Hunter Surv or Marks DPS, What Spec to Choose for PVE in 3.3?

I have been playing the hunter a bit lately with all the new easy LFG system. As i hadn't played for a few months, the gears and spec was getting away from me a bit. But after a bit of researching i came up with the following DPS specs.

My Gear isnt awesome, and the DPS is still a bit crap ~2.5k or so, but for 5 man heroics its more than enough while i gear up for the more srs stuff ;) Not that ill ever get there as im more casual than anything these days, but something to do to pass the time i spose.

I found a nice DPS Calculator/Spreadsheet from Female Dwarf, you can import all of your armory and gear settings into it, and it will tell you what DPS you should be hitting, quite useful.

This one is quite good for recommending gear upgrades: @ Hunterloot.

The rotation that you should be looking at with a Surv Build is:

1. Kill Shot


2. Explosive Shot


3. Black Arrow


4. Aimed or Multi Shot


5. Serpent Sting (Make sure it's always up)


6. Steady Shot

I think im going to go with one of these specs:
0/14/57
or, they recon that this is the best PVE dps:
6/14/51

Best pet is still a wolf in pve, just for the added AP boost buff, i got one of those cool lookin demon ones ;) Here is the spec:
Wolf PVE Pet Spec

Here are a couple of good reads on what the hell we should be doing to get decent DPS in PVE. ;)

Official Forums for Hunter DPS on 3.3

They recon that a good addon for hunters and seeing when everything procs is Power Auras a Great Hunter Addon.

Why play Wow when you cant win?

So wow is having its five year anniversary eh! Man that means ive been playing it for almost 5 years. Hmmm... Probably too much time spent in a fake world.

I guess you can add up the amount of time that is played via the amount of level 80's you have. Way too many, i think im up to about 5 now. And thats more than enough. I seem to get bored now when i hit 80 though. Eh idk, just not as fun for me any more playing wow.

I am enjoying some other games more now these days tho, such as Aion and if i can manage to get a beta testing key (prays) MAG.

Im also looking forward to starcraft 2, if that actually ever gets released. Apparently there is already rumours of a new Aion expansion. Maybe they will fix that dam rubberbanding problem, man that annoyed the crap out of me! walk for 5 steps, bounce back 2. Argh! Good reason to quit i spose.

Rogue Blind Macro

This is a good focus Rogue Macro for blinding a mouseover target, so you dont have to de-select your current one. Also says the target has been blinded.

#showtooltip Blind
/focus [target=mouseover]
/stopmacro [target=mouseover,noharm][target=mouseover,dead]
/cast [target=mouseover] Blind
/s %f has been blinded. DO NOT TOUCH!

What happened to Junglist from Good Game?

Watching Good Game on my Iphone on the bus as usual the other day, and dam that was weird, they had replaced Junglist! I thought it must have just been a fill in for the episode or something, but then they went on with the new introductions and such, and well the new chick replacement is hot and all, i will miss the most excellent reviews that were provided by Junglist.

Then on searching as to what the hell had gone down, it appears that a scandle has occured, which no one can talk about due to some privacy policy or something layed down by the ABC. Anyway, He will be sorely missed as an awesome presenter on Good Game.

You can sign the petition to save Junglist here.






Photos Found Using Newsomatic.

Power Leveling with another account in wow

You will need a tanking class, or just pull less mobs at a time if you have a hunter or a class that doesn't have as much damage mitigation. I have used this method with a 80 hunter. Also you will need another account so that you can log in with the noob character that you are leveling and the High level you will use for farming the instance. Also can be easily done with a frost spec mage. Some SM Maps are included down the bottom of this post.

Unfortunately the raid lockout applies after 5 resets in a one hour period. So if you just run SM Cath over and Over (can be done in about 5-10 minutes per run, once you get a method going), you will have to wait til it resets.

1-8 quest 1-2 hours

8-16 RFC: 2-4 pulls depending on gear. 8-12 minute runs. will have some lock-out time. log out.

16-20 deadmines: 11-13 minute runs including reset time. minimal looting.

20-43 SM cath/armory: CATH: 6-8 minutes 4 pulls , minimal looting and zone out after all the mobs die, run away from the boss to save time. zone into armory. ARMORY: 3 pulls. skip the last boss, skip looting last pull to save time. zone out, reset (12-15 minutes for both cath and armory)

43-47 took me 3 hours, and could have been done faster. i stayed in SM until level 45 (was catching a friend up). It wasn't really that bad though, it was decent xp (but could have been better)

43 - 53+ we skipped ZF and went straight to BRD. At 45 i was getting 80k / hour, my 43 friend was getting 65k.

On my shaman, i remember getting closer to 100-115k / hour in ZF, but i really didnt like the instance so we tried to skip it. didnt work out so hot, and we plan to go back to ZF until 50 (need mageweave as well).

Currently have a little over 19 hours played at 47, next stop is ZF.

Cheap Level 40 Epic Land Mount

Well i discovered today (even though it was probably changed a while ago now) that the epic land mount is available at level 40 and its price has been reduced quite a bit. /yay for my noob hunter. Here are the the new mount costs:

Apprentice: 4g (60% Land Mount) Level Requirement Lowered to 20
Journeyman: 50g (100% Land Mount) Level Requirement Lowered to 40
Expert: 640g (150% Flying [increased speed from 60%]/60% Land) Level Requirement Lowered to 60
Artisan: 4000g (280-310% Flying/100% Land)
Cold Weather Flying*: 1000g. Required to fly in Northrend

Buff to Hunter AOE and Nerf to Rogue QQ

So it seems that there is more rogue bitching on the way with the Nerf to fan of knives. Aww poor rogues cant quite finish you off while you are in stunlock anymore? pfft.

And hunters got a stealthy buff to volley increasing its co-efficent by a little bit (not in the patch notes)

Volley "stealth buff" in 3.2.2

Quote from: Ghostcrawler

The AP coefficient of Volley has been increased from 0.0586 to 0.0837. Base points did not change. This probably did not make the patch notes.

---

Q u o t e:
Seriously i dealt with my rogue being so broken in BC i couldnt even get into a raid. We finally were back to being at the top of dps charts (where rogues belong in this game) and you go and nerf us. For chist sake i mean we have no viable raid buffs to help a raid in that way we might as well be dps machine's.

---

Changes happen to all classes based on where we want them to be in many ways. That said, I'd like to hope that a 30% reduction in your Fan of Knives isn't going to be too much of a change for you that you can't overcome it. If it IS too much of a change then please feel free to share constructive feedback on how this change has affected you.

Also keep in mind there were only two other changes made to rogues in this patch. Envenom's scaling has been increased from 7% to 9% of attack power per combo point and there was a change to Master Poisoner in the Assassination tree. (No longer increases the Deadly Poison application rate following a successful Envenom and instead now provides a 33/66/100% chance of preventing Envenom from consuming Deadly Poison.)

We always welcome constructive feedback and often what happens when we patch is that we get a lot of quick reaction based on what people see as a decline in the numbers applied to their skills. In some cases, this concern may be justified and in others, it may just be a small overreaction until players get in to the game and experience it for themselves. There have been many changes over time that were seen as major until such a scenario played out and then people discovered it didn't change much about how they played or if it did, it did so in a way that benefited them more than they expected.

---

A few general arena healing strategies and tips

Found this post, its a bit old now but still relevant i think. Gives a few good tips on Arenas and healing just a few general points.

With my 2v2 team finally breaking 2000 rating, it's time for me to take stock of my experiences in arenas, and look to see how I can improve myself to push myself (and my team) to the next level.

While my experience is mainly in 2v2, I have done enough 3v3s and 5v5s to get used to the dynamic, though I would hardly count any of those teams I have to be successful (yet, anyway).

So, here are just a few of the things I've learnt, both in generic terms, and as they relate to my class, the priest.

Generic Healing Tips
POSITION POSITION POSITION
It is vital as a healer to watch where you're standing, I think more so than any other class/role. Hug pillars and constantly move in and out of line-of-sight of your opponents. Not only will this help you with ranged classes, but for melee classes, it has the potential to put the rogue/warrior/etc. who's attacking you out of line-of-sight of his/her healer. Nagrand is obviously best for this, as you can just kite around a pillar. You might want to change directions and head for another pillar after dropping a successful fear, but do this only if you know with certainty that you can make it there (don't try it if there's a hunter, for example). In the Ruins of Lordaeron, run around the tomb in the center, realizing that the four corners are deadzones for anyone standing on the tomb itself. In blades edge, the pillars at the bottom of the bridge are decent to work with (but realize that they aren't entirely circular, so it's harder to hug them). Also, the two small pillars on either side of the entrance to the bridge section (on top) are good deadzones to abuse. If nothing else, running up the ramp and jumping off the bridge is a good kiting tactic.

Bait Spell Lockouts/Interrupts
Even classes (like priests and druids) that have the ability to heal without ever casting should consider drawing silences/interrupts/etc. You want your opponents to spend their cooldowns at a point when you're still comfortable with your health (or your teammate's health). For druids and priests, getting a healing school lockout will allow you to get mind control or cyclone on one of your opponents.

Priest Tips
Mind Control
Use it. As described above, bait a school lockout by casting a heal, and use that opportunity to mind control your melee opponent. If nothing else, it will force them to burn their trinket cooldown (which then allows you to get a fear off). Blades edge is especially good for this: stand on the bridge, and mind control your opponent off, buying you priceless time.

Use your Trinket on Snares
It may seem obvious, but you shouldn't just save your trinket for true CCs (sheep/trap/etc.). A well timed trinket can help you gain some distance on your opponents, allowing you to survive for just that much longer.

Offensive Dispelling
This is something I always forget to do, but something that can turn the tide of the battle. Basically, if you're not healing, you should be dispelling your opponents.

Run and Heal
Where possible, I try to always have a finger on one of my movement keys. With prayer of mending, renew and power word: shield, we have 3 great instant cast healing spells. In a good game, these are the only healing spells you'll use. Continously refresh them on all your teammates, and keep running around while you're at it.

Source.

Yay i got my Challenger title back, what class to play now?

Well it seems that they stuffed up the titles this season and have given back arena titles even if you didnt really earn one this season, which means i spose it will be taken away again soon. So ill have to go back to the good old Blood Guard title. Ah well something different i spose.

Now i have to just pick and stick with a class! what class to play these days, I just cant decide. Hunters are going well now in arenas, ranking up fairly high. Although the popular character chart on sk gaming seems to be changing every dam week/day almost.

As if druids are second least popular class now... they still seem to be doing fine, but i guess its all relative to the top 100 classes anyway rather than the over all pvp, but still gives an indication to the popular or overpowered classes for the moment i think. Interesting to see that the warlocks are climbing back up again and warriors are obviously doing well now but not quite on the same level as the paladins. ;)

So what class to play:
I still like playing the priest the most at the moment i think, healing is quite fun in pvp as disc. and usually live a while as well. Hunter is ok as well, but i have a tauren and its just too dam big, and i would faction change to go to a be but then it would end up costing me, lets see ($30 + wait 60 days + $30) or i could move my alience 70 hunter over to horde, but then i have to grind the last 10 levels over again, is it worth it just to roll a BE. Probably not. DK i just cant get the hang of DK's not sure why just not my thing really. Rogue is also a pretty large learning curve, but idk.

Makes it even harder now that i dont have a lot of time to play these days, real life seems to be (and should be) taking a priority over all game playing shenanigans, so must pick a class and stick to it. Just which one to choose dam it.

New Arena Season Starting soon!

Another arena season, number 7. Am i excited? Not really. I dont know why i spose it will be interesting to see what classes are op again after all the class changes goin on. I logged on about once this week to my priest and well, was kinda bored. Did some of the new battleground, and its more of the same i guess.

I used one of those scrolls that i had from leveling up inscription and it sent me to STV so i flew over to the horde camp there, and there was some noob ali pally killing all the npc's there, so i ran out and killed him once, and then he rezzed and came back for some more, and i ran back into the base after going oom, and got him to agro the whole place pretty much and he died again. /target noob pally and /lol. But anyway then he logs onto a horde alt that he made esp for me called nymosfail and starts crying about how much of a noob i am, etc obviously looking for a reaction, heh. Usually i bite and start name calling right back again but yeh it was quite funny and i just ended up loling at him :P

Anyway here is the blue about arena ending:
Bornakk: We are currently planning to end Arena Season 6 as early as August 25. At that point we will go through our normal process to determine who is eligible for the end-of-season rewards. This process should take approximately one week. It's very important for players who feel that they may be eligible for the arena-specific titles and/or Furious Gladiator’s Frostwyrm to refrain from transferring their character to another realm until after Arena Season 6 ends.

The following Arena Season will not begin for at least one week after the current season ends. During this time between seasons, all rated matches will be turned off and only skirmishes will be available. When Arena Season 7 begins, all team ratings, personal rating, and arena points will be wiped, but matchmaking rating and honor points will remain.

Loosing Interest in wow

Its been a weird week for me really, i havent logged in to wow at all. I have been busier with other things like life than normal. But I dont seem to be missing it at all.

When i do play its just the same old repitition over and over again, log in, should i do dailies again, do some more pvp, eh kinda boring. May as well just switch my brain off.

I guess it comes with not being interested in instances, or raiding, and pvp seems to be whatever class is flavor of the latest buff.

My latest char is a rogue, and well i just cant be motivated to sit in bg's and get my ass handed to me for several hundred thousand honor points to get him the gear to do well all over again.

I guess its just wow burn out vs real life at the moment. I have played the new battle ground a few times now, and its ok. Just like an update of AV yet usually shorter and less annoying as i havent played it over a million times yet.

Eh what to do. Even the content patch didnt help. Dam it. Apparently the Current Arena Season of Wow is almost over now, maybe that will re-light my interest. Maybe not, more of the same.

So thats how they get on the Stables Roof in AB

It may it looks ez, but you gotta get the jump timing just right.

Also apparently you are suppost to report people that use this particular jumping skill.

The Bitching continues about tier 9 armor models

Man srsly what do you want from the new armor set designs? I mean yes, i spose they could be slightly more original, but could they really i mean were saying they don't look original because there basing them slightly on the older armor sets that they created. So Give them a break man! :P. If you want to see a preview of the new armor sets have a look here.

Here is a comment and a follow up response from blizzard in the official blizzard forums:

Quote (Discobiscuit):
I'd really like a response from blizzard about why they put so little effort into the new tier9. It sucks and there was a thread 146 pages long from people who were upset about it. Did blizzard ever respond? Nope. They just quietly locked the thread and pretended everything was fine. (you've lost my respect blizz. that was low) It's tier9, not some half effort pvp set.

Response (Nathaera):
This is going to be a tough one to clear up with you in a way that you're going to accept. First off, I can't say that "complaints"

don't fall on deaf ears, because that may be true, but not in the way you think. Constructive feedback is very very welcome. Complaints don't equate to constructive feedback though and don't open the door for constructive discussion.

We've addressed Tier 9 several times now. We posted about what we had in store here as well when we did the initial preview- http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/underdev/tier9.html

In general, when we explain our design philosophy and why we do what we do, we get a lot of responses of the sort that call for more people to be put to work on designing these sorts of things, but throwing more people at something does not increase the ease of creating them. These take a lot of time and collaboration.

In this case, like all of our armor sets, we have set resources to apply to creating new armor sets that we must work within. This does not change with each new set, but remains the same. I'm sure to some, this may seem too limiting, but we work within these constraints so that the art team can also continue to work on the many other projects they have on their plate, while still continuing to put out quality designs (whether you may believe they are quality or not.) Increasing the demand on them for these will not aid them in all of their other tasks.

That said, these new armor sets are much more focused on creating a visual division between what is representative of the Horde and what is representative of the Alliance who are obviously still at odds with each* other despite the best efforts of the Argent Crusade to bring them together. (*See Isle of Conquest)

We're not pretending anything, but we are continuing to moderate and direct discussions into more productive topics. I'll leave this topic open for now with the caveat that should it devolve into non-constructive discussion, I will close it. The armor sets are what they are whether they are your favorite or least favorite. The work that went into these was not diminished, nor were the resources for them compared to other sets. Please refrain from any further degradations of the art team or Blizzard employees and their work.

via Original Thread Link.

Keyboard Shortcuts - Undo and Redo Crazyness!

I know this isn't specifically wow related, but its dam useful. And also i know this is probably widely known, but i never knew the shortcut for redo ;), Anyway just a quick one...

Everyone Knows:
Ctrl+C = Copy
Ctrl+V = Paste

More Unknown:
Ctrl+Z = Undo Last thing
Ctrl+Y = Redo Last.

This can be quiteuseful and is used in windows all windows almost, like notepad and rich text editors and such. Well maybe you already knew all that, well arent you just too leet for me then :P Not really sure why they used Y as undo. Needs two hands to get there, unless you have freakishly large hands or a small keyboard. But anyway. Yes this does also work in wow chat screens and macro editor.

Garwal is no more, well no more taiming anyway.

So we knew it would happen eventually didnt we. Garwal is no longer tameable. Oh well i couldnt do it anyway but looking at the hunters cruising around org and dalaran quite a few of them figured it out.

Now the dev's are contemplating if they should remove the taimed ones.

Zarhym: We don't want hunters to have worgens as pets. That is the reason whether you find it reasonable or not.

And the QQing on the forums is definately going hard:

---

Q u o t e:
It's hilarious how he is completely avoiding the fact that oozes and hydras don't belong to any specific pet family either. I guess they just have something against worgens?

---

In some previous cases we fixed the bugs that allowed the taming of certain pets, but felt the pets weren't so far to an extreme that they needed to be removed. In other cases in the past, and in the case of Garwal, we've removed the pets as well feeling as though allowing them to remain hunter pets would be going too far.

Those of you asking for consistency, or to "pick a side" as I believe I saw one player request, are over-simplifying the nature of bugs. There's no side to be on when it comes to fixing bugs and addressing any unintentional outcomes due to those bugs being present. We have to assess each case on an individual basis.

A humanoid who could only be tamed through the trickiest of means didn't sit right with us, so we removed the ability to tame him and removed his status as a hunter pet.

---

Q u o t e:
I am of course NOT happy with the arbitrary and unfair way in which this was handled

---

I'm not sure how fairness can be measured in a case where the taming of this pet was largely unfair. Taming the worgen relied on a quest and an odd commitment to timing. It wasn't fair to anyone.

---

Q u o t e:
along with the ridiculous delay in communicating with your customers how you planned to handle your mess.

---

With all due respect, the issue gained traction and popularity over a holiday weekend. We began discussing the situation the moment we arrived in the office on Monday morning. By Monday afternoon we confirmed this to be a bug with the public, stating that Garwal would be hotfixed so as to be untamable in the future. The exact changes made in the hotfix were only tested and solidified within a very brief window of time before being pushed live to all realms.

---

Q u o t e:
This worgen-wolf model gave me hope that I could have a "cool pet" that would actually be raid-viable. I was excited about playing my hunter again, like I used to be when I first started playing.

---

It is unfortunate when a bug is found that provides players with something really cool that we feel they shouldn't have. For that I apologize.

So anyway that is almost the end of the tameable Garwal. Or is it! :P

Read more here before they close the thread.

A Tameable Worgen OMG! But not for me unfortunately

So apparently you can now tame a worgen for a pet if you happen to be a lucky hunter that hasn't already finished the Alpha Worg quest. So anyway i thought no worries i know someone that has not yet done this quest line, i will just tag along and nab the pet before it was killed.

But as fate would have it, no matter how hard i tried to /tar Garwal i just couldnt see him, even though i was in the same group and everything. So Its not going to happen for me, /cry.

So as i understand it according to Mania's Arcadia here is what you have to do if you are lucky enough to not have finished this quest yet and you are a 71 hunter.

1. Get Wyvern Sting. It does about 19% damage by itself over 6 secs, and sleeps for 30.
2. Find him.
3. Hurt him until he is approx 67-69% health.
4. Wyvern sting him.
5. Wait till there is 14 secs left on Wyvern sting.
6. At 14 secs left, cast tame beast.
7. If done right, right as your tame ends, he will have just transformed.

So they recon this is going to be hot fixed pretty dam quick, and they may even take the worgen away from those that have already tamed it, as it does not really belong to any pet/animal family, and rather is just awesome looking! :P I think worgen are close enuff to wolf's for us to be able to tame them.

Also dont go into any arena's with this pet or it will transform back into a wolf permanently, just go to Orgrimmar/Stormwind (if thats cool for you allies) or Dalaran and /dance with your new cool worgen friend.

Ill just go back into my corner and sit with my Original Spirit Beast aka Classic Spirit Beast that no one cares about anymore and remember the good old days. Or maybe ill just goto bed. :P

Northrend Bonfire Locations

Just found this list of bonfire locations. Not bad exp or money if you have a few minutes, ~11k xp per quest handed in at each bonfire and 2g if your not yet 80. And if you desecrate the ali/horde bonfires stamping them out you get ~22k exp.

Borean Tundra - Bor'Gorok Outpost
Borean Tundra - Fizzcrank Airstrip
Crystalsong - Sunreaver's Command
Crystalsong - Windrunner's Overlook
Dragonblight - Agmar's Hammer
Dragonblight - Wintergarde Keep
Grizzly Hills - Amberpine Lodge
Grizzly Hills - Conquest Hold
Howling Fjord - Camp Winterhoof
Howling Fjord - Fort Wildervar
Sholozar Basin - North side of River's Heart
Sholozar Basin - South side of River's Heart
Storm Peaks - K3
Storm Peaks - K3
Zul'Drak - North of Argent Stand
Zul'Drak - South of Argent Stand

Dont cry for me im already Dead, Gondria Spirit Beast

So even though i said I wouldn't bother with taming this new Gondria Spirit Beast i have spent a few hours out of today just flying around the spawn points in ZD. Its that or level another alt which i already have far too many of.

Then at around 4.02 i found the body of Gondria, I cried a little bit (Not really), but i was sad :( then a druid came along and skinned it. Ah well... I wonder what the respawn time is. I heard it was between 0 and 6 hours, and it may or may not share a cooldown with all the other rares in Northrend. That's a fat lot of help right there isn't it. Sounds like ordering a technician when they say they will be out between 9am and 5pm, and then at 4:30 you call them and they say they cant make it anyway. But that's another rant / story :P.

Anyway, I guess ill give up for now, and keep checking back every few hours. Might get lucky.

Gondria Spirit Beast Taming Guide

27k exp from killing just one mob Old Crystalbark

So i was leveling my Alt rogue for something to do, and i came across a rare elite. That was nice easy experience ;) 27,860xp from killing just from killing one mob Old Crystalbark and some nice blue items to go with it. Crystalbark's Toenail of the Beast. 20g and 20 Frostweave cloth.

Hunter Pre Raiding Solo Achievable Gear List

I found this list of gear from the wow alone blog and i thought i would summarise it for easy reference. Some good pieces here and some are quite easily achievable. I spose its good if you dont like PVPing since the 3.1 nerf but still want fairly decent DPS/PVE gear for your Hunter. Its a good place anyway.

• Ranged Weapon - Nesingwary 4000. with the Hearseeker Scope. From AH or a friendly Engineer.
  
• Melee Weapon - Silvery Sylvan Stave or Icier Barbed Spear. with Greater Savagery. obtained from the Argent Tournament after you become Champion
• Head - Toothslice Helm. This helm is easily obtained from the Oracles in Sholazar Basin. Arcanum of Torment from Knights of the Ebon Blade reputation in Icecrown.
• Shoulders - Spaulders of Grounded Lightning. These are sold by the Kirin Tor faction in Dalaran.
• Back - Ice Striker's Cloak BOE from AH. with Major Agility.
• Chest - Razorstrike Breastplate. Crafted with Leatherworking. with Super Stats (+8 to all stats)
• Bracers - All BOE: Eaglebane Bracers, Giantmaim Bracers, Slime Stream Bands (2kgold in AH), Armguard of the Tower Archer, Bracers of Smothering Inferno, with Striking or Greater Assault.
• Gloves - Rusted-Link Spiked Gauntlets, BOE from Naxx with Major Agility.
• Waist - Giant Ring Belt - Sons of Hodir Honored.
  
• Legs - Giantmaim Legguards with Icescale Leg Armor.
• Boots- Boots of the Terrestrial Guardian with Assault.
• Neck - Choker of the Betrayer or Titanium Impact Choker crafted.
• Rings - Inscribed Band of the Kirin Tor and a Band of the Kirin Tor.(Probably not for the 15KG ;)
• Trinkets - Medallion of Heroism and Automated Weapon Coater or Darkmoon Card: Death, Oracle Talisman of Ablution.

Theed 3 Shadowpriest Arena PVP Pwnage!

Shadowpriest PVP in Arena, not much more to be said. Some srs skill goin on there.



Link to video Details on Warcraftmovies

Arena Tournament Winners and Nitro Boots Nerf thoughts

I've been playing my priest more since the Hunter has been nerfed. The priest seems a lot better since patch 3.1. The Hunter on the other hand seems to be lagging behind which is unfortunate after spending so much time on the Hunter.

Crygil was asked can you at least put in a vendor that will refund 2000 to 2500 G and takeaway engineering or at least give us some states like every other profession the response was we have plans to make certain that this item is still worth the investment made at so don't vendor it just yet.

Then they were asked if that is the case then gives back a full five seconds on the nitro boots crygil responded that it is an option we may explore we also have several other changes to no tributes in mind we may include additional stats to making this item comparable to other boot in chance there are quite a few ideas currently on the table and they are still narrowing down to get the best option so basically don't drop engineering yet.

They finally announced the winners of the Taiwan regional final of the 2009 will do for craft arena tournament looks like another number one team is death knight, priest, rogue. The winning teams won $15,000 and $6000 respectively. They will be competing this year at blizzcon.

I did a few arenas this week. Priest and Rogue just 2v2. We won 6/10 games so not too bad for the first week. The new arena points system seems to be a bit better than the old one. Not that we are rated very high yet. Also shamans seem like they're a bit overpowered at the moment so they must have got quite a buff.

It sucks now that they have nerfed the winter grasp dailies and made them weekly. Apparently this will reduce lag by making winter grasp less popular. So now we have to go back to grinding old battlegrounds if we want to get any honour to get the gear we want. Unless you like to PVE then you can just buy the gear with tokens. For some reason I'm still doing the Argent tournament dailies Im not really sure why as there isn't very much good gear to get as a reward.

I was going to work on fishing for that new turtle mount but im not sure if I can be bothered for that much effort they can at least make it 100% speed on land I don't think I would even use it for swimming.

Another one of the big bloggers has decided to quit world of warcraft after levelling his DK and mastering it skelleton jack. He finally realised that wow is never ending. I think how you have to deal with is just to play less become casual and make it no longer your number one priority. Everything should take priority over world of warcraft.

Ghostcrawler responds to Hunter Nerfs

Sounds like blizzard think hunters are fine, stop QQ'ing ;)

From Ghostcrawler:

Okay, here is just a slew of our current thoughts on the topic.

PvE

1) Hunter dps was just too high through much of Naxx. Ideally hunters should be competing with locks, rogues and mages and for a lot of the LK content they were just head and shoulders above the rest.

2) Currently, hunter dps might be a little low, but we're not 100% convinced yet. Some of the earlier fights in Ulduar are very melee friendly. XT is a rogue and cat's dream. We were pretty harsh to melee in Naxx with a lot of run-out moments and cleaves. Kologarn and other parts of Ulduar turn that on the ranged a little and require them to focus more on situational awareness. We think the later fights in Ulduar are a little more ranged-friendly, and we're waiting to get more parses from those. Plenty of guilds are on or have beaten Yogg by now, but the current data are pretty noisy since people are still learning the encounters.

3) We understand Vezax is a special case for hunters. By the same token, our goal is not to have every class do the same relative dps on every boss. Some fights are just better for some than others. Our goal isn't even to have "the shadow priest fight" or "the fury warrior fight." We just want diversity. We really wanted the Ulduar encounters to push players more towards "What can I do to improve my dps on this fight?" and less on "What is my dps?"

4) Survival may still be slightly higher than BM or MM. We don't think it's off by 1000 dps in most cases. It's something we want to keep looking at. We understand some Marks hunters say they'd be fine if it weren't for mana.

PvP

1) The TNT stuns and the uber mana drains were just too good last season. Sorry. Those aren't coming back.

2) Last season, burst spell damage was very high. That put a premium on active defenses, which ended up being a good niche for hunters. Last season there was almost no reason to bring a warrior; rogues and hunters brought the MS debuff in a stronger form as well as a host of additional utility. Warriors are back now, which means more competition for that spot.

3) This season has seen different classes rising to the top. Priests are rogues are good. Arms and Ret are good, depending on who you believe. We are nerfing or have nerfed some of those classes, which should open up the top playing-field a little. We are getting rid of Exorcism allowing paladins to two-shot pets. I'd agree that hunter representation is a little low at the moment, but we're not sure the class needs massive buffs so much as others need some nerfs.

4) Hunters are betters in 5s than 2s. It's really challenging to have every class or spec have the same representation in small teams as large, which is one of the reasons we offer multiple sizes. Recently the community seems to be focusing on 2s even more than 3s. We are taking some steps to make sure the larger brackets are as rewarding as the smaller ones. (I'm not saying it's a goal that some classes are only viable for some brackets. But it is nice that if you aren't as good for some brackets, you always have the others to fall back on.)
Source.

Arena PVP Disc priest DK 2500+ Rank 14

Ironheast_2v2.mp4

Second highest ranked Disc/DK team worldwide

Games VS
Paladin/Warlock
Rogue/Warlock
DK/Pala

Source

New Chicken Mount Discovered - El Pollo Grande

So apparently while someone was browsing through the patch files, they have discovered a new bunch of gear ready for the next Upper Deck Expansion TCG, and included in the findings was a new Chicken Mount (El Pollo Grande). The Black Chicken of Death.! Lol.

Well at least the crazy people that buy whole boxes of the TCG, or play it... will look pretty stupid riding around on a chicken. Apparently the chicken has appeared in the game before in an old school felwood quest, but obviously not as big or ridable as this new one.

Kind of annoying that they keep releasing things that are specially for the trading card game, but i guess they have a good deal with them for that kind of thing. If its anything like the spectral tiger mount, it will be on ebay for around $900 shortly after its released.

Give me a spectral tiger mount or a Green Proto Drake or even a Turtle mount (even though its only 60% speed, but in water) over a chicken anyday.

Sexiest Minimal UI Setup

Was looking through some old screen shots i had lying around and found this one. I have to say this is one of my fave UI layouts. No crap everywhere. Its just nice and minimalistic. Nothing like mine unfortunately ;)

Arena - Priest Rogue Owning 2v2 Again

So after the latest 3.1 patch it seems that the priest and rogue combo has risen back to the top of arena teams.

Poor hunters arent even 1% represended in arenas, did they all just lay down and re-roll? Seems that way.

So what do we do just wait for the nerfs and buffs and re-roll accordingly? It seems that way, Have one of each class ready to go. The way that they keep randomising classes is crazy at the moment. But you can bet that they will never nerf stun. But they added Dimishing returns to stun didnt they? Pitty it only takes 2 stuns for you to be dead by the hands of a fairly well geared rogue or ret pally.

Mind you i only have 600 res on my priest and around 550 on my hunter, so i guess if i had some half decent gear it would be a bit less painful maybe.

Yes i started leveling my rogue again, not sure why, by the time its 80 and has some decent gear it will probably be nerfed anyway. Not sure what to play these days dam it.

Somone on the DPS wow forums suggested that gear with resiliance should buff your own damage on pvp targets to the point that pvp gear will do just as much damage as pve gear on a pvp target.

Ghostcrawler responded with : One of the problems we had last season (and the first season when you think about it) was that you need a minimum threshold of resilience to really be viable. A change like this would only make that curve steeper. Having 1000 resilience would be even more powerful than having 500 resilience. Source.

We definately dont need a steeper curve.

Start grinding for more resiliance. But on what character...

How to find easter eggs for Noblegarden

It seems that the 3.1 Patch delayed the new easter event Noblegarden. But now you have until the second of May to get a new title "the Noble" and another rabbit pet not too mention all of the holiday gear that they are giving away for finding easter eggs and collecting the chocolates from them.

If you are Horde, the best place to look is Bloodhoof village near the Tauren starting zone Just south of Thunderbluff. Or if you happen to be near the Blood elf starting zone, there are also quite a few eggs to be had around there. If you are alience have a look in Darnassus/Dolanaar or Goldshire.

Grab the quest: A Tisket, A Tasket for a egg basket reward which you can equip and increase your running speed for more collecting of egg's.

Do laps around your selected noob zone and as you find the egg's you will also randomly find bits of clothing and other items like the new pet Spring Rabbits Foot. All of these items are used for the achievements, that count towards the achievements for Noblegarden.

You will need to find around 125 - 275 chocolates, depending on how lucky you are getting the items to drop. If you get all items to drop you will only need 130 chocolates for the eating achievement and buying the egg for 5 chocs to plant in your races assigned city for the Noble Garden achievement.

Achievements:
Blushing Bride - /kiss someone wearing an Elegant Dress while wearing a White Tuxedo Shirt and Black Tuxedo Pants.
Chocolate Lover - Eat 25 Noblegarden Chocolates during the Noblegarden celebration.
Chocoholic - Eat 100 Noblegarden Chocolates during the Noblegarden celebration.
Desert Rose - Use Spring Robes to plant a flower in each of the following desserts: Badlands, Desolace, Tanaris, Thousand Needles, Silithus
Dressed for the Occasion - Discover an Elegant Dress by opening brightly colored eggs during the Noblegarden celebration.
Hard Boiled - Lay an egg in Un'Goro Crater's Golakka Hot Springs as a rabbit during the Noblegarden celebration. I Found One! - Find a Brightly Colored Egg
Noble Garden - Hide a Noblegarden Eggs in Alliance Stormwind City / Horde Silvermoon City.
Shake Your Bunny-Maker - Use Spring Flowers to place rabbit ears upon females of at least 18th level of every race.
Spring Fling - Find your pet Spring Rabbit another one to love in each of the following towns:
Alliance: Azure Watch, Dolanaar, Goldshire Kharanos
Horde: Bloodhoof Village, Brill, Falconwing Square, Razor Hill
Sunday's Finest - Discover the White Tuxedo Shirt and Black Tuxedo Pants by opening brightly colored eggs during the Noblegarden celebration. (this one is not needed for the title)

The only one that was a bit annoying was the Hard Boiled achievement, which involved flying to Silithus and setting my hearth there, and then flying back to TB to and collecting more eggs to get the bunny buff again, and then Hearthing to Silithus and walking down to the Golakka Hot Springs in Un'Goro Crater from there, luckly there was no annoying people waiting for me on the way down there I guess i chose a good time to do the walk. It takes around 6-7 minutes to walk down there in bunny form, and you cant use your speed up basket either which sux a bit.

Other Links to Noblegarden Stuff:
http://www.wowwiki.com/Noblegarden
http://kaliope.wordpress.com/2009/04/25/kaliopes-guide-to-noblegarden/

Gondria Spirit Beast Taming Guide

I dont think ill be looking for this sexy spirit beast myself just yet. But i have scraped a bit of info together for those that want to start looking / camping. Loque'nahak was enough effort for me i think, and it looks like Gondria is on around the same Spawn Cycle with the other three rare elites in Zul'Drak.

It appears that when spawned it stays in the same spot, so it you shouldnt have to chase it around, and does not seem to get killed by NPC's.

Macro for Spamming while flying around Zul'Drak

/tar Gondria
/stopmacro [noexists]
/script PlaySound("RaidWarning")
/run RaidNotice_AddMessage(RaidBossEmoteFrame,"Gondria - Found!", ChatTypeInfo["RAID_WARNING"])

or alternatively you could just use

/tar Gondria

And watch for the target to come up.

Wowhead Map Link for all known spawn locations.

Gondria
Level 77 beast (elite)
556-784 damage
8822 armor
17068 health
Diet: meat, fish
Tameable (Exotic)
Tame abilities: Spirit strike, Prowl, Claw, Cower, Growl
Location: Zul'Drak (63.2, 42.7)

As this beast is exotic, make sure you have one of your specs with the 51 point talent in the Beast Mastery Tree before you go around looking for it. Also if you do have dual spec, make sure you have already switched to BM spec, so that you don't run into Mana Issues when taming, if you are lucky enough too stumble on this rare spawn.

Happy Spirit Beast Hunting ;)

Other Links:

BRK's Video of the New Spirit Beast

More Info on Gondria.

Buying a Mechano Hog - Now im Officially Poor

So last night i finally saved up enough matts/rep/cash to buy a mechano hog. And yes its probably a waste of cash. But dam its a pimp ride!

Just vendor matts alone this mount costs 12,500g, Luckly i had been saving up Titan Steel bars for a while, so that saved me about 1200g.

The thing that really got me was the last level of engineering, i was stuck at 449 for about 350 saronite bars, making so many gyro adjusters its just wasn't funny anymore, so i had to end up buying the matts for the epic goggles, just to get the final level.

Now to wait for the 3.1 patch to finally download, and cower from all the hunter nerfs.

Top 10 teams of the 2009 Arena Tournament

The top 10 teams of the 2009 Arena Tournament’s online qualifier as of April 8, 2009 are listed below:

Rank | Team Name | Classes | Win – Loss | Team Rating
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1. a wild rogmonkey appears | Hunter, Mage, Shaman | 126 – 31 | 2540
2. well then | Death Knight, Paladin, Warlock | 167 – 40 | 2538
3. GET TANKED | Death Knight, Paladin, Warlock | 164 – 45 | 2521
4. monkey attack squad | Hunter, Mage, Shaman | 296 – 129 | 2519
5. BARKSDALE CREW | Death Knight, Paladin, Warlock | 195 – 66 | 2513
6. GET MONEY GET PAYCE | Death Knight, Hunter, Paladin | 264 – 133 | 2510
7. Primatech | Death Knight, Paladin, Warlock | 100 – 19 | 2500
8. Almost Eighty On Live | Rogue, Shaman, Warlock | 147 – 54 | 2491
9. Lord Icarium n Friends | Mage, Priest, Rogue | 104 – 39 | 2484
10. big team | Rogue, Shaman, Warlock | 145 – 56 | 2483

You can follow the full ladder rankings of the online qualifier on the World of Warcraft Armory here .

New MMO on the way from blizzard?

According to Ghostcrawler, there are no plans for another MMO any time soon. Not sure what Starcraft 2 is going to be classified as.

Q: What new MMO is Blizzard working on? Has any info been released?

Ghostcrawler:
1) We haven't announced anything on the new project. We probably won't for awhile.

2) Kalgan is still here on WoW. We discuss the game design every single day. He is behind all of the changes we make.

3) The design team makes all of our decisions by consensus. It's a slow process, but it means there are no I-told-you-sos down the road. That portion of the team that doesn't post here doesn't get enough credit for all of the enormous contributions that they make. It kind of sucks. :(

4) The WoW forums have a storied tradition of attacking the messenger when they don't like the message. When Kalgan posted a lot, players attacked him too. Whether it's me or someone else posting here two or whenever years from now, they will become the new most hated person in WoW. :)

5) We don't let it bother us. You can't in this business. It's important to us to communicate with the players, and the forums are one way to do that. We just ban the players that can't control themselves and like to spew garbage instead of discussing the game.

Official Forum Link

After three eggs finally a Proto Drake!

So it took three weeks but finally the green proto drake mount is mine! which proves that this is probably the easiest (at least for me) way to get a proto drake mount ;).

Also on a sad note File-Front is shutting down on the 30th of March, so it will make getting quality arena/wow movies a lot harder, they have been a great provider of this content.

P.S Tiling bathrooms sux.

PvP With Tree 6 - Awesome Hunter PVP

Showing the current state of Survival, before the nerf...


PvP With Tree 6 - Final Volume

Rep Grinding for Horde Expedition Daily List

So while im looking for better things to do i thought i may as well level my Horde Expedition rep for the Mecano Hog, these are the quests that will give me about 2.5k rep per day. /fun

Grizzly Hills Dailies:

• Keep 'Em on Their Heels - 250 rep
• Making Repairs - 250 rep
• Overwhelmed! - 250 rep
• Shred the Alliance - 250 rep
• Blackriver Brawl - 125 rep (spillover from 250 Horde Expedition rep)

Icecrown Dailies:

• Assault by Ground - 250 rep
• Assault by Air - 250 rep
• Blood of the Chosen - 250 rep
• King of the Mountain - 250 rep
• Keeping the Alliance Blind - 250 rep

New Rare Fishing Mount Coralshell Turtle

So according to the PTR patch notes, there is going to be "A new (and very rare) special mount can now be caught from Northrend fishing pools"

Coralshell Turtle - Summons and dismisses a rideable Coralshell Turtle (probably will look a lot like this). This is a very fast mount, both on land and in water. So its 100% on land and in water, much like all epic land mounts after the 3.1 patch.

So i wonder what the cast rate is going to be on something that is "very rare" it could be like fishing up Mr.Pinchy all over again.

Also it seems that they have removed the annoying Nat Paggle fishing quest, the one that you have to walk half way around the world and fish in different spots to get artisian fishing. This is now trainable from the fishing trainers.

- New fishing dailies are now offered from Marcia Chase in Dalaran City!
- Players are no longer required to do the Nat Pagle, Angler Extreme quest to gain Artisan fishing. The quest now offers a special superior-quality fishing pole instead. If you already completed the quest, you can visit Nat Pagle in Dustwallow Marsh to receive this new fishing pole.
- The time needed to catch fish has been reduced.
- You can now fish anywhere, regardless of skill. Every catch has the potential for fishing skill gains, but you are likely to catch worthless junk in areas that are too difficult for your skill.
- You can now fish in Wintergrasp, and the fishin' is good!
- You no longer need to learn fishing from books. The trainers have finally done their reading and are able to teach you the same thing
- A new clam, the Giant Darkwater Clam, can be obtained by fishing in Wintergrasp. This mighty clam has a greatly increased chance to drop pearls, and yields up to five times the regular amount of clam meat.

Gondria the new Spirit Beast

Click here for my article on taming this beast!

So apparently from my last post there is another spirit beast, Gondria, basically its a see through frostsaber, much like the mount and winterspring ones.

Not as original as the Loque'nahak skin thats for sure, but still pretty cool.

So does that mean that everyone will be going back to BM when the patch hits just to search for this new beast? I dont think ill bother really, finding the first Spirit Beast was enough of a pain really.

Here are the known spawn locations on the PTR at the moment:

(62,63) (62,42) (69,47)


Happy Spirit Beast Hunting! :)

New Spectral Tiger as a Hunter Pet?

I dont know if it can be tamed, but /crosses fingers/toes.

Its just like my winterspring frost saber, except see through and shiney!

Hunter changes of 3.1 is it goodbuy survival?

So the time had to come for them to nerf the dps of survival. sheds a small tear...

I have been survival ever since BM was nerfed last patch, and have had two of my stable slots going to waste with a

Spirit Beast and a Corehound waiting for BM to become the powerhouse it used to be.

So what do we have to look forward to in regards to survival nerfs exactly:

According to MMO Champion PTR notes for 3.1:

Survival (official changes)

* Hunting Party: This talent has been reduced to 3-points, and now increases your total Agility by an additional 1/2/3%.
* Lock and Load re-designed: You now have a 33/66/100% chance when you trap a target with Freezing Trap, Freezing Arrow or Frost Trap and a 2/4/6% chance when you deal periodic damage with your Immolation Trap or Black Arrow to cause your next 2 Arcane Shot or Explosive Shot spells to trigger no cooldown, cost no mana and consume no ammo. This now has a new spell effect and sound.
* New Talent: Trap Launcher: When activated, your next Trap will be launched instantly at the enemy target. 1 minute cooldown.
* T.N.T. re-designed: Increases the damage done by your Explosive Shot, Explosive Trap and Immolation Trap by 2/4/6%, and gives your Explosive Shot a 33/66/100% chance to refresh the duration of your Immolation Trap effect on the target.
* Trap Mastery: This talent has been moved up to tier-2, up from tier-9.
* Wyvern Sting duration increased from 12 sec to 30 sec. PvP duration reduced from 10 sec to 6 sec.

Survival (undocumented changes)

* Hunting Party (Tier 10) is now a 3 point talent, increasing agility by 1/2/3% and your Arcane Shot, Explosive Shot and Steady Shot critical strikes have a 33/66/100% chance to grant up to 10 party or raid members mana regeneration equal to 0.25% of the maximum mana per second. Lasts for 15 sec.
* Trap Mastery moved from Tier 9 to Tier 2 and is now a 3 point talent. Increases the duration of Frost and Freezing trap by 10/20/30%, Periodic damage of Immolation and Explosive trap by 10/20/30%, and number of snakes summoned by Snake Trap by 30%. (Previously was just 1 point)
* *New Talent* Black Arrow (Tier 9) - Fires a Black Arrow at the target, increasing all damage done by you to the target by 6% and dealing [ 10% of RAP + 785 ] Shadow damage over 15 sec. Costs 6% base mana. 5-35 yard range. Instant Cast. 30 sec cooldown.
* Sniper Training (Tier 9) has been changed to increase the critical strike chance of your Kill Shot ability by 5/10/15%, and while standing still for 6 sec., you gain Sniper Training increasing the damage done by your Steady Shot, Aimed Shot, Black Arrow and Explosive Shot by 2/4/6% Lasts 15 sec. (Previously increased damage and critical strike chance based on your range to the target)
* Wyvern Sting (Tier 7) now lasts 30 sec on the target. (Previously lasted 12 sec)
* T.N.T. (Tier 4) now increases the damage done by your Explosive Shot, Explosive Trap and Immolation Trap by 2%. (Previously increased critical strike chance of explosive shot and and gave it a chance to stun the target)
* Lock and Load (Tier 4) now has a 33/66/100% chance to proc off Freezing Shot, Freezing Trap, and Frost Trap, and a 3/7/10% chance to proc off the periodic damage of Immolation Trap and Black Arrow. (Previously worked on all traps and included serpent sting)
* Improved Wing Clip has been removed from the game.

On the surface it doesent really look like too much of a nerf really, just scaling back damage a bit.

But i guess we will have to wait for the official patch notes to really be able to guage the differences after it has been taken off PTR.

At least we will be able to have a BM spec and a Surv Offspec, and with the new skill Call Stabled pet it will make it that much easier. Really not sure why they added a 30 minute cool down to that ability though.

Also even though its probably just lazyness from me, why the hell do our pets only scale up too level 75. I know i remember when we had to level them from whatever level they were tamed at, and it would me a massive mission to level them all the way up to our level, but im just not sure what benifit grinding for five levels with a new pet gives us.