Wrath's Release Is Imminent

Well that's it, where do we go?

Stick to WAR, continue the leveling process up to 40 and get the gear maxed out until Mythic bring out an expansion?

Back to WoW, return to the addiction of grinding to 80, farming honor/arean points, raiding (in a successful guild for a change) and watch over WAR players running around at half my level?

I have finally ran out of money on my WAR account, just in time to make a quick decision on which I'd prefer to invest in.

I'll look at a few pros and cons...

I'm in a guild where I have some importance in WAR, I'm a Vault Manager, the guild's web designer (even though I'm not that great), I've met some great people already in WAR, I'm enjoying leveling up Thwomp greatly, I'm more into the RvR side rather than PvE aspect of the game.

WoW, I have 3 level 70s, one of them is well geared (in my opinion) and I do have a very vast knowledge of this class in particular, as well as the game in general. Some of the game mechanics for damage mitigation, threat generation, mana regeneration, etc, are not one of my strong points but I have experienced some of the numbers needed to optimize output of these stats. I've spent a good 2 years or so playing WoW, and enjoyed playing from when I first played.

WoW currently lacks what WAR has which benefits players like me greatly. I'm not great with finding groups to run an instance, since I prefer to either be head hunted, or be in the LFG queue and wait an hour or 2 before I am contacted. With the PQ system in place, and open parties, I can contribute to taking BO's, Keep's, etc without having to look for the group myself. It's a huge waste of time in WoW and I never liked it.

I'm not the highest level in WAR yet, not even close, but after a previous post about the Sovereign armor set for Black Orcs, which looks almost impossible to get after reading all of the requirements to get to that stage, it's orientated for a player like me. Even if I wanted to be anti social for many levels, I can still pick up my first armor set by nothing more than grinding to rank 40 and renown rank 37+ or something along them lines.

In fact, after writing this post, I've realised I've already made up my mind.

Thwomp will continue his crusade! I will more than likely not play WoW again until Thwomp is fully clad in full Sovereign and the guild rank is 40! Even then I may decide to level up an alt... or even taste what WAR has to offer on Order's side...

Thank you so much Mythic, you've converted me and I'm deeply proud you have... how many more can you convert?

A Suitable Surname

I only found out recently that you can have a surname! That's a great idea, but what if you pick the wrong one?

Well I'm learning new things about Mythic's top product all the time! WAR has some fantastic features and a surname is a great idea!

Think of a recent post about guild colours... why have guild colours when you can all unite under one surname? Well a number of reasons... lets have a look and find out.

Firstly not everyone will want to have the same name as other people? Well that's fair enough, but seriously, what's the problem with it? People will be able to refer to a surname when complimenting or complaining about or something like that. Although, when they say... 'it ended in something like chaoswithin' which wouldn't be any help since all members will be named the same.

Guild colours would be a better idea in my opinion, since we would be noticed by the similar colours, and it would look a lot smarter than a bunch of yobbos in mismatch coloured gear. Thinking about it again though, some complete retard can colour his gear the same, just to pretend to be in the guild, but they can do the same with a surname I guess.

I can imagine that all members would turn their nose up if they had to pay it themself, but keeping prices in mind, a surname would be 4g per member, whereas it could be 2g per full colouring per member, which although right now it seems hands down that colours would be cheaper, gear can be upgraded and so will need recolouring, which eventually can turn out to be considerably expensive.

I can only see the guild paying for the first paint job and the player has to pay for it afterwards, but it could also turn out that the guild will pay if (for example) it colours more than 4 items.

With the guild tax, surely it would be more appropriate for the guild to pay it all the time, since it's almost like a payment for paying your guild tax?

So which would it be, a guild surname, guild colours, both or neither?

A Very Annoying Quest!

Since I do not have as much time as others playing WAR, I have been quickly logging in during the mornings before I head off to work.

The past few morning attempts at doing a quest called Heroes' End

Now I know I added the link to http://www.wardb.com/, but I've been extremely good for not 'cheating' and finding out how to do it using a spoiler...

I've killed Lithia (the first part of the quest) on the first attempt... but there are 3 big tents around where she is, and a smaller tent behind them.

I need to place her head on the 'Planning Desk' in the 'Command Tent', well the only tent that stands out from the others is the smaller tent... but why would that be the command tent?

I've noticed that the greenskin and chaos quests seem to be very enjoyable and at times simple. I don't want every quest to be simple, since I don't want every other player able to solo most of the quests (like I can). Champions are the biggest problem for me, but because I can take them on, they aren't even a threat anymore (unless they have about 4 other weedy mobs with them or are a much higher level than me!).

The Dark Elves quests are (excuse my language) sh*t! When I first arrived in Shadowlands, the quest givers were sending me all over the place for minimal xp for the area! Not only that I spent probably an hour finding things for certain quests!

I'll be glad when I'm out of Ellyrion... it's just as bad as Shadowlands, and it's the location where this Heroes' End quest is...

Corporeal Mistake!

I posted previously that I was told about Corporeal Resistance being the resistance against physical attacks... for a tank, that is a must have stat!

To my horror, while busy sorting out my bank on Larlas (Zealot if you forgot) I had my mouse hovering over one of his spells... it caught my eye... the word Corporeal pointed out that I was mistaken!

So let me get this straight, a Shaman deals Elemental damage, a Sorceress/Sorcerer deals Spiritual and a Zealot deals Corporeal damage?

Do some casting careers have more than one school of magic? For example, you stumble across a mob with high resistance to Elemental spells, so you instead cast Spiritual spells to wittle them down?

I logged in on Thwomp quickly to see how the guild were doing with leveling. Squig is 20, which clearly points out I'm already falling behind. They'll be taking on tier 3 while I'm lagging back in tier 2! I'll pass on the guild signups for ORvR so I can grind the levels to catch up... but will they be able to proceed without a tank? Some attempts on the champions in Friday's warband had me sitting idle while I was on the phone with the rest doing what they do best.

Will I be missed? Will I be left behind and they find another guild tank to run ORvR with them?

I must step up the pace! I need to be strong and get a few levels over the others, just to allow for slack times like what I'm going through at the moment, along with me having little time to game next week!

Gear Increasing Levels

I have been reading my favourite Warhammer blog The Greenskin, and I've just read about the 'gear treadmill' (as Snafzg says). If I had enough time to devote to both leveling and RvR, I'd be blown away to see Thwomp sporting the Sovereign set which requires all of the previous gear but also rank 40 and renown rank 73 (at a minimum), at the time of this posting, he is rank 18 and renown rank 11. He's got a long way to go.

Thwomp is a beast in his current gear... but if he could get his hands on the sovereign set... I'd be ecstatic each time I logged in.
This is what an orc tank should look like!

Gearing up is something I've never really been up for in my experience of MMO's. My first experience of MMO's was Runescape... yes, laugh at me, I know you want to. I leveled to be a mage for a number of reasons. Firstly since it was the easiest way to get around the game teleporting and portaling others, but the problem with it was I was not set to be a 'Pure'.

A Pure was someone who was geared and skilled for PKing (player killing). They would outclass any other player who was maybe 5 levels above them which had a varing choice of combat specialties such as Attack, Defence, Magic and Prayer. I created my character (Cunning Git) in the hopes that I would be one of the highest rated mages in the game.

Who could ever be better than the legendary Zezima?

Zezima was one account, one character, and possibly 6 people playing. I knew the true best player in Runescape. Sadly he died. 'The Old Nite' was a great guy, I met him once (ingame) to do business.

My gear in Runescape was nothing special, I had rubbish gear for long periods of time. ocasionally daring the wilderness to get to the Mage Arena in deep level 55+ wilderness. Once I had 230k gold while running up to the Mage Arena to buy runes to further my Magic level. I stumbled upon a clan just outside the entrance. I could do nothing, they slaughtered me, mages binded me while rangers shot me down. It was at this point that I became less interested in Runescape.

I devoted a lot of time on my recent MMO choice, World of Warcraft. I have a Rogue, Warlock and Druid at 70. Both the Druid and Rogue are poorly geared, either Karazhan gear or lower. Wakeofdeath, my Warlock that I grew attached to as mentioned in one of my first posts is taking a time out from gaming. Wake has respectable gear for entering Karazhan and Gruul's Lair, it's entirely possible that he could perform well in Tempest Keep and Serpent Shrine Cavern.

Would my guild take me there? No... so I left the guild and have been working on my PvP gear, which isn't really that great, but who cares when it' going to be replaced in a few weeks. Who cares if Wake doesn't return to WoW?

We come to WAR... I've spent my time at work, creating and editing the guild website. I've started and enjoy writing this blog. I love playing the game. I love playing alongside my guildmates in WAR. Why should I be bothered if I never see Thwomp wearing the Sovereign set? Why should I be bothered if Thwomp isn't the toughest tank in the game? I'm not playnig it to be the best! I'm not playing it to laugh at players less geared than me. I'm not playing it to pass the time until another MMO comes out.

I'm hooked... I admit it... Why should I look for anything other than WAR?

I play WAR cause it's a fantastic game, I'd be more than happy to be sitting at level 40, renown rank 45 and equiped with full Conquerer (or the Black Orc equivalent).

The Chaos Within Website

I've had some thoughts on this, and they are good thoughts. http://the-chaos-within.webs.com/ also has it's own email incase anyone wishes to leave feedback privately about a member of The Chaos Within, the website itself, or any suggestions to put up onto the website or guild info in-game.

On the website is a photo gallery, and I'm not 100% sure how much space we have to store images and stuff. The Chaos Within email will be like an archive of images, each character will have their own folder, and images will be emailed to this account and when an admin is available, they can upload these images to the photo gallery on the website.

The Chaos Within email address is... the-chaos-within @ live.co .uk (spaced out to avoid email bots)

This will (hopefully) be in the guild info in-game and on the website, should it all be approved.

Are there any other guild bloggers? Or bloggers on Karak-Norn that wish to add me to their blogroll to help me get some more traffic?

The Chaos Within Grows...

Thwomp reached a big rank 18 last night! And to celebrate, I customed Thwomp's gear so that it's not just white, but now white and yellow...

Here is Thwomp giving us a ferocious RAWR!!!

Here's another one from a slightly different angle and performing Da Biggest war bellow...

I was quite surprised while playing last night, Fjorten offered me the title of Vault Manager in the guild, with me being someone he can trust... well the only time I've spoke to Fjorten was when he invited me into the guild... how could I have been so foolish, Fjorten is my Squig Herding greenskin hunting partner also known as Squigboss.

Not long before it was getting late and people were heading off to bed, I was having a bit of a think, is there a guild website? After asking, I was told that there isn't one yet and that Fjorten (I'll call him Squig from now on since I'll probably be referring to him in future posts) had forgotten the codes to create one, so I offered... and here is my first attempt http://the-chaos-within.webs.com/ it's not great of course, but it's just to see the reaction of Squig and the rest of the guild. If they like it, great, I'll continue. If it needs a tweak in major areas, fine, I'll stick with it, if they don't like it, well... they can do it themselves right?

Anyway, as Vault Manager, one of my duties is to organize the guild vault. Unfortunately, we are only guild rank 9, so we only have 1 tab available to us. If we can get guild rank 11 iirc, we get a second tab to use, but the third is a long way to get.

I mentioned in a previous post whether I would be able to get my 20g for my mount at level 20 before I get to that level of course...

This might answer that...

In fact, I seem to remember me checking before I logged out last night, I'm sure it was 24g...

Bye Bye IE8 Beta

I've had Internet Explorer 6.x for many years on pretty much every computer I've had since prehistoric windows 98 where it was most likely IE 5.x

Upon the release of IE7, people were doing the windows update and installing the crappy thing on all computers everywhere... at work, at the missus's, at home, at friends, etc... all except mine... IE7 was nothing special, riddled with bugs, unfixable issues, frequent crashes... you get the idea...

Anyway, a long time has passed since IE7 was introduced, and about 6 weeks ago, there was an introduction to IE8 beta, so I thought I'd head on over to good old microsoft.com and test it out for a bit, see if it was worth a crack...

Well after a 6 week period, I'm glad to see the back of it... uninstalled, removed, gone, BANISHED from my computer. I know it's still in beta, it'll be fine when it's finally released, but to view almost every page in whats called 'compatibility view' is just ludacris...

Now I'm back to IE6, I'm more than tempted to install IE7 due to the similar looking interface, but is IE7 really all that?

Boredom Sets In

Stuck in work, doing nothing more than browsing others blogs. The Greenskin is definately one of my favourite reads! I have enjoyed the comics from there also, but there are other sites around, what was that one called... something like Book of Grudges *checks history* yes it was http://bookofgrudges.wordpress.com/ I particularly feel for this poor person not having the internet for 2 weeks... I'm also an addict, I couldn't last without it...

Quote from Hawley's most recent post:-
I’ve not had broadband for two weeks.
And I’m here to say that yes, I am an addict.

There are plenty of links on the blogroll on that site (which I may have to link to as they are great reads), but one that caught my eye was Save Da Runts! It sounded like a funny blog to digest, and I happened to stumble across this post which is absolutely fantastic for any healer. I will be returning to see the 10 Tip From A Healer To Tanks post, anyway, here's 10 Tips From A Tank To Healers.