The December 2011 Experience

It has been horrible.

Owait, this refers to my personal life. It also refers to the "technicalities" of said life. I am so happy that I have found the girl of my dreams, possible "the one". But that's just about it. Struggles in work, financial and all that jazz really makes it tough to keep up with the times, especially also with an expensive game such as WoW.

Game-wise, I am surprisingly pleased with LFR. It is a game-changer so to speak. While it makes missing your normal raids tolerable, if you are competitive and have that burning desire to achieve, it is nowhere near as close to the real thing, the real thing being the normal raid groups that you usually conduct prior to LFR.

I am also pleased with the theorycrafting that has been going on. Everything may seem "trivial" by referring to Elitist Jerks or whatnot, but with the current weapons and set bonuses, there are just those little tweaks that will spell normal high dps, to exceptional. And you do not need math for this, just simple commonsense. Why do I say this? It is simple. EJ always refers to the "perfect scenario". Always, always apply your own personal conditions, tendencies, margins of error and you will figure out another suitable scenario for your DK. I am currently wearing all Tier 13 gear, not by choice of course, but I have to live with it while we all hunt for our BiS.

Will be posting more soon, on addons, or what-have-you. :)

I do hope you enjoyed your Christmas! Cheers!

I'm Back

Greetings fellow readers, passers-by and what-have-you!

I am back after a long hiatus due to some heavy studying, work and the recent Bar examinations. It has been hell, but this is also quite an interesting experience for me. The priority would be to get back into the groove with this game I love, and to juggle my real life obligations as well.

It is not so good for me financially, but I am getting by. This of course has an impact with raid schedules and whatnot. Most of the people do not understand the preparation and focus that we, as gamers try to execute when it comes to games. To me, it is good practice, as everything we do in this game applies to real life. The real challenge has always been to strike a balance between fantasy and reality.

Whichever you do, whatever that may be, take it as a learning experience. And if you do absorb whatever experiences you do have with a video game or whatnot, they are somewhat applicable in real life. Naturally, if you expect them to be completely compatible, yes, you are then a nub. :)

So more things to come! Patch 4.3 is only a week old and a lot of guilds are 8/8. So based from the new features, it would seem that heroics is truly where its at. Happy hunting people!

DREAM Paragon Ragnaros 25-man Heroic Mode Kill

Finally! They did post it after Method got the second world kill of Ragnaros 25-m HM.

Enjoy! I shall be watching this and learn a thing or two from it. You should as well.

The 10 and 25 man Debate: Depends ON YOU.

You can see the entire article by Paragon here.

It is quite obvious that in Cataclysm, the 10/25 man format have been relatively similar, in terms of gear and lockout. This forces the raider to choose to simply stick with one raiding format, which I think is beneficial to avoid redundancy and for raiders to fall into that time sink that would be running both raids.

Both raid formats have its pros and cons. Personally though, I would prefer a 10-man setup, being a hardcore-minded raider, but one that does not have enough time to actually set up 24 people, wait for some, organize those loot issues, etcetc. Bad.

However, it is also in my opinion, that in order to fully maximize the epic feel of raiding and teamwork, 25-man is the way to go. If you have a capable raid leader, and several others that can manage these little things for you, then you are in luck (also if they raid with your preferred times as well).

With 4.2 content, Paragon had discussed their opinions on more on the technical aspects of 10 and 25 man raiding:

"Further thoughts

It's immediately obvious that there's a much greater degree of clarity and control in the 10-mans. Thinking logically, this should help quite a lot with the learning curve and avoiding mistakes, but that's not really something we could say our little skirmish 'proved' in practice. We already knew what the encounters were about and what the flame to avoid looked like -- relearning to accommodate differences is very different than learning from scratch.

A theme of more significance that you can clearly see in the three harder bosses for this tier is that the dps requirement is much too lenient in 10-man. This means that you don't really have to cut the amount of healers, which ensures relaxed gameplay for the healers while about half of their 25-man brethren are taking beta blockers just to be able to see clearly. The other half is naturally on the bench, sitting out for the extra dps. Perhaps this is a backlash from what we've been hearing about T11, but it really doesn't work as it is.

Proper tuning has repercussions though, since class balance has a huge impact when you're forced into two-heal and solo heal situations. And that's not even a stretch -- don't be surprised if you see a druid solo healing Ragnaros 10 hc before this tier is over. Might or might not happen, but at least it seemed plausible enough. Try doing that with a shaman.

This leads us to the fact that the gap between an optimal setup and the wrong setup seems to be quite a bit larger in 10-man than in 25s. If the encounters are really hard, you'll need a proper setup. Guilds shooting for a world first should always be expected to come up with one, but those below, the ones without alt raids, will be left hanging. If the encounters are tuned for the 'average' setup, guilds who can afford the optimal one will steamroll through them.

If we were really playing 10-man, we *would* have a close to optimal setup. Even right now, scaled down from 25 to 10, we would have about 14 players and 30-ish fully raid-capable characters. The difficulty and tuning we're concerned about is for that scenario, not for the level where you're simply enjoying the game with the hand you've been dealt."

It is apparent that they found it "easy" when they did 10 mans. However, this is not the case for most, as the content is fairly challenging, and if you do not have the same latency as they have, you probably will suffer more as well with RNGs. If anything, I would like to participate in their raids to know how they communicate, how things are dealt with, and how the leadership is. No, no, this does not mean I'm great. I am just curious as I would love to improve the quality of raiding in my guild as well. Having that communication is essential.

I will agree with the difficulty being "easier" in 10 mans. Our 25 man raids were crap. Not because on individual skill, it was because of lack of communication. It was frustrating. Everyone should actually be talking, but what can we do. What Paragon said on that article rings true. I did say on our forums that going back to 10s can simply be summed up as going back to basics and improving communication.

On other news, I should read more as well, which I have been doing these past few weeks. I have been expanding my knowledge on social networks, and other stuff to dabble on to see if I can profit or generate any buzz on it. I want to make an impact now on the things I do albeit small. You will never know when you will be able to lift someone's spirit up, or an accidental visit to this blog will be what that person actually needs.

A Better Address to my Site IMO

Yes. It is now cheesefreeze.blogspot.com

I have always been wanting to have a funny site address, even a funny guild name, rather than go serious. It has so much OOMPH factor for me, when you have a semi-sarcastic name or whatnot and get it done. Serious guild names/sites are those for the really serious or old school people. It shows age and wisdom.

Nowadays, being current will take you places as well. It does not necessarily mean that you are a joke or that you suck. To me, the primary intention is to bring a smile to the reader's face, or make that reader sigh, or do a facepalm. You name it, you got it, as long as it elicits a reaction and burn through the reader's memory. We all want to be remembered, and having an impact from the get go is awesome.

Of course credibility should follow you as well. You must be able to give your readers some input, great humor or insight. Whichever the case may be. As author of this site, it is my goal to share with you the conflicts real life is posing on the gaming side of things, or vice-versa. There are so many sites about theorycrafting and all that, and the numbers can make one very frustrated. I am telling you right now, you need only to focus on certain aspects of your class, your toon and your focus on the game in order to win. This also goes for the nine or twenty four other people with your group.

I will be posting some more experiences here as well, as my outlet to the world. Things are still shaky in guild, and I wish I could do something to really make things settle down. I do not know if this will require a fresh start or not. In my opinion I did realize that you do not need a "fresh start". It is all mental.

I will be posting soon on my PvP experience just now. And man oh man, was I in for a treat. I am no PvP nut, and having a very experienced guildie in 2s really was an eye-opener and such a fun experience that it refreshed my PvP vibe. Raiding has been pretty frustrating, to my standards. I know we have so many skilled people, yet we have not found that right mix just yet. We will get there eventually.

Aside from that, there are also numerous things up for discussion. Like how to pay for certain accounts when my country does not support the debit cards around this place. Of course, this is in lieu of a credit card. I do not have a credit card because it is simply my decision not to have one, and this seems like more of an impediment than a liberating experience.

Any experiences you would like to share as well? Post a comment, let me know! We are in this together! I may not have the time to do "hardcore" raiding, but I truly believe that it is a thing of the past. I sincerely believe TWO DAYS worth of hard raiding is what one needs to win. Of course this does not apply to hardcore top-ranked guilds. They are getting sponsors and tons of freebies for it. Are we getting the same thing? NOPE. These discussions should be up soon, and I would love to read your thoughts on it as well.

The site's theme had also been changed. Just because my main is a Death Knight it does not mean it has to be dark.

The Hot Kill, Blizzard's Plan of Action

Congratulations to DREAM Paragon for downing Heroic Ragnaros, making them the first in the world. So far, they have been the only team that was able to manage this. I suppose grumpy old Rag is not cooling off anytime soon. This of course makes them the hottest team in WoW.

Alright, with all the heat nowadays, it is very difficult to keep cool. A lot had happened in the past few days. In my real life as well as in-game. It is indeed a frustrating feeling, attempting to mix and match both, and make them function harmoniously.

Okay, enough of that. Now into more yummy news. It was provided in MMO-Champion of the Blizzard Product Slate, and it does look promising. This had been leaked previously as well by the said site, and it does not seem as different from the first a couple of months back (I think before Cata was released), so it seems like it is credible. At least they say it is. Diablo III on the last quarter of this year? That is nuts! Some Christmas presents for kiddies... and kiddies at heart.

Based from the same Slate, it seems that WoW has a life until 2014. This is good... for them? It is never good for our pockets until they make it free. At least they still provide high quality content and keep us busy for the next month or two. Thus, it provides as a security blanket for your WoW assets and aspirations, and perhaps the resurgence of gamers that left, depending on what the next patch or expansion will provide us with.

I cannot wait for Diablo III. I have been an avid follower of the series, and this will surely take some time away from WoW. Not that I am really complaining. I have never looked for any other game as I do not have the time or the patience to relearn everything, with the exception of... well, Diablo.

In other news, there have been hotfixes and such for FL bosses and/or mechanics, which will surely make things balanced or easier. Happy hunting hot peeps.

It's hot.

Clarity in Equity

I just wanted the title to rhyme to be honest.

As per the most recent post, after grinding my brain for hours on end, I finally figured out the priority of my tasks. It did not change much to be honest. It simply focused on this: ME.

I have been, and will always be a team player. However I cannot be a team player at the moment. I do not have enough time or energy to do so. I have to focus on myself first. Focusing on others screwed me up last year as well. It is not bad to focus on yourself for quite some time when needed.

So do not be scared to focus on what you need to do or improve on at the moment because trust me, it will benefit others in the long run as well. Bottom line: everything starts from within. Cheesy I know, but it always rings true.

Apologies for the disorganized vibe of this post. I just wanted to share some thoughts for now, but lack the energy to do so.