Yesterday evening I was digging through my blog to clean up some markup when I noticed that it was about 6 months ago since I last took a good look at my character progression.
So in what has become the only real tradition over here at noobding it's time to take another look at 'then' and 'now' in terms of character progression and hopefully, finally, come up with some worthy goals that do not involve levelling (yeah... who am I kidding).
Back in november the field looked something like this and if you'll remember wrath just hit the shelves so there's some serious TBC nostalgia here:
Capsize - lvl 70 undead warlock
Capstone - lvl 70 blood elf paladin
Capricious - lvl 64 troll hunter
Capibara - lvl 68 tauren druid
Capone - lvl 43 Orc rogue
Capeesh - lvl 31 Orc warrior
Capacitate - lvl 35 undead priest
Capitulate - lvl 40 Blood elf mage
Capow - lvl 35 Tauren shaman
Cap???? - lvl 55 ???? Death Knight
Now 6ish months further down the line the field looks like this (level diference in brackets):
Capsize - lvl 80 undead warlock (+10)
Capstone - lvl 80 blood elf paladin (+10)
Capricious - lvl 70 troll hunter (+6)
Capibara - lvl 80 tauren druid (+12)
Capone - lvl 43 Orc rogue (+0)
Capeesh - lvl 34 Orc warrior (+3)
Capacitate - lvl 44 undead priest (+9)
Capitulate - lvl 58 Blood elf mage (+18)
Capow - lvl 50 Tauren shaman (+15)
Capsickle - lvl 63 Orc Death Knight (+8 from 55)
Which comes down to about 90 levels in the period from november till now putting me at just about 1/2 a level a day.
That doesn't sound too exciting and is definitely down from my usual average but considering I took a new job back in february which cut my wow time down by at least 50% and the treck from 70 to 80 is a slow one I am not really unhappy with the progress (I have 3 80's now after all).
Looking at the totals I now have a remainder of 198 levels to go till the glorious 800 levels mark which at half a level a day would take me a solid year to complete.
Due to more relaxed job circumstances I expect that average to go back up to 1/day though so those 198 levels are looking a hell of a lot more manageable.
In the meantime I rest safely with the thought that even though I still have 198 levels to go I did already complete 602 of the 800 total putting me just over the 75% mark.
The general idea now is to slowly quest up my various characters till they hit northrend where they will be put on a slow drip of daily progression. Starting out with the kalu'ak dailies following by dailies in grizzly hills, then the oracle dailies and last but not least the argent tourney dailies (+ others) should ensure slow but stead progression whilst I work on getting the rest of the team up to northrend levels.
Primary goals at this point include getting the jewelcrafting and inscription professions up. Since they're unfortunately stuck on a pair of lowbies I'll have no choice but to prioritize both the shaman and the priest over other characters.
Mind you this doesn't exactly fill me with glee. Both characters are decent enough to level but have failed to capture my imagination so far (like most characters under level 50) so lets hope it won't be too much of a chore to get them to the level requirements for their professions (60 or 65 I believe it was).
In the meantime I remain steadfast on the course to 10x80 with other goals falling by the wayside or being picked up as things go along.
And you? Level much these days? I certainly haven't seen you in Azeroth (come to think of it I haven't seen anyone while questing in azeroth anywhere... hmmmm).
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
Sunday, May 10, 2009
Argent Tournament Evaluated
As you may or may not know I have been putting some of my characters through the ropes over at the argent tournament ground. And whilst the large collection of dailies certainly helped my druid do the jump from 78 to 80 in no time I can't help but say I am a little dissapointed.
It's not so much the concept that bothers me. Basically you go through stages where you collect 'badges' through jousting matches and dailies for your selected faction. Once you collect enough of these 'badges' you become a champion of that faction and can make use of the faction specific vendor. Once you completed a faction you can pick the next faction to pursue championhood with.
All in all the idea of unlocking faction vendors and faction specific rewards really spoke to me. After all, here is something that given time any solo player can do without too much hassle and you get a whole slew of titles while you do it.
There are however a few things on the argent tournament ground that really takes away from the intensity of it all and makes it look like more of a fair than an actual tourney.
1. Enemies don't scale well. Once you have the basic strategy down on how to beat a valiant you can use the same strategy to destroy champions, lieutenants, the black knight and even those pesky commanders out in the scourge fields. In other words, once you beat one you can beat them all.
2. No epic storyline quests (in fact very little non-dailies whatsoever). At the least something along the lines of the wrathgate quest that would take you a while to complete and offer up a nifty cinematic if nothing else. Instead we get nothing except all the factions playing pokeystick in the lich king's backyard. You'd think factions would be a tad more involved in training champions that are supposed to topple the lich king's might.
3. All the faction vendors sell 90% of the same crud. I don't mind unlocking x factions at 5 days each but I'd like it if the vendors were selling things that were more faction specific. A pet and an overprized mount are certainly not going to draw me over the line here (even if the mounts will cost less 'badges' with some patch to come). Implement some 'this faction only' kind of gear, trinkets and whatnot and you'll definitely see some motivation towards doing more than just one or two factions.
4. It doesn't feel like you're contributing anything. Sure they're building a big arena thingie in icecrown even though I can't fathom why you'd build something like that... 'there' ( You could at least pick someplace warm ). But beyond that you're not really feeling the whole 'fuel the war effort' vibe that you'd expect from a place like that. Give us a war on the outskirts of the tourney ground where you can go crazy with different types of vehicles. Gives us quests to seek out the monstrous champions of the lich king all over azeroth (medivh knows the place could use a visit), give us something to make us feel like we're doing something towards the war effort.
5. Players are not motivated to joust players other than to grab a quick achievement. If nothing else you should be able to joust other players and receive something that'll contribute to your overall standing with your faction. Hell, even some reputation at that point would be good but anything to motivate a little bit more player jousting activity.
So all in all I am a little on the fence about the whole argent tournament. There's quite a few things I rather like and the overall concept is a great one but there's just so much more that could've been done to make the tourney as epic as it should be.
Then again the argent tournament was sort of a 'bonus' that came with the whole 3.1. content patch so this is by no means a vicious rant on how terrible it all is (I am still playing it after all) but just thinking of what the tourney could be really puts a damper on the experience.
As it stands I'll settle for an 'somewhat poorly implemented'.
On the bright side: the more frustrating the tourney is the fewer people will be running around with crusader titles which is at least worth something...
So what do you think? Break a lance or would you rather try and fish up a turtle?
It's not so much the concept that bothers me. Basically you go through stages where you collect 'badges' through jousting matches and dailies for your selected faction. Once you collect enough of these 'badges' you become a champion of that faction and can make use of the faction specific vendor. Once you completed a faction you can pick the next faction to pursue championhood with.
All in all the idea of unlocking faction vendors and faction specific rewards really spoke to me. After all, here is something that given time any solo player can do without too much hassle and you get a whole slew of titles while you do it.
There are however a few things on the argent tournament ground that really takes away from the intensity of it all and makes it look like more of a fair than an actual tourney.
1. Enemies don't scale well. Once you have the basic strategy down on how to beat a valiant you can use the same strategy to destroy champions, lieutenants, the black knight and even those pesky commanders out in the scourge fields. In other words, once you beat one you can beat them all.
2. No epic storyline quests (in fact very little non-dailies whatsoever). At the least something along the lines of the wrathgate quest that would take you a while to complete and offer up a nifty cinematic if nothing else. Instead we get nothing except all the factions playing pokeystick in the lich king's backyard. You'd think factions would be a tad more involved in training champions that are supposed to topple the lich king's might.
3. All the faction vendors sell 90% of the same crud. I don't mind unlocking x factions at 5 days each but I'd like it if the vendors were selling things that were more faction specific. A pet and an overprized mount are certainly not going to draw me over the line here (even if the mounts will cost less 'badges' with some patch to come). Implement some 'this faction only' kind of gear, trinkets and whatnot and you'll definitely see some motivation towards doing more than just one or two factions.
4. It doesn't feel like you're contributing anything. Sure they're building a big arena thingie in icecrown even though I can't fathom why you'd build something like that... 'there' ( You could at least pick someplace warm ). But beyond that you're not really feeling the whole 'fuel the war effort' vibe that you'd expect from a place like that. Give us a war on the outskirts of the tourney ground where you can go crazy with different types of vehicles. Gives us quests to seek out the monstrous champions of the lich king all over azeroth (medivh knows the place could use a visit), give us something to make us feel like we're doing something towards the war effort.
5. Players are not motivated to joust players other than to grab a quick achievement. If nothing else you should be able to joust other players and receive something that'll contribute to your overall standing with your faction. Hell, even some reputation at that point would be good but anything to motivate a little bit more player jousting activity.
So all in all I am a little on the fence about the whole argent tournament. There's quite a few things I rather like and the overall concept is a great one but there's just so much more that could've been done to make the tourney as epic as it should be.
Then again the argent tournament was sort of a 'bonus' that came with the whole 3.1. content patch so this is by no means a vicious rant on how terrible it all is (I am still playing it after all) but just thinking of what the tourney could be really puts a damper on the experience.
As it stands I'll settle for an 'somewhat poorly implemented'.
On the bright side: the more frustrating the tourney is the fewer people will be running around with crusader titles which is at least worth something...
So what do you think? Break a lance or would you rather try and fish up a turtle?
Monday, May 4, 2009
GC says: No more changes
Well it looks like big blue got a little fed up with all the patching and decided to call an overall freeze on the more significant talent changes. Behold the post of the mighty ghostcrawler on the oboards that was made sometime last saturday:
"When players feel weak, they tend to ask how often until the next hotfix or patch comes around.
When players feel strong, they wonder why we have to change things so often.
That said, I don't think you will continue to see as much class change for the rest of Lich King. Many of the changes in 3.1 were to address problems introduced when we made big changes in 3.0. You can look at the classes that have had the most iteration, and in most cases those are the classes who were restructured a little bit in Lich King: warlocks, hunters, priests, paladins and the new class.
We will continue to tweak numbers up and down as needed, but I would not anticipate as many talent or mechanic changes for the next several patches (though there will be some)."
This is certainly a bit of a doozy since it has widespread implications on the current game. To take GC's words rather bluntly it basically says that if you're not happy with your class now your chances of it being fixed beyond some number tweaking are pretty much nil. That is until patch 4.0 or so which for all intents and purposes could be years away (or 'soon' as blizzard likes to call it).
So without too much drama or QQ about how those miserable bastards basically kicked my warlock to the curb, shot my hunter through the head and elevated my puny level 61 DK to godhood status lets take a quick look at wow census.
Why? because it's reasonable to assume that the most popular classes now, will be more or less the most popular classes all the way through wrath:
Allright, I'd say that pretty much speaks for itself... the bottom end is still clearly shared by rogues, warlocks and shamans and the top end is still looking at a lot of love for pallies and dk's.
Cross this data with the arena representation for the freshly bred season 6 here
And voila, it's safe to say: If you're on the bottom half of both curves and you're not happy with your talents as they are you might as well re-roll, well wait a few weeks and then re-roll since season 6 is fresh off the plate.
That's right... re-roll... don't roll with the punches, don't try to adapt your miserable talent spec that doesn't make you happy through adjusting a playstyle that doesn't make you happy in the hopes that a future patch will make you happy.
It won't, because there will be no patch to fix you until blizzard decides to get sick of whomever holds on to their decrepid class and maintains a steady stream of whines on the oboards for the next months.
So the waters will indeed become stagnant and start to stink over the next few months as blizzard's developers either find some time to put into diablo and starcraft or find themselves out on the street wondering what the hell happened to their cosy jobs messing up our talent trees.
At least I am not alone in this life raft of misery *waves at the hunter sitting behind him*... now if you will excuse me I have to will myself into liking my Deathknight.
*unghhhhh*
"When players feel weak, they tend to ask how often until the next hotfix or patch comes around.
When players feel strong, they wonder why we have to change things so often.
That said, I don't think you will continue to see as much class change for the rest of Lich King. Many of the changes in 3.1 were to address problems introduced when we made big changes in 3.0. You can look at the classes that have had the most iteration, and in most cases those are the classes who were restructured a little bit in Lich King: warlocks, hunters, priests, paladins and the new class.
We will continue to tweak numbers up and down as needed, but I would not anticipate as many talent or mechanic changes for the next several patches (though there will be some)."
This is certainly a bit of a doozy since it has widespread implications on the current game. To take GC's words rather bluntly it basically says that if you're not happy with your class now your chances of it being fixed beyond some number tweaking are pretty much nil. That is until patch 4.0 or so which for all intents and purposes could be years away (or 'soon' as blizzard likes to call it).
So without too much drama or QQ about how those miserable bastards basically kicked my warlock to the curb, shot my hunter through the head and elevated my puny level 61 DK to godhood status lets take a quick look at wow census.
Why? because it's reasonable to assume that the most popular classes now, will be more or less the most popular classes all the way through wrath:
Allright, I'd say that pretty much speaks for itself... the bottom end is still clearly shared by rogues, warlocks and shamans and the top end is still looking at a lot of love for pallies and dk's.
Cross this data with the arena representation for the freshly bred season 6 here
And voila, it's safe to say: If you're on the bottom half of both curves and you're not happy with your talents as they are you might as well re-roll, well wait a few weeks and then re-roll since season 6 is fresh off the plate.
That's right... re-roll... don't roll with the punches, don't try to adapt your miserable talent spec that doesn't make you happy through adjusting a playstyle that doesn't make you happy in the hopes that a future patch will make you happy.
It won't, because there will be no patch to fix you until blizzard decides to get sick of whomever holds on to their decrepid class and maintains a steady stream of whines on the oboards for the next months.
So the waters will indeed become stagnant and start to stink over the next few months as blizzard's developers either find some time to put into diablo and starcraft or find themselves out on the street wondering what the hell happened to their cosy jobs messing up our talent trees.
At least I am not alone in this life raft of misery *waves at the hunter sitting behind him*... now if you will excuse me I have to will myself into liking my Deathknight.
*unghhhhh*
Monday, April 27, 2009
Noblegarden: Nobility in a day
Who'd thought that becoming of noble blood didn't take years of arduous labour under some king or the other trying to prove your worth for all eternity or even a quick marriage into a royal bloodline.
No, Instead it turns out that with a few hours of picking up brightly colored eggs even the lowliest of jenkins can become of noble birth.
For those of you unfamiliar with the noblegarden event I can summarize it really quick by saying it's the wow-variant of easter involving mostly exclusively picking up (not so) brightly colored eggs from your respective starter zones.
Yes, starter zones, you remember those places you haven't been to in the last month or 12? Areas like brill, razor hill and falconwing squary are now brimming with life.
But enough with the inane babble and lets go on the fast-track to becoming a noble in a day. What we're after is the title 'the noble' which is available through the new noblegarden achievements of which you have to complete the following (if it's not listed here you don't need it for the title):
Blushing Bride
Kiss someone wearing an Elegant Dress while wearing a White Tuxedo Shirt and Black Tuxedo Pants.
Chocoholic
Eat 100 Noblegarden Chocolates during the Noblegarden celebration.
Desert Rose
Use Spring Robes to plant a flower in each of the deserts listed (check the achievement for locations).
Hard Boiled
Lay an egg in Un'Goro Crater's Golakka Hot Springs as a rabbit during the Noblegarden celebration. (just go there as a rabbit or bring a friend that has a rabbit transformation branch and stand around there for a few minutes as a rabbit)
I Found One!
Find a Brightly Colored Egg.
Noble Garden
Hide a Brightly Colored Egg in Silvermoon (or stormwind if you joined the other side) City.
Shake Your Bunny-Maker
Use Spring Flowers to place rabbit ears upon females of at least 18th level. (note the level requirement and the 5 minute cooldown on the quest item)
Spring Fling
Find your pet Spring Rabbit another one to love in each of the towns listed.
(basically just go to all the starter towns with your pet out and run into someone else's pet bunny)
The achievements themselves are fairly self explanatory but I added a few comments here and there. All the items you need for the achievement are purchasable from the easter candy vendor.... but...
The first thing we have to realize is that any of the needed items can also randomly be found when opening brightly colored eggs.
The second thing we need to realize is that the drop rate for whatever we want at the time (pray for the pet) is abysmal so we'll need anywhere in the neighbourhood of 200-300 brightly colored eggs. That's a lot of eggs my friends and so pick a starter area that's fairly quiet for your egg hunt. Falconwing square in my case was pretty quiet.
Pick up the 2 quests available for the easter event and then look around. Eggs spawn all over the place but respawn in the same spot quite often. Eggs like stuff to spawn in, spawn next to walls and generally any crevace or crack they can find. Observe the spawning pattern for a while and then stand at a spot where you can see 3 or more spots where eggs appear and then just stand there until they spawn.
You can run around like a headless chicken looking for eggs but that will actually result in you finding 'less' eggs than you would by just standing there and acting cool waiting for a spawn.
Yes, it's spawn camping, no it isn't exactly on the morally up and up but you need 200+ of the damn things and the sooner you're done the better for everyone.
Incidentally you also got a egg basket which next to a spiffy fashion accessory can also give you a 60% run speed buff in the egg-finding zones which is just what the doctor ordered for staying ahead, or at least at the same speed as the competition.
Crack open all the eggs you find. Eggs don't stack but the chocolate inside them will... every item from here on in is a great find but what you're hoping for is some spring flowers, a bunny pet and a robe that allows you to plant flowers. The tuxedo pants and shirt are needed for an achievement (the kiss) but are only 25 candy from the vendor so I myself opted to buy them at the time.
The trick is not to buy anything from the vendor until you're pretty sure you don't need to collect any additional 'brightly colored eggs' which is somewhere in the neighbourhood of 200 - 300 depending on your luck (I've heard of someone finding everything they needed in the first 50 eggs... normal people will need more eggs... luck-challenged people like myself should just go for the 300 mark).
That's all there is to it except a quick trip around the world for the various achievements... but primarily it's all about collecting eggs.
A perfect title for anyone who has a few hours to burn or just can't seem to get a hold of a title at all.
No, Instead it turns out that with a few hours of picking up brightly colored eggs even the lowliest of jenkins can become of noble birth.
For those of you unfamiliar with the noblegarden event I can summarize it really quick by saying it's the wow-variant of easter involving mostly exclusively picking up (not so) brightly colored eggs from your respective starter zones.
Yes, starter zones, you remember those places you haven't been to in the last month or 12? Areas like brill, razor hill and falconwing squary are now brimming with life.
But enough with the inane babble and lets go on the fast-track to becoming a noble in a day. What we're after is the title 'the noble' which is available through the new noblegarden achievements of which you have to complete the following (if it's not listed here you don't need it for the title):
Blushing Bride
Kiss someone wearing an Elegant Dress while wearing a White Tuxedo Shirt and Black Tuxedo Pants.
Chocoholic
Eat 100 Noblegarden Chocolates during the Noblegarden celebration.
Desert Rose
Use Spring Robes to plant a flower in each of the deserts listed (check the achievement for locations).
Hard Boiled
Lay an egg in Un'Goro Crater's Golakka Hot Springs as a rabbit during the Noblegarden celebration. (just go there as a rabbit or bring a friend that has a rabbit transformation branch and stand around there for a few minutes as a rabbit)
I Found One!
Find a Brightly Colored Egg.
Noble Garden
Hide a Brightly Colored Egg in Silvermoon (or stormwind if you joined the other side) City.
Shake Your Bunny-Maker
Use Spring Flowers to place rabbit ears upon females of at least 18th level. (note the level requirement and the 5 minute cooldown on the quest item)
Spring Fling
Find your pet Spring Rabbit another one to love in each of the towns listed.
(basically just go to all the starter towns with your pet out and run into someone else's pet bunny)
The achievements themselves are fairly self explanatory but I added a few comments here and there. All the items you need for the achievement are purchasable from the easter candy vendor.... but...
The first thing we have to realize is that any of the needed items can also randomly be found when opening brightly colored eggs.
The second thing we need to realize is that the drop rate for whatever we want at the time (pray for the pet) is abysmal so we'll need anywhere in the neighbourhood of 200-300 brightly colored eggs. That's a lot of eggs my friends and so pick a starter area that's fairly quiet for your egg hunt. Falconwing square in my case was pretty quiet.
Pick up the 2 quests available for the easter event and then look around. Eggs spawn all over the place but respawn in the same spot quite often. Eggs like stuff to spawn in, spawn next to walls and generally any crevace or crack they can find. Observe the spawning pattern for a while and then stand at a spot where you can see 3 or more spots where eggs appear and then just stand there until they spawn.
You can run around like a headless chicken looking for eggs but that will actually result in you finding 'less' eggs than you would by just standing there and acting cool waiting for a spawn.
Yes, it's spawn camping, no it isn't exactly on the morally up and up but you need 200+ of the damn things and the sooner you're done the better for everyone.
Incidentally you also got a egg basket which next to a spiffy fashion accessory can also give you a 60% run speed buff in the egg-finding zones which is just what the doctor ordered for staying ahead, or at least at the same speed as the competition.
Crack open all the eggs you find. Eggs don't stack but the chocolate inside them will... every item from here on in is a great find but what you're hoping for is some spring flowers, a bunny pet and a robe that allows you to plant flowers. The tuxedo pants and shirt are needed for an achievement (the kiss) but are only 25 candy from the vendor so I myself opted to buy them at the time.
The trick is not to buy anything from the vendor until you're pretty sure you don't need to collect any additional 'brightly colored eggs' which is somewhere in the neighbourhood of 200 - 300 depending on your luck (I've heard of someone finding everything they needed in the first 50 eggs... normal people will need more eggs... luck-challenged people like myself should just go for the 300 mark).
That's all there is to it except a quick trip around the world for the various achievements... but primarily it's all about collecting eggs.
A perfect title for anyone who has a few hours to burn or just can't seem to get a hold of a title at all.
Argent Tournament: Dealing with Valiants
With my paladin stuck knee-deep in the noblegarden event (more on that some other time) which seems to mostly involve an infinite string of picking up not-so-brightly-colored eggs I started musing on how to continue levelling my druid.
Now at a healthy level 78, the xp/hour through questing is good but has the unfortunate side effect that in order to progress him I am literally taking time away from all my other lovely alts.
So I decided to put my druid through the initial quest chains for the argent tournament and while the first couple of days of dailies hardly proved to be a challenge the next set of dailies can, but don't have to be, a bit of a pain in the arse.
I am talking about duelling valiants. No, they're not difficult to beat in general (after the first time) but the trick is to beat them fast so you can be on your merry way to do other things.
So here's my simple approach to defeating valiants quickly:
1. Charge up your defend to max (3) before you initiate the duel
2. Accept the challenge, you'll note that the valiant will 9 out of 10 times start to move away from you so open with a ~CHARGE~
3. After the charge curve around (I mean curve, not stand and turn, just make a smoothish half circle) and close the distance between the valiant and you, if you can, spam your ~SHIELD BREAKER~ ability to see if you can get a shield breaker in before you get close to him
4. At melee range priority 1 is to keep your ~DEFEND~ up at max (you shouldn't be needing to defend much, just make sure the buff doesn't drop off if you're at max defend) and spam ~THRUST~
5. You will notice after a short stint of melee the valiant will try to get some distance between him/her and you. When that happens go back to nr 2 and rinse and repeat the entire cycle.
What doesn't work:
1. Keeping your enemy at range. Valiants don't seem to have any significant cooldowns on their abilities which means they can ~SHIELD BREAKER~ and ~CHARGE~ you quite a bit if you keep them at range
2. Melee combat with anything less than a full stack of ~DEFEND~ is really bad for your HP
3. ~SHIELD BREAKER~ before ~CHARGE~ doesn't always work and when it doesn't it usually leaves you open to be charged or otherwise attacked by the valiant.
4. Starting out without a full stack of ~DEFEND~ really puts you behind since you'll be trading in a lot of damaging attacks just on building up your shield.
On a side note: Should you ever fight a gnome valiant note that their defend icons are really really tiny so can be somewhat hard to see.
The 'strategy' seems to work quite well on any NPC you can joust including the lieutenants you have to kill in the scourge area in the southern part of icecrown (daily).
There's not much to it, but I've seen some people break a bit of a sweat over the valiants so I thought I'd throw this out there.
Now at a healthy level 78, the xp/hour through questing is good but has the unfortunate side effect that in order to progress him I am literally taking time away from all my other lovely alts.
So I decided to put my druid through the initial quest chains for the argent tournament and while the first couple of days of dailies hardly proved to be a challenge the next set of dailies can, but don't have to be, a bit of a pain in the arse.
I am talking about duelling valiants. No, they're not difficult to beat in general (after the first time) but the trick is to beat them fast so you can be on your merry way to do other things.
So here's my simple approach to defeating valiants quickly:
1. Charge up your defend to max (3) before you initiate the duel
2. Accept the challenge, you'll note that the valiant will 9 out of 10 times start to move away from you so open with a ~CHARGE~
3. After the charge curve around (I mean curve, not stand and turn, just make a smoothish half circle) and close the distance between the valiant and you, if you can, spam your ~SHIELD BREAKER~ ability to see if you can get a shield breaker in before you get close to him
4. At melee range priority 1 is to keep your ~DEFEND~ up at max (you shouldn't be needing to defend much, just make sure the buff doesn't drop off if you're at max defend) and spam ~THRUST~
5. You will notice after a short stint of melee the valiant will try to get some distance between him/her and you. When that happens go back to nr 2 and rinse and repeat the entire cycle.
What doesn't work:
1. Keeping your enemy at range. Valiants don't seem to have any significant cooldowns on their abilities which means they can ~SHIELD BREAKER~ and ~CHARGE~ you quite a bit if you keep them at range
2. Melee combat with anything less than a full stack of ~DEFEND~ is really bad for your HP
3. ~SHIELD BREAKER~ before ~CHARGE~ doesn't always work and when it doesn't it usually leaves you open to be charged or otherwise attacked by the valiant.
4. Starting out without a full stack of ~DEFEND~ really puts you behind since you'll be trading in a lot of damaging attacks just on building up your shield.
On a side note: Should you ever fight a gnome valiant note that their defend icons are really really tiny so can be somewhat hard to see.
The 'strategy' seems to work quite well on any NPC you can joust including the lieutenants you have to kill in the scourge area in the southern part of icecrown (daily).
There's not much to it, but I've seen some people break a bit of a sweat over the valiants so I thought I'd throw this out there.
Monday, April 20, 2009
Warlock hate runs deep
A lot of times I am struck by sheer amazement on how much hate people harbor towards classes that either counter them or that they simply do not play. More often the reasoning doesn't make sense but obviously human beings are more than just compilations of rational thought.
Still, the guy who decided to complain about the fact that soulshards can be gotten from training dummies these days and calling for a hot fix might've just gone off the deep end.
Bug, perhaps, game breaking in a fashion that it needs hotfixed: hardly
Read the original report here
Oh ... did I mention you can get soulshards from training dummies? I didn't did I... well you can, bugs are a beautiful thing.
You can also trigger your lightweave cloak enchant off of fel armor life ticks which really makes me appreciate the little bugs that seem to prevail despite any horrendous fear nerfs that seem to abound every now and then.
Also in the 'not so latest news' section it seems that warlocks and rogues are actually now the least popular classes at level 80, death knights and paladins taking the top 2 according to wow census.
Still despite all the negativity the warlock is quite decent to play as affliction in 3.1... I wouldn't want to try and pvp with it still (perhaps as destro) but if blizzard ever lets warlocks back into the drain tanking game via a boost to the health returns I'd actually be quite pleased.
On the other hand it's probably better to wonder what'll get nerfed next.
Still, the guy who decided to complain about the fact that soulshards can be gotten from training dummies these days and calling for a hot fix might've just gone off the deep end.
Bug, perhaps, game breaking in a fashion that it needs hotfixed: hardly
Read the original report here
Oh ... did I mention you can get soulshards from training dummies? I didn't did I... well you can, bugs are a beautiful thing.
You can also trigger your lightweave cloak enchant off of fel armor life ticks which really makes me appreciate the little bugs that seem to prevail despite any horrendous fear nerfs that seem to abound every now and then.
Also in the 'not so latest news' section it seems that warlocks and rogues are actually now the least popular classes at level 80, death knights and paladins taking the top 2 according to wow census.
Still despite all the negativity the warlock is quite decent to play as affliction in 3.1... I wouldn't want to try and pvp with it still (perhaps as destro) but if blizzard ever lets warlocks back into the drain tanking game via a boost to the health returns I'd actually be quite pleased.
On the other hand it's probably better to wonder what'll get nerfed next.
Friday, April 17, 2009
10 Random 3.1 facts
3.1 has brought a multitude of new content and in-game changes which you can undoubtedly tell by the myriad of bugs, the overloaded Blizzard support lines and the somewhat random looking realm crashes.
Still all in all I'd say the 3.1 patch went in rather smoothly considering its massive size... on the bright side the 20 minute patch download on my machine gave me ample time to take a closer look at the patch notes for 3.1 and there's a lot of interesting stuff in there.
I am sure you already encountered or read about your particular class' changes (I know I read the warlock changes first) so today we devote our post to the topic of changes that have been implemented for the convenience of players that no one ever seems to notice until you accidentally run into them:
1. Your land mounts mysteriously learned to swim, mind you not all of them do it very elegantly.
2. You can dual spec at level 40 for a 'mere' 1000 gold.
4. You can turn an option on in the interface menu that allows you to allocate talent points in your talent screen without actually allocating them until you press save (or learn rather)... that way you can change your spec multiple times until you're happy with it and then save it... This option is NOT turned on by default...
5. Bored? turn on the color blind mode in the options menu.
6. Try pressing 'ALT' while hovering over an item...
7. Turn on all the quest objective tracking options in the interface menu and even useable quest items will display in the objectives screen. Very handy if you don't have quest helper.
8. Your hearth timer got cut down to 30 minutes... no you really haven't been playing that long yet.
9. Horde mount vendors got a few new mounts to show for. Go to ogrimmar, bloodhoof village and brill and get your 3 mounts if you're still looking for some.
10. If you hapen to be in the area of feralas and see sprite darters go give them a good whacking, slim changes are you will find yourself a sprite darter pet (something previously only available to the alliance)
There we have it... 10 more or less useful and interesting facts from the 3.1 patch notes.
As always after each significant patch it pays to just run through all your options menus and visit your various class and profession trainers to pick up on all those things that have been added with the patch.
There's a lot more in the patch notes that may be of interest to you and I could've easily made it 20 random facts... but then you might as well go out and read the actual patch notes.
Still all in all I'd say the 3.1 patch went in rather smoothly considering its massive size... on the bright side the 20 minute patch download on my machine gave me ample time to take a closer look at the patch notes for 3.1 and there's a lot of interesting stuff in there.
I am sure you already encountered or read about your particular class' changes (I know I read the warlock changes first) so today we devote our post to the topic of changes that have been implemented for the convenience of players that no one ever seems to notice until you accidentally run into them:
1. Your land mounts mysteriously learned to swim, mind you not all of them do it very elegantly.
2. You can dual spec at level 40 for a 'mere' 1000 gold.
4. You can turn an option on in the interface menu that allows you to allocate talent points in your talent screen without actually allocating them until you press save (or learn rather)... that way you can change your spec multiple times until you're happy with it and then save it... This option is NOT turned on by default...
5. Bored? turn on the color blind mode in the options menu.
6. Try pressing 'ALT' while hovering over an item...
7. Turn on all the quest objective tracking options in the interface menu and even useable quest items will display in the objectives screen. Very handy if you don't have quest helper.
8. Your hearth timer got cut down to 30 minutes... no you really haven't been playing that long yet.
9. Horde mount vendors got a few new mounts to show for. Go to ogrimmar, bloodhoof village and brill and get your 3 mounts if you're still looking for some.
10. If you hapen to be in the area of feralas and see sprite darters go give them a good whacking, slim changes are you will find yourself a sprite darter pet (something previously only available to the alliance)
There we have it... 10 more or less useful and interesting facts from the 3.1 patch notes.
As always after each significant patch it pays to just run through all your options menus and visit your various class and profession trainers to pick up on all those things that have been added with the patch.
There's a lot more in the patch notes that may be of interest to you and I could've easily made it 20 random facts... but then you might as well go out and read the actual patch notes.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)