Player

Exceptional PvP Horde Warlock: Carmilla-Draenor.

About Damn Time

Martini is finally a Kingslayer!

Some Info

Found a little article at Massively.com called "Seven tips for Star Trek Online newbies" that was helpful. Still intrigued about how there will be no real class or XP in the game. Also want to know more about the UI now.

Resistance is Futile

So I've decided to try out Star Trek Online. With the arduous, tumultuous history the code and license has had, I really wanted to ignore it. Yet I've been a fanboy for over three decades now so I felt obligated to give it a shot.

There have been many references to the Everything we know about STO post on the official forums which got the ball rolling. It's been updated well, kept organized, and I found it interesting. The games mixture of space combat and FPS ground play sounds pretty fun. Then there's the whole defending a starbase from a fleet of Klingons thing. Having a bunch of disposable red shirts to order around. Customizing your own space ship, even having multiple ships, along with managing a bridge crew. Sparks my youthful fires.

Just wish I could have gotten in on the closed beta. There are a number of sites that are handing out open beta codes but I couldn't get any. I was either too late or there were too many hoops for me to jump through. Decided to just go ahead and pre-order the game. I don't feel bad about throwing $80 at Cryptic's endeavor.

Was really clever of them to have a number of in-game bonuses available. Tapped into my collection and ego motivations. It came down to GameStop with their Constitution Class starship and Amazon with their Borg bridge officer. Nostalgia was a powerful draw to the starship, but I get the impression that it will have limited use. It would be more visible and showy. But having a Borg as part of the crew sounds cool and ultimately more useful. Jeri Ryan had nothing to do with it. *snicker*

Managed to download the Open Beta from Ten Ton Hammer despite not getting codes from them. Amazon still hasn't sent me mine so I'll find other things to do. There are already a number of issues on the Release Notes page that I will go over.

Darkmoon Faire Buff List

Question 1 -- Question 2 Answer -- Buff
1-------------- 1-------------- +10% Damage
1-------------- 2-------------- +10% To all resistances
1-------------- 3-------------- +10% Armor
2-------------- 1-------------- +10% Spirit
2-------------- 2-------------- +10% Intellect
2-------------- 3-------------- +10% To all resistances
3-------------- 1-------------- +10% Stamina
3-------------- 2-------------- +10% Strength
3-------------- 3-------------- +10% Agility
4-------------- 1-------------- +10% Intellect
4-------------- 2-------------- +10% Spirit
4-------------- 3-------------- +10% Armor

Hodir Changes

They fixed the Etheral Worgs in the Hodir Daily Spy Hunter. It used to be that if you got on your flying mount, the wolf would get your flying speed as run speed. They'd run all over the damn place. Was great! Nerfed.

Hot and Cold now requires six Frozen Ice Scraps instead of five. Annoying.

They took out the regular dungeon dailies so you couldn't get the little 500 bump. All this is moot as the reputation gains have been increased. Hodir's Tribute now offers +650, up from 250! That should make the prices on Relics of Ulduar drop and the grind to Exalted a cinch.

One thing I saw nothing about was that the exalted inscriptions are Bind on Account! WONDERFUL! The honored ones remain BoP.

The New Five Mans

Decided to run the Deathknight through them first.

Forge of Souls

Really short and sweet. The first boss isn't bad... just move away when channeled on then stay in center for phase 2, running back to center when feared.

The second boss is a pain for dps, melee especially. He's always pooping out purple circles. And you have to stop DPS when he has the red tether out, but you don't always see it. Then there's the arc thing to run out of. Wiped the first time, but got him the second. Having a Portal pop up right there to PoS was nice.


Pit of Saron

Longer instance and a lot of running... even a gauntlet that recycles the Hodir rune circles! The first boss was pretty fun. Lost the healer because he, like most healers, doesn't like to move. The second boss wiped us... you can LoS that debuff off. The last boss people wouldn't move when the drake targeted someone, but we grunted through. Pretty fun seeing all those slaves die at the end.


Halls of Reflection

Holy shit, the first encounter was a pain. The -75% DPS/Heal debuff is total ass. Ended up LoSing behind the boss to draw the ranged spirits in. The second boss was also evil with the aoes and half-health debuff. The ret pally with us died five times.... kinda kewl since I got to use my Raise Ally. Running out with Jaina was pretty awesome.


Summary
The whole series was pretty fun. Enjoyed getting in there and not having a clue what to expect. Reacting and learning quickly instead of know what's too come. Listening to the NPCs as the story progressed. And interacting with Jaina. Too bad that's over already.

Didn't get the DK any upgrades until the very last. Won The Lady's Promise over the constaDead ret paladin. Then I got a nice patch surprise... constant DC. Before I could even equip the ring, I was insta DC'd. Log in, hear the join group sound, insta DC. Total cycle so I have to put a ticket in.

Seems there are some BoP drops from trash. At least in the Pit of Saronan an Unsharpened Ice Razor dropped for our lucky rogue off of a skeleton.