Project Lore

With rumors swirling about the incoming Patch 3.2.2's release date, last night I took some time away from Brewfest festivities to squeeze in a final encounter with Onyxia, in her classic form. I was hoping this would serve as inspiration of sorts for others to go battle her as well before the patch, but as we heard this morning it looks like the update is now underway. As early as tonight, a freshly angry Onyxia awaits those brave enough to enter her lair. Although I've seen plenty of videos and heard players brag about soloing the once epic brood mother, I wasn't confident that I'd be able to take her on alone in my squishy leather gear. So I rounded up a couple of guildies who also were keen to battle Ony, and together we headed for her lair in southern Dustwallow Marsh. The three of us - rogue, warrior and paladin - sneaked in through the gate and easily tore through a few trash dragonkin. I felt almost guilty as we rounded a corner into her nest and found her sleeping peacefully. But not guilty enough. She awoke with a fiery vengeance, ready to lay a team of 40 adventurers to waste with a single Deep Breath. Instead, she found just us three, 20 levels higher than she, and geared with equipment and spells far beyond those she once knew. Regardless, she put up a good fight. Most of her fire attacks practically bounced off the plate armor of the paladin while I threw DPS from the side. When her whelps came, spamming Fan of Knives worked handily. More ranged DPS would have come in handy when she took to the air, and the three of us ran around puzzled about how to get her down before her fireballs took us out. I was a fraction away from dying several times before we finally pulled her back within melee reach. The warrior was not so lucky; he took the brunt of fireball damage and reached his end. As Onyxia died, we each picked off a ton of loot. The little achievement whore inside me also was thrilled to get Onyxia's Lair, even though I've heard it will no longer be required for the Classic Raider achievement. But there will be new achievements! Plus a new pet whelpling and updated loot! Not nearly as troublesome as she was in her hayday, but still a beast to be reckoned with, Onyxia soon will be back at the forefront of glorious encounters. I don't know about you guys, but I am revved up to have this battle be returned to its nostalgic difficulty. With any luck, Onyxia will be back up and ready to really shine tonight. Who else plans to pay her a visit?

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Wow, is my Google Reader ever full after my little excursion to the east and west coast of St. Croix. Good thing I took that little ski trip a few weeks ago as a warm up to the withdrawal. Otherwise, I do not know if I could have made nine days without a PC to entertain me and record my thoughts. Like a good little rogue (Irish to boot), I did my best to stay in the shadows at all times.

Boy, oh boy, do I have a lot of catching up to do. It will likely take a whole week to be up to snuff on everything that has happened. The prolific writers over at WoWInsider have over 200 articles for me alone – not that I will read it all – then there are all the blues to filter through and likely a good amount of in-game mail to round out the schedule.

I am sure I am not the only person who managed to sneak away for the holiday season, so just in case you missed them, here are some of the stories that perked my interest.

Donations to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society = WoW Subscriptions – A Blizzard Employee will be offering those who donate a chance at one of three one-year subscriptions to WoW. One lucky winner will score themselves a LIFETIME SUBSCRIPTION  ($_$).  This is still running, so be sure to donate.

2008 MMO Trends Analyzed – Get this, GamerDNA and Massively find out that WoW is the most popular MMO! They also believe that the title's reign is coming closer to its end, due to additional subscribers plateauing in recent months.  Me likey graffs!

FCC Commissioner Resigns – Deborah Tate, the commissioner that WoW players love to hate (...) decided to step down after getting made fun of on the Internet. Okay, that wasn't the real reason, her previous actions – like taking corporation opinions into consideration – probably had more to do with it.

Ulduar Won't Be “Hard” In The Normal Sense – PvEers have proclaimed Wrath to be entirely too easy, but Blizzard demands that available raids are just the beginning. Vaneras promised that Ulduar will be more difficult, but only if your guild is brave enough to try a more challenging encounter than the norm.

Mage Solos Naxxaramas Military Quarter – Just watch the video, Ms. Mage did some creative stuff to pull this off.

These are the items that jumped off the page for me, but I am sure there is additional interesting stuff that has happened in the last week and a half. For instance, the nerf to required enchanting materials is one. Anything big that I should make sure I speed read?

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I'm currently specced enhancement, which is my spec of choice for the time being. It's also the one I tend to recommend to shaman who are leveling up. Of course, both Elemental and Restoration have come a long way in their viability as leveling specs, but an enhancment shaman is able to solo with very, very little downtime, PvP decently, bring utility along with great DPS in groups, take on elites without breaking a sweat, heck I even tanked the ranged horsemen in 10 Man Naxx. Knowing the abilities that are at your disposal will help you make fights go much smoother. One of the key abilities available to enhancement shaman is Feral Spirit, the 51-point enhancement talent introduced in the Echoes of Doom patch. I said I would address my love for this tandem of wolves and you might have wondered what they do besides look cool and make lots of noise. I'll tell you right now - they are a versatile little cooldown that I've used in a myriad of situations. While leveling through Northrend, I used my wolves to solo most of the group quests that I encountered. My basic strategy when approaching an Elite was to start out with totems that would increase my damage output. That means Strength of Earth, Windfury, Flametongue, and Mana Spring. If I knew the enemy was a caster, I'd drop a Grounding Totem and wait for the cooldown to be up before heading in. Once set, I'd run in, let the dogs out, take some damage, heal with a 5 stack of Maelstrom Weapon when I got low on health, use my wolves' Twin Howl when I got too low on health to let them soak up a little damage, grab aggro again, and repeat. Usually by the time my wolves despawned, I was able to kill the enemy. If things got too dire, I'd use Shamanistic Rage or even Heroism, but most of the time I wouldn't need to go to those lengths. Now, while the additional DPS from the twins doesn't hurt, the real key to these guys is one of their abilities: Spirit Hunt. Spirit Hunt heals the wolves along with the Shaman, for 150% of the damage they cause, which ends up being a very nice HoT on both me and the wolves. This means that when I'm ping-ponging aggro on an elite by using their taunt, I generally don't need to heal myself during the time that they are being targeted and they don't need healing unless they're taking a severe beating. It also gives your healers a break during heavy raid damage and can give you a nice buffer in PvP so long as your wolves can stay on an enemy. Another useful ability that the Spirit Wolves have available is Bash, which is a stun. This is the only true stun that shaman have access to. It's amazing for PvE since it can give you an extra breath between damage, and in PvP, well, you can't do that while stunned. If you're a Shaman who's done any real PvPing, you know how much it sucks to be stunned, so start using it against all of those rogues and pallies. Unfortunately, the wolves will cast this as soon as they start attacking something, and although autocast can be turned off manually once the pets are out, it will turn back on the next time they are summoned. I've looked and tried hunter macros that turn off autocast, but they are not effective on the spirit wolves. Blizzard is aware of the issue and hopefully it will be fixed soon. Spirit Walk is the last of the wolves' abilities that I'll cover. It is a Sprint-like ability that increases your run speed and your wolves' run speed by 60%. It also clears any root effects on all three of you. Incoming AoE spell? Stuck in a Frost Nova? Getting kited? Running a flag? Trying to catch a flag carrier? For an enhancement shaman, if you aren't in melee range, you're missing out on a lot of your potential damage. Sure you can Lava Burst for a decent crit on top of a Flame Shock, but that's not how you get your damage done. Movement is critical especially in PvP. Spirit Walk will get you there faster than Ghost Wolf, frees you from roots, and even works indoors! (Insert Plea for Ghost Wolf Indoors, maybe a glyph? Please!). If used early enough in the wolves' 45 second duration, it can be used twice per summon. I often use it while running back in an instance if I know it is going to be a long one. Now, if only they were permanent and not just 45 seconds every 3 minutes...

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