Need Relish?

I went on a search of the interwebs, and found a few links I’d like to share. Not much substance to this post I’m afraid - just a few links :O

Resto4Life ~ Guest Post: So You Want to Rip Some Face?

Raider101 ~ Druid Cat

One Druid, Many Worlds ~ The Daily Druid - No Patch 3.0.8 for you

So, in my last post, I mentioned I’d respecced Rosi until 3.1 hit (complete with dual specs). I set about gearing, and didn’t anticipate how difficult it would be to get into the guild’s raids. I was more than a little surprised when I was told my dps wasn’t high enough for it. So I went off and did some research. Apparently my aim was 2k dps. My actual dps was closer to 1.3k. So, clearly not good enough.

I also realised I was painfully away from the hit-cap, so I spent my time going back to inferior(?) pieces to try and make the hit cap at the expense, for the moment, of other pieces of gear. Of course I’m hanging onto them, but it’s killing me than my shiney new stuff has to go on the backburner. I’m starting to figure out how, with a combination of enchants and gems and strategically statted items, I’m getting close to the cap. Now I’m looking for Sphere of Red Dragon’s Blood from heroic Nexus. Hopefully it won’t be one of these things I need to farm for, or I’ll outgrow it before it becomes an issue.

See, and with resto druids, it’s just all “stack spirit and YOU WILL WIN”. Well, maybe that’s an exageration, but y’know.

So, aiming for the hit-cap - anyone else looking for help should check BBB’s post on the maths. It’s helped me make sense of it, and also reminded me there’s an expertise cap (boo!), but I’ll get there. I just need the trinket and I’m done.

I get the feeling that was a bit rambley, but bleh :P

I couldn’t have been a little more patient could I? With dual specs on the horizon, you would think I could have contained myself. But no. I have respecced feral.

And, frankly, I’m glad of it.

If any of you have been attentive (or indeed even care :P) you’ll have noticed my lack of recent updates. This is partially because of a conscious decrease in WoW-time. And also partly because there was nothing to talk about. I go, I heal, I leave. I don’t really like progress raiding, mostly because it’s too much hard work. I have a full-time 9-5 job. I don’t want to still be around at midnight throwing myself at bosses that just won’t die. So, maybe it’s a little selfish of me, but I won’t ALWAYS have to go to raids now, especially since I’m not even a decent tank.

So I did go to 10-Naxx last night. And I had a lot of fun, getting to grips with the tanking thing. I had to be ‘replaced’ at Gothik (ie, our usual bear-tank who’d been dpsing switched roles with me), but I though I’d had a good run.

Hopefully feral will be a nice, new change for me. I didn’t really enjoy it while levelling, but I guess I just don’t really like levelling either :P

So yes, take an update and like it :3

AMG YES!!

Umbungo has downed 10-man Malygos :3 I didn’t get a decent kill-shot screenie - but this one should count for something right?

No loots for me, but I’m still stoked as Hell! :D

Just in case none of you are keeping up with World of Raids just have a watch of this and tell me you didn’t cringe.

Lol, QQ maor n00b. Apparently this is his armoury profile (though I can’t back it up - apparently some people tracked down the character name from the reporter’s blog and whittled it down to the only top level Paladin with that character name). Top 10 players eh? Apparently his flashy mount ‘proves it’.

More extensive posts incoming, I just felt a need to pass this gem along.

What have I been doing recently? Well, not so much, I guess I’m trying to actually cut down on my WoW time as I try and make a little time for other things. But since it’s been a while since I made a post - let’s get down to what I have been doing!

I finally got my Reins of the Bronze Drake from the timed run in Old Stratholme. I’ve never had a speedy mount on Rosi, so it was a welcome surprise. Albeit there were a few grumbles when I won the roll - apparently druids with epic flight aren’t allowed to have mounts. To that end, I would say anyone who already has an epic flying mount isn’t allowed to roll either. But whatever works I guess - I was happy :)

Rosi's Epic Flyer!

I’ve also been busy in Naxx on Rosi - Finally got the achievement for clearing Naxx The Fall of Naxxramas! I’ve also picked up a lot of goodies between the badges I’ve been picking up and the drops I’ve been getting. Unfortunately my guild is only large enough to do 10-man Naxx, but I wouldn’t want to be part of a full-on raiding guild, so that suits me just fine :D And yes, in that picture I’m still wearing Robes of Heavenly Purpose. Bite me :P

Malwyn at 68! <3

And also, I’ve been working hard on my Paladin, Malwyn. I’m planning on dragging her across to be my new main once she gets high enough - but for now she’s hit 68 and has been taken through into Northrend. It’s been a very different experience playing a Paladin than a Druid, mostly the ability to withstand lots of things at once. I’m finding Northrend difficult at the moment, but I blame that on coming from Outland with slightly rubbish gear, and not having done any quests to get better gear yet. But that will come in time I suppose :)

Myself and a few like-minded guildies plan on whoring out on WotLK dungeons for levelling. Might not be the fastest way there, but the loot will be nice. And learning how to play a Paladin in a group setting will help out when it comes to raids. I haven’t had much experience of anything except soloing ;)

Paladins, I would say, are pretty fun to play in PVP. Now I don’t know if this is because they’re supposedly OP or whatever - I don’t really pay attention to who needs to be nerfed. I only know this because of an interesting little story. So I was doing that one quest near Falcon Watch where you need to escort the captured pilgrim back to the base. She’s PVP enabled, and I play on a PVE server. What this usually means is that the Horde and the Alliance can leave each other alone and go about their business doing whatever it is that they’re doing. Not today. Twice an ally trying to kill my quest mob (and succeeded I guess). However, both times they became PVP enabled. The first time, I had no idea what was going on. I hit this Death Knight by accident and flagged myself. I went into that PVP with an “OMGOMGHE’SGONNAKILLME!” attitude. Somehow I won. But my quest NPC was dead, so I ran back to town - let my PVP flag wear off and went back to try again. Lo and behold, another Death Knight was there. But this time I was waiting. I started my quest, and the instant he hit the NPC, I laid into him. Roflpwned if I do say so myself. But then /gasp! He came back as a ghoul. Now, let’s look at the logistics. I have 2 extra moves I can use upon undead. Yes, I blew him away. And that is the story to how I now am willing to partake in world PVP. Hopefully I’m not just being overconfident ;)

So, I’m not dead - I do plan on updating - and I’m just struggling for topics to cover ;)

Recently, my partner and I decided it would be fun to try the Recruit a Friend offer in WoW. Essentially one of us makes a new account and we both reap the benefits. I decided to make a Blood Elf Paladin, which meant I had to buy TBC as well as Vanilla WoW to get up and running and out of my trial status.

Just to recap for those who aren’t aware, the RAF system has several advantages:

The level 60 Loladin!

• The friend you recruit gets 10 days of free gameplay. During this time, however, they’re restricted by certain things. For example, they cannot join guilds or form parties (although they can join parties). They cannot use mail or the AH, and they cannot own over a specific amount of gold. I believe there’s restriction on /yell and other channels as well. You also may not whisper someone who doesn’t have you on their friends list.
• Your accounts are linked for 90 days, which means you recieve the other benefits for a long time.
• While characters are within 2 levels of each other you recieve a x3 experience bonus on quests and monster killing. You also recieve a +50% reputation bonus on monsters you kill (not quests for the rep). However, this does not stack with rested experience, which you start to eat into after 60. You can also make use of the heirloom items, which DO stack and will be useful after level 60. These effects incidentally, last until 60 (although I have been informed it was halfway through 59, I wasn’t alert enough to check).
• Every two levels the recruited player gets a ding to award to the recruiter. This ding can be awarded to any character below level 60 on the same realm as the character which owns the dings. We levelled my partner’s priest from 34-60 this way in less than a minute.
• Here’s the one we weren’t interested in, but some others might be. When the recruited player pays for their first month of actual gameplay (this does not include any free months associated with buying the actual game) the recruiter gains a free month of gameplay.
• Another one which didn’t bother us too much, when the recruited player pays for their second month, the recruiter is awarded a Swift Zhevra.

So, my partner and I burned all the way up to 60. in less than 48 hours /played. While I love my new level 60 to death, 1-60 in less than 2 days is a little shocking. It also makes me wonder if I haven’t had that much experience playing my new class.

However, the plan is to get them up to 60 and then I’m going to transfer Malwyn to my own account and let the other account lapse. So, £9.99 for Wow, and then another £9.99 for TBC (for the belf, you could most likely skip this step if you didn’t want one ;) ), and then it’ll be £15 for the paid character transfer to my account. £35-ish split down the middle which works out to £17.50-ish each. Probably wasn’t worth the money, but it was worth it for the little experiment. And, to be honest, if my partner had anymore free slots, we’d probably be getting another couple of 60s out of it for £7.50 each.

So, RAF, worth it or not? Worth it if you’re an old player with a couple of years experience under your belt, and you just want to get to raid content with your alts instead of playing the whole game again. Not worth it if you’re just starting out, or are just lazy. And also not really worth it if you just want the Zhevra mount, athough, granted, you don’t need to put too much effort in!

As for me. I may have found a new main. I’ll keep you guys up to date on that ;)

So, I made a lot of gifts this Christmas. Mostly because I was in a cafty type of mood, but also because I found some nifty ideas my other half would enjoy. One of these was something I found on World of Warcrafts, a crafting website based on WoW. And on there I found some raid art. Having modified it to pictures I wanted, I came up with this:

My partner’s character Landothar on the left, and my character Rosiline on the right. And yes, there’s also a dancing Lurky - we both have Lurkys so it seemed appropriate.

I plan on maybe making some other WoW-related crafts at some point in the future, but I need a break after Christmas - I made LOADS of stuff, it even cut into my WoW time. “Sorry, can’t come Naxx tonight, I’m sewing!” Yeah, sad I know xD

So, I’ve always had a feeling that the Horde are getting shafted in WoW. Not in any noticable “QQAMGWTFBBQ!” type way. Some things just seemed geared towards the Alliance. For example, they have a straighter path in Alterac Valley, and an easier bottleneck to defend. For Christmas the Ally tailors are the only ones who will ever be able to make the red Christmas outfits (and we all know we’d rather wear red santa outfits than green, right?), and the Allies have an achievement which they can get at a low level, where the Horde have to be 77+ with a flying mount and cold weather flying.

Maybe I should go ahead and explain myself? ;)

My Shaman (the lovely Dristana) completed the achievement “Hallowed By Thy Name”. As some of you may be aware, if you collect all the title achievements, there’s a last achievement. So, naturally, I wanted my Shaman to complete all of the World Event achievements. Yes, I’m an achievement whore. Don’t judge me! xD

So, anyway, I figured, how hard can it be? So I meandered through the list, doing achievements that I thought were easiest. And finally I was left with “Bros. Before Ho Ho Ho’s” (incidentally, before the Ho Ho Ho’s what? That’s a possesive apostrophe right there - but I digress). So, gotta use mistletoe on some guys in Undercity, Warsong Hold and… Icecrown? But y’know, whatever works. I’d corpse jump or get summoned or something. So, eventually I was left with just the Icecrown guy to tag. Brother Keltan lives on Orgrim’s Hammer. Which is a flying ship. Which I need to FLY to get to. Great. I tried to get some guildies to summon me up, but of course it’s a transport so that didn’t work. I was at a slight loss. Eventually I got the achievement by glitch-ressing onto the boat. But this is beside the point when you realise, the Alliance don’t even have to leave Azeroth! At least 5 of their NPCs are in Stormwind!

In conclusion, I wonder how it’s fair that the Horde have to go to Northrend and be able to fly to not glitch this achievement, while the Alliance can take a relatively low-levelled character and run around a few NPCs. Granted, the Alliance have more people to talk to - but I’d prefer that to be honest. I imagine there’s something somewhere that is harder for the Alliance than the Horde, but I’m ranting, so y’know… :O

I’ll get off my soapbox now! Dx

Well, it’s installing.

To say I’m excited would be an extreme understatement :O