Project Lore

Choosing gear used to be so simple. When you roll a new character, you start out with the crappiest of the crap. At first, it’s just a matter of picking whatever has the highest armor rating. Couldn’t be easier. Then you add in stats to consider. Would you rather have agility or intelligence? Is your character more suited to armor of the bear or of the tiger? Are you mainly PvE or PvP? The choice becomes slightly more difficult, but usually is still pretty clear-cut as long as you have a certain spec in mind. My main character is a rogue, so I almost always went for the agility, with stamina as my second-favored stat (<3 “of the monkey” armor). Then come item enhancements. Being a leatherworker, for me the choice was between using an armor kit or getting a guildmate to enchant my gear with increased stats. Again, I usually went for the agility whenever possible. But then I hit the high-50s, and things got more complicated. Blue armor was no longer always better than green armor. The stat bonuses started getting better. Many items offer bonuses to more than just one or two stats. And now there are sockets to consider, along with bonuses for actually filling the sockets. Or, bonuses for having multiple items in a set. And in addition to just stat bonuses, there also are pluses to attack power, crit rating, resilience rating, dodge rating, resistances etc. Too many choices! Of course, one helpful trick is to equip back and forth between the gear you’re choosing from, and see how the stats that matter to you change. Or, if it’s a bind on equip item, you can use an add-on specific to your spec (I use GearDPS) to see how the gear will work for you. Sometimes you have to choose between one great stat and another great stat. A straight-up plus to agility isn’t always my best choice anymore, not when so many other enhancements may increase both agility and a combo of other needed stats. How does one cope, especially when making the shift to questing in Outland, then Northrend, where much, much better equipment is given as quest rewards (and it drops pretty frequently, too)? In the early 60s, I often found myself carrying around gear that, as it was, wasn’t quite as good as what I had equipped. But if I was able to get it enchanted, it would be a little bit better. Then I would find an even better item before I had the chance to enchant the second one. Or I would hold on to gear that I thought was awesome, but that I wasn't high enough level to equip yet. But once I reached the right level to equip it, my gear already had surpassed that mark. Now that I'm in Northrend, it’s getting even more complicated. So, I became more stingy with my gear. For BoP gear that's a quest reward and already obsolete, I'll just choose whichever item sells for the highest amount (yay, Auctioneer addon). For me, I can't justify equipping BoE gear if I’m going to find something better in a half-level anyways. Instead, auction it! Or give it to a guildy to disenchant.  Do those few extra tenths-of-a-chance to crit really make a difference when I can level quickly without it? Is it even worth keeping spare sets of gear for different uses when you’re leveling up so quickly that it becomes obsolete before you can use it? At least until I hit 80, my guess is no. So how do you go about choosing whether to use gear that may be replaced quickly? Do you go ahead and equip it and make use of it while you can? Do you just go for the money? Or is there a happy medium?

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Kenzi from DeathKnight.info has been running one of the most amazing Death Knight sites since long before Wrath of the Lich King launched. In case you decided not to make a Death Knight your new main or if you just haven't been paying a ton of attention, here he tells us how things have been going with WoW's first Hero class. Two months have passed since the release of Wrath of the Lich King! The initial rush to roll a Death Knight has come and gone. Many have leveled their "free" level 55 for a bit then went back to their mains while tons have benched everyone for their new DK. However you fall into the two categories, one thing is for sure; everyone has had an experience with a Death Knight.

Getting past Deathtard.

So, are Death Knights the new Huntard? With the ease of availability and thought of being overpowered, many a tard has made their way to managing rune cooldowns and trying to tank. Has that put good DK's in a questionable position? I don't think so. In all actuality I found that those outside of the DK community were more oblivious to Death Knight capabilities then the ones actually playing them. How many of you tanking DK's got asked if you where "frost" before entering a pug? Was it really a mainstream opinion that tanking Death Knights had to be Frost and that Frost was -the- tanking build? Better yet, how many of you tanks got asked.."uh, hey man...where is your shield?" Luckily the above scenarios didn't last long after launch and some of the more stupid events happened a little less often. Or...is it still common to see a Death Knight in spellpower gear?

Finding our place taking it in the face!

Once most people learned that Death Knight's could seriously tank...without a shield...it became easier to find our way into groups and raids. Tanking problems still existed though. Many tanks found it hard to get and stay defense capped. Most of the preraid gear was from crafted blues that are really high in defense, but low in other avoidance stats. In order for a tanking DK to stay defense capped they usually have to put tier 7 epic upgrades in their bags because the lower defense rating caused them to drop below the cap. Unless you are lucky enough to get your hands on certain pieces of gear, getting and staying capped is a struggle. To help that struggle, Blizzard announced that with the release of patch 3.0.8 Death Knights would be getting a new "tanking" runeforge enchant that gives 25 defense skill along with a new tanking sigil that procs a 55 defense rating buff. Notice the runeforge has 25 skill, not 25 rating, which means Death Knights can easily afford to lose 154 points of defense rating via gems and enchants and still stay defense capped.  The thought behind it was because DKs can't use shields they miss out on a huge opportunity for more defense rating, which has lead to many topics about gemming and enchanting post 3.0.8. Single target threat has also been an issue for tanking Death Knights. Some have experienced problems with their threat scaling with their raids gear improvements. As the DPS in raids gets better and higher, holding threat becomes harder and harder. It was announced that a bug with Frost Presence was keeping the skill from properly resetting after a death, meaning when the DK died the presence was removed, but the server thought he still had it. That bug was hotfixed and it was also announced that with 3.0.8 Runestrike would be adjusted to be the proper tanking skill it was meant to be. The damage will be lower and the threat increased, which will make for even easier single target threat.

You mean I need two runeweapons to melt faces?

Enough tank talk, lets pew pew! It's been known for a while that Death Knights could dual wield as well as swing a big two hander and for the most part it was widely accepted that duel wielding was the inferior choice for DPSing. Wrong. Many smart people played around with and stuck with dual wield enough to finally find those right talent choices to make it work. And make it work they did. Now it seems almost all of the high DPS numbers we see today are from the dual runesword wielding Death Knights. So, do you think Blizzard is happy their first hero class, the fabled Death Knight who is famous for the two hander, is forcing people to go DW to DPS? The short answer is no, Blizzard will be changing some DW talents to bring DW DPS "back in line" with two handed DPS. Soon you will get a legitimate choice between one and two handed weapons without gimping your DPS.

This is going to hurt me more than it hurts you.

PvP is still pretty open for debate. The new WotLK season 5 is still somewhat fresh. Most of the complaints about Death Knights stem from just the lack of understanding of what they can do and how to deal with them. One can argue though,  that many of the PvE nerfs stem largely from PvP overpowerness. Take Anti-Magic Zone for example. The duration is being reduced to 10 seconds in 3.0.8, down from 30 seconds now. Runestrike's damage being reduced also came from some complaints that argued that a high damaging Runestrike combined with a Scourge Strike, Obliterate or other attack in quick succession made it nearly impossible to stay alive long enough to kill a DK. All valid complaints, but it tends to rub people that wrong way when an ability is nerfed on one side of the fence because it is overpowered on the other. Maybe one day there can be balance between PvE and PvP.

Moving on without the Lich King...

So here we are, two months in, patiently waiting our first round of "balancing". Our class is starting to take a nice shape. We still have to battle against prejudice and thoughts that we are the new love of Blizzard. Yes we are called a "hero" class, but hero is nothing more than a fancy title for "you start at level 55". Wer're still going to see nerfs, get buffed and share that same car on the balancing roller coaster as everyone else.

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So you're a hunter. Done. As a hunter you have one job, (unless you are spec'd survival, in which case you still really only have one job) you shoot shit. Since all you do is shoot shit, it becomes of paramount importance that you shoot shit correctly. Okay so how do you do that? Well I don't f***ing know, that's why I look to other people to tell me, specifically http://www.bigredkitty.net/. Bigredkitty has spent lots of time creating and compiling info for the betterment of huntards everywhere. And if you dig into his forums a bit you will find a (not-so-secret anymore) secret. A brave, Tauren hunter by the name of Manito has perfected the Beast Master's 3:2 shot rotation macro. And he has graciously shared it for all the world...of warcraft, to see. You will find all the info you need if you follow this link. Follow the instructions carefully and in no time you will be shooting shit about as good as you can shoot shit. By the way this is the macro I was speaking of in Episode 2.4

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How do you choose your professions? If you just want to make money, clearly there is a general consensus that taking a couple of gathering professions such as mining and skinning would be best. Just head out for a little while, gather up some materials, and sell them. No sinking money into leveling, no rare recipes to find, no investing in mats to make something and hoping it sells. However, if you want to make your character as effective as possible in battles, it will probably cost you a bit of cash. All of the crafting professions have a few items that can only be used by characters with the right profession, but some are better than others. A couple of the nice ones are engineering for goggles, leatherworking for drums, enchanting for ring enchants, and alchemy and jewelcrafting for trinkets. Let's say you decide ring enchants and drums are best to make your character top the dps charts. How are you going to make that profit? Doing enchants and making armor kits will only make you so much money, especially if you have to buy mats. So, now you have to make an alt in order to provide mats and make a little more money. But don't you want to make your alt as uber as your main? I guess that's just something you'll have to decide for yourself.

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You ever get to the point on your main WoW toon that the game seems to loose it's luster? Days in AV for honor points or hours Raiding Hyjal for the chance at a drop that 20 other people want? Well, I have a solution for you: Make an alt!

Not some simpleton bank mule or AH stand-in - make a real alt that you will play.

Why you ask? Several reasons:

1. To know another class as well as your main. This helps you understand the dynamics of working in a party or raid better.
2. To have two additional potential money making professions. Gathering professions on an alt can sometimes be key to making huge money in WoW
3. To re-experience the wonder of playing the easy, fun low level content.
4. To challenge yourself to level faster and more efficiently
5. To see the interactions people have with your new class that may be different from your main's class. There's nothing like playing a huge DPS toon then becoming a holy healer. People openly seem to love DPS and tend to forget the healers. Come on people - let's show some love here.

And those are just a few reasons.

So go make an alt.

And play another 85 days... lol

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So, obvioiusly, I love Dorkins. He’s the best. He feeds me good meat, strokes my fur, and lets me kill horde. We are best friends. But lately he’s been leaving me in the stables in favor of that stupid wind serpent “Steve”. I hate Steve, he thinks he’s so cool with that lightning breath and his dumb flapping wings. I think Dorkins was persuaded by the rumor that wind serpents are the best dps pet in the entire world...of warcraft. I think that's bull****!!! I rip F***ing faces off!!! I'm getting so mad waiting here in this ridiculously small excuse for a pet boarding house, what the f*** is this thing anyways?!?!?! I'm going to poison Steve's food, then Dorkins will have not choice but to take me out. Oh no, what if Dorkins never comes back? What if he leaves me in here forever?!! Nooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!!!! F*** Steve!

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Okay, okay. Sorry. Geez... Stop your cryin' and belly achein' for crap sakes! All you frost mages who think I'm not showin you luv or that I'm bashing on you or your talent tree need to take a freakin' chill pill. Maybe you have a talent for that or something... Yeah, yeah. I know. Frost mages can do damage and it's how you play your class and your spell sequence that determines your mana management and that a frost mage is incredibly effective against A'lar and... blah, blah, blah. Hush! listen up here peeps. The point is this: fire mages still kick ass in raid situations. Period. I'm not saying frost or arcane can't kick ass. I'm just sayin fire mages kick ass. Okay. The water elemental is nice in PvP and yes ice barrier is a very cool spell. I have seen some rockin' frost mages in AV kick the crap out of buckets of people with that frost nova and ice lance. And yes, yes, I know that ice block was originally your talent tree and for that one I thank you. But my whole point with talking about fire mages before is that some people have the misperception that only frost mages are good for raiding and end-game content. That is pure bull$hiT. I certainly can, and I have seen other fire mages, decimate instances left and right, utterly destroying clusters of mobs with a few well-placed arcane blasts and dragon's breath. But this is what get's me agitated: I've actually had people tell me that their guild doesn't want fire mages because they pull too much aggro or lack DPS or suck at killin raid bosses. What f'kn morons! Those issues are with the person playing the game, not the game itself. Got get Omen2 and Deadly Boss Mods to clear half of that crap up. So once and for all, so as to quell this brewin storm twix fire, frost and arcane mages I may have inadvertently started, the real bottom line is this: we mages have CC, we have great DPS, we have remove curse, AI and can drop enough tables to feed an entire raid. Frost is great for PvP. Fire is great for PvE. Arcane can one shot just about anything their level. All are doable for killin mobs in BT, Hyjal and Sun Well and will continue to be in WotLK. Face it: If you rolled a mage, people want your DPS.

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Ah... when it's done, it's done. It's sad to see it go... but we'll all move on... What am I talking about? One of the worst things that could happen in-game: my guild disbanded. ( /cry ) Yes, a few weeks ago, maybe longer now since time has lost all meaning since I entered this state of mourning, the first guild I joined broke up over internal politics, RL issues, in-fighting, alleged favoritism and a few freakin' stupid idiot jerks ( different people depending on whom you ask ) brought about the final straw that broke the guild's back. I am talking of Midnight Run on Frostmane server. We were good. Really freakin' good. We were almost on farmin' status for Hyjal and BT, gathering mats for boss fights in BT and beginning our venture into Sun Well within a few weeks, but then it happened. On night I logged in at raid time, ready to kick the crap out of Vashj and maybe get a new chest piece, when the GM called all online people over to the Aldor bank. Then he dropped the bomb. It sucked. Really sucked. I meet some really cool people in the guild and had fun takin' down some of the hardest content in the game but now, as I stood at the Aldor bank getting my share of epic gems and wizard oil from the soon-to-be defunk guild bank, it was just dawning on me that I would probably never raid with most of these people again. A damn f'k shame. And I knew some of the reasons why it was disbanding were very legit. RL comes first no matter what anyone says. And the freakin' jerks who were making a mess of the guild's name really f'ked it for everyone. How just a few asses can come in and within a weekend f'k it up for everyone is just astounding to me. So to those who were in Midnight Run, thank you. Puffball, you are a great GM and I would join any guild you make in the future when you come back to the game. Hedone, you are an amazing healer and I look forward to raiding with you soon. Gomja, you rock as a Pali tank. Noodshot, Stings, Legendaryoda, and the rest of the MR crew, thanks for the fun. And now the guild is done. The fractured pieces split into two or three different guilds, each somewhat bashing the other for the downfall and how cool they are now. Whatever. My ego resides in myself and not in how much DPS I can do. That being said... If you have a guild on Frostmane server that raids after 9:30 server time that's lookin' for a raiding fire mage whose sustained DPS is always in the top 10, usually top 5, then give me a call. Loyalty is one thing while there's something to be loyal to, but when it''s done, it's done. Besides I want that freakin' chest to drop off Vashj! So if you need a raid savy fire mage, give me a call, but only if you raid after 9:30 server time on Frostmane. ( btw - The Armory says I'm in Divine Turtle Protectors but that's my alt's guild. And the gear I'm wearing is epic! lol )

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