Zygor Guides 3 Revealed

Only one week to go before the Cataclysm releases.

With the 2 new races, the whole leveling experience changed for levels from 1 to 60 and the 80 to 85 leveling, there's a lot of new content and stuff to go through, which keeps the people behind the premium leveling guides busy...

And now, just before the new expansion, Zygor Guides revealed a new 3.0 version of their in-game guide viewer.

To see for yourself what Zygor Guides 3 looks like, watch the Zygor Guides 3.0 video now:

In addition to the in-game interface tweaks, the Zygor's leveling guides as a whole, and everything else has been renewed for Cataclysm (and the patch 4.0.3 aka The Shattering onwards), including the brand new level 1-60 guides, Goblin and Worgen guides, and of course, the huge level 80 to 85 guides that'll get you to the new level cap as fast as possible.

Also, if you're returning to WoW after a break, a leveling guide like Zygor's is an awesome way to get into the groove again.

Zygor Cataclysm Level 80-85 Guide

Zygor Guides 3 for Cataclysm has been announced! The fully renewed 1-85 Cataclysm leveling guides for both Alliance and Horde (and the 80-85 update) are on sale now, so you can be ready when the Cataclysm comes out.

Are you ready for The Cataclysm on day one?

Zygor Guides, the best-selling World of Warcraft leveling guides for both Alliance and Horde, is getting ready for the new expansion.

The updated version 3 guides include everything about leveling from 80 to 85 and the new starter guides for the starting areas of the Goblins and the Worgen, The Lost Isles and Gilneas.

WTH is Zygor Guide?

In case you are not familiar with the Zygor Guide's, check this video out:



If you can't see the video embedded above, watch it on YouTube: Zygor Guide Demo. Also, watch this video, comparing the usual leveling guides to Zygor's...



If you can't see the video embedded above, watch it on YouTube: WoW Leveling Guide Comparison.

In case your wondering why one would pay anything for a leveling guide when there's free leveling guides available...

Ask yourself who will do a better job and have all the updates ready for the new expansion on time - Someone who slaves away when there's time or someone who is well-known for premium leveling guides?

If you want to level as fast as possible, you get a premium leveling guide (with a in-game addon). If you want to explore or for someone to create and update a free guide, you wait and have fun on your own, and that's cool if you like it that way :)

Personally, I like to level as fast as possible and not waste any time running around not knowing what to do - The videos and the numbers speak for themselves, Zygor's guides are top-notch, and I'm proudly linking to them with my affiliate links, which means that if you buy'em through my links, I'll get my cut for that sale, and I'll thank you for that if you do.

The Cataclysm 1-85 Leveling Guide

The new 1-85 Leveling Guides are on sale now, as the Zygor Guides Version 3 was announced a week before the new expansion.

Zygor has all the new talents covered as well, so you'll know what to pick when others are scratching their heads and reading forums while you're laughing with your main at level 85 and alts well on their way there :)

How to get the level Cataclysm leveling guides?

Go and buy Zygor's Leveling Guides today.

One guide (either Alliance or Horde) is $40, and the full package with both the Alliance and the Horde leveling guides, the dailies guides and other bonuses is priced at $60, including the Cataclysm update.

• That's cheaper than Dugi's guides ($97 for full package) , which has Cataclysm updates coming as well.
• iDemise's leveling guide would be the cheapest at $47, but it does not seem to have Cataclysm update coming, and both Zygor's and Dugi's guides have all the dailies, evens and other bonuses in'em anyway.

With the Shattering of Azeroth, the level 1-60 leveling has completely changed and the there's brand new 1 to 60 guides in Zygor's package as well, so you'll have the edge in the new Azeroth when leveling new alts.

Zygor Guides are 100% In-Game, you'll be blasting your way to the new level cap in now time :)



Be ready to powerlevel to level 85 when The Cataclysm comes out, and check out the Zygor's Leveling Guides today.

Related articles

• World of Warcraft: Cataclysm To Launch Dec. 7th (games.slashdot.org)
• Immersion and lore in Cataclysm (wow.joystiq.com)
• 'World Of WarCraft: Cataclysm' Release Date Confirmed (multiplayerblog.mtv.com)

The Raid - WoW Documentary

World of Warcraft documentary "The Raid" is in the making. The Raid will be a film about WoW raiding and what it means to be a raider, first of its kind on this scale, so it'll be interesting to see how it turns out.

Based on the trailer the documentary looks promising, so it will be an interesting look into the game. Because the movie is still in the making, you have a chance to help making it real. This blog post of mine is part of doing my share for it...

Check the trailer yourself to see what's coming. And check the links below to join the raid yourself.

"The Raid" - Interview Trailer

"You know that day-dream you had as a little kid? The one where you and your friends got together to battle the evil dragon? Well, these guys are kind of doing that. Every night." - http://www.jointheraid.com

Want HD? Watch the trailer in YouTube

Interviewees are (in order of appearance):

• Ilya Basin - "Fame" of Might, U.S. - Turalyon
• Mike Mascone - "Darksend" of F.H., U.S. - Black Dragonflight
• Scott Porcaro - "Ttocs" of Aftermath, U.S. - Mal'Ganis

Cinematic footage by:

• "Lore" of Months Behind, U.S. - Eredar
• "Jazdia" of Continuum, U.S. - Garrosh
• "Abider" of Bound, U.S. - Staghelm

Logo design:

• Kevin Guido of Cedarsplit.

The Raid Trailer Music

• Track 1 - "Being Hunted" by Ilya Kaplan
• Track 2 - "Stop Cp" by Dynamedion
• Track 3 - "Inspired Cyborg" by David Flavin
• Track 4 - "No End in Sight" by Jonathan Geer

The Raid - World of Warcraft Documentary

Welcome to the world of online raiding. In certain MMORPG's, like Blizzard Entertainment's World of Warcraft, gaming content is regularly created for the collaborative participation of up to twenty-five players at a time. Each player fulfills a particular role within the collective based on the skills attributed to their class of character in the game. Some play healers, some play damage dealers, and some play characters defensively designed to soak the large amounts of damage dealt by their virtual opponents. These players group together to form raids that routinely meet to test themselves against scripted game encounters. The technical design of these encounters is often so tightly tuned that it requires a remarkable amount of practice and planning for a raid to complete them, and the near flawless performance of each of its members. - http://www.jointheraid.com

"The Raid" will be a film about raiding and what it means to be a raider. We will capture the numerous hours invested by a diverse group of gamers in a complicated and choreographed digital environment, where every contribution weighs on their success or failure. We will watch, in person and virtually, as members strategize, fail, re-strategize, and inevitably find victory in their pursuits. We will sit with them in their homes and seek to understand the value this kind of commitment has in their daily lives, amidst their work, and within their families. We will question them about virtual achievements and their value. We will sit with social experts concerned about the growing issue of internet addiction and seek their opinions. We will question the future of the MMO experience and its place in the global landscape of culture, education, and business. Most of all, we will demonstrate and feel the excitement and energy of this kind of experience, which is so often criticized and misunderstood. - http://www.jointheraid.com

You can contribute at http://www.jointheraid.com.

I have always been fascinated with technology and its effect on social culture, but my exploration into the world of Massively Multiplayer Online Role-playing Games (MMORPG's) opened my eyes to a type of social organization I had never seen before. I experienced faceless communities capable of remarkable commitment, coordination, and success while never actually interacting physically. - Kevin Michael Johnson http://www.jointheraid.com

Join "The Raid" on the web

1. Youtube - http://www.youtube.com/jointheraid
2. Facebook - http://www.facebook.com/theraid
3. Twitter - http://www.twitter.com/jointheraid

WoW Achievements: The Lurker Above [VIDEO]

Here's a video I made for WoW Achievements: The Lurker Above (Fishing), it's also a part of Accomplished Angler achievement (Check my older post, here: full guide to Accomplished Angler.).

For the achievement, you need:

1. A way to walk on water (levitate, water walking, etc.)
2. A way to avoid falling damage (levitate, slow fall, bubble, blink, etc.)
3. 300 fishing skill

The task for the achievement is: Fish up The Lurker Below in Serpentshrine Cavern. At the time I'm writing this, this video of mine has 150000+ views. It shows how this achievement is done, period.

CLICK HERE to watch this on YouTube: The Lurker Above - Accomplished Angler

How to get the Lurker Above Achievement

Watch the video above. And here are the "steps":

• Group up with someone,
• convert to raid,
• enter SSC,
• take two elevators (no enemies),
• jump down (not into water, but "on it", fish in the water will crush you in seconds)
  
  • Use levitation, bubble or such to ease the landing
  • You need to walk on water, so levitate, water walking, etc.
• walk on water to Strange Pool,
• fish until you get Lurker up and achievement.
• (Then you'll most likely visit Spirit Guide)

If you found the video useful, hit the like button Youtube video page: How to do Lurker Above Achievement

Blog Watch: Ulduar Healing Guide by Matticus

Yay, Ulduar is here! And for us Healers, Matticus treats us with Healing Ulduar: Flame Leviathan for the first boss. Although, it's Nice guide for non-healers too if you ask me :) To get things rolling, Razorscale and XT-002 Deconstructor 25-man guides are there too already.

For those who've lived under a stone and are unaware of World of Matticus blog, go check it out! If nothing else, check the healing guides for raids, like the needed-this-week Ulduar Healing Guide, which the mentioned Healing Ulduar: Flame Leviathan is part of.

I Never Thought My Vids Would Get 50k Views on Youtube

My Two Achievement Videos have almost 50000 views combined!

The old PvP Event vid has gone up to 20k or so, which is also great.

The WoW Achievement: The Lurker Above (Fishing) has over 35000 views and 5-star rating after almost 60 rates.

I'm so happy about that, because I made the "this is how you get the achievement" videos to help others get'em without the problems I had trying.

I don't do any regular video updates, but you can see all my youtube videos from Zemalf's Youtube Channel, please subscribe to the vids to get notified when I actually make one again :)

Three (Healing) Addons to Rule Even More

Yes, more useful healing addons right here.

The most popular post on this blog was posted a year ago, and it's time for continuation of the oh-still-so-valid Two (Healing) Addons to Rule Them All.

In the previous installment of "healing addons that rule" series, I highlighted two essential ones: Quartz and VisualHeal.

A year after Quartz is still the best casting bar there is, so go get that if you for some non-sense reason haven't already! (Even if you are not a healer, Quartz is for you, as it has has useful plugins, like flight time and tradeskill timer)

VisualHeal is also still an essential addon, but note that several addons (including the most popular raid frames addons like X-Perl and Pitbull) use LibHealComm-3.0 too, so check if you have one installed already.

VisualHeal, PitBull, BunchOfBars, oUF, Grid, PerfectRaid, ag_unitframes, X-Perl and sRaidFrames all use LibHealComm-3.0 for communicating healing. Ideally all healers in the group should have VisualHeal or another addon that uses LibHealComm-3.0 installed. VisualHeal will continue to function even if some healers don't have it, but it will not be aware of healing cast by these players.

Three (Healing) Addons to Rule Even More

After you have Quartz and VisualHeal (directly or through LibHealComm-3.0), you'll be wanting these three too:
Clique
Grid
SmartBuff

Why these, you ask?

Clique

Easy mouseover casting

When healing in a party you can manage targeting each player and casting a spell to'em, but on raids you will need simple mouseover casting (which helps you in 5-man teams too). And Clique makes setting up your keystroke+mouseclick shortcuts to all your spells so simple that adding tailored macroes yourself would be a waste of time.

Grid

Very compact and highly customizable unit frame

Grid gives you compact view to the whole party/raid, and through some configuration, you'll have all the information you on one glance. For example, you can see who has your renew or Prayer of Mending on them and if you need to recast one soon, see incoming heals to the whole raid (as all healers are using VisualHeal or some mentioned LibHealComm-3.0 addon right?).

If you setup your unit-frames nicely, you can go without Grid, but I like it's compact view a lot, and use it as my only raid frame. And Grid works superbly with Clique, so there you do, get'em both :)

SmartBuff

Super easy buffing

I don't want to check if someone needs that Stam or Spirit buff, or if I should renew my well-fed buff, or even worse, have someone in the raid shoud "Stam buff please!". Smartbuff does it for me, and all I have to do is roll my mousewheel and it's all done. This way I always have my Inner Fire up and the lone one who took one for the team at last boss gets the needed buffs from me before we rush on. Works for all classes.

Bonus Addon

Some people say you don't need Decursive if configure and set-up Grid as your decurse/cleanse point, but I like to have those curses and sicknesses in different area of the screen, so I prefer Decursive. Every class with any curse- and/or disease-removing abilities, should have this.

Where to Download Addons

Download the addons from wow.curse.com or WoWUI or any site you prefer (those two are the biggest and get fast updates for the popular addons)

You also want to set-up a system to automatically check updates for your addons, because to avoid using old/buggy version, and skip the manual work of checking, downloading and installing the new versions.

Unfortunately WoW Ace Updater is no longer with us, as wowace integrated with curse.com, and for me, curse updater just isn't very good (tbh, it sucks big time).

But you have at least two great options: Wowmatrix being the most popular I believe, and WUU - WoW UI Updater which I'm using at the moment (because I happened to find that before wowmatrix).

Both Wowmatrix and WUU support all the possible addon sites and give you one-click version check and update of the addons while at it = Less time updating addons, more time enjoying the game you love.

More "Healing Addons That Rule"

Two (Healing) Addons to Rule Them All

How To Powerlevel Mining with Smelting

I leveled my Death Knight Alt's mining skills the tradiotional way to 240 until I realized one can also get a lot of mining skill from smelting ores. In fact, you can level all the way to 315 entirely by Smelting (if enough Ore is available). After 315 some actual mining is mandatory, but not a lot. After 375, only way to level mining is, well, mining.

Here's the most efficient way to level mining from 1 to 375.

WARNING: the most *efficient* does not equal the cheapest.

This requires gold, but if you really want to powerlevel, that's what it takes. If you don't have extra gold to spent, use the traditional mining guides.

Depending on the price difference of Ore and Bars in your server, the cost of leveling this way varies (in theory, you might even make money). The buy amounts are heavily overestimated, it is possible to get by with less.

When Smelt turns green for the Ore in question, skill-ups will slow a lot, so you might hit the gray or you might not with the noted amount. To 90% guarantee no mining runs, buy the noted amount (and buy more if needed).

At least buy the minimum to minimize the mining runs.

* SHOPPING LIST

Buy 12 (minimum 3) stacks of Copper Ore.
Buy 12 (minimum 3) stacks of Tin Ore.
Buy 12 (minimum 3) stacks of Silver Ore.
Buy 12 (minimum 1) stacks of Iron Ore.
Buy 5 (minimum 2) stacks of Gold Ore.
Buy 12 (minimum 2) stacks of Mithril Ore.
Buy 6 (minimum 1) stacks of Truesilver Ore.
Buy 12 (minimum 2) stacks of Thorium Ore.
Buy 12 (minimum 3) stacks of Fel Iron Ore.
Buy 10 (minimum 2) stacks of Adamantite Ore.
Buy 8 (minimum 2) stacks of Eternium Ore.

OPTIONAL SHOPPING:

Cobalt Ore (buy if you don't hit 375 with the above)

* 1-75 MINING

Buy 12 (minimum 3) stacks of Copper Ore.
Buy 12 (minimum 3) stacks of Tin Ore.

Smelt all the Copper Ore (green until 47, skill-ups slow after that)

If your mining is under 65, buy more Copper Ore and Smelt more. (or go mining until 65)

Smelt Tin (green until 70, gray at 75)
Smelt Bronze (green until 90, gray at 115)

If your mining is under 75, buy more Copper and Tin Ore and Smelt more Bronze. (or go mining until 75)

* 75-150 MINING

If Smelting Bronze took you way past 75, you don't need as much Silver.

Buy 12 (minimum 3) stacks of Silver Ore.
Buy 12 (minimum 1) stacks of Iron Ore.

Smelt Silver (green until 122, gray at 130)

If your mining is under 125, buy more Silver Ore and Smelt more. (or go mining until you hit 125)

Smelt Iron (green until 145, gray at 160)

If your mining is under 155, buy more Iron Ore and Smelt more. (or go mining until 155)

* 150-225 MINING

Buy 5 (minimum 2) stacks of Gold Ore.
Buy 12 (minimum 2) stacks of Mithril Ore.

Smelt Gold (green until 177, gray at 185)
Smelt Mithril (green until 202, gray at 230)

If your mining is under 230, buy more Mithril Ore and Smelt more. (or go mining until you hit 230)

* 225-300 MINING

This is where it gets hard, if Truesilver Ore is not available.

Also Truesilver is the one Ore is most likely to cost a lot more than the bars.

Buy 6 (minimum 1) stacks of Truesilver Ore.
Buy 12 (minimum 2) stacks of Thorium Ore.

Smelt Truesilver (green until 242, gray at 250).

If your mining is under 250, buy more Truesilver Ore and Smelt more. (or go mining until you hit 250)

Smelth Thorium (green until 270, gray until 290)

Go mining until 300. In theory, this is the first spot you absolutely have to mine :)

* 300-375 MINING

Buy 12 (minimum 3) stacks of Fel Iron Ore.
Buy 10 (minimum 2) stacks of Adamantite Ore.

Smelt Fel Iron (green until 307, gray at 315)
Go mining until you hit 325.
Smelt Adamantite (green until 332, gray at 340)
Go mining until you hit 350.

Buy 8 (minimum 2) stacks of Eternium Ore.
Smelt Eternium (green until 357, gray at 365)
Smelt Felsteel (green until 357, gray at 375)

Note: You need 350 to mine Cobalt in Northrend (so 375 is not needed).

If your mining is under 375, and you want to Smelt as far as you can:

Buy some stacks of Cobalt Ore
Smelt Cobalt (green until 362, gray at 375)

* 375-450 MINING

Smelting days are over :(

Go mining Cobalt until 400.
Go mining Saronite and Titanium Ore until you hit 450.

* LINKS

Traditional mining guides (with mining route information)

Gatherer - The addon for any gathering profession

WoW Mining Guide with Maps 1-450 - WOTLK Mining Guide

WoW Forums Mining 1 to 300 Guide by Highlander on EU-Terenas
Mining @wowwiki
Smelt @wowwiki

WoW Achievements: Accomplished Angler

a.k.a. "How to Get the Title: Salty"

You get the title Salty by finishing all the achievements needed for the Accomplished Angler Achievement.

Here's a brief guide on how to get them all and the title Salty!

Word of warning: Getting the title Salty is not for you if you don't have the patience for it. If fishing is just boring to you, just don't do this :)

Fish Don't Leave Footprints

Try to get before / while doing the other achievement requiring fishing from pools (as this make's finding them very easy)

Acquire the Fish Tracking ability. You need to get a Weather-Beaten Journal, and you can get it out of many fished trunks and crates, you can also get it from the daily quest.

Northrend Angler

Fish 10 nodes in Northrend

(copied from Wowhead, credit to Ithinarine)

* Borean Man O' War School - Borean Tundra (coast).
* Deep Sea Monsterbelly School - Borean Tundra, Dragoblight, Howling Fjord (around Icebergs in the Frozen Sea).
* Dragonfin Angelfish School - Dragonblight (Lake Indu'le).
* Fangtooth Herring School - Howling Fjord (rivers and lakes, not coast).
* Glacial Salmon School - Grizzly Hills (rivers and lakes, not coast).
* Glassfin Minnow School - Crystalsong Forest.
* Imperial Manta Ray School - Northrend (general Northrend fish, found off any coast, not in lakes or rivers).
* Moonglow Cuttlefish School - Borean Tundra, Dragonblight, Howling Fjord (around Icebergs in the Frozen Sea).
* Musselback Sculpin School - Borean Tundra (Lake Kum'uya).
* Nettlefish School - Sholazar Basin (rivers and lakes, not coast)

Master Angler of Stranglethorn

Some say this is the hardest achievement as you have to compete for it and only one can get it each week. some even say it should be removed from Accomplished Angler achievement, and thus, remove it from requirements of Title Salty.

I say, you can't call yourself serious fisherman if you don't try and win the extravaganza. So go and practise, you will get it eventually. If you don't, perhaps Salty is not the title for you.

Best source for tips on Winning the Extravanza can be found from El's Fishing forums: Stranglethorn Extravaganza.

The One That Didn't Get Away

This might take a lot of work. I did this in Shadowglen (the Night Elf starting area, it took me 3 hours of continuous fishing, your milage may wary)

Mr. Pinchy

or more accurately, Mr. Pinchy's Magical Crawdad Box, as catching Mr.Pinchy is not enough, you must get lucky with the 3 wishes and get the mini-pet (I needed 2 Mr.Pinchies to get mine).

Empty out all the Highland Mixed Schools in the area. This means the lake by the alliance town, the lake by the horde town, and the bigger lake up in Skettis. 3-5 nodes in both the Horde and Alliance rivers, and 7-10 in the Skettis area. They spawn rather slow, so after cleaning out the nodes I would find something else to do for 2 hours then come back.

Make sure you pay attention while fishing, because he is BoP, so you need to click accept.

While at it do the daily fishing quest in Terrokar, for great rare gifts like the hat, or mini crokolisk pet.

Deadliest Catch

Info from El's fishing forums

Enter the instance, go down the steps and head straight left avoiding mobs to the waterfall. Mount jump into the lake below, pop water walking and follow the river around collecting the mudskunks from their pools. If you haven't completed the lure quest follow the river all the way around to the NE side where you'll see a tent and a bunch of booze. There's a chest there with the quest item. This is also the location you use to summon the boss.

After doing the background quest and getting a mudskunk lure from Nat Pagle in Dustwallow Marsh:

Head into ZG again and water walk to the Zulian Mudfish pools and fish 5 up (bring a few water walking pots with you--if you can't solo the groups of alligator's that is--because the fish that live there will attack you from time to time (make sure you can solo a level 60 elite fish) and take off the water walking buff. After obtaining the 5 fish, water walk to Pagle's Point (just keep following the river north) and apply the lure (you don't have to cast or even have your pole equipped to do this) and congratulations! ... you are now 1 step closer to the Salty title!

This was very doable on level 70, but at level 80 this is super easy mode (mobs barely aggro to you). D note that the achievement only goes to the fisherman who actually fished him up.

Might as well bring other level 80's with you (healer, tank, dps) and try to get the Polymorph book + Tiger & Raptor bosses for the rare drop mounts.

The Scavenger

(credit to jamras on thottbot)

Steam Pump Flotsam: Zangarmarsh, all over the lakes
Schooner Wreckage: Southshore, near dock and along coast line
Floating Wreckage: Tanaris, coast
Bloodsail Wreckage: STV, coast south of Grom'Gol
Waterlogged Wreckage: STV, Lake Nazferiti and along river

The Coin Master

This is accomplished by fishing the entire collection of coins out of the tiny fountain in Dalaran. Pretty simple, but requires patience (like a lot of these fishing achievements), so just fish, fish, fish from the fountain. Throw the gold coins back to gain the "lucky" buff, whenever you have gold coin and do not already have the buff. And do fish for the whole 2 minutes of the buff, take your break afterwards :)

Outland Angler

(credit to Tadzulempke on Wowhead)

Brackish Mixed School - Terokkar Forest/Zangarmarsh
Bluefish School - Nagrand
Mudfish School - Nagrand
School of Darter - Terokkar Forest
Highland Mixed School - Terokkar Forest (only reachable with flying mounts)
Sporefish School - Zangarmarsh

Old Man Barlowned

There is a daily fishing quest in Terrokar. Each day the fishing quest is randomly chooses one of five fishing quests for you to do. Keep doing this quest every day and eventually you will get all 5.

The Lurker Above

Fish up the Lurker Below in Serpentshrine Cavern

This is definitely soloable, watch my video on how to do it: WoW Achievements: Lurker Above.

Catch 1000 Fish

You will get this while doing everything else on the list, don't worry about it.

The Old Gnome and the Sea

Successfully fish from a school = Fishing achievement which will come automatically by doing other achievements.

ADDITIONAL NOTES

Some fishing achievements, like I smell a Giant Rat, Old Ironjaw or Old Crafty ARE NOT PART of the Accomplished Angler achievement, and are not needed for title Salty.

You might also want to look at El's compilation on Fishing Achivements

CREDITS

Original Brief Overview on Getting Salty by Laizhensil at El's Fishing forums

Do Not Downrank that Heal (to Save Mana)!

10 months ago and at level 70 downranking your heals was a standard way to save mana, e.g. by spamming downranked Greater Heal continuously but still staying with almost full mana (because of mana cost and mana regen).

However, this all changed in the patch 3.0.2 (Downranking from WoWWiki) :

With the release of patch 3.0.2, downranking was essentially eliminated for its ability to conserve mana, as all spells are now reliant on current base mana. It can still be used as a choice should a player want to use a faster spell

So if you downrank your heal, you'll be using the same amount of mana but heal a lot less. Generally this is a bad thing (there are exceptions, if downrank is faster to cast but this is pretty rare).

And this is exactly what I did all the way from level 70 to 80, and even *on* the level 80. I downranked all my heals, I was healing about 2/3 of my max heals but I was using the same amount of mana. I did Heroic Culling of Stratholme like this (not easy), I did Spider Wing of Naxxramas like this. Basically using level 70 heals all the way.

Why?

For the sake of it? Because I'm crazy? Well, yes, but that's not the case here.

I use combination of addons called Grid and Clique for my heals. Grid is super simple, but modifiable, group/raid frame. And Clique enables you to bind any spell in your spell book to keypress-combinations used with different mouseclicks & cast them on mouseover (so no "targeting" in a sense). All this works beautifully apart from this one small thing...

When you "map" a spell with Clique (e.g. by holding down Alt and right-clicking a spell in spellbook with Clique config open, that spell is mapped to Alt + Right-click), it essentially maps the certain *rank* of that spell. Now you probably see why I was using level 70 heals all the way...

I've been using Clique for a very long time, so of course, I had mapped my level 70 heals to it. In came the expansion, I never went to see Clique's config - why should I, spells were already mapped and I was mostly dps leveling my way up - so all the spells were at level 70 rank.

I'm so happy the fellow priests noticed this when we were doing Naxxramas (don't remember the exacts, but I was throwing 7-8k crit Greater Heals, when it should be closer to 11-14k range). So I remapped all my spells and now it's good.

Conclusion: Addons are very helpful, but don't rely on them to work as you think they work, make sure they do :)

Zemalf out, See You in Northrend!

Be Prepared for WotLK: Badges of Justice

Continuing the series 'Be Prepared for Wrath of the Lich King', this time on Badges of Justice you have lying around.

In Wrath of the Lich King, there will be new "badges": Emblem of Heroism, similar to Badges of Justice, but for level 80. Badges of Justice will continue dropping in level 70 heroics and raids, but you can only use them to level 70 items.

If you have plenty of Badges lying around, you might want to make use of them now - or actually not lying around anymore, as they are in your Character windows Currency tab, but anyway.

More and less you have two options:

1) Use Badges of Justice to optimize your gear for leveling, that starts after a week from now, by buying items that will help you do more damage, and thus, level more quickly.

* use lootrank.com to evaluate which items you could possibly buy. You don't have to do theorycrafting yourself, as you can take advantage of the templates dwarfpriest has gracefully submitted to lootrank.com for all of us.

2) Use Badges of Justice to buy uncut Epic Gems, 15 badges a shot. You can use the gems yourself to help the early leveling, or you can sell'em as they're not bind in anyway to you:

* Cut the gems yourself, or find Jewelcrafter to cut them for you, and socket the gems to your current gear to boost damage.

* Sell the gems! Prices are going down fast, but you still might fetch several hundreds of gold if you're quick. Check the Auction House for the prices, and decide if it's better to sell the raw gems or the cut ones.

I'm going for a combination of these, I'll be buying couple of items I can use, which will even out my shadowpriest gear in different slots, and the rest of the badges I'll be putting on gems, which I will sell. If it happens that I can't sell'em during this week for reasonably good price, I'll get'em cut for +Spellpower & possibly +Hit gems and use them then.

One more tip: It's only a week to go until expansion is live, so make a use of it and empty your bags and bank from unneeded trash and sell'em at Auction House. After doing that you might want to empty your quest log (by doing the quests preferrably, not just abandoning them) to have a fresh start with the quests from the expansion.

If you're in a guild, or even responsible for the guild bank, you might have a lot of work to do when emptying the guild bank and selling the items, but it pays off with more room in bank for the new mats and items, and of course, some much needed gold for the guild.

That's all for now. See you in Northrend.

Blog Watch: 1M Milestone For Dwarfpriest

A Dwarf Priest achieved 1 Million page hits. Congratulations!

Short story: if you haven't visited the best priest centric blog there is, or one of the best WoW blogs/websites in general, you're missing out a lot, so visit A Dwarf Priest now, subscribe and never look back.

Be Prepared for WotLK: Leveling

The Wrath of the Lich King expansion is upon us, and for many it means leveling our character to the new level cap of 80. It's been ages since I've done any leveling, and just a week ago I took and leveled all my alts at least two levels, just to get a hang of leveling again.

So here's a quick post with some tips for leveling:

Spec and gear for the most damage

Forget healing. Concentrate on Damage!

You should be geared, and Your talent points should be distributed, to maximize you damage (and thus maximize your experience/hour for example).

For example, I will be very dark shadow priest as soon as the expansion launches, as shadow talents improve my damage output the most.

Get some questing addons

Two I use the most are:
LightHeaded
- Tips directly from Wowhead to aid your questing
QuestHelper
- Calculates the most efficient path to do the quests you have

And to take these two to a whole new level:
Cartographer 3.0
- Maps and notes
TomTom
- Waypoint arror deluxe

Don't forget to have fun

It's new expansion! so enjoy it, don't let it swoosh by too fast :)

Achievement Hunt: Two new videos

As I posted before, I'm heavily into the achievements. I love'em. Rigth now, they keep me busy and they keep me in the game until the expansion comes out. I should probably be leveling some of my Alts, but getting the next (and next, and next) achievement is just so addictive and fun!

I have noticed that some of the achievements are pretty hard or so into detail that they are pretty hard to do without guide, so I look up achievement info from Wowhead achievement pages.

The guides and instructions are great, but it's fun to show things on video as well, so I just posted two youtube videos showing how to do couple of the achievements I did yesterday. One being for the Quests and The Burning Crusade: Blade's Edge Bomberman and the other is The Lurker Above for Fishing (and Accomplished Angler).

Check them out if you need help on doing those:

WoW Achievement: The Lurker Above (Fishing)

WoW Achievement: Blade's Edge Bomberman

Do subscribe to my videos if you like, as I'm posting some WoW videos every now and then.

Quick note to other WoW fishing enthusiasts, if you haven't found El's Extreme Anglin' yet, go there now :) It's the best place for any kind of WoW Fishing info, and even that it's concentrated on fishing profession, it's one the best WoW sites in general because of the superb quality in all aspects.

Gone Fishing.

I didn't play WoW between the 2.4 patch and just-launched 3.0.2, and during those months several of my old WoW friends have moved on, and some of them I miss already. Happily, I'm in active guild (and they didn't kick me out or anything) and my friend list is not totally gray (everyone offline), so I won't turn too lonely in game :)

But that wasn't what I planned to write about as the new patch 3.0.2 brought a load of new features to the game, which will keep me busy too..

Hail to the WoW Achievements!

I had a post earlier this year about What kind of bartle player you are?. This of course refers to the Bartle Test, which categorizes players depending on what their interest in game is. I was somewhere along achiever-explorer-socializer-killer lines, in that order. And at least the achiever part is dead on..

With the new Achievements in 3.0.2, I started rethinking the whole thing, and realized that I must be quite a bit on the "achiever" side, as I immediately started checking the achievements and planning how I can start working my way towards the more difficult to reach achievements.

So I'm doing all kinds of odd things around Azeroth and Outlands, just to get achievement unlocked, couple of points and possibly a mount or title at some point. Some couldn't care less about the achievements, but for me, they're something to work towards, keep me busy and feel that I achieve something. Even that I don't actually achieve much, but anyway :)

At the moment, I'm concentrating on fishing - for those who know me in-game, no big surprise :) The Accomplished Angler achievement for title of "Salty" is what I work towards. The achievement requires a murloc-ton of running and fishing rare fish in hard to reach places, including raid instances SSC & ZG and opposing capital - Orgrimmar for me. Before I had no reason to go and bug Hordies in any way, but now I have a reason. Fish.

After I get the fishing achievements done as far as I can pre-expansion, I'll turn my eyes on Cooking and start pursuing the Hail to the Chef and title "Chef" to go with the "Salty" from fishing one.

Heck, when the expansion is out, I might even try to shoot for the Realm First! Grand Master Angler, but I think it might be really hard and would need me to get the game as soon as possible.

That pretty much describes the game experience for me, there's always something to look forward to. At some point I might (again) get bored, and take a break, but I don't see why I wouldn't keep playing/returning to WoW every now and then. When the expansion is launched and level cap is opened, the leveling start again and the brand new gear will be there to be looted - so again, there will be something to look forward to.

So WoW is quite a bit about achieving and pursuing something. And at the same time exploring things you've not seen or experienced before. But one can't deny the social aspect of the game, the friends you have in the game can also be the reason you keep returning to the game.

Perhaps that's what has made WoW so popular - something for everyone.

Back in WoW: 3.0.2 Patch is Here.

Those darn Wrath of the Lich King ads and the Blizzcon news I ran into. It's been 7 months since I started the break from WoW. But I couldn't resist too long.

I'm back in WoW.

Yes, I resurrected my account and installed the game to my repaired laptop. So I enter the game just when 3.0.2 patch enters the realms, so I handily avoided everything between 2.4 and 3.0. And a month before the new expansion. Just in time to get myself ready for the level 70-80 grind (Bye bye Holy Priest for a while, welcome the good'ol Shadow!).

There's loads of info about the new patch and such around, here's the one for Priests: Patch 3.0.2 Priest Survival Guide by Dwarfpriest.com. btw, I was so glad that the dwarfpriest blog/site was still around, and bigger than it was when I last visited, helped me a lot to read all that info while waiting for the patch downloads after install. So with such quality info I'll probably survive my comeback.

Anyway, I picked up the little things from 3.0.2 patch notes. And it's the little things that matter the most :)

Macros and key bindings are now saved server-side so there is no longer a need to reconfigure them when logging in using another computer.

- So good! I wish this had been around already, so I wouldn't need to reset every macro I ever had. But for the future, very nice.

Once a vanity pet or mount is learned, the icon will disappear from within a player’s inventory and reappear in the appropriate tab under the pet tab under Character Info. Say goodbye to your vanity pets and mounts taking up bag and bank slots!

Lost pets and mounts (one time quest rewards) can be recovered by visiting a stablemaster.

- YES! at least 10 or 20 slots freed from bank and bags. So good.
- And if the other one means that I can get the pets and mounts I had to delete to free some space in bank, it gets even better.

There was also some info/news about Badges of Justice and Battleground Marks being stored in the new "Wallet", freeing even more space in the bank - but I didn't find this from patch notes.

Of course there's a whole lot of class changes, new talents trees, addon problems/downloads/installs and all that which makes your and my head hurt.

But I don't stress about that right now, I have to learn the game again. It took a while to remember how to move the toon like I did 7 months ago with the camera/mouse (mouse right-button pressed worked). But I figured it out, so maybe I'll survive. And I got Pitbull unit frames and Clique setup already, so maybe even some healing when I get into the game after patch is out in EU servers.

But before that I'll be attending the preview of all previews today, Max Payne the Movie.

Taking a break from WoW

The boredom came after six months for me.

I played way too much and I simply got bored.

And playing through the end-game content felt like work more than fun game.

With all the grinding needed to keep up with raiding is just too much.

Early in the game, rewards (e.g. gear upgrades) come every hour or even every minute - at the end game rewards come monthly. Weekly or daily if you're extremily lucky.

End game is just too slow for me. I might come back some day, but it'll be more casual.

I have subscription until end of May, so I'll be playing a bit every now and then, but it's very likely I don't renew the subscription anymore.

Forum Watch: (Priest) 2 years healing in raids, now losing spot

A Human Priest named Lizarb made a rare thing in WoW forums priests community and created nicely structured post about the problems of the healing priest in raids. She has been 2 years healing in raids, now loosing spot (repost on US Priest Forums too).

As a summary of the post: in her guild healer spots previously filled with Priests, have now been conquered by other healer classes for greater Utility and Survivability. Priests are no longer needed for raids as other classes can do the same job better.

I'm relatively inexperienced raider compared to her, as I don't know pre-2.3 WoW, but from what I read from the post, makes sence:

I get one-two shotted in raids/instances if something bad happens. I'm still using Primal Mooncloth Set as the +healing and mana regen is ridiculously good, compared to early/mid raid drops. My Power Word: Shield hardly saves anyone.

I've been relatively happy with my priest, and I think I still am, but I still feel that many aspects of the (healing) priest could be improved.

But you better read the original post by Lizarb yourself, and if you feel like it, post your comments to either the original European thread or the re-post in US forums, whichever you have access to.

Blog Watch: Interview with a Gold Seller

I was pointed to the blog in question by Matticus' post at World of Matticus.

And whether you approve gold selling, buying it, cheating in a digital game or are very much against all that, I think one of the most interesting blog posts last week was Tobold's MMORPG Blog: Interview with a Gold Seller.

I found it interesting, because it made me think again (yes! it happens, thank you very much): What kind of player I am (how I play), and why do I play WoW (or any other game).

When I'm playing a single player game, I don't use cheat codes or such, as that would be cheating and what's the point in cheating yourself?

In a multiplayer game, I play with what is given to me, as doing something against the rules would be cheating, not only against yourself, but against everyone else in the game too. Remember, you are not alone.

So personally, I would never buy gold, items, leveling service or whatever these companies offer, because that would take away everything I love in World of Warcraft:

What I got, I have earned. What I got, I had others there to help me. And what I got, I can help others with.

And where's the fun in buying bytes with credit card, when I can have the most fun trying to figure out a virtual economy and play a little business game inside the fantasy world?

When someone finally gets that *ding* for level 70 or gets that Epic Flyer after hours of grinding, I'd cheer her, she worked for it: She earned it.

But if someone would pay real life currency for the same, it wouldn't be the same, would it?

I don't admire people for what they wear, I admire them for what they are.

Two (Healing) Addons to Rule Them All

The most useful healing addons right here. Individual needs and preferences apply, but these ones I love the most.

I'm addon "freak", I use them a lot, so I reckoned to make another topic out of it.

I'm constantly tuning my UI, removing unused addons and adding new ones. I like it simple but my screen always ends up cluttered, as I feel that I need this and that.

I prefer Ace addons, as they're constantly maintained (a blessing after patches). With WowAceUpdater it's easy to install new addons and it keeps all my installed Ace addons up-to-date with single click. As all Ace addons use the same library, the addons are lightweight for cpu (compared to having same number of independent addons)

I use Omen and BigWigs, which help a lot in raids/groups.

I have Pitbull unitframes (even more important after, for some reason, my Grid started malfunctioning).

For heals I use Clique (different mouse clicks with different modifiers (alt/ctrl/shift) to do mouseover heals on frames/player).

For decursing I use, well, Decurse. And tons more (e.g. Fubar,Bartender3,Buffalo2,AuctioneerAdvanced,etc)

But if I would recommend two addons to all healers (and all casters, and they benefit melee too), it would be these:

Quartz
VisualHeal

Here's why Quartz and VisualHeal are sooo good:

Shamelessly ripped from my own posts on several forums (as I love these addons so much I'd love to more people getting the benefits, and as they will benefit even more if others would use them too).

QUARTZ

CastingBar

Holy efficiency! I stumbled upon this castingbar replacer - and even that it's very very simple - Quartz is absolutely, hands-on, the best addon I've ever seen!

Why?

Because Quartz adds "latency" to your casting bar. Without going into any client-server jargon, you're normal casting bar is showing how your client sees the casting time, but because of latency, your spell is actually going off at server before your casting bar reaches the end.

What this means? And How Quartz helps.

It means that if you have 200ms latency for example, you can see that visualized in Quartz and start your next spell / action 0.2s before your casting bar is actually full and the spell still goes off! So with ten spells, you have saved 2 seconds. With 500 dps, that's free 1000 damage more. make it 100 spells and it's 10000 damage! And all this just by tackling the latency with Quartz. If you experience 500ms of such latencies, it comes even better! Don't let lag and latency get you, get Quartz

VisualHeal

Healing Visualizer for both Healers and the ones healed

For healers: VisualHeal shows where target's health will end up after the heal hits
--> cancel unnecessary casts which would cause too much overheal

+ it shows if someone else has same target and is also casting heal on it
and it adds all this to the estimated health after your heal hits --> you can cancel cast if it would mean too much overheal, as the other healer has the target covered.

For others: VisualHeal shows incoming heals to you = where your health will end up when heal hits you --> can use abilities accordingly.
- low health & no heals coming? better use some "saving" ability!
- low health, but two heals incoming. Great! Keep pounding.

For all this to work, everyone needs VisualHeal, so once again, get it!
Must for healers. Recommended for everyone else too

+ VisualHeal shows up in unitframes too if they support it (PitBull does), so if every healer uses VisualHeal, it can be easily seen who is not healed yet = less parallel healing

So I'd say that every healer (if not everyone) should install VisualHeal (make the bar invisible if you want, but do have it). I'd think it will help you and your guild a lot, especially in 25-mans.

Where to Download Addons

Get WowAceUpdater! Keeps your addons up-to-date, and easy installs for every Ace addon. That is the best way to get Quartz and VisualHeal (and Omen, BigWigs + loads of other goodies), and keep them up-to-date.

EDIT: Unfortunately WoW Ace Updater is no longer with us, as wowace integrated with curse.com, and for me, curse updater just isn't very good (tbh, it sucks big time). New and improved alternatives for easy addon maintenance: Wowmatrix and WUU - WoW UI Updater.

There are many other places too to get addons, like Curse.com (they also have installer, which isn't nearly as good as WowAceUpdater) and WoWInterface.

More "Healing Addons That Rule"

Three (Healing) Addons to Rule Even More