Ad now for something completely different…

My little Druid is up to 34 now, officially making her my highest alt (she finally surpassed my hunter/bank), and it’s almost to the point where I’ll have to actually start caring about my spec. I’m not that crazy about Feral, as I’m pretty used to casting, but from what I’ve seen, Balance is really inefficient in terms of mana. I realize Moonkin form adjusts this a bit, but the concern is still there, especially considering that I’ve been wearing caster gear to stack Int. for the last few levels (having outgrown running around in Cat form), and the amount of leather gear aimed at boosting mana seems to be minimal. I’m also beginning to notice what a pain it is to level on a low-population server. I leveled Raizi back on a higher server before TBC. Rococo leveled (at least at the beginning) on my old server, and then leveled the rest of the way just after TBC, when there was an influx of traffic. Laika leveled for a while during the post-TBC frenzy, and then I took a break from her, until finally returning a bit later, but there had been enough players around to PUG instances in her early days, and by the time I returned to her, well, she was a ‘lock, so needing a group to take down elites wasn’t that necessary.It’s just struck me now that I’ll be in a zone, and there will only be three of us. Forget doing actual instance runs. I usually end up begging the Mister to run me through something because it really is that much easier. As much as I hate it, I also feel like I’ve paid my dues, having legitimately run instances with three different characters. It’s not like I don’t know the game mechanics, or the boss fights (BLADES OF LIGHT!!!) or the layout of each dungeon. Plus, who wants to wait three hours to amass five people? Not me. I hope they open us up to transfers soon (incoming, that is). 

 

PTR – Mage Speccing

I’ve been taking a few tentative steps into the Public Test Realm (PvE) over the last few days, trying out the new changes to magi (I was recently informed that “mages” is incorrect) and seeing how the alterations to the arcane tree would pan out.

The verdict: It’s kind of awesome. I’ve been toying with a 51/10/0 tree at the moment, but since it’s the PTR, and money doesn’t matter, I’ll undoubtedly respec another 15 times.  My thoughts:

• Slow is amazing
• Arcane Fortitude makes a noticeable difference
• Improved Blink is good enough to be nerfed before the patch comes out
• Mana Shield – I have yet to fully test this (I always feel guilty for spending too much time in the PTR, as the changes made have no real impact on my chars)
• I seem to be doing more damage with this spec. I’ll have to analyze Recount to be sure, but it seems to be taking less time to kill stuff.
• This could be a nice PvP spec.

I’ve done a little testing with my Priest, but I feel there is less to play around with there. I either spec her Shadow (for my enjoyment) with a little Disc. thrown in there, or 25/36/0 for some healing (for my guild). It’s nothing that groundbreaking.

I’m sending my little ‘Lock in there next to see about a switch to Affliction (from Demonology).  This could be necessary, especially if the rumoured changes to pet scaling are implemented.