Words of Replicant Jesus

Just more random screens from my time in Alpha and Beta!

Just some screenshots of me running around with my tauren paladin Go Wigglylight go.

Halion is an interesting encounter in Ruby Sanctum, even on normal it’s fun for a tank.  You start off with a single tank but in the third phase you switch to two tanks one for the Incorporeal realm and one for the Physical realm and the raid has to balance their damage or they will force a wipe.  I like it overall and can’t wait to see the heroic version.

With the first of the Cataclysm class change previews going up today, I can’t help but wallow in anticipation for the 16th when Blizzard finally posts the new information for Paladins. Our class is so awesome we need that much more time to perfect our ground shaking changes.  With the recent announcement of the Death Knight tanking tree being Blood in the expansion and some preliminary changes about Rage Normalization I am excited to see what they have cooked up for the paladins.

I don’t have too many inferences yet on where they will take us but there is some writing on the wall:

- I expect them to make changes to Hammer of the Righteous or Seal of Command and even possibly both.  I think the fact that our threat rotation is exactly the same in single target and AoE is just boring.  I look forward to this.

- The Dispel mechanics will definitely change some of how I play at least when it comes to dispelling my own magic effects like on Steelbreaker.

- I think paladins in general will get a low level instant attack ability to add to the low level experience and make it more interactive.  At least more interactive than auto-attack and judgement.

- More of a wish and inferred guess based on similar vanity shaman changes; but I suspect that the varying paladin races may get race specific mounts in Cataclysm.

The 16th will be a good day, I look forward to the new class changes being posted today!  And now some Thom Yorke to soothe your weary soul.

I have made up my mind when Cataclysm comes out I will be race changing Vanifae into a tauren because I think a tauren paladin would be pretty awesome.  Also my shields and weapons won’t look all tiny and wimpy.  I am really excited about this and can’t wait to do it, should make for a fun new fresh experience come Cataclysm.  I will still hang out in Silvermoon though; just on principle because that is my favorite city.

Tank Threat

Some replies by Ghostcrawler on Tank Threat.

I am not sure what to think as of yet on some of the comment on the one hand I do agree that tanks could use stronger single target threat and that the reliance on Tricks of the Trade and Misdirect while interesting from a group dynamic strong point make the tank classes as a whole feel incomplete.  Again we reach the issue of threat scaling, and I agree it was absolutely perfect in Naxx and solid in Ulduar but after that it seemed to not really keep up.  Can we still hold threat, of course we can and I doubt I can lose it once I get going.  But the amount by which threat has scald with damage is not consistent with the increase for DPS classes.

Given this is the second time this has happened though not as bad as Burning Crusade, I am not truly confident they will find an adequate solution.  But I do have hope they will do their best to enhance the tank classes in the places they need it most.  I am not too terribly thrilled about losing more AE threat but I understand why.

Glorious Asian Taddies

How you doing?

Courtesy of Really Cute Asians.

I got nothing else, probably see The Crazies tonight.  Should be fun.

Well Ulduar is a great place I really like it; finally got to Yogg-Saron last night in the normal version and still stuck on Mimiron in the heroic version. I expect to have Mimiron down soon and hopefully plowing through the General and onto Yoggy in the heroic version soon.

The raid instance is well done and I have main tanked every encounter in there besides Yoggy which I have only seen Phase 2 briefly. But we are pushing Hard Modes as we go and did Heartbreaker in normal and chose Runemaster last in both heroic and normal. Freya +1 and did Flame Leviathan +2 as well.

Overall this instance is well tuned and I like it.

We got Thorim down last nigh and the night before it was Freya on the hit list; so things are trucking along quite well. I am impressed with the Ulduar raid zone and the variety and difficulty of the fights. Mimiron is definitely a challenge and I like the complexity to the fight. This week our challenge is to get past Mimiron and clear all the keepers so we can get down to some business with the General and ol’ Yoggy.

Going to be a fun time.

I should be studying for a Java programming exam but I have some time to kill to talk about my experiences in Ulduar.  I will break the overview up into three parts, each section pertaining to a subzone of the raid instance.  This only covers the content I have cleared or experienced and should not be taken as gospel but just a collection of my experiences.  Breakdown of Part 1 after the break.

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Ulduar progression continues unabated for Taurential Reign, just cleared Auriya and Assembly of Iron in Heroic Mode last night.  I maintanked both encounters last night, well on the Assembly I was on Steelbreaker and the interrupt duty on Stormcaller Brundir.  Fairly easy encounter tanking wise for a paladin just remember to dispell the Fusion Punch if you are not GCD locked.  I tended to save a cooldown just for that reducing my threat but hopefully saving myself with a Cleanse.  The other thing to watch out for is to move the boss out of the blue rune/void zone, Rune of Power, so he does not get extra damage output.

The Auriya encounter is all about the pull, the tanking part is relatively simple.  The most dificult part is to make sure she is turned in a direction that is advantageous to the raid after the fear.  If you are fear warded, resist the fear, or break it quickly then this is not an issue and you hould probably just stand there and have the raid run back.  If not just use your judgement and base where you face her on where the majority of the raid is feared to.  Move her as needed away from the void zones and push out as much damage as possible.

As far as Noblegarden is concerned I really hate this holiday, it encourages camping and doing unfun things.  I do like that alot of the items are able to be bought but the camping part and the static nature of the spawns lends the holiday a no-fun feel.  Worse then the Love Fool achievement in my opinion and I hope they rehaul this holiday next year and do soemthing better with it or just make it like it was a one day event with no attachment to the meta-achievement

for the mount.

Easily my least favorite holiday.