Sunday, January 17, 2010
Wednesday, December 30, 2009
Sunday, December 27, 2009
Monday, November 9, 2009
Belated Birthday Bloggery 2009-11-09
1. Happy Birthday Michelle! You aren't getting older . . . I am:)
2. Happy Birthday to Meece's son, Sean! Get that nelf drood leveled!
3. And, finally, Happy Birthday to the United States Marine Corps, founded 11-10-1775. In the words of Eleanor Roosevelt:
It's been awhile since I last blogged, this has mostly been due to a need for renewed focus at work, and an attempt to focus on raiding in WoW. Well, the later focus has crashed and burned like the Hindenburg.
Meece and I are out of Eclipsed -- the guild broke up like a gigging rock band -- and are now in a new, far more casual family / social leveling guild called Kilrogg Fighters. I'm taking a breather from raiding to level a brand-spanking-new Draenei Shaman. While I have the option of moving and / or faction changing another toon from, say, Kul Tiras, over here, the total cost of doing that all at once is Too Damn Much Money™ right now. Tyrantos is now Level 35 or so after slightly less than a week of spending every second of WoW-playing since creation playing him. The /played timer shows just over 2 days playtime spread over that period . . . so I'm leveling fast.
My secret? Tyrtrinos the death knight has access to the necessary resources to buy two "bind on account" Heirloom items that give bonii to earned experience for good old Tyrantos. The items scale with level, so they will be useful all the way to Level 80.
2. Happy Birthday to Meece's son, Sean! Get that nelf drood leveled!
3. And, finally, Happy Birthday to the United States Marine Corps, founded 11-10-1775. In the words of Eleanor Roosevelt:
“The Marines I have seen around the world have the cleanest bodies, the filthiest minds, the highest morale, and the lowest morals of any group of animals I have ever seen. Thank God for the United States Marine Corps!”
It's been awhile since I last blogged, this has mostly been due to a need for renewed focus at work, and an attempt to focus on raiding in WoW. Well, the later focus has crashed and burned like the Hindenburg.
Meece and I are out of Eclipsed -- the guild broke up like a gigging rock band -- and are now in a new, far more casual family / social leveling guild called Kilrogg Fighters. I'm taking a breather from raiding to level a brand-spanking-new Draenei Shaman. While I have the option of moving and / or faction changing another toon from, say, Kul Tiras, over here, the total cost of doing that all at once is Too Damn Much Money™ right now. Tyrantos is now Level 35 or so after slightly less than a week of spending every second of WoW-playing since creation playing him. The /played timer shows just over 2 days playtime spread over that period . . . so I'm leveling fast.
My secret? Tyrtrinos the death knight has access to the necessary resources to buy two "bind on account" Heirloom items that give bonii to earned experience for good old Tyrantos. The items scale with level, so they will be useful all the way to Level 80.
Thursday, October 22, 2009
Bloggery 2009-10-22
1. Pics of Parker from his visit last weekend, as well as Photographic Proof™ of the literary awesomeness of one Seanan Mcguire -- her book, featured on the new paperback rack in the front of the Arden Faire Barnes and Noble.
Oh, and the book itself, Rosemary and Rue, is a terrific read. Rosemary and Rue is to urban fantasy as Lois McMaster Bujold's Shards of Honor (another great book, by the way) is to military space opera: a sharp, witty, very well written first novel with great plotting, crisp dialog, intelligent world-building that will gain a vast following. I think that, like Lois, Seanan's work is award-worthy. I foresee Hugos and / or Nebulas joining the Pegasus awards on her mantle.
2. Weekend WoW: Another weekend, another FAIL Naxx-25, aka, the Floating 1d4 of FAILBOTTERY. Fresh run, started in Construct Quarter. Patchwerk, Grobbulus and Gluth were all one-shotted. I got my hopes up . . . then we hit Thaddius, aka the "White Death Knights Can't Jump" boss. This time I made the jump (about a quarter of the raid didn't) because I tried a couple of tricks to boost my Run speed. but the raid's damage output was far too low to take Thadd down before he enraged and hard wipes the raid. About 1/3 of the raid was not even geared for Naxx-10. One guy had mostly green (low level) gear from the lower end zones of Northrend.
Consensus on being geared enough for Naxx-10 is to have all or almost all Rare ("blue") gear at Item Level 187 - 200. This gear can be obtained through quests rewards, through faction reputation rewards, from crafters and from dungeon loot drops in heroic-mode dungeons. New level 80 toons have little business in Naxx unless they have the gear to survive.
I still managed to get enough heroic dungeon runs in to score my second piece of T8 with badges. The loot from heroic dungeons -- with one exception, namely Heroic Trial of the Champion -- no longer provides me with gear upgrades. The badges, on the other hand, can still buy some upgrades. However, the Emblems of Conquest that drop in heroics and pre-3.2 raids no longer buy me gear upgrades. The higher-level Emblems of Triumph are what buys the Tier 9+ and associated upgrades. I can trade the EoC's down in level, save them to buy other things, just no gear upgrades. I'm five Emblems away from my third pirce of Tier 9.
Oh, and the book itself, Rosemary and Rue, is a terrific read. Rosemary and Rue is to urban fantasy as Lois McMaster Bujold's Shards of Honor (another great book, by the way) is to military space opera: a sharp, witty, very well written first novel with great plotting, crisp dialog, intelligent world-building that will gain a vast following. I think that, like Lois, Seanan's work is award-worthy. I foresee Hugos and / or Nebulas joining the Pegasus awards on her mantle.
2. Weekend WoW: Another weekend, another FAIL Naxx-25, aka, the Floating 1d4 of FAILBOTTERY. Fresh run, started in Construct Quarter. Patchwerk, Grobbulus and Gluth were all one-shotted. I got my hopes up . . . then we hit Thaddius, aka the "White Death Knights Can't Jump" boss. This time I made the jump (about a quarter of the raid didn't) because I tried a couple of tricks to boost my Run speed. but the raid's damage output was far too low to take Thadd down before he enraged and hard wipes the raid. About 1/3 of the raid was not even geared for Naxx-10. One guy had mostly green (low level) gear from the lower end zones of Northrend.
Consensus on being geared enough for Naxx-10 is to have all or almost all Rare ("blue") gear at Item Level 187 - 200. This gear can be obtained through quests rewards, through faction reputation rewards, from crafters and from dungeon loot drops in heroic-mode dungeons. New level 80 toons have little business in Naxx unless they have the gear to survive.
I still managed to get enough heroic dungeon runs in to score my second piece of T8 with badges. The loot from heroic dungeons -- with one exception, namely Heroic Trial of the Champion -- no longer provides me with gear upgrades. The badges, on the other hand, can still buy some upgrades. However, the Emblems of Conquest that drop in heroics and pre-3.2 raids no longer buy me gear upgrades. The higher-level Emblems of Triumph are what buys the Tier 9+ and associated upgrades. I can trade the EoC's down in level, save them to buy other things, just no gear upgrades. I'm five Emblems away from my third pirce of Tier 9.
Friday, October 16, 2009
Bloggery 2009-10-15: Journal of the Plague (years)
With NO APOLOGIES whatsoever to Norman Spinrad's awesome novella from the 80s about AIDS.
I'm finally (two weeks later) feeling almost back to normal.
I've been passing the time -- when up to it -- playing WoW. Getting out of Clothing Discouraged and into Eclipsed was a blessing in disguise. Three *scheduled* raids a week, and this week we had a couple of Good Ones: Trial of the Crusader-10 and -25. I've tried TotC-10 once with CD and we wiped like a 12-pack of Charmin rolls on the first boss.
Not this time, bunky! While we were only able to down the first 3 bosses in 25-man (Beasts, Lord Jaraxxus, Faction Champs), we were able to finish 10-man (Twin Val'kyrs, Anub'arak). Then we did 10-man Ulduar and managed to buzzsaw our way through Flame Leviathan, XT-2000 Deconstructor, Ignis, Razorscale, Kologarm, Auriaya, and the Assembly of Iron. We went bounce off Thorim. Left are Hodir, Freya, Thorim, General Vezax, Mirimon, Yogg-Saron and Algalon. As dessert I managed to get into a no-fail Naxx-10 PuG, and dropped Gluth and Thaddius to finish Constuct Quarter (and this time I made the jump!), Sapphiron and Kel'Thuzad. I am missing one boss -- Instructor Razuvious, in Military Quarter -- from my personal Full Naxx Clear.
New additions to my gear include a ring and boots from Ulduar-10. With the emblems from here (3 per boss dropped) I got my Tier 9 gloves. Now I have 2-piece set bonii for Tier 8 and 9 -- nice because the bonii do not overwrite one another. My "gear score" is in the mid-2400s, good enough to pug Ulduar once I know all the fights.
That's the problem: reading about the fight strategies is not enough for me. I need to actually fight the boss in my assigned role, to really understand the strategy . . . and for many groups, this does not work because they do not want to take the time to teach you the fights (and I had a very bitter experience with this on Marty in Naxx back in April . . .).
Now I'd like to get the guild to run Onyxia's Lair. This is a raid from Original WoW that has been owered up for Level 80. Ony's another draconic loot piñata, or so I am told.
On Sunday I get to see my grandson. Camera in hand, of course. :)
I'm finally (two weeks later) feeling almost back to normal.
I've been passing the time -- when up to it -- playing WoW. Getting out of Clothing Discouraged and into Eclipsed was a blessing in disguise. Three *scheduled* raids a week, and this week we had a couple of Good Ones: Trial of the Crusader-10 and -25. I've tried TotC-10 once with CD and we wiped like a 12-pack of Charmin rolls on the first boss.
Not this time, bunky! While we were only able to down the first 3 bosses in 25-man (Beasts, Lord Jaraxxus, Faction Champs), we were able to finish 10-man (Twin Val'kyrs, Anub'arak). Then we did 10-man Ulduar and managed to buzzsaw our way through Flame Leviathan, XT-2000 Deconstructor, Ignis, Razorscale, Kologarm, Auriaya, and the Assembly of Iron. We went bounce off Thorim. Left are Hodir, Freya, Thorim, General Vezax, Mirimon, Yogg-Saron and Algalon. As dessert I managed to get into a no-fail Naxx-10 PuG, and dropped Gluth and Thaddius to finish Constuct Quarter (and this time I made the jump!), Sapphiron and Kel'Thuzad. I am missing one boss -- Instructor Razuvious, in Military Quarter -- from my personal Full Naxx Clear.
New additions to my gear include a ring and boots from Ulduar-10. With the emblems from here (3 per boss dropped) I got my Tier 9 gloves. Now I have 2-piece set bonii for Tier 8 and 9 -- nice because the bonii do not overwrite one another. My "gear score" is in the mid-2400s, good enough to pug Ulduar once I know all the fights.
That's the problem: reading about the fight strategies is not enough for me. I need to actually fight the boss in my assigned role, to really understand the strategy . . . and for many groups, this does not work because they do not want to take the time to teach you the fights (and I had a very bitter experience with this on Marty in Naxx back in April . . .).
Now I'd like to get the guild to run Onyxia's Lair. This is a raid from Original WoW that has been owered up for Level 80. Ony's another draconic loot piñata, or so I am told.
On Sunday I get to see my grandson. Camera in hand, of course. :)
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