EconoWoW

The last three times I rolled on staves as a shaman, I heard some comments that made me chuckle because they sounded like urban legends.  Because the shaman is one of the least-played classes, there’s a lot of ignorance around their mechanics.  Let’s take a look at why it makes perfect sense for a shaman to wield a staff.

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Although I’m sure one of the first things most Restoration shaman did when Patch 4.2 rolled out was start saving their Valor Points for tier pieces, let me just say that if you haven’t, getting the 2-piece tier bonus is one of the most important upgrades you can make.  This could be the thing that makes the difference between you going OOM and having Beth’tilac squished under your boot.

The bonus verbatim: “Your periodic healing from Riptide has a 40% chance to restore 1% of your base mana each time it heals a target.”  To give you an idea of how much of a mana return this actually amounts to, let’s describe the process more thoroughly.

Occasional Flametide procs for 234 mana add up to a huge mana return over the course of a 7-minute fight.

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What's more amazing: a fishing line withstanding lava or fish swimming in it?

Need some gold fast? Looking for a steady income that takes relatively little investment? Fishing up the ingredients for the Seafood Magnifique Feast may be the answer to your problems.
Especially on PvE servers with lots of raiding guilds, the demand for the mats for this feast can be quite high, but since most people are bored to tears by fishing, the supply remains low to moderate. By being one of the relatively few suppliers on your server, you stand to reap a tidy profit from others’ busy raiding schedules. I’ll explain the most efficient way to go about this below the break.

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I just took the month of June off from World of Warcraft. I canceled my subscription, stopped reading blogs and news about the game, completely didn’t think about it for one month. It was great.

I was getting a little burnt out by the end of May. I had raided Tier 11 a fair amount while working full time – even though there was farther to go in the tier, it can be pretty rough balancing raiding and real life.  I was also in the “grind” rut: I felt like I had to log in almost daily for half an hour at the very least to get anywhere with anything, and some days I put in several hours.  I had a vacation scheduled in June, and I decided I would enjoy it more if I not only took a vacation from my job, but also from WoW.  Lastly, I had a hardware failure, forcing my hand in the matter.

During my month off, I relaxed around the house, read books, traveled, visited friends and family, gardened, took walks, rode my bike, started a new diet. I didn’t even think about WoW for the first three weeks. During the fourth week, I started to hunger for the game again, and especially looked forward to the new content offered by the Firelands, Patch 4.2, that had just rolled out.

When I came back to the game, I was relaxed, refreshed and eager to play again. I am liberated from my previous routine, feel free to play for fun again rather than to try to “get somewhere” if I just earn enough Valor points from dungeons or raids, or gold from crafting or gathering herbs, etc. And I feel sharp, clear, and ready to bring my “A” game to raiding.

After this experience, I plan on taking vacations from the game on a regular basis, and I recommend you do so as well. Here are some thoughts on when and how to go about it. (continue reading…)

If you found the 1,000 flasks required to get the Better Leveling Through Chemistry achievement daunting, then it’s easy to become resigned about the 3,000 flasks required for the Mix Master achievement, even if you are in a fairly large guild.  The rewards are well worth the effort put into the achievements though, as the recipes for the Flasks of Battle will pay off in the long run, and more so if your guild has leveled up enough to receive the benefit of extended flask durations.  So how can we speed you toward the achievement a bit? (continue reading…)

Patch 4.1 will likely drop on Tuesday, and Resto Shaman everywhere rejoice at the long awaited Spirit Link Totem.  This newly implemented healing cooldown will finally bring us close to other healing classes in terms of utility – something we were once upon a time known for.  Along with recent buffs to the base power of CH and GHW and the boost to our amount of Mastery, plus the extension of Mastery’s influence to our HoTs in the coming patch, I would say we have come a long way since the beginning of the expansion.

According to the final patch notes for 4.1, Spirit Link Totem will reduce all damage by 10% as well as redistribute the damage done to those who stand within 10 yards of the totem so they all end up with an equal percentage of health.  This should go a long way toward keeping tanks alive through moments of intense damage.

On the other hand, along with the benefits of our new ability come some potential new frustrations and hazards.  Let’s take a look at some below. (continue reading…)