Frost is the New Black

Frost is the New Black has MOVED!

2009-01-16T00:00:00.001-05:00

The blog that you all know and love, Frost is the New Black, has moved to wordpress! Click on this link to direct yourself to the new new black.

Also, the RSS feed has changed. Subscribe yourself to this link if you want an up-to-date feed of my blog. But it's not like a lot of you read it regularly anyways, right? (Oh great, now I'm depressed about my self-consciousness as a blogger. /wrist)

See you on the other side of the internether!

Transitions

2009-01-15T12:43:00.002-05:00

There comes a time in a person's life when major phases begin to shift into something new. Whether the change is radically different, or just an improvement on a good thing, it is something that people cannot change, and we just have to deal with it.

For me, there are three main things in my life right now. First is real life, second is WoW, and third is the blog. Hilariously enough, all three are going through transitional periods at the same time at this very moment. And for some reason, I am quite happy to accept and cope.

In real life, I'm starting school again, albeit only one course for the entire second semster. It's another year of grinding out the study hours and simply finishing what I set to complete in the first place. As much as I wanted to finish this certain course last year and simply graduate, limitations have prevented me from doing so, and as such, I have to plan my study time around WoW and the blog.

In WoW, I'm starting to phase back and forth between the three characters. Bashertin is my main, and always will be. Leyola is the lovely druid healer, and ever since she hit eighty, she's been in more demand from my guild than the mage. Wimzig is steadily trotting along through Northrend, taking names and axing out his rage against Arthas. All three are now equally important to me, despite loving the frost mage more than the others. They all have their own professions, and contribute to the overall cash flow.

The guild is also changing, and perhaps it may be for the worse. The recent hemorrhage of members has demoralized its members, and it has not only limited the raiding time of its contributors, but also limited progression as well. There's not much that I can do to help except continue what I'm doing to help provide services to the guild in the form of enchants, bags, gems, glyphs, and a character of each role to run instances and/or heroics with.

The blog is surprisingly changing as well, perhaps in the most drastic way imaginable. I've recently decided to switch to wordpress, but haven't made the full transition yet. I'm still setting up pages, blogrolls, RSS feeds, and other administrative things to get the main thing going, but it won't be until later that activity and content on this blog will be completely transfered to WP. I like the personal and intimate feel of blogger, as it fits well with plenty of sites like the Pink Pigtail Inn and the Greedy Goblin.

However, I want a bit more customizability with the blog, and am grossly intrigued by all the WoW-related widgets that have been develloped since I started blogging. I certainly don't want to be as Metropolitan as World of Matticus, but I would like to a more straightforward presentation with accessible features, like criticalQQ or Gnomeageddon. I suppose this is partly due to DK101, as well as other regular features on FitNB. Since I'm too lazy to organize them here on blogger, I might as well just start anew on wordpress.

Funny how all of this has come within the new year. I suppose it is only customary to make a somewhat late resolution to be able to handle these transitions with the utmost care, and to not only enjoy the ride, but to marvel as the scenery as it goes by.

Again, wordpress will come later, and all the announcements will be made by then. But for now, I hope you continue to enjoy your time here at blogspot.

Death Knight 101: Introduction

2009-01-12T12:30:00.005-05:00

Wimzig is mad at me.

He is not satisfied by the amount of Frost Death Knight content. All the attention I've been placing on Bashertin (Frosty Foes, etc.) with regards to Frost Mage information is fine to an extent, but I have clearly neglected dear old Wimzig. Where's the light theorycraft? Frost Tanking tips? So on, and so forth.

Because sometimes, (questionable) roleplay just isn't enough.

Well, I've been caught in a phenomenon again. Shortly after the release of Lich King, I plowed Bashertin all the way to 80 in short time, giving me a good amount of time to bring Wimzig up to 70. Of course, Outlands was overpopulated with Death Knights, and 4 DK/1 Healer dungeons were the norm.

Scracth that. 1-2 idiot DK/2-3 normal DK/Healer dungeons were the norm. All the way up from Ramparts to Shadow Labs. Fast leveller that I am, I decided to go ahead of this wave and level him quickly so I can get somewhat normal groups going, and actually learn how to Frost Tank without having my mobs Death Gripped away from me.

Once the gnome hit 70 ahead of the general populace, I placed a good amount of attention on levelling Leyola, while at the same time, levelling up Wimzig's professions.

Now the druid is 80, Wimzig is back in the driver's seat, and is taking names in the Nexus and Utgarde Keep. Unfortunately, those "deathtards" and "doucheknights" caught up in Wimzig's absence in Northrend.

Now can you see why he's so mad at me?

To make it up to him, I am going to devote a bit of time on this blog to attempt to teach the basics of death knightery, covering topics ranging from combat, spellbook, talents, specs, and frost-specific strategies. While doing so, I hope to present the material in a straightforward, simplified way. Hopefully, if any Deathnoob happens to read this and learn something from it, I will atone for ignoring Wimzig.

See you on the other side of Acherus!

Friday Five: Just Dinged 80 Edition

2009-01-09T13:29:00.005-05:00

It has been a wierd few weeks over at Too Many Annas. New Laptops, New Year, New...Friday Five Guest Post? I'm quite sure that Matticus from World of Matticus can carry the torch quite well. And I'm quite happy to respond to this week's edition. In honor of achieving 80 seasons of sacrifice and dungeon-crawling with complete strangers, Let's put spotlight on Leyola Swiftwillow.

Congratulations, Leyola!

1. Last week, you state your New Year’s resolution for 2009. How do you plan on achieving your resolution?

Leyola: I suppose I ought to explain my resolution for this year, correct? Unfortunately, my resolution was to achieve 80 seasons of experience, but lo and behold, I completed my goal rather quickly. Okay then, I suppose now is an appropriate time to set another goal for this year. Hrm...Maybe I would like to lend my assistance to larger parties who aim to venture into more dangerous dungeons, such as the Obsidian Sanctum.

Oh wait, I've already done that? Well, forget this then! Elune knows what this year has in store for me and my friends, so I'll let her decide my fate. I'll try to be prepared for anything.

2. There is always a character defining moment that happens every year. For example, Mallet defied all odds and managed to take down Kil’Jaden but losing a precious Enhancement Shaman friend to the Twisting Nether as the cost. What event (tragedy or otherwise) do you foresee your character going through?

Leyola: Last year's defining moment did not necessarily involve myself, but my good friend Wimzig Wintersprug, whose life was taken away, only to be restored as a cold, calculating Death Knight. For the most part, he remains as whimsical as ever, but there was a part of him that was lost. I deeply care about him as a friend, and I forsee the possibility of helping restore what he lost.

Or perhaps, it will be I who will have to deal with his loss.

3. Like it or not, we’re all materialistic at heart. What is the one thing you plan on getting in the months ahead?

Leyola: I admit that there is no single item that I long to obtain...although, I would like to get my first piece of Dreamwalker garb. Wait, I did already? Why must elune mock me so!

More often than not, I find myself picking up things that do not appear to be of use at first, but become criticaly important later on.

For example, the Overcharged Capacitor that I had bought all the way back in November from a friend in the guild sat in my bag, rotting away until yesterday, when I finally turned it in at the Fizzcrank Airstrip for a quest. It just so happened that this particular quest put me over the top in experience, allowing me to reach my 80th season. How wonderful!

I would like to see myself getting something similar in the near future. I'm not sure what it's going to be exactly, but I hope to find out soon enough!

4. In times of hardship, it’s necessary for characters to diversify themselves in their skills. What sort of occupations would your characters involve themselves in (they don’t have to be actual professions)?

Leyola: Not long ago, I left the Argent Dawn on personal matters, particularly relating to Wimzig's death, as well as the events at Light's Hope Channel. I certainly wouldn't like to relive those moments, but apparently, there's no escaping fate, is there?

The Argent Dawn is now the Argent Crusade, and they're taking names up in Northrend. Perhaps it's only a matter of time before I enlist my services to them again. Besides, their tabard is quite elegant.

5. But hard work shouldn’t have to be backbreaking all the time. Your character needs to have fun once in a while. What hobbies would your character pick up?

Leyola: After having explored all of Northrend, traversing its many dungeons, meeting many people, I would like to go back to my roots, and finish exploring the rest of Azeroth. I would also like to observe the different species of flora that live on all corners of the world.

Wimzig's Whimsy: The Defias are a Crafty Bunch

2009-01-08T09:00:00.000-05:00

Tonight, something very strange happened. A feeling of intense fear has been evoked in me, the likes of which has never happened in-game before.

Someone in my guild was talking about dogs. In my hasty reaction, the depths of my instinct instructed me to respond with "Lapdogs, all of you!"

Instincts driven further, I thus concluded that I must kill Edwin VanCleef. I didn't even know who this man was, but I knew the name, and somehow, perhaps due to some experience before death, I had failed to kill him.

Considering my newfound power as a Knight of Death and Destruction, I figured that now was the time that I would be able to handle him man-to-man. I was sure that the cobalt-plated armor that Leyola gifted me upon arrival to Northrend would suffice. (A short aside, I can never stop thanking her for everything she's done for me so far in life and beyond.)

Anyways, while on a gryphon ride towards westfall from the Eastern Plaguelands, I received a faint whisper from someone far, far away.

"Death Knight, we are in need of your service! The Dragon Keristrasza is held captive in the Nexus, the stronghold of the Blue Dragonflight! Would you care to join us?"

A fantastic venture into a dungeon of the cold depths of Northrend? I couldn't resist accepting their offer, whoever this person was. I ended up forming a group with an assortment of friendly faces. There were two druids in particular, one of them may have been the one who had whispered me. Somehow I had failed to mention that I was hellbent on getting my revenge on the Defias Mastermind, but I had the self-control and courtesy to accept any summoning spell they would cast.

I ventured deep into the dark, unforgiving deadmines. Slashing left and right with honed bloodlust, I garnered the attention of entire corridors of me, before they perished to Death and Decay.

"Hey! Are you still coming with us?" The whisperer said to me again.

"Yes," I responded, calmly. "I must get my revenge on this VanCleef first! His blood shall be mine!"

"..."

I had reached the undergound docks leading to the giant vessel and hideout of VanCleef. I smote Smite with my own cleaver, yet moments before his death, he urged to me a warning.

"Van Cleef is a Crafty one! Don't think that Strength alone will stop him!"

Ignoring his warning, I quickly decapitated the bull's horned head.

At that very moment, I began to feel the connection break with my whisperer.

"I'm sorry, Death Knight! Your position has been...replaced. I, well...goodbye."

My hearthstone rumbled. The severed link to the others spurned its activation somehow.

NO! I thought. I can't leave! VanCleef must bleed!

I stormed through the tiers as fast as I could. A grotesque murloc wielding a large stirring rod stood in my way, obstructing my path.

"Get out of the way, vermin!" I yelled, with an intimidating voice. The only response I could evoke out of him was some derivative of "ggghhrrrgglllllgggrrrhhh!!"

He died quickly, but his task of slowing me down was successful. I couldn't stand it anymore. I had no chance to rest my lungs, so I plowed through the final Defias Barrier and headed straight to VanCleef.

"Lapdog!" He said. "The Defias shall triumph!"

Shoving the large mob aside, I aimed my axe specifically at him. With the greatest surge of savagery, I arced my swing perfectly to drive through him, shoulder to hip.

But it would never be. The next moment, I was in Dalaran, with not a single drop of blood staining my blade.

Curse that VanCleef! I shall have his head next time!

Exercises in Creative Design - Epic Gnome Mage Quest Chain

2009-01-07T09:28:00.003-05:00

Yes. I'm not talking about any mage. It has to be a gnomish mage. For this idea, somewhat sparked by BigBearButt's challenge, I wanted to think of an "Epic Quest Chain" that would fit my character, or a quest chain that I would like to see myself doing.

Firstly, the quest is started by a token drop from sort of boss, I would like to think maybe Sartharion or perhaps Archavon. Not Malygos, though. We can save that for later.

Actually, yes. Sartharion. He'll drop a mage token called Scale of the Ancient Aspects.

Start the quest, give it to Rhonin in Dalaran, and he'll be marvelled by such a piece. Unfortunately, he doesn't know much about the ancients as much as his good friend Krassus. So off you go to the Wyrmrest temple in Dragonblight to talk to the big bad motherhubber.

"By the Old Gods!" Krassus says. Apparently, it's the original scale of the aspects, the piece of mortal flesh from which all the ancients were crafted. Think Genesis and Adam's Left Rib, that type of business. Krassus, in his awe, gives you a quest item called "Scale of the Kirin Tor." In certain parts of the quest, you will be able to use it to summon him to assist you.

First, since the original scale came from the black flight, it only makes sense to go back to Sartharion's Lair, the Obsidian Sanctum to investigate the matter. There will be a tiny shrine standing near one of the Drakes. When you kill it, you can summon a miniboss. A level 80 Elite Black Dragon that you will have to kill. By yourself. Apparently, since you went in with a raid, the Black Dragon (let's arbitrarily call him Necrofarion) will bind the other raid members except you. Oh shiz, what will you do now, little one?

Summon Krassus, the dragon mage, of course. He swoops down from wherever and starts tanking the crap out of him. Infinite threat, so you don't have to worry about getting aggro. His health is not infinite, however, so you will have to DPS Necrofarion by yourself. Thankfully, he's a squirt compared to most dragons, so you'll only have to sustain 2500 DPS for 5 minutes to take him down. Not too demanding, in my opinion.

Once Necrofarion is defeated, you will have a chance to interrogate him. He drops the big bombshell that the Black and Blue dragonflight have made a temporary truce! The exchange of the scale was supposed to take place between Sartharion and Malygos himself.

Now that you have the scale, obviously Malygos is going to send all his worst henchmen at you, so it's up to the Bronze Dragonflight to hide you where he can't touch you. In the past.

"Ah, Bashertin! How could you get into such trouble?" Asks Chromie, the amber dragon-gnome. "Oh well, since I'm charged with hiding you from Malygos, you might as well go home to your people."

And boom. You're in Old Gnomeregan. During Third War. During the Troggs.

Wandering around, you run into a quest hub in a little house of the gnomish arcane. The wizardmaster will charge you with random dumb quests like "collect 8 of these for the troops" and whatnot. But at the end, Chromie will whisper you.

"Mage, our plan didn't work out as well as we thought! It would seem that the Infinite Dragonflight have gotten hold of some information regarding the Scale. You must watch out!"

And then BAM. Troggs and Black Dragonflight everywhere.

And there's nobody to help you now. Except for a billion gnomes.

In an instanced quest, you have to stave off 7 waves of 7 Dragonflight mobs. None of them are casters or ranged, nor are the elite. So you know what to do here. AoE them all. Successfully. By yourself. Troggs appear here and there, but they're joke waves, and are way below your level.

At the end of that quest, you return to the present. Appearing before Alextrasza, you speak to her and Krassus, and suggest that the only way to deal with the situation is to destroy the Scale of the Ancient Aspects. Manually. The only way to do so is to use it AGAINST Malygos.

The Scale of the Ancient Aspects becomes an equippable trinket, and you have to use it in a fight against malygos with a group of 10 or 25 people.

So now we go to the Eye of Eternity. When Malygos sees you with the scale, you get automatic aggro. And you get much more threat from your spells. Thus you will have to mage-tank him. When Malygos sees you with the scale, he will enrage and gain a damage reducing buff. Spellsteal it, and you can take buttloads of damage, and you can use your trinket to put up shields from time to time.

During the flying phase, you don't ride on the disks that drop. Use the scale that krasus gives you, and he will appear and turn into Korialstrasz. And you ride him and dragon-tank the boss during the flight phase. Wonderful!

When it is all said and done, you finish this awesome mage quest chain, and the reward is none other than a blue dragon epic flyer. Wicked.

Oh crap, gotta get to school now. Second Semester, yay!

Frosty Foes: Loken

2009-01-06T11:48:00.002-05:00

(video courtesy of WTBBlue.com, an excellent up and coming website for WotLK guides and videos to 5-man, 10-man, and 25-man encounters. Go check it out for yourself!)

"Loken is the mastermind behind the war efforts of the iron dwarves of Northrend. Having previously served the Pantheon, he has recently heard the calls of the old god Yogg-Saron. Since that moment, he has lost all faith in the Titan's vision and considers the Old God his new master." - WoWWiki

General Strategy

The fight boils down to two main things you ought to look out for. The first is a raidwide aura that does periodic damage to all members that deals damage ever two seconds. The damage scales with the indivdual's distance to the boss himself. Thus, you will want to stand really close to him, if not, on top of him.

The second, and perhaps the trickiest part of the fight is avoiding Loken's Lightning Nova. On both modes, a raid emote will appear saying that Loken is preparing to cast Lightning Nova. During this window, you have FIVE seconds to move out of the nova's twenty-yard range. Once the nova is cast, you must get back to Loken as quickly as possible, minimizing damage from the aura.

Mastering the Nova Dance

There are two general approaches to movement during the Lightning Nova. One involves the tank moving out of Nova range, and the other involves him or her staying behind and taking the full damage when the spell is cast. Tanks that move out of range should stay in place after the nova and simply let the boss move to him or her. The other members should move in the same direction as the tank to minimize their run distance post-Nova and receive less periodic damage.

The latter method is doable if the tank is well geared for the instance. The other members will not have to worry about movement direction, since Loken will stay in the same place the entire time.

Thus, blink is a godsend, since you travel the same distance as the nova itself. However, do not assume that you are automatically out of range after casting it, since the spell is not exactly perfect at the moment.

Offensive Spells

Pop all your cooldowns as soon as the fight starts, and when they're up again, save them for after a Nova. This way, you will receive the benefits of the spell's effects for longer periods of time, without being interrupted by having to run out of his Nova.

For some reason, my water elemental is immune to all periodic damage as well as Lightning Nova, so you don't have to worry about him. Mirror Images die instantly, so don't even bother using it.

Defensive Spells

Ice Barrier should be kept up whenever possible to both minimize damage as well as reduce the strain on your healer. Ice Block can save your butt in an instant if you are unable to get out of range. You should cast Cold Snap as soon as you come out of Ice Block, but be aware that due to Hypothermia, you will be unable to use Ice Block during the next Lightning Nova, so be prepared to Blink out.

You may opt to use Mage armor for the resistance against the periodic damage you'll be taking. It is also quite useful if by any chance one or both of the other DPS classes die during the fight. If you have to shoulder the damage load by yourself, be prepared for a somewhat longer fight.

Phat Lewtz

Ornate Wooden Stola - An excellent pre-T7 chest piece. Somewhat comparable to the Robes of Crackling Flame, but you sacrifice haste and MP5 for more crit. If you're not yet at the hit cap at this point, you should go for the Ebonweave robe, but this is a good drop to take on the way there.

Flowing Sash of Order - The badge sash offers better stats overall, but this piece is a decent holdover until you accumulate enough emblems to grab one. The Spirit is a bit of a waste, though.

Woven Bracae Leggings - This is a truly excellent pair of pants for any cloth caster, even disc priests. There's no reason why you shouldn't pick this up, unless you need hit, or want T7 set bonuses.

Frostradamus!

2009-01-05T11:27:00.002-05:00

I was going to do a boss post for Loken today, seeing that the group that I run heroics with have recently gotten down a solid strategy, and are comfortable with positioning and timing of movement. However, this is the new year after all, and in the same vein that others on the internether have done, I would like to have some fun and express my own thoughts and predictions regarding this year, specifically frost mage-oriented.

Now 2008 has been considered to be a very up and down for mages in general, but the Frost school has seen nothing but good things. The introduction of our proc-based talents have helped our dps, while at the same time, make our rotations a lot more interesting than frostbolt spam. Improvements to our Water Elemental, including both the talent and glyphs, have increased both dps as well as group utility, thanks to its mana regenertion skill. Oh and Blizzard started critting. How awesome.

On the downside, I can only put my finger on Deep Freeze as a center of discussion. The removal of its damage component has irked both PvP and PvE mages alike, but in the end, it seemed that the controversy has subsided to say the least. If anything, Frost kept about its business critting people's pants off, and enjoying the heck out of it.

But where do we go in 2009? What does the new year have in store? Here is my list for predictions. Some are wishes of fortune, while others are ill omens.

1. Frost will be more of an asset in raids than before.

This will be done by either (or both) of two things:
- increase in overall Frost DPS
- more useful raid utility compared to other mage specs

The first buff is a rather straightforward approach to buffing frost raiding by simply raising the damage done by frostbolt. Conveniently, frostbolt is not the primary nuke in the PvP spec due to its cast time, and as such, will be the easiest way to increase frost dps.

The second buff suggestion doesn't focus on the mage's damage output, but rather the other assets he brings to the table compared to other specs. The most significant unique contribution that a frost mage brings is the water elemental's mana regeneration. With one mage alone, it doesn't feel like too much, but with two, you can really see the difference on your mana bar when you're blasting away at a boss like Patchwerk.

Simply put, I predict that if they are going to buff water elementals, the easiest way to do so is to provide the straight up replenishment bonus that Shadow Priests, Ret Pallies, and Survival Hunters provide. This is a more reasonable choice for the frost buff compared to a straightforward dps increase, since frost is more known as the best DPM spec (damage per mana) compared to the DPS power of Frostfire and Fire.

2. AoE will become less viable, but Frost won't be affected as much as other classes.

My thoughts on this stem from a recent pug that I ran. It was Culling of Stratholme heroic, and the party consisted of a prot pally, a hunter, and a boomkin. While the healer's class isn't important in this case, you can see where I'm getting at here. The entire instance was just AoE. It was fast, it was furious, it was boring. Frankly, other than for solo use and farming, I've become sick and tired of Blizzard.

I'm sure such sentiments are shared by many DPS classes, but it also comes from the fact that I simply don't look at my DPS meter anymore, all because it boils down to how soon I start AoE'ing, and how much faster I can regenerate mana compared to my counterparts.

Blizzard will probably fix this for sure in the next content patch. The newer raid and 5-man dungeons will consist of dreadful pulls akin to Magister's Terrace and Shattered Halls, but will be in less quantity, to keep in line with the Lich King dungeon design philosophy.

On top of that, AoE damage from other classes will be reduced, following the Hunter volley nerf. This may include Seed of Corruption, Hurricane, and very likely Divine Storm, but Blizzard will still be able to crit, and will continue to make AoE grinding manageable, albeit more challenging than it was when Wrath was released.

3. Water Elemental immunity in select boss fights will be replaced by AoE damage reduction on all boss fights.

I just noticed that Squirtle doesn't take any raid damage from Loken's debuff. Is it just me, or does he not die to Lightning Nova either? And I don't mean survival, I mean full immunity from heavy AoE on some boss fights. I ran Arachnid quarter with my guild yesterday, and he didn't take any damage at all from rain of fire on the second boss. Is this a glitch?

I would like to think so, and that Blizzard has probably noticed by now. Expect such situational perks to be fixed soon, but in exchange, they will give elementals the AoE protection that they deserve, bringing them in line with other pets.

4. Frost will once again be rulers of PvP.

Thanks to the upcoming buffs to the arcane tree in the next patch, the WoW devs will keep a close eye on the damage of Arcane Barrage. Due to the crying of those who aren't swift enough to get the new resilience gear, they will be one-twoshotted left and right. Arcane Barrage will be brought back in line in terms of damage output.

Similar to the awkward PvE gear scaling towards the end of BC, more and more people will catch up with resilience, and while Arcane PvP won't be neutered to epic proportions, it will no longer be the powerhouse that it once was. Frost will emerge from the shadows once again as the safer school to burst with.

5. None of the above will come true.

Some of it is just wishful thinking, but seeing that Frost at the moment is not getting as much attention as Frostfire and Arcane in PvE and PvP respectively, it is quite difficult to think that Squirtle-wielders will not get any form of attention at all while the other trees are uner review. Only time will tell.

Happy New Year!

2009-01-02T10:11:00.002-05:00

I've got lots of explaining to do. Now normally, this time of year (December 25th to January 1st) spells disaster for my hobby life, since everything is put on hold for numerous family functions and impromptu get-togethers. You see, I have a few relatives that come up from the States from time to time, and it's always a blast. Spending time with the cousins is always fun, too. And with family around, that usually spells hangovers for me.

That said, December 24, 25, 31, January 1 are a wash. There's no getting around to that. December 26 is also a no-show because of Boxing Day, and due to staying up all night and getting into line at 3 o'clock in the morning to buy electronics for really cheap (got an Xbox-360 amongst others), then sleeping for the rest of the day.

For family impromptu stuff, we had last minute get-togethers on the 27th, and on the 29th for the cousins to take the littler cousins to watch Twilight (very nice tween fluff and good chemistry between attractive co-stars).

So where does that leave 30th? Sick. Terrible cold. Couldn't even drink as much to ring in the new year, because hangover symptoms for me are amplified by illness.

And now, I'm back, but till a bit sick, though! This learns me to have pre-arranged posts for instances of sick days and unavailability. But iunno. 9 consecutive days worth of filler posts wouldn't float well with anyone. Heck, I don't even think Matticus would have the blog-fu in him to do so without some modicum of assistance.

Me? I get none. I play the game solo, and this is what I get for not being around. Le Sigh! Oh well. Time to catch y'all up on stuff.

Individual Progress
- Bashertin finally got new shoulders to replace his Loot Reaver mantle, and is a head slot away from Superior. It won't happen anytime soon, because his current piece has a lot of Hit on it.
- Leyola is 77 and has epic flight! She also has Cold Winter Flying! Now the herb/mineral farming can truly begin in between pug groups.
- Wimzig has become the REAL moneymaker in the group, doing Jewelcrafting dailies almost exclusively, and selling the Dragon Eyes for ridiculous prices. He's still 70, though.

Guild Progress
For some reason, the awkward post-Wrath conundrum that surrounds the guild is still there. We're still hemorrhaging all of the new members we get. Recently, it's been in part to other up and coming guilds stealing healers and tanks away from us. We have fallen into the trap of recruiting dishonest alts who are only there to scout things up and combing through the ranks and spiriting away our new recruits.

Well, I've got a few choice expletives for them, but I'd rather not say it here. All I am going to say is that Ironwill Mercenaries does not condone dishonesty, forgery, or underhandedness. And don't think we don't know which guilds are responsible, as well. We got your numbers, and don't expect us to help you out any time soon, or even acknowledge you with any common decency. And that is that.

Conclusion
I hate to end the post on such a nasty note, but I have an equally nasty cold still lying around, and I don't have much left in me. I think I'll do a boss strat soon, though. Anyways, happy new year again, and I'll see ya around.

A Familiar Poem of Season's Greetings

2008-12-24T08:25:00.005-05:00

'Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the nether
Not a blogger was blogging, not even Bellweather
Their posts were scheduled for prearranged times
Most likely were poems with silly little rhymes

Their children were nestled all snug in their beds
While the parents had 25-man Naxx in their heads
With Leyola, Wimzig, and Bashertin specced Ice
They were a trio of Lovely, Naughty, and Nice

Meanwhile in Ironforge, there was a loud "clank!"
The group was in LFG, asking "need DPS and tank!"
Bash Ported to IF to buy reagents and dust
thinking "I must grind my rep, I MUST I MUST!"

The heat of the forge made sweat beads appear
As they rolled down his brows, his nose and his ear
He stopped by the bank, where he saw such a site
A jolly man in red, with beard of snow white

An interesting fellow, with gadgets and printers
Bash knew right away it was Greatfather Winter;
"Oh mage," greatfather said, "how timely that you came!
My reindeer was kidnapped, but I forgot his name!"

"Was it Dasher, Dancer, Prancer? No Blitzen?
Comet, Cupid, Donder? No, wait! It was Metzen!
I need him back, because he crafted my sleigh
So go off to Lost Rigger cove! Off off and away!"

Not since the BC days of Magister's Terrace
Bash flew to Kalimdor, to the deserts of Tanaris
He arrived at the cove, and saw Metzen stabled
Bound and chained, quite clearly disabled

Invisibility up, he sneaked to the roof
He could hear the chains jingle, attached to each hoof
As Bash drew out his wand and jumped to the ground
A mob of Southsea pirates cluttered around

They wore swashbuckler clothes, wielded swords on each hand
Their faces were covered by the desert sand
With murderous intent, they threatened the gnome
"We'll slice ya and dice ya, then mail you back home!"

Then a surge of rage grew in old Bashertin's eyes
The pirates instead foretold their own demise
The bandits were quick when they gave the mage chase
But suddenly they were all Frost nova'd in place!

The mage blinked away quickly, like a warp-stalking lizard
Then he turned back to the mobs, and cast a huge Blizzard
The crits were enormous, giant numbers abound
When the spell was over, corpses littered the ground

Bashertin turned giddy, at the one-sided fight
And Metzen stared blankly back at the sight
Bash turned to the reindeer and said, "It's okay!"
"I came to rescue you, so you can craft the Greatfather's sleigh!"

With Metzen unbound, they escaped from the gorge
With Bash making a portal straight home to Ironforge
Soon, Greatfather Winter was again with his deer
Who happened to be a 450 engineer

Metzen crafted the sleigh, and they were off in a whistle
And they all flew like the down of a thistle
Bash heard him exclaim, knowing next year he'd be back,
"Merry Christmas to all, from Frost is the new Black!"

Frosty Foes: Keristrasza

2008-12-22T11:42:00.005-05:00

"Keristrasza was a servant of Alexstrasza's flight. She planned to stall Malygos's advance in the Nexus War by eliminating his consort and facing his retribution with a fleet of red dragons. While the plan worked and Malygos was distracted, he used his considerable power to imprison Keristrasza within The Nexus and slowly bind her to his will as a new consort. She is currently being held there and players are tasked with killing her to preserve her freedom." - WoWWiki

General Strategy

The only thing that you have to worry about this fight is the Intense Cold debuff that is applied when your mage stands still for a period of time. This debuff will both deal damage and increase cast time on your spells. To combat this, you will have to jump in between each spell cast (even instant cast spells) to maintain minimal casting time on your frostbolt, as well as minimal damage.

Keristrasza also casts Crystal Chains, a spell that does Frost damage and roots everyone in place, making them vulnerable to Intense Cold. Fortunately, mages have spells that free themselves out of it.

When Fingers of Frost Procs, you can squeeze in a shatter combo on the second charge before having to jump. For Brain Freeze procs, toss a Fireball in place of a Frostbolt in between jumps, since doing so during a jump will result in the inability to cast a frostbolt as you land, forcing you to jump anyways.

Offensive Spells

Mirror Image clones will die quickly. Don't bother using them. Your Water Elemental is immune to Intense Cold, so summon him as soon as the fight starts. Icy Veins as soon as possible as well. After Cold Snap, use your second Icy Veins when Keristrasza enrages, minimizing damage done to the tank. Depending on how long the encounter lasts for a particular group, you might want to save your trinkets for the enrage if you can only use it once during the fight.

Defensive Spells

Your tools of choice here are Ice Barrier and Frost Ward. If you can keep both up whenever their respective cooldowns are available, you will not take any damage for the duration of the fight. You can Blink, Ice Block, or Escape Artist your way out of chains.

Mage Armor is useful for this fight due to its Frost resist. Use it to decrease damage taken, and to increase the duration of your bubbles in the process.

Phat Lewtz

Gloves of Glistening Runes - Decent stats, but the large amount of Spirit and lack of +Hit signals that this is more suited to priests. The T7 gloves and Ebonweave Gloves have +Hit, and the former has better +Crit.

Conclusion

With the wide variety of tools at your disposal to counteract Keristrasza's damage, it is certainly possible to take absolutely no damage during the fight (see screenshot below!). With a frost-immune Elemental, this fight is a cakewalk for Frost Mages. Healers will be love you for not having to worry about you, as this is a healer-intensive fight due to having to heal multiple targets pinned down by the chain.

Friday Five - Keeping Up Appearances

2008-12-19T11:44:00.003-05:00

The theme for F5 this week over at Too Many Annas is about appearances. Due to my current ailment, I'll limit the response to just one character. And in celebration of the big healy christmas tree reaching her 75th season, this week's installment will feature Leyola Swiftwillow.

Describe your characters general appearance - is it exactly what you see in the avatar?

Leyola is somewhat typical for a Night Elf with regards to general appearance, except somewhat lankier for her height. She's quite tall, pale purple-grey skin, and wavy silver-white hair, which, at moderate length, she'll style according to the needs of her helm.

What are their opinions on baths/showers/etc?

Taken whenever available, but her journeys limit herself to doing so at night, at a nearby lake, where nobody can see. For hot, relaxing baths, she prefers natural springs rather than man-made devices.

Do they fuss about their looks (and if female, wear makeup)?

Spending most of her time in the Tree-of-Life form, she has no qualms about her looks, since there's no saving the ugliness of barked skin. Outside of her druidic duties, she's too exhasted to bother with her appearance. Besides, it's not like anybody's looking anyways.

If they could pick an outfit out of an infinite closet, what would it look like?

She doesn't care much about clothes outside of her healing form, but if she could pick any tree in the entire world of Azeroth to shift into, she would probably want to be one of those beautiful tall oaks in Grizzly Hills. Simply remarkable, in her opinion.

For the guys - boxers, briefs, or commando trousers? For the girls - bikinis, thongs, or boyshorts?

She wears a thong underneath all that armor, for comfort. But that doesn't mean she'll be dancing on top of Stormwind mailboxes anytime soon.

On Guild Exhaustion

2008-12-19T05:10:00.003-05:00

If you haven't noticed, I've been posting slightly less this month, and for good reason. I just don't do too well in the winter months. Despite my penchant for the concept of everything frosty and cold, I get sick rather easily. I've been battling an on-and-off temperature for a few days. WoW certainly doesn't help the cause either. But I still fight on! I don't give up! I remain standing through rough times. In real life, I'm a trooper.

In WoW, not so much.

I've been demoralized by events that have transpired in my guild. Due to the allure of the new raid dungeons, the guild has been actively recruiting for 10-mans. The possibility of 25's will probably come later when the vast majority of our guild is at 80. Due to the casual nature of the guild, we're pretty lax about levelling.

At first, no one was under any sort of pressure to get to the cap (due to my sheer awesomeness, I was the first to ding 80 in my guild!). But when the first wave of 80's hit, the hunger for Kel'Thuzad's blood stirred, and all of a sudden, raiding couldn't come any sooner.

Motivated to get back into the BC raiding schedule, the first wave started doing heroics together to gear up. To their dismay, they were surprisingly difficult. Perhaps they were too used to being overgeared for BC heroics, or perhaps there was still some rust to shake off, the reality of having to overcome heroics first has shaken a few members. This was not a problem though, since they were quite well for themselves, and geared up accordingly.

This was all fine and dandy. Having been part of the guild for quite a time now, it's always been about slow and steady. Questing and regular dungeons progressed into heroic dungeons, which then progressed into the entry-level raids. Those who were part of the first wave of 80's, recruited very late into BC (pre-Wrath) began to contribute to a hemorrhage of sorts that continues until today.

"This guild isn't serious enough for me."

"This guild is progressing way too slowly."

"I was only here to level."

Many reasons why new recruits left. The first two were quite reasonable. The third irked me so much. Yes, we're casual, but we're still a raiding guild! We still expect some sort of commitment to stay and be a part of the progression, despite the pace of it. It was disheartening, and perhaps I amongst the other core members took the gquits too personally.

In reaction to this wave of departures, the officers have begun to feel desperate, and frankly, I could only wish there was something that I could do to alleviate this restlessness. There's a bunch of members who are still not at the level cap, and perhaps this second wave will be the panacea. I don't want to be restless about it, but it's only a matter of time before further hemorrhaging will result in an increased amount of pressure put on these members to hit the cap.

I for one really don't mind the pace. I'm just not sure about the others. It's a whole new world of heroics and raiding out there, and I feel that there shouldn't be a rush. Yet at the same time, it's that lax that drives potential or existing recruits away. It's the casual dilemma. Only time will tell what will happen, and I, for one, will be sure to still be there when the guild gets back into the groove of things.

Having A Greenchy Winter Veil!

2008-12-16T10:03:00.004-05:00

For this holiday season, I decided to go the way of the sneaky crook, and stole a lot of money from "lazy-minded" individuals.

You know, the usual. Buying items from seasonal vendors for several copper, then selling them for a few gold. Farming Small Eggs in Westfall, then selling them for even more ridiculous prices. Reposting people's Winter Boots on the AH even though I never crafted them in the first place. That sort of thing.

As an alliance mage, the greatest joy of all was to venture into the depths of the Stormwind Stockade, clear it out in one giant pull (plus a leftovers pull), and repeating as many times as the server could allow me. Dusting off the old dungeon soloing guide the other day, I figured now is a good a time as ever to start doing that sort of thing again just for the sheer fun of it.

And make unfair amounts of money in the process. Not a lot of money, just an unfair amount of it.

At the end of the day, I was selling single bolts of wool for 4g buyouts, reposting undercutters all day, and selling nearly every one of them. In addition, I was letting lowbies tag along for a generous fee of 10g per run (which, by he way, adds up over several runs and a full group of people wanting free, fast experience.) Approximately five to six hundred gold for an honest day's work of facerolling Dextran Ward and about eighty others at once, just for sheer giggles.

And I apologize for neglecting the blog yesterday, but I was on a roll! I'm sure Gevlon would have been proud, but it is ironic that he's showing his softer side during this time around, spending his hard-earned cash in-game on his girlfriend. Sure, if I had a girlfriend, I probably would have done something similar, but that's an issue that I'd prefer to touch upon later.

Unable to stress this enough, I'm having a greedy little time, and having fun in the process. I truly learned the value of a "throwaway" BG. In Alterac Valley, I arrived late, after the customary zerg failed. I knew this was the situation primarily because everyone and their uncle was in a gnome costume trying out the achievement.

As a range class, I had no problem camping people from the back ranks, sniping them with shatter combos and blizzarding them at the chokepoints. On top of the Beatles-themed achievement that I earned (all during the same 30-minute buff, no less), I had acquired the Damage Control achievement, doing 300k damage even though the Stormpike reinforcements were less than 300 when I had entered initially. I managed to get the thousandth honorable kill as well. 'Tis the Season, indeed.

Merrily on my way towards the title, I'm only missing the Ogrila achievement, the Frosty Shake achievement, the cooking achievement (225 iLvl makes this a challenge, but not an impossible one), and the ones that can't be done until much later. Grandfather Winter may very well leave a lump of coal in the Boots of Foretelling that I hung up on my wall this year, but more often than not, the best gifts are often the ones you conjure for yourself.

Have a merry holidays, everyone!

Friday Five: What Dreams May Come

2008-12-12T08:32:00.006-05:00

Anna has another exciting F5 post, and now that the FitNB gang is all caught up and united, it's time for the first official full edition of Friday Five!

1) Describe your character’s sleep habits. Do they eat breakfast or have other routines?

Bashertin has the average sleep schedule. Give or take, he'll have regular hours, but is quite flexible depending on the situation. He's too eager to conjure up his own breakfast, but will spend more time than most mages to make the perfect meal.

Leyola sleeps only when necessary. She doesn't eat much, so she's not picky about what she has for breakfast or when she has it. She's a working girl, so it's always on the go.

Wimzig doesn't sleep. Period. He eats whatever is available to him at the time.

2) What do they dream about at night, if anything?

Bashertin has vague, abstract dreams. They usually involve fantastic colors swirling around in an elaborate dance, and magical leylines flowing through the patterns. It's a natural effect of studying the arcanum for a very long time.

Although Leyola does not sleep often, but when she does, she has vivid dreams of the landscapes of Azeroth. Often, she will "recreates" the Emerald Dream in her sleep, but without the residual effects of actually being out-of-body.

Wimzig doesn't sleep because of his dreams. He is haunted by the Lich King in his sleep. Fortunately, undeath has no requirements for sleep.

3) Is your character a night owl or a morning songbird?

Bashertin can more easily detect the flow of arcane energy in the environment when it's daytime. Thus, he plans his actions accordingly.

Leyola is a night owl by racial nature, but is capable of operating normally under daylight conditions thanks to her training in the druidic arts.

Wimzig is a night owl, only because he likes seeing the sun go up. It invigorates his spirit.

4) What do they wear to sleep?

Bashertin has a personal collection of sleeping robes that he crafted himself, made out of mystical spellthread and the finest bolts of Imbued Frostweave Cloth. It helps keep him attuned to the arcane even as he sleeps.

Leyola prefers to to sleep outdoors amongst the trees. She will choose to sleep while in the Tree of Life form, as a means of training.

If Wimzig ever sleeps, it is probably unintentional, and thus he will be in his plate armor.

5) Is your character ticklish?

Bashertin is ticklish by nature, augmented further by the shivers he gets while casting his Frost spells. It doesn't help that his clothes are thinly layered, either!

Leyola spends a lot of her time in the Tree form, and her bark skin does not make her ticklish one bit. As a result, she is the same outside of form.

Wimzig is indeed ticklish, but is covered in plate most of the time, making the point moot. It's probably for the best anyways. His laugh, thanks to his voice augmentation as a Death Knight, tends to strike fear into others, even though he doesn't mean to do so.

Even More Clam Love

2008-12-11T10:58:00.002-05:00

Straight from the horse's mouth (aka 3.0.8 PTR patch notes):

"Players can now open clams while riding a vehicle, sitting, mounted, stealthed, and invisible."

ZOMG, NERF CLAMS!

I Think Ghostcrawler is a Pretty Cool Guy.

2008-12-11T07:50:00.004-05:00

eh buffs Arcane Mages and doesn't afraid of anything.

I'm sorry, dear internet, for having to stoop to the lowest common denominator for that remark. But whether or not you enjoy the digital cesspool that is 4chan, there is some grain of truth in the humor and sarcasm that can be found there, especially when you apply it to WoW (which in some cases, can contain the same content up on the boards from time to time).

Yes, what I mean to say is that Ghostcrawler is indeed a guy to keep your eye on. One day he's nerfing hunters to the ground without remorse, and the next day he's being so nice to Arcane Mages that everyone turns a suspicious eye towards him, wondering with the fullest extent of paranoia if he's going to bat us to the ground too. Let's take a look at the 6-step program, shall we?

1) Evocation – cooldown reduced to 4 min.
2) Arcane Flows – now also reduces the cooldown of Evocation by an additional 1 / 2 min.

If by chance you misread Arcane Flows, the Evocation cooldown is not reduced by half a minute, but rather by one or two minutes, depending on how many points you invest in the talent. This means that fully talented, your purple funnel of delicious mana is reduced to a 2 minute cooldown. Great for all Arcane mages, but specifically for PvP. With the Evoc glyph, you're looking at considerable HP and mana regeneration every 2 minutes, coming from an mage built for increased mobility over his Frosty counterpart.

Sounds very threatening to the PvP balance, but good ol' ghosty is quite aware, saying "If every PvP mage invests in this glyph and you find they just never die then we can chill out the amount healed." So not only is he pretty cool, but pretty chill as well. Excellent!

3) Arcane Blast – overhauled. Will now increase the damage of your next Arcane spell by 15%. However using Arcane Blast itself does not consume the charge, but instead increases the mana of your next Arcane Blast, up to a maximum of 3 stacks (and a 45% buff). You can alternate Blast and Barrage to keep buffing Barrage, or you can build Blast up higher for a heavy mana cost.

Euripides over at Criticl QQ has a very spot-on analogy regarding the overhaul of Arcane Blast and the new Arcane mage playstyle in PvE (but moreso in PvP). Claiming the mage to be a caster version of a rogue, you use arcane blast as a means to build up combo points, and use your Arcane Barrage or Arcane Missiles as your finishing move, potentially doing massive damage if you land a crit, or have cooldowns boosting the spell damage.

Yet at the same time, the rotation comes back to the old BC days, where the purple mage can once again cast a certain amount of stacks of ABlast depending on the his or her current mana pool, the enemy's health bar, the mobility conditions, and many other things. The decision tree aspect is restored, and it looks like Arcane is getting some love once again.

4) Torment the Weak – now works with Arcane Blast and does bonus damage to targets afflicted by any kind of slowing effect (e.g. Thunder Clap).

The question that remains now is whether or not bosses will be affected by Torment the Weak through means other than Slow when the patch hits. Having read through both the actual topic posted and the blue post watcher on MMO-champion, there hasn't been a clear-cut answer.

If it is a yes, then Deep Frost will really have to take some consideration into investing in the Arcane Tree. Unlike Fire mages, who are already investing in this talent for the cookie cutter build, Frost doesn't need a "Slow slave" to apply the snare effect to boost damage.

And besides, it's never a bad thing to be able pick up clearcasting and Focus Magic along the way for increased damage and mana efficiency. With Spell Impact increasing your Ice Lance and Fireball damage during Brain Freeze and Fingers of Frost procs, you get one free point to invest to your discretion. I've noticed that I'm taking a lot of raid damage, and despite having the convenience of Ice Barrier to buffer the hurt, the 40 resistance from rank 1 Arcane Absorption is a personal decision, and is probably the right choice for many mages for survivability purposes.

So, if the answer to the original question is yes (and my frosty intuition leads me to believe it to be so), then expect to see me use a 18/0/53 build for raids. I lose my blizzard grindy goodness, but I gain a significant amount of damage and mana efficiency.

Suddenly, that dual-spec idea doesn't sound as useless to mages as it used to be.

5) Elemental Precision – renamed Precision and now works on all spells.

This has two main implications. One, it removes the double-dipping hit bug that Frostfire Bolt used to have. Due to being both a fire and frost spell, it would often reduce the hit rating for the spell by six percent instead of three. This change essentially brings FFB back to three percent. At first glance, bringing the this would appear to be a nerf, but in reality, FFB mages were gearing up for 3% anyways, because while slushbolt was affected by the "bug," Pyroblast and Scorch were not.

Instead, you're looking at an additional three percent reduction to all spells, meaning that Precision and Arcane Focus will stack and lower the hit cap for Arcane Mages by a considerable amount. Since they are already going so deep into the frost tree for better itemization freedom due to less points needed in hit rating, they can might as well go the full eleven points for Icy Veins, thus reliving the good old days of 40/0/21 Arcane in the Burning Crusade, except with an overhaul to Arcane Blast as warranted by Ghostcrawler and the development team.

Larísa, you might want to consider coming back to them, I kinda miss the old spec wars. They made for some excellent posts, and some really nice traffic. Wait, did I say that out loud? Moving on! :3

6) Improved Blizzard – snaring effect reduced to 20/40/50%.

At first glance, the change is inconsequential as far as raiding or instancing goes, but when it comes to AoE grinding, we end up with less snare than we originally did before Chilled to the Bone was introduced. Fully taleted, the current snare effect of blizzard is 85%, 75% if you ignore CttB. With the change to Imp. Blizzard, the total snare effect of Blizzard, including CttB will be 70%, five percent less than what it was before 3.0 was even released!

What this means for AoE grinders out there is that we have to revert to the pre-3.0 methods of grinding, before CttB. This means that once again, we cannot use Frostbite in our spec because of the separation created by the snare and root effects, and we will once again have to blink out of Frost Nova range to gain adequate space for our blizzards to do the full duration of its damage. But with the ability of Blizzard to hit, we will still only have to do one iteration of Blink->Blizzard to kill them off. Any survivors will simply be Cone of Colded or Arcane Assploded for style points. Fine by me, it will make for more entertaining youtube videos.

As an AoE purist, I welcome the change, since it brings back the finesse required to do the elaborate channel-dance known as Blizzard. The learning curve will be even worse for those who want to try it out for the first time, but will make it much more exciting to those with experience. The only thing I don't like is having to edit my Northrend grinding guide once again. Damn you ghostcrawler! *shakesfist*

Closing Thoughts

Despite these great changes to the arcane tree, as well as the somewhat deserved nerf to AoE grinding, things still look very great for mages everywhere. With the adjustment of Hunter DPS, it is now more viable for mages to compete with them on the DPS charts with a multitude of specs. Some will say that mages will come out on top with this round of changes, and I'm inclined to agree.

We will now have to look out over our shoulders with a paranoia. As Ghostcrawler stated, "Mage PvE damage in general is something we are keeping a close eye on. With the recent hunter changes, many of which were nerfs to PvE damage, we want to make sure mages now don’t break away from the pack of damage-dealing specs."

Even as Frost, we will have to watch out, because any possible chance that the frost tree is indirectly affected by nerfs to frostfire, the current king of mage dps, will cripple us as well. Ghostcrawler won't hesitate to make the call. He doesn't afraid of anything.

An Open Letter of Apology to Hunters Everywhere

2008-12-10T07:47:00.007-05:00

Dear Hunters of Azeroth,

Please let me get this off my chest. As a mage, I grew very envious of hunters as a class after the expansion hit. I was squeezing every last cooldown available, and the hunter in my heroic pug always pulled away on the dps charts. All this time, I had thought it was a gear issue, but having run with a guildie of mine who had JUST turned 80, and barely passing me (who has been quietly acquiring gear over the past few weeks). With comparable cc skills and MQoSRDPS, I truly felt threatened to be replaced in PuGs and raids. For my envy, I apologize.

And it wasn't just single-target dps. Volley was starting to irk me some. Just when I thought that the addition of crit to blizzard would make us awesome at AoE again, the hunter came along with his removed cooldown and raining absolute death on the multi-mob pull. No, it wasn't the fact that the ability was instant-cast, only cost seventeen percent of base mana compared to our fifty million, and allowed hunters to continue pewpewing while the spell took effect. Rather, it was the tendency to lean on this spell on every pull that involved more than two mobs and an adequately skilled AoE tank. I thought, what were these guys trying to do? Become mages? For thinking that my class was getting quietly usurped, I am sorry.

Last but not least, your pet was doing some fierce damage. For as long as I can remember, I've always wanted my Water Elemental to simply stay by my side forever as a combat pet. Quite aware that this line of thinking was stepping on the toes of the uniqueness of pet classes such as Hunters and especially warlocks, I still thought that they wouldn't mind the fixture, especially since it would help with Frost Mage DPS quite well. But when I see the BM hunter come along with his ferocity pet, I knew that Squirtle was not going to cut it this run. For even considering thinking twice about my water elemental, I have let myself down, and I apologize for putting even the tiniest shrivel of a percent of blame on your class.

I'm sorry for the envy. And the xenophobia. And the Pet-class blasphemy.

But seriously, it didn't have to end up this way.

I die a little each time now, thinking that my thoughts and actions have led to this decision/proposition put forth by Ghostcrawler and the Blizzard Devellopment team. The nerfs to single-target, multi-target, and pet-based DPS are simply staggering, and I just hate to see all of it adjusted at once.

To me, it's like putting the damage tax back onto Frostbolt.

To me, it's like removing critical hits from Blizzard.

To me, it's like removing Summon Water Elemental off of Cold Snap.

That third one hit home, and it hit hard. And if I were any more sensitive than I already am, I probably would have broken down to unthinkable levels of emo.

So hunters, In spite of my subtle and hidden, well, spite, for your class performance, I wish to start things over again. Unlike the Retribution Paladin Nerfs, this was one that hit a class more related to mine. Pure, unadulterated DPS, taken away, with no option to respec into a different role without having to reroll another class.

That's not how it should be, even though the intent was justified. I wish to turn over a new leaf with regards to my perception of hunters. No more anger against huntards, since a large number of them rerolled Death Knights anyways. No more envy, since we're on closer footing with regards to our DPS.

I shall work even harder now to compete with you. But if you ever need anything, just ask. I've got some strudels that will keep your Gorilladin happy for quite a while. It even has the swirly icing on top, shaped like a thunderstomp.

Thanks much,

Krizzlybear

Hit-Capped, and Ready for Naxx!

2008-12-09T09:40:00.003-05:00

Neat little story about how I managed to get the last piece of gear to reach the oh-so-elusive hit cap.

I flew to Wyrmrest Temple (am I the only one who initially read the faction as Wyrmnest?) after crafting my ebonweave. Having hit honored a few nights ago during a heroic Violet Hold run (my second favorite instance in LK), I visited the quartermaster on the top floor to grab my sash, assuming that it would bring me to the hit cap.

No dice. After equipping it, both my hit rating and spellpower went down instead. What? Was there soemthing I was missing? I checked my bag again for the item that I had replaced with the sash. It was a badge reward. *dumb dumb dumb*

Waste of a few pieces of gold. Penny-pincher that I am, I looked around for a quest that I could do to reimburse me the gold spent on getting that inferior rep reward. I checked the radar for "!", and it was Chromie who was in need of my assistance.

"Do you remember that time when you defended the infinite hourglass with your future self?" She asked. "Well, he's now your past self, and you gotta help him out!"

Well, off I went! At the bronze dragonshrine, I laid out the houglass, and lo and behold, Past Basertin was there.

If I recall, the last time I did this quest, Future Bashertin was a dagger wielding maniac. I was rather amused, so I joined in on the shennanigans, since he was doing quite a bit of damage by himself.

This time around, it was pretty much the same thing. He daggered. I daggered. Laughs were had. Insults were hurled.

Past you whispers: This equipment looks cool and all, but couldn't we have done a little better? Are you even raiding?

After completing the quest, I can finally say "Yes. Now I can!" The quest reward was an awesome trinket that brought me up to the hit cap. Thank you, Rune of Infinite Power! Time to add you to the Hit gear post. Once the servers are back up, I'm gonna pug it out and check out this so-called Naxxramas. Those Scourge won't even know what hit em!

Meet the Cast

2008-12-08T02:15:00.006-05:00

Name: Bash (Bashertin) Fizzleblock
Level 80 Gnome Mage
Professions: Tailoring and Enchanting
Armory Profile

An enigma to many, but gifted nonetheless, this gnomish mage is a member of the Kirin Tor. He was discovered by the mage council in Northrend, where he was encased in a giant block of ice in the southern reaches of Crystalsong, trapped for an unknown amount of time. Brought up as one of their own, the mage displayed a knack for cryomancy, which some believe to be tied to how he was discovered in the first place. Like all mages, he is currently a target of Malygos and his crusade against the arcanists of Azeroth.

Name: Wimzig Wintersprug
Level 70 Gnome Death Knight
Professions: Jewelcrafting and Inscription
Armory Profile

A former agent of the argent dawn, Wimzig was tragically slain by the Scarlet Crusade in a top-secret experiment of manipulating the undead. Due to the powers of a runic necklace that he kept as a good luck charm, the Lich King sought him out and raised him as a Death Knight. Rescued by the Knights of the Ebon Blade, he was freed from the clutches of Arthas and was reunited with his dear friend, Leyola Swiftwillow. Having no memory of his previous life, he keeps a journal that he had kept prior to his first death, called "Wimzig's Whimsy." An enthusiast of writing and calligraphy, he is a skilled scribe.

Name: Leyola Swiftwillow
Level 73 Night Elf Druid
Professions: Herbalism and Mining
Armory Profile

A second-generation Druid, Leyola's parents were veterans of the Third War, particularly the Battle of Mount Hyjal. Unlike her parents, who were trained in Feral Combat, Leyola chose to pursue the art of Restoration, healing those she would meet during her journeys. Daring to forge her own path, she joined the Argent Dawn, where she met Wimzig Wintersprug, a Frost Mage at the time. Somewhat shaken by his turn of evets, she swears to avenge her friend, and hopes to one day find the "natural cure" for undeath.

The "Jack of All Trades" Dilemma

2008-12-04T00:29:00.002-05:00

Straightforward and to the point, I'm going to start this post with some advice. Play what you love.

Something interesting came up today, while I was healing an Old Kingdom PuG with the lovely Leyola. Originally, I was lounging around in Dalaran with the boisterous Bashertin, and saw a few messages in the trade and lfg channels wanting heals for Old Kingdom. Leyola, still a good way into her 72nd season, could potentially heal it, and I was in the mood. So why not? I whispered the group leader, telling them I was on my way with a resto druid.

While game went through its loading process, I whipped up good old WoWHead to check out the instance info, since it had been a while since I last ventured into that dungeon. Levels 73-75, it had suggested. I began to have second thoughts regarding the appropriateness of both the level and gear of my Night Elf for the instance. Those chilling words words from Illidan, "You are not prepared!" suddenly rushed into my head. I warned the group that I was undergeared and underlevelled, being both a level under the suggested range as well as having the gear equivalent of a fresh 70; approximately 700 spellpower and a below average amount of health and mana.

The Pally tank shrugged. "Whatever," he said. "We'll adjust as we go. Might as well try."

We dawdled along through the dungeon as expected. The run went as smooth as it could, despite numerous individual deaths during the bosses and pulls (as expected). This was a great run, and I enjoyed healing. The kicker though, was the two individual whispers I got when it was all over, and I left the group.

"Thanks for the awesome healing. We couldn't have done it without you."

"TYVM for coming! I'll add you to my friends for the next time we do an instance."

Leyola is just an alt, yet she gets such praise from groups due to her ability to heal. In my entire time with Bashertin, I really don't think I've gotten as many compliments on my DPS. Attribute this to the fact that DPS is a group responsibility, but the fact remains that I have an ability to heal as well. This seeped into the guild as well, having received accolades for healing guild runs with efficiency.

"Bash, we need some healers. Think you can get Leyola up to 80 and help us heal Naxx?"

Let's switch back to my life, because this is the reason why I wrote up this post in the first place.

I'm Asian, and by stereotypical nature, I happen to be smart. I obtained very good marks in High School, across a wide variety of subjects. I got accepted into all the colleges/universities that I applied for, and the family praise was just as stereotypical.

"Oh, he should be a doctor."

I could be a doctor, but I don't want to. It's the "Jack of all trades" dilemma. When you're capable of doing many things well, it is often asked of you to do things that are optimum benefit. You may not like it, but you're damned good at it.

Well, 4 years later, and I'm about to graduate at the University of Toronto with a degree in Forensic Science. No doctoring here. Instead of preventing people from dying, I'm investigating people who are dead. Instead of administrating blood tests, I'm analyzing blood samples. So on, and so forth.

What happened to the doctor thing? I was capable. I could have been something that provided me all the financial stability anyone could ever ask for. But I didn't go through with it. I didn't like being a doctor. I loved Forensic Science. It's not because of the glamor and romance of the the show, CSI (sorry matticus, I actually don't like the show at all!), but the hunkered-down laboratory aspects of analysis, and working with the justice system via expert witness testimony. These avenues were enthralling, and I choose to do it, despite being skilled in a lot of other things too.

The situation has reared its head again in WoW, and currently I have 3 toons that I play, and play well (for completion's sake, I tanked with Wimzig through BC content all the way up to 69 with no problems, and lots of praise as well). And guess what? I will still keep blogging about Frost Mages, and I will still keep raiding with my mage as my main. Leyola remains second fiddle with Wimzig in tow.

Of course, if and when Leyola reaches 80, I won't mind throwing her out there if the guild is short on heals for a heroic run or heck, even a naxx run. I love the guild too much to hold it back whenever we hit a snag in progression or general activity. It's just that when given the choice, I will be logging into Bashertin at every available opportunity.

Why? Because I love the thrill of riding the threat wave with my Water Elemental by my side. I love the utility of being able to port and make tables and counterspelling and spellstealing. I love the survivability of Ice Block and Ice Barrier. And no amount of rolled lifeblooms or critted Frost Strikes could change that.

I tell you now, denizens of the internether. Do what you love, and do it well. Don't let anyone dictate who you ought to be if you don't like it. You will end up burnt out in a dead-end situation, feeling like you're doing a chore, while everyone else is enjoying themselves.

This is my belief in life, and once again, WoW conveniently reaffirms it.

Spell Hit Your Way Into Naxxramas!

2008-12-02T08:45:00.012-05:00

If you're familiar with my previous iteration of this spell hit guide, "Spell Hit Your Way Into Karazhan," then there's really no need to explain further. But it has been a while, and since the outdated version, the blog has grown (if at all) in its readership, so an outline is always good.

When preparing your fresh 80 for the endgame raid content, the most important stat to stack on your mage is hit rating. Theorycrafting aside, the general conclusion is that up until your character's hit cap, hit rating is the most efficient stat, point-for-point, to increase your overall DPS.

Generally, ??? level bosses in raids 3 levels above your own, meaning that the chance of your spell to hit is a mere 83%. By investing points in your gear in Spell Hit, you can potentially raise that percentage to 100. And depending on your talent spec and race, the required amount of points to raise that percentage is relatively low. Thus, Spell Hit is the first stat that you will need to stack if you want to start raiding. But once your chance to hit bosses reaches 100%, any excess points will do nothing. Thus, as you gear up, it is always important to make sure you have the bare minimum, regardless of your Spell Damage, Spell haste, and Stamina.

At level 80, the hit cap for mages is 368, requiring that they invest 3 points into either Elemental Precision or Arcane Focus, depending on spec. With Heroic Presence, a buff from having a Draenei in your raid composition, the hit cap is lowered to 342.

Let's get onto the gear!

2-Handed Weapons

Tower of the Infinite Mind - 32 hit
Quest reward from the group quest Last Rites in Borean Tundra. The spell power is disappointingly low, but it's worth picking up while levelling.

Zabra's Misplaced Staff - 34 hit
World Drop BoE. If you can find a good deal on the AH, it might be worth buying out. There are other more cost-efficient methods, however.

Stave of Youthful Sorrow - 44 hit
Quest reward from the quest Tirion's Gambit in Icecrown. It's a great combination of hit and critical strike rating, with nice spellpower to boot.

Chilly Slobberknocker - 50 hit
Quest reward from the group quest The Champion of Anguish in Zul'Drak. It's the Wrath equivalent to the Ring of Blood, so it's a great piece to pick up if you can find a group of people to run it with.

1-Handed Weapons

Flameheart Spell Scalpel - 34 hit
Kirin Tor Quartermaster, requires Revered reputation. Very nice spell power. Start wearing that tabard ASAP! No excuses, either, since mages start out Friendly, and thus are eligible right away to wear one.

Cursed Lich Blade - 34 hit
Drops from Novos the Summoner in Heroic Drak'tharon Keep. Another great spell power blade. Tip: Repeatedly do Drak'tharon while wearing the Kirin Tor tabard, and see which one you get first.

Off-Hand Frills

Telestra's Journal - 39 hit
Drops from Grand Magus Telestra in Heroic The Nexus. A good early option if you decide against the badge reward.

Ward of the violet Citadel - 38 hit
Purchasable for a cool 25 Emblems of Heroism. Start farming up hose badges!

Wands

Ancient Measuring Rod - 11 hit
Drops from Loken in Halls of Lightning. Good all-around stats.

Wand of the San'layn - 14 hit
Drops from Prince Keleseth in Heroic Utgarde Keep. Has haste, which is always a good thing. I prefer the HoL rod for the overall stats.

Head

The Argent Skullcap - 61 hit
Quest Reward from the quest The Crusader's Pinnacle. Aside from its staggering amount of hit rating, it also looks like a turban, so it will look pretty awesome with your flying carpet while you sing "A whole new world," while flying through Icecrown.

Hat of Wintry Doom - 44 hit
Craftable by a tailor. You might be able to pick one up at the AH, but expect a very steep cost due to ebonweave cooldowns. You'll probably want this because of the Meta Gem slot, but the skullcap is much easier to obtain and has a higher hit rating.

Shoulder

None outside of Naxx-25. Ain't that a kick in the gnuts?

Chest

Turtle-Minders Robe - 38 hit
Kalu'ak Quartermaster, requires Honored rating. Very easy to get, as long as you do a the Kalu'ak quests in Borean Tundra, Howling Fjord, and Dragonblight.

Robes of Lightning - 55 hit
Quest reward from the dungeon quest http://www.wowhead.com/?quest=13108 Whatever it Takes! in Storm Peaks. Very nice stats overall, lots of spell power. Look at that Stamina!

Water-Drenched Robe - 62 hit
Drops from Ichoron in Heroic Violet Hold. Considering the odds of this boss appearing in VH, combined with the drop rate, it will take a few runs for this to drop, but it remains as the best and cheapest alternative to the Ebonweave Robe.

Ebonweave Robe - 68 hit
Craftable by a slvl 440 tailor. Very expensive and costly to make. With proper gemming, The Violet Hold robe is only slightly inferior, stat-wise, and will save you a large number of cooldowns and mats.

Wrist

None Available pre-naxx. There's a badge item, but it's only purchasable with valor emblems from 25-mans. /sadpanda.

Hands

Lava Burn Gloves - 36 hit
Drops from Lavanthor in Violet Hold. The only viable alternative to ebonweave tailoring.

Ebonweave Gloves - 51 hitCraftable by a Slvl 435 tailor. Not as costly as the Ebonweave, but offers excellent stats. I highly suggest crafting this item first in your set, compared to the others.

Waist

Sash of the Wizened Wyrm - 40 hit
Wyrmrest Accord quartermaster, requires Honored reputation. By far the easiest piece to obtain, but compared to the next belt listed, leaves MUCH to be desired. Take it for the +Hit only.

Girdle of Bane - 48 hit
Drops from King Ymiron in Heroic Utgarde Pinnacle. Best belt available, given that you can make it past Skadi the Ruthless, who is probably one of the more difficult encounters in the game, pre-raid.

Flowing Sash of Order - 31 hit
Drops from Loken in Heroic Halls of Lightning. Inferior to to the girdle, even with the socket. Use a green +Hit gem or +Damage gem, and you're still short in stats compared to its utgarde counterpart.

Legs

None outside of Naxx-25. Boo!

Feet

Available from a badge vendor, but requires emblems of Valor, which you can only get from Naxx-25. Again, we're shortchanged with spell hit.

Neck

Necklace of Taldaram - 43 hit
Dropped by Prince Taldaram in Heroic Old Kingdom. Better overall stats than Emeline's Locket, but lacks the socket flexibility.

Emeline's Locket - 25 hit
Quest Reward from The Admiral Revealed in Icecrown. The socket bonus, when gemmed with a Rigid Autumn's Glow only amounts to 1 more point of hit raiting than Taldaram's Necklace, but the flexibility of socketing allows you to socket more spell damage if you reach the hit cap, at the cost of some points in intellect and stamina.

Finger

Ring of Northern Tears - 31 Hit
Crafted by slvl 420 Jewelcrafters, but are Bind on Equip. Grab one off the AH as early as you can! This is the best entry level ring, and will go for quite a good amount. Socket it with pure hit, or with a spirit/hit or mp5/hit gem for the socket bonus and meta gem requirement.

Voodoo Signet - 24 hit
Quest reward from the dungeon quest For Posterity in Gundrak. The stamina and intellect stats are delicious, and goes well with the jewelcrafter's ring.

Trinkets

Figurine - Twilight Serpent - 42 hit
Crafted by an slvl 425 Jewelcrafter, requires slvl 400 Jewelcrafting to use. The great boon here is the additional two gem sockets. You could put +Hit gems on it, but even with two Rigid Autumn's Glow, the trinket will end up statistically worse than the Mark of the War Prisoner, mentioned below. But at the hit cap, you can gem for spell damage, making this trinket very valuable afterwards.

Mark of the War Prisoner - 73 hit
Drops from Cyanigosa in Heroic Violet Hold. This is the level 80 version of the Scryer's Bloodgem, giving the same % increase to spell hit at 80 as the Bloodgem at 70. Thankfully, this item does not require you to choose one faction over the other. With so much hit, this item will last for a VERY long time. Pound for pound, this should be the most sought-after item for casters looking to get into raiding.

Enchants

With the staggeringly small list of gear offering hit rating, you're left with bugging the enchanter in your guild for the following:

Enchant Gloves - Precision - 20 hit
Requires 15 Infinite Dust, 5 Greater Cosmic Essence

Enchant Boots - Icewalker - 12 hit, 12 critical strike
Requires 8 Infinite Dust, 1 Crystallized Water.

Enchant Weapon - Accuracy - 25 hit, 25 critical strike
Requiers 40 Infinite Dust, 8 Greater Cosmic Essence, 6 Abyss Crystal

Conclusion

From the looks of the list above, one should immediately notice that there is a limited amount of gear with hit rating for caster classes. Due to the limited availability of each item listed above, it is imperative to plan your raiding preparation strategically. Wear the right tabards concurrently with heroics that offer gear that provide hit rating upgrades. The secondary route towards the hit cap is to obtain gear with plenty of sockets for yellow gems that increase your hit rating.

My suggestion would have to be farming Violet Hold while wearing your Kirin Tor Tabard. There are a LOT of hit rating items that drops from each of the bosses, and with Northern Cloth Scavenging, you can also acquire a reasonable amount of cloth each run to help level up your Tailoring for those ebonweave pieces.

Good luck, and happy hunting!

Ask a Krizzlybear: Frostfire Bolt Edition

2008-11-24T00:02:00.004-05:00

Christopher asked a question in the comment section on ony of my recent blog posts. He writes, "could you share a little knowledge about the newest Mage trick, Frostfire bolt? How does it affect us frosties with deep frost builds? Is it worth it to use? Does it replace frostbolt in our rotation of frostbolt, frostbolt, frostbolt with the procced fireball and ice lance when appropriate?"

Well Christopher, let's begin by examining the properties of Frostfire Bolt. Frostfire Bolt is a 3-second nuke that counts as both a frost spell and fire spell. This means that any and all effects that would affect either school would apply to Frostfire Bolt as well. However, when it comes to damage, it doesn't count as either frost or fire at all. Instead, it counts as frostfire, and because of this, it ignores resistances and immunities to either school. But, if the target has a general resist/immunity to spells, it will affect it.

So what does this mean for frost mages? As a deep frost raider, no longer will you be completely shut out of a fight where he boss has phases of frost immunity. An example of this would be Hydross in Serpentshrine Cavern. When he gets pulled through the beam and takes on his frost phase, your Frostbolts will be rendered useless, but your Frostfire Bolts will be able to damage him. The spell will benefit from a large number of talents in your build, excluding Improved Frostbolt and Empowered Frostbolt. This is a definite asset to have, but that's as far as it goes with regards to the spell's use. Your frostbolt still has greater DPS capability in a deep frost build, thanks to Empowered Frostbolt and a faster casting time than Frostfire Bolt.

Thus, in order to maximize the effect of a Frostfire Bolt-centric raiding build, you will have to "double dip," taking talents in both the Frost and Fire trees to boost the abilities of your spell in order to maximize DPS. Due to the placement of such talents in both trees, you simply cannot take them all. It will require proper tuning and balance of talents to both improve its damage, and cater to your playstyle.

At the end, you will end up making one of three choices with regards to the spec: deep frost with leftover fire, deep fire with leftover frost, or an elementalist spec with approximately equal amounts of points invested in each. From what I've been reading on the net, it would appear that deep fire is the ideal route to maximize the damage of frostfire bolt, and thus has more of a fire spec feel than frost.

And from one look at the talent tree, this is quite the case. Most of the fire-buffing talents on the fire tree is in the higher tiers, while the frost-buffing talents are more spread out on the frost tree. More importantly, by homogenizing the effects of Improved Scorch and Winter's Chill, it is no longer required to invest points into both, making Winter's Chill a less attractive option, as it is in a deeper tier than Improved Scorch.

But as a diehard frost fanatic, I will tell you that you can still have lots of fun with Frostfire Bolt with a deep frost build. Here's a spec that may tickle your fancy. It plays a lot like a deep frost build, but replaces Frostbolt spam with Frostfire Bolt spam. Of course this will output less single-target dps than Frostbolt spam, but by going into the fire tree, your AoE dps becomes absolutely DISGUSTING.

World in Flames, meet Blizzard, your new best friend.

Or, how about an elementalist spec? Let's emphasize more fire, but keep to the spirit of deep frost. Try this 0/30/41 spec on for size. You grab Fire Power for an awesome 10% increase in Frostfire damage, you retain sufficient snare to AoE grind effectively, AND you get to keep Squirtle! Hot damn!

With these two builds, you can do your best frost mage impression while you get acquainted with this awesome new spell. Now all blizzard needs to do is to make a dual-school AoE spell. Frostfire Storm, anybody?

Frostfire Storm
110% of Base Mana, 30 yd range
Pelts the enemy with shards of frostfire, doing 3000 damage over 8 seconds, slowing movement speed by 10% and causing an additional 50 damage over 5 seconds to each target. If the target is more vulnerable to Frost damage than Fire damage, then this spell will cause Frost damage instead of Fire damage.

Tomorrow: Frost Death Knight Impressions

Wimzig's Whimsy: I am Reborn!

2008-11-21T02:05:00.006-05:00

It feels...strange. The sensation of death undone. I remember nothing, yet my goal is clearer than ever. I serve the ebon hand, and I fight for them until my last breath. I fight for those I have lost. I fight for those who have lost me. I am a Death Knight, a pawn of the scourge, reformed to deliver cold vengence. Hated by many, merly tolerated by few. I accept my destiny to take arms against Arthas in his quest for power.

A mage no more, but the ice still flows coldly in my veins. Frost I shall remain, now and forever.

Screenshot: A Whole New World!

2008-11-18T09:43:00.004-05:00

A new fantastic point of view

No one to tell us no

Or where to go

Or say we're only dreaming!

A whole new world

A dazzling place I never knew

But when I'm way up here

It's crystal clear

That now I'm in a whole new world with youuuuuuuuu!!!!!!!

The All-Purpose Lich King AoE Grinding Guide

2008-11-16T18:34:00.010-05:00

Sick of questing now? Still only level 70? Tired yourself out from camping baby murloc cages in Borean Tundra, or opening crab traps in Howling Fjord?

Need to make some money?

If you're a mage, all of this can be answered, and then some, with my frost-tastic Northrend AoE guide! In this post, I'll teach you the ins and outs of gathering up a bunch of mobs and absolutely murdering them! And by the end, you should have the know-how to blizzard your way to 80!

Part the First: The level 70 Build!

0/0/51 (+10) - The bare bones

This build picks up ALL of the necssary talents required to maximize your AoE grind. Let me break it down to you Talent by Talent.

Frostbite - Combined with shatter, allows for blizzard crits pretty much all the time.

Ice Floes - Gets your Frost Nova sooner, so you can use it just in case something goes wrong. If you're lucky, you won't even have to use it at all!

Ice Shards - Makes blizzard crits absolutely ridiculous.

Elemental Precision - guarantees that Frost Nova hits everybody. Just in case you have to grind on mobs 1 level above you, you don't have to invest as much in Hit rating to achieve 100% accuracy.

Permafrost - Makes them go as slow as possible, giving you more time to hit with blizzard.

Piercing Ice - Increases blizzard damage.

Improved Blizzard - Makes them go even slower, giving you more time to hit with blizzard.

Arctic Reach - Lets you freeze more mobs with frost nova/Shattered Barrier. Also lets you blizzard after a blink.

Frost Channeling - Ensures that you don't go OOM sooner than you need to. Also lets you do more pulls without having to eat/drink.

Cold Snap - Your panic button, in case something goes terribly wrong.

Cold As Ice - Gets your Ice Barrier back sooner, just in case you really need it.

Winter's Chill - Increases the crit chance of Blizzard. Each blizzard tick applies a stack of debuff, so by the time you cast your second blizzard, you essentially have 10% increased chance of critting each tick.

Arctic Winds - Increases your blizzard damage. Also increases your dodge slightly, making your Ice Barrier last a tiny bit longer.

Fingers of Frost - Proc increases crit chance of Blizzard ticks by 50%, thanks to Shatter. It procs ALL THE TIME.

Summon Water Elemental - Take him only for the free ranged frost nova. Keep him on passive, so that he doesn't aggro some random mob from one of your pulls.

Chilled to the Bone - Increases chill effect of your blizzard by another 10%, bringing the total to a disgusting 85%.

This minimal build is good enough to start grinding in outlands, but since we're talking about Northrend, you have another 10 talent points to spend. If you are looking to do other things besides AoE grinding, I suggest putting the remaining points into Improved Frostbolt, Improved Water Elemental, and either Brain Freeze or Empowered Frostbolt.

If you want to really go pure AoE from 70-80 (although I really advise against it), go down the Fire tree and pick up World in Flames, which increases your crit chance of Blizzard by another 10%!

Part the Second: The Gear!

The most important stats for AoE grinding are Stamina, Intellect, Spell Power, and Critical Strike Rating. Stam and Int are important for staying alive long enough to cast your blizzard spells, and to make sure that you don't run out of mana in the middle of a pull. Spell power increases (albeit slightly) the damage done by blizzard. Not as important as the other stats, but it's very good to have. Besides, most quest reward gear give adequate amounts of spellpower anyways. Critical Strike Rating is good too, now that blizzard can crit.

Now for Trinkets, there are two items in the game that I'm glad that I saved up and/or quested for. The Lightning Capacitor and Thunder Capacitor. The Lightning Capacitor drops from Illhoof in Karazhan. Alliance-side, the Thunder Capacitor is a quest reward from a quest chain in Dragonblight given by the NPC Zivlix, located at 54,23, just north of Galakron's rest. Anybody who knows details on how to get it horde-side feel free to drop off a comment.

Why I mention these two trinkets in particular is that they have stacking effects. Each tick tha crits will add a charge to BOTH items. Since Blizzard is going to crit A LOT, you're going to have charges proccing left and right, dealing a whole ton of damage in the meantime. Testing naked on 6 theramore combat dummies, The two capacitors alone increased my DPS by about 800, compared to using the badge trinket and its brewfest equivalent.

Part the Third: The NEW AoE sequence!

Thanks to new features in 3.0, such as Blizzard critting, as well as Shattered Barrier, it's easier than ever to take down multiple mobs. Just follow these easy steps!

1) Cast Ice Barrier. Wait for the cooldown to run down a bit.
2) Run around and gather some mobs. Make sure to just get into their aggro radius, rather than walking right into them, to minimize their damage done to you.
3) When Ice Barrier's cooldown is up, cast it again as you wait for the mobs to gather around you.
4) Let the mobs pound on you until Ice Barrier breaks. Shattered Barrier will freeze all the mobs in on space.
5) As soon as it breaks, BLINK AWAY, RIGHT AWAY. Make sure you blink to a spot that's not close to another mob.
6) Turn around and cast Blizzard, making sure that the farthest edge of the targetting circle is touching the frozen mobs.
7) Cast blizzard again when the channel is close to zero. Make sure to aim it so that they walk right into the blizzard as its being cast.
8) Repeat #7 as necessary. Thanks to the snaring talents, You can fit up to 3 blizzards before they reach you. With adequate gear, you should be able to kill them before they reach you as well. If not, then Frost Nova, Blink, repeat.

Alternatively, for #3-4, you can simply frost nova while your Ice Barrier is still up, but I prefer to save that for just in case you pull another mob to you while you're in the middle of a sequence.

Also, If you have Water Elemental out before you start the pull, you can have it cast freeze during the first cast of Blizzard, so they stay in one place. They're also good for protection, just in case a mob breaks free, or aggros you from elsewhere during the sequence.

Part the Foruth: Grinding on Yellows!

Some of the best mobs that can be AoE'd do not have an aggro radius at all, and will only attack if they are provoked by an attacker. These exist mainly in the form of animals scattered around the place. You can find some that noticeably travel together in formation, thus they can be AoE'd at once, without having to lure each to a particular spot.

However, there's usually a "bull" version of that mob that does have an aggro radius, so it's wise to grab that one and lure it to the rest of the pack. Once you meet up with the rest of the pack, use Arcane Explosion to aggro the entire group, and continue with the grind, either by Shattered Barrier or Frost Nova.

Part the Fifth: IDEAL GRINDING SPOTS!

Just remember, this method works ideally when you gather a group of mobs that are purely melee-class. You don't want to be pulling any ranged classes or casters. Sometimes there are mobs that charge after aggroing, which completely disrupts the pulling process. So skip these. Here are a few of my choice favs.

68-70

Wooly Rhinos, Borean Tundra

They travel in packs, and are often accompanied by bull rhinos. Just stay away from D.E.H.T.A while you're doing this, k?

70-71

Gorloc Waddlers and Gorloc Steam Belchers, Borean Tundra

These guys are scattered close to the coast, just south of the geyser fields. You can probably grab a good number of them and then lure them onto the main path, ensuring that you don't aggro anything else. Just start at one edge of the stretch and work your way down to the other edge. When you get back to the first part, there will be respawns. Excellent group.

Iron Dwarfs, Howling Fjord

There's a large line of them surrounding the excavation. You can pull a few of them, but don't do too many, since their attacks leave a stackable DoT that is sure to kill you. A caster patrols the area, but you can pull it separately from the pack without too much trouble. Respawn is fairly good.

72-73
Wastes Diggers, Dragonblight

These guys have stackable DoT's as well, so watch out and don't pull too many at once. You can rotate between excavation pits and they should respawn by the time you get back to the first one. The Taskmaster is ranged, so be sure to pull him seperately when he patrols to the edge of the area.

Scarlet Onslaught, Dragonblight

Northeast of Wintergarde, there's a large encampment of Onslaught mobs that are purely melee. there are so many groups here that you can have a field day with multiple pulls and respawns will occur when you go back to the beginning.

74-75
Highland Mustang, Grizzly Hills

OH MAN. There are a few herds that gallop in groups of 8-10. These are the ones you want to go for. OH BOY ARE THEY GREAT TO GRIND ON. Remember. Arcane explosion to have the circle collapse on you, then Frost Nova in place. Highly Recommended!

75-76
Venture Corp., Sholazar Basin

JACKPOT! The entire Venture Corp Encampment on the northwest side of the Suntouched Pillar is made of melee mobs. Plan out your pulls, and be sure to stay a safe distance from the "boss" mobs. They're not elite, but they have some nifty ablities that can throw off your pull by a lot. As you work your way through the encampment in a circuit, you'll hit respawns again. As a tailor, I get about 3 or 4 stacks of Frostweave in 10 minutes of AoE'ing here. Great experience as well.

77-80
Skeletal Runesmiths, Icecrown

MEGAJACKPOT! Once you hit 77, you can start "attempting" to grind on these guys. All the mobs in the area are level 80, so you will need quite a bit of hit rating to ensure that Frost Nova never misses on a single person if you're only 77. There are two elongated, slightly elevated platforms with mobs on each side of them. If you do a circle around one of them, you'll grab mobs from three of the four sides. If you're feeling adventurous, you can pull all four sides. With the large amount of mobs aggroed, your ice barrier will break early for sure, so remember to refresh it in the middle of the pull, and to give some time for your cooldown to go down somewhat before you start the pull. Ice Blocking before casting Nova is an asset, and highly advised for such a large number of mobs to pull.

The best part? The respawn timer here is ridiculously low. Once you finish the pull, loot, and run off to the side to drink, they will instantly respawn by the time you're ready to start another pull.

Level 74!

2008-11-14T20:56:00.005-05:00

I've made about 200g selling ports to Dalaran (EDIT: 310 now, but newer figures are periodically updated on the blog banner) No lies. It helps to be one of the first mages to hit 74 on US Arygos. There are about 2 or 3 ahead of me, but I don't mind staying back to make some nice coin. The inner goblin tells me to go for the gold, not the glory!

Tomorrow or sometime this weekend, I'll be putting up some Northrend AoE guides as well as Frost boss strats for the first few dungeons that I've done so far.

C'MON!!!

2008-11-13T00:57:00.002-05:00

/e taps his foot impatiently.

Future Shop is the Best Electronics Store Ever!

2008-11-13T00:47:00.003-05:00

Made my way down to the midnight release in one of the future shops in Mississauga, Ontario. I forged some comraderies with a bunch of people who shared the same passion for the game. We shared war stories, glory days, and our secret love for Frost Mages. Seriously, the two people in front of me and the two people behind me, THREE of them have Frost mages. TWO of them are mained.

Oh. And Because Future Shop is the coolest place ever, we get an extra bonus to our Collector's Edition:

Now if you'll excuse me, I'll be reading my artbook while I wait for the installation process to finish. You can bet your sweet canadian dollar that I'll still be wearing this helm well into Naxx-10!

And Now We're Live with Ollie Williams, and the Tuesday Maintenance Report. How did things go Ollie?

2008-11-12T07:57:00.007-05:00

"THINGS GOT FUCKED UP BAD!"

Thanks Ollie.

Lest We Forget

2008-11-11T14:49:00.002-05:00

Akin to Veteran's day in the US (who celebrate the end of the war on the Sunday), Canadians (and Australians) everywhere pay their respects today to those who fought in the first World War. In a symbollic sense, veterans of the wars that proceeded WWI are also honored. Let me take today's post to reflect on what their sacrifices have meant. Without them, we may not have had the freedom to do the simple things that we may take for granted today. For example, blogging in itself may have been outlawed if our freedom of speech was taken away.

Praise Elune for their efforts. May the light bless those who live peacefully now, and those who rest in peace. See you tomorrow.

5 Ways to Occupy Yourself Before Wrath, Frost Style

2008-11-09T11:30:00.006-05:00

Thursday, right? Is that when it comes out? It's practically sitting behind me in class, teasing me and making me cry, bringing back horrid childhood memories of preschool, kindergarten and the like. And I will be the first to admit that NaNo has minimized the pre-wrath jitters and anxiety. But they're still there, so what I have now is both NaNo and Wrath Anxiety. (On a side note, I'm still writing for the Scarlet Dawn, but it just so happens that these extras are out of sequence, and I don't want to post them in that manner. Not yet, at least.)

So to deal with the compounded nature of both "deadlines," I'm compiling a tiny list to remind myself of my wrath specific goals, while at the same time find time to chunk up a few thousand words a day to catch up with the pace. Oh, I'm unemployed right now, but that's a post waiting for another day. So here you go, Cryomaniacs, have some fun.

1. Solo Dungeons

Even if it means certain death. Start small, but work your way up to bigger things. I'm talking dungeons and elites. Go to deadmines and the stockades, pull the entire room, and kill them without casting a single spell other than Molten Armor. When you're done that, stealth your way to each boss in Scarlet Monastery with proper uses of blink through patrols.

And when you're done that, solo the stairs event in Zul'Farrak. Free the Prisoners, and Slow Fall all the way down to the bottom steps and proceed to Blizzard everything in your way.

Heck, Solo Stratholme if you think you're adequately geared. Some timely Blinks and stealthy sneaking through mobs can potentially earn you your very own mount. Spicytuna has a great guide for that sort of thing. If you get the mount, go visit his site and thank him! Or rub it in, whatever, just tell him I sent ya there!

There's probably some old-world dungeon achievements that you've yet to complete. Might as well do them yourself, rather than helplessly look for others.

2. Solo Elites

Same thing as dungeons, except with elite mobs that roam around Azeroth and perhaps Outland. Go to WoWhead. Look up every single elite mob that exists, and see if it can be chilled or snared. General rule of thumb. If they can do either or both, they are killable by a Frost Mage. Start with hogger, then work your way up to those Scourge Shadow of Doom guys. Trust me, I've brought one down to 25% before the other mobs started respawning and killed me.

Simple rules for fighting elites.
- If they can't be chilled, DON'T DO IT.
- Talent yourself to maximize chill effects. Get Frostbite.
- Pop Water Elemental AFTER your first Frost Nova. Get distance, pop the ranged Nova as soon as he breaks free.
- Shatter Combo at EVERY opportunity.
- Save Brain Freeze Procs for when you're on the move.
- Pop cooldowns as soon as you can. Get your Water Elemental Back ASAP.
- NEVER Blink after a Frost Nova. Simply run/strafe away. Use blink while they're chilled for essentially the same effect, and it spreads out your kiting cooldowns (Nova/Blink)
- Plan out a kiting route ahead of time. Don't pull any extra mobs. Be aware of the Elite's maximum kiting distance (before it resets and runs back home)

3. AoE Your Way into Northrend

If you're not yet 70, there's nothing wrong with taking your time before the big expansion comes. Take the road less travelled. Go to Hellfire Peninsula and learn to AoE grind on vultures in the Valley of Bones, or just south of the Temple of Thalmat. When you're a little bit higher in level, go to Netherstorm, and take out some guys at the Junk Heap, just south of Area 52. You get some nice rep turn-in items in the process.

If you're pretty well geared as a 70 as it is, look for some interesting ways to flex your AoE-peen. For starters, on your last Kara run before the expansion, ask your raid to let you solo the non-elite trash pulls. They're grouped up in a circle that perfectly fits the ranged nova perfectly for a reason.

Or do some scourge fighting! Go look for an invasion spot that's uninhabited by players, and AoE a few of them at a time. They're melee for the most part, but they do have a ranged slow attack that deals a lot of damage when they all do it at the same time. With sufficient spellpower and HP, you probably don't have to Nova the second time anyways.

The necrotic runes are so easy to farm with a frost mage, second only to perhaps T6 prot pallies. If you're an enchanter, you can buy epics from the vendor with those runes, and DE them into Void Crystals.

4. Read up on Frost Death Knights

If you're a die-hard cryophile like me, either these guys will become your best friends, or you'll simply roll one when the expansion comes. So do yourself a favor, and go look up information about Frost Knights, and have yourself drool at the promise of some good times playing (with) one.

5. Level a Druid

Apparently, mages have a thing for druid alts, or associating with druids. Heck, even some Druids have a thing for mage alts as well, or are former mage mains themselves. With good reason, too. As a DPS spec, it's only natural that one would try out the different roles. Resto healing is perhaps the most fun thing to do when you get to a certain level. Hell, pewpewing with the chickenform is very gratifying as an alternate style of DPS. I have no qualms against bear tanking either. I've done it a few times, and currently am doing so with leyola as she ferlols her way to 70 before the patch hits. She's 66 right now, and taking up pretty much all of my time.

Okay, fine, it doesn't have to be a druid. But level something, because that's what Frost Mages excell at, and feeling the rush all over again can tide you over before Yarrrthas sticks his nose into our business.

Final Thoughts

It's coming soon. I'm excited, yes, but with all the fun I've been having lately, I wouldn't mind if it didn't come as soon as it is.

The Sarlet Dawn - Four

2008-11-07T17:07:00.003-05:00

The Scarlet Dawn - Three

2008-11-05T16:45:00.001-05:00

((The Scarlet Dawn is the title of a derivative piece of fiction set in the WoW universe, written by Krizzlybear for National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo). As per the word count demands of NaNoWriMo, all spelling and grammar errors, continuity problems, and failures to adhere to canon, are unintentional, and will not be attended to until the end of November. Thanks for reading, and I hope you enjoy.))

In the depths of a wooded area to the east of Auberdine, the Night Elven port village, a meager squirrel scampered its way up and down an oaken tree. One by one, nuts were carried up to an enclosed area towards the top of the tree's trunk. Mindlessly going along with its instincts as the world's winter drew ominously near, the squirrel continued obliviously until it had met its fate.

Midway through the seventeenth trip, the tiny critter was interrupted by a fatal swipe of a rabid bear's claw. In nature, this particular grizzly would have minded its own business as it made its own preparations for the colder months. Instead, however, a force unknown to both the predator and its prey had caused this sudden change in behaviour.

The grizzly intently stared down at its dead victim, instinctively proud of its catch, yet at the same time clouded by its sudden burst of primal rage. Soon, that rush of aggression had returned, and the bear thirsted for more violence.

Then it fell asleep.

As if under some sort of spell, a spiritual force beckoned to the animal's most basic nurturing instinct, pleading with it to regain a hold of its natural role in the forest.

No, it had said. Never will you do that.

The voice had spoken with a somber tone, and ragged the bear's brain with a calming aura. It drifted off into nothingness and ceased to be a physical threat to any living being within its vicinity.

Meanwhile, the druid who had cast the spell wiped the sweat off her brow as she took out a tiny dart from a pocket of her simple brown tunic. Confident that she had successfully subdued the bear, she neatly stuck the dart into the hide of the hibernating animal. She tensed herself in anticipation of the bear possibly emerging from sleep in primal rage, but the effects of the dart had done its job.

The druid closed her eyes, and sensed the serenity of the bear's spirit, as if it were freed from an unseen evil grasp. She accepted its thanks, and quickly disappeared from the spiritual realm that she had entered.

Minutes later, the druid appeared once again amidst the other inhabitants of Auberdine. She sneaked up to another Night elf, and handed to him several darts that were left unused during her chore.

"Your service is deeply appreciated, Leyola."

She nodded. Leyola Swiftwillow was a helpful druid, well-known to the working people of Auberdine. Even without her valued service, her pale, purple-grey skin and mysterious visage highlighted by long, wavy silver hair stood out amongst her kin. She was very tall for a Night Elf, yet her curves were apparent from her fitted tunic and thin, jet black cloak. She was an intriguing sight, and that alone may have had merit free passage from Auberdine to her home in Darnassus, a mere boat ride away.

But these were troubling times in Kalimdor, the Western island continent of the world of Azeroth. Auberdine, a town developed on the northwest coast of the continent, was no exception. Leyola was summoned to the presence of her druid teacher during the middle of an independent training exercise aimed at strengthening her mental and spiritual focus towards her own abilities.

She had meditated for hours, but a voice of concern from her master had undone all of her work, but justifiably so. If she was interrupted in such a way, it was probably due to a very troubling situation. Because of this, she was anxious to return to her home. But despite this, she did not anticipate having to pay a boat fare to get back to the Night Elven capital.

"As a servant of Elune," Leyola Swiftwillow jested in a manner that did not suggest a strong allegiance to the moon goddess, "I had figured you to grant me passage so that I could hastily fulfill my duties."

"I apologize miss Leyola," the patron said, "but I didn't know who to turn to at the time. Perhaps you can report the situation in the forest to your shan'do."

"Fair enough."

She had observed the obscurity of the behaviour of the local fauna, and attributed their radical changes to some external agent that threatened the natural balance within the woods surrounding Auberdine. Leyola acknowledged the Night Elf's plea, having sensed the disturbance, and was determined to bring up the topic with her teacher when she had the chance.

A boat pulled up to the docks closeby, large enough only to carry a few passengers and a limited amount of cargo. The architecture and build of the boat was clearly of Night Elf origin, which indicated that the female druid would be able to take her leave. With a wave farewell, she inwardly worried for the man, hoping that the Mother Moon would protect him and his town of Auberdine during this trying time.

She boarded the vessel, tightening the wrap of her cloak around her slender body.

The boat disappeared into the mists, the evening fog surrounding Leyola as she leaned unassumingly onto the portside rails. She contemplated her future amongst the Night Elves. One part of her considered that her success as a member of the Cenarion Circle was undeserved; as a child of two veterans of the Third War, their clout amongst the Cenarion Enclave was apparent, and Leyola's favor amongst her instructors was apparent. Regardless, she worked hard to become as skilled as she was, and she had vowed to put forth an effort in her work, despite what others thought.

She kept abosrbing herself into her thoughts as the boat was into the mist. Several hours passed before she arrived in Darnassus.

Darnassus was a bustling city, and the Night Elven Capital. It resided miles above the sea, nestled in the boughs of Teldrassil, the last World Tree of Azeroth. Above the clouds, the city comfortably nested its inhabitants, who scuffled about their business in the same manner they had done for as long as it had existed. Amongst its citizens, an uneasy social tnsion could be felt between both the Druids and priests and priestesses of Elune, the moon goddess worshipped by the Night Elves themselves.

The boat finished its trip, its captain tying the vessel to a rickety dock, several yards away from solid ground. Leyola, not one to take chances on the structural integrity of the makeshift port, hurried her way onto dry land. Once she had done so, she had finally reached the World Tree, standing on its very roots, thousands upon thousands of feet below the canopy where the capital lay.

She stepped into a chamber near the base of the tree. It radiated with a magical lunar pink energy, perhaps powered by the Moon Goddess Herself. As soon as she had entered, she was instantly in Darnassus. Amongst her was the chatter of passers-by, and immediately she sought the tranquility of the more rustic scenery of the Cenarion Enclave.

The Cenarion Enclave was an open, grassy sector in Darnassus that catered to all Night Elf Druids. Compared to its neighbouring district, the more commercial Craftsman Terrace, its structures were carved into the trees themselves, rather than made of its material as the numerous shops and inns were in the terraced sector. Here, the druids lived in harmony with the flora, which were merely extensions of the world tree itself.

The tallest and most grandoise tree in the Enclave housed the Archdruid Fangren Staghelm, leader of the Druids. It also served as the training center for up and coming Druids. A recent alumnus of the program, Leyola no longer visited the training center, and preferred to have her meetings with her mentor out in the open, amongst the trees themselves, rather than within.

She arrived at a spot to her liking, and sat down with crossed legs. Closing her eyes, she opened her soul to the nature around her. Her breathing settling into a slow rhythm, she emptied her mind, and a spiritual aspect of her seperate from her body. The world around her new form faded out of color into a dim, faded monochrome. She was now floating above and amongst the the clouds. She felt that she was still in Darnassus, but somehow she had returned to a time before the World Tree itself, before the separation of the contents.

The Emerald Dream. The refuge of druid meditation. She had finally perfected control over herself as she soared through it, thanks to the teachings of her teacher, who she now knew was observing her physical form.

"My child, you have come a long way."

A deep voice swirled through her from without, as if spoken from the wind as it blew through the foliage of Teldrassil itself. Having found him, she prompted herself to return to her earthly self.

Her eyes opened, revealing pupiless, silver orbits, characteristic of her race. In front of her was the form of her mentor. "My shan'do. What is it that you called me for?"

Leyola's Shan'do, or beloved teacher, Valfare Stormsong was a master of the restorative druidic arts. With great authority, he wielded the power to heal and nourish those that suffered. He channeled the power of the trees with such command, to the extent that he took the form of a tree himself. A treant, his body features mimicked that of the forests themselves. His legs curled around themselves as roots, but was capable of walking like any elf. His arms stretched out sideways and in front of himself like branches. His skin was literally bark, hardened to protect him against the harshest environments, and wrinkled around his face, making him look older and wiser than his years.

"My child, I apologize for calling you here on short notice."

Leyola stood up slowly and respectfully. "Shan'do, there is something wrong with the balance of nature?"

Valfare sighed, the features on his stonelike face drooping with slight subtlety.

"It is as you fear, dear Leyola. A dark force threatens to not only encroach on the balance of nature, but the laws of life and death itself!"

Life and death itself, the thought sent a haunting chill down Leyola's lengthy spine. Whether or this unseen evil was related to Auberdine and the rabid bears, she did not know. She never even bothered questioned Valfare about Auberdine, considering that this threat was of greater concern.

"What can I..." She lost herself mid-sentence. "...How can I be of any use? I'm just a novice!"

Leyola bowed her head apologetically, as if she had failed her master in some way.

Valfare let out a deep chuckle, one that ruffled the leaves on his own branches. He turned at the waist, looking around for something or someone.

"Novice? You don't think highly enough of yourself, my child. Your reputation reaches further than you would expect!"

Leyola's face darkened, akin to a blush. She was quite aware that she drew attention to herself unwillingly wherever she went. Partly she thought it was due to her uncommon appearance by Night Elf standards. In another way, she remembered that her parents were war veterans, and that the Swiftwillow household had a nobility due to their contribution to the third War, and their efforts at the Battle of Mount Hyjal.

In fact, she had begun to notice that her surname took on synonymity with Hyjal itself, according to talks between her former druid peers and instructors.

She shrugged. "I suppose just a bit. But I still want to earn my praise, teacher."

Her shan'do smiled. "Yes. It is as you say, Leyola. Your parents were fine warriors."

He shared his reminiscence with his student. Having fought with her parents at Hyjal, he knew the elder Swiftwillows as if they were siblings. He even took pride in bringing the two together romantically. Returning the favor, his closest friends entrusted their only daughter to his care, hoping that he could help her walk the path of the Cenarion circle.

Leyola smiled regretfully whenever her teacher told her that story. She missed them dearly, and hoped that they would return from their duties in Outland, the dreaded place beyond the Dark Portal of Azeroth.

She shook off her sudden wave of emotion, replacing her saddened face with a stern look at Valfare. "I am at your service."

Valfare shot a look of disappointment.

"I'm sorry, Leyola. There's not enough time for me to teach you. You've learned a great deal from me, I can only hope that your skills would be of best use against this looming darkness. I suppose that you know about the Argent Dawn?"

Leyola curled an eyebrow in slight misunderstanding. "Yes...I suppose I have."

The tree sighed with relief. "Great. Go to them. They'll be waiting for you in front of the Temple of the Moon."

Leyola acknowledged his request and began to make her leave. She barely took two steps before she was grabbed by a branch. Instantly, she was caught in a warm embrace.

"Take care, my child." He smiled. "You were taught by one of the best healing druids in the Cenarion Circle. You will do well."

Leyola smiled, her skin darker once more. "Thank you."

She proudly walked away, heading in the direction of the temple, a short distance south of the Enclave.

Mother Moon, watch over my student. Valfare prayed to himself. She just might have what it takes to become the Tree of Life.

((Running word coun: 5162))

In Between NaNo's

2008-11-05T13:09:00.003-05:00

So yeah, haven't done a regular post in a while. Blame the novel! Go ahead, I dare ya! It's my baby, so I will sit here and defend it to my dying breath. Unfortunately, I've reached a point in the storyline planning-wise that I think I may have to spoil myself with Lich King Lore, since there's a bunch of details that I need to know in order to fit the story as best as I can with the main storyline.

In-game, I've shelved Bashertin indefinitely until the expansion hits. Too much time NOT writing to do anything worthwhile in WoW, so I spent my last badges on the Scryer's Blade of Focus, and called it an expansion. At approximately a thousand or so spell damage, hit capped, and a very small health pool, Bashertin has come a long way from level 1. I'm proud of him, and I eagerly wait for the expac to hit.

And Leyola. Well, she's a different case. I've been having a lot of fun healing Outlands instances. I've been pugging out on normal UB, BF, HR, and SP so many times (rather quickly too, because at least 80% of the time, a 70 had helped out his guildie who was part of the initial PuG), that I didn't even know that I had levelled up TWICE without doing a single quest. Wild Growth? Best 5-man healing spell EVER. EVER. EVAAARRRRR!!!

Here's a thought regarding my time spent on alts, particularly with Wimzig/Leyola/Death Knight. What if Wimzig became the death knight? Something I've considered, and will get back to you on when the time is right.

The Scarlet Dawn - Two

2008-11-04T13:04:00.003-05:00

((The Scarlet Dawn is the title of a derivative piece of fiction set in the WoW universe, written by Krizzlybear for National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo). As per the word count demands of NaNoWriMo, all spelling and grammar errors, continuity problems, and failures to adhere to canon, are unintentional, and will not be attended to until the end of November. Thanks for reading, and I hope you enjoy.))

Thousands of feet below the surface of the earth, a wonderous city remained abandoned and partially in ruins. Expanding as far as any being could see, Gnomeregan's infrastructure stretched for countless miles in all directions. Its buildings and houses built with meticulate detail, every single structure was crafted with at least some form of technological variance from the norm. The average building stood erect on smelted metal, its parts bolted together and lined with arcano-electrical wiring for numerous automagical purposes. Whether it be for simple lighting or for visually communicative lilve transmissions to other outposts not only on other continents, but even on other worlds.

And those were just the average house. In more mechanically advanced districts, more complicated structures were present, and had more robotic, lifelike qualities to them. In the heart of the city, a grand platform appeared to perpetually hover above the rest, supported only chains to stabilize its position over the rest of the city. The sheer fact that it remained intact all these years after the city's evacuation is a wonder for even the most gifted engineers.

And yet, as fast as it had been built and develloped, it had been taken away just as quickly. The gnomes who had previously occupied that city, were invaded by a fearsome yet numerous race called the Troggs, barbaric and violent beings that emerged from the depths of the earth when the urban sprawl had gone too far. It had led to their peoples downfall, and except for a handful of Troggs, the city was devoid of gnomes.

Except for Wimzig Wintersprug.

A mage by nature, Wimzig peered into a scrying orb that he formed by himself. Through this orb, he was able to see a multitude of numerous views of the city that he had once called home. Why he always spent his time there, none of his peers knew; all that mattered to him was that one day he would help his exiled bretheren retake the city and find his missing kin.

The orb dissipated into nothingness, and Wimzig sighed. "Nothing today." He said. "They must be hiding, they must."

He drew an imaginary line in the space in front of him, and with a quick thought, a cane sublimated into form. He grabbed it in mid-hover, and began to walk with it.

For a gnome, he was quite old, but other than the cane he now wielded, his appearance did not indcate as such. With a full head of thick black hair and a bushy mustache, he passed for a gnome recently of age, even though he had studied the arcane arts for nearly two decades.

A veteran of the Battle of Gnomeregan against the Troggs, there was a sense of unease in the mage as he lightly stepped through a connecting tunnel littered with rubble from the rocky ceilings above. Eyeing the crevaces in the cavernous walls for possible Trogg encampments, he stayed alert for any ambushes. Even though it was rightfully his home, those beasts had conquered it handily, and were prone to mercilessly destroying any and all intruders.

At the end of the tunnel, Wimzig approached a large metal door, nearly shut, apparently jammed from its automatic open/close functions. Placing his tiny hand on the aged, neglected metal panels, he studied the elemental composition of the obstacle before him.

"Eleven-point-six percent Carbon, fifty seven-poin-nine-three percent Iron...Hello!"

His thin lips curved upward, turning a huaghty grin.

"Three-point-seven-seven percent solidified Iron oxide? How depressing..."

He frowned at it. Rust. Plain old rust.

Wimzig whispered a spell, and suddenly his hand radiated a yellow glow that spread through his four fingers onto the door itself. It began to hiss, as an acidic reagent began to line the surface, dissolving the rust, yet keeping the rest of the door intact.

When the time was appropriate, Wimzig disengaged from contact with the door, and walked towards a nearby panel. Pressing a sequence of keys that he remembered from long ago, the door opened with a hiss of steam coming from the vents above. It operated again as if brand new.

The end of the path opened up again, and Wimzig walked through, now appearing in a new section of the city previously blocked off from his scrying orb.

From a quick glance at his surroundings, he concluded that this was a residence district, to which his fellow gnomes would retire after a day's work in the central market areas. He picked up the pace of his step, and eventually reached a particular structure, still standing, its banner still intact and hanging from the top.

"Wintersprug Water Emporium."

For the first time since the beginning of the Third War, which had happened several years ago, he was once again home.

He was not alone.

Hearing footsteps grow louder from behind him, he concentrated on his own form, and studied the surrounding light sources. Visualizing the arcane fields flow around him, he quickly formed a line running around himself, and directed the flow at it. When the spell was cast, the surrounding light was completely absorbed, and no form of visual colour had escaped from his being. He turned completely invisible.

Still able to visually and audibly sense the world around him, he quickly settled himself against a nearby wall, monitoring the space around him.

From the tunnel from which he came, several figures clad in robes and armor marched into the vicinity.

"Is this the place the commander spoke of?" one mail-wearing individual asked.

"Yes," another robed figure replied. "The map leads to this spot."

"Keep your eyes open then," the third and final individual remakred. "There should be a few lepper gnomes around here still."

Lepper gnomes, the unfortunates who were unable to be evacuated when the Troggs invaded, were victims of the invasion. In a desperate attempt to ward off the encroaching beasts, the leader of the gnomes, Gelbin Mekkatorque, released a cloud of radaiation from the city's vents, long after they had evacuated most of Gnomeregan's citizens. Unfortunately, the attack that was directed at the Troggs also hit straggling gnomes, who had been turned into psychotic shells of their former selves.

Wimzig's former love, Karin Coldchill, was one of them.

Wimzig cringed slightly as he suddenly reminded himself of her. He continued evesdropping on the trio in front of him, who were clearly not Gnomes or Troggs. By the time he had set his focus on them again, they were now two.

The two figures in front of him bore tabards with a red crest of Lordaeron, a former kingdom from the northern region of the continent. One of them had a red hyena under his care. They both waited for the third to return from wherever he or she may have gone.

Wimzig continued observing them from his invisible state, until the third came running back to the group.

"One's coming out!" The person said as he rejoined the group, having emerged from a nearby alley.

The trio and their pet readied a defensive stance as a fourth figure emerged from the same alley, this one less than half the height of the the initial three. It was also covered with radiation, and glowed a sickly green. A lepper gnome.

The robed figure took out a glass orb from his pocket, and threw it at the lepper gnome. A fiendish green slime sprayed out at him, causing him to shake about in discomfort. As he continued to stumble around in a circle as the slime was absorbed into the body, the green glow that the lepper gnome had emitted suddenly vanished.

Remarkable! Wimzig thought to himself, still veiled, yet fully able to witness what had happened. If he could figure out what the strangers had used, then there was a possibility that he could cure his-

A loud yell echoed throughout the underground mechanical suburb. The gnome writhed with a shriek of pain as its skin began to peel at the shoulders and face. As tiny as he initially was, his form somehow grew in height significantly, but left him still significantly shorter than the three figures who had caused his condition. His back hunched, and his innards and organs became visible through the clothing, which ripped as a result of the growth.

Claws, fangs, veiny yet lifeless eyes marked the completion of the zombification of the poor lepper gnome.

It raged on its own initially, before setting its eyes on the three people out in the open. Almost as quickly as it had changed, the monster had run up to the three and gave chase.

"Run away! We need to tell the commander!" Said one of them.

Quickly, the others complied and they hurried off to the tunnel from where they came.

In an instant, Wimzig was once again by his lonesome, successfully not drawing any attention to himself from the parties who he just witnessed. Dispelling his own illusion, he came into visible form, and widened his eyes in sheer disbelief.

"Gelbin must know, he must!" He muttered. Quickly, he reached out his arms slightly to the side of him, and they began to emanate a subtle purple glow.

And just as quickly, he was gone as well.

((running word count: 2888. I'll pick things up by this weekend. Thanks for the kidn words so far, everyone! And don't worry, I promise to put at least some form of non-NaNo content in the blog. Just haven't done much besides dailys anyways.))

The Scarlet Dawn - One

2008-11-03T13:25:00.003-05:00

The Scarlet Dawn

2008-10-31T00:00:00.002-04:00

In a land plagued by undeath, one individual makes her vow to restore life, and another seeks to understand it. But a corrupted organization stands in the way of their goals in the...

Leyola Swiftwillow, a druid with a storied family history, makes a name for herself by enlisting with the Argent Dawn in their fight against the Undead Plague.

Wimzig Wintersprug, a gifted gnomish mage, seeks to discover his place in the world by embarking on a journey to find a cure for a disease that afflicts his cherished race.

Little do they realize that fate will cross their paths. In the midst of a recent plague wrought by the Lich King, Arthas Menethil, this unlikely duo will have to learn to work with each other as they uncover a grand conspiracy that threatens to destroy all of Azeroth.

Will they succeed? Only time will tell, as they strive to prevent the coming of...

The Scarlet Dawn

Featured only on Frost is the New Black, from November 1-30

The Big Bang Theory

2008-10-29T21:52:00.004-04:00

The Big Bang Theory is this terrible wednesday night filler sitcom on CTV channel 8 in Toronto. I'm not exactly sure of its syndication status right now in the US, but well...iunno. Let me quote the description by the CTV website.

"Leonard and Sheldon are brilliant theoretical physicists, the kind of guys who understand the nuts and bolts of how the universe is put together.

But none of that genius helps them deal with people--especially women. When a free-spirited beauty, Penny, moves in next door, sensitive Leonard realizes that she could represent his best chance to live in the real world.

Even Leonard's pragmatic roommate, Sheldon, whose idea of meaningful social interaction is gathering "friends" on MySpace and playing Klingon Boggle until 1:00 a.m., can see that Penny might just change both of their lives.

This comedy was created by Chuck Lorre ("Two and a Half Men," "Dharma & Greg") & Bill Prady ("Gilmore Girls," "Dharma & Greg")."

So yeah, 2 nerdy guys and a total babe. Except that the two nerdy guys are terrible nerds, and the babe is, well, okay, she's pretty hot. The characterization of the former two is overly stereotypical.

Why is this worth mentioning on the blog? Well, the latest episode tonight features Penny dealing with unemployment and general life failures by playing an MMO played by Leonard. Guess which one?

Nope. Not WoW. Age of Conan.

And boy, if success of an MMO is reflected by its promotion by mainstream media, then this fits the bill quite well. Where WoW has gotten exposure by the big boys in South Park, all AoC can muster is a terrible produced episode in the BBT.

Some points to consider:
- better usage of MMO-lingo by the writers of South Park. For writers supposedly trying to characterize geekwads in Leonard and Sheldon, they do a piss-poor job of being leet haxxors, using the word noob ONCE, and Leonard not knowing what "OIC" stands for. blah.
- in-game production values are superior in South Park's "Make Love, Not Warcraft." In-game was represented by actual WoW machinema, while AoC was represented in TBBT simply terribly.
- Still watching just now, I notice that Penny is using the same Logitech headset that I use, except with the red-colored plates for the earphones rather than my blue ones. I'm all of a sudden much more attracted to her, haha!

Extra Content: What I've been doing lately in WoW, all in one Screenshot!

In the screenshot:
-Hallowed Helm
-Sinister Squashling
-Magic Broom
-Tabard of the Argent Dawn
-Argent War Horn
-Argent Dawn Banner
-(Not Included, but worth mentioning that I currently own): Gloves of Undead Cleansing

State of the Blog

2008-10-28T12:51:00.003-04:00

Gee, it sure is getting cold up here in Sunny Canada. The days are shorter, the air is chillier, and work is getting a lot more demanding. And with NaNoWriMo coming up, I'm actually finding myself with a very crazy task of using whatever free time that I have after work to write and grind it out.

I'm quite sure that I'm not exactly looking forward to the expansion, not because of the content itself, but more along the lines of the sheer population and traffic. Considering that a.) even a week or so after the patch, my server is still qeueing up, and b.) Arygos was not listed as one of the Free Transfers that was announced by Blizzard, I expect traffic to shoot up drastically, making the experience more uncomfortable.

There are a few things to consider from here on out:

- How much time do I focus on NaNoWriMo?
- How much time will I get with my characters?
- How soon do I want to get to 80?
- Which characters get to 80 first?
- How many 80's do I want to have?

It's a myriad of questions to which I have hardly any answers, except:

- I really want to hit 50k words for NaNoWriMo.
- I want to go fast to 80, but as smoothly as possible (avoiding tagging contests).
- At the very least I want an 80 of each type of role (Mage, Druid, Death Knight).

From the looks of it, it seems that this schedule pinch that I'm in will result in a somewhat noticeable change in the way this blog is run. For the month of November, you will see a lot more of NaNoWriMo excerpts, which is completely fine by me.

That said, it doesn't mean that I will be completely ignoring WoW. But when Lich King does come out, watch the priority shift back and forth between Bashertin and whoever this new Death Knight will be when November passes. The title of this blog is indeed Frost is the New Black, so I want to really represent what it means to rain icy death, whether it be from a mage's perspective, or from a Death Knight perspective.

Does that mean that I will no longer be a mage guy? No way! It's probably more that I will not only be a Mage man, but hopefully a death knight dude as well. If anything, think of me as the Frost guy, as the blog suggests.

So, for the remainder of '08, get yourself a nice warm cup of coccoa, since things are about to get a lot colder. November will bring a really cool story along the likes of A Stab in the Dark, and December will unleash the full fury of frost! What is in store for Krizzlybear as he continues to hone his icy sorcery alongside learning from an unspoilered clean slate the ins and outs of death knighthood.

I truly look forward to it, and I surely hope you will do so as well.

A Sunday Hangover Post

2008-10-26T15:14:00.002-04:00

I went to my cousin's Halloween party. Got pretty wasted. I'm still at his house, and I'm quite sure that I'm going to miss my guild's afternoon raid.

I told an officer ahead of time that I might not make it, so they know if I'm not there. And it's TK, so I'm already saved anyways (hence, why I got pugged by another guild the night before).

But back to the party. I went as Super Mario. It was pretty nice. Ran into a Link, that was pretty cool.

This one guy dressed up as a demon, and his girlfriend dressed up as a sorceress. I kept laughing in my mind that maybe they went as a WoW warlock/demon couple.

Thinking about it a bit more, I suddenly noticed that my hatred for warlocks has waned somewhat over the course of the latest patch. Perhaps it's because they got nerfed somewhat with the new patch, or maybe I recently added a lot of warlock blogs to my RSS. But as it stands now, I'm actually tolerant of them, and respectful of them. Gotta update my power rankings.

1. Mage - Duh, by default this is a lock.

2. Druid - Moonkin form is my favorite non-mage dps caster class. My favorite healing class as well!

3. Shaman - Same as druids, except I'm kinda blah about their healing. Maybe I should level one to the point where I can use chain heal. That might change things.

4. Paladin - hrm, I'm starting to see a trend here. Maybe I'm a closet Hybrid lover.

5. Priest - I don't care about their healing abilities. I'm a fan of shadow spells.

6. Rogue - My favorite melee dps class, which doesn't mean much since I'm a caster type.

7. Warrior - Tried levelling one on Bleeding Hollow, but now it's a bank alt.

8. Warlock - By default, they're supposed to be a lock for last place, but iunno. I kinda feel sorry for them now.

9. Hunter - I love good hunters. Too bad I can't seem to find one in-game. Too bad I'm not one myself.

Unranked, Death Knight - expect this to shoot up to #3 or #2 when Lich King hits.

Dear Kael'thas,

2008-10-25T19:06:00.003-04:00

You just got served, bizzatch!

25-man style!

Sincerely,
Bashertin

p.s. Please tell Loot Reaver I said thanks for the shoulders!

Dr. Phil Can Kiss My Gnomish Butt.

2008-10-24T00:00:00.000-04:00

Feel free to play along.

1. Do you feel that you need to play online games as a way of dealing with anxiety or depression in your general life?

No. I blog about it instead. But guess what? It makes me feel better than any video game ever could. And since then, I haven't been depressed or anxious lately, so screw you Dr. Phil.

2. Are you preoccupied with gaming so much that you are distracted from the priorities in your life, such as relationships, school or jobs?

School is not yet. I got warned once for blogging at work. I stopped doing so, and less than a few days later, got a work duration extension. Up yours, Dr. Phil!

3. Have you lied to your friends or family to conceal your obsessive thinking about gaming?

I'm out of the WoW closet actually. I've skipped a family get-together once or twice for a raid, but I stopped on by as soon as it was over.

4. Do you get restless and irritable when you are away from gaming or feel that you are restricted from your next gaming event?

Not so much irritable as I am tired, but that's due to reading in bed for a long time after the computer is turned off. I'm reading the WoW books again. What can I say? I have a particular Knaak for wow lore! /BADPUN

5. Have you attempted to stop or cut back your gaming behavior, but failed because of the anxiety, depression or general stress you experience?

Never tried. Never needed to. Went on a trip to Boston for a week or so, and didn't go crazy. Omg, I'm actually kinda normal? o.O

6. Do you feel you need to play online games because it gives you the self-esteem and confidence other activities don’t?

I don't play games to give myself self-esteem and confidence. I get my self-esteem and confidence from elsewhere, then apply it to my games. You don't know me, you Freudian Fraud!

7. Have you lost or damaged a relationship, such as affectionate, sexual or parental connection because of your obsession, lying or distorting your behavior of gaming?

I have postponed a date to do a podcast, but oh my goodness, I'm actually going on that very date this weekend? What has this world coming to? I desperately need help!

And besides, it's YOUR twisted view and prejudice against gamers that make you assume that we all have these weird anti-social tendencies. Here's a middle finger for your birthday Mr. Phil. /middlefinger

8. Have you diminished your goals, such as grades, sports, money, etc. because of your obsession with gaming?

I have diminished grades because I'm too lazy to put in an effort to study. But appaently to some people, a B-/C+ average is considered diminished grades. And this was before WoW, and it hasn't changed since. At least I'm smarter than you, Dr. Phil, you jerk!

9. Have you lost or damaged job opportunities because of your obsessive gaming behavior?

I'm still in school, and I have been paying for my own tuition since second year! And that was amidst nightmarish time sinks such as Harvest Moon. But wait, what? Harvest moon actually teaches you how to manage your money and become a decen budgeter? What a miracle!

10. Have you lost or damaged family and community relationships because of your gaming behavior?

If "Kriz, you're a weirdo" counts as damaged family relationships, then holy crap I need to go ahead and skulk in a corner for being a weirdo and a loser in life! Dr. Phil, you can go shove it. Actually, never mind. Come over to my house so I can eat your brains!

Conclusions

Yawn. What a joke. If anything, I've actually become a better person after wow and even moreso after the blog. This was a waste of time for me, but I just wanted to make a point that Dr. Phil thinks he knows gamers. So instead of turning this into a self-defeatist post about having no life as a gamer, I turned it into a retrospective, with lots of self-link love for articles that I remember fondly. Think of this as a follow-up to the anniversary post, under the guise of a rant aganist a lunatic know-nothing baldface.

I actually shouldn't say bald, or else Wimzig would beat me up. Or turn me into a penguin.

A Less Original Hundredth Post

2008-10-23T00:00:00.000-04:00

I'm so honored to have been through this wonderful ride. Back in July, when I stumbled upon a neat little thing called Blog Azeroth, I had discovered a quaint, yet strong community of intellectuals who, through their dedication to both the game and to blogging, possessed qualities that resonated with my interests.

You see, originally, I liked to write fanfiction back in the day. That isn't to say that I don't do it now; if you squint, you could probably say that I'm about to embark on a very grand project that extends into the realm of fanfiction, but otuside of the fanfiction.net community.

But it wasn't just about writing. It was about a game that I also curiously tried out during the boring old days of reading week (spring break in the US) of 2008. What started out as a number of deleted alts, and the beginnings of an awkward looking little gnomish mage named Bashertin.

And the rest is history.

I truly believe that what I've become today is but a sample of what's to come. I'm in this zone of stability in my life; work, home, only one class left for university, and a little bit of the dating game, amongst others.

This lifestyle has permitted me to be a part of this grand little thing known as Frost is the New Black. And after only 100 posts, it has become quite a part of me. Regardless of whether or not the day's post is something as small as a screenshot, as ambitious as a amalgamation of Karazhan Boss Strategies wrapped up into a spreadsheet, or as serious and personal as contemplations towards moving onto another guild/realm, I've always been open to sharing it with whoever was curious enough to read it.

And I can look now how far I've come. Blog-wise, I've gained a nice little readership, compared to maybe the one or two subscribers that I had when I first registered for a blogger account. Game-wise I've reached 3/5 T4 and a Be Imba! rating appropriate for SSC/TK, and for MH/BT trash, and with the recent nerfs, maybe more.

At the same time, all of this has not been at the cost of any sort of personal sacrifice or downside. Despite moments of obvious obsession and addiction (I blame achievements!), I am yet to make a terrible life decision due to WoW or blogging, even though I've had my share of comments of concern from higher ups and parents.

But I still have my job, my blog, my social life, my WoW account, my health, and my sanity.

Looking to the future, there's plenty on the horizon to look forward to. There's a looming expansion, and server issues aside, it looks to be the most amazing thing yet. There's National Novel Writing Month, an opportunity to get back to my most basic interests: creative writing. There's a school semester with only one class to worry about. There's a trip to Japan that I've been saving up for as a reward for completing school. And there's another 100 posts, probably more, to make, consisting of my thoughts, desires, and moments of both enlightenment and utmost silliness.

It's just so much to look forward to. And I just want to take this moment to tell everyone reading this that I surely hope that you've enjoyed the ride so far.

Thanks for the kind comments. Thanks for the encouragement. Thanks for the feedback. Thanks for your dedication to not just follow my blog, but to keep up with your own if you happen to have one. Thanks for the recognition. Thanks for pretty much everything.

As much as I often think that this sort of thing belongs in a personal livejournal or anything, I feel that living vicariously through others is what makes life worth living, games worth playing, places worth exploring, relationships worth developing, and more.

And I hope that I continue to express this attitude as we as a community continue to pursue our goals for the future whatever they may be.

I wish you all luck, and I hope you're as excited as I am for what we are about to embark upon.

It'll be something worth blogging about indeed.

AoE Grinding in the New WoW: Leveling Talents 1-18

2008-10-22T00:00:00.002-04:00

Yeah yeah, quest rewards provide better XP than anything else while levelling. So what? I've seriously walked through Jame's alliance levelling guide I don't know how many times from 20-30, and I just hate having to go from one spot to another to another and turn quests in chunks at a time.

I like my slow painful grind. I like staying in one place and killing a billion things at once. I like having passers-by stop in their tracks as you perform your elaborate dance. I like making oodles of money from cloths, skins, and greens.

With the change in 3.0.2, we have ourselves a few things that completely change the AoE grinding process. For the better, of course. Three things come to mind:

- The removal of the natural 1% miss rate. As long as you group up with mobs at your level or lower, you will never whiff a Frost Nova on a random mob in that group. You will never ever go "OH SH-" and scramble for the Cold Snap button.

- Reconfiguration of the talent tree. Some good AoE talents come a lot sooner than usual, and some require less points to max out. With this adjustment, you can have a really good baseline talent set-up to grind with as early as level 25. At higher levels, introduction of talents that further increase your snare will result in even more control over your mobs. I'll explain what those talents are later.

- The ability to crit with Blizzard. Holy crap, this is what will make me AoE my way to level 80, with dungeons and instances on the side. Now that Blizzard can crit, you will NEED to put talent points into spells that increase your crit chance and damage.

A combination of the three points above, it is now much easier and smoother to go through the motions of the Blizzard sequence, and your damage capabilities can shoot REAL high.

AoE Levelling Build: 10-27

It was an omen, I suppose, that when the patch hit, the only functional realm that I could access was Wimzig's. He surely has been neglected somewhat with his levelling, but I suppose that in between making acquaintances with Bre's guild, levelling up with Leyola, and my raiding schedule with Bashertin, there wasn't much time.

That's besides the point though. I am now presented with an opportunity to do what I've always wanted to do with Wimzig; AoE grind. I already have a plan set up with his talents as he goes through the motions once again. Here's what I plan on doing.

Lvl:
10-12: 3/3 Ice Floes. Shortened cooldown on your Frost Nova is more important for AoE grinding in the long run than Improved Frostbolt. At these levels, your cast time is pretty short anyways, so it's not such a big deal.

13-14: 2/5 Improved Frostbolt. If you don't like the cast time on your frostbolt, you can switch this with Ice floes, but only take 2 points here, since you're going straight to the second tier at level 15.

15-17: 3/3 Permafrost. At this point, all you should care about is single-mob kiting. This really helps in that regard.

18-20: 3/3 Ice Shards. The crit is pretty good, but you won't see it too much for now. This is just in preparation for when you start grinding it out.

21-23: 3/3 Improved Blizzard. Technically, you could start grinding at this point, but I seriously doubt you have the sufficient Intellect and Stamina to do so, unless you've been buying out "of the Eagle" gear at the AH.

24: 1/3 Piercing Ice. We need one more point to get into shatter, and then BAM! it's paradise city from here on out.

25-27: 3/3 Shatter. Once this talent is maxed, you are essentially good to go with your blizzing with this resulting spec. From here on out, grab all talents that help increase your abilities to AoE grind, including:

- Arctic Reach
- Frost Channeling
- Cold Snap
- Winter's Chill (even more crits!)
- Cold as Ice
- ICE BARRIER (very important!)
- Shattered Barrier (optional. I myself will have to see how this goes, to see how easy it is to control when your barrier pops. Most likely, this will involve waiting a bit for the cooldown before starting the pull.)
- Water Elemental/Improved Water Elemental (Free ranged freezing effect ftw!)
- Chilled to the Bone

In a future edition of this series, I'll flesh this out in more detail, depending on how the grinding goes.

Conclusion

Maybe if I get off my butt and start levelling Wimzig again (in between NaNoWriMo, Leyola, and raiding with Bashertin), I can provide even more information with first-hand experience at the lower levels. My plans for this series of posts regarding AoE in the new WoW will hopefully include:

- 3.0.x grinding pre-Wrath at 70
- levelling build from 28-80
- choice grinding spots, as well as commentary regarding those spots

Wimzig's Whimsy: AoE

2008-10-21T12:59:00.006-04:00

((Apologies for not posting the 3.0.x AoE guide. This is probably the next best thing, though!))

Wimzig was trapped.

He had expected himself to get into this particular situation. He peered outwards from the mine, and saw a band of kobolds setting up camp in front of the cave's entrance.

A surveying party, he thought to himself.

There were seven, maybe eight of them, from the looks of it, and to simply try to sneak through was an unwise idea for the mage. In moments, the group would start their rounds towards the mine and discover him anyways. There was no getting around the fact that he would have to face the entire group by himself.

In the heat of the moment, Wimzig formulated as precise a plan as he could. Considering his limited arsenal of spells, he re-examined the opposition one last time.

None of the kobolds were armed with ranged weapons, he noticed. If they were going to take him down, it would only be with mining picks. They weren't bright either. Wimzig assumed that they would all chase him in some uniform fashion, eschewing any form of organized pursuit.

With those facts in mind, he settled on a surefire strategy to escape.

Wimzig closed his eyes, sensing the flow of the arcane around him. He concentrated the flow to his outstretched arms, forming circular orbs at each of his palms.

With his specialty in the arts of frost magic, he concentrated on the energy that had formed, and finally imbued the orbs with deep cold. Casting his spell, the energy spread around the tiny gnome, forming a thin protective sphere, laced with ice.

This sudden burst of magic drew the attention of one kobold standing outside, who had noticed a sudden flash of light blue emanating from the nearby mine. He wandered towards the entrance in curiosity.

Wimzig immediately ran out of the mine, zipping by the one who had wandered, immediately grabbing his attention.

"Intruder!" The Kobold initially reacted and began to give chase to the gnome.

Wimzig continued to pump his stubby legs as he shortly reached the remaining group. He ran a full circle through the group, grabbing the attention of the entire band.

"You take no candle!" said one.

"You die now!" said another.

As expected, the entire camp of kobolds, including the one who had initially wandered into the mine were now pursuing the ice-laced gnome. They begun their chase with short-sighted killing intent, but was halted by an unexpected maneuver by their enemy.

Wimzig stopped in place and began to concentrate. He visualized a ring around him, and channeled the surrounding arcane energy throughout the area enclosed by the ring.

Just a bit longer, he thought.

The group of kobolds had closed on him, and began to swing their pickaxes at the gnome, but to no avail. The energy of the icy orb surrounding their target braced the impacts of their makeshift weapons.

"Harder! He die now!" said one.

"He no take candle!" said another.

A few more seconds, and the energy of the orb gave to the repeated impacts from repeated swings. But it was too late. Wimzig cast his second spell. A concentrated blast of arctic energy spread out from him, hitting each kobold. The impacts were not damaging, but managed to freeze each one in place.

Wimzig immediately stepped back in time as his initial barrier spell wore off, and began to concentrate at a spot of land approximately twenty or so yards away from him and the group. He visualized himself standing on that spot, and in an instantaneous blink, he was already there.

The kobolds remained rooted from the knees down, their close-range weapons no longer a threat to the distant gnome. They struggled in place in an attempt to break free, but failed.

Wimzig turned back to the group, and sensed the arcane energy emanating from the open environment. He mentally drew a series of leylines, and channeled the arcane energy into a circle above the group of kobolds. He channeled his spell, imbuing the arcane flow with ice once more.

A torrent formed above the hapless group of kobolds, as they began to be pelted by a violent, yet concentrated blizzard. The sheer impact of the pellets shattered their icy shackles, freeing them. Their sights still set on the source of the cold pain, they forced themselves towards the caster.

Wimzig continued to concentrate on his spell, channelling the remains of the surrounding energy into the storm. The kobolds continued walking towards him, albeit very slowly, as if hampered by the cold. By the time they had reached the mage, they were terribly damaged by the spell, and had but a tiny opportunity to have their last whacks at the gnome.

But Wimzig had anticipated their actions, and immediately cast another quick spell around him. A second short blast shot out from him to the now nearby kobolds, freezing them in place once again.

Estimating the amount of energy he had left remaining, Wimzig elected to strafe away from the group instead of using his instant travel spell. Once he had obtained adequate distance, he began to mentally form another circle above the group.

Now in a new area of the field, he redirected more arcane energy into the lines above the group of kobolds. He cast one final spell, forming another blizzard, this one more violent than before.

The storm pelted relentlessly at the kobolds, once again binded by ice. Unable to defend themselves, they were critically wounded by the miniature blizzard. Simultaneously, the eight corpses collapsed onto each other, making a neat pile.

Exhausted, Wimzig lazily walked towards the pile, taking out a long stick of wax from his pockets. Examining it once more, he concluded that the item he had held was of no value, and was not the relic that he was looking for. He tossed it onto the heap of dead kobolds.

"Fine," he muttered, "you can have your damned candle!"

What a Wild Weekend!

2008-10-20T00:00:00.000-04:00

Some crazy server population going on in US Arygos! It must have taken at least half an hour before an instance server freed up a spot for the Ironwill Mercenaries to have their slightly-pugged guild run at Magtheridon on Sunday. Makes me really look back at my slight dissatisfaction with my personal and guild raid progression.

Then Blizzard nerfed the bosses to the ground. I end up one-shotting Gruul with a pug, and we two-shot Maggys! Hooray!

But while I'm on the subject of Gruul, I must mention that the Warrior/Priest Druid tokens dropped ALL six times on Saturday. The loot gods must have taken notice, since maggy dropped the T4 Token for Hunter/Mage/Warlock. Twice.

And I lost roll. Both of them. Terrible rolls btw.

LOL. Just kidding! I love pulling yer leg, dear reader. I surely hope you forgive my jest. Maybe some sparkling teeth might swoon you back.

Shiny teeth, Tier 4 Robe included. Seriously, I've done so many Hallow's End achievements, and it's only day 3 of this holiday. I'm just a Squashling away from "the Hallowed." I'm loving this game all over again! /hug Blizzard

Come back again tomorrow, I'll be making a more thoughtful post about the state of Blizzard AoE grinding in the new patch.

Screenshot: Bashertin the Gruulkiller

2008-10-19T01:49:00.005-04:00

Gruul down! With a pug no less.

Tanked HKM with 12k HP. With a solid Frostbolt/Ice Barrier/Spellsteal rotation, I didn't take any more than 2k damage.

Maulgar Dropped not one, not two, but THREE Pauldrons of the Fallen Defender. Dammit, lol.

And to top that off, Gruul did the same thing, dropping not one, not two, but THREE Leggings of the Fallen Defender. HOT DAMN, LMAO!

Bonus Screenshot!

Broom + Hallowed Helm = AWESOME

Friday Five: Leyola's Lore

2008-10-17T11:42:00.003-04:00

I love Fridays. It means another F5 from Too Many Annas, and it means I can take a bit of an easy breather with regards to blogging and with what's going on in the World of Warcraft. Today I'm going to feature Leyola Swiftwillow, since it'll be a good exercise to think more about her character as I prepare for her story in November.

What is your character most proud of?
Leyola is proud of the accomplishments of her parents, two veteran Druids from the third war. The both of them survived and played a crucial role in the battle of Mount Hyjal. As a Druid herself, she aims to live up to the reputation of her parents.

What traits does he or she really respect in another person?
Although it may come off as superficial at times, she is fascinated by the family histories of others. Whether it be a long line of nobility, or modest traditions (such as the Wintersprug Emporium), she respects those who wish to extend and solidify their family tree (somewhat coincidental for a person who spends most of her time in the form of a tree).

Does your character have any titles, and if so, does he or she actually use them?
Leyola currently is not experienced to be able to carry a title. If she were ever awarded one, she would proudly wear it.

Is your character looking to get any recognition through the new system of achievements?
As a Druid, she is compelled to gain the utmost recognition from the Cenarion Circle and Cenarion Expedition. As a healer of the land, she wants to travel all around Azeroth, preserving and restoring every inch of the land that she desperately wants to protect.

In her travels, she was told a particular folktale of a human named Leroy who valiantly took on a room of Whelps and...well, perished. It was the wat the story was told that amused her so much, resulting in her deep empathy for this tragic hero. Hearing of such an achievement now motivates her to succeed where he has failed.

When the time comes, she'll be prepared. She even has chicken.

What’s one silly, irrelevant, or otherwise not in character achievement that you think you’ll get, even if your character would NEVER do something like that?
Leyola does not have a penchant for exotic and/or alcoholic beverages. She prefers the purity of water, but has a terrible feeling in the pits of her stomach that someone could easily influence her otherwise. A particular gnome comes to mind, but she feels her self-discipline will prove effective against the offbeat, yet calculating logic of said gnome.

3.0.2 Blizzard AoE Dummy Test - 3.3k DPS

2008-10-16T20:09:00.007-04:00

Essentially, I went to Theramore, and stood in the middle of the 6 dummies near the castle. My rotation was [Frost Nova, Blizzard, Blizzard] x 3, as to simulate an AoE grinding sequence.

See the Recount below. Note that the relevant stats are 18% crit with Molten Armor on and ~1k spell power.

50% crit rate CONFIRMED. Freaking sweet. Kings of AoE? I think so.

Went all out on Curator, but managed to discover that Ghost hit was indeed removed in this patch.

10% miss rate confirms it.

Overall, about the same damage as before; but once I hit cap, that shouldn't be such a problem.

In a way, I'm a little too lazy to gem/gear up some +Hit...Maybe I'll respec arcane for fun. Everyone's into Frost nowadays, and Larísa's gone back to her standby with fire, so maybe Arcane would be a nice chage of pace. I don't know what I'll ever do without Squirtle, being there for me almost half the time.

3.0.2 Frost First Impressions - Raid

2008-10-16T10:25:00.004-04:00

Frost spell rotations are a bit more "tricky" this time around.

It's not to say that Frost is a difficult raiding spec; while cooldown management is of utmost importance, the actual spell-casting part of Frost raiding is more demanding than before.

Brain Freeze

Brain Freeze, when procced, will give you a buff that makes your next fireball an instant cast. This buff only lasts for a limited amount of time, so you need to keep an eye on your buff timer to make sure you can throw a Fireball in your rotation.

The fireball will take up a global cooldown as normal, but because of the instant cast, you can cast it on the move. In fights that require mobility, you may want to reconsider when you want to throw your fireball. Time spent moving without casting any sort of spell will be a hamper to your DPS. This ability is a godsend for mage mobility, so use it wisely.

Fingers of Frost

When FoF procs, your next two spells will treat the target as if it were frozen. All of a sudden, Shatter becomes useful to all facets (PvP, group PvE, solo PvE) of a Frost mage's gameplay.

In PvP, Shatter was used for Shatter combos, in which an Ice Lance was cast right at the end of a Frostbolt cast, causing both spells to hit the target at approximately the same time. Due to latency, both spells would be affected by shatter, despite the intended mechanic of having the frozen effect break upon the first instance of damage.

For PvE raiding, this is the same case, since the target is considered frozen for both spells. But simply due to the fact that FoF will apply to TWO spells cast, you will want to cast two frostbolts and then Ice Lance. For reasons stated in the previous paragraph, you can have all 3 spells crit before the buff wears off. This is the ideal rotation during FoF for maximum DPS.

Due to the nature of your spell rotation, by the time you get the buff, you're already in the middle of casting another Frostbolt. At the end of that cast, it will count as the first spell of the buff. So if you notice your buff too late, you may mistake your second affected spell as your first, and waste a GCD on Ice Lance, thinking it would be affected by FoF.

Likewise, if you have both the Fingers of Frost and Brain Freeze buff at the same time, it is possible to get your Fireball to crit if it is cast within the first two spells of the FoF proc, but it will use up a spell. However, since Ice Lance does more damage anyways, it is unwise to do so. Thus, if you have both buffs up, you want to make sure that you get the Fbolt-Fbolt-ILance off first before casting your fireball.

Mobility

With FoF and BF as the new additions to a Frost mage's arsenal, it is possible to have a spell that you can cast instantly while on the move, and still keep your DPS reasonably up while on the run. However, since both abilities are proc-based, passive abilities, it requires you to remain on your toes and to pay attention to your buff status.

That isn't to say that you HAVE to wait for the proc to occur before you move. Your main priority is to move if you have to, otherwise you will belly up and die. The point I'm trying to make is that if you do have to move, or anticipate a time when you have to move, awareness of these two procs will help you keep your DPS up.

For example, in Nightbane, if Scorched Earth is up, you need to move out of it, regardless of whether or not you have a proc. However, as you move, if you notice that you have a proc up, you can cast an Ice Lance or Fireball depending on what your proc is, and do some damage while on the run.

Likewise, in Netherspite, if you are required to step into the blue beam after someone else, you can start anticipating your proc several seconds ahead of the moment when you are required to actually step in. If you manage to get that proc, it won't hurt to step in a tad early so you don't waste time moving.

Water Elemental

Fully talented, Water Elemental lasts a VERY LONG time. Because of the talent point restrictions at 70, it is difficult to put points into both Improved WE and Arcane Meditation. But even in the absence of Arcane Meditation, having a Squirtle around for essentially 50% of the time to help regenerate my mana is something of absolute beauty. This, combined with Acane Meds at 80, as well as emphasis in Spirit, as well as having both Student of the Mind and Focus Magic available in tiers leading up to the talent, Frost mages seem to look really good when it comes to both their DPM and DPS.

Ghost Hit

I'm not exactly sure if the removal of ghost hit was taken into effect this patch, or if it will go away during Lich King. Any feedback on this would definitely be appreciated.

Conclusions

I noticed that my Spell Power has gone down due to the nerf to items that used to increase specific school damage. Right now I'm using 3/3 Frozen Shadoweave as well as the Frost Damage off-hand, so my Frost Damage went down about 40-50 points due to the nerfs. However, with the new talents in place, the increase in overall DPS seems to make up for it and then some.

All in all, raiding as Frost feels "more of the same," but due to increased synergy with Shatter, the word "more" in that phrase ends up being emphasized quite substantially. Quite exciting indeed.

3.0.2 Frost First Impressions - AoE

2008-10-15T21:01:00.010-04:00

So um, blizzard can crit now.

I crit my mobs for almost 1k damage, which occurs 50% of the time btw, thanks to Frost Nova/Shattered Barrier.

Plus Fingers of Frost procs. Which procs essentially every tick of blizzard if you have enough targets in your blizzard.

Even if Fingers of Frost doesn't proc, all mobs still get winter's chill. +10% crit and you still have about half your blizzard left to channel. Assuming you don't proc FoF. Which is often btw.

Oh, have you seen these new glyphs? Like Glyph of Frost Nova, which increases the damage taken by mobs before a Nova breaks? Seems like it's good enough to keep them rooted to take TWO CRITS before breaking.

Oh, what about Glyph of Blink? Farther Blink means extra time to get hit by blizzard. More Procs. More Crits.

Unless Seed of Corruption was a lot more OP than I am led to believe, I have no problem being convinced that Mages are once again kings of AoE.

I'm critting almost 1k, but I think I already said that. And that's only with barely under 1k spell power.

Bah, realm went down. Can't get back in, stuck on loading screen. I think I'll go to bed.

...Well maybe a few more minutes. /swoon.

The Best Thing About Being Unable to Log In?

2008-10-15T10:53:00.005-04:00

Those new loading screens. Damn, I could just look at those forever.

Forsaken - Good day, good sir! Care for a toffee? Very well!

Gnome - OMG so cute, but I'm quite sure she'll rip my head off!

Human - Serious Business

Dwarf - Hooray for female dwarf love! I was starting to get sick of that hunter in the previous version.

Blood Elf - I have to remind myself that I'm not a 14-year old boy, but sometimes that just doesn't work...

Night Elf - See Blood Elf

Tauren - More or less the same, but I've never had anything against taurens, other than their tendency to punt gnomes. GNOME PUNTING IS BAD, KAY?

Draenei - I'm convinced he can cure my woes with the power of the Naaru.

Orc - If you haven't noticed, /cower has an animation in the new patch. Now is a good time to start using it.

Troll - So freaking badass. If I rolled horde, I'd have a troll.

Posting up screens when I get a chance, either via google during lunch, or when I get home.

Wimzig's Whimsy: A Different Kind of Debate (Part II)

2008-10-14T12:20:00.003-04:00

((The Canadian Election draws to a close today, and the Polls have been open since this morning. I shall uphold my civic responsibilities and vote at the Catholic school down the street from my house. Makes me wonder which party Rip and Matt are voting for, if at all.

In the spirit of politics, therefore, here is the second part of my neat little roleplay debate between Leyola Swiftwillow and Wimzig Wintersprug. Part 1 can be found here.))

Krizzlybear: Welcome back to part 2 of our debate between RP alts! We have Leyola Swiftwillow and Wimzig Wintersprug in our presence today to debate the merits of their existence in my stable of active alts. My time is limited, and I need to decide on a hierarchy of playing time between alts, especially with the looming addition of a Frost-specced Death Knight to the ranks.

Wimzig: Speaking of active alts and limited playtime, you seem to be hiding the fact that you've started another alt, Mr. Kriz.

Kriz: *chuckles nervously* Yeah. I'll admit it. I started a Paladin on US Bleeding Hollow.

Leyola: Such blasphemy! Here you are, torn between the two of us, and the only way you could decide is to just abandon us altogether? How could you!? /disgust

Kriz: I'm sorry, Leyola and Wimzig! I've just been active on another server because I am currently spending some time with Breana's guild, just to get a sense of what it's like.

Wimzig: Breana? That Dwarf chick who apparently loves guns? I have nothing against Dwarves. They're quite kind and hospitable. Believe me, I would know! I wouldn't think Ley would take kindly to Dwarves though, or any other race for that matter...

Leyola: You are mistaken, Gnome! Unlike most of the elder Night Elves, I don't harbor any feelings of mistrust to your kind or others. In my journey, I have develloped an understanding and respect for all the different races that I met.

Kriz: So the two of you are okay with the existence of a Dranei Paladin in our stable of alts?

Leyola: No. I still don't forgive you for doing that.

Wimzig: Unlikely. Religion just ain't my thing, buddy!

Kriz: Well, fret not, the two of you. Kryz, the Paladin is merely a placeholder member for Bre's guild. If things keep going along nicely, I will either put the Death Knight in there, or server transfer Leyola and Bashertin, all made possible with allowable PvE to PvP transfers.

Wimzig: I for one welcome our player-killing overlords.

Leyola: If that's what the master wants, then I won't object.

Kriz: Well, I'm glad we settled that matter. But either way, the two of you are still going to compete for playing time. Continuing our little debate, please tell the readers and I what you plan on doing for patch 3.0.

Wimzig: Have you visited Stormwind Harbor yet? My goodness, that place is an architectural wonder! I'm quite sure that there will be people there "looking for contact" who I can talk to.

Kriz: Indeed. There's potential encounters abound wherever new content is added, particularly in regards to capital cities and towns. Leyola?

Leyola: I think I will remain specialized in Restoration spells. I look forward to being able to cast Healing touch while in my Tree of Life state, amongst others. This will definitely be an exciting learning experience.

Kriz: Well, I'm looking forward to both of those things that the two of you mentioned. It certainly makes my decision even more difficult. I could always just split the time between the two of you more evenly.

Wimzig: If you analyze the situation, you can certainly conclude that there is a niche for all of us. If you want to DPS, Bashertin is your guy. If you want to heal, Leyola is the lady for the job. If you want to tank it out, Mr. Gnomish Death Knight will provide his services when the time comes. I'm always good to experience Azeroth through characterized interaction with its numerous denizens.

Leyola: That's a good point, Wimzig. You are actually quite smart for a gnome.

Kriz: Do my eyes deceive me? My toons are actually getting along?

Leyola: Well, at first, it seemed to me that Wimzig was the kind of person who wouldn't interest me. He's a little too different from me for my liking. But I suppose if given certain situations, that sentiment could disappear quickly over time.

Wimzig: As they say, Krizzlybear, opposites do attract! I learned that from observing others. If anything, Ley and I would make quite a team! We could go around solving mysteries and stuff! It would make for an awesome novel!

Kriz: omg...

Leyola & Wimzig: ...what?

Kriz: ...BEST IDEA EVER! HOLY CRAP GUYS! HOW DID I NOT THINK OF THIS BEFORE! THANK YOU SO MUCH!

*Hugs the both of them*

You know what!? Forget about playtime and stuff! You two will be just fine! BUAH HAHAHA! *runs off to plan out his NaNoWriMo*

((LOL! OMG, I just realized what I am going to do for NaNoWriMo! I'm gonna write a story that takes place in the Warcraft universe, and use the two of them as main characters! Seriously, I JUST thought of this as I wrote the post, so I'm actually super excited! I'll see y'all again soon!))

OH, SNAP!

2008-10-13T12:19:00.005-04:00

No, Larísa and Gnomer. I have did not cast invisibility and walk away from the battle over the current state of mage specs. As we all know, the pre-invisible phase is quite tricky to time if you truly want to get yourself out of a wipe situation. Even if I tried, the AoE damage from Larísa's Arcane Explosions would have certainly elminated that possibility.

Surely, at this point, however, Larisa's run out of mana due to Arcane Blast spam, and Gnomer is squeezing every last drop of his increased DPS for the past 19 or 20% of the duration of this event. What about me? Have I used all my cooldowns and arguments to warrant any consideration for Frost as the raiding spec of choice?

Simply put, yes. I have said what I needed to say to garner some semblance of support for my frosty friends.

All I have to do now is cast Cold Snap and do it all over again.

Ideally, to use Cold Snap at the very last leg of a dps race is surely an unwise tactic in making the most of your cooldowns and maximizing your DPS, but for the purposes of making a typed online argument about the merits of spec in a raiding environment, repeating arguments is not as effective as repeating damaging spell effects.

On Cold Snap Itself

Cold Snap is the 21-point talent on the Frost talent tree. It is a spell in itself, that costs ZERO mana. It finishes the cooldown on all of your Frost Spells.

Water Elemental expired (all you frosties out there made sure he used up all his mana and didn't die, right?) during a raid fight? Cold Snap, and summon him again.

The Shaman in your group cast Heroism? prolong your Icy Veins with Cold Snap, and proceed with your utterly stupid 1.6-second Frostbolts for up to 40 seconds.

Did Moroes/Maiden/Illhoof just Garrote/Holy Fire/Demon Chain you for the second time? Cold Snap your Ice Block, and block your way out of another duration of considerable damage, saving your healers some critical mana.

AoE grinding on a bunch of mobs, and your Frost Nova got randomly (Damn that 1%!) resisted by one of them? Cold Snap, and root everyone again, thus saving your AoE pull.

Taking a little too much DoT damage from the boss fight? Cold Snap your Ice Barrier, and put up another bubble immediately after the first one fades, and save your priests even more mana worth of healing!

Just to top everything off, Cold snap does NOT use a global cooldown. Simply beautiful. And to think that at one point, this was merely an 11-point talent. And when it got moved, its talent spot was replaced with the remarkable Icy Veins.

The downside? A pretty long cooldown, at 8 minutes untalented. With 2 points in Ice Floes, however, you will be seeing your Cold Snap ready in just 6 minutes and 24 seconds.

On Cooldown Management

With all these neat tools that Frost Mages are given, proper management of their cooldowns is the make-or-break factor that determines the amount of damage that particular mage can put out.

When it comes to Cold Snap, the dilemma comes where the mage has to decide WHEN to use it during a boss fight. Simply put, to maximize a Frost mage's DPS, one needs to cold snap as early and as opportune as possible, but at the same time, use the spell to remove as many cooldowns as possible, to maximize the effect.

On trash, use Cold Snap liberally. Snap back your Squirtle and your Icy Veins. On AoE pulls, Snap back your Frost Nova and Ice Barrier if you generate the most threat in the group. Use it at every opportunity, and your control over others, as well as the capability for dealing damage, will effectively double.

On Boss fights, the mage needs to really study the fight to determine when to use cooldowns and when to Snap back those cooldowns. Keeping in mind the duration of a particular fight, it is ideal to use up your Cold Snap as SOON as possible, since there may be an opportunity to use it again towards the end of the Fight. Consdering that the cooldown for other spells are shorter than Cold Snap itself, you can potentially summon your Water Elemental up to 4 times in a fight. Simply absurd.

Conclusions

While the Water Elemental is the penultimate damage dealing spell in a Frost Mage's arsenal, it's Cold Snap that serves as the heart of a cryomancer's reportoire. With the arrival of the upcoming patch, Frosties will be getting another cooldown in Deep Freeze, just another in a long line of potential cooldown spells that Frost Mages will be getting. With every new spell added to the school of icy wrath, proper judgment in the use of Cold Snap becomes increasingly paramount, meaning that this spell is certainly here to stay.

BONUS! Pimp My Frost Mage for 3.0

Frost is a wonderful tree with multiple tools and talents that can be picked-and-chosen by players based on their playstyle needs. But with only 61 points to spend on a tree designed for 70-point use, one cannot simply have it all, perhaps until 80. So rather than go the Euripides route and go through all the talents and evaluate them on a PvP/PvE/etc basis, I'll just list suggest talents for the different playstyles.

PvP: You want control and survivability. You want to maximize the use of stuns, roots, and snares, while at the same time have a security blanket with defensive cooldowns and passive abilities. Top it off with some freaky-ass burst damage via Shatter Combos. Just be aware that you cannot spec both Improved Counterspell and Deep Freeze due to the talent cap. Both have their benefits, so it all depends on preference.

Useful talents include Frostbite, Ice Shards, Permafrost, Shatter, Improved Cone of Cold, Ice Barrier, Shattered Barrier, Arctic Winds, Summon Water Elemental, Chilled to the Bone, and Deep Freeze.

Solo: You want control and survivability as well, but make better use of Frostbolts and your AoE spells. While the casting cost of your different spell ranks have been unified, it does not negate the effectiveness of your 1.5s rank 1 Frostbolts when kiting much higher level mobs. You also care about reducing downtime, since Frost is a very mana-efficient school compared to the other two specs.

Useful talents include Improved/Empowered Frostbolt, Ice Shards, Shatter, Permafrost, Arctic Winds, Summon Water Elemental, and Chilled to the Bone.

AoE Grinding: Your spell sequence consists of Ice Barrier, Frost Nova, then a repeated sequence of Blink, Blizzard, Blizzard, Cone of Cold and Frost Nova until the large group of mobs dies. Your talents prioritize on minimizing the resist on your Frost Nova (via Hit Capping), reduced cooldowns of your Frost Nova and Ice Barrier, and increased snare effects on your Blizzard and Cone of Cold Spells.

Useful talents include Ice Floes, Elemental Precision, Permafrost, Improved Blizzard, Arctic Reach, Frost Channeling, Cold Snap, Improved Cone of Cold, Shattered Barrier and Chilled to the Bone.

Group: You will take up the DPS role in your group. Depending on the nature of the instance, you may or may not be responsible for some encounters that require Solo skills (such as handling adds or AoE pulls). Assuming single target DPS, your main talent priority is placed on maximizing your DPS via cooldowns and procs, while minimizing your threat on the target.

Useful talents include Improved/Empowered Frostbolt, Ice Shards, Shatter, Elemental Precision, Icy Veins, Cold Snap, Frost Channeling, Arcitc Reach, Summon/Improved Water Elemental, Winter's Chill, Fingers of Frost, Chilled to the Bone and Brain Freeze.

Here's a spec that I will be using in the upcoming patch. It is essentially a 0/0/61 build with Shattered Barrier. This talent simply does not get enough credit. It makes you a god of AoE grinding, as well as AoE trash pulls in raids, such as the beginning of ZA, or the dining room pulls in Kara.

Well, that's it for my Monday post. It's supposed to be my day off work to prepare for 3.0, but I'm still at a relative's house, and relatively hungover. Whatever. I'll be getting into the nitty gritty of the new patch tomorrow night, so I look forward to posting my impressions, particularly with regards to AoE grinding. Because well, Shattered Barrier is THAT awesome.

I'm just waiting for the patch to come, so I can fire off a salvo to begin the second battle between mages.

So it was inevitable

2008-10-13T00:00:00.003-04:00

yeah, it was inevitable that I would end up getting smashed at someone's house during the Canadian Long Weekend (HAPPY TURKEY DAY MY FELLOW CANUCKS!) But it was another thing that I ended up with access to someone's computer and take advantage of internet access to post something meaningless and random.

But no. That's not living up to the responsibility of a blogger who actually has a readership. A small readership, but a readership no less. Did I ever tell you guys that I love you guys?

So um, staying on topic with the nature of my blog posts, let's talk about 3.0. You know, that thing that's coming up on Tuesday, but I'm going to be at work to miss most of the download. I'll leave for work in the morning, turning on the computer and leaving it on for the background downloader to do its thang, but at work, I'm just going to be all "OMG I NEED TO GET HOME AND SPEC!"

So here are a few things that I'm looking forward to in 3.0, and Wrath in general.

Fingers of Frost. Free fireballs are pretty neat. And it's not like they're going to be totally gimped. With the merging of all sorts of damage and healing stats into a universal Spellpower stat, my Frozen Shadoweave set will definitely be gimped, but at the benefit of making all my other non-frost spells that much better.

Student of the Mind. Supposedly, Spirit is the new Stamina. Either your mana regeneration is going to go wayyy up, or your spell damage is going to take a considerable increase. But in a tree with Arcane Meditation, I find it VERY convenient that this talent goes right before the tier with AM.

Feck. Some guy is kicking me off. Part 2 on Monday, followed up with my Frost answer to Gnomer and Larisa's final thoughts on the big bad battle of the Mages!

I apologize for my conduct.

True Story

2008-10-10T13:01:00.003-04:00

I called this girl Wednesday. She's a very cool person, who I haven't seen in a long time. We've been chatting it up a lot on msn and on the phone lately, but it never reached that point where I could ask her out to coffee or whatever, until a few days ago. Here's how the conversation went, approximately:

"So um, I was wondering if you were available anytime soon. I would love to go out with you sometime. For coffee/drinks/whatnot."

"Sure. When are you free?"

"I'm free anytime after work. What's a good day for you?"

"How about this Friday?"

"Oh. Well, I'm actually a bit busy. I have a podcast recording that I happen to be a part of. It's at night, but I still need to set up the computer for it."

"Aww, too bad. Well, I've got midterms afterwards, so let's put it off for two weeks for now then."

"Alright."

I felt like a total nerd afterwards. It's not really a date or anything, but this is as far as many dorky guys go with regards to interacting with females, and I put it off for two weeks because I had a "podcast" to record. TOTAL DORK, ANYONE?

/strikeout

The squeaky little sneak that I am, I managed to "persuade" Bre and Fim to squeeze me in on the live recording of their upcoming blogcast, which happens tonight at 12:30am EST. I appear out of the shadows somehow for this episode. I suppose there's a little bit of Rogue in me. I anticipate a great show, even if I end up d/c'ing multiple times.

You can catch the live show on the TNB Ustream show, use the password tnb73 to get in. Check out the official announcement at the twisted nether website for further details.

Cute girls come and go, but blogcasting is serious business.

Friday Five: Not Exactly Ideal for Living Arrangements

2008-10-10T11:22:00.005-04:00

Cop-out Friday Five response! Anna has her F5 up, so here's my response for both Wimzig Wintersprug and Leyola Swiftwillow.

1. What does your character’s living room look like? (If they don’t have a stable home, describe an inn room that he or she has rented steadily.)

Wimzig is constantly travelling from place to place in search for customers. After a long day of business, he unwinds at the nearest inn. Recently, he has been seen in the Thunderbrew Distillery, in Kharanos. Unfortunately, it was Brewfest at the time, so he can't exactly remember what the room looked like.

As a druid, the great outdoors is a natural home for Leyola. Despite recently re-rediscovering her more animalistic talents, She's always trying to restore the beauty of nature. The last place that she has rented out recently was a wooded area east of Everlook, in Winterspring. The foliage of the evergreen, contrasting to the blanche of snow, is an appealing and homely sight to Leyola.

2. Does your character have any pets?

Wimzig keeps a prairie chicken as a companion. The chicken's name is Doug, and is often subject to Wimzig's various antics. Most notably, he was vomitted on during Brewfest, a memory that Doug does not want to keep for too long. Why he remains faithful to Wimzig is a mystery. Most likely, it's because of the prospect of more feed from the vendor from Saldean's farm; it's the reason he joined, and likely the reason he'll stay.

Leyola does not keep any pets, but tends to the various critters that she meets on her journeys. She would never harm a living thing, unless it didn't belong to the order and balance of nature.

3. Does your character collect anything? Is that collection of any value to anyone other than them?

An avid hydrophile, Wimzig obsesses over the quality of water in the places he visits. He likes to keep samples of the local water in tiny vials that he keeps in his pockets, for the purposes of examining later on with his self-created Hydromatic Qualitificationator.

Leyola has a fondness of seeds. Many species of seeds make for valuable reagents for her druid spells, so this hobby tends to save her the trouble of going into town to buy said reagents from vendors.

4. Does he or she have any “side” jobs or professions, other than their class and/or talent professions?

Wimzig's main non-class/profession job is water vendoring, but he has a few side interests that generate periodic spurts of income. Namely, his hydromatic qualitificationator finds a few tainted samples originating from the inns he visits. A frank discussion with the inkeeper regarding threats to report said inn to the Azerothean Health Ministry often results in a free stay for a night or two. In a way, Wimzig's exploits make him notorious to inns as a maverick health inspector.

Other than her two main professions, Skinning and Mining, Leyola has no other jobs. Her income is steady enough that she can afford to focus on her task at hand as a restoration druid.

5. What would you find in his or her sofa cushions?

Wimzig is always travelling, so the various sofas in inns he visits will vary in sub-cushion content.

Leyola is at home with nature, so sofas are not a part of her furnishings.

I'm Not Going to Lie to You...

2008-10-09T13:30:00.000-04:00

From the start of November all the way up to the release of Wrath, most of what you're going to be hearing from me is Frostsaber rep and NaNoWriMo. But is that really a bad thing? I think not. Both have a few things in common.

1. A hellacious, nightmarish grind.

Going from neutral to exalted is 42,000 reputation points. The goal of Nanowrimo is to grind out 50,000 words worth of a novel/novella. No matter how you look at it, that's a lot to cover. Considering that both the time before wrath hits and Nanowrimo are approximately 30-ish days in duration, that's 1400 reputation points a day, and about 1667 words. Not to bad, but once you realize that you have to sustain that pace for thirty days, it gets pretty bleargh.

2. Both are perfectly bloggable.

It's only been day two of my Wintersabering exploits, and it feels a bit faster than say, doing SSO dailies, since the rep gain comes in with turn-ins that don't count towards the daily limit. So instead of a giant surge in rep gain at the end of a day, it's a steady stream of rep that can stop and start at a whim, allowing me to blog about whatever is on my mind.

Coincidentally, one tends to think about a lot of things when going through repeated motions.

With regards to the writing project, just by reaction alone, as well as the small subset of bloggers participating in said project, I believe that it is perfectly understandable to be able to post snippets of what I'm writing in my off-wow time. Besides, it's good writing practice, and it should help me improve as a blogger as a result.

About That Novel

I still haven't settled on an idea for what I want to write, since there are a few things that are contributing factors towards what I want to write:

Firstly, the allowance of writing derivative works means that I could spend the month writing fanfiction. This may seem like the easy way out, since I write about what I know and particularly like, but that's something that I'd do anyways.

Secondly, the (extremely) thin chance of finding representation for publication of works done during NaNoWriMo is an intriguing inspiration to write and see how far I can go as a writer. For me, I understand my skills as a novelist; bad at usage of literary devices, but a good command for continuity, and extremely creative/experimental storytelling. If I am capable of improving my weaknesses (simply by reading and writing more), then I'm sure that one of my stories could be interesting or intriguing enough for someone out there to take a chance.

Thirdly, my attraction to both roleplay and fanfiction has combined into this blurred where a lot of my post ideas regarding my RP characters, particularly Wimzig Wintersprug (and Leyola Swiftwillow especially, since she is not on an RP server) has shifted into this sort of stab-in-the-dark-like quality of a post, that feels like fanfiction of a character that I play, often based on RP encounters that occur in-game. It's a strange thing, but to actually use one of these two characters in my november novel is not actually a bad idea at all, especially considering the first point that I made about fanfiction in the first place.

So where does that leave me in regards to a general idea of the noval that I am about to write in a few weeks? I mentioned the following ideas on the wow blogger Nano group:

- a video gaming champion's rise to fame, mostly narrated through the meta-ficticious games that he plays.
- a big bank heist, narrated multiple times from differing character's viewpoints.
- a murder-mystery in a fantasy setting (think LotR meets CSI)
- the fall of gnomeregan

It's a somewhat varied list, but the bad part is that there's more going on my head plot-wise with other ideas that are just as, if not more, enticing to write about. ARGH. Just watch, the day I actually settle on an idea is the day that I get stuck on how to go about writing it. It always happens.

Such is the life of a writer.

Random Thoughts While Grinding Wintersaber Rep

There's only one NPC present on Frostsaber rock, but the faction name is "Wintersaber Trainers." Where are the other trainers? Does his pet count as another member? If so, does that mean that this pet teaches other pets as well?

I really ought to switch to skinning. All these guys going down fast makes me feel bad about wasted hides.

Winterspring is just beautiful. I can only imagine what Northrend will bring. A cryophile's wet dream, for sure.

If I ever level a hunter past 60, those chimaeras would make pretty neat pets.

I switched back to 0/0/61. Despite Arcane Meditation, I'm still getting some intense damage per mana. Instead of passive regen, I'm getting shatter combos like nobody's business. With the reduced aggro radius, I can stand a few feet away from my target, Nova, then shatter combo for a one-shot kill. The distance between mobs also helps with mana regeneration.

Some Choice Words

2008-10-08T00:00:00.001-04:00

1. Wordle

As in, I has it!

2. Lunacy

Not the Darkmoon deck. But the type that you are. I've joined Bre and the others in the absolutely nutso writing thing. I haven't written fanfiction in a VERY long while, so this is another opportunity to get back into writing, original fiction or fanfiction, or otherwise.

3. Frost

Something was missing in my quest to become totally epic frost. And I just realized that I'm missing myself a Winterspring Frostsaber. Yep. From now until the expansion, I will be grinding Frostsaber rep, so I can get into Northrend with style. Forget about the Champion of the Naaru or the Zul'Aman Bear Mount. You just can't spell frostsaber without "frost."

4. Roundtable

Well, technically it's supposed to be round table, but I wanted to continue the theme with headings of only one word. And well, if I used one of the two words, it just wouldn't make any sense. So um, yeah. I'll figure it out, how to invite my uninvited self into next week's roundtable blogcast. We'll see. We'll see.

Exercises in Creative Design: The Storm

2008-10-07T13:01:00.004-04:00

Today, I have 30 minutes to write about any topic that comes to mind at the moment. This "exercise" actually comes from Matticus' post over at the twisted nether blogcast (I apologize for the lack of link love, but to actually click my way over there would simply eat into my thirty minutes, which by now actually twenty-seven)

Anna over at Too Many Annas (I actually remember this address, so I linked it. So sue me for being inconsistent!) had a nifty little challenge while she was gone running away from one of the many hurricanes that ravaged the southern area of the US. Make a T6-equivalent raid encounter involving the use of a Hurricane.

Beautiful. For some reason I'm good to go on this one. I should have done this sooner, but oh well. Better late than never. Speaking of which, how much time do I have left? twenty-five minutes. Ok. Sounds alright. Let's get this started!

Raid Instance: The Hurricane

A hurricane is fast approaching the western shores of Kalimdor! A council of elders from the Cenarion Circle felt disturbances coming from the Hurricane, suggesting that the cause of the storm is not natural. It is up to you and 9 friends to investigate!

Upon accepting the initial quest from a Druid NPC in moonglade, he will give you a trinket that has special powers. The first time you use it, you to turn into a Druid's flight form. Using it will allow you to fly directly up into the air, where the isntance portal lies.

After passing through the instance portal, your party appears in flight form in the middle of the great sea. A bird spirit appears in front of you, asking the party to follow him. After a short flight, you arrive at a giant rock sticking out of the water, with enough standing space for a raid group to run around in.

"Stay here. The storm approaches!" The spirit says, then disappears.

The storm approaches, you brace for impact. The fight begins!

Raid Boss: Storm King Nolorkam

Well, what'ya know. It's another darn troll that's gone nuts-o. He rides a Dragonhawk, wielding voodoo powers that are the cause of the storm. Debris flies around everywhere, so watch your step!

For the first thirty seconds of the fight, flying Debris randomly hits 2 of your party members for 4k damage each second.

PHASE 1

Storm Lord Nolorkam appears. He's pretty pissed, so he lands on your rock and starts wailing at the party.

His melee swings hit for an arbitrarily large amount of damage. Main tank needs to be healed by a dedicated healer, while the second and/or third healers look after the raid.

Debris continues to hit party members, but only for 2k damage each second.

Continue tank and spank until he switches phases. If DPS isn't fast enough, he switches to...

AERIAL PHASE

SLN lifts up and flies into the air, summoning violent winds. The party has to use their flight form trinket to fly around and dodge debris that soars around during this phase. Members that get hit by debris get blasted for 6k damage. Lasts for forty-five seconds, then returns to his regular phase on the ground.

PHASE 2

At 66%, storm Lord gains a buff that grants him immunity from ranged damage, and will start casting thunderbolts at random people for 3k damage. He also summons dragonhawks that appear in small numbers. Ranged DPS needs to damage these dragonhawks. When they are sufficiently damaged, they will fall to the ground, and become mountable. Right-click the birds to be able to fly into the air. Those who are in flight can use their trinkets to cast thunderbolts at the boss for considerable damage.

DPS him quickly, or else he'll go into aerial phase.

PHASE 3

At 33%, Storm Lord Nolorkam performs a voodoo self-sacrifice, and transfers his essence to the storm. His form is now immune to all damage, but his health diminishes over time and no longer attacks raid members. At this point, random debris hits for even more, and dragonhawks are summoned by the swarmful. Most are non-elites, but the larger ones are elite, and need to be picked up by the tank and offtank. They hit for considerable damage. In this phase, he stops switching to Aerial Phase

PHASE 4

At 5%, SLN is desperate and has his last stand against your raid party. The storm dies down, but he enrages and hits for a BUTTLOAD of damage. All healers need to overheal the tank to keep him alive. DPS him down for the last 5% to kill him.

Conclusion

That exercise ended up taking 40 minutes because of a very delicious office lunch potluck. Oh well.

Frost Mage Tears Make Delicous Popsicles

2008-10-06T14:50:00.001-04:00

A wise Frost mage once told me, "When life hands you lemons, summon lemonade elementals."

Ok, well, I thought of that saying, and right now, I'm in the mood to change my blog description to that very saying. This is a Frost mage blog first and foremost, with stuff on Frost death knights soon to come when the expansion hits. So while we wait for those good ol' DK's to arrive at my doorstep, I only have things to say about the Frost mage class.

I love my class. I love everything about them. I love the spec even more. The sheer control over your enemies. The cold heartedness of your temperment when staring down against another enemy in player versus player combat. The companionship of your own summoned elemental. Just don't target the wrong monster in kara when sending him out to attack, like I did a few weeks ago.

I love the state of the frost mage as it is now, and how it look to be when the expansion hits.

But when I see another mage dislike things about his or her class, it kills me inside. My heart simply goes out to them, because as soon as their feelings are made public, the whole world screams "QQ MORE, WHINY ASS MAGE!"

I feel bad for Christian Belt. He's a fantastic writer, and the contributions that he has made to WI are surely important. His passion for the game and for mages is surreal, and I only hope to emulate it. But because of his status as a mainstream-equivalent mage blogger, he's prone to criticism, and this post is no different.

To summarize a recent post he made regarding the state of the 51-point talent, Deep Freeze, he states that the talent is simply useless and broken, and the dev team at Blizzard need to do something to bring it back to respectability. Well, it was something like that. Let me highlight a few points that he has made, and discuss from a cryophile's viewpoint and make opinions on the subject.

"Let me preface this by saying that if you are one of the many who label anything written by a Mage that isn't full of sunshine and candy canes as complaining, crying, or QQ, you may want to just stop reading right now. Thanks for coming, post your "UR TEARZ R DELICIOUS" nonsense in the comments section, and then go back to tea-bagging your kills on Halo or whatever. This column is not for you."

This is a valid preface and warning to those who like to make stereotypes of QQ'ing mages everywhere. The thing that irks me is that the way it was written only encourages said trolls to continue reading and further justify said stereotype. Remember that bully in elementary school that always made fun of your braces? He only did it because you were self-conscious of your braces. He knew you'd cry about it, so he'd keep doing it for kicks. Christian, never do this again, or else you're just asking for it.

"In PvE, though, Deep Freeze is no longer even worth spending points on. It affords no tangible DPS increase, isn't usable on bosses at all due to stun-immunities, and even if it was, wouldn't be worth the mana cost and global cooldown simply to apply an extra five seconds of frozen status."

Simply correct. As of the current beta build, Deep Freeze does not have any damage component, thus rendering it useless. But, Deep Freeze was never even worth using in spell rotations. The author was under the assumption that the Fingers of Frost proc applied to spells cast within a certain time limit, hence utilizing Deep Freeze's instant cast over the inferior Ice Lance. But now that FoF creates charges that are spent when casting the next two spells, fitting in frostbolts for the two charges means that Deep Freeze wouldn't be used anyways!

Does the absence of DF in rotations mean that Frost mages or no longer PvE viable? Not exactly. From day one, this looked to me like a PvP talent to the bone, and it only makes sense that the PvP class gets another PvP tool. I'm not an expert on PvP, but an instant cast spell that causes a stun seems pretty neat, even if it does have the requirement of having the target frozen first.

Talent-wise, this only means I get to spend this point on something more worthwhile, maybe in another tree. Investing all the way to Focus Magic becomes much easier to do, but the buzz in the mage beta community seem to suggest that FM isn't as great as it looks. Either way, it's miles better than DF, and the clearcasting talent that you get along the way is a reliable way to save mana in the new cost-heavy environment.

"At the heart of the issue is Blizzard's design philosophy for 51 point talents. Looking at the 51 point talents for other classes, they share a common theme. For healing specs, they increase healing by substantial amounts. For DPS and tanking specs, they almost universally increase damage output."

In simplicity, isn't that actually a no-brainer? Spells are meant to provide damage/helaing or have some sort of utility. But again, Christian is under the assumption that there is a precise correlation between talent tier and raid/pvp performance enhancement. But looking at talent trees as a whole across the different classes, a lot of specs have their most important 1-point talents in the 31 and 41 point tiers, the ones that really define their role in a PvE or PvP setting. (note: When I mention PvE, I also mean both 5-man as well as raid instances)

At 31 points, there's Moonkin Form, Trueshot Aura, Shadowform, Soul Link (PvP), Leader of the Pack and a few others. At 41 points, there's Circle of Healing, Avenger's Shield, Vampiric Touch, Shadowstep (PvP), Tree of Life, Mortal Strike (PvP), and most relevant of all, Water Elemental.

I am of the opinion that Water Elemental is the most important source of a Frost Mage's damage in PvE, and is a significant presence in PvP as well. Proper Squirtle management is what seperates the pros from the scrubs in both sides, and with the Improved Water Elemental talent, this line of thought is even more convincing.

With the existence of such talents, I am also convinced that Blizzard's design philosophy regarding talent trees have not changed since vanilla. For each release of the game (normal, BC, and LK), Blizzard's revision of the talent tree emphasizes a definitive talent for a particular school, and in subsequent installments of the game, that particular talent is fleshed out even more, further defining the class around that talent. Case in point, for BC, Blizzard added Improved Leader of the Pack for the Feral tree, while Improved Moonkin Form in Lich King adds a increased haste effect to its critical strike effect.

"The essential question when judging a 51 point talent should be: is it worth spending the 51 points necessary to get here? You tell me, Frost Mages. Is it? Though I am not a Frost Mage, I know what my answer would be."

As stated above, it's definitely not worth taking in a PvE spec. But I don't look at it as a "waste of a talent point," since I'll spend that point in another area anyways. It's not like Frost Mages were given 70 points compared to everyone else's 71, which is the impression that I got from reading the article.

Knowing that Mr. Belt is an arcane mage, the same could be said about Slow in Burning Crusade. It was a no-brainer that the talent wasn't worth taking in PvE, but Arcane Mages coped with using other spells in their rotation, and they competed with the other mages, thanks to their amazing 2-piece Tier 6 bonus.

"There is a comparable spell out there called Hammer of Justice. Like Deep Freeze, it is an instant-cast short-duration stun. Deep Freeze has a longer range, but Hammer of Justice can be used on any target, regardless of status. Deep Freeze's cooldown can be talented down to 24 seconds, Hammer of Justice can be talented to 30 seconds. Hammer of Justice stuns for 6 seconds, Deep Freeze stuns for 5. Deep Freeze applies frozen status to the target (assuming the target was already frozen), but Hammer of Justice does not. Deep Freeze is a 51 point Mage talent, available at level 60. Even at its highest rank, Hammer of Justice costs 3% of base mana, while Deep Freeze costs 9%.

Hammer of Justice is a Paladin spell, trainable at level 8.

To me, that says all that needs to be said about Deep Freeze's comparative value. Is it worth 51 points and 60 levels of experience to get? All things being equal, it appears to be worth 8 levels, no talent points, and about 90 copper."

Christian is not mentioning the design philosophy that Blizzard implements with each class. Regarding spells, gear, and talents, they try to quantitize balance between classes using a points system. There exists an value selected by blizzard to represent the strength of a talent or spell. Ultimately, each class should be balanced with regards to the total value of these supposed balance points.

And it holds true with the design of Hammer of Justice. A paladin spell that provides such awesome control is balanced to the many spells in a Frost Mage's arsenal simply by virtue of the fact that HoJ is only one spell, and Frost Mages have plenty of spells that contribute to control.

"Comparitive value" cannot be made based on a spell-by-spell comparison, since the context of the class in which those spells are used needs to be evaluated as well.

"First--and probably easiest--solution? Put the damage back. Fixed."

It's the easiest value to fix for sure, but only time will tell if Blizzard will implement it. After all, numbers are the easiest things to adjust for class balancing purposes. If this spell gets "fixed" at all, a damage component is the most likely means for that to happen.

"Make the spell allow the caster to turn into a cheetah, run behind a pillar, apply an instant cast HoT effect, then sit down to drink.

Ok, so I was kidding about the last one. Sort of."

It's lines like these that keep me coming back to Christian's column. You sir, despite my criticisms, are full of win.

But I don't know. Up until this point, his points have been all arguable, yet valid. Had this been any other class, you could even say it was an effective piece capable of starting debates regarding the state of this class in beta.

But afterwards, for a length that almost exceeds the content discussed above, he went on to plead to a hypothetical blizzard employee to fix the spell. Not any employee, mind you. An employee who was supposedly the exception, and was well aware of the supposed gripes of the mage community.

Certainly, if the trolls have not been lured out, they certainly have now. All of a sudden I was reminded of preschool, with the bullies playing keep away with the loner kid's lunchables. Damn, as much as I miss lunchables right now, I don't think that rant was warranted.

As much as he did warn that there was going to be some form of expressing complaints regarding this spell (necessary, valid), he perpetuated the stereotype of the QQ'ing mage (not necessary, unwarranted).

So as a result, we are left with a post that, with all of its potential of sparking debate about a valid issue, it spurned a debate of the nature of the post itself. Instead of discussing the merits of a 51 point talent that may or may not even be intended, or hell, even has already been fixed for the upcoming beta build, it has grown this unattractive aura that would turn away developers (who probably do turn to columns like these, as well as blogs on the web, just secretly).

We as mages can only learn from this. We must do what we can to not perpetuate the stereotype of the QQ'ing mage, but at the same time not be affected by this stereotyping, as Christian unfortunately shows in this post. It's a delicate balance that must be kept, but for what it's worth, we need to be grateful for what Blizzard has given us. Forget the 51 point talent. It's the 41-point talent that really counts, and I can't really thank Blizzard enough.

Wimzig's Whimsy: A Different Kind of Debate (Part I)

2008-10-03T15:22:00.001-04:00

Krizzlybear: Welcome, kind readers, to a special edition of WW. Firstly, I would like to present to you conundrum that I have faced in my WoW gaming career.

Lately, I've been doing a lot of work on Bashertin, my main, but have distributed playing time between Leyola and Wimzig as my alts. With an expansion coming around the corner, a Death Knight is expected to join the ranks as co-main, leaving very little playtime to be distributed between the remaining two.

As such, in the spirit of yesterday's US vice presidential debate, I have summoned the presence of both Wimzig Wintersprug and Leyola Swiftwillow to debate the merits of being the third wheel in the upcoming expansion. I will be acting as the moderator. Without further ado, let's bring out the participants, shall we?

*Enter Leyola and Wimzig, audience applause*

Krizzlybear: Greetings Leyola and Wimzig. To be blunt, this is going to be a debate for more playtime in the upcoming expansion, Wrath of the Lich King. I will be asking questions to the both of you, and you will be given only a paragraph or so to make your point. At that time, the other individual will be given the opportunity for a rebuttal. Are the rules understood?

Leyola: Yes.

Wimzig: Indeed!

Kriz: Excellent. I have flipped a coin prior to the start of this event, and Leyola will be answering first. Let's begin.

*applause*

Kriz: The first question is very straightforward. Please introduce yourself to the audience with a brief character history, in-game or otherwise. Leyola, you first.

Leyola: Thank you, Kriz. I would like to first state that it is an honor to be a part of your blog, despite not being a mage myself. My name is Leyola Swiftwillow, and I was born around 300 years ago in the forests of Ashenvale. My parents fought in the battle of Mount Hyjal, and now live as retired veterans of the third war. Thanks to their respected position, I was allowed permission to learn the arts of druidism in Teldrassil, and have developed a penchant for the restorative powers of nature. I am in my 52nd season.

Kriz: Thank you Leyola. Wimzig?

Wimzig: Very well! My name is Wimzig Wintersprug. I am a water vendor from Ironforge. Originally from the underground city of Gnomeregan, I inherited my family's business. Then the troggs came. The folks and I escaped unharmed, but our legendary business has been reduced to nothing. Thus, I have decided to take the shop on the road, and taken up cryomancy to complement my hydration services as well as protect me on my travels. So far, it has been 17 seasons since I last left Ironforge.

Kriz: Thank you for the responses. The two of you are indeed interesting figures. Following up that question, what have the two of you been up to recently? Wimzig, let's start with you.

Wimzig: Well, um...*laughs*...to be precisely honest, I don't actually remember much. Supposedly I was recruited to help the Westfall militia deal with the defias threat, but those efforts were halted indefinitely by none other than brewfest.

Lots of drinking to be had, I'm quite sure of that! Not great for business, I presume.

Leyola: Some of the elders of the Cenarion Circle have felt strange omens originating from a distant land. They are convinced that a shadow looms over Azeroth, threatening to wipe out that which we have worked so hard to create.

I have volunteered to work with the other alliance journeymen as they venture into the depths of dungeons such as the Sunken Temple of Atal'hakkar and the depths of Blackrock Spire, in an attempt to bolster the spirits of those who are prospected to be a part of a future effort against this threat.

Kriz: Very well, Leyola. Speaking of looming threat, have either of you heard about these individuals known as Death Knights?

Wimzig: Of course! Word from the Thunderbrew distillery says that there exists a group of people who were dominated by their own lust for power, resultingly losing their very freedom.

A tragic story, indeed, but within lies a very intriguing power. Some of which resonate with my own.

Kriz: You mean, frost.

Wimzig: Bingo!

Leyola: I object to Mr. Wintersprug's statement, Kriz.

Kriz: Why so?

Leyola: Because, the individuals that Wimzig speaks of are a force of death, one that threatens all that is filled with life!

Wimzig: A redundant statement, quite frankly.

Kriz: Now now. Let's have some order here. Leyola, please. Now is your opportunity for a rebuttal.

Leyola: Certainly. Wimzig is grossly misinformed. The information that he relies on come from an unreliable source. Rumor? from a bar? Not exactly reliable information.

According to the Cenarion Circle, these individuals are known as Death Knights, and from their experiences in the Third War, they wrought disease and death to everything they touched, and soiled the ground they have walked on.

Kriz: I understand your concern, Leyola. But as the moderator, it is my duty to inform the both of you that a Death Knight will soon be a part of Krizzlybear's WoW team.

*audience gasps, applauds*

Kriz: Yes. Death Knights will be joining the ranks of the Alliance. Regardless of your opinion of them, you will have to cope with coexistence. How do the two of you plan on doing so, if at all? Wimzig, you first.

Wimzig: Well, apparently, these people are extremely seasoned warriors. I suppose I have no alternative but to go with the flow, depending on how the situation goes.

I estimate a 98 percent chance that this new recruit is going to specialize in frost. If that is the case, I for one welcome our icy overlords!

*audience laughs*

Kriz: That could mean the beginning of a frosty friendship. Leyola, your thoughts?

Leyola: If they are a part of the solution, then they won't be a problem. But the fact remains that they are destructive to the earth. It is my duty then to nurture that which they don't mean to destroy, even if it means healing Death Knights themselves.

At the very least, they will become powerful allies who are capable of protecting others from harm. It is then my duty to mend their wounds, if they feel pain at all...

Kriz: Miss Swiftwillow, you certainly live up to your name, quick to bend and adapt to your surroundings, regardless of their nature.

Leyola: All in good nature, my friend.

Kriz: Okay then. Let's shift the perspective away from Azeroth, and a little bit beyond the game itself. I write a blog, and so far, I have settled myself within a wonderful community in the internether. What dynamic do you feel you bring to my blog? Leyola, you're first.

Leyola: I certainly haven't had the same exposure on your "blog" as my opponent, but I feel that I can bring a different perspective to your content. Considering that you are a mage specialist, my opponent does not bring anything new to the table, since your main member, Bashertin, is the source of your knowledge as a Frost Mage.

Now, my opponent also promised that he would provide a unique take on slaying multiple enemies, but he himself has yet to fulfil that promise! He is not even seasoned enough to have the tools to successfully carry out his plan.

Kriz: Wimzig, your rebuttal?

Wimzig: We don't need more information about druids on the internether. That is all I have to say about that.

Now, I on the other hand, have much more experience as the focus of the moderator's blogging content, providing a fresh take on a class he knows and loves. To simply chronicle my adventures in Azeroth, particularly with other aspiring individuals such as myself, is an attractive premise to a good portion of the moderator's readership. My opponent isn't experienced enough to do what I do.

Kriz: Seems like the debate has just started to heat up. Now is a good time to have our intermission. We will return with part II of the debate, where we will discuss issues such as the economy, foreign relations (death knights) in greater depth.

Screenshot: Hex Lord Malacrass...

2008-10-02T00:42:00.003-04:00

...didn't go too well. Pretty good for a PUG to go that far, especially when 2 or 3 of the raiders (including me) were seeing Dragonhawk and Lynx for the first time.

Short commentary:
- Today was excellent timing to pug it out. The reset day is the same day we have a guild ZA. I can lend my services if they are required.

- Avoiding Dragonhawk's fire orb thingy is more fun that I had expected.

- /target macros such as /tar corrupt or /tar demon simply don't work for caster classes. You need to do add /stopcasting and /cast [primary nuke] at the beginning and end of the macro to ensure that you don't lose time using esc/move to cancel out of a cast.

- Spellstealing Haste from those Amanashi Fire dudes is rediculously fun. Using Arcane Missiles afterwards is just PIG DISGUSTING.

- I was on sheep duty for the Blood Elf in the Hex Lord Fight. I did my job well, but gimped my DPS, which added up with other CC'ers to become very lackluster raid DPS.

- Many of the raiders in this pug are in guilds well into T5 and above. Doing an adequate job was good for at least a decent first impression for networking purposes. Even the pally tank, who is part of a BT/MH guild added me for future ZA pugs.

Raiding as a Frost Mage: What Lies Ahead

2008-10-01T15:23:00.003-04:00

If I were to simplify the main goals of a Frost Mage in a raid boss situation, I would narrow it down to the three points below:

1. Spam Frostbolts
2. Use cooldown spells whenever they're up
3. Keep your pet alive

Compared to the slightly more complicated rotation of Fire's Scorch Debuff->Fireball->re-Scorch-debuff and Arcane's absurdly complicated Arcane Blast variants (Arcane Blastx3, Missiles, Fireball, or Frostbolt timed perfectly such that the next Arcane Blast casts faster, but for less mana, transitioning in and out of AB spam for mana-intense fights), it is safe to say that Frostbolt spam is indeed fairly straightforward.

But to generalize Frost raiding as simply spamming a single spell is ludicrous. Proper management of cooldowns, especially with Water Elemental, can easily determine the mage's spot on the raid DPS charts.

I'm not here to provide strategy, since Euripides has an excellent general outline for raiding Frost mages.

What I'm here to talk about, however, is the state of Frost heading into 3.0, and by extension, the release of the upcoming expansion. There are a lot of new tools being added to the cryomancer's arsenal in the form of baseline spells and talents. So let's take a look at each of the upcoming individually.

Mirror Image

As I stated before, it would be an absolute riot if the clones created by Mirror Image could summon their own Water Elementals. I'm not just talking about the DPS increase as a result, but the possibility of having each Water Elemental stacking mana regen for the raid if specced into Improved Water Elemental. That would be disgusting, but hey, I can dream, right?

Either way, this is a welcome addition to the collection of cooldowns in our reportoire. The difference between this spell and Summon Water Elemental is the control the mage has over his or her summons. The clones cannot be controlled, and as such, proper timing of cooldown usage will contribute to the spell's contribution to your DPS.

Initially, you will cast this at the same time as your Water Elemental, but due to cooldown-reducing talents, Squirtle will be coming out a lot more.

Fingers of Frost

Fingers of Frost is a passive talent that currently procs off of your spell rotation, and gives your current target a "frozen" property, regardless to immunity to traps and snares.

This talent will now require talent point investment into Shatter in order to maximize the damage gains from the proc.

Shattered Barrier

Mages who spec deeply in the Frost Tree are typically specialized for AoE pulls and "add duty" during boss fights due to their investment into talents that increase their ability to kite and control multiple enemies. This talent essentially gives them a free Frost Nova for AoE kiting multiple spawns during an encounter (i.e., Nightbane's skeletons).

As a result, Shattered Barrier will not increase DPS, but will increase the survivability of mages responsible for the roles mentioned above. As we all know, a dead mage does zero DPS.

Brain Freeze

Here's another proc-based talent that will certainly be incorporated into your rotation. Free, instant cast fireballs are nothing to sneeze at. This talent will increase damage per mana, and is good to use on the run.

While it is unwise to simply wait for the effect to proc before you move out of a boss's devastating AoE spell, the duration of the proc is long enough to decide whether or not you need to reposition yourself in anticipation of an oncoming attack, or if you need to move your Water Elemental closer to mana-hungry raid members.

With Fire Blast also available as an instant-cast, it is possible to use up 2 GCD on instant casts, giving you approximately 3 seconds in total to move without severely hampering your DPS. While not exactly an earth-shaking improvement in a mage's raid mobility, it's certainly better than nothing.

Improved Water Elemental

This talent alone, in my opinon, will singlehandedly change the way frost mages are viewed and used in the upcoming expansion.

With proper talents and cooldown management, it is possible to have your pet up for more than half of the duration of a boss fight. Combine that with the fact that the Water Elemental will be affected by the mage's Hit Rating, and we end up with a very significant source of DPS.

Although we won't be replacing Shadow Priests anytime soon, the beneficial mana regeneration effects provided by this talent cannot be ignored. With the changes to mana regeneration and potion mechanics tweaked in the upcoming patch/expansion, every single point of mana spent is crucial. The increased utility of the water Elemental spell, combined with its buffed duration essentially turns your pet into a caster's wet dream, literally.

Now, more than ever, it is of utmost importance to properly manage your Water Elemental with regards to survivability, timing and positioning. Frost mages need to really learn boss fights in order to determine the optimal times and locations to release their pets.

In a way, Squirtle has changed from a flash-in-the-pan increase in Frost DPS into the 11th/26th raid member. The only difference is that this raid member is multiboxed, and lags out periodically during boss fights.

BONUS: Spirit is the new Stamina

If you haven't noticed, I've been a tad concerned lately regarding issues with mana regenration and conservation. Terms such as DPM, Five Second Rule, and cooldown management (with regards to chain-potting and chain-gemming) have made one or more appearances in the last while.

And even though I don't have access to the beta, it has been reported and acknowledged by development that mages are indeed having mana problems in recent builds. Whether or not this is due to regeneration mechanics, spell costs, or simply untweaked numbers, the fact of the matter is that the patch is coming soon, and because of issues related to Hunter and Shaman talents, the Development team is not unaccostomed to simply releasing content and emergency patching if necessary.

With itemization emphasizing spirit, passive mana regeneration could become more lucrative to mages as a raiding class, especially if high DPS specs continue to have problems with running out of mana as the content progresses.

That being said, mages are left with Mage Armor as their baseline mana regeneration ability, which directly benefits from this trend in Spirit itemization. While at 70, 18/0/43 is a very viable spec simply due to its raw DPM, it is often eschewed in favor of 10/0/51 or even 0/0/61, depending on the mage's mana management abilities. But in the upcoming expansion, I predict that 18/0/53 may get some more attention once the dust settles and more data can be collected from first-hand raid experiences on the live realms.

Conclusion

It is a very exciting time to be a Frost mage with the shadow of an unexplored expansion blanketing our frozen hearts. In the past few weeks, we have been given previews of what is to come, and while the theorycrafters are furiously pounding away at the calculators, it is a thrill to see how Frost DPS is stacking up against the other trees and classes with each beta build.

For as long as anyone can remember, Frost was regarded as a single-spell spam spec, sometimes summoning Squirtle (alliteration for the massive win). But crymancers can rejoice in Wrath, for now they have to really push their pet, while predicting procs in the process (not as alliterative, but nonetheless still win).

While our DPS remains middle-of-the-road, it is something that we are accustomed to seeing. But with a potential emphasis placed on mana management on a raidwide level looming over the heads of frantic GMs everywhere, our utility may be an x-factor that could determine our success in high tiered content.

Because in the end, it is only appropriate that the ones most tolerable to the vast, icy cold of Northrend are those who can harness the icy cold itself.

I'm Back!

2008-09-29T20:53:00.004-04:00

I just got home from a 11-hour car ride from Boston. I had access to the internet at my cousin's house while I was there, but there was quite a bit on the family itenerary that I was unable have sit-down time to make a post.

Now that I'm home, though, I find myself too tired to think of anything to comment on, other than the small backlog of updates that my blogroll added while I was gone. So for now, I'll post this screenshot of how obsessed some people are about brewfest, or how gullible I am to believe this particular individual.

I can only say that he made the right choice by leaving afterwards; epic baby drops are worth more than any kodo in my book.

SHHH! Don't tell anyone I'm here!

2008-09-27T13:19:00.002-04:00

Turns out that I'm deserted in some Sony Store in a suburbian boston outlet mall. That's how it works. You visit a distant relative's place, and the first thing you do when that happens is to hit the discount malls.

So what I did was hide myself way back in the Vaio laptop sections of this particular refurbished goods distributor, and logged in! Woot!

Plenty of neat stuff around me. There's a twenty-something looking up sports illustrated next to me, and on the other side of the display booth, a family is with a sales rep, who is desperate to make some sort of commission. He's being a little too agressive for my tastes, but I can only watch and laugh while seeing the family's reactions, trying to politely decline their way out of this poor man's pitch.

If the guy said "It comes with WoW installed, and free subscription for 12 months. Oh, and you get beta access for the expansion," I wouldn't feel bad for shoving the family aside and going "YES YES YES PLEASE."

Now the manager is giving me an evil eye from across the room.

AFK, Evocating

2008-09-26T00:00:00.001-04:00

Hi everyone! If you're reading this right now, chances are I'm on the road heading towards the Canada/US border. I haven't forgotten about the readers, so this is one of a few scheduled posts to reflect upon until Tuesday comes. In this installment, I would like to talk about mana mechanics.

On thursday, during my lunch hour, I lurked around through the beta forums, browsing through a slew of topics regarding Mages and the upcoming raid content. As you may or may not know, the first 10-man raid instance, analogous to Karazhan for TBC, is Naxxramas. The design of the raid supposedly is meant to mimic the encounters from vanilla WoW.

One boss redesign in particular, Kel'Thuzad, has a particular mechanic that raised a few questions about the nature of mana regeneration for the mage (and to a certain extent, elemental shaman and balance druid) class. Periodically throughout the fight, KT does an ability that flat-out depletes mana from mana classes, currently to the point of going OOM.

At first, I thought that this mechanic sounded fairly straightforward, but in the grand scheme of game design and class balance, an issue was brought into question regarding mana regeneration across different classes. The post that I read argued there should be a tradeoff for caster classes between mana and DPS.

Consider Warlocks and Hunters. When both classes run out of mana in a fight, they can simply use Lifetap and Aspect of the Viper respectively to regenerate their mana mid-fight. The observation posed by the post (hopefully, when I return from my trip, the topic will still be up so I can link it) is that both locks and hunters, as long as they remain alive, can perpetually keep up mana at the cost of a slight dropoff in DPS, whereas a caster who goes OOM after blowing all of his cooldowns will cease to provide DPS at all.

Thus the OP argues that with the implementation of fight mechanics that strain mana such as the KT fight, min-maxing will cause mages, and caster shaman/druid classes to be benched, not because of their DPS, but because of their mana regen mechanics. Thus, he suggests that mages are given some sort of mana regeneration mechanic similar to Hunters and Warlocks, or to have current talents and abilities tweaked to reflect those mechanics. Later on in the thread, someone even suggests changing Evocation in such a way that it can be cast more often, but returns less mana each time, or leaves a mage more vulnerable to damage like the Curator's evocation: an idea that actually carries a noticeable amount of support from other posters.

Regardless, I feel that the OP raises an interesting and valid point regarding the existence of these tradeoffs for exclusive classes. With the changes to mana regeneration in the upcoming expansion, the argument is supported even further.

However, from a flavor perspective, this disparity actually makes sense. In a way, going OOM as a mage is all part of the live fast, die young, glass cannon way of life that the class is known to have. Whether or not the "glass" and "cannon" aspects are equally represented by mages is better left to debate by theorycraft and QQ, but I really don't see mages as an endurance class in that regard.

At the end of the day, it's actually quite funny for me to think of such a thing at all, considering that I have yet to use an evocate during a boss fight ever since my respec. Oh well. Something to chew on until I get back.

Announcement!

2008-09-25T08:41:00.004-04:00

Not exactly new, since I briefly mentioned it during the last installment of Wimzig' Whimsy, but I will be away on Friday all the way up to Tuesday. I'm off to Boston to visit my cousin. Her kid is having a baptism, so I took some days off of work and WoW to attend.

I may or may not be able to post, depending on how much I am able to get done today during work, or whether or not I have some semblance of internet access during the weekend. If you don't hear from me until then, don't worry about it.

Until then, um...I suppose you can entertain yourselves with some machinema.

EDIT: HOTDAMMIT, HOW DOES A YOUTUBE VIDEO GET PULLED THE DAY AFTER I POST IT? DAMMIT DAMMIT! ok, maybe this one will work.

Crap. Does that mean that I'll be missing 5 days of brewfest? Lightdammit. I better get my Kodo tonight, or I'll be kicking some asses and taking names.

Cya tuesday!

Proper Spelling is the Difference Between...

2008-09-24T12:45:00.006-04:00

"Because of my new profession, I would probably need to get my hands on an experienced miner."

and

"Because of my new profession, I would probably need to get my hands on an experienced minor."

Thank goodness for spell-check.

...

Ok. That aside, I don't think I actually noticed that the shift to Spellpower would affect DPS classes as well as Healers. Where I once thought that +healing gear were the only ones affected, I now realized, thanks to PuggyPriest, that anything that isn't "spell damage and healing" will get re-adjusted to spellpower.

That means goodbye, Frozen Shadoweave!

When 3.0.x hits, My overall damage is going to drop significantly, simply because my +300-ish frost damage will be converted to +200-ish spellpower, not to mention the supposed nerf specifically to FSW regarding the Spell Hit bonuses. All of a sudden, I don't feel so bad about hording up a bunch of off-spec gear. I already have a super-glamorous shoe collection that I could pick from to replace the FSW Boots, but I'm still looking for replacements for my badge off-hand, and the other two FSW pieces.

It now makes me wonder if I should give up the crafting protection in lieu for a gathering one in preparation for Wrath. I know that money isn't supposed to be a factor in Wrath, but even now, it feels great to have a nest egg to cover my expenses ahead of time. I've been spending a lot lately for consumables and such, and it's only inevitable that I will probably run out of funds.

If my funds hold out, I'll probably drop either my tailoring or enchanting for jewelcrafting. At first, I can use some of my alts to funnel the lower-level ore to my main and power-level it out a bit. But at higher levels, because of my profession, I'll need to get my hands on an experienced miner.

So all in all, I'm not exactly sure what to do. I might even just cop out and Mine/Skin my way into wrath, just for the cash flow.

Wimzig's Whimsy: Out of Business

2008-09-24T00:00:00.002-04:00

((Hey everyone! Funny thing, the other day, I noticed that I was listed on the blogroll of Adventures of Desdarii, most noticeably as an RP blog. Des, are you serious!? HA! I wish I could blog more about my RP adventures, but lately, Bashertin has been hogging up so much time due to his sudden gear-up in the last few weeks. But that doesn't mean I won't pass up an opportunity such as Brewfest...

...well, I wish I could. The thing about brewfest is that there are just so many people doing it who aren't RP'ing (in a way they are simply by immersing themselves into the event, but not really in character), it's extremely difficult to identify people looking for an encounter, especially when your character is already smashed beyond belief. Perhaps one of you could help me out with that!

Thus, sometimes the most enjoyable RP is often the one you simply do with yourself.))

Elune, shoot me now. Let me combust spontaneously, or something!

"Sir! Might I interest you in some of my conjured water?"

"HARRRR?" Said the drunken dwarf.

"I said, 'MIGHT I INTEREST YOU IN SOME OF MY CONJURED WATER?"

I waved my arms about as to try to grab his attention, but my sudden realization of his inebration ruined the opportunity.

"Shilly gnome!...hic! Why buy your puny 'il water when I's can drink the finesht brew in all of Azeroth!...hic!"

I stared quizzicaly. My eyes widened in disgust.

Brewfest. Free beer.

"Blast it!" I pumped my fist. "Why now? Why not this weekend, when I would take a momentary break from my journey?"**

"Break from a journey?...Hic! Why not take it now, little man?! Have some ale!"

He fell, leaving a giant thud on the stone walkway leading up to Ironforge. I walked away from him, leaving him in his alcohol-induced coma. If I were to take a break from my quests, I might as well do it here. The beer is free. I'm sure that will compensate for my lowered business activity for the next while.

My vision began to stretch on me. Blame that on alcohol-induced losh of coordination between the brain and the oc...ocular muscles controlling eye m-movement and focus. The only panacea? More brew!

Hic!

"Beer gogglesh that make ANYone look ACTtractive?" I asked.

"Sure, sweetheart!" The gnome lady said. That girl was a genius. She showed me the schematic. My goodness it works, but Light blesh me, I don't know why. Hic!

AND THEN I shteal that lady's idea and shwo them to another gnomish gal, right? I haf photogra- photogra- I redrew the ssshhkematik...and showed ish to her! Here it is, I think.

Flawless Design!!!!!!1111111!!!1!11oneoneone

AND THENNNNNNNNNNNNNNN,
I puked...ON MY HENNNNNNNNNN!

LEET RHYME RIGHT? WELL, that NIGHT ELF LADY WASNT SHO IMPRESSD? *HIC!*

And then I hecklez the guy with the rams and the beer kegs! YESH! MOR BEER PLZ!

Oh, and my mother isn't that fat. I just wanted to make that guy riding the ram angry...wait, where'd he go? *hic*

So that's my shtory of Brewfest, YAY! If you excuse me Ineedtorestfortomorrowgoodnightlol.

((**Oh, by the way, I'll be away from Friday to Tuesday. Goin' on a road trip to boston to visit out-of-country family. I'm unsure if I'll be able to have access to the Internet, or time to do much with it. So don't panic if I don't post in a long while! It's because I'm gone!))

It's A.D.D., but for bloggers.

2008-09-23T15:59:00.005-04:00

If I were to call it anything, I'd call it that. This blogging A.D.D., combined with a bunch of stuff that came up at work today, resulted in this effect in which where I wanted to write up a draft of a post, but absolutely hated it, or thought it covered a bunch of other topicts that I wanted to post seperately. So I went from draft to draft, idea to idea, perhaps writing over three to four thousand words worth of deleted paragraphs and quotes.

Blah, that's the life of a blogger sometimes.

So here's my cop-out for "today," until I get home from work and work on a post for tomorrow.

RE: Fun, Responsibility, and Group Dynamics. Where do you fall on the matrix?

Think of a graph. X axis is motivation, Y Axis is the responsibility you take upon yourself. For maximum success in a group, each member needs to be at the top right sector of this matrix. You need to be both motivated to perform your role in a group, and know how how to do it properly. If you find yourselves in other sectors, you need to think about how you can improve yourself to get into that top right.

Not motivated, not responsible - These individuals are the ones who go afk, who always blame other roles whenever the group wipes, who never bother maximizing their performance, or know how at all. There is simply no hope to change their mindset instantly; you're better off excluding them from your group.

Motivated, not responsible - These players are those who are eager to play their class, but don't fully understand their role mechanic in relation to the other roles in a group. "Huntards" are common examples of this class, but not all individuals of this kind end up improving in any way. They are often eager to learn, but are shunned by more experienced players because of their lack of skill. All it takes is a simple tip here and there to improve performance, and this individual's motivation will continue to grow alongside their knowledge of their class.

Not motivated, responsible - These players are simply bored of their role, or don't want to do it, even though they know the insides and outs of what is required for their task. They'll half-ass it, and will probably end up doing their job. Regardless, they are bound to make mistakes, and when they do, they simply don't care. Dealing with these individuals is quite tricky, but essentially involves communication regarding what their goals truly are, and establishing an understanding of what the person wants, and how to get there.

Motivated, responsible - These players are the first ones to the summoning stone, giving tips to newbies who happen upon their group, or are raid leaders themselves. These are the ones who thrive on challenges, always improving their performance. They stand out, and become coveted assets to their guilds. If you run into these individuals, you will probably want to add them to your friend's list.

If you happen to be one of these individuals, you need to start blogging!

((Blah. That turned out to be a bigger edit than I originally planned. That just goes to show that you simply cannot rush a post when you have 10 minutes until hometime.))

E-Peen (and Other Awkward Social Experiments)

2008-09-22T00:00:00.004-04:00

WHAT WHAT! Top of the DPS! In the brackets, it suggests that I cracked a thousand dps, but doing the math of the actual damage count and the duration of the encounter, My calculations say that I only did about 850.

Either way, *flex*

On Sunday out I got called upon by my guild to help with Gruul's as well. Another one of our mages ended up tanking Krosh, but it was a wipefest either way. I stepped in a few times when the mage died to take up the tanking duties, but at that point wipe status was inevitable anyways.

After getting the Brewfest caster trinket, Be Imba told me that I can actually start doing SSC/TK, as well as do BT/MH trash. I don't have the HP to survive the BT bosses, but it's a comforting thing to know. I might consider pugging out higher tiered raid runs whenever someone announces it on realm forums or LFG. Case in point, the Nalorak fight screenshotted above was from a PuG.

But that's really a side thing, since my main focus is both helping the guild gear up. But on the side, I want to network with other guilds to make myself available to be pugged on new content that I would love to see.

So there you go. I've re-established my goals leading up to the expansion, and I am even more motivated now to see new content without dropping my current guild commitments. Sounds pretty hardcore from an outside perspective, but since I'm overgeared for T4 anyways, I have no qualms against geeking out that extra content on the side.

Speaking of which, the GeekEteers are a pretty neat bunch of bloggers who dabble into everything geek. Comic Books, Video Games, Anime and Manga, you name it. They were at Fan Expo this year, a con in Toronto that I visit annually. They do have a very nerdy yet humorous journalistic flare, as shown in the video below. Go ahead and take a look.

At 3:23 and 4:06, there's a hilarious non-interview with a peculiar person playing WoW.

Um, yeah. That was me. LOL! The bit was scripted, obviously. My tunnel vision while playing WoW isn't THAT bad...or so I've been told.

Screenshot: Buccaneers, Big Bad Bosses, and Bashertina!

2008-09-20T01:43:00.009-04:00

Yarr! ITLAP day has come and gone so here are a few highlights, revolving mainly around Bashertin and his foray into Day 2 Kara.

Big Bad Wolf, eh? Sounds like fun. Hopefully I won't die and lose my pirate costume...

But I ended up getting the Red Riding Hood Debuff. I lived through it, luckily. But for some reason, after the fight...

Bashertina appears! I must say, I look pretty cute as a female gnome. Must be some Pirate Day bug. Petty scandalous bug, to be honest.

Yarr, Curator be flogged in one go!

Arr! 'tis Illhoof fella be no match for me guild! One shot!

Sometimes, when ye be sailin' for many months, a pirate will eat anything...even mage ghosts!

As Desdarii eloquently points out, "Chess is serious business." Not exactly a costume, but color-coordinated nonetheless. Imagine if my Squirtle was actually THAT big? Me timbers are shivered at the thought!

Other Comments

- T4 Helm for Bash! Yay!
- It's 2:00am, and I'm dead tired lol!
- It's the 20th. Isn't it Brewfest now? All I need is to get me a purple trinket, and then I'll be decked out in purples!
- Couldn't get down Nightbane or Netherspite, but the rest were one-shots. Both bosses, Netherspite in particular, are extremely difficult to learn as a beginner raid.
- I was actually quite impressed with the progress of the first-timers. Not a lot of gear was sharded, so that's a good sign of guildies gearing up.
- This girl messaged me on msn after the raid. I haven't talked to her since high school, and maybe once or twice online since then. We're totally meeting up. Did I forget to mention that she was my first crush when I first entered that high school? *squee* She just got offline actually.

hehehehe. Too tired. I'll get back with y'all on monday. Hope you enjoyed your Talk Like a Pirate day.

10 Reasons Why Mages are Fantastic Lovers

2008-09-19T13:07:00.004-04:00

Matticus has challenged classes everywhere to speak up about why they make great lovers. On behalf of mages everywhere, here's my list!

10. We burn with the passion of fire, can send icy chills down your spine, and can take it slow like arcane.

9. We're smart. We know our way around.

8. We're masters at wine-and-dining.

7. We peel clothes off our lovers faster than aggro off of tanks.

6. Two words: Jaina Proudmoore.

5. If you're looking for a one night stand, we'll be happy to port you home afterwards.

4. Mirror Image. Think you can handle 4 of us?

3. Just when you think we're spent, we Evocate, and give it another go.

2. Jaina Proudmoore. Seriously, it's worth repeating.

1. When the deed's done, we'll light your cigarette.

Screenshot: Maidens Gone Wild!

2008-09-19T00:00:00.002-04:00

Maiden was a bit tough for the Day 1 newcomers.

I was a bit surprised that her deceptively alluring curves fit her through the columns without breaking them.

But we got her down. Hit exalted with the Violet eye for the kill. And I giddily won Boots of Foretelling. It doesn't replace my tailoring boots, but just another piece of my epic shoe collection. Despite the wipes, still my favorite raid ever. Going to remember this for a long while. Makes me wonder why I ever complained about raiding in the first place.

It's about the content! The experience! The epic dings!

Bleh.

2008-09-18T16:20:00.003-04:00

I am currently writing another edition of "Exercises in Creative Design," where I do a bit of fantasy WoW design. It'll come up tomorrow, I think, so for now, while I chip away on that at work, you are left with a bit of a QQ post today.

Yesterday, I came really close to ninja-gquit. By that I don't mean steal a bunch of crap from the gbank and then leave, but rather, log on outside of peak guild population hours and simply /gquit. To be clear, there wasn't any drama leading up to it at all, but if you follow this blog closely, you might have seen the signs already.

Simply put, here are my reasons that I would quit:
- I'm getting quite busy at work, leaving me too tired to do much at home regards to WoW. I have early mornings, so I can't really stay up to instance or whatnot. Lately, most of my extended WoW sessions during the week is to raid, and that's only once a week.
- As a result of my schedule and lifestyle, my availability does not mesh well with raid scheduling. I don't know exactly what my plans are for a given period of time, because family always plan out impromptu parties and dinners and whatnot that always take place on raid days.
- Guild is literally swimming in mages as it is. I've become somewhat redundant in my role in the guild, since there's already a number of mages who are more geared, and more "appropriately specced".
- I haven't connected as much on a personal or professional/gaming level with the other members..
- As a result of all the above, I get literally no opportunity to participate in progression, if any progression happens at all.

There are a few reasons listed above that are perfectly reasonable (ie, real life), and some that could simply amount to whining on account of my frustration with a lack of character progress.

I'm always put on standby for raids due to first-come-first-serve signups, but oblige to run farming runs, and end up carrying a significant load of the raid DPS in the absense of the other senior members, going the extra mile to ensure raid success such as kiting Moroes adds when there's a lack of cc, or decursing on AoE pulls in addition to doing AoE.

At the end of the day, everyone progresses, yet I stay behind to continue doing Day 1's to help gear up the new members. And once the time comes where we can actually field a co-guild run of 25 man content, I'm left out. Not just hypothetically either. This Sunday, I'm on Standby for Gruuls, and despite voluntarily acquiring a Stamina set for tanking HKM, and gemming/enchanting it out, and studying the bossfights. You know, just in case.

Do I have to do all of that to prepare? Of course, it's my duty as a member of the guild to play my part, regardless of the significance of the role. And I'm willing to say that I do my job well. I might not top the DPS charts against the other senior DPSers, but I'll hang with the ones who outgear me by miles. I've turned heads, particularly those who originally were convinced that Fire is the only way for a mage to go. They've acknowledged me, but somehow, it's just not enough to get to the next step.

I could never really I've already turned my corner. I'm ready for the next step. I just want to be given a chance, that's all.

Is that too much to ask for, or is this just a bunch of QQ? Please let me know what I can do to experience new content; I'm willing to do anything to make this situation feel less...bleh.

(EDIT:) Now, it's almost 7:20pm, and Kara Day 1 starts in 10 minutes. Guild Leader asks me if I could hand my spot over to someone so he can get his first chance. I happily hand it over. And I feel good about it. Oh, and there's still a free space, so I join up anyways. Heh.

My reward for being a ncie guy? Raid Assist. Pretty sweet timing, if I do say so myself. I'm not going to delete this post. I was honest about it at the time, but I just needed a good train ride home to get some perspective. Have a nice day!

Spell Hit Your Way into Karazhan!

2008-09-16T22:02:00.010-04:00

When preparing your fresh 70 for the endgame raid content, the most important stat to stack on your mage is Spell Hit. Theorycrafting aside, the general conclusion is that up until your character's hit cap is reached (more on this later), Spell Hit is the most efficient stat, point-for-point, to increase your overall DPS.

Generally, ??? level bosses in raids 3 levels above your own, meaning that the chance of your spell to hit is a mere 83%. By investing points in your gear in Spell Hit, you can potentially raise that percentage to 99. And depending on your talent spec and race, the required amount of points to raise that percentage is relatively low. Thus, Spell Hit is the first stat that you will need to stack if you want to start raiding. But once your chance to hit bosses reaches 99%, any excess points will do nothing. Thus, as you gear up, it is always important to make sure you have the bare minimum, regardless of your Spell Damage, Spell haste, and Stamina.

Untalented, the spell Hit required to successively hit with your spell 99% of the time is 202.

If you're specced into Fire, you will want points in Elemental Precision, which lowers your hit cap to 164.

If you're a "cool" Mage like me (and are currently facepalming at the pun), a bug known as "Ghost Hit" effectively lowers your hit cap to 126 when specced into Elemental Precision.

If you're spamming Arcane Spells in your rotation, and have specced into Arcane Focus, you only need 76 points of Spell Hit!

As you can see, the required Spell Hit stat is not too demanding if you know where to look for the right gear. Look no further than the following item list for your Spell Hit needs!

Gems/Enchanting

Due to the scarcity of items that contain Spell Hit, the most available means of stacking the stat is through using gems on socketed gear that you acquire as you continue to progress your character, as well as the lone Spell Hit enchant available for gloves. Take note that socket bonuses that do not awared additional Hit are not worth excluding the use of Spell Hit gems if you're not yet at the cap.

Spell Hit is a stat primarily associated with Yellow sockets.

Great Dawnstone, Jewelcrafting
Veiled Noble Topaz, Jewelcrafting
Vivid Chrysoprase, Heroic Slave Pens
Lambent Chrysoprase, Heroic Underbog
Shining Fire Opal, Heroic Mechanar
Comments: Dawnstone is your best bet for stacking hit, but if you're close to the cap, consider farming Heroic Mech for the additional damage provided by its gem, granted that you have the funds for a flying mount. Lambent Crysoprase is useful for specs that care a lot about passive mana regeneration, such as Arcane and Frost-Arcane.

Chest

Vermillion Robes of the Dominant - Warlord Kalithresh, The Steamvault
Warp Infused Drape - Warp Splinter, The Botanica
Comments: As a fresh 70, the Robes are your most likely bet, but the sockets from the Drape will yield better stats if you have a flying mount. Regardless of your spec, the Epic Robe that you can craft from tailoring has great stats and sockets. The Frost robe in particular grants extra Spell Hit as a socket bonus.

Feet

Extravagant Boots of Malice - Tavarok, Mana-Tombs
Comments: Not much choice here, which is all the more reason to be a Tailor if you roll Frost; the Frozen Shadoweave Boots are excellent for the same reasons as the robe.

Hands

Gloves of Oblivion - Warchief Kargath Bladefist, The Shattered Halls
Gloves of the Deadwatcher - Shirrak the Dead Watcher, Auchenai Crypts (Heroic)
Comments: Both are considerably difficult to get if you're a fresh 70, but there are numerous excellent socketed alternatives.

Head

Spellstrike Hood - Tailoring, Grand Warlock Nethekurse, The Shattered Halls
Demonfang Ritual Helm - The Black Stalker, The Underbog (Heroic)
Comments: Again, both are difficult to get. If you're horde, consider doing a quest chain in Nagrand described below. I've been trying to farm the Spellstrike recpies for a while, and still haven't gotten them to drop. The Hood is easier to farm than the pants because the recipe drops off of the first boss of the instance, rather than the last.

Legs

Spellstrike Pants - Tailoring, Murmur, Shadow Labyrinth
Trousers of Oblivion - Talon King Ikiss, Sethekk Halls
Comments: The warlock dungeon set has a pair of items that provide spell hit. Do not overlook them, despite the useless 2-piece set bonus. Great stats overall.

Shoulders

Mantle of Three Terrors - Chrono Lord Deja, The Black Morass
Comments: The Mantle is worth farming, because the rep rewards from the Keepers of Time include a really neat Spell Hit sword. Frosties rejoice at the use of their Tailoring Shoulders!

Waist

Belt of Blasting - Tailoring, Auction House
Sash of Serpentra - Warlord Kalithresh, The Steamvault
Comments: You will not get the recipe for the tailoring belt until you're arleady in raid content. Thankfully, the belt is bind on equip, but the AH price may be a bit absurd on your realm, so consider running Steamvault for your belt instead. Arcane and Fire get a good belt from their Tailoring specialization.

Wrist

Crimson Bracers of Gloom - Omor the Unscarred, Hellfre Ramparts (Heroic)
Comments: This boss is quite tricky in Heroic mode, due to the Felhounds that drain your mana if you're closeby. Not exactly reccomended, but is worth mentioning. Thankfully, Arcane and Fire have their Tailoring specialization.

Back

Cloak of the Betrayed - Priestess Delrissa, Magister's Terrace
Sethekk Oracle Cloak - Talon King Ikiss, Sethekk Halls
Comments: Delrissa is one of my favorite non-raid boss encounters, so it's worth running over and over again, even if you can't seem to get past that final pull before Kael'thas. The Sethekk Cloak is relatively easy to get at 70.

One-Hand

Starlight Dagger - Mennu the Betrayer, The Slave Pens
Continuum Blade - Keepers of Time, Revered
Greatsword of Horrid Dreams - Murmur, Shadow Labyrinth
Comments: I simply LOVE the greatsword for its stats, but the Keepers of Time reward might come more easily if you find yourself doing plenty of CoT instances for the other pieces of gear.

Off-Hand

Lamp of Peaceful Radiance - Harbinger Skyriss, The Arcatraz
Star-Heart Lamp - Temporus, The Black Morass
Comments: The Caverns Lamp is more accessible to mages that don't have flying mounts yet, and has the extra crit rating. You can't go wrong with either, but both instances can be challenging depending on the group.

Two-Hand

Auchenai Staff - Aldor, Revered
Grand Scepter of the Nexus-Kings - Nexus-Prince Shaffar, Mana-Tombs
Sun-infused Focus Staff - Kael'thas Sunstrider, Magisters' Terrace
Warpstaff of Arcanum - Warp Splinter, The Botanica
Comments: Kael'thas' Staff is hands down the best two-handed weapon for any mage not doing raid content. It has Spell Hit AND sockets. What more do you want? Consider that an arcane mage will only be about 20 or 30 points short if he gems out his Staff with nothing but +8 Spell Hit. You can get a Spell Hit Staff as a PvP reward, which I will list in the next section.

Neck

Brooch of Heightened Potential - Blackheart the Inciter, Shadow Labyrinth
Eye of the Night - Jewelcrafting, World Drop
Hydra-fang Necklace - Ghaz'an, The Underbog
Comment: The Blackheart fight might be frustrating to some, but I personally love it, and is worth farming. There aren't many other viable drops.

Finger
Seal of the Exorcist - Terokkar Zone Buff Rewards
Sparking Arcanite Ring - Epoch Hunter, Old HIllsbrad Foothills (Heroic)
Comments: Since a lot of the drops listed in this guide come from Auchindoun instances, you will likely accumulate a fair amount of Spirit Shards. Consider spending them on the PvP ring; they provide excellent Stamina, but lacks Intellect.

Trinket

Arcanist's Stone - Epoch Hunter, Old Hillsbrad Foothills (Heroic)
Scryer's Bloodgem - Scryers, Revered
Comments: Mages should always pick scryers, hands down. They have the better spellthread recipe for tailors, and they have the BEST SPELL HIT ITEM IN THE FREAKING GAME. LOOK AT IT!

Bonus: Solo and Quest Your Way to the Hit Cap!

Ok, so you might not have time to group for dungeons. The best alternative is to simply farm out craftables as well as doing quests. By specializing into Tailoring, you can get 48 Spell hit from gems alone! The list below will put your Spell Hit well above the cap, so choose to your discretion!

HEAD: Mag'hari Ritualist's Horns
Complete Hero of the Mag'har in Nagrand. This is long quest chain, and is horde-only, but is well worth it.

SHOULDERS: Frozen Shadoweave Shoulders
Take up Shadoweave Tailoring and farm the mats. Use the +8 Spell Hit gem for the socket bonus.

CHEST: Frozen Shadoweave Robe
Take up Shadoweave Tailoring and farm the mats. Use +8 Spell Hit gem for the socket bonus..

WAIST: Ethereal Sash
Complete Gava'xi in Nagrand.

PANTS: Heap Leggings
Complete It's a Fel Reaver, But with Heart in Netherstorm. You might want to get a group for this, but it's certainly solo-able with a frost mage. Simply pop cooldowns as needed, put your pet on adds, and furiously pew pew on the Reaver. If the mobs get out of hand, throw up Ice barrier, and kite them around with Frost Nova and Ice Armor while throwing instant cast spells on the reaver.

FEET: Frozen Shadoweave Boots
Take up Shadoweave Tailoring and farm the mats. Use the +8 Spell Hit gem for the socket bonus.

TRINKET: Starkiller's Bauble
Complete The Horrors of Pollution in Netherstorm.

TRINKET: Scryer's Blodogem
Gain the reputaton by doing all the Scryers quests, or by farming gold and buying reputation turn-in items such as Tomes and Signets.

WEAPON: Grand Marshall's War Staff
Farm up Alterac Valley and get yourself 24,480 Honor Points and 40 AV Marks. At this point, you might already be at the cap, so get a decent weapon instead.

NECK: Eye of the Night
Buy from the AH.

FINGER: Seal of the Exorcist
PvP your butt off in Auchindoun. Get the shards and buy the ring.

Conclusion

Rough calculations put the total spell hit of all the items listed above as 158, including set bonuses. Speccing into Fire can be accomodated if you gem/enchant the gear accordingly. Regardless, the main point of this guide is to show that getting Spell Hit items is very straightforward and available if you know where to look. By getting into Karazhan, you will be able to upgrade your gear even further, and you will have to learn to boost your stats through gear upgrades, while at the same time managing the hit cap. It's a tricky balance that can frustrate some, but hopefully this guide will at least provide the initial stepping stones towards reaching that point in your fledgling mage-raiding career.

Alternate Blog Descriptions

2008-09-15T14:59:00.004-04:00

This is just a placeholder post for past, present, and future Blog Descriptions that would be used on the banner of this blog. I have been tempted to change the blog description for a while now, but resisted the urge to do so, since it would open the floodgates to constant blog description changes. Well, today I'm opening them up.

"There's something cool about frost-specced mages and death knights that make me shiver. Wait, that wasn't supposed to be the joke, dammit. ugh, /wrist"

"When life hands you lemons, summon lemonade elementals."

"Because 2.1-second Frostbolts just aren't enough."

"A blog about a cryomaniac, cryophile, a cryo...um...I ran out of suffixes."

"If you're looking for Fire of Arcane, you're in the wrong place."

"A Frost Mage walks into a bar. He blogs about it the next day."

"Looking into the World of Warcraft from the bottom of a glass of Conjured Water."

"Step out of the harsh cold of Northrend into a place where it's...not as cold."

Make Lemonade (and Other Musings)

2008-09-15T09:45:00.002-04:00

This weekend, our raid encountered something that I would like to dub as a "2-faced" instance.

The OMGROFL KARA face

a.k.a. Day 1. Undergeared, underprepared, unsynergized. A few people were having their first runs through the instance with the guild, and many of them needed substantial upgrades. So I came in expecting a few wipes. Oh, I also aimed to not die. Those two didn't really coincide, but in the end, both expectations were fulfilled. On two or three wipes, I managed to slap on Invisibility at the right time. On AoE pulls, I managed to deal considerable damage without dying at all. I only died once the entire night. ONCE. On a wipe.

On Moroes, I kited the Retribution Paladin. I forget his name, but I did it with my spec, and survived, even after getting manaburned TWICE by the Shadow Priest. I had to Ice Block in the process, but I was lucky to not get hit by Garrote. Either way, I had Cold Snap just in case.

On Maiden, I had Quagmirran's Eye Proc DURING Heroism. I popped Icy Veins, and somehow I was doing 1.3s Frostbolts. Cold Snapped back Icy Veins, and I was doing 1.7s Frostbolts for about a whole minute. Hells yeah.

I almost died in Opera. Well, pre-Opera. You see, my raid has an Opera tradition, where we run the event while standing in the room before Opera, on the farthest wall. We have one person start the event, and have the rest of the raid dance naked in place as the encounter starts. Think of it as a Russian Roulette of sorts, since someone usually ends up dying to Dorothy's Frostbolts, Roar, or Julianne.

I died on an AoE pull leading up to Curator, but everyone else ended up wiping, so that doesn't really count. It doesn't help when the tank pulls when all the mages are still drinking. >.<

The WTF WORST KARA EVER face

Day 2 Kara was blah. Maybe it was the high expectations. Maybe it was because half the raid was cloth. Maybe it was 3 mages in Shade. I don't know. There were too many wipes, and we didn't get anything done.

I believe that some sort of twilight zone effect was looming over us. While recently we have been struggling with Illhoof due to a lack of Warlocks, we've been doing other bosses fine, even with an undergeared party. But this week was completely opposite; having pugged a warlock, we simply destroyed Illhoof after our "get used to playing with a warlock again" wipe.

But afterwards it got ugly. Fast. Numerous wipes on Shade meant that we ended up clearing trash respawns twice, even wiping on a few of the repeated pulls. We were simply too careless overall. I'm not going to blame any specific roles, but I'm just going to say that people need help each other out. If DPS learns to take less damage, then Healers will be able to keep up with heals, and will have an easier time doing their job properly as well.

Regardless, a few good things to note. We ended up recruiting the pugged warlock, and our Holy Pally got both healing drops off of Illhoof. This is a wonderful thing, because we desperately needed a Warlock for Kara, and our Pally has been aching for gear upgrades, and was often in that position where gear dropped whenever he wasn't in the raid, and vice versa.

All in all, Kara gave us nothing but lemons, but we came out of it with a nice glass of lemonade.

Other Random Thoughts

- Got onto the 3.0.x PTR for the first time ever. I am now officially excited for WotLK. I didn't think that something as simple as a talent tree revamp could get me so pumped up, despite not having training dummies available, or any other world server except for Eastern Kingdoms available.

- I have a resto druid. Yep. That means I have a non-gnome. If gnomes could become healers, I would roll one as my alt, but as it stands, I have no choice but to branch out into other races. She hit 50 on the weekend, and picked up Tree of Life. It's so amazing. I can see her listening to Marley while smoking her own leaves. I guess that would make her...

...a restofarian.

Yeah, I cringed too. It's ok. Something to wake you up on this lovely Monday.

Nerf Bat? What Nerf Bat?

2008-09-12T00:00:00.002-04:00

I was reading WoW Insider today, and happened upon a bunch of posts. Didn't read many of them, since the titles of those very posts spoke for themselves.

"8926 a test of faith for Holy priests"
"Shadow Priests beaten to death in the Wrath beta"
"Totem Talk: Curses, foiled again"
"Human racials revised again"
"Things don't look pretty for PvP Hunters in 8926"

To say that 8296 was known for its nerfs to many classes would be a sheer understatement. Which is why I loved to see this on MMO-champion regarding the new beta build.

Unofficial changes:

which is quite surprising, considering the introduction of Mirror Image. I could only guess that there simply wasn't enough time for the devs to observe the spell in action and make their adjustments. Expect more concrete evidence to be observed when more 80's show up via pre-mades or self-mades, and we'll see how it goes.

Regardless, it is frequently said that no news is good news. So if we're to walk away with anything, it's that with the inevitable tidal wave of QQ, it's refreshing to see that the mages aren't likely to be the ones not drowning in it.

But then again, I could be wrong.

Video Game Death is Serious Business

2008-09-11T12:51:00.005-04:00

Today's lunchtime post is going to be a bit short, since I am currently obsessed with Final Fantasy IV for the DS. My goodness it is sweet. So far, it's pretty much everything I loved about FFIII and a little bit more. It has been a while since I last played an RPG though, and being a little too used to playing MMORPGs as of late has definitely shown in my gameplay.

Firstly, dying in WoW has led me to become careless with my character. In WoW, there is no "Game Over." In non-arena/non-battleground areas, you simply respawn at a certain location, and you can either resurrect your character on the spot, or resurrect your character where you were last killed.

The harshest penalty you end up receiving upon death is a hefty repair bill, or an optional 10 minutes of "rez sickness" that gimps your stats the point of being unable to defend yourself from other monsters.

In traditional RPG's, however, when you die, that's pretty much it. The game ends, and you have to restart the game from the last save point. If you don't save , you might end up losing upwards of an hour or two worth of gameplay, and you have to start all over again.

My goodness, playing WoW for an exclusive amount of time has driven me to that carelessness with regards to FFIV, and as a result, I've played the same beginning dungeon four times today, each time assuming that I could save the game later, but dying unnecessarily in some situation. One death was due to a random encounter wtih a really high-level monster, and another was due to having the entire party afflicted with Stone status, automatically resulting in a game over.

As a result of my experience, I got horridly pissed off at myself for becoming such an RPG noob, and tightened up saving habits, and haven't died since. I wonder now, however, if that will translate into an analogous behaviour in WoW?

My guild has this tradition when we run Kara. A mage has to die. It doesn't have to be me, since we have a lot of mages in the guild. There has been only one run in recent memory when there wasn't a single mage in the raid. And in each of those mage-filled runs, the mage is always at the top of the "deaths" list on recount/SWS.

Squishiness aside, I feel partially responsible for myself whenever I die, but not to the extent that I would adjust my gameplay to ensure survival, essentially the same way I play my regular RPG's. As such, I often perpetuate this careless attitude towards my characters in WoW, even though I shouldn't. As such, I would think that harsher dying penalties in WoW would make me more careful, and I wouldn't mind if such changes would be implemented.

So the questions I want to throw out there into the internether are as follows:

Are you careful with your WoW toon?
Do you like to play games outside the MMO genre that have harsh penalties for character death?
Does your WoW play mirror that of your gameplay in other genres?

With those questions in mind, I set my goal for this Friday's Karazhan: not to be the top of the DPS chart, but to be on the bottom of the "deaths" chart. Hopefully my frustration with non-MMO's will be successfully channelled into conservative yet productive play. I'll report on the results sometime on the weekend. So for now, wish me luck, and see you soon!

Hi, I'm Krizzlybear, and I'm a Manaholic.

2008-09-10T00:00:00.005-04:00

EDIT: As in, mana-a-holic. Damn you, Chu. *sigh* lol

audience: Hi Kriz!

As a mage, I'm normally used to chugging water in between battles with monsters from the twisted nether. As a result, I have become dependant on water for my mana-replenishment needs, to the extent that I've even conjured water for myself even when not in battle. I've snuck a bottle here and there, and realized my addiction.

But I have realized the error of my ways, and it's been about 8 days since I last had a skin of water, and so far it's been a success.

*audience ooohs, ahhs*

But, my friends, I must confess. I've died way too many times for my own good. Not taking Ice Barrier and other talents that improve the snares of my spells have taken a hit on my survivability!

In Kara, I died 8 times leading up to Curator alone, not including raid wipes. Some of those were from AoE pulls leading up to Moroes and Curator. Almost half of them were form failed attempts to kite Moroes adds and Strawhead. After Curator, there were plenty of early deaths in Netherspite simply due to not being able to keep Ice Barrier up.

*audience mourns the numerous weekend deaths of krizzlybear*

Fear not, my fellow Drinkers! I have found the error of my ways again! And found a way to improve my survivability but remain non-dependant on those cursed conjured consumables! Behold! THE IMPROVED NO-MORE-DRINKING BUILD!

*audience oooh's, aahhh's*

Did you see how it's different from the previous build? Let's take a look.

1 point from Winter's Chill moved to Frost Barrier: 4/5 Winter's Chill is good enough to keep stacks on the Winter's Chill Debuff, so the free point IMMEDIATELY goes to Frost Barrier. Similar to how a Frost mage depends on Water Elemental for offensive purposes, the same mage, to the same degree, relies on Frost Barrier for defensive purposes.

I don't know how I overlooked this in the first place. I guess I was too busy spamming Frostbolts and not going out of mana. With Frost Barrier available, the mage with Arcane Meditation can now afford to keep it up on every cooldown, saving precious mana spent by healers, as well as reducing knockback from attacks from adds.

2 points from Improved Frost Nova to Permafrost: Sounds a little counterproductive, but hear me out. From a kiting perspective, the increased snare gained from permafrost increases the time it takes for a mob to get to you. Spamming rank 1 frostbolts while strafing and blinking and Jump Blasting will completely make up for the 4 seconds added to the Frost Nova cooldown. In most cases, you only have to use Frost Nova only once anyways, before the kited monster gets killed, so this is a worthy trade.

Also, since I'm not even trying to get into Shatter, IFN no longer needs to be taken by default.

I really wish that I could add at least one point in Improved Blizzard for the snare effect, which stacks with Permafrost. Maybe I'll take out another point in Winter's Chill, and really pray to the RNG gods that my stacks stick. But oh well, that's a bullet that I'm willing to bite in exchange for Ice Barrier and Permafrost.

*audience applause*

And that, my friends, is my personal tweak to 18/0/43, modified to stay alive longer, so I can continue to drink less and pew pew more.

Just a Thought...

2008-09-08T21:54:00.006-04:00

The official firing of the Large Hadron Collider is on October 20. Their test run is this wednesday. If the experiment fails due to massive explosions, and the human race wipes, then I won't be able to play Wrath of the Lich King.

DAMN YOU HARDON COLLIDER! YOU WILL BE THE END OF US ALL!