Interesting Items In The Next Patch

We recently put up a page for the Patch WoW links at Blizz. But we also want to give you some more insights incase you don’t go into patch notes like some folks (and you know who you are). So here are the more interesting tidbits coming from the current PTR notes.

Titansteel bars will no longer have a cooldown, expect prices to drop a bit since supply will be able to more adequetly match demand. The same thing applies to Moonshroud, Spellweave and Ebonweave – no more cooldowns on those.

Random dungeons have been such a hit that the concept is moving into the Battlegrounds. Using this system will give you extra honor equivalent to 30 kills the first time through each day and an extra 15 for further BG’s the same day. Since honor per kill is being doubled, that’s going to mean a lot more honor in random BG’s than queueing for specific battles. Marks of honor for specific battles are also being removed, we can only assume that those items which required marks will now be purchased with honor instead.

the deserter debuff for bailing on a random dungeon has been increased to 30 minutes. leaving a random party for any reason will trigger this debuff, which overwrites the usual 15 minute debuff. This will prevent some of the goonery for instances like Occulus, where people leave the second they see where they are. Honestly, just make the run mon.

For holiday bosses, you can now queue for the encounter without having to do the prequel quests each year. As long as you’ve done the boss before at least once you can just queue up random and go spank them.

But the big one is that those worthless Frozen orbs will now actually be useful for more than just vendoring. A new NPC is being added in Dalaran that will convert your Frozen orbs to other items. Here is the list of what he sells in exchange for frozen orbs (consider this to be currently accurate but Blizz has been knows to change their mind at the last minute).  You can see the (current) list of items Frozo is selling at the link below.

Items you can get from Frozo the Renowned

Frost Lotus for a Runed Orb – that’s going to help some.  It’s also going to raise the value of the orbs a bit and lower values for certain eternals.  Since only one orb drops per heroic, there shouldn’t be a huge change in Ah prices for the items above, but beware the first week or two while everyone blows through all their extra orbs they might have sitting around.

I’m kicking myself now for finally vendoring about 60 of them, but you might be able to snag a few cheap stack off the AH before this change goes live.  There are also some class changes you’ll want to take a look at.  Once again DK’s are getting the most fiddling while most other classes remain fairly static.

It’s not what we would call a Dominating patch, but Frozo and the random battlegrounds will be a nice couple of changes.

18 Comments » ~ ~ Random Post

Win A Little Swag And See Your Toon Enshrined On DYS

You may have noticed that we are updating our class pages to link to all the specs we’ve been posting.  In the interest of making things look a little better around here what we really need is a few good pictures of each class in action.

Now, Law could go and do them all (at least one level 80 of every class, except Lock and Rogue) but we know how picky you guys can be.  It just wouldn’t do to have pics of, say, my pathetic little Paladin in crud gear posing as Dominating.  But we know that not only do our regular readers have some seriously geared toons, they also have a good eye for the artistic.

A while back during the Midsummer festival event we had a little screenshot contest:  Screenshot Contest, The Votes Are In.  First place went to the lovely Fran Molina who submitted the fantastic shot below.  Boy, does 18 months seem like a really long time ago.  We’ve come a long way at DYS since then, but one thing hasn’t changed, our readers still Dominate.

It’s time to show off your skills once again.  We need you to get on your mains and snag some killer screenies of your toon in action.  We’ll all vote on the best of the best and your screenshot will be featured on our class pages.  The grand prize will be a $50.00 gift certificate to J!nx, where you can get some killer swag for your sweetie (or yourself if you’re like that) for Valentine’s day (if everyone hurries).  Second and third place will get WoW time cards so you can play free for a while.

Maybe it’s a pic of you doing the Captain Morgan leg-up on Arthas.  Perhaps it’s your toon in Mimiron’s head or some other wicked flying mount you bagged.  Anything and everything we’ll put up for a vote.  But one thing is for sure, we need some truly Dominating pics for each class.  Voting begins when we have at least one screenshot of each class (so hurry up) and then we’ll post them all for voting.

So get those screenshots submitted in the next few days and we’ll find out who gets to have their toon be the spokesperson for their class right here at DYS.

Send your screenshots to editor@dominateyourserver.com with the subject line “class screenshot”

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Retrospect on Raiding in Wrath

Welcome to my 3.3 preview live from my time on the PTR, this is Gustava, and this week I am going to talking about dungeon updates.

Let’s look back for just a second, since Wrath is little over a year old now and the story of this saga has really changed raiding. We started in Obsidian Sanctum and the return of Black Dragons.  Twilight Drakes showed us the first taste of hard modes and fire avoidance. Then we return to a classic raid: Naxxarmas. Raised from  the depths of vanilla WoW raiders’ nightmares as a new level 80 raid with Tier 7 gear. New raiders could learn the joy of slimes, Patchwork and Deep Breaths/Frost Tombs all over again. Once you got  a key in Naxx, you can go fight Malygos bringing new meaning to fighting fire with fire – with drakes.

Ulduar opened its gates in 3.1 where hardmodes abound and new Tier 8 gear. From the massive tank opening that was way better than flying drakes in the Malygos encounter to the madness of Mimirons’ fight with a giant robot and an old God with a thousand maws. Ulduar was truly a challenge with its epic scale with some of the hard modes offering more replay value  than ever.

Following that: the Trials of the Crusader opened its doors in 3.2. The fights were new and challenging with monster beasts,  demons, champions and undead – plus the Tier 9 gear. Now all that’s left is the icy fortress of the lich king in 3.3 and a conclusion to the epic tale of Northend once and for all.  At least, we think so . . .

Icecrown Raid Difficulty Functionality (source)

We chose this particular functionality because we didn’t want to use the Trial of the Crusader method, and have four versions on a raid of this size. We felt the Ulduar method of having to know a certain trick to do on the boss was difficult to communicate and tied too heavily to achievements. We might eventually convert Trial of the Crusader over to this new system but Ulduar and Naxxramas will likely never change.

• Many bosses and creatures have had their total health reduced.
• Several bosses and creatures have had cooldowns on specific abilities increased, effect durations reduced, and damage on some of these abilities reduced.
• Ring-Lord Conjurers and Sorceresses now hang out in packs of 4 instead of packs of 5.
• Vehicle scaling on the drakes based on the rider’s item level has been increased to make them more powerful.

Icecrown Citadel: The Frozen halls (New 5-Man Dungeons)

The Frozen Halls

4 Comments » ~ ~ Random Post

Death Knights get quite a few changes in patch 3.3 and I want to go over some of them with you.  As of this writting these are the changes. Mind you, I have not gone into to much detail because it could all change as of patch day!! We are at your mercy Blizzard.

• Army of the Dead: The cooldown on this ability has been reduced from 20 minutes to 10 minutes. Army Ghoul damage dropped by 50%. Cannot be used in Arenas.

Ok now this change seems like nothing really happened, if you consider what they really did. The main thing I see with it though is it means Army of the Dead will be ready for every boss in a dungeon or raid when combined with Night of the Dead.

• Raise Ally: The cooldown on this ability has been reduced from 15 minutes to 10 minutes. Cannot be used in Arenas. Has anyone ever used this besides me?

When I used it, the player got so angry with me I thought he was going to hunt me down and hurt me. He cursed so much and so loud I think I actually heard him from hundreds of miles away. Also make sure that the person you use it on knows what is going to happen.

• Rune of the Stoneskin Gargoyle: There is now a 1-handed version of this rune in addition to the current 2-handed rune.

Finally Blizzard has listened and helped the Death Knights that want to tank. The added defence and Stamina will help alot.

• Rune Strike: Threat generated by this ability increased by approximately 17%.

Now this also will help the tanking ability and improve the ability to hold aggro.

Talent Changes
Unholy

• Night of the Dead: Now reduces the damage your pet takes from area-of-effect damage by 45/90%, but no longer applies to area-of-effect damage caused by other players. In addition, this talent now reduces the cooldown of Army of the Dead by 2/4 minutes, down from 5/10 minutes.

This will definitly be a help to the unholy build.

• Scourge Strike: Redesigned. The base ability now deals 50% weapon damage plus an additional amount as physical damage. However, for each disease the death knight has on the target, the target will take additional shadow damage equal to 25% of the physical damage done.

It  was needed to boost Unholy build to the level of the Blood build.  With this change it is like Heart Strike for the Unholy build causing lots of damage.

• Unholy Blight: This talent now deals only 10% of Death Coil damage as a damage-over-time effect on the target.

Well it was bound to happen sooner or later another nerf but at least this one isn’t to bad.

Glyph Changes

• Glyph of Icy Touch: Instead of granting additional runic power, this glyph now causes Frost Fever to deal 20% additional damage.

This is the best change of all on the DK changes. An Additional 20% is huge!!

Glyph Fixes

These are some minor fixes to some known to exist bugs and nothing is changed  that affects build.

• Glyph of Bone Shield: Now updates the number of charges in the Bone Shield tooltip.
  Glyph of Dark Death: Now updates the tooltip on Death Coil. In addition, its own tooltip has been clarified to indicate it also applies to healing from Death Coil.
  Glyph of Death’s Embrace: Now updates the tooltip on Death Coil to indicate runic power is refunded.
  Glyph of Heart Strike: Now updates the tooltip on Heart Strike to indicate Heart Strike applies a movement snare.
  Glyph of Icebound Fortitude: Now updates the tooltip on Icebound Fortitude to show increased damage reduction.
  Glyph of Plague Strike: Now updates the damage shown in Plague Strike’s tooltip.
  Glyph of Unbreakable Armor: Now updates the tooltip on Unbreakable Armor. Tooltip on glyph modified to make its effect more clear as well.

Class Changes Mainly just corrections and do not affect gameplay.

• Bloody Strikes: Now properly increases the damage displayed in the tooltips of Blood Strike and Heart Strike.
• Bone Shield: Tooltip corrected to indicate the player has the correct number of bones.
• Chains of Ice: This ability will no longer appear to land on targets which are immune.
• Desecration: The debuff from this ability will no longer sometimes appear as if it were cast by someone else. In addition, the visual and snare from this ability will now both dissipate at the same time. Further, this talent will now respect snare immunities, and no longer sometimes snare immune targets.
• Frost Presence: The animation for activating this presence will no longer also have the animation for Blood Presence played at the same time.
• Master of Ghouls: Tooltip typo corrected.
• Night of the Dead: Tooltip typo corrected.
• Obliterate: This ability will no longer sometimes fail to do additional damage based on diseases on the target.
• Raise Ally: While this spell is active on a target, they will not be sent to the graveyard, prematurely ending the spell.
• Strangulate: Updated tooltip to include the functionality that this ability also interrupts spellcasting on NPCs.
• Taste of Blood: Corrected inaccurate information in combat log tooltip.
• Unholy Presence: The animation for activating this presence will no longer also have the animation for Blood Presence played at the same time.

Bottom line here folks, Unholy is getting a big buff, big enough that it just may rival Blood in terms of DPS and  possibly  Frost for Tanking. All this while blood retains the status quo. Blizzard made great efforts to balance the trees out in one of the biggest updates any class has ever received in a single patch.

3 Comments » ~ ~ Random Post

Hello, Gustava here again. I’m currently testing the PTR ver 3.3 Fall of the Lich King part of the Wrath expansion. I will be previewing user interface in this artice of stuff i’ve seen in the PTR. I will be going over the new  things on the PTR I think the people like to know and other things I find cool.

In Game tips

Remember back when you created your first character and it seemed like everything you do would make that little box with a question mark pop up at the bottom of your screen and demand your attention? Well, Blizzard has decided that their in-game tips are not quite as helpful as they should be. How could new players know that converting their small and innocent party into a raid would stop them from gaining quest credit? Or how would they learn that elite monsters and quests usually require more than one person to overcome? So they pretty much tripled (rough estimation) the number of tips they have – and made them prettier too.

what about fire

Wrath Reputation  Increase (from patch notes)

• Commendation Badges which award reputation with various Wrath of the Lich King factions can be purchased with Emblems of Triumph in Dalaran. Each badge costs 1 Emblem of Triumph.
• Gaining reputation with the Ashen Verdict in Icecrown Citadel will grant players access to upgradeable rings from Ormus the Penitent. Players can switch between the type of ring (melee/caster/tank/healer) at any point in the upgrade path for 200g.
• The following reputations have been sped up by roughly 30%:
  • Argent Crusade
  • Alliance Vanguard
  • Horde Expedition
  • Kirin Tor
  • Knights of the Ebon Blade
  • Sons of Hodir
  • Wyrmrest Accord
• Sons of Hodir quests now give more reputation overall.
• Top-level helm and shoulder faction-related enchants are now available as Bind-on-Account items that do not require any faction to use once purchased (they still require the appropriate faction level to purchase).

The 30% more rep in Heroics is a great move by Blizzard now you can get a lot of rep and emblems to gear your new 80’s faster. We all hate grinding rep for the Sons of Hodir for the 56th time this rep increase will make a lot easier and less like a chore. But the thing I really like is the BoA Shoulder and Head enchant. This simply means that you’re getting Raid-level enchants as soon as you hit 80 (assuming you can afford them) as long as you’ve done it at least once on any of your other 80s. Add to that a new upgradeable ring (like the old violet eye one in BC) will make every trash mob rep in Icerown as rewarding as the trash drops themselves.

New fishing event: Kalu’ak  fishing derby

Tired of getting ganked in Stranglethorn Vale for the weekly fishing contest? Well worry no more as our favourite walking walruses, the Kalu’ak, are hosting their own fishing tournament in Northrend every Wednesday. Elder Clearwater is going to hang out in Dalaran for exactly one hour and wait for a Blacktip Shark that you have to catch and return to him. The event starts at 8:00 PM on Wednesday. During the contest all fishing in Northrend is free of trash. Don’t worry though as even if you don’t end up being the champion angler,
you’ll still receive a reward just for turning the shark in. On an achievement related note, the master of strangle achievement has been changed to Master Angler of Azeroth. Winning the Stranglethorn Fishing Extravaganza or the Kalu’ak Fishing Derby will be enough to meet the requirements for the achievement. Also winners can win a rare heirloom(BoA) ring or a pair of boots that warps you to Booty Bay every 30 minutes (Yet another hearth-type product).

Emblems in 3.3

Bosses in Naxxramas, Obsidian Sanctum, Eye of Eternity, Ulduar, Trial of the Crusader, and all Heroics will drop Emblems of Triumph. Bosses in the Icecrown Citadel 10- and 25-player dungeons will drop the new Emblems of Frost. Choosing the Random Heroic Dungeon option via the Dungeon Finder (new in content update 3.3) and completing whatever dungeon is selected for you, will award you with two Emblems of Frost the first time you do it (this is in place of the daily Heroic dungeon quests which are being replaced with weekly raid dungeon quests).

Continuing to use the Random Heroic Dungeon option within that same day to complete dungeons will award you with two Emblems of Triumph each time in addition to those dropped in the instances. The random option can also select Heroic dungeons to which you may already be saved, so you can technically do every Heroic dungeon more than once in a day by continuing to use this option.

New Weekly Raid Quests(Npc who did heroic daily quests)

New weekly raid quests have been added to the game! These quests will give you a good reason to run the old raid instances for 5 emblems of Frost and 5 emblems of Triumph each week. Here’s the list for the bosses tnat have a weekly quest kill. One is picked each week for the quest.

• The Obsidian Sanctum/Eye of the Eternity-Sartharion and Malygos
• Naxxramas: Anub’rekhan, Noth the Plaguebringer, Instructor Razuvious and Patchwork.
• Ulduar: Flame Leviathan,Ignis the Furnace Master,Razorscale,and XT-002 Deconstructor
• Crusaders’ Coliseum/Trial of the Crusader: Lord Jaraxxus
• Icecrown Citadel: Lord Marrowgar

New Armor Sets in Icecrown Citadel:  Tier 10

The next tier comes out in 3.3 and to earn them is no simple task.

• The first set of T-10 (251)  is bought with Frost emblems costing 405 Emblems for the whole set: 60 frost  emblems each for gloves and shoulders, 95 Frost emblems for head piece, chest plate and leggings.
• The next set is 10.5 Sanctified (263) which you need the first set piece and a Conqueror’s Mark of Sanctification to upgrade the 10 piece into the 10.5Sanctified piece.
• Same goes for 10 Sanctified heroic(271).The gear is in the ardent verdict camp in the raid.

The sets are modeled after Lich Kings troops , the Ashen Verdict and Faction Heroes.

• Warrior – Ymirjar Lord’s – Elder Saurfang/Muradin Bronzebeard(link)
• Death Knight – Scourgelord – Highlord Darion Mograine(Link)
• Paladin – Lightsworn – Highlord Tirion Fordring(link)
• Shamans – Frost Witch -Vrykul(link)
• Hunters – Ahn’Kahar Blood Hunter – Nerubian Cryptlord(link)
• Rogues – Shadowblade -Geist(link)
• Druids – Freya Lasherweave(there none in Scorge or Verdict)(link)
• Mages – Blood Mage -San’layn Blood Princes(link)
• Warlocks – Dark Coven -Lichs(link)
• Priest – Crimson Acolyte’s -Cultist High Priest (link)

__________________________________________________

Well with 3.3 coming out in next week or two Bizzard has pulled all the stops to make it the biggest patch ever.With raids and dungeons for the PvE crowd and a new arena season 8 with Wrathful gear for the PvP crowd. Add to that impoved leveling with quest helper and new in-game tips for those who need to make new toons every day (Alt-a-holics). So whether you do PvE or PvP this patch can provide lots of entertanment for many weeks/months ahead. Wherever you go in the world of Azeroth always remember to Dominate whatever bizzard throws at you.

-Gustava

5 Comments » ~ ~ Random Post

Anyone who’s been playing on-line games for a while will understand where I’m coming from with this and Dominate is no exception. Every guild/group/association goes through this, be it in WoW or even in real life to a certain extent.

If you haven’t guessed it yet this is going to be one of those thought-provoking-life-changing-deep-seeded-realization articles (or some reasonable facsimile )

As we speak Dominate on Fenris is going through it’s 4th iteration (cycle). Some of the players are new some have been here since the beginning and yet others are returning after a hiatus but all share a common goal. Any guild that is to survive this cycle  must have one if nothing else to truly rise from the ashes: a purpose.

The Birth:

Dominate (for those who don’t know yet) is a loose association of like minded individuals that stems from a web site (www.DominateYourServer.com). It all started on the web with Gavin putting up tips from time to time to help anybody get better at WoW. Over time this eventually lead to the creation of guides: Horde Leveling guide, AH Mastery guide. Popular demand is the real reason there is a Dominate guild on Fenris in the first place. When the guild was started everyone had a common goal: Dominate, Raid and Progress through content as a group. And we did through every cycle to varying degrees.

The First steps:

After everyone signed the charter and we had 150 members in the first 2 weeks it was time to see what we can do with all the toons. We all started running heroics and doing the special events in anticipation of the next expansion (Wrath). When the expansion hit it was a good ‘ol fashioned leveling race to 80 through new content with almost no outside help. Wowhead was incomplete, no web site had any real information on anything even the Horde leveling guide had us running to Alliance quest givers on occasion. 14 days after the launch of Wrath we had enough to form our own 5-mans on a consistent basis with new 80s popping up every day and the true spirit of this guild shining bright. Everyone was there helping everyone else out with advice, materials, professions and anything else we needed. There was a real sense that we were going to do something great.

Growing up:

It wasn’t long we had 5-man dungeon runs every night and anyone that came online would find a group really easily, we were getting all the gear we could in anticipation of our first real challenge: Naxxramas, a zone that would make or break us. A month after the expansion had launched we had enough “geared” 80s to head into Naxx … And wipe the whole night without killing a single boss. We took it in stride after a great motivational speech from our Guild Leader we went back to the drawing board and got more gear from heroics, OS and VoA. By the next raid lock out period we were ready for our next crack at taming the beast. That night we cleared spider wing and one more boss, everyone had gotten some piece of loot and we felt great, so great we spent as much time talking about that raid in vent afterward as we did actually in the instance. We were on fire and the world of Azeroth was our oyster.

The glory “years”:

After that week we started on the road to conquer the rest of that place we had most bosses on Farm in no time. We were attracting more and more people every week and it didn’t take long to build up 2 complete 10-man raid teams. After that 25 Man Naxx was ours for the taking. Our players were gaining experience and everyone was getting more gear every day. We were updating our guild ranking every day in whichever web site was most used at the time and we managed to crack the top 10 server after only 2 weeks of raiding Naxx 25. That spurred the troops onward and KT was ours to pwn.

The beginning of the End:

Just when things were rocking and we were doing good that’s when we started seeing the problems. Like all guilds we had our share of problems, from Key Officers going AWOL for personal matters,  to squabbles over spoils and even the occasional public rivalries between the Tanks. We also had people leave the guild for a more “hard core” raiding guild after they got geared up with us and learned all the fights and the ones who left because we “didn’t raid enough” or at the “right times”. There was also a member who got his account hacked and even though Blizzard did eventually restore all it, he’s never really come back. Others just got tired of the game and simply needed a break be it because of real life constraints on their time or simply a genuine need for a break. I don’t know if it was any of these alone that did it but I am certain that the confluence of events led to our eventual collapse. I got to tell you the higher you climb, the longer the fall seems. One particular week we missed a raid because there simply wasn’t any Tank on-line, the next raid night we were short 3 healers. Then we said let’s resume raiding in 10 days or whenever the next patch comes out, but some people have a very short attention span and needed their raid fix then and there. Ultimately when patch day hit the guild just wasn’t the same and we had to start over again.

From the ashes:

Dominate was started from a web site that had one single goal in mind: to help the average player become better. We have, from the beginning, been brought together by an ideal and a common sense of “dominating and having fun doing it”. Because of that Dominate can never really die, those who believe in what we stand for will be there through thick and thin, the hard times and the good. Those who believe that helping people level (through hints and tips and knowledge and possibly a phenomenal leveling guide)  is just as important as gearing the new 80s and Raiding Ulduar or any new raid out there ( ToC, Onyxia, Icecrown etc.)  This, the true Spirit that holds us together, can weather any storm.

Copy and paste this back to back a couple times with different people and it could very well be the story of any guild on any server.

Starting over … Again:

Gavinn and Lawbringer have both stepped down from the day-to-day leadership of Dominate and some of the more experienced players and some newer ones that have believed in what we stand for since the beginning have stepped up to the plate to rebuild in the Spirit of Dominate. With the help of others we are rebuilding from the ground up the guild was formed over a year ago with one purpose: a Casual Raiding/Training Guild. We have really high hopes and even higher expectations. Whether  you are in the middle of leveling your first toon or if you’re at your 5th 80, we have need of every class to rebuild the Dominate guild on Fenris Horde side.

Getting it Right:

If you like helping out other people and don’t mind answering the occasional noob questions or if you’d always wanted to ask some noob question but have always been scared of the backlash in trade chat, then Dominate is for you. If you are sick of the drama and would like to play the game in a friendly, cuss-free atmosphere where respect and a positive attitude are the primary criteria of entry, you’re more then welcome to join us : Horde side on Fenris server(/who Dominate)

As of this writing:

1. Dominate GM: Anibow (DK)
2. Second in command/Raid Leader: Dindrane (Prot/Holy Paladin … aka Agorg)

These are some of the things that we have learned along the way and have decided to incorporate into the current cycle in order to grow:

• Better communication between the guild leadership, its members and officers.
• Using the Spirit of DominateYourServer.com as the unwritten rule of the guild.
• Actually helping players of all levels (including 1-79) learn to play their class and play as a team.
• Organize runs for lower levels .
• Help the newer 80s get gear as well as experience raiding.
• Getting every 80 their free Bronze drake … I like free.
• Restructuring the guild staff so that all jobs get done by those who enjoy them.
• Restructuring ranks in a visually meaningful manner.
• Getting some PvP in there as well (Premade BGs, daily PvP, Holiday PvP etc)

That’s not to say that we’re perfect but we do try to make a difference wherever we can.  We are once again on the look out for like minded people that believe in what we stand for. Wherever you are in the world of Azeroth: always DOMINATE!

29 Comments » ~ ~ Random Post

We’ve told you before to level cooking alongside of Fishing. You’ve heard us say over and over that cooking can get you some gold and how every class in the game can benefit something from cooking. You’ve also heard us tell you how big of a pain in the @$$ it is. Then THIS IS YOUR CHANCE. We’ll show you how to get cooking to 350 in an hour.  There are complete guides to the actual festival itself out there but this article will focus exclusively on the cooking aspect of it.

It all has to do with Pilgrim Festival. This will require you to run from Undercity(Stormwind) to Orgrimar(IronForge) and ThunderBluff(Darnassus) but will net you a bit of gold and those precious cooking levels that are such a pain to get. Assuming you’ve got no skill in cooking you’ll want to get to Undercity and train up cooking at the Pilgrim Festival Cooking trainer.  Buy the Bountiful cookbook from the vendor and open it up to pick up the 5 Festival recipes and learn the first one right away: Spice Bread Stuffing

Undercity/Stormwind

Buy:

• 60x Simple Flour
• 60x Mild Spices
• Create 60x Spice Bread

The recipe will go gray on you at 40 but you’ll get to use the extra you buy to make the last few points.  Once you’ve got 60x Spice Bread, combine it with 60xAutomnal Herbs (from Pilgrim Vendor) to make 60xSpice Bread Stuffing and get to 100 cooking (or a little more).  Don’t forget to train up cooking before you get to 75 cooking skill or you’ll have to re-cook the bread. Learn Pumpkin pie recipe (at 100)

Buy

• 70x Ripe Tirisfal(Elwynn Pumpkin)
• 70x Honey
• Create 70x Pumpkin Pie

Again remember to train up cooking when you get to 125 (but before 150).  Once you hit 160 cooking, learn the Cranberry Chutney recipe and travel to your next destination (Orgrimar/Ironforge).

Orgrimar/Ironforge

Buy:

• 70x Tangy Southfury Cranberries(TangyWetland Cranberries)
• 70x Honey
• Create 70x Cranberry Chutney

Again remember to train up cooking when your skill reaches 200 and before it hits 225. Learn the Candied Sweet Potato recipe at 220 cooking and move on to your next destination: ThunderBluff/Darnassus

Thunder Bluff/Darnasuss

Buy:

• 70x Mulgore Sweet Potato (Teldrasil Sweet Potato)
• 70x Honey
• Create 70x Candied Sweet Potato

Train cooking between 275 and 300 and return to Undercity/ Stormwind for the last part of this adventure.  This part will require you run around like a turkey after … well … Wild Turkeys

Go outside Undercity/Darnassus and kill Wild Turkeys and remember to loot them, you’ll need quite a few so don’t be shy they are scattered all over the start area and spawn rather quickly.

Back to Undercity/Stormwind

Buy:

• 140x Honey
• 70x Automnal Herbs
• kill 70x Wild Turkeys
• Create 70x SlowRoasted Turkeys

Voila! Your cooking skill should be at 350 or a little above (355?) In the process you’ve managed to accomplish all the seasonal cooking quests and have enough for 3 days’ worth of dailies. All of which should buy you more then enough Turkey Shooters to turn all the rogues you need for the achievement (assuming you don’t miss too often)

This is BY FAR the cheapest and most effective way to level cooking you’ll ever get. The recipes don’t go yellow until you’re 10 pts away from the next one (which is whyI make you buy 70 instead of the minimum 60 you really need). To be honest I didn’t do the math on this and it’s so cheap that I’m not even going to bother. 5-10 gold ? … the amount is infinitesimal, ridiculous even.

Regardless whether you do the seasonal events or not this is a DOMINATING way to level cooking and it only comes around once/year so better take advantage of it now or you’ll regret it come Christmas when you need to get your MerryMaker title. Don’t say we didn’t warn you.

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Just because we publish cutting edge articles about new content, doesn’t mean we can forget about the basics. There is something within World of Warcraft that is more important to you than even the Sword of a Thousand Truths. That thing is your User Name and Password and more recently your email address and password. All of your weapons, armor and loot and all of your gold mean nothing if someone can steal it from you. That is why your account security should be the most absolutely important thing to you. I would like to stop seeing “I’ve been hacked” forever and I am sure you would like to stay safe as well.

The basic principle of account security is this:  the ne’er do well individuals want what is inside of your account and they don’t want to go through all the trouble of getting it. Often times their plans are extremely transparent and its up to you to stop them in their tracks. With a few various added practices you can prevent most every form of account security problems. You can’t prevent them all though and this guide can’t act as a complete shield for them all but you can make the chance so small you cant see it.

Account security comes in three phases. Your primary line of defense is your Email and Password. Second is your security question and making sure your Email account and your WoW account passwords are not the same really helps.  Third is your CD key and any other information that can be used to verify its your account.

If you do get hacked though Blizzard’s top notch customer service is there to help out. They can restore your account and give you a new password. They can even restore any goods stolen. ( see more on this later). Although, its best never to let someone up to no good get that far in the first place.

A secure email/password combo starts with having a unique email address and password.

The following is from Microsoft and can greatly benefit your password security.

6 steps to build a strong password

The strongest passwords look like a random string of characters to attackers. But random strings of characters are hard to remember.

Make a random string of characters based on a sentence that is memorable to you but is difficult for others to guess.

1. Think of a sentence that you will remember
   Example: “My son Aiden is three years old.”
2. Turn your sentence into a password
   Use the first letter of each word of your memorable sentence to create a string, in this case: “msaityo”.
3. Add complexity to your password or pass phrase
   Mix uppercase and lowercase letters and numbers. Introduce intentional misspellings.
   For example, in the sentence above, you might substitute the number 3 for the word “three”, so a password might be “MsAi3yo”.
4. Substitute some special characters
   Use symbols that look like letters, combine words, or replace letters with numbers to make the password complex.
   Using these strategies, you might end up with the password “M$8ni3y0.”
5. Test your new password with Password Checker
   Microsoft Password Checker evaluates your password’s strength as you type.
6. Keep your password a secret
   Treat your passwords with as much care as the information that they protect.

Blizzard to the rescue: Blizzard Authenticator.

The Battle.net Authenticator is (but shouldn’t be) an optional tool that offers Battle.net account users an additional layer of security to help prevent unauthorized account access. This includes World of Warcraft players who log in to the game using a Battle.net account.  The Authenticator application itself is a small program that you install and access on your cell phone or mobile device. For the complete Q&A go to the  Official Blizzard Q&A.

Speaking from personal experience here, having this little thing on my accounts (yes, plural) I can certainly vouch for the security. As a matter of fact it’s a pain in the glutius maximus (anatomical body part) to have to re-type the randomly changing numbers whenever you get disconnected from the server. But if it’s that big of a pain for you, think of how much of a pain it’s going to be for the “hacker”

The concept is really sound, most companies actually force their users to go through some similar hoops, RSA security cards etc. The Blizzard (Mobile) Authenticator uses much the same technology.

Blizzard Authenticator

The Mobile Authenticator can be downloaded Here for your iPhone or other hand held device follow the link for the list of supported units. and is free (I am certain it’s free for iPhone and iPod touch, not sure about other versions)

The Key-chain Authenticator can be purchased from these Official Blizzard web sites:

• Here (US only)
• Here (Canada, Australia, NZ and Latin America)
• Here (Europe)
• Here (Korea)

Certainly a worth while investment if you’re still willing to pay a monthly fee to play the game, paying a fraction of that montly fee one-time to protect all you’ve acomplished sounds like a no-brainer to me

Another problem these days are the people who go to websites spammed in trade chat. These include gold buying sites and “your a winner of a new mount from Blizzard.” Don’t fall for these things as you can be hacked very easily by doing so. So if you want to protect your toons, like your 10k DPS specialist or the Tank that can’t be killed follow simple common sense practices and enjoy your new found security.

23 Comments » ~ ~ Random Post

Products We Love – Razer Naga, The Ultimate WoW Gaming Mouse

Click Here To Order Yours!

We’re a big fan of nifty peripherals here at DYS, just in case you hadn’t noticed, but every now and then even we get blown away.  Every month or two we test a new product in the market to see if it offers something more for our readers.  In order to get a review at this site, the thing really has to add something to the wow experience for the novice and pro alike.  Not making our cut doesn’t mean it’s a bad product, just that it doesn’t meet our Dominating and demanding flavor.

But every now and again we come across something that actually changes the way we play.  The Sennheiser headphones are great, but won’t really make you a terrific player.  The G13 game pad will – I still use both of them every single time I play.  But the Razer Naga blows away everything we’ve ever reviewed by such a huge margin that it’s a little hard to know where to start saying just how good it really is.

First things first, then.  It’s a standard size mouse (even though the button field looks pretty intimidating in the pic above) with 12 extra keys on the thumb side (for righties anyway).  That is the big difference between the Naga and every other mouse on the planet.  It has the standard left, right, scroll, scroll click, four and five buttons as most gaming mice – but adds twelve more keys for your thumb.  One look and we KNEW we had to give it a spin.

How Does It Feel?

In just ten seconds it was apparent it was the most comfortable mouse ever.  It’s like holding hands with your sweetheart.  The texture is just smooth enough to be soft, just matte enough to be completely slip free.  Not only do your index and middle finger glide into the perfect rest position, but there is a little shelf for your ring finger and a cup for your pinky that actually make it more relaxing to have your hand on your mouse than anywhere else.  You hate to let go of the thing to type.  So in the tactile area the Naga gets a 10+ out of 10.

Cursor Response

The drivers are super easy to install both on Mac and PC.  The interface is clean and offers a degree of movement control that is nothing short of outstanding.  It supports Dpi ranges from 100 to 5600 – which is a range from nearly dead turtle to fighter jet speed.  You can also adjust the acceleration factor and frequency response over broad ranges.  But the really slick part is that you can set it to control the X and Y axis Dpi independently.  That is a real WoW factor.  If you use a wide screen setup it is so nice to have the cursor move faster from left to right than up and down.  Cursor response and setup = 10 of 10

Movement and Function

Most mice have a few little slip pads on the bottom and a big bright lazer or whatever.  This beauty has a slip ring around the entire perimeter of the bottom, which makes it glide like butter.  It even has an extra slip ring that completely surrounds the invisible lazer orifice.  One thing is for certain, if your mousing surface isn’t completely clean, you’ll know it in about half a second. (we also prefer the Lazer exact mat for all our mice, but it’s especially nice with the Naga).  I prefer a free-wheeling mouse, but since very few have that option I can’t deduct too much for the incremental scroll.  The four and five buttons are right up at the very front and absolutely WILL give your a hand cramp if you try to use them very often, but we’ll get to why this makes almost no difference later.  And, finally the button clicks are easy enough to make without much force, but firm enough to avoid lots of accidental clicks – pretty much perfect.  Movement and function = 9 of 10

Extra Juice

Now we get to the good stuff.  Those 12 extra buttons are so good it’s not even fair to rate this thing against other mice.  It turns all those other mice into meece.  There’s everything else – and then there’s the Naga.  I pitched my G3 in a drawer for good and didn’t have a qualm in the world about doing so – and I loved that mouse.  Even apart from the extended functionality, the Naga is just a much better overall mouse, but those extra keys are WAY past incredible.  And then I played with them.

I fully intended to try to use as little hyperbole as possible, but that’s completely impossible in this situation.  Compared to every other mouse I’ve ever used – and I go through mice like a tomcat, the Naga would have no peer, leaving even the G3 completely in the dust.  But those extra buttons make it so different that it becomes completely unfair to all the other mice in the world.  If the G3 (a really good mouse) rated a 45 out of 50, the Naga (even without the buttons) would have raised the bar to 60, and that’s no kidding.  Those 12 new buttons put the bar at 100, and we’ll put the Naga right there 95 out of 100, which means there really isn’t any way to compare apples to apples.  everything else just got pwned.

That extra button pad automatically binds to either the: 1 through = keys on your keyboard or the number pad keys, whichever you prefer.  I already had bar one and two in Bartender assigned to those suckers as it is, so with the flip of a switch I can use my one mouse to toggle 24 keys – it’s so slick you have to use it to believe it.  And then comes Vuhdo – yikes.

Plug this thing into Vuhdo and you are one little macro command away from complete and total healing Domination.  And, in reality, it could almost make the choice between Healbot, Grid/Clique and Vuhdo closer to meaningless than ever before.  We’ll discuss that macro in the next article since it’s so slick and useful for so many other situations, but just know that you probably would never use it nearly as much without the Naga.

You’re Wasting Time Here!

All there is left to say is get one.  Get one right this minute.  Do not pass go, do not argue, just get it and Dominate.  Ask for it for Thanksgiving, your birthday, Christmas and New Years.  Beg, borrow, cheat, lie, steal or work like a fiend until you can get one.  Get up from your chair right now and go to the store – yes, it’s THAT good.  Once you plug this dude in, you’ll find 50 new ways it can improve your WoW life in about 5 minutes.  I am seriously excited about this thing, as if you couldn’t tell, but it really is the single best gaming peripheral I have ever seen.

If you can’t stand it, and we’ve done our job, you can click on the pic at the top of this article (or below) to go directly to Amazon and get one for yourself.  You don’t have to use our link, of course, but honestly, once you use the Naga you’ll never know how you played with anything else.   Go get one, and bring your Domination to a whole new level of pwn.

Order The Razer Naga Now

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This is a little last minute folks but I wanted to get it out there as soon as I could verify the accuracy of the article.

Since Blizzard instituted the 2hr return policy on BoP items, it is now possible to complete the BrewMaster Achievement in a week or so. and here is how you do it:

Start the festivities and do all the available quests you can, save up all your coins until you have 350 of them (200 for the chest, 100 for the boots and 50 for the hat).

This requires doing the dailies every day for the 25 coins and the ram racing barrel hauling one for anywhere from 10 to 26 more coins, depending on how well you can race your Ram.

Once you’ve got your 350 coins (or more) you can:

• Buy the 3 pieces of clothing you need
• Get completely smashed
• Hearth to Dalaran
• /dance
• Take the portal to Org/IF
• Return your clothing for a full refund
• Purchase the brew of the month club membership
• read it to start the quest.
• Complete that quest for the BrewMaster Achievement.
• Buy the pet with left over coins

I’ll keep this one short and sweet.

Happy Dominating BrewFest !

6 Comments » ~ ~ Random Post