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Can Mages tank?

On my way home for lunch, happily link-hoping from blog post to blog post. Reading the undeniable Wrath information from wow-insider and other tidbits. After a while, I stumbled onto a blog that has cleverly eluded me for far too long.

Life of a Nin from blogger 2ndNin is Incredibly well written, it gave me goosebumps from reading it, really. I spent my entire lunch break, reading trough the blog entries.

Nothing says “Awe” like arriving late for work, with the “sorry boss, I got lost reading….” excuse. but hey, it happens.

Thank you Nin (squared) for providing me with, yet another, daily read.

(yes I know, I couldn’t post yesterday, don’t ask me why, but I just couldn’t)

Real life took more then it’s share of my free time this weekend, from social events to home improvement, there has hardly time to play World of warcraft. Still I managed to squeeze in a few hours game time on Friday, and again some more on Sunday.

Friday was dual night, had the farm team level to 14 (Armory is too slow to update). It’s a whole new experience playing with both characters at the same time. The learning curve (I think) is really fast to get over, the options both characters provide on a Pve environment are really that good.

but,  not everything is handed down to you on  a silver plated (thank Elune, in my opinion), normal methods aren’t cutting it.

Why?

Well, for starters, the background work behind these two is much greater then on a Solo leveling session. There are quests that aren’t worth taking and others that are. Wowhead helps with the research for best routes between objectives and maximizing Experience gains.

There’s Lag, and lot’s of it! If my connection had a good stable “60-ish” ping, I’m getting close to 140 every time I play with both clients. Even worse, there seems to be some sort of “Internal lag” between both clients and the server, witch means if there’s a long “run” anywhere, Chances are your follow character will get stuck, draw aggro, or just plain old stop following you.

Sunday (yes, because Saturday didn’t exist for me) I logged with Dranzig and clobbered some ogres down in Tanaris, mashed a few yetis in Feralas and finished the cooking quest for 300 skill. leveled all the way to 52, I think I’m in a good pace with him. Bloodrazor and Shadowfang are incredible weapons. I need to get a more solid investment in Agility and strength, rather then sharing between Stamina, I think I need to set as priority the stats, going from Agility > strength > Stamina.

Outlands is a mere 6 levels away (8 if I stick arround to 60), but It’s so close that I don’t see the need for that gear change right now. the weapons will due me until later levels, so I’m not too worried about those. but I’m lackyng severeally in the critical department. well, let’s wait and see right.

two clients versus two machines

Two heads are better then one, same goes for the machines.

Both my laptop and my desktop handle Wow very well, even with low latency on both machines. Having the “extra” monitor to check my surroundings and to better control the 2nd character is very handy.

2x keyboards and 2x mice isn’t such a thrill. I’ve looked around for software to enable me to use just one set of controllers. Synergy and Keyclone we’re among the top searches. Synergy acts has a KVM software switcher, thus requiring two machines rather then 2 clients. Keyclone is a key-press repeater to all selected windows, Can be used with two clients or with two machines (provided that you buy a 2nd key for the second machine)

Of these two options, Keyclone is by far the best. Even considering it’s price tag, if you’re looking for a two client solution, it’s your best choice.

Class choices

I’m “Dualing” (that means two) so what are my best choices and why? (1st/2nd)

• Warlock / Priest

Possibly the best comp for Pve and Future farming characters. They both deal Shadow damage, with a couple talents to make better use of it. One character heals, while the other tanks. Soul-freakin-stone! Crowd-Control galore. Healing options from the warlock side

• Mage / Priest

With no tank, this comp would have to deal massive damage in short periods of time. Again a good degree of CC options. Consumables for free, reducing the mana shortage down time. Going Frost will help keep fights under control.

• Druid / Shaman

I’ve tried this last night! Let me just tell you, this is crazy! Cross healing available, the totem buffs, mail armor healer and “Tank with your face” attitude. it’s just full of Win. Downside could be the speed reduction while leveling. So far it’s most the same on my test, but on higher levels  it can be a problem.

• Rogue / Druid

Having a Rogue for a tank can be a dangerous idea, but provided keyclone is working properly, the 2nd character druid will have no problems keeping Heals-over-Time on the main, and still have mobility to provide off-tanking (???), some damage and even crowd-control.

• Hunter / Priest

Same has Warlock / Priest comp. but with a twist! No shadow enhancement from the warlock, but the hunter can heal (more efficiently) his pet versus the warlock, Quick action crowd-control and sustained damage

• Warrior / Druid

Not much to discuss, best survivability, worse leveling time is my bet. Tank and spank 99%  of the time.

• Warrior / Shaman

Same has above, not so high on surviving but still very good.

All comps, are “same race” possibility’s witch makes leveling easier from the start. The test I made on Druid/Shaman were, if nothing else, hilarious and I had a good feel about the duet of healing, I’m looking forward to trying out the Warlock / Priest.

Add-Ons

Installed and updated (kinda) Dual-box toolkit. The icing on the cake, whispers are forwarded to the main character, and follow action can be reset without having to Alt-Tab (or switch). coupled with another set of Crafting add-ons, there’s an eminent tradesman user interface coming up.

Professions

The best choice, regardless of the classes used, would be to have your main be a dual gatherer and your 2nd be a Tradesman. (keep at mail box distance a third character for bank/Auction house trading). On the Warlock/Priest duo, I’m considering putting tailoring/Enchanting on the Priest (2nd) and having the warlock be a “farm-hog” and have Mining/Skinning to make some bucks.

Priest provides gear upgrades, and bag space, while the Auction house sale of ore’s and leathers raises the bank account for the lvl30 mount and such.

First things first, right?

I’ve, finally, conviced a family member to try out Wow. After months of debating about “childish graphics”, “poor gaming experience” and “gaming atmosphere”, he finally craked and promptly started the Painful track to install/Patch wow.

He asked me to start a character with him so we could “dual” our way trough content. Help him I shall, and it will be great. I wont be bothered about class selection, since it’s his first ever wow character, but also because, no mater what he chooses, I will choose a good solid complement to his character so we can blaze faster and safer. Hopefully we will have 2 high level characters (maybe not 70 yet) to play with before “The Rash” comes out!

But not all of this are sweet news, oh no…

• My country isn’t eligible for Recruit-a-friend program ( /sadpanda) so no Zebra mount/free levels for me
• He’s reluctant on account fees (Means I’m paying for is account – actually my 2nd account)
• Another Alt (this is going 4thehorde very fast)

On guild News….yay!

I’ve started recruiting into <Star Shards>, Dranzig is level 50, Black rock is an inch away, so it makes sence to start gathering players to fill the roster!

Long term goal form <Star Shards> would be to get enough guildies to be able to do outlands instances with the minimum of pugging possible. Let’s see…

It’s freaking late….

What, the h7ll, am I doing up?

Oh, right…….Had this to show you

Watch more WoW Videos and 3 more things!

That’s Freaking awesome!!

I think I’ll start doing a “mandatory” weeklly post, be a Videos (media) show.

What do you guys think?

Well, I kinda may have probably did that last night. I’ll explain….

Leeroy ?

First of, I’ve meet a great night elf hunter, Tox****, he´s good. he’s not only willing to listen but also shares is thoughts in a very clear way. Hell he even call’s out trap resists in instance runs.

I’m out-&-about last night, getting my last quests done in Stranglehorn Vale, you know favors for the goblins and such, when Tox**** whispers me and asks me if I what to tank Zul’Farak. I’m Fury talented, but I have good gear, my tanking is decent, and I did clear Maraudon and Scarlet monastery with him before while tanking. So I’m thinking that I’m up to the challenge, right?

I answer back with a big thumbs up and get an invite almost instant. We’re only missing a healer, not to bad right?

(of course, I’m like, jumping in my chair, because he actually recognize me as a tank, and instead of looking for a group, it came to me….I’m thrilled really)

The group starts talking and we’re really interested in Gahz’rilla. So we need the mallet to summon him. By now we’ve signed a druid (a balance one) to heal (interesting). The group set’s out to Southshore, to help out the Party leader (the rogue) get the mallet so we can take down “Gahz”, talk about team effort, right!!

The group is now composed of:

• warrior 46
• Rogue 46
• Druid 47
• Hunter 42
• Mage 50

I’m thinking we’ve got a good group..everyone is talkative enough in Party chat, we’re all getting out of our ways to help one member get a quest item. that’s really nice…by the time I get to Southshore (all the way from booty bay) I check the map to realize that they didn’t wait up for me, in fact, they almost got to the Altar to craft the mallet …oh well, less pain for me I guess….

In party chat, I ask if they need help, the answer: No, it’s ok. Wait for us in there, so we can all ride down together.

ONE hour later….I’m still sitting by the Flight amster (I ran out of rabbits to kill) and the guys finally return after getting three more quests done down there. (they actually completed 3 of the mage’s quests in the area, you know, since they already in there right!?!)

I remain calm and didn’t, I repeat, DIDN’T say anything….but I wanted to !!!

They get to Theramore (mage portal???), and say that they will summon me to instance. Ok, I answer, while I lit a cigarette, and pour some chocolate milk in a glass. After a few minutes, there it his, a summon to ZF.

/greet

Ask if anyone needs stamina/mana food (yes, I do it). we’re all okay, and ready to go. we jump inside the instance, now the troubles start.

The mage (who shall remain anonymous) has a trigger finger issue! a severe one. so Severe he single-handedly made us wipe. three times.

After the first wipe, I asked to have a little time to build threat on the target mob, and to get at least a solid Aggro base, since the level difference from the mage makes it harder for me to hold it. A General “Yes!” sends me to the next group and we sheep and sap, moon and cross, leaving skull for me to build on…all is good all is fine none steals aggro! I move to Cross (sap) and get a solid start too, no problems there. I know the sheeped mob already has a base aggro from the mage , but my taunt is up, so I sunder the sheep and taunt the target, get working on it, and all is fine. That was the only good pull we had…

Right around the corner, the next group, was Aoe pulled by the mage’s Blizzard, I was thinking to myself….what, the….***curses to himself***, run and try to get me some attention. we barely made it.

Next pull, I manage to get to the mob first, but everyone had already started to Dps, before I landed the first hit. so much for that attempt. it was just a single mob, so not to bad. I mean, we lived.

Next pull, we sheep/sap again…no worries I get skull, draw him back and the mage starts exploding everywhere…needless to say, we wiped, again…

we go back..

same pull….

SAME FREAKING EXPLOSIONS……

I just sit down and die!

He get’s all berserk at me, saying, I’m not holding aggro……oh, if was next to me, I’d be eating trough a straw about now!!!! (yes eating **curses again**)

I say, something like, when I get to “tank” the mob, we do fine, when you start spamming needless spells, and do crazy actions, we wipe…but hey, if you wanna go for the mob first, go ahead, Tank away, just remember you have 2000 less Hp then me, even less armor, no avoidance, no shield….but hey, it’s your boat, rock it has you please…

I get a whisper from Tox**** saying, that he couldn’t believe the way the mage has acting, and saying sorry for having invited me.

“no worries mate, it’s a good trip, at least I now know who not to group with right…^^”

Call if fate or whatever, On our 4th wipe of the evening…we’re running back to where we died, and some mobs already started re-spawning, just after we kill one mob, My Internet decided to commit suicide, and left me hanging…

I try to get back, but it keeps saying that I can’t login! I figure I have to restart the router (like it or not) and the whole operation takes about 15  minutes to reboot..

I call it quits, and leave them all hanging…

I know I did a very bad thing…but the respect they showed me had it coming, I moved out of my way to help, and get stranded for over an hour, I try to do my job in the instance and can’t because some mage’tard doesn’t help, I get a massive (I know it’s level 46, but I’m not rolling in gold you know!!) repair bill.

I feel sorry for Tox**** tough.

in the eyes of the beholder

(borrowing this bit from a famous blog)

Hello Merder. It’s great to have had a positive feedback from a reader. Yes, it does feel good!

This is the “3.0 version”, if you can call it that, of my user interface. I’ve been working on it for a long time now, always trying to make the best use of space, and while trying to keep addons visible and functional, also working to make it appealing too.

Breakdown!

I tried to apply some basic self made “rules” aswell as some “hardcore” Interface design concepts.

• Has clean as possible (like you point out)
• No compromise on Information gathering (quality before quantity)
• Force the design to prevent “tunnel-vision” play
• Low on memory (tolerable at least)
• Fast access (I Press before I click)
• Five Pixels of design (1)

With this in mind, building the user interface, was like playing lego’s. Everything had to slide with minimal impact on other Add-ons.

Cowtip on the top left corner of the screen provides useful, quick and easy to see information. It works out of Mouse-over events so a quick nudge on the mouse and I have a little bit of target information.

On the opposite corner I have the mini-map, Simple Map provides more then needed information, customization and adaptability to most user interface’s. It works great for me too, all add-on buttons are hidden except for the tracking Icon and the Omen threat meter (yes, that’s how important it is!!!)

On the Left of Mini-map are my buffs and debuffs, these are stock Ui, with the time option enabled. Below it I have the quest tracker (stock). Another Design major, If it’s not broken don’t fix it!

A look at some cooldown action

Wandering to the Left bottom corner, there’s Prat and the first of two Eepanels2. The panel provides a “darker” background to my chat window, while Prat gives me a (really) never ending custom options (editbox un-docking for instance).

Above it, there’s cooldownTimers2 divided in 2 groups, one for items (left), and one for abilities (right). They are placed that way because I’m less likely to need to see my Hp pot cooldown in favor of my Bloodrage, Revenge or Sweeping strikes cooldown.

Of to the far left there’s the mother of all Instance loving, group snugging wow-fans, Omen2. While providing me with CLEAR threat generation info, it still notifies me (with a quick glimpse of the eyes) of who’s trailing behind me so I can prepare for events properly.

Next to it (Left side) there’s Grid. I use it more on my healer (Niam) the on anyone else. The value of this single add-on to a healer! One click (or mouse-over) and you can pop off a heal, decurse or cleanse, faster and reliably. truly priceless! It still holds it’s end on my warrior, allowing me to see an overall picture of debuffs across the “raid”.

Parrot in Action

Center screen (besides Dranzig) there’s Parrot, Semi-circling to the left are the damage taken, health gained, blocks, parries and dodges. On the right damage inflicted, damage Dodged, blocked or parried (by the mob).

Enter the big guns, Pitbull took me days to configure. There are so MANY options!!! The config consist of left side bars (Me, Focus, Pet) and right side bars (Target, Target’s target and Party). cool things to note: It shows who has just gained Aggro. It shows if a target is CC’ed. It shows health incoming. It shows Buffs, and debuffs of the target. and that’s just a scratch at the surface.

Above my frame, sits the Swing timer and the Cast timer, via Quartz, I can also have one on my target’s frame (also right above it). Shameless Shield Bash abuse ^^

Bartender3 and Cycircled vol skin present me with buttons to mash, and this configuration has alot under the hood. The Three stances change the top bar to the according stance-bar it also changes with Shift modifier for quick use of some abilities. The middle (static) bar, has some “clicable” spells, either high cost or less used. The bottom bar shifts with Alt modifier to present professions and other abilities (like Hearthstone). The little Bar over my Pitbull frame is a “witch stance I’m in” (sometimes it gets confusing) and trinket action (it’s only six buttons across, three for stances, one for weapon swap macro and the two trinkets)

Better view of Pitbull

Finally, to wrap up, there’s fubar with some more information. It goes in order from left to right: Performance, Durability, Topscore, Experience, Mail, Bag space and Local time.

You can say it unfolds or blossoms. With some aspects of it showing themselves only in specific circumstances.

–

(1) The five pixels of design, stand to a concept of Operating systems building. It shows that independently of the users knowledge or capacity, there are always 5 Pixels on your computer screen that you will not miss to click or see! The five pixels are, of course, the four edges of the screen and the pixel immediately under your mouse pointer. These present themselves has a great source for crucial information (take a look at windows or Mac bar, your windows close button, the right-mouse button menu, and so on…)

Open for business 10 levels sooner.

Actually I did get my mount at 30 and don’t get me wrong, faster leveling is “always” a good thing. It helps out on most leveling aspects.

Blizzard has implemented several re-design game mechanics to the game.

• Elites being turned to normal mobs
• Experience increase from level 20 on up
• Mounts available at level 30
• Recruit-a-friend with 3x experience for you character up to level 60, plus some more benefits.

These are all great changes, of the top of my head I can come up with “hundreds” of reasons to justify it. Most important, they provide the “new” players with a chance to reach end-game content faster, but at what cost?

Leveling faster can “make” you miss some cool quests and events, old-world content is almost always discarded, there’s no need from players  to “seriously” upgrade your characters with all the Outland gear at such a close grasp.

The last changes Blizz’ Implemented were, from my point of view, not in favor of the new player!

I’m new at World of Warcraft, I’ve been leveling a mage, quest rewards are really cool, and I’ve had some good upgrades from them, gold is  problem though, it seems I never have enough. With all the spells, abilities and cool things I find in the Auction House, there’s hardly enough for the repair bills”

I know of no New player in a server that has close to 40G at level 30, that’s even less likely to happen if you are New to the game. So much to explore and so little time (read: gold) to do it! If you have experience in the game, it’s great. If you have a higher level character, it’s wonderful. There’s just no way around it.

I grabed some gold from double gathering professions, leveling to 30 in a breeze, and getting enough Gold from Herbalism and Skinning to get my mount at level 30 (yes, it is a big difference). But I had help! I never spent a single Gold coin on repairs. Niam, who gracefully grinded for gold in Outlands provided Dranzig with a “starter fund” for gear, repairs and level 19 enchants. In short, without my “sponsor” I wouldn’t have been able to ride at 30, maybe not even at 40, since my first character ever only got is mount at around 45-ish!

I wonder what are other players perspectives on this subject. Care to share your achivements? How soon did you get the Mount gold?

When I first started playing world of warcraft, “learning” how to play has hard! Don’t get me wrong, I had previous Massive Multiplayer Online (MMO) experience before, having played Ultima Online, Lineage II, and a few others. But Warcraft had something different of an appeal to me while leveling. It was either more challenging, or more complex, (or both) but I had a lore-type addition to it. Such so, that after the North-America incident, I really thought about gaming, and how it involves me and my time in front of the computer.

That’s about the same time I started to read a couple of Wow-oriented Blogs, that I discovered an endless amount of Warcraft information spread across the internet. I also read about how questing is a good (best) way to level, and how to do it properly. I gained access to a leveling guide, and following it, got my Horde hunter to close to 60.

Unfortunately, I grew tired of my daily routines, and decided to create an alt, to have the option of gameplay content variety, since the class I would pick would present itself with a new set of challenges and with different tactics on how to take on Mob killing. I liked it so much, soo I had a Mage on is 50’s!

When I changed to Alliance, the “fresh” start, provided the perfect opportunity to maximize my gameplay. Starting out with another hunter, this time a Night-elf, I also created a bank Alt. I had no access to bigger bags, gold, or even friends, so I used the mailbox as a makeshift Infinite Bag of holding.

Niam (paladin) had a better fortune, I mean, Xarlee (hunter) had already made some gold, and Niam was a “Holla fo’ a Dolla!” paladin, and had some funds to start up is career. It was easier then, the  funding and knowledge of how to avoid certain obstacles in my way to 70!

When Dranzig was born, I had very clear goals for him, I wanted to make sure I had the best possible “advantages” early on. I drained (yes, he took me to the cleaners!) my bank, bought and quested for the best gear for level 19 Warrior, got every piece of gear enchanted or enhanced in some way or form. I had decided that I would get my taste of blood on the lvl19 Warsong bracket, grinding on honor for my future weapons, and for the PvP trinket (witch btw, I think is a must for any tank).

What really surprised me tough, was when I dropped the 19th freight-train killing on Warsong, and resumed leveling I was unstoppable. I mean, I know that up to level 23, 24 I would have a major advantage, because of gear, but I was dealing with larger numbers here, by the time I was 22, I took on the Omer’s Revenge quest in Wetlands, and had a run-in with Sarltooth. I never back down from a fight, hold habit I guess, but he is a 29, so that’s a big level difference, I’m wearing 16-19 level gear. He didn’t even knew what went trough him….

Now I’m level 39, I’m still wearing the same gear, I’ve upgraded my weapons, but that’s it! Nothing more, and I still kick some monumental tush on Mobs much higher then me. I wonder if I had a 70, with access to top tier professions (Enchanting comes to mind, of course) If would still find it challenging?

Are you like that? Do you know players like that?

Are you challenged to your best every time you play, or do you slack of, because it’s just a farm session?

For me, I bet when I have these three stooges in some serious action, I will most likely have another character to “have fun” with, but knowing myself, I bet he quickly will become another addendum to my class choices to bring to a raid character instead of my ” relax and have fun” character!