Project Lore

I was around during the initial Scourge Invasion.  In fact, I was still playing WoW hours upon hours a day, many of them spent in raids, instances or just farming for gold.  Yet, I never really joined in on the fun of the Scourge Invasion.  I checked it out, but you wouldn't find me there day in and day out, in an attempt to stop the Necropoli from taking over.  I can't recall my reasoning, but it probably had something to do with the fact that I already had the Argent Dawn reputation that I needed for Naxxaramas.  This time around, I have been all over the invasion. This year's invasion started off with the infamous plague that turned so many of Azeroth's heroes into minions for the Scourge.  The Horde and Alliance put aside their differences, got together, and rid the lands of the threat in only a few days time.  But the plague was only an attempt by the Lich King to weaken Azeroth before sending out his Necropoli and Undead fodder. I enjoyed the plague for all that it was worth, and the continuation into the Scourge Invasion is partially what sucked me into the re-hashed event.  Invasion 2.0 is not all that different from the original pre-Naxxaramas event, if I remember correctly.  We have the areas under attack by the Necropoli, Necrotic Shards, Shadow of Dooms, Undead weapon enchants, and extra bosses in select instances. Only a few things have been added, namely rewards for participating.  Rather than receiving superior gear for our efforts, players can now select from almost Karazhan-quality gear that bump up one's Undead slaughtering capabilities.  We even have a few trinkets that summon an Argent Dawn agent or abilities to our side.  On the content side of things, players can still tackle the new Karazhan boss, Tenris Mirkblood, who seems to be the only thing remaining from the plague days gone by.  Not to mention, the only thing I have found that could really link the two events. This Rogue and Priest combo will be continuing the purging of the Undead from the Plaguelands until the event ends.  I am mainly doing it so I can try out Solidsamm's new spec, but I tend to be a sucker for summonable buddies.  So if you see a purple skull appear on your map (and are on Magtheridon), I will likely be in their base, killing their mans.  To bad the Argent Dawn reputation has been replaced by the Argent Crusade in Wrath of the Lich King and will be useless. Sadly, I haven't seen many other people partaking in the Scourge Invasion, is it just too old hat for you?  Or are you burned out from the plague - as the Lich King intended?

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Okay, this is something that everyone is allowed to be angry at, casual, hardcore, Auction House nuts, everyone.  Maintenance day.  Thankfully, I actually have something to do on this day of reduced playtime.  In my effort to head over to Karazhan and Tenris Mirkblood yesterday, I realized that I have not logged into my Rogue with a purpose, for some time.  Poor Solidsamm has been relegated to the role of bandage machine in recent weeks. The main issue with this is that Solidsamm had never had his talents redone for Patch 3.0.2.  Gasp!  How the hell can one raid without spending those precious talent points.  Instead of being “that guy” in the raid that largely does nothing, I informed the leader of my plight and kindly allowed a replacement.    What a nice guy I am.  I then spent the next hour or so pining over my talent spec and have finally come up with a base spec that I will fine tune after some raiding. The current specialization is built around daggers and will change to a more level friendly build when Wrath launches in a few weeks.  For now, raiding, instancing and damage is all that I really care about.  At the same time, I decided that I wanted to try something new.  Out with the old Combat Daggers build I was using, and in with the new Mutilate build that uses 3.0.2's Turn the Tables talent. The build is pretty cookie cutter, but I will try a moving a few points around to see what can maximize my damage, if anything.  The current setup focuses on energy conservation and creation and is heavily reliant on poisons, namely Deadly Poison.  I threw in that point of Vigor mainly for farming purposes.  Which I do plenty of.  I will have to get used to using Seal Fate again, as well as another new talent, Hunger for Blood.  My combo point rotation will change, from Gouge/Backstab, to a Mutilate heavy rotation capped off with Slice and Dice or Envenom.  In the end, a whole bunch of new buttons, that are bound to a collection of new abilities, will be pressed.  It'll be almost as different as leveling a Priest! What do you PvE-focused Rogues out there think?  Have you guys tried Mutilate yet?  Am I the only person attached to his daggers?  As for the rest of you, did you take the opportunity to try something fresh like I am about to?  Hopefully my toon won't revolt on me for ignoring him for weeks...

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Oh, Hallow's End, how you have drawn me into the game once more. I mentioned in my Hallow's End Achievements post that it is my favorite seasonal event in Azeroth, and real life. The new Achievements, items and especially the candy, that Hallow's End offers has drawn me back to the game ahead of Wrath of the Lich King, which I did not expect to happen. I may not be raiding, but I am playing as much as before, if not more.

My new priest has received most of my Hallow's End play time, as well as most of my time in general. I have tackled a few of those Achievements I mentioned, despite the fact that I said I don't really care. I guess when I am so close to completing things like Tricks and Treats of Eastern Kingdoms, I get sucked into the idea of the pretty colors and effects flashing across my screen when I grab my last goodie. Unfortunately, I haven't tested my new found healing abilities in The Graveyard of Scarlet Monastery yet. The Headless Horsemen is just going to have to wait until I am 70, which should be before the event ends on November 1^st. I really need to get her in there so can experience the encounter as a healer.  Of course, she could also use the two rings, the mount, and squashling.

If I don't think my Priest is going to make it to 70 by the end of this week, I guess I will just start farming the Horseman on my Rogue. The rogue still needs an epic flyer, and while I will still have to cough up most of the money for the riding skill, at least I will look cool on the hard-to-get mount. Sadly, nothing else but the encounter itself is really needed.

I know Hallow's End is just a few days old at this point. Judging from the comments in my last post, that hasn't stopped some of you from completing the insane Hallowed Be Thy Name Achievement. Props to those who managed to accomplish it in only four days time, especially if you finished it before A Mask for All Occasions' removal. What are you guys going to do now? Work on scoring it on your alts, back to farming gold ahead of Wrath or abusing the EZMode raids due to the new patch?

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So you have finally hit level 70 on your alt, or perhaps it is your main.  As you begin to run the 5-man content while trying to get into Karazhan and doing PvP in between it dawns on you that most of your gear lacks enchantments.  Whatever shall you do? Most players will quickly look-up what materials are required for class-appropriate enchantments, only to be shocked or annoyed at how much the enchantments will cost them.  For this discussion we will focus on weapon enchants, generally the most expensive and often the most important. Being a melee class character - a Rogue to be exact - Mongoose is the best enchantment, its tooltip reads "to occasionally increase Agility by 120 and attack speed slightly."  Yum.  But here's the catch, the materials are expensive, costing:

• 6 x Void Crystal
• 10 x Large Prismatic Shard
• 8 x Greater Planar Essence
• 40 x Arcane Dust

Not to mention the fact that you have to find someone to do this for you, which may cost you a little extra. Well maybe Mongoose is a bit nuts, after all you did just hit 70 and are likely to replace your gear soon.  So how about Executioner which will allow you "to occasionally ignore 840 of your enemy's armor."  Not to shabby in this day where bear tanks easily have over 16,000 armor.  Materials for this one?  Not much different:

• 6 x Void Crystal
• 10 x Large Prismatic Shard
• 6 x Greater Planar Essence ( - 2 GPE)
• 30 x Arcane Dust (-10 AD)
• 3 x Elixir of Major Strength (+3 Elixirs)

This begs the question, to enchant or not to enchant? The benefits of such should be readily obvious, you get a boost in selected stats but at what cost?  A character in my predicament, just hit 70 with some basic Karazhan and PvP gear, will easily replace much of their gear in a the coming weeks.  So should they waste all of those mats on a high end enchant?  Probably not and the drawbacks aren't horrible. Lower stats mean lower DPS in my case, or lower healing or crappier tanking in other cases, but not matter what the reduction is by an incredibly small percentage.  Of course, we cannot forget the endless ridicule that may ensue fromguildmates or persons in your party.  Avoiding the constant teasing could make the decision for you. There is one other route, a compromise of sorts.  Instead of getting a high end enchant like Mongoose or Executioner on my Emerald Ripper - an item easily replaced - I will get a medium grade enchant.  Therefore I have SOMETHING which will help me avoid some ridicule while gaining SOME stats but not "wasting" obtuse amounts of gold on mats.  One could argue that I should just save that gold to put into the high end enchant later, but then we get into a vicious cycle and I hate those.  As for my Merciless Gladiator's Shiv?  Well, it won't be replaced nearly as quickly as the Ripper, so Executioner it is. This was my first post here at ProjectLore.com.  Was it good for you?

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So Wade had a great question which a lot of people starting out ask, even myself. "WTF is Tier?!" I will admit that it took a number of times having this explained to me before I fully grasped it so I hope this will clear it up. Basically, the Tier system is a way to explain the quality of loot dropped and where it comes from. So Tier 4 Gloves, Netherblade Gloves, are not as good as Tier 5 Gloves, Deathmantle Handguards. Tier 4 Gloves drop in Karazhan which is an easier raid than SSC, where the Tier 5 Gloves drop. You'll also notice that both are part of a set. Tier 4 raids (Karazhan, Gruul's Lair, and Magtheridon's Lair) have bosses that drop Tier 4 tokens, which are turned in at a vendor in Shattrath for a part of your class set. So, all you really need to know is Tier 6 is better then Tier 1 and when you get a drop it will fall somewhere on that scale, according to where it came from. I know it's confusing and I hope this helps. If I missed anything please help clarify in the comments. - Dr Dark

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So I've been leveling an alt. Now I will say that I have a lot of alts. Mostly from starting a character before I had a 70 and just losing interest before they were done. My first character was a Troll Hunter. I got her to 31 before the Burning Crusade... Well then of course we all had to roll Draenei, so I started a Paladin. After getting him to level 52 I realized I just didn't like Pally that much. I never wanted to Tank, I hate healing, and the melee DPS just wasn't kicking it. So I started what was to become my main, a Night Elf Rogue! Now that I have a full level 70 I've been wanting to level another. So I started a Druid... but I hate leveling again! So where is the fun? Is the fun seeing how fast I can level? Maybe trying to find quests I missed on my first go? I just don't know. So please if you have an opinion on how to level an alt without gouging your eyes out with boredom... comment here and let me know. - Dr Dark

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Well it finally happened. After a few uneventful trips into Karazhan I got the drop day. We actually had a ton of world drop Epics including my new, yes I know they're for druids, feet Zierhut's Lost Treads. Also I was able to land Malchazeen for my PvP dagger spec... very nice! Oh and Maiden dropped these little bad boys, Bracers of Maliciousness. So it was a good day :) Oh yeah and this off of Chess... Mithril Chain of Heroism... too many Epics in one run? No on your life!!! - Dr Dark

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