Getting stuff done (and random stuff)

I've been trying to get some goals done before MoP comes out, but it's been going slow. I blame Tera and Diablo 3, mostly, although general boredom with WoW has been part of the problem too. Talia is still stuck at 76 (only about 2 bubs from 77 though), Max is still 81 and has stalled out RP-wise as well, and most of my profession grinding has not happened. (Must get more peeps' fishing/cooking/first aid maxed, argh.) I did at least get Kal's blacksmithing to 525, thanks mostly to the free skillups at the Darkmoon Faire. Now I just need to get cracking with her Molten Front dailies, to get the weapon patterns from there. (Ugh.)

Gearing up my max-level characters has gone way down, as well. I am kind of terrified of the raid finder, after hearing all sorts of stories about jerks and idiots in other peoples' runs, and it's frustrating to deal with 2fps lag during most of the boss fights. It might be easier if Blizzard would put in a 10-man option, but I doubt that's going to happen any time soon. And honestly, it just seems like unnecessary effort when MoP will be replacing most of the gear within the first few questlines/dungeons. Maybe if Blizz would give a release estimate (if there is one, I haven't heard about it yet), it would help me decide whether it's worth it, but again, I don't think it's likely to happen soon.

One thing I have been getting done is tinkering with my hunters' stables. Kerrowyn has gotten most of her pets traded back to the white theme I had when I first rolled her, and Rajji has let a couple of his more neglected friends go. Kel has released one or two as well, but things will get ... interesting, when Mists comes out. She has bonded really well with several new pets on the beta, but to tame them, I had to release a few pets that I would rather keep once everything goes live. Releasing them on the beta wasn't an issue, because it's not 'real', But she currently has only one free stable slot on live, and she (and I) are quite attached to the pets she has now. The only option I have so far is to let a couple of her spirit beasts go, which I really don't want to do. However, since Max has Tundra (Arcturis) and Rajji has Wraith (Gondria), and Kel's Tahnka and Fogg don't get out of the stable much, it is still an option. :(

One good thing about Kel's pet situation is her latest tame. See, after she finally got her dragonhawk mount, and I realized how much I love the color (and dragonhawks in general), I finally went ahead and took her to Sunwell and got her a 'vanity' pet to match. Meet Drago-

Aren't they gorgeous? :D

Kel did a round of Tol Barad dailies with him, just to see if they bond. The answer is a definite yes.

One last thing to mention- one of my friends, who plays Kal's mate (or girlfriend/lover/whatever term suits you), has been having a ball with transmogging, and he's come up with some really amazing sets. The newest one that he showed off last night had Kal speechless. Literally.

Plus, they are just so darn cute together. >.>

I'm tinkering with a story idea for Kal, just something to keep her busy. Hopefully I can get it sorted out in my head and write something about it soon.

That's about everything for now. Hopefully I can beat my leveling slump, and have some 'Max and/or Talia is 85 now' news soon. :P
/Waves

Um, hi...

So, I just realized it's been almost a month since my last post, so it's probably time for another one, eh?

Starting with some catching up- poor Max has stalled out a bit, sitting at 81 right now. I think I'm giving up on Skoll camping, for now at least. I swear he has to be the most frustrating thing to camp ever. Not even Loque was this bad at spawning. The only single time I ever saw Skoll was when Kel tamed him. (After my sister found him, which emphasizes my bad luck at camping him, I think.) So rather than annoy myself by having my toon freeze his ears off in the snow, I'm going to (eventually) get back to leveling the poor guy. Besides, all the new pets I've been seeing on the beta make me think I should have at least one hunter with lots of stable space.

Talia is still going, at level 75 now. Rogue-ing is still fun, and I cannot wait to get her into Cata content. She even has almost a full set of gear waiting for level 80 already, so hopefully she can avoid the issue Max had, where his gear's ilvl wouldn't let him in the dungeons until right before he hit 81. (And then he dinged doing Children's Week orphan quests. Go figure. :P) Hopefully I can keep going with her, and reach my goal of 85 before MoP comes out.

I have my second character completely transmogged now. :D

Kal, with her Quel'Delar, the Inferno Tempered set from the Shatrath JP vendor, and the no-longer-available Shaleskin Cape. I have to say, she looks pretty danged intimidating. Also, I'm so happy to find a set of armor that doesn't turn into a 'plate-kini' on a female character. (Not that Kal wouldn't wear something like that, just to show off, but she's too smart to actually fight in it. :P) Now I just need to get a decent screenshot of Kel, showing off her Stalker's armor. I might have to just make a whole post for my transmogs, since I have plans for several other characters, I just have to stop being lazy and collect the sets. And take screenshots.

I've been tinkering a bit on other servers out of boredom, and I think I found a new home for all my Hordies on Cenarion Circle. I made a baby tauren druid there, and so far the general atmosphere is pretty nice. My Horde characters on Feathermoon have been neglected lately, so now I'm probably going to be migrating them over to CC, as my finances permit. My Alliance characters on Arthas are most likely going to join them, because I seriously am sick of being on a PVP server. (No offense to my brother, who has almost all of his toons on Arthas. Constant fear of getting ganked is just not my thing. :\) My Blood Elf hunter Kerrowyn has already been moved, and with some help from sis and our buddy, Shadoclaw has started a tiny RP-based guild.

Well, other than a bit more beta tinkering, that's pretty much all the WoW stuff I've been up to. I have to confess, I haven't even been on the game very much lately. I'm not sure if it's boredom, burn-out, RL issues, or a combination of all, but I just can't seem to stay interested in much with WoW. Not even just WoW, either, because LotRO has been just as neglected, if not more so. Honestly, the only reason I bother logging into WoW has been to be around my friends. Although that isn't helping much, because most of the time they're busy with other things, and barely seem notice when I'm online.

And probably the biggest reason that I haven't been on WoW or LotRO- I admit that I've gotten the Tera bug, like my sister. It has been a truckload of fun so far, so much that I don't even have a 'main' character there, because I love playing them all. My archer is my highest level, and is my favorite so far, so I guess he counts? But really, all the classes are fun. The gameplay is amazing. Compared to WoW, which can sometimes get boring and repetitive, combat in Tera has a lot of action, and requires a lot more attention. And some of the scenery is downright breathtaking. I plan on posting some screenshots of my toons, as soon as I can get them from my sister's computer onto mine.

The only problem is, my old laptop is so outdated that it can't run Tera. Like, at all. (It can't run Diablo 3 either. /sadface) So the only time I can play is when sis is working on my days off, so I can use her desktop computer. It's been working out okay so far, but it sucks not being able to play together, and it does get frustrating for me when our schedules don't give me time to play for days at a time. So, I am now looking to get a new computer. My financial situation is going to make it take a while, though.

Not much else worth mentioning at the moment. Hopefully I won't take another month to come up with another update. :\   /Waves

'Short' Update...

... Because work has me all tired out again.

First, the big news. Max has finished another goal.



I'm beginning the camp for Skoll now, although at the moment it's just been logging in periodically to check his spawn points. I may attempt an all-night camp tonight, since I have tomorrow off from work.

Beta spoilers ahead!!

In other news, I got my beta invite right after sis did, and I've been poking around with it a little. My pandaren monk is 16 so far, and has been fairly fun. It seemed a little lackluster at first, but after his first dungeon run, with a few new gear peices, he's finally able to kill things relatively quickly. I'm just very happy that my 'real' monk is going to be spoiled rotten with heirlooms. >.>

As far as the other new stuff goes, I've copied most of my level-85 characters over. The hunter bugs has made it a bit frustrating to play Kel, but I've done some questiing on her and I love it so far. I keep forgetting that I don't have to be at range any more, I can pewpew things right in the face now. That is, whenever her pet lets the mob get that close. The growl change is pretty neat, and danged useful when I'm too lazy to redo my pet attack macro. :P Just having her pet on 'assist' makes sure he is after the target as soon as she starts shooting, and he usually grabs it before it comes near her.

I haven't done much on either Kal or Arien, so I can't say much about warrior/paladin changes. Rynia hasn't seen much attention, either, but I blame Blizzard for that. Destruction is ridiculous right now, mana-wise, to the point where I don't even want to try doing anything on her because she is out of mana after about 3-4 spells. She might kill one mob in 3 or 4 spells, but if she aggro's a group, I don't know what I would do. So now she's just sitting, until something gets adjusted.

Caderly, on the other hand...

I love what Blizz did with shadow priests. Cad is so much fun right now, I've been on him more often than even Kel. The shadow orb mechanic is way easier to manage, and having it under control, instead of having to wait on random procs, is so much better. The new version of his apparitions is tons of fun, too. And his survivability and mana management has gotten way better, as well. If nothing major is changed before MoP goes live, he will probably become my #2 main for the expansion.

(I'm pretty sure everyone knows that absolutely nothing will move Kel from #1. Right? :) )

I copied both Jahira and Windstar, so that I could play with both feral and balance, without having to worry about the issues with dual specs at the beginning of the beta. I have to say, I'm very happy with the new cosmetic glyphs. Moonkin form has never felt exactly right with Jahira, so it's nice to have the astral glyph so she can at least appear as herself. I know some (maybe most) people don't like it for various reasons, but it works for me.

As for Windstar, the very first thing I did was equip the stag glyph. And then run laps all over the grass next to 'their' house for several minutes. I can't even describe how excited I am, all about that one little glyph. Windstar, my druid of the Antler, is allowed to take the form of the demi-god she worships. This has so much in-character meaning for her, I have to admit I get a tiny bit choked up when I think about it. That probably sounds silly, but Windstar is a much-loved character for me, and thinking of how happy and awed this will make her... I can't even describe it.

And now I think I'm going to end on that note, before I start sounding like a total idiot. :P

Little Talia is hanging around level 66 now, and I think I'm going to try to get another one (or two) tonight. /Waves

p.s. I really did mean to keep this post short. Really.

Why hello there...

It's funny what you can find when you aren't looking.

A couple days ago, I had my neglected troll hunter Rajji out, doing his Firelands dailies so he could open the vendor to get his gun and scope schematics, when I happened to fly over a big blue surprise. About a minute later, Raj had a new buddy.


This is his third spirit beast, joining Wraith (Gondria) and Snowcloud (Loque). And unless I happen to stumble over Karoma and can't resist, that will be all for Rajji.

Shortly afterwards, Raj was working on the dailies in Molten Front, and found a certain hyperactive green spider. After looking up the taming technique on wowhead, I gave it a try. Well, okay, a few tries. Okay fine, he whooped poor Rajji's tail and I finally had to admit defeat, after many deaths. Raj just didn't have the HP or the amount of haste to beat Kirix's stunning poison(even with sis bringing her hunter Booggah, with a core hound, to help). I didn't give up completely though. See, Rajji has this thing with green pets, and Kel's Fidget (Deth'tilac) has made me sort of like the Firelands spider model. So I figured I would just work on Rajji's gear a bit, and try again another day.

Well, I was doing Arien's dailies today (for the same reasons, yay for multiple engineers?), when I found Kirix up again. I decided what the heck, and switched to Rajji, who had stocked up on haste elixirs and speed potions, and was parked by Kirix's path. It took a few more deaths, and I finally asked my sis to bring Booggah and his core hound to help again, but finally Raj's tame beat Kirix's stun. I think the neighbors probably heard me cheering afterwards. XD


After taking so long to tame, with so much frustration, (and so many repair bills,) he totally earned that name. >.>

So after that was over sis ran around a bit looking for the rest of the fire spiders, and found Solix sitting in his lava pool. We looked up the taming process for him, and (with a bit of encouraging from me) she had a go at taming him. It was ridiculously easy, compared to Kirix's stubbornness. It was pretty amusing to see and hear her reaction to having a spider following her around afterwards. (She doesn't seem nearly as tolerant of them as me. Yet.)


The name was my idea. >.> She said he needed a cute, innocent name, and that was what popped into my head. :D

So now Rajji has exactly 3 stable slots left, and I think I'm saving them for any new pets Blizzard gives us in MoP. He has a couple pets that I'm not really attached to, but I'd rather not let any of them go, since they weren't exactly easy to tame. That's okay though, because it's just more encouragement for me to go finish leveling Max. :D

Speaking of leveling, Talia the rogue is now 64 and still going. \o/
/Waves!

A Pair of Dings

I have had a couple characters hit some milestones recently. Firstly, my little formerly-Blood-Elf-but-now-human rogue, Talia got a few runs through Ramparts, (courtesy of Jahira,) with a couple quests mixed in to bump her xp a bit. Not long after run #3, this finally happened-


(Next up, Blood Furnace/Slave Pens/ Underbog. Whooo!)
The whole reason I faction-changed her was, no matter how much I want to play my lil rogue, it would only take a few minutes for me to get bored and lonely on Horde-side. Now that she's on Alliance, I have a lot more fun playing her, where I have chat channels and friends to keep me company. I may actually make my goal of getting her to 85 before the expansion! (Maybe...)

And next, I have my newest maxed character. And boy did it take long enough. Poor Cad, he went through my little issue with getting a toon close to 85 and then having a short burn-out phase. But last night, I finally finished the last couple bubs of xp he needed, and then Ding!



Hooray for another gear grind, eh? Although, this one won't be so bad, because he's an old, familiar character, and I really enjoy shadow-priesting. He already had some epics waiting for him to level, thanks to Kel's justice points and Rynia's tailoring. I ran him through the Firelands starting quests and Thrall's chain, so he's all set for normal heroics. I just hope I don't have too many fail-PuGs before he can get into the DS heroics. My previous experiences with Jahira and Rynia weren't all that encouraging, though. :P

I've been spending a lot of time on LotRO lately. My tax return got me a one-year subscription, so I've been messing around with the monster-play PvP side, mostly on Laurelin. So far, my warg is rank 4, weaver (aka spider) is rank 2, and my reaver and defiler are both rank 1. Not too bad, considering that all of them but the warg are new additions, and the spider is the only other one that I play seriously. (The others are just to goof around with and farm extra commendations.) I have a war leader on Windfola, but I don't play very much on that server, so I've been thinking of making one on Laurelin as well. I think I want to get my current toons ranked up a bit more, and get more of their skills, first.

Funny thing about my spider... I'm actually arachnophobic IRL, and it doesn't help much that LotR's spiders are fairly realistic-looking. But after watching this person's videos, I just had to make one, and it's actually been very fun. Like, even kind of cute, in a omgkeepitawayfromme sort of way. I'll probably have another post to show my Creeps off a bit sometime. ;D

Lastly, I'm starting to actually pay attention to the Mists of Pandoria info coming out, and I'm starting to get excited. There's still some stuff that I will have to see to decide if I like it or not, (like talent changes and pet battles,) but most of it sounds really interesting and fun. Oh yea, Windstar is totally gonna be able to shapeshift into a stag. That could not possibly be more epic. If I didn't have so much stuff to do before then, I would be practically bouncing of the walls with impatience. XD

Well, that's it for now. Off to terrorize more hobbits in the Moors! /Waves

Whew!!

So, I mentioned not long ago how Kel was stuck on 98/100 mounts for her achievement. Well, today my OCD kicked in, and I had a little grinding spree.

First attempt- heroic Utgarde Pinnacle. No blue proto drake. :(

Next, Karazan. Midnight did not want to come home with Kel. :(

Next, heroic Magister's Terrace, with Pitch along in case the pet dropped. No pet, but Kel finally got some loot-luck. :D


Clearly, I need to have Pitch tag along more often... >.>

After that, PvP seemed like the quickest way to get #100, since Kel only had one of the PvP mounts, and had just over 800 honor at the time. Hooray for Isle of Conquest weekend!












Now the only problem is, pretty mount should have pretty pet to sit beside it (when it's on the ground, anyways). However, Kel would have to let one of her current pets go. :(

Although, I'm not really very attached to her snake, even if he is gorgeous. So it might be a possibility in the near future. For now, I'm going to bask in my accomplishment.

Which reminds me... This is only adding to the odd (but nice) trend, when every time RL starts getting too much to handle, something in this game happens to make it a little easier to bear. First the incredibly easy time I had with Max camping for Loque, and now this. It may only be a temporary distraction, but hey, I'll take what I can get. I may go back to feeling like crap tomorrow, but for today, life doesn't seem all that bad.

Unexpected

So, Max has been continuing his 'level to a certain point and then camp for a pet' routine. His current project was getting to 76 and then looking for Loque'nahak. The getting-to-76 part was easy enough, but I never expected the second part to work out this well.


Frozen kitty!


With his new buddy.

It was almost funny. I had both my acounts going, and was doing archeology on Rynia, pausing every so often to do a lap around the Basin. I had just finished one such lap, and decided to park at one of the gorilla spawn points to afk again for a bit. Well, when I stopped at the first point I reached, I swear something was telling me to go check the other spawn before I went back to Ryn. NPCScan went off as soon as I got within reach. It was almost like Loque wanted me to come find him.

He's not named yet. I'm thinking of just sitting Max and Kel somewhere and trying a few words in Darnassian, and see if something clicks. That will have to wait a while, though, because I'm already running late for work. >.<

/Waves