There’s a couple writers for Blizzard that I’m very familiar with. Christie Golden being one of them. It seems she’s gotten the axe Christie Golden Let Go in Latest Round of Blizzard Lay-Offs. I didn’t spend much time reading WoW novels until I discovered The Flying Buttress doing animated cliff notes of the books on YouTube. He got me hooked on her stories and had to read her books.
She’s one that I’m going to miss being at Blizz. Just as I miss my buddy Jimmy N being at Blizz.
I’m a little behind in the news. While I was blundering my way out of a storm, season 4 had smacked Aes square in the face. I rather like how the weekly quests get you bumped up quickly in gear. I got lucky with a couple drops from Timewalking Dungeons, the weekly dungeon quest, the Timewalking Raid, and the weekly raid quest. I got 8 pieces of gear at or above 480 with only one overlapping item. Aes ended S3 with an iLevel in the low to mid 460s. Now he’s comfortably sitting at 477.
Not sure if I’ll be doing the achievo for doing all 3 awakened raids on Normal or higher, but I’ll do them on LFR. Maybe when all 3 raids are awakened I’ll feel motivated. /shrug.
I’ve been beating myself up about my part in the guild explosion back in my post “Filth Casual Life” and have been seriously contemplating disappearing from WoW for who knows how long. A guild friend started asking questions about the future of the guild and I got completely honest with them. They expressed their sadness about the state of the guild, and I apologized for my part in it. They were very quick to shut me up real quick on that subject and reminded me that no one was coerced. Everyone that left was in the same mindset that things needed to change. They made their own choices. As real life creeped in and got in the way of a game, things had to change and everyone followed their hearts. Whether it was to leave WoW and go to FF XIV, quit gaming all together, server hop, or stay; they followed their hearts. I feel less blasé about WoW as a result of the pep talk. We’ll see how I feel as the expansion winds down and we prep for TWW.
I think the title says it all. I have made it to renown 40 with Keg Leg’s Crew. I have the mounts, the mog, the pets, the tendies, aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand I’m done.
My little troll has been queuing up a lot more lately and the end is in sight.
The recent changes (double reputation and the “dailies” being converted to “every times”) has made the game mode bearable. In the time it took me to initially get to renown 3 (1.5-ish hours), I was able to get to 10. I’m getting about 10 renown every 2-ish hours. I was really hoping I would be done with this game mode last night, but I had to call it a night at 1:00 am because my dog needed to go outside again and I really should have been in bed an hour earlier. I finished up at about 37.5 renown. If I can keep up my groove with the quests, I should be able to knock the rest out in about 10 games and I’ve got 7 days to do those 10 games. To say I’m looking forward to this going away is an understatement.
It’s gotten to the point that i mostly roll my eyes at the nonsensical April Fools Day drivel, if I even acknowledge it. Yes, I’m old. GET OFF MY DAMN LAWN!!! Even Blizzard’s yearly yawn-fest barely deserves more than a minute to glance over. Thinking their “funny guys” were the asshats that got canned back in 2021/2022. Or, due to the recent layoffs, they don’t have time for the levity.
However, J&P Cycles caught my attention with the RevZilla E-Z Rider Child Seat and legit made me chuckle. They have an order page for it (both front riding/rear riding versions) at a price of $4,120 ^ 24.
Or $ 572,180,673,773,500,618,575,186,196,623,039,412,449,880,265,900,139,142,589,710,336,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000.00.
Even has a twist on a cliché helmet sticker, “Cash, grass, or applesauce. No baby rides for free.”
Of course, they were sold out. Only thing missing from this one is the “Poseur Perfect” brand label. Wondering if they’d bundle it with a free case of the grape exhaust fuel additive. If you think I’m fooling about the grape exhaust fragrance fuel additive, here’s the Amazon link for the stuff. You can get it through custom chrome, J&P Cycles, and a handful of other auto/cycle places with staff that has a sense of humor.
I’m probably going to sound like a Boomer-lite version of GenX here, but I’m thinking Blunderstorm belongs on a console. NOT a PC. I’d like Plunderstorm a LOT more if I could download it onto my Nintendo switch and button smash on it.
I feel like it’s a WoW-esque version of Smash Bros on a PC. I am definitely not a fan of button smashing games on the PC. Put it on my console, and I might play it more. I doubt I’ll put enough effort into it to earn any tendies.
Maybe it’s time to step aside and allow the WoW 2.0 and its contingent of players to step in and take over.
Maybe I’m just tired.
Maybe I’m just angry that I didn’t earn a chest and cloak on my monk, a chest on my mage, and a belt on my evoker that I can convert to LFR tier appearance and upgrade to Normal appearance (thus finishing out their appearances) and I’m taking it out on the new “hotness.”
Maybe I’ll earn some LFR => Normal appearances on my Demon Hunter, and my grumpy will subside.
Maybe I’ll finish leveling my Rogue and Priest so they can do their appearances.
Maybe I’ll get super drunk this weekend and plug in a game controller on my computer and start button smashing and get my tendies.
/shrug
Maybe it’s just time to go to bed now. See you on the flip side.
It happened again. Guild(s) go ‘splodey. I was complicit in it too. Flash back to April 2015 when I was the GM of a dying guild. I’m now the GM of a dead guild.
The guild “of the Queue” <otQ> was bleeding out at the end of Shadowlands. A couple of folks wanted to try and stop the hemorrhaging, but weren’t given the permissions to do things. Heads butted. Feels were had. Folks that wanted a growing guild environment left and setup shop in “Last Pull Magic” <LPM>. I went with them and became a part of the 5 person council that would be a democratic leadership. We were adamant that all guild decisions would be majority rules.
We talked to folks to let them know what was happening and why we were leaving. Told them that we were not going to tell them they have to follow us, they’re still our friends and we will still run content together and they should follow their hearts.
This fractured the raid team (duh!) and they went in 3 different directions. Some came to <LPM>, some stayed in <otQ>, and others server hopped to Moon Guard. Dragonflight lands on us and we’re able to fill a raid team. Our raid team downs Vault of the Incarnates on normal difficulty. Then the burn out begins. We make a couple attempts for heroic progression, but we don’t have the people for it. We lose a tank who has quit WoW and is settling down in FF XIV. We put raiding on pause for a while. The active raiders then move to Moon Guard or Sin’jin. Then the other 4 council members stop logging in due to real-life stuff. For a few months, it’s just me and one of the healers logging in regularly. There’s another guildie that occasionally logs in, but rarely when I am logged in. The healer stops logging in because she’s moving. A young couple in the guild (daughter of a council member and her boyfriend) start logging in regularly, but they’re doing couples things.
So here I am. Back where I was in 2015. Contemplating whether I want to attempt organized group content. So I do the LFR thing. I enjoy the ability to convert LFR gear into tier appearances. I enjoy the ability to upgrade the gear into normal appearances. I am enjoying the story. I’m okay with being a filthy casual.
On the plus side of being a filthy casual, I’ve got 10 classes to max level. I’ve got both Alliance and Horde toons at level cap. I have the complete LFR and Normal tier appearances for 7 classes, with one more class being just a belt appearance away. I’m doing things and don’t have to worry about coordinating with others. I think I’ll bury my head in the sand for a spell and just keep with the status quo.
Took pieces from the Emerald Dream questing set and MC Cenarius tier set and the resto Artifact and combined them. Rather proud of the results.
Last year (2022) I was lucky enough to get the Headless Horseman’s mount. There were lots of squeeeeees and of course the declaration of “It is officially over, my search is done. Fate chose when I’d claim the reward. AH-HAHAHAHAHA!!!!” I thought I’d only be running the occasional HH after that to help friends with a quick tank or healer queue. I was so very wrong. Enter Dragonflight. Enter Dragonriding. Enter Dragon transmog. Enter an adorable doggo pet. Looks like I’ll be farming HH every year again. *sigh*
Realized I hadn’t done the time rift on my Moo Shammy this week, so decided I’d knock one out. Sadly, no one was doing it when I landed there. I still did the mini-chores they asked before entering the rift. I figure perhaps folks will show up. Nope!
Time came to enter the rift. Still no one.
*sigh*
Sitting there waiting for boss to become attackable and hoping someone will port in. Still nope.
*double sigh*
Item level is 402, give it a shot as Elemental with tank pet, fire pet, and lust on pull. Got him to 20-something% and he killed me.
*triple sigh*
Still no one showing up. I’d used one of those items that guarantees a drop, so I wasn’t quitting. Swapped to Restoration. Lust was on cooldown. No pets (they’d be on cooldown anyways). Pulled him. It took SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO long to kill him. I spent most of my time healing myself, moving out of poop, interrupting, and purging while the fire shock dot ticked on him. Got the occasional Lava Burst and Lightning Bolt on him, but most of the damage to him was the dot. But I got him. That all that matters.
Bodhi Rana 