The Dream (PvP) Team

Saw this on BBB's blog today. All I want to say is: Dibs on being on Cynwise's team. I'll even take Gnomer if we can figure out some across-the-Earth thing, (even though he's a mage). Can we have a fantasy draft? I'll need some sort of Average Honor Per Battleground (AH/BG) stats for appropriate judgement. Or what would be the best stat of effectiveness?

I don't think I count as a PvP blogger, though. Maybe I'm more of an alternate, since I've mentioned PvP occasionally at least. And I'm not sure my WoW toon is geared well enough to be less than a burden on the pros out there. I'm about one season behind. I can look pretty. And fight on the flag. And set a mean mid-map pick for the FC (Frost DKs can be supremely annoying).

My Jedi is damn near Battlemaster, though. Decked out. Not that that improves my odds of being chosen on any Dream Team. (The odds are not in my favor, much like a certain Everdeen.)

I think a blogger PvP brawl is a great idea. I don't have the wherewithal to set it up, but it's a great idea. Maybe BBB should pawn it off on Hugh again. ;-)

Oh What A Difference A UI Makes

Here's a non-Skyrim related post idea that I had tagged to write about a week ago. I'll try to do it justice now, though we never got around to taking screenshots. It actually ties into Skyrim though, as you'll see in a bit.

(Yes, I'm being a bit facetious here. Normally, you see, I'd feel I have to mention this is a "non-WoW" post. But since all the WoW blogs have recently become Skyrim blogs (amirite?), I'm poking fun.)

As the title indicates, I'd like to wax philosophical about UI's for a bit.  The idea came to me as Fuu and I were doing our 2v2 arenas last week. In the weeks leading up to the Skyrim launch, there was a distinct lack of gaming things to do.  The calm before the storm, if you will.  Fuu took it upon herself to go in and revamp her UI for PvP.

In our raids, she's a tank, and that UI has been customized for her for a very long time.  She'd just started getting serious with me in PvP about three months ago or so.  Before we made a guild push to try and gear for rBGs, I was pretty much the only PvP'er of the guild.  I think one of our mages regularly ran BG's too, but otherwise the rest of our crew only dabbled.  I'd never gotten into high end PvP, but I'd generally gotten all the gear I could without stepping foot in arenas.

The point is just that I've had a PvP UI for ages now.  I use mostly the same addons, but things are arranged in a completely different manner.  I'm a bit of a macro guy (though I've not written a new one in ages), so most of my custom work is done there.  In PvP, seconds can be the difference between life and death.  You need to have the appropriate skills at fingers reach.  I'm talking snares, silences, oh-shit buttons, as well as attacks.

Generally, in PvE, you know what to expect going into a fight.  So while I may shuffle a few buttons around, make a special macro for one fight, etc, I don't usually have to have everything available all the time.  In PvP, it's a completely different approach.  Reaction spells need to be pressed, not clicked (unless you're the fasted clicker in the west).  Attack spells need to be chained with certain CC.  You learn and adapt over time, and a customizable UI is crucial to this.

So Fuu gutted her UI and set up a PvP-centric one.  When we PvP'ed that night, it was like I'd picked up a different partner.  All of a sudden, she was a healing machine, easily able to frustrate opposing players while slinging bubbles like a madwoman.  What a difference a UI makes!  That isn't to say we went undefeated, or there weren't the frustrating moments where we were pwned by our betters.   We still ran up against unbeatable combinations (I have a whole post in mind for how two druids are OP), but it felt like we were now beating the teams we should beat.  There weren't as many frustrating losses where she said "man, I should have done x."  We left it all out there in the arena.  We played our best.

I made the quip about Skyrim because it shows the other side of this.  I can't even begin to tell you how many times I've died already because of fumbling around with their crappy UI.   Yes, that is my one Skyrim complaint so far: the crappy UI.  I'm playing on the PC, and it's just awful.  I could go into detail, but that's already been done.  Check this out.  I think that about sums it up.  I hope Bethesda takes note and maybe hotfixes some of this, because otherwise, the game is amazing.

PvP for PvEers: Get Out Of The MUCK

Cynwise left a comment on Monday, encouraging a list of the things I've noticed from mingling with players newer to the PvP scene.  At first, I thought I was going to be able to put together a simple list of concrete "moves."  The problem I quickly ran into, and one veteran PvPers can attest to, is that there really aren't a set of moves that always work.  More accurately, PvP might be described as having "seasons."

Yeah, I know, Blizzard already does the season thing.  But I'm not talking about those seasons.  I'm talking about the way the balance of PvP ebbs and flows.  Like the tide.  Or, like our seasons.  We have a spring, summer, fall, winter... and then get right back around to spring.  Certain moves that are good in the spring will net you death in the fall.  And you don't want to be wearing your summer armor in the midst of winter.  Brrr!

PvP is all about adaptation.  More than anything else, you have to be flexible.  You can't really hone in on a rotation, because as soon as you do, someone will figure out a way to counter it.  Sure, certain combinations work, but the better they work, the more quickly we'll devise a counter-strategy.  Such is the way of PvP life that I think is totally different from PvE.  After all, in PvE, the only thing that alters playstyle is the changes made by the Devs.  In PvP, you have that still, sure, but you also have the adaptation of the playerbase.

Look no further than resilience as a prime example of this.  Originally, it was a very good stat (spring).  Then, it got too good (summer), so they nerfed it (fall).  Finally, resilience gear started being eschewed for raid gear, since it wasn't such a great stat.  It got buffed, and we're right back around in spring.

Some of that is due to Blizzard's manipulations, but some of it is also due to the player base.  Originally, when resilience didn't really affect DoTs, what did we do?  Bring on the DoTs!  Blizz, said "hey, wait a minute" and changed things.  A large number of Blizzard's decisions in PvP can probably be traced back to a group of people "exploiting" weaknesses.  And I don't mean exploit like "cheating," but rather, it's simply part of PvP.  You should always be looking for an edge.  That's just good competition.

So, really, knowing a set of "moves" is a passing advantage.  If you've PvPed for years, chances are you use completely different moves now than you did a year ago, and not all of them are because something is "better."  More likely, it's simply "different."  There are, however, strategies that you pick up through the course of PvP that separate a veteran from a newbie.  They just aren't as concrete as you might think.  So after giving this a lot of thought, I've attempted to condense my feelings on PvP Lessons, or "stuff you pick up," into four neat categories... with an easy to remember acronym: MUCK.  As in, you won't muck up your RBG group if you have learned these things.  Otherwise, you make me pull out my mucking hair.

• Make Your Life Count - Or, if you prefer: Give it Meaning.  Perhaps the biggest frame of mind tick I find from PvE folks dabbling in PvP is an overemphasis on living.  Dying in PvP is Not A Big Deal.  Let me say that again.  Dying in PvP is No Biggy.  Sometimes, dying can even be strategic.  Use death as a teleport.  Make your life count.   Charge into that group of 5 guys, AoE CC them in some way, plop an AoE on the flag... and then bite it.  If you do it right, you can buy precious seconds for your team to respond.  Or maybe they hit somewhere else while the enemy is distracted.  Very simply, you have infinite lives.  Use them!  Make them count!
• Use the Terrain - In PvE, I know those rocks are, at best, a pretty piece of scenery.  At worst, and annoyance.  In PvP... they're a shield!  The can block casts and/or hide your from unfriendly eyes.  Duck behind the shack.  Avoid peaks of hills and return the flag through the valleys.  Terrain can be you friend in PvP, pay attention to what works, and try to see it from your enemies point of view.  If you don't use the terrain, I guarantee your enemy will.
• Cast Control - (Cue up a certain Prince song).  But seriously, don't blow everything you've got right up front.  Then you're left, well, impotent, and no one wants that.  A big part of PvP is knowing when to use your spells.  Do we back load our CC?  Should we go for a cleave?  In PvE, as a DPSer especially, you grow used to going all out ALL THE TIME.  The only choice is when to pop heroism or that one really long cooldown your class has.  In PvP, you'll be using a lot of utility spells that are on shorter cooldowns.  Make sure you control yourself.  Use them at the correct time and save us all a lot of embarrassment.
• Know the Big Picture - One of the first things I try to get newbie PvPers to do is turn on the battlefield mini-map.  That's the on you get by pressing shift-m (if you haven't changed the default keybind for it).  I don't know how people PvP without this.  It's like being blind.  The BMM shows you all the objectives, who holds them, and where all your team members are.  It will also show you the flag carriers, though the EFC only if you can actually see them (if they're following "U" above, then they may not show up right away).  You will take your game to the next level with this one simple step.  When we started our RBG, I had people wonder "how does he know where I am?"  I was, after all, across the map fighting at a different node.  It was like, "Duh, battlefield map... oh you don't even know about it? B'whaa?"  It is absolutely crucial that you know not only what's going in your neck of the woods, but also in the entire forest.  That is, if you want to be a woodsmen.  Terrible metaphor aside... Know what the muck is going on!

That's it.  Those are my four.  They represent a larger view of some of the most glaring things I've seen.  I would call these things "the basics."  Yet, for PvE players, I don't think a lot of this comes naturally.  To some extent, they're things I've taken for granted after years of PvP.  When I encounter someone mucking up, my initial reaction is one of bewilderment and anger.  How could you not know these basic concepts?  But that's probably not fair.  If you've not PvPed regularly, you've probably not picked up this stuff.  They're just not all that important in PvE.

PvE folks, you know how to gear.  You know how to press buttons in a semi-sequential order for maximum effect.  You even know how to avoid the bad.  There are a lot of transferable skills.  These four, however, I think you need to learn.  At least, if you don't want to annoy a muck-head like me.

Cyn's Tips: Corpse Running

Quick one this Monday.  Cynwise talks briefly (for him) about corpse running in battlegrounds.  Since we've put together our own fledgling Rated BG team, I've been on the lookout for the little things that differentiate a PvP player from a PvE player.  The majority of our team is PvE players that are trying out PvP (some for the first time).  It's something I've done for a long time now, and I'm realizing there are a lot of small things that you just don't learn in PvE.

Off hand, things like when to use CC and how to use terrain to your advantage come to mind.  A lot of these are things I do naturally now, that I never really realized I picked up.  When one of my guildies doesn't do it, I have a mini-WTF moment before I realize: they just don't know.  It's amazing sometimes to step back and reflect how different the two aspects of the same game can really be.  They honestly require a whole different skill-set, IMO.

Anyway, Cyn's explanation of corpse running is a good one.  It's something I could use to get better at as well.  I've only really done it in randoms in order to avoid someone GY camping.  It's never really occurred to me in the RBG's, though it should because the rez timer is so much longer there.  Also, with the return to GY button, there's really not a downside.  Tick off the timer in your head as you run, and return if it looks like you're not going to gain an advantage.  I mean, why not?

So check it out.  Share it with your team.  Go forth, and prosper.  (And all that junk.)

To Wrap Up The Week

No fiction today, sorry. I've been sick all week, plus work has been busy. Amazing how that happens, right? It's like they wait until I feel like crap to all show up at my desk and want stuff done.  In any case, the day's already flying by and it's not looking like I'm going to have the appropriate time to dedicate to a good bit of fiction.

On that front, though, I'll pass along some news.  I've compiled a short story based on the posts I made for the Fall of the Lich King that we're planning to submit for the Blizzard Fan Fic contest.  It's short at around 3,500 words, but represents some good memories from what I consider the pinnacle of the game.  (Right now, anyway.  I reserve the right to have the future change my judgement, but killing Arthas was truly a great moment in gaming).

It'll be prettied up, and I added a new little bit at the end to tie it all together.  When it gets done, I want to try to offer it around here for your e-reading devices.  I'm not sure if I'm allowed to go through like Amazon or B&N or any of those places, but at the very least we're going to try to set up a little download mirror that will let you download it for free.  I'll be open to suggestions when we get it up.  We're also working on getting the rest of the fiction in a single, coherent format so you don't have to comb through archives and such around here... making it more of a novella than a collection of posts.  We'll see how it turns out.

Apart from that, I've been thinking about gearing all week, and wanted to wrap up the hot topic with a few last thoughts.  Cynwise wrote a great article today sort of tying things together and hashing out the basics for each gear path.  As he says, there is not really one thing you can point to as a good solution, and each PvE and PvP path has its problems.

My final thought on the whole thing is that, reading Cyn's bullet points, I can't help but feel like the PvP system is better suited for PvE players, and the PvE system would appeal to PvP'ers more.  That sounds crazy, but look at it this way.  If PvP seems more suited for a gradual build-up over time, a steady progression to gearing with periodic resets... isn't that what we want in PvE?  We want to make steady progress, and if stuff resets along the way, that makes the entry barrier to raiding that much shorter.

Then you have PvE, where gear seems to retain its value for longer and the player base gets more stratified (borrowing Cyn's word, a good one) over time.  Aren't those things that appeal to your typical PvP player?  They want to be rewarded for being beating another player, and then to have that reward mean something.  It's almost like Blizz has it backward.

At the same time, though, one has to acknowledge that, to some extent, each of these paths are products of their respective environments.  For instance, how would gear resets work in PvE with each tier?  Or in PvP how could you maintain a stratified player-base without ruining competitiveness?  There's simply no easy solution.  At the end of they day, all we can really say is that they each have their own problems.  And those problems may be more or less annoying depending completely on the person. 

What drives Cyn bonkers, I may take comfort in.  What I can't stand, he sees as a ray of hope.  Yet, we both play Warlocks and love our class/the game enough to blog about it (ad nauseum, for years).  It's really two sides of the same coin. 

My New Hawtness: 2v2 Arenas

It took me, what, three years? Four? How long have I been playing this game anyway?  Somewhere between those two I think.  I was a TBC kid.  In all that time, I'd never given arenas a try.  Not even once.  Neither had Fuu.

A week ago, that all changed.  We both got our "step into the arena" achievements... and then promptly became addicted.  Our team, named simply Hodor, hovers around .500.  We've not played two dozen matches yet, but are closing fast.  We've capped out our conquest points in two days each week.

We'd been doing BG's a whole lot, and our guild is forming up a rated team.  Thus, we wanted to work on our gear.  Honor is all well and good, but conquest is where it's at, and normal BG's really aren't a good source of CP.

Arenas, however.  Holy fel.  I feel like it's stealing getting that CP.  It falls like a deluge of Mage tears.  It's awesome.

We're doing a 2v2 (of course).  DK (me) with a Healy Priest (Fuu).  I have no idea if the combination is any good.  In the 2's bracket, I understand it's a whole lot of "rock, paper, scissors" going on.  Some rocks fare better than others.

We've fared pretty well so far, going on some streaks both ways.  We win as much as we lose.  Also, we're not usually getting blown out.  They're close, hard fought matches, so the match-making process appears sound, at least in our limited sampling.

And have I mentioned the CP?  After running simply normal BGs forever, it seems to drop super fast.  We'll definitely be in good shape for tonight's guild debut into rated BGs.

The upside of 2v2 for us is that we're in the same room.  Communication is easy.  Scheduling is easy.  You can hop in, spend an hour, and be nearly capped even if you simply split your matches.

The downside is that the rating doesn't work toward the gear upgrades.  2v2 is sort of the "unsupported" slice of arenas.  Also, there's a certain amount of, ahem, marital stress you may have to be willing to endure.  Having raided together forever, it's really not different, but say the wrong thing at the wrong time and you may be sleeping on the couch.  Consider yourself fairly warned.

On the other side, I think teamwork is a great skill to build for couples.  Too often that benefit of gaming together is overlooked.  The couple that plays together, stays together, says I.

Even if you're not a PvP maven, consider the 2v2 bracket.  We did some dabbling in 3v3... a lot more brutal.  A lot more losing.  2v2 seems to be more forgiving.  It's a great place to whet your appetite and get a bit of CP.  If you go into it expecting to lose as much as you win... it's a great time.

How Has Tol Barad Been Treating You?

The title says it all. I honestly want to know. They made some changes in that last patch, and I think we've all had some time now to experience what that means for the much maligned PvP zone. So on the topic of the changes: Thumbs Up or Thumbs Down?

Thumbs Up
The addition of different conditions for holding/losing bases seems to have evened the playing field a bit. I certainly feel like my efforts are a lot less futile, and there seems to be a pervasive sense of "we can do this!" People are talking strategy, trying to work together, and not just resorting to the old method of bitchfest.

The rewards currently seem commensurate with the activity. For a win, it is a nice chunk. For a loss, I avoid the feeling of having wasted time. This plops the whole experience squarely in the middle of "good fun."

Thumbs Down
I do have two thumbs, and I can't point them both up. Tol Barad, you're not getting the Roger Ebert measurement of success just yet. While the changes are definitely a step in the right direction, I can't help but feel that what's really happened is that things have just gotten a whole lot easier for the attackers. It seems that a defense has become a rarity.

Perhaps people just haven't figured out how to properly defend, but I certainly find it easier to attack. Still, I can't completely fault the zone, because there have been some rather epic battles where things really seem balanced. On the other hand, I've been party to some crazy <1 minute zergs.

I think my biggest complaint at this point is that it's still difficult to get a grasp of what you're actually doing. I understand the map, the basic mechanics, and a simple idea of what I should be trying to do, but I find it hard to draw a clear connection between when I feel like I'm executing well or poorly and what that means for our chances at victory. Sometimes it feels like we just faceroll our way to a victory, and others it feels like we've got a good amount of cohesion and are getting nowhere.

Look Ma, No Hands.
To a certain extent, I'm not sure the "thumbs down" portion can be fixed. After all, you can't really ever account for the vast varieties of situations that an MMO battle will throw at an encounter. And, like I said, the changes have achieved feelings of "worthwhile" and "good fun" where before there had just been "massively annoying and unfulfilling." I find I actually look forward to TB a bit, a la the good ol' Wintergrasp days. Still, I don't think they've quite hit the epic feel that WG had in it's heyday. So it could probably use some tweaking still (and I'm still waiting for my "kill 10 horde" killquest daily), but, in my opinion, we're getting there.

The Curious Ebb and Flow of PvP

Now, I consider myself a casual PvPer at best. I've written enough about it that long time readers are probably already familiar with the fact that I PvP on my DK. In Cataclysm, I'm finally at the point on my main toon (the 'lock) that I feel it's time to begin PvP gearing my DK. Basically, this means that I've done all the daily quests I care to to (earned exalted rep with everyone), and am ready to fill that time previously spent on questing with running random BGs.

I don't really do the whole arena thing, and we don't have enough PvPers in my guild to form a "rated" group. Thus, I simply queue up for randoms while mining or whatever, and gear up the hard way (grinding honor). It's fun for me, really, to start out feeling weak sauce and then slowly to get stronger and stronger. I feel like, by gearing this way, you learn some good strategies for survival early that only help you when you begin to out gear people. Generally speaking, I've found that running on average a BG a day will outpace the majority of the players in gearing, as well as how quickly tier patches come through. Thus, with each gear step by the devs, I'll start a bit behind the hardcore folks and then slowly catch up as they top out.

The one thing I've noticed is that the skill/difficulty in BGs varies widely depending on day and time. Like the ebbing tide, it seems that the skilled players flood the fields at certain times. In my experience, this usually means several things.

First, during the week, play is more consistent. You generally don't get as many preforms, and things seem more competitive. I tend to run about 50-50 for wins/losses (and I'm on the Alliance side, fwiw). People generally know what they're doing, though you'll always have the mid-fielders. There isn't as much shit talking.

Compare that with the weekends. Being Alliance, my W/L record plummets to probably 20-80 and I find myself awash in noobology. I mean, I zoned into WSG yesterday to see the strategy proposed: "Me and a healer will go for flag, everyone else fight in the middle." And they were serious! It was not pretty.

Now, the queues are a lot shorter on the weekends, so honor wise it might balance out. You also seem to have more pre-formed groups of guildies playing together. As a pretty much solo-random person, this can get a bit rough. I mean, any good PvP group has a healer, and I, obviously, do not. Pretty much any class vs any class with a healer will lose (unless you out gear them significantly). And shit talking is through the roof.

All this probably makes sense when you take into account that more casual folks will have the chance to play on weekends, including the immature and skilled. It's a simple fact of numbers. I suppose I just wondered what your experiences are? Do you see the same flow to the BGs? When do you think the "best" time to play is?

I enjoy the competition, so I'm a fan of during the week, early evenings. Sometimes things degenerate a bit later. I like it when people are actually trying to play smart, even if they're not the most skilled. I think there's more of that during the week. How about you?

Pink Box... Giggity?

If that doesn't get me some nefarious Google searches, I don't know what will. Unfortunately for them, I have neither naked Succubus pics nor Thrall in a thong.  (I mean, he just met that girl and she's trying to get his clothes off, amirite?  Also... /shudder).  Nay, what I'm going talk about is much more mundane.  Well, maybe not if you're a prolific PvP'er like Cynwise.  

If you're a diligent 'lock follower, you may have already see this over there, but the short story is that Isle of Conquest is borked as shit.  And this is not like, "oh it's broken because we always lose, QQ."  No, this is legit breaking.  Like embarrassing pink box breaking.  That's like climbing out of a car wearing a skirt and no panties, embarrassing... at least in software terms.  Or something.

The omnipresent hangar issue was there, that's not what this is about either.  If you've played on the Isle in the last, oh, three months or so, you've probably been told very sternly not to go to the hangar.  It's been worthlessly broken for quite a while.  I remember my first time experiencing it.  Folks said "Avast ye! Go not to the hangar lest ye place thine soul in peril!"  Being a bad sailor, I just had to clicky.  What can I say?  I'm not a trusting sort.  I want to see it for myself.  Several moments later, and I found myself dead in some water area that wasn't near any sort of flying apparatus.  Yes, apparently the mages screwed up the portal.   Seemed like sabotage to me. 

The latest bug takes the lying cake though.  As far as mage shenanigans go, it's akin to moving the entire city of Dalaran and no even having the goddamn common courtesy to leave rubble or any sort of textured skin behind.  Not only does it suck, but it only affects the Alliance side of thing.  So it's Horde mages.  The worst kind of the worst.

(As far as tactics go, I'm rather jealous.  If our mages had come up with the "replace the gates with indestructible pink box" strat first, man we'd be sitting pretty.)

"A bug!" sayeth you?  "Working as intended," comes the reply.  At least until Cat and the resources free up to fix it, I suppose.  Until then, destroying a gate in order to gain entry to the Horde stronghold is only a farce of a strategy.  The pink herring, if you will.

I feel like I'm just not adequately describing how duped one feels when, upon finally battering the last batter that the gate can hold, a giant pink box appears.  Screenshot or it didn't happen... My first view was quite astonishing.  Imagine my surprise when the cry "the side gate hath fallen!" went up, and I hustle around the corner only to be confronted with this:

Umm, nice box?

I wanted to get an idea of the scope of this blockage, so I found a convenient nearby catapult and launched myself over it.  Quick thinking had me snapping a few pics in flight.  If you'll notice, my trajectory lands me outside the front gate... bad aim, but good pics!

This pink box needs a waxing.  That's no bush, it's whole tree!

Clever mages!  Not to be deterred (and because the BG was sort of degenerating at that point, as borked things have a tendency to do), we hustled down to the workshop.  We took that over, and grabbed a bunch of Demolishers, intent to destroy the front gate.  Maybe that would prove the avenue of our salvation.  But it was not to be.  The pink box trap was sprung there as well!

A pair of pink boxes.  You usually have to pay double for that action.

At this point, people are bemoaning all number of things in the battleground chat.  Mages are blamed.  Developers are blamed.  Blame is Chuck Norrised.  Hell hath no fury like a bunch of PvP'ers scorned. 

"TURTLE!" the cry went up.  We were, at this point, up about 100 reinforcements to 70ish.  Sounds good to me.  It's never a bad time to hop in the old mini-van and shoot pizzas at people.  Turtle power!  Splinter would have been proud.

Making haste our non-pink boxed gates, I found a maelstrom of activity.  Apparently the Horde had sensed their window of fun swiftly closing.  They decided to storm the keep.  They'd already captured our graveyard and the rallying cries went up.  However, it seemed like we'd be too late; they were already inside.  I ran as fast as I could, hoping against hope that I could get up into the keep to assist our commander. 

Sadly, as I sprinted into the keep courtyard, a scoresheet popped up.  Only 50 or so reinforcements short of victory, we must have been overwhelmed.  BUT WAIT!  It says Alliance victory!  What is this about?  I thought we were all back at the keep, eating pizza and practicing our skateboarding moves.  How did we achieve victory? 

If I had to guess, I'd say that a task force of airborne shock troops stormed their keep simultaneously and that somehow we downed the big guy first.  Considering the pains it took us to gain entry to their fort, I'd say it was only fair justice, but really I was more puzzled that we'd apparently catapulted that many people in.  (Catapulting being, naturally, our only way in).  More likely, though, the win/loss counter is borked as well and it actually meant to say we'd lost.  (Maybe our mages held the ultimate trump card). 

That may be pessimistic, but I was inexplicably 3-0 in Isle of the Conquest this weekend.  The pink box strat was only used in one of those attempts, the others were straight turtles to the max.  Which is where I must contradict poor Cynwise.  Apparently on Lothar in whatever battlegroup we're in now (is it still Ruin?), queuing up for IotC as Horde is a distinctly bad idea.  At least when I'm in the fray, that is.  I've yet to lose despite the odds being stacked against us. 

Really, I think the Horde just get distracted by the sheer effectiveness of the Pink Block Strat, and they forget that they still have to, you know, win.  That, or maybe it provides a unique rallying cry for the Alliance, plus some much needed direction.  It's a well known fact that in BG's, the more organized force usually wins.  That is, if you can work together, you stand a much better shot at a victory.  As far as the Alliance in IotC, we're being forced to work together.  It's not like we have options, as Cyn points out.  Docks and Turtle, that's it.  See what happens when Alliance actually plays together?  We're invincible! (/twirls pen)

At least until those crafty mages come up with another crazy strat.  Maybe the Blue Exploding Boat At the Docks Strat.  Then we'll be really pissed, and no amount of Blaming The Dude That Capped Hangar will save us.  

I Am But A Decoy

Chas wrote what I thought was a really good article over at Righteous Orbs yesterday.  In case you didn't catch it, the short version (or at least the part that I really found myself screen-nodding at) was that sometimes you need to view PvP as an "allocation of resources" type game mechanic.  That is to say, it's not about staying alive all the time or racking up kills.  Sometimes it's about delaying the enemy in order to further your team's objective.  You may end up dead and they may end up with some HK's... but they had to work for them and your team just capped three bases to their one in the time it took them to down you.

In short: Sometimes it's okay to be just the decoy. 

I think this is an important attitude to not only understand in BG's, but also to cultivate; it takes some getting used to.  Especially for us mainstream PvE folks, it can be daunting to spend so much time with the Spirit Healer.  What you have to remember is that at the end of the BG, a win is a win and a loss is a loss.  There are no moral victories in PvP.  You get no bonus honor for having "fought the good fight".  Maybe it helps you sleep better, but the bottom line is that we should all be in it to win it.  Or at least have a lot of fun trying to win.

(With the above viewpoint, you may realize that I get quite frustrated by the sit-in-the-middle-and-farm-HK folks.  While that's not the topic of today's post, I can't help but pointed at the screen and Mr. Stabby-Stabby Rogue atop the kill charts that I know did nothing to help and decry: "but you lost!"  It's nice to top the HK list, but a win is a win and a loss is a loss... get over yourself.)

Ranty aside... aside,  the point I really liked in Chas's article is something that I've really prided myself on during my time spent in BG's.  Often I'll take on several opponents in the face of certain death, but I'll hold 'em off until the cavalry arrives and we keep the base even as I fall.  To me, that's a small victory in the larger war.  I didn't necessarily kill any of them - and they certainly killed me - but in my way, I prevent them from achieving their objective.  That's what BG's should be all about.

In any case, I wanted to highlight the point and throw out a few BG specific examples that I've encountered.  Maybe some folks will pick up on them as ideas.  Keep in mind I'm usually PvP'ing as a Death Knight, but please add any of your own specific little tricks of the trade in comments.  Here are the little PvP things that make me grin...

• Chillblains is an awesome DK PvP talent.  Especially when you have the Howling Blast glyph.  It basically gives you an AoE slow effect.  Dropping that on a group of melee following a friendly vehicle and watching them all fall slowly behind... priceless.  Or just slowing down that spasmodic Rogue that is ravaging a clothy.
• Hungering Cold is exceedingly fun right before death.  You may be dead, but now they're all stuck on your dying breath.  Hopefully they've blown their cooldowns too, so you can watch as they sit in a block of ice right next to your flag and your buddies arrive to mop up.  Good stuff.
• Silencing casters should be a staple of any class.  Fuu and I run as an S-spriest/DK duo mostly.  Thus, between the two of us we can keep casters locked down for a decent amount of time.  Chopping down the smarmy tree that thinks he can insta-heal his way through anything is just plain fun.  Then we grind him up, mash him into paper and print The Bible on him.  (Dane Cook joke if you're into such things... I can't help but snicker at trees when I think of it.)
• Who doesn't love Death Grip... oh yeah, everyone but DKs.  Yanking people away from objectives really pisses them off.  Especially when you follow up with chain silences.  
• Frost Chains work for folks heading for an objective as well.  Not just for the yank off the mount/kill technique.
• All of the above are great for hindering folks trying to beat on your FC in WSG.  I can just see them slamming keyboards and mice, especially when the handful of them gang up to kill you out of frustration while your FC is capping.
• If you're protecting LM in AB, keep a parachute handy.  Not only does it protect you from Mr. I'm-So-Clever-I-Push-You-Off-Cliff Boomkin Doucheface, but you can paratrooper into BS and show up at the opportune moment.  It's a great "surprise" factor.  With your pocket priest, you also have the slowfall spell.  That works too.
• The whole Hungering Cold trick works really well with bombs in any of the siege BGs.  Run in, drop your bomb, pop a Hungering Cold.  Hell, throw an Army of the Dead on for more chaos and laugh when your bomb explodes right after you die.  Bonus points if it's the last bit of health on the last wall you needed down.  
• Warlocks use Howl of Terror, S-priests have that whole Psychic Horror thing... works like Hungering Cold only more chaotic.   Replace "Hungering Cold" with your AoE fear of choice and you can do the same shit.  

Well, that's just a few and mostly DK-centric, but I'm hoping you get the idea.  Most of those don't really do damage and a lot of them won't even stick long on a competent PvP player, but they will also actively delay an enemy player.  Sometimes, just playing the decoy card can net you a victory.  What tricks have you figured out to stop the opposing team at a crucial moment... usually at the expense of your own offensive or defensive capabilities?

It is done...

Hey Gang!

Over the last few days, Fulguralis & I have not only acquired our first home, but we also did a slue of other things inside:

- Swept the entire house
- Steam Cleaned all of the carpeting
- Went to Menards for tools that we don't have but needed
- Washed down some of the walls that looked beat up
- Invested in our own Water Softener
- Went back to Menards because we forgot something
- Bought & installed a new Kitchen Sink & Facet
- Purchased a New Lawn mower & weed whacker
- Acquired a Malfunctioning Oven (beeping F7 errors ftl)
- Made a plethora of phone calls to Utility companies to switch things over from the old place & to find someone to fix the oven
- Assembled Two out of the Eight Dining Room Chairs so we had a place to sit
- Went back, yet again, to Menards because we bought the incorrect tool
- Put together a new Coffee Table with four little stools that slide under
- Found out that our Blower doesn't work so we don't have AC inside the house
- Cleaned the entire kitchen from head to toe

Had a beer & then fell over from exhaustion...

Sunday Morning rolled around and you couldn't pull us out of bed even if the house was on fire.

The only thing that got me up (see: Eventually) was Children's Week that started Sunday.

:::::::::::SIDE STORY::::::::

I have a little confession to make... I've been so gung ho about these Holiday Achievements since they were availible but one thing got in my way... Abigora. You see, about a year ago, we introduced a friend of ours to the game and I figured that we could hit up the Recruit - A- Friend with him to get him started. Abigora was young & the Holidays were in full force that year. Fuubaar had become an Elder, a Love Fool, & a Noble in a span of only a few months. You could feel the guilt in the air and it was thick.

Since Noblegarden & Children's Week over lapped it proved to be too much. I got everything finished but the elusive School of Hard Knocks. I threw my hands up in frustration & didn't finish the holiday. I wanted to get back to leveling with our friend and hit 60 before the Recruit- A- Friend expired.

Needless to say, we did hit 60 and headed to Outlands right before the wedding in July. Then Abigora sat in Honor Hold at 62 untouched for over a month while the wedding settled down. I did finish up the remainder of the holidays that year. Hell, I even had time to do the Fire Festival (one of my Faves btw). Brewfest was my last holiday before the cycle started over again.

Then it hit me... I was all of 1 Achievement away from Finishing the Meta Achievement What a Long, Strange Trip & receive my Violet Proto-Drake 310% style.

Children's Week: School of Hard Knocks

Even thought I was buying a house this year, I told myself (and Fulguralis) that I HAVE to finish this achievement. There is no way in hell that I'm waiting an entire year (AGAIN) to finish this.

::::: Back to live Action::::::

So I woke up on Sunday with a Goal. PvP or Bust! So Fulguralis jumped onto Decedereful (his pvp DK toon) & I on Fuu with our child whistles in hand & off we went.

Needless to say, it was, at sometimes horrifyingly annoying and keyboard smashingly infuriating.

First up: Eye of The Storm


Objective~ Cap a Flag

Decedereful & I went and Defended the Mage Tower right from the start. It was just both of us there for the first 2 minutes until I saw one of our Alliance guys running towards us with his child not far behind. It was mass chaos in the center of the field. There were only a hand full of people running around & Defending towers while the rest were in the center. The Alliance held two and were scrounging to acquire a third. The Horde on the other hand carelessly offered themselves as cannon fodder to those who actually pvped. The Alliance controlled the center now with 3 towers working on the fourth. Thus, pinning the Horde on their little ledge. you could tell with their 30 seconds of time out was up because a flood of them would shoot out of the top in a sea of red only to head straight to the center & die once again. I got my cap & Decedereful got a HUGE number of HKs & Killing blows from the clueless Horde. Easy as Pie :)

Next Up: Warsong Gulch


Objective ~ Return an Enemy Flag

This was probably the most absurd Battleground I've ever been in to date. If you've ever seen how Warsong Gulch normally works is right from the start, everyone runs out & Bee-lines it straight to the enemy Flag room or scrums in the middle for the entire time. No one I mean NO ONE ever defends unless you take it upon yourself to do it.

What was happening, for this event, was someone from the opposite faction would come into your flag room. Proceeded with caution usually using emotes to tell you that they wanted to help you. Pick up your flag & repeatedly drop it while everyone in the room would cap it for their achievement. The biggest hurdle was usually trying to get your team to stop killing the person who was trying to help you. Their instincts were HORDE IN MY ROOM KILL HIM NAO! Then everyone would start scolding the newb who didn't pay attention. Usually there would be around 5-7 people of your own faction sitting around with their orphans out waiting for the nice little Horde (or Alliance) to give them the flag. The funny part of the whole thing is you would have random battles erupt because either another Horde (or Alliance) would come in & spoil the fun. For some odd reason it always seemed to be a damn Warlock! He would hide up on top & spam Dots on his unsuspecting victims. Anyone who knew how to pvp would run after the perpetrator & either kill him or scare them off.

Once the battle ended, I saw the most amusing stat and I had to screen shot it:

Really? You felt it necessary to cap the flag 25 times?! Really?!

Continuing on: Arathi Basin


Objective~ Assault a Flag

This was really a hit or miss & it all depended on your team. If they sucked, you weren't getting anywhere fast. You had to either cap it right off the bat or you had to really be at the right place at the right time. I was lucky enough to had finished this one last year so I didn't really have to worry too much about it. Fulguralis decided that if he was going to help me on Decedereful this year, that he was going to get it too. So I wanted to try to help him out but I'm about as useful as a poppy flavored lolli-pop on Fuubaar, so he ended up doing this without me.

Good Luck to you on this one!

Last but not least: Alterac Valley


Objective~ Assault a Tower (or Bunker if you are a Horde)

Remember recapping one of the Alliance Bunkers DOES NOT GET YOU YOUR ACHIEVEMENT! I was all pumped in wanting to help out both factions at once so I went back up to one of the Assaulted Bunkers that the horde were sitting at waiting for some sucker to cap it again. Not sure if it was just our Server but we had some real assholes.

Ok, here are the two gems we met in Alterac Valley.

Asshole #1: I was running back to help out the horde at one of the Bunkers. I slowly walked up the stairs & emotes /wait and had my child up. Everyone just sat there & /cheer 'ed at me so I figured I was in the clear. So I wondered over to the flag & just as I was about to get it, this stupid Shaman Shot me from the other side of the room interrupting my cast. I have no clue why he did this. This was only screwing over his own faction Achievement guys. So I Line of Sighted him outside of the Bunker & cleansed myself. I thought maybe it was just an accident & the rest of the room was yelling at him right about then. So I came back inside to start the process over again & again he put his DoT on me. Thus, interrupting me. So I jumped out of the window and said screw helping. Well the R-tard jumped after me and tried to kill me. Not sure what this guys problem was really. Trying to screw his own faction...

Asshole #2: You can tell when you have rooms for the Achievement people because it's completely FULL of people. It's like a total Rave party in there. Tauren with Glow sticks & whip-its, Orcs running around trying to score drugs, Blood Elves Dancing their hearts out to the music, Night Elves dancing naked on the mail boxes, Gnomes spanking each other... Needless to say it was getting rowdy in there. So, the cap trading was under way. Horde would cap it & then when it was the Alliance's turn, some D-bag Orc Warlock would fear bomb the room interrupting the caster (probably pissed he wasn't getting any in the rave). And then he would start Doting up the room so that the alliance would slowly keel over & die because they weren't paying attention to their health. Once someone from the Alliance started fighting back, their entire faction would gang up on us thus killing most of our Achievement guys. So here's to you Mr. Orc Warlock... I hope you DIAFF :)

I really think if you don't get it on the Zerg, you'll be Extremely lucky to get it in one of these rooms. My biggest tip is to go for the bottom two Towers (or top two if you are Horde). Once you have it finished, try a few times to help out the other faction. Have your Child out & emote /wait before entering the room of Horde. If they attack you, try to survive & don't fight back. They might stop because their faction is yelling at them. If there is one of these assholes in the group though, just wave goodbye & don't bother going back to that Tower because it will only frustrate you further.

Good Luck to those who are still in the hunt to become a Matron or Patron.

<3 Fuu

The Short Strat: Warson Gulch

Welcome to the Warsong Gulch edition of The Short Strat, the show where we take complicated battleground strategies and condense them into one easily pasted message. I'm hoping that by making these strats simple and copy-able, it might provide a reference to get people on the same page.  These strats are not meant to be comprehensive by any means. 

As always, if you have an alternate strategy, please submit it via comments and I will include it in the strat reference section of this post.  Please keep in mind that all explanations need to be kept under the 255 character limit for the default WoW chat box.

If this goes well, then eventually I will clean these up and provide an index page on here to facilitate quick reference, but I don't want to put the cart before the horse.  Let's see if anyone finds these actually useful first.  So, without further ado...

Warsong Gulch Brief Overview
WSG is a prized piece of woodland in the southern region of Ashenvale forest.  The battleground itself is straight up capture the flag. Each faction has a base with a flag inside of it and there's a long swath of land in between.  There are several ways into each base, and three levels on each structure.  The middle ground has a few small buildings, but is mostly open.  Right clicking on an enemy flag will pick it up and allow you to advance the flag towards your base for capture.  Like in Eye of the Storm, when running with the flag you cannot mount or certain other spells (Nitro Boosts, Pally Bubble, etc.), as these will make you drop the flag.  The flag will also drop upon death.  You can return your own faction's dropped flag by simply right clicking it.  It will then be magically sent back to start (you do not need to run it back).

Teams of 10 players (2 five-man groups) attempt to accumulate three flag captures in order to win.  There is a time limit of 20 minutes.  After time expires, the team with the most captures wins.  A tie is broken by who captured the first flag.  Should no flags have been captures, the match ends in a draw.

For reference, here is the map of the Battleground.  The "X" marks the flag spot on the ground floor.  The circles denote entry points to the base:

Short Strat Reference
Be sure to type /bg before pasting to make sure it goes to the battleground chat channel.

• Six Attack, Four Defend.  Stick together in groups, protect your own flag carrier.  Attack the enemy flag carrier.  Please don't just scrum in the middle ground.

The Short Strat: Eye of the Storm

Welcome to the Eye of the Storm edition of The Short Strat, the show where we take complicated battleground strategies and condense them into one easily pasted message. I'm hoping that by making these strats simple and copy-able, it might provide a reference to get people on the same page.  These strats are not meant to be comprehensive by any means. 

As always, if you have an alternate strategy, please submit it via comments and I will include it in the strat reference section of this post.  Please keep in mind that all explanations need to be kept under the 255 character limit for the default WoW chat box.

I also wanted to point out a great link given to me in comments on another post.  Cynwise runs a great battleground/PvP oriented blog which can be found here.  Not only is she a fellow 'lock, but she has some great posts about strategy here and PvP gearing here.  Definitely worth a trip over there. 

If this goes well, then eventually I will clean these up and provide an index page on here to facilitate quick reference, but I don't want to put the cart before the horse.  Let's see if anyone finds these actually useful first.  So, without further ado...

Eye of the Storm Brief Overview
The Eye is a contested floating piece of rock in Netherstorm in the Outlands.  The battleground itself is sort of a mash up between base defense and capture the flag.  A base is denoted by a flag and there are four of them here: Mage Tower (MT), Draenei Ruins (DR), Blood Elf Tower (BT or BET), and Fel Reaver Ruins (FR or FRR).  You capture a base by having the highest amount of bodies in close proximity to the flag return location.  This location is observed as a small, dark circle that sits directly in between two base flags.  Over time, the faction bar in the default UI will swing red or blue depending on the number of folks nearby.  There is a gray "transition" area that will make the base neutral.

In addition to the base capturing, there is a flag spawn in the direct center of the battleground.  A right click on the flag will capture it for you, then you will have to return it to one of the return locations held by your faction.  Death drops the flag where you are and allows anyone nearby to pick it up and advance it.

Teams of 15 players (3 five-man groups) attempt to accumulate points over time until a maximum (currently 1600 as shown in the default BG user interface) is reached.  The more bases you own, the faster you accumulate points.  Additionally, each time you return the flag you gain points.  The amount of points you gain per flag return scales with the number of bases you have.  Having more bases yields more flag point per flag return.  First to maximum wins.  There is no time limit.

For reference, here is the map of the Battleground:

Short Strat Reference
Be sure to type /bg before pasting to make sure it goes to the battleground chat channel.  My first two are basic mirrors of each other, the first being more Alliance friendly while the second is more for Horde due to the proximity of the bases to the start points.

• G1 to MT, G2 to DR, G3 to BT or FRR (whichever has fewer enemies). Always keep three to protect, extra two help where needed. Always fight near the base! Call out incs. Ignore the damn flag until we have three bases capped.
• G1 to FRR, G2 to BT, G3 to MT or DR (whichever has fewer enemies). Always keep three to protect, extra two help where needed. Always fight near the base! Call out incs. Ignore the damn flag until we have three bases capped.

Five Unconnected, Irreverent Thoughts

Today I present you with three five short, unrelated, and perhaps ill-conceived thoughts from my crazy, demon-addled brain...

1. If you haven't heard some shit about a Cataclysmic Raiding Transformation, just go Google "WoW Blog".  The only word I don't think has been said on the topic is "Fuckin-A".
2. Just once, I want to pretend to have a sudden onset of Turret's in the stalls of the Men's Room.  Maybe then that asshole next to me will stop snoring and ruining my perfectly peaceful BM.  
3. In Strand of the Ancients, if you're fighting on the beach while the rest of us are up freezing people who are trying to click on the relic, you need to do the world a favor and roll a Quit. 
4. Being chain stunned for like 20 seconds by two Rogues is just insulting.  Especially when you live through it, and kill them both. (Good Heals were involved)
5. There are more fees involved in closing on a house than there are Druids and Rogues on the all Druid and Rogue PvP all-star teams I keep finding in my BGs.  Srsly, it's like fighting in a haunted forest or something with shit popping out at you all over.  I'm not sure how that analogy holds up to closing on a house except that I feel equally baffled.

The Short Strat: Arathi Basin

Welcome to the Arathi Basin edition of The Short Strat.  The goal of The Short Strat is to take complicated battleground strategies and condense them into one easily pasted message.  It has been said that a lot of times leadership is lacking in BGs, and I'm hoping that by making these strats simple and copy-able, it might provide a reference to get people on the same page.  These strats are not meant to be comprehensive by any means.  I will start with a brief overview of the battleground du jour and then begin the short strat reference section with my personal preferred strat. 

If you have an alternate strategy, please submit it via comments and I will include it in the strat reference section of this post.  Please keep in mind that all explanations need to be kept under the 255 character limit for the default WoW chat box.

If this goes well, then eventually I will clean these up and provide an index page on here to facilitate quick reference, but I don't want to put the cart before the horse.  Let's see if anyone finds these actually useful first.  So, without further ado...

Arathi Basin Brief Overview
The Basin is a contested land in the Arathi Highlands of the Eastern Kingdoms.  The goal of the battleground is simply to hold the most bases for the longest amount of time.  A battleground base is denoted by a flag and there are five of them here: Lumber Mill (LM), Blacksmith (BS), Stables (Stabs), Goldmine (GM), and Farm (usually referred to as farm).  You capture a flag by right-clicking it.  After a short, few-second cast time (which can be interrupted) it will change to a neutral color and begin the automated process of being "capped".  If left alone, the flag will eventually change to your faction's color (blue if you're Ally, red if you're Horde).  During the neutral time, it is possible for a defender to re-capture the flag in the same manner, thus defending the base.  It will then return to it's original color.

Teams of 15 players (3 five-man groups) attempt to accumulate points over time until a maximum (currently 1600 as shown in the default BG user interface) is reached.  The more bases you own, the faster you accumulate points.  First to maximum wins.  There is no time limit.

For reference, here is the map of the Battleground:

Short Strat Reference
Be sure to type /bg before pasting to make sure it goes to the battleground chat channel.  My first two are basic mirrors of each other, the first being more Alliance friendly while the second is more for Horde due to the proximity of the bases to the start points.

• G1 to LM, G2 stay Stabs, G3 to BS. Always keep three to protect, extra two help where needed or head for an extra base. Fight near flags when you can! Focus on burning any enemy healers. Call out incs.
• G1 to Mine, G2 stay Farm, G3 to BS. Always keep three to protect, extra two help where needed or head for an extra base. Fight near flags when you can! Focus on burning any enemy healers. Call out incs.
• 3 Defenders at Stabs, 3 take&defend LM, 3 take&defend GM rest take and hold BS, report all incs.
• 3 Defenders at Farm, 3 take&defend LM, 3 take&defend GM rest take and hold BS, report all incs.

Two Roads Diverged

It's not that I chose any road less traveled by, I just like Robert Frost. I actually chose both roads in this case.  We'll call this Bifurcated Post Day.

Road 1 is a semi-response to the whole PvP shenanigans that my wife talked about yesterday.  I don't have too many thoughts, because I've been PvPing on my DK a lot longer than she has on her Spriest.  I'm sort of saddened that she won't go healer for me, since having a healer in a BG is often a rarity but can totally make you feel OP, but such is life.  The problem now is that we need to teach her the art of being ranged.  She doesn't run away like a good clothy should.

Now, part of it isn't her fault because Rogues just suck.  I swear, the only way I've ever been able to beat a rogue is outlast their plethora of stuns.  And boy do they have aplenty.  I recall a recent article that I can no longer find to link (edit: duh, here it is on WoM, thanks Deyndor for the comment and link and thanks Thespius for the inspiration!) whereby the statement was made along the lines that "a well played Rogue is damn near impossible to beat 1 on 1."  That's probably not an exact quote (Here's the real quote from the above link: "Now, not because I think they’re OP, but because when a rogue is good, it’s near impossible to survive. "), but the point was that, as things stand now, if you avoid one of those bastards popping out of stealth, stun locking you, and having his or her way with your corpse... it's more than likely because they didn't see you than any skill on your own part.

This isn't to say Rogues are OP, as the original poster also pointed out.  We don't want Rogue nerfs, we want other class buffs.  The whole increased health pools across the board in Cataclysm will help.  So would giving classes more opportunities to counter the stun abilities.  The problem is that it's incredibly frustrating to sit there and watch yourself get stabbed together and be able to do ABSO-FRIGGIN-LUTELY nothing.  Sometimes you can like, trinket out and maybe pull off a miracle, but you really need to be twitch-tastic to have a good shot as survival.  Otherwise, just wait out that damn spirit timer (which is ALWAYS just resetting when I die, I swear) and get back in the game.

The short explanation here is that neither Fuu nor I am really geared enough to survive yet, but we're working on that.  I think PvP as a whole will be a lot more enjoyable with bigger health pools.  Everyone will be a lot harder to kill, but shouldn't that just make for more epic encounters?  At the same time, some of the BG mechanics may need to be reworked to account for this.  I don't have any cool examples off-hand.  I can offer one piece of advice to anyone who might be looking to break into PvP to stave off boredom like we are... if you want to gear up fast, hit up Wintergrasp.  It is hands-down the best way to bank honor and snatch up the starter pieces.  After that, you're on your own :-).

Road 2 is just a short point regarding knowledge retention.  I think one of the most overlooked facets of raiding is Raider Retention Rates (RRR).  We talk a lot of about skill, situational awareness, and such.  I don't ever see much about the impact of RRR, yet, to me, this is one of they key components to any successful raid group. Raider Retention can be looked at from two angles.

First: do you have the same group of people from week to week?  I've been a part of two distinctly different raid groups now.  One had a very high turnover.  The other was a very consistent group.  They both have been pretty successful at raiding, but I think one spends a lot less time at it.  You guessed it, the consistent group.  It's pretty obvious that when you're switching a lot of people in and out, it can add an extra challenge.  However, having a consistent group isn't all sunshine and butterflies either.  Scheduling can be quite difficult, as well as catering to individual needs and issues in order to keep the group cohesion.  RL has a bad habit of getting in the way of an otherwise good, efficient crew.  That's just the nature of the game, but it should hardly be overlooked.

Second: how well do your raiders learn?  Knowledge retention is the key to putting things "on farm".  It does you no good to learn a fight, master it, and then forget everything you learned.  A big part of raiding is locking those lessons learned away.  This is one thing my current group excels at.  We may spend a lot of time learning things and not have a whole lot of time to begin with, but I feel that we go from "learning" to "farm" in one or two runs.  It's a nice feeling.  In a group with a high amount of substitutions, you could expect several more "tweener" runs when you're transitioning from "learning" to "farm".  A lot of times, those can be the most frustrating since half the group may believe their beyond the content, and the other half is still new at it.

Raider Retention Rates are definitely something to be aware of when choosing a raiding group or leading one.  Each group will have it's own identity and rate, and a good leader will need to work with that to succeed.  Also, you don't want to choose a group that doesn't fit your desired raid style.  If you're a quick learner, you may be really frustrated in a high-turnover, low retention type group.  At the same time, you might be forced into such a group if you just aren't able to commit to a more stable group.  There are certainly trade offs.

This was just a little topic that was needling at me since, like I said, I feel it's pretty undervalued.  What works for one type of group might not work for another and you can really tell a lot about a group by the strategies they employ.   A group with a lower retention rate will really see the value of a simplistic strategy.  After all, the less that has to be explained, the less that needs to be retained.  A group with a higher retention rate may benefit from a more complex strategy, since many of the lessons learned and skills perfected will be carried over to future encounters.   Usually more complex strategies take the emphasis off gear as well, allowing you to rely more on player skill that time able to gear up.

I don't think approach is essentially better than the other, since each can most certainly lead to success.  I just wanted to point out the differences as they occurred to me.  I'd been writing and getting a lot of great, varied responses about ICC strategies lately, so it sort of fit.

That, and bifurcated streams suck.  That's all I have to say.

"Melting Faces with Mass Confusion" or "Is that Shadow Priest Drunk?"

Hey gang!


So Fulguralis & I have got the case of the burns.... well that didn't come out the way I wanted.

*Clears throat*

Let's try this again. Fulguralis and I are a bit burned out right now with regards to Raiding, instancing, Mail box dancing, etc.

"What shall we do Fulguralis?"
"I don't know Fuu? What do you feel like doing today?"
"Let's have a Sexy Dinner Party"

/dances around the room

3 hours later:

So we've come to the conclusion that we are going to begin the Ultimate Game! PVP!

Fulguralis is bringing Decedereful the DK & I'm Sporting Abigora the Shadow Priest.

"But Fuu... you don't know wtf you're doing! Isn't that a DPS spec?"

OMG I know!

Here's the thing, I don't really like pvp'ing on Fuubaar because melee is boring and I don't understand lolret. I've really enjoyed pvping on Abigora because Priests, in general, are fun because they have so many unique tools to use for healing & DPSing in pvp.

I started off Healing as Disc in pvp but I've decided that I want to melt faces and become giddy with excitement when my DoTs crit their faces off. Here's the thing... I'm a total Newb!

I need a new spec & a clue as to wtf I'm doin out there. Right now, Decedereful & I are just running the Daily Random Battleground and trying to work on exchanging our PvE gear over to Resilliance gear. Right now, I feel like a sitting duck where I'm getting murdered by Rogues and two shotted by Mages. It's ugly out there. Over the weekend, I had enough honor to buy two new pieces (neck & bracer) that put me over 22k health & 390 Resilliance.

I know that I'm no where near where I should be but I'm really enjoying myself even if I'm a free HK. I need to learn how to work with a DK as well as on my own.

Here is usually what I've been encountering while I'm doing my thing:
I buff everyone & mount up. I've been letting Decedereful pick the location & I just watch my back. Once we arrive at our location, we have been trying to pick as even of fights as possible. 2v2 or something like that. Either I get sapped by a rogue or a warrior stuns me instantly completely ignoring the DK. I use my trinket to get out of it & instantly try to blow my Fear bomb. If it's a rogue, I'm sapped immedietely and because splat. If it's a warrior, I've feared him and I try to throw a few DoTs on him. By this time, I'm around 15-50% of my health. I try to throw a bubble on myself and a Renew but it's usually too late.

Rince & repeat until time is up.

Sad & Pathetic I know.

This is a picture of how I want to roll into battle!

Can I be team leader? No? Fine just don't make me stand behind the Gas officers... who feeds these guys anyways?!

So here is my QotD for all of you:
Where is the "best" place to find out about Shadow Priest PVP? I've had a look over at http://www.shadowpriest.com/ and at some of the specs that they offer but I want your opinion.

DISCLAIMER: By me asking for your opinion, here are a few things that I'm NOT looking for
~ l2pnoob (I'm trying to l2p ;) hence the question)
~ lolwut? u sux (Well duh, I do sux but I want to unsux now)
~ Re-roll Horde (not sure how that helps but ok?)
~ Or anything that doesn't actually answer my question

Any help that is offered though is greatly appreciated since I'm such a clean slate.

<3 Fuu

Patch 3.3.3.3.3.3.3 ummm what?

Hey gang!

I wanted to give you the update for Protection Paladin stuff for patch 3.3.3 So I'll copy it below:














As you can see, ... wait what? Hmmmm maybe my copy & paste button doesn't work. Hold on.

*Cue Jeopardy Music*

Well this is strange, I've looked up & down that entire list of updates for this patch. Nothing, Zero, Nada, Ziltch. It appears that nothing for the Paladin Class (minus some bug fixes) is changing.

IT'S A TRAP!

/ducks for cover

/looks around for booby-traps

Calm down Admiral Ackbar, Blizzard knows what it wants and it was to leave Paladins alone for the first time in my WoW Career. That would be two years this May... that's not strange at all. /end sarcasm

So I'm thinking that this occurred because of one of two reasons:

A) Blizzard Likes where the paladin class is (Holy, Protection, Retribution Trees)
B) There is SO much in the works for paladins that they needed to skip a patch worth of changes so that they could put more work into it so that all of these changes weren't implemented with flaws (because we all know Blizzard never does that...)

Regardless, I'm not here to speculate about what the Developers have in store

*cough* AoE threat nerf *cough*

So I'll talk about what I've seen thus far of 3.3.3 in game.

Here is a tale of my journey through Dalaran trying to find that Stupid Gnome Frozo the Renowned fella who trades Frozen Orbs for useful stuff. From what I read in the patch notes is that he put up shop in the Magus Commerce in Dalaran. WoW, could you be any more vague? So I ran around trying to find him in the stores. I /target Frozo'ed him so I knew that he was close. I ran through every building looking for a Gnome who would trade me 1 Forzen Orb for 1 Frost Lotus or Eternal Fire (note: I don't give a poo about the other crap). I couldn't find the bugger anywhere. So I decided since I was so close to Threads of Fate, I would pop in and get my shoes shined and have some small talk with the friendly Gnome up there. Maybe he would know. Shoe Shiners know everything about everything.

10 minutes later: Fuubaar has shiny shoes and has totally forgotten to ask where the Frozo guy was located.

Damn it! Oh well. Let's do another lap, I should be able to find him because of the crowds. Sure enough, that little bastard is outside hovering on his cutesy little Carpet greeted by a horde of Horde (sorry, bad joke). So I traded him for my goods and off I went. He is located just outside of the big anvil and I believe the Engineering Store in the Magus Commerce in Dalaran.

For the next item on my list was to figure out how to exchange my Marks of blah for Honor. I checked my Currency Tab to see if they hadn't just exchanged them outright for honor... nope still there. I asked a few guildies and they didn't have a clue what I was even talking about. Thanks guys! :-P

Hmmm, maybe if I go to the Hall of Champions or what ever in Stormwind, I could figure it out. So I headed over there. Patch Notes where vague at best (again awesome Blizzard) when it comes to these things. My thoughts are "look for the crowd" and sure enough right inside where you can purchase PvP items for rewards has a guy on the top of the stairs where you can make the exchange. Cool, I thought this should be easy. I walked up the stairs to find gobs of people doing some sort of "Cha ching" motion and shooting off white and orange, almost similar to when you level up, kind of colors. This was happening to everyone near him roughly once each second.. wtf?

IT'S A TRAP!

No, Admiral Ackbar, there must be a reasonable explanation for all of this. Let's talk to the NPC up here and figure this out.

Side note: Did you know that only one person can talk to an NPC at a time? I believe that it has something to do with the animation of them turning around & making a gesture of them actually speaking to you. Sometimes you had to stand there & wait in line to talk to the NPC before they would help you out. Why is that?

Anyways, so I finally got his attention and clicked on the Option to Trade in my Marks. This pulls up a tab where you can buy Honor Seals for 1 Mark of each battleground. Well, this isn't so bad. Ok, let's start at the top and work my way down. 10 Clicks later " YOU CANNOT HOLD ANY MORE OF THIS ITEM!" Wait, what? But I have more!

What you have to do is close your shop window with the NPC, open your bags, use the 10 Converted Honor tokens to get them out of your bag & repeat... well, that's freakin' stupid. You have to not only fight to get the NPCs attention but you have to do this multiple times to convert all of your marks because you can only hold a stack of 10 at a time.

:::::Confetti:::::::

Congratulations Blizzard! You have chosen the dumbest way to convert Battleground marks to honor. Hell, you could have just converted them all with a click of a button, but NOoooOOoo you have to make us do it for you. What did you believe that if you converted it for me, that I would miss out on the pleasure of doing it myself? Self Gratification? lolwut? Are you drunk?

New NPC = Crowds Crowds = some idiot dropping a train on top of it so that it annoys the hell out of you while you hopelessly have to spam stacks of 10 Honor Tokens at a time.

Or, what Blizzard should have done, was convert it all for you and if you hit the 75k honor Cap, in game mail us the rest in Honor Tokens... BRILLIANT!

/facepalm

Lucky for me though, I'm not a huge battleground fan so I didn't have loads of them to convert. I actually had more on my Priest but that's besides the point. I had enough Honor to buy a pair of Furious Pants for Abigora so that's pretty cool.

Around this time ADD kicked in so figured I would give my new pants a test run and I try out the new "Battleground Randomly Generated Lose & Humiliation of the Alliance" Feature that Blizzard implemented.

You can still be queued up for the other Battlegrounds like before but now it has the "Random Battleground" option on the top of your pvp tab. Cool stuff. I queued up & around 5 seconds later, I got one. I hop in and we lose a horrific battle against the Horde or Kittens... Not sure. Either way they kicked our asses and we left with our tails between our legs. Ahhh, the beauty of Alliance "Even when it's random, it's not really random" is what I say about such things.

IT'S A TRAP!

No Admiral Ackbar, we just suck...

Anyways, that's pretty much it for patch related crap that effected me in anyway. Alchemy & Jewelcrafting didn't change, Paladins were forgotten, and Abigora isn't high enough geared to care that her tier 10 4 piece set has changed once again.

<3 Fuu

19 Elemental Shaman Twink: Update

Hey Gang!

I wanted to give you an update on my level 19 Elemental Shaman Twink. Once I hit level 19 I road the boat to Stormwind and found the creepy rogue in the corner and payed my 10g dues and shut off my precious XP gains. Now the fun begins.

I warn you, this is quite long and informational. If you aren't really in to Twinks or shaman, I suggest you just click read on your feed reader and look for another days post :P

This is the gear I'm currently wearing:

Flying Tiger Goggles- I dropped leatherworking and picked up Engineering for the ability to wear the Goggles. Other than these, the only other viable helm available to anyone at this lvl would be the Fishing Hat from the Stranglethorn Fishing Tournament. It is extremely hard to win especially on a pvp server. A lvl 19 in stranglethorn is like bait if you don't have bodyguards to protect you from certain death.This is a wussy way out if you ask me :)

Thick Bronze Necklace- Since I have a Jewelcrafter, I made myself the +3 Stam necklace. I've looked at other twinks and this is pretty much the norm. I'll poke around and see if any of the instances offer anything better for me in terms of drops.

Aged Pauldrons of the Five Thunders- I ended up buying the pvp BoA pieces that are made for Shaman. Some people say that you are not a true twink if you have BoA gear. They are probably correct in that there is most-likely something better out there but I doubt that they have +Resilience on anything that is level 19 or lower.

Mystical Vest of the Elements- I used some of Fuu's endless supply of Triumph Emblems and downgraded them to Heroism for the PvE chest. This is a pretty decent Piece of gear for this level. I've been really trying to only gear with Leather for the +armor on them verse a Cloth piece but the major problem is you will mainly find +Int, +Spirit, +SP, on Cloth while you find +Str, +Agility, on Leather pieces. My previous chest was actually a really decent green that I found on the AH but it was cloth. Once I purchased the BoA, it was leather but if I remember correctly, I actually lost some stats. Over all though, I'm happy that I bought it.

Inscribed Leather Bracers- I dug up a decent green from the AH. I'm a total Auction House Bargain shopper! Every day that I log in, I'll do a quick sweep of all leather & cloth pieces for level 10-19. If I find a piece that is an upgrade in any way and is at a reasonable price (less than 10g) I'll usually buy it. Though you have to be careful if you are looking for the "BEST" piece gold can buy because someone else knows that it's good for a twink and will jack up the price considerably  ranging from 100-300g. Now, I'm not saying that these pieces are not really good pieces but in all seriousness, I'll be doing a lot of homework on if it is the BiS for an elemental shaman at 19. If it is, and I plan to stay in this bracket for a while, I might invest in them or if they are crafted items, have someone make them for me.

Spidersilk Drape- This was my actual big ticket item. I dropped a whole 50g on the Silken Drap (I'll have to look this up when I get home for actual name & spelling) This is one of the best caster cloaks for this level. A good quality cloak is hard to find and when you do, you need to grab it up like it's going out of style. It is a tailored piece but the mats are retardedly hard to farm and 50g was definatly worth it. I think they normally sell for around 100-150g so 50g was a bargain.

Feral Gloves of the Eagle- I've actually been trying to replace these when I run instances. I've seen a few upgrades drop both Cloth & leather that were complete upgrades but I've lost the roll on all of them. I've also been trying to decide with ones I wanted to go with. There is a wide variety of gloves out there for Elemental shaman. Anywhere from +int & +stam (which I'm actually sporting now) to +SP. There are blues that drop in Wailing Caverns that have +int, +Stam, & +spirit cloth and those are my goal as of right now. I believe that the stats outway the +armor that I would get from a leather piece.

Bright Belt- AH buy. This also seems to drop from a heap of lower instances as well if you want to save some gold.

Bandit Pants of the Eagle- AH buy

Walking Boots- AH buy. I think these are from a Rare Spawn

Rings- One of these babies is from my Jewelcrafter Simple Pearl Ring and the other is with my Honor Points/ Badges from Warsong Gulch Lorekeeper's Ring. I was actually pretty disappointed with what can buy at this level with the millions of HP and Warsong Gulch marks. 1 Ring, 1 Staff, (look up what alliance can buy). Only the ring had potential in all of this. Pretty sad stuff if you ask me. I think blizzard really needs to go back & fluff this stuff up. Especially if you have twinks who have been doing this for so long that their Honor Points are maxed with nothing to spend them on.

Trinket- I bought the Swift Hand of Justice haste trinket. My other slot is currently empty awaiting for the pvp movement trinket. I may buy with Stone Keeper Shards (250) Inherited Insignia of the Alliance  BoA as well.

Sergeant's Warhammer of Healing- I found a nice +SP mace, I think from the AH. Again, good caster weapons are hard to find that aren't staves.

Forest Buckler- I found an awesome Shield for a whole whooping 75 silver on the AH. It's a little squatty thing but it's perfect for my shammy. Gives me more survivability than a Staff.

Enchants:

Helm- None
Shoulder- None
Back - Funny story about this. When I found the awesomely delectable cloak, it was also enchanted for me with +50 Armor. This was truly the best thing ever!
Chest- +100 health
Bracer - +7 Intellect
Gloves- +10 Haste Not really sure what else would be better for me but hey, cast your crap faster can't be a bad thing.
Belt- None
Legs- +16 Armor from the leatherworking Patches
Feet- +5 Stamina
Main Hand- Need to enchant. Just need to find something that's reasonable for a 1 hand caster.
Off-Hand- +HP5 & +MP5

Stats: (as of 01-18-2010)

Unbuffed:

Health: 891
Mana: 1,161
Spell Power: 37
Crit: 7.04%
Haste: 9.83%
Armor: (without my totems) 995
Resilliance: 5

Totally twinked out individuals normally run around 1,600-2000 health which is something that I'm going to aim for if I stay in this bracket. I've found this it's actually funny to run lower level instances with non-twinks because their health is so low. Sad really. I never top Damage charts though because most of the time, I'm ending up healing or things die too fast that it's just too much mana to lay down my searing totem than to just melee things to death.

Professions:

Engineering- For the helm mainly and the bombs that you can make that are quite fun and useful.
Herbalism- Lifebloom, Lifebloom, Lifebloom. This is like an insta HoT that could save your life. Now, I was stupid and forgot to check to see if this worked a long with Gift of the Naru before I dropped my 150 lvl skinning for this. So, if you are a Draeni, skip this one and pick up something else.
Skinning- +Crit which is nice to have for any class at this level because there are few pieces that actually have crit on them.
Mining- +Stamina is the bonus that you receive for this. This is something that's Viable for all twinks if you ask me! edit: for some unknown reason I thought this was +strength. Thank you for pointing this out to me :D
Leatherworking- This was my initial Profession that I chose because I thought I could make some decent blue gear for my shaman. I dug around and really found that, no, this was not the case. I dropped this and picked up Engineering instead.
Inscription- There really isn't much you can do with this profession other than maybe save yourself some precious silver if you want to buy glyphs. I suggest just buying them off the AH or have a friend make them for you.
Blacksmithing- I'll actually have to see if there is any viably stuff that you can craft for an elemental shaman such as Maces or Shields. From what I've seen, no.
Alchemy- This would be a good pair if you choose to have herbalism as your second profession. you can make your own health & mana potions along with some +intellect elixirs if you so choose to have that extra boost. Since Fuubaar is my alchemist, I didn't really feel it necessary to have another.

My suggestion is for an Elemental Shaman would definitely be Engineering for the helm and bombs, and herbalism if you are not a draeni. If you are a draeni, then it's a toss up for skinning, Alchemy, or Mining. It all depends on you and your circumstances.

My spec looks a little unorthodox. This little project was to create an elemental Shaman but the more I keep reading, it's not the "BEST" spec at this level. Actually, if I wasn't so gung ho about being elemental, I would probably go Enhancement. This is why:

Dump my first 5 points into +intellect to reach the second level in the enhancement tree to got to the Ghost Wolf form that makes it instant cast. This, by far, is so OP. The only other class that has a travel form is the druid. Shaman and Druids make some of the best Flag carriers in Warsong Gulch mainly for this reason alone. Speed! get your ass into the other sides Flag room and get the hell outta there asap! The last points are normally spent on lowering the cast time on our only healing spell in the Resto tree.

So, since I am not going this route I wanted to stay in the Elemental Tree and beef spells up that way. I make good use out of my Gift of the Naru as my mobile heal and if I get the chance to duck behind a corner, I can cast my OMG slow heal. It's pretty powerful though if you can get it off. It will pretty much heal you to full if you have caster gear on. Since I usually dont have the luxuray of time, I bandage or if I have a real emergency, I'll pop a health pot so that I can get the hell outta there.

This is what I came up with for an Elemental Shaman Spec.

As you can see, I spread my points out on the top row. I feel that Elemental Shaman are horrible mana suckers. We run oom any chance we get. Running OOM during a BG spells certain death for caster. So I spent them in reducing the costs of my totems and improving my damage done by those spells. I figure if I can burst the player down faster, I'm using less mana the more powerful the spell is. This got me to the second tier so I invested 3/3 in  6% damage reduction. Who doesn't want that in a BG? Yummy stuff let me tell you. That's how I spent my 9 talent points.

Again, I could have spent them differently if I wanted to spec in the best way possible as an Shaman at level 19 but I want to be an Elemental Damn it! Here is my wowhead link if you would like to see it for yourself.

Anyways, this is getting ridiculously too long, even for my own taste. Let me know if you have any questions, suggestions, ZOMG L2PvP, you know the drill. Thanks :)

<3 Fuu