Anyway, in Wrath I really liked Discipline healing, shielding really, but the spec was interesting.  However after the healing mana nerf from hell that was Cataclysm, it is a pain in the ass to play Discipline and still have mana to do anything with.  Yes I know there is a way for Disc to get mana back and it is through Evangelism.  That mechanic while great for PVP blows in PVE.  To get your stacks up and running well you need to Holy Fire and or Smite.  Now at least Smite with the correct talents will also heal and essentially replaces your Heal Spell, except when you want to heal.  Currently the only way to replace 1 button with these 2 spells is to do it with a macro and use a modifier key to switch between them.  In the middle of dodging fire or the rogue on your ass this is not possible.  If they want us thinking then game play needs to slow down even more to the point where you are not relying on muscle memory to do a job.  That is not skill or decision making process that is just automatic reflexes programmed through repetition, no thought needed.

So one of 2 things really needs to be modified to keep clutter under control.  We need more expansive logic structures possible in the macro interpreter or an extra spell added to Evangelism.  I really think Evangelism needs to have Heal also added into the list with Smite and Holy Fire. This will allow those that don’t like to deal damage to heal an alternative so they can actually use the mana regenerative mechanics for the spec.  This whole post was really to set up that one sentience in bold, I don’t think much else needs to be said.

Well now that I say that and I think about the dark side for a moment, there is one change as well.  I think Dark Evangelism needs to have Mind Spike added into the list with Mind Flay. This will allow for a DE to build up when you are on a short burn phase with adds or trash and have Mind Flay for the normal rotation.  Given the cool down on Archangel it will not really effect Shadow all that much.

Read Lissanna’s post here before as this is a follow up with my 2 cents.

Before I go into theory land lets look at all of the healing masteries.

Druid - Restoration: Deep Healing – Increases the potency of your heal over time spells by up to 20% based on the current health level of your target (lower health targets are healed for more). Healing increased further by mastery rating.

Paladin – Holy: Illuminated Healing – Your healing spells also place an absorb shield on your target for 8% of the amount healed lasting 6 sec. Absorb increased further by mastery rating.

Priest – Discipline: Shield Discipline – Increases the potency of all your damage absorption spells by 20%. Absorption increased further by mastery rating.

Priest – Holy: Echo of Light – Your direct healing spells heal for an additional 10% over 6 sec. Healing increased further by mastery rating.

Shaman – Restoration: Deep Healing – Increases the potency of your direct healing spells by up to 20%, based on the current health level of your target (lower health targets are healed for more). Healing increased further by mastery rating.

Ok so here we see Druid and Shaman have nearly the same mastery bonus, this needs to change.  So lets for sake of argument say that Deep Healing will now be the following.

Deep Healing – Increases the potency of your healing spells by up to 20%, based on the current health level of your target (lower health targets are healed for more). Healing increased further by mastery rating. (Tool tip is copied from shaman but would be either Shaman or Druid.

So what would be the new Mastery for either Druid or Shaman, who ever did not get Deep Healing, well I have an idea for it as well as naming.

Druid : Touch of the Dream, Shaman : Ancestral Guardian – Your healing spells place a stacking buff on the target where each stack give X/(# of stacks)% reduction to all damage taken and lasts for 6 sec.

Now the range should be between ~5% and 15% for the total effect and of course the amount gained each stack would be based on mastery.  How this interaction would stack or not is a complex interaction.  But it is the last “Buff” healing effect that is not currently assigned.  I looked in the healing trees and Shaman still have the 10% physical damage reduction and this should definitely stack with that buff.

The 3% damage reduction talent is gone from Discipline priests which is where I got this idea in the first place, it is surprising but that 3% really adds up over the duration of an ICC fight.

Additionally Disc. Priests are another group that seems a bit screwed in their mastery unless it also effects Divine Aegis which in the wording does not seem like it would, time will tell on that one.

1. Mouse Over Button -> Key Press -> Auto Binding Mode
2. Movable Default UI Bars

Ultimately the functionality that I am referring to here can be provided by Dominos or Bartender 4 addons. I have used something like them for years and I know of many other players that use them. Not a complete replacement like NuUI and some other compilations but never the less just a couple of very useful mods to let you arrange your bars how you want them.

Really all that needs to be done is to turn off the default UI bar frame graphic and then make the different sets of button bars movable actually exactly like Bartender4 does it. Now even though these 2 mods allow you to customize each bar into a bar of X by Y rows and columns I would just be happing with the ability to move the default 5/6 bars currently showing and be able to break bars 1-6 out of the paging system that the default UI has.

Like some of the “new” features added in WotLK, the Equipment Manager, the ability to preview talent specs before committing, and the entire quest tracking system this would be a very basic enhancement to the default ui to make it a little more customizable without having to resort to a replacement mod.

The other advantage would be that the Vehicle bars would not randomly break on release of a new patch due to a conflict with one of the custom bar mods. We would not have to use custom bars if the default ones were configurable, and I mean more than just Show/Hide.

Well enough of a rant for now. Nothing major to mention but the new Guild UI got me thinking of other aspects of the default UI that could use some attention. One that the users have had to make their own mods to fix.

So here is what happened I am already in the SC2 beta from Blizzcon 08. I pre-ordered SC2 from Amazon.com and received an email from Amazon with a Beta key in it from pre-ordering the collector’s edition. I wanted the Thor in game WoW pet. But I now have a Beta key and no one to give it to.

For a chance at the key post in the comments section of this post your idea/opinion/concept of one way to improve the economy in World of Warcraft. Oh and getting rid of gold selling spam which should already be done does not count. Out of the acceptable ideas I will enter the email addresses into a spread sheet and either /roll in game or roll some actual dice to randomize it. So please enter a valid email address that will reach you when the form asks for an email address. This will run until Midnight Friday 4/23 as in 00:00 4/24 EST.

Combo points need to stack on the Rogue or Druid and not their target. I realize for PvP purposes this will need to be looked at closely but the new ability of Rogues Redirect (81) looks really cool but lets be honest this is an ability that should not even need to exist and if it is needed then it is something that rogues should have from about level 10/20 on.  It is something that should be available for use while leveling.  Furthermore no Cat equivalent was mentioned, however this is another area where it could simplify the “John Madden” effect that was mentioned when dealing with the Feral Cat rotation or should I say management system.

If we are worried about having too much burst from having combo points stack on the Rogue/Cat then also change combo points to stack from 1-5 to 1-10.  This will add additional tweak points and granularity for damage and buffs.  You could have points 1-5 scale linearly and 6-8 by powers and for real fun and burst 9-10 exponential.  But the time required to get 9-10 combo points will be about 2X if we keep the current combo point generation rate.  But even if 1-9 was linear with an extra boost at 10 for flair would not be uncalled for.

Now if Druids get another ability to equal Redirect for Rogues then that would be acceptable, not ideal but necessary.  The real problem with the Druid class as a whole with the exception of Resto is all 3 other spec flavors directly parallel another class.  This is actually OK because it is the nature of the Druid to be able to shift and therefore change what they are emulating relatively easily.  This is less the case with Bears.  Unless you time something perfectly you are not going to be able to shift out of Bear while a boss is wailing on you to do something in Caster or Cat form.

However here is the thing if Blizzard does not want the paralleled classes to play like their brethren then they need to create completely unique mechanics and resources for each flavor of Druid.  This in the end is insane from a development standpoint let alone class balance.  So in the end Cat and Bear need to have at least 50% of the tools that Protection Warriors and Rogues have access to including fundamental role and mechanical abilities, just not the flavor abilities.

Things not to copy:

• Vanish, even though we want it.
• Cloak of Shadows
• Shadow Dance
• Essentially most 41 and 51 point abilities.

Things that are copied or need to be:

• Last Stand
• Shield Wall
• Hunger for Blood
• Redirect(81), if it is implemented.

Anyway I will beat the horse one more time, to sum this all up, since combo points are here to stay then they need to be on the player and not the target.

Now I have read the Stormrage book and one of the pivotal moments described a really cool concept for future druid possibilities.  I would call this ability Dream Cast, I don’t think they named it in the book if they did, I missed it.  Now that I have seen the Shaman preview, all I can say is well crap.  I initially envisioned an effect that is now very similar to the Elemental Overlord effect from the elemental tree, which is currently a talent Lightning Overlord.

So what I was initially envisioning would be a talent that when activated for the next  say 12 seconds every spell you cast a dream version of yourself would also casts it at the same time with the same buffs ect, and deals x% of damage of the base cast regardless of whether you normally hit or miss.  The lore perspective would be your dream version in the Emerald dream is casting at the same target as you are.  It would be a mix of Elemental Overlord/ and Mirror Image.

Ways to tweak this further would be to change duration and what spells it effects.  Initially I thought all spells would be duplicated but upon thinking about it further I think it should be like the old Elemental shaman talent Lightning Overlord.  It would only affect Wrath and other Nature based Damage spells maybe even including Dream Treants, which would look cool.  The dream form should show up as an effect but not be targetable given the short duration.  But the benefits and considerations are all tweak points.

Well given the release of the Druid information coming Friday this idea/concept is probably a bit too late but I thought still worth mentioning and maybe starting some discussion somewhere.

I think this is a really cool idea, I won’t be using this feature most of the time, but definitely something I will be using at other times. Especially since theoretically you could be on 1 character of the account and check the AH on other servers and or the Bank Alt of the same account. But they may put something in place such that is that account is logged into the game no character on that account could be checked. We will have to see.

Over all I like this idea but lets be serious the current AH in game feels like a quick fix that was added at the last moment to at least have some sort of an in-game economy going. The default interface is a pain in the ass and even with Auctioneer and other Add-ons it is still extremely tedious and a bitch to find stuff if you are just browsing. If you know exactly what you want it works otherwise it fails.

Out of the 4 in game AH like interfaces I have dealt with directly and several, more than 3, others I have heard about only 1 stands out as actually being something different, robust and useful.  EVE-Online is the only MMO I have seen that actually has a robust and useful economic interface.  I believe it is this way because, crafting and the economic game are actually acceptable play styles in EVE.  Whereas in all of the other MMOs I have dealt with and heard about those systems, crafting and trading, seem to be a quick fix to add features.

So what am I suggesting or IMO is needed. A complete overhaul of the AH. Yes our bag space may be limited by stack size but why the hell should the AH. The AH like everything in the game is ultimately a series of entries in a Database. Currently it seems like 1 entry in said DB has a stack size limitation. This is insane.

The following are IMO the way to make the AH sing.

• 1 entry in the AH per Item of unlimited quantity (ultimately an unsigned Int of either 8/16/32bit in size. 16 would be the best since dust and some rep items could get into the hundreds easily.)
• The biggest and most important one,  list Buy Orders
• Fully customizable search for gear.
• Wild Card Search-able for Name Text
• iLvL
• eLvL
• Quality(Pick-able, not Lowest filter.) If I want to find a green item I want to see green, not green, blue, and purple.
• Stat Search X [<|>|=] of Y Stat [Str|Agil|Stam|Int|Spr|SP|AP|Armor|Crit|Hit|Haste|ect....] Repeatable so add additional filters.
• Price History (at least past week) so we can in game see the price trends over the past week. (Min, Max, Avg) of both Price listed and Price Sold. Maybe a separate graph showing # sold at what price through Bid and Buyout.

Essentially look at what EVE-Online has for an in game economic interface and make something similar with the Blizzard polish, because I really can’t think of any way to really improve the EVE interface, I just know that I like it and it would be great to have something similar in WoW. Unfortunately for EVE it is about the only thing I really like in the game but I will save my dislikes of EVE for another post sometime.

If a Starcraft 2 beta ever begins I may mess around with that or give my beta access to friends that like RTS games more than I do.  I just don’t like that with the exception of the highest skilled players he who mobilizes a medium size strike force wins it seems in most RTS games.  In Civ III parlance I end up being an Industrious/Commercial leader and specialize in perfecting my resources and scientific research.  In MOO2 I would end up with the species that was creative and end the game with Millennium Falcon size ships with the Death Star weapon.  I loved destroying planets with small frigates.   So In RTS games I hate micro managing individual units and thereby leaving other units quasi vulnerable.  It is a shame that turn based strategy games have seemed to stop evolving other than with better graphics.

Anyway back from that tangent.  The one aspect of RTS games that I do like are Tower Defense scenarios.  In a LAN game a long time ago in Red Alert I won the game by building out a web of Tesla Coil Towers across the map.  I had wiped out the other player’s base but they had 1 unit hiding somewhere on the map….  So rather than scour the map looking I just let automated defenses do the killing.

So the game that brought me back to this style of play was the South Park Tower Defense game that is on XBox Live for download.

How would it all work I really have no idea.  I just think that the concept would be interesting and I am sure Blizzard or some other gaming company will figure out a cool way to incorporate something like it into a raid and or dungeon scenario.

Because I have been waiting for 3.3 and the joy of the new LFG tool to finally be able to get random groups when ever I have time I have mostly stopped playing my level 80s except when raiding.  I have farmed some more badges and stone keeper shards for my new time filler.  Leveling several new alts.  I am currently working on a Mage, Rogue and Druid.  The cool thing that is keeping most of the mind-numbing bordom at bay when leveling the umpteenth toon through the lower levels is now I am skipping large blocks of zones especially in the 14-20 segment.

The reason I am able to do this and doing this is that I can now get XP in the Battlegrounds.  I use to hate battlegrounds while leveling before because they always seemed to be a waste of time and then there were the twinks.  Now my Mage and Druid with 2 Heirloom pieces of gear are a quasi Twink but no where as bad as they use to be.  With the turn XP off feature all of the serious Twinks have been moved to their own little bracket.  This means that the battlegrounds are now full of people just wanting to play a game or few to either level through BGs or just to get a break from the normal quest grinds.  Before getting to one of the more serious points and improvements that needs to be made to Battlegrounds I have to say playing a Rogue with 2 Heirloom daggers enchanted with Life-stealing is fun as hell.

Bracket Restructure

As the section title directly above states Bracket Restructure is one of the main things that needs to be done now that we have XP in Battlegrounds.  All BGs need to run from X0-X9.  Let the level cap players always be in their own separate bracket.

The reason for this is the end result of several previous PvP changes.  Lissanna, a mutual friend and I got into an argument about this on Sunday over vent.  Because it is player behavior Lissanna is of the opinion that no blame can be placed on Blizzard.  Ok so what is the combination of issues that is causing a problem?   It is a mix of XP in BGs bringing players of All Levels into a BG instance and the level capped 80s only wanting 80s in their game using the AFK reporting tool to “kick” anyone of a significantly lower level out of the instance.  Because there are no repercussions for reporting someone AFK you can just do it to anyone for no particular reason.  This then causes the person to get the debuff and if they don’t do a certain action within a time frame they will be kicked and given the Deserter Debuff.  This occurred to our mutual friend in AV when they were killed and were running back to meet up with the group.  While they were dead they were reported and kicked while running back.  This type of crap can not be tolerated.  If a person is active and attempting to participate they deserve to be there unfortunately even if their performance sucks.

The report AFK tool has now become kick those that don’t agree with us and is now a device for griefing.  There needs to be a mechanism put in place that allows one to defend themselves from being wrongfully labeled.  Because there are legitimate reasons in battlegrounds to remain stationary to either defend or gather surveillance.    Especially if you are a Rogue or Druid since you can stealth and remain mostly hidden.

Yes as Lissanna pointed out this is a player behavior issue especially since the player base asked for such a system to be implemented.  However since we own nothing in the game it all belongs to Blizzard then they are also to blame.  The created the system and implemented it, and like many things they implement they don’t seem to stop and figure out all of the ways the system could and will be abused so that there are counter mechanisms in place to enforce better behavior or more fair play.  As in if you falsely report someone AFK then you are the one booted.  There should at least be a Query system to the player so that they can respond to their accusers directly.

Anyway I look forward to the PVP XP through level 70.  Afterward, looks like it will be impossible with the level cap Twinks behaving badly either because they don’t know better or are bored.  I suspect the later but ya never know.

I admit I don’t like seeing a non 80 in the BG when I run BGs on my 80s but I realize that the system allows them there and as long as they try I don’t have a problem with them being there.  I would prefer to see the level cap become it’s own bracket for just this reason.

What I mean here is that the stance/form/state dynamic array needs to be changed.  Currently Moonkin and Tree form are exclusive.  As soon as you hit 81 you could have both forms.  Both forms now sit in slot 5 of the druid form list if they have either talent otherwise it becomes flight.

Is this a big deal no I admit it is not.  However for consistancy sake and so that generalize macro sets could be developed it would be useful if for druids the form numbers were static.

0 – Caster

1 – Bear

2 – SeaLion

3 – Cat

4 – Cat (Stealth)

5 – Travel

6 – Moonkin

7 – Tree

8 – Flight

9 – Ret Paly DK form, So we can Tank and crank out the damage. (Ok wishing here).

Either way if static numbering is implemented cool if not I know we will adapt.  However more character specific macro slots would be useful.  Say 45-60ish.  This is just a target number that I would need so I could create a full set of macros for each Talent Spec as a druid and still have a little room to spare.  Personal wish here but hey my blog.

***** Edit*****

I forgot to mention before this posted that currently with Rogues Non-Stealthed is stance 1 and Stealthed is stance 2.  Where with Druids you have to use the Stealth modifier to differentiate.  It would just make some of the macro syntax tighter.