New patch

Before I forget, I want to mention that this week's Twisted Nether Podcast, which I just now got around to listening, made me laugh quite a bit, especially with the segment about "roar, I'm a dinosaur" in Japanese. They found a translation on yahoo answers, but if you are curious it looks like this: 「ウリャー！恐竜だ！」(Uryaa! Kyouryuu da!) The yahoo answers suggested "gaoo" for the roar sound,  but that makes me think of big cats, and uryaa sounds more like a shriek I associate with the Jurassic Park dinos >_> Also fun fact: the word for dinosaur is "scary dragon."

In other minor news, I have updated some stuff around the site, including my blogroll which should hopefully more accurately reflect the bajillion blogs I follow. As a general note, if you are truncating your feed posts you should totally stop doing that, and if you don't I will put your blog into fullrsstextfeed.com and forcibly untruncate your posts. I'm not sure how that plays with Blogger's recognition of said feed, however, so I may not be able to advertise for you in my blogroll! Untruncate your feeds! /flips every table

Next week I will be traveling for Golden Week, so although I have posts scheduled I will be slow on comments. A friend has offered to sell me his used DS Lite before he returns to the States, so I'm glad I can save my Wheel of Time books for when I'll be...at work... The only problem is that his DS is pink. -_- And not even an exciting bold pink! Maybe I should just get a new one so I can get a blue one, eh? That's totally worth 300 bucks.

Influx of interest! Being generally responsible means being busy after work, which makes me oddly uninterested in WoW when I finally do get time to log on. I typically get excited about holiday events, but having no desire to get "the Noble" on any more toons and the distinct lack of enjoyable quests means Noblegarden has been a disappointment. In terms of motivating me to do dailies or play my alts, anyway. The egg rage always makes me laugh, especially the rare moments when it sneaks up on me! Running up to an egg, only to see it disappear as you arrive and a pink bunny scamper off...ah, I love it when people get mad over pastel chocolate eggs. It reminds me of hunting them in the middle of the night with my old guildies. I was  running circles around Brill, /yelling at my two guildies running their own circles. Some idiot had the gall to call us losers for spending our Friday night playing WoW. Hello pot, this is kettle! The next night found us in Bloodhoof, where I was camping a lovely spot with 4 spawn points. My guildie stupidly made some comment about me having boobs (even funnier, as he has zero interest in the ladies), and I had to gently let down a vaguely creepy, curious lowbie who whispered me to ask me "if I really was a girl" and then a bunch of adorably nooby questions about how to play the game.

Despite Noblegarden failing to be exciting, as far as holidays go, I stayed home Wednesday night to raid and had a BLAST. It's been so long since enough people were online on a night I was available to raid, and I have been seriously neglecting my heroics. Just rolling through bosses in BWD was sheer joy in itself, but I was being reminded of the 4.1 changes left and right which was icing on the cake. Now I can do more than one heroic per day without feeling like it's wasted time, we got credit for a guild challenge (killing a raid boss) and 1000g, we got some people their Chimaeron achievement, ZG and ZA are out for whenever I can find time and a guild group to explore them, I got two new kitty pets (and a ton of secret achievements!), and I just found out that Children's Week has a fourth pet added! Everything is all smiles, and although not a single piece of spirit leather dropped, I got three (!!!) agi leather pieces for my bear set. Neither our bear tank nor rogue wanted them, although I felt like a pile of poo taking them for a spec I am so selfish with. At least I don't feel terrible about depriving the guild of shards, what with the new sources of epix!

Speaking of patch changes, I took the opportunity to redo both of my specs. WHICH, by the way, go up in price as if it were the same spec being changed multiple times. Remember when changing your singular spec within a certain time frame would drive up the price? Well, despite the fact that we have two distinct specs, they are still perceived as one, so changing one right after the other doubles the price. Poor form! At any rate, you must be beside yourselves with excitement to see my new specs!

Resto spec 4.1

 I got back the wonderful Efflorescence and avoided points in the Rejuve-specific talents in favor of the mana talents in Balance and Feral. Sadly, I couldn't respec in time for raid, but I look forward to using this new spec soon!!

Feral spec 4.1

This spec was created based on The Inc Bear's hybrid feral post. I hope this and my new pieces will help me solo more stuff!

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

The Great Blog Noblegarden Egg Hunt!

The second GBNEH is upon us! Started by Angelya of R&R, this year it is being organized by Kamalia of Kamalia et alia. Eggs have been hidden in all sorts of places on participants' blogs, and if you can locate them all and send an email off to the following address:

Here is the list of participating blogs. Be sure to check out Kamalia's explanatory post for tips on where to look and how to cite the locations when you send your email. Bloggers and non-bloggers alike are invited to participate, and you could win some fabulous prizes!

Azeroth Apple
Bag Overflow
Bubblespec
Cannot Be Tamed
Christine’s Blog
Cynwise’s Battlefield Manual/Green Tinted Goggles
Daily Quests
Dwarven Battle Medic
Elfi’s World
Fel Concentration
Flavor Text
Fuzzy_Magicz Magical Parlour
Jaded Alt
Kamalia et alia
Manalicious
Muradin Musings
Oddcraft
Orcish Army Knife
Perish Twice
Raid Trauma
red cow rise
Revive and Rejuvenate
Scribblings on the Asylum Wall
The WOW Debutante
Top Rosters
World of Saz

[Shared Topic] Goblin Editorial

The Economics of Ecofriendly Living

Sprinkie Sparklefizz is a renowned auction house mogul, a respected mage, and the current head of Sparklefizz Industries. She enjoys economic PVP and melting faces.

I'll put it to you straight: environmental destruction is not profitable. Not in the long run. I know this isn't a popular opinion, but it has to be said. If we make our environment unlivable, we will die before we can profit. Here is the problem as I see it: we are treating the whole of Azeroth as our personal estate and it's about to make business rough for us.

To the goblins in Azshara, I'm speaking to you as a fellow survivor of our demolished home. What we did to Kezan, what we are doing to Azshara now; it's not sustainable. Azeroth is a big place, but that doesn't mean we can, or should, take all of its resources without a care for how they will be replenished. 

Let's start small. Our settlement in Orgrimmar has quickly become known as a slum, and the water we contaminated has not made us any friends. If we want the trolls and orcs as allies, especially economically, we will need to rein in the toxic waste we are producing in their city. We can't monopolize trade with hostile races.

The Cataclysm has seriously limited resources as we renavigate the changed face of the planet. Those who followed the news in Kezan will already know what I am talking about - we have spent years inventing temporary solutions for what we know would become a crisis of resources and space. Although the space available to us has expanded, we should take this message to heart and take care of the land before it gives out on us.

We should take our inspiration from the Steamwheedle Cartel, whose outposts in Everlook, Gadgetzan, and Booty Bay have managed to exist in their respective locations without permanently altering the face of those environments. They take materials from their surroundings but do not convert it to serve their own aesthetics. And what's more, they maintain a high reputation with both Horde and Alliance factions and have a complete monopoly of inter-factional commerce. This is a prime example of what we should strive for when expanding into new environments. It bears mention that this is our competition I am referring to. We need to improve on their successful design if we are to stay competitive.

Our recent construction in Azshara suggests a dangerous precedent for a return to our construction habits of old. We must curb our destruction of the landscape and confine our impact on the area to the space and materials we need. The massive change from Kezan to Kalimdor is the perfect opportunity to reassess our building strategies in order to minimize our environmental impact and maximize our ability to generate profits.

excerpt from The Daily Auctioneer, Vol. 43, Issue 45

This Week

Guild level 25

Scorpion joyrides

It does not become a lion.

My weapon fire CHANGES COLORS

Day 2: Why blog?

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 1: Who is red cow?

What prompted me to start a blog? In the 6 months or so leading up to my first post, I followed 2 blogging shitstorms that led me to some admirable writers that made me feel excited about commenting and getting involved in blogland. The first was what has since been referred to as "Women in WoW" which, despite claims that "girls don't play WoW" and similar sentiments are obsolete, continues to be a hornets' nest of discussion fodder. The second was the RealID explosion, which interestingly enough was at least partially related to the first.

Both topics I followed with interest. Especially during RealID I needed the support of like-minded folks, because I was facing the possibility of quitting the game, not because I was done playing, but because I would not have my real name publicly associated with my Azeroth activities. During weekdays, WoW is my only source of English-language conversation and community, so I was pretty stressed. 

Long story short (too late), I was introduced to the rich WoW blogosphere. The more I read, the more I began to think about my own thoughts on the topics addressed, and they always turned into more than a comment here and there. Although it was major topics that brought me into blogging, my list of "What do I bring to a wow blog?" (I love lists) looked like:

1) screenshots
2) funny stories
3) resto guides or something??? 

Perhaps not a lot to go on, but I had the time and the inclination to write at least for myself, if not for others. I got the blog name, spent a week or so toying with the layout, and tentatively jumped into posting!

Go to Day 3: A wild noob appears!

Seductive Alts

Before I get into what I actually want to talk about today I need to complain bitterly about the fact that I lost my DS on the train. FFFFF!! I was wearing a stupid fashionable coat that I knew had slippery, poorly closed pockets, one that I had even lost a gym card from before and I went and put my stupid DS in the stupid pocket anyway. And then I got off the train and walked about 10 steps, realized that my pocket was too light, and turned back, only to have the doors close in my face and the passengers stare uneasily at the foreigner goggling at them. Then I went to the dirty lost objects office and had to wait for like an hour for them to call every freaking station that my train went to as it arrived, in the hopes that someone would have turned it in. They had not. I've been to my own station since and it still hasn't turned up in the database.

It's not the hardware itself that I miss; it's an ancient DS lite bought back when they only sold them in white [in the US]. It was due for an update anyway, provided I had a reason to. I guess now I do. The problem is that the game contained Pokemon SoulSilver, the DS remake of my most beloved Pokemon generation, and what's worse, it was a gift from my best friend; the English version that I waited a whole year to be translated rather than just buying it at the store when it came out in Japan. And now I have to tell her that even though I had hatched a small Eevee army and named my Togepi Poopie?! just like old times, I lost the game and now I have to buy another copy and start from scratch. UGH MY NERD RAGE KNOWS NO BOUNDS.

So, that out of the way. Despite being very, very close, like 550 lockboxes close, from reaching my extremely long-term goal of The Insane title, I have been completely enthralled by my lowbie toons this week. I got the hardy dwarf shaman to level 20 in no time at all and I have killed every single freaking rare that has come across my path. There are a TON in the old world. Unlike other lowbie experiences, I have found that Loch Modan quests level easily with the toon. Sure, I have gotten a few green quests, or left them too long and they became green, but I'm still getting yellow quests and yellow mobs to kill, so it doesn't feel completely pointless to level there. Compare that to my goblin in Azshara or my worgen just hitting Darkshore, where my goblin isn't even finished with the mage apprentice questline and is juggling green and gray quests. The worgen was sent to Darkshore as a natural progression of questing, and every damn quest is green already! And it's not like I did anything special in Gilneas; you have to do every stinking quest just to get out of the zone!

I wandered around Darnassafrass on my worgen once I got there. I always get the urge to check out lowbie zones and infrequently visited capital cities once in a while. Did you guys know that Malfurion is hanging out with Tyrande?? Spoiler alert: he is!! Her eyes look unusually pinched and tired compared to the flawless skin of her other nelf sisters, so seeing her boyf back in action made me happy. Homegirl deserves a break, and probably a good romp in the sack. She's earned it!

Being in Darkshore was a little weird, because I had first gone through there on my only character, a night elf. Doing some of the quests, I immediately thought of how she would react, mostly with a lot of upset and murdering, because all of the sweet NPCs from Auberdine are dead! /cry But then I realized, as a cursed human-turned-monster worgen, just getting back into the fold with a potentially unreliable Alliance, having lived through the Cataclysm and worgen-related drama with your own people, what would she think about the state of Darkshore? All I could come up with was that it would be upsetting in the way that Things Have Gone Wrong With the World generally are, but not nearly as personal or depressing as it would be for my night elf. So then I hopped on my night elf and wandered around Stormwind in a lovely level 10 dress, sandals, and lantern. I thought about going to Northshire Abbey to do the new human starting zone, but decided to actually roll a new alt somewhere and do it another time. /flop

One thing that I do want to mention about hanging out in lowbie zones is how often I am surprised to encounter NPCs. They are much more active in the zones, patrolling around, killing mobs left and right. I kept seeing them and starting - what are the odds that another lowbie is questing at this time of night, especially with so few lowbies around anyway? And then I would mouseover the character and see that it was an NPC fighting a mob or saving a comrade, and be even more surprised. I'd love to see more NPCs out and about, not only in quest areas but out in the wilds of zones or wandering around major cities. 

Part of playing my alts so frequently is that it's easier for me to go and do the things I need to do in the evenings (gym, J class, food shopping) if I don't get on a character in my guild. That way no one will ask me to just heal this one heroic, super quick run, promise! It's much easier to pick up and go if you have been killing bobcats or collecting rock turds without having to explain to guildies where you are going. Unfortunately, because I have been so entranced by playing alts, this means I haven't run a random in about a week. Not that I was running them any more regularly before I worked out this self-control method. Now that we are close to level 25 in the guild, I'm wondering if I'm ready to brave solo PUGs again. Especially since I'm so close to finishing The Insane. Agghhh I need to do that.

Chelley's Bane of Covetous Beko dropped last week, and I've been casting about for some extra cash to buy it from the gbank. I guess I still haven't learned my lesson from before, which is that even if I do blow all of my gold on it, it will likely be replaced before I can even make the money back. I guess it's good that my guild leader hasn't replied to my mail, because I'm only about 3/4 of the way prepared to buy it. Unless he is willing to accept herbs as partial payment...

I finally unlocked the last rare archaeology piece I need from Northrend, so assuming I ever get any Nerubian digsites, I can hopefully return to the old world and get toasted by Deathwing at some point. Maybe one of my gaudy tier sets will bring him down from the skies to roast me.