He Ain't Heavy, He's a Newbie...

Well, it happened to me: I ran a Heroic (Halls of Lightening) with "sub par" DPS. I don't have the screen caps here at work, but his overall DPS was about 650. I was a bit awestruck, since I had never run across anyont that low before.

So, looking above (wow-heroes) his gear isn't great. And looking below, a couple things become aparent:

1 - He's in a TON of crafted PvP gear. Well, as it turns out, he's on a PvP server, so this actually makes a fair bit of sense. (and the guys is a BS, so I assume s/he's rather proud of all that work!)

2 - He has no gems (belt) or any enchants.

3 - His talent placement looks less than ideal: 70/1/0.

I did a bit more digging (thanks to stalker.com, I mean wowarmory.com ) I found out that he had dinged 80 literally the day before, and that this was his 3rd Heroic run.

This would (to a degree) explain the lack of any enchants: this is probably his first toon, and on a PvP server, farming for stuff is a tad risky, so it's likely he's simply cash starved. (one confounding piece of info is that he's in a moderately large -202 members- guild, so I'm not sure why he isn't getting *some* help/direction)

But clearly, he has some learning to do.

Anyhow...

He died once on the mobs before Loken, but other than that, he was there fighting, but not accomplishing much.

From Recount, his melee atack was about 60% of his damage, with 2 other abilities making up the remainder (sorry, I can't remember what) so I don't think he really "gets" how to play his toon to the max... BUT, he didn't do anything glaringly stupid either. (even if his gearing/talenting is sub-par, he didn't PLAY badly - and that, in my opinion is HUGE)

So, do I feel like my gme was ruined because I carried a newbie, that didn't gem, didn't enchant, didn't chose talents as optimally as he/she could?

Not in the slightest. I just wish s/he were on my server so I could possibly help the guy out. because:

- not everyone KNOWS to even look for info on blogs. (let alone EJ or similar)

- clearly nobody in that guild has bothered to teach/guide him (well, the guy could unwilling to learn- but if someone is *that* hard headed, they are usually booted from a guild)

- if someone is new to the game (and possilby to online computing) it can be daunting to even know WHAT to Google for.

So, yeah, I will cut the guy slack. Even if he isn't a top performer. After all, I bet that trip through HoL was a pretty fun run for him.

And that's what matters...

Hmmm... maybe I'll start a toon on that server and, as politely as possible, try to give him a bit of advice.

Money Makes the World Go 'Round, and with the Auction House, WoW is no exception

As I mentioned before, I plan on making instructional “WoW 101” types of posts on occasion. This is one of them.

I’m going to be talking about some basic banking & auction house (AH) tips for someone new(ish) to the game. I’ve seen bits & pieces of my “method” in various places, but I think it’s worth putting down in one place…

The Pre-fundamental Basics

Some of these are obvious why they are in a post about banking & AH use, and other bits may not be so, but they are all needed…

Vendors are the folks you buy your supplies from, and these are the folks you need to sell you grey & white (common/”worthless”) items as well as any items that are soulbound that you don’t wish to keep.

Banks allow storage of personal items and offer limited, free to use storage space. They can be expanded for a price. They are located in many major cities, (per faction) AND in most neutral towns. They almost always have mailboxes located right outside their doors.

Mailboxes are the way you receive payments from items you sold on the AH, as well as the way you receive items you bought/won on the AH. They are also the means by which you can exchange items & money between your own multiple characters, as well as between you & other players. They are located in ALL major cities and medium cities, and are often found in many smaller villages as well. Items sent between your own characters are delivered instantly, but items sent between different players takes about 60 minutes. There is a nominal charge for mail, starting at 30 copper for each letter, and goes up depending on how many items are being sent. (up to a couple silver at the most expensive)

The Auction House is where the WoW economy is at work. This is where most items of value (both reward/dropss & crafted items) are bought and sold, as well as the raw materials (aka “mats”) that are used in crafting various items. This is where the vast majority of WoW money changes hands. It is a rabbit hole of complexity: it can be extremely easy to use, but there are extremely complicated methods that can be used to squeeze every last copper of profit, and it is its own “meta-game” within that is “played” by many folks who have zero interest in questing, raiding or PvP.

And now to the Fundamentals

Step 1 – create a “bank alt”. You should have one, even if "playing the AHis not your intent. They just make things a LOT easier. A bank alt is a second (or third/fourth, etc) character whose primary function is to handle ALL financial/item transactions for you. They live between a mailbox, the AH and a bank. It's not uncommon for them to NEVER do any questing. Their purpose is to save you time, (no need to hike back to a major city, just mail it) Save money (flight paths cost money too) and they also give you access to a LOT more storage (the bank alt’s bags and bank account PLUS the mail can act a free temporary storage)

The only real suggestion I can make here is to start with race that starts out CLOSE to a major city. This is because (in theory) you will need to get a completely unused (level1) character all the way from the start area all the way to a large, AH containing city. For Alliance, I would suggest Human, since it’s a relatively short (AND SAFE) hike from the starting area to Stormwind. I think Undead is similar with Undercity being fairly close to Brill. I would NOT suggest Tauren, Draenei, Dwarf, NELF or BELF (night or blood elf) because the hike is too long, and there are too many opportunities for bad guys to kill a lowly level 1.

If you are questing on your “main” (the one toon you usually play) and you get low on bag space, just mail the excess loot to you bank alt. It can sit in the bank for 29 days to “store” it, or you can return it for easy pick-up, or you bank alt can simply put it in the bank or sell it at a later time. Meanwhile, you bags are cleaned out so you can keep collecting loot.

Step 2 – decide how you want to make money: Farm (run around collecting) and then sell mats? Use a crafting skill to sell crafted items? Buy & sell stuff on the AH, with no other “input/work”. The first & 3rd options can make money from level 1 to level 80 (or skill level 1 through skill 450) The second option, really won’t make you money for a while. You can make some items for your own characters, but they are rarely worth enough at low levels to make any real money.

Once you have an idea what items you will be working with, you need to use step 3 (or you can go to step 3 to help you pick what you want to do…)

Step 3 – watch the AH and “take notes”. There are daily and weekly cycles, long term trends as well as some other weird things. Do certain items get more pricey on the weekends? Or do the prices drop? Do some items get real common in the afternoon, but are “out of stock” by the late evening? Do some items have big price swings, and others stay stable? Do some items ALWAYS sell well, and others always last for the full 48 hours? Lastly, if you are looking at particular items or types of items, do you always see the same person posting the same items over & over?

Step 4 – Make your play. Regardless of how you get your items to sell, there are two fundamental things to remember:

Buy low - This applies to any mats you need to do you crafting or any things you buy with the intent of re-selling. Make sure you try to time your buying so that you only buy when things are cheap.

Sell high (* and **)– Obviously, you don’t want to sell you stacks of copper ore at the same time some other farmers are selling theirs. Watch the AH, and only list your items when the other prices are relatively high.

• * NOTE – this only really works for mats or other items that are used in large
  quantities (healing potions and other heavily used items) Trying to play the AH
  with green item drops/quest rewards is tough, since it’s rare to get the same
  item multiple times.
  
  ** NOTE - there are other, more “cutthroat” people
  in WoW that will drop their prices to the point that no one else will even
  bother trying to sell a particular item. They make their profits by sheer volume
  and the fact that they can own the entire market. This method has some benefits
  and some problems.
  
  The benefits:
  
  - If you chose your product well, you will always have a steady stream of buyers, and you will be the only supplier. You control the market.

-If step 1 is true, then you have a steady stream of profit. You are pretty much
always in control.

-If you enjoy getting under peoples’ skin, this method works wonders for others trying to do the same business. There is a multi-server community that works this way and they can be welcoming to like minded folks.

There are also some things that are less than ideal:

Most of these methods involve crafting a large number of a particular item. This in turn requires a large, steady supply of relatively cheap mats. More than one person could easily farm themselves, which means they must be bought off the AH. This is a point of weakness that can be attacked/manipulated by other equally dedicated players.

Profit for effort is not being maximized. The profit margin has to be kept as small as possible to keep others out of the business. This means that for every gold spent (in mats) you relative profit is relatively small (also known as “ROI” – return on
investment) It is often quite possible to earn the same net profit by using your competitors to nudge the price higher, and increase everyone’s profits.

You will create enemies. Possibly a lot of them. Even though this is only a game, this can still have (in game) consequences. There is a reason many of the people that do this via “anonymous alts” that are completely dis-asscoiated from their main toon, or guilds. It is entirely possible that you might kicked out of a guild if you were “found out”, mainly if other guild members are being negatively affected by your tactics, etc.

Some basic tactics & tips to make some spare gold in spare time

I watch the ore/bars on my server pretty regularly, so for each item type, I have learned what the top end prices and low end prices are for most of them. (I also dabble in mageweave, runecloth and netherweave cloth) Since that’s the type of item I know, I will be describing my methods using them. The basics will work, regardless of what you bailiwick is…

*note, I usually look at the lowest priced auction item that has a buyout price. Bid only auctions aren’t good benchmarks. Also, if there are a large number of items at a given price, and maybe one or two a good bit cheaper, I will only record the price for the group. To me, one or two items aren’t “setting the market price”. The large groups of items at the higher price are the ones setting the price. The low ones are just spurious under-cutters.

- Use Auctioneer or some similar addon that color codes prices and gives
relative percent, versus “average” costs.

- Look for other peoples’ mistakes and buy them. If copper normally sells for 4-6 gold a stack of 20, and someone lists a few stacks for 1 gold (or less!) BUY ALL OF IT.

- Undercut the current prices, but don’t lose out on profit by undercutting too much. (there is an exception to this, see below) Usually a 1% undercut is enough.

- Don’t flood the market with your item. More than 4-6 (stacks) of an item will take longer to sell, and is more likely to be undercut by someone else. Simply wait until the first group sell, THEN post more.

-If you just bought 20 stacks of Netherweave cloth for 40 silver each (?!?!? Yep it happens) and don’t want to waste the storage space and want to sell it ASAP, you CAN flood the market, BUT you will need to undercut it by 20-25% or more. This ensures that 1) it will sell fast and 2) that anyone that wants to post the same item will be less likely to try to undercut.

- After watching an item for a week or more, and see an item’s normal price range, set a “buy” price near the bottom, so that when you see them at that price, you know it’s a good time to buy them.

- Similarly, set a “sell” price, such that when you see the items reach this price, you know it’s time to sell. Note, this is not the price YOU will sell for, since you will want to undercut slightly.

- Remember that all servers close down at a given time every Tuesday. During this time, no bids will be received, and any auctions that close during this time will go the last, highest bidder. Great deals on all types of items can be had if you happen to be awake an hour or less before the servers shut down and do some bidding.

- If you receive some loot that you want to sell on the AH, there’s a pretty good way to appraise it (assuming you don’t have any addons, and even if you do, this is more accurate) 1) go into the auction house and open the “Browse” window. 2) Select the item type you want to sell (ie, mail, waist, armor) 3) In the “level range” boxes, input numbers slightly above & blow this item’s user level (user level, NOT “ilevel”) 4) Hit the “search” button. 5) Look for items with similar specs (like another green belt, not a blue one, etc) and price them accordingly.

- Lastly, beware that there is a cost for unsuccessful auctions. The “deposit” you put
down to list an item will be kept by the AH if the item doesn’t sell. This isn’t usually an issue with mats and such, but it can be a HUGE deal when you try to sell items you find during questing. Often times some items will only auction for 5 gold, but the deposit could be 2 or 3 gold. As long as the item sells the first time, it’s not an issue. BUT, there is the (large) risk that items won’t sell on the first attempt, in which case any profit you COULD have made will have been eaten up by paying the deposit. Oh, and the 5% fee that the AH charges when your item DOES sell. You just need to realize that sometimes you should just take the smaller “vendor” amount. (or, if you know someone that will dis-enchant it for you, that will often be the best result – but that’s a topic for a later day)

In closing, I would like to let you know that this isn’t a get rich quick scheme. I can easily make 100 - 300 gold a week with a bare minimal “casual” effort. 500 – 1000 gold is easily doable, but you need to put some effort in to get larger amounts. I make about 30-50 gold a day, and that’s without doing any “buy now, sell later”. With that method, I can make 200 gold in a day, when the items are on the “sell” cycle. It just takes time, storage and patience to do.

For better or worse there isn’t an “EASY” or “I WIN” or “I’M RICH” button in the game.

A Jagged Little Pill for Some: We ALL Play to Have Fun!

Head's up... a bit of a n00b-rant here...

I've now been playing Balthazario for a bit over 5 months. (I don't remember exactly when I started, but my earliest achievements were picked up around May 10, 2009. During that Time I've really learned to do 3 things within the game:

• Play a Ret Paladin with some basic degree of skill
• Learn some skills/professions
• Learned my way around (and in) Azeroth/Outlands & a bit of Northrend. This includes how to fight through a few instances.

When boiled down to those little bits, it seems ridiculous that it's taken me 5 months to get here. The problem that boiling it down like this is that it completely misses the depth, complexity and nuances involved in getting here. The learning curve has been brutal at times, and the pace has been both doggedly slow and blisteringly fast, both at the same time.

If you look over on my blogroll over here ->>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> you will see a bunch of blogs that I read. A few are Paladin specific, but overall, they're ones I enjoy reading. They don't talk down to any player groups (other than "bad" players or "jerks") and try to be inclusive and funny as well as informative.

There are a number of other blogs I read on occasion that I don't list, simply because they can be mean spirited, "holier than thou" and simly not inclusive to WoW players as a whole. Even in areas you would think would be like minded, you can see HUGE divisions. Google around on Ret Paladin, Holy Paladin and Prot Paladin (or even go to the official WoW Paladin forums) and you can see an unbelievable scism in attitues and ugly jabs abound, ALL WITHIN THE PALADIN COMMUNITY.

I guess with 12,000,000 players, many of which are VERY invested in the game, it's not surprising that one or two different opinnions come around...

Now to the point of this long ramble-a-thon post: the uncomfortable divide between many "new" players (let's say 1 year or less) and the "old timers" (the Pre Burning Crusade/"pre-BC" aka Vanilla WoW players in particular).

Even though I played my Belf Warlock for a while, a few months before Wrath of the lich King (WoLK) was released, I didn't play much or long, so I definitely consider myself to be new.

And here's where I get a tad annoyed, irritated and just plain frustrated: the oftentimes condescending, barely tolerant (or completely intolerant) and often hostile attitude that some long time WoW players show towards us n00bs.

The things we hear a lot are :

• You didn't earn your way
• You don't know how to play
• You want everything now/fast
• You skipped everything
• Things are too easy for you

And other similar sentiments. It's not just the sentiments that are so troubling, it's vehemence with which they are stated, and the vitriol that accompanies them.

I'll try to tackle these one at a time...

You didn't EARN your way.

From what I can gather, it took 6-12 months in the old Vanilla Wow days (pre-Burning Crusade) to hit maximum level. Which was level 60. You had to walk everywhere, and even flight paths were few & far between. Yeah, you had to walk to school, in 3 feet of snow, uphill. Both Ways. Seriously, though, reading about many of the mechanics of the game (ESPECIALLY all the grinding necessary to level) and I applaud the effort of the first players. ESPECIALLY before the flight paths became the way they are.

HOWEVER, as much as I respect the effort that was put in, I have to counter with my own opinion: the game was kinda broken at that time. At least for anyone that isn't "hardcore". Grinding through collection quests where you need 20 of a certain item that only drops at 3-5% is tedious, boring, and IMHO a waste of time. And THEN you have the "jog across the entire continent and back" and all the way backAnd all for a paltry amount of EXP. As far as I can tell, it's a game only the hardcore would stick with for any length of time. As I've said before, I am NOT hardcore, but I am far from "casual".

But in the end, after 8 months or so (maybe a bit longer) you would hit max level and FINALLY be able to take part in the endgame: raids, dungeons and the like.

A couple years later Burning Crusade came out. An extra continent, more quests and 10 additional levels were added before you could enjoy endgame. But, to compensate, some of the early content was sped up, nerfed a tad, in order to get new players to the end game without taking 12-18 months to get there.

NOWADAYS, we have 4 continents, 3,000 odd quests and 80 levels to work through before we get to play the end game. Again, Blizzard tweeked things in order to allow new players to get to the "endgame" without spending 18-24 months grinding.

After all, if the "fun" doesn't start until level 80 ( as many players will tell you) then it makes sense to make it a bit faster to get to. Afterall, Blizzard wants new players, and a 24 month "learning period" will turn players off. (and new blood is kinda needed, if for no other reason than to replace all the folks who have stopped playing - not to mention to pay for expansion packs, patches, etc)

And now we can beat our way to max level in 6-8 months. Faster if you focus on levelling, or slower if you stop & smell the roses.

Does this mean we haven't earned it? Well, lessee... we CAN probably get to max level a bit quicker, but still, we had to fight for a half year to get to the "current" content. I say we fucking well eared it.

Now, if you mean "less boring", then yes, we get off easy. Nowadays you can get exhalted with some factions with only *153* quest repeats instead of the old 840 repeats. (I'm referring to the Winterspring Trainers) But really, is killing the same ~ 20 beasts 153 times instead of 840 times hurting our skills? Again, IMHO, the old-old game was broken, or at least ONLY suited to the most hardcore of the hardcore

You don't know how to play.

If this were referring to ONLY the "refer a friend" folks, I might actually agree. BUT, if someone spends 6-8 months playing a game, and STILL doesn't "get it", it has less to do with the "learning period" and more to do with "maybe this player isn't the greatest" or ""just plays for fun".

Now, since the game isn't quite as boring, you are going to get more players that aren't super hard core. WoW isn't a lifestyle for them, and they play just to mess around and have fun. This leads to less invested players, which can lead to less skilled/educated.

I think that's it's a lifestyle/gamestyle change that has "lowered the bar", and not a lack of knowing due to inexperience. I still think that an influx of more casual players is pretty much required for WoW to continue to survive, let alone expand.

You want everything now/fast

We want to be able to reach end game content in a reasonable amount of time. It took old time player ~8 months to get to end game. Now we can get there in 6. OK, maybe a tad faster...

And yes, I *DO* want to get from Gadetzan to Thousand Needles faster. Jogging instead of riding does not imbue the jogger with skill. It just.......... takes........... longer......... with no benefit.

You Skipped Everything

True, but good luck finding groups to run all the old instances. Unless you're in a guild that likes to reminisce, you aren't going to find folks interested in Uldaman, Ahn'Qiraj, Molten Core and the like. If you can't find a group, you can't run the instance (at least not "at level"). At least on many of them, you can run them way over levelled...

Fact: the game has moved on to level 80, and Blizzard seems to be doing whatever it can to push this. Maybe Cataclysm will change this?

Things are Too Easy.

Agreed to a point, but with comments (of course...) "Back in the day", you could find enough groups and spend the time to have multiple wipes on low level instances. Nowadays, as mentioned above, the focus is on end game content. If an instance is so difficult that you need a well experienced, well coordinated, well geared group to complete it, noone will bother at all. If a "normal" PUG can't complete an instance in a sngle night, the place will be deserted.

This might have some effect on our learning. However, I think the lack of groups available to join is hurting low level players far more, since many (like me) will simply skip the instance until we're so over levelled/geared that we can duo/solo the thing.

All in all, yes things have changed, and (IMHO) most of it for the better. I may argue about many of the balancing attempts that Blizzard does (and often seems to completely fail at) but at the core, I think Blizzard has done a fantastic job at creating a world that gets people interested in playing, coninuing to play, and fosters a heck of a community.

I do believe that without some sort of alteration to get people to the end game in a "reasonable" period of time, that there would be less & less new blood in the game. Obviously without new blood, the game would die.

I realize that some hardcore would probably prefer that Wow died, rather than be "noobified". I don't know how to handle these folks. Most people would rather have the game continue, albeit with changes, rahter than die a slow, hardcore death. *shrug*

I play to have fun. So do most WoW players.

Help for the New Kids on the Block: A bit of a Start Me Up

I've recently made a new alt (Berniemadof - a Rogue, of course) so that I could create a bank/guild of my own. I now have my own personal guild: Ponzi Scheme. In the process, I had to chat up a bunch of very low level characters. Many of them were completely lost. I'd explain a few things, point out a few things and explain what some of the acronyms mean.

But enough of the history of HOW I came to this decision, but here it is: many of the guys running around have NO CLUE what to do, since they are starting out on their own, with no RL friends or anything to help them out.

So, from now on, every few posts or so, I'm going to dedicate a post to the newest of the new guys. I'll delve into some topics in fair detail, others in deep detail, and some in just passing. But the point will be to answer some of the most basic questions. Yes, many questions are easily searched for, but some players may not even realize it. I may not have my nominal musical pun in the titles of these, but we shall see... Regardless, it seems that so many websites & blogs focus of the "end game" or top level players (how do I gem, theorycrafting, dailies, etc) so I want to put together some basic info for folks new here.

First & foremost is a list of places to get information, as well as what types of information you can get. (note, I will embed links in many areas, so look for funny colored bits for links to click)

1. Google - Google is the friend of almost everyone in WoW. Chances are you will never think of a question that one of the other 12,000,000 players hasn't thought of, and posted about. Anything from "How do I equip new armor WoW?" or "How do I kill Hogger WoW". Just type in your question, (it may help to include the word "WoW" or "warcraft") and keep tinkering with your wording, and you will probably find the answer.
2. The WoW "blogosphere". Go to WoWheadlines.com, AzerothUnited.com, BlogAzeroth.com and look around for some blogs that fit your interest. Then, once you find a couple/few blogs you like, look to see what THOSE bloggers read. Before you know it, you'll find a plethora of places to go.
3. The WoW online databases & wikis: Thottbot.com, wowwiki.com, wowhead.com, Alakazam.com are the biggies for general (and some very specific) info, and places like Elitistjerks.com for more advanced info.

Between these 3 groups of sources of info, you should be able to get a LOT of needed information.

The other "HUGE" topic I think beginners need to become familiar with are the "addons". These are pieces of software that are used INSIDE of warcraft to make the game easier, more accessible, and just plain PLAYABLE. The big ones (In my opinion - if others have better/other suggestions, please reply!!!!) are:

• Carbonite - This does a TON of things: tells you where your quests need to be done, where they need to be turned in, as well as providing MUCH better maps than the standard ones that ship. It also lets you add notes, and "waypoints" on your maps.
• Quest Helper - Similar to Carbonite, but a bit less functional. They can work together. The one thing this has that Carbonite doesn't is a flight time timer. It tells you how long you will be on the flight path.
• Gatherer - It tells you where ore, plants and chests are. It puts these on your minimap, as well as showing them on your world map.
• Cartographer - Along with Carbonite, it gives you better/more usable maps.

There are a bunch of others, but for the basics, I think these are the ones you need to start with.

They can be downloaded at the following places:

• http://www.curse.com/
• http://www.wowmatrix.com/
• http://www.wowinterface.com/

I'm not the best with installing these, so I'll leave that for another day, or you can dig around. They aren't HARD, but it's just not something I do regularly, so I can't remember...

Cry Havoc! Let Loose the Dogs of War, Vengeance is MINE!!!!

I just dinged level 64, and with that I now have Seal of Vengeance!

Um, ok…. and?

Until now, I have been using either Seal of Righteous (SoR) or Seal of Justice (SoJ). For straight damage/DPS, SoR is preferable because the seal deals extra damage, but against casters (or frikkin Rogues) SoJ is my preferred seal because it can stun/interrupt. I catch some flack for this in some of the forums I visit, (they also strongly argue against my sword & board preference) But hey, it works for me.

I have read in numerous places (for example, Elitistjerks.com) that Seal of Vengeance (SoV) is the new hotness. Especially after Seal of Blood sorta went away and Seal of Command got reworked.

But how different in DPS are all these judgments?

I am NOT a theorycrafter, and I don’t even know where to begin to realistically make any calculations. This means I gotta do thing the empirical way: clobber stuff and check out the numbers (Most folks – me included – use Recount, the add-on that records DPS and all sorts of other data: Recount (at curse.com) )

The ideal way to do this is to find a medium level boss that will take ~2 minutes to kill (solo, obviously) and fight him using the normal attack rotation, one fight each with each seal being used in only one fight. This gives you real world fighting DPS for each variation. There are a couple issues with this that make it a “last line” type of test:

1 – Boss fights are rarely exactly the same, so you end up questioning whether the differences were performance (DPS, etc) or were just a fluke of the fight. Realistically, you need to try at least 3 attempts with each judgment/variation, and with 3 options (in this case) that means 9 individual fights. That takes a lot of time.

2 – Your armor & weapons lose durability every time you fight, and the tougher the fight, the worse it will be. This means you have to trudge to someplace and repair armor/weapons between each test. So an already long procedure just got a LOT longer.

So I did what many folks do and use the test dummies. (this is really only an option when you get to higher levels, since the lowest level dummy is level 60 – meaning anyone below level 56-57 or so would have a hard time doing ANY damage )

First I thought I would just use the judgments alone and see what happened. Due to the nature of Recount, and the 8 second cooldown between judgment spells, it recorded each judgment as an individual battle, and didn’t add/average them.

OOPS.

To avoid this, I decided to alternate casting Judgment and Consecration. Consecration should work well because it produces a pretty consistent damage over time (DoT) with ~87 damage every second.

The results? Very strange: SoR was best and SoV was worst. WHAT?!?!?

Well, in the reading I did, there’s something about SoV proc-ing (a proc is when a special action/result/attack/etc “proceeds” – ie it happens, and the word is shortened to “proc”) and stacking, often with melee auto attacks. (it actually said a lot more, but I’ll be honest; I only understand half of it. What’s a “white attack” anyways? I dunno…)

So I then repeated, using auto attack, and alternating judgment and Consecration every 4 seconds. I let it run for about 2 minutes, stopped and took a screenshot of the results so I could review them later. Here they are:

Seal of Vengeance

Seal of Righteous

Seal of Justice

I put the numbers into a table and did a little calculating so I could see the DPS (and not the %) of each type of attack.

Now we’re getting somewhere!!!

SoV CLEARLY has the advantage. BY ALMOST 100 POINTS!!! And SoJ has a MUCH bigger loss of DPS than I had realized. I still like the stun effect, but I will need to “swap Seals” in mid fight so that I can maintain DPS, and still try to get some stun effects.

I then tried the test dummy with SoV and my normal full attack rotation. (I haven’t had the time to repeat this with the other 2 Seals yet)

And this data put into the chart for comparison:


That’s roughly 609 DPS. Based on some quick addition, I would expect my SoR to be roughly 520 DPS and SoJ to be roughly 475 DPS. THAT IS HUGE!!!!!!!!!!!!

My next work will be finishing up "full rotation" data for SoJ and SoR, since it's clear that the Seals *so* get affected by other attacks. So things may be better (or worse)

I will think about doing the tests on some Bosses, now that I have an idea, but we shall see.

I also plan to try out a 2 handed weapon to see just how much damage I'm losing out on. (but that will require a re-spec - theoretically - to get the 2 handed specialization talents) We shall see how much time I want to spend doing this, instead of questing or farming.

Back in the Saddle, and out of BGs for Now

EDIT- Not sure why, but Blogspot is screwing up my formatting, so this could look strange. I had to use the "-" to force paragraph breaks. SORRY!

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After one more loss last night in Warsong Gulch, I'm done camping at level 39. I will run through a few more times just to get the honor marks, but it will probably be as a level 40 or 41. I still want my Trinket and Protector's Sword.

I also learned something that is a bit of a "Doh!" thing for me:
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Judge based on which seal you use.
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So, for me, since I use "Seal of Justice" most of the time, I should be Judging with Justice. Why? Did you ever seee this little tidbit in the Seal description?
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Unleashing this Seal's energy will deal 75 (or whatever number)
Holy damage to an enemy.

I never knew what that meant unti lI asked someone in a forum. I wondered; is it a proc? do you have to actually target someone else when you put the Seal on?

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Nope: when you cast a Judgement for the correct seal, THEN it does the extra damage. So, cast Justice with Justice, Light with Light, and Wisdom with Wisdom. So obvious... *facepalm*

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In other news, I picked up a couple recommended Add-ons: Pally Power and Recount.

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Pally Power is an Add-on that is intended to allow pallies to keep everyone in the group/raid with the proper blessing, and keep it up to date. I can't figure the damned thing out. And now when I tried to minimize it, it went away completely, but still shows up on my other (non-paladin) toons. ugh.

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Recount allows you to keep track of the damage you & other group/party raid members do. It's also a good way to measure DPS (damage per second) both during battle and as an after report. DPS numbers aren't really that important at lower levels, but they are a good indicator of how well optimized you are. Run one fight with one setup/gear/spell rotation and note your value. Then try a different routine and see how they compare. THAT is a huge deal. Also note that DPS values for Paladins will be different in PvE compared to PvP. (also note that DPS can't realy be measured in short fights, it should only be taken over a long fight)

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DPS Stuff

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For example, I soloed all the way thorugh Dead Mines the other night. I wanted to get some "greens" for my Enchanter to disenchant. (and it's low enough level that I wouldn't get any EXP)

In the longer fights, I was getting multiple 114 DPS results, with a couple of 131 fights. Shorter fights were in the 95-95 range. (Overall, I'd say I was getting about a 100 average)

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In comparison, in my last couple PvP matches, my best average DPS was 52. (since BGs are so dynamic and active, I never took the time to hunt down my numbers, fight by fight) I had a couple in the low/mid 30s and one game was only 14.

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If you are "in a fight" (your level indicator is replaced by 2 crossed swords) it is measuring time. And if you are chasing someone across the valley and not hitting them, you are spending lots of seconds doing nothing, and your DPS will drop significantly.

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Aside from the dynamic running aspect of the PvP compared to the PvE, the biggest "loss" to DPS in a PvP fight is due to not having Exorcism. For me, Exorcism hits for 300-350 points, and it hits for 600+ when it crits. (which for some reason is almost half the time) If we take a rough average, I'd say my average is about 450 points per use. Since it has a 15 second cool down, that means I can cast it that often. 450 points every 15 seconds (450/15) is 30 damage per second (DPS) Not having this spell is a HUUUGE loss in damage potential in PvP.

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When patch 3.2 is released, we will once again be able to use xorcism in PvP. The "hitch" is that it will require 1.5 seconds to cast. I believe it will be the same for PvP and PvE.

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That means it will be on a 16.5 second rotation (15 second cooldown, + 1.5 sec to cast). Doing the same math from the previous PvE example, that means 450 points in 16.5 seconds, or 27.3 DPS. That's nearly a 10% loss. FUCK!!!! Now, since it's not all the damage I do - only part of it - the final loss in DPS won't be 10% (probably closer to 4%) but every bit hurts. After-all, Pallies, especially Ret pallies, are hybrids, so we are never going to be the best at anything, and this will hinder our cross functional "jack of all trades" abilities.

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Yes, it will be a nice tool to help fight the ranged players, EXCEPT you need to stop for 1.5 seconds to cast it. Which means they can keep running (out of range), melee you to slow down the cast, or stun/interrupt it completely. Is it better than a sharp stick in the eye? Yes. Am I happy with the implimentation? No. Then again, I guess it's better to get it "pre-nerfed" than to get a neat new PvP toy/ability, and then to have Blizzard take it away again.

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But it's going to really screw up the PvE damage I can do.

Here Comes the Judge: Spell Rotation

JUDGEMENTS & SPELLS

This is where the rubber hits the road. And part 3 of this dig into my methodology is by far the most involved. this is partly due to the nature of it, but also due to the fact that PvE and PvP have some very different requirements (and limitations)

PvE

My spell of first choice in PVE is Exorcism. It’s instant cast, it's a Pally’s only “ranged” attack (30 yards vs 10 yards for regular Judgements) and, when it gets a critical hit (when it “crits”) I can hit for over 600 damage! WooHoo!!! Once Patch 3.2 hits, I'm not sure WHAT I'll do, because it will require a 1.5 second (interruptable) spell cast time. I will still use it, but it will completely FUCK my PvE playing.

Next is either Judgement of Wisdom or Judgment of Light. Since I’m usually more likely to be hurting for mana (also, I often quest with a healy Shaman which is mana intensive too), I usually use Wisdom. When the foes get a bit tougher, and I’m worried about health, I’ll use Light.

My usual fight consists of:

Exorcism – Judge – Judge – (Judge?) – Exorcism – Judge – Judge – (Judge?) … ad infinitum with auto attacks during the cooldowns.

If the guy I’m fighting is a Boss, or a tougher than usual character or if there are multiple mobs I’m going to be fighting at once, I will follow the above sequence EXCEPT I will use Hammer of Justice on the “baddest” enemy as soon as the enemy is within melee range. This stuns him for 4 seconds and interrupts any spells he was casting. This is to limit how much damage, and how quickly I take damage.

In cases where there is more than 1 enemy, (of any significant threat) I will cast Consecration just before they get within melee range (or, just as they get in Consecration range) I will still use the above rotation, but I will add Consecration into the rotation every time it comes off CoolDown (“CD”) I don’t really LIKE Consecration (It costs a TON of mana, and it doesn’t do THAT much damage) but it’s the only Damage Over Time (DOT) and only Area of Effect (AoE – affects multiple targets at once) spells Pallies have, and anything that shortens the fight (and how long we are taking damage) it’s a good thing. You are pretty much guaranteed to need to drink a mana potion after any fight where this gets used.

During these same circumstances, I will often cast Divine Protection right as the melee fight starts. It’s “only” 12 seconds and “only” reduces damage by 50%, but it’s a life saver. Due to the long effective CD (2 minutes before you can receive it again) I don’t use it unless it’s really needed. Divine Protection is “ok”, but it cuts YOUR attack damage by half, so, even though it slows how quickly you die, it also slows how quickly THEY die… and with multiple bad guys, that means you’re getting hit by THEM for more time. Bad idea. I will use Divine Shield when I need to heal (and still have mana left) but it's not ideal.

If I’m tanking, and someone else in my party is taking more damage than they can/should, I will cast Righteous Defense, to get them to attack me instead.

The only other odd or “quirky” spell I will use is Turn Evil. It sends evil (undead, demons AND MINIONS!) running away for 20 seconds. It’s simply a way of keeping multiple enemies from attacking you at once. It only works on certain types (listed above) so it’s very situational, but it does come in handy.

If absolutely needed (for escape, or chasing) and IF I have been iced in place, or webbed in place, I will cast Hand of Freedom on myself to be able to move.

OH! Healing! Um, I heal as needed. Even though Rets aren’t Holy, we CAN do a fair share of healing; on ourselves as well as any party members. Usually I leave most healing until after the battle is over, but sometimes, it’s mandatory to replenish during the fight. So here’s my “SOP” for in fight healing.

1 – Gift of Naaru: It’s a racial ability for us Draenei. At level 35-39, it heals 560 points over 15 seconds. It’s NOT a major “OH SHIT!” button to be used at the last moment. It should be “This fight is lasting a while, and I’m GOING to get low on health.” You need to be able to survive for 15 seconds to get the full benefit, so I use it a bit earlier than I feel.

2 – If I haven’t used it already, I use Divine Protection. It SHOULD have been cast already, but this is my time to check/make sure.

3 – I will use a healing potion now. I don’t use it first, since I might need to take a mana potion.

4 – If I can, I will cast Holy Light. (I don’t bother with Flash of Light for myself – you will probably lose more health than you gain during the casting time – Yes, Holy is nearly twice as slow, but can give you 4-5 times as much health)

5 – Lay on Hands (LoH) – the final “OH SHIT” button. The good news is that it SHOULD buy you lot more time to fight, heal, mana up, etc (and the spell gives you a little mana to boot ANNND reduces the damage you take for a time afterwards!!)

If someone else in the party needs healing, I will help if I can, but in PVE, I focus on tanking/DPS, so I will be slow at best. To be brutally honest, if it comes down to another party member or me being saved (especially if they are about out of mana, or there are a bunch of enemies left and the party member is squishy) I will save myself first. I can take more punishment and continue fighting, LoH myself if needed, and then resurrect them after the fight. If I save them, and end up dying myself, it can often mean a wipe.

PvP

The first, and most frustrating thing is that as of now (pre Patch 3.2) Exorcism doesn't work in PvP. Not even against Minions. (It will be re-introduced in PvP in 3.2)

As for how I fight, it really depends on the situation:

Killing an enemy flag carrier:

• Hammer of Justice - Nothing slows a running flag like a 3-4 second stun
• Judgement of Justice - The next best thing (in our arsenal) is this. IT will slow the enemy down so he can be caught more easily.
• Consecration - Once the "dash" slows (if it does), I will cast this. It does slow damageto ANY enemy around.
• Auto-attack - when sitting on CD, (which is a LOT of the time) I simply keep swinging my sword.
• Repeat.

Protecting OUR flag carrier (me or someone else) - both are about the same

• Hand of Freedom - Put this on as soon as carrier gets close to enemies.
• DO NOT cast Divine Dhield. (at least on yourself, haven't tried it on others) If you cast it on yourself before you grab the flag, you won't be able to pick it up. If you cast it on yourself when you have the flag YOU WILL DROP IT!!! (not good)
• Divine Protection has worked fine for me (but only protects 50%)
• Cast Judgement of Justice (JoJ) and Hammer of Justice (HoJ) on any folks that get too close behind
• I will cast consecration as I run simply to injur the folks chasing me/us.
• Keep close to the Lay on Hands (LoH) to heal/save the carrier.
• If I'm the protector, and not the carrier, I will sometimes drop back a bit, and hit the chasers, trying to get a "Seal of Justice" proc that will stun the follower.

Grabbing the Flag (in their base)

• I usually drop from the blacony. I cast Hand of Freedom as I fall, I cast Gift of Naaru as I run (It's a "HoT" - heal over time) and after I grab it, I run like hell. I think Divine Protection works ok here.
• I keep my finger/mouse on the LoH button so tha twhen/if I get low on health I can make it a little further.

General PvP Fighting.

This is the toughest, and the most variable. I will HoJ stun ranged attackers (Mages, Warlocks and Hunters) and Rogues (and theire damnable stuns) Then, once I close the gap, I just Judge, Consecrate and auto-attack.

For Melee attackers, I will hold off on HoJ, and rely on JoJ to stun them. I TRY to wait on using the HoJ until I need to heal.

Always try to fight in a group. Save team mates as best you can, but if the odds are 3:1 or 4:1 against, better hold off, unless there's incoming help as well. Because chances are, as soon as you engage in a 1:2 or 2:3 engagement, THEY will get help, and you get to spend 25-30 seconds waiting to respawn...

Another One Bites the Dust: 11 Losses in a Row on Warsong Gulch

Seems like the story of my WoW life, at the moment...

(Sorry for the rambling here...I have a bunch of small things that tie in to my main thought, but are hardly worth their own post)

You would think that the random PUG nature of most Battleground (BG) fights would lead to a more random outcome. But, for whatever reason, the Horde always kicks out butt. While I'm not the best BG player on the world, I regularly end up in the mid to upper end of my team's score (with killing blows, honorable kills AND healing) Since I'm so "average", I doubt it's simply my being inept that is causing us to lose so much. The only thing I can say is that going up against teams of 3-5 Rogues, a couple Warlocks, Hunters and Druids seems to be a tough thing to beat.

The Rogues in particular cause my team (me) fits in most games. It seems to take 3 "normal" players to kill just one skilled Rogue. And if you have 2-3 skilled Rogues on the other team, (not to mention the REST of their team) it feels like you're playing short handed the entire match.

The "best" game recently was the last one. We actually had 2 flag caps (I GOT ONE MYSELF!!!) and had a fighting chance. In the end, the other guys just played better. This game was odd in that it wasn't a blow-out.

I'm not sure why wowarmory.com shows my current record as it does: 31 games on Warsong Gulch (WG) with 13 victories. Assuming the total number of games is correct, I've won 10 times: I have received a total of 51 Marks of Honor. I get 3 for each win, and 1 for each loss. If you do the algebra, that works out to 10 wins (which still feels better than I've done)

Anyhow, Balthazario is now a level 39 Paladin and should be at the "top of the heap" for the 30-39th level bracket. I am FAR from twinked at this level ( the only "NICE" piece of equipment I have is my shield:

Salbac Shield - A 1400 armor shield.

And as much as I would like to "twink out" and upgrade everything to the maximum so I could do better in WG, I have to save my money. At level 40 I get to use Plate Armor, which means that in another 20,000 EXP, every piece of armor I have will be way sub par.

The good news is that a couple pieces will be things I can make as a Blacksmith (plate helm and a couple mithril pieces) Blacksmithing for the win!!!

Also, on the topic of upgrading your armor & weapons: Scrolls of Enchanting are the bomb, if you can find the right one, for the right price. They are relatively new to the game, and they allow Enchanters to make an "Enchant to go". They don't have to buy armor/weapons, enchant them, and hope they guessed right.

You the buyer don't have to spend hours on the trade channel finding someonewith the recipie, etc to enchant the item you have. They simply put the enchant on a scroll, put it on the AH, and we the buyers, simply buy it and apply it to our item of interest. WIN-WIN!