Fun In The Head

Recently some friends of mine have become a bit more active playing WoW.  This has, in turn, provided me with more structure when I play WoW.  We don’t have anything formal scheduled but we do like to run the heroic daily, regular daily, BG daily and maybe a quick heroic ToC whenever we can.  It’s been fun and I’ve made significant progress on my gear via emblems.  Sadly there isn’t any gear in heroics that are useful to me (especially my druid) but I’ve been tweaking my tanking gear with upgrades from conquest and triumph.  (hurray for 2 piece T8.5 bonus)

While I sit here and reminisce about my recent gaming accomplishments and what has provided me with the most entertainment I notice that WoW is pretty short on the list.  I play WoW more than any of my other games solely due to the diversity of things I get to do.  On a daily basis there are my crafting cool downs (epic gem transmute, moonshroud etc) there are the profession quests (fishing, cooking, JC etc) and a plethora of other things I can do to occupy my time.

When I’m not on WoW what do I prefer to play?  Rock Band, of course.  I’m pushing myself into expert drums rather rigorously these days.  I refuse to play on hard when I play by myself.  That isn’t to say that I can play all the songs on expert but rather I play the easier songs so that I can force myself into the expert mindset.  When I play with others I often down-grade to hard to ensure we can play all the songs we want – and survive!  Guitar, on the other hand, has become my formitable bread-and-butter.  I’m at the point where I can beat almost every song on expert – and beat them convincingly.  That is, my worst case scenarios end up being about 85% or so, and the vast majority of songs end up being above 90%.

The list of songs that I can’t beat have shortened considerably.  I recently beat Green Grass and High Tides, which took about 3 hours of back-to-back attempts to do.  Vicious!  The list has widdled it’s way down to 5.

Painkiller – I’m convinced I can beat this now I just haven’t tried in a very long time.

Panic Attack – This is my current project.  I’ve spent about 1 hour with it and am fully confident I will command and conquer on my next set of solid attempts (damn that organ solo).

Warriors of Time – Does the solo need to be that long, fast and difficult?  Really?  I honestly can’t foresee myself completing this without a solid afternoon of attempts.  It’s cool though because it’s a great song and fun to play.

Snow, Hey Oh! – Can someone explain how this isn’t a tier 7 song?  Mother of some-other-son-of-a-pain…

Visions – Whoever suggested this song as mandatory in order to complete the endless setlist needs to have a vice grip attached to their balls (or punched in the boob if it was a girl).  Speaking completely from the music theory perspective this song is terrible.  There is no well defined beat, melody or harmony.  It’s composition is sloppy and it’s just a shitty song to play.  Some chick just grumbles into the mic for 4 minutes and the guitarist just hits random strings…not to mention what the drummer is doing…

Other than that I’ve downed every other song (that I have) on expert.  I’m sure there are some DLC songs that would be very challenging but I haven’t come across any that sounded appealing to me.  It’s sad how a great deal of the very challenging songs consist of people just screaming at the mic.  Perhaps I’m getting too old but when it comes to music I’d like to have feelings aroused.  The songs I end up liking are songs that I find moving – either by lyric or note.  Screaming incomprehensible words means very little to me.

When thinking back on what I’ve done, as far as gaming goes, in the last few weeks I must admit that Rock Band sticks out as the game I’ve had far more fun playing.  Why is it that I choose to spend so much more time on WoW?  A mystery…

Why Can’t I Just Enjoy It?

There is a new Internet phenomena sweeping the nation.  It’s a low budget web-sitcom titled The Guild.  It seems the show has caught on and is becoming very successful.  Although I typically enjoy original thought and comedy I find this show kinda…well, dumb.  Maybe I’m just a hater but, from my perspective, it’s the writers and producers of The Guild that are the haters.

If you haven’t seen this show I’ll give you a short summary.  The Guild is based around a group of people who play an online game.  The game is never specified – to my knowledge anyway – but it’s very clear it’s an MMO similar to EQ, WoW or Warhammer.  The show goes on to depict the people in the guild as completely dysfunctional morons.  Now, I’m sure there are more than enough dysfunctional morons who play the game but I think the vast majority are probably pretty normal.

The casual viewer watches a show like this and assumes that everyone who plays WoW is a complete retard.  That’s fine.  What erks me is that they feel completely justified believing I’m a complete retard because they’ve seen the show and they “know how MMO players are”.  Then, I’m unjustified in believing they are a complete retard because they spend 2 or 3 hours a day watching television.  What a waste of your fucking life.  At least with gaming you are involved.  I have to solve puzzles, practice motor movement, coordination and environmental awareness.  People who watch television (be it network, Internet or other) are just draining their brain and doing nothing more.

So, how exactly am I the retard?  Clearly it’s a stereotype that has developed from a small percentage of the MMO population.  The same conclusion can be drawn about people who watch television.  I’ve seen several people who watch television all day who are grossly overweight, unemployed, lazy and unhygienic.  So, using the same logic, I can pigeon hole everyone who watches television to be dirty, stinky, out-of-work fat asses.  Right?

Wrong.  I wouldn’t do that because I’m not a retard.

A Change of Pace

Generally speaking this a WoW related blog but I’m a gamer and enjoy several flavors of games.  The other game I spend my time on is Rock Band.  I began playing about 2 months before Rock Band 2 was launched.  Prior to that I had never touched Guitar Hero or any other ‘instrument simulator’ in my life.  I fell in love with Rock Band immediately.  I purchased Rock Band 2 the day of the launch and downloaded about 60 songs since.  I play guitar, bass and vocals on expert.  (the drums on medium/hard…depending on the song)

As many of you know Harmonix recently launched The Beatles: Rock Band.  A friend of mine purchased it for the Wii and said it was really fun.  She lives in California.  I live in Alabama.  So, I didn’t really get the chance to try it out for myself on her Wii.  Well, I have a college buddy who lives in Portland who plays Rock Band with me over XBOX Live.  We like to play the very challenging songs together.  It turns out that he purchased the game as well.

Well, this last weekend my roommate rented The Beatles: Rock Band and we spent several hours on Friday night playing with my college buddy.  I was guitar, my roommate was bass and my buddy plays drums.  I should point out that I am not a fan of The Beatles.  They have their share of catchy songs but I give them no credit as great artists.  They are rather a group of musicians, who are moderately talented, who happened to fall into something original.  They were a fucking boy band, for christ’s sake.

One can argue taste all day long so I will not continue along with this discussion.  So, back to the game.  Well, we jumped on and noticed some immediate differences between Rock Band 2 and The Beatles: Rock Band.  Many differences were neither ‘improvements’ or ‘shortcomings’ – they were just differences.  Some differences took me a few moments to get used to.  Some I didn’t like.  Some were of no consequence to me.  There weren’t really any improvements from what I saw.

My first stumble was that the track that the notes come down on was very short as compared to Rock Band 2.  That is, when a note is coming down the ‘fret’ it can sneak up on you because there isn’t a great deal of ‘fret’ to look at.  Does that make sense?  It’s really just a matter of the prospective of the graphic.  In Rock Band 2 the ‘fret’ is angled more acutely and you can see a greater distance down it.  So, when a note is incoming you have more time to prepare for it.  This was just a difference that I needed to get used to.  Neither an improvement or shortcoming.

The second stumble was that the art from the background was unbelievably distracting.  Come on with the psychedelic colors already.  The spinning, twisting and colors distracted from the notes so much it was borderline dizzying.  When you go into overdrive you can barely make out your fret during some art sequences.  The art in The Beatles: Rock Band was much more of a point-of-attention than in Rock Band 2.  That is, it was apparent that the developers wanted much more time and effort put into the art for The Beatles: Rock Band.  The problem was it was too distracting to the game play mechanics.  Major short coming.

The third stumble is that the game is unbelievably short.  Oh, my.  My roommate and I ran through the entire Story Mode in just a few hours.  Not bad for a rental, but to buy the game would be insane.  Why spend $60 when you can spend $6 and get the exact same experience?  It comes down to an argument of repeatability.  I can’t foresee any reason why I’d want to play any of these songs again.  I suppose if one were an avid Beatles fan it might be worth $60.  Of course, you can probably buy a CD compilation for $60 that will have more than 45 songs in it.  Not impressed…

The fourth stumble was the difficulty of the game.  Not once did I fail when I played it.  Not once did I have a ‘oh, shit’ moment.  There was simply no challenge in the game.  I got 5 gold stars the first time through on many of the songs.  Granted they were among the easier songs – but there just weren’t that many difficult songs to choose from.  I believe my worst performance was 82% or so.  This leaves a lot of room for improvement but many of the tier 7 Rock Band songs required me to play for hours to beat it.  There are still some songs I can’t beat and many that I get sub 80% on.  So, to fly through the entire game scoring over 90% on probably 42 of the songs means that the game is just too damn easy.

My final thought is related to the intentions of the developers.  (and perhaps George Harrison’s son – who was directly involved in the ‘direction’ of the game)  This game was fully intended as a core to a plethora of DLC songs.  That is, they created this song fully intending to have their audience pay another $40 to $50 (at least) to download more songs for the game.  Why do I think this?  Even though I’m not a Beatles fan I know what are the ‘good’ songs.  There were maybe 5 songs on the whole game that I could stand – let alone enjoy.  Now, I will admit there are about 8 to 10 Beatles songs that I find catchy and entertaining to some degree.  I know this set of ‘greatest hits’ was intentionally avoided to cause people to pay for them later.  What a crock of horse shit!  Good marketing on their part?  Probably.  Does that make it any less coercive?  No.

I know, I know…people aren’t forced to pay for the DLC…blah, blah, blah.  It’s just a matter of ethics, in my opinion.  They knew full well what they were doing and the primary purpose was to get more money out of people.  People will argue “that’s capitalism”, which is just a poor position to hold.  Telling me the name of the economic system that supports this behavior does not justify it.

Let’s say I was designing a Rock Band game specifically around Led Zepplin (oh, god…that would be awesome if it was done right) but decided not to include Black Dog, Kashmir, Stairway to Heaven, Living Loving Maid, Ramble On, Over The Hills and Far Away or D’yer Mak’er.  So many Led Zepplin fans would purchase the game because they love Led Zepplin only to be disappointed when they found out their favorite songs were intentionally left off because the developers wanted them to pay for them later.  That is just a coercive thing to do.  It’s unethical and the fact that we have an economic system that supports it is simply staggering.

In conclusion, if you are a die hard Beatles fan and want to support them in everything they do or are a part of then I say:  Go for it.  For the rest of us who don’t really care for the Beatles, prefer to have a game with depth, challenge and meaning or would rather get what you pay for then I say:  Skip The Beatles: Rock Band and stick with Rock Band 2.  If you spend $60 on DLC you’ll likely get a list of songs that have more of your favorites than the entire The Beatles: Rock Band will.  Sure you can’t buy 45 songs with $60 from the Rock Band 2 DLC but I guarantee you won’t get a shit ton of stupid songs – because you decide which songs to buy.

Stupid song in The Beatles: Rock Band – about 35

Meh songs in The Beatles: Rock Band – about 5

Pleasant songs in The Beatles: Rock Band – 3 (Ticket to Ride, Come Together and While My Guitar Gently Weeps)

Potentially good songs that were omitted from The Beatles: Rock Band because the producers knew people would dish out extra money in DLC to get them but should have been included in the original because of their obvious ‘greatest hits’ status – Let It Be, Yesterday, All My Loving, Please Mister Postman, Love Me Do and Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da.  I’m sure the Beatles fans would have a more extensive list than what I came up with here.

Now, admittedly, I only played the guitar part throughout the entire game.  Perhaps the other instruments are more challenging, fun and worth while.  If so, then John Lennon was a shitty guitarist.

Peace Out!

I have decided it’s that time – the time to walk away.  This last Tuesday our guild was going to have it’s first day back from a short raiding break.  I logged on to get my toon in proper order.  Gathered my reagents, pots and repair money.  Everything was good to go and I thought: Holy christ, I want to shoot myself in the face right now.

I logged off, wrote a short (very short) explaination on the guild website and called my PvE days to finish.  Then, this morning, I received an email from Blizzard telling me my 6 month renewal is up today and my account is inactive until I manually renew it.  Ultimately it’s just perfect timing.

Although I do not want to do anymore PvE I do think I may occasionally jump on for some PvP.  I’ve been enjoying PvP with my Death Knight, Druid, Hunter and Mage.  Although my mage is only 69 it’s still a good time.

What will happen to this blog?  Meh, it will probably just sit here.  I may keep making leveling guides.  When the mood strikes I’ll probably write about a new PvP spec I’m trying.  All things considered this blog has gone the way of the Dodo.  I have started another, non-WoW related, blog on my personal website for anyone who is interested.  I haven’t been in the writing mood lately so it’s rather scarce at the moment.  If you are interested in philosophy, social science or politics you can take a gander.

ricosignal.com

Don’t Fuel the Fire

What is our obsession with worrying about the wrong things?  I think Mary Schmich said it best.

Worrying is as effective as trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing bubble gum.

However, it seems to be in our nature to want to worry about something.  This is why there are soap operas, or just television shows in general.  It’s a futile attempt to try and get people to stop worrying.  Instead, I wonder if it’s possible to direct people’s worry to the right things.

Well, who defines the “right” things to worry about?  Tough call.  Some of them seem pretty obvious to me but there may be things I’m missing.  For a topical example let’s look at the Swine Flu pandemic.  The death toll has risen to around 330 last I heard.  So, doing some number comparisons:

Swine Flu Related Deaths This Year = ~330 (Worldwide)

Regular Flu Related Deaths This Year = ~13,000 (USA only – between 100,000 -  200,000 Worldwide)

I don’t recall seeing anything in the news over the last month about the regular flu.  For some reason somebody thinks it’s relevant to talk about swine flu.  Little known fact:  The regular flu derives from pigs.  There are local schools closing due to the worry about swine flu.  That is ridiculous.  Let’s now compare this to a larger problem.  Say, auto related fatalities.

We close local public schools because nearly 300 people have died because of something.  The number of people who die from an auto related death on their way to school is far and away a more staggering.  If you are interested in USA national statistics you can easily find this information on the government website here.

Let’s speak to who should decide what is important enough to worry about.  I still don’t know the answer but there is something fundamental inside most social human beings that would agree that the number of auto related deaths is far more alarming than the number of swine flu related deaths.

It is the opinion of this author that it is better to worry about something than it is to worry about nothing.  When people don’t have anything important to worry about they will start worrying about at least one of two things.  Themselves or something that doesn’t need to be worried about.

Granted everyone worries about themselves to a certain extent.  You must be aware of your own well being if you are going to survive.  The worry I’m talking about is more selfish in nature.  People will begin worrying about things they don’t have and want.  What good has that really ever done?

Now, when people start worrying about things that don’t need to be worried about we begin wasting resources.  Take for example…Swine Flu.  We have spent a great deal of money to close the schools, broadcast news, do scientific research and many, many other activities all surrounding Swine Flu and the threat it may spread.

Oddly enough I haven’t spoken with, or know of, anyone who is actually worried about Swine Flu.  Surely there is somebody out there who is worried about it otherwise there wouldn’t be so much going on to prevent it’s spread.  Perhaps I just travel in well educated circles because I have a hard time understanding how anyone can care about this.  For some reason, however, the media keeps fueling the fire.

We’ve focused so much on what shouldn’t be worried about.  What should we worry about?  Well, I think this probably changes from person to person depending on their believes, morals and priorities.  I think, in general, it’s safe to say we should worry about the infringement of people’s rights.

We are able to function as a society by understanding and observing that each of us have rights by which we are allowed to live by.  Only when those rights are violated, in some way, do we run into the recurring problems.

Regardless of all that it’s not hard to argue how ridiculous it is that all this attention is being given to Swine Flu when 40 times as many people have died to the regular flu…just this year.

A Line in the Sand

Have you ever read (or heard) something that actually paralleled your own thoughts and experiences so much that you felt enlightened solely because there exists someone else out there whose opinion so closely matches your own?  I came across such a feeling this morning while reading a post from Selyndia over at TankSpot.

This particular post was on the topic of tolerance.  The author (whom I assume is female from the name alone) spoke, in very general terms, about a problem that arose in her guild recently.  The method by which she handled it was flawless, in my opinion.  To summarize, Selyndia’s guild was in the process of recruiting a player who declared they were homosexual in their application.

Seeing as this declaration had nothing to do with the players ability they ignored it and proceeded to recruit this player the same as any other.  This player was involved in several raids and progression runs in an attempt to see what kind of skill this player had.

Now, from some discussions in gchat and over VOIP the player was offended by the language they used.  Although Selyndia wasn’t specific about this I can only assume the offense was because of “gay bashing”.  She did, however, point out that the offensive language was not directed at any player but rather just used casually during the conversation.

Well, the player complained to several officers over the course of several days (maybe even weeks).  She decided that since the other players were not directing their offensive comments at the new recruit she was not going to take any action.  Later the guild was in the process of recruiting other players.  The offended party discussed their concern with the guild leader again noting that these new recruits have offended them in the past and if new recruits joined then they would leave.

Since such an ultimatum was given that either placed the progression of the raid on hold to cater to a single player’s happiness or to continue progression at the expense of one player and the possibility of defamation the offended party might bring about due to starting rumors about this new “gay bashing guild”.

The decision passed was to drop the offended player and to move on.  This was perhaps the best thing I’ve heard someone do since Obama made it illegal for a president to be able to classify anything they wanted to.  You see, it is an unreasonable expectation to try and force everyone to cater to everyone.  That is ridiculous.

This person is probably steamed about how intolerant this guild is but probably hasn’t once stopped to ask themselves: How tolerant was I of them?

Tolerance is a two way street.  Do you really expect people to give up their first amendment right to ensure you feel good?  Surely not.  Too quickly are people willing to pull the ‘race card’ or declare ‘gay bashing’ when something is deemed offensive to them.  Could it possibly be that the person was expressing themselves in a way that is completely independent of you or your affiliation?

Don’t get me wrong here.  I don’t advocate hate crimes, bigotry or racism of any sort.  Ignorance of such acts is astounding and I’m constantly taken back by the them.  It’s unreasonable to think that racism is dead.  I live in the South and believe me, racism is alive and kicking.

What I don’t understand is why people are so quick to assume something is an attack towards them.  The first step in changing the world always and has always started with yourself.  If you see something that needs to change in this world you need to change it within yourself before you can begin to try and change it in others.  Actions have always spoken louder than words.

Don’t complain that others are intolerant if you can’t be tolerant yourself.  Nobody is 100% tolerant.  You give me a person and I will find something that they will not tolerate.  For me it’s stupidity and immaturity.  I can tolerate someone who isn’t intelligent.  I can tolerate someone who is immature.  It’s the marriage of the two that I can’t seem to tolerate.  It’s a person flaw and I’m well aware of it.

Therefore, I will never stand on a street corner, write in a blog or have a conversation with someone about advocating tolerance until I can be tolerant myself.  What am I doing now if not writing in a blog about advocating tolerance?  I’m advocating looking within yourself to make the world a better place.  Do not put the blame of the world’s problems on others.  It’s everybody’s problems and we need to learn to deal with them together.

Value vs. Worth

There has been something on my mind for the past few months to a year.  The more I think about it the more upsetting it becomes.  This post is not necessarily WoW related.  I’d like to talk about something more of a foundation in the real world.  Although I don’t know exactly what to call it I’ll just say this post is about economics and morality.

I get frustrated all too often when I hear someone talk down about someone else because of the way they look or dress.  It’s actually infuriating.  Unfortunately I work with several people who tend to have a “holier than thou” outlook on life.  One example was a comment made by someone about Walmart employees.  He was disgusted at the dredges they are willing to hire.  He went on to complain about a specific instance where a young man had unkempt hair and several piercings.  Now, this person refuses to shop at Walmart because they are willing to hire employees who choose to have a hygiene similar to this example.

What nonsense!  I argue that it doesn’t matter what the person looks like or dresses like.  If they are capable of performing their task, whatever that might be, then they are a positive contribution to society.  That is, the Walmart employee is valuable to our economic system.  He provides a service that is necessary for the functioning of thousands of people’s daily life.

Now, let’s talk about his worth.  He is quite nearly worthless to our society.  He probably doesn’t make more than minimum wage.  What can someone expect out of an employee if you are unequivocally stating they are worth the bare minimum to you?

Well what is the difference between value and worth?  You see, value is an associated merit that is attached to something.  A somewhat arbitrary attribute we, as a society, assign depending on how necessary it is.  Worth, on the other hand, is just how much compensation someone is willing to put forth for something.

Do you see the difference?  I’ll give an example.  A garbage collector and a professional basketball player.  Clearly the professional basketball player is worth more.  However, it is not necessary to have a basketball player for our society to function correctly.  Therefore his value is relatively low.  If we were to attempt to go 1 month without garbage collectors many cities around the world would go into chaos.  Imagine if you had no means to remove waste, what would you do?  Most people would probably just find a field to dump their trash in.  We can all imagine how this would turn out.  So, the garbage collector has great value.

You may notice, especially in this case, the discrepancy in the income.  I’m using such an extreme example just so it’s easier to see the difference.  The average NBA basketball player will likely bring in around 30 times the annual income of a garbage collector.  It is very clear that there is a problem here.  Nobody is that valuable.

Some may argue that the basketball player has skills that only a select few people have.  Granted, but it remains a fact that he is still not as valuable as the garbage collector.

Anyone (relatively speaking) can be a garbage collector so it really isn’t that valuable of a position.  Wrong.  The person, themselves, might not be valuable but the position is very valuable.  A garbage person may not have skills beyond the average person but the function they provide is still more valuable than any basketball player.

What am I saying here?  I do not suggest that a basketball player should only make as much as a garbage person, or less.  Clearly the basketball player has some value to society.  He provides a source of entertainment to millions of fans all over the world.  You see, the entertainment may not be necessary for the survival of the world but it is still valuable – if only for morale purposes.

The problem I see is that someone with arguably the same education level can make 30 times the income.  I don’t care what you say about how the basketball players when to college…we all know they spent 50% of their time on the court, 20% at parties, 10% in class/doing homework and 10% getting syphilis.

Education, however, is entirely irrelevant.  What is it that makes us think that if person A is more knowledgeable than person B then person A should have more stuff?  I don’t see the logic there.

I went to college and have a few degrees – electrical engineering and mathematics.  Does that entitle me to have a better life than someone who chose not to put for that effort and preferred to skip college in exchange for a casual lifestyle and partying?  No.  Why would it?

Person B chose to be a construction worker.  He was blessed with the ability to withstand physical labor for 9 hours a day for 20 years.  That shit is way harder than sitting at a desk looking at a computer screen all day.  To me he is just as valuable as I am.  Unfortunately he will probably never make as much money as I do.

The capitalist system rewards people who take advantage of others.  It’s as simple as that.  If you want to become successful, in a capitalist system, you need to provide a service that others are willing to pay for.  Then you need to charge as much as you possibly can for it without losing too many customers.  It’s simply a maximization scheme.  All companies do it.

What is the problem here?  Well, the problem is that some YimYam can charge $75 for a ticket to see 10 sweaty guys working each other over for 2 hours.  Now, multiply that number by 15,000.  So, this YimYam has now provided a service that has little value and has been able to manipulate enough people into increasing it’s worth.

The net result is a select few profit greatly off the manipulation of the majority.  What impression does this give?  If I can make money, and in turn provide myself with luxury, by taking advantage of others then why not?  Especially if it’s legal and is supported by our society.

My utopia would be to bring the top down and pull the bottom up.  I don’t suggest everyone make the same amount of money.  That is ridiculous.  We all know Communism failed.  There isn’t a single person on this planet whose value is $10 million per year.  In fact, anyone can live extremely comfortable on $500,000 per year…anywhere in this country.

Human greed is the underlying cause of so many of our problems.  I could literally go on for days about this but this post is running longer than I expected and I’ve barely skimmed the surface.  I’ll leave you with a quick abstract of my ideal society and a great quote that will help keep it all in focus.

Abstract:

People should be allowed to fail.  Don’t reward the weak or the manipulative.  Let the value of the task drive the price for it.  Education should be a means for enlightenment not for a better life – hard work should do that.  Integrity, above all else, should be rewarded.

“The drift toward a society that offers too much to the favored few and too little to the many, inevitably raises questions among young people about the rewards of hard work and integrity.”

- Fred M. Hechinger

Another Day Another Dollar

If you haven’t been able to defeat Ignis don’t worry.  Most blogs I’ve read have people skipping him and moving on to the Assembly of Iron or Kologarn.  We have a somewhat stubborn guild leader and he was insistent on killing Ignis before we moved on.  Death was numerous in amount and frequency.  It was a matter of honing a strategy.

The strategy we came up with was pretty cool.  Admittedly we didn’t really use any strategies on the web…and haven’t really done that for any fight in Ulduar so far.  We like to figure it out ourselves.  It gives us a sense of accomplishment and satisfaction that just isn’t the same as if you cookie cutter the strategy from wowwiki or bosskillers.

I digress, now on to the strategy we came up with.  It was actually pretty fun.

Raid Make Up:

Death Knight Tank – Comatos

Paladin Tank/Healer – Sylo  (Had to leave early)

Druid Tank/DPS – Duragar

Druid Healer – Shifta (Yours Truly)

Shaman Healer/DPS – Zulquid

Shaman DPS – Ugoff (Replaced Sylo)

Priest Healer – Bignorm

Rogue DPS – Valeiria

Hunter DPS – Porterhouse

Paladin Healer – Phiath

Warrior DPS – Naidarim

Strategy 1:

Sylo and Duragar on the adds and Comatos on Ignis.  Ingis is tanked in a pool and turned to the left so that his flame breath landed on the ground.  The next flame breath goes on the right and the 3rd goes in the water.  So, every 3rd breath dies in the water.

Duragar was designated to pull an add into the flame and then to the water for destruction.

Phiath designated to heal Comatos.  Shifta and Bignorm on raid/OTs.  All three healers on pot.

Zulquid designated to kill the brittle construct.  Naidarim, Porterhouse and Valeiria on Ignis full time.

This strategy took too much strain on the healers and lasted too long.

Strategy 2:

Duragar on the adds and Comatos on Ignis.  Ignis is tanked in a pool and not turned at all.  No adds are to be destroyed.  Duragar took a significant amount of damage so 4 healers were used.  Phiath healed Comatos full time.  Sylo, Shifta and Bignorm healed raid/OT/pot.

Naidarim, Zulquid and Valeiria on Ignis full time.

This strategy took too much strain on Duragar and eventually had enough adds the healers couldn’t keep him up.  The fight lasted too long.

Strategy 3:

Sylo had to leave and Ugoff replaced him.

Durgar on the adds and Comatos on Ignis.  Ignis is tanked in a pool and not turned at all.  No adds are to be destroyed.  Duragar was going to kite the adds back and forth through the raid while the shamans kept their Earthbind Totems down.

Phiath healed Comatos full time.  Shifta and Bignorm healed raid/OT.  All three healers helped on the pot.

Naidarim, Zulquid, Valeiria and Ugoff on Ignis full time.

This strategy takes a bit of finesse.  You will get into a rotation and if you can maintain the healing this is probably the easiest strategy.  With the lack of a Shaman for the Earthbind Totem you can get a hunter to lay a trap.  We were able to down him with this strategy the first time we tried it.

Ultimately this is the most difficult for the off-tank.  Be sure you get a skilled, and well geared, player to do this.  A druid is nice for this due to the high HP and Nature’s Grasp, which helps with taking damage.  Just be sure to apply Nature’s Grasp away from the raid before you kite back through it.

The healing in this fight is also pretty epic.  My druid had 3200hps for the entire fight, which lasted 7:34.  I didn’t need to pot and used my intervate with about 30 secs to go and ended the fight with 85% mana.  So, if the healing is done right it’s not that bad.  My over healing was pretty low too…it’s all about timing.

For a druid healer you should position yourself in the middle of the healers and dps so they are all in range of your Wild Growth.  The moment everyone is thrown in the air from Flame Vents cast your Wild Growth and start quickly putting a Rejuvenation on everyone in the raid.  Once that is done start casting Regrowth on any players who are significantly lower health than everyone else.  You’ll get about 2 Regrowths off by the time he tosses someone in the pot.

Once a player is in the pot you need to immediately switch to them and cast Regrowth.  I’m glyphed for Regrowth so if that player already has a Regrowth on them I land a lot higher heal.  Then I refresh the Rejuvenation and get a feel for how much the other healers are contributing.  If the player seems low I’ll cast Swiftmend.  If he seems fine I’ll cast a Nourish and move to the tank.  This is key.  Since I really can’t contribute past a few Nourishes at this point (Lifebloom won’t do much for a player in the pot as they will be out by the time it blooms) so I’m better used elsewhere.  If the player is really low I’ll continue to spam a few more Nourishes on them but usually the other healers have them sufficiently topped of at this point and I can be of better use on the tank.  Unfortunately at this point our tank was usually below 25% health so I would cast Regrowth, Rejuvenation and 3xLifebloom to keep enough sustained healing on him for his healer to get back into place.

From this point it’s quite literally rinse and repeat.  The key is to finding the rhythm among your healers.  It’s really all about rhythm.  His Flame Vents is very predictable and is announced by DBM.  He charges and targets the player he is going to put in the pot so it’s very easy to see when you need to switch to them.  (we would also call this out in vent to ensure people didn’t get tunnel vision) Once the player in the pot drops out and the tank is taken care of it is a waiting game and putting a few heals on the kiting off-tank.

If you manage to get Ignis down you will be among a rare group.  Most guilds have chosen to skip Ignis altogether and move past him until they can out gear the fight.  We chose not to do this and now have an extra achievement for our trouble.    (completing the entire quarter)

Unfortunately we didn’t get a chance to attempt the Assembly of Iron.  We got a look see at Kologarn but weren’t able to down him.  This fight is significantly easier than Ignis so it shouldn’t be a problem once we get the movement down.  In fact, we almost killed him when one of our tanks jumped off the edge to his death…watch out for that.  You can fall off the ledge on this fight and you will die.  Kologarn will fall next time we get a chance to fight him.

Tonight we are going to go for Ulduar25.  Now that enough of us have seen the fights and learned the strategies we are going to pull in our top 25 and get some loot.  Flame Leviathan will be easy once everyone figures out their vehicle controls.  Razorscale shouldn’t be too much more difficult on 25-man than she was on 10-man.  XT-002′s tantrum might be a headache but with dedicated add dps we can probably handle her.  I doubt we’ll even touch Ignis.

Challenging Pitch

A great saleman usually has a great pitch.  They have that catchy little saying that makes you feel good for a moment.  Whether it rhymes, is deep or just sounds fun it is effective.  Matt over at World of Matticus had a post today about a blog pitch.

What would I choose as a pitch for this blog?  That is a great question.  To be honest I’ve never really thought about it before.  Clearly I’m a noob blogger.

The purpose of the pitch should be to express the purpose and content of the blog so that someone immediately knows what I do here.  It should be short and sweet.  The aesthetics of the pitch are of high merit as well.  Nobody wants to hear an abstract but rather a clever summary.

When would I need to use a pitch?  Most likely when I’m asked what I write about here.  I should have a response that has some spunk to it.  Unfortunately I don’t classify myself as an individual that is over flowing with spunk.  I’m more firmly grounded in logic and philosophy – more generally a cynic than anything.

Observing gamers while waxing philosophical.

Gaming guides, observations and musings.

How clever do I want to be?  Well, I don’t want confuse the audience.  Of course my pitch may offer assistance in choosing my audience.  I prefer to converse with intelligent, open-minded, people.  Anyone who is unwilling to put forth an effort to be civil and understanding is not welcome here.  So, perhaps I should choose my pitch to delineate what audience I want.

Forum for gaming topics, philosophical proclivities and conversation.

Too much?  I don’t want to come across as pedantic.  Maybe something along the same lines but more monosyllabic.

Discussion of gaming topics, strategies and open conversation.

Pretty vague, if you ask me.  I need more detail without sounding too wordy.  One thing I was always taught to avoid, when speaking to an audience, is using strings of nouns.  Bad, bad, bad.  Being a mathematician and engineer I am forced to use them.  My favorite example is: Second Order Constant Coefficient Homogeneous Non-linear Partial Differential Equation.  I don’t care who you are that is a mouth full.

What should I do instead?  I’d like to shoot somewhere between the waxing philosophical one and the forum one.  What middle ground could I find?

Open forum for gaming observations and waxing philosophical.

I like it.  It welcomes the reader to participate in the discussion.  At the same time, however, it will discourage the most ignorant among us to participate.  (one can at least hope anyway)

I think I will go with that as my pitch.  What do you guys think?

Ricomoss: Open forum for gaming observations and waxing philosophical.

We Are Back

Many may have noticed my lack of posting over the last week.  First, my apologies.  There are two reasons.  WordPress has had some significant problems with their dashboard feature for bloggers…site wide.  So, when I tried to access the tools I use for posting articles I would just see a mess.  This has been fixed, obviously.

The second reason, more importantly, is that I have had a very difficult work schedule as of late.  I work as an engineer and have had two really big projects to finish by today.  I finished both of them yesterday.  whew.

I’ve actually had to work so much that I’ve worked my allotted 80 hours for this two week period and then many more…and it’s only Tuesday of the second week.  (That means I’ve been working a lot of weekends and long days…booo.)

We have a company policy that we can’t work overtime unless it is expressly approved.  Well, I was expressly approved to work overtime until the projects were completed.  Since my projects are completed my overtime must come to a end.  Technically they will allow me to work a bit more but I don’t wanna.  So, I get to have a sweet 5 day weekend starting tomorrow.  Hurray!

I have been jotting down some ideas for articles during my sanity breaks over the last few hell weeks.  As a result there are some good articles in the oven.  Many are only about half complete but there should be several rolling out within the next few days.

Sneak Preview:

- Hunter Leveling Guide (specifically for BM tanking)

- Thoughts on the Raiding Break

- Insight Into Faction Switching

- Exceptional vs. Big Fish

Stick around for the interesting banter.  I should also mention that my sister has tasked me with creating Warrior and Paladin leveling guides.  In the works…the Warrior will be easy as I have a lot of experience with them.  The Paladin is going to take some research.  Maybe I’ll level one up this weekend.  *shrugs*

p.s. Just kidding about leveling the Paladin…I don’t level that fast.  haha

p.p.s.  I’m not kidding about leveling a Paladin – as I’m already working on that – but about being able to level him in a weekend.