I did end up creating some quick tables in my journal—one for killers, and one for survivors. I listed out four columns: Licensed, Non-licensed, Crown Get, and Name. The first two columns might seem redundant, but it makes sense to my brain to see a “yes” shorthand symbol I use in one column versus another. And in the end, it truly did make figuring out what I had and what I needed much easier. Heck yes, crowns!

I did it. I ground stuff out and did things and stuff! And things. I’ve been kind of disenamored with WoW, as of late. Partially because depression makes it difficult to do anything but sit in front of Netflix, as of late, but also because I haven’t been enjoying alt raiding. Thus, I couldn’t really motivate myself in any sense to log in for a while. Which put me at a detriment when I tried grinding out a few things the two days prior to patch-day.

The Gold Queen put out a reminder about how Pet Tokens were changing, and that we should use them up before they were essentially dust. I didn’t actually know that was happening (I have a habit of not reading up on anything until changes happen because it’s all in so much flux and I don’t have the spoons to handle consistent changes in my games on top of managing life). So I rushed over to Dalaran, and talked to the fine ladies in the Menagerie. I picked up my mirror toy, and just bought a bunch of stones and bags to use up all of my tokens. So I guess I’ll get to do a bit of grinding out on pets when Squirt comes around, and use some stones, as well.

I also finally made it over to the Mage Tower on my main. I honestly don’t care much about alts, but I wanted the skin for my main spec (Prot), at the very least. It took me a few tries, though, despite trying it ages ago when it first released (to much failure). First try, haha. Well. It went extremely poorly. I forgot about only taking approximately 5-7 stacks (I had 10) and firmly faceplanted, even with an orb. The second try, I breezed through the first half and easily got to Kruul… where I got knocked off the platform (though I am unsure if it was by him or an add). The third time I had him down to 4%! But, look! An add! And no Intercept! Wheeeeee! Off the side I go again! The fourth time I was very confused. I got him down to 1%, and then thought I died. I was so absolutely angry. I was cursing and going on about not wanting to do it again (even though I knew I would), and then realized I’d rez’d in Dal. Wait. What? Why am I in Dal? Wait… did it say I got him in the quest? IT SAID I GOT HIM IN THE QUEST! So I trotted myself over to sexy Dadgar and handed it in and got my new (fairly ugly) mage tower skin. I called it quits on skins, after that. I rarely play DPS on Chestnaught because Blizzard has ruined trying to level alt-specs for me. And they also ruined playing alts for me (a thing I adored back in Wrath and Cataclysm before my five year hiatus), so I didn’t bother hopping on my Shaman or Hunter to grind those out.

Then I finally decided to get the last few First Aid achievements I needed. And can we just say that Field Medic was a pain in the butt… but bless all those parties that were going. And, honestly? Those parties made me feel a lot better about the WoW environment! I’ve spent a lot of time avoiding pugs of all sort this expansion because of some pretty poor experiences at the start (and then consistently getting kicking my under max level characters in every single Timewalk I tried…), but the Field Medic parties were pretty good. They were either completely silent outside of a “brb handing in”, or they were super chatty, wishing each other luck, joking about wishing drops could be traded, just generally chatting, etc. It was a nice backdrop while I watched Interview With a Vampire for the first time.

Meander a Bit

I’d been trying to work on grinding out some reps that were going away in the pre-patch, but I just haven’t had the time, for the reasons listed above. But, I still have a few things I’d like to finish before the end of the patch:

• Level Chest-Dwarf to 60 (then boost to 110) for Double Agent achievement
• Level Macadamia to 110 (towards Quintessential Quintet achievement—which puts me at 3/5 if I recall?)
• Obtain flying in Draenor (so that I can level more alts for Quintessential Quintet)
  • Finish Nagrandeur achievement
  • Explore Shadowmoon Valley achievement
  • Explore Nagrand acheivement
  • Securing Draenor achievement
  • Revered with The Sabersatlkers
  • Revered with Order of the Awakened
  • Revered with Vol’in’s Headhunters
• Level Arraign (Femcow Death Knight) to 110
• Level ?? (probably Kaelari, the Femcow Paladin?) to 110

Yeah, there’s a theme there. I’d like all my Tauren ladies to be up and at max for the release of the expansion. So, we’ll see how far I get in a month…ish. So, those are my goals going forwards! What are you guys working on to finish out before BfA?

Image from Ru

IRON CIRCLE DEFEATED HEROIC ARGUS!

Congrats to all that were there on the first kill (March 29, 2018)! I’m hoping we can get the mount for some more guildies. A few folks have poked officers about it, and I think they’re concocting something along the same lines as the Moose? I hope so, anyway.

We’ve only downed him once, so far. But I’m sure we’ll get him on farm soon, so long as we can skip Coven. We’ve also only downed them once, and they are murder for us, apparently. I think I might be the only one in guild who enjoys the Coven fight.

Image from Moo

We skipped raiding on Monday, and we struggled a bit last night just due to lack of numbers, but we’re pushing back through for another full clear.

Maybe one of these days I’ll get my final piece for my four piece of tier… (That’s at least something I am looking forward to in Battle for Azeroth—no tier.)

I mentioned working on this achievement in my monthly gaming goals post, and I finished it sooner than I expected, to be honest. All I had left was the Viscidus Globule, Giant Bone Spider, and Stitched Pup, and I’d finally obtain Mr. Bigglesworth (putting me one step closer to Crazy Cat Lady).. but the RNGods have never really been in my favor.

Before I did anything, I decided to see how much they were on the Auction House, because I really didn’t want to trek all over on tons of different toons. However, after breaking down and getting the Viscidus Globule on the AH for 14k, I decided it was probably worth my time to just go farm the dang things. I know a lot of people won’t think that 14k is a lot, and it isn’t that much, but when you only have 300k gold to your name, one is kind of stingy. And at least it cut out having to trek over to AQ40 until I wanted to just get the achievement, or was working on transmog farming (which is low priority—pets first!).

I hit up Naxxramas on Chestnaught to see what I could get, and ended up with the pet from Loatheb (which I already have two of thanks to generous guildies), as well as the one off of Maexxna. Gluth was not kind to me, sadly. Nor were tier drops, for that matter. So since Naxx is so easy to get to, I’ll have to make farming both normal and heroic Dreadnaught Battlegear one of my first transmog goals. Anyway, the spider is gross. I’m super afraid of even Daddy Long Legs (yes, I know they aren’t spiders), so I put this guy out, took a picture, and put him right back. Blech. But at least I have him, now! And I’ll level him eventually when Squirt is back on the 30th (NA realms).

So, since Gluth didn’t put out for Chest, I hopped on my hunter, Hazelnutt, and decided to just hit up the Construct Quarter. She didn’t get lucky either. So off to the shaman, Shaelee! Only hit up the Construct Quarter up to Gluth as well, but she surprisingly ended up getting lucky. He’s cute in a kind of disgusting way. It was a bit annoying to try to run even old content as a healer, so I guess I’ll have to finally bite the bullet and get my enhancement weapon on her.

And so, I have finally obtained the adorable Mr. Bigglesworth! I also ended up with pretty much every 10 Man achievement on Chest on my run through. Which, honestly, is my top pet peeve in WoW. If achievements are truly supposed to be account bound, why on earth do I not get credit on the toon if I’ve already completed it on another! I shouldn’t be spamming guild chat with achievements I got back when it was current content when I was playing my Druid. That defeats the whole purpose, Blizzard. Fucking fix it. I don’t mind if I can’t get credit cross-characters for most achievements. That’s fine. Whatever. But I want the credit for the ones I’ve done, instead of a “Not completed on XTOON.” when I mouse over something.

#IntPiPoMo Count: 20/50

I like the new schedule I set for myself. However, last week I only got in one post, when I meant to at least get in two. This post was slated to be posted over the weekend, and then I just never got to it because I was editing the podcast (which I plan to finish as soon as this is posted!), adulting, and spending what little time I had left relaxing over in WildStar. My goal this week is to try to make my three days for at least once. We shall see, though.

Moooooose!

I’ve been trying to find a #FriendshipMoose run for weeks with no luck. Oh, I’ve sat in Twitch and such and chatted and raffled and attempted to get in, but lady luck was never on my side.

Last week, though, T and Hearn decided to put some Moose runs together for Iron Circle folks who didn’t have it yet, and the guild carried one or two folks per run. I feel so blessed to be a part of such an amazing guild that does things for each other like this. I mean, I would’ve understood if I couldn’t’ve gotten a Moose, despite how much I wanted one.

But that all those folks went out of their way to do that for guildies just makes me feel really good to be back in WoW and over with Iron Circle (and kind of silly for not joining them sooner… five years ago!).

[Disclaimer: I had this stuck in my head when I got the Moose. Hence the title.]

Icebound Frostbrood Vanquisher

Speaking of mounts, Chaide and I were missing two or three achievements for our Icebound Frostbrood Vanquisher, so we knocked those out one weekend, and now we have both mounts! There’s so many mounts for me to go collect, now. Especially since I got so lucky with Mimiron’s Head on my birthday weekend. I just feel motivated again to go collect them and the achievements in the older content that I’m missing. Of course, now it’ll have to wait until after I hit 110.

GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOLD!

But I had some fun in WildStar! One of our guildies is working on attument and is at the Adventures stage, so we decided to hit up Malgrave to help him out.

It was nice to run some stuff with guildies, and it was even nicer to get Gold for the first time while in there! I’ve run Veteran Malgrave Trail quite a bit in my time playing WildStar, and I was glad to finally be able to get gold out of it! I also managed to pick up two new achievements I didn’t have, plus a title. We also got the Speedster run, which I already had, but we got it for the guildie who needed the run.

Birds of Prey

There was also a mini-pet that dropped, and I ended up winning the roll for him! It is the Vulcarrion Scavenger mini-pet, and apparently only drops off of gold runs. It’s a really pretty pet, actually. I’m hoping that the more we run it, we can get it for more guildies that need it, since only one person in the group out of the guildies there had it.

Raiding Fun

Raids seem to be like everyone is hitting burnout for various reasons, though the big one seems to be that we don’t yet have a full and complete group (second seems folks are dying for F2P!). I completely understand that real life happens–I myself am the prime example of real life happening and not raiding. But some folks have just stopped altogether.

But that’s okay, because we’ve some members that just hit 50 and are looking forward to raiding for the first time! We’re not a progression guild, so we’ll get there when we get there. We’re not going to force people to get to 50 and raid if they don’t want to, because it’s not what we’re about. But I am glad that folks have been having fun and are excited to try raiding out! It makes me a happy guild leader to see folks trying new things, and excited for new challenges and endeavors.

And it was great to see some folks who needed upgrades get some really great ones out of raid last night, even if we only got a few bosses/mini-bosses down.

Algoroc Done

I also spent some time putzing about in Algoroc. One of my goals for the month is to finish out either Algoroc or Celestion, and I was much closer to finishing out Algoroc’s achievements than I thought. All I needed was the I Like It Rare achievement. So I killed the last five Primes I needed, and I’ve finished it out!

Well, as much as one can finish it out before F2P. They’ve added in acheivements for Public Events on Live already, but the public events won’t come out until the 29th with F2P. (EDIT: I’m a scrub and didn’t realize that the events are already out there, at least in Celestion, so I’ll be checking out Algoroc again to finish those two out…) But don’t worry, I’ll be going back to do them because I’m a completionist. Now, onto Celestion! Let’s see how much I can finish before the month is over!

Boss Train, Woop Woop!

Saturday I hopped into WildStar for an officer meeting, and then a scheduled Rose Bowl event!

Not only did we do Rose Bowl, however, we started a World Boss Train. It was a lot of fun!

I even got to do R12 for the first time! I’d love to do both again!

We actually downed King Honeygrave!! He’s an extremely buggy boss (no pun intended) and can reset randomly sometimes. So it was awesome to get him down for the group. Unfortunately, I didn’t get credit for him (and I didn’t get credit for the other buggy boss over in Farside, either). So I’m hoping Carbine does some magic fixes on both so I can go back and snag them without glitches!

Saturday while I was out running chores, I also stopped at a Game Stop and picked up two more box copies of WildStar hoping our luck would win out. I got the hoverboard from my box, so I sent it over to Chaide as it was the last thing he needed. And he happened to get the Snarfelynx out of his box which is the last thing I needed. So now I have my fat farting cat! And a title! Hurrah!

Speaking of titles, I also finally redeemed my Anniversary gifts for my title, and toys, and Rowsdower! He’s all candy-fied! He is mine! And I shall call him my Squishy!

Saturday night we also hopped over to FFXIV for a bit. A good friend we gamed with in WildStar (whom we met in EVE and have kind of game-hopped with them until WildStar) has a FC over on Lamia. We had initially played there but left due to some complications with folks who have since moved servers. So I rolled up a new Magnolia Chestnut that’s going to try to main a Bard.

Honestly, I plan to play much more often over on Cactuar, but I do plan on every-so-often spending some time continuing to play with someone Chaide and I would consider family. And who knows, maybe I can get two different raiding environments. (I find it funny I look forward to raids in FFXIV but could care less about raids in all of the other MMOs I play…)

Wars and Podcasts

Sunday was some Star Wars. I did two flashpoints, put on gear that will last me through to level 50 (so long as I consistently change out my mods and such) and tried to fiddle with my spells. It’s a tad overwhelming the number of spells, so I’m looking for any help folks might have for a Marksman Imperial Agent!

I was also the guest over at Strange Tales from Outerspace (Episode 48) on Sunday! It was a lot of fun! If you missed the livecast, the podcast will be up sometime tomorrow, and I’ll be sure to link to it… so long as you don’t mind listening to my sailor’s mouth, haha. I vaguely recall someone in chat calling me “sassy” and I had a great chuckle about that. It kind of comes with the territory of being a Ginger. ;P

I’m also finishing up edits to the next Yardcore, and expect to post that baby sometime today. If you’re playing WildStar over on Entity, I’m looking for more volunteers (Exile or Dominion), so please hit me up and we’ll set a date and time to record!

Last week, I didn’t do any blogging, and was pretty much offline because my mother was in town (expect a long post on last week’s shenanigans sometime today), so I’m playing a bit of catchup with the Safari this week.

So, my first submission for the Safari this week is a screenshot that embodies the Epic Achievement topic. Granted, the screenshot above is just of a world boss kill. And it’s not my greatest screenshot because even when you hide UI, text still pops up on your screen, which I was a little sad about.

But anyway. How does a world boss kill count as an epic achievement, especially when you need fourteen world bosses anways to get Attuned for raiding, and they spawn on a four hour timer (approximately, assuming they’re not events like the Hellrose Bowl)?

Well, it was my first ever kill on that particular boss–Scorchwing. I know, I know, he’s been around since like, Drop 3 (back in early November 2014), and we’re on Drop 5. How the hell have I not done Scorchwing?

I’m one of those people that doesn’t get lucky with meeting spawn timers. Not only that, if timers are up, I’m usually in the middle of something else. That kind of falls in the territory of being a guild leader and having a focus that isn’t particularly progression-minded. There’s also just so damn much to do in WildStar.

Some people berate the game (WildStar) for having a “lack of content” and I would whole-heartedly have to disagree. I still don’t have my “main” professions maxed out (well, the gathering ones are, but they’re the only ones). I still haven’t finished Wilderrun, Blighthaven, or Defile. Then there’s achievements to do, Contracts to complete, PvP to die in, Companions to collect…

Yeah, there’s a lot to do. So, this is an epic achievement for me, because it’s my first time on Scorchwing. It’s an epic achievement for me because I was able to make the time to do it. It’s an epic achievement for me because I had fun, and I was excited to complete it. And after all, isn’t that what makes something an achievement? Not that other people deem it as such, but that you have a personal sense of fulfillment after completing it.

Besides, who can say no to a title and another in-game achievement complete in my log?

Just a quick little check off list to the Elephant’s and my original list, and first update on the list.

What We Checked Off:

• Both weapon achievements: Knuckle Sandwhich and Four Types. They’re now feats of strength.
• All of the critter achievements. There’s now a new one… which I am diligently making a list for. Maybe I’ll even post the list when I’m done with it.
• The book achievement. Though, with the little exploration we’ve done, it looks like most books are generally in the same vicinity as they were before the Shattering.
• Loremaster of both Eastern Kingdoms and Kalimdor. And we’re glad we got it out of the way, too. All of the changes really screwed some guildies out of theirs. One was about 600 quests into each and now has practically none.
• We fought our way through lots of dungeons to get Classic Dungeonmaster. Glad it’s finally done, though, we will still need to go back as a guild and down all the bosses for the Guild Achievements. Yay for fun nights!
• Keymaster was pretty much done thanks to our reps in BC, so we just grabbed the Shattered Halls Key as the last bit. (It seems to have disappeared, though, which saddens me, and my keyring is empty-ish. I wonder what keys I lost!)
• Ambassador of the Horde was a fun one as well. Lots of low-level quests toward Loremaster which just gave us the rep we needed. No cloth quests at all.
• The Argent Dawn and Argent Champion came together. It was awesome. I wore that title for days after I got it.
• We even maxxed out our rep with Zandalar. I’m glad we did. Even if it is a feat of strength, now, it counts toward our reps still.
• Timbermaw was pretty easy to grind out. We took turns smashing and looting, but we still shared rep from kills. It was great. We’re also just one step away from our Diplomat titles now. Come on, Mag’har!

What We Got in the Process:

• Various Exalted Reputation achievements.
• Various mount collection achievements.
• Swift flight form! The quest was so much fun to do with someone else. Instead of trying to solo it… at 70.
• We had gotten various quest complete achievements, but with all the changes, our ~2500/3000 quests keeps waffling between ~1400 and ~2500. Make up your mind, Blizzard!
• The Deadliest Catch. Most. Fun. Ever.
• Various holiday achievements; Brewmaster, Hallowed Be Thy Name, and Pilgrim in particular.
• We also got a For the Horde in one late night. Figured “What the Hell” and got all of them in one shot.
• Downing Sarth with three dragons (which we’ve now made a regular weekly event to get people their drakes).