Have fun.

Sometimes we need reminding.

MgT too easy? too hard?

Word from the official WoW forums is Magisters' Terrace (or MgT as we'll call it - thanks Ratshag) is too easy....or too hard...depending on who you ask.

We outgeared the place on normal so I can't really give an accurate assessment. (I hate when someone says "It's easy, L2P!" and you inspect them and they are wearing gear from BT.)

But my observation is it will be tough on normal for the people it was intended for (they said it is supposed to be on the level of Shadow Labyrinth and Shattered Halls).

Edit: The justification for the difficulty is the epic drop at the end.

Magisters' Terrace

I took part in some of the Sunwell Offensive activities and did a run through MT. (Do we call it MT? How many people really use MT to describe Mana Tombs? No one goes there right?)

Al'ar's mini-me dropped off the maimed Kael'thas. I didn't win it - but since the vanity pet bags weren't introduced in this patch as rumored - it was a blessing in disguise.

I don't know how big of a request this really is but: Blizzard should introduce patches of this type every 4 months (not necessarily with a 25-man instance included - maybe make those every 6 months).

Patch 2.4 today

That was quicker than I expected! Coincidentally, I shortened my to-do list drastically the other day. I have nothing left to do that just *has* to be done before this patch, but my plan was to close the chapter on some things. I won't have time to do that now.

However, if the flurry of activity causes me to push some items to the back burner so be it. History has proved its best to take part in certain events during the height of their popularity (have you tried to get a group for Zuluhed the Whacked or the quests to open up Ogri'la or Skettis lately?)

Time is the currency of WoW

I came across another phrase that caught my eye, this time in a post made by Ciderhelm (TankSpot's administrator).

It was in the context of hardcore raiding.

Surprisingly, the same things being said in this post about people no longer being able to raid (hardcore) apply to people who were never able to raid (casual).

The hardcore vs. casual thing has been done to death. So its interesting when you see they have common ground.

His solution was to make encounters with timers. If you aren't good enough to finish it in time that's your attempt for the week. But as someone mentioned it has to be on the person to limit themselves to the amount of time they spend in the game. As soon as timer-limited encounters are introduced would people play less? No they would spend the rest of the time farming to the hilt for extra resist, pvp gear, badge gear, the most beneficial consumables possible. In other words they would shift their time elsewhere but it still would be unreasonably spent in the game. Because raiders want to separate themselves somehow with their accomplishments and they are willing to spend that currency to do so.

Fury of the Sunwell

Upon logging on we are now being greeted with a splash page advertising Patch 2.4

Unlike the Patch 2.3 - the Zul'Aman patch (I expected it to be my saving grace from 25-man raiding), I'm not particularly hyped about Patch 2.4 which doesn't even include a 10-man option.

Purely personal reasons. I was expecting to spend a lot of time in ZA but it turned out to be a bust. I then moved on to an alt and although I'm back in ZA on my main, as it stands it looks like I'm not going to defeat Zul'jin before Sunwell is released. And to be honest I don't look forward to playing on my main for the new content. Yet my gear on my alt is probably not ready for to take a part in it.

So I split time trying to finish off the last boss of ZA (I've decided this is the last content I really want to see - meaning I've given up on setting goals requiring any kind of raiding) while also trying to gear up my character I enjoy playing more as the fury of the Sunwell looms overhead...

Principle of Progression

I was browsing World of Matticus and he mentioned a phrase "principle of progression".

What I think he means is you should do Step A before moving on to Step B or trying to skip A and B and go directly to C.

I mentioned briefly in a another post about how removal of attunements allows you to skip what actually isn't a bad idea - gearing up your character and gaining some experience.

When 23 of your people are ready to move to the next step, but your 24th and 25th person are blocked due to attunement its a bad idea. But when 3 to 4 of your people out of a 10 man team either aren't willing to wait or haven't bothered to spend time getting gear by other means (pvp, badges, heroics, or simply normal level 70 instances) an attunement process is preferable. Especially if you can't get them to understand why minimum raid requirements exist.

I call it the "run me through deadmines" syndrome. Someone on an alt in quest greens thinks its okay to have another group run them through a place like Karazhan. If the group agrees? Sure no problem, but I can bet you epic mount gold the people who have actually spent the time to gear themselves up aren't so eager to spend more time in the same exact place to get an alt some easy gear. Guilds sell spots for this exact purpose!!!! Because they want a return on the investment of their time.

Cenarion Labs: Time vs Talent

Cenarion Labs: Time vs Talent

With my interest in all things druid, I came across this post as another casual player has hit the wall with what they can accomplish in the game.

Fortunately for me, as a brand new 70, I have lots of things I can do in short amounts of time that will improve my character.

As this poster pointed out "There are two separate sets of people who play this game- those who are able to make the time commitment and those who are not."

I can actually make the time commitment, but I am no longer keen on doing so. Spring is around the corner, I've been playing WoW for a few years now. And I've reached another phase in my gaming.

You wouldn't think so based on this past weekend. I spent about 5 hours straight doing an instance Sunday. And while the time passed quickly - as I was playing on a new character - I came away realizing I don't want to do that again. Old habits die hard. I can easily get caught up in raiding and have to make a conscious effort not to do so.

This new phase of WoW involves me sticking to things that don't require a schedule or anything that will last more than 3 hours. That will leave me faced with the things on his list. When I get to that point it's either leveling yet another alt or taking a break. I can easily see myself in that druid's paws some day.

Full on Night Elf!!!

Does anything scream night elf as much as a druid does?

Apparently not as much as I thought, as I looked up the classes from WoW's ancestor, Warcraft. From what I can tell by quickly browsing, those classes would actually be:

• Demon Hunters
• Keepers (half night elf, half stag)
• Priestesses (at least I got that one right! except those Priestesses were more like hunters?)
• Wardens (think Maiev)

Anyway, I'm playing a druid now and have added a list of links to druid blogs of interest. Focusing on feral. I feel like I've healed enough for one night elf life time (yeah it feels that long), I refuse to go restoration on this character.

I've joined a new guild

My main remains in my old one. But I joined a new guild on my alt.

This time was much different than before. No more selling myself on what type of gear I had, going on trial runs, needing to have someone vouch for me, clearing things with my old guild before joining the new one. All things I realize make sense for a raiding guild, but not for a casual one.

Nope, this one just involved a chance encounter with one of the officers and then shortly later getting an invite.

Their one rule? "Be polite and respectful of others".

Keeping up vs. going at your own pace

I think I know why I should have left my current guild when I quit raiding.

My guild's priority shifted to raiding 2 years back. That's how I came to join them. I wanted to raid and they were starting to raid on their own.

Things were good at the time. They raided at the right pace for me and I got to see lots of encounters that many raiders take for granted.

Then the raiding picked up, more days, longer hours and I could no longer keep up.

But since our guild wasn't originally a raid guild, a few people remained that didn't raid and I also was welcome to stay and fill in now and then.

It sounded like the perfect match still. I could in some way be involved with what was going on. I would get to see a few bosses that I hadn't spent any time during the learning phases on. And I could sometimes still group in 5 and 10 mans with some efficient and effective players.

But along the way the guild changed a bit and I did too. The guild's 25-man group started grouping more with themselves in the 5 and 10 mans (no surprise there) and I started caring less about getting one more badge or one more timed kill. My goals and the guild's goals had diverged even further.

And perhaps I've done a disservice to my guild and myself.

With someone like me around, they could pull me in when someone was absent, instead of focusing on getting a new raider geared up that could be rotated in and play on a more consistent basis.

And I albeit unknowingly still tried to keep to a raider's goals without raiding! I can't imagine our raid guild is any different than any other, so during raids, guild chat is peppered with epics being linked as they drop. I would note what I needed to get close to those things in badges. There is also talk now and then about different resist gear, and epic gems needing to be crafted - all things that if you don't raid you shouldn't give a flying fig about. But in the back of my mind I was making lists that I needed to get those things as well.

The reason why I've had so much fun on my alt is in part to the fact I'm not in the guild, I don't see the chat. I don't see what I'm missing and I don't have any urgent need to quest faster, group more, farm a lot.

So I'm thinking I should have dropped my main out of the guild as soon as I "retired" from raiding. Just the way I first joined a raid guild to be with like-minded individuals, why would I remain there now that we no longer were? What has and is keeping me there at the moment are memories and my self-defined loyalty. But I don't want to try to keep up with something that is out of my reach. I want to go at my own pace and I think finding a guild where people embrace that would improve my game time.

Raiding requirements

One of the slightly negative things about the removal of keying and attunement is that players can now join a group for something without the gear that you normally acquire by jumping through the keying and attunement hoops.

And while you can get decent gear through other means than raiding, doesn't mean everyone does so. In the end raiding (with a group that knows the instance) is still the easiest way to get geared up.

I do wish people would be considerate when joining something unreasonably undergeared - like no one will notice. It makes things harder on everyone else.

Will they find a balance?

If I sound like I've been doing a little bit of "hardcore" bashing, I apologize.

I guess now that I don't raid, I'm on the other side of things. Some of the things I used to do are starting to seem more and more.....insane. But I still remember the feeling you get when a boss dies that you've been working on for weeks if not months. And while I was never truly hardcore or have any idea what it would be like to be in a top raiding guild, I empathize.

I read where a top 10 raiding guild decided WoW is becoming (has become) too casual. It was in reference to badges (and arenas too I guess) allowing everyone, so inclined, access to tier equivalent loot without stepping foot into tier instances.

But another thing that was surprising is they are saying the Sunwell instance (the part they attempted) didn't give them the challenge they desire. In fact even Illidan didn't seem to impress them.

Pair this up with the person in the pug I was with this evening telling me they never expected their guild to see Karazhan but this past week they entered together for the first time. (I didn't have a chance to ask how long they've been a guild.)

That's a huge gap in participation. Badges for the new Karazhan guild will be like gold doubloons. Badges for the Illidan guild will be like skittles. How would you find a balance for that?

"Catering to casuals"

The only people who say this and really believe its true are people who have no idea what it is like to be casual.

The price of 150 badges for one thing, one single item, puts it right in the place it needs to be. Someone who isn't casual simply wouldn't understand how long it would take to get that one item, forsaking everything else you could possibly buy with badges.

It's similar to pvp rewards. Anyone who was truly casual would see the possibility of acquiring some nice gear, but also recognize the huge task they have ahead of them.

And you'll notice I didn't say insurmountable task. Apparently, this is what "hardcore" players want some things in the game to be....for others.

When to call it quits?

No, not the game silly!

After how many wipes do you say this group/raid just isn't going to cut it?

I don't have a magic number, just a feeling. I don't have unlimited time (who does?) and wiping over and over isn't always productive.

My old raid leader seemed to function on zero sleep. His motto seemed to be keep wiping until the thing is dead or 'fan;gwrwgfmcwkc;wowieon' appeared in raid chat due to people's heads falling asleep on their keyboards. (Did I mention I don't miss that part of raiding?)

Back when I first started WoW (had to be on the weekends!) I remember spending over 3-4 hours in a lowbie instances. I'm not talking Molten Core, I'm talking places like Maraudon and Sunken Temple. Not only were the places prone to lots of wipes, the corpse were runs brutal and the instances themselves were huge!

People seemed used to spending hours upon hours upon hours doing single instances. I'm so glad TBC made them shorter.

I've been pugging them all so far, with one or two friends joining me every now and then. But I have only bailed on one. I chalked it up to my inexperience. After wiping on the same trash for about the fourth time, I felt I wasn't up to the task of tanking. And I definitely wasn't up to doing it over and over. I apologized to the group and they removed me.

Later I did the same instance with a higher level of players, great cc and we finished it in a decent amount of time. No muss no fuss.

Avoiding time sinks

I continue to enjoy my latest and greatest alt.

I'm having the fun you'd expect to have in a game. Something I hadn't even realized had been missing. I haven't pinpointed the difference for sure, but I think it's because I'm grouping again.

I had quit 25-man raiding and to my surprise, the 10-mans wanted to gear up the 25-man raiders, so by leaving one group I lost access to the other as well. I fell back on playing alts, but alts that soloed so well I soloed/duo'ed most of the time.

Now I'm playing a hybrid class, but I didn't want to heal (did enough of that on my priest). So this time around I'm tanking - "the" pve grouping role. I'm not great at it. But I've only not completed one instance I've tried so far (went back with a different group and cleared it). My alt is not in my guild so I pug everything and so far things haven't really been that bad. Not 70 yet, things may change at end game with heroics, etc. I'll cross that bridge when I get to it.

In the spirit of this new found enjoyment, I've decided to try and make a concentrated effort at avoiding the time sinks in the game.

1) Play a needed class. I haven't spent much time grouping as dps, but healers and tanks seem to spend less time in LFG.

2) Focus on one role. As a hybrid I could spend lots of time gearing up for all the roles I could fill. But I ended up playing double time on my priest gearing her up for shadow AND holy. I'm not going to do that again.

3) Do not raid. I'm not going to raid with this character if I can help it. Maybe one day I'll do Karazhan. But I really don't want to get into a scheduled situation where I can't log off when I want to.

4) Do not pick up a crafting profession. I've hit 375 with my gathering professions. If I want to farm I can, but I don't have to try and spend hours getting mats for one skill up, or to purchase a recipe, or to get a recipe drop. I spent hours in an attempt to farm all BoE recipes, I think I only had one left to get.

5) Get loot through crafting, reputation and pvp. Instead of running an instance ad naseum for a lucky drop, find alternatives through other avenues. I'll never have the best of the best without raiding or arenas anyway.

6) PvP marginally. I've spent countless hours on battlegrounds not necessarily enjoying myself trying to earn honor. AFKing screws things up, but I can definitely understand why people do it. When during a bg I find I'm thinking AFKers have the right idea - log off immediately.

7) Grind reputations that only give rewards I can't easily get anywhere else. Do I really need exalted with Sporregar? The bat *is* cute, but helm and shoulder enchants are better.

8) Give up on fun frivolities - this is a hard one, but probably will give me the most bang for the giving-up buck. Spending hours farming ogres for a Talbuk no longer makes sense if I'm trying to spend more time in RL.

Did I miss any other time sinks?

Perhaps its not really a time sink if you have fun doing it. Yet it is so easy to get lost in this game and wonder where all your time went. It sounds like I'm cutting a lot out of the game, but I'll still spend numerous hours playing even without all of this.

Puggin' it!

I've been pugging instances again as I level up yet another alt. This is an unguilded alt, free from the pressures of "come heal this instance for us please" (more on that later).

Believe it or not, the worst part of pugging is BEFORE we even enter the instance. Waiting for the group to form, waiting for everyone to arrive. You spend a good 15-45 minutes right there.

Of course, I could join a guild and have less pug stress. But so far I'm enjoying pugging again. I've come across a surprising amount of ret paladins, and unsurprising amount of draenei shaman.

My expectations of pugs are so low, that I come out feeling great about them. Part of it has to do with the feeling they really nerfed these instances from a year ago. Part of it has to do with running normal instances is easier than heroics. And part of it has to do with me being in a new role other than healing. But besides all that, players seem to work together for the most part. I imagine just about everyone is on an alt, and know these instances very well. And if they are like me, they are so happy to find a group, they want it to succeed.

The good and bad thing about guild runs is, you know each other so well things move very fast and efficient. But you also have less unexpected things happen - in one word - boring. You also come to take for granted that someone will heal your instance or tank your instance and quickly lose sight that you're burning them out. Pugs are more appreciative and anonymous, you won't be swooped down on like a vulture's lunch when you sign on the game.

I'm trying to stay happily oblivious to the impending doom that is end game. Right now, by spending an hour and 1/2 I have a chance at a nice drop. I enjoy my time spent online, and I haven't made a promise to a pug that I'll be on the same time tomorrow and after that and after that to run another instance with them.

Life in Azeroth and beyond...is good.

2.4 PTR

3 bosses in the new Sunwell instance have already been killed on the PTR. With only 6 bosses total, those remaining 3 bosses must be extremely hard. Or the top guilds are going to have another 6-8 months with nothing to do.

Have I won the game?

It just dawned on me that I've pretty much done the things I really wanted to do in this game. It is my own virtual finish line that I've set. I can't think of anything else I feel I need to do if something came up and suddenly I had to quit.

Sure there are instances left to visit, crafting profession caps left to be reached, reputations left to hit exalted on, and all those mounts I can save up for! But none of those things will I look back on wistfully and say "I never did X while I played, I wish I had".

Feels good. And kinda frees me from the game. (No I'm not quitting.)

Oh no!

Okay there is one thing. I many times wished I had played a horde character to max just to see what pvp is like on the "smarter", "more mature" side.

Drat.

8 months of no new content?

I came across a forum post about guilds who killed Illidan 8 months ago. Essentially they are beyond bored and have warned Blizzard that they will not wait another 8 months for new content.

Lucky for Blizard no other MMORPGs are close to release. You sometimes see mention of WAR, but I haven't heard anyone mention anything about the Pirates or Tabula Rasa MMORPGs come to think of it and both of those are out already I think. At least LotRO got a little bit of publicity before dropping off the radar - too bad they didn't have their higher level content fleshed out ahead of time.

We've had a few guilds clear everything before the beginning of this year. You don't really hear them say they are done farming yet.

The guild I'm in is still in Black Temple/Mt. Hyjal and they have a ways to go before they clear both from what I've heard. And this is with the more dedicated players in our guild. They are kept busy with that and Zul'Aman and don't seem a bit disgruntled.

And we have several guilds still in Serpentshrine Cavern/Tempest Keep mostly stuck at the end boss humps. They are kept busy actively recruiting. Although you see some players trying to jump ship because they recognize this will be the bottleneck until either those bosses are nerfed or attunements are lifted.

Why is there such a divide in groups who can clear all new content within a matter of months, groups who may clear most of it in the time span of a year or so, and guilds who will never get very deep into 25-man instances without extensive nerfs and removal of attunements?

And Blizzard has to try to keep them all happy. If you release content faster, the slower guilds feel like they can never keep up - and lose their better players to better guilds. If you release content slower, your more progressed guilds get bored and irritated and people stop playing the game altogether.

Why did they release SSC/TK at the same time they release BT/Hyjal? Maybe they should have spaced them out a bit more, made the bosses harder. Slow guilds wouldn't have noticed (because they always get nerfed eventually) and faster guilds would have been kept busy longer.