Level 90 Spell: Halo

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At level 90, you gain access to Beyonce-inspired spell, Halo.

It’s an AoE healing (or DPS) type spell depending on your spec. The healing scales depending on the distance between you and the rest of your targets. The biggest impact occurs to players that are 25 yards away. That’s going to be a little tricky for you to eyeball. Would be nice if AVR was still around so that you had a HuD telling you how far exactly 25 yards away was.

Halo isn’t a spell that’s targetable. It uses you as the main point before emanating outward.

You can see it in action below.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zp10FrESsGE

The Pandaria Plan

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With the recent opening of level 90 and all the assorted events, you know that we’re drawing ever closer to a Mists release. All that’s left to do is tuning numbers of abilities, finalizing both PvE and PvP content, and polishing the rest of the glitches still in the game.

Personally, I’m ballparking the expansion to debut at some point late in the summer (or September). I hope they don’t shoot for a Christmas release again.

Every GM is thinking about (or at least, gave some thought) to what their guild is preparing to do for launch. Some have strict time tables, others a little more lax. After getting through two solid expansions, our raiding plans aren’t going to change much.

Every raider will be instructed to get to max level as quickly as possible. Those that can pull off the all nighter grind can and those that need a little more time can do so. Our bottom line is that the sooner we have 25 players available to raid (with a respectable composition), we’re going to raid.

The 10 man plan

Before that, we’ll dispatch the first 10 players into raids quickly. They’ll be able to gain two things:

  • Experience: A better understanding of mechanics. They can see and interact with various bosses. They get to be familiar with the little nuances and how to get through different phases and then pass that knowledge on to others as they level.
  • Gear: It’s all the same ilevel still between 10 man and 25 man encounters. If one of our healers gets a trinket or a weapon in 10 man, it’s one less item the raid’s going to need when we hit 25 man. It could also mean one less epic item to craft. Even if the drop isn’t the best in slot, at least it’ll be high enough that it can still do the job. No sense in replacing epics with epics so early on when the rest of the raid can benefit.

Realistically speaking, it’s going to take roughly a week to get everyone up to 90. It’s also going to take at least another week before the raid has the collective gear and stats. That’s the way it’s been for us in the past, and I don’t foresee that changing.

What about raid finder?

The raid finder tool wasn’t present at the dawn of Cataclysm. Here’s where it’s going to get fun. I can’t recall if raid finder was going to be enable at the start or not. My guess is that it’ll be available, but there’ll be some sort of cap or limitation imposed (as in, no access to end bosses or first half of instances only). Raid finder means that both 10 and 25 man raiding guilds have the option to provide their guilds with another avenue to get raid ready loot.

Obviously isn’t going to be as good as the normal quality stuff in raids. But it’ll be superior to the dungeon heroic items we get.

What I think I may do is gather as many max level characters as possible for a massive group queue into raid finder. Maybe do that on a Monday to buy people as much time as possible to get to 90. Good way to get in there and get the lay of the land and see at least some of the challenges we’re going to be up against, even if it is going to be slightly weaker than the real thing. After that, establish a group for 10s and continue to develop characters that way as well until we have enough players to run 25 man consistently.

The opening weeks are going to be interesting.

Can’t Wait

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I’m 6 bars away from hitting level 90. Trying to get there as fast as I can so I can jump into heroics and do the cool level 90 stuff.  Woke up at 6 and just hit 90. Specced into Divine Star right away (you can see an image of it in action up there).

Can I tell you guys something?

I’m falling in love with this game all over again. Wish I could nail it down to one specific aspect to get really excited about, but I can’t because there’s so many things that I like. It’s not like there’s one really good part of the game that’s overpowering everything else. All the stuff that’s playable right now feels great – And it’s just the beta.

Can’t touch raids, heroics, pet battles, or PvP yet. But I’m just blown away by the other parts like the leveling, the questing, the atmosphere, and so forth. Haven’t been this enamoured with the game since Burning Crusade. Remember that feeling you got when you charged head strong into Nagrand and then looked up to see that belt streaking across the sky? I felt something similar walking into the   Valley of the Four Winds and just taking in the scenery (and the Brewery).

Mists doesn’t beat the story telling that SWTOR had. SWTOR spanked it when it came to the leveling and questing experience.

TERA and Guild Wars 2 are both way better looking games, of course. But there’s something appealing about the cartoony style of WoW. It started that way in 04 and it’s received upgrade after upgrade since then.

It’s like falling in love.

You have that goofy grin on your face while your head is tilted slightly to the side. Even though you can’t see it, there’s that little twinkle in your eye. Your mind can’t stop thinking about them and the different, fun activities available. You’re just super excited to be in that presence.

Not that I’d ever know what that’s like, of course.

I know a whole bunch of you guys quit. But give it another go when you can. It’s so easy to lose yourself in this world now.

Just Quit

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To any raider who is coasting along and simply not trying,

Just stop raiding.

Quit the game for a day. Quit the game for a week. Or quit the rest of the expansion. I don’t care how long it is, but just stop.

You are doing zero favours for your WoW family. They need you to be there and at your best. If you’re not at your best, then don’t even go in at all. You are making things worse.

I take great joy in playing my best. I’ll still use cooldowns even if I don’t have to. I’ll call for help even if it might not be necessary. I’ll do everything I can in my power to ensure we get that kill and move on because it’s what I like doing. It kills me when I find players aren’t trying. It feels like disrespect to me and to the standard. You want to make fun of and disrespect me? Sure, whatever. But you don’t disrespect the battle standard.

What motivates me isn’t the loot.

It isn’t the PvE scores on WoW progress, either.

It sure as heck isn’t the boss encounters.

What really gets me going is knowing that I can look at myself and look at everyone else and say “I tried my absolute best and didn’t hold back.”

When I get wind that someone wasn’t trying, I don’t get pissed. It’s the feeling of a hot air balloon being punctured. You start sinking to the ground second guessing everything. You second guess yourself to see if there was anything else you could’ve done. You second guess the people around you wondering if they’re really the people you thought they were.

I want to go into the hockey rink with someone who may have missed shooting on the goalie, but at least can say they took shots.

Remember high school PE class? When you were playing sports? There was always that one kid on the side who just didn’t participate. Then at the end, your team won and didn’t have to do laps around the track as punishment. And that kid who did absolutely nothing got a free ride. I don’t want to be that kid that just stood around on the field and joined in on the celebrations after the win. I want to be a part of the reason the celebration occurred.

At Stanley Park in the summer, we used to rent one of these multi-seater bikes. Naturally, I took the rear seat. There were moments we were pedalling around the park where I felt super bagged and wondering what was going on. I’d lean to the side and yell up “What’s going on over there? My legs feel like lead!” “Oh, we’re just enjoying the scenery, keep pedaling”. I never did get on those bikes with my parents again.

So if you’re just going through the motions, your heart isn’t there anymore, and you’re just not trying, do everyone else a favor.

Just quit.

Drawing the Line Between Training and Results

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Did you know dogs can identify smells thousands of times better than us humans? And the portion of their brain used in identifying and allocating scent is way more than what we use. It comes in handy during avalanche search and rescue operations. But even dogs can’t rely on pure senses to rescue people. They need to work with their handlers and train in a variety of situations. Training helps improve these skills so that they can get better at finding people.

Now let’s say your guild managed to pick up a new recruit. He’s a little under geared and is behind your main raid on a few encounters. One of the common reasons that I see for this is because their previous guild “held them back”.

Okay, understandable. It happens. It’s not uncommon for players to be in guilds that are behind where they think they should be in progression.

Regardless of that, they’re with your guild now and they need to be brought up to speed so that they can make solid contributions. One of the most agonizing moments for me is bringing in inexperienced players to an encounter that we have on farm. They claim they’ve read our strategies but still need a full explanation (which completely boggles my mind considering our strategies, placements, and all that are on the forums).

Best case scenario? Your new guy completely aces the encounter, fits right in, and helps your raid crush the boss.

Worst case scenario? They screw up their assignments, can’t seem to dodge a pillow for the life of ‘em, and don’t notice really slow forming pools under their feet causing wipe after wipe.

At what point do you go “That’s enough” and bring in the varsity? Your guild has to be able to hit that balance. On the one hand, newer players are going to need a minimum level of experience with the different aspects of the encounter. On the other hand, your veteran players are going to get understandable annoyed and irritated because they want to move on to bigger and fiercer bosses.

Advantages of training and gearing

Your recruits will get the exposure, experience, and gear they need to help your raid make a difference on the encounters that matter (such as the hard mode ones that they’re working on). The logic is that their skill gap between your current raiders and new players will narrow until they’re almost the same.

Raider frustration from wiping

Maybe they’re a slow learner. It’s been proven to me time and time again that not every player is going to pan out. New players have hit their skill ceiling and just aren’t able to improve anymore no matter how hard you try or what accommodations  are made.

Guild’s on the clock, right? Have to get going and kill some bosses!

Either way, a line needs to be drawn.

How do you find that balance?

One suggestion would be to set a hard limit on either attempts or time spent. If it’s clear they’re not getting it or you’re really pressured for time, then you can scale those conditions down to something that’s more suitable.

But, you do need to consider that the player being brought in isn’t the main cause of wipes for the guild.

It’s one thing to say that you’ve hit the 6 minute mark on heroic Ultraxion and the new player’s DPS is right at the bottom of the meters. It’s something else entirely when they’re able to dodge ice walls and survive longer than most of your raid during a wipe. If you’re going to sit them, do it for the right reasons.