I really like this instance. The rest of the group was good, and no one else tried to tank. We got through with no real issues. I hearthed home, turned in all my quests, and realized that I missed looting the second boss for the gnome in Stormwind. I popped open the dungeon finder, selected Deadmines and was back almost instantly.
We start up fine. By the time we get to the first boss I notice something. The hunter isn't shooting. I try to ask him if he has a ranged weapon, but before I do the lock grabs aggro. While the priest is rezzing the lock, I get to ask the hunter why he is just using an axe instead of a bow or gun. No answer. Two pulls later the priest answers for him. "No ammo, lols". I notice they are in the same guild.
We get to the second boss, the only one I really need, and he goes down fairly smoothly even though the lock pulled the whole room and the hunter's pet died two pulls ago. I think the other DPS is AFK I loot my quest item, and the priest announces the she has to go and hearths. At this point I can't take it any more. I announce that I can't continue with a melee hunter that can't rez his pet, a pull-happy lock, and Mr. AFK. As I'm hearthing I notice that the lock has pulled again. Too bad.
My ever expanding ignore list has some fresh names, and I'm off to train and call it a night.
Saturday, January 30, 2010
Wailing Carverns
I did my usual group buffing and let everyone know that I hadn't been in here for a really long time. Neither had anyone else. We cleared the upper portion and the first boss with no problems other than a DC from one of the DPS. We continued on and took out the second boss. While this was happening, the palidin in the group started the usual crap. After a pull gone bad by the pally, I asked him to stop pulling and let me tank while I rezzed the healer. This lasted until we got back over to the other side of the instance.
I don't know what is so hard about the concept of Tank-Heals-DPS that these morons can't understand. We finished the rest of the instance with a few near wipes and me on DPS again. I think I was one of the only ones who didn't die to stupidity on the run. Shadowmeld FTW!
There seems to be a pattern forming. My ignore list grows with every run. At least I leveled a bit, so after a hearth and some training I queue up once more for the night. Six seconds later Deadmines is loading.
I don't know what is so hard about the concept of Tank-Heals-DPS that these morons can't understand. We finished the rest of the instance with a few near wipes and me on DPS again. I think I was one of the only ones who didn't die to stupidity on the run. Shadowmeld FTW!
There seems to be a pattern forming. My ignore list grows with every run. At least I leveled a bit, so after a hearth and some training I queue up once more for the night. Six seconds later Deadmines is loading.
Friday, January 29, 2010
Baby Tank, Baby Steps
Inspired by BBB, I decided to level a new druid. I want to level him mainly through tanking using the dungeon finder. Between the leftover shards, seals, and emblems on my main I was able to outfit by new bear with heirloom shoulders, trinket, chest, and weapon. A few more seals and he’ll have trinket #2. It’s been a while since I rolled a new nelf. The first thing that struck me was that all the starter area mobs are yellow. Even all the spiders. The drop rates seem to have gone up as well. Quested out of the starter area and headed for the mailbox in the next zone to pick up my gear and bigger bags. Dinged 10, and proceeded to do the quests to get my bear form. Once I had completed that, I headed over to Stormwind and made it my home. I figured I’d get level up to 16 so I had swipe and then start using the dungeon finder. I leveled up getting the VC prerequisites so I would have all the quests when I went in.
I had my talents set, glyphs set, my heirlooms on, my non-heirloom equipment the best the AH had, and everything enchanted. I even picked up some elixirs and buff food. I leveled my First Aid. I was ready and eager to tank. I have been mainly running as melee DPS for the last few months on my DK. Before that I was ranged on my Hunter. On my DK I have the pug pet and all the emblem gear I can get from pugging heroics. I’m not a total newb. I’ve seen a lot of bad pugs. It still didn’t prepare me for what I was about to face.
I queued as a tank. Three seconds later I was in Ragefire Chasm. The only other time that I’d been there was when my hunter did the wrathgate quest. I popped over and did both the instance and fished up the rare. Alas, when I tried to do it on my DK, I found it was no longer possible. Anyway, back to my first instance. I buffed everyone with MotW, popped Thorns on myself and let everyone know that I hadn’t been in here in a real long time. Meanwhile the DPS warrior gnome runs over and starts aggroing mobs.
I rush over, pick up the mob, and we’re off to the races. Every time I pull, he charges in and taunts. Or he starts pulling. The healer is going nuts, the warrior and pally are trying to tank, and I’m doing my best to keep the mobs off the healer. Somehow the entire instance gets pulled and we wipe. The healer and a DPS drop group and I follow suit. I repair and rethink my plan. I queue up again and back into Ragefire I go.
Oh look, the same warrior and pally. We proceed to tank the instance. By we, I mean me (queued as tank) , the warrior (queued as dps), and the pally (also queued as dps). After a few minutes of this the warrior says just let him tank and go cat form and dps. I let him know that I don’t get that until level 20. I drop out of bear and stay in my nelf caster form. I stick to dps and also help the healer out because the other dps also thinks they are a tank. Wearing cloth.
The pally goes AFK on follow for the rest of the instance. We somehow get though. I put the warrior, pally, and warlock on my ignore list so I will never have to group with them again. I repair and queue up again. Almost instantly the confirmation pops up. And this time the loading screen shows Wailing Caverns…..
I had my talents set, glyphs set, my heirlooms on, my non-heirloom equipment the best the AH had, and everything enchanted. I even picked up some elixirs and buff food. I leveled my First Aid. I was ready and eager to tank. I have been mainly running as melee DPS for the last few months on my DK. Before that I was ranged on my Hunter. On my DK I have the pug pet and all the emblem gear I can get from pugging heroics. I’m not a total newb. I’ve seen a lot of bad pugs. It still didn’t prepare me for what I was about to face.
I queued as a tank. Three seconds later I was in Ragefire Chasm. The only other time that I’d been there was when my hunter did the wrathgate quest. I popped over and did both the instance and fished up the rare. Alas, when I tried to do it on my DK, I found it was no longer possible. Anyway, back to my first instance. I buffed everyone with MotW, popped Thorns on myself and let everyone know that I hadn’t been in here in a real long time. Meanwhile the DPS warrior gnome runs over and starts aggroing mobs.
I rush over, pick up the mob, and we’re off to the races. Every time I pull, he charges in and taunts. Or he starts pulling. The healer is going nuts, the warrior and pally are trying to tank, and I’m doing my best to keep the mobs off the healer. Somehow the entire instance gets pulled and we wipe. The healer and a DPS drop group and I follow suit. I repair and rethink my plan. I queue up again and back into Ragefire I go.
Oh look, the same warrior and pally. We proceed to tank the instance. By we, I mean me (queued as tank) , the warrior (queued as dps), and the pally (also queued as dps). After a few minutes of this the warrior says just let him tank and go cat form and dps. I let him know that I don’t get that until level 20. I drop out of bear and stay in my nelf caster form. I stick to dps and also help the healer out because the other dps also thinks they are a tank. Wearing cloth.
The pally goes AFK on follow for the rest of the instance. We somehow get though. I put the warrior, pally, and warlock on my ignore list so I will never have to group with them again. I repair and queue up again. Almost instantly the confirmation pops up. And this time the loading screen shows Wailing Caverns…..
Thursday Night Fun
Our weekly friends and family night run went pretty smooth. We range from 32-35, and have been progressing through SM. Our usual team is a pally tank, priest on heals, and mage+kitty+me on deeps. I took my hunter through this time. We ran Library for the first time last night. It went very well so we reset and ran it again. The Houndmaster dropped the Dog Training Gloves both times, which I passed on the first run to the druid. They were still better than the ones I had so I picked them up on the second run. Doan dropped his robe and rod both times so the clothies were very pleased.
There and Back Again
I had a rather stuttering introduction to WoW. A friend told me about the game and thought I would enjoy it. I signed up for the 10 day free trial and created an account. I didn’t know anything about the game at all. I rolled an orc warrior and wandered about, eventually noticing the first quest giver. I didn’t know it was a quest giver, nor did I have any idea what the big yellow “!” over his head meant. After some initial frustration, I figured out that you could right-click to interact with him and I received my first quest. After playing for about an hour alone – there were no other “real” people to be found, not that I’d be able to talk to them anyway since I had no clue as to how to use the chat, I logged off and the free trial eventually ran out. A few weeks later, I created another account for another free trial and it ended up lapsing without me even logging on.
The third time was a charm. I created another account, rolled a nelf hunter and never looked back. The difference in the starting area was the thing that hooked me. Instead of the barren, empty wasteland there was a colorful, thriving area with several “real” people playing. I went to the local electronics megastore and picked up a WoW bundle that came with BC and the large WoW and BC player handbooks. After reading them both several times, I dived back into WoW and leveled my hunter up to 10, rolled a nelf rogue, a nelf warrior, nelf priest, and finally a nelf druid. Now that I had a stable of level 10 nelfs, I thought I’d do something different and rolled a spacegoat hunter.
I eventually settled on my original hunter and continued leveling. I was invited into a guild and started to get into the social aspect of the game, spending about half of my time playing solo and the other half questing with a few others in the guild. I found that the ghost kitty that spawned from the relics in Darkshore could be tamed, and I made that my mission. This would become my signature pet, and I still have her to this day. I learned a lot about my class from my new friend that invited me to the guild. I also learned a lot from trial and error. I progressed rather slowly, exploring and experimenting, spending a lot of time on my various alts. I used them mainly to play around with different professions, eventually creating my own personal guild for storage space and transferring items.
My new friend went to anther guild and invited me to come along. Since the only people that I ever played with went to the new guild, I followed suit. The new guild was a bit more social and after about eight months I hit the level cap of 70. The guild started raiding, and we spent two and sometimes three nights in Kara. I discovered the wonderful world of WoW blogs and spent many hours reading and learning. WotLK arrived and the guild stopped raiding while everyone leveled and explored Northrend. Once we were all 80 and semi-geared from heroics we started raiding Naxx.
I was having a blast. The guild was a lot of fun. These fights were new for several of us, but a few in the guild were raiding Naxx back in the day. The raid leader was great, explaining what need to be done, and we carried out the plan. We were slow progressing, but we were efficient with very few wipes. Just before Ulduar showed up we had Naxx on farm and were working on Maly. All good things, however, must come to an end it seems.
I logged on one night and noticed that the guild roster was missing almost 80% of the people. My first thought was that an officer or the GM had been hacked and we were in the middle of getting everything stolen. My suspicions grew stronger and “so and so has left the guild” messages started scrolling up my chat log. The GM wasn’t on and none of the remaining guildies were online. I received a whisper from one of the former guild members. We weren’t being hacked, the guild had imploded.
There was drama brewing that I was unaware of. I won’t get into the specifics, but it started when WotLK came out. It seemed such a petty thing. I was in shock that the seemingly solid team we had could be torn apart so quickly. A few days later I received an email from the GM saying that the guild was finished and I should look for a new home. I received whispers from some guildies who moved to a new guild asking if I wanted to join. I turned the offer down and retreated into my private alt guild. I took a short break from WoW.
RAF came out and so did sales of WoW/BC combo packs, so I tried to get my wife and son to play with me. My wife played once and didn’t get into it, but my son still plays occasionally. I ended up multi-boxing. At first I would three-box, eventually five-boxing. I gifted levels to my stable of alts to continue their professions, and eventually dropped back down to three accounts as the RAF expired. I had two level 80 toons, and almost thirty more ranging from level 20 to 74.
My RL friend that got me into WoW played on a different server. Rather than spend the money to transfer all of those to his server, I rolled a DK and some bank alts on his server. I quickly leveled up to 80 and joined the raiding guild his main was on with my alts in his private friends and family guild. When WoW went on sale for $5, I couldn’t resist the urge to grow my alt farm on the new server. I now have several level 60 toons to rebuild my profession group. Currently, I spend my time bouncing between servers, and I will eventually transfer at least my hunter over to the new server. My friend has a low level alt and, along with his two sons and a friend of theirs, we get together every Thursday night and run an instance or two.
The third time was a charm. I created another account, rolled a nelf hunter and never looked back. The difference in the starting area was the thing that hooked me. Instead of the barren, empty wasteland there was a colorful, thriving area with several “real” people playing. I went to the local electronics megastore and picked up a WoW bundle that came with BC and the large WoW and BC player handbooks. After reading them both several times, I dived back into WoW and leveled my hunter up to 10, rolled a nelf rogue, a nelf warrior, nelf priest, and finally a nelf druid. Now that I had a stable of level 10 nelfs, I thought I’d do something different and rolled a spacegoat hunter.
I eventually settled on my original hunter and continued leveling. I was invited into a guild and started to get into the social aspect of the game, spending about half of my time playing solo and the other half questing with a few others in the guild. I found that the ghost kitty that spawned from the relics in Darkshore could be tamed, and I made that my mission. This would become my signature pet, and I still have her to this day. I learned a lot about my class from my new friend that invited me to the guild. I also learned a lot from trial and error. I progressed rather slowly, exploring and experimenting, spending a lot of time on my various alts. I used them mainly to play around with different professions, eventually creating my own personal guild for storage space and transferring items.
My new friend went to anther guild and invited me to come along. Since the only people that I ever played with went to the new guild, I followed suit. The new guild was a bit more social and after about eight months I hit the level cap of 70. The guild started raiding, and we spent two and sometimes three nights in Kara. I discovered the wonderful world of WoW blogs and spent many hours reading and learning. WotLK arrived and the guild stopped raiding while everyone leveled and explored Northrend. Once we were all 80 and semi-geared from heroics we started raiding Naxx.
I was having a blast. The guild was a lot of fun. These fights were new for several of us, but a few in the guild were raiding Naxx back in the day. The raid leader was great, explaining what need to be done, and we carried out the plan. We were slow progressing, but we were efficient with very few wipes. Just before Ulduar showed up we had Naxx on farm and were working on Maly. All good things, however, must come to an end it seems.
I logged on one night and noticed that the guild roster was missing almost 80% of the people. My first thought was that an officer or the GM had been hacked and we were in the middle of getting everything stolen. My suspicions grew stronger and “so and so has left the guild” messages started scrolling up my chat log. The GM wasn’t on and none of the remaining guildies were online. I received a whisper from one of the former guild members. We weren’t being hacked, the guild had imploded.
There was drama brewing that I was unaware of. I won’t get into the specifics, but it started when WotLK came out. It seemed such a petty thing. I was in shock that the seemingly solid team we had could be torn apart so quickly. A few days later I received an email from the GM saying that the guild was finished and I should look for a new home. I received whispers from some guildies who moved to a new guild asking if I wanted to join. I turned the offer down and retreated into my private alt guild. I took a short break from WoW.
RAF came out and so did sales of WoW/BC combo packs, so I tried to get my wife and son to play with me. My wife played once and didn’t get into it, but my son still plays occasionally. I ended up multi-boxing. At first I would three-box, eventually five-boxing. I gifted levels to my stable of alts to continue their professions, and eventually dropped back down to three accounts as the RAF expired. I had two level 80 toons, and almost thirty more ranging from level 20 to 74.
My RL friend that got me into WoW played on a different server. Rather than spend the money to transfer all of those to his server, I rolled a DK and some bank alts on his server. I quickly leveled up to 80 and joined the raiding guild his main was on with my alts in his private friends and family guild. When WoW went on sale for $5, I couldn’t resist the urge to grow my alt farm on the new server. I now have several level 60 toons to rebuild my profession group. Currently, I spend my time bouncing between servers, and I will eventually transfer at least my hunter over to the new server. My friend has a low level alt and, along with his two sons and a friend of theirs, we get together every Thursday night and run an instance or two.
Thursday, January 28, 2010
So it begins...
After lurking on numerous WoW blogs for quite some time, I've been bitten by the blog bug. I've recently started a new alt (again) and wanted a place to document my experiences. I've played WoW since just after BC launched, and have about 50 toons across three accounts. As I get more familiar with Blogger, I'll adjust the layout accordingly. All names have been changed to protect the, ahem, innocent.
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