AFK for a week

Am I tired of world of warcraft ? Is that the reason im taking a week AFK.

Has the game lost my interest due to all the bugs lately ?

Or am I bitching over to easy content ?

None of the above is the reason, im a addict how the hell should I be able to take the road of the drugs... :)

Nope, im just switching to another big drug of mine for a week. Yeap, beware. The slopes will not be save for the next week. My board is brushed of, and my helm is in the car. Togheter with the cold winter suit. Yeap, im going snowboarding... Ohhh, yeah...

So catch you in a week, when im back. Hungry for more post's and alot of more WoW. Will try not to break any legs... or should I ? Maybe on the last day, a long pause from work, and alot of wow with my leg up.... Might be a possibility....



Wow or snowboarding, im always carrying my wings near by. May the light be with you.

Video - Sartharion + 1 add. (Tenebron)

After been thinking through alot of the encounters in Wrath. I actually think that Sartharion is my favorite so far. Why ? I ofc see this from a melee dps perspective. But it has all out damage, movement, awareness and multiple targets. Whats more to ask for, except a phase where only holy dmg can be done.... :) (Gotta have some Retribution Epeen... hehe.)
This is a video recorded on our first try with an add up in Heroic. I think most of the people that was present this night, havent done any normal Sartharion with adds. So it was all new to almost all of us. We picked Tenebron as our add. This is a recorded video of our very first shoot of it ever in Epiphany, my guild. Enjoy.





Epiphany goes Sartharion and Tenebron from Jesper Stoico on Vimeo.

This is a video of our first try/kill on Sartharion + 1 add. Tenebron was our choice of add.

Blizzards perfektionism broken ?

Blizzard have been my number one game developer for a long time. Way before world of warcraft came out. All in all, they have made rock solid titles everytime. I cant recall a bad game from em at all. One of there absolute strongest points, have been there drive to perfektionism. They have never ever, been afraid to delay a game, because they didnt feel it was quiet right/done yet. It aint good to delay, but if I know the game will be perfect (or as close as it can get) by the delay. I can live with it. And I like that better, than an unfinished product.

But blizzard have let me down lately, with precise that. I will come with some of the issues I have had. It all started when Wrath was about to hit the shelfes.
After some time in the expansion, I think the expansion is to small. I think that deep inside blizzard would have like to had more content in it. The levelling is good, alot better than it ever have been. It's the endgame that worries me. Not that it is to easy, thats another discussion. What worries me is the amount. 2 bosses, which is single boss instances. Satharion and Malygos. And a raid instance which is a remake of an old instance. Thats it. Ofc there is wintergrasp, but that is PVP. And as far as I know, World of warcraft is still a game with priority on PVE. Im disapointed.
Was they in some way rushed to release it before time ?
Because of the release of WAR ? I doubt it, deep inside I dont think that blizzard was afraid of the release of WAR. WAR have never been a WOW killer, you need more than that to be able to threatend WOW.
Because they had to have it out to christmas sale ? I truely believe christmas or not, the game would sell just as good.
Because of there new big brother, having more to say than blizzard state ? This is where I lay my cards, I may think that even though blizzard would have liked to delay the expansion a bit. Activision have had a good deal to do with getting the game out when it did. Maybe because they thought some of the above, was a good reason.

Next up, we have another disapointment. Patch 3.0.8. A patch alot have been looking forward too. The patch after the expansion, normally have alot of fixes to game stuff, that have been coming up after alot of people is closing in on the endgame. And are exploring the new stuff in the classes. But what a disapointment. What the patch have brought, is just more bugs. Arena is down, Wintergrasp is down. There is reports of lag all over the net. People getting thrown out of instances. Bugs on old spells like summoning from warlocks. It really smeels undone, untested and so un-blizzard. Whats happening ?

Is it Activision that have such a big influence on blizzard, and for now in a very bad way ?
Is it the worldwide financiel crisis ? Maybe not a blizzard, but there bigbrother, draining the positive numbers out of blizzard ?
Are the good developers on new assignments, for new games ? Leaving WOW in a state to get worse and worse, and in the end loose its popularity. Or am I painting the devil on the wall ?

I really have no real answer, but blizzard have one customer and long time fan, which is sitting blogging with a disapointment in his stomach. Growing with the speed if the un-blizzard like things they do for the time being continue.

Am I alone on this one ?

Bits and pieces

Tooltip to wowhead added
Added the feature "Powered by wowhead", to the site. What it does, is a thing most of you is problaly already familiar with. When ever you hover a tooltip, leading to wowhead.com, it shows a tooltip for the item, skill or whatever the link points to. A very nice feature. I had been looking for it for a while, but ofc the wrong places. Tnx to Josh from the blog Eye for an Eye, I now have it on my site as well. Tnx Josh.

Here is an example, Red sword of Courage.


Weird things you find in azeroth.
From time to time, you stumble upon grey items. Most of em you problaly just sell, and dont even look what it is. I normally do that as well. But while playing on an alt, I got this book. And luckyli I read it. Blizzard do have some moments, atleast it made me smile.. ;) Look for yourself.












Movie in the making.
Last reset I frapsed the guilds Naxxramas 25 man run. And have started on editing and figure out ideas for a coming movie. Its not a movie aimed for the big crowd. Mostly for the guild to enjoy and as a diary of what we have done togheter. I have gotten Anub and the Lady in so far. Its far from done in anyway, but its starting to shape up. You can see what I have done so far.



You can also just download the file from filefront, can be done here.

A bit of future plans.
I have an idea to present you for some of my alts. As Impadin is pretty geared out in HC's, badge and 10 man gear. So I can almost only get upgrades in 25 man now. So will problaly start spending some more time on my alts now, untill we see Ulduar come out.
I still as well, havent really seen the changes from the patch. I look forward to go Naxx 25 this weekend. And hopefully get a better view of the changes there.

Malygos, still our nemesis

Another night of raiding have passed. We started out with a Satharion visit, my first 25 man visit to him within my current guild. The goal was to leave an add up, just to see how it would go. Tenebron was the drake to keep alive.
1st try and we had em both down with little casualties. The kill was a little sloppy. Wasent super organized. But thinking of it was the first try on Satharion for some, and most if not all, first try with a drake up. I think we can be proud of the kill.

So we ventured towards Malygos, to progress from our 8% defeat on him last week. The raidleader decided to try to root the sparks this time, to save em for a a serious dmg boost, when we had around 3 sparks rooted. It caused alot of confusion, and in all honesty, it didnt go to well.
So after some try's we went back to how we did it last time. As we had some new people along that had never seen the fight, we struggled a bit in the different phases. But after some try's we got to phase 3 again. We got there 4-5 times, but got beaten on the enrage timer every time. With our best try being 3%, so we got a bit closer. The guild will be on him again tonight, but I cant make it there, so can only wish em goodluck.

A few notes to max your dps performance in there. In phase 1, when he lift up from the ground, and are about to whirl you around. You can still dmg him with judging, and if you move to the center of the platform, you can also melee hit him. A bit more dmg there. Remember you can hit him with instant abilities in the air as well.
Phase 2, get a mark up and a tank fast on the first ground add to take down. I had a problem with agro on it, so think about pop Hand of salvation there to help yourself and your tank out. And get up on the disc asap, key to fast killing of air adds.
Phase 3, whats there to say. As a dps there. Push 1-1, wait for around 80 energy, push 2. And right after 1-1, then wait for 80 again and so on. Rinse Repeat.

As I saw it last night, our dps in phase 3 was to low. Way to many not stacking em problaly, but had max 5 stacks. If we get the stacking right, im sure he is down before we know it.

Current state of dps

Last night me and my guild ventured into Naxx 25. A nice and fresh reset instance, a instance we have cleared 2 times fully before. So I thought it would be a good indication on how my dps is currently. I like to measure my dps around a full naxx run, rather than a Patchwerk fight. I think a full run gives a better picture. As in my world, dps is not just being able to go max out on a single boss. Its being active on all mobs, move and adjust the situations and most of all dont die.

We had a few wipes in the run, I think 4-5 all in all. I died to a hurtfull strike on patchwerk... :S So missed some good dps there, died around 40% left I think. Also died on Sapphiron at around 40% as well.

This is the dps I handed out during the night.



Around 3,5K dps overall. I dont have to many Retribution paladins to compare to. How does it look for you guys ?

After I got the Betrayer of Humanity, I made a promise to a good friend of mine, Grandad. I promised him to do over 5K dps on Thaddius. We wiped on the first try on him. Second try he went down. I was on 4,987dps on the first try. So close.
Second try, 5393dps.... there you go m8, as promised.

T7,5 Leg upgrade
I got an upgrade as well last night, got the T7,5 Legs. So off with the heroes I had and in with the yellow ones.

Valorous Redemption Legplates
2011 Armor
+85 Strength
+100 Stamina
+75 Attack power and +22 Critical strike rating
Red Socket (+16 STR)
Yellow Socket (+16 HIT)
Socket Bonus: +6 Critical Strike Rating
Durability 120 / 120
Classes: Paladin
Requires Level 80
Equip: Improves critical strike rating by 66 (1.44% @ L80).
Equip: Improves haste rating by 84 (2.56% @ L80).

This is how they look after I have gemmed and enchanted em.

Frapsing again
I also frapsed all the boss fights last night. 66,6GB of video. I hope to set myself some time off, to get Vegas fired up again and make a Naxx video. This will be my first video as an epiphany member, as well as my first frapsing in Wrath. I actually look forward to make it... :)
Will get back to you, when new things happend on this front.

Keep save and keep the holy damage high untill next time.

Retribution mana issues ?

After reading a post over at Blessing of Kings about the new Hammer of Wrath glyph. And reading through the comments. It seems like some people still take consecration as a spell which is used carefully, as its mana consuming. This surprises me actually a bit.

As consecration is a spell I use almost every cd in my rotation. And I have no mana issues. The place where I can get mana issues is under longer chain pulls or long boss fights when we get under 20%. But it is actually very rarely. As long as I use Divine Plea, when its off cool down. (I normally start using it around 40-50% mana left.)
Divine plea and the mana regain from spiritual attunement and replenishment is more than enough for me to keep consecration on cooldown. Its very rarely I have to use a mana pot, I normally only have to do that in fights, where the healing im getting is low.

To be able to continue full spam of both consecration and hammer of wrath, I have picked up the glyph for hammer of wrath. And looking forward to the change it will receive in patch 3.0.8. But as it seems the better gear I get, the less mana issues I have. I may very well replace it with Glyph of avenging wrath, for even more dmg.

How is your mana, are you having issues ?

What a night !

It was a raiding night, we should get the last of Naxx 25 done for the week. I have been looking for a while after a replacement for my Axe from HC HoL. But have been unlucky on rolls, or simlpy havent had any drop when I have been around. But that should change tonight. We was missing one wing and then Sapphiron and Kel'thuzad.
The clearing went smoothly, and typically alot of nice melee plate dropped. But tryed to hold back, as I was saving the dkp, for a weapon drop.

I gotten resist to bid low on a few things, as I might be lucky to get em, if no one else bidded. That actually scored me, Iron-Spring Jumpers, as I was getting low on hit.

The dps chest dropped at sapphiron, but I was strong and holded my dkp. Kel'thuzad went down first try, and there is happend..... my wishes had come real. The drop, I bidded all I had in dkp, and lucky that was enough. Im now the proud owner of, best 2H dps weapon ingame atm, Betrayer of Humanity. I was literraly jumping up and down, with a big smile on my face, cheering at my screen.... :)

As we finished rather fast with raiding, I took some heroics afterwards, which nettet me up to 60 badges, so I got myself T7 gloves. Also got the back, from 25 man badges. So it was really a night of upgrades.








A few gear options
After switching around gear, to get 4 set bonus, im now there. So lets see how it all goes and if I can feel a dps increase.
So here is what I came from, till what I am now. Here is the stats.

Old set :
2 Tier set bonus
2967 AP
231 Hit
37,18 Crit
250 Haste
0 Armour Penetration

New set :
4 Tier set bonus
2978 AP
260 Hit
36,41 Crit
283 Haste
37 Armour Penetration

Really looking forward to testing my new gear setup.

Argent champion
The heroics I made last night nettet me exalted with the argent crusade. As I always thought, since I saw it, that the title the argent champion, would be awesome to have as a paladin. So looked up my Reputation and could see I needed 9K with the old fraction argent dawn. So today I decided to deal with that, after some hours and a few clears of Stratholme and Scholomance. I'm now know as, Impadin the argent champion. (With a kick ass axe.. :) )

Glyphs, what is our choices ?

Glyphs ? What are they good for and what can they bring to the table ?

I will start with, in short, to explain what glyphs do. Glyphs is new to the game. They where introduced in 3.0, short before wrath came live. What they do is improve your spells/abilities to do more dmg, more duration, more pew pew or something else. You have 3 minor glyph slots and 3 major glyph slots. The slots are coming avaible to you from level 15, where the first 2 slots opens. And at 80 all your 6 slots are yours to use. Here is a break down :

• Level 15: 1 Major, 1 Minor.
• Level 30: 2 Major, 1 Minor.
• Level 50: 2 Major, 2 Minor.
• Level 70: 2 Major, 3 Minor.
• Level 80: 3 Major, 3 Minor.

The glyphs are made by the profession, inscription. So they are all player made. So you can get em from the AH as the most commen place. When you have one in your bag you wanna use, you have to find the local inscription trainer, as they have a thing called Lexicon of Power. You have to be close to the Lexicon to be able to equip the glyph. (Ask a city guard to find the trainer.)
Where do you find your glyph slots. Open your spellbook (P) and choose the glyph tab at the bottom of the book.

Thats the basic about glyphs, lets dive into the fun part. The glyphs that is usefull to Retribution Paladins.

Major glyph's for PVE:

Glyph of Judgement Major Glyph Classes: Paladin Requires Level 15Use: Your Judgements deal 10% more damage.
This is the one to have glyph, 10% more dmg to the ability we get the most dmg out of. This is really a no-brainer. Get it, asap.

Glyph of Consecration Major Glyph Classes: Paladin Requires Level 20Use: Increases the duration and cooldown of Consecration by 2 sec.
You should have consecration into your rotation. It should net your around 50 dps more, and the more targets there is, it will ofc gain up. 2 seconds more duration and 2 secs less cd. I say yes to that.

Glyph of Avenging Wrath Major Glyph Classes: Paladin Requires Level 70Use: Reduces the cooldown of your Hammer of Wrath spell by 50% while Avenging Wrath is active.
This one is a glyph im about to give a try myself. You should use Hammer of wrath, everytime the boss gets below 20%, when ever it is of cooldown. But that brings us to the use of this one. It can only be used when the target is below 20% AND you have Avenging wrath of cooldown. That more or less makes it useless on thrash, but pretty nice dps boost when you are on bosses and have your avenging wrath timed right.

Glyph of Hammer of Wrath Major Glyph Classes: Paladin Requires Level 44Use: Increases the range on Hammer of Wrath by 5 yards.
Agree that this one dosent look so sweet now, but it will in next patch. As then is will lower the mana usage of Hammer of wrath with 100%. And that is nice, if you have mana issues there.

That brings us to 4 major glyphs worth using in PVE pew pew. And the bright reader would notice that, thats not gonna happend. We only have 3 slots to use. My recommendation would be. Use the first and second one no matter what. Then make your choice around the last two. Take number 3, if you have the mana to spam it endlessly when the boss gets to 20%. If you have mana issues in the end of boss fights, take number 4. As some Hammer of wrath less, is better than no mana to use on any. As hammer of wrath is nice dps to push out in the end.


Minor glyphs for PVE :

Glyph of Sense Undead Minor Glyph Classes: Paladin Requires Level 20Use: Damage against Undead increased by 1% while your Sense Undead
ability is active.
This one is not bad at all. I know its only against undead, but as wrath so far is all about undead mobs I aint complaining. Worst part about this one, is you have to remember to make sense undead active... :)

Glyph of Lay on Hands Minor Glyph Classes: Paladin Requires Level 15Use: Increases the mana restored by your Lay on Hands spell by 20%.
You may say at first sight, lay on hands upgrade, but that is a healing ability. Yes, it is. But the way I use lay on hands aint for healing. I use LoH for mana return and this baby raise the return from 1950 to 2340. So start using LoH on yourself, call it an extra mana pot.

There is really no more usefull minor glyphs. Atleast no one who raises our dmg in raids or PVE in general. The last slot I would use for one of the following 3. The 2 of em are just a nice thing to buff the duration of your normal might or wisdom. The last is a small mana help when buffing kings.

Glyph of Blessing of Kings Minor Glyph Classes: Paladin Requires Level 20Use: Reduces the mana cost of your Blessing of Kings and Greater Blessing of Kings spells by 50%.
The kings one.

Glyph of Blessing of Might Minor Glyph Classes: Paladin Requires Level 15Use: Increases the duration of your Blessing of Might spell by 20 min when cast on yourself.
This is the might one, the wisdom is the same. Just with the wisdom buff instead.

So not to many choices of minor ones just yet, lets hope some more usefull ones will come into play at a later stage.

Hope this gave a insight in what we have to work with as a retribution paladin. To up our arsenal of holy mayhem.

Expertise cap and information.

Last time I talked a bit about hit, this time I will try to uncover another dps stat, expertise.

Expertise was a stat that, got introduced to the game in the late part of TBC. When it first came into play it was the new hot stat for tanks. I was playing a prot warrior back then, and I rmb how we farmed badges to burn on those pieces with expertise on. It really pushed our threat generation up.

Im talking about prot tanks, and threat generation. Not something I would like as a Retribution Paladin. Why should I care about it then ? What can expertise do for me ? As a dps melee class expertise is a great way to boost our dps some more. What expertise does is, when you attack from behind, you can push dodge of the combat table. Meaning like hit, more hits = more dmg to us.

Cap ? Is there a cap like hit, yes there is. You will need 26 Expertise to cap it, removing dodges from the combattable. Thats 214 expertise rating, if you rather like it like that. When the stat is capped, all over the cap is a waste. So make sure to hit the nail, or maybe a little less. No idea in waste itemization points on something that dosent help us.

It will be a great dps increase to get some of this on your gear. I would not gem for it though, I would let it come by gear upgrades. And even though you wont have it capped, you should still be able to get some more dps out right away. As it effects our normal white attacks, our strikes and our seal. (SoB)

So what are you waiting for, go get you some… ;)

Hit the magic number

Hit must be the stat that is being talked most about in all classes, if we talk dps. This is/should be the first stat to cap or raise to around the cap. Before all, stats. Why, you may ask ?
If you are new to the game or maybe not been a raider a long time. You actually may not know this.I will try to explain.
Alot of people, would problaly think. Ok, im a spell caster, what does my bolts need to make bigger numbers, equal more damage. And by all means that is a normal way to approach it. And then the answer ofcourse would be spell power. But what if that bolt miss, how much have you so gained in dmg ? Zero, thats right. This is the main reason your first stat to cap or get close to, should be hit. Hits with bolts or whatever you throw at the enemy = damage, if its a miss its wasted. Its wasted damage, and in mana users terms, also wasted mana.
So make sure to get that hit up as soon as possible. And always have that stat in your mind when you are changing gear around. I know some, think they are getting less and less, dont think its worth to gem for hit. Im completly disagree. If you are way below hit cap, gem for it. Get that hit up. But watch it, as soon as you are above the cap, hit becomes less desired. So when you are around the cap, start to gear for other stats. Even change out your gems to dmg gems. That being spell power, str, crit, attack power, etc.

What do you need as a retribution paladin to reach the hit cap ?
32.8 rating gives you 1% hit. At level 80, we should require 262 hit rating, or 8%, to be hit capped on white swings, specials, and judgements.

There you go, your first bibel step to follow to add up to your damage in raids, 5 mans or whatever you are trying. This is to be hit capped on raid bosses. If you are perfectionist, you could get some pieces with a bit less hit on, for thrash and HC's.

Will make an article with the hit numbers for all classes. Sitting in the train atm, so my connection is to slow to get em all surfed up right away... :)

Have fun and go kick som ass out there.

The professionals enter the wow universe

The Craft of War: BLIND from percula on Vimeo.

Some weeks back, I stumbled upon a video on the net. I was just randomly surfing around, and I must say it took me by surprise and storm. Its freaking awesome. I have been following the machinima wow related stuff for some years now. Made a few myself. I like video's in general, that being pvp, fun, world stuff, PVE or pure machinima. As long as the editing, visual style and the music is gathered in one nice melt. Baron soosdon is one of my all time favorites.
But back to the video above. Its in a class of its own. Its the first long video I have seen where personal created animation is used in the whole show. Its amazing to see the universe I love so much, being brought to live like this. I love it. Im gonna try to find time to get my 3dsmax polished off and back on the harddisc. And try to play around with it some. Its amazing. Did I say I think its amazing... ;)

Well, im out, gonna watch it one more time.