Ossi Down!

A pretty good Sunday overall:

• Downed Nef
• Got Exalted with Cenarion Circle so that all the Encrypted Twilight Texts I farm are turning straight into Gold.
• Killed Ossirian for the first time

Now I just have to pester the guild bank for mats for my CC Healing Mace and get it enchanted.

I'd like to kill Ayamiss at some point just so I can say I completed all of AQ20, but we RARELY do that boss >_<

A Slightly Better Grind

I've started grinding at the Ravaged Twilight Camp way in the north of Silithus by the cave with Vyral the Vile and the Twilight Flamereavers. It's not the best imaginable grinding spot because I'll usually get some interference from other players and Wind Elementals, but it's got a whole bunch of good things going for it:

• Non-elite mobs (I was grinding Hydras on Alcaz Island before)
• Twilight Text drops for Cenarion Circle reputation
• Twilight Cultist Trappings for some extra gold (probably 15s apiece)
• A decent number of Major Health Pots and some Major Mana Pots
• Level 61 mobs that have the potential to drop Eternium Lockboxes and thus the ever-elusive Bottomless Bag pattern

I've got about 600 more Twilight Texts to hit Exalted with the CC. I'll probably end up buying the majority of those, which is probably a mistake because the Exalted reward isn't that much of an upgrade for me, but I'm a big ol' rep whore sometimes.

A New Grind

Our guild didn't get any raiding done over the long weekend -- most of our members were on vacation or otherwise unavailable. We managed to go into Molten Core and kill Ragnaros, but considering that we should have been working up to Farming Speed in BWL or exploring AQ40 or Naxx, we were slacking.

Personally though, I'm more or less satisfied with my pre-expansion gear. My DKP status means I don't realistically have a shot at any of the elite gear that would be a real upgrade, and the marginal upgrades that I could get -- the Mantle of the Blackwing Cabal vs. the Mantle of Maz'Nadir, for example -- aren't beefy enough to get too excited about.

Instead, I've become fixated on getting Bottomless Bags. On most servers, this might not be a problem; you'd just have to farm the gold to buy the mats. On my server though, only one person ever got the pattern. And while he WAS Horde side, he either quit the game or transferred. So, no Bottomless Bags for my realm until someone else finds the pattern.

People are claiming on Thottbot that you can get the pattern from Eternium Lockboxes. Unfortunately, the only mobs that drop them are elites level 61 and above. Usually you have to go into an instance to find mobs that level, but there are a couple of places in the overworld where you can find them.

One of my guildies suggested Alcaz Island, a mini-zone off the coast of Dustwallow Marsh used for some of the Tier 0.5 quests. I quickly learned that I couldn't tackle the Minions of Weavil, but with six stacks of yummy mage water in my bags I was able to farm the Naga and the Hydras for a good long while. Only about a third of the mobs are level 61 (and thus eligible to drop Eternium Lockboxes), but after a couple of hours of farming I netted one Eternium Lockbox, several greens and a couple of blues.

Sadly, the lockbox held only a random blue and green item and no Bottomless Bag pattern. But considering my farming yielded both a +20 FR ring and a Maiden's Circle (approximate worth: 250g), I'll give this area a couple more tries. If I don't have luck or get bored, I'll start assisting groups attacking Hive'Regal in Silithus where I can work on CC and Brood rep while killing the occassional Level 61 bug.

Long Time, No Post

Tonight I finally got to raid and kill Nefarian! I was present for a bunch of "learning" wipes before the guild killed Nef, but the previous two times my guild actually killed him I wasn't able to attend. So, I'm pretty psyched to be able to scratch the final boss in Blackwing Lair off my "To Be Accomplished" list.

Our guild also spent a little bit of time cycling the first set of mobs in Ahn'Qiraj to build up rep and get everyone mounts. Not too many people have hit Neutral for the ring yet, but pretty much everyone is up to 20,000 / 36,000 hated so it won't be too much longer before our entire guild gets a boost in power all at once.

The nice thing about a shadow priest -- Vampiric Embrace is one more source of healing during Nef's Priest class call!

Shamans and Paladins

Sometimes it feels like I'm the only person excited about the additions of Paladins (or Blood Knights) to the Horde and Shamans to the Alliance.

To everyone who is complaining, I'd ask -- Are these changes really going to affect how you personally will play WoW for the worse?

The two arguments I'm most sympathetic to are the Lore Guys and people currently raiding with a Shaman.

It does seem that the backstory for the Blood Elves is getting weird, and I don't know if I like that they captured some demi-god and forced it to make Paladins. Seems kind of vampiric and a perversion of the light.

Shamans are worried that there won't be as much of a place for them after the Horde get Paladins. That may be true to an extent, but I know just as many Shamans who wish they could use a non-healing spec and who might just get their wish as a result of Blizzard moving some of the responsibility for buffing and healing over to Pallies.

I want the Brood of Nozdormu to like me....

I logged on too late to join the guild's raid of Blackwing Lair last night (they cleared up to Chromaggus), so I just did a little bit of grinding in Silithus. I started out soloing the bugs for their carapaces, but it took forever just to get to 100 of them, and I need 200 for each turn-in.

Fortunately, a PUG passed in my area and invited me. I helped them kill the Lv62 NPC elf in the hive, and managed to collect enough carapaces for a turn-in on the way.

I've got another 31,000 rep to get out of hated... then 3,000 for hostile, and another 3,000 for unfriendly... that's 37,000 rep to grind, or 740 turnins of 200 carapaces apiece.

Ouch.

LFM anyone?

Monday and Tuesday

Monday we made our final attempt for this cycle on Nef. It was pretty much just a wipe-fest, but we experimented with a couple of different approaches and got our kill count up. We didn't make it to phase 2, but this week we'll be fully buffed with flasks and such before we try it again. Everyone is pretty optimistic that we'll manage to beat BWL before the end of the week.

Afterwards I made another UD Strat run to gather more Crypt Fiend Parts and Bone Fragments for the Talisman of Ascendence. I'm more than a third of the way there, which is good progress all things considered. I'm thinking of changing my approach to gaining tokens completely though -- the best use of my time may be to just FISH. If I can find a spot where I can get Stonescale Eel for the guild and spare cash, and pick up either Lightning Eels or Plated Armorfish for quest turnins, I'll probably progress a lot quicker while also making more gold and contributing to raid progress.

Tuesday the instances reset, so we started anew on Blackwing Lair. We killed Razorgore without any trouble. We wiped twice on Vael before killing him -- I managed to pull aggro both times, but I'm hoping that the wipes weren't my fault, per se; I was healing the low fire resistance group so my aggro was high. First wipe the main tank died immediately, so that was bad healing. Second wipe the secondary tank didn't have enough aggro to handle his transition because he wasn't using his aggro generating abilities soon enough. The third try I was moved to a slightly more hardy group and the tanks built tons of aggro, so it was clear sailing.

Even though we were moving slow and it was late we managed to run through the Suppression Rooms and one-shot Broodlord. I picked up the Head of the Broodlord for the Only One May Rise quest chain and turned it in, so now I've got another reputation grind in front of me -- the bugs of Silithus!

This development may actually turn out pretty well for me... I can grind the bugs in Silithus (which drop pieces for Brood of Nozdormu rep) while doing the Combat and Tactical Quests (Cenarion Circle Rep) and slowly accumulating gold (to buy pieces for Argent Dawn rewards). It's a little known secret that the Silithid Hives have pools of water in them, so you can actually fish in the desert wasteland of Silithus!

Lovin' the Long Weekend -- Sunday

Sunday the guild raided Molten Core. I missed the first part because I had to go entertain a guest from out of town for a little while, but afterwards I joined near the end. Right before Domo it was pretty late, but we kept on after losing only 2 or 3 people. It was a good night for priests as one of our alt-shadow priests got the Eye for Bene, and then we took down Rag giving me the Leggings of Transcendence!

So now I've got two pieces towards the all-important three piece Transcendence bonus (+15% mana regeneration while casting, stacks with meditation) and with any luck I should be able to pick up the third when we raid Blackwing Lair again next week.

Afterwards I was still ready for more WoWing since I don't have to be back at work until Wednesday. I joined a UD Strat pug that was nice enough to let me have all the Crypt Fiend parts that dropped. It was rough going in the beginning, wiping like 3 times due to the challenges of not using Ventrilo, but we did the last 4 bosses without a problem and killed the Baron without any deaths -- actually a respectable accomplishment given that we had no mage and our Warlock was facing the Baron for the first time, props to him!

Getting about 60 crypt fiend parts puts me about 3% closer to getting the Talisman of Ascendence -- I want to farm some gold so I can buy more quest turnins from the AH, but barring a lucky epic drop or a good market for the alchemy patterns I like to farm it'll be a long grind.

Friday and Saturday

Friday we downed everything up to Nef, which was a good run. I don't think we got much Elementium at all, but we finally got enough Arcanite to get our guild's second Thunderfury that evening.

Saturday I was too burnt out to raid AQ20 with everyone, but they managed to down Ossi for the first time, so woot for the guild!

I spent a little time grinding, then went into Scholo where I was able to pick up enough Corruptor's Scourgestones to finally get my Chromatic Mantle of the Dawn -- +5 to all resistances enchant to my shoulders. It's not a big boost, but coupled with the Polychromatic Visionwrap chest (+20 to all resistances) might be useful down the road.

Unless I get pulled into a raid, I'll probably spend the day grinding gold and/or drops for the new Argent Dawn items. Prices on everything but the Savage Fronds continue to fall, so hopefully soon I'll be in a position to get the Talisman of Ascendence that I've been coveting.

A Good Thursday

Heh. I played around in Undead Strat (Baron Strat to some of you) and got the Rune of the Argent Dawn finally. Woot for a boost in spellpower fighting Undead! Coupled with a Blessed Wizard Oil, I was finally able to get a 1000-point non-crit Mind Blast.

Afterwards I joined the guild to continue in Blackwing Lair. Our motto some weeks seems to be, "We'll wipe on Vael and trash mobs, but one-shot drakes!" We took down the Broodlord and the first drake, and I won the Bracers of Arcane Accuracy which made me very happy.

Overall we did very well. I felt bad at one point when one of the mages I was watching died during AOE because a tank died and I got freaked out, and later because I managed to kill myself in the cubby while healing for the drake because I didn't handle the tank transition properly. I'm sure that as I raid more and more I'll get more confident. Until then I can say, "Maybe my unorthodox thinking helped save the raid and let all 39 of them continue without dying to success!"

I really didn't expect to get the Bracers of Arcane Accuracy -- I'm guessing that the other damage casters have better Tier 2 stuff available -- but now I'm back at negative 10 DKP. I'm also stuck with the Mark of Remulos from working towards the Rockfury Bracers I won't need anymore, but the Logistics Badges will probably now be applied towards a Wrath of Cenarius.

I know! Let's push a patch during prime time!

So, Blizzard kinda screwed up last night and pushed a patch to fix a soft lock issue during prime time last night, making it difficult-to-impossible for some people to login. When I was finally able to logon after watching an extremely weak card of Ultimate Fighting on Spike, a bunch of people had given up for the night, but the guild was starting an AQ20 raid.

I wasn't too keen on joining up. The Rajaxx encounter takes a while to complete, and if you fail, there's a fifteen minute wait for the NPCs to respawn before you can try again. Mess up twice, and you've pretty much wasted an evening. I do like the free CC rep, but there's only one item I want that I can really roll on left in the instance. The robes aren't enough of an upgrade for me to roll on, and TONS of people want the Eye of Moam for its +spell damage.

But, I'm a priest, so I had to capitulate and join up.

A quick note: I'm really bitter that there's no new rank of Shadow Word Pain book in AQ20. Most raiding priests downrank their heal spells, so there's absolutely no excitement from books for me. Well, except for Prayer of Healing, which I tend to overuse.

We rolled through Rajaxx without any problems, but wiped three times before killing Moam. I think we just got our wires crossed so far as banishing the adds and healing the 'Locks.

After that the raid disbanded, and I was too tired to do any grinding. I sent one arcane crystal and four Dark Iron ore to the guild bank, and called it a night.

Tuesday Raiding

Our guild had a reasonably productive Tuesday. We started out with an Onyxia run where I picked up the Halo of Transcendence, and hit up Blackwing Lair for Razorgore and Vael before calling it a night.

I wasn't especially keen on getting the Halo, since it isn't too much better for me as a Shadow Priest than the Circlet of Prophecy. If I remember correctly, it costs me about 12 damage and only adds 30 healing, 2 spirit, and 10 frost protection. It's a concession to the needs of raiding, really -- I tend to spend a lot of time in BWL outside of shadowform. So to be an effective healer I'll need to work up to the 3/8 Transcendence bonus, 15% mana regeneration while casting that stacks with Meditation (another 15% regen while casting.)

I probably also need to get into the habit of buying a lot more Major Mana Potions. Speccing shadow means I have a shallower mana pool to begin with than the other healers, regardless of whether I'm doing damage or healing and trying to keep shadow weaving up I tend to bottom out and having pots at the ready is better than begging for an innervate.

I'm getting better at keeping Shadow Weaving up using Shadow Word: Pain rank 1 when I'm not doing damage. The new feature where you can see the health and mana of your target's target helps some, in the Vael fight it was also me getting into a groove of shielding a caster or myself, throwing a prayer of healing, then putting a couple of shadows on instead of trying to get all five at once.

Ossi Bad, Rep Good

Last night we made yet another haphazard run at Ossirian in AQ20. No luck. I think everyone was thinking, "Hey, we've cleared to Ossi already, it's going to reset tomorrow, let's pound on him and get the phat lewts." But Monday is a horrible night for the server performance-wise, and people seemed to need more time to rest and relax after playing all weekend.

Afterwards, I made a circuit through Un'Goro since I was in the area. It's a nice place to farm -- you can get Essences of Earth and Guardian Stones from the Guardians, Living Essence from the Tar People, and now Savage Fronds for AD tokens from the Lashers.

Then I joined up with some folks for a quick Field Duty run in Silithus since they were claiming Blizzard changed it back so that you would get Cenarion Circle rep every time you complete it. I didn't have high hopes that it would work for me since I've made it up to Revered, but I was VERY pleasantly surprised to discover that you do indeed get 25 rep per completion!

I'm tempted to set aside a few hours to just run back and forth this weekend doing Field Duty and see if I can get close to Exalted, but I've got 16,000 rep to go = 640 Field Duties... I'll probably just work on collecting 25 Argent Dawn Valor Tokens so I can get the Chromatic Mantle of the Dawn, then split my time between working on Rockfury Bracers and the Talisman of Ascendence when I'm not raiding.

I'm really hoping, though, that the prices for Savage Fronds, Cores of Elements, etc. start to drop. Most people are selling them for 1g per, with the occassional seller trying to sell quickly at 50s per (but not in bulk). My feeling is that 600g-1000g is a reasonable price to pay to "buy" an epic, whether it's buying it outright, cobbling together materials, or buying quest turnins.

At Exalted with the Argent Dawn, it takes 27 Insignia of the Dawn and 27 Insignia of the Crusade for an epic. Each of the 54 insignia requires 30 drops for a total of 1,620.

So, paying 50s a drop on the Auction House isn't a horrible rate... but if the supply gets glutted to the point where they're going for 25s each or less I'll be thrilled and buy them as fast as I can.

An Introduction

Hi everyone!

I started WoW around Patch 1.4 playing only at a friend's house and an internet cafe. Pretty soon I bought my own account, and a computer powerful enough to let me play from home.

I got my generic Night Elf Hunter up to Level 60 in the days before the Hunter Love Patch and when anti-hunter sentiment was still high -- people were still saying "LF2M NO HUNTER" in the city channels.

With mostly green gear and no Beaststalker, I decided to switch to a new PvP server and roll an Undead Shadow Priest.

I had only gotten to Level 20 or so when Hurricane Katrina hit my hometown. While evacuated and staying with my little brother in another city, I managed to spend wayyyy to much time WoWing and got to Level 60 in a great guild.

After things settled down in Real Life I returned home for a while, then moved to another state for a new job since my old place of work shut down.

In the game I tend to be more of a grinder/explorer than a raider -- I've gotten Exalted with the Timbermaw Hold, Alterac, and the Argent Dawn -- but our guild is on the later stages of BWL and I hope to be around when Nef falls.