My Guild

I have had many, many discussions with people as to why I do the things I do.

One of the more common questions, particularly from dissatisfied guildies or curious non-guild friends, is:

Why do I stay with my guild, Southern Wardens of US-Proudmoore, where raiding progression is slower than I'd like, wipes from silly mistakes are frustrating, and first kills are often obtained through PuGs weeks before the guild as a whole even sets eyes on the boss?

My short answer tends to be: "Because I want to".

Of course, people are rarely satisfied with that answer, so here's a slightly longer one:

• My guild doesn't care if I raid as BM.
• My guild doesn't immediately replace me if I'm running late for a raid.
• My guild /rolls for loot and often pass in favour of someone else who needs it more.
• My guild helps people who ask for it, and don't mind "carrying" people who are good-natured, grateful, and at least try their hardest.
• And more importantly, my guild are a friendly, cheery bunch that accept people for who they are... even if you're a mage called Wildence.

Would I recommend this guild to a hardcore raider? No.
Would I recommend this guild to someone who doesn't mind a few wipes as long as everyone has fun? Hell yes! Southern Wardens rock :)

(If you're wondering what inspired this post, we ran Ulduar 10 hard modes last night in preparation for seeing Algalon. Sure, we wiped a couple of times despite now having double the HP and DPS as when we did normal modes, but it was better than stressing over ICC10 progression. When the most important loot /roll of the night is over who gets to push the Big Red Button, you know there's fun to be had :D)

The other side of AH Arrows

After complaining about arrow etiquette on the AH, I thought I should also post the other side of the story - the times when I actually like several pages of arrows being listed:

Gotta love it when people put blue arrows up for less than vendor arrow price!

The Aussie Ping

Everyone on US servers that aren't based in the US are aware of our higher latency, particularly when some uncaring Yank makes a complaint that - ZOMG! - they have 200ms, how terrible!

(200ms is the type of latency us Aussies only see in Exodar at 2am... 3-400 is more normal)

However, we're all used to it - and unless your Arena team is hitting 2k rating, we don't really notice. I don't, anyway.

Until last night.

Every strat I've read for hunters on Sindragosa states that if you're quick enough, you can hit Disengage on her Icy Grip and not move at all.

I'm here to tell any hunter that hasn't done Sindragosa before that if you have 500ms like I did last night, that "tip" is bull&#$@.

Yes, I still got a headstart on the rest of my crew in running out.... but the best I could manage was the edge of melee range. Definitely nowhere near where I started.

I've heard horror stories of the timing that used to be required for Naxx40 back in the day and now I wonder - if any Oceanic guilds were actually raiding that place successfully, they should probably have their guild name plastered next to the old Nihilum guild for world firsts back then, because they deserve it.

Even more annoying pea-shooter

Usually I scoff at BoA items, since my hunter is always the leader of the pack and I don't care much about gearing/levelling alts.

I am, however, going straight out to buy a bow after reading a post in the hunter soloing thread on the EJ forums by Brightlol (Brightofday of Aman'thul), the first hunter in the world to solo Nefarian.

Not only did Brightlol solo something pretty epic, they also provided an absolutely epic tip: the BoA Charmed Ancient Bone Bow has no durability, and therefore can't be broken in Nef's hunter class call!

...and I guess another good thing about it is if you ever forget to repair, you know this bow will never break. Almost never happens to me, but hey - I remember some pretty close calls doing Hyjal retro runs where the mass AoE was enough to make me worry :P

Auction House Arrow Etiquette

If you insist on listing a single arrow for sale on the AH to try and catch people out (eg. listing 1 arrow for the same price as the average stack of 1000)... at least have the decency to only list, say, 4 pages' worth.

Not 10, 20, or some other obscene number of pages that gives everyone trying to find the first decently priced lot of arrows RSI.

Trust me, there aren't 200 stupid hunters that will each buy a few of your single arrow stacks within the 2 day AH limit, so there's no need to provide for that many!

Was that really heroic?

I had to double check that the ToGC10 raid I'd joined was heroic or not - it was one of the smoothest runs I've ever been on.

...Also, I won the horse. Woot! :)