Could it be?!?

This hasn't, so far, been posted to MMO-Champion's front page yet so I'm not just repeating information! Apparently Blizzard is considering reworking Savage Defense a bit so it will absorb damage until a certain amount rather than just breaking as soon as you take any damage.

For Savage Defense the change we're thinking about would probably be instead of reducing the next physical attack for X damage, it would instead absorb X damage for some duration. Big single target hits would probably drop the shield either way, but all the dinkier hits from pack pulls would be mitigated rather well. It's probably something you'll see fleshed out on the PTR.    - Bashiok, Community Manager

In other words - right now if you proc Savage Defense and you get hit for 1 damage or 50,000 damage the shield gets used up. It might completely absorb the damage or it might mitigate the hit and absorb some portion of the damage (depends on your attack power and mastery rating).

What the devs are considering is changing Savage Defense so that it works similar to a Priest's Power Word: Shield. If you proc Savage Defense it absorbs X amount of damage, even if it's multiple hits!

Two things:

1. Easier add/trash tanking!
2. Yay for soloing old content!

---

Also, it's safe to ignore my previous recruitment post, Shenanigans Inc found a new Warlock that we are extremely happy with and we are now continuing our push into heroic content. I also went ahead and assembled a new computer (possible future post) so I'm making a promise to myself to record our heroic kills. Halfus, Chimaeron, Maloriak and Atramedes will not be first kills, but I'm still going to record them. Next up will be Magmaw and Conclave!

The quiet death of hit rating..?

There is a lot of information coming out from various sources about the 4.1 patch. Lots of things I'd like to touch on, but for the moment I want to focus on something that I missed on my first skim of the notes.

"Classes: General

• All non-damaging interrupts off the global cooldown will now always hit the target. This includes Pummel, Shield Bash, Kick, Mind Freeze, Rebuke, Skull Bash, Counterspell, Wind Shear, Solar Beam, Silencing Shot, and related player pet abilities."

Making the case for Hit Rating, kind of

Recently my guild, Shenanigans Inc, downed Heroic Maloriak. During one of our better attempts something happened that was embarrassing and completely preventable. I was in charge of interrupting Arcane Storm and of course the inevitable happened - one of my interrupts missed! So far in Cataclysm I've had relatively good luck with interrupts on my non-hit capped Bear, not so much a few nights ago when I caused this unnecessary wipe. I immediately apologized and reforged a couple of pieces of gear to gain about 1.5% hit rating, putting me above 8%.

Ignoring Hit Rating

Why wasn't I already hit capped? Well hit rating is practically useless past a certain small percent for raiding. Yeah...unless of course you are in charge of interrupting a crucial ability. Sacrificing a fairly large amount of avoidance for a stat that simply increases your threat (and a bit of uptime on Savage Defense) just doesn't seem worth it in the thick of things. When Vengeance gets stacked up a bit and your Mangles are hitting for over 30k threat generation really starts to drop in priority. So I've mostly ignored hit rating (and expertise).

With non-damaging interrupts (aka. Skull Bash) always hitting come 4.1 I'll literally have no use for hit rating except for the first 30 seconds of any given fight. To me it seems with this change Blizzard is really making Hit Rating an option (and a poor option at that) not a requirement. Of course I don't advise running around doing heroic raiding with 0.00% hit, but I'll be dropping the 50 hit enchant from my boots, and reforging most of my hit to Dodge Rating after 4.1 hits live servers.

Problems with ignoring hit

The one big issue with ignoring hit rating is when you are assigned to some form of add tanking in a given encounter. Which is why it's always good to have around a few pieces of gear that can significantly boost your hit rating. For example, pre-4.1 I'm using Fluid Death in one of my trinket slots for a huge hit boost, post-4.1 though you can be sure I'll be going back to either Symbiotic Worm or Lifebound Alchemist Stone paired up with Vial of Stolen Memories.

Honestly if you have a tank in raid that is hit capped and is better at AoE tanking to begin with consider leaving it to them, honestly it's just playing to each others strength, ego need not get involved.

Can't wait for 4.1

Good riddance hit...it was fun while it lasted. Needing hit for taunt (removed chance to miss in 4.0.1), needing hit for threat (end of any tier/expansion when DPS scale up drastically, hello Vengeance), needing hit for interrupts (changing in 4.1), you put up a good fight but you're dead to me. =]

Feral talent builds (4.0.6)

This post might not be as pretty as it could be, but I want to relay as much information as efficiently as possible.

I've divided this post into three sections. First is Bear spec, second is Cat spec, and third is hybrid (Bear/Cat, Cat/Bear) spec(s).

As a precursor so I don't have to keep mentioning it later on:

Brutal Impact is really nice to have in 10m, there are times when you simply don't have another interrupter readily available to help interrupt or for some other reason it's just easier if you are interrupting which is impossible without this talent.

Fury Swipes, Stampede, and possibly Feral Aggression are all talents that vary by preference. I would never have a build without Feral Aggression (more on this down below), Fury Swipes is really nice for threat/rage generation (but doesn't proc Savage Defense), and Stampede is situational at best.

Part 1: Bear Build
The only option for a full Bear build is the points between Fury Swipes, Feral Aggression, and Stampede. Personally I max everything except Fury Swipes. Even doing this you still have 2 spare points and they fit nicely into Fury Swipes (no other option).

Feral Aggression is extremely important as hit is not that valuable for tanking currently. If you are low on hit you might see abilities miss and miss often. It's best that when your Faerie Fire (Feral) does hit, it immediately stacks up to three. And also, like I said, you don't really have any other obvious choice for the points..

Talents:
http://www.wowhead.com/talent#0ZfMrbRubzrckMcu:qr00zVzMm

Glyphs:
Prime - Berserk, Lacerate, Mangle
Major - Frenzied Regeneration, Maul, Rebirth (optional), Feral Charge (optional), Faerie Fire (optional)
Minor - Challenging Roar, Unburdened Rebirth, Dash (all minor glyphs are preferences)

Part 2: Cat Build
I don't have much to say about the Cat build other than you have plenty of points to get everything that is a DPS increase. You end up with one extra point if you take every DPS increase and I throw it in Nurturing Instinct as it's probably the most useful if you use Tranquility and because it makes your healers stronger when they need to heal you.

Talents:
http://www.wowhead.com/talent#0ZfbGfRzddbfzMcz:MzfVsimz0

Glyphs:
Prime - Rip, Shred, Tiger's Fury, Savage Roar (I believe Tiger's Fury is better than Savage Roar, check EJ Forums for more info though)
Major - Rebirth, Entangling Roots, Feral Charge, Ferocious Bite, Faerie Fire
Minor - Dash, Unburdened Rebirth, Aquatic Form (all minor glyphs are preferences)

Part 3: Hybrid Builds
I've always hoped that Blizzard would eventually offer tri-spec, what...a Druid can dream can't he/she? Given that isn't going to happen anytime soon or at all, it's sometimes necessary to delve into the realm of hybrid talent builds. The nice thing for me is I hardly ever DPS on my Druid so I can lean a bit heavier onto the Bear side.

There are two different mentalities one might want to use when designing a Feral hybrid spec and they can most easily be described as these:

1. Bear/Cat - Pick up everything you need to be an effective Tank, sacrifice some DPS
2. Cat/Bear - Pick up everything you need to be an effective DPS, sacrifice some Tank talents

Pretty obvious. For me I easily fall into the first camp. I need to be the best Bear I can be for progression and because I rarely DPS, for others maybe it's different. So first lets focus in on Bear/Cat and build a spec around that mentality.

Bear / Cat
For this spec we want to complete our Bear talents to be the most effective tank we can possibly be and then pick up as many Cat talents so we can effectively DPS.

The cat talents that you have to sacrifice to be the best Bear you can be are Predatory Strikes (not a huge DPS increase), Blood in the Water (unfortunate, but you need the points to mitigate spell damage), and Stampede (situational DPS increase). You also only have the option for one spare point after getting everything you need for Bear, so I suggest throwing that point into either Fury Swipes or Stampede.

Talents:
http://www.wowhead.com/talent#0ZfMRfoubzrckMcu:Mz00zVMzm

Glyphs:
For hybrid specs you can always min/max depending on what you are doing in a given encounter. The only cost is the 10 gold for Dust of Disappearance. Overall I'm suggesting glyphs that will be the best of both worlds, but ideally you would change them to be appropriate on a per encounter basis.

Prime - Rip, Shred, Mangle (Lacerate, Tiger's Fury, Berserk are all suitable based on role)
Major - Frenzied Regeneration, Maul, Rebirth (nothing really important for Cat)
Minor - Challenging Roar, Unburdened Rebirth, Dash (all minor glyphs are preferences)

Cat / Bear
For this spec we want to complete our Cat talents to be the most effective DPS we can, but at the same time we need to have all of the essential Bear talents so we are a logical choice and not a risk to the raid when tanking.

The only difference between this build and the Bear / Cat build above is you can free up some points from Perseverance and put them in Blood in the Water and Fury Swipes.

Talents:
http://www.wowhead.com/talent#0ZfMrfoubzrfkMcz:Mz00zVmzM

Glyphs:
For hybrid specs you can always min/max depending on what you are doing in a given encounter. The only cost is the 10 gold for Dust of Disappearance. Overall I'm suggesting glyphs that will be the best of both worlds, but ideally you would change them to be appropriate on a per encounter basis.


Prime - Rip, Shred, Mangle (Lacerate, Tiger's Fury, Berserk are all suitable based on role)
Major - Frenzied Regeneration, Maul, Rebirth (nothing really important for Cat)
Minor - Challenging Roar, Unburdened Rebirth, Dash (all minor glyphs are preferences)

Cataclysm Bear Rotation

I'm not really sure why I hadn't put this post up earlier in the expansion as I'm sure it would have been quite useful. Better late then never I suppose, so if you are curious about the optimal bear rotation to maintain max TPS (Threat/sec) look no further!

Abilities used in standard tanking rotation(s)

Mangle
Maul
Lacerate
Pulverize
Swipe
Faerie Fire (Feral)
Demoralizing Roar
Thrash

How do you come up with a "standard" rotation?
There are a couple things that you should consider in order to determine what your highest DPS and TPS rotation is. Sometimes they aren't the same! Regardless, once again I turn to Rawr for some numbers. When properly configured Rawr is an excellent tool for all sorts of information. Earlier this week I showed first How to set up rawr as a Bear tank and then I showed how to use the RSVs that Rawr gives you in conjunction with Wowhead to produce an extensive and trustworthy BiS gear list.

In this post I'll focus on the last section of the "Stats" tab in Rawr. Once everything is configured correctly and you've looked over your gear to ensure it's the correct pieces with the correct enchants/gems/etc. Have a look at the last section labeled "Threat Stats" (you might need to scroll down in the "Stats" tab to see it):

Don't follow these numbers blindly!

There is a LOT of information here and don't forget about mouse-overs as they are fairly helpful in this section of Rawr. For example when I highlight over the numbers to the right of "Melee:" Rawr tells me this:

Per Hit: 5,880 damage, 17, 640 threat
Per Swing: 5,951 damage, 17,854 threat
Per Second: 2,837 damage, 8,512 threat
Fury Swipes Hit: 18,228, 54, 684 threat
Fury Swipes Swing: 18,782 damage, 56,346 threat
Total: 3,651 dps, 10,954 tps

All of that information on just one mouse-over is excellent. Based on the information listed in this pane you can clearly see which abilities offer up the most threat and you are well on your way to determining a tanking rotation.

Rawr's max TPS rotation
When I mouse over the numbers to the right of "Highest TPS Rotation:" Rawr tells me what is considered the highest threat rotation (which also happens to be the highest DPS rotation). Let me copy it word for word here and then in the next section I'll spell it out a bit more:

1. Mangle if off cooldown
2. Lacerate if no Lacerate stacks
3. Demoralizing Roar if not up
4. Thrash if off cooldown
5. Lacerate if less than three Lacerate stacks
6. Pulverize if three Lacerate stacks and no Pulverize buff
7. Faerie Fire (Feral) if off cooldown
8. Lacerate

Standard "Rotation" Priorities
As you might have guessed Feral Bears don't necessarily have a set rotation when it comes to maximizing threat and damage. Think of this as a list starting with the very most important thing (high priority) to the least important thing (low priority).

1. Mangle / Mangle from Berserk Procs
2. At least 1 stack of Lacerate
3. Keep Demoralizing Roar on target
4. Trash
5. A max (3) stack of Lacerate
6. A max stack Pulverize (if Pulverize is not up)
7. Keep Faerie Fire on target (use if low rage)
8. Maul (if you have the spare rage)

AoE Priorities
AoE is very different compared to single target and depends on a number of things. The important thing to realize is that you should be using Swipe and Thrash on cooldown, keeping Demoralizing Roar up at all times on as many targets as possible, and tab targetting to get as many Lacerates as you can going to proc Berserk.

1. Time Swipe to hit the maximum number of targets
2. Time Thrash to hit the maximum number of targets
3. Demoralizing Roar
4. Mangle main target
5. Lacerate main target
6. Tab target other mobs in melee range and apply Lacerates (even without Mangle if necessary)
7. Use Berserk proc'd Mangles on targets that you are losing threat on
8. Maul every cooldown (rage permitting)

Final Thoughts
Hit and Expertise go a long way in helping to stick to the above priorities, but the important thing to realize is after about 15-20 seconds into a given encounter your threat should be pulling away (above) anyone else in raid. With the way that Vengeance works currently there really is NO reason to worry about Hit/Expertise.

As a general rule of thumb I'd say shoot for the dodge cap for Expertise (5.00%) and enough hit so you aren't running around with zero or something crazy like that. That's really the best advice I can give, unless you are tasked with interrupting a crucial ability (in 10m maybe, should never be the case in 25m) you really don't have to worry about hit.

Any questions/concerns/etc please feel free to comment! I'm always looking for feedback and what other people find helpful and not so helpful.

What a crazy week it has been..

I don't have too much time this week for a long blog post and believe me there are lots of things to talk about. The scramble to 85, the dungeons, the heroics, the gear, the Tol Borad raid, gear, reforging, stats, alchemy, engineering, YIKES!

I did go through some guild changes as well, probably more on this later, but right now I want to focus on getting Shenanigans Inc. up and running. Quite literally any information you could want to know can be found at our website - here. If you are a Protection Warrior or Hunter and you enjoy raiding and having fun and all that other cliche stuff that sells a guild, get a hold of me in game or on the website.

More to come..once things calm the heck down.

My Pre-Cataclysm game plan

Time to chat about a game plan for Cataclysm, starting with preparations for the leveling rush on December 7!

• Clear the work schedule.
  I have a bunch of vacation days that I should probably use anyways before the end of the year. Sure they carry over, but accumulating 10 a year, I could spare a few to get a head start on leveling! Just told the boss I was taking a few days off for my birthday, a kind of stay-cation. =]
  
  
• Clear bags of anything I don't think I'll need while leveling.
  I typically carry around a bunch of extra gear including several different sets for PvP, Feral Cat, Feral Tank, and special items for specific tanking encounters (armor/survival compared to threat/avoidance). Most of this stuff can find a place in my bank, which leads to my next point...
  
  
• Clean up my bank and make some room!
  Really my bank is a large extension from my bags because of my robot butler pal, so I don't mind not having every single item I might need sometime between 80-85 in my bank. I can also move most WotLK crafting materials, mats, non-soul bound items to my bank alt.
  
  
• Consumables.
  I'll have a few stacks of Well Fed food as well as my Alchemy flask, it's nice to have that extra bit of oomph!
  
  
• Leveling Spec.
  Since I'll be leveling with dual feral builds I'll have one specifically tailored for tanking (my current spec) and one tailored for kitty leveling.
  
  Tanking:
  I'll add points into Natural Shapeshifter/Master Shapeshifter, and then grab Perseverance as I level.
  
  DPS:
  Not sure if I'll for sure go with these particular glyphs, but I'll be able to switch them on the fly so it doesn't much matter. As far as points while leveling, I'll probably end up filling in Natural Shapeshifter/Master Shapeshifter and then Fury Swipes and then it won't matter much.
  
  
• Full quest log.
  It's a great way to grab a quick little boost of experience the second you log in to start leveling. Think dailies!
  
  Wowhead does a great job of filtering dailies and experience gained (based on level): Sorted by reward, filtered to only WotLK and Daily

Tauren ARE the master race!

I could talk about the changes cataclysm is bringing and has already brought. I could talk about the completely broken AoE threat problems that bears are facing until level 81. I could even talk about the fun I'm having leveling a new Warrior alt while waiting for December 7th. All of them would be more informative and useful than something that is far and away more important and demanding of everyone's time.

Are people seriously rolling/race changing to Troll Druids? Let me break this down real nice and easy...I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings. I actually like Trolls, well most of em..

Troll Warrior, Mage, Priest, Hunter, Rogue and Shaman (and Death Knight) I get. I'm okay with it. However I'm really not okay with Troll Druids. The thing is, I actually think the new Troll Druid forms look neat and it's probably nice having a semi-useful racial ability in a raid (Berserking > War Stomp for min-max purposes). I can even look past the inherent lore problems..aka worst explanation for a race/class combination yet!

The one thing that I can not and will not come to terms with if you are horde-side is.."If you have the option to play a Tauren and want to roll a Druid, why on Azeroth would you choose a Troll?". Tauren are the master race. Why might you ask? Let's look at the clear and non-biased evidence shall we:

• Tauren are the biggest (playable) race in World of Warcraft - this should automatically convince you. You look cooler on mounts, your armor and weapons look cooler..the reasons related to size go on and on. In this case - bigger is definitely better.
• Tauren have an amazingly awesome dance. Period.
• Tauren have(had) the coolest Leader.
• Some consider Tauren to be the most peaceful race in WoW. This is heavily debated, but trust me I've done hours and hours of non-biased research.
• Tauren have the most unique and coolest major city.
• Tauren have mastered all of the coolest classes. The only one they are working on is Mage, and don't worry it'll happen (Shoo Rogues/Warlocks).
• Tauren are involved in one of the oldest and well known racist jokes in WoW history (lol Cow lol).
• Tauren tend to have the greatest community members - ALAMO!
• Too many things to list.....

Maybe some screenshots will convince you:

Notice how awesome I look here.

The only pollution that is tolerable by a Tauren/Druid...

You're convinced, right?

Master Race.

Seriously, MASTER Race.

Elemental Invasion - Part 4

So Mal'Ganis is a great server. It's got loads of PvE potential if your a good player and really hits home the Massive in MMO. The other good things about an enormous horde population are just as obvious. But then you have the bad things. The crazy things...

 

The best part was when a GM showed up and announced that anyone standing on top of NPCs was violating the ToS and could be banned. Made those Goons think twice!

Quick thoughts on 25m vs. 10m in Cataclysm

As the Cataclysm (and "The Shattering") draw closer and people prepare themselves for what ever type of leveling they plan on doing, more and more attention is being brought to the idea of 25 man versus 10 man raiding. And for good reason..

It's a fair assumption that most 25 man guilds are anxious to see how the first tier of Cataclysm pans out. The decision needs to be made:

• Continue to organize a 25 man raid
• Reform/Break apart/whatever into 10 man raiding

The topic has been discussed, endlessly might I add, since Blizzard announced the changes. Which if you don't know (seriously?) here is the important parts:

"The first of the refinements being made is that we're combining all raid sizes and difficulties into a single lockout. Unlike today, 10- and 25-player modes of a single raid will share the same lockout. You can defeat each raid boss once per week per character. In other words, if you wanted to do both a 10- and 25-person raid in a single week, you’d need to do so on two different characters. Normal versus Heroic mode will be chosen on a per-boss basis in Cataclysm raids, the same way it works in Icecrown Citadel. Obviously the raid lockout change doesn't apply in pure Icecrown terms though, as this change goes hand-in-hand with a few other changes to raid progression in Cataclysm."

Rather than talk about what to do or what I think might happen or even what I want to do (which I'm not sure yet) I want to talk about something that is of a different type of concern.

For a social game all about interactions with other people and creating bonds with people you've never met face-to-face (sometimes stronger bonds than in real life), why is everyone SO concerned about logistics and efficiency? Basically the argument against 25m raiding in Cataclysm is always a rehash of the same basic thought process - Why put the time and effort into organizing and dealing with a 25 man raid if we reap the same rewards from a 10 man raid?

Does anyone find this as troubling as I do? For example, how about 25 man raiding guilds that started up in Vanilla BC, 40 man raiding it took real talent to organize that type of raiding, even 25 mans in Burning Crusade and Wrath of the Lich King can cause any seasoned Raid Leader/Organizer headaches. Some of these guilds follow this line of though:

"We've been raiding together in a large group like this since pre-BC, and we'll likely continue to do so in Cataclysm, we have no intention's in splitting up into smaller raid groups, not at least until we see exactly what benefits 25 man raiding have over 10 man."

So even people that have enjoyed each others company and don't even WANT to switch to 10 man are considering it simply because it's more efficient and awards the same benefits? If World of Warcraft is anything, it's a game that's suppose to be incredibly fun with other people, especially other people that you've come to know, sometimes better than any person you've encountered in real life. Is it worth giving that all up? Does it really matter that 10 mans are easier to organize? Guilds and Raid Leaders that struggle to organize 25 mans might look at the Cataclysm raiding scene as a blessing, but is it, even for them?

10 people can have an extremely fun time playing this game together, it's close knit, it's a family. There is no denying that 10 mans will forever be easier to organize than 25 mans. That's now my point though. Think about the 25 man guilds and their players that are legitimately torn between easier/faster rewards and continuing to raid with the people they enjoy.

What does it say about social gaming in an MMO? A player is more likely to break off into a 10 man raid because above all else there is more success to be had individually. Everything is groovy in 25 mans until the benefit is taken out.

So instead of posing the question - "Why raid 25 mans when 10 mans will have the same rewards"? I pose a different question, maybe a better question, and one that concerns me a bit more - "If you enjoy raiding with 24 other people, are you really considering 10 man raiding because it's easier and more rewarding?"

What do you think?

You'd think Blizzard learned a lesson...

So, as I'm sure most everyone that logged in yesterday can tell, the "Elemental Invasion" has started. Basically Blizzard flipped the switch and now not only are elementals spawning across all of World of Warcraft's continents (including Outlands...which can I just say makes no sense) the "doomsayers" are also making their presence known.

There are a couple of things to do already and the Invasion has just begun. First there is a time consuming Feat of Strength (FoS), Tripping the Rifts, that requires you to be present at a Fire, Wind, Earth and Water "elemental rift" when they spawn. You complete the Feat of Strength by being close to the rift when it "dies". The only way to destroy a rift is to take out the elementals that spawn from it. As an added bonus to getting the FoS, if you destroy a rift in an level appropriate zone you can pick up a daily (Hammering It Out). Pretty simple. The annoying part is finding the darn rifts! I spent a little over an hour last night and ended up with 2 of the 4 buffs. Believe it or not that's not what the title of this post is about. I can deal with wasting large amounts of time as "filler" content before an expansion..I get it, it's a Feat of Strength no one is holding a gun to my head.

The other half of the fun starts in Orgrimmar (Stormwind for Alliance) with a quest called Prophecies Of Doom. It's a medium sized quest chain that has you run around the city and it's outskirts and the basic idea is, you learn what the doomsayers are all about, you pretend to be a doomsayer to get information, you get the information and use it against the doomsayers and then you go tell on the doomsayers to Garrosh. Here's the problem..

On a server like Mal'Ganis there are literally hundreds and hundreds of people doing this chain of quests at the same time. I wish I had taken some screen shots, but I was too busy zooming into first person view trying to click on a tiny little scroll. There are three scrolls you have to pick up for this first quest and they are situated close to the ground on little "tables" besides doomsayers. Two of the three scrolls were fine, but the third one..no chance. At least 30-40 people on mammoth mounts, and dancing, and using spell effects and whatever else you can use to obscure the view are all standing on top of the scroll. There is actually a guild on Mal'Ganis, Goon Squad (they would probably enjoy that I'm naming them specifically), that purposefully blocked access to the scroll.

The only solution, and the only way to finish the quest was to purchase/create an Lesser/Invisibility Potion which thankfully makes every player disappear similar to when a Mage uses Invisibility. Some people even took the harassment a step further and bought out the entire Invisibility potion market on the AH and started re-posting each potion for 100g each. I quickly bough the mats to create the Lesser version of the potion which no one had touched yet for 5g and crafted two (one for me and one for Kaate [my significant other]). Just the worst of the worst kind of people trying to ruin peoples night. But honestly..while I blame them entirely for displaying that type of behavior, I have to wonder why Blizzard didn't account for it.

Two examples, real quick, of similar harassment that Blizzard had to take action for.

The first was actually recent and dealt with mail boxes. Once the Mammoth mounts, Exhibit A, Exhibit B and Exhibit C, were introduced to the game people would block mailboxes in major cities by standing on top of them so people couldn't right-click them. So Blizzard added more mailboxes. That was a reasonable solution there probably should have been more in the cities anyway.

Second example was during the release of Sunwell and the Sunwell dailies. All the quest givers had to be raised up onto platforms so people could quickly and easily interact with them without having to hunt through countless other players and their mounts. It was a reasonable and thoughtful solution. Put the NPCs up on platforms that are impossible to stand on as players and no more harassment.

Should have tossed that in a best practices handbook for the developers...me thinks.

Bear Max TPS rotation Now and in the future

Live

With all of the changes coming down the pipeline in regards to cataclysm, and my last post about Bear AoE tanking, I thought it'd be a good idea to lay down what I use as my Bear tanking rotation currently, and hopefully within the next couple of months we'll be able to confidently say, Bear tanking (in terms of what abilities you are hitting) has changed to at least be a little more interesting.

So currently on live here's a detailed run-down of a max threat Bear rotation, it assumes you have the rage (of course you do), you are main tanking, and you have respectable amounts of hit/expertise and you have 0/0 points in Improved Mangle.

Normally you want to start with a Faerie Fire (Feral) or a mangle.


Once you are at five stacks of lacerate your rotation changes slightly, but then is the same until the boss dies or your lacerate stack falls off for whatever reason.

It should look like this from the pull until the boss dies:

[Pre-five stack of Lacerate] FFF>Mangle>L>L>FFF>Mangle>L>L>FFF>Mangle>L>S

[Lacerate is stacked to five] FFF>Mangle>S>S>FFF>Mangle>S>S>FFF>Mangle>S>L>Repeat

The only thing I did not include above is Demoralizing Roar and Maul. Demoralizing Roar because it extends the above rotation by a couple of iterations and is pretty much redundant. So just be sure (if someone else isn't already putting up an attack power debuff) to replace one of your swipes (not lacerate) with Demoralizing Roar. Maul should be queued up all the time via macro or if you are like me, old school key bind.

The rotation above (again as long as you don't have Improved Mangle) never changes and it's restricted by GCDs. You'll quickly start to notice that after your second Swipe or Lacerate if you are refreshing, FFF will have just come off the GCD the same time it's cooldown is up. And once you FFF, Mangle will come off cooldown the same time it's off the GCD. A simplified way of looking at the rotation is, you have two GCDs to do whatever you want between using FFF and Mangle on cooldown.

One other small thing to mention with the Bear rotation. If you are having trouble keeping Lacerate from falling off, change the "Lacerate is stacked to 5" rotation above just a little bit. Instead of waiting until the last second to Lacerate, Lacerate on the first GCD and then Swipe on the second. You'll end up overwriting Lacerate a bit earlier and it won't get the last tick, but it will keep you from having it drop off and stacking it back up.

[Cautious about Lacerate] FFF>Mangle>S>S>FFF>Mangle>S>S>FFF>Mangle>L>S>Repeat

This is all drastically changing in Cataclysm.

1. Maul is no longer "On next attack", so it's going to have to be incorporated when it makes the most sense, which is possibly high rage, when you know the rage wouldn't be put to use doing something more important.
2. Lacerate stacks can be "eaten" by Pulverize, which will increase threat, but at the same time require lacerate to be applied more often.
3. Swipe is getting at least a 6 second cooldown.
4. Thrash makes it's debut, may be used in conjunction with Swipe for AoE tanking as well as rotated in to the single target rotation.
5. Faerie Fire Feral no longer has a cooldown, now stacks, and (I believe) costs rage.

With all of the changes, it's hard to tell exactly what a rotation is going to look like so I'm not going to bother guessing; however, it's definitely going to be interesting seeing how all of these changes mold the new Bear rotation!

Changing everthing we've ever known of Bear AoE tanking one tooltip at a time..

Sooo, six second cooldown on Swipe. Why do I feel like this has happened before? What is it...something is like clawing at the back of my brain saying, "Remember when this happened and like everyone was formulating their 'sky is falling' theories?"

Ah hah! Sunwell! AoE healing spells changed in a very similar fashion.. Here is pretty much the way people felt about it when it was announced (first link on google when I typed in "when did circle of healing get a cooldown"

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?sid=1&topicId=12454546105

Let me quote the first post just incase you are being lazy and don't want to clicky.

Bunnypuncher says:

Circle of healing is very great for fights that introduce continuous raid-wide AOE damage.

Circle of healing is good for healing the entire raid granted they are close enough to each other to warrant AOE heals.

How is introducing a 6 second cooldown on the spell going to solve the issue of priests only using one ability? All this will do is make the continuous raid wide AOE damage impossible to heal. It will not affect other fights where constant AOE damage is not being taken.

Think of it this way. If I am healing 5 people taking constant damage (like on Bloodboil), circle of healing is immensely powerful. But as soon as that damage stops, it's virtually useless, and I should focus on other heals. Adding a cooldown to CoH will just make Bloodboil unnecessarily harder while not affecting the off-period where there is no AOE damage. We generally don't spam COH 3-4 times in a row when that AOE damage is not coming at us, so why make those fights THAT much harder.

Of course this is all assuming you keep fights like Bloodboil, Malacrass, Void Reaver etc. in WOTLK. But if you are doing away with the nasty raid wide AOES, then why bother making the change at all?

My two cents.

This is exactly what's brewing for this swipe change. Poor feral druids all around the world are stretching their paws out and slowly waking up to see this bomb dropped!

I'm not worried though. Nope not even one bit!

I actually almost welcome this change. Currently on live if you are a bear and you are assigned to tank some type of group you have but one option: Spam swipe and maul on everything and don't even think about using a GCD to demoralizing roar or mangle for that matter.

What this change does is essentially free us up. Blizzard's going to make sure we can AoE tank well enough that we don't go back to pre-360 degree 3 mobs only swipe days. So it's pointless to get all worked up about that. I really think they are making a determined effort to do two things.

1. Not everything is going to be about AoE tanking, they really want CC back and I say bring it on.
2. Bears are really boring, especially AoE tanking, and they want to change that

Possibly look for something closer to: Toss a thrash out, followed by a swipe, get demoralizing roar up and look to brush up your tab targeting skills.

Right now on Beta

Swipe is really weak. I think it's hitting for about a quarter of what it does on live for me..maybe a bit more than that. I don't know if that's intended or if it's just scaling poorly due to the lack of talents existing anymore to boost it's damage. Regardless, the bear scene is changing quite a bit as is all of the classes/specs.

I hate to admit that I haven't really been ON the beta that much recently. Between raiding and logging into live to do a couple of things before raid, I don't have much WoW time to actually hop on the beta and tinker around. I'm going to really make an effort to get in there and tank an instance or two and then I can gauge a bit better how things are and possibly where things are going.

Incoming Cataclysm Beta thoughts!

Really just a quick update. Got some great news from the folks over at Blizzard last night!

Oh yes! It's true:

I copied my druid over last night and can't wait to get the client installed so I can start messing around with things tonight!

I'll have much more to come about the current tanking situation in the beta, as well as anything else that is worthy of a post dealing with druids. I'm going to try and avoid putting up general beta information since MMO-Champ is much better at that anyways. Stay tuned! And if anyone not lucky enough (yet) to be in the Beta wants to test something out let me know and I'll see if I can help.

Thanks Blizzard! =D

on Talent Trees, Patience, and Being a Robot

First order of business is the flood of class information released yesterday. Yes I looked over the feral and resto trees, yes I tried a couple different preliminary specs, yes I have a few concerns, no I'm not going to bother worrying about it just yet or lose any sleep.

I will say there are some things missing from the feral tree that just can't go away, namely Improved Leader of the Pack! If it's going to be an ability learned from the trainer to "upgrade" regular LotP once you get to it in the talent tree that's fine, but I just don't want to see it disappear completely. Good bye soloing old content (and new content for that matter, haha).

A couple other things not there but I'm not as worried about either because it was mentioned that it would be included (even if not directly) in the talent tree or because it's clearly obvious Blizzard is going to make quite a few passes before we have something resembling finalized talents:

Omen of Clarity - Already mentioned that Blizzard was well aware this is useful to all druids and will show up somehow.

Primal Fury - No more kitty love..? I do like to DPS occasionally, and getting one combo point regardless of critical hits is going to be incredibly awkward and possibly completely requiring of a new kitty "priority", which I'm not trying to say that's a good or bad thing..it will just be very very different.

Blessing of the Grove/Perseverance - They just don't feel right. Maybe Blessing of the Grove should include something for bears, or maybe furor should come over to the feral tree! (where it belongs) The idea for a bear build is to probably get down to Perseverance and this is especially true if Protector of the Pack is gone for good or we don't get some baked in spell damage reduction in bear form.

Nothing more to say about it right now..like I said no reason to get all choked up. Yet!!!??! =P

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Second order of business! For the love of Soggoth Blizzard, can I please haz a BETA invite? I promise I'll submit feedback and test things out how they are and are not intended to be tested! Fear not, even though it may seem like it, my patience is not wearing thin just yet, I haven't lost all hope. Make this happen.

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And finally, something rather important to me, and something I'm proud to announce! I'm officially a robot.

I love this guild.I've been trialing the past couple of weeks, and I must have done something right because I was promoted to raider rank last night right before pulling heroic Marrowgar.

It really feels good to be back into a legit progression progression guild. I'm looking forward to the rest of this expansion now and hopefully killing Heroic 25 Lich King. As far as plans for Cataclysm, I'm sticking around with this guild, hopefully the core group feels like the benefits of raiding in a 25 man guild outweigh the ease of splitting off to 10 man raids. Time will tell..

NDA, Cata Profession Preview, Ruby Sanctum, Expertise/Hit, T10 4-piece

All things Cataclysm

MMO-Champion announced early today that Blizzard formally asked them to remove all leaked Cataclysm information from the website. This includes any information posted on the sites forums as well as information posted to the main news feed.

Personally I think it's a good thing Blizzard is enforcing the NDA to some extent and even though MMO-Champion is a huge site that gets a ton of traffic, I have a feeling Blizzard pays attention to as much as possible across the internet for all "unofficial" cataclysm information.

I admittedly ate up the information that was posted on the site, but I also have no issue waiting for the beta to start and the NDA to be lifted before seeing more than what Blizzard intends for the public to see.

This brings me nicely to my next topic: Relatively long blue post about cataclysm professions was released on the European forums and I'm pretty happy with most of the changes.

Engineering:

• Engineering is still being designed, but expect new unpredictable gadgets to use on yourself or enemies. Toys, explosives, and even a new vanity pet or two. Oh, and powerful mechanical bows and crossbows in addition to guns.
• In general, we want Engineering to remain a tradeskill mainly focused on creating fun or useful gadgets for the engineer, but we are exploring options for items that can be sold to other players for profit. 
  

 I'm really happy they are keeping Engineering relatively the same. Just give me a new (or keep the current) rocket boots and cloak parachute and I'll consider any other new/interesting additions as added perks!

Alchemy:

• New elixirs will be about 75% as strong as flasks. So you can get more total stat points with two elixirs, but flasks will still be the best at giving you a single offensive or defensive stat.
• New unique material used by nearly all high-level recipes will be created by alchemists on a one-day cooldown.
• New Mysterious Potion created with common materials restores health and mana in a massively random range, as well as sometimes granting the benefit of another potion. The health and mana range is from 1-20,000 and is able to crit. The minimum amount restored, however, is scaled upwards by the Alchemy skill, making it a great choice for alchemists to keep for themselves.
• All potions and elixirs now use the same basic vial type. Flasks still use a fancy vial.
• New Alchemist Stone.
  

I'll be honest I'm kind of on the fence with Alchemy right now. Everything in this preview looks promising with the exception of possibly the elixir change in the first bullet. As long as elixirs persist through death (which I highly doubt) the change is fine, but either way the rest of the alchemy preview looks promising. I really like the idea of the Mystery potion and it's added benefit to Alchemists; however, I have to admit I've been thinking of switching over to Jewelcrafting for some time now because of the added stats. And the flexibility that comes with that.

I suppose I will wait until Cataclysm releases or at least further into the alpha/beta before I make my decision, but it's something to keep watching.

Sunwell 2.0   The Gods of Zul'Aman 2.0   Obsidian Sanctum 3.0   Ruby "filler-content" Sanctum

Yes there is significant story and reason for it to be added, yes it will add some diversity to off-set/trinket slots for characters, yes it will keep people busy before cataclysm starts, but at least be a bit more creative than just adding a new boss with re-used models and popping in three fake...err excuse me.."mini-bosses".

It's never felt "epic" or mustered a sense of accomplishment, at least for me, fighting boss minions that have more health than regular trash and unique names, but cause no real threat to the success of a raid (see: Obsidian Sanctum drakes [if not doing hard-mode] & Freya tree adds [if not doing hard-mode]).

Time sink city if we have to kill a whole bunch of trash waves...yay!

Sorry for the ranting - I'm done. /hug

VoA comes through big and T10 4-piece really is THAT good

I was sitting at around 71ish frost emblems when this week started and had full intentions of picking up the T10 iLvl 251 legs from the vendor once I hit 95 emblems, but the first thing Berserk does as a guild once raid time starts on Tuesdays is head over to Wintersgrasp and knock out Toravon for some easy badges and hopefully something usef...BAM iLvl 264 feral pants drop! So now I'm sitting pretty at 105+ emblems after ICC 25 last night and I now have my 4-piece tanking set.

It's kind of funny with the current system how a couple weeks ago I was starved for emblems and had to be careful about every purchase I made and now I'm practically swimming in them so to speak.

Regardless it seems as though my expertise and hit rating woes are solved. I went ahead and picked up this beauty for 7k gold on the AH to make up for the hit I was losing by swaping from T9 pants to T10, and I'm pretty happy with my overall stats now.

And oh yeah - the T10 4-piece is A-M-A-Z-I-N-G. This is something anyone who is a bear tank has probably known for at least a couple months, but the low cool down on Enrage makes this fantastic in conjunction with Barkskin.

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Hopefully some solid attempts on Arthas tonight after we get Sindragosa down in 25 man! Hopefully they let me solo tank Sindragosa and MT Arthas at least for Phase One.

Cheers.