Ding 80 Paladin

Yep, you read correctly. Casavel is a level 80 paladin with 539 Def. She's just a point shy of being able to go directly into raiding. I'm not looking to raid with her just quiet yet, to be honest. All I want to be able to do right now is learn the heroic fights. Heroics will give me better gear... still wearing mostly Tempered Saronite.

I've been looking forward to 80 on Cas ever since Ticalos stopped playing. I had said, when he started appearing less and less in game that I would try and step up Cas' leveling and become the tank for the guild. In that time we've gotten another DK 80 that is willing to tank, and Vel is a Prot/Healy(Holy) dual spec. We have the tanks, and now Cas can be added as one more. I am willing to stand as a tank for Bloodriver, when we need it, or when Carpe Jugulum or The Unsung need a tank, and Shava isn't around on her 80 Paladin.

And, I have found out under a priest and a paladin healer (haven't worked under a shaman or druid extensively enough yet) to know I can handle anything that comes my way. If my healer is good? I'm good to go. I can handle moronic DKs, idiot hunters who don't know what threat is, and just about anything else.

I like this tanking gig I do believe. Have Shield, Will Travel too, I guess :)

76 Glitched Pally

Well, Cas hit level 76... and I helped out with Ahune the other night, then found out while trying to drink that she won't remain sitting for more than 3-5 seconds... even if sitting is initiated by drinking, eating, or hitting x on the keyboard. Without being able to drink... I really can't play her. I want to, don't get me wrong... I want to get her to 80... but until I can sit, stay sitting, and get her to finish her tea... that won't be happening.

I put in a ticket last night to Blizzard... no response... what a big surprise there, eh? And I put in the ticket around 9:30pm my time, logged off at 3:30 this morning. They had time, never saw it come down beyond "We are experiencing a high volume of tickets....". Blech.

Well, I guess, back to playing Tzia and putting the cash together for the Paladin's Regular Flying, Epic Flying, Cold Weather Flying, and Epic Flying Mount. 7k Gold... here I come. Bleh.

72 Paladin in Sholazar Basin - Yeah, about that . . .

Well, not much to report over on Wyrmrest Accord. Tzia is 80, has done heroics and seen Naxx 10 Man 2x and Maly 10 1x. She watched most of the Maly fight prior to the wipe from the floor... (note to self: do not follow Niqo anywhere!). Aside from that not much has been going on with the hunter.

No, I've been playing Casavel pretty extensively. She's sitting at 72, 2/3 of the way through to 73... but I've been working on her mining and blacksmithing. She's been running around Sholazar Basin quiet easily, 75-77 mobs are not bothering her a bit- she's an AoE Tankadin after all!

Just means I can manage to pull down groups of anywhere between 3-9 mobs at a time... though I have died at least 3 times when pulls went wrong and I missed a button in the rotation. Yes, these are levels 75 through 77, which is orange, orange, and RED! mobs. They hit hard, but being able to heal over some of the damage really helps... and if things get really desperate I can drop a mana potion.

I haven't seen Loque in all my mining runs though, and aside from the spot by the pillar and the one closer in to Nessingwary's I do run by all the others quiet regularly. The MapNote markers are still there, so I keep my eyes peeled. I know a few hunters that would probably like the location of the cat, and if I can make a bit of cash... well, I will need the epic flying, regular flying, epic mount, and cold weather flying all at the same time. 7k gold... ouch. She's sitting at about 2.4k though, so things could be worse.

Mining is maxed out at 450. The blacksmithing is stuck at 437. Yes, because I'm in yellow territory and need a ton of saronite to do anything what-so-ever. Its just mildly annoying. But I do have any and all gear I could want personally crafted from levels 73-78.

Remember how earlier I said if things got desperate I'd drop a mana potion... who had the brillant idea of making the potion cool downs only kick in once you were out of combat?! That kinda ends up killing me on longer fights... very, very, very quickly. Now, mind you, if Tzia had to drop a potion under the old system, either the mob died in under two minutes, or she did.

Cas would be entirely possible to last through a two minute cool down, but with the potions no longer on cool down, the effectiveness of potions has been diminished by about... oh, I'd say 90%? I'll only ever NEED five of either kind on the paladin or the hunter, because either I'm going to be dead or... dead by the time I need another potion.

No, I'm not pleased by this change. Could we just make potions only usable out of combat? I mean really... what's the point of having them anymore? Health and mana potions have largely been removed from the game... take one for each of the boss fights in an instance, and you should be peachy. Raid supply only, the same way flasks are.

Sorry about the rant... I'm just disgusted by the mechanics change. Never noticed it on Tzia because she really didn't use potions, while Cas at times was defined by that now non-existant cool down.

Casavel, my paladin tank

"My comrades are my weapons, and I am their shield.
While I draw breath, they shall not perish.
So long as they live, our enemies will fall.
I am defender, protector, guardian.
I am a Paladin." - Cathela the Seeker

This sums up so well what I feel when I pull on the plate and pick up a shield. I may only be a lowly level 70 tankadin at the moment, but she's coming along, slowly, but sure in her path.

So far I've only done a few guilded runs, the first of which was tanking for a 65, 70, 72 group. Yes, we four manned a few things like Underbog and Mana Tombs with only four people. I must say my level 65 healer rocked. I only freaked out once... and that was because I was tanking a nexus terror right next to a four pull. We somehow didn't pick up the four pull and the fear sent me in the opposite direction, Anti-Shadow buffs non-withstanding. Cleared both = happy, bit more confidant paladin tank.

Yes, those were my first attempts tanking. And the 65 priesty (welcome back Sol!!) was 66 by the time we were done, and rocked my socks off. The group was willing to risk getting severely mauled by a complete and utter rookie tank. I'd never actually tanked an instance prior to attempting those two.

Then last night? We did Nexus and Azjol-Nerub (AN). I did die twice, through no fault of our tree druid. The first time? I wasn't familiar with the patrols, and had a second patrol right into me. Single group pull turned into a massive two group pull, and I went down HARD. It basically was 60%, 40%, Dead.

Zharve (the Tree): "Wtf Cas' health? OMG MOBS!" :Dead Tree:

The second time? First time handling Keri in Nexus. Forgot about the tail swipe thingie, turned her just wrong, dead plant life, so dead paladin, and the 80 hunter kills her after everyone else is dead... go go Niqo!

AN went flawless as far as I'm concerned. Though, The paladin retadin/holyadin (Vel)and our Tree did comment at one point that it got close... I didn't notice, was too busy trying to keep all the mobs in ONE SPOT. I didn't have time to glance up at health bars, my eyes were trained on the mobs being hit by consecrate. They stayed put. ^_^

As I said to them, "If nobody died, it was a good pull." I admit as a tank, I put my trust in the healer and just dive in. I'll do my job to the best of my ability, just keep me alive. That's all I ask. Especially while learning the ropes of how to be a paladin tank.

Thank You Bloodriver. Thank you for being willing to let me practice on guild mates before attempting a PuG of any instance. Being able to survive two healers tells me I might actually be able to carry off this crazy idea of being a tankadin for our guild at 80. I'm also humbled by the fact you are even willing to let me try, when everyone knows I'm a hunter first. Thank you.

Spec 'Splosion

Well, I've got an annoying visual glitch on Casavel, my paladin over on WRA. Or more specifically, on her talents. Armory, and the game itself, both claim that for all intents and purposes I have a level 19 paladin, when in fact she's a 68. Armory shows I have a 0/10/8 build when I know its actually 0/51/8, with a planned 0/51/20. The game can't display anything past my first 10 points in protection. She does not have a dual spec, or even glyphs at this point. And she's the only character I've leveled since 3.1 came out... boy am I glad I don't need to put any points in the Prot Tree.

From reading a few forum posts, and talking to a friend over xfire, it sounds as though the glitch may be linked to dual specs. Or the new preview thing that Blizzard introduced. Jury's still out on that one, and I could see it being either.

I'm just worried that if she hits 69 the Ret tree will gray out like Prot did and I'll be stuck unable to spend points. I really do want to play my paladin, but with issues seemingly plaguing WoW, perhaps its time to test run War? I know, Tzia wondering about Warhammer... feel free to cringe. I know I am.

Iron Buckles... Blah

Well, my current hunter is stalled at 195 leatherworking due to iron buckles. I need buckles to progress... no seriously, its the cheapest thing out of all the other potential money sinking resources. Threw the iron in the guild vault. It will be turned into buckles for me to pick up tomorrow by one of my guild's black smiths, who I can't thank enough!

Kora hit 45 tonight, so I went and threw on the boots I had waiting, fumed over the fact that I'm still using a leather of the falcon (level 33) head piece because I can't find anything in mail... or rather anything I will actually PAY FOR. I'm sorry, inflation bloody well sucks.

I will not pay 10g for a level 42 of the falcon headpiece. Its not worth 10g. And before somebody quotes "an item is worth whatever its purchaser will pay" (yes Myst, I've heard that quote way too many times from Civ 4), I won't pay that price, most people I know wouldn't pay that price. So, its not worth that price. I will agree that good hunter gear is hard to find, especially when in competition with shaman, but I still think this is stupid pricing.

Oh, I paid 4g+ for 10 iron bars (yippy inflation) if I'd had my paladin over here... I'd have gone, mined the iron myself, made it into buckles, and mailed them to Kora. But, still waiting... it'll be April before I can move her over. Tonight just re-enforced again how much I want my paladin over on WRA. I can wait, I supose.

Blacksmithing 298

Well, part of the reason for not having too many updates on the blog is, well, I'm not playing any of the Tzia's very much. Nope, I've been playing my now level 66 paladin, Dione on Quel'dorei.

I started playing her again to keep my awesome original CC guildie, Rivey, company while he leveled his paladin towards 80. He did make a post saying that I was the reason he didn't get anything done before he left for Washington state. I deny that accusation. I was on a QD character fumbling my way around Hillsbrad. That hunter is 26, I couldn't remember what the heck I'd been doing, its been several months! But I would have been happy to just figure out which quests I was doing, load up on arrows and kill things with the black lion while chatting with Rivey as he leveled. He instead decided to go back over to Deathwing, and I followed him over and logged into Tzia. Not like I'm doing much there either, since The Guy and I are leveling those two together. The guy was at work, so Tzia sits, and well... I didn't want to play the DK either. So, Rivey leveled his lil rogue and he and I talked. And talked. He got a few quests done, I got a bit of rested XP under my belt.

Once Rivey logged off to pack, I went back over to QD and tried to figure out just what the heck I was doing with Di, because I figure if I can talk him into questing together, then I can help keep him on track with Jaska. I figured I'd try and level up my blacksmithing to something remotely useful... I don't have to level the paladin all that fast, she's not a main character, so I can dink around on her to my heart's content.

Anyways, did a number of runs through EPL. Got thorium until its coming out of my ears. Then I remembered something... I hadn't chosen weaponsmithing or Armorsmithing yet on her... oops. Rivey obviously wasn't on at the time, and since I needed a bit of advice, I flipped back over to Deathwing to see if any of the blacksmith's I knew were on and could point me in the right direction with a potential tankadin.

Ran into somebody from Vane in our friendly group channel, and he pointed me in the right direction: Armorsmith. So, I returned to Quel'dorei and found that I have to do a LOT of work just to get to the point where I can break the last few points and get to 300.

I've done The Old Ways. Now I need a ton of Mithril and even more Iron. I guess Its back to Arathi for a few stacks of Iron, then on to Ungoro and Tanaris for Mithril and a bit more Thorium.

I'll give you a blacksmithing report when I've broken 300! And I might just have some hunter news by then too!

AoE Prot Pally + Shaman w/ Windfury Totem

All I can say to this is HOLY CRAP! My guy and I (Yes somebody is back playing a shaman ^_^) were killing demon-spawn pigs while in Hellfire last night. I was on my paladin, he on his newly transferred Shaman, and he had a brilliant... well, what if I - moment, dropped a box around me, gave me a minimum of 1.5k threat and then started going to town on a three pull of pigs. It was completely nuts, and I think we managed to drop a tertiary target before the main one died.

Now, yes, he's in crappy, largely pre-outlands gear, is the melee shaman spec, and had the two handed staff from one of the first quests in outlands, plus being Salvationed = I'm trying to learn HOW to tank still! But things were going down faster than I've ever managed before on Di. Now, its not nearly as fast as Tzia can pull something down, but its hyperactive enough to be extremely fun... and at this time, extremely overpowered!

Windfury totem procs + Reckoning Procs + Consecration + Holy Shield = things dying very, very quickly. I'm absolutely loving this. All I need to do now is get him geared up and then things ought to really take off!

And a special thanks to an orc hunter on Ysera, who linked me a great Tankadin guide. It was exactly what I was looking for!