Dire Aquatic Form

So, I know no one's actually reading this as of yet(google analytics can be a depressing thing) but I foudn the awesomest blog ever. Seriously. It's hilarious. Go, read. Need More Rage

Edit: Fixed the link, and apparently I suck, because I actually have developed a rather small readership that google analytics knows nothing about! I need to enable mail on comments. Or actually check my gmail account now and then.

So, I was reading a post over at Blessing of Kings about how the endgame since pre-TBC has improved leaps and bounds for smaller guilds, and it's spot on. Those were dark days back then, when raiding consisted of 10 competent players and 30 half-afk button mashers downing bosses that took almost no strategy or skill in MC. Things got slightly better as new 40 man content was released, and the scene improved a bit with the release of 20 man raids, but it still left the smaller guilds that wanted progression without having to resort to ginvite spamming and trolling forums for new members. Dire Maul was a great addition, but sadly, it was the only one of it's type, and without new content it left 5 man and 10 man guilds with nowhere to progress except trying to field enough people for ZG and AQ20.

Nowadays, we have Kara and heroics to challenge the smaller guilds, and give them a path of content progression, and the release of Zul'Aman last month shows that Blizz cares about the smaller guilds, and providing content that more people can experience. As a casual raider, I have to say that really makes me confident with the way the game is going, and makes me question less whether or not I really want to drop the money for WotK. If things keep progressing like this, I definitely see myself staying with WoW for quite some time.

Christmas Countdown deals 1,000 stress damage to you.
Your Credit Card dealt 600 shopping damage to Christmas.
You have slain Christmas!

So, Christmas shopping is done, and we've got a tree(it's fake, which kills me, but it'll be better for Sharon who's allergic to the real thing, and beggars can't be choosers). Her son should be having a pretty awesome Christmas. Wii, sled, a few Wii games, Simpsons movie, Battlescape board game, iTunes giftcard, and some assorted sundries. Couldn't really afford to get much for ourselves aside from a new TV stand, but I'm of the opinion that it's more important that his Christmas be great.

So, on the WoW front, I hit BFD last night with a pug. I had forgotten why I hate pugs. But I remember now! Who the hell has loot drama at level 26? Seriously. It vendors for, like, 30 silver. Just chill. Also, there was an awesome exchange of two of the people in the group calling each other gay. Because of loot drama. I'm fairly sure none of them was old enough to buy smokes, nevermind drink. Goddamned blood elves, bringing the kiddies to the horde. ;P

On the positive side, I'm almost level 26 myself. That run got me just about a full level, plus I still have a quest to turn in that should ding me up to 26, and put me a little closer to Sharon's level(28). I'm looking forward to doing Gnomer in the next couple days, and then the awesomeness with a side of awesomesauce that is Scarlet Monastery. I can't wait. More good news to report next time, I hope.

So, I played the Druid a bit last night, finished up the Battle of Hillsbrad chain, did some stuff in Southern Barrens with Sharon's rogue. She dinged 28, I dinged 25. I'm looking forward to the days right around Christmas when I'll be off from work and will have a bit more time to grind and quest and whatnot.

Speaking of Christmas, ugh. I mean, don't get me wrong, I love Christmas, but we're coming down to the wire and we're just so completely unprepared. No tree yet, doing the Christmas shopping tonight...it just feels like it's hit so suddenly, and I'm not going to be able to pull it all together in time.

Anyway, back on-topic. I'm hoping tonight we can do some questing in 1k. I'm a tad low for it, but hopefully there will be enough that I can get that it will be worth it. I'd really like to get an SFK run, but it seems like it's nigh on impossible to find runs for the low level instances, which makes me sad, because VC and SFK were some of my favorite instances ever. And I'd really like to get some practice in tanking and/or healing. Oh well, maybe things will come together more around the Gnomer/SM/RFD levels.

I will say that I have noticed the increased XP that came in Patch 2.3. Levelling seems to be going a bit faster. I expect that if I could get steady instance runs for quests that it'd be going even faster. Curious to see how things pick up when we hit the 30 quests and the increased xp there, too. I'm hoping to be back in Outland by the end of January, or so, and 70 by mid-March. Might be pie in the sky, but we'll see.

Okay, I'm curious. Of course, I have, like, no readership as of yet, but maybe I can drum up a little business with a quick poll of sorts. What's everyone's favorite 5 man instance? Old world, outland, any level. Mine? It's a toss up. Either Dire Maul North, or Caverns of Time: Old Hillsbrad. Post yours in the comments!

So, as we speak, the WoW Visual Studio AddOn developer is installing to my home PC. I'd toyed with the idea of learning lua last year and trying my hand at AddOn development, but it kind of fizzled out. Now, with a tool like this, I'm giving serious thought to trying my hand at it again. Of course, it would probably help if I knew what I wanted to create. I'm thinking maybe some kind of mod to change the way who's talking on in-game chat is displayed. It'd be cool if someone's party/raid frame could be lit up while they were talking.

On other fronts, I'm still plugging away at my druid, and also working on a Draenei Mage on the side. Got him up to level 20, and I'm currently working on the Westfall quests so I can go through Deadmines and do the quests there(damn, I love that instance). Mages are, I've discovered, pretty freaking awesome. Free drinks, being able to hearth to any capital city for a bit of cash, and all kinds of CC are really making me dig it. I'm currently frost specced, although I'm not sure that's the way to go, especially since Sharon has a Draenei warrior she plays when I play my mage. I was giving some thought to switching over to Arcane, but I can't decide. I'll probably stick with frost for now, and see how it goes. I just hope it doesn't end up like my old warrior. I specced him arms through about level 45, and someone suggested Fury, so I gave it a shot. I was instantly in love, and wished I hadn't spent the 5 levels from 40 MS grinding. If there are any mages out there reading this, I'd love comments on good leveling specs. I guess that's about it for now. Happy grinding.

So, having spent most of my time at work the past few days browsing WoW blogs, I figured I would join the in-crowd. Not really sure what exactly I'm going to say here, but I like having an outlet for my opinions and rants and the like, so I figured what the hell.

I guess I'll ramble about myself first off. I'm 28, and I work in IT for a megacorp doing hardware support for enterprise storage systems. I've been playing WoW off and on since a month after launch, mostly alliance side, although I've just recently rerolled Horde. Got my GF into playing WoW, and she decided she prefers the Horde, so I'm going with a Tauren Druid(started with a belf priest, then remembered I absolutely hate levelling priests). I'm currently level 24, and plugging away at getting to the Outland content, since I really enjoy it, and have done the Azeroth stuff ad nauseum, although I try not to plow ahead too fast since it's all brand new to Sharon. I will admit that doing the Horde thing this time around has breathed a bit of fresh air into the old world for me.

My goal is to be a feral tank/offtank/dps, depending on what's needed at the time, with perhaps some brief stints into resto land since I enjoy healing from time to time, but my true love is tanking.

Not a whole lot I have left to say, hopefully I'll come up with more before a year goes by and this just sits here collecting dust.