Sometimes I wish that I could go back to Pre-BC with the knowledge I have now about my class. I was very lucky in many senses of the word. I got into a guild that started raiding about when I hit 60, made up of mostly people who had never raided before, and as such we all learned together what raiding was about. But still, when I look back on those times, as much fun as they were, it still pains me to remember how little of a clue about my class I had.

In fact it wasn’t until Gruul that I was even aware of the concept of a shot rotation and clipping auto shots. The improvement to my dps just from knowing that, not even studying shot rotations or spamming macros improved my dps by crazy amounts. To have had that knowledge in MC…well it wouldn’t have given us more time, (Four months after we started ZG, BC came out.) but perhaps we would’ve gotten a little farther.

I was lucky to get in on a guild like this at the ground floor, and support it all the way to Illidan like I’ve been able to. Of course there are very few people from the original guild anymore, but it still feels just as friendly as it did back then. And I’m glad I’ve learned as much as I have, though this is in no way the end.

Melannie: Level 62 Human Priest (6/0/46)
Tailoring/Mining

Name origin/meaning: Melanie is a character from a story in the Universe Matthew and I created together. She is the healer at a fighting tournament.

Reason created: By the time I was in my 20s on Nabith, I already knew priests were a rare commodity. As such I picked the only healer character I had at the time, and created a priest. (Couldn’t do the blue hair, and had to add an extra ‘n’.)

Key moments:
Realizing that Gnomeragon was one of the most horrible instances in existence.
Being invited to <Order of Bahamut>.
Learning to aoe fort a group that was not my own.
Hitting 60, having been Holy the entire way.
Realizing I hated this character and rolling another priest.

Comments:
Keeping in line with Melanie, she is shy, apologetic, and aims to please. Because she was a healer, I never specced her out of Holy until Outlands. Despite shadow pwning face, I still hated the character. It’s my own fault for remaining Holy, but eh.

Currently: She is permanently stationed in Zangermarsh, making primal moonclothx2 whenever I remember. I doubt I’ll level her any more unless I get really, really bored.

Screenshots:
Tuesday: I took this screenshot because of the quote, but it’t the earliest picture I have of Mel. Considering the spells on my bar, I wasn’t even level 10 yet. (No resurrection.)
Buddies: The only way I got to instance level was my friend Jenn leveling a warrior with me. She is since then back on her own server of Elune, horde side.
Dancing: This was in Gnomeragon while our party leader was for the umpteenth time trying to find a fifth member. Later this day I swore off Gnomer and joined <Order of Bahamut>.
Melannie: I wanted a shot of her in her robes and belt from SFK, which I was very happy to get.

It’s a common theme in House. A lot of issues with treatment come up because the patient lied about something, or withheld something else important. (Either way, it never turns into anything good for the patient.) It comes down to whether or not you can really ever know another person.

It’s common practice with everyone else to put up a front. You see what they want you to see, and nothing else. Maybe because of my own honesty I tend to believe that everyone else is honest. Not like every random person I meet, but after being around someone for a certain amount of time, and talking with them, and getting to ‘know’ them, I would think that I would know something of their real self.

Most recently, I got a bit of a shock about someone that had it not come from the source it came from, I never would have believed it. After starting this post several times in my head, I was going to keep names out of it, but after thinking about it, I see no reason to.

I play on the server Kael’thas, and always have. There has been a guild on the server for nearly as long as I can remember called <Redemption>. The GM and leader of this guild was a guy named Moneyus, who when BC came out switched his main to Muneyus.

Muney is a very good people person. He always dodged my questions of what he did IRL, but I always assumed he was some sort of councilor. He gave me lots of great advice when I was looking to improve my leadership as an officer of <OOB>. I was able to talk to him about problems I was having in the guild, get advice, that sort of thing.

He was one of the few people to garner respect server-wide. When he posted on the forums, people from outside his guild would attack trolls on his behalf. He could ask questions that would get other people pounded into the ground, and get real answers.

Back in December when <OOB> was struggling toward our first Kael kill, Muney said Redemption would be in BT come January. I believed they could do it, but it wasn’t meant to be. January came and went, and patch 2.4 came and went, and I still think they haven’t downed Kael.

And then I heard Muney was turning over GM of <Redemption>. He did it in the way I’ve seen suggested on the wow forums, where you leave the guild, or just leave an alt in to keep people from still relying on you once you’ve given away leadership. He even went so far as to transfer off the server. He said he was tired of raiding, and that he needed a break.

He’s now on Antonidas, in 3/4 T6.

Why do people insist on lying?

Nabith: Level 70 Night Elf Hunter (0/28/33)
Enchanting/Leatherworking

Name origin/meaning:
Nabith is an elf traveler I created for an interactive story. You can find her character page here. I modeled the in game character off of her (sans the height, which I couldn’t do much about.) and even had an owl pet named Siffy for her first 40 levels.

Reason created:
Matthew’s roommate in college, Dan, had a hunter in Havoc, and I spent many a night watching over his shoulder as they raided. Not only that but I loved all the different types of pets he had and would try out.

Key moments:
Discovering my bow did more damage than my melee.
Walking into Darnassus for the first time.
Realizing I could not complete [Relics of Wakening] at level 9 and grinding to level 10 to get my pet.
Spending the better part of a day trying to figure out how to fish and swim underwater.
Hopping on the boat and sailing to Menithil Harbor.
Discovering the auction house.
Going back to Wailing Caverns at level 40 to catch and train a blue level 20 wind serpent.
Realizing I did not have to feign death every 30 seconds in raid in order to not pull aggro.
Kiting Drakk in UBRS for the first time.
Getting Hyacinth Macaw for 25g.
Completing my epic bow quest.
Getting my first (and only) piece of tier 2.
Stepping through the Dark Portal.

Comments:
Because she was my first character, I didn’t know much at all about the game. I spent much of my time early on exploring every nook and cranny that I could find. She’s really the character that developed from an actual incompetent newbie to a skilled raider, because she is with whom I learned it all as well. I never really got into pvp, even though I have done it.

Currently:
She is my main raiding character, and very possibly will stay that way in the forseeable future. She has been BM for a long while, but is now trying out survival for the added raid buffs. I pretty much use her only for raiding and her professions on occasion.

Screenshots:
2006-03-13 – Moon: This is the first screenshot I have, and couldn’t have been taken more than a week after I first started playing the game. Despite Darkshore’s general ‘gloomy’ feel, I was still amazed by the scenery.
2006-03-17 – Skeleton: Took this screenshot because I was amused by the skeleton that was so far off the ground. In it you can see my default UI, my owl pet, Siffy, and my non-combat pet, as well as the fact that I was doing the “waste of time” quests that had you run all over Azeroth. But then I guess since I was new to the game, seeing new places was part of the fun.
2006-04-23 – Doorway: The exploits of the recently turned level 40, with a cat I was trying out from STV. I happened across the Dark Portal for the first time, and thought it was so cool.
2006-08-23 – Onyxia: Pretty sure I’m level 60 here. It was right after the patch that put Onyxia’s model in for the Masquerade quest instead of the little dragonkin, but before they moved the pvp generals out of this room. (I was probably pvping to get the 200g off my epic ground mount.) As you can see, my bars have filled out and the UI has changed slightly.
2006-09-08 – No, you get closer…: Even though I’ve done a ton of raiding since, this was my first experience with a end game end boss. Shows my leet raiding UI, and some of the old <Order of Bahamut> members. Still remember how we were all scared that getting any closer would pull Hakkar.
2006-10-21 – Tier 2: I wanted this helm so badly, that I set a crazy record (at the time) bidding on it to make sure it was mine. It’s one of the items I’ll never de.
2007-01-18 – On the other side: Two days after BC was released is when my copy finally came in the mail. This is the beginning of my exploits in Outland.

We’d read the strats about how similar to the Maulgar fight, the Illidari Council was all about the pull, getting into position, and doing what had to be done. I don’t think I’ve ever used so many mana pots in my life, and when you hear the paladins start complaining about being oom…well suffice to say it was a lengthy fight.

Despite what other people think of this fight, I found it a great deal of fun. Of course my only job was misdirecting the pull and then running around after the paladin who is in a near constant state of motion due to all of the stuff we can’t stand in.

The fight was a lot of the same over and over. The kill attempt was not beautiful or perfect, but we all did what we needed to do. Also, it seemed that a lot fewer people died once we began calling out who was a poison target.

And at 1%, the stupid priest got off a heal, which stretched the fight on a bit more, but we held it together and finished them off.

Gratz to Lesia, Koho, and Allysa for their shiny new t6 pants. And to Kindasil, who’s giddier than a schoolgirl with his [Helm of the Illidari Shatterer].

And I had something a bit longer planned for this moment, but in light of…things, we’ll just leave it as: My Final Goal Accomplished. Now it’s just up to the guild how far we go.

So yesterday was Koi’s birthday. As a birthday present, he wanted to have a raiding marathon. As such those of us in a reasonable timezone were on at 11 server time. And after a MgT run to wait for a few more people, we headed out to Hyjal and cleared the place (sans Archi), earning some gems, three t6 tokens, and badges of justice for everyone.

Also, a special gratz to Rosalind who completely cleared himself out of dkp while in Hyjal.

At normal raiding time we went into Black Temple, (after all logging off to update Omen at the same time) one shot Bloodboil, then went and 2-shot Mother Shahraz. Oh, right, that was our first kill of her. And yeah, it’s about that underwhelming. Though I guess it was a nice change after all those horrible wipes on RoS. The video is just as underwhelming. (I’ll get it up sometime.)

However, gratz to Grianne, Azurmahn, and Lelaine on their respective t6 shoulders. (Yeah, we got one of each.) And Burdokva who got [Shadowmaster’s Boots].

So with an hour left we headed up to play with the final roadblock.

As for the misspelling, I fixed it but in truth I really didn’t give a rat’s behind. This boss exists as nothing more than a way to force you to spend extra time in the game using a mechanic that has nothing to do with skill, and everything to do with how much time you spent farming in one form or another.