Bruny is finally level 85! I accomplished a simple goal that accompanied my angry little warrior's levelling progress, and that was to fully do the Deepholm quests and get noticed by Therazane. Upon finally defeating Lorthuna I was sitting at level 84, 90% to ding or about 1M experience to go. I finished it off by doing the first few quests of Uldum, which also opened up the Uldum portal to boot.
Now that I am 85, I have "so much" opened to me. Regular heroics, HoT faceroll heroics, T11 and T12 raids, LFR just around the corner, and many transmog soloing runs. My intention now is to run enough regular heroics until I have acquired enough JP to buy one new piece of gear, and hopefully by then I would have picked up enough upgrades along the way to not suck in the HoT heroics. It'd be really nice to see fights that last more than 30 seconds to fully test out the potential of Fury dps!
I shall report back, not that anyone cares!
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Monday, January 30, 2012
Finally a New Look!
And...Ta-da! As I have promised many many months ago to renew my banner ..it is done!
*Bow down before my amazing MS Paint skills*
You are now graced with the images of Truny, Turby, and Turny from left to right in all of their current glory. Oh no reader, each of their appearances has a special meaning behind them!
*Makes some shit up real fast*
Truny: Ahh my long forgotten Warlock, my favourite all the way up until the adolescence of T11. You can see her donning her famous every-warlock-wears-this-crap tier with her current T13 tentacle face helm, which I adore. She is backed by the Dark Portal itself, as I thought to myself what is the most demony thing I could think of (and it was close to the city portals...)
Turby + Puppy: Turby and Puppy are models for nostalgia. Turby poses in his transmogged noob gear with his very first and oldest Devilsaur and he dons his invisible "Explorer" title. Puppy has tanked the Lich King amongst other heroic and suicidal jiggery (yes, that is a word though I'm probably using it in the wrong context bahaha).
Turny: Turny is my famous Restless Tree and he is ANGRY. He has donned his Tree of Life form and, while standing strong atop the World Tree roars across the cosmos in a furious rage lined with the tiniest bit of sadness that his form only lasts for 30 seconds.
There Shall be a Fourth
I have two toons vying for the spot of "Fourth Main" right now and that is my warrior or deathknight. As I say time and time and time again, melee are silly, but I have had great fun blood tanking and also tanking in general. In terms of DPSing, Fury seems a bit more on the ret side of whack-a-mole proccy than the button spammy frost DKS...so we shall see. And also it boils down to who looks better in transmog.
Truny the New Look Same BS
*Bow down before my amazing MS Paint skills*
You are now graced with the images of Truny, Turby, and Turny from left to right in all of their current glory. Oh no reader, each of their appearances has a special meaning behind them!
*Makes some shit up real fast*
Truny: Ahh my long forgotten Warlock, my favourite all the way up until the adolescence of T11. You can see her donning her famous every-warlock-wears-this-crap tier with her current T13 tentacle face helm, which I adore. She is backed by the Dark Portal itself, as I thought to myself what is the most demony thing I could think of (and it was close to the city portals...)
Turby + Puppy: Turby and Puppy are models for nostalgia. Turby poses in his transmogged noob gear with his very first and oldest Devilsaur and he dons his invisible "Explorer" title. Puppy has tanked the Lich King amongst other heroic and suicidal jiggery (yes, that is a word though I'm probably using it in the wrong context bahaha).
Turny: Turny is my famous Restless Tree and he is ANGRY. He has donned his Tree of Life form and, while standing strong atop the World Tree roars across the cosmos in a furious rage lined with the tiniest bit of sadness that his form only lasts for 30 seconds.
There Shall be a Fourth
I have two toons vying for the spot of "Fourth Main" right now and that is my warrior or deathknight. As I say time and time and time again, melee are silly, but I have had great fun blood tanking and also tanking in general. In terms of DPSing, Fury seems a bit more on the ret side of whack-a-mole proccy than the button spammy frost DKS...so we shall see. And also it boils down to who looks better in transmog.
Truny the New Look Same BS
Friday, January 27, 2012
Wtf Jedoga?
So this morning I walked into my kitchen to pack my breakfast and lunch for work and all of a sudden out of nowhere I heard:
"These are SACRED halls!"
Jedoga Shadowseeker, wtf are you doing in my kitchen??
"These are SACRED halls!"
Jedoga Shadowseeker, wtf are you doing in my kitchen??
Thursday, January 26, 2012
LFR Progress - Collect ALL The Loot!
How many weeks has patch 4.3 been out? About ten? LFR was and is all about accessible raiding and oh boy did all my alts feel the love, especially my healers!
I shall reiterate here that LFR works great with my broken schedule and our guild's once a week raid times (and one session of "real" stuff a week is good enough for me).
I'm going to take a look at each of my toons and see:
1. How many LFR bosses they have downed. (# In boss order)
2. How much loot they have hoarded into their greedy greedy vaults.
Turby - Hunter
1. (5,6,5,5,7,6,6,6) for a total of 46. Poor Ultraxion.
2. Helm, Chest, Gloves, Legs, Trinket, Kiril, Vishanka
Can't complain here, I'm pretty much "done" the game save for our regular DS runs.
Truny - Warlock
1. (5,5,5,5,4,3,3,5) for a total of 35.
2. Helm, Shoulders, Gloves, Legs, Trinket, Bracers
Still need to get super lucky with a weapon drop! And perhaps finishing off the T13 4P!
Turny - Druid
1. (5,4,7,8,3,3,4,4) for a total of 38. I stopped queueing for DW cause I have all the weapons. And I tend to queue for Hagara for easy VP.
2. Helm, Gloves, Heal Trinket, Ti'tahk, Maw of the Dragonlord
Since I have both the cool weapons useable by my druid I have stopped queueing into LFR despite not having any tier gear. My reasoning is that the druid T4 bonus is kinda crappy. The extended hots are kinda nice but our heals USED to last even longer anyways. Though the quick queues are super awesome and this is a great "live" training dummy to practise boomkining.
Klupty - DK
1. (2,2,2,2,2,2,3,5) for a total of 20.
2. DPS Bracers. (Leg tier given away, Soulsipper given away).
Can you tell I dont like playing my DK but I like playing it at the same time? It's totally not worth having to play melee and I have yet to win Soulsipper/Gurthalak after that one miracle win. Klupty tends to have horrible luck, and he tends to be in the LFR Law groups where the afk people win everything (which doesn't matter on my other toons cause being ranged is FUN!) I have also decided to level a Fury warrior, which I find more fun than frost to go crazy on Melee weapons.
Truby - Paladin
1. (1,1,1,1,2,2,2,2) for a total of 12.
2. Shoulders, Str Trinket, Dps Ring
Not bad for having only been there about 1.5 times. I'm still stuck as Ret, too lazy to respec to holy, but blah I already have a druid heals. Watch, if I queue in again I'll end up winning stuff that I don't even want to use (then why roll need??)
Husbrus - Priest
1. (1,1,2,3,0,0,0,2) for a total of 9.
2. Robe, Heal Trinket (Ti'tahk given away)
Screw my priest, druid heals RULES! *Explosion of glitter and rainbows*
Grand Total
1. 160 Boss Kills or 20 full raid runs!
2. 24 item drops or a 15% success rate!
This compared to my 12 total boss kills in regular DS and 0 drops and a couple epic gems and some green gems. See the difference?
So in conclusion, druids rule!!
I shall reiterate here that LFR works great with my broken schedule and our guild's once a week raid times (and one session of "real" stuff a week is good enough for me).
I'm going to take a look at each of my toons and see:
1. How many LFR bosses they have downed. (# In boss order)
2. How much loot they have hoarded into their greedy greedy vaults.
Turby - Hunter
1. (5,6,5,5,7,6,6,6) for a total of 46. Poor Ultraxion.
2. Helm, Chest, Gloves, Legs, Trinket, Kiril, Vishanka
Can't complain here, I'm pretty much "done" the game save for our regular DS runs.
Truny - Warlock
1. (5,5,5,5,4,3,3,5) for a total of 35.
2. Helm, Shoulders, Gloves, Legs, Trinket, Bracers
Still need to get super lucky with a weapon drop! And perhaps finishing off the T13 4P!
Turny - Druid
1. (5,4,7,8,3,3,4,4) for a total of 38. I stopped queueing for DW cause I have all the weapons. And I tend to queue for Hagara for easy VP.
2. Helm, Gloves, Heal Trinket, Ti'tahk, Maw of the Dragonlord
Since I have both the cool weapons useable by my druid I have stopped queueing into LFR despite not having any tier gear. My reasoning is that the druid T4 bonus is kinda crappy. The extended hots are kinda nice but our heals USED to last even longer anyways. Though the quick queues are super awesome and this is a great "live" training dummy to practise boomkining.
Klupty - DK
1. (2,2,2,2,2,2,3,5) for a total of 20.
2. DPS Bracers. (Leg tier given away, Soulsipper given away).
Can you tell I dont like playing my DK but I like playing it at the same time? It's totally not worth having to play melee and I have yet to win Soulsipper/Gurthalak after that one miracle win. Klupty tends to have horrible luck, and he tends to be in the LFR Law groups where the afk people win everything (which doesn't matter on my other toons cause being ranged is FUN!) I have also decided to level a Fury warrior, which I find more fun than frost to go crazy on Melee weapons.
Truby - Paladin
1. (1,1,1,1,2,2,2,2) for a total of 12.
2. Shoulders, Str Trinket, Dps Ring
Not bad for having only been there about 1.5 times. I'm still stuck as Ret, too lazy to respec to holy, but blah I already have a druid heals. Watch, if I queue in again I'll end up winning stuff that I don't even want to use (then why roll need??)
Husbrus - Priest
1. (1,1,2,3,0,0,0,2) for a total of 9.
2. Robe, Heal Trinket (Ti'tahk given away)
Screw my priest, druid heals RULES! *Explosion of glitter and rainbows*
Grand Total
1. 160 Boss Kills or 20 full raid runs!
2. 24 item drops or a 15% success rate!
This compared to my 12 total boss kills in regular DS and 0 drops and a couple epic gems and some green gems. See the difference?
So in conclusion, druids rule!!
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Gaming Within Our Means: The Loot Roll System
On upgrades and progression, on the need/greed loot system, and about entitlement and what meaning we find in each of these terms.
The need/greed system is fairly common in MMOs and it presents itself as the ideal channel to distribute loot amongst group members. Say a Tanking Shield of Tank Only Tanking drops, and what happens is a loot window pops up on everyone's screen and they can either need the item, greed the item, or pass, with need being the highest priority.
This is where I would like to stop time itself and analyze the situation further in a multi-layered multi-faceted abstract.
The Loot Itself
The shield. Currently only the tank can use it in his main spec so technically he should be the only one to "need it. Ok
Need vs Greed
Now we come to the little roll window. I don't actually like the way need/greed works, I would rather take the current LFR loot rules a step further and that is by keeping the class restrictions on gear, keeping the roll bonus, but also removing the concept of "needing or greeding".
In real life, how often do we actually "need" anything other than the very very basics of food, clothing, shelter, and perhaps a stable income and the ability to maintain all this? Do we really need to buy an $80,000 car over a $50,000 car? It's all for show. I have taken on the stance of living BELOW my means as a stance against the rampant consumerism and dwindling of real values.
Anyhow, in game, do we really NEED an extra 0.75% mitigation? Will it make or break an encounter that is no longer designed to punish one who is not completely min/maxed? So no, the tank probably doesn't NEED the extra 2% reduction in damage and 1% block chance. It makes the healer's life easier but when was the last time you ran out of mana save for the accidental pull of 4 difficult trash mobs and a boss? Our reliance on gear is pretty much coded into the game, until we reach the absolute threshold of not being able to tank/dps/heal through the content is probably when we "need" an upgrade.
Completing tier sets is also not an argument, you were doing fine with your 3P T13, but do you NEED to have 4P? It would be very very very nice to have a 4P bonus (for most classes anyways), but your life doesn't absolutely depend on the fact that you have an internal bloodlust or your Soulburn finally gets some use (though with that being a class fix coded into gear...that's another story).
So back to the need/greed system. I say we change it to a "roll/pass" mechanic (I've seen this somewhere, don't remember where, was it Lotro?) and the game internally does all of the class restrictions and role bonuses in the background. Everyone can "roll", but if a hunter rolls on a BOP shield the game will secretly put their roll to 0. Over time, people will realize that only certain classes tend to win certain items. We get to retain our "entitlement" that is being able to roll but the "Gods of Fairness", aka smart coding makes sure the right people get the right items. If everyone defaults to nil, then a random person will get it for vendor trash.
Progression
Having said all that, this is still a game and a game without progression isn't that much fun. Imagine having to quest through Vash'jir because your ilvl 264 gear was "good enough". Receiving an upgrade feels good, your character "progresses" in the shallowest of sense; your throughput goes up by 1% and it feels nice. This answers the argument of "casuals don't need raid gear to do dailies", well you probably don't really need to maximize every single slot that you have for raiding (unless if you are perhaps doing heroic modes on the SECOND week of release).
Another facet of progression could be how higher level gear tends to look better than quest greens. I believe this scenario is exacerbated in the Northrend levelling scene. Remember what you would look like as a fresh level 80? You would have an SM cowl, a wooden club, metal if you are lucky and every other slot was some sort of drab dull brown. Transmog did a great job in solving this, as can be seen with my warrior changing his quest green sword into an epic Ulduar sword of cosmic goodness.
Have you ever been in the situation where an "upgrade" drops but it looks like it could be 1% better or worse than your current item and you are sitting there doing internal calculations of int vs crit over the lost mastery which is 0.5% of your spellpower, but if you cast 0.04% faster with an additional 15 int then your total throughput could potentially go up by 0.7% in a standalone fight then you think of high movement fights and so on and so forth? And all this time you are not sure if you "need" the trinket or not, most likely you don't need it as it won't astronomically propel your performance into the cosmos, but what if there was just a roll option, if you win then good, if not, then too bad so sad. This is the type of situation I am talking about, where we don't really NEED something and pressing the "need" button is the only way to obtain said item to test it out despite the lack of actual need.
What Will Come of LFR
The current loot-mania going on in LFR is a double edged spell dagger. The class restrictions and bonuses inhibit people from stealing gear and let's them roll "need" on anything that they can. This could potentially get people used to the "just roll" aspect of what I propose, or it might groom people to feel entitled to everything because they can simply click need on everything that's available and walk away without considering the group and their fellow raider's own gear progression. We've seen people rolling on items, taking them hostage for future trade collateral, but we've also seen people winning gear and passing it on to more deserving folk...who probably don't actually "need" the gear (but upgrades are fun). Just saying.
So next time you click need on something, think of it as not a "need" button but a "First World Problem: I would like this item to progress my character for the name of fun" button. Then trade it to someone who wants it even more than you because you, as a wizard, should know better.
Truny the Needful
The need/greed system is fairly common in MMOs and it presents itself as the ideal channel to distribute loot amongst group members. Say a Tanking Shield of Tank Only Tanking drops, and what happens is a loot window pops up on everyone's screen and they can either need the item, greed the item, or pass, with need being the highest priority.
This is where I would like to stop time itself and analyze the situation further in a multi-layered multi-faceted abstract.
The Loot Itself
The shield. Currently only the tank can use it in his main spec so technically he should be the only one to "need it. Ok
Need vs Greed
Now we come to the little roll window. I don't actually like the way need/greed works, I would rather take the current LFR loot rules a step further and that is by keeping the class restrictions on gear, keeping the roll bonus, but also removing the concept of "needing or greeding".
In real life, how often do we actually "need" anything other than the very very basics of food, clothing, shelter, and perhaps a stable income and the ability to maintain all this? Do we really need to buy an $80,000 car over a $50,000 car? It's all for show. I have taken on the stance of living BELOW my means as a stance against the rampant consumerism and dwindling of real values.
Anyhow, in game, do we really NEED an extra 0.75% mitigation? Will it make or break an encounter that is no longer designed to punish one who is not completely min/maxed? So no, the tank probably doesn't NEED the extra 2% reduction in damage and 1% block chance. It makes the healer's life easier but when was the last time you ran out of mana save for the accidental pull of 4 difficult trash mobs and a boss? Our reliance on gear is pretty much coded into the game, until we reach the absolute threshold of not being able to tank/dps/heal through the content is probably when we "need" an upgrade.
Completing tier sets is also not an argument, you were doing fine with your 3P T13, but do you NEED to have 4P? It would be very very very nice to have a 4P bonus (for most classes anyways), but your life doesn't absolutely depend on the fact that you have an internal bloodlust or your Soulburn finally gets some use (though with that being a class fix coded into gear...that's another story).
So back to the need/greed system. I say we change it to a "roll/pass" mechanic (I've seen this somewhere, don't remember where, was it Lotro?) and the game internally does all of the class restrictions and role bonuses in the background. Everyone can "roll", but if a hunter rolls on a BOP shield the game will secretly put their roll to 0. Over time, people will realize that only certain classes tend to win certain items. We get to retain our "entitlement" that is being able to roll but the "Gods of Fairness", aka smart coding makes sure the right people get the right items. If everyone defaults to nil, then a random person will get it for vendor trash.
Progression
Having said all that, this is still a game and a game without progression isn't that much fun. Imagine having to quest through Vash'jir because your ilvl 264 gear was "good enough". Receiving an upgrade feels good, your character "progresses" in the shallowest of sense; your throughput goes up by 1% and it feels nice. This answers the argument of "casuals don't need raid gear to do dailies", well you probably don't really need to maximize every single slot that you have for raiding (unless if you are perhaps doing heroic modes on the SECOND week of release).
Another facet of progression could be how higher level gear tends to look better than quest greens. I believe this scenario is exacerbated in the Northrend levelling scene. Remember what you would look like as a fresh level 80? You would have an SM cowl, a wooden club, metal if you are lucky and every other slot was some sort of drab dull brown. Transmog did a great job in solving this, as can be seen with my warrior changing his quest green sword into an epic Ulduar sword of cosmic goodness.
Have you ever been in the situation where an "upgrade" drops but it looks like it could be 1% better or worse than your current item and you are sitting there doing internal calculations of int vs crit over the lost mastery which is 0.5% of your spellpower, but if you cast 0.04% faster with an additional 15 int then your total throughput could potentially go up by 0.7% in a standalone fight then you think of high movement fights and so on and so forth? And all this time you are not sure if you "need" the trinket or not, most likely you don't need it as it won't astronomically propel your performance into the cosmos, but what if there was just a roll option, if you win then good, if not, then too bad so sad. This is the type of situation I am talking about, where we don't really NEED something and pressing the "need" button is the only way to obtain said item to test it out despite the lack of actual need.
What Will Come of LFR
The current loot-mania going on in LFR is a double edged spell dagger. The class restrictions and bonuses inhibit people from stealing gear and let's them roll "need" on anything that they can. This could potentially get people used to the "just roll" aspect of what I propose, or it might groom people to feel entitled to everything because they can simply click need on everything that's available and walk away without considering the group and their fellow raider's own gear progression. We've seen people rolling on items, taking them hostage for future trade collateral, but we've also seen people winning gear and passing it on to more deserving folk...who probably don't actually "need" the gear (but upgrades are fun). Just saying.
So next time you click need on something, think of it as not a "need" button but a "First World Problem: I would like this item to progress my character for the name of fun" button. Then trade it to someone who wants it even more than you because you, as a wizard, should know better.
Truny the Needful
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