Staghelm vs. Lazor Chicken

Some fights feel more personal than others, and heroic Staghelm is one of them for me. We began our attempts with a 3-healing scorpion strategy. It was actually a lot of fun once we figured out exactly when to place those big ol’ cooldowns to watch the stacks go higher and higher and just know that you were going to save your team from certain death.

However, we hit the enrage. We didn’t even know the guy had an enrage and here we are fighting a plate-rending version of the big red kitty. It hurt. Enrage timers are something we rarely take into consideration when devising our team’s strategy for a raid encounter, so we were a bit stymied. We knew 2-heals would not, no way no how cut it on our current scorpion doom strategy, so we switched to the heavier leaning kitty strat and I gave up my HoTs for DoTs.

Talk about an eye-opener.

Transmogrification: 5 Reasons Windsoar Won’t Be Hanging Out in the Ethereal’s Shop

There’s lot of excited folks out there. Finally, a way to lock yourself into a favorite wardrobe! Nostalgia is uniting teams of players to go farm those lost tier sets, players with a bank full of clothes are congratulating themselves on their foresight, and fashionably dressed blogs are reaping the readers.

How can something that reminds of us of Calvin and Hobbes not be win?

Not to rain on anyone’s parade, but I’m just not that excited about the transmogrifying closet, and here’s why.

Collecting the Loot: A Quick Guide to Dire Maul North’s Tribute Run

I’ve never made any secret about the fact that I’ve been playing this game for a long time. For the most part, I don’t think that changes much for the dynamic of the game, especially where I spend the majority of my time, killing end-game bosses. However, I can’t help being a little nostalgic about early dungeons, and I think part of the reason I enjoy leveling alts through the early levels in the dungeon finder is getting to run all those dungeons again. Sure, I had to walk across a mountainous passage during a blizzard to even find the entrance door, but I’m ok with these newer versions–they’re still fun! At least, most of them are fun. If I never see Dire Maul North (Gordok Commons) pop onto my screen again, I think I might die happy.

Stairway to Twilight

I first saw this view in all its colorful glory… those saturated purples and tans that seem to infest the area surrounding the Twilight Citadel. However, I wondered if it wouldn’t look better in death: and lo and behold, it did!

Around the Campfire: Spirit

I’ve been seeing a lot of variation around the block when it comes to spirit. As I commented last week at Beru’s blog, I felt that I was in a mite nifty place, not running out of mana too early, but having a nice little cushion when a fight demanded it. However, this week, not only did I get my tier chest, I picked up the heroic leg and chest token as well as the random stat shoulders with a bit of intellect, stamina, haste and mastery.

Since I suddenly found myself in such an awesome sea of stat upgrades, I decided to play a bit with my gear-set and talents. So if you like anecdotal tales come sit around the campfire and review a night of changes with me!

Welcome Back! Or How I Rolled Another Alt

It’ll come as no surprise that when Scarymidget said he might, possibly, maybe be interested in returning to the game, I was doing my best to break his arm *ahem* hype up the fun factor. You see, before he was scary.. and a midget, he was my beloved pocket healer and a guy (and gal–his wife is awesome folks) that my husband and I had gone to visit at the end of a couple of weeks in the woods. And yes, we were nice enough to stop at the hotel and shower first!

A Drama of Personal Angst

Somehow, despite never ever having actually lived in the fifties, I managed to get one of the core values drilled rather permanently into my skull:

You don’t air the family’s dirty laundry.

Somehow that has come to encompass everything from honest to God family matters, to friends secrets and more recently guild stories. I try not to talk about my guilds in anything but a positive light because, well, they’re family. Talking about the bad seems like airing the dirty laundry for the neighborhood to see, and that’s BAD!

However, like many other of my guild posts, this isn’t really about my guild, it’s about ME. About my behavior, my needs in-game, and frankly, whether or not other people have had similar situations and whether or not the solutions they found worked for THEM.

Applicants: To Kick or To Teach?

Matticus started a thread at PlusHeal a few months ago and it’s had me thinking ever since. When someone applies to your guild, do you question their knowledge, or do you teach them? He described the question as a philosophical debate occurring in his guild that had evolved into the following:

An application is sent in for applicants to demonstrate their knowledge of their class and their contributions. I should not have to point out obvious incorrect gemming choices, specs, or how their playstyle is. That’s not what this stage is for. It’s like taking an exam and having the teacher provide you with all the answers. The purpose of the application then is from an evaluatory standpoint. The guild wants to know what the applicants know and what they believe in so they can either upvote them into the guild or downvote them into oblivion.

However, there are those who believe that there is nothing wrong helping a player solidify their knowledge of the game and their class by telling them exactly how they should be gemming, what they should be speccing along with additional resource sites to examine. The belief is we should help everyone that applies regardless of whether or not they get in.

Alysrazor | 10-Man Normal

Rewarded by Ragnaros for delivering Fandel Staghelm, Alysra was transformed into Alysrazor, a fiery bird o’ doom.

Saz’s Screenshot Challenge #7: Screenshot of the Year

Welcome back to the Screenshot Challenge brought to us by Saz, of World of Saz.This challenge is comprised of 15 parts, and challenges the blogger to talk about themselves and their characters through screenshots. For more details, or to take part in the challenge yourself, go check out the original.