Gitr Knows WoW

Gitr took his first trip to Sunken Temple in Swamp of Sorrows tonight. He was joined with guild GM, Filetofish, Aurora, Talion, and Inebriate. Inebriate is a whacked out addict and has jumped to 57 already. 🙂 Hi, Neb.

The first task was to touch all the statues around the circle. It was pretty easy going with a 60 MT and letting me just go buck wild dual-wielding around. We were able to very easily take down the first boss we came to. Everyone had been there several times, so I was really on a follow-hit-loot mode. After we downed him, Fish had to log because of a pounding head and it was on Talion a bit more to keep us a live because I became MT. We went through the center and all the dragons to get to the next boss and called it a night.

Just as I got to The Hinterlands to turn in a quest, I got a whisper if I wanted to kill the dragon in Blasted Lands. Sounded like fun, so I got summoned. Strange. This looks like the jungle. I checked the map and saw we were just south of Felwood. We took a few minuted and got a few more people and went after the first dragon.

We dropped it with what I’d estimate as 12 people. It was REALLY easy with that group. No one came close to dying and I was pretty ineffective. I only got a few overpowers off. The first one didn’t put people to sleep or anything unusual. He just died. Someone saw another dragon up the ramp to the portal.

This dragon at least made it interesting. He put us to sleep every 5-10 seconds or so. Once again, I don’t think anyone was ever in any danger of dying, but this fight lasted about 2 minutes. It’s fun fighting things so big that they make a group look small. Pretty cool stuff.

After a portal to IF and another to Darnassus, I was headed to Wintersprings to quest for my next level. Considering I fell asleep in flight at both points, I decided to just try a couple of quests and leave it at that. I went after the 4 fragments in the ice and went to return the quest. I saw that I had 3 or 4 quests that all have turn-ins in Eastern Plaguelands. Great. I can’t even safely go through Western Plaguelands, let alone finish THOSE quests. Oh well. Since it was level 56 and pretty easy, I was willing to give it a go at killing for the 10 yeti hides. I got 3 of them before sleepiness really started to overcome me.

I went back to the inn to get rest, but not waste travel time tomorrow. There I’ll be after work to pick it up again.

An interesting topic came up today at work from Talion and Tox. They have been monitoring Gitr’s progress closely as they have melded FoA into a raiding guild for the mains and a mentoring guild with the alts for lowbies. With several recent departures in the family due to differences of opinion, moves, etc., there are suddenly far fewer warriors. Gitr just hit 53 tonight (YAY!!) and is getting very close to UBRS, LBRS, Scholo, etc.

This not only excites Gitr and me, but the officers. It’s probably something along the lines of “Fresh Meat” being stamped on my shield, but also a chance to add some more plate to a group. Admittedly, that was one of the main reasons I wanted to be a warrior.

The topic on the table is if a Fury spec tank should concentrate on AGI or not. I was quite ticked today to see that warriors got nerfed with the 1.9 patch with the decrease in Enrage bonus, despite the 5% increase in Bloodthirst AP. Whoopdie!! Anyway… If flurry is my “big thing” according to them, I should want to increase AGI to capitalize on it even further when Flurry trips. My previous thinking was that Enrage was my strong suit, therefore I wanted to GET critted more and have more STR to take advantage of the melee bonus, not speed bonus.

Now it’s all confusing. Maybe we can work this out. Let’s look at my current stats and gear:
Bonesnapper, Warlord’s Axe of the Bear, Ornate Shield of the Tiger, and Ornate Shield of Strength

This is really embarassing, but if anyone can tell me how to get this text to just appear after the images without having to use useless text as a place holder, it would be greatly appreciated. Blogger didn’t have this problem. You just put in line breaks, and the text moved down. I’ve never had such a problem with web-related formatting of such simple elements. I’m really hoping to get this down to just linking a photo and having text either wrap around it or appear below it. Oh, look. more text to go. Still not to the bottom of these 3 pictures yet. Ah, but to have it simple. That would be nice. I’d retire to…

After putting on a shield in place of the off-hand axe, the numbers change to the following:
With the Ornate Shield of the Tiger :

Finally, armor above the 5,000 mark! Now this is what I’ve been waiting for. With a bit more armor, I can last and last like the Energizer bunny. I can recruit a personal healer and hit the horde towns and wreak havoc. *dream bubble pops*
With the Ornate Shield of Strength :
Wait a minute. These can’t be the right screens. The armor should be the same. Sorry folks, but some dufus must have put in the wrong shot and deleted the correct one. I shall make sure he is given a just punishment somewhere in the vicinity of the Plaguelands tomorrow.

I think Gitr’s REALLY tired and needs to go to bed now. I’ll work out the problems with Neb in the morning.

OK, well, Neb didn’t come into work today. Must have been too much fun last night in the IF tavern. Back to the discussion, regardless of incorrect images. If Flurry is tripped by critting a mob, would one do more damage by further increasing the attack speed with AGI, or by increasing the power that comes with the already increased speed?

My thinking still remains that a warrior, regardless of build, will benefit more from always hitting harder and therefore critting for more damage regardless of having Flurry or not. In any given instance, I am always going to be hitting. I never stop in a battle. I don’t want to, I don’t have to, and most of all, I’d better not. The issue becomes a debate on hitting more often or harder.

This much is clear: as a Fury spec, I do NOT want Defense, Parry, or Dodge abilities. I want to get critted as well, and all of those will lower the number of time Enrage trips. Enrage is only good for a certain number of swings, so it really doesn’t really give me any gumption to increase my AGI if I’m enraged either.

All of this, and I still haven’t scratched the surface of what I did last night.

I got off work around 3pm and got home about 3:40 to begin downloading the patch. I got it from the GM on our forum site and started posting it on my blog as a mirror for the guild while the patch started installing.

As I logged in, I was immediately hit with an error from a CT component that decided to leave the guildie note button sitting on the screen when everything else was closed, even ALT-Z’d. So annoying. Then I was having mail trouble. No biggie, though, because the big money things that sold didn’t have any problem getting into my bankroll. I went to the AH to get some healing potion for a long night of questing and grinding, only to find 1 potion. Not one stack of 5, but 1 potion period. GAH!! I only had 7, but it was going to have to do until more went up for sale.

Gitr headed to SW to Booty Bay to Ratchet to turn in the corrupted water south of Ratchet. Then he rode down to Theramore and hopped on a Gryph to Gadgeton to ride down into Un’Goro Crater for questing. Before too terribly long, he had all 15 bloodpetals and 3 of the 16 dinosaur skins for the flyer. It was time to go back to AH and get some more potion. I hearthed back only to find that there were now zero potions. Zip, zilch, nada. GAH!

I flew down to Morgan’s Vigil to turn in a quest and try to grind some dragons for their skins. In the process of turning in the quest, I picked up another quest that involved shooting the broodings with a goblin gun and getting some essence. The problem, and it was a big one, was that you have to get close enough for them to flame you in order to shoot the gun. If you get too close, they interrupt the gun with their claws. It took 2 deaths to get 8 essences, but I got them. Level 52 dragons really pack a whollup on a level 52 with no fire resistance, because you can’t block all the fireball casts.

From there, I went to Feralas to finish some water stuff in the quest line and then I had to go to Felwood. I decided that I’d grind my way from the gryph point to the Emerald camp and get to level 53 that way. Just about there, and 40 minutes later, I dinged, mounted, and turned in the quest.

On my way down, I had been asking how to get from Felwood to Winterspring and Everlook. Guildies said I’d need a bubble and try to run through because no one could go with me to fight the furlbogs because of faction points. I got there, was attacked by a 52 and 53, killed them, and ran straight through with no problems. I don’t think they run fast enough once they see something, because I only got hit twice the whole way through the tunnel.

I explored enough to discover each area on the way to Everlook and immediately got the gryph point. I dumped some Un’Goro quests that I can get again and loaded up on Winterspring quests. I’d prepared when I went back to IF and got my new shields and axe to bring along. After getting the quests, I equipped the lava pants from BRD and an axe and went hunting. I went after a 53 chimera, I think. I’d never seen one before, and it wasn’t going down very fast at all. I used my last health potion on it. When it was dead, I looked to the left and saw a whole column of “your skill in axes has improved.” LOL. That explained it. I’d just gained 23 points in axes. I had a ways to go, so it was time to find something easier to kill. After running around and getting a couple more quests, I still hadn’t seen any easy kills, so it was back to IF for some AH stuff.

I got quite a few good buys for around 60g and was down just over 100g to go when I saw an epic sword, Dazzling Longsword for 115g. I hovered over it for my auctioneer and it said it goes for 295g minimum over the last 7 auctions seen. Quickly as I could, I logged in as Zapit and Druidr and sent Gitr all their gold and logged back in and bought it. I put it up and chuckled. I whispered Tox and linked him the sword and told him I got it. He replied with, “why?” When I told him why, he said that I should sell it. LOL. I was ROFLMHO. All told, I have over 700g in the AH right now. I just hope it sells.

I was able to get together an awesome in-house group for my second shot at BRD just now. Three guild 60s joined Gitr and Inebriate. Herein lies the tale of run number two.

I was getting quite upset over being 8 hours into level 52, and only 26% of the way through. Every time I spent 2 minutes getting somewhere, it was time to go, too hard to complete a quest, too camped out, or an Act of God prevented me from having fun at the time. I logged in after a 20 minute struggle of handshaking, retrieving the character list, and getting into IF. Man, I wanted to get somewhere today.

I flew down to put the ogre’s head on a stick in Blasted Lands after Neb told me it was soloable at my level. I saw a number of 60s on that had finished Scholo and put out a request for a BRD run because I had 6 quests that were just jamming up my log. I NEEDED to get through there several times. Soon. I don’t want to be one of those 60s that got there not doing anything fun or difficult.

Is this difficult enough? This was our first stop after talking to one of the prisoners. My mind is complete goo, and without taking screens for notes, this is the best I can do in my accounts of a night. I have asked Tox/Neb to help in this area so you get a better picture of what happened, because he remembers everything he’s done and seen since he was born. As the Geico commercial says, “I digress.” We made our way to the highway and hung a left to go to the big lava boss, Bael-Gar, and complete a quest. Again, sucking as I do at knowing things ahead of time, I didn’t have the item I needed to complete the quest, so I get to do it again. YAY! It was a really fun fight. It went something like this:
[Gitr]: What am I going to do for this fight? He’s a 54 Elite.
[Neb]: I think we’ll have you tank him.

[Gitr]: *cheer, woot, YAY, cool*
[Fivefinger]: (rogue) I think he has adds.
[Neb]: Just help Gitr. Ach, just heal and everything will be fine. Mana up, go ahead and charge, Gitr.
[Gitr]: (above screenshot) *gulp*
[Ach]: Wow! He hits hard. *dies*
[Gitr]: *pops a major healing potion*
[Party]: *everything dies when the boss dropped*

We made our way to the bar, dropping another boss or two along the way. Names excape me, Neb will have to do that for me. One was a level 57 Elite, and that is the best I can do. We finished in the bar by breaking a barrel and opening up a can (or barrel, I guess) that ended with a recipe that needed to go to Barley Thunderbew. I danced on a table for the entertainment to the patrons of the bar in an attempt to persuade them from attacking when I spoke to the goblin. My dance didn’t work. People died. It got ugly, but we overcame and got two very fine blacksmithing recipes. After checking the guild bank, Gitr took one and ran to the AH, laughing all the way. If all goes well, it’s a good chunk toward and epic mount.

Earlier in the day, a guildie asked me to tank for Razor Fel Downs. At the time, I had just started grinding for Bloodpetals in Un’Goro after traveling for 27 minutes. I just HAD
to finish the quest, but the drop rate was getting worse as I went on. I finally stopped trying for the day at 11/15 petals and mounted up to run to the Downs. It was kind of embarassing to get there, because I ran right past the entrance. I just saw dots on the map, but they were already underground and had to send someone out to show me the way. *blushes* Your fearless (and clueless) tank is here. 🙂

I had never heard of the place, let alone been there. I was suprised to see that everyone else in the group was in the low 40s, and confirmed that they wanted a 52 for a tank because I was going to steal all the XP. They said they were all there for the drops. It was going to be REALLY easy until the druid dropped in the first 10 minutes. After waiting for 10 minutes, the group decided to work on up to the top. The top of what, Gitr had no idea. I was just there to take a beating and dish out damage as allowed. We beat the next three bosses with no healer. As it turns out, I was there for the drops, even at my level. I got a great chestpiece from the spider boss, and an equipable helm that I wore into BRD.

Gitr didn’t play much this weekend, either, but still managed to get to level 52. Much more difficult, though, was getting herbalism from 154 to 201 by riding around Arathi Highlands. He sent all the herbs to his level 16 mage alt, who used them to get alchemy maxed out at 150. After locating the next level trainer in Darnassus, he learned that you need to be level 20 to train for that skill. Crap. Later, I guess.

Gitr’s about to log in now, but the server is full. It shall be a late night because the office is still closed tomorrow. Back to the daily grind on Tuesday.

Gitr is currently pushing his way through level 51, but is taking the day off to recuperate. He’s been doing a lot of instances and quests with a lot of screenshots. There will be a very big post soon, I promise. Just not yet. Things will really get in gear again in the New Year.

Is this an Easter Egg?

The weekend is quite a blur because of how many groups, quests, and levels were going on. Gitr really moved up the ranks and got lots of experience, almost 350,000xp. He did everything from ZF to southern Tanaris to Un’Goro to The Hinterlands to Blasted Lands.

Much of his time was spend collecting quests and doing those he could solo while Inebriate was signed on as Intoxication, and then grouping together for the harder ones Gitr can’t solo. Neb has ridiculous crits with his frost spec and gear, killing most things 2-4 levels higher than him before taking a hit. Combine him with a tank 1-2 levels higher (Gitr at the *beginning* of the weekend) to keep things away for good, and we did MASSIVE damage.

At the very bottom of Tanaris is a big door with about 7 51-53 elites guarding a quest podium. We decided to test ourselves. To our great delight, we came, saw, and conquered. We only made two mistakes, one killing Neb in seconds, and another finishing me off and Neb finishing the elite off. The first mistake was critting a frostbolt for 1100HP with only one sunder armor. The mob ran, Neb died, I ran for the hills. The next problem was a patrol that got too close before I could pull us back far enough away. We ended up killing both, though.

As we finished turning those quest in, I got an invite to run ZF, and Gitr still needed quite a few quests there. Keep in mind, I HATE PuGs with a passion. I hate people. I know it’s kind of hard to tell here, but I’m an introvert. Get to know me and trust me, and build my trust in you, and you’d never know I’m introverted. Meeting people just wears me out. It’s the same online. I spend too much time trying to figure out the roles in the group, how to get classes to do what they are supposed to, etc. We had a mage who wouldn’t sheep, a rogue that didn’t do enough damage, and a priest who liked to use fear so much, we were constantly fighting 5-6 mobs. Oh, did I mention that he forgot to heal? Yeah. I popped 4 major healing potions because I had to watch my health instead of tanking. Sure I tanked. Had to keep hitting challenging shout every 10 minutes when it cooled down, taunt every 10 seconds, bandage after every fight. I did 36% of the damage (in 1H defensive stance) and took 43% of the damage in a 5-man, like-level group. It broke up after 3 wipes.

I didn’t play too much on Sunday, but Monday brought my first BRD run with an all in-house group. The best learning environment. I died 2 or 3 times, but I was pretty small. I think I was only 50, maybe even 49. After so many quests in Blasted Lands as being lower than the Golem Machines, it’s hard to remember if I was higher yet or not. It even turned out to be quite profitable. I got 2 black diamonds, which sold for 25g each within 2 hours. I learned so much on that run and people were pretty patient with me, too. Gitr took the normal low 40s% damage and had a 2g75s repair bill. The only thing not broken were his Truesilver Gauntlets, which still had 2 points left. 🙂

That about covers the weekend. Hope you’ve all enjoyed it and are still happy and safe.