This morning’s Random Tuesday Morning Thought is brought to you by the northern sun of Norway, a young mother, and twin boys. I cracked up watching this film of this mother trying to put her sons to bed, or rather, having them stay and sleep. I can draw a parallel between so many things, but since this is at its heart, a WoW blog, I’ll stick with one: those nagging achievements. Get one down, and up pops the other; accomplish that, and like a three-headed hydra or twins, never ending. Last night I saw that Shel from AnLaShok guild was on – I think she’s the bees’ knees, by the way-and that she was in Ice Crown. I need two more achievements for the ten man and asked if I could go along. She was talking to me in Vent, but I didn’t have Vent on yet, so didn’t hear that it was 25 man. A small group runs it every week for Invincible. It was fun to tag along anyway. Maybe I’ll try to organize a few more achievement things for Old Ladies this weekend, and actually somewhat “lead” the group so we can get them done. Everyone wants mounts, don’t they?
The problem, or should I say ‘social opportunity’ is that many achievements in Azeroth require…ugh…other people. We hope to see someone who’s not only on, but willing, and available to do something, be it planned or spontaneous. Finishing up achievements requires list-making and goal setting, both of which often take some of the mojo out of the fun for me. Maybe that’s just me. Lists can be sexy, too, I suppose. But take yesterday for example, when something is not sexy, or fun: I took little priest Pessah (which means Passover by the way, which I swear was a subconscious choice for her) to do some dungeons. Under level 44, (level 44 is when you get Mind Spike) the shadow priest abilities are truly anemic. There is no AOE, and heaven help you if you try to put your phantom down and fear anything that’s eating your little face. But it seems that I can still get hurt feelings when unannounced, get kicked from DIRE MAUL, because you know, those low level dungeons are critical to success in Azeroth.
When the group stopped, hesitated before the next group, and then I saw the splash screen, I had that disheartened, sad feeling of being kicked. Why does it still bother me? Why do I take it personally? We didn’t wipe, we didn’t fail, nothing bad happened, and no joke, the warrior tank jumped to everything and downed it before Pessah’s little legs could get there and get her dots on…I couldn’t tell them that she and two other players just three-manned Stratholme (she did! Really!) or that give her a chance, cause when she hits level 44 she’ll Mind Spike the hell out of those level 40 spiders! Just you wait! So, back to Eastern Plaguelands to squeeze grubs and skeletons. Pfft. Poor little thing. I really hope some of the changes help, because I love playing Shadow Priests, but I’m just not very good at it.
Class changes
Shadow Priests had one large problem toward the end of Mists of Pandaria: single-target damage. Their AoE and multi-DoT damage was some of the best around, so they still ended up competitive on most fights. But, in any fight that was mostly single-target, they felt lacking. Additionally, one of the new stats we’re adding in Warlords of Draenor, Multistrike, is almost exactly what their current Mastery, Shadowy Recall, does for DoTs. So, we took these two problems and came up with a change that we think will solve both of them. The result is a new Mastery, which primarily increases single-target damage. Shadow Priests who want to focus on single-target damage can aim for Mastery in their gearing; or, when multi-dotting is more valuable, prefer other secondary stats over Mastery.Shadow Priest’s Mastery (Shadowy Recall) has been replaced with a new Mastery: Mental Anguish.
Mastery: Mental Anguish: Increases the damage of Mind Blast, Mind Spike, Mind Flay, and Mind Sear by 20%.
Time will tell, I suppose. In the meantime, Pessah is plotting her revenge. She won’t be ‘passed over’ again. Get it? Ha. Yeah. Okay.
Sugar&Blood 