Just in case some of our respective readerships don’t overlap – Lissanna from Restokin is running a Resto Druid survey on the official Druid forum.

Hey everyone! I’m going to work on my 3.3 healing guide. However, before I do that – I want to get some input from all of you! I’m looking for people who are already level 80 who heal in PvE (either 5-mans or raids).

So, I created a short healer survey designed so that I can compile a little bit of data before I finalize my decisions about what my new healing guide will look like.


It’s a multiple-choice survey, so it only takes a few minutes. Go post!

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Last week, Lissanna from Restokin wrote about her view on trash mobs, and why instances need them. I was going to post something on the topic earlier, but I just got back from a great weekend in Melbourne.. and I have Christmas, familiy birthdays, and a few social engagements bearing down on me, argh!


Truth is though, that I do like a bit of chaos and pressure. Christmas time is probably my favourite time of year, because I can really indulge my desire to plan and organise everything. Plus, business deadlines start to close in. It’s funny.. I find that the more work and pressure that I have, the more energy I have, too.


Anyway – I could have just shelved this one because I was a bit late with it, but I did want to write my own take. Better late than never.



Trashless TOC is fine (by itself)


Honestly, I love our trash-less TOC. I don’t think it trivialises the instance or makes it feel boring. I think it is a breath of fresh air – something different. You can get on with things without having to wade through trash first.


But – I don’t think I’d like all instances to be like TOC; it’s only the fact that it’s the only instance of its kind, I guess, that makes it “OK”. If every instance was like TOC, with no trash, then I think things would probably feel a bit cheap and easy.


I agree with Lissanna that trash helps to break up the encounters, and pace things a little. But the problem, I think, is that once you’ve been doing an instance for a few weeks, and you’ve mastered the trash, or you outgear it, it really becomes very tedious to have to clear and reclear each week. It no longer provides a challenge, it’s just an annoying speed-hump standing between you and the bosses. And each week, it becomes more and more irritating to have to reclear it. I believe that in many cases, this stops people wanting to go back, and probably shortens the lifespan of the instance.


I think that’s why we see so many people pugging TOC; because you can just jump right into fighting the bosses. There’s no chronic AFKing on trash, or spending an hour clearing to the first boss and then disbanding because someone had to leave. You can just dive headfirst into the action, no mucking around. I love that. I hope we see more of it.


But, on the flip side, as I said, I don’t think I’d like it to always be like that. There needs to be instances and encounters with trash. If every boss had no trash, it would start to feel a little too easy, a little trivial.


There just needs to be a balance.



Trash that we hated


Naxx: long, winding corridors of pack upon pack upon pack. Packs of cursing and poisoning spiders that made me want to kick puppies. Some novelty in the eye-stalk gauntlet, Frogger, timing the gargoyles properly etc. On the whole – far too much trash.


Sartharion: far too much trash for a single boss.


Hyjal: waves and waves of trash, and if you die at the end of one, you get to start allll over again. Every week you have to clear 20 minute waves of trash.


BT: Supremus’ room: far, far too much to clear. You could skip some of it if you were careful, but it was still far too much trash.


Sunwell: very difficult trash that many guilds struggled to get through to get to the first boss.


Flame Leviathan: fun a few times, while you play around in each type of vehicle; but such a huge area to clear.


Freya: another huge room to clear.


Vezax: a long way to go, then when you get to his room, you have all of those annoying packs of mobs, plus the two big guys. Glad it was reduced a little. Not terribly difficult, just so TEDIOUS.



Author’s note:


RAID-WIDE POISONS AND CURSES: STOP DOING THIS. SERIOUSLY. I absolutely LOATHE these pulls. They serve no purpose other than to make the pulls tedious and miserable for cleansing classes. Stop doing it. I can’t even begin to express my seething hatred for these.



Trash concepts that are good

• Novelties like spider tanks on Mimiron trash

• Gauntlets (as long as they are short)
• Achievements for clearing trash fast (like Freya)
• Novelty mounts (AQ40)
• CC pulls – makes people work together instead of “zerging”
• Mobs that restore health/mana when they die (Kara)
• Reputation (how about adding some fun rewards to buy?)
• Trash epic drops
• Herb and ore nodes, and skins, as incentive for clearing
• Final bosses with no trash – it’s a relief
• Small numbers of challenging packs, rather than long sections of dull packs


I think you either need a small number (say, 2 or 3) of challenging packs, or, if you’re hell-bent on a huge room full of trash, then it should provide a reward for clearing. Nodes, a higher chance of trash drops, achievements, or other rewards – there needs to be a trade-off. I can handle large and boring rooms, if it’s not just a large and boring room, every single week.


Slowing raids down for the sake of slowing them down just makes people annoyed and restless – and less likely to want to come back.



Rewards for clearing trash


One of Lissanna’s main points is that trash rewards raiders even if they don’t kill the boss.


I agree and disagree. It’s true in theory, but I think that these days, trash is less rewarding than it used to be. Sure, there are BOE drops, but often these go to the guild vault, so the players don’t really benefit (at least directly, in a way that they feel glad they came for the trash). I think players need to feel that they, personally, are getting something out of long trash, otherwise it’s just a chore.


I would love to see the return of reputations from raids – with more rewards. Let’s face it, most of the rep rewards in the past have been sidegrades at best – by the time you’ve done enough runs of Instance X, you likely outgear anything that the rep vendor offers you. How about offering things like:


- BOA items
- pets and mounts
- tabards
- more powerful food, only able to be used in that instance
- a way to port to the instance (like the BT neck or Argent tabard)
- novelties, like costumes or single-use items, novelty foods, trinkets


I treasured (and still use) my BT neck. Of course, that was a quest reward – but we could have something similar to the Argent tabard that ports you to the tournament grounds. Food, buffs, perhaps even special flasks that you can only purchase at exalted rep and can only be used inside that instance, or perhaps even cooking or alchemy recipes for buffs that can only be used there (although this may have economic implications – but you get the idea).



Speed things up for old hats


How about selling an exalted mount that allows you to travel through the instance faster than normal mounts? This would make wipe recovery faster, which helps to ease the strain on veteran guilds that are getting jaded after being in the instance for a long time.


Or, even more fun, something like a bomb detonator (with limited charges) so that next time you have to run the frogger bomb gauntlet at Mimiron, you can protect the raid by blowing up the bombs? Or a flag that acts basically as a totem, that you can put down and it gives you +X damage against elementals, so clearing Freya’s room becomes faster and easier?


Basically – items that are a mix of fun, a slight money sink, and most importantly – novel ways to speed up the instance for guilds that have been there for what may seem like an eternity. Anything that helps trash go a little faster will help these guilds feel like the instance is less of a chore.


I also think that we should see more nodes in instances, to reward guilds for clearing everything. Epic gems or frost lotus for the bank is definitely nice compensation for having to clear a room of trash.


I think they’re also introducing raid “dailies”, but I’m not sure of the format of these. I’d love to see raid quests that require you to kill X flowers in Freya’s room or Y iron dwarves leading up to Flame Leviathan – with an emblem and cash rewards for completing them. This would make tedious rooms much more rewarding because you know you’re going to get 26g and an emblem, which then goes towards your upgrades and repair bills. They’d need to make sure people couldn’t just reset and cheat, though.


Of course, I’m not saying that we should throw epics at people just for walking in and killing the first couple of pulls – but I do think that trash should be more rewarding, particularly if it is long.



The balance


Overall, I agree with Lissanna that trash is helpful to set the pace in instances; but I don’t think that it should become such a tedious chore for veterans of the zone. Trash should provide a challenge for a while, but we shouldn’t have to clear long corridors of trash, or waves, or encounter trash that is a massive “gear check” like Sunwell – unless there is a small reward for doing so.


It should:

• be challenging for the new people, but not an impossible bottleneck

• not be tedious and discouraging for farming guilds – can we improve this?
• alternate between large and small, zerg and CC
• add the occasional novelty pulls
• trade off between small/fast packs and longer clears that are more rewarding
• contribute to repeatable quests for emblem/cash rewards


Trash can be fun and rewarding. If I had the choice, I would much rather have fun trash than no trash, certainly. None (if it happens a lot) can be just as boring as too much. Some is good – it just has to be balanced.


I think one of the biggest issues is how boring and discouraging trash can be when you’ve been in an instance for weeks or months – Could this be improved – while still providing an initial challenge, and without trivialising the instance?

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Hello Tauren and Night Elf friends.

A quick disclaimer on this one: This post is about the lack of threat-reduction abilities for druids. Night Elves have an ability through their Racial, and boy is is nice – but Taurens do not. So this is mostly about how we moocows miss out on the ability to drop a bit of threat if we need to. Important: it’s not a complaint about Shadowmeld, or a request to have Shadowmeld. It’s about the gap that exists for Tauren druids, and whether that should be filled (without detracting from the NE racial).


Remember, I have Tauren and Night Elf druids, and I love both. I don’t want my NE friends to think I’m trying to steal their awesome racial.


—————-


Somebody started a thread on the healing forums to ask if resto druids had ever wished for a Fade-like ability. Something that allows us to drop a bit of aggro – if only for a short time. I really feel that a threat-dump is something that druids are sorely missing, and I’ve mentioned it a number of times in the past.



Aggro-reducing tools at our disposal


We have a few things to help reduce healing aggro:


Innate threat-reducing tools
– Subtlety talent (10/20/30%)
– Bracing Earthsiege Diamond
– Enchant Cloak – Subtlety


Most druids don’t max out Subtlety (the norm is 2/3 to progress to the next tier of talents) because it’s really just not needed, generally speaking. Honestly, I don’t think threat is something that is constantly an issue, enough to warrant putting that extra point in Subtlety – and certainly not enough of an issue to warrant enchanting your cloak (and losing haste, spellpower, or mana return options) or giving up your meta slot to use the reduced aggro gem.


It’s not a chronic problem; it’s not as though I spend most of my time fighting off adds – but there are absolutely times that I have thought, “if only I had Fade”. But I’ll go into those later.


It’s worth noting, too, that there are situations where druids don’t want a static and innate threat reduction, for times when we need to kite things. Some druids have had to put talents into other spots in order to deliberately drop their 2/3 Subtlety, in order to perform a kiting role – for example, for constellations on Algalon. So I don’t think that buffing Subtlety or giving us some kind of extremely strong innate threat reduction is the best idea. I’d rather it was an ability that I am able to use when I need to.


Proactive and reactive threat-reducing tools
– Cower


Yep, this is pretty much it, if you’re a Tauren. Cat form and cower.


You have to be in range of the mob to do this, and chances are that if someone has face-pulled extra mobs and they are heading your way, you’d be better off dropping to bear than trying to cat+cower, especially if you’ve pulled multiple mobs.


Last-ditch tools to survive when things go bad
– Barkskin (and Improved Barkskin)
– Nature’s Grasp
– Warstomp


Barkskin is my best friend; whenever I get aggro, my instinctive knee-jerk reaction is to hit Barkskin. Unfortunately it only reduces damage – and if you’ve aggroed a boss or a pack of mobs, Barkskin isn’t going to save you. It should buy the tank a little time to pick up, if you’ve only grabbed one stray mob, though.


Nature’s Grasp is handy for stepping away from single mobs (I like it on Faction Champs), but only lasts a few seconds, can only affect one target, and is often resisted or breaks quickly. It’s nice, but it’s not great.


Warstomp is a nice AOE stun to help buy you a few seconds, whether you’re being attacked by one or several mobs. It’s ok in PVE, but really it’s mostly used as a PVP racial. I find it helpful in some situations, but not amazing. It also only works at short-range – so if you blow it prematurely before the mobs get to you, or if the mobs are staggered, it won’t help much. They have to be right up close to you to be effective, and by that time, you may already be dead.



Is healer aggro just a tank problem?


A common theme running through the replies is “get better tanks.” If something is aggroing onto you, the tank must be awful.


Is that really the issue?


Are all our threat problems caused by bad tanks, or someone face pulling an extra pack of mobs?


I see people saying things along the lines of, “lol if u get aggro, ur tanks r bad – or ur a bad healer, L2P” and that the tank should save you faster. Their argument is basically that if a druid is aggroing something, then “something is very wrong” – usually with the tank.

Dark Legacy’s Donald:
If this is your tank, you’re in trouble.
http://www.darklegacycomics.com/87.html


Now – I can agree with this to a point. If a tank has something picked up, it’s VERY rare that I can strip it off. I have my moments (/flex) but generally speaking, my tree tanking flings are short and sweet. Once the tank has got the mob, he’s got it. If I am pulling mobs off a tank that is already being tanked, then something is probably wrong with the tank’s TPS. Usually.


But I’m not talking about situations where the tank can’t hold the mobs. Or where he won’t pick things up off the healers. I’m talking about situations where you have a second, perhaps two, to react and survive – because something went wrong. Evidently the people who have said it’s a bad tank issue have never been one-shot by a mob that was pulled by someone else but made a beeline for the healers in about 2 seconds flat.


All taunts down, 30 yards distance to close – sorry Mr or Mrs Healer, it’s dirtnap time for you. And down I go.


I just don’t buy the argument “the tank should have seen the aggro and saved you.” Sometimes it’s just not that cut and dried. It’s not always because someone did something stupid.


Consider:

• the tank is stunned, frozen, or otherwise incapacitated for a few moments

• the tank dies; another tank class needs to pick up the mobs in a hurry
• the tank has already used his aoe/ranged taunt/s, and needs a few more seconds to pick up
• the tank does not have instant snap-aggro on multiple mobs
• someone else pulls aggro and drops to full health; you NS+HT them to full, and pull off
• you have HoTs ticking from a previous phase of a fight, new mobs spawn


and so on.


I guess it’s easy to be short-sighted and simply blame things on other people, rather than considering whether our tools could be improved in some way. And in this case, I think it’s a tool that has missing from our toolbox the whole time.



DruidFade mileage in WotLK – a tally


To further demonstrate the fact that it’s not always about someone being dopey, or about your tank being Donald – here are some encounters that I think I could have used a Fade for:

• MC resist on Instructor, he runs for a priest, I save priest and get aggro, splat, bye bye Immortal.

• The eye-stalks in the gauntlet leading to Loatheb
• HoT aggro on Gothik’s summoned adds
• Gluth’s zombies (although I often helped to kite them, so it depends)
• KT’s giant bug adds – drop aggro so the tank can pick them up more easily

  


• Malygos P2 – buggy adds that aggro to you and one-shot you, yay my favourite

• Sartharion – how many times did I get destroyed by whelps? SO MANY. (Hint: sometimes AOE snap aggro isn’t so snap)

  


• Auriaya – initial heals on the pull – close your eyes and pray you don’t die

• Mimiron – P3 adds are simply a nuisance
• Vezax – the few seconds before the Animus is able to be picked up
• Yogg Saron – I absolutely cannot avoid pulling the faceless adds as they spawn
• Algalon – get the constellations out of my face, I’m trying to work here

  


• Faction Champions – speaks for itself

• Anub – avoiding the little bugs; helping the tank to pick up the big adds

  


• Not to mention the many, many times during trash pulls that someone does face-pull, or gets feared, or pulls aggro and needs a huge heal, or the tank is stunned etc, which often leads to me getting massive add-aggro, through no fault of my own.


The point is – aggro happens, and it’s not always the tank’s fault, my fault, or anyone’s fault.


“L2P” doesn’t hold up in these situations.


Consider the rogue mobs on the way to Vezax – I think of them as Shadow Lab Rogues v2.0. They come out of nowhere to test your reflexes. I love that, actually. They add a bit of excitement and chaos.


Now, the tank should be quick enough to pick them up – but wouldn’t it be good to be able to fade and help save yourself? Is it really reasonable to just use the tired old statement that the tank should L2P and save the healer faster – or should healers be able to have defensive mechanism to buy the tank a few seconds?


Do you think that is babying the tank? Or just giving healers a tool to help themselves survive?


If it’s unnecessary – why do others have aggro-dump abilities? Can’t they just learn to manage their threat – or learn to find better tanks?



Too much homogenisation?


Of course, some people have cried “grey blob”. The classes should be different, stop making them have the same abilities as each other, etc. But really – is giving us a Fade such a big deal? Would it be game-breaking? I’m not even being greedy here – I’m not asking for Shadowmeld (as much as I would love to have it back!), just a Fade, or some other similar and temporary drop in aggro.


Is it particularly unfair to everyone else, to allow us a way to drop aggro temporarily? Is it making the classes too much like each other?

If it was a healing spell that someone was asking for, or a major raid utility tool – something that would bring us closer to being a pally or a priest or a shaman and start stepping on their toes, then I would understand the opposition. And I would likely agree – I don’t want the classes to merge – I want us to maintain our niches. But in this case, it’s a trivial personal utility spell to temporarily drop aggro – which is something that (for some reason) we lack compared to everyone else. It won’t hurt any other class, nor will it detract from their unique abilities or roles.


Is there a genuine reason why druids don’t have a threat dump? Is it unreasonable to ask for one?



Perhaps a buff to Cower?


I don’t want to simply give Taurens a Shadowmeld type ability. I don’t want a combat-drop. I don’t want to detract from the NE racial, that’s not really fair on them. This isn’t about seeing that they have a cool new toy, and stamping my foot til I get exactly what they have. There has to be a unique benefit to that racial that isn’t available to the rest of us as an innate or trained ability. So I’m definitely not asking that Taurens get Shadowmeld too.


But a Fade-type tool would be extremely handy in a lot of situations.


Perhaps buffing Cower could be an option?

I don’t want Shadowmeld (well, yes I do.. but I’m not actually asking for it), I won’t even ask for anything brand new – buff Cower, I’d be happy with that. Let it work globally, not just on one target, and let it work at range, so that it is similar to a Fade ability. I would happily pop into kitty and cower for a second, and then back to tree. That even fits in with Blizzard’s philosophy of wanting druids to shift often in order to use different tools – and it would require us to weigh up the sacrifice of being unable to heal for a few seconds while we drop threat.


Give Cower the Shadowmeld treatment (although not quite as good as meld) – buff it to be useful for any spec of druid.


I’d love that, actually.


The more I think about it, the more I really like the idea of simply taking our existing ability and making it more practical and useful. There’s not really a need for a new, standalone ability – just buff Cower to make it useful for every druid, not just the kitties at close range.

—————-


As healers, we can’t simply watch Omen and stop healing if our threat gets too high. Uh oh, I’m too high on threat, I’ll just stand here and not heal for a while.


I’m sure that will go down well.


We can certainly “go easy” on initial pulls, and try to give the tanks as much time as possible to pick up adds, but there will always be times when we have to spam heal, and generate high threat. With HoTs rolling across a lot of people at once, we are often the first person to be targeted by newly spawned adds. A tank’s taunt/s may be down, or he may die and someone else has to try to pick everything up. In those few seconds, our threat can be a big problem.


I want to stress again that this is not a chronic problem – we don’t have threat problems all the time – but an ability to drop threat temporarily would be valuable in a large number of situations.


We have high armor, barkskin, a stun, a reactive root and instant heals to try to save ourselves – which may seem like a lot – but we have no way to actually drop any of our high threat in certain situations – whether it be reactive (because we pulled), or simply to drop a little because we’re about to pull. I would definitely prefer a way to proactively drop aggro before a mob gets to me, rather than have to activate all of my reactive lifeline abilities to stay alive.


Elves have an amazing option to be able to drop some aggro, not only to save themselves, but to make their raids and groups run more smoothly – it’s a tool that doesn’t just make things easier for themselves, but for their entire group.


Being able to dump aggro just before you pull, or in the second when the mob turns, makes things so much easier on your tanks and raid, and I think it’s unfair to generalise and blame aggro on bad tanking. We could have a tool that makes life a lot easier on our tanks, by managing our threat, especially in chaotic situations.


Isn’t it time druids had a proper threat dump – or, at the very least, a temporary threat reduction?

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OK, not a huge deal I suppose – but I was pleased to notice that the Night Elf Mohawk “costume” that has been put into the game persists after you shift into a form and shift back out.

That is, you can be wearing the mask, shift into Tree form (no mask in forms, though, obviously), and when you shift out again – you still have the mask!

Why do we care? Because we never get to keep any of our other costumes! As soon as we shift, we lose the costume and the fun. But NOW – there’s a costume that doesn’t break when you shift!

Please Blizzard – make other holiday costumes and novelty items like the Iron Boot Flask, orbs, Deviate fish, Pygmy Oil etc last through our shapeshifting by making them a buff like the Mohawk. We’re not asking to be Night Elf Mohawk boomkins or anything crazy like that (as cool as that would be) – just don’t make shifting remove the buff and waste the costume.

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I’m not sure why I subscribe to Gevlon’s blog anymore. Lately it provides fewer and fewer insightful posts on making money in WoW, and instead just seems to be post after post about how he considers a lot of players to be morons for having a different definition of the word “fun”. There are actually a few blogs on my blogroll that annoy the heck out of me because I read the posts and think “wow, I can’t believe you’re so far off the mark”, but I can’t bring myself to unsubscribe. I’m going to put it down to morbid curiosity.

Gevlon has snatched hold of the $10 vanity pet concept and decided that only morons would spend tangible cash on intangible in-game rewards. He now seeks to understand why people want to own them (although I suspect he has no real desire to understand, he just wants to reiterate that it is folly.)

He refuses to accept that some people want these pets purely because they are “fun” or “cute”. To him, there is one main reason why people purchase these pets: to show off, to have a status symbol, to keep up with everyone else who buys a pet. Fun/cute is an unacceptable explanation. There must be more to it.

Do we really have to question why people enjoy things, why they consider something to be fun? Is “because I like it” not good enough? Is it really necessary to delve deeper?

I like things that make me happy. Do we really need to psychoanalyse that?

It’s his blog, of course, and if he WANTS to psychoanalyse – that’s his project. But what really annoys me is when he simply slaps labels on people because they do not conform to his idea of what is productive and what is wasteful or pointless. People are not automatically morons because they choose to do activities that they consider to be FUN.


Digital items are worth less because you can’t hold them in your hands

I think people are getting too hung up on the idea that it’s bad to use real cash for digital items. That somehow, you’re a moron if you pay good money for something that you can’t hold in your hands and “own”.

Do you ever buy songs from iTunes or similar? I do. That’s a digital download. Whatever you buy digitally, you do it because you like the product, and it brings you enjoyment. The only difference between an iTunes song and a Pandaren Monk is that we know that after a number of years, WoW will close down, and your panda will cease to exist (whereas your iTunes song should endure). So the pets are more like a rental than a purchase – one day you’ll no longer own them.

So why are these two minipets such an enormous waste of money? $10 for some giggles and fun, why not?

Have you ever bought someone a surprise gift, just to make them smile? What about a bunch of flowers? Flowers die after a few days, they serve absolutely no purpose other than to make someone smile and feel nice. Pandaren Monks have been popular pets for people in the last few days – to make people smile and laugh.

A few pots of beer or a bunch of flowers will cost you $10 and can make you feel good for a short time, then they are gone. A pandaren monk will cost you $10 and makes you feel good for a short time, then he’ll be gone (when you get sick of him, or when WoW shuts down).

$10=$10.

But a $10 bunch of flowers or a few drinks with friends is “normal”, while a digital minipet is for morons.


I don’t subscribe to the idea that pointless = moronic

I spent hours one day grinding Gelkis Centaur rep. Remember those two centaur clans in Desolace – that you have to collect their ears and whatnot to become friendly with one clan and hated with the other? I wanted exalted with one of them. Why? Something to do – something silly. So I could laugh and say “haha, I’m exalted with a pointless faction.” Hardly an achievement or anything to show off, but a bit of harmless fun. Doing something incredibly tedious and long-winded, purely to say I’d done it, and laugh.

(by the way, you can’t get exalted with them – it caps at 11999/12000 Honored – but I didn’t find that out until I actually got capped. Heartbreaking!)

By Gevlon’s standards, I’m a total moron. I spend hours of my time doing achievements, farming, grinding, fishing (for fun, not for money), and all of those other dumb things that non-goblins like to waste their lives on. But I enjoy it. Call me crazy (but not a moron, thanks), but I love doing laps of the basin, mining and herbing. I love fishing for hours and hours. I enjoy mindless grinding.

Am I a moron?

No. I “simply like” grinding.

Why is it fun? Why do I like it? Because it makes me happy. I enjoy it. Why do I enjoy it? WHO CARES, I JUST DO. You’re just gonna have to take my word for it when I say “because I like it”.

Evidently the very subjective idea of what various people find to be “fun” is just really hard for some people to grasp.

Gevlon spends his time making money for the sole purpose of making money. He never EVER buys anything that isn’t absolutely necessary – no mounts, no pets, nothing frivolous, ever. So apart from a time when he was paying for a spot in raids, he pretty much does nothing with his money except pile it up in a corner. Pointless, right?



Figure 1: Morons collect these because they are stupid sheep
and like to waste time collecting shiny things.

Figure 2: Intelligent and sensible people collect these
because they like the challenge of collecting shiny things.
(Note: This is completely different from collecting pets and other worthless pixels)



Is he a moron for collecting gold? No. He “simply likes” making money for the sake of it.

Why is it fun? Why does he like it? Because he enjoys it.**

If someone with 100 vanity pets is a moron, then Gevlon himself is just as much of a moron for collecting gold for the sake of it (it would be entirely different if he had a specific purpose for the gold – but generally he just stockpiles it).

I don’t understand how people can be so judgmental and short-sighted, labelling other people as idiots for displaying a particular behaviour, but almost duplicating it themselves without even realising that it is exactly the same kind of thing. Collecting for no particular reason. Collecting because it’s just “fun”. Something to do. A milestone to strive for. 214k gold, 100 mounts, 100 vanity pets, 40 exalted reputations – they’re all “pointless” goals. But why is the vanity pet collector a moron compared to the gold stockpiler?



Figure 3: Waste of time vs Not a waste of time.



One of us

Honestly, I feel sorry for people like Gevlon, who are so hung up on judging everyone else’s idea of fun, constantly feeling the need to label and judge. The saddest thing is that he is exactly the same as any other collector who collects something for the sake of having a collection, but either doesn’t see it, or decides to rationalise his behaviour as “better”.

I collect vanity pets, Bob collects bottletops, Gevlon collects gold. He spends his time and his subscription money on his minigame of hitting the gold cap. I spend my time and subscription seeing how many pets I can jam into my knapsack. Sorry Gevlon, but there is no difference. We’re all wasting our time here, if you think about it – everything you do in the game is “pointless” except for two main things: a certain sense of accomplishment (however warped it may be), and whatever enjoyment you get out of what you do – whether it be raiding, RPing, grinding, playing the AH, collecting pets, fishing, racking up achievement points, PvPing, or dancing on the Ironforge mailbox in a Lovely Black Dress.

As long as someone else’s idea of “fun” doesn’t interfere with my idea of “fun” then frankly they can spend their subscription any way they like, who the hell am I to dictate to them what’s fun? Who am I to tell them they’re a moron for buying a minipet, or spending weeks grinding for The Insane, or spending 5 nights a week raiding for server firsts? Where do I get off making those calls?

In the end, when they switch off the servers, we’ll each of us have nothing to show for our time – so the only thing that matters is the enjoyment that we get out of our monthly subscription (and, if you consider it worth the purchase, any add-on products that you might like to buy). That enjoyment and “value” is entirely subjective, and does not have to have any kind of in-depth analysis to discover the “truth”.

Sometimes, “I did it for fun” is exactly the explanation. It does not need to be investigated or extrapolated. There is not always a shady hidden agenda. Not everyone buys shiny things to show off on the Dalaran steps. Sometimes, useless vanity items are just fun to look at or play with – even if nobody is around. Just for fun.

Pandaren Monks are fun and they make me smile and laugh. And in my case, it not only made me happy, but it made my friend (who gifted it to me) happy as well.

All for the low, low price of a few beers, a couple of coffees, or a box of widgets.


That’s 10 bucks well-spent, right there.





**Edit: Gevlon has clarified that he in fact does NOT enjoy making money, he does it only to prove that his methods work:

“PS: I don’t know how many times I explained why did I gained goldcap but people still keep asking. I’m fully aware that anything over 10K is useless. No, it wasn’t fun at all to grind that money. I did it as a proof that my goldmaking tricks work. Imagine that I’d say “this and this would work, though I never tried it as I don’t need more gold”. Yes, by saying this I also mean that others who gained lot of gold without any plan how to use it did something irrational.”

My brain just might explode. It’s NOT ok to do pointless things that you enjoy, but it is fine to do something that you DON’T enjoy and (by your own admission) is utterly pointless – except to be able to say “and here’s how I did it.”

How can anyone scoff at another person’s 100 minipets – that they enjoyed collecting – while they themselves are mindlessly grinding for 214k gold that they neither want, nor need, and even DISLIKE doing? At least I’m enjoying my time-wasting – you don’t like what you’re doing at all. /boggle. I especially liked the last part – which I take to mean “If you copy what I did, but you don’t have a purpose for your money, then you’re an idiot.” (but remember – don’t buy vanity items – because that’s dumb.)

Yet we’re the morons…

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• A 10man raider in a 25man guild
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• I shapeshift, therefore I am.

I’ve been thinking lately, about all the changes Blizzard makes over time – some of them are applauded, others are opposed. Some are things that we all believe that we should have had a long time ago. For example – remember when..



• HoTs didn’t stack, so the only druid who could use them in a raid was the person with the highest +healing (A more powerful spell is already active) and everyone else was stuck with HT spam duty?

• Gift of the Wild was cast group-by-group?
• Omen of Clarity was cast, and lots of new druids didn’t know it? (so they couldn’t work out why they never got any procs!)
• there was no mailbox in Nighthaven?
• we could wear costumes and use Noggenfogger?
• ToL aura used to affect healing done, not received? (mmm stacking healers)


Your turn!

How long have you been a druid? What are some of the things that you remember and look back on, and find amusing?

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I really wanted them, but I’m trying very hard to pay off my car at the moment. I have $6000 to go, and I will have paid it off in 9 months instead of 5 years. I’m very proud of myself, but it does take a bit of commitment.

When a friend found out about them – he bought them for me as an early Christmas present! <3 Frosty!

(I'll lecture him later about HIS car payments..)


If you aren't already aware - Blizzard is selling these pets for $10 each. Until the end of December, $5 from each Monk sale goes to the Make a Wish Foundation.

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• Slayer of Dragons

Despite trying very hard to take a break from raiding, I felt too bad stepping away while we were trying to get Algalon.

We got him tonight after about 2.5hrs total tries.




Feels good. It’s still a shame we couldn’t keep going on 25man; I’m confident that we would have killed him on 25man a long time ago.

Possibly Related Posts:

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