We Got a Long Way to Go, and a Short Time to Get There...

OK, so maybe time ISN'T so short but still...

I finally got around to getting my dual spec. Yay, I’m officially a tankadin as well as a retadin.

Ho-lee-crap! It is a major change of pace! Not that I’ve tanked with any groups or anything, but even sauntering up to the practice dummy is all kinds of different. Fighting PvE just amplifies it… Lots to learn and it’s not the kind of thing you want to try out for the first time in a PUG.

Let me ‘splain to those that haven’t made the dual plunge…

(The first part kinda just highlights the changes that ALL dual spec folks have to deal with, but the last half (or more?) gets into some very specific Ret versus Prot yabbering)

And here… we… go!

There are 3 big things that change when you get a different spec, to the point that you are essentially using a completely new character:

1 – Talents & Glyphs – in general, nothing you know about your old character will work. In most cases (unless you have a PvP version and a PvE version) you are talenting for a completely different game style. Just researching what tree and different talents is nuts! Look at my talent numbers above, and it’s clear there’s not much overlap.

2 – Gear – This may actually be the easiest part of the change: at least for the under-80 crowd. For a ret pally, you want strength, strength, strength, with some attack power, crit and a “dash of haste” (hey a pun…) For a tankadin (Protection spec) you want stamina, block, defense and THEN maybe strength. While I’m probably getting the exact order of importance wrong, the basic premise holds true – there is gear that is primarily Ret, and there is gear that is primarily Prot. It’s fairly easy to see the difference and grab what’s right. It can be expensive, time consumingh and space consuming (in your bags) but it’s not all that tough.

3 – Spell/ability rotation – YIKES!!!!! Here is where things get a bit hairy. First, the basic spells I use are a tad different, and the WAY they’re used is different. Hmmm… this point is gonna get long, so I’m going to break it out even further… But in general, all your spells, abilities and how you use them will be changed. Either they are unusuable, or are less effectual, AND you will usually get something completely new to learn how to use.

POINT THREE, BROKEN DOWN - Paladin Specific

Ok, for a Ret Pal, you use what is referred to as “FCFS”, which is “first come, first serve”. In practice, this means simply looking at your regular spells, and using the first one that comes off global cool down, and, if 2 or more do, picking the “best” one. Because the spell times, cooldowns and such are so all over the place, there's no real "best" rotation. The basics are:

Hammer of Wrath
Judgement (usually wisdom for me)
Crusader Strike
Divine Storm
Exorcism
Consecration

Just start casting them in that order, and recast the next one to become available. If two come off cooldown at the same time use the upper one.

Though to be honest, if it’s just me, or me & Kattastrophe, I will pull with Hand of Reckoning, and then Judge them when they get in range, THEN start the list as above. But then, knowing to do that little thing to maximize damage as the baddie runs towards you, is part of knowing your character.

I don’t have that comfort/knowledge with the Prot build yet.

In Prot, you actually DO have a spell rotation; the 9696969 (or the 696969696)

For me this is usually as follows (I got it from tankspot.com HERE )

Judgment
Hammer of the Righteous
Holy Shield
Shield of Righteousness
Exorcism
Hammer of the Righteous
Judgment
Shield of Righteousness
Holy Shield
Hammer of the Righteous
Exorcism
Shield of Righteousness

And repeat. Over & over, til death do us part.

(also I will try to pull using Ardent Defender – which can hit up to 3 targets. YAY!)

Here’s a Pinkraidframes vid of it in action:




Learning to use this, when to bend it, how to watch threat/agro on other members so they don’t get their face chewed off, etc is a BIG deal. Test dummies don’t help with that…

There are 2 good taunts that we can use:

Hand of Reckoning – which taunts and can do damage on a single target

Righteous Defense – which pulls up to 3 attackers of a raid/party member


Now, I know *how* to do them, but one thing I would LOVE to find, is something like healbot, but shows whenever team members are taking damage (when they shouldn’t be) so I could just click that bar/frame/whatever to taunt them off.

Is there such a thing?

Lastly, I’ve been running into one other possibly MAJOR issue when I try to play as my tank spec – I keep going out of mana. FAST.

Now, if I use Seal of Wisdom, and I Judge Wisdom, the problem takes longer to manifest, but is that REALLY the way it should work? I had always thought that Tankadins should Judge Light (for the health rejuv) and that Ret should be the one to Judge Wisdom.

Now, I usually hit this problem when fighting “trash”, and I *believe* that we should be getting mana back from our shield blocks, which doesn’t happen much against low level trash.

*shrug*

I know Consecrate is a mana hog, but given it's the only AoE we have, I can't think it's advisable to skip....

Any thoughts?

To All My Friends in Low Places

Most of us have alts. Who are they and why do we have them?

Well, here’s a “Rogues Gallery” of mine… at least the ones on my home server (I won’t bother with Balthazario, since I ramble on about him all the time)


Yeah, there are a couple toons up there that you won’t see pictured, simply because I pretty much never play them: Slikrx – my ”real” namesake – He’s a Tauren Hunter and Vexell, a Belf Warlock. Vexell is a name from 25 years ago, back when I played Dungeons & Dragons. Vexell (actually, I always called him Vex) was Half-elven fighter magic user (yes, I know, only full blood elves could multiclass – and his stats WERE elven, I just was being weird and liked him having some human blood)


The rest of my tunes have plain odd/goofy names. There’s no history to them, and I don’t identify with them at all. They are, at most, Balthazario’s “friends” and of ill-repute at that..

Good old Wysywyg. (pronounced “whiz –ee- wig”) It’s a mis-spelling of the acronym “wysiwyg”: “what you see is what you get”. Back when the Macintosh first came out, and Claris released “Word”, it was the first wysiwyg word processing program to see common use. The text you saw on your moniter, was pretty much what you saw when you printed it out.

He’s a Dwarf and a Warrior; what you see, is what you get. He’s a skinner and an engineer. I don’t think I have put ANY talents for him yet. I am not a fan of the rage mechanic (it works well enough, I just prefer mana) I made him so I could level an engineer. Sword & board is relatively easy to do, and I didn’t want another paladin, so Warrior was the choice. He’s only level 31, so he has a pretty long way to go.

And here’s Bigmistake, a level 25 Druid, speaker of Druish, from Druidia (funny, he doesn't LOOK druish - thank you Mel Brooks). I wanted to make an enchanter, so I made another toon. I like the mana aspect of casters, but I also like the ability to go into the melee and bang around. So I went with a Druid. The name came about because I didn’t think I’ll really enjoy playing a druid. (it's actualy OK, just a HUGE change from a pally) Why a Nelf? Not sure I can remember. Probably so that his first mount could be the big Cat.

Later I realized I wanted a pretty much dedicated bank toon. Because of this, I started a Human, so the trip to Stormwind would be quick & easy. The name Bernimmadof is, of course, a nod to the criminal Bernard “Bernie” Madoff that had one of the largest Ponzi Schemes the world has seen. SO of course, Bernie had to be a rogue (aka thief, to my D&D heritage) The personal guild I started for her is (obviously) called Ponzi Scheme. Why a female? Because if I had to watch that goofy ass human running style, it could NOT be a dude running. There’s just something off-putting watching this burly avatar with massive muscles and deadly weapons, just flouncing around on the screen. So it's a girl.

Just recently I started her off doing a bit of jewelcrafting. Kattastrophe has a JC alt, but eh, why not…

Most recently, I decided that I hadn’t seen a couple aspects of the game and the alliance. Namely, the brief history of the Gnomes, and I had not played a mage. So I created a Gnome mage. (and you can also thank Gnomeageddon for some influence here) And of course, I had to come up with an appropriate name, so I came up with my take on “ignominy”: Ignomeminy. (pronounced ignominy) I may have him do alchemy, though I’m not sure…

I will do more leveling for these guys, but most likely it won’t happen until Balthazario can buy some Heirloom gear.

Raid for the Cure - no silly song title here

If you've read BigBearButt's blog HERE, Gnomeageddon's Blog HERE, or Catryalini's blog HERE, or any of a TON of other blogs, you may have heard about an "All Faction Road Race" across Azeroth. It's a massive get-together, show of support and fund raiser for Susan G. Komen for the Cure charity for breast cancer.

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Bring a character of your choice (race, level, etc is all open) to the and take part in a walk across azeroth. BigBearButt's blog has all the relevant details.

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Here's a brief summary:

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Where - Kael'thas realm. US

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Alliance Where - Starting in Shadowglen (Night elf starting area) going on through Darnassus, Auberdine, Astranaar and meeting the Horde at the Crossroads

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Horde Where - Camp Narache (Mulgore - Tauren starting area) and then following the road to Crossroads

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BOTH factions - From Crossroads on to Ratchet, then on to Booty Bay for a party.

When - Saturday, November 14th. Starting in each faction area about 2 pm central time (a bit later for the Horde, since they are closer to Crossroads)

For more info, including donation information, please visit:

http://thebigbearbutt.com/2009/11/02/announcement-world-of-warcraft-raid-for-the-cure/

SEE YOU THERE, IN THE PINK!

What's Goin' on... The Auction House is Actin' weird....

As I've been grinding through some quest lines and working on some rep, I've ended up collecting a fair number of semi-valuable green items. Some worth (theoretically) 60-80 gold, or occasionally more.

And on a few occasions, I've ventured into the AH to buy something.

But something strange is going on: no one has been buying my stuff (even after discounting it to only a bit above vendor price) and I'm having troubles finding anything *I* want to buy either. What gives?

The end result is that I've been vendoring a HUGE amount of stuff (I can disenchant lower level stuff, but I'm starting to get quite the supply of soul dust, dream dust, etc) Yes, I save on the AH fee, or paying a posting fee every time it falls off, but it still has me bugged.

Does this happen often on other servers or at certain times of the year?

It kinda sucks if you're trying to make some profit from your farming, and it's also frustrating when you want to buy a nice piece of kit (like a nice tanking weapon) and there's just nothing really there.

I've only been playing since May-ish, so maybe I just haven't seen that many cycles in the game, but it has me puzzled. I could "understand" it, if the Cataclysim expansion pack were about to come out, or something similarly HUGE, but even if the Icecrown update/patch were to come out tomorrow, I doubt it would have THAT much of an effect.

*shrug*

What say you?

I Can't Get no Satisfaction: I Just Suck in BGs...

Ding Dong the Witch aint dead...

I don't know what that incessant ringing is during raids & BGs is caused by, but for me, it's a signal of FAIL. Whenever the enemy is ringing that bell, my DPS (effective) for that fight drops to about zero. (I don't watch Recount, but I *do* watch the health bar - and it isn't moving!)

Stuns/interrupts don't seem to do anything (and it doesn't help that I have no clue who's doing it)

*sigh*

*deep breath*

People gripe that Ret Pallies are "faceroll easy" and "impossible to kill".

They must REALLY suck. Especially if they are part of a group. Kiting, stuns, traps, blinks, fears are essentially impossible for a Retpal do get out of. Yeah, I can blow a trinket, or Hand of Freedom, but most classes have more stuns than we have ways to break them.

Throw in that damnable ringing bell, and even with bubbles and all my long cool downs (my CDs) and I'm still dead in 14 - 16 seconds.

And while I may be less than skilled at PvP, I *NEVER* see a paladin in the top spots for killing blows, damage, honor or anything else.

What *do* i see at the top of the aggressive side (as opposed to healers)?

Warlocks
Hunters
Rogues
Shaman (pretty rate, though)
The occasional Warrior

*huff*

My games in Arathi Basin last night were PAINful. My general tactic is to go where the Horde isn't. Slogging it out, 8 v 8 isn't really a way to win the game. And if 8 folks are in one place, it means they aren't elsewhere, so off I go.

And get overwhelmed 1 v 4, 1 v 6 or something equally lopsided.

I'm not sure if its people respawing where I go, but 1 person explodes into 3 - 6 with amazing quickness. the only goodness is that, on occasion, I can keep a large group occupied with trying to kill me, so they aren't trying to kill my team mates. I die, so they may live. I'm generous like that. *cough*sucks*cough*

OK, done ranting about that.

Because Recount was MIA during my BG work, I can't say what sort of things were going on. I know I was near the bottom of the list, both combined and Alliance alone. But, I learned a few things:

If I keyboard turn, I have trouble casting/attacking. My fingers miss their mark, and I end up button mashing or looking down at the keyboard. NOTeffective.

If I mouse turn, I can't pick targets effectively. ([TAB] rarely picks who I want to kill) That's less than ideal, but at least I am efficiently attacking a target, albeit the wrong one.

For better or worse, my first games on PC were all first person shooters (FPSs), so keyboard turning/moving and mouse aiming is deeply ingrained in me.

Incapatacitations (repentance, sap) are nearly worthless for anything other than interrupts. UNLESS you are on a well organized team. In that case, they are super deadly. I don't think anyone I "Repented" lasted more than 0.5 seconds before someone ran up and kit them.

All that added armor & health really DOES improve survivability. Just not enough lol

The Horde on our server seem to be better at being where they need to be. When I attempt to pick up a straggler, 1 v 1, within 5 seconds or so, it ends up 1 v 3 or worse. And lets be honest, if I have 3, 4, or more guys attacking me, it's suicide for any one or two Ally guys to try to help.

I can "feel" the difference in healing with my "tanky" armor set. The loss of Haste is noticable.

Now, if I can only get myself to play the game, and try to learn without getting unbelievably frustrated, I might get better. But I doubt that'll happen any time soon.

And what the hell IS that damned ringing bell?

Do You Believe in Magic, A Young Girl's Heart, and the Benefits of Good equipment?

(new vs old helm comparison)

Looking at the picture above, it may be obvious that this will be a bit of a numbers slog… but it won’t be THAT bad… I promise. Now, as for the amount of senseless back story & explanation, well, I make no promises there…

A while back, I mentioned both here in my blog, as well as comments I’ve made in other folks’ blogs, that I want to look at making Tank as my off spec, AND that I thought it would be interesting to try a BG or 2, with me simply working on healing as much as possible.

Without going dual spec with the protection tree, all I can do is get a second set of armor. Per commenter Sarge , the Cobalt set (not the spiked Cobalt, mind you) you can make a decent set of Tanking gear. So with this in mind, I ventured around Azeroth doing Smithing and stuff. I made the gloves, shoulders, helm and legs. I didn’t equip them, but stored them, and didn’t think about them for a bit.

Saturday night, I went into Alterac Valley (AV) with the intent of just healing, and fighting when needed. The results were surprising:

I was 6th overall (Horde & Alliance) in whatever order is “Default”
I was the Alliance member with the most honor (507)
7th overall in Killing blows
3rd overall in healing (I had 130,000, Kattastrophe had 300,000) Mine included 2 potions and 1 Lay on Hands. I couldn’t tell for sure, but 2/3 – 3/4 of my healing was done on others.

(sorry, I was too busy reading to think to take a screen cap or 5)

I found out the hard way that “heads up healing” (using the friendly bars, and no heal-bot or anything) is a MAJOR pain in the ass, when you have 20+ people in small areas. The health bars just jump around too much. Also, with limited Haste, and no real healing talents, it’s a challenge to get the heals onto the folks in need, fast enough.

AV worked well, since there are enough targets for me to heal, and I’m not likely to stand out as a target myself.

I tried it in Arathi Basin (AB) with horrid results. Even without the healing part, it was just a dismal showing by the alliance. I rarely even had the chance to play healer; I was too busy fighting and dieing.

So is healing an option for a ret pal? In a pinch, definitely. No way in hell could I fill the role of raid healer, let alone tank healer, but if a Boss fight were winding down, and the proverbial shit hit the fan, I could easily fill in a few gaps.

I have a point to this, I PROMISE, so please bear with me…
AAAAAnyhow… I then had my equipment failure (it’s an equipment failure, I tell you! A fishing pole does not a sword make!) I did a bit more smithing to level up enough to make a replacement 2H Sword; Forged Cobalt Claymore.

It was at this point I realized I could TOTALLY make this bitchin’ shield, the Saronite Defender. I had the needed Saronite, and I had the needed Cobalt. BLAMMO! Kickass shield. And an additional Smithing skill point.

Just pretend I’m James Burke, and this is “Connections”. There’s a point to all this, and I’m nearly there…

So, in a fit of boredom mixed with a tad of wanting to get richer, I made another foray into Wintergrasp to fish & mine. There were only a few minutes left until the next fight started, so I decided to skip the fishing and just run around looking for ore. I did manage to find a couple before the next fight started, and then

LOADING SCREEN

And I was ported out of the fight (I’m too low level AND I hadn’t queued up) I was on a ridge overlooking Wintergrasp, with one of the walls of Icecrown crowding over me. I couldn’t go into Wintergrasp, because I would get-

LOADING SCREEN

-Teleported back out.

I had used my hearth stone a short while before when something similar happened, so that left two options:

1 – sit and wait 20 minutes for my Hearth Stone CD.
2 – try to find my way out via Icecrown.

Remember, I’m level 74, so I can’t fly out, and the ridges here/there are jagged enough that you can’t travel on them. Also, I’m too easily bored to sight tight, so I chose…

ICECROWN!

I make it down off the wall, into the basin area, and get harassed by a few mobs, but I’m able to avoid fighting until I reach this door with (Leaving Corp’Rethar) and there are these four Abominations guarding the door.

I grabbed my 1H sword, shield, did my full buffing (food buff, potion, scroll) and waded into the fray. I only pulled one, and slowly killed him. I moved forward, started slowly killing the 2nd, when the first one respawned.

Oh, boy….

I grind them down and kill the second one, while dealing with the “third” one as well. I alternate Judge light (for health) and Judge Wisdom (for mana). While it’s tough going, I’m actually not doing badly. Especially when you consider they are 6 levels over me (which means I’m doing less than 350 DPS) I’m whittling them down, but it’s a slow crawl to zero mana and zero health. But, it looks like I’ll make it. Especially after bubbling and quaffing a mana pot (potion).

Here’s where I did a dummy: I didn’t keep going and walk far enough out of the doorway. And this means? You guessed it: the first (second?) abomination respawned and aggroed.

I was almost OOM (out of mana) and was dang low on health, so I just waited for the inevitable and died.

The good news was that, by now, my Hearthstone had come off cooldown, so I just hearthed back.

So what does all this drivel and long, meandering story have to do with anything? Well, as I said, I had also considered getting a tank spec, and with just how long I lasted against several over level mobs, I think it’s high time I actually put my money (and equipment) where my mouth is and “do it”:

(TANK)

Below are the character shots of me in both sets of equipment. I have Retribution Aura on with the 2H sword, and Devotion Aura (extra armor) with the Sword & board equipped. No other buffs, spells or anything were used.

Something I didn’t capture is that my DPS (melee) is about 295 DPSwith the 2H set, and drops to 245 DPS with the Sword & board. A ~20% drop in Melee DPS. But melee usually only accounts for 25-35% of my total DPS, which is what… a net 7% DPS drop overall? For a “DPS race” type instance/boss (most of them), that could be VERY important, but the overall survivability is through the roof. (ie, I would need less healing, even if I screw up)

I need to hit the test dummies and see how big of a difference this works out to be...

As the little summary below shows, MAN what a difference a few items can make. I *REALLY* need to take the tank set into a BG. The armor won’t make THAT big of a deal against casters, but I should be a not-so-holy nightmare for other melee classes…

One other thing though: the “tank” equipment lacks haste, so that the slooooow healing will be even slower.

So what does all this mean?


Regardless of skill, playstyle, or level, just tinker around. See for yourself what does and does not work.

One Tin Soldier Rides Away... Missing Something...

And LO! Our brave adventurer, with keen blade and impenetrable armor sallies forth to...

What's that you say? I've got a fishing pole?

OH!, hold on and let me equip...

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...

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AAAAAAAARRRRRRRRGGGGGGGHHHHH!

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It happened to me, oh, about once a month a while back... but pretty rarely now:

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I go fishing and catch a bunch of fish. I have my fishing pole equipped (I'm wearing my fishing hat too, but I don't show helms, because the look pretty retarded) I mail off the ones I want to keep, and vendor the trash.

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And then, when I'm done, I equip my sword & helm.

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While still at the vendor.

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Without closing the vendor window...

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OK.

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And, like last night, I usually notice when "Hey, why can't I crusader Strike or Divine Strorm?!?!?" I then proceed back to the nearest vendor and buy my stuff back.

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And thus it should have been last night. I didn't log off or anything. BUT I did go afk (while flying) and I DID port from Dalaran to Darnassus.

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Evidently, one of those actions "emptied" the vendor buy back window, and I am now stuck trying to kill things with a +25 fishing pole.

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*sigh*

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[edit - blogspot is REALLY ticking me off: For whatevern reason, it won't realize I have hit [carriage return] and forces me to use periods to seperate my "paragraphs... *growl* ]