Leaderless...

Warning: This post is a rant and contains starred out words!

The past 2 to 3 weeks my guild has been largely leaderless. Our  Guild Master (GM) has quite frankly f***ed off with no warning. He logs in for a few minutes here and there at weird times (according to real ID). When I say weird I'm talking at times of the day when we all know the guild will be dead. You might even be inclined to say he's logging in so it doesn't get to 30 days when somone can take over!

Happy Birthday Elloric!

Today would have been Elloric's birthday but sadly he's not here to see it. Nonetheless he live's on in WoW with an npc of his character in the Vale. If you're unaware of Elloric's story you can read about it here and a special birthday post here.

Breakfast Topic Thoughts: Which playable race would you like to see come to WoW?

Today's Breakfast Topic, asked by Elizabeth Harper, is "Which playable race would you like to see come to WoW?". This topic follows an interview with Greg Street in which he spoke about Naga being a playable race (more on this here).

I think Naga would be a pretty cool race to play, I do like how they slither along and their movements in general. But I can see how this causes a number of problems - especilly when it comes to gear! After all Naga don't need shoes as they don't have feet! Obviously there would be the possibility of removing unnecessary gear slots for certain races but inevitably this would make them easier (or possibly) harder to gear effectively.

Fun on the US PTR

On Friday afternoon I had arranged to spend some time on the PTR with a guildie. It turned out that the EU Normal server 'Brill' was offline and so we headed to the US server 'Anasterian'. Having noted when I first got onto the PTR that the US servers will an option I was curious to see if I could access them - and yes I could. I assume it works both ways and that those of you on US servers go get to the EU PTR ones. The Korean server was, however, locked.

Clearly, this would be a brilliant way to meet up with those of you on US servers and share a slice of cake! Perhaps, if people were interested, we could arrange for a party of sorts?

I think this is what happens when you complete the Legendary cloak!!

Friday Fun-Run: ICC

Having missed last weeks Friday Fun-Run I was keen to get back into the swing of Fun-Running and seeing the usuals etc. It was also a bit of a surprise location until about 10-15minutes before start time - we went to Icecrown Citadel which happens to be one of my favourite raids (out of those I've been to).

Breakfast Topic Thoughts: Random Group Tools - The Results

A couple of days ago WoW Insider's Breakfast Topic, asked by Lisa Poisso, was Love 'em or hate 'em, do you use random group tools? I decided that rather than blogging about my thoughts on this topic on the day that I'd wait for the results.

 

First off my answer to the poll was "I use them, and I think they're a fantastic addition to the game." Quite simply if it wasn't for these tools I'd never see a lot of the content - in particular raids. I've only recently gotten into raiding (well LFR) and I am enjoying it. But I can safely say that real raiding (as so many people like to call it) probably wouldn't work for me. If I'm perfectly honest I don't think I'm cut out for it and I could see myself getting stressed - which is not what I want to achieve from the game!!

My Personal Pet Battle Strategy

About a month ago Mr and Mrs WoW commented on a post of mine asking whether I have a strategy when it comes to pet battles. Then this week I got asked a similar question by Trolling Azeroth:

So, I've decided to put my strategy down in writing. It most definately isn't the most efficient method but it may be useful for someone.

I'd like to point out that there's a whole sub-community of WoW blogs out there that deal specifically with pets, battles, strategy etc. I like to read the work of Liopleurodon, Quintessence, Kaitz, Ross and Ratshag amongst others. Ross has even got leveling from 1-25 down to four fights but it does require you to have some specific items and pets.

Community Blog Topic: What would you buy from the in-game store?

This weeks Community Blog Topic is not only a rather controversial one but it's right at the forefront of recent WoW related news!

Robin Torres asks "What would you buy from the in-game store?".

Robin would like to see transmog sets. She suggests "witch sets for warlocks and mages or kung fu sets for monks" and note that se wrote this before the transmog helms were announced, which are now purchaseable. I do like a spot of transmog and I do like the idea of transmoggable item skins. However, at £10 a helm this is certainly above what I'd be willing to pay!

PTR: Pretty Pets & Magnificent Mounts

As I mentioned earlier in the week I downloaded and went on the Patch 5.4 Public Test Realm (PTR). If I'm honest I didn't do much testing when I was on there. But one thing I did do, pretty much instantly, was check out which pets and mounts I had available to me. There's absolutely no spoilers here - just a lot of screenshots!

Terrific Trio

Last night I was on a mission. A mission to get my DK to Level 90. And I did it!

Disappearing Dirt

Saturday afternoon I headed down to Sunsong Ranch and harvested my plants - primarily White Turnips for Work Order: Golden Lotus II. I then set about planting seeds for the next day when something very bizarre happened.

I had an occupied plot. So I disturbed the vermin and killed it. But then the plot mysteriously disappeared. I reloaded my screen but it was still missing. I decided to carry on with the remaining plots and then go back to it. Another plot was occupied and exactly the same thing happened.

Missing plots.

PTR: A Guide To Getting Started

I know there's plenty of guides to getting started when it comes to Public Test Realms (PTRs). However, I encountered an issue when I tried to access the PTR for Patch 5.4. yesterday - for which I couldn't find any obvious answers. Fortunately the boyfriend was able to have a think about it and we found a solution. In my quest for answers I noticed that the forums were indeed full of people encountering the same issue as me so I decided to compile a guide to the process in general and how I fixed my particular issue.


1. Downloading the PTR
Firstly, you can only download and play on the PTR when there is an open PTR. If there is then you need to log into your battle net account (i.e. eu.battle.net). Once on your account summary page you need to click 'download game clients' on the right hand side.



Account summary page and 'Download Game Clients' link.

Breakfast Topic Thoughts: Potential Virtual Realm Headaches

Todays WoW Insider Breakfast Topic is about Potential Virtual Realm Headaches. Elizabeth Harper asks:

"are you looking forward to virtual realms or are you frustrated that they'll crowd your realm? Are you racing to get farming done before patch 5.4 -- and virtual realms -- arrive?"

I'm really looking forward to virtual realms!

My Alliance home server is medium population and it suits me just fine as it is. But it's quite stagnant. It's the same names selling the majority of stuff on the AH at stupid prices. There's the same trolls spamming anal jokes (though I don't find them particularly funny). The guilds are much the same aswell with the odd new one popping up and dying off.

A Busy Week Fun-Running!

I haven't blogged since Wednesday due to a pretty hectic week of Fun-Runs! Tuesday right through to Friday I was on Fun-Runs and so I haven't done a great deal outside of this in-game. Plus I've been coming home from work and logging almost straight into WoW (which has got me into real-life trouble for not doing my jobs around the house, oops!). So, yesterday I caught up on the house work, gardening etc. and finally watched The Hobbit!

We started Bastion of Twilight on Tuesday evening. Previous trips to BoT have not been very successful for me! Despite this I was pretty sure things couldn't go much worse than the last time I went and thankfully I was right!!



Day 1

Community Blog Topic: Is Leveling Too Easy?

This weeks WoW Insider Community Blog Topic asked by Robin Torres is "Is leveling too easy?". To set the scene a little, former Blizzard developer Mark Kern has recently claimed that WoW is too easy (read more here). We've also seen an in-game store bought item that grants a 100% xp buff - Enduring Elixir of Wisdom - datamined. To me these give slightly conflicting messages - if the game were to easy why buff xp?

Nostalgia...

I've been wanting to write a blog post about in-game nostalgia for some time now. I have however struggled to work out a way of writing down my feelings without sounding like an arse. But, WoW Insiders Matthew Rossi has inspired me!

Firstly the inspirational article in question. Matthew Rossi posted an article about The living game and the end of nostalgia which I highly recommend everyone reads (especially if you intend to read further on). I think that he has hit the nail on the head repeatedly throughout his article. It's well balanced, well written and most of all sums up how I feel.

Anyway, I have decided to jump right on into the deep end so here goes.

Getting Serious About Gear

As you may have noticed I've been do a fair few LFRs recently. Well a trip into ToT Part 1 on Friday with some guildies prompted me to take a look at my gear. To cut a long story short, someone was moaning about the crappy DPS, something was said about hit caps and I got a bit confuzzled by the technical talk. Fortunately the boyfriend was on hand to help me out.

Friday Fun-Run: Naxx etc.

This past Friday I was able to make it on a Twitter-guild Friday Fun-Run. As usual it was a brilliant event with lots of achievs and giggles!! We also had a brilliant turn-out which included a lot of Draenei!!

Some More LFR

Thursday evening I did some more LFR with my guildie Roooby. I also remembered to take lots more screenshots in order to make this a slightly prettier post than my last LFR post. We did two seperate LFRs which, for me, requires quite a lot of brain power and concentration.

Heart of Fear. Pt 2.

First off we did Heart of Fear part 2. The first two bosses, Wind Lord Mel'jarak and Amber-Shaper Un'sok, were both pretty standard LFR. I think we wiped we wiped a few time on Mel'jarak and once on Un'sok.

Breakfast Topic Thoughts: Do unlikely race/role combos disturb you?

Todays WoW Insider Breakfast Topic is "Do unlikely race/role combos disturb you?". Lisa Poisso asks "Whether your reasons are aesthetic or practical, have you found any particular race/class combinations to feel a bit dodgy? Is there a race/roll combination in game that just doesn't work for you?"

Lisa talks about her dislike of Gnome warrior tanks. I do get her points entirely; theyre small which doesnt help when it comes to locating them amongst masses of baddies and the meager size doesn't exactly inspire confidence. But as a Gnome DK owner I love how, despite their size, they can still kick some serious ass!

Personally, I'm a bit iffy about certain races being healers. I don't know why exactly this is but I can envisage some races as healers but not others. For example; Night Elfs, Trolls and Tauren's are what I imagine to be healing races whilst Dwarfs, Orcs and Undead are not. I guess that the races I see more as healers are slightly more in touch with nature etc. compared with the other (more) destructive races.

LFR Idiot

I haven't done any LFR for ages so yesterday I decided to change that. I usually run it with a guildie and he was up for doing the first part of Heart of Fear in the early evening. We even managed to get another guildie to joing us. Overall it was pretty successful. We downed Imperial Vizier Zor'lok and Blade Lord Ya'yak first time and had a few issues with Garalon (see below). I got some gold and the Legbreaker Greatcloak, plus The Dread Approach achievement.

It was my first time in here so I had no grand expectations that I'd survive the whole thing without dying but as far as LFR's go I didn't die to much as a result of my own stupidity. However, I died once or twice due to a complete and utter spoilsport (I could say a lot worse!).



Introducing My New Pet: Arvash!

Last week it was Arvash (over at The Crimson Hammer)'s 1 year blogiversary. Arv asked people to "leave a comment, explaining what superhero, or supervillain, your Warcraft character would most resemble" for a chance at winning an Armored Bloodwing or one of two Blossoming Ancient.

There were some really good answers and some funny ones. Here's my answer: "I’d like to say that my hunter’s most like Hawkeye because she’s an excellent aim but I’m not sure how true that actually is… Nontheless, Hawkeye is brilliant ". Arv soon pointed out to me that Hawkeye doesn't use pets - he's missing out if you ask me.

Community Blog Topic: What is your favorite playable race?

This weeks WoW Insider Community Blog Topic is "What is your favorite playable race?" as asked by Robin Torres last Tuesday. For once this Community Topic is quite an easy one for me and the answer hasn't changed since I started playing WoW over a year ago!

I have two favourite races - one Alliance and one Horde. Like I mentioned above I have loved these two races from day 1. Infact, they we're the first two races I rolled of each faction, respectively. If you could only ever play two races I'd play these. SpaceBard mentions a massive server crash in his answer and yeah, these races would be the two I'd pick from when starting over. Further, if my chosen Horde race was playable as Alliance too I'd [probably] never visit the dark side (and vice-versa)!

So, without further ado my two races are: Gnomes and Taurens!