Blogs
My mom explains the use of tools.
jaibyrd — Fri, 03/13/2009 - 10:11
TOOLS EXPLAINED
DRILL PRESS: A tall upright machine useful for suddenly snatching flat metal bar stock out of your hands so that it smacks you
in the chest and flings your beer across the room, denting the freshly-painted project which you had carefully set in the corner
where nothing could get to it.
WIRE WHEEL: Cleans paint off bolts and then throws them somewhere under the workbench with the speed of light.
Also removes fingerprints and hard-earned calluses from fingers in about the time it takes you to say, 'Oh sh -- '
ELECTRIC HAND DRILL: Normally used for spinning pop rivets in their holes until you die of old age.
SKILL SAW: A portable cutting tool used to make studs too short.
PLIERS: Used to round off bolt heads. Sometimes used in the creation of blood-blisters.
BELT SANDER: An electric sanding tool commonly used to convert minor touch-up jobs into major refinishing jobs.
HACKSAW: One of a family of cutting tools built on the Ouija board principle. It transforms human energy into a crooked, unpredictable
motion, and the more you attempt to influence its course, the more dismal your future becomes.
VISE-GRIPS: Generally used after pliers to completely round off bolt heads. If nothing else is available, they can also be used to transfer
intense welding heat to the palm of your hand.
OXYACETYLENE TORCH: Used almost entirely for lighting various flammable objects in your shop on fire. Also handy for igniting the
grease inside the wheel hub out of which you want to remove a bearing race.
TABLE SAW: A large stationary power tool commonly used to launch wood projectiles for testing wall integrity.
HYDRAULIC FLOOR JACK: Used for lowering an automobile to the ground after you have installed your new brake shoes, trapping the jack
handle firmly under the bumper.
BAND SAW: A large stationary power saw primarily used by most shops to cut good aluminum sheet into smaller pieces that more easily fit
into the trash can after you cut on the inside of the line instead of the outside edge.
TWO-TON ENGINE HOIST: A tool for testing the maximum tensile strength of everything you forgot to disconnect.
PHILLIPS SCREWDRIVER: Normally used to stab the vacuum seals under lids or for opening old-style paper-and-tin oil cans and splashing oil
on your shirt; but can also be used, as the name implies, to strip out Phillips screw heads.
STRAIGHT SCREWDRIVER: A tool for opening paint cans. Sometimes used to convert common slotted screws into non-removable screws and
butchering your palms.
PRY BAR: A tool used to crumple the metal surrounding that clip or bracket you needed to remove in order to replace a 50 cent part.
HOSE CUTTER: A tool used to make hoses too short.
HAMMER: Originally employed as a weapon of war, the hammer nowadays is used as a kind of divining rod to locate the most expensive parts
adjacent the object we are trying to hit.
UTILITY KNIFE: Used to open and slice through the contents of cardboard cartons delivered to your front door; works particularly
well on contents such as seats, vinyl records, liquids in plastic bottles, collector magazines, refund checks, and rubber or plastic
parts. Especially useful for slicing work clothes, but only while in use.
DAMN-IT TOOL: Any handy tool that you grab and throw across the garage while yelling 'DAMN-IT' at the top of your lungs. It is also, most
often, the next tool that you will need.
Moonkin Dps
Disrupter — Tue, 03/10/2009 - 12:04
I've been pouring over parses for a while now, and this is what I found.
There are a few key things to a moonkin's dps rotation.
Q 1) Proper dot management, when do you renew the dots? When do you let them fall of completely?
A 1) For moonfire, there generally isn't a time where you'd rather let moonfire fall off and not renew it immediately afterwards. The only example that comes to mind is a boss fight you know you're going to move momentarily, within the next few seconds, and moonfire is just about to fall off. That way you can do something useful while you move.
Prime example is Grobbulus. You know he'll be moved in a moment and your dots are just about to fall off. If you dot now, you'll move and do nothing, if you dot when you move your damage will go up. That seperates a "good" caster dps from the "average", ability to think ahead on rotations.
My Results: I've been going through the parses logfiles to check how my applications on dots, particular moonfire, were doing. I'm generally within less than a global, my moonfire dot times are quite good. Checking over parses the possible # of ticks for our last patchwerk kill was about 51 and I had 48 which is excellent.
A moonkin of my gear will not renew a insect swarm in any haste buff or eclipse scenario, but they will renew moonfire. So if you get a Power Infusion, Haste Pot, Trinket Haste Proc, Eclipse proc, or even heroism... do not renew insect swarm.
Q 2) Eclipse, how do I manage eclipse.. which eclipse proc do I want?
A 2) Currently the preferred Eclipse proc is the starfire 30% critical strike chance. A lack of crit on gear/raid buffs can make getting said proc a pain but it's still in the end more dps than the wrath proc unless you have absolutely zero haste and can make full benefit of nature's grace on wrath..
My Results: I've been within 4 seconds and rarely 5 seconds on my eclipse procs it seems. (This is from when I gain eclipse, to when I land my starfire.) That's actually very good. Anything short of 4 seconds is either luck or, like myself, you watch for a natures grace proc when you're casting wrath and immediately switch to starfire. If it didn't proc, you hope your starfire didn't crit. (Next patch this will be more doable as the wrath eclipse isn't as bad as before.)
Q 3) Treants, /sigh.
A 3) /sigh.. They're a large dps increase if used properly. They recieve buffs such as battle shout(yes it ups their dps rawriors battleshout when you see those trees!) and most notable heroism. If your raid heroisms at a specific time and your pets will live the duration, summon them right before heroism directly behind the boss and you'll be good to go.
My Results: If we call heroism, my treants rape face :<. They'd kill 4-5 of our squishier raid members if I could sick them on them muahahaha.
My overall dps recently has been about 5750. What my rotation primarily is (note don't do this) is IS MF Wrath SF during eclipse/haste procs. I'll be -trying- (do this) switching to the starfire idol, and -only- casting wrath when it can proc eclipse, starfire period otherwise. Going off parses that should zoom me up past 6k. We shall see.
So tonight on Patchwerk, I'm hoping to break 6k. Warriors that aren't doing commanding please throw up a battle shout if you have the global when we heroism for treant raping goodness. And if we could count down the heroism that'd be excellent.
Saedo's 3.1 Wishlist
saedo — Mon, 03/09/2009 - 15:59
20 Slot Bags Cheaper than I Thought
Fjork — Fri, 03/06/2009 - 09:58
Just in case you are as out of the loop as I am, the 20 hour cooldown on [21845] has been 100% removed as of 3.0.8. I did not know this. No-one TOLD me.
What does this mean for you? [21876]s are now extremely cheap if you have a tailor-friend that happens to be Mooncloth specc'd.
My spriest Fjork does have Mooncloth Tailoring (2x per 1x mats).
So I'll be making myself some upgraded bags, but I've never really liked being selfish.
You still need those 20 slot bags, but don't want to pay the $$$ for the [41599]? Send me(Pedran) an in-game mail with the following mats PER bag you want: (If you send the mats to Fjork, no promises on speed....)
If you enchanters want to be cheap, I can make the [21842]. Mats: 12x [21840], 8x [22445]
One run of Black Morass should get you enough [21881] if there isn't any on the AH.
Raid Achievements and Hard Modes, your thoughts.
Agoney — Fri, 03/06/2009 - 09:50
So I was thinking lately on how the game has changed (at least, imo for me) when it comes to raiding and the whole landscape of it. I probably should warn this post may or may not sound elitist, take it however you'd like. It's not my intention for it to sound that way, but I'm sure it'll come across that way at some point.
Basically, I'm going to come out and say my view on it and just run with it from there. I think (some) raid achievements and "hard modes" have ruined the game. Let me get in before "its just starter content" and "everyone deserves to see all content". Let me also get in before the inevitable "PTR content always is exactly how it is when it's moved to live".
For me, my favorite instances were AQ40, original Naxx, and the Sunwell. You could even include ZA bear runs as well (although, then again, its a "hard mode"). The thing about the first 3 however, was they were all challenging. You couldn't just run in and dps shit down and win with knowing just part of the strat. The only fight that rivals any of those original challening fights now is Sarth 3D, and even then it is much easier compared to the others (I would rank 10man sarth3d up with the others though). Max consumables were needed for each boss fight, and there would be countless nights of wiping on the same boss. The process of putting in so much to an encounter, failing over and over, and then finally winning is where I truly got the most out of raiding. There was no, oh if you kill all these drakes, you can down the boss, but you get less loot. There was no easy/hard mode. You either did the fight the right way, or you failed.
Some people liked it, others hated it, some didn't give a shit, but the PvE race was a great aspect of the game. You could make a case that achievements can provide something similiar, but its not the same. Honestly, how many people cared about who killed the eredar twins in reverse order first..??? And then it was realized reverse order was actually easier, and you got more loot, so that became the general strat. So it was no point really to track or care about it. I know we don't "compete" on the world level or anything, but we do generally on a server level, in a sense. We might not get server firsts, but we like to be generally close or within a good time period (although, yes, thats not the #1 goal[which is to have fun :) ]).
So lets look at the current picture and compare it to the past. Naxx, being the starting instance, won't be as tuned as it was previously. Understandable. So lets compare it to a Kara or MC. We'll also figure Malygos = Gruul/ony, Sarth = Magtheridon, in terms of raid starting level. I'm hesitant to include kara, as it wasn't really that difficult compared with the exception of nightbane, which, at the time provided a decent challenge. Not to mention it was a 10 man. But for the most part, the high percentage of raiding guilds were not clearing the full instance within their first raid reset. People were getting stuck on certain bosses, wiping on other stuff, etc. Some may think that its hard, but it shows the game is actually challening. If you compare new naxx to MC, it's not even on the same difficulty level. Forgot the 40 vs 25 aspect. You needed both gear and skill. You had to clear MC numerous times to be prepared for rag, the end boss of that level of raiding. With the new naxx, you can effectively clear it with fresh level 80 gear. There is not one single difficult fight in that instance. You don't need naxx gear to defeat its KT, its end boss. You don't need new gear to defeat malygos, let alone Sarth. If everyone performs their best, at most you will need a week or two worth of naxx clearing to defeat Sarth3D. Looking back to only TBC, you had to have farmed decent gear to survive gruuls, and at the same time to survive Mag. All content was not being defeated within a week of release.
So, is the game(pve) to easy? IMO, yes, it is. Blizzard decided to go with this achievement system as a way to reward raiders who went the extra step, but it's really gone the other way. It's now become lets go for Xxxx achievement otherwise raiding would be boring gear farm until the next content is released. Before, it was more enjoyable. Farm gear to go further in content to defeat more difficult bosses. Now, its become farm gear and do XX achievement until they release new content. The achievements are nice and all, but it proves some of the fights arent nearly as difficult as they should be. Not MCing and casting widows embrace on Faerlina would become instant wipe. Sarth 3D should only of been available in 3d form, and tuned a little bit better.
So, now, the future. From my understanding guilds are ripping through Ulduaar. Of course, these fights may be undertuned and such, as they are only testing them, but they did say that about the new naxx originally as well. Blizz even commented that guilds were not trying them the "hard" way, as thats one reason guilds were seeing sucess. I don't think there should be a choice, it should just be the hard way, or you fail.
I'm really hoping to see raiding return to how it was originally, or, if they must keep "normal/hard modes" in the game, at least make the normal modes difficult and challening.. not something that will be defeated after two or three attempts.
TLDR version: QQ, raiding is easy, Shin's my dawg.
Life After Raiding
Karli — Wed, 03/04/2009 - 11:23
So as many of you know I recently re-activated my account and have logged in for a few short stretches. After spending a week with enough free time to play crappy video games, I figured I might as well do something I enjoyed a bit more.
Well, enough time has passed for me that I feel a bit lost. My gameplay for so long was centered on raiding that I kinda don't know what to do with myself! I've been toying around with the idea of doing pvp (in battlegrounds) because that's the easiest way for me to have flexibility to step away if need be.
The nice thing is that the last month has made a major difference in how much care my son needs, and I've really been enjoying getting some of my free time back. He's starting to consistently go to bed earlier, and even though he still wakes up a LOT at night (and hence I wake up), he sleeps very well during the night time hours.
My question to you all is: what's your take on solo-ish play these days? One of the reasons I stopped playing wow was because I couldn't commit to doing things w/ other people (as to not want to inconvenience them if I had to bail at a moment's notice). Once upon a time I played completely on my own on another server (on a horde mage) and didn't even have a guild, so I know there was a period when I enjoyed solo play.
I miss the group game play and whatnot, but I know it's completely possible to have lots of fun doing solo things on wow. I just need some ideas and inspiration!
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