Blog Posts from "Xaeranth's Place!"

My Sign From God to Blog; Reckoning Scrubs > Stormstrike Scrubs? Xaeranth's New WoW Home...

Sat, 13 Mar 2010 13:34:11 -0500

I've really been meaning to blog lately. I've probably written drafts of 20 blogs in the last few months and then decided not to publish any of them because, quite frankly, I have neither been inspired to write, nor have I written anything I felt was truly deserving of our beloved (...emo, elitist, racist, sexist, teen angst ridden, narcissistic, degenerate...) WoWRiot readership.

(inb4: this is another one you should not have published - suck a dick, trolls)

But then, like a sign from God, two things happened:

1) Shindo started blogging again (.../groan), and I thought to myself: "self, let me show this ******* clownshoes how it's done". Sure, Shindo is going to have more +1's and positive comments - but that's only because of his legion of rabid chode-swinging e-fanbois with season tickets to the VIP seats on his nuts, who aren't anywhere close to bright enough to discern a decent writer from a horrible one (as evidenced by them laughing at the same Chumpjohn and Wingz jokes he makes in every other sentence).

But deep down, we both know who the better blogger is (/wink).

(note: Shindo, don't feel bad, better men than you have been torn asunder by my razor wit, unparalleled wisdom and mad blogging skillz)

2) Warriors seem to be getting hit with the nerfbat! Now before we begin, I want to preface my comments by saying that this isn't a warrior "QQ" blog, because, unlike most people who have made this argument and failed miserably, I have facts and data to back up why I think the Bladestorm nerf is more than warranted.

You see, in the entire World (of Warcraft), I know 3 people who play the Warrior class, and coincidentally, all of them are raging dickheads. Now, for a little thing I like to call "Statistics 101" for those of less educated ilk: given my ample sample size, if 100% of the Warriors I know clearly fall into the "raging dickhead" category, I can extrapolate that out across the entire population and safely (mathematically) hypothesize that the rest do as well. Yes, you read that correctly, that brings the total to 100% of people who play the Warrior class are, in fact, raging dickheads - and by this fact alone, deserve to have their class bludgeoned to death with the bladed, spinning, nerf bat of ******* hate rape...

Hopefully this nerf serves as a lesson to you jerkoffs that just because you play a retardedly OP class and that Blizzard coddles you ******* limp dick wimps, it doesn't make you good at this game, so please tone down your sense of entitlement.

Furthermore, Warriors seem to fall into two distinct categories:

1) The very amazing ones (who understand how retardedly OP Bladestorm really is, and saw this nerf coming a mile away)

2) The horrible to average ones (who think Bladestorms current iteration is fine)

Given these facts, those of you who play Warriors and are reading this blog should take my little test by deciding where you stand on the OP'ness of Bladestorm to see which of #1 or #2 that you fall into. No hard feelings.

Onto the next subject: for those of you sending me tells when you bump into me on the mean streets of the Mal'Ganis server, which, two nights ago, I made my new home: "Yes, I am the Xaeranth that used to blog on WoWRiot." And yes, I just hit 80 on my Hunter like two weeks ago, so lay the **** off my gearz (or at least have the common ******* decency to offer to carry me to some ICC purps, thanks)!

Yep, it's true. After more than 2 years on the Spirestone server, I decided it was time to strike out on my own and move on to The Big Show. And no offense to my old friends back on Spirestone, but I didn't realize what a piddly-****, backwoods little server it really is (/queue "dueling banjos").

Growing up in a small town in Central Vermont, I recall the first time I bore witness to a big city such as New York City, Los Angeles or Hong Kong, and logging into Mal'Ganis for the first time (right in front of the AH, too) held exactly the same sense of scope and awe.

...and then...OH GOD WHAT THE **** IS THIS BULL**** BURNING HOLES IN MY EYES???

...*leaves Trade Channel*...

Up until I transferred, I had never seen a 6k gearscore. Upon logging into Mal'Ganis, I was standing next to a Resto Druid with a 6101. Until yesterday, I had yet to personally see anyone with a Wrathful T2 weapon yet, but upon zoning into an IoC yesterday, I was standing next to some Warrior from my server, and sure enough, he was rocking the 325DPS 2h axe - then I noticed that the server is absolutely littered with them. Not to mention that PuG's are clearing content that most guilds on Spirestone are struggling to see.

So it makes me wonder - why the **** do people stay on these tiny ****hole servers with low progression, and shrinking/nonexistent talent pools?

News from Duelist-Land: so I transferred over with a friend of mine who plays a Ret Pally. We had tried some 2's back on the Reckoning BG with varied results last week, so for points we decided to give it a shake here. Coming into it, my impression was that the Stormstrike battlegroup was supposed to be more difficult than Reckoning, so we didn't really expect much, yet we rocked out a 71% Win/Loss our first night going 22-9 as Ret/MM.

The teams we beat were laughably bad, even for a 1700-1800 MMR (our MMR is **** because I haven't arena'd on my Hunter since S3. Oh, and because I a horrible)

So what's the deal Stormstrike? Are you really going to let your scrubs get outshined by Reckoning scrubs? Bumfights incoming...

Anyhow, thanks for those who have sent me tells ingame, it's always nice to chat with you guys. To the rest of you, I will see you around : )

Oh, and WTB 3's and 5's and a guild, PST!

Signed,

Xaeranth, now of the Mal'Ganis server

HARRY! YOU'RE ALIVE! ...And you're a horrible shot...

Tue, 13 Oct 2009 10:01:31 -0400

As you all are aware, before I fell off the WoWRiot radar a few months ago, I had spent the previous 4-5 months to that dominating both the PVE and PVP aspects of this game on my beloved Death Knight, Xaeranth, Champion of the Frozen Wastes.

But even as the de facto DK class hero in Serennia's semi-absence (an absence which is only equaled by that of the substance in his blogs), I had found myself growing increasingly complacent and bored with the class (and, admittedly, the game).

(Note: and yes, retards, I quit my DK pre-nerfs, so you all can suck it in the comments about me being an FOTM reroller; it's only slightly true.)

I've come to the sad realization that all of you elite players (not unlike myself) complaining that this game is too easy have been right all along, and when I do the simple math, I can't help but jump on the bandwagon with you:

Rival Title secured? Check.

7/8 Ulduar on farm? Check. (Damn you Yogg-Saron *shakes fist*)

ToC cleared? lulz...

2800 Achievement points? Check.

All of this while only trying moderately hard? *****, please...

What the hell else is there left for a ******* baller like me to do in this game?

The answer: step up the difficulty of the game by rolling a Shaman; an Elemental Shaman.

Of all the classes I have mained, the Elemental Shaman is easily the most fun, yet most absolutely frustrating of them.

On the fun side, there are two amazing reasons to play an Ele Shaman. The first of which is the burst. While still nowhere near capable of what a decently geared Destro Lock can do (nerf this **** harder plz), if I am left alone to cast, people turn into pink mist and grease stains. The damage I can do with 3200SP is downright absurd at times.

The second reason to play an Elemental Shaman is, you guessed it - Thunderstorm. In my humble opinion, there is not a single mechanic in this game that offers the endless hours of sheer entertainment and glee that Thunderstorm does. If I was a 13 year old girl (and I am not, so hold off on the PM's, horndog's), Thunderstorm would be my Robert Pattinson; I just can't get enough of it.

Arathi Basin? The Lumber Mill.

Eye of the Storm? The flag spot.

Isle of Conquest? Parachute onto the opposing teams cannon towers, attack the cannons until the operator jumps out to fight you and *BOOM HEADSHOT* SkillStorm them off the tower to their death.

Blade's Edge Mountain Arena? Buh-bye, GTFO MAH BRIDGE, *****ES.

Alterac Valley? Single handedly recap towers by drawing the other team to the edge, punting them off and recap it while they are running backup.

Those pesky healers turtled the **** up on the roof of their base with the 47k HP Prot Warrior holding the flag in WSG? Guess what? *BOOM* they are now in the flagroom, running back up.

Yes, I am totally "that ******* guy" in the Battleground that seeks out every opportunity available to be as "gay" as possible (am I doin it rite, Vance?) with such a ridiculously overpowered spell.

The supremely frustrating part about playing an Ele shaman is the simple fact that anything with interrupts humping your leg for any length of time = a big fat GG. In BG's, you are mostly Rogue fodder. In the Arena, you are almost exclusively trained for the entire game, every game.

This can be pretty devastating in 2's and 3's (lol Ele in 2's = /wrists, grats to those who can succeed at it, as such), but in 5's if they get on me, they will more than likely lose. 100% Ghost Wolf + Earthbind roots + Thunderstorm makes me a really horrible target for all of the ******* horribad wannabe faceroll cleaves that just absolutely infest the bracket. Plus I got mad cuts and jukes when I rock out with my **** out in GW.

(Disclaimer: I prefer drawing regular Herpes Melee Cleave over the AIDS Wizard Cleave any day of the week.)

Overall, I am very happy with my choice to have rerolled a hybrid. After farming up my Ele set, I farmed up a starter Enhance set and scored a pair of Deathbringer's from 10 and 25 man Ony the first week, which was only made sweeter by me somehow winning a Main Spec roll on a 196DPS Main Hand weapon as an Ele Shaman and receiving a menstrual flow of nonstop tears and blood clots via tells from the groups enhance Shaman about it. Did he not know I was going to use it to absolutely dominate the 1600's in 2's with a Blood DK? Apparently not; but he should now consider himself informed.

And when I get bored with that? I can respec into Resto in my Ele gearz with my amazing 78Mp5 AND HEAL! YEAH! 30-18 in 2's healing a Destro lock in my Ele gear seems ******* legit.

After playing a Hunter in S2/3 to around 2100, a Rogue in S4 to 2k, a Priest and DK in S5/6 to around 2k and my Shaman to 2k this season, I can safely say that in my opinion, the Shaman class EASILY has the highest skill cap for an average player such as myself, within those ranges.

So to all the pro Ele's out there, please don't hesitate to flood my inbox with some tips and tricks : )

Patch 3.2: Much More Sinister Than You Think...

Tue, 11 Aug 2009 13:13:52 -0400

After following the forums and WoWRiot for the past few weeks, the consensus seems to be that everyone is blissfully happy with the new patch and back to finally enjoying our beloved WoW again. Well, I am here to tell you why you shouldn't be.

I want to take a moment to discuss the most disturbing and egregious issue with 3.2: XP in the BG's.

What looks like a casual "Quality of Life" gameplay enhancement is really nothing more than a way for Blizzard to cater (once again) to the hardcore arena crowd, more specifically, the hardcore Alliance arena crowd while squeezing every last penny out of their loyal, unwitting customers. I know, many of you had to reread that last line and mayhaps be scratching your collective heads, so let me spell it out for you.

It's a well known fact that the majority of BG AFK'ers are, in fact, the hardcore arena crowd. And no, they don't want to participate in the BG's where they stand a chance of getting embarrassingly steamrolled by a more skilled and lesser gear opponent simply because they don't have their pocket un-OOM-able Resto Druid assfriend making babies with the nearest pillar to carry them, they want nothing more than to safely sit around all idle, alt tabbed and stroking each other off at AJ.

"But Xaeranth, if they are the hardcore arena crowd, why the hell do they need XP in the first place?"

Thanks, that's an excellent question, let me address it.

As we all ALSO know, the phrase "hardcore arena crowd" is synonymous with "Flavor of the Month" rerollers (or "FOTM" for those of you that don't halba). With the new XP in BG's feature, it is now entirely possible for the hardcore arena crowd to AFK their alts all the way to 80 and be immediately honor and token capped upon reaching it. Yep, a few accounts all running at the same time all day long in moms basement, all with different classes means they have their pick of the litter of geared OP classes prepared for any sweeping buff or nerf that may come, at their disposal. As such, this feature is now going to do nothing but cause us to see the instant saturation of FOTM classes skyrocket after patches, which will then artificially inflate their respective representation which will THEN in turn cause those classes to be unjustly nerfed (think: Ret in 3.2) because of it.

"But Xaeranth, you mentioned that this benefits the Alliance more than Horde, how so?"

This is because Alterac Valley seems to give much, much more XP than the other BG's and I think we all can agree that the AV map severely favors the Alliance. This means that the legions of Alliance side hardcore arena motorhead alts waiting in the wings are going to progress at a much, much faster rate than the Horde, placing the Horde FOTM'ers impossibly behind in the XP in BG's arms race and at a severe competitive disadvantage.

Well, isn't that some type of ******* coincidence that they release this feature shortly before releasing PAID FACTION transfers? Carrot on a stick, much?

Is this not enough evidence for you ignorant naysayers? Let's look at the exciting new BG that you downers have been slobbering over for the last week. After having measured the distances myself, I can confirm that the Alliance have a ~2.6 yard distance advantage to the flag at the Hangar, which is the most powerful node to hold in the game for obvious reasons.

BUT WAIT! THERE IS MORE!

Let's also take a look at the timing of the SoTA starting coin flip change. The issue here is that the Alliance started on offense (which has the significant advantage) for so long that their opening strat is much more refined, while the Horde sides is clumsy at best. The whole coin flip change is nothing more than Blizzard blowing smoke up our *****.

Furthermore in 3.2, we have seen the absolute destruction of Wrath of the Lich Kings two Hero Classes: DK's and Ret Pallies.

"What does this have to do with anything, Xaeranth?"

Well, with the new Cataclysm X-pac around the corner, Blizzard knows they need our current classes to be piles of steaming horse ****, that way when they release their two new Hero Races, people keep playing this game to flock to them after seeing the swath of destruction that grossly overpowered DK's and Ret Pallies were allowed to cut through this game as the flagships of the last X-pac.

With this being said, Blizzard be warned, I am hip to your game and will be watching.

/points to his eyes with two fingers and then points them at Blizzard

To the rest of you, don't say I didn't warn you.

The Bodi Experiment...

Mon, 20 Jul 2009 12:47:49 -0400

While I enjoy Bodi's articles, over time I am becoming more and more fascinated with the fuzzy green **** that grows all over the comments sections of his blogs as if it were some kind of social lab experiment taking place in a petri dish in a huge World of Ming refrigerator.

As a writer and now semi-blogger (of nowhere near the same ability, e-fame or following), I can appreciate his approach to writing. I can see the blogs where he experiments with different things such as varying his literary devices, language and rhythm, and even if they aren't blogs that I particularly enjoy the content of, unlike some people of far less intellectual ilk, I can at least appreciate the attempt and +1 the blog for the effort of trying to create vehicle in which to deliver us his message, rather than just delivering the message to us wrapped in a brown paper bag.

However, my fascination mostly stems from the comments section of his blogs and the simple fact that many people expect every single blog to be tailored to their specific interests and ignorantly refuse to view or consider anything outside of their own frame of reference.

For example, after it being suggested that he just skip Bodi days on WoM if he doesn't enjoy them, Hogan replies:

"You're right I can skip it. However, if Bodi wasn't a blogger then someone else would be writing in his place. If that was the case I, and many others, would enjoy the site a whole lot more because we wouldnt have to skip content like we had to with the notorious "jasi-day"."

Well, Hogan (and others like him), I hate to break it to you, but "I, and many others, enjoy the site a whole lot more" with the addition of Bodi, than if they were to replace him with (yet) another day of some robot spouting off about comps and specs and 2900 rated players and who is playing for which nerd sponsor this week. You see, not all of us need to live vicariously through e-famous players to feel secure about our own position in a video game.

Then there are the people complaining about how Bodi's writing is "casualizing" WoM. The simple fact is that WoM is a business, just like WoW, and just like the Wal-Mart many of you work for. By virtue of this, it has to tap potential markets in an effort to grow, and the casual market just so happens to be the majority of people currently playing World of Warcraft, so it's a no-brainer move.

When I first started reading WoM over a year ago (perhaps a year and a half), I'm not going to lie, Ming annoyed the **** out of me - I truly believed that he was a complete retard. Like, what everyone thinks of Levidian right now, is equivalent to how I felt about Ming back in the day (before GameRiot).

I fell for the trolling and visited his site to read his articles just to see how utterly stupid he was being that day. It was like gawking at a Camry sandwiched between a semi and an electric pole on the side of the road - you just can't pull your eyes away. However, I became hip to his game, and over time I was able to watch in absolute amazement as he built WoM (and WoWRiot) into the powerhouse that it is today, and just when I thought the hokage was about to finally stumble (A.K.A. the Jasi End Times), he grew some balls, cleaned house and re-focused his efforts into further growing his site and business, and did so with dramatic results.

Those complaining about about the casualization of WoM are most likely the same people complaining about the casualization of WoW, and ignorantly do so without realizing that it is a necessary step. Yes, I know most of you don't have the first clue what type of responsibility is involved in shouldering a bottom line (much less balancing a checking account), but a business is like a living thing, it needs to grow, and most often takes the path of least resistance to do so (casuals).

Contrary to what you believe, World of Ming isn't here to serve each and every one of you, and bend to your every whim and request, it is a business feeding off of you and your page clicks - page clicks that you haters help generate by not only clicking on his blogs, but by making your mostly angry and generally controversial replies that keep you and others coming back again and again to respond to. So basically, by hating him in such an obsessive manner, you are doing nothing but supporting him and strengthening his position at WoM, because at the end of the day, Google Analytics is all that matters - not blogs, not bloggers, not comments, not what anyone thinks - just the numbers; and you all are just that, numbers.

The addition of Bodi as a casual/entertainer blogger was a phenomenally intelligent move no matter how you cut it, it's just that most people are too ******* stupid to understand it.

With that being said, and with there being no doubt about what role Bodi plays at WoM, I am amazed at how many people still heckle him for talking about his experiences in the game at the 2200 level.

As VoidKnight recently said in one comments section:

"I used to like your articles, they were something fresh and different. Now I have come to realise you really only talk about your own experiences (which seem to be only pvp) all the time. This would be ok if you actually played at a competitive level, but you don't."

How many "competitive level" writers does WoM now have? 3? 4? Really? Did you ever stop to think that not every single person that logs into WoM wants to read the same tired article over and over and over every single day about competitive play? Did you ever stop to think that perhaps there really isn't enough "news" out there to publish a "competitive level" blog on every day?

And furthermore, are you people who don't like Bodi or his articles (or Serennia's, or Anna's, Ming's, etc) absolutely incapable of seeing that he has posted one, not read it, and happily carry on with your day? If not, exactly what kind of mindset does someone have to have to read an article you KNOW you aren't going to like by a blogger you KNOW you don't like, for the sole purpose of ****ting all over them in the comments section?

Hogan's Mom: "Come up for dinner, my little love pumpkin, before it gets cold"

Hogan: "MOM, I'VE GOT A FULL BLOWN, FIVE ALARM INTERWEBS EMERGENCY HERE ON MY HANDS, BODI POSTED A BLOG AND I HAVE TO REPLY ANGRILY TO IT OR I WILL LOSE FAVOR AMONGST THE INTERWEBS ELITE AND MY LIFE WILL BE OVER".

/Hogan's mom closes the basement door

Does it make you feel like a better person? A better player? Does it give you a feeling of acceptance among the WoW elite to bash on the dirty, heathenous casual? Does it make you feel loved? Does it give your life some type of value? It must, you people are awfully (and frighteningly) persistent...

The bottom line is this, while I can't speak for Bodi (or any of the other bloggers out there), I can say that many of us are really only encouraged by the haters. You think your comments are "getting under our skin", but the truth is that we have already gotten under yours, anything you say beyond that does nothing but prove it.

Best of luck, see you in the comments section...

Xaeranth's Top 10 List Of The Gayest **** Currently In WoW.

Tue, 14 Jul 2009 12:21:16 -0400

And here it is! Everyone's favorite format, the Top 10 list! Let's begin...

1. Typhoon. First and foremost, you twatfaces shadowmelding at the LM and punting people off the cliff to their death need to get raped with an AIDS dick and have it wiped off in your hair afterwords.

2. Typhoon, again. For all of those times I have been alt tabbed in Sholozar basin on my flying mount, blissfully, and unassumingly pleasuring myself to some photoshopped Stephanie-from-Lazytown pr0n only to come back and have my afterglow harshed by the realization that some ****head dismounted me and plummeted me to my death.

3. Shadowmeld/Flight Form. There is nothing in the game that makes me want to step away from my computer blacken both of my wifes eyes out of sheer frustration like this absurd bull****. These pompous douchebags fly up to me while I am innocently herbing and moonfire me, prompting me to chase them from the Basin all the way to the ******* Howling Fjord in an attempt to kill them, just to have them shadowmeld and fly the **** off when I have finally run them out of mana.

4. Thunderstorm: see Typhoon (for BG's). This one is even more insulting because of how terrible the Shaman class is, and the people who play them are. At least when you get Typhooned to your death you know it's by someone with significant skills (confirmed by the simple fact that they chose the Druid icon at character creation).

5. Dismantle. Yes, I know that Rogues need survivability (Evasion x 2, Vanish x 2, 17 different stuns on different DR, Blind, CloS, etc., just isn't enough), but their Resto Druid partner DOES NOT. Nothing is gayer in WoW than when I am on my DK, firmly slapping my rigid member on the plump lips of some trashy Resto Druid who is trying desperately (in vain) to escape the clutches of my onslaught of faceroll-ness, and as I pinch one nipple while expecting to coup de gras the slippery little *****, I get Dismantled. "..." <- Yep, the triple Dot.

6. Demonic Circle in WSG. Ok, so through the Seduces, fears, Deathcoil and the endless Shadowfuries, I was able to actually get 3 hits on the Destro Lock holding the flag on the roof, so he jumps down. I, of course, can see the portal on the roof where I was fighting him, so do I: a) jump down like a retard and have him portal back up to safety, or b) just stand here at the portal like a retard while he doesn't portal back up, and gets to relative safety?

DECISIONS, DECISIONS!

7. Prot Warriors in the BG's. You gotta be ******* kidding me? Every BG I get into, out of the 9, 14 or 39 other people in the game, some ****head Prot Warrior always singles ME out, humping my leg the entire game and then jizzes Shockwave, Conc Blow and Revenge Stun all over my tits when I am about to kill something; something which inevitably gets the **** away while I am stunned.

8. Hungering Cold. AOE Blind on a one minute timer? Yes, Please. Totally fine when I skillfully use it to juice you while your partner is on ice. Not so ******* totally fine when some other dickhead uses it on me after I blew my trinket on something stupid. Even though I love this spell, I am still giving it a solid 8 on the Gay-o-Meter (note: for perspective, Levidian ranks a 9).

9. Ring of Valor. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I am totally over the whole "pet getting stuck on the pillar thing" and the whole "standing in the ******* fire is bad thing", but the whole "no static LoS thing" really burns my ass. Upon seeing they drew this arena Hunters, Destro Locks and Mage/Rogue teams must pop such a massive ******* boner that it shreds right through their fishnet stockings, knowing that they have a guaranteed win.

10. Double DPS 2's. I know, I know, you all think that double DPS takes "skill", but anyone who knows anything about arena understands that in that context, "skill" = "luck + RNG". No, I am sorry, you should not be rewarded points for being "luckier" than the other team. The Arena is a skill based system, let's keep it that way by removing the cancer that is double DPS.

That is all I have for today!

"The Customer Is (Not) Always Right" + "Game Experience May Change" = Shut The **** Up...

Wed, 08 Jul 2009 23:15:14 -0400

For those of you experienced, intelligent and worldly enough to understand that the ancient adage "The Customer is Always Right" no longer holds any type of water as it pertains to business to customer relationships, just +1 this blog and move along, there will be nothing shocking or eye opening for you here.

For you other folks - grab a pad and get a pencil, school is in session...

One of the most supremely frustrating arguments that I come across in my Xaeranth vs Wild-like adventures in the cesspool we like to call the World of Warcraft interwebs is from the folks who attempt to wield the word "customer" in Blizzard's direction as if it were supposed to make their opinion more valuable, and well...I am here to tell you that it isn't the truth. And not only that - you look ignorant doing so.

The issue here is that you aren't actually a customer in the traditional sense of the word, you are paying for a subscription to access virtual/intellectual property that they offer as an entertainment experience. You literally do not own your account, you literally do not own your character, and when WoW is over and done with, you literally have absolutely nothing to show for it but a couple of dusty, obsolete disks upon which you can place drinks as to not stain your moms basement furniture.

Given the nature of this relationship, trying to play the "customer" card with Blizzard is like trying to tell your favorite author that you demand answers as to why his last three books have been total **** (Hello, Chuck Palahniuk), and that he needs to listen to your input because you invest time and money into reading everything he writes. The truth is that the author has absolutely every right in the world to write ****ty books if he pleases, he just won't make any money doing so and will most likely lose his fan base- but the reality is that your input in completely irrelevant, no matter how much you think it is.

It's akin to subscribing to a Cable television package, which can often change its terms, channels and/or prices. When this happens, do you call your cable company and say "Hey, I am a customer! I demand that you conform your packages to my needs! I'M A CUSTOMER HERE! YOU MUST LISTEN TO ME! IF YOU DON'T, YOU'LL RUE THE DAY!"? No, you decide to either maintain the subscription or cancel it. Again, your input is completely irrelevant.

Sure, they can listen to you, but they are in no way obligated to listen to you because you pay them a monthly fee. Part of the issue that leads people to think they have this power is, simply put: the official forums. Aside from the fact that it is a total ****house, for some people, its very existence seems to validate their belief that Blizzard must listen to what is written there - or they wouldn't exist, right?. Wrong.

Another aspect of playing an MMO that people often (conveniently) overlook is the "Game experience may change" printed on every box, which serves as the developers "we can do whatever the **** we want, whenever the **** we want, so go choke on a fat sweaty **** over it" disclaimer. This means that content, classes, and gameplay are going to change, and that there will most likely be those who benefit from it, and those who don't.

In a nutshell, this means that every time you log into your character, there is no guarantee that its abilities, relative power and balance are going to be the same as when you left it. Yes, you've been warned, and pissing and moaning about things you have been warned about makes you...yep, you guess it: a total ****head. Let's look at a real word comparison:

The non "Game experience may change" world customer interaction:

Joe the Customer: "Hey there, I am looking for a toaster, can you recommend something?"

Ralph the Shady Toaster Sales Guy: "Sure, this toaster here is the Orgasmo-Toast 5000. With just under 270 horsepower under the hood, it will toast your bread to 27 different shades of brown in under 10 seconds!"

Joe the Customer: "Wow, that sounds terrific! I'll take one!"

The "Game Experience May Change" world customer interaction:

Joe the Customer: "Hey there, I am looking for a toaster, can you recommend something?"

Ralph the Shady Toaster Sales Guy: "Sure, this toaster here is the Orgasmo-Toast 5000. With just under 270 horsepower under the hood, it will toast your bread to 27 different shades of brown in under 10 seconds!"

Joe the Customer: "Wow, that sounds terrific! I'll take one!"

Ralph the Shady Toaster Sales Guy: "Woah, woah, woah! Not so fast, there hombre, there is a little something you need to know about this toaster before you go storming off with it!"

Joe the Customer: "Uhh, ok. Such as...?"

Ralph the Shady Toaster Sales Guy: "Well, first of all, you might get this toaster home today and plug it in and everything seems fine, but tomorrow you might wake up ready to make some delicious toasty goodness and find out that your toaster doesn't make toast anymore, but it has instead become...A BLENDER!"

Joe the Customer: "Well, Ralph, I'm gonna be honest, I don't really want a blende-"

Ralph the Shady Toaster Sales Guy: "Ya, well...you'd be lucky if you only got a blender! I heard of one guys toaster turning into a Brita Filter! Haha, oh man, that thing pissed out some tasty filtered water for him until a year later when it turned itself into an air conditioner"

Joe the Customer: "An air conditioner?"

Ralph the Shady Toaster Sales Guy: "Yep, was too bad - he lived in Alaska, he didn't get much use out of it after that"

Joe the Customer: "So then, why the hell should I throw my time and money at this toaster?"

Ralph the Shady Toaster Sales Guy: "Because it's the chance you gotta take for the potential to have some mighty fine toast!"

This is essentially the way that World of Warcraft (and most MMO's) work, it's one big gamble. One day your Death Knight is completely underpowered and at 0% representation on SK-100, and the next day you are an unstoppable killing machine facerolling your way to a pimp Gladiator mount - all brought to you by your local neighborhood "Game Experience May Change".

Shadow Priests, Retribution Pallies, And Everyone Else Who Should Shut The **** Up...

Tue, 30 Jun 2009 14:14:33 -0400

This Blog is dedicated to Retribution Paladin Vir.

If one were to judge solely by reading the DPS forums lately, they might assume there are only 2 specs of 2 classes left playing this game: Retribution Paladins and Shadow Priests.

The irony of the Retribution "QQ" is that since the patch before WOTLK shipped, they basically became Gods in this game. Easy to play, and easy to beat just about every other class in the game. But this isn't enough - they cry for a gap closer, they cry for a snare, they cry for an MS, all the while not giving two ****s about the big picture which is that the former two will do nothing but fan the flames of melee domination, and the latter is something that: a) they don't NEED, and b) the Devs have already stated they don't really want to do (for any classes).

What these players fail to realize is that every class NEEDS to have a weakness. At the beginning of WOTLK when Death Knights had almost zero weaknesses (*cough* I mean less than they have now *cough*), the CM's were on 24/7 sandbag duty to reinforce the levees because the tears were about to overflow the DPS and PVP forums and wipe out the villages below, yet it is "ok" for Ret to lobby to be in the same place? Weakness-less?

One of my favorite claims by Ret Pallies while lobbying for buffs is that they "have no utility", and therefore need some. Now, I am no pro gamer as I normally reside in the 1900's with all the other bads, but running Disc/Ret, I get to see some amazing utility from my partner. Getting HoF'd out of Kidney, getting BoP'd out of blinds and away from those pesky 2v2 cleave comps, continually sacred shielded + art of war proc FoL's, getting Flame Shocks, Immolates and Fears cleansed while still placing decent pressure on his target?

Without the trademark Pally reply of "well, BESIDES THAT we have no utility" (I think they teach this kind of bull**** reasoning in a secret cutscene Ret Pally tutorial somewhere between character creation and the opening scene after you hit "enter world"), I would love to hear exactly how this "no utility"?

My partner and I are painfully average PVP'ers, but he is a "good" Ret Pally in that he understands that his class is retarded. Just last night I ****** up and got blowed up by a retarded comp (Boomkin/Mut Rogue) because I LoS'd him for a heal and the other team punished me for it early on in the game. When I died, both of the other players were at 90%-ish. My partner swooped down from the pillar in BEM and and "accidentally" killed the Rogue just by looking at him (he died in about 4 seconds) and then as if he was wielding a 232.5 DPS biscuit, mopped up the Boomkin like he was grandmas hearty +14 rating point beef gravy.

When I said to him "Holy ****, amazing job saving that one", he replied, "it's not me man, had I been any other class we would not have won that game", an answer which I can respect and understand.

Regarding the MS debuff, I hear from many Retribution Paladins that they struggle to kill healers, which is why they need one. Well *NEWS FLASH* pretty much everyone struggles to kill healers these days (and more so in the days to come) even CLASSES WITH MS, you guys are no different.

My answer to this is simple: get some gear and learn to hit your 4 buttons harder. Again, I am not amazing by any means, but I can tank 95% of the Ret Pallies out there (read: the ones complaining) because they are either bad or undergeared. So their solution is to ask for an MS debuff to cover their shortcomings? I guess all-in-all, that is the easiest route, huh?

But onto the OTHER 5%, these mother******* scare me with their straight gangster mack-ness. With 25k health and 1030 resilience (yes, the resilience is overkill, I know), all a WELL PLAYED and WELL GEARED Ret Pally has to do is swing away until he gets some Skill/RNG to place decent pressure on me, pop wings, HoJ and its pretty much over. I was taken from 65% health instantly to spectator mode last night in Pain suppression up by a winged Pally (yes, I fully understand how wings works against Pain Suppression, so I will save all you angry comment-mongers the trouble of noting this).

On to the Shadow Priests, a section that will be much, much shorter than my Ret tirade. Guys, I totally sympathize with you and as I have previously stated in other blogs, I still can't fully understand how the **** you can log into such a "not very good" class every day, but really - lay the **** off the forums.

But in the best interests of everyone who frequents the DPS forums for the sake of intelligent, mature and unbiased discussion, please just know that the devs have heard you, yes they know your issues - but pissing and moaning and flaming GC, who you KNOW is only going to give you a ****ty, sarcastic answer, which is only going to give you more fodder to **** all over him for is not doing anything productive. At this point if I were him, I would intentionally let you all rot in the cold, dark hell of unviable-ness just for being such whining ******* douchebags.

To those of you who just take your punches and roll with it (and enjoy your class) without being part of the aforementioned, grats - Uncle Xaeranth respects and loves you.

Does Lore Still Have A Place in World of Warcraft?

Mon, 22 Jun 2009 21:07:04 -0400

While reading this thread today, something happened to me that rarely, if ever, happens - I became confused about my own opinion. Keeping in mind that this thread was more likely a troll than a serious query, he poses an interesting question:

"I keep seeing the "Lore" justification being touted as a reason why some classes can't use certain weapons and why some races can't be certain classes. On the other hand, we already see violations of the lore ingame: there is at least 1 Shaman dual-wielding swords that I know of [Drek'thar, shown right], and there is a Human Shaman in the game as well. "

Naturally, my first reaction to this was that this game is based on a universe that has a lengthy and highly celebrated lineage, why the hell should they go bastardizing their franchise just because some douchebag wants to be an Undead Druid?

But then I thought about it - honestly, what the hell would be so terrible about opening up all classes to all races? Sure, it would feel highly unnatural to see Blood Elf Shamans and Gnome Priests running around Azeroth (only because we are unaccustomed to it), but would it really have any type of quantifiable impact on the game?

Irrationally, part of me feels like it would be another in a long line of Blizzard sell-outs, but would they really benefit from it? Would it draw subscribers? Would it be enough to keep people playing? Would it somehow make the game easier to balance? On all accounts, no, I don't think so. So it really isn't "selling out", is it?

Would it be homogenization? Another check in the "no" column for me, if anything it would open up more diversity than we currently have with everyone the same a la every Horde Druid being Tauren and every Alliance one being Night Elf.

So it comes down to Lore, but what percentage of the player base is actually aware of, or even appreciates, any of the Lore in this game? Hell, as someone who has played this game since Beta and has one of every class at least level 70, I had to Google the sword wielding Shaman referenced in the original post. Boy, was I shocked to see that it turns out to be the guy I have literally spent hundreds of hours Death Gripping overeager Allies to their instant death to in AV.

And in terms of lore, if blue spacemen can crash their highly advanced spaceship into Azeroth, don't you think that if a Gnome really wanted to, he could learn to heal? Because after all, it is just a game, right? Or as Drusis from Gorgonnosh put it, it all boils down to:

"Your Spell#348 hits Polygon201885 for 1828 points of type C damage."

In terms of race/class restrictions as they pertain to weapons, I personally feel that it is silly not to let Shamans be able to use swords. In GC's own words:

Kind of weird? Really? Is this how decisions are made at Blizzard?

After much thought, my gut tells me to stick to my previous opinion which is no more articulate, intelligent, or rational than that things should stay the way they are "because they should", but I am certainly open to arguments if you have them.

/shrug

As The World (Of Ming) Turns, Part II

Mon, 22 Jun 2009 10:51:29 -0400

The two men stood in the doorway in complete silence for almost a full minute before the man on the right slowly lowered his hood to first expose his long dreads, then a bone horizontally grown "pygmy style" into the cartilage of his nose, followed by a right eye grotesquely whited out with blindness.

Unveiled next was a disfiguring scar that pilgrimaged from the top of his right temple, around the corner of his mouth, to just under his chin. Lastly, with a sinister grin he punctuated his bad mother******-ness with a 24 carat gold smile. The man who stood prominently before them like a ying-yang twin of certain death was none other than Kanelol, the legendary Rastafari assassin, presumed long dead.

When he finally spoke, he asked "aye be loookin' fer dee man day call Meeeng, which wan of you be heeee?", in a deliberately slow Jamaican drawl; he eye****** the crowd like a hungry lion would a pack of sickly gazelles.

Anna instantly pointed at Ming.

Bodi instantly pointed at Ming.

Ming instantly pointed at Affix.

Affix instantly began to cry.

The man was slowly, and menacingly, walking up to face Ming when Anna suddenly leaped in front of him and struck her best defensive karate pose - if Kane had any intentions of harming a single hair on Mings fobby, soup bowl haircutted head, he was going to have to go through her first.

Behind the bar, Bodi deftly replaced his Neo Glasses with his Morpheus ones and cautioned her "I won't lie to you, Anna. Every single man or woman who has stood their ground, everyone who has fought an Agent has died. But where they have failed, you will succeed."

With the confidence of Bodi's encouragement pulsing through her loins, she winked and nodded first at Ming, then at Bodi, then faced the intruder - it was business time - you know how I know, baby? Because it's Wednesday.

With her lips pressed firmly together and nostrils flaring, she breathed in deeply. When she opened her mouth, she unleashed an impossibly thundering Gandolf-banishing-the-Balrog-ish "YOUUUUUU SHALLLL NOTTTTT PAS-", and was quickly shut the **** up by a blindingly fast straight right punch to the face from him which viciously snapped her head back and cleanly knocked her out; her nothing but skin-and-bones-and-clothes body crumpled to the floor without so much as a whimper.

Kane turned to Bodi to assess whether or not he, too, was going to unsuccessfully attempt to defend his boss, but Bodi only swiftly (and sloppily) guzzled the remainder of his Apple Martini and wiped his mouth off with the sleeve of his trenchcoat. He then proceeded to nervously whistle while looking innocently around the room, point at Ming and then shrug as if he had never met him.

Facing Ming, Kane hissed "I happeeen to be in da employ of a reech and powerfool man, who joo seem to have the unfoortunate luck to cross", which bountifully showered Ming's face with an extravagant 4th of July style display of spittle, and assaulted his nose with a hot blast of ganja-thick breath.

Hearing this, Ming's stomach dropped and his thoughts immediately turned to Estele. Once beautiful Estele, whom Ming stole away from her brutal captors in a rundown Tijuana tranny brothel. Once beautiful Estele, whom Ming had roofied and made sweet, sweet, passionate love to. Once beautiful Estele whom Ming currently had chained up in his baseme- "Vere sheee bee? Meeng? Tell us and we will make your death quieek and peenless", he said as he flitted his cane-sword to Ming's neck in a flash.

Ming swallowed hard, and a sad, harsh realization set in on him - he would never get to see the end of his beloved Naruto Shippuden series.

In an effort to Protect their "investment", Vir, TheReaper and Slapnuts sprang into action and attempted to rush down Kane to save Ming, which prompted the entire bar to explode into an *******-and-elbows knock down, drag out brawl.

As if on cue, DJ Puddels spun some vinyl that was appropriate for the occasion:

"...shortie had them apple bottom jeans (jeans)
boots with the fur (with the fur)
the whole club was lookin at her..."

Ming struggled with Kane, Anna struggled to remember where she was, Bodi struggled with the top to the ******* stubborn-ass Apple Martini mix bottle behind the bar, Windrunner and Smokeee struggled to escape the vile clutches of their Hambeasts (which seemingly, and violently, went into heat due to all of the excitement), Vir struggled with his sexuality...

"...them baggy sweat pants
And the Reeboks with the straps [With the straps]
She turned around and gave that big booty a smack..."

Affix soulgazed into Levidians eyes and said "Levi, I dont wanna die a virgin...", his voice trailing weakly off on the word "virgin" as if we all didn't already know. Levidian met his gaze as he palmed the dice and replied "I'm gonna trow dis d20 and critical strike tap dat ass in da mens room, gurl!", and through the chaos, smoke, broken glass and flying bar furniture they frolicked off to the mens room - hand in hand.

"...She hit the flo [She hit the flo]
Next thing you know
Shawty got low low low low low low low low..."

Suddenly, the two closest windows to Ming and the skylight above him burst alive as fine shards of glass danced amongst the flashing lights and orgy of tangled, thrashing bodies, en route to their final resting place on the ground around him. People panicked and were in the process of scattering as the first *POW* second *POW* third *POW* flashbangs hit the ground.

If anyone hadn't been blinded by the devices, they would have bore witness to a stunning sight - one that most don't live to tell the tale of: three ninja's gracefully spilling through the two broken windows and skylight like night-black liquid death, and then materializing on the floor of the bar room in perfect silence.

Kane rubbed his eyes as they un-flashbanged themselves and he became frighteningly aware of a final fatal truth; that he was face to face with the greatest Ninja ever to don the black Ninja garb - Master Neilyo.

Without hesitation, Master Neilyo spewed green smoke from his mouth into Kane's face which caused the giant man to squeal in pain, claw at his eyes and begin to froth at the mouth. Another of the Ninjas, Buddhist, deftly drew a sword through the stomach of Kanes assistant and pushed his now innard-leaking, quivering body to the floor. The third ninja, Shindo, pulled a black sack over Mings head, tossed a smoke grenade, and just like that *POOF* - they were all instantly gone, including Ming.

On the floor, long marinating in a puddle of his own sauce that poured from previously fatal wounds which had somehow impossibly healed themselves, GibTehStix began to stir...

Faintly from the mens bathroom was the distinct sound of skin slapping skin and Affix screaming "OH LEVI, ANAL ME!"...

From behind the bar there was the sound of empty bottles clanging together and Bodi's drunk bellowing voice singing "Blame it on the ah-ah-ah-alcohol, blame it on the ah-ah-ah-alcohol...", and then he passed out.

And through the door, suspiciously long before the authorities could ever have been notified and had time to respond, walked FBI agents ARCTURUS and Klynx, determined to get to the bottom of this ******* mess...

Patch 3.2: Lack Of Satire Fodder Makes Xaeranth A Sad Panda!

Fri, 19 Jun 2009 15:42:51 -0400

With the details of Patch 3.2 being recently released, I was working under the assumption that I would have a surplus of "Satire Fodder" to work with today for some good laughs, but boy was I wrong. So in place of a funny blog, you get a ****ty super serious one.

In a certain kind of "careful what you wish for" way, I am a little apprehensive about the resilience changes as a way to curb stomp the games current burst issues. I mean, don't get me wrong, I can't wait for the change so I can play ******* Godzilla in the BG's with my 1100 Resilience Disc Priest, but this is a major change to the game and I don't think that anyone can fully guesstimate the overall effects this will have on PVP.

Let's get this started:

- The Resilience change will finally force the traditionally Resilience-less classes to forgo more offensive stats (which will become less advantageous with this change) in favor of survivability.

- The absurd increase to healer survivability will cause the Mana War style of gameplay to allow Drain style teams to become more prominent, adding more depth to the comps you will see in 3's and 5's.

- Forcing everyone out of the 2v2 bracket will cause us to see a larger variety of teams in 3's and more teams overall in 5's.

- The Resilience change will also be the final nail in the coffin to Double DPS teams in 2's, not that it really matters anymore.

- The returning style of Mana War gameplay, the change to Barkskin dispel resistance, and new found reliance on 3's and 5's for rating will easily bump Priests into the #1 healing spot for arena teams.

- HOPEFULLY now that Blizzard only has to concern themselves with balancing 3's and 5's we can see them take steps to work some of the traditionally lacking classes and specs into the gray-ish area of "viability".

Overall, I am happy (yet apprehensive) about the changes and am excited for 3.2, and I think you should be, too : )

On a completely unrelated note, I wanted to thank everyone for their support of "As The World (Of Ming) Turns, Part 1". As I have said before, I never really know what to expect after I hit the Publish button and was pleasantly surprised to see the feedback from it and to receive many PM's about it.

Today is the last full day of my Vacation here in North Carolina, and I will be traveling tomorrow, so I hope to have the next installment completed by Tuesday for maintenance/restarts.

As The World (of Ming) Turns, Part I

Thu, 18 Jun 2009 17:52:00 -0400

Top 10 Random Things You Need To Avoid On The Official Forums!

Thu, 18 Jun 2009 10:21:07 -0400

Developers Design Structure: All That Is Wrong With WoW?

Wed, 17 Jun 2009 12:45:45 -0400

I'm not even going to lie - I have no idea how to design a video game, but a few recent quotes from GC regarding how Blizzard's design team is structured to do so has me scratching my head:

Ghostcrawler Weighs In On The State of PVP...

Tue, 16 Jun 2009 20:31:04 -0400

Taken straight from the horses ass:

TL;DR: The BG's Are Fine!

Tue, 16 Jun 2009 09:30:08 -0400

Because I am such a dedicated WoWRiot Blogger, I am blogging to you while on vacation in the bustling metropolis of Charlotte, NC. With little else to do while visiting the in-laws (/twirls finger in the air and whistles), I have taken the liberty of TL;DR'ing this relatively lengthy blog right in the title for those of you with attention spans that are calculated in nanoseconds, so you can just it and move the **** along.

And those of you who continually piss and moan about the repetitive nature of my satirical and heavily sarcasm laden blogs better mop up every god damned word of this uncharacteristically super cereal blog like a delectable plate of prose biscuits and orgasm inducing literary gravy - and grits, whatever the **** that **** even is.

So here we go!

*raises hand*

“Hello, my name is Xaeranth, and I am a recovering Battleground Loudmouth”

Yes, I have no doubt that every single one of you has encountered “that guy” at some point – and many of you might actually still be one of “him”. You know, the guy that is always telling everyone how terrible they are, USUALLY IN CAPS, in BG chat the entire game as if he was the only one who knows how to play?

Now, I have no doubt that many of you right this very moment are scratching your heads in confused unison and asking “But Xaeranth, don’t the ‘terribles’ deserve to be berated, belittled and otherwise verbally beat-the-****-down by us elite players? And if so, what caused you to ‘get on the wagon’”, so to speak.

Well, the answer is quite evident if you pinpoint the impetus behind people going into the BG’s in the first place:

1) They need honor for gear.

2) They enjoy them, whether it be simply because they actually have fun in the BG’s or whether they are overgeared and get their rocks off running around facerolling terribles and Mr. Green-Machine Arrow-Turner’s.

3) They are bored.

Not so shockingly, “the level of competition” is nowhere to be seen on the list.

The harsh reality is that when in the BG’s, everyone is going to get their moneys worth in their own way – just like when purchasing the services of a prostitute, most people assume that everyone hires them for *******s and/or sex, but never stop to think that some people (*cough* Vir *cough*) pay just to get pissed all over in the shower.

So I asked myself, “why am I wasting my time in the BG’s (trying to 'motivate' people by) calling them terrible solely because they don’t subscribe to my own specific vision for how they should conduct themselves in a BG (and probably not to my blog either, /sadface)?”

Yeah, it sounds pretty ignorant when it gets put like that, huh?

Things people pay for the right to do in the BG’s:

1) AFK (because they find BG’s a frustrating and boring mess which is a necessary evil they only perform for gear)

2) Fight in the middle of WSG (because they and their friends are group queuing and just want to run around and “have some fun” whether they win the game or not.)

3) Not defend a node they just capped in AB (because their idea of fun doesn’t consist of standing at an unassaulted farm for 28 minutes.

4) Cap snowfall (as Horde - because they want an AV that is a throwback to the old days of massive turtles and epic battles for SP GY.)

What most people can’t wrap the shriveled gray matter in their haphazardly deformed coconuts around is that this does not make anyone “terrible”, or “bad”. Sure it makes them complete dickheads (depending on your perspective), but it has absolutely nothing to do with their mastery of the game. And World of Warcraft is just a game afterall, isnt it? So why are people getting their panties in such an epic ******* wad about it?

My friends and myself are guilty as charged; most nights we group queue with a Disc Priest, Resto Druid, Ret Pally and Unholy DK, and while just the four of us can easily sway the outcome of most games – some games we just want to **** off and have some “fun”, so **** you, **** your big mouth, **** your couch, and **** your BROKE ASS CAPSLOCK KEY right in their perspective cinnamon rings.

Now at this point, you are undoubtedly asking yourself “Ok brah, what the **** is your point?”, and there are a few simple answers to this question:

1) If you are “that guy” in the BG’s yelling at everyone – SHUT THE **** UP.

2) The BG’s aren’t an inherently competitive environment because many people who queue for them never had any intention of winning right from the get-go.

3) The fact that BG’s aren’t a competitive atmosphere means that the gear that is rewarded from it should be comensurate with the average level of effort that someone needs to place into being on the winning team (a.k.a. the current reward system is fine, possibly even generous).

4) We don’t really need more BG’s since every BG going forward is going to be a fetal alcohol syndrome crack baby combination of existing BG’s forcing us to do the same **** that we are already doing over and over.

To those of you that just balked at (read: nerdraged over) the “BG’s aren’t an inherently competitive environment” part, in light of what I have just laid out for you, you can’t possibly, in good non-downs conscience, argue the opposite – because you know it’s true.

What type of competitive environment would the NBA be if players were allowed to “just have some fun” and see how many 3-pointers they could land (or miss?) every game, or had to go AFK because their mom needed them to take the trash out in the middle of a game, or were allowed to do other **** that just was not condusive to their team winning?

Or if in Football, the QB wanted to “just have some fun” and run that elongated pigskin thing they carry every time they are at bat , even if it meant he was going to singlehandedly lose the game for his team while doing so? Should these players be rewarded with millions of dollars a year for their contribution (i.e. PVP Gear)? Would the team that benefitted from these types of shenanigens from the opposing team really "deserve" the win? No? I didn't think so.

The only way for Blizzard to make BG’s a competitive environment worthy of the rewards that many players long for from them, is to ensure that every single player which steps into said BG are actually there to win; we have a little word for these in WoW – Premades.

Rated BG’s have been on the wish list of many people - BG’ers and Arena Motorheads alike – for a very long time, and while this subject is large enough to easily be a blog (that nobody would read) entirely unto itself, the short of it is that the only way it can possibly be done intelligently is for it to be open to premades only. This means that those of you pining for rated pug BG’s can give it up now, it is a terrible idea (and you know it) – mostly because giving people incredible incentive to do things that are in the best interest of the game (when done sparingly), will have the opposite effect when everyone is doing nothing but trying to beat everyone else to it, thus making the BG’s less of a team effort than they currently are (if that is even possible).

Many of you argue that the focus of balancing should not be on the arena, but instead on the battlegrounds since more players participate in the BG's than do in the Arena. The flaw in this argument is simple: how on earth do you balance around an environment where the battles range from 40v40 to 15v15 to 1v3 to 1v5 to 4v10 to 3v6, to where people can be insta-gibbed thrown or blown off ledges, to where winning can be measured by the “skill” someone displays by clicking on a flag (WSG/AB) or the "skill" of standing in the right spot potentially not even fighting a single other player to capture a node (EOTS), to a more PVE-ish oriented environment such as AV? The answer is that there simply is no good way.

And no, I am not here to argue that the Arena is the pinnacle of a fertile breeding ground for balance, but I do feel that it is a more tightly controlled environment with less “non-PVP variables” (flags, nodes, etc) which makes it better suited for balance as it pertains to class versus class (or multiple classes versus other multiple classes) combat – but not necessarily a “good” gauge for balancing PVP.

In conclusion, the BG’s are fine as they are – people just need to understand that by queuing for them you are agreeing to step into the seedy underbelly of the game where balance, skill and teamwork are often thrown out the window for the sake of some stupid bull****, like let's say..."fun", as if this were some type of ******* video game or something. Where the games shouldn’t be rated and the entire game shouldn’t be balanced around it. Games where the QB pays for the option to run the ball every down, players have the right to miss 3 pointers all game if they so ******* please – and the Vir's of the world can be pissed all over in the shower by some HIV-riddled Tranny hooker to their hearts content.

All in all, don’t take it so ******* seriously and don’t try to make them what they aren’t – just relax and have a little fun.

World of Warcraft: No Longer A Home For Casuals?

Fri, 12 Jun 2009 11:45:40 -0400

I don't think it's hard to see with each passing day that the World of Warcraft is becoming a harsher and harsher landscape for the casual player, all of whom are being dealt a severe blow from the announced changes contained in the next major upcoming patch.

As I reported yesterday, Blizzard has decided once again to cater to the hardcore crowd by allowing those who have the time to farm 5g before hitting level 20 to be able to purchase and use a ground mount. This change will inevitably alienate the casual players who most likely will not be able to meet the harsh demands of this newly introduced gold sink, and who will now tragically fall behind the leveling curve of the newly mounted "elite" players, drawing a larger distinction between the "have's" and the "have not's" in the land of Azeroth.

In their infinite wisdom, Blizzard has also decided to construct a new zeppelin tower to transport players between Thunder Bluff and Ogrimmar. This is another obvious boon to the hardcores since the stinking casuals can now relegate themselves to using their beloved Bat Rider with which they don't have to place any effort into whimsically flying from one location to the next, while the hardcores can differentiate themselves by choosing to actually work (read: wait) for their transportation like real men.

The upcoming highly unnecessary Ulduar buffs are also another kick to the teeth of casuals everywhere struggling to muddle their way through Blizzards most difficult PVE challenge to date:

Yes, you read that correctly, with the time between Gravity Lapse and Searing Light casts being reduced, this encounter is going to become nothing more than an epicly cockblock-ish guild breaker-upper along the same lines of Kil'Jaedan and Attumen the Huntsmen.

Along with these changes, it seems that Blizzard is also investing a great deal of development time and effort into implementing highly frivolous things such as the Mountain Dew Battle Bots and updated Druid Skins that only appeal to the hardcore players since the casuals just want to log in and not be bothered while doing nothing but being terrible in the battlegrounds.

As the casual subscriptions begin to dwindle due to the ongoing gentrification of WoW, will Blizzard continue down this path? Or will it change course and chance driving our beloved game into the ground just to appease them? Only time will tell...

Upcoming Mount Change: Blizzard Answers All Of Our Prayers...

Thu, 11 Jun 2009 12:14:34 -0400

For those of you not in the ******* loop this week, Blizzard has finally released big plans to answer all of our prayers in one fantastic fell swoop:

"In the next major content patch, we intend to adjust mount requirements to further improve the leveling experience in World of Warcraft. In addition, cast times for summoning all mounts will be reduced to 1.5 seconds, down from 3 seconds"

Really, Blizzard? REALLY?

I am currently (and hesitantly) leveling a Warlock and I want to be the first to congratulate you on hitting the NAIL RIGHT ON THE ******* HEAD! I'M SOLD! The whole time I am begrudgingly killing mobs (for the umpteenth-million time) on my way to 80, I am asking myself, "Hey, do you know what would REALLY improve my ******* leveling experience...?"

AND OH NO-NO, don't you even think for a second the answers are that when I finally get to 80, I can look forward to seeing that you:

1) Fixed your ******* lopsided-ass-starting battlegrounds and your broke ass SoTA with Allies getting the ******* advantage every game (and I swear to God if any of you ******* downs cases try to argue that Allies DON'T have the advantage by starting on offense, I will come to your house, kill your family and rape their corpses in front of you).

2) Smoothed out some balance issues which would otherwise have led me to be repeatedly brutally pounded in the ass all prison-style by Rogues, Warriors and Ret Pallies for months while trying to farm the required 900 resilience needed to die .4 seconds slower to them than when I started in greens.

3) Worked to fix people dying in a few GCD's in the arena because BURST IS TOO GOD DAMN HIGH regardless of how you ******* feel about it.

4) Have dealt with ridiculous balance bull**** like the current state of Innervate (+Barkskin), UA stacking with MS, and Frost DK's with the Ulduar Sigil...

5) Resolved any of the many issues with your buggy-ass arena maps (LOL RING OF VALOR).

6) Made an attempt to balance the disparity between the top of the pack in PVE DPS and those languishing at the bottom.

Nope, that's not what I am thinking at all, I'm thinking "Damn, I would carve the left nut out of my own sack with a rusty spoon and shove it directly up my own ass with no lube for a mount at level 20 AS LONG AS SOMEONE WOULD PLEASE DO SOMETHING ABOUT ITS TOTALLY BULL**** ******* CAST TIME"

Yep, I'm sure that's what we all are thinking.

Fail Musical Blog Is Fail Musical Blog: Who Will Be The First To Make The "Jasi" Joke?

Wed, 10 Jun 2009 13:25:05 -0400

Today I am going to venture out on a limb to take a slightly different approach to my blog; I am going to put up some music for your listening enjoyment. I want to preface my comments by acknowledging that my tastes are probably a little different than many of yours even though I enjoy just about everything from folk to rap to metal - but here is what I have found myself listening to the most lately.

A quick side note: I enjoy live performances more than studio versions of songs. Unfortunately, sometimes the acoustics and recordings are terrible, so I chose as many as I could.

I have been on a folk kick lately, so that is where the first two come from. The first one I only found out about when I picked up a copy of their album "Swell Season", by in general (even though I do enjoy some screamo bands such as "Haste The Day"), I do love their awesome cover of the Big Tymers "Still Fly":

Well, you're in luck! I am running late for work so I am going to cut it short here. Please feel free to link artist/music that is similar for me (and others) to check out, or send it via PM, I am always on the lookout for new music!

The Vindication Apocalypse And You: What You Need To Know To Survive...

Tue, 09 Jun 2009 13:28:46 -0400

I stand here today as the last line of defense for Retribution Paladins everywhere against the relentless onslaught of unfair and prejudiced hotfixes they continue to receive, which have now placed them at the very top of the "most nerfed classes in the history of WoW" list.

The backbone of the argument is simple: Vindication barely had any impact on PVP in the first place because it's not like it "removed" health or actually did any damage; after it is applied, the target is still at 100% health.

Now, many people try to make the argument that it proc's on "damaging attacks", which means it doesn't even necessarily require the use of a GCD (in the case of auto-attacks) - and that this is what makes it OP. What these degenerates fail to realize is that the ability was designed this way because Ret already has a tight enough rotation GCD-wise without adding another one to it(remember how they removed exorcism from use on players because it made their rotation unmanageable?).

The developers seem to think that the Vindication talent was condusive to burst, but I say "nay". I would love for one of them to explain exactly how an ability that does absolutely zero damage has anything at all to do with burst? Sounds to me like you are slinging more of your strawman arguments, GC, and I'm here to tell you that I'm watching you.

Some people also try to claim that health pools in WOTLK are already too low and that Vindication does nothing but exacerbate the situation. My rebuttal is that Vindication can only be applied to one target at a time, so please stop trying to make it the scapegaot for PVP gear universally not having enough stam. In my not-so-humble opinion, the right move was to add stam to all of the gear in the game instead of nerfing Vindication, but Blizzard is too lazy (color me shocked).

Many people don't even understand that the drawback of Vindication is that when the target is afflicted with it, we can't even use Hammer of Wrath until they are at 15% of their original non-vindicated health. Yes, you read that correctly - Vindication actually forces us to do 5% more damage to the target before we can "Hammer of GG" it. Essentially, this change to Vindication is a BUFF to our ability to kill someone because HoW will light up at a higher hitpoint threshold.

More than anything, this hotfix is nothing more than another in a long line of nerfs aimed at Retribution Paladins based on nothing more than public outcry and "QQ" from terrible players who don't understand how this painfully benign ability works and/or are too dumb to counter it in the first place.

As compensation for this atrocious nerf, my clients (the Ret Pally Community) demand:

- A "gap closer"

- An MS effect

- A Pummel

- A box of tissues

And then we will finally be even...

A Blog About Blogs, Blogging, Bloggers And Bloggees......

Tue, 09 Jun 2009 11:30:00 -0400

So you all should be happy - you fickle mother******* finally broke me down.

My previous blog was the last straw; the one to push me over the edge.

At no other point in my life have I actually written for an audience (besides unhealthy amounts of forum trolling), so the concept of it is entirely foreign to me. As such, I have come to you, my audience, for a few honest answers.

I don't think I can stress enough how absolutely bewildered I am about my last blog, due to the simple fact that I only hit the "Publish" button out of sheer frustration as I felt the material lacked a "defined direction or purpose" and felt the humor was too simple and "elementary".

But I had it written, so I submitted it with an apathy fueled "meh, what the **** ever" (as the attention to my site has recently been waning) as I was on my way out the door for work, and was absolutely certain that I was going to return home to another embarrassing 6 likes and a depressing littany of "ur ******* terrible"'s and "Go kill urself"'s from the usual suspects in the comments section.

After making several blogs in the last few weeks that I had placed a TON of time and effort into and was sure were going to be popular - that totally ******* bombed - todays, which I had zero attachment to, and very little effort placed into (all in all, 15 minutes max), was one of the more popular ones I have ever posted.

/boggle

So this got me to thinking - given the evidence, I clearly don't have the slightest ******* clue what WoWRiot readers are looking for in a blog, or even what the **** I am doing for that matter. Yes, I know some people only log in to act like gigantic twatbags in the comments section, but the rest? I just don't know...

I also realized that I have no clue how to gauge how successful a blog is, mostly because many people who visit the blog, even if saying "good blog" - don't + 1 it. How do I know this? Well, because I can be at 7 likes, check in two hours later, see 3 positive comments, yet still be at 7 likes. Now don't get me wrong, I am not here lobbying for likes, but it really is the only tool some of us have to gauge what type of material is "popular" and what isn't - and giving a little credit might be enough to get more people writing higher quality blogs.

The truth is, I can't offer you the type of information that Serennia can on game mechanics and not being able to pay electric bills; I can't offer you the fascinating and glamorous half-truths about playing top teams that Ming can; And I honestly don't think that I can compete with Bodi's level of seasoned writing (god damnit, someone gimme some dirt on this guy so he doesn't continue to go unscathed), so really, I am here picking up the scraps.

I want to continue to write here at WoWRiot (yeah, bad news for my anti-fans), and I want people to be entertained by that writing, or it's all for naught. Ultimately, I am here today to find out what I can do to make my articles more appealing to my readers. So please, if you have the time, opportunity and/or inclination to drop a comment with some feedback (or the usual death threats and requests to sign man-boobs or mousepads), or to PM me through WoWRiot - I would eternally be in your debt, not only for helping me put out higher quality blogs, but also for helping me grow as a blogger and writer in general.

And you! Yes, I am looking at you sitting there all smug Mr. Silent Majority - I know you are there because I get PM's and ingame tells from you, I implore you to get involved in the community and support the content you like whether it be mine or anyone elses (except Bodi's...and Levidian's).

(Note: I do not make any money from my blogging, nor do I seek any. This post is not a QQ about likes, comments, WoWRiot or anything else - it is just an honest to God, shoot-from-the-hip query to the readers in an ongoing effort to be better at what I do)

My Super Important, Super Informative MLG Blog...

Mon, 08 Jun 2009 12:15:21 -0400

I'm going to be honest, I didn't watch a single second of the MLG happenings, but while digging through the forums I have come across a treasure trove of credible information regarding them. Armed with this potent knowledge, I will do my best to jump on the MLG-blog bandwagon as part of my ongoing effort to keep my readers and legion of subscribers highly informed.

First, I want to define a few key terms I have learned in my reading for those of you that don't habla:

- Gives Ming and Serennia something to actually write about.

What did this years MLG prove?

- As evidenced by the winning team, the community has been correct all along that DK's and Ret Pallies are clearly OP and in need of severe nerfs.

- Complaints that burst is too high in WoW are completely unfounded.

- Casters are no match for the massive power of cleavage teams, as there are no casters on top teams as a result of them.

- Healers need to be toned down since every team had at least one.

- Hunters are fine since they were more highy represented than many other classes.

What can we learn from all of this?

Overall, I think that this years MLG was proof positive that the community really needs to rethink its stance on issues such as what is "OP", what isn't, and whether or not "burst" is really too high, or just an excuse they use to rationalize their terrible play.

Debating Balance: Incestuous Relationships, Moral Decisions and Natural Selection!

Sat, 06 Jun 2009 01:24:55 -0400

After many comments and a ton of fan mail asking the same question: "Xaeranth, y dunt u uze ur supeeror intelect and razer sharp wit to dizcuss balance instd of makng fun uv ppl?", I have finally decided to answer.

And that answer, my friends, is simple...

Debating "balance" around here is like nailing your sister - sure you get your pickle wet, get your rocks off and kill a little time 'round the farm, but nothing will ever come of it other than a three legged, retarded, conjoined twin, cyclops baby and a case of gonorrhea that you just indirectly inherited for from dear 'ol dad.

The problem is simple; it's a matter of perspective - everyone has a different frame of reference based on their own experiences. It's like popping the cherry of a fair, chaste maiden - sometimes you get a 'natural' and it's the most beautiful, tintillating and meaningful experience of your life (i.e. you play a Ret Pally), and sometimes you end up with a bloody mess that you just can't seem to scrub out of the crotch of your clown suit (i.e. you play a Warlock).

For most men, believing that they have perspective is like believing that they "got game"; those of you who think you do - don't, and those of you who think you don't - don't. However, you want to believe that you have perspective because it is good for your ego, just like after spackling your sisters last not-so-pearly white tooth you want nothing more desperately than to believe her when she snickers and says "Well, it's not as big as dad's, but it's still 'average' size...I guess".

The basic fundamental issue with discussing "balance" in an MMO as complex as WoW, is that "balance" is competely undefinable.

Yes, that means that you longwinded ****tards posting your terrible blogs here, on the official forums, on AJ, EJ or any other pretensiously acronymical site that are littering the interwebs with your double-wide, trailer-trash, yellowish-stained-tighty-whities-on-the-clothesline-in-the-front-yard diatribes on how to make this game "balanced" are accomplishing nothing more than driving the property value down for those of us here angling for something with a higher, tangible and objective purpose.

Most intelligent people (who are smart enough to **** all over creationism) see the system for what it is - Natural Selection, and sometimes tough decisions need to be made. Let's assume for a second that WoW is the aforementioned three legged, retarded, conjoined twin, cyclops baby, which is sitting on the operating table and that you are the uncle-father faced with the following decision:

1) Do not separate the conjoined twins and they both die

2) Seperate the conjoined twins so one can live, but the other dies

Given this decision, most rational incestuous parents would make the decision to operate and allow one of the drooling vegetables to live, so *WHOOMP* they just lopped off the cancerous Shadow Priest twin so the Disc Priest twin could live. HOORAY!

Some nearsighted folks would like to see the game balanced around 1 v 1, but the issue there is that as the number of people in any given fight rises, it would become inherenly less balanced; even moreso than it currently is.

Besides, then you have the arms race of "lets give Warlocks the 'super-mega-awesome quivering palm of excruciatingly painful death' to even out the Warlock/Rogue 1 v 1 imbalance", but all of a sudden that ability gives Warlocks too much of an advantage over Paladins, and now we need to give Paladins something to counter Warlocks, which means they are now equipped with an ability that is super overpowered to another class, and pretty soon we are all running around launching nuclear warhead tipped ICBM's out of our ass-silo's from the Stables to the Farm, which not only instantly gib anyone in a one mile radius, but also rolls them back a few levels - "**** MY LIFE, I'M LEVEL 78 AGAIN?"

The truth is that this game will never be truly balanced - and by truly balanced, I mean it in the literal sense: balanced evenly around AB, WSG, EOTS, SOTA, AV, 2v2, 3v3, 5v5, 5 man dungeons, 10 man raids, 25 man raids, and Best in Slot - it's never gonna happen. And if you are 'downs' enough to think it can, then your uncle-father and aunt-mother chose to kill off the wrong ******* twin.

Like life, this game is what it is, and is going to be what it is going to be - no matter how much time and effort we waste debating what would "balance" it. Also like life, the best we can do is sacrifice a live chicken to the RNG God's and hope they choose to show us some favor, and if they don't - well, either get the **** over it, or quit.

But either way, I don't give a **** - so kindly shut your ****-holsters up about "balance".

So You Don't Think Burst Is Too High In WoW? A Video By Kayosiv...

Thu, 04 Jun 2009 12:54:33 -0400

For those of you with a burnin' yearnin' in your ample loins for a throwback to the Golden Age of "Jasi Days" (the last 5-6 months), who are already tired of this Bodi guys diarrhea of the mouth being power squeezed all over the pages of our beloved WoWRiot, I bring to you - a video review.

Kayosiv, the esteemed Warrior Class Hero from the renowned Moon Knights guild on the Llane server (which nobody has ever ******* heard of) stunned the world this week by releasing his video "Kayosiv BURSTED DOWN" which is a shocking expose into the seedy underbelly of burst mechanics in WoW, and a *****trong in-your-face rebuttal to Ghostcrawler's misguided comments about the Dev team not feeling that burst is "too high".

What this video effectively demonstrates is that a warrior who does absolutely nothing to defend himself will die quickly when everything that hits him crits. Yes, I was absolutely shocked to hear this news, too. Personally, I feel that any class which does nothing to defend itself and is hit by a series of 7-10 crits in a row should die in no less than 5 minutes - it only seems reasonable.

Now, like a pair young, smooth, supple breasts, I would like to touch on several quotes from Kayosiv's thread on the DPS forums, which has quickly risen to 24 pages of highly intellectually debated goodness - and if the fine people of the WoW Official Forums support him then he can't possibly be wrong, amiright?

A Blog of a Personal Nature: Wrinkly Dead Babies and Oscillating Severed Heads...

Wed, 03 Jun 2009 14:52:25 -0400

So it happened again last night, but this time was so vivid that it prompted me to write about it.

For the record, I don't believe in ghosts, UFO's, Bigfoot, the Lochness Monster or anything of supernatural origins that I can't physically see; when I see one, I will believe it, but until then - no thanks.

However, one thing I do believe in is a sleep disorder known as Night Terrors (Pavor Nocturnus) - most of which involve horrifying images of things "I don't believe in". Quite a paradox, huh?

Night Terrors differ from nightmare in that nightmares are "bad dreams" - hence they occur during dreaming and often times cause you to wake up feeling frightened due to the nature of the dream. Night Terrors on the other hand, are like bad dreams which partially persist through waking.

For example, last night's Night Terror involved me waking up laying on my side, looking across the bed at my wife's nightstand at a teddy bear she had sitting on it and seeing - not the teddy bear - but a dead baby in its place. The illusion was so vivid and real that I could place the baby at around a year old and could guess that it most likely died from drowning because it had pale, wrinkly "dishpan skin" (the fur from the teddy bear).

(Note: the wrinkly "dish pan skin" dead baby is a recurring theme in my Night Terrors, which is particularly unsettling for me since I drowned - completely dead - as a very young child, but was revived in the ambulance on the way to the hospital)

Due to my unshakable partial dreamlike state, there was no doubt in my mind that it was a dead baby - and the illusion was so vivid that my brain could make no attempt to recall that it knew there had ever been a teddy bear on the stand in the first place. Nope, just me and a wrinkly dead baby chillin' in my room in the middle of the night - even my wife sleeping next to me was completely absent from my "experience".

I sat there motionless for a good 10-15 seconds just staring it, semi-terrified that there was actually a dead baby in my house (and imagining how I would explain it to the police - yes, these hallucinations are that real) before getting up, walking around the bed and picking it up (which finally brought me to my senses) to find it was only the teddy bear.

(Note: and there is nothing more that my wife loves than to wake up at 3am with me standing in front of her looking terrified and holding her teddy bear - creepy much?)

But here is the thing, the whole time I sat there trying to rationalize that there was no way there could be a dead baby sitting on her nightstand - I was still partially asleep - in the sense that I wasn't fully in control of my rational senses. It's kind of like when you are dreaming, and you know you are in a dream, but you can't wake up - but you also can't stop believing everything that is happening.

And before I get "lol little ***** scared of a teddy bear in the dark", as the most brutally rational person I know, I can vouch for the fact that there is no chance of me seeing something in these Terrors and saying "oh, it's just the teddy bear", rolling over and going back to sleep. If during the terror I can't "investigate" it and find that whatever I am seeing isn't real, it usually takes 20-30 seconds for the effects of the trance-like state to subside and allow me to come to my senses wherever I may find myself.

Even if my wife tries to wake me up, I will talk to her as if she is part of my "experience" until I finally "come to" - and have very little recollection of what I told her, which apparently has been everything from "get the **** out of the house" (so I can battle some super serial supernatural force knowing she is safe), to "call the police" (because someone is in the house, or to report the dead baby...again).

I recall the First Night Terror I ever had, I was 15 at the time. I woke up and looked out the window at the foot of my bed onto our deck outside and saw a dead body lying on it (which later turned out to be a patch of snow, duh?).

I laid there looking at it, trying to rationalize it, but unfortunately there was no way my brain was going to see a patch of snow instead of the dead body which I can clearly recall was of a middle aged balding man that I could see from the waist up (wearing a white shirt, how'd you guess?)

I jumped out of my bed and wanted to run out of my room - but I "couldn't find" the door (which was about 10 inches to the right of my bed) and suddenly was trapped in a completely dark room which apparently had no door to find. When I finally "came to", I found that I had been feverishly running my hands all over the walls of my room which had just a few seconds earlier been a 7 x 7 cell with no light and no door (and no window which I had originally seen the dead body through in the first place) - with none of my belongings in it.

Since then I have woken up multiple times to investigate people standing in my closet (clothes hanging a certain way), a severed head oscillating at the foot of my bed (my floor fan), those worms from Dreamcatcher (or slither, I suppose) in my bed (my dog kicking me while he is dreaming) which caused me to pin him down and almost choke him to death (thinking that I was killing one of the worms) and the dead baby - an image I tend to see over and over - prompted by any number of things in my bedroom.

The most comically frightening of which was the night I looked down from my side of the bed (where there was a hard cover copy of Steven Colbert's book "I Am America: And So Can You" with his face on it), to see something that was half Crypt Keeper and Steven Colbert talking to me from the cover of his book.

In closing, I have been dealing with this issue for a good 14-15 years, even though most sources say that people outgrow it - and wanted to share my experiences for those of you who might also be dealing with it to let you know - you're not alone.

Xaeranth's Literary What's Hot and What's Not List™

Tue, 02 Jun 2009 23:18:56 -0400

Disc Priests: Priest Class Hero Speaks Out On What Needs To Change NOW!

Mon, 01 Jun 2009 10:28:54 -0400

Life imitates art, which imitates life.

Following in the footsteps of fellow mega-couples such as Jon and Kate Gosselin from the reality television show Jon and Kate Plus 8 (pictured right, with their 8 children), Ming and Jasi have finally split (citing irreconcilable differences). This means that the community has not only tragically lost a valued and beloved blogger, but also - a Priest Class Hero.

After calling an emergency meeting of the WoWRiot Elites late last night, (in between bouts of Naked Twister and giving Slapnuts a super hot Baked Alaska, which I was given the high honor of lighting for him), we put our heads together in an attempt to find a suitable replacement for Jasi amongst the now disillusioned Priest population. After many hours of heated debated, we finally concluded that there were no extremely high rated Priests with the "cahoonies" left to carry the torch here on WoWRiot with the exception of, well...me?

The opportunity to follow in Jasi's shoes is a great honor - and one that I humbly accept on behalf of WoWRiot and Priests all over the world...

My first act as "Priest Class Hero Xaeranth" will be to talk about a devastating bug which was recently discovered by Dusknoir from the guild BOOMSHAKALAKA on the Mannoroth server. Earlier this week he voiced a legitimate concern on the DPS forums about a bug with Shadow Word:Death which isn't allowing it to break the Death Knight ability "Hungering Cold" in the same manner that it does Mage sheeps:

"but we should be able to.

make SWD backlash damage direct damage instead of the 1-tick DoT it is right now; we should be able to do this."

Which I think we can all agree is a reasonable suggestion. After thorough testing today in the highly controlled environment of the Gulch of Warsong, no matter how soon or late I clicked my Shadow Word: Death into the DK's Hungering Cold cast, I could never actually break the effect - not once (although I think I was very close a few times) - in about 267 solid attempts.

Blue posters have yet to comment on this game breaking bug.

"Self-Penance" has been getting a healthy dose of hate on the forums, and as a Priest I must admit that this ability is completely ridiculous in its current form and in need of a serious revamp for the sake of balance.

The main issue here is that when I cast Penance on myself, it looks like I am punching myself in the face with an enormous oven mitt made of sunshineny, sparkly, rainbowey goodness instead of some type of badass graphic which conveys the dark and serious nature of me feverishly mending my near fatal wounds on the field of battle.

If those whiny lame ass hippy muther******* Druids can get new baddass skins, there is no reason why Penance needs to look this ******* silly when I am using it on myself.

Another issue (that only someone playing on my level would even be aware of) that the Dev team needs to resolve, which will kill two birds with one stone (by nerfing Penance to be in line with the relative strength of other healers heals as well as giving Warriors a slight buff against Priests), is to make Spell Reflected charges of Penance cause DAMAGE to the Priest, instead of healing him/her as if it were intended to be cast on a friendly target.

As it stands, if I am in need of a quick heal and I see that some tricksy Warrior has popped Spell Reflect, I am easily able to thwart his feeble attempts at reflecting a harmful spell by burning his SR and healing myself IN ONE FELL SWOOP! This total abortion of game mechanics needs to be looked into before more Priests jump on the bandwagon of abusing this strategy, and Warrior representation sinks to all time lows as a result of it.

(Note: For future reference, when Priests start putting out PVP videos with clips of them doing this, it shall henceforth be known as "Xaeranth'ing that Spell Reflect" in the same manner that someone would claim a player "Neilyo'd that Deathcoil" - learn it, love it, use it)

Ladies and gentlemen, might I treat you to a little eyecandy? A little "fap material", if you will? Here I present to you "Priest Class Hero Xaeranth" in a portrait I call "/serious pose" (and yes, that is the 1850 weapon! Believe it!)

Jasi-Gate: The Aftermath!

Sun, 31 May 2009 01:28:26 -0400

I want to preface my comments by acknowledging that I clearly understand my "nobody" status here at WoWRiot, but I feel compelled to write about the events that transpired this evening, so here it goes...

As a long time reader of WoM, I am actually quite stunned that Ming and Jasi have finally parted ways (part of me still believes this may be some very elaborate hoax by the Hokage). Admittedly, this is because I personally don't remember WoM without him, and not because I feel Jasi was a huge asset to the site beyond making sure the page was filled on his days.

Most reasonable people can recognize that many of his haters were nothing more than "bandwagoners" that jumped in his **** to be "cool" with the rest of the "cool kids" (ok, I am done with the quotes thing...well, almost), but bandwagon or not, the truth is that his writing was robotic, uninspired and often times painfully dragged out.

It seems clear that he knew he wasn't meeting the quality expectation of Ming, the readers, or himself - but instead of stepping down, he carried on with his seemingly apathetic blogs. Perhaps his reason for not stepping down was solely to not give the bandwagoners the satisfaction of thinking they "forced" his hand into quitting, or perhaps he was just collecting an easy check, but no matter what the end - fired or quit - when the time came, people were going to rejoice and rub it in his face anyhow.

Something that has always shocked me was that he rarely took the time to defend himself to his readers. I feel that his failure to do so combined with his consistently benign blogs week after week did nothing to promote his personality. With no clear personality or "voice" in his writing, he became nothing more than an internet avatar, mechanically producing a content-less blog a few times a week.

To me, his most tragic mistake was announcing that he was going to start playing the game more seriously in an effort to write higher quality articles and then coming nowhere close to delivering.

Part of me empathizes with him because I don't think most people know how difficult it is to consistently put out "quality" articles 2-3 times a week on the same subject for a year and a half. I know that I set my personal goal to 3 "good" (by my standards, **** you haters) blogs a week and, in an effort to do so, often times find myself sitting in front of a blank screen typing out a bunch of unfunny bull**** just to fill the page, then deleting it and starting over - rinse and repeat.

As a hobby writer, I would never accept a position (read: paid) where I had to publish something I felt was subpar just because I absolutely HAD to have something on the page - this is the part where I do feel badly for him as I feel it may be what inevitably did him in.

Personally, I would like to see someone with "personality", "zest" and "voice" (ok, now I am doing it on purpose) blogging for Ming. Someone who knows the game, but can write about it in an entertaining manner. Ming and Serennia can provide excellent information about the arena, but there is little "sizzle" or "flare" to their posts.

Ming - I implore you to hire someone who fits this bill. It should be inherently clear that casuals don't give two ****s about the mechanics of this game, they just want something entertaining, fun and/or funny - if you want to get their attention, this is what you need to deliver.

If you build it, they will come.

Xaeranth's Guide To WoWRiot Blogging Success! (A.K.A. How I Slept My Way To The Top)

Fri, 29 May 2009 16:29:42 -0400

As someone who, in a very short time, has reached the pinnacle of success here at WoWRiot, I feel compelled to take a break from my normal hilarious and thought provoking blogs to dedicate this one to helping all of the struggling Bloggers out there that sit around wishing they could be me.

Lastly, with some hard work, a little effort and a lot of luck, one day you will have a super serious successful blog just like I do.

Best of luck to you!

-Xaeranth

DK PVP Glove Nerf CAN'T GO LIVE! And Here Is Why...

Thu, 28 May 2009 00:47:27 -0400

With patch 3.1.3 looming on the horizon, most have noticed what seems to be a subtle change to the DK PVP Glove bonus:

Blizzard, as a high rated DK and someone who intimately understands this class - this is my plea to you not to remove the current DK PVP Glove as it is the key to DK PVP viability.
Please, I beg you not to flush your Hero Class down the crapper because of a bunch of whiners on the forums.

Those of us who have stuck with this class through its outlandish highs and absurd lows (instead of abandoning it at the first sign of trouble) deserve better than this.

Lastly, and I hate to have to strongarm you like this, GC, but if you foolishly choose to go through with this nerf, myself and my legion of loyal readers and subscribers will be canceling all of our accounts in protest - and I know you damn well don't want me to spell out the math ($$$) on that one for you.

Think about it before you do something silly.

First Look: New Druid Forms Artwork (Yeah, **** You Hippies)

Tue, 26 May 2009 19:43:58 -0400

Just a short entry here tonight with some BREAKING NEWS:

With the game reaching unprecedented levels of balance, and an endless amount of challenging PVE content everywhere you look, there was no other place for the WoW Dev team to turn their attention than to the last bastion of lackluster gameplay experience - Druid art forms!

Community Manager Zarhym made the post on the Druid forums today informing the Druids of the unique and interesting art forms that they will be allowed to choose from, supposedly in patch 3.2.

As you can see from the Tauren Bear form examples, the WoW Art team has gone very far out of their way to completely overhaul the look of the Druid Bear form and offer them selections that are far more than just "different colors".

Apparently, Druids will be able to switch between the skins at will by visiting the barber shop.

I, for one, am truly happy to see that my $15/month has gone to such a great and artistic use as I was growing tired of it being endlessly funneled into stupid projects like nerfing and buffing classes to appease the PVP motorheads or to implementing other stupid **** that benefits EVERYONE.

Bravo, Blizzard - and Grats to Druids everywhere!