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Spiritual Guidance: Gear guide for fresh 80 healing priests
Every Sunday, Spiritual Guidance and Dawn Moore lead priests into the light by studying the fine art of healing. Priests who walk into the light have a longer life expectancy* than those who follow the teachings of Fox Van Allen. Recent studies show that the 51-point talent Dispersion is actually an unexpected side effect of drinking spiked Honeymint Tea, partying with warlocks and cannibalizing gnomes. Well, the day has come: I finally decided to put together a gear guide for fresh level 80 healing priests. Many readers have been requesting this, and I figured I ought to stop teasing everyone with promises of it. I hope that this list, combined with the 101 guides we published in the past few months, will be enough to help my fellow fledgling priests find themselves somewhere in Azeroth. I can't have you all getting lost before you have a chance to dive into that new, shiny Cataclysm water. Before I get started, let it be known that this is not a list of any and all healing upgrades you can get after you hit 80. Instead it is a list of gear I would recommend to a healing priest who is trying to get the best gear he or she can without raiding or is trying to get enough gear to start healing in the current raiding content (Trial of the Crusader and Icecrown Citadel.) Since this is not a complete list, feel free to deviate from it when you find upgrades that work for you. A lot of items you find in heroics will be be better than the gear you are wearing from questing. Now, let's get started.
Arcane Brilliance: Fire 101
It's time again for Arcane Brilliance, the weekly mage column that believes there is no such thing as too much Pyroblast. You can certainly have not enough Pyroblast, as any fire mage who is desperately praying to the RNG gods for a second consecutive crit so that Hot Streak will grant him an instant one can attest. But you can never have too much. Never. Since publishing Arcane 101 and Frost 101, for our series of class 101 guides, I've received numerous requests for Fire 101. Where is it? When is it coming? Why haven't you written it yet? There's even one guy who I swear has emailed me pretty much daily inquiring as to Fire 101's whereabouts. These emails progressed steadily in their tone and verbiage from mild annoyance to frustrated desperation, to thinly veiled threats to do me bodily harm. It wasn't long before the emails began coming with increasingly creepy pictures attached: first one of a road map with a thumbtack in the southwestern portion of Nevada, then one of the "Welcome to Las Vegas" sign, then one of the street where I live, then one of my house, my driveway, and so on. The picture contained in yesterday's email was of a naked man who wasn't me standing in my bathroom brandishing a large knife. So, I've decided that today is the day! Now, please ... get out of my bathroom, crazynakedguy@iwillstabyouinthefacechrisbelt.com. As always, these posts come with a small disclaimer: these are meant to be basic guides covering a general overview of the spec from a PvE perspective. This one is meant as an introduction to Fire. It will not help you maximize your DPS on heroic 25-man Lich King. It will, however, help you get some idea of what the fire spec is, and how to go about playing it. Without further ado, I bring you Fire 101.
Lichborne: Blood tanking 101
Welcome to Lichborne, your weekly journey into the world of the death knight. This week, we're getting ready for Cataclysm in our own round about way. While sometimes less considered by the WoW population at large, blood tanking has long been known to serious players and theorycrafters as an incredibly dominant raid tanking spec, thanks to incredibly high health pools. It will also be the sole tanking tree for death knights in Cataclysm. While it is certain that the tree will change extensively under this new system, it is likely to have a lot of the same elements in place that make it distinctively blood tanking, even in the new expansion, so it might not hurt to start practicing with it now. Whatever your reason for trying blood tanking, this guide is here to help you take the first few steps along that path. Remember as this is a 101 guide, we won't necessarily being doing hardcore theorycrafting, and we may simplify a few basic concepts that can be a bit more nuanced for an experienced, high-end blood tank.
Lichborne: Frost DPS 101
Welcome to Lichborne, where we're taking a break from all the Cataclysm info and analysis to focus on the here and now in death knight issues. One of Patch 3.3.3's biggest focuses was adjusting frost DPS to be viable at the end game. The changes proved to be mostly successful, and as a result, dual-wield frost DPS is back on the map and may have an outside chance of not getting you laughed out of a raid. With that in mind, it's a perfect time to take a look at the spec. This guide will give you a rundown of the basic stuff you need to know to break into the ground floor of the spec. The goal is to make speccing, gemming, glyphing and doing damage as simple to understand and implement as possible, making it easier for you to break into the playstyle and start using it on your own character. In some cases, this means "cutting corners," and in other places it means making judgment calls on gemming and glyphing options that are still a bit more nebulous once you get to the really heady theorycrafting stuff. This article is meant to make being moderately success at frost an easier task. Without further ado, then, let's begin!
iPad 101: The easy way to get high-def videos onto iPhone or iPad
Even though the iPad has that HD feel, there are plenty of HD files it can't stomach -- the maximum resolution for videos to sync via iTunes is 720p, and anything higher (1080i or 1080p) simply won't transfer. On the iPhone and iPod touch, the upper limit is even tighter; those devices can only handle 640x480 videos, meaning that a 720p file will stall out. Generally, movies or TV shows purchased from iTunes will arrive with versions tuned for both devices, but for anything you've created independently of the store, you may run into a spot of trouble. There's an extensive walkthrough over at Gizmodo covering how to use Handbrake for downsampling your 1080i/p videos to a more manageable resolution, very helpful if you're in a DIY mood -- but there is an easier way. It takes advantage of a feature in an app you're already using: iTunes. Just select your movie file(s) and check under the Advanced menu. See those two "Create..." options? The iPod or iPhone version will deliver a resampled video at a resolution the smaller devices can manage; the iPad/Apple TV choice will spit out a 720p file. All you need to do is select your choice and wait for a while... depending on the length of your video and the speed of your Mac, it may take quite a long time, but be patient. You can try out the steps with an Apple-provided sample file, if you like. Once the conversion is done, you'll see a second instance of the video in your media list -- then you can sync at will. Note that if the file you're choosing is already adequately low-res, you'll see the dialog box below. Happy squeezing!
Blood Pact: Destruction 101
Blood Pact is your weekly warlock digest brought to you by Dominic Hobbs. "I love the smell of napalm in the morning... The smell, you know that gasoline smell, the whole hill. Smelled like... victory" ~ Lieutenant Colonel Bill Kilgore Destruction is often considered to be the 'mage-like' warlock spec; this is based on its more dwarven style of play (fight, drink, fight, drink...). It is true that destruction relies more on direct damage than DoTs or the damage done by minions, but don't be fooled, destro locks are not just emo-mages. Where the other lock specs focus on shadow magic, destruction primarily makes use of fire spells. Incinerate takes the place of Shadow Bolt as a filler, and Conflagrate and Chaos Bolt are added to the spell book making a dazzling array of... well, destruction. Destruction benefits Destruction locks have the greatest 'burst' potential. This means that they can deliver a high level of DPS very quickly. This makes them ideal for short fights and swapping between multiple targets. Destro locks are also very mana efficient -- not because they don't get through their mana (they certainly do!) but because they have so much mana restored through Improved Soul Leech.
Spiritual Guidance: Discipline 101
Every Sunday Spiritual Guidance is liberated from the shadows by Dawn Moore, while Fox Van Allen is busy massaging the many tired tendrils of Alfonz, Dawn's loyal Shadowfiend. Dawn will reflect on the intricacies of priest healing for discipline and holy priests, while forwarding Fox's address to her gnomish allies. It was sometime in early 2009 that I was sitting in Dalaran, reading trade chat when someone asked "can disco priests heal?" Someone replied "lol, disc priests?" to which the original poster said, "yeah, disc. Can they?" I smiled when I saw the mistake. Then a few months later when I applied to a guild, I filled in my spec and class as Disc(o) Priest. In response this, one of my future guildmates told me he expected the 70s to be in full revival during my trial: I provided. I might have gone overboard since, but I was born for this. So here it is, Discipline 101. Just as was the case with the holy 101, this is not meant to be a comprehensive guide to every nuance of the discipline tree. Instead it will cover the basics of how to get started with gearing and playing a discipline priest in a PvE environment, and hopefully get you asking more questions that I'll be able to answer in future articles. If you are a veteran discipline priest please provide the newbies with any tips or tricks of your own in the comments.
Blood Pact: Demonology 101
Blood Pact is your weekly warlock digest brought to you by Dominic Hobbs. "The time has come! Gul'dan, order your Warlocks to double their efforts! Moments from now, the gateway will open and your Horde will be unleashed on this ripe, unsuspecting world." ~ Medivh You might think that you could always tell a demonology warlock on sight, its minions being bigger and more powerful, to reflect his greater dominion of demons. This isn't really the case though, every warlock's minions look the same irrespective of build. If they are over level 50 then they become easier to spot as you'll find that they'll have a felguard following them about. To be fair, he is bigger and more powerful than all the other minions. If you're drawn to demonology so that you can summon a greater variety of demons, or maybe more exotic ones like those beastmastery hunters, then you're going to be somewhat disappointed. You'll have and use the same demons until you learn to summon the felguard then you'll have him. That said, the demonologist has an array of talents that really amplify your minion's power and also boosts your own by drawing on the power of your demon. If it is synergy with an embodiment of evil ripped from the nether that you are looking for, then this is the place for you.
Arcane Brilliance: Frost 101
It's the weekend again, and that means it's time for another Arcane Brilliance, the weekly mage column that would like to continue its ongoing series of "Pictures of things you're hitting that warlock in the face with." In today's installment, we'll be hitting that warlock with a large chunk of ice. As you can see, the ice has sharp edges, pointy parts, and is hurtling toward the warlock at an absolutely painful rate of speed. Other things we'll be hitting that warlock in the face with in future installments include massive balls of flame, rapid-fire salvos of arcane energy, and of course monkey feces. To contribute to the increasingly awesome collection of guides that make up WoW.com's class 101 series, I bring you Frost 101. As with the Arcane 101 column I did a few weeks back, let me begin with what this guide is, and also with what it is not: What it is: A general overview of the spec from a PvE perspective, directed at relative newcomers to either level 80 or the spec in general. It will provide basic idea of where to start, how to spec, how to gear, and what to do as a frost mage. What it is not: A guide to in-depth theorycrafting, detailed hard-mode raid strategies, min-maxing, which weapon kills Sparkman fastest, how to pull off an ultimate combo, or burn an entire quarter on one play with Bo Jackson. We'll cover all of those topics on some other day. Well, maybe not all of them. But definitely the Bo Jackson run, because that was crazy.
Scattered Shots: Marksman 101
Welcome to Scattered Shots, written by Frostheim of Warcraft Hunters Union and the Hunting Party Podcast. Each week Frostheim uses logic and science mixed with a few mugs of Dwarven Stout to look deep into the Hunter class. Marksman was the original hunter raiding spec back in vanilla. After falling out of the top spot in BC and early Wrath, MM is back with a vengeance. MM is topping meters, punting gnomes, and kicking so much ass MM hunters have to use addons to take names of all the ass they can't get to just now, but will get around to kicking at their convenience. The MM spec comes with the most versatile toolbox, the most controllable DPS cooldowns, two optimal raid specs, and the strongest AOE of the hunter specs. However, MM is also one of the trickiest hunter specs, relying more than other specs on proper use of cooldowns and good movement management. Join me after the cut as we go through the nuts and bolts of the MM hunter spec and how you too can learn to punt gnomes and top meters.
The Light and How to Swing It: Retribution 102
With the Light as his strength, Gregg Reece of The Light and How to Swing It faces down the demons of the Burning Legion, the undead of the Scourge, and helps with the puppet shows at the Argent Ren Faire up in Icecrown. We're back again. I wasn't sure I'd be available to write the article this week as I've got a little paladin on the way and she's due any day now. The closest the doctor would give us was "soon." However, let's get down to business. Last week we did a Retribution 101 article on what qualities make up a ret pally and what to expect from the spec. This week we're going to look at the basic talent spec as well as what our talents do for us. It's a fairly long post, so feel free to go grab something to drink now and then catch us after the break.
The Light and How to Swing It: Retribution 101
With the Light as his strength, Gregg Reece of The Light and How to Swing It faces down the demons of the Burning Legion, the undead of the Scourge, and helps with the puppet shows at the Argent Ren Faire up in Icecrown. This week, we're looking at retribution paladins. Retribution. This is what every paladin begins as. No shield to hide behind. Just a big two-handed weapon slung on your back and grim determination as your guide. And, sadly, the spec that took the longest to become completely viable. It's been a hard road for the retribution paladin. In classic era, you only used retribution to level up and then you were expected to heal or play blessing-bot for raids. In the days of Burning Crusade, retribution was a little better and could be okay if you stacked your raid the right way. However, they'd rather you be the adds tank or heal. Then Wrath hit and retribution came into its own... or should I say 'pwn' (bad joke, but absolutely true if you remember early Wrath). After some balancing, retuning, and all of those other euphamisms for 'nerf,' we're a still a fairly decent force along with the rest of the pack. Let's take a deeper look into the good, the bad, and the ugly of the ret pally.
Know Your Lore: Lore 101, part 1
One of the most frequent questions I'm asked as someone that's entirely too interested in Warcraft story and lore, is where to go to get story information. How, exactly, do you find all of these story elements when they are literally scattered across several different games, comics, manga and novels? How do you know what should be taken as official lore, and what to throw away as mere speculation? Where, exactly, does someone just starting out with World of Warcraft find story information when they've got no idea where that story actually starts? It's a difficult question to answer, and you'll see why later in the article. The Warcraft storyline is made up of several different parts, spanning several different games, and the time line is continually changing and developing as these games are released. Here's a brief list of places you can go to get started:
Totem Talk: Restoration 101
Want to be a sultan of swing healing? A champion of Chain Heal? Totem Talk: Restoration will show you how. Brought to you by Joe Perez, otherwise known as Lodur from World of Matticus and the For The Lore podcast. If you're reading this, you've most likely decided that healing is going to be one of your two possible specs and you're looking for information before you jump right into healing. I can think of no better place to start my inaugural post of Totem Talk: Restoration than to provide the basics to get you started on the path of one of the strongest healing types in the game. This is not the definitive Restoration guide this is just the basic overview, the more complex stuff will come later on.
Shifting Perspectives: Bear 101
Every week, Shifting Perspectives explores issues affecting druids and those who group with them. This week, we rage against the dying of the light, the nearest raid boss, and the Gunship battle chest until it barfs up a Corpse Tongue Coin. UPDATE: This article has now been updated for Cataclysm as of January 2011. Please go here for the new Cataclysm bear 101 guide! Titles rejected for inclusion in Shifting Perspectives this week: Shifting Perspectives: I will &%#(% kill the next *#%%(%) hunter who *#&%*% rolls on my &#%*#% polearm. Shifting Perspectives: Design successes: Why combining the visual hallmarks of the yay-trees-protector-of-nature-class with the I-kill-defenseless-people-class was totally an amazing idea. Shifting Perspectives: Paladins suck. Editors: You tried to use that last week. Allison: They still suck.
Shifting Perspectives: Balance 101
Every week, Shifting Perspectives explores issues affecting druids and those who group with them. This week, we're preening our feathers, practicing our dance moves, and polishing up on our slaughtering skills. There has recently been an in pouring of requests to make starter guides for all of the various classes and specs. Originally I refused such a topic on the standing that any player that wishes to play a balance druid is already 100 times more awesome than every other player out there and wouldn't possibly benefit from such a things. Then a guild mate of mine showed me the light. Balance druids themselves are quite an amazing bunch, but balance druid alts are a completely different story. In all honesty though, even the veteran balance druids cannot agree on talents from time to time. I figured, after a few threats of maiming, that a beginner's guide would actually be a really good thing; providing the caveat that some of the more controversial talents be explored more in-depth.
The Care and Feeding of Warriors: Arms 101
This week, The Care and Feeding of Warriors continues its look at the warrior specs with Arms 101. Matthew Rossi spends some time this week talking about that peculiar form of finesse that involves smashing things with a two handed weapon. We've talked about protection, the tanking spec, and we've talked about fury, the Tasmanian Devil spec. This week, we're talking about arms. We defined fury last week as the spec for people who want to kill things, and that's fair, but if fury is that, what's arms? Well, fury is the 'kill it kill it kill it until it's dead and then kill it some more' spec, defined by Blizzard as the 'screaming barbarians in woad'. Arms, however, is the finesse spec. Yes, that's right, I'm defining the spec that relies on using a great whacking axe, polearm, sword or mace as 'finesse'. Welcome to the warrior class, where the fanciest Dan at the party is still a hulking madman in plate. As the class Q&A put it: However, we would like to reinforce a little more the kits of Arms and Fury. Everyone (I hope) gets the difference between Frost and Fire mages. Arms is supposed to be about weapons and martial training and feel "soldierly." Fury is supposed to be about screaming barbarians in woad. You get a sense of that, but it could be stronger. Indeed it could, and for my money, eventually will be, but that in a nutshell is arms. Fury is about grabbing anything big enough and beating on things until they're paste. Arms is about style, about finesse, about perfect control of your weapon, and about taking advantage of openings for huge, devastating blows that get around normal conventions and defenses. If you like the idea of being really, really good at hitting people with a sword the size of a barn door, then arms is for you.
Lichborne: Blood DPS 101
Welcome to Lichborne, your weekly look into the bloody business of being a death knight. This week, said business is especially bloody as we take a look at the most popular death knight tree. According to recent armory analysis, blood is the most popular death knight spec. It's not hard to see why, it's a simple yet robust tree that provides lots of power with a minimum of fuss. If you're interested in getting in the DPS side of the tree but aren't sure where to start, or if you're just looking to brush up on the basics of the tree, this is the Lichborne for you. While this guide doesn't necessarily cover some of the more advanced aspects of the tree, it does covers the basic ways to get the most out of your gear, rotation, and spec as a blood DPSer. 1. What is blood DPS? Blood is the death knight tree that focuses the most on pure physical damage. It also has superior health regeneration. Like all three trees, it can be used for both tanking and DPS, but we'll focus on DPS for this guide. 2. Blood DPS Benefits Superior single target damage. Superior self healing and health stealing abilities mean you probably die less and can survive through a less than stellar healer or tank more consistently than many other DPS. Some very nice group and raid melee buffs in the form of Hysteria and Abomination's Might. 3. Blood DPS Drawbacks Not quite as much AoE potential as the other two trees.
Shifting Perspectives: Cat 101
Every week, Shifting Perspectives explores issues affecting druids and those who group with them. This week, we are polite, professional, and have a plan to kill everyone we meet. There's a bit of a gentlemen's wager going on here behind the scenes at WoW.com; the author of the weekly feature that gets the most hits by the end of the month will get cookies from Elizabeth Harper. And I like cookies. The following is a list of titles that were subsequently rejected by the editors for inclusion in this week's edition of Shifting Perspectives: Shifting Perspectives: Naked women playing Cataclysm alpha. Shifting Perspectives: Paladins suck. Shifting Perspectives: Everyone should be nerfed but me. Shifting Perspectives: Gear Score is amazing.
Spiritual Guidance: Holy 101
Every Sunday (and the occasional weekday) Spiritual Guidance offers holy and discipline priests advice on how to wield the holy light and groove to the disco night. Your hostess Dawn Moore will provide the music. There is this priest trial in my guild right now. He applied as a discipline priest but what we were looking for at the time was a holy priest. Unfortunately, he doesn't know how to play holy, so I'm exploiting my veteran status and making him learn it. Coincidentally, the big bosses also want all of us here at WoW.com to work on these 101 columns, so this kills two anything-but-birds with one stone. I really like birds, by the way. The following is meant to be an introductory guide to the priest holy tree. It is not going to tell you what to do step by step (at least not until you get to the enchants section) instead it intends to show you some options from which you can get started. If you're already a veteran holy priest, feel free to add anything I left out in the comments so readers who use this column as a resource can get as much help as possible.
