Thursday’s Thoughts
After a short break from WOW, I’m getting back into the swing of things, and even have begun raiding. I was getting a little burnt out on logging in to fish, scan the AH and grind archaeology and herbs.
So what did I do while away from Azeroth? No I haven’t been playing Rift like all of the cool kids.
Reading
First, I’ve really gotten back into reading again. The Kindle has uh… rekindled… my voracious appetite for novels. When I was growing up, reading was my main form of entertainment. If I recall correctly, back in High School I read about 5 epic fantasy novels a week. I’m certainly not back to that scale, but I’ve finished four books in the past three weeks.
Jaedia inspired me to join Goodreads, so I’ve set up a profile over there. It’s a fantastic way to keep track of what I plan on reading – I keep getting recommendations and forgetting about them. Now I no longer have any excuses. I’ve also done a few short reviews of what I’ve read so far this year.
Currently I am devouring The Wise Man’s Fear by Patrick Rothfuss. He is without a doubt one of the best new fantasy authors out there, and has attracted a bit of a cult following. This sophomore release was long anticipated, and I”m thrilled to finally have my hands on it. So far it has been a pleasure, and it’s obviously a well crafted story that I find hard to put down.
House Hunting
The second thing that has kept me away is house hunting. Jardal and I have lived in our 2 bedroom apartment for almost three years now, and although spacious for an apartment, it’s starting to feel cramped. Now that the wedding is over with, we’ve determined our funds are sufficient to become home owners.
We saw at least 15 houses, and I spent countless hours flipping through online listings. I tend to get a little obsessed when I work on a “project” like this and think about it every waking moment.
We put an offer in on one house last Monday. We received a reasonable counter offer and finally signed the purchase agreement on Friday. I am utterly thrilled with this house – we snagged a pretty good deal, and it’s much closer to my “dream home” than I ever thought we’d find within our price range.
We close on April 15th and will move shortly after that. I expect the move and setup to take a bit of time away from WOW and from blogging, but I think you all will survive without me.
Raiding
It feels very good to be back in the saddle again. We’ve downed Magmaw and Argoloth, and are working on the Omnitron Council.
Despite being irritated at the idea of DPSing while I heal, I gave in and specced into Telluric Currents. Just as I had heard, it makes mana on a fight like Magmaw a complete non-issue. It actually made me feel more useful – instead of standing around while his head is down, I added a paltry bit of DPS. I think I’m officially on the Telluric Currents bandwagon.
I definitely feel the lack of cooldowns as a gaping hole in my toolbox. I look forward to seeing how the Spirit Link Totem in 4.1 pans out. Other than that, I know I just need a lot of healing practice.
Cool Thing
I got a little behind on my podcast listening, but one of the episodes of the Matticast (World of Matticus) podcast that I listened to this week mentioned a cool utility called AskMrRobot.
I know there are a ton of gear/gem recommenders out there but the Gear Optimizer on AskMrRobot just feels like the most polished and user-friendly I’ve seen. They have default stat weights for all classes and specs that are pretty good, based on a bunch of research from Elitist Jerks and bloggers. If you don’t like the defaults, you can change them. The forums are very active with people discussing enhancements, changes to the default stats, and beyond – so you know if something is wrong it’s likely to get fixed.
This web-based app is fantastic because you don’t have to download software that won’t work on a Mac, and you can access it from anywhere (even at work on your lunch break). I would highly recommend you check it out!
The site also has basic spec info. It’s basically designed to be a one-stop-shop for raiders who don’t have time to digest 100-page threads and complex math, or are trying to raid on one of their alts. I’m pretty impressed so far – let’s see if they can keep it updated.
As usual, your voice is a calming influence.
With the craziness around here, coming to read your words gave me a sense of peace for a few minutes.
Thank you, Kae.
I’ve never been described as “calming” before, so thank you. Writing is therapeutic to me, even if I don’t have anything important to say.
Oh, and a big RL high five to you and Jar!!! Grats on the house!! I can’t wait for the house-warming party. Should I bring my karoake machine?
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Excellent! I can remember the excitement, nervousness, and anticipation of moving into OUR very first house. Great times.
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On high school reading: five novels a week? I read a lot, but wow. The high school reading record I recall was starting Robert Jordan’s Eye of the World… and finishing it before the end of the day. I hated running our of book.
Definite grats on the house.
On Ask Mr. Robot: my biggest problem with it is that there really isn’t a static set of stat weights for every (or even any) gear level. Unfortunately, the new incarnation of Rawr is both buggy and just plain broken for most specs still, and SimulationCraft takes a long time to generate it’s numbers (and doesn’t actually recommend anything specific, just that my next point of mastery is only worth a third of the next point of intellect) and so far I’ve only been able to figure out how to get DPS numbers out of it.
I also suspect that AskMrRobot undervalues crit for a healing shaman, since crit not only has a mana return, but it also procs a smart heal. It also, naturally, values unlimited spirit stacking; this may only be an issue because I’ve been almost exclusively doing 5-man healing, and right now a healing-heavy pull only brings me down to seventy or eighty percent mana; I lose people sometimes because of a lack of throughput, but not because I’m out of mana.
Although some of that may be because of Telluric Currents; your endorsement of it on Magmaw led me to throwing it in when I respecced (for some reason I didn’t have the bonus totem duration talented. WTH?). It’s not that uncommon to find opportunities to use it in heroics, either, although I sometimes have trouble remembering that, hey, I can regen my mana with zapping!
Straight stat scales are definitely problematic for healing – different encounters, gear levels, etc all value different things. For example the AskMrRobot resto scale highly values haste, but haste is only really valuable up to certain thresholds (currently 916 is the first), and after that other stats matter more. Our resto mastery especially is hard to value because it’s only great when people are spending a lot of time with low health. Crit vs spirit depends on whether you need throughput or mana conservation.
With all that said, if someone is just starting a class or is trying to keep up with their 3rd level-capped alt, the stat scales are invaluable. For my own purposes they help me make a quick decision, but I do tweak them often.