My previous entry was about all the awesome things that the new cross-realm LFG tool has brought to us as Heroic-rompers and Leveling Lowbies.

This entry is more about the things that I lament about the new LFG tool.

Upcoming class and item balance changes

There has been a lot of good discussion lately concerning various aspects of the DPS status quo. Some classes are putting out too much compared to their cloth counterparts, and others have suddenly found themselves too powerful in certain areas of the game. Blizzard recognizes this, and this evening the Lead System Designer, Ghostcrawler, came out and enumerated a few things Blizzard believes are true.

Blizzard giving serious consideration to mandatory authenticators

WoW.com has learned through trusted sources close to the situation that Blizzard is giving serious consideration to making authenticators mandatory on all accounts. According to our sources, while this policy has not been implemented yet and the details are not finalized, it is a virtually forgone conclusion that it will happen.

Breakfast Topic: Effective Communication

One of the good things about running more PuG’s than ever before is that it’s forced me to learn how to communicate what I intend on a pull to a group of people I don’t really know. This, in turn, has made me better at communicating with my guildies and friends when we raid, in part because now I’m finally thinking about how to express what I intend to do in a more organized way.

The BoondockSaints

I don’t think that when we started this guild we realized that we were actually going to progress as much as we have. We have grown in numbers but still have the same family feel we did when it was just a dozen of us. As a guild we have gone six bosses deep into Ulduar and could probably come close to clearing it with the new gear we are all getting. Some of us have finished ToC and even getting into ICC raids. As a guild we are killing trash to get rep and a good number of us have the free rings from there.

The Warcraft Advanced Gold Guide – The Best Guide For Players With High IQ

The Warcraft Advanced Gold Guide makes some unusual claims. For a start it claims to be a market driven guide. Warcraft’s markets are pretty tight. The methods of buying and selling are much regimented. We were keen to find out exactly what this claim actually meant. It claims to…

“Be written by people who understand the Warcraft economy!”

Turning over an old leaf

Yesterday while I was at work towards the end of the day I was reading Zan’s blog and it got me thinking. In my little guild I’m comfortable. I’m the master of all the classes I play and there is no one above me… or at least that’s how I feel. I’ve talked before about how being challenged and grouping in pugs is a good way to improving as a player. Well I came to realize that I’m not really following my own advice. Sure I run with a semi pug raid every week… but with the classes I bring I’m generally on top. Again, no real room to grow.

Bloodlust/Heroism Could Become Drum Buff

It’s one of those signature Shammy abilities that sets them apart from all other classes and makes them, for some, an essential party member of any raid group: Bloodlust / Heroism. But a lesser version of the ability could soon become available through leatherworking drums, according to Blizz posters Eyonix and the fabled Ghostcrawler.

WoWFlix: Avatar Trailer

I went and saw Avatar over the holidays with my in-laws, and got thoroughly sucked in to the stunning visuals of the film and the fantasy storyline. I didn’t think much about it during the movie, but afterward my father-in-law, who had seen me playing WoW while visiting, commented that it could have been taken straight from the game. Chinese player WenYe Shang attempts to prove just that with his video that echoes an extended Avatar trailer, but with visuals from WoW.

Icecrown Citadel: Festergut

Short guide to the Festergut encounter, one of three bosses in the second wing of Icecrown Citadel. Song is Coloris by SHE. … festergut guide how to icecrown citadel world of warcraft shaman raid

Pugs with Wolves – a best seller

Alright, so it’s not. Well, it might be if the book would not be comprised of 30-second sketches with uneducated, new, illiterate, abusive or downright clownesque characters. Time to share a few tidbits of fun and agony I have come across while pugging random classic dungeons on my little healadin:

Razorfen Downs – the neverending tank

Brushing through unending tangles of thorns, murderous pigs and heaps of mud, our tank pulled us through – literally. He did not speak, did not wait, did not buff, did not discuss tactics. He ran through all the mobs, kept aggro and pulled the next group right as the last mob died. When we got to the timed boss (an event following a captured mage leading to an altar) he started the event as the rest of the group came rushing into the room. Pigs spawned immediately. After three minutes of waves of adds, I was out of mana and people started to die. I bandaged who I could, then proceeded to be clobbered by a particularly vicious specimen of pigman.

Just weeks after gushing about the new Hunter loot I had acquired I’ve decided to put that character on the back burner and switch to my Priest full-time.

The Reasons

This happened for two specific reasons. Number one, I was just tired of playing a pure DPS class. At some point you reach a level of gear and proficiency with your rotation that things just become kind of boring. In the last few weeks, when playing my Hunter, each instance run has kind of felt like the same old thing run after run. I felt like a switch was necessary to maintain my interest in the game.

Number two, I joined a really cool guild that gives me opportunity to heal some Heroics from time-to-time. As the Priest, I can go Holy to heal or Shadow to DPS so there’s a variety there that I just didn’t get with the Hunter. http://www.alteracvolley.com/ive-retired-from-the-hunter-pew-pew/

So we had previously left off with my WoW career right as I had gotten hooked.

Mage

My first “main” was a mage, it was really all I played. Leveled him all the way to lvl 62 (back when 70 was the cap). I mean the first and still primary “glass cannon”. Enough CC to almost never be touched, but if enemy’s breach that security there is enough BURST to burn them down. However, if not done quickly enough death will arrive shortly.
Mind you this was my first toon ever, so here I am leveling all my professions (secondary and primary), running EVERY single dungeon that I can (sometimes multiple times), and just wasting tons of time taking forever to level. The whole time I think I am going as fast as I can.
Needless to say I was moving, and incredibly broke. I took my longest break from WoW, approximately 6-7 months. http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/BigHitBox/~3/wFTysQV_OXE/

Balancing Healing In Progressing Raid Teams

I remember in the few weeks before Ulduar came out, how our guild faced a healer retention challenge.

You see, after months of farming Naxx25/OS25/EOE25/VoA25, our team got pretty well geared. Most of us were filling out to the Best In Slot standard, and a LOT of purples got sharded because nobody needed a lot of what dropped anymore. http://wowgrrl.com/2009/08/30/the-natural-waxing-and-waning-of-healing-teams/

New screenshot gallery of Wintergrasp: http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/pvp/gallery-wintergrasp.html

The paid character transfer service has been reduced from 30 to 3 days. http://wowvault.ign.com/fullstory.php?id=53547

Don’t forget Daniel’s ever helpful morning posts at WoW.com. http://www.wow.com/2009/07/21/tuesday-morning-post-howling-at-the-maintenance-edition/

Go give WoWGrrl some Digg love! http://digg.com/pc_games/WoW_Hunter_WoTLK_Raiding_Consumables_Guide_WoWGrrl_com