The Classifieds: Against all odds
Welcome to yet another Fox Van Allen edition of The Classifieds, your weekly news roundup from the WoW community. Being a shadow priest, it's difficult to keep a wholly optimistic spin on the week's news, but that's what Fox promised Lisa Poisso he'd do when he covered her shift. Still, needing to inflict Misery somehow, he's sprinkled this week's edition with links to Phil Collins songs -- and not even his Genesis stuff either. If you have guild news or a Random Act of Uberness to share, send to to TheClassifieds@WoW.com.
It's not easy playing World of Warcraft on a server where one faction has a massive advantage over the other. Take the Zul'Jin (US) server for example -- Horde outnumbers Alliance by about 3:1. The Alliance winning Wintergrasp on a server as unbalanced as Zul'Jin is a rare occurence -- there just aren't enough Alliance players showing up to give their faction a shot of winning.
Recently, however, the Alliance has seen a resurgence of their PvP fortunes -- they're starting to win Wintergrasp against all odds. Why? A huge chunk of the credit goes to one person: Hellsbargin <Guild Display Error>. As it is explained to us:
In the last week, Alliance has pretty much had Wintergrasp on lock down. Hellsbargin will sit in Dalaran drawing attention to the fact WG is about to start through normal means, like trade chat and yelling. But he's also gone the extra mile to draw attention. He's spent well over 6k gold in fireworks, flares, and clusters to make a highly visible display outside of Alliance quarters. He shapes an arrow pointing through the doorway with lights set up inside like a landing strip leading to the WG portal. I thought it was amazing how much effort he's put in to just getting people interested in doing the event, and how much a little enthusiasm can do to provide a win and keep it going.
More news, uberness, and yes, even more terrible, terrible Phil Collins. All after the break.
Random acts of uberness
Ninjas? Trolls? Jokes about the Xbox 360? Nothing to write home about, all. We'd much rather read about our readers' brushes with moments of true uberness. Did your tank stick around long after an instance was finished to help you finish a quest? Did stranger from a PUG take time out from his playing to walk you through the mechanics of your class? When the last two people alive finished off Malygos' all by their lonesome to get your group of ten credit for the weekly, were you there; saw what they did? Saw it with your own two eyes? Send your shout-outs to theclassifieds@wow.com. Keep things brief (150 words or less, please), and be sure to list everyone's character names and home realms or battlegroup. (It's the least you can do.)
Saelor (Kul Tiras [US-A])
I had just achieved the level cap and really wanted to start running heroic randoms, so I queued up. (Being a tank, the queue times are insane -- I had to wait like a whole 30 seconds that time.) "Great, a UP heroic, this should be interesting." I buffed every one and explained in party chat I was a fresh under geared 80 and probably wont hold aggro. Saelor, a DPS DK from Kul Tiras promptly said, "no problem, we got it." The rest of the group followed with, "don't worry, you'll do fine." We get to the end and the boss drops a sweet one-handed tank sword. I rolled need and so did Saelor. He won the sword. I sighed to myself and went to get some of the items for the quest that dwarf gives you at the beginning. After a few minutes a trade window pops up and there is that sword, taunting me. I click accept and I receive a party message from Saelor saying, "you need this more than I do." And poof, he was gone. I would like to take this time to thank Saelor -- that has got to be one of the kindest acts that I have run across in game.
-- Driply <PWNstars> (Thorium Brotherhood [US-A])
Secrtmistres(Kael'thas [US-H]) During a pugged raid of Serpentshrine Cavern, one of the members accidently died on the way to Lady Vashj and he couldn't find his way to the instance entrance. Damn that underwater pipe! Secrtmistres, a friendly and sympathic priest followed me through the instance in a failed attempt to find the lost player's body. Eventually, the lost player found his way and we continued the raid to wipe on Vashj. Afterwards, Secrtmistres insisted in the name of "friendship" that she repay me for the fish feasts I had supplied. She gave me four feasts for the two I had used and wouldn't let me give the two extra back. It is rare to see such generousity in a pugged raid and when I do, it's an awesome feeling! Three cheers for Secrtmistres!
-- Chawakanda <The Zug Initiative> (Kael'thas [US-H])
Pariaah <Silly Latin Name> (Terokkar [US-H])
About a week ago, I was asking in trade chat about what a good GearScore was for doing random heroics. I was a fresh 80, and I had been told by a friend that I should gear up in lower-skill Heroics before I do the random dungeon finder again. Of course, Trade was able to offer limited advice; however, one person stood out as highly helpful. Pariaah engaged me in a conversation about random heroics and how gear didn't really matter for them. I eventually found myself in a random Heroic group with her and 2 or 3 others from my server, and Oculus popped. While we didn't get the mount, I got something far more valuable: a chance to finally get over my fear of heroic dungeons!
Pariaah was so helpful that she even was willing to help me see that a higher-than-a-certain-level GearScore wasn't needed for random Heroics! She did a gear check on another player who randomly came in (after a couple others left) and told me: "See? You don't need a certain GearScore to do these! Look at [this player]!" I quickly looked at the player's GS number and was amazed that hers was lower than mine!
Pariaah also gave me some benchmarks: she wanted me to do five random heroics (for the gear) and two battlegrounds (so I could learn how to heal well as a raid healer) each day. While the numbers astonished me (at least, for the dungeons), and I haven't been able to do a whole five dungeons as of yet (more like 2 or 3, but that's because of my dailies and personal life taking up the length of a couple), I'm still glad I asked trade. Pariaah was such a great help for me. I hope she is reading this, and I want to thank her for helping me so much.
-- Lamasu <Ascendant Gloria> (Terokkar [US-H])
News: Around the WoW community
Slaughtering the innocent for a good cause Last August, WoW.com covered the WoWathon, a 12-day, live-streamed World of Warcraft marathon to benefit Child's Play. Child's Play, started by Mike Krahulik and Jerry Holkins of the popular online comic Penny Arcade, is a charitable organization whose goal is to bring video games and other toys to children's hospitals worldwide.
This year, the folks behind the original WoWathon are organizing their second annual event. Beginning on July 15, two brave Southern California volunteers will brave uncomfortable desk chairs, suboptimal levels of air conditioning, and gank-happy griefers to start two characters on a PvP server (yet to be announced) and level them to 80 over the course of several days, raising money for charity along the way. Last year's event saw nearly $8,300 donated directly to Child's Play, and they hope to raise even more this year.
if you want to learn more about the event, you can visit their website at www.wowathon.com or follow them on Twitter. All donations made on their website through the ChipIn button go directly to Child's Play.
Ironman Challenge update Do you remember two weeks ago, when Lisa introduced the Ironman Challenge? To successfully complete it, you work your way through each and every instance wearing only the gear that you find in those instances. Last week, we checked in with reader Largo (The Sha'tar [EU-A]), who is blogging about his own personal attempt at the challenge.
Though he's not very deep into the challenge -- he just finished Stockades, as of his last post -- he's already learning some valuable lessons about World of Warcraft. Lesson one: Stockades is an awful place to go looking for gear drops. Lesson two was this gem:
I swear, this challenge sometimes doesn't seem like so much a challenge of only finding gear in the dungeons, as it seems to be about finding a functioning group in the dungeons. Skill over gear? Heck yeah!
Employment: Guild recruiting
Is your guild searching through the day and into the night to complete your team? Is the boomkin you desperately need not anywhere that you can find them? The Classifieds can help. Send your guild's recruiting information to theclassifieds@wow.com and we'll try to feature as many as we can!
ICC-10 Casual <Knights Of The Blade> (Sentinal [US-H]) was founded in 2007 as a friendly casual guild. <Knights of the Blade> is officially opening their doors to recruitment for the first time since the release of WotLK. They are seeking friendly DPS for their 10-main raid group, which is a respectful ICC 6/12. There is plenty of room for improvement for those who feel they may have been left behind in the raiding scene. Their main progression raids run Thursday and Monday starting at 5:00 p.m. server time (8:00 p.m. EST). Precaution: Those who take themselves too seriously need not apply.
ICC-10/25 Casual <Raider of the Lost Bacon> (Elune [US-H]) is currently seeking new raid members. They describe themselves as a fun, casual raiding guild looking to fill out their ranks and start working on 25-man content. They run one ICC-10 two nights a week, and have a day set aside for the weekly raid on mains and alts. They also try to kick back a few times a month on some old school raids. Raid times start around 20:00 server and go until around 22:00-22:30. <Raider of the Lost Bacon> emphasizes having fun and teamwork over hard core raiding attitudes. As an added benefit our guild leader has the voice of an airline pilot!
ICC-10 Casual <Legacy of the Forgotten> (Lothar [US-A]) is a semi-casual Alliance raiding guild currently looking for people to fill out their ICC-10 normal (6/12) raiding group. They are open to all classes and specs, especially tanks and healers, and are willing to teach if you're willing to learn. They try to keep things fun and understand that real life takes precedence over the game. <Legacy of the Forgotten> raid twice a week, Friday and Sunday nights. Players should contact Bolgar, Deramierre, Amelan, or Grid if they're interested.
The Classifieds brings you weekly updates on player and community news, help finding the right guild, who's making waves in the WoW community and more. Email your news and Random Acts of Uberness to TheClassifieds@wow.com.
