Peter's Blog

Maezyn

I ran Maezyn around Un'goro and Felwood until she got to level 53 and her rest bonus was used up. After Un'goro I decided to give her a respec. She had five points in 'Improved Arcane Shot' which weren't being used as I am not spamming that like I used to. I decided to shuffle the points around and put them into 'Rapid Killing' and 'Mortal Shots'. I took the two points out of Beastmistress, she is now 100% markswoman.

Rapid Killing

reduces the cooldown on the Rapid Fire buff to three minutes but also gives a 20% bonus to the first Aimed, Arcane or Steady shot after a kill.

Mortal Shots

increases the crit damage.

Armed with these I went on a hunting trip with the bears in Felwood. I'd kill one, send the pet into the next and Aimed shot. The pet engaged before the aimed shot was cast and I'd carry on from there. The best hit I got was 1400 damage but as my crit chance is only 9.3% this only happens on one in ten attacks, normally the opening shot is about 600 damage. The big numbers are fun and, as I suspected, immediately draw agro from the monster but the killing was ruthless. I'd kill a batch of three or four, then stop to loot/skin them all, then continue.

Maexyn

Maexyn was in Southshore. She dealt with the murlocs which were troublesome, she died twice, once without the soulstone(!) and I became disheartened. She went on to the Yeti cave and was far more methodical, no casters in that cave and she killed every yeti with ease. The murlocs are always awkward. I was missing Maezyn's Silencing Shot which is excellent for pulling casters.

Maesyn

With no rest bonus I wasn't going to waste my time running Maezyn or Maexyn. What to do?

• Pookypoo (paladin): still can't face it. Until he can kill at a decent rate (hunter/warlock) it's too much of a slog.
• Sissle (priest): can't help thinking that priest play would be boring too. I'm not so interested in healing (pook can do that) and don't want to group anyway. So why run a priest?
• Lugulas (rogue): I don't have any fondness for rogues or male night elves.

So I rolled a druid. I'd avoided this for a long time because:

• have to be a night elf. Then I realised that running a female night elf wouldn't be so bad.
• hybrid class and hence not particularly good at anything. However, druids have some neat tricks (see below) that should make them more interesting to play than paladins.

Druid neat tricks:

• various forms, particularly cat form with buffs running at 130% speed, travel form with 140% speed, flight form at level 68 etc. Pity that epic flight form still costs 5000g and involves running a heroic In summary, travel is less of a chore.
• teleport to Moonglade. One can avoid boat trips with a hearthstone in the eastern kingdoms and teleporting to moonglade.
• stealth (but are there any useful applications for this? Soloing brd?)

Night Elf Advantages:

• forward somersault(!)
• Sabre mount! With no rep grinding!!!
• sexy female dance. But not for profit!

I named her Maesyn. I was tempted to call her Maecyn but decided that would be a better name for a mace weilder. I found out later that druids can indeed weild maces but too late, she was already made and I didn't want to kill her. So that's Maezyn, Maexyn and Maesyn, all pronounced the same way. Sorry for any confusion, I'm experimenting with the use of a written medium. My first novel will doubtless break the boundaries of english literature but the movie will baffle everyone. UPDATE: because I care so much, I've tweeked PetersBlogger to automatically convert the character names to links to armory profiles! No excuse for confusion now.

It took me 3 hours and 44 minutes to get her to level 10 and I think it was the first time I've done it without dying. She simply pulled from distance, cast wraths until the foe hit, then staffed it to death. Very easy and repeatable (no mana breaks) but I doubt it is representative of druid play (it was funny seeing pet-less hunter lowbies). The Night Elf start area is easier than the Dwarf/Gnome start area with less running about to do. I didn't do that annoying barrow-maze place.

She did struggle around level 8-9 against equal level mobs but mainly because I couldn't find the druid trainer and she only had level 6 skills (including moonfire, which helped). It was only after hitting 10 that a quest led her right up to the guy. It then turned out she could have had 'Entangling Roots' at level 8. I tried this on a spider and it was sublime, I'm going to have fun with that, it will open up new tactics. Without rooting she could just about handle pairs of foes by casting moonfire on them both and exploiting it's DoT while self healing (Rejuvenate: instant cast heal! Paladins eat your hearts out).

I didn't have time to do the bear form quest, I'm looking forward to that one. I bought her a big of the bear' mace but she needs to go to eastern kingdoms to learn the skill to use it UPDATE: hum, there is a trainer in the Exodar, two boat rides away.

I kitted her out with three netherweave bags so she has plenty of bag space. I made her a skinner as I love that so much. As a second profession I think I will make her a herbalist.

I'm debating whether to run Darkshore or send her to Menethil/swim to ironforge/run loch modan/westfall. I'll make sure she is in the right place to get bear form and then decide.

Maesyn will probably be Feral. She will be her own pet!

Question time: does it matter what base dps a melee weapon is when in bear/cat form? Surely the bear/cat aren't swinging weapons? UPDATE: no:

For weapons, until you get to Outlands, you should look for green Two Handed Maces or Staves with a name that ends on "of the Tiger", "of Strength", "of the Bear". Remember that the DPS of the weapon does nothing for forms, it is only about the stat bonuses on it. So often the green weapons are better than blue ones. Once you get to Outlands you should only be using weapons which add Feral Attack Power, you can get one from one of the first quests in Honor Hold / Thrallmar.

http://druid.wikispaces.com/Feral_Leveling

Damn game. Hooked me again.