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Cataclysm Daily

Daily Thoughts: I’m a Little Scared of Tanking

March 7, 2011

I have a confession to make: Tanking heroics or raids freaks me out a little. First, a little background on me. I’m a WotLK baby mostly. Although I started in TBC, I didn’t hit max level until it was 80 and didn’t do any tanking past level 45 or so. After that point my only max level toon was my Holy/Ret paladin. I’d say it took me halfway through the expansion to get my DK to level 80. The DK was blood-spec DPS (remember back when blood was DPS?). It didn’t take me too long to make the second spec – frost tanking. This spec was aimed at running heroics with its impressive AOE capabilities. Even still, it probably took me until I was geared enough to be ready to raid before I actually queued as tank for a heroic. And I got… Halls of Reflection. Actually, every new tank I got to level 80 hit halls of reflection first…and my shaman when I switched to resto. That place just loved me. I hated it though. I’m a little surprised I don’t somehow get it in cataclysm at 85.

Tanking on a frost DK in Wrath was… very easy. Surprisingly the instance went relatively smoothly that time. Frost-specs massive threat and EZ-mode area of effect damage (I’m looking at you Howling Blast) made picking up adds and holding aggro on bosses a piece of cake. When my druid hit level 80 I’d already done some regs as tank but he was mostly geared for boomkin. Again I waited until I had over 5k gearscore and 30k HP before queuing as tank. Basically identical to my experience as a frost DK. Halls of Reflection > Awesome AOE(swipe spam) > decent single target threat. I did miss having death grip to reel in those stray caster adds but it was easy enough to keep the rest of the mobs under control that the occasional ranged didn’t kill us. Finally, my warrior reached 85 and became over geared for heroics and I queued… it was sloppy. Bringing in packs of mobs (yes in Halls of Reflection, yet again) was a bit more difficult than as a frost DK or bear druid. Most of the time I was scrambling to hold aggro and keep everyone alive. I think I’m a bad warrior tank, but who knows.

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4.1 Cataclysm News/Updates

4.1 Patch Notes

February 24, 2011

*Edit – Since this old post is getting a lot of attention from players looking for patch notes I wanted to link the current notes here – http://us.battle.net/wow/en/game/patch-notes/ptr-patch-notes . – Feel free to let me know if you see a more recent set of notes on Blizzards site.*

Finally, the long-awaited patch notes for 4.1, the first major Cataclysm content patch, have been made available. In addition to the notes below, I’m pretty sure we’re going to get the Firelands raid to kill Ragnaros and probably another one – both dropping tier 12. In later posts I’ll probably go into some of these changes in more detail but for now here’s a few of my personal favorites from the patch:

Divine Storm now generates 1 point of Holy Power if it hits (i.e. successfully lands on) 4 or more targets. – Hurray for more Paladin AOE potential.

Stealth base cooldown has been reduced to 4 seconds, down from 10, and the movement penalty from being in Stealth has been removed. – Non-rogues that PVP are crying right now… crying tears of blood in preparation for all the incoming deaths.

The Guild Perk, Cash Flow, no longer prints out text to the Chat Log. Instead, the daily amount deposited is shown in the Guild Vault Money Log. In addition, players can view the weekly contribution in a new window at the bottom of the Money Log. – Cause that was really annoying.

Continue on to see the patch notes in their entirety.

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4.0.3a Cataclysm Daily

Daily Thoughts: Item Level is the New Gearscore

February 14, 2011

To be oh so cliché, the more things change the more things stay the same. WoW is no exception to the rule. I’m not talking about whether or not new bosses or gear are too similar to old ones, which are complaints I’ve heard from a couple of fellow players who’ve been wowing since vanilla. Nope, I’m instead here to talk about players and how regardless of what is added to the game, we’re always going to act the same way. Prior to cataclysm and 4.0.3 I suppose, gearscore ruled pugs. The gearscore addon, which attributed a point value to each piece of gear and gave a “score” for each player based on that gear was the loathed standard from which players were judged before being invited to a random group or raid. Not content with mere players making their own system for judging the “goodness” of others, blizzard implemented the average item level. Viewed on both your character sheet and on your armory profile, it is the new number from which all characters must be judged. I say this sarcastically of course, as there are much more important factors; see: Skill. Now instead of a gearscore requirement, we see “looking for heals for *instance*, 350ilvl or higher”

Along the same lines are the recruiters for small or social guilds and their message. Prior to cataclysm we’d see “Friendly leveling guild looking for members of all levels. Have tabard and 4 bank tabs, pst xxxx for invite”. Quite often after spamming a couple of those, random /trade trolls bash the poster, mocking their guild tab message. Usually undaunted, they continue the recruitment spam. Now the trolls have a new topic to mock the social guild recruiters for, “we’re a level 4 guild…”

Anything else you can think of that we keep doing over and over as players? Aside from standing in fire.

4.0.6 Cataclysm Daily

Daily Thoughts: 4.0.6

February 7, 2011

Those anxiously awaiting patch 4.0.6 should be happy to know that this patch should be hitting the live servers tomorrow. This includes the redefining of how many players constitutes a “guild group”, fixes and adds to the “luck of the draw” buff, adds some balance to Tol Barad and Strand of the Ancients, makes Retributions mastery possibly their best stat, along with a plethora of other class and instance changes. This patch has seen a ton of revisions already – you can find the most current after the break – with more possible by the time it goes live. I’m pretty happy with the changes overall. We should see some class balance, random dungeon finder groups might be a little more manageable, and did I mention the buff to retribution? Continue on for the most recent patch notes (as of this posting) in their entirety.

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Cataclysm Guild Recruitment

Guild Recruitment: Band of Thorns, US-Thrall Horde

February 2, 2011

Band of Thorns (BoT) is looking for a few skilled raiders to round out their 10 man teams. They’re looking for a couple more melee dps (enhancement shaman preferred), a couple healers (not paladin), and one or two ranged (mage, lock or a boomkin would be nice, but aren’t those mythical creatures?).

The majority of BoT has been raiding/playing together since Vanilla/BC. They went 9/12 heroic in ICC (before cataclysm) and are 5/12 in the first tier of Cataclysm content, as of this posting. Raid times are currently 9pm server Tuesday/Friday.

All raiders are expected to show up to raids on time, be properly gemmed/enchanted/flasks, and have fun. Raids, and guild chat in general, keep a pretty light and fun atmosphere even when they’re getting serious for a kill. So, although they’d love you to read Elitist Jerks (or similar) to know your class, please don’t be one.

Their website is available at bot.wowstead.com, or contact Minmon or another officer in-game if interested.

Need to fill your roster? Feel free to email me at contact (at) alternateimage (dot) com with your information.

4.1 Cataclysm

Patch 4.1 and Confirmed Hyjal Daily Quests

January 18, 2011

*Edit* Seeing as this old post is still getting a lot of views – I wanted to redirect people to more recent information. Check out THIS and THIS for more updated patch 4.1 info and the patch 4.2 trailers (which include dailies) respectively.

A recent post of mine mentioned that daily quests would be coming, though I wasn’t entirely sure when. I went back and checked the information (credit to Wow Insider’s blog for confirming) and there will be a new daily quest hub added to Hyjal in patch 4.1. The term ‘hub’ suggests it will contain several repeatable quests, similar to deepholm or Tol Barad, and unlike the pair of solitary quests available in Uldum for Ramkahen reputation. Those of you dying to grind Hyjal rep for the great loot they offer, but don’t want to put on a green tabard and hit up dungeons should finally be satisfied.

Other content this patch will add is the Firelands raid, where we will kill Ragnaros for good, and a 5 man underwater dungeon in Vashj’ir. I’d imagine Firelands will be tier 12 raiding gear. Also, the Enhanced dungeon maps is expected to make it live in 4.1. Dungeon maps should be more detailed, including boss lore, abilities, and loot.

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