Blog Azeroth Shared Topic: What was your favorite ____ in WotLK?

I’m a little late to this topic, but I’m doing it anyway.

This past week’s Blog Azeroth Shared Topic was brought to you by Revelart.

What was your favorite ____ in WotLK?

He left this wide open for interpretation, and so I’m running with it.

Vivacious meets Ysera

My favorite thing in Wrath of the Lich King was the epic adventure of getting to meet the dragon aspects.

I’m a lore junkie. While it is a bit strange, and I’m a bit disappointed that we killed Malygos, I was enamored of Alexstrasza and the whole scene at the Wrathgate. While I may be a bit confused about why we are allowed to visit the Dragonshrines (we’re just that epic?), my favorite thing of all was getting to visit She of the Dreaming.

It can only get better in Cataclysm, right? Deathwing, we’re coming for you!

Blog Azeroth Shared Topic: What Mementos Have You Kept? (Or Amaranth’s Closet)

Amaranth is my main, and she is the collector of my bunch. What special items do I keep in her closet… err bank?

Well, the bulk of the mementos that I keep are dress up outfits. I’ve had to weed out the less meaningful ones over the years.

Allow me to play dress-up for you and explain why I’ve kept the things I’ve kept.

Ama in her Burning Crusade mementos

First is my old Burning Crusade Gear, which includes a Violet Badge, Violet Signet of the Grand Restorer and Shattered Sun Pendant of Restoration. The primary pieces though are my precious Wings, my Robes of Heavenly Cleavage, my Voodoo Shaker, and my Gavel of Naaru Blessings. Burning Crusade was my heyday, and I can’t bring myself to part with any of my gear from then. When I finally replaced my Mantle of the Avatar during WotLK I vowed to keep it, but accidentally disenchanted it. I wound up petitioning a GM and begging to give this angel her wings back.

Ama in her Lunar Festival gear

 

One of my other favorites is my Festive Black Pant Suit from the Lunar Festival. The Lunar Festival as well as the Midsummer Fire Festival are the two festivals that give me the fondest memories of my Jezzabell.

Ama's Chef outfit

Every woman ought to have maxed cooking, and Ama can fish on top of it. My cooking outfit consists of the Tuxedo Pants and Shirt, Chef’s Hat, and Old Crafty for dinner.

Ama's Birthday outfit

This is my favorite outfit of all. The dress was a very special gift from a good friend for my Birthday. It can only be gotten Horde side, so it is truly something special for my Night Elf. To date it is still my most favorite in game Birthday gift, and brings back good memories of good times with this friend.

I pair it with the Halo of Transcendence, the original from level 60 Onyxia. I keep that one as well as the level 80 version in my closet because I love the model so much.

I have other outfits, but I also keep other random toys and mementos. Among them are:

• Seal of Ascension – completely useless now, but I worked hard to get it and can’t let go
• A Steamy Romance Novel: Northern Exposure – for those lonely nights
• Darkmoon Card: Blue Dragon – see Seal of Ascension notes
• Titanium Seal of Dalaran – every girl needs a lucky charm
• Piccolo of the Flaming Fire – every girl loves to dance
• Brazier of Dancing Flames – ^^
• Orb of the Sin’dorei – because who doesn’t want to be someone else for a while?

There is so much more, including a consistent stack of Savory Deviate Delights and Ribboned Wrapping Paper just in case I want to give someone a present.

So, now you all know, there are no skeletons in Ama’s closet.

Another Picture, Another Thousand Words

Quick take the picture! There's no dragon goo dripping on me is there?

When I killed Onyxia for the first time, I was level 70 and she was still level 60.  Having started playing the game very late in Vanilla, I hadn’t even made it to 40 yet when BC was released. It still felt epic to kill her, even at 70.

My guild was the first on our little reroll server to kill Ony on the Alliance side. No one bothered with it Alliance side, since 70 was the new 60, who cared about old content? The only people who thought this stuff was srsbsns were the people duped into getting Kue his Scarab Lord title, and that was Horde side anyway.

My guild cared about old content, if for no other reason just to see it. This was back when we were still just having fun. I’m fairly certain it was a Saturday or Sunday and one of our Paladin tanks sent ripples out seeing if anyone wanted to see if we could down Ony. Of course I wanted to go. We trudged through the attunement quests and made our way to Onyxia’s Lair.

I think there were 13 of us, and we wiped a few times, since none of us had seen the content before. In the end, we succeeded despite the MANY WHELPS! I left there with a spiffy level 60 hat that I wore when I was in Shatt for the entirety of the expansion after (and I still have in my bank even though I’ve replaced it with the level 80 version).

It was incredibly dramatic marching into Stormwind with Onyxia’s head in tow. The excitement of the event of placing Ony’s head on the gates was amazing. The guild made a march of it with the Alliance soldiers, and people kept coming up to us asking what was going on.

It was nice of Blizzard to revamp Ony for level 80, but it never felt as epic as that first time.

I’m hoping with Cataclysm there will be something equally dramatic for the downing of Deathwing, and not just a statue in the middle of Dalaran.

Shared Topic: A Picture Tells a Thousand Words

Jezzabell and Amaranth at the Fire Festival

Jezzabell and Amaranth attended their very first Fire Festival in the Summer of 2008. Together we spanned the globe, honoring the Alliance flames and desecrating the Horde’s. Together we traveled to the Horde cities, died together to desecrate their flames, and together we wore the Crown of the Fire Festival.

It reminds me of all the other things we did together. We met in Booty Bay, as she was chatting with someone else about hats, and as I walked by in my Whitemane’s Chapeau, she said “Nice hat!” I knew right then that I had met someone special.

Jezzabell and I first truly fell in together during Children’s Week that May. We did the orphan quests together. We ended up in the same guild. We went through the Dark Portal together. We leveled together. We ran dungeons together. She tanked or dpsed while I healed. She was my playful kitten and my aggressive bear. We geared up through heroics together. We raided together later, her a tree and me the priest balance to her HoTs.

This screenshot reminds me of my relationship with Jezzabell. This was not a character to character relationship. This was soul to soul across oceans within the game. She was my first WoW love, and there can be nothing else like it. We opened each other up to new potentials within this virtual world. She will always be near and dear to my heart.

As befit our relationship, she is busy playing with fire, while I watch safely from the sidelines. She taught me to love hats and to traipse across country away from the safety of the well-marked path. While she pushed me to be more daring, she could not change who I am. Being worlds apart, we drifted away from each other. I will always cherish my memories of her, of us.

I like to think that while she helped to make me a better me, that I also helped her to be a better her.

Amaste’s Tale: Part Three

Author’s note: This would be my entry for the Blog Azeroth shared topic: RP a scene with your favorite mount. It is also the next chapter in my story about Amaste Lightweaver. Ironically, this is where the story was headed, even without the shared topic coming up.

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Tripping over the rubble of the broken door, she stepped through the entrance way. She grabbed her cloak, drawing it over her mouth and nose to keep from inhaling any more of the acrid smoke. As she blinked away the tears from the smoke, what recently was a body filled her vision. A dark pile of ash lay on the floor in front of her. The person this once was had not been burned naturally. There had been a lich among the undead that had invaded here.

Among those ashes she could see the gleam of an emerald, an emerald in a beautifully filigreed setting. It had been her aunt’s.  She scooped it up and stuffed it into her pocket, fighting back tears. She glanced around in search for any signs of her sister. She had to stay strong until she found her sister.

Out of the corner of her eye she saw movement in the shadows at the corner of the room. She urgently hissed, “Dhoti!” but no answer came. She tiptoed forward, carefully avoiding any burning rubble. As she approached the corner, she heard a high pitched squawk and a rustle of feathers.

Her aunt had been attempting to hatch an orphaned hawk strider egg. In the turmoil of the invasion the egg must have hatched. She made soft cooing noises as she inched towards the corner.

Still wet with the fluid from it’s egg, the bird was huddled behind what once had been a bookshelf, shivering and squawking occasionally. Her feathers a jet black, as dark as the ashes of her aunt, the bird looked at her knowingly, calming as Amaste approached, and allowed her to pick her up.

Allowing herself a moment to cope with the series of events, Amaste bowed her head, hugging the bird tight to her chest and whispered a solemn prayer:

Out of death comes life.

Out of violence comes peace.

Rest easy, Aunt Zoe.

I will see that this life lives,

Even though you have died.

Amaste made a silent vow to herself. The bird’s name would be Zoe, and she would be the best hawk strider that ever lived. She wiped the bird clean with the end of her cloak and carried on in search of her sister, the newly named hawk strider in tow.

Blog Azeroth Shared Topic: To Heal or Not to Heal

I’m going to start this off with a recent PUG story.

Don’t make me get all Discipline on your @&$!

Using my handy dandy Dungeon Finder the other day, when the queue popped up, it had that telltale message that the dungeon is already in progress.

Whenever that happens I hesitate. This is my last chance before getting stuck in something potentially horrible.

Given the gear and skill I have on my priest, more often than not I just accept and hope for the best. Sometimes I wish I hadn’t.

I got popped into Pit of Saron, staring at some Rimefang butt and standing on top of a dead tank while the rest of the group was in the cave eating and drinking and getting ready.

Great, a lazy tank who refused to run back, and instead decided to wait until the LFD found him a healer who was fool enough to rez him. Wonder why the last healer left?

So, I rezzed him.

I applied all three of my buffs and as I was throwing a Penance on the tank that I  had just rezzed and was at about 1% health, he emotes a /charge and goes in.

Split second decision making. Do I attempt to keep him alive (I’m not even sure if I can but, damn I love a challenge), or do I let him die and most likely the rest of us wipe because of his idiocy?

I’m sad to say, I healed him. I used all my cooldowns. I healed my little ass off. I did it. I kept the numb nuts alive despite his complete lack of ability to pay attention to even his own health bar. It felt good, but it also felt oh so wrong.

This is something I regret. This is one of those situations where I should have let him die, despite the consequences. I honestly feel that this tank needed to be taught a lesson, but I wasn’t the one to do it. I did say something to him after the boss was down, but a tongue lashing is never going to sting as much as a death/corpse run.

Healer Decision Making 101

It is a strange, strange world we play in, when I feel guilty for keeping someone alive.

In most situations I try to keep everyone alive no matter what. This is the nature of what a healer is. That said, there are always priorities.

1. ME. I am my top priority. If I die then I can’t keep trying to keep you and everyone else alive.
2. The Tank. The tank should be the one attempting to hold aggro and keeping baddies from nomming my face.
3. DPS. If things don’t die at a reasonable rate, it’s likely I will run out of mana and we all will die. DPS must stay alive if I can arrange it.
4. Pets. I will bubble and renew your pets as long as you don’t leave growl on or it doesn’t run halfway across the instance aggroing everthing.

Despite what you might think, it is very difficult for me to distinguish between different names on my healing UI. It takes extra effort for me to exclude someone from healing, so it’s very unlikely that I will even try to do this, even if you’re a total douchebag. I’m more apt to try to votekick you than to stop healing you.

That said, there have been a few situations where I have deliberately made the effort not to heal particular people.

The fresh 80 warrior who queued as DPS/Tank for a random heroic and got the DPS role, but insisted on “tanking” even though we had a better tank who was actually Defense capped. Squishy warrior in mostly DPS gear but holding a shield taunts repeatedly off of the “real” tank. Both myself and the “real” tank get irritated because the one the Squishy wanted to tank kept getting loose and nomming my face. I warned him I would stop healing him, and I followed through with that promise. He stopped taunting and we got through the dungeon.

1337 Hunter who wouldn’t let the tank pull mobs, and didn’t MD, but allowed his pet to tank. Poor tank is rage starved and can’t get aggro. I warn that I’m going to stop healing his pet and ask that he let the tank pull. I follow through with that promise. He stopped pulling and we got through the dungeon.

These are the situations where I am going to stop healing you. Typically I do this in situations where your behavior is detrimental to the group, and I question whether we can complete the dungeon if it continues. I always give a verbal warning first, so you have time to change the behavior. Sometimes this works, sometimes it doesn’t.

Random Favorites Meme

TIME OF DAY: Midnight – the day is winding down and I’m usually snuggled into my bed reading or texting.

DAY OF THE WEEK: Thursday – This is one of my days off of work, and I get to have the house to myself since it’s a weekday.

SEASON: Autumn

HOLIDAY: Halloween

SONG: Lateralus by TOOL

SINGER/BAND: TOOL

MOVIE: The Phantom of the Opera with Lon Chaney – old school black and white horror!

BEVERAGE: V8 Mango Peach juice

FOOD: Macaroni and Cheese

DESSERT: Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Eggrolls from Bluephies (see below)

RESTAURANT: Bluephies

COLOR: Green

HOBBY (you do or wish you still did): Writing

ANIMAL: Cats

AUTHOR: H.P. Lovecraft

BOOK: The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux

My Favorite WoW Machinima

1. Blind by Percula. Words can’t explain how Epic this Machinima is. I love Ony! ~swoon~
2. All the Ninja Raiders – by RavenSylphe, vocals by EmberIsolte. EmberIsolte blogs at Girls Do Play WoW.
3. ROFLMAO by Oxhorn. Watch all the Oxhorn movies at Oxhorn.com. Dooo eeeet!
4. Jimmy, The World of Warcraft Story by Rurikar. Because Everquest sucks.
5. Discipline Priest in AV by PurplePenquin. PurplePenquin is my ex. He is the person who introduced me to the Priest class and made me fall in love with Disc. Respect.

My Favorite Bosses

5 mans

1. Princess Theradras – Maraudon – Isn’t she beautiful?
2. Warbringer O’mrogg – Shattered Halls – “Left Head: Me Hungry. Right Head: You always hungry. That why we so fat!”
3. Blackheart the Inciter – Shadow Labs – “TIME FOR FUN!”
4. Herald Volazj – Old Kingdom – “Iilth vwah, uhn’agth fhssh za.”
5. Keristrasza – The Nexus – “Dragonqueen… Life-Binder… preserve… me.”

Raids

1. C’thun – The Temple of Ahn’Qiraj – I love the Old Gods!
2. Shade of Aran – Karazhan – Two words: Flame Wreath
3. Hex Lord Malacrass – Zul’Aman – The randomness of Soul Drain. WTB more bosses like this.
4. Kel’Thuzad – Lich of all Liches.
5. Yogg-Saron – Ulduar – See #1

My Favorite NPCs (big and small)

In no particular order:

1. Sylvanas Windrunner – “Anar’alah belore/Shindu Sin’dorei/Shindu fallah na/Sin’dorei”
2. Millhouse Manastorm – “Hahaha, alriiight! Who ordered up an extra large can of whoop-ass?”
3. Griftah – “Look over here, -class-! I got somethin’ for ya. Just what ya need. It’s soap, right… and it’s on a rope! No offense, man, but yer a little ripe, know what I’m saying?”
4. Chromie – “How did I learn your name ? You could say that we have met before. To that end, we shall also meet again.”
5. Alexstrazsa – The Life-Binder, The Dragonqueen
6. Oralius – The only sane one at Morgan’s Vigil.
7. Lonika Stillblade - “Then, a new generation of rogues will learn such staples as the gouge’n'grin, combat looting, and blaming someone else for breaking polymorph. And who can forget the central rule of roguery — real rogues don’t feint.”
8. Gamon – “Not again!”
9. Hemet Nesingwary – The Great Game Hunter
10. Apothecary Keever – (sheep explodes) “Keever is most pleased.”