Wowiversary
Today marks exactly two years since I started playing World of Warcraft. I’m quite the youngin compared to the likes of Brandon, for example, who has been playing WoW for five years. I’m certainly not your Vanilla WoW Veteran, but two years is a good stint of time. I don’t know whether to reward myself with a pat on the back or not, but heh! It’s been an interesting past two years.
I started playing WoW on this day two years ago because my boyfriend at the time convinced me it would be a good thing to do together since we were in a long distance relationship. Previously I had been very steadfast in refusing to try this game, fearing that I’d get too into it and play constantly at the expense of other things. (This was at a time when I was in the middle of college and also had a part time job, with little sense of time management.) However, I decided it couldn’t hurt trying. I was already talking to the boy every night for hours, it might as well be while playing a game too, yes? So I downloaded the trial. And I spent something like 4-5 hours playing a Night Elf Priest—GASP! Alliance!… Just don’t tell anyone—on some random server it assigned me. I didn’t realize that 4 hours had gone by until my boyfriend called me and pointed out that it was 4 am. WTF!
A few days later I bought the BattleChest (with both Vanilla + BC in it) at GameStop and installed it. I rolled a Blood Elf Priest on a friend’s server, and my boyfriend joined me as an Undead Warrior. We leveled 1-70 on Thorium Brotherhood and took our sweet time doing it. It took a few months, if I recall correctly. I reached level 70 in June 2008, and that’s about when the boy quit playing WoW. (Then in September we broke up, but that’s a whole ‘nother story.)
Because I enjoyed WoW so much, I decided to join a raiding guild. Since then I’ve been in… 4 raiding guilds. I stayed in my first one for all of BC raiding, and then joined a new one at the start of Wrath. When that one fell apart, I transferred to Scarlet Crusade and joined Axiom. I remained there for 6 months, but then my schedule changed and I couldn’t raid with them anymore. Now I’m back on Thorium Brotherhood, with the server-first guild there and ready to kick some Arthas ass. Who’s with me?
I’m eFamous!
For those of you who haven’t heard already via our Twitter, my UI has been featured in World of Warcraft Magazine. I’m on page 101, if you have your own copy. If not, you can view a PDF scan of the page.
(For a higher quality version of the UI screenshot shown, click here. For a more recent screenshot of my UI in action, click here.)
Big thanks to Matticus from World of Matticus for interviewing me for the article and scanning it. You can check out all the articles he wrote on his blog. Sadly, he is not credited in the piece(s). :(
And, they have me listed as a Holy Priest. How blasphemous!
EDIT: For those wondering, I have not uploaded this UI, LilUI2, to WoW Interface yet. It’s still a work in progress, I’m not completely happy with it yet! I’m actually just working on the art/textures for it right now.
The King Has Returned
According to WoWProgress.com, only 4% of guilds in the world (that’s roughly 1,391) have downed 25 man Heroic Anub’arak. As of this posting, 22% of all guilds (approximately 7,681) have downed the first four bosses in 25 man Icecrown Citadel. Now assuming that Blizzard is sticking with their 4 weeks of waiting between each wing of Icecrown being released, those 22% of guilds will have some free time on their hands. Guilds are reporting getting through the first wing of Icecrown within a night or two of attempts and depending on your raid schedule, that still leaves plenty of time to see about getting your guild into that super elite group who have completed 25 man ToGC.
Phase 1 for resto druids in the Heroic Anub’arak encounter is pretty cut and dry. Keep a Regrowth and a Rejuvenation on the main tank and the add tank at all times. Anub’arak will choose 5 targets for a DoT called Penetrating Cold. Your raid frames or user interface should have a way of marking those targets and DBM calls it out, too. Place a Regrowth on all 5 of the targets and possibly even a Rejuvenation on them, depending on how much you see them taking. Regrowth should have a high enough crit chance, where you will eventually proc Nature’s Grace – so casting it on 5 targets shouldn’t take too long.
The reason why I find Regrowth to be better for the PC is because of how long the DoT lasts. You can put the HoT on the 5 targets and refresh your HoTs that you initially put on the tanks and keep it all going.
How to Pick the Healing Corps that will Keep Your Raid Alive
This is a guest post by our friend Matticus from World of Matticus. He’s that crazy Disc priest Lilith has mentioned before that likes to heal the raid and stacks way too much intellect. But we love him anyway. (/pat wee dwarf priestie)
“Let’s bring the Paladin in. We could use another set of blessings.”
“But what about that Priest? She’s done these fights before and her experience will be invaluable.”
These are one of the many internal conversations that raid leaders have with themselves mentally or their officers. Deciding which healer gets to come to raid and which healer gets to sit isn’t an attractive activity for most people. No one likes being the guy that has to tell a person that they’re taking the night off.
But first, you need to get to that point.
I’ve handled healing assignments for various different guilds and I can tell you that there is a system that is used. There are certain criteria that make different healers desirable over others. In this post, I’ll walk you through what goes on during my head when I’m selecting my healing roster.
3.3 Is A Crowd
*taps the microphone* Hello? Is anyone out there?!
I just wanted to post a quick update about my hiatus in posting on here and to thank everyone who has still been adding us as readers and who have been following along and eagerly awaiting new posts from us.
Personally, I had taken a month off from the game and rolled an elemental shaman, just to relax and get psyched up for Icecrown Citadel. Throw in a generous helping of holidays, a new position at work and redecorating my loft and it’s been nothing short of hectic, lately.
I’m getting back into the scene, with a great new guild and I’m learning as much about 3.3 as I can (from Heroics, glyphs and everything in between), so I can keep my fellow druids updated with the best advice and opinions that I can. I’m still deciding what I want to cover first, but it will be very soon, I promise.
I do frequently keep in touch with the other bloggers and I know we have some great things in mind for our readers in the coming weeks and the start of the new year. There has been talk of another new section on the blog, that is more reader oriented and even rumors of a very special guest blogger in the near future. You won’t be disappointed!
Again, thank you all for sticking with us and you will be seeing more of us very soon.