While there are somethings I like better here, I think that for what I’m currently using it for, I’m going to stick with my Blogspot address for now.

If anyone happens to stumble across this, you can find  me at http://treeburglar.blogspot.com/

Want to know a secret? There’s a shortcut.

Shift-left click on the box that appears in your basic mail window. When mousing over the box, it tells you how many items are attached to that one mailing. But by shift clicking on the mail, it will automatically pull every item out of that batch (as long as you have bag space) and drop it in your inventory.

This was actually something I didn’t know for several years, and only started using it recently when my brother made a comment about me doing mail the long way. =)

Even with only a single item in the mail, this shortcut saves you a click… With a full mail of 12 items, it saves quite a bit more.

See you the other side of 2 weeks, unless I find wireless and time somewhere.

Perhaps the most interesting item she offers is the Argent Pony Bridle. This allows your little squire to be very helpful once every 4 hours… He can open your bank, a vendor, or your mailbox. MMOChampion currently reports that he can also provide access to the AH, but that is not currently what the PTR shows. Would be great if that is available as well though =)

Don’t forget a new boss is being added to the Vault of Archavon! PTR testing says he’s pretty difficult… Same as Emalon, don’t expect to beat him with a pug too soon after launch.

The achievements for several new holidays should be released with this patch, though we will likely not find out much more about the events until closer in time. Looks like the first of these would be encountered on International Talk Like A Pirate Day, Sept 19.

Keep an eye out for Northrend Children’s Week… After all, who doesn’t want a pet Oracle or Frenzyheart? You’ll want to locate Orphan Matron Aria in Dalaran and see what you can do to help out.

Oh, wait. You need more pets? Hmm. In that case, you might want to start hunting down varioud raptors around the world, especially those rare elites. Current gnome reports have found several baby raptors can be looted and learned from those.

Currently, there’s some confusion about the new heirloom items. MMO Champion reports that they can be purchased with Champion’s Seals OR Badges of Heroism, but other sources say only Champion’s Seals. As badges are much easier to obtain, I’m really hoping they are available through both.

As these are not live items, I will be linking them to their MMO Champion page for the time being. This post will likely be updated to WoWHead links once the patch is live. (Anyone perhaps know how to get it to instead show up in the WoWHead popup screen?)

Some item models & names will be different for Horde and Alliance, but the stats and bosses should be the same. Horde versions will be my links.

Cloth items will be included. Loot will be basically sorted, but don’t ignore the other spec’s list as you may find something of interest there. Anything that well itemized for both specs will be under Resto.

Trial of the Champion

This is the new 5 man instance located in the Argent Coliseum at the Argent Tournament in Icecrown. Even though it is a 5 man, this instance drops all epics.

Normal mode:
Resto:
Gaze of the Somber Keeper
Binding of the Tranquil Glade
Handwraps of Surrendered Hope
Leggings of the Haggard Apprentice
Mantle of Inconsolable Fear
The Confessor’s Binding
Signet of Purity
Tears of the Vanquished

Balance:
Mantle of Gnarled Overgrowth
Belt of the Churning Blaze
Bindings of the Wicked
Brilliant Hailstone Amulet
Abyssal Rune

Heroic mode:
Resto:
Spectral Kris
Mariel’s Sorrow
Gloves of Dismal Fortune
Leggings of the Snowy Bramble
Embrace of Madness
Symbol of Redemption

Balance:
Barkhide Treads
Boots of the Crackling Flame
Kurisu’s Indecision
Sinner’s Confession
Gaze of the Unknown

Trial of the Crusader

10 Man Normal:
Resto:
Sunreaver Disciple’s Blade
Mace of the Earthborn Chieftain
Illumination
Perdition
Helm of the High Mesa
Pauldrons of the Glacial Wilds
Belt of the Bloodhoof Emissary
Legwraps of the Demonic Messenger

Balance:
Lightbane Focus
Sunreaver Magus’ Sandals
Looming Shadow Wraps
Felspark Bracers

Balance:
Talisman of Heedless Sins
Skyweaver Vestments
Boots of the Icy Floe
Breeches of the Deepening Void
Belt of Biting Cold
Dark Essence Bindings
Shroud of Displacement
Reign of the Dead

25 Man Heroic:
*Same as 10mH – Missing items, buffed from normal*
Resto:
Robes of the Shattered Fellowship
Sandals of the Mourning Widow

Balance:
Shroud of Displacement

Emblems of Triumph

Resto:
Mask of Abundant Growth
Epaulets of the Fateful Accord
Hood of Clouded Sight
Mantle of Revered Mortality
Heartmender Circle
Band of the Invoker
Talisman of Resurgence
Idol of Flaring Growth

Balance:
Hood of Smoldering Aftermath
Pauldrons of Catastrophic Emanation
Shard of the Crystal Heart
Idol of Lunar Fury

Updates are sorted based on their release date, you have to find all the updates up to patch 3.1.3 … and 3.2 after next wednesday.

I read French >.> I swear. Not my fault that translation’s identical to MMO Champion’s post.

Current 3.2 PTR Patch Notes I’m sure you all love me for not pasting that all in here… But I’m not going over everything, so I’d recommend reading through that when you have the time.

Now, down to the fun parts. Druid info! (This is assuming that you’ve been following a bit on the latest changes. If not, I’d suggest checking out the 3.2 portal on MMO Champion. I will not be going over Coliseum specifics other than loot of interest.)

The Argent Tournament Expands

• All new Argent Crusader daily quests and rewards have been added for players with the Crusader title. Rewards include a new Argent Crusader banner and tabard (which can port players to the tournament grounds), a mounted squire (can periodically run bank, mail or vendor errands for the player), a paladin-exclusive Argent Crusader Charger mount, and new heirloom items.
• All new Silver Covenant and Sunreaver daily quests and rewards have been added for players exalted with these factions. Rewards include tabards, new ground and flying mounts, and a new pet.

This means, get to daily-ing! Just looking at those rewards makes me a very happy tree. A pet that can also be a bank for me? <3

New Dungeon Loot Feature

• Players will now be able to trade soulbound items with other raid or group members that were eligible for the loot. This system will work like the Item Buy Back system and allow 2 hours for players to trade an item after it has been looted. Players who choose to enchant or add gems to the item will get one last confirmation before losing the ability to trade the item.

So, no more having to ticket a GM for a missloot! While this isn’t something that we run into every day, it will be nice to no longer have to be quite so paranoid about looting items.

• New druid art for Cat Form and Bear Form has been added. There are now five unique color schemes for each form and faction. Changing hair color (night elves) or skin tone (tauren) via the barbershop will change the look of one’s cat and bear forms.

Tigerfeet @Secret Agent Cat made some great charts for figuring out the form exacts. NElf and Tauren. I’m probably going to end up changing my hair several times before I find one I’m totally happy with, but it’ll be fun ^.^

Dungeons and Raids

• Dungeon and Raid ID Extensions
  • In order to allow for parties and raids to progress through instances at their own pace, players can now extend an instance ID on an individual basis.
  • Existing or recently expired IDs can be extended via the Social tab under Raid by clicking on Raid Info.
  • The ID of any instance to which a player is saved can be extended. Doing so will extend the instance lock period by the same amount of time as the original lock (i.e. extending an Ulduar instance ID will add 7 days, a Heroic: Halls of Lightning instance ID will add 24 hours, and a Zul’Gurub instance ID will add 3 days to the instance lock time).
  • An ID can be extended more than once.
  • An extension can be reversed on an individual basis provided the player does not do anything in the instance during the extended instance lock period that would save that player to the instance.
• Emblem System Changes
  • Both the 10 and 25-player instances of the Crusaders’ Coliseum drop a new Emblem of Triumph.
  • Any dungeons that previously dropped Emblems of Heroism or Valor, such as Naxxramas or Heroic Halls of Stone, will now drop Emblems of Conquest instead. Emblems of Conquest can still be converted to Valor or Heroism.
  • The Heroic dungeon daily quest will now reward 2 Emblems of Triumph and the normal daily dungeon quest will reward 1 Emblem of Conquest.
  • The existing achievements to collect 1, 25, 50, etc. Emblems of Heroism, Valor, and Conquest have been converted to Feats of Strength since Heroism and Valor Emblems are no longer attainable.
  • New achievements have been added to collect various amounts of any combination of emblems.
• 25-player raids will no longer be referred to as Heroic versions of a raid, as there is a new distinction between normal and Heroic modes for both 10 and 25 player versions of the Crusaders’ Coliseum.
• The Nexus: The Oculus & The Eye of Eternity
  • Drakes used by players in these instances will now scale in health and damage according to the rider’s average item level.
• Ulduar
  • Players can now use Blink, Shadowstep, and Demonic Teleport while participating in the illusion events in the Yogg-Saron encounter.
  • Ominous Clouds in the Yogg-Saron encounter are now more vocal about touching players and should no longer sometimes appear to be in the wrong place for certain players.
  • An Immortal Guardian targeted for Empowering Shadows in the Yogg-Saron encounter will now become a ‘Marked Immortal Guardian’ while targeted.
  • Crusher Tentacles in the Yogg-Saron encounter spawn a little slower in 25-player mode allowing a bit more time for players to clear out the Illusion room.
  • Empowering Shadows in the Yogg-Saron encounter now targets a maximum of three Immortal Guardians in 25-player mode.
  • Yogg-Saron’s health has been reduced by 20% in the final stage of his 25-player mode.
  • Winter Jormungars will no longer put everyone in the zone in combat when they emerge from a Snow Mound. Additionally, Snow Mounds will now disappear when all their jormungars have emerged.

Read it, love it. There are very few of these changes that I don’t think are a good thing, and even with the worries about what the emblem changes will do to raiding, I think it’s a good decision in the long run.

Agility: The amount of agility required per percentage of dodge has been increased by 15%. This change required recalibrating the amount of dodge a player has with 0 agility by a slight amount as well, so all players will see their dodge percentage vary a small amount.

Block Value: The amount of bonus block value on all items has been doubled. This does not affect the base block value on shields or block value derived from strength.

On-Use Block Value Items: All items and set bonuses that trigger temporary increases to block value have been modified. Instead of increasing their block value amount by 100% like other items, they have all had their effect durations doubled. This applies to Glyph of Deflection, Gnomeregan Autoblocker, Coren’s Lucky Coin, Lavanthor’s Talisman, Libram of Obstruction, Tome of the Lightbringer, Libram of the Sacred Shield, the tier-8 paladin Shield of Righteousness bonus, the tier-5 paladin Holy Shield bonus, and the tier-5 warrior Shield Block bonus.

Dodge Rating: The amount of dodge rating required per percentage of dodge has been increased by 15%. This is before diminishing returns. Combined with other changes, this makes dodge rating and parry rating equally potent before diminishing returns apply.

Mana Regeneration: All items that provide “X mana per five seconds” have had the amount of mana they regenerate increased by approximately 25%.

Parry Rating: The amount of parry rating required per percentage of parry has been reduced by 8%. This is before diminishing returns. Combined with other changes, this makes dodge rating and parry rating equally potent before diminishing returns apply. Parry still diminishes more quickly than dodge.

Yep, this means that we will see a bit more Mp5, but our tanks are going to be seeing some pretty significant changes. I would imagine that bears are going to be a bit harder to heal, but we’ll see how bad the damage is once things have gone live.

Mounts

• The cast time for summoning any ground mount is now 1.5 seconds, down from 3 seconds.
• Apprentice Riding (Skill 75): Can now be learned at level 20 for 4 gold. Mail will be sent to players who reach level 20 directing them to the riding trainer.
• Journeyman Riding (Skill 150): Can now be learned at level 40 for 50 gold. Mail will be sent to players who reach level 40 directing them back to the riding trainer.
• Expert Riding (Skill 225): Can now be learned at level 60 for 600 gold from trainers in Honor Hold or Thrallmar. Faction discounts now apply (Honor Hold for Alliance; Thrallmar for Horde). Flight speed at this skill level has been increased to 150% of run speed, up from 60%.
• Artisan Riding (Skill 300): Faction discounts now apply (Honor Hold or Valiance Expedition for Alliance; Thrallmar or Warsong Offensive for Horde).
• In order to further equalize the number of purchasable mounts available to each race, a new 60% speed ground mount has been added for night elves, and a new 100% speed ground mount has been added for the undead.
• Flying over Dalaran and Wintergrasp is now possible so long as players keep a healthy distance above the ground.

Anyone with an alt will likely love these changes. Anyone with standard flying will also be happy, as their speed is getting more than doubled. And I want to know how Blizz defines a ‘healty distance above the ground.’ Hmm…

Druids

• Enrage: This Bear Form ability now generates 20 rage initially, and 10 rage over the next 10 seconds. The armor penalty is unchanged.
• Flight Form: Can now be learned at level 60. Flight speed increased to 150%.
• Flight Form and Swift Flight Form: Now benefit from a paladin’s Crusader Aura.
• Innervate: Duration reduced to 10 seconds, and cooldown reduced to 3 minutes. This means each use of Innervate will give half as much mana as before, but it will be available twice as often.
• Lifebloom: The final heal that occurs when this spell blooms has been reduced by 20% on the base and on the spell power coefficient.
• Mangle: Ranks 4 and 5 base points reduced by about 11%. Scaling from attack power unchanged.
• Rake: Ranks 6 and 7 base points on initial and periodic damage reduced by about 7%. Scaling from attack power unchanged.
• Rip: Ranks 8 and 9 base points and points per combo point reduced by about 6%. Scaling from attack power unchanged.
• Savage Defense: The animation for gaining this buff will no longer make the bear stand upright
• Shred: Ranks 8 and 9 base points reduced by about 10%. Scaling from attack power unchanged.
• Swift Flight Form: Druids who have acquired a mount able to go 310% flight speed will now also go that speed while in this form.
• Swipe (Cat): Percent of weapon damage done reduced from 260% to 250%.
• Travel Form: Can now be learned at level 16.
• Talents
  • Balance
    • Balance of Power: Now reduces all spell damage taken by 3/6%, rather than reducing the chance to be hit by spells by 2/4%.
    • Eclipse: The Starfire and Wrath buffs from this talent are now on separate 30-second cooldowns. In addition, it is not possible to have both buffs active simultaneously.
    • Owlkin Frenzy: Now also restores 2% base mana every 2 seconds for the duration (10 seconds) in addition to its current effects.
  • Feral Combat
    • King of the Jungle: This talent now reduces the mana cost of Bear Form, Cat Form, and Dire Bear Form by 20/40/60%.
    • Primal Tenacity: This talent no longer reduces the mana cost of Bear Form, Cat Form, and Dire Bear Form.
  • Restoration
    • Empowered Touch: Now also increases the amount of bonus healing effects for Nourish by 10/20%.
    • Improved Barkskin: No longer provides dispel resistance to all effects on the druid, but now reduces the chance your Barkskin is dispelled by an additional 35/70%.

Not much to say here either. The notes pretty well sum it up =)

User Interface

• The quest log is now double-paned for more easily viewing quest information. The list of all quests a player has will show in one pane, while the quest details of any highlighted quest will display in the next.
• Character name auto-completion for the chat frame, pop-ups, and mail interface can be enabled through an interface option in the Development settings.
• Character names can now be colorized according to class in the chat frame through an interface option in the Development settings.
• Casting bars under the target frame, focus frame, and nameplates will now display as shielded if the cast cannot be interrupted.
• Druids will now be able to see their mana bars when shape-shifted.
• Item Comparisons: Holding the shift key while hovering over an item will now display the stat differences with the item currently equipped in the relevant slot.
• Item Level: A new option has been added under Display in the Interface Options to show the item level on item tooltips.
• Macros and scripts will no longer be able to target totems by name.
• New Feature Icons: Options recently added to any of the options menus will now display a yellow exclamation point next to them to indicate that they are new features.
• Vendor prices will now be listed on items whether or not players are at a vendor.

Some great things in here, some that are a little redundant with standard addons. But it’s progress in the right direction either way.

World Environment

• Wolvar and Gorloc orphans have arrived in Dalaran and need your help! Players can find out more by visiting the Eventide District (completing the quests being offered for this event will not count toward any Children’s Week achievements). Players have a limited amount of time to care for these orphans before they take their leave. They will then return again for the regularly-scheduled Children’s Week next year.
• Portal areas in all major cities now offer a portal to the Blasted Lands near the Dark Portal.
• Once crossing through the Dark Portal, players can access a flight path directly from the Stair of Destiny to Shattrath.
• A new zeppelin docking ramp has been added to Thunder Bluff allowing Horde players easier transport to and from Orgrimmar.
• The local Postal Service has grown tired of walking so far each day to collect mail and has decided to install a large number of new mailboxes in Stormwind, Undercity, Darnassus and Orgrimmar.
• Mathiel in Darnassus has finally earned himself enough money from your repair bills that he was able to buy himself an anvil.

And now to the fun parts… New pet? Check. Easier travel to Shatt? Check. No more TB > Org run? Check. More mailboxes? Heck yes! Anvil FINALLY in Darnassus? Lol.

Tome of Cold Weather Flight: New heirloom item. Players who have reached level 80 can now purchase this book for 1,000 gold from Hira Snowdawn, the Cold Weather Flying Trainer in Dalaran. Similar to other heirloom items, this item can be mailed to other characters of the same realm, account and faction. The book is consumed when read training the character in Cold Weather Flying. Requires level 68.

Wahoo! Again, more for alts though…

• Val’anyr, Hammer of Ancient Kings: This item’s stats and level have been increased to match the power level of healer weapons coming from the Coliseum 25-person normal difficulty instance. In addition, each time Val’anyr is equipped, Blessing of Ancient Kings will be placed on a 45-second cooldown before it can occur.

Very nice. For those lucky few that have the legendary already, this will be a nice change to keep the weapon in line with current item levels. And who doesn’t want a more awesome shiny?

Druids should no longer be removed from a form after using any engineered bombs.

Very nice. My baby druid will actually get to use some of her stockpile now.

Now that we’re done with the patch notes, time for the fun things… Loot list next!

We now interrupt your regularly scheduled broadcast to bring you yet more guild leadership posts. Because you all care, right?

I’ve got 2 other druid/raidy posts that are done except for editing, but after reading back over them, I realized that my stress and attitude of the past few weeks is showing through, and I’m not satisfied with they way they are currently. So instead, I’m going to go back to my favorite topic lately.

My goal with this is not to drag out my guild’s dirty laundry. Narrischkeit has a great group of people, many of them my close friends, and I don’t believe that anyone deliberately went out of their way to cause issues for us.

However, I am hoping that by discussing what I believe to be our mistakes as of late, other guilds can take the warning and hopefully prevent a fallout such as we’re currently experiencing.

Looking back now, I think I can identify the point where bad things began to happen.

We were in the middle of a 10m Malygos attempt, when a shaman made a comment about our guild leader (Fah) needing more health to reach the recommended # for the encounter. While the comment could have been worded a bit better, it was clear to most that he was intending it to be as a word of advice for Fah, and a heads up for we healers. Instead, Fah took it to be an insult directed at him, exchanged a few nasty comments, and kicked the shaman from the raid. Our raid leader invited the shaman back, Fah kicked him again, and then removed the shaman from the guild. The raid leader, who had been RL for us throughout LK raiding, gquit on the spot.

Lessons to learn:
1.Communication. If any of the main three involved had taken the time to really try and discuss this, I believe that the incident would have been resolved without anyone leaving the raid or the guild.

2.Authority. Too many cooks spoil the pot. I am a fan of only a select few people having raid assist. As a lock, I don’t think that Fah needed or should have had assist at that time. Having too many people with authority over a raid leads to confusion and conflicting orders.

3.Organization. All guilds need a set of policies. If we had anything in place regarding raid control or guild removal, even if the incident had continued in the same way it did, I feel that the guild members’ impressions would have been less that a fit had been thrown, and more that a decision had been rationally reached.

As we were suddenly without a raid leader, the GM (Fah) stepped up to fill those shoes. Raids were still going well, though we began to have some issues with scheduling, as he would typically only place raids on the calendar the day of, giving some not enough time to make plans to be there and resulting in attendance trouble.

I started helping out by organizing the raids for him, and then being a raid assistant. At the time, I hoped that I could help out for a short period while the officers got their stuff together and found a permanent person as a RL. Instead, I soon found myself as a new officer, and unfortunately still one of the few that was contributing in a major way to the guild.

I shortly became the main RL. Along with the typical problems someone would find in that job, I also began having trouble with various guild members, especially officers, trying to control certain parts (or all) of my raids. Instead of speaking with them, I simply assumed that was part of how this guild ran their raids, and that I needed to just deal with it.

Lessons:
1.Organization. Things going a bit lopsided after having a RL leave is one thing, but the officers and GM that were already in place should have stepped up and made whatever changes were needed to keep things happy and happening. A 25 man raiding structure should never fall to pieces because of the loss or absence of a single person.

2.Responsibility. I’ve always strongly felt that all raiders, especially officers, should have to answer for their responsibilities. Many of ours were not (and still aren’t) being an officer in more than name. I believe part of that is due to them having no need for quite a while, but also in part due to the fact that most of them are close real life friends to the GM. As such, I feel that he doesn’t like to assert his authority over most of the officers unless absolutely needed.

3.Communication. We should have communicated with the officers as soon as things started getting rough in raids. I should have spoken up about the trouble I was having with people in my runs. Instead, bad feelings and confusion started to spread throughout our raiders.

Summer hit, and with it, we started loosing raiders. We went from a 25 man raiding guild to a 10 man raiding guild in the space of a few short weeks. Due to some real world issues, I had to mostly leave the game for about a month. Things got worse, but a few officers and raiders got together and set up a good 10m group, and we’ve been smashing our way through Ulduar. Unfortunately, as most raiders want 25m runs, we’ve continued to lose members.

An officer meeting was called, and some things were ironed out, including various policies and roles for certain officers. Unfortunately, many of those have not been enforced, and a majority of our officer core does not seem to take their responsibilities seriously.

Things began coming to a boiling point when two of our officers decided to apply to one of the top raiding guilds on our server. They spoke with our main raid leader and myself beforehand, and were planning to speak with the GM as soon as he was available that evening. Unfortunately, a guild member that was close to both the officers and the GM called Fah to inform him of their application. He logged into Vent during the raid that evening, and started in on one of those that was likely leaving. The next morning, 5 of our core raiders, including 3 officers, had quit the guild.

Lessons:
1.Communication. The officers should have talked to Fah before applying, and let him know that it was likely that they would be no longer in guild soon. Fah should have controlled his temper and discussed it with them in a reasonable way.

2.Responsibility. We have a couple of officers that are working their asses off to keep this guild alive, but many more that do nothing. As we currently have 11 of officer rank or higher, that is a very large chunk of our admin group that is not currently putting forth the time or effort needed to save our guild.

TL;DR

Keep communication lines open and friendly between all members of the guild. Much drama can be solved or prevented by taking the time to politely talk to someone.

No matter the size of your guild, like every other organization out there, some basic policies and procedures need to be set down and enforced. It’ll be unnecessary 80% of the time, but for the remaining 10%, it may save your bacon.

Authority should be respected, but not feared. The admin in your guild have the job of keeping things together and moving, and guild members should keep that in mind. However, keep in mind who is the head honcho in each situation, and listen to them above all.

Take responsibility for your role in a guild. Whether you’re a normal raider, an officer, or a GM, you have a job to do, and you should do it to the best of your ability.

And finally, act as soon as you start seeing problems. Putting a problem behind your back just lets it grow quicker, and with less warning. Speak with your officers, GM, or other guild admin as soon as you start seeing trouble. Even if it turns out to be nothing, it’s better to be safe than sorry.

Things are still going downhill, though some of us are still fighting tooth and nail to save Narrischkeit. We’ll see what happens =)

However, I’m slowly going back to playing again, and I’ve missed it for sure. Done some Ulduar 10 runs, organized an officer meeting, and started doing Tourney dailies again. I’m trying to keep my time in game limited, while still attempting to keep our guild alive and raids going. People really don’t know what they’re talking about when they say that being an officer is fun

However, I do have some info/discussion posts that I’ve got about halfway done, and will likely have at least one out later this week, as long as this final college app gets done soon.

Sadly, I like these alot better than those that we Tauren get… Wtb less horns?