March goes out like a … Lion?

Lately, I have been asked about how to level a Feral Druid: “how should I spend talent points” and “how do I select leveling gear”, etc. The truth of the matter is that it has been more than two and a half years since I created Kathoid the Night Elf Feral Druid. It took me quite a few months to level her up to 70, the hit cap of the time. I believe I was about level 55 when Burning Crusade came out, and I took my time going through Outland. I in no way tried to speed level; just sat back, relaxed, and enjoyed questing.

So when people ask me about leveling a Feral Druid, I feel almost clueless. It has been so long, and so many things have changed since then, that I have decided to do some “research” in the field, or as it were, fields of Mulgore.

And so here she is, my beautiful, hooved test subject: Kathoid the Tauren Druid!! (At an impressive level 5!)

I don’t generally like to talk about Alts when they are so young, but leveling her will be an experience I want to share with all of you. And I know my naming of characters is hardly original, but I chose it so some old friends from my Alliance server (Dalvengyr) would find me on my new Hordey Server (Tichondrius). I have leveled a Tauren to about level 15 or so, but have never really stuck with it. This time I’m really going to put in an effort. And with such little raiding going on pre-Ulduar, and Spring still not quite here in Upstate NY, I think I should have enough time to dedicate to leveling her up.

I’m really looking forward to getting to see how the other half of druids live. I’ve always loved Tauren so playing one will be a lot of fun! (I should also note that this will be my first Horde character I really plan to level!)

I will try to give weekly updates on my progress with her, and discuss what type of Gear to be looking for, and where those first few talent points are best spent.

10K Crits and Earth Hour

Ah! I have been crit for 10K! Fortunately, its a good kind of crit. Some time in my sleep last night this little bitty Druid Kitty blog hit 10,000 views! For a blog that not so long ago only got 5 hits a day, this is pretty awesome. Thank you, thank you, for everyone who keeps coming to the site to read what I have to say.

Earth Hour is coming up this Saturday, March 28th. What is Earth Hour, you say?

Earth Hour is an international event organised by the WWF and held on the last Saturday of March each year, which asks households and businesses to turn off their non-essential lights and electrical appliances for one hour to raise awareness towards the need to take action on climate change. (Wiki)

How do you participate? Well, it couldn’t be simpler. At 8:30 PM local time just shut off all the lights in your house, and leave them off for one full hour. Anyone anywhere in the world can join in – and this year the WWF is hoping to have 1 Billion people participate.

Why do this? While shutting off the lights for one hour may not save the world nor stop Global Warming, it does show us the difference we can make by just making a few simple changes. It is a simple way you can help send a huge message: that we support and love our Earth.

Remember that we can’t build our own Exodar spaceship and we can’t just teleport to Outland or any other planet when the going gets tough. We only have one Earth, and making a few small changes is enough to help keep it healthy for generations to come.

Why do I care? I do play a Druid after all.  WoW may be my hobby, but being Eco-Friendly is part of my life style. I’m a vegetarian that eats Organic when ever possible. I buy local food via our local Farmer’s Markets. I shut off the lights whenever I leave a room and use CFL bulbs. I clean my home with natural cleaning products and use natural health and body products. Druids are very in touch with their natural surroundings in WoW, and I feel that way in my own life, too. And if I can pass on the message of Earth Hour to just one person through this blog, than it makes it all worth while.

So what can you do once you turn the lights off? (Or really, can you still play WoW?) Yes!! You can still play WoW, (unless you play on a light bulb?), just try to shut off as many lights in your house as possible. If you do decide to WoW it up during Earth Hour, here are a few things you can do to lower your power consumption, and your energy bill in the process!:

• Remember that a CRT Monitor takes up way more energy than an LCD Monitor does, so if you can, use an LCD for the night. LCDs on average use half to two thirds less energy than CRTs. If you are in the market for a new Monitor, look for one that is Energy-Star rated or is “Halogen-Reduced” (like the Dell Ultra Sharp 2009W) that avoids the use of Halogen in its parts.
• If you have a dual-monitor set-up, just turn one off for the night. Sure it can up your productivity to have two, but you will survive for one hour (or more!).
• A laptop takes even less energy than a desktop, so if you have one that can run WoW, unplug it and use it to cut down on your energy consumption.
• Use a headset! A headset uses less energy than a big speaker system, so turn off the speakers, put on a headset, and get into your WoW zone. I love playing with a headset because I get more into the game, and Northrend has such beautiful music you can enjoy while you play!
• Use a wired mouse! Wireless mice require batteries, which add a lot more garbage to landfills because people seldom recycle them properly. If you do decide to use a wireless mouse, use rechargeable batteries. It cuts down on waste and also saves you money in the long run. I personally prefer wired mice over wireless because they have a faster response time and are much more accurate for gaming.
• Turn off other electronics and appliances you don’t need while you play WoW. You don’t really need to have that TV or Radio on while you play. You will be more focused on your game and save a little energy while you are at it.

Last year I participated in Earth Hour by shutting off the lights in my house. This year I plan to shut off all the lights, the TV, and the computers and do something that doesn’t require any energy at all.

If you also decide to log off of WoW and shut down, there is plenty to do.  Many major cities around the globe also have events going on for Earth Hour (mine, unfortunately, does not), so check out the happenings in your own city. You can also check out this list from U.S. News and World Report for some ideas on what to do once the lights are out.

Still want to stay connected to the world during Earth Hour? You can use Twitter.com on your mobile phone or on your iPod Touch – and you can follow Earth Hour here!

For more information and to sign up to participate in Earth Hour, please visit their official website.

I thank you all again for helping me reach 10,000+ blog views. If you plan on participating in Earth Hour, please feel free to comment below and tell me what you will be up to!

March Madness

I have been a bad, bad blogger and I know it – but this March has been rough for me. There’s been a lot going on for me both in the game and in real life. I’ve been so overwhelmed with things going on that I’ve kinda pushed this blog onto the back burner. I have tons of ideas for posts, and I’ve started writing some, but I keep running out of steam or hitting some major writers block.

I have checked out the PTR some – unfortunately I haven’t raided Ulduar yet, but I have been inside it empty and the place is beautiful and huge. I’ve also played around with creating what will be my 3.1 Spec, so long as Blizz doesn’t do a massive change of things again for Ferals. Primal Gore, which grants periodic damage from Rake, Lacerate, Rip the chance to crit, is awesome and I think will help bump up our overall DPS numbers. The change to Improved Mark of the Wild which now increases all attributes by 2% is a welcome change for myself, as I have picked up the talent because I often end up being the only druid in 10 mans, and want my group to have the best buffs possible. I have also been checking out MMO-Champion daily to look over the Feral changes, new gear, and new weapons. (I hope to have a post up soon with more 3.1 data.)

Two things are apparent about the above picture. One is that I have been doing a lot of quests, the other is that I am guild less. I got my “Seeker” title a few weeks ago, without even realizing I was that close to completing 3,000 quests. I have done many more since then, as I am working on getting the “Loremaster” achievements and title. (I have roughly 200 quests left to go). I have been working on achievements hard core this past week because I’m not raiding, because of the guild less thing.

I left my guild <Leviathan> about a week ago because I wasn’t happy with the direction the guild was taking. Being that I was basically a Co-GM type of Officer, it was kind of a big deal to all the guild members. The other officers who were same rank as me were starting to miss the point on a lot of things I thought were major points on how to run a guild. They have this idea that in a serious Raiding Guild there is no place for “nice”. I wholeheartedly disagree. I think that there needs to be a balance of tough and nice, strict and respectful. They are fine with being assholes to everyone from fellow Officers to Trial ranks. I am of the mindset that the name over my head says a lot of me, and if I can’t stand behind my guild I can’t be in it. So I left. They just assume I will come back even though the officers are not really acknowledging the problems, and are not wanting to do anything about them.

So am I LFG? Maybe? I don’t know if I want to transfer to a new server. But for the record:  Alliance Feral DPS Druid seeks highly ranked Raiding Guild. 3.5K DPS, 5K Achievement Points. Have downed all bosses Normal and Heroic. Downed Sarth 2D. Highest ranked Alliance Feral Druid on Dalvengyr according to WoW-Heroes. Raids after 8PM EST. Prefer guild with other female raiders, no annoying teen players, and room for advancement.

I have a lot of new posts in the works. Hopefully I can get back into the swing of things here soon. Thanks for the continued readership.

PTR Patch 3.1 – Feral Glyph Changes

Well, as they say it does, March has certainly come “in like a Lion“. My hopes for an early Spring were some what squashed today as Old Man Winter decided to dump another pile of his crappy white crap all over the North East yet again, causing much mayhem in its wake. While we in Upstate NY weren’t hit quite as hard as a lot of other parts of the country, the snow was enough to make the roads horrible locally, and so I stayed home from work to spend way too much time staring at the TV and grinding mostly-pointless WoW Reputations, like Wintersaber Trainers and Timbermaw hold.

I did, however, decide to make something productive out of my day, and so here I am with newly formed thoughts on these ever changing PTR Patch 3.1 notes. As it seems that some of the overall class changes and abilities haven’t made their way to the PTR quite yet, I am sure there more changes in store for us that just haven’t been announced yet. And so with that thought, I have decided to first go over all the Glyph changes and put in my two cents on the changes.

Glyph Changes

• Glyph of Shred

New: Each time you Shred, the duration of your Rip on the target is extended by 2 seconds, to a maximum of 6 seconds.
Old: Increases the damage dealt by Shred to stunned and incapacitated targets by 20%.

This is a very welcome change. This Glyph was really only useful for soloing previously. Anything that increases damage or duration of Rip will make a big change for overall damage done while raiding. And I haven’t tested this out yet, but I am sure that this will stack both with the Tier 7/7.5 set bonus and the Glyph of Rip bonuses to Rip, as those two stack with each other.

New Glyphs

• Glyph of Berserk -

Increases the duration of Berserk by 5 seconds.

This will up the durations to a total of 20 seconds. Nice glyph, but I think that there are other glyphs I would rather have for a Kitty DPS build. I’m not sure if it is one I would include in a Tanking build. I will have to play around with it to see.

• Glyph of Savage Roar -

Your Savage Roar ability grants an additional 6% bonus damage done.

With the overall change to Savage Roar, changing its effect to an extra 30% Physical Damage from and increases 40% Attack Power, I am not sure exactly how much this will buff Savage Roar compared to how it is now, but this is definitely a glyph I want to have in my Kitty DPS build.

• Glyph of Barkskin -

Reduces the chance you’ll be critically hit by melee attacks by 1 to 0% while Barkskin is active.

Barkskin isn’t something I think about much as far as Cat form, but I found it very useful last night while I temporarily respeced Bear to OT for Naxx 10. Using Barkskin in Bear form is still very new to me, as when used in BC it would shapeshift you out of form. Now it can be used while tanking to lessen damage taken while tanking by 20% for 12 seconds, every 60 seconds. If you are defense capped already, this will make no difference to you, but if you are still working on your tanking gear and are a few points under, this Glyph will help you stay alive just a little bit longer. Eek! Sorry to all Bears! I am so used to Bear Tanking in BC still that I forgot that “defense cap” doesn’t apply to Bears anymore. So this Glyph is really not for us ferals. ><

I will need to look for these new glyphs on the Auction House on the PTR to see if these are Major or Minor glyphs. I am thinking they are all Major, with a chance that the Barkskin may be a Minor. I will update once I figure it out!

- – - – -

Please see my Patch 3.1 Post here to see what all the changes were once the patch went live.

Sick Kitty

I have been a sick little kitty for the past few weeks on and off, dealing with this stinky cold I seem to get every Winter. I seem to be mostly over it, though – and hope to get all caught up with reading the constantly changing PTR Patch notes, and actually get in a raid or two in Ulduar soon. Once I can sift through all my thoughts and put something cohesive together, I will get back to posting. Promise!

In between cups of tea and boxes of tissues I have gotten a lot of raiding done the past week or so, too (since that is one thing I can do comfortably in my pajamas) – so I have some more thoughts on that to share as well.

Hope everyone else is fairing better. Spring is just around the corner now (I hope!).

More coming soon!