With how slow things are getting in the game right now while everyone is impatiently awaiting the Cataclysm, it’s the perfect time to bolster your guild’s cohesiveness with some fun guild events!  You can check out the list of fun guild events I wrote last year, or try this new one I’m adding to it: 

Themed Screenshot Contests

 This contest is perfect for this time of the season, because even your guildies who have temporarily suspended their accounts could participate if they’ve saved up some decent screenshots, and it can keep your guild forums active during downtime.

 What you need to do is come up with some sort of theme appropriate to your guild.  Some ideas are:

• Best guild moment (maybe an important achievement or boss kill)
• Best guildie mistell (because we all SS them for blackmail purposes, right?)
• Screenshot of a suggested “guild headquarters/hideout” (good opportunity to explore all the cool hidden places that might be gone soon!)
• Screenshot of “Guildiewhodiesalot” dead in some awkward/funny position or situation

 If you get some solid interest, I suggest turning this into a monthly contest!  Schedule the first 3 weeks of the month for submitting screenshots and allow the last week for voting.  Of course, prizes are great motivators.  Depending on your situation I might suggest a game timecard, a pet/mount from the Blizzard Pet Store or the right to redesign the guild tabard for the next month.

It’s that time again!  That time when the current content starts to feel a bit stale, and all anyone can think about is the new expansion that is just barely over the horizon.  Also, summer.  I hear there’s sunshine and fun to be had outside, or something.  *shrug*   

So what’s a blogger to do?  I could write about all the breaking news from the Cataclysm Beta that’s been coming out, but I am actually trying to avoid spoilers and wait to see it all myself when the time comes.  I could rehash all my random dungeon adventures, but after a while they seem to all become the same story.

The blogging desire is still within me.  Quite often I’ll sit down with a blank text box open and just try to type something.  But there is very little inspiring to write about right now!  I’m determined not to give up, and I don’t consider my blog abandoned, but I am just waiting for that divine intervention to start flowing through my fingertips.

Until then, I will try to post at least once a week.  It might not be particularly inspired or helpful, but maybe it’ll give me a chance to keep my writing muscles in shape, and even give you a nice break from all the “ZOMG LOOK AT THIS STUFF IN THE BETA!”

Today, I will post Twitter-sized updates on various aspects of my life:

Raiding: Got to 10/12 in H ICC before our 10-man guild dwindled to a 3-man. Other games and activities have put us on a summer/pre-Cata hiatus.

Brajana: With no one to conquer raids with, my hunter is taking her own personal hiatus. Probably won’t see Ruby Sanctum at all!

Kaeira: My Prot Paly hit 80! Geared up and making it through Heroics. I make a fine tank, if I do say so myself! Still scared of raids though…

New Alts: Finally got a rogue past level 12! Hoppi the gnome (20) has been my new focus, in a friend’s guild where people actually still play.

Other games: Got a bit carried away with Steam’s sales. I’ve got a list of games to keep me busy such as Mass Effect 1&2, Torchlight, World of Goo!

Real life: Started a new job a few weeks ago. Adjusting to the un-unemployed life slowly… less recreation time, but the paycheque makes up for it.

The WoW Armory iPhone app has proven quite useful for me – allowing me to update my raid event status on the fly, mostly.  But what I’ve found especially interesting is the ability to look at a list of all my characters – even the ones on my old, inactive account and the ones below level 10.  As you might know, I am quite an alt-o-holic.  I love playing around on the character creation screen and running through those quick first few levels.  I got curious to see if my attitude about favourite class/race panned out with my actual playing statistics, so I looked into the details.

I’ve removed all bank alts and counted Death Knight levels as if 55 is level 1, and compiled some fun facts:

• Total characters: 28
• Total levels: 684
• Average level: 24.4
• Most played class (by total levels): Paladin (3 characters, 166 levels)
• Most played class (by total characters): Hunter (5 characters, 141 levels)
• Least played class (both): Rogue (1 character, level 11)
• Most played race (by total levels): Gnome (5 characters, 131 levels)
• Most played race (by total characters): Draenei (7 characters, 41 levels)
• Least played race (both): Human (0 characters)

• The highest Draenei I’ve ever played made it to level 13.
• Although I’ve got 4 Shaman, the highest one is level 7.
• I’ve never gotten a Death Knight out of the starting area, although I’ve rolled 3 of them.
• I have 6 characters that are level 11.  That is the “make-it-or-break-it” level for my alts.
• Despite my race preferences, I have the same number of Night Elves as Trolls: 1 each.
• I have more Alliance characters than Horde characters! *GASP*

See, wasn’t that fun?  Have you noticed any interesting patterns in your alts?

With over 1500 screenshots saved to my WoW/Screenshots folder over the last 5 years, I decided to go back and pick out a few I haven’t yet shared on Mend Pet.  I’ve narrowed it down to 1% of my most interesting shots and posted them in chronological order!

Since it’s such a giant list of images, I’m adding a click-through for once.  So click and enjoy!

Read the rest of this entry »

Hey!  Remember me?

It’s been a while, I know.  I have excuses upon excuses to throw at you, like how finals came out of no where, and then my computer bit the bucket, and I had 2 weeks of computer-less vacation… but I won’t tell you about all that non-sense.  I’ll just stick to the stuff that really matters.

Like my shiny new TITLE!

I’m now Brajana the Kingslayer since several weeks ago my guild and I finally took down the Lich King!  Since then we’ve been progressing through Heroic 10 and are currently ranked 4th on our server (and 1st if you just count 10-only guilds)!  Unfortunately, I’ve been absent from a big chunk of this progress.

The rare times I have had some time to log in, I’ve been working on my alts.  Mostly, it goes like this:

1. Log into Ferguson, queue up to heal a dungeon.
2. Log out of Ferguson in frustration after barely making it through the dungeon with some failtank.
3. Log into Kaeira to level my tank, so I don’t have to deal with failtanks.

So, Kaeira is getting a lot more love than dear Ferg.  I’m actually contemplating making him full-time Shadow, because maybe healing just isn’t my thing.

There you have it.  A quick update to get the ball rolling again!  Thanks for sticking around during my extended AFK!