So setting disappointment aside, I settled for reading the FAQ and other information Blizzard has released. The concept initially looks promising. Access to the Auction House no matter where you are, able to browse, buy, and sell items. But dig a little deeper and you’ll realize that this new feature isn’t all that great after all.

• No Addons – If you are anything like me you have a collection of addons to help you manage the AH. The Remote AH will allow you no such luxuries.
• 200 Transaction Limit – That’s right, 200 total, both buying and posting. Now the FAQ was unclear if splitting stacks would count as multiple transactions but my guess is it will. I don’t know about you, but I’ll post over 200 auctions in one session on one bank alt. This limitation alone knocks out any chance of using it for any serious auctioneering.
• $2.99 a Month – That’s right, to even use the Remote AH you have to pay three bucks a month on top of your current WoW subscription. Three dollars for a slimmed down, severely limited version of the AH. No thank you. (Note: You can browse the AH without paying extra, you just won’t be able to actually perform any transactions.)

When Blizzard announced the Remote AH a few months ago I was actually excited, but now that we know some of the actual details all I can say is that I’m disappointed. While the potential was there for something truly awesome, Blizz simply dropped the ball.

I could live with the limitations. The lack of addons is a no-brainer and the transaction limit makes a slight bit of sense from a technical and/or game-balance perspective. But when they slapped a $2.99/month price tag on it they lost me. It is just one more example of the rampant greed we have seen lately ($25 for a re-skin of a mount already in the game?).

Source: Remote Auction House FAQ

That’s right Mr. “Hard-core, Leet 25-man” Raider STFU. I’m tired of all the whining about the loot changes in Cataclysm. So what if 10-man gets the same loot as 25-man. Get over it. Better gear does not make you a better player. It does not make you special. Nor does it make you “leet”. If you need higher item level gear to be happy with your choice of raid size then maybe it’s time you stepped back and re-evaluate some of your decisions.

The gear change is not going to destroy 25-mans. There are people who choose that mode simply because they enjoy raiding in a group that size regardless of loot. (Hint: I’m not one of them. Good-bye 25-mans.) If you still want to raid in 25s all you have to do is find other players who feel the same way.

/rant off

• 10- and 25-man modes will share the same lockout. This means that you only get to run one version each week, so pick wisely. No more running both modes every week for extra badges.
• Difficulty will be normalized between the two modes.
• Both modes will drop the exact same gear. (This is the big one, and boy does it have people up in arms.)
• To compensate for a greater number of people and higher logistical requirements, 25-man will drop a greater quantity of loot (items as well as both badges and gold).
• More raids per content patch with fewer bosses each.
• Blizzard will continue to gate content.
• Heroic modes will be on a per boss basis and set up similar to normal modes, with both 10- and 25-man dropping the same loot and being tuned to the same difficulty.

My opinion in a word: FINALLY! If you ask me, this is how Blizz should have done it with Wrath and it is good to see they are learning and making changes for the better. I’ve never made it a secret that I don’t particularly care for 25-man raids. Given the choice, I would rather spend my time in 10-mans.

In a 25-man raid odds are you don’t know everyone there and might even despise a few people, but you deal with to get the machine moving. A machine that seems to always take forever to get going, especially if you have to PuG in players. Vent has to be kept on lock down if you don’t want it to quickly turn into unintelligible chaos. Loot drama is almost a guarantee. Player accountability is terrible.

On the flip side, 10-mans are much more personal and more than likely you know the other nine people fairly well. The runs start rather quickly and you rarely have to PuG in players. Vent is more open making it easier to talk and joke around. Loot drama is non-existent. And when something goes wrong it is vastly easier to pinpoint the problem and fix it.

I’ll admit that even though I don’t care for it, I do run ICC-25 most Sundays. Why? Because of gear. I strive to get the best gear that I possible can, and to do that means I have to run 25-mans. If I don’t then I will eventually fall behind and end up being carried by my guild. ¹

Also consider that at some Tier levels a player was required to farm both 10- and 25-man content to even build a full set of gear for that Tier, the most recent example being Tier 9. As a Hunter I was unable to get a T9 trinket out of ToC-10. And the Fury Warriors I know always complained about being stuck using Agility-based swords because no decent 2-handers dropped out of 10-man. With these new changes in place that will never happen again.

So ultimately these changes make my life easier. I can stop running the 25-mans I don’t care for and just focus on the 10-mans without having to worry about gearing. I won’t feel obligated to farm the same raid twice a week to obtain enough badges to keep up. These changes will allow me and many other players to play this game we want to.

I think I’ve figured out what I want to do with this blog though. I’ve stated in the past that I no longer raid exclusively on my Hunter. I spend a fair amount of time on my other two 80s, even taking both of them into ICC. So that’s what I’m going to write about: What I do. I’m also going to go ahead and give my thoughts and opinions on recent news regardless of who else has covered it. Ultimately I write for my own enjoyment, so I might as well get back to it.

The Case For

• Invulnerability – Outside of an act of pure stupidity (like leaving your Authenticator in a public place with your login info wrote on the back) your account becomes virtually impossible to hack once you have tied an Authenticator to it. While I’m sure there is still a way, the time and effort a hacker would have to spend make it non-profitable to even try.
• Cost – Lets face it, Authenticators are cheap. Blizzard is only charging $6.50 for the things with free shipping ¹, and if you have an iPhone or iTouch you can get one for free by using the app. I suspect that Blizzard is selling them at cost and counting the time saved on account recovery as their profit. ²
• Simple – Once you have an Authenticator setting it up is a breeze. Takes 5 minutes, tops. After that there is simply one extra piece of info to enter when you login. Hell, it takes more time and effort to log into my banks website.
• Peace of Mind – While you may only pay $15 a month to play WoW, how many hours a month do you invest in your characters? I’m a more hardcore player and on average I spend about 20 to 25 hours a week playing WoW (actual play time and research). Hell, that’s a part time job. So think about it, is seven bucks really that steep to insure all of your invested time?

The Case Against

• Availability – Blizzard has had a hard time keeping Authenticators in stock and is regularly sold out the things. ³ Also, not everyone has an iPhone or iTouch. This can make it difficult to obtain an Authenticator.
• Cost – Yes, this point goes both ways. While they are cheap not everyone can afford an Authenticator. Think teenagers with little to no income or players who keep their subscription alive through time cards gifted by friends and family. Even the free app carries the overhead cost of owning an Apple product.
• Potential Hassle – Notice I said potential. If you ever lose your Authenticator (or forget to de-link it when upgrading the app) then you are sentenced to phoning Blizzard up to have it removed from your account. While not a big hassle, it could have you out of game for a day or two.

The primary complaint against mandatory authenticators is not actually having to use an Authenticator, but being required to obtain one. This is a very valid argument, but a near-perfect solution has already been mentioned: include an Authenticator with every copy of Cataclysm. This wouldn’t solve the issue completely since some players won’t purchase the next expansion, but it will put an Authenticator into the hands of the vast majority of players.

Even given the cons, I can see no reason not to use one, the benefits far outweigh the cost. If you don’t already have Authenticator, keep an eye out and purchase one as soon as you can.

• Not much raiding over the last week. Just the weekly three times and one venture into ICC as a healer, which did not end well. Two of the three healers on the run were alts (mine and another Hunter) and neither of us were really prepared for how healing intensive the Marrowgar encounter is.
• Randoms every day. Honestly I’m getting a little tired of them. It has gotten a little better since I cut back to one random a day per 80 (unless a guildie needs help of course).
• I jumped back into leveling my Paladin over the weekend. Decided to re-spec him to Prot, picked up a shield and one-hander off the AH, and jumped into the queue for low level randoms. So far it’s going pretty well. The XP is nice and I’ve already picked up several blues that are more suited to tanking.
• While my gear says I can heal in ICC, the above mentioned experience tells me otherwise. I need to work on my technique and maybe rework some gems and enchants. Some research will help with itemization problems, but the technique is going to be more difficult. Outside of raids, the best practice is going to be Heroic Halls of Reflection.
• I’ve been tanking heroics for about a month now and feel I have developed a pretty solid grasp on it. Now I want to move on to raids. I know it will be much more difficult, but I need to do it for the challenge.
• Back in real life, the wife and I took the kids out on a local Geocaching adventure yesterday. While the baby didn’t get much out of it (he slept the whole time), my four year old had the time of his life. It is definitely something we are going to have to do more often.
• Been playing with specs on my Hunter lately. Been specced Survival so long I can play it in my sleep. Now I’m trying to wrap my head around Marks.

That’s all I got, now give me yours.

And you know what I think on the whole idea? Bullshit. Allow me to explain my reasoning though. Below is a direct quote of Gordon’s article with my thoughts, comments, and rebuttals between the paragraphs.

Tanks and healers are the most important classes for any group. Tanks set the pace of the group, the flow of experience and man the vanguard as they lead the team into battle. Healers mend the broken bones of their companions and keep the tanks a live – without the healers there could be no tanks and there could be no group. These are the two most important classes that exist in any MMORPG. But the DPS? They’re just meat in the room.

What Gordon forgets to take into account is that a group also requires DPS to progress. Simply because DPS are more plentiful does not make the job any less crucial and far more than just “meat in the room”. ¹

Look at it in terms of supply and demand and stress and responsibility. Tanks and healers are in consistent short supply whereas DPS are a dime a dozen. And there’s a reason for that. Tanking isn’t easy and it comes with a lot of pressure and responsibility. Do it right and the group will sing your praises for days to come yet do it badly and you’re on the receiving end of every criticism and jibe. Healing is much the same and also comes with it’s own set of stresses and strains. If the tank dies who gets the blame? Not the DPS classes that didn’t burn the mob down fast enough but the healer who didn’t heal well enough. They carry the heart and soul of the party on their shoulders and all of the difficulties that come with that.

It’s a known fact that tanks and healers are in high demand. And yes, DPS are plentiful. But you can’t gloss over the fact that many DPS can barely faceroll out 1000 on the meter. Good DPS are just as rare as tanks and healers. Also, as DPS I’ve carried my fair share of sub-par tanks and healers though runs. It is amazing how shitty of a tank and/or healer you can run with if you can kill things fast enough. And while I can’t speak for Gordon, I know I have no problem calling out a DPS if they are the source of the problem.

And raiding? That’s even more stressful. Not only do we even already acknowledge the importance of tanks and healers in this situation. We have Main Tanks and even Main Healers but who’s ever heard of a Main DPS before? There’s a huge amount of pressure to do these jobs right. Sub-par DPS can join a raid (even if it’s not desirable) but sub-par tanks cannot tank one and poor healers cannot heal one.

I’m sorry, but that whole paragraph is riddled with inaccuracies and assumptions. Progression raiding is stressful on the whole group, not just the tanks and healers. Everyone has a job, and if one person fails the whole group goes down. Rogue missed an interrupt? Wipe. Not enough DPS to beat the enrage timer? Wipe. A mob not CCed properly? Wipe. See where I’m going with this? And as to the titles of “Main Tank” and “Main Healer”, Gordon is giving way too much prestige to a simple way of saying who tanks the boss, who tanks the adds, and who heals who. And I have heard of a “Main DPS”, but it is more commonly referred to as a Main Assist and is actually a quite important role when it is needed.

All of this stands to reason that tanks and healers should get bigger rewards than anyone else. I mean, it’s in our culture to reward those that do the most and work the hardest, right? Call it a Tank or Healer Bonus, and a well deserved one at that. They are more important and necessary than anyone else, rarer to find, and they’re jobs are a lot tougher and far more stressful. They’re like the mommas and papas of any group, bringing the necessary order and structure. Without a tank there is no group, without a healer there is no group. DPS can just be picked up randomly as required.

I’ve got nothing against DPS. It’s fun and there’s nothing wrong with that but they simply don’t deserve the equality of rewards. Tanks and healer should get a little something extra on the side (maybe a nice ‘Thank You Drop’ from the boss mobs they fell) because they have the hardest and most demanding jobs and are traditionally the slowest to level up (unless you turn them into DPS). They require the most effort and who can argue that as a result they should get the biggest rewards?

Again, full of inaccuracies and assumptions. Just because DPS are more plentiful does not mean they deserve less of a reward than tanks and healers. They are a key part of the group dynamic, the third node of the Holy Trinity if you will. Tanks and Healers with no DPS get nowhere. Gordon claims that healing and tanking are more difficult and stressful. Well, I’ll let you in a little secret: they’re not. I have three end game characters, a Hunter, Resto Shaman, and Death Knight tank. I have filled all three roles in both heroics and raids, and they all carry the same level of difficulty. Anyone can faceroll a DPS class, but you have to be good to earn your raid spot over the rest, paying attention to aggro management, crowd control, etc. Tanking and healing might have a steeper learning curve, but neither are too difficult once you have a little practice and a solid group of players.

Any class that can tank or heal can also DPS. It is a choice made by the player. No one is twisting their arm or holding them at gun point to play that role, they have freely chosen it for their own reasons. There is absolutely no reason to reward that choice other than to try and convince more players to tank or heal. But, while extra rewards may bribe players into filling those roles, it would only create more sub-par tanks and healers hoping to be carried by good DPS.

• Icecrown Citadel raid over the weekend. I am now 4/? in ICC-10 on my Hunter.
• Got lucky in ICC and scored two upgrades: the Njordnar Bone Bow from Lady Deathwhisper and the Hauberk of a Thousand Cuts from Deathbringer Saurfang. And if everything goes well tonight and I can get a run for the weekly raid I will have just enough Frost Emblems to pick up two pieces of Tier 10 (the gloves and shoulders).
• Also on the gear front, my Death Knight now has four pieces of Tier 9 which rounds out his tanking set quite well (his DPS set is a whole other story) and I’ve managed everything I can get outside of raids for my Shaman’s Resto set and have started to pick up emblem gear for his Enhance set.
• I’ve all but dropped out of the glyph business. There has been so much competition and undercutting on my server right now that it isn’t even worth my time to post glyphs. I still have my inventory of glyphs sitting on bank alts, so there is a chance I may get back in that particular game at a later date once the market thins out some. Until then I’ll just keep raking in the gold other ways.
• Now that my toon’s main sets are pretty squared away I’ve began trying to put together their off-sets. The Shaman’s Enhance set mostly just needs gems and enchants, but I still need to farm some stuff for the Death Knight’s DPS set.
• The guild has started to run regular ToC-25 runs on Saturdays. While fun, it has also helped remind me why I like 10-man raids better. If only 25-man loot wasn’t so tempting…

Well, that’s all I got on my mind. What’s on yours?

Prior to 3.3 I tried my best to not PuG. Anytime I had to it was an unpleasant experience at best. Healers the spent more time typing than healing, DPS that performed worse than the tank, tanks that didn’t know how to hold AoE aggro, etc. But now with the cross server dungeon finder it’s like these kind of players don’t exist. Party chat is generally quiet, with only a few things said regarding boss strategy or AFK announcements. I’ve had runs where the only thing ever entered in party chat was a quick hello before the first pull and a quick thanks before people dropped group. People show up, do their job, and leave. And in the rare event of some one not knowing their job or being under-geared they are honest about it, and perfectly willing to follow directions given to them.

So where are all the morons and asshats that we’re used to dealing with? Well, I have a theory on that. Even with the new dungeon finder there is still a considerable number of people spamming trade for heroic runs. What I’m thinking is that this is where all the asshats have gone too. The new Vote Kick feature has had the added effect of discouraging them from letting the dungeon finder form groups for them. My guess is that due to their nature they have gotten kicked from most random groups they have joined. This has forced them to either change their ways or stop using the dungeon finder. I really don’t care which they choose because in the end the rest of us end up with a better quality pool of players to group with.

Anyway, enough of the bad and back to the good.

The best PuG I’ve had was actually just a few nights ago. Me and three guildies PuGed a healer for Heroic Forge of Souls. This guy was great. Sure he was a little under geared, but he admitted it and was trying his best. And that’s what made him great: his effort. Halfway through the run he even joined us in our vent channel to make things a little easier. Everything went fine until the last boss, where we wiped several times (maybe because of my non-uber geared tank, maybe because of heals, who knows), but we stuck with it and finished. This guys attitude is what made it a great PuG. He was polite and willing to stick with instead of dropping group after the first wipe.

So how about you? Have any horror stories or dream runs with the new dungeon finder? If so, leave them in the comments.