2010-05-01

Many players pick up tanking for different reasons.  Some like the control, some like the sense of indestructibility against normal enemies, and others switch to tanking roles simply so they can find groups faster.  No matter your reasoning for being a tank there are several wow gold things you can do that make you a better or worse tank.&nbsp,tiffany jewelry; We have all heard horror stories of tanks that pull before the groups is ready, pull whole wings when not geared for it, and more.  We have also all joined groups where the tank just seems to know what they are doing perfectly and runs through an instance with ease.

The 5 worst things a tank can do
Relying on AoE for all pulls – This is something that I have seen way too often recently.  The reason is that you can get away with it when you are over geared for an instance or raid.  The problem with it is that it will really not work when you are at the right gear-to-content difficulty ratio. So make sure you keep practicing at least some controlled pulls between now and the release of Cataclysm or when content difficulty ramps back up compared to your gear you will be lost.

Going before the group is ready – This is again something that many players get in the habit of doing simply because so many of us out gear most of the content we are playing through.  You should always make sure you watch the group before each pull, check their health, mana, and closeness to you and make sure they are ready.  There is nothing worse than pulling another group to find out your healer has no mana or your DPS are two rooms behind looting and skinning.

Not building threat on everything – I know the item above is all about making sure you don’t just AoE, and this is almost contrary to that, however you really need to have threat on everything around you at all times.  This may mean using AoE attacks, it may mean tabbing back and forth through enemies and slapping each of them around in turn.  No matter which method you use, what really matters is that you do check all of the nearby enemies’ threat level against you occasionally. 

Many times a DPS will focus on the wrong target, or your multi hit attacks constantly miss one target and that is the one that goes off to smack a DPS or healer.  While it is the DPS’s job to not draw agro and watch what they are doing, you should still be aware of it and watch for it.  If it is a healer that draws agro that is 100% on you and you need to watch closer at the various creatures you are controlling. In this age of AoE threat generation it is easy to slip up and not check just assuming everything will be ok.  Most of the time it will be, but not always.

It is best to balance all of your tanking stats not jsut focus on staminaFocus purely on stamina – Far too many tanks out there focus cheap wow gold purely on stamina which only means that they can take big hits.  It does not mean they are a good tank or that they can take many or successive hits easily.  There are far too many tanks with huge health pools that have almost no avoidance or mitigation, or if they have some it is not in balance to what they need. 

Given a series of 100 10,000 health hits the first tank needs to be healed for 1,000,000 health. The second tank will dodge 20 of the attacks and parry another 20, meaning they will only need 600,000 health to be healed.

Being full of yourself (unless you really are the Messiah) – Too many tanks are really full of themselves.  It’s ok to be confident, even cocky, but when you make a mistake fess up to it, it happens.  I have seen way too many tanks that believe they are gods, do everything right all the time, and yell and scream at their groups when something goes wrong.  Yet they never evaluate what they are doing, because they believe themselves to be flawless.&nbsp,ugg boots; Guess what, no one is flawless.  Remember even tanks and healers are replaceable as much as we would like to believe we are not and if you are so full of yourself that you are a jerk to everyone, you’ll be a tank that can’t get a group very quickly.

The 5 best things to do as a tank
Be prepared – While this sounds so simple, you would be amazed at the number of tanks that do not do this simple little thing.  Be Prepared.  What does it mean exactly though?  I sum it up as all the little things like making sure you are repaired and have your tanking gear with you.  It also includes things like bring food and drink (if you are a Paladin and need mana), flasks, elixirs, potions, bandages, reagents, and anything else you could possibly need.  While many of the items you may not need, and probably won’t if it is a simple instance, it is always better to be safe than sorry.

Plan your pulls – Make sure that you know which creature in each pull should die first, second, third.  Know which if any should be CC’ed or kited away from a group.  If the pull is difficult for your group then make sure you mark them to make it clear what the order is.  Have a set kill order such as Skull, X, Triangle, Square, Moon.  Whatever order you decide, just make it clear. 

A Paladin Tank in gearKnow your group and their abilities – More than any other class, when you play a tank you need to know (and are expected to know) what the other classes are capable of at all times. You really need to understand the cheap wow gold mechanics of all the other classes, not just yours. You need to know who can CC what and when,folding bikes, who can backup heal effectively, who can kite an enemy, who can burst something down quickly, and much more.  As a tank, assume you will be expected to know it all so that when something goes wrong you know who to call on to get you out of it.

Research – As a tank your job is almost as much out of the game as in the game.  You need to learn as much as you can constantly about tanking techniques, tanking builds, boss fights, strategies, and more. As a tank you will generally be in charge of what is going on, so make sure you know enough to be able to handle it.

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The Endless Healing Potion is no longer usable in arenas as intended.

Warlock&rsquo,wedding dresses;s using a lower rank of Life Tap will receive a reduced benefit from their shadow spell power.

The damage done by the cheap wow gold&nbsp,ugg boots;cannons in the gunship encounter in Icecrown Citadel has been increased and the rate at which their heat decays has been reduced.

In Alterac Valley, the buffs that the Generals get from the Warmasters and Marshals now grant them negative enemy dodge. This means they will now ignore some of their target’s total dodge percentage. The base health of the Generals has been increased and the buff also grants a slightly increased amount of damage and health.

The cheese items in Dalaran as well as the Kvaldir Berserkers in Icecrown will once again respawn at a faster rate.

The window that comes up when talking to an NPC should no longer close on its own.

Some changes to the battleground queuing system have been made to improve performance and group queuing.

The timer for when the next battle in Wintergrasp will occur should no long disappear.

Some bug fixes came in wow gold over the weekend, mostly miscellaneous things that were broken in the 3.3.3 patch.

I’ll be missing my Endless Healing Potions in arenas, doing all of 1500-2500 healing (not including mortal strike). Some of the things that they focus on, honestly.

The Alterac Valley change to the faction leaders seems aimed at ending the trend of both teams rushing to the opposing team’s keep and killing the general, leading to AV games lasting less than 10 minutes on average. I don’t think many players find this to be a bad dynamic per se, but apparently Blizzard does!

I can attest from first hand experience that the change to the Gunship Battle encounter in Icecrown Citadel is quite annoying. The nerf to the guns’ attack speed prolongs the fight by around 5 minutes but does nothing to increase the difficulty. This makes an already boring fight into a longer more boring fight, kind of an unfortunate change in my opinion.

Simply amazing. Paragon (EU-Lightning’s Blade) has done what everyone thought was impossible and killed The Lich King on 25 player Heroic. It was widely expected that a Heroic kill would require a few more stacks of the zone-wide buff, but Paragon proved otherwise.

They were rewarded cheap wow gold with the realm first achievement, Arthas’ "Invincible" mount,tiffany, and the distinction of being the first guild in the world to defeat what is arguably the most challenging raid boss in World of Warcraft history.

Apparently there is a realm first achievement, however it doesn’t look like there is a corresponding title. I guess the ‘Light of the Dawn’ title for killing him in the first place is enough! Congrats Paragon!

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After years in exile, the Darkspear trolls are preparing to invade the Echo Isles and reclaim the land once bestowed to them by Thrall. Led by Vol’jin, a wise and highly buy wow gold regarded Darkspear, the tribe’s bravest warriors will set out from Orgrimmar and Sen’jin Village, seeking to bring about Zalazane’s fall and begin the process of rebuilding their homes and villages on the Echo Isles. In World of Warcraft: Cataclysm, new troll adventurers will begin their journey on these tiny islands off the coast of Durotar, where they’ll be able to experience this time of trial and transition firsthand.

Though the Darkspears may once again have their land, the tribe’s turmoil is far from over. The impending cataclysm will spark rivalry among the Horde leadership,nfl jerseys, and after years of running from a seemingly endless string of conflicts to preserve the Darkspear nation, Vol’jin is done fleeing. The Darkspears have reclaimed their islands and have no intention of settling elsewhere. Of course,tiffany jewelry, as an untested member of the tribe, you’ll have some training to do before tackling the Darkspears’ larger matters.

Every great hero starts somewhere. As a troll of the Echo Isles, the journey begins with safeguarding your people’s well-being. Early in your adventures, you’ll be charged with protecting the local Bloodtalon raptors and hatchlings from the sorcery of a nearby sea witch, slaying the beasts that feast upon the Darkspears’ primary food sources, and assaulting the naga who’ve overrun the northern isle. But it won’t be long before Vol’jin trusts you with vital — and potentially dangerous — information about the political struggles plaguing the Horde and, ultimately, the fellow members of your tribe.

In World of Warcraft: Cataclysm, you’ll face these trials and more in the trolls’ new and enhanced introductory questing experience (level 1 to 5). Be steadfast and honorable, and your actions will help usher in a new era of Darkspear perseverance in a time of ultimate peril.

The Echo Isles is being completely redone in anticipation of the pre-cataclysm content patch, and it looks amazing. It’ll be an early buy wow gold look at the Cataclysm storyline that will more than likely give some neat flavor items (kind of like the events leading up to the release of Naxxramas 60) like perhaps tabards or pets or toys.

This will obviously be a Horde only quest zone, as the Alliance will be busy reclaiming Gnomeregan for the Gnomes.

It only took 5 years, but the Trolls will finally have a capital city of their own! How the Echo Isles will play a part of the actual Cataclysm expansion is unknown, but it’s right on the ocean, so perhaps it’ll act as a gateway to some of the new underwater zones. Wait and see!

Seriously, this zone is absolutely beautiful. Can’t wait.

Players that are thinking about rolling characters on the Arena Tournament Realm need to be careful about what they name their characters. In past years, and currently on live realms there is a large amount of leeway in terms of what players can name their characters and even more leeway with how they can name their arena teams.

This has led to a large number of obscene or racist arena team names. In order to prevent this from happening on the Tournament Realm there will be a zero tolerance policy for "inappropriate" team names. There are no hard&nbsp,wedding dresses;wow gold and fast guidelines for exactly what kind of names will get you banned, but if you use your imagination I’m sure you can get a general idea.

It’d be a shame to throw away $20 over something as stupid as an offensive team name on the TR, so just keep this in mind!

Players with any questions about the naming policies can post on the Customer Service Forum and get official responses from Blizzard staff.

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2010-04-29

A loot council is a simple way to distribute loot in theory. A designated group looks at the loot that drops, looks at who wants it, and decides the best fit.  Sounds easy right? There are problems though since people’s perceptions, bias, and feelings are involved, it can turn ugly quickly.

One of the most basic things that can cause drama around any loot system is players not understanding it, or the raid leader not explaining it clearly.  So, before we look at some of the ways to minimize the drama cheap wow gold around a loot council let’s run through some basic loot council rules. I promise that if everyone knows the rules and understands them, you will have fewer issues in the long run.

Loot Council Rules
The first thing you need to know about a loot council is that it really should only be used when it is a full guild run.  Recruits that you are looking at are OK to be included, but not just any old PUG player.  The basics to running a loot council are as follows:

1 - The loot council should be made up of the raid leader and several guild officers. They should have access to a separate Vent channel or raid channel to discuss loot distribution.

2 - Raids are run with Master Loot on and one of the loot council is given control.

3 - When items drop from a boss, or an epic from trash, it is linked in raid and everyone that is interested speaks up. A last call warning is given from the loot council and then they leave to discuss it.

4 - The loot council then discusses who should get the item and why.  The things that should go into the decision are individual to your loot council but are generally:

The player&rsquo,cheap dvds;s time in guild
Their place in the guild, for example the main tank over an off tank
The improvement over their current gear
How often they attend raids compared to the others interested
How many drops they have gotten recently
Their other contributions to the guild
What is best for the guild
Main characters get preference over alts
5 - The gear is then given to the person that the loot council awards it to and the group moves on.

6 - No public complaints are allowed after distribution, all discussion must be with a loot council member.

You can make any rule changes to the standards that you want, but it is critical that they happen before a run not during a run.  If done cheap wow gold in the middle of a run, you are just asking for trouble and for people saying you are doing it to play favorites to someone. 

This brings up the point that while you can make the rules whatever you would like, you also need to make sure that they are fair.  If they are not fair and equal to everyone you are asking for trouble.

Something as simple as who gets which piece of gear can have dramatic effects on a guild.Because it is based on human decision at every step, it works best in a guild full of players that know and trust one another.  They also should have similar goals and not be ego driven. 

The ideal group to use loot council is a group of players that knows each other and wants to work as a group to get through and defeat new content.  While wanting to experience new content they also do not really care if they are personally 1st or 15th on the damage meters, or 1st or 5th on the healing meters, or if they are the main or off-tank is the ideal group for using loot council.

How to minimize drama
As with any loot system, or almost anything in the game, drama will ensue since people are involved.  There are several things that you can do to minimize drama though.  A few of the basic things to keep in mind are outlined below.

The simplest thing to reduce drama from a loot council is to make sure that everyone is on board with it and understands the end goal.  The end goal of a loot council is to distribute loot for the betterment of the guild.  Make sure everyone is clear on that.  Players need to understand that at some times that will mean one person potentially getting a lot of gear in a row, and at other times none. 

A good example would be if your guild lost a key DPS cloth player and replaced them with a known good player, but that player was under geared.  This could result in that player being given several of the next cloth DPS drops buy wow gold even though other DPS players wanted them and haven’t gotten a drop lately. Even though another player wanted it, it is better for the guild to have all their DPS functioning at a high level.  The gear may make a 15 DPS difference to your existing players,coffee mugs, but a 100 DPS difference to the new player. 

Even though loot council is not like a DKP based system and each piece should be given on the merit at that time,led lights, you really should also keep track of loot over time. Sometimes loot should be given to a player that is there all the time even though it is a small upgrade if they have not been given anything in a long time. It is very easy to forget that you haven’t given a certain player gear in 5 weeks, since you are dealing with 24 other players, however I guarantee that player will not forget.

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In World of Warcraft: Cataclysm, we’ll be making lots of changes and additions to class talents and abilities across the board. In this preview, you’ll get an early look at some of the changes in store for the shaman class, including a rundown of some wow gold of the new spells, abilities, and talents, and an overview of how the new Mastery system will work with the different talent specs.

New Shaman Spells

Primal Strike (available at level 3): Primal Strike is a new weapon-based attack that every shaman will learn very early in the game. Our goal with this ability is to make leveling as Enhancement rather than as Elemental more viable, since many key Enhancement talents become available at fairly high levels.

Unleash Weapon (level 81): Unleashes the power of your weapon enchants for additional effects (see below). A dual-wielding Enhancement shaman will activate the effects of both of their weapon enchants. Instant cast. 30-yard range. 15-second cooldown. Undispellable.

Healing Rain (level 83): An area-effect heal-over-time (HoT) spell that calls down rain in a selected area, healing all players within it. There is no limit to the number of players who can potentially be affected; however, there are diminishing returns when healing a large number of targets,coffee mugs, much like the diminishing returns associated with AoE damage spells. This should give Restoration shaman another healing tool that improves their group-healing and heal-over-time capabilities. 2-second cast time. 30-yard range. 10-second duration. 10-second cooldown.

Spiritwalker’s Grace (level 85): When this self-targeted buff is active, your spells are no longer interrupted by buy wow gold movement and possibly even by your own attacks. This will give shaman of all three specs another way to heal or do damage when it&rsquo,folding bikes;s necessary to move in both PvE and PvP. Instant cast. 10-second duration. 2-minute cooldown.

Elemental Overload: Your direct-damage spells have a chance to proc a less powerful ‘bonus" version of the spell. This will work much like the current Lightning Overload talent, but would also apply to Lava Burst.

Nature Damage: This will provide a passive bonus to the Nature damage dealt by the Enhancement shaman.

Deep Healing: Your direct heals will do more healing when the target’s health is lower. This will scale to damage (e.g. someone at 29% health would receive more healing than someone at 30%) rather than have arbitrary break points.

We hope you enjoyed this preview, and we’re looking forward to hearing your thoughts and feedback on these additions and changes. Please keep in mind that this information represents a work in progress and is subject to change as development on Cataclysm continues.
The first thing that struck me when reading the new abilities was: "damn, they really want Shaman to heal!" Giving the class a new direct heal will be a nice addition,led lights, and Healing Rain certainly sounds interesting. That’s the first time I’ve ever heard the idea of a ground targeted AoE heal.

Casting while moving will be cool. It’ll certainly have some PvP applications, but I think it’s there primarily to address the lack of a reliable instant heal that doesn’t involve Nature’s Swiftness. For situations where you really have to move but you also need to heal Riptide just doesn’t quite cut it. If anything this ability seems underpowered with a long 2 minute cooldown. The ability to heal while moving.. almost sounds like a Resto Druid!

The Totem of Wrath changes constitute a really nice quality of life buff to the class that Shaman players have been clamoring for since the ability was released. The class will also be changed to reflect the new ‘three dispel type wow gold per healer’ policy, which I assume will leave the Shaman with the ability to dispel magic, decurse, and offensively purge since cleansing is being removed.

The rest of the changes seem aimed at making the Shaman less of a jack-of-all-trades hybrid and giving them the ability to differentiate into more specialized sub specs. Some very cool changes here, but surprisingly little in the way of buffs or modifications to Enhancement; maybe we’ll see more of that as the developers continue to tweak the class.

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Ogni razza possiede 4 caratteristiche peculiari, alcune passive e altre attive. Eccole divise per razza:

Nani
Stoneform: Va attivata e permette di essere immuni al veleno, alla malattia e al sanguinamento.
Gun Specialization: Aumentà l’abilità con le armi da fuoco
Frost Resistance: Aumenta la resistenza al freddo
Treasure Finding: Se attivata buy wow gold permette di vedere le ceste dei tesori sulla mini mappa. Funziona fino a che non viene interrotta,wedding dresses, in ratica non ha una durata a tempo.

Gnomi
Escape Artist: Permette di interrompere una magia di blocco o di immobilizzazione (root e snare).
Espansive Mind: Aumenta l’intelligenza.
Arcane Resistance: Aumenta la resistenza alle magie arcane.
Engineering Specialist: Aumento lo skill bonus nell’ingegneria.

Umani
Perception: Va attivata e permette di aumentare il raggio d’azione per individuare i personaggi nascosti.
The Human Spirit: Aumenta lo Spirito (Spirit).
Diplomacy: Bonus nell’aumentare i punti fazione.
Sword Skill: Aumenta la skill nell’uso della spada.

Night Elf
Shadowmeld: Se si e’ immobili e non in combattimento, attivandola si entra in modalità invisibile.
Quickness: Aumenta la possibilit&agrave,ugg boots; di un colpo a sorpresa.
Wisp Spirit: Permette cheap wow gold di muoversi più velocemente quando si e’ morti.
Nature Resistance: Aumenta la resistenza a magie di natura.

Orchi
Blood Fury: Quando viene attivata aumenta la forza.
Hardiness: Aumenta la resistenza allo stun e al knockout.
Command: Aumenta i danni inferti dal proprio pet (per le classi che hanno un pet).
Axe Specialization: Aumenta la skill nell’uso dell’ascia.

Tauren
War Stomp: Permette di stunnare l’avversario.
Endurance: Aumenta i punti vita massimi.
Cultivation: Aumenta lo skill bonus in Herbalism.
Nature Resistance: Aumenta la resistenza a magie di natura.

Troll
Berseking: Va attivata quando si è feriti e aumenta la velocità nel combattimento e nel lanciare le magie.
Regeneration: Aumenta la velocità di rigenerazione dei punti vita.
Beast Slaying: Aumenta il bonus di danno nei confronti delle bestie.
Throwing Weapon Specialization: Aumenta la skill nell’uso delle armi da lancio.

Non morti
Will of the Forsaken: Se attivao rende immuni dagli effetti di paura, sonno e charm.
Cannibalize: Aumenta la velocità wow gold&nbsp,cheap dvds;di rigenerazione dei punti vita, quando si consuma un corpo.
Underwater Breathing: Aumenta il tempo di resistenza sott’acqua.
Shadow Resistance: Aumenta la resistenza a Shadow.

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