Pandaria Professions! (Pt1)

This title is no secret to you if you are a WoW player or at least a gamer who keeps up with industry news. For those of us who are the former(casual or chronic), there's something to be said about the amount of work that's going to be going into this expansion, from questing and enjoying the lore to leveling mains, alts, and everyone's professions in the process. For those of us like me who have EVERYTHING in terms of professions, this is probably something you've been pondering, trying to decide what takes priority over all else, what will be the most beneficial.

This post is going to revolve around all of that, and I'm going to make myself sound like I know what I'm doing. I... what? Oh... the voices in my head say I do, so...!

And to note, I'm waiting 'til day 3 or 4 to touch the monk or panda leveling.

Nice thing about end-of-expansion raiding has been getting gear that'll make leveling much easier. Enchantments have a minimum iLevel of 372 while jewelcrafting's minimum is 417, something that really won't make a difference unless you're a blacksmith, as leveling gear doesn't really have gemslots. Blacksmiths can add them to their own gloves and bracers, but you won't get 417+ gear 'til well into 86 at least. Most of my gear when I hit 90 on my premade monk was between 414 and 442, and not a single gemslot, and that's questing and some dungeon gear.

Anyway, getting back on track, my whole point is you won't need most quest reward gear 'til it out-stats your gemmable Cata gear, 397 and 410 gear alike. Enchanting will prop it up a little longer, but gems won't do you any good. For this reason, Jewelcrafting will wait a little to get my attention. I may poke at it if the rings and necks are worth grinding for, but the gems will happen when the market has a need for it. Enchanting, though, will be one of my focuses. My first though will actually be a bit split as my druid will be the first I work to level, his professions being alchemy and herbalism. The split comes in the fact inscription will provide shoulder enchants in Pandaria, so I'll be sending herbs off to my death knight. If I have to work on him, I'll be able to gather ore for my Paladin and Priest, my blacksmith, especially, and jewelcrafter, respectively.

Blacksmithing, on tat note, will be another focus of mine, seeing that I have 3 plate wearers who will need things from it, guaranteed. Windwool cloth is abundant, so my mage will be swimming in it like he has been with embersilk. My hunter will probably have the hardest time as his guild is a hanger-on that doesn't have a high level, and therefore doesn't have Bountiful Bags. All that's left is engineering, and that really won't be a huge worry for me as my warrior also has mining like my DK and Paladin, though my Priest is also engy along with being my jewelcrafter.

Sound like a mess? It is, kinda. Long story short, Alchy and Inscription, Blacksmith, Enchanting, and Leatherworking. Tailoring will progress naturally, while Engineering and Jewelcrafting will come along when I feel like grinding them. There's a good amount of logic going into the decisions, but it also hinges on my own personal procrastination problem.

I would go into secondary professions, but it's time for racing on Speed. I'll touch on them later on. Ciao!

Re: Dear Vanilla Players, I'm Sorry...

I’m sorry you wasted 40 hours a week of your life so your Rogue can wield an axe (Weapon Proficiency).
Im sorry you had to grind 40 hours a week to get a mount.
Im sorry you had to grind 40 hours a week to gain one level.
And most of all, I’m sorry you were misled into believing that a long winded BORING grind made you feel like a special snowflake.

Get over it...move on, Wow is better now then it ever was.

;P

Dear High and Mighty...

Don't need your pity for something that was enjoyable for me. I never got epic riding, but I was fine with that. I got to raid UBRS while it was still a legit raid and got to see ZG. Would love to have gotten to do MC and BWL and such when they were current content, but then that's my problem because I started late in Vanilla. People say I didn't miss much, but I say I missed something I'd have enjoyed. And even if I hadn't enjoyed them in the end, at least I'd have gotten to try them. It took me months to level my first character to 60, and I enjoyed it. Now I level characters when I'm bored(and dang have I been bored without too much to do). When I leveled my first character, getting gear and working on professions were important and actually gave me something to do. Now when I level, I do it so I can keep up with others and not have someone go "u suk l2p" or such derpy derivatives or because if I skip doing them they'll be a pain to go back and do later. Back when things were slow, the game was an adventure and a challenge. Now it's all just go go go, rush rush rush. That isn't fun. I miss classic AV where there was some strategy and mobs to kill that mattered and calling Lokholar and so on. Now it's a zergfest, to see who can kill the other side faster. Frankly, if they did have Vanilla or BC servers, I would play on those more than current servers and leave all you entitlers behind.

And one thing to note... I consider myself a casual. I don't raid like it's all that matters to me, nor do I don't like hard modes and have no absolute need to do them and feel like I'm an awesome player. I don't really do arenas either, really, though I have two characters that I'd heal in arenas with if I had folks to be steady and PvP with. Simple as that. I can tank, I can heal, I can DPS, I have done all but one class up to full level, though my warlock's close. My point is I know what I'm talking about, and I have every right to feel the way I feel. Do I still play? You bet. Have I ever taken breaks? Maybe a week or two at a time, or cut back on my time in game, either because I was busy with life or I just needed to deal with some burnout. Am I going to keep playing? You already know I am because I enjoy the game for what it is. If this is too hard for you to understand, that's fine, I don't care. I'm gonna keep right on playin'.

And for the sake of saying, you ARE right that WoW is better now than it ever was, but was it bad then? Not from my point of view. You are entitled to your opinions about things, as I am about mine, but for me, I have my own personal facts that your opinions will never, EVER change. I'm not sorry for that, either. I'm not the only one who feels this way either, so it's your turn to get over it and move on. Good day.

Original post on the forums that was too full to respond to - http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/6308661972

Patch 4.2 - Firelands, or "Too soon, Executus!"

(Note, I started writing this back in December or just before, so this will be well out of date, but I wanna finish it and get it done.)

So yes, I know we're into patch 4.3 now, yet I've been lax about tossing in my two cents about patch 4.2. Well, I'm going to fix this. Patch 4.2 saw some very big events come into play. First, the Firelands invasion, which consisted of the Molten Front and the dailies it gave, a compelling story that, for some of us, encouraged us to get involved on the basis of just retribution. Second, the Elemental Bonds questline which consisted of Thrall, Aggra, learning more about our beloved Warchief. Third, "The Firelands" raid.

Admittedly, Patch 4.2 holds some bittersweet memories for me, but for what it is, I enjoyed it. The Molten Front has some very nice upgrades for folks like Blacksmiths and Tailors and a couple of plans for Engineers that they really shouldn't pass up if they're close to getting them, even now, though to be honest, the quest grind, after days and days and days of unlocking does get old. If you did the Shattered Sun Offensive on Quel'Danas in BC, in prep for Sunwell, you understand.

If you haven't done Thrall's questline, I won't spoil it for you. For your first time, you'll do it for the story. Anytime after that, chances are it'll just be for the cape. I actually get a little sad when I do it because I'm a pseudo pacifist, and 'cause I miss certain characters. But I'm sure you'll know what I mean if you've seen it.

And finally, The Firelands. It was a fun raid for me, though I didn't get to see the end 'til after the nerf happened. Ragnaros was a fun fight for me, Fandral was a wuss, Alysrazor always causes amusement 'cause someone derps, it never fails, and then there's Beth and Rhyolith and Shannox too. Beth'tillac finally gave me her shiny shield. Twice! I love the model of the Ward. I still want a set of shoulders. Someday.

It was during 4.2 that I actually started my transition back to Bloodhoof from Silver Hand in terms of server preference. Things happened, won't go into 'em, but I learned my lessons, and that's why I still play this blasted game. Heh. Next post will be about Dragon Soul, patch 4.3.

Quickie: Y'ever Notice...?

It's no secret I read MMO-Champion often, keeping up on the news and rumors and such, plus finding out what's going on in the wacky World of Warcraft playerbase as a bonus. Some things I've noticed...

PvP servers and primarily-PvP players have horrible spelling habits and a lack of PvE knowledge, something I've discovered in great detail when I group with them of course, but reading their posts on MMO just make me shake my head. Note, I do PvP, but it's not why I play the game, and I don't care if you play the game to PvP, the game is based in a PvE universe. PvP is only an added bonus component, meaning you will always be second class, especially to me.

It's funny to read most blue posts being tracked. A great majority of them that have been locked have been started by an Alliance player who can't seem to spell/capitalize/punctuate/etc, and when I try to read them I get a headache because they're so horribly written, not to mention the fact the topic tends to be inane and pointless if thought about for 5 seconds with the use of common sense. Shoo, stupid Alliance players, and you too you Alliance transfers who can't form a complete thought. You can even take our bad Horde players with you. The Alliance transfers that legit-ly realized they started out on the wrong faction and have brain cells + maturity can stay.

And before this turns into a complete Alliance bash, as it's too easy to do as such, I'm going to stop here.

Okay, I lied. One small note - I don't mind if you're Alliance, if you don't want to kill me and don't have completely skewed thoughts and unfair bias against my faction's races. I can co-exist with a Nelf just fine, heck I'd like to chat with one, assuming they didn't hate my guts needlessly. I'd make my Draenei Horde if I could, considering I want to play him but can't stand Alliance. Hate the faction, not the races.

Edit 8-20 : I do realize that there are a lot of bad Horde spellers and such, don't get me wrong there. I guess when I read those posts from those Alliance folks I fat-finger-pointed out, the ol' stereotype pops into my head, about how only kids play Alliance, how they're usually underage and such, because we all know kids are the ones who netspeak liek dis and use 4 instead of for and go out of their way to skip using one or two vowels or consonants to make a word and so on. I kid you not when I say it tends to be Alliance folks that start a thread only to have it locked. 

4.1, the Return of the Trolls

(Yes, this is way past relevancy, but I may as well touch on it.)

So for those of us who played back in Vanilla and BC, chances are you got to experience good ol' Zul'Gurub and Zul'Aman. The Cataclysm hit though, and ZG was abandoned by the Gurubashi, while the Amani stayed holed up in the Ghostlands.

Until the Zandalar tribe, the highest of Troll empires, decided the time had come to bring all the Troll empires together with the belief that to survive, they had to work together, but not only that - to retake what other races had taken from them, they so believed. Only the Darkspear, led by Vol'jin, rejected this notion, this offer. Why? They had separated themselves from the other tribes because they didn't follow or accept the traditions and bad habits that had been taken up, and despite recent events, they were still loyal to the Horde. That said, they couldn't stand by and let the Zandalari simply do as they pleased. Alerting the Horde and the Alliance alike, Vol'jin spearheaded the efforts in ZA while Darkspear and Booty Bay members went to ZG. Only you know if those efforts were a success or a failure...

Personally, how do I feel about these instances, redone as they've been? I think ZA didn't change a whole lot, which is fine, though the Zandalar mobs added new challenge to it, and being someone who wasn't able to get a bear in the day, it's nice to have a chance to get another one. No, I still haven't gotten one, but it WILL happen... someday. Now ZG? That's another story. Completely redone, and in a lot of cases, tough, very tough, if you're not used to it OR are just having a clumsy off-night. It's also a good idea to have a good Archaeologist in the party to do the Cache of Madness, not unlike needing an Alchemist to make Gurubashi Mojo Madness in the old ZG.

The redone gear isn't too shabby either. If it wasn't for the gear, I wouldn't have found out Enhancement is MUCH better than Elemental for me, which makes my solo and Tol Barad questing efforts MUCH easier. Heh heh.

Unfortunately, doing either as a random tends to be... tricky at best. Sometimes it's smooth as silk. Sometimes it's like grinding yer face on a brick wall. A few nights ago, myself and a good friend were the DKs in a 2 DK, 3 Druid run, and despite the complete lack of CC and dispels, it was nearly a faceroll. It would have been completely, but Malacrass got to have fun with all those stolen Lifeblooms. We 2 shot him, no matter the case.

In short, it's a nice slice of the good ol' days. And along with the new Bear, there's also a new Raptor mount off Mandokir, and there's a new Panther mount to replace the beloved and often-farmed Tiger. So, if you have the patience, relive the old days, but if you're a new player, welcome to a crash course in how you REALLY do an instance. CC, patience, and situational awareness.

And with that, another post comes to a close.