Scattershot

No, not the hunter talent, the post topic.

Right I've got a lot of half-completed posts and ideas floating around, but here are some of the short ones that come to mind immediately but aren't worthy of their very own posts:

• Phaelia's started a new guide to spirit and mana regeneration in patch 2.4. It comes with a healthy dose of math, and promise of more to come. Now that all casters will be using the same formula for mana regen, this post is a must read for all theorycraft lovers who care about their blue bars.
• I'm warming to Christian Belt over at WoW Insider. He's writing the latest incarnation of the mage column, Arcane Brilliance, where he gives off the air of someone who -- at last -- not only enjoys our class but knows how to play it in all its squishy variations. I still think the WoW Insider class columns spend way too much time on the 1-40 game, but it's a nice change of pace.
  
• Apparently all kinds of people think Patch 2.4 will be out in the next two weeks. To which I say: bwahahaha. Ha. I mean, um: ohpleasenotyet, I haven't finished my guide to new dps caster gear.
• Improved Alchemist Stones: about damn time! 54 spell hit rating is a ton of +hit; my spooky may have to respec to use it properly.
• I just spent some of my new job money on Jonathan Coulton tickets for me and The Boy on March 22nd. Commence with the jealousy.

5 Lessons from WoW

image by beigeinside










Over at The Bronze Kettle, Jon tagged me with the "5 (Gaming) Lessons in 5 Years" meme.

I know, I know -- WoW hasn't been out for five years, but that just means you get 40% more lessons in the same blog post! Right? Of course. Here we go then.

1. AOLSPEK SI DA SNGL3 MOST UESFUL INDICA2R OF SOMAON3 I DONT WANT 2 GROUP WIT. (Okay, just typing that hurts.)
   
2. When it comes to long distance relationships, Teamspeak is much cheaper than phone bills.
3. You can always spend more time theorycrafting. Always.
4. 40-man raids are less coordinated in real life.
5. Gamers are surprisingly superstitious.

Tag, you're it! I'd love to see five gaming lessons from:

• Ratshag of Need More Rage
• Matticus of World of Matticus
• Breana of Gun Lovin' Dwarf Chick
• Pike of Aspect of the Hare
• Lance of Saber Squadron

Even if I didn't tag you, feel free to respond with five of your own on your blog or in this post's comments section.

Blogroll Update

I've gotten a few comments on my image-based blogroll over the past few weeks. I like the screenshot mosaic feel to it, even though I envy the ease with which Mania and others can manage blogrolls through Google Reader. For now though, I'm sticking with it, which means it's time for an update. This month's additions include:

• A Couple in Azeroth - Starring Josh and Kate, a druid and priest who've just gotten back into the game.
  
• Adventures in Azeroth - It's another druid blog! I'm beginning to suspect bears don't poop in the woods; they blog instead.
  
• Altitis - Gwaendar called me out on my /stopcasting in 2.3 post, and since then I've been a slacker and haven't re-addressed the issue because the precise mechanism keeps changing on the PTRs. I should really get on that, but in the meantime, you should read his blog.
  
• Aspect of the Hare - Pike has been leaving all kinds of interesting comments here for weeks, and I'm only now just linking to her. Shameful! Oh, she's another hunter. (See also: druids, woods.)
  
• The Bronze Kettle - Jon and Shelbi have gotten two WoW Insider links in the past week or so, and hardly need any introduction from me, but just in case you've been living under a rock: they're creating IRL recipes for in-game food on their awesome blog, and I think they're onto my secret identity.
  
• Frostbolt - I meant to link to Frostbolt's blog in the original incarnation of the blogroll; I even had a screenshot picked out and everything. He's a raiding druid in a guild working through Hyjal/BT.
  
• One Among Many - She sent me an email about my blog, and then started one of her own.
  
• Saber Squadron - What do you get when you decide to multibox five night elf hunters? The Saber Squadron.
  
• Someone WoWing - "Someone" is sometimes a feral druid, and sometimes a BM hunter, and likes to talk maths. Seriously hunters and druids, I think your classes have reached blogging quota.
  
• The Shadow Flame - Poxus has rerolled warlock, and is starting back at the beginning.
  
• Warlock Therapy - When not enslaving demons, Jagoex blogs about all kinds of WoW topics. He's got the latest on the Mad Alchemist's Potion, by the way.
  

Disclaimer: GMW is not responsible for the post content or frequency of sites on this blogroll, but does reserve the right to add or remove blogs at whim due to same. GMW's blogroll is hand-coded as a giant wall of text. It's possible there may be an error in there; if so, or if you have a different 50x50 pixel image from your blog you'd like me to use, please send me an email.

What's New in the WoW Blogosphere

What's new with GMW, you might be wondering? Well, I'm seeing a ton of traffic to my post on how to summon the Headless Horseman (so much so, in fact, that it appears I've exceeded my bandwidth on the Google Pages account that hosts my blogroll and my banner image... working to get those back up asap!), my guild is hard at work trying to take down Vashj, and when I'm not raiding, I've been poking around on the PTR checking out all the new goodies. But it looks like I'm not the only one...

Szilia on the World of Raids forums has scooped the post I'd been putting together on the new Dustwallow Marsh quests. (He doesn't include a map though; that's me, all me!) They're currently only partly implemented on the PTR; you can accept them, but most of them don't actually complete. One of the nice things about the new UI changes is that your cursor will now tell you if someone has a quest for you when you mouse over them, even if your level is too high for (!) to display over their heads. It's not quite as good as a pink exclamation point, but it's still a welcome change.

Mania's Arcania has done some PTR testing on how hunter pets will get behind their targets in patch 2.3. Essentially, pets won't bother circling if they have aggro (though it would be funny to watch them try), but they will move to the side of the mob if someone else is tanking. Since they don't attack while repositioning, this could mean a fair bit of dps downtime on a boss with a large footprint.

AFK Gamer, as usual, has the most fantastic-looking screenshots up. That's his picture of the headless horseman's pumpkin shrine in Scarlet Monastery at left.

Big Bear Butt's got the news on druid itemization changes. His shiny new Earthwarden is getting an extra 156 attack power in the patch.

Matticus has a public service announcement for all raiders: use your cooldowns! He's right, too: stop waiting for an emergency and break out the big guns already.

Breana at Gun Lovin' Dwarf Chick has written an awesome post called How to Survive in a WoW Marriage. If you're not married like me, just pretend it's called How to Survive Playing WoW and Living in Sin. (*wicked grin*) The advice still applies.

I've got a date with 9 other people on the PTR this Friday, so unless the the PTRs go down, I hope to be back covered in troll's blood and riding a bear to deliver you all the latest on Zul'Aman sometime this weekend.