HM:A New Beginning, Dating!

So recently Allen "confessed" his feelings to me.  Actually he just suggested I become his girlfriend because it was getting tiresome having to deny to everyone that we were dating all the time. Apparently my frequent visits offering herb soup got a lot of people talking. *chuckle* But now that we are dating he has become very possessive (not that I mind). He's an excessively confident cutie pie and I'm very happy with this choice of dating partner in the game! :) [what... a... dork...] lol

HM:A New Beginning - Foliage Festival

Autumn Year 2 and a few tasks completed have lead to the Foliage Festival! If I had any doubts before whether Iroha and I were BFFs, that has now been alleviated. LOL This Harvest Moon is seriously one of the most involved and interesting versions I've ever played.  So how did this festival confirm our friendship status? In this festival, the marriage candidate of your gender that you have the highest friendship rating with is the one whom approaches you to suggest gathering fall leaves together.  To be honest, I wasn't sure if it would be Iroha or Yuri since I often give Yuri her favorite gift (Herb Soup) whenever I see her. But Iroha has been receiving gifts (primarily scrap metal) from me for much longer.

Harvest Moon: A New Beginning - My "birthday"

So, I'm in year two of this Harvest Moon for the 3DS and as my real life birthday is April 11th I claim Spring 11 as my birthday.  I don't know how many other Harvest Moon games do this, but in this game I can actually receive presents from the villages on my birthday! Some of the memorable gifts I received include pineapple and rice seeds from Dunhill and Clement. My BFF Iroha gave me a Stay Awake potion and a Spring Bouquet from last winter's Starry Night date, Allen (I put that one in the vase in my farmhouse). LOL! This game is so cute and thoughtful. I forgot to visit the harvest sprites or they would have had gifts for me as well, I'm sure. Even if you don't have a good relationship with some of the villagers, they will still wish you a happy birthday! It's so freaking cute and adorable! I love this game. =D

Welcome to Banished!

Good evening, all.

This is the first, and probably worst (maybe) blog post I will ever compose.

With that aside, welcome to my Banished review/story.

The beginning of Skellott.

This game is very similar to that of SimCity, in that you must build a thriving community and survive the elements.  Unlike SimCity, you cannot hit a population of 0 and come back from it and there are not any competing towns to pull citizens from or to lose them to.  Your population can only breed within certain age limits and you must provide families their own houses.  Food is the most crippling factor, in my opinion, in that you must make sure to stock enough to survive with.

You will see above my start of a new town.  These people were "Banished" from their previous home... and that's the story.  They are currently homeless, have everything they own in a cart... and, I must help them to develop into a thriving community.

Overall, I won't be mentioning game settings and such as that, but as FYI, this game is set to Hard difficulty (they will likely die from this).

And so begins the history of Skellott!

-Acturon

Illegal Danish

If any of you remember the old Illegal Danish wow machinimas (and even if you don't), I'm am very pleased to announce that there is talk of making the next sequel : Illegal Danish 3!

Myndflame has long been a favorite of mine thanks to great songs like Learn 2 Play and MC Raiders. A lot of their awesome songs can be found on itunes, including another favorite of mine, Club Thrall!

Now to add to their list of great music is their latest (and potentially offensive to some) Kitties and Titties - licka licka lick my asss, bitch! =D Their music is the best. :) Check out this Theory of a Death Knight video to hear a clip from the song and learn more about how you can help bring about Illegal Danish 3!! :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=juE-VmVlJSM&feature=share

Cataclysm Head & Shoulder Enchants

Hey everyone! Another Cataclysm Guide thanks to Totalhalibut/Totalbiscuit/The Cynical Brit. To watch the complete video click on the link below:

http://www.youtube.com/user/totalhalibut?blend=1&ob=4#p/u/21/j7y-VTlJqgA

This is a quick writeup to help you to know right away where you want to focus your questing so that you have the reputation you need when you hit level 85 to get your head and shoulder enchantments. Yes, you can only apply these at level 85.

Same - Just like Wrath of the Lich King, you will be able to pick up a tabard once you are friendly to further your reputation gain while running heroics.

Different - Unlike Wrath of the Lich King, the "Lesser" Shoulder enchantments are not equivalent to the previous expansion's "Greater" enchantments. Not only are the secondary stats a bit different due to the new features of Cataclysm, but the actual stat bonus is a bit larger as well.

I'll begin with the head enchantments. The cost appears to start at 150g, but of course by the time you're revered that cost goes down to an amount equal to 120g, I think - possibly 135g at revered and 120g at exalted.

Mount Hyjal (Kalimdor) 78-82

Quartermaster is found in Nordrassil

Revered with the Guardians of Hyjal

Arcanum of Hyjal: 60 Intellect & 35 Critical Strike Rating

Vashj'ir (Eastern Kingdoms) 78-82

Quartermaster is found in the following path:

Shimmering Expanse -> Shimmering Grotto -> Silver Tide Trench -> Silver Tide Hollow

Revered with The Earthen Ring

Arcanum of the Earthen Ring: 90 Stamina & 35 Dodge Rating

Uldum (Kalimdor) 83-84

Quartermaster is found in Ramkahen

Revered with Ramkahen (Cat people)

Arcanum of Ramkahem: 60 Agility & 35 Haste Rating

Twilight Highlands (Eastern Kingdoms) 84-85

Quartermaster is found at the Bloodgulch

Arcanum of the Dragonmaw: 60 Strength & 35 Mastery Strike Rating

Next up, Shoulder Enchantments. All of these can be found at Deepholm in the Maelstrom. The Quartermaster is located at Therazane's Throne. From what I could tell, they are all 60g. Deepholm is a level 82-83 zone according to wow wiki.

The following are the shoulder enchantments for honored reputation:

Lesser Inscription of Charged Lodestone: 30 Intellect & 20 Haste Rating

Lesser Inscription of Jagged Stone: 30 Strength & 20 Critical Strike Rating

Lesser Inscription of Shattered Crystal: 30 Agility & 20 Mastery Rating

Lesser Inscription of Unbreakable Quartz: 45 Stamina & 20 Dodge Rating

The following are the shoulder enchantments for exalted reputation:

Greater Inscription of Charged Lodestone: 50 Intellect & 25 Haste Rating

Greater Inscription of Jagged Stone: 50 Strength & 25 Critical Strike Rating

Greater Inscription of Shattered Crystal: 50 Agility & 25 Mastery Rating

Greater Inscription of Unbreakable Quartz: 75 Stamina & 25 Dodge Rating

And yes, this faction does include a tabard at friendly for heroic reputation runs.

Now, I'm not sure why the Arcanum of Dragonmaw says "mastery strike rating" while the shattered crystal ones say "mastery rating." I don't know if that is something specific with that type of melee dps or just a inconsistency or error of some sort. Also, this information is from the Beta, so it is subject to change. But I wanted to share this to give everyone an idea of where to start/focus questing. And of course, each quartermaster also has gear you can get as you level up so check that out as well. Totalhalibut goes through each item at every quartermaster in the video I linked above.

4.0.1 Fire Mage Guide

I was typing an email to Acturon today in an effort to help him with some mana efficiency troubles on his mage and he recommended I write a mage guide. I'm not interested in doing an entire website for it, but I thought this might help anyone reading this that is a fire mage or considering it.

The information that I used as research comes first from Totalhalibut's YouTube mage guide:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LjhdJedV4-Q

and secondly from simply reading the talents myself. I took Total's recommendations and scaled them down for lower leveled mages and then I will build it back up for level 80 and finish up with the full Cataclysm rotation that he finishes the video with.

Before we begin, I want to list the talents that you will not be taking. Please keep in mind that this entire blog is directed towards PvE gameplay and not PvP. Here's the list:

• Blazing Speed - b/c this isn't pvp and your talents can be better spent elsewhere
• Improved Scorch - b/c you won't be casting it much anyway
• Molten Shields - again, more pvp related
• Firestarter - this one you may want to take when you start doing Cataclysm instances that require you to be on the move a lot more, but you can wait to decide on that later on.

Level 25

To begin with, at soon as you hit level 25, go to the AH and get yourself the Glyph of Fireball. This glyph adds 5% crit to your fireball spell. This is massively valuable to you because at this point you should already have two talents that are directly affected by your spell crits. The first one gives you back mana and the other one turns your spells into free dots. So more mana and more damage.

Level 29

By level 29 you will begin to use what I consider the most valuable talent in the fire tree: Hot Streak. At this time your talent tree should look something like this:

http://cata.wowhead.com/talent#oZdf0bz

You can see the two talents that benefit from spell crit. Master of Elements returns 30% of your base mana every time you crit. And Ignite take your spell crits and make 40% of your damage become additional damage over time. Spell Crit is your friend, indeed. ^_^

Feel free to put your 2 points of Impact into Fire Power instead, but I figure at these levels your tanks are probably pulling multiple targets and you'll want the extra aoe dmg potential, but that's your call. The important point here is that if you limit yourself to only 5 points in the first tier and 5 points in the 2nd tier, then you can put that 1 point you get at level 29 into Hot Streak.

Also, Total recommends putting your 3 points all into Burning Soul instead of 1 point and 2 in Improved Fire Blast like I recommended. Later I recommend the same thing, so if you don't want to spend the gold on respecing later, then go ahead and do it Total's way from the start. However, bear in mind that you will then no longer have the 8% Fire Blast crit that I reference below. Overall you may consider that a non-issue.

What's so special about Hot Streak? Every time you crit with fireball, you have a chance of procing Pyroblast, making it instant cast and mana free. There are other spells that trigger it also, such as Fire Blast. If you follow the recommendation link above, you'll have an 8% chance to crit with that. So 8% with Fire Blast and 5% with Fireball = increased chances of a free and instant Pyroblast. So here is the rotation I recommend at this stage of the game:

1. spam Fireball
2. Fire Blast whenever it's up
3. on hot streak only: Pyroblast

Level 39

As early as level 39 you will be able to put your first point into Improved Hot Streak, which essentially increases your chances of procing Pyroblast, which is fabulous. So now, when you get two non-periodic crits in a row, you have a 50% (and at level 41 it becomes 100%) chance to proc Pyroblast. BTW non-periodic means that your crits from dots don't count for inducing a proc. The following is the talent setup that I recommend (obviously at 41 you use that talent point to complete your Improved Hot Streak):

http://cata.wowhead.com/talent#oZdfhbk0z

Notice that I took a point in Blast Wave. This is great for aoe damage on trash pulls and you should definitely add it to your rotation. So your spell priorities should look pretty much the same, but for the one additional spell:

1. spam Fireball
2. Fire Blast whenever it's up
3. on hot streak only: Pyroblast immediately upon procing
4. if more than one mob: Blast Wave

Even if there are no other mobs around to spread your dots, Fire Blast is still good to cast because it adds to proc potential for Pyroblast. I believe at the later levels hot streak will proc more frequently and you will not need Fire Blast anymore, but we'll get to that later.

Level 59

At level 59, Scorch finally has a valuable purpose to in your rotation thanks to a talent called Critical Mass. Here is the recommended talent tree:

http://cata.wowhead.com/talent#oZdfhrk0RMcz

You will eventually want to take Dragon's Breath because it's required to get Living Bomb, but there is no use in investing those points now. Total said the spell is a waste of your time. The new talents that we've picked up include Combustion, which turns all those nice crit-induced buffs back into direct damage and creates a new dot that lasts 10seconds. Total recommends that you wait on using Combustion until you have a high crit on Pyroblast or Fireball. This is because the dot from Ignite is based on 40% of your crit damage. So, the more you crit for, the more damage your Ignite dot will have. The more your Ignite dot has, the more your Combustion dot will do in turn.

In addition to Combustion you'll have Molten Fury which increases the amount of damage you do when your target is near death. More damage is always nice. :) You will also pickup Improved Flamestrike. This talent is really awesome for aoe/trash pull damage. Not only does it turn your Flamestrike into an instant cast spell, it will be automatically cast every time that your Blast Wave hits more than one target! Awesome, right? :)

In order to access all these lower tree goodies, I also grabbed Cauterize from the third tier. Hopefully you will never need this, but it's nice to have the instant and free reincarnation just in case.

Okay so all of this so you can get to Critical Mass. Here's what's so awesome about that talent. It does make your Living Bomb and Flame Orb do more damage, but at this stage of the game you don't have that yet so that doesn't matter right now. What matters is the 5% extra crit it produces from the target that has your Critical Mass debuff. Remember, we love crit because it not only means more mana and more dots, but it also means more hot streaks! You will be getting this extra crit initially by casting scorch. At level 59 you only have a 33% chance of procing the debuff on your target, so you might have to cast it more than once until you reach level 63 and then it becomes 100% chance upon casting scorch. Until then, you will continuously cast scorch until it procs OR if you're lucky enough that your scorches induce a hot streak, then throw in a Pyroblast because Pyroblast also has a chance to induce the Critical Mass debuff. But again, at level 63, your first scorch will be all that it takes. Once you have that debuff, continue with your rotation.

Okay so without further ado, here is your new rotation:

1. Scorch (until you get Critical Mass, which will take only 1 casting at level 63 when you make it 100%)
2. spam Fireball
3. Fire Blast whenever it's up
4. on hot streak only: Pyroblast immediately upon procing
5. Combustion: save for when you have a nice, high crit from Pyroblast or Fireball
6. if more than one mob: Blast Wave (flamestrike will go down automatically)

At this time, if you feel you are getting enough crits with Fireball to induce Hot Streak and no longer want Fire Blast in your rotation aside from spreading your dots, you may wish to swap your talents to Total's recommendation in that top tree - giving yourself full points in Burning Soul and no points in Improved Fire Blast. That is of course assuming that you didn't already make it that way from the start.

Level 69

Moving on, level 69 is the earliest point that you can get Living Bomb.

http://cata.wowhead.com/talent#oZdfhrk0RMsso

Living Bomb is a dot that lasts 12 seconds. When those seconds are over, it explodes and does aoe damage to nearby enemies. To get to it, you'll need to pick up the Dragon's Breath as we discussed at the top and 1 point in Pyromaniac. Once you have Living Bomb, your rotation grows into this:

1. Scorch (only once now b/c you have it at 100%)
2. Living Bomb
3. spam Fireball
4. on hot streak only: Pyroblast immediately upon procing
5. Combustion: save for when you have a nice, high crit from Pyroblast or Fireball
6. if more than one mob: Blast Wave(flamestrike will go down automatically)/Fire Blast

Your final rotation change will come at level 81, when you finally get Flame Orb. At this stage, Total's video of rotation recommendation comes into full effect:

1. Scorch (only once now b/c you have it at 100%)
2. Living Bomb
3. Flame Orb
4. spam Fireball
5. on hot streak only: Pyroblast immediately upon procing
6. Combustion: save for when you have a nice, high crit from Pyroblast or Fireball
7. if more than one mob: Blast Wave(flamestrike will go down automatically)/Fire Blast

Level 71 and beyond

The following is a list of the remaining talents I recommend beyond level 69.

Put your last point into Pyromaniac.

3 Points - Arcane Concentration (Clearcasting!)

3 Points - Piercing Ice (Spell Crit!)

2-3 Points - Netherwind Presence (Spell Haste!)

Depending on your preference and experience when Cataclysm comes out, that final variable point for spell haste can be used to pickup Firestart and allow you to cast Scorch while moving.

This concludes my Fire Mage Guide. Please bear in mind that I am in no way an expert on mages. Not only is a mage not my main class, my highest level mage is still running Burning Crusade content. This is simply my logical recommendations based on the research I have done from watching Totalhalibut's video and reading the talent trees. I may be completely wrong about a lot of things, but it's a great place to start if you are new to the game or simply just want to try something different to see if it will work better for you.

If you have any questions, particularly an explanation of some of the geek terms that have been abbreviated or simply left undefined, feel free to put it in a comment. Hope some of you found this useful! If this proves successful, I may post another one for Frost Mages.