Stressed For Time

A new Experiment

2009-01-05T02:11:00.000-08:00

Brahmos is currently doing well at 80, doing a few heroics, getting geared up for naxx. In the meantime I tried playing on a pvp server again - to my utmost frustration.

Anyways, I got tired of being aimlessly killing stuff. For a few days even, I did not play anything. Just taking it light. But , WoW is a fun game and you feel like playing it again.

On top of that I am an altaholic ( people who like alts). But one of the things I realized is that I did not have a high level human alt ! Here's my high lvl toons :

Brahmos lvl 80 Night Elf Hunter
NeverHere lvl 70 Dranei Shaman
TheDoctor lvl 44 Dwarf Priest
RedCat lvl 45 Blood Elf Warlock

No Human ! So, I decided that I would want to roll a human. Then, to give myself a challenge, I decided that it will be on a server where my main is not - as I want to see how much money I can make.

The choices I had were : Warrior, Priest, Paladin, Warlock, Rogue.

I decided on the Paladin. Humans and Knights kind of fit together than anything else. So, I rolled 2 alts on the RP (role-playing normal) server 'Cenarion Circle'. One is going to be the main - which I named BlackPal - kind of giving a dark feel to a knight. And the other I named as DarkBank ( as in the bank I will have). Following screenshot shows the 2 characters.

Day 1 : BlackPal

The bank also I made a paladin as I don't want to be lured into playing a different class ;)

The first thing I do after this is to strip off the clothes. No, I am not a pervert, just that the initial clothes are of no use. Paladins wear 'mail armor', but everything you get is 'cloth'. So, removed all that and vendored it off. The character screen now looks like the following - empty.

Off for the quests and dinging is quite easy. Following is the first ding on the character.

At this point, I have enabled very few addons. Just enough to get me by. The following are what I am using as of now :

Quest Helper
Titan Panel
AutomatiX

Now Blackpal dinged lvl 5. Time to get professions. As you can see, I have been gearing her up with drops and quest rewards.

Level 5

In the meantime, she has been killing wolves and kobolds, gathering Mily's grapes and Red Bandanas from the thugs in the forest nearby.

Level 5 means that now the character can learn ... professions ! OnWards towards Goldshire and Stormwind.

Since one of the aims I have is to make lots of money, I am going to go with 2 gathering professions. My choices are skinning and mining. I was wondering whether to go herbalism and mining - but since one can only track either ore veins or herbs, i took skinning and mining.

The remaining money will get me the secondary professions - first aid, cooking and fishing.

Updates of blackpal will keep coming. Wait for future adventures. :)

Epics for hunters

2008-12-23T11:27:00.000-08:00

My Needy List

From Heroics

Drake Mounted Crossbow [ Utgarde Keep : Ingvar the Plunderer] - got it -
Interwoven Scale Bracers [ Nexus : Keristrasza ]
Handgrips of the Savage Emissary [ Voilet Hold : Cyanigosa ]
Leggings of the Stone Halls [Halls of Stone : Sjonnir the Ironshaper ]
Sovereign's Belt [Utgarde Pinnacle : King Ymiron]

From Reputation Grinds (need to be exalted)

Polished Regimental Hauberk [ Argent Crusade ]
Boots of Twinkling Stars [ Kirin Tor ]
Oracle Talisman of Ablution [ The Oracles]

From Raids (once heroics are done and I have time for raids)

10 man Naxxramas

Collar of Dissolution [Anub'Rekhan]
Rust Spiked Gauntlets [ Grand Widow Faerlina ]
Wraith Spear [ Maexxna ]
Bands of Anxiety , Sealing Ring of Grobbulus [ Grobbulus ]
Arc-Scorched Helmet [ Thaddius ]
Accursed Bow of the Elite , Cloak of Darkening [ Instructor Razuvious ]
Spectral Riders's Girdle [ Gothik the Harvester ]
Pauldrons of Havoc [Four Horsemen Chest ]
Tresspassers's Boot [ Noth the Plaguebringer ]
Tunic of the lost pack [ Heigan the Unclean ]
Loatheb's Shadow [ Loatheb ]
Cloak of Mastery [ Sapphiron ]
Gem of Imprisoned Vassals , Nerubian Conquerer [ Kel'Thuzad ]

List from the amazing Kalibaan's Loot List

Brahmos 80 !

2008-12-22T03:24:00.000-08:00

Whew ! finally at 80 !

in the meantime I have...

Tried to be an Orc

Worn Murloc

Ridden a Dragon

Been in the presense of the Lich King

Fought with my darker self

Become a prowler

Jetpacked as a Golem

Infiltrated a Cult

Been in an epic battle where the Horde fought with the Alliance

Ridden a drake

Been Dwarfed

Showed the way to a bear god

Skateboared a croc !

Phew !

An Epic Thread !

2008-12-21T01:08:00.000-08:00

oh boy ! some people have a great sense of humor !

Blizzard started putting ads on the forum of World of Warcraft, and the result is this epic thread.

Rise Up Sons of the Horde

Absolutely a work of genius !

Happy Holidays !

2008-12-19T01:45:00.000-08:00

still 3 more levels to go before Brahmos hits 80 !

fufufufu flying machine !

2008-11-23T12:13:00.000-08:00

Finally Brahmos has got his Turbocharged Flying Machine.

The mats had all been created much before. Now, with the expansion available, engineering was easily levelled to 375, and a quick hop to shadowmoon valley, and presto. Riding his own TFM.

Can you see the hulla doll on the dashboard ?

TurboCharged Flying Machine

A Duel

2008-11-23T05:51:00.000-08:00

Just a normal day for running errands and getting some gold. Or so thought NeverHere as he went into Auchindon. Having given the bones he had gathered to Ramdor, he started back when he was suddenly surrounded by a few of the horde. A BloodElf priest, a Blood Elf paladin, and a Taurean warrior. Supposedly here to enter the dungeon, but while they waited for their other members to come, they thought that a Dranei Shaman was easy picking.

The priest was unusually arrogant even for her name, and challenged the shaman.

The shaman looked her over, he did not want to duel. He just wanted to go on with his quests. But there was a snigger in her which stopped him. So, he accepted ... and lost the duel. This got him mad. He had not used his totems properly.

So he challenged the Blood Elf.

The bloodelf laughed and took the bait.

This time the totems were doing their masters bidding. The tremor totem broke the fear scream used by the Blood Elf. That was it. The shaman had the upper hand, and before the elf knew it, she was down and had lost the duel.

Neverhere laughed.

The blood elf wanted another duel to avenge the fall of grace in front of her friends. The friends started to buff her up.

Never had enough. Those turncoats would use everything to win - there was no honor in that. He left, back to his questing and getting the experience needed which would allow him passage to northrend.

Damn. That achievement felt good !

2 DeathKnights on a Realm

2008-11-21T20:47:00.000-08:00

I first transferred a DK from Aman'thul to Saurfang. Currently Aman'thul is one of the realms where you can get free transfers. Then I created another DK character on Aman'Thul, but the server is usually full. So, twiddling my thumbs i thought... "what would happen if I transferred this character too?"

And the result is above. Both the DKs had the same name, so the move has changed the name into something stupid.

Into Northrend !

2008-11-18T02:00:00.000-08:00

Phew ! Finally got the client upgraded to WoTLK ! :D :D :D . Once the download finished in the wee hours of the morning, it again applies the latest patches (3.0.x) .. and off you are.

The starting points are 2. The Borean Tundras , and the Howling Fjord. Brahmos was impatient to be away, so he took the portal from Shattrath to Stormwind, and Onwards ho! to the newly commissioned Stormwind docks.

At the Stormwind docks .. waiting with fellow adventurers.

Outside Valliance Keep. Notice the attakers from the sky beyond.

Attackers in the Mist. One of the many environmental effects added with WoTLK

A huge Mamoth. The scope of everything is huge - be it the locales ( already 4 fps in BT), or the lifeforms

You get to ride a Mamoth ...

... a death knight's charger ...

... dragons ...

... And help the dragons rescue hostages high above the ground ...

Soon after touching 71, Brahmos wanted to rest, and as they say the empty mind is a devil's workshop ... which gave birth to a lvl 55 Death Knight, under the tutelage of the Lich King.

The Lich King instructs the new apprentice.

I am still not sure which race would be good for the DK. I am on a PvE server, so I can roll either a horde or an alliance DK. Here, AtomicKnight is a BE DK.

91% Done

2008-11-16T10:18:00.000-08:00

I don't think I will get time tonight to step in WoTLK :(

Installing WOTLK

2008-11-16T00:39:00.000-08:00

Yipee ! I got the CD Key for WoTLK. The gaming industry usually neglects Indian market - probably because there is thriving piracy and also most indians do not play a wide variety of games. I know people who have not played anything other than Age of Empires or Quake. Sad.

So, obvoiusly, I did not have much hope for getting the WoTLK expansion until Blizzard allowed digital upgrades. But then I thought about a cousin of mine who plays on Andorhal, and pinged him. He willingly got the CD for me too, and sent across the key. Its great to have elder brothers :)

Added the key and then tried to upgrade the client from http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/lichking/download . This downloads a 1.1MB installer and you can download it from there.

Initial tries last night resulted in errors. Frustrated I gave up. One of the drawbacks about upgrading the key is that you can no longer play WoW in BC until your client has been upgraded. That left me in the lurch.

Error : Failed to read information from the Internet. Please close all applications and try again.

Then today morning I tried again - and viola ! It started to download.

WoTLK Installer. Notice the arrows on the installer. From that you can read the story of the lich king, about how Arathas became the Lich king.

Now, keeping my fingers crossed and waiting for the install to finish...

full queues

2008-11-14T19:08:00.000-08:00

The place i live in (Pune) is pathetic when it comes to infrastucture. Currently we have 10 hours powercuts everyday - starting around 9am - to 7pm. So, whatever little time i get, I want to play - but when i log in, i see the above queues !

IF Blizzard is so proud of their technical prowess, why don't they create a universe which has everyone logging onto the same realm? EvE online does it, why can't World of Warcraft ?

Realms Down - 2 days in a row

2008-11-12T07:18:00.000-08:00

WoW ! This is getting bad. The servers seem to be continuously down from last evening...

official reason - perparing for the midnight launch --- but i tell ya -- 2 days of money lost !

Where's Your Main On?

2008-11-11T08:06:00.000-08:00

Hello Fellow Indians !

I am just doing a quick headcount for how many people are there playing World of Warcraft who are in India. The unfortunate thing about the google group (wow-india) we are on is that there are no freakin Polls ! Pshaw !

So, I m using this blog to throw across ze question. If you are playing in India, Please take a moment to stop and add to the count.

Another Poll just below it is about wheter you prefer PvP or PvE ...

Do leave a comment here if you want to add something particular.

Locked Realms

2008-11-08T23:03:00.000-08:00

I usually play on Aman'thul. There are a few more Indians on Frostmourne... but there is a BIG problemo my friend.

On weekends, trying to play on AU realms leads to this..
The realms are so populated, that the servers get locked out. You will be 347th or something in the queue to get in...

Blizzard ! Increase the number of servers for people in Asia !

Exalted !

2008-11-07T19:48:00.001-08:00

The damn Ogres don't drop enough beads ! :(

And in the process of levelling up my Consortium rep ... I hit exalted with Karunei ! Which meant I was going to get the long legged mounts ! After the tigers of the Night Elves, this was the mount I liked really a lot in terms of looks.

So, a hop to the vendor gave me the Reins of the Silver War Talbuk ! I suddenly felt a lot taller.

A short time later ( like after collecting another 100 beads ), I hit revered with the Consortium, and was finally able to get the plans for an ingredient of the Flying Machine. A 100gs poorer ( after getting money for the mats), and I was flying over shattarth in my spanking new flying machine ! :)

2 mounts in an evening - nice !

Does WoW 3.0 patch have Northrend or not ?

2008-11-07T04:35:00.000-08:00

Over at the wow india googlegroup, we are stressed out trying to figure out whether the 3.0.x patches have northrend or not.

My take - it does.

Here's my reasoning.

- new port at Stormwind and other places. Hordies going gaga about new zepplins also... humf .. i believe i can fly ..

- new profession - inscriptions - which was supposed to be a WoTLK profession.

- A new 'Northrend' map with each zone there.

- a 1.2 GB 3.0 download, followed by a 300MB 3.0.1 'sorry about the messup' patch and another 3.0.2 patch. A 1.2 GB download has the northrend continent in it I quite believe

The naysayers say that no dude, the CD box of WoTLK will have the content . I say 'pffft'. The only benifit people with the box will get is the key to unlock their account to play Northrend about a few weeks before other people who will do a digital download. It happened with BC and now it will happen with WoTLK.

What do you say ?

Stressed For Time

2008-11-07T04:16:00.000-08:00

The blog name has changed. . .

World of Brahmos was a good name.

But it had drawbacks.

It was about Brahmos. It was about World of Warcraft.

Anything else - and it just did not fit in. If i wanted to talk about other characters - it did not fit in. If I wanted to talk about other games - it did not fit in.

So, here I am - stressed out with figuring out how to manage multiple blogs.

Here I am - stressed out about how to play all the games that I keep playing.

Here I am - stressed out with office work, and figuring out a place where I can just put my boots up and post nonsense.

Stressed For Time is the blog for it.

Stay tuned for more (hopefully) updates !

Karazan Hunter Loot

2008-09-04T07:37:00.000-07:00

The list below is to help hunters in choosing which loot to roll for in Karazan. This takes inputs from various sources especially wow-loot and wowwiki, and acts as personal list of things that I have ( )and want to get.

Attumen the huntsman

- Stalker's War Bands

- Steelhawk Crossbow

Moroes

- nothing ! zilch !

Maiden of Virtue

- Gloves of Quickening

The curator

- Garona's Signet Ring

- Gloves of the Fallen Hero

Terestian Illhoof

- Girdle of the Prowler

Shade of Aran

- Drape of the Dark Reavers

- Saberclaw Talisman

- Steelspine Faceguard

Netherspite

- Rip-Flayer Leggings

Prince Malchezaar

- Farstrider Wildercloak

- Helm of the Fallen Hero

- Sunfury Bow of the Phoenix

Nightbane

- Ferocious Swift-Kickers

- Scaled Breastplate of Carnage

Opera : Wizard of Oz

- Legacy

Opera : The big bad wolf

- Wolfslayer Sniper Rifle

Opera : Romule and Julianne

- Romulo's Poison Vial ( good to have)

Opera : Other loot shared between the events

- Beastmaw Pauldrons

Dust Covered Chest

- Fiend Slayer Boots

Trash Mobs

- Belt of the Tracker

Kara night

2008-09-04T04:21:00.000-07:00

Hah ! The Prince is down again !

No screenshots though - forgot to take.

It started of innocently enough. Neverhere was looking for some thorium mines - when the guild chat came alive with a plan for a kara run. They needed 2 dps - huh ? When has it been that dps was an issue in our group mulled Neverhere - hacking away on a Mithril deposit. This was after a long gap that I was visitng the lands of Aman'Thul - work and life taking up much more of my time.

"If ya guys need me, i can come over as a hunter dps" said NeverHere over the guild chat.

"Sure. relog" was the response.

So relogged. Roused up Brahmos who was idling away the time in Stormwind.

Brahmos quickly realized that things were not right. He was with the wrong pet - a wolf - his PvP buddy, but he really needed the cat who was more into raid bosses. Made his way to a stable master and got that fixed.

Suddenly he realized - oh damn ! most of the arrows had been used up on PvP. Hearthed to shattarth - but there was no time to get the special arrows from his special supplier in Nagrand. His engineering also was not that high that he could make the high level arrows. No other option but to get the usual lvl65 arrows ... damn.

Just in time, got a summon to the gates of Karazan. The group had cleared upto the Curator.

Curator down 1st try. Hey baby, this is becoming easy mused Brahmos.

Onto Shade of Aran. The trash was easy - but with some heart in mouth moments - sometimes we got more trash than we bargained for. The end result - we clared out the trash pretty fast !

Shade of Aran is someone i can't stand. The constant moving around, fleeing the blizzard and arcane explosion , freezing in fire - bah ! The healer died. We hung on for dear life - and got morphed - except for me. Now i dont know how that happened - so i just shot at aran and forced him to stop his drinking while everyone was sheeped. He took out his ire on me - but most of the others survived and we kicked his ass real good ! Shade of Aran down !

Illhoof ! Everyone wanted him - but our first try was so bad, we decided to take him on some other time.

Off to chess - and cleared it out. I got Mithril Chain of Heroism. No one else was rolling for it - and instead of getting it all shareded up - Brahmos rolled - it was an improvement over his usual necklace.

Next on the Prince.

This time it took us 3 times.

1st time, priest went afk. Poor fellow fell asleep on his keyboard ! Without enough heals to help - we died around 14% of the Prince still left.

2nd time, wrong placement of infernal. Sigh. This is an encounter based on luck!

3rd time - lucky. We whammed him bad !

The token for the hunter head dropped. This was the 2nd time I was at the prince, and the token dropped. The other hunter (from PUG) rolled higher than me - sigh. He got it. I don't instance that much, and I will willingly gave the last token to a guildy who instanced more - but this seemed a bit bad. Hope the other chap instances more.

Anyways, need to change my headgear through PvPing now I guess.

All in all, it was a fun night. :D

PIt Commander in Shattrath

2008-09-03T21:26:00.000-07:00

Some guys got bored and lured the pit commander into Shattrath ! I wonder how they did it though. pretty neat !

The spirit of competition

2008-08-09T22:12:00.000-07:00

Blizzard is paying homage to the Olympics, in their own in-game way. Simply put, if you can keep winning in the BGs consistently, you get a new pet.

Now, the issue with BGs is that the lvls are n0-n9 (n = 1to6), and 70. So, if you are a low level, lets say 24 like my druid, then going into the BG is not really helpful. You lower the standards of the other players. So, since my lock was near to 38, i just leveller her a couple of bars and started the BGs.

Won the first - which was the weekend BG - Warsong Gulch. Got the 3 flags. The reward - the competitors tabard.

Lost the next few (who says horde does not loose?).

Then today, zerged the arathi basin BG (5-0) ! Got the medallion which would help summon the spirit right after that.

All hail the Olympics !

Reroll Horde

2008-08-09T22:06:00.000-07:00

Ok. Finally I am a horde. I rerolled as one cause
- Just not getting time to play my hunter as the rest of the guild is into raiding, and I just don't have time for it (yeah, work sucks). Raid timings are quite ok actually : 6:30pm IST, but my office never ever lets me go before 7.
- It gets boring levelling another alliance character (though I got my shaman to 60).
- after much dilly dalying finally reached agreement that many indians will play on Deathwing.

So, here I am, as a druid contemplating the adventures across the barrens.

Shivaji Rides !

2008-07-18T10:56:00.000-07:00

I have a Paladin whom I named Shivaji. Shivaji was one of the great Maratha warriors , and it seemed right that the nobleness of the Paladin would fit in well with the name. Well, I was not playing the pally much - more of a bank for my other characters. But with the reduction in levels required for getting a mount, i thought of levelling up the few levels and get the mount. As with Warlocks, the Paladin's mount are summonable creatures - no 35g for learning it !

And here we have, Shivaji rides through the lands of Azeroth !

New mounts at lvl 30 now !

2008-07-15T11:01:00.000-07:00

well, Red's got a new mount ! with the 2.4.3 patch, the mounts are available as soon as you level to 30. The cost - 35g. However, the warlock mount is ... hold your breath... 90s ! Yup. You got that right ! Only 90s ! You get it from the warlock trainer !

Muwahahaha !

The warlock

2008-07-14T11:34:00.000-07:00

Well, Brahmos is lying down a bit. He's lvl 70, got an epic flyer, but not enough time to raid. So, i have been trying other alts . My shaman is lvl 60. This screenshot is of my warlock - this time on the horde side. Just want to lever her to 40 so as to get the warlock mount - which is one of the unique ones in the game as its only available to warlocks.

What's it about Diablo

2008-07-10T03:38:00.000-07:00

One of the things that I like about the games from Blizzard is that the games are fun !

Diablo was such a game. Instense hack and slash. Go and mow down the monsters. Deeper and deeper into the labrynth. Each time you play, a new maze to discover. At that time (1995 or thereabouts), it was one of the best graphical games.

Then came Diablo II - expanded world, but a shit system of save points. How I hate them.

Now, Diablo III has been announced - avaiable "when its ready" by the blizzard team.

Nostalgia. Took out my diablo cd (diablo II is a game my sister plays .. so the cd is with her), and started playing it (anyways, my WoW playtime is at an all time low). It is still so very refreshing to play it ! Save games means i can come out anytime I want to !

hack ! hack ! hack ! slash ! muwahahaa !

Down with the Prince

2008-03-14T06:34:00.000-07:00

This was my first time at the prince. The guild has been clearing Kara for a few weeks now without breaking a sweat. But, due to work pressure, I was hardly able to play much. So, finally, after a hiatus of more than a couple of months, I was finally in T2 (team 2) for kara.

What did he drop ?

Well, I could go on about how effective I was in bringing down the prince - but then that would not be right. I died right at the start of the fight :(

So, there I was - lying dead on the ground , while others were hammering it out with the prince..

The Helm of the Fallen Hero dropped for hunters, but Nonick got it. I fully endorse that - he has been karaing for a lot more than me, and waiting for the token to fall. Gratz dude on your Demon Stalker Greathelm !

Guild shot ! i wish i could freely move the camera...

Don't nerf the Warlocks !

2008-03-10T02:38:00.000-07:00

Man, some of the most innovative people are there on the horde side :D

Check out this thread on prayers for keeping the warlock nerfs at bay !

Also check out the warlock jokes..

man, need to get RedCat out from the inn and level her !

Episode 2

2008-03-04T09:12:00.000-08:00

Blizzard has this podcast which they have started. Lets see how frequently they update it. From Episode 2 of it :

I like the up and down of it but, you can run into trouble sometimes where, if you're walking in from one game to another game, back-to-back creative meetings
and come out of a StarCraft meeting with certain themes that were big in our minds and I walk in and ‘Guys, I had this idea for Warcraft blahblahblahblahblah,'
and they're like ‘Woah, dude, that sounds just like…there's no laser guns in Warcraft!' ‘Oh, that's right!'

Epic Bow

2008-02-13T21:50:00.000-08:00

Patch 2.4 is coming out with a Legendary Bow ! Time to get my guild to work on the instances ... and time to find time out for me to play during raid timings !

/drool

Warlock!

2008-02-13T10:13:00.001-08:00

Say hello to Red Cat ! I basically started this character on Deathwing on Horde as there are some Indian's playing there. But they are all level 70. My first character was actually a druid, but then, trying to get my wife hooked, I thought let me try and create a female character for her, and hopefully she will start playing it. Alas, that was not to be.

However, the warlock piqued my interest. Like the hunters, they also have pets who fight for them (other classes get pets as a non-fighting companion). Unlike the hunters, these pets have to be summoned. The above pic shows the lock with a voidwalker - which make pretty good tanks for soloing.

Another cool thing about WarLocks is that they get a free mount at level 40 ! well, RC is now level 27, so in 13 levels I should get a horse. Its a cool looking thing with fire coming our of the hooves and nosrtils ! I hope to upload the pic soon!

Things I need to get

2008-02-11T12:19:00.000-08:00

Man, I have been away from WoW for so long ! The latest patch has added flying machines for engineers ! Damn ! Why did I drop engineering ! sigh ! Check out the copter below !

What is a Tier 4 ?

2008-02-11T11:27:00.000-08:00

My post of a tier4 glove I got prompted the following question :

Not to sound like a noob or anything but I probably will, i had the Gauntlets of Renewed Hope drop in kara on my 1st run yesterday, once socketed with teardrop living rubys (18 heal a piece) and since im a chanter i enchanted it with major healing (35+ hp heal) along with its base of 62 heal it totals 133hp heal which is actually very bad ass.. i read around tho and ppl say T4 or tier4 gloves are better cuz of the spell crit, but my question is what the hell is a tier4 item, even better what the hell is tier4 (is there a tier 3 etc..) I know tier means levels but Im kinda confused.. help!

Well, I think its best to start off with what is a Tier 4 item. WoW has been around for a few years now. In its initial offering, it had levels from 1 to 60. Now, most of the instances till level 60 were 5 man instances like Sunken Temple. However, at 60, players got the first taste of a raid instance , which in those days was 40 man raid - like MoltenCore. There one could start collect armor which belonged to a set - i.e. if you had 2 pieces of the set, it would impart more bonuses !

In those olden times, when the continent of outland was not known to the Azerothians, the maximum level the armor sets went was to level 3.

To just illustrate the difference in quality of the different tier sets, lets see how the head piece changes from Tier 1 to Tier 3 for a Paladin

Tier 1 : Armor : 695 [+9 Str 20 stam 24int +10sp + 10 fire resist]
Tier 2 : Armor : 795 [+17str +18stam +23int +6sp + 10 frost resis +10 shadow resist]

Getting the difference ? Another thing which would happen is that the lower tier would become a requirement for getting the next level of armor. The T2 helm dropped from the lair of Onyxia the dragon - and guess what - the dragon breathes fire, so you will do well by getting a T1 helm which has the fire resist !

The first raid in the burning crusade campaign is Karazan. Here the set items dont drop, rather you get a token which can be traded in Shattrath for the corresponding item for your class. Since this is the first tier armor to drop after level 60, this is the next tier - i.e. T4 armor set.

Now for the differences between the Gaunlets of Renewed hope and the T4 Justicar Glove:

Gauntlets of Renewed Hope

906 Armor
+19 Stamina
+29 Intellect
Blue Socket
Blue Socket
Socket Bonus: +3 Intellect

Justicar Glove :

944 Armor
+29 Stamina
+30 Intellect

From the comparison (cause there is only one set you have), its clear that with the sockets, the Gauntlets would be a better choice as healing gear. However, as you get more sets, the set bonus for the T4 set becomes :

[2]Equip: Restores 5 mana per 5 sec.
[4]Equip: Increases healing done by up to 62 and damage done by up to 21 for all magical spells and effects.

And so would make more sense to use the T4 gloves once you are sure of the set bonuses. Hope that helps !

Shaman Power

2008-02-10T19:13:00.000-08:00

One of the things that WoW lets you do is create a multitude of characters ( or Altsas they are called ingame). Now, I am an altaholic, having umpteen alts. However, apart from my hunter, the other alt that I have managed to level past the 40 level mark is this shaman. It is level 48 now, and here he is waterwalking in Ferals !

No post for a long time

2008-01-10T02:01:00.000-08:00

The world is in upheavel. The real world is more finicky than the virtual one. Whereas in WoW I can find a mailbox in every place I go , even in gnomerigan, here in the real world, its difficult to find an Internet connection.

I recently changed jobs, and moved to another city. Found a place on rent and shifted in, only to find that there is no Internet connectivity there. I live in one of the upcoming cities of India - Pune, and the internet infrastructure is not there . Sad. :(

Having the WoW blues !

Illidan

2007-10-07T11:41:00.000-07:00

Illidan, the betrayer. The one we have to defeat in the Burning Crusades...

But, how did he become the monster he is ?

illidan.wmv

I love my hunter again!

2007-10-02T23:57:00.000-07:00

I stumbled across a site called BigRedKitty, and going through the posts , I started liking the hunter more and more !

The problem I see with Brahmos is that he is low on the DPS side when compared to others in my guild. Also, I don't have much time to play, so I end up doing not much online, for which reason I started levelling a Priest and a Shaman (both now 40+ lvls). The issue this creates is that none of my toons are actually very good.

However BRKs blogs show how a hunter can be played. And now I am hopeful about making Brahmos one of the better hunters again. Check out this post and you will find that a hunter tops the chart of DPS ! amazing ! Brahmos just got a Guru !

Karazhan - The Curator

2007-10-01T05:14:00.000-07:00

The fight is Karazhan continues. This time was my 3rd time into the eerie tower of Karazan. My guild members had found the unused backdoor entry to the fortress, and we crept silently in from there.

Kara - back door entry

The Curator. An arcane senient being was our first big hurdle, and it took a few attempts for our new group to get him down. But we did get him down. The issue we had was the DPS.

Curator. One mean peacekeeper

Next onto Aran, but I was not able to do it due to issues with the connection at my end. Sigh... there goes my Sunday :(

Shattered tower, but stuck in time. Its as if the explosion ripped the tower apart, but then it just froze before the parts fell down.

Karazhan

2007-08-02T00:52:00.000-07:00

Its been a long time since i posted here.

The world of Outland. What do i say about it. Its massive . A continent hung in the skies. A place of chaos and otherwordly energies.

Since the last time I posted, I have undergone a lot of adventures. I have reached level 70. I know most of outland as the back of my hand. Getting to know a lot of factions, and trying to gain repute with them. I have also been able to procure a winged mount, which enables me to fly all over outland at my pace in my way. However, i still use the services of the Wing Masters to fly me over to far out places as my mount is not that fast. Those mounts cost around 5000g , sigh!

In my travels, as I meet other adventurers, I found that there are other mounts available ! Imagine my surprise one day when I saw a netherdrake being flown into the city of Shattrath. It was an awesome sight. Someday, I will also unlock the secrets of getting this magnificent mount ! Another mount i have set my eyes on is the riding mount the kurenai sell.

But thats for later. Lately news seem to have come that Illidian resides in the black temple ! The call to the heros is out. We need more and more people to help up against the tides of darkness ! Through a lengty attunement a few of us are now battling for life in Karazhan!

Yesterday was my first raid to this lair of the monsters. And this was fun ! Whereas other instances are 'take your own time' kinds, here the fear of respawns within 30 mins keeps us going. Going to get the boss, before his helpers arrive. After a fierce battle with Midnight and Attumen, we prevailed ! It was not a simple fight. We got wiped twice. The third time, with 3 of us down, we were still able to down the damn monster.

And ah ! The sweet tast of victory was even sweeter for me ! The SteelHawk Crossbow dropped. I had long chatted with other adventurers on the bow, and hoped one day it would be mine. That day was yesterday !

Hellfire Citadel

2007-02-13T07:18:00.000-08:00

Instancing in Hellfire Citadel. The group went in with me to get me a nice sword. Unfortunately, it did not drop at all - even though we went in 2 times.

The last Boss is this dragon and the dragon rider. The dragon just blasts us with fire and well, makes toast of us !

Outland

2007-02-06T06:33:00.000-08:00

The Burning Crusade expansion is here !

And its made WoW better than ever.

I was going to level to 60 and then get the BC expansion. One problem was that it was available only in the US, and getting it here in India was a big problem.

Then the BC became a download from Blizzard's website. Still I did not want to download it - but then I read that to go through the dark portal you needed to be only level 58 ! I had just reached that level, and so I went and downloaded the expansion.

The Dark Portal

Through the Darkportal I went. Guildies were already there levelling up, linking the goodies there through the guild chat. Now I was there.

Outland is Outlandish.

Its undescribeable. A world which is surreal. Let the screenshots do the talking :

A Floating Tower on a Floating Land?

Nightsabre

2007-02-06T06:18:00.000-08:00

At level 40, you get a mount. That is, you are eligible to ride a mout. However, whether you can get it at that level depends on your skills in saving your money. The riding training is around 20gold, and the mount is around 80gold. So, you need to save around 100g. However, with a discount of 10% once you become honourable with your faction, you still need 90g for it. That my dear friend is a problem, cause I never seemed to have more than 10g at one time !

Ultimately, I was able to get the mount at lvl 46 or there about. Till that time, used the 'aspect of the cheetah' to move from one place to another!

The next level of mount - a much swifter one, one gets at lvl 60.

I am already lvl 60, but I just dont have that much gold - around 700g !

More info on the differnt mounts for differnet races can be found on the wow site.

Brahmos successfully test fired!

2007-02-05T04:11:00.000-08:00

Brahmos is the name of a cruise missile in the Indian army. Today it was successfully test fired.

BrahMos missile test-fired successfully

Wikipedia entry on BrahMos explains the roots of its name.

lvl 60

2007-02-05T04:09:00.000-08:00

Reached level 60 !

Any other time it would have been an achievement, but now with the BC expansion, it means i still have 10 more levels to go!

From lvl 58, I crept into Hellfire Peninsula. Then it was a breeze levelling up - taking just a couple of days for the 2 levels.

The story from now on

2006-09-12T08:30:00.000-07:00

At the present I have become a level 42. By now you would have gotten some idea of my origings. The story now is my day to day life and the happenings in the world... the world of Brahmos!

The City Life

2006-09-12T07:57:00.000-07:00

The first city I discovered was Darnassus - the place where night elves discuss matters beyond what I as a low level elf can even even start to comprehend. I was amazed at the scale of the city.

A scene out of LOTR ?

Wandered around for ages drinking in the sigts. Visited a few shops, drooled over the wares for display at the various shops ( too expensive for me :( , with just a few coppers in my pocket). Then I got to know that this was not the only city around ! Stormwind and Ironforge beckoned.

Also got to know that Ironforge is where one can learn guns ! Guns !! Man, a hunter with a Gun would just rock . I just had to go there.

Took the boat to menthil harbor. Hiked to Ironforge through some dangerous terrain. Carved out of the mountains, a grand sight to see ( I dont know why dwarves make things of such a grand scale!)

Paying my respects to the Huge Dwarf at Ironforge

From Ironforge a tram runs to Stormwind. Oh boy ! The world is more than just night elves!

Stormwind ! What a sight !

I got a pet !

2006-09-12T07:37:00.000-07:00

A hunters best buddy is his pet.

At level 10, I went and talked to the hunter trainer, who decided to let me know the secret of taming the wild beasts. But first I had to prove it to him that I am really really ready for the training which really initiated my move into the world of deadly hunters, and I told him to test me. So, he had me go and tame a few animals of different types, which I did so admirably.

As the last quest finished and I faced my mentor again, he had a different glint in my eye. Like he had misjudged me. "The taming of beasts was in my blood" he said. "Go forth, and tame whatever pet you like - he will be your constant companion. Take care of him and he will take care of you".

The choices opened up for me. I could tame any animal I liked !

Unfortunately, only one can be by your side. Fortunately most inns have a stable master who can stable upto 2 of your other pets.

My Pet Owl

I had various pets : an owl ( Hooter), a tiger (Bagheera), a wolf ( Shera ) , but now I have 2 pets who have shown exemplary loyalty - a bear ( Bhaloo) and Spots (a leopard).

With Bhaloo

Exploring the wilderness with Spots

Transportation

2006-09-12T06:48:00.000-07:00

The world is huge ! If you have checked the wow map, you would have seen that the world has a couple of continents and an island. So, how does one move around ?

Run Baby Run

Well, you run !

And I run and I run and I run!

Yeah, you can run and run and almost cover all the continent by just running, and that is majorly the way which you will use to go and find other locations in the world. This is also the only way to find flight points all around...

There are some training you can get at later levels which will make running faster. E.g. as a Night Elf at level 20, I get Aspect of the Cheetah which makes me run to about 30% faster - which is quite cool as I am outrunning everyone else ;-). I have an alt on the Horde, a Taurean Shaman, who got ghost wolf form at level 20 which makes one run about 40% faster once I shape shift into the form of a ghost wolf.

Level 40 is what everyone is looking at though. At level 40 you become eligible to getting a mount. For the Night Elves, you get a tiger to ride (one of the big reasons to go night elf) ! The mounts increase your speed on land by 60%. The drawback ... they are costly. The training costs 20gold pieces, and the mount itself costs 80gold. If you are honoured with your race you get a 10% discount on everything you buy and instead of shelling out 100 gold, you only need to shell out 90gold. Some people have it easy. Paladins and Warlocks get their mounts for free !

Pretty Warlock lady get horse for free :(

The only problem - at level 40, I had a few silver pieces only. Now, at level 42, I am at around 20gold pieces. Still a very very long way to go !

I believe I can fly

Up ! up ! and away !

Running though can be quite time consuming. That's where air travel comes in ! Each submap in the continents has a flight point . Well, not all the submaps have, but its safe to say that most have. Once you have discovered a flight point ( called a flight map), you will be able to hop into the backs of one of the big birds and fly off to the other point. Much faster than running all the way over.

Wanna take a dip?

It better not sink!

But even these amazing beasts cannot fly over the oceans. So, to move between the oceans, you need some other means of transport.

For the humans - these are ships. For the Horde, you get the Zepplins. Once you get to the specif harbors, you can take the ship to the other end.

Some may wonder as to if they can swim over to the other continent. Well, you will drown in the ocean due to fatigue :-).

Trams

Waiting for the deeprun tram

The eastern kingdom is the land where the Dwarves and human races live. As such they are quite good at making contraptions - and one of the unique things they have is a tram which runs between the cities of Stormwind and Ironforge. Though you can take a flight between them, the tram is faster and cheaper (its free).

Hearthing

Another way of tranport is hearthing. You basically have a hearthstone which can be set to a inn in one of the cities or towns. Then you can hearth from wherever you are to that inn. Works reall great if you are in the opposite continent and want to come back to the other one.

It is rumored that in the next expansion we will get mounts which fly to our will ! I am sure it will cost like a million gold pieces or something :(

The begining

2006-09-08T00:29:00.000-07:00

NightElves are one of the oldest races on the face of Azeroth. Living in unity with the nature forces, as a new adventurer, one starts off in the island of Teldarsil.

The quest to become the best starts of then and there with people with the big ! mark over their heads heralding that they have to give you some work. This is a major help as you dont have to run around figuring out where to go and find out who will give you a Quest.

Some background on the type of people you will find in the game. As mentioned players are either of the Alliance or the Horde, and you are bound to one side. But apart from the players, there are a lot of computer generated characters known as NCPs ( Non Playing Characters) and enemies.

NPCs are the characters in the world you can interact with and primarliy the ones who give you quests and to whom you have to come back to hand in a completed quest. They also provide many other services like if you want to buy or sell armour/weapons/gear. Some NPCs will be specific for your class and will only help you. E.g. the Hunter Trainer is the person I go to every alternate level to get training on better abilities. So, now , I can for instance Feign Death which means that the enemy thinks that I am dead and I can save myself from dying.

Enemies are the computer generated characters whom you have to kill mostly. They are of different types and levels. Everytime you kill them, there is a chance for them to drop some loot - which can be something quite mundane to something quite cool at higher levels. Suffice to say, at this stage there was hardly anything worthwile.

In the first hour or so, I was up at level 4 or so. The initial quests are quite simple and many of the enemies dont even attack you until you start attacking them. This helps anyone who is new to the game to get to know how to play.

One thing about WoW is that the landscape is beautiful. Check out these screenshots:

First Look

Drink in the scenery. Soak up the atmoshpere. There is nothing quite like the fantastic views you will get as in World of Warcraft. Instead of making the world look like a real world, the developers decided on putting more colour and contrasts and a bit cartoony - to give a world which is just surreal in its beauty. Teldarsil is mostly covered with huge big trees, and you just get glimpses of the sky here and there through the shadows. It also makes you feel quite small :-)

Tree Ent !

In the above screenshot - you see a hulking tree like creature straight out of the world of JRR Tolkien and the Lord of the Rings. These guys move at a slow pace and patrol the world of Teldarsil and keep it safe for low level players like me . At the left of the screen you can also see another player ( name in blue identifies a player who is on the same side as you. If that name was in Red I would be in big trouble as they will most likely be of the opposite side and be after my life ! If someone has been in a PvP the name is in Yellow-Golden. More on PvP in later blogs.

What is the World of Warcraft ?

2006-09-07T00:13:00.000-07:00

I am currently playing a game known as WoW ( for World of Warcraft). What sets this game apart from all the other games I own and play ( and that is quite a few) is that I have been playing this game for more than a month now ( i usually change games at least 2 times a month) , and it is online ( all hail broadband connections!)

WoW as it is more popularly known as , is a Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game ( MMORPG). What this means is that you have thousands (nay millions) of players logging into servers, playing against or with each other.

Did not get it ? Ok. Lets assume you know about social sites like Orkut - where you can add people, make groups and have people joining in, leave scraps etc. Now think of all this in 3D. Think of all your friends not as static pictures but as real 3D figures - walking, fighting, drinking, cheering... That my friend is a MMORPG.

Though I have other blogs, and I was thinking of starting out writing on those, I thought it may make better sense to blog exclusively as a different blog. And hence this.

The first choice for you is to choose what you look like and what kind of abilities you have. Though there are 2 sides who keep fighting each other - both are cool. If you remember Warcraft , there were 2 basic races. The humans and the Orcs and they were at war with each other - and you could play both the sides. Similarly, you have the Alliance and the Horde.

Alliance are the goody goody guys . Humans, Night Elves , Dwarves and Goblins make it up.

Horde are the terrible guys who always want to kick the butts of the goody goody guys. They consist of the Orcs, Taureans, Trolls and Undead.

What you select decides on what you really want to play as. For myself, I chose the Night Elf race. I think elves are cool and look cool , especially with glowing eyes, and LOTR did leave a lasting impression on me.

Next chose your sex. No special bonuses - they just look that way.

Next chose your class. I am a hunter - but you have a large list to chose from. Be aware that some classes only are available to a few races. For instance, for you to be a Shaman, you have to play the side of the Horde, and Paladins are available to the Alliance only.

That's it . Chose your name and login. You will start off in one of the many starting locations based on your race.

Since you will miss out many of the details about the game without pics, I will update this blog with a variety of pics from my travels as time goes by. At present I have reached level 40 and am looking for making money to get a mount. But I have screenshots from other levels and will post them.

To whet your appetite and mine, here is an screenshot of what the game (and you) will look like at the higher levels.

Links you may find interesting :

BTW, I think I am the only person from India playing there. If you know of someone else who plays, please get them to contact me.