Saturday, October 30, 2010

Update and getting something off my chest

Ok so, the Vuhdo guide is still a work in progress, *blush.* I've taken a lot of screen shots and a few videos, now Im just going through and cleaning them all up. I hope to have part 1 up tomorrow sometime... hopefully....

Anyways, I have to get something off my chest. I am all for raids being social and fun, and we all raid to have a good time. But theres a time and a place for everything. One of those being talking on vent / mumble / teamspeak... whatever. I am guilty of this too, but when we are doing a new heroic boss, new content, or something that the raid needs to concentrate on... Please... don't congest the chat with twittering.

Lets face it... you could have been through a long day and need to vent about it a bit. Thats cool, but when your talking while important information is being yelled out, the other 8 of us or 23 of us can only hear "wargarblargbl," and it ends up wiping the raid.

So please.... have a heart. This little tree just wants to kill the Litch King a second time before the expansion hits, let the happy apple pie be happy once again.

(vvv Happy Apple Pie vvv)

Wednesday, October 27, 2010

I'm still alive :) and starting a VuhDo how-to series

Sorry I haven't posted in a few days, I have been pretty sick the last few days and I am still just getting over it. Now I was pretty dead empty on what I wanted to post next, but thanks to a quick chat with Keeva, I believe a small series on customizing VuhDo is in order.

You can get VuhDo from Curse or WoW Interface, and their homepage has some really epic resources on how to get started as well.

If you don't know what VuhDo is, I like to describe it as a "Clique-ie, Grid sammich with some Healbot toppings." If I haven't lost you yet; its an add-on that kind of takes the best parts of Grid, Healbot, Clique and others, then puts them together in a pretty brilliant setup.

The great news about it, is that it can be as basic or as advanced as you want it to be. Its ready to go out of the box, but there are some great features you can enable from the GUI (i.e. cool-down timers / bars, GCD timer, De-spell / Buffing options, etc.) that will really help you get the best bang for the buck with your hps. All that will be discussed later.

Anyways, stay tuned, while I cook some stuff up and give you a nice picture by picture guide on all the stuff you need to know.

Also, while Im doing this, if you happen to stumble upon my blog and have any requests on what you would like to see from this "guide" be sure to leave a comment, or contact me.

Saturday, October 23, 2010

HoL bug ;)


So yeah, heres a quickie...
its my first time doing HoL since patch and yeah... theres alot of death buggings in there

Why I love the druid even more

Before I get into anything, somebody posted a script on our forums to add and remove tool tips. I BELIEVE know he got this from the WoW forums, but I'm not 100% sure and will definitely ask next time I see him so I can give credit for the quote.
If you are like me and your game freezes solid when somebody either makes a food table, a fish feast, or what ever else, this is a sure fire way to get you past that.
Granted when you have the tool tips off, if something is linked your not going to be able to see it (cool tip here... don't be like me... have them turned on when loot is handed out during raids >.>)
Once again copied verbatim from our guild forums and source will be linked just as soon as I find out who called it.. (*** UPDATE*** I found the source here... BIG kudos to Deyneth from Wyrmrest Accord)

-Turn Off Tooltips
/script GameTooltip.Temphide = function() GameTooltip:Hide() end; GameTooltip:SetScript("OnShow", GameTooltip.Temphide);


-Turn On Tooltips

/script GameTooltip:SetScript("OnShow", GameTooltip.Show);

Anyways, tonight was my first raid since the patch, and thanks to all the changes, its fun again. Its no longer a "whack-a-mole" game as a lot of people have put it, because it has started to mirror the healing roots from back in the day. It took me a good part of the night to get out of old "blanket the raid" play style and try to find my new flow.


Here are some things that I may be doing wrong, but helped the situation.
My guild is really notorious about killing things in a different way, which is not always a bad thing, but it leads to some really interesting decisions. Alot of the stuff that I did / came up with was pretty much all on a spur of the moment trial and error.


Changing Lifebloom targets as the tanks switched.


~The way to tell who the main tank is in our raid, is to see who is taking the most damage. It could switch every 5 seconds, or it could switch every minute. Instead of just keeping Lifebloom on one target for the whole the fight, I would change targets depending on who's getting hurt the most.


Casting Rejuv then do nothing to the tank until he was hurt pretty bad then pop Swiftmend / efflorescence.


~ One of our tanks, is a great player, but he hasn't played the game since before the patch came out and we started out on blood princes. With that said, his agro-holding abilities, were kind of low... which is ok, because of the situation. For most of the time there, it was:
*tank pulls
*tank holds 2 of the bosses and starts taking damage
*druid or pali heals
*said druid or pali is greeted by one of the bosses and gets face nom'd off.


The way I fixed it, was to hold off on healing as much as possible for the first 30 seconds or so, and only heal when he was about to die. This seemed to help balance out healing agro between 3 healers.


Casting all hots and then spamming Regrowth on Dreamwalker.


~This one really felt like it was me getting the best bang for the buck. My raid leader loves to have me take all the portals, so it seems that for the 12 - 15 seconds between portals, I'm really getting more heals off than with nourish.
Now with mastery, it seems that when all the HoTs are on the boss, I should be getting more hps with Nourish, but for some reason spamming regrowth was upping the numbers a bit.

Over all, I feel like I lucked out and druid healing has gotten closer to my heal style, and my effective healing has quite frankly doubled.
I wrote this while it was very late for me. My vision was getting progressively blurred as I went on, and you are probably reading this for the second time because I really meant to hit save instead of publish last night. With that said, if this is hard to follow, I promise to write when I am more awake :3

Friday, October 22, 2010

Blizzcon :(

So this morning when I woke up, I had a choice to make. Either stay at home "sick" to watch Blizzcon, or to go to work, make money and just get updates as it goes. Sadly work found out about the decision somehow... darn you internetz, and so I'm stuck here at work.


GG amirite?

Thursday, October 21, 2010

Here Comes the Fail :3

So it all starts tomorrow night... the first raid I will have healed since the new patch. Honestly Im excited to see how all the prep work pays out. A guy can only do so much, but those questions just keep running through my head like nobody's business.

“Did I glyph right?”

“Do I have the right rotation planned?”

“Can I still live up to the expectations of the leader because of the changes?”

“Can I explain the difference between the Good goo and the bad goo?”


I can go through and research till the cows come home, but Im a guy that learns by doing... and usually by oopsing. With that said... I have to apologize now to my 10 man team over the fact that there will be a lot of oopsing on my part because of the rotation change and trying to combat the muscle memory of spamming the raid with hots and playing nourish / regrowth guy. I have a lot of gratefulness to the druid community posting blogs and what happens when posts, especially Keeva, who came out with the awesome guide that gives me a lot of the heads up I need to know.


At the same time too, there have been quite a few people in my guild asking me for moonkin help. My heart goes out to you guys, because well... I just haven’t had time to do much of anything with all the stuff that’s happening in RL and trying to get healing down again.


After I raid, I think I can update this blog more often, because I will know whats going on more than the laggie battlegrounds aspect.


So I guess wish me luck and I hope to update this more often than what I have in the past.

Wednesday, October 6, 2010

4.01 Gem Conversions

So I was going through my blog roll today and I find this really great post from Revive & Rejuvenate Talking about what happens to gems when the patch drops next week possibly. She also included a table that just lays everything out brilliantly

Source: Gem Conversions for 4.0.1


Gem

Current Stats

Action

Will Convert To

New Stats


Red

Bold Cardinal Ruby

+20 Strength

no change

Bold Cardinal Ruby


Bright Cardinal Ruby

+40 Attack Power

removed

Bold Cardinal Ruby or Delicate Cardinal Ruby

20 Agility or 20 Strength

Delicate Cardinal Ruby

+20 Agility

no change

Delicate Cardinal Ruby


Flashing Cardinal Ruby

+20 Parry Rating

no change

Flashing Cardinal Ruby


Fractured Cardinal Ruby

+20 Armor Penetration Rating

removed

Smooth King's Amber

20 Crit Rating

Precise Cardinal Ruby

+20 Expertise Rating

no change

Precise Cardinal Ruby


Runed Cardinal Ruby

+23 Spell Power

removed

Brilliant Cardinal Ruby

20 Intellect

Subtle Cardinal Ruby

+20 Dodge Rating

removed

Subtle King's Amber

20 Dodge Rating

Brilliant Cardinal Ruby


*NEW*

Brilliant Cardinal Ruby

20 Intellect


Orange

Accurate Ametrine

+10 Expertise Rating

removed

Accurate Dreadstone


+10 Hit Rating

Champion's Ametrine

+10 Strength

altered

Champion's Ametrine

10 Strength

+10 Defense Rating

10 Dodge

Deadly Ametrine

+10 Agility

no change

Deady Ametrine


+10 Critical Strike Rating

Deft Ametrine

+10 Agility

no change

Deft Ametrine


+10 Haste Rating

Durable Ametrine

+12 Spell Power

removed

Wilful Ametrine

10 Intellect

+10 Resilience Rating

10 Resilience Rating

Empowered Ametrine

+20 Attack Power

removed

Lucent Ametrine or Resplendent Ametrine

10 Agility or 10 Strength

+10 Resilience Rating

10 Resilience Rating

Etched Ametrine

+10 Strength

removed

Etched Dreadstone

10 Strength

+10 Hit Rating

10 Hit Rating

Fierce Ametrine

+10 Strength

no change

Fierce Ametrine


+10 Haste Rating

Glimmering Ametrine

+10 Parry Rating

removed

Stalwart Ametrine

10 Dodge Rating

+10 Defense Rating

10 Parry Rating

Glinting Ametrine

+10 Agility

removed

Glinting Dreadstone

10 Agility

+10 Hit Rating

10 Hit Rating

Inscribed Ametrine

+10 Strength

no change

Inscribed Ametrine


+10 Critical Strike Rating

Lucent Ametrine

+10 Agility

no change

Lucent Ametrine


+10 Resilience Rating

Luminous Ametrine

+12 Spell Power

removed

Brilliant Cardinal Ruby

20 Intellect

+10 Intellect

Potent Ametrine

+12 Spell Power

altered

Potent Ametrine

10 Intellect

+10 Critical Strike Rating

10 Crit Strike Rating

Pristine Ametrine

+20 Attack Power

removed

Glinting Dreadstone or Etched Dreadstone

10 Agility or 10 Strength

+10 Hit Rating

10 Hit Rating

Reckless Ametrine

+12 Spell Power

altered

Reckless Ametrine

10 Intellect

+10 Haste Rating

10 Haste Rating

Resolute Ametrine

+10 Expertise Rating

alter

Resolute Ametrine

10 Expertise

+10 Defense Rating

10 Dodge

Resplendent Ametrine

+10 Strength

no change

Resplendent Ametrine


+10 Resilience Rating


Stalwart Ametrine

+10 Dodge Rating

altered

Stalwart Ametrine

10 Dodge Rating

+10 Defense Rating

10 Parry Rating

Stark Ametrine

+20 Attack Power

removed

Deft Ametrine or Fierce Ametrine

10 Agility or 10 Strength

+10 Haste Rating

10 Haste Rating

Veiled Ametrine

+12 Spell Power

removed

Veiled Dreadstone

10 Intellect

+10 Hit Rating

10 Hit Rating

Wicked Ametrine

+20 Attack Power

removed

Deady Ametrine or Inscribed Ametrine

10 Agility or 10 Strength

+10 Critical Strike Rating

10 Crit Strike Rating

Wilful Ametrine


*NEW*

Wilful Ametrine

10 Intellect

10 Resilience Rating


Yellow

Brilliant King's Amber

+20 Intellect

removed

Brilliant Cardinal Ruby

20 Intellect

Mystic King's Amber

+20 Resilience Rating

no change

Mystic King's Amber


Quick King's Amber

+20 Haste Rating

no change

Quick King's Amber


Rigid King's Amber

+20 Hit Rating

removed

Rigid Majestic Zircon

20 Hit Rating

Smooth King's Amber

+20 Critical Strike Rating

no change

Smooth King's Amber


Thick King's Amber

+20 Defense Rating

removed

Subtle King's Amber

20 Dodge Rating

Subtle King's Amber


*NEW*

Subtle King's Amber

20 Dodge Rating


Green

Dazzling Eye of Zul

+10 Intellect

removed

Purified Dreadstone

10 Intellect

+5 Mana every 5 seconds

10 Spirit

Enduring Eye of Zul

+10 Defense Rating

removed

Regal Eye of Zul

10 Dodge Rating

+15 Stamina

10 Stamina

Energized Eye of Zul

+10 Haste Rating

altered

Energised Eye of Zul

10 Haste Rating

+5 Mana every 5 seconds

10 Spirit

Forceful Eye of Zul

+10 Haste Rating

no change

Forceful Eye of Zul


+15 Stamina

Intricate Eye of Zul

+10 Haste Rating

removed

Energised Eye of Zul

10 Haste Rating

+10 Spirit

10 Spirit

Jagged Eye of Zul

+10 Critical Strike Rating

no change

Jagged Eye of Zul


+15 Stamina

Lambent Eye of Zul

+10 Hit Rating

removed

?


+5 Mana every 5 seconds

Misty Eye of Zul

+10 Critical Strike Rating

no change

Misty Eye of Zul


+10 Spirit

Opaque Eye of Zul

+10 Resilience Rating

removed

Turbid Eye of Zul

+10 Resilience Rating

+5 Mana every 5 seconds

+10 Spirit

Radiant Eye of Zul

+10 Critical Strike Rating

no change

Radiant Eye of Zul


+13 Spell Penetration

Seer's Eye of Zul

+10 Intellect

removed

Purified Dreadstone

10 Intellect

+10 Spirit

10 Spirit

Shattered Eye of Zul

+10 Haste Rating

no change

Shattered Eye of Zul


+13 Spell Penetration

Shining Eye of Zul

+10 Hit Rating

removed

?


+10 Spirit

Steady Eye of Zul

+10 Resilience Rating

no change

Steady Eye of Zul


+15 Stamina

Sundered Eye of Zul

+10 Critical Strike Rating

removed

Misty Eye of Zul

+10 Critical Strike Rating

+5 Mana every 5 seconds

+10 Spirit

Tense Eye of Zul

+10 Hit Rating

removed

?


+13 Spell Penetration

Timeless Eye of Zul

+10 Intellect

removed

Timeless Dreadstone

10 Intellect

+15 Stamina

15 Stamina

Turbid Eye of Zul

+10 Resilience Rating

no change

Turbid Eye of Zul


+10 Spirit

Vivid Eye of Zul

+10 Hit Rating

removed

?


+15 Stamina

Lightning Eye of Zul


*NEW*

Lightning Eye of Zul

10 Hit Rating

10 Haste

Nimble Eye of Zul


*NEW*

Nimble Eye of Zul

10 Hit Rating

10 Dodge Rating

Regal Eye of Zul


*NEW*

Regal Eye of Zul

10 Dodge Rating

10 Stamina


Blue

Lustrous Majestic Zircon

+10 Mana every 5 seconds

removed

Sparkling Majestic Zircon

20 Spirit

Solid Majestic Zircon

+30 Stamina

no change

Solid Majestic Zircon


Sparkling Majestic Zircon

+20 Spirit

no change

Sparkling Majestic Zircon


Stormy Majestic Zircon

+25 Spell Penetration

no change

Stormy Majestic Zircon


Rigid Majestic Zircon


*NEW*

Rigid Majestic Zircon

20 Hit Rating


Purple

Balanced Dreadstone

+20 Attack Power

removed

Shifting Dreadstone or Sovereign Dreadstone

10 Agility or 10 Strength

+15 Stamina

15 Stamina

Defender's Dreadstone

+10 Parry Rating

no change

Defender's Dreadstone


+15 Stamina

Glowing Dreadstone

+12 Spell Power

removed

Timeless Dreadstone

10 Intellect

+15 Stamina

15 Stamina

Guardian's Dreadstone

+10 Expertise Rating

no change

Guardian's Dreadstone


+15 Stamina

Infused Dreadstone

+20 Attack Power

removed

?


+5 Mana every 5 seconds

Mysterious Dreadstone

+12 Spell Power

altered

Mysterious Dreadstone

10 Intellect

+13 Spell Penetration

13 Spell Penetration

Puissant Dreadstone

+10 Armor Penetration Rating

removed

Jagged Eye of Zul

+10 Critical Strike Rating

+15 Stamina

+15 Stamina

Purified Dreadstone

+12 Spell Power

altered

Purified Dreadstone

10 Intellect

+10 Spirit

10 Spirit

Regal Dreadstone

+10 Dodge Rating

removed

Regal Eye of Zul

10 Dodge Rating

+15 Stamina

10 Stamina

Royal Dreadstone

+12 Spell Power

removed

Purified Dreadstone

10 Intellect

+5 Mana every 5 seconds

10 Spirit

Shifting Dreadstone

+10 Agility

no change

Shifting Dreadstone


+15 Stamina

Sovereign Dreadstone

+10 Strength

no change

Sovereign Dreadstone


+15 Stamina

Tenuous Dreadstone

+10 Agility

removed

?


+5 Mana every 5 seconds

Accurate Dreadstone


*NEW*

Accurate Dreadstone

10 Expertise

10 Hit Rating

Etched Dreadstone


*NEW*

Etched Dreadstone

10 Strength

10 Hit Rating

Glinting Dreadstone


*NEW*

Glinting Dreadstone

10 Agility

10 Hit Rating

Timeless Dreadstone


*NEW*

Timeless Dreadstone

10 Intellect

15 Stamina

Veiled Dreadstone


*NEW*

Veiled Dreadstone

10 Intellect

10 Hit Rating



Dragon's Eyes - Jewelcrafter Only

red

Bold Dragon's Eye

+34 Strength

no change

Bold Dragon's Eye


red

Bright Dragon's Eye

+68 Attack Power

removed

Bold Dragon's Eye or Delicate Dragon's Eye

34 Strength or 34 Agility

yellow

Brilliant Dragon's Eye

+34 Intellect

no change

Brilliant Dragon's Eye


red

Delicate Dragon's Eye

+34 Agility

no change

Delicate Dragon's Eye


red

Flashing Dragon's Eye

+34 Parry Rating

no change

Flashing Dragon's Eye


red

Fractured Dragon's Eye

+34 Armor Penetration Rating

removed

Smooth Dragon's Eye

34 Critical Strike Rating

blue

Lustrous Dragon's Eye

+20 Mana every 5 seconds

removed

Sparkling Dragon's Eye

34 Spirit

yellow

Mystic Dragon's Eye

+34 Resilience Rating

no change

Mystic Dragon's Eye


red

Precise Dragon's Eye

+34 Expertise Rating

no change

Precise Dragon's Eye


yellow

Quick Dragon's Eye

+34 Haste Rating

no change

Quick Dragon's Eye


yellow

Rigid Dragon's Eye

+34 Hit Rating

no change

Rigid Dragon's Eye


red

Runed Dragon's Eye

+39 Spell Power

removed

Brilliant Dragon's Eye

34 Intellect

yellow

Smooth Dragon's Eye

+34 Critical Strike Rating

no change

Smooth Dragon's Eye


blue

Solid Dragon's Eye

+51 Stamina

no change

Solid Dragon's Eye


blue

Sparkling Dragon's Eye

+34 Spirit

no change

Sparkling Dragon's Eye


blue

Stormy Dragon's Eye

+43 Spell Penetration

no change

Stormy Dragon's Eye


red

Subtle Dragon's Eye

+34 Dodge Rating

no change

Subtle Dragon's Eye


yellow

Thick Dragon's Eye

+34 Defense Rating

removed

Subtle Dragon's Eye

34 Dodge Rating

blue

Nightmare Tear

+10All Stats

no change

Nightmare Tear



Monday, October 4, 2010

Medical Update and possible leak of the release date for cata ;)

So instead of writing like 50 text messages I figure I'll just post on here. I have an advanced condition of sinus polyps that I ultimately need surgery to take care of. Today, I went to go get a CT scan and have a pre-operation meeting with my specialist. It turns out that the special steroids that I have been taking has done a super job of clearing alot of the stuff out, but theres still alot left. So in about 3 weeks give or take, I will be having an out patient surgery to take care of this mess.

So With all that aside, its been passed around at Gamestop that the big day for the Cataclysm expansion will be December the 7th... *bean spilling sound*

Sunday, October 3, 2010

A Must Have for ALL Resto Druids

Big shout out to Keeva of Tree Bark Jacket for making this 4.0 How-To-Tree for all of us. Granted she is completely redoing the guide as new stuff comes out, but this is pretty much a simple plan on pretty much everything you need to know for all the big changes about to hit us.

You can read the guide here

Saturday, October 2, 2010

New Loot

Sqwee

Hello World

So I decided to pretty much necro this blog and kind of change stuff around. I'm thinking it will still be random blurbs and other things I find interesting (lol its a blog right?!?) but, I kind of want to make it to where its focused on playing a druid.

So with all that said... more stuff to come ;)