Buel's World
Ramblings From Azeroth and Beyond
Disc priests & mana (level 80)
Oct 21st
I was in a heroic last night (Halls of Reflection) on my hunter, I was pet levelling and figured a guild run was just what was needed – HoR seems to be thrown up alot recently (3 from last 5 dungeons) we had a holy priest healing which is great – I am always happy to see a priest healing (mostly because playing a priest I know they are exceptionally capable healers – yes I know that all healing classes are, it’s just a preference). I noticed that whilst the holy spec easily kept up with the HPS there was a certain lowness on mana towards the end of each wave which as a disc priest I tend not to get – not I know I shouln’t compare apples to oranges and I’m fully aware that my kit is rated higher but it made me appreciate how much better the disc priest is for healing/shielding at level 80 on mana retention alone.
For those holy priests out there, grab yourselves the dual talents (if you dont already have it) and try it out, it’s not everyone cup of tea, but because we have access to Evangelism and Archangel at 80, and holy will need to wait (and shadow) till 81 for Evangelism and 83 to get the Archangel mana and DPS buffs, now this isn’t a dig at blizzard because I really do think that they’ve outdone themselves with this amazing patch and the future expansion looks f’in awesome, it’s really to point out that in my (humble?) opinion us disc priests have got the best deal currently – the game will definately balance up at 85 (as the whole game is balanced around the 85th level and that just as it should be), so seriously get out there and try it, I promise you wont be disappointed, you might not wanna go back to holy again.
Raiding with Disc?
For some reason some people have an issue with a disc priest, they see the HPS charts and start moaning that you’re not pulling your weight healing, or the dont like the shields over standard healing, but thats where we are flexible, with the recent patch we are very capable healers as well as shields/barriers – I’m lucky my guild have actively encouraged me to spec disc, the guild tanks (Paladin, Bear & Warrior) are all very happy with the shields and HPS when needed and dont review HPS charts and graphs to see why the disc priest doesn’t reach the top of the charts (sure we use them to review wipes etc, but they understand the lower HPS figures from me) and the healers in the raid are very happy as they have to heal alot less as I try to keep shields up on everyone when needed.
My answer to anyone facing this grief is to simply turn the other cheek, and let them moan, a true raider and gamer will know how the mechanics work and will soon realise your importance – especially in key fights (a disc priest on the Lick King fight is highly desirable, especially getting shields up just before the Infest is cast, pretty much guaranteed that no-one will take damage from this – which can be a big heal drain).
So – you guys have homework, buy a dual talent proficiency, or re-spec your second prof (it’s only 100 gold now an un-documented change in the last patch) and try disc for a few days come tell me then how much you love it 
/Disc(o)
Hunter chit-chat
Oct 20th
Like most keen WoW players I have many alts mostly congregated on one server (Agamaggan-EU), whilst waiting for the impending release of Cataclysm (which reminds me I have added a little countdown “widget” in the top right so we all know how long we have to wait) I have a tendancy of alt hopping to find something to fill my time. So I hear you all asking (guessing it’s not a great things when you hear voices in your head is it?) what are you filling your time with now? Well I’m glad you asked…… I’m fairly happy with where things are with my priest (Flyté) and raids are happening once (sometimes twice) a week, there’s little need for heroics on that goon, so she’s having a well deseved break, I’m messing with a hunter alt that I had levelling as a background goon, one of those “couple of levels here and there” kind of goons that I’m sure we all have, now that 4.0.1 has landed with a big wet plop (after I sorted the priest) I figured it was a nice plan to use this as my DPS alt when Cataclysm launches as I’m partial to Beast Master spec and it seems at last it’s being treated as a possible raid/dungeon spec in Cataclysm (for too long it’s been not a spec that could be used for anything other than levelling, and I’m partial to the rare pets) – so Mohawke has been treated to some play time (Info on this goon at the bottom of this post).
My selected “BM” spec (once I respec tonight) is going to be: 31/2/3 which in my opinion seems to be the best PvE build in BM spec (altho some will not agree) – sure there’s some pvp talents there I’ve omitted but I’m not using this goon for PvP currently, and the pet will be this sorta configuration (using a spirit beast as a template, not everyones cup of tea but I like them).
So my preparation so far has consisted of alot of pet gathering – now that we’re allowed 25 pets I figured it was time I started filling the slots up and unfortnately my fascination with rare pets has once again taken over and I seem to spend too long on Petopia finding the skins that I like then tracking down the pets from that (I know, I know, what can I say, I admit it’s not good, but I’m wired that way lol). So what pet’s have I got so far:
Ghost Saber – a rare kitty from Darkshore that you need to break statues until one spawns, and then you can tame them.
Humar the Pridelord – until WoTLK release he was the only black male kitty in the game, I managed to tame him when I was 24 back before WoTLK release (I did say this goon had been kicking around some time)
Arcturis – White bear spirit beast in Grizzly Hills
Loque’nahak – probably one of the nicest skins available, a spirit beast kitty from Scholazar Basin
The Beast – A red skinned Core Hound, a boss (one of the few tamable bosses) from UBRS (easy to get but you do need to watch your DPS in one phase before you get to him, if any interest I’ll post up more about this one)
A White Rhino – nothing special just wanted to add him to my collection.
A White Wolf – nothing special either – just wanted a wolf
There are other spirit beasts I want, like Skoll (wolf spirit beast in Storm Peaks), Gondria (tiger spirit beast in Zul’Drak) – I’ll keep you all informed of my progress.
Feel free to discuss anything in this post, just post comments below.
Oh yeah, that character info is below.
/out
So much newness
Oct 19th
Newness? is there such a word, hmmm will have to check later and report on that.
Right I am here, I am working on overhauling the site bringing it back to the “former glory” (yeah right) putting a new shine on the site making it less tired.
Yeah I had a change of direction, the story cut very short is that Buel (my resto druid) got sidelined, I’m a flexible guy when it dcomes to the guild needs and I will fill any role that is short so it kinda goes thus……..
We need healers – I get the Resto up and running and raiding, then everyone wants to heal, so I change to fill that other tricksy role the tank (so the warriro gets levelled) – again tanks begin to re-appear and melee DPS becomes an issue, so I gets me shammy up to 80 and raid kitted and that’s how we run for a long time. Over the summer I levelled a priest, this was down to a long standing “go on you’ll love it” that Miss Medicina mentioned to me in passing ages ago – so I spent the summer months levelling like a mad thing getting the priest to 80, dual specced it (shadow/disc) and set off running 5 mans to get the kit up to scratch……. frankly I love the disc priest, it’s become my main and during a frantic raiding period I specced disc/holy to fill out the healing role so I was never going to be wanting for HPS. I’ve now got my shiney Kingslayer title and wont be changing away from priest (still disc at heart – and 4.0.1 is awesome for us discs) – anyways more to come on priestly things, this was only gunna be a sorry i’ve not been here much type post.
Right, a few things to mention – I’m running FRAPS now fully on raid night so I should be able to post some video’s so you guys can see raiding from a disc priest perspective, and give me pointers on how shocking my tic tacs are (hehe) along with any other things I decide to capture, plus anything you want to see I’ll do my best to fulfil – I’m not in Beta or PTR so please no requests for that content.
/Disc (and loving it)
Roll Call
Sep 6th
Damn, no seriously damn…..
It’s been a long time, how is everyone doing?
Yeah I know, I let the side down and haven’t been around much, no I’ve not deserted to the Alliance side, no I’ve not gone off to pastures new or indeed started another blog site (well I do have others but they’ve been on hold too).
Roll call, who’s still around then? I notice BRK is back blogging and Wow’ing will have to check my links see who is still around.
Right – whats new my end? Well Buel is unfortunately kind of on hold, our guild kinda filled up on healers, so as a nice guildie I levelled up my warrior to fill out the tank role that was always a bugger to fill, which seemed to spur an influx of people wanting to tank (grr), so again I swapped around to fill a niche that we seemed to lack and completed my enhancement Shammy (something I’ve never once regretted) which is an awesome class, then late spring and summer holidays hit the guild – it does every year and raiding etc stops so I hit my summer project and levelled a priest to 80, man they’re pretty awesome……. so that pretty much brings me up to date, oh yeah except I also finished the hunter to 80 and am gearing that one up ready for the Cataclysm (I like to have plenty of choices available)
Ok, ok, thats me for this post – damn it’s good to be back.
/Buel
The Oculus – is it really all that bad?
Jan 7th
Morning all, I’ve just just been reading one of my favourite haunts (Miss Medicina) an interesting post about why Oculus is a failure, it kind of got me thinking, and to be brutally honest I dont consider it a failure, in fact now it’s one of the easiest heroics in the game, when WoTLK was launched sure it was hard, but over the months it’s recieved nerf after nerf and loot lovin’ to encourage people to stick at it. Now Uncle Buel is gunna give you the benefit of his (limited) knowledge showing how easy this instance really is, and that you can be out of there in 20 to 25 minutes, no great shakes – with your badges, and now thanks to recent lovin, the extra loot.
Entrance: ok you enter at the bottom level, the opening crawl in is a simple left hand sweeoping curve full of dragonkin and whelps, simple tank and spank situation. Run to the end of this killing all the way, where you’ll see a portal.
Once through this portal you see Drakos the Interrogator (Boss 1) quite a straight forward tank n spank, yes you get magically pulled into the boss, and he summons bombs around you, but quite an easy job for any moderately geared healer to keep you alive through.
Once he is dead, you get mounts – there are three mounts, Tank (ruby – far right keeper), DPS (amber – middle keeper) and Healer (Emerald – left hand keeper) easiest combo I have used is 1 Ruby (tank), 2 amber (DPS), 2 emerald (healer). So summon your mount, each one has restricted abilities until the end encounter – but take a few minutes now to check what each ability is – just tell the guys you need an AFK if you’re worried about being called a nub lol.
Fly to the center of the instance, where you need to clear the Banf of acceleration, a simple job, get the tank to use the entry arches to los pull, they all file thru the arches to get to the tank, a simple nuke fest.
Next part is pretty easy there are 3 floating circlular platforms just above you, you need to fly to the southern ones first, follow the tank let him take the aggro there are 4 mobs on each platform, these are simple to put down, nuke them fast, move to the second southern platform rinse and repeat the first platform. Then onto the northern platform where you’ll see Varos Cloudstrider (Boss 2) – essentially another tank n spank, you need to be slightly mobile during the fight to avoid the Energize Cores, this spawn covering about 1/3 of the platform, a simple job to avoid as you have 2/3rds of the platform to move freely in – with good dps this boss is nuked in no time – got a shammy in the party? Great – use bloodlust/heroism now.
Next level up (Band of Transmutation), around the center “core” there are 3 “kidney” shaped platforms, on each of these you will have an “encounter” with Mage-Lord Urom each time he will summon in 4 mobs for you to kill (not much of challenge here) once the third platform is cleared he will meet you in the centre of this level. now this part calls for a small amount of tactics firstly follow the tank so you’re the same side of the boss.
Tank the boss either clockwise or anticlockwise moving him out of the frostbomb he throws on the floor (this causes constant damage to you and your helaer wont be best pleased if you dont help out) so the tank keeps him moving occasionally Urom will teleport to the center you cant hit him or hurt him so dont bother trying, you get the easiest job ever HIDE!!!! just take cover behind a colum so his Empowered Arcane Explosion doesn’t hit you (yeah this one hurts about 13.5k damage on heroic). It’s not a difficult fight, and usually he’ll only get to teleport and use Empowered Arcane Explosion once.
Final part, and again, it’s really easy if you follow a simple set of guidelines. Firstly fly upwards clearning the trash you need to on the way to the platform with the chest on it. Now you should be able to see 3 platforms, your tank will decide whether you got clockwise or anticlockwise and decide the Time stop order on the DPS (ie who uses first and second so you dont waste it) and that’s all the decisions you need to make. So pull Ley-guardian Eregos, stay hovering over the platform do not move yet lay down dps, healer poison and heals (poison keeps your health up by leeching through the poison) DPS don’t use your time stop yet – wait for it…… when Eregos goes into Enraged Assault (deadly boss mod highlights this for you, or listen for “Such insolence…. such arrogance…. must be PUNISHED!”) first DPS now hit Time Stop contiune nuking until Planar Shift – this again DBM highlights now which way did your tank decide to fly? follow him to the next platform either clockwise or anticlockwise – if you set off immediately you wont get hit by anything, once at the next platform hover over it and let the tank pull her, rinse and repeat this process, usually she is dead on the 2nd platform. And that’s it – well done, it wasn’t that hard now was it? The reason for staying above the platforms is simple really, if your mount dies, you fall onto a platform rather than falling to the floor and dieing. If you do lose your mount and fall to the platform it’s not over for you, you can still range dps and heal from here, I’ve done this healing from the platform before without a mount, and found it just as easy to heal the party.
Fly back to the chest platform, grab your loot, thank the party for the smooth run and thats it.
So is it really all that difficult? is it worth dropping out of a party and taking a 15 minute deserter debuff? No I dont think it is, if you explain to new people each phase as you go round, it takes about 5 minutes longer and they get to learn it to. We can do a guild random here in about 15 – 20 minutes tops, randoms take about 5 minutes longer.
I can understand why it’s disliked, but dont get the logic of instantly dropping so you dont have to go there, by the time you’ve taken your 15 minute sitting on the sideline debuff, you could almost be finished and have badges to show for it.
So in closing, I have alot of respect for Miss Medicina, and I agree with alot of her opinions but on this one I’ll have to say…. I dont believe it’s a failure as it is exactly what it says on the tin! Sure we all like playing our toons, thats why we rolled them up and spent many, many hours kitting them and for that reason it’s disliked………. alot!
Meh, as always comments encouraged, if i’m wrong (and it has been known) feel free to comment, not just “loser” or “noob” but constructive comments.
/Buel
3.3 and Icecrown Citadel
Dec 17th
I have been away again, sorry – but it’s the yuletide period and things get pretty hectic around this time of year
So – new patch, new experiences, new things to report.
Lets start with a thank you – big thanks to GirlieGeek who’s comment last week reminded me to pull my finger out (so to speak) and get writing again.
Heroics
So we have 3 brand new 5 man heroics to run now, I’ve run them all now several times and will pass on my opinions of them.
Forge of Souls: Cracking instance, first time thru a couple of mobs are a niggling pain in the backside (with each pack of spellcasters, theres a frustrating spectre type mob that hops around the range members of the party damaging them) which naturally included myself (healing) so thats one to watch out for other than that the trash are mostly “trash” for a healer theres not much to be worried about.
Bronjahm <Godfather of Souls> (first boss): two phased boss, first phase tank and spank with dps primarily focussing on the boss, Bronjahm will use Corrupt Soul at this point it is “wise” for DPS to switch to attack the “Corrupted Soul Fragment” that is created, this floats back to Bronjahm and heals him. Phase 2, everyone hugs a tank – simply move in close to the tank and nuke him, Bronjahm creates a swirling ring around the party (a Soulstorm) which will cause 2.5k damage when you stand in it (so basically for your healers sake DONT) during this phase one party member will be feared thru the ring, so just need to watch the feared member and throw a heal on them (I usually keep a rejuv on most members during this).
Devourer of Souls: This is fun, no really fun, I very nearly fell off my chair with laughter the first time against this boss. Things to note, The ghosts cant be killed, when he summons them either stand and take it or move around them – they dont move all that fast so they can easily be avoided (this is during Unleash Souls) next thing to note – Mirror Soul, whoever is targetted with this will take all the damage you do on the boss (simple eh? well not for a paladin in our group who decided to one hit herself) and the last thing “Wailing Souls” this is a 90 degress sweep of the room random direction and random starting point – quite simple get out of the stream – high damage ticking every 0.4 secs, this is a healers nightmare – as a rule not easy to heal thru (and you’ll probably die). Other than that – pretty much a spank fest.
Thats the forge of Souls covered, tomorrow (or Monday) I’ll cover Pit of Saron.
Catch yer all laters
/Buel
Dwarf Rogue Blues
Nov 25th
Yeppers you guessed it, I have Dwarf Rogue Blues – does anyone actually roll a dwaff rogue? I’m gunna stick my neck out here and say that it seems a lower population than troll rogues – theres obvious combinations for you alliance types, human rogues have a great stealth detect & free -pvp trinket, nightelf rogues get double stealth and gnomes get pink hair! but dwaffs nope cant see it myself – so this is my evenings camping outside the bank and inn’s of dalaran hoping that some poor unsuspecting dwaff rogue will poke their head out and let me blast em with my Turkey Shooter – not great is it……. I mean it’s getting close to the time where I beg people in the guild to use a slot just to roll a target dummy dwaff rogue just for me to shoot, NOOOOOOOOOOO.
Still I’m getting cunning, tonight – I’m taking the fight to them, yeppers, I have to go and sit at the Ironforge table, and the Stormwind table and whilst I’m there being all stealthy, I’m hoping to bag me a rogue, a dwaff rogue. So you all know where to catch Buel tonight, Agamaggan server (EU) running around Ironforge screaming “come get me” – I trust you’ll roll out the red carpet for me eh If you do see me – help me out and /point at a dwaff rogue just to help me, before you take me apart lol.
What with this new set of achievements, and raiding Sunday and Tuesday, the priest hasn’t had a look in, so once I get this achievement sorted I’m hoping to get back to some kind of levelling again.
/Buel
Noooooooo – another achievement crawl………
Nov 23rd
hehehe, greetings fellow wow’ers it’s time for yet another Achievement crawl, this time taking in the sites of Azeroth from all the major towns / cities, yes it’s Thanksgiving time, so time to partake in the Pilgrims achievement – now I wont go into loong lengths about thanksgiving, well mostly because I’m from England and my understanding is pretty poor – so instead I’ll refer you to Wikipedia, where you can get all the info about this time of year.
Things to note, this is an excellent time to level cooking from 1 – 340 without having to hunt for the materials – seriously what better chance are you gunna get to do it – I mean you can buy all the materials from the vendors scattered around the major cities, sure you’ll need to vist them multiple times, but it’s a breeze and will probably cost maximum 10g to get all the training and recipes – TOP TIP
I’m really not going to reproduce the achievement guide here because theres sites dedicated to achievements with alot more input from members who have done them, I recommend:
WTB Achievements or perhaps the Oracle (Wowwiki) both will guide you through, if you struggle with any part shout here and I’ll help yer.
Weekend raid – well we hit Ulduar last nght – not a particularly successful evening, we did 5 bosses (FL, Razorscale, XT, Ignis & Kolo) but it seemed to be a struggle rather than the usually smooth event our guild runs are. Still as always it was nice to get out with the guild for an evening – and I manged to snag a little more loot – Energy Siphon – from the Leviathan, I’m not a fan of the “use” items but it’s still a nice mp5 trinket.
Anything else new – well I managed to ding 20 on the priest, so now I can use a mount (big difference to the game, no longer waiting til 40 for a mount) that means it’s the highest priest I’ve ever had (yay me).
Anyways, thats me for today, cya guys later.
/Buel
Yesterday
Nov 19th
Yip I had the day off – you probably noticed the lack of new entries…..
I was out for most of the day, and by the time the evening came around I just had to veg out in front of the computer playing WoW.
Unfortunately we had to cancel the Tuesday night excursion to Ulduar (yep again) bit of a shame but hey it happens, so did a few heroics with the guild and swapped over to the priest for a little more levelling fun – it’s still holding my interest which I’m happy with, I cant claim it’s the fastest goon to level, but it’s certainly no where near as painful as the warrior was!! the great news is that it’s now equal to the highest level I’ve ever attained previously as a priest (18) and I’m not showing signs of giving up hope (hehehehe)
Wednesday night I tried a little PvP with Flyté (priestess) and enjoyed it, altho I really dont think priest is gunna be a strong PvP class, hunters in this bracket are OP, and no thats not a whine – hell they need a bracket to be OP in – they’re miserable in the other brackets.
In other news, 3.3 is looking close to completion – I reckon it wont be long till we see it fully released (the patch has started rolling) usually 2 weeks once that happens but hey dont shout at me if I’m wrong – will be certain to give my thought and comments to the upcoming resto nerf (yep again – Rejuvination taking a swift seeing to from the bat au nerf, shorter duration and no immediate tick).
Short and sweet today (not me, the post).
Hunt Well
/Buel
Azeroth of Olde
Nov 17th
Hey, hey, hey……..
Was just having a conversation with the guys in the office about what is was like when WoW was released, you know what it’s like what with the 5 year anniversary fast closing, and we’d already discussed sunday nights Top Gear being blokes we have little else to discuss other than cars and computers (ok mebbe one or two other things, but I’m trying to keep it clean).
Anyways back on topic, when WoW was new, so what I was thinking how about we try some form of “Azeroth of Olde” chain blog thing (c’mon you all know what sorta thing I mean) the idea being to answer a few shortish questions about you’re experiences of WoW when it was new – now to some it might be Vanilla playing the game on release, for others it might be as recent as WotLK, once you’ve answered the questions, you get (politely) ask 3 other blog type sites to complete the same questions – it might be a laugh or two.
- When did you first start playing World of Warcraft.
- Name, Race, Class and Server of your first character.
- Where is that character now?
- What was your first level capped character, and is it still your main?
- From days gone by – what is your favourite in game item and why?
- What was your “classic” noob error – and just how stupid did you feel when you realised?
- Favourite instance or in game event that has passed or you no longer visit?
- Any fond memories you’d like to share with the collective?
- Finally – if you could change any one thing in the game – what would you change?
When did you first start playing World of Warcraft.
I bought it on day of release, I can still remember having bought it my better half dragged me to one of her friends houses on the way home from work, and expected me to hold a civil conversation with them, whilst all the while I had this red hot game begging to be played.
Name, Race, Class and Server of your first character.
Flystar – Undead Priest on EU Shadowmoon
Where is that character now?
hehe, I have no idea – theres a small possibility that it’s still festering on EU Shadowmoon but thats highly unlikely, back then the priest was marginally unintersting, so I rerolled an Undead Rogue.
What was your first level capped character, and is it still your main?
The undead rogue I levelled up to 60 first, before I considered rolling another alt, it was also the first goon I levelled to 70 when TBC was released, but sadly I got all “rogued out” by the time WoTLK was released and Buel the Druid was the first to 80. Now my main is buel, and the rogue gets an outing rarely, but it’s still there to be used when needed.
From days gone by – what is your favourite in game item and why?
It has to be The Lobotomizer, it was a long grind to get the rep to finally purchase it – but wow what a rogues dream it was the best dagger in the game (to me anyways) which perfectly fitted in with the old “tri-specced” rogue (basically a smatteing in all three talent trees gave proabaly the best dps for the rogue) at level 60
What was your “classic” noob error – and just how stupid did you feel when you realised?
Oh I can believe I’m gunna share this, but I guess it’s kinda two-fold – levelling the rogue I didn’t know I had to train – so there I was about level 20 odd untrained and shamefully untalented not realising that I coulda made things sooo much easier with training and talenting – I felt perhaps the biggest idiot ever when I mentioned in guildchat that that game was kinda boring with virtually no interaction during fights – it took a while to live that one down, fortunately all was explained to me and things got easier – and the mocking eventually died down.
Favourite instance or in game event that has passed or you no longer visit?
Would have to be just before the release of TBC, the dragon kin’s that kept appearing where they shouldn’t be (like in Orgrimmar, or flying over the crossroads) had some amazing run in’s with them tring to kill elites from instances that kept spawning where they shouldn’t.
Any fond memories you’d like to share with the collective?
Wow, way too many that would probably send alot of you off to ZZ land, but fond memories of instances and raids gone by, I have plenty of those – My first time as main tank (on my warrior) in Karazhan sticks in my mind I was there as offtank supporting (in my opinion) one of the best tanks in the game (Maniac – known as Manny on our server) when on TS he proudly announces – “I want a nice clean easy night tonight, smooth run, and no arsing about…… oh by the way Forty (my warrior is FortyTwo) your main tank”, and so it was thrown in at the deep end, I was petrified of wiping the raid, I’d not been tanking long, and here I was MT with my “hero” OT he was a legend, talked me through everything whilst in there, and to this day is still a “real friend”.
Finally – if you could change any one thing in the game – what would you change?
Personally I felt that they should have allowed the horde to have “Anti Paladins” and allow them to be undead, reckon that would have made it awesome rather than just giving us Paladins through Blood Elf only.
Hey well thats me – I’ll nominate three others shortly and let yer all know who, hopefully they’ll join in
Buel
