Friday, July 18, 2008

A Beggar No More

We've all seen them, we've all been whispered by them, beggars asking for silver or gold. I've seen many solutions to the beggar problem, anything from telling them where to go, telling them you aren't a bank or opening a trade and then leaving to make a sandwich...but this solution, is the best I've ever heard.

Big Red Kitty has got the right idea, on dealing with beggars. This is a brilliant idea. While carrying out this request, the young adventurer would stumble across quest hubs, several new zones, and collect a fair amount of random drops and pocket change.

This has got me thinking, are there similar type things one could collect in the other sub level 20 zones? No more will I send beggars away without a spark of hope. If they can work for it, the gold can be theirs. Not to mention the fact that a small pile of gold like that would easily cover the cost of a shiny new mount at level 30.

Brilliantly done BRK!

Beta Patch Highlights

The WotLK beta has begun, and it brings with it some pretty interesting patch notes.

Druid
- Entangling Roots: Can now be used indoors.
- * New Spell: Revive - Returns the spirit to the body, restoring a dead target to life with health and mana. Cannot be cast when in combat. (Ranks 1-7 added)


These are my two favorite changes to druids. Indoor roots will come in handy for a variety of situations, from temp CC in a regular group, to separating enemies that must be cleared in stealth runs, making multiple pulls more manageable. Revive can't get here soon enough. I've always hoped they would give druids a "real" rez, as it can be quite the challenge to heal a 5 man group with only a druid battle rez. No mention of changing or removing the battle rez, which may sound a bit over powered, but I think will work out just fine. Druids can help rez at the end of a fight, but they retain their utility in battle as an emergency rez too.

Hunter
- If a hunter tames a pet that is more than five levels beneath than the hunter's level, then the pet jumps to five levels beneath than the hunter's level.


There are lots of hunter changes that I'm happy about, but this one, I really like. So many times I've wanted to go back and tame a pet of lower level, but find it really hard to level it up. This is still 5 levels to work on, but closing the gap should really help those of us that like to collect interesting pets. Now...about that stable size Blizzard!!

Changes to buffs, auras and totems that make them into proximity, instead of party benefits are really exciting. It makes much more sense for them to apply to those around the caster, rather than having to stack groups and force a healer to keep the tank (for example) in range.

I'm happy to see that the Death Knight still sounds like it's balanced to be able to choose any tree and be effective, I truly hope the nerf bat isn't hitting them too hard anytime soon.

How about those Achievements?

This system is one I've wanted to see in place for a while. It's fun to have a list of things you've done to look back on, and for others to see. I'm hoping, for the sake of not only myself, but others that like to collect things like this, that most of the old world stuff is going to still be unlock able in Wrath. I also hope that things you have done in the past will count! The only down side to this system that I can see so far is the fact that it announces to guild when you unlock something. Now, as nice as that sounds...I've got a big guild...and a lot of people who are going to be working on stuff like this. Think of a boss achievement...and the 25 people who unlock it at the same moment. Spammity!! Perhaps there's an option to disable it...guess we'll wait and see.

Shave and a haircut anyone? I'm looking forward to seeing what new styles are added for each race. A couple of my characters could really use a makeover...who knew when I created them that I'd still be playing years later? It's not something I plan to change often, but I can see it being a pretty effective gold sink if Blizzard continues to release new options with content patches. Now all we need is a groomer for those shaggy druids!

Wednesday, July 16, 2008

New Healer Community



PlusHeal.com is a new healer forum community started by bloggers who frequently discuss healing on their blogs. The idea is to get all the good info in one place, and also have a spot to discuss healing issues together.

I'm not a healer primarily, but my druid knows a thing or two, and can cast some mean HoTs when called upon. I think this new forum will be highly useful, and hope to see it do well. I've pointed all of my guild's healers over there and plan to look there first when anything healing related comes up.

Tuesday, July 15, 2008

Patch 2.4.3 and Hunter Love!

Grab your level 30 alts and head for the riding trainer! Patch 2.4.3 is live and apprentice riding is now available to level 30 characters. This goes for the Paladin and Warlock trained mount spells as well.

Wowhead has a handy, fully linked, version of the Patch Notes.

Wowhead has also announced the launch of some really cool new features for hunters, including a pet training calculator and a great chart for pet comparison. I personally love the 360 view of each pet model. All of these can be found here.

Monday, July 14, 2008

Screenshot Errr...Monday - Cowrock

Protected

The Blizzard Authenticator has really helped to put my mind at ease when it comes to account security. It has always been a big issue for me, since I would feel horrible if anything happened to the guild through some hacker getting their dirty hands on my account. Sure, characters are restorable...but I've heard horror stories of guilds being disbanded. That would kill me. Not to mention the fact that I now feel safer in having only my account have access to the guild funds in our bank.

I was a tiny bit worried that it would be irritating to have to put in an extra number each time I wanted to login, but it's really easy and no trouble at all compared to the peace of mind it offers.

I'm good to go, authenticator is setup and working...now we all just hope the battery has a nice long life expectancy!

Wednesday, July 9, 2008

Horde Alting

So, over the holiday weekend I decided to check up on Annarchy's horde side guild. It was started back in January by myself, and a member of Panda Attack (our counterpart horde guild on Dark Iron) as a place for the members of both guilds to hang out together, if they so choose.

It hasn't been super active, as members of both guilds usually focus most of their play time on their main characters, however we do have a few people who play there a lot. After our recent horde newbie event, interest has been sparked again, and a few people have started playing new horde alts.

I decided to join in the fun, rather than just check the bank and roster and logout like I have a tendency to do on most occasions. I rolled a new druid.

Now, as is clear from my character list here, I already have a druid. In fact, I already have just about every class. But druids are different. My druid is currently resto and geared for raid healing. This new horde druid? Totally Feral.



This is my new moo druid, also named Feathermyst, grinning for the camera. She reached level 20 last night, and can now turn into a kitty too. Adventuring through the horde content has been a fun and refreshing change of pace from the all to familiar alliance quests and leveling process. I don't know if this druid will reach the level cap, but for now she is a fun addition to my alt collection.

Friday, July 4, 2008

Happy 4th!

Happy 4th of July to everyone who celebrates this holiday, and happy Friday to the rest :)

To celebrate the three-day weekend, Winter and I, plus our 5-year-old have turned to our wild side and rolled three horde side druids. Annarchy has a horde alt guild over on Sargeras called "Pink Pandas" that we share with our Dark Iron rivals, Panda Attack (horde). Since my alliance druid is resto, this one, of the same name (Feathermyst) shall be ferlol. I've already got my level 10 bear form and am quite happily bounding around the barrens mauling raptors and striders alike.

Winter says that since his alliance side druid is feral, he may go resto or balanced with this one, though he managed to name his differently from his first druid.

Overall our 4th of July weekend should be nice and relaxing with much fireworks and ice tea and mauling of creatures.

Tuesday, July 1, 2008

Is My /DND Showing?

I've been a guild leader for three years now (ok, not officially until the 6th of next month, but still) and in that time I've talked to many people. I talk to people all the time, sometimes several at once (which can lead to interesting mistells), or while raiding (but that's another story). I like it.

Yes, I like talking to people. I like to listen to their problems, and help to solve them when I can. I also like to talk when there isn't a problem. For some reason though, people seem to assume that I either don't want to hear their problems, or am too busy.

Granted, I am busy. The guild is large, there are a lot of things on my todo list, and I have a couple of adorable 5 and 2-year-old distractions, but I choose to be the guild leader. I volunteered for this job. Nobody pushed it on me, and let me assure you, I'm not in it for the money :P I may not always answer right away, occasionally I miss a tell, but I care, and I do want to listen.

I often feel as if I must have a /DND tag up. I'd say about 90% of my conversations in game begin with some variation of "Sorry to bother you" "I don't mean to intrude" "I know you are busy" and the most boggling? "I know you're on your alt" Hold it just a second...I'm an altaholic, I'm *always* on an alt. But that doesn't mean I don't want to do my job as guild leader...all my alts are guilded and at officer rank in either the main or alt guild. They all have "feather" in their name. If I want to have some quiet time, I'll logout. And even then, my officers have my phone number, and my forums have a PM system.

Perhaps my perspective is just a bit different than most people's. Yes I play the game to have fun, but guild leading and talking to people *is* that fun. Some people play for the pvp, some for the raiding, a lot of my guild members play for the community (I think...) and all of those are great, but I'm not going to resent someone for telling their guild leader when something is up! I certainly wouldn't have started a guild if I didn't want to do the job. I knew what I was getting into. Ok, maybe I didn't know it would last this long, or be this wonderful community that it has grown into, but I've been in, and led groups before, and I knew what to expect as far as work/dealing with stuff is concerned.

Anyway, my point is this: A guild leader is there to help the guild members. As are officers. These are not jobs they are forced to take, they make a choice to be available to help people. Their goal, in these roles should be to help make the guild community run smoothly, and stay content while following the rules. They are there to help with conflicts and drama, not to avoid them. Don't be afraid to talk to your guild leader and officers, they do the job because they care.