Molten Core LFR Madness

Tonight I decided on an experiment. I’m going to queue for the Molten Core LFR and list my accomplishments through it, or lack thereof. As a reminder, I’m a Feral Druid, and all times are Mountain Standard Time (MST) – the only time zone that matters.

8:12 pm: queued for LFR, approximate wait time 9 minutes.

8:13: queue is ready, looks like a fresh run. Huge sigh to try and get ready for what is ahead.

8:13: zone in, first pull is already under way.

8:17: first tank drops group.

8:19: first complaints in chat of the fact that it’s a fresh run.

8:28: first core hound pack pulled.

8:29: Lucifron engaged.

8:31: Lucifron killed.

8:33: core hound pack respawn.

8:35: Magmadar engaged.

8:36: Magmadar killed, with no fears. Creepy.

8:45: Gehennas engaged.

8:47: Gehennas killed.

8:56: Garr engaged.

8:58: Garr killed.

9:02: Baron Geddon engaged, along with a mob pack.

9:04: first wipe of the night. I am shocked and amazed.

9:07: Baron Geddon engaged.

9:10: Baron Geddon killed.

9:13: first non-boss death. Lava Elemental aggroed me, tanks were busy.

9:16: Shazzrah engaged.

9:17: Shazzrah killed, with 11 people left alive.

9:31: Sulfuron Harbinger engaged.

9:35: Sulfuron Harbinger killed.

9:39: Golemagg ninja aggroed by a stupid mage.

9:41: second wipe of the night.

9:43: Golemagg pulled by a rogue randomly dropping from above him.

9:44: third wipe of the night.

9:48: Golemagg pulled properly.

9:51: Golemagg killed.

9:54: Majordomo Executus engaged.

9:57: Majordomo Executus defeated.

10:02: Ragnaros summoned.

10:07: Ragnaros defeated. Hatespark the Tiny collected, huzzah!

As a whole, I am actually very happy with how it all went. the group that I ended up getting was very organized – the tanks marked the targets, healers were fantastic, and DPS did an excellent job. The only wipes we had were from a few people being stupid, and not the raid as a whole failing.

This was my third time trying to complete this, and I am very glad that I never have to do it again.

Mists of Pandaria – Three Weeks In

On September 25th, something very interesting happened. Mists of Pandaria was released to a horde of fans who were eager to have something different, and hopefully better than what Cataclysm had been. They were chomping at the bit, desperate for something more than running a raid for the past 9 months.

Blizzard Entertainment did an extrordinary thing. They delivered, and then some.

Most people I had spoken to were completely done with Cataclysm. Dragon Soul had been out for about 9 months, they had cleared everything and had all of the mounts and achievements they could get or wanted to get. All of their professions were maxed, they had all the reputations they needed, or whatever their case may have been.

Personally, I wasn’t playing as much as I had before. I would log on a few nights a week to do a couple randoms, maybe a Raid Finder group (if it didn’t blow up). Leveling alts only stays exciting for so long. Not having time to raid took out the only regular thing I had ever relied on in previous expansions. The only thing I was doing was leveling my Alliance Mage on my friends’ server.

When Mists launched, all of a sudden I had so much stuff to do again. True to what I had been expecting, the very first thing I did was do some pet battles. I had only done a little bit of them in beta, and they were just as much fun as I remembered. Memories of playing Pokemon in junior high school came back in a very big way.

For the first time since Burning Crusade, my wife and I decided to level our mains together. I play a Feral Druid and she plays an Enhancement Shaman, so we were able to power through most mobs without much problem (except for some of the rares that we stumbled across). We hit 90 this past weekend, and really enjoyed all of the zones that we quested through.

Overall, the quest design of this expansion is absolutely amazing. There were quests where we laughed – mainly the Hozen quests, especially Riko expressing his undying (see what I did there?) love for Kiryn – some quests that were quite touching, but the most important thing is that pretty much all of them were a lot of fun.

There is one thing that I keep coming back to, something that I find myself saying all the time, which is how absolutely beautiful the new content is. It’s hard to believe that the engine running this is over 8 years old, yet we’re still given these amazing views. Everything from the grand temples and structures, down to the small little tumbleweeds that blow around Kun-Lai Summit. The environment is gorgeous and incredibly immersive.

At the moment, I have yet to find something about this expansion that I don’t like. The closest thing that I could label as a complaint is that there’s just too much to do. Once I hit level 90, I have at least four different factions that I want to raise my reptutation with immediately, and being the completionist that I am, I want to eventually get them all up to exalted.

I still have yet to fully do many dungeons or scenarios – the only ones I’ve done is one run of the new heroic Scholomance, and one instance of the Arena of Annihilation.

All I know is that I’m more excited about this expansion than I have been for any other, possibly having Burning Crusade for the exception (only because at the time, it was the first expansion). One last note: a few friends of mine were extremely critical of the Mists of Pandaria announcement after BlizzCon. They were complaining about how much it looked like a very weak expansion without much content. Now, after talking with them after the release, they have completely changed their stances and are quite happy with the result.

Bring it on!

Boredem and changes

Over the past while, I have to admit that I haven’t been playing much World of Warcraft. It’s not that there is nothing to do – far from it – but there just really isn’t much that can keep my attention lately. I find that I’m logging on for a random heroic or two, but after that I’m finding that I can’t keep interested.

I’ve come to realize that finally, after over seven years of playing, I’m mostly bored of WoW. There have been times where there have been some gaps where I haven’t had as much fun, but it never has been like this before. Even though there are things coming up with Mists of Pandaria that look really cool, at the very least we’re around 6-7 months away from that. When the time comes, I’ll definitely pick it up and play it, but there’s just the problem about the time from now until then.

Previously, I had a solid raid team that I would work with twice a week and work through the raid content. Not having this sort of anchor has affected me more than I ever thought, as the only person who I spend much time with when I’m playing WoW at all is my wife (not that this is a bad thing, it’s just that I would like to have more acquiantances). Even though I have joined a guild on my Death Knight that has a great number of people, unfortunately I have yet to find a suitable raid team that works with the times that I’m available.

With all of this being said, I’m playing other games and having some fun doing different things. I purchased Terraria and Portal 2 during the Steam Christmas sale last year and have started playing them again, and this year I’ve purchased Skyrim and Bastion, along with being fortunate enough to get into the Diablo III beta. Between these five games, I’m keeping myself quite occupied and not really missing WoW very much.

As I’ve said many times before, I’m a Blizzard fanboy and will continue to be one. I still really enjoy WoW, but as many other people do, I think I’ll just play it less than I have in the past. When the New Spawn comes in February, it’s quite possible that I might be doing some Archaeology at three in the morning while feeding the baby.

Maybe I’ll get lucky and get into a raid team that works for me, because I know that it will re-kindle my interest in the game. The future holds many unknown things, and what I will be doing with my spare time to have fun is most definitely one of them.

The End Begins Now…

It’s hard to believe that it’s almost been a year since Cataclysm was first released.  There’s been a lot that has happened – good things, bad things, and things in between that people really aren’t sure about.  The expansion on a whole seems to be controversial in the fact that some believe it’s been a big success, while others believe it’s been a failure.  I personally think that it’s an experiment that was partially successful, but that’s for another time.

As of November 29th, the beginning of the end of Cataclysm is upon is.

Blizzard has said that this will be the last full content patch for the expansion, and that this will basically be the end for updates before Mists of Pandaria comes out.  This could be taken two ways: the optimistic way, thinking that we’ll be seeing MoP sooner rather than later and won’t have to do this content forever; or the pessimistic way, thinking that we’ll be doing the exact same content for a year, as we did with Icecrown Citadel at the end of Wrath of the Lich King (Ruby Sanctum doesn’t count).

Unfortunately I don’t work for Blizzard, and I don’t know when they hope to release MoP.  Like everyone else, I’d rather see it sooner rather than later, but we know that it will be done when it’s done.  However, all that being said, I’d like to take the optimistic view.

The 4.3 content patch has a lot in it.  Not only do we get the new raid on Deathwing, but there are three new 5-man dungeons, a revamped Darkmoon Faire, Transmogrification, Void Storage, the Raid Finder, a bunch of new items from the raids and other content, and a whole bunch of balance changes.  It would take too long to go through each one, so I’ll suggest you check out WoW Insider’s guide to Patch 4.3 to get the details about many of the new features.

Briefly, I’m very happy with Transmogrification.  The interface is incredibly easy to use, and I finally am rewarded for being such a packrat for all these years.  I was able to have one of my favourite looks of the Tier 5 shoulders and Wildfury Greatstaff for my Druid, which really makes me happy and nostalgic.

Void Storage is nice, but unfortunately a bit too restrictive.  I have a lot of stuff in my bank from the many holidays that have come around, and I was hoping to empty a bunch out to free up some room.  The biggest thing is that items labelled “unique” or items not soulbound cannot be deposited to VS.  Many tabards, as well as other holiday things are all unique, and some of the holiday items like the Brewfest and Winter Veil gear are not soulbound, but I wanted to keep them nonetheless.  So I deposited what I could, and at least freed up some room.

The Raid Finder has been one of the things I’ve been looking forward to most.  As I’ve mentioned before, my schedule is very weird for when I can raid, so now I can raid whenever I want – as long as there’s enough other people queuing as well.  I was able to get into a group, and successfully get the four bosses currently available with little drama.  We only wiped twice, and there were people taking charge of the raid to get things done.

We also got Tyrael’s Charger.  It’s pretty.

All in all, there’s some great new content that everyone can enjoy no matter what you do.  Raider, casual player, leveling player, there’s something for everyone.  As I experience more of the new content, I’ll post my thoughts about some of them.  In the meantime, happy exploring!

Guild Reputation

Guild reputation was a brand new feature that came out with Cataclysm and combined with the guild perks, rewards, achievements, and other stuff like that. Your guild levels and gets perks, and the more reputation that you have with the guild (by killing bosses in a guild group or doing daily quests), you get access to more of the rewards.

I’m not talking about any of this.

As I had mentioned before, I recently joined the AIE guild with my Death Knight on the Earthen Ring server. I was looking for an alternative place to hang out and find somewhere that had a better raiding schedule. After being in the guild for about a month, I’ve found that I’m rarely ever spending any time on my Druid anymore and mainly hanging out on my DK.

Many times I’m doing random dungeons for the Valour and Justice points, daily quests, a Baradin Hold run, or whatever the case may be. Yet, I could easily be doing these things on my Druid as he also needs some upgrades as well. At this point, I’ve all but decided that I will be moving him over to AIE soon-ish.

Getting used to a new guild is tough, and even more tough when there’s so many people in it. At any point in time, there’s at least over one hundred people online, and it’s hard to see familiar faces when there’s over 7000 to pick from. That being said, AIE is fortunate in the fact that the guild as a whole is very well run and has a great culture by itself that people seem to embrace easily.

For an example of the guild culture, twice a year they have craft fairs.  People give up a ton of materials from each profession to help others level up theirs.  I’ve heard stories of people maxing whatever profession they are (even the annoying ones like Leatherworking and Blacksmithing) within the short period of time that the craft fair is on.  This is a guild culture that I can support without a problem.

The Instance podcast has definitely made AIE popular, and is the reason why I decided to join.  Yet, even though it was the podcast that got me there, it’s the people who keep me there.  During BlizzCon, there were a bunch of volunteers who made a guild hall in one of the nearby hotels, which was basically a place for guildies to hang out when they weren’t at the convention.  Some people flew down there just to go to the hall, rather than the convention itself.  Goodie bags were made specifically for this, and it was a whole event contained within that hall.

Just by these few examples, it’s obvious why I’ve decided to try out this guild.  The reputation that it has gained from the amazing people who are members is truly awesome.

As a whole, I’ve had enough experience with AIE that I want to continue my association with them. The reputation that a guild has outside of the reputation panel is extremely important. If you don’t enjoy being in a guild, why bother getting Exalted with them?

Does Guild Size Matter?

Guilds have always been a key factor to World of Warcraft and most MMOs. When Cataclysm launched and the guild system was reworked, they became even more integral to the gameplay. While not required to do anything, they make life a whole lot easier with the perks that they provide.

I had mentioned before that I created a new character on a different server to try and get a new play experience. Since then, I have successfully joined the guild Alea Iacta Est (AIE) on the Earthen Ring server. This guild might ring a bell for some people as being one of the biggest in all of WoW. As far as I’m aware, there are over 7000 players spread out across a number of “co-guilds”, since there is a cap on how many characters can be in an guild. At one point, everyone was all in one guild, but the guild panel would stop showing people past a certain number.

My Death Knight that I was leveling just recently hit level 84, and is now a member of AIE Libertas. This is just a slight change from where my Druid is, back on the Thrall server. Band of Thorns is a very small guild, and might have about 10-15 people on at most at any point in time – usually during raids. Both guilds are level 25 and have all perks available.

So, does the size of the guild matter? It certainly does… to an extent.

One of the first things I noticed was just the fact that there’s always somebody on. Even if not in the specific co-guild that I’m in, but through one of the addons that makes guild chat go between all guilds, someone will be there. Even so, even in my co-guild I have yet to be on at a time where there’s less than 10 people on.

Along with that, with more people comes more help that can be available. Something simple as having some lockboxes to open, I asked in guild chat and I had five people who were willing to help out. I would normally have to wait for a while for a rogue to appear to help out, but now I have a number of people ready right away.

Raiding is a very different situation. There are a great number of raid teams in AIE, and a new team can easily be formed by starting a signup for a regular time. Rather than just having one chance to make the raids per week, I’ll now have many teams to choose from or be able to start a new one if needed.

The only downside that I have had so far is the fact that the guild is so big. I want to get to know people, but with so many people out there it’s hard to find the same people to talk to time after time. I know everyone in Band of Thorns, so far in AIE I don’t know anyone. At the same time, I’ve only been in the guild for about two weeks so far, so there’s definitely time to make it work.

There are plenty more options available in AIE than I currently have in Band of Thorns. More than once, I’ve thought about transferring my Druid over to Earthen Ring and joining in with him as well. The problem that I have is that I’ve been with Band of Thorns (in one way or another) since the game’s launch, and have never not been in the guild. There are people who I’ve known through the guild since the very beginning, and it’s very hard to let go. I wouldn’t sever all ties, but at the same time I want to keep my main character active.

Lots of things to consider. All I know is that I’ve been playing my DK a lot more than my Druid, for the main reason that I have stuff to do again, and I’m enjoying the people I play with.

Firelands Nerfs and Me

Recently Blizzard announced that there was going to be a nerf in the difficulty of Firelands bosses, for both regular and heroic modes. For a lot of people this came as a surprise, as the Tier 11 content wasn’t nerfed until Firelands was released, and heroic modes were kept on the same difficulty. The reaction has been mixed: some are very happy that this will let them see the content before the next raid patch comes out, and some are very upset that the content is a pushover now and their previous work is all for naught.

My thoughts are somewhat in the middle. Unfortunately, due to my real life scheduling situation and some very frustrating timing for being rotated out of a raid spot, I have yet to see an actual Firelands raid. I did a trash run during the first week as well as a few attempts on Rhyolith on another week. No kills or loot from the instance at all for me.

Because of my situation, I’m a bit excited about the nerfs. This means that when the time comes that I’m actually able to raid, there’s more of a chance that we’ll clear through the bosses and I’ll be able to get more Valour Points and good loot. Rather than taking the rare chances that I actually have to raid (so far I’ve been available for three nights of raids since Firelands released) and beating my head against a wall because of stalled progression, I will have a good chance at stuff that most of my guild has had for months.

However, I see where the regular raiders are coming from in their frustration. They’ve been working on this content for a while, learning the fights week after week and making steady progression. Perhaps there’s a guild who was on the verge of taking down a certain boss after many attempts, and all of a sudden the fight is easier by 15%. It’s a little bit of a downer, as the pride in taking things down at full strength is a great feeling.

In the end, this means that more people will be able to see more content. We don’t know any sort of estimated time of arrival for 4.3 and the new (hopefully) awesomeness that awaits there. In the meantime, people who have yet to see all of Firelands will be able to do so. More people will get better gear, meaning that when the next patch finally does arrive, they’ll be better geared for the new content.

I know that our guild has been 6/7 for normal Firelands, so I’m sure that many of my guildies are feeling the frustration. Hopefully the frustration will pass when they realize that they’re getting new goodies and will look forward to beating Deathwing to a bloody pulp.