Patch 3.1 is here! Kinda...

So I arrived home and found that most of the realms were offline. Disappointing, but not surprising considering the scope of this patch as well as the anticipation built up waiting for it.

I decided to watch Fringe instead, but 15 minutes before it aired, Arathor came up. Good thing I still decided to record the show.

Naturally, logging in was a chore, but not as bad as expected. Dalaran was incredibly laggy and it was a good 2-3 seconds before looting something (from mail, bank, etc) and it appearing in the bags. No crashes yet though so it was good.

After doing chores in Dalaran, I went straight to the trainer to learn dual specs. There is also a feature that allows you to preview the spec before learning it....but it has to be turned on. Still, a great feature. I chose frost tank and frost dps specs.

I did miscalculate a bit with the tank spec. Particularly because Glyph of Howling Blast is not available yet, though I imagine it will be on the AH pretty soon. The frost DPS spec is one I was confortable with on the PTR, but have not done any testing in raids.

Speaking of raids, we did Ulduar last night despite the distinct possibility that the fights would be bugged. After some miscommunication and learning to use the vehicles, we got through the trash and beat down all the towers. We had intended to leave one tower up, but some confusion led to the intended tower being brought down.

As an aside, this part of the Ulduar courtyard is definitely more fun than most vehicle fights. Everyone got to do something different and healers were topping the DPS charts. There is also the need for a LOT of communication. Vehicles need to be together for the most part and the passengers need to communicate where the dropped Liquid Pyrite are. I thoroughly enjoyed this part and I look forward to the raid getting better with the vehicles.

Then comes Flame Leviathan....and a stray shot to him before the strats can be gone through. Luckily, we were able to defeat him losing only one demolisher - mine. We did manage to beat Flame Leviathan without stunning him. Stunning him involves chucking a dps/healer team on top of the boss and kill all the turrents.

I did think that Flame Leviathan was easier than I anticipated, but then I realized that most of the raid were geared to the teeth...and their vehicles ended up being powerful as a result.

Trouble started not long after the kill and the instance server started lagging. We managed to get some pulls for Razorscale, but the lag prevented us from succeeding. Spells were cast several seconds after they were supposed to, mobs running in all directions, it was chaos. It was also a great learning experience and we are definitely going to take him down when the servers stabilize.

In the end, I left Kaegi trapped in Ulduar. Can't log out, can't leave, and no mobs or anything in the courtyard. Logging in on Agiathas, I was only able to get my prot spec done before Eastern Kingdoms went down...the server following not long afterwards.

All in all, it is a promising patch. Ulduar has a lot of flavor to it and I look forward to reaching Yogg-Saron. The Argent Tournament is a different kind of grind, and will be crowded. Dual spec is simply amazing. While Kaegi may spend a bit more gold to find a DPS spec I am comfortable with, Agiathas will not.

Still so many things to experience and I plan to check them all....if the servers are up when I get home.

Green Proto-Drake!!!!

First, i just have to share this Dark Legacy Comic. (image is taken from that comic)


So when I got home and opened the cracked egg, I just had to rejoice. Reins of the Green Proto-Drake!!! I had to stare at the contents for a good minute before I believed I actually got the mount.

I suppose there is a bit of relief too for never having to get those eggs again. Of course, there is the matter of getting that mount for my alts, but having already gotten one makes waiting for the others feel easier. I would also be done with those big-mouthed freaks on my paladin, but I was made aware of an achievement that would require me to hit exalted with the Oracles first. /sigh

Now to try finding that Time-Lost Proto-Drake. =)

Death Knight: Quick Rune Management Blurb

So I decided to go unholy with Kaegi in Naxx25 to make full use of the T7 set bonus. Naturally, while my DPS was a respectable 3.3k sustained, I am no match to Ascent's more experienced players. But it did show me one of my weaknesses playing a death knight.

With my paladin, I have the habit of spamming the button I need to cast next in my rotation while waiting for the ability's cooldown to wind down. Naturally, this is not best practice, but it is something that I've gotten used to doing and, frankly, especially when all my abilities are on cooldown anyway, it does no harm. My keyboard is unhappy though.

However, using the death knight, I found that spamming the buttons is just not a good idea. Well, not with unholy anyway, or any spec that uses a 2-rune ability as a primary strike.

The problem arises after an Icy Touch -> Plague Strke -> Blood Strike -> Blood Strike -> Scourge Strike rotation. After this rotation, which can take just 5-6 secs to do, my habit, from being frost spec, of spamming the Icy Touch button after the runic dump tends to use up my frost rune and the second one causes the death rune to go back to being a blood rune. Which, in turn, allows for fewer scourge strikes.

I know death knights have been out for a while now, and Kaegi isn't exactly a fresh 80, but the importance of managing her runes just hit me. I do plan to get a UI mod that brings my rune info to the center bottom of my screen...perhaps a HUD addon. This will allow me to just relax and wait for my runes before using any ability. This also might be good practice for other classes as well. I'm sure my keyboard will be happy when I start being smarter, not faster, with using character abilities.