Shared Topic: The Rules of Me

Matty over at Sugar & Spice asks:

The Rules of Me: What are your personal rules you wish others would know about you?

This is gonna be fun! I'm just gonna let it out on this post. So, in total stream of consciousness here we go:

1. I can complain about the members of my family. But if you do it, I'm gonna get in your face and defend them. Rather vigorously, too.
2. If you even hint at hurting my kids, you will become my mortal enemy.
3. Sleep-over house guests are like fresh fish: after three days they start to stink.
4. Repeatedly asking me the same question will not change my answer. However, it will make me quickly lose respect for you.
5. Trade chat should require an additional monthly premium to utilize.
6. Prefixing any in-game ability with "anal" does not make you clever or amusing. Quite the opposite, it showcases your idiocy.
7. If you wouldn't actually say out loud what you're typing in chat to actual people in an actual conversation, then you probably shouldn't post it.
8. "Pwn" is not a real word. Likewise, unless you're texting using a phone without an actual keyboard, there is no reason whatsoever to not type out the actual words "you" or "are".
9. The word "Rape" does not mean anywhere near what you think it means as you casually refer to how well you just fared against that person in PVP. 
10. "Your Momma" jokes were funny in the 80s.  It's not the '80s anymore. Move along.
11. Words have power and should be respected accordingly.
12. Stupidity that is later recognized and recanted via sincere apology may be forgiven; it's likely an honest mistake or a reconsideration once facts have been presented. Refusal to accept facts or other viewpoints on the same issue is just plain stupid.
13. Unless specifically requested to do so by a leader in your group or raid, as a DPS class you never ever pull the mob -- even if you're just trying to "help the tank".
14. Bitching at your healer as a DPS class puts you that much lower on the heal priority list.
15. Constructive criticism helps me learn; nerd rage makes me /ignore you.
16. An /assist macro should be a default function of the WoW UI and combined with an auto-focus function on the main tank.
17. Don't get hissy with me if I don't respond to your un-solicited guild invite. If I wanted to join you, I would have asked you.
18. Why must you assume I'm a RL Female just because my Human Priest is stacked like a stripper? And no, just because you tell me I'm cute does not get you WoW-sex. Ewww.
19. Unless we're in the Inn at Goldshire in a bed together, do not friggin' /lick me.
20. If a member of the opposite faction emotes a /spit at me, they will become my /focus target until the end of the battleground or they log off. 
21. Just because you flagged PVP at the Crossroads and are now getting your ass handed to you by guards and level 90s from Orgrimmar, I'm there for other stuff. Don't whine at me for not joining your sorry self in pointless PVP.
22. I'm entitled to my opinion, just as you're entitled to yours. Even when our opinions are at odds with each other, we can still get along. 

Holy schmoly, Matty.  I feel fantastic!  Thank's for the virtual venting!

Shared Topic: Spell Envy

Arvash from The Crimson Hammer offers up this week's Shared Topic:

In the new Mist of Pandaria expansion, Druids will be getting a new spell called Symbiosis, which will allow them to "trade" a spell with another player, based on the player’s class and combat role and the Druid’s specialization.

So my question is, if you could have any spell you want from any other class, current spells or new ones in MoP, what would it be? How would you work it into your rotation, gameplay, etc.?

What a fun question! I'm going to look at this by role -- damage, tank and healing.

Damage

My choice on damage spells is not going to be based on putting out the highest DPS. It's about pure fun! The winner? The new form of priest Mind Control:  Dominate Mind. Perhaps I'm biased with the PVP I've been running lately, but I simply love this ability. Walking folks off cliffs or into lava... Such evil joy! I'm literally giggling as I imagine having an enraged spirit beast wailing away on a target as I'm lazily walking it towards it's doom!  Very Warlockian of me!

Tank

Well, I just got educated. I was going to say "Concencration" because that AoE holiness was such the effective aggro-magnet for a pally tank. But I just checked Wowhead, and it's gone.  A victime of 5.0.4?

Hmmm... When I'm tanking (in 5mans), what is my biggest issue?  AoE threat! What's the next best thing?  Death and Decay! It may no longer be fashionable, but when I was tanking on my dead knight, a drop of DnD pretty much stuck the pack on me and I was able to maintain aggro despite the best efforts of my AoE happy DPS members.

Healer

Once again, I'm leaning towards the Priest class.  My favorite healing spell got to be the frisbee (formally known as the Prayer of Mending). For those that never priested, you cast this on a party or raid member taking damage, and it heals for a goodly amount when that person is actually damaged. Then, it bounces to another party or raid member and does the same thing. It will sit there waiting for damage for up to 30 seconds, and it can bounce up to five times to friendlies before it expires.
In a single tanking fight where only the tank's taking the hits, the frisbee is "meh".

But, when there is party-wide or raid-wide damage, the frisbee bounces around and heals -- all for a minor mana cost. At that point, it's more a "yay!"

Imagine as a shaman, dropping a healing rain and tossing out chain heals along with a frisbee bouncing around as well!

Or, a tree-formed druid loading folks up with rejuvinations, life bloom stacks and tranquility and swiftmend, and then having that frisbee to bounce around as well. Holy AoE healing!

Sadly, I can't comment on pally healing -- I just don't know how it works. I guess I need to play my pally a bit more and experiment. One more thing to do!

Impacts of 5.0.4
Holy noobishness, Batman! My first reactions have all been changed with the new game mechanics! Mind Control is now a talent. Shammy Thunderstorm is gone! Pally concencration is gone! Uh... time to relearn and rectify the ignorance.

For that, I'm thanking Arvash!

Shared Topic: Flavors of WoW

The weekly Blog Azeroth Shared Topic comes from Cymre:

It would not be uncommon to hear about the initial release of World of Warcraft as Vanilla or Classic. In terms of ice cream or gelato (which is my preference), Vanilla was once considered the most popular flavour of it’s time. So if Vanilla represents Classic WoW, what flavours could represent the following expansions?

Really?!? A post topic combining ice cream and Warcraft? Epic win!

Original

Flavor: Vanilla

Vanilla

First of all, I have to admit I'm partial to vanilla. Both in WoW and in ice cream. And, if I'm buying ice cream, I'm partial to Breyer's brand, so shameless liberation of images from breyers.com.

I really enjoyed the vanilla expansion set before it got 'remodeled' in Cataclysm. I leveled both Horde and Alliance characters, and I hung out in the Plaguelands all through my late 50's because that lore with the Argent Crusade was so cool.

My point?  There's absolutely nothing wrong with vanilla. It's perfect all by itself.

Burning Crusade

Flavor: Chocolate Chip

Chocolate Chip

So what happens next? Well, there's a new threat of the Burning Legion and a long lost space continent of the Outland.

Blizzard added some new races: Dranei and Blood Elves. These races led to additional enemies (Sunwell in particular for the Elves).

In my frozen dessert analogy, we've got a baseline of vanilla, and now we're adding some chunks to it.

Who doesn't like chunks in their ice cream?

Wrath of the Lich King

Flavor: Mint Chocolate Chip

Mint Chocolate Chip

That formula of Burning Crusade worked; you could level up in Azeroth and then hit the Outland for end game. Well, why not do it again?

I view Wrath as the same formula: Blizzard took the existing game, and mixed it up some more by adding a frozen continent back in Azeroth and a repackaging of the Plaguelands factions to battle the scourge.

This isn't a bad thing.  If I'm not picking up Vanilla at the market, I'm grabbing Mint Chocolate Chip. It's still damn tasty.

Wrath was FUN! I like the factions based on tabards. I liked daily raid and instance quests. There was a lot of good stuff to do in Wrath.

It's like Chocolate Chip, cooled with Mint. Get it?

Cataclysm

Flavor: French Vanilla

French Vanilla

For whatever reason, someone thinks vanilla is boring. So Blizzard tries to reinvent vanilla. We get a new talent structure. We get flooding of old zones. We remodel some capital cities.

It's vanilla, repackaged, but the final product isn't any better than the original.

Think back to the eighties (those of you around then).  Remember "New Coke"?  What a flop that was?  The back-pedaling the Coca-Cola company had to do once they realized that New Coke sucked?

That's Cata in a nutshell for me.

So let's get back to basics and add to the elements that work.

Mists of Pandaria

Flavor: Neopolitan (Vanilla, Chocolate and Strawberry)

Vanilla, Chocolate, Strawberry

Enter MoP.

If I'm a marketing guy at Breyers, I know that French vanilla bombed. Back to the old drawing board.

So what do people like?

They like vanilla. Well, lets add in both chocolate and strawberry to that mix.  We have always had Alliance and Horde. The've fought.

Put them back into confrontation on those classic lines; Chocolate is flavored vanilla. It's still a simple flavor, but it's a new twist.

Now, add some Pandas that don't know which side they're going to take and offer a disinterested position (the Strawberry).

We have an upheaval. A cleansing. (Seriously - take a bite of vanilla or chocolate, and then take a bite of strawberry.  The berry washes away the others!)

Now, here's where it gets fun...  When I eat a bowl of mixed flavor ice cream, sometimes I'll eat up all the vanilla, then the chocolate, then the strawberry. Other times, I'll mix 'em all up into one flavor and enjoy the soup.  MoP will give me that option! It looks to have flexibility to essentially do what you want to do.

Conclusion

Not only can't I wait for MoP, I need to make a run to the store for some frozen desserts.

Shared Topic: How has WoW Changed Your Life?

This week’s Blog Azeroth shared topic post comes from Effy at Effraeti’s RP:

Very simply:
How has WoW changed your life?

It's a simple question.  My answer is far from simple, however.

Consider this your warning: I'm about to blur... No.  Actually I'm about to absolutely obliterate the line between a blogger's opinions about a game and his life experiences while playing that game.

What you're about to read will be personal. It will be raw. Sad. Not just <sniff> <sniff> sad, but for me a level of sadness that has taken me to some very dark, scary and lonely places where I wasn't sure how the hell I was ever going to get back from. This may just be as difficult to read as it has been to write.

Shared Topic: Are you playing in the WoW Beta?

This week’s Blog Azeroth shared topic post comes from Frinka from Warcraft Street:

Are you playing the MoP Beta? Why or why not? How much time are you spending there vs. the "live" servers.

When I subscribed to the annual pass option, I was guaranteed a MoP Beta key. That wasn't why I fired off the annual pass, however. I was going to be playing in some form or other, so why not get a free copy of Diablo 3 to muck about with at the same time. The account wide mount was okay too for up and coming alts. The beta key? Worthless to me. Absolute rubbish.

Paying for the Privilege to Beta

In my professional role ( switch talent spec to Project Manager), I find myself constantly beta testing either base software code or integrated data solutions within a standard software code base. In any event, I spend a substantial chunk of my waking hours ensuring things work as expected and advertised.

When I get free time, the last thing I want to do is ensure a game I'm paying a fee to not only purchase but also play on a monthly basis is also working as expected and advertised. I'm shelling out dollars to a company to develop that software, after all. I expect Blizzard to pay staff to perform that role.

Now, now! Don't get me wrong! The more exposure and the more people that are testing something, the better the final product becomes. Beta testing from a general public polishes the product into something better than Blizzard could have imagined or marketed in the first place. It's an open exchange of not only "can I log in and not blow up?" but also "the lore here doesn't jibe... what if...". I'm indebted to those folks that are beta testing! They are helping make my eventual play experience all that more seamless, magical and satisfying.

But, if I only have a few hours to play, I'm going to play the final polished product (even Cata in the doldrums of a pre-expansion period). I'm not going to pay Blizzard for the privilege of testing their software for them as well as purchase a copy of the same game I would have tested. It's a stand on principle.

Surprise Me

The other main factor on why I never activated my beta key? Surprise! When Wrath was being released, I was an avid reader of Big Red Kitty's hunter blog (c'mon, who wasn't?). BRK was communicating tidbits of the beta pets, gear, zones, etc. When Wrath hit, I felt like in all the focus of pre-expansion TBC on Wrath content, I missed  out of an element of discovery in Wrath of that same content for myself. In other words, I got so worked up on researching Wrath that I missed out on experiencing a part of Wrath. Part of the fun for me in a new expansion is exploring the new content. Learning (and failing) make it more fun.

You may notice in my reading list, however, there are blogs that cover the MoP beta. I am reading, but as posts get into the details and mechanics, my reading becomes a skim. I don't understand in the least, for example, how a pet battle works. I just know that there are pets that will now go all Pokemon as needed.

I also know there will be Pandaren, and they will start neutral, and somehow that Pandaren will choose to align with either the Alliance or the Horde.  I know there is a new class, the Monk, and that the class will be like a druid only in that it can be played as any of the three main roles: Tank, Heals or DPS.  Although there are sites covering this information, I'm not actively reading them -- again I want to experience this for myself.

By the same token, I know the talents are totally being revamped. I will review the class sites for my characters after I've messed around with talents on my own. By merely applying someone else's experiences to a new spec, I'm losing the ability to experience that on my own.
My favorite part of Wrath, hands down?  The Death Knight character experience from birth to graduation at 58. In Cata?  The starting zones for the Goblin and Worgen races. I don't want to risk spoiling any of the freshness MoP will add for the Pandaren or the Monk class with previews or guides.

So, no... you won't find me on the beta realm. To those that are there, kudos and thank you very much for your contribution! It's just not something I'm willing to do.

Shared Topic: Professions

I discovered Blog Azeroth the other day and among all of the great resources offered, the shared topic intrigued me. This week's topic was offered by Effy who asks:

Professions are fun for some and a necessary evil for others. Some of us have farming professions. Some of us have crafting professions. Some of us have a little bit of everything! Professions are leveled because they fit our style of play, help us in raiding, allow us to outfit our alts, and make us money. What professions do you have on your main? Do his/her professions fit their personality? Why did you choose them? If you chose professions based on your character and not on gaming needs, would that change some of their professions they use? (This can include the secondary professions of archaeology, fishing, cooking, and first aid too!)

Primary Professions

My Hunter began life as a skinner and a leatherworker. They just seemed to fit, you know?  He's out, well, hunting things. The whole "waste not want not" mantra repeated for him - if you have skins, use them to make yourself cool things. Up to Wrath, I wouldn't argue that my hunter got much of a benefit game-wise from either choice. My favorite reason for  a max level leatherworker in BC was the Stylin' Hats, but that's just because they looked awesome. I forget now which expansion added the bonuses (thinking Wrath), but all of a sudden skinning offered a Master of Anatomy bonus to critical strike rating, which became a nice benefit. Leatherworking now had an amazing wrist enchant for agility and a cheap leg armor enchant, so there were gaming elements there that were nice bonuses.

Recently, I dropped skinning and learned engineering. Why? I was at 16,000 honor kills and had my sights set on reaching the 25,000 kills achievement prior to any account-wide consolidations. The combination of a Disengage and Parachute Cloak! I will never PVP again on a hunter without my disengage macro that also fires the 'chute; the next thing you know I'm flying from the ramp of the Ally stronghold in Twin Peaks to the bridge. So much fun! The other perks to engineering for me have been less of the cogwheel enhancements and more having Jeeves and Moll-E. They are great when you're out and about farming old content!

As far as alts go, I've maxed all other primary professions.  The priest has enchanting and tailoring, the paladin is a blacksmith, the shaman is an alchemist and a jewelcrafter, and the warlock is an inscriptionist. Of these, the priest was my first alt, and again I felt like tailoring would fit (being able to make my own robes was cool). Enchanting was also appealing for the bonus to spellpower on rings (more so in TBC).  The rest of my stable?  Their professions were chosen not as much for fit as for gold grubbing speculation. I love being able to craft most of the items in a profession and shoot it to an alt (or guildmate). I also like being able to craft things as suggested by TSM and make a bit of gold. It adds a nice layer to the game!

Secondary Professions

I am a completionist. I have maxed out all secondary professions: archaeology, cooking, first aid and fishing. However, no other alt has even bothered to learn secondary skills.

Archaeology has potential. You can dig up some great stuff from it (the mount and the pets). But, the downside to me is that it's only in four places on a continent at the same time. That's too much travel time to be flying all over Kalimdor to then prospect a dozen times only to mount back up and fly across the continent. I wish digsites were more plentiful and didn't include so much travel time, and my complaints would lessen.

Cooking wasn't necessarily bad. Prepared food offers nice buffs as you're leveling and the good old 'feasts' are part of the ritual of raid preparation. I actually really dig that; before you and 9 or 24 of your friends attempt to down some bosses, you engage in a communal breaking of bread. It has a bit of ritualism, doesn't it? When it came to alts, however, I just can't be bothered with leveling up cooking.

First aid has it's uses. As a hunter, the ability to heal yourself is nice. While leveling, it's a nice outlet for all that cloth that drops from humanoids. I'm running into a priority conflict; do I consume that embersilk cloth for bandages or zip it to the tailor...  And for my AH speculations tailoring is a clear winner.

Fishing has improved a bit in the base UI, but it's still a matter of spending hours doing absolutely nothing other than clicking and listening for the fish ding.  All I can say is multi-task. This is a drag!

Why did you choose them?

Back to what I interpret as Effy's central question.  Why, indeed?  For my hunter, the profession choices are about gaming. In PVE, he got a bonus to crit from skinning and he got the bonus to agility on wrists.  For PVP, he gets the mobility of the cloak plus retained the wrist enchant.
For all the other alts, it's about opportunity: the opportunity to craft most items for myself without having to pay premiums in the Auction House as well as the opportunity to craft many items and then sell them at a premium in the Auction House!

How about you?