News and Opinion

General news and opinion about WoW.

How Fast can you Kill Curator?

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Curator speed

One of the funnest encounters for me in the game is when I get to see big 4-digit numbers scroll up through my screen. As a healer, I hardly ever see that. So it’s definitely a pleasant sight. I posted a cropped version of a kill shot I took of Curator several weeks ago because we killed him in a ridiculously fast amount of time. My personal goal is to see this guy dead before the 2 minute mark. If you’ve ever played Mario Kart, you’ll remember that the game had a function called Time Trial. I wish WoW had something like that. Then maybe we could all get funky titles based on how fast we blitz an encounter.

So how fast can you kill Curator?

Group Makeup

    Protection Paladin (Main tank)
    DPS Warrior
    Feral Druid
    Enhancement Shaman
    Hunter
    Resto Druid
    Warlock
    Mage
    Holy Paladin
    Resto Shaman

General Tips

  • Blow cooldowns at the 10 second to evocate mark
  • Drop fire elementals at the base of Curator
  • DPS down the sparks until the last one, then let it free. Group should be geared enough to withstand 15 seconds of that free spark.

Oh and you know the cardinal rule of bragging and SS or it didn’t happen. Photoshopping doesn’t count either, you crazy people!

Are You Kidding Me?!

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Have you seen the test realm notes? Can you believe that they’re doing this to me? This is absolutely outrageous! All that hardwork and then they decide to step on everything I’ve accomplished. I invested so much time and effort in learning my skills!

Of course, I am obviously referring to:

Monstrous Kaliri have learned how to chase players going straight up.

Now I’m really screwed in dailies! Can I get at least chaff or flares or some kind of countermeasures or SOMETHING? Sometimes, I wear my Benediction staff in the hopes that the sparkles that fly out the back end are enough to blind those friggin’ birds.

Responding to the “I Play for Personal Advancement and Gear Argument”

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I was going through my dailies this morning (a real life quest involving using all my reagents to create coffee, finding clothes, and reading 20 blogs before going to school) and I came across a post on the Raider’s Progress that was seemingly not happy with Warcrafter.

The reason for their unhappiness?

It has nothing to do with the features of Warcrafter.
It has nothing to do with the information on Warcrafter
It has nothing to do with the analysis and conclusions that comes out of Warcrafter.

It has to do with the attitude and mentality that these kind of services support. That is, emphasizing the person over the player.

The Question

This quote effectively echoes the sentiment of 95% of players in the game [citation needed]:

    the only reason I play is because of gear and my personal advancement. I know it sounds selfish but thats how it is.

That quote was also taken from Raider’s Progress.

That’s fair enough. Everyone likes to feel a sense of achievement. The best way to express that achievement is via the gear on your character. It proves that you’ve done certain things in the game and killed certain bosses. Raiding Guilds are composed of players that want to progress in WoW (Casual and hardcore).

Players that are in the game only for themselves can be detrimental to the Guild they are in. But sometimes, being selfish can be a good thing. If the attitude can be harnessed properly, you can easily turn a player from a loot maniac to a player who will do whatever it takes to get the loot he wants.

So how do you change the mentality of that player who is so intrinsically selfish that he doesn’t seem to care about the Guild?

The Answer

You, as the GM, officer, monkey, murloc or whatever title you may have in the Guild have to make them understand 1 thing only.

Change this:

    the only reason I play is because of gear and my personal advancement. I know it sounds selfish but thats how it is.

to this:

    the only reason I play is because of gear and my personal advancement and the only way I can do that is ensure my guild is also progressing which requires gear.

It’s a real obvious statement, there is no question about it. Make that person understand that it takes 25 people to move forward.In order to that, it needs hard work and effort. I don’t know how many times I can emphasize that.

There are always going to be players that have a “me first” mentality in a Guild. Make them understand that in order for them to get the best pieces of gear in the game, everyone else in the Guild also has to get it at the same rate as that player or else that Guild will not move forward.

Dangle the loot that’s relevant to them in front of their faces. Even they can understand that if they want that loot, they have to kill a boss in order to even get a shot at it. The “me first” attitude is fine if they understand that it comes with patience and effort.

Star Players

In every professional sports teams, there are star players. There are certain names who night after night just seem to deliver their best performances.

The Patriots have Tom Brady, who was able to deliver and lead his team to a Super Bowl choke appearance.
The Penguins have Sidney Crosby, the best overall hockey player in the world.
The Yankees have (had?) A-Rod, who… was probably important for other reasons.

Challenge your Guildmates to be the best they can be. Recount and other DPS meters, used in the right way, can help foster a little of competition. Warcrafter and WWS can be used to show whose slacking and who isn’t.

In my opinion, it’s not about the methods. It’s about the results. Eventually, players will realize that PvP Gear isn’t going to cut it on certain encounters because sites like Warcrafter and WWS will prove that your PvE geared players will eventually top them in damage.

Just remember. If everyone brings their A game to the table, then those end game bosses won’t even stand a chance.

6 Signs You Masturbate Too Much

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We all do it at some point, but we all deny it. Yet we do it because it brings us pleasure and sometimes we have to hide it from other people. Obviously as this is a WoW based blog, I am referring to WoW masturbation. It can be incredibly unhealthy for you. If you start noticing the following signs, start looking for help right away.

Tired

1: Extreme Fatigue

You start feeling tired throughout the day. Why? Because you have been up all night again playing with your toons. Your eyes are nearly blood shot. When you go to bed, your hands are shaking incessantly from the surge of Red Bull and coffee. But you still do it anyway because it’s only one more attempt. Then two. And it slowly snowballs after that. Before you know it, it’s 3 AM and you have to get up at 5.

2: Self-Admiration

So you got yourself some nice shiny purples and you are spending most of your time checking yourself out and showing yourself off to everyone you know. Damn, man! Go and do something with all that gear and make yourself useful, eh?

3: Obsession

You have to fire it up every day because you can’t seem to get satisfied.
You have to finish every quest.
You have to get the best possible gear.
You need to farm as much gold as possible in case the economy crashes.

Hell, you ARE the economy!

4: Can no longer perform

You just can’t keep it up anymore when you’re depended on. Your marks are slowly dropping away. You’re blowing off important emails from Bob in accounting while you’re busy reading up on your favourite blog. Your productivity in life is slowly withering away top the point where you can’t seem to look yourself in the mirror anymore.

5: Losing touch with people

Your friends don’t even bother inviting you to Friday night poker because they know Friday’s a raid night for you (sniff). But that’s okay, because you need the money that you would have lost to pay off your WoW bills. Your boyfriend or girlfriend has to buy the game just to speak with you and hold a conversation. Normally I would suggest watching TV, but with the writer’s strike happening…

6: Physical pain

This one applies to me. My back hurts. It’s probably due to sitting down in one position for too long. It pays to get up once in a while and walk around the house. In fact, I’ve made a conscious effort to get out of my room and my house at times to grab some coffee. Most of my blog posts are being written via pen and paper initially before being typed on my computer. During long raids, I like to fix myself something to drink. If your joints start feeling sore and your limbs are feeling cramped, change your posture or consider playing standing up for a few minutes. Learn some Yoga.

Here’s an idea I’ve been thinking about: Everytime you wipe, do 10 push ups.

Hopefully these telltale signs will be noticed by you in time for you to act upon them. If you think you have a problem, seek help immediately. There’s actually an Online Gamers Anonymous. Consider seeking counseling or other extreme forms of treatment. If you think you have the will, then you might be able to quit WoW cold turkey by uninstalling the game in order to get your life back on track. Video game addiction is being considered for the DSM. Let’s not forget that people have died from WoW.

Remember, WoW is only healthy in moderation!

Brazil Government Bans Counterstrike and Everquest. Could World of Warcraft Be Next?

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It seems that the various democratic governments around the world have begun to take an interest in the well being of their citizens. I’m sure most of you are aware of China’s World of Warcraft curfew. There’s about 1.5 million players in China alone, although I would guess 1.4 million play as their full time job [citation needed].

The big news comes last week. Both online gaming giants Counterstrike and Everquest have had their distribution banned from Brazil. As far as I understand, LAN centers and players with existing copies are allowed to keep them. But it is a federal offense for those 2 games to be sold in Brazil either via retail or online.

The federal judge who imposed the ban stated the games were “…[a] subversion of public order, were an attack against the democratic state and the law and against public security.”

So far, World of Warcraft has escaped the banhammer. Seeing as WoW is not showing any signs of slowing down in terms of growth, sales, or subscribers it would be reasonable to expect that the Brazillian government has WoW on their crosshairs. We’ve already seen 1 government take legislative action on WoW. For Brazil to do something like this, it sets a pretty large precedent.

I’ve taken a few political science courses and from what I remember, Governments exist to determine “who gets what, when and how” (Lasswell). You’d suspect that they’d have bigger fish to fry other than games. Can you think of the possible criminal implications? No more will Brazillian drug lords be smuggling cocaine, marijuana or other drugs. The real money now will be in titles such as Call of Duty 4 and World in Conflict. Instead of cash crop farmers, we might see a rise in piracy!

As a law student, one of the fundamental principles we learn is that a crime is what is defined by society (I’ve condensed months of learning into 1 sentence). Gamers will always be gamers and they will want to play what’s up there. We’re consumers after all. Wouldn’t it suck if we had to go into a dark alley somewhere just to get Starcraft 2? It’s almost like the government is playing the role of a parent by deciding what kids can or cannot play.

Canada may have had it’s share of murderers, but thank goodness nothing like this will be in force up here.