Waldonnis

No wonder she was licking instead of biting all day... Happy Birthday!

Strider group did awesome on the last few attempts and we look to be tightening up and knocking them down with time to spare early on. Latter striders seem to go down progressively slower, but I think we can solve that by getting and staying ahead of the strider spawns better to allow Rahgesh some time to get into position. Notes for the strider group: Watch positioning. I saw some folks get a bit too close to the striders, especially by the fallen pillar area. Even if you don't get clipped by the fear, it's just easier to stay a tad closer to the centre. If you position yourself well, you shouldn't need to move much to stay in range throughout the kite circle (shadowpriest range is an issue, however). Snares, stuns, roots...INVALUABLE. The more time we can give Rahgesh to cast things aside from frost shock, the more threat he can sustain, so whatever you can safely do, go for it. We're already using nets, but other ideas are frost nova, mind flay, concussion shot, frost trap, hammer of justice, and quite a few others. Steady damage and moderate threat is what we really need to see. On the earlier attempts, I watched us burn 50% of the striders' health in the last 20secs, but the first 40secs were slow and spiky damage- and threat-wise. If we can keep the damage output high and steady, as we did in the final few attempts, the striders go down comparatively faster and with less threat issues. Side groups, I was pretty busy up top but tried to keep an eyeball on what was going on. Things looked good from my perspective, but noticed some bad luck and coincidences that we need to work through. I know it sucks when naga and striders spawn at the same time and place as a tainted, but we'll probably just have to deal with that somehow (they do have to spawn somewhere...usually in the worst possible spot). Best advice I can give is keeping an eyeball on the spawn timers and save any AoE-ish abilities if at all possible until they're out of the way. In all, I'm quite pleased at the progress. We may not have hit phase 3, but we are showing definite signs of improvement in organisation and execution.

One more thing worth mentioning... I know that we all use Omen (or should), but it's accuracy is in heavy question lately with all of the combat log changes as well as some changes to threat mechanics that aren't exactly bug-free. So PLEASE treat Omen as just an additional source of info and NOT as if it were a solid fact. You may be 8th on the threat list on Omen, but if you pulled aggro, it's not Omen's fault. We all should know our own threat generation roughly by now and can "feel" it out. For me, if I crit 2-3 times in a row, I know I should probably ease up a second or two if it's early in the fight or right after a threat-wiping transition. This is less of a concern on Vashj, but I wanted to reiterate it since we seemed to have some aggro problems on the farm content. In time, Omen and Threat-2.0 will improve, but for now, it's just not quite there. In short, push the line, but always be mindful that what Omen says may not be accurate.

Some tips, based on our last batch of attempts: Know where you are directionally. If you're north, know you're north without having to look around. This makes it much easier to get in position for tainted core relays, picking up the topside baddies, or grabbing runaway elementals. Call naga and striders as soon as you see them spawn, along with the direction ("strider north"). Too often, I've seen a strider already nearing Vashj before anyone mentions it. Kiters/naga tanks have to start moving quickly to keep these things from 1-shotting people, and the early warning is extremely helpful for this. DO NOT GO NEAR THE KITING PATH. I can't stress this enough. The reason so many people die around a netted strider is because they're often in the kiting path. The striders are the largest things in the encounter, so zoom out a bit and make sure to stay VERY clear of them. Monitor your debuffs. Please don't wait until Cal mentions that you have static charge on TS before you start moving. TS has a 1-3sec delay at times and by then, you may have killed a clothy (and made the healers grumpy). Various boss mods help with this and will let you see who has the debuff as well and/or announce it somewhere more visible on your screen. Stay alive. Bring health potions, nightmare seeds, etc if you need to and use them. Healers, don't forget to heal yourself sometimes too Green poo is bad, mmkay? This is really a phase 3 thing, but since we haven't seen phase 3 much, I wanted to remind people about the evils of standing in stuff. "Don't stand in stuff" is the unofficial motto of boss fight designers, apparently, and we've seen this plenty of times in the past...so, basically, don't stand in stuff. Lastly, don't stand in front of the naga unless you're tanking them. I've eaten one of those cleaves and they hurt badly. Don't be me, avoid the cleave. Besides, have you smelled a naga's breath? Only other thing that I can't stress enough: we CAN do this. We're geared for it, we've seen it, we just need to DO it.

Nope, it's a stand-alone program and it can be installed to its default location (you won't need to look for it, it'll be added to your Start menu). What it basically does is check your installed add-ons against the repository of Ace add-ons and highlight the ones that are out of date. You can then mark the ones that you want to update or just have the program figure it out for you. I'm a nit-picker and have some add-ons that I refuse to update, so I have mine set up a tad different than most, but the defaults seem to work well for the less demanding folks that I've talked to. Also, I am running Vista and don't use the UAC version (mostly because I disabled UAC ), so I'm not sure how well that one works for the Vista users. If needed, I can probably put together some screenshots with how I have mine set up and basic usage, but the instructions at WowAce seem to be pretty good.

Actually, the fallacy of a "fast loss" is what got us to having a sub-10% win record before the changes. It actually is not the case unless it's a total-turtle win vs. a really rapid loss with a few objectives (which rarely happens, even pre-2.4). The true "best honour per hour" is close wins or close losses, with an optimal game time of 17mins, give or take 3-4mins. What usually happens with the "fast loss" mindset is that Horde puts up no defence, including at the objectives they manage to tap flags at, and subsequently lose ALL of those objectives with the rare exception of one tower....which bluntly leads to craptastic-to-no bonus honour and a "thanks for playing" token (not to mention an even slower loss, as we end up rezzing at the relief hut). In essence, THE CAKE IS A LIE. Do not believe the BS about "best honour per hour is a fast loss" in any sense. Someone started spreading that lie pre-2.4 and, given the herd mentality on Horde these days, it's been a ###### to break them of it ever since.

No kidding. I usually start by reading the PvP forum and didn't really notice the difference at first (), but swapping over to the realm forums made it more apparent. I gave up even trying to read the forums after about 10mins and now can't shake lolwut the lolcat headache kekeke

The shadowpriest can be counterspelled or silenced, which really helps. When I brought Waldy on Sunday's run, I kept the felhunter out just to spell lock that mana burn, and waited to sacrifice him until after she was dead. If you really want to maximise effectiveness, be sure to counter/silence/spell lock/kick as she's casting mana burn, since I believe there's a cooldown on that for her. Keeping her from mana burning just about anyone is a priority that early in the fight, in my opinion...I've been on the receiving end of that as a healer and it really sucked

One thing to note about scorpids is that it makes a druid/paladin's life much more difficult in PvP if used correctly. Stacking the poisons on top of DoTs gives you that much more to get rid of to get to the real damage-dealing stuff. Otherwise, they're more of an annoyance than anything else damage-wise. Also, builds are posted above for warlocks and a couple of raiding mage builds.

I'll post some warlock and mage specs as well, but need sleep first Sleep acquired: Mage: http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=obhVZxgGzfcsoeRt0h Here's a cookie-cutter 10/48/3 deep fire raiding build. I have a variation of this on Verissi and enjoy it quite a bit. It's lousy in PvP, but very good for raiding, since the focus is heavy sustained damage, boosted crit rate, improved spell hit, and some mana efficiency with MoE and elemental precision. There's some room to play around with points, since you can always boost Playing with Fire by removing points in improved fireblast, etc...but overall, it's more just for personal taste at that point. http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=oZxgGzfcIoeRtVG00o This is a new build that's floating around for raiding. It incorporates icy veins for hasted casting, but can be a bit mana-intensive since it lacks clearcasting. Again, there is some room to play with points, especially in the frost talents, but I'd recommend only playing with the second tier talents there. Having improved frostbolt is handy on fights like Al'ar (fire immune). There are tons of solid frost builds out there for PvP/Arena and I won't write the novel that it would take to explain them all. Some prefer arcane/frost for some control with a punch, while others enjoy heavy frost builds for maximum control and survivability. All seem to be pretty successful in the hands of a practiced mage, so I encourage experimentation to find your own style. Warlock: http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=IZsxczIozZEt0tr0zhhi This is Waldonnis' current demonology/destruction build and it brings one thing: tons of direct damage. It lacks any kind of survivability and has only one instant-cast DoT spell, so I wouldn't recommend it for anything but raiding. Another bonus is the simplicity that it brings (shadows, then chain-cast shadowbolts for max damage output) and some flexibility with demonic sacrifice buffs. At upper levels of raiding, most warlocks that I know end up going with some form of this build since the damage is unmatched by affliction or demonology-heavy builds. Tweaking some of the unimportant demonology talents for the various ranks of improved healthstone is about all that I would change. http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=IEMrVMfzVtbocxZxx A good, all-around affliction build and similar to what I used for quite some time. There's a ton to like about this build for 5-mans and even some larger-scale PvP (AV) since it brings nice DoT damage, dark pact (use the imp for this...great mana regen on that little guy), instant-cast AoE fear, siphon life, nightfall, and tough-to-interrupt draining. Variations of this build are numerous and include such things like shadowburn, malediction, or shadow embrace. PvP-wise, this is a "die fast, but take everyone down with you" build, so expect to be killed a ton, but your opponents will be thinking about how much they hate you as they are waiting for their rez or stuck trying to out-eat your DoTs. http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=IA0rVRbzoZbxczIiz0es This is the "Vrugz, Hatemonger" build for PvP and generally known as SL/SL (siphon life, soul link). Many variations exist on this, but the combination of siphon life, soul link, nightfall, and soul siphon make for an unreal amount of survivability. Many warlocks choose to ignore suppression and put more points towards either a felguard or improving their DoTs, but the key talents listed above are always included. Pair this warlock up with a paladin healer and it basically takes 3-5 Alliance puggers to take them down. http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=IV0MZMxZxx0trhtVuAo This is Katak's build and has been for pretty much ever This is definitely not a cookie-cutter build at all and only one warlock I know has been able to make this shine in both PvE and PvP, but it's a very nice destruction-heavy build all around. PvE-wise, it brings the heavy damage talents in destruction for the same style of play that I enjoy with my demo/destruction build. PvP-wise, the addition of shadowfury, conflagrate, and improved searing pain give options for cast time and an additional level of control without using fear. It's definitely worth noting that it takes a ton of comfort with this build to make it work well for you, but given enough practice, you'd pretty much wreck anyone one-on-one, including our traditional Achilles' heel: warriors.

Only the one from Sunwell...at least that's all that I saw any reference to from my PTR time. I doubt we'll see any other legendaries until WotLK, though, since this is likely the last major content patch that we'll see until then. In all, I think the slowing down of that particular encounter was due to our extremely high gear level for the instance. In essence, we brought some of the top damage dealers in our SSC/TK raid, so we had a stupid amount of dps for a heroic group and really had to slow it down. At normal gearing for most heroic groups, it should still be controlled and likely slower than a normal boss fight, but not seem quite as "stand around and wait"ish as it was for our group. It's definitely worth waiting out and rotating the debuffs *if* your healer's mana isn't limiting the group no matter what (always burn hard once he starts his AoE at 15%, though). One thing to note also is that particular fight is rough for paladin healers (no HoTs and if too many people have the debuff, group healing becomes a fight against GCD for paladins). It can be done, but it was obviously designed to challenge a class like paladin that is weaker at healing multiple targets at once. Having an off-spec healer around for that fight is very beneficial on heroic (Bar actually helped heal that one instead of doing damage) simply because of the amount of damage that the Pure Energy killers will end up taking. In short, it's not a dps fight...it's a healing and control fight. Kael was definitely fun on heroic and it seemed like the whole instance is a great "trainer" for some of the mechanics that we've seen in later raids. Heroic and non both should help some of the newer folks get more accustomed to the types of encounters they'll see in Karazhan and beyond, so I highly recommend that people who are interested in or starting to raid get some time in there. The drops are also pretty nice and more suitable as "bridge into raiding" gear (if not better than some Karazhan gear for certain specs and classes).

Well, there aren't that many dailies to do out there *yet* (more will be revealed as the Isle is further unlocked), but there's quite a variety, including a new bombing quest, and a few of the typical "kill x demons" style quests. Eventually, there will also be a portal revealed from Shattrath to the Isle to make getting there easier. Now, properly ordering the quests so that you don't end up with your hearthstone on cooldown...THAT is the challenge.

Two words: fishing daily (Yeah, I'm insane), followed by the combat log changes and the addition of two hawkstrider mounts. There's quite a bit to like about this patch. The increase to 25 dailies, new daily quests to fill the wallet faster, and some nice new patterns and jewelcrafting cuts to fill in some gaps....not to mention some new clothes and weapons available through badges. I played a bit on PTR on the new Isle and through the new dailies and, while some are tedious, they really did a nice job at decorating the place. Call me silly, but I kinda liked setting fire to the attacking ships' sails and busting up their crew as well (an idea they should've introduced earlier, given how many pirate factions we see along the way to 70). I never ventured into Magister's Terrace (or obviously Sunwell), but the addition of another five-man instance was sorely needed and I was hearing pretty good things about it from other people. As for the combat log changes, they are NOT the Second Coming and will definitely not solve all of the tracking problems raid-wise (for the number crunchers out there). Lifebloom and earthshield are still credited to the target rather than the originating caster and it has been stated that it wouldn't be changed due to mechanics. Also, pets that don't belong to the person logging will not have an obvious association with their owner, so they must either be called during the course of the raid/logging period or resurrected during that time...otherwise, they will effectively be "ownerless" for the purposes of meters or WWS. Folks running Omen/Violation should have an accurate sync of pet ownership, however, since they added some code to sync/track these things. I could go on about the flaws in the new logging system that I've found, but overall, the new system is a vast improvement over the pre-2.4 combat log from every aspect. Newer players should find it much easier to configure and read, while experienced players will find that they don't need as many add-ons to filter events to their liking. A little-mentioned change that will benefit those frustrated by endless turtle matches in WSG is the increase in damage to the flag carrier the longer the flag remains uncaptured (it's a drastic increase). From what I could tell, this does not "reset" when the flag is passed to another person, as it's tied to the the uncaptured flag rather than the player. Of course, let's just hope nobody starts dropping flags in terrain to avoid this (I've seen this a few times). Also, the Horde starting point in AV has been moved backwards to fall more in-line with the relative location of the Alliance cave to their initial objectives. I'm seriously hoping this will force the Horde to start considering defence...

I just like hearing them saying "Sega!" as their last word as they flop over dead This does look interesting. I don't PvP often on Hoofie, but I can see it being somewhat useful in 5-mans on trash with some tweaking (mostly since diminishing returns isn't an issue).

I hear ya. Once I reach hit cap without the Scryer trinket (basically once we're getting into Hyjal), I'll be swapping over to a demo/destruction spec myself. I'm starting to notice some damage limitations with affliction at this gear level, due to the nature of damage over time. I've also been demo/destruction before and liked it, but affliction gave me some flexibility that I needed early into raiding. Either way, it's really up to you. I wouldn't stress much about healing unless the healers are mentioning it being a strain. We actually bring more healers than many of my friends' raids do, so we should have enough cushion. I tend to chug health potions like they're going out of style and use my healthstones as often as possible as well just to get used to not having my imp's mana pool in the future

Personally, I don't bother with immolate these days (most of my gear only increases my shadow damage), so I'm usually better off saving the casting time for a shadowbolt...leaves one extra slot But Eigun's correct about having to consider debuff slots. They may have increased it, but it's still a consideration since they only gave us 40. On a standard boss fight, I'm putting up four (UA, corruption, siphon, and doom), and a periodic fifth from improved shadowbolt (we all share that one, though, so it's only one slot for all of the warlocks combined). As for affliction, it's a toss-up. Honestly, any warlock spec should be able to handle the elementals...it's just a matter of comfort with the spec and knowing the strengths/weaknesses each brings. Also, shuffling specs may not necessarily be the solution if you're having issues. It could be something as simple as gem, gear, or enchant swapping since we're still shy of the point where our gear alone can get us to the spell hit cap. Affliction does offer some help with the spell hit problem, since 5/5 suppression means 10% less spell hit to get, but that only applies to affliction spells, so you'd still end up gemming/enchanting/gearing for spell hit quite a bit to overcome resists on shadowbolt. 202 rating is the cap without talent benefits or totem of wrath versus raid bosses, and a 5/5 suppression warlock would only need 76 rating to cap (but only for his affliction spells...Waldy's over cap on affliction now, but still a bit to go on my shadowbolts). If Kalea's having any issues keeping you alive and you stick with demo/destruction, it may be worth considering putting some points into soul leech as well. Any health returned is less health to heal

It was a good night indeed and I was happy that we finally managed that raid's first full clear!

BT gear specifically will help out on Malacrass, though, since reasonable shadow resist gear becomes available at that level (from what I'm hearing, it makes the fight rather trivial). Of course, the new badge gear does look nice and seems to be not only very good for +spell dmg/hit but also looks to be an improvement in stat distribution overall. I'm hearing some complaints on PTR about certain specs/classes not seeing much on the vendor for them, but there are some other options sprinkled around the new Isle that look to fill in some of those gaps. In all, it was nice to finally kill Zul'jin...especially since we usually don't have much time left when we reach him

People go into raid. Raid goes into instance. Naga's in the instance....our naga. WE'RE GOING TO NEED A BIGGER BOAT! *twitches*

Happy birthday, Kytae!!!!! May the next year bring much luck and good memories *hugs* 1337 translation: BDAYZOMG0LD3RL0LZ!!!11oneeleventy

Not a bad deal at all, from the looks of it. All of the above info is definitely worth noting, especially about WoW not getting as much of a benefit lag-wise (Shattrath isn't a slideshow for me on my system, but it still is obviously worse than other areas...I *really* wish they'd implement hidden surface removal for at least that area). Also, something to note is that nVidia SLI boards don't support ATi's Crossfire implementation, so if you're thinking of getting two ATi cards and running them in that configuration, forget it. If Vista's on the table and you choose nVidia cards for SLI, it's worth noting that their current Vista driver support for SLI isn't quite up to par. In short, get one good video card from either manufacturer and you should be fine *if* you're going the Vista route with this particular bundle. WoW doesn't benefit from SLI much anyway, so if this is your major game, it's not really worth the extra cost. Aside from all of that, 4GB is probably overkill if you're just playing WoW. I'm quite happy with 2GB on 32-bit XP and only really notice a need for more when I'm working on programming stuff or doing heavy multitasking. I will say, though, that if you go with a 64-bit OS, go for the 4GB anyway. Memory operations on 64-bit OSes are all done in (surprise) 64-bit chunks, so even storing a '1' in RAM takes all 64 bits to represent...long story short, 2GB just doesn't go as far in 64-bit land compared to 32-bit.

Apologies for missing last night. My connection was down for most of the night, sadly, so I couldn't even post a notification (problems with the local uplink). It seems like it's fixed now, though, so I shouldn't have a problem next time. Hope everything went well

I report the blatant ones, especially the high levels. Sometimes they've gotten back to me in a reasonable amount of time, while others, they seem to just act on it without further contact. It's definitely a worthwhile effort and doesn't take long to do Strangely enough, I seem to mostly see and report Alliance night elf rogues or hunters...go figure

Be sure to give me a bit of advanced notice before you're ready for the Dire Maul "final fight". I need to load up on shards to keep the objects going during the encounter and, sadly, no mobs in Azeroth except for those in Deadwind Pass are high enough level to yield souls.