...they pull me back in.

Seriously. I was sure I had the alt thing under control. I had a plan. I had a set. There was no need for anything else.

Mumphred – to play with Katyana (wife/alliance)
Paronymous - theoretical main
Grexel - skillz to pay the billz.
Xorroshow – learning to tank
Gawdbovver – learing to heal
Santsuen – learning the dungeons so that I don't make too much of a tit of myself as Xorroshow and Gawdbovver
Bampot – to play with Berrius (wife/horde.)

I'd also kinda stopped blogging. Which is exactly like stopping except you occasionally spend a wistful moment wondering how to start up again.

Well it turns out this is how:
Tamarind started a blog community guild. I'm a fairly long time reader and fan but unfortunately I can't get to the EU Servers. Fortunately there is a US/Oceanic chapter started by Ms Medicina.

So last night I popped out a brand new Gnome warrior; Theosaurus.
And it was great fun.

Lots of people already. Lots of dings. Lots of OMFG I can't believe I have no money/bags/spells/idea-where-alliance-stuff-is.

And, of course, now I have a huge list of new blogs to check out. I may never get anything done again.
But, you know, in a good way.

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The thing about alcohol and drug addiction is that it's about escaping from yourself. Maybe you want to be a version of yourself that doesn't think so hard or worry so much. Or maybe you want to be a version of yourself that thinks they're really REALLY funny.
Or, you know, just oblivion.

Fact of the matter is my Real Life™ hasn't been very pleasant for a little while. Basically my worklife has been very busy and very stressful. Which made it seem really weird that I would want to play Warcraft in the limited spare time that I had.

Because there's a real work-like quality to WoW. Go here. Do this. Do that 40 times and come all the way back so that you can head off to do it again to a slightly differently named gnoll.

Yet somehow it's soothing.

I think part of it is just clarity. I've been saying at work (to anyone who'd listen) that any one thing would be fine it's just the whole everything at once effect that makes it suck. In Azeroth everything can wait. You can choose your mission. Do some or all of it. Stop if you want. It's all about freedom of choice.

So I rolled a new alt.
I had been wanting a BloodElf because I haven't played one. I also wanted to start a warrior to be the Tank that balances Gawdbovver the healer. My plan is to pug up all the instances. Especially now we have the new Dungeon Finder thing.

What I didn't know was that Belfs don't Warrior. So what did I do? I could have gone with my second choice class and Rogued it up. But no. I went all the way back to beginning and popped up a brand new Tauren.

Oh and it was so soothing. Back in Mulgore it was like being wrapped in swaddling and loved by the mobs. The association of my earliest WoW experience and the newness of a whole new class was just... therapeutic.

And I finally found a use for the Thunder Bluff Zeppelin. A quick hop to Ogrimmar. Onwards to the Undercity and then through the portal and I'm the tallest noob in Eversong Woods

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I swear I never even looked at that pig. Even so it got me pretty sick about a week ago.
A week before that I got a light touch and took the day off. That was an easy Warcraft day. Sweet. By the weekend I was in bits. couldn't even concentrate enough to level.
I don't know about anybody else but when I get feverish it all feels very cyclical. Like waves coming and going and coming. And going. and coming.
So spell rotation just makes it worse. Pyrolast, scorch, fireball... hurk.
So there I am with four whole days where I have time to play but can't bring myself to do it. Torture.
There was only one possible solution.
Well, two... but staying in bed and admitting defeat wasn't going to be it.
No the only sensible thing to do was to finally upgrade from AuctionLite to Auctioneer. Still cyclical to some extent but a 20 minute scan cycle is much easier to deal with.

So everything changes. It's a whole new ball game. I'm a babe in the woods again, of course, but At least I'm on the playing field.

My best thing at the moment is disenchanting. I scan for things that should disenchant for materials worth at least a gold more than the sale price and scoop them all up. There're heaps. Pretty much all the time. In fact I've upped the minimum profit to 2g just to reduce the traffic.
Weirdly people also sell stuff cheaper than vendor prices. The only justification I can think of is that they just want to empty their bags and they're already doing other auctions. Or they're morons. Whatever.

Now proper AH players measure they're profits in hundreds or even thousands of gold per hour. However as they say IRL the first million is always the hardest. You totally need capital.

My first couple of days I was totally broke. After about a week I had about as much money as I started with. But that's where the whole thing really kicked off because what I did have as profit was an enormous AH list of things for sale. Grexel is now raking it in.

Gawdbovver is my priest on the Alliance side and he isn't doing quite as well. The main reason for that is that he doesn't disenchant... instead he sends stuff to Katyana so that she can shard it. I suppose I could ask her to send cash back but it works out better as a way of keeping her sweet when I want to do auction scans last thing at night.

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Haven't posted in weeks. I am a bad noob.
The post below was hastily scrawled out a while ago now and then left to fester in the drafts folder.
Due to the journal-like aspect of this project I will include it here anyway.
More soon.


Meanwhile Katyana and I have been rocking on up through the content. We've alpha-dogged Shadow Fang Keep which I love for its shape and layout. Gathered many sparklies from whatever the underwater one is. We've baconaised our way through Razorfen Kraul.

Finally we got through the Scarlet Monastery Library as well. We'd gotten pretty sick of it and wandered away. Then the other night we had a only a little bit of time so I thought we could run it through before bedtime. Turned out we could do that and the Armory as well. Glad to put it behind us. We'll probably do the last bit some other time when we haven't got long.

At the other end of the spectrum we're exploring Uldaman. We've covered a few bits but it is quite huge and we keep running out of time. I admit I've googled some of it and I don't believe we'll be able to finish it as a two-some; Katyana remains unwilling to search for groups. I will be patient. The game has successfully taken her to every other step. It can only be matter of time.

Did I mention she's auctioneering now? I downloaded AuctionLite for her and she's making her own money and buying her own mats. We both spent all our money the last time we played on AH fees and speculative trades.

Hopefully when we get back online we'll be rich.

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Another day, another Pick-up Group. That's not exactly the way it was. I finally got the time together and logged into the Looking For Group Channel. I ticked that I could offer healing because, well, I did last time.

Not long later I was invited to a run heading into the Hellfire Ramparts. Ramps. I even had a quest for it. Rock on.

Now in a perfect world I should be playing to my Boomkin spec strengths and observing a proper healer at work. At least for my first time into the instance, right?

But no. Seems like there's never a healer around when you need one. So rather than sit around I offered to do it.

And I went ok. The tank learnt pretty quick not to run in too hastily and we made it to through to the last boss. In fact I got the achievement for the instance but I still needed the bloke riding the dragon for my quest.

Unfortunately, by this time the group was falling apart. My server tends to the Australian so they're a good few hours ahead. Second time the boss wiped us it was just me and the Group Leader.

DK - I can tank it but we need at least a DPS
Me - I can DPS but then we need healz

In the end we reformed a whole team. Enough, in fact, to reset the instance and run it again. This time we had a good high level tank who was clearly very experienced and helpful. Bugger it if he didn't disconnect and then log on long enough to apologize for his computer.

So we ended up four-manning the same last boss. We wiped. I couldn't stay alive. And I couldn't keep the tank alive.

From a personal development point of view, I suppose, it was good: I had actually learnt enough about what I was doing to completely understand that... well... I just didn't have the healz to pull us through.

I could tell the GL (now tanking) was getting frustrated. Everybody kind of wandered away after the second wipe. They didn't say anything direct but I know that blaming the healer is common phenomenon.

And if it happens when it's unjustified, you can bet your last murlock it happens when the healer really is at fault. Oh and I accidentally rolled on a piece of plate and won it. I really was *that* guy.

I will be addressing this two ways: I'm leveling a proper healer. A Dranei priest. As soon as he hits 20 I'll be running every instance I can get my paws on.

And for my Druid, it seems if I want to run instances I need to be ready to heal. I'm not ready to give up my spec. So I'll need another. That's 1000g for dual spec that I need. AH here I come.

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Okay, so I totally noobed it.

I had been fiddling around trying to tidy up some quest chains before I headed off into Outland. Having bought Burning Crusade a fortnight ago that's a little sad but I do now have the Boomerang of Nintendo and I've done some obligatory smiting of the Plaguelands.

I also started a Dranei Priest (called GawdBovver) so I felt like I was getting my money's worth and Katyana and will still only be in Vanilla for a little while yet.

My guild leader was gently needling me to get out there though. So I wrapped up some Plaguery, deleted some quests from Sithilis and hopped in the Portal from the Undercity.

Then I proudly announced in Guild Chat that I had 'made it!'

The attentive will spot my deliberate error. I was in Silvermoon City. Which was awesome and I hadn't been there before and you couldn't use the Portal until you bought BC so this *must* be Outland, right?

/doh!

Alekto (the GM) kindly zipped in and showed me the *other* portal and escorted me through the other-other portal.

Alekto: Can you see the Portal now now?
Me: Is it behind the enormous glowing green thing?

And holy mother of jehosephat, it's AWESOME.
I had, like, half a level to go before I was 60 but by the time I'd done all the meet'n'greet quests I only needed to sideswipe a Bloodletter Orc and I was golden.

All the talk of better gear was true as well. No more prevaricating over whether to wear that hat that's good for spells or the helmet that's good for keeping your head it one piece. Go with the awesome spellcasting helmet of doom. Obviously.

And as advertised, I can fly. I honestly couldn't have imagined what a game changer this is. I finally understand why people complain about leveling. Being mounted is one thing but once you've swooped into a quest and swooped out again there's no going back.

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Now for another installment of Things I Should Have Done Sooner! I finally played a pick-up group. I know, right? It's only, like, the core of the game.

Basically my problem is I've been far too desperate to come across well. Not to ruin the instance for everybody. To not be That Guy.

The main issue being time. The other times I've tried to do this I've ended up standing around a meeting stone for all the time I had available and then having to apologize and leave. Mortifying. That problem is made worse because I had literally no idea how long it would take to do a run. An hour? Four? Several play sessions over multiple days? Who can say.

On the other-hand I'm resistant to the whole 'know the fights' mentality. I mean I get it and I understand the time and place for it but I want to treasure the exploration and the surprise value of the unknown.

So anyway, eventually the number of quest lines leading down below the Swamp of Sorrows just became too much and Katyana and our house guest went off to watch Culture (hoik-pitu). I knew I had the evening to myself and a group presented itself on the LFG channel.

I leapt into action, pausing on the way to buy wildberries so I could cast my group druid buff. The gang came together and we went in.

Now it wasn't a complete success. I got more or less drafted into healing. That's what I think will end up as my natural role and everything but it felt like a lot of responsibility straight out of the gate. There were a couple of Paladins there as well so they chipped in a bit from time to time.

Cards on the table, we didn't finish. We got a bit stuck when the dragon above wouldn't wake up. Nobody seemed to know what was going on and we did a bit of aimless wandering. Then our tank (and clearly the most experienced player) succumbed to either tiredness or tedium (it's pretty damn late for the Aussies when it's 10pm in Hong Kong) and the whole thing kinda fell apart.

We tried jumping through a hole in the floor into water which turned out to be inches deep. We tried a bunch of silly stuff but we knew it was all over.

Maybe it's just me, or maybe it's a product of all the content being new but I still call that a success. Having two-personned a bunch of stuff with Katyana it seems weird to me tha people would rather stand around or abandon completely rather than give it a shot with whoever's available.

Anyway, I had fun. I got my feet wet (in more ways than one) and I feel much more competent to try it again. Win.

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