I've Seen You Before...

I only need Dirkee and Terror Spinner for Frostbitten, so I've parked an alt at one and set my hearth to the other, and log out at a spawn point.

It is, however, rather disconcerting to see someone else parked close to you when you log out... and in the exact same position when you log back in the next day. Do these people not sleep or work?!

Anyway, I've been trying harder to get this Achievement done because I was reminded recently that come MoP, zones will be cross-realm... meaning more people in the zone and therefore less chance of you seeing rare mobs. Great for questers, not so great for Achievement hunters like me! :(

Here's hoping I manage to get the Time-Lost Proto-Drake and the Camel Hoarder as well... although if the dude I see when I log into Storm Peaks is still there for the rest of the week, I'm not holding my breath!

The Minions of Hell Grow Stronger

...and the minions of Azeroth grow lonelier.

My guild has jumped on the Diablo 3 bandwagon, plus we've had illnesses (it's getting into cold 'n flu season here in the Southern hemisphere, don't forget!) and people taking holidays, so it's been a little quiet in WoW lately.

That's not to say we haven't been progressing, though - we consistently kill 3 heroic bosses in DS and we're working on a 4th.

Not to mention, we're finally at the last few runs of Firelands for our guild leader to get the legendary staff - an epically long hard slog, if you ask us. Our rogue got his legendary daggers with much less group effort.

I was actually a little surprised that we all keep turning up to raid, considering. I guess Diablo 3 is more of a solo game or with a small group of friends, so WoW is still the only way we can all get together in a big group and have fun.

Well, that, or perhaps the core raiding team of 11 or so that we have left are the more motivated group - after all, Southern Wardens hasn't traditionally been a heroic raiding guild, but I think we can safely say we are now! :)

Solo Pit Fighter

I know I'm not the best PvPer. Far from it, in fact. However, I do like being the underdog - sometimes you can sneak your way to the finish line purely because you're not the most obvious target.

With no extra buffs, under-par PvP gear (still less than 3500 resilience) and not a single party member to back me up, I almost didn't step into the Darkmoon Arena ring tonight because I knew it'd be tough. However, there were enough people fighting that I figured I'd have a chance of ninjaing the chest...

...which is clearly what happened, because I've just come away from the Darkmoon Arena with my second Pit Fighter trinket - and this one I managed solo!

All it took was waiting for the right moment. In this case, a mage put up a Ring of Frost on the chest, clearly expecting to catch everyone and have the chest be safe for a few seconds. I deliberately run in, trinket, FD to make everyone lose me as a target, drop a Freezing Trap and start opening the chest.

Meanwhile, of course, everyone else is still either frozen in the mage's ring or staying out so they don't get caught. I send my bat to stun someone coming close, a warrior charges into my trap... and bam. Cast finishes, I get the trinket. Epic win! Only 10 more to go.... :P

Failands Raiding

We've been trying to get one of our guild members a legendary staff from Firelands on our off-raiding night, which is actually quite a long slog.

You'd think it'd be an easy raid for a guild in heroic DS - and for the most part, it is - but Ragnaros actually gives us more trouble than regular progression content, to the point where we almost always finish at Domo.

We also tried heroic Shannox once or twice tonight for fun; it wasn't pretty. It's a little difficult to catch Face Rage when the only shot that works for me is Chimera and the other ranged don't have great shots either (we unfortunately don't run with a mage/warlock regularly). Saving Chimera for Face Rage doesn't quite work when you're the one getting swiped, funnily enough....

I'm starting to wonder if Firelands might not be more difficult now that DS is progressively getting nerfed - even if it isn't, it certainly feels that way sometimes!

Heroic Dragon Sorrows

I've mentioned before how much I hated when I clicked the button on Ultraxion, got the cooldown, and still died (presumably from latency issues).

It's still happening, and this time I got pic proof:

We were sitting on 4% as our best attempt for the night on heroic Ultra.... and tomorrow night it'll be nerfed at the reset. Tad disappointing not to get the kill before then :(

Dragon Soul Challenge

Vodka and Method are facing off in a race to clear Dragon Soul: http://athenelive.com/dschallenge

I love watching things like this - not only is it fun to see the top guilds in the world competing, you can also pick up some great tips scrutinizing their gameplay.

I always pay special attention to the hunters, of course - it's amazing how much you can improve. I only wish Blizzard would organize more of it - I know watching Arena games always helped me a lot; why not PvE-based competitions?

And yes, I know I could always watch boss kill vids... but really, it isn't the same. People doing boss kill vids tend to either be comfortable playing, showing the strat, or showing a messy-ish first kill. This Dragon Soul challenge will be challenging enough for the players to push themselves, but will also rely on excellent execution.

/popcorn time :)

Ultrafun

Of all the bosses in Dragon Soul, I didn't expect heroic Ultraxion to be so much fun compared to normal mode.

I've always viewed Ultra to be a rather boring fight - DS's Patchwerk; the obligatory tank n' spank.

However, making Fading Light a variable time - plus the added bonus of having to stay out for Hour of Twilight every now and then - somehow makes the fight a lot more interesting.

No, I don't know why either - possibly the extra adrenaline from almost missing Fading Light occasionally when it's on a short timer? Who knows! In any case, I'm a fan and can only hope that the other heroic fights improve on the normal modes as much as this one :)

Swiftest Springstrider Ever

Yeah, I really couldn't believe I'd got it that fast either. Very glad I didn't have to camp for ages this year - it gets a bit old when someone standing next to you has better latency! :P

Bit of a Beta Breather

I finally got my MoP beta pass and am currently waiting for the setup to finish.

Last time I did beta testing, I didn't do the quests or anything that people usually do in betas; after all, I rather enjoy the process of discovering new quests and items at launch and don't bother reading many spoilers besides talents and spells.

Besides, I figure there must be enough people testing quests, talents, spells, PvP and the like - no need for me to join the bandwagon.

This time I plan to do much the same - find quirky things to test that probably aren't necessary... but at least it'd be unlikely that others would be testing the same things.

Testing plans:

1. Pet strength - DPS and tank pets vs lvl 90 and 90 elite mobs
2. Gear strength - Normal DS level gear (which is what I'm wearing, mostly) vs no gear
3. Talent gauge - Determine which talents look promising for levelling, PvP and raid
4. ???

If anyone has any suggestions as to what to test in MoP, feel free to fire 'em at me... I'm not a theorycrafter or number cruncher by any means (I tend to leave that to the rest of the great hunter community), but hey - I'm sure Blizzard wants some "average" people testing their game and not just the elite few :)

The Time is Now

Raid nights shortened (DS normal is now a 1-night a week affair and we haven't started heroic modes), almost no Raid Finder (I have everything except the ring... which continues to elude me :P), no Diablo 3, no MoP beta, no Darkmoon Faire dailes - I finally have time to take a look at the worgen and goblin starting areas!

So far, I'm really liking the worgen area; the story and atmosphere are great - for now, anyway. I can see that levelling more than 1 could get quite tedious, considering you can't really skip quests etc.

It's not really a problem for me since I don't really have many alts, but I'm sure there are others that would want the absolutely epic racial and are sick of the quests.

Hopefully RL will allow me to play through the new areas - and hopefully the BElf one too, since I still haven't completely finished it - before Diablo 3/MoP/raiding kick in again, because I'm quite enjoying this "new" content!