date, I've not had but 1 experience with a pally healing that didn't turn to crap in 10 seconds. This is ALL post 60, so its not like I was in deadmines and he couldn't keep me alive.. As a lock I found I LOVE druid healers. They can HoT me and I can lifetap to get some free mana. LOVE that. love love love love love.

For a guild leader, it is essential to have your officers doing PUG's. I mean that is how I would draft people in. Word of mouth, but I would only take my officers word for it. And the more the officers work with folks the more they can coordinate their leadership skills with how groups should work. I haven't raided, but I would think having any amount of "what do I do when he does..." would screw you over pretty quick.

Now for the casual player, I think its good for the same reason I like/hate them. Basically seeing how other people do what they do, you get an idea of how you like things done. People you like to do things with, etc.. I have a big friends list, and probably 4 are in my guild. The rest are people I played with in the past who handled themselves good. This is basically my go-to list for groups. Like if my group (guilded or non) need a rogue. I know of 3-4 rogues that can do what we want and how we want it done. Frost mages? I know 3.. Fire mages? I know 2.. Hunters.. well who ever needs a hunter in WoW and can't find one has serious issues. I have a hunter and I can't throw a AOE up in a town without having 4 hunters run in that circle. But yeah, I know of some BM hunters, 1 survival hunter, and 2 MM hunters.

So basically I think pugs are good. You will create more headaches than you'll solve, but it will help you by having people put their expectations on YOU, and you in turn learn how to deal with them.

Farming Cloth

My friend from the blogosphere has already given her take on it, however she's not a warlock, and she's not alliance. So here's my take on it, being both.

Linen:
The Linen capital for alliance is the Deadmines. Its easy to get to, easy to run through. Its all good things. PLUS, you might make a few gold by running folks through (just make sure they know you get the linen). Deadmines is really straightforward. I usually would run/dot/hellfire when I got a big enough crowd. You can, of course run through 1 at a time. SPECIAL HINT: Most locks don't use fear in instances cause it "brings back friends". Use it here. howl of terror pays off good when you get a ton of folks as it 1) gives the dots a few more secs to kill them and 2) might have them bring back friends.

Wool:
Wool is the Stockade, and the stockades are wool. This is an easy farming place. I'd send in the VW to each room and do an AoE taunt just to pull. He can take the damage anyway, and then do some siphon life, and run into the VW, and do hellfire. This will kill everyone if you have enough +damage. The most I've been able to handle at 64 was 10 guys at once. I'm not "great geared" or anything either, so don't assume I'd blow you away.

Silk:
Scarlet Monastary. Go there, run any part you want. The armory was good for me but so was the cathedral. At 65 these guys sting a bit if you get 5-8 of them on you, so for the purposes of armor repair bills, be careful. Otherwise you might as well buy it in the AH for your 5-8g repair bill. Use the VW that is why he is there! and let them run. Runners mean you don't have to wander around looking for people to gather, they'll come to you. Same theory as Deadmines..

Mageweave:
Hinterlands - Specifically Jinth'Alor. This place is CROWDED with folks so be careful. They are mostly 45+ elites from my run there this weekend. While they aren't a collossal powerhouse, some do really put the beat down on you, and there are some ranged folks (mages/hunter types) that will smack you from a distance. My suggestion here is same as before, use the VW. Get 3-4 folks grouped, dot them up like nuts, lifetap.. Drain Life to get full stats.. then if you feel like it rain of fire. (This is a circumstance I dont' advise hellfire. There are nooks here that can conceal folks and you might pull 3-4 more guys at once. Remembering that they are elites, its better to not get hit than to get hit. At 60+ I doubt they'd kill you, but if you get enough on you its a possibility you may have to deal with)

Runecloth:
The good folks of the Scarlet Crusade have been good to us in the past, and still are. Head to Western Plague Lands (WPL). From there head up to Hearthglen. There is a ton of these folks standing around looking dumb, so you can take them 1 group at a time (groups are non elites that I saw, and about 3-4 in a group). Once at hearthglenn, be careful. A runner can pull back 9 guys, again at 60+, this probably won't kill you.. but why pay repair bills?

Netherweave:
I'm not at a level where I can farm this place alone. However, the Hellfire Ramparts is where I go to get this. I am a huge fan of NOT getting into groups to farm. I actually almost refuse to. So any other ideas? SURE! All around hellfire citadel is about a million orcs. They can be elites in some places and remember your quests to know how to avoid the guys that will smack you too hard. I really like farming those guys, but the hard/fast truth is.. Instances typiaclly get better drops. So while doing it for JUST netherweave is a bonehead move, if you are 70 you might get in a group to run through here by just saying.. I'll go with, but I want the netherweave. I don't know the success of this, but I do know that I never sold any of my netherweave and the extremely painful rep grind with Honor Hold (HH), almost requires you to farm these places. So I have just goo-gaas of this stuff sitting in my tailor's bank.

Notes:
Finally, keep an eye out in the Auction House. Weigh out your time, if its worth it to you to run to Jinth'Alor for 40 mageweave, go. Now if you just need 40, honestly.. you will probably do better to just buy it at the AH. Sometimes folks are pricing things to MOVE, and don't care that they are way below market. Also, try putting your query in the TRADE channel. If you need 100 mageweave, put it out there and see what the person comes back with. Remember not everything in the game is about gold, so they might need pots (if you're an alchemist). This is a social game, and while the full Tier6 guys don't really need your 5 bars of fel iron, it may be worth it for them as they aren't using what YOU want, and you won't sell what YOU have either..

Skining for gold!

Skinning is one of my go-to professions. There seems to always be a market for it, and there are animals EVERYWHERE in Azeroth/Outlands, just begging for you to rip their hide off and sell it. Ok so they aren't begging, but I'm a warlock, and I dabble in soul stealing and crap like that.. Don't expect rosey things here!

Light leather: Ok this one is easy. Pretty much everything you skin in starter zones will drop the ruined leather scraps or light leather. I play around with humans (even though, mostly I use dwarves/gnomes), so I go from stormwind to eastvale logging town. These mobs are lvl 10ish, so don't show up at lvl 6 and think you'll steam roll these guys. As a higher level lock... you should tag RUN. I use this a lot, the run+dot+hellfire farming method. It's gold baby, thats all there is to it. There is SOME downtime, but really not enough to sweat especially when killing 9 mobs at once. Hit NUM LOCK and run through hitting everyone with curse of elements, and siphon life(this reduces downtime) when you get about 6-8 on you sacrifice the VW, and pop hellfire. They should all be hurting anyway, and you should get some good health before you really feel the pain. This works great, and I use it on lvl 60's even now (at 65!) although I put a corruption on them for good measure. This will level you out of that in quick order.

Medium Leather:
I go to Duskwood for this. Duskwood was my first big BOOM for money in the game with Mcgoo anyway. I got lucky drops and the leather off the nightbane worgen folks is all gravy. Caution: These guys hit pretty dang hard. Casters in particular should watch out. if you are a lock/mage this is scary (unless you are a frost mage), but papa Mcgoo has your way out. I have 2 tried/true farming methods. First is the dot+run+hellfire method, second is the VW AOE taunt method. As you can tell I send the VW in to a series of mobs hit each one.. (while I dot them with the appropriate aforementioned dots), then I force the AoE taunt. and hit passive to pull them to me. Some locks use hellfire, others use rain of fire. Rain of fire sucks. They always come for me, it never works for me.. ever. If you are a serious farmer, getting the talents in destruction to have things "daze" from your spells can be suped up a bit by the talent to cause ROF (rain of fire) and HF(hellfire) to do the same thing, and also resist interrutpion (BOO YA!). So that really ups your chances to daze them. This, really, seems to have almost no utility in instances, so if you're going to go raiding remember to respec, cause most priests would rather let you die from HF than keep your sorry butt healed. Anyway this is the other method, and the one Papa Mcgoo says will work for you. TRUST in Papa.

Heavy Leather:
This is the easiest to level.. 2 words, Stranglethorn.. Vale. Its a gold mine. There tends to be more Heavy Leather on the AH than anything else for most servers I've been on.. I rarely had issue not selling though so I pushed this till I could go up to thick. Now on occasion in STV there are some guys that will drop thick leather. You can check your WoW database for the level ranges here because STV spans a good distance in levels. One of the great things about STV is you may not have to kill anything. THAT'S right kiddos, there is always 90 bigillion people in STV, and most don't do skinning so just run around and you'll find bodies to skin. Another reason to love this place, I know..

Thick leather:
If you are leveling up, you should just FIND this stuff from fighting mobs your level or higher. But the goldmine for this, Ungoro. Specifically the Monkey Caves. Not saying you can't do it from raptors, but my monkey friends.. if they are almost dead.. run to get help (ahem.. no need to search.. they'll go get help on their own. This is always awesome, many q's push you into these caves @ level so you may find some bodies to skin without killing, but the drops can be good so I wouldn't turn my nose up if I was you.

Rugged Leather:
Any schmuck will tell you the Yeti Caves in Winterspring are the place to go for this in mass numbers. I however will tell you that Fearing these guys as a lock, is where the REAL money comes from in the caves. They bring back friends, and you can dot them up for the dot+hellfire method. Sometimes I sac the VW to get that pain shield, but really in here dots almost always kill them at 60+ anyway.

Knothide Leather:
Pretty much everything in Outlands has this, or some scraps. Nagrand is where this becomes the awesome. Keep in mind I am just getting THERE myself! So this part I am hazy on. I prefer Clefthooves. Why? cause occasionally they drop clefthoof leather, which is worth a lot of money on its own.
There are talbuks and all manner of things here to kill/skin, so go nuts

This is where the skinning guide ends for now kiddos. Now go get some dead animal and skin it! hm.. well in game you can do this.. IRL, you might get some funny looks.

;)

Farming fun!

I am a regular reader of Wowgrrl, as she's got a good writing style and she speaks her mind about things. She's had a 2 parter on powerleveling tailoring. I wish to expound on that and basically put it out there on how I do things.

We all do things differently, and her being only Horde means she is naturally smelly (j/k Val!), and probably wins many battlegrounds against me. Honestly though Hordies do things different in different places.. I'm going to start a series of farming notes for people who want to find some stuff and weren't sure the best way to do it, or maybe.. just wanted a warlock's opinion on it.

Stay TUNED!!

Vacation

Look to any/all that read this blog, I have been bogged down in classes and with RL concerns and unable to do much on the "WoW" front.

I am recently out from under that shadow, and assume things will make a drastic 180 and push me towards more and more WoW for the next couple weeks (until finals, basically).

Progress Report:
Dwarfenstuff has his weapons, he has his rune.
He needs:

1. 150 hlth enchant on his chest
2. +agi ench on both his weps (yikes, that will hurt)
3. fortitude ench on his feet (stamina FTW!)
4. new shoulders (the scorpid ones have great agi, but spirit isn't something I want/need)
5. the lower level rune of duty (I don't know if the +life per second stacks, but the stamina does..)
6. maybe eventually get another hat and put a head enhancement on it
7. POSSIBLY, if I had a crapton of gold, I'd get a purple ranged wep (hurricane, or precisely calibrated boomstick)

Mcgoo is now thundering through HFP, leaving carnage in his wake. Still on my regular mount, no epic for me :( . With any luck I'll push through to 65 tonight, but I wouldn't hold my breath on that. I've done a crap load of quests and pushed pretty far in 64.. about halfway.

Tonight I think my shammytwink and my dwarf are going to go out and see what kind of irritation they can cause. Well Zenior is more irritating, but dwarf can really screw over a whole team if he's ignored even for a second. Its obvious when I get "noticed" as I almost immediately get a mage and a warrior assigned to "hurt the dwarf" duty. and they will leave their flag carrier to kill me. Its a mark of pride that they send 2.. usually only 1 returns.. hehe.

Yummy basilisk!

If you have ever read anything hear read the warlock how to I wrote up. In that I comment on cooking, and how it rules and you should do it.. shut up and do it already.

There is a recipe that calls for basilisk meat that increases your spellpower.. (any of you casters hear that?).. your +dmg goes up. A decent amount to boot. I typically keep 2 kinds of food on me, buzzard bites, and basilisk, but I am also keeping talbuk steaks too.

Why Mcgoo? Why 3 kinds of food? The answer is pretty simple. Basilisk helps me do more damage, great if I have a burly fella in plate armor getting hit on instead of ME. Buzzard bites are great for grinding, they buff my stamina really well and my spirit (I use spirit, so sue me). And the last, the talbuk steak. This is used to fill my life when my buff from being "well fed" is still active and I don't want to waste another basilisk or buzzard bite.

So.. Keep 3 stacks of food with you at all times. Don't question it!! just do it.
***sidenote, having a few extra for teammates makes people love you. Having one for +agi for rogues/hunters and +str/atk pwr for warriors makes everyone happy.

The Mana Tombs

Well I got into a little "mana tombs" action last night. And by a little action, I mean I got the holy foofoo kicked out of me. We had a "ok" group, but there were some group cohesion issues.

All that being looked at, but discarded to tell you this:
Unstable Affliction = holy crap damage

I actually BEAT my mage friend in damage, and I was not (IMO) doing all that I could most of the time. For this I apologize, but seriously.. This is a new instance for me and I didn't really know how to roll in there. I did the best I could, and can happily say, I wasn't a weak link. We had a 70 healer (from my new guild!) and that was pretty awesome. Healer was a resto druid in Tree form. Now aside from being wicked funny looking, I always liked druid healers. I always felt like, doing a HoT would be better in most cases than a big massive heal. This was very true for us in Mana Tombs. As a lock, if I see I have a HoT on me, and I have full life and not full mana. I lifetap baby. The healer was great, and I was good. We had a pally that seemed to get HAMMERED (ret pally). Some aggro issues between him and the tank also.

We got up to the last boss, but couldn't take him out. I don't do enough direct damage to get rid of the stupid beacons.. and well.. Lets just say aggro issues caused a lot of problems. I got a 5g repair bill, and about 20-30g in random crap and AH goodies. It was fun, but I want to be more powerful when I run in there next.

New guild

I have had nothing but love for my friends/family over at Elder Dragons, and then the splinter guild Mystic Abyss, and the other one also mystic.. or something..

I've been recently (so recently armory doesn't show it) signed on to The Order of Medivh. My biggest fear of it being a "stuffy" guild and not goofing around was quickly abated by some really crazy comments here/there by people doing.. well doing stuff I can't get to for being too low in level.

I'm excited to be in this guild, for its great members.. and good reputation amongst other players on Medivh. I won't get too much into it but this guild has done some stuff that seemed way too long/hard to do for their key members.. I hope to contribute to it at some point instead of just being "color commentary" in guild chat. We'll see, I'm sure..

C.R.E.A.M.

This is a throwback to a previous post on my original blog. .

Anyway, I'm feeling rich. Loaded even..

I had tons and tons of stuff in my queue to go to AH and sell, and it all sold this weekend. I ended up making well over 100g. Now this particular event has put me at almost 400g. Now remember that at 70 I need to be able to get my flying mount for.. 900g. So I'm almost halfway there and I am just at level 63!

I realize that epic flyer is MUCH more expensive.. BUT first things first. Really I'm not so sure I NEED a epic flyer. I don't NEED a epic land mount. I want one really bad, but even now as I think I can almost BUY my epic ground mount, I don't do it. The only real reason I am bothering with THAT is that its (IMO) the best looking ground mount in the game (dreadsteed, FTW!). I have almost no intentions of paying the big gold to get the great mount.. I will eventually I am sure, but I just can't see paying 6k gold for a mount that just goes faster than before. Being a caster, I don't buy too much equipment wise, cause I don't NEED great equipment. I seem to do okay though with gear. I stay in good blues.. and my damage is really good (for my level, I think anyway).

I want my flying mount NOW though. I want it because I want to fly around, and because I need to get the hang of it before I win the arena group and get my ultra uber cool PvP dragon mount. Yeah, thats right... I'm winning it. Don't stand in my way, or you'll regret it! Particularly the 2v2 arena looks best to me, I haven't seen any class that could beat me 1:1 before, except those stupid shaman. Anyway, as long as there aren't 2 enhancement shaman, I should be fine. Not to mention who I could arena with. Personally, I'd like to have a pally. I think they don't do the damage, but they sure are good at support and can throw heals. I'll have UA, so healing the other team will become a deadly proposition. Not to mention I'm lowly 63 with 413 shadow damage, I've seen people in the thousands on that. I'll be there, and it'll be ugly for any who oppose me.

So I'm saving money again, for another mount.. again.. Fortunately everything that is in AH is all big weapons, and a little armor (crafted), so there really isn't anything to blow it on. Now Alts.. thats a different story. I MAY be putting a spellpower ench on my shaman for wsg(19), but not before dwarf gets his +15 agi. These are big money ench's and not taken lightly for me anyway. I just don't know if the spellpower one would really matter to zenior. I mean sure 40 is a big boost, but c'mon.. he's not half the twink I wanted him to be. Course I constantly leave off Felorinn (my rogue), who is in desperate need of cruel barb and the defias chest. Will I keep her in 100% defias? probably not. But its good to gauge damage with initially.

Alts overplayed

I've been into World of Warcraft a bit over a year at this point. I have a fleet of characters' I've played with (ahem, look to the right.. :) ). My Highest is (to date) is Mcgoo and he's lvl 62.

I don't think I have any that aren't in the TEEN range. Most not at 19 though (although that is the goal, at the moment). To be honest I have founds outlands leveling to require so much grouping, that I haven't been able to really enjoy it. I prefer solo-ing, or doing like a 2-3 man run through some quests. I'm a good solo class (warlock), but I am a kick butt assist class. Protection warrior? having trouble killing? No worries, DoT's speed this up BIG time. Need to take 1 at a time, instead of 2? I have a succubus that can take that one guy out for you in the mean time. Need an offtank? I have a voidwalker who can keep a guy busy for you, while we focus on the elite guy.

My preference is running with a shadow priest. I hear a lot of crap about them being superior in damage to a lock. I just don't see it. I do, however see them as a huge asset. I ran with one through some q's a while back. Having shadow weaving on something and my curse of shadows.. makes me and that guy very VERY happy. Plus, he can heal (even if not spec'd, you are still a priest), and do the other priestly duties.

All this being considered, I have too many alts. I play for a while come up against a strategy that either beats me or I think is very beneficial to group play, but is under-used.. Then I make a toon for that class and level it to see why it might not be used. So far so good with that. I picked a warlock after being schooled by them with my hunter. That no longer happens. I picked a shaman to figure out the same thing (but from being schooled by one with my lock.. casters fear the dwarfenstuff). Rogues? I got one for just such an occasion. I think the Rogue is probably the LEAST fun to play. I am so used to fighting mobs 2-3 levels above me, and the rogue is just hard pressed to do this. Now, if I can find a pally to run with this works great. Those guys don't do much damage (I have one..) but last FOREVER. So I can do the damage and they can get beat on..

My Mage would be my MAIN ALT. As she's in her 20's. But the 20's is an abysmal 10 levels to go through. Stockades is all you can do instance wise (that I know of), and those suck. My least favorite instance by far. She's my enchanter, and tailor. So really I should focus more on her and get her leveling up. Ideally I'd like to get her to 49, to have as a PvP alternative to my dwarf. Plus as 49, she could level both tailoring and enchanting to 300. The limit to get to at least 300 would require a level of 35 I have heard, but 39 bg's suck usually. My real concern is that my skills in melee would be hurt by me playing 2 casters for that long (mcgoo and estavian[mage]).

To be honest my FAV Alt is my priest Healyoself. Healing is just a lot more fun than I ever thought it would be. He should move along just fine if I could get him to 30. Now he's not a priority, but I do plan on playing him every 10 days to get him up 2 levels from rested XP. He is a lot of fun, but he's painful to level with alone. If I could find a guy to do some damage I could keep him alive.. Often enough though, this is hard to do. I have met/seen about 14 priests TOTAL in all of my travels of my realm Medivh. That being said, it must be rare to have a healer like that so I would assume they'd be in demand. In fact they are and really group composition later in the game almost requires a healer to even hope for success. And while I've heard tale of Pally's and Druids doing healing.. I haven't seen one do as good as a priest. Not saying they can't get it done, just saying.. most day's I'd prefer a priest.

So this weekend I'll be hitting some thorium for a little while.. then I'm going back to the alt rotation to be prepared for the week when the people I know will be on to run around with.

Ruin Vs UA

Well after a long debate, and some playing around with Ruin currently..

I decided to respec and get UA. I like the big "boom" Ruin brings to the table, but dislike when a tank has to grab aggro back cause I hit for 2.5k on a shadowbolt. If it was a talent that you could activate and had a cooldown, etc.. I'd keep it. But the unknown kinda randomness to it makes it undesirable to me. Now farming, when I'm farming for leather, I LOVE it. Nothing like a nightfall proc and then ruin going off and hitting a lvl 40 guy for almost 3k.

The respec should happen this weekend. As its my first with the 'goo, it'll cost me 1g. Which is reasonable. I'm glad I spent time using ruin, and enjoying its crunchy goodness. I just don't think it fits well with my "please don't let that huge orc with a flaming axe hit me" playing style. UA won't bring as much damage as ruin on occasion, but it will sup up my drain life/mana ability.. AND its shadow based, so my dots have increased by 1 and my damage might be surprising. I may run a few Ramps/BF runs to test this DoT out on the bosses. I'm at the high end for running either really at this point, but I know both instances well from doing the painful rep grind. I don't know that I'll ever do something like that again to be honest. Except when I shift to tailoring and want the mystic spellthread hehe..

Returning to Hellfire Peninsula

Well I am almost done leveling up my mining, to return to Hellfire peninsula. I am stagnant at 62. Not as much as I was at 61, but still.. Stagnant.

I am done with the "rep grind" in HFP, so I can push through quests and get back to my solo roots. Cause at this point I should smoke everyone (enemy wise) running in HFP. I can't wait to get Mcgoo MOVING again. There are spells yet unknown to him that he must learn!!

Thorium blows

I've been mining this crap for about 4 days and I can barely scrape together 3 full stacks of this crap. Maybe pre burning crusade, this stack would be big bucks on the AH. Now though, nobody wants this crap, and the going price isn't much better than mithril (which I can throw 4 stacks of 20 up there after 1 hours work). I just need 20 or so more xp from mining it to hit 300 and move to outland ores..

Lord, give me strength.. 20 more..

Warlock class tips part 2

<<<<>>>>>

Well in the previous post I spoke on in general things to keep in mind, fight choreography, etc. This post I'll give you more group related advice.

Sidenote: Some groups suck, you can't help it and neither can I. Some healers suck, same problem as groups in general. Don't sweat it, when things go wrong, just minimize your mistakes as much as possible. Spend some time talking to the healer, as a lock you don't really NEED healing, probably ever. So let them know that. If you are a hellfire freak like me and like to do that, let them know. A bubble and some HoT's make your hellfire a knockout punch for at least 5 mobs.

Sidenote #2: As soon as you start doing instance runs regularly, get Omen. Omen is a threat meter, and it isn't 100%, but it stays close for me.. roughly 90% of the time if I overcome someones aggro on a target.. it comes to kill me. As you can do a LOT of things, this is important cause while most people in the group need to focus on just 1 mob at a time, you can be a collective force on all mobs being engaged at the time. Gone poorly, this means 3 guys run at you while the tank continues to keep the initial guy busy. Only too late do they find out the lock is dead.

Instances with runaways:
Now this is really a tough call, cause new people will not know what instances have "runners". This is a major concern for all groups as the runners come back with "friends". We can solve that.. Curse of Recklessness (CoR). Try to do this as close to their "time to run" life point as possible. I'd say depending on the groups speed burning down the mob, adjust to the last 3 hits or so. Most people go for rank one to keep them in place, a note I'll throw in for free is.. if you have a rogue.. use the highest rank as possible and tell him before you do.. eviscerate on a target with no armor kills people FAST.

Big Mob Pulls:
Never push to be a puller. This is something tricky to be done correctly and let people wearing leather/mail/plate deal with that headache. Once the pull goes off, Crowd Control (CC) starts. Either Sheep or Sap.. makes no difference leave them. If you spec'd affliction to be like me, and have the talent points to reduce threat generated by dots.. you're golden. Assist the Main Tank (MT), and then the Offtank(OT). This helps everyone out, and you don't loose much in mana.

Healer Protection:
Once you get slomo, put that on the mob running for your healer. If the tank is busy or gets dazed. Drain tank that guy but first put a searing pain on him (this draws BIG aggro). Healers heal others better than themselves, and they'll love you for drain tanking cause then they just are "topping you off". Personally a renew usually does all I need for a drain tanking session.

Pets:
Always ask if the group would like your imp out (for the huge stamina) or if they'd rather you have something else. I typically show up with my imp out, cause being affliction that imp is just a mana battery for me and allows me to do more, and do it faster. Succubus has some CC ability, but not one I'd bank on for very long. I typically have my succubus on seduce only and invisible when not seducing. She can't deal damage like any other well geared person in a party, so her damage is negligable. Better to save that mana from lash of pain, to do seduce if needed. Felhunters are my favorite pet. They are just a nightmare to anyone that casts spells. If you are going into a cater heavy area.. pull him out and let him spellblock, devour magical buffs, etc. Just don't forget he can eat DEBUFFS on you and your party. I've never had luck with this, but I hear its possible. The voidwalker is only advisable for groups where you need an offtank, and you're stuck with casters. He can keep a guy busy for a while with almost no problem, but he
s not REALLY doing much damage to him. So if you do this.. only put on like corruption and agony and leave that mob alone. You Demon locks will have the felguard. He is a VERY capable offtank, no matter what anyone says. He looses life pretty quick tho so be ready to fuel him with health funnel (since the healer may be busy with the real tank).

I mentioned it before, but any lock should have a maxed out First Aid ability. If possible max out cooking too. There are some good recipes that help you out big time (basilisk that gives +spellpower anyone?), plus some that increase str/stam here and there that all good tanks love. The great thing about both First Aid and cooking, is that they don't require any real work to level. You can (as a lvl 60) run through a number of instances if you want to get the cloth for first aid (I prefer this as you get more green drops to put in the AH also :) ). Or you can go to the AH and drop a few gold to level that up.

If you are smart leveling cooking is a breeze. It requires you to fish though.. (this is good because there are some good things you can get from fishing that are much harder to get outside of fishing). I typically (meaning my last 2 alts) buy a strong fishing pole (+fishing skill) and sit them in SW and fish off the dock next to the fishing trainer. I started this at lvl 10. So I do this until my skill is maxed out. THEN I get the recipes (usually mailed from my main) for the smallfish, catfish, and the longjaw.. and I create a fire in the trade quarter and start cooking. You'll have a ton. I am incredibly unlucky and I leveled my cooking from 0-150 in like 5 minutes just doing this. Now these recipes aren't really very good, there are better ones, but to just LEVEL the darn thing this is great. After this you should see meats from the animals you are killing in zones dropping meats you need for recipes you already have since you are topped out on cooking. This seems to work pretty good. I took Mcgoo from 105-320 in like 3 hours of gameplay. All of which was to make a few things that I gave to my 49 hunter for both pet, and himself.

This is a bit of a rant for the cooking/fishing/firstaid, but you get the point its easy to level and is a "good thing". Like mining, fishing pays off in higher levels.. in the beginning its pretty lame though.

Warlock class tips part 1

Regardless of your talent specialization, warlocks are king of damage and in most cases mana efficiency. Demon locks, seem to be more durable.. but suffer with lower damage cumulatively. Destruction locks are almost fire/shadow mages. And affliction locks enjoy watching you fight while their dots tick your life away.

A few things are in common for all locks. and the spells are pretty standard. Most Affliction/Destruction locks start out the same.. Instant corruption. This is your money maker if you are a affliction lock, if you are destruction, this pads your casting time for shadowbolts by ticking away good amounts of damage. There is a lot you can do that changes things up. For this post I'm going to hit on soloing.

Soloing. First and foremost as soon as you turn 10 get your voidwalker. At this level you are still pretty squishy and the blue marshmallow keeps mobs occupied while you drain/bolt/wand them to death. In the end he has shortcomings, such as he does almost no damage at all. He's a protection spec warrior. He is there to be hit on, and to taunt. I personally endorse Affliction locks. I do this for 2 reasons:

1. almost no downtime
1. you get improved lifetap to turn life to mana
2. you can drain life to refill yourself health wise.
2. kiting
1. This sounds lame, but honestly when mobs break loose, knowing you don't have to be looking at him to renew Curse of Agony (CoA), Corruption ("C") makes things nice.
   

Demon locks get the same hype as the BM spec hunters, but frankly I don't see it as viable.. Oddly enough all my lock friends are Demon locks, so go figure. I hit 60 in 14 days I think (played time). I wasn't setting a land speed record or anything, but that includes about 4 weeks of PvP only ( I love killin folks, what can I say). Destruction locks are good, but it (to me) seems like being a mage without mage abilities (sheep/blink, etc..). So Destruction didn't appeal to me right off.

My personal belief is.. Do everything you want till you have enough talent points to get shadowburn, and instant corruption. Shadowburn is your only insant attack for direct damage as a warlock and it takes a shard to do (unless the target dies). This reason alone makes it a must have for me.

So goof around, see what works for you if the tank(VW) and bolt strategy works for you, go destruction, you'll love it! If you like me like to take on 5 guys at once and walk away at full life, then I'd say afflcition is your best bet. As a 62 (now) I have solo'd 63 elites. I'm nothing special as a lock either. My damage is way up (compared to some I see) but it is also less than half of others. I don't really enchant, and I don't socket (unless I have the jewels and know a JC that'll do it for free). What I'm saying is it takes no great gear/ability to do what I do.

Fight choreography:

What I do, and this works like a charm for me, is I pull with curse of shadows. I do this because it does no real damage, but does pull. So my VW can pick up aggro quick and I can dot the daylights out of that guy and get the next while my VW deals with the rest of him. I have run the numbers, and I am gimping myself with this strategy. You should use curse of agony. It does damage, and the damage goes up over time. Anyway once I have mob1 dotted, I get another one, this time using agony, then siphon life, then corruption. Then.. FEAR. Let that fool run around, do lifetap to get your mana back and then drain the life from the rest of mob1 while mob 2 runs around and runs back to meet your VW. VW won't pick up aggro, cause you just did a buttload of damage, but he helps. If you go affliction, empowered corruption is a MUST. It makes corruption a VERY powerful spell that is an instant cast so love it.

At early levels, when leveling is more slower paced. Send VW, dot up.. lifetap, then drain life to refill. The affliction talents to improve life drain and soulsiphon are required. They do things that decrease your downtime (mana regen, and larger health drain). This should end most fights.

****Sidenote, all locks should max out bandages ASAP. sometimes mobs are coming and you need to heal and the drain life won't work fast enough. This rules, and should just be expected of you.

Shards:
Shards are evil.. I hate them. They don't stack. They take up valuable loot spaces.. man.. screw shards. Ok I'm done with that. You need shards. As a solo'er you need a healthstone ready at all times. Possibly a soulstone if you are going for an elite. This being said, you don't need to take 20 shards with you. I said it, and I'm on the record. I take about 5 with me anywhere. If I am planning on grouping I try to get another 3. So in a group I can dish out 5 healthstones for everyone and a soulstone ready for the healer. Don't wait to be asked for this by the way, they might forget, but having everyone with an instant heal outside of pots is great and can save your bacon. Healers LOVE soulstones. It means they can res the group, and having a healer who can res now.. I love saving time and just bringing the group back..

More to come on this subject

Alts all over the friggin place

There are a few times in WoW that are kinda hard to solo for any non-hunters, and these parts cause untold pain for the rest of the classes. Now I know some people have 3-4 lvl 70 guys and can throw 20g to an alt to get a run through ZulFarrak or to do the quests in Westfall.. That, has never been me.

Mcgoo is my main guy. My go-to character. I also have dwarfenstuff(dwarf), who is a 49 twink hunter. He's not REALLY twinked, but lets just say me not in the top 3-4 in damage and HK's in a battleground means the Horde team won in record time, and I'm grumbling about it. So upon completing his "twinking", he should be a force of nature that all run in fear from.

My problem is this. I have fantastic friends on Frostmane and Eonar. Frostmane is a scary place though. I mean its a PvP place, and I'm horde. I've never really BEEN horde before. So I don't know where to go next, or where is the best place to grind things out.. nothing. Plus if I stray to far.. an alliance lvl 70 looking for something to do might hit me so hard my spirit won't resurrect.

Eonar, man Eonar is a wild place too. Its not PvP though. I have some teens on here and its great fun. Problem is simple things become hard on this server. Firstly, my buddies that play here are on hiatus. Meaning that they were ahead of me, by a long shot, and quit for a while. So I'm kinda on "catchup" for these guys. Good news is, here I have a dranny hunter. Which I love. He'll be marksman mostly till I start pushing him into survival. I figure with the way hunters level, I should probably get this guy to 80 (the new expansion coming, remember?) long before Mcgoo (as locks don't level as quick, or I don't.. whatever). But back to why Eonar is kinda crappy. There's not a lot of social interaction here. I was IN the mage area of darnassus, polling "WTB port to IF, pst". This happened for over an hour. (note: I was amidst the trainers so I KNOW these people could port me, as they were all >40). FINALLY, a 60 lock asked me what I'd pay for a summon. Summon's are cool! I do them all the time on Medivh with Mcgoo. So I told him, what I thought was a fair price, 1g. He put me on ignore. I have a good mind to make a horde character JUST to kill him. I have his name written down, and he's SO on my short list of people to annihilate in a dual in the future. But I digress. I was ON THE BOAT to menethil as a wee lvl 10 hunter resigning myself to a long and arduous run, when a hunter sends me a whisper.. "you still need a port?" "sure do!" "kk lemme log my gf toon on and I'll port you". So I ask him, maybe this new server has a different going rate.. (on medivh, its all 1g.. its just.. understood. Some people ask more, but they are kinda rare). This guy says its always 1g here too. So then I figured that lock is just a butthead, so screw him..

Seriously though, if I wanted >1g for a summon, I'd ask for it. Don't be all sissyfied and him and haw about it. I want 2g for the summon. Thats how you do that stuff. Now I have done one in desolace once for 3g, but I had to farm for shards real quick , plus I had to find some folks to do it with me. Not like I asked for it though. This was my first summon, and he said "summon me for 3g?". Well I'm a money grubbing gnome, so I went for it. Gave the guy some food too (cook) for a stamina buff and off he went.

Medivh is just home. I know so many people there and have so many close connections that I don't know if I could ever really level a guy seriously away from that server. Unless of course some of my close friends on Medivh went with me. Hm.. Now THAT is an idea.

I'll throw that out and see what sticks with my buds and I'll report back later.

Netherweave...mmm..

Recently finding/equipping my netherweave boots, I have decided I need a replacement for my crap gloves I have. I'm shooting for netherweave.

They have tasty stamina goodness that is always satisfying! I wish there was some int on that stuff, but as a lock I'm suppossed to look for +dmg, and stamina. They have both of those, in GREAT quantities. I wonder where I'll top out at the end of this trek to 70. I hope I can still represent myself well in battlegrounds and in instances. I don't know if I'll ever have the time open enough to do big raids, but it'd be nice to be in some 5-10 man raids. After I've done all the 5-10 man content, I think I'm going to go back and try to get some of the OTHER lock gear from places like naxxramus and MC. Naxx seems crazy hard, but that was for level 60 players, surely a lvl 70 would be of magnitude more capable to handle things, right? who knows.. I know I want to kill Onyxia.. just, well just because she's a big honkin dragon who I get to take her head off and bring it to ironforge or stormwind and get it hung up.. that's why.

The reat of the stuff.. I thoroughly plan on wailing on Zul Farrak over and over again. I hated that instance from day one. I also plan on running lowbies through gnomeregan (my capital city) for a modest fee.

In the end though.. I really just want to do arena battles. I want to face off in a situation where 3 rogues can kill me at the same time (unless they are ignoring my partner who should be wailing on them). I seem to spend most of my deaths in battlegrounds at the hands of shaman (dirty bastards) or by finding myself a lone target amongst a sea of invaders. 1:1 and 2:1 encounters I usually win. its the 3:1, 4:1, 5:1 encounters I get spanked hard on.

oh well.. wonder if I could run through Zul Farrak now?

Rep farming in hellfire

At the behest of some much more experienced guys I know, I've been rep farming in hellfire peninsula. I am now to the point that I will be going THROUGH those 2 instances only 1 more time. I will get the quests FOR the instances so I can run through and get what I need. This should be the last time I run regular ramparts/bf.

I'm so excited I can't even express it. I've been bored with Mcgoo since all I could do is group up and do instances. Most everything I found in outland is either demon or an orc, so I totally plan on using my succubus. I can banish demons and I can seduce the orcs. I will mow these fools down. Its been so long since I've solo'd anywhere except to help buddies out in various parts of the world, I may be a bit rusty. Maybe still use VW for a bit then, right? Couldn't hurt.

The guys in outland seem to be all orange to me. I mean, most everyone is higher level. Like I'm lvl 4 running in westfall or something. I mean I'm a bit worried I'll find an elite that will smoke me like yesterdays tobacco. Plus I have found lots of these orcs are immune to deathcoil. Which, to this point, has been my "OS" handle. I can get distance and drop a quick shadowbolt/shadowburn on someone and drop them 2k points just in a snap. My problems come with mobs that are even slightly immune to shadow damage. I'm at over 300 shadow damage, which makes my corruption a lethal instrument, to be sure. I think I get like an additional 30% to my corruption.. so thats almost another 100 damage. If I use my curse of shadows (and I always do, just in case of nightfall proc), that adds even more. So my corruption is how I kill things. Everything else is pretty much icing. Siphon Life? Icing, helps me regen life in longer fights, and helps me in my drain life, if I'm drain tanking. Immolate? Well thats kinda icing, for some reason it REALLY ticks ppl off and I pull aggro from my VW. It does good damage, but who needs the hassle? This is for if I have a real tank. Or if I'm in PvP, where aggro doesn't matter.

My new Addon Omen will keep me in check when it comes to pulling aggro off the VW. VW is still pretty much king for me for handling multiple mobs. I can deal with 2 64's with the VW on one, and his guy dotted up, plus me dotting up mine and drain tanking him. Its fun, but I am going to give my succubus a try, just to see. Some locks swear by her, some don't.

Oh well looking forward to tonight an maybe my last ramp/bf runs.. /dance.

Blood Furnace, wasn't so hot..

Went on a run through the blood furnace, and it turned out to be more of a sprint. We spent more time waiting for people to come back from bathroom breaks than actually regaining mana/healing up.

Tank was good. A bit hasty for some people (I was shocked), but literally downed one mob of 3, then charged the next mob. I can be ready to go in a very short time with dark pact and lifetap.. but I think our mage felt a mana pinch. We didn't get close to wiping.. ever. There was one time when we had 6 guys on us, but with rooting/fearing/sheeping.. it wasn't a big problem.

I think the benefit here was the rogue in our party. I'm not a big fan of rogues. This is just something that's known. I find all but a few of their abilities dumb. The one in particular he was using was backstab. With almost NO exception, backstab and sap are premier abilities. Sap takes one guy out of the equation, and backstab does big damage, plus you aren't getting hit! Spam Sinister Strike, and then do backstab until you get full points for an eviscerate. I do that with my lvl 14 Rogue (Felorinn). Having a tank means you don't have to sneak behind.. you just walk there. Also, unless you crit too much, you won't pull aggro. You'll be doing big damage without getting hit, all while not pulling aggro. Its a great thing really. Now he got mind controlled once and put a beating on me.. but still. This was a good rogue. It may have revolutionized my viewing of rogues altogether.

Priest was good, but not exceptional. His HEALING was exceptional. He knew when to bubble me, and when to put big heals on me, and when to let me heal myself with drain life. All this without voice or text coordination. He was either a lock in a former life or he is VERY familiar with how we roll. I got bubbled when I started hellfire, when the bubble faded, I got HoT'd.. and then a big heal when I hit 50%. So after I helped AoE 5 guys down, I was at full life, and almost full mana (loving the imp mana battery).

Mage was Frost/Arcane I think, cause I saw a water elemental, but also saw some arcane missles blasting away. He beat me with damage on allthe boss fights but in general I was doing more damage than him. Frost mages are awesome for crowd control, slowing everyone down and rooting with the nova. That is usually when I came in and did Hellfire actually. A bunch of guys all stuck in one spot.. sounds like they are asking for it to me.

I wasn't at the top of my game, but I did really well. Nothing to be ashamed of like the last ramparts run I got in.. Gosh I was so terrible I put myself on ignore... LOL!

PvP tips for hunters (AB edition)

Firstly, please read the WSG edition. I went over some basics I won't (on purpose) repeat. Remember this is for in general lvl 49 hunters, I'm not looking back to see what I had and when.. look at your skills and see if you can do this stuff. Also remember I am marksman, I have trueshot aura, as well as aimed shot/scatter shot, and even a point or two in Beast mastery for the improved hawk aspect (otherwise known as holy smokes rapid fire). A must for all hunters is the 3 points in survival for the longer range.

Arathi Basin. Its a beautiful place with a ton of possibilities, mostly.. Death.

Defense:
As a hunter you won't always be on the fringe of an attack, but sometimes defending something. Surprise is always an element you like in your favor though. So don't forget to hide, and do it in a place where you MIGHT get an aimed shot off. This levels a playing field FAST.

5 guys coming to the mine, and suddenly the healer has a mana drain on him and 3/4 his life is gone. Healing himself means he's low on mana and WON'T be an element for the coming fight. Ignoring himself means he'll die fast and STILL won't be an element in the coming fight. If you get jumped by anyone in melee range, if you are over-ran.. I ignore them. I continue raining pain on the people that are at range. I put my pet on the guy melee'ing me. Least I could do to bug him. Or I'll put a freezing trap down to stop him cold (always fun). Keep in mind Melee is not your Forte. You do the most damage from 40 yards out, and don't forget it. POUND the guys that are in range. Take out clothies/rogues first. Clothies either cause big problems with their big damage (mage/lock) or cause big problems with healing. So they are #1, #2 target is the rogue/stealthed druid. These guys can do some wild things to you. Drop flares around your team mates so they aren't surprised and can stop them. If you see one who is un-checked, aimed shot his butt. He wears better armor than cloth, but you can still devastate him.

Skills/practices:
Use your hotkeys if you don't already.. In a group I use a spamming motion with my poison shot. Everyone needs it. Tab targets people quick, but has its shortcomings. Use tab and your hotkey for poison shot to poison a group quickly. For me its Tab +#2(the number 2 above the "w" key on the keyboard). I will sit out of the way and just literally toggle those 2 buttons till I notice my next tab has it already. It won't turn the tide of battle, but it keeps healers busy,and helps in a skirmish (where you aren't seen) to be more of a damage dealer. Remember you can do this while running /strafing.

Real Estate:
Like in real life, being a hunter requires location/location/location. You WILL be found most times, but if you play your cards right you could have already lowered the whole attacking team's life by 20-30%, AND killed a few. Keep in mind doing well in Battlegrounds means doing well with your team. No solo.. not at all. Unless a particular node is calling for help, don't be alone.. ever. Hunter's make great defenders as they can "track" the enemies movements, and no matter what anyone says.. KNOWING what's coming is always better than "SURPRISE!!" 6 guys in your face. Once you get feign death, use it. I have let whole groups of horde run right by me cause I was faking being dead. Best is to put your pet somewhere else (or stealthed) and do it. Let them run by and when they are starting to claim the flag or when your people engage and they push forward come up from the flank and pick some guys off.. Remember most people can't see very far in back from their vantage point in playing WoW. SO if you are far enough behind, they won't see you pop up and cast aimed shot on their back. In surprise scenario's beware of using the hunter's mark. This gives away that there is a hunter around.. and people generally look for you then.. so you loose a bit of surprise by not using it during the aimed shot, but put it on immediately afterwards (as they will now KNOW you are not dead and want you to die a painful death).
Some specifics on Real Estate:

• Mine
• Spot above the mine (structure) is great for sniping people, but its a known place so expect company
• off by the water will be a good place to hang out especially if you are a dwarf. You may get ignored even if you AREN'T faking being dead.
• Hiding inside the mine itself is not so hot, you can't track people outside the mine (or inside if I remember correctly, but that means if you are outside you track outside, inside: inside tracking only)
• The crates besdie the mine is a great hiding spot, nelfs can shadowmeld there and do a peek-a-boo with people at the flag no worries.
• Smith (probably the worst hunter spot)
  
• For defense from Farm side, get on the rocks overlooking the bridge from the Farm/mill crossroad.
• beside the building itself in shadowmeld (night elf only)
• Playing dead.. by the graveyard is best. No one expects you to pop up from there and unload.
• Lumber mill
• (dwarf) the woodpile at the mill structure for sniping at folks coming up the hill
• overlooking the hill from farm
• at flag. This is debatable as most ppl run FOR the flag, but I like it since I can hit people on the hill still from there
• Stables
• I play dead IN the stables facing the mill all the time
• Rocks on the shore by the bridge towards mill
• Farm
• This is heaven, by the way cause if you take farm, you are guaranteed tons of hits/kills as their home is just beyond the farm
• bushes accross the road from the flag (its good distance, and a bit of cover)
• play dead by the windmill on the farm you can snipe some ppl running for the mine to avoid you at the farm. Or stop an advance if they swarm the farm from their base.

On Offense:

Find a mage and follow him around. They have good grounding abilities and even have polymorph if you get in trouble. Plus they do great damage and are expected to do so, few of their spells are 1 hit kills so you can finish some folks off with him/her. Don't go anywhere without a guy in plate. This is lame, but unfortunately, rogues exist and will cause big hits.. the guys best able to absorb that damage are warriors/pally's. THEN once the rogue is known you and the mage can wipe him out quick. Rogues do the most FAST melee damage, so they are priority, second would be the charging bulls (warriors, usually tauren). If you and the mage focus on someone, they die. Period. Make sure you guys are on the same page. If he wants to go for the healer, follow his lead. We are more consistent with damage, but they have BIG booms to put on people. If your warrior is fighting someone, its better to take him/her out. Keep in mind he won't be fighting 1:1, it'll be 5:1 easy. That's why I say rogues first.. THey do the most the fastest, so get rid of them first. Multishot them if you can.. and have him sheep a healer or something.

Absolute best assualt group: Warlock, and 2 hunters. Seduce can take 1 guy out of an equation from the word go, and fear takes out another (just not an undead guy cause they are tricky). Hunters can mark the other two and the lock can dot them up while the hunters unload and put pets on them. I've taken out 5 man groups this way lots of times. Never has the guy who was feared came back to the flag. He runs away, always. Cause the feared guy is almost always a rogue. Rogues are good 1:1, but can't take a group.. Especially a lock and 2 hunters. Affliction locks are great but, sometimes can't take people down fast enough. Destruction locks are my personal favorite (when I'm a hunter, since mcgoo is affliction and partial destro)

Just don't forget your: Scope, sharpening stones, potions (loose these only in serious situations)

If I think of more it will be added to this post so if you are referencing this in the future come back to the 2 posts.

PvP tips for hunters (WSG edition)

(Preface: I am mostly a marksman hunter. I don't really see the use in PvP of being survival or beast spec. Sure the kitty gets red, but when that's OVER, the guys the kitty didn't kill.. kill you. Not saying that I haven't been with some good survival/BM spec hunters.. Just sayin, it wouldn't work for me)

Ok I have battled untold numbers of folks with my hunter, dwarfenstuff, and reaped good results. I have even managed to beat higher levels than me with other hunters (as I level them). I have been asked for "training" in this, and I think this is where I'm putting it.

Post lvl 10 (so you have pet):
Your attack should begin, with putting your pet on aggressive. If dueling, or if in a battleground (usually best on defense), aggressive is best because you can only see some of the field, and your pet seems to target things on proximity and line of sight, even if not looking in that direction. I advise warlocks in all PvP bg's to put detect invisibility on me, and my pet. Jury's out on whether this really helps or not, but if it does.. Great if not.. what does the lock loose like.. 100 mana? As a lock I do this without being asked. I don't really have buffs to help in groups so in battlegrounds I try to pass healthstones to flag carriers and/or healers.. but that's off topic.

If you are uncomfortable sighting enemies from your pet, or prefer to have your pet focus on a specific guy, go passive. This requires you to be MUCH more active in ordering the pet tho.. So I don't do it much. I don't have the "shot rotation" that a lot of the bigshot hunters have in WoW. Its just not a habit I picked up. What I DO have is a knowledge of how my shots work. Arcane/Poison can be shot while running. These are really all I do from the stings area, cause strength shot, doesn't help enough to really gimp a warrior.. and the viper sting (mana drain) doen't drain enough on its own to really stop a good caster. Aimed shot is for peeking into a skirmish and eliminating a healer who's casting a big heal. Multi shot is for flag carriers and when you come in to a place after your team got beat up on by some guys (so they all hopefully aren't at full health). Traps are mana expensive and best when used in special situations (YMMV).

typical engagement @ 49 WSG:

Find midfield and if there is an offensive push of less than 4, go help. If not, stay and wait for the inevitable horde guy to try to run past and get to the tunnel/ramp of his base. If you are alone, you will probably die. WSG is not about alive/death, its about flag captures. Your JOB as a ranged guy is to #1 Mark the guy (helps cause more damage for anyone attacking him), #2 Poison sting the guy (this slowly takes life away), #3 Slow him down with any/all of your tricks.

Put your pet on the flag carrier, forget anyone else. If you have enough time you MIGHT get an aimed shot off, this usually means you can kill the flag carrier. This is great, but not your ultimate goal. The ultimate goal in this situation is to get him close enough to dead that he gets ran into by YOUR team escorting YOUR flag carrier, so they can capture your flag back. Why? Nobody runs the flag alone, it just never happens. This means the guy probably has 1) a healer, or 2) a bunch of guys LOOKING for you. You will in most cases NOT survive this encounter. A good hunter can die leaving a group of guys at 50% health. This is your secondary goal, to hurt everyone. If you are alone focus on slowing the Flag carrier and viper shot the healer (if one). The healer will try to keep the flag carrier at full health while your pet wails on him, so viper shot works out okay (since he/she is casting they may not notice which will work out good when your group runs into them and crushes them). In general though its straightforward.

1. Send pet after Flag carrier
   
2. Concussive shot Flag Carrier
3. Poison sting FC (flag carrier)***If FC is pally, he will take this off quick.. then use viper sting to drain as much mana as you can.. pallys are lame without mana.
   
4. viper sting healer
5. If you don't have a big warrior hitting on you by now, do multishot
6. If you still don't have a big warrior on you, hit rapid fire and blast away
7. when the FC gets in range, wing clip them THIS IS A MUST
8. When the warrior gets to you, wing clip him
9. Same with healer, wing clip to slow them down
10. Run (if you can) to the FC and renew the poison (if not pally)
11. Concussive shot the FC again
12. RIGHT BEFORE YOU DIE, scatter shot the FC, and do a frost trap to slow the group
13. Die in peace

I am a defeatist. I thoroughly believe that solo in a battleground, you die. Coordination wins battles and a lot of the time there will be no coordination. Don't go in expecting to just demolish everyone. Do go in thinking that every rogue you see should be poison stung immediately. This breaks their stealth which will help your cloth brethren annihilate him.

All shots have the ability to crit. So shoot as much as you can. Don't waste rapid fire on a large group of people, use it to kill the flag carrier. Find sniper positions and take them up. Always ALWAYS have track humanoids on and tell people when someone is coming (when on defense), they will love/adore you for this since non hunters wait to SEE someone. Saying (undead rogue from horde in tunnel) will make people on your team love you. If you get ambushed (from not looking at the tracking screen, or from a rogue) put that info in the battleground chat so people know where a problem is being started. Use your range! Get the 3 talents in Survival that maxes out hunters' range. This is imperative, and DON'T try to melee. Your melee skills will suck in comparison to anyone but a priest. If someone closes to you, you have 3 options.

1. Freezing trap
   
1. this is great for stopping a rogue and letting you get the heck out of dodge
2. watch for DOT's. this will break the freezing effect
2. Wing clip
1. slows better than any other affect I've seen in WoW
2. requires you to take possible more than 1 hit.. so pray its not a steroid Tauren with a Fiery axe banging you in the head
3. Frost trap
1. slows well.. and a big area
2. Immune to dots (won't affect the slowing affect)
3. Unfortunately, costs more mana ( I think) than #2, and has same side affect

Melee means you hit/run. You won't take him out unless he's almost dead or retarded. Regardless of your "leet skilz", you need to know your role. You have a pet to irritate people in PvP with your pet. Casters are best and "cobra reflexes" is a MUST for all pets for PvP, as it increase the speed your pet hits. Faster hits = slower casting. Damage overall is reduced, so your pet won't hit for the same dmg, but will hit more. Unless you're a beast spec guy this won't bother you. Remember that getting hit means you cast for a longer time, so don't try to do a aimed shot when you are in a crowd. That is a "sniper shot", meant for BIG damage from "out of no where". A pet on a healer is the best medicine for killing the crowd.. He'll heal slower, and eventually have to heal himself. Plus any time spent healing himself or fearing the pet off, is time he ISN'T healing your enemies.

Side notes:

• Find some +strength scrolls for your pet and use them right after you rez and are going after the other team, you'll die and the buff will end.. So don't spend a lot of money on this crap.
  
• Agility Potions RULE! They help you dodge, and increase your crit % chance. They tend to cost a crapload, so unless you can find an idiot alchemist that will give them to you on the cheap.. this will be a rare assistance for you, don't depend on them.
• Sharpening Stones/frost oil.. etc. These all augment your melee weapons. All have good uses too. Frost oil usually costs more than sharpening stones, get the cheapest you can cause you SHOULDN'T melee unless forced to wing clip and run. But doing a bit more here/there is always a good idea. Same as the others though, don't spend a ton on these..
  
• Scope: If you don't have a scope in PvP.. I'd smack you. I'd totally smack you for going into PvP with no scope. There is always SOME scope on the AH. Get one. Even if its +1 (cause the good ones aren't on the AH at the moment). You'll replace it with a better one. My advice is to just KNOW when you can get a new scope.. and get one. Buy them in advance if you want. Buy a couple if you trade off weapons mid-stream. Just make sure you have one.
• Armor Kits/enchantment: If you can't have a +agi weapon enchant, don't cry. I don't have one either. But my armor is always padded up for extra survivability in the battleground. As a hunter, if you know a high level Leatheroworker.. beg/whine/cry for the knothide leather kits on your pants. They can't be BOP pants, but they give a crap load of stamina and agility on your legs (who cannot be enchanted, btw). Other pieces, just do what you can when you have the money. If you're a big spender, get enchants. I can tell you the +agi enchant for a weapon will cost you (mats ONLY), about 70-100g. So if you are lvl 18 and think you can swing 100g for a weapon enchant.. make sure its THAT much gold. Its a great enchant, and I hope to have it someday on my POS 2h sword. but I digress.
• Gear: Some go all out for agility, and resign themselves to a quick death.. Some go for the middle of the road for agi/stam.. and some go all out for stam, and forget about agi. Whichever way you go keep in mind your playstyle. If you () end up doing melee, get something with some +attack power, and agility. It'll help you hit harder and help you dodge more. For you guys like me who like to stay 40yards out from the horde, all out agi is good. I'm not all out agi anymore as I am trying to boost my stamina, then save up for the agi enchants EVERYWHERE. Plus some good 1h weps.

Know YOUR abilities or you'll get killed quick and won't do any damage. I tend to be #1/2/3/4 on the damage charts and usually 1/2/3 on the HK chart. So I do a lot of killin, when I get in there.