Big move...

So, I did it! I server transferred! In the end I decided to move my monk instead of my shaman for a few reasons, one: she is my best geared which gives me better chances at raiding and two: she's my money maker. I hope to bring my shaman over next, but at the moment there's no money for it. Unless someone out there wants gold for the transfer, I'd be all over that! I've only been on Bleeding Hollow for a few days now and I LOVE it! The guild I joined is great, and there are plenty of people looking for raids in trade chat, not to mention all the PvP that's going on as well. I've made a few lowbies because I know that I will not be able to transfer my druid or priest for a long time. So they are name holders with a guild bank for now.

The guild I joined is called Tabbed Out, and I had originally applied to join them on my shaman, but her gear is too low, and I knew this but gave it a shot anyway, so I was denied. However I was extended an invite to the guild none the less because they liked my application and so I took it. So I was invited to tonight's alt SoO run and I'm hoping to impress. Fingers crossed, wish me luck! I know they are looking for a monk, I'm just not sure if my gear is good enough. I'm at 545 right now, but they are already starting on heroics. So we'll see, I keep telling myself not to commit to raiding 3 nights a week again, but DAMN this game for being so freaking addicting!

Oh! I almost forgot, Moya's name was taken :( So I went with Kaliapy :D Now I'm gonna have to find a new name to call my hunters!

I think this is also a good time to update my about me page and change gear scores and such, it's been long over due.

I also owe you all a tour of Karazhan, I've had the screenshots for weeks, just haven't gotten around to making the post yet. Sigh... busy, busy, busy.

Tempest Keep: The Eye - Mistweaver Style!

Lately I've been on this kick to do old raids and dungeons for mounts and pets, so I decided to put together a little guide on how I solo them as a Mistweaver. I'm starting with The Eye and will do my best to add a raid every week.

Tempest Keep: The Eye

The Eye can be found in Outland in the Netherstorm region.

The trash in this place is not bad and can be easily AoEd down.

The first boss is Al'ar. He's fairly simple to kill just pull him from the top balcony and move along as he does until u get his health down to 0. He will then re-spawn in the center of the room you'll just DPS him down again.

If you get lucky he'll drop a Brilliant Phoenix Hawk Feather and if you already have the pet, simply cage it and sell it in the AH, they go for over 1k on my server. Here's Moya with her Phoenix Hawk Hatchling.

Now it's off to visit Void Reaver. Be sure to clear the trash in the room or they will pull when you agro the boss.

I hate this guy on my casters >.< As a Monk though we are fortunate enough to be able to melee him down with no problem :)

Getting silenced here is a little annoying but since we get healed as we DPS the damage we take is never really an issue.

He drops a Tiny Fel Engine Key. Which is a really cute mini pet version of himself :) Here is Moya with her Pocket Reaver. Again, if you already have it and want some extra gold you can sell this one too.

Next is High Astromancer Solarian. Here you def want to clear trash, or at least kill the two Nether Scryers walking around the room. They Mind Control and if you pull the boss you'll just get MCed and keep resetting the trash and boss.

She's very simple and if you can avoid getting tossed in the air even better!

It's not easy getting good screenshots while you're getting tossed in the air!

She drops Crystal of the Void, which gives you a cute Lesser Voidwalker. This one seems to be more popular and goes for about 3k in the AH on my server.

And finally we get to Kael'thas Sunstrider. This one takes a little coordination to do, but still simple enough for us Monks thanks to Touch of Death.

Start by killing the first 2 members of his council, Thaladred the Darkener and Lord Sanguinar in the back of the room behind Kael.

Then run to the front of the room and kill Grand Astromancer Capernian.

Then run all the way back and finish off Master Engineer Telonicus where you killed the other two. Then AoE the weapons down.

When you're done there you'll have a good bit of time to recover and run to the front of the room where Grand Astromancer Capernian will rez. Take the time to regen enough Chi to do a Touch of Death, because as soon as she pops up you'll need to use it on her otherwise you might be in a bit of a mess if they other guys catch up to you while she's still up! If you feel more comfortable getting a weapon then grab the Staff of Disintegration and you wont have to worry about his council. You could also do Kael before the Void Reaver and use the weapon on his, especially if you're a caster.

Then it's just a matter of DPSing Kael'thas and you're all done. 

If you're lucky you'll get the coveted Ashes of Al'ar mount! I haven't been fortunately enough to get it yet, but I will keep trying.

At this point I usually send all my Netherweave cloth over to my tailor to make Netherweave Bags which sell very well on the AH. I send the greens to my enchanter for disenchanting and sell the mats on the AH as well. All the epics I sell for money unless there is something I want to keep for future transmogs. You can make about 300g just from the run itself which only takes about 30-45 minutes, not including all the possible items you can sell in the Auction House for profit.

Next I'll be heading to Karazhan to show you how to solo the Chess Event! 

Monk Healing Changes for 5.4

5.4 is bringing some big changes not just to Pandaria and it's beautiful landscape, but to healers as well. Since I'm playing a Monk as my main, I'll start with that one first. The following comes from Blizzard and the red text is my opinion on the subject.

Monk

Mistweaver

Mana Tea is now consumed at an increased rate of 1 stack per 0.5 seconds (up from 1 stack per 1 second). I still prefer the mechanics behind the Glyph of Mana Tea and will more than likely stick with it. It's just easier to work into a rotation than to find the time to channel it in busy fights.

Revival's healing has been reduced by 30%. We all knew this was coming, I'm sorry if you were in denial, although 30% seems a little harsh.

Talents

Chi Brew now restores 2 Chi, has a 45-second cooldown (down from 1.5 minutes), and generate stacks of Brew/Teas based on the Monk's specialization. I tried this talent for a bit, but noticed I didn't use it as much as I should have. I tend to prefer passive talents over those with cooldowns unless the rewards are really significant, and now I am definitely not investing in it. I believe most Mistweaver Monks use it to Uplift 4 times in a row during heavy AoE damage. Now you'll only be able to get 3 in there making it even with Ascension, minus the 15% mana increase.

• Mistweaver: 2 stacks of Mana Tea

Chi Burst no longer requires a target. It now travels as a 40-yard line in front of the Monk. Much easier to use this way. I switch between this and Chi Wave depending on the fight.

Healing Elixirs will no longer activate if the Monk is already at full health, and activate automatically when the Monk has less than 35% of their maximum health. A good fix, but I personally still prefer to use Diffuse Magic. I tend to get into trouble sometimes due to lag and this helps keep me alive.

Invoke Xuen, the White Tiger now has a pet control bar for Xuen, and the talent is no longer on global cooldown for all Monk specializations. Because this provides no healing in and of it self and only through Eminence, I use it very seldom. I prefer to use Chi Torpedo. If I have to move anywhere during a boss fight I make every effort to do it either by Chi Torpedo or Spinning Crane Kick.

Power Strikes will now activate from the following Chi generating abilities; Jab, Expel Harm, Spinning Crane Kick (when it hits at least 3 targets), Crackling Jade Lightning, and Soothing Mist. This is in tier 3 of your talents along with Ascension and Chi Brew. By the looks of it they wanted to equalize these 3 talents and now it's just a personal preference of which one you want to use. 

Ring of Peace has a new visual effect that properly depicts its area-of-effect, and now disarms both enemies and those attacking allies within the Ring of Peace's area-of-effect for 4 seconds (up from 3 seconds); the silence effect for casting spells remains unchanged at 3 seconds. I tend to use this one the most from this tier.

Rushing Jade Wind has been redesigned and replaces Spinning Crane Kick.

• Rushing Jade Wind: The Monk summons a whirling tornado around them, dealing damage to nearby enemies (heals nearby allies for Mistweavers). Rushing Jade Wind has the same costs, Chi generation, and periodic rate as Spinning Crane kick, but, deals 60% of the periodic damage or healing, lasts 6 seconds, is instant, and not channeled. I am definitely looking forward to this. Now we have an AoE heal that will allow us to continue healing while it does it's thing. 

Zen Sphere now deals 15% more healing and damage. Something to test out, don't know how this boost will compare with Chi Wave and Chi Burst.

Glyphs

They made changes to some of the Major Glyphs, but the only ones that really peeked my interest are below:

Major Glyphs

• Glyph of Detox causes Detox to heal the target when it successfully removes a harmful effect. This will come in handy on fights where you find yourself decursing a lot.
• Glyph of Targeted Expulsion now causes Expel Harm to heal for 50% as much when used on other targets.
• Glyph of Uplift has been replaced by Glyph of Targeted Expulsion.
• Glyph of Targeted Expulsion allows Expel Harm to be used on other players. With Spinning Crane Kick gone there will be no need for Glyph of Spinning Crane Kick which leaves an empty slot for a new glyph, and I believe this will be the one I will use. I use Expel Harm on cooldown to regenerate chi. Now I can use it to heal someone other than myself since the majority of the time it just contributes to overhealing.

I have no complains about the changes they will be making to Mistweaver Monks, and of course nothing is ever final until the patch is out; but I'm looking forward to trying out the new raids and bosses and I hope to be able to post about them from my perspective as our guild progresses through them.

WoW Screenshot a Day: Day 13 - Fast

During raid I decided to take a screenshot of my super FAST torpedo!

This is so much fun to do, however I wasn't paying attention and almost pulled Horridon!

So much to do, so little time...

When you take a break from WoW and come back closer to the end of an expansion you find yourself in a rush to catch up and there is never enough time to do EVERYTHING you wish to get accomplished. I have 4 kids, a man and a home to take care of as well. None of which can be neglected for a game, and although I do have my weak moments, I can usually tear myself away from the game to get things done, like cleaning :P but in WoW I have a list of things I want to accomplish:

• I need to get my reputations up and I despise doing dailies, so that in itself hasn't been easy for me. I miss slapping on a tabard and running instances for rep.
• I need to work on my legendary quest line and due to some bad luck I can't seem to get the drops I need. Mind you, Moya hit 90 about a month ago, it's not that I've been slacking, my priority has been set on gearing her for raid first and foremost.
• I need to continue on my quest for transmog gear for Moya. I can't seem to get a full set for any of the outfits that I like.
• I need to level up the rest of my characters, starting with my hunter. I have a project I want to do with her and her rare pet farming for the blog.

• I need to level up Moya's professions, most of which are at 1. Unlike my shaman, whom I have been playing since 2006, I simply didn't have time to level her secondary professions at the same time as her. It irks me to have fishing and cooking barely off the ground and I believe your main character should have everything maxed out. Unfortunately I just don't have the time for everything on this list and to do that as well. 
• I've also been getting her ready for 5.4. As one of the main raid healers, her gear needs to be in tip top shape and as high as I can get it.
• And last but definitely not least, I still need to make money in this game. Mind you I am by no means rich. In fact I'm usually broke. The most gold I've ever had was 40k and for a lot of people that's just pocket change. None the less it's enough for me to maintain my characters and spoil them and Izzy whenever I can. That's not to say that I don't want to make even more gold, so that's something that I'm working on with the help of Nev over at Auction House Addict.

So I ask, how do you deal with the pressure of changing mains? Do you level their profession or do you continue using your old main for that? How do you manage your time and what are your priorities after a hiatus from WoW?

With 5.4 just around the corner I'm feeling overwhelmed and frustrated with my inability to catch up fast enough.

People can still surprise me...

Random Acts of Kindness

Yesterday while I was out in the Barrens gathering lesser coins on Izzy's priest I ran into a warrior doing his weekly. I didn't pay much attention to him, but when I was almost done I decided to ask if he needed any of the Latent gear which my bags were full of. He said no, but thanked me for offering and from there we continued to chat while going about our grind. We both finished but continued to talk about random things in game: raiding, dailies, etc. I got back on Moya and while I was out in Kun-Lai working on my Lorewalker's Achivements, which I will get to shortly, I was also doing PvP Pet Battles, and I mentioned "hating", I used a more profane word of course, the little Direhorn pets because of how ridiculously OP they are. He laughed and mentioned they were the reason he stopped doing pet battles, although they are cute and they remind him of the dinos from The Land Before Time. We kept on talking of this and that about WoW. Then he came out to were I was and handed me a Direhorn Runt!!!

So in his honor, I named her Cera, after the triceratops in the movie :D Isn't she adorable?!?! Thank you Havoc, I don't recall the last time a perfect stranger was this nice to me in-game. It's much appreciated.

The Lorewalkers

This brings me to one of my goals for the week and that is to get exalted with the Lorewalkers. I've seen the Lorewalker's tabard a few times now in transmogs for Monks and decided I had to have one! So I started looking into how to acquire one and it seems fairly easy. I'll be working on that today and I'll show you how to get it done very fast. In less than two hours you can acquire over 100 achievement points, an exalted rep, a mount and a tabard! Can't get any easier than that!

WoW Screentshot a Day: Day 7 - A Sign

And finally my #wowscreenshotaday:

The "signs" of an Engineer! The banner says it all! If that's not enough the chopper is there to make sure you don't forget it, engineers "PWN"!!!

I love my bike and I love being an eng, it's a lot of fun. Just reading some of the warning labels on the things we can create make me giggle. The malfunctions; the near death experiences with misfired rocket boots; the wonky transporters that will turn you into a chicken, another race, or simply port you hundreds of yards up in the air! How can anyone resist?!?!

Weekend fun...

I'll start off with Thursday night's raid. We cleared ToT leaving Sunday a raid free day. Möya ended up with a decent amount of gear, leaving me with one forsaken blue quality ring to get rid of.

I'm getting more comfortable with my healing abilities and my mana regen is probably well over what monks need, but since I'm still learning I find it gives me a little room to mess up without going oom. I'm ranking 8th in the guild now, as far as gear is concerned, just above my shaman. Not bad for a week, last Wednesday I was 18th! I'm almost completely ready for 5.4.

Last week I was farming cobalt to level my engineering and I remembered reading about the unborn val'k pet. I decided to look at the spawn points while mining. While I was in Dragonblight I spotted her! Unfortunately my pets were only at level 15, so I couldn't capture her, but I let a guildy know and he quickly came along to scoop her up. Ever since I've been determined to have her and I spent all week leveling my pets. So this week I'm on a mission to find her again and capture her for myself.

Friday night Izzy and I went out for dinner and a movie. On our way to the theater his car's transmission took a shit and we had to go back home to switch to mine. We weren't about to let that ruin our night. We ended up watching Wolverine. The visual effects were good, it was an over all good movie. After the movie we went to Friday's for dinner, but decided to take it to go instead and stayed up watching TV till 4 am.

Saturday Izzy had to work so I spent most of the day hanging out with the kids  and picking up around the house.

Sunday was family day, we went to my mom's house for lunch with the grandparents, my brother and his family and of course my mom and her husband. After lunch my brother and his family came over for some Xbox fun and dinner.

We played Street Fighter, Tekken and Injustice. We spend the day passing the controllers around challenging each other!

Over all a great weekend on and off game. Looking forward to some relaxation today and closing up my wow week by making my Blingtron and hopefully finding my Unborn Valk!

Getting Lucky!

I leveled Möya so fast that she still has 16 slot bags >.<  So last night I decided that today I would get her some free bags, like the ones that drop from OS and Onyxia, etc. I seem to be on a roll with Möya lately though, I've been running old raids for transmog gear and I've ended up with tons of pets. So needless to say I went to do Ony on her for the first time a little while ago and not only did I get the bag but I got the mount as well!

Izzy is the mount whore, I prefer the pets, although I don't get fanatic over it either. The last two days he's given me a nice F U over mounts. Not only did I end up with Ony's today but a few night's ago we ended up with a Primal Egg in my bags from a ToT quest which gave me a pretty Black Primal Raptor last night during raid! Needless to say he's a little bit jealous lol. 

And speaking of raid, Möya is doing so much better, I'm actually on the heal meters now lol.

This was a wipe of course, but the point is that I'm on there!

He had a hard time with Lei Shen yesterday, mainly to RNG, but this ia pretty muh how I did over all last night. Mind you I'm still only at a 496 item level while everyone else is over 522, so I'm proud of myself. I've managed to not only switch my main on a very short notice, but I'm also getting the hang of Monk healing very fast. It's not second nature yet, I do get myself into a zone and then when shit hits the fan I panic and fumble over what spells to use. Practice will resolve that issue. I'm looking forward to tomorrow when I can do some ToT LFRs and hopefully get rid of the rest of the blues and lower level LFR items that I have. Möya needs to be ready for 5.4 as she will be one of the main raid healers :D

Success!

Last night was a success, for me anyway! I managed to do Heroic Jin'rokh without needing to be scraped off the floor. I died just like everyone else when it was a wipe and I was thankfully not the cause of any of them. My under-geared self probably didn't even beat the dk tank in healing, but I contributed with my OP Revival and healed my little Monk ass off. I didn't get anything off the boss not even with my coin, he dropped crap loot and a lot of repeats. After that we worked on Heroic Horridon. I died once or twice due to standing or running into poop on the ground, but other than that it wasn't too bad. When we had 30 minutes left of raid time we switched to norm and killed him. I used my coin and received the Roots of Rampaging Earth legs, not the greatest for me but it's still a big upgrade from raid finder gear. I was also given the Petrified Eye of the Basilisk ring because at this point anything is an upgrade, but I gave it to Izzy for his priest after raid because the ring has mastery and I know I would replace it first chance I got. On Council of Elders I lagged and died to standing on quicksand so just watch the other Monk healer fistweave the entire fight and do about 80k hps just from eminence, it's crazy! I got my tier gloves and the other two items that would be available to me there have mastery so I decided not to waste a coin. Then we did Tortos, thankfully I managed not to die to swirling turtles and when the fight was over I used my last coin and got Robes of Concussive Shocks Thunderforged!

Over all it was a great night, I went from a 476 ilvl to a 486 in just a few short hours. Today I'm running the rest of ToT LFRs in hopes of more upgrades, who knows maybe Thursday I can actually outheal the tank :P
As it stands according to WoW Heroes I'm ranking 18th of the healers in my guild as far as gear is concerned.

There I am all the way down there lol. Izzy on Rahdiggah has been getting gear consistently for the last 2 weeks, so he's 7th right now and that's because he hasn't had time to work on his priest with his new production manager job, otherwise I know he would be higher. Even with his gear as it stands he's out-healing everyone. Maybe I'll pick his brain one of these days and post about Holy Priest healing, I'm know there's A LOT he can teach. My shaman was getting up there but I stopped taking loot since I knew I was going to be switching to Möya. I'll check back with WoW Heroes next week to see my progression in guild and after that I might be able to start comparing myself to other Monks on our server.

I'm glad the stress and anticipation of last night is over and I'm looking forward to gearing up Möya and improving my Mistweaving skills.

Under-geared and raiding? (Heroic Jin'rokh)

Well, that's what I'm supposed to be doing tonight! Thanks to a full maintenance today I can't be on Möya right now running LFR for gear. Instead I've been getting lots of other things done around the house, like laundry, cleaning, practicing the piano and of course dealing with the babies, that never changes.

Since I wasn't able to get my gear high enough last Tuesday I am to start raiding today instead, and in true form, I am freaking out! We've killed him a few times now so I'm glad it's not our first attempt, but I'm still at a 476 item level and my HP is still not high enough for cover the damage of Ionization in Heroic Jin'rokh which inflicts 450k damage when removed. As a Monk I'll be using Defuse Magic but it's still a scary though.

I've been reading up on the fight from a Mistweaver Monk's perspective, since I've never raided as anything other than a resto shaman before I need as much advice and help as I can get. Icy-Veins has a great guide for Throne of Thunder as a Mistweaver here. I also found some YouTube videos of the fight from a healing Monk's perspective here and here. I have a lot of studying to do and hopefully I can get some practice time in LFR before raid tonight.

Wish me luck, I'm gonna need it! I hope not to emberrace myself too much :P

Dating again...

The kids got home yesterday from their father's house and I was happy to see them, I missed them terribly, even if 5 minutes later they are driving me insane. A few weeks ago Jr (he's 12) was given a Doctor Who sonic screwdriver? by his grandmother, I don't watch the show so I'm totally clueless. When we put the batteries in the damn thing it wouldn't SHUT UP! So last weekend Izzy and I went to Hot Topic to get it exchanged and while we were there we got him a Doctor Who Keep Calm Seat Belt belt and he loved it! He had been sweating Izzy's Star Wars one, so we figured we'd get him one of his own so he could nerd out the first day of school! Needless to say he was very excited to see that not only did we finally exchange his broken toy, but we added to it to make up for him having to wait for our procrastinating asses.

After dinner everyone was pretty much nerding out, Jr was in bed on his 3DS XL and Ashley (she'll be 15 in Septemeber) was watching one of her little girly movies while Rene (he's 2) was playing on his Mobigo2. Izzy and I were going to hit WoW when he got the urge to go get some ice cream. While driving we couldn't decide where to go for ice cream, then we thought about buying a movie, but we've sen everything and none of the movie we wanted to buy are out on DVD yet >.<, so he gets the idea in his head that we should go to the movies! Mind you it's 9:30 pm and the next showing was at 10:40 pm. So I think about it for a minute and figure what the heck! We haven't gone out ALONE since Livy was born 5 months ago... how sad :(

So we head back home without our ice cream, ask Ash if she wants to baby sit for $20 and of course she jumps on that right away. Besides, Jr is in bed doing his thing, Livy is out for the night and Rene is falling asleep by now on the sofa next to her, so it's easy money for her and Izzy and I get some alone time.

We went to see Red 2 and it was hilarious! The first one was great and the second one was even better! It was nice to be able to cuddle in the theater, chit chat and just be in each other's company without kids interrupting every 5 minutes lol. We got home around 1 am and Ash was still up watching tv, as we expected, everyone else was out for the night.

We settled into our PJs, got on WoW and about 5 minutes later decided that other sources of entertainment were available to us, and did that instead ;)

Now it's Saturday morning and we've already done what feels like a million things... Izzy took Ash to the bookstore to get a hard copy of her summer reading book and then to the grocery store. While they were gone I got the laundry started, and picked up around the house cause since I cleaned yesterday I'd like it to look like it for at least another day :P When Izzy got back he bathed the dog while I got lunch started and now here I am sitting in front of my comp blogging and thinking about what I need to accomplish on Möya so don't fail hard core on Tuesday.

I need to finish my weekly so that I can upgrade my legs, hopefully into something that I can use, and then possibly do Nalak or, even better, Oondasta. I just need 4 little item level points to go into the ToT LFR so that I can be closer to where I need to be for Tuesday.

Izzy is going to help me on his priest, it should be interesting, there's nothing more fun to watch than two healers trying to dps in healing gear >.< At least his gear is epic, all I have for pew pew is reg dungeon blues...

Gearing up in a hurry... continued.

Yesterday around 5 pm a guildy asked me if I was going to be raiding on Möya, and when I told him yes he made me a leather 476 item level chest piece and gloves! I immediately upgraded a few pieces with the valor and justice points that I had and was well on my way to doing LFR! Every boss in the first 2 raids gave me loot. Talk about getting lucky! Unfortunately that's all I had time for, dinner needed to be made, kids needed to be fed, hubby needed attention before raid, so poor Möya was left with a 470 item level. it's not bad considering that in a day she jumped 30 points in item level. So today the grind continues and hopefully by Thursday I'll be at around 500 and be able to raid with the guild. Fingers crossed!

Gearing up in a hurry!

Yesterday I hit 90 with Möya, my monk mistweaver, and I'm in a huge hurry to gear her up because I've already been ranked as a 25 man raider for the guild!

She's at a 440 item level right now and I need to get her to at least 500. That's a huge task which is going to require a lot of luck from LFR. I've already gotten her the 502 boots, and now I'm working on the Barrens weekly to get her a chest piece I picked up on another toon, just need the mojo. Then hopefully through a few heroics I'll be able to get into the first raids in LFR and go from there. It's a very daunting task, but definitely a challenge that I am up for. I'll continue to update this post as the day progresses and let's see how far I've gotten by 7pm EST, which is our raid time.

It's 10:15 am and they were just doing rolling restarts, so I'm gonna go check if WoW is back up now so I can get started on my crazy mission to raid heal tonight.

It's now 12:47 pm and Möya's item level is now 451. Just a little bit more to go to be able to get into LFR.  The grind continues...