Mend Pet

I went home a bit early last night because I had a goal.  Ghugh was sitting at about 5% through level 79 and I was going to get him to 80 no matter what!  So after 4 hours of playing, I finally got my dear paladin to 80!  He’s got his epic flyer, he’s using his Titansteel CD, he’s spent his last talent point.

Oddly enough, my first reaction when my experience bar finally disappeared was… Now what?

This is quite different from when my Hunter hit 80.  When Brajana hit level 80 I had clear goals.  Get my hit rating capped, run Heroics with guildmates, get that stupid freakin’ crossbow from Heroic UK (it never dropped, BTW), start raiding.

But I don’t have goals for Ghugh.  Heck, I haven’t even decided if I’m going to make him a tank or a DPS!  I doubt I can gear him for both equally.  I also don’t really know any of my guildmates – they are my boyfriend’s guildmates, not mine. Which means Ghugh is lined up for a ton of PUGs.  Do I want to PUG?  I don’t know, I’ve never been such a huge fan.

In fact, once I hit 80, I did a couple more quests, I hearthed to Dalaran and did some banking, and I logged out to go watch some TV.  It was actually very anti-climactic.  I loved leveling my Paladin… will I love playing him at 80 as much?

Let me get right to it… we’ve been working on Mimiron for several weeks now.  Our first week, we got so close we could taste it!  But haven’t seen anything quite that close for a while.

Well, it finally happened.  We took him down!  After battling with disconnects and bad storms and silly mistakes… we finally pushed through.  Vent exploded with cheers and laughter!  I love that feeling after finally achieving something so big.  And while this might not seem like such a big deal to some… it was very important for us to finally get that fight down.  Of course, this doesn’t mean we won’t have issues with him next week, but at least we know we can do it!

This week was also quite the gear fest for me!  I picked up my BIS pants, Saronite Mesh Leggings off of Razorscale, and FINALLY got my hands on some of that oh so desirable tier 8.  Picked up the chest from Hodir, and bought the helm with my saved up Emblems.  It breaks my T7 bonus, but the T8 one is so much better!

In fact, I was so excited after picking up the gear that I proceeded to run the wrong way and aggro several Jormungers onto the raid, and keep Aspect of the Pack up for at least one trash pull.  Yeah, that’s how I earn my tier pieces. 

Unfortunately, Thursday night didn’t go quite as well.  We found ourselves stuck on Thorim.  So very, very stuck.  I still don’t really know why it was so different from the other times we got him down… but it was a very sad ending to a raid week.

Hopefully next week we’ll be able to get to General Vezax!  I hear that fight is a lot of fun!

This Week in Raiding… is my weekly Saturday post where I allow myself to brag about new gear, bosses, achievements, and such.

Come back next week for another dose of epeen and QQ!

Scavenger Hunts are amazing guild events.  They get everyone involved doing something where gear doesn’t really matter.  It does, however, require a ton of planning ahead of time.  Previously, Unemployed celebrated a Feast for Thrall, where the scavenger hunt employed the participants to gather materials for food and party favours.

Well, I finally came up with a story for a new Employment Opportunity (Scavenger Hunt for Unemployed), and here is how it will begin:

URGENT NOTICE FROM THE AZEROTH HEALTH ADVISORY BOARD

A plague is upon us! No, not that plague. A NEW plague! No… not THAT new plague…

Some warriors have returned from their journey to Northrend and are exhibiting strange symptoms. We have isolated the disease, and it seems to be related to contact with the Boars of Borean Tundra. Naturally we’ve consulted the most powerful shaman, priests and druids of the Horde, but none of the conventional methods seem to have any effect.

After working with the greatest healers and the most clever apothecaries, we may yet have a solution to end this pandemic. But it will not be easy. Strange reagents gathered from all over Azeroth, Outland and even Northrend will be needed. There will be dangers untold, there will be blood, and there will be sweat.

We ask only the bravest members of the Horde to offer their hand to help eliminate the Swine Flu threat.  If health and safety is not enough of a motivator for you, be aware that there will be grand rewards for the one who helps develop the cure!

Sincerely,
Thrum Bloodbringer
Head Shaman
Azeroth Health Advisory Board

NOTE: All further Zeppelin flights returning from the Borean Tundra will be strictly monitored. Import and sale of Boar Ribs is prohibited at this time. Please wash your hands regularly. If you are feeling ill, please remain at home and do not attempt to attend any raids.

The official date for this event is yet to be determined, but I will be sure to follow up here with more details as it gets closer!

I’m not one for whining about Blizzard’s changes, generally.  I actually hate it when people complain that other people are going to have an easier time getting the same stuff as them.  I don’t care how easy or hard others have it, what I care about is my own gameplay, and how it will be affected by the changes.

So I’ve taken some time to figure out how I really feel about these upcoming Emblem changes.

My overall opinion is that when you’re running Heroics you don’t need T8.  When you’re running Naxx you don’t need T8.  When a dungeon or raid gets too easy then you should move on to the next level.  Not before, not after.

But I can understand some people just want to get their alts to the same level as their mains.  Maybe they want to switch and don’t want to put in the overtime to catch up… I am not sure.

For my main, my Hunter, I don’t really care much about the Emblem stuff.  When 3.2 comes out, chances are we will have cleared the non-hard modes of Ulduar 25 and will be working on hard modes, maybe even have a few of them down.  It’s likely we’ll be moving on to the new raid when it comes out.  We aren’t going to be forced to go back and farm Naxx for Emblems, although I can see this making our off-night raids a bit more popular.

The strange thing is, this patch is supposed to be aimed at ‘casuals’ and alts.  Look!  You can get the 2nd highest shinies by running Heroics!  However, these changes make me quite sad when I think about my Paladin, who is just about to hit 80.

Will Ghugh ever get to see Ulduar?  Doubt it.  Because why would you run Ulduar when you can run Heroics and get the same gear?  Which means if I wanted to raid with him, I’d have to jump from Heroics to T9 raiding.

And that scares me.  What I like is progression, challenge.  Doing Ulduar again on a new character in a different role will make it a whole new challenge for me, but I don’t think anyone will bother running it much when you can get half of your epics from doing Naxx Emblem runs.

All in all, I’m not pleased by these changes.  I can’t know for sure what will happen, but if for some reason I decide to start raiding on my off-nights with my Paladin, he’ll be forced to skip content.  And that is just not cool.

A few weeks back, Pike from Aspect of the Hare opened up commissions on her adorable hand-crafted avatars.  I realized what a great little gift that would make for my sweetie!  But of course… he wasn’t going to get one if I didn’t get one!  So I sent in my two requests

And here’s the result:

Isn’t it cute?!  Look at happy little Ambrose, floating at my side!  Awww!  Even got my Journey’s End and Siren’s Cry in there.  I’m a very happy Troll!

And here’s the one I sent to Gadgetsnguns for his birthday yesterday:

Unfortunately there wasn’t much room to fit the gun in there, but he’s got his Tiger and his Tabard of the Achiever, which are both quite important to my little Dwarf.  He loved it!

Thanks Pike!