The STORM Crow!

Today is the day I found out that in order to achieve epic flying, you have to pay 5000 gold. Considering it costs me several hundred gold just to repair my gear, I am not very hopeful for getting that any time soon. I got my first real taste of having the ability to fly by touring Outland and leveling my mining. Though it sucked getting it up, it’s now at 350, which means I can mine in Northrend! Cobalt ftw!

I’m dissapointed at my inability to push decent dps as a feral druid. I ran Nexus today, my first exposure to a Northrend instance–and I went in as DPS. I was the lowest level toon, but still the lowest damage dealer (though only by about 20K, beaten out by an elemental shaman).  The DPS was decent, definitely, and I did a good job helping the tank maintain aggro, but compared to the damage dealt by the balance druid who was also in the raid (he topped the damage charts by a longshot) I paled in comparison. I’ve never really played a caster, and I don’t particularly have a desire too–but I’m seeing that it is much easier to push high DPS as a balance druid as opposed to feral.

Feral does have its ups, however. Before the first boss, our tank had to leave, and so I was promoted to MT. I was voted much better than the previous tank (though, he was a DK, so I don’t know how impressive that is) at holding aggro, but didn’t come even close to the damage he had been doing (obviously), however, we did amazingly, managing to get all the way to the final boss before dying, and then only once before defeating her. The funny thing is, the group consisted of 3 druids including myself, one of each spec. It was ridiculous,  druid tanking, druid healing, druid topping the damage charts, each doing their job perfectly. I’d say that the only place the druids lost today was trying to melee dps. Oh well, it was a valiant effort.  I still like cat form and will probably stick with feral through my Northrend leveling experience. I’m fine with being a tank.

Coldarra has now been defeated, and I move on to finish the borean tundra. 70-71 is a long trip in comparison to 69-70. Oh, dear…. I’m in for quite a ride.

Hello, World!

This is the first of hopefully many posts expounding on the adventures of the captivating World we all love. My role in that world is currently a Tauren Druid named Keojin.

The druid has always been my favorite class. I enjoy the dynamic nature of their abilities, and the fact that they can turn into animals. How AWESOME is that, seriously? But in actuallity, the power to choose between caster, melee, and healer is quite a world at your fingertips.

I played a Night Elf druid before the expansions hit, and I was feral–which was at the time considered nerf, and for good reason–there was no gear for the class, and as much as I tried to be an efficient feral druid, it just didn’t make sense for them to do anything but heal. The burning crusade unlocked the druid’s full potentional. Feral gear–not ROGUE gear, FERAL gear… new abilities… flight form… wow, how awesome! Playing a feral druid from 1-60 didn’t feel much different, but playing 60-70, the change is vast. Lots of damage, realistic damage. Easy survivability, good buffs (leader of the pack was always good, moonkin aura and tree of life aura are also quite nifty) A druid is just a good class to have around.

I was never able to PVP with my druid before, but now, the fact that I can kill death knights at and above my level proves this is no longer an issue. My strategy right now for pvp is to gear more stamina then agility. I find that surviving peoples initial burst damage is more important than being able to do the damage quicker than they can. The new cat form ability “maim” is a finishing move that stuns for 7 seconds. Yes, 7 seconds at 5 combo points. That is beyond ridiculous, and if I can survive the attackers inital burst long enough to build up those combo points (which 9K hp makes very easy) that seven seconds is all I need to either win, or gain the upper hand.

I’m still experimenting, however, and have a long way to go. The trip from 69-80 is going to be a long one, but worth it. Im excited about the prospects of becoming a skilled druid player, and looking foward to the challenge.