Maintenances Blues

Oh I hate Tuesdays. It seems just knowing that it is server maintenance day makes me want to play cuz I know I can't.

Well, I survived the weekend in Healer mode. It went mostly as I expected. Once I adjusted to the changes to the interface, it all sorta settled in. Of course, it was made easier by the fact I was with very skilled people and the fact I have plenty of experience healing on my Ally Shammy. Now if I can just get some luck in some drops occuring! Several trips to see the Prince in Kara AND Mags, and still waiting on the rest of my T4. Oh well. Need the experience badly. I guess when it comes to MMO's, I am a slow learner.

Of course, I may be using up all my luck. Tried MgT tonight after Mags (I had respecced back to Tank), after never even making it to the 1st boss in the PUG's I joined and thou there were numorous wipes, several of my causing, we made it through. The reward for my efforts? I rolled a 100 on a Phoenix Hatchling drop. Well, at least he goes well with Attumen's Horse.

The things you have to do for money (or gear)

So I have made some Kara runs, off-tanked few pulls in Gruuls, the priest on Mulgar and the first channeler in Mags. Starting to get at least the hint of some decent gear. So what did I do this week? Respecced to Holy! Huh? I wanted to be a tank? am I nuts? Not really, it is just that I am not really ready yet and aside from the above mentioned roles, I am not very useful. So I decided I had to do something to increase my available roles and thereby increase my ability to gear up and be a proper tank!

Our Kara runs need more heals and that was really the deciding factor. I can accept even speccing back and worth if needed. I have my epic mount so with all the dailies, cash isn't a huge issue. So I am playing with a 41/20/0 spec. I am so far rather pleased with it. It works nicely for soloing, seems to allow greater flexibility with my mana pool and in theory will allow me to heal pretty good. I can still throw on tanking gear to off tank so long as the DPS'ers watch Omen. It did mean shelling out a lot of money to get an initial set of healer gear and some enchants, but all in all, I think it is a great investment.

I am still gonna be a pally tank, I just may do a lot of healing to get the tanking gear I need to put me over the top in my ability to be effective. I was getting a little frustrated with the limits on the class. This is a nice break.

And now, on with the show!

So the first couple posts were sorta background. This one should lead into current events.

A pally Tank.... Tankadin. Maybe one of the more difficult classes to manage from a game mechanics perspective. Very gear dependant. A high need to balance many attributes and skills For example, with a hunter, you can always add more AGI and do no wrong, but a good Tankadin needs a balance of good DEF, STA and Spell Damage at a minimum. In raids, she can, um, tank, and after that, well.... a pally tank DPS's like an anemic toddler and heals like Kevorkian. Most other classes can fill a couple roles in a raid, but pallys don't really have that luxury.

So why on earth would I want to play one? Just to see if I can. After 2.5 years of WoW, the challenge is the game to me, that and the social aspects that come from being in a great guild.

I leveled as a Ret pally just to be able to deal a little damage, but when I hit 70, specced for Tanking and started doing the quests to get into Kara (still needed attunment then) Gathered a little gear, and marched into Kara as a vetaran of many raids..... and didn't have a clue what to do. Being a melee class, and especially a Pally tank whose ability to aggro a mob depends on threat generation by means other than raw white DPS was a far cry from running a shammy and staying back hurling boltz. This was work! But I learned.

Finally came my first true tanking gig as a MT in Kara. I was worried, nervous. I didn't want to screw up and look like a bigger noob than usual. A healer/dps can goof and more often as not, it can go unnoticed and be recovered from. Then a MT bones it up, its usually pretty obvious as the raid is running back from the graveyard.... But the chick must spread her wings and learn to fly. So there he was, Attumen. I will assume that you, dear Reader, know the fight well. It's not hard and on that night, it wasn;t either. But what did I get as a memento of my first tanking? He dropped his Warhorses Reins! First time I had ever seen an epic mount in a raid. Naturally everyone rolled. When i did, I saw... Amineh rolls a 97(1-100). I was like...OMG! I was hooting and hollering so much my roommate came in to see if I had hurt myself. Not a bad start to raiding career!

More soon.....

So how did did I get here?

Ah dear reader, I salute you. I tend to ramble. That you read this warms my heart.

I thought I would outline a little game play history on how I got to where I am. In August of 2005, I purchased WoW. I was playing Final Fantasy Online at the time, and resisted WoW when it first hit the shelves. So there I was with my new Night Elf Hunter (she is still semi-active thou many alts have come and gone). I picked a Hunter solely for the chance of have a kitteh pet. In FFO, I had been in a guild called the Kitty Kat Gang. Can ya see a pattern here? :)

So I leveled her with a few other guildies from FFO. We had all made the leap to Guild Wars and now to WoW together. In time I was raiding in Molten core and AQ40 and farming Ony when TBC came out. And suddenly, a hunter seemed like the relative at the family reunion that no one really dislikes, but they don't really want to have over to dinner either. The guild just had too many. So I created the one thing our guild needed, a Draenei Restro Shammie. Wow... suddenly I was Miss Popularity. My poor hunter gathered dust as my shammie leveled, entered and conquered Kara, Gruuls, and was starting in on TK and SSC. (In fact the poor Night Elf is still wearing Beastmaster gear).

But here something odd happened. The same gamers I had played with across three games and five years seemed to change. Our casual style disappeared as it become more and more challenging to progress. I wasn't able to raid with them consistently due to real life events. And to be honest, I just didn't pay enough attention to the little things to play at that level. So we started to drift apart. I was a little bored with WoW and decided to create a Horde character just to see some new scenery and quests.

Thus was born Amineh. I decided to make a Paladin just because it was the one class I had never really played on any alt. I was invited in a starter guild of great people and leveled away, spending less and less time on my Ally toons. When it become clear I wasn't going to welcome to return to raiding with my old so called friends. I found a guild that still had a place for a new raider.

They opened my eyes to a side of WoW I never knew existed. This guild is truly like a family. We help each other, just to help. They mentor noobs like me with the patience of a saint (even when I cause a Raid wipe single handedly, more on that in some future post!). They made the game fun again when others had made it seem like work.

So that really is were I am today. Future posts will talk about some funny stories of life as level 70, offer *coughs* pearls of wisdom that I have learned about pally tanking and in general just babble on as a way to pass the time. If you bored enough or just curious, please read on and I will even beg for a comment so I know I am not typing to myself :)

Welcome to the corners of my tiny little mind

I often have wanted to write stories about the characters I play in games like World of Warcraft but I seldom make the time to write. As I play this game and try to learn how to play a new class, I decided I wanted to journal my experiences.

I have a blog over on myspace about my so-called life. It seemed to me there was as much in it about about my gaming as about the real me so I am gonna move my gaming chatter here. But since there is a real person behind the toon, I'll add a little here about me.

My friends call me Tina, but it says Christina on my ID. I am a 48 year old divorced mother of one and surrogate grand mom to four living in Southern Mississippi. When I can find gainful employment, I am a computer geekette that has been in desktop support and Network administration for a little over a decade. I graduated from Purdue University in 1990 after doing a tour in the Army to get the money I needed for school.

I got hooked into gaming way back in the day when RPG's were Dungeon & Dragons type pencil and paper affairs. I was dating someone that was into it and gaming together was a way for us to be closer. After we went on different paths, it was an outlet for my imagination. When computers entered the arena, I was first seduced by Diablo II. Then gaming was like crack to me. I played a Korean game called Talesweaver that no one that speaks English has ever heard of, followed by Ragnorok Online, Final Fantasy Online, City of Heroes, and finally World of Warcraft.

I have never been, nor do I foresee ever being an "uber" gamer. I play to relax and unwind and I am not overly ambitious. I like to think I am above average at what I do but that may just be my own conceits showing. I always considered myself a fast learner, but when it comes to WoW, I am constantly humbled. I am a "Cancer" and tend like many born in that time to be reflective, a bit of a homebody, fiercely loyal and since I am also a redhead, entirely too emotional and quick to anger.

I have been playing WoW since 2005, starting on the alliance side where I have a Night Elf Hunter and a Dranaei Shaman in semi retirement/alt status. Playing them has led me to Amineh, my Blood Elf Tankadin on the Horde Side. All are level 70's and raid at various places.