Moving on...

Now that I’ve gotten my frustration off my chest, I do want to say that accomplishing the Thorim and Freya hard modes last night was satisfying. Mimiron hard was quite a bit more difficult, what with the fire all over the place, but I trust that with fresh minds and fingers we will make some progress on that fight next week. After Mimiron, Yogg+1 will basically be all that stands between us and a new drake. I imagine that fight will be annoyingly difficult, too. We shall see.

I have begun to pay more attention to PVP in the last week or so, going to the trouble of grinding out honor for some new gear and respeccing to Mutilate PVP (thanks Boston for your advice). I immediately noticed the great burst DPS of the spec and am sold on it—at least for PVP. My focus for the next little while will be BGs for Ofn, particularly as there are 6 mounts and more PVP gear to grind out. I will possibly look for an arena team at some point, it will depend on how my feelings for PVP progress. I do not enjoy arenas, but I believe I could experience some success and it would be nice to obtain some of that gear.

On achievements, this week I completed my (second) journey through the Argent Tournament ranks and Ofn is now a “Crusader” again. Between the achievements related to the tournament, a few PVP ones and the hard modes achieved last night, Ofn is now sitting at exactly 7,000 points (the armory is still apparently counting ach. points received when Ofn was still Alliance, but were subsequently taken away, in-game, on the faction switch). I’m not sure if he will ever see 8,000 pts., as I’m running out of achievements that can be accomplished solo.

One long-term achievement I have begun working towards is the one for 100 mounts. Currently, Ofn has 81 mounts, and there are 3 more that can be purchased (at great gold cost) and 11 more that can be ground out via PVP and the Argent Tournament. The rest will require the luck of an egg, drop and/or roll. I believe it will not be easy, but can be done.

Additionally, Ofn is sitting with 33 exalted reputations. I would like for him to eventually hit 40 exalted reps, granting the title “The Exalted” but, holy cow, it will require quite a lot of work. I’m not sure if I have the motivation for it.

On gold, Ofn switched factions with 20k and later, Zephaniah, the pally, switched with 9k. Currently, there is 37k spread around my 3 Horde toons, but I have easily spent 20k in gear, pets and mounts. The gold seems to flow much more on the Horde side. I am almost through the stockpile of mats brought over with Ofn, so reinvestment costs are about to make a dent on the gold income.

On rogues, a week or so ago, after having Ofn’s proverbial DPS head handed to him, I bit the bullet on a change I knew was coming, and blew his Emblems of Triumph and approximately 12k gold in mats for several new pieces of gear and respecced. Where Ofn had been a rogue in T8 4/5 with critting ruptures, he is now running with no tier gear at all pushing out 10k to 24k eviscerates. T9 is basically a joke for rogues, except for the i258 versions—which Ofn most likely will never see. T10 set bonuses have just been released, and, while not as bad as the T9 bonuses, the rogue community, generally speaking, doesn’t seem all that excited about them. Additionally, it seems that, as rogues obtain higher level gear heading into T10, Mutilate PVE spec is again going to out-dps Combat. It remains to be seen if this becomes reality, but it does fall in line with Blizzard’s stated desire to make PVE rogues want daggers more. This disappoints me, as I prefer to play the Combat spec in PVE and it’s been satisfying having it be a valid PVE DPS build. /sigh

Finally, my good friend Sindella, who returned to WOW earlier this year, has again called it quits for RL reasons. This time around, it was never quite the same as it was when we played WOW together a couple years ago, but I did enjoy our time raiding together. I wish him the best in his new endeavors.

The Baconstrip™ Maine Weather Report:
Currently 56° F and overcast

Prepared, I was not

It did not really occur to me that our once 1.5 (out of 10) physical dps raid group was now a 4.5 physical dps raid group. Not due to new members, but to members switching classes. Didn’t occur to me, that is, until Mjolnir Runestone dropped.

I am... frustrated.

Devolution

If you didn’t already know (not likely), those of us who were Alliance in the guild Unusual Suspects, switched factions a week ago to become Horde toons and form a guild named “Devolve”. Ofn is no longer a slick Night Elf with a sleek pony tail. He is now an Orc with spiky hair, poor posture and a bad case of bad breath. Basically, he looks like me in the morning before I’ve had coffee. I just know Tolkien is rolling over in his grave. Of course not because of me specifically, but, when one of the chosen race chooses to become a race created in mockery of the elves... well, I’m sure he would be disappointed. Yes, yes — I know this is the world of Blizzard’s Warcraft, but *all* fantasy stems from the world created by The Godfather of the genre.

But I digress... what’s done is done. The were pros and there were cons. New racial - pro. Yellow-green skin - con. Massive shoulders and menacing stare - pro. Capital city of Orgrimmar - con. New experiences, places and quests - pro. Losing all Argent Tournament rep and over 2k completed quests - big con. Being in a good guild with friends and inadvertently providing its name - big pro.

On the banking front, I brought over all my gold-making mats to get kick-started horde side. Pretty good thing, too, given that some of my regular mats are priced higher over here. But I dared not spend the $30 to bring my banker over. Even if I had, I would have lost the guild and guild bank to which he was attached. So, I went to the effort to create an Orc Death Knight as my new bank. Eventually, I’ll start a new guild bank, probably when I’m overflowing with mats. This banker is much fiercer-looking than the previous one. It would be cool if he could just scare gold out of players. But in case that didn’t work, I started the factory again right away. I’ve already made 4k+ in a week’s time. Not too shabby.

There will be more to say on this... but this is all for now.