Welcome to Draenor

Yesterday was probably the longest work day of my life. It's hard to say though. It was comparable to the day I was leaving for Disney World a couple of months ago. I'm not sure which I love more - WoW or Disney World. Haha. I stopped by the grocery store on my way home to stock up on Mountain Dew. I almost never drink Mountain Dew except when I'm planning on an epic gaming session. (Honestly, I knew it wasn't going to be that epic last night because I had to come back to work this morning.)

So I got home, logged in, and got straight to it!

For all the whining I've done about always being on a low-pop server, I was glad last night. I didn't have to wait for one minute in a queue to log in. However, Josh did run into a bit of a snare. He had been playing his druid (Yonywu) earlier, but he had intended to level his rogue (Popkorn) with me. He wasn't logged on at all when I got home. So he went to log in to Popkorn, and it was doing the 90% loading screen thing. Finally, it went back to the character screen and said, "A character with that name already exists." I searched the /who, and sure enough, it said Popkorn was online. Only, she wasn't. I checked the forums, and it seemed all the people it had happened to had been knocked offline, and when they tried to come back, it gave them this error. It was strange because Josh hadn't been online at all. But we waited 15 minutes for it to "log off," and then we were set to go.

General chat was so full of tears, I'm surprised it didn't flood. So much, "You would think Blizzard would know how to release an expansion by now! They should be prepared for this!" Y'all. That's like saying, "You should be prepared for someone to drop a bomb on your house." Even if you know in advance that it's coming, what the hell are you going to do? There's only so much preparation they can do. The rest has to work itself out (for example, after a few days, EVERYONE won't be trying to log in at the same time) or get worked out as they see the issues. 

One of my favorite WoW memories was on the WotLK release day. I was out in Borean Tundra killing things, when all of a sudden, every NPC in sight disappeared. Friendlies, enemies, neutrals...all of them. Gone. What could I do but laugh? It was funny! I don't understand these people who rage over things like this. They came back after a few minutes, and I stopped laughing and got back to killing things. I've seen every release except Vanilla and MoP, so I knew what to expect. Everyone is saying this one is the worst, though. Maybe that's true, but for me it doesn't seem so. And it wasn't the lag or the problems with the garrisons are any other game factors that upset me. It was only the other players whining about the problems that got under my skin.

And Blizz's hatred for warlocks. So way back in the day, warlocks didn't have any instant spells except for curses, and a curse wouldn't tag a target. Because, you know, people are always just accidentally throwing curses around. You have to throw a 3-second shadowbolt to show you really mean it. (I don't know if shadowbolt ever really had a 3-second cast time. It seemed like it was a 5-minute cast time before haste was a thing. But I'm destro; I don't even have a shadowbolt anymore.) So on a release day, or in daily zones, when there were a ton of players and not so many mobs that needed killing, it was nearly impossible for a warlock to get what she needed unless she was killing things with a friend. Then Blizz finally realized, hey, this isn't cool! A curse is a spell and it should tag a target. Thanks, Blizz! I love you guys! All was well in the warlock world. I could quest on my own again. And then they took away our curses. I can conflagrate every so often, but that just isn't enough. So last night, when I was in a crowded area, I would just cast rain of fire right over myself. It wasn't stealing mobs from anyone because the chance of hitting a mob is still pretty small and it was only getting the mobs that I should have been able to get on my own. So then this death knight comes and lays death and decay directly under my rain of fire. Really dude? You're melee. You have death grip. You have zero trouble getting mobs. Even if you still wanted to use my tactic, you couldn't move over ten yards and get the mobs that would never have even come near my rain of fire? When I finally finished that quest, I had a few choice words for him. His response was to try to invite me to  a group. Really?!

I'll be sure not to get separated from my pocket rogue anymore.

I got about two bars into 91 before I called it a night. We got a bunch of upgrades, which was pretty sweet. Okay, so maybe a lot of them weren't actually upgrades, but we figured we ought not look a gift horse in the mouth. If they want me to show a little lot of skin, I guess that's what I'll do.

It's time for introductions

Uhh, better late than never, right?

Some of my characters are not in the gear in which I'd like to present them, but I'm at work, so there's nothing I can do about it right now.

My very first character was an itty bitty baby warlock named Loihi. Though I knew nothing about the elements that warlocks use, nor that a fire (destro) lock would become my favorite class/spec in the game, I wanted to name her after a volcano. Loihi is actually an underwater volcano that no one has ever heard of. I've never been to Hawaii, and I don't speak Hawaiian. I couldn't find a pronunciation anywhere online, so I took my best guess and pronounced it lo-wee-hee. A month or so later, I met someone in game who claimed to be from Hawaii. He told me I was wrong and that it was lo-why-hee. After a couple of years, I learned that my first guess, lo-wee-hee, was absolutely correct. But it had been too long. The name was stuck, and so I pronounce her name incorrectly to this day.

After a couple months of playing, I had reached level 25. (Hey, it was hard back then!) Shortly after BC came out, they opened up free realm transfers from highly populated realms. Josh decided to take it, and I decided not to. I was being stubborn. Scarlet Crusade had been my WoW home those few months, and I didn't want to leave it. He tried to cancel his transfer, but it was too late. By the time I realized it was stupid to play without him, the free transfers had ended. And so I left behind my level 25 Loihi, and she's still there on Scarlet Crusade.

I created a new warlock with the same name who looked exactly the same on The Scryers and pretended it had never happened. So I think I created her around March of 2007, and if I remember correctly, I finally reached level 70 in February of 2008. In January 2010, I faction changed her, and within two weeks, I changed her right back. I'm really weird about Loihi. She has to be exactly as she's always been, or it really gets to me. I've never been able to change her hair or anything. I'm still dealing with her new face.

She's my baby. Before achievements, mounts, etc, were account-wide, I did everything with her, even when I had lots of alts. She's always the first one I level in a new expansion. It may sound silly, but I feel like she's a part of me. So here she is in silly pvp gear.

Don't worry. No one else will have that long of an intro.

So next is Adelaide, my draenei shaman. She was my first alt. Josh and I had done refer-a-friend, and I was able to boost her to level 60ish right before WotLK came out. Josh had already had two max level characters at this point (warrior and warlock) and I was happy to be able to catch up. I leveled her as enhancement, but once I hit 80, I decided to try my hand at healing. I loved it. And I was good at it. Hell, I played on a laptop with the touchpad mouse, without healbot, and I was still good. So when I started playing on my desktop with a real mouse and with healbot, people didn't die. Ever.

Shortly after leveling both of them to 80, we got burned. We decided to switch to horde. I decided to give a paladin a try, since everyone always talked about how easy they were. I leveled retribution, of course, and I hated it. I sucked at it, and it was just so boring to me. So once I hit 80, despite my affinity for healing, I decided to go protection. And I loved tanking even more than I loved healing. Josh had always been a tank on his warrior, and it made him rage a lot. But tanking was just so much fun for me. (I did eventually give pally healing a try, and I hated it.) So meet Amayaa, my blood elf protection paladin. (Excuse her ugly gear.)

We stuck with horde for awhile, and I started to miss my warlock. Amayaa had everything she could ever want or need out of Naxxramas, so I leveled up another warlock...also named Loihi. Lol.

And then we got burned again - this time by real life "friends." So we went back to the alliance. I had loved paladin tanking so much that I decided to level a draenei paladin. And so we have Lumey. (Excuse her ugly gear too.)

We weren't in a raiding guild and weren't really doing much of anything else, so I just decided to level another alt. This time I went with a warrior. If I remember correctly, I leveled her all the way up as protection, and I enjoyed warrior tanking just as much as pally tanking. Whimsy has had her hair and her face changed since the patch, and she's still not as cute as she was before. :/ Right now, she's fury because that's how I leveled her.

Now here's where we enter the Land of Too Many Alts, and things start to get a little fuzzy. I think I leveled Gatsbie next. Gatsbie is a druid. I leveled her up as a kitty with the intention of having my offspec be boomkin. However, I decided to try out a bear spec, and guess what? I loved it. I just really love tanking. The only kind of tank I don't like playing is a deathknight. I don't like playing any kind of deathknight. So Gatsbie never got any kind of caster spec. She's always been kitty/bear, and I enjoy them both, which is interesting because I don't like playing rogue at all. (For some reason, wowhead would only give me her old model.)

I think Ladella came next. I didn't have a healer horde side, so I decided it was time to give priest healing a try. I like discipline a lot, and I went through a phase where Ladella was my preferred character to play.

Then maybe Avena came after that. She has pretty much always been a dps warrior. I'm really not one for melee dps classes because I suck at staying behind the target, but I had fun with her. She's currently arms (and only level 89.)

Next came Katnìss. To be perfectly honest, I have no idea why I chose to level Katnìss. I think it was that I had just finished reading The Hunger Games, and I thought it would be cool to have a hunter with that name. Her main pet is a cat named Buttercup. I've never done a whole lot with her besides leveling her to max level. But I do think her new model makes her look beautiful.

And last, but not least, is Liora. Somewhere along the way, Josh and I had done refer-a-friend again and I leveled a shaman. We had a shaman/mage 2s team, and it was freaking amazing. But I was too cheap to transfer that character to my main account, so she's still sitting there at level 85. I decided to level a new one, but I stopped about halfway there and just finished leveling her this week. Right now, she's enhance, which I hate. If I decide to do anything with her, I'll probably go ele/resto. She also needs a new face, but I just haven't gotten around to it. I think she looks like a human man haha.

I do have a mage and a priest (both alliance) that are level 81. I was trying to get them leveled up to use them for the last few days of horseman, but I don't think that's going to happen.

So there you have it. My happy little big family!

green fire fail

So as I mentioned in my survey a few weeks ago, my first character was my human warlock, Loihi. One day I will have to tell you all about her history and her adventures, but today is not that day! Hahah. I've checked out most of my characters on beta, and I'm pretty satisfied with the changes. But Loihi...oh man, it makes me want to cry. She is my one character who truly holds a piece of my heart. I feel like I've been through so much with her, and she is a part of me. And I hate her new face.

It just looks so...derp. I also don't like the way they "fixed" her hair. I liked those pieces sticking out. But this character...I once got her hair cut, and after having it that way for a week, I just couldn't deal with it. I had to put it back to the original. So I am hoping and praying that they will give us at least one free re-customization. Because I don't want to spend money to fix her, but I really can't live with that face.

My second main is a blood elf (paladin), so I don't know yet if I'll like those changes. I have a feeling, though, that she's going to look hot no matter what they do to her.

Next is my druid, Gastbie. (Side note: The Great Gatsby has been my favorite book since...2003? I've had the character for...awhile. And then when the movie came out, people started giving my all kinds of crap for my name. So lame! I also have a hunter named Katniss who I've never played seriously, but I made her way before the Hunger Games craze started, and people gave me SO much crap about her name that I just don't even play her at all anymore.) So here's Gatsbie:

She looks so mean! Her old face was so friendly and nice, and now, she looks like someone I wouldn't want to mess with. But I'm okay with it. She's a total badass, and I like it. Plus she's a cat or a bear most of the time anyway.

I wasn't going to show my undead Loihi in this post, but I accidentally captured this super cute face. 

Hahahaha. I think they made the undead look too pretty (look at that skin!) but I absolutely love them.

So the actual point of this post was....green fire. I renewed my account on Sunday, and I have been working with Loihi (human) to get her green fire ever since. It took a few days and a lot of rare kills to get the tome, but my husband was helping me, so it wasn't so bad. 

I got the tome and got started on the quest chain while he went to start leveling up his warlock (from 87) so that he could do it when I got done. I really enjoyed the storyline, gathering the soulstones, and seeing the memories. It's one of the most enjoyable quest chains I've ever done.

Then I got to the Black Temple scenario. I couldn't even get past the third stage where you have to use your eye of kilrogg to see traps and then you have to get around them. I knew I should probably try to utilize my demon gate, but I'm so bad with that thing. It seems like every time I need to use it, I panic and end up dead. Don't get me wrong; I'm good at playing a warlock. Specifically a destro class. It might be my strongest class/spec. (Maybe my second strongest.) But I am just awful with demon gates.

So I got Josh to get me through that stage, and he continued playing until he got to the boss. He tried to kill the boss until Loihi's armor was broken and didn't even get him down to 50%. I was looking up strategies and trying to guide him through it, but nothing was helping. I wouldn't say that warlock is one of his strongest classes, but he does know how to play one. Loihi's item level is 490, which from what I've read, is sufficient to complete it, but I did read that there are some specific talents that will really help you out (so much for talent choices not being important!) that I didn't have. So I'll do some reworking tonight and try to kill that dang boss! It just really sucks that you have to start the scenario from the very beginning if you log out.

(If you're wondering why I got these from wowhead and not from the game, it's because I'm at work xD)