Eyes of the Beast: What Your Pet Is Really Thinking (Repost)

April 3, 2009 Pike 23 Comments

(I am reposting this since it literally disappeared off the face of my blog, comments and all, about six hours after I posted it on the morning of April 3rd. I have no idea how or why it happened, and I am sad to say that the original twentysome comments that were left on it and that I have copies of in my Inbox… cannot be recovered. My apologies for the extraordinarily bizarre mixup >.<)

Recently Tawyn got in touch with an engineer of some repute and was able to fit out her raptor, Wash, with an extraordinary and experimental communication collar. The collar recorded the thoughts in Wash’s head– thoughts he couldn’t otherwise vocalize due to the limitations of his facial muscles. She let Wash wear this collar to a recent raid on Naxxramas, and upon playing it back later she was… surprised… at what she heard…

Anub’rekhan
Giant spidery things. Great. I was looking forward to that all morning. Have I mentioned lately that I’m arachnophobic? Just a wee bit? I don’t get why all these joints gotta be scary, anyways. One of these days I’d like to raid Fluffywing Lai– OOOOOO KIBLER’S BITS GIMME GIMME GIMME AHAHA MMMMMMMM I LOVE YOU ^_^

Grand Widow Faerlina
Hey there babe. I can see why all those adds hang out next to you. Perhaps you’d like to… add me to that list? Eh? Eh? …oh come on it wasn’t that bad of a pun, now why are you flinging fireballs around? What did I ever do to you? Meh, at least you’re not a giant spider.

Maexxna
…you’ve gotta be kidding me.

Noth the Plaguebringer
Ugh I’m glad I’m out of that spider zone and we can move on to something slightly more normal. This guy here, looks like a normal tank’n’spank. You know, like the good ol’ times. In fact I… OHCRAPSKELETONS

Heigan the Unclean
WHOO you can smell this guy from a mile away. Hasn’t taken a bath in weeks I’m sure. As for dancing, I’ll show you how it’s OHMYGOSHDISEASEGETITOFFGETITOFF ahhhh… that was a close one. Okay, now for my dance moves. And one and two and AHHHHHHHPOISONPOISONPOISON phew. Okay, at this rate, I’m never gonna be able to demonstrate my dance, so perhaps if I GAHNOTAGAINTHISGUYNEEDSAMISTERYUKSTICKER

Loatheb
Oh sure, you get all the spores and the crit. I’ll just sit here, crying myself to sleep /huff

Ooooh Cobra Strikes you say? Wellllll maybe we can work something out here…

Instructor Razuvious
So wait, I don’t get to use one of the mind control thingies? But I would be so good at it! Look at these! These are what we in the industry call “opposable thumbs”. At least, I think they are…

Gothik the Harvester
Wha… I’m on… Defensive? Huh… …huh… …huh. I feel odd.

Four Horsemen
So lemme get this straight: I just sit here, while you shoot a guy in the face. By yourself. While everyone else is on the other end of the room. I totally don’t get you sometimes. Look, I’m gonna at least go help you eat him… AAAAHHHH IT BURNS. Okay… never mind… I’ll just sit here, I guess… twiddling my aforementioned opposable thumbs…

Patchwerk
[The following occurred roughly every 1.17 minutes:] AHAHAHAH RAWRRAWR BEAST WITHIN AHAHHA I AM A GOD AMONG PETS! I’LL COME TO THE LAND OF THE ICE AND SNOW, BEAST WITHIN AND CHEW YOUR FACE OFF GO!

Grobbulus
So I know this guy is scary and all but does it really give you an excuse to keep running off to the wall? Okay, I’ll tell ya what. Ol’ Washy will take care of it. You go stand by the wall, and I’ll Claw the guy to death. K? K. Oooh, pretty green circle. *zap*

Gluth
WHOA WHOA WHOA, waitaminute. First spiders. Then skeletons. Now zombies? I don’t think so. I’m just gonna sit up here in this tube until it’s all over. Sound like a plan? …DON’T YOU DARE SPAM PASSIVE AT ME!!

Thaddius
Okay, okay, you can quit with the Passive spam already, I got the point on the last fight. Hahaha, look at you poor suckers running back and forth. More proof of the superiority of us pets and being immune to everything ^_^ Oh, right, that Heigan guy. Never mind.

Sapphiron
Okay, so this Kel’Thuzad guy who owns the place… he’s really gotta start paying his power bill. I mean, I understand the economy is bad right now, I’m a knowledgeable dinosaur, but really, when everything is covered in a, ya know, sheet of ice, it’s time to make some concessions. There’s only so far the ice sculptures can go before they get tacky, anyway. Oh, hey Sapph, ‘Ice to meet you. [Here Tawyn /facepalms]

Kel’Thuzad
Banshees now? Tawyn, my fragile psyche would like to thank you for this excursion into my nightmares. Maybe we can get Locke to come next time and I’ll take a nice long break and…

Oooh, is that KT?

…can we Bestial Wrath now? Please? Pleeeeeease?

AHAHAHA YES OMNOMNOM!

Tawyn, this looks like the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

[End transmission]

Uncategorized

I Have Never Been More Confused

April 3, 2009 Pike 12 Comments

This morning I wrote a post, posted it, got like twenty comments on it according to my e-mail inbox… (I’m sure most of you saw it and many of you even commented on it), and I come home from work and it’s completely 100% gone. It’s like it never existed. Heck, there’s even a 10% done version of it saved in my Drafts. It’s like my blog rolled itself back a day or something.

If any of you guys have any clue what could have possibly happened let me know… otherwise I’ll be reposting it later, sadly sans-comments.

*extremely confused*

rp, screenshots, Uncategorized

The Negotiator

March 31, 2009 Pike 12 Comments

So remember that post I made a while back that got tons of publicity where I said I wanted a Violet Eye title?

Well I’ve been thinking I need to clarify something, namely, my wanting of that title is purely from a Pike perspective. Tawyn, the character, from a roleplaying standpoint– is titleless. Partially because I haven’t seen any titles in the game that fit her, and partially because I don’t think she’d want a title or feel very comfortable with one. Oh sure, I’ve got Jenkins (like everyone else), and I’m gonna wind up with Champion of the Frozen Wastes sooner or later (Oculus and Malygos left… my money is on getting Malygos first… that is how much I stink at Oculus =P), and I might wear that one for a bit later down the road when not everyone is using it, but… that one doesn’t fit Tawyn either. Tawyn is Tawyn. Period.

Lunapike, on the other hand, is a different story. I view her as being not only very intelligent but also good at understanding people, particularly “fringe” groups that she can connect with on some sort of deep level as she, too, is a bit of an outcast. This is in contrast to the more acerbic Tawyn who is sort of a misanthrope to people until they earn her trust. Anyways, this was largely why Lunapike wound up exalted with the Mag’har before achievements even existed– reputation is one of my favorite forms of “passive roleplaying” (mounts and tabards, by extension, are another favorite).

So then came Achievements and with it the Diplomat title and I knew immediately that it was Lunapike’s title. Since I already had the Mag’har finished I was 1/3, and I knew from experience with Tawyn that getting Sporeggar up there isn’t that hard. So I opted to work on it after Tawyn hit 80 and the resulting initial WotLK hype died down.

I really wanted to get a level on Lunapike first before I started, so I did that, and then for the past several weeks she hasn’t set foot in Northrend. Instead, I slowly worked on getting rep with the Timbermaw and Sporeggar between doing things on my other characters. The Timbermaw one was the most tedious especially at Revered when you stop getting rep-per-kill (except for named mobs) and have to go through turn-ins, but lemme tell ya, having House on in the background while you do it makes it go a lot quicker. >.>

Sporeggar was done mostly through solo’ing the first 25% or so of Underbog over and over and farming Sanguine Hibiscus (Hibiscusus? Hibiscusaii? Haibisukasu?). The mobs in there were all still green to me as a level 71, so not only did I get some experience for my pets but I also got experience for myself– 35% of a level entirely from Underbog. Not too shabby.

My hard work culminated in this today:

It looks good, and fits her character. Passive roleplaying for the win. *nods*

Oh, one last thing (off-topic!)… if you are actually at my “physical” site, you will notice that the Sitemeter button on the right hand side of the page is hanging rather precariously close to 200,000 hits. I would like to officially extend the offer I made at 100,000 to this one, too: e-mail me a screenshot of the 200,000 ding and get a free “WarCute avatar”. Oh, and if I already owe you one (I know I’ve offered out “freebies” before on my LiveJournal), I apologize and I’ll try to get right on it >.> And my apologies for forgetting to announce the “contest” until relatively late in the game. /phail

screenshots, special, stories, thoughts

It Was Raining In Teldrassil Today

March 30, 2009 Pike 26 Comments

I’m not going to get all long-winded. I’m not going to get all sappy. I’m not going to turn this into a eulogy because I don’t think there’s a reason for it to be one.

I’m not going to say BRK was the first hunter blog I found, because it wasn’t. That credit goes to Lassirra at The Hunter’s Mark and I will give credit where credit is due. I’m not going to sit here and talk about how I found BRK at level 24ish and grew up on BRK Brand Baby Food, cause I’m sure I’ve mentioned that before.

I am going to tell you a quick story.

Today I got into an already half cleared Naxx25 PuG. Normally I bring Wash to my raids, but today I brought Locke, my kitty. Because it seemed appropriate.

Four Horsemen was the first boss we did, which made me happy cause it’s basically my favorite fight in the entire raid, and then we headed over to Noth. The raid leader said he would give away a free flask to the top DPS on the fight.

I looked around. I was one of four hunters. Every one of the others was cookie cutter Survival. Every one of the others outgeared me.

I looked down at my kitty. Us against the world. As it should be.

The raid leader asked to see the overall damage done thus far in the entire raid, as well. Someone posted it.

I got a free Flask of Endless Rage.

I’m not trying to say that I did the best DPS in the world. But I am trying to say that this wouldn’t have happened if I hadn’t stumbled across BRK and the rest of the blogosphere as a young level 20something throwing random talent points around and dying all the time. It goes beyond just DPS and performance, too– it’s about “Look at this amazingly fun class! *skips around with glee*” That‘s what hunter is.

Of course, as I think many of us sort of feel, you eventually “graduate” from the Alma Mater that is BRK-U, (though you never truly leave, of course), and that’s where the person comes in. I remember him IM’ing me when he added me to his blogroll, complimenting me on my writing. I remember shyly whispering him in game on his server and being chucked a guild invite. I remember meeting up with him in WotLK Beta and him dropping everything he was doing so he could come see if we could two-man Molten Core in the name of a Core Hound. He wasn’t shy about whispering me the second I logged into Beta every time after that, informing me that it was about time I showed up!, and the two of would begin us cracking jokes like old friends.

“Of my friend, I can only say this: of all the souls I have encountered in my travels, his was the most… human.” – Captain James Tiberius Kirk

In closing, I ask that you read my favorite BRK post of all time, ever, and then head over to the newest post and wish a friend good luck, if you would. We may not be able to read of his adventures and misadventures anymore… at least not for a while… but he is happy.

—

“Hey, Brain, what are we going to do tonight?”

“The same thing we do every night, BRK. Try to take over the world.”

screenshots, specs

It Took A Few Weeks But…

March 29, 2009 Pike 10 Comments

I’ve finally cleared Naxx! Much thanks to my guild for making room for me to squeeze in to their weekly run when I actually requested time off of work for this (I’m a dork.)

I have to admit, I was getting antsy about my lack of having done it when it felt like everyone else had. Partially because it felt like I was missing out, but also partially because I’ve been really wanting to make a “Hunter’s Guide to Naxxramas” as a sort of a spiritual sequel to my “Hunter’s Guide to Karazhan” that I made a while back. Now that I have done all the bosses at least once (and most of them, many more times than once), I feel qualified to do so. Look for that in the near future. ^_^

As for the new spec I tried out that I detailed in the last post: overall I think it worked well. I was definitely consistently somewhere near the top of DPS on the occasions where I remembered to pull out Recount (I forgot a lot >.>), and I ended Patchwerk with 3548, which beats my previous 10man Patchwerk high score of 3300ish, and is in fact a perfect tie of what I got pre-BM Nerf as a blue-clad fresh 80… yeeeah, we probably needed the nerf. /cough

I’ve been pretty solidly sold on the virtues of Improved Tracking over Improved Arcane Shot at this point; I’m a little iffy on Survival Instincts though. I think I’ll probably end up moving those two points back into Mortal Shots, or one into Mortal Shots and one into Beast Mastery cause I feel naked without that talent. >.>

And now it’s onward to countless Malygos wipes with the guild as we try to do it for the first time… oh, and trying to PuG my way through 25man Naxx. Yeah that last one’s gonna be… interesting. x_x

beast mastery, specs

Building a Better Beast Master Pre-3.1

March 27, 2009 Pike 9 Comments

It may seem a bit silly to be focusing on tweaking my spec and DPS now that we are probably only a few weeks away from 3.1 and the potential spec changes… especially as someone like me who generally takes a rather laidback approach to her own personal theorycrafting.

But I’m going to Naxx tomorrow with my guild for the first time in a while– yes, I’m actually going to be able to go with my guild this time and not have to PuG– and I want to make sure I make a good impression and am pulling my weight!

Which leads us to the spec experimentation that I’m currently in the midst of. I did opt to stay with Beast Mastery. I do want to make clear that I enjoy Marksmanship enough that I have offered, in the past, to gladly respec to it on particularly pet-unfriendly fights, such as a guild Sarth1D run I did the other week, but we’ve always managed to end up eventually clearing it without me having to do so. (Sarth Dancing For Your Pet movie in the future, perhaps?) But Naxx, I know, is pretty pet friendly overall which leans itself towards BM, which works out fine for me!

My experimentation comes from this post over at the WoW_Ladies community on LJ, which referenced this thread on Elitist Jerks, which is devoted to hammering out various max-DPS hunter specs on paper. Their suggested Beast Mastery build? 52/12/7.

Which is kind of, well, a lot different than the 53/18/0 I’ve been running with.

What this spec primarily does is swap out 15% extra damage on your Arcane Shot for 5% extra damage on all your shots– a reasonable trade, I figure– and some of the bonus crit damage for an increased chance to crit with your specials, which should in turn boost the number of Cobra Strikes procs you get. Oh, and you’ve gotta give up the Beast Mastery talent. Which I opted to do for now. Just… don’t let me go into Sholazar until I get it back, because knowing my luck, I will find Loque while not able to tame him and I will cry.

Anyways, I took that suggested spec, made one minor tweak to it (I can’t live without 2/2 Improved Mend Pet… I just can’t. >.>) aaand went and did a couple of heroics and a normal Archavon. Unfortunately I don’t feel like I got very satisfactory Recount results. Heroic Drak’theron does not seem to lend itself well to many tests other than a couple of the bosses, and this Archavon was a rather ragtag group with only one tank rather than the usual two, and as such wasn’t a “typical” battle like I was hoping for. Still, on the occasions where I was able to simply stand and pewpew, the results were promising.

Overall I think that this spec might in fact be able to squeak out a little more DPS than what I was running with before, but I’m still not entirely sure. A DPS test on paper is different than one in the field, taking your own personal gear and buffs and group composition into consideration. And the training dummies aren’t gonna work this time due to the nature of Improved Tracking and the fact that the dummies are mechanical. Anyways, I’m working for most of the rest of the afternoon but I’m hoping I might be able to do at least one more Heroic late tonight before I drag this spec into Naxx tomorrow.

…can ya tell I’m nervous? Yeah, I’m not really sure why, to be honest. >.> Maybe because it’s been a long time since I was in a raid group with people I know are really good and who I really respect. I don’t want to disappoint anyone.

Oh, and one last thing! My WoW Insider profile has caused a large influx of new traffic and, with it, several e-mails. I apologize if it takes me a while to return your e-mail. I sometimes have a hard time telling which ones I’ve replied to yet. *nods*

memes, rp, screenshots, Uncategorized

Meme Me

March 25, 2009 Pike 8 Comments

I’ve been tagged by a couple-a memes! Guntitan and Faradhim are the duo guilty of it.

First we have some questions to answer, which I’ll be having Tawyn answer in character, RP-style. That’s right, I said the “R word”. Picture yourself sitting across from her at the Pig & Whistle Tavern if you’re Alliance… or perhaps the Broken Keel Tavern if you are Horde.

1. What is your name, and where did it come from? I’m Tawyn Starshifter. That’s Tawyn to you. I dunno where it came from. Blame my parents. You can also blame them for the odd looks Night Elves give me when I do tell ’em my family name.

2. How old are you, and what is your birthday? Eh, I stopped keeping track of age a long time ago. I was born on the shortest day of the year. [Ed. note: So was I. >.> -Pike] Make of that what you will, I’ve had plenty o’ shamans tell me it’s important somehow. [Tawyn shrugs]

3. Are you in love, and with whom? [Here Tawyn makes some sort of vocalization that is somewhere between a chuckle and a snort, and refuses to go into any further detail, instead taking a rather large swig of her beverage.]

4. What is your favorite mount, and why? [Tawyn seems to open up more at this question.] I’ve a Palomino stallion named Chip– fiesty bugger, you’ve gotta have a firm hand and a firm heel with him. But he’ll take you anywhere, and fast, once you’ve shown ‘im who’s boss. He’s got a fire in ‘is eyes, the likes of which I rarely see in citybred horses these days.

Of course, horses ain’t got wings, but I’ve a… companion for that. His name is Spirakistrasz… I call him Sparks though. He doesn’t mind. [Tawyn grins.]

5. Do you prefer a certian type of Azerothonian meal, and where do you get it from? I’m really not that picky, but lemme tell ya, they make a mean meal in the World’s End Tavern in Shattrath. Have you ever been there? Worth the trip through the Dark Portal just for this roast they have sometimes. Hey, tell ol’ Shaarubo that Tawyn sent you… he might get you a discount.

6. You know those giant mushrooms in Zangarmarsh? What is your theory on how they came to be, and why they are so huge? Things are supposed to make sense up there? [Tawyn laughs good-naturedly.] You couldn’t get me to go back there anyway. Well, except for the World’s End, but I think we’ve already established that.

7. If you saw the Lich King walking towards you, what would you do? Shoot him. [Tawyn chuckles then quiets down.] I dunno, he’s a force to be reckoned with. I’ve faced a lot of things in my day, but… yeah. I suppose I’d shoot him.

8. (Dav added this one) Be honest, how many times have you used the Grizzly Hills outhouse without any real reason? Not even going there.

—

And Faradhim’s meme is to post screenshots from when you were much “younger” in this World of Warcraft. Now I’m such a screenshot junkie and I’ve got so many of them that it was hard to really narrow it down, so I’ll just toss up a few random ones I’ve found…

Working on Solo’ing Deadmines with Tux. I believe I mentioned how I used to attempt this every couple of levels until I finally cleared it at 41. Since then my personal record has been lowered to 36.

Creepy Pentagram Kids from Goldshire wandered into Stormwind. I was really confused. Yes, that is Wash. Of Heigan Dancing fame.

Just enjoyin’ the fire…

I went exploring and wound up in Brill, in the heart of Horde territory. I was sure I was going to die as I stood next to the Undead fishing trainer and calmly pulled out my own bait and tackle…

Darkshire quests were hard. (Mor’ladim, anyone?) Here I am doing them with the boyfriend. This is right about the time I stumbled across hunter-blogs online; anytime people mentioned ravagers (the “in” pet at the time), I assumed they were talking about the big wolves that attacked you in these parts.

Possibly the oldest screenshot I’ve got. I was level six, in Goldshire, 31 copper and a handful of abilities to my name– got in bed to log out (it just felt right to do that) and had a gnome inform me that I was in his bed. It amused me.

I was struck by the simple beauty of flying across Darkshore at night…

…or sunset.

Okay, that’ll do it. I tag whoever wants to give either (or both) of these memes a shot!

Uncategorized

Interviews

March 24, 2009 Pike 21 Comments

At some point today– I’m not sure when– a “Fifteen Minutes of Fame” article about me is scheduled to be going live on WoWInsider. This is terribly ironic to me for two reasons, firstly, I have to confess that I really don’t like being linked to on WI, so the thought of being interviewed by them is quite terrifying, and secondly, I’ve no idea what about me would be so interesting! Other than perhaps my WoW-on-Linux tendencies, which we didn’t touch on in the interview.

I also find it super ironic that I get WI’d on a weekly basis, that my sisters have been WI’d (they were the ones who made the pompoms), and that my boyfriend writes the warlock column over there. Considering that two years ago I wanted absolutely nothing to do with this game (long story), it’s all crazy, I says!

However, I did agree to go through with the interview, mostly because as far as I’m aware it means someone out there is interested in hearing about me for whatever reason, and I wanted to oblige! So… if you’re curious, keep an eye out over there for the impending article. And leave me kind words, if you’re feeling so inclined… I’m super nervous about it.

And now I head off to… another interview. A job interview. Yes, I am in the market for a new job, one that won’t make my allergies go haywire and one that will align itself with my World of Warcraft schedule better than my current one does. Yes, that is a motivating factor. Yes, I am a geek. Guildies, I do this for you. /salute

thoughts

When We Were Young

March 23, 2009 Pike 19 Comments

I had an interesting revelation the other day when I realized that we were now about four months into Wrath of the Lich King. See, I began playing four months into Burning Crusade, myself. Back then everything was brand new for me despite the number of 70s running around. It got me thinking about how maybe a lot of the lowbies I see running around these days… aren’t alts after all, as I tend to assume they are by default.

It occurred to me that there was, in Burning Crusade, some nebulous point where the guard changed. A point where I went into Molten Core with 39 other people about about 30 of us had never done it before. (To be fair, some of the people there had, in fact, been playing in Vanilla WoW, they just weren’t raiding.) It makes me wonder if we’re going to see a similar trend in WotLK. How much longer until I tell people “this boss is just like Romulo and Julianne” or “This boss is just like Gruul’s” or “This boss is just like [some level 70 heroic boss]” and people have no idea what I’m talking about? Or perhaps we won’t get to that point this time because the raids in BC were, in general, more easily accessible than they were in Vanilla WoW?

I’m not trying to say to say any of this is a bad thing, by the way… I’m just pondering. And wondering how many people out there are experiencing this world for the first time.

I’ve been feeling kind of rushed lately in the game– a rush to clear all the available content, a rush to finish turning my blues into purples– and whenever that happens, as it inevitably will every so often, I have to sit back, take a deep breath, and play alts for a while to recharge my batteries.

Lunapike is grinding Timbermaw rep on her quest for the “Diplomat” title. The Winterspring music always gets me all nostalgic for some reason.

Tamaryn is doing the Karazhan key quest. Oh come on, did you really expect me not to? =P

Tawyn is relaxing in Stormwind. The content will still be there later. Just like the Burning Crusade stuff was all still there when I finally set foot into it a year and a half after everybody else did. I didn’t care back then that I was so late to the party, why should I care now? Remember when you were just a wee baby WoWer? I’m sure the game wasn’t always about achievements and loot and progression for you.

Perhaps sometimes it’s worth it, sometimes, to look around at the young’uns and take a page from their book.

…or at least to crack jokes with your significant other about how someday you’ll be able to tell your kids things like “Back in my day they didn’t hand you your mount outside of Northshire Abbey! /waves cane” >.>

guides, movies

Heigan Dancing Lessons For Your Pet (Movie Included)

March 21, 2009 Pike 23 Comments

Couple things before I post the movie on this:

1.) Beast Masters have it easier. Improved Mend Pet for the win.
2.) I make no apologies for my cluttered UI…
3.) …or the super campy music. =D

This is my first try ever using the YouTube annotation feature so let me know if you have any problems with it. And now our feature presentation:

I would like to extend a special thanks to < Song of Chu > for letting me raid with them this week, and FRAPS a Heigan run with them (and extra credit for trying so hard to get me to defect from my guild and join theirs… ;P)

Aspect of the Hare