buwahaha. I win!

Got the boy to try WoW. More accurately, I bought him the battlechest with vanilla/bc. He, in turn, decided to buy a new laptop.

After a long install, we finally got the recruit-a-friend thing set up. And that was the start of awesomeness. 300% xp, regardless of whether we're rested or now. My heirlooms seem to work on top of that, but I'm not using the shoulders/chest because I don't want to outlevel him.

He told me that he wanted to be a battlemage - a caster that could also melee. Sounded like an enhancement shaman to me, so he rolled a shaman (and then proceded to go elemental, but whatever. He seems to like it.) I wasn't sure what to roll, but I figured that a tank/healer would always be welcome, so I made a Prot Pally. /gasp

I made a pally a ways back on my old/horde server, and she went holy as soon as possible. Being holy gave me something to do besides autoattack for the first 20 levels. Ugh, old pally leveling was teh suck. But now I gotta say, its pretty awesome. Holy power makes sense to me. Mana regeneration attacks make more sense to me. Having kickass relevant talents available at level 10 is freaking fantastic.

The leveling/talent system + recruit-a-friend bonus + a tank/healer + dps/healer  is making leveling  a breeze. In about 1.5 hours today we got 4 levels. Absolutely insane.

WIN

Frustrated

Patch 4.0.1 started out so sweet. Shiny new talents, runeforging, mastery, new mechanics, cooldowns and abilities. And the new graphics, especially the water! /swoon

Then I (and just about every other WoWer out there) realized that Blizzard had given us a buggy patch that never should have seen the light of day.  I understand Blizzard's idea behind rolling it out - giving us a chance to get used to our new abilities before Cata rolls out. Which I appreciate, I really do. But quite frankly, it wasn't ready. Here are just a couple things that are bothering me

• Mousing over things should not make my computer go on strike
• Nameplates are not consistently showing up for some reason.  In a group of five mobs, one will have a nameplate, two might have it flash up occasionally, and the remaining two never have a plate over their head
  
• If using the default UI, this can be fixed using the following macro: /console bloattest 1. I found this solution on the wow forums
• Why should anyone bother bringing a feral dps to the raid? Wolves give the Leader of the Pack buff, Paladins and drums can overwrite MotW with Kings, and Rebirth now triggers a 30 minute cooldown which affects all druids in the raid group. Innervate only gives 20% of my base mana (which means I can donate 1400 mana, so...yay?). They've taken away almost all our utility, and I hate it.
• I know not everyone pvps, but please, oh please, oh please do something about Mages. I got hit for 30k (I have 29.5k health) while in full Relentless.  I would understand it more if I wasn't decently geared but....yeah. Battlegrounds are not even fun when you're a one hit kill.
• I like how hunter pets brings buffs now. I don't like (or understand) how a hunter pet can bring a buff just as powerful as a regular character.  For example, hyenas have Tendon Rip, which is the equivalent of a feral Druid's Mangle. Tendon Rip increases damage taken from bleed effects by 30% for 15 sec.  Yes, it only lasts 15 seconds, but the cool down is a mere 10 seconds, which means they can keep it up at all times. Why/how are Hunter pets able to mimic trademark class abilities? I know spirits beasts have an ability similar to Death Knight's Horn of Winter, and there are probably more examples. I am fine with a hyena's Tendon Rip causing targets to take maybe 20% more bleed damage, but just makes no sense for them to brings buffs as strong as a full toon, unless perhaps they are a beast mastery pet.

On a good note...Skull Bash makes me a very happy feral. As does my Sinister Squashling FINALLY dropping on Eva :D  I also ground through Skyguard rep in about a day, making enough money on the way to buy all of the mounts plus the pet.

I just wish Blizz had waited a little longer for this patch. There really is nothing for me to do till Cataclysm except farm. I'm seriously considering taking a break off until either 1) Cata comes out, or 2) the bf buys a computer and WoW so I can level some lowbies with him.

Hallow's End Makes Me a Sad Kitty

Dear Blizzard,

Its been 2 years. I have faithfully trick-or-treated whenever possible, killed the headless horseman, and saved Goldshire from fire all the freaking time.

I can haz my sinister squashling and title please?

k thx bai

- Eva

**Update**
 Finally got it! Found a Sinister Squashling lurking in my bags when I was farming Mr. Pinchy/Skyguard Rep on Eva.

First Impressions - Feral dps

 Really impressed with the patch thus far. Even though it took forever to install, the graphics are amazing, and I'm kind of in love with the glyph and runeforging systems. I'm also really happy that they've changed heroics so you can't just mow everything down with AoE. Tanking on Ky seems a little scary now as dps/healers don't seem to realize that things have changed and they need to cc, so I've been messing around with the new talents on Eva in her dps spec.

Some first impressions about kitty dpsing -

FERAL CHARGE/RAVAGE COMBO - pretty excited about using ravage. It was my favorite attack while leveling, and being able to use it for FREE after an opener I do anyways is pretty awesome. It crits all the time for 8k+ (probably way more for kitties better geared than I).

MANGLE/SHRED- We've lost the talent that reduces the amount of energy that Shred requires - its now at 40e, as opposed to 35e for Mangle. Not sure which is better in a rotation - I'm assuming Shred, but Mangle+Mangle glyph might be decent if you can't get behind your target. Not sure on that one

RUNECRAFTING - As I said, I'm kind of in love with runecrafting.I've been converting all of my extra hit into mastery - I'm not sure if I should convert some of my haste into mastery too. Is feral druid attack speed still based on the one handed weapon craziness? If not, I'm definitely converting some of the haste into mastery.

GLYPHS  - One part of me really enjoys the new glyph system. Another part of me is a little resentful of how much scribes are charging when you supply the mats. Some are asking for over 100g -.-

• PRIME - Rip, Shred, Savage Roar 
• seriously considering Tiger's Fury
• MAJOR - Ferocious Bite, Entangling Roots, Rebirth/Faerie Fire?
• Ferocious Bite seems to be the only obvious choice - other than that, Entangling roots for cc, and a kind of blah third glyph
• MINOR - Dash, Unburdened Rebirth, Mark of The Wild
• Aquatic form if you like swimming around - will probably be very useful come Cata

ROTATION - I'm assuming that for the most part we're keeping the same rotation, only now at level 80 rake will be lasting up to 9 seconds longer if talented and in t9. Savage Roar seems to be lasting longer now at 1cp, but I don't remember how long it used to be and I'm too lazy to look it up.

What I've been doing....

• Feral Charge
• Ravage
• Savage Roar
• Mangle
• Rake
• Shred as needed till 5 cp
• Rip
• Ferocious Bite if all dots are up and there is extra energy/combo points/time
• make sure to keep an eye out for things to cc - cyclone, entangling roots and hibernate are available to all druids - use them!

On the whole, I'm ok with feral dps. They gave us a few more buttons to press, but the heart of it stayed the same. Tomorrow I'm planning on trying out some bgs  - I'm a little afraid of the pain of playing with non-pvpers, but excited about bg ratings :)

kitties and trees and bears, oh my!

Eva was my very first 80. She leveled as a kitty, and then spent some time growing leaves and tanking with her face before settling down as a pvp/pve kitty. She will rip you to shreds, and revel in it. I love being able to sneak around on the battlefield and being able to stunlock almost as well as a rogue, but still be able to heal, cast spells, or go bear if I'm taking heavy damage. I also like running instances with her, and getting complimented on the fact that I can actually play a kitty (keep up the correct priorities/watch for innervates and rebirths, give out instaheals as needed). Getting complimented frequently on a spec that is rarely seen or respected is pretty exciting and encouraging.

Ky started out as a kitty, tried to be a boomkin for a level, and then suited back up as a feral and tanked her way from 45 to now 77. Mobs stick to her like glue, and I've made a lot of people respect bear tanks. Around 60 (the time of dk failtanks) people used to get excited whenever I zoned in because they remembered me from earlier runs and they knew the run would go smoothly.Eventually she'll dual spec to be a tree, but right now she's pretty happy being a bear.

For non-ferals, I have an 80 Elem/Enhance shaman and an 80 mm/bm hunter, and then a ton of alts all hanging out around 60 and waiting to get leveled. I've promised myself I'm going to finish leveling my warrior and priestess, but as for the rest...who knows.