Mini Post: The Isle Was A Good Decision

Yesterday I posted that Blizzard themselves are suggesting fresh 90′s should begin questing on the Isle of Thunder to help get geared up and ready for the newly added content. I am not at all a fresh 90, but I was so worried about completing rep for the various factions that I hadn’t ventured over there yet. I was a bit concerned I might have trouble doing the quests because I don’t raid for gear and I assumed the quests would be slightly harder than the Klaxxi and ShadoPan dailies I had been doing.

But I went anyway. I did all of the necessary solo instances and unlocked the beginning of the dailies and I’m back again today doing them. I haven’t had any extra trouble killing mobs. In fact, I’m realizing I was doubting my abilities for no reason – something I also struggle with in real life. So I’m having fun again instead of feeling dread about doing those same old dailies I had been doing. Yes, I will be tired of these eventually but my hope is I won’t have to stay in this area long before I move on to the newer stuff.

Plus today I got the surprise bonus of an achievement. I spotted the gold chest and almost didn’t click on it because I thought “I don’t think I’ve picked up a key here”. Luckily, I’m very curious so I clicked on it anyway. Hooray for achievements!

Go West, Young Druid. Straight To The Isle Of Thunder.

New content has been coming out super fast, which is awesome for the people who are able to keep up and are done with all current content but not so awesome for someone like me who just bumbles along slowly and stops to smell every flower pick every herb. I made it to 90 in 4 days, but when patch 5.1 came out I was behind on grinding rep with most of the MoP factions. I believe I had only done the Tiller rep to exalted and was bff’s with all the farmer people. When 5.2 came out I was still behind. I had gotten exalted with Golden Lotus but only revered and honored with a few of the others. So, hey, guess what? Now that 5.3 is here I still haven’t spent more than a few hours on the Isle of Thunder.

This worried me. I love that content is coming out fast, but I hate the fact that I cannot catch up to it. Part of the problem is that in addition to being mostly casual (and constantly distracted) I am also a completionist. Not a good combination in a game with this many things to do. I never moved on to the Isle of Thunder when it became available because I wasn’t finished with some of the original MoP factions. I’ve never been good at doing dailies anyway so it was slow going. Now we have more new stuff and I am feeling overwhelmed.

In order to try and speed myself along a bit, I had asked my guildies Tuesday night if they had any suggestions on which reps I should concentrate on more than others. I mean, finishing up Shado Pan is probably not going to benefit me at all gear wise but maybe Operation: Shieldwall would. Rather than looking it all up myself I decided to ask them because they are raiders and all current with content. Also, I am lazy. They were completely helpful as usual, so I set off immediately to the areas they suggested and decided to skip over some of the (now) less important things.

But then today at work, I decided to read the patch notes for 5.3. Yes, I realize you all did that weeks ago but I didn’t bother because I knew I wasn’t ready for it. However, I’m glad I looked them up tonight because while I was perusing the site I came across this article which basically lets me know I should skip straight to the Isle of Thunder to help myself catch up. Admittedly, it will bother me a bit to have skipped so many things but I’ve heard such good reviews of the Isle and of the new 5.3 stuff that I think getting a bit caught up and seeing the awesome stuff will outweigh the disappointment in leaving things unfinished.

The reason I’m mentioning it here is because it will be useful information to have for anyone who is trying to get alts caught up and are tired of grinding out Klaxxi rep and the like. Straight from the horse’s mouth – going straight to the Isle is the most efficient way for a fresh level 90 to get caught up.

The One Where I’m Getting My Groove Back

Back when MoP was new and everyone was busy farming their asses off and raising lots of vegetables and cooking lots of things … I was concentrating on making money. I farmed vegetables and immediately sold them on the AH instead of stockpiling them or leveling my cooking. As soon as I unlocked the Songbell seeds, I began planting them for Motes of Harmony and quit vegetables all together. The reason being I could use the motes to make extra Living Steels. Which I then sold for money. I like money. I always want more of it. Strangely, I never really have a lot of in-game money due to not actually playing on a serious daily basis and not having enough high level alts to help support my own crafting. Which means I never really made a huge amount of money off of Living Steel because I had to buy Ghost Iron Bars to make Trillium to then make the Living Steel. While there was a profit margin there, it wasn’t a very large one. Especially considering I only used my daily Living Steel transmute an average of 4 days a week. Or some weeks not at all. But I digress; I never stockpiled vegetables or leveled my cooking. That’s the main point here.

Guess what happened when I decided last week I wanted to become Master of all the Ways? I totally had to buy ridiculous amounts of vegetables and meats. I also had to spend lots of hours fishing so I could bundle them into groceries and trade them in for IronPaw Tokens to buy Soy Sauce and all the veggies and meats that were not available on the AH. I was able to grab some stacks of ingredients from the guild bank and I’m very grateful for that and hopefully payed generously enough to compensate for them, but I still had to come up with a lot of the ingredients myself. My in-game money averages around 15,000 gold (seriously, i have GOT to be better at doing dailies and running dungeons) and while I did accomplish what I wanted to accomplish by the time Saturday afternoon had rolled around, my 15k had dwindled down to around 6k. I feel so broke. But it was worth it to get those achievements and finally have that all finished up.

Now I just need to learn to be more dedicated to spending my time in game wisely. I get so easily distracted. I do seem to be heading the right direction though as I made myself buckle down and finish up my Klaxxi reputation by doing those dailies very regularly over the past week.

Maybe the fact that I’m really, REALLY, loving my Death Knight and now have her at level 86 and questing in the Valley of the Four Winds will inspire me to do dailies more consistently. She kicks some serious ass even though I’m merely facerolling my keyboard. I think dailies with her will go much quicker. Plus, she’s now mining ghost iron ore so she can help Elfi transmute living steel without having to pay for mats. It’s actually a little concerning to me that I seem to take down mobs in the Valley faster with my lvl 86 DK than I do with Elfi who has an ilvl of 480. I guess the real test will be if I ever brave up enough to take Morrissa into dungeons. Because I’m playing her by facerolling my keyboard, I’ve been hesitant to do any grouping. I’m such a sensitive little thing sometimes. I don’t want any big, bad internet strangers mocking me. But aside from all that, she seriously kicks ass.

Let The Boring Blog Posts Begin Again

Heads up, suckers! I have found my way back online. My grandfather has improved enough to be moved to a nursing facility near his house for therapy. That means my mother no longer has to stay with me and since he’s back to being 2 hours away and out of danger, I don’t have to spend my days sitting at the hospital. My free time has returned and as a direct result so has my derping around. I’ll admit, the first night I was able to login I did not stay online long. Even though it had only been roughly 5 weeks I had been gone, I had been so focused on other things and so stressed out that I let WoW leave my mind completely. Which resulted in me logging in to Elfindale, gathering my crops and planting new ones, and then standing there in the middle of my farm staring at my bags trying to figure out why I had all that shit and what the hell was it all even for. After about 15 minutes of this brainless staring at inventory, I gave up and logged out.

The next night I logged back in to find my brain had mostly returned to normal and I was able to do dailies, run a scenario and switch over to my DK for some leveling. Ah, it feels so good to be back. I’m behind in that I’ve not done any Thunder Island stuff, so I need to hop over there. However, I think before I get sucked into the island hub, I’m going to finish up some things on Elfi I never got around to, such as finishing off my cooking by completing all of the Ways and getting a few more reputations up to exalted. I will simultaneously work on taking my DK from 86 to 90 so she can fly while gathering ore for me.

In almost related news, screenshots:

Where I’ve Been and Where I’m Going

Where I’ve Been:
I have been out of game and basically offline completely for the past 28 days or so due to a family emergency. Except that’s not exactly as black and white as it seems. Most people have no idea what’s going on or why I’ve been absent, but even the people that do know the basics don’t really understand the family dynamics at work. So I thought I’d take a shot at trying to explain it real quickly.

Approximately 28 days ago, my 86 year old grandfather was crushed under a tree that was being cut down by my father, but fell early and unexpectedly. It also fell the opposite direction of where they planned it to go. This is a serious injury for old people. He was knocked unconscious immediately, 911 was called and he was airlifted 2 hours away to a trauma hospital in the city where I live. My entire family lives within miles of each other in a small, rural community. I’m the only one who escaped to civilization lives away from them.

Grandad was critically injured. His left scapula was broken in 2 places, his lungs were bruised and 8 ribs were broken, his lower back was broken, his pelvic bone was broken on the right side and his right femur was broke in 2 places. The next morning they did surgery on his femur to insert a steel rod, but he was not stable enough to have any other surgeries. The rest of his breaks are being left alone in the hopes they will heal fairly straightly on their own. It took him 4 days to wake up after being put under for his surgery, but he finally did and was downgraded to stable condition. After another week in ICU, he was moved to a private room. However, he is still in the hospital in the city where I live.

I am the responsible one in the family. Even if I didn’t want to be, I’m expected to be. But I generally take responsibility on willingly. Probably connected to my whole Virgo and servitude thing. The day of the accident my mom called me and asked me to rush right over to the hospital because it was going to take them 2 hours to get there. So I went over and met with the ER doctors, heard all the gory details, was taken to see him in all his bloody (lots of scratches from the tree and ground), broken misery. I started filling out his paperwork and making decisions that needed to be made urgently. I am someone who is calm in emergency situations, so when my parents did finally arrive, I was still in charge of the situation. And I have remained in charge of the situation ever since then. Whether I want to be or not.

We all stayed in the ICU waiting room for 3 or 4 days after it first happened because the doctors told us he’d be lucky to make it through each day. Once he finally woke up after surgery and was considered stable instead of critical, most of the family went back home. Except for my mother. My grandmother is in a nursing home immobile and suffering from dementia, so she is unable to visit him. Which means my mom is the main person who cares for Grandad. Since she is retired and lives 2 hours away, she’s been living with me ever since the accident so she can be at the hospital around 20 hours a day and not waste time and money driving back and forth.

Not only have I spent the past 4 weeks sleeping in chairs at the hospital and then on my own couch at home, I’m also not getting as much sleep as normal and when mom and I are home together in the evenings we watch her TV shows and I don’t “play” on my computer because video games are dumb. Yes, I realize I’m an adult and this is my house. But some battles just aren’t worth the fight and I’m trying to keep in mind that she’s stressed out and been away from her own home for weeks now.

The good news is, other than the issue with all of his broken bones still being broken, Grandad is recovering nicely (but very slowly) and they hope they can move him into a nursing home down local to his home in the next two weeks for several weeks of rehab and therapy. Then my life will be my own again… I don’t mean that to sound as selfish as it does but hopefully you understand what I do mean.

Where I’m Going:
I am freaking going to Blizzcon! I can hardly believe it. Like most of you, I have been anxiously waiting for tickets to go on sale. I warned my mom in advance yesterday that I would be spending some time on the computer at 9pm (central time) because I needed to buy tickets for an event. I didn’t bother telling her what the event was; she would not have approved. When the time came and the button lit up that tickets were for sell, I clicked the button. I was approx. #6500 in queue and I could tell by how much stock decreased compared to how much the queue was decreasing, I wasn’t going to make it.

I was right, I didn’t make it. I was still at around #2400 when they sold out. Boo. But wait! I had been reading Twitter while waiting for my chance to buy tickets and I had seen that Vidyala was lucky enough to be at the front of the queue and had indeed snagged tickets. Then she mentioned she snagged extra tickets and thanks to the awesomeness of guild membership and online friendship, she sold me 2 of them. Also she’s just a darn sweet person.

I am so excited to be going and so ecstatic at having a chance like this to snag the tickets. Especially since I am taking a much needed camping trip this weekend to escape my current life of sitting in a hospital room most of my day. I won’t be home on Saturday, so last night was my one chance. Even though I haven’t been around at all lately, I have a great guild. I can’t wait to meet a chunk of them at Blizzcon this year!

Quick Update

I’m alive. I’m still playing WoW way too much. Just been concentrating on getting my mining alt up to Panda land so I can gather my own Ghost Iron Ore for Elfi to use in her transmute. I finally made it to the Jade Forest last night. Too bad I can’t fly or else I’d just stop here. Lol.

I’ve also been working some voluntary overtime and I’ve had a touch of the blues coupled with exhaustion. As a result, things have been quiet here but I’m quite certain I’ll be back to blathering about all my normal nonsense in no time.

Since I’m currently a tad bit emo, this seems like a good post to include the picture of my Blood Elf I took when she got smashed up against a giant mushroom in Zangarmarsh and the camera didn’t know what to do. It reminds me of a typical profile picture from an emo teenager.

The One Where I Gave Up My Red Hair

I absolutely love the color red. Not only is it my favorite color, but you can actually sell me all sorts of shit I don’t need just by presenting it to me in red. I’m sitting at my desk at work right now and just in a quick glance I see a red pencil holder filled with red pens and pencils, a red water mug, my red lunch cooler, my red tupperware sitting on top of my cooler, my red mouse pad, my phone’s red case… I could go on. It’s probably a bit ridiculous, but I don’t care. My Nikon 3100 DSL is even red.

Obviously I love the color red in my video games too, though it’s easier to theme things red on the Horde side than on the Alliance side. Which is why when I faction changed my Worgen druid to a Troll druid several months ago, I was excited to be able to choose bright red hair. I wish all my characters could have bright red hair, it makes me sad. I know there are several races that are able to have a natural red hair color, but I don’t actually care for that color. I want the true red. The fire engine, superman’s cape color of red. It was my favorite thing about my troll.

But you know what else I’ve discovered I love? Transmogging. And I have recently completed a transmog set for my troll where the items look so good together I voluntarily changed my hair color away from red to match my outfit. Yes, it’s that big of a deal. It’s such a big deal, I had to show it off to you guys. I think the hair color makes the whole thing even more awesome looking because it’s seriously like an exact match. Also, while I do like the staff I’m carrying (it’s a kick as staff with bonus animation) I would be interested in finding one that goes along with the pale green color scheme a bit more so if you have any ideas, let me know.

Here are the pictures of the transmog outfit I gave up my red hair for and a list of items can be found below the pics.

Items:
Head = Runic Leather Headband
Shoulder = Epaulets of the Fateful Accord
Chest = Lunar Eclipse Robes (different colors depending on faction)
Wrists = Contender’s Leather Bracers
Hands = Embossed Leather Gloves
Waist = Melador’s Mercurial Wrap
Staff = Sulfur Stave

One advantage to wearing a robe is I don’t have to transmog my pants.
One advantage to being a troll is my boots don’t show. (not actually an advantage, I hate my troll feet)
One advantage to not displaying your cloak is … your cloak doesn’t display.