Know Your Role . . . in WoW: DPS

L2DPS, when your tank is not cookie cutter spec, when your healer isn't geared, why dps SHOULDN'T be a dime a dozen!

Hello again WoW enthusiasts. Termenus, your friendly neighborhood frostie mage-tank, here once more. Today I come to talk to you about something other than my love of frost, my hatred of A-holes, nor how there should be an "of Stonard" title for the number of times my raid members took my port without looking where they're clicking.

No. Today is for people who suck at dps. No, not people who have low damage or slow "deeps" as the kids have been using colloquially. T3h sk1llz, if you will. I have been dps from day one and although I am making forays into tanking and healing, my first toon was a hunter. You want to talk about managing aggroe, talk to a hunter player from pre-BC/post -mob stats- wow. (in early WoW your pet had the same stats as the mob you tamed, effectively having an equiv level mob for help, they fixed that later) You had to pay attention to your pets aggroe and how fast you were shooting, what crits you would hit. Have you ever heard of the "two growl/sunder rule" ? I sure have.

My entire "High End/Hard Core" career has been as a frost mage and for good reason. When I first rolled a mage (early/pre-BC) I recognized them as a fun nuke with a low aggroe rotation. This was a bonus to me as I had been an aggroe magnet on my hunter numerous times in old 5-mans. I had heard numerous horror stories of dps over-aggroeing and pulling the mob, getting mass healed by the healer, getting squished because you're not the friggin tank, then getting the healer killed . . . WIPE! I felt, as a vital part of a combat unit, that this was part of the job and managment of this sort of thing was necessary.

ITS NOT THAT HARD PEOPLE!!!

When I first started raiding we had the 3 second dps lag. As soon as the tank would pull, heals would keep em up, they would get aggroe (back when 25-mans meant 3+ tanks), then after 3 full seconds raid leaders would call for dps, and they would start in. Many of us who new each other very well, and were fairly high crit dps, would even start out slow before really laying into the boss. Personally, I would wand 3 times, frostbolt 3 times THEN I would pop CD's and roll on up the damage meter.

This was during BC when tanking was a bit different mechanic and too many crits meant aggro for you and your closest friends. Sylvanis forbid you got a string of 3 or more crits, the boss would turn, stomp you down and then move on to your closest relatives and ask them "why, dear Arthas, why would you crit that much in a raid situation, did he think he was in PvP? How did you raise this child?!" And then stomp them into a gooey pulp.

Now I will be the first to admit (when asked directly, no need to tip my hand) that my dps is not as high as other equivalently geared mages (fire & arcane are still higher output) BUT! I have been doing high end content with my guild for almost something like two years now and I am always a welcome raider, from fellow dps up to our GM. Why? Cause I know my class, I know my spec, I know the fights, I listen, and I know how to manage my aggroe. Whenever I mage tank, it's by choice, or someone else missed something.
More so now then ever before any idiot can power level to 80, farm gear for raiding up to the highest content, and go apeshit when the boss is pulled.
Most dps I encounter lately don't have any indication of letting the tank get aggroe. Due to the changes made by blizzard all the the new tank specs allow mediocre tanks to hold mobs while high damage output goes crazy.
That's nice and all, but dps needs to go go the other way. Many of us like to play in weird and different ways we should strive to excel in our roles, regardless of spec. When tanks and healers don't follow the standard specs groups bemoan them and drop them, if dps is poor they just let the other Dps pick up the slack. Ooh, sure, there are 2 more in the party and there are hundreds more waiting to get in. I call bullshit.
No, what I just said was true, but good dps know how to wait to let a tank gain threat before attacking. This allows the healer some time to get the rhythm of the pull and hopefully the dps wont take any excess damage. Or if the healer is the weak role, same. So many of us are so concerned with damage output optimization, proper rotation, and jumping to the top of the recount meter. That's nice and all, to have a huge epeen/wow-wang and to watch those crit numbers roll up the screen. BUT, to me these Are the sings of someone who has gear and a spec. Woohoo, you found Elitist Jerks and made it to 80.

Now really impress me. Play your role with class. Help your tank and heals. I like to use the joke "healbot" and "shieldbot/meatshield." But most of these digs are in jest and with comradeship. Lets stop being dpsbots and start being excellent damage roles. Enrage timers make us necessary but strategy fights require us to be superb, and very few fights are Patchwerk.


Sincerely,
Termenus; Lord Of Ancient Sin - Cenarius, Mage of the Grave Chill, Frost Imp, Mage Tank Extraordinare, Crusader, Ambassador, "of Stonard," Shadoweave Tailor, Goblin Engineer

Warmth for the Cold

Oh Hai guys! Termenus here again, be right down.

Last week I told you guys how I was hanging out on the Public Test Realms, testing the changes to frost spec.

While I was there I joined 3 different guilds, saw a ton of content, new and old, experienced a couple epic stories, and experienced true joy and yet nerdrage in all its WoW glory.

Result? I'm a Frosty, and I'm staying that way, baby!

While on Broxigar, the normal test realm, I randomly received a G-invite to a "meh" guild, and felt fairly safe as an anonymous person in a semi-non-asshole-non-hardcore Guild. I was running the new 5 man Instances
( Forge of Souls[FOS], Pit Of Saron[POS], Halls Of Reflection[HOR] and you need to be attuned to POS, from FOS, and then POS attunes you to HOR. PLUS!! theres a questline that gives you an "event" in HoR. Fun dungeons, great loot, but the attunement thing is gonna be a bit of a hassle so everyone will most likely run them all a ton of times, just to finish HoR once. You get to say Hi to Arthas[AGAIN], see Frostmourne up close and personal in HoR, and you get to spend quality time with the Lady of your faction through all 3[Jaina or Sylvanis])
I never finished HoR, it was disappointing, but I had other fish to fry . . . my damage output! Although some cool stuff did drop . . . .

(That sword is called "Seethe" yes, it's a caster main hand, Aint it cool?)

I specced frost, obviously, and the only enacted changes on the PTR I saw for frost were Deep Freeze and a Glyph for Frost Elementals. (yeah, no sign of a ice lance crit making frostbolts 1 second quicker to cast.) Deep Freeze, the last talent in the mage frost tree, will now do about 2k damage to targets "PERMANENTLY IMMUNE TO STUNS." That's who? Bosses! Yeah damage output increase.
Glyph of Eternal Water makes your water elemental permanent, like out all the time. The trade off is that with this glyph your water elemental loses its AoE freeze. A detriment to PvP in almost every ones opinion. Although that is more damage in pvp, 99% of frost mages rely on that mobile/extra freeze. On top of that, you're still locked down by how often you can summon him, so make sure your not zoning in and out of areas, porting, or dying or your cooldowns will be hurting. Blizz has made changes to elemental pets to make them more mana efficient and I was pleased with my new friends performance.
I even had the idea that maybe Deep Freeze could be a DoT. I like the idea of it "being so cold it burns." But then, Blizz doesn't pay me. And with the new perm. pet some people are saying that Frost is the new Lock. To be honest, I don't care anymore. We've been so underpowered in instances for so long I welcome any change.
Although the changes did not blast me to the top of the damage meter, I saw a definite improvement and feel these changes are an awesome step in the right direction, and I will take them over nothing. I HOPE Blizzard has a bit more in development, but I think I can stand this till Cataclysm.

So one night I jumped into a pugged ToC 10 man with some real jerks and some real pro's. We wiped a couple times on Gormok, no big, communication wipes, we got it together and moved to the worms, wiped a few times as our tanks had two different ideas as to how to tank the worms. lost a few people, gained a few people. We got through gromok, used all the B-rez's at the beginning of the worms, downed the worms with 3 dead, and Icehowl hit. 1 person died from the leftover damage of the worms and there weren't enough heals to keep the lock and the rogue alive, and the priest went into spirit healer. We we're down to me, a DK and shammy healer. Cause the priest had just died we we're all at max hp when Icehwol decided to charge me, he was down to 68%. We lived. the three of us managed to down that ugly beast. After Icehowl the raid fell apart, but not to worry!

A jumped into a Black Temple PuG (great idea, right? I know.) and met a fellow "character copy" player - Crim - an Orc Fury War rocking the purple banana helm! (you know, the new one from Ony. Its a green bobba fette wanna be but all they could afford was a football helmet with a purple dildo strapped to the top. Thats how I rememebr it anyway.) He recognized a kindred spirit in me as one who was looking to actually test the new content as a realistically geared player, not some OP l337 XBox live reject who cant get gear on live realms so you rolled a copy so you can feel like you accomplished something, GET A LIFE AND STOP BEING A DOUCHE BAG AND READ THE TRADE CHAT POST, DONT ASSUME!
( i was trying to get some enchants I'd been meaning to get on live. I tried asking EVERYONE ON THE SERVER WHO HAD A PREMADE CHARACTER WHO AUTOMATICALLY COME WITH EVERY ENCHANT IN THE GAME AND A SHIT TON OF MATS!!!, and all I got was "noob, u have enchanting, duh!" I even got into group with a guy, ported to Ogrimmar and he whispers me "I know what you do" I'm like, whuh? "piss off" he says, and puts ME!?!? on ignore!?!?)
Anyway, Crim and I saw each other in action and acknowledged our "pro" gaming style. He helped me get into - The Non Premades - a guild of, you guessed it, copy characters. Started by 2 interesting female characters, fairly sure they were legit females IRL. Cool people.

I saw an increased dps in my spec, so I came back to live realms. continued to be arcane for a day, literally, then respecced back to frost, and my dps increased by about 300. Familiarity, and devotion to the spec make a huge difference.

To all you people who think Frost can not raid, a dead mage does not put out damage, and a good, alive one, can help you get through the most difficult content. Most fights are strategy fights and require movement, survivability, and technique, not just to be a glass cannon, we do that, but most frosties I know, we do it, and make it look good. Its too bad we cant put out the same numbers as arcane. I respect good fire & arc mages, but this mage is staying frost, for everything.

Common Vocabulary

As you hang around you might notice certain proclivities within my vocabulary. Today I think it might be nice to define and clarify some things that might confuse or just generally help give insight into some of the madness running around here.
Also, don't feel afraid to look up any word I use, even if you know the word, I often twist and have my way with meanings. Something I know I enjoy sharing with some of my closest friends. I.e. the inordinate amount of food metaphors for things that are distinctly NOT edible in any way.
(Me being geeky at a LAN party. ol school, no flat screens. back in HS days)

Definitions:

Geek: A self identifying term I use constantly. To me a geek is CAPABLE, not necessarily comfortable, but capable of social interaction and more often than not, enjoys it, especially when in the company of other geeks. Common interests can range from anime to movies, to music, to zoology. He (I use the male tense because frankly, its from a male perspective, but I know many female geeks, I'm engaged to one.) may not be born a geek, nor may he even realize what he is, but will more often than not become aware at some point in his pursuit of things geeky. Such as conventions, D&D, Renaissance Faires, reenactments, video games.

Nerd: In its potentially negative form, a nerd is one who is socially retarded, wallows in his outcast state and resentful of a world that does not understand his obsessions, nor his singular focus on ideas that many might find trivial.
In its more mundane definition and in both situations a Nerd is smart and often a specialist in what ever subject his fanboy heart clings to. By result, his knowledge usually surpasses that of the geek, but at the cost of being less well versed in other things.
(as this very guy would often yell at me, "NERD!!!")

Trekkie vs. Trekker: As I understand it (and I'm not sure I entirely do, as I am a Star Wars fan first, but my fiance is a ST:NG fan so I have sampled it as well and enjoyed it.) Trekkie/Trekky is someone who is a Trek Nerd. A sad creature who speaks klingon, has SEVERAL starfleet uniforms and has an opinion on who the better captain was that would rival religious fervor in the middle east. They are numerous and not to be trifled with, use caution when interacting with them. As well as be kind, they know not what they are. A Trekker is a Trek obsessed geek, very similar to a trekky in most habits and collectibles, however, will only THREATEN to cut off your head with a Bat'Leth if you disagree with their chosen captain.

Freak: A horrid beast akin to a nerd but without any redeeming values. A freak doesn't know how to wear a trench coat, wears black faded jeans with said trench coat, and is rarely a viable expert on any geeky/nerdy subject, but believes himself to be one. Often names his characters after main characters from whatever realm he cherishes at the time thinking he is the first to do so, but stubbornly refuses to be creative when confronted with the fact that several hundred have come before him. So, left to his own design forces names such as "xStriderx3285" or "neofromthematrix" upon the world. Trolls, noobs, flamers, reprobates, the filth of our sub-culture. Often they will attempt to perpetuate the idea that others believe they are actually witches/vampires/werewolves/aliens/not virgins, no matter how solid any argument is otherwise. Take the high road and either ignore them, or try to be generous and tactful in your recommendations about being less of a dick and maybe try creating an awesome character of their own. . . . . which brings me to a theory . . .

In Live Action Role Playing:
-LARP by yourself- Masturbating. But you're doing it by yourself, so no harm done.
-2 person LARP- If it's out of normal campaign progression there shouldn't be any need to dress up, SO then its naughty
As soon as you get a third person or more in on the action, SOMEBODY, somehow, one of the participants will get too into it, get a little out of hand, or try too hard and turn into a freak. Ruining the experience altogether, or worse in my opinion, making things JUST uncomfortable enough to distract from play and then letting everyone dwell on the idea that things might get out of hand.
If you can not identify who this person is, step back, asses the situation and I can only offer 3 solutions; 1, YOU"RE IT! I'm sorry, try not to reproduce. 2, you're all it, in which case cease and desist, you are a danger to yourselves and society, go play a console game or seek counseling. 3, a miracle has occurred, you managed to find an assemblage of geeks who not only trust each other, but realize boundaries, follow rules and put just enough enthusiasm into it to make the game great, but not at the expense of their real lives. Cherish this, for in my decade plus of geeky experience I have never even heard rumors of such a thing.

San Diego Comic Con 2009 Part 2

Next morning, got off to a late start. rolled down the hill, took a left at Albuquerque when we should have turned down at Timbucktoo. (If you dont know that joke, grow older by five years or more, watch some loony toons, or GTFO mah bliggity blawg!) but still rolled right into downtwon San Diago(yes, Anchorman jokes were in full swing from celeb tweets and beyond)

By this time T1nk was in full "im-late-and-i-will-kill-if-i'm-not-on-time" freak out mode, so I dropped Pievuhg and the better half at the first good looking stop, and moved my way up to $15 parking lot that was a good mile away. hopped a bicycle taxi, tipped the poor guy with a roll of quarters (do not underestimate my brokeness) and schlepped up to get mah badge.

As I was herded like an animal of the field among a multitude of other geeks attempting to get into the convention center, I began to feel that familiar sensation of elation. These were my people, and I immediately began to judge them. But elitism aside, I never feel more at ease than at a con. this is where my kind, the geek, the nerd, the outcast, the goth, the Trekkie(wow, spellchecker corrected that for me, yikes), the weird guy, the gamer, the hacker, the candlestick maker, this is where we congregate and only our own judge us, not the entire locale. And if they're our own judging us, we at least feel the comfort that, they have an understanding, and don't come of their opinion blindly but from a mutual understanding that most of us know, we're still not considered "normal." And I don't know if I'm getting soft or just have gained more wisdom, but now I often think before I pass judgment, assessing the previous thought as well as playing devils advocate for a second. A good example of this is actually from a panel I missed entirely.
(for the extended version seek out Kevin Smith Q&A from Hall H Comic Con 09, there should be a link here somewhere . . . there's a good one, for shorter, try this, But I suggest starting at the top and writing off your next 2 hours.)
Kevin Smith effectively said GTF-OFF Twihards, they are the geeks of the future, they are girls w/Vamp hard on's, WTF is wrong with you dude?"

Oh look, a tangent, never had one of those, or sarcasm for that matter *false belly chuckle* Oh ho ho ho . . moving on . . . .

Grabbed my badge for Fri, was told I could grab my badge for sat after 4 pm, was tossed a swag bag (very literature heavy, less on the swag) and really started taking in the sights (see pic, the 2 Astromech droids in the general Lobby. Fear the SW fans!) , the sounds (general cacophony with strange snippets, and of course, the smells [if you are, know, or have interacted with any sort of social deviate for longer than two days, we don't smell the prettiest, no, not even some of the girls. It's unfortunate, but we are making strides towards change[its here that I wanted to link to a flyer/handout/thing by Something Positive about using a shower at conventions specifically targeted at geeks. i.e. undress, we know it's embarrassing, get under the water, we know, its cold, turn it towards hot. use the soap, no those aren't demon creatures eating your flesh, they are bubbles, and normal, then rinse, dry, and dress again.] Unfortunately I cant find said pamphlet, if anyone else can, please notify me). I then hustled to get to some hall where T1nk was already in line even though the panel was about to get out in less than 10 minutes. To be fair, it was a Coraline panel with Niel Gaiman. while waiting for Pievuhg to recover me, (I was a bit lost, but she had explored the con the day before) I am very confident, I saw Stan Lee. I heard the voice, looked back, there was a white suit upon an older gentleman wearing glasses, all attached to a mustache, and surrounded by an entourage. Liz found me, and took me to T1nk. ( ComicCon Nazi's/Elite's are, well, doing there jobs, to them; "please stop being dicks," if you encounter one; "they are doing their job's, don't bug them more than twice, don't be dicks to them, they're trying to keep the Con form being lame. If you have a problem, join staff and fix it." gee? sounds like cops.)

T1nk was still in line and concerned we wouldn't make it into the "9" panel at hall H because, well, it's Hall H. So, I told her, as her Man-Pack for the weekend I was gonna head over there and get in line. ( I had attempted to establish a couple times, that since I would be attending Aftercon, and dragging her along, AND since she paid for my tickets for ComicCon, I was there at her whim to carry swag [ill-gotten or otherwise], supplies, and hold spots in lines)
Pievuhg led me down to the bottom level and we popped into the dealer hall. What a ridiculousness. To say this hall is large, crowded, or noisy, is to call an ocean wet. Picture a pulga(that's flea market for you non-ethnic's) and put it under a large concrete ceiling and sink it about 5 feet under street level, and you've got an idea of how this place looked.
Pievuhg stopped at the ComicCon booth (not as awesome or impressive as you might think, very simple, one booth) to buy a sexy ComicCon shirt. I took the opportunity to find, as Scott Kurtz put it, The "Penny Arcade Elbow" which he was in, and it seemed, so was most of the rest of the WebComic Industry. MC Frontalot was holdin down a Corner of the PA booth as their official . . um, something fancy sounding, as Tycho likes to do, that effectively means Front is their official Rapper. I stopped, saw MC Frontalot in the flesh. Got my copy of Nerdcore Rising signed, Front regaled me with the fact that my copy was early run copy and superior to the merchandise in front of him. I was pleased. I then rolled around to the other side of the booth and had Gabe of Tycho and Gabe sign my "I roll twenty's" Shirt with the phrase "I thought you were supposed to get better at this" If I could get Wil Wheaton to sign that same shirt, I may end my life as a geek in peace.With geek/fanboy Nirvana almost attained I unerringly head to find THE LINE TO H! Found it, stood in it, T1nk showed up, stood in it. Met two groups of people, one groovy, one annoying, none worth more note than that.

Then, finally made it into the SUB-FUCKING-LINES INSIDE HALL H!!! which are there to further torment those who have endured the outside for 3+ hours. Apparently other situations have been explored and I pray and keep myself ignorant of the truth in the hopes that Comic Con higher ups have assessed other options and find that this is the most effective.

Once inside Hall H we find that the end of the Disney Panel is underway and find seats.
Disney panel: Tons of Fun. Beauty and the Beast in 3D this coming Valentines day ( I know what T1nk and I are going too).
But the one I am really excited for is The Princess and the Frog. Oh yeah, all hand drawn, full blown musical numbers performed by the characters. Good jokes, a nod to more mature audiences than just kiddy fare, a gator named Louis who solves problems with sharp sticks and plays jazz trumpet(after my own heart, I assure you) and a Cajun firefly named Ray who thinks as disjointed and quickly as he talks. I laughed my ass off at the 3 min clip they showed. I'm seein that one. Only down sides I can think of, the first black Disney princess isn't actually a real princess from the start, and as if New Orleans square in Disneyland wasn't crowded enough already, with Fantasmic, Haunted Mansion, three or so restaurants, one of the easiest to find bathrooms, the train station, and of course The Cpt. Jack sparrow ride, sorry, Pirates.
Also, Miyazaki, or, J-colonel Sanders, was there to promote Ponyo's release in the U.S with full Dub, and was awarded the g">Comic Con Inkpot award, those things are metal, I want one. Paton Oswald came out, made the Disney panel a little PG13 with the Q&A, awkward geeks were awkward cause it was friggin Miyazaki-san, and the panel ended.

There was than a lull in between panels and t1nk and I moved up for a better seat and settled in for an awesome panel. Some dude I didn't recognized was moderating but introduced the director, Shane Acker, as well as Acker's two "mentors" on the project, Tim Burton, and Timur Bekmambetov (the director from Wanted). Hrmm . . Tim Squared helped shane, lol. And two huge names working on the movie, Elijah Wood, and Jennifer Connelly. In Short, "9" looks awesome, and even if it's not the deepest movie, it will have a crazy nifty hook and be very pretty to watch. After this panel, T1nk and I left to locate Pievuhg and wander the Con Some more.

We wandered the dealer room, apparently Amanda Palmer(lead singer of Dresden Dolls) was doing a book signing that afternoon/evening and T1nk had to stalk her, we ate Con food, and were charged too much for it.

Around 5 PM was a lil in booth concert by MC Frontalot and the Categorical Imperative (his drummer) at the PA Elbow! (see Pic above, I know, its a shitty pic from my cell phone. I will get a better phone and try to take better pictures, never guarantees.)

Finally, due to the fact my parking pass was only good till 8:30 pm, we all decided to call it a day and headed back up the hill.

S.G.I.S.Con: The Tale

" WTF is S.G.I.S.Con?!"
Sad Geek In Snow Convention. A "con" held every year in honor of my birthday at a family cabin. I invite every geek I am buddies with and we assemble in a beautiful section of the wilderness, and stay inside for the entire weekend. well, I do, usually the guests venture farther up the road to some snow and get all cold and wet then come back. good times.
I know, "wow, how pretentious, a 'Con' just for your birthday?" but, if you've ever met me, you know I have great plans, just like anyone else, big dreams. One day I hope for it to actually be a full blown Convention, dedicated to all things geeky! Well, most things. I have often complained how Convention season is in the summer, so I would prefer a winter con, especially if I am the figure head and its soul, its true con type, would be flavored by me and my friends interests.
So, a weekend long get together, by invite only, we have begun doing themes, and vague itineraries, as well as, registration fees (so we can afford food) for room and board.
Of course, being the elitist jerk I am, I wont publicly advertise this Con, but I do extend invitations to friends of friends in the hopes that it continues to be a VERY harmonious event with like minded, yet unique individuals.
So far we have had as many as 25 geeks assembled for the festivities, and I will post synopsis of past S.G.I.S.Cons. Also watch Theatreg33k who posts day by day journals of most of our trips.