Mar 27

My druid is currently level 39. That means soon I’ll be forking out about 80 gold to get me a shiny new ride. Definitely faster than travel form, but has a three second “cast” time. This got me to thinking: how far do you need to go before your travel form is not as good as your mount? For going from the Auction House to the Bank, surely travel form is better, as by the time I can mount up, cheetah-girl* is already there. So I did some math.

Running at normal speed, we all know, is 100% run speed. Woah, mind-bender there, huh? We’ll say that running at normal speed gains you X units per second. Travel form, at 140% run speed, would net you 1.4*X units per second. A mount, after three seconds, gives you 160% speed and 1.6*X units per second, and an epic (ground) mount 200% speed and 2*X units per second. To make the math nice and even, we’ll make X = 10. That gives us:

Running = 10 units/second
Travel Form = 14 units/second
Mount = 16 units/second
Epic = 20 units/second

The key here is, of course, that travel for gets a 3 second head start. After one second, travel form is 14 units off, while the mounted druid is still rubbing her hands together. After two seconds, 28 units to 0. After three seconds, travel form is 42 units away and the mounted druid is just getting on their cat/kodo. One second later the mounted druid finally makes it 16 units, but the travel form druid is already 56 units away. So how long until the mounted druid catches up with her cheetah sister?

Since I grind in cat form a lot, I figured I’d do the math for both cat and travel forms against both normal and epic land mounts. Here are the results:

16 seconds for a land mount to catch a cat.
9 seconds for an epic land mount to pass a cat.
24 seconds for a land mount to catch a travel form druid.
10 seconds for an epic land mount to catch a travel form druid.

This means that, at level 40, I can get at least from the mailbox to the flight master in Stormwind (probably farther–I’ll have to do some time tests later) as a travel form druid than on my shiny new mount!

*I apologize sincerely for this link.

Mar 20

Yesterday, my wife and I headed out to The Big Blue Box to buy her a computer and myself a new monitor. She ended up with the HP 8300f, a very nice desktop, and I ended up with the LG L226WTQ, a 22″ wide-screen monitor that is absolutely wonderful. Of course, the first thing I wanted to do was fire up WoW on it and see how I liked it.

Short answer: a lot. It is amazing! With about 400 extra horizontal pixels to play with, I immediately rearranged by UI a bit to add an always-present combat log, as well as moved my bars around a bit to give more empty space and more out-of-the-way tooltips. I’ve still a lot of work to do on it, but it’s looking good so far.

If anyone out there is debating on whether or not to get a wide-screen monitor, go for it. It’s the best technological investment I’ve made in a long while.

Mar 17

It’s been a few days since I’ve posted anything here. I do the lights and sound occasionally for a local theater group, and that’s been taking up a lot of my WoW time recently. However, I did receive one of the greatest WoW gifts any guy could ever hope to receive–my wife decided to log in one day, while I was at work, and create a character!

Now, I have to be careful, because my naturay instinct is to go “YAY I HAVE SOMEONE TO PLAY WITH ALL THE TIME AND I DON’T HAVE TO WORRY AS MUCH ABOUT PLAYING TOO LONG AND THE WORLD IS GREAT HAPPY FLUFFY FUN TIME YAY!” My wife has never been too terribly much of a gamer, but that’s because she grew up with a lot of brothers and they hogged all the game time. Slowly but surely, she seems to be developing an interest, and I have to tell myself that if she enjoys it, and if she decides to keep playing, then can I reach that conclusion–I don’t want her to play just because I want her to, and I don’t want to pressure her or overload her with my infinite knowledge of WoWdom (pfft, yeah, right). We’ll see where it goes, and maybe one day we’ll be running Kara together or something!

Mar 12

WOW Insider reported today that patch 2.4 is hitting the Internets! That’s a good sign. I’m guessing either this coming Tuesday or the Tuesday after. I’m thinking it won’t be any longer than that before we get to see how much our nerfs hurt play some new content!

Edit: Please let me clarify, I’m referring to Blizzard pushing part of patch 2.4 to the Background Downloader, not the actual going-live of the patch.

Mar 11

http://blue.cardplace.com/newcache/forums.worldofwarcraft.com/5286958645.htm

(For my prior post, see Patch 2.4: People are Far Too Optimistic.)

Mar 10

I’ve never been too much into PvP. I’ve taken my mage into Warsong Gulch a few times and enjoyed it okay. But only recently did I take my first foray into Alterac Valley on my warlock. Like, I’m sure, all AV noobs before me, I had no idea what I was doing. My very presence in the BG, taking up a raid slot, was probably more a hindrance to my team than a boon (we they won anyway).

About a week ago I took my hunter into AV. I loved it! I actually contribute to the fight, rather than getting endlessly ganked like on my warlock. (In retrospect, I believe this is because my hunter is in the 51-60 bracket, while my warlock is only level 66 in the 61-70 bracket, meaning I’m facing long-time 70’s on my warlock.) I love the feel of a large scale war you get from the battleground, and I’ve found I really enjoy playing defense in WSG on my hunter as well–now, on my other characters, I feel blind without my tracking skills!

What about you guys? Do you enjoy PvP? What’s your favorite battleground?

Mar 7

I don’t think I’ve laughed so hard in my life. The original post is on the WoW forums, spread out amongst multiple posts; I’ve copied them here after the break:

The following is copied VERBATIM from the forums (I don’t actually spell this badly):

Read more… »

Mar 7

I finally dinged 58 on my hunter yesterday, and in spite of only having about 20 minutes to play, I did the initial “Welcome to Outland, now go talk to this guy” quests and went and got my first aid books. Of course, this means I reached a decision regarding my prior question of when to go to Outland. I just couldn’t bring myself to do another quest in Silithus or Winterspring or especially the Plaguelands (I hate those zones so much).

So, here I am, running around in Outland, just gathering quests, all of which offer a huge upgrade to some random piece of my gear. On another note, I had forgotten how much I hate the Fel Reaver. Seriously. That guy sucks. A lot.

Anyway, I have a lot to look foward to, and a lot to do until I reach 70–and even more to do once I get there! My highest character is 66, so everything from there on out will be a new experience for me. I’m looking forward to it!

Mar 6

Patch 2.4 is getting closer and closer, and it’s bringing with it some changes–and some not so changes. Let’s look at some highlights:

The Life Tap nerf is gone! The spell on the PTR has been reverted to it’s regular X health for X mana state, and Kalgan has confirmed that no other nerfs are planned for warlocks this patch.

The Mortal Strike style debuff added to the shaman Flametongue Weapon and Totem buffs have also been reversed.

One of my favorite changes so far is this: many spells that hit multiple targets will no longer hit crowd controlled enemies! More specifically, any spells which are not considered AoE spells will not hit extra targets. This includes a druid’s Swipe, a hunter’s Multi-Shot (but not Volley), a shaman’s Chain Lightning, a warrior’s Cleave (but not Thunderclap), etc. I am surprised to note that there are a few missing spells, such as a rogue’s Blade Flurry.

There are several AV changes, as well, including the option to, once again, join as a party (does this just mean party, or also raid?).

These changes are in addition to the plethora of other changes being made. Check out the Test Realm Patch Notes for more information! (Note–that link will go out of date once a new PTR is up, so check out the alternate notes on WoWWiki.)

Mar 4

Oh how many times I’ve wanted to do this. In the famous words of Scott Johnson, click the small to see the large.