Weekly Round-Up

Well, it feels like a while since I have been able to do a round up of the events in WoW of the past week, and that was due to a bit of stagnation within the game. That's all changed now, and once again this blog can be a hive of activity.

Obviously the massive change of the past week was the new guild, and I can say without doubt that it was the best decision for us, but I have talked about that enough times now.

Well it's been a week of heroics, I have finally got under my belt: Lost City, Halls of Origination, Stonecore, Deadmines, Shadowfang Keep, Blackrock Caverns and the final boss of Grim Batol. I've still got to run Vortex Pinnacle and Throne of the Tides and I'm picking up heroic upgrades as I go along. I especially love being a Holy Priestess in the first boss fight of Shadowfang Keep against Baron Ashbury when everyone has their health reduced during Asphyxiate. Afterwards once his heal has ticked a couple of times I can use Prayer of Mending, Circle of Healing, Prayer of Healing and Holy Word: Sanctuary, not to mention a Lightwell and then concentrate on tank healing and as long as I'm careful can manage the fight without running out of mana.

I really need to spend some time sorting out my UI because it's a bit hectic, but I like X-Perl because I can see people's health bars etc and find it easy to assess their damage. I tried Grid recently but found it difficult to assess how much damage people were taking. If anyone has any tips/advice about clearing up my UI or a better add-on to use than Xperl, I would love to hear it.

Hold on tight I feel a rant coming on...LIGHTWELL. I now have 2 macros I use where lightwell is concerned. I have one I use at the start of a PuG which explains the virtues of lightwell which are:

• It can be clicked at range.
• It doesn't change your current target.
• It can still be used even when you are: Stunned, Sapped, Casting, Running, Feared, Falling and Eating.
• The effect is only cancelled when you receive an attack which is equal to 30% of your total health.
• It lasts for 3 minutes and since I have it glyphed, 15 charges.

Its so incredibly useful when I have to focus on tank healing, and why I have to shout at people to use it is beyond my comprehension...because yes, my second lightwell macro, is reminding people to 'PLEASE CLICK THE LIGHTWELL!'

So that macro goes out and then the DPS do something stupid, instead of staying where they are and clicking the lightwell they run over to it and practically stand on top of it and then run off again...why? I always take care to place it within reach of everyone. So I have taken it upon myself that all people playing WoW need to know exactly how a lightwell works, because it makes my life easier and helps keep 'you' alive. Got it? Good.

Now that I've got that off my chest I can get back to rounding off the week.

Last night after running a couple of instances, Nuad and I decided that we would run heroic Culling of Stratholme for the Bronze Drake mount. Between us we did it easily and Nuad let me roll for the mount, and we plan on running it again very soon so he can get it too. I'm also waiting for my 6th Oracles egg to hatch hoping to get the Green Drake mount. I've had the companion pet 3 times, but still no luck with the drake. Hoping I will get lucky soon though.

Its also been a week for raising reputations, I got exalted with Earthen Ring so I could buy Flamebloom Gloves. My next reputation grind is with Therazane in order to buy Greater Inscription of Charged Lodestone.

Last but not least, thanks must be mentioned to people on Twitter and people in Drama who solved my 'haste or critical strike rating?' query. Haste it is and I've made sure that yellow gem slots contain Quick Amberjewel for +40 Haste and when I'm not reforging Spirit, I am reforging haste at the moment until I reach about 12.5% when buffed. I'd also like to get around 2500 spirit. This is how things are currently looking: Click for my Armory. 

Once again, any advice and tips would be greatly appreciated. I am still learning having only played a few months but I'm using this as my friend.

So that is my week in-game folks, as usual would love to hear your comments.

2011 brings a lack of love for WoW

Firstly, I'll apologise for the lack of posts recently. I have been AFK during the Christmas period due to family commitments and in-game not much has been done, and the guild has been quiet - most likely for the same reasons there has been missing posts on this blog.

So what have I been doing in game? well, running normal level 85 dungeons for reputation. I've recently managed to get my rep up with Guardians of Hyjal in order to get a new epic belt Cord of the Raven Queen which is lovely, and I've added a belt buckle to give me an extra gem socket. and I'm currently working on Earthen Ring for Cloak of Ancient Wisdom (it has no spirit but not come across anything better?) and Flamebloom Gloves. Ideally I'd like to earn exalted with every Cataclysm faction. Now I've got decent blues, and reforged and enchanted, I'm finding normal 85's great fun.

Trouble is, I'm finding not a lot of cloth healer items - not many items on quartermasters have spirit, am I missing something very obvious? I am reforging spirit, but still a little disappointed!

I've also discovered a new found love for battlegrounds. When I first started playing WoW I was very much against PvP, honestly, it scared me but I've found them to be fun and relaxed and my battleground tactics are to try and hide behind something or stay far enough away that alliance players don't try to beat me up but I can still heal. I've found Prayer of Mending is my favourite spell in the battleground as is Holy Word: Sanctuary and Mass Dispel, if people are particularly annoying I stick my Shadowfiend on them. I even got the courage to carry the flag in Eye of the Storm, which was a massive thing for me, I picked it up, put my shield on me and ran and prayed that I wouldn't get attacked en route. I didn't. I earned the achievement Storm Capper and we also won... I'm not saying that  won the battleground for everyone...but I definitely feel like I played my part, and since I'm not concerned about PvP gear (because its just a bit of fun for me) I've spent my points on mounts :) I've even managed to get a few killing blows using Shadow Word: Death and all we need is to kill a Human Hunter for the guild achievement, Alliance Slayer.

But, honestly, I'm not enjoying the game at the moment. I'm finding heroics just too hard, and I don't know what I can do about it. I'm trying my best to heal effectively, I'm looking up the stats I should have and feeling pretty comfortable with my haste and spirit and other stats, getting a good amount of critical hits resulting in free heals, but people seem to take so much damage that I cant heal as quick as their damage and then we wipe, and wipe and wipe. Don't get me wrong, I expect to go into a heroic and wipe a few times, but its stressful and not fun anymore and that's why I am spending more time in a battleground than a dungeon. I have even re-learnt my talents in order to get Lightwell. Ive made two macros and I will be using it, and those who don't click it shall be feeling my wrath, never mind the Lich King's!

I hope beyond hope that when we start running guild heroics, which we are planning now Christmas is over that they will be more bearable and hopefully more entertaining with a bit a banter and chat and not so much pressure. Until then, I'm not sure how much activity this blog will see. My new year resolution is to fall back in love with the game, because at the moment I'd rather be experimenting with baking different kinds of  bread in my new bread maker (a Christmas present from the in-laws) than healing in a dungeon...and that is just seriously wrong!