Blog Azeroth Shared Topic: Hoarding and Me

The Blog Azeroth Shared Topic this week is one dear to my little hoarding heart.

World of Warcraft has added many different items for players to collect, whether it be collecting pets, mounts, transmog gear or knickknacks about the lore. This week’s topic asks what you do collect in the game and what is your prized item from that collection?

Suggested by Noahdeer of Be MoP.

I have a slight tendency to collect all things but if I break my various bits and bobs down, it probably comes out like this:

1. Gear with a primary focus on staves. This is my very first Druid, Briarrose with her Undead slaying skirt and her Grand Marshal’s stave. In fact even though I’ve hadn’t really used a staff on any end-game character since the off-hand enchant was introduced, I have bags full of them.

Erinys being my main for so long has the bulk of my clothes and weapons collection but Sprout hasn’t done too badly herself, especially with old dungeon runs. That said, my prized item of gear has to be my Benediction. I was the 2nd Priest on my then server to complete it and it has a lot of wonderful memories both of that sense of satisfaction of killing the bosses back in my first raiding days but also of the people I played along side who helped me farm for the Eye of Shadow all night.

2. Things to gank with. Gathered from a variety of sources, some from rares and some from festivals for example but over all, little silly things to brighten up battlegrounds and frustrate the enemy.

Here we can see the results of the Gin’ji knife set (that pile of meat I’m sat on happens to be Panda) and my romantic picnic basket. Oh and before anyone assumes I’m a hateful ganker, my little monk arrived in Arathi en route to the Scarlet Monastery to be greeted by this:

Okay anyone with a fragment of a brain cell may have questioned why I stayed whilst being spammed by that and personally the /chicken and /laugh emotes would have definitely made me nervous had I been in their shoes but …. they forgot the cardinal rule of world pvp, there is always a bigger fish somewhere in the shadows.

I’m tempted to say that the knife set is my favourite of these items, simply because I’d hate it to be used on me. The fact that you can use it on your own faction is a plus point too.

3. Pets/Mounts

My very first WoW pet cost me the shirt off my back, quite literally as I hadn’t found the auction house at the point but desperately wanted to buy a cat off the crazy lady with cleaver. Since then, I’ve done my best to acquire a decent pet collection. I’m also well on my way to 150 mounts, which I freely admit isn’t many by some standards but given that all my characters seem to ride the same 4 or 5 is still a little excessive.

The favourite here would be a toss up between Spike my Iron-bound protodrake (lots of happy memories of frying dwarves week in week out) and my Hyacinth Macaw, a gift from Mr Harpy who got lucky with the drop in Vanilla whilst camping some Horde in STV.

4. Achievement points. Unfortunately I’m one of those people who when shown a list has a pathetic urge to tick everything off it.

I’m also quite partial to collecting grey items, especially the ones you get from pick pocketing so have quite a few Gnome Effigies and Rag Dolls kicking around in my bank just waiting to be used for something. One day I just know they will come in handy!

Favoritism

This week, Matty from Sugar and Blood provided the Blog Azeroth Shared Topic:

A few weeks ago, I noticed logging onto some characters seemed to be more irksome than others, it dawned on me that there were a few who never, ever seemed to be a chore to play. My question is, (and yes, you need to have more than one character over level 1) which of your characters do you always look forward to “seeing?” But the real question is why? Perhaps think of this from a role playing perspective, that this character has a personality, play style and demeanor that inevitably just works. I’d love to meet them!

This wasn’t even a question I needed to think about, I knew the answer would be Sprout. I wasn’t particularly keen on Gnomes when I first started playing WoW and certainly could never see myself playing one. I wanted to play a character more like myself in Real Life than a pint sized giggling psychopath (although come to think it, remove the height restriction and ……. ). I found the males creepy and the females too doll-like but then Blizzard dropped a bombshell. When they announced Gnome Priests I knew I was going to have to dabble on the Gnomeside and somehow I fell in love.

The voiced animations are awesome, yelling /flee in a crowded bunker works so much better on a Gnome than it does on any other race, as does the /chicken emote. Sprout is happy all of the time and by extension, she makes me happy when I play her. She’s giggly and smiley and is guaranteed to find fun side in anything, even four hour statemate Alterac Valley games against the German realms. Plus, the fact that most people admit to hate being killed by Gnomes adds a certain sweetness to the pie.

Obviously her being a Priest, the class I’m most comfortable on helps a great deal. I know her abilities and her keybinds like the back of my hand. Throw me into a pitched pvp battle and I’d far rather be on Sprout than say my new Monk or a melee of any kind but she brings something to the table that my other Priests lack.

In short, she’s the me I’d like to be. Happy to be alive, carefree and not in the slightest bothered by authority. Sprout doesn’t suffer from depression or obsess about her work, Sprout isn’t a perfectionist, she doesn’t care whether she kills stylishly as long as they’re dead. She bounces through life protected by her shields and an army of mini pets.

All I want for Winter Veil is……

A couple of weeks ago the Blog Azeroth shared topic was

Winter Veil is around the corner and it’s time to sit upon Greatfather Winter’s lap and answer the important question, “What do you want for Winter Veil?” Is it that expensive grand expedition yak? a nice transmog custom outfit? or a Red Ryder carbine-action, two hundred shot Range Model air rifle with a compass in the stock?

What is on your Winter Veil wishlist?

suggested by Noahdeer.

Having been both a good little Gnome and a good hard working girl, I’d like my stocking to divulge the following this Winter Veil.

1. Mr Bigglesworth. As a little girl, I had my own pet cemetery moments (at least in the sense of wishing that the dead didn’t have to stay dead) and even now I still in my deepest dreams find myself wishing for undead pets. Since I suspect my childhood dog, his bones bleached white isn’t going to come tapping down the corridor, I’ll take Mr Bigglesworth as a substitute.
2. An end to Dailies. Yes I get the whole “don’t do them” argument but they are there sitting in quest logs and with reputation bars not maxed laughing at me.
3. More time to actually play. What with my commute and with my work load, time outside work not spent asleep is remarkably precious right now. At this time of year especially, there are so many other demands on those fleeting moments that I’m struggling to find any time at all in Azeroth.
4. This one basically leads on from 3. Ideally if every thing goes according to plan, in the new year, we’ll smash the nasty commute into little pieces which then will hopefully allow me much more time to do other things like finish the 100 plus drafts sitting waiting to be finalized, to possibly find a guild to do some raiding with and to complete all the other little projects sitting half done, like my Tree of Life cushion.
5. Come up with a Winter transmogrification for Sprout who is still wearing a semi matching set of PvP and PvE gear all collected from MoP and held together by a tabard of all things.

Of course I wouldn’t say no to “Peace on Azeroth and Goodwill to all Gnomes” either. Garrosh’s bloody and battered head in my stocking would be greatly appreciated too.

Seeking Redemption: A Blog Azeroth Shared Topic

The Blog Azeroth Shared Topic this week is a touchy subject for me, I’ve always been a firm believer in asking forgiveness not permission but only when caught red handed in mischief. However, in order to write this, I’ve put my “big girl shoes” on and gritted my teeth. Here’s hoping confession really is good for the soul, as suggested by Matty.

What is one thing, just one thing, you did that was pretty awful in Azeroth, that you wish you could get some kind of redemption or forgiveness for, or even just get off your chest?

First the extenuating circumstances leading to my crime.

Back in vanilla, my then guild got server firsts on everything after Razorgore (the Horde beat us to that one) but everything in the garden was far from rosy. Too many egos clashing, massive competition to top the damage metres and lots of cliques hidden amongst the raiding team. We Priests however all got on fairly well, communicating mostly through the Priest channel, the name of which we changed regularly to stop non-Priests from infiltrating. The biggest “fly” in our ointment was a former Priest rerolled Mage who thought that we “healers” existed to serve, nothing more and who set about orchestrating  a campaign with the Guild leaders to prevent amongst other things healers rolling against dps alts on dungeon drops that no main wanted on our Molten Core/BWL fun runs. Things came to a head one BWL where our GM (who ruled with a rod of iron) was catnapping with the intention of logging later for AQ40. In his absence, the one healer who was an officer lead the raid and awarded Mish’undare to a fellow Priest. Now everyone’s favourite Mage ignored the war raging in guildchat and took the step (too far) of phoning the GM at home who promptly erupted on-line and proceeded to read the riot act. DKP was threatened and even I (usually considered immune to the yelling) ended up on the receiving end of furious whispers because I had done nothing to stop the “crime”.

The Priest Officer turned first to shadow before vanishing in the dead of night, having “mislaid” the guild bank and the rest of us were under scrutiny and house arrest by the rest of the guild. We in turn, reacted like the children we were currently being treated as. Rank 1 fortitude buffs on certain people and lots of “accidental” deaths on Nefarian during the Priest call topped the bill. However my sin came a bit later when still smarting from the fall out I happened to be spending a lazy afternoon on-line  picking herbs in Felwood and chatting away to a range of people including a pvp hungry Horde Druid who had logged his Alliance alt for some ganking gossip. Our server had a fairly small community and the news of rebelling Priests had spread like wildfire, after all, no other guild wanted to be “infected” and so once we’d covered the latest who ganked who news we moved straight to the events of that BWL. Some how I found myself breaking my own cardinal rule and the identity of a certain Mage fell from my lips like cherry blossom petals from the tree. Naturally my Druid buddy excused himself from the conversation a few minutes later and logged off, I continued picking flowers and waited to see what happened next. It didn’t take long, soon Mr Mage was complaining about being ganked by a 5 man group including a particular Druid. In all, he died five or six times before the cavalry reached him.

I didn’t give his location but then I didn’t need to, the Druid was perfectly capable of using the /who function but that doesn’t mitigate my crime. As soon as I started typing I knew what would happen, after all Druids were in a similar boat to Priests, having to fight to be accepted as something other than healers and more importantly I knew that this particular Druid would be happy to avenge me.

In closing, I’m not in the slightly bit sorry that the Mage got ganked repeatedly and from that moment forward had a target painted on his back but I do regret the fact that I sunk to his level, that I got into bed with the Horde to get revenge.

 

Edit: Mr Harpy made me add this bit which is probably the worst part. We ended up being part of the rescue group because the guild had to stick together and all and despite said Druid emoting /love at me, when my GM charged him I had no choice but to play my part as a good little Alliance healer. In short, not only did I get a Guildmate ganked against my own “principles”, but I played a starring role in the corpse camping of my Knight in shining armour because I didn’t have the guts to admit that it was all my fault in case my DKP got wiped.

Blog Azeroth Shared Topic: The Rules of Me

R is for Rules amongst many other things.

I almost passed on last week’s shared topic, suggested by Matty, partly because I felt there are some potential grey areas in my rule set but after giving the matter some careful consideration I realised if you bend, you tend not to break.

So without further ado,

The Rules of Me: What are your personal rules you wish others would know about you?

1. Whether it’s professionally or personally, I expect honesty from others and in the spirit of my Grandmothers I give what I get in return. One of these days the people I deal with in a professional capacity are going to catch on to this and my life will become so much simpler.

2. As far as PvP is concerned I hate the other faction with a passion usually reserved for inconsiderate drivers (yes, you….. the idiots who hog the “overtaking” lane for 20 miles doing 30 in a 70 because you can’t handle changing lane and you plan on turning right at some nebulous point in the future) and soggy Brussels sprouts. I will put my faction first and if that means healing that jerk who is constantly mouthing off on the realm forums and that everyone hates rather than let some annoying spit spamming male Goblin Hunter (you know who you are….) kill him, well sometimes sacrifices have to be made.

3. The phrase “Lose fast” turns me into a monster determined to ensure that we do the opposite. Losing five nil, no problem I’ll go and tag a couple of nodes behind their back to prolong the agony. 2 flag caps down and being graveyard camped, utter that phrase and I’ll be hiding on their roof with their flag or killing their flag carrier who is unescorted because the rest of his team are sitting on the corpses of the “lose fast” brigade. I might be on the aggressive side of competitive but I don’t understand the mentality of people who participate in games which keep score without trying to win.

4. I’m fiercely loyal to those I consider friends and of course to my family as annoying as they are. In fact the vast majority of times I’ve lost my temper in-game have been because of insults or blame wrongly apportioned to those I care about (blame rightly apportioned is a completely different story :p).

5. I’m a thousand times harder on myself than anyone else could ever be. Thus attempting to be mean to me is basically wasting your time. My inner demons have already gleefully yelled it in my head whilst leaping up and down on what’s left of my self respect.

The Sinner in Me: A Blog Azeroth Shared Topic

The shared topic this week was suggested by Noahdeer of Be MoP.

We all know of the Seven deadly sins (Wrath, Greed, Sloth, Pride, Lust, Envy and Gluttony) and we all succumb to aspects of them at one time or another, but is there one particular sin that affects you more than the others when you play World of Warcraft? 
Are you a bit too prideful about your armor set? or Do you look upon someone with envy when they have a piece of armor that you don’t have yet? 

My downfall has to be Pride (and not just because I happen to love this picture):

Pride by Erte from his series on the Seven Deadly Sins

If you’ve never seen his work before, it’s definitely worth a look.

In both pleasure and business I have a driving need to be good at whatever I do. Partly perhaps because in WoW, I tend to play healers and in the real world, mistakes at work could have horrific consequences for those I’m supposed to be helping. It’s not that I think I’m better than everyone else but more that I’ve built my own mental barriers around not making mistakes and around being a fast learner. I find it hard to cope with failure or with not hitting my own admittedly high standards. After all, what’s the point of doing something if you can’t be proud of whatever you achieve at the end.

On the other hand, Sprout’s greatest sin has to be Wrath… usually brought on by people who spam “Lol let’s lose fast” or turn up to pvp in the equivalent of a lovely red dress and then whine about the healing. It makes her see red very fast and everyone who has ever played on a pvp server knows that red=dead. It’s just a shame you can’t always apply that to your team mates. This ties back in with Pride, because I (through Sprout) get angry that my team aren’t even attempting to play properly and are effectively making me look bad. I know that’s a slightly screwed way of looking at things but the habits of a lifetime are hard to break, especially when they help get you promoted.

Blog Azeroth Shared Topic: I believe!

Last week’s shared topic caught my eye for a number of reasons but I’ve been so distracted I failed to get a post written in time. However that nagging desire to put pen to paper refused to go away so better late than never, here’s my contribution.

Canon refers to the actual events and characters that exist in a fictional world. Headcanon refers to any situations or characters that are imagined by fans of said fictional world. Sometimes they are silly, like the fact that Garrosh’s favorite treat is lemon squares. Sometimes they are serious, like positing that tauren store grief in the lungs. For my writing, I’ve come up with a lot of headcanon. Got a theory about a torrid romance between your favorite auctioneer and the patrolling guard? Given any thought to where mounts and pets go when they aren’t summoned? Do you know how your characters do their laundry, or what Baine Bloodhoof does in his free time? What are your headcanons, and where did you get the idea?

Suggested by Akabeko.

Long before I actually rolled a Gnome, the Longberry sisters fascinated me. I used to follow Bimble around Ironforge buying apples from her as an excuse to engage in conversion.

With time she and her sister Ginny morphed from being innocent fruit and reagent vendors into something slightly more sinister in my head. Instead of just helping the inhabitants of Ironforge get their vitamin D, something they clearly need large amounts of since they live underground, Bimble and Ginny are actually Gnomish spy-masters in the pay of SI:7. Shipments of fruit come in from all corners of Azeroth and hidden within the crates of sour green apples and heavy moon harvested pumpkins come reports of troop movements and blood stained battle plans. So if you happened upon the right code word next time you buy your juicy pomegranates straight from the Twilight Highlands, who knows what information might fall into your hands. Of course the consequences for messing with such things might be lethal, after all everyone who has ever read Christina Rossetti should know the perils of purchasing fruit from small creatures.

Come buy, come buy:

Our grapes fresh from the vine,

Pomegranates full and fine,

Dates and sharp bullaces,

Rare pears and greengages,

Damsons and bilberries,

Taste them and try:

Currants and gooseberries,

Bright-fire-like barberries,

Figs to fill your mouth,

Citrons from the South,

Sweet to tongue and sound to eye;

Come buy, come buy.”

from the Goblin Market by Christina Rossetti.

I’ve also been running Violet Hold quite a bit recently. On Sprout I still needed to kill Moragg and since I went to school with a girl called Morag who I didn’t particularly like for a number of reasons, I really wanted to tick that off (to be fair, I was far nastier to her than she was to me, including “poaching” the boy she liked in 5th year by making sure he danced the last dance of our summer ball with me rather than her. It later turned out he was afraid of dogs so that relationship really didn’t work out but that’s another story).

One thing has always bothered me about the Violet Hold. What crimes did these “dangerous” prisoners commit? Can they possibly have topped the terrible things that we the player base have done and if not, why are we swanning around in the Kirin Tor’s tabards whilst they languish in magical prison cells. Thus to sway my own guilty feelings, I started coming with possible offences for these monsters.

This chap above for example might not look particularly ferocious when trapped behind a forcefield but meet him face to face and you’d soon be singing a different tune. His line of “Free to–mm–fly now. Ra-aak… Not find us–ekh-ekh! Escape!” is purely diversion, he doesn’t want to escape, he wants to eat your face with a side order of salted eye chased down by a pickled egg.

Moragg might look like a typical demon, the sort of thing you warlocks can make friends with these days, but secretly it loves nothing better than watching people get down and dirty. This was going fine until the demon happened to come across this:

The tiny gnome peered over the railing into the secluded Dalaran courtyard.
“The view from the balcony is amazing.  You have to come see!”
Armor legplates creaked as Marcus walked over, taking in a deep breath as he absently scratched his scruffy chin.
“The Hero’s Welcome is no slouch.  And there’s something in the room that might interest you.”
Tavi bounded into the room, pausing only a moment before jumping onto the massive bed.

from A Steamy Romance Novel: Northern Exposure

What happened next had a profound and rather disturbing effect on the poor creature. We’ll never know what exactly caused the outburst but once the demon was distracted (you really don’t want to know how much blindweed that took), the body count was in the hundreds.

I actually spend far too much time coming up with stories both for my own characters and those they encounter. I suppose I feel that all of them, from the one line baddies we slaughter on a daily basis to the passing NPCs deserve a story of their own and without the words to sing it themselves, we need to tell for them.

We all scream for icecream: A Blog Azeroth Shared Topic

The shared topic this weekend is all about icecream,

It would not be uncommon to hear about the initial release of World of Warcraft as Vanilla or Classic. In terms of ice cream or gelato (which is my preference), Vanilla was once considered the most popular flavour of it’s time. So if Vanilla represents Classic WoW, what flavours could represent the following expansions?

Suggested by Cymre.

I struggled a bit with this, going backwards and forwards through the freezer section trying to make up my mind.

The Burning Crusade –  Rocky Road Icecream

When we arrive in the Outlands, it’s most definitely a rocky road through Hellfire and onwards into the other zones. Everything is crumbling just like the crushed biscuits and there are definite soft and gooey spots to represent the marshmallows, the Black Temple for example was a favourite of mine. Unfortunately, just as with Rocky Road the icecream, there are also glacé cherries like Lady Vash’j, the bits you want to avoid but can’t really.

The Wrath of the Lich King - Honey Lavender Icecream

Slightly sickly with a touch of purple is how I’d best characterise Wrath. Whilst Ulduar and the revision of Naxxamas were fine, as is honey lavender icecream at least for the first few mouthfuls, as the expansion wore on, the vomit inducing stickiness increased. By the time Cataclysm rolled around, I suspect most of us were happy to wash our mouths out with something new.

 

Cataclysm - Lemon Icecream

With a hint of sourness but a refreshing after taste, Cataclysm cleansed the palate from the aftermath of Wrath (and the tournament shenanigans in particular). It might not have been the most popular expansion yet but it brought a revamp to Azeroth which was needed.

Mists of Pandaria - Margarita Icecream

Whilst we were in San Miguel de Allende, I had the most amazing Margarita icecream. There was just a bite of tequila on your tongue before it softened into the taste of lime and sugar. I could have eaten the entire tub it was so beautiful and standing on the cusp of MoP, that’s how I see the forthcoming expansion. It had that same freshness, that same excitement on the tastebuds and that same sense of wonder I feel now as I prepare to step into Pandaria for the first time (beta not withstanding).

Why I beta test: A Blog Azeroth Shared Topic

The shared topic over at Blog Azeroth this week is:

Are you playing the MoP Beta? Why or why not? How much time are you spending there vs. the “live” servers. 

suggested by Frinka of Warcraft Street.

I’m one of those people who hate surprises, partly because I’m a total control freak and partly because I have rather expressive face. Birthday parties used to be a nightmare as I’d try and rearrange my features into something resembling a smile as I opened yet another bunch of weird and wonderful presents from people who should really know better. As a direct result of this, I still have a bad habit of sneaking a peek into presents before they are “officially” handed out just so I know what I’m getting and can prepare appropriately.

So yes, of course I’m playing the Beta. I’m not playing a huge amount at the moment but then I’m not spending that much time in Azeroth either right now. At the start I was fairly dedicated, running dungeons, trying out the new Panda start zone and questing as much as possible however life has got in the way a bit and I’m basically playing with pet battles and pretending I’m a farmer.

The idea of having to do it all again doesn’t faze me in the slightest, I’d rather have to do it twice but know what to expect than run in with my eyes shut. Whether we like it or not, Mists is going to come rolling out and thus playing the Beta, along with reading forums/blogs and the like is the best preparation we can do.

Azerothian Floriography: The Blog Azeroth Shared Topic

This week’s shared topic is all about professions:

Professions are fun for some and a necessary evil for others.

Some of us have farming professions. Some of us have crafting professions. Some of us have a little bit of everything! Professions are leveled because they fit our style of play, help us in raiding, allow us to outfit our alts, and make us money.

What professions do you have on your main? Do his/her professions fit their personality? Why did you choose them? If you chose professions based on your character and not on gaming needs, would that change some of their professions they use?

(This can include the secondary professions of archaeology, fishing, cooking, and first aid too!)

suggested by Effraeti.

I admit to having a bit of a love and hate relationship with my professions. Some I adore, I have three Priests with alchemy for example, others especially when I was raiding felt more like something I was forced into rather than my own personal choice.

If it were solely up to me and all the professions offered the exact same bonus, all my characters would be herbalists. My first character was a Warlock and I remember running around Ashenvale on her and coming across my first Kingsblood. This plant and I looked at each other and in that brief moment I knew then that my destiny was to pick flowers.

During the rest of vanilla, my entire guild knew without looking at the guild screen that if I was online and we weren’t raiding or pvping, odds on I’d be in either Felwood or Winterspring meandering around herbing without a care in the world. Even though it was a pvp server, I was protected by both my guildtag (not because the rest of the server loved us but because they were used to us travelling in packs and had made the mistake of attacking innocent healers before only to be stunlocked by rogues) and my association with Mr Harpy. I had a couple of conversations on IRC with various Horde which went like this “Saw you in Winterspring, thought about trying my luck but thought it was probably a trap. Attack Priest, get aim shotted by shadowmelded Hunter and camped for ages for daring to attack his “precious”. Based on the fact that my beloved did once spend 5 hours camping someone it was probably a smart move and it meant that apart from the odd new player or the very brave, I got to pick flowers to my heart’s content. In fact I picked so many that despite my mana pot addiction, at the start of the next expansion I had a stockpile to use up.

When the Dark Portal opened and flight form was introduced, I switched herbalism from my Priest to my Druid and have been flying around pulling them up in my beak ever since.

Of course the ability to disguise yourself as a herb has to be one of the best things Cataclysm added to the game. I keep a large stack of these on me at all times. Attempt to pick me at your own risk however.

I find it particularly relaxing, put some music on and then just fly around. Some of the herbs have beautiful names, others amazing graphics and some have both. I particularly like Netherbloom because it’s sort of a creepy venus fly trap, reaching out every so often and snatching up that little purple glow.

As a child, I loved reading the Latin names of plants (in fact when I was about 10 and thought that having children was something you had to do, I was planning on calling a daughter Alchemilla Mollis, the formal name for Lady’s Mantle.. ) and have lots of books on botany and herbs, influenced perhaps by the fact that the three most important women in my life when growing up, my Mother, Grandmama and Great Grandmama were all great gardeners (well technically two of them still are).

My Grandmother is very formal when it comes to sending flowers, still subscribing to the Victorian ideas about the language of flowers, with different species and then different colours within a family giving different meanings. When applied to Azeroth, some seem fairly obvious, a bouquet of Grave Moss for example is surely the Goblin equivalent of a horse’s head in your bed. I imagine too that sending a Heartsblossom would imply that the sender can’t live without you. Others are slightly trickier to place but it could be a fun afternoon’s work figuring it out.

Herbalism is definitely a perfect match for me and with hindsight it suits my Druid more than it would my Gnome Priest. It’s easier to imagine the Druid chasing up rare species of plants in exotic lands than is to see Sprout, whose idea of weeding is probably to use explosives.