WoW

Impatience

stargrace August 4, 2016 1Comment

Yesterday I decided that I’d  take my level 15 monk and run some LFG dungeons as a healer. I love healing in groups and raids and my character has lots of heirloom so at these levels it’s pretty simple. I don’t expect perfection from any group that I end up in – but it would sure make things a lot easier if people just had some patience. The first dungeon run I did went flawlessly. No problems, everyone followed the tank, smooth as could be. The second dungeon was a different story. We were in Wailing Caverns, and there was myself (monk healer), a tank (paladin), a hunter, rogue, and priest.

The hunter decided to take it upon themselves to tank and they ran every place that the actual tank was not. The actual tank didn’t know his way around the dungeon, so he was backtracking and just running where ever he wanted. Everyone else followed one of these other people but no one followed just one of them so the group was pretty split. I followed the tank.

As a healer this makes for an exceptionally stressful experience. I can’t heal anyone who isn’t in range. If you’re going to run and pull the entire dungeon (especially as a DPS class) and expect me to keep you alive – well, that’s just not going to happen. We managed through most of the dungeon without incident despite the mass pullings in all directions but eventually the hunter pulled one too many and they ended up dying.

I can’t resurrect in combat. My only option is to wait until we’re out of combat, and then cast it. The hunter had no patience for this and decided to leave the instance instead as soon as I told him that I couldn’t rez until after combat had ended. Since everyone kept pulling (and were finally in range) this put me in combat a lot. The tank then decided to run away from the rest of the group while we tried to trail after him and after another failed pull because people just couldn’t work together I decided to cut my losses and left the group.

I don’t like to leave groups, and like I said at the beginning I don’t expect perfection or even “good” game play. I don’t expect a new player to know the dungeons inside and out, and I don’t groan if someone can’t keep up optimal DPS. I will always complain if someone doesn’t have the patience to ensure their survival in a timely fashion. Don’t run away from your healers. It makes things difficult. Try to stick with your tanks. It makes things easier. Those types of tips are things people should keep in mind. If you’re new, unsure, or returning, just speak up. Yes, there are some less-than-kind people out there who may grief you if you speak up, but honestly you’ll find more understanding people than not.

I’ve done a LOT of pick up groups over the years so these types of situations don’t bother me long term and I was back to LFG later in the evening on my druid instead (until the DDoS stuff happened, but that’s a whole other post) where the runs went pretty well. My Dalaran characters are sitting in a comfortable spot. The deathknight is 60, druid is 27, warrior is 14, and monk is 18. I’m really hoping that some folks from Zero Commitment will be into dungeon runs this weekend, even if I have to tank them myself. We’ll see how that goes.

As always, happy gaming no matter where you find yourself!

Three Humans and a Night Elf

stargrace August 3, 2016 0Comment

Last weekend I decided to join up with friends on Dalaran, and I created four new characters (originally I created one). A human warrior, a human monk, a human deathknight, and a night elf druid. Why so many humans you may ask? Well, that reputation bonus that humans get is something I will always take advantage of if I can. Out of all of the racial bonuses the game offers, it’s the only one that I feel gives a significant advantage. There’s so many factions in game, and every little bit helps.

I created the deathknight so that I could farm lower level instances for transmog gear and sell them, earning myself a bit of coin. Little did I know that a billion other players would also be headed to the DK area. It was absolutely packed! It was so busy that trying to quest was a feat in itself. Thankfully you can tag other people’s mobs and still get credit, but I feel bad doing that because they also get reduced xp with that method. Since most of the experience you gain comes from quests and not from actual kills it’s not such a huge deal, but still something I don’t enjoy taking away from someone else.

Since my DK has lots of heirloom I managed to get almost 60 before leaving the starter zone. I really wish we could just skip that entire place, I’d rather level up some place else. There’s no option to skip it and you can’t leave until it’s done so you’re pretty much stuck there. A quick dungeon run and I should find myself at 60.

I haven’t decided who I’d like to focus on when it comes to this new server. Lets face it, I’m basically just wasting time until the 9th and then until Legion comes out. I’ll probably swap back over to my priest main during those other times, and group up cross-realm (hey, have I mentioned I dislike servers) through bnet. Speaking of, if you’re looking to add me, my bnet is: stargrace#1783 – I play both horde and alliance, and while I may not say a whole lot, I’m always eager to group up with friends!

Tired of Servers

stargrace August 2, 2016 4Comments

Almost nothing irks me more than not being able to play with my friends in any particular game on any particular day because we’re all spread out across different servers. I know, servers used to be (and perhaps still are) the ‘norm’ in video games – but honestly, I feel that a better way should be found. Sure, WoW has come leaps and bounds in allowing people to group together by faction so long as they’re on your bnet, and by server cluster, but it’s not enough.

The whole reason this comes up is because I’ve recently started playing on another new server in WoW so I can play with friends (ie: in their guild). I don’t want to have to pay to move my 0lder characters so the only option I really have is to start fresh. I’m currently playing on three servers and I REALLY want to just be playing on one.

It’s not completely unheard of, I mean EVE Online does well with their shard universe and there are a handful of other games out there that will let you transfer (for no cost) between servers at your discretion but older games (EQ, EQ2, I’m looking at you two) require you to stay put unless there are server merges or free transfers.

Of course this is all easy for me to say. I know if it were as simple as developing a new idea to keep people happy then it would probably already be implemented. Plus there’s revenue generated when someone pays to transfer. Still, I can’t help but wish things were a little different, and that when my friends gathered in their respective games I could play with them too without having to start all over once again.

Thoughts on Hunter Changes

stargrace July 28, 2016 2Comments

I try to keep my characters all on two realms, I have horde over on Area 52, and alliance over on Argent Dawn. After playing around with my alliance priest and getting raids done yesterday, I decided to swap over to my horde character and try out the hunter. First though I played with the shaman. Not a fan of the new melee changes. Then I played with my warlock, choosing demonology since that was the entire reason I created a warlock to begin with. Nope. Just not a fan. The class plays very “slow” at level 94, and I just wasn’t feeling it. I’ll have to take another day to try out the other warlock specs, it seems like Blizzard is really keen on people playing a brand new spec outside of their comfort zones. Not a bad thing per say, it’s just different. In fact so far none of my characters have kept their “main” specs from before the Legion Pre-Patch.

I knew things had changed for the hunter but I wanted to start off with a familiar spec, which was beastmaster. Right away I noticed that things were going to be different, my skill rotation consisted of four buttons along with a few temporary self buffs. It wasn’t a huge surprise since pretty much every single one of my class skills across the board have been compressed, but it did make for some pretty boring gameplay. I queued for the first four raids and spent most of my time waiting for focus to regenerate in between auto attacking while my pet did most of the work. My DPS was abysmal, around 13-15k with an ilevel of 670.

I’ve heard some fantastic things about both of the other specs for hunters, most of the positive comments coming from the survival line. I’ve never really been a melee player, I don’t have a rogue or any other class that gets right up there with the mobs, so I decided to try out marksmanship first. Based on a guide, one of the talents I took was “Lone Wolf” and this meant I’d get a nice 18% increase in DPS but it also meant I wouldn’t be using any pets.

Turns out, this is useful.

I was still a ranged class, but without a pet, and the rotation goes a lot faster. On multiple targets my DPS was easily over 70k – a HUGE difference between the BM spec I had chosen before. DPS dropped a bit for single targets, but it could have also been my rotation as I had set it up specifically for group encounters. The more I played this spec, the more I got used to the idea of being ranged without pets. It’s an odd feeling for a hunter, but not a completely inane one.

I still haven’t tried survival yet, that will be next on my list. I also had hopes of testing out the level 100 paladin that has been sorely neglected ever since I boosted the character, but I was just too dang tired, my eyes kept closing. That will be a project for another day. I still have a 91 deathknight, 91 monk, and the warlock sitting at 94 – I’m debating if I want to try to level those up before Legion releases, or if I should just be happy with the 5 characters I already have at 100. I have more than enough choices, really. I suppose we’ll just see how it goes.

Sure, I can be bribed to heal LFR

stargrace July 27, 2016 2Comments

I don’t belong to an active guild in WoW, having decided ages ago that instead of being kicked for inactivity (something that happened on a pretty frequent basis) I’d be better off in my own personal guild. I created it years ago, and I’ve been there ever since. I may have alts elsewhere, especially on other servers (my “main” server these days is Argent Dawn) but I still hold that personal guild quite close. Since I don’t belong to an active guild, getting things done outside of LFR or LFG is something I don’t often do. I know I could find a raid to go along with, or even apply just with one character and leave my other alts at home, but I haven’t felt especially comfortable getting back into that stuff. I’d love to play more with friends, but again due to my nature I always feel like I’m intruding, and I’d rather have someone approach me and invite me instead of inviting myself along, if that makes sense. Dang my passive nature.

One things I will admit right now that gets me into those LFR and LFG encounters is the savage satchel of cooperation. The goodie bags that show up every so often when a specific role is needed. I most often see these requirements for tanks, then healers, and every so often, dps. 90% of the time if I’m queued for a raid it’s because I’m going to get that extra satchel – and they’re incredibly handy.

While garrisons have been nerfed into oblivion when it comes to gold making, these satchels still reward over 500 gold for each one. Plus they’re filled with baleful gear (not class specific, you can mail them to alts and even across servers) the chance at an apex enhancement, and other random treats. It’s a fantastic way for my alts to gear up WITHOUT having to go through Tanaan Jungle (again). Is it wrong that I only feel the desire to queue when there’s an extra incentive in it for me? Well. Maybe if I was going to group with friends and required incentive, that would be a bit morally confusing for me, personally. In a LFG or LFR environment though I feel that these incentives are almost essential due to the nature and vitriol of a large portion of the community. In order to put up with these comments and the stress of grouping in a LFR environment, yes, I need a little extra incentive. With friends, not so much. They’re (hopefully) much more lenient.

Do these treat bags give you any incentive to queue up for dungeons and raids? If not, what would it take to get you into them? As always, let me know in comments below and happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself.