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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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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Best DPS Raiding Spec For Elemental Shaman In Best In Slot T9 Level Gear

Last time we looked at the Ele Shaman in T8 gear, and this time we are turning up the heat all the way to true end game gear.  Shaman itemization gets better in T9 gear, which means Blizz did a little better job at balancing things out a bit.  T9 Shaman in Elemental spec with BiS gear still will not match the very best geared mages and rogues, but this spec will do just 300 DPS shy of even the most ridiculous cookie-cutter mage.  And no, AoE on big gobs of trash doesn’t count – we’re talking single target boss fights, since they are the only things that count.

Profile

This time you’ll see all the epic gems and the Meta activated.  We’re not sure about the glyph choice for the T8 set either, that’s just what the Simcraft engine says does the most DPS.  You can expect about 9,500 DPS in an extended boss fight in perfect stand still and cast conditions.  Since that hardly ever happens, at least you can expect to do a good, solid 5-7k depending on how much moving you have to do.  For instance, you’ll do a lot more DPS on the Twin Valkyr than Beasts just because you move so much less in that fight and can just sit there and blast away.  The toon in the sim also uses enchanting, but you could definitely get more mileage out of JC/BS, but that is just common knowledge right?

http://profiler.wowhead.com/?profile=14636542

Glyphs

• flame shock
• Lava
• lightning bolt

Priorities

As always, throw the idea of rotations out the window and look at priorities. You’ll return to more of a traditional cycle in T9 and use Chain Lightning, but you need to stick with Thunderstorm when it’s up (which means getting in range and can get tricky, but you’ll figure it out) as well as stay on top of searing totem drops.

• flask type = frost wyrm
• food type = fish feast
• flametongue weapon
• water shield
• mana spring totem
• wrath of air totem
• speed potion
• elemental mastery
• flame shock
• lava burst (only when flame shock is active)
• searing totem
• chain lightning
• lightning bolt
• thunderstorm

Damage Sources

Here you can see the graphs for how all of this works over the course of a fight.  You’ll notice that although Searing Totem doesn’t do a huge percentage of overall damage, it does the most damage per execute time.  This means that it does more damage for the time it takes to cast  – you spend one global cooldown for 60 seconds of damage output.  Pretty efficient if you ask me.  Those two trinkets are seriously potent as well, but good luck getting your hands on even one of them since every PD spell-caster in the game would sell  their mother to get them.

Pawn Scale

( Pawn: v1: "Shaman_T9_57_14_00_258": HitRating=3.94, SpellDamage=1.78, CritRating=1.42, HasteRating=1.28, Intellect=0.50, RedSocket=45.71, YellowSocket=62.97, BlueSocket=31.48 )

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Best DPS Build For Maximum DPS With Best In Slot T8 Level Gear For Elemental Shaman In WotLK

Since we’ve had so little overall information about the Shaman class, we thought it would make a perfect beginning for our DPS profiling series.  Even if you don’t have a Shaman, you’ll probably end up being surprised at a couple of the points you’ll find here, and it will make you foam at the mouth to get the post for your class and favorite build.

The elemental Shaman has been a little low on the DPS charts for a while, and is showing no signs of making a serious run at rogues and mages anytime soon.  However, that doesn’t mean you won’t want one in the raid.  An ele shammy will buff the locks and mages another 500 dps or so from totems, so they get part of their DPS from the buffs they give to other classes.  The more casters you have, the more you need an Elemental Shaman in the raid.

It turns out that the real key to best DPS in T8 gear for the Elemental Shaman is to skip the T8 legs and one spell completely.  It will make a huge difference in your DPS overall, although this will certainly apply to single target pulls such as Boss fights and not trash quite so much.  So let’s take a look at the build and show you how to begin using these guides.

First, take a look at the build profile from Wowhead:

http://profiler.wowhead.com/?profile=13000116

When the page loads, you’ll see the doll slots all filled up with best in slot gear, so you can know what you’re looking for from all those dungeon runs.  We will post the T9 current version next, but for those of you without a bagillion Emblems of Triumph and no Trophies the T8 version of BiS is a great place to start.  At the bottom you will also see all the enchants and gems you will want to use (or epic versions of course where available).

In the tab at the top you will see the talent tab where you can check out the full build along with glyphs choices, although the glyphs are also listed here:

Glyphs:

• flame shock
• lava
• lightning bolt

The next thing you need to do is know what to use and when.  Don’t think of things in terms of rotions any more, but rather in terms of priorities.  In the following list, use things in the order of the list from top to bottom, refreshing as things higher up in the priority list become available.

Priorities:

• flask type = frost wyrm
• food type = fish feast
• flametongue weapon
• water shield
• mana spring totem
• wrath of air totem
• speed potion
• flame shock
• lava burst (only if flame shock is active on the target)
• searing totem
• lightning bolt
• thunderstorm

Now, of course you’re going to drop all of your totems at once, but you will need to refresh searing totem every minute.  The other thing you will notice is that you will not be using chain lightening at all in this spec.  Rather, you will just cycle through and hot flame shock every time the cool-down is up and fill in the spaces with LB, and oddly enough, Thunderstorm.  Thunderstorm will require you to be almost in melee range, and as you can see in the charts below it actually barely registers when it comes to damage.  In other words, TS will only come into play in a few fights but can fill up a cool-down in the rotation from time to time.  You can see the damage graphs from the Simulationcraft Wiki for all of this below.

And, finally, you can always make gear choices a whole lot easier with Pawn.  You can download pawn from either WowMatrix or Curse and keep it updated easily enough.  Pawn will give every piece of potential gear a score while you work toward best in slot so that you can keep the same build and priority list while you collect gear that matches the best in slot stats closely enough.  This will keep you from having to tweak and test your rotation and gear choices and get used to what you are doing.

Pawn Scale:

( Pawn: v1: “Shaman T8 57-14-00″: HitRating=3.02, SpellDamage=1.59, HasteRating=1.39, CritRating=1.13, Intellect=0.38, RedSocket=36.85, YellowSocket=48.32, BlueSocket=24.16 )

So there you have the Max DPS build for the Elemental shaman in T8 equivalent best in slot gear.  Next time we’ll bring the Shaman up to T9 level and then move on to the other classes one at a time.  As always, you can leave your requests for which class we do next in this thread and we’ll post the most requested in order to help you Dominate.

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Dominate Your Server Launches Alliance Faction Guild In Two Flavors

You’ve been asking about it for a while now, and Dominate Your Server is always listening.  Last October we launched the Dominate Horde guild on the Fenris realm, and now it’s time we did the same for Alliance.

We’ve been getting ready in advance this time, and have a couple of options for all of you ally freaks out there.  First of all, we took a little flak for the horde guild being on a pansy-wansy PvE server.  None of that this time.  Our Alliance guild is on a full out warfare PvP server.

Our experience with the Horde guild also taught us that we needed to be pretty certain that we picked the right time zone so that both late night and early raiders can all get in on the action, so the new server is Pacific Time to ensure that those folks on the East Coast have a good shot at getting their fill of raiding at peak server pop times.

Next, we also wanted to make sure that everyone got the experience they needed from the guild.  We have a lot of casual players in Dominate, but also a group of pretty serious folks who really want to kick some butt and take some names.  To make sure that everyone has a place without rubbing each other the wrong way, we’re not just announcing one Alliance guild – but two.

For the casual player who just wants to hang out with folks and have a good time with people who have their WoW screwed on straight, thee is the DYS guild.  DYS will be the nub and learning friendly place to come hang out and get geared up or hone your skills until you are ready to join a much more elite group of raiding folks.

From the very top of the Dominate guild, a group of our senior officers have agreed to defect to Alliance and have formed a sister guild – Dyssention.  Dyssention is a hard core raiding team with one goal in mind – clear content now and let Arthas beware.  These guys will be raiding all the time, I kid you not, and will have some of the best players we’ve ever seen.  You’ll need to apply for Dyssention and you can get details for that during the first live DYS guild meeting.

The meeting will be this Friday at 6pm server time, which (in case you missed it) is pacific.  That means 9pm on the east coast.  If you’re out of the country you’ll need to figure it out on your own, but I’m sure you’re used to that by now.  We’ll meet right outside the front gate of Stormwind to sign everyone up.  So come and join the fun, or come to find out more about Dyssention.  Either way, DYS wants to give fair and equal treatment to both sides in the Horde vs. Alliance debate.

And even though Law and Gavin are snowed under with an exciting new project these days, you’ll be able to catch them sneaking about the Ally guilds in the coming weeks as Dyssention clears content like a bunch of crazed dogs.  So come meet the crew, and make some new friends with DYS and Dyssention this Friday at 6pm server time on the Kalecgos realm.  Whether you already DOminate, or want to learn how, you’re sure to find a place in DYS.  See everyone Friday!

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FOR THE HOrde. . .Wait, What Side Am I on Now?

We’ve been talking bout it for some time, and it really seemed that it would take a lot longer than it has for this to take effect.  But this afternoon Blizzard released the news that the faction chnge service has gone live.  Since it’s big news, but there isn’t a LOT of news, we’ve borrowed from the official Faction Change FAQ page since it represents the most up-to-date and complete information available.

What is the Faction Change service?

Our Faction Change service is designed to allow existing characters the opportunity to change their designated faction (from Horde to Alliance or Alliance to Horde).

How do I begin the Faction Change process?

To begin the Faction Change process, please visit the Account Management page, select the Faction Change option, and carefully follow the instructions provided.

How much does this service cost?

Each Faction Change costs $30.00 USD (not including applicable taxes). This covers a single Faction Change for a single character.

Is this service taxed? If so, how can I tell if my purchase will be taxed?

Players in select states in the U.S. may be subject to taxation when using our Faction Change service. This list includes, but is not limited to:
- New Mexico
- Texas

Can I change multiple characters’ factions at once?

No. The Faction Change service only allows one change per transaction. If you would like to change multiple characters’ factions, you will need to pay for each one separately.

At what level can I change a character’s faction?

Characters level 10 and above are eligible for a Faction Change. Death Knights will be unable to change their faction until level 60.

Will PvP realm restrictions prevent me from changing a character’s faction?

No. PvP realms no longer possess any faction-based restrictions. You may now play Horde and Alliance characters on any realm you wish.

Will this service allow me to customize a character and select a different name once its faction has been changed?

Yes.  Each Faction Change purchase will also provide the target character with an included re-customization and optional name change.

When I change factions, can I select any race for the character?

You may select any race of the new faction provided that it is available for the character’s class.

Does that mean I can use this service to change the character back to its original faction?

Absolutely; however, this will require purchasing another Faction Change.

When I change a character back to its original faction, can I select any new race?

Yes. As noted previously, though, you will only be able to select a race that is available to the character’s class.

Will I be able to select Cataclysm races and class combinations for a character once they’re available in game?

Details are not available at this time. As development continues, though, we hope to provide more information.

How often can I change a character’s faction?

You may change a character’s faction every 60 days.

What happens after I initiate a Faction Change?

Once your payment has processed and after you have remained logged out of the game for at least 30 minutes, you will see a new button to the left of the character’s name upon next login. Clicking on this button will allow you to select the character’s new faction and race, as well as customize the character’s look and name. These steps will greatly resemble the character creation process.
To complete the Faction Change, press the button labeled “Click to change your character’s faction” and confirm your selections. If you do not wish to change the character’s faction immediately, you may do so at a later time.

What will happen to the character’s old name?

If you opt to change the character’s name, the name will be locked from use on the realm for 90 days. You are not required to change the character’s name, though; this is simply an option we provide included with the Faction Change.

What will happen to the character’s equipment when I change its faction?

Equipment which is not considered faction-specific will remain unchanged by this process. Faction-specific equipment, however, will be automatically exchanged for a cross-faction equivalent. You can view a full list of faction-specific equipment and their cross-faction equivalents here.
**Please note that neither enchants nor socketed gems will be affected by an exchange.**

Will the rest of the inventory (materials, alternate currency, etc) be affected in any way?

As with equipment, items which are not considered faction-specific will remain unchanged by this process. Faction-specific items will be exchanged for a cross-faction equivalent. You can view a full list of faction-specific items here.

What will happen to the character’s mounts when I change its faction?

Mounts which are not considered faction-specific will remain unchanged by this process. Faction-specific mounts will be exchanged for a cross-faction equivalent. You can view a full list of faction-specific mounts and their equivalents here.

What will happen to the character’s non-combat pets when I change its faction?

Non-combat pets will not be affected by this process and will be available once the character’s faction change completes. This even includes faction-specific non-combat pets.

What will happen to the character’s achievements when I change its faction?

Achievements which are not considered faction-specific will remain unchanged by this process. Faction-specific achievements will be exchanged for a cross-faction equivalent. You can view a full list of faction-specific achievements and their equivalents here. Please note that all achievements relating to the Argent Tournament will be reset.

What will happen to the character’s titles when I change its faction?

Titles which are not considered faction-specific will remain unchanged by this process. Faction-specific titles will be exchanged for a cross-faction equivalent. You can view a full list of faction-specific titles and their equivalents here. Please note that all titles relating to the Argent Tournament will be reset.

What will happen to the character’s reputation levels when I change its faction?

Upon changing factions, the reputation level associated with the character’s previous race will become the reputation level of the new race. All other racial reputations will be converted according to the following chart:

• Orc (Orgrimmar) ↔ Human (Stormwind)
Tauren (Thunder Bluff) ↔ Gnome (Gnomeregan Exiles)
Undead (The Undercity) ↔ Night Elf (Darnassus)
Troll (Sen’jin) ↔ Dwarf (Ironforge)
Blood Elf (Silvermoon) ↔ Draenei (The Exodar)

• Additional faction-specific reputations will be converted into their cross-faction equivalents (if a cross-faction equivalent exists). You can view a full list of qualifying faction-specific reputations and their equivalents here.

• Faction neutral reputations will not be affected by this process, and faction-specific reputations which do not possess an equivalent will be lost.

What will happen to the character’s quests when I change its faction?

Quests which are active in the character’s log at the time of the Faction Change will be cleared and all quest items associated with these quests will be destroyed.
With this, completed quests that are considered faction-specific will be removed from the list of completed quests and no longer count towards any running “quests completed” totals. Should you ever elect to change back to the original faction, the original list of completed quests will be restored. Completed quests that are considered faction-neutral or possess a cross-faction equivalent will be unaffected or automatically exchanged without any detriment to the quest completed totals.

What will happen to the character’s flight paths when I change its faction?

All flight points associated with the character will be reset and you will receive a new list of flight points which are appropriate for the level and new faction. Please note that as the Dun Niffelem, Shadow Vault, and Crusader’s Pinnacle flight points are associated with faction-specific quest lines, they will not be automatically provided. To regain these flight points, the character will need to re-complete the appropriate quests.

What will happen to the character’s “Friends” and “Ignore” lists when I change its faction?

The character’s “Friends” and “Ignore” lists will be reset following a Faction Change.

What will happen to the character’s Guild and Arena team(s)?

The character will not be affiliated with any Guild or Arena team following a Faction Change. Guild and Arena team tabards will be removed and Arena team ratings will be reset as a result. If the character is a Guild Master, you will not be able to perform a Faction Change.

What will happen to the character’s honor and Arena points?

Any honor points, Marks of Honor, and lifetime honorable kills will not be affected by this process. Earned Arena points will carry over, as well; however, any pending Arena points accrued after the last maintenance period, but before your Faction Change is initiated, may be lost.

What will happen to the character’s mail and auctions?

Active mail and auction items will prevent a character from Faction Changing, so please be sure to pull all mail from the mailbox and take down any auction items prior to initiating the Faction Change process. These items will be handled as normal inventory.

Is there a gold limit for Faction Changes?

Yes. Characters possessing too much gold for their designated level bracket will not be eligible for a Faction Change. Please use the following table as reference.
Level 10 to 30: 300 gold
Level 31 to 50: 1000 gold
Level 51 to 69: 5000 gold
Level 70 to 80: 20000 gold

Where will the character be located after the Faction Change is complete?

Once the Faction Change is complete, the character will be moved to the capital city of its new race.

What will happen to the character’s Armory profile?

Once you have completed the Faction Change process, the character’s Armory profile will be updated to reflect any faction, racial, gender, or name changes. Please note that our Armory system is still in beta at this time, so the character’s profile may not immediately display the updated information.

Will this service share a cooldown with the Character Transfer, Character Name Change, or Character Re-Customization services?

No. The Faction Change service will not share its cooldown with any of these services.

Can I use this service to change race on my existing faction?

No. We will be releasing a Race Change service in the near future for this purpose.

Will this service share a cooldown with the Race Change service?

Yes.

Can I purchase a Faction Change for a character that has a pending Name Change or Re-Customization or is in the process of being transferred?

No. Before you may initiate a Faction Change for a character, please complete any pending Name Changes, Re-Customizations, or Transfers. These pending transactions will prevent you from initiating a Faction Change.

When will I be charged for the character’s Faction Change?

You will be charged immediately upon pressing the confirmation button on the Faction Change page.

Is there any way to cancel a Faction Change while the process is pending?

Because your payment method will be charged immediately upon confirmation, you will be unable to cancel the process once you have pressed the confirmation button and the Faction Change process is underway.

Is there any way to reverse a Faction Change once it’s completed?

No. Once a Faction Change is done, it is permanent. You may, however, purchase another Faction Change to switch back to the original faction once the service cooldown time has elapsed.

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Part 1 Of Our Coverage Of The New WoW Expansion: Cataclysm

All of the information regarding the upcoming expansion to WoW is going to blow your socks off.  It’s so good that WoW is going to be like a whole new game, and that’s and understatement of the highest order.  When Cataclysm comes out, your whole WoW experience will be rejuvenated.  So many things are changing it’s a little tough to know where to start, but we drew from a hat and came up with something.

The new races look even better than we expected.  For the Alliance there are the Worgen.  The mysteries locked behind the Greymane wall in southern Silverpine are revealed as the great gate is torn down to reveal the human kingdom of Gilneas – but the humans are not merely human any more.  This new starting zone will run from level 1 to 15 and the graphics are fantastic.

For the Horde (sorry about that) we get the goblins of Khazan who have been shipwrecked on the Lost Islands between Kalimdor and the Eastern Kingdoms.  The zone looks an awful lot like Stranglethorn Vale, but you’ll get a big dose of the new water rendering all around the islands – and it is truly awesome.

So while we’re on the subject of the new races you should also know that every race in the game will get new class combinations.  There are some odd entries in the list – to be sure.  Dwarf Druid anyone?  How about a Tauren Paladin?  Combine all of that with the upcoming faction change service and there’s a pretty good likelihood that you might consider changing at least one of your alts to the other faction just to grab one of the new races without having to go from 1-85 (that’s right, the level cap is being raised – but more on that another time), although we recommend you not take shortcuts since Cataclysm will change almost everything about the entire world.

Here is the complete race/class matrix for your viewing pleasure:

When you find out just how much the entire game is going to change there is a good bet you’ll want to start all over from the very beginning and go from 1-85 on one of the new races.  The whole game is getting an overhaul from the ground up and nothing will be like it was pre-BC.  And that’s what we’ll talk about tomorrow.  Until then, just know that Cataclysm is certainly going to Dominate!

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Taking The Next Step Past Healbot To Advanced Raid Healing Coordination

Recently we did a review of the most popular healing addon – Healbot.  An alert reader (thank you Mr. Vilem) suggested an alternative.  After just a few minutes we were hooked on this fabulous addon.  We wanted to try it out in some of the more complex raid  healing situations and on every healing class before we did a review, and after two weeks the review is in – and Vuhdo rocks.

What Healbot does, Vuhdo does even better.  The only drawback we can see a relative newcomer having is the massive variety of configuration options available.  With that being said; however, the interface for making those adjustments is by far the best of any WoW addon we have ever used.  Frankly we’re not real sure how they did it.

Vuhdo (voodoo in case you were wondering how to say it) is a mouse-over spell execution addon much like Healbot.  And since it’s easier to configure, it has taken the place of Healbot on all of our toons.  As a matter of fact, it’s so good we are requiring Vuhdo for all of our guild healers – even if all they use it for is the clean way it provides vital information to all raid healers.

You see, for some time we have wanted an addon that could show us all of the HoTs on everyone in the raid in a clean and simple way that doesn’t take up the whole freakin’ screen.  Grid can show all that information for sure, but learning to make sense of all the goofy dots and blocks and bars is kinda silly.  If you get the grid panel big enough for it all to make sense you can’t really see where you’re going.

But with Vuhdo, you get miniature spell icons with countdown timers for not only your own HoTs, but also every other healer in the group or raid, regardless of whether they are using Vuhdo or not.  Did you catch that?  How slick can you get, eh?  No matter how many folks are in the PuG or BG, I can see every single HoT on every single target all the time, instantly, even if I’m the only one using Vuhdo.

This one feature has allowed our guild to coordinate healing better than ever before.  Our paladins can see the druid hots and priest bubbles before they reach over and spam heal someone who is in fine shape.  It has reduced over-healing in general by all classes by quite a bit, and paladin over-heals by a really big bit.

Plus, the bars and panels in Vuhdo can be almost infinitely customized, making nameplates far easier to read than with Healbot.  Beyond that, out of range indication is far easier to see at a glance, just because of the way you can configure the toon plates.  All in all, Vuhdo is absolutely the best combination of power (as opposed to Grid/Clique) and ease-of-use (as opposed to Healbot) you are likely to find.  We’ve never seen anything quite like it.

After using Vuhdo for two weeks, it takes everything Healbot can do and does it better.  It does everything Grid does and makes it easier to configure and see.  You can honestly sit back in your chair and power heal some the most difficult raid situations with one hand on the mouse – and yawn.  Not everyone will be able to do that, of course, but an accomplished healer will be amazed just how much more efficient they can be.

Putting your spells into Vuhdo is also easier.  You jut open your spell book and drag and drop.  It also allows for more options from the mouse clicks with more modifiers, as well as mouse-over heals for those of you who still want to push some buttons not on your mouse.  You can tell we like this one – a lot.

Vuhdo does pre-load several panels that we find unnecessary, but you might think you need them so we’ll leave it up to you.  If you decide you don’t like one of the panels or want more, they are easy to close and add from the options interface.  You’ll want to take some time to go through all of the option screens.

Another drawback is that there doesn’t seem to be a way to save a configuration to pre-load on other toons.  This means you’ll have to go through the setup process on every single toon, but in our book it’s worth it anyway.  Plus, not everyone plays on 4 different level 80’s either (not to mention the ally alts we’re leveling – sheesh).   Go grab Vuhdo HERE right away.  Learn it and share it with your guild mates.  You’ll be surprised at just how much easier and Dominating your healing can be.

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Abilities and How to rotate them in for maximum effectiveness.

Welcome back to the 5th article in this series dedicated to the tanking paladin. Today we’ll cover the rest of your abilities, how to use them as well as a more in-depth theory about rotation.

First, let’s go over some formalities: Seals, Judgments and Blessings. These abilities and combat mechanics define the Paladin class.

• Blessings: Kings, Might, Wisdom, Sanctuary: you’ve had them since early levels and should know by now what each class needs from you.  Obviously if you have more then one paladin you should share the work load. PallyPower is great for that. It allows the raid leader/assist to assign specific buffs to specific paladins. (Holy palys will end up using Wisdom, Ret palys will use Might and Prot palys can use Sanctuary)

1. Warrior: Might is overwritten by Battle shout so use: Kings
2. Hunter:  Kings or Might
3. Warlock: Kings to benefit from 10% to spirit
4. Priest: Usually Kings for DPS, Wisdom for Holy.
5. Shaman: Might for Enhance, Kings for Elemental and Wis for Resto
6. Death Knight: Kings or Might
7. Paladin: — You should be able to figure this one out by now —
8. Druid: Kings for Moonkin and Tree, Might for Kitty,  Kings for Bear
9. Rogue: Might
10. Mage: Kings or Wisdom

• Seals:  Seal of Vengeance/Corruption should be your only option while tanking anything serious. You can always get fancy and seal shift for special occasions, Wisdom to get mana back quick, Justice to stun non-boss type creatures, Light to get Health and untill 3.2 is released you can still use Blood for more DPS, assuming that your healers can keep up.
• Judgments: These are the most situational and really depend on a few things. We covered them in the last article but they are worth going over again. Always coordinate with the other palys in the group so ensure that at the very least, Wisdom and Light are being judged. Justice can be added in for good measure while tanking adds but I have never really used it

Rotation:

Depending what encounter you are about to enter and your function during that encounter, your rotation is subject to change. Let’s cover the standard rotation for a single target first.

Exorcism works really well but will not be worth much after 3.2 since it will have a cast time. So avenger’s shield is still your best pulling move, when you get in range you can then Judge whatever you want since it’s the next longest range ability (10 yds) and as soon as you’re in  melee range you want to really grab and hold aggro you need to get your Shield of Righteousness off as soon as possible. From that point on, just rotate your abilities: Hammer of the Righteous, Holy Shield , and Consecrate. Once that’s done ShoR, Judge  etc.

The basic concept is 96969.  9sec cd, 6sec cd, 9, 6, 9 etc.

By the time you’ve gone through your rotation once, the whole point is to always have an ability to use when your global cool down is up. Even though it may seem like a good idea at first to pop all your 9 sec abilities first to get them to come back faster after your second rotation, you’ll be looking for things to do while your longer ones come off cool down. 9 sec cd = 6 global cool downs while a 6 sec ability only requires 4 so you need to interlace them or your threat will get real skippy while you wait for abilities to become ready again or you will loose out on your potential maximum if they are ready and you’re not using them.

Generating threat should never be an issue for a paladin except early on when he’s under-geared, has no hit rating or expertise and is in a group with much better geared DPS that doesn’t look at their threat meters. It can also become an issue later on in Ulduar when the well-geared DPS can just sit there and prefect their rotation while the Paladin has to take time to move the mob/boss around or avoid bad/deadly things on the ground, but at that point the DPS should know what to do to prevent that.  All in all, on single target, threat is a non-issue if you know your rotation.

Essentially your rotation could look like this:

1. Judgment (9sec)
2. Shield of Righteousness (6sec)
3. Holy Shield (9sec)
4. Hammer of Righteousness(6sec)
5. Consecrate (9sec)

If you do the math and lay it out on paper you’ll see that the 6 sec CDs are up so you have to rotate them in differently on a first come first serve basis from that point on. After 18 seconds (12 Global Cool Downs) you will start all over from square 1.

Rotation: 1; 2; 3; 4; 5;    2, 1,    4, 3, 2,    5, 4; rinse and repeat

This may not seem obvious at first but I assure you there is a pattern if you look closely enough. Of course, you can, and should refresh your Sacred Shield every 30 or 60 seconds; pop Divine plea if it’s gone and taunt the mob that’s beating on your healer. The whole rotation is far from cast in stone and any tank should have enough awareness to see the big picture of the fight. Rotate your camera, zoom in, zoom out, do whatever it takes to keep an eye on your surroundings.

For multi-mob tanking, consider reversing your rotation so that your AoEs go off first, Avenger’s shield to pull them, Consecrate when they pull to you, Hammer of the Righteous when the first few are in range, Holy shield to boost the ones that hit you for the first time, then Judge and Shield of Righteousness whoever you have least threat on and tab target to build stacking Seal DoTs on every mob.

Now let’s go over your abilities and how to use them appropriately. If you’re new to the Paladin class these sound incredibly similar but I assure you that Holy Shield,  Divine Shield and  Divine Protection are not the same at all. In our last article we saw the “Bread and Butter” of threat generation along with DPS. Now you get the menu, the appetizer, all the trimmings as well as coffee and desert: Eat your heart out!

Before the pull:

Sacred Shield: Use this ability every single time – preferably BEFORE the pull since it will cost you 1 Global Cool Down (GCD) in your rotation. Having every hit reduced by 500 (600 with Divine Guardian Talent) makes this extremely useful and one of the reasons why paladins get Add Duty all the time. You can just sit there and chill with the mobs for a while before you need help or start taxing your healer’s mana pools. Not a bad idea to refresh between pull as well, just in case.

Seal of Vengeance/Corruption: This is your premiere tanking seal. It does less damage on a single target than Seal of the Martyr/Blood, but when you tab-target mobs to hold aggro, those stacks will build up and the DoT component will keep ticking. If you’re keeping more than one mob busy this is the seal for you and you should always change targets during your GCD, since most of your abilities affect more than one target anyway. After 3.2 this becomes your best seal.

Divine Plea: This is the very last ability you use before the pull. Put it on right after you do Sacred shield. It will generate quite a bit of your mana back and an OOM tank usually means a wipe. Since you’ve only got White melee swings that don’t require mana will not benefit from Righteous Fury, it makes them meaningless for threat generation.  Also note that unlike Warriors, paladins generate no threat from Dodge, Parry or Block (DP&B).

With those two abilities up you’re good to go.  Divine Plea is also the reason why paladins have this overwhelming urge to pull … pull now! It’s like a drug, and 45 seconds left on the cool down will feel like an eternity if it expires.

Defensive and Utility abilities include:

Hammer of Justice: This is your Primary Stun/Interrupt, this is the one that will work on Kel’Thuzad’s frost bolts and get you the Less-Rabi achievement. Although the stun component of this ability will not work on bosses the interrupt portion definitely will. You want to keep an eye out on the cast bar of those targets and interrupt whenever possible.

Hand of Salvation: Aggro reduction = 20%. Every tank should have Omen loaded and working all the time. As a tank it’s far more important than DPS meters like Recount because a tank is all about Threat. If you see someone catching up to you in threat you can ask them to use their threat reducing abilities first (Warlocks: SoulShatter, Hunters: Misdirection, Rogues: Tricks of the trade etc.) But when all else fails, this ability will greatly help out. Just remember, since it’s % based, it has more impact later on in the fight than it does early on.

Divine Sacrifice: Warn your healers before you pop this one and use at your own risk.  It may not save a healer caught in a void zone, but it just may allow some silly DPS to live through some of the more lethal AoE.

Righteous Defense: A last ditch effort to save your healer or some other silly DPS that pulled aggro, but can be useful in a bind.  Make sure to hit the mobs with something more sustainable like Hammer of Righteousness or Avenger’s shield for longer lasting threat.

Finally the Paladin also has this fine array of “Oh $H!T” buttons  that can/should be used if things go sideways and can really make the difference:

Oh $H1T buttons:

Lay on Hands: (15 minute CD with Glyph) Will restore you to full health. Every tank should keep an eye out on their health bar and be ready to pop this if they are losing health faster then the healers can bring it up.

Divine Protection: (2 min CD) Is the Paladin’s answer to a Warrior’s  Shield Wall. This ability should be used at the end of boss fights when they enrage Patchwork, Maexna or Razorscale to give the second tank more time to taunt him off when you can’t move to help your healers keep up. It can also be used as a starter on heavy pulls, like Grand Widow Faerelina with only 1 tank, achievement style or Emalon the storm watcher if you’re tanking the adds.

Divine Shield: (5 min CD) Commonly referred to as “The Bubble”, this is your final effort at staying alive. It’s an aggro wipe while it’s up, so people will die if you use this at the wrong time.  Just know that it can canceled by right clicking on it in your buff box. It gives you time for 2-3 Holy Light on yourself, a Healing Pot, and that’s about it.  It can come in quite handy in PvP.

Divine Intervention: (20 min CD) When everything else has failed, when it’s a wipe and you have at least one person still alive that can rez the group, this will kill you but save everyone a run back into the instance.

This covers the majority of what should be on your action bars or at least within easy reach should the situation call for it.  Remember, that as a tank, the life of the raid is (mostly) in your hands and the hands that heal you.  Keeping them happy and alive long enough to loot the bosses should be a priority for you.

This quick run down should give you a reasonable good idea of what you are capable of in a given circumstance. Now get out there and DOMINATE!

Articles in this thread:

Part 1 – The Basics

Part 2 – Combat Ratings

Part 3 – Armor: Mitigation vs. Avoidance

Part 4 – Hit Table and Threat Generation

Part 5  – Abilities and Rotation (You are here)

Part 6 – Professions and Upgrades

Part 7 – Buffs and Starter Gear

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Getting Better At Healing Doesn’t Get Any Easier Than This

I have to hit the reset button from time to time when it comes to DYS.  And that means listening to my own advice.  You see I preach all the time that MOST people who play WoW are probably on the low end of the casual gaming part of the bell curve.

I realize that not every post is going to please everyone, and that especially means you pros who are so far to the right end of the bell curve you’re barely hanging on with your 1900 arena rating and Yogg-Saron hard mode attempts (+1 tonight – WOOT!).  But for you, you need to realize you’ve forgotten more things about this game than most people will ever know.  And in a sense, that’s not a good thing.

So today I wanted to cover the one mod that you simply must have if you plan on healing in dungeons and raids – ESPECIALLY if you’re a nub.  You pros keep your mouths shut about using Grid and Clique or any other combination of things.  There really is nothing else out there that is hands-down better than Healbot.  Maybe you can do more with Grid, but in the end the expanded functionality makes me chuck it in the trash every few days.  I love it one minute and hate it the next – but I have always loved Healbot.

For a little while – I resisted Healbot.  I liked being able to target anyone I wanted and use any one of my heals just on them and check the unit frames for any other information I thought i needed.  It turns out it was only slower, and that’s just 5 man stuff.  When I got into 25’s I knew targeting was going to be an issue.  (That’s when I tried Grid the first time, and, well, NO).

So I looked around a bit at UI mods for healing.  And Healbot was by far the most popular.  So I gave it a shot.  Right out of the box it’s better, and if you tweak it a little bit in the settings – there’s nothing easier.  Now I can’t imagine healing without it and I’m actually thinking of using even fewer keystrokes and going to more clicks.

If you have never seen Healbot I’m already too far ahead.  So let’s go back to basics.  You can download Healbot here: Healbot.  Once you get it installed you’ll have this new little panel on your screen.

Left click the word “options” at the bottom of the panel to get this one:

For those of you who just want the facts and then let’s get back to playing – we’re going to walk you through our settings “AH Mastery Guide” Style.  Since we’ve been using Healbot for over a year, we’ve been through just about every situation there is with it and have tweaked our settings here and there to give us maximum visual effectiveness with as few “GOD I HATE THAT” moments as possible.  Here they are: (just make each of your pages look like each screenshot).

Obviously these are class specific, and this is where Healbot really shines.  With a 5 button mouse you can set it to do more than 25 different things.  All you have to do to customize it for your tastes is to select a mouse button with the radio buttons at the top, and then type in the name of the spell you want to use with that click.  Once you have them set, it’s as easy as hovering your mouse over the person’s name in the Healbot frame and clicking left for Rejuv, Right for Regrowth, Cleansing on the middle button, Wild growth on button 4 and maybe Swiftmend on button 5.  Since that’s about 90% of what I do I don’t even mess with the modified clicks much, but if you like having every single spell available with one click, Healbot makes it possible.

Here is another class specific portion, but Healbot “reads” your class and the options you’ll see in the pop-downs will only be those available to your class.  This one uses wacky colors to tell you at a glance who has debuffs.  We set ours to only show debuffs our toon can remove.

This is where you really make Healbot easy to read and see without getting it so large that it eats up your whole screen.  It’s not easy, it’s taken us hours of fiddling to get it just right.  You may not like it, but it’s a much better place to start than the standard settings.  Try these out for a while and THEN fiddle with them to suit your tastes.

We skipped the Tips tab, since there’s nothing all that great in those.  You can hover a nameplate for the big tooltip, but reading it in the middle of a boss fight is kinda dumb.  So in the buffs panel just make sure that you’re not monitoring for missing buffs in combat and then set all sorts of nifty ways to buff different classes and subsets of a raid.  it’s not as good as Pally Power, but it works pretty well.

The rest is pretty self-explanatory.  You get yourself into a dungeon and start click healing everything.  Be sure to check the spells you have inserted before you start.  Normally we use a small heal on left click, a big heal on right click, cure on the middle button and then OH CRAP stuff on buttons 4 and 5.  Past that, you’re on your own.

What you will find is that after using Healbot for a few weeks you’ll wonder how you ever healed without it.  Even if it only makes up 25% to %0% of your healing, it’s still going to make your response time better than if you’re just button healing.  And don’t brag that only noobs use Healbot and you do just fine without it.  That’s like saying you get to work just as well walking as driving your car – it’s hogwash.  If you’re fast just pushing buttons you’ll be even faster using a mod designed to make things even faster.

Now, Healbot doesn’t work quite as well in Battlegrounds, where members of a raid all all spread out from here to the end of a zone, but in raid situations it’s almost the only way to fly.  while you can pretty effectively heal five mans with buttons, you’ll find it much easier to heal in a raid (especially as a druid or Priest) with Healbot.  Yes, there are other options (and I’m 100% certain we’ll hear about them in the thread), but you really need to start with Healbot, and if you’re not using it you really should.  It will help you develop into a truly Dominating healer.

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