Gankbang.com. Interesting.

After adding the wife and I's Horde 70's to the Gankbang.com database, I find Droonda on the first page of the Shaman's when I sort on +Attack Power. She's Enhancement, so "Yeah, baby, yeah!" #24 (88%) out of 209 total. Not bad for a non-raider. Blackhoof, logged out in his fighting gear, is at #57 (72%).

Msaker is #194 (58%) out of 466 with regards to Armor. That's kind of disappointing. At least I'm #174 (62%) for Health, but that's also no record.

Now I found I needed to add my characters so that they appeared. If you're checking out Gankbang and don't find yourself, and you're level 70, don't forget that you might need to add yourself to the database.

Other things I found interesting at Gankbang: Their numbers would indicate Shamans are the least popular class. Followed by Paladins and then Druids. Warriors, Mages, and, if you can believe it, Priests round out the top 3. (Where are all those Priests when you need them???)

Least popular classes for the Horde are Paladin, Druid, then Shaman. Least popular for the Alliance are Shamans, Warlocks, and Druids.

Warriors are the most popular for both, followed by Mages for both.

Hunters edge out Priests for 3rd spot for the Alliance. Whereas for Horde, Hunters are bypassed by Rogues, Warlocks, and Priests. They only beat out Shamans. Interesting.

Of course their sample size is only ("Only!" "ONLY!?" Dag!) 850,000, so quite a small sampling of the overall WoW population. (That's just the 70's, and only the 70's the programmer's noticed. I had to manually enter my own two and that of my wife's. Being #24 she should have been there anyway, don't you think?)

Solo. Instance. Solo. Instance. Enhancement, or Resto? Resto. Or Enhancement? Resto. Chef.

Blackhoof got off his Tauren cowhide seat and flew out to Skettis to do his daily quest. What? The Dwarf had nothing to say to him. Doh. He needed to kill some Ogres first. Twenty of them in fact.

Back to Shattrath and a trip above Aldor Rise to where the Ogres are. Being a Resto specced Shaman, and having been in an Outlands instance, oh, four times, he was kind of the wrong spec for this lifestyle. Shield in one three fingered hand, and a Nexus Claw in the other, he took on Ogres one at a time. (Which is possible since they aren't linked.) Every battle saw him at about 1/3-1/4 health when it was over. Don the healing gear (600 or so +Healing), recover, then reequip the fighing gear (950 or so +Attack Power), and move to the next Ogre.

Then I thought: "Well, hell. This sucks." I went ahead and did the daily quest anyway. The birds managed to knock me off my mount twice. And fighting them was like pushing a wet noodle around. But, I finished that too.

(Reminds me of way back when I was gumming STV Trolls to death. Full Resto. BUT I did manage to leave a Human Paladin, same level, for dead anyway, after he killed my guildies Warlock alt. Ah, life on a PvP server.)

Then I thought: "Enough." Ported back to Shattrath and hopped into the portal back home to Kalimdor, to pay the Shaman Trainer in Orgrimmar a visit.

Did I want to relearn my talents? Yes. Did I want to pay 15 gold to do so? No. Argh! Take it anyway. Reset my talents for the Enhancement plus a little Resto life.

Then I get invited into a group to go to Steamvaults. I can knock out three things there. I can get the Warlord's head. I can pick up the orders for Lady V. And I can get my key fragment. But I'm Enhancement, not Resto.

The party, guild, consisted of a Warrior all in purples. Nice. He knew it. He had purples in his bag he wasn't using. Nice. I've got purples too. :) They're all level 60 though. :(

Anyway, the Warrior is excellently geared. A Rogue. Our guild's 2nd-in-command, a Warlock. Another Shaman, and me.

This other Shaman I assumed was Resto. Isn't everyone used to instancing Resto? But, no. He was Enhancement. Great. Was he going to heal? Uh, no. He didn't have gear to heal, only fight. I checked out his gear. 350 or so +Attack Power. Hmmm. Was that his Healing set perhaps? No. 22 +Healing. Oh, good lord. He was going to help DPS. I was the healer.

The Warrior was great. The Rogue, not a problem. The Shaman? Like a teen going down at an R. Kelly party. Aggro management. (Or use a shield.)

We got my key fragment. But after several tries at the Hydromancer we called it.

Okay. So that's out. I returned to Orgrimmar and respecced back to Resto. And spent the rest of the night working on my cooking skill. (Completed the Gadgetzan quest to raise my cooking limit to 300.) I did that because as an Alchemist I should be able to produce potions and foods that provide effects and buffs. There's two nice recipes I picked up in Blades Edge, but my Cooking, still, remains too low to take advantage of it.

P.S. Msaker, in Defense gear and stance, never gets knocked off his mount by the birds of Skettis. Does the dismount occur upon being critted, and being uncrittable makes me immune to that?

I was down, then up. But then I realized the solo, or small group, player was going to be left behind. Yet again. And seemingly forevermore.

At first the news of the future brought me down. What? More level 70+ stuff? The Sunwell Plateau. "Sunwell Plateau will be coming in a patch before the WotLK launch. It will include both a 25-main raid and a 5-main instance with both normal and heroic mode." Raiders only. Yeah, pugs in Auchinduon do just fine, right?

Then I read about the leveling process being sped up some by Blizzard. Sure. It kind of has to do this. Since Blizzard doesn't give a green goblin butt's care for "mid-game content" it's pretty darn elven of them to get players to the end-game faster. And the instanced end-game at that. Guild Wars anyone? Instant max level character that you take into instanced areas. Familiar? Too.

It seems, now, that the new races were simply their means of getting end-game Paladins into Horde hands, and end-game Shamans into Alliance hands. Yeah, the new 1-20 content remains 2/3 of the highlight of the expansion. The 60-70 content the other 1/3. At least for me. Mileage from hardcore raiders may vary though.

What I need to do is get two computers here, side by side, and get back inside the game with my Princess. Orcs, Elves, and Humans. That'd make things better for sure. :)

Hey all.

Not doing much in the hotel room here. But I found word of a new database over on WoW Insider. Lootables. I've linked to it over in my Resources sidebar. Check it out. With guides to level the professions. Handy. And it looks good.

Bought a house.

Looking for a truck. Browsing Ashley Furniture for a bed and a formal dining room table.

And that takes a bit of time. (Doing affordability studies take even more.)

And playing WoW on a laptop... Not desirable.

But, dang, that house is a nice one. With a pool installed by next summer, my journeys in Northrend will be punctuated with swims in the azure oasis behind the house.

That's where I've been and where I hope to be.

Now, once we get back online, I realize I don't have time to devote to a new foray into a PvP world.

The wife and I need to get an Alliance couple to 70 now.

Is it the Druids?

Or is it the Paladin and the Mage?

All four are in the early 40's.

Deathknight. Coming to a Valley of Honor or Chapel of Light near you.

Deathknight. Blizzard's first Hero Class for World of Warcraft.

From Blizzard:

The death knight combines martial prowess with dark, necromantic energies. Players might be familiar with the death knight from previously released Warcraft games -- most recently, in the campaigns for Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos and the Frozen Throne expansion, the former paladin Arthas became a death knight and wreaked havoc across Azeroth and Northrend before fusing with the spirit of Ner'zhul to become the Lich King.

We haven't yet made a final determination about which races can be death knights. However, the class will be available to both the Alliance and the Horde.

So which class can start over as Deathknight? Any?

I sure hope so. My Shaman is gimp. What a wonderful opportunity, with a little help from my friends, that I can make Blackhoof, currently a Shaman, a Deathknight. Then Msaker. Then Arcarius. Hmmm. Will we see enough Deathknights around? Shopping for reagents. Farming motes. Dancing on mailboxes. They're going to be as common as Gnomes on the end of a kebab skewer.

Speaking of Orc BBQ, Gnome Deathknights? WTH?

Somewhere a lore writer is weeping heavy tears of infinite sadness.

New expansion.

Takes place in Northrend.

Appears to be about more end-game.

The new area, Northrend, is designed for 68-80. Bring your Outlands gear to conquer more of the Homeland.

Tuskarr and Taunka are Horde friendly races. No mention of new Alliance allies.

No word on any new 1-70 content. But unless they're going to add new zones or races, there won't be any.

So, you got it, new races, if any, will get their 1-20 content area, and then you go struggle in STV like your Dreanei did, and your Trolls did, and your grandpa did. Why,when I was leveling up, it was uphill, both ways, in the snow, barefoot. Nice to know you kids aren't getting any breaks!

They say they were pleased with the 60 to 70 pacing. If you recall that was beaten in 4 days, or was it a mere 24 hours?, by some French guy if I recall correctly.

That means 70-80 will be reached within a week by the usual hardcore cadre, and a month by the raiders (more guilds broken apart perhaps?), and 3-4 months by the rest of us.

It's all good though. It's WoW.

P.S. I'm not going to level my NE Hunter past 68 though. Spending months at 70 might be as non-productive as spending months at 60 was.