Gaming and Bullying. (Rant)

I am going to be straight up honest right now, this post is not a post, this is a full on rant about a few things that I have noticed concerning gaming and online bullying.

Let me take you back....about 13/14 years ago, to the year 2000. Counter Strike was released on steam, which was also still in its beta phase. I was just getting into the online gaming scene and really enjoyed playing CS. However back at this time, it was not really a common thing for a girl to play games and I suffered a lot of abuse. I've heard it all "get back in the kitchen", "go play with dolls" "stop trying to play a mans game", "I bet you're a lesbian"....and the rest. It got worse before it got better, I changed email addresses on Three separate occasions due to "boys" being idiots and not being content with abusing me in-game, they would get my details off steam and send me messages including all of the above and worse. It's something you either get really bothered by or you ignore. Being bullied in school was a blessing in disguise, it taught me to pity people who spent their time being malicious to others, and it made my skin as thick as a rhinos. 

As time went on the abuse got less and less as it became more "acceptable" for girls to play games. I still get the odd snap comment here or there, though I am yet to experience it on WoW, another online game I played until about a year ago which I shall not mention the name of had a terrible community for the most part. Some people were nice but 75% of them were total assholes. I've seen a guy get told to "go get cancer" and myself have been told to "go and die in a fire". But apart from that my gaming ventures in the past 4-5 years have all been pretty stress free (apart from Garrosh).

Ok now time for the brutally honest part. I have, myself, called people out on games, we've all done it. But my insults are never personal and usually stretch about as far as "you noob" or "you idiot" or anything along the same lines. So I am no angel in all this, and I would be a liar if I said I had never insulted anyone online, because I know I have, but, I never make it personal, that's when it becomes bullying. 

Cyber bullying is evidently still alive and kicking, in the gaming world. 

I read an interesting article which stated:

"Cyberbullying is recognized as a legitimate threat on social networks, but video games are often overlooked as battlegrounds for the same kind of behavior. One World of Warcraft player complained on the forums that a group of players was harassing people by impersonating players and bothering others, bringing blame on their targets. This is similar to Facebook cyberbullying when high school students create fake profiles of fellow students. They then post humiliating information about them, or harass others under their assumed name."

Just yesterday I read a blog written by a woman who got abused (and that's putting it lightly) via twitter because she voiced an opinion. What the hell is wrong with people? Why do people feel the need to personally attack someone because they didn't like the opinion?? You know, freedom of speech still exists and all but that does not give you the right to tear somebody to shreds with disgusting, vile, and personal attacks when they did absolutely NOTHING to deserve them, IE: no personal attack was made in the first place. It sickens me to see that people are ready to jump on the band wagon to attack someone behind an internet name just to follow someone else.

I have done some other research to see just how bad it is and have read countless stories from people being abused online through games because of all sorts of things, including race, religion, sex and disabilities. Each one made me sad to think that people doing a recreational activity could find amusement or enjoyment from hurting other people. The cold hard truth is that any sort of bullying can ruin lives. Causing depression, which I have first hand experience with, and worst case, suicide.

I am not naive enough to think that it will ever stop. It wont. Some people will always need an outlet for their own insecurities, and others are just of a malicious nature and enjoy causing other people pain. But that being said I think it's important to speak up about this issue, so may people are too frightened to talk about it because they are worried about the comeback. In the future I am looking to set up another blog of sorts with the aim of helping people having issues to air their problems to me, and I will do my best to support them. It's only in very basic planning now but it is something I would like to do.

Having studied a lot of psychology I know how bullies work, and my door is always open to anyone having problems. My contact details are all on the blog. 

For some more upbeat news, I shall be appearing on an edition of Monk Meditation on Saturday 22nd of February when the girls are taking over!! More info on that closer to the time ;) Be prepared!!

Liberators of Orgrimmar, the heroes return victorious.

In the beginning.... 

At the start of 5.4, our main raid group made a start on 10 man normal Siege of Orgrimmar. Saaladinka and I made a group of around 15 people and went into the first flex wing. Under geared and not quite sure what to expect of the raid or ourselves we stood in front of Immersius for the very first time. As my co tank and I had only met the day before, we were all very nervous and a few wipes later I was beginning to wonder if I had gone in over my own head. However being the determined (stubborn) person that I am, I forced myself to carry on. Which just turned out to be the best decision I ever made.

Clearing the first two bosses on the first night was a big achievement for us at the time, and something like Garrosh on normal didn't even enter our minds, we had to enlist the help of our main group to eventually complete the flex version of all 14 bosses. We celebrated as a guild when they triumphed over Hellscream for the first time back in October 2013.


And then there were 10....

It wasn't until November that Saala and I collected 10 people with the faint hope of getting some normal kills of our own. On our first night in the big boy raids we managed to down not one, not two, not even three but FOUR bosses.

Having done a couple of progress runs with the main guild myself I knew what progress felt like but this was different. This was something WE had built and worked for, together. We finally had our own raiding team.


Progress is not always easy. 

We've gone through quite a few ups and downs since that night, people joined, and left, we had nights where we didn't have enough people due to work schedules and illnesses.  Still, we continued on, getting stuck on various bosses for what seemed like months at a time even though it were only weeks. Wiping on Thok night after night became slowly soul destroying but we never gave up. We learned to lean on each-other and help each-other through when times got difficult. Trying all sorts of combinations of tanks healers and dps. Finally, Thok went down and that was when it really started to become a huge reality. We were into the final 3 bosses, was there a chance we could make it to Garrosh? 


The real work begins.... 

After making swift work of Siegecrafter and Paragons we were all set for Hellscream. We started our first night with 15 wipes, which were all in the second phase at least!! The following night came with another 13 wipes. We extended and tried again. More wipes ensued and after hitting 40 we decided it was time to reset, get some more gear and give it another go. Spurred on by our goal we absolutley rampaged through the first 13 bosses in a night and a half, leaving us plenty of time to start on Hellscream again. Getting him to 22% that week was our closest yet, we had one raid day left. Sunday. We had already decided to reset again and I could tell some people were starting to get a little despondent. Having already seen the encounter through on my monk I decided as I still wasn't confident enough to heal on it and call the fight, I would bring my priest for Sundays raid.
     
Of course we spent all night wiping, with each wipe making the end seem further and further away, but, not to be disheartened and enjoying the experience with friends we trooped on. We started seeing the final phase, and excitement began to fill vent. We got to the end of the evening and decided to give it "one last go". At which point we promptly went in and wiped on the first phase. A unanimous decision to have "another One more go" was made and the pull timer was started for the 56th time. Vent went silent, apart from calls from me to stack on a colour, or switch to MC targets, or my co healer letting me know his cooldowns, vent was silent, something was different about this attempt, everything was going perfectly. Pushing Garrosh to his final phase with no adds or axes up I thought "oh my god we might actually have this" . A mind control on me after bloodlust was popped left me frantically looking for my other healer in total terror that he had been taken too, but no, there he was, casting as many heals as his GCDs would let him, yelling at the raid to forget the boss and focus MC and we were out in a flash, next thing I know I took an axe to the face and for the first time in about 50 seconds I looked at his Garrosh's health.....gone. We had done what was initially the impossible. Of course vent exploded with many cheers and congratulations from anticipating guild members listening in. 

I've gone from tank, to dps to healer, and enjoyed every single second of it, I am proud to call my raid group my friends and honored to raid with them every week. I cannot wait for us to start on our own heroics in a few weeks!

I think we would all like to thank the main group in our guild, for giving us something to aspire to, for helping us out when we needed it with tactics, advice on our roles, and moral support. 

So, without further ado (here's hoping you're still with me) I present to you my finest video to date, cheers guys, here's to many more!!

The Whispering Forest Ritual...in all it's glory!!

Hey guys, hope everyone is having a lovely weekend!! Mine has been pretty productive, and I would like to share something pretty awesome with you....

Ok so this all started after I read my EU buddy Vaylens post, which I ended up helping provide the wierd part for (go figure right?). Anyway, there was something in there that really interested me, being a huge fan of woods and lush grasslands and secluded hideaways I was dying to visit The Whispering Forest, the pictures alone looked wonderful and I knew I simply HAD to go there!! After doing some research I found some videos on the ritual that happens on rare occasions. I sat there for about 2 hours this morning....

...And I waited....

...aaand waited some more....

....and a little more....

....then finally.....

.....I couldn't believe my luck to be honest, this is a rare occurence. I did manage to record it, so crank up the sound, enjoy the beautiful music and of course, grab a brew!!

When Chuck Norris becomes Florence Nightingale.....

Ok so here it is folks, my first hand account of how I have gone from tank to healer in around 2 weeks....

I have had to make some rather drastic changes to accomplish this. My spell bars, my guard and keg smash have been replaced with renewing mist and uplift, all my spells look "green" in comparison to the somewhat colorful spells of my Brewmaster. My UI has had a complete overhaul. New weak auras, revamped the raid frame and tweaked Big Wigs to suit a healer (IE I no longer need it to yell at me when the Sha is casting wounded pride - But I now need to know when sun is casting a calamity). My gear, more specifically my transmog....that was one of the most important things, getting the right look, because we all know its ALL about the asthetics, anyway, after some delving into the depths of my bank and void storage and a few runs of some random old dungeons, I present.... "The Ice"

 

Fabulous isn't it? 

The biggest change that I have had to make though, I did not foresee coming, sure I knew I would have to learn some new spells and learn to Fist Weave and Mist Weave but I overlooked something that was incredibly hard to change. My mentality.

    Let me start by explaining my tank mentality. I feel like Chuck Norris, in fact, I could probably kick his butt, I stroll into the raid with my head held high, usually the last one in, I am the first to fight. I feel like entering and saying "Fear not my squishy friends! I have arrived! I shall forge us a path through all these minions!" Before clashing the first bunch of mobs I can find with Zero F**s given for the rest of the raid. Basically, I feel like a god, nothing can hurt me, bosses can pound on me all day and I just don't care, I welcome the pain, no wait, I laugh at it!! 

   Before switching to healer I went in as a DPS for a few runs, still with my "Queen of the raid" mentality and oh dear did I get handed a big can of sit the F down. I died. To trash. and I didn't just like, lose my health slowly, no, I was one shot. ME, getting one shot, by trash??!?!?! My poor little Panda, she doesn't get one shot! Buuuut apparently it would seem that I am no longer Chuck Norris, while I still hit like a truck I am as soft as a kitten in comparison to what I was. Over a few nights I soon discovered (the hard way) all these wonderful mechanics on bosses that actually hurt non tanks. I took a corrosive blast to the face by mistake and died, I stood in some yellow goo on the floor and died, I got mind spiked and died, and worst of all, I got melee'd by Kadris and yep, I died. Something serious was going to have to change if I wanted to survive long enough to actually manage to heal anyone. So I went back to basics, and researched each fight from a "squishy" point of view. I looked up all the abilities the bosses did and discovered that for most fights I now need to avoid pretty much everything if I want to live. 

I think one's feelings waste themselves into words; they ought to all be distilled into actions, and actions which bring results. - Florence Nightingale.

I really like this quote, I think it's very powerful, and true, and this is what I based my mentality on. I tend to talk quite a lot, this is no secret, anyone who knows me will tell you I have a gob like a chainsaw and could happily talk a glass eye to sleep. As a co-raid leader I tend to find myself talking too much, so I stopped talking, apart from direction on a fight and simply focused on what I was doing and the health of the rest of the raid. At first i think it made the guys a little uneasy but they seem to have adapted and they have all  been very supportive of my new role. Slowly but surely I stopped trying to be the leader and became the supporter, I started paying more attention to other people in the group, how they were doing, where they were standing, and what sort of actions they were taking to prevent damage themselves. In turn this has allowed me to help a few raid members with their own issues, and I have learned more about them as people. I appear more approachable now, instead of the loud mouthed tank that was not to be messed with, I am now the lesser loud mouthed healer who is willing to help others and communicates far more directly with the raid during combat.

   I have so far managed to 2 heal the first 13 bosses with our Shaman. Thok, which we always 3 healed before was my biggest challenge as I had no idea how to approach the fight. We did it, and with our best attempt on Garrosh yet (22%) I feel much more confident about myself and my abilities. I have also been using my priest more, as her healing has a place in certain fights, however i have managed to go the full 13 on the monk now, we are going to use the priest for garrosh later this week as we feel that the monk/shaman combo isn't quite working for us for that fight just yet. Previously I would NEVER have swapped to another toon, but right now all I want to do is help the guys in my group that have not seen Hellscream fall yet, and if that means benching my beloved monk for a night then so be it. (My priest is still a Panda after all) The point is, I have actually totally changed my approach to raiding, raid leading and playing in general. I have a new found respect for healers, because let me tell you, that job is NOT easy.

    Finally I would like to give out some thanks to some folk in the monk community, without whom I would have never made it past the trash before Immersius. Daikatsu, with his Kung Fu healing has responded to nearly every single SOS I have sent out without hesitation, and I really appreciate this! Naoyuki For helping me via the Monk meditation show with knowing when to FW and when to MW and for also responding on twitter with instant help. Tzufit  for her weak auras and her help over twitter. Finally Kristin  for her help and support via twitter. All these guys have been fantastic during this process, answering my "OMGHELP" tweets while I am mid raid and just generally being there with help and information. The rest of the community have also been supportive and I really appreciate all the kind words and good luck wishes that I have received, once again the Monk community comes up trumps!! I'd also like to thank my awesome Husband for being supportive, and helping me out with general "healery" type rules, putting up with the tantrums and the tears and just generally being awesome <3

This tree stands as a symbol of hope. Hope that the land might in time be healed and made stronger by your deeds. - Chi-Ji.

Builds for Bosses Pt 3

I had ALMOST forgotten about this little set of posts!! I shall continue with my personal builds for more of the bosses momentarily, first of all I would just like to mention that I have a new Bloggers and podcasts page, which you can access by clicking the tab at the top of the main page, I would love people to go and check it out, it has blogs from all different specs, and some other classes too. It's something I have been meaning to do for a while, as the little list down the left of my page was just getting too big!! Ok, onto the meat of this post, my personal builds for different bosses, today I shall cover General Nazgrim, Malkorok and Thok the Bloodthirsty, so sit back, chillax and lets get on with it!!

General Nazgrim.   

Ahh the General....I don't mind sharing with you that our Guild Masters video of the main groups first kill for this almost made me cry, (Incoming lore nerd) I love Nazgrim and I am actually gutted that we have to kill him as part of the raid. Never-the-less *Drinks a can of man up!* This is how I like to approach the fight stat wise (and trinket wise now I actually have some to choose from!!) and what sort of damage you can expect too come across. 
   Naz himself doesn't really hit very hard to start with, by this I mean his general melee swings aren't too bad, and he deals no magic damage so I leave my guard unglyphed, and select Dampen harm, and this is usually what I will use in case he does manage to get a war song off - which he will do if he gains 70 rage, this happened to us a few times on progress so I found it was good to have it ready to help the healers out with. I will happily take either Xuen or RJW for this fight, Xuen provides a nice DPS boost and if you can control him well enough he can help you out massively with adds in the very end phase. However if you find that shiny tiger a little to wiley, RJW is also great for a bit of extra threat gen' on those warshamans during the extra adds phase. 
   As the fight goes on, Nazgrim changes stances, just be aware that during his Beserker stance he does gain a 25% damage increase, so I like to make sure I have a guard up going into this stance. Another thing to note for this stance is that he generates 100% more rage, so you and your co tank need to make sure that there are no mistakes made when swapping him during this phase. Other than that, the assassin adds will never target a tank, but your dps may appreciate a quick leg sweep to keep them safe if you have the time, I prefer this talent over the ring of peace, but that is a personal preference and you can target the RoP on another player to silence a shammy if you need to, which makes them equally viable talent choices in my eyes. None of the adds will cause you any great deal of damage, the ravagers DO hurt if you get one up, if we ever got one I used my Fortifying Brew and tried to keep Naz away from them. Due to the low incoming damage I prefer a crit build for this fight, it means I can help out with the dps a little, which is very welcomed when you are helping with adds. Trinkets I chose the Curse of Hubris for that extra crit burst, and the Sigil of rampage for the cleave on the adds, also I like the Agi procs on this for the extra attack power.


Malkorok. 

One of our groups "Sticky" Bosses. After healing it this week I can see why. There are phases in this fight where you can expect a shed ton of damage, but fear not, as Brewmasters we can do what we do best...cheesing mechanics. For the stats on this fight I love to go all out Mastery, and I mean ALL OUT. I will stack every last piece I can , and while we were progressing I even swapped from my preferred Dual Wield to a polearm so that I could drop a load of expertiese and replace it with mastery. Why you say? He doesn't hit that hard? Well, no, he doesn't, but during the Blood Rage phase he hits for 1.8 million a swing and as we were struggling with the healing on that phase we decided to try it with me solo tanking it. Now, I will say that I have the 4 set bonus which I have found to be VERY useful for this particular part, being able to heal 15% of the amount I have staggered (which is high due to all the mastery) almost feels like cheating. I now couple this with the juggernauts focusing crystal (During this phase I am hitting like a truck myself and so the healing becomes a bit insane from this trink!). I dont have a particular preference for my other trinket, though I tend to go with the Curse of hurbis, because it gives a nice chunk of extra HP to work with, however I have done it with the Sigil equipped by mistake and I didn't really notice much of a difference and again, the Agi procs are nice.
   The only thing I am really careful of with this boss is making sure I have NO stacks of fatal strike going into the Blood Rage, that seemed to result in an insta-death so I have to work with my co tank to ensure that we are taunting at 12 or as close to it as we can. For talents i like to take Xuen for the DPS boost, Dampen Harm for the defensive CD, chi wave as it's spammable and helps the healers a fair bit.
 


Thok the pain in the a....Bloodthirsty. 

As you can guess from the title we have had our fair share of wipes on this, and the only time we killed it was with me on my priest as an extra healer. however, having tanked it for our main group and spending 3 weeks wiping on it, I do have a nice little set up for tanking him. 
   First of all, after healing this boss I have to say we tanks have it SO EASY. No being chased around the room. I swear I would rather tank this boss no matter how hard he hits than do anything else on this fight!! Now, getting my setup for this fight took a few attempts until I was comfortable. It all came down to weighing up the physical damage vs the magical damage. My main problem was to glyph the guard or not to glyph? Let's number crunch; physical damage, first phase, 200k 3 times, fairly spaced out, plus regular melee attacks, and the deafening screech of 300k in each of the 4 tanking phases. Magical damage 500k per blast for the acid phase (ouch) 200k per blast for the water phase and 200k + a 75k ticking dot for the fire phase. I don't believe there is a right or wrong way to go about this, but when I saw those magic damage numbers my first thought began with F and ended with off!! 
   The build I have settled on is to stack mastery, take dampen harm and keep potion of the mountains handy to deal with the physical damage, as it is more spread out it seems a little easier to cope with. Also disarming the jailer and/or having a hunter/druid take off his enrage makes him hit like a kitten. I then Glyph my guard, and take chi burst to help out with the healing during the stacking phases. I like to take tigers lust for this fight as it helps out if you need to help a buddy escape the impending doom of becoming meaty chunks, or if you need to go pick up the jailer in a hurry. For trinkets I like to take Rooks Unlucky Talisman to help reduce the fire damage in the last phase and the Juggernauts focusing crystal to help with healing myself. Before I had this trinket I took the Curse of Hubris to ensure I had crit bursts for building up brew stacks when needed.


That's it for those 3, feel free to ask any questions, you can either comment them here or reach me on twitter or via my email address. Happy Brewing!!

Looking into the future...or is it the past? Warlords of Draenor.

Well, I wont lie, this post has taken me over a week to compose, I struggled massively initially as I wrote what can only be described as a novel on how upset I was about the loss of reforging. Re-reading what I had written it suddenly dawned on me that I sounded like a moany spoiled little brat. So I ditched the entire post and began again. Before even writing a single word I did something very important...research. How could I project an opinion on something I had not really looked at that much since Blizzcon? So I delved, I nosed, I trawled through forums, blogs and various other sites where I could get as much information as I could before sitting down to look at the changes objectively and like an adult, rather than my initial "tantrum" about reforging.

   I should probably start by stating that as it stands, Outland is one of my absolute favorite places to quest and level, so when the Blizzcon announcement came through that they were basically going to "Re-vamp" this zone and take us back to when it was Draenor I was actually very excited. I don't intend to cover every detail in this post, I will just hit a few of the headlining changes and discuss my opinions (minus tantrums) on each one. If you have any comments or questions please feel free to discuss them below the post or you can now contact me via the details in my new "Contact" page!!

Garrisons.

I shall start off with this as it is quite possibly one of the things I am looking forward to the most, being an avid Sunsong Ranch owner (I have 6 now) I am absolutely stoked at the prospect of having my own "Gaff".  I really love the followers Idea, and the fact that they will even go off and get shinies for you!! (Because let's be fair here, who doesn't love a shiny or two?!) I already plan to have mine based in either the Tanaan Jungle or perhaps Nagrand, anywhere lush and green would be great for me. I think having something like this in the game will be great for anyone like me who is struggling with having "too much" free time on their hands, as it will provide a nice alternative outlet of entertainment when the LFR's are done. Also the removal of the daily questing will promt a need for replacement activities, and I think this could well be it.

UI Improvements. 

This is also something I am looking forward to. For me, as something of an altaholic I am very pleased to see that all my heirlooms will be accessible from all toons, at present my Priest is my Heirloom bank baby, and I am always sending things to and from her bank, and as she is also my jewelcrafter, I could do without the loss of at least 15 bank slots at any given time. Having them cross realm will also be handy, as it means again, I don't have to worry about things like "hmm, ok so who's got my agi mail set at the moment?"  The introduction of the toy box... YES PLEASE!! They take up SO much room in my bags currently, so than you Blizzard for giving me at least 20 bag slots back!! Personally I didn't have any issue with the current quest log but I can see how it does need improving a little, and I can understand how some people may find it confusing as to which quest they need to be on to progress what storyline, which are side quests etc, so I do think on the whole this needs to be adressed, it would also encourage more casual players to play more I think, as it can be a bit daunting to get back into a game and not know what the heck you need to do to get any further.

Dungeons and Raids.

I think this is my first "sticky" point, I am immensely looking forward to the new dungeons and raids, however the new raid structure as it stands is a little concerning for a number of reasons.
Let's take a look at it:

So, I basically have just a few questions about it really, most of these will revolve around the Mythic raiding section.
- What happens to 25m guilds? Do they drop 5 players a week? How will they select which of their players sit out? What if they are a guild that has been raiding together for a long time? I think that this could possibly cause friction, however I also understand that a lot of people are adults and I'm sure if this is the way the raid structure will truly lie they will be able to work around it, however I just feel that it may be a bit of a needless stress.
- Equally, what about 10m guilds? Where do they get the extra 10 bodies from? Do they merge with another guild? Do they disband to find a guild with room? Other end of the scale here, but I can foresee issues with guild mergers, 2 guild masters, one guild, how do you pick which one runs the guild? Would the players from one guild show more allegiance to one person than another? Surely this would potentially cause many issues, however, again, a lot of people can be mature about this and I'm sure some mergers would be perfectly successful, just, in my opinion, again, un necessary stress.
    I have to say that I am a little disappointed that flex mode will now be normal mode, I personally thought the introduction of the flex raid was a really good way to help people gear up for normals, and I think having a clear definition between flex and normal is needed, I'm not trying to sound elitist here but some (not all) of the major issues with raiding can involve people being under geared, and not prepared for fights, and having a flexible mode to send people into to prepare is a great and positive way to helping them, rather than telling them to go sit in an LFR where the tactics don't exist and the gear is lower. I do, however like the way that you can now expand your normal group to 15 or 14 for example, thus saving the hassle of guilds which suffer with "uh oh, I've for 12/13/14 people signed for our 10m raid again".

Gear Changes.


Right, here we go, probably one of the most Taboo changes Blizz are making, judging by forum reactions and comments, however, as I said, I shall be adult and look at things objectively here.

Hit/Exp- GONE. YES!!!!!!! Well done Blizzard, thank god for that, no longer to I need to try and reach the caps, thus wasting the stat points when I could be using them elsewhere (Think of ALLLL the mastery I could have had with no hit ex!!) But seriously, from a non selfish point of view, I can't see anything bad with this at all, casters will no longer be missing important spells, melees will hit everything they aim for, this is a wonderful notion and I can only say I wish they had done this before :D

Dodge/Parry - GONE. For me this will have little impact as I can't ever really say that I have specced into either stat, I use dodge with my brew but that's about it. However for DK and Warrior tanks I should imagine it will be a benefit not to have to waste the stat points into them? I leave this one open for now, I shall speak to my GM who plays a DK and get his thoughts on it :)

Reforging - GONE. (Rip) Ok ok, I will make this brief - personally, and this is purely selfish, I am not happy because I just spent 4 months learning to use the reforge tool myself without having to follow a guide, and I'm quite proud of being able to reforge my gear to my liking without having to consult Mr Robot /end rant. On the other hand, with the loss of hit/exp/parry and doge, and the introduction of the new stats, there should be no need to reforge every time you get a new piece, and to be honest this will be quite nice, because it means that perhaps you can equip it as soon as you win it, rather than having to wait until the end of raid to go gem, ench and reforge everything. See, I found a positive!!

New stats. Amplify, Multistrike, and Readiness....oooh, now these look like fun, its nice to see stats that you would have only seen on a trinket previously be put onto armor, makes me wonder what kind of wierd and wonderful things trinkets will do, persoanlly I love things like the netherwing trinket, where you can summon a netherwing ally to fight with you, would new trinkets have cool things like this on them? 

Fewer items can be enchanted. This I quite like the prospect of, as a person who has a lot of toons, enchanting everything to make them all possible standins for a raid can be time consuming or expensive if you don't have the professions, so I think having an enchant possibility as a bonus is a much nicer idea than making them manditory. It will also hopefully remove the LFR notion of "Omg that tank iz shit cos he gots no gemz or enchantz". Some people just cant AFFORD to gem and enchant low level gear on alts, they wait until they get something WORTH enchanting, I'm hoping that this new way of enchanting will remove this issue from LFR's. (This is purely because lots of toons = lots of LFR, and anything to make it easier/more pleasurable is a bonus in my book) 

Item Squish. This is much needed, don't get me wrong, I know we all love the pretty numbers, and it always amuses me greatly on a Garrosh pull to watch our two warriors lolstorm a million dps, but realistically, how big to the numbers go? I saw something absolutley hilarious on the WoW forums while I was researching, where someone had made up a piece of gear called the "Chestplate of ridiculous numeracy" and had, based on previous expansions upgraded the 5.4 stats to a hypothetical 6.0 stat. 7k mastery rating on one piece...while on one hand I'm like YES PLEASE!!!! On the other hand it is totally ridonculous, people would be doing millions of dps, and the recounts/and skadas would end up taking over the whole screen. It seems a loit of people are complaining because they will miss their numbers but to be honest I really don't think it will be noticeable. Blizz have confirmed we can still go and lol through old content just as we can now so I dont see the issue. If anything I personally think this may help with raiding because some people should focus less on the numbers and more on what they are doing....hopefully!!

This little monk had 1 spec, this little monk had 3.... 

As many of you know I am in a guild that currently has 2 10m groups, one progress group which are 7/14 HC and our little normal group which are on Garrosh. We are hoping that the new raids involve some mechanics that require more than 2 tanks, but there is a very high possibility that they wont. So there is a very large chance that there will not be a permanent tank spot for me. I love the guild I am in and would never leave, and at first I was a little sad that I may not be permanently tanking for WoD, but then I thought, this opens up so many doors for me, I am a monk....we can play ALL 3 roles, so in the run up to WoD I shall be gearing up all 3 specs so that when it comes to raid time I can jump onto whatever spec I am needed for, thus making me a far more useful tool for my raid team. So for any other monks that are worried about this sort of thing, don't despair, we have SO many utilities, go learn them, have fun doing it, and expand your knowledge in the process!! 

Anyway thats it for me on this one, I hope it's not too much of a wall of text, I have taken the images from the official WoW website and if you visit this link you can see much much more!

Dont forget its the 13th, which can only mean one thing.....MONK MEDITATION TONIGHT!!!!!
Looking forward to watching live as I have been unable to for the past 2 episodes, feel free to come and join me in the dojo, I will be there with my cup of Brew!! So head on over to The Monk Meditation Homepage.....and come join in the fun!!

Lady, out xx

What a week!!

This week seems to have been very busy and exciting for my little monk, I am aiming to have my WoD post out in the next few days, but I would love to share a few things for todays post.

The Trinket dropped....

Yes, I have finally gotten my furry paws on the Juggernauts Focusing Crystal all be it a flex version but still, I've been waiting since the start of the patch to try one of these babys out. I have obviously reforged the dodge into mastery, and so far I have to say, it seems to be worth it, especially on hig damage fights where I'm hitting like a truck (Garrosh) it is doing a reasonable amount of healing, which I am very happy with!!


Progress. 

Our guild's second raid team has undergone a few changes and we have even made some progression, as we have a new tank and one less healer I brought my priest in for the Thok fight, worked out a proper healing cd rotation with our other healers and after 3 weeks of wiping, down he went!! In the same night I switched back to my monk, went WW (!!!!!!) and we got Siege master down after 6 pulls and one shot the Paragons, I have to say I was right out of my comfort zone the whole night, having only ever tanked those fights I had NO idea what the dps mechanics were. However, I managed to adapt, and was even soloing belts!! We are on Garrosh right now, and for most of our group it will be their first kill, we had 13 pulls on him last night, we have the empowered whirling phase under control, and are now working on the empowered MC phase. Calling the fight and trying to remember my DPS rotation is hard work but fun. 


Achievement!! 

Having managed to earn silver on the first try when 5.4 hit, I thought I was all set for gold. I could not have been more wrong. I spent hours trying it and failed miserably, since then i have tried it once or twice, to no end apart from a lot of frustration, self doubt and anger. However yesterday, for no apparent reason I went and gave it a go. I had NO idea how much I had learned about my class and how to use it properly from tanking SoO every week, I completed it first try, with ease.
This is by no means a guide, but here's how I did it:
Talents: Chi wave, Dampen harm, Tigers lust, Xuen, Ascension and Leg Sweep.
It was all about managing my cooldowns and remembering to use by utilities. Xuen is only a 3min cd so I remembered to use him early on (Wave 4 ish) so that I could use him again later (Wave 8). Use dampen harm for the big enrage mobs, used clash as much as possible to pick up new mobs and for mobility. For the very last wave I had the idea of disarming one of the bigger mobs, which halved the damage intake.....how I didn't think of this before I will never know!! I will begin to make some progress on endless soon, and shall attempt to record some of it and perhaps incorporate a more comprehensive "how I did it". 



Last but not least.... 

My biggest news is as per my previous post, I shall be going Mistweaver to cover a healer for a month. Having spammed twitter for help I have to say the community's response was in a word, AWESOME. I have had guides thrown at me, people helping me with trinket choices, stat priorities, and the support is very welcomed. It's a big change for me and I am both excited and also scared witless at the same time. I shall hopefully over the month piece together a post detailing the transition and how I handle it. If I'm confident enough I may even include a video or two :)
I shall be updating the blog page this week to incorporate a section dedicated to other blogs and useful resources. I'd really like to thank everyone that's helping me out, hopefully you will see the fruits of your labor pay off, if not, I shall be hiding in a corner somewhere crying!!
Lastly I am very excited to announce that I received a Beta invite for Elder Scrolls online for this weekend, as a HUGE Elder Scrolls fan girl I am quite giddy at the prospect of being able to be one of the first to play it! Due to the very serious looking non disclosure agreement I shan't be able to give too many game details away but I do plan to review things that don't give away too much detail.

Mistweavers.... I want YOU!!!!

Just a very quick post, I am likely to be spending the next month or so as a healer due to the needs of our raid comp, I am really excited about this, I have had a bit of experience healing but would REALLY appreciate any long standing Mistweavers input, so I shall very likely be bugging people on twitter and Chi Burst, If anyone can point me in the direction of any guides/people that can help a fellow monk out I would be most appreciative!!

Also, happy Darkmoon Fair week!! For those that don't know I am going for my Insane title at the moment so I have been spending every day at the DMF doing the dailys, which I love as I have discovered they are a lot of fun :)

The Panda Behind the Monk

This will seem like a strange post to many I am sure, however, I feel I should dedicate a small post to the creature that inspired me to get a Pandarian character in the first place, my Cat, Panda. Yes, sorry, but I am a crazy Cat lady, (no I don't have the achievement yet hehe) and as she is old and on her last legs I would like to sgiver her a little shout out, as she was the reason I picked a Panda, and it's surprising how involved with my gaming she can get......

Once there was cat sat on a cushion.....

....one day the cushion was no longer any good, so she decided she'd rather sit on my lap instead....

 ......When that no longer sufficed it seemed logical to just use my hand as a pillow....while I am raiding.....

 ......Needless to say this got a little annoying so I relegated her back to the sofa arm next to my desk.....

......Which of course she was not satisfied with for long so she fashioned herself into some sort of back pillow.....

.....And then a scarf.....

......In short, I can no longer raid in peace, I have my husband sat directly behind me on his PC, and Panda, well, she sits in a slightly more convenient place now, which, looking at the photo does look kind of cute....

Looking back....Looking forward.....

Happy Brew Year!!!!
After taking a short break over the holiday period I am back and feeling refreshed and ready to tackle another year!!

Looking back over my (almost) first full year on wow it's quite weird for me to imagine the time when I couldn't tell the difference between PvP gear and PvE gear, when I didn't know what gems were for or how to get them, and tanking was a long way away from anything I could possibly do....
Still, thanks to some friends, I soon learned how to play (this can be a debatable statement ;) ), within 3 months of starting I had 3 level 90s, (here they are!!)

 I had secured myself a place in a raid group on my Warlock, I leveled tailoring and enchanting, not at the same time, which turned out to be quite expensive, and not to mention the fact that I thought you could only enchant an item once and didn't know what enchanting vellum was.....yes, I WAS that daft, but we wont go there!!
Some of my other highlights of 2013 include: Moving guild to get the chance to play my beloved monk, meeting one of our new guildies in person, had a fantastic week!! Getting my "Master of them All" achievement, getting my 6th level 90, completing the SoO raid on my tank, something some people never thought would happen. Last but not least, joining the Monk community, tuning in to watch Monk Meditation every week, checking all the blogs to see who's posted what, and what tips I can pick up, and being welcomed into the community itself like an old friend. 
    Finally, at the end of the year on boxing day I turned 30. This was a fairly big milestone for me, and I'm sure some people would wonder why a 30 year old woman still delights in playing computer games, all I can say is this..... once a gamer....ALWAYS a gamer!! My husband clearly supports this theory but getting me this AWESOME T-shirt for Christmas ;)

Looking forward to what this year has in store for me, I plan to get my last 5 90's to complete the full set of classes, I will be posting more on how I approach bosses and also raid leading situations. I will in the near future be talking about the upcoming Warlords of  Draenor Expansion, what I like the look of, what I don't like the look of, and the potential switch to a different spec for raiding purposes. 

I hope everyone had a fabulous Christmas and New Year, I would like to thank the following people for welcoming me into the community and give them a bit of a shout out, go check out their blogs if you haven't already....go on....GO!!!!!

The futures bright, the futures Green ;)

These are the people that have made me feel so welcome, thanks guys!!

Sunnier - you can visit her Blog here: Sunniers Art of War
Chaithi - Host of monk meditation, which you can watch.... Here!!
Vaylen - Check out his blog Legacy of the Brew
Arielle - Follow here on twitter @ArielleEJ
Daikatsu - Follow here on twitter @DaikatsuCTR
Naoyuki - Follow here on twitter @Naoyuki_CtR
Ayr - Follow here on twitter @AyrMonk