My sister and brother-in-law finally got over the hump of the 15$ a month subscription fee for WoW and signed up. They’re both loving it, of course, and have been playing a fair bit over the last week. I’ve been helping them as much as I can, explaining things, throwing them some coin or gear that my army of characters can craft and so on.

On the weekendm when I was there to pick up my kids, I noticed my brother-in-law (who I shall call, “BIL”) was looking up a quest on a site that was about selling gold, mainly. I realized then, that they came from playing Wizard 101 where buying and selling some in game things was part of the way King’s Isle had everything set up but that wasn’t the case for Blizzard.

I quickly explained that buying gold and services from anyone other than Blizzard was not a good thing and they come down pretty hard on it often banning accounts of buyers as much as they do sellers. I then pointed him towards WoWhead.com where he could find all sorts of information as needed.

It’s sort of funny, BIL didn’t have problems buying crowns and stuff in Wizard101 but if you mention having to pay 30$ a month for two accounts in WoW, he cringed. Of course, I RAFed him and he RAFed my sister (that sounds wrong, oh well, they’re married now).

Blizzard, introduce a family account package please? Take a look at what Wizard 101 is doing. I cancelled the Little Big Ogre’s account because he wasn’t playing it much and he wanted to play Wizard 101 instead. If his account was discounted, I would have gladly kept paying for it.

While we’re talking, fix the issue where you’re left with a bunch of ‘Unknown’ people in your friends list if you transfer servers. I’ve got about 10 or so in my friends list and I can’t seem to remove them.

And hurry up with the better system for LFG, tie it automatically into the instances you’re saved against. It’s been really painful trying to get into heroic groups these last two weeks. I swear I have better luck just spamming in LFG channel than I do using that built in LFG tool.

Here is the design for you…

On the left, have a list, listing the expansions (with sub sections for raids for those expansions). Clicking on that will populate the right hand side of the dialog. Checking the box next to that list item will select all options in that expansion.

On the right, you specify which ones you want to do by checking a check box next to the dungeon name (context being based on what you selected in the list on the left!). The Dungeon item is disabled if you’re too low level.

Heroics don’t show up unless they’re open to that character (i.e. you have the key or are level 70/80). These manifest as a second column right next to the name of the dungeon. They fall under the expansion on the same panel with a second check box for it (i.e. Regular column and a Heroic column). If the character is saved, the Heroic column check box is disabled, tooltip says, “Saved to this instance” or something.

Also put a sub category for raids on the left, under each of the expansions, handled in much the same manner.

Also include a check for selecting or deselecting all available items per section (i.e. all WotLK Heroics, none of the WotLK regulars, etc.). This way the user can pick everything they want to do or uncheck things like Oculus which they don’t want to do.

There, design all done. Send me a cheque.

UPDATE: I had heard they were revamping the UI for LFG but I totally missed this article about it.

My first thought is, oh God, no! Don’t do the treeview list. Too much clicking and scrolling, especially scrolling and it doesn’t expand as well when you want to add more dungeons and stuff in.

I like the other changes.

I posted awhile ago that I was switching to my Hunter as my main and I’ve spent the last week and a half building him up from his sad state of gear. He’s gone from a mix of greens, blues and the rare purple to wearing almost all purples (epic), except a trinket, which I’m working on.

He’s been in Ulduar, clobbered Onyxia, pounded his way through the ToC raid – several times now – and finally had a chance to clobber the three bosses of Vault of Asomething (can’t remember the name).

He’s completely skipped Naxx, Sarth and EoE. Really, there is little in those raids for him anymore aside from maybe a lucky ring or trinket drop.

That is kind of sad really.

Of course, I’ll probably get all my Emblem of Conquest gear just in time for Emblems of Triumph to become the regular drop from heroics and raids.

I’m slowly working my way up the factions (only to hear it’s all going to be made easier in 3.3), hitting Exalted with Kirin Tor, Argent Crusade and Ironforge while closing in on Exalted with Darnassus, Gnome Exiles, Stormwind, Exodar, The Silver Covenant, Ebon Blade, and Sons of Hodir. I’m also grinding out the Tourney dailies so I can get access to the Champion’s quartermaster.

There are a lot of things to build up again, including some of the professions like Cooking and Fishing, though I think I’m going to just use Lannister for that stuff. Still, it would be nice to have it all on one character so I don’t have to switch around.

Oh, and then there is getting some PVP gear together as well. I want to get back into the PVP with Smaken which should be a lot of fun. I’m leveling a pair of Cunning pets; an Eagle (go disarm!) and a Spider (webbing for the pissing off of opponents!). I’m going to have to get in the rhythm of it again.

Things to look forward to.

Oh! Thanks to Tim for loaning me 800g so I could get epic flying yet again! I almost have you paid back but it is definitely nice to have it again. I can finally use that Bronze Drake I won in Culling of Stratholme last week.

In dedication to the wedding I was at this weekend. Ever notice how many cliches are thrown around during weddings? After going to them for awhile they all seem sort of the same. I suspect I’ll end up spouting some cliches when my boys get married, but that’s a ways off. WAY WAY OFF.

It was a nice wedding, up in resort north of Toronto. Lots of trees all over the mountains/hills changing colors. Food was pretty good, though expensive when we ate in the restaurant – 150$ expensive just for us two. I think the only night I went to bed sober was… okay, so I didn’t go to bed sober at all that weekend.

The kids stayed with their aunt and uncle while we were away. Apparently they were perfect angels which changed as soon as they saw us. It was a nice break, but I definitely missed them both. That’s the first time we’ve been away from them (overnight) in about 4 years. We were really nervous because of Little Big Ogre’s allergies to egg and most animals (his aunt and uncle have two dogs) but he was fine while there, even played around with one of the dogs. Poor guy, he’d love to have a dog but between his allergies and his mother’s allergies, it isn’t likely to happen any time soon.

One more wedding to go this year then I should be good for a few years.

Or not.

I’ve been slacking with the posts over the last couple of weeks because I’ve been on vacation. I still am on vacation and will be until next week so don’t expect too many more posts.

Yesterday I woke up to my usual seasonal affliction. It seems, every year, around October to December I end up with some sort of phlegm problem which usually turns into some sort of infection – chest infection was the best, it had me coughing so hard I thought my brain was knocked loose.

Don’t say it.

I try all sorts of different syrups and other medications to no avail. Eventually, I end up visiting the doctor and she prescribes some lovely antibiotics. These are a semi-synthetic because of my mild allergy to penicillin.

I’ll admit right now, I hate taking pills, not because I’m a martyr that feels he needs to suffer, I think it goes back to my childhood when I was visiting my grandparents. My grandfather’s breakfast consisted of 12 different pills, pills for one issue ended up with pills for the side effects of that pill and so on. I couldn’t help but think how horrible all that must taste while I was eating my toast drenched in honey. I guess the thought stuck with me.

So here’s a list of side effects; abdominal pain, diarrhea, flatulence (um yeah… I’m not sure if I’ll notice this side effect), headache (I have children, this isn’t a side effect, it’s standard issue), nausea, rash, taste perversion and vomiting. Of course, not listed are the warnings of finding blood in your vomit or stool in which case you should contact your doctor immediately. Reading some more of the side effects, it could possibly create some pretty hefty toxins in the body which cause a condition that results in further illness and a mild case of death.

Yay!

I usually get nausea, taste perversion (no, I don’t suddenly start liking men – there is a constant metallic taste in my mouth when I take this stuff) and vomiting, usually early morning or REALLY early morning. Okay maybe a little bit of diarrhea. I hope no one is reading this around breakfast, lunch or supper time… if so, you should know better dammit!

I think this year I’m going to skip ahead to talking to the doctor, assuming I can get an appointment. The thing that is pushing me over the edge is a slight pain in around where my appendix would be. I’m hoping it isn’t appendicitis.

That would suck.

I’m that with it this morning.

Grab a mug, a bowl, a teaspoon then open the instant coffee (I know…), scoop up some in the spoon and dump it into the bowl. Empty the coffee from the bowl into the mug where it should be then turn on the kettle. Put some Fruit Loops (I’m feeling it) cereal in the bowl, add milk, grab kettle of boiled water and pour into bowl… almost. I did catch myself there.

Good start.

I finally decided on switching my main character to Smaken yesterday. I’ve been bouncing the idea around since I faction/server transferred him off of Firetree (PVP) and leveled him up to 80. I just like the Hunter class too much.

The main reason I made Lannister was that I didn’t really want to level another Hunter up and there was no faction transfer (the guild on Rexxar was Alliance while Smaken was originally an Ork ). I fiddled around with a Hunter alt but just couldn’t get into leveling it.

Long story short, my DPS has been a bit suspect as Lannister, although it has gotten better with some gear switches and items I purchased. Still, it just wasn’t as much fun as playing the Hunter. Downside of melee DPS is you can’t be as mobile and there are a lot of bosses that almost punish you for having too many melee types. Ranged DPS was definitely a nice change.

After the switch, I raided with NInefold Dragons and we downed Onyxia and moved on to CC:ToC where we did really well – we actually one shot Faction Champions. Playing the Hunter was a lot of fun and despite my gear I put up some numbers that were close to what Lannister did which is scary. I ended up walking away with a lot of upgrades and enough Emblems of Triumph to get my T9 gloves.

Net result? I was at around 3400 gear score, now I’m almost 4000. I’ve made a few upgrades since last night (already) but I’ve still got blues; chest, head, legs, boots and a trinket.

Tim was laughing at my gear last night, noting it was a mix of quest, emblem and some pretty high end raid gear. It does seem a little funny to have Item Level 175 gear mixed in with some Item Level 232 stuff. Oh, and I still don’t have the epic flying skill, though I did win a Bronze Drake from H CoS (everyone else had it).

I’m off for this week and the next so I probably won’t post too much since it will be more of the same WoW stuff. I thought I’d be able to farm the crap out of Heroics and replace my blues with purples but there doesn’t seem to be any healers on in the morning.

Lazy bastiges. You can have your sleep when I misdirect to you on a boss fight and you take a dirt nap!

(I haven’t done that yet, I’ve joked about it and accidentally MDed to a mage but mobs were mostly dead so no worries there.)

While I was mucking around with Smaken doing some dailies for Hodir faction I started hearing some pretty unpleasent sounds from inside my computer.

My first thought was the fan is dying.

I shut down and popped open the lid then looked around and couldn’t see anything. I fired it up again and heard the sound but couldn’t tell which fan was the offending one – I’ve got four fans in one area; cpu, video card, rear and top fans. I turned it off again, since I was sure I was smelling burning.

I poked around inside checking wires and discovered one that wasn’t attached to anything and it was under the video card.

Ah ha! That was the source of the sound. One of the wires slipped down and the video card fan was clipping it. I wrapped the wire up carefully and out of the way and fired it up again.

All is well.

The burning smell? Haha, I can hear the jokes now… well, the wife had started a fire in the fireplace upstairs.

Smaken wins!

Flame Leviathan 0 – Smaken 1
Razorscale 0 – Smaken 1
Ignan 0 – Smaken 1 (although he did cook me in his pot, but the rest of the raid finished him off just as I died so it’s sort of a tie)
XT-Deconstructor 0 – Smaken 1
Auriyia 0 – Smaken 1
The Iron Council 1 – Smaken 1 (we had a mishap where the raid ended up wiping, but we got it done the next attempt)
Hodir 0 – Smaken 1

Our guild has a plan that I might have mentioned before. The plan is to let the lower geared folks and alts run through the first bosses of Ulduar up to Hodir on one day. On another day, they have the high geared raiders take stabs at the Keepers on Hard Mode (we’ve already done Hodir). This effectively benefits the whole guild because our more hardcore raiders get to take cracks at the hard stuff and the folks that miss raids, are behing on their gear or who can actually still benefit from loot drops off the first bosses can actually advance their characters gear-wise.

It’s a great system.

I asked if I could bring Smaken into the raid instead of Lannister because Lannister really doesn’t have a lot of upgrades available to him in there and I wanted to see how I could do with Smaken in a raid. As you can see from above he did well and only died (on a boss) in one fight and it was right near the end.

Smaken had a gear score of around 3000ish, under that a bit I think. He was in all blues except for a green trinket, purple gloves and a purple gun (courtesy of Tim’s Engineering). For enchants he’s got a step down from the best – huge price drop – where I could find enchantments, a step down on the shoulder inscription (don’t have enough Hodir faction for the best one), no head item enchant and no enchant on the staff I am using. For the few items that have gem slots, I’m using what was affordable focusing on +Hit mainly.

Despite that I can manage about 1800 DPS on solo mobs when I cranked it out so I was a little unsure. For the raid I cranked out between 2100-2300 DPS (except where freaky buffs were in place). The raid leader was impressed with the DPS knowing full well my gear was pretty weak.

As a point of reference, Lannister has a gear score of about 4500ish and does about 3000-3500 DPS, sometimes higher on certain fights or when facing multiple targets.

For loot it works in this order; main character main specs roll, alts main spec roll, open roll for alts/mains second spec. I rolled on one ring I didn’t win and ended winning a roll for something else which I passed on when I saw a rogue wanted it (I believe it was leather so better for him).

I walked out with a new shoulder armor piece (I was using some crafted leather shoulders – blue), new gloves (leather), and two new bows. Yes, I said two. I was the only Hunter there, no one else used bows and they didn’t want to shard the second one because our guild bank is loaded with those things.

Overall, it was a lot of fun. There were several encounters I was worried about, Hodir being one of them but I survived!

After the raid I realized I was one Emblem of Conquest away from getting the top of the line neck item (as far as non-raid drops go) so I ran Heroic Utgarde Pinnacle with some of the big guys. I realized I had never been in there with Smaken so I picked up the two quests at the door. My DPS was much lower since I was using white ammo (instead of blue stuff) and my bow skill was only 365/400 when it started. Of course, I was also distracted running around picking up the quest items – hehe. No complaints, we mowed through everything there, I got the Emblems I needed, completed both quests and the Heroic Daily Dungeon quest and also scored a trinket off King Ymiron. Oh, and got a bunch of achievements too.

Now the temptation is burning to switch to Smaken as my main.

I am really disappointed with some recent changes to vacation benefits where I’m working. I understand why they did it, but I dislike it.

A lot.

I also dislike how they’re trying to spin it as being about the same when really, it isn’t.

Message to HR folks out there: when dealing with people who get paid to deal with logic, systems, numbers and analysis (effectively, you’re paying them because they’re intelligent) drop the bullshit because they’ll see through it.

My vacation time is effectively halfed and a third of that time is already accounted for.

Thanks.