Silly

How do You Ask Mages for Water?

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Water. Without it, all raids would become excruciatingly longer as healers would have to halt and gas up after every attempt. I don’t know about you, buy the raids I’m in tend to have a lot of biscuit-hungry players. They just devour the entire table. Sometimes we have to ask for single conjures.

And let’s not begin to even talk about that guy.

Oh yes. You know who I’m talking about.

He’s that guy who always accepts that summon late.
He’s that guy who never realizes there’s a table (or a fish feast) on the ground and asks for one after it’s completely disappeared.

Or he just plain forgot to loot the table. In the past, I’ve always found the raid I was in to be under the Bystander effect.

…social psychological phenomenon in which individuals are less likely to offer help in an emergency situation when other people are present. The probability of help is inversely proportional to the number of bystanders. In other words, the greater the number of bystanders, the less likely it is that any one of them will help.

Ever get in a raid with like 5 Priests and wonder why the raid hasn’t gotten Fortitude yet? Because each Priest expects one of the other Priests to do it, thereby saving them precious candles. I noticed its the same thing with mages and any other player with biscuits. Some of them conveniently AFK or spin around in their chair not sharing.

So instead of asking Mages for Water, I simply walk up to the closest Mage and pop open trade while saying "Need gas!”. Most of them usually figure out what I’m after. I trained the guild mages well after all!

Here’s another thing. How many biscuits do you really need? Do you really need four stacks of biscuits? You’re telling me you go through that many in a single raid? I go through 1 stack usually. On serious wipe nights, it’ll hit the tail end of 2 stacks.

If every raider took 2 sacks of biscuits instead of 4 stacks, then we’d have enough stacks of food to go around. Don’t be so greedy! Eat what you take! Stop burning through Mage reagents to conjure that stuff!

And don’t get me started on the players out there that have almost no bag room and choose to throw away perfectly conjured biscuits just so they can loot some random trash loot to vendor later. At least pass it on to someone else.

Oh yes. I know you exist.

Anyway, enough with that rant.

How do you ask Mages for water?

The Zen of Healing

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rock_garden

Zen (noun): school of Mahayana Buddhism asserting that enlightenment can come through meditation and intuition rather than faith; China and Japan.

So, how does this pertain to healing in WoW you ask? At it’s base level, meditation is a tool that is used to make the mind and body whole, to realign a persons energy through focus and insight. It is also the realization of an inherent natural wisdom and virtue that fills us all. The most basic function of a healer in WoW is to mend the raid and make the raid unit whole again. Is this far out there? Probably but bear with me a bit. We heal our raid through focus and intuition. We predict incoming damage and set heals and preventative measures accordingly. We trust our intuition, and apply logic to make our healing target decisions rather then trust blindly that our heals will find their mark. We do so through intimate knowledge of our classes and the raiders around us. It’s like hitting the “zone” that athletes talk about. You become centered, super focused and just make amazing saves and pull out all the stops without even realizing you are doing it.

I’m sure you’ve done it before. You’ve been in a fight where afterward someone comments “I have no clue how you healed through that!” and you have to stop and think back on it, because you don’t remember doing anything special, you just did it.

I’ve always referred to healing in WoW as a very fluid thing, it is very natural and adaptive in nature.  It’s something that if you are a healer, it just flows from you without much thought. For me the true zen of healing comes out during my guild’s heroic raids. A couple nights ago we were doing General Vezax (working on our second kill on him at the time).  I had assigned three healers on the main tank, a Resto Druid, Holy Pally and Disc Priest. Vent was quiet as dps wait for the call to burn down a vapor and interrupters were waiting for the flame spheres to pop up around Vezax. Early into the fight our Paladin MT healer get’s hit with a shadow crash and then very shortly there after an interrupt is missed due to a lag spike and a Searing Flames goes out. The Paladin dies as a result. Without saying anything I see our second Holy Paladin shift his position and take over tank healing, while the rest of the healers move to fill the healing gap throughout the raid. Later on in the encounter our Vapors wound up in the back of the room, I watched as the healers rotated on their own, without any direction. Healers got their mana back and then relieved the tank healers so they could regen then the tank healers took back over. I watched my healers work as one unit, without any spoken or written words passing between them. That to me was a moment of zen similar to the story of the Flower Sermon. Everyone used logic and intuition to work as one cohesive body and win the fight without a word even having to be spoken.

I’ve had other people tell me about how they get into “the zone”. Some have pre-raid rituals, and yes I mean rituals. I have a friend who before a raid sits down on the floor takes some deep breathes and tries to release any stress he’s gathered during the day before the raid through meditation. I have another friend who drinks a can of coke, eats a bag of Andy Cap Hotfries or hot-wings and then sits down to raid, he compares this to say sacrificing a chicken to the raiding gods. Another of my associates listens to classical music while he’s healing, keeping it just low enough to replace the game music but still hear directions in vent. Me before a raid I listen to some music like  John Williams and the Indiana Jones theme to get myself in adventure hero mode.

So what about you? Have you experienced a moment like we did with Vezax? Do you have a pre-raid ritual to get you into your zone? Have you hit your Zen through healing yet?

That is it for today, until next time. Happy Healing!

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It Came From the PuG!

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Definition : PuG

Pickup Group; used commonly in WoW and other MMORPGs. Basically means a group that isn’t formed by people you know; instead, it’s formed up of random, possible noobs that can completely wreck whatever experience you are getting the group for.

Ex. “I was in a pug with Oversoul and that F#$*& ninjaed T7.5 glove what a dick !”

We’ve all had those moments where we’re really bored, or we have an alt that we want to run through an instance that that rest of the guild is done with or just isn’t in the mood to run. Others of us are professionals at this and stick exclusively to doing raids this way. The item I’m talking about is the PuG. or Pick Up Group. This is a random assortment of players taken from either Looking For Group or sometimes trade chat. The power of a PuG is quite amazing honestly. You’re taking players that most likely have never met, never played together before and you are taking them in one direction together.PuGs also have some amazing stories attached to them. They are terrible, awesome and often times hilarious.

Personally I’ll admit I’m a glutton for punishment. I love PuGs because they give me a certain amount of freedom I don’t have when we’re running a raid or when it’s an all guildies group. I can do and try zany and weird things I couldn’t otherwise get away with  and see if they work. I’ve had amazing PuGs and I’ve had ones so terrible you can’t help but laugh hysterically

Let me share a couple gems from my recent PuG experience

I often miss my guilds 10 man runs on Lodur due to real life popping up. Sometimes late night I’ll log in and park myself in Dalaran, grab a beer and sit around trade chat waiting for a Uld / VoA  10 group to need a healer. I dutifully send my tell and when they ask my gear level get to gleefully tell them “working on rounding out my T8.5”. Needless to say it is not long before the invite comes in.

A little over a week ago I found myself looking for an Emalon 10 group. I hadn’t killed him that week and badges with a chance at free pvp / pve loot is always welcomed. I get in the group and find my way down to the vault as the group is being filled up. They were looking for a second healer when someone noticed my name.

“wait… Lodur… Lodur from world of matticus Lodur? Guys stop looking for another healer just let this guy solo heal it!”

Obviously he was just yanking around and we all had a good laugh at that and found a nice restoration Druid to come along with us. The group went really well despite a couple wipes and things came together after everyone figured out where to stand. We had a warlock that kept cracking jokes about going healing spec and helping out. It was a good PuG, we all had a good time and a couple upgrades were found for members of the group. Everyone was even tempered and were having a blast making crude comments and bashing a few mobs in the face.

Before that on a late night for me a guildie asked if I wanted to come heal Iron Council for a PuG Uld10. I said sure and hopped a bird. Got there and got in, popped a couple elixirs and got ready for the pull. There was a green Resto Shaman and a paladin healing with me. This time I did step up and organized who was healing who and doing what and we began. About 45 seconds into the pull a tank goes down. I’m laughing because I immediately get 4 tells saying “sorry we’re normally better then this”  we dust ourselves off and go back in and at it. The druid tank was making all sorts of bad jokes in between and even though we never downed IC, it was fun and I made a couple new friends. I also helped a new resto shaman out with ideas and tips to help him become competitive for raids.

A little time before that I was on my Death Knight and I got a tell asking if I was DPS or Tanking spec. I replied with “both” and I got an invite right off. The group was for a Naxx 10 run so I figured why the hell not I’ll go along with it. 3 DKs, 1 Boomkin trying to heal, one Holy Priest and one Resto Druid with a couple hunters and rogues. We make our way in and do pretty good. The group had already cleared most of the wings and only had military and then Saph and Kel. 4 Horsemen took a while to get but we eventually did it, but that’s when things went south. We get to Saphiron and the guy tanking it starts explaining the fight… but he’s doing it wrong. I pipe up and correct him on some of the things. (like the fact you DO NOT want to stand behind big angry skeletal dragon…). He immediately gets pissy and throws a bit of a tantrum. Five minutes later he calms down and we do the pull… only to have him turn her towards the raid. Two dead healers later we wipe. Not only did this happen once, but two more times after. I asked him nicely to turn the dragon away but he kept doing it. So, I hop into my tank gear, switch to frost presence and sit where the dragon should be facing. I see the dragon start to turn, and I taunt keeping it where it should be. He taunts to get it to face him, I taunt back. Eventually I get kicked from the group and get a nasty tell. I personally thought it was hilarious.

Lately though I haven’t had to pug much. I’ve been spending more time doing guild only runs and even on my new DK over on Icecrown, Rhyane, Nytesong, Ezrii and the rest of the Black Powder Foundry crew make sure I don’t have to PuG. (thanks again guys!) But truth be told I feel the itch again. I think I might have to find my way to a couple late night PuGs to get my fix.

So how about you? Have any PuG stories to share? Do you love PuGs or hate them?

Until next time, Happy Healing

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Image courtesy of www.pugslife.org

Shamanism Part Deux

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totem_rmbc_1_phixr

Lodur here again, this time with the second installment of Shamanism. This week I’d like to talk about my favorite area of Shamanism, Norse Shamanism. To give you a bit of background before we start, my love of Norse mythology was born in college in my classics class. The epic stories always seemed to resonate with me. I carried this over in the naming of my Characters

Here’s a little background on the name Lodur

Lodur, (Icelandic, Scandinavian) In the Norse Edda, one of the creative divine trinity who endowed nascent humanity with their own properties, thus creating a thinking kingdom of beings out of the ashtree and the alder. Lodurr’s gifts were la and laeti (skill and manner, also translated as blood and keen senses), while his brother deities Odin and Honer gave them respectively spirit and discernment.

The name Lodur is also an obscure reference to the first shaman of Odin, who carried the burden of Odin by tearing out one of his own eyes in ritualistic fashion to become closer to the god and earn his favor.

My other toon Sigrdrifa is named after one of the Valkyre’s, the one which acted as mentor to Sigurd, who is one of the Norse heroes. As you can start to see that my interest in norse mythology goes a long way.

Norse spiritual leaders had two schools. Shamanism was practiced mainly by females, a group known as the Völva. You can find reference to them in many of the texts of Norse mythology. The Völva practiced a form of magic called seiðr. This magic involved the invocation of spells to invoke spirts, manipulate the environment and seek visions.

They could work on the spirits of the wild animals and were responsible for the good luck in the hunt, executed the correct rituals in order to ensure the fertility of the earth, knew how to tune the spirits of their ancestors benevolently an more. In trances they contacted the ancestors, could be possessed by them, giving their body and their voice to the spirits in order to let them act in the world of the living . They knew how to cure diseases on a spiritual, psychological and physical level. Long before modern medicine, they had a broad knowledge about the interactions between body, soul and spirit. They also had a commanding knowledge of the available herbs and how to use them to great effect in both rituals and healing.

You can see this in Northrend in Warcraft. Lets take a gander at the Howling Fjord. You travel into the spirit world in the Quest chain that starts with Into the World of Spirits. The chain has you bring a shaman his goodies and then he sends you into the spirit world to gleam information from the spirits past. The chain follows up with The Echo of Ymiron and  finishes with the Anguish of Nifflevar.I think this is pretty darn cool. (and a little cookie if you didnt already know, when you’re in the spirit world if you head over to Utgarde Keep where the ramp leads up and in you’ll be treated to a visit from the Lich King and a discussion of Shaman magic. )

You can also see this particular item in some of the NPC’s. Dragonflayer Seer’s are female magic users, throwing lightning and healing their party members, Dragonflayer Spiritualist is another form of this NPC. (You can also see Valkrye type NPCs like Annhylde the Caller and Svala Sorrowgrave.) Take a look around Northrend and see what you find. You’ll see a ton of Norse spiritualist influence there.

Until next time, Happy Healing.
~Lodur

P.S. At the goading of Matticus I’ve reinstated my twitter, Feel free to check it out

http://twitter.com/LodurZJ

No More Healing, Ever!

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marfi_triumphant

Well, here it is folks. Phaelia’s left the World Tree behind to go tend to her sprout, and BRK is likewise taking a break from WoW to spend time with family. And now me–I’m announcing today that I am changing my main character to my ret paladin Marfisa. I regret to inform you all that I will no longer be healing, ever. This blog is now exclusively about my determination to hit things upside the kneecap with a blunt instrument.

The Top Ten Reasons to Switch to Ret Paladin

10. Sure, I’m good at healing. But I’ve got a lot more room for improvement in the dps department.

9. I absolutely love regular 5-mans. I haven’t been to one on Marfi since Scholomance, but that’s not about to stop me.

8. I adore PuGs. No one ever, ever hears me complaining about fail PuGs. In fact, I love it when people play badly on purpose. As soon as I finish this post, I’m going to join a regular Nexus group and jump off all the ledges to my death, repeatedly. Bonus points if I can aggro some stuff onto my group while I’m at it.

7. Ret paladins are good at ganking people (or, at least, they’re better at it than resto druids). From now on I’m going to harass innocent people trying to do their Hodir dailies. I’ll be watching for someone to pull a couple of mobs, and when their health’s at 50%, bam! paladin burst damage, right to the face.

6. Crusader aura makes my gryphon fly faster and thus helps him burn calories. Everyone hates fat gryphons, so I’m doing the world a public service.

5. I really love the Macarena. It’s so much better than the Night Elf pole dance. Watching Marfi do her /dance emote brings back fond memories of that Carnival cruise I went on in 1997. . .

4. No more unit frames, no more mouseover macros. Just me and the numbers 1-6. I now have a free hand for gin and tonics while raiding.

3. I can pop wings every time I take a screenshot of myself. I am the angel of death!

2. Using Seal of the Martyr makes me feel superior to all the other dps. Look what I sacrificed to kill this boss! I deserve a medal. Whenever I have Seal of the Martyr up, I can throw my self-sacrifice in the faces of my selfish guild members and make them hate themselves for being such indulgent slackers.

1. With her new haircut, Marfi could be singer Lady GaGa’s twin. Don’t believe me? Check out the photo below. They were separated at birth, I swear. Maybe if hitting things doesn’t work out, Marfi can have a career as a pop singer. Half psychotic, sick hypnotic, indeed.

marfi_and_gaga

Oh and, by the way, happy April Fools Day kiddos.