Benie's Games Blog

Another Tuesday is upon us. And you know what that means in the World of Warcraft? Yep… maintenance!…and we haven’t suffered with the 3.1.0 patch enough already.
On top of that, as I suspected… a patch to fix last Tuesday’s patch. The irony!
And on top of that… guess what happened? Our talent trees HAVE ONCE AGAIN BEEN RESET!!! D: FFFFFFFFFUUUUUUU-
It’s because of issues with the dual talent spec system. Even though this issue wasn’t felt by me, I’m still going to suffer from having to re-re-reset my talent tree.

As I “patiently” wait for the realms to go back up (hopefully it will not be 8pm like last Tuesday. Since it’s a fucking patch it probably will), lets say you wanted to write a nice letter to Blizzard… thanking them for this patch. No, I’m serious.
What would you say? How would you tell them?

Well… this is what I would say;

Title: Disgruntled random customer #452,652
Dear Blizzard,

Is it the fact you’re seeing an increase in players, you all have no desire to want to change your ways? You think that the more players you get, the more testing will be done to fix what you created?
It will never fix waiting hours on end for the realms to come back online.

That’s basically what I would say to them. Attempt to stay calm while discussing the pure hate with them I’ve experienced over the years.
The fact they haven’t changed over the years just makes my blood boil.

I’ve never seen hell like this since that one patch back in 2007, which was supposed to prep WoW for TBC. Not only are most addons broken, the UI has been broken for some people.
People not being able to access the AH. People getting stuck in instances. People can’t send/receive their mail. It’s all out chaos.

Even as I speak, Blizzard has yet to get the few remaining realms back up.
When I finally got back in, it was chaos with people yelling “Anyone know if my realm is back up yet??” and ones like it.
Soon the smoke cleared and the lost ones started getting back into their realms. But only a few still remain.

As for me and my addons, I’ve actually lucked out with this patch. The only addons that cried foul on me, where MapNotes and QuestHelper. Both are updated to the 3.1.0 patch, and working perfectly.

However I am having my share of problems with the “new” UI. One being the coin icons aren’t working for currency, and my pets are being mistaken as Players. What I mean by that, say like my one pet, Norb, shows as;

Norb
Friendly
Benie’s Pet
Level 80 Norb Norb (Player)

What’s strange about this bug, is that it happens when I take a pet out of the stables. But when I dismiss the pet, then call the pet, it fixes it.

Hopefully all of this will begin to calm down later in the week. I sense another round of downtime, for a patch to fix this patch… the irony.

The “long-awaited” 3.1.0 patch has finally been released today! Lets all celebrate with a round of no playing until who knows when the realms will be back up! Yay!! …
Ohh yes. Time to celebrate our favorite fiend, the nerf. And there’s alot of them in this patch. With the Mage-killing nerf; mana regen reduced by 40%. Ohh and not to mention.. every player on every realm has had their talent points reset!
This is what I have feared for bringing my Druid back from the grave. Or at least, away from the clutches of Troy.

Oh. I don’t think I told you guys about my Druid. And if I have, skip this part.
But if I haven’t. Well.. I guess since the realms are down, I got time to. Two or so years ago, when TBC was out, I made my Druid sometime way after getting my Hunter to Level 70. I got a 2nd account going and started working on him. It wasn’t until I got him to Level 60 when I started to help him level to 70.
After I got him to 70, time passed and this fellow named Troy showed up. We became friends. At this time I was struggling with trying to figure out how to come up with 5,000g to get an epic flyer, so I could try to somehow get Netherwing rep to get a Nether Drake. Troy in a way made this possible, with the magical powers of a Private Server.
It was there where I saw how awesome a Nether Drake was. And I guess as ‘return’ of his good deeds, he would ask me to let him play my Druid.
After alot of deliberation, and promises that he won’t try to hack and shit, I allowed. Time went on, and I quit WoW. Several months after that, Troy shows up again, asking me when I’m going to come back to WoW, telling me that WotLK is fast approaching. I told him I was done with WoW. And this was around the time I was obsessed with dragons, and playing Gmod and Wurm. He asked if he could change the name of my Druid. I allowed it.
Forward a few weeks later, and I decided to do one of the most stupidest things I’ve done in my life. I removed him from my Yahoo friends list. Because I didn’t want him to keep trying to get me into WoW. And I wish I didn’t. Because I wanted to apologize.
Some time after that, I canceled my primary account. Didn’t cancel my secondary because of Troy, thinking “well it should cancel due to inactivity”. A few weeks later, it wasn’t. So I had to cancel the secondary.

Fast forward two years in the future to February 2009. I decide to finally have the guts to come back to WoW. And… the rest has already been said. What Troy has done to my Druid makes me saddened and depressed. Because of all the work he put into him in such a short time, and all the places he’s been in without me.
It makes me wonder if it was wise to bring him out. Because he changed him. But I did my best to shape him back into the way I had him the best I could, and he’s now Level 76. Not bad for less than a week. I think it was last Tuesday when I decided to start leveling on him after figuring out which gear is Feral.

And now, this patch has undone his talent tree. This is what I feared about leveling him up. That as soon as I got his talents set, they would be reset, again. Though it took a week for this to happen. It did. The 2nd thing was hearing this patch to be “Druid-killing”. Hearing the Feral Combat talent tree got hit the hardest with nerfs.
I guess when the realms come back up(hopefully today) and I get my talents set… again, will I know the damage this patch did.

I am the proud, but tired owner of an Onyx Netherwing Drake!! 😀
And what a long and hard road it was. It was back in March the 15th when I had the money to start getting rep. It took me 3 weeks and a day to get from Neutral, to Exalted. That’s pretty impressive.
I would’ve had it alot sooner too, if I worked every day.

And it’s about fucking time too. If I see another Dragonmaw Peon, I’m going to go insane! I swear to it. And on top of that, it’s going to be a LONG time until I touch another Daily quest in my life.

But I knew this day would come. I just wish it came sooner. Like two years ago. Because this very drake is one of the reasons I quit WoW. Because I thought I would never get it. Boy, was I wrong.
I also thought I would need a raiding guild just to have a chance. Again… WRONG! 😀

I have proven that the following two statements are false, and then some. Probably being a Level 80 helped tremendously. There’s quests that would probably be difficult to solo if I was still a Level 70. So I just secured victory for myself by getting to 80.

All that was left to do was find a way to come up with the 5,000g to start getting Netherwing rep, which is one of the reasons I quit. 2 years later… I paid a gold farmer to give me 4,000g, which gave me more than enough.
Once I finally had my epic flyer, a Swift Red Gryphon, it took me a day to realize how to start getting Netherwing rep.

Then it started. Doing just around 4 quests per day. I thought “there’s NO WAY I’m going to get to exalted at this rate!!”, but I told myself “You’re closer than you ever have been”. Took a few days to wrap up the quests I left from Zul’Drak, then went back to Netherwing.

Time went by, and I was Honored with Netherwing in notime. I began to get alittle more aggressive with more daily quests I could do, which in turn began to show the hate of daily quests.
Soon, I was Revered. The home stretch. I really got aggressive after that. I found I only had a week to go and I would have it!
Time went on, and I found myself… 1 bar left from exalted(which was yesterday). I began to become obsessed with finding Netherwing Eggs. Since I completed my dailies for the day, but you can still turn in eggs for 250 rep each.
I waited for 4am last night, then raced back to Shadowmoon. 4am is when dailies reset. Angeredly, they did not reset like they where supposed to. I wanted to get to exalted that night, but it didn’t happen. So I had to go to bed.
The next day, still in Shadowmoon, I lessened the quests I had to do. Didn’t need to do much to get to exalted. I finished with the Booterang quest, and finally… the moment finally came after all of these years.

“You are now exalted with Netherwing.” 😀
After the Dragonmaw found out I was a spy, I was saved by a dragon. Who shockingly was the goblin that was helping me out. The goblin merc is a Nether Dragon in disguise. He flew me on a one way trip to Shatt, and landed infront of the area of where the drakes where.
I finally got to speak with the ‘drake seller’, Barthamus, who said that I helped to defeat the Dragonmaw, and said the least he could do for all the hell I went though was to choose a Nether Drake and it will be binded to me.
Once I accepted, all of the Nether Drakes behind me got a “!” over their heads. I ran up to Onyxien, who I believe was the very drake I was on when I was playing as a Blood Elf Hunter on a private server with Troy being one of the GM’s, and the drake I used to build my Dragon Plane in Gmod.
It told me that I could only choose one drake, and once I have chosen, I cannot go back. So my thought of being able to own them ALL was defeated. lol
After some thinking, I finally chose Onyxien. And finally I had the [Reins of the Onyx Netherwing Drake] in my hands.
Once I added him to my mount collection(8 right now) I hearthed to Dalaran to get more ammo, and begin typing this blog entry.
But at least I know that what I heard about getting a free drake from all of this, is true.

EDIT: On 4/21/09, I found out from someone as I was leveling my Druid in Scolazar Basin that you CAN buy all the Nether Drakes, from the Orc at Netherwing Ledge. The place where you go to begin getting rep with Netherwing.

My life has changed alittle bit since I got a fake guild going again, and this includes a free Draenei Shaman.
But why did I create yet another Shaman? This is like my…. 3rd or 4th Shaman, and not one of them had hit at least Level 60. lol

I have debated if I should be a Rogue. But that thought continued to be killed everytime I thought of how vital his skills need to be for survival.
What I really wanted was my Druid back. My old Level 70, Benthedruid. Sadly, the fact I allowed Troy to get his hands all over him and allowed him in a way to take over my 2nd account and allowing him to rename said Druid… he’s no longer mine.
I could just create another Night Elf Druid. But I do not wish to go through the hell I did to get him to what he was…, again.

The reason I’m doing alt making, is to lower the stress on myself by ‘retiring’ my Hunter, but not completely. What I’m currently doing on my Hunter is something I have wanted since he hit Level 70 — my very own Nether Drake.
I’m now currently Honored with Netherwing! 😀 Two more faction increases, and I’ll finally have it after all of these years.

I also did something… really stupid. While on my Shaman, I was in The Exodar, searching for the trainer when I saw someone looking for an off-tank for BT. I thought “BT? Come on!! I can solo that thing!” and asked if they wanted my main.
So I hopped on Benie and got in… a raid group. I thought “Wait… why do we need a raid for B… wait a minute… BT?! .. BLACK TEMPLE!!! I THOUGHT THEY MEANT ST! SHIT!!”. Still, I went there after getting ported. What’s so dumb is I was right there in Shadowmoon Valley.
If I knew it was BT not ST(ST being Sunken Temple), I could’ve just flew to the temple from the Dragonmaw base at Netherwing Ledge.

Remembering the day on that private server when I asked Troy if we could run BT, and he tore up the place with that GM Pwn-o-matic ray of his. This run wasn’t as easy. But it was fun to actually be in BT… the first time ever on my main. Which is also the first time I have raided since when I quit nearly 2 years ago.

As we where attacking the first boss, my computer decides to say “LOL, FUCK UP!!!” and does a hard lock. This has always been my worst fear with this. Be in a raid, killing a boss… and BAM! Lock up.
When I came back, it’s like I wasn’t even needed. Even when I apologized for my ‘disappearing act’, they where all “Ok lets get to the next boss. Come on people!”
We get to the 2nd boss. Well, computer didn’t fuck up, but we did. 3 times. 2/3rds of the raid(including myself) didn’t know how to stay away from the things that boss does that can kill them VERY quickly. On the 4th try, we finally pwned him, and entered the temple. But the cheering was short-lived, as long with the raid.
What I can remember and see happening, everyone’s attacking this group on the right. I help out, then someone walks over and does a Leroy Jenkins on the group on the left, wiping everyone.

We get back… and then probably one of the funniest things I’ve seen in this game happens. One of the Mages near the group of people starts to make a Summoning Table. I help out and we all get Conquired Drinks and Food… during this, someone else did another Leroy Jenkins on the group we where trying to kill before, catching us all offguard…
OHH THE HUMANITY!! lmao… bodies everywhere.

After that, people start leaving the raid one by one… hahaha. I see this as a “GTFO of this hellhole!” ticket and attempt to leave before I get auto-ported to Dalaran, and make it out.
And here I am, back on my Shaman while typing all of this.

Have you ever had one of those times, where it seems the entire world is against you? Sure you have. We all have once in our lives.
But what about when it feels like no one understands you, and they say you bitch too much? … I thought so.

Well. I got plenty to bitch about. And when I bitch, I usually have a good reason. First, an unfixable lock up issue that I have tried everything that doesn’t cost money, and a few things that do.
And I seem to be the only one that’s having this issue, which is sickening. Or no one wants to confess.

2nd thing. Well. This is what I went through before. It’s called “end game depression”. The feeling of not knowing what to do now since you got to the highest level possible. I did this as Level 60, 70, and now 80.
Lets see… there’s raiding. Instances. Rep grinding… and then what? OHH YEAH! PvP! Everyone loves PvP! .. except me.
Then what after that? Endless, repetitive grinding. Boring.

But lets just say this. Say you have the best gear for your character. You’re #1 in your guild. The enemy faction hates you because you’re too good. You’re always called to fight in every battleground in the game. You have an Albino Drake, and every companion in the game. And you’re also exalted with every faction.
In other words. You got everything good going for you… then what? Wait. There is nothing else. You’re bored senseless!

Well. That’s how I feel. Except I don’t have everything going for me. Once… just once I wish someone would come up to me and say “Hey. Are you alright?”, instead of getting laughed at, and when I turn to my ‘friends’ for help, they say I complain too much and ignore me.

I got no one to turn to. I’m pretty much on my own to deal with my problems. So, I thought of joining a friendly, but active guild and post on the WoW Forum.
But seeing as my post is falling down the pages… my hope of joining the guild I want is disappearing. So, I’m doing my last resort. Attempting to make a ‘fake’ guild called “Doesnt Join Guilds”.
I only got the guild crest right now, waiting on 9 signatures. But as I write this, I’m wondering if I’m making a right decision.
I mean, it won’t ‘fix’ my depression. But maybe it’ll allow me to think better. What I mean is I’ll be able to concentrate on getting rep up. And I won’t have to deal with the constant guild invites.

And there’s also a 3rd thing I forgot to mention. The fact I’m 80, I should be respecing to Survival instead of Beast Mastery for the maximum DPS.
But me with my “no! I don’t want my pet to die! I love him too much he’s like a best friend to me!” feelings, is preventing me from making the right decision. I have tried going Survival, and Norb died while I was trying to solo LBRS. And I felt heartbroken and confused.
It’s hard for me to get “it’s just a game” into my head. I guess that’s why no guild will want me, and everyone will always laugh at me. Because I’m so pathetic that I shouldn’t even be playing this game.

And then there’s the thing of joining a dungeon group. You’re trying your best to kill the enemy and your other party members are telling you to “hit harder”, then they find out you’re still in pre-EP gear and raise hell, then kick you out. And all you wanted to do was get a fucking quest done that couldn’t be solo’d!!

And don’t get me started on Goldshire, when I just want to rest. Yet that’s not the idea with other people, then they attempt to duel you and you know you’re just going to get your ass handed to you, so all you want to do is sit down on a fence and say nothing to avoid being noticed.

Well. That’s all I have to say. I wanted to get this all off my chest. But it doesn’t make me feel any better because there will be no one that will take my hand, say “everything will be ok. I will help you get on the right path. We’ll take this step by step”, and help me, and accept the way I am.
But no. That doesn’t exist in the real world.

Remember when I said I would never stop playing Wurm after I got back in WoW? Well… yes I lied. But for good reason. You see, I got this issue I believe(well, think) seems to be isolated down to faulty RAM.
It’s that flickering issue. And the square box. WoW in a way has a more serious version of this. When it happens, it locks up my system to the point I have to manually shut it off.

Anyway, I got back into Steam today after a 3 day “offline spree”, thinking that by not running my Startup programs(including Steam) would be easier on my system. It didn’t do a bit of good.
I asked Matty if he knew how to use a Memory Scanner, he said no and told me that raiding has hit JK-H. And they’re marching to Bennie Bay.
How did this start? Well, I don’t know much from what Matty has told me, but it seems that yesterday, this announcement came that raiding has hit JK-H, and everyone started scrambling for safety.
I’d probably be going “WTF?! … No…. NO!!!” if I was still into Wurm.

Well. I guess it’s time to play the Blame Game. And of course the winner is Rolf. But why would he do such a thing — go back on his promise that JK-H will be a PvP-free land?
Well. I wish I knew. But what I do know is, I officially QUIT! If Rolf wants to do stupid shit like this… ruin everyone’s work by HoTS raiding us. Fuck it. I’m done.
Even if I get this issue fixed, I’m not going back.
Here’s the thread about it on the Wurm Forum. And guess who created it? Yup… MD.
http://wurmonline.com/forum/index.php?topic=16269.0

And as for angry. Well, I don’t know what happened, but I believe he has been punished for, well he says a “few months”, but I don’t think it’ll be that long. So, Bennie Bay is pretty much defenseless.
And I can just see what my HS’.. err, sorry. HS looks like. Yep. Dragon Forest disbanded last week. I asked angry to keep my HS’ up, but he forgot. And now he’s punished for god knows how long. Dragon Haven will be the next to be disbanded.

But, why should I care? BLers are having the time of their lives here in JK-H, griefing and shit. There’s also reports of… ugh. I cannot believe what I’m reading here. Spy alts running loose in JK-H?!

But anyway, I got WoW now. So fuck Wurm. It’s a boring game anyway!

The last time I wrote in here, I was a mere Level 78… not anymore! I am finally a Level 80! 😀 Go me!! Actually I dinged to 80 last week. Last Tuesday. The 17th.

Anyway, since the 20th, I’ve been soloing Level 60 instances. So far I have completed BRD(Blackrock Depths), Strat(Stratholme), and Dire Maul West/East, and North.
And now I’m moving onto “bigger game”, such as UBRS(Upper Blackrock Spire), HFR(Hellfire Ramparts), Scholo(Scholomance), MC(Molten Core)….. Ony(Onyxia’s Lair).. who knows. The possibilities are endless of what I could solo that I never had a chance of completing as a 60-70.

Tomorrow I’m planning to do HFR. Then maybe start working in LBRS to get attuned for UBRS(and maybe take a swing at the [Leeeeeeeeeeeeeroy!] achievement to get the Jenkins title…lol).

What is I was to tell you, that you can get a Nether Drake, without being Exalted with Netherwing?
Would you call me crazy? Say I’m cheating? Well sorry, but it’s true. And this is how you do it.

First thing, you must do two things.
1. Complete the main quest to get the Netherwing faction in your Reputations tab.
2. Pay the 5,000g for Artisan Training.

Once both are done, go to Shadowmoon Valley, and talk to the guy who’s feeding the Nether Drakes in the Netherwing Fields. Once you get the quest from him to begin sabotaging the Dragonmaw Orcs and told to go to the Netherwing Ledge. As soon as you get there, your mount turns into a Nether Drake(a buff called “Dragonmaw Nether Drake”), and you get turned into a Dragonmaw Orc.
So you say to yourself “This probably can only be used here”, well. Yes and No.

A picture with me, proving you can do this.

If you leave any Dragonmaw zone (Dragonmaw Fortress/Netherwing Ledge), you will lose your Orc disguise…but you will not lose your Nether Drake!
Not only that, but you can fly with it anywhere you want in Outland, which is the unfortunate thing. Because it only works in Outland.
Also, if you get dismounted in anyway, you’ll lose your drake and have to go back to Shadowmoon Valley to get it back.

You might say “Does Blizzard know about this? It has to be a bug!”. Actually it is, and they do know about it. But, they don’t see it as an issue that needs to be fixed. It’s not an exploit. It doesn’t give you an advantage.

But at least you can get Netherwing rep to buy a Nether Drake, while on one.
And who knows what the future will hold? Maybe someone will make a mod where you can use a clientside model of a Nether Drake, to “replace” the model of a swift gryphon. It happened before when it came to replacing any mount’s model with the Goblin’s rocket car that looks like something out of Star Wars Episode One.

Two great things happened today. Since I was taking some R&R, I decided to head back to Northrend and start uncovering zones to get my hands on the “the Explorer” title.
One thing’s for certain. There’s only two no-fly zones in all of Northrend. Inside of Dalaran, and Wintergrasp.

Anyway, my uncovering began in Dragonblight. Uncovering another Dragonshrine, belonging to Azeroth’s enemies from Burning Steppes, The Black Dragonflight. Apparently now they have no leader and all they do to “kill anyone that threatens to stop them” is at Burning Steppes.
There’s a quest giver. A dragon in human form(ohh those clever shape-shifters) as a Blood Elf.
Anyway, you do a few quests for him to help the Black Dragonflight to show they show no mercy again. And find out this bad dude is actually resurrecting dead dragons and turning them into minions of the scourge.

Anyway, I went far North into the bitter cold zone known as Icecrown, which is the “end game” zone, where we finally get to go against the Lich King. And man… it’s 10x more awesome than Shadowmoon Valley was in BC.
The land isn’t frozen… everything’s just dead. There’s very few FP’s there. And the main bases are hovering overhead as zeppelins.
The Alliance’s Zeppelin looks more earth friendly, using wind power. It has 3 levels, with a 4th level being a bomb bay, with a large nuke in it. Wow.
Then it was on to Sholazar Basin again. Got it done. Soon I only had two more zones I had to discover and uncover. Storm Peaks and Zul’Drak.
I spent alot of time in Storm Peaks. It was freakin’ cold there. So cold that this one Alliance town, the dwarves’ faces where blue as ice. Once done I went to Zul’Drak. Now it was much easier because the zone is more narrow.
I found the aqueduct that pretty much separates the zone in half, quite awesome. Too bad I couldn’t go for a ride with the current.
Finally, all of Northrend is uncovered, but I’m not done yet. I still had to go to Bloodmyst Isle in the Eastern Kingdoms and get to The Bloodcursed Reef.

Finally, I had my title ‘Benie the Explorer’. And to “celebrate” this, I bought myself 4,500g from a site I’ve never been to but I trusted it with my money. Was it a foolish mistake? At first I thought so. Since I never got a confirm from them that they got the money.
But about 15 minutes after I had made the purchase, I got a PM from a guy, telling me to invite him about my order and meet him in SW’s bank.
Finally I had my money, giving me over 6,000g, more than enough to get epic flying mount training, aka Artisan Training.

Instead of going back to Northrend and to Dalaran, I went to Outland and to Shadowmoon Valley. Went to where I bought my flying mount. Grinned when I saw I could finally afford the training and gladly handed over the money. Got my mount, and YEE HA!
Finally… after YEARS of suffering of how I would come up with the money… I had it! 😀 It’s not a Nether Drake… but it’s the next best thing.

So that’s basically what’s been going on. … Ohh. BTW. I’m now a Wrymrest Champion. I found out you got to wear this tabard to get the Wrymrest Champion buff. Basically, if you do any Level 80 instance with it on, you will gain faction with The Wrymrest Accord.
If you get to Exalted status… you get to be a dragon rider, with your very own Red Drake!