From Out Of The Mothballs.

My first end game character was Shawndra, a troll warrior, which makes it fitting that I chose that as my blogging moniker. She was arms for part of the 60 end game, fury for the part just before the Burning Crusade expansion and for the grind to 70. At 70, Shawndra went protection, to help her guild experience Karazhan. She ran Karazhan enough to get her to exalted with the Violet Eye twice before she was put aside to gear up Carlotta, the hunter, and Delgada, my current main character. When Wrath of the Lich King was introduced, Delgada picked up and moved to Northrend, as did Carlotta, Maura, and Shawndra. Delgada made her way to 80, giving some time to Carlotta when it suited her. Shawndra and Maura have been, except for rare occasions, mothballed.

Yesterday Shawndra stepped out of the closet and pulled out her talent tree. She spent her points heavily in fury, all the way to Titan's Grip, and allowed Rowena to log in and send her some money and a new two handed sword, then stepped back into Dalaran, equipped her sword, repaired her gear, and hearthed to the Borean Tundra for some questing. Morgond, a good friend and guild mate, exclaimed,"I thought you killed Shawndra!" To which she replied, " Not dead, just stored away. " It is now time to bring her back.

Our guild has seasons. Seasons of raiding, seasons of arenas and battlegrounds, and seasons of trying out other games. It would seem that the guild is taking a PvP turn right now, and so, as a PvE girl, I have to have a project. Sure, if I get an invite to go run Strand of the Ancients or any other battleground, I'll hang out with the guild for a while. But I'm not great at split second decision making when I game. I sit there as someone pounds on me with a "duh" sort of expression, trying to figure out what I can do. I usually come up with the least creative solution, and get pounded into the dirt. That is why I PvE. Game controlled mobs don't run over to me unless I invade their space, so I have time to calculate, to set up a strategy. If I do accidentally invade their space, their attacks aren't generally creative, and so give me time to gather my wits and start attacking sensibly.

So, the project I needed was sitting there in mothballs, just waiting for me to bring her back out. Shawndra is now level 73, with a good start on 74. It is kind of fun to not be hitting ranged targets again, to get down and dirty and clobber things with my big old axe and sword. I'm not sure if I will eventually move her talents to protection when she is old enough, as tanking can be stressful, for me, and it seems to be all about multi target tanking these days. For now, we will be content to kill things faster, taking short breaks to clean our weapons and mend our wounds before we push on.

This could be fun!

Just One More Level?

Things on Smolderthorn have been quiet this past week. Too quiet, really, so after Delgada had finished her cooking and fishing dailies, and her mad rush for the Noble title, I logged in to my two alt mages (Esoterique and Gwenna) and hippity hopped their way to the polymorph:rabbit spell. That didn’t take too long, so I logged in to Minya, sorted out some auctions, hippity hopped her way to a head piece (those bunny ears…if there had been more time I would have taken every single one of my characters out just to get those silly things!). What kind of egg hunter was I? Well, by the time I decided to do this with a few alts, the insane camping of egg spawn points had been whittled down to a very few, so I just ran from egg to egg, getting most, and missing some. I didn’t even bother using the silly basket, as by running slower, I grabbed some spawns as people zoomed by me.

Noblegarden over, I logged in Halinka to do her Children’s week quests. When she finished hers, Esoterique set off to do her two sets of orphan quests. They were so much easier on a mage! It took as long on Halinka to do her one set as it took for Esoterique to do both sets. Done with those, it was a new day after all, so I logged in Delgada to do her daily cooking and fishing quests. While I was in Shattrath, she picked up her blood elf orphan, but didn’t do anything with her, because I had promised to do the achievements with the hubby. No chocolate cake recipe, no mini pet, no fishing pole. Delgada was only mildly amused with her new compass. Being a bit upset about it all, she stopped by the toy store and bought herself a few new toys to fiddle with.

Noone was on, hubby was off dropping 3 of the seven off at their mother’s house, so I was left to my own devices. I pulled out Halinka, hearthed to Menethil, and took a boat to the other continent. Theramore had many quests for her, and she dinged 37, then 38. She did all this even without Cartographer! I wonder if she would have hit another level still had she had a pointer to follow. Not long after the ding of 38, hubby got home, and it was TV dinner night, so I zapped a chicken teriyaki meal for him, pulled out a chicken parmesan for me, and sat down hoping for one more level. Then, having been in Ventrilo for all this time alone, it started getting more occupants.

One more level, please? Nope. Hubby logged in to start running some battlegrounds with the boys, and Delgada donned her newly crafted Frostsavage set and started enchanting some pieces with the materials she had. By the time that was done, they remembered to invite me to the group, and we tried out Strand of the Ancients. It was the first time I had been there, and I am still very confused. When I get home today I will have to read more about it. The battle lost, we hearthed to Dalaran, and hopped directly into Wintergrasp. I have only been to Wintergrasp to do Vault of Archavon and the fishing quests, so still confused, I picked up some anti-tank missiles and started blasting away. We lost. I’m sure it wasn’t my fault. I had such bad lag that I don’t think I got to do much of anything useful. I doubt I’ll do Wintergrasp again. My laptop can’t handle it.

After that, enough guild members had logged in, including hubby, to do the “Hail to the King, Baby!” achievement, so we picked up a lonely hunter from the lfg channel and finished it off. We wiped during the gauntlet because the silly healer didn’t get out of the dragon’s frosty breath (Delgada needs some practice mooovvviiinng). The hunter dinged 80, we finished the instance, achievement and all. Hubby and I headed out to the Argent Tournament grounds, and started out the quests there. My thought was that for the daily quest achievement, since it now only requires that you complete 5 daily quests, not the same one 5 days in a row, that there would be at least 5 daily quests out there that we could knock them all out at once. We finished one daily, then flew out to Grizzly Hills to kiss some frogs. That lady would not come out. I think we kissed at least a hundred frogs. By then it was late, so we flew to Ulduar and logged out, with the idea that we would gather stone and then go get wood in Crystalsong Forest to finish dailies 3 and 4, and that would leave one last daily, which would be the scourge killing. Busy day ahead of me when I get home, as we had also planned on trying to run Naxxramas (10) if we had the people to do it tonight (which is when I will be posting this!).

I am just slightly disappointed at the tease of having quests for the Oracles during Children’s week, and not actually getting them. Was I hearing things, or assuming things? I wanted a baby goreloc!

Twinking Post 3.1

This past week, I had the pleasure and pain of taking my bank alt, Rowena, into her first Warsong Gulch in a very long time. Apparently, it had been so long, that when I was transported into the Horde Flag room, I discovered it. It took me until today to realize that I had taken her after I put the finishing touches on her gear, because how else would I have had the scout's medallion around her pretty little neck?

Back to the story. It was purely out of rage that I took her in, as most times are, because she is my frustration release. Not getting my way? Rowena comes out to play. This time, I was at home as my husband was out picking up his kids for the weekend. First of seven was home to watch Seventh of seven so that I could nap. I desperately needed a nap. So, hubby pulls out of the drive, and I prepare to log out by logging in Rowena to post auctions. Just as Rowena pulls through the nether and finds herself inside the Orgrimmar Bank, First of Seven's boyfriend walks through the door. He is a nice enough kid, very careful of respecting my wishes when I am within earshot, even to the point of steering my daughter away from stubbornly doing the opposite of what makes me happy. Now, as many parents of teenagers, I have been accused of "not trusting" my offspring, "not being fair", and been called many names. I don't nap when anyone else's kid is spending time under my roof and I am the only adult present. It isn't kosher. She tried to get me to take a nap, I told her my point, she got huffy, Rowena steered away from the auction house. She had just made an impulse buy of 14 explosive sheep, and she had found a perfect reason to use them. Rowena's operator, crankier than all, is more than into this foray into the battleground.

Rowena tells the battlemaster she is ready, and waits her summons. Less than a minute passes, and she is whisked into a battle that is almost won, with only one more flag needing to be run. She runs out to the middle, thinking they don't need a guard in the flag room at this point, and looks for an easy mark. Remember, friends, this is after the patch, and Rowena has taken a little ding. I say little, because even though this patch took away 500 health, 12 agility, and 10 haste rating, it did not take away enough to make me want to kill Rowena and redo her. Rowena got out there and did what she has always done best, making them run screaming after one sinister strike, then following them and finishing them off. Nothing wrong with this part of the game, she all of a sudden is mobbed by most of the other force, and sprints away with just a hair left on her health bar. Finally dropping combat, she stealths and sneaks into the flag room to bandage. No bandages, bad rogue, so she will have to report on whether she is still able to use heavy runecloth bandages another day. At that point, with half her health back, she runs back out to kill a few more, and someone gets past and gets the flag. Somehow, she catches up, and kills him.

Rowena is a great flag room guard. She likes to place a guard sheep near the flag and stealth near him, poised ready to sap and start ripping the enemy to shreds. So, sheep placed, she waits impatiently for the next flag runner. He shows up, and the sheep ignores him. WHAT? Rowena misses the sap she is so upset about the stupid sheep, and starts whaling on the carrier. She follows that sucker all the way to the gates of their flag area before she dies from lack of healing support. The flag is capped, and the flags are returned. If she could have gotten in just a couple more swings...crusader would have procced, and he would have been down. She shuffled back to her self assigned guard post, pulled out another sheep, and waited. Someone leaves the battle, and a new one arrives, pats the sheep on the head, and goes off to farm honor. Rowena skulks along the wall, waiting for another. The same person this time, the sheep continues to ignore them, but someone had been hiding upstairs watching, and jumped down to help. He got out to the first bit of green before she landed the killing blow, and returned the flag. The call from the rest of the players was to grab the flag and end this battle, so they did. Rowena didn't check her damage, she had done well for herself, and she knew it.

My thoughts? I could care less about the lost leg armor kit, the lost head arcanum, and the lost chest enchant. I may replace the chest enchant with the lesser absorption enchant, just because it is level appropriate and I have always wanted to play around with it. I can even deal with the fact that those nifty pair of boots in my bank from Nat Pagle she will never be able to wear. But the sheep?


WHY?!?!?!??!

On a side note, I have searched, mostly in vain, for this problem. A few people have had the same problem. It may not be a priority. PLEASE MAKE IT ONE! /batlashes

Shadow Priest Kindergarten - Talents

If you read the last two posts, you have a rough idea of what a priest is and what stats they use. Today, I'm going to dig into the Shadow tree and parts of the Discipline tree, and give you my opinion on how points should be spent as a shadow priest is leveling. At the end I will post a final spec for a PvE shadow priest. I may even get ambitious and pretend I know something about PvP, and post my interpretation of a PvP shadow build. Don't take my word on this as law. I know a few things, but I'll bet that if you are reading this, you are also quite intelligent and can reason your way into spending your own points!

I will be basing this on the new talent trees going live with patch 3.1. I wanted this post to be relevent for more than a week, so hop into the future with me, if you dare!

So, you've hit level 10 and you have a whole talent point to spend. Congratulations! When I spent my first point, I spent it on Spirit Tap . I spent my next two points on that, too. Anything to keep your mana up will reduce down time, which leads to faster leveling. Level 13, and we have a new point to spend. If you want to hit Shadow Form by 40, we need to continue spending points in that tree. So our next talent to fill will be Darkness. At levels 18 and 19 we're going to want Improved Shadow Word: Pain filled, so we can get Mind Flay at level 20. At 21, until the talent is filled, I like to fill in Improved Mind Blast. At this level, you only have 4 shadow spells. The more you can use one, the better! The order you spend the next 4 points in is a matter of taste. I prefer filling in Shadow Reach before I touch Shadow Weaving for 2 points, because I like to keep mobs as far away as possible. Did you notice I only put 2 points in Shadow Weaving? That's all it takes to open up Vampiric Embrace , which needs to be open in order to get down to Shadow Form, but is also useful if you are taking on more than one mob at a time. While you are killing one mob, keep one with a dot or two on it and Vampiric Embrace to get a bit of health regen while it is slowly dying. Now, at level 32, we can finish off Shadow Weaving and spend our next points in Focused Mind, because less mana spent means more to deal damage with. The next 5 points are really a no brainer, because at this tier, there are only 5 points to spend. Improved Devouring Plague, at its top rank, says it increases the periodic damage of the spell by 15%, and deals 15% of the total periodic damage when cast(this could change, as 3.1 hasn't been set in stone yet). After those three points, or before, Mind Melt will add to your critical chance.

Now, we are level 40, and we get Shadowform! We have gained the effect that not only shouts out to all of Azeroth that we are shadow priests, but it sure disguises ugly armor. At level 40, the way you spend your points is all a matter of taste. If you are grouping a lot without another priest as healer, you might want to go a few points into the Discipline tree first. Start with Twin Disciplines for extra damage, then Improved Power Word: Fortitude for a little better buff. For now, that is probably all you will need to spend there. I might even suggest going back to Tier 2 of the shadow tree and grabbing Shadow Affinity for the extra threat reduction. From there, I would choose Shadow Power, then one point in Misery at level 56 would let us get Vampiric Touch at 57. Level 58 and 59 I would finish out Misery, so at 60 I could start filling in Pain and Suffering. By the time that is filled, if we were diligent about training, it would benefit our newly gained spell, Shadow Word: Death.

At 62, I like to hop back to the Discipline tree. Here is where you need to think a little. Do you want to spend 3 points in Silent Resolve or Improved Inner Fire, or spend 2 points in Martyrdom and stick a single point in Improved Inner Fire? Your choice. I'm not sure there is a perfect answer. If you find yourself healing in pinch, you might go with the first. If you are on a PvP server, the last might be your answer. Inner Fire is not a great spell, but if you must choose something, I'm sure not many will criticize you for choosing to improve it. The whole goal here is to get down to Meditation and Inner Focus. Once you have filled these, you will be at the ripe old age of 69, and getting ready to hit Northrend!

At 70, our next talent to fill will be Twisted Faith. Again, damage is your friend, and the more friends/damage, the better! At 75, you can pick up the ultimate talent in your shadow tree, Dispersion. This is a great talent for both PvP and PvE, and shouldn't be passed up (in my opinion, anyhow). Why would anyone pass up the chance to be a floating purple mass of shadow?
For our last 5 points, we will skip back to Shadow Focus and fill it, then even further back to Improved Spirit Tap. By this time, we will want the added hit bonus, and the added mana regeneration.

All that work, and we are now level 80! Here is our finished talent tree. Right here, my attempt at a PvP talent specialty. Now we can start getting together our gear. Next class will be about Shadow Priest Fashion for the new level 80. The bell is ringing...Recess Time!

At 80, if you find that you are needing more mana and threat reduction than range, a quick respec to add Veiled Shadows and lose Shadow Reach might be in order. Your results will vary! :)

Queue Up for Battlegrounds... Anywhere?

This is fabulous news. I have heard of the twink that would group up, travel to Sen-Jin Village to get whatever buff the witch doctor would give them, and then have their buddies queue up for a battleground. Now, Bom'Bay, the witch doctor in training, doesn't give any performance enhancing buffs, but how fun is it to run into Warsong Gulch huge, or ghostly? Mangletooth in Camp Taurajo has buffs he gives in exchange for Blood Shards that improve your stats. Certainly worthwhile for a level 19 twink to park themselves in Camp T instead of a major city now, isn't it? For us higher level characters, perhaps we'll be camping in Zim'Torga and using our Drakkari Offerings before a fight to get these buffs. I don't imagine Alliance have any cool buffs you can get for a few worthless gems, do they?

What other fantastic things can we do as we wait out our queue time in just about anywhere? Dailies come to mind, as well as flower picking and mining. Fishing trips with a little butchering sprinkled in? Tired of the long grind for reputation and want a change? Enter the queue. Pug group really so bad that you want to go kill yourself? Queue up and let the other side do it for you.

When you finish your battleground, does it deposit you where you left off, or will you find yourself at the nearest town, flightpoint, or worse, major city (faction taken into account)? I guess we will have to wait for the test realm players to tell us. I can wait. :)