Monday, November 24, 2008

Arthas.. you son of a...

Well I'm truckin along in Northrend with Mcgoo.. Dwarf has yet to show up there at this point. Probably won't until Mcgoo runs out of rested XP (I mean seriously.. I have another guy to level).

Initial thoughts: This expansion is lame. I was fairly well geared but by no means rediculously so.. And I stomp on everything. I can only imagine what the rediculously geared folks are doing. My hopes is that this will allow dwarf to actually be useful in Northrend.

Initial complaint: Are you serious? Every quest gives like 20k xp. All of them.. just about. And I do a crapton of questing. I Did something like 24-40 quests yesterday and FINALLY pushed over 70 into 71.. and got most of the way through 71. Do the math and you'll see the rediculous amount of XP needed to go up a single level. Now I don't think it should be insta-leveling... But none of the 60+ levels were this long (or they didn't seem like it). If this is merely my perception, sue me.. otherwise I think its noteworthy that doing 4 quests in outlands at level 1 would get you to level 20.

Challenge: My son when i was loading the expansion saw Arthas (the lich king) looking menacing, and said...
-"Daddy.. is that the bad guy?"
---"Yup that's him, he's the Lich King"
-"Lick king? That is a funny name daddy"
---"No LICH.. not lick.. he's a zombie kinda guy"
-"Oh. "
-(menacing look)
-"Kill him daddy"
---"You got it boss.. "

So you heard it here first (rather you read it).. First WoW was a fun game, but I've been tasked with killin Arthas' Monkey @ss. Am I talkin crap for a lvl 71? yes. 2-3 people in my guild hit 80 this weekend. This means the gearing process is beginning. I BELIEVE I'm the highest warlock, so I should be competitive for when that starts up. My mentor Sanath might be there before me, but who knows.

So Arthas.. watch your back.. Well mostly for rogues. If you see a little gnome /roar-ing at you. You better get that sword of yours and cut you some gnome sticks fast.. That little guy.. He's got orders.

Wednesday, November 19, 2008

Watch for the Rpr

As silly as I am I did start a DK. The beginning quests were a breeze. The biggest issue is taking on mobs that can easily kill you if you don' t know WTF you're doing. The bad news is nobody knows wtf they are doing, its a NEW class. So I died a few times.. what did I care? Ok it bothered me a lot, but lets not mention it ever again.. EVER.

Moving on... Since my buddy was held up in getting the expansion pack, I had nobody to level with in Northrend, and even more importantly no hunter to track what we're after (I love hunters). So I pulled my DK who's name is Grimrpr (as in grim reaper).

My setup:
I'm blood spec, it has a self heal aspect from bloodworms and blood aura that is awesome for me. I chose this because I heard blood=dps, frost=tank, unholy=aoe. Well I wasn't interested in tanking or Aoe-ing. So I went for DPS. I have since found out that unholy may be better for pure dps, but more on that later.

Fight Coreography:
Almost all a DK's melee abilities are buffed by how many diseases the target has. So its important to maximize your damage by putting your diseases up and leaving them up. I usually start with plague strike, then the freezing (ranged) magic attack (I forget names, deal with it). That means I have 2 diseases on the target, and my weapon has a rune that CAN increase frost dmg. So THEN.. I start with my serious abilities.. I do death strike first because I can convert runes to death runes (like a wild card rune), this is helpful in longer fights since you can cast your spells easier and without the hindrance of the "you don't have enough runes" to do that message. After Death Strike I go for heart strike. They both get buffs from diseases as I have said but heart strike does more damage by far, but lacks the death rune conversion I am after. After that I tend to flip flop.. 2 heart strikes, then 1 death strike. Rinse... repeat until dead. What is nice is the abilities in blood spec make it so you're nearly invincible. I ran Ramps with some guys (all DK's) when I was 58. I feel as if I held up my end of the dps, and I never died. I only bandaged 2x's. Are you seeing what I'm saying now? I hope it doesn't get nerfed but seriously if you wanted to cry over OP, or imba.. this would be a good reason to do so.

I plan on leaving the rpr in the inn for a while and let Mcgoo run around in Northrend and collect some xp. My goals are non-existant at this point as I don't have questhelper (a crutch, I know) running I'm just trying to get a lay of the land. This is difficult for me personally as I have mental issues not grasping distances.. like oh its just over that hill.. mount up.. ride.. then look as the hill NEVER gets closer.. ah.. hm... ok.. so that hill's not so close.. back to the other area to finish up the other 2 quests. Its just me, I know.. but its a problem that Questhelper fixes. I need some UI tweaks since ace is out of the picture.. I just don't know where I'll go for all that.

If you have some UI customization hints hit me with them.. I could use a hand.

TTYL.. oh and.. watch out for the Grimrpr.. I don't know how long he'll be insanely OP.. but I 'm loving every second.

Wow.. getting the ball rolling

Well.. Like everyother noob-cake.. I started a DK. I did this for 2 reasons
  1. My leveling buddy was SOL when it comes to getting the cash for the expansion.. leveling alone, FTL.
  2. It starts at 55 or something right? well thats awesome..
So I rolled a DK, I'm full blood spec ATM, although I will be dipping into frost to give my own personal idea of a DW guy with a rune weapon smacking ppl in both hands a try. If you know this sucks.. please STFU so I can figure that out alone. HAHA.. ok so if you know it sucks.. tell me why.

I have only had Mcgoo tiptoe into Northrend a VERY small amount. I believe the starter area is Valiance Keep? Anyway I've done like 8 quests (I told you I tip-toed). Then last night.. When I was loggign on to tip toe a bit more.. my buddy sent me a whisper.. FROM A DK. /dance. So he has the expansion now. We managed to meet up in Valiance keep, only to find out we couldn't see each other. I don't mean we were blind.. I mean his character was invisible to me, and vice versa. The world server crapped out on us before he got there, and I assume this is part of the issue. So we are both parked ATM in valiance keep waiting to stomp through everything. I am not terribly hopeful in this regard, but so far I have been drain tanking 6 guys at a time even still. The new mojo from the affliction tree makes this a bit easier. I mean if I dot you up and then haunt you.. I can fear you and know that you will probably be nearly dead when you return, and that I can Lifetap if need be and get a big heal coming my way. So far my impressions of Northrend are.. This place is a zoo. Too many people, not enough mobs.. not enough anything. Is it cool you ask? well hell yes its cool, but I mean really when we have 5 groups of 5 waiting in line to kill a named mob for a quest chain.. seriously... SERIOUSLY.. jack the respawn rate to like every 40 seconds or something blizz.. it was like a free cheese line out there. But I digress..

Friday, November 7, 2008

More on the meh...

Wow has really kind of stagnated for me.

I play still about 3-4 nights a week and I have a good time when I do, but I'm apparently all excited about the expansion and cannot see getting beyond that into the other stuff. I played dwarf a bit in "the Isle" to get some gold.. did that.. then played my druid and got him to 52.

The druid.. Jeez louise. I seem to find myself in these situations once in a while when leveling.. When I'm too low level to go to a new zone, and to high really to get any good XP in the zone I'm in. That is where my druid is. I finished up a bunch of quests in UnGoro and Felwood. I am really waiting for 53 (of which I am halfway through 52 anyway) so I can go to the plaguelands. You do realize what happens after plaguelands don't you? Outlands.

I plan on hitting plaguelands for a few days and get a few levels knocked out and then at 55-56 roll over to blasted lands to finish my approach on the black portal. Will this happen Pre-XP? no. I seriously doubt it anyway. With my select skills I use killing is kind of easy I don't seem to stop to heal ever, and I tend to help out others when they are soloing just to get some good druid behind the back attacks in. There is a new talent from mangle called infected wounds. Basically its like the pally talent in ret where you gimp the mob from your hits.. THAT little talent was worth every penny. I was taking on 3 level 55's last night and easily solo'ed them in cat almost the whole time. I kept mangle and rip up on everything as well as faerie fire. So I was (in my mind) gimping them 2x's. I was removing some armor (faerie fire) and removing some of their attributes (ala infected wounds).

Tonight I won't be playing because I never get to play on Friday's. Real life closing in on me as it would seem. I have high hopes to get in on some WoW-time this weekend pre-sunday (my biggest wow day). May consider taking a day off around XP release so I can get some all-day gaming done. Mmmmm my new death knight... if you have ideas for funny names for a death knight (most certainly a gnome.. ) let me know.. I'm not 100% on any names yet.

Monday, November 3, 2008

Hardly blogging..

Ok I let it go for too long before I updated here again.. so here's whats going on..

Dwarf.. Now has epics.. I'm shocked too, so don't feel bad. He has all the "new" scourge invasion epics, 2 rings from headless horsemen, 2 trinkets from brewmaster. Plus his bracer he got from PvP goodness... So he's doing well. I am sporting a wasp as a pet, mostly for the armor pen ability that he grants me and my party. Pet is 68, and is very nice. I really can't complain at all about him. He's not really the sort of pet I wanted, but he's good enough. I named him Mosquito.. cuz.. well a wasp named mosquito seemed funny to me. I still have chump bow.. and chump arrows.. and... chump head/neck/boots/cape.. but really that doesn't bother me. I do a lot of damage now. Am I as good as a Tier4 guy? GOOD LORD no.. But I think I do decent. Shot rotation needs work, and I'm a bit spacey with new abilities and such.. It is to be expected. I will get better as I thunder through the expansion. Maybe even get ole dwarf decked out in some epic 80 gear (ZOMG).

Mcgoo... Well I have only done bit of dingle danglin around with Mcgoo. I play around with dailies.. and I killed a ton of undead for the invasion. If you don't remember Mcgoo got himself his last epic from Brewfest, a +spellpower pipe (don't ask). So he's in all epics (woot) and with my new spec I do more damage than should be rationally possible. I went into TK mech last night to help ati out.. and we were with 2 other 70's. I don't think either were geared as well as ati, or myself. I did what I do now.. I just dotted the hell out of things and started bolting them. and I don't know for sure but I am reasonably sure I was at the tip top of dmg. The tank commented on it.. and tanks tend to watch aggro/dmg meters to see who's getting crazy. Well anyway.. i was happy to know that I could crank out that kind of dmg.. So now it beckons the question as to how well I'd fare against other locks... My thought.. poorly. My build is almost totally set up for PvE, Raids.. I think I'd be a GREAT asset in raids.. but then again my spec is hardly unique.. oh well

Last update for now...
I bought my expansion preorder saturday. That means it's time to rock very, very soon..