You know, when I origionally created this blog I did it for several reasons. The first was simply curiousity. I don't really have all that much interest in 'putting myself out there' in the world. Nor do I really have the time, the inclination, or the idea of how to create a successful blog viewed by thousands of people.
It's a good thing too, since to date this blog has not been viewed by a single person other than me. Not one! Not that I'm upset or anything. Probably more relieved, actually.
The second reason I did it was to try to soften up my writing, which to me feels very stiff and unfriendly. Vanilla. Uninspired. Boring. I find that oftentimes when I'm imagining something in my head, there is a lot more flourish and flavor to my thinking which simply doesn't translate to what makes it past the keyboard. It's my hands, really. They are just too damned plain and dull and disinterested in anything other than switching letters around and making me look illiterate.
Did I mention that no one ever looks at this thing?
There were, however, a few things that I did NOT want this blog to be. I didn't want it to be about WOW, or any specific thing really (despite the name). I also didn't really want it to be a personal, online diary about my life (though my sister just had twins, yay!). I just wanted to do it to write about things I wanted, when I wanted to write them, and damned any internal consistancy. This was more of a practice for me than anything.
Yet lately I've really been having the itch to write something serious again. Something that hasn't happened in years. I'm getting bored again in life, I know, and writing is an outlet for me that I rarely take advantage of anymore.
I have a confession to make (ahem!). At one point in my life I wanted to be a professional writer. Now, even back then I didn't really think I had the chops for it. I'm very hard on myself, especially on my writing. And I know I'm not very good at it.
I need practice. Serious practice, not just on writing itself, but on HOW to write; how to make a sentence or paragraph not only readable, but fun to read. Because often that is what is missing in my rather stiff writing...the fun!
A long time ago (has it really been ten years now?), I made an attempt at writing a book. I think it was a rather good attempt at the time, but in hindsight the book simply doesn't work even if I still like the concept even to this day. It had all of the elements I was interested in. Travel to other worlds. The clashing of diffent cultures. Mysterious characters with questionable more objectives. And a real sense by the end of the book of having to question who was was the good guys, and who were the real bad guys.
By the time I was done with it, there was no real resolution to the plot (the book was intended to be part 1 of 2). And the story itself deviated from my origional outline about half way through. I really did start writing itself, something I've heard happens to other writers, and experiencing it myself really made me feel excited at the time. But, because of that there were also quite a few inconsistancies that cropped up in the story. Including main characters and plots that never intersected. Characters living that were supposed to die. Others dying that were supposed to live. A major plot change which added like 10 chapters to the book and completely changed the ending. And a major betrayal at the end which seemed to perfectly fit where the story was going; but hadn't origionally been planned for and left me completely stumped on how to continue it to the second book.
If I restarted that today, I know I'd go about it in a different way. But, do I really want to? I mean, I want to write again. But where, and in what format. And how do I deal with the fact that in 10 years, my writing style has actually declined since then, not improved like I would have wanted? Not to mention the fact that, do I really have time to do something like that again right now? That one story took me an entire summer to write (4 months, often spending at least 8 hours each day on it).
Maybe I'd do better writing something entirely different? I have a few ideas, some of them more fleshed out than others. And I've been spending a lot of time lately designing a world-setting for a character concept I had...but while I like the premise (future humanity / post holocaust, mad max + blade runner + star trek style setting)...but what do I really want to do?
And that's the problem. I really don't know.
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
Monday, June 29, 2009
Virtuality
So, after missing it on Friday, Virtuality showed up on Hulu this weekend and I decided to watch it. The show certainly wasn't promoted very well, but it was pretty heavily hyped on some of the web sites that I frequent. So I decided to watch it and see what I thought.
Well, now that I've seen it, I can say that it wasn't that bad, but it wasn't all that good either. And it started off damned slow. And while the movie continued to get better as I watched it, the show itself has literally no resolution at all. It makes no attempt to be anything more than the pitch for a new series, and because of that I'd have to label it as nothing more than a watchable failure.
Spoilers below...
The show is really a mishmash of different concepts crammed together into one show. It's part 2001, part Big Brother, and part Matrix. The show is based on the premise that a ship is launched from Earth (sometime in the future) to Epsilon Eredani on a 10 year mission to find intelligent life. The ship was funded by a mysterious corporation which spend hundreds of billions of dollars on the project...in order to make a reality TV show out it.
The ship has a crew of 12, each chosen not because of their particular skills, but to make 'interesting' TV by ensuring there will be lots of conflict. There is the Gay Couple, The Bi-Racial Couple, the Wacky Captain, the grumpy disabled engineer, the hot doctor (who is married to the TV Show producer...and is banging to Wacky Captain), and the media girl. There are a few other characters, Starbu--er, the ship's pilot, and a few others that really don't have anything to do in the pilot.
Let's get one thing straight right from the beginning. Most of these characters a fucktards...the exact sorts of characters you'd find on Big Brother or Survivor. They bitch and whine about petty things, have little respect for authority, and generally spend much of their time bitching about each other. They live their lives being filmed 24/7, they have to spend time in the Confessional to talk about their feeling to the camera. The producers encourage them to spice things up by fighting more. Even the ship itself is purposefully designed to be less comfortable in order to encourage conflict.
Because, on a 10 year voyage to another star system with no one in a position to rescue you, the first thing you want to do is make sure the ship is uncomfortable; and the crew unstable.
To make matters worse, mysteriously after their departure, they begin receiving word from earth that some massive ecological disaster is taking place and that Earth itself will be uninhabitable in less than 100 years. And this means that this crew is now the sole hope for humanity...though why their trip to Epsilon Eredani and back is going to save them is never explained. And even the Captain is suspicious of this.
To round out the show, the characters have each been giving VR systems that are designed to allow them to escape into their own private virtual reality for a time as a form of stress relief. The VR realities they create for themselves vary quite a bit, and are generally reflective of the characters. Though I have to admit the one chick's reality where she's a Rock Superstar / Super Spy who performs concerts singing a punk-rock version of the Munster's theme song...in Japanese...while tracking international criminals...is pretty out there.
Even early on, there are a few signs that not everything is as it seems. The VR system seems to be glitching...but intelligently so. And as I already said, the Captain doesn't really believe everything they are getting from Earth is real. Much of the show deals with the Go/No Go decision at Neptune at whether to go ahead with the trip to Epsilon Eredani or turn back for Earth...a decision made more complicated by the fact that the ship's doctor diagnoses himself with Parkinson's Disease the day before the final point where they can abort the mission. Everyone want's a vote, of course, but the Captain has final say...though not everyone aboard agrees with this.
At this point, the Captain seems to be convinced that they must turn back. However, while investigating his own personal VR glitch (via the mysterious VR persona which seems self aware and keeps taking control of his VR and shooting him dead)...the Captain has some form of off-screen epiphany and begins to start acting very strangely. He's no longer cautious. He starts talking about a transcendant experience and the next step of evolution; and he no longer seems to care about anything. He's now fully wanting to continue to journey, no matter what, and he seems barely in control...which does nothing for the stability of the rest of the crew, who seems to be getting more and more paranoid as others experience their own personal VR glitches.
The VR glitches continue to being an escalating problem; with the VR cyberstalker attacking the crew inside their VR systems, usually resulting in their virtual death, and cumulating in the virtual rape of one of crew in a rather disturbing scene. Some of the crew favors turning the VR systems off; others find the prospect unthinkable...and the Captain himself, acting just as wacky, seems convinced that the VRs are absolutely necessary for them for them to experience transcendance, which will either save or doom them.
And right after that, the Captain gets sucked out an airlock, killed apparently due to a computer malfunction that could not have been anything but deliberate sabotage. The show ends with his lover entering his VR simulation, only to see a VR version of the Captain, fully self-aware; warning her that nothing is real; and asking her to follow him through the mirror and down the rabbit hole, because that is the only way any of them are going to survive.
And that's it. There is no real resolution. Though you do find out a few other intriguing bits. One of the character's speculates about the captain's death...obviously a murder and someone on the ship has to be responsible. There are even some obvious motivations for character's wanting the character dead (for example, the captain was having a 'virtual' affair with the wife of the show producer). And another of the characters seems to be having some form of dialog with the VR glitch persona hidden within the VR system.
But, Virtuality is all setup and no payoff. There is not even the attempt at an explanation here. And much of the important setup happens in the last 30 minutes; giving the show a rather slow beginning, a weak character-building middle, and a strong finish w/o any resolution. As a pilot for a TV show this would be fine, but since that isn't going to be happening, the show is a bit of a failure. Not an unwatchable one, but a failure nonetheless. Not to mention the fact that I don't really see Virtuality being able to sustain a long-running TV series in the first place. Virtuality would be better served as a miniseries IMO, but that isn't going to happen either.
One thing that worries me...a LOT of people have said that this show is better than the Caprica DVD movie that came out a few months ago now (and I still haven't seen)...that statement really worries me about what to expect from Caprica when I eventually decide to go ahead and buy it.
Well, now that I've seen it, I can say that it wasn't that bad, but it wasn't all that good either. And it started off damned slow. And while the movie continued to get better as I watched it, the show itself has literally no resolution at all. It makes no attempt to be anything more than the pitch for a new series, and because of that I'd have to label it as nothing more than a watchable failure.
Spoilers below...
The show is really a mishmash of different concepts crammed together into one show. It's part 2001, part Big Brother, and part Matrix. The show is based on the premise that a ship is launched from Earth (sometime in the future) to Epsilon Eredani on a 10 year mission to find intelligent life. The ship was funded by a mysterious corporation which spend hundreds of billions of dollars on the project...in order to make a reality TV show out it.
The ship has a crew of 12, each chosen not because of their particular skills, but to make 'interesting' TV by ensuring there will be lots of conflict. There is the Gay Couple, The Bi-Racial Couple, the Wacky Captain, the grumpy disabled engineer, the hot doctor (who is married to the TV Show producer...and is banging to Wacky Captain), and the media girl. There are a few other characters, Starbu--er, the ship's pilot, and a few others that really don't have anything to do in the pilot.
Let's get one thing straight right from the beginning. Most of these characters a fucktards...the exact sorts of characters you'd find on Big Brother or Survivor. They bitch and whine about petty things, have little respect for authority, and generally spend much of their time bitching about each other. They live their lives being filmed 24/7, they have to spend time in the Confessional to talk about their feeling to the camera. The producers encourage them to spice things up by fighting more. Even the ship itself is purposefully designed to be less comfortable in order to encourage conflict.
Because, on a 10 year voyage to another star system with no one in a position to rescue you, the first thing you want to do is make sure the ship is uncomfortable; and the crew unstable.
To make matters worse, mysteriously after their departure, they begin receiving word from earth that some massive ecological disaster is taking place and that Earth itself will be uninhabitable in less than 100 years. And this means that this crew is now the sole hope for humanity...though why their trip to Epsilon Eredani and back is going to save them is never explained. And even the Captain is suspicious of this.
To round out the show, the characters have each been giving VR systems that are designed to allow them to escape into their own private virtual reality for a time as a form of stress relief. The VR realities they create for themselves vary quite a bit, and are generally reflective of the characters. Though I have to admit the one chick's reality where she's a Rock Superstar / Super Spy who performs concerts singing a punk-rock version of the Munster's theme song...in Japanese...while tracking international criminals...is pretty out there.
Even early on, there are a few signs that not everything is as it seems. The VR system seems to be glitching...but intelligently so. And as I already said, the Captain doesn't really believe everything they are getting from Earth is real. Much of the show deals with the Go/No Go decision at Neptune at whether to go ahead with the trip to Epsilon Eredani or turn back for Earth...a decision made more complicated by the fact that the ship's doctor diagnoses himself with Parkinson's Disease the day before the final point where they can abort the mission. Everyone want's a vote, of course, but the Captain has final say...though not everyone aboard agrees with this.
At this point, the Captain seems to be convinced that they must turn back. However, while investigating his own personal VR glitch (via the mysterious VR persona which seems self aware and keeps taking control of his VR and shooting him dead)...the Captain has some form of off-screen epiphany and begins to start acting very strangely. He's no longer cautious. He starts talking about a transcendant experience and the next step of evolution; and he no longer seems to care about anything. He's now fully wanting to continue to journey, no matter what, and he seems barely in control...which does nothing for the stability of the rest of the crew, who seems to be getting more and more paranoid as others experience their own personal VR glitches.
The VR glitches continue to being an escalating problem; with the VR cyberstalker attacking the crew inside their VR systems, usually resulting in their virtual death, and cumulating in the virtual rape of one of crew in a rather disturbing scene. Some of the crew favors turning the VR systems off; others find the prospect unthinkable...and the Captain himself, acting just as wacky, seems convinced that the VRs are absolutely necessary for them for them to experience transcendance, which will either save or doom them.
And right after that, the Captain gets sucked out an airlock, killed apparently due to a computer malfunction that could not have been anything but deliberate sabotage. The show ends with his lover entering his VR simulation, only to see a VR version of the Captain, fully self-aware; warning her that nothing is real; and asking her to follow him through the mirror and down the rabbit hole, because that is the only way any of them are going to survive.
And that's it. There is no real resolution. Though you do find out a few other intriguing bits. One of the character's speculates about the captain's death...obviously a murder and someone on the ship has to be responsible. There are even some obvious motivations for character's wanting the character dead (for example, the captain was having a 'virtual' affair with the wife of the show producer). And another of the characters seems to be having some form of dialog with the VR glitch persona hidden within the VR system.
But, Virtuality is all setup and no payoff. There is not even the attempt at an explanation here. And much of the important setup happens in the last 30 minutes; giving the show a rather slow beginning, a weak character-building middle, and a strong finish w/o any resolution. As a pilot for a TV show this would be fine, but since that isn't going to be happening, the show is a bit of a failure. Not an unwatchable one, but a failure nonetheless. Not to mention the fact that I don't really see Virtuality being able to sustain a long-running TV series in the first place. Virtuality would be better served as a miniseries IMO, but that isn't going to happen either.
One thing that worries me...a LOT of people have said that this show is better than the Caprica DVD movie that came out a few months ago now (and I still haven't seen)...that statement really worries me about what to expect from Caprica when I eventually decide to go ahead and buy it.
Friday, May 1, 2009
Friday, April 24, 2009
Uldaur Week 2
I'm half way through the guild's raiding week, the second spent in Uldaur. And I've got a few impressions.
Week 1 was pretty difficult. The guild managed to kill Flame Leviathan (yawn), Razorgore, Deconstructor, Iron Council, and Thorogrim (forgot his name already), and Ignis. 6/14. Of those, we managed to kill Razorgore, and Deconstructor before they were severely nerfed. And Ignis only after he was patched to not insta-gib the tanks.
Since that time, most of those bossess have had minor-to-major nerfs handed out to them. And this has certainly changed the flavor of those encounters. Our week 2 has certainly been easier...we killed all of the bosses we killed the first week on the first day, plus Aurilya (sp?)...and spent all of last night on Hodir (didn't get him), Freya (got her, but that fight is assy), and Thorim (we just had time for 3 pulls, and didn't really get to see the real encounter).
I have to say, after having gone farther into the instance...so far this is the best instance that Blizzard has released so far. The instance has a fairly cool atmosphere, and the trash/encounters really feel different from one another. And with the exception of Freya, most of the trash just isn't that long...assy maybe, but none of it takes very long to go through. And well spaced teleporters allow for getting through what is otherwise a massive area fairly quickly.
What I don't like is that most of the gear seems a bit...underwhelming so far. I don't like going into a new raid instance and DEing 70% of what was dropping...but this is exactly what was happening to us. I'm guessing that standard-mode gear is mostly 226, 226 gear which is at best mostly side-grades or not as well itimized. It's pretty annoying.
Flame Leviathan.
The first time we were in Uldaur, we 1-shotted FL. And that was with 3 vehicles locked out due to accidently starting the encounter early, and no one on a motorcycle understanding that they were supposed to be picking up the people that get lobbed onto the leviathan after taking out the turrets. On normal difficulty, this boss is a joke in every way. But, he's also a lot of fun.
Ignis the Igniter
This boss was a complete broken ass when he came out. Bugged to hell. Killing his adds didn't properly remove his damage buff. He had a tendency to melee attack the people we put into the slagpot. And he would randomly double-attack the tank, killing him instantly.
I'm not sure how some guilds got past that (though I know a few obviously did). But, Blizzard was pretty quick to fix some of this stuff. Plus they nerfed him to boot. We did not kill him the first night...our first kill on him came Monday before the reset and after most of the fixes/nerfs.
Now the encounter is pretty simple and no longer quite as punishing on the healers. I wouldn't say it's trivial, but it's nothing like it was.
Razorgore
This boss has a pretty simple, fun design. And when Uldaur origionally came out...a punishing enrage timer. We managed to beat him (barely), our second boss kill...but wow, it was by the skin of our teeth. By this point I had decided that Blizzard's description of difficulty was WAY off...Uldaur didn't feel like a step up in difficulty...it felt like 3 or 4. The encounter difficulty was really feeling more like the second half of black temple...IE not sunwell hard, but not easy either.
Of course, then they nerfed him by extending his enrage timer (which was honestly the only thing that made him difficult). They also reduced the spawning range of the drills, which is a nerf but a more welcome one. Those things were quite annoying spawning all over the place.
Deconstructor
At this point, my idea of what Uldaur was going to be had changed quite a bit. So I wasn't surprised that XT turned out to be as hard as he ended up being. Again, the encounter itself wasn't all that complex. DPS, DPS-heart, then AOE adds before they get to him. And run out when you get the nasty debuff. But his 6-minute enrage timer made this fight much harder than it would have been otherwise. With a 6-minute enrage timer, you had to execute it perfectly while stacking DPS.
This boss gave us the most trouble of the first four...I think we wiped 44 times to him over the course of a single night (our second night in Uldaur). But we got him...and then they nerfed the hell out of him the next day. The changes made to him, again, don't make the encounter trivial, but certainly provides a LOT more latitude on executing the encounter.
Iron Council
Hmmm...after some fairly difficult first bosses, the encounter difficulty in Uldaur dropped significantly with Iron Council. We one-shotted him, and didn't have much trouble doing it either. I don't think he was nerfed that much either before we got to him, so I was a bit surprised on how quick this guy went down.
Kologarm (or whatever his name is, I cannot remember)
The first time we fought this guy, we got him to 6%. Though in the end it took 5 kills to actually kill him. Honestly I like this encounter. It's one of the least complicated and easy to execute fights in Uldaur. The only thing that makes this fight difficult is the lack of room to manuever when dealing with eyebeam...especially in the 25 man version where you don't want to run it through the middle of everyone.
Again, this guy was nerfed. Not sure why because he was already pretty easy. Now he's even easier.
Auyrelia (or whatever else I can do to butcher her name)
We didn't get to do much with her the first week. The hardest part of this fight looks to be the pull...man she can wipe a raid FAST. Otherwise it's a fairly simple fight that tries to make it seem more hectic than it really is.
Tactics are simple. Stay together. After the fear group back together fast. Stay out of the black stuff. And kill the adds she spawns on a regular basis.
Hodir
Tried him last night. We weren't really set up for him, though we did manage to get him to 16% before went on to another boss. Our DPS was a LITTLE low on him, and unfortunately the healers were having a hard time keeping the boss alive.
Mostly I like this fight. And the animations in this fight are pretty cool. I would consider this a moderately difficult fight. Nothing too severe, but 36 million HP is a lot of health to burn through in 9 minutes (or 8?, I don't remember now).
Freya
Holy shit that's a lot of trash. And the actual fight itself is somewhat annoying. This is the first boss I don't really like in Uldaur. And I can't imagine how hectic it is going to be to do her in full hard mode. On the plus side, she did give me a nice pair of T8.5 legs...which I got!
Thorim
Didn't get to see much of this fight...just a little of the gauntlet. We'll be working on him and Hodir on Sunday...hopefully we'll get both of them down.
Week 1 was pretty difficult. The guild managed to kill Flame Leviathan (yawn), Razorgore, Deconstructor, Iron Council, and Thorogrim (forgot his name already), and Ignis. 6/14. Of those, we managed to kill Razorgore, and Deconstructor before they were severely nerfed. And Ignis only after he was patched to not insta-gib the tanks.
Since that time, most of those bossess have had minor-to-major nerfs handed out to them. And this has certainly changed the flavor of those encounters. Our week 2 has certainly been easier...we killed all of the bosses we killed the first week on the first day, plus Aurilya (sp?)...and spent all of last night on Hodir (didn't get him), Freya (got her, but that fight is assy), and Thorim (we just had time for 3 pulls, and didn't really get to see the real encounter).
I have to say, after having gone farther into the instance...so far this is the best instance that Blizzard has released so far. The instance has a fairly cool atmosphere, and the trash/encounters really feel different from one another. And with the exception of Freya, most of the trash just isn't that long...assy maybe, but none of it takes very long to go through. And well spaced teleporters allow for getting through what is otherwise a massive area fairly quickly.
What I don't like is that most of the gear seems a bit...underwhelming so far. I don't like going into a new raid instance and DEing 70% of what was dropping...but this is exactly what was happening to us. I'm guessing that standard-mode gear is mostly 226, 226 gear which is at best mostly side-grades or not as well itimized. It's pretty annoying.
Flame Leviathan.
The first time we were in Uldaur, we 1-shotted FL. And that was with 3 vehicles locked out due to accidently starting the encounter early, and no one on a motorcycle understanding that they were supposed to be picking up the people that get lobbed onto the leviathan after taking out the turrets. On normal difficulty, this boss is a joke in every way. But, he's also a lot of fun.
Ignis the Igniter
This boss was a complete broken ass when he came out. Bugged to hell. Killing his adds didn't properly remove his damage buff. He had a tendency to melee attack the people we put into the slagpot. And he would randomly double-attack the tank, killing him instantly.
I'm not sure how some guilds got past that (though I know a few obviously did). But, Blizzard was pretty quick to fix some of this stuff. Plus they nerfed him to boot. We did not kill him the first night...our first kill on him came Monday before the reset and after most of the fixes/nerfs.
Now the encounter is pretty simple and no longer quite as punishing on the healers. I wouldn't say it's trivial, but it's nothing like it was.
Razorgore
This boss has a pretty simple, fun design. And when Uldaur origionally came out...a punishing enrage timer. We managed to beat him (barely), our second boss kill...but wow, it was by the skin of our teeth. By this point I had decided that Blizzard's description of difficulty was WAY off...Uldaur didn't feel like a step up in difficulty...it felt like 3 or 4. The encounter difficulty was really feeling more like the second half of black temple...IE not sunwell hard, but not easy either.
Of course, then they nerfed him by extending his enrage timer (which was honestly the only thing that made him difficult). They also reduced the spawning range of the drills, which is a nerf but a more welcome one. Those things were quite annoying spawning all over the place.
Deconstructor
At this point, my idea of what Uldaur was going to be had changed quite a bit. So I wasn't surprised that XT turned out to be as hard as he ended up being. Again, the encounter itself wasn't all that complex. DPS, DPS-heart, then AOE adds before they get to him. And run out when you get the nasty debuff. But his 6-minute enrage timer made this fight much harder than it would have been otherwise. With a 6-minute enrage timer, you had to execute it perfectly while stacking DPS.
This boss gave us the most trouble of the first four...I think we wiped 44 times to him over the course of a single night (our second night in Uldaur). But we got him...and then they nerfed the hell out of him the next day. The changes made to him, again, don't make the encounter trivial, but certainly provides a LOT more latitude on executing the encounter.
Iron Council
Hmmm...after some fairly difficult first bosses, the encounter difficulty in Uldaur dropped significantly with Iron Council. We one-shotted him, and didn't have much trouble doing it either. I don't think he was nerfed that much either before we got to him, so I was a bit surprised on how quick this guy went down.
Kologarm (or whatever his name is, I cannot remember)
The first time we fought this guy, we got him to 6%. Though in the end it took 5 kills to actually kill him. Honestly I like this encounter. It's one of the least complicated and easy to execute fights in Uldaur. The only thing that makes this fight difficult is the lack of room to manuever when dealing with eyebeam...especially in the 25 man version where you don't want to run it through the middle of everyone.
Again, this guy was nerfed. Not sure why because he was already pretty easy. Now he's even easier.
Auyrelia (or whatever else I can do to butcher her name)
We didn't get to do much with her the first week. The hardest part of this fight looks to be the pull...man she can wipe a raid FAST. Otherwise it's a fairly simple fight that tries to make it seem more hectic than it really is.
Tactics are simple. Stay together. After the fear group back together fast. Stay out of the black stuff. And kill the adds she spawns on a regular basis.
Hodir
Tried him last night. We weren't really set up for him, though we did manage to get him to 16% before went on to another boss. Our DPS was a LITTLE low on him, and unfortunately the healers were having a hard time keeping the boss alive.
Mostly I like this fight. And the animations in this fight are pretty cool. I would consider this a moderately difficult fight. Nothing too severe, but 36 million HP is a lot of health to burn through in 9 minutes (or 8?, I don't remember now).
Freya
Holy shit that's a lot of trash. And the actual fight itself is somewhat annoying. This is the first boss I don't really like in Uldaur. And I can't imagine how hectic it is going to be to do her in full hard mode. On the plus side, she did give me a nice pair of T8.5 legs...which I got!
Thorim
Didn't get to see much of this fight...just a little of the gauntlet. We'll be working on him and Hodir on Sunday...hopefully we'll get both of them down.
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Hooray for Idle Postings!
I haven't posted on this blog since November. I'd like to say that it was because I've been too busy. But I have a confession to make...I just haven't been all that interested or had much to say.
In the WOW Front, patch 3.1 has come out and I took a first step into Uldaur last night. The first boss is/was a joke...we did everything wrong from what I could tell...had multiple people get locked out, and STILL managed to suceed easy enough. Past that, though, things got more difficult. The second boss was hitting like a truck, and after a Uldaur reset caused all the trash to respawn we went on to the second boss. The second boss, Razorgore, seems easy enough, but has a pretty agressive enrage timer. So, Flame Leviathan was our only kill of the night. And people were pretty happy that, at the very least, we weren't just steam rolling everything.
But, this points to what Blizzard has done wrong with Wrath. Now, compared to BC things are much better. But Blizzard made a major mistake making Naxx so easy and providing no clear alternative. Not only was Naxx a remake of an already-existing zone with well known tactics, but it was completely forgiving.
Now, IMO, that's a very good thing. Not only does Naxx serve as a very good introduction to raiding, it drives up interest and brings in new players. Unfortunately, there was no real alternative to Naxx for a hardcore guild to sink their teeth into. Naxx was on farm mode for those guilds the second week of Wrath. And there has been a serious sense of...what now? permeating the game. Uldaur has been viewed as the second coming, and certainly with 14 bosses, 11 hard mode alternatives, and a few other new features, there is more here for a guild to get into.
I think people are going to be a bit shocked by the difficulty shift from Naxx to Uldaur. Not that it seems -that- much harder, but Naxx was just SO easy that a lot of casuals are going to freak out. Of course, I think the intention is to have a better representation of difficulty: Uldaur 10 < Uldaur 25 < Uldaur 10 Hard Modes < Uldaur 25 Hard Modes. But we'll see.
For right now, I've stuck with a cookie cutter FFB build 0/52/18. I did go ahead and purchase the dual spec option for my mage (and also my newly minted druid and DK). For my mage, I'm a more popular fire/arcane build, or possibly a full frost build used just for learning boss fights. Mana, which I was somewhat worried about, did not seem like much of an issue to me last night.
When Wrath came out, I didn't spend much time researching gear, nor was I very disciplined when it came to DKP purchases in the guild. This time I'm planning on being much more on top of things. Instead of making rash purchases, I'm going to be very specific about what gear I'm going to go for and which I won't.
In the WOW Front, patch 3.1 has come out and I took a first step into Uldaur last night. The first boss is/was a joke...we did everything wrong from what I could tell...had multiple people get locked out, and STILL managed to suceed easy enough. Past that, though, things got more difficult. The second boss was hitting like a truck, and after a Uldaur reset caused all the trash to respawn we went on to the second boss. The second boss, Razorgore, seems easy enough, but has a pretty agressive enrage timer. So, Flame Leviathan was our only kill of the night. And people were pretty happy that, at the very least, we weren't just steam rolling everything.
But, this points to what Blizzard has done wrong with Wrath. Now, compared to BC things are much better. But Blizzard made a major mistake making Naxx so easy and providing no clear alternative. Not only was Naxx a remake of an already-existing zone with well known tactics, but it was completely forgiving.
Now, IMO, that's a very good thing. Not only does Naxx serve as a very good introduction to raiding, it drives up interest and brings in new players. Unfortunately, there was no real alternative to Naxx for a hardcore guild to sink their teeth into. Naxx was on farm mode for those guilds the second week of Wrath. And there has been a serious sense of...what now? permeating the game. Uldaur has been viewed as the second coming, and certainly with 14 bosses, 11 hard mode alternatives, and a few other new features, there is more here for a guild to get into.
I think people are going to be a bit shocked by the difficulty shift from Naxx to Uldaur. Not that it seems -that- much harder, but Naxx was just SO easy that a lot of casuals are going to freak out. Of course, I think the intention is to have a better representation of difficulty: Uldaur 10 < Uldaur 25 < Uldaur 10 Hard Modes < Uldaur 25 Hard Modes. But we'll see.
For right now, I've stuck with a cookie cutter FFB build 0/52/18. I did go ahead and purchase the dual spec option for my mage (and also my newly minted druid and DK). For my mage, I'm a more popular fire/arcane build, or possibly a full frost build used just for learning boss fights. Mana, which I was somewhat worried about, did not seem like much of an issue to me last night.
When Wrath came out, I didn't spend much time researching gear, nor was I very disciplined when it came to DKP purchases in the guild. This time I'm planning on being much more on top of things. Instead of making rash purchases, I'm going to be very specific about what gear I'm going to go for and which I won't.
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