Well 3.2 is alive and kicking. Heroics are being run more frequently then they ever have been. The new 5-man is being run on regular to farm Abyss Crystals and easy epics like there is no tomorrow. Epics gems are far cheaper than I had anticipated, probably because everyone and their dog prepared for it.
And to keep myself busy I have found the glory of Death Knight PvP. I have a lot of folks playing WoW that I know in real life. My wife, my uncle, both of my brother-in-laws, and 3 Â real life friends. One of them being Warbull who you know if you’ve been reading for a while. Well his Paladin and my Hunter made an attempt at doing the 2v2 bracket. It was miserable. After a dismal performance I decided to give the Death Knight a try. I had a single piece of PvP gear and a trinket. And we went like . . . 6-1.
And while the 2v2 bracket starting next season is *almost* meaningless, it was fun to try and play. I am kind of hoping to try 3v3 Hunter, Ret Pally, Holy Pally (once I break down my friend to transfer). While probably not the most ideal comp in the world, I would rather play with friends than advertise in trade chat.
On top of that I have been playing more alts than I have ever played. It’s crazy! My Shaman, as we speak, is a bubble from 40 and dual wielding the shiny BoA daggers in his bag. My Ret Paladin is 26 and capping flags like a mad man. I have a Mage at level 15 just to play with my lowbie friends. And its been incredibly enjoyable. It has been great having a break from the scheduled raids and having to show up on time and the general hullabaloo of raiding.
But that’s not saying I’ve ignored. So far I’ve PuGed the first 2 bosses on normal 10-man with me as the acting raid leader. While its no 25-man heroic, I’ve at least seen it so far.
And of course we have the monster bomb of Onyxia being revamped for the 5 year anniversary of World of Warcraft. Holy crap, 5 years. I’ve been playing that long. But you know what, despite current day PvP imbalances, epics being tossed around like Halloween candy and the like, I’ve loved it. 5 years of awesomeness.
I remember the first time we stepped foot into Onyxia’s Lair. Wipe after wipe. No raid encounter to this caused me to wipe more often than Onyxia did. It was just so . . . Â not like anything else we fought in the game yet. And I tanked her with like . . . . 6,000 life. Back then, tanks learned to stance dance. Our guild had one dwarf priest. He gave me Fear Ward when he could. But other than that, we danced! None of this Berserker Rage in Defensive Stance crap! Spoiled tanks. :)
Tanking Onyxia . . . a long long time ago.
I am quite excited to see some old content revisited, even if it’s just for an anniversary event. It still rocks.
How is 3.2 treating everyone?
I haven’t noticed much of a difference being a MM Hunter, but there does seem to be a handful more BM hunters around. Most of the profession changes were nice, and it seems Ulduar 25 is MUCH easier between the gear upgrades in the new 5, 10 and 25 man instances. However after farming ToC about a million times for various guildies I’m really sick and tired of instances with 5 min talk times followed by a really poor mechanic not just on jousting, but a lack of a threat wipe after you dismount. If they don’t go down near eachother it can be really hard to pull one of the bosses off my healer even as a geared pally tank. Seems kind of silly to me. Other than that, new dailies, new pets, new mounts. What’s not to like?
I know the feeling about the 3 dying near each other. When I did it on my Death Knight, I just pray they are relatively nearby. And I agree, the jousting mechanic/long-winded intro got old fast. :)
I don’t like this patch. The fact that they’ve did a gear reset with Conquest badges (the thing they wanted to prevent, like the BoJs in BC), made running the daily heroic now mandatory for gearing, they’re destroying pre-Wrath raiding by redoing Onyxia’s Lair (and likely other instances and raids too), and the main piece of content for 90% of the raiding guilds is still Ulduar Hard Modes for the next 3-4 weeks.
I always care less about mount changes, the Wintergrasp queueing, or UI changes. I’m just sour at the fact that I end up returning to heroics to get the badges I need at this point in the game. I never even did heroics when I first dinged 80, why should I have to go to lower level content to get gear for the higher level content?
That and all the crazy rumors about Cataclysm that MMOChamp has been spreading. Whether or not they are true isn’t exactly my concern, it’s that there’s essentially no evidence to support their claims and the owner is constantly saying “It takes a lot for me to post something” every time he posts another obscure rumor… blagh.
I don’t consider redoing Onyxia destroying old school raiding. At this stage in the game, you were either a person who raided Onyxia at level 60 or you were not. As the devs have stated, this is nothing but a 5 year anniversary deal. They aren’t trying to twist it around with lore or anything but just a celebration. And I am quite alright with that.
As far as the daily heroic giving Triumph badges, meh. It’s not an effective way to gear. And Conquest dropping from everything is irrelevant. If you didn’t need the gear pre-patch, you don’t need it now. The same gear is available from Conquest badges as it was pre-patch, it’s not like new stuff was added. If you raided Ulduar you have no need to do a single heroic to the change is moot.
As far as the new raid goes, it definitely is lackluster. While I am sure 25 man heroic is harder, the concept is the same and the concept is meh in my opinion.
Cataclysm . . . who can say how accurate any of it is.
I think I only phrased it like that in the heat of the moment, I don’t think Onyxia’s Lair being revamped is going to destroy it exactly. It’s that they are taking a step out of the progression path for those that want to attempt a lvl60 cap’ed guild and progression line. There’s a decent chunk of people out there who are putting a bit of effort to bring that back, and this is setting yet another big change they are going to have to deal with. If they start to redo other preBC 60 instances then yes, they would be destroying it. Trying to play hopscotch becomes immensely harder when you have to jump 6 spaces worth.
I am not sure how I feel about the supposed leaked info and a lot of revamping done to lots of the old instances. While its leaked, assuming it correct, I find it hard to believe that Blizzard wouldn’t add in new content. While as much as I would think fighting a level 80 VanCleef would rock, knowing that there might be a daily for level 80 Gnomeregan, I say screw that. But I’ll wait and see their real plans.
I love this patch! Playing lately has been a blast. I don’t even really care about the badge changes or anything; I don’t feel any need to “gear up” for anything in particular, though it’s nice to know that stuff is there if I need it.
Mount changes for lowbies, new druid form art, it’s all been awesome. Love it!
Drotara,
Would you be willing to do a write up on the pieces you would choose in the reset? What items you think are worth going after if, for example, you were bringing your hunter back from the bench?
Well he’s not completely benched yet. But I am sure I can post something about which ones I would choose.
Silly alliance tank. I rememeber not having this Fear Ward you speak of. =) Horde were always better because we had it harder. Glad you play on the dark side now.
Haha, Onyxia at level 500. I remember how addons interpreted ?? as “OMG LEVEL 500 WTF”.
Tip for ToC, after jousting last one down, just run out. You can then come in and they will be chillin for you to get ready and take them down.
Para looking for a raiding hunter if you’re interested in getting back into it and wanna put in an app :) Eiden recommended you http://www.guildparanoia.com