Döra's Log

It's always the darkest before the dawn

2011-10-13T07:07:00.003+01:00

Yesterday I decided that Nerfiron was out of the Ironman challenge. I was stymied, demoralised and depressed.

Now she is back with a new lease of life! Will this turn around mean she feels she's in with a chance to get to 85? No - definitely not. So what's changed?

It sounds silly really, but:
a) Using Bartender, I've turned off my ability to see my XP bar.
I've gone from this:

Now you see it

to this:

Now you don't

and
b) I recalled what Tome of the Ancient said in a comment on this post when she was very demoralised on Ironsally. She was so close to 85, but was thinking that she couldn't make it. Being so attached to Ironsally having invested so much emotion and effort into her character, she didn't want to let her go, and was wondering what Ironsally could do next. In a comment. she came up with the idea of maybe going for 'The Seeker', which I actually thought was a great idea. Something I thought I might try for with Thriftee sometime.

It struck me like a bolt of lightening. Lol - the psychology of this is so simple. Yesterday I was depressed and had given up the challenge. Moaning about making a crappy 100 XP per really difficult kill in Outland, or more XP for a nigh on impossible kill in Northrend. Not wanting to let Nerfiron go, but knowing I wouldn't be able to get to 85.

So I thought - why not try for The Seeker on Nerfiron instead? Then it occured to me that if I'm going for the Seeker then a minuscule 25 XP per quest doesn't mean anything right? The goal is no longer to level, it's to get those quests under my belt.

There is a strange beauty in this shift of perception, because - those XP points are still adding up, and provided I don't watch my XP bar I won't get frustrated - like you do when waiting for a kettle to boil.

I've seen the light!

So now Nerfiron is currently rolflstomping those mobs in the Southern Barrens, seeing crits, doing quests she's never seen before, & generally having a ball, not caring about XP (but still making some - slowly but surely). I still don't think it's possible to get to 85 with Nerfiron, but maybe, just maybe, I can get ahead of the yellow quest curve that was holding her back, by going for the Seeker along the way :)

Nerfiron Seeking

End of the road for Nerfiron.

2011-10-12T09:10:00.002+01:00

Nerfiron Level 70

Well I think I've hit the wall. Bloodied and bruised I eventually managed to get Nerfiron to 70, but that last level was pure hell. In fact I actually had to resort to grinding mobs in Zangamarsh to get those last three bars. All the time I was thinking "if I can get to 70 then it will get easier".

Well, I was mistaken, it wasn't easier. All level 70 gave me was a minimal extra 274 health, a new ability - Shiv (which is great for dispelling an enrage effect but useless for anything else), some new weapons that didn't feel any better than my old ones - and to top it all, now I can only get about 102 XP per lvl 68 mob in Outland. That's not funny! Every fight with a mob of that level is hit and miss as it is. If evasion is off its 3 min cooldown then I can survive, if its on cooldown then I have about a 50/50 chance of surviving. All this for 102 XP per kill? No wonder Ironsally headed to Northrend at this stage.

Things started to get REALLY tough in Blades Edge. No green quests other than green group quests that I cannot do. Believe me I've tried. Like Ironsally found out, it's just impossible to get ahead of the curve, & now I find I've still got half of Blades Edge, Netherstorm and Shadowmoon, but the effort is just not worth it for the pitiful XP.

Before hitting 70 I was getting over 500 XP per kill - I wonder why Blizz drops the XP so much in Outland once you hit 70? Doesn't make much sense to me.

So I decided to head to Northrend and see what the mobs are like there. I had a feeling this was the end of the road but I had to see first because I was mighty curious. Well the XP is better obviously, but now my survival rate is about 1 in every 4 fights - and these are just the easy introductory Northrend quests with level 68 mobs.

Other than lucky drops of grey gear there will be no more upgrades for me all the way to 85, and only an axe upgrade at level 75 which will give me a whopping 1.7 dps more that I have now. My average item level is only 55 at the moment even with the new weapons I equiped at 70, so this lack of prospective upgrades doesn't really inspire me to look forward.

So I think it's the end of the road for Nerfiron.
I'm not too sad though (well I am - but what can ya do? lol) . I got much further than I ever expected. Anything over level 50, I class as a bonus because that is originally how far I thought I could get with this challenge on a rogue.

If you would like to try the Ironman challenge please visit Psynister and Vrykerion for the rules.

Bye Bye from Nerfiron! Best of luck to all the other Ironman challengers out there!

Update: Bit embarrasing really given the above post, but I've just had a flash of inspiration that may keep me in the challenge a bit longer, so don't commiserate with me just yet. More on this tommorow :)

Ironsally is the Ironman of Wow!!!

2011-10-06T23:04:00.002+01:00

Massive congratulations to Tomeoftheancient. Perhaps my heading should read 'the Ironwoman of Wow!' On her Ironman challenger, the Warlock Ironsally finally made it all the way to 85 wearing nothing but white vendor gear and grey drops. No talent points and no item enhancements! A huge - huge feat of awesomeness!

There are several of us in the blogoshere, including myself, all trying this challenge - (thanks to Psynister & Vrykerion for thinking up the rules), but Ironsally is the first challenger to complete it. I know from my own experience that this is a really tough challenge, especially as it was so touch and go for Ironsally on that last level - so I am in absolute awe!

Head over to Tomeoftheancient's blog and follow her through her trials and tribulations where she describes her journey from start to finish.

CONGRATULATIONS IRONSALLY! A TRUE HERO OF WOW!!!!

Sneak peek at her Armory

Ironsally 85!!!!

Ironman challenge level 65

2011-09-05T19:55:00.000+01:00

Well, I might have made it to level 65, but those last 3 levels have been tough as hell!

Deaths are increasing at an exponential rate since entering Outland. Well ok - not quite exponentially, but you know what I mean, and it's a great word. Plus, if I understood maths & the ramifications of all things exponential, then maybe I wouldn't be spending my time playing computer games :D As the US scholar Albert Bartlett pointed out (source Wiki) "The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function."

I really wish I could have started Outlands at level 65 - would have been so much easier. But I have learnt a valuable lesson here for if I ever do anymore crazy leveling in the future. I am going to do something similar to what Eccentrica Jones is doing her character Mad Murray. i.e, I am going to get the most xp out of the zones that I travel through before hitting Outlands as I can, by doing each and every zone bracket as I progress. Eccentrica reckons that she can get to level 65 or 66 with Mad Murray before he hits Outlands using her plan. So note to self: Plan out your crazy levelling challenges better!

As it was, I didn't start Outland till I was level 62 - but did that help? Nope!

First off, after dinging 60, I completed the...
Badlands.
It was pretty easy, especially since I now had a flying mount, and enjoyable as a horde, because I got to do a lot of quests I hadn't seen before, like killing Illycor, (who dropped my new Smooth Cloak). I have never got a horde char this high before (except for a DK I once tried out). I dinged 61 here, completed the quests and Explored the zone (plus a few adjacent ones). Gotta put that new flying mount through it's paces!

I still wasn't as high a level as I wanted to be, so I headed back to...
Silithus, where I exacted my revenge on Deathclasp! Although I did quite a few more quests here, I didn't finish the zone. For some reason I can't get along in Silithus. Every time I end up there I come away wishing I hadn't bothered. Can't put my finger on why, but I have a severe dislike of this place.

Still wasn't high enough, so I went back to...

Un'goro Crater

Here mucho fun was had, although challenging the Ironhide Devilsaur was probably not a good idea! However, once I became his squire, Maximillian of Northshire <Knight-Errant> helped me to sort Ironhide out, although poor Maximillan nearly ended up naked in the effort lol. Fun Quest! (The Ballad of Maximillian).

I also picked up a cute pet - which will get bigger (and maybe become rideable?) if I do the dailies and continue to feed it. I think I will keep it little for now - bigger fish to fry for the moment. :D

I still hadn't leveled, so I searched out some more green quests and found them in Swamp of Sorrows where I dinged 62. Other than going back to Silithus, which I was loath to do, I think I had exausted the green questing in Azeroth and the Eastern Kingdoms, so I had no alternative but to step through the portal into...

Hellfire Peninsula
I first went to Shatrath, alligned myself with the Aldor, for no other reason than they seemed close to the bank and AH. No need to go back to Undercity for a while. :)

In Hellfire every quest was yellow and it got very very tough, very soon. My aggro range was smaller - the mobs were a lot higher health - in short, I started dying a LOT more than usual! It's strange in that I can fight say a level 61 and beat him comfortably, then die when trying again on the same mob, same level. I put this down to my low crit rate maybe? ie. sometimes I get some lucky crits, sometimes I don't get any. I don't know really - I'm just conjecturing.

Gouge then Bandage!

Very pretty, but weird looking mob

One mob I am particularly proud of beating though was this guy! <-----

I was doing the quest Disrupt their Reinforcements, hastily clicking on the portal - thinking "why won't this work?" (I was at the wrong portal - doh), when this guy spawned right in front of me. Elite with 9958 health to my 2479. Maybe because he had just spawned he was a little sleepy or something - but can't believe I beat him, especially as he caught me on the hop.It was very very close!

Well after some time, and a lot of deaths I was starting to think I had reached the limits of where Nerfiron could go. So I thought to myself "What did Tomeoftheancient do at this point?" So I looked her up, and it turns out she went to Zangamarsh! See her Warlock Level 65 post. "Zangamarsh?" I thought "Surely that will be harder." Well it turns out that some of it was easy and some quests very hard. So I finished off all the easy ones I could find then went back to Hellfire. So basically - that is what I've been doing - criss crossing both these zones looking for the easier quests. As I levelled up, I would run the circuit once again looking for the easier ones. But - it's been a tough few levels, and finally some of them in both zones have turned green! Even the green ones are hard though. Even so, I still couldn't resist taking a pop at Boglash :D

On my second trip back to Hellfire I encountered a couple of bugs. After handing in the Quest Shizz Work I ended up with a Fellguard hound guardian who insisted on followed me around everywhere - didn't fight for me, but ate any Helboars I killed and then promptly left behind a stinking mess. He finally disappeared after I died to the Fellreaver lol. The second bug happened after I died. I found myself stuck in the looting pose, both as a ghost and alive. I could fight but it looked weird. I had to relog to sort that one out.

So - I finally hit 65! Woopee - I could get some new gear. The only problem was it's only sold in Northrend. Taunka'le Village in Borean Tundra to be exact. So Nerfiron girded her loins for the epic trek to get her new gear. As it turned out, she got there safely by stealthing all the way from Warsong Hold. This was really fun actually as it reminded me of Döra's epic adventure.

After buying my new gear - I picked up the flight point and flew to Dalaran to buy my next lot of weapons (which I can't use until level 70). They are now safely in the bank! I found it pretty sad to be in Dalaran. I recall the heady days not too long ago when this was a thriving bustling city - the place Döra called home! Now its an empty shell with nothing going on - it felt very sad.

But I love my new look - even if I am perspiring a bit in Hellfire.

Snowhide Leather Set

Interested in trying the Ironman challenge?
Here's the rules: From The Land of Odd & Psynister's Notebook

Happy Birthday!

2011-08-31T20:04:00.002+01:00

Yay - Happy Birthday to me :)

Döra's Log is One Year (and a few days) old today!

A few days late - but I only just realised - lol

Video: Thanks to: http://www.youtube.com/user/Kalothira

Nerfiron vs Ernee - level 61 (a snapshot in time)

2011-08-30T11:03:00.002+01:00

When Tomeofoftheancient recently got her Warlock Ironman challenger - Ironsally - to level 73, she decided to scour the armory looking for another level 73 Warlock so that she could compare stats. Seems she had quite a job finding one, and the one she eventually found also happened to be untalented. So this was probably a Warlock that hasn't been played in some time and had their talents reset in patch 4.1 or something. I recall when levelling Thrifty though Zul'Drak and patch 4.1 came out - over a couple of days every time I logged on my talents had been reset, and I had to re-do them. Nevertheless, the comparison showed up the huge differences in stats between the Warlock Ironman and an untalented Warlock in decent gear.

Seems great minds think alike because prior to her post, I had had the same idea to compare my Ironman rogue Nerfiron with another rogue - and it just so happened that I have Ernee (my level 61 Rogue who has been leveled normally). Perfect! Although Tomeoftheancient pipped me to the post with the topic, it's still relevant because it's a different class - so here I present... Click to enlarge each graphic.

Nerfiron vs Ernee - level 61 (a snapshot in time).

Just look at those differences in stats - lol. Ernee's gear is pretty average for his level. He's done a few dungeons - he is in Outland and Nerfiron is not there yet. He's not using any enchants or jewels yet, but he is fully talented and trained for his level. Most of Nerfiron's stats are 50% to 60% lower than Ernee's. I'm not going to comment further on these stats - I just wanted to present them for people to see and for my own records.

That said - there is one stat that really surprised me. Our respective death counts - lol. They are much, much closer together than I had anticipated. Seems I die a lot no matter whether I'm doing some crazy challenge, or just playing normally - lol. If we subtract the difference - it seems that this challenge has only accounted for 14 extra deaths on my Ironman. In my twisted sense of logic I think that's pretty good! Haha

So, does this mean that - for 'my' play style - dunno what else to call it - (which I hereby name - 'Die a lot') my death count is pretty good for Nerfiron? Or do I just need to 'learn to play' in general? I've been playing for several years now (mostly solo questing, alternative leveling, and occasional group and solo dungeoning), so I can't see any improvements to this situation incoming soon. Without the ability to play in someone else's body I have absolutely no way to know what most everyone else does differently than me. Plus Nerfiron is my third (edit: fourth) rogue! But class is no indicator here - this happens across all my characters. Also - whenever I have been grouped in dungeons I don't die in that situation any more that anyone else I am grouped with at the time. So it's strange.

In my defence I do think persistence, bloody mindedness, and strong desire to experience content plays a part here though. Unless a mob absolutely flattens me, I usually go back for a second or third or even fourth go - convinced that I have learned something from the encounter each time, and that this time I will beat it. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. Plus I always have a go at rares and elites when I spot em even when I don't think I have much of a chance, just because I want to experience the encounter. But... maybe everyone else does those things too!

I'ts not just Wow either - I died a lot in Mass Effect too - but I did beat the game eventually and had masses of Mass Effect fun doing it :)

Sadly I don't have a record of Thriftee's death count at this level. That would have been an interesting comparison to make. He had exactly 100 when he dinged 85 which most people probably think is way too high for a hunter no matter how he was levelled - but for me, given my track record with normally levelled chars, it's probably pretty good.

Don't get me wrong though - dying a lot in game doesn't worry or bother me - If it did I wouldn't find Wow fun - and it's not like my playing impinges much on other's play either - so it's no big deal. I'm not asking for learn to play advice - I just can't help speculating on the whys sometime.

Also - I don't get the 'Largest Hit Dealt' stat. Is this an Armory anomaly? Or am I miss-interpreting the meaning of the stat?

Ironman Challenge Level 60

2011-08-29T06:22:00.008+01:00

Nerfiron Level 60 (Ironman Challenge)

Whoop! Nerfiron made it to 60. Can't really believe it - I never expected to get a rogue to this level on this challenge. And the strangest thing of all, despite having to use the same weapons for the last 19 levels, 50-60 actually seemed easier. Very strange!

I put this down to 3 things.
First: I now only level on green quests (mobs typically 5 levels below me). This still gives quite good xp and has actually speeded up my leveling. Edit: According to a recent comment from Eccentrica (see Ironman level 50) - green quests give the same xp as yellow! Never knew that - but if that's the case it's no wonder I'm leveling faster and easier. :D

Second: I got an ability at 50 (Leather Specialisation) which gave me 5% more agility. More agility is good!

Third: With a little help from Recount (in the field - still haven't tried it on the dummies), I finally decided that Wound poison was better than Instant - After level 50 it seemed quite a bit better to be honest. In fact - looking back I wonder if I should have used it consistently when it first became available - but I will never know the answer to that question. When I did small tests with it earlier there didn't seem to be too much difference, but after level 50 mobs seemed to be dying much more fluidly with Wound on both weapons. So maybe the extra agility was helping here. I'm not a theory crafter so I really don't know. But I should have read this first! Only just found these comments while writing this up. /embarrassed, but it really is quite complicated trying to work out which poisons are better, as weapon speed also seems to come into play. So for Nerfiron, I am mainly going off how it personally feels.

When I got Envenom (at level 54) I tried Instant (main hand) and Deadly (off hand), but it was useless! I think you definitely need to be specced assassination to make the most of Evenom. So this ability is not even in my rotation.

My rotation:
My typical method of killing normal mobs is now: Stealth, Sap, reposition behind, Cheap Shot, two point Slice & Dice, then spam the hell out of my Sinister Strike till mob is dead. Then use Recuperate to use up any remaining combo points and heal me whilst I move on to the next mob.

If only fighting one mob but my health is getting low (typically elites, rares or non average mobs), there are a few ways to deal with this. I can use up my combo points & Eviscerate (in the hope that this will finish them before they finish me), or I can Gouge and bandage. If all else fails I can either use a health potion, or give up and use Vanish (provided its not on cool down). If I attract an add, then Blind is useful for stopping thier attack whilst I finish of my main opponent. If I attract 2 adds - its dicy! I'm using kick a lot more now too, to try and stop casters casting.

I am particularly loving Gouge at the moment - it's a real life saver! I have managed to get my first aid up to the point where I can now make Frostweave Bandages. I'm having to buy the cloth, but it's so worth it. I have a macro on Gouge that stops my attack once I've used it. This stuns the mob for 4 seconds and disengages me. Provided I'm quick to use a bandage I can fully heal myself from nearly zero health within this 4 seconds as the bandage is twice my health pool! Very useful. Doesn't always work of course (might have a DOT on me that I didn't notice), but when it does it's sweet.

So - where have I been? Again - all over the place. That's another thing I am loving about this challenge - it's forcing me to level in far more zones that you would usually have to go to, so I am seeing lots of stuff and doing quests and zones I have never done before, so boredom factor = nil!

Thousand Needles:

Baby Pridelings


Baby Pridelings with helmets


Brilliant model


Would love this outfit

Thousand Needles Quests

I really really enjoyed this zone and dinged 51 as I got to the end of it. The baby Pridelings were so cute! Can you get these as pets? I want one! I also loved the Twilight Hammer disguise I was given on one of the quests - it looks so Rogue like. Would be great if you could Transmogrify an outfit to look like this, or even get hold of the outfit itself. I suppose that's a question for Ironyca - lol. This is the first time I have played this zone and it was brill that I managed to do all the quests. Next time I come back I am going to get that rare (Krkk'kx) I spotted underwater that killed me a couple of times.

Tanaris
Another great zone that I managed to complete. I hit level 53 here, and the only mob I recall having a bit of trouble with was the SouthSea Taskmaster. He was pretty tough and killed me a few times because it was a small area with no way to clear the room without attracting him first. That is until I finally decided to Sap him then deal with the other mobs first - Doh! Sometimes I definitely don't think about what I am doing. After Tanaris I headed into Ungoro Crater. Did a few quests here before deciding it was a bit too hard, so went to...

Felwood
Yay what a great zone this now is! Another zone I've never done since Cataclysm. I always hated it before, but now I think it's great, and can't believe I actually got to fight Arthas from a time when he looked so handsome! Plus lots of rares and elites. Scaring mobs with Rainbows - lol What fun! I dinged 55 here and managed to complete the entire zone.

Winterspring
Before I went to Winterspring I explored Moonglade - every bit of xp helps :). By the time I had finished Winterspring I had dinged 59. Can't believe I went up 4 levels here. Must have been all those animals I had to kill. But I must admit, those 4 levels went by fast and it was pretty easy! The only mobs I had trouble with were Shy-Rotam and Icewhomp. Also, mobs in the zone have the nasty habit of repeatedly giving you some great buffs. Ironman police please note - I did knock them off whenever I noticed I had them!

I so wanted to buy a Winterspring cub, but I was worried that I might not be able to afford flying if I spent 50 gold on a pet. Was heartbreaking but I forced myself to forgoe the pet for now. Again, I managed to complete the entire zone. As I was heading to the flight master to get a flight to my next zone I bumped into 2 alliance players killing the flight master. They then spotted me and came over for a chat. Haven't a clue what they were saying, but thank goodness I wasn't flagged - lol.

Silithus
For some strange reason I decided to go to Silithus next, where I was well and truly Deathclasped. I present - The Deathclasp sequence! After a few more failed attempts I bid a hasty retreat back to...

Un'goro Crater
Mobs were still reasonably challenging here - especially the tar lurkers who had the ability to disarm me, and I was foolish enough to try to take on the Goroshi Fledgling Collosus! Needless to say I did not succeed. But I dinged 60! Yay!

So after that I didn't hang about - it was back to the trainer to train Cloak of Shadows, stock up on poisons, empty my bags, do some auctions, then it was through the portal into Outland to train flying mounts and get my Flight Master's Licence. Whoop!

After getting my flying mount ( A Blue Wind Rider) I found the vendor in Outland who sold me a weapons upgrade. He is Fallesh Sunfallow at Falcon Watch in Hellfire Peninsula. I bought 2 Draenic Sparring Blades. These weapons are blisteringly fast - I'm hoping that's good - lol. I also upgraded my thrown to a Master's Throwing Dagger - Good stuff! No armour upgrades till 65 but I'm still hoping for some lucky grey drops - like this - Smooth Leather Helmet I got from somewhere - it gave me a whole extra 10 armor.

I had a go at one or two mobs in Hellfire Peninsula, and they didn' seem too bad.

That said - I'm not sure I am going to start Outland just yet. I think I will do the Blasted Lands first. Keep to the green stuff!

Ironman level 50

2011-08-23T09:39:00.006+01:00

New here? Here's the rules of the Ironman challenge: From The Land of Odd & Psynister's Notebook

Yay! Well I have been here there and everywhere, but I finally made it to 50. Never thought I would actually get this far, so I'm kinda proud of myself. Plus I think there is life in the old girl yet - so lets see if I can get her to Outlands. :D

Ding!

Nerfiron dings level 50 (Ironman Challenge)


Falchion & Rondel

Weapons & Poisons
At 41 I could I finally upgrade my main hand weapon. I now carry a Falchion (main Hand) and a Rondel (off hand - obtained at 39). I have also bought a Francisca. This is a slower main hand than my Falchion, and the tooltip says it does 0.1 % more damage, so I have used that a lot. But personally - I am undecided which one is best. If I was talented in combat spec I would probably prefer the Francisca, but as I cant take any spec, I actually think the Falchion might be a touch better, as it probably applies poisons that bit faster. I dunno - its a tough call. The Falchion certainly looks cooler in combat :) My thrown weapon is a Gleaming Throwing Axe. I went for a thrown, rather than a bow or gun, because I can poison it. I orginally had crippling poison on my thrown, to slow down running mobs, but thats a pain if you are using your thrown weapon to make a pull, so I changed back to using instant.

I've played around with poisons quite a bit, (and died quite a bit while experimenting - lol - yes I know that's what target dummies are for, but I keep forgetting whenever I am near any), but I've come to the conclusion, that at least for now, the best all round poisons seems to be Instant on all weapons. Still haven't made my mind up. Need to play with Wound poison a bit more. This will probably change once I get to 54 and train Envenom. At that point I will probably start using Deadly poison on my off hand, Instant Main hand. For Assasination Rogues Envenom is awesome, for an untalented one - who knows? More experiments to come - methinks.

This is my last weapon upgrade till I hit 60! That's 19 levels with the same weapons - but they have got me to 50, so maybe they can carry me a bit further.

Reinforced Leather Set

Gear

Once I hit 45 I could upgrade to the Reinforced Leather Set. I have to wear it - but I don't like it! Far too skimpy for my liking - lol. Although I might not mind if I had a figure like Nerfiron in real life. About the only thing we have in common is our big feet!

I've been lucky with grey drops and managed to upgrade my cloak to an Overlinked Chain Cloak and I managed to get some Hardened Leather shoulders .

Unless I get any more lucky drops - these will also have to last me until I hit level 65 & even then I might have to do a death run into the Borean Tundra to get them. :) But as I might not get that far - no use worrying about that yet.

The Journey
After Stranglethorn vale I headed back to finish up Western Plaguelands. Now I had leveled up a bit it was doable and I managed to put Zen'Kiki behind me and finish the zone. After that I headed into the Eastern Plaguelands, but after dying a few times I very quickly decided to get the hell out of there!

So off I went to Dustwallow Marsh.
Here the quests seemed just the right level of difficulty, some hard - most, relatively ok. This was great because I have never actually quested through the whole zone before, and never as a horde, so it was fun. I love seeing new stuff :)

From there I decided to try my hand in the Thousand Needles.
Another zone I've never quested in before. I was really really enjoying myself untill I hit a quest that I couldn't do. Defend the Drill With this quest you have to lay down an oil drill and defend it from attackers. Well I could manage the first wave, but the second wave was too much for me. Very frustrating. I must have tried this 5 or 6 times before finally giving up. It wouldn't have been a problem except that this quest was required before any more in the zone would open up, so I hung my head in frustration and decided I needed to go elswhere.

So I ended up in Feralas.
Here the quests were green but very quickly turned grey on me. I was glad really because I've always hated that zone. It's so hard to find your way around. I did meet a few interesting rares though. I cant help myself when I see a rare or an elite - I just have to have a go - probably why I die so much. - lol Rares and elites are strange creatures. Sometimes you can take them down with relative ease, then another one with similar health/level will flatten you in moments. The ones below I managed without dying.

So back to Eastern Plaguelands.
This time the quests were just about right! That is except for Borelgore! After he killed me 3 times I decided to leave well alone. I also dropped the quest The battle of Darrowshire which is a shame as its a favorite questline - but I knew I would never manage it. Cranius, one of my favorite machinima artists of all time and fantastic musiscian made a great video about this questline - if you haven't seen it - its well worth a watch!

From there I went to Badlands
I didn't finish the zone - after dying too many times on The Sorrow and the Fury. Seriously whoever came up with that quest at Blizzard is an out and out sadist. This brought back so many memories of Thriftee's nightmare trying to do this quest its unbelievable! But I'm a glutton for punishment, and I had to keep trying - and dying! In the end I still had to give up. I have never managed to complete this quest - it's an absolute nightmare. But I did manage to ding 50 here :)


The Sorrow and the Fury

So - where am I now? Well I went back to Thousand Needles, and I've just managed to complete the quest Defend the Drill :D So the rest of the zone is open to me now (and the quests are still giving reasonably good XP even though they are green). So I am one happy bunny!

On a side note - I'm feeling a little guilty because I've been neglecting Ernee for Nerfiron. Sorry but I can't help it - this Ironman challenge is so much fun, and leveling Ernee feels a little boring at the mo. Plus - I have been playing at the most odd hours - my sleeping patterns are seriously out of whack at the moment. I have managed to get him to Outlands though - he is now level 61, so he might be ready for some oldworld raids :).

Also hit on a bit of surprising news. I posted about my Explore Mount Hyjal Video in the Events and Fan Creation Forum in January, and to my surpise it made the community news on the 9th August! Maybe it's time had come - lol. Although its also brought some youtube comments about me using bots and speed hacks - sigh!

And edit - lol: Gasp - I have just noticed on my Western Plaguelands pics that I had a buff on me! I'm always telling people I have tunnel vision - well its true - Honestly - I never noticed at the time! Hope the Ironman police don't ban me. :) Bad Nerfiron!

Ironman level 40

2011-08-13T06:32:00.001+01:00

New here? Here's the rules of the Ironman challenge: From The Land of Odd & Psynister's Notebook

Oh wow - it's ages since I had this much fun! I had had a really annoying day, so wasn't really in the mood for chat, and decided to log Nerfiron rather than Ernee. I finished off the Hinterlands quests and found myself in Western Plaguelands! This was soo hard, and I was getting really fed up of struggling. Plus, Zen'Kiki the Druid was really annoying me. So after dinging 37 I decided to look for pastures new and I headed out to Stranglethorn in the hope of picking up some easier quests that would still give me decent XP.

Eventually found some at Hardwrench Hideaway. At the start they weren't giving me much XP but as I was enjoying the easier time I was having with green rather than yellow quests, I wasn't bothered. I have never done any of these quests before so it was fun, and I wasn't having so much down time bandaging and eating. Although I did die a few times through sheer carelessness.

After a while I found myself infiltrating the Bloodsail Pirates and there the real fun began! I was swabbing decks, running round on a speed boat with a cannon, killing ninja's, and causing mutinies. Before I knew it I was in a massive battle for Booty bay, and literally grinning from ear to ear. Swinging on ropes, bombing from the air, the whole of booty bay on fire, with pirate ships right in the harbour firing their cannons! I never knew that Booty Bay had such an amazing quest chain! What amazing FUN!!!

I handed in the last quest that ended the battle, and dinged 40! Lol!

I had been having so much fun I barely noticed myself levelling.

Battle won - Ding Level 40

It's definitely green quests for Nerfiron from now on! :D

The Monty Python of Paranoid!

2011-08-12T04:43:00.007+01:00

Not a dead parrot - something better!

I was not a part of this, (still too low a level) but Mer's post was so funny I just had to point people to it. XD

Also Feignheart (Jamin) from Shattered Beginnings (who became a member recently) has also written a great post about his time with Paranoid so far, and his adventures doing some old world raids.

Not a great deal to report with Ernee. He has just dinged level 55 ( is in the Blasted Lands) and is hurrying as fast as he can so he can join in the raiding fun.

Get a move on!

Oh - and I would like to point you to the latest addition to my blog roll.
Ashlova with her blog Pick and Pick Exclusive.
She has just started a very interesting challenge that I will definitely be keeping my eye on!

Ironman level 34 (and a bit)

2011-08-10T06:54:00.003+01:00

New here? Here's the rules of the Ironman challenge: From The Land of Odd & Psynister's Notebook

I had been hoping to make this post titled 'Ironman level 35' so I logged on in the early hours tonight in order to get Nerfiron to 35. Unfortunately I logged on 4 minutes before the server shutdown - so it wasn't to be. Drat - I was so in the mood to play her for an hour too! My playtime has been so erratic lately what with one thing and another going in in RL, that it's pretty annoying when you can't sleep, you wanna play, but then the servers are offline. But no matter - I can't sleep - so I might as well use the time to give everyone an update instead.

Loving Sap and Steath but not server shutdowns

Well - it's pretty tough going, but I think I can keep going for a bit yet - but just how far? To be honest I can't see her getting past 50, but we shall see. If I get to a point where I can only kill grey mobs - then that's the point I will give up. I don't care how many times I die, but I hate grinding, so I'm not prepared to try and progress at a snails pace of minuscule xp per kill. That said - I am not in that situation yet so I'm still having fun with this, simply because I am playing her a lot differently than I play my other rogues. Plus I am enjoying seeing the game from the side of the Horde, as I pretty much always play alliance. I have shifted my home city to Undercity, and I'm finally beginning to be able to find my way around there - much easier than Orgimmar.

My favourite abilities are stealth and sap (which I have macroed with Pickpocket), and vanish is becoming increasingly useful. Just a shame its on a fairly long cooldown, as it's got me out of many a scrape. I thought I was doing really well until I hit the Hinterlands when I found all the quest mobs were my level again and each mob was taking me down to at least half health. So I now find I am having to eat and bandage a lot more than I used to, but the ability to use left over combo points for a small heal is helpful on occasions. Sinister strike is quite energy heavy so its taking an age to kill stuff, and if I catch the attention of a wandering mob in the middle of a fight and vanish is on cooldown, then the chances are I am dead again. But Sap has given me the ability to take on a pair of mobs quite comfortably, (albeit slowly) and now I have just trained blind I might be able to cope with a wandering mob too. I haven't had chance to try this out yet.

I've been unlucky with wool drops, and wool is really expensive on my server, so it's held up my ability to train First Aid as well as I would like. But to compensate, I can usually find really cheap silk bandages for sale on the AH, so that has proved invaluable. But I suspect I'm going to have to buy some wool soon, so I'm saving like mad in order to afford it. I find it really heartbreaking to vendor those quest items though - all that lovely stamina and agility down the drain!

Studded Set (love the hat)

I recently upgraded my gear to the Studded Set, but I really didn't notice much difference to my survivability at all. Even when I upgraded my weapons (Main hand) from Longsword to Broadsword & (Off hand) from Kriss to a Main Gauche, I didn't really feel much benefit, although there must have been some. The biggest boost to my damage output came when I got the ability to use poisons. If I couldn't use poisons I would have already given up I suspect.

Like Ironyca, in her latest post I am contemplating what to do with Nerfiron if I get to a stage where I can't carry on. If / when I get to that stage, I might just allow myself to use decent weapons, but stick with the white gear - I haven't decided yet. I am also seriously contemplating doing the Ironman on a hunter, because I am really interested to see how it compares to Thriftee's challenge, and I can only do a direct comparison using the same class that I did Thriftee with.Plus I think that Hunter has a chance of getting to 85 (maybe).

But I'm not done yet, and as I level through the Hinterlands I am hoping that the mobs will get easier like they did when I worked my way through the Arathi Highlands quests. And most importantly I am still having fun with this - although the notion of probably not being able to get to 85 puts a little dampener on the motivation I have to say. Once I started Thriftee I began to see the chance of getting to 85 doable, so that was a great motivation. With Nerfiron I have had to set my sights a little lower - my goal is now 10 levels at a time.

250 Quests Completed

Those Crazy levellers

2011-07-23T20:50:00.010+01:00

I am having so much fun in the blogosphere at the moment watching so many people doing so much crazy levelling, that I thought I would bring them all together into one crazy post for some crazy delight!

Not that I am saying these people are crazy (well they are just a bit), but they are also some of the sanest, soundest people I know. These are people who want to look at WoW through different eyes and see the game anew. Different strokes for different folks. Odd bods! Or as Ironyca put it (in her suberb post) - The overlooked heroes of Wow. The ordinary people who dare to do extraordinary things. My kind of people!

If you are looking to do something different in game, then you can't go far wrong by rolling an alt and having a go at one of these. Or think up your own crazy way to level. It could change the way you look at WoW forever.

There are three main challenge types that I am following at the moment (some with slight variations), but in essence, three.

1) Thrifty levelling.

I think I am the first person to dream up and try this challenge. I recently succeeded on my hunter Thriftee, and a lot of fun I had too. The basic rule is 'Spend no money, accept no gifts'. Sounds simple, until you think about the implications.

2) Ironman levelling

Born out of the single thought by Vrykerion over at the Land of Odd, “How far could you get in WoW without using green or better items and not spending talent points?”

Psynister from Psyister's Notebook, assisted Vrykerion to help flesh out the concept, and the Ironman challenge was born.

Recently pointed out by Kamaliaetalia, in her blog post 'alts are like Pokemon, gotta catch ‘em all',

the Thrifty challenge and the Ironman challenge are similar, but with key criteria reversed.

She writes:

"The Thrifty leveler can’t use trained abilities, but CAN use talented abilities. They will get all of their gear from quest rewards and drops.
The Ironman leveler CAN use trained abilities, but can’t use talented abilities. They will get almost all of their gear from vendors, as they can only use grey/white quality drops.
The Thrifty leveler, therefore, will have decent gear but a limited array of abilities, whereas the Ironman leveler will have poor gear but a wider array of abilities."

I would add to this, that due to the nature of the challenge, the Thriftee leveller has other restrictions that the Ironman does not. Examples include, no repairs, no flights(unless free), no ground or flying mounts (unless free ), no use of the auction house or mailing system, no gifting of money or gear from alts or other players. The Iromman leveller is able to utilise all of these.

Whether these make the 'Ironman' or the 'Thrifty' the harder challenge - my money is on the Ironman being the most difficult - but even then, I think a lot depends upon the class you choose - thus increasing the range and scope of both these two challenges, from the semi-easy, to the awesomely insane!

Oh my goodness - I just had an insane thought! The Thrifty Ironman! Noooooooo!

3) 'Die Hard' levelling
The correct vernacular is permanent death or permadeath. Basically, if you die, its over for that character. You have to delete and start again. I've called it Die Hard, because I think you need to to have a certain type of 'Hard mode' madness to take on this kind of challenge - but I love the concept, even if I could never take this on myself.

Onto those crazy levellers: (In no particular order - I'm loving them all)

First up is Ironyca from 'Ironyca Stood in the Fire'. She has two levelling challenges ongoing at the moment.

Elford the (former) Executive

Elford, the (former) Executive. The mage with a flair for snappy dressing who has fallen upon hard times. Elford reminds me of a time traveler from the Edwardian era, upper middle class with a stiff upper lip, and an attitude that nothing can keep him down. Shocked by the seedy goings on in the Goldshire Inn at night, Elford is trying to stick to his own high moral character and behaviour, and has his mind firmly on the challenge (and rebuilding his fortunes).

Elford is Ironyca's entry to the Ironman challenge.

Joy the nerfed hunter

"What do you do when the challenge is gone and everything is too easy?" This is the question Ironyca asked herself one day, and the answer she came up with was Joy the Nerfed Hunter. She introduced us to Joy in her post - 'Self nerfing for the sake of Joy'.

Thought up by Ironyca before the Ironman challenge came into existence, I would describe Joy as being on an easy mode variation of the Iromnan challenge. Fun character who has recently faced a few moral dilemas of her own in The Auschwitz of Azeroth

Next up we have Tomeoftheancient with two entrants to the Ironman challenge

Ironsally the Warlock

Ironmary the mage

Tomeoftheancient started out with Ironmary, the mage. In my eyes she was doing ok, but she thought differently, and recently described her experience as:

"Playing Ironmary is exactly like having a hangnail and constantly picking at it. It really hurts but you can’t stop doing it. At some point I started wondering, a lot, is this challenge that hard or am I just completely incapable of playing a Mage, really, I want to know. Ironyca’s Elford is doing just fine. No embarrassingly high total of deaths like Ironmary. So I had to know and Ironsally was born."

So she started to play Ironsally, - an experiment within an experiment! Was she just an incompetant mage, or is the Ironman challenge too hard?

Ironsally is steaming ahead - from her picture she even looks more confident! So I ask the question. Will Ironmary continue the challenge?Or has Tomeoftheancient decided that Mageness is not for her? I await the answer with interest! Apparently all Tomeoftheancient can get out of Ironmary at the moment is a mumbling “Oh, the horror, the horror, nooooo …” Haha!

Then we have Vykerion from The Land of the Odd, with his Warlock Ironkerion

Ironkerion the warlock

Vykerion added a twist to the Ironman challenge for himself by asking his readers in a poll to pick and choose his race & class for him. The readers choice was undead warlock, and so Ironkerion was born.

In his latest update I love the way he gives hints and tips on playing warlock the Ironman style.

"I was able to kill the completely optional elite Ettin that wandered the Gilnean countryside though. I simply dotted him with everything I could and health funneled my blueberry. When the blueberry eventually died, it was just a matter of fearing the ettin away long enough to soul burn summon another voidwalker for immediate disposal."

Maedra's Challenge. Diehard with a Twist!

Maedra the 5th

Meet Maedra the 5th! That's right - this is Maedra's 5th character on his Die Hard challenge to get to 85 without dying. Only it's Die Hard with a twist! Maedra cannot use quest rewards, only drops and items crafted by himself.

Over on his blog he has a graveyard where he parks all previous incarnations of Maedra.

Maedra the 4th made it all the way to 59 and was in the Outlands when the Fel Reaver got her. RIP Maedra 4th. He hasn't yet written about Maedra the 5th, so I am really looking forward to his next post. Be careful Maedra!

Next up - Kenyaku the Cheapskate

Kenyaku the Cheapskate

Kenyaku, is the first person I have come across to take up the Thrifty challenge, so I have been following his blog posts with interest. He is doing it as a warlock, and his rules are similar to mine, with the exception that he allows dungeon runs. Obviously this gives him access to much better gear than Thriftee had, but unfortunately it has also brought problems with his money count. "An interesting note I found from doing that dungeon is that the statistics tab has one bug, it does not count money earned via the Random Dungeon Finder towards your gold acquired count.." However, he is doing very well and has just started Zangamarsh. Keep it up Kenyaku!

Here is a very interesting new entry to my blog roll Kamaliaetalia

Thrifty-Lynne & Iron-Lynne

Kamaliaetalia was so fascinated by the differences in the Thrifty and the Ironman challenges that she has decided to create the twins Thrifty-Lynne & Iron-Lynne. Both Paladins!

Karolynne is the Thrifty leveller & Koralynne is the Ironman.

This is a fascinating experiment, and I can't wait to see how it plays out. Nice one!

I am waiting to see what class/race Psynister will decide to play. So that's another Ironman player/blogger to watch out for. His post on the Ironman challenge is chock full of useful info for anyone thinking of giving this a go. So I recommend a read.

And last but not least....

NerfIron the rogue

Well I couldn't stand it any longer. I might not have much time, but the itch was too strong. Can't let you lot have all the fun can I?

Meet Nerfiron my new troll rogue Ironman. Psynister puts rogue as one of the harder classes to do the Ironman on, whilst Vykerion disagrees and thinks rogue might be a contender. I was fascinated to see how this would go on a rogue & most people have chosen caster classes not melee, so I decided to enter the fray.

I am not the least bit hopeful I will get to 85, but hey - who cares - doing this sort of thing is fun, and I'm gonna give it my best shot. I've already died more times that I have levelled, but what's death? - pfft!

I am on a server with no other characters, so have no money. I even had to wait till level 23 or so before I could afford to train riding, mainly because I have been lazy bout using the AH to make a bit of dosh. Once I hit Ashenvale, I thought 'enough of this night elfy terrain lark' and headed off to Hillsbrad, where I finally met up with Johnny Awesome - I never knew the horde had such a brilliant sense of humour!

BTW: Good luck everybody! :D

Catching up with Paranoid & Ernee

2011-07-19T12:24:00.001+01:00

I haven't posted on a Wow topic in a while, so this will kind of be a catch up post about all the things going on with Paranoid and Ernee at the moment.

Soon I want to do a post about alternative levelling, because there is so much going on currently with people I am following who are doing crazy leveling - a topic really close to my own heart. But don't want to include that here - it would make the post too long and convoluted, so please check back in a few days for that.

So I will start off with...

Paranoid
The guild is going very well I think and (if I have done my math right) we currently have 56 members, with 109 chars between us. The atmosphere is great - very laid back, and I hope/get the impression that people are enjoying the guild very much. On the 10th of July we had a guild party in Darnassus, followed by a conga line through Stormwind (very funny - I kept falling off the edge of the docks when I had the person in front of me on follow). A huge effort was made by Mer & other members to get all the guild members decked out in party gear, and a fun time was had by all.

Ernee dressed for the party

I was really impressed by how many turned up, and we made a pretty large line through Stormwind, much to the amusement of the residents there.
To Quote Mer's Article:

You’d think people with Social Anxiety would rather not draw attention to themselves by going to Stormwind City on a Saturday evening in their party outfits (although some were still nekkid, thanks to the inventory bug), but not Paranoid and The Bravery was soon transformed to a party boat!

With Kia wisely disassociating himself from the group by flying above us under the guise of Official Screenie Taker, we marched through the city. I think most Emerald Dreamers were a little bemused to see this parade dance by, but we didn’t get one negative reaction. Kudos to the realm community!

Then we ran a suicide mission to Orgrimmar. I got lost again when I took a wrong turn in Stranglethorn Vale, but luckily Mer had her eye on me and called me back - lol. The assault on Orgimmar was very reminiscent of the Gnomes Vs Tauren Event, that I and Ironyca attended. I ended up dead on Garrosh's throne again and several members kissed, hugged and luved Garrosh to death. He wasn't very amused (Garrosh has simply no sense of humour), but I think the horde players found it all very funny.

Here is a small selection of screenies in no particular order because I can't get them to lay out properly Grr..

Paranoid is now level 4, and the guild achievements are rolling in every day!

New application process
Applications from new members has slowed down a little I think, but Mer has now added an application form to our site, which we hope will help potential new members apply and just as importantly - know what kind of guild we are. We also added a few guild rules which are just common sense really, but we wanted to ensure that members without Social Anxiety (who are friends of existing members, or who join because they want a slower pace), join under the condition that they have at least some understanding of Social Anxiety, and what we are about as a guild, as we feel it is important that our SA members are not made to feel uncomfortable through a non-SA member's inadvertent ignorance of the condition, or the type of guild we are.

This potential problem has not occurred yet, as most of our members have found their way to us from reading about us on the wow forums or on this or other blogs that have posted about us, but this kind of free advertising cannot continue for ever. So it's inevitable that we will get people wanting to join who don't really know what we are about. So the new application form, will lead applicants to our guild ethos and rules and hopefully will cut down the possibility of a potential problem in the future. We are still feeling our way with this one, so we will have to see how it goes.

Ernee
Not run too many dungeons lately because I'm finding it difficult to find people in my guild at the right level to dungeon with. This is a bit of a problem because we are only a small guild yet, and I am refusing to pug in Paranoid. Plus, it doesn't help that my play times/sleeping pattern is all over the place (a perennial problem for me).

But even so, I have run several since my last post and had enormous fun doing them with barely any nerves at all. Everyone I ran with all expressed how much fun they had too, and with barely any wipes, I suspect we are all much better than we think we are! I find that I am still holding back and letting other's take the lead, but that's mainly because I never know where I am going and get lost all the time (some explorer huh?)

Following people around can lead to some funny moments. I have found Riddle, another gnome rogue to be a very good leader, in terms of he seems to know his way around a dungeon. If you ask him about this he will just tell you that all he does is look at the map - but that is a skill still beyond me, so I look where he is going and follow him. However, Riddle is not infallible. I saw him hop off a ledge in Dire Maul, so I followed him. I found myself quickly pummelled to death by a pack of mobs. Riddle was very quick and used vanish & survived. Seems he hadn't jumped - he fell! lol That'll teach me! Well no - actually it hasn't - haha.

Arnee
Arnee is my new Gnome Frost Mage in Paranoid. I started him after I locked XP on Ernee. I thought it was high time I got to grips with mage, because everytime I have started one up to now it has got deleted before level 12. I have never been able to understand why people say that mages are so powerfull - lol.

Well, by the time Arnee was level 15 he had already died 22 times & I was nearly ready to throw in the towel. But thankfully I persevered. Whether it was the advice given to Tomeoftheancient by Psynister, or whether I acquired an ability that made all the difference, or just got stronger, I don't really know (probably a combination of them all) - but by the time I hit Loch Modan I really felt like Arnee was getting it! Woohoo!

I hit level 20 in the early hours of today, and have locked XP in the hope of doing the early dungeons soon. That will be a real first for me! I have never played any kind of ranged class in a dungeon. I'm pretty nervous, but also really looking forward to it. I am really starting to enjoy mage now. So instead of saying "Seeya" like I have with all my magi in the past, Arnee is saying "I'll be back!" In my Dress!

Arnee

New Gadget!

2011-07-18T10:36:00.007+01:00

Well I have been very remiss not posting in over a fortnight, but to be fair I have had some major computer problems - again, so they must have set me back a week while I had to reinstall everything on a new hard drive after my other one started to fail. I logged on Wow one day, to find all my beloved Macro's (both char specific and general) that have taken years to acquire - all gone! Half my UI settings and addons across all my characters gone! This happened after a blue screen of death when logging out the day before. After much testing of my system, I tracked down the fault to the hard drive that had my windows installation and all my software on it. Large hard drives are a great invention, but when they start to fail there is so much to back up and reinstall, it takes forever. What a pain!

Then - back on-line I discover that George RR Martin's long awaited new book has come out:

A Dance With Dragons: Book 5 of A Song of Ice and Fire

As I love this series, I was overcome with the urge to buy it. Except it's only out in Hardback and it's over a thousand pages! A doorstop if ever there was one. Plus, my eyes are so bad these days (I even need glasses for the computer now), and the print in this weighty tome is so small, I wondered how on earth I was going to get through it.

Since I was knee high to a grasshopper I've been an avid reader, but the last few years I have mainly swapped to audio books because my eyes are suffering from old age, and I have come to love audio books - great for getting through all those household chores. I even listen whilst I'm trying to get off to sleep too. Listening to audio books whilst sleeping can give wonderful dreams :) However, checking on Audible, I found the unabridged version was split into two parts meaning that with my £7.99 a month listener plan I would have to get it over two months, and I wanted it all - now!. Plus, I really didn't like the narrator for the audio version, (liking the narrator is a deal breaker for me) so what to do?

Then I noticed this on Amazon!

OMG! My very own Star Trek pad for only £111 quid! I have wanted an e-book reader for a very long time, but I always wanted one with the special electronic ink screen (easy on the eyes and restful after staring at a monitor all day), and the last time I looked they were way out of my price range. I was shocked that the Kindle was so cheap now in comparison to the last time I checked up on these things - admittedly - a while ago.

Now, I have always struggled for money, but Dad left me a little bit, so I decided it was high time I treated myself. Sorry if this all sounds like one huge advert, but I am so in love with this gadget, it's unbelievable! It even plays my audible books as well, although for ease of carrying in my pocket whilst washing up, I will probably stick to the little Ipod my son gave me for those.

So before I knew it, thanks to the miracle of next day delivery, (that actually arrived next day for once), my Kindle was in my hands. Within a minute of attaching it to my household Wi-Fi, I had bought the book and it was on my Kindle - it was that fast! Then I discovered all those free kindle books on Amazon. Oh my word, so distracting, but so lovely to fall in love with the printed word again. :)

To my utter joy, the electronic ink has lived up to all the hype, it's a real pleasure to read with absolutely no glare. I can change the text size to suit my bad eyes. It's light and easy to use, and if I fall asleep reading, it just switches itself off and always remembers the last page I was on.

Wonderful Wonderful gadget!

A new Wow post is incoming soon - I promise :D

Pilgrim's Progress

2011-07-02T07:47:00.016+01:00

Thought I would update you on Ernee's progress in Paranoid and his mission to overcome his difficulties running dungeons with guildies.

Well I did my first guild run - The Deadmines!

Paranoid's first official wipe

Mer's plan to wipe us (by making a massive pull when we first went in) went horribly wrong when we all survived, but we successfully had our first official guild wipe a bit later on to those mechanical harvester things.

Riddle struts while we fight

Really enjoyed this run, (and the second run of it later), and by the look of this screenie (left), Riddle was enjoying it too. :D

Apparently, as I was told later, I came in top dps on Cookie!

Not surprising really - I was a higher level than anyone else, over levelled for the dungeon and for this fight I didn't have to move. :P

Paranoid's first Guild run

On another night a few of us decided to party in Orgrimmar. We were all over-level to use the Dungeon Finder, so to get there we had to corpse run in. Having run into Orgimmar recently on the Gnomes vs Tauren event with Ironyca and hundreds of others gnomes, and also when I did BBKing on Döra, I thought - "no problemo"! But - haha - Pride comes before a fall! The most famous and best corpse runner in the game (a.k.a Döra- me) was the last person to reach the dungeon, because I lost my body somewhere in Orgrimmar and the rest of the party had to come out and guide me to it! I could see it, but just couldn't find a way to get to it. Talk about feeling an idiot - but hey - I'm in Paranoid & it was cool!

After the boss we decided to really let our hair down.

On our way to storm Orgimmar

Dirty dancin in Ragefire Chasm

The only thing that's not so cool is, when I get myself into embarassing situations, or I'm a bit fluffed, I forget to take screenies! Grr. I now have an addon that auto takes screenies of my achievements called Multishot, which is better than missing them, but its my funny and embarrassing moments I really wanna catch, as they are the most fun to look back on and remember. So unfortunately - no screenie of our group all escorting me to my body. :(

I did have one moment when I wanted the ground to open up and swallow me. I was asked by a guildy to join a group to run Blackfathom Deeps. Wahay! - I jumped at the chance and within moments we were in. About half way in the tank seemed to be going pretty fast. I was having a hard time tryna keep up with the group, and started to really worry I was gonna get seperated and lost. This is one of those dungeons that I have got lost in before. So I ask in party chat:

Me: Could we slow down a little please?.

Tank: "Why? This is slow!"
Me: silence - sudden realisation that tank is not guildy!
Rest of party: silence
Me: Bit of frantic /w with guildy's explaining my embarassment of just realising I'm in a pug, and had I known I would have kept my mouth shut.
Guildy's: Supportive /w's back telling me not to worry.
Tank: "You want me to pull bigger? Is that it?"
Me: silence (wishing myself somewhere else)

But anyway - we finished the dungeon without further incidence, and I stayed behind and had a chat with the tank later, explaining why I asked him to pull a little slower and he was really nice about it, so all's well that ends well. What really came home to me about all this, is that in Paranoid, I am actually more comfortable running dungeons with guildy's than doing pugs. Strange that, considering my problem has been exactly the opposite up to now - despite having a wonderful guild (Vice Versa) on my other characters. Being with other people that you know 'really get' the social anxiety, has obviously helped already.

I am having an enormous laugh in Paranoid - it feels so relaxing to play with others who know exactly where you are coming from, and the guild seems very friendly and & most importantly - happy. I'ts been an eye opener to me being an officer though, as it's forced me to confront my lack of chatbox skills. To this end I found a lovely little add-on called Chit Chat. My own personal answering machine! So now I don't miss those important whispers from members or new applicants. So now, if I am going to be AFK (making a brew or something), I just remember to type /afk and if someone whispers me, they get sent a message telling them:
a) I am afk,
b) their message has been recorded
c) I will get back to them asap.

Similarly, if I'm in a dungeon I type /dnd and they get a message telling them I am sorry, in a dungeon and can't type and fight, but will get back to them soon. The brilliant thing is that I don't get the /w in my chat window, which would make me feel really guilty and distract me from the task at hand. But as soon as I am able, I mouse over the Chit Chat Icon and it shows me any waiting messages and lets me whisper them back. Brilliant! :D

Mer (our GM) has set up a brilliant forum, where members are getting to know each other, (I love forums) and she is working hard at getting the public front end up and running. Especially after Glorwynn over at Heavy Wool Bandage & Bossy Pally did some lovely posts about us. Although Mer will scold me if I don't mention that the site is currently 'work in progress', so if the link doesn't work it means she has broke something and is busily but quietly panicking in the background tryna get it up and running again. But she is doing us proud, so please try again later :D

With the help of these fellow bloggers, and from Mer's original forum post that sparked off the idea for the guild, fortunately people with social anxiety are steadily finding their way to us, all with similar tales to tell, and all so eager to give this a try. So all in all it's going really well I think.

Will leave you with a few screenies - until next time!

I fish up 'Old IronJaw'

Gruesome find

The mystery of the invisible demon

Loving the Eyepatch

Gnomregan for the gnomes!

On our way to SFK

Oú's gift :D A pet for life!

Oú' and the amazing hat!

Like the new haircut?

Hello - My name is Ernee and I am Paranoid

2011-06-22T10:51:00.008+01:00

Ever had a sudden revelation where all of a sudden everything makes sense?

Well this happened to me recently. I edged close to an understanding when I took the Online Motivations Assesment survey from the Daedalus Project and in a comment I wrote on my 'Odd Bods' post back in in April, (see 4th comment down) but the final piece of the puzzle still hadn't quite clicked.

After taking the survey I found that in the Socialising component, whilst my chat and relate scores were pretty average, my teamwork score was only 2% (very low), and that in the Immersion component my escapism was a very high 93%. Non of this was a huge surprise to me - ever since I have been playing this game I have disliked grouping, and through most of this time my RL has been pretty stressful looking after an elderly and very ill parent (who has recently sadly passed away), so it was easy to think that I was playing Wow to escape RL.

However, as a result of the survey I finally admited to myself that the reason I have been doing these odd ball solo challenges (Döra & Thriftee) was mainly as a way to avoid grouping, but still be a valued, & liked (if odd) member of my guild, and at the same time create a lot of fun and added challenge for myself into the game. I didn't even know that the final piece of the puzzle was missing... Until I read this... From the Wow Forums written by Seilaani.

I quote the first two paragraphs - but please go read the whole thread:

"I've been playing this game for just over two years now and in that time I've seen several threads, both on the official forums and elsewhere, where people talked about social anxiety and WoW. Soloing everything, because grouping is too stressful; not wanting to speak on vent, even though you do fine in gchat (or even gchat is too much); wanting to try raids, starting a /w to that guy in trade who's lfm, but deleting what you wrote rather than pressing enter; selecting a dungeon in the lfd tool, hovering the mouse over the Find Group button, but after a few minutes closing the window instead; not daring to log your char after making a mistake/saying something stupid and starting yet another alt on a different realm; etc, etc.

Yeah, I'm like that too. I've done Naxx once. I vaguely know where Ulduar is (think I did a weekly there once, I probably blocked it from my memory). I was taken on an alt-run to ICC once, with a hardcore raiding guild I was only in because a friend wanted me to join. I was carried, utterly and totally, but it was fun. Until one of the raiders started to complain about low DPS. I hid my character behind a moonkin (thank goodness for big birds!), hoping he wouldn't see me (I wasn't doing that bad, really, but I was terrified he'd single me out). They would've been fine without me, but leaving would've drawn attention to me and that was the last thing I wanted. Afterwards, I had a splitting headache. From then on, I always had something else to do when they had a spot left over. I didn't last long in that guild, obviously."

Those first two paragraphs led to an epiphany of astounding proportions! It was like reading about myself!

You see - I'm pretty old (58) as far as most people who play WoW go, and when I was younger there was no such thing as 'Social Anxiety'. Well ok it must have existed, but it hadn't been defined or studied, and in my day and age we just had to get on with things and hide our insecurities lest we were labelled as being 'soft' 'shy', 'coward', 'loner' or just plain 'odd'. Those that did it with panache were labelled 'eccentrics' and were generally well tolerated for their deviance. As a female it was ok to be soft and shy, so it wasn't much of a problem for me, but for males of my generation, probably much harder. Also, we didn't have the mass communication that we have now so maybe it was easier to hide our foibles within the small circle of friends, family and acquaintances we made in our lives. Besides that I wasn't actually that bad as a youngster, its largely the knocks I've experienced in adulthood that have dwindled my self-esteem and confidence.

What I realised after reading that post was - that I had never really looked at the reasons why I avoided grouping. I knew that grouping was intensely uncomfortable (most especially with people in my guild), who opinions and view of me grew to be increasingly important in my own little world of personal self-esteem. So I opted to play the game with panache! I don't really care what strangers think about me, but I do care deeply about how I am perceived by those I care about.

All I knew was that put me in a group with guildies and things like this happen: (from one of my Thriftee posts)

"A guildie on one of his alts (Waylanderii, the same guy who helped me do BBKing) decided to come help me whilst I found my sea legs. From there on it became hilarious. I have such a bad sense of direction. I couldn't find my way back into the upturned boat to hand in my quests - I was tryna shoot at whatever he was attacking - but bear was off attacking other things - and as I have bear macroed as my focus - well.... I tried to put him on follow - but he was too fast for me - so that never happened. It got slightly easier when he marked us both with raid targets.

Then at one point I was trying to jump out of the water back into the boat, but didn't realise that I had my cursor in the chat window, so pressing space just wasn't happening. I floundered around nearly drowning like this for quite some time!"

Now ok - I could make light of this and jest about it because we were only a two man group, and he came to help me not the other way around. Note - I never (well rarely) asked for help, except maybe for a summons - he took it upon himself to come help me out of the goodness in his heart from something I carelessly typed in guild chat. I rarely ask for help with quests. Just another one of the things I find difficult.

Due to a severe spinal injury over twenty years ago now I found myself in a situation of utter helplessness where I was in hospital for 6 weeks, bed-bound for months, and dependent upon others for the most basic things for over a year. I was in the prime of my life, but I couldn't even look after my young children properly because I was so disabled. Things like that make you fiercely independent when you finally come through them, as you never want to be reliant upon others ever again. It also ruined what had previously been a good marriage and dropped my self-esteem to virtually zero.

So the situation with Waylanderii wasn't one where I would be expected to pull my weight as part of a team, it wasn't that important like it would be on a dungeon run or a raid - heaven forbid!. But even so - the scenario got so out of hand because - my mind went blank - the pace became different to what I am used to - "Omg! Omg! - what is he thinking about me?" - "Omg! Omg! I look such an idiot" - tunnel vision hit - sweating, shaking, inability to use abilities, move, and type at the same time. Talk about stress. It's nuts!

Put me in a dungeon group with guildies and this stress multiplies tenfold, with the added disadvantage that it becomes far more difficult to laugh at my own antics too. So I have gone to extraordinary lengths to avoid it.

After my Döra the Explorer challenge I did run a few dungeons with the guild on my main - Salad (a gnome rogue). Well - when I say a few - I think I did two! I don't think I actually played too badly (well no-one said anything) - but I just couldn't take it - so I took to using the LFD tool rather than running with guildies.

This was at the tail end of WotLK. I found this to be slightly easier - grouping with people who don't know me was a bit less stressful, and I could always cut and run if I needed to without any comebacks. I think I managed to do most of the dungeons in that period, and I went back and soloed all (or most of the earlier ones). But I wasn't happy - even though I was getting to see the content (I'm an explorer at heart) it wasn't fun - and I never got to the point where I was happy to group with my fellow guildies. I would play at odd hours just to avoid being drawn into a guild group run. I nearly quit the game on more than one occasion.

Then Cata hit! Perfect excuse to play Döra again and explore the new cataclysm areas. So there was I on Cataclysm launch day exploring Uldum on Döra while everyone else was rushing to get to 85. Also around this time I came up with the idea of Thriftee's 'level to 85 without spending a copper' challenge, and another long term solo project was born. This was fun, and a really useful avoidence technique as I couldn't be expected to run dungeons wearing leather and cloth gear, with a pet I couldn't control and only arcane shot! Perfect!

So since about January I don't think I've even played my main. I certainly haven't run a dungeon in a group for six months, and now I am even more scared than ever. Don't get me wrong - I have had enormous fun doing these challenges, and I do hope to do more in the future - simply because they are fun. But I wanna have fun doing normal in game stuff too.

I had literally only just finished my Thriftee project, bereft and scatching my head, desperate to see what new and interesting solo project I could come up with next. Not wanting to get Salad to 85 because end game means running dungeons!

Then I saw the post on the forum about 'Social Anxiety' and suddenly I knew what I wanted to do! And even more wonderfully I found that there were people like me. People who really understand! My revelation was two fold. I have Social Anxiety, and I wasn't escaping from RL, I was escaping from from things in game & from facing my fears.

So this is my next project. I wanna control this - not have it control me!

To this end I have created an alt gnome rogue Ernee & joined the new guild (formed by the forum poster Seilaani aka: several alts called Mer* see below) on Emerald Dream (EU) called 'Paranoid'. I'm an officer in the guild and this is our ethos - taken from our guild's website About Us page

Paranoid is a guild for the socially awkward, the shy, the people who'd like to raid, but get a headache just thinking about all the things they could screw up. The people who type a message to someone who's LFM in trade, then backspace, then type, backspace, type, stare at what they've written, backspace again and go quest on their own. And if they do press enter, they're relieved if they get the reply: "Sorry, full."

The people who've never seen Naxxramas or even vanilla dungeons, because the thought of grouping with strangers (or even guildies) freaks them out. The people who don't like talking in gchat. The people who are actually quite lively in gchat, but refuse to speak on vent. The people who would like to try tanking, but haven't gotten any further than taunting mobs off the NPCs on that pvp island between Conquest Hold and Amberpine Lodge in Grizzly Hills. The people who'd like to see all the game content, not just the stuff you can solo. But if you want to solo, you just do it, without others trying to press you into grouping/talking/whatever.

Paranoid will be a no-pressure guild and we'd like to get into raiding eventually. We don't demand you have your mains with us, we don't ask you to read tactics and/or watch videos (I know it doesn't help me at all!), we don't care if you make a mistake that wipes the raid (seriously, we're too busy worrying about our own mistakes), we won't think badly of you if you suddenly need a break if you can't take it anymore and it won't cost you a raid spot. If you'd like to join with an alt and raid with us on a main, that's fine!

We aim to bring a bunch of people together who get this. Really get it. We want to play with the like-minded, who also sometimes say: "I'm out of social energy. I have to go" or "I need to turn off gchat for a while."

If you're interested:

- /w Mershelle, Meryssa, Meracle, Ernee or Oringo or use the guild finder tool

- email us at paranoid.emeralddream@gmail.com

- drop us a note in the forum

Vent is not required. ;)

I have explained all this to my guildies in Vice Versa and they have been wonderfully understanding and supportive, as they would love me to be able to run dungeons and go on fun runs of easy social raids with them too. They see it as a great opportunity for me to grow as a person and a player, and they are looking forward to the day when I can do this with with them. So am I. I know they have fun because they write about their fun antics on our forum, and I so wanna be a part of that.

Mershelle, the GM of Paranoid is such a fun person too - as are our few other members. In the short time we have been together I have grown to like them immensely and I can't wait for the day when we run our first dungeon together.

As we are only a small guild as yet, we are looking for people like us to join us, so if you see yourself in anything you have read, then please don't hesitate, come join us - we aim to have fun and we are waiting to welcome you!

Hi from Ernee <Paranoid> Emerald Dream (EU)

Thriftee Did it!

2011-06-15T02:15:00.010+01:00

Yay! I did it!

Uldum proved difficult. Needed too many summonses to get to places. Plus the gear rewards weren't very good there either. I died on a Harrison Jones quest when I was expected to jump into a great black hole after him. Fortunately I had the sense to take off some of my gear first. lol. I couldn't take it all off because my bags were full, but it did save some precious durability loss.


In the long grass


Dangerous to know

Needed a summons to get up to the 'Obelisk of the Sun' but pretty soon found myself stuck up there unable to hand my quest (Ignition) in, and had to hearthstone off the mountain. The quest was really buggy. I had to kill a Guardian from a platform up above it by kicking it's own fireballs at it. The trouble was, after every time I damaged it, it just healed itself up again. From the platform I was out of range to shoot at it, and bear wouldn't jump down either. Then one of the fireballs knocked me off the platform. Killing the statue was easy after that, but I couldn't get back up to the platform, so I was stuck - forcing me to use my hearthstone. The only way to turn that quest in would have been to get another summons to the Obelisk of the Sun again. Annoying.

No way up

No way down

Similarly, at Shnotts Landing I had a quest to kill three captains on three different boats, only to get on two of the boats you needed a flying mount. In the end I had only one quest where the mob was too powerful for me, and three quests all requiring summonses, so I thought it was time to move on. Not till I got some great footage of Deathwing flying over the zone though!

Got a summons to Stormwind and made TONS of XP on the starter quests for Twilight Highlands. I had been advised before going to Uldum to go to Twilight Highlands just because of this high XP quest chain. The trouble is - they always spoke in terms of XP numbers, whilst I think in XP bars - so it didn't sink in just how much XP they were talking about.

Thriftee vs The Black Bishop

I was 2 and a bit bars off dinging in Twilight Highlands when a bored guildie decided to see how quick he could find me from SW. I think it took him about 11 mins He persuaded me to do the Crucible of Carnage (scary) and before I knew it we had a group of 4 together. I usually get very nervous and do stupid things when I'm grouped, but not this time. What fun - I didn't need a heal, and also managed to not stand in the fire! Thanks guys - was really awesome of you. The XP meant I only had half a bar to go and I picked up a great new bow too.

Reminds me of 'Grizzly Adams'

Thriftee completes his challenge

Didn't take too long after that :D

Total gold acquired on dinging: 8437g 36s 33c !!!!!! Not a copper spent!

To finish off - I have made a short video to show what the challenge entailed and my final money and stats that can't be gleaned from the armory. It's my proof if you will.

Hope you enjoy!
Best watched Full screen 720p

Yay - I made the community news :D http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/blog/2473643#blog
Bloomin eck - I made it on Wow-Insider!
http://wow.joystiq.com/2011/06/22/the-classifieds-thriftee-never-spend-a-penny/

Gnomes vs Tauren Official Video

2011-06-13T01:18:00.008+01:00

Here's the official video of the Gnomes vs Tauren event that took place on the EU server Sargeras on the 7th June 2011.

Posted up by Lenwë here on the EU Forums
Youtube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mFvft9sueac

This is one of the most brilliant vids I have ever seen. Really professional and VERY funny. Can't praise this and the event organisers Team G.O. enough. And huge thanks to Lenwë!

Think I spotted myself just before the end. 5mins 16secs Attempting to cast shadowbolt on Garosh.
I thinks its me - anyway - Haha! Such Fun!

Thriftee is nearly there!

2011-06-10T17:45:00.008+01:00

New here? Read about Thriftee's challenge here

Well it's taken some time getting there, but I feel the end in sight for Thriftee's challenge. What on earth am I going to do next? Gotta get my thinking cap on. :)

Thriftee was born on the 2nd December 2010 and I can't believe it's already June 2011! 6 months! Ok I haven't played him continuously. I've explored Cataclysm & shot the Horde leaders with Döra, as well as doing Higher learning. I took some breaks too, both because of RL commitments, a few days off making movies, and a bit of Wow boredom - but 6 months to level a character? - lol But hey - what's the rush?

I think my longest lull period was doing Outlands and Northrend - If I am honest, It was pretty tedious doing those zones, and kind of hard to maintain my enthusiasm for the task. But I loved the 1 - 60 experience, and I am having an absolute blast in the Cataclysm zones.

Vash'jir- part 2

Well despite the difficulties described it my last post, I did indeed make the right decision to see Vash'jir out to the end. The visions quests were awesome, and relatively easy (despite my usually not liking quests that force me to operate another character, NPC or machinery). But these quests were different - Being a Naga was really fun and (just as importantly) gave some good quest rewards, which I desperately needed. And what can I say about the 'Thriftee and the Brain' quests? - Had this theme running through my head throughout.... :)

Pinky and the Brain - lol

Thriftee's visions

Thriftee and the Brain

Thriftee's about to be left standed

Thriftee's last look goodbye

Thriftee meets Thriftee

The final battle was somewhat confusing though, and when it was all over, I had the feeling of being left stranded in the middle of nowhere. No indication I had finished the zone or anything - wierd! So I swam around to get the final reveals for [Explore Vash'jir] and asked a guildie for a summons to Stormwind. This guild perk is proving really really handy. I was level level 82 & 3/4. Too young to try Uldum, so off I went to...

Mt. Hyjal

Thriftee's Terror

Thriftee meets Deathwing again

Thiftee bounces

I am so glad I went to Mt. Hyjal as I've ended up with my bags stuffed to the brim with gear - which is a problem in itself - but better full than empty. Surprisingly I even enjoyed most of the quests, but there is one thing about this zone that I really really dislike. I found out with Döra that Blizzard went to great lengths to discourage low levels (below 78) from being in the zone but I never understood why. With Thiftee I found out that also Blizzard wanted to make the zone as difficult as possible for people without mounts. I mean what is the logic of a quest giver (the big turtle - can't remember his name) - who is 3/4 the way down the zone sending you off to give a message to someone in Nordrasil, only for her to send you 200 yds further down the road from the turtle? lol

Oh No!


Looks familiar

Thriftee Explores Hyjal

Thriftee give a stirring speech

Thriftee vs Sethria

The whole zone was - 'run here Thriftee - run there Thriftee' all for no apparent reason other than to give you exercise through a long gauntlet of mobs! :D I got to the point where I hadn't a clue where it was best to set my hearthstone! Obviously, pretty much everyone comes to this zone with a flying mount - everyone but me that is - so most people would probably not have noticed this. But running from one end of this zone to another, just to get sent back to where you started from, then shortly sent back again, can get pretty tiresome after a while.

That said, some of the quests here were pretty cool - except the jousting - that was pretty terrifying! But phew - I got through it without dying. An awesome feat for me - my heart was racing I can tell you. If I had had the option to skip it I would - but that's another thing about the new Cata zones - its nearly impossible to skip quests. I sincerely hope I don't come across an un-skipable quest that wants me to spend money!

I twice had the good fortune to come across a rare giant who has a 100% drop rate some level 84 blue leather gloves with agility and stamina on them. Well nice! Spent a good hour (in the early hours) tryna find a way up to a nest! In the end I had to wait for a guildie to come online and ask for a summons - I was so close - but not close enough! Had a really hairy moment when I fell off the edge of the world as a ghost. I flew too close to the edge on a ghost gryphon, and ended up in Ashenvale or somewhere. Shades of my Döra nightmare came flooding back! Oh noes - another 20min corpse run! Until I realised what an idiot I was and clicked the [Return to Graveyard] button - lol.

1500 quest

Thiftee hits 84

Thriftee comin down the mountain

Anyway - it might sound like I am moaning - but on the whole I actually had fun on Hyjal, and I think I almost finished the whole zone. The last quest I had wanted me to kill an elite in an area behind the raid instance that I simply couldn't get to. Chances are I wouldn't have been able to kill it anyway - so I called a halt on this zone after that. By this time I had dinged 84! Time to go to Uldum! Boy I have been looking forward to this!

Spent quite some time wondering about the best way to get to Tanaris to pick up the starting quest, until I realised that the fastest way was get a summons to Dalaran and use the portal to the Caverns of Time. Aggmiok duly obliged and also gave me a ride on his chopper to the caravan.

So my next Thriftee post will probably be my last! But I really must guard against complacency now. 'There's many a slip 'tween cup and lip' so the saying goes :D Gold on entering Uldum - 6901g 50s 3c

Oh - and if the graphics and text are all over the place for you - I truly apologise. They finally look ok for me in firefox (my usual browser), but with chome they are doing my head in! Goodness knows what a mess this page will be in I.E. Why can't I be neat like Jamin?

Gnomes vs Tauren event video

2011-06-08T16:39:00.038+01:00

Ironyca :)

Wow did I have fun doing this event. I must have DC'd a dozen times, but who cares? It was FUN, FUN, FUN!

One of the best bits was I met Ironyca too! A fellow blogger whom I have come to think of as a great friend. She has written a fantastic piece about the event with tons of screenshots.Well worth a visit.

My only regret was I wish I had made a mage.
I totally forgot to bring my imp out - lol.

Huge thanks to Team G.O. for organising this. It must have been a nightmare - lol.

I won't say too much - best to let the video tell the story.. Hope you enjoy :)

Best watched 720p Full screen

Edit: Found a few extra screenshots of interest by browsing a few French forums :)

I apologise that I cannot attribute the screenshot authors, as I forgot which I got from where. But thank you whoever you are, and if you wish me to remove them I will be happy to do so.

Lol - It's Jonyjones!

Ironyca is Mort!

I'm in there somewhere :)

Gnomes on a throne

Level 1 events FTW!

2011-06-05T02:13:00.002+01:00

I've just been browsing the wow forum community news (EU) and found a couple of fun events posted, so I thought I would give them a bit more publicity.

___________________________________

The FIRST EVENT is to be held on the French server Sargeras on the 7th June at 8pm (UK time).

How many level-1 gnomes do you need to kill a level-85 tauren?

http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/2151590859

Here is the new challenge the Team G.O. ("Kind Organizers Team") proposes you to achieve next tuesday at 8pm (UK time)! Create a level-1 gnome on Sargeras (French PvP realm) and come to face a level-85 tauren, backed by hundreds of homies!

After the battle, a huge marathon will be organized from Gnomeregan towards Booty Bay, passing through the Deeprun Tram. The party will end by a massive suicide attack of Orgrimmar!

The size does not matter, only the number!

The event takes place on a French-speaking realm but all the instructions will be given in English too. The more, the merrier. Spread the word! ;)

Rendez-vous at 8pm (UK time) outside Gnomeregan, on the west side of the lake, where the combat will take place! To reach the outside of Gnomeregan, go to the platform in front of the starting room then follow the tunnel on the right. The guild Armée de Gnomeregan (Gnomeregan Army) has been created. You'll be automatically invited to join it.

All the instructions will be given by the following characters:
Lenwë
Supergnomeva
Angelove

We did a few tests today and attacked a lvl85 tank druid tauren in bear form with epic gear by one lvl1 gnome mage: the tauren has lost a bunch of HPs despite the dodged and missed strikes. The gear may be adjusted if the combat takes too much time.

MAP

Gnomes vs Tauren Event Map

___________________________________

The SECOND EVENT is planned to start on 15th of June 2011 on the server - Shattered Halls [EU]

Time : 20:00 [ Blizzard-Used Time ]

Level 1 Gammon Kill

http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/2098121725

We are going to be the first to kill the new Gamon [ LvL 85 elite ] with raids full of lvl's 1. The event will be filmed, posted on Youtube and you will earn the eternal glory of being the first to do it! All players must be on horde side so we won't have to walk all the way to Org and have problems with the guards or players. You do not need an invite to the raid or something like that, we will gather infront of Gamon and we will nuke him! Prepare yourself for awesomeness!

Note: This was posted up by a tauren called Korrag but the post was edited by Vaneras.
So possibly this is a GM inspired event! Pure speculation on my part. Who knows?

___________________________________

Both these events sound like great fun, so I already have two level 1's on these servers ready and waiting and I am hoping to fraps them both, so lets hope thats lots of gnomes and hordies turn up to make these events a smashing success, (and pray it doesn't get too laggy) :)

Meet Gniggle & Trickle!

If you come to either of these events, and spot me there, please say hi!

And just to whet your appetite, here are a couple of youtube vids of similar silly & fun events in the past.

Thriftee learns the better part of Valour

2011-06-01T01:13:00.003+01:00

New here? Read about Thriftee's challenge here

Vash'jir is proving to be a lot harder than Northrend. Once I got out of the initial starting area it started to get easier, and I was slowly replacing my Northrend gear. That is, until I hit the Nespirah quests.

Thriftee hits 81

I ended up abandoning the quest 'Overseer Idra'kess' because I just couldn't take him down. It was always really really close, but I kept dying and all my lovely new gear was getting lower and lower on durability. I had already lost my boots and had nothing to replace them with and my other gear was down to between 20 - 30%. So I left Nespirah to see if I could find some easier quests. Big mistake! I couldnt find any quest givers, and couldnt get back into Nespirah - the entrance was blocked! Oh No! What to do.?

Thriftee kills those Eels

Maybe what I should have done initially was call for help to get that boss down, but, what can I say? I am such a stubborn soloist. Plus the chances are it was a phased quest anyway.

Well I spent quite some time, sat on top of a safe ridge contemplating my predicament and googling for a solution, or to find out if others had had the same problem. Well I found that yes - others had had this problem, but nowhere did I find a solution. As well as this, (with the gear situation being so dire), I was thinking of maybe asking for a summons back to SW, so that I could go back to Northrend. But it was the early hours of the morning and I was the only person in the guild online. Also I really didn't want to do that because I was actually really enjoying the Vash'jir experience! It was really starting to feel challenging and I was having a lot of bloomin fun. Northrend again? Boring!
But I was contemplating on...

"How long do you keep on gambling that there is some good gear replacements around the corner and quests you can handle, and when do you decide to play it safe and go back to a lower zone? Make the decision too late and you could find yourself with no gear at all!"

Mainly I was annoyed that I couldn't find any more quest hubs and could'nt get back into Nespirah to retake the quest I had dropped. I decided to log off and think some more on what to do. Well I 'thunk' for about ten mins and decided to give it one more go to get into Nespirah. If that was no go - then I would write a ticket. Well - logging out must have done the trick! I could get in! Ok - 'lets give it one more go to get this mob down!' If I fail - I had decided to go back to Northrend.

I had to be a lot more sneaky this time getting to the boss, as I couldn't afford many more deaths. So there I was - barefooted with a cloth helm, hiding, ducking and weaving from those nasty patroling Naga and thier crabby pets. I could handle a single Naga, but a Naga paired with a crab were taking bear right to the edge of what he could manage. I have also learnt the value of running like hell if I see bear is about to die. Up to lately, I have never run from a mob in my life, but on Thriftee sometimes cowardice (discretion) is often the better part of valour. lol

Thriftee's done the deed

Ok I was in the room - it was do or (die and go back to Northrend)! Well I died - but I also did! Haha - the boss went down, and one second later,so did I!

I rushed back to my body - most of my gear was now in the 15 - 20% range - handed in the quest and was shortly at the new questing hub. Nice one!

Thriftee gets a free ride - still no boots!

Googling at the gear I would be offered for quests at this hub I decided to stick it out & HOPE I had made the right decision.

Well I think this has turned out ok for me - so far :). I have picked up loads of new gear, (although I will shortly need some new legs, and I am now wearing cloth boots) - but - hey - my new chest more than made up for loads of stats that I had lost! So Thriftee is holding his own again.

This is just the kind of stuff that I embarked on this challenge to find - up to now it's been far too easy - but Vash'jir is turning out to be a great challenge and because of that - great, great fun. But - 'it's not over till the fat lady sings' as I once said on my Döra the Explorer challenge, so I must take it day by day.

Thriftee is 82 & he's got some boots!

Thriftee is now level 82 & he has 5026g 72s 79c :)

Thriftee is 80!

2011-05-25T20:18:00.004+01:00

Haha - I made it to 80! New here? Read about Thriftee's challenge

When last I wrote I was in Storm Peaks. I would have stayed there, as I love the zone, but I was really struggling for gear. I had already done a level and a half with no bracers, my other gear was getting low on durability and there were no replacements in sight. Thoughout the challenge up to now the gear situation had never been so bad. So I decided to try my luck in Sholazar basin.

Thriftee explores Icecrown

I also thought I would make use of my loaned flying mount to get some easy XP exploring. I already had 'Explore Storm Peaks', so I went on to get Sholazar Basin and Icecrown (these being the only zones I can use the loaned mount in). That was fun, as I had no idea just how much I was missing being able to fly - so decided to make the most of it while I could.

To show just how dire the gear situation was - not long into the sholozar quests I lost my chest and shoulders as well. I had a spare chest but the stats were worse than the one I was using. However, the mobs were a lot easier in Sholazar, so it wasn't difficult to progress and eventually I got a new ring, bracers and shoulders - phew! The xp wasnt quite as good, but the questing was a lot faster especially as it consisted mainly of game hunting, so before I knew it I dinged!

Thriftee dings level 80

My special reward for dinging? Ability to now train Master Riding! - lol. Not even a talent point. Bear got one though - but I really didn't know where to put it. I eventually settled for 'Last Stand' - thinking this would come in handy when I go to my first Cata zone. However, this turned out to be an idiot choice, because I found that this ability goes on Bear's pet bar - which I don't have access to - Doh! I clearly wasn't thinking straight, but you gotta laugh :D

Thiftee's Argent Aspiration

Well I hung around Sholazar for a little longer & noticed that I had got a mail. This made me nervous - had some player sent me something? If a player ever sent me money and I opened that mail I would fail my challenge. I asked in guild, but no-one had mailed me. Then I found that if you mouse over the mail icon it tells you who has sent it, and I could see it was an NPC. So that was ok. When I got to a mailbox I found that I actually had two mails from NPC's. One inviting me to the Argent Tournament, and another with a reward of some potions for dinging 80. So I flew to the Argent tournament and got an achievement! I didn't stay there though - as I hate jousting - much as I have tried in the past on Salad, I just cant get the hang of it.

So now came the dilemma! Stay in Sholazar and level up a bit more, or jump straight into the Cataclysm areas, and, if I choose Cata - Mt. Hyjal or Vash'jir? My heart was telling me Vash'jir. After spending so much time on Mt. Hyjal with Döra, and having already started leveling there with Salad - I really don't like that zone. But having said that, my feeling was that it would probably be easier for Thriftee there. But Vash'jir questing would be something totally new for me, and thus very exciting, but probably really hard. Then there was talk in guild chat about getting a free seahorse mount, although it wasn't clear if I would be able to use it or not. My own thoughts were that I probably wouldn't be able to - but if I could? Bonus!

I was itching at the bit - the thought of carrying on in Sholazar (probably the wisest course) seemed really boring so I chose to go to Vash'jir. This could turn out to be a big mistake, but I can always come back if it turns out too difficult. Although, quite how I will get back (other than getting a summons) escapes me - lol.

Thriftee says goodbye to his flying mount

So - I said my goodbyes to Northrend and hopped on the boat to Stormwind. Cleared out my bags as much as I could, did the quest where you get a look at the Maelstrom, picked up the intro quests for Mt Hyjal and Vash'jir, and hopped on the Vash'jir boat. Before I knew it I was in Vash'jir drowned, rescued and starting my first quest. I was attacked by a Naga and it took me a good 30 seconds (if not more) to kill it - but great XP (over 4,000 + 2,000 rested). Then not long after I drowned! Not good! lol

A guildie on one of his alts (Waylanderii, the same guy who helped me do BBKing) decided to come help me whilst I found my sea legs. From there on it became hilarious. I have such a bad sense of direction. I couldn't find my way back into the upturned boat to hand in my quests - I was tryna shoot at whatever he was attacking - but bear was off attacking other things - and as I have bear macroed as my focus - well.... I tried to put him on follow - but he was too fast for me - so that never happened. It got slightly easier when he marked us both with raid targets.

Then at one point I was trying to jump out of the water back into the boat, but didn't realise that I had my cursor in the chat window, so pressing space just wasn't happening. I floundered around nearly drowning like this for quite some time!

I like to think I have a certain status in the guild - but I honestly don't think people realise just how bad a player I am, because 99.9% of the time I am solo. That might have all changed now - lol. For instance - I was level 79 & 3/4 before I discovered that I could actually fire Arcane shot on the move! Embarrassing, but great fun now I have discovered this. This is why I do these insane challenges - I could never cut it in the main game and my pretend mask of uberness would slip very quickly :D

Anyway - we played like this until I got my sea legs and I got kidnapped by a Naga, who dropped me off at the place where I got the quest for my seahorse. The first seahorse I grabbed bugged out. The quest was telling me I was on the horse but I couldnt' see it. The next time I tried I could see the horse but somehow failed to control it - Probably my inability to tell my left from my right. :) Anyhow, after a few failed attempts I finally got my Subdued Abyssal Seahorse! Only I can't use it - lol. Needs Expert Riding Skill.

It was early hours of the morning, so that's where I left it for the night. I was tryna say goodnight to Waylanderii and thank him for the help but Dc'd, so 'Thanks Way!'.

Only time will tell if I made the right decision. You never know - I could be back in Sholazar in my next post :) I did pick up a lovely new axe though. Captain Taylor's Chopper. Stupidly - what with all the madness and excitement of this new zone - I forgot to take some screenies -Doh! So they will have to wait till I next log on.

Thriftee's gold at 80. 4201g 6s 96c!

Thiftee's gold at 80

Thriftee gets a flying mount...

2011-05-17T03:53:00.004+01:00

and he didn't cheat either!

New here? - Read about Thriftee's challenge

Yay, I am starting to have real fun with Thriftee since my last post, (where I was in Zul'Drak, halfway to level 76). When I hit 76, Bear lost all his talent points again - seems it was a bug with the patch. I put a bug report on the wow forums and thankfully this has now been fixed. Losing the ability to auto-target was a bit of a pain though. Basically, if Bear was tanking more than one mob, then once the one I was shooting at was killed I was having to manually select the other mob before I could fire at it. Normally I could just keep firing and I would automatically acquire the target.

Anyway - to get around the problem I wrote a macro that - fires up my trinket whenever its off cooldown; makes Bear my focus; assists him, and fires my Arcane shot. So now I automatically fire at whatever Bear is fighting. It might not be the most elegant solution, but I find it works really well - so problem solved.

#showtooltip Arcane shot
/use Talon of Hatred
/focus pet
/assist focus
/use Arcane Shot

Thriftee Explores Zul'Drak

I stayed in Zul'Drak until I was level 77, and got 'Explore Zul'Drak' which was nice. At 77 I wasn't sure where to go next - I was thinking - probably Scholazar Basin. However, I had heard that you could get a free flying mount from an NPC at K3 in Storm Peaks so I decided to check that out first, as it's a pretty long run from Zul'Drak to Scholazar.

Thriftee gets a flying mount

I made a short, but rather hairy run through Crystalsong Forest, (got half blown to death, when I strayed into the mine field), but made it to K3 in one piece. I was really expecting that you would at least have needed to have trained apprentice riding to be able to get this mount, but nice one - I was wrong. The only stipulation required was that you needed to be level 77. It stays as an icon in your bag (so I put it on my action bar) and you click it to mount. You can only use it in Storm Peaks, Scholazar Basin and Icecrown, and it's only a 60% speed mount, but hey - to me it feels like going 70 mile an hour down the motorway :).

Thriftee Explores Storm Peaks

So Thriftee is now airborne and questing in Storm Peaks! The further I get into this zone the tougher it is getting. It's mainly a gear problem. I've gone a whole level and a half with no bracers, so I hope I pick some up soon, and I am having real problems with lack of focus - Arcane shot drains focus fast. But I am enjoying the challenge!

I have just dinged level 79 and Cataclysm is looming! Well Exciting! I haven't even done the Cata zones on Salad yet, so it will be all new content for me - although I am obviously familiar with the layout of the zones having explored them with Döra. I have a huge dislike of Mt. Hyjal so I will probably go to Vash'jir once Thriftee gets to 80. I hope I can cope in my leathers - lol.

Money wise - I now have 3890g 33s 76c I seem to be making approx. 286g gold per level and by my rough calculations, seem to have been making that amount per level for the last 5 and half levels. Strange that - but interesting!

Dora and Salad got their new kittens - arn't they just so cute!

How was it for you? Patch 4.1

2011-04-28T04:50:00.010+01:00

and a Thriftee update lower down....

Well for Döra this patch wasn't very nice - she has lost the enchants on three pieces of her gear.

I can tell you now, the level 1 'Achievement' oriented twinks are not going to be very happy - but - as always they are a very inventive lot and are used to overcoming such knocks. :)


Formal Dangui changes 4.1


Royal Dangui changes 4.1


Haliscan Jacket Changes 4.1

The Formal Dangui - which I only recently acquired and took ages to get has had it's item level reduced from level 60 to level 1 and a player level of 50 introduced on the enchant.

So + 22 Dodge - gone!

Similar with the Royal Dangui - down from iLvl (can't remember) to 1, and a player level of 25 introduced with the enchant.

+ 150 Health = gone!

Also the enchant on my Haliscan jacket has had a player level introduced, so that doesn't work either.

+ 6 All Stats - gone!

Fortunately, I only use these pieces of gear infrequently, so it's no great blow for me other than the huge waste in time and gold expended to get them in the first place.

At least my weapon enchants still work. :)

One thing you will notice though - I have finally learned how to put text next to my screenies, so my post layouts should be a little more attractive from now on, although knowing me - I will probably go a bit overboard with it. :)

Old Ironforge 4.1

Whilst I was logged on Döra I had a little peek into 'Old Ironforge'. Go to Kings room - entrance on the left as you enter the room. It's changed a bit since I was last there, with the addition of a few npc's, an ice statue and some books and scrolls. No quests in there yet, although it looks like there will be some in the future.

I first saw the place when I was a WoW newbie and someone glitched me in there by throwing me off the back of their mammoth through the door. I remember having to kill myself in the lava to get back out, but it was very exciting seeing a secret place.

Dalaran portal to Stormwind 4.1

Salad is immensely pleased that her Kirin Tor ring has regained some of it's usefulness with the re-addition of a portal to Stormwind in Dalaran.
Being able to move fast when stealthed is really nice as well. :)
Other than that I don't really know how this patch has affected her because I only logged her to check some mail.

However, she will be buying the new Winterspring cub pet soon. Will be nice to see the cub following her mum. :)

Thriftee Read all about Thriftee's challenge here

Well, as far as I can see, Thriftee hasn't really been affected by the patch much except that...

The need to keep pets happy has been removed. However, seeing as I already had the pet talent 'Growl' enabled, (that used to keep my pet happy automatically), this change hasn't affected me.
Now if I am shooting at one mob and the mob dies, but another mob is attacking me or my pet, then I don't automatically aquire this other mob as my next target. This is really annoying as I now have to select the mob, thus wasting a bit of time that I could have been using to actually shoot at it. So not too happy with that, but it's no big deal really as I think I can probably sort this out with a macro that targets the target of bear.

I did have a few problems this evening (Wednesday). When I logged on for an hour in the afternoon I checked that both mine and Bear's talents were intact, as usually after a patch the talents are reset. They were fine. (But I have just got my new prescription spectacles for use at the computer today, so maybe my brain didn't take in what my eyes were seeing - I will never know - lol). Anyway - when I logged on again after my tea, I carried on with my leveling, but slowly started to get the feeling I had been badly nerfed. I died a couple of times because bear was having difficulty holding threat in situations where it wouldn't normally have been a problem. I couldn't work out if it was something Blizzard had done with the new patch, or if it was the few changes in gear I had recently made.

Well, I went on like this for an hour or two thinking that I was going to have to return to a slightly lower level area. Then I decided to check bear's talent tree to see when his next point was due - only to find that all his talents points had been removed. No wonder I was having trouble! Phew! Actually, this was quite nice for me as it allowed me to respec Bear at no cost. Nice! I changed his talents slightly and have now got down to the final tier.

So where is Thriftee and how is he doing? Well, now that I have got back into playing Thriftee over the last few days, I can say that I am enjoying it immensely. On my last update he was level 73 and was at Valliance Keep in Howling Fiord. Since then I worked my way up through Howling Fiord and hit level 74. Also, at Westgarde Keep I earned the [1000 Quest completed] achievement.


Thriftee hits level 74

Braxley's Backyard Moonshine Trinket

When I got to Fort Wildevar I acquired the worst trinket ever! The stats seemed better than one that I was using so I equipped it and sold my old one at the same time - bag space is always at a premium. Big mistake! I always macro my trinkets to my Arcane shot, so this is what was happening to me every couple of minutes lasting for 20 seconds!

Blind as a bat! Avoid this trinket at all costs!

Although strangely most Wowhead comments favour it - lol.

Fortunately, I managed to replace this trinket soon after entering Grizzly Hills. Thank goodness! In Grizzly Hills I earned the achievement [5 Daily Quests] at the Blue Sky logging camp and suffered my first ganking on this adventure whilst I was there. I was well and truly one-shotted. That was fun - all adds to the interest :). I also hit level 75!

After sorting out my talent point issues I decided I was probably capable of taking on Zul'Drak, so that's where I am at the moment, really enjoying myself, and half way to level 76. Amazingly I am holding my own, the challenge still on track, and the gold is finally starting to flow. :) Here's the screenie to prove I haven't spent anything. :)

Thriftee's gold at level 75

Bear Talents Level 75


Thriftee's Talents Lvl 75

Here's some pics of my current talent tree's for anyone who is interested in my talent choices. I have no idea if these are the best talents for my challenge, as I don't do any in-depth research - I tend to choose the talents (especially for bear) that will strengthen his threat as I need to keep those mobs off me seeing as I can only wear leather gear and am thus a bit squishy for a hunter.

So - How are you finding the new patch?

Odd Bods

2011-04-22T07:52:00.015+01:00

Since Döra's last achievement I have hardly had the chance to even log on and play but I have been doing a lot of thinking about why I like to play the way I do, and have been looking at other players, who, like me are somewhat eccentric in the way they like to play wow.

This train of thought was largely sparked off when my favourite gnome Gobbygonk posted his latest video. Now I don't know Gobbygonk in the game (I don't have any characters on his server), so I have no idea how he actually plays the game, but his video's show me that he is an 'odd bod'. Now I hope he won't be offended by that label, because this is the very reason why I like him so much, his videos are so different. He has a great sense of humor and he never fails to make me smile and feel warm inside. There is an innocence about him that I find really attractive and he deserves more viewers than he gets. If you are not familiar with Gobbygonk's work please check him out. http://www.youtube.com/user/Gobbygonk Here's his latest offering, but check out his Jumping Jack Flash It's a gas, gas, gas!

In preparation for this post I was googling around trying to find info on other players who have found alternate ways to play such as Gutrot the Troll warrior who levels naked, Noor the Pacifist, or this Draenei warrior who only fights with a staff or throwing weapon. The latest one is Everbloom, level 85 Night Elf Restoration Druid from the Feathermoon server, leveled all the way to 85 by grinding exploration and gathering experience! No Quests, no kills, ~~no deaths~~ 25 deaths! Incredible achievement.

I find their stories really interesting, but they never got down to the nitty gritty of 'why' they did it. That is - untill I came across this this interview with Gweryc the melee only hunter. If you are at all interested in non-conformity play in Wow I strongly advise you to read this really fascinating and illuminating article. In my opinion Gweryc really nails it as to why some people have a need to play this way, and also why they come into so much flac from large portions of the player base. Having recently come in for some of this vitriolic flac myself (see the edit at the end of my last post), I actually feel a bit more understanding about why I was flamed which I hope will help me immensely when it happens in the future.

Gweryc's interview pointed me to this great site called The Daedalus Project
where you can take an online Motivations assesment survey This survey explores your in-game preferences and behaviours and the results are very interesting - so when you are done here, please have a go yourself, they don't ask for any personally identifying information and you might be surprised by your results - and don't you just love finding out what makes you tick? I know I do :)

According to the survey there are three main motivation components - Achievement, Socialising and Immersion. Each of these main components is broken down further into subcomponents. Average score in each of these sections is 50 to 60% and are generally meaningless. What you need to look at is where your score is high or low.

The Achievement component:
Advancement: Gamers who score high on this subcomponent derive satisfaction from reaching goals, leveling quickly and accumulating in-game resources such as gold. They enjoy making constant progress and gaining power in the forms offered by the game - combat prowess, social recognition, or financial/industrial superiority. Gamers who score high on this subcomponent are typically drawn to serious, hard-core guilds that can facilitate their advancement.

My score: 5%

Mechanics: Gamers who score high on Mechanics derive satisfaction from analyzing and understanding the underlying numerical mechanics of the system. For example, they may be interested in calculating the precise damage difference between dual-wielding one-handed swords vs. using a two-handed sword, or figuring out the resolution order of dodges, misses, and evasions. Their goal in understanding the underlying system is typically to facilitate templating or optimizing a character that excels in a particular domain.

My score: 12%

Competition: Gamers who score high on this subcomponent enjoy the rush and experience of competing with other gamers on the battlefield or economy. This includes both fair, constrained challenges - such as dueling or structured PvP/RvR, as well as unprovoked acts - such as scamming or griefing. Gamers who score high on this subcomponent enjoy the power of beating or dominating other players.
My score: 10%

Obviously I am not an achiever in the terms of this survey.

The Socialising Component:

Chat: Gamers who score high on this subcomponent enjoy meeting and getting to know other gamers. They like to chit-chat and gossip with other players as well as helping out others in general - whether these be less-experienced players or existing friends. Gamers who score high on this subcomponent are typically drawn to casual, friendly guilds.
My score: 48%
Relate: Gamers who score high on this subcomponent are looking to form sustained, meaningful relationships with others. They do not mind having personal and meaningful conversations with others that touch on RL issues or problems.

My score: 69%

Teamwork: Gamers who score high on Teamwork enjoy working and collaborating with others. They would rather group than solo, and derive more satisfaction from group achievements than from individual achievements. Gamers who score low on this subcomponent prefer to solo and find it extremely important to be self-sufficient and not have to rely on other gamers. They typically group only when it is absolutely necessary.
My score: 2%

Hmm - I like people, prefer meaningful one to one chat, but feel very uncomfortable in group situations, need to be self sufficient - so very true - this applies to my real life too! :)

The Immersion Component:

Discovery: Players who score high on Discovery enjoy exploring the world and discovering locations, quests or artifacts that others may not know about. They enjoy traveling just to see different parts of the world as well as investigating physical locations (such as dungeons and caves). They enjoy collecting information, artifacts or trinkets that few others have.

My score: 90%

Role-Playing: Players who score high on Role-Playing enjoy being immersed in a story through the eyes of a character that they designed. These players typically take time to read or understand the back-story of the world as well as taking time to create a history and story for their characters. Also, they enjoy role-playing their characters as a way of integrating their character into the larger ongoing story of the world.
My score: 74%
Customization: Players who score high on this subcomponent enjoy customizing the appearance of their characters. It is very important to them that their character has a unique style or appearance. They like it when games offer a breadth of customization options and take time to make sure that their character has a coherent color scheme and style.

My score: 2%

Escapism: Gamers who score high on Escapism use the environment as a place to relax or relieve their stress from the real world. These players may use the game as a way to avoid thinking about their RL problems or in general as a way to escape RL.
My score: 93%

This is sooo why I love playing this game! Discovery, immersion and escapism.

My own results correlated with a lot of what Gweryc says, such as this:

"As it stands, WoW is designed to faithfully serve the recreational ambitions of only one subgroup of gamers: the achievers. The aocializers and immersionists are accepted but certainly not catered to. I'm sure that this alienates existing or potential players who are significantly motivated by things other than achievement goals. My own response was to redefine the game, so to speak, in terms of what I wanted to accomplish, and Gweryc has served me very well in that regard. "

and this:

"I think the really violent reactions come from highly competitive players who can't reconcile themselves to the idea that I am, in essence, playing a different game than they are. They mistake my own meta-game of optimizing Hunter melee for fun as a serious effort at excelling as a melee Hunter on their own ambitious turf. In their view, I am playing wrong, and their very nature compels them to respond provocatively."

So there we have it! Wow doesn't strictly cater to who I am, so to maximise my enjoyment I have to re-define my own game, and the flamers can only define me from their own viewpoint and therefore what I do can never make sense to them.

For quite some time I have known that not even a lot of the level 1 twinks I know really understand me. Most level 1 twinks get their explorer achievement riding on someone's rocket mount, and I must admit that I never understood why they would class that as an achievement. I think that I understand them more now - these are players who get their satisfaction from having best in slot items, research the mechanics of the classes to the n'th degree, need to excel at pvp and/or like grouping to take on higher level mobs. i.e - they are Achievers! It's no wonder they are always trying to give me 'helpful advice' on how to improve my skills lol. My 'Gear' video was made in response to requests from other twinks and I now see that by making one I have played into their expectations of why I play Döra. No wonder some of them think I am wasting my time and am a poor player lol.

If you have managed to read through that lot, and love doing surveys, I would love to hear what your results are and whether you feel your results fit you and your play style.

Döra does 'BB King'

2011-04-10T03:02:00.017+01:00

Well - what with all the recent sadness, I really needed to something to shake a stick at, and this was it!

There is something about playing Döra in particular that really helps me take me out of myself. Maybe it's because of all my characters - she is the most fearless. She faces the most insurmountable odds, doesn't care about dying and always comes up laughing.

She also attracts a certain amount of curious attention from other players, and because I am naturally a reclusive and shy person in real life, this has helped me to be more outgoing in game and it was through Döra's explorer challenge that I finally found my niche and was able to forge bonds in my guild. It doesn't matter to them that I am lacking in end game skills - I know they are proud of me and that is such a nice feeling.

It was also through playing Döra that I developed the wish to make Wow video's and share them on Youtube. I hadn't a clue how to go about it, I have always had a love of learning new things, so another hobby was born!

Döra's explorer diaries needed a home and a blog was born!

So much from one little level 1 character - who would have thought it?

I was browsing the TwinkInfo forum and spotted a post from another level 1 about the Red Rider Air Rifle
It is used for a Winter veil achievement called BB King. The great thing I found out from this post, is that this achievement can now be done all year round, and that you can buy the toy rifle from the toyshop in Dalaran.

Once I read up on what you had to do, I just had to try it on Döra! You have to go to 4 enemy cities and pelt the enemy faction leaders with your toy BBgun. This is a gun that misses a lot, has a cast time that is interrupted by damage, and will occasionally backfire and hit you in the eye!

Listed on Joystiq.com as one of the 25 most evil achievements. Impossible odds for a level 1 - 100% chance of dying, chance of getting a fun video out of it - something I could really sink my teeth into. Just what I needed :)

Here is the result - I hope you like!

I needed help from Waylanderii (a guildy) to get Garosh Hellscream as the guards were even firing at me through the walls (from the outside), because my aggro range is so high and the room is pretty small - but I managed the other three bosses unaided. Big thanks to Waylanderii.

Hard for a level 1, but a very satisfying, and did I say 'fun' achievement :)

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Update 12th April: I recently put this video on http://www.warcraftmovies.com
Its done really well - the most views on any of my video's ever - over 13,000 views in 36 hrs or so with an above 4/5 rating. Amazed and really happy that people are enjoying this - nice to spread a little fun and happiness around :)

Trouble is - I am also getting accused by a small minority of 'Having no life'! and I should 'Do something constructive with my life'! Now ok - these are pretty typical of the types of comments you would get for any level 1 or achievement video that looks like a grind - but..... This comment in particular is extremely hurtful.

"I cant imagine how boring your life must be if u actually put effort into achieving smth that unimportant with an unimportant lvl 1 char. I mean sure u are allowed to do anything you want and I dont wanna insult u or anything but jesus its like taking time of your life and burn it in the fire for no good reason at all"

If only people knew what the last few years of my life have been like, and that playing Wow, (and Döra in particular) has been a port in the storm for me. Obviously they have no way of knowing that, but it makes me sad that people enjoy being cruel. I couldn't live with myself if I had said that to someone! I tried to make light of it & guess I should learn to grow a thicker skin - but considering my recent loss, and the fact that I did this in game to help me through the grieving, (a few hours where I could forget) this statement really stuck the knife in!

I post my vids in the hope that it will make someone smile, and realise that there are many different ways to get fun out of this game, not to be judged as to the type of person I am or how they think I live my life. :(

Real Life

2011-04-07T02:00:00.003+01:00

Sadly my father passed away on March the 20th after many years of struggling with COPD. He was 80 years old and was ready to let go of life - wanting to be re-united with Mum who passed away in 2007.

The funeral on April 1st (dad would have appreciated the joke), was sad, but also lovely. He had a woodland burial with a humanist service - the same as my mum had. The woodland burial site is a beautiful spot above a river with a lovely view of a very famous local hill & the remains of an old castle. As people are buried there, trees and wild flowers are planted over and near the graves and the whole site is left to grow wild to attract wildlife and birds - the graves being unmarked.

I really felt mum there on Friday too - all the birds came out to watch and sing! Mum & dad loved watching & feeding wild birds in their garden, so it felt quite significant when this flock of tits all swooped down onto a nearby tree and tweeted their little hearts out as we said goodbye to Dad.

I wanted to finish off with this very poignant song. I am 58 yrs old and with my parents now gone I feel my own mortality very keenly. I am reminded more and more of just how quickly time slips away from us, and just how important it is that we experience every moment, live well, love others, and enjoy the wonderful gift of life we have been given.

This song is my reminder to myself.

Regular posts will resume in a little while.

Döra: Master & Commander

2011-03-18T07:40:00.005Z

I swore I would never go back to Mt. Hyjal with Döra, but I should learn to never say never! Once I heard about this little achievement I just had to give it a go.

Fortunately I had picked up the flight point to the Grove of Aessina when I previously explored Hyjal, or I definitely wouldn't have bothered. There were only two mobs that needed clearing on the way to the trampoline in the Whistling Grove, so I logged Salad to kill them then re-logged Döra and ran past.
A handy trick I employed when I was exploring Mt Hyjal.

From thereon it was just bouncy fun all the way. :)

Here are some tips I read up on how to get the achievement:
You must stay on the trampoline for 20 consecutive bounces.

1) Try to turn your character when in mid air to face the centre of trampoline.
2) If you land correctly you will bounce automaticly, so no need to press space.
3) Run towards the center when you land.

Must admit I did non of these things - lol - but I got it eventually. :)

Thriftee is 73!

2011-03-16T01:14:00.001Z

Huge apologies for not posting for weeks and further apologies that this is going to be a brief one. Loads going on IRL (my 80 yr old father is very ill with emphysema and has just been diagnosed with bladder cancer). So as you can imagine there have been lots of calls on my time. Also boredom with Wow kicked in so I decided to take a little break Then what with the disaster in Japan and all that is going on in the world I've actually been feeling guilty to be playing games, so I've been spending the bulk of my spare time keeping up with the news.

New here? Then read about Thriftee's challenge

But - having said all that I have been playing Thriftee off and on in short bouts of an hour or so here and there and although progress is slow I thought I aught to give you an update. If you recall I was really bored with Outlands. I spent a little time in Netherstrorm then decided to head for Northrend once I hit level 69. I started in Borean Tundra and did most of the quests there. Much better experience than Outlands and I was holding my own quite nicely and got some new decent gear. Then I headed into Dragonblight and did a few quests around 'Stars Rest', but I have never really enjoyed that hub so I moved down the coast doing quests here and there and eventually found myself at Valliance Keep in Howling Fiord. That's where I am at the moment. The challenge is still on track and I have now amassed 2328g 6s 61c.

Also to break things up the guild ran a scavenger hunt, so I took a break from levelling Thriftee to take part. The rules allowed you to use any character you played.

We had to find the following and take screenshots.

- A human baby

- A gold filled goblin

- You and Hogger

- You riding a zeppelin

- A big mechanical spider at least three times your size

- A school of jellyfish drifitng towards the surface

- A druid in treeform

- You and a cat whose name starts with 'Mr.'

- You in a Hot Tub

- A gnome yelling at you when you killed his exploding sheep (tip, it's near a castle)

That was really fun and pretty challenging. I am happy to say that with my screenshots I came in second place & won 300g on my main Salad. :)

Here's a few screenies of Thriftee :)


My favourite quest in the game!

Off to Scalywag

Level 73!

Under Utgarde

Thriftee is bored with Outlands

2011-02-19T00:34:00.005Z

A Thriftee post ... Read about Thiftee's challenge here

The grind is on! I am so bored with Outlands that I'm struggling to motivate myself to log on and play Thriftee. I was hoping that this challenge would make Outlands more challenging (read interesting for challenging), but to be honest - it's not happening. I really hope that Northrend is better. But I'm not there yet, so I'm trying to bite the bullet and get through this.

To help things go faster I am making sure that I log out in an inn now, which is something I don't normally do, but anything to give me better XP is most welcome. I am also playing in the right areas for my level. I honestly thought when I started this that I would have to quest in lower level areas in order to survive, but I've found that is not neccesary - even with a gun that only does 24.6 dps! lol

I have occasionally run out of leather items and had to use cloth with things like intelect on them, but even this has not made things difficult. I only seem to get into difficulties if I make extreemly bad pulls, which happens occasionally because I'm bored and not paying attention, but luckily that's not often. Ive also decided not to do any group quests unless I absolutely need the gear reward for it as the risks of dying are too great without help, and the goal is get to 85, not do every quest in an area, so its no big deal missing out on some of them.

When I last posted, Thriftee was level 64 and in Zangamarsh. I did 50 quests there, then went to Terrokkar forest, which I hated! So much running around! So after doing only 27 quests there, I decided enough was enough and I headed to Nagrand. Nagrand has always been a favorite Outlands zone of mine so I thought it would be more fun. Well it was - for a while! I managed 39 quests here before I got bored and decided to head for Netherstorm.

I was quite surprised to learn that you can now train Cold Weather Flying at level 68. Not that that will be of any use to Thriftee, but it's a welcome change for when I level any other alts.

Cold Weather flying at 68

The run to Netherstorm from Nagrand took quite some time on foot, as I had to run across the whole of Nagrand, Zangamarsh and Blades Edge mountains, but I am so used to running everywhere with Döra that I quite enjoyed the run and the change from questing. So, thats where I am now, enjoying a nice rest in the Area 52 inn ready for the next round.

Thriftee Resting

Thriftee is currently level 68, he has three ranged weapons in hand, but still using his worst 24.6 dps one. :)
Money is starting to accumulate nicely now - he has 1358g 19s 39c. The biggest problem at the moment is lack of bag space, as he's accumulated quite a bit of backup gear which he knows that the minute he sells it he will end up needing it. It's an immutable law of the universe. :D

Hellfire lessons!

2011-02-03T10:35:00.005Z

A Thriftee post ... Read about Thiftee's challenge here

Lesson no. 1: Don't die!

This might sound quite naive as I have always known that when you die your items take 10% durability loss. But knowing something and 'really' knowing it are two different things. Now I REALLY know it. :)

You see, on Döra, (as a level 1) dying has no consequences, and on my other characters I was always in the habit of repairing whenever there was a repair NPC around, so this simple fact had never really sunk in because it was never an issue. This has all changed. On Thriftee I finally understand it matters a lot!

Die ten times and everything is broken! That's without ever rezzing at a graveyard. Doh!

I started Hellfire Peninsula with some trepidation because I was really surprised at how easy the 1 - 60 experience was. I have levelled other chars before Cataclysm and on Thriftee it was pretty easy in the revamped zones, so I naturally I assumed that the new Cata zones were easier than WoTLK and that once I hit Outlands things would be much tougher with harder mobs and harder quests.

Well in some ways this was true, but the first couple of quests upon entering the zone furnished me with melee and ranged weapons that did twice the dps of the ones they were replacing. I soon picked up some better gear too, so all in all there wasn't very much difference to write home about. I was having a relatively easy time and my confidence grew! Fatal mistake :)

I made a bad pull and died, then Ironyca's advice about watching out for the fellreaver came a little late. lol. I was in combat when it came upon me and I couldn't get away fast enough. Prior to this I had noticed the durability on my nice new shiny ranged weapon going down pretty fast, (there is a thread about this on the Hunter forum - seems its a problem), so I resolved that I aught to do the quest that would get me a new one.

FelReaver death

This was a recommended 2 person group quest that I had always soloed on my other characters. As Thriftee & Bear seemed to be holding their own pretty nicely I thought I would be able to do it no trouble. After all, we are kind of like a group of two. :) The quest was Colossal Menace.

Well it was close, but I managed to down the first Raging Colossi, but after engaging the second one I suddenly found that my auto shot and Arcane shot wouldn't work - Bear died, and I very swiftly followed his demise. My ranged weapon had broke mid fight!

Fortunately I had a few spares in my bag which did pretty low dps compared to the one that broke, so from that point on I had to use those. The durability went on another of these pretty fast but I was managing ok and managed to complete most of the other quests with these. I learnt my lesson and asked a guild friend to help with the group ones, so I could get the new crosbow I so desperatly needed and a nice new trinket from Overlord. Then it was off to Zangamarsh.

Lesson no. 2: Keep the best for last!
You never know when you are going to get another ranged weapon, so use your worst ones up first!

Halfway through Zangamarsh (one death from a mobbing by Naga's) and my shiny new crosbow was down to half durability. I have tons of quests in my quest log and not one of them was giving a ranged weapon as a reward! Hmm. Seems to be no ranged weapon rewards in Zangamarsh!

My policy up to now has always been to equip my best weapons and gear. Given the fast durability loss, I have now revised this policy. I still wear my best gear, but I am always going to equip my worst ranged weapon. That way I hopefully wont find myself stuck with having to use some level 40 weapon when I am level 70 or something. Keep the best for last! Strangely enough - this new policy is not causing me any problems up to now :D

Thriftee in action

Lesson No. 3: Don't try to solo group quests! - lol

Thriftee achieved 'Got my Mind on my Money', is now Level 64 and he has 871g 16s 94c

If you want a sneak peek - here's Thriftee on the Armory

Thriftee's got his mind on his money

Thriftee gets to the Outlands

2011-01-31T21:10:00.001Z

Again, apologies for such a long gap between posts. No excuses this time - but I really should resolve to write more often as a lot has happened to Thriftee since my last post. Although I don't feel as though I have played much since I last wrote, looking back I see that I have completely worked my way through another couple of zones.

New here? Read about Thriftee's Challenge

Before I get into what I have been up to, I surprisingly made the Community News again. This time with Thriftee's video UFO's over Westfall! So wow I was very happy with that :)

I left off with Thriftee halfway through the Burning Steppes. From there I went to Swamp of Sorrows. I really loved the quests in this zone, especially In With A Bang. In this quest you jump into a cannon and get blasted onto the deck of a ship offshore. What was so sweet about this was I took some fall damage as I landed and got the Going Down achievement. Shame I didn't manage to get a screenshot - it took me by surprise. By the time I had finished here I had completed the 500 quests achievement and I found myself heading to the Blasted lands.

Again Blizz has really improved this zone and I enjoyed it immensely. Here I hit level 60 and got burnt to a crisp by Deathwing - which was really fun! Unfortunately I didn't actually see Deathwing, it all happened so fast.

Thriftee Stood in the Fire

And so with some trepidation I stepped through the portal into the Outlands.

Thriftee through the portal

Considering that I only really have one attack ability I am expecting that things are going to start to get really hard from here on in, so I was really happy to find that my first couple of quests in Hellfire Peninsula rewarded me with a new staff and bow. Both gave a massive boost to my dps, so up to now it's not quite as hard as I was expecting. It's bound to get harder though, as I cannot wear mail, only leather, and I do find myself rather energy starved at times. However, bear is holding his own quite nicely and can easily hold threat against a couple of mobs, so as long as I am careful with my pulls everything is ok at present.

I am also starting to make better money now on quest rewards and vendored items, so my gold count is rising nicely. The challenge is still on track! :)

Thriftee's gold 30th Jan 2011 487g 34s 27c

Interesting week

2011-01-20T09:57:00.008Z

Sorry it's been a while since I made a post but there have been a lot of real life stuff going on so not really had much time to put a post together. Aside from RL issues it's been a very interesting wow week for me with lots of nice things thrown in for good measure,

Döra
finally got 'Higher Learning' :) Getting that last book took forever! This unlocks a great pet - the 'Kirin Tor Familiar' As that left me only a couple of pets away from the 'Plenty of Pets' achievement I decided to buy a couple of cheap ones to make up the numbers. One from the Dalaran Pet Shop and the other off the AH. So another achievement done :) I also tried to complete the 50 Quests completed achievement, so ran around the world and completed every quest in the game that was available to me. Unfortunately, try as I might, I am still 4 quests short of this achievement, so will have to wait for the next seasonal event in order to complete this. Not long to wait though as I think the Lunar Festival starts next week, :)

I am rather attached to Döra, so despite Thriftee's challenge I am always on the lookout for things that Döra can do, so rather than simply resigning her to being a bank alt, I am going to see how many achievement points she can get. She is currently at 1195 :)

My Kirin Tor Familiar - Reward for Higher Learning

The next nice thing.
I got a Blue response to my machinima video 'Need More Cowbell!' that I posted on the Events and Fan creation forum. They put it into this weeks Community News - so that was a great and lovely surprise as I get a real kick out of people watching and hopefully enjoying my video's.This is the second time this has happened with one of my vids - the first was for 'A Month in the Life' my Level 1 Explorer vid that chronicled my journey and was my tribute to WotLK.

Thriftee New here? - then read about Thriftee's Challenge
is now level 52 and has acquired a whole 273g 9s 15c. :) After the Eastern Plaguelands I caught a free ride from a Goblin NPC to the Badlands. I just love these free flights that Blizz have introduced into the game - saves me loads of running around. Although overall I really enjoyed the questing experience in this zone - some of the quests were really annoying. In fact I had to give up on one quest ' The Sorrow and the Fury'

With this quest you get given a bunch of NPC's to control who fight with you. You have to kill this elite dragon that will fear you into tons of fast re spawning fire casting whelps. This quest is quite buggy in that if one of your NPC's die you lose the control bar for them. However - the worst thing was that the NPC's replaced my bear, so obviously my own dps was severely lacking, and as a result I felt at a distinct disadvantage being a hunter on this quest. Anyway - I died and I died and I died some more until I finally said enough was enough. Also, before even starting this quest I had lost my helmet - the first piece of gear I have worn to date that ended up with zero durability, and I didn't have a replacement. When I tried to sell it later I found that the vendor wouldn't buy it unless I repaired it first, so I had to destroy it instead. I did get the achievement for completing the Badlands quests though - so I don't feel too bad about having to drop one - although I bet there was a great reward for completing this chain as it was pretty tough.

Other than that though - kicking goats off a cliff was pretty fun. :D

Broken Helmet

After the Badlands it was onto the Searing Gorge where I got a nice new piece of headgear. Have completed all the quest in Searing gorge and am now currently halfway through the Burning Steppes. :)

Thriftee update (No. 2)

2011-01-12T02:49:00.008Z

Well now that Döra has pretty much hung up her running shoes, I thought I would update everyone on Thriftee's progress.

On a quick side note though, Döra finally managed to get a Formal Dangui yesterday. This is the rarest white item (chest) in game and it's best in slot for a level 1 because you can put level 60 enchants on it. It is sold by Geenia Sunshadow in Moonglade for 50G and it's an extreemly rare spawn, and it sells on the AH for about 4000G. I have been camping this NPC for about 6 months on another of my chars and been checking her regularly several times a day, so was over the moon when it spawned yesterday. I have applied Scroll of Enchant Chest - Greater Defence and a result Döra now has an 80.16% dodge rating. So perhaps its now time for Döra to pit herself against some more higher level mobs seeing as she is no longer exploring. :)

Döra gets her Formal Dangui

Back to Thriftee: (Thiftee challenge rules here)
To up the ante, and make this challenge a bit more interesting, both for myself and my guild, I decided to start the Great Thriftee Giveaway competion for my guildies. Basically I asked my guildmates to guess how much gold, silver and copper Thriftee would have in his bags the moment he dings 85. The person with the closest guess wins the lot! This all assumes that I don't fail of course (in which case the competition is nul and void). However, my honour is at stake now, so it makes me all the more determined to get to 85. Given that there are potentially thousands of gold to win here, its not surprising that my guildies have got behind this competition with gusto and thier guesses range from 5K gold all the way up to a whopping 18K! I myself have absolutely no idea how much I will have either, so it's all very interesting. :)

In my last Thriftee update, he was only level 24 and in the Weltlands. Since then he has done Arathi Highlands, Hinterlands, Western Plaguelands and is currently nearly at the end of the Eastern Plaguelands.
Xmas nearly saw him fail the challenge. At that time I was in the Hinterlands and had just picked up my xmas pressies from Santa on my other characters in Ironforge. I logged on Thriftee and was just about to click the flight master there to fly to Ironforge on Thriftee (to get my presents) when I suddenly remembered just in time that flights cost money. Phew - that was a close one! So rather than run from the Hinterlands to Ironforge, then run all the way back again, Thriftee decided to forego his presents this year. :)

Thriftee is currently level 45. Levels 40 to 44 it was starting to get really hard as a lot of his gear was about to break, his energy regen was exceedingly slow, and it was taking an age to kill anything. However when Bear hit level 44 he got the talent point that allowed him to generate his own happiness, Guard Dog - so all of a sudden, with one kill he was happy again and doing 125% damage rather than the 75% he had been doing up to now. Then Thriftee hit a quest hub just in time to see him re kitted out with new gear replacements for the several items that were about to break. Add to this he got a nice trinket that gives haste, so his energy regen is now not the problem it was. So thriftee now feels he is able to hold his own again!

Thriftee also picked up an unusual pet - Mr Grubbs . He found Mr. Grubbs inside a Hidden Stash that dropped off of a Carrion Grubb in Eastern Plaguelands. To see the drops you need to have Fiona's Lucky Charm active; available after you complete the quest of the same name Fiona's Lucky Charm. I love collecting pets, although I never go out of my way to get them, and this one is cute. Every now and then Mr Grubs will do a high jump and summersault.

Mr Grubbs

Currently Thriftee has acquired a whole 152G 6s 62c! The challenge continues!

Thriftee - Level 45 - Eastern Plaguelands - 152G 6s 62c

Thriftee runs to the light!

Explore with Döra - Mt. Hyjal

2011-01-08T12:36:00.002Z

My internet connection has been playing up over the last several days, with constant disconnections and drop outs. This has prevented me from playing WoW and even web browsing was proving tiresome. So whilst I got BT to investigate, I've been busy making another video. It's the tale of a level 1 explorer who sets of to explore Mt. Hyjal and discovers a mountain of trouble. If you hadn't realised - I'm the level 1 explorer and the tale is a true one.

Regular readers of this blog will know precisely what trouble I am talking about, but for those who don't know, this post --> The Trouble with Hyjal - describes it quite well - although I urge you to watch the video first.

I absolutely loved making this video. It contains some of my favourite music (all carefully chosen to help tell the story - so listen to those words), and footage of some great in game friends. The film starts off quite slowly, but its telling a tale, so give it time to build, and I'm sure you'll enjoy. :)

Best watched Full Screen 720p HD

Döra Explores Vashj'ir video

2011-01-02T10:36:00.001Z

Here's the second of my 'Explore Cataclysm' vids.
For info on how I did this zone and how I got there please go --> Here

Having thoroughly explored all the Cata zones on the beta (except for Mt. Hyjal), and some more than once, it was very quick to do them again once cataclysm went live, because I knew exactly where to go to get the reveals. The tune on this video was what was humming in my head whilst doing this. Hope you enjoy :)

Döra Explores Uldum video

2010-12-31T03:42:00.002Z

This is the first of my Explore Cataclysm video's. Still working on the others although I am only going to do video's of those zones I didn't video myself exploring on the beta. So I won't be doing a second Twilight Highlands or Deepholm video. Exploring these zones on live was virtually no different to doing them on the beta, so pointless to duplicate the video's.

Uldum is the first zone I fully explored once Cataclysm went live. Great, great zone. Love the atmosphere and the sheer majesty of the place. Looking forward to leveling one of my toons here as I've heard a lot of people say that the lore and quests are really cool here. Nothing very difficult about exploring here.
Achievement completed at 3:58am 7th Dec 2010

I've just found the function in my video editor that allows me to speed up my video, so you might find that I went a bit overboard with it - lol. But hey - I'm experimenting :D

Enjoy :)

Music: the Pyramid theme from the Nintendo 64 game The New Tetris
Thanks to ReceiveDeath for the upload!

Cataclysm Explored!

2010-12-22T17:26:00.011Z

Well, Level 1 Döra came, saw, and conquered, and I did it my way - On Foot! You have no idea how happy I am. It feels like Xmas already - lol

After my last post, I was getting heartily sick of exploring Mt. Hyjal and the frequent and hugely long corpse runs. It was painful, (See why) and I needed to come up with a new strategy. Then I was struck by an awesome idea!

I just realised that Salad (my lvl 80 rogue) was in the early part of leveling on Hyjal, so I came up with the idea of using her to clear a path for Döra. i.e. just before I recover my body on Döra, I log on as Salad and clear a bit of a path, then relog Döra and run past the downed mobs, then relog Salad etc. It didn't cut out the huge corpse runs entirely because the 20sec logout timer would often allow mobs to respawn and catch Döra unawares, but hey it probably cut down my corpse runs to 1 in 3, so a huge saving on time and by the end of yesterday I was in Nordrasil! This left only two spots at the bottom of the map to find today and I would be done.

Everything was going well until I hit a slight snag. I first needed to uncover the lava area at the bottom of the map. The only problem was you needed to get right to the edge of the lava to discover it, and the way was guarded by two elites. I tried to kill one with Salad, but she died a horrible death :). Fortunately Aggy - true and stalwart friend that he is had just logged on and offered to help on his DK which had not yet been to Mt. Hyjal. Wanting to get this finished today I gladly accepted his offer. The elites were easy with both of us. Döra had one more area to go!

On my run up the zone yesterday, I set Döra's hearthstone to Shrine of Aessina thinking it might come in handy, so I hearthed there as it was nearer to my final goal 'Sethria's Roost'. So Salad and Aggy set to clearing the road from the shrine down to the roost. Bit by bit Döra made her way down the road using the log Salad, log Döra method with able Aggy's assistance until Döra was unluckily killed by a respawning mob.
By this point it was quicker to corpse run than start out from the shrine again, especially as the mobs on this road have a really fast respawn rate, so Aggy went off to get some breakfast whilst I made the run back to my body from Astranaar.

We were probably 200yds from our goal, when my computer freaked out. No idea what happened, but I DC'd my screen went wonky and I had to reboot. When I got back on Döra was dead. So I had to do another corpse run. In the meantime another guildy called 'Strunk' arrived to see if he could rez me. Unfortunately, he was out of phase or something because he couldn't see my body. However he waited for me to get back to help with the final push. For some strange reason, once I recovered my body he could see me. I was very close to where I needed to be, and it was a simple matter to get the final reveal after that.

And so Mt Hyjal was conquered and Cataclysm explored!

To see my video of this, click here --->> The trouble with Hyjal - Explore with Döra


Level 1 Döra achieves 'Explore Mt Hyjal' and 'Explore Cataclysm' - 2:17pm 22nd Dec. 2010

Level 1 Döra's Exploration achievement pane 1 - 22nd December 2010

Level 1 Döra's Exploration achievement pane 2 - 22nd December 2010

Level 1 Döra celebrates the achievement 'Explore Cataclysm' by buying a new hat!

The trouble with Hyjal

2010-12-20T04:58:00.005Z

Ok, I (Döra) have started my exploration of Mt. Hyjal in earnest now and it's proving to be really hard. But - I am trying to be positive and am looking upon it like a long grind - focusing on how good I will feel when I've completed this.

Basically you get a few steps up the road and you are dead again - release and you find yourself at the Astranaar graveyard. So off you run as a whisp back to your body. Down the road through Ashenvale, up through Felwood, through the furbolg tunnel, down to the bottom of Winterspring, gingerly scramble your way around the Darkwhisper Gorge (because the bridge is no more), and eventually you find yourself at the entrance to Mt. Hyjal again.

This takes a minimum of 20 minutes. Once inside Hyjal you get a flying whisp, so from there it doesn't take too long (another few minutes) to recover your body. Two or three steps up the road ... Bam - your dead! Rinse and repeat!

Working on the assumption of probably 100 or more deaths to explore this zone alone on foot, (could even be 200 for all I know, as the respawn rate for mobs in certain parts of Hyjal is absolutely mental) at a minimum of 20mins per death (lengthening the further you travel into the zone) - do the math!

Now I don't mind difficult terrain or tightly packed mobs (that's the kind of challenge explorers like me relish), but an arbitary mechanic that has no good reason to be there, that kicks you to a graveyard 3 zones away everytime you die is just plain nasty and pigheaded of Blizz. Especially as I have had confirmation that this is not a bug and working as intended.

Sad, because I like to explore alone, tonight I asked a friend (Aggmiok) if he would accompany me. He's a level 85 Paladin with a two person bike. My thoughts were he could rez me when I die (save me the long corpse run) and maybe clear a few mobs from around my body first. This worked really well for about 500 yds :). The respawn rate of the mobs is pretty high so he really had his work cut out - but - we were making a small amount of progress. However, at some point I got in his bike, but you cant outrun the mobs here as my aggro range is huge. I was killed in moments, and Aggy could no longer see me and I couldn't see him. We had run into phasing issues :(

This prevented him from being able to rez me, so we have had to scratch that idea.

I haven't tried exploring here on a two person flying mount yet. For one - I don't know anyone who has one, although I haven't asked in guild yet, and two - I really do not want to go down that route as it will take away my sense of achievement - seeing as how I have fully explored the whole world on foot with absolutely minimal help up to now. Plus - we might run into the same issue with phasing - who knows?

Another way would be a summons to each of the spots that I need to find. Again - it wouldn't feel right if I had to go down this route. Call me a glutton for punishment - and maybe I am, but at least if I manage to complete this in a way that satisfies me, I can say - "I did it my way!" - lol

Below is a screenie showing how far I have got up to now - the arrow is where my body is. It's taken me about 8hrs maybe more in-game playtime over 3 days to get this far. Just gotta keep plugging away :)

Slow progress

Döra Explores Deepholm - One zone to go!

2010-12-18T05:30:00.008Z

Tonight I decided to try and get Deepholm done, so I asked for in guild chat for a summons and was duly obliged. So huge thanks to Anateen, Hotspur and Dottus, who kindly dropped everything to get me there.

It was so weird when I got there because I couldn't see anyone and I wanted to get some good screenies!
We thought it might be due to phasing, but I think it was just lag, because just as everyone was dropping the group and leaving they all came into view, so I managed a couple of screenies but they're not very good.

One of them is funny though, as a warlock was announcing "Level 1 here ", and Hostspur replied
"not just a level 1...that is Dora the Explorer hehe". Amusing moment

Anyway, just to let you know, it was great fun, wasn't too difficult, although a little harder than I found it on the beta. It wasn't helped by my internet constantly dropping towards the end. Must have lost connection a dozen times! Maybe it's the snow - there's a blizzard going on outside :)

If you want to see the video I made when I explored this zone on the Beta, please click here.

It was important to get Deepholm out of the way before I start Mt. Hyjal, because once I start Mt. Hyjal I won't be able to do anything else with Döra until she has finished exploring there. If I leave the Hyjal zone alive, I will have to start again from square one due to the graveyards issue.

For info on the issue see: Here and The Trouble with Hyjal

Spot the guildies!

Not just a level 1...

Level 1 Döra achieves 'Explore Deepholm' - 2:36am 18th Dec 2010

A Thriftee update

2010-12-12T12:42:00.005Z

Thought I would update you on how Thriftee is getting on with his 'Level to 85 whilst spending no money' challenge.See rules here: Meet Thriftee

Well Thiftee is now lvl 24 and is finding the challenge pretty easy up to now, which I am pleased about. Imagine, if I was finding it difficult now, just how much harder it will be as I start to meet higher level mobs! He started in DunMorogh then went to Elwyn Forest, then Westfall where he had a high old time chasing mysterious objects in the sky. From there he went to Loch Moden, and is currently in the Wetlands.

He avoids picking up flight points, so that he can't be tempted to accidentally fly anywhere and he's had no trouble up to now getting gear, weapons or bags. He is trying to keep a spare set of everything in his bags so that in the event something breaks he has a replacement, but he always equips the best gear he has. Anything else he vendors unless its useful like potions and certain foods. Occasionally he has to destroy the odd few things to make room in his bags, but with the new smaller questing hubs this is not a regular occurrence like I thought it might be.

Have only had a few hairy moments lately where bear was acting very strangely, running of and randomly attacking stuff. Seems this is a bug and has been reported on the forums. Something to do with certain pets aoe abilities and critters.

According to someone on the forum "This will happen to any pet with an aoe attack. Bears, striders, foxes ect. Upon using them the critter turns hostile and runs. The pet will finish off the mob and pursue the critter. The only way around this atm is to disable the aoe ability. It can also result in being unable to exit combat until the pet has killed the critter."
See here: http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/927077539

I had some trouble at the IF Airport quest hub being stuck in combat, so maybe that was the same problem.

There are a few ways to deal with this, but as I can't train any abilities or control my pet, non of these methods are open to me, so it's making life a bit more dangerous when I am having to quest nr crowds of mobs. At least it's not because he's unhappy. Bear is hungry and extremely unhappy, and I have to get him down to the third tier of his pet talents before he learns the secret of happiness. No idea how many more levels that will be. I bet its level 60 or something

As you will see from the screenie Thriftee now has a whole 12G 21S 82C (which is the same as 'total gold acquired' so his savings are coming along nicely. I will admit to an enormous amount of trepidation when I vender stuff! One moment's lack of concentration and all could be lost!

Thriftee still on track at level 24

Just love these free flights

Get down with Hobgob (Goblin Male Dance)

2010-12-09T23:54:00.001Z

Get down with Hobgob, my new Goblin warrior and all round funky dude. He's only level 3, but he sure
knows how to enjoy himself. :D

I made this because he has the most awesome dance and he needed a good tune to show it off. I think I've chosen a good un. The original tune this dance is based on (Soulja Boy Tell 'Em - Crank That by Soulja Boy) has to be the most awful thing I've ever heard, but then I am probably just showing my age.

Hope you enjoy.

Vashj'ir Explored! Great day :)

2010-12-09T08:53:00.009Z

After yesterday's angst over Mt Hyjal, I decided to explore Vashj'ir. I had a bit of trouble getting there though.

I have explored this zone twice on the Beta with copies of Döra, and on neither occasion do I remember having so much trouble getting there. But maybe this time I was just a little unlucky, or maybe Blizz has made it more difficult - I really don't know.

I swam from Menethal hugging the coast along Wetlands and Dun Morogh until the map showed me that I was as close to Vash'jir as I was going to get. Then I started to swim towards Vash'jir as fast as I could in the hope that I would get there before I died of fatigue. I didn't make it! The graveyard I ended up at was in Westfall! Haha. Rather than rez there and make the long swim from Menethal again I decided to corpse run it back up the coast - must have took 15 mins or so. Then another quick dash over dark water as a ghost to pick up my body. My ghost was about half fatigued by the time I recovered it and rezzed, so I quickly swapped gear to my dress (which has 150 health), drank a halani whisky, popped lifeblood, bandaged, popped my Arena Grandmaster, then swam like hell. All of which I should have done on my first attempt had I been thinking about what I was doing. - lol. Well I made it just in time. I also noticed that Blizz have added a few sharks in the water on this approach to Vash'jir, but luckily I managed to avoid them.

So first thing - I headed to the island to pick up the flight point, and also picked up the seahorse underwater flight point too. After that it was pretty easy. The main thing that makes it easy for a level one is that you can't drown in Vash'jir. Your health regens faster than you lose it through drowning, so you don't die, unless you are hit like a truck by all the mobs of course. This is only fair when you think about it, as on land you only die from mobs or the occasional fall off a cliff. As far as I'm aware, higher levels are given an underwater breathing buff to compensate too. Whether a level 1 can no longer drown anywhere else is a question I will try to answer next time I play her. I could certainly drown before Cataclysm!

Having done this zone twice before on the beta, I didn't take long to uncover the map and get the achievement on this occasion. I had already explored virtually every nook and cranny on the beta, so didn't feel it necessary this time. Met a nice bunch of people in one of the caves who were surprised to find a level 1 emerge from the water - so that was fun. I am a rather shy person and rarely initiate contact with other players that I don't know, so I love it when they initiate contact with me. Döra has done wonders for my social life in WoW.

So - that's three of the new Cataclysm zones explored. Just Mt. Hyjal and Deepholme to go. I have video footage of all three zones, but I'm not ready to make a vid of this yet. I think I will combine all 5 zones into one video. Not sure yet. Need to find the right sound track for it or something. Exploration video's can be so boring without an angle (and I haven't yet come up with one). - lol But anyway - here is the obligatory screenie to prove I've done it.

Level 1 Döra achieves 'Explore Vash'jir' - 4:23am 9th Dec. 2010

And to finish of a great day..
I also picked up another Gurubashi Arena trinket :) Ended up in a super fight with a level 1 twink Blood Elf Hunter. We were the only one's there so it made a really nice change to actually be in a fair fight over the who gets the chest. It was pretty close and I only just beat him. He put up a great fight and kited me around the arena like a pro. Hope he wasn't too annoyed that I beat him. He killed me afterwards (didn't put up much of a fight because I was guild chatting and I am hopeless at doing two things at once - lol) and then ran back in hoping to make friends. I was just about to salute and bow to him, but unfortunately he either hearthed or logged off. Shame that! Hope he's lucky next time, as I know just how hard it is to get those trinks. For myself - I just need 4 more for my second GrandMaster. :)

Döra Explores Uldum and Twilight Highlands but disapointment too.

2010-12-08T05:39:00.024Z

So Cataclysm is here and I was all excited! I had Döra in Winterspring waiting outside the entrance of Mt Hyjal, really looking forward to exploring this new zone. I ran in - you can get quite some way up the road before you attract the attention of your first mob, but there is no way to avoid it, so I died.

Which graveyard did I get sent to? Astranaar (Ashenvale)!! This was happening on the beta but I had been hoping that it was a bug that would eventually be fixed. The corpse run back to your body is through Ashenvale, the whole of Felwood, through the furbolg tunnel and back down to the bottom of Winterspring.
The corpse run from Astranaar to your body in Mt Hyjal is a minimum of 20mins!

So, so disappointed in you Blizzard! My first few moments of Cataclysm were a cataclysmic failure for me instead of the high I was hoping for.

"But not to worry" thought I. "It's probably a bug that has not been fixed yet, plenty of other places to explore". So I decided to raise a ticket about the issue and find out once and for all.

I went off to explore Uldum whilst I waited for a response. I completed (achieved) exploring Uldum, and did a little leveling on my level 80 then logged off for the night.

Level 1 Döra achieves 'Explore Uldum' - 3:58am 7th December 2010

When I logged back on today a GM had replied to my ticket. Here is the GM's response!

So - it's not a bug and it's working correctly! What the hell? So does this mean that if I attempt to explore Mt Hyjal with Döra I am looking at a potential ban?

People were banned for attempting to get into Hyjal after the shattering because Blizzard introduced a method to kick them out of the zone until Cataclysm, and those who circumvented this were banned. So if I circumvent this 'Correctly working kick out of the zone', by marathon corpse running or by summonses or two person mounts, will I be banned also?

The GM also said that if I wished to improve the situation I should ask on the Wow suggestion forum. The new Blizzard Wow forums don't have a suggestions forum. Great!

I don't mind accepting help when absolutely necessary like if I need a summons to an otherwise inaccessible area, but help to explore an entire zone! - it seems excessive! Because it's excessive (and 'working correctly') its obvious that Blizzard don't want certain levels in this zone for reasons only known to themselves.

I've had several offers of help to explore this zone, but what worries me greatly about this is - could this potentially put anyone who helps me at the risk of a ban also? The more I think about it the more I think that it's a strong possibility.

So I have now made a follow up ticket asking that very question. "If this is working as intended, could I find my self banned for attempting to explore here?"

I await their response.

Tonight I explored Twilight Highlands. Anyone else see the utter ridiculousness of this situation?


Level 1 Döra achieves 'Explore Twilight Highlands' - 3:52am 8th Dec. 2010

Update: I recieved a response to my second ticket. As you will see, this was much more helpful (and friendly).

At least now I know that I won't get a ban for exploring here, and neither will anyone who helps me. It's interesting what is said here. He implies that other Cataclysm zones have a similar mechanic. In my eyes, this is doubtful, as I did all the zones on the beta (Except Hyjal) and I got sent to the zone graveyards in all of them. I doubt this has changed now it's live. My guess is - that it is a bug (or anomaly) that they cannot be bothered to change because it affects so few people. But anyway - I'm happy with this good news.

UFO's over Westfall!

2010-12-06T02:00:00.000Z

Thriftee came across some strange sightings over Westfall. What does this mean?

Meet Thriftee

2010-12-05T04:50:00.017Z

Meet Thriftee - Döra's grandad! View Thriftee on the Armory

Thriftee starting his adventure

He looks like Father Christmas, but he is down on his luck. He suffered a great misfortune when he lost his retirement fund betting with a goblin that the rumours of the coming Cataclysm were just Conspiracy theories.

Döra persuaded him to seek help and he went to Gambling with Goblins Anonymous (GwGA) where he learnt the error of his ways. However Thriftee was always an all or nothing guy, and now finds that he cannot bear to part with a single copper - for anything!

He has decided to live off the land until he reaches retirement age (level 85), when he hopes to have a nice nest egg saved. To help himself to live off the land, he has chosen to be a Master of Beasts. Unfortunately he is not very good at it because Bear, his pet, is rather unhappy. You see Thriftee has no means to feed him, and Bear has not yet learnt how to feed himself.

Will Thriftee reach retirement age with a nice nest egg? Or will his frugality be the end of him?
Will Bear stay loyal to Thriftee long enough to find his own true path to happiness?

Answers to these and other questions will unfold over the coming weeks and months. Stay tuned!

RULES of Thriftee's challenge.

The idea of this challenge is not to make money (making gold is easy in Wow),
but rather it is not to spend any (not a single copper!).

This means:
No training abilities
No repairing gear
No flights that cost money
No training or buying, ground and/or flying mounts
No buying from Vendors
No trading on the auction house
No learning professions
No Posting
No Enchants
No Jewels
No Glyphs
No Heirlooms
No quests that involve parting with money.
Anything else I haven't thought of that involves parting with money.
I will not accept gifts of money or gear or items of any kind from my other characters or other players.

Final Proof:
By the end of this challenge (the moment I ding level 85) my Total Gold Acquired should equal the amount of gold in my bags. Other stats should also bear this out.

If my bear runs off and leaves me then it will be challenge over (fail), as I have no means to train another.

I am happy to get help from friends occasionally (such as the odd boosts, and summonses to out of the way places), but don't want to make a habit of this - mainly because I want to see the new questing content of Cataclysm in the manner Blizzard intended, and don't want to level too quickly through boosting, i.e. I need to try to keep at a level where I can manage the mobs but still make XP.

I have never heard of this challenge having been attempted before, so I could be setting myself up to fail this one. But it will be interesting trying :)


Free Flight to Ironforge Airport

A Month in the life... (Tribute to WotLK)

2010-12-03T02:08:00.004Z

This is my tribute to a great expansion and a way for me to remember a fantastic personal adventure level 1 Exploring Azeroth. I have tried to make this video diary so many times over the last few months, but I just couldn't get it right. I always had the music in my head that I wanted to put to this, but I just couldn't fit the screenies to the length of the music and I was lamenting not taking more screenies during the early part of my adventure. Even so, with the screenies I had, at one point I had a video lasting nearly 13 mins and it was straining my computer's capacity to handle the editing of it.

I would keep laying it aside for a week or two and make other video's. However, something kept driving me back to this project over and over. I really wanted to make this vid!. The day before the shattering, I started to regret even more all the missed opportunities I had had to take screenies of things that would disapear for ever. So I re-purchased the white gear that I did my original exploring in, and rushed around Azeroth getting some last minute shots (like those of the Dam, Thousand needles etc.)

Once I had these, I returned to my project and tried to put it together one more time. I messed about, shortened one track and introduced another, ruthlessly sorted the screenies &, all of a sudden it miraculously all seemed to fit. At last I had something I could be proud of and happy to show to the world. It's time had come. :)

For me, the timing of the finish and release of this video is both poignant and significant - the end of WotLK and the start of Cataclysm. It is an intensely personal project, and the music was chosen to to closely represent my feelings as each stage of my journey unfolded. Indeed halfway through Icecrown I started to suffer from a little melencholia, as I was beginning to see the end of my epic journey.

WotLK was magic, and I look forward to many new and unusual adventures in Cataclysm.
I hope you enjoy my (very personal) tribute to WotLK.

Lol - I posted a link to this vid on the new wow forums and got a blue response!

If you are wondering why I use screenshots, it's because I didn't start recording or making videos until the penultimate day of my challenge, so the only record is my written logs and all the screenies I took along the way. Maybe finally I can now clear them off my hard drive and make a bit of space ready for Cataclysm! Yeah!

I was also really pleased to at last find somewhere where I could use one of the very first things I frapsed, where me and Aggmiok spent a fun half an hour jumping from the dalaran sewer pipe. It was such a fun memory & once I added it in it felt so right and a lovely way to end the video.

Sadly, I have noticed since putting this vid out there that I missed adding the screenies for Bloodmyst Isle :(. Oh well - lol - I've added some below. (for completeness)

Dôra Explores Deepholm (Cataclysm Beta)

2010-11-04T18:23:00.006Z

After another aborted attempt at exploring Mt. Hyjal (I try this after every new patch on the beta) I was a little bored and decided to ask in trade chat if anyone was willing to summons a level 1 to Deepholm. I wasn't really that hopeful. After all, a warlock summons takes a group of players to perform, and I didn't expect anyone to take a pathetic little cry in trade chat from a lowly level 1 seriously. But hey - you gotta try!

On my second plea "Would anyone be willing to summons a level 1 explorer to Deepholm please?" someone invited me to a group. Beginning to feel hopeful I quickly joined and almost immediately a summons window popped up! Click and whoop, I am in Deepholm! Oh man - was I high!

Standing there to greet my arrival was a level 85 Worgen hunter called Kroson. After much enthusistic thank you's on my part and a little chat about why I wanted to be in Deepholm I started to wonder how on earth a lone hunter could summons me anywhere. Seems it's one of the new guild perks Have Group, Will Travel It allows anyone with this guild perk to summons all raid or party members to the caster's current location. That is going to be so useful for us level 1 explorers in the future. No more need to have to organise a group of people to summons us to those out of reach places any more. Just one helpful player and we are away!

Anyhow I began to have a look at my surroundings. Kroson had summoned me to the Temple of Earth which is smack bang in the centre of this circular zone. I noticed two portals in the temple. One leads to Orgrimaar and the other to Stormwind. I was still partied with Kroson so I told him I would take a look outside and do a 'test death' as I was really expecting that once I died it would port me out of the zone like it does on Mt. Hyjal.

Joy of joys! After dying I was still here, so Kroson left me to get on with the business of exploring and I ran back to the temple to see if I could set my hearthstone there. I had very sound reasons for doing this. The whole zone from what I could see was full of jagged rocks and nooks and crannies, so there was a high chance that I would get stuck at some point. When you get stuck, more often than not you have to use your hearthstone to get out of it, and no way did I want to end up back in Ironforge with this zone only half explored, requiring another summons to get back. I eventually found an NPC in the Temple who let me set my hearthstone there, so now I was all set to explore!

Deepholm is another stunning zone and I really thought it would be very difficult to get the explore achievement here as most of the areas that need uncovering are high up and seemingly inaccessible. However, at some point I died and found myself at a graveyard in one of these high zones. After that things were relatively easy. I made a video of my adventures here. In this vid I try to give you a real flavour of what it's like to explore as a level 1. Hope you enjoy! :)

Music is "Queen of the Night" by Per Kiilstofte.
I got it from here: http://www.machinimasound.com
They have a great collection of free music for Machinima makers, so check em out.

Deepholm view

Therazane

Level 1 Dora Explores Deepholm (Cataclysm Beta)

Need More Cowbell!

2010-10-27T20:37:00.003+01:00

My First proper machinima!
It's a World of Warcraft parody of the famous Saturday Night Live comedy sketch which fictionalised
the recording of the song "(Don't Fear) The Reaper" by Blue Öyster Cult.

For anyone interested and / or hasn't heard of or seen the original sketch -
Its here: http://www.funnyhub.com/videos/pages/snl-more-cowbell.html

Here's some info about it from Wiki:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/More_cowbell

"More cowbell" is an American pop culture catchphrase originally derived from an April 8, 2000, Saturday Night Live comedy sketch fictionalizing the recording of the song "(Don't Fear) The Reaper" by Blue Öyster Cult. The sketch featured guest host Christopher Walken as fictional music producer Bruce Dickinson and Will Ferrell, who wrote the sketch, as fictional cowbell player Gene Frenkle. In the television special Saturday Night Live: 101 Most Unforgettable Moments, this sketch is at the moment number five.

I was inspired to do this
a) after seeing the band in Shatrath &
(see my video of Dora goes to a Rock Concert)

b) after someone commented on youtube on my Goblin Trike video in Azshara that "It needs more cowbell" because I had used the "(Don't Fear) The Reaper" track on it.

I looked to find a cowbell in Wow and the only one I could find was around the neck of a cow - and so the idea was born.

The software I used was Corel VideoStudio Pro X3 (can't yet get my head around the Sony one), Wow Model Viewer & the free version of Machinima Studio. I used Fraps for capturing the clips and Audacity for music editing.

As it turned out, I had chosen a rather ambitious subject for my first machinima because it showed me just how severely limited in memory my computer is for doing this kind of work. So it's a little rough round the edges and some of the animations are slightly out timing wise. But I don't think that this detracts from the overall comedy of the sketch, so I am really pleased with the result.

One thing I have learn't is that making good machinima is not easy, and so my admiration for good machinima artists has gone through the roof!

Anyway - I hope you enjoy!