Why I quit WOW \ The issues with World of Warcraft: Part 1

Greeting Musers

    I mentioned in my last post I quit WOW because the consequences of playing WOW were no longer worth the benefits. When I attended my IT end of year meeting & mentioned this to another ex-player he concurred this was the same reason he had quit. Though we briefly spoke about it, we began to discuss the issues with the game that lead us to this choice.

    Before I begin though I need to explain my list. As an IT systems geek, I have to look at the big picture in order to solve problems & to grade issues. This has lead me to be cold at times when a user is having problems with a BlackBerry, but as they're bosses boss knows I have to support all of our company's BlackBerry's for the America's. But it does give me an insight into the how's and why's on system's, such as World of Warcraft.

    The main issue with WOW is the same issue many other systems face. It was built to solve a problem, was hugely successful & is now being forced to do things that the original designers never intended it to do. It has attracted user's who were not familiar to the architecture of the system & had to be adjusted to support them while at the same time keeping it's original user's happy.WOW has now become bloatware.

     Before I go into this lets talk about why WOW rocked. 1st  though MMO 101: All subscription based MMO use a standard currency: Time. He who can put in the most hours (or who can afford to pay someone to put the hours in for him,) is He who is on top. When WOW launched in 2004, it was successful because it greatly improved on the MMO Currency exchange rate . Prior to WOW MMO's were awful in this regard.You don't get a term like poopsocking if a game  is an enjoyable romp in the woods! WOW's designers took the currency rate & cut it in half . A dungeon that took 4 hours in Everquest now only took 2 hours. A raid that took 8 hours now only took 4 etc. This made it possible for what i think was WOW biggest success: The democratization of MMO's

    By cutting down on the amount of time required to play the game WOW opened up MMO's to people who had avoided them due to the draconian requirements. A 25 year old male gamer who avoided EQ\UO because they had a full time job, social life etc. could now afford the time requirements of WOW. Yes he would have to give up something else to play the game but now he could delve into the MMO environment that he had avoided for fear of the consequences. While this was in itself a tremendous improvement. WOW greatest success was far more  sublime.

    Over the years people have written about WOW's success and listed the many things that the game improved on compared to existing MMO's I have found though that with successful systems it's always the unassuming things that lead to their success. For example Facebook over took My Space because it was easier to use. That's it - End of Story. It was an easier for someone with little computer experience to use Facebook than it was to setup a MySpace page.

   WOW became the top dog because it allowed people with no MMO experience to start playing the game without jumping through hoops. Prior to WOW required a user to either a.) Know someone who would help you along b.) Read up prior to setting up a character or c.) Suffering  from griever's or PK's until you learned the ropes. WOW changed this. People who had never played a video game were able to load it, login & learn how to play. This feature + the cut down of time requirements + all the other improvement that WOW presented is why it still has 12 million user's playing it.
    In my next post I'll go into the details of how these great improvement have lead to it's current sad state
Until another day
The Musing Moonkin

Why I quit WOW: A farewell to Moonkin Musings (sniff, sniff)

Greetings Musers:

   Well it's been over six months since I last posted. It may have been another six months if a reader hadn't emailed me to see why the posts stopped in June. But that /player poke gave me the urge to put what's been mulling in my head for a while, but it really came to fruition this past Tuesday when I sat with a co-worker who's also an ex-wow player & we mused over why we quit the game & what we saw as the critical flaws in WOW. Granted we're both IT people so our views may be a little biased but he did agree with my points on the issues & the logic of our decisions.

    I quit WOW back in August. Initially it was a response to a crisis of my own creation, & as a self-flagellation to the death of one of my pet chinchillas. I thought that if I had paid more attention to the little puff then maybe the issues he had would've have been more noticeable. and I could've saved him.

    But as I've made peace with the fact that 1.) he was sick for a long time & 2.) his breeder stopped breeding chinchillas due to the issues with her herd. I forgave myself for his Death. Still though I quit WOW. 

    I have to admit it was very hard, the urge to play was strong. And oddly the person I had initially quit for, (my wife) actually encouraged me to play. Her argument was that it was my way of de-stressing & as long as I handled it in moderation she was fine with it. So I reloaded the game, & started up again. Then one night while I was in the middle of a daily quest for the Argent Crusade, she tells me that she wishes I wasn't play WOW again & that she liked me when I was "Off the Dragon." I promptly shut down & proceeded to delete my alt characters (even my Tauren Druid!) & left poor Neren alone on the character list. 
     In addition I also had to remove the client from my work PC due to our company's IT security audit. While this was never an issue prior (hence 7 IT staffers having WOW loaded & being told of the record it didn't worry the security officer since his scans of our PC's had shown no misuse other than  the WOW client.) because of the audit the various 'unauthorized apps' that we had been allowed to use on our PC had to be removed so that we didn't get any write-ups. 
    So no WOW on my Work PC & no access on my home PC did help with the withdrawal,  but don't get me wrong there have been many times in the past four months I've wanted to play again. When I heard about the release of Cataclysm, when I had a really rough day, when I was by myself on a Friday or Saturday night because my wife was watching our nephew's or nieces. But I didn't start playing again. It wasn't that the game was boring, It was that I realized that WOW is a lifestyle. I'll repeat that last point: World of Warcraft is a lifestyle and like any lifestyle it forces you to make choices. I got to a point where the choices that you have to make in order to play WOW were not worth the consequences.

    Before I continue I need to make this point. For most of this decade I practiced & taught Aikido. One of the many things I got out of my practice was the following: All choices have  good & bad consequences. When I started back in 2001 my girlfriend at the time encouraged me to practice, I had wanted to study Aikido since early 2000. The consequence of this encouragement was that within a month of my practice the Children's Aikido instructor felt I had the right temperament to help with the Kids class. I could've said no but hey he was a Nidan & I was frankly scared of saying no to him. 
    Because I started helping with Kids class I could no longer go out on Friday nights with her & our friends since I had to be at the Dojo bright & early Saturday morning to clean it before classes started.  The one time she came to meet me at the Dojo on a Friday night to go out to Dinner became an uncomfortable hour of suffering for her since she had gone out to a bar prior & in her words "felt dirty" coming into the Dojo smelling of cigarettes & alcohol. In retrospect her choice of encouraging me to practice Aikido & my choice of pursuing the apprentice path lead to eventual break-up.

     In that respect WOW is no different. The choices I had to make to be a successful player on my server were no longer worth the consequences. This is why I've been able to resist the urge to re-login; I could've reup'd my account but it wasn't worth the effects in the real world. I'll cover these effects in my follow up post. Until then consider what WOW has given you vs. what it's denied you. If your like me you may find that it's no longer the end all be all

Until another day
The Musing Moonkin

Brain Calgonated but who am I now?

Good morning musers!

I don't have words for the lack of blogging over the last month. I seriously underestimated what the tutoring schedule would do to my brain. Don't get me wrong, I have no regrets, but I think that I needed to be more honest with myself. If I can't play WOW then I can't blog about WOW. Blogging requires a minimum commitment of WOW time in order to aggregate enough events to make a decent post.

So you may be asking wth is up with the Title for this post? Well this weekend, which was absolutely lovely if I may say so, I spent with my loving wife & just relaxed and let my brain soak, no major thinking no students just mental calgon. It was just lovely. To top it off, my honey went to the gym after Sunday's festivities. Which gave me some uninterrupted WOW time. After banging out some dailies, I see on guild chat someone looking for an arena partner & I find myself saying on gchat, " I'd love to get a 2x2 or 3x3 team"

This leads to my first major change since I did a Major Post. I LOVE PVP! I dunno maybe it was all the stress of the last month, but I found BG's WG & now arena fun & relaxing.

But this is so odd for me, I was so anti-pvp for so long that my friend Doug busted my boomkin balls for wanting to do a 2x2 with him. He ripped into me how he had begged me to be in his 3x3 back in the BC days I had snubbed him. This was of course when he was scoring the Green Trophy Tabard of the Illdari, on Sat afternoon but I digress.

Onto other items of note

Guild dramarama: I'm still in Knights of the Blade, but I may be looking to leave, there has been guild leadership issues over the last month which have lead to progression issues & other items. I do like all of the people in the guild, but with the summer coming I may look to greener pastures. Still I may stick around & see if they're able to shake this off. Stay tuned for more dramarama

On the state of cowardice: This has to do with VOA 25 & Mr. Emalon. I've noticed a level of cowardice towards Emmy that makes me shake my head & wish for the good old days when I got yelled at for being a boomkin. Here is what I've seen since his arrival on the scene

1.) VOA 25 Pug gets organized

2.) People wipe on 1st Emalon mob due to n00bishness

3.) Players whine that we should do the easier boss 1st

4.) if easier boss is done 1st, whiners leave raid after scoring gear\badges.

5.) If Emalon is done 1st whiners leave raid.

Hopefully as players get better geared etc, this pattern will VOT, but it is leading to gear check's as a response to players asking to be invited then bailing on emalon.

That's it for today

Until another day

The Musing Moonkin

Remember Me?

Greetings Musers
Yes I know I've slacked on the blog for way too long! I feel so bad about it! Even though I have on my treo to post every four days, actually finding the time to post with my schedule was nigh impossible. I even had a couple of good ideas to boot!
In Any case with the slowdown in SAT work I should have mental juices to update my blog more frequently!
Until Then
The Musing Moonkin

Won't anyone think of the children?!?!

Greeting fellow musers!

In general I hate it when I'm right, since it usually isn't good news, but alas regarding my post about Noblegarden\Children's Week\Argent Tournament screwing up day to day patterns on my server has been proven correct. Only 1 out of 25 flasks of endless rage sold on the AH. Not because they were overpriced but because no one was raiding. I don't know what is going on with other servers\guilds but my guild has taken to raiding on Friday\Saturday to compensate for all of the the holiday's. I wouldn't mind this schedule except that Friday is now a teaching night for me & Saturday is off limits unless the wife is out & about. An important note gentle reader's it really is good to set days that you will not raid unless X criteria is met (in my case X is wife is away on business or out with friends.)

I am feeling ambivalent regarding the achievement's for Children's week. I don't know if it's because I'm on a dark humor binge ATM, or because I think that they took a event that was I felt was very sweet & added some dark items to it. (Hail To The King, Baby is just plain dark IMHO.) I've been mulling over some other changes that I think would fit this dark, bleak version of Children's week

1.) Orphans brought into Battlegrounds, Instanced Dungeons or Daily Quests where damage can incur can be killed. So you've accepted responsibility for your orphan how can you not expect that bringing your ward into a dangerous environment wouldn't have consequences. What did you think was going to happen? It's a kid for frak's sake. I feel that this will make earning the achievements involving combat much more valuable.

2.) New Achievement! I've singled out the kids who are mean to me: We all know that children; esp children who are orphan's due to War, Catastrophe etc can be mean to the 'new kid'. Show your love of your orphan by helping him\her get revenge on the kids who tease him at the orphanage.

3.) New Achievement! Laying Flowers On Their Graves: Help your orphan find closure with the senseless death of their parents by taking them to their grave\final resting place of their parents.

If you can think of any other changes that can be made to children's week let me know & I'll post them

Until another day

The Musing Moonkin

3.1. Aftershocks: Herd Mentality in full swing

Good Morning Musers,

I had this minor moment on insight yesterday after getting the Noblegarden title outta the way. I went over to the AH in IF to post some flasks & get some mats to make more flasks when I noticed that there were barley any flasks or mats for sale. Oddly price gouging of the assrouge variety was not in swing (though this was rectified by last night; frost lotus was up to 140% of market value on fenris's alliance ah's)

I then realized that while I was posting my wares that no one was actually in IF, players on Fenris were either wrapped up completing Noblegarden, perusing advancement in the Argent Tournament or god forbid trying to get both done at the same time. My curiosity intrigued I scanned the AH and discovered that it's cupboards were not fully stocked. There was gear on sale of course but not the rows and rows that normally would be available to peruse.

I'm still trying to explain this logically, I think what I saw on my server and may be happening on other server's is a classic example of herd mentality. If enough people stop doing their daily routine to pursue a special event (holiday, sporting, etc.) It will affect day to day needs whether in a community or on a virtual world.

The question I have though is how long will this disruption continue. My gut says that with Children's week Starting on Saturday we will still see disruptions with day to day server needs for at least two weeks. By then people will have done enough Argent Tournament quests that they will start to pursue their usual goals.

Until another day

The Musing Moonkin

A Noble Idea

Good Morning Musers!
Well it was noble of me to think that I could keep a hard 'n fast writing schedule, but RL reared it's ugly head and prevented me from keeping up beyond daily tweets. This was compounded by the fact that two server events were going on & I had guild runs to do & I had real life obligations.
So let's see what's been going on
1.) Naxx 25 Cleared: Yes I stayed up till 2am on Sat to finally knock this achievement off the list. As you may be aware I tutor all day Saturday, So I had been up since 6am and had taught 3 kids that day. (AKA it wasn't a quiet day for me.) I actually passed out during phase 3 of the KT fight. It took my GM screaming at me to move out of the Purple Rings O Death to wake me up. While Naxx may be easysauce I firmly believe now that it's best done either as an afternoon event on the weekend or over two nights. There's just something that happens around the 2nd wing were people start going AFK. I don't know what it is but suddenly people will post bio BRB, afk phone etc.
2.) Gear Upgrades: This has been bittersweet for me, I tend to get attached to my gear & I set goals on what I'd like to replace with what etc, but sometimes you have to go with what drops. I had to make peace with that and take what the random die roll generated.
3.) Petopia: I do love holiday events esp when it get's me closer to my goal of 75 pets!!! I have grown quite fond of my Argent Page as it is quite nice to have a pet to kneels before you periodically!.

That's it for now. I'm off to enjoy a tasty Lunch!
Until Another Day
The Musing Moonkin

Feeling like a plucked chicken!

Good afternoon musers

First off I hope that your server has finally become stabilized. Fenris became somewhat stable last night, though there were still some hiccups here & there.

Well I wanted to post my current talent build but the armory isnt' updated. Needless to say right now I feel very un-moonkinie (if that is a word) I took the points I put into Typhoon & Starfall & put them into Imp IS & Imp FF. While this does up the dps across the board i feel like I've cut some of myself off. I know that Typhoon really is for PVP & Starfire is situational at best but still I miss them.

Normally I don't post questions to my readers but for those souls that do mull over my scribblings have you noticed this feeling before when you sacrifice BOOM for viability?

Until Another Day

The Musing Moonkin

3.1 Quick Thoughts

1.) Job Well Done!

As always Blizzard takes what worked & didn't work in previous major patches and improves on them.

Positives

- Argent Tournament is fantastic. What got me was the fact that you have to earn the right to compete in the tourney & from what I can gather this takes at least 3-4 days to acquire all the tokens. This means that all day players only have a slight advantage against casuals.

- In addition it opens up a number of items and achievements. I like the fact you can trade tokens for faction rep.

- Mounts Swimming is fun, hilarious & ever so useful.

- Fishing quests actually make sense, though the question for me is do I or don't I focus fire on getting that Turtle Mount?

- Completing the Epic Flight Form quest line is now a feat of strength. Oh Yeah!

- Level 213 idols being available for purchase. Goodbye Idol of Steadfast Renewal! Hello Idol of the Shooting Star!

Negatives

Major

- Mana Regen Nerf: Before I vent, I have a feeling this nerf will itself be nerfed. I understand the dev's view that mana regen was way too high (it kinda reminded me of a sci-fi weapon's power pack being drained then quickly replenished) but still the 40% nerf was a bit much. My guess is that it was nerfed that hard so they can 'adjust' it to say 20%.

- No Alchemy Daily Quests WTF?!!? I was so looking forward to this. I am seriously considering giving up my Alchy Stone for a epic trinket now.

- Dual-Spec: I'm going to have to agree with a couple of my cohorts, this was the worst 1000gp I have ever spent in world of warcraft. In my opinion, the concept of Dual Spec is good, the idea behind it is good, the implementation of it is good. Where it fails is the reality of players. What I saw last night was scores of alliance players on Fenris 'expanding their minds' only to say a few minutes later WTF, when am I ever going to be Shadow Priest or a Ret Pally.

Here's my point. To be an effective player, you need to know your class & spec. Unfortunately that takes time. There's no way around it, you want to be a good PVP'r your going to be in the battlegrounds or arenas for hours, you want to raid end game? Expect to put in hours reading strat working out theorycraft, determining what is sacrificed for what etc.

I can back this up with my own experiences Bear Tanking last summer, reading how to feral tank is one thing, but actually doing it took about six weeks before I had it down in normal dungeons.

I guess this ties back to my belief that once you find your ideal self, you should stick to it. In the end you find your alts unsatisfying.

Minor

Mini-Map needs to be fixed couldn't see my arrow on the new one.

That's it for now

Until another day

The Musing Moonkin

Moonkin Fury, Dual-Spec Delight & My First Poll

Good Morning Musers!

Wow, all I have to say is wow. The last couple of days have been chaos in both game & real life. For starters I scored big in Naxx 25. I mean huge I won the heroic key to the Eye of Eternity Raid. Actually I didn't win it, another player beat my roll of a 86 with a 94, but he had already won a trinket from Sapphiron & he had forgotten the raid rule of 1 item per boss. Oh joy of joys!

I also won my tier 7.5 chest piece. As of last night my wrath is now hitting between 5.8k & 6.2K! & my Starfire is Criting right below 11k However I refuse I mean absolutely refuse to put the Powerful Stats enchant on it. The reagents for the enchant are absurd! 4X dream shard & abyss crystal?!!? Sorry but the difference between that and Super Stats (+8 vs +10) don't justify the cost.

Now onto new business. 3.1 is launching today, I am both excited and nervous. One one end I am kinda curious to try Feral Tanking, but at the other end, I have to agree with a co-worker who said that Dual-Spec allows groups to Spackle in a player to fill a void but that player will not have the experience to effectively preform the role that he's now assuming. What I think we'll see is a lot of almost WOW's funniest home video's moments such as a holy pally tanks and gets his ass handed to him etc etc for a couple weeks until players get their bearings.

Lastly I've posted my first poll! Yes should I dual spec (and if so which blend) or should I stay true & stick to a single spec. I look forward to your input!

Until another day

The Musing Moonkin

Support your local merchant: Thoughts on buyer's psychology in WOW

Good Morning Musers!

First off; Yes I know I've been negligent on my posts over the last couple of days! To remedy this I've setup a Blog schedule. My goal is that Moonkin Musings will now be updated every four days. My hope is that this will remedy a issue that I've seen with my posting. I go through spats of grand ideas and then months of drivel!

Ok now that's out of the way. Onto new business. My experiment in working the auction house has been a profitable success. I won't say my coffer's are overflowing but I'm getting to the point where I can actually look at a BOE level 213 epic & mull over actually purchasing it. I haven't though I need to have money to make money, & alchemy while profitable isn't a cash cow the same way enchanting is!

Also while having a Mule has it's merits, I've found that a mule doesn't cut it after a certain point. I'm not saying that Mules don't have their place in the server economy, but they have their limits. Mules conflict directly with a need that a buyer has trust.

When you use an Alt to conduct business beyond X scale (X being the value of the item but for arguments sake lets us the 150 gold level that blizzard will be adding a confirm to in 3.1), it adds a a level of skepticism\mistrust to the transaction. This level directly increases to the amount of gold that is needed to purchase the goods or services.

OK so you may be thinking why? Well my hypothesis is quite simple. Just like in real life we're just more comfortable buying from people we know then people we don't know. We're able to rationalize away this discomfort with small purchases, but as purchases increase in cost, we get more nervous about the purchase. We want to buy the goods from someone we know, someone who we can go back to if we need something else etc. Also with large purchases, negotiations will take place. If an item is on the AH for 2800gp, it may sell it may not sell, however if you know the person and tell them I'll buy it for 2500gp, then they've still made a sale.

The question for me though is how far will real-world economic psychology permeates into MMORPG's will it get to the point where brand loyalty comes into play? Will people forgo gaming to be farmers for a player who's amassed enough gold to pay game salaries? I suppose only time will tell.

- Until Another Day

The Musing Moonkin

Finacial Idealism vs. Reality: WOW Style!

Greetings musers!

Today's topic is something near and dear to my heart the sordid topic of coin! Unless you're a new reader, you already know that I work two jobs to make my financial goals. desire, intent and dedication to succeed financially. Well my friends this desire, intent and dedication to succeed financially has finally crossed over into wow! I pulled in about 1k in auctions between Sunday morning and afternoon, and put more auctions up this morning as well. I know to some of you this is a non-news as you're already masters of high finance. But to me this is a big deal. In fact it's a HUGE deal.

You see in my ideal self I'm beyond money. I'm almost aesthetic about it I have enough, I'm not greedy I feel like I should rise above it. This view helps me keep WOW in perspective (as I've said to people who've I've given gold to "It's just digital imaginary numbers"

In the real world I was once the same way, but reality, hard cruel pwing reality taught me otherwise. Frankly, I was almost delusional. Part of this was my own self-deception, and part was due to my grooming. I was being skilled up that I would be a learned man, a man who's skills and knowledge would mean that I could afford to have others watch out for me. This belief was re-enforced by several factors. The primary one was my upbringing I had literally been raised by my family with no concept of finances beyond the abstract, and thinking back on the matter I even recall that when I was curious about daily money matters my family eschewed me for not focusing on my studies

So now we flash forward, I'm in my mid-late 20's and practicing Aikido on a daily basis, I share a apartment with a roommate & I've become fairly self-sufficient. Still though my family is telling me that while I was self-sufficient now, after I grew up a bit more I would have other take care of my finances for me. To add to this In my martial arts practice I saw what my family discussed actually being carried out. First in my readings on Aikido (O-Sensei's son handled the dojo day to day business,) and in my own dojo with my Sensei's wife handling money matters. After all they were above petty dirty common details like payment & left that to others (course now I don't think highly of this.) but back then it made perfect sense to me.

I think the high point of this way of approaching finances was in 2003 when I bought my car. I didn't negotiate for it, I didn't haggle for it, the whole transaction was handled by my family. I came in, shook the dealers hand, went into the finance office, signed on the line and drove off. Of course though I learned (as many creative people do) that if you have others handle your fiance's hijinks's will ensue. So I learned grew up moved on. etc. etc.

Except in World of Warcraft.

In WOW a war has raged about in-game finances between my ideal self and real self for a long long time. I really noticed though back when 2.4 launched. Like now I was teaching 15-20 hours a week, and because of the requirements to raid I only had time to do SSO dailies. After a couple of weeks of SSO dailies I found that I had a huge surplus if money (at the time over 5k.) I didn't know what to do with all this gold, so I blew a lot of it: 20 slot bags, recipes, pets etc. I then went horde for the summer & spent the fall farming a wintersaber mount & doing old school raids since I had already seen the WOTLK beta.

After lich king launched. I found a comfortable balance of gold (1800-2k) I didn't feel rich, but I didn't feel poor either. I was OK. I knew that unlike other players who focused on heroic runs & raids so much that that they were perpetually broke.

I was happy like this until yesterday, something changed I don't know what it was but something clicked that synced my real world views on finances with my digital views on them. I do know what the catalyst for it was though. Yesterday morning I had an early tutorial (9am) so I decided to farm wintergrasp for eternals.

As I was farming I found out from my guild that eternals were no longer were as valuable as they had been. This stunned me, because I had a stockpile of them in my bank in case I needed them to trade for goods or services. But instead of bemoaning how things change, I decided to sell all my eternals on the ah along with the other items of vaule that were just gathering digital dust. In the mix I checked flasks and saw that I could make a killing selling them. And for a moment I hesitated because part of me wanted to be above commerce, but I then reconciled my ideal with the real. Between tutorials I logged in checked the mailbox and found 1000 gold waiting for me.

So today's another day & now Fenris has a new elixir master selling his wares on the market.
Where I'll be tomorrow though is another matter

Until another day
The Musing Moonkin

A Reminder about successful raiding

Greetings Musers! I hope your weekend is fairing well whether in the real world or the realm of Azeroth!

Last night I was permitted a very rare and precious treat: Raiding on a Saturday night with the missus home (Thank you HBO for showing Sex and The City: The Movie!) My GM was also thrilled since I'm a dependable dps'er who can off-heal should the situation arise. In my joy of this celestial alignment, I setup the home office to be raiding central for the night and also setup the living room to be as cozy as possible for my love.

Now while she had a wonderful time enjoying the urban adventures of Samantha, Carrie, Charlotte and Miranda, I was stuck in a wipe fest of epic scale in Naxxramas's Construct Quarter. After 2 hours of impotent attempts on Grobbulus our GM called the raid. (Ironically this occurred right when the movie was over, which is leading me to think that some collusion between the GM's wife & my wife may be taking place, but I digress.)

With any bad raid night there is usually a little fallout. Once it settled (a couple of protest gquits etc.) we voiced our thoughts etc. over vent. I gave my feedback on what I saw: raiders goofing off and not focusing on the task at hand.

This leads me to an issue that I'm seeing with WOW 3.x: The Raiding dial has been turned down to where it can actually hurt Guild Progression. While I applaud Blizzard's decision to allow everyone to raid, it has also matatisized piggybacking: Players who are carried by the raid group.

Let me be clear Piggybacking has existed since WOW was launched. But while in the 1.x & 2.x builds this was relegated to one player in the raid it's now spread to 3-6 players in the group. This stops raid progression dead in it's tracks since there are group cohesion fights such as Grobbulus that require everyone to be on their toes.

So as a reminder

To be a successful raider in WOW (in order of importance)

1.) Arrive on Time,

Commit to raids to you can attend & do not interfere with real life obligations or commitment.

- This means ready to go 15 min before the raid.

2.) Be Prepared

- Gear fully repaired & the correct gear\trinkets for the raid.

- All Potions, Flasks, bandages for yourself

- Talent's spec'd correctly (if you've been doing PVP make sure to switch back to Raiding Spec)

- Real Life, Bowels\Bladder voided, pets taken care off, chores taken care off, food\drink by pc ready to go. Nicotine ingested before raid.

- Read Strat watch video of fight before raid.

- Make sure headphones\mic working

- UI's set for raiding.

- Vent working

3.) Be Focused

- Game sound off or very low

- Background IRL sound low

4.) Have Fun

Until another day

The Musing Moonkin

A Long Overdue update

Good Afternoon Musers!
Well I sit here at my office desk unable to do some of my tasks because a certain website I use to purchase equipment is down! So I figured it's time for a long overdue update
First off Congrats to my friend Sheilds (who's still in KoC) his wife had a lovely baby girl Monday! Mom & Baby are doing fine & Mom let Dad play a little bit whilst the baby did sleep. I've already told him that I'll gladly take his toon!
Secondly I didn't listen to my own advice & I did a full clear of Naxx 10 Man yesterday after noon from 12:30 - 4:15pm. I think it's my fate that I happened to luck out and come across these types of runs at the oddest moments. I pulled in my friend Sindel to be the off tank & he lucked out & got the Heroic Shoulder Token that he'd been looking for months. I scored the SoulBlade and my Tier 7 Helm + 15 BOH's so it wasn't a bad run IMHO.
Now the question is what to do next. I really don't have the time to raid seriously for at least two more months. But at the same time while I like the new alt I'm leveling he's not my idealized self I use him to work out focus and calmness in a raid environment.
Contemplate on this I must
Until another day
The Musing Moonkin

Twitter Blogging

Good Morning Loyal Followers!!!

Due to my work schedules, life commitments & desire to play WOW, I find myself lacking the time to make a coherent post. I know sounds odd, but I like to have clear concise posts that are significant and not just drivel. Seriously there's enough of these on the net & I don't want to add to them!

Luckily I've found out the joy's of twittering!!! So if you enjoy my blog posts, you can follow my tweets, these are more regular (several a day) and are still WOW based.

Until another day!

The Musing Moonkin

Thoughts on Successful Guilds

Good Day Musers.



I hope you're awaiting 3.1 as eagerly as I am. When I saw it download onto my laptop Sunday I was overjoyed at the promise of new content. However I don't think it's going live tomorrow. My gut says that it still needs more brew time on the PTR.

The following post come from my decesion yesterday to gquit Knights of Camelot & my choice to throw my hat in with the Knights of the Blade. Some of this post comes from a discussion I had with a Guild Leader from KoC yesterday afternoon offline.

If you've followed my blog you know that for a period of 2008 I ran Ronin; I had been involved in WOTLK beta & knew that the old ways of wow were going away. When WOTLK went live I stayed guildless for a while but came to a point where I needed a guild. I decided to join The Crystal Dawn based of my experiences with a couple of their members, but soon learned that casual attitude ran too deep for my liking.

I was then presented an opportunity to join my friend's guild, The Knight's of Camelot. The first couple weeks were great, but Feb to March I noticed a disturbing trend where there simply wasn't enough people to even do 10 man content online. This didn't bother me much because for the last couple of weeks I was simply too busy with real life quests to spend time on virual life quests.

Then this saturday I had an opening (my wife away on business), and an invitation for 25 man Naxx. I signed up, took care of my chores & was ready, only to find that people who signed up were no shows. Frustrated, I was going to run heroics or try 10 man naxx when a guild member with an even busier schedule than myself invited me into another guilds 25 man naxx run. I raidied Sat night until 1:15am EST and cleared two wings. I also recieved a guild invite which I didn't really take seriously ATM. Sunday morning though I woke up logged in while having coffee, and decided after being tempted by the guild membership to gquit & roll with KoB.

Anyway here's my thoughts on what makes a successful guild. I'm going to try to distill it.

A successful guild is run like a business that's owned by friends. That is everyone gets along, everyone is on good terms but everyone also knows what to do and how to behave. There are agreed goals and clear leadership.

That's it

Until another day

The musing moonkin

The Effects of Brain Mush

Good Morning Musers,

I hope the calm before 3.1 is not as boring as I've been told by my friends. Frankly I wouldn't know at the moment, for you see I haven't played WOW in almost a week! I actually tried logging in @ 7am this morning because I realized that I had an Oracle Egg that had hatched on Tuesday & I didn't check to see if it had yielded a pet, food or God-Willing a Drake. Ironically, I found the process of doing two daily quests so taxing on my brain that I said screw it & logged off. The only guildie online when I was didn't mind as he was still recovering from boozing & bowling on last night.

The irony of my mental state is that WOW helped produce it. That is I took practices for maximizing efficiency in play & applied them to real life 'quests'. I plotted out paths to see the quickest route for students, used mana\health conservation formula's to enable me to keep going for 12-14 hours straight etc. The only downside that I can see is that it created three distinct mental states

1.) On: Mental Faculties running 100%

2.) Off: Mental Faculties off, brain in a soak or sleep mode. Reading INOP, WOW INOP, TV as acceptable entertainment.

3.) Halfway: Mental Faculties running but not at peak efficiency. Judging from my own observations this state exists from 1 to 2 hours a day. Personal Tasks are accomplished in this mode (if not at work), entertainment that requires anything beyond simple mental strat (bejewelled etc.) is taxing

I was discussing this with my Friend Bill, who also happened to be my Best Man and commenting that the mental and physical exhaustion was creating a state of Shoshin that was allowing me to have ideas and changes in process that enabled me to do more than I thought possible. However it is a state that cannot exist forever at least in my opinion. Although many stressor's are removed I've found that other stressor's that normally don't bother me (being late for an appt etc.) are now very stressful since my schedule is very tight & the amount of time flexibility I have is in some cases only measured in minutes.

Luckily though once this week ends my schedule calms by about 25% That should be more manageable

Until another day

The Musing Moonkin

An Hour's Respite

Good Evening Musers.
My gauntlet of overwork is almost over!

I just have a couple more days and this tutorial fest (that has been very very very financial good to me!) will be ending. After Sunday my schedule will settle down a bit, but with my next crop of incoming students I have an odd trade off in the works. I'll be losing weekday game time but I'll be gaining weekend game time. That is if I don't fill the time with other students OR have other real life things to do.

In my heart I think that Neren will be going in Storage for a bit. Not because I'm tired of him, but because I won't be able to invest the time in him that the 3.1 content requires until at least May. Once May comes around the SAT prep season begins the wind down & I can spend more time on my virtual self.

Still though I do enjoy my game time, when I can get it in. I actually got an hour in this morning..It was bliss. I mean I just felt the stress melt from me doing the Oracles dailies. Even farming the Stormwright's Shelf!

Until another day

The Musing Moonkin

Ready Check..Occ @ 7:30EST

Good Afternoon Musers,

If you've noticed the gaps in my posts are increasing. This is just due to part time work schedule I'm juggling the transition of my SAT students. The March Students are wrapping up and the May Students are spooling. Luckily this controlled chaos will be over next sunday. I'm not running on fumes yet, but I can feel my mana is down below 30%. If this went on past next week, I don't know what my mental state would be like. I will say this I wouldn't need Yogg-Saron to drive me mad!!!

In other news. Tonight I've assembled a top team of lunatics to take down Occulus. I've been reading the strat & getting psyched up to knocking this one of my list. I'll just need to get that extra boss in OK, kel & mag and another title is mine!!!

Tier 8..Looks Great!

http://www.wowinsider.com/photos/tier-8-armor/1383206/full/
Awesomeness!!! I know I'm busy but I so need to run Uludar when it goes live

On leveling a warlock..inital thoughts

Good Morning Musers!

I know it's been a couple days since I last posted. For anyone who's read this blog since it's inception, you'll know that this time of year is very busy for me due to SAT season. In fact I'll be leaving soon to go do a 'rescue' tutorial (Student used other services before coming to my employer.) I hope to get back on the writing wagon next week (finger's crossed!!!)

Also you may also remember my stance on Alt's. I have a love\hate relationship with them. I strive for the Zen like purity of my friend Zorch. He has one toon, that's it no alt's not even a bank alt. If he needs to goto the AH he goes to the AH. At the same time I also find that an Alt can be liberating. With my work schedules, personal commitments, and in-game commitments an anonymous alt is a way to unwind and have fun.

Still though Alt's are an investment in time, if you spend time on an Alt you lose time you can invest on your main. Turndow is getting dusty because of this. With SAT season in full swing I don't have the spare hour to invest into his leveling. There's a part of me that's even wondering if I want to invest more time in him. He may be boxed for a while because I'm leveling a Warlock!

Yes I know I've said before I can't stand Lock's but an odd thing happened. Well not really odd. Last Friday the missus & I saw Coraline. I heartily recommend seeing this film & if you can see it in 3D. Anyway for the film adaptation, they gave her a friend name Wybie. He was dark & moody etc. but not evil. So last Sunday logging into WOW I had a scratching thought...let me see if that name is taken. Guess what it wasn't

Hence Wybie The Warlock was born! In a way he reminds me of Greathoof, the name was so good I had to level him. But Also I got it. I mean I get what makes Warlocks a tough class & a great leadership tool. The nature of the class, the need to be situational aware almost all the time and not be stressed by it is fantastic. Wybie offers me a way to train my mind, and I'm enjoying it. It's almost like Randori, you have x attackers coming at you & you need to prioritize and have on the fly strategy.

I don't expect Wybie to become my main, but I have a feeling I may actual level him to 80 because of the opportunity that the toon offers me. Not in WOW but in real life.

Until another Day

The Musing Moonkin

My Laggy Valentine

http://www.wowinsider.com/2009/02/15/my-buggy-valentine-problems-with-love-is-in-the-air/

Agreed!!!
Sunday I had enough rockets for the rockets pink glare achievement, and I missed it due to a lag spike. I cursed in guild chat & gave up on the achievement after that.

Hopefully they'll extend this holiday for next year because I can't see the lag issues being resolved.

Until another day
The Musing Moonkin

Annoyed with The Guild

When The Guild first appeared, I loved the webisodes, I mean I LOVED them. The mix of humor and social commentary was as balanced as my Druid!
In addition it gave me a way to explain WOW to my wife. I get that for some people MMO's, WOW, gaming culture in general is frowned upon. My beloved wife originally fell into this group but over time she's become quite understanding of my passion towards WOW. It's my 'thing' like her dad likes golf or my brother in law like bowling. The Guild helped her I think to come to this understanding.
Lately though the tone of the episodes is turning darker. Yesterdays episode set off memory triggers of my geek apprenticeship. My wife thought it was absolutely hilarious but I beg to differ..I think that the show has 'jumped the shark'.
The thing is (and again this is my own opinion) the reason the show started was out of Felicia Day's experiences using WOW to avoid real life due to her unemployment & the people she met during this period of her life. That's where it picked up its fan base. I've lost count of players who used wow (myself included) to hide from the unjust universe. I liked Clara in season 1, I knew woman like her stuck at home with toddlers and a husband who worked 90 hours a week. Now she's become the dark party girl. For me the show feels more of a mockery of the actual people of The Guild.
I think in the quest to become more successful, the creators of The Guild are forgetting those that actually made them successful. If the show continues in the fashion for season 3 I'll stop watching it.
Until another Day
The Musing Moonkin

Monday\Sick\Didn't Play WOW all day

The title says it all I actually didn't play WOW yesterday when I was home sick. I tried to, I logged in and did some dailies, but the plan I had for the day just didn't happen. However this was a good thing. I really just needed the bed rest\couch rest and I will say it again that if your home sick, you should avoid playing WOW because your mind will view the sick day as a virtual chore day. (I'm home, I can get all these quests, to-do's etc. finally done) therefor you'll end up feeling sicker than you did when you got up in the morning because you really didn't rest.

Here's the obstacles that gave me rest time

1.) Naxx Run that fell apart: One of my exguildies in TCD invited me to a Naxx am run. We were going to clear three bosses in construct quarter & then take down Kel'Thuzad. We started at 9:30, but after three wipes on Grobbulus two of the raid member quit which peeled off another 4 members and caused the Raid Leader to call the event.

I decided to go to bed until 11am to particpate in...

2.) The Occ run that never happened: Again a to-do that made me want to ignor how I felt. Yesterday's daily heroic was The Occulus. This is high on my to-do list because I still haven't downed the last boss on Heroic. The guild members logged on in the morning decided to Run it after the 11am reset. I got out of bed, logged back in only to find the people who said they'd run Occ not logged in. I decided to log out & watch TV for the rest of the afternoon.

Hell I was so sick yesterday, that my autopilot alt only went from 25 to 26. If that doesn't say your plauge ridden I don't know what is

Until another day

The Musing Moonkin

An Achievement Worth The Effort

Good Evening Musers,
In the whirlwind of the week I forgot to post this.
http://www.wowarmory.com/character-achievements.xml?r=Fenris&n=Neren

Yes that's right I am now an ELDER!

So you know what you have to do..

Yes that's right. Kneel & Show Respect to your Elder!!! =P

But Seriously, I am very pleased with this achievement compared to the other holiday achievements that have been implemented since Echoes of Doom. First off, you actually have to work to earn this title. There is simply no way around it; if you wanted your name to be Elder X, you were going to have to do some seriously hoofing about Azeroth to meet all the requirements. So when the event started on 1/24 I decided to use the time I had that weekend (which was more than usual since my wife was away on business,) to knock out as many of the requirements as possible. I believe I started at 6:00 am with Omen, then went focused fire on the Elders of Kalimdor, (stopping for dungeons along the way), then Eastern Kingdoms, then Northrend on Monday.

In my opinion, the Major Effort that was required was devilishly designed. Here's what I thought was the highlights.

1.) To actually earn the title you would need to run Heroic Gun'Drak. This meant that you had to be level 80 & geared since the elder was with the Extra Boss in the dungeon.

2.) The Classic Dungeon Elders were all deep in their respective dungeons. While 3.08 has removed some of the slog, you would still need to expect to invest 20-30 minutes per dungeon to find the Elder.

3.) Elders of the Horde \ Elders of the Alliance was very well balanced. Although the event leans towards the Alliance (as the Wickerman event leans towards the Horde,) The placement of the elders effectively balanced out the advantage. For my friends who play Horde, they described the experience as 'Death of a thousand cuts'. For me and my ex-guildies, it was a Gank-Fest from the start, Horde PVP players were waiting ready and excited to see us and prepared to one shot or toons from the get-go.

4.) The Time Requirement meant that only those who were dedicated to getting the title would pursue it. I calculated that just doing the Elders of Kalimdor and not the dungeons on the continent took approx 4 hours. Eastern Kingdoms was about 2hours (but more time spent in dungeons) and Northrend elders took about an hour.

And last but not least...

5.) The players who pursued the title were the cream of the server. People who pursue (or are still pursuing this achievement) are really the dedicated few. It brought pride to my face to see us roaming lands that we had moved past once again

Until Another Day

The Musing Moonkin

Why I left The Crystal Dawn

Good Day Muser's I've been laying low the last couple of days partially because of work & partially because of what I did Wednesday Night.

Since I know some of my ex-guildies read my blog I wanted to use it to explain my actions

I gquit The Crystal Dawn Wed night after the fourth attempt on Instructor Razuvious on heroic mode. This was wrong on my part, it was bad form to quit the raid and then quit the guild. I hope that you will accept my apology and understand I had reached my line. There were several factors in this choice. My only regret is how I left the guild. It was juvenile of me though considering TCD's behavior on Fenris it does seem rather appropriate.

Before I go into the why's I want to thank TCD for all the kick ass times I had with all of you. Frankly I burnt out on WOW and you guys re-ignited my love of the game. Overall TCD is a solid guild with members who know the game, and will back you up.

Now for the why I left. First & Foremost this wasn't a choice I made lightly. I had been mulling over it for a couple weeks but I had stuck it out because I liked TCD. Yes we couldn't get a raid together to save our lives but the guild members compensated for this.

Item #1 Raid Times

What I'll say now has been discussed with a TCD officer in confidence and he agreed with me but acknowledged he was powerless to make any changes. Fenris is an East Coast server. I live on the east coast as do other current member's of TCD. However a large population of dedicated raiders in TCD live on the west coast and the raid leaders setup raids based of the pst time zone. At first this didn't bother me but after awhile it wore me down because I am not really a night owl. I have a full time IT job that usually starts around 6:30 in the morning & ends around 5pm if I'm lucky, and of course I'm teaching SAT Prep 20-30 hours a week. I wasn't the only one to be irritated by this (not naming names) So I'll say this:

"While I have no issue with people from other time zones playing on any server, running raid times based of your local time zone is in my opinion a teensy bit selfish. If you want to run raids on PST Time then play on a PST Server Gawd Damn it!!!"

Item #2 El Laxo Attitudo

TCD is a very casual guild. This is why I liked it, hell why I loved being in TCD. After being in several hardcore raiding guilds I was tired of the guild drama & the time commitments. This is why I also turned down other guild invites when the state of moonkins was realized by the raiding guilds on Fenris. WOW is a game yes there is serious time but not all the time. TCD though was just a bunch of guys out to have a good time. However raiding does require a focused mindset and commitment to virtual obligations. TCD guild members because of item 1 & item 2 made raid progression difficult. Sign up for a raid, sure! Actually be logged in that's another matter.

I'm an adult I work two jobs, have a wife, children (albeit furry and egotistical but nonetheless children) and various other concerns. I do not have the luxury to waste time because people who say they'll be available for a raid do not show up because something comes up. I'm sorry I can only deal with that so many times before it becomes an issue. It became an issue for me about three weeks ago.

Item #3 Member Behavior

TCD was an adult guild and I was made clear of this before I joined it back in December, and truthfully I found the trash talk of some it's member's posted liberating. As I said in item #2 coming from hardcore raiding I had witnessed guildmates gkicked for lesser offences then what was done in TCD on an average day. However, I also noticed that this lack of mutual respect for other players had a degenerating effect on the guild as a whole. It was infectious, new members who joined the guild would in a few days begin to trash talk as if it was a hidden side to them.

As I said in my grand project post, people want to be led; and as we've seen in the real world if people see their Superior's, their leaders preform bad actions and get away with it they will as well. I had several time had to apologize to players who I had leveled with, who I had raided with who I had known since coming over to Fenris for the behavior of my guildmates. I also began to notice that people asking me if I would join them for heroics because there is truth to the old saying that if you hang out with ducks your going to quack. I was being written off as another TCD douchebag.

At first I didn't care, but an event on Tuesday made me re-evaluate my commitment to TCD. I won't go into specifics but a guild officer did something that in my opinion really showed his nature, which is to shock & to grab attention & to cause strife because he has that power to do so. That was the straw that broke me, and luckily for me opportunity presented itself & I had a guild to goto that still remembered who I was & not who I had been hanging out with.

I think by now the dust has settled & when I login tonight there won't be a stream of pst's that are inappropriate to post even on Encyclopedia Dramatica. In WOW people have short memories, it's the nature of the game I think. Still I know I won't ever get back the 900g that's owed to me by a guildmember for repairs respecs etc. but that's ok because I view it as a deposit on a learning experience. One that taught me more than I ever imagined. Somehow hanging around with a bunch of trashtalking goofballs made me a better person. It made me realize what I valued vs. what I thought I valued.

Until another day,
The Musing Moonkin

A grand project of both scope & scale: Addendum to Part 1

I was thinking about this after I posted

"6.) Class shortages are due to basic human nature. The reason that there's always a shortage of tanks\healers & an abundance of DPS is because for the most part human beings want to be involved in the event but not in charge of the event. It's one thing to say I went to Heroic Naxx last night, it's another to say I was the main tank for Heroic Naxx and we didn't wipe.
Human nature is to be led not to Lead. Healers, Tanks & Specialists (off-tank, off-heal etc.) have responsibilities that if not preformed correctly can have dire consequences in game. Most people do not want these responsibilities, which leads to most players choosing a DPS class."

What this means is that no matter what blizzard does to make some aspects of instance\raid\guild responsibilities more tolerable if your idealized self does not want to tank, to heal, to provide off-heals battle rezz'es etc, You will not do it. You may respec from time to time because your raid needs a tank or a healer etc. but as soon as your given the chance you'll respec to your idealized self. If forced to do it, you will resent it.

A grand project of both scope & scale: Part 1

Greetings Musers!

Well I'm just too excited so I will let you in on what I'm working on.

Beneath the surface of WOW lies the motivations and desires of it's players. Some are aware of why they play the game, but most aren't. Their motivations their desires manifest in WOW in their character types and play style.

Still though real world behavior manifests in the world of Azeroth. As we all note the major events (such as the Corrupted Blood Event or the Zombie Invasion event) when we can clearly see human group behavior mimicked virtually. But for the most part the group behavior that occurs on a day to day basis doesn't get noticed, even though that's the behavior that affects us the most.

This is why my project will be about. What I am proposing is a analysis of WOW players based of race, class and specialization. I have several hypothesis I would like to confirm based of data gathered.

1.) All WOW players regardless of server, participate in role-playing. The difference is whether it's idealized role-playing vs. theatrical role-playing.

2.) A player chooses a main toon's race, class & spec based of their idealized self (or selves). If your idea of a hero is a samurai, you may find yourself playing a night-elf warrior specced arms because the talent build calls to your idealized heroic self.

3.) Diametrically opposed to this is your idealized fallen self. A person who's always being picked on may choose to play a Rogue and lash out at other players. This self represents all your worst tendencies and desires.

4.) A player will attempt to find his or her niche in WOW based of which idealized self is stronger. A healer who needs to be praised consistently is a good example of a mix of the two. At one end he\she is helping other and saving the group. At the same time, the need for acknowledgement is being fueled by their guild or party. If this fuel is throttled down or cut off, the negative self lashes out by either underheals, party member deaths or wipes.

5.) Since WOW is a game and people play it because it lets them be who they want to be, the real-world limitations are slowly being erased. In the real world not everyone can be powerful, see everything etc. But we play WOW to do this. This leads Blizzard to slowly remove restrictions to keep it's customers (us) happy & to increase profits. However it can and does have unintended consequences such as

a.) Undergeared players entering heroic dungeons & raids

b.) Players who had to invest significant time to achieve gear and see end-game content becoming increasingly frustrated & leave WOW or take breaks from the game in their own way.

To minimize item b.) Blizzard develops systems to compensate players: achievements, feats of strength etc.

6.) Class shortages are due to basic human nature. The reason that there's always a shortage of tanks\healers & an abundance of DPS is because for the most part human beings want to be involved in the event but not in charge of the event. It's one thing to say I went to Heroic Naxx last night, it's another to say I was the main tank for Heroic Naxx and we didn't wipe.

Human nature is to be led not to Lead. Healers, Tanks & Specialists (off-tank, off-heal etc.) have responsibilities that if not preformed correctly can have dire consequences in game. Most people do not want these responsibilities, which leads to most players choosing a DPS class.

Furthur Posts will go into more detail of the Why of this project

Until another Day

The Musing Moonkin

Quick Update: A hint of things to come

Greetings Muser's!
I'm sorry there hasn't been post since 1/23. RL Work FT & PT ate up much of my time last week. I am working on a project that I will need data from WOW players. It is a project grand in both scope and scale. But I think that it will answer some of the mysteries of social interaction and behavior in WOW.
Until another day
The Musing Moonkin

Don't Be Greedy

Good Morning Muser's, I hope this patch Tuesday is going well. Let us all pray that the server glitches we've been seeing are whisked away by Blizzards magic wand!

What you see above you was a rare moment when good guy won. I decided to grab this screenshot because I was sure that I would I needed to defend myself in a flame war on the realm forum. Also because it's awesome when you out roll someone who's a sneaky bastard.

Now here's the story. From 1/23 to 1/25 the Missus was away at a convention in Denver. Now I did have to teach while she was gone since the tutoring season is now in full swing, but as luck would have it instead of tutoring\break\tutoring on Saturday I bopped from student to student. This let me play WOW from 2:30 p.m. till I was ready to hit the sack.

As I'll post later I spent the majority of the time Sat\Sun working on Lunar Festival achievements. But I did take in a couple of dungeon runs over the weekend. This was one of them a vault 25 man pug. We downed the boss on the 2nd attempt, and I was surprised to see the Epic Moonkin PVP Gloves drop. I've done about 5 vault 25 man pugs, and never has druid gear dropped for me yet.

Within 30 seconds of downing the boss & getting my Badges, I get a pst from Druidlord offering me 500 gold to not roll on the gloves. Now I'm just going to say my peace and move on. It has been my experience that the worst players of WOW tend to have the most egotistical names. I wish I could say with 100% accuracy that there's a direct proportional relation to UberName & bad player, but since I usually avoid those players anyway I can't say it with any degree of scientific certainty. But I will say that \when I mentioned what happened to my guild, the trash talk about the above player was quite thick.

In any case I told Druidlord no go on his offer & I rolled. My roll beat his by 1 point.

Just goes to show you that the universe will slap back greed.

Until another day

The Musing Moonkin.