My Warcraft Year in Review Meme

I took this a second time because I didn’t bother tagging people the first time and I also had a few revelations after the first shot. Take a look at my updated response Here.

It seems that over the Thanksgiving Holiday, which I extended by taking some vacation time, I was tagged to participate in this meme to share with you some of what happened to me through the 2009 year in relation to WoW.

As with any meme, the general idea is to answer the questions and then pass it along to other people to see what everyone has to say on them. Instead of passing it along to five people in particular though, I’m going to throw it out there for all to see and allow you to tag yourself with it if you choose to do so.

My Warcraft Year in Review Meme
1. What did you do in the World of Warcraft in 2009 that you’d never done before?
2. What was your favorite new place that you visited?
3. What would you like to have in 2010 that you lacked in 2009?
4. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
5. What was your biggest failure?
6. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
7. What do you wish you’d done less of?
8. What was your favorite WoW blog or podcast?
9. Tell us a valuable WoW lesson you learned in 2009.

1. What did you do in the World of Warcraft in 2009 that you’d never done before?
This question is both hard and easy to answer. It’s hard in that I only played for a short time in 2008, so almost everything was new. It’s easy in that, well, everything was so new.

To list a few, I did the following: Reached level cap, purchased epic flying, made my first successful twink, left my first true “home server”, switched from playing primarily Horde to Alliance.

2. What was your favorite new place that you visited?
This one is pretty easy as there really wasn’t much of anywhere that I went this year that I didn’t reach in 2008 save for the higher leveled areas of Northrend. To pick a single place though, I will have to go with the AQ40 raid. I went there for the first time a month or so ago with our main guild on the new Alliance server, Durotan-US. We had a blast in there and I found that I really love running around on the mounts that drop in there. It really sucks that you have to be in the instance to use those mounts, but it was really cool to go in there for the first time and really nail one of the big raids from the past that I was certainly nowhere close to being ready for while it was actually being played.

3. What would you like to have in 2010 that you lacked in 2009?
I think I’m looking forward to actually participating in some of the end game raiding in 2010. Not a whole lot, but a little bit. I’ve never been a fan of raiding, and I don’t expect to become one any time soon either, but I just recently got a new computer that I think can actually handle the the load that an honest raid will put out where before I would lag like crazy if there were more than 5 people in a group.

4. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
There really wasn’t much in the way of achievements this year in the use of the WoW term, so I’m going to say that reaching the number of views on my blog would be my greatest achievement of the year. I think I did quite a bit to move up from being “just another WoW blogger” to having people actually care about what I’m writing. As I check the stats on the blog, I find a lot of people constantly referring back to things that I wrote here, particularly in relation to the Prot Paladin. So I know that to at least some degree I am actually reaching my goal of helping people.

5. What was your biggest failure?
My biggest failure is going to tie into one of my biggest changes, which was the swap to playing Alliance rather than Horde. I had two of my friends end up paying to transfer their characters to my Horde server, and this year my wife made the switch to an Alliance server herself and after going to help her get a start I actually found myself really enjoying the server as well. So much so that I actually very much dislike playing on my old Horde server now except for the occasional run.

I also left a fairly good guild because I wasn’t going to raid and joined another which decided shortly after my joining them that they would open their doors to everyone. The guild now has over 500 members who constantly talk about random, stupid crap that makes me actually leave the guild channel in another chat window that I never look at just so that I can ignore them all.

So basically I screwed myself by switching to a fail guild, and then I screwed two of my friends out of actual money as they transfered the characters over to play with me and then I changed servers myself. For those reasons, I suck.

6. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
I think the only thing that really got me excited this year as far as WoW goes is going to have to be Cataclysm. I’m still excited about it even though we have no idea when it’s actually going to hit the shelves yet, and I can’t wait to jump in there and get started on rolling a whole new set of characters.

7. What do you wish you’d done less of?
I wish I had done less of my twinking. While I had a great deal of fun doing it, and I’m still doing it even now, I wish I had done a bit less. The blog stopped getting updated while I was doing it, I pulled away from other players quite a bit while I focused on doing my own thing, and so on. It’s a great deal of fun to twink a character and to really get to know the ins and outs of your abilities and increase your knowledge and skill with the character, but it has its drawbacks sometimes too which you don’t always see until it’s too late to fix them.

8. What was your favorite WoW blog or podcast?
This one is really hard, actually. There are a lot of things that I like about a lot of the blogs that I read out there. Narrowing those down is a bit too hard, so I’ll just link a few that really come to mind right off: LoreCrafted, Darraxus the Warrior (Real Azeroth Heroes, especially), Cynwise’s Battlefield Manual, Through the Eyes of Death, Empowered Fire, Slice and Dice, Troll Bouquet, and Shaman on Ramen.

As far as podcasts go, I’m still new to them and the only two I even listen to (and on an infrequent basis at that) are For The Lore and WoWPhiles.

9. Tell us a valuable WoW lesson you learned in 2009.
My reply here is actually going to be almost exactly the same as the one from which I was tagged who said, “I learned that it is not worth it to offer up constructive criticism or unsolicited advice. Even if you think you are friends with someone and see themselves repeatedly shooting themselves in the foot with their poor communication skills. Even if you see them run folks off with their communication style and their lack of respect for others’ ideas and opinions. Just keep your mouth shut. Because all you’ll get is a black eye for trying to help someone be more aware of how others are perceiving them.”

In my blogging I try to go into a lot of detail to break things down and explain in such a way that anyone could pick it up and put it to use even if they were brand new to the game. I don’t always do the greatest job with that, but I try. It has recently been brought to my attention though that using the same type of language in replies or offering of my own opinion makes me come off as more of a jerk than someone trying to help.

So I’ve learned something quite a bit like what Miss Nexxi there learned, that giving advice when it isn’t asked for, no matter how useful or important it might be, is better left ungiven.

Sometimes I actually want to get someone upset, to show them how stupid they’re being, or to tell them they’re screwing things up for the rest of us. And in those cases I come right out and smack you upside the head and tell it like it is. But for the most part, I just want to open doors, broaden views, or give some insight into things that people don’t know or haven’t figured out yet. The key is expressing that without coming across in a completely different manner, and while I haven’t learned yet how to do that, I have learned the need for it.

5 Folks I’m tagging to Complete this Meme
As I said at the top there, I’m not tagging anybody in particular with this. It’s just not the kind of thing I do, personally. So instead I’m going to offer this up to the first five people that feel like taking it upon themselves to do so.

If you’d like to tag yourself with this, then drop me a link to your blog in the comments to this post and I’ll add your name and your link to the list below:

1)
2)
3)
4)
5)

 

New Page Added: Psynister Support

Though this not related to WoW, it is related to my blog, because it’s related to me.

I have added a page on this blog to show you two wonderful organizations that I support, in order to give you an opportunity to show your support as well. Though I would ask for your support, I certainly do not require it nor do I expect it. It is merely a hope. This will be the only post I plan on ever focusing on anything other than WoW on this blog, but I wanted to give you a post to make you aware rather than hoping that you might one day stumble across it on your own.

Neither of these organizations are paying me anything at all to do this, I put them up there because I care. I get nothing out of doing this other than a sense of hope that others might lend a hand as well.

New Page: Psynister Support

 

Grand Opening: Suggestion Box

In order to try stirring up a bit more reader interaction, I want to point you towards a new page I have added to the blog here called the Suggestion Box. You will find the link there near the top of the page, and you can leave any comments you like in relation to my blog.

The purpose of it is to give you an opportunity to tell me what you would like to read about. What I am looking for is specific topics for the most part, however, I will take any suggestions you might have regarding the blog. You can give me a topic, you can request more specific details on a topic I have already covered, you can suggest that I learn how to post in fewer than 10 paragraphs, ask me to change my color scheme, or anything else you’d like.

It is there for you to leave whatever suggestions you have to help either improve my blog or to improve your experience while you are here. If you have any suggestions at all, feel free to leave me a comment on that page and I will give each comment an honest consideration at the very least.

Each person whose suggestion is accepted and acted upon will be referenced in the respective post, and if you have a blog or website of your own I will have either links or trackbacks set to refer the readers to you as well.

 

State of the Blog

As of today May 19, 2009 this blog has officially achieved 1,000 views! I’m still a blog n00b, but at least I’ve got that fancy achievement.

So far I feel that the blog has been a success since I changed it over from its original site(s), switched the format, and the intended focus. My thanks to all of you who stop by to see me on a regular basis, and those who drop in on a random search as well.

And a special thanks to Veneretio of Tanking Tips for the image there.

Where To Now?
I am pleased so far with the changes I have made and the direction I am taking the blog. The one thing that I find really lacking right now is reader interaction, so I need to find a way to bring in something more that the readers can comment on and discuss. Maybe I ramble on too long and nobody wants to spend the time to read the whole post, so I need to shorten them down a bit? I don’t know what the key is yet, but I’m searching for it.

I plan to start branching off into other classes besides the paladin at this point, with the Shaman being the next primary focus, followed most likely by the Druid. There is a chance that the druid will be knocked back a step by a Warlock since I had quite a bit of fun with one over the weekend, but since the druid was picked by the users it will have a place here before too long.

As I have mentioned in the information concerning this blog, I am here to help people level up their characters. That means all of their characters, not just their paladins. While there may come a time that I blog about a single class, I do not intend for this one to be that kind of blog. Shaman is definitely next up on the list since I got my orc up to level 21 last night and am having a great deal of fun with him.

Summer Vacation
Tomorrow I leave for a vacation trip to see my in-laws in Utah. We have not seen the family up there in a couple of years and find this a great time to visit them.

I leave tomorrow, May 20th, and will not be back until May 28th. I know that there will be no time for playing WoW while we are there, and I am not sure whether or not I will have access to the internet enough that I will be able to blog while I am gone.

If I am unable to blog, please hang in there until I return. The blog certainly isn’t going to die, I just might have to be without net access for a week. If I am able to post again, then it will most likely be concerning the Shaman, and possibly a little snippet of Warlock as well.

 

Recommended Reading

I wanted to take the time today to share with you some of the blogs that I follow. I certainly will not attempt to link every one of them as that would be far too large a list.

These blogs all have something to do with World of Warcraft. Some of them are focused on specific classes, some on specific roles with in the game, some on leading or participating in guilds, or on various other topics as well.

While I focus my blog primarily on leveling new characters, most of my personal blog reading has little to do with leveling and more to do with…well, everything else.

Since each site can explain itself far better than I can, I will leave only a quick little blurb by each one indicating why I, personally, visit the site.

My name is Jason Griffith, and I approve these messages:

Ithato – I primarily visit this site for information on addons and new game content.

No Stock UI – I come here for all things User Interface’ish. Addons and macros are two things that I love about World of Warcraft, and both can be found here.

Mattycus, World of Matticus – Has a team of bloggers that focus frequently on healing end game content as well as guild leadership and interaction. I keep an eye on healing because my wife is primarily a healer, so I like to keep her in the loop on things. I keep an eye on the guild leadership side of things because I would really like to have my own guild but yet…I don’t think I’m up to the task. Never hurts to dream though.

Veneretio, Tanking Tips – Veneretio is the man with the plan when it comes to warrior tanking. I first found the blog while looking for tips for my wife’s leveling partner who happens to be a warrior tank. I can’t stand the warrior class myself, but tanking tips can still be applied to other classes, such as my paladin.

Tharion Greyseer, Netherbane – When it comes to amazing lore and roleplay in relation to World of Warcraft, Tharion Greyseer knows his stuff. I stumbled onto this blog via twitter and really started paying attention to it when Tharion asked for help proof-reading a story he was going to submit. I must admit, I got caught up in other things and did not get a review to him in time for the submission, but once I did read it I didn’t want it to end. Easily the best lore-related site I have found so far for me, personally.

Arrens – This sneaky little sucker makes no attempt to hide the fact that he’s willing to stab you in the face, or to cut off your arm if you complain about cutting your little finger. Another roleplaying blog here that’s always interesting to read from an RP perspective, and he also shares many of my views on gameplay, including end game raiding.

Kestrel, Kestrel’s Aerie – Another blog I visit primarily for healing information, but that also covers other topics that are enjoyable to read. I’m not sure why my wife can spend hours reading fashion blogs, but she can’t stand reading WoW blogs for her healing – and she’s the raider!?

Just Anna, Too Many Annas – This is one of those “All-Around” blogs that covers many different aspects of the game. I come here because I never know what the topic might be next, but I know it’s going to be a good read.

Rhidach – This is one of my more recent finds as I looked for other sources of paladin tanking. Since I need to know what I’m getting into as I level higher and higher with Lexington, I need to know where to look for that information. Rhidach knows.

Llanion, Mad Cow Chronicles – Another recent find as I prepare to roll a new druid. Llanion likes to keep things a bit more on the interesting side, and that’s more of what I’m in the mood to read. I don’t generally care for straight, boring information and Llanion helps it to remain enjoyable.

Adgamorix, Divine Plea – Yet another recent discovery, Adgamorix provides another source of end game paladin tanking for me. The site also covers interesting builds that I may be temped to try out.

Karthis, Teeth and Claws – Another source for my incoming Druid toon, this blog covers what I need for tanking and DPS’ing with my druid. When I am trying to figure out how to do something new via researching blogs, I like to find ones that take the time to go over some of the details instead of just throwing a half-useless description of doing something using nothing but acronyms and expecting me to know all of the details in between.

Kadomi, Tank Like A Girl – I found this blog while looking for information on end game tanking as well. I still can’t stand playing a warrior, so some of the information here is lost on me, but tanking is still the same at its core, regardless of your class, so it never hurts to have information about events I will experience in the future, even if it’s not entirely in line with what I’m doing.

Kagrra, The Druid Team – This is my source for all things Druidic. A team of druid bloggers that cover the various roles of the druid. The site itself happens to be visually appealing in that my favorite color is green, and it’s another blog that remains entertaining while also being informational.

Blog Roll
I do plan on including a blog roll to the site in the near future once I get all of my feed links together and have them organized into one place. Until then, hopefully this thread will point some of you to places that I like to visit.

Help Me!
I like to read blogs about World of Warcraft, from all different perspectives. Whether it’s a raiding blog, a roleplaying blog, class specific, role specific, or anything in between. If you have a WoW Blog of your own, or have suggestions for others, please leave a link for me and the other readers in your comments below.

EDIT: My apologies for misspelling Ithato’s name up there. Apparently that was one that I didn’t bother copy/pasting over.