Definitions:

Fully Talented Flash Heal

• 5/5 Empowered Healing

Fully Talented Renew

• 3/3 Improved Renew
• 3/3 Empowered Renew
• 5/5 Twin Discipline

All other talents are not considered in this comparison because they would affect both spells equally.

The Numbers

These numbers are brought to you by Zusterke’s Priest Spell Calculator (beta). The only exception is the Flash Heal w/glyph numbers, which I calculated myself. For these numbers, I am assuming 3,000 spellpower.

There you have it: some quick and dirty facts about Flash Heal and Renew. These numbers, of course, aren’t the only thing to keep in mind when deciding which playstyle works for you, however, I do think knowing the facts about your spells throughput and efficiency is an important thing to know, regardless of how you decide to play your class.

I love cell phones. Scratch that. I love the mobile web. I have this overwhelming need to feel connected to the things I enjoy; to feel like I’m not missing something. Maybe it has to do with working second shift while the rest of the world is at home, doing far more interesting things than I am. I have a feeling it has more to do with my mom.

You see, my mom has this need to be able to get in touch with her family at any time, any place. In fact, if she can’t get me on one of my cells, she will call the other. (Yes, I have two cell phones: my personal cell and my work cell. Heck, even work has to be able to get to me ASAP! Moving on…) If that doesn’t work, she might call my husband’s cell. We don’t own a home phone, so that’s out of the question. I think I inherited that need to get in touch with who I want when I want to. Enter the mobile web. With current cell phone technology, the ability to stay connected to what’s going on around me is absolutely fantastic!

I used to have a Blackberry Pearl. I loved that phone, until my then 4 month old puppy got a hold of it and chewed two of the buttons off. Missing two buttons made typing on it rather hard, so as soon as my annual upgrade came around, I was phone shopping! Initially I had planned to get another Blackberry, since I’d enjoyed the other so much. Fate, it would seem, had something else in mind.

While at the store, I noticed the HTC Droid Eris. It was love at first sight. It was sleek. It was smexy. It was web worthy. Above all else though, it had the andoid operating system! At that point in time, the thought of getting a Blackberry went out the window. Here before me was a droid. Android. Google. I love Google. Seriously. I’m the girl who had gmail back when it started and who snatched up a Google Voice number as soon as she heard about it. (If anyone wants a Google Voice invite, by the way, just send me an e-mail.) Sometimes, I feel guilty I don’t use Blogger. At any rate, before too long, I had myself a brand new droid phone. I have to say, I have been very pleased with my choice. I’m not going to write-up a tech review on how awesome this phone is, but if you are interested, you can find some here.

I said I was going to make this WoW related, didn’t I? Well, here’s a list of some droid apps I use to stay connected to WoW (and WoW friends, of course).

Elena’s Apps for Staying Connected

1. HTC Peep – Twitter app that comes with the phone
2. Facebook app
3. Droid Armory – nice little free armory app
4. NewsRob – syncs with Google Reader so I can read my blogs on the run (or during lunch break at work)
5. WpToGo – A nifty little WordPress app
6. Mobile Web – not really an app, but most of my mobile web use is devoted to WoW activities
7. You Tube app – nice for watching boss videos on the fly. Kinda buggy right now though.

Have a Droid, iphone, Blackberry, or other web capable phone? How do you use it to stay connected?

For most of my WoW career, I have considered myself a dedicated, loyal guild member. Someone who sticks around for the long haul. Wrath has been different. I’ve been in more guilds (and on more servers) in this expansion than in the rest of my playing time combined. I’m getting ahead of myself though, let’s start at the beginning. Warning though, this is loooooong.

Vanilla/BC WoW

Yes, I played back in Vanilla. My first character of any importance was my Night Elf Hunter, Aduialwen. When she was about level 7, I met another hunter who was starting up a guild. It was an RP guild (I played on Shadow Council). Would I join? Sure! I was a total noob and didn’t know anything about guilds or well… anything beyond Teldrassil to be honest. I joined her guild and became a member of <Rayven Order>. Flash foward two weeks and the GM goes on vacation only to never come back.

It wasn’t a total loss, however, since I met some people who would become good friends over the next few years. One of those individuals decided she wanted to make a new guild, and so we did. <Imladris Elite> was born. We were Tolkien fans; well, some of us were anyway. I was in Imladris for the entire duration of the guild, one year. Actually, I’m the one that disbanded it, having been promoted to GM after the current GM left to go hordeside. It was a tough decision, but I still feel was the right one.

Moving on! A good friend and fellow officer from Imladris decided to start up her own guild, <Beatha Siorai>. It took me a few months, but I eventually joined them, became an officer, and eventually became second in command. That’s where I stayed for the rest of Vanilla WoW and all of BC. Three years we ran the guild and it was an awesome guild!

Enter Wrath

A lot of changes happened in Beatha over our three year stint. The biggest, was the gravitation from a super casual guild to a guild that raided. We struggled with this transition for most of BC, and were bound and determined to have successful raiding in Wrath. Ten mans were going to be our salvation. Looking back, I can see that part of our problem was that over the course of the years, our goals for the game had changed. As officers, several of us wanted raiding. That’s all we were really interested in with the game anymore. Many of our members, however, had joined because of the family and social aspect the guild had for so long. We could have probably sorted through it all, but RL crit for 100,000 and life for the GM and myself changed pretty drastically. We decided to disband. I cannot explain how this felt. Felt like I was loosing home. At the same time, it felt like an opportunity to find the things my husband and I wanted out of the game. We wanted to raid, period.

Ok, so here we are. Me, holy/disc priest (I forgot to mention that I leveled this priest up about midway through vanilla wow and swapped to player her as my main) and my husband, a I-can’t-remember-what-cause-he-has-changed-mains-so-many-times-this-expansion, and we are looking for a raiding guild. I had never been in a raiding guild, so I really didn’t know exactly what I was looking for. All I knew was that I wanted a friendly, team oriented, supportive environment that took raiding seriously. The catch? Due to my craptastical work schedule, I can only raid on the weekends. NONE of the progression guilds on my server raided weekends. That was ok though, cause we were really looking for something at the same level of progression we were at. We don’t like being carried through anything.

I’m not going to name guilds anymore at this point, cause some of these guilds I have been in are still around and I don’t feel like giving anyone a bad name.

Guild #1 – My GM from Beatha (who happens to have become my best friend over the course of time) was friends with the GM of another guild on the server. She was able to pull some strings and get a few of us invites into this guild. They were a little ahead of Beatha in terms of raiding, but the group was a little more rough around the edges. Since that’s where our close friends were going, my husband and I decided to give it a try. We didn’t last too long. It wasn’t a bad guild, but there were too many prima-donnas and bad attitudes in the raids for my taste. We wished them luck and moved on.

Guild #2 –  This guild really seemed like the perfect fit for us. The guild environment was casual, but they seemed to take raiding seriously. It helped that my husbands former roommate was an officer in this guild. He was also the one driving their raiding success. The problems there didn’t start until the GM decided to quit one day and promoted a new GM. This happened not long after we joined – maybe two weeks. We were ok with that until we realized that the new GM was a DRAMA QUEEN!!! Big time. And let me tell you: I have Z E R O patience for that kind of crap.

Guild #3 & 4 - After the GM Drama Queen experience, I decided I had had enough and wanted to try running my own guild. At this point, I had a pretty good idea of what I wanted. I’d also come to the realization that I suck as a regular guild member. The recruiting prospects on my server were pretty dismal, so my husband and I made a decision to transfer to a new server were a friend of ours (who was transferring with us) had some family. Between his family’s group, and our group, we had about 8 folks, so it seemed a solid building block to make a 10 man guild.

You know how the poem goes: “Best laid plans…” That was the case here. Turns out that his family opted to join a 25 man raiding guild instead of joining up with us. Oh well, big set back, but we were still determined to build our guild. During our recruitment process, we found another small guild (4 folks – we had 4 as well) that were looking to build a 10 man guild that raided same time we wanted to. After discussion, we decided to merge. <Reckless> was born. We had some excellent players and started ploughing through content. Cleared up to Yogg in Ulduar, doing some hard modes along the way. Cleared ToC easily. Things were going wonderful until…

My hard drive crashed. Bought a new one and then my monitor went kaput. Same time all this was happening, we started having trouble with our internet connection. Disconnects became frequent. Our success was then marred by frustration as raid nights had to be cancelled or didn’t progress as far because of the comp issues. Needless to say, about half the guild (we only had 15 folks) split off and joined a 25 man guild. At this point, my husband was done and just wanted to join a guild were we could raid and not have to build something.

Guild #5 - I did a lot of research to try and find us a good guild that raided weekends. I can’t tell you how hard that is. The only guilds I could really find that fit our level of progression and schedule were newer guilds. With new guilds, you always take a chance, but we didn’t have a lot of options. I finally found one I thought would be a good fit and we transfered after talking to the GM for awhile about guild goals, how they ran things, what the raids were like, etc. It really did seem that they shared our goals and values. For a little while, things were good, but once the guild started running 25 mans, things took a turn for the worse. It eventually became apparent that the GM valued gear over all else. If you didn’t have the gear he thought you should have then you weren’t doing it right and you weren’t serious about progression. When he decided to turn that line of thinking my direction, I voted with my feet and walked right out that door. Where do you get off telling ME I am not gearing correctly when I am outperforming you in raids!!! Performance > gearing choices. Period. Basically, it became apparent that the GM was an idiot. (That guild has since disbanded, btw).

Guild #6 – This guild is probably the golden child in my WotLK journey so far. I 100% enjoyed being in this guild. Raiding environment was serious, but the guild was casual. It was everything my husband and I had been searching for for about a year. That was, until the GM went overseas to study abroad. Who knew that you can’t get much of a connection in Japan? Raid attendance started to take a decline and guild leadership decided to put the guild into hibernation until the GM returns in late May. Everyone was free to join other guilds to finish out Wrath, and welcome back when the guild was up and running again. Since my husband and I have a personal goal of killing Arthas, we decided it was time to look for something else.

Guild #7 - Apparently the only guild on our server that raided times we could raid was Guild #6. I absolutely refused to go back there and the husband agreed. We were deciding what to do when the Raid Leader from guild #6 sent me a tell. He’d just /gquit and was going to be forming up a new guild. We liked him and agreed to join up with him. <Dark Covenant> was born and for some reason, I got promoted to Co-GM (I built the website and had all kinds of input on guild policy haha). So far, we’ve been doing well in 10 mans, and have our first 25 man next weekend. I am hoping that this is the end of the line. I’m tired of moving around and around. I want a guild to call home. I want a team I can count on. I think this time, we’re on our way to just that.

Elena's Power Auras

What they are

The large yellow circle on the outside is my Surge of Light notification. I have it set up to pulse when I get a SoL proc. You’ll notice the yellow timer to the outside of this ring; it corresponds to the SoL proc.

Next up is the inner green ring. This is for my Serendipity stacks. I have a different color ring for each stack of Serendipity, so I always know how many stacks are up. The one shown above is for Serendipity+3. The green timer on the outside corresponds to this ring.

I also have a notification set up for when Prayer of Mending is available. This is the inner yellow arcs. I find this notification helps me tremendously with firing off my PoM on cooldown.

Last but certainly not least, is the large pink flame in the middle. This is to let me know that I don’t have the Inner Fire buff. For shame. Better get that up, pronto!

One thing to note is that I have each and every one of these set up to display only when in combat. Having a big pink flame in my face when tooling around in Dalaran would be obnoxious to say the least.

Importing the Auras

If you would like to use any of these auras, you can simply import them into Power Auras. All you have to do is copy the string below for the aura of your choice, type /powa in-game to open the Power Aura frame, click on the “Import” button, and paste the string into the provided field. If you’d like to use all of the auras provided here, you can use the “Import Set” button and copy/paste from the “Elena’s Power Auras Set” string provided below. If, on the other hand, you would like to set-up your own Power Auras, but aren’t sure how, I recommend Derevka’s Power Auras video tutorial.

Surge of Light ◙  Serendipity+1 ◙  Serendipity+2 ◙  Serendipity+3

Prayer of Mending ◙  Inner Fire ◙  Elena’s Power Aura Set

Surge of Light

Version:st3.0.0A; gcd:bofalse; b:nu0.10588235294118; anim1:nu4; g:nu0.92941176470588; optunitn:bofalse; ignoremaj:botrue; stacksLower:nu0; target:bofalse; icon:stInterface\Icons\Spell_Holy_SurgeOfLight; size:nu1.0599999427795; torsion:nu1; r:nu1; y:nu-30; x:nu0; customname:st; groupany:bofalse; isAlive:botrue; timerduration:nu0; unitn:stOnly for raid/group.; bufftype:nu1; stacks:nu0; focus:bofalse; raid:bofalse; texture:nu10; alpha:nu0.75; aurastext:st; symetrie:nu0; soundfile:st; owntex:bofalse; isResting:bofalse; duration:nu0; mine:botrue; multiids:st; inVehicle:bofalse; speed:nu1; sound:nu0; stacksOperator:st=; realaura:nu1; threshold:nu50; exact:botrue; stance:nu10; InactiveDueToState:botrue; textaura:bofalse; wowtex:botrue; groupOrSelf:bofalse; customsound:st; combat:botrue; party:bofalse; inParty:nu0; id:nu1; HideRequest:bofalse; aurastextfont:nu1; Active:botrue; anim2:nu0; beginSpin:bofalse; customtex:bofalse; tooltipCheck:st; isSecondary:bofalse; thresholdinvert:bofalse; spec2:botrue; inRaid:nu0; spec1:botrue; Showing:botrue; UseOldAnimations:bofalse; buffname:stSurge of Light; begin:nu0; off:bofalse; texmode:nu1; inverse:bofalse; ismounted:bofalse; targetfriend:bofalse; randomcolor:bofalse; finish:nu1; timer.InvertAuraBelow:nu0; timer.dual:bofalse; timer.HideLeadingZeros:bofalse; timer.h:nu1.2000000476837; timer.ShowOnAuraHide:bofalse; timer.UpdatePing:bofalse; timer.Texture:stDefault; timer.enabled:botrue; timer.Showing:botrue; timer.lastShownLarge:nu1; timer.lastShownSmall:nu14; timer.y:nu87; timer.x:nu79; timer.HideRequest:botrue; timer.Transparent:bofalse; timer.a:nu1; timer.CustomDuration:nu0; timer.id:nu1; timer.cents:botrue

Serendipity+1

Version:st3.0.0A; gcd:bofalse; b:nu1; anim1:nu1; g:nu1; optunitn:bofalse; ignoremaj:botrue; stacksLower:nu0; target:bofalse; icon:stInterface\Icons\Spell_Holy_Serendipity; size:nu0.75999999046326; torsion:nu1; r:nu1; y:nu-30; x:nu0; customname:st; groupany:bofalse; isAlive:botrue; timerduration:nu0; unitn:stOnly for raid/group.; bufftype:nu1; stacks:nu1; focus:bofalse; raid:bofalse; texture:nu7; alpha:nu0.75; aurastext:st; symetrie:nu0; soundfile:st; owntex:bofalse; isResting:bofalse; duration:nu0; mine:botrue; multiids:st; inVehicle:bofalse; speed:nu1; sound:nu0; stacksOperator:st=; realaura:nu1; stance:nu10; threshold:nu50; exact:botrue; InactiveDueToState:botrue; textaura:bofalse; wowtex:botrue; groupOrSelf:bofalse; customsound:st; combat:botrue; party:bofalse; inParty:nu0; id:nu2; HideRequest:bofalse; aurastextfont:nu1; Active:bofalse; anim2:nu0; beginSpin:bofalse; customtex:bofalse; tooltipCheck:st; isSecondary:bofalse; thresholdinvert:bofalse; spec2:botrue; inRaid:nu0; spec1:botrue; Showing:bofalse; UseOldAnimations:bofalse; buffname:stSerendipity; begin:nu1; off:bofalse; texmode:nu1; inverse:bofalse; ismounted:bofalse; targetfriend:bofalse; randomcolor:bofalse; finish:nu1; timer.InvertAuraBelow:nu0; timer.dual:bofalse; timer.HideLeadingZeros:bofalse; timer.h:nu1.2000000476837; timer.ShowOnAuraHide:bofalse; timer.UpdatePing:bofalse; timer.Texture:stDefault; timer.enabled:botrue; timer.Showing:bofalse; timer.lastShownLarge:nu47; timer.lastShownSmall:nu26; timer.y:nu86; timer.x:nu78; timer.CustomDuration:nu0; timer.Transparent:bofalse; timer.a:nu1; timer.HideRequest:botrue; timer.id:nu2; timer.cents:botrue

Serendipity+2

Version:st3.0.0A; gcd:bofalse; b:nu0.87450980392157; anim1:nu1; g:nu0.2; optunitn:bofalse; ignoremaj:botrue; stacksLower:nu0; target:bofalse; icon:stInterface\Icons\Spell_Holy_Serendipity; size:nu0.75999999046326; torsion:nu1; r:nu1; y:nu-30; x:nu0; customname:st; groupany:bofalse; isAlive:botrue; timerduration:nu0; unitn:stOnly for raid/group.; bufftype:nu1; stacks:nu2; focus:bofalse; raid:bofalse; texture:nu7; alpha:nu0.75; aurastext:st; symetrie:nu0; soundfile:st; owntex:bofalse; isResting:bofalse; duration:nu0; mine:botrue; multiids:st; inVehicle:bofalse; speed:nu1; sound:nu0; stance:nu10; stacksOperator:st=; realaura:nu1; threshold:nu50; exact:botrue; InactiveDueToState:botrue; textaura:bofalse; wowtex:botrue; groupOrSelf:bofalse; customsound:st; combat:botrue; party:bofalse; inParty:nu0; id:nu3; HideRequest:bofalse; aurastextfont:nu1; Active:bofalse; anim2:nu0; beginSpin:bofalse; customtex:bofalse; tooltipCheck:st; isSecondary:bofalse; thresholdinvert:bofalse; spec2:botrue; inRaid:nu0; spec1:botrue; Showing:bofalse; UseOldAnimations:bofalse; buffname:stSerendipity; begin:nu1; off:bofalse; texmode:nu1; inverse:bofalse; ismounted:bofalse; targetfriend:bofalse; randomcolor:bofalse; finish:nu1

Serendipity+3

Version:st3.0.0A; gcd:bofalse; b:nu0.32549019607843; anim1:nu1; g:nu0.62745098039216; optunitn:bofalse; ignoremaj:botrue; stacksLower:nu0; target:bofalse; icon:stInterface\Icons\Spell_Holy_Serendipity; size:nu0.75999999046326; torsion:nu1; r:nu0.058823529411765; y:nu-30; x:nu0; customname:st; groupany:bofalse; isAlive:botrue; timerduration:nu0; unitn:stOnly for raid/group.; bufftype:nu1; stacks:nu3; focus:bofalse; raid:bofalse; texture:nu7; alpha:nu0.75; aurastext:st; symetrie:nu0; soundfile:st; owntex:bofalse; isResting:bofalse; duration:nu0; mine:botrue; multiids:st; inVehicle:bofalse; speed:nu1; sound:nu0; stacksOperator:st=; realaura:nu1; stance:nu10; threshold:nu50; exact:botrue; InactiveDueToState:botrue; textaura:bofalse; wowtex:botrue; groupOrSelf:bofalse; customsound:st; combat:botrue; party:bofalse; inParty:nu0; id:nu4; HideRequest:bofalse; aurastextfont:nu1; Active:bofalse; anim2:nu0; beginSpin:bofalse; customtex:bofalse; tooltipCheck:st; isSecondary:bofalse; thresholdinvert:bofalse; spec2:botrue; inRaid:nu0; spec1:botrue; Showing:bofalse; UseOldAnimations:bofalse; buffname:stSerendipity; begin:nu1; off:bofalse; texmode:nu1; inverse:bofalse; ismounted:bofalse; targetfriend:bofalse; randomcolor:bofalse; finish:nu1; timer.InvertAuraBelow:nu0; timer.dual:bofalse; timer.HideLeadingZeros:bofalse; timer.h:nu1.2000000476837; timer.ShowOnAuraHide:bofalse; timer.UpdatePing:bofalse; timer.Texture:stDefault; timer.enabled:botrue; timer.Showing:bofalse; timer.lastShownLarge:nu1; timer.lastShownSmall:nu21; timer.y:nu86; timer.x:nu78; timer.HideRequest:botrue; timer.Transparent:bofalse; timer.a:nu1; timer.CustomDuration:nu0; timer.id:nu4; timer.cents:botrue

Prayer of Mending

Version:st3.0.0A; gcd:bofalse; b:nu0.043137254901961; anim1:nu1; g:nu0.81176470588235; optunitn:bofalse; ignoremaj:botrue; stacksLower:nu0; target:bofalse; icon:stInterface\Icons\Spell_Holy_PrayerOfMendingtga; size:nu0.5; torsion:nu1; r:nu1; y:nu-30; x:nu0; customname:st; groupany:bofalse; isAlive:botrue; timerduration:nu0; unitn:stOnly for raid/group.; bufftype:nu7; stacks:nu0; focus:bofalse; raid:bofalse; texture:nu1; slot:nu3; alpha:nu0.75; aurastext:st; symetrie:nu0; soundfile:st; owntex:bofalse; isResting:bofalse; duration:nu0; mine:bofalse; multiids:st; inVehicle:bofalse; speed:nu1; sound:nu0; stacksOperator:st=; realaura:nu1; threshold:nu50; exact:botrue; stance:nu10; InactiveDueToState:botrue; textaura:bofalse; wowtex:bofalse; groupOrSelf:bofalse; customsound:st; combat:botrue; party:bofalse; inParty:nu0; id:nu5; HideRequest:bofalse; aurastextfont:nu1; Active:botrue; anim2:nu0; beginSpin:bofalse; customtex:bofalse; tooltipCheck:st; isSecondary:bofalse; thresholdinvert:bofalse; spec2:botrue; inRaid:nu0; spec1:botrue; Showing:botrue; UseOldAnimations:bofalse; buffname:stPrayer of Mending; begin:nu0; off:bofalse; texmode:nu1; inverse:bofalse; ismounted:bofalse; targetfriend:bofalse; randomcolor:bofalse; finish:nu1

Inner Fire

Version:st3.0.0A; gcd:bofalse; b:nu0.56470588235294; anim1:nu1; g:nu0; optunitn:bofalse; ignoremaj:botrue; stacksLower:nu0; target:bofalse; icon:stInterface\Icons\Spell_Holy_InnerFire; size:nu0.75999999046326; torsion:nu1; r:nu1; y:nu-30; x:nu0; customname:st; groupany:bofalse; isAlive:botrue; timerduration:nu0; unitn:stOnly for raid/group.; bufftype:nu1; stacks:nu0; focus:bofalse; raid:bofalse; texture:nu13; alpha:nu0.75; aurastext:st; symetrie:nu0; soundfile:st; owntex:bofalse; isResting:bofalse; duration:nu0; mine:botrue; multiids:st; inVehicle:bofalse; speed:nu1; sound:nu0; stacksOperator:st=; realaura:nu1; stance:nu10; threshold:nu50; exact:botrue; InactiveDueToState:botrue; textaura:bofalse; wowtex:bofalse; groupOrSelf:bofalse; customsound:st; combat:botrue; party:bofalse; inParty:nu0; id:nu6; HideRequest:bofalse; aurastextfont:nu1; Active:botrue; anim2:nu0; beginSpin:bofalse; customtex:bofalse; tooltipCheck:st; isSecondary:bofalse; thresholdinvert:bofalse; spec2:botrue; inRaid:nu0; spec1:botrue; Showing:botrue; UseOldAnimations:bofalse; buffname:stInner Fire; begin:nu0; off:bofalse; texmode:nu1; inverse:botrue; ismounted:bofalse; targetfriend:bofalse; randomcolor:bofalse; finish:nu1

Elena’s Power Aura Set

Set=Page 1@
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Ophelie over at The Bossy Pally and the Giant Spoon is writing a series about the treatment of women in WoW. In Part I of her series, she comments that women can be good gamers and be feminine all at once. I approve of this message. I think far too often, folks expect that us women gamers are just “one of the boys.” Now, I don’t mind being one of the club, but I always find it amusing when they are surprised and shake their head when I do something um… girly? Shocker, I know. So, I’m going to compose a short list of girly things I do, just so we’re all on the same page.

Elena’s List of “Girly” Things I Do:

1. I hate shorts and tend to wear sundresses all summer long. I’d wear ‘em in winter too, but it’s too dang cold for that.
2. My Firefox theme is AvantGarde Mist Rosepetal. It’s pink
3. Multiple elements of my WoW UI are pink. I always try to make my UI look a little feminine, either with color or curved lines instead of a blocky layout. I’ll admit, I do this in part to make my husband roll his eyes. Two birds, one stone. You know how it goes.
4. I like for things to look pretty. This includes my character, UI, PowerAura set-up. Yes, I’m all about the aesthetics. Shallow maybe, but I don’t care.
5. Related to above: I prefer when my character has matching armor. I groan inside when I upgrade to something that looks ridiculous. (No, I’m not so shallow that I won’t take an upgrade cause it doesn’t match, but why oh why do those T10 gloves have to look so silly with everything else being T9!)

I’m sure there are many more things I can think of, but this is what pops out at me. I don’t apologize for any of it. I’m a girl. I’m a damn good priest. I’m also feminine. You don’t like it? Too bad for you.

I call shenanigans.

Ok, ok. In all fairness, I don’t think this priest was intentionally trying to feed misinformation. For some reason or other, he really thought this was true. Well, I’m here to tell you it isn’t. After hearing this, I went on a webhunt to see if any other disc priests were having trouble post 3.3. i checked PlusHeal and the Elitist Jerks Priest forums. If there was a disc nerf, disc priests in those two venues would be in an uproar. Nothing. Nada. What I did find, was this lovely gem on how bubble spam makes Deathbringer Saurfang worlds easier.

I took it a step further and decided to test it out myself by changing my off-spec back to Discipline. Guess what? All my heals were hitting for what they should be, given my level of spellpower. If there had been any kind of nerf, I certainly didn’t see it. What’s more, this past weekend I healed ICC-10 in my discipline spec and put out more effective healing than (including the bubble absorbs) our holy priest. This isn’t a flame on the holy priest, but just an observation that disc healing is certainly alive and well!

I recently made a move from The Scryers to Nesingwary (decided, in the end, to transfer and start up my new guild on Nesingwary instead of The Scryers) and in the process, discovered there are a few things the Blizzard FAQs don’t cover. Here are some things to take into consideration when planning a realm transfer.

1. Read the FAQs

Blizzard’s official Paid Character Transfer FAQ covers information about account restrictions, realm restrictions, character restrictions, guild affiliation, and honor/arena points. Yes, I know, I just said the Blizzard FAQs don’t cover everything. While that’s true, they still have valuable information you need to know before you transfer.

2. Rob Your Alts

If your alts have anything you will want on the new server, you’d better grab it from them before you transfer. Items to think about: gold, heirloom items, account bound pets, potions and other consumables, enchants, etc. You get the picture. Personally, I sold almost everything in my alts inventory and took anything of value they had. I didn’t want to be broke on a new server.

3. Save Your Macros

This is actually covered briefly in the Blizzard FAQs, but I think it bears further emphasis. Since macros are now stored server side, not client side, they will not transfer with your character. If you use a mod such as Macaroon, you shouldn’t have to worry about this, so long as you follow step4 below. For the rest of you, be sure you save your macros! You can copy/paste them into Word, Notepad, or any other word processor and save them to your computer that way. Once on the new realm, it’s just a matter of copy/paste into your macro interface.  Yes, it’s a pain, but better than trying to remember what your macros were!

4. Save Your Profiles

Be sure to check all of your mods to see if you can save a profile. If you can, save it right before you transfer. Once on the new server, load the profile you saved and wham! your old settings and preferences are loaded. You definitely want to do this step for all mods. It sucks spending time having to redo settings on a mod such as Pitbull. What if the mod you use doesn’t save profiles? Well that brings us to …

5. Copy Your Saved Variables

NOTE: Unlike the rest, this step has to be done after you transfer.

Some mods don’t let you save profiles (such as PowerAuras). In some cases you’ll have to reconfigure it from scratch. Most of the time, however, the settings are saved in a file in your saved variables folder. If you go copy that file and move it to the saved variables folder for the new realm, your mod should run with all it’s former glory (i.e. your former settings should be restored).

Here’s the pathway, starting with your World of Warcraft folder on your harddrive:

World of Warcraft → WTF → Account → YourAccountName → YourRealm → YourCharacter → Saved Variables

So, for example, if I wanted to move my PowerAuras file from the settings I had on The Scryers over to Nesingwary, it would look like this.

World of Warcraft → WTF → Account → MyAccountName → The Scryers → Elenaltatien →Saved Variables → PowerAuras (copy this file and paste it into…)

World of Warcraft → WTF → Account → MyAccountName → Nesingwary → Elenaltarien → Saved Variables

For some mods, there may be more than one file to copy, so just copy over all the files that are associated with that mod.

Well, that’s it for my advice. Have any additional advice for folks looking to transfer? I’d love to hear it!

For those that may not know, my search for the right guild stems from the fact that the guild I was in for 3 years recently broke up and I’ve been trying to find my place ever since then. At any rate, after my recent experience I did some thinking and pretty much came up with three choices. I can join a social guild and not worry about raiding and raid schedules, transfer off the server in search of the “right” guild, or by golly, try and make my own guild. With 4 years guild leadership experience under my belt, I decided for option #3 and Synthesis was born.

The odds are against me. I’m on an low population RP server with tons of guilds all vying for the same members. I realize all of this. I also realize that I’m probably going to have to put off progression in Ulduar and head back into Naxx to gear up new recruits and build a solid raid team. I’m ok with that. If there is even a chance I can build the guild I want to be in, it’s worth it. I may succeed, I may fail. At least I won’t have to live with the question of “what if?”

The biggest challenge to this project is the fact that there are so many combinations of holy talents available. It’s really unrealistic to break down every possible combination and what the HpM would be. That’s where the spreadsheet will come in, as a tool to see what is possible given any user defined set of talent choices. My write up on the topic will be an explanation of how the benefit from talents is calculated, and what the HpM would be, given certain talents which, would be considered typical of holy builds. Of course, as I said before, we will toss in Glyphs as well.

I thank you everyone for their patience as I work on this!

5/13/09 Update

I’m roughly halfway done with the spreadsheet. Hopefully I can get it finished up in the next few days. Once that’s finished, the writeup can begin!

5/20/09 Update

Recently found out new information regarding talents that I will have to put into the spreadsheet. I thought I had best pop on here to let you all know I have not abandonded the project or this blog. I have, however, been swamped at work, and then got sick. RL crits for 1000K sometimes and this is one of those times. Might be worth mentioning that I’m also int he process of buying a house and a little over a week away from closing. For my husband and I, it’s our first home, so the whole process is a little stressful. I’ll be back though, and have the holy talent post up soon as I am able. Hope to finish up the spreadsheet soon as my brain is off this cold medicine long enough to function properly.

I have a confession to make. Sometimes, I don’t want to heal people. It’s true. There are times when someone in my group does something so obnoxious that I find it really hard to cast that heal on ‘em. Ok y’all, be honest with me. You’ve been there too! Well, here’s a short  list of personal pet peeves. These aren’t in any particular order. I might catch some flack for this, but here goes.

1. Constantly running out of LOS.

Violet Hold comes to mind here. How many times do I have to tell them? “Up or down the stairs folks, I need everyone in LOS.” It never fails though, I end up with half my group up the stairs, and half the group down the stairs. I finally find the sweet spot where I have them both in LoS, and the tank moves just a bit and I loose him. Arg

2. Not using aggro reducing abilities – and then pulling aggro

Sometimes pulling the aggro off the tank happens, I get that, but for the love of all that is holy and good, don’t just stand there and tank the mob if you’re a hunter. Same goes for all the rest of the classes with aggro reducing abilities. You have them for a reason, use them. What I typically hear is “but if I feign, the mob will run to you.” While I appreciate the gesture, I have fade and am not afraid to use it.

3. “I didn’t get enough heals”

Ok, sometimes that’s a valid statement, and I am always willing to fess up if I dropped the ball and didn’t put enough healing into someone. Often times though, when I hear that, whomever said it was doing something they shouldn’t have. I was once in a PUG run with a tank who (besides the fact that he was a warrior tanking with a two handed weapon and then wondered why he was taking so much damage /facepalm) stood in a poison cloud that did more damage than I could possibly heal through. Spamming heals and his lifebar just kept doing down. He dies and of course it’s all my fault (in his mind). We had to point out to him that a) he had better start sword and boarding and b) get out of the dang poison!!

4. Having a mod that says “Heal me”

This has got to be my personal biggest pet peeve. I used to be in a guild with a warlock who had a mod like this. Anytime he got to a certain level of life, his character says “Heal me!” He could be taking no damage, only lifetapping and it would do this. If you don’t know already, here’s the deal. As a healer, I am staring at lifebars. If your life starts going down, I probably know if before you do. I don’t need a mod to tell me to heal you.

Have any pet peeves that really make it hard for you to heal folks? I’d love to hear about it!