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algalon$ mail
Mail version 8.1 6/6/93. Type ? for help.
“/home/.users/112/algalon/mbox”: 1 message 1 new 1 unread
U 1 loken@pantheon.net Feb 13 04:02 95/4273 “Automated Message from Loken Designate”
& 1
Message 1:
From loken@core.pantheon.net Fri Feb 13 04:02:05 2009
Date: Fri, 13 Feb 2009 04:02:05 -0700
To: algalon@core.pantheon.net
From: loken@core.pantheon.net
Subject: Automated Message from Loken Designate

This is an automated message from the Loken Designate Defense System. Observer Algalon, if you are receiving this message, please investigate the Azeroth system for possible signs of filesystem corruption. Should filesystem re-origination be necessary, please execute replycodeomega.sh.

~Loken
& quit

algalon$ sudo fsck -fN /dev/azeroth
Password:

fsck 1.39 (29-May-2006)
** Phase 1 – Check Blocks and Sizes
Inodes that were part of a corrupted orphan linked list found. Fix? no

Inode 704590 was part of the orphaned inode list. NOT FIXED.
Inode 796931 was part of the orphaned inode list. NOT FIXED.
Inode 901416 was part of the orphaned inode list. NOT FIXED.
Inode 901418 was part of the orphaned inode list. NOT FIXED.
Inode 901974 was part of the orphaned inode list. NOT FIXED.
Inode 3467309 was part of the orphaned inode list. NOT FIXED.
Inode 3477115 was part of the orphaned inode list. NOT FIXED.
Inode 8675147 was part of the orphaned inode list. NOT FIXED.
Inode 8802251 was part of the orphaned inode list. NOT FIXED.
Pass 2: Checking directory structure
Pass 3: Checking directory connectivity
Pass 4: Checking reference counts
Pass 5: Checking group summary information

***** FILESYSTEM STILL DIRTY *****
/dev/azeroth: 425/10469376 files (24.2% non-contiguous), 31527901/41848832 blocks

algalon$ wall There is partial corruption in the filesystem’s superblocks, as well as complete corruption in most of the filesystem’s inodes. Executing replycodeomega.sh – filesystem re-origination.

Broadcast message from algalon (pts/1) (Tue Apr 14 11:28:01 2009):

There is partial corruption in the filesystem’s superblocks, as well as complete corruption in most of the filesystem’s inodes. Executing replycodeomega.sh – filesystem re-origination.

algalon$ sudo sh /usr/replycodes/replycodeomega.sh /dev/azeroth
Password:

===REPLY CODE OMEGA: Filesystem re-origination on /dev/azeroth===

Performing: dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/azeroth bs=255 count=2000M

PLEASE STAND BY, ALGALON OBSERVER…

FILESYSTEM RE-ORIGINATION COMPLETE.

MAIL SENT TO TITAN EONAR FOR FILESYSTEM CREATION AND SEEDING.

algalon$ exit
logout

((My apologies for the lame fake fsck output and the hooooooorrible jokes. :P))

Incredibly epic picture photoshopped by Jezriyah, click for full-size

So Jezriyah and I were on Skype, and we were both bored as sin. We both have two-piece Tier 5, so we decided to go out and, on our respective hunters with our respective tenacity pets (Indalecio for me, Micropterus for her) and solo old-world shit for fun, profit, and the allure of many fabulous prizes.

We each started off in ZG, heading after the boss with the mount we wanted first – her to the Tiger boss and me to Broodlord Mandokir – and dispatched them without much issue. Jez encountered the issues that I soon encountered when I was done with the Raptor boss – timing the deaths with Lor’khan healing is tricky. But in the end, every mount-dropping boss went down to our prowess, but we left empty-handed, minus a few blues and roughly 30g a boss. Oh, and since I started this before she did, I took out the Spider boss for shits and grins, too.

After that, I decided to do Attumen. He was a fair deal harder than ZG bosses (well dur, since he’s 70), but it was still a one-shot – he even dropped the schematic from which SES draws its name. In a display of sheer idiocy, I took a few cracks at soloing Moroes as well, but the combination of his adds and my inability to juke his Garrotes left me deader than a doornail repeatedly. I hearthed, and Jez told me to give MC a shot at the chance of even more fabulous prizes. So I whistled for a cab and when it… no, fuck that.

Lucifron went down like a chump. Magmadar was harder due to the dog packs, but still trivial. Gehennas took some trying due to range issues – all of his attacks that would hit me are 40-yard abilities, so I had to stand at the very apex of my increased range afforded to me by my soloing spec (more on that later). It took three tries, but he went down. Garr, the boss that scared the most, was trivial – an opening Misdirection + Global Thermal Sapper Charge locked threat onto Indy, and then we bursted the Firesworn adds down one at a time. After they went down, it was a joke – Auto-Shot + 2PT5 kept Indy alive through Garr’s damage.

And that’s where the easy mode ended.

Geddon was an exercise in sheer finesse. Living Bomb and Ignite Mana, both abilities that will kill me in VERY fast order if they land, have a 45 yard range. Well, so does Mend Pet, unless you have the 3-piece Giantstalker bonus. I do not. Thusly, this fight because a matter of dipping in for a Mend Pet and a Serpent, and ducking out before Geddon decided to nail me with Living Bomb, or worse, Ignite Mana. It took two wipes, but I got a perfect position locked that ensured me a win.

Oh yeah, Shazzrah was a joke. Right.

I decided to go for Golemagg instead of Sulfuron Harbinger at the fork. This was a bad decision from a short-term perspective, but one that kept me from abandoning the run early. Golemagg will be the biggest challenge to any Hunter attempting this, and was easily my biggest roadblock. Nine times I lost Indalecio to Golemagg (but managed to Deterrence/Rockets/FD away). Several things complicate the fight – having your pet on Golemagg directly will cause the on-hit debuff that Golemagg applies to stack to levels that will kill your pet in short order, so you have to have your pet “tank” Golemagg through MD’d Multi-Shots and Thunderstomp. He also has a 40-yard range Pyroblast, so you have to be exacting in your position both of your pet and yourself – Golemagg is a big boss, so improper position with you and your pet relative to him will leave you out of Mend Pet’s 45-yard range but still within his 40-yard range Pyroblast. The trick is to slowly build threat with MD and Thunderstomp while DPSing one of his two hounds – this keeps health flowing from 2PT5 to your pet.

Sulfuron Harbinger was a test of patience. It took about 9 minutes for the adds to go OOM to the point where I could burn them down; standing at 40 yards is again your key to winning. The damage is so low to your pet that Mend Pet is only there for cleansing debuffs (again, refer to my spec later) – 2PT5 will again win the day here. Once the adds are down, just DPS down Sulfuron from more than 30 yards away – he’s got an Incinerate with a 30yd range.

Majordomo is like Garr Mk.2, but with a twist. Whenever Domo ports you OR your pet to the coal pit, he will stop attacking your pet, but NOT reset aggro. All it takes is one hit from your pet to get the threat back to your pet – consider a /target Majordomo Executus; /petattack; /targetlasttarget macro (and manually attacking your add again) to save yourself. Treat it like Garr – burn the adds down one at a time after an opening MD of an AoE. (3.3’s new Misdirection will make this AND Garr miles easier.)

Ragnaros himself is surprisingly easy. You will need to bring a couple of ways to heal yourself – ideally a healing pot and bandages, plus the Uber Racial of Hax helps – as your pet WILL get knocked away from Rags and you WILL get targeted for his 6k Fire damage blast. You might consider DPSing him at absolute minimum ranged range and then stepping into melee if your pet goes flying, but I didn’t think about it.

Phase 2 is the strategy part – your pet MUST MUST MUST be set on Passive/Stay and staying in melee range of Ragnaros but NOT near you. When P2 starts, the Sons will make a beeline for you. Deterrence to cover your ass once the first few come, and when all the ones that come at you have swung at you once, Feign. They will despawn, leaving you to wait until Rag surfaces. This is the BEST time to heal yourself.

So, you wanna do this too? Rake in 450g in pure gold, plus tons of purples to vendor? Want an Ancient Petrified Leaf but don’t want to share? RILGON TEECHES U TO SOLO COOR

BLUEBERRY RAGE + TUDDLE RAGE

SPEC: Use this spec that Pikestaff suggested on Twitter. It is made of win. 3/3 Eagle Eye is GOD DAMN MANDATORY, do not remove it. Glyph of Mending is also god damn mandatory.
PET SPEC: Some tuddle be for tank. If yours wants to be, use this spec.
GEAR REQUIREMENTS: 2p T5 is an absolute MUST, IMO. You will NOT get through Golemagg without it without the intervention of a deity. 3p T1 is a godsend for Geddon, but not mandatory if you’re quick (protip: Use Disengage liberally). Stamina gear is nice (I used my Brewmaiden trinket over my Banner), but don’t go overboard – you absolutely need good DPS output for this shit.
OTHER SHIT: Consumables = easier time of it. Bring pots, bring mana strudel, consider using buff food and a flask. Engineers will have an easier time deciding what loot to take home and what they shouldn’t (since we can just take it all and let Jeeves sort it out).

I didn’t get any really notable loot – no mounts or bindings – but I did get the Essence of Pure Flame, the Leaf, BLASTARSHAWT LAWNCHAIR, and DS Pants.

Oh right, I did Heroic Magister’s, too, and got my second Phoenix Hatchling. >_< WTB Chocobo!

Now I’m figuring out some of the new gemming concepts that are coming out. Words through the grapevine mention Deadly Ametrine being useful where gemming for some crit is actually better than gemming for pure Agility, depending on your crit rating. Me being the skeptic that I am (not to mention stubborn), I’d like to see some numbers for this, so besides plugging away at my own spreadsheet, one of you more math-inclined bloggers should totally do a post about this. Yeah, you.

Well, okay then.

Looking at our handy dandy… SPREADSHEET!, we notice that on the Overview page, it gives us a DPS equivalency for each point of a given statistic. This is what mine looks like with my current gear (only relevant stats included)

Agility + 1 1.695 1.695
AP + 1 0.674 1.347
Crit + 1 1.461 1.461
ArP Rating+1 1.590 1.590

The reason there are two numbers is simple – the first is what one POINT gives you, and the second is what one ITEMIZATION POINT gives you. AP is worth two half an itemization point, so that’s why the second number is double the first.

So with that said, we look at the DPS values of our two contending gems: Delicate Cardinal Rubies (20 Agi) versus Deadly Ametrines (10 Agi/10 Crit).

DCR: 20 * 1.695 = 33.9
DA: (10 * 1.695) + (10 * 1.461) = 31.56

As you can see, in a one-on-one comparison, the Ruby beats the Ametrine by 2.4 DPS. But that’s not why we gem Deadly Ametrines.

Look at, oh, my beloved best-in-slot shoulders. They have a yellow socket (which an orange Ametrine matches), and a 4 Agility socket bonus. This skews the numbers like so:

DCR = 20 * 1.695 = 33.9
DA = (10 * 1.695) + (10 * 1.461) + (4 * 1.695) = 38.34

Aha! With the socket bonus added, the Ametrine wins out by almost 5 DPS! Thusly, the thesis for gemming Ametrines versus Rubies can be summed up as such:

When a socket bonus provides a DPS gain equal or higher to the value of the DPS loss incurred for using Ametrines, Ametrines should be used in favor of Rubies.

For me, this means that if a set bonus offers 2 Agi, 2 Crit, 2 ArPen, or 4 AP per yellow socket, it is wise to gem for the bonus versus STICK A ZOD RUBY IN THAT BEAST.

Edit: Thanks to Feist and Jez for pointing out my inability to type or close tags properly.

I will save you the time however, and give you the MM Hunter perspective:

THIS IS THE BEST DESIGNED MAIL ARMOR IN THE HISTORY OF MAIL ITEMIZATION.

Like that’s not even a Kanye-ing: THIS IS THE BEST FUCKING MM-ORIENTED ARMOR EVER IN THE HISTORY OF EVER.

The chest, boots, and gloves are all Agi, Int, ArPen, Crit, and AP. No goddamn Haste is ANYWHERE on the gear. The belt isn’t perfect, but it’s still great – Agi, Int, Hit, Crit, and AP. And to top it all off, nearly every socket is yellow or red, and ALL the socket bonuses are Agility!

Of course, there is a downside to all of this – the emblem trinket is completely worthless just like Mark of Supremacy: it’s lolhaste + Fury of the Five Flights 2 – Fury Harder. Doing some ghetto napkin math, it would take an 8 minute fight with no downtime of the buff for this trinket to out-pace DMC:Greatness, and it’s practically impossible for it to outdo Death’s Verdict, Dark Matter, or Mjolnir. But hey, we can’t have everything :V

Added:
*LoreCrafted
*Divine Bubbles

Removed blogs, please remember that should you ever return to the scene, your renewed place on the blogroll is only a comment away. :)

Inspired by the original one for healers by Miss Medicina, this one was done by Hinenuitepo of Death Goddess. And being the good, lemming-like blogger I am, I’m stealing it and doing it myself. \o/

What is the name, class, and spec of your primary dps?
Rilgon, Draenei Marksmanship (ArPen-Focused) Hunter

What is your primary dpsing environment? (i.e. raids, pvp, 5 mans)
Almost universally raiding. I do PUG five-mans to supplement my money and emblem income and do a WINTARGARSP every now and again, but I am a progression 25-man raider at heart.

What is your favorite dps spell/ability for your class and why?
Probably Kill Shot. I know, I know, Execute-style abilities are old hat, but there’s just something very primal and devastating about a 75k crit on Twins/Hodir that just makes you want to pelvic thrust at the screen and spike a football or something.

What dps spell do you use least for your class and why?
Multi-Shot. So situational and sub-par for a MM Hunter – Aimed out-classes it on one target due to talenting, Volley out-classes it in an AoE scenario. And you can’t even use it on the move, WTF is that crap?

What do you feel is the biggest strength of your dps class and why?
Realistically? I’m not sure we have one anymore. It used to be that we were a DPS class unfettered with threat like everyone else, but WotLK has made threat a non-issue for most situations. We used to have decent crowd control that required a brain to use, but that’s a thing of the past. We used to be at or near the top of the DPS meters, but now every goddamn hybrid is beating us for the most part (just look at WMO global scoreboards).

What do you feel is the biggest weakness of your dps class and why?
Our overall output period. We are being routinely beaten by hybrids on both single-target AND AoE encounters due to the fact that we require such a deep pool of buffs and debuffs to be at optimal capacity – both caster AND melee buffs and debuffs.

In a 25 man raiding environment, what do you feel, in general, is the best dps assignment for you?
Single-target DPS. My AoE output is pathetic compared to anything that isn’t an Enhancement Shaman.

What dps class do you enjoy dpsing with most and why?
The only class I’ve raided with as a DPSer is my Hunter. I cannot seem to gain any sort of love and appreciation for any other class, as something about them bothers me.

What dps class do you enjoy dpsing with least and why?
See above. Never played anything else, so I have no way to say one way or another. I don’t enjoy melee classes AT ALL, though.

What is your worst habit as a dps?
Meter envy, leading to recklessness. Sure, it’s stupid, but the fact that I’m a pure DPS class getting out-DPSed by people like Ret Paladins (*gag*) and Elemental Shamans is exasperating, so I tend to be extremely overzealous when trying to get to my deserved place as top DPS and make stupid decisions like riding threat at a very high level (talking 115% or more).

What is your biggest pet peeve in a group environment while dpsing?
Apathy. If you’re not going to bring 110% of your game, don’t walk through that green portal at all.

Do you feel that your class/spec is well balanced with other dps?
Absolutely not. MM is in good balance with SV amongst Hunter specs (but BM needs a serious shot in the arm), but Hunter DPS as a whole is dramatically low. Again, one only needs to look at the WMO global scoreboards and note the dramatic lack of Hunters – a pure DPS class – to see that we are lacking. Bad.

What tools do you use to evaluate your own performance as a dps?
Recount, World of Logs reports, Shandara’s Spreadsheet (to compare actual performance to theoretical max performance), and a littany of add-ons tailor-made to give me the exact info I need right now, damnit.

What do you think is the biggest misconception people have about your class?
That MM and SV Hunters do not have to do the same level of “pet control” as BM Hunters. This is absolutely ludicrous – the pet of a MM Hunter (at least mine) is easily 14-15% of their overall DPS, and the cooldowns they provide us account for even more.

What do you feel is the most difficult thing for new dpsers of your class to learn?
Situational awareness while still managing rotation, including tricks like clipping Steadies, waiting for cooldowns instead of firing a steady, and the like.

What dps class do you feel you understand least?
Pure casters (Warlocks/Mages). I know they’re probably the same as us in a lot of core concepts, but eh. Something just doesn’t click with me about them.

What add-ons or macros do you use, if any, to aid you in dps?
Mik’s Scrolling Battle Text, SilHUD2, Recount, OmniCC, Deus Vox Encounters… Why am I typing all this crap out? I did a post on my UI and on my major macros, just go read those.

StrengthAgility over other stats or balanced stat allocation, and why?
A carefully orchestrated web of Agility, Armor Penetration, and Crit Rating. I ride the bloody edge of my hitcap, abusing Focused Aim and my Draenei racial for everything they’re worth, and pursue “hard” DPS stats at its expense. also lol strength.

So an instance that was already extremely easy if you had two brain cells to rub together and the patience to explain a 10-second boss strat to people is now even easier due to people whining about it, and I still guarantee you that people will continue to whine into 3.3 when it comes up on the random dungeon system.

Oculus is not hard, people. Get to the first boss, don’t stand next to crystals, DPS the boss. Get a 2 Red/1 Bronze/2 Green formation, kill blue dragons, kill the constructs. Second boss, make sure the boss is between you and lightning bolts. Fly up, kill more blue dragons, engage Orum’s add packs. Third boss, kite him backwards and stand behind the pillars for the AE. Final boss, stun him when he enrages and fly away from balls.

HOLY SHIT THIS IS HARD STUFF RIGHT HERE.

*sigh*

…god damnit, fine.

So we’re working on Twin Val’kyr Heroic, and it’s fallen upon the Hunter task force to be the Ikaruga pilots for the guild – weeding out the light orbs so our raid can bask in delicious dark orb radiance. Well, this requires us to be ridiculously durable, and have some extra tweaks to our builds to make up for that.

So yes, I have dual-specs now, and yes, my secondary spec is a hilariously bad mish-mash of talents that looks like 23/31/17 or some nonsense.

Also it’s totally like I’m playing Ikaruga.

It was rare that I graced the large building in Shattrath City that was rented out to the ruling council of the Elitist Jerks. Oh, sure, I was on many of their lists to receive periodic correspondence and post, but I rarely went in-person. Many of the Hunters held in highest esteem there were not fond of me for my rhetoric during the days where Illidan was considered the foremost threat in our world, and even though it’d been almost a year since then, my name was still one said with more dislike and venom than anything if it was mentioned at all. But still, this day I found myself lounging at the door, my steam-powered adding machine clicking away at figures beside me.

I had gone to visit Shandara for a new copy of her enchanted parchment – it was a magical thing, full of power and mathematics; A Hunter only had to scribe in the equipment that they used, and it did all sorts of numerology and analysis for you, probing the very nature of the Hunter holding it to glean varying figures for the power of our shots, ideal gear progression paths, and how much extra power we could expect to see from the various magical enchantments from other allies, such as a Warrior’s rallying shouts or a Paladin’s kingly blessings. Most of my idle time was spent tinkering with my copy of the parchment – scribing in random options with the erasable ink that Shandara had developed with the aid of a Gnomish Mage and scrivener, seeing their result, and then erasing it all down to the enchanted core and starting again.

It always was a sharp prick in my heart when I flipped the parchment over for its guidance on gear acquisition – the spells woven into the parchment would calculate how much power a certain statistic would grant to you, and then compute optimal gear placement for you from those values. It wasn’t perfect, as all gear interacts like a puzzle – change one thing here, and then suddenly the second-best option for your boots becomes the best option. Change your neckpiece, and suddenly your belt becomes irrelevant. But that was what I enjoyed – the chase for the one perfect solution.

Today, however, I found myself flipping over the parchment to find a surprise – many of the items that I’d placed into the fields on the parchment as what I was wearing were coming back as the best or second-best options I could find – my new crossbow, awarded to me for my triumph over an uninhibited Lord Jaraxxus within Fordring’s Trial of the Grand Crusader, was second only to the highest award an Alliance Marksman could find themself awarded: a combat rifle designed entirely by the now-retired Paragon of Hunters. My newly-acquired neckpiece was considered the best available by the parchment. My gloves, replicas of those worn by Alleria herself, were only inferior to the enhanced version granted only to those who successfully retrieved a Regalia of the Grand Protector from one of the Crusade’s Tribute Chests after a skillful victory in the Trial of the Grand Crusader.

Looking up from the parchment, I saw a female Night Elf standing near me, almost as if patiently waiting for me to finish so she could speak with me. Scooting over my adding machine for her to sit and handing her a spare copy of Shandara’s parchment, I smiled. “Trouble lately?” I marveled at the Sergeant Major’s insignia hanging from her shoulders – she was a veteran of the older wars for Alterac Valley, and was given official rank within the Alliance armies. “Come, math will solve it.” I said with a smirk, and handed her a pot of the erasable ink. “Terrisan, was it? Your letter was well-received… Let’s talk options!”

Many people, including the Verizon rep on Twitter who was the unfortunate victim of my rage for a short time, queried why I didn’t bypass the TP2 for the Imagio. That picture symbolizes why – the real QWERTY keyboard. I absolutely hate virtual keyboards – I cannot stand the iPhone’s, and I probably wouldn’t like the Imagio’s any better. Sure, the TP2 doesn’t have WiMo 6.5 yet, but it will soon (it already does in the EU!), and I’m content with 6.1 for now.

As the name indicates, this is a phone heavily driven by touch interaction. It has wonderful Haptic force-feedback when touching buttons or other things (it slightly rumbles in your hands when dialing to indicate “hey you pushed the button, good job”), and while it’s a resistive touch screen (reacts to pressure, as opposed to a capacitive touchscreen like the iPhone, which reacts to the electricity your body generates), it’s very responsive, and I’ve never had issues where I had to execute a gesture more than MAYBE one extra time because the phone didn’t get it. Swipes, taps, and intricate gestures in Opera Mobile 9.5 are all very accurate for a resistive screen, and I don’t have any issues with it. :3

The camera is pretty good. No flash, which is my only complaint, but it’s pretty clear (and no I’m not taking any other pictures of my house than the one I posted above, it’s a mess), and in the light of a room or outside, the pictures come out pretty well.

Interaction with your PC is fantastic. If you’re on XP, you install Microsoft ActiveSync; if you’re on Vista or 7 (like me), you install Windows Mobile Phone Center. Your phone’s storage, both internal and MicroSD card, are fully open for you to play with, which allows for tons of tweaks and stuff. Want custom ringtones and message alerts? Copy over some MP3s or WAV files, and voila, you have the Thorim remix as your ringtone, and Razuvious telling you that you should’ve stayed home when you receive work email!

Fully unlocked GPS (which is unusual for a Verizon phone, but Verizon is starting to learn that crippling their phones = bad), and since there’s a Google Maps app for Windows Mobile, you will NEVER be lost with this phone. GPS signal acquisition is pretty fast (10-15 seconds when outside), and you can boost that with an already-installed GPS syncing app when you’re not outside. The GPS is ridiculously accurate with Google Maps, and I find myself having more accurate results than my buddy’s Garmin unit. >:3

It’s still a WiMo phone though, and lots of people will complain about that – I also have no info how it scopes up to the new and emerging Droid, as I never played with it and it came out AFTER I got my TP2 – but I’m loving it to bits. Call quality is stellar, battery life is fantastic (full charge = full day of usage with GPS running, 3G internet access, etc.), and for all the complaints that it’s “underpowered”, I’ve not had a single incident where I had to power-cycle it or anything similar.

It’s my new perma-connectivity device, and I luff it! <3