Curse you, podcasts

...for reminding me that if I actually checked WoW Insider/MMO Champ once in a while I would see all the crazy cool patch notes! You'll want to skip right to the Pet Battles section, I'm sure.

They are: adding more pet slots, integrating several of the "enhanced pet journal" addon features, ADDING MORE PETS, and adding RARE CANDY!!!!! Well it's not exactly like Rare Candy and can, in fact, delete levels from your trained pet, but it increases the quality to uncommon or rare! Also, stuff is going on at the Darkmoon Faire! NEW PATCH NEW PATCH!!!

I just have to get through the current iteration of the game first...

The Bard

"It's only for a few days," the pandaren soothed, patting her mother's arm

The middle-aged pandaren huffed noncommittally. "I don't see why you can't just keep training here in the village."

Now the younger pandaren's features drew into a frown. "You're the one who wanted your daughter to learn traditional cultural arts. I can't help it if I'm particularly good with a staff."

"You're particularly good with a brush, too, though," said her father sadly, not looking up from where he was carefully affixing a tuft of horse hair to a bamboo reed.

The pandaren closed her eyes briefly. "Well, that was inevitable growing up in a house of brush makers. Anyway, I only need to defeat two more opponents to get my final rank certification. I'll be back before you know it, and I'll get right to work. How does that sound?"

"It's fair," her mother replied. "I did agree to let you go." She took her daughter's elbows and kissed her cheek. "Be safe, Weipon."

Weipon smiled and turned to go. Her dog Fu ran around frantically underfoot until her mother scooped him up, holding him under one arm and waving with the other. As she left, her father called out, "Give 'em hell!"

She had to walk from Mandori Village to the training academy where Master Shang Xi had summoned his students. The sun was setting as she left the village and started down the rural road that cut through the surrounding fields to the small hill. Soon, the moon had risen, and she began to look for the natural overhang where she had rested on previous trips. Thinking of her parents, she composed a poem.

Moon rising over the road,
Reflected in the white sheet.
The ink is ground, the weight set,
Breathe and put brush to paper.

She awoke with the sun and resumed her walk, finally entering the training ground as the sun approached six fingers above the horizon. Other students, some of them looking as if they trained there regularly, were already beginning chores or milling about expectantly.

Weipon headed for the hill on the edge of the academy, knowing she would find the good-humored Master Shang Xi there. He was sitting cross legged on a rock, watching the students below with sharp eyes. He smiled when Weipon approached.

"I'm glad you could make it. I suspected your father might not like to miss you for so long. You know, he and I used to be drinking buddies."

She bowed, half-smiling and half-grimacing at her feet. "He's told me many times. I couldn't pass up this opportunity to learn from you again, though."

His expression turned sober. "I have many things to teach you before it is time for us to part. But first, I know you are eager to complete your final matches. Go and see when you have been scheduled to compete!"

Weipon competed in the first round of the day, dispatching her equally ranked opponent with some effort. As she bowed to him and the judge, she noticed Master Shang Xi in the crowd, peering at her contemplatively. When she looked again, he was across the room, silently watching two initiates sparring.

She didn't see him again while she watched other matches and waited for her second in the afternoon. This opponent, a surly, barrel-chested woman, put up quite a fight, but in the end Weipon was able to accrue more points and win with a judge decision.

The final ceremony went by in a blur, as each competitor who had progressed was awarded their higher rank. Weipon stood alone, admiring her new sash, and was surprised by a hand on her shoulder.

"May I speak to you for a moment?" asked Master Shang.

"Of course!" she replied, immediately moving to follow him.

He walked slowly to the staircase in the training house, but stopped at the foot. Without turning to her, he murmured, "Burn the Edict of Temperance and return to me." He strolled away, offering congratulations to other students.

Weipon blinked, then jogged up the stairs. She knew that finally having reached the highest rank, her training was only beginning. Traditional pursuits were lifelong studies of the art, after all. She just hadn't expected her first lesson to involve burning one of the oldest, most important doctrines in the school.

The words on the paper whispered across her mind even as she set fire to the Edict. Even if the physical paper no longer existed, she wouldn't soon forget the earliest lesson. She returned to Master Shang.

"Have you given any thought to whether you will follow the Huojin or the Tushui?" he asked abruptly. She opened her mouth, but he interrupted her. "There's no need to decide anything yet. I expect you will have plenty of opportunities to weigh both options." He left the training house and shuffled down the hill, leaning on his staff. Weipon followed obediently. "The pandaren have not spoken to Shen-zin Su in many years, and it is high time we fixed that," he said gravely. "To do so, however, we will need for each of the four elements to return to the Temple of Five Dawns." He paused to let the weight of that sink in, then continued, "Two of my former students, Aysa Cloudsinger and Ji Firepaw, are already taking measures to awaken the elements. I want you to help them."

Weipon stopped, shook herself, and rushed to catch up with her teacher. He stopped at the main gate, looking out over the grassy hills rolling away towards the mountains. Weipon joined him, standing beside and slightly behind the elderly pandaren.

"Ji has gone to Wu-Song Village to seek a method to awaken Huo. Collect your belongings and go to assist him. Learn from him." Master Shang Xi turned to his student and smiled. "I look forward to seeing you soon."

Weipon bowed low, bobbing until master Shang inclined his head slightly. She gathered her bags and was on the road within the half hour, striking out across farmers' tracks. As she walked, she began to sing, and her hands twitched as if fingering invisible frets and plucking imaginary strings. The Wanderer's Song spilled out before her into the open sky.

Today was a very good day (gifsplosion)

You may recall the horrible experience that was gaming on my laptop. Having finally moved into my new apartment and set up my PC, I was finally able to sit down and play for many uninterrupted hours today. It was awesome!

On Monday, Navi invited me along to a Laid-back Raid, which I joined from Lady Deathwhisper up until too many people had to go before Lich King. I got to finish Valithria on heroic! Hooray! Sadly, I spent the rest of the day unloading the shopping and trying to put my life back into cabinets and shelves.

HOWEVER

This morning I woke up, went to school long enough to find out my class assignment and officially register, and then it was time for FUN!

I logged into my main! There were pets and mounts everywhere! I did quests in Tol Barad because GIMME DAT FOX.

Then I switched over to my mage (hey do you guys even remember Sprinkie) and actually quested! For a while! Now she is at 81 and in Vashj'ir, but sadly those mobs are still beating on her pretty hard :( Why am I so terrible at mage-ing? Is it because I'm too cheap/lazy to buy glyphs?!?!

One of my guildies wanted to queue for the Theramore scenario, so I hopped over to Aka and we got through it. I got lost a couple times, but fortunately NOBODY MESSES WITH BEAR. I only got fireworks in my loot bag, but my guildie got a sweet hat! I want one too! I gotta say that I did feel pretty bad about the final cutscene in the scenario. Is Jaina okay?! I'M SORRY THERAMORIANS D: D:

The craziest part is that when I ported out, ending up near the Tol Barad portal in Org, I saw a name I recognized...Dragonray was standing RIGHT. THERE.

We got to chat, which was great, and now we are totes ~battletag friends~. I'm so glad my friends list is starting to actually have people online!! Note to self: make an effort to be sociable OR ELSE.

Lately I haven't had much to say outside of storytelling, because aside from the ongoing storylines in my head, there wasn't anything happening to me! But now that I can actually play again, just like that, the switch is back on, and the floodgates to CREATIVITY are open!

#Dragon*con: Who's with me?

This weekend is Dragon*con! Some of my friends are going and have talked me into it. I've never been before, and have only ever been to one anime convention some years ago, so I don't know quite what to expect but I sure am excited!

Since I am driving up with some friends, my schedule is at the mercy of the driver. We will be arriving sometime Friday afternoon and leaving Monday afternoon. There is a Warcraft trivia event/meetup on Sunday night, which I am hoping to attend. Aside from that, I will be moseying around with friends I haven't seen in a while and probably lusting after nerdmerch.

Is anyone else going? I would love to meet some more WoW players and bloggers in ~meatspace~!

Upgrade your OS, Macs!

There was some news about patch 5.0.4, which will usher in some changes from Mists of Pandaria and in general get us ready to welcome our pandaren friends. In particular, I'm excited about the sharing of mounts and pets across toons, AOE looting, battletags, and talent changes. HOWEVER, sad news! When I opened the launcher to start my background downloader, I got a message saying that the next version of WoW will no longer work on my ancient operating system! For the record, I'm running Leopard 10.5.8 on a 2008 macbook. Yes, I live under a rock. And I'm cheap.

Some searching around online brought me very little information. Best Buy and the Apple store both wanted to sell me Mountain Lion which isn't even supported on a machine this old. Lion, which came before ML, is available in the app store, EXCEPT that I need a Snow Leopard install before I can upgrade. Finally I called up apple support to see what could be done. They hooked me up with both Snow Leopard and Lion for $20 each, although I have to wait for SL to come in the mail. The customer service lady told me she had already sold 10 copies of SL that day, leading me to wonder why Apple doesn't still just list it in the store. It would save lazy assholes like me a lot of panic and waiting on hold!

So soon my pokey laptop will be compatible with my programs for at least a few more years. Except that this morning when I booted up the computer and tried to start writing this post, both the keyboard and trackpad stopped working. I thought maybe I had turned on universal access, but it was still off. I'm using a USB mouse and keyboard just fine at the moment, but since the beauty of a laptop is the portability I'm afraid I'll have to take it in to be repaired. I don't want to pour more money into this thing -_-

Reading Material

First up, two absolutely delightful reads from WoW Insider. Know Your Lore: Getting into the Lore of Mists is a nice spoiler-free reminder of what you should know going into the expansion, and explains where and how you can find and appreciate the new lore. I am really excited for the Lorewalkers faction and all the new excitement it entails!!

Perhaps more importantly, the WI folks have unearthed more information on my very favorite Steamy Romance Novels!!! There will be two new items in Mists, although I'm In Love With a Robot is too smudged with oil to read. ("oil"? SORRY NM) The other novel, Hot and Misty, is a 5 page romp in which Marcus flirts with not one, not two, but three ladies on his way to a blood elf pair. Wait, what? Isn't this the pandaren expansion? SHAKE DAT BEAR. I guess I'll just have to write it if I want to read it. If you need a refresher on who Marcus is or which races he's tapped so far check out this post!

I also bring you an article from Forbes responding to the recent rash of articles tearing down "fake gamer girls". These callouts have interesting implications regarding the concept of gatekeeping admission to a hobby and only questioning one half of the population, and I am more than willing to challenge them. This guy is not having any of that nonsense and makes a good case for allowing geeks to define themselves and being as inclusive as possible.

Last but not least is a very strange twitter conversation that occurred earlier. It began with an offhand comment about how many damn roaches there are in my house, led to completely understandable discussions of bug nervousness with Aralossien, and evolved into a full RP session about defeating zombie bugs (zombugs) DMed by Rades. If you are interested in such a tale, you can read Resident Weevil: the novel (thanks to Pixellated Executioner for the fantastic name!)

Can someone explain pandaren lore to me?

[not-so-spoilers: brief reference to pandaren starting area general plot in brackets; otherwise just speculation based on currently available information]

Lore nerds, I need your help! I have some questions about pandaren. I read WoW Insider's guide to pandaren roleplay recently, which was very helpful, but I have some logistical questions about the Wandering Isle.

We know that all playable pandaren will be from the Wandering Isle. That means they are descendants of the original adventurous pandaren that chose to leave Pandaria to travel the world. Some of that adventurous spirit must still remain, but I wonder if after so long they don't also get some odd birds that like their simple island life and don't feel the need to adventure. Not to mention that exploration would necessitate actually leaving the Wandering Isle. Just standing on the edge and peeking at other islands flowing by doesn't seem very adventurous.

Chen Stormstout, a native of the Wandering Isle, left the island to explore Kalimdor (probably spending most of his time wall-jumping trying to get into hidden areas). How many other pandaren have left the island in order to explore? Do they return - can they return? Have they heard about the changes to Azeroth - things like the orcs invading, draenei crashing, Gilneans emerging, goblins joining the Horde? After all, they've been on the Wandering Isle for centuries. They must have experience the Cataclysm, but do they know who caused it, or his fate? If not ambassadors, have knowledgeable pandaren returned to the island to teach things like Common and Orcish? To teach about the other inhabitants of Azeroth? [[ [[The final events of the Wandering Isle suggest that pandaren can communicate well enough with the Horde and Alliance and aren't too troubled by the sight of a tauren or human, but why is that?]] ]] How much communication is there between Shen-zin Su and the rest of Azeroth? 

Then, upon finally reaching Pandaria (for the sake of story I would likely skip the out-of-timeline leveling between 12 and 85), how would the pandaren react to their ancestral home? For other adventurers, it would merely be a place of rumor, novel but not personal. For pandaren, this is the place they've heard about in legends. Their ancestors were raised here; many of their customs and beliefs come from this place, although time and separation might have changed them. Can you imagine how sayings and beliefs from Pandaria, things like the need to expel negative feelings to avoid creating real enemies, would warp into empty platitudes on the Sha-free island?

Currently, the pandaren of Pandaria react to island pandaren as if they were run of the mill adventurers: you look different, here is some ancient pandaren wisdom you don't know. I think this could be explained away if the pandaren of Pandaria think of island pandaren as immature and uncultured. And considering how long the two types of pandaren have been separated, it's likely that everything from accent to lexicon to fashion has diverged.

But the Pandaria natives are extremely laid-back by necessity - it's more likely that they would simply accept the island pandaren back into their homeland with little trouble. This is probably too nitpicky, but I'd love it if Pandaria NPCs could react to player pandaren differently than other races. Imagine if a draenei questgiver were like "Man you have no idea what it's like to live in a spaceship" and your draenei is like "Um excuse you I think I do." Mayhem!

#NBIMMO Blog Setup and Community Building

Previously: Why and What to Post

While your first posts are percolating in your head, let's think about a name and hosting. Names are incredibly important to me - I agonize over them for days before I can finally create whatever I was trying to name. Hopefully you don't have this affliction. Names can be simple, descriptive, punny, or random. They don't have to be immediately obvious, but straightforward works too! Your content can help influence the title - guides would want a plain title, fiction would merit something more flowery. See if you can encompass the goal of your blog in the title - something like "The Best DPS Evar" sounds more likely to have DPS theorycrafting than fanfiction about Thrall.

Got your name? Let's go register. If you're new and unsure (or a cheapskate) you probably don't want to plunk down cash on webhosting. Fortunately, there are solid blogging platforms like WordPress and Blogger that offer free hosting. I've also read blogs hosted on tumblr, but can't say too much on these. My feedreader is about half WP and Blogger.

Okay, the blog is made and you're ready to customize! With the popularity of feed readers, I often suspect that the only time people see your actual site is their first visit, when they comment, and any time they want more information: a specific post, your profile, or your contact info. Make your blog representative of your personality, but also make it accessible. Choose a premade background or upload your own. Create or commission a header for your title - screenshot, drawn art, or fancy text works!

Remember that different screen resolutions will affect the appearance. For instance, my background doesn't quite reach the edges of my widescreen but is heavily cropped on my work computers. I have it set so it doesn't scroll with the page for a less busy appearance. The max width of the important bits is 900px, because I know some people who still use 640x800 screen resolutions, and width scrolling is a pain.

Blogger helpfully suggested page element colors based on my background's "palette," and I went with dark text on light background for max legibility. I've read that light text on a dark background can cause more eyestrain, but since I get most of my posts in google reader's black and white interface it doesn't much matter. Whatever your color scheme, be sure to test the visibility of your text!

Now it's time to add widgets. Being comprehensive without cluttering up the page is our design goal. You have the option of tabs and sidebars, so see how you like one, the other, or both. (Or even double side bars all the way across the page.) Here are some things to put near the top: your email/twitter contact info, a link to your RSS feed or email subscription, a search bar, an about page, and archives. Other things you might like to include are: a picture roll, armory/achievement widgets, an organized page of your major posts, a Creative Commons license, a tag list or wordcloud, and a blogroll. Blog Azeroth is an incredible resource for this stuff - I added a contact page because of the advice there, and you can find CC and achievement widget howtos as well.

Optional: Feedburner is a neat little service that creates a permanent feed for your blog, meaning you can change your URL and subscribers won't need to update a thing! It also opens a special page where readers can automatically add the feed to their preferred reader, which is convenient. There's also a stats page, although I usually use Blogger's Stats or Google Analytics if I feel like stroking my epeen. Just, for love of the Earthmother, don't truncate your feed. If you do, I may give up on reading your blog on principle, or stick your URL into fulltextrssfeed out of spite. Also a secret desire to keep reading. Follow your own feed to see how posts translate into your reader - everything from colors to formatting can look wonky when taken out of the context of your blog!

If you choose to use advertising on your blog, that's cool, but as a personal favor to me please put it above or below your posts. Ads in the middle of a post are very distracting!

Before seriously networking, I recommend that you publish at least three posts on your blog. A generic introduction is ok, or jump right in with your deepest of thoughts, but give potential readers something to see! There's no way to know what will appeal to different readers, but an example of your aim and style will give them an idea. I always seem to get more comments on throwaway word vomit than well-researched compendiums...hmm...

Now it's time to get out there and make friends! I must emphasize the fact that the WoW blogging community is full of sweethearts. We are a helpful and friendly bunch, and we love to cuddle and coo over newbie bloggers. (Metaphor too creepy? Let Auntie Aka pinch your widdle cheek!!)

Hop on over to Blog Azeroth, register, and post in the New Authors forum! Use the template...or else. Then, fire off an email to the TNB Wiki to get on their lists. Finally, message Beru to be featured on an upcoming Welcome Wagon!  Okay, your name is out there. All that's left is to make some friends! (And keep posting. Never stop posting!)

If you already have some blogger buddies in the community, ask them to promote you on their blogs or blogrolls. I get the impression that it's generally frowned upon to message a stranger blogger and ask them to include you on their blogroll. However, interacting with them may earn you a place! Populating your own blogroll is a good way to start - free advertising for blogs you read is never bad, and if you refer traffic their way they may be more inclined to check out your blog and link back! I've chosen to import my Google Reader feed as my blogroll, and it was so massive I ended up cutting it to the top 10 most recent. Other bloggers show titles only in alphabetical order, sometimes grouped into topics like RP, guide, comics, etc. Pick whichever you like!

Comment on blogs. If there's an option to sign in or include your URL, do so. Linking your blog with no other comment is kind of spammy. If their post inspired you to write a response, by all means link that in your comment. Otherwise, include your link in the designated box (it will usually show up in your nickname or even show your most recent post) and leave a nice comment. Even something as simple as "Great post!" can make a blogger smile.

Write fan mail. If you write into a podcast, your comment and signature info will often be read on the air! Writing to bloggers will make them feel good and hopefully prompt them to read or comment on your blog. I've gotten requests for proofreading and advertising, and it is very flattering to be asked for help!

If you want a less formal way to interact with other bloggers, try out twitter. It's not mandatory - I know at least one well-known blogger who manages just fine without it, but the added element of short, snappy communication is quite useful. Ask questions, offer comments, and see a more personal side of your favorite writers. Promote their stuff by retweeting, and they may do the same! Consider an automated service like twitterfeed to advertise your new posts.

Your posts are out there and people are reading them. You may get comments! They may not always be to your liking. Gird your virtual loins and respond, moderate or close comments to stem the flow, or simply avoid posting about stuff that typically attracts controversy. (This blog caters to casuals and noobs raauugghh!) Some bloggers don't respond to comments at all, or may only respond to a few. Others respond to each and every one, no matter how many (or few, boohoo!). Respond however you like, and remember that since your blog is your space, it is entirely up to you how you deal with comments. Moderating or closing comments is not a bad thing. Maintain your space in whatever way makes you most comfortable.

Keep writing! Keep posting! Legions of adoring fans are just waiting to read it!

Next time: Roundup, Using Screenshots

#NBIMMO Why and What to Post

Blogging tips and help for new and prospective bloggers! What a great idea! I hesitated to add my own 2 cents, but the nature of blogging is to talk at length whether anyone is listening or not, so...

The point of the Newbie Blogger Initiative, hosted by Syp of Bio Break, is to encourage those thinking about or just starting a blog to do so with style! I think something like this would have helped me to get started, what, a year and a half ago? Dang, it's been a long time. Since I write about WoW, some of this advice will be specific to the game, but hopefully it can be generally useful to anyone interested in blogging!

When I first considered blogging, my thought process was something along the lines of "Man, I have a lot of thoughts about WoW but no one in my immediate circle cares about them! Who will listen to all my feels?" The answer is: the internet will listen! Tell us what you think! What do you care about? Before you pick your site name and register it, you may still struggle with what will become the content of your blog. Fiction? Random thoughts? Artwork like screenshots or drawings? Guides to DPS, transmog, or quests? Anything is okay, even a mix. Especially a mix! Guides take a lot of time and energy to produce, but they don't generate much conversation (unless you make a mistake). I follow guide-style blogs for news and info about my class, but in the end I mostly skim them until I need the information. More personal blogs are what keep me refreshing my reader at work.

Perhaps the most important thing is to write what you want, because you want to, and not because you want internet fame and oodles of money. Sharp writing and savvy networking may bring at least the first, if not the second, but that's not a good reason to start a blog. Write because you have thoughts, stories, opinions, or other creations that you want to publish and point to and say "I made that." Your readership may be small and slow in coming, but if love of creating is what's driving you, you won't care. And one day, young lowbie, you too may be featured on WoW Insider. Or not. But don't get discouraged!!

let's talk about holidays

Content is anything you want it to be. I've read poetry, fiction, and prose, looked at artwork, and listened to original music. If it moves you, write about it! A lot of the motivation to post comes from thoughts that start small but grow into information to be shared. Obscure lore observations, beautiful screenshots, and funny personal experiences all make for good posts. Readers want to learn something new, or find common ground with the writer, or appreciate a good piece of art. What do you want to share?

Find your voice - be it fun and relaxed or polished and formal. How do you feel about emoticons and lolsp34k? Post screenshots, with or without comment. Showcase your personality and style. I was going to say be yourself, but more importantly you should be the you that you want to present to the world. For some that means writing in character, for others a professional detachment, and for others a conversational lightheartedness. Include personal information if you'd like - your readers care about the person behind the URL. Watch your language - or don't. Your choice of slang or expletive contributes to the overall atmosphere of your blog and affects its appeal for different people. Realize that offensive language can, well, offend some readers, and colloquialisms can alienate non-native speakers. (Not that it's stopped me!)

NBI content unedited

Polish your writing. Organize your thoughts with an outline. Add addenda and notes in the margins and arrange everything coherently when you construct the post. Even if you want to publish without editing your ideas, use spell check. Write your post, sit on it for at least a few hours, and reread it for consistency and flow. Consult a dictionary or thesaurus if you need to keep using the same word or can't think of the right one. Get a beta reader to help you look for misspellings, awkward phrasing, or confusing narratives. For fiction, be consistent with verb tense and perspective, and relieve long dialogues with descriptions of each character so the reader doesn't get lost.

Develop a quirk. What makes people remember you? Some bloggers are known for fun quirks like quotations, title themes, or colorful setups. Others are famous for their unique writing style or incredible insight. Still others like myself are just uncontrollably awesome undeniably strange. You can intentionally cultivate something like this or just see where your blogging adventures take you!

yes that's a crying alot

Keep a memo of post ideas that occur to you as you read news or other blogs, play the game, or zone out at work. Take ideas from memes or the Blog Azeroth Shared Topic. Write about current events or deeds from long ago. Write on scraps of paper until you can organize your thoughts at the keyboard. Post tweetable snippets or bearwalls or somewhere in the middle. To me, around 500 words is the perfect amount of post, but that doesn't stop me from reading - or writing - more!

Include screenshots or graphics if you have them and if they're relevant. Crop them to the important bits, and if you have the intestinal fortitude, spruce them up with a (free) image editing software. Graphics can help break up an imposingly long post. You can also keep your paragraphs short and break up sections with headers, or use bold and italics to highlight important points.

If you're inspired by a quest, a news piece, or another post, link to it! The different color of a link creates a unique emphasis, so choose your linked words well! Cite your sources. Those cited may get pingbacks and thus see your commentary, and readers can go to the original content that sparked your brainwave.

scheduling topics

Post regularly to keep your name in people's minds. Pace your posting - even if you churn out multiple posts in one frenzied sitting, polish them and schedule them over a period of days or weeks. Publish hot topic items as close as possible to the issue's debate, holiday information when the holiday is being celebrated, and fill the rest with your less time-sensitive musings. If you are creating a series, post them consecutively and provide links to the rest of your series. Try to keep gaps in an ongoing story short.

Publish or die! Do whatever works to keep you posting - set deadlines or weekly minimums, make a friend pester you to post something, set alarms on your phone or computer to blare horns when it's Friday and you haven't written a thing. Set aside time to write. Give yourself homework. Take the time to arrange those screenshots just so in your post or finally jot down that story that's been wriggling around in your head. Make writing a part of your routine so that it doesn't seem like a chore. A lot of blogs go dark after just a few weeks, so find your motivation and stick to it! We are looking forward to hearing from you :)

Next time: Blog Setup and Community Building, Roundup, Using Screenshots

Day 19: The Things Aka Carried

This is the next day in Saga of Spellbound's 20 days of...WoW blogging challenge. You can find more participants here.

Catch up on Day 18: My favorite outfit

I get really self-conscious showing pictures of my bags because people inevitably react with shock that I keep so much shit around. Do you worst...!!

Go to Day 20: On the last day

The tan epidemic!

Find out what popular items in your bank could harm your alt's leveling experience, tonight at 11!

I don't like using heirlooms, and I am annoyed that they are such great point-sinks for capped toons. Furthermore, I regret the heirlooms I have already bought and can't think of reasons to purchase any more.

I HAVE USED HEIRLOOMS

I leveled both my paladin and warlock wearing their respective shoulders and weapons. This was two years ago, when the old world was still old and leveling slightly less interesting. Even at the time, it felt pretty OP.

I transferred to Nagrand and rolled a priest and a rogue. The priest inherited the warlock's gear, now including a robe, and the rogue got PVP shoulders and chest. I recently bought PVP shoulders for my hunter and shaman.

THE CONS

Stop and smell the roses

Because of all the heirloom pieces (except for weapons) have an XP bonus, you can get a total of 40% bonus XP gain while leveling. I've talked about my experiences leveling recently, and I can assure you that even in nothing more than a loincloth and party hat you can outlevel your quest chain in no time. Add heirlooms to that mix and you'll be changing zones every 20 minutes, or trudging through grey quest chains.

At the moment, my problem with leveling too fast is that Azeroth recently got a very serious makeover. Quests everywhere were re-imagined and much improved. Things are new and exciting, and I relish my time on lowbie alts as a good way to see the world with fresh eyes. I'm not trying to rush to 85 because I'm more interested in finding out how my old favorite quests have been revamped, and what new ones have been added. I'm not ready to leave Azshara yet, but halfway through the 3 major quest chains and everything is green or grey! I don't need any help leveling at lightspeed because it's so easily done anyway. Manfriend even told me that he avoids logging out in inns now so he doesn't get any rested XP bonus, and he's avoided all heirlooms save the weapon. Even with that, he whispered me on his goblin, "How is it that Azshara has brought me all the way to level 23?"

Are we too OP?

I generally disagree with the elitists who gripe that WoW has become too casual-friendly because 1) allowing for more satisfying gameplay with less time required is a good thing and 2) many of the changes that require 85 mains benefit long-term players.

However, I do think that there is a point at which questing becomes so easy that it's not as fun. This is of course relative not only to different people's opinions, but also individual players' moods. At level 85, Aka has a lot of opportunities to overpower content. It's fun to tromp through Ulduar, remembering the screaming terror of heroic Mimiron at level. It's even more fun to blow through Kara or MC practically auto-following the rest of the group because everything dies before you can get a cast off. Also because you have important facebooking to do. Those things are fun because you know that those raids were a challenge - would still be a challenge if you were at level. Grinding rep, on the other hand, is not a challenge. Mass murdering pirates outside Ratchet would be time-consuming at level, but not challenging. Doing it at 85 is no great feat, comparatively; it merely takes less time. That sort of OP isn't satisfying or fun.

At level, however, I would like at least a little challenge. By level 20 I have a good assortment of spells, and I want to push all the buttons! At level 60 on my rogue, I can hit 3 spells and tab out, secure that the mob will die before I've taken any damage. On my level 20 mage, I can cast 2 spells, and if that doesn't kill the target, my Water Elemental Bubbles' next attack will. I don't want 5 minute fights, where an overpull means certain death, but I would like to use the rotation I have cobbled together!

On the catwalk

The last point may be less important for other people, but it is something I notice. If you wear heirlooms, your outfit never changes. There are some beautiful pieces of gear in the game! Or if not beautiful, at least hilariously terrible. Getting quest gear is a grab-bag of fun, because those pants you get might be barely-there leggings, or the robe an intricately-patterned dress. Changing gear is one of the very few opportunities you have to see your toon look a different way without paying for it.

Not only is changing gear better than being stuck with the same silhouette for 80 levels, but some of the heirlooms are terrible things to be stuck with! The skull caster shoulders and staff look wonderfully demonic on my warlock, but on a priest they are out of place. DKs don't look at home in gleaming silver and gold plate. The PVP leather shoulders are pointy and ugly (there, I said it).

THE PROS

The good news is that if you don't care about

1. reading quests,
2. following quest chains,
3. playing dressup, or
4. occasionally being challenged by mobs,

you will love blowing through content with a full set of heirlooms. If the only use of a character is for level 85 content (or farming lockboxes in lonely Burning Steppes), then heirlooms are the best choice for the job.

BUT MY GRANDMA GAVE ME THIS

So what do you think? Do you use heirlooms? Why do you like or dislike them? How many do you have, and where do you store them when done leveling? Should I get over myself and deck all of my alts out in full heirlooms??

Day 3: A wild noob appears!

This is the next day in Saga of Spellbound's 20 days of...WoW blogging challenge. You can find more participants here.

Catch up on Day 2: Why blog?

My first day in WoW was one of those travesties where you know "One day we'll look back on this and laugh."

I started with a human priest in the dark forests of Elwynn. My human warlock BFF and our nelf druid friend came to meet me at Northshire Abbey, where I proceeded to have some very embarrassingly basic problems. They were talking to me in floating white text bubbles. I tabbed out to AIM.

redcow: how do i type bakc??/
lockbff: /s

I tabbed back in.

[Amarosa] says: ohi

[Lockbff] invites you to a group.

The text suddenly became blue. I didn't know how to make my text blue, so I responded in white /s. Bystanders laughed at my noobish questions. My friends began to emote at me.

Nelfdruid licks you.

Lockbff hugs you.

[Amarosa] says: WTF how are you doin that??

Conspiratorial purple text appeared.

[Nelfdruid] whispers: type /hug

You need a hug!

[Amarosa] says: WTF it didnt work!!

[Nelfdruid] whispers: click on someone and type it!

You hug Nelfdruid.

[Amarosa] says: why are you whispering to me?

They explained the concept of a private conversation and instructed me to /whisper name or /r name. Nelfdruid's name was 10 characters, and Lockbff's 7. I spent a lot of time typing both out unnecessarily for our hushed, secretive conversations.

They taught me how to play a caster: target the thing you want to kill, then inch forward until the numbers on your buttons are gray instead of red. That was an easy enough lesson! It would be weeks before I learned about my priest bubble, which led to a lot of dying. I killed some wolves to show off my new skills.

To [Nelfdruid]: ok im gonna log off and go to bed

[Nelfdruid] whispers: kk byeeee!

To [Nelfdruid]: how do i save??

[Party] [Nelfdruid]: you don't save

[Party] [Nelfdruid]: it's an mmo

[Party] [Lockbff]: Lol!! It's not like pokemon. You don't need to save.

[Amarosa] says: but what will happen to my character!?

[Party] [Nelfdruid]: it just waits here for you!

[Amarosa] says: WTF

[Amarosa] has gone offline.

Go to Day 4: Oh, darling

Healing without leaves

I have two goblin starting zone posts lined up, but the beta keeps giving me the bird when I try to log in, so I've been unable to get the last few explanatory screen shots that I want. Jumping ahead, let's talk about how I'm faring with my tauren gal.

Who have I been reading?

Beru's Q&A on Falling Leaves and Wings

Lissanna's Resto guide on Restokin

Keeva's spec/FAQ guide on TBJ

RestoDude's RestoGuide

Spec and Glyphs

I poked around on all the specs offered in the list above and came up with the following to cautiously test my mana pool and new abilities.

talent calc here

I would like to include Nature's Cure and Blessing of the Grove and max out Nature's Majesty. I'm still thinking about Fury of Stormrage and Malfurion's Gift, but only for the chance of Lifebloom proccing Omen of Clarity, and I'm not sure how much I'll want that at 85. Perhaps a lot. I see Genesis looking delicious in the second tier of Balance, but I'm not sure how I would juggle points to get down there, so I'm not going to worry about it until later.

Having done a handful of heroics and two raids, I think I'm ready to get rid of Furor and invest those points in something else. With what I have on me now, it's unusual if I dip below 75% mana, and that's with Rejuve spam and much generous casting.

With the changes to Regrowth, I switched to the Lifebloom Prime glyph. In Major glyphs, I stuck Healing Touch in instead of Innervate because I don't expect to do much innervating for a while. Minor glyphs are what they are. I just can't get enough of that fast Aquatic Form! With glyphs, because of the distinct lack of options, it seems pretty easy to pick what you should use. Well, to be honest, when it comes to specs as well it seems that just by avoiding PVP stats I can make myself a good PVE build and avoid picking a terrible spec simply due to what's available.

Gear, Gems, Enchants

This is the part where I reveal exactly how lazy I have been. (Hint: very, very lazy) It's actually more of a to-do list than anything.

To get my leather specialization, I need to replace my Circle of Ossus with the Belt of Petrified Ivy. Then I will need gems for that and also for my Idol of the Black Willow. I'm not sure if I will be replacing any of the other gems that I already have socketed - although I would not be opposed to replacing some of my gems with Int/Haste to get haste-capped, I'm not sure if I want to spend the time and money to do that scant weeks before I start replacing these sick purpz with quest rewards.

As far as reforging goes, I'm considering playing around with spirit pieces to see if I can't eke out some more haste, or see what this mastery business is all about. This is mostly encouraged by my current lack of mana problems. I think I can get away with losing some regen in favor of getting closer to haste cap!

Spells

I am feeling the hurt left behind by lack of a long hot from Regrowth. Before the patch I would load up the squishies and healers of a group with Regrowth before say, Bonestorm or BQL's fear. Then, as I was running willy nilly around during said phases, I would Rejuve anything in range and LB people in particular trouble. Now, I feel like I only have one hot - obviously that's not true, but Regrowth's hot is kind of a joke, and LB is restricted to one person. Fortunately, I was able to fully retrain myself in tonight's raid to not only stop casting it on more than one person, but to keep in rolling instead of using it for free mana during OOC procs.

Regrowth replaces Nourish as my quick top-off. Nourish and HT are excruciatingly slow (it's ok, other healing classes, you can laugh), often either too late to save someone or needless overheal. For now, HT is still relegated to my NS+HT macro, or if I happen to hit the wrong button and have the time to watch it go off. I feel like I'm missing a medium cast, medium heal spell. I'm still keeping Wild Growth on cooldown and tossing Rejuve around on DPS in addition to keeping it on the tank. I feel less inclined to cast, having only the useful Regrowth and the cumbersome, overzealous HT, and yet lacking in hots. To be honest, I don't always know how to spend my GCDs. I find myself lacking instants or quick casts, but wasting time and mana when I try out the longer casts. I guess the idea is to spam Regrowth...hopefully I can retrain myself to do that soon.

Efflorescence is a mixed bag...I like planning where to drop it in the same way I plan where I use WG. Unfortunately, because of that, I feel wasteful when I use Swiftmend on a ranged target all by her lonesome and end up with a useless healing circle miles from the raid. Also, I'm not sure if it includes overheal in the percentage it heals targets standing in it for. For instance, if the melee is taking damage but the tank is topped off, a Swiftmend on the tank that heals for 1000 won't create much of a healing puddle. If it doesn't take overheal into account, it would obviously be better to SM a low-health melee, but sometimes you don't have the GCDs to prep with a Rejuve and then SM. 

Tree of Life now seems very foreign to me. It's still on the class bar which tempts me to click it, but I always remember at the last moment that if I do it will blow the cooldown. Incidentally, cooldowns like this have always confused me. In fact, I try to avoid on-use trinkets in favor of equip style effects because I never know when I should save the cooldowns for! It's not the same as being dps, where most long cooldowns should be saved for bloodlust or a time-sensitive phase. I'm torn between macroing it to a spell like Lifebloom or Regrowth to ensure it gets used once in a while, or putting it somewhere unobtrusive on my bar to save for some phase in some boss fight that puts out lots of raid damage.

Raid Frames

Grid, my current raid frames of choice, has updated, but I still need the capabilities of status hots. I did get an update for GridStatusHots, but it won't actually work when I turn the buffs on. This is very sad, because the hots plugin uses colors in the corner dot indicators to show when the hot is about to expire, which I find more visually useful than a numerical display. Grid itself will show the hot buffs, but as one uniform color for the entire duration of the hot, and without regard to who cast it (even if I specify "My Hots").

Because Lifebloom is now single target, I've set it to central icon display. It shows stacks, and very dimly duration (the icon is rather small). If I can get PowerAuras to load without crashing everything I might make a duration alert for myself (to be fair, it could be any number of things causing me to crash, including but not limited to: addons, mobs, instances, usable items, unusable items, logging in).

I'd love to have it show me who is affected by Efflorescence. I never had space for a WG indicator before, but I added it to my buff indicators this week and it's really surprised me with the range of affected targets! Sadly, Eff. doesn't appear to create a buff when standing in it, so I'm not sure how or if I could get Grid to recognize it.

Standard UI vs. Grid

I opened the Blizz raid frames to check them out. I like a lot of what they are doing, and there are indicators for useful things like range, offline, dead, mana/energy/etc, and buff indicators. It even shows my hots - although the countdown is still not clear enough. My biggest complaints are that the buffs obscure the health bars sometimes, which makes me nervous, and the frames are enormous. I have them set to the lowest possible size and a ten man raid still takes up so much space! I'm curious to see if mod authors will (can?) make addons for these new frames, and if that will make them worth switching over to.

Other Patch Comments

It's Hallow's End now, so I've been spending lots of time taking my various alts around for their candy buckets and trick or treating on Aka to try to get A Mask for All Occasions. I've also been taking advantage of the Invocation of the Wickerman reputation gain buff by turning in my junkboxes for Ravenholdt and inscription decks for Darkmoon Faire. I'm still doing ZG and MC regularly and also working on my Ally priest, who just got shadowform! Yaaay!

Addon updates are coming in slowly but surely; I haven't lost any major ones fortunately. However, there has been a huge change regarding buff mods - you can no longer right click to cancel buffs using any mod! If you use the extremely limited standard Blizz buffs you will still be able to right click to cancel, but that's it. The idea is to prevent addons from auto-cancelling buffs, but that's a far cry from looking at your list of buffs and manually removing one that you don't want. I've read some semi fixes to get around this change but I'm hoping that they will fix it so that even if mods can't cancel something without your input, you will still be able to right click it off yourself.

The Hunt Begins

Everyone needs a good origin story. I remember sitting at lunch listening to a friend tell another friend about this cool game he was playing. She was interested, so they talked shop about the different roles and abilities available, and she expressed an interest in playing a warlock. I was curious too, but paying to play a game? I'll stick with the one time purchase cartridges.

Or so I thought. They continued to wear me down (mostly by talking about their fun adventures in Azeroth) and finally I agreed to download a trial the week after final exams. At this point I had the two original friends, a friend from Japanese class, and my roommate and his girlfriend all encouraging me to play. Peer pressure, y'all - it works.

I wanted to be a druid; when I heard about the tank-heals-dps options I originally wanted to level a tank (DPS are dime-a-dozen! I'm a special snowflake! etc) but was advised against it until I had learned the ropes a little. So, to take after my friend who was a resto druid in a progression raiding guild, I planned on a nelf.  No, he said. If you play a female night elf I won't play with you. Well, male nelves were way too creepy for my taste, so I switched to a human priest. I thought the name was so clever (being a witty pun on my name and a mix of the two languages I study) until someone pointed out that it was the name of a person on a reality TV show.

Well, leveling a priest is hard. Even now, knowing tons more about the game I still struggled through the first 20ish levels on my alt. So I struggled and my friends were never on when I was and finally my J class friend said, hey, make an alt on my server and I'll talk to you! Thus was born Akabeko the tauren druid. My friend sent me 50g (!!!!) and said that if I made it to level 30 I could get an invite to her raiding guild.

So, I killed quillboars (and was killed by quillboars) and begged my friend for help on group quests because I was too afraid to ask in general chat - although now I realize that there may not have been many alts in the zone, and even less willing to help. At her suggestion I leveled feral and got lots of advice on gear stats (like, even into Outlands I was asking about quest loot). I joined her guild and made some friends and got to 70 just a little while before WotLK was to be released, and I abandoned the miserable priest I had languishing on my first server.

There is, of course, much more to the story that I hope to talk about. For now I'll say that I hit max level, respecced to resto, and began healing dungeons and heroics (and was even carried through Kara <3 ) and Aka became my beloved main.