31.12.10

Ghostcrawler on Healing

A few days ago on the Official WOW blog, Ghostcrawler posted a kind of “State-of-the-Union” style post detailing how Blizzard is feeling about where things are so far and things that could potentially be addressed in the first patch.  There is a lot of great information in this post, and it shows a snapshot of how Blizzard views the game balance thus far.

With regards to healing, there is one paragraph in particular that is caught my attention:

Healing in PvE is working out pretty much as intended. There are some Heroic dungeon bosses that are probably tougher than the required item level average permits. In general, you might have a tough time upon zoning into a Heroic dungeon with a bunch of strangers as soon as Dungeon Finder permits, especially if your group isn’t willing to communicate and work together. We want Heroics to be challenging -- if you want to zerg the content, stick to normal dungeons.

I only read this today but, interestingly enough, it was posted on the 27th, the same day I wrote my First Lessons from Heroics post about communication; meaning that Ghostcrawler is obviously reading my blog. Hi Greg, welcome to Dwarven Battle Medic.

The basic point here is that heroics are not going to get any easier, at least not when you’re working with a random group of total strangers… and that is how Blizzard wants it. 

As frustrating as my experiences with Heroics has been (there has been much wailing and gnashing of teeth, lemme tell you), I’m glad they are not going to be nerfing heroics.  Heroic Dungeons are supposed to be hard and good teamwork and communication should be needed to successfully complete one.  During Wrath I found heroics quite dull; not because of the content or the mechanics or the fact that I had done them several dozen times each, but simply because everybody ran them with a deadly silent efficiency.  No communication meant that you might as well have been running the dungeon with four NPCs.

I would have liked to have seen this post mention a buff to Holy Light that makes it heal for a kajillion HP, but you take what you can get.  It’s actually interesting that there is nothing in here about Holy Paladins at all.  It seems that they are working as intended.

Priests look like their in for a nice little buff, however:
For Holy priests, we’re increasing Chakra’s duration and changing Surge of Light so it can now benefit from Flash Heal and Greater Heal and can crit.
A little link love needs to go out to Tarinae over at A Healadin's Tear for writing about this in a far more timely manner than I managed to.


30.12.10

Feeling Behind the Curve

From a game company’s perspective, December is a great time to release a new game, but for those players who have families and jobs, it’s a terrible time.  Between family obligations, travel, work, a pregnant wife and a nasty bout with the stomach flu, I have had virtually no time to dedicate to getting geared enough to begin raiding.

I have typically been able to squeeze in only one heroic attempt on the nights when I have a chance to play, and I’ve had to cut several attempts short due to real life concerns.  It’s been over a week since I was able to queue for heroics, but I only got my first upgrades from them last night. 

This has me feeling a little bit behind the curve in terms of progress.  Some of the more hardcore people in my guild are beginning to organize the first raids, and we’re short on healers.  I would dearly love to be with my guild when they first step foot into the new raid instances, but frankly I don’t think that’s going to happen, which is very disappointing.

So my goal is to maximize my gearing in the minimal amount of time that I have.  To do this I am going to focus on specific dungeons:  Halls of Origination, Blackrock Caverns and Stonecore.  These are the dungeons with both the most drops for Holy Paladins and the most potential Justice Points with 490, 350 and 280, respectively.  Technically Shadowfang Keep has 350, and a couple of great drops as well, but you’ve gotta draw the line somewhere.  Besides, I still have nightmares from the last time I was in that place.

The biggest downside to this strategy is that I will be foregoing the 70 Valor Points for doing the daily heroic.  However, once I get closer to 340 ilvl (currently I’m at 331) I’ll go back to doing the randoms. 

I hope this post is just a little bit of gear QQ, as it’s probably not as bad as I’m making it out to be.  I am on the cusp of becoming Revered with the Earthen Ring, giving me access to [Peacemaker's Breastplate], and as well I should be able to buy [Legguards of the Gentle] using Justice Points after the next heroic run.  So hopefully I’ll be back on track before too long.

How has your gearing been going?  Are you feeling behind the game in terms of gearing?  Is your guild getting antsy about when raiding is going to start?  Have you come up with a strategy to maximize your own gear progression, or are you just taking it day by day?



27.12.10

First Lessons from Heroics - Communication

This is not news, but Cataclysm Heroic 5 Man dungeons are very hard.

Well, kind of.  It depends on the group and how well it communicates.  In my opinion, communication is the single most important factor in determining the group’s success.  All other things being equal, a group that talks to each other and discusses or explains the encounter strategies will succeed where one that doesn’t communicate will fail.

The PUG groups that I have been paired with using the LFD finder have been failing a lot.

With most LFD groups, the communication has been terrible, and its really been affecting the results.  I’ll give you four examples using a couple of the runs that I have done over the past couple of days which have had differing levels of communication and differing levels of success.


24.12.10

Merry Christmas and Happy Winter's Veil

Happy holidays to all!  In honour of this holiday, I present Kel'Thuzad's T'was the Death Knight Before Christmas!


T’was the Death Knight before Winter Veil, and all through Azeroth,
Not a creature was stirring, even Plaguebringer Noth.
The weapons were hung in Naxxramas with care,
In hopes that The Lich King soon would be there.

The ghouls were nestled all snug in their tombs,
While maggots devoured their brains in the gloom.
And Heigan in jammies, and I in my cap,
Had just settled down for a long deathless nap.

When out on the ziggurat there came such a clatter,
I rose from the grave to see what was the matter.
Away to the window I flew like a drake,
Tore open the shutters and did a double-take.

When, what to my decaying eyes should appear,
An armoured nightmare with a frightening sneer.
With bright glowing eyes, blue as stained glass,
I knew in a moment that it must be Arthas.

And then, in an instant, I heard on the roof,
The scratching and clawing of a skeletal hoof.
As I drew in my skull and looked at the room
Through the portal came Arthas, heralding doom.

He was dressed all in plate, from his head to his foot,
With the blood of the innocent caked on his boot.
A runesword of frost in his outstretched appendage,
And the look on his face was filled with pure rage.

He said not a word, but went straight to his work,
Of raising the dead, and then turned with a smirk.
And pointing his sword at my boney chest,
He gave me his army to lead to conquest.

He sprang on his horse, with deafening knell,
And away he flew like a demon from hell.
But I heard him exclaim, ‘ere he drove out of sight,
“The last Winter Veil for all, for here comes a Death Knight!”
 

23.12.10

The First Annual Peevie Awards

This is a Blog Azeroth Shared Topic as suggested by Amaranth of Specced for Drama

Hello, and welcome to the 2010 Azeroth Peevie Awards, where we recognize excellence in the art of irritation and annoyance!  Your host for this year is, as always, the single most annoying character in all of Azeroth and the Outlands, CORKI!

[pause]

Wait, I’m sorry, I’m told that he’s been kidnapped again; this time by a hostile coalition of squirrels from Elwynn Forest.  Oh well, we now present the 2010 Peevie Awards after the jump!

Next Up: Heroics

A few normal dungeon runs tonight and Thosif is now eligible to queue for Heroic dungeons.  Well, barely able to queue.  I am at 329 exactly and had to cheat a little to get that.  I have two ilvl 333 items that have +Hit on them, and PVP Ornate Pyrium Gauntlets that put me over the top.  The gauntlets, while they have a lot of useless Resilience, are still a major upgrade to the Stormhammer Gauntlets that I was wearing before.

This is why I love the Reforging concept so much.  Reforging allows you not only to optimize gear, but to turn a piece that is an absolute upgrade in all ways but one into something useful.  The flexibility is greatly appreciated by this Holy Paladin.  Using the gauntlets as an example:  They come with Int and +140 haste.  I reforged the haste into spirit and then enchanted the gloves to give back +50 haste.  The net result is 56 Spirit and 134 Haste.  An effective compromise.

Ophelie has a great article about reforging for Holy Paladins over at Bossy Pally.  As well, Kurn has put out the definitive list of pre-raid gear for Holy Paladins.

My gearing strategy has been to emphasize Spirit and Haste over Crit and Mastery.   Any item that is missing either of those two stats is getting reforged, if possible.  I am tending to lean towards putting spirit on first over haste for the extra regeneration and I think my mana longevity is good so far. 

The bosses on the normal modes have been much, much easier than I thought they were going to be.  I have been jumping into the dungeons without a great deal of prep work beforehand, and it hasn't really mattered yet.  Some of the mechanics are important (like the Upwind buff on Altarius and Grounding Field on Assad in Vortex Pinnacle), but the trash is way more dangerous than the bosses if it's pulled wrong.  I have yet to wipe on a boss fight on normal; all my wipes have come to bad or accidental pulls on the trash packs.  I'm sure its worse on heroic, and I'll find that out first hand tomorrow.

Fannon’s Tip of The Day:  Once you are at the level cap you can change the XP bar to show a Faction’s Reputation so that you can keep track of it as you're grinding.  To enable this, go to your Reputation Tab (default Hotkey is U) and click on the Reputation you want to track.  This pops up a box with a couple of checkboxes, one of which is Show as Experience Bar.  Check the box and you’ll have a Reputation Bar on the bottom showing you how much rep you need to get to the next tier.


21.12.10

Ding!


Last night I did the last half of level 84 and got the Ding! that everyone looks forward to most.  Thosif is now at the level cap with a 323 iLvl; just about ready to enter heroics.  I completed three dungeons to get the final 6 bars of XP, two Vortex Pinnacles and half of a Stonecore run.  All of them went very smoothly, setting myself up for the inevitable shock that I'm sure I will experience when I start focusing on the harder dungeons.  I was hoping to get Grim Batol or Lost City of the Tol'vir, neither of which I have seen before.  But no, the random dungeon finder had other ideas.  At least it put me together with three amazing groups.

Disco Stu has come to heal you!
Of course, level 85 as a Paladin means that you are going to be looking at this guy on the left an awful lot, Guardian of the Ancient Kings.  I think this spell has a lot of promise, and I'm really looking forward to trying it out.  But wow... Blizzard sure made this guy look stupid.  I guess they feel that Paladins need to have more wings than anyone else.

I still need to finish questing in order to get my faction Reputations to where they need to be.  Earthen Ring is my priority, as they have some really nice things for Holy Paladins.  So that means that I'm heading back to Vashj'ir, which I did only enough of to get my seahorse mount and find the entrance to Throne of the Tides.  It's ironic that after I hit the level cap the first thing I do is go to the starter zones.

Really... I can't even look at this guy.  He had better be worth it.

20.12.10

Images of Azeroth

For a number of years I worked as a Professional Photographer until I was forced to give it up. Ever since, I have been doing fine art photography for my own enjoyment, including a lot of landscapes. Since I spend a great deal of time in the virtual world of Azeroth, it makes sense to photograph that world as well.

It should be noted that these are not just straight screenshots.  Just like I would do with a photograph that I've taken, each of these has been gently manipulated to enhance it's visual impact.  Nothing major; a crop here, a little bit of burning there, some images need to be in black and white, others in colour.


Waterfall in the Twilight Highlands

Ironforge at sunset

The Maelstrom

Uldum
Please click on the images for a full size view.

18.12.10

First Week: The Blogenning

"All great deeds and all great thoughts have a ridiculous beginning." - Albert Camus

It’s has now been a week since I first put up Dwarven Battle Medic and I must say that it’s been a learning experience.  I have never had a blog before, and aside from seeing what other authors do with their blogs, I really have no idea what I’m doing.  I’m learning on the fly and hoping for the best.

I thought I would share some of my initial impressions and observations about being a blogger.  I’m pretty sure that the majority of my readers at this point are bloggers themselves, so I’m sure most everyone who sees this will know exactly what I’m talking about.

Observation 1:  The Stats Page is Addicting. 
I have spent an inordinate amount looking at the Blogspot stats page this week.  Each pageview that shows up is an incredibly exciting thing and I can’t help but wonder who is on the other side.  It is very cool to know that someone has taken a look at what I’ve written.  Some random stats for those who are interested:  Not counting my own, I’ve had about 100 pageviews this week from people all over the world.  Canada, US, England, Italy, South Korea, Germany and Australia among others have been represented.  Welcome, everyone!  

Observation 2:  Links are The Single Coolest Thing Ever.
I received my first link this week for my Tower of Fizzle post and that generated a fair bit of traffic for me.  It was from the lovely Ophelie at Bossy Pally and the Giant Spoon.  Another big thank you for Janyaa at Muradin’s Musings for being the first person to add me to her blog roll! 

Observation 3:  Pageviews Without Comments Are Frustrating. 
With the blog being this new and paying as much attention to the stats as I am, seeing people viewing the blog but not leaving comments is a little disheartening.  I understand that the comment leaving public is quite small in proportion to the people reading, but I can’t help but wonder what people think about what I’ve written.  Of course, I don’t think anybody puts out a blog so that they can be quietly appreciated… I think every blogger is secretly looking for that comment that says they are doing a good job.  Blogs are far too public to not be a cry for a little external approval.

I would like to give a shout-out to my first commenter, Janyaa from Muradin's Musings, who's post on LFD compassion should be required reading before people can enter the LFD queue.
***Edit:  OMG, I completely forgot that Soul from Cathedral of Taintedsouls left a comment early on as well.  Thank you, Soul, here is some link love.  :)

Observation 4:  Moar Pictures!
This one is tricky since I do a lot of my writing during downtime at work where I have no access to my screenshots.

Observation 5:  Generating Content is Harder than I Thought. 
All of the best blogs out there have really solid content on them.  Guides, theorycrafting or other helpful posts that have kept myself and others coming back.  That stuff is hard to write.  Fluff (like this post!) is easy and can be entertaining at times, but real content is hard.  Unique content is even harder.  Things like Amber’s Flowchart Fridays are fantastic things to make your blog stand out.

Observation 6:  Patience While Posting, Young Padawan.
Of the stuff I have written, I am happy with the majority of it.  Looking back I should have taken a bit more time with a couple of the posts as I’m not sure that the ideas are expressed as well as I would have liked.  The patience to proofread and then proofread again is something that I have yet to master.  Spelling mistakes are embarrassing when the entire world can see them.

Final Observation: Blogging is a Lot of Fun.

15.12.10

Slowing Down is Hard to Do

“To make the merry-go-round go faster
so that everyone needs to hang on tighter,
just to keep from being thrown to the wolves” – They Might Be Giants 
This is a post about slowing down. 

This is a post about taking the time to soak in all the wonderful things in the world.

This is a post about joy.

In our modern world, the pace of life is always increasing and the demands on our time are always getting larger.  We have more to do and less time to do it, and the small amounts of free time that we do have are precious.  I’ve noticed this in my own life and my initial reaction is to try to cram more things into my free time in order to get the most value out of it.  However, in squeezing more stuff into a finite amount of time, it’s inevitable to derive less satisfaction out of each activity as you attempt to finish one thing and move on to the next.

In World of Warcraft, this manifests itself in the tendency to race through content to reach other content, and it is at its worst at the beginning of an expansion.  Once the expansion is installed the leveling process begins and most people will jump on the server and slam through the new content at lightning speed in order to get to the level cap.  The first person to reach 85 did it in a mere 6 hours.  Once there, they begin the endgame:  grinding Heroics to get better gear to allow access to Raids to gain better gear to allow access to harder content which gives you access to better gear which gives you access to harder content, etc, etc, etc, ad infinitum.  Then Blizzard releases a new patch and you start whole process over again.

No wonder this game can sometimes feel like a job.

The thought occurred to me:  Is this really the best way to spend my free time?  I love this game, but am I getting the most enjoyment out of it and therefore getting the best value for my free time?

I play World of Warcraft to relax.  I truly enjoy this game on many levels and I find it’s a great way to unwind.  I love the lore.  I love the stories.  And the gameplay.  Why am I rushing through all this wonderful content in order to see other content?  How much do you really see when you blitz through 5 levels in 6 hours?

This came to me last night as I was leveling Thosif through Uldum.  I was waiting for the Dungeon Finder to pop up and I decided to do a quick quest or two while I was waiting.  I looked at my map and saw there was a quest nearby, so I headed for it.  It was a quest to grab some Ancient Tol’vir weapons which were located in boxes guarded by a few mobs that looked tougher than what my Holy gear could handle.  Just then a something arrived and distracted the guards, so I flew down, grabbed the weapons and flew away, thinking myself very clever. 

That’s when I realized that I actually had never even read the quest text, nor did I realize that the questgiver gave me a horn to summon friendly NPCs to distract the guards so that you can get the weapons.  I got the quest done in the most efficient way possible, but I derived the minimum amount of enjoyment out of it and felt as if I missed out on something.  I felt that in the rush to get to 85, I was actually missing out on a huge amount of great content just to get to different content a little faster.

The same is true of leveling a new alt.  Even with a completely new questing experience from level 1 to 60, and a whole new world to explore, I find it extremely hard to slow down and enjoy each quest and each zone.  I feel like I’m conditioned to scroll down to the bottom of the quest, find out how many rats I need to kill, look at the map to find out where they are and then go and do it in the most efficient way possible.  Never have more innocent mobs been so thoughtlessly slaughtered than right now.  Is that fun?

I want to enjoy this game on a deeper level than merely slaughtering Kobolds and dinging levels.  I really want to have each moment that I spend in Azeroth to be emotionally fulfilling and entertaining, and I’m just not getting that with the pace that I’ve been going.  And this goes not just for the game, but for every aspect of my life.

It’s time to slow down and smell the Peacebloom. 

I am making a New World Resolution in honour of the new Azeroth.  I resolve to read through every quest that I get and to give each one its due consideration.  I will slow down the pace of leveling to truly take in all the glorious things that Blizzard has given us with both this expansion and the complete make-over of the old world.  I want to appreciate the stories that Blizzard is telling.  I’m going to be more patient in dungeons and not nerd rage over wipes or having to explain things.  I’m going to enjoy this game and all that it has to offer.  Who cares if I it takes me a few extra days to hit 85?  

14.12.10

Tower of Fizzle


Update:  In addition to the Tower of Radiance nerf, Blizzard also reduced the healing from Light of Dawn by 40%.  Full details of the patch are found on the Official WOW Blog.


This blue post on the official forums from Nethaera confirms that a hotfix was implemented today that nerfs Tower of Radiance to no longer generate Holy Power when casting Holy Light on your Beacon of Light target.

The reasoning is that by using Holy Light (an ultra-efficient, low output heal) to generate 3 Holy Power and then casting Light of Dawn was far too efficient and that many Holy Paladins were being too successful in casting only those two spells.  HL, HL, HL, LoD equals massive healing on your Beacon target.

Ok, I get that.  That makes sense.  I am not looking to have my Paladin overpowered with regards to mana efficiency.  What bugs me about this is that it is not just a nerf to our mana efficiency, but it’s also a nerf to our total healing output.  With Holy Power being generated up to three times more slowly (2 Holy Lights + 1 Holy Shock equals approximately 4 seconds vs. 3 Holy Shocks with a 6 second cooldown equals 12 seconds), we no longer get to use two of our biggest heals nearly as often without decimating our mana pool resulting in a drop to our potential healing output.

I think a simpler solution would have been to change Light of Dawn itself.  By simply changing it to no longer transfer it’s healing I think this problem goes away.  As Light of Dawn is not a terribly strong heal by itself, this change removes the temptation to cast nothing but Light of Dawn while still leaving the ability to build up Holy Power through Holy Light, which is was an excellent strategy when damage is coming in slowly.  If a free heal is causing the problem then change the free heal, not the underlying class healing mechanics.

Netaera goes on to say that the purpose of Tower of Radiance is to make direct healing the beacon target less punitive.  Now it seems like casting Holy Light itself is punitive and not worth the global cooldown nor the cast time.  It certainly doesn’t heal for much, nor is it quick enough to be worth spamming during heavy damage.  Previously, during moments of slow damage you could cast three HLs on your beacon target to get full on Holy Power and have an instant heal available for when the damage started to come fast again.  Now that you can’t do that, it seems like the only purpose for Holy Light is to make yourself look busy so that the DPSers don’t call you a slacker.

The whole concept of Holy Power seems to really be forced onto the Holy Paladin healing style.  It works reasonably well with Retribution because you have a lot of different ways to get Holy Power and you have several different ways of using it.  With Holy, it just doesn’t seem to work.  Adding the mechanic was supposed to add complexity to the spec and introduce some interesting choices with your spell selection.  I don’t think it accomplished this.  I fear that with this change they have removed what little synergy that existed between the spells entirely leaving us with many spells, none of which really work together well.  We have a bigger tool box than we did before Cataclysm, but is our class more fun or interesting to play?

Full text of the Blue Post after the break.

13.12.10

Lament for the Shieldless

I just did something unpleasant that made me feel a little weird.


First off, I dinged 83 last night on Thosif, my Paladin. That wasn't the unpleasant thing; on the contrary, leveling felt really quite good. I immediately hearthed to Stormwind and trained Holy Radiance, the Holy Paladin's new bread and butter group heal. I am really looking forward to trying that out tonight. My next post will likely be a run down of how the first dungeon with HR goes and my impressions of the spell.

The unpleasantness actually happened earlier in the evening during a random Stonecore pug run where I obtained the Prophet's Scepter for my main healing set.

"So what?" you may ask. And you'd be right. It's a nice leveling off-hand, and it's certainly a large upgrade from what I had previously. Thats not the problem.

The Expansion Gold Mine

This is the first expansion that I’ve been through where I have been at level cap and ready to go at release, and there are a lot of things that are quite different than any other time.  The crowds, for example.  There are more players in one area than I’ve ever seen before.  Hjyal was just swarming with players from both sides when I played through it.  It was hard to click on anything without accidentally attacking someone from the opposite factions.  Most quest givers were a nightmare for that… assuming that they didn’t have four or five people sitting on top of them on their gigantic flying mounts so that you couldn’t even see them much less click on them.

And then there is the money.  Oh my… the money is goooood.

I’ve never been very good at handling my virtual money, and I certainly wouldn’t call myself an auction house star or anything, but this is a once in an expansion opportunity to seriously rake in some gold.  While I'm not doing any dedicated farming or anything, I'm very happy with the amount of money that I've managed to get so far. 

During my leveling I have been trying to grab every single mining node that I can find to sell on the auction house.  The ore, volatiles and cloth that drops off the mobs have been raking in a very tidy sum for me without any large effort.  The volatiles hardly sit on the AH for more than a few minutes before they’re sold.  As well, the smelted Obsidium and Elementium bars are generating approximately 25% more than the raw ore does.  And some of the Blue BOEs that have dropped off in the dungeons have netted me a very nice chunk of change as well.  Except the Toxidunk Dagger… is that not the most common blue in the game or what?

How are you doing on the AH with the expansion?  Have you found a great market niche that is making you a ton of money that you’re willing to share?  Or are you a buyer trying to get your crafting skills maxed as soon as possible?

11.12.10

Stockholm Syndrome

I play on a very old, very full and very busy server.  It's not really surprising that there are queues to get in after a major expansion or content patch.  This time around it's been awful, however.  2000 people ahead of me in the queue and an hour wait or more is not uncommon.


What surprises me though is after sitting and staring at the login screen for that long, Deathwing is actually starting to look really cute and adorable.

Cataclys-meme response

Janyaa over at Muradin Musings posted a list of questions asking about initial impressions of Cataclysm which incidentally coincides with Blog Azeroth's current Shared Topic.  Since this blog is very new, and I'm not above cheap and easy content, here are my answers.

1. Disk or Download?
Disk. I bought the Collectors Edition on Tuesday in the late morning. More for the L’il Deathwing pet than anything. I was a little worried that I would have a tough time finding one, but my local Future Shop had stacks of them.

2. Did you experience any difficulties? IE: Login servers crashing, late delivery, etc?
No problems at all when I installed it. There was no queue on Tuesday afternoon when I logged in for the first time. I did run into a nasty bug that made the boat from Stormwind Harbour to Darnassus disappear, tho.

3. What are you doing first? IE: Speed leveling to 85, rolling a new race, completely avoiding the new content, etc?
Leveling to 85. It’s now official, my Paladin is my main. I didn’t even give my priest a second glance before beginning to level the Pally.

4. Mt. Hyjal or Vash'jir?
Hyjal. I actually meant to do Vashj’ir first, but my brain got mixed up and I ended up going through the Hyjal portal instead. By that time it was “Meh… I’m here already”.

5. Worgen or Goblin?
Both, eventually. I created the Worgen druid that I’ve been itching to create since I heard that there was another druid option other than Night Elves (eeewwwwww). The Worgen don’t look as cool as I was hoping for. I created a goblin on a different server and they look awesome! Finding a great name for a gobbo was a lot harder than I thought, tho.

6. Questing, dungeons or both?
Both, of course. With 100k xp for just doing your daily random Cataclysm dungeon, why wouldn’t you? I’ve already got some great gear out of Blackrock Caverns, and the dungeons are not nearly as hard as everyone was saying in Beta (50 Whacks with a Wet Nerf Bat). As of this writing, I am just about to ding 82 and most of the way through Hyjal. The only problem I’ve found with dungeons is being required to find the Entrance before you can queue for it in the Dungeon Finder. I love that idea in theory, but it’s annoying in practice.

7. What was the first piece of gear you replaced and with what?
My retribution set is being completely dismantled now. One of the very first quests gave me a new 2-handed green sword to replace my Tyrannical Beheader axe from the ICC 5 mans. As of now, I’m in about ½ quest greens/dungeon blues. My holy gear hasn't really been touched yet, however. I think I have only a new trinket from BRC and maybe one green upgrade.

8. Did you take any time off from work or school?
No, sadly. I had Tuesday off, but that’s it.

9. Will you be keeping the same spec and main, or changing to a different toon?
I changed my main halfway through Icecrown Citadel, so I think I’m good for now.

10. What's been your favorite aspect of Cataclysm so far?
New content is new! (I just lost the game, btw). Also, this is the first expansion that I’ve been max level for and it’s been interesting to see the mayhem that is the leveling zones. It’s amazing seeing dozens upon dozens of people all doing the same quests. The gigantic pile of bones around Baron Geddon in Hyjal was seriously impressive to see.

Introductions and Obligatory Welcome Post

Hello, World of Warcraft blogosphere.  I've finally decided to join you.

Welcome to my first foray into the blogging world, The Dwarven Battle Medic.  I'm Fannon, a raid-healin' Dwarf Holy Priest from the Shadowgarde guild on Sargeras-US.   I'm a healer.  I heal.  That's what I'm hoping that this blog is going to be about.  I hope you enjoy it.  Actually, more to the point, I hope somebody actually reads this.

<listens to the echoes for a moment>

In addition to my Holy Priest, I have Thosif, my Holy Paladin and current Main, and I am also leveling the Resto Twins, Shaman and Druid.  My hope is to have all four healing classes raiding in Cataclysm.

Now, I'm sure you're thinking "Why on Earth does the blogosphere need another WOW healing blog?"  That's a great question, and I wish I could answer that.  No answer that I can think of doesn't boil down to something incredibly narcissistic.

I hope that this blog will be at least entertaining.  I don't suspect that I will get very deep into theorycrafting at all... really, Kurn and Rohan and Elitist Jerks are going to do that better anyway.  I fail at math.  What I hope to give you is some Light Entertainment Warcraft (if anyone gets that reference, kudos), some insightful commentary occasionally, numerous spelling mistakes, and hopefully lots of jokes.

Enjoy the ride.