Woes and Hoes

LFR and Stupidity
Feng.
I hate you.
I remember a long time ago I was flabbergasted by the easiness of LFR and wondered if Blizz really thought players were that stupid. Then I did Feng and realized they may have been right. Can people just simply not run out of the raids when DBM yells at them?!?!?!?!?!? Can they not spread out? Can they not realize that big explosions are bad?!?!?! WHY!?
Every LFR I've done has involved a wipe on Feng. Good groups have only wiped once. Bad groups never get past it. Other crippling factors include low dps and low heals. And if I see one more DPS Bear I might stab them.
Grinding. Grinding. Grinding. 
I'm worn out. And not because the game sucks or has no content. It has too much content. Everyday I log on and feel pressured to do dailies. The dailies are varied enough, but it's a hour long chore session no matter how I look at it. Some of the dailies are fun though. The Rolling one...OMG. I did it over and over again, giggling because it was some of the best fun I'd had in a while. I also enjoyed the Onyx Serpent one where you jump from drake to drake. It reminds me of Northrend, but it's still fun to be grappling around.
Raiding
I'm in a very close knit guild, who has seen rough times and thinning ranks. A few of us want to start raiding but we're having problems getting some people to commit. They either keep changing their main, won't run dungeons unless we are running them (and they do horrible dps), or say they'll be on but not show on. It's frustrating and is making one point clearly obvious- we are going to have to start recruiting.
I don't know how I feel about this, if it's at all possible. We don't even have a set raid going on, how can we build our ranks with nothing.
My problem is more on trust. I have a hard time trusting new people in game, especially those who are not friends of friends. I've been burned too many times for being open, and I'll be damned if that happens again. We haven't had to recruit in a real long time, so it'll be interesting to see if how this all pans out.
That guy
Have you ever had someone in your group/guild/raid who is just a bad player? 
And you can't just exlude him because he's also a close friend of someone vitally important in the guild. So you're basically stuck with him.
I've never really considered myself an elitist, but I definitely have my moments. I did a long time ago when I was raiding with a group of friends. We had a healer who was not exactly very good. Part of it was he just didn't care as much as the rest of it. I'm not sure what part was exactly skill. His numbers were far below mine and our priest, but he still did enough that it wasn't entirely hopeless. That and the priest was a great healer too. I think my only real problem with him was that he always asked who to beacon. Hell if I know, I'm a druid.
This new guy is a whole set of different problems. He is the definition of tunnel vision, but even when that's okay, he still doesn't pull off the numbers he needs to be. What's even more disturbing is that instead of trying to fix the problem, he immediately blames the class and decides to level another alt. He has about 6 alts or so.
I'm trying to convince my raid leader/his friend that it might be best to have him DPS...as a mage...in a corner. But he thinks that as a healer, he'd be less of a problem. As a healer being told that I think I almost faceplanted on my keyboard.
It's also bad enough that during a LFR run, said bad player was called out in the raid and then effectively and loudly kicked. In LFR...
At least it's not all in my head.
When we do finally start raiding, I'll get to see how it all plays out. I'm pretty much in charge of healers, but I've been in this position before, and I almost lost my mind. I'm not good with people not doing their part.
Ultimately, there is a plus side. The player this time is actually dedicated (last guy wasn't so much, which was part of the reason why he sucked), and willing to help. And I can appreciate that.
But is there a line to draw in the sand?
Carrying people is no fun for the people involved.
Farming Master
I farmed up and fished up and finally got my Master of the Ways title. Basically you must master every branch of cooking to gain the title. This is done by leveling the branch from 550-600 and it's a separate skill level outside of cooking. There's one for each main stat, so there's five of them. The amount of meat, veggies and fish needed for each one was quite a bit, and even converting extra meat and veggies to Ironpaw tokens to get what you need is an inefficient method. So I farmed and fished and got this badass title that I think fits a monk perfectly.
I'm actually impressed with the fluidity of the Tillers and the extensiveness of the Cooking this time around. It's a bit of a grind, but now I'm faced with getting 50 Ironpaw tokens to buy my Cooking Bell, which supposedly has MORE dailies, as I teach another the ways of the kitchen. Kinda cool. Just gotta get them damn tokens. :(
Reputation Update
So I am exalted with the Cloud Serpents, Tillers, and Golden Lotus. I did realize that I had worn myself out a lot by doing so many dailies, so I only do three, which may seem like a lot, but it mostly feels like just 2 long ones. The Anglers and the August Celestials are not that long so together they equal one Golden Lotus imo. Man that daily chain was a drag. So glad to be done with that. Shado-pan are okay. They're a but long just because there's a decent amount of traveling. I don't particularly enjoy them, but the ultimate reward will be worth it.
Hopefully, when we start raiding, I'll be feeling happier.
  

I R Disappoint

Today I am going to make a list of things that have disappointed me over the past month or so. My mood has greatly soured over the past day and now my poor blog gets to feel the wrath of it. There might be some spoilers for a few tv shows, but I'll spare you the Dark Knight stuff. And yes I liked the movie but I was still disappointed... Maybe I'll share it wayy down on the bottom.


SWTOR: My first victim.
I was given 7 free days of game time to try our 1.3. While I had fun doing a couple storylines, I wasn't overall impressed. My biggest disappointment in Swtor is the Legacy system. I don't like that I have to spend credits on some of the more wanted perks. I don't like that its ridiculous amount, even though credits aren't that hard to come. I don't like that, despite this, nothing has changed. No more subscription for me.

Game of Thrones will feature book 3, A Storm of Swords, in two seasons instead of one. 
As the cast list grows and grows, the storylines become more complex and drawn out. So yeah, it's no surprised that A Storm of Swords is getting two seasons. But at this rate, I'm going to be like in my 30s by the time the seasons finish. And whose to say that other books won't get split up. From the looks of it, A Dance with Dragons is like three times the size of A Game of Thrones. I only mention my concern/disappointment because I worry about the shows longevity. As the show gets more expensive to make (them dragons and dire wolves be growing) I worry it will become more of a burden to make and they may stop making it.

Final Fantasy Versus XIII may have been canceled. But we don't really know.
The only game (besides a possible Kingdom Hearts 3) I've been looking forward to console and Ps3 -wise was FF Versus XIII. The characters intrigued me, the battle system, what little I knew, made me wanna try it. I loved the gothic feel they were going for. But we haven't heard anything in a while, and the game has been obviously missing at game cons and showcases. Square only seems interested in pushing out more Lightning games, which doesn't appeal to me at all. I hated FFXIII. Aside from the fact that it was damn beautiful, I thought the characters were boring or annoying (cough Vanille cough), the battle system wasn't for me, and I didn't much care for the story. I instead long for the days of old Squaresoft and the amazing RPGS they used to release. To make matters worse, they haven't even really said yay or nay to FF Versus XIII, so we don't even know for sure if its done for. But most sources point to yes. Square's having some sort of party/announcement thing soon so I'm sure we'll be put out of our misery soon enough.
Speaking of disappointment...the one recent game I would buy of theirs, Theatrythm Final Fantasy is Nintendo 3DS exclusive. Considering I wouldn't even play any of the games in 3D makes the console a waste of money for me...but that game looks soo much funnnn.

Spoilers below for True Blood and The Dark Knight Rises

Updates and Ranting

Hello
Yeah, it's been a while. I have actually had a lot of updates, both within game and outside, but there have been so many things going on I haven't had the time to blog. In fact, all free time goes to sleeping.

If I'm gonna be wrong, I'm gonna assume the worst./ Post 4.01: Druid

I have to hand it to Blizzard. Tree heals (although it may be a mistake) as of now, are pretty freakin' sweet. This may come from the fact that now, some healing classes (particularly Pally and Druids) are completely OP. With my gear (about a 5.8 gs) and the mana talents (because at this moment, longevity is important to me first, since I know I can outheal my gear) I'm sitting at a comfortable 43k mana unbuffed. Even when faced with a need for massive heals, I still barely get close to the 40k mark. Honestly, this will change when I actually hop into ICC tonight, so I haven't changed around my spec yet.

Efflorescence is by far my favorite new thing for restoration druids. It's powerful; when coupled with Swiftmend Glyph, it's completely worth it, and it also takes advantage of our mastery (because there has to be a hot for Swiftmend to work). It's also incredibly pretty.

I have had a difficult time adjusting to relying solely on HOTs for raid and group heals. I also have a difficult time remembering to keep Lifebloom up on the tank (I miss Healbot btw. It's literally hiding from me...). Because, as far as my raid's composition goes, I'll never be a tank healer, using things like Nourish and Healing Touch are pretty much out of the question at the moment. Nourish sucks now. At least without 200 extra mastery points (my friend loves nourish on tanks with 200 mastery points <.<). It's a nearly 2+ second cast and does half the healing it used to. Because I don't plan on tank healing, it is a waste. I do like that Nourish renews Lifebloom, and this coupled with the new Replenishment, makes it worth it.

My stats for the most part, haven't really changed. I switched out a cloth piece for a leather piece that ended up exchanging haste for crit. I was thinking about maybe reforging it, but because of the HOT's ability to crit now, it's not entirely useless. My HOTS actually crit a lot. Because I haven't been using Parrot or MSBT, I got to see each individual HOT blow up on my screen with the normal Blizz battle text. Omg. Is that annoying, having green everywhere. But damn! My HOTS crit a lot. :O

For the most part, I'm not having any problems at all. The first run ( a guild run through H FoS) was a little shaky for me, simply because I kept wanting to toss Nourish out after a Rejuvenation. Just plain habbit. Also, having to rely on Clique with the Blizzard unit frames was no fun. I personally don't like Clique, but it was all that would work. I switched to VuhDo because both Healbot and Grid aren't working. VuhDo is pretty nice. A good combination of both Healbot and Grid, but I need to figure out if I can change the health bars to Class colors. It's driving me crazy that it's all green. (I rely heavily on Class colors to know who is possibly doing what, and also, it helps me AOE heal the melee.)

We'll see how tonight goes. I'm not sure if we'll delve into Heroics or just do a basic run to see how the new stuff goes. One of the Tanks/Raid leaders mentioned to me getting down 10/12 tonight, but that means we're not doing heroics...I think.

Some negatives:
I still miss Tree form a lot. I feel really bulky as a tauren. I miss that little waddle.
My Gm needs to suck it. I'm sick of him defending Blizzard's decision to craft classes in preparation for Cataclysm, but expect us to continue in ICC content. Healing is all about reflex. The health increase hasn't really deterred the damage people take, so we still have to heal to some extent with the old style. As a druid this hasn't been much of a problem. But...as a shaman. well that's for another post.
I also have no reason as a druid at the moment to DPS. Actually even if I took the Fury of Stormrage talent (wrath procs free starfire) to reach the extra Clearcasting proc talent, it doesn't proc because I use more Starfire. It's because I use Lifebloom. Really dumb...

um btw.

A Cry for Help (Teen Mom)

I have to really get this off my chest.
I'm incredibly disappointed in MTV right now. They need to really drop Amber from their Teen Mom show. And even report her to Child Services...

Today's episode (2.10, Hello and Goodbye) was just a second show of Amber's domestic abuse against her baby daddy Gary. And I'm not just talking about the punch she threw at him on today's episode, which is the second time she was physically abusive towards him. Nor am I talking about the shocking first time she was in episde 1.03, Fallout, where she threw him against a wall, choked him and then hit him. I'm talking about her constant yelling, her abusive language, and her horribly bad, but horribly obvious anger management problem.

Amber is a constant hot mess. She is always yelling at her child, always yelling at Gary, then sits around wallowing in self pity when she doesn't get her way. And while Gary isn't daddy-of-the-year, he has a lot more patience (although possibly because of lack of balls) when dealing with Amber. She really doesn't show remorse for her actions.

She throws Gary out of her apartment (screaming the entire time) and then tells her daughter that her daddy abandoned her...that just makes me sick.

Then we have the season 1 reunion episode with Dr Drew, where he confronted Amber about her attack on Gary, and she just laughed about it. Laughed. And then acted like it was no big deal. Only when Dr. Drew pointed out that this was domestic abuse did she give a half-assed apology to Gary.  

I hate when Amber cries (granted...I'm laughing at her when she cries because she looks so fuckn hilarious).
I think she enjoys the attention that Teen Mom gives her. She really needs to go.
No matter how many pathetic little "domestic abuse" mini PSAs they add during the commercial breaks after Amber's tyrants, it's wrong to allow her to continue this way. How can MTV not do something about this, beyond just some stupid little infomercial at the end?

I hate that I wasted this time writing this about a person who doesn't deserve our attention. But that poor child certainly does.

You can show someone whose shitty (like Farrah), hate her, but then feel better as you watch her grow and start taking responsibility. Then you have someone like Amber, whose antics may seem great for Jersey Shore, but not for a show called Teen Mom. That child deserves better.

Video (courtesy of Youtube) showing Amber choke and hit Gary.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d_HvDNlhiWE

I don't care if she s a girl and his a big huge man. This is completely and utterly wrong. (and domestic abuse...)