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Four Mistakes New Raiders Make
Assuming the position.
I’ve leveled fourteen characters to 100. I’ve done Heroic dungeons, PVP, and even pet battles. I’ve farmed for mounts, pets, transmogs, and gold. I’m almost at the point where I’ve got the Brawler’s Guild on lock. So it’s s safe to say that I’ve dabbled in pretty much everything WoW has to offer. But Blizzard is all about the raiding. Dungeons? A means to gear up for raiding. Storylines? The plots get wrapped up in raids. Legendary items? Raid or GTFO (which is actually quite helpful, that’s a future reference to something I haven’t discussed yet stay with me here people).
I’m actually no stranger to raiding. Back in my Everquest days, my guild often raided numerous World Bosses and Planes of Existence. In those days though, raid zones weren’t instanced. Every guild had a rogue alt parked where the various bosses spawned. When you got the word that a boss was up, your entire guild had to race other guilds to be the first to clear to – and pull – the boss when it was up.
That, boys and girls, is hardcore raiding. The ability to mobilize a raid with whoever you had, rather than the optimal raid configuration that guilds like to push for encounters today. You had to make due with whoever your guild had online, knowing you might only get one shot at the boss. Making that pull while another raid parked itself just around the corner, waiting to move in if and when you wiped. The PLP (Play Nice Policy) extended just far enough that guilds wouldn’t try to get you wiped (unless you were on a PVP server, which I assume is a special kind of Hell that plenty of people still manage to get off on).
But that was then, and this was now. Raid comps had become more stringent on their requirements, even in LFR. For a tourist mode style of raiding, there were still groups that expected a certain level of performance out of raid members. Some of it was reasonable, some of it was not. Mythic aspirations out of weekend warrior raiders.
I’d heard the horror stories, and it kept me away for the longest time. But one day I finally took the plunge (out of desperation and boredom), not caring what mistakes I happened to make. I had to give this raiding thing a try. If LFR was as easy as everybody claimed, it would be a learning experience. And if I didn’t measure up and got kicked, screw it.
So I did some researched, queued up, and drew Archimonde as my first raid. I may not have performed as great as I could have, but after we wiped and the raid leader went through the roster to cut dead weight he didn’t cut me. I’d tried to prep myself as best I could. And you know what? Things pretty much turned out ok. Well, for me at least. But other people… damn folks. Come on now.
Now that I have run a few LFR’s, I am something of an expert as far as raiding goes. Because of course.
Experience bragging aside, there are a few things I’ve noticed in the raids I’ve been in. Some faux pas, so to speak, some that I was guilty of myself. It’s not necessarily a WoW raiding thing, because I’d seen the same kind of issues when I raided in Everquest. These issues also seemed to be some of the reasons that many people try to avoid raiding altogether. I was one of those people, so again, experience talking here.
As I said, some common mistakes kept rearing their ugly head, and the sad part is that they’re easy enough to fix. So what kinds of mistakes do us rookie raiders make?
Bajheera Discusses Death Knights in Legion
So listen up Rokkstars, let’s all take a breath and not lose our minds for a second. What am I referring to, like, specifically this time? Well, Blizzard has recently outlined the proposed changes to various classes once Legion comes around. Now let’s remember that the beta has not even been launched yet, so some of these changes may not even happen. Let’s also remember that many people are outraged, or confused, because other people are outraged and confused and they themselves don’t know just how earth-shattering these changes might be.
I prefer to have a voice of reason explain these things. I like to hear from someone who not only is knowledgeable, but can speak to me in terms I can understand. Dumb it down for me. I don’t have a PhD in Min-Maxing or Theorycrafting.
Bajheera (@BajheeraWoW on the Twitter), he of PVP and Warcraft Hosting duties, knows a thing or two about Warriors. We all know this. What you may not know is that he’s also pretty well versed when it comes to playing a Death Knight. Witness now while he discusses the upcoming changes to the Death Knight class in Legion. Take it away, Baj!
I think I’m looking forward to playing my Death Knight Deathrokk in Legion. I suspect, should I improve my gaming rig, that I may also try to get onto a raiding team. Why? Because Death Knight’s Tier 19 armor looks fifty shades of badass.
Is your main class going through updates? Are they good or bad for the class? Let me know in the comments below what class changes you’re looking forward to in Legion!
Changes to Rokk Talk
There are changes coming to this blog. The first of which is the URL (rokktalk.wordpress.com). It was either that or pay GoDaddy for the official URL. That may still be coming, but Rokk Talk has been the blog for long enough that it justified some changes.
The next change will be the theme. The idea of the blog isn’t just for me to chat up my toons. No, the idea is for my posts to help people out in some way. If people find them entertaining, great, but first and foremost they should be helpful in some way. Leveling tips, gearing up, making gold, I’m constantly surprised by people who are still asking questions about these topics. I’ve posted plenty of information about these topics. Problem being, it’s not the easiest to find on the site unless you search for it.
So if you’ve found my little World of Warcraft blog, welcome. Welcome to Rokk Talk (soon to be 2.0).
#RokkTalk – What’s Your Why In WoW
Do I really look like a guy with a plan?
When you have a life outside an online video game and limited playtime, it’s important to have a plan when you log in. More importantly, you have to have a reason to be there – be it arenas, raiding, or leveling up battle pets. Hell, even archaeology counts. Not having some kind of purpose leads to frustration, burnout, and walking away from the game entirely.
I actually found myself having that kind of moment earlier this week. I had a couple of days off from work, and no pressing commitments for a few hours each day. It was a sweet, sweet green light to get my nerd on and get some serious WoWing in. I had a freshly level capped DK who was decked out in a mishmash of heirloom and early 500ish gear. Time to engage Beast Mode and crush my enemies bones into sweet crystal currency!
Day One started off by running the Apexis dailies to upgrade his fighting fashion sense. I had my strategy to get the most Apexis I could in the time I had, so I tore it up. A few hours later when the clock ran out, my Death Knight had picked up several upgrades from rare mobs and random drops. I was pleased to see that his iLevel was now knocking on the doorway to mid-600’s range. This pleased me. And, so pleased, I logged off.
But just after I clicked the Exit Game button, I was ambushed. At least, that’s how it felt. I didn’t see it coming at all, probably because I’d been focused on getting quests done and measuring secondary gear stats. I had no idea what was waiting for me as soon as the game was off. But sure enough, there it was as soon as I looked at my desktop.
A single word popped into my head – Why?
“Why? Why what?” I asked my brainmush.
Why did you spend the past few hours gearing up yet another character? Why did you even log in?
“That’s a stupid question, brain. His gear was crap.”
Does his gear really matter? You’re just going to throw him in a garrison, get him treasure hunter followers, and use him to make gold. He could do that naked. Knowing you, he probably will.
My brain knew me too well. It should, being my brain and all. “Not necessarily,” I countered. “I might want to use him at some point. I need him to be ready.”
Ready for what? Running a dungeon? Face it, you log in for garrison follower missions. That’s your game. That’s your WoW. It’s like Mists of Pandaria all over again.
My stupid brain wasn’t as stupid as I thought, and it pissed me off. More than just a little bit.
Rewind back to MoP. Before I walked away from WoW for a year, my sole purpose for logging into WoW was to make gold. I’d log in, do my daily alchemy transmutes, play the AH for a bit, check the mailbox, and log off. I wasn’t even really doing anything with the gold I earned. I wasn’t saving up for anything. I was simply leveling up my bank. I needed something to do, and that was something that felt like some kind of progress.
In retrospect, that wasn’t much different than what I was doing now. Only now I was actually doing less than I was in MoP and making more gold in the process. Doing Apexis dailies, like I was doing now, just felt like busy work. To what end? To give me something to do other than farming my garrisons?
As I tend to do, I ignored my brain and dismissed the feeling as having an off day.
Day Two started off like Day One. But even before I logged in, my brain was throwing that “Why” word around. Why was I logging in? Why was I gearing up? Why was I even playing? Was there a purpose to what I was doing, or was I just going through the motions with more busy work?
Even after I started doing the Apexis rounds, that damn word haunted me. As soon as I finished the batch of quests, I stared at the exclamation marks on my mini-map. Was I really going to finish those quests? For what purpose?
I felt like Morpheus in Matrix Reloaded. Only I didn’t know Kung Fu. What I did know was Jack Shit.
Merovingian: The question is, do you know why you are here?
Morpheus: We are looking for the Keymaker.
Merovingian: Oh yes, it is true. The Keymaker, of course. But this is not a reason, this is not a `why.’ The Keymaker himself, his very nature, is means, it is not an end, and so, to look for him is to be looking for a means to do… what?
The Keymaker drops epics. You do the math.
Great. Now it wasn’t just my stupid brain that was questioning things. It was my stupid Me.
As much as I loved the Matrix Trilogy (maybe not so much the third one), this was not good.
I looked at my Death Knight. This boy needed something else to do. He needed a purpose. A cause.
A why.
And this is how you come to me, without ‘why’, without power.
“Shut up brain, I’m trying to think.”
You do see how ridiculous that statement is, yes?
“I swear I will stab you with Q-Tips if you don’t zip it.”
What exactly were my options here? Brewfest was going on, but I already got everything I wanted from that holiday when I got the meta-achievement, including a purple drake that I never used. The Burning Crusade Timewalker dungeons were an option as well, but much of the gear I had from Apexis crystals were very close to what I’d get from those dungeons, and easily upgraded to be superior.
What about raids?
“Go home brain, you’re drunk.” Or was it?
Normally I wouldn’t have even given it a second thought. My computer had problems in the past with groups of people blasting away in closed quarters. It was why Ashran tended to kill me before I even saw my attackers. It was why killing Lord Kazzak was essentially a twenty second screenshot that ended with my death or another twenty second screenshot from a slightly different angle.
You changed settings. Things seem to be loading quicker now. There is nothing keeping you from giving it a try other than empty excuses.
I’m not saying it’s possible that my brain bullied me. All I know is that it was an odd sensation when I clicked the button to join the raid queue. Any apprehension I had about raiding was gone. I was a man with nothing to lose. If my computer couldn’t chug through a raid, then I’d officially run out of options and maybe look at playing something else. Even though it was LFR, I didn’t want a poor computer to make me a detriment to the other raiders.
I checked the dungeon guide while I waited for the queue window to pop. I wanted to make sure I had a hairy clue as to what I was supposed to do if and when I managed to attack a boss. From what I read there didn’t seem to be much to it. Between that and my DBM addon, I felt I might not stink up the zone too badly.
When the Enter Raid window popped up, I could feel the anxious butterflies. I was really going to do this. This thing I’d heard about in blogs and podcasts for years. I was going to raid.
Bloody Hell. I zoned in and was standing right in front of The Butcher. “Okay brain, you wanted a cause. Here’s one – don’t suck.”
Sure, fine. Now do you have any potions? Flasks? Stat food?
“…”
Well that’s just great.
Someone dropped a feast and I was all over it like, well, like an unprepped raider on a feast.
I accepted the Ready Check window that popped up in front of me. We attacked. My computer was fine. I didn’t die. The Butcher got butchered, and I even got loot! It ended up being vendored, but it was still raid loot!
After I left the raid, my DK stood alone in his garrison. I’d killed my first true raid boss, and it felt like I’d opened the door to a whole new set of options. Causes.
Purpose.
I queued up again immediately, signing up for the highest boss I could access – Warlord Blackhand. I zoned in again, and after knocking off some baddies I ended up getting killed in phase three of the Blackhand fight. But I didn’t care. When we won, it felt good.
I wanted more.
I knew I’d still be working on improving my gear, one way or another. But at least I’d have a reason for doing it.
I had found my Why.
Do you have your Cause? Your purpose, your reason for playing WoW? Or have you stepped away from the game because there was no cause for continuing?
Five Reasons Flying in Draenor is Sexy
Not a single mention of the Mile High Club. Promise.
Love it or hate it, flying in Draenor is a thing now. How about that.
Now I can’t speak for anyone else. I can barely speak for myself, since my brain feels like it’s slapped together with rusty wire and spoiled fruit, yet I still realize that this is a fucking video game and not the cure for anything, therefore my emotional investment is not as strong as many others out there.
So for sure relax with all the angst about flying, or not flying. Get a grip.
I was in the “take it or leave it” camp before flying went live. Not having flight wasn’t keeping me from playing or anything like that. But that didn’t stop me from getting the Draenor Pathfinding achievement though. Mostly because doing it gave me something to do, a sense of accomplishment, and a butt-ugly mount that has yet to see the light of day. All in all, I just wasn’t as enamored with flying as many others seemed to be. I didn’t feel like I needed to have it.
That right there is a prime example of that “rusty wire and spoiled fruit” part of my brain, trying to do something silly like think. Because now that I’ve tried it, my vote goes to hells yes to flying.
When I log into WoW, that RL clock keeps ticking away. Don’t get it twisted – I’m not logging into a video game to stand around with my thumb up my ass. No, when it’s time to get my WoW on I’m doing it with a goal in mind, and I want to get things done like five minutes ago. Flying has kicked up my efficiency several notches.
Unfortunately, I’ve barely managed to get more than a few hours of air time in during the past week. But I’ll be honest – the criticisms that flying made things easier was right on the money. Things like…
#5. It’s Now Easier To Play In Dirty Holes
Remember Archaeology? Of course you don’t. Nobody does. It’s the profession that so few people bothered with, Blizzard had to stick a quest NPC out in the middle of nowhere just to let you learn the ability so you could loot a few treasures in Spires of Arak. But did you know it’s also good for other things – like pets, mounts, or some sweet transmog items? It’s true! Really! Stop looking at me like that!
Before WoD flight, leveling Archaeology was a huge pain in the ass. Getting from dig site to dig site was a special kind of abuse, and it took foreeeeeever to get it done. Flight and Archaeology have always gone hand in hand, and now that flying is available in Draenor there’s going to be plenty of people taking things in hand.
#4. You Can Be a Big, Raging Dick (If You Want To)
To quote the great philosopher, Uncle Benjamin Parker, “With great power comes great responsibility.” It’s totes easy to abuse great power like the ability to fly, especially when there’s so few people who actually have it. Those who have it should use that ability for Good.
“Good” being subjective of course.
I’ve got a hunter that I have decided to level to 100. As soon as she reached 90 she was flying around Draenor, gathering treasures and garrison resources and picking up a nice chunk of experience in the process. At thirty thousand xp a pop, it was definitely worth her while to snag every one of those things that she can get her hands on.
But there came a moral dilemma. It happened when she was soaring through the sky, hoping to scoop up a bundle of garrison resources. It was just lying there on the ground, and she closed on it like a mighty eagle swooping down on a helpless rabbit or other cute yet delicious morsel, like a Twinkie. Just before she could sink her talons into her Twinkie-like prey, some dude riding a big boar started closing in at a full-on waddle, trying to get there first.
Please. That’s a race you’re going to lose ten times out of ten, son. They call it air superiority for a reason. Also, nice pig there jack.
But there it was – that moment of moral reflection. She could stop right there in mid-air and fly away, easily picking up other treasures in the zone that this guy would probably never be able to reach. Was it really that important to deny Boar Boy a few garrison resources and a fistload of xp, just because she was on the faster mount?
Damn rights it was.
She landed, looted, and lifted off before Bubba could bring his hairy pig mount to a full stop. I’m sure he wept as she flew away. As the ground fell away beneath her, she laughed and shook her fist at the heavens in celebration of her victory. In my mind she did, anyway. I gave a little fist pump from behind my keyboard, which startled my dog.
I’m not the best person sometimes.
#3. I Can Totally Get Wood So Fast
When you’ve cranked out as many level-capped alts as I have, as fast as I tend to do, being starved for garrison resources is an unfortunate – and fairly common – side effect. Getting the Lumber Mill set up in the garrison is a great way to solve that particular issue. Normally what I’d do is get the Lumber Mill, and level it up as high as I could afford to with whatever gold I had on hand. I’d then make my way up to the northern tip of Gorgrond and grab the nearest flight path to the Laughing Skull village. That spot was the best place to pick up lumber – plenty of spawn points for Timber, and in such a dense area that it was quick to gather them up. A quick cross-realm hop, rinse and repeat.
Before flying, that is.
Nagrand has trees all over the damn place. With flying, I was able to take obscene advantage of that. In the same amount of time I’d spent in Laughing Skullville, I could pick up a couple hundred pieces of wood by flying around Nagrand without having to cross-realm hop for more spawns. It’s also a much better alternative for Alliance alts, since they would have to dodge the Laughing Skull tribesmen in Gorgrond while chopping down their trees.
Ain’t nobody got time for that.
#2. Questing? More like Crushing AM I RITE!
One of my side projects has been to get the “Master Relic Hunter” achievement (aka the achievement that gets you Harrison Jones) on one of my Alliance alts. It can be a beast to do these quests at times, especially the one that sends an Alliance character all the way to the far side of Frostfire Ridge. Even the better quests in the achievement will start you out in the middle of nowhere. The chain of quests that follow drag you all over the hairy ass crack of the countryside. This also has a tendency to roll you through as many mobs as possible, which according to Blizzard is supposed to be “experiencing the content”.
Nine of my eleven level capped characters have Harrison Jones in their garrison. I’m therefore all sorts of good as far as experiencing these quests again. Flying made it so much quicker and easier to jump from point to point that I didn’t even feel my blood pressure start to peak as my alt picked up parchments and avoided packs of fast-spawning birds (If Deathwing could shat his guts out on Skettis, that would be great).
#1. Taking Leveling To A Whole New Level
Like I said, my current project is a Hunter that I’m taking to 100. She was at 86 when I decided to resume her leveling, and dinged 90 after a couple of hours of questing in Pandaria. Deciding I’d rather drop a brick on my man-marbles than go through the Tanaan intro questline again, I took my girl to the Isle of Thunder and pulled off “the shortcut” one more time.
Getting her garrison started was a breeze. Getting her to 91 was even breezier. With heirloom gear and rested xp, she was getting roughly 30,000 xp per garrison resource/treasure that she looted. With flying, she could easily take a victory lap around the zone and pick up all the goodies on the ground. After making one lap around Frostfire Ridge and completing the three bonus objectives (at 100,000 xp each) she was almost at level 92 in maybe 30 minutes. It’ll be interesting to see just how much faster she’ll level with flying (spoiler – she’s going to be leveling much faster).
Anyone out there have their own Draenor flight love stories? I’d love to hear them. Drop ‘em in the comments below, if you’re so inclined, or if they’re of the shorter variety (140 char kind of short) tweet ‘em to @RokkTalk and let me know how flying is making things better in your world.
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