I apparently have 25 warlock trainers in my personal guild bank ("Spider Pride")...
Monday, May 17, 2010
Altoholic Fail...
I apparently have 25 warlock trainers in my personal guild bank ("Spider Pride")...
Monday, May 10, 2010
Why Leveling Alts Makes Me a Better Healer.
Now that I've got a full set of toons that I can use almost interchangeably in our weekly raids, that is, I have a DPS, a tank, and a healer, I can say confidently that I am a healer through and through. However, I'm not completely ignorant of the fact that my other toons teach me about being a healer. What can a hunter and a warrior teach you about healing? Plenty.
As a Hunter/DPS, I didn't have too much use for healers in dungeons/raids unless I accidentally stood in the stupid or a mob got loose and I pulled aggro. I did like it when healers would throw up a heal or two on my pet, that made me happy that they acknowledge my pet was a valuable part of the party. Even if it was AOE-heals, my pet still got something other than Mend Pet and that was nice. From that experience, I don't think of pets (Lock pets included) as non-members of the party, if I can, I'll throw some heals their way. Or if I see a hunter rezzing a pet, I'll rebuff it. Hunters spend time with their pets, they level together, they quest together, they get to pick out talent points for them, pets are very important to the hunter, even if they're not Beast Master spec'ed. Keeping the hunter's pet happy also keeps the hunter happy. And if the hunter's happy, they won't misdirect to you on purpose...(I've been offered gold to MD to random people in the party/raid, which I've taken XD, but not usually if I like the person)
As a Warrior/Tank, where do I start? Tanks and healers have to be close, they need to trust each other, the tank especially needs to trust the healer. My method of healing has typically been to keep the tank topped off whenever possible, or at least be my main focus. The tank moves, I move. The tank doesn't loot, I don't loot. Only in extreme cases will I /oom and stop to drink. When I'm on my tank, the way I heal is only reinforced, especially when I get healers that can't keep up or have to drink after every other pull. As a Warrior specifically, I get to watch my rage drain as the healer's mana bar goes up. I get itchy, ready to pull the next group and refill my rage. I LOVE charging into groups and using Thunderclap. I HATE when I can't charge because the healer went AFK at the last second and I suddenly have to stop mid-pull and pop cool-downs. I tank the way I do because I'm also a healer and I heal the way I do because I'm also a tank. I make sure my healer has the mana they need and when I'm healing I make sure that the tank isn't slowed down by me.
If you read my previous post, you'll see that I have a new appreciation for Warlocks and Life Tap since I'm leveling one myself now. I had one sitting on my character page for a while, as is typical me, and I decided to get her more heirloom gear (only had the shoulders from leveling Kady, bought the robe and the staff) and actually start leveling her. It was a struggle to get her out of Redridge, but I pushed through and got to questing regularly. It's so nice to be leveling again, to have a goal to be working towards, something to do that's within fairly easy reach and that I can do at my own pace (not once a day for example).
Each alt that I level teaches me something new about healing and about my play-style, even if they only sit on my character screen for months eventually seeing only the "DELETE" window instead of level 20. But they only teach me if I'm willing to pay attention, like right now, I have no idea what makes Shammys happy because I haven't leveled one past the ability to turn into a wolf...
As a Hunter/DPS, I didn't have too much use for healers in dungeons/raids unless I accidentally stood in the stupid or a mob got loose and I pulled aggro. I did like it when healers would throw up a heal or two on my pet, that made me happy that they acknowledge my pet was a valuable part of the party. Even if it was AOE-heals, my pet still got something other than Mend Pet and that was nice. From that experience, I don't think of pets (Lock pets included) as non-members of the party, if I can, I'll throw some heals their way. Or if I see a hunter rezzing a pet, I'll rebuff it. Hunters spend time with their pets, they level together, they quest together, they get to pick out talent points for them, pets are very important to the hunter, even if they're not Beast Master spec'ed. Keeping the hunter's pet happy also keeps the hunter happy. And if the hunter's happy, they won't misdirect to you on purpose...(I've been offered gold to MD to random people in the party/raid, which I've taken XD, but not usually if I like the person)
As a Warrior/Tank, where do I start? Tanks and healers have to be close, they need to trust each other, the tank especially needs to trust the healer. My method of healing has typically been to keep the tank topped off whenever possible, or at least be my main focus. The tank moves, I move. The tank doesn't loot, I don't loot. Only in extreme cases will I /oom and stop to drink. When I'm on my tank, the way I heal is only reinforced, especially when I get healers that can't keep up or have to drink after every other pull. As a Warrior specifically, I get to watch my rage drain as the healer's mana bar goes up. I get itchy, ready to pull the next group and refill my rage. I LOVE charging into groups and using Thunderclap. I HATE when I can't charge because the healer went AFK at the last second and I suddenly have to stop mid-pull and pop cool-downs. I tank the way I do because I'm also a healer and I heal the way I do because I'm also a tank. I make sure my healer has the mana they need and when I'm healing I make sure that the tank isn't slowed down by me.
If you read my previous post, you'll see that I have a new appreciation for Warlocks and Life Tap since I'm leveling one myself now. I had one sitting on my character page for a while, as is typical me, and I decided to get her more heirloom gear (only had the shoulders from leveling Kady, bought the robe and the staff) and actually start leveling her. It was a struggle to get her out of Redridge, but I pushed through and got to questing regularly. It's so nice to be leveling again, to have a goal to be working towards, something to do that's within fairly easy reach and that I can do at my own pace (not once a day for example).
Each alt that I level teaches me something new about healing and about my play-style, even if they only sit on my character screen for months eventually seeing only the "DELETE" window instead of level 20. But they only teach me if I'm willing to pay attention, like right now, I have no idea what makes Shammys happy because I haven't leveled one past the ability to turn into a wolf...
Dear Warlocks,
I hereby apologize for telling you to be more mana efficient. I take back what I said about stealing my mana for healing you as you LT yourself. Having been raising a Warlock lately, I now understand that your spells are expensive and LT is the only way to continue to put out damage sometimes. I've been really good about making sure any Warlocks I group with are always topped off now that I know. Thanks for helping me see the other side.
Love,
Kady
My Warlock is up past level 50 now and is quickly on her way to being my 4th 80. I'm having a ball leveling with her, even though Vanilla is soooooo tough to level in once you get up to the 40's. I just have to make it a few more levels to 58 and I can get the heck out of Azeroth and REALLY love leveling. I've been using Dungeon Finder as often as I can to help. I've found that I can solo a lot of quests that are actually well above my level (as in orange and red ones) so I run out of quests in a zone more quickly than I probably should. DF helps supplement questing nicely, not to mention the gear choices are way better and way more accessible now that everyone's into pugging low level dungeons. Between heirlooms and DF, I've been steadily leveling over the past several weeks and--for the most part--avoiding the zones that are painful to quest in (got out of Tanaris as soon as I could). I'm also now fairly comfortable running a lot of the low level dungeons without having to look at Atlas to find my way through. What's good about hitting the same dungeon over and over is that, chances are, your first time through there, you'll end up with a tank (or at least one person) who's already gone through it several times. By the time you're in their position, there's someone else in your pug who's running through for the first time and you can show them through. Having a group that knows where they're going helps orient you to the dungeon and running the same thing over and over, also does that XD
Love,
Kady
My Warlock is up past level 50 now and is quickly on her way to being my 4th 80. I'm having a ball leveling with her, even though Vanilla is soooooo tough to level in once you get up to the 40's. I just have to make it a few more levels to 58 and I can get the heck out of Azeroth and REALLY love leveling. I've been using Dungeon Finder as often as I can to help. I've found that I can solo a lot of quests that are actually well above my level (as in orange and red ones) so I run out of quests in a zone more quickly than I probably should. DF helps supplement questing nicely, not to mention the gear choices are way better and way more accessible now that everyone's into pugging low level dungeons. Between heirlooms and DF, I've been steadily leveling over the past several weeks and--for the most part--avoiding the zones that are painful to quest in (got out of Tanaris as soon as I could). I'm also now fairly comfortable running a lot of the low level dungeons without having to look at Atlas to find my way through. What's good about hitting the same dungeon over and over is that, chances are, your first time through there, you'll end up with a tank (or at least one person) who's already gone through it several times. By the time you're in their position, there's someone else in your pug who's running through for the first time and you can show them through. Having a group that knows where they're going helps orient you to the dungeon and running the same thing over and over, also does that XD
Saturday, May 8, 2010
Children's Week, Twice Over
Finished Children's Week today, on both Lade and Kady.
YYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY
Ok, done with that. Kady still needs Flame Warden before she gets her drake, but I did manage to get all of School of Hard Knocks done on THE FIRST TRY in each BG! Holy Crap! I think it was because I knew what I was doing this time, plus I could heal myself. I went Shadow which was tons of fun, must think about doing more BGs in Shadow...
Now I'm just having fun and taking my time doing all the quests the orphans give you so I can get more cute pets :)
Happy end of F***ing Children's Week!!! XD
YYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY
Ok, done with that. Kady still needs Flame Warden before she gets her drake, but I did manage to get all of School of Hard Knocks done on THE FIRST TRY in each BG! Holy Crap! I think it was because I knew what I was doing this time, plus I could heal myself. I went Shadow which was tons of fun, must think about doing more BGs in Shadow...
Now I'm just having fun and taking my time doing all the quests the orphans give you so I can get more cute pets :)
Happy end of F***ing Children's Week!!! XD
Thursday, May 6, 2010
1 Year of Posting
I think this might be my longest running, consistently posting blog. Yay :) In preparation for this anniversary, I spent last night uploading some of my favorite screen shots to Flickr to create a gallery of my time played. It still needs work, but there's some shots of Lade while I was still leveling her (in crazy, mis-matched gear) and Kady while she was still human, among other things. I've got to get back to cleaning so I can maybe get my drake today, but enjoy the pix!
http://www.flickr.com/photos/canikeephim/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/canikeephim/
Wednesday, May 5, 2010
Good news everyone!
After several, not-so-solid attempts at Prof. Putricide, we managed to get him down tonight! This was a very nice boost in our confidence, especially since we couldn't get past a specific point in the Dreamwalker fight. Each time we wiped on the Prof, we managed to get him a little farther down, each wipe we were farther into the fight than the previous attempt. We made tweaks here and there and managed to finally defeat him! This makes me happy because it's one more boss we know we can beat and it's one more boss closer to the Lich King. I got a new mace (Lockjaw) and paired it with what is technically a DPS offhand (Scourgelord's Baton), however I did the math (in between wipes) and I get more stats out of it than if I have my Mag'hari Chieftain's Staff. Wasted stat or not, my heals are still epic XDSide note, Garaba and Nayana helped me get the EoTS part of the School of Hard Knocks yesterday. We attempted to get the other two, but I fail at BGs so Lade still doesn't have a pink drake. She is one step closer though, and that's good. I don't know yet if Kady will get it. I started doing the Children's Week achievements with her today, but only because I was bored and killing time before raid. I'm off work tomorrow and as a reward for cleaning the house, I'm going to allow myself achievement time later. We're also going to have an alt run in ToC, which should be cool, we'll also do the weekly (this week it's Ignis) and get some more frosties. All in all, a pretty good night tonight :)
Monday, May 3, 2010
School of Hard Knocks = Bane of My Existence
Capture the flag in Eye of the Storm
Assault a tower in Alterac Valley
Return a fallen flag in Warsong Gulch
are all that stand between Lade and her pretty pink drake (actually it's kind of ugly, but it's my only shot at 310% flying speed). I don't really see AV being very difficult, other than the queue to get into it (was in 3 BGs yesterday, didn't get it once, got WG twice). WG I almost returned the flag--twice, both times I wasn't quiiiiiite quick enough. I think EotS is going to be the most difficult one and I'm not looking forward to it.
Seriously considering not even doing it on Kady, but then again, that's what I did last year for Lade and could have had my drake ages ago if I had done it...
Assault a tower in Alterac Valley
Return a fallen flag in Warsong Gulch
are all that stand between Lade and her pretty pink drake (actually it's kind of ugly, but it's my only shot at 310% flying speed). I don't really see AV being very difficult, other than the queue to get into it (was in 3 BGs yesterday, didn't get it once, got WG twice). WG I almost returned the flag--twice, both times I wasn't quiiiiiite quick enough. I think EotS is going to be the most difficult one and I'm not looking forward to it.
Seriously considering not even doing it on Kady, but then again, that's what I did last year for Lade and could have had my drake ages ago if I had done it...
Saturday, May 1, 2010
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