I have bad timing.

Story of my life, really, so it's not a big shock that it should apply to Warcraft, too. Just like everybody else, I'm stuck in this weird purgatory waiting for the expansion to come out. Some people go to other games, some people stop gaming altogether for awhile, and I....am treading water.

Mostly, I'm kicking myself. I spent my entire summer leveling a character to 70 on a PVP realm I had left once before, lured by the promise of superfancy raiding. And I got to do it! And it was so unbelievably awesome (except the trash waves in Hyjal that are too much for my computer to handle. You know, the ones where I turn the camera up to the sky and just hear cool shit happening. Fun.)! I got thrown into it headlong and made cheat sheet and spreadsheets and tried to learn how to heal on the fly. All very exciting and heady stuff.

And then, one day, it all just kind of dried up. Overnight. Like a particularly vicious drought had hit and I hadn't read the forecast. Pretty much from the start of it, I was rather resigned about the whole thing. Truth be told, the End of Raiding As We Know It couldn't have happened at a better time - the semester was starting up and I had a lot of researchy and teachy type shit to pull together.

And as much as I love raiding (and I really, really do) I kind of needed the break to get Sinead's shit together, too. She was an idiot savant, frankly - enchanting only half leveled up and rep so messed up that she could only do a handful of heroic dungeons. Yeah. Not pretty.

So I had to let the dream of getting to Sunwell go. I had plenty on my plate, and while my guild was in a turbulent and unstable state, the interwebs suggested that most guilds were getting hit pretty hard. No real point in trying to find a new guild (which as Dani pointed out (woot! return to blogging!) take some time and effort) when I'd probably only be able to raid for a month or so before having to level to 80.

I've been biding my time trying to fix Sinead so she's able to shatter voids and get into whatever heroics people are running and leveling alts. The Fix Sinead's Shit campaign has been chugging along with some success - only the Lower City key remains to be gotten, I think, and she's 4 points away from max enchanting. The Level Alts campaign has actually been full of twists and turns. So, stay tuned for that.

But yeah. Kicking myself and asking two questions: why didn't I level to 70 sooner? Or just wait till after the expansion?

The Guild

Two posts so close together?  Well, I know it's such a shock, but I had something to say that I just thought of.

A treatise on the Guild.

Now this may be a little funny, it may not be funny at all, but in all honesty, I think it is necessary.  

What is the guild?  I have to admit that I wasn't really sure about this until recently.  I thought it was just a place where people organized raiding and 10 mans, where people got together to help level alts and just have somewhere to bullshit while they were messing around on WoW.  

I was really wrong.

I found myself a bit bored at night.  I had finally gotten down the mechanics of raiding and now my guild wasn't raiding anymore.  That mixed with a few other things, like the fact I never apped at my guild, but was invited in because I knew people there, made me think it was time to have my first guild hunting experience.  I went to ranking websites, and researched what guilds were doing what raids.  I looked around to see who was as geared as I was, and who was much more geared.  I looked to see what enchants people had and which I needed.  I started farming mats for things, and farming rep so I could get my best shoulder and helm enchants.  I read applications that were accepted and those that were denied before I even thought of applying for a guild.

What did I learn?

1) Applying for a guild is like applying for a job.  Sure, the research I needed to do took me a couple of hours on the internet, and a job hunt takes months and months, but the basics are the same.  I really had to know my stuff to make sure I was going to get in.

2) Getting into a guild is an exciting and new experience.  People want to know who you are, they are all suspicious of your skill and pleasantly surprised when you suck less than they expect.  Most want to help because you could be a new friend, also they like that you are showing up to raids while the person you are most likely replacing isn't around.  And if you're a girl, you're almost always a pleasent surprise on ventrillo, the talking program.

What else did I learn?

Leaving my guild was more like leaving a family than it was getting a new job.  Not only did i miss the people I left, I missed the sense of belonging I had.  Raiding was fun, but these were other people, not my people.  I didn't have anyone to share my excitement with, or my disappointment.  There was no one to complain to if I had to, and no one to commiserate if I lost a roll or died early in a fight.  The new fights were fun, but it was like leaving for college times a million.

I guess what I really learned was that my guild was like my family.  I really loved the people there, and their banter, and how well we all knew each other.  It wasn't just that they helped me to make me be an asset to the raid, but they helped me because they liked me.  And I found that I didn't just like them, I relied on their being there.

Not having guild chat was a sad shock.  not having vent was also less fun.  Even without raiding, being in my old guild was more rewarding and enjoyable than this new exciting guild full of wonderful people that just weren't my people.

And while I may have hurt feelings, and will always be a little suspect to the people in my guild, I came back.  It was as much like the prodigal son as I could think anything.  There were people there that held my hand and led me to the place I was out, and honestly, I would still be squeeling at boars if not for them.

I think I miss it more than I wanted to leave.  The more people that leave to raid, the more I miss the togetherness of it.  And I think that's what distinguishes WoW from any other game.  You're in it with someone else.  A lot of someone else's.  You have to look out for them the way they look out for you.  And sometimes you're good at that, and sometimes you're not.

Of course there is bickering, there is always bickering, but people seem to come together at the end.  And I will always belong to that group of people, even if they scatter to the wind.  Change is a hard thing to grasp, and some of you may be saying that by going back to what was comfortable, what I loved, I fought a change that could have helped me throughout the expansion and forever.  But when I really think about why I play the game, it isn't to be the best at it.  I never will be.  It's to be with people I like and work together and have fun.

I hope I am still doing that.  I think I am.

So thank you, Predatory Instinct, for being there, and taking me back.  And thank you(you know who you are), people who carried me through 70 levels and a whole lot more.  I'm sorry that this is more serious than the rest of our posts, and I promise to go back to my usual silly self.

Tomorrow.

Go go endgame!

It may not be a slapfight, but I do have a video for you:



Yep, last Thursday, with just over 15 days played, Sinead hit 70! My very first truly high-level character! As you may be able to tell from the gushing and the fact that I nor only recorded the ding itself but also waited until I had witnesses, this was a thrilling moment for me. I definitely felt like I'd earned a cookie.

I have to admit, though, that I'm playing at 70 so far has been a bit of a mixed bag. I've read some random stuff on the interwebs about how warcraft is essentially two games in one, leveling and endgame, and that the two bear little resemblance to each other. To this end, it does feel a bit like I'm starting back at square one. I am still learning the basic little details, like where to pick up daily quests, and it feels just like the very first time I played and couldn't figure out how to right click without a mouse on a mac. I also have to admit that I feel a little loss without an XP bar to gauge my progress by, but I assume that I'll get used to that soon enough.

I'm also having a love/hate relationship with the endgame instances. On the one hand, a desire to raid was the driving force behind me leveling up so fast, and I really couldn't be more excited to finally see a lot of the content I've just been idly reading about. On the other hand, I am painfully aware of just how green a healer I am. A couple of Karazhan runs at 68 and 69 and a Zul'Aman run just after I hit 70 have left me with some really awesome gear, so I look good on paper (as it were), but I'm learning how to heal as a holy priest. All of the fights are also totally new to me, meaning I tend to make a ton of really embarrassingly noobish mistakes. I'm sure I'll get better in time, and thankfully everyone's very patient, but I really hate sucking at things and wish that they didn't have to be so patient. Nothing like a steep learning curve to keep you humble, I guess.

I haven't really been posting. For many reasons. One: I finished graduate school. Two: All my free time went to actually playing wow. Yes. Yes. It did in fact, eat my soul. Now, I'm sure you're asking how I went from freaking out while trying to kill boars to complete disappearance...

Well, let me tell you...

The game draws you in kind of like a good fisherman. If it pulled too hard too fast, you'd notice you were being reeled, and you'd flail like crazy until you got free. Too slow, and you'd be bored and swim away, trailing the line until it got free or didn't matter anymore. WoW? Oh, it starts slow.. a few hours here and there killing a boar or two, but then the "I wants" start.

The "I want"s come before the "I need"s. They are the stage of the game where you start to realize that there is more to life than your white or maybe if you're lucky green gear. The "I want"s are when you begin to realize that a little more time and practice means that you may actually... and get this... be good at this game sometime. Once you make that realization, you're hooked.

For me it started at about level 30. I was ambling along, and then it dawned on me: if I went a little faster, pushed a little harder, I'd get a mount! A mount is a little animal your toon rides on that makes you faster. And, well, once you're faster the endless running around the stupid map? WAY less tedious.

The mount became a shining star in my horizon. A beacon of a dream. "If only I had a mount" was the sentence I began to utter over and over again. And then it became my first solid painful goal. That's when the I needs started.

The I needs are when you're done. Toast. It's when you begin to plan time for WoW into your day. It's when your goals become part of your to do list. Let me illustrate. My day would look like this...

To Do:
1) Class
2) Homework
3) Eat
4) Get to the next WoW level so I am closer to my mount

And this was how it went. If I didn't make a level that day? I felt horrible. I'd stay up as long as I could, I'd fall asleep while playing, I'd push and run instance after instance. I needed a mount. I had to have a mount. Once I got a mount getting to 70 would be easy. And that's all I wanted, right? I just wanted to get to 70. Then things would calm down. I could play less once I got to 70. Just needed a mount.

But, my friends, let me warn you. The "I need"s never actually go away. They just layer and layer. Once I got the mount, it became an epic mount, and then 70 itself. Once you get to 70? The "I need"s reach their pinicle!

And this is where I am now.

You see, the "I want"s come back, of course. But now you need to want. If I want Mojo, the cute frog pet that hits on you when you kiss him, I *need* epic gear. And if I *need* epic gear, I *have* to run heroics. It goes around and around and around. I want, I need, I must, I have. And it keeps up until the game is no longer just a game.

You have work before you can have fun. The game becomes life.

So that, my dear readers, is where I've been. But don't worry, I have plenty to say now. Oh, plenty to say. And if you pay attention, I may just say it to you.

Also? Coming soon are some guest bloggers. Melissakins from her infamous knitting blog will be blogging here as well. Be excited. Be very very excited.