One man and his blog...

Modern Warfare 2 bandwagon

2009-11-10T01:51:00.000-08:00

It was inevitable. This was a game I've been looking forward too since I drenched myself in the previous incarnation, single player campaign, online play, replaying single player on vet, completing all the acheivements - it was just that good. I'm hopeful Modern Warfare 2 lives up to expectations.

When I found out Sainsburys were kicking the game out for £26 it was a full gone conclusion, despite the disaproval from the wife :-) In fact I was so fixed on getting a copy I was actually there before the store opened and I queued for a game for the first time in my life!

So, I have an early finish from work today - and quiet relaxation/sleep and a break from baby stuff will now be replaced with violence, machine guns, online banter, and smack talk. Fantasic.

Office Wrestling

2009-11-04T06:27:00.000-08:00

Me: *grapples*
Co-worker: *supplexes*
Me: *1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 punch in the corner*
Co-worker: *reverses, followed by a slap to the chest, runs to the other corner, removes turn buckle cover, grabs him and throws him face first into expsoed metalwork*
Co-worker: * runs to opposite corner, face crowd, peels off elbow guard, lifts it to the gods of wrestling, throws it into the crowd, screaming blonde catches, sniffs and faints, turns in time to land a flying elbow drop*
Me: *barrel rolls out of the ring, picks up the chair, puts it down, picks up a wooden spoon, puts it down, picks up some chesse, throws it on the ring floor. Clambers back into the ring, gets opponent in a DDT between the legs, falls backwards to execute move, half way down utters the words "smell my cheese", and watches his opponent struggle with the thought of being locked between my legs with the strong odour of cheese thrashing at his nostrils...*

Placeholder for something better

2009-11-03T00:47:00.000-08:00

I owe a considerable post on life in general at the moment. Most significantly the recent arrival of my baby daughter Olivia. I'm struggling to decide whether to have a seperate blog for my gushing on that subject, or whether to include the likely sporadic posts here. Either way they'll be mention on here which ever way, of course.

For now a quick summary of recent times.

- Daughter born!!
- Coping with late nights!
- Found my Siamese Dreams CD
- Playing COD 4... again.
- Got a Blackberry Bold (through work)
- Feeling web inspired

There's hopefully more to come soon.

Mixing Business with Pleasure

2009-11-03T00:43:00.000-08:00

Is it possible to play Call of Duty 4 whilst tending to your 6 week old, on your own, at 1am?

No, it is not.

That's my mug!

2009-11-03T00:39:00.000-08:00

About... I dunno, 4 years ago I subscribed to the trend of taking a cup to work from home to drink my tea from. Everyone was doing it. The polostyrene one's in the office were shunned. But no-one wants to wash up at work, right? And so these cups are left to furment either in the kitchettes provided, on desks, in cupboards, or stashed under a colleagues desk so that they constantly wonder "what IS that smell!?". And my cup from home was no different.

For days (perhaps only a day maybe...) I slurped my tea back with wild abandonment. It felt like being at home. Except I wasn't.

Then one day (the same day maybe...) it seemed necessary to wash out the previous beverage's remains and stains so off to the kitchenette I went, and meh. It got left on the side with dozens of other best intentions. When I returned the next day enthausmed for more cup fun and a whole new perspective on washing up, she was gone - stolen away as if it was one of those plain permantely stained cups provided by the work place. Gone.

I easily fell back into my polostyrene ways and the "make, drink, and drop" style remained mine and still does to this very day.

Every now and again when I've attened site in the depths of night for on call reasons I've seen my cup, either on the wash board filthy, or prestine in the cupboard and I always use it on these occasions. But again it is destined to realise its usual fate.

But today, when I needed it most, when I'd been up all night with Olivia and thoughts of coffee and awakeness burnt in my mind all the live long way to work - what should be greeting me when I cannot falter the lock on the cupboard that stores the polostyrere cups?

My cup. And I will never let you go again!!

...until you are dirty.

I think I'd like a bike...

2009-09-16T09:56:00.000-07:00

I've been thinking about it on and off for a while now, and I really fancy a motorbike. Nothing crazy, nothing wildly powerful, I'm not into all that. But I'd like to try it, experience it, plan long rides with a friend, that kind of thing - sounds right up my street.

Of course there's the expense and the onset of a new baby on the scene, but surely that shouldn't stop me doing things I like or stop me from persuing a passion?

Certainly worth looking into. CBT for my Birthday, save some money, buy a little bike, enjoy. Sounds good.

*post heavily inspired by this blog: http://www.thepostman.org.uk/ and thankfully the need has since subsided*

The Smashing Pumpkins

2009-09-09T07:46:00.000-07:00

I was sifting through some music I'd found on an old harddrive on Friday and stumbled across some Smashing Pumpkins tracks. They've really made some fantastic music.

I can remember being into the whole Nirvana and Pearl Jam thing when I was at school (around 91, 92), not the scene particularly but the music definately. Sure, I had a check-shirt, but I wasn't into guitar and I didn't hate my parents. Anyway, I think like a lot of people I hadn't really gotten wind of the Pumpkins back then (even though they had an album out, Gish, by that point) and I continued to unfortunately overlook them for a number of years. Around 95, 96 a friend of mine picked up Melon Collie and the Infinite Sadness and I gave it a listen. The attraction of the heavy guitars and ferocious vocals pulled me in, but I don't think I gave it much listening time as I was going through a Neil Young Zuma, Freedom, Weld kind of phase at the time.

When I hit University, and musical interests became a common topic of conversations/distraction, their name would pop up and I'd be able to convey my meagre knowledge of some of their music and at least know enough to know that around 96, 97 and on the back of their epic double album Melon Collie, their popularity was at a high. So I revisited that album, became hugely drawn to it, and with it came the usual process of buying up the back catalouge and soaking myself in it until I was drenched! Siamese Dreams effected me the most at the time, and had a big influence for me personally with regards to the music I was experimenting with. You see, around 97 I guess, I'd finally picked up the guitar. I'd always been into guitar driven music and now I craved being able to replicate my favourites - and in turn make something of my own. There's alot to be said for coming up with a chord sequence, or a melody, or even a noise that YOU made and that you like the sound of. It's writing to your own taste, and you can get more whenever you like. I don't pretend to be profecient or even intermediate some many years later, but I still get a kick out of it, and I still enjoy it bashing away the best I can.

Pumpkins were'nt the only band I liked the sound of around that time, with my love for Nirvana, Perl Jam, Metallica, Neil Young, and Foo Fighters all playing their part for my musical soul, but the Smashing Pumkins had so much energy in their music - so many layers - that I was quickly a huge fan.

Back to finding some Pumpkins tracks on a lost harddrive. There weren't many of them (I had the albums on CD anyway, right), but as I flicked through I remembered a dear favourite of mine, the track "Hummer" on Siamese Dreams. It's much easier to find music online than it ever has been, and in particular when I want to check out a track quick without the rigimors of finding them on sneaky sites and downloading copies that turn out to be a completely differnt band or porn, I fired up YouTube and did a quick search. Obviously loads of results, and to my delight there were a handsome amount of music videos and live performances. I poured over them for hours, happening on some rare footage and some documentaries to boot. The guitar came out, the tablature for Hummer was sought, and although I'd get no-where near replicating it in full or even well, I managed enough of the intro chords to fill me with that same enthausiasm I had for them over 10 years ago.

And once again I find the drive to work all that more acceptable, as Gish resolves around and around in my CD player, with Adore having never left the glove box, and when I finally locate my lost copy of Siamese Dreams I'm sure it will once again become a permanent resident until I've attacked my ear drums with it so much that I start thinking in rich swirls of melon collie and wallowing in fuzz soaked waves of guitar...

Blogging blasts from the past

2009-08-28T09:41:00.000-07:00

As explained in a previous post, at one point or another I was quite into World of Warcraft. Well, today I found out just how much...

You see, I do remember doing a little blogging on the subject a while back ( 2007/08) - but those links were long forgotten and with them all record of that period of time... but I found them! And there were many posts!!

I had no idea that I'd written so much, and seeing as this blog is for me to flex the occasional creative writing muscle I've consolidated all those old posts into this blog under the very clever sub category World of Warcraft so that all evidence of what I've written past and present are here in historical format. I must admit, I did enjoy re-reading some of that old stuff - some of it lasting well and sounding very much like me... and some utter twoddle. But for the main part, a very enjoyable revisit. Check them out if the subject matter of WoW and hunters interests you, or the scrutiny of people's past works gives you a kick also.

I may well do the same for a raft of posts I started and never finished on our honeymoon in Kenya experiences. Watch this space.

What I'm listening too

2009-08-27T04:36:00.000-07:00

I have to drive an hour to work via two pretty much full time stacked motorways, and then an hour back home - which has on occasion spanned as long as 3 hours if there is an accident. I'm sure this is not uncommon for a number of people.

Doing at least two hours in a car each day gives me ample opportunity to listen to music, and the CD player is rarely off during my commute.

This week in the passenger seat and raring to go, and by way of a top 5, have been:

1. Drive-by Truckers - The Dirty South
2. Patterson Hood - Murdering Oscar
3. Drive-by Truckers - Brighter than Creations Dark
4. Joe Bonamassa - Ballad of John Henry
5. Wilco - Sky Blue Sky

Stand out tracks across the albums; Where the Devil Don't Go (Dirty South), Murdering Oscar (title track), Funkier than a Mosquitos tweeter (Balld of John Henry), and That man I shot (Brighter than Creations Dark).

Sometimes it's a pleasure to have a long commute :-)

World of Warcraft owned me...

2009-08-26T08:54:00.000-07:00

I was never a hardcore gamer. Not even when I was a kid. I loved video games and everything about them, but I rarely had a next gen console, and I was never chasing graphic card evolution when it came to PC's. But I played a bit of everything, from Street Fighter II to MMO's and World of Warcraft become my prefered gaming passtime for a reasonable period.

At university my housemates and coursemates where all into the same kind of games, and at that time First Person Shooter (FPS), Real Time Strategy (RTS), and Role Playing Games (RPG) were in their element. We played and created custom maps for Duke Nukem and later Unreal Tournament, peppered each other with tanks in C&C Red Alert and Total Annialation, and spend hours pouring over stats in Diablo and Baldurs Gate.

Oh man Baldurs Gate. What a game. It was single player game so detailed and beautifully storied that it was often the reason for a missed class or drinking binge. Diablo on the other hand was an excuse to drag our respective machines round to each others houses and connect them up so that we could battle the elements together. This soon became the case for every game that allowed mutliplayer and we continued the process of lugging computer gear miles and miles long after we left University.

By this time we were into whatever lastest version of UT it was at the time, Quake 3 Arena, and the latest incarnation of Diablo - but soon Massively Multiplater Online Games (MMO) started to loom onto the horizon. Initially dismissing them as forums for nerds with far too much time on there hands I was encouraged over time to sign up to a game a group of my friends were playing called EVE online. This changed my perspective on video games forever. EVE was, and will likely always be, the most thought provoking, involving, strategic, and satisfying game I have ever played. It dominated our lives and our discussions for a very long time. I struggled with the time commitment it asked of you, and still shared some perspective from outsiders that it was a soul dominating environment that asked too much and ultimately in the grand scheme of things gave nothing - but still it was a huge draw for all of us and we formed a Corporation in game that we lovingly ran, developed, and enjoyed.

In the end EVE turned out to be incompatible with girlfriends, and bit by bit I pulled myself away from the scene. Still starving for a game pastime I persued a new incarnation of the Warcraft universe, an MMO called World of Warcraft. WoW advertised itself as "any game-time commitment" friendly, in that if you weren't there you weren't losing out. In fact the longer you were gone, the more experience points (XP) you would build up so that when you did return the things you slay we more valuable and consequently you were easily able to catch up. A fine design, and exactly what I was looking for! EVE had been a punishing Player Vs Player (PvP) world in which absence could result in lost teritory and income, whereas WoW promised the same game experience whether you were online all day or for an hour.
EVE had been heavily sociable, and with my friends still persistant in that game and almost none in WoW I headed back to EVE online for a time to enjoy it from the angle of playing the bad guy, as many of my friends had also chosen. For a while this was a "time friendly" way to enjoy the game - it mainly involved logging on, heading out into the cosmos to find someone with either money, materials, or simply easy targets, and dispatching them for their precious cargo or another notch on the killboard. It was satisfying and profitable. But the cracks started to show again, and I found it harder and harder to manage a new girlfriend and the late night rampaging through the game - and once again I put it down to persue other interests. It was the right thing to do, but had the ill effect or losing some Real Life (RL) contact with my buddies - which was highly regrettable.

With gaming still in my blood, once again WoW become the prefered option and I feaverishly got back into it. I wasn't terribly interested in running dungeons or grouping and the single player aspect tickled my every fancy. More and more friends dropped in to try the game and those that stayed organised a guild and it was a highly enjoyable period.

Online games had long been a bone of contention with my partner however, and my penchant for saying "just 5 more minutes" and being online for 2 more hours was growing thin with her. I'd now seen alot of the game, actively participating in guild activities, running more and more dungeons, and taking a liking to more group activity based challenges. I very much did not want to stop playing, but it had gotten to a point where I was allocated a night I could play (Tuesdays) and (a) if I missed the opportunity it would really grate me, and (b) I was totally unable to hold myself too it, often slipping online Friday nights, Saturdays, and Sundays.

There are worse crimes obviously, but my home life was starting to suffer a little from it and I gave it up on the basis that the Xbox I received for my 30th birthday would be able to sustain my gaming wimms, and perhaps I could finally break the additction of WoW crack. And that's the way it worked..... up until now :-)

I still read the odd snippet about WoW and now and again I get those pangs that make you want to break your online silence and once again ride forth through Azeroth. Obviously the soon to be arrival of a baby is highly incompatible with this thought process and the mear mention of the game may well send my wife into hysterics.... but, every now and again I think about installing it and taking a peek to see what new features are cool and whether anyone I use to play with is still around.

I mustn't! I won't! But still, none the less, World of Warcraft owns me....

iLove it

2009-08-25T09:12:00.001-07:00

I'm starting to obsess over the iPhone.

Many many months ago when it was released I thought it was an attractive bit of kit and like everyone else I wanted one, but the price was ridiculous and so it wasn't to be. Not too off-put I carried on with my normal life and my normal phone.

Present day, they have become affordable (I guess) and finally within the realms of possible ownership - but now I'm torn over whether to pull the trigger or not! See, now that's it been a little while the competition have started releasing comparable devices with a host of similar or in some cases superior features. So effectively rendering my previous no-brainer decision a now potential reflex decision with drastic gadget related consequences!!

Well... ok, so maybe it's not quite that bad. In fact, surely having comparable devices to investigate makes the whole experience a bit more fun and a lot more valuable to us the consumer. Right? Wrong. Now there's too much choice! I'm not precious about phones at all but in this instance, when realistically I'll have to shell out of some dosh to get one, I need to consider my needs carefully. I also realise that whatever I buy will be obsolete in 6 months making the 24 month contracts seem like unbrakeable chains of telecomunitive restraint.

So with all this in mind and a little research later I've gotten it down to a few phones I'm interested in. The iPhone, the HTC Hero, and the Palm Pre. All attractive, all innovative, all feature heavy, and all realistically obtainable.

Now if you thought this was going to be a break down of pro's and cons you were wrong. I've gone over that enough in my head and in almost every area each has a case for why it's superior. No, what I'm talking about is money, plain and simple.

I'm with Orange who rather nicely carry the HTC Hero. With a £5 increase in monthly payments I could lay my hands on one for FREE! Put that in the plus column if you must. The iPhone on the other hand is not only on a different network but would also see and increase of £10 on top of what I currently pay monthly to (a) get the 3G version for FREE or (b) stick on £90 for the new and shiny 3Gs version. Yum yum. I've absolutely no quarms about changing provider if it gets me the device I want, and you can even carry your numnber so that is a moot point. But the facts stand:

- HTC for a meagre £5 increase per month
- iPhone for an extra £10 a month and potentially £90 initial expense.

Lets break down the iPhone options. 3G or 3Gs. I've pumped questions into google along the lines of "is there really any point getting a 3Gs over a 3G version" and all I ever get back is "depends". The 3Gs certainly is faster, every resource I've plucked through agrees with that, but is that really important to me? No. The 3Gs is capable of recording relatively low quality video which, with a baby on the way, could provide not only hours of fun but a good way for me to share little triumphs over the net for my family to revel in. Awww. That's a plus. Other features like being able to voice dial people sounds useful for car journeys and for being flash at any opportunity but ultimately they don't interest me enough to be a must. Just find contact, dial 'em, right. So I'm not moved by that stuff. But the video, I'll admit, I'd get a kick out of that.

Is that feature worth £90 to me and an inflated monthly payment....

The other extenuating factor is my wife also wants an iPhone. Should I advise her to get the 3G one for FREE and then allow me to drop £90 on my one? Hardly seems fair. So are we now talking about £180 for a couple of phones and £20 more per month on phone contracts? For 2 years!!!

Ok this is where I normally start to get hazey and pass out. We're not talking unsurmountable quantities of money here, but I can think of hundreds (well... a couple) of things that kind of money could be put towards.

And that's when the HTC Hero slips into view once more, sporting a low cut dress, and ridiculous looking chin. There is however no denying that it's an attractive prospect, and I hear good things about if from a friend of mine who regales me with it's possibilities but laments its current sluggishness. (soon to perhaps be altered in a patch?)

I know a great number of people with iPhones and I occasionally snatch them from their now touch screen happy dexterous hands and navigate it's menus with that "not trying to be intrusive to your private data but I must inspect every aspect of it" sense of purpose. I know it's the prefered device. I know getting the 3Gs over the 3G means I get increased speed in applications and a onboard movie maker to exploit my childs daily triumphs with and share with everyone I know for no other reason that its so damn cute! But...

...the HTC keeps making eye contact and it's availability and comparable cheapness is very VERY endearing.

Site themes

2009-08-20T00:53:00.000-07:00

I will readily admit that site themes torment me! I can't write until I'm comfy with the look and feel of the site and safe in the knowledge that the presentation is there. Which is pathetic! I've read a number of sites, blogs, articles, and the content mattered a whole lot more than the layout. But this is my little spot on the web and I'm a sucker for a nice bit of design.

I will find one I like!

edit: I settled on a default one anyway! It's not too exciting but it's neat and its kicked of my need to write again :-)

What we're not watching...

2009-06-01T08:55:00.000-07:00

You remember the post "What we are watching"? Well the first film on the list was Quantum of Solace. It is still at our house!!! The concept of this Blockbuster post it/receive it business is to get through your list as quickly as possible to take full advantage of the price you pay and get your moneys worth. Now, on a couple of occasions they have not had it available and sent us another DVD from our list (whatever they were they were forgettable because.... er, I can't remember what they were) so it's not quite as bad as it looks, but still - We suck terribly at getting the DVD's back, and we normally watch them the evening they arrive. *sigh*

That's it, I'm starting a list:

1. Must get better at sending DVD's back.

Right, home, put DVD in packing, send off... whatever it takes.

Epic Fail

2009-05-01T00:00:00.000-07:00

Last weekend I was a keen bean about getting things sorted around the house. We have a baby on the way (don't worry, they'll be a proper post on that!) and a spare room that has been a repository for junk for far too long.

A couple of weekends back I had gotten rid of the spare double bed we had, and it went from audious chore to enourmous fun in the space of about 5 minutes. The reason? A hammer. The bed was a duvan, and as such was made up of two hallow frames (so it could accomodate drawers) wrapped in fabric - so basically you have two boxes as the base. Having lugged them all the way downstairs, panting and sweating, I quickly came to realise that they weren't going in the boot. I hadn't really wanted to start my day messing around with furniture, and I still wasn't convinced that the bed in whole form wasn't worth some money. But the powers that be (Emma) had determined it junk so junk it was. Fine, but how was I going to get it to the dump. Hammer time baby!! I only have a little claw hammer but man, it made short work of it. I was jumping, leaping, stamping, slamming, clawing, wrenching, and destroying to my hearts content - I reduced it to splinters I'm telling you. FUN!

Wait, what? How did I get onto that? Anwyway, so I had this room to clear and the main contributer to my reluctance was the computer desk. This room has been my domain for 2 years now, and has been basically a boys room of things that are fun. Computer(s) in the corner, shelving full of CD's and old consoles and games, guitar(s) and amps about the place, it was great. At any turn there was something of mine, something to play with - and now the baby wanted it out! I don't really mind of course, I rejoice in the thought of converting this space into a babies room and Emma has some brilliant ideas surrounding that, but where the hell was all my stuff going to go? Where was I going to sit at my computer and do what I do? Where was I going to practice being a rock and roll star? Where was I going to lay on the floor with all my CD's around me putting them into some clever order? Dammit, where was I going to hide!! Bit by bit I started dismantling things. The computer desk now resides in our bedroom... on my side of the bed - which is about as far away from a power plug as can be in that room. The shelving went to a better home and my cd's nestle sheepishly in a smaller unit in the landing. All the rest, yep still in there. Hence the title.

You see I was left to my own devices most of Saturday last week, with one clear message coming from my wife... "Clear out the room before I kill you until you are dead from it!!!" or words to that effect. As the whip crashed over me I begged to be left to it while she.... er, went out and had fun I think. Anyway, I started immediately (after a quick game of Call of Duty 4) on dismantling the computer desk. It was dusty. I made a mess. I broke the desk a little. It was a sunny day. I got hot. I got fed up. But I completed that task all the same, and it fit pretty well into our room and I considered the fact that we would now be able to watch DVD's or even downloaded or streamed content - a nice little byproduct actually. But there was more to be done, and I started back immediately (after a quick sit down and some TV) to the spare room to continue. The last break had drained my enthausiasm, but nevertheless I decided the next step was to stick some items in the loft, one of which was a TV stand that I've never been able to find the screw key for. Well, I found it straight away (who knew actually looking would work) and I made short work of it's breakdown and now I had a good size pile of stuff to put in the loft. The day was now cooking and I considered another break - and before I knew it I was outside with a cup of tea. Suddenly hungry I gave Emma a ring to see what she wanted to do about lunch, and the response was "I've already eaten". Perfect. And that marked the end of that session. I'd bottom'd out on that bomb shell.

What does this mean? What this means is this weekend, the glorious sunny bank holiday weekend, will be spent finishing that room so that it is ready to decorate next weekend. And that kids is why you should do what you're told and finish something when you say you will...

Ushering in a new era of lawn upkeep

2009-04-27T04:21:00.001-07:00

Bit of an overstatement, but none the less the grass is now cut. I did indeed borrow the aforementioned flymo and it was brilliant.

I started out the back, and fired away with no clear plan of coverage. The flymo was struggling, the grass considerable in height, and occasionally it coughed and stubbled as it keenly tore through. When it did get to an agreeable height it happily made a good job of it. And it was a pleasure to use as well, light and nibble, quiet and easy.

After some considerble effort I looked around to review my progress and found there there wasn't any - I perservered with renewed vigor. Eventually I'd covered the area, and with the exception of the border (which was still sporting it's messy hair look) it was looking prettyneat. It came however at a cost, I was knackered. With the old mower it was a simple walk up and down the garden with it purring away yumming up all the grass. Because of it's wieght it did alot of the work itself and now I was missing it, as I felt the heat in the lower back and contemplated the compression of my spine that I was suffering at the hands of the nippy flymo. The new guy had also neglected to retreive a single particle of grass.... it lacked the capacity, and again I looked over to my old mower in the corner with its onboard grass collector with renewed fondness.

This was shortlived. Though the old one appeared to offer more services, it was frankly never really good at them. For example, the weight meant moving it around was back breaking, it's straight line regime and rollers - while useful for creating light and dark stripes - was a game breaker if you missed a bit or made a mistake, and it's ace in the pack grass collector needed emtying constantly throughout. The reminiss was over, there was a new sheriff in town! So what if I needed to rake up the grass, it just looks like I'm working hard and in the process earning me more browny points. Right? Anway, it's sunny, raking will be... oh, I don't own a rake.

I'd borrowed the flymo with the promise of bringing it back the same day and I'm renowed for "borrowing" things longer term than planned and I wanted to break out of this association. I popped the mower in the car and headed for the sister in laws - hell, I'd pick up a rake and shears on the way home! (which I was interested in trying over a strimmer). Obviously stunned by the early return of their possesion they foolishing impulse offered me a rake and shears and although I wanted some of my own I accepted in the interest of time (and effort), so armed and dangerous I headed home to finish the job.

Target 1 was the front garden. The flymo had owned it, although the grass was such that it required that I hold the mower with both hands and do an initial sweep of the area a number of inches above the surface, then it was down to the nitty griity of trimming down. The front garden went from miniture nature reserve to short back and sides in a pretty short space and I took time to admire the new neatness of it all. Now for the finishing touches with the rake and shears. It turned into an obsessions. A snip here, and snip there, a re-snip there to keep the height accordingly.... and re-re-snip to adjust..... and re-do of the whole thing..... then further touchups! It was a enjoyable process but it was started to get old and in my haste to finish I servered the wire that records the gas and electric usage to the monitor outside and continued in a more mindful manner. Some raking later and I was done out the front. Tings were looking better.

I started on the back garden snipping my war around the perimeter, and by now I was starting to lag. My back was hurting and half way round I decided enough was enough and I needed a break... besides I was hungry.

And well I should be, it was gone 8 o'clock and Emma had neglected her duties as live in chef and irresponsibly fallen asleep on the couch! Disgraced she stubbled into the kitched and started to create something, and I used my role of critic and professional moaner to excuse myself from continuing the shearing and left the rest for the following day. It had been a good effort, the garden was looking much better, and the flymo had done itself proud.

.... I could almost hear our old mower choking in his own filth, outside, in the cold, lamenting it's inner workings which gave in to months of exposure. If it could speak it would likely say "bloody kids" as the memory of the small fast and nippy flymo burned in it's memory.

Lawn mower down

2009-04-24T04:16:00.000-07:00

Our lawnmower is broken. Or at least, it's stopped working.

We were bought this mower as a moving in gift from Emma's parents, which was very nice of them - and as mowers go it's always been fine. Electric powered, rotary blade, roller on the back, no worries. The only real issue, and it's not a huge deal, is that it's fairly bulky - meaning when it comes to do the small patch of grass fondly referred to as the front garden it gets a bit tricky to manavoure and isn't really practical. None the less, it does a sterling job out back and the roller allows me to create Wembley style stripes up and down the pitch. I mean garden.

Now, storage of said mower was an issue. Money is often tight and some things fall by the wayside - and some form of shed or storage unit for the garden is one of them. Therefore, the mower is stored in a nice cosy corner of the garden and wrapped in plastic. This is far from ideal, I realise that, but plastic is in fact water proof and you can't tell me it's going to be warmer and happier in the shed. Well you could say that, but I'd mostly ignore you. It had concerned me throughout the winter, as I gazed at it longingly from the warmth and dry of our kitchen with a nice hot cup of tea in my hand and regretted it's weather induring misfortune - although feeling powerless to commit money to it. I'd like to think that it breaking in a smells all smokey, oh God the power is draining, what's that noise, ah shit, kind of way - was in no way related to it being stored outside for..... 2 years? I'd also like to think that no-one would hold me accountable for it's immediate failure to operate, although a giant foam finger is likely soon to be pointed at me for not caring enough about someone's gift to protect it appropraitely. And to be honest, that's valid.

There are two issues as I see it. (1) The grass is not mowed, and being spring it's going batshit crazy out there. Weather permitting I hope to get some garden work in this weekend because, damn, it's looking like it's going to go amazon any second. (2) I'd like a flymo, I really would. A small one. It's nippy, floats on a blanket of air, and it's highly mavauverable. But effectively replacing a gift... that's dangerous teritory.

So, tempoary solution is in place. Borrow the sister-in-laws flymo. Get the grass down this evening. Attempt to fix the old failing mower this weekend by gleefully tearing it to pieces to "see" if I can find anything wrong with it (perhaps it needs greasing up or something). If all else fails I'll be forced to buy a new one, simple as that. And I think I'm willing to commit some money towards some kind of garden storage unit to save this happening again. I don't want to spend the money but lesson learnt it needs doing!

Honestly, if it's not one thing it's another!

I went to the Dentist: Part 3

2009-04-24T00:20:00.000-07:00

As acting assistant I attempted to make the best job I could of it - after all, it was in my interest of course! It was purplexing to be involved at this level though, but at least he'd given up trying to do both the drilling and the suction. Having a dentist drop tools on your chest by accident because he was unable to do a two person job on his own was more than a little bit intimidating. Especially as I watched particles of tooth launch from my mouth and onto my mask! I was suspecting I'd been lights out twice, I was helping the dentist operate the suction arm because he was alone, and with all the time it had taken with the x-ray I had now been there an unacceptable amount of time - dammit there were games to be played.

The dentist paused and allowed the drill to whir down....

Dentist: "Hmm, seems the decay is worse than I thought"
Me: "Thought that's what the xray was for?"
Dentist: "Indeed, but it didn't show very well. This is far more decayed than I initially thought"
Me: "Sooooo, what does this mean?"
Dentist: "Er.... we'll just pack more filling into it - should be ok"

This "should be ok story" was getting old but I no longer had designs on legging it, I wanted this over and done with so I could get the hell outta here. This guy owed me a filling!

After a further flurry with the drill he was done, and began working on the filling. Having avoided an injection I was still left feeling groggy with the addition of worried and in pain, but there was light at the end of the tunnel and although the packing of the tooth was deeply uncomfortable I knew things we coming to a head.

Finally he uttered the magic words that he was done, and I limped my ass out of his domain feeling far worse than when I went in. He wiped the sweat from his brow and bd me farewll, but there was however more insult to come:

Receptionist: "That'll be £xx"
Me: "Whatever. Here's my card"
Receptionist: "We don't take card"
Me: "What the hell? What kind of place doesn't take card. I mean, this is a surgery isn't it? This is a busines right?"
Receptionist: "We only take cash"
Me: "This is crazy! I don't carry around £xx in cash!"
Receptionist: "Well there's a cash point around the corner, I can come with you and you can withdraw the cash for us"

Ok, this had personal burglary written all over it. But I was defenceless, twitching from the filling compound ache and weary from the ordeal - so I offered to withdraw the cash as requested but I would go alone thanks very much. SURELY YOU NEED TO BE HERE!!

I made my way to the cash machine and withdrew the ammount required to the nearest £10, questioning myself over actually paying and thinking more than twice about simply walking home - but I'd been asked to leave my keys there to ensure I returned. Mind boggling.

Anway, I headed back paid them IN CASH and got my measly change. I got home, took some paracetomol and crashed on the sofa. It had not been the best experience.

I would crack a tooth two more times after this incident, over the space of a number of years. What can I say, I like boiled sweets. The first time I returned to my dentist in my hometown (yep, I made the effort to go there especially) and although more expensive I didn't feel a thing. There were a number of assistants, the dentist explained what he was doing, and they had a glowy heated wand thing that sealed the compound immediately meaning I could eat on it straight away. What's more I trusted them. The second time I went to my wifes dentist with whom I was recently registered and again it was almost a pleasure - painless, friendly, easy, and professional. And long may that tradition continue!

I went to the Dentist: Part 2

2009-04-21T18:28:00.000-07:00

I wake in the morning completely forgetting about the trauma I've endured. I wonder about the flat trying to wake up, make myself some toast, chuck it in my gob, bite down on..... NOTHING!! Ah yeah.

I made my appointment early morning and having already committed to taking the day off work I'd made the decision I wasn't going to waste my time sleeping late, knocking nervously around the house waiting for dental hell... no, no. I was going to nip this in the bud right now and spend the rest of the day playing computer games and watching TV. I grab the address of the surgery off google, memorise the route and get underway.

I leave ridiculously early, that's just how I roll, meaning I arrive and take the opportunity to revel in the sun and walk around the block. Eventually I get up the motivation to dive in and am immediately on the back foot.

Me: "Hi, I'm... what the..."
Receptionist: "Hello. Can help you?"
Me: "Yeah, er... I thought this was a dentist surgery?"
Receptionist: "That's right, we're having a bit of a redecoration"
Me: "But, but it's someone's house. We're in the living room"
Receptionist: *blank stare*
Me: "Ok. Um, I have an appointment - broken tooth guy, I probably spoke to you on the phone"
Receptionist: "Yes, just let me find a file..."

This is the point where she makes her way into the lounge and starts wading through a tipped over pile of brown paper folders that are literally occupying the entire floor space. There are three or four chairs as a waiting room... none of them match.

Receptionist: "Ok, you can go straight in"
Me: "Which way?"
Receptionist: "Through the door"
Me: "... the door hanging off it's hinges?"
Receptionist: "I did say, there is some works going on"

I started towards the door, and I'm proper crapping it. This did not look sanitary, comfortable, I was in no way feeling self assured that this was even in fact a dentists - but what's the worst that could happen? What, they'd strap me into a chair, torture me? Well....

No-one is in the room and I look around at the vast nothingness. Dentist chair, check. Little side table, check... er, flys buzzing around, check... check, check, check. Eventually someone in casual clothing enters the room and gives his name. "Take a seat please Mr Stocker". Nervously I lie prone in the chair and the investigation begins.

Dentist: "Ah yes, I see.... you will require a filling"

Ok, I'm starting to relax now. You see I was expecting the worst and hoping for the best. I was worried I'd decimated so much of my tooth that I'd need a crown or something equally expensive/painful. I was strangely over the moon to discover it wasn't regarded as particularly serious and although it would incur a cost I at least knew it would be a sensible one.

Dentist: "This is a minor bit of work, I don't even think you will need an injection"
Me: "What? Really?
Dentist: "Sure"
Me: "Hey, an injection avoided is fine by me"

I was beaming with confidence now, this was going to be an in an out job with no craggy feeling afterwards from the injection. Bring it on Doc!

Dentist: "Oh wait, I haven't done any xrays"
Me: "Umm, what for if it looks fine?"
Dentist: "Well it might be cracked or rotten under the gum line"
Me: "But you just said easy peasy no injection etc etc"
Dentist: "True. It'll probably be ok"
Me: "Are you taking advice from me, I don't have any qualifications here?"
Dentist: "It should be fine, lets begin"

Fear was creeping in again. He reclined the chair, prompted me to open my mouth and did some pressure tests on the top of my tooth. It hurt. I yelped. He continued. Out came the drill for the forboding pre "bbbbbzzzzzzzzzzzzz!!!!" - comforting. It felt pretty unpleasant but I was holding it together with some occasional sqirming and the odd "ahhh". Then "ahhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!" ............ nothing. I came too in pretty unpleasant pain with him saying:

Dentist: "Ok?"
Me: "Dude, what the.... ahhh, shit, that really hurt mate".
Dentist: "Almost done"

I'd tough it out, but I was pretty sure I just blacked out. I remember it hurting VERY much then things got darker then nothing for a bit. I was now bloody anxious, but I had a drill in my mouth what could I do. He continued. "Ahhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!"....... nothing.

Me: "Oh, oh I feel sick, oh dude that killed and I think I just passed out."
Dentist: "Lets get an xray"
Me: "What, now, half way through, no injection, pain, passing out, now?"

The machine was wheeled from outside the room and he positioned it then disappreared. He didn't come back for what felt like a pretty long time, and he was holding a small bit of yellow plastic. Had he spent that time making it? Dunno, but he was aiming for my mouth with it.

Me: "Humphhh, ahhh, arrrg, I think it's too big"
Dentists: "It's one size fits all"
Me: "It hurts, it's cutting into the bottom of my mouth"
Dentists: "You need this in, it's all we have"
Me: "No smaller ones?"
Denists: "Nope, you're going to have to cope. It's only for a few seconds"

This thing was cutting into me in a few different places but I bore the pain and eventually he got the xrays and buggered off again. I withdrew the plastic from my mouth and it was covered in blood. By now I was feeling a little woosey, and more than a little converned - to be honest while he was out the room thoughts of taking off were paramount in my mind. But this process was half done and I really wanted it sorted, finding a dentist had been hard enough.

He took ages to return with the xrays, and continued to explain with a massive grin on his face that the tooth was a little cracked below the surface but nothing to worry about - we could proceed safely. Just a litte more drilling, then the filling. The packing of the filling I knew I could handle after all this, and more drilling - gah I guess I was snookered on that one. The drill went back in, but this time I had a role to play. It hadn't occured to me until now but there was no assistant, and now thrust into my hand was the suction device which he placed and then asked me to hold.

Dentist: "Hold this here please. No, like this. Don't move it."
Me: "But it's kinda stuck to my tounge"
Dentist: "It's fine"

So, now I was acting assistant. I was not happy.

I went to the Dentist: Part 1

2009-04-21T10:01:00.000-07:00

I went to the dentist and my teeth were... fine!!! Yes, I live - mwahahaha. In your face death misery, and most importantly decay! I mock you with my healthy gums, and chew at your bitterness and hatred with my solid and bitey white soldiers of enamul! FACE!

"Why so much loating?" I hear you cry. Let me explain.

When I was a boy I was forced to attend the dentists to the usual pre-determinded schedule of 6 months. I needed to do nothing. My Mum would pipe up when it was time, they had copies of the Beano in the waiting room, all the staff were lovely and kind, and the dentist himself was amusing and for the most part not a warden of dissapoinment and bestower of pain. Even when he declared braces were the best idea for scrawny invisible to women hormone fueled teenager. Whatever, we rode that storm and came out stronger. Everything was peaches.

Then I stopped going. Brush, floss when you remember, twice a day, yep ok I've got this. Thanks.

But these rules can be difficult to maintain when you lack motivation... gah, lets just say it - when you are lazy and thoughtless to your own dental health. This casual attitude went unchecked through University, into my first jobs and beyond - and then it happened.

Myself and a number of other people I worked with were being recognised for a job well done on a particular piece of work and we were being spoilt to a meal out at a decent restaurant. I wasn't with anyone I knew particuarly well, so I idoly chatted to my beers. Eventually a menu was thrust into my hands and I attempted to make sense of the french, however being relatively confined to the understanding of words such as "bonjour" and "cheval" the only option was to identify words that were the same in English and have a best guess. I ended up with raw beef starter and Lamb shank main. Raw beef starter. What kind of human orders that on purpose? I saw beef, I thought maybe skewed kebabs? No. Ultra thin slices of raw meat, that was so red as to convince my mind that it was in fact flesh from a recently mutilated cadavar. None-the-less very hungry and a little achohol fueled I perservered and it wasn't the animal roadkill scraps I had taken it for. Did I finish? Can't remember, but I'm not normally one to leave a man down.

Shortly after the main course was delivered, and after the betrayal of the menu for my corpse starter I was dreading the plate coming before me and being greated with a lambs head. Or arse. I was served last, dead last, out of about 25 people. In fact many people had already finished. But I didn't expect this to take very long, as with most fancy places the portions we made for those who are watching their waistelines and not their wallets and my thought process shifted to "eat this, drink up, thanks very much, McDonalds at the nearest service station". The lamb was hanging magnificently from a number of bones. I'm not mad on bones in meals, you can't eat it, it's basically the previous owner of the fleshes skeleton, and it's a battle between fingers and knife and fork that you hadn't counted on. Anyway, I began.

Not three mouthfuls into the meal came an almighty...

*crunch crunch, SNAP!!!*

What the.....

*grind grind grind, swallow*

"Man oh man, that was a tough bit of.... what, fat, bone? Have I just eaten bone!!!?" Followed by the quick inspection everyone does with their tounge, "1, 2, 3, 5, AHHHHHHH, what's happened to 4.

Me: 4? You ok buddy?
4: Ahhh, dude...
Me: 4, ah man what's happened!!?
4: Oh I feel bad, ahhhhh this is weird.
Me: I checked with tounge and he seems to think something is... *gulp*... missing!!?
4: Yeah, aaaaaah, you could say that. Lost the top corner buddy. Not gonna lie to you, it feels odd.
Me: Yeah, tounge said the same. Says it feel cavenous.
4: He's not wrong! I can't see the full extent without the lights on though. Would you mind hurrying to the bathroom and checking this out?
Me: Dude, I've love to but I'm trying to remain cool in front of all these people. I've already send messages to face to dim the red lights on the cheeks and I'm working with glands to stop the perfuse sweating. Brain is working on an exit strategy.
Brain: Matt
Me: Yup
Brain: We're gonna have to see this one out, they're taking the plates and pudding wil be server in a few moments.
Me: I like pudding!

So I sat there trying to asses the damage, remain calm.... calm!!! Calm!!! I've just lost a bit of me!! There's 0.025% less of Matt the person. Oh God, STUPID LAMB I HATE LAMB!!!

Anway, I juggled some kind of desert aorund without getting in my broken tooth, made my excuses, and headed for my car. I checked things out in the rear view mirror and it looked terrible. Not discounting the amount of redundant food parts swimming around but there was a HUGE chunk missing. It felt wierd and I mumbulled and lamented my blind food decisions.

The following morning, I trawled the net for a local dentist. I'd moved away from home years ago, and lived miles away now so I needed to find a dentist willing to work on me - which was not easy. Eventually I found one within walking distance of my place, and I booked up to see him the next day...

What we're watching

2009-04-20T09:23:00.000-07:00

We subscibe to Blockbusters "post you a film" service, it's like Love Film. You've heard of that, right? Right. So I don't need to descibe the process. Anyway, these are the next ten films on our list with remarks I made in an email to my wife - seeing as I'd done all the hard work in setting up the list for films I wanted to see. I mean, wait!! Films WE wanted to see:

Quantum of Solace - Bond, nice.

Changeling – that one you wanted to see

Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa – one for your Mum ?

Burn after Reading – adverts looks good

Yes Man – Jim Carey, should be like Liar Liar

Inkheart – Another one for your Mum, features Brandon Fraiser and is fantasy

Mad Money – Stars Diane Keaton so I added it for you

Max Payne – Will be a bit Sin City like, but still looks quite good

Flawless – Demi Moore diamond heist stuff

Day the Earth Stood Still – Keanu Reeves classic sci fi remake.

Pretty good huh. Now, if I hadn't been trying to go for "see, I make decisions based on our mutual needs and interests" I would have put:

Quantum of Solace - Cars, women, explosions, killing, sneaky sneak, stab, women, evil plans in ruins!!!! Not necessarily in order of preference.

Changeling – What! You added that behind my back. Hmm, Clint Eastward... meh, I'm game.

Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa – Hehe, cartoony animal fun - bring it!!

Burn after Reading – Advert looked interesting in a kind of "skip to the end" sort of way. Added for curiousity.

Yes Man – Standard Jim Carey over-the-top-look-at-me-a-thon. WIN!

Inkheart – As long as he doesn't tell as story about spiders, safe.

Mad Money – Added purely for "Wife safety check" purposes.

Max Payne – Woo hooo! I played this game back in.... whatever! Expect slow motion effects of the Matrix like, but explosions, shooty shooty, sulky cop - should be watchable.

Flawless – Demi Moore still makes films? Proove it.

Day the Earth Stood Still – Lets poke fun at remakes and say CGI ruined the whole thing when in fact without said computer generated scenes it would have just been a bit of wood talking to other people about unavoidable crap.

I've been warned off adjusting the list without prior discussion (hey, who knew "Tropic Thunder" would arrive before "Tearjerker 3"), however this list is subject to change. Yes it is.

They say...

2009-04-20T09:22:00.001-07:00

... you need to start somewhere. So I started, here.

Shoulder Obsession

2008-05-01T09:20:00.000-07:00

I’ve always had this problem. Right from level 20 or whatever it was when you could equip shoulder pieces. I just couldn’t get enough. The problem is crap looking shoulders make your whole character look rubbish - imo - and following around a rubbish looking character is no fun. You can put up with it when you are a bit lower level, because those 3/4 length ripped up brown leather trousers aint doing much for you anyway. But later on in life you demand some dress sense satisfaction.

In all, I’m not too unhappy about how Lofgrin accidently looks these days. Chest piece, gah… its buried under the guild tabard anwyay. Legs, green’ish.. scaley… that’s fine. Boots, kind of knighty looking. Tick. Gloves, belt, wrists, check.. yep not too shabby.

Up until recently I was sporting a small pair or green flat shoulder pads. That sucked. Not very inspiring at all. So I am almost always looking out for upgrades, auction house, quests, dungeons, quatermasters, the armoury, everywhere. Now its not like I’ll always persue a pair. I mean, lets me reasonable. I’m no a dungeon hugger so I tend to ignore them most of the time (for now), and I look but CAN’T buy from quatermasters or PvP honor people because I’m not 70 yet. Leaving me scouring on the AH (normally a waste of time), having a look on the armoury (which normally is slow, and tells me that the best ones are dungeon based), and getting lucky with quests I’ve picked up.

Bah, I don’t really mind. I’m patient like that.

So, I got this quest during my 66 mash-a-thon. Essentially I had to drag down some 67 elite called Teribus. Not a big deal, I’m a hunter, I have hunter pride… I’ll solo the mofo.
I checked out the area and noticed that the task was preceeded by obtaining 20 skulls from the mobs in the area, then making sure some sort of landing pad was clear of yet more mobs, then calling down this beasty. Ok, its fiddly but fine.

I was very late on in level 66 so I thought to myself, instead of tackling this now, finish off another couple of quick quests, ding, then come back and pwn. So that’s what I did.

Unfortunately I may have built up the scenario in Guild Chat a little *cough* and so as I started clearing the trash in the area some fellow guildes came to witness my attempt. I wasn’t phased. I knew what I had to do. I had an agility potion cooking up, I’d stam buff’d my pet, my trinkets were ready for a 20 second attack power burn, and Bestial Wrath and Rapid Fire were available on cooldown. I’ll show these naysayers the power of this battlestation!!!

So, there they are standing on the sidelines waiting for epic fail. Gilamnbesh, a priest and RL mate offers to group in case things get sticky - so they can easily heal up, and get in on the kill. I accept, but I expect a speedy victory anway.

I call down this dragon, and prepare to layeth down the smacketh. I send pet and…. AHHHHH, OMEN error right in the middle of the screen. *click*. Target dragon, ERROR ERROR!!! *Click*. Target. Error screen. *click*. Error screen. ZOMGWTFBBQ!!! Target. Error, hit fire anyway. Close eyes. Pray. /shame

Fortunately my gun ho compardorades had decided waiting for me to down the beast was no-where near as fun and jumping it immediately and destroying it in mere seconds. So the battle report is something like this.

Engage DragonLofgin sends petLofgrin complains of weird omen errorParty engages dragonLofgrin complains of weird omen errorLofgrin complains of weird omen errorLofgrin fires one autoshotParty kills beast in < 15 seconds. I was decidedly annoyed. All that time clearing trash. All the talk up in Guild chat. All the promise of a epic fight and triumphant win. And what did I get. I got served an error while my party eat my dinner! Two things occured to me. (1) If I hadn’t be grouped with them, there would have been no omen error (I presume it was a version thing with someone else in the group). And (2) I’m glad they were they to vanquish the beast cos it was a lot of fun, and the easiest upgrade I’ve got yet! And these shoulders look cool. Spikey cool. I lost a bit of health from equiping them, but gained some damage and we all love more damage. I’m willing to trade health for good looks at this point, because I am not struggling with day to day PVE at all. So all happy in my spanky new shoulders (dedicated to each member of the party, respectively) I run off to the new area (Nagrand) and pick up a couple of quests. One is for a pair of shoulders. And they are an upgrade over the pair I had literally just got. And they look better. WOOT!!! Someone out there understands my obsession…

Hi! Long time no post…

2008-05-01T09:00:00.000-07:00

Hello. So, I took a break from WoW for a bit. No particular reason, I just didn’t feel the urge to log in.

But I’m back (for now), and I’m really enjoying my time online. Maybe a little hiatus now and again is just the trick to get enthausiasm flowing…
Anyway! Status update.

Lofgrin is now at the heady heights of level 67! ZOMG. I absolutely ploughed through level 66 when I came back. Went from a fraction into the first bar to full level in a weekend. Now, that doesn’t sound particularly epic, but I must only have been on for a couple of hours maximum each day. So levelling that quick is killing it in my book. Level murder. Committed. Eh?

Er… where was I. Oh yes. So, 66 down - and already getting a 1/4 into 67. And most of that is down to the shameless time sink that is the quest lines for killing Tarbucks, Windrocs, and Clefthoofs in Nagrand. If I wasn’t a skinner I’m not sure how I would have got through it. Kill 30 of this, kills 30 of that… are you insane! Luckily I do skin, and I did skin, and I stand to make some wonga out of it. Woot. But what do I get when I hand those quests in, all pleased with my stamina and dedication… huh, huh? That’s right, “Ok, great…er, now kill 30 more of each.”
RAGE!!! Kill them yourself! I’m off to do something else for a while before I tear my own eyes out!

Apart from that, things are good. I’ve aquired a couple of new bits of kit of course, the guild has integrated some membership from another guild - meaning that at all times there are alot more people on. Awesome. And… that’s all for now.

The Beast Within

2008-03-01T09:19:00.000-08:00

Well, I broke my plan last night. I hit 63, and the talent point was destined for Rapid Killing. Not too exciting for me I must admit because for whatever reason I rarely use Rapid Fire. I just don’t. It’s not handy on my toobar, I never feel the need to click it. I’m probably missing out!! *makes a note, use Rapid Fire*

What!? Anyway.

So when it came to allocating that precious point in Rapid Killing… I couldn’t do it. I knew it was the quickest way to get down to mortal shots and start getting my crit up… but the lure of The Beast Within was too great. I plopped my point in it and immediately tested it!!

After seaching around for the icon on the spellbook for 1 or 2 (5) minutes, I re-read the tooltip and realised it was passive. When I activate Bestial Wrath I will automicatically turn red too. Really? Dammit, I was looking forward to having a button. Never mind. I continued.

Find a mob, send pet, hit Bestial Wrath, AND!!!…. I turn red. Not big and red. Just red. Did I notice much difference? No I did not. But I susepct that is more down to the usabilityof it rather than stone cold disapointment for it being low impact (seemingly). For example, the prospects for it in PvP are huge. I use Bestial Wrath not only to make my pet into a person puree’ing chainsaw, but also to evade any tricksy magics that get put on him. *damn your eyes Fear*. Then you get the added bonus of turning you big red pet back onto the person that was casting on him, and chase him around a bit. Marvelous! So the thought of having that evade bonus for myself is a pleasing one. *I’m looking at you stunlock*

And I guess, in instance runs/raids I can see the benefit of having increased damage and some magic immunity for 18 seconds every 2 minutes is a good good thing too.

… but for Killing a spore bat in Zangermash - its boring!

Fishing and Cooking. Priorities?

2008-03-01T09:00:00.000-08:00

As I talked about in my previous post, I’m spending some of my time at the moment with professions.

My main profs are Mining and Skinning. And for levelling I hightly recommend this strategy - I’ve rarely struggled for money. I could make more, but… I’m a bit lazy
I also took fishing, cooking, and first aid as secondary levels. Not uncommon. But I left them completely and only now (while my enthausiasm for levelling to 70 is low) am I looking at getting them up.

First Aid is all but done. I paid my way to 365 and I’m satisfied that the payback from making bandages was actually worth my while.

But Fishing and Cooking I have dreaded getting round too. I have meagre skill in both from experimenting with them, but as with all of my proffessions (with the exception of Skinning) I neglected them as I levelled and now I’m left with touring low level areas and grinding them up. Its ok though, its pretty fun for the most part if you have no other drivers at that moment.
… but that’s just it. I’ve got lots of inspiration! I want to level to 70, of course. I want to hit those skills at 64, 66, 68, and 70 (Oh Kill Command, Snake Trap, Aspect of the Viper… how I look forward to playing with you). I want to finish off my talent build and get all those remaining points in Mortal Shots. I want to join the guild in more instance runs. I want better armour and weapons!! I want… oh the list is long, OK!

However the game isn’t going anywhere, and that list of stuff will keep me interested in the game for the forseeable future, so I see now harm in taking time out to get fishing and cooking up. Afterall, they should benefit me in the long run. I understand there are some daily quests for some easy money, and I’ll finally be able to fish and cook my own pet food without Shoryuken (my Winterspring Frostsabre Pride Watcher) turning his nose up at it for being “too low level” for him. Bah!

Having all these bits and pieces to do keeps me coming back to WoW, but it is very confusing. Everytime I log on at the moment, I have no idea what to do. Do I level profs? Do I level and gear up Lof? Do I PvP? Do I level alts? Perhaps I need some sort of plan to organise my time online, because on more than one occasion I’ve attempted to do all three within a space of half an hour and that’s just frustrating! Nothing gets done.

Maybe something like (allocating days won’t work, I never know!), weekend time levelling, early week professions or PvP, late week instances if possible.

Hmm, might put some though into that.

… oh and also, how disjointed did this post get!

Time Management, profession grinding, and me.

2008-03-01T08:00:00.000-08:00

There is so much for me to do in WoW, I could never complain of being bored with the game.
As it stands Lofgrin is level 63 and progressing towards 70 VERY slowly, and there are many reason why its such a meandar.

For one, I don’t feel the main drive to level right now. In the mid to late 40’s all I could think about was getting to 60. I don’t even remember the 50’s because it was a period of time where if I was on WoW, I was hitting it hard to get through the 50’s. Getting to 60 finally was a relieve, and I was very proud of the accomplishment - but I had an instant drop in motivation to get to 70, and I felt I’d missed some of the other aspects of the game driving to 60.

As such I’ve taken time to do other bits and pieces in the game, such as proffesions. These are time consuming, but a great deal of satisfaction comes from progressing them. I recently power levelled First Aid (from someone like 75 to 365 in one or two sessions). I had no quarms about buying items from the AH to get this because (1) I have very little patience, and (2) time spent grinding out mats is time I could be doing something else. You weigh up that cost and have your preferred way of working. In this example, I felt I’d be better off dropping X amount of gold on mats for First Aid rather than spend session after session located mobs, farming them, then managing the end product. Would it have saved me money if I’d done that? Not at all!

You see, say you spent 2 hours grinding away at Ogres in Arathi Highlands to get cloth. At the end of it you had 4 stacks of 20 cloth and a handful of silver. Fine, well done. Now you can level First Aid for that part, say by 60. You spent no money, and you’re feeling pretty good about yourself and you sit aloft you mountain of gold. Hurrah!

Well… actually. If you’d bought the 4 stacks of 20 cloth off the AH for say 75 silver each (3 gold), levelled First Aid up by 60, then spent the next 1 hour and 45 minutes in outland questing - then the end result would probably see you exceed 3 gold and therefore you would have made money from spending your time more wisely. And, if like me, your game time is limited or varied then this is the best solution I can see.

Everyone has their opinions, some people have time or far more willpower. Good for you - but this works for me.

Fruit. Why?

2008-02-02T09:18:00.000-08:00

How did my banana go from “completely fine” to “all moldy” in 4 hours!!

Now I won’t get 1 of my… well, 1 a day fruit intake. /distraught

Defending Arathi Basin

2008-02-01T09:18:00.000-08:00

I had a little bit of time on last night, and didn’t feel much like levelling (tbh that was a mistake because I’m a nats nut away from 63).

Instead, I got my fishing up to 100 and cooking somewhere around 50 - the reason being I want them high enough to cook up my own special pet food buffs. W00t.

Anyway! I had time for a couple of runs in AB, and I was really satisfied with the performance.
In a post somewhere on our guild forum I mentioned that normally I leap from base to base killing as I see fit. Its great fun, keeps the action high, and there’s extreme satifisfaction involved in headhunting.

However. As my GL pointed out, it is a selfish self-gratification, and so I decided that I would ONLY DEFEND during my next AB encounters.

… it was brilliant! I got two games in. (warning, EPIC post!!)

(1) Seeing people head off to Stables and Lumber I made my way to mines. Not the best strategy to be honest, it would have been worth seeing where the zerg was heading and bolstering those defenses (in this case, Lumber Mill). I was greeted at the mine by a wave of horde and was unable to hold on. At the same time Lumber got contested and the weekness of the “hit all the nodes!!!” strategy was obvious. For a few minutes I resumed my usual preference of finding people and mixing it up, I grabbed a few kills and died a few times. Normal.

I respawned and took a moment to review the map. The horde were buzzing around pretty much as one at the time, so I took the most direct route to Farm which was open - assisting in any melees on route. I didn’t move from farm for a large portion of the match. I was dropping Frost traps on the flag, scanning for hidden, popping flares up, and set my Cat to Agressive. It was a bad day for Rogues! I was stood on my Trap for the most part, so even if I was suprise sapped the trap would spring and give me some time to get range - hit intimidation - fire up Bestial Wrath - Concussive shot - and kite them until they were dead. I’m not saying these were all one on one, but I was definately doing my share.

Alliance were actually spread across the map in a suprisingly organised way - manning all the nodes we had (3). And this is how it remained for the whole match… we held all those bases and the resources ticked away. I had a little wonder up to the Lumber Mill to see from up there if a one man assault was possible on stables but decided against. I moved on to contested Blacksmiths and got some great fights and kills in - but once the area was cleared I left it in someone elses hands and got back to defending Farm.

My first taste of holding nodes has been satisfying. Alliance were overwhelming at the defended nodes and still had a three man unit pushing their bases and getting kills. It was beautiful. We won by a fair margain, and I had come mid table on kills and nearer the top on HK’s. Paricularly pleasing considering the amount of 69’s in the mix. Team work people, it works!!

(2) Match 2 - I held stables… and didn’t move for the entire match. This was the most personally satisfying game of AB I can remember.

I headed straight there from the opening, and I dared anyone to try and claim it! What fun. I did the usual, popping traps on the flag, putting flares up, and pet on agressive for those pesky rogues. There were three other people with me, a couple of Rogues and a Priest - and we did a fine job in my opinion.

There was little of no action for a few minutes, but I was patient (for once) which was hard considering we went down 4 nodes almost straight away. But I knew we’d get incoming soon….
First wave was mainly warriors and Shaman. I was throwing in concussive shot and backed off the flag to draw them in. Once they were popped in the trap the rogues got to work and I rained arrows from range with my pet running down the fleeing. Nothing is more fun that watching your big red cat chasing down a shaman, as he’s running in cirlces trying to get away or get a hit in - pop intimidation and stun them for 4 seconds - more chasing… and dead. HK!

Back to defending, reset the trap, and throw up flare on the flag. On this occasion I can see a Rogue on the map holding 30 yards off the flag. No problem mate… I see ya. I send a flare in the wrong direction to give him room to move and to lure him in, and I back off the flag (where the trap is). He takes the bate and makes his way for flag glory and springs the trap. The Alli at stable pound him.

The rest of the match isn’t going so well, we are holding stables and lumber but not making much of a move for anything else. We are ticking resources just fine but so are horde, and they’ve nudged ahead. It appears to sit like this for some time, with the Horde mainly throwing Rogues around.

A couple more assualt of stables occur, with dual stealthed druids. I’m incapacitated by one, while the other springs my frost trap on the flag (tut tut). I get my cat on the one who attacked me - hit inimidation and pop bestial wrath. He attacks my pet, and I simply move around him concussing when we runs and I drag him down with Arcane shot. The other Druid is now free from the trap and engaging the Priest. Another engagement is happening around us, with Tauren warriors and shaman involved. I quickly step in to help the Priest and we drop the cat formed druid in no time. I get a heal! ;-)

As soon as I’m done with the Druid I drop a frost trap where I stand and turn to let it rain on the warriors and shaman engaged in melee. More concussive shot to slow them up and I’m running arcane shot all over the place. I get a friend and am charged and stunned. My cat engages and again “intimi-Wrath!”. We both fall out of stun and I make him chase me back to my previuosly laid trap with my pet nipping at his heels. In he goes and he’s frozen. I get range, send my cat, some of the other melee are free, and we rinse him in seconds.

Back to defending.

And this is how it went until we lost. Not by much, but a loss all the same. I was second in Alliance for HK’s and I hadn’t budged an inch.

It is definately a great role for a hunter. We have some fine tools to stopping incoming and enough offensive to…. be offensive!!

Perhaps next time I take the opportunity of defending downtimes to review the map and make some calls becaues I am still rubbish at communicating. However on these occasions I’m not sure much needed to be said. For once, Alliance seemed to be quite organised and defending bases in numbers - which ultimately was an unspoken rule.

… or perhaps I never notice that because I’m usually running around the map like a headless chicken chasing down any hordies I encounter.

*Jerrard, how can you read that and not want to WoW PvP :-)*

Raiding?

2008-02-01T09:00:00.000-08:00

So, over the last few weeks I have actually been able to get in a couple of instance runs! Very unusual for me. I don’t normally get involved because most of the time my schedule is random, my work time is shift driven, and I’m often pulled away at the last minute to do non-wow things. All this adds up to letting down the group I’ve signed up with, and ensuing the wrath of our GL.

*cowers*

Anyway, I did have some time on a couple of Friday nights and I signed up for the Zul’Gurub raid a couple of weeks back, and more recently a quick run through Blackrock Depths. Both very different obviously. One’s a 20 man, and the other is a 5 man for example.

So I thought I’d do a quick summary of what I thought of the runs, what my role was, how well I performed, and any problems I encountered.

Zul’Gurub

This was great fun. Not been in a raid party that size before, and not even met/spoken to half the people in it! As a guild we have “Allied” with a couple of other smaller guilds we know and share a common chat channel. This was a stroke of genius in my opinion, and allows these small guilds to participate in big content. Wonderful.

What I thought of the instance?I really like the open topped instances I must admit - I find it helps with my positioning. Its a jungle/ruins kind of place and the weather effects really kick off the atmosphere. It was a huge place, but there were experienced people in there that knew their way around.

What my role was?Most of the time my role was “visitor”. I was one of the lowest lowbies there (at 62), and as I’d never set foot in this place before - I had to be led around like a lamb. However, when called for I was raining down arrows with the best of them and REALLY having a great time hearing the strategies around boss kills and seeing them carried out. There is something very satisfying about that, and very addictive - I can see why people like raiding.
How well I performed?I did OK. Like I said, I was new to the instance, new to a raid group, so I just shut up and kept my ears open for “ranged attack group” or “someone res Lofgrin”. I died a couple of times for getting to close, or being at the mercy of adds that were beyond me… but once the coordination within the group settled down things went a lot smoother. Actually Ael did a write-up on her blog (with comments on group coordination :-)) check it out: Ael’s Zul’Gurub post

Problems encountered?I was probably the only one without an epic mount - so I was playing “catch up and find the group before I die” a number of times. Apart from that, I had enough ammo, I had pots, I had pet food, and I managed to ensure my pet didn’t wonder off and come back with half the instance.

Blackrock Depths

This is a cheeky little 5 man. Hosted in an underground, fire and brimstone, kind of setting.
The main drive behind the run was for MC attunement, which is gained at the very uninteresting rock at the back of the instance. We did venture into MC for laughs at the end and all I can really say about it is “GIANT GREAT BIG FLAMING DEATH THINGYS FROM HELL!!!!”. Anyway, BRD…

What I thought of the instance?Think of Bill and Ted’s Bogus Journey when they get sent to hell. That scene where the boulders are hanging on chains, and they are being pulled in towards the devil. Yeah, like that!! You even get to walk down those sorts of chains!! It ruled. I thought it was a fun, quite spacey instance - where the foes where quite far below the quality of our group and we didn’t struggle at all.

What was my role?Bowslinger. The guys knew the instance well, and as I mentioned we over powered it, so it was elementary stuff for the most part. Sit back, see which targets the tank was grabbing, hit my “Assist Tank” macro to select his target…. then let it rain! Holyshell was on damage for a change, and was topping the damage metres (or so she says, I could not authenticate this boast as I don’t have any installed :-)) so my role quickly became “burn the mobs down first and beat Shell to top-spot!!”. However, usually by the time I was winding in good shots, and sent my pet to rip peoples faces off all over the show, the mob was down, dead, and looted. But it was fun winding up the DPS occasionally. Would have liked the opportunity to throw around some traps, and CC a couple of mobs just for practice considering the mobs were below us - but I forgot all about it because the place was new to me and I was having fun!
How well I performed?I did alright. I use to getting myself into position quickly now, knowing how long to hold back before unleashing arrows, and when and how to use my pet to the best effect. I did get reminded about putting my pet away for a drop down to another level - and to be completely honest I would likely have forgotten on that occasion (I’m normally pretty good with it). But hopefully now its in the forefront of mind. Drop down = Dismiss pet.
Problems encountered?No, not that I remember. Apart from the whole pet business as mentioned above. Other than that it was simply a nice paced smack down.

So there’s a quick breakdown of the fun I’ve been having doing some group runs recently. In addition I ran a guildy through Deadmines earlier this week to grab him some items and get some of the older quests and the whole zone done and dusted so he can move on. Was fun overpowering everything (one shot kills and all), and I was glad to roll all the gear over to him for some pocket change… but I think we’d both agree that when we hit the end of the run it was a bit unsatisfying. I’d wiped the floor with most things before he’s even got a shot off, and I suggested that next time finding a group - no matter how long it takes - is probably a lot more enjoyable.

I should take my own advice now and again!

I hate petrol station clerks

2008-01-02T09:17:00.000-08:00

I hate it when they arrive to serve you, and they are laughing. Well, giggling. Obviously something has happened that has tickled them, but do they share… no. Do they stop laughing and respect the customer… no. Do they continue to snigger and forget all the please and thankyou’s that I expect… yes they do that!

The course of action:Ignore them, carry on about you business (getting your card/cash out), and then under your breath as you walk away… “fag”.

What you want to do:Ask the clerk what he’s laughing about, when he just giggles and says “nothing” you punch him in the throat, grab him by his head, drag him over the counter, throw him into the confectionary display, stand him back up, kidney punch - kidney punch…… KIDNEY PUNCH, throw him through the window, pull him by the hair to the petrol pump, and fill him up with as much fuel as it takes for his eyes to pop out. Then ask him again, what was so funny.

Whoah, repressed anger!!!!

But I do so hate giggling petrol station clerks…. grrrr.

Eye of the Storm

2008-01-02T09:00:00.000-08:00

It was bonus honor weekend for Eye of the Storm, and I had 15 minutes before I was going to log and decided to drop in and see what it was all about - as its the only BG I haven’t tried yet.
I’m not sure I understood really what was going on. There was a flag, a couple of rooms, and alot of mass carnage - which was enjoyable. I held my own, used a lot of Bestial Wrath, targetted priests and busy mages, and threw in quite a bit of steady shot > arcane shot > steady shot and it was pretty effective.

I got to drop a few traps on chasers, and generally be a pain in the ass… but I got to the end and thought to myself “what was the goal?”

The admition of a guy who just spent 15 minutes chasing people around and shooting arrows when perhaps at least some of the time could have been spent realised the objective and help staving the overwhelming defeat!

Good fun though, but I do think its time to review strategies for battleground and stop focus’ing explicitily on just dropped fools!

Addon: Rating Buster

2008-01-01T08:00:00.000-08:00

How do people survive without it? Install this addon, and when you hover over a piece of gear - along with all the information from the item and auctioneer (if you have it installed) comes a break down of how this piece of kit affects your stats compared to the equivalent piece of whatever you’re wearing. If its better you get positive green numbers - if its worse you get negative red. What could be simpler! You can even confiure it to show you the specific stats you’re interested in (for me normally Health (stam), Crit (agility and crit rating), Mana (intellect).

So if I have my Hunting Spear on (its enchanted with a +25 agility as well as its already awesome crit strike rating), and hover over the Sonic Spear I can see that it pwns most of my stats except for crit. Which is minor. So is it a good investment? Yeah sure. Its an upgrade.
Now take this example and consider everytime you nervously hover over the Buyout button on a new piece of kit.

“It ‘looks’ like it should improve my agility over that other bow I have equiped, but I might lose damage because this one has a crit strike increase. Shouldn’t be much though….er, er…. DAMMIT AUCTION HOUSE HAVE MY GOLD I MUST KNOW!!!”.

Then the agony of:

“OH C’MON!!! - its killed my crit rating and the agility increase is nothing!! waaahhhhh” /wrists
Not with rating buster! Its got the info on hover, and you can make an informed decision based on math not gut feeling (or even worse, writting everything down and calculating it, and blah blah *math=snore*

And what’s better than finding a bit of kit in the wild and getting the all clear from rating buster that you can equip it immediately and it will boost your stats…

.. nothing.

Maddening Hats

2007-12-12T09:16:00.000-08:00

Grrr…. I previously had a “Worst looking helm of the Monkey” or something like that, and it drove me crazy that I had to wear it to boost my stats.

However we’re all saved. I read somewhere, probably BRK as usual… that you can go to: Interface options > Basic setting > Show Helm… and untick it!

Yes. Did it. Loved it. Thank goodness.

So there’s a tip, hate your hat (and your cloak for that matter, option for that too) - well, you no longer have to suffer.

Lof. Lol!

2007-12-11T09:16:00.000-08:00

How similiar do they look in game? Very. How many times has someone lol’d and I thought they were asking for me? Many. Have I learnt to pay more attention? Nope.

Lol… What?

Top five things I’m doing in game at the moment

2007-12-08T09:15:00.000-08:00

1. Levelling

Haven’t been questing in quite some time (been doing the odd instance, pvp, auction house, pouting) - and I’d forgotten how satisfying it is. Especially as in Outland I’m touching content that I’ve not done 100 times with various alts! So its great. Why level? Well I’m of course trying to get to 70 so that I have my full compliment of abilities, and I’ve also promised myself not to chase down any armour sets or other shiny crap until I’ve hit 70. That’s incentive - shiny things rock.

2. Refining Skills

I’m not the best player. And being a hunter in alot of cases you can afford to be lazy because well… you can. You have the tools. So I’m trying to make sure I start nailing down hunter basics, and work on my kiting and chain trapping. All ready for eventual dungeon runs.

3. Getting Professions up

Rubbish at it. I didn’t mine that much at early levels, and had it not been for the fact that most things are skinable along the way my skinning would probably be hosed to. Luckily the only thing staring me in the face and causing me progression issue is… mining. Grrr. Have to hit lower levels and claw it up to respectable. As for fishing, first aid and cooking. Don’t get me started.

4. Trying to do the odd instance

I’ve dodged these for my whole WoW career. I rarely have time (2-3 hour stints) and as such I am completely lost when it comes to strategy, knowledge, and self awareness (i.e what my class is suppose to be good at!). I muddle through when I do get involved. But I want to be better. So in summary, make more time for instances, and try and avoid angering Ael by pulling no-shows.

5. Sponsoring Aughra

A buddy of mine from work plays a Dwarf Hunter, and is currently languishing at level 20. When he’s on I try and help if I can, with pointers, spec advice, tips and tricks, and phyiscally get involved in stuff if it doesn’t deter from his experience. I don’t usually agree with boosting people, but seeing as he’s not on that much right now I going to help him get equipped with some reasonable items for his level, and assist him in any dungeon quests he has - as long as he’s able to learn from it and is struggling to group. It would be all to easy to dump 100g on him and get him glowing gear, but 4 levels later it would be wasted and what we he have learned huh. Huh.

History of Lofgrin

2007-12-07T09:15:00.000-08:00

Alright more background on the main character I’ll be documenting the life of on these pages.

Lofgrin.

Lof’s a Night Elf hunter. I’d tried a few other classes when I first started the game (around release originally), and I really wanted to like the Paladin. Sadly, it didn’t do it for me and no-one I knew really played the game and initially I gave up and focus’d my available playing time on EVE.

After a while the craving for Warcraft clawed its way back and I fired it up.

Dispondant because of the Paladin boredom I decided to create a new class, a Warrior. Kortez the Warrior still exists today (at lvl 30 respectively), and was good fun for a time. I started to play a bit more frequently and there were some friends now into the game as well, and a great time was had charging murlocs and hitting them with big double handed swords. But again, it didn’t feel… great. I was often overwhelmed and killed to death, and any multi-mob situation (yes I’m aware this should be warrior art…) would result in my annoyance at ANOTHER corpse run.

Again, I bowed out of WoW for a bit and did other bits and pieces.

More and more of my pals were starting to play the game or had already established a healthy WoW existance and once again I became interested. After some deliberation (not much) I thought I’d give a hunter another go. I’d already created a dwarf hunter alt on a previous occasion and found it to be rather frustrating. I had a bow, but not matter how much range I got the target would always close me down and melee - and engaging multimobs was a waste of time. I think I got to about level 6 on that one before trying something else. Luckily having hit the net, and obviously from seeing people around Azeroth I knew that at 10 it was possible to get a pet. I didn’t really appreciate the importance of that but it sounded good to me.
Instead of resurectting my hunter alt, I decided that I’d start a fresh (I like to), so I chose a Night Elf because I’d seen them around and I thought they looked cool, and I bestowed upon him the name Lofgrin.

I breezed through to level 10 - it was a blur. And I was already in the process of getting my pet. I remember the first pet I tried to tame was higher level than me, and tore me a new one. It would take two more attempts before I realised that you couldn’t tame anything higher level than yourself (there, my first bit of advice for up and coming hunters!). Logic should have dictated, but meh… you live you learn.

After I had a pet, everything made sense… and it was great fun. I’d read up about feeding your pet, getting up his loyalty, and it was all as easy as it sounded. I hated Danarrsus so I headed over to the tried and trusted Wetsfall to continue my levelling - also running into a Priest friend of mine there too. I’d tamed some sort of Nightsabre back in the Elf lands but as soon as I landed in Westfall I tamed a boar (named him Boargasm) and he was my pet for a further 10 levels. Finally I was able to attack a mob, stay at range and do my thing!

I had talent points to spend. On other characters I’d had no idea what to pump stuff into and just gone for whatever sounded funky, so this time I read up on what specs had what advantage and see if I could find some appealing map for a character build. I happened upon BigRedKitty - and a wealth of information was obsorbed! I decided I would follow the almost perfectly timed blog entry on Building a BM spec and I was eating up as much information about Beast Master Hunters as I could. I grabbed some of his masterful macros and put them to work, and the levels flew by. 20, 30, 40 (first eveer mount!!), 50, and more recently the adulation of finally reaching the old style end goal of 60.

And that’s around about where we are today folks. Level 61, in outlands, with my trusty Winterspring Frostsabre pet “Shoryuken”. I’ll perhaps recap on a couple of good old times and landmarks, but for now…. thats the History of Lof. Sorry its a bit windy and pointless.

Who the...

2007-12-01T09:14:00.000-08:00

Hello! Welome to my humble blog.

First things first, I’m not a hardcore WoW player… and I never will be. If you are after deep and thoughtful theorycrafting, or advanced playing tactics, then there are much better blogs than this one that will satisfy that craving (check out my blogroll for example). My intentions for the blog are much more lighthearted. A virtual diary of what I’m doing and what I’ve accomplished in WoW, the people I play with, things I’ve learned and how it may help you, the odd bit of “check this item out it rules because..” and probably a few “there was this one time, in a cave…”.
If there are any of you left then let me tell you a little bit about myself:

I’ve been playing WoW pretty casually on and off for a couple of years. Yes, you would think that in that time I would have a couple of decently high level characters and have come to grips with the gameplay aspects so that it was second nature. Well, I don’t always get big chunks of game time (I’m a grown up don’t you know) so I can tell you now - I am still learning the game. I’ve found a couple of classes I like playing (which obviously I’ll end up talking about), with a current and very heavy preference toward my Hunter - Lofgrin. Who is level 61, respectively (as we speak).

Lof is the first character I’ve managed to stick with, and we’ve been through a good portion of the old world content and are now fighting for our lives in Outland.
So anyway, that’s the highlights.

More soon.

The Hunting Spear

2007-10-25T08:58:00.000-07:00

It glows green....

That's badass!

I'm level 50 and tracked down my class quest. After some pre-quest "got the horns from this" then "get me the skin from this" nonsense its time for the main event. The Hunting Spear.

Its in Sunken Temple, and I wants it!

Upgrade tactics

2007-10-25T08:44:00.000-07:00

How many time have you looked at a piece of your armour or a weapon and wept for its crapness? How many times have you looked on the Auction House, only to see no items for your level to replace aforementioned horrible garment or whatever? How many times have you seen a grren/blue drop from a mob, only to discover its about as useful to you as a chocolate firegaurd? Too many times.

I don't have the best gear. I've been grabbing mail and stacking agility and stamina with a hint of intel since I hit 40, and that's been working out fine. It helps me, it helps me pet, and I have no issue - however, I have not been able to get rid of my leather chestpiece or my leather pants since then. And it rages me! Surely in the last 10+ levels I should have come across something?

Clicking the character portrait button is a constant and painful reminder.

But at last, there may be a way out of this item-crap misery.

I took a look at a friends armory profile on the WoW site, and noticed a new (new to me) feature - find an upgrade. I loaded my profile, clicked find an upgrade on my chestpiece and low and behold.... options! What's even better is it tells you if its a drop, or boss item, or a quest item. The quest items scenario interested me greatly, so I found an item I liked the look of, checked the quest out on Thotbot, and headed out. In this case, to Wintersprings.

This is where I drop you, and kill the satisfaction of the post. I haven't gotten round to doing it yet!!! But the point is - there is a way out of poor items. Do some research on the armory site, and track down that free piece of kit. I will DEFINATELY be checking this out everytime I outgrow a piece...

Talents spent explained

2007-10-23T09:12:00.000-07:00

I'm Beast Master specc'd. When I hit level 10 I decided I wanted to research the choices and see what routes people were taking and why, and had the fortune to stumble open BRK's site... advocator of the BM spec, and I never left. So accordingly my current 10-50 spec is as follows:

Endurance Training - 5/5
Points in here to boost the health of your pet. Good thing. Seeing as your pet will be taking the brunt of the punishment from here unti.... well, always.

Focus'd fire - 2/2
So, while your pet is active your damage gets a 2% boost. That's nice.

Thick Hide - 3/3
Pound armour on your pet. More pet boosts sounds good to us. Take all 3 points.

Bestial Swiftness - 1/1
You'll be travelling around the world in aspect of the cheetah alot of the time, and its annoying that you only realise that you've outrun your pet and its disappeared when you get jumped and stunned by some random mob. Get it to make sure your pet is always by your side.

Unleashed Fury - 5/5
Increases the damage done by your pet by 20%. If that doesn't sound good to you, I don't know what does. Get it.

Improved Mend Pet - 2/2
Reduces mana cost for the mend pet spell, and gives you a 50/50 shot at curing diseases and such. It makes a difference.

Ferocity - 5/5
Another pet damage buff. Increasing your pets crit chance by 10%. More crits means more frenzy. You'll see in a minute...

Intimidation - 1/1
Gives your pet a lot of threat, and stuns the target for 3 seconds. That's 3 seconds of not casting. 3 seconds of not fighting. 3 seconds of your pet and you getting uninterupted spankage down, and for the rest of the fight you can wind up your damage and unleash because your pets threat gauge suddenly says it ok to! Obey!

Bestial Discipline 2/2
Gives your pet more focus. More focus equals more bite/claw/growl. See?

Frenzy - 5/5
Seeing this proc all the time... is great. Gives your pet a 100% chance to gain 30% attack speed for 8 seconds after a crit (told you Ferocity makes sense). Chuck in the focus gains you just got AND the increased crit chance, and your pet is now throwing about claw at an increased rate and critting more often. It.... feels.... good.

Ferocious Inspiration - 3/3
When you pet scores a crit (which he is now doing often) all party members get a 3% damage increase for 10 seconds. Its free extra damage. Sounds good right.

Bestial Wrath - 1/1
At last! Turn your own pet into a big red version of itself, and cause 50% extra damage for 18 seconds. AND.... "While enraged, the beast does not feel pity or remorse or fear and it cannot be stopped unless killed". What is not to love about that sentence. Get it!

Serpents Swiftness - 5/5
What a great talent. 5 points in here gives you 20% increased ranged attack speed, and boosts your pets attack speed by 20% also. Its the balls.

That's the beastmaster side, and at 50 I've finally been able to plump a point into Marksman. I opted for Lethal Shots (increase ranged crit by 1%) and all 5 points in here will definately be filled. 5% increase to crit. Now thats alot of crit ontop of insane pet damage.

The 40's and..... ding 50!

2007-10-22T08:12:00.000-07:00

The 40's I initiall felt - were boring. As I've explained in a previous post, I'd reached my mount goal and picked up a few decent skills, but it seemed like a long slog to the 50's. But as you get into the game, some of the quests and new opportunitys open up to you and the levelling ticks along at a decent enough pace.

And here I am, finding myself at level 50. So what's been good?

Guild

The guild continues to be a huge source of amusement for me. Great people, having fun with the game. No-ones under any pressure to do anything, but someone is always up for something. Its a great balance for someone in my position - that being someone who is randomly on for various amounts of time.

Instances

I managed to get into ZF, and I have to say its the best damn instance I've done so far! Great fun, and the two guildies I did it with were a good laugh and excellent tour guides. It helped me get a couple of decent quest rewards and a chunk of experience. Will definately be making a run back there soon.

I don't find it easy making time for instance runs. You need large chunks and usually its not something I commit too. But hopefully I can keep squeezing them in as I enjoy the teamplay and the new scenery.

PvP

I've been having fun with PvP. I took a break from levelling to do a week of Arathi Basin, and it was great. Definately making time for that in the future, and looking forward to hopefully getting together with some guildies for some Alterac Valley fun.

Levelling

As I mentioned, levelling hasn't been as bad as I thought it would be in the 40's. I'd heard it can bog you down a bit, but its gone by at the usual pace in my opinion. I was anxious to make it 50, and keep things ticking over, and I've managed that milestone and looking forward to the next one (60).

Talents

As I hit 50 I got to put my first point in Marksman!!! I went for the +1% crit talent, and looking forward to pumping the next 4 levels in there also. Hopefully this will see me adding more meat to the bones from my end of the bow while Shoryuken (my pet cat) keeps doing what he does, and ripping himself some tasty snackage.

So all in all I'm a happy hunter.

EDIT: This is a horrible post. Even I think its badly written and I wrote it! I wanted to put in something brief that filled the gap and included some experiences during the 40's, but what I think I'll do is go back over it - and eloborate on the good points. Until then... excuse the crapulence.

Blog Update

2007-10-22T07:55:00.000-07:00

As you can see, all my posts are in October. Seeing as this blog is a record of my progression from lvl 10'ish, and I only play casually, you can assume that this is not correct. That's right, you've guessed it... I've copied the posts from an old blog and put them on here. With a few updates.

What does this mean? It means I need to write a "what have I been up to" entry for the last few level or more....

PvP...again - Arathi Basin

2007-10-17T04:10:00.000-07:00

I'm a double gatherer (mining, skinning) but every mining node I come across in the levels I'm working are too high for me to mine. Therefore pointless AND not making me any money. Bad combo. So I decided to take some time out from levelling and work on getting my mining skill up. A few minutes of research on google and I know what areas to hit to maximise the use of my time. Mining is at 66 and I'd like to get it to 125 at least. Tin is the problem, but there are a host of nodes in Arathi Basin. Huh, AB.

So I decide the best course of action, and to not make myself go to mad on mining, is to hit that area - sign up to Battlegrounds - and whilst waiting to get in do some mining. Ideal.

I got quite a few runs in these are a few of things I've noticed so far are:

There is generally zero communication. If there is any at all its normally (omfg noobs buff me now!) at the gate before it begins. -
Everyone is keen to score, not necessarily win. And you get drawn into that mindset.
Rogues and Druids rein supreme. Especially horde ones. Rogue = *sneaky sneak, backstab, stun, obscene meleee damage, can't move... dead*. Druid = *sneaky sneak, SUPRISE, cat cat claws!!! runs, disengages, sneaky sneak, SUPRISE!!!
Hunters nearly always top the damage meters (yeah baby)
Defending a base on your own is not fun. Even 15 to 1 I still refuse to run though!
Heals are rare.
Doing a BG after lvl 40 and being able to use your mount... rules.
Blowing all your cooldowns on that mage that was attacking someone else means that the warrior running at you has a good chance of seeing your giblets.
Having a pet with dash > all.

Good things:

I was attacking a priest (squishy) at the stables and he broke off and made a run for it, with nearly full health. My pet chased him all the way to the Blacksmith nipping at his heals, and in the distance I see the priest drop, kill registered, and my dutiful pet running back to me. I was able to assist from range on another target whilest this happening. Two kills registered.

Bad things:

When a Rogue is in my area of "ahhh I can't range attack you" its hard for me to come-back unless my pet can overpower them. Icetraps and wingclips often save the day. But team-mates would be better!

Hunter Tips:

Send your pet! If you are Beastmaster (as I am) hit your special magic pet go mad button (Bestial Wrath) and watch the damage pour off. Bang in a concussive shot to slow the charge, and then lay down your ranged DPS - popping arcane shot whenever its available. If the target is closing, drop an icetrap and back off. If he pops it, get range, rinse and repeat. If not, first melee hit should be a wingclip (slow)... then back off and lay down the hurt.
Ice-traps and flares. Rogues can move around the map hidden, they can stab you in the back, stun you, and have you deadified in a matter of seconds. If you are on defensive duties lay an icetrap behind you, and put a flare up around you. Two things will happen, when he comes into your zone he will appear to you (target send pet). If you missed him, he will go for the backstab and slip into your icetrap (send pet, get range, hammer time)
Don't melee. We're just not cut out for it. Get range, and stay at range.
Turn off Growl. In PvE we can have our pet growl and hold the mob. This does not happen in PvP, that target will just keep coming. So turn it off. It means more focus, which means more claw/bite and focus available to hit dash and chase down runners.

AB is great fun. I was often at or near the top, cosistently top damage dealer, and having Beastial Wrath scares the crap outta squishies :-) I got enough honor and badges to grab myself some lvl 48 boots from there, and had a great running around killing horde. I'll defiantely take more PvP breaks, very enjoyable. And I must look into Warsong, and in a few levels Alterac Valley :-)

Dueling

2007-10-17T04:02:00.000-07:00

Ha! Dueling... I've never done it before. It annoys me alot, the whole "Blah blah has asked to Duel". Blah blah being a level 70 whatever who is now doing the chicken dance and lol'ing you. Whatever dude.

But I was offered a duel while in Gaget last night, and the guy was a few *cough* levels lower than myself. A warrior (I'm a hunter). So I thought, meh, why not.

It was a short fight. He charged, I dropped an ice trap, activated Bestial Wrath and sent my cat in. It absolutely tore him to pieces. Before I'd even got range to let of a shot, the fight was over.
"%&@$ your pet!" "N00b" "You activated all your cooldowns" "And your pet was immune to everything".

I exclaimed that my angry claw'ry, big red cat had torn him a new one and to live with it. Then the claims of cheat etc came in. And also...

"I have a hunter. A lvl 70"

But of course.

He demanded a rematch, now he was buffed and ready for my tactic. *what tactic...*

Anyway, once again he charges, I drop a frost trap, get range.. and this time he lasts long enough for me to get off a shot of Arcane and a couple of auto's. Dead again. This time he says nothing, while the crowd around us lol. He smacked me a bit more, and then challenged the 70 Paladin watching to a duel. One hit dead. And this went on for some time, much to my amusement.

Fun thought it was to beat someone who was a few *cough* levels lower, I did notice a couple of things I struggled with. (1) I didn't notice when he switched from passive to aggresive (when the fight enabled) so he was able to make the first move (didn't see the count down). It didn't make much difference but obviously his charge stunning me for a few. (2) I was struggling to lock onto him (click) and my trusty tab button kept picking up bi-standers.

So in case of dueling, and to see if useful in battlegrounds as well, I'm off to make an "Assist Pet" macro that targets whoever kitty is ripping.

Also I need to create a macro that does something like /point /wave

And that's my dueling experience...

/bow

Awful hats!

2007-10-16T08:54:00.000-07:00

Grrr.... I have a "Worst looking helm of the Monkey" or something like that, and it annoys me that I have to wear it to boost my stats on a daily basis.

However I am saved. I read somewhere, probably BRK as usual... that you can go to Interface options > Basic setting > Show Helm... and untick it!

Yes. Done. Like it. Thank goodness.

So there's a tip, hate your hat - you no longer have to suffer.

Pet obsessions

2007-10-16T03:53:00.000-07:00

As you know, I’m mounted. :-) One day as I was getting off my whitestriped nightsabre, and my pet appeared loyally by my side it struck me. It would be possible to find a pet the same colour as my mount. Thus giving the impression (now, use your imagination here) that I wasn’t dismissing my pet but simply, er… mounting him. Riding him if you will. (damn the inuendo!)

I’ve so far been finding the lower 40’s pretty uninpiring. After the gallop (miander) to lvl 40 and a few cool skills and my first ever mount, it felt like my next big goals were lvl 50 (finish up my BM tree) and then lvl 60 (start getting invited in cool stuff, and hunting around for omgwtfawesome gear). But the areas I’m in (back in stinking STV) weren’t getting me excited about levelling. I needed a reason to make progress other than I thought I should be, and my next pet upgrade felt like a decent enough drive.

Rufus, my loveable STV tiger has been great. I’ve had him for about 10 levels, and he was the first pet that had dash, and the first pet I bothered to look into damage with. I.e, claw Vs Bite. Mobs have stuck to him like glue, and I can’t fault cats. They are just great. But he wasn’t the same colour as my mount, and I needed to make that happen because.. well, it has the potential to be awesome sauce.

So I hit petopia and looked for the skin I wanted. Low and behold King B sprung up, a lvl 43 elite. Puuurfect. I was level 41 but I wanted to make sure I knew where he was so that when it came time (lvl 43) to trap him I could hit the mark and get it done quick.

Levelling in STV is just torture now, but before I knew it I was 42 and half way to 43. I had a quest that involved Trolls (around lvl 37-39), and I decided I would just farm them until I levelled up. They were great fodder, taking them down normally in around 10 seconds. Easily doable 3 at a time, and on one occasion 6!

After not too long (a few sessions/nights considering I don’t play alot) I did the fateful ding and headed back to the stables to drop off Rufus. I would not abandon him. HELL NO! If the King B thing went bad, or any other completely unlikely random event I wanted to know that Rufus was waiting in a ready to kill position.

On my way to the King I tamed a Gorilla. Why not. He might come in useful to clear the way to the King. He was not. Not trained, not loyal, nothing stuck to him. However, he did enough to add some damage to the cause and soon enough I was one to one with B.
Trapping him was a cake ride. I dropped the icetrap, pullshot the King and immediately started taming. By the time he snared the trap he was almost half mine.. and he dinged into my possesion without even getting a hit in. Easy. I immediately screen shot him, then me on my mount, and gloated to my guild about my uberness in pet/mount fashion. I don’t think they respect it. I don’t care, it rocks and you know it!

So I’m now lvl 43 and going well. New pet to work with and train, which is always nice, and now I’m looking to see which area to hit next.

I’m coming for you level 44!!

Burning Temptation

2007-10-16T03:52:00.001-07:00

I tried. I said to myself when I picked up WoW again all those months ago, that I wouldn’t buy Burning Crusade until I’d reached level 60. I didn’t want to be tempted by Outland and phat-off loot until I’d experienced a large portion of the original content. But the draw to try new alts became to much, and the GAME voucher a got months ago was burning a hole in my pocket. And I succumed. (ooooh errr)

Installing it did not go as smoothly as I’d hoped. I had the whole evening, there was nothing to do except relax, play games, and do whatever.

At approx 17:30 I put in disc 1 of 3 and began the install. Disc 2 entered, and the install progressed, and then 3… good good. “Please enter disc 4?. Ummm…… WTF! There isn’t one! I presumed there was a problem and ended the install, and kicked it off once more. Same issue. Dammit! After trying to put disc 1 back in, and a host of other disc/swearing related efforts - and in the interest of sanity - I decided to download it from Blizzard. It tool an hour. That’s an hour I could have been playing. (edit - I later discovered that disc 4 is in a cardboard sleeve in the other side of the box…. why…. the…. hell).

Once the package was down the install went smoothly. But upon opening the game, it demanded a 500MB patch. No problem, the 1.25G install had only taken around and hour, so I’d be up and playing in…… WHAT!! 3 hours to download!! It was now peak time, and my download speed had been slammed by my ISP. Grrrr, ahhhhhh, C’MON!!

I watched TV. I was not pleased. The patching was done and dusted about 3.5 minutes before I’d planned to hit the sack, so at the moment my first impressions of Burning Crusade are 2 minutes of logging in, checking the AH, and logging out.

Nevermind. Its on now, and the urge to lvl has become even greater. Hurrah

Hunter Macros

2007-10-16T03:52:00.000-07:00

I won’t take credit for these. I’m a big fan of Big Red Kittys hunter blog, and I have definately learnt things from his teachings. I also tried a few of his macro’s and I must say I find them VERY useful.

For any of those who are interested, here are some hunter macros that I use:

Pet Attack with hunters mark

/petattack
/cast hunters mark

Quite simply, you click the mob, hit this macro button (or key assinged to it), and your pet runs in and hunter mark is cast on the target. What does this mean? It means you only have to hit one button everytime you attack someone, and your bread and butter pet attack and spiffy ranged buff “hunters mark” is sorted. An attack spell/auto shot is not included into this macro because your pet might not get enough threat if you don’t let him growl first. So wait while your pet gets some threat…. then unleash!

Pull shot

/cast arcane shot(Rank 1)
/stop casting

Right, as a hunter you are going to need to lure mobs into traps. To stop the wastage of mana use a rank 1 spell, and also throw in a stop casting so that you don’t accidently break the trap when its snared. Trying to shut off autoshot when running backwards etc is a hassle you don’t need. It keeps threat low, so one hit from someone else after the trap has expired and the mob shouldn’t be heading in your direction. If you want to attack the attention after the ice has broken you can easily interweave Distraction shot into the sequence. This is a low damage high threat shot, and should keep the attention on you. Useful for chain trapping, especially if you are doing something without a tank.

Feign Death

/s Lofgrin is Feigning Death
/cast Feign Death

I’ve not used this one in an instance yet, but it for exactly that purpose. When you feign death, you appear to die, drop all your aggro and the mob will head for the next person on the threat list. The problem with doing it without telling anyone is (a) they might think you have generally died and mourn you instead of fighting and (b) suddenly a mob or group might be heading for a guild member and they had no time to prepare.
So this macro is to replace the Feign Death button, so your party mates know what’s going on. Neat huh.

Change Aspect

/castsequence Aspect of the Hawk, Aspect of the Cheetah

The lazy hunters macro. I flip between these constantly so instead of having two buttons I now have one. I think I might have modified it so that if one aspect was active it would select the other (otherwise sometimes you had to hit it twice). But I can’t remember it, and this does just as well. If you assign it to a button its one less click you need to do. Told you it was lazy.

Melee

Forgive me, I can’t remember this one off the top of my head. I think its…

/cast Aspect of the monkey
/cast [name of your melee weapon]
/cast attack

OK, I admit this is a bit of a weak one. For starters you need to spam it three times (as you can’t have /cast activate automatically one after the other). However it does save you looking around for the button where your hand to hand weapon is, then looking for the aspect of the monkey button, and then stabbing away trying to left click on the mob. Bang bang bang on this button, and you’ve changed aspect, pulled out your wang, and bitch slapped your target with it. Not full proof but good enough for me.

If I think of anymore I’ll add them.

Almost there!!

2007-10-16T03:50:00.002-07:00

30,000 XP away from lvl 40, and I have over 100G for the skills and mount

C’mon !!!!

Grinding

2007-10-16T03:50:00.001-07:00

I jumped on for a bit last night and did a couple of things. Firstly, as I was in the Badlands, I looked to do a couple of quests. Whilst doing this I came across a clear grinding spot of troggs - and I was able to dispatch them pretty easily considering alot of them were up to 5 levels above me!

This netted me a few bucks, and the XP certainly wasn’t hurting. Also one of the mobs dropped some blue leggings which I should be able to shoot across to my Warrior alt (they were strength inclined). All in all, its was a decent enough time. I did get whisp’d by a random lvl 42 Dwarf Warrior who asked what quest I was doing. When I told him “Iridium” he said “follow me”. I did, and he led me into Uldaman! What the…. The mobs I was hitting when he found me dropped what I needed, without the hassle of them being elites. So I made my excuses and returned to the grind. Eventually I got the bits I needed, handed in the quests, and decided I needed a change for a bit.

I noticed a fellow guildie was in Stranglethorn. I still had a couple of quests I wanted to finish off that way, because the quest rewards were armour that I was interested in. So I hailed him, and asked if he’d mind helping me out with Panther Mastery so I could snag the leggings. He was similar level to me, and agreed.

Now, the beasty that you have to vanquish to finish the quest and I had met before. When I was around lvl 34 I decided I wanted to get this quest out the way (I really wanted those leggings) so I tracked him down, and attempted to kill him where he stood. I failed miserably. He’s a 40 elite and he whiped the floor with me solo. So I had no expectations that things would be any different at lvl 38. Except my demise might take longer. Which is why I called in help.
Myself and my guildie made our way to the location. It wasn’t without issues. The first time he managed to drag a 43 elite mob with him, and it killed us both. The second time I managed to drag a 43 elite with me and it killed us both. As I made my apologies and way back to my corpse this guildie vanished offline. Hmmm. I presumed connection issues as he had been unresponsive in chat and in combat, so….. Damn, was I ever going to get this quest done !!!
I picked up my corpse, no other mobs were around so I thought “why not”. Send pet and open fire.

I dropped him like he was hot, almost no trouble at all. Had to mend pet once, but apart from that it was standard stuff.

I turned in the quest and tried on the leggings. They weren’t as good as the one’s I was wearing !!!! All that…. for nothing. Haha

Back. And mounted :-)

2007-10-16T03:50:00.000-07:00

Its taken me a few months to get back to WoW, and what a great time to come back.

The Fighting Mongooses have a few new faces and peak times see more activity and chat, which is always good. And more importantly, I was almost level 40 and about to get my first ever mount, and a host of new abilities. Woot!

After only a few minutes of grinding and dinging 40, and made my way straight to the Elven homelands. I already had the money in place for the mount, so without delay I headed for the…. mount distribution… people. After many minutes of agonising, I picked the white striped Frostsabre, and immediately took him out for a ride. And there was much rejoicing.

Quick trip to the Hunter Training to pick up some new skills, and I released myself back into the wild. Armed and mounted. (sounds like a porno).

Without further adu I……. did nothing. I couldn’t remember what area I was working, why I was there, and having reached my goal of lvl 40 I was uninspired! After a quick scout through my questlog I realised that I was once again heading back to Stranglethorn to polish off some quests there. *groan*. I’ve spent so much time in Stranglethorn that I needed a break, and looked for a new area to explore. I happened upon the Swamp of sorrows, and after getting my ass kicked alot (not remembering how to play the game ftl) I hit the heady height of lvl 41. Wait, lvl 41… YYYYEEESSSSS!!! Its another milestone! One I’d been waiting for with much excitement and intrige for a long time. Being lvl 41 allowed me to choose the talent… Bestial Wrath!!!

I grabbed it, set it up on my quick bar, and tested it immediately. Yep, Rufus went all red, and yep for 18 seconds he went postal. I Love it!

So what am I up to now, well I’m feeling pretty good about being back in WoW. The guild is great fun, the only pressure to lvl is from myself, I can now ride around on a giant cat, and I can make my pet go insane at the touch of a button.

Here’s a quick list of things I’m looking to accomplish soon:

Hit lvl 43 so that I can tame King B. He’s white. Like my mount. You see where I’m going with that?
Reduce my Stanglethorn quest log and find a new area to hit
Get a run in Uldaman
Keep lvl’ing as hard as a casual player can, and hit my other milestone of lvl 60. Then I can finally join a large portion of the guild in old style high end content

That’s all for now. More coming to be added to the list I’m sure.

Money for my mount

2007-10-16T03:49:00.000-07:00

OK, upon doing some research it turns out that that you need around 90-100 Gold for a mount.

Oh my.

At the moment I have an all time maximum ever seen of 50 Gold. So halfway there….. with 1.5 levels to go. Hmm, I can see the exaltion of hitting 40 might have the come down of not being able to afford a mount and the new skills. Hmm. I need money fast.

Grinding doesn’t really do it for me I must admit. I becomes very repetitve, and you also become complacent. And that complacenty often puts you in bad situations. However, I know a couple of spots in the Badlands were I can get alright money from a grind…. so I guess a bit of that will help the bank and net me XP.

Quiet time for Lofgrin

2007-10-16T03:48:00.001-07:00

I’ve managed to get on Wow a couple of times this week, for short bursts. But not with my hunter.

Lofgrin is level 37, and the race to get a mount is still very much ON. I think I blew myself out a bit when I wanted to hit Scarlet Monastray to see what it was all about, and to get some XP so I’d be hitting the next zone with some fresh skills trained. However, because of the odd times I’ve been on I’ve not managed to make the massive hike to SM. I did try, got burnt out hitting the wrong places, and in the end I headed back to Arathi Basin for a quick blast of PVP. I didn’t fancy a grind to 38 at this point, so I decied to take a break from Lof and see about creating a new melee character.

I won’t wonder on this subject too much, as I intended this blog to be hunter related (experiences up to 60/70 and then techniques/advice) - so lets just say I created a Rouge and a Druid to play with. Both great fun.

But I think for now I’ll get back to achieving my goals with Lofgrin and his eager cat companion Rufus at hit 40 and buy my first ever mount!

Then perhaps I’ll spread my efforts a bit and see what other classes I get on with.

Level 38 and a couple of instance…. er, appearances

2007-10-16T03:48:00.000-07:00

After moaning about the fact that I didn’t want to log Lofgrin in because of the grind I probably needed to do for him to ding 38, I logged in, grinded Rock Elementals in the Bad Lands for maybe 10 minutes and DING! Not so hard afterall (the rested XP obviously helped).

I heathed back to Iron Forge and got the lastest skills from the trainer. More upgrades, but useful ones - including Wing Clip rank 2 and AotH Rank 4. It all helps.

I didn’t really fancy questing so I decided to bite the bullet and make the journey to this much heard about place called Scarlet Monastary. This time I bothered to look up the route there from Southshore on Thotbot, and away I went with a spring in my step.

Upon arrival I noticed a couple of things. 1. If I wanted to come here again I would have to make this ardious 15-20 minute journey again. 2. I realised that I hadn’t bothered to find out the level of the mobs, and upon engaging a few of them I was able to dispatch them solo with relative ease.

Point 2 quickly faded as I realised that the mobs outside the instance were grey to me. So no experience.

I decided to take a peek inside. I didn’t have that much time left online and didn’t really want to get into a random group that I’d eventually have to let down halfway through, so I wondered into the Cathedral. More grey mobs. I decided to take the opportunity to test out my chain trapping skills, and after a couple of successes with some lighter targets I noticed some greens. “Oooo, XP!” - swiftly followed by - ”ahhh, didn’t see those other mobs behind that guy” - followed again by - ”leg it!”

After 20 minutes of looking around, seeing what the instance was about, chaining a couple of mobs, getting my hands full, and realising that to do things comfortably I needed at least one other person with me…. I bowed out. Taking a couple of ok’ish green items with me
For ease, I heathed back to Iron Forge to AH those greens and get some more arrows.

I noticed I still had a bit of game playing time left, so I thought while I was in the exploring mood I’d check out Gnomeregan down the road. I trundled over there, went in and noticed two things. 1. Everything was a lot lower level that me and the mobs at the early stages I was pretty much able to throw a melee hit, keep moving and collect the copper in my grubby mit. And 2. the money wasn’t bad for the effort put in. I admit, I wasn’t in there long but I made my way around pretty fearlessly, killed a few things, grabbed a couple of greens, and just had an explore.

So in a very short amount of time I’d dinged 38, seem SM Cathedral and bagged some greens, visited Gnomeregan… and bagged some greens.

I’m started to feel very affectionate about instances….

Levelling update

2007-10-16T03:47:00.000-07:00

I’ve now reached the heady heights of lvl 36. For someone that does not commit alot of time to gaming, especially in any meaningful hourly chunks, I’m quite pleased how quickly I am progressing my hunter.

Lvl 34 and 35 seemed to shoot by. I was between Southshore and Hillsbrad foot hills, and was questing hard between the two areas. At the end of 35 I threw in maybe 30+ minutes of grinding and dinged 36 in no time.

That’s great physcologically because I’ve felt this period of levelling the longest so far (progress wise), and getting over the halfway hump from 30-40 has proved that a little bit of gametime here and there really is all it takes. Which is perfect.

Stranglethorn Quests

2007-10-16T03:46:00.002-07:00

This weekend saw me squeeze a couple of hours game-time in, and hit level 34. I feel like I’ve been questing in Stranglethorn for a while now, and its a fair distance between Booty Bay, and the questing areas I’m working on. So I’m trying to do as many as I can before heading back, selling, and grabbing more. Its going ok.

Managed to hook up with Tokar, a mage Guildy of mine, and we did a few of the mastery quests together. I’ve received the hunters gloves for the Tigery Mastery quest set, and the leggings and chest piece from Panther and Raptor respectively are ready to be got. They are red to me, but with Tokar’s assistance we were certain we could quickly run around and get them. Sadly, as we went hunting for the panther we needed I had to log and leave Tokar hanging. Apologies for that!

Hope I have the chance to get those red quests sorted, get myself kitted in the new gear they will bestow upon completion, and get a change of scenery for a while. Hillsbrad Foothills here we come.

PvP

2007-10-16T03:46:00.001-07:00

Well, I hadn’t really intended to get into this. I was having a blast in PvE and I didn’t need the headache of being chased around by people with lots of time and lots of money, with twinked out characters solely PvP’ing.

However when at Refuse Point I noticed a cave I couldn’t get into. Upon asking the General on the door what was going on, he proceeded to invite me to a Battleground called Arashi Basin. I signed up and waited….

… a few minutes later I was in the action, trying to capture strategic points, engaging everyone and his dog in combat, and running around like a headless chicken. It was great! I headed straight back in after the map was won, and tried to get to grips with the fast paced playing style and the teamwork.

I can see myself going back there often. Although not the most gifted PvP’er (according to the stats), I still managed to come 7th out of 30 players on my second attempt which was pretty pleasing.

It cuts into my goal of reaching lvl 40 ASAP, but its a great distraction from that grind and improves my combat skills and battle awerness.

Stranglethorn Tigers

2007-10-16T03:46:00.000-07:00

The inspiration for the previous post was in fact because I recently swapped Jeff out for a Stranglethorn Tiger the same level as myself (32). There were a few reasons, the over-riding one being that I wanted to try out the Pet skill Dash (increase pet speed by 40%). To be honest, when I send my pet in to combat I want him there fast so I can start pounding the mob that little bit sooner, and hey, trying new pet skills is fun right?

So I was hunting at the top of Stranglethorn and happened upon a few of these tigers. Around levels 32-33 and all sporting Dash. Once the decision was made I was faced with a logistical problem. I was at the top of Stranglethorn and nowwhere near a stable. Back in the stables I had my original Boar (named Boargasm) - who had served me well in those early levels, and I must admit I find it hard to contemplate his demise. He’s stuck on level 20 - and I could get a far better boar immediately (Belly Grub in Lakeshire springs to mind). But still, no. Not yet. His cheeky face and the fond memories steer my mouse pointer everytime. The other stable slot is occupied by the Ghost Saber I worked so hard for over in Darkshire. Again, the hassle involved in getting that see-through cat was worthy of him being shedded and not releashed back into the wild when I aquired Jeff. So can’t do it yet, can’t show him the door, it took so long to aquire him.

Oh dear, doesn’t look good for Jeff.

Jeff the Lion was actually also a right sod to aquire. I’d hot-tailed it all the way over to the Barrens, often going the wrong way, with the intention of getting a rare black elite lion (a previous post outlines that journey). After discovering it was quite a wait for blacky to spawn (read: 10 hours), I decided to grab one of the vanilla flavoured ones lying around. And Jeff has been my loyal pet for many a level since. In fact, I’ve trained him since he was 15 (now 32). So why don’t you stable Jeff, tame this tiger, get Dash, and train it to Jeff? - I hear you say. I prefer the Tiger skin basically.

As I mentioned there was a locational issue. I was at the top of Stranglethorn and questing hard. I’d have to heathstone it back, then run all the way back to where I was and close to more diffilcult areas. And petless. So, after thinking about it for probably not long enough, I released Jeff from active duty and tamed a lvl 32 Tiger. My thinking being I didn’t need 3 cats (2 stabled - 1 active), and having two cats at identical levels and close skills was just silly (sillier than having two pets stabled that I’ll never use? lol).

The Tiger looks great. Very striking. Dash is just what I wanted - activate it, send pet, and he sprints into combat with a skip in his step and blood on his teeth all that bit quicker. Now I just need a name as classy as Jeff…

Taming Beasts

2007-10-16T03:45:00.000-07:00

This is something I’d imagine everyone new to the class quickly comes to grips with, but suffers a few savage attacks in the trial and error stage. I remember the early days when I would try and tame an animal that was higher levels than I, and wondered why it kept failing and chewing me up.

Well, I’m all better now and I’ve got trapping licked. I reckon.

Its a simply strategy involving freezing trap. Simple find the desired beast, flip on aspect of the monkey (for when the beast eventually comes for you - your improved dodge rating will lower his effectiveness), lay a trap, and wait 30 seconds. This allows your trap cooldown to expire so if things go wrong you can immediately drop an emergency trap at your feet - remember traps last one minute when placed so you have time. Now pull the beast towards you, get some distance from the trap, and watch him get snarred. Then hammer Tame Beast. That’s 20 seconds of uniterupted taming, and only 10 seconds to survive a pounding when the beast is released. If you have gotten a decent distance away from the trap before the beast was frozen, by the time he gets to you he’ll only have the chance to throw a half arsed claw at you before he’s humping your leg and begging for food.

Since I’ve had freezing trap I have never struggled to trap a pet, and have in all cases avoided getting a right kicking.

I’m sure you could work on this further, say, drop a frost trap (slows target), wait 30 seconds, pull the beast, get some distance, drop a freezing trap, get some distace, start Taming Beast. With some strategic trap placing he’d have to made it through the slowing frost, then get frozen for 20 seonds. I’m sure you’d be able to tame without him even getting close. Hmm, might try that out.

The 5 level gap catch up

2007-10-16T03:43:00.001-07:00

So I’ve reached level 30. My highest levelled character, and its been a great journey. It has rarely felt like a slog, and although the “send pet - cast hunters mark - autoshot - arcane shot - repeat” can wear thin, I’m always keep on my toes by unwanted adds, grabbing the aggro from Jeff, or doing something silly (and usually for speed purposes). All these factors force my to learn how to evade such incidents, and a hunter is very capable of controlling these situations. So much so that I often find myself sending Jeff against the most horrible of odds, just to see if I can overcome them. 9 times out of 10 is a success. A trap here, a concussive shot there, an aspect of the cheeter everywhere, and a few wing clips and rapid shots thrown in for good measure.

I was looking forward to level 30 for a couple of reason. Firstly it meant I had found a class I enjoyed playing and learning, and secondly I had been eye’ing up the skills available to me at that level at the hunter trainer for some time. I have to say, I was a little dissapointed. A few improved Ranks and Feign Death. Having said that, I was looking forward to trying Feign Death to see how useful it was. I obviously couldn’t wait for an instance (as I rarely participate in them), so I got myself in trouble, grabbed aggro and popped FD to see what would happen.
What happened in this particular case was a resist from the mob in question, and my fetal positioned fake corpse being pushed along the ground by an angry axe weilding orc. I picked myself up, dusted off the side of my face, dropped a frost trap, and ran like buggery.

Still, I take great pride in my lastest ding. And reflect on my progression since I picked up the hunter class. I must admit, I can barely remember the lower levels and certainly nothing before having a pet! But the most satisfying aspect is that I want to progress this character. I don’t feel bored by his repitoir, I don’t resent my pet reliance, and I certainly do look forward to more skills - more gear - and more experience.

Lookout level 40 and my first mount. I’m coming for ya!

Quick update on pets. I did take the time to catch the ghost sabre at the ruins in darkshore. A laborious tasks of finding cat figrurines and opening them (boring) and I did it without a pet (stupid), but once it appeared…. joy.

He was a lot lower level than I, and at the time I wanted to progress and hit 30 and not go through the process of training my pet to hold aggro and get some xp under its belt. I stabled him and got Jeff killing for me again, but should I find things slow in the future, or I fancy a low level grind for some materials or something, I’ll be sure to drag out Smokey the Ghost Sabre because he looks damn cool…

Addons

2007-10-16T03:43:00.000-07:00

I was looking through Big Red Kitty and took a look at the addon section of his blog. I hadn’t really tampered with addons much, I did install a boat load from a PCGamer DVD one-time - but all versions had subsequently become obselete.

There were a few on his list that intriuged me, so I found some lastest versions and added a few.

Firstly I threw on zHunter - a mod that gives you the ability to hover over a beast and see what skills are available to you should you attempt to tame it. Very useful, and it helps you cherry pick the ones you want instead of trying them all. Of course, at lvl 20 you gain an ability “Beast Lore” to do the same thing… but hey, this way I just hover. Works for me.

I also installed Atlas - this gives you dungeon plans basically, and you can see where bosses are, where certain key NPC’s are, and reveals the outline of the whole dungeon. Very useful when instancing and for finding where the quest item you are after drops.

Now the two that I no longer wish to play without:

Auctioneer - modestly, it gives you more options at the auction house, in fact it gives you the ability to NOT search the whole auction house looking for proce comparisons… it does it for you! This has helped me massively, as I don’t like spending ages looking through prices at the auction house and I don’t know how much to pop my items up for. Auctioneer gives you an average when you add items up and a quick modify here and there and you’re away. Got 20 wool? Throw it up and see what auctioneer suggests you sell it for. Its helped me make money from my material collections I pick up as I walk around, and that’s good enough for me.
Titan XP - this is brilliant. I’ve configured it so that I only have an information bar at the bottom, but it tracks my ammo, my XP per hour, my bag space, my framerate, money available, and I also have the actual time for my location. Little things that are just VERY useful to have at a glance of an eye. This is by far my favourite addon so far.

I also bumped up my resolution (why did I have it on 1024 x 800?), but just bumping it up a notch means I have more real estate for buttons on my screen and a very nice increase in picture quality. Pleased.

Jeffs progress

2007-10-16T03:41:00.001-07:00

Jeff is progressing nicely. He’s levelled to 22 already, and he now holds the target in place solidly making it all to easy to dispatch mobs. Super. I took 5 minutes out to tame a bear with rank 3 claw, and immediately trained Jeff in the ways of creating humanoid kebab. So he now flys into battle with Growl 3 on autocast, Bite 3 on autocast, Claw 3 and Cower on standby. MUST get dash, but I need to do some research first to find out what animals have it, and where I can find them.

All in all, last night was another succeful stint of questing and I hit the heady heights of lvl25. Gratz to Jeff for finally being able to hold targets when I unleash Arcane Shot 3.

Thunder… thunder…. thundercats, hoooooo

2007-10-16T03:41:00.000-07:00

Like I said, I had to have a lion after seeing one yesterday. A quick sneak on Petopia to find out where they live, and I was off.

I noticed on the petopia site that there was rare-elite black lion - that would be perfect! I find out where I can find this brute, and make the fairly long and ardious treck over to the Barrens to find him.

When I get to the spawn spot I find…. lions. Lots of them. But not this black fella. I head to thotbot and look him up to make sure I’m in the right place (awww, bless he doesn’t know about the spawn rate) - 10 hours !!! WTF.

Not really one for hanging around just “incase” some camera shy black hairy feline decides to grace me with his presence. Hell no, I’ll catch up with him another time. I snagged a normal coloured lion, call him Jeff, throw him some meat, and demand he now savage those who he was minutes ago lying with. Sadly Jeff is much lower level than I am (I’m lvl24, he’s only lvl15), so I’m gonna see how quick he levels and see if he’s go the “right stuff”.

So far, and after some minor training from myself *bows*, he is able to hold MOST aggro for the levels I’m working at. And any that slip by, I can handle in melee. Just until Jeff starts pulling his weight.

I’ll keep him for now and see how it goes. Afterall, I ran far and wide to get him…. sod.

Questing

2007-10-16T03:40:00.000-07:00

So I had a bit of spare time yesterday after, and managed to squeeze in a bit of questing. I had a couple outstanding in the Wetlands, so I headed over that way to work on my next lvl (almost 24).

Nothing too exciting to report. Crocilisk quests - get scales - etc etc. I picked up some quests for the Mosshides as well, so things are progressing nicely.
I did manage to identify a few good grinding spots should I ever feel the need though, and with only a few bars to go until a level up I might take advanatage of that when I get home later today.

Oh, I did see some hunter running around with a lion! I must have one…

Instance experience

2007-10-16T03:38:00.000-07:00

Well I got a fair bit of WoW in this weekend. Good by my standards anyway. And I got to run a couple of low level instance with Lofgrin, and a guildie or two.

All in all I’m impressed with how effective a hunter can be in instances, and also how devastating they can be if they do things wrong. Tbh I covered the “wrong” aspects rather comprehensively, and then came back stronger and wiser the second time around.

Ok, things I learned from doing DM. I was with a lvl 60 Warrior, one of the guild founders and a RL mate. I had a quest for Deadmines, and it would produce “The Westfall Tunic”. Good for me. Colbey, my trusty guidey said he’d help me through the instance for the experience of it, and to get me this tunic. *claps*. So off we went…

Things I learnt (of course obvious, but I went in all guns blazing and forgot my training):

Don’t pull aggro off the tank - it spells doom for your leatherclad hunter.

Remember you have traps and concussive shot when you accidently pull mobs.

If in trouble do not change to aspect of the cheetar and run round in one great big circle pulling everything in the room.

Do not jump off a ledge with your pet out, he will take the long route and pull every single mob in the instance.

Look in corners for silly bloody little elite goblins.

DO NOT FIRE MULTI SHOT INTO A PACK OF MOBS THE TANK IS HOLDING!

I think that covers most of what got me killed! I got many green (and blue) items from the run, realised a few things about my pet and my coolness under pressure (what pressure, I was running with a 60!), and got the quest done. Interesting experiece (read: embarrassing).

The next run was much better. Stockades. This time I was running with another RL mate, Elendiil - Night Elf Druid, and a hunter guildie around the same level as me - Niyla. Straight off I knew this was going to be a great experience, as Niyla and myself got talking outside the instance about the in’s and out’s of the class. He was MM spec, I was BM. I was confident he knew what he was talking about (not his only character btw), and as we entered it was obvious he knew how to conduct himself from range. From watching and learning, and taking into account the DM run earlier, I managed to:

Lays traps when mobs were accidently pulled off the tank

Control my DPS so as not to pull aggro

Drag targets back to the tank should I get in trouble

Control my pet, and send when the tank had aggro’d

Avoid any melee, and get to range as quick as possible

Be mindful of the surroundings and mobs

Target select with to see which mobs were being damaged

Wait… wait…. and wait until the tank was only dealing with one target, and then lay down tons of multishot

Satisfaction! No-one died (not even me), loot was grabbed in a logical way (not half way through combat), my pet was useful and not a liability, and I did my job - laid down ranged fire and mitigated mob control. Marvelous!

Sleepy Druid

2007-10-16T03:32:00.000-07:00

By the time I was ready for work this morning I had an hour free before having to leave. Nice, I’ll hop on WoW for a bit and see if I can knock out a quest or two.

As I said in a previous post, I was almost levelled so a few Boars died in Lakeshire and off I went sporting a big “21? next to my characters name. Horrah.

I hit the Wetlands again with the intention of shipping over to Darkshore, and polishing off some quests I had outstanding there. I hate loads and loads of quests for different regions hanging around, but I can’t help but click every yellow explanation mark I see! Its a sickness. Anyway, while in Wetlands I did a couple of quests regarding killing Murlocs (easy stuff), and grabbed the boat to Darkshore.

I had 10 minutes until I had to leave, and a quest that seemed pretty straight forward. “Lead this sleepy druid guy, down to some place on the way to Ashenvale”. Or something similar. I find him, demand he follow me, and he hands me a horn in case he falls asleep on the way. K. Thanks. After a few kips on his behalf, and a few “oh shit I’m gonna be late”’s on my behalf, we get about 5mm away from the destination on the map and we’re ambushed. “Right, why’s he flying into combat.” “Whoah, he’s getting banged”. “Go sweet boar… charge!!!!” “Quest failed, the Druid is dead”. B***ocks. I’m late, and no quest complete satisfaction. Git.

I have lame gear

2007-10-16T03:31:00.000-07:00

I managed to jump on WoW for an hour or so last night. The constant “must level” feeling overcoming me once more. I was a breif grind away from lvl 21, but knowing my time on would be short, I decided to do some bag cleaning instead (sounds wrong), and sell my surplus wares. In doing so I realised that the gear I was wearing was starting to smell funny and with an injection of cash (although minor) I decided it was time to hit the AH and get myself some new equipment.

Bad timing I guess.

*click Weapons > Staves* …. “hmm, nothing giving bonus’s to agility. Nothing else in my price range or level. Meh, leave it”
*click Leather > Chest* … “ok, nothing I can afford. Ohh, nice blue item…. how much!!”
*click Everything else* … “Doesn’t look good.”

So with no new items to showoff and consequently no attribute increases to pour over, I headed to Wetlands to see if I could grab myself a raptor (why the hell not). After a quick browse (I have a mod which shows skills the beasts have available when yu hover over it) I decided nothing had anything to offer so I called it and logged.

The Fighting Mongooses

2007-10-16T03:28:00.000-07:00

My guild. Well, not “my” guild - but the guild I’m a member of. Some RL friends created it, so there’s normally always a familiar face knocking around, and everyone else I’ve spoken to has been just fine.

Because of the amount of time I’m on, and being a relatively small guild I’ve not managed to co-ordinate with them on any instances or such yet. Many of them are in the higher echelons of the game also, so running deadmines is likely not high on their agenda :-) However, some have alts and I noticed a number of lower level character online so must try and get involved.

Not had a lot to do with instances at all in my WOW career so far. Been to deadmines a couple of times, and Stockades once too. All with Kortez. But I’m itching to see how my hunter handles the surroundings of a close quatres dungeon.

Things I’m interested in:

Learning how to control my pet in dungeons. One bad “send” and he’s giddily running back with half the instance chasing him

Seeing how effective my DPS is at my level (20) Finding my place in the “team”

Looking forward to giving it a go, and hopefully getting my hands on some nice kit.

Join the hunt

2007-10-16T03:07:00.000-07:00

So I’ve started playing World of Warcraft again. Talked into it by a mate *shifts blame*, and enjoying it massively when I have the opportunity to log on.

Having played EVE online on and off (mostly on) for almost two years, things had gotten stale and my lack of available time for games dwindled so much that it was hard to sustain an existance in EVE. It demands huge time investment.

World of Warcraft on the other hand is a different kettle of fish (read: orcs). You are not punished for putting in a small amount of time, although it could be argued that you miss out on various group/raid aspects which can take hours to complete. However for the casual gamer that I am, I can log in when I like, play for however long I wish, and log at a moments notice. Ideal.

So having come back to the game after a long break, I decided to press on with my main character “Kortez” my Human Warrior. I quickly grew tired of the class (10 minutes) and decided that with this fresh start I needed a fresh face. Off to the character creation screen (woot).

I decided upon a Night Elf Hunter. Lofgrin. Facinated by the use of a pet, and having no experience with long range combat I thought a hunter was the way to go. Skip ahead 10 levels to when you get a pet, and I was suprised to find that the disposing of mobs was relatively easy compared to my warrior. It was viable to handle mobs 3-4 levels higher and come out well and truly ontop. Have your new found best buddy take the brunt of it, sit at range and fire way until the mob is vanquished. That’s what the pets are for, so I didn’t feel sorry for them one bit. Meat shield. *pats*

Having great fun exploring the Elf lands and such, and even more fun taming beasts and stealing their skills, hooo yaaaa.

As you can see from the blogroll over there (—> *points*) I’ve linked a few WOW related sites - BRK and the Hunters mark being exceptional pieces of work and a wealth of imformation, so I’ve been frequenting their installments and learning a great deal from them.
It makes my casual gamer fingers twitch with frustrated agony, and makes me crave the game with rabid ferosity. I shall shrink my need for now and, oh… work!