Lethal Shots

Honestly, I never thought I would find PUGs enjoyable, but lately that seems to be all I am doing. And I’m enjoying it. Sure there have been a few asshats I’ve had to deal with, but only one person that actually warranted a Vote Kick.¹ For the most part though I’ve had really great experiences.

Prior to 3.3 I tried my best to not PuG. Anytime I had to it was an unpleasant experience at best. Healers the spent more time typing than healing, DPS that performed worse than the tank, tanks that didn’t know how to hold AoE aggro, etc. But now with the cross server dungeon finder it’s like these kind of players don’t exist. Party chat is generally quiet, with only a few things said regarding boss strategy or AFK announcements. I’ve had runs where the only thing ever entered in party chat was a quick hello before the first pull and a quick thanks before people dropped group. People show up, do their job, and leave. And in the rare event of some one not knowing their job or being under-geared they are honest about it, and perfectly willing to follow directions given to them.

So where are all the morons and asshats that we’re used to dealing with? Well, I have a theory on that. Even with the new dungeon finder there is still a considerable number of people spamming trade for heroic runs. What I’m thinking is that this is where all the asshats have gone too. The new Vote Kick feature has had the added effect of discouraging them from letting the dungeon finder form groups for them. My guess is that due to their nature they have gotten kicked from most random groups they have joined. This has forced them to either change their ways or stop using the dungeon finder. I really don’t care which they choose because in the end the rest of us end up with a better quality pool of players to group with.

Anyway, enough of the bad and back to the good.

The best PuG I’ve had was actually just a few nights ago. Me and three guildies PuGed a healer for Heroic Forge of Souls. This guy was great. Sure he was a little under geared, but he admitted it and was trying his best. And that’s what made him great: his effort. Halfway through the run he even joined us in our vent channel to make things a little easier. Everything went fine until the last boss, where we wiped several times (maybe because of my non-uber geared tank, maybe because of heals, who knows), but we stuck with it and finished. This guys attitude is what made it a great PuG. He was polite and willing to stick with instead of dropping group after the first wipe.

So how about you? Have any horror stories or dream runs with the new dungeon finder? If so, leave them in the comments.

So far I’m thoroughly impressed with 3.3. I’ve yet to set foot into Icecrown yet (scheduled for Friday night with the guild), but so far I really like what I see. Like every other patch day, it was pretty rocky, slow loading while trying to zone in, lag, intermittent DCs, and pretty much everything else we’ve learned to expect. My initial thoughts:

• Forge of Souls – Short, fun instance. Two quick emblems.
• Pit of Saron – Fucking awesome. What’s better than a shit talking gnome riding a zombie? A gauntlet in an ice tunnel that is literally falling down around you. And the Pit features both.
• Hall of Reflection – Lore wise this one rocks, though it will become rather boring once you have farmed it a while.
• New Dungeon Finder system – Overall it seems to work pretty good. I like being able to teleport to and from instances (huge timesaver). It seemed a little buggy last night, but that may have been due to general server instability.
• Emblem of Frost gear – Have you seen the stats on this stuff? It’s completely insane. I’m decked out in the best ToC-10 had to offer with a smattering of stuff from ToC-25. This stuff blows my current gear out of the water.
• Misdirect – Amazing. This is a huge change. How huge you ask? In a heroic 5-man I was dumping almost 50k threat on my tank with one Misdirect. Now imagine multiple Hunters in a raid all doing it at the same time. Can you say goodbye to aggro problems forever?

That is all I was able to test out last night. Tonight I plan to hit up the Frozen Halls instances some more along with a few random PuGs for fun. So what do you think of 3.3 so far?

Seriously people, enough is enough. Yes, Blizz announced the new expansion. Yes, there is loads of info available. Yes, the expansion is bringing huge amounts of change. Some of those changes so drastic that I have questioned the thought of keeping my main as a Hunter if they go through.

But give it a rest already.

Cataclysm won’t be released until next year. That means 12 months (give or take, my money is on a November 2010 release) and, at very least, one more content patch left in Wrath. Play the game as it is now. Yes Blizz announced a ton of changes, but Cataclysm isn’t even in beta yet, so who knows how many of those changes will make it through.

Remember, BlizzCon is more than just a “Look at Our Cool Shit” weekend for Blizzard. It is a test-bed for new ideas. They have everyone’s attention, making it a perfect time to throw out ideas and see what kind of reaction they get. We know how they work, if enough people whine something gets changed. So they announce huge game altering changes and see how much whining happens. Think of it as a mass informal consumer questionnaire.

Anyway, my point is enjoy the game as it is now. There are still raids to be cleared, gear to be got, and fun to be had. So have fun today and worry about tomorrow when it gets here.

The Hunter formerly knows as BigRedKitty, aka Daniel Howell, has been paid tribute by Blizzard. The lovable little dwarf has had a gun named after him, the BRK-1000. Thanks to Daniel for letting us know about it on his new blog (if you aren’t already following him there, I highly suggest you do). The weapon shows up in the WoW Armory, but notice that it shares the exact same stats as Fezzik’s Autocannon, and also is listed to drop from the same source. I would love to see some confirmation on whether or not the weapon is actually in the game or not. Either way it is great to see Blizzard recognize some one who did so much for the player community.

And the best part of it? It “Smells Faintly of raspberries.”

Yes, as strange as it is, I really think that is the case. But first, a little background to help explain my thought process.

I currently have two level 80 characters, a Survival Hunter and a Resto Shaman. My Hunter is in Ulduar ready gear (have yet to pick up any drops there) and my Shaman is in a mix of heroic and Naxx gear. I have long considered the Hunter my main, but with very little to do on my him outside of raiding (I hate dailies), he has been seeing very little play time. Consequently I have been taking a deep interest in learning to heal with my Shaman and getting him geared up.

Also, these 2 characters are in different guilds (on the same server). My Hunter is simply a raider in Soulbound, while my Shaman is a senior officer in Circle of Friends. I won’t go into any more detail about that here, I’ll save that for another post. The raid leaders in Soulbound are aware of my Shaman, but will generally only ask me to bring him if our raid has entered PuG status since the toon is in a different guild. Anyway, enough background and on with with the story.

This realization of multiple mains came upon me last Saturday night during a 25-man VoA run with Soulbound. We were short people so we started pulling in PuGs to fill slots. The raid leader wanted Heroism, but we couldn’t find any Shamans. My Hunter already has the achievement for Emalon, so I offered to switch to my Shaman. So I jump over while the raid continues the search for more people. Long story short, in the search for more people I end up inviting a friend of mine (an awesome Prot Paladin) who I have been running occasional heroics with on my Shaman. We did Archavon first, and then started to weed out the people with too low DPS for Emalon. Several Soulbound people had started to log on so we began pulling them in for Emalon. One of those pulled in was another Resto Shaman, so I was asked to switch back over to my Hunter, which I of course did.

At this point my friend (the Prot Pally mentioned above) whispered me and asked if I had switched to an alt. His question confused me for a second, and then it dawned on me. While he has grouped with me many times, I had always been on my Shaman, never on my Hunter. I was even on my Shaman when I invited him to join the current VoA run. Naturally I explained to him that my Hunter was my main and that my Shaman was an alt.

But after that I got to thinking. I have been playing my Shaman so much lately that it has become more than an alt, yet my Hunter is still my main when it comes to raiding. So that leaves me with a declared main, and an alt that is more than an alt. Well, what is more than an alt? A main.

That leaves me with two mains.