Crafting Professions

In reponse to Gevlin's post, Why should the crafting system NOT change?

I would like standardization among the different professions. Right now, JC, Inscription, and Enchanting have monotonous tasks that other professions do not. That is milling, disenchanting and prospecting. All other professions pick a number of items to produce and click create and go afk while they are created, then come back and craft the final product the same way. What I ask for is standardization. One click can trigger a disenchant, mill, or prospect on multiple items. If that's not the way that Blizzard wants to go(and I'm OK if they go either way), then remove the ability for other classes to make more than 1 thing at a time so everyone has to click for each item.

If Blizzard wants to make things cheap, they will go with automating milling, prospecting and disenchanting, which I think is the best choice for them to make. This lowers the investment of time into crafting, and will generate more competition.
If Bliz goes the other way and makes intermediate crafting materials one click each, then there will be massive QQ, etc, but it would effectively raise the prices of all the crafted items from all professions. This would make crafting attractive to more people and it would cut down on the amount of items that an individual can craft in a given time.

I see benefits on both sides, but I really don't see Blizzard expanding the 1-click per item system. I think the choices are to leave it as is, or make it automated.

What I am really interested in is a revamp of the low level crafting items. There are tons of useless items spread across many professions right now, and from what I understand from Blizzard's news releases so far, we should expect to find more useful low level items available to crafters, so that it may actually become a meaningful decision between disenchanting and selling them on the AH.

When Should you leave a Guild?

It's time for another update, and this time around I'm going to talk about when to change guilds. To really have a background on where I'm coming from on this post, it would really take some familiarity with a blogger named Gevlon, AKA Greedy Goblin. His perspective on the game is often refreshing and he always attempts to look at things from a new perspective. He likes to challenge social behaviors and point out where they are unproductive or counter-productive, and suggest a more productive behavior to replace the default 'monkey' responses that are almost automatic.

From a raider's perspective a guild is a team that advances through current end-game content together, first tackling the normal encounters, then moving on to hard-modes, achievements, etc.

There are a lot of important aspects to a raiding guild's progression. A good recruiting staff, a loot distribution method that helps the guild's advancement through the content, and skilled players. If any one of these is missing a guild's advancement can be slowed, stopped or even reversed. By reversed I mean not able to take down bosses that they previously killed. This happens when skilled raiders leave the guild to go elsewhere, and the main reasons are lack of advancement and a perception of unfair loot distribution.

So this brings me to the aspects that should be weighted when evaluating your current guild in making a decision to move on.

1. Progress. How often is the guild downing new bosses? Progress rates vary wildly between guilds. If a raid is composed of 100% skilled raiders, then the guild will advance quickly, as that percentage approaches 0% the progress will come to a halt. By a skilled raider, I mean someone who optimizes their performance for the best possible output for their role, and who is capable of responding to events in a boss fight as they are needed to kill a boss. This relates back to having skilled players in the guild.

2. Attendance. Is there a full 25 man team with enough skilled players on standby to fill a 25-man raid for the current progression raid? This relates back to a good recruiting staff. A guild can be great, but if a few skilled players quit the game or leave the guild, the guild's progress will slow or halt very quickly unless those players are replaced with equal or better players.

3. Loot distribution. How fairly does your guild distribute loot? There is a risk vs reward aspect to loot. The lowest geared players are often going to be the newest recruits to the guild. The best advancement of the guild would be to give loot to the player with the lowest ilevel gear in that slot when the loot is optimal for his spec, or if the loot is not optimal for any spec give it to the player with the ilevel item who it is not optimal for. This of course is quite opposite to most loot distribution systems, and the reason for it is simple, players can quit a guild anytime they want with no repercussions. This is the risk. Most loot systems delay new players from getting loot one way or another or limit the amount of loot that new players get. However you have to consider how quickly you are getting geared. After a month or two in a guild you should have a fair chance at getting gear, if 25 pieces of loot drop you should have a fairly good chance at landing a piece that is optimal for your spec. Each boss on 25-man drops 4 pieces of loot, so 25 drops equates to roughly 6 bosses, which should be easy even for a guild that only raids twice a week.

So setting aside the emotional aspect of the decision, here are some firm items you can use to weight your decision: 1. Progress, 2. Attendance, and 3. Loot Distribution. If you find any of these aspects lacking it's always best to first bring it up to your guild officers, or guild master. Give them some time to fix the issues, but if you think you have given them sufficient time, and the problems continue then it's time to start looking. Put in applications with other guilds quickly, because sometimes the application process can take a long time.

Violet Proto Drake

After two years of working on holiday achievements. I have finally completed the last one (Love is in the Air) and received my drake. It was so totally worth it!

Blizzard Authenticator out of sync issues

I'm posting this here because I could find no mention of it on the Blizzard forums, etc. I have recently been having problems with my authenticator. It started off that I would not be able to login and two or three tries (of new keys generated from my authenticator) would get me in, and it slowly got worse from there. I was to the point last week that I had to get the code from my authenticator then wait about 30 seconds before hitting Enter, or I would get an authentication failure. So I e-mailed blizzard to ask them what to do. I got back the most horrible response.


Hello Alex,

Thank you for contacting Blizzard Billing and Accounts Services, If you are requesting that the Battle.net Mobile Authenticator be deactivated from the account due to receiving an error upon login that the Authenticator code entered is invalid, please try using the "Resync" button to see if that resolves the issue.

If you were unable to remove the authenticator using the "Resync" option, please submit the following documentation in order to deactivate the Battle.net Mobile Authenticator:

- A legible photocopy of the identification of the registered account user. Only a government issued photo ID or Birth Certificate will be accepted for the registered user. (School IDs are *not* accepted.)

- A copy of the TOU (Terms of Use) form found here: http://us.blizzard.com/support/article/BNETTOUFORM

You may send the information 3 different ways:

**EMAIL**
- Email as an attachment to Billing and Account Services: AccountServices@Blizzard.com
- Use the account name as the SUBJECT line
- Attachment must be under 5MB
- Attachments must be in JPG, GIF, or BMP format.
- Make sure that all attachments meet the recommend requirements. Security concerns may cause files with other formats or files that are too large to be filtered or deleted without response.

**FAX**
- (949) 725-0701

**MAIL**
- ATTN: Blizzard Authenticator
Billing & Account Services
Blizzard Entertainment
PO Box 18979
Irvine, CA 92623


To assure prompt processing of your submission please review the following tips:
- Be sure to include *ALL* of the requested documents. Missing or incomplete information may cause delays.
- Print and manually sign the TOU form. *DIGITAL SIGNATURES WILL NOT BE ACCEPTED* Processing will not proceed without the proper legal acknowledgement of the Terms of Service.

If you have any questions regarding this procedure, please e-mail our Billing and Account Services department at billing@blizzard.com or call us for live assistance. Billing representatives are on hand to take your call between 8am and 8pm Pacific Time, 7 days a week at 1-800-59-BLIZZARD (800-592-5499). Customers in Australia should call 1-800-041-378.


Ciro E.
Billing and Account Services Representative
Blizzard Entertainment


-----Original Message-----
From: alex@cresswell.org
To: web.support@blizzard.com
Sent: 1/20/2010 7:00:54 AM
Subject: [en]World of Warcraft -- Other -- Authenticator

Contact Information -----------------------
Name: Alex Cresswell
Email: alex@cresswell.org



System Information ------------------------
IP: 209.163.254.38

Request ------------------------------------
Product: World of Warcraft
Category: Other -- Authenticator

Description --------------------------------

Beginning this week my authenticator has been causing me to not be able to login immediately. It seems that my authenticator is out of sync with the server, because if I enter the code from the authenticator and immediately try to login I get authentication failure, but if I try again and enter the code and then wait about 15 seconds before logging in I get in fine. Is there a way to re-synchronize my authenticator with the server? Is this a common problem?


So after receiving this I was even more frustrated. I know that the mobile authenticator app has a 'Resync' button, but that gets me nowhere with my hardware authenticator. So I decided to see if I could get it fixed myself. I got it to work, and here's the solution in case you need to do the same:

From the main page on worldofwarcraft.com click on Account Management, and login. After login click on Home, then click on Change Security Options. This will get you to the page where you can remove your authenticator. You will have to enter two codes, and then will have to enter the serial # and the code to add it back again. I believe the server side requires two codes in case your authenticator is out of sync so it can verify that it's the right authenticator, and adding it back will sync the 'time' on the server side to the internal 'time' on your authenticator.

Hope this helps!

Gearing up with Emblems of Frost

This is my follow-up on part 1 of my gearing guide for your Arcane mage. In this post I'll cover how to spend your Emblems of Frost.

First off, I'm going to assume that you have a full set of ilevel 232 gear including 4 pieces of Tier 9. Whether or not that is true you should still be able to take away something useful from here, and if you don't have the gear then check out my previous post on gearing up to ilevel 232 gear. I would still recommend running the Heroic 5-man Icecrown Instances for your chance at the Battered Hilt until you are lucky enough to get a weapon from Icecrown Citadel itself.

So you've got a whole stack of Emblems of Frost, and want to know what to buy first? Well the answer is going to depend a lot upon what pieces of Tier 9 you have. What's that, you have all 5 pieces? Well then, let me list the order you should go for then:

1. Bloodmage Shoulderpads (Shoulders) - 60 Emblem of Frost - You should still be using your 4 piece Tier 9 set bonus.
2. Bloodmage Robe (Chest) - 95 Emblem of Frost - This is a nice jump from the Tier 9 chest, and will get you to the Tier 10 2-piece set bonus.
3. Bloodmage Leggings (Leggings) - 95 Emblem of Frost
4. Bloodmage Hood (Head) - 95 Emblem of Frost
5. Circle of Ossus (Waist) - 60 Emblem of Frost
6. Volde's Cloak of the Night Sky (Back) - 50 Emblem of Frost
7. Gloves of False Gestures (Hands) - 60 Emblem of Frost
8. Maghia's Misguided Quill (Trinket) - 60 Emblem of Frost

Patch 3.3 guide to gearing your Arcane Mage

I have wanted to do one of these posts for a long time, so I finally sat myself down to get it done. What I'm going to provide you with here is a Best-in-Slot (TM) list of gear that you can get doing current 5-man Heroic dungeon content, excluding Emblems of Frost. I'll follow up next week with the Emblems of Frost post. For each slot I'll list several options, and how to get them, either what dungeon they are from, or how many Emblems (and what type) it takes to get them. So kicking it all off, it's best to start with a weapon isn't it? Of course the Staff wielders are at a disadvantage because their DPS is going to be slightly lower than the Main Hand/Off-Hand mages, but to each his own.

If you are a sword or dagger wielding mage, then you'll want:

1. Seethe (Main Hand)- drops from Devourer of Souls in Heroic Forge of Souls

2. Chilled Heart of the Glacier (Main Hand) - drops from The Captain's Chest in Halls of Reflection

3. Spectral Kris (Main Hand) - drops from The Black Knight in Heroic Trial of the Champion

If you are more of a Two-Hander type of mage then you have:
1. Engraved Gargoyle Femur (Two-Hand) - drops from Sourgelord Tyrannus in Heroic Pit of Saron

2. Unspeakable Secret (Two-Hand) - drops from Forgemaster Garfrost in Pit of Saron

Right along with that Sword or Dagger you'll want a fancy off-hand. Here are the best:

1. Shriveled Heart (Off-hand) - drops from The Captain's Chest

2. Handbook of Obscure Remedies (Off-hand) - 25 Emblem of Heroism

Wands:

1. Brimstone Igniter - 25 Emblem of Triumph

2. Soulsplinter - drops from Falric in Heroic Halls of Reflection

3. Coffin Nail - random drop from ICC dungeons

Head:

For the head slot I recommend one of the non-Tier pieces since the non-Tier head is better than the non-Tier pieces for the other slots, but you do need to get your 4-piece Tier bonus, so make sure you pick up those Tier pieces!

1. Hood of Fiery Aftermath (Head) - 75 Emblem of Triumph

2. Hood of Smouldering Aftermath (Head) - 75 Emblem of Triumph

3. Sunstrider's Hood of Conquest (Head) - 50 Emblem of Triumph

Neck:

1. Arcane Loops of Anger (Neck) - drops from Devourer of Souls in Heroic Forge of Souls

2. Evoker's Charm (Neck) - 19 Emblem of Conquest

Shoulder:

1. Sunstrider's Shoulderpads of Conquest (Shoulder) - 30 Emblem of Triumph

2. Very Fashionable Shoulders (Shoulder) - drops from Bronjahm in Heroic Forge of Souls

3. Frayed Abomination Stiching Shoulders (Shoulders) - drops from Marwyn in Halls of Reflection

Back:

1. Disguise of the Kumiho (Back) - 25 Emblem of Valor

2. Kurisu's Indecision (Back) - drops from Eadric in Heroic Trial of the Champion

Chest:

1. Sunstrider's Robe of Conquest (Chest) - 50 Emblem of Triumph

2. Ancient Polar Bear Hide (Chest) - drops from Ick in Heroic Pit of Saron

3. Embrace of Madness (Chest) - drops from The Black Knight in Heroic Trial of the Crusader

Wrists:

1. Bracer of Worn Molars (Wrist) - drops from Falric in Heroic Halls of Reflection

2. Wraps of the Astral Traveler (Wrist) - 60 Emblem of Valor

3. Wristguards of Subterranean Moss (Wrist) - drops from Ick in Pit of Saron

4. Bindings of the Wicked (Wrist) - drops from Champions in Trial of the Champion

Hands:

1. Sunstrider's Gauntlets of Conquest (Hands) - 30 Emblem of Triumph

2. Touch of the Occult (Hands) - 28 Emblem of Conquest

3. Marwyn's Macabre Fingertips (Hands) - drops from Falric in Halls of Reflection

4. Handwraps of Surrendered Hope (Hands) - drops from The Black Knight in Trial of the Champion

Waist:

1. Braid of Salt and Fire (Waist) - drops from Ick in Heroic Pit of Saron

2. Sash of Potent Incantations (Waist) - 28 Emblem of Conquest

3. Essence of Anger (Waist) - drops from Devourer of Souls in Forge of Souls

4. The Confessor's Binding (Waist) - drops from Confessor's Cache in Trial of the Champion

Legs:

1. Sunstrider's Leggings of Conquest (Legs) - 50 Emblem of Triumph

2. Legwraps of the Master Conjurer (Legs) - 39 Emblem of Conquest

3. Rimewoven Silks (Legs) - drops from Scourgelord Tyrannus in Pit of Saron

4. Leggings of the Haggard Apprentice (Legs) - Confessor's Cache / Eadric's Cache in Trial of the Champion

Feet:

1. Prelate's Showshoes (Feet) - drops from Sourgelord Tyrannus in Heroic Pit of Saron

2. Ice-Steeped Sandals (Feet) - drops from Forgemaster Garfrost in Pit of Saron

3. Boots of the Crackling Flame (Feet) - drops from The Black Knight in Heroic Trial of the Champion

Rings:

1. Ashen Band of Destruction (Finger) - Friendly reputation with Ashen Verdict, gained through killing anything in Icecrown Citadel, definitely worth killing trash just to get this ring

2. Band of the Invoker (Finger) - 35 Emblem of Triumph

3. Band of Channeled Magic (Finger) - 25 Emblem of Valor

4. Sinner's Confession (Finger) - drops from Confessor's Cache in Heroic Trial of the Champion

Trinkets:

1. Talisman of Resurgence (Trinket) - 50 Emblem of Triumph

2. Abyssal Rune (Trinket) - drops from Confessor's Cache / Eadric's Cache in Trial of the Champion

3. Sundial of the Exiled (Trinket) - 40 Emblem of Heroism

4. Nevermelting Ice Crystal (Trinket) - drops from Scourgelord Tyrannus in Heroic Pit of Saron

Frustration with guild progress

Since back in November when I posted about downing Jaraxxus in 10-man, our guild has been blocked of any progress. It's not that we haven't tried, we have spent several nights attempting the faction champions. We've been back in Ulduar, to try a full clear, and have been suffering wipe after wipe on bosses that we have downed before. (Hodir, Thorim, and Freya have been the latest setbacks) We have yet to attempt Mimiron, General Vezax, and Yogg. We have had several attempts at Marrowgar, all met with lots of wiping. So the frustration has been building for sometime, and I'm starting to look at what else is available, because I'm seriously doubting the guild's ability to clear ICC before the next expansion. So far it has been frustrating to say the least of it. The people in the guild are all very fun to play with, but in the end I play Warcraft to see current content and take down bosses, that's why I play, and what I enjoy doing. So I'm currently LFG (looking for a guild). I'd really prefer not to have to server transfer, and there look to be several really good guilds on Aggramar, so after I get the best 5-man and badge gear that I can get for my mage, I'll be putting in some applications.

Achievements - Personal and Guild

Two new achievements, one by our guild, and one by me. The first achievement is breaking 20,000g for the first time. This has mostly been due to my AH sales of crafted items from Inscription, Tailoring, and Enchanting. I think I'll hold onto the money for now, I still have several characters that will need Epic Flying (5000g each), and maybe I'll buy a few high-end Tailoring recipes if I rack up enough gold to cover it all.
The second achievement was our guild's first kill of the Beasts of Northrend in Trial of the Crusader 10. Not only did we down the Beasts, we killed Lord Jaraxxus as well, but were stopped cold by the Faction Champions fight. We have yet to be able to take down a single champion in that fight, and are studying our strategy to see what needs to be done.

The pendulum swings in patch 3.2.2

A while back I wrote a post about gear progression and talent builds, from freshly dinging 80 through the current content. Patch 3.2.2 has changed all that, and I'd like to delve a little bit into this.

Category 1: This remains the same, Arcane is still the best build here because it provides you with 6% spell hit from talents, leaving only 289 spell hit to reach the hit cap.

Category 2: Things have been shaken up here because of the buffs to Arcane damage in patch 3.2.2.
Here are the relevant changes:
Mages
Arcane Blast: The buff from using this ability now stacks up to 4 times instead of 3, and each application increases mana cost by 175% instead of 200%. In addition, the duration of the buff has been reduced to 6 seconds.
Arcane Missiles: Casting this spell while both Missile Barrage and Clearcasting are active will cause only Missile Barrage to be consumed.
Talents
Arcane
Missile Barrage: The effect from triggering this talent now removes the mana cost of Arcane Missiles. In addition, the chance for Arcane Blast to trigger this talent is now 8/16/24/32/40%. All other listed spells continue to have a 4/8/12/16/20% chance to trigger it. This talent no longer has a chance to be triggered when spells miss.
Fire
Combustion: This talent now also increases the critical strike damage bonus of Fire spells by 50% while it is active. In addition, Living Bomb periodic ticks will no longer interact with the count or the charges on the talent.
To sum things up, Arcane damage has increased. Fire damage has increased slightly, and Frostfire damage has increased slightly (from combustion).
This makes changing specs after reaching 368 spell power a little dubious. Arcane damage is on par or better than Frostfire, and Frost spec outputs the lowest damage of all specs by a significant amount. Arcane is still heavily dependent upon spell haste, and Frostfire places a higher priority on spell crit, so depending how your gear is you may be better off with Frostfire.
Category 3: Again the choice to go to Fire spec is dependent upon gear at this point. If your gear is heavily into spell crit, then Fire is going to be better, but if you have a lot of spell haste heavy gear then Arcane will still be better. I'd recommend comparing the two for yourself with your gear selection to see how it works out. I use rawr, and I recommend it.

For further reference Arcane is receiving another buff in patch 3.3, further support for the Arcane spec, which I am highly in favor of. I just wish that Blizzard would make a viable Frost raiding spec possible. Replenishment does not make up for the loss of 1000+ dps.
Mages
Talents
Arcane
Arcane Empowerment: This talent now also grants 1/2/3% increased damage done by the mage's party or raid for 10 seconds after the mage gets a critical strike with Arcane Explosion, Arcane Missiles, Arcane Barrage, or Arcane Blast. This effect is exclusive with Ferocious Inspiration and Sanctified Retribution.

Why do guilds fail?

I have been reading some very interesting posts on raids and raiding which got me to thinking about the people that I raid with, and about pugs and what could possibly improve that situation. I arrived at the conclusion that the anonymity provided by Blizzard is at the root of the problem.
Consider this, when someone posts a comment or article on the internet that clearly shows their identity, they only post something that they are willing to stand behind, something that is aligned with their values, and they they are proud of, or at least feel very strongly about. When you give that same person anonymity when they post, they may be far more willing to "step outside the lines" fling hefty accusations that they can't backup, or any number of other malicious things. I believe the same thing happens in WoW. Right now it's all very anonymous and you create a virtual identity, i.e. a character name, that is in itself not even a permanent thing. Paid name changes cost only $10. The ease with which you can change the only identifiable characteristic of your character is quite low, and I believe gives rise to a lot of the idiocy that goes on. I would be fully in favor of Blizzard showing both the account name, and the real name of the player, and I'm not just talking the name that the account is registered under, because that can easily be faked. I'm talking about names on credit cards. Something that can't be faked. Sure this will still open up the door for people who use the monthly payment cards to stay anonymous, but if they want to remain anonymous then guilds can easily exclude those people. Also showing the account name that characters belong to would be an great leap forward. A lot of people wouldn't go to the trouble of creating another account just because of the costs involved in purchasing a new copy of WoW, BC, and WOLK. This would allow for a lot more accountability to be placed on someone. If you steal the guild bank and transfer servers, guess what your account name follows you, and your guild can make sure that those on the new server know just what you did. No more guild for you. If you want to get back in with a good guild, you now have to buy a new account complete with all the expansions and either transfer your character or create a new one. This would open the door for a site to show you who the good and bad players are. A service like Carfax, except for WoW. A player could place a notice about you on your player report, good or bad, and each account could have a history of activity, server transfers, guild changes, etc. Those players that attempt to infiltrate a guild just to steal, or that guild hop, or ninja loot could be easily identified, and black listed on the site so that guilds can easily exclude them from membership.
This brings me around to mention how our guild actually works, because it aligns with what I've mentioned. To join our guild you have to know someone in the guild. Not just online, but you have to actually have met them, know who they are, etc. Our guild is mostly made up of friends, family and co-workers. It's interesting how the guild has grown, and the connections. I joined upon the invitation of a co-worker. He joined through his sister, who was one of the founding members. There are several husband and wife pairs in the guild, as well as a father and daughter. All in all the guild is drama free, and it's because of the real relationships between these people. There's absolutely no anonymity in our guild, everyone has at least one real friend, relative, or co-worker who knows them, and it works great. Now this is not to say that we have downed all the current content. We're still working on the Antechamber in Ulduar 10, Trial 10 (first boss), and VoA Koralon. We have downed Naxx 10, Malygos 10, OS 10, and Naxx 25.

For interest here are the other posts that got me thinking.

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/ThePinkPigtailInn/~3/k5gBWIP4bG4/why-you-shouldnt-let-one-man-run-show.html
http://greedygoblin.blogspot.com/2009/09/better-devil-you-know.html

Mage Talent Progression and Gear Progression

I came across an interesting topic today, so decided to share my thoughts on the whole thing. I'm making a couple of assumptions right off the bat about you the mage, so I'll spell it out. First off you are concerned about performing the best you can in your current gear in a raid and topping the damage meter. Second you don't mind switching between specs, including getting new glyphs, and regemming your gear to optimize your damage. This takes quite a bit of cash. In total for me to switch from Arcane spec to Fire spec I spent about 400g. That included 10g for the respec at the trainer, and the rest went towards buying gems and glyphs for my new spec.

As a mage you are going to fall into one of several categories, which I'll define for you, and this will help you determine which spec will be best for you. One last thing that I assume is that you stack as much spell power as you can. Spell power is the single biggest contributor to damage that you can get as a mage after you reach hit cap for your spec, so stack on the spell power.

Category 1:

In your gear gemmed and enchanted, you have less than 368 spell hit. This would be most mages starting off. Coming out of leveling with the best items you can get from questing and dungeons, and with a few crafted items, you should scrape up all the spell hit you can get. Ignore spell haste and spell crit at this level and focus on getting those items that will increase your spell hit. At this stage Arcane is your best friend. With an Arcane build 56/3/12 you only need 289 spell hit to be capped thanks to Arcane Focus and Precision.

Category 2:

After a while as your progress through gear having a spell hit of 368 will be within reach for you. At this point (or even before that) you want to take a look at your gear and see how your spell crit and spell haste stack up. If you are heavy on spell crit, then at this point it would make sense to go with a Frostfire build 0/53/18. If you are heavy on spell haste then you would probably want to stick with Arcane until you build up at least 20% spell crit. I prefer the Arcane spec myself, so I stay with Arcane up until I reached Category 3. You can even switch over to the Frost spec 18/0/53 at this point if you like frost. If you go frost you want to cap your spell hit, then stack on the spell power and spell haste. I avoided taking Brain Freeze in my frost build, but YMMV, so check it out for yourself.

Category 3:

You have reached the pinnacle of spell hit, you can get to 446 spell hit with gems, enchants and gear. You will most likely have a decent amount of spell crit (at least 20%) even if you haven't been trying to get spell crit. At this point fire spec outshines frostfire, arcane, and frost. The main reason is that much of the gear at this level has huge amounts of crit, spell power and spell hit, and fire spec can do slightly more DPS than frostfire once you have reached the hit cap for fire spec. The build I use here is 18/53/0. The lack of any talents for spell hit means you have to gear to reach hit cap without any boost from talents. I didn't reach this point until I had a decent amount of gear from Ulduar 10, Heroic Trial of the Champion, and Naxxramas 25.

Beyond these levels I have yet to test, but progression looks to favor staying with the fire spec as Blizzard continues to pile on the spell crit on all the mage sets. I do sometimes miss my Frost and Arcane builds, as I like them both, but without spell haste on my gear to support these builds, I am just not competitive in dps.

Difficult Choices

So patch 3.2 hit last night, and I'm feeling the aftermath. CoDS went into the new 10-man crusader raid last night and got chewed up and spit out. We wiped a few times on the very first mini-boss before figuring out that we needed to switch tanks once the main tank got the bleed effect. Also the 15-yard radius around the boss in which spell casters shouldn't stand. We finally downed him but with only 3 left alive out of our 10, and the jormungers (or however it's spelled) ate us rather quickly. I'll chalk it up as a lesson learned: we are way undergeared for that content right now, even the first few mini-bosses. I am glad we got to see a fight first-hand without already knowing the fight, and able to analyze it and down it.
So in the aftermath of the patch I started updating all my addons and updated my rawr with the new gear today, and while I was playing with rawr noticed that my spec is no longer ahead of the Frostfire nor the Fire spec in damage. So that leaves me with a difficult choice now. Do I switch specs to the more popular frostfire spec and fire spec as my main and off spec, or do I keep my good old frost spec as a back and just jump into the fire spec, or do I keep arcane as my secondary spec. I'm a bit conflicted as I have really grown to like my arcane, and I have gotten quite good at it, but I'll be starting all over again if I go with either of these new specs, and I'll now be looking for spell crit gear vs spell haste gear, which means no going back once the change has been made. I guess I have been fighting the inevitable, since Blizzard has piled on the spell crit with the Tier 8 gear, so why fight it? I'll probably swap out my frost spec first so that I can keep my arcane spec available in case I have trouble with the learning curve of a new spec. After I'm comfortable then maybe I'll drop my arcane spec as well.

Malygos and Heroic Naxxramas cleared

Just a short update today.

I picked up The Spellweaver's Downfall, as Circle of Dark Scholars downed Malygos for the first time as a guild on 7/31. It was quite a fun night, then following on the success of Malygos, our joint run with Dread Pirates full cleared Heroic Naxxramas on Saturday, which was a first for me, so I now also have the achievement for Heroic Naxxramas.

As a side note I was very dissappointed with Gown of the Spell-Weaver. According to rawr this is not an upgrade over my Tier 7 chest piece Heros Frostfire Robe. The loss of my 2-piece set bonus is the critical part in that, because if I swap in the Tier 7 head Frostfire Circlet for my Faerlina's Madness, then it would be an upgrade. I'll have to stick with the Naxx runs and see if I can't pick up that tier 7 head.

I also picked up several pieces from Heroic Naxxramas, and I was very dissapointed to find that most of it was downgrades for me. Bindings of the Expansive Mind vs my Cuffs of Winged Leviathan, reasons here are that spell crit is far less valuable than spell haste for Arcane and Frost, and I'm already hit capped, so the spell hit is worthless, and the lack of spirit. Mantle of the Corrupted vs Valorous Frostfire Shoulderpads, again the loss of my 2-piece Tier 7 set bonus, the lower spell power (due to the socket in the tier piece), and the spell hit is unused because I'm already over the hit cap. The one upgrade that I did get was my tier 7.5 chest which replaces my tier 7 chest.

This all brings into very sharp focus the complexity of choosing loot. I ended up with several of these pieces because I rolled on them instead of letting them go to be disenchanted, so rest easy that I am not a total loot-whore. I use rawr on a regular basis to generate a list of upgrades from available items in game, but the interface leaves some things to be desired. I would primarily like the ability to filter the list by raid, so when I run Heroic Naxxramas I can see a list of what I need from just that raid, but in the lack of tools like this, it can be very confusing to new raiders on what piece of loot they should really go after, and what they should pass on.

Raiding as a mage

The DPS rotations have been done to death by other sites, so I wanted to do something a little different and talk about other spells you may be called upon to use while taking down a boss.
First off let's talk about damage absorption. All mages get Mana Shield, Frost Ward, and Fire Ward. If you're a frost mage, you can also take Ice Barrier. These damage shields are extremely useful on a lot of fights because they can take some load off of your healers. I will put the shield that I'm going to use for a particular fight on my bar so I can just hit a key to throw up the shield. Here are some fights that they are extremely useful: Heigan (Ice Barrier or Mana Shield during the dance), Sapphiron (Frost Ward), Sartharion (Fire Ward), Ignis (Fire Ward when you're in the pot). You should always be looking where you can take some healing pressure off of the healers, first because it will same them from going oom, and second because it might just save your ass in case the healers don't get to you in time.
Next up there's Ice Block, this can save your ass in a wide variety of situations. Can't make it behind Sapphiron's ice block in time? Throw up your own. Can't make it out of a lava wave on Sartharion, Ice Block through it. Pull aggro on some trash? Ice Block will send them right back at the tank.
Blink is probably an underused spell in raiding. There are a ton of situations where I find it helpful. During the dance with Heigan you may find yourself a little behind, you can use Blink to get where you want to be. Lava waves on Sartharion. Any situation where there is an AoE from the boss, such as Loken, Blink will give you a little more time to react. It will also free you from being rooted.
Invisibility has saved me so much money on repair bills I can't even count it all. Once a tank or off-tank goes down and you know it's a wipe, hit that invisibility button early because it will drop you out of combat. Stay away from random trash, such at Patchwerk in Naxx, if you run too far back you will pull the slimes and wipe the raid when you drop out of invisibility.
AoE: Blizzard is the king of AoE, use it responsibly. If you have a warrior tank be very wary of Blizzard. Be aware of your mana pool when using Blizzard as it takes quite a large chunk of mana, so use it sparingly.

Back on Track

After my transfer to the new server, my raiding has gotten back on track, and we have downed new bosses. Last night Circle of Dark Scholars on Aggramar downed Ignis the first time, completing the achievement The Siege of Ulduar. We are also now raiding Naxx 25 with the Dread Pirates, which so far has been going quite well. Overall I'm very happy with the raids what we're now doing, and we are pushing forward making progress and downing new bosses. Our next attempt is tonight and we are taking on the Iron Council.

Guild Collapse

So in what I consider a hostile take-over, the guild that I was an officer of for almost a year has completely collapsed. There were to several factors that built up the pressure that led to this take-over. First our guild master was absent for weeks, relying solely upon his co-gm and girlfriend to manage day to day guild things, including our guild website, guild applications, scheduling raids, and recruiting. Second the co-gm lost computer access, and was absent for several weeks from the guild. Third one of the raid leaders who was also an officer and our best geared tank took a hiatus from WoW because he couldn't afford to pay his monthly subscription. (I'm not sure there aren't other reasons behind this, but I don't know.) The other fact here is that a month or two back we merged with a guild called Crimson Legion, gave anyone from this guild an open invite, no application required, to join, and promoted their officers to officers in our guild, including bank access, but more importantly access to setting officer notes, which is used to store the EP/GP rankings for our guild.
That sets the stage for what unfolded on Tuesday when I logged in to send out invites for our regularly scheduled Ulduar run at 4pm server time. I log in expecting to see about a dozen or so guildies ready and prepped, and no-one is on. Our guild messages says that we are to transfer our mains to Crimson Legion. I check my friends list and several of my friends from the guild are on, and I do a who for Crimson Legion and see that they are all in fact part of that guild now. So I contact one of their officers and ask what's up. (This officer has been a regular raider with our guild) She explains that because no-one was posting raids a lot of members were talking about leaving and some had already left. Ok, so I ask what's the deal with all the the EPGP scores being screwed up. Well the officer from Crimson Legion who was promoted happened to have a mishap with his addon, and bjorked up the ratings. I don't believe that for a second. That was pure vandalism. So what is to be the new system for loot distribution? Well a lot of new 80s feel that the EPGP system is unfair because they don't get a shot at loot, so we're going to go with open rolls.
That was previously discussed among the officers of Sinners Paradise, and the loot system was put in place to prevent guild hoppers from getting lucky on rolls and yanking very sought after loot from regular raiders. (Which happened to me personally on 3 occasions) I was offered an officer position in the guild with guild bank access, but ultimately I decided that I didn't want to stay. Considering that there was no attempt to contact me at all before all this went down, and that I was the second most senior officer in the guild. I don't want to be a part of what has been done, and I consider it all a coup against the current guild leadership by the 'new 80s' and the officer that they complained to.
I would like to offer some advice to guild masters left in a situation like the above for whatever reason. If you are not going to be there for the guild, leave someone who is active with the ability to maintain the day-to-day activities if you want to have a guild left when you come back. In fact it would probably be best to just make them GM and step down. Had I been given access to our website, and been able to promote/demote and invite and kick people from the guild, this whole thing could have been avoided. So I have moved on and am now a member of Circle of Dark Scholars on Aggramar. I have several past co-workers and friends that I know in this guild, and so far all has been well. They have a very simple loot system, but I am comfortable with the people in this guild to know when they should roll, unlike a lot of the players on Ursin, who seem to roll for just about anything they can use even if it's a downgrade to their current gear.

BlizzCon tickets sold out

So I attempted on both May 16th and May 30th to get Blizzcon tickets for this year, however both time I narrowly missed the mark. I got in queue around 5345 the first time and 5315 the second time around, and it seem that only 5000 tickets were released both times. I'm a little frustrated by the whole thing, as I was on top of being at the site on time, but still didn't get tickets. I have a feeling that Blizzard is really missing the boat by choosing not to accommodate the number of people that want to attend. It's great to be an exclusive event, but if there is a huge gap between the number of people who would attend, and the number of people that get tickets, then why not close that gap? Is it a tactic by Blizzard to keep the event exclusive? Couldn't they at least meet 90% of the demand instead of say 50%? It would still keep the event exclusive and sold out, but when we're buying tickets this far in advance, don't you think they can scale things (at least some) to handle the load?

I also have some doubts as to the fairness of the system that they are employing, knowing a lot about the internet. Refreshing the page is quicker for those geographically closer to their servers (CA), and so they can get a refresh in less time than others. The only really fair way for them to do tickets is by lottery, since even if you're on a slow connection or half-way around the world, you'll still get a shot at tickets.

In closing I just want to say that although I didn't get tickets, I made my best effort, and congrats to those who got tickets.

Childrens week PvP achievements

So I completed the dreaded School of Hard Knocks achievement. I had almost given up on it until I saw my friend Heem complete it, then I became determined to knock it out. First I went to my bank and took a look at my gear to determine the best survivability gear that I could muster. I pulled out Deadly Gladiator's Silk Handguards, Deadly Gladiator's Silk Raiment, Glacial Waistband, and Glacial Slippers, and Medallion of Heroism. Then I went to the auction house and bought some resilience gems for the PvP gear, and spell power gems for my Sapphiron gear, and finally I went and bought Medallion of the Horde, since I knew I'd be needing it. I was all set to enter the battle grounds.

I entered EotS first, since it was the holiday battleground, and I thought it might be fairly busy. It took me some time to get used to my keybindings, I rebound Z,X,C,V and G to some of my 'get out of jail' abilities, e.g. Blink, Medallion of the Horde, Will of the Forsaken, Ice Block, and Medallion of Heroism. The first time through I was pretty confused with my new key bindings, and I attempted to cap the flag as much as I could, but I was repeatedly foiled by a shaman that kept knocking me off the middle, and even got MC'ed off the edge once as well. We lost, so I queued again, determined not to give up. This time through I got the second cap of the game, and I earned some achievements.

Next up, Arathi Basin. I really didn't stay in Arathi Basin for long. I had incredible luck, as I got thrown into games that were near the end. The first game I didn't even have time to run the the mine before the game ended with a loss. Second try I made it to the mine, along with a hunter, and there was a lone DK guarding it. It was depressing really that it took both of us focusing on the DK to take him down, and I had to use Ice Block to get his attention on the hunter or I would have died there. So we both survived, DK is dead, and we both rush the flag with our orphans at our side. I end up capping and about a minute later the game ends with another alliance win.
Next up WSG. (I figured save AV for the last as it'll take a long time) I queue and immediately am in a match. I take position above the flag room on the platform to the right, and just wait for the alliance to come for the flag. Our first attempt was horrible, alliance just steam-rolled us, and I think I may have taken down only 1 of their flag runners. Second WSG, same strategy, a bit more even of a match, and I take down two or three runners, but still don't return the flag. Third try, absolutely amazing this time. We steam-roll the alliance, I downed at least 5 flag runners, and I got the achievement this time as well as a perfect win 3/0 against the alliance and pick up a couple of WSG achievements along the way.

Last up was AV, which I wasn't looking forward to. First attempt I get into a match where the alliance basically own us. I look at the map and there is no red to speak of, about 2 minutes later the game ends in a win for the alliance. I queue again and this time I get a fresh game. I make a run for Stonehearth Bunker, and it's already been capped, so on to Icewing Bunker. I arrive with only one other Horde there who has already taken out several archers, so I cast invisibility and sneak up to the flag. I start capping, and an archer plugs me with an arrow. The awesome DK who is with me jumps on the archer and I begin capping again. This time I finish and voila I have the achievement. I wasn't real motivated to finish the AV, so at that point I left, having got my achievement, but I am a little intrigued by PvP now. This is probably the best I have ever been geared for PvP, and with the right trinkets, and key binds, I was a lot more survivable than ever before. I still wasn't using a PvP spec or the right glyphs, so there is still even more room for improvement, and when I finished the whole thing I realized that I had a Scroll of Enchant Chest - Exceptional Resilience sitting around in my bank. So now I'm planning my next foray into PvP, and really considering giving arenas a try. I know there are several good players into PvP in my guild, and I might just see if we can get a 3v3 team going.
Also to Euripedes at Critical QQ, my sympathies, perhaps you should take the week off of battlegrounds?

Naxxramas 10-man guild run first full-clear in 1 night

I have some very exciting news this week. Tuesday was our regular guild run through Naxxramas, and we usually run two groups a week through 10-man Naxx. This week I went to the first 10-man group, and we had everything we needed except for the off-tank. Our MT is a DK that is specced for single-target tanking, so we picked up an awesome Prot Pally OT, and started on our run. We started on Arachnid quarter first, we downed Abun'Rekan very easily. We took out Faerlina with not problems, and we didn't use the adds to remove her enrage, our healers just healed on through. We finally got to Maexxina and we wiped due to the slow releasing of players from the web wrap, and she got off a web spray after she was Frenzied. So our second run I focused more on the web wraps, and despite her getting a web spray after Frenzy, we still downed her.
Next quarter up was plague quarter. Our DPS was pretty good, so we had practically no problems here. This was my first encounter with Heigan that I lived through, and it's really to the credit of our healers that I survived. I did get hit several times by the green lava, but our healers kept me up, and we downed him before we got to the second round of the dance. Loatheb went well, to our healers credit, and the plague quarter was clear.
Moving on we went to the Construct quarter next. Our first real challenge here was Gluth, and our team of kiters (a hunter named Foxkin, and a new DK) had issues and died before we could down Gluth. Our second attempt we reassigned our shaman to be on kite duty with the hunter and with his earthbind totem the kiters were able to keep the zombies under better control, and we downed Gluth. Thaddius went amazingly well considering that several people were new to the fight. Our timing on the mini-bosses was good as usual, and there were only a few minor bruises from the positive and negative charges, and Thaddius went down without much of a fight.
On we go to Military quarter, and we took down Razuvious without a problem. Gothik is one of the easier fights here in my opinion and I got to do the undead side. Four horsemen took two attempts, and I was tanking in the back with our hunter Foxkin for the first part of the fight. I died (due to our single shared healer in the back not being able to handle healing us both) just as the after the first boss went down, and our MT picked up tanking for me. I sat and watched as the group successfully downed the remainder. This was a difficult fight for our healers, and I have much respect for them.
We downed Sapphiron rather easily despite many people not having frost resist gear, and being new to the fight, but after the air phase of Sapphiron everyone understood what to do from there on, and I kept on decurse duty faithfully.
Kel'Thuzad has proven a difficult fight for us for some reason, maybe we're just tired, or maybe we are a little low on DPS for this fight. Anyhow someone always manages to end up dying to a Shadow Fissure, or our healers don't get a heal off on a Frost Blast target, and we have had our OT or MT go down in phase 3 but still somehow managed to bring down Kel'Thuzad. This was really the fight that I came for, hoping to get the T7 head, but no drop this week. I did however pick up the T7 legs from Thaddius, so it was a good run for me. I'm getting down to a mere handful of items left for me to upgrade in Naxxramas 10, so I'm hoping we will soon move up to Malygos 10, or even Naxx 25.

Phew Loot is out

Well I reported earlier this week that the loot from 25 Vault was not distributed, the GM ticket finally went through and the loot should be on it's way to recipients. I felt very bad about everyone not getting their loot from this run, and it's certainly a relief that I have been able to make up for it. Thank you for your patience while this was resolved, and enjoy your lewtz!