The Neverending Story?

I enjoy Wednesday nights because it’s the night our guild takes off from raiding. It’s nice to get a break from all the chaos and preparations for 25-man raids. So on nights like these, I generally start farming or questing. And as I looked through my quest log, something hit me. At this point, I have no outstanding quests other than some quest chains that require dungeon content or a group of several people. This does not include quests for raids or daily quests.

When I started raiding 25-man, I hit a slump where I wouldn’t quest at all. I had completed half of Netherstorm and none of Shadowmoon Valley. then slowly but surely, Netherstorm was finally completed. Motivation for pushing through Shadowmoon Valley quests came from attunements for 25-man content, particularly to get the Champion of the Naaru title and the Black Temple attunement. It’s kind of crazy when you think about it. Burning Crusade was announced with “hundreds of new quests”. Has anyone ever really counted? Did I really complete the majority of those hundreds of quests?

The thing is, I enjoy plain old questing more than daily quests. What happens when the single driving reason that kept me playing early on is suddenly being taken away, catching me unprepared? I don’t want to lose interest in my hunter, but what would I do when I’ve run out of quests? Sit around in Shattrath on the LFG channel? That doesn’t sound too promising. I can’t bring myself to do dailies for another set of factions after getting exalted with the Shattered Sun Offensive. All that daily questing burnt me out I think.

I feel like not many people can say they’ve gotten to this point, at least on my server. I wish Blizzard implemented more new quests with each patch because the story should not end where the quests end.

Progression Thrills, Gorefiend Dead

We paid our respects all right. And Teron Gorefiend is dead on the floors of Black Temple. (You’ll see me on the right.)

The Hand of Fate kills Teron Gorefiend.

It was my first time taking part in a progression kill with my guild. It wasn’t too shabby either. We got him down on the third try, and I didn’t blow up the raid with constructs. The last time we were in here last week, I think I screwed up partially by just being a bit slow. This time, the raid just DPS’d away as I got the debuff. I didn’t even realize Gorefiend was down until everyone was yelling in chat and on Ventrilo because I was too focused on the constructs.

We walked away with [Shoulders of the Hidden Predator] from Shade of Akama and [Softstep Boots of Tracking] from Gorefiend himself.

I must say, there’s nothing like the feeling that you’ve taken part in a progression kill.

Blanking and Karathress

I’m blanking out. Not really sure what to post because I was out of town all weekend. Any ideas I might have had were erased while I was enjoying time off.

The guild went into Serpentshrine Cavern today so we can get the ball rolling on Black Temple attunements to get the shadow resistance neck piece. We downed Hydross, Lurker Below, and Leotheras without much problem. Karathress took 5 tries, unfortunately, due to blunders and mistakes. We walked out with [Ring of Lethality], our first upgrade from 25-man content!

Next week we’ll be going into Tempest Keep with our sights set on Al’ar. Here’s to hoping that [Arcanite Steam-Pistol] and/or [Talon of Al'ar] drop. Marksmanship hunter beauties. If we decide to go to Void Reaver as well, I hope the tier 5 shoulder token drops.

One of These Is Not Like the Other

It’s been a while since we’ve played on Anejon. We decided to forgo the Friday raid because we’re planning on going with the guild on Monday to get our Black Temple attunements in Serpentshrine Cavern.

So instead, I decided to go play on Anejon and see if I can still play a warrior. I logged on as level 17 and decided to solo the Defias escort quest. Well, I managed to get halfway into Moonbrook but pretty much aggroed anything near me. Fortunately, a priest was kind enough to heal me, which helped me finish the quest.

Then I proceeded to ask if anyone in my guild would be willing to take me through Deadmines. (I would’ve looked for a group and tank, but it was Friday afternoon, and I didn’t think many people would be up for it.) A warrior guildmate was kind enough to offer, and off we went.

It was a night for weapon drops. Anejon picked up [Cruel Barb], [Smite's Reaver], [Rhahk'Zor's Hammer], and [Cookie's Tenderizer]. All usable for warriors. So that now we’re better geared instead of outleveling our gear by at least 5, we went back to questing, and it was so much easier.

By the end of it, Anejon was level 19, and I decided to try out PvP at the low levels. Warsong Gulch. Home of level 19 twinks. It was an interesting experience. My HP was probably less than half that of warrior twinks. I kind of felt bad for being a non-twink because it would hold the others back. We went with one win and one loss with almost 40 honorable kills. It was fun since WSG was the daily battleground also.

I think it’s more fun doing PvP at this level. You don’t have people wearing resilience gear. It’s just pure enchants and drop gear. All PvE gear. Despite the difference between twinks and non-twinks, I think it’s somehow more fair. Given the limited number of abilities, it’s not really about spec either. It’s about skill and using what you have to play well. No Brutal Gladiators; no Mortal Strike warriors; etc. Heck, I nearly solo’d a hunter that was in twink gear, with his boar breathing on my back. I had more fun doing it than when I PvP on my hunter.

I think I’ll come back to level her again more often.

Improving Pet Raiding: WoW Web Stats

It would seem that I have neglected to clarify on the configuration of my WoW Web Stats reports and how I analyze them, particularly regarding pets. The Stoic Guardian’s Gothyelk did an analysis of his pet’s performance using WWS, and he was keen in observing how much his pet “missed”.

Why did I put that word in quotes?

The reason is because WWS sometimes has confusing terminology. When you click on the Columns bar, there are options for All Miss and Miss. All Miss includes attacks which did not produce damage or critical damage, which means parries, misses, dodges, blocks, resists, etc. Therefore, Miss is a subset of All Miss.

Want a proof? All you need is a screenshot. This is from Nalorakk in Zul’Aman.

From the image above, you will see that the number of Miss, Parry, and Dodge add up to the (All) Missed column. (For the hunter himself, it doesn’t matter that you choose All Miss because ranged attacks generally miss and not parried or dodged, which is why I chose the summarizing column.)

Now if you were considering whether or not to spend more talent points on Animal Handler, what you want to look at is the number of actual misses, not all missed attacks. Unfortunately, we can’t control the parry and dodge chances of a mob. However, positioning our pets at the back of mobs generally reduces the chances to block and parry.

Brajana of Mend Pet also has a great overview on pet management and pet healing to supplement this entry. Pet management is an important skill to have for all hunters, not just Beast Mastery ones. Without our pets, hunters lose half of their whole.