The Unconventional Priest

The Unconventional Priest is back with a new mission!

noreply@blogger.com (Fuyuko) — Sun, 22 Nov 2015 23:59:00 +0000

Oh, hello! Long time, no see!

It has been nearly six years since my last post on The Unconventional Priest, and a lot has happened during that time. I've moved from Tennessee to San Francisco to Brooklyn, I've started a fabric business, and I've been working at this amazing company called Etsy as a product manager. Also, Fuyuko went through a couple identity crises and is now a night elf. :D

I've continued to play WoW on and off these last six or so years, but I haven't seriously played since Wrath. The last progression raid I did was Ulduar 25. Most of my limited playing time has been spent either leveling to catch up with others or achievement farming. And to be totally honest, Blizzard has changed so much over the years about the class I love that I've been struggling to play at the level I did during Wrath. It's hard to re-learn your class over and over when you've morphed into the very definition of the casual player.

That said, you all know I love crazy, stupidly hard or annoying challenges, and I recently discovered one that I couldn't resist: The Iron Man Challenge.

You can read the complete rules here, but the TL;DR is that you must level a spec-less, talent-less, profession-less character to max level without dying, while only wearing white non-heirloom gear, and without any assistance from buffs, potions, groups with other people, etc. No raiding, no dungeons, no guilds higher than level 1.

I am SO excited about this challenge - excited enough that I'm planning to dust off this old blog and cover the entire process from start to finish (or when I get frustrated enough to give up).

I'll be starting off with a fresh character on Bonechewer (US) named Setsuko, the naming of which I realize in retrospect is a little ominous.

Setsuko is a priest, because duh.

Setsuko is also undead. Most of my characters are Alliance-side, but I actually started my WoW life as a troll and really miss the Horde universe. I also selfishly know that choosing the faction that has an unfair population balance on my server will likely lead to a lower chance of world pvp-related deaths.

I suspect Setsuko will not be the toon that completes the Iron Man Challenge. I'm optimistically guessing I'll go through about five characters before one hits 100. I have absolutely no data to back this up, though. It's just a guess. Maybe it only takes one or two characters. Maybe I never get it.

Regardless of how long it takes, I'll be blogging about the experience the whole way. Hopefully this blog will inspire other long-time WoW players who are at the quitting/hanging in there crossroads to try something new and a little crazy while waiting for Legion to drop.

My first post as Setsuko the Iron Man will come later this week, so stay tuned!

- Fuyuko

Post-College Yuckies

noreply@blogger.com (Fuyuko) — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 08:25:00 +0000

Hey all!

No, I haven't died. Actually, I've been rather preoccupied with post-college life (which, thus far, is teh suck). Finding jobs where I plan on moving is tough for someone with literally no qualifications other than a BA (which is surprisingly not helpful), so I've been tapping away at the keyboard on jobsites into the wee hours of the morning, with little time left for WoW, sad as that makes me.

I've not quit (I really do want to get back to playing...), and I do log on sporadically, but I will not be making it or this blog my main focus for a while. Yes, I know, I just said I was turning this into a smite priest blog, but sometimes things happen and life doesn't care about the epic blog post you just made. Hopefully my last post will serve as a resource for aspiring smite priests regardless, and hopefully you will see a smite post on here every now and again as I find free time.

So what's the scoop now? Well, if you recall, I was planning on taking the Japanese proficiency exam last December. And I didn't. I just didn't study long enough. Poop.

Well, I've decided to buckle down and start some hardcore studying and translation practice. There are a lot of opportunities for Japanese speakers in California (where I am headed), which is all the more reason for me to stop goofing off and get things done.

I have started a new blog about the long journey ahead, called "Interpreter Noob." I figure keeping a journal will help me keep track of my progress in breaking into the field, as well as provide my friends and family some ammo in yelling at me for any laziness I might fall into. And maybe.... MAYBE some poor fool in my same situation will come across it one day and find it helpful.

So if anyone is interested in reading what Fuyu is doing outside of the WoW-sphere, check it out and subscribe! You can find it here!

Thanks for all the comments and lovely emails I have received while blogging. They always made me smile.

So so long, and thanks for all the fish..... at least for now.

Edit: If you, somehow, got the original link when I had this post up for about 15 minutes the other day and added me there, please update your links to the "Interpreter Noob" site. Thanks.

Smite Spec - Making the Switch

noreply@blogger.com (Fuyuko) — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 19:09:00 +0000

So no doubt, priest or not, you've heard of the infamous Smite spec. Often called "Lolsmite" or "Holy DPS Spec," it's a playstyle for priests that involves dealing Holy spell damage, with little to no dipping into the Shadow tree.

As with most offspecs, it's rough being a Smite priest. Priests, do you remember being Shadow during Vanilla WoW? Do you remember not being taken to raids, or being ordered to respec to Holy? Do you remember being laughed at, being told "Priests are for healing, reroll mage"?

It's worse than that for Smite priests. Why? Because we don't have our own talent tree, and our build is officially (yes, officially) unsupported by Blizzard. As in they actually said, in a more professional way, "Lolz, wut u gaiz doin'?"

Ghostcrawler posted the following on the US forums on August 4, 2009, regarding lolsmite:

We have no intention of majorly supporting a Smite-centric, Holy-damage-focused priest build.

Smite is there to give you something to hit at low level and give you some ability to do damage in a Holy or Disc build. But we don't expect it to do competitive DPS with a Shadow build. Shadow is your DPS spec.

Now, I'm not trying to be the harbinger of doom and gloom for all those aspiring Smiters out there, but before you consider making the switch, you need to realize we have our work cut out for us. Sure, Smite spec is loads of fun, and one of the most rewarding aspects of it is overcoming the hurdles we face in-game. But it's not easy, it's not cheap, and it's not something you can do overnight. You need a special kind of personality to enjoy the struggle, so if being made fun of or being let down after a lot of hard work will crush your soul, don't try Smite. Because one or both of those WILL happen to you at least once, if not often.

OK, HAPPY TIME NAO!!!

You still there? Ok, good.

All that being said, Smite is really, really fun. There is a lot of support for it in the Priest community, believe it or not, and many priests have been running it since Surge of Light became a talent. It was actually pretty awesome in Burning Crusade, if you knew what you were doing, and Smite Priests DID top damage meters in Heroics and some raids.

I played Smite a bit in Karazhan, and I gotta say, nothing was more satisfying than coming in on top of the "pure" DPS classes on the meters. Once we got to upper Kara I had some trouble with mana, however, and rather than spend oodles of gold leveling Alchemy to test out the Alchemist's Stone, I just went back to a traditional spec. Where I am now in the game, both gear/progression-wise and emotionally, has made me decide that I, once again, want to play around with this spec. The support of fellow Smiters and of my guildies (or some of them anyway) is invaluable in this little journey.

So where do I start?

Well, that's where the fun begins. One of the issues with Smite is you have to ALREADY be geared for it to work. We also have no +hit talents, either, so expect to have to stack a ton of +hit.

If you're a Shadow Priest: You've got an advantage on the healing priests because you possess some DPS and hit gear, AND rolling on hit gear in a raid won't cause a ridiculous uproar. If you want to save a ton of gold respeccing and you're serious about trying Smite, make it your second spec. Yeah, you'll probably lose that healing or PVP offspec, but I told you this wasn't going to be easy.

If you're a healer: Go Shadow.

Why? Because otherwise you're going to have a very hard time justifying your rolling on +hit DPS gear as a healer, unless you run exclusively with a very understanding guild. As Shadow, no one will question those rolls, and you won't need to deal with the harassment of people who don't understand what you're doing. It's also good practice for learning the role of a DPSer in a raid, which can be vastly different from that of a healer. I'd suggest the same as above for specs: make your specs Shadow/Smite. If you want to stay as a main spec healer in raids, then that's fine, you can keep your healing spec. But be prepared to spend a lot of gold respeccing between Shadow and Smite.

You need 17% hit for Smite, due to lack of talented support (thanks for killing what we DID have, Blizz). That's 446 hit to be capped. If you're a Draenei, or have 100% access to one in raids, that takes you down to 16%, and a Shadow Priest or Boomkin will grant you an additional 3%, bringing that number down to 341. Remember, the Draenei and SP/BK combo is the ideal situation, so you want to get as close to that 17% as possible. Most, if not all, raids will require you to be hit-capped.

If all of this insanity hasn't phased you, then you just might enjoy Smite!

Stay tuned for next time, when we'll explore talenting, glyphs, and stats. In the meantime, go grab some hit gear!

TUC is now a Smite Priest Blog

noreply@blogger.com (Fuyuko) — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 22:37:00 +0000

When I first started this blog, it was with the intention of making it a blog about a priest who did all sorts of bizarre stuff - including Smite. But I love Holy healing so much that I've been focused more on that aspect of my priestlyness.

Well, now that I'm not raiding, for both lack of time and, at this point, lack of interest (ToC is kind of blah to me, and I hate playing catch-up in raids that have made tons of progress and have their own vibe already established), I am going to goof off with Smite again.

So here is your warning - while I will still post about healing occasionally, as well as achievements and stuff, this blog is officially becoming what it was originally intended as: a Smite priest blog.

I thought about making a separate blog about it, but to be honest, I am incredibly lazy and maintaining two separate blogs would be too much.

Expect to see layout and content changes in the next couple days. What is currently available from Loregasm, as well as my Insane guide, will still be available, so no worries there.

I'm looking forward to just logging on and goofing off again.

Edit: I would like to point out I am not quitting healing by any means, but since we have dual-spec now, I can freely play with smite without hurting my pocketbook. So consider Fuyu Holy/Holy =)

WoW Rage, Lessons, and Craziness: Or why borrowing gold is a bad idea...

noreply@blogger.com (Fuyuko) — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 15:00:00 +0000

WoW rage. Don't lie. We've all had our moments. Remember the giraffe from Robot Chicken? That kind of Stage 2 Anger?

Yeah, that was me last night.

See, I borrowed gold from someone I've known for years and years and years. I usually loathe borrowing gold from people because I am slow to pay back, but I had 800g worth of CoDed junkboxes in my mailbox with an hour left on them. And this person offered to lend me the gold if I'd promise to pay by the time her alt hit 40, "which I don't ever play, so don't worry, haha."

So I borrowed the gold, got my junkboxes, and promptly proceeded to be swamped with schoolwork. I've not really even been on WoW the past month or so.

So imagine my surprise when this person, who only ever talks to me about WoW even though we know each other IRL, messages me demanding her money back. Not in a nice way either. In a belligerent sort of way. I explained that I'd been busy with school, which just got me a "grow up."

And thus, Fufu became very, very angry. I logged on with the intention of selling the Crusader Orbs I had worked so hard in my very little free time to save so that I could pay her back and stop the harassment.

The first thing I see when I log on is a Horde pally ganking in Southshore, where I'd logged out working on junkboxes. I mount and ride off. HE mounts and hits crusader aura, chases me down, and a 10 minute fight ensues that ends with his popping LoL on Hands at 100 HP and destroying me with infinite stuns.

Now Fufu is really pissed.

At this point, I'm tired of people who play WoW. Tired of people who only ever IM me to talk to me about WoW, or people who take it too seriously, or people who really have nothing else to do but gank.

So, in a rage, I sell 2 Crusader Orbs, unload the rest alongside anything even remotely valuable in my bank into the guild bank, send Loan Shark the money, and promptly log off and cancel my subscription.

The following 30 minutes went something like this:

- Yell at keyboard

- Eat chocolate

- Yell into phone

- Log back on, make toon named Helloladies with the most Fabio-esque appearance possible

- Giggle

- Go, "Oh shazbot, I gave away all my stuff. HAHAHAHAHAHA"

So after that little melt down, and some WoW blog-browsing, I came to a decision. Since I'm not going to be able to play consistently for a while, I'm just going to go nuts and play with Smite again.

You've been warned.

Also....

.... don't borrow gold from people. Geez... it's really not healthy for you. >.<

Really Cool WoW Blog

noreply@blogger.com (Fuyuko) — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 00:46:00 +0000

Every now and then someone has a WoW blog with a really cool theme, beyond just class mechanics or achievements, etc. Postcards from Azeroth is just that - a really awesome WoW blog with a neat premise.

The blog author, Graham Surman, takes screenshots of various things around Azeroth and turns them into "postcards" as if from a postcard collection.

Not only is the idea really cool, the shots are pretty amazing too.

Check out his blog here!!!!

Oh Mah Gawd - Healer Meme

noreply@blogger.com (Fuyuko) — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 22:13:00 +0000

Clearly my lack of consistent content during my last semester of school is making an impression on people, as Averna over at Nerf This Druid tagged me in a "lovefest between healers." Either that or she just wubs me as much as I wub her!! /snorgle...... /end creepy...

So here it goes!

Post this questionnaire, with your answers, on your blog. Pick the healing class you know most about (or is the focus of your blog), and then send it over to another healing blogger you know and love who deals with a DIFFERENT class. Include a link to the blogger who sent you the questionnaire, as well as a link to whom you are sending it.

What is the name, class, and spec of your primary healer?

Fuyuko - Priest - Holy

What is your primary group healing environment? (ie, raids, pvp, 5 mans)

I've not really been able to play much recently because of school, but when I do, Fuyuko usually heals in 25 man raids.

What is your favorite healing spell for your class and why?

This is actually a really hard question. I thought about it for a couple minutes, and eventually decided on Divine Hymn.

"What???" I hear the other priests say loudly. "Why not Circle of Healing, or Prayer of Healing, or Prayer of Mending for the fun ping sound, or even Guardian Spirit for the wings???"

Well, here's the thing with Divine Hymn: Heals the 3 lowest HP nearby raid or party members for 3024 to 3342 every 2 seconds for 8 seconds, and increases healing done to them by 10% for 8 seconds. Maximum 12 heals.

So why is this awesome? It can retarget every tick, hitting a different set of people with the "lowest health," and when used with Heroism or Inner Focus, it's even more amazing.

To sum it up, the following comments from WoWHead:

-"So this is an "Oh sh*t, button?"

-"No, it's a "F*CK YES BUTTON!"

What healing spell do you use least for your class and why?

Probably Greater Heal or Binding Heal. Greater Heal just takes too long and Binding Heal has never really been in my play-style's arsenal.

What do you feel is the biggest strength of your healing class and why?

This is pretty obvious to me - the fact that we have two healing specs that can fulfill two very different roles extremely well. Disc is awesome for tank healing, and Holy is awesome for raid healing. We don't have one healing tree with abilities and talents for both specs. We have two separate, dedicated specs for each job.

What do you feel is the biggest weakness of your healing class and why?

Watch me get flamed for this again.

I feel like our biggest weakness as a class is our inability to be the best at any one thing. Now, I keep hearing "Zomg, you suck if you don't top your meters, lolz" but I feel like if I am on raid healing with, say, a shaman, and I am higher on the meters (not just number-wise, but overall with efficiency, etc.), then that doesn't make me look GOOD, it makes that shaman look BAD. The same goes for Disc priests and tank healing, I suppose. Disc priests are about mitigation, and so their overall healing output is lower than most, making them great tank healers, but probably not the best. But I'm a Holy priest, so I don't know much about Disc, to be honest.

Anyhoo, it seems like both specs can do a variety of things well, but not one better than any other class every single time.

In a 25 man raiding environment, what do you feel, in general, is the best healing assignment for you?

I'm Holy, so raid healing - no question. I'm not made for MT healing. I'm sort of ok with OT healing. And lolz at asking me to waste the mana putting up bubbles. I'm not a disc priest. My bubbles are pretty worthless for the mana they cost me.

What healing class do you enjoy healing with most and why?

I'm going to go with Averna's answer and say I enjoy healing with our healing team as players, not as classes. I do not prefer healing with one class over another.

What healing class do you enjoy healing with least and why?

Again, going with Averna's answer here and saying shamans named Vicars (although, technically, it would be shamans named Victoree). Hehe

What is your worst habit as a healer?

Letting one bad raid make me feel like I am a bad healer and causing me to not sign up for future raids. That's kind of where I am now, to be honest. I could spare an evening every now and then in my schoolwork for raiding, but I won't, because of that one raid.

What is your biggest pet peeve in a group healing environment while healing?

From tanks - LoSing your healers for no reason, especially during fights that involve a lot of obstacles.

From other healers - QQing about how people are sniping or stealing your heals and how that is why your numbers are so low. Take that up with the RL or healing leader, don't spam it in raid or healing chat.

From DPS - standing in fires, not moving out of obstacles, not CCing and letting healers take damage needlessly.

Do you feel that your class is well-balanced with other healers for PvE healing?

Yes, I love where we are at right now, at least those of us in Holy spec. Again, I don't know much about Disc.

What tools do you use to evaluate your own performance as a healer?

Recount, WoW Meters Online, whether or not everyone died.

What do you think is the biggest misconception people have about your healing class?

Hmm.... probably the idea that Disc and Holy are easily interchangeable and that one can easily do the job of the other. Sure, I could tank heal for a small amount of time before I ran out of mana, and a Disc priest could raid heal if absolutely needed, but really, we're two different specs to the point where we could even almost be two different classes.

What do you think is the most difficult thing for new healers of your class to learn?

Which of the 50000000000 priest healing spells to put on the toolbar.

Haste or crit and why?

Crit first, up to a certain point, then haste. Most Holy priests spec into Surge of Light, which grants us free Flash Heals when another healing spell crits. It has been calculated that crit for this purpose stops becoming useful around 30% raid-buffed, so when you've reached that threshold, haste all the way!!

What healing class do you feel you understand the least?

Probably paladins.

What add-ons or macros do you use, if any, to aid you in healing?

Recount. Otherwise I use the standard DBM/oRA/Omen raiding mods and the standard Blizzard UI. I don't use Grid or Healbot or Clique or any of that stuff. I leveled on dial-up and raided through Naxx with a horrible laptop, so I just got used to not using those mods. As for macros, I am currently working on some humorous /yells for spell casts.

Do you strive primarily for balance between your healing stats, or do you stack some much higher than others and why?

I did the whole balance thing for a while, but now I aim primarily for spell power and haste, as I have reached that crit threshold, and my mana regen is fine.

Alrighty, since I said I don't know much about paladins, I'm passing this one on to Pallymar over at Pallymar's Take. HA HA. Have fun!!

PTR Awesomesauce: Valithria Dreamwalker

noreply@blogger.com (Fuyuko) — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 02:16:00 +0000

I saw this post over at World of Raids regarding testing for the green dragon boss Valithria Dreamwalker, and I gotta say, I'm intrigued.

Most encounters that depend heavily on healers have just revolved around the whole "oh shazbot, moar fire moar heals!" mantra, with some exceptions. So when Blizz comes up with nifty little things for us healers to do besides just staying out of fires and healing, I get excited.

For example, I really liked the Vezax encounter because healers had to really watch their mana pools. Or that one encounter in Naxx where there was only a short window every so often that heals could be cast...

But this Valithria fight... this is pretty cool.

So the basic premise, according to WoR, is that the healers must heal Valithria to 100% health. (She are gud dragon, mhm) She has 30 million HP on 25-man and 10 million on 10-man, and begins the encounter at 50% of that. Seems easy, right? Spam big heals, fun fun?

Actually, waves of adds will spawn throughout the fight and must be CCed and DPSed down so that they don't damage her. These adds are also a source of damage to the players assigned to deal with them, so healers in this fight have to watch the raid AND heal the boss.

<.Might.> posted their 25-man kill video from the PTR on Youtube. It's from a healer's point of view, so check it out below!

For a full list of abilities, mob types, etc., check out the WoR post here!!!

Also, if you watch the video..... WTF is up with the gates??? @_@

Guilds Through the Years

noreply@blogger.com (Fuyuko) — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 04:45:00 +0000

I was browsing Facebook the other night and remembered that I'd joined a little group for my little family on Perenolde a long time ago, and it got me thinking about my guild history... It's actually kind of interesting to watch the change...

I was running as shadow in Vanilla WoW and refused to switch to holy, so you can imagine that I was less than eager to join a guild. I'd also always imagined guilds to be places where you HAD to raid 100% all the time, and that wasn't really my cup of tea... I didn't want people telling me when and how I could play, and so I was guildless for a very long time.

Taking guild photos is srz bszns!!! I'm the purple thing! Hai Kyo!!!

The Deviate Cartel: My first guild ever. I was in SFK one day with another priest and our group was really, reallllllly bad. He and I had been chatting and cutting up, until the hunter in our group somehow managed to pull the entire ghost wolf room and wipe the group. This kind of thing had happened multiple times, and the holy priest and I eventually quit. He sent me a tell inviting me to his small guild of friends, and after asking him about 50 times if I had to raid or respecc, I joined. The "premise" of his guild, he said, was to start a Deviate Fish selling operation and make oodles of gold in some kind of fish monopoly in the AH. He even said we'd have "fish fry parties" in the Barrens.....

Although we never actually accomplished this Perenolde market takeover, I still find the whole thing really funny.

WoahMyGod: After some issues with a....um.... creeper in the TDC, most of us split off into this small guild. We were a guild of about 7 people, and oodles of fun. Sure, we never got anything done, but nothing was more fun to me at the time than running 5 mans and listening to my GM's chinchillas go insane over Vent. The guild lasted quite a while, until the GM and his girlfriend stopped playing as much and one of the guildies changed to a more active guild, recruiting me to go along with him.

The Pantheon: This is the guild I was with for the majority of TBC. A small raiding guild, they downed content without any major rules or DKP or insane strategies. They just got drunk, logged on Vent, and kicked the crap out of whatever they came across. The GM was on drugs (I'm almost positive), half the guild was Canadian, and the main warlock was so good at pulling aggro that he constantly pulled through walls. They were a crazy lot, and I was sad to leave them for another server. They eventually merged with another guild, and then another, and I have no idea who or where they are anymore. Most of the people I played with have quit for other games now.... But I will always remember loading the guild site's front page and seeing my troll priest (whose name was misspelled) in the awesome flash intro. =D

20 years later....

Ascended: After changing to Bonechewer Alliance so I could play with my friends, I joined Ascended when Greenie was still GM. They had made a name for themselves as a casual raiding guild on the server, and were full of interesting and awesome people. I was super nervous about joining a raiding guild of any sort, but Ascended wasn't full of the jerks that I had always seen in guilds that actually downed content. No one told me how to play, and they even let me try out lolsmite at one point!! The age groups were pretty mixed, too, which I liked.

Valis is the GM now, and the membership has changed drastically over the past year or two as the guild has grown and progressed, but these guys are like a second family to me now. And I've even raided with them! Who'd have known when I first joined TDC back in Vanilla that I'd be a raider, let alone a holy priest!

It might be boring to read someone else's guild history, but for me, it's a lot of fun to look back and see how my expectations and goals for guild membership have changed. =)

I didn't die, really!!

noreply@blogger.com (Fuyuko) — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 02:03:00 +0000

I apologize for the lack of posting for what seems, to me, like ages. I've been crazy busy with school the past couple weeks. Taking two lab science courses in a single semester might have been a bad idea. XD

Not much has been going on in WoW-land for me recently. I've not raided since utterly failing last time, so most of my in-game time has been spent on PVP, since it's an aspect of the game I haven't done much of since back during the High Warlord grind on my troll. (I only got the shoulders and Senior Sergeant title before TBC came out, though, since I hit 60 late. Bah.)

I forgot how unbearably annoying BGs can be.... it seems like a lot of the ones going when I am online are losses. I'm only doing it for better gear for my 2s team, though, which is a frost mage/disc priest combo. Both of us are kind of arena noobs, and new to our combo, but all things considered we're doing pretty well. We did awesome at the beginning of this past week, but played for too long, I think, and lost a few. It's a lot of fun, and it's nice to have a partner with so much CC!! It's hard to get used to playing offensive disc, though, as I feel like most of my time is spent running around healing myself.

In other news, I've been playing Aion when I get the chance, and I love it. I'm playing a cleric, which is essentially a priest. The priest class in Aion breaks down at level 10 into two subclasses, from which you choose one. There's the melee-based, bard-esque chanter, and then the healxxor cleric.

Don't get me started on crafting. It's so much fun. The tailoring looms mooooooove.

I'll prolly join the club and make one of those "Aion from a WoW-er PoV" posts in the near future if anyone is interested. But for now, I just wanted to let everyone know I'm not dead, I still play WoW, and new posts will be coming as soon as midterms are over at school.

For now, if anyone is interested in reading a former WoW-er's PoV on Aion, my bf currently has a blog he's keeping as he levels. Check it out at Cliona Lake Yacht Club!!!!

d-^_^-b

What a Long, Strange (and Frustrating!!) Trip It's Been...

noreply@blogger.com (Fuyuko) — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 20:06:00 +0000

Hot damn!

Returning to Raiding

noreply@blogger.com (Fuyuko) — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 04:22:00 +0000

Ya gotta love Google Image search...

It has been about a month since I stopped raiding, and tonight I returned for Crusader's Coliseum 25 and Ulduar 25.

I've not really healed anything during that month hiatus, short of the Heroic UK run I did right before the raid. In fact, I've not really done any instances at all, short of DPSing Heroic ToC, which is just lolsear half the time.

So imagine my surprise healing something - a raid - in a new instance for me - for the first time in a month.

Sucked.

Hard.

Oh my god. It's one thing to be low on the meters because the other healers outgear you, which several of them do now. But I was just plain bad.

The first couple bosses were ok. As long as you get the movement mechanics down they seem fine. But then we got to the Faction Champions.

To quote one of our shaman: "Don't read the strat. Just bring a pvp mindset and a trinket."

Ok! I can totally do that. I'm really bad at pvp when it comes to keeping other people alive, but surely I can handle this! (Just like to point out, in case my RLs read this that I DID read the strat anyway, haha)

I switched to my disc pvp spec on a suggestion from the other priests, but seeing as I specced into that yesterday, I had no idea what I was doing. I died so fast I might as well had skipped it to go get ice cream.

We downed Anub, which was awesome!! I didn't die for that one, I don't think, but I may be wrong. The evening was kind of a blur.

After finishing CC, we went to Ulduar. "Aaaaaa," I think. "I can handle this now. Rawr!!!"

Mrrggll..... my healing was still bad, my overheals were nuts (73% wut?), and Thorim went a little like this:

Fuyuko has died.

RL: Bring up Fuyu.

/clicks accept

/rezzes

Fuyuko has died.

.....

Battle rez is up! Who should I bring up?

RL: Bring up.... Fuyu.....

/sadface

And the heckling from the priests in our priest channel didn't help either!!! It was vicious! I have scars! The emotional distress!

I guess I am just waaaaaaaay out of practice. Hopefully as I get back into the swing of things I'll start to do better, because I do know my class, and I do know how to play it in raids. I've just become a wee bit on the tetanus-inducing rusty side.

Hope you've all had your shots, cuz Fuyu is back.

Lament of the Bloodsail Admiral

noreply@blogger.com (Fuyuko) — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 02:56:00 +0000

Avast, me maties, the time is near.

Today the day was finally here.

On WoW with dreams of hope I logged..

I wanted to join the pirates who grogged.

But curses, I say, to my fellows in plunder.

Your chosen location was quite a large blunder!

For I, a Bloodsail Admiral cannot be seen

Near the short little people with skins of green.

I swallowed my pride and made the trip

But alas, my pvp gear I did not equip.

For alongside the angry, rep-hungry Cartel

Was a mob of angry Horde whose position was swell.

The guards did latch on me like barnacles at sea.

Their nets were quite annoying though their damage was wee.

I died several times and then several more..

Just trying to make it past the Flight Master's floor.

I finally made it in death to the roof,

Hoping the few guards there would remain as aloof.

But one of them saw me and fired his gun,

And I was flung into the ocean like a spring that had sprung.

The Horde did attack me and sadly for me

I am absolutely horrible at shadow pvp.

Several more corpse runs and then to my glee.

Before another death the achievement I'd see.

Loregasm! The Silver Covenant/Sunreavers

noreply@blogger.com (Fuyuko) — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 14:32:00 +0000

Image courtesy WoW-Wiki

So, no doubt if you're a level 80 player and have been doing the Argent Tournament dailies for a while now, you're either exalted with a faction called the Silver Covenant or the Sunreavers.

But how much do you really know about these factions?

I personally think this is a huge lore-fail on Blizzard's part. I've not played my Hordie through the AT, but I must say, there was not a whole lot of background into the Silver Covenant on the Alliance side...

The Silver Covenant

This is a militant group belonging to the Kirin Tor. Led by Rhonin's wife, the famous Vereesa Windrunner, the main purpose of the Silver Covenant is to keep blood elves out of the Kirin Tor.

According to Project Lore, the blood elves of Silvermoon asked Rhonin to be admitted into the Kirin Tor, but those high elves within the faction, associating the blood elves with the betrayal of Kael'thas, formed the Silver Covenant to keep them out.

The Sunreavers

The Sunreaver faction, led by Archmage Aethas Sunreaver, is the Horde equivalent and polar opposite of the Silver Covenant. Their purpose is to gain entrance into the Kirin Tor for blood elves.

It is through the work of Sunreaver that the Horde was even allowed into Dalaran at all.

Both Vereesa Windrunner and Archmage Sunreaver can be found next to Rhonin in the Violet Citadel. Rhonin and the Kirin Tor itself have yet to make any official decision on the matter.

Both groups can also be found aiding the Argent Crusade at the Argent Tournament. However, the two factions continue to keep a healthy distance from each other.

Sadly, this is really all we know about the factions themselves. Hopefully, as the Argent Tournament grows, we'll learn more about them. But for now, the basic idea is:

Pro-belf in purple robes: Sunreavers

Anti-belf in purple robes: Silver Covenant

If anyone can point me to some more information on these two factions, please do! I really hope it exists...

Heroic Dire Maul?? 10 Ways It Could Happen!!!

noreply@blogger.com (Fuyuko) — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 10:45:00 +0000

Image Courtesy WoW-Wiki

Before you panic, no, Blizzard isn't putting in a Heroic Dire Maul... as far as I know!

It's ok. You can breathe now. Deep breaths. There you go, that's it.

Actually, Blog Azeroth suggested the topic "10 Things That Would Make __ More Heroic" in their Shared Topics forum, and seeing as the little time I spend online nowadays has been in Dire Maul, it is only fitting that I choose that!!! (Although I really wanted to pick Kara, but they said Old World.)

So imagine - it's major patch day. In the patch notes you see that a couple instances have now been re-attuned to level 80! AWESOME, right? Everybody loves Dire Maul, right???

Well, here are the 'patch notes,' teehee. Enjoy!

Dire Maul has been re-attuned to level 80, and now offers a heroic mode.

1. Pusillin is back, and he has brought friends. Members of your party now enter a temporary phased instance upon entering DM West, similar to the final boss of Ahn'kahet. Each player must keep up with one of Pusillin's friends while doing damage to him. The imp must be defeated before he reaches the "imp room" or the phased player dies to a whelp-esque swarm of fire-crazy imps. Once all players have killed their imps and left phasing, or have been killed within the phased zone, Pusillin becomes targetable. All 5 players must successfully finish the encounter for the Heroic key to drop.

2. The Shen'dralar faction now features epic neck pieces! Approximately of the same iLevel as the gear in Heroic ToC, the Shen'dralar rewards allow the player to transform into an Ent for 10 minutes, with a 1 hour cooldown.

3. Reputation with the Shen'dralar has become easier! Each boss of Dire Maul now drops a Libram of Eldre'Thalas. These librams grant 500 reputation and can be turned in until 11999/12000. Heroic DM bosses drop Librams of the Quel'dorei, which are required to reach Exalted status.

4. Tendris Warpwood now has a 0.1% chance of dropping the 280% Ironbark Protector land mount. Players must be level 80 and exalted with the Shen'dralar to equip this mount.

5. Ogre Tannin will now be looted off of bosses in Dire Maul North.

6. New tailoring and leatherworking patterns can be found in Knot's cache! These epic patterns require 20 ogre tannin each in addition to cloth and leather materials, as well as 450 skill to learn.

7. Slaying Immol'thar now has a 5% chance to drop a Baby Void Terror pet. Awww, ain't he cute?

8. The title "the Drunk" is now available via a quest-line completed on Heroic difficulty. Wearing a Gor'dok Ogre Suit, all players in the party must purchase grog from the temporarily friendly ogres. Upon reaching King Gordok, players must reach 'completely smashed' status before slaying the king, in costume.

9. Alzzin the Wildshaper now has a "Possess" mechanic, allowing him to temporarily turn a player into a worg, rendering that player useless for 5 seconds. This is similar to a polymorph, and can be dispelled with Dispel Magic.

10. Exalted status with the Shen'dralar, possession of the Ironbark Protector mount, as well as of the Baby Void Terror pet unlocks the Feat of Strength "It Puts the Tannin in the Basket...," granting the title of "of Eldre'Thalas."

Just an FYI

noreply@blogger.com (Fuyuko) — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 15:13:00 +0000

I'll be trying to find a layout that is less troublesome and more aesthetically pleasing today (ie, an actual header), so if you happen to check the blog and it looks very disjointed and crazy, bear with me. My knowledge of HTML is very rusty, and I'm still learning about Blogger.

Thanks, guys!

Healing - Where Being Too Good Can Be Bad

noreply@blogger.com (Fuyuko) — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 19:05:00 +0000

Image Source

I saw a blog post on this subject on Snarkcraft a while back called "Healing Myself Out of a Job," and found it very interesting.

Let's explore this.

In progression raiding, the goal of the raid is to down bosses as quickly and painlessly as possible, moving through the instance until all encounters are down and solid.

There are 3 basic roles in a raid: tank, DPS, and heals. We don't need to get down to the specifics of what kind of DPS, or pullers/CCers, etc., here because it's irrelevant. What is interesting, however, is how the individuals in these roles are affected as the raid gets better and better.

The tanks: Encounters generally call for a set number of tanks. For example, when my guild raids 25-man Ulduar, we bring 3 tanks. Sometimes we only need 1, sometimes only 2, and each encounter is tanked by the player that the raid leader deems most suited to it. In short, the number of tanks you bring generally stays the same as the raid gets better. You always need tanks. As individual players get better, they may be subbed in for other players who are not as effective or have less than optimal gear.

The DPS: When raid assignments go out, the amount of DPS is usually set at a certain number. High DPS is important, because it is required to bring bosses down. Simple enough, right? So as the raid gets better at a certain encounter, and the DPS is higher, what usually happens? The number of DPS brought to the raid either remains the same or increases to aid in a faster kill time.

I'm sure you're wondering where I'm going with this, so bear with me for a second...

The healers: When raids first begin an instance, such as 25 Ulduar, they bring x number of healers. For our purposes, we'll say 6. Some encounters at the beginning simply require that many heals to make sure things go smoothly as the raid learns the encounters.

However, here is where healing differs from tanking and DPS. As DPS goes up, tanks get better at encounters, and the healing begins to handle the damage more smoothly, what happens?

You bring less healers.

The healing load lightens as everyone improves, and so those 5th and 6th healers become overkill that could be replaced with another DPS to speed up kill time.

So essentially, healers heal themselves or their comrades out of a job as they get better.

I feel like that might be why the healing "department," if you will, of a raid can be so competitive and meter crazy. We know that the number of healers needed for an encounter will go down as the raid as a whole improves, even if we don't actively think about it. We know that the best healers will be the ones to stay in that role, barring some kind of composition requirement (which Blizzard seems to be actively trying to remove anyway).

Sometimes Numbah 5 and Numbah 6 have DPS offspecs that they can switch to and remain in the raid. However, not all guilds work this way, and many would prefer to bring their best healers and their best DPS over their best healers, their best DPS, and the extra healers that are not needed in healing anymore as offspec DPS.

And you're kinda screwed if your offspec is PVP.

It's a very intriguing process, at least to me.

If you're a tank, you know there are set slots for encounters, and your goal is to get better to be one of those set numbers.

If you're DPS, you want high DPS and good CC. Getting better helps the raid, and as the raid improves, you're likely to add TO your DPS lineup to speed up kills.

If you're a healer, you very well may not be needed once the raid gets better. Your goal is to be an amazing and efficient healer so that you can remain in the raid once spots start disappearing.

Any thoughts?

Thanks so much to Ambient for linking me the OP! I could not, for the life of me, seem to remember where I saw it.

Faction Transfers - Would You Do It?

noreply@blogger.com (Fuyuko) — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 15:43:00 +0000

Baby Kyo!!!!

Well, it's here, folks. Faction transfers.

I don't know about you, but I never saw it coming. I thought that there was a slight chance of Blizzard caving in on their strict policy about playing both factions on a PVP server (which they did), but I honestly never thought they'd allow full-blown faction switches.

I'm honestly pretty torn about it. As you all know, I am a bit of a lore whore, and so the idea of a Draenei/Troll with no knowledge of Orc/Gnome history suddenly running around as a level 80 drives me insane. So much faction history in leveling up!!!

When I rolled my first character, Kyokiru (troll priest), I read the little book that came with my game about the history of some of the races, and the first thing I did at level 5 was brave the walk to Orgrimmar, look for Thrall, and take a screenshot of my character kneeling in front of his chair. Yes, I know. Nerd, right? Well I thought I was pretty badass. =P

At the same time, though, when I switched to Alliance to play with my friends, I would have given anything to change level 70 Kyo into an Alliance character. I loved priest, and knew I wouldn't be able to devote enough time to both characters, so I created Fuyuko as a priest. (Hence why I have 2 high level priests).

While it was a huge pain in the butt to relevel a character and try to catch her up to the rest of my new guildies, I'm thankful looking back, because Alliance leveling is a different experience than Horde leveling, and I know a lot about the lore associated with both factions now.

At this point, if I were in the Kyo situation again, would I take advantage of the faction transfer service, despite my complaints of it ruining lore? Even if I didn't know anything about Alliance history?

Yes.

It's just too convenient for playing with friends. Releveling a character that you intend to be a raiding main at some point, for most of us, just takes too much time. This was a good financial decision on the part of Blizzard, and I bet they are making some decent scratch off it.

How about you all? If you were in a situation like I was (and I bet most of you have been), would you take advantage of the service? Why or why not?

The Journey to Insanity V: That Time of the Month...

noreply@blogger.com (Fuyuko) — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 17:07:00 +0000

Picture courtesy of WoWWiki

Welcome to part 5 of The Journey to Insanity: a guide to the Insane in the Membrane achievement. This time around we'll cover the final faction required for the title!

The Darkmoon Faire faction is a bit odd. Like most of the factions we have dealt with thus far, you have access to easier methods of reputation gain until a certain point. However, unlike those other factions, you only have access to the easier DMF gains until 2000 Friendly.

So what are these "easy rep gains"? Well, once a month when the Faire comes around, there will be several NPCs that offer quests to collect x number of a certain item. Each item turn-in quest has "tiers" that you can work in until you reach a certain reputation level before moving onto a "harder" tier of item turn-ins.

TIER 1 (Doable until 500/3000 Neutral)

Gathering: 5x Small Furry Paw
Blacksmithing: 10x Course Weightstone
Engineering: 5x Copper Modulator
Leatherworking: 3x Embossed Leather Boots

TIER 2 (Doable until 1100/3000 Neutral)

Gathering: 5x Torn Bear Pelt
Blacksmithing: 7x Heavy Grinding Stone
Engineering: 7x Whirring Bronze Gizmo
Leatherworking: 3x Toughened Leather Armor

TIER 3 (Doable until 1700/3000 Neutral)

Gathering: 5x Soft Bushy Tail
Blacksmithing: 3x Green Iron Bracers
Engineering: 36x Green Firework
Leatherworking: 3x Barbaric Harness

TIER 4 (Doable until 2500/3000 Neutral)

Gathering: 5x Vibrant Plumes
Blacksmithing: 1x Big Black Mace
Engineering: 6x Mechanical Repair Kit
Leatherworking: 1x Turtle Scale Leggings

TIER 5 (Doable for reputation until 2000/6000 Friendly)

Gathering: 10x Evil Bat Eyes/10x Glowing Scorpid Blood
Blacksmithing: 8x Dense Grinding Stone
Engineering: 6x Thorium Widget
Leatherworking: 8x Rugged Armor Kit

Ok, so 2000/6000 Friendly still leaves A LOT left to deal with. What does one do for rep after the turn-in cut-off?

Spend lots of gold if you're not an herbalist/inscriptionist.

That's right. You have to turn in decks for reputation. Lower level decks made through inscription or purchased on the AH will yield 25 reputation per turn-in, and can be turned in at any time (the Faire doesn't need to be up) by using the completed deck to summon a Darkmoon Faire NPC.

The low-level decks are:

Rogues Deck
Swords Deck
Mages Deck
Demons Deck

Higher level decks (the ones that yield epic trinkets) can be crafted through inscription, looted off of mobs/bosses, or purchased on the AH. Higher level decks yield 350 reputation per turn in, plus the trinket, and can only be turned in when the Faire is up.

The high-level decks are:

Level 60 Decks: Beasts, Elementals, Portals, Warlords
Level 70 Decks: Furies, Storms, Blessings, Lunacy
Level 80 Decks: Chaos, Nobles, Prisms, Undeath

If you're not an herbalist/inscriptionist, be prepared to spend big bucks on these decks. Avoid buying them close to the start/end of the Faire, as prices tend to skyrocket. Prices average on my server anywhere from 200g for anything but Nobles to in the thousands for the Nobles deck.

One thing you might try, if you're an inscriptionist and don't need a Greatness trinket, is selling any Nobles cards you create on the AH to finance the purchasing of other cards/decks.

These decks are the only feasible means of getting to Exalted with the Faire. The only other option is to do the random fortune quests offered by Sayge when the Faire is up, but these quests are randomly acquired and only yield 75 reputation, so don't depend on them.

Good luck getting your Darkmoon Faire rep up, and I hope you enjoyed the last guide in my Journey to Insanity series!!!!

I'm not dead!

noreply@blogger.com (Fuyuko) — Sun, 23 Aug 2009 20:54:00 +0000

Thanks again to Azumanga Images!!

So yeah, I haven't really posted anything in over a week, so I figured I would let you all know I'm not dead. After my summer classes ended, I spent a week in California with my boyfriend, and then came back and immediately started fall classes.

To add to that, I am taking the Japanese Language Proficiency Exam in December, so I turned in my "raiding resignation" of sorts to my guild the other night. I'm really sad, because I love progression raiding a lot.

It's not that I am quitting WoW or never raiding again until after the exam is over, but I will be playing far less often and I want the time I do have to devote to the game during the next few months to go beyond just raiding. Besides, Ascended raids on weeknights and I've decided weekend WoW fun will be my reward for working hard on school and exam prep until January.

Does that mean this blog is done? Hell no.

I never really wrote about raiding anyway, mainly out of a self-conscious fear that I'd get rage-filled comments about how "bad" my healing style is. The time I spend in game now will mostly be devoted to questing and achievements, so nothing about this blog will change! I will be on every day for a couple minutes doing my cooking or AT dailies so I don't fall hopelessly behind, so if you're on Bonechewer and happen to catch me, send me a tell!

I'm going to do my best to post at least twice a week, but if I miss a week every now and then, I hope you'll all stick with me! Last semester of school is always hell.

And besides, I'm getting close to being Insane. Muahaha! Check out my Armory to see my progress!!

The Interwebs > Applebough

noreply@blogger.com (Fuyuko) — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 18:57:00 +0000

I was recently contacted by THE Applebough regarding his blog. He was concerned over a comment by someone named Inishi about the lack of activity on his blog recently and wanted to set the record straight:

I regret to inform my legions of loyal readers that my blog may remain un-updated for some period of time. It is not that I am too busy, as the fruit business has been suffering in Azeroth recently. It would seem that, with the new additions to the Tournament in Icecrown, my usual customers have chosen protein shakes from some no-name shop in Gadgetzan as a means of gaining their nutrition. While I cannot fault them for being concerned about their muscular welfare, I must say I have always considered fruit smoothies just as healthy and a thousand times more delicious... maybe I shall start a stand for fruit smoothies..... I have the supplies...

Alas, I digress. As I stated previously, my lack of activity cannot be attributed to a busy schedule, nor a lack of intriguing content to post.

No, the cold hard truth of the matter is..... I've forgotten my blasted password. And in the process of trying to recover it, I realized that I had also forgotten my username. To make matters worse, I have always posted from the Dalaran computer lab, and as most public lab users know, passwords are not saved on these machines.

It pains me greatly, but until I can recover this information or muster the energy to create an entirely new blog, Applebough's Fruitcart is suspended indefinitely.

I am going back to my empty fruit stand now. This month has been utterly depressing.

There you have it, folks. Right from the tree's.....um.... mouth. Here's hoping he can find his password and username, because I was looking forward to reading more about the war between Averna over at Nerf This Druid and Applebough.

Loregasm! Elune

noreply@blogger.com (Fuyuko) — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 18:00:00 +0000

Image from WoW-Wiki

You've seen monuments dedicated to her. You've heard her name praised by night elves all across Azeroth. Her name is on weapons, robes, and even songs on the WoW soundtrack.

So who is the mysterious Elune?

Elune has been called "one of Azeroth's few full deities," and can be referred to by several names. Mother Moon and the Night Warrior are names common to members of the Alliance, and the tauren have given her the name Mu'sha, the left eye of the Earthmother.

She has many followers, beginning with the religious order "The Sisters of Elune." As the name implies, it is composed of women who have been endowed with magical powers by the goddess herself. They can heal an ally near death or curse an enemy on the battlefield. The sect is led by High Priestess Tyrande Whisperwind, and is the highest order of Elune's priests.

According to the World of Warcraft website, all the priests who served Elune were originally night elf women. Gradually over time the order has allowed both men and a few priests of other races to join. However, they believe that Elune's magnificence can only truly be understood by women, and so the Sisters of Elune are still excusively female.

She is often depicted as a beautiful night elf woman crowned with a simple platinum circlet and surrounded by dazzling luminescence. Artists also traditionally portay her with long, white hair, alabaster skin, and eyes of pure moonlight. - WoW.com

Elune is also known for the creation of the moonkin, whose purpose was to protect areas she deemed sacred, including her shrines.

She had a romantic relationship with the forest demi-god Malorne, and that union led to the birth of the famous Cenarius.

Very little is known about Elune, as she has never been seen in a physical form by any mortal, and some even believe her to be a "collection of ideals" rather than an actual physical presence. Whatever the case may be, she has had a profound impact on both night elf and tauren cultures, and her priestesses still keep watch over her temples.

Sources: WoW-Wiki and World of Warcraft Official Site

Character Naming Methodology, or, Hao u do eet?

noreply@blogger.com (Fuyuko) — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 22:31:00 +0000

When you walk into any major city in WoW, you can see a wide variety of player character names. There is always the obligatory LoTR rip off, the guy pretending to be a girl (Bradsgrl), or the guy trying to be funny (Bigblackdk).

One of the annoying things about playing with friends sometimes is the nearly constant badgering about how I name my characters. My priest, Fuyuko, isn't some freakish anime reference, but an hommage to the language I studied in college and my favorite kanji in that language (fuyu - meaning 'winter'). Luckily, most of my friends either took Japanese or were so used to the rest of us having taken it that the 'anime fanboi" label never came out.

And then I made a druid one day that I planned to name Fluffles. And all hell broke loose.

"Fluffles? What the hell?"

"Make a serious, respectable name."

What? Respectable? This coming from people whose character names just seem like they took two bags, one of consonants and one of vowels, and randomly put together a name through blind drawings that followed the typical consonant/vowel/consonant pattern. Lorizakisa? Is that an old world god or a sammich? Pfft...

So, out of rebellion and annoyance for this harassment, Droodohnoes was born. And Droodohnoes has given rise to Wafflekins, Panzerkin, and Ohgodwhy.

I do have "intelligently-named" characters based off of other Japanese combinations or off of gods and goddesses, but it just bugs me to no end that with people running around with names like "Bradsgrl" or "Urmomisgud," my "Fluffles" was the one to go be torn to shreds by the bloodthirsty mob.

Although, I still get messages from people who think Fuyuko is a cleverly disguised "f*** you!"

Anyone else ever get harassed for a character name choice?

Loregasm!: Vol'Jin and the Darkspear Trolls

noreply@blogger.com (Fuyuko) — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 11:53:00 +0000

Apologies for being a day late on this. I just finished up finals for my summer session and it has been a little chaotic, to say the least.

So, if you've ever played Horde (because I doubt you were paying that close of attention during For The Alliance), you'll remember that the hall in which Thrall resides is home to a number of other npcs as well, including a troll boss named Vol'Jin.

So who is this Vol'Jin, and why is he a boss?

A long time ago, all of the Darkspear trolls lived on some islands in Stranglethorn Vale, under the rule of Vol'Jin's father, the famous witch doctor Sen'Jin. The Darkspear were constantly under attack by humans and murlocs, and were nearly wiped out if not but for the aid of Thrall and his orcs.

Vol'Jin became chief of the Darkspear after his father died in Stranglethorn defending the tribe, and stayed behind with some of the trolls while the rest of the tribe fled to Kalimdor. The group in Kalimdor fought alongside the orcs against the Burning Legion.

When the war had ended, Vol'Jin brought the rest of his Darkspear overseas to Kalimdor, settling on the Echo Isles off the coast of Durotar, but it wasn't long before the humans were after them again, this time in the form of a fleet commanded by Grand Admiral Daelin Proudmore.

According to WoW-Wiki:

Vol'jin aided Rexxar, Rokhan, and Chen Stormstout in evacuating the Darkspear tribe, turning the three into wyverns allowing them to attack the Alliance fleet from above, and supplying them with a squadron of bat riders.

Unfortunately, they were outnumbered, and Vol'Jin fled with his tribe until the Tauren and ogres joined in the fight. The humans were defeated, but even then the Darkspear were not free from torment.

One of their own, a witch doctor named Zalazane (which many Hordies remember from their noobie quests!) began using his voodoo to enslave the trolls, and Vol'Jin and his remaining people fell back to the mainland of Durotar, living in what is now Sen'Jin village (named for Vol'Jin's father).

Vol'Jin can be found in Thrall's chamber, where he advises the warchief on various matters, and watches over his small tribe of trolls.

Source: WoW-Wiki

Maintenance Day Shenanigans

noreply@blogger.com (Fuyuko) — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 11:20:00 +0000

Some of us troll the forums.

Some of us troll the chatrooms.

Some of us even go outside.

But seriously, why would you want to when you could sit at your desk and play with WoW Model Viewer?

Now, yeah, it's just full of the same things you see every day in Azeroth, so what could possibly be so exciting about it?

Remember encounters like Kael where your entire guild spent the first 10 minutes of every raid spamming /spit on the boss, because after months of attempts, you still had not managed to down him?

Wouldn't it be great if you could go back to Tempest Keep and humiliate the miserable bastard?

Well, you could, but it's maintenance day. Whatever shall you do? You need revenge!!!

You could......

.........

..... MAKE HIM DANCE!!!!!

No, you heard me correctly. Make. Kael. Dance.

"Womanizer" by Britney Spears, (c) Jive Records 2008.

(It's a little slow because of the compressor... but you get the idea.)

Yeah, who's a big shot now, eh? EH????

Unfortunately, Kael was such a terrible dancer that he crashed the program.

But, yeah, if you're finding yourself bored waiting for servers to come back up, go check out WoW Model Viewer. There are plenty of NPCs to embarrass, bwahaha.