A Revisit to Reforging

Elkagorasa to the rescue! Last Friday there was a nice little post over at Elk's site in response to my Reforging for Dummies article. The article generated a lot of Twitter buzz, because, as we discovered, there is a moderate amount of confusion among Affliction 'locks about what to reforge. Some were thinking Mastery was better, and that Crit should be our prime candidate for expulsion (as opposed to my published negativism toward Mastery).

After some research and discussion, we verified that, for the most part, Mastery is going to be our least favored stat, though Crit is a close second. Still, my advice should hold from the article. Yet, I was unsatisfied. I didn't feel optimized, but I certainly didn't want to go and try to figure it all out manually. Surely there is a resource out there to do this for me.

Enter Elk and a Friday endorsement of the Ask Mr. Robot website that is even now linked in my resource area. Having been sucked in to the article by the piece of blog candy that sucks in all of us e-writers (yes, a link... and I'm jk, Elk is firmly ensconced in my reader anyway), I was rather intrigued by the site. I had been using WoW-heroes for many moons now, but find it woefully lacking for reforging advice.

Mr. Robot does it for you. Check out Elk's article for some wonderful screenies and a quick run down of what the site does. That's what I did. Then I went and tried it out for myself. Wonder amongst wonders, the site was not yet caught by the work filter, so double bonus. It loaded my character from the armory, populated it's lists, and even gave me an Affliction stat weighting that looked pretty decent with what I expected.

Click, click... optimize... and we're off! Mr. Robot crunched all the numbers for me and offered an optimized solution in a manner of seconds. Over the weekend, I decided to take the plunge and blindly follow the advice. It's only gold, right?

Reforging at the behest of the laudable Mr. Robot found me completely rearranging everything from gems, to enchants, to gear stats. When I was done, I had followed all of the reforging advice, all of the enchanting advice, and most of the gemming advice. (I will not cave and ruin my color matching OCD, though Mr. Robot even takes whether or not the bonus is worth it into account it seems.)

After dropping about 1k of gold to do all this (with some help from the guild bank as far as gems), I got a chance to run a heroic. Imagine my surprise when I found myself about 2k higher. 2k! From just rearranging stats. (Side note: I was trying to add Shadowflame when I could as well, so that may have slightly skewed things upward too, but I wouldn't call its addition successful because I have a compulsion against running into 8yd range. One which I didn't overcome as much as you'd think. Fwiw - I went from around 11/12k to around 13/14k.)

So I'm going to jump on the band wagon here. It doesn't get much simpler than letting a Robot crunch the numbers for you. For the casual among us, the default stat weightings seem to be grounded well enough that they'll be applicable (Elk notes that the devs make use of SimC for this). For the more hardcore theorycrafters, you can tweak until your heart's content to get the perfect weighting. After just a short weekend of trial and error, I love this site, and it's definitely improved my damage output. The initial investment to get on board was high, but I did replace one piece of gear after my initial foray and re-ran the optimizer. I was pleasantly surprised that I only had to shift around a few things. Carrying on like this should be minimal, especially since I really shouldn't have to re-gem or re-enchant, having obtained all my hit from gear reforges.

So, to you, Ask Mr. Roboto: Domo arigato!

Three Amigos

"Please, Warlock, stand up and introduce yourself."

"Hello, my name is Fulguralis, and... and... my wife slapped me in the face."

"Hello Fulguralis, and who is your friend with the bruised nose there?"

"Balentis."

"Excuse me?"

"He said Valentis."

"Ah, very good. And the decaying man to my left, who might you be?"

"Melvin Brightrune, my good man. Former Captain of Stromgarde. It is a blarghlblah blargh blargh."

"Ahem, yes well. Let me just help you pick that up and reattach... quite slimy really, and that's a vicious crack... is that where she... and there you go!"

"Thank you, Goodman. Taught my daughter everything she knows about hitting."

"Gee, thanks, dad."

"Hey, it's not my fault that Deathwing showed up when he did. You can hardly blame that on me. Besides, I seem to remember it being your operation."

"I did what I had to. If Valentis over here wouldn't have pulled me into the felling Emerald Dream, we wouldn't be having this intervention."

"Blat's not flair! You know as blell as I blat ble sodding dlagons made me do it!"

"Dragons. Boy, I tell you if a dragon came up to me and asked me to do something, I'd punch it square in the face!"

"And you wonder where she gets it."

"At least she only slapped you, son."

"All right! It seems like we all just need to calm down. Let's try a quick breathing exercise. Close your eyes. All of you... well, if you don't have eyelids I don't see how you can... here, use this strip of cloth. There you go. Oh my! Wolf!"

"Balentisgrra."

"Oh dear, did it just speak to me?"

"He said Valentis."

"Yes, of course. A Gilnean. I had forgotten."

"Yeah, they do that when they get riled up."

"Sod off, Fulgurglalisgrra."

"Blarghl blargh blargh."

"Ah, uh, your jaw again, Captain... here you go... just, um... there."

"Apologies, Goodman. The crack seems to have loosened it. Won't happen again."

"So let's just all take a moment and close our eyes. Imagine we're somewhere safe and warm. Deep breathing now. In and out, focus on the... not quite that deep Valentis, more control and less slobber... focus on being calm, collected, in control."

"Why the fel are we here anyway? Medivh's beard this is pointless! Can't I just go set some critters on fire or something? That's how I deal."

"It was Minnie's suggestion, sport. And trust me, you don't want to get on my wife's bad side."

"I suppose she hits too."

"Crits, is more like it."

"Ouch."

"Ah, but you see. That is exactly why we all are here. We need to learn to channel our rage productively. Burning bunnies is not a healthy way to relieve stress. Nor is uncontrolled shapeshifting, or running into a crowd and spinning haphazardly with sharp objects."

"I didn't hit anyone, Goodman. Can't let your weapon control you, as they say. Besides, those hooligans were on our lawn."

"My lawn. You're just visiting, dad, remember?"

"You wouldn't force your dear old father-in-law into a home, would you son? Those places reek of decay!"

"Have you looked in the mirror lately?"

"What ablout me?"

"You have a tent."

"Grrrrr..."

"Don't growl at me, Gilnean."

"Gentleman! Gentleman! Let's not forget why we are here. We're trying to become one with nature around us. We must feel the el-"

"Warlock, what did you do to the Goodman? He's froze and I can see right through him."

"Banished. He was getting a bit too elemental for my tastes. What do you say we deal with this the traditional way?"

"Dlinksggrrr?"

"Yes, Valentis. Copious amounts of ale. Though you're going to have to get back to human form before they'll serve you. You in, Mel?"

"Blarghle Blargh!"

"Yeah, you're gonna wanna get that looked at."

"Aye, get me a wire and some of the hard stuff."

"Good, then let's go before the Banish wears off."

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.

Reforging for Dummies

Let me start this by saying that, prior to the last couple of days, I'd never really been a big fan of reforging. I hesitate to use the phrase "dumbing down," but there is such a thing as being "too customizable," in my opinion. And there's nothing the engineer in me hates more than something that is too user friendly.

Back in the day, before the fall of the Lich King, you had to be clever with your itemization, gems, and enchants. There was a rather interesting trade off where you had to decide whether to exist as much as a percentage point over the hit cap, or risk going a few scant points under. Entire posts were written debating the merits of being close to cap against being over cap. Snow fell only on uphill slopes that I, of course, walked on to get everywhere. It was a golden age of snowshoes and tough moral dilemmas.

However, what I call interesting, a lot of other people call blatantly annoying. What's worse than getting the new, awesome, super shiny upgr- Oh it has no hit on it. Damn. Burn it all to fel. Enter reforging. The salve to our irritable bowel syndrome. The panacea to our collective case of conjunctivitis.

Being Catholic, my initial reaction to change was one of intense fear and suspicion. It is something that is bred into me like an overactive sex drive and a love of the "occasional" drink, as well as an affinity for the pleated skirt. What was wrong with the old ways? Doesn't too easy = bad = sin = anger = fear = the dark side? Isn't there some sort of inherent nobility to my suffering? HAS EVERYTHING I'VE EVER DONE BEEN FOR NAUGHT?!

Okay, I'm catastrophizing. But seriously, I'm the type of person that sometimes struggles with change. I had my old system worked out and working for me, and then they had to go and gunk it up. So I did not welcome reforging with open arms.

Yet, now that I'm max level and beginning to to tweak gear for raiding, I'm starting to see it's allure. No longer am I pigeonholed into lesser gear for fear of losing my cap. No longer do I develop a twitch when the new epic trinket awards me with a whole percent of wasted hit points. I simply reforge, and then I'm done. Or unreforge (isn't that just "forge"? IDK).

The beauty of reforging is that it allows you to mess around with numbers to try and hit the cap exactly on the nose. It's still a bit challenging, as you can only get so much from each piece. In fact, it sort of becomes a game within a game as you try to work the puzzle pieces together to fit perfectly (as possible). Right now I have achieved a scant 0.04% overage. I was irrationally excited by it since, after purchasing the scarily hit free Justice Point hand upgrade, I knew full well that the loss of hit from the slightly worse piece it was replacing would be a challenge to make up. In the past, I would have just ignored the upgrade, because no way would I be able to gem/enchant swap enough to make the purchase worthwhile, sinking tons of gold into the process and probably ending off with a worse itemization than when I started.

Now, though... WAHOO REFORGING!

Being still somewhat resistant to change and extreme measures for min/maxing, I wanted to pass along my simple rules for reforging. These rules are supposed to be the "basics" when you're mucking around for hit cap. Sure you could reforge everything to the best stats possible, but I'm not dealing with that right now. I'm deriving these from my current stat progression (found in the guides up there on the left), so they may change over time. I want to try to keep it simple though...

Affliction Warlock Hit Reforging Rules of Thumb

1. If you need more Hit, try to steal it from Mastery. Mastery is the worst.
   
2. If you can't steal Mastery, get it from Crit or Haste (you can get into Haste plateaus if you want, but I'm not worrying about that yet, I'm still switching gear too frequently).
   
3. If you have too much Hit, unreforge or put some back into Crit or Haste. Forget Mastery.
   
4. ???
5. Corrupt things for Profit

Demonology Warlock Hit Reforging Rules of Thumb

1. A clever Demo lock told me we should shoot for 1996 Haste. Meander around this rating if you want.
   
2. Crit and Mastery are about on the same level, so steal from either of these for Hit.
3. Too much hit? Unreforge or metamorphosize some into Haste.
   
4. ???
5. Enslave things for Profit.

Frost Death Knight Hit/Expertise Reforging Rules of Thumb

1. Melee hit cap is 8% and Expertise cap is 25 (check your mouseovers).
2. Steal it from Haste.
3. Pop it back into Mastery. Bwuh? Yeah, Mastery is actually decent here. Or my fave, Crit, is always good.
4. ???
5. Freeze things for Profit.
   

And right now, that's the long and short of it as far as I'm concerned.

The Satisfaction of a Successful PuG

We see a lot of horrible, no-good, very bad PuG stories. They pretty much range from atrocious to mildly irritating. Yet, good PuG stories seem few and far between. After all, it's not all that gripping to write: "Pugged last night, tank held aggro, healer healed, CC did their thang, bosses all died." Wahoo, right?

I'll be the first to admit: I don't pug a whole lot. I wouldn't say I'm scared of it, I just put a premium on my own time. It's sort of an extension of the if-you-don't-have-anything-nice-to-say-don't-say-anything rule for me. Basically, I know I'm going to be impatient and unforgiving in a pug. I don't really want to show up and deal with people playing sub-optimally, wasting time, and wiping often. It drives me nuts when someone stands in the fire and dies, or when DPS don't drop aggro or properly use their abilities.

In short: On my toon, "the patient" title is a lie.

So I don't put myself in that situation. I don't pug unless I'm in a really good mood and prepared to be patient with people. Which means I don't pug often. In fairness to others, I can't be throwing myself into situations where I know I'll behave like an asshat. I'm not judging right or wrong here, when it comes to playstyle. To each his/her own. If you enjoy playing sub-optimally and floundering around, more power to you. It just drives me nuts. I'm an engineer. I prize efficiency and pulling your weight in a team. It's a personal thing.

However, this is something about a successful pug experience that, in my mind, makes it all worth it. It's not about gear for me. I'm skilled enough that I can hold my own on a DPS meter without the best gear out there, and gear will come eventually. We're not on the bleeding edge. Heck, at the rate we're going right now with RL intrusions, we'll be lucky to get any of the raid content down before the next major patch.

To me, those times when you zone in with completely low, rock-bottom expectations, and are pleasantly surprised... those are special moments.

Take last night. It wasn't a true pug, but we were short a healer. So four of us went in and pugged a healer. Normally my self-imposed rule is "no pugging of healers or tanks" for obvious reasons. But I said "chuck it" last night. I was in a good mood. Our tank wasn't my precious Fuu, it was our newb tank (former healer) who recently switched for the guild and is still learning the ropes. It was a less than ideal situation, but I was with four good people I knew, and I figured we could deal with a sub-par healer.

Turned out, the healer we drew was pretty solid. There wasn't a whole lot of chatter. We threw out quick strats for the bosses, and lined them up and knocked them down. We even lost the tank halfway through one fight, but recovered and finished off the boss by ping-ponging with the remaining DPS. The pulls were messy, but not one lost their head and we never wiped. Not once. The run was the picture of efficiency. We knocked out the entire thing in 45 minutes (it was the wind heroic).

When the last boss fell and the little pop-up appeared, letting us know that we'd been rewarded our VP, I felt a deep sense of satisfaction at a job well done. I remember the feeling from my days spent involved with organized team sports. It's that same feeling you get after a solid win against a good team, when you're high-fiving each other and giving the ubiquitous butt-slap. I love that feeling (Yes, even the butt slapping).

We did not win the championship. This was just a regular season win. A good one, but a win all the same. And that feeling is a large part of why I still play this game. You can't get that from a single player game. Say what you want about how the social aspects of MMOs are dying. As long as there's still a way to attain the feeling of a successful PuG, they're offering something special.

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?

The Welcoming

Fulguralis and Fuubaar stepped out of the portal an onto the cobblestone plaza. Other portals ringed them, swirling with an shimmering, ethereal promise of exciting adventures in far off places. Fulguralis, however, had had enough excitement for now. He was glad to be home.

As they headed away from the traveling grounds and into the city of Stormwind proper, he was struck by how different everything looked. It wasn't just that there was a charred section of the city back where the Park should have been - Fulguralis expected that much - it was just that everything seemed somehow sharper, shinier. It was as if the Titans had stopped by in the Warlock's absence to give the city a facelift and a paint job. Fulguralis brushed it off as a product of his near-death experience.

They had hardly set foot in the northern square of the Dwarven district when they encountered someone familiar. Abigora stood forlornly on a street corner, reading a book, surrounded by crates. Something shimmered inside of the wooden boxes as Fulguralis and Fuubaar approached.

"Gems, Abi?" Fuubaar asked.

The Priest looked up from her book and blinked. "Fuubaar! You're all right. And what's more, you've brought back a Warlock. The Warlock, if I may say so. Most curious that. By my calculations, he should be dead."

"Nice to see you too, Abi," Fulguralis nodded. "You might sell more of those gems if you, you know, actually tried to sell them."

Abigora frowned down at the boxes, and then back up at them. "Aho. A Gilnean too it seems."

"'ello there," Valentis said, stepping out from behind the couple. "I'll just be, ah-"

"You!" A shrill voice screeched through the air.

Where before there had been the constant drone of background conversations, vendors hawking their wares, and the general bustle of the city, now it was as if the voice had sluiced the sound out of the very air. There was silence. Even the usual clang of hammer on anvil in the Dwarven district was absent. The denizens in the square were all turned, staring at the source of the sound.

"You!" Decedereful repeated.

She stomped across the placid plaza toward where Fulguralis was standing with his wife, the Priest, and the Gilnean. With each step, it seemed like an entire dune of sand spilled out onto the stone pavers that made up the street. The Death Knight didn't seem to notice the fact that she was leaving an entire beach behind her. Her burning blue eyes were boring holes in the the group, even narrowed as they were.

Fulguralis could only stare stupidly as she clomped up. He mouthed a single question - me? - when she was only a half dozen steps away. She didn't answer. Her eyes were fixed... passed him?

Even as Fulguralis mind struggled to put the pieces of the scene before him together, his sister strode confidently past him with a raised fist. She punched Valentis squarely in the face. Fulguralis gaped. He pointed as his fuming sister, then at his wife, then at himself, eyes flitting between them all. Fuubaar and Abigora had no answers for him, they both stood with shock written plainly on their faces as well. Finally, Fulguralis turned back around and pointed at the Gilnean, who was even know picking himself up off the cobblestones.

"Dece, um, I'm over here," Fulguralis said.

Decedereful whirled to regard him with smoldering orbs, "Oh, I'll get to you in a second, but first..."

"Dece, if you will just..." Valentis began.

"No. You don't get to explain," Decedereful raged. "A big, bad dragon shows up... and... and off you go! Not even a good bye kiss! I thought Gilneans were supposed to be charming and thoughtful and romantic and sweet. Not to mention the fact that you lied to me. That you pretended to be just an ordinary solider. No! Not. Even. A. Kiss."

Valentis had stood up. He struggled for words, "Yes well, you see... I was just... and then... Ysera...." He trailed off staring blankly ad the Death Knight. "Oh, toss it," he said. Then he grabbed her around the waist, pulled her in, and kissed her.

Decedereful fought for a moment, but it was obvious her heart was not in it. Especially not after the punch she'd delivered. Instead, she rose up on her toes into the embrace.

"H-hey," Fulguralis objected, quietly at first, and then more strenuously. "Hey! That's my sister you beast!"

Fuubaar and Abigora giggled.