Mark Crump

Gaming By Mark Crump

New Player's Guide: Class Psychology

This week, we get to tackle a fun topic: personality disorders. I mean, how your personality type can help determine what class you might feel comfortable playing. Now, it's prudent I mention that I am not a degreed mental health professional -- heck, I'm not even a degreed writer. I tried to play a doctor on TV but was told I had a face made for writing, preferably in seclusion in a fortified compound. So, while these may do a good job at matching your personality type to a class, I'm not making any judgment on whether I think you're nuttier than a bar mix. There's also a certain amount of tongues and cheeks involved here, as well. In fact, if you pretend the guy that does the voice-overs for the "Real Men of Genius" ads is reading these you'll get an idea of how tongue in cheek they are. Aside: Holy Cow, the original Survivor vocalist does the background singing on those? I did not know that. The Tank: Your job is hold the monster's attention. Your going to have decent defense, but your main job is just generating threat. You may not contribute a ton of damage towards the kill, but keeping the monster's attention focused on you will make it a smooth ride. The Healer: Primarily, your job will be keeping the tank alive. Sure, you'll also be healing the rest of the party, but the tank will be your focus. Damage Per Second (DPS): With the tank contributing slow but steady damage, and the healer, well, healing, it's your job to actually bring the monster down.

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Ask WoW Insider: What does an ex-GL do?

Welcome to today's edition of Ask WoW Insider, in which we publish your questions for dissection by the peanut gallery -- now with extra snark and commentary by one of our writers. This week Nickiter writes in:Hi WoW Insider - Until tonight, I was the GL of a raiding guild - a new guild, to be sure, and not terribly accomplished. But, after a night of listlessly wiping on The Lurker Below, I gave up. Maybe I don't have guild leadership in me, maybe I do, but that's immaterial.What I'm asking of WI and your sometimes kind, sometimes harsh, but always vocal readership, is what do I do now?I'm a Protection Warrior in T5-level gear, aka the least in-demand class in the game for guild recruitment. I also have a Hunter... which I'm not even going to bring up.I love raiding... PvP is a diversion, at best... What have those of you who've been in this situation done?Reroll a Resto Shammy and find a guild to Brain Heal for? Quit 'til Wrath? Something else entirely?Thanks in advance for your input.- Nickiter, Smolderthorn (H) I'm pretty much going to throw this out to the audience -- you're having problems I couldn't even dream of having, but I'm sure you're not alone in. Plus, I thought it was a good question even if I couldn't throw some snark in.So, bring it, boys (and girls).Got questions? Don't wait! Send them to us at ask AT wowinsider DOT com and your query could be up in lights here next week.

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Ask WoW Insider: Ding before Outland?

Welcome to today's edition of Ask WoW Insider, in which we publish your questions for dissection by the peanut gallery -- now with extra snark and commentary by one of our writers. This week Houldlum writes in:I'm wondering if it's possible to hit level 70 before ever heading out to Outland. I've been working through every zone trying to hit every quest, even if it's grey (they do give a bit of XP). So far I've only skipped the dungeon quests and any group quest I can't solo. My goal is to hit 70 before Outland so I can maximize the gold return from those quests... and to see if I can do it. I have managed to get to 63 on my Alliance Rogue before I hit Outland, but I skipped several Zones. What are your thoughts? Thanks, Houldlum (Falsehould, Fatherhould)It was a light week on questions, so I'm going to dig down and use this one. Short answer: I'm pretty sure you can't. Long answser: Why the heck would you want to? Even if you got xp from anything in the Azeroth, even Cartman would think that grind was nuts.So, anything out there -- at all -- that will give him or her xp until 70. Got questions? Don't wait! Send them to us at ask AT wowinsider DOT com and your query could be up in lights here next week.

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Ask WoW Insider: When to gem and enchant?

Welcome to today's edition of Ask WoW Insider, in which we publish your questions for dissection by the peanut gallery -- now with extra snark and commentary by one of our writers. This week Greta writes in:Hi! After nearly two years of fiddling around with far too many alts, I finally got a rogue to 70. I'm working on gearing to be able to do heroics and maybe some of Kara with friends before Wrath comes out. My question is this: at what point is it worth it to drop money on nice gems and enchants? I'm mostly still in quest rewards and I'm still saving for my epic flyer, so I'm somewhat loath to drop the gold just yet. At the same time, I want to be a solid addition to my group and I know that maximizing gear is part of that. Any advice on when this is a practical expense?Thanks,Greta

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Ask WoW Insider: /roll abuse?

Welcome to today's edition of Ask WoW Insider, in which we publish your questions for dissection by the peanut gallery -- now with extra snark and commentary by one of our writers. This week Urdunai writes in:Hey WoW Insider, This week I have a question about rolling, as in /roll, and the proper use of it. I was recently on a run of Zul'Farrak with my Shaman, a guildmate Fury Warrior, a Healadin, and a Tankadin. The 2 *adins were dating or some such, I'm not sure but it's important to the story. The run had been going really well, and everyone was being very polite on loot drops. Whenever a Blue item would drop everyone would pass and we would discuss it. This is generally not a practice I approve of (The Need and Greed buttons are there for a reason, blizzard was nice enough to provide them) but that was the group's consensus so I kept my mouth shut and did it.

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Ask WoW Insider: Seeking motivation to level

Welcome to today's edition of Ask WoW Insider, in which we publish your questions for dissection by the peanut gallery -- now with extra snark and commentary by one of our writers. This week JJ writes in:I was wondering if you could give any advice to those who struggle with leveling. I guess you could call me a very casual wow player as I hardly have any time for it.Recently my friend let me look at his level 70 and once I saw those in action, I have a hard time committing to leveling. When I play WoW I generally hang out around cities chilling with the other players. I just can't seem to get myself to level. I get bored very easily and I don't have a very high-level character. My highest is a level 29 hunter on a PvE but i recently rolled a warlock (level 12 -.-).Please explain how you go about leveling. Is there a state of mind that you use to continue?Thanks in advanceJJ

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New Players Guide: Your first login

Ok, you're done clicking sliders and choosing your race and class as part of the character creation process. You've watched the opening cinematic - you watched the cinematic, right? Did you stay through the credits to see the bonus scene? No? Good thing there wasn't one. Now you're sitting in starting area for your race, staring at the user interface (UI) for the first time and could be going, "Oh, man. What do all these buttons do?"As far as UIs, World of Warcraft's isn't that bad actually. If you want to see a game with a horrid interface, take a gander at Second Life; that UI will scar your brain.

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Ask WoW Insider: Any point to starting to raid before Wrath?

Welcome to today's edition of Ask WoW Insider, in which we publish your questions for dissection by the peanut gallery -- now with extra snark and commentary by one of our writers. This week Kedou writes in:Hi,I'm wondering what people think about starting to raid (as in, starting Kara) now, with WotLK on the horizon. Is there any point?Thanks.

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New Players' Guide: Your life as a Hunter.

The WoW Insider New Player's Guide is a series of features designed to help those brand new to World of WarCraft get up to speed as fast as possible. It's our way of giving back to the community, without the paparazzi mob that usually follows celebrities when they try this.As a Hunter, your primary role will be to provide ranged damage-per-second and crowd control with your traps. Actually, I lied, your primary role will be spent convincing everyone you group with you're not one of those brainless morons that seem to end up playing Hunters.You see, Hunters, hands down, are the easiest class to level in the game. At level 10 you get your first pet. This pet will tank for you while you stand back and hail arrows at your target. This means that your overall deaths and repair bills will be lower than other classes, while at the same time your kills will be faster since your pet adds to your damage output.Combat with your Hunter is fairly straightforward: send in your pet, wait a few seconds for it to build sufficient aggro and then start plinking away. It's worth installing an add-on like Omen so you can tell when you're in danger of out-aggroing your pet. You will need to do some damage yourself to get xp or be able to loot the corpse, so even if you're just out farming easy mobs, make sure you hit it once or twice with your bow.

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Ask WoW Insider: Casual Raiding -- does it exist?

Welcome to today's edition of Ask WoW Insider, in which we publish your questions for dissection by the peanut gallery -- now with extra snark and commentary by one of our writers. This week Anonymous writes in:A long, long time ago I dinged level 70. At that time I was in a guild that only had a select group of level 70 players and we tried to make the best of what we had. I had tons of fun discovering all the level 70 dungeons, and finally also the heroics, as a tank (which I rolled due to the tank-shortage). After a while our guild started to attract more level 70 players and we started raiding Kara. Something we never expected to happen since we were nothing like a raiding guild. After clearing Kara we soon moved up to ZA which we cleared with the regular 10 people we pretty much always ran raids with. After this many people started aching for 25mans, and we merged with another guild. We downed Gruul on our first try, piece of cake. Then things started to go bad. We were raiding casually, 2 to 3 nights a week of Kara and ZA. Most people in our guild were casuals (only available about 1 to 2 nights a week to raid) who were really psyched we got a chance to raid. Of course we had a base of "hard-core" raiders. They wanted more and things started to bubble up. Then came the worst news ever, our guild would disband. Our guild leader couldn't do his tasks any more due to a busy schedule out of WoW and he didn't have fun in playing anymore.Our guild disbanded and many players moved on. I as one of the casuals got left behind. We are all very over geared for the content we were raiding due to farming ZA and Kara for so long we could easily afford the new 2.4 badge loot and of course we'd have a lot of drops from ZA. Most people were easily accepted into MH/BT raiding guilds. However these end-game (even the SSC/TK raiding guilds on my realm) have requirements if you wish to raid, you need to attend at least 3 times a week. I, and a lot of other casuals, simply can't do this due to engagements besides WoW. I've gone on a quest to find a casual raiding guild. I had no luck.First I applied to a guild that seemed okay with my requirements, however they didn't need more tanks and denied me. After a while a spot for a tank came up, but they just aren't progressing, at all, so I declined. I couldn't bear the thought of raiding Kara or ZA one more time, I wanted 25man content. So I joined another guild, which turned out to be total chaos. Sure, I could raid there, but when they raided it took all night to down one boss, I left. Now I've joined another guild, which draws a line between "Casual" and "Raider" like many other guilds tend to do. As a casual (even though I'm geared as a raider) I won't get invited into any 25man raids apart from the "lower" content such as Gruul, which I've already seen one too many times. This guild is currently clearing MH/BT and were actually looking for an extra raiding tank, however I couldn't get invited into the raids being a casual (not even two nights a week) so they keep looking.Now I ask you, WoW Insider, where do I find a freaking guild that makes me raid 25man content with the not so many nights a week I have? This is getting urgent, since I'm now finishing my Netherwing rep grind and have nothing else to do besides raiding in this game and it's starting to turn me away from a game I love playing.Yours sincerely,Anonymous.

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Ask WoW Insider: Making friends on a new server

Welcome to today's edition of Ask WoW Insider, in which we publish your questions for dissection by the peanut gallery -- now with extra snark and commentary by one of our writers. This week Matt writes in:Good afternoon to all the staff at Wow Insider. My name is Matt, early 20's, and am having a problem making new friends on a new server.I recently Paid Character Transfer'd to Xavius EU from Balnazzar EU, and as they were looking for a hunter for Black Temple I was recruited to a guild without an application. Although this goes against popular opinion from a few of the people on my old server, I believe that creating an application provides a formal introduction of both yourself as a character and a person. I went from raid leading and being an important member of a T5 clearing guild to a new recruit and trial member in a T6 almost-cleared guild. The step down has been difficult for me to take, and the feeling of not being able to make decisions has shell-shocked me a little bit.My issue is, how does one go about creating new friendships and relationships on a completely new server and with a guild that contains no-one you know? Balnazzar had a thriving IRC channel, shared in-game chat channel between members of varying guilds, and a fantastic Wow Europe realm forum - Xavius doesn't seem to have any of these: the IRC channel is unfriendly and quiet, no shared channel and the realm forum is full of useless troll posts. The guild seem to forget that I've pretty much got no-one to speak to on the new server, and I've spent more time on my other two 70's on Balnazzar than my hunter. Raids are fantastic, and I know that if I was accepted into the more social aspect of the guild I'd enjoy it a lot more than I currently am, but if the situation doesn't change I will probably look elsewhere, which is a shame because the new guild is a really solid, well structured and mostly friendly place to be.Azuredream70 Draenei Hunter<Destiny Awaits>XaviusSlothie70 Draenei PaladinMithranda70 Gnome Mage<International Chaos>Balnazzar

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Ask WoW Insider: WoW runs slow

Welcome to today's edition of Ask WoW Insider, in which we publish your questions for dissection by the peanut gallery -- now with extra snark and commentary by one of our writers. This week Nick writes in:Hello to all the writers/columnists at WoWinsider! My name is Nick and I would greatly appreciate for your help/advice. My problem is that my PC, runs on windows XP home edition, is very VERY slow. I believe that it is because of an infestation of viruses, even though I run AVG free edition, Avast, and Spyhunter. I scan once a week and nothing comes up. My gameplay in WoW is very...laggy. If I am lucky enough, I'll get maybe, 10-20fps in Azeroth and 7-9fps in outlands/isle of quel'danas. It has been like this for a long time. I play a 70 bloodelf Mage, Evolves, on Lightbringer-US while I live in the east coast, even though its a west coast server. I understand that brings my latency up but still not as bad as 1fps EVERYTIME in shatt. I need some help to speed up my computer and maximize efficiency, any ideas/advice? Anything would help me because I'm desperate and am considering quitting WoW if this continues... :'(Sincerely,Nick

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Ask WoW Insider: How to avoid idiots?

Welcome to today's edition of Ask WoW Insider, in which we publish your questions for dissection by the peanut gallery -- now with extra snark and commentary by one of our writers. This week Benjamin writes in:Hi, my name is Benjamin. I am a daily, if not hourly reader of WoW Insider as it is my Warcraft fix while slaving tirelessly under the oppressive regime of work. My question is this: How do you separate yourself from the idiots when trying to PuG? With Mr. Rossi's articles about never Pugging, the endless replies of concurrence, and the numerous other articles of horror stories, I see why I can never get that group together for Black Morass. Part of my issue is that my main is a Night Elf Hunter, which does not exactly inspire confidence but I can chain trap, I am learning to FD BEFORE I pull aggro, and I protect my healers. Bottom line is this, do you have any recommendations when I am hitting the LFG to distinguish myself from the numerous other "OMG, I PEW PEW AND LEWT!" folks, regardless of class? And yes, I do have a Warrior and Priest alt. =) Thank you for your time.When it comes to avoiding idiots in PuGs, often times the answer is a line from the movie WarGames: "The only winning move is not to play."Myself, I'm largely removed from the PuG game as well. I'll do a variation of a Pug, where myself and a couple of guildies might seek out a fourth or a fifth, but the days of me hitting the LFG tool have passed. These days, I'm more interested in a Heroic for the badges, and those can be dicey even with guildies; doing it with strangers is just too much of a hassle.How about you folks -- any tips on how Ben can avoid idiots?Got questions? Don't wait! Send them to us at ask AT wowinsider DOT com and your query could be up in lights here next week.

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Ask WoW Insider: What to do at level 60?

Welcome to today's edition of Ask WoW Insider, in which we publish your questions for dissection by the peanut gallery -- now with extra snark and commentary by one of our writers. This week a level 60 writes in:I'm a newbie to World of Warcraft and got hooked to it quickly, after trying the 10day trial, and find myself frequently checking WoW Insider for latest news and updates.I'm going to ding lvl 60 within the next couple of days and was wondering what is there to do at level 60 (besides upgrading to the next expansion). What can i do at level 60 that I couldn't do at levels 56+i can upgrade my mount/armor/weapons ...... but is that it? I like dungeons a lot, they are fun and I noticed that I've become eligible for raids at level 56, however I haven't done one yet.... so maybe that's it..... Raids.I'm using this page as a guide http://wow.joystiq.com/2008/03/24/wow-rookie-raid-101/ I see all the cool things you can do at level 70 and I could possible get the upgrade and work my way up to it, but, what else can I do at level 60?Sadly, the reality is you're going to need to pony up for the expansion. Oh, I could tell you of people still doing old-world raids (in fact, I answered such a question not too long ago), but, Blizzard and the players have largely left the 60-and-under content behind and moved on to TBC. Plus, if you really like instances, you'll love them in the expansion; personally I feel they're the best in the game.Also, like it or not, Wrath is going to be launching soon-ish (in that "could be this year, could be the year after" way) and with it the level cap is raising to 80. I'd recommend sucking it up and hitting 70 before its launch.Anyone have any advice for him if he delays getting the expansion?Got questions? Don't wait! Send them to us at ask AT wowinsider DOT com and your query could be up in lights here next week.

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Ask WoW Insider: Help a teacher compete with WoW

Welcome to today's edition of Ask WoW Insider, in which we publish your questions for dissection by the peanut gallery -- now with extra snark and commentary by one of our writers. This week a Swedish teacher writes in:Dear WoWI,I am a teacher in Sweden, teaching kids aged thirteen to fourteen. I am also a WoW player, something that has both pros and cons when dealing with my students. Among my students a great deal of the boys are playing WoW and most of the time, not a day passes by without they not discussing the latest content, the coolest instance and the best gear. This is a huge dilemma, especially when most of the boys don't do anything else but talk about WoW. In Sweden, teachers today have to compete with WoW in a frustrating way. We have huge problems with students who can't focus on school due to they playing too much. Since I am a WoW player myself, I have started to think about how I could use this in school, to get my students to actually learn something. I am teaching English and it is obvious that WoW players in this age, have developed their skills a lot and this is something good. My questions are, if the readers of WoW Insider have any constructive ideas on:1) how I can compete with WoW and gain my students focus and concentration on school work2) how I can use WoW in my teaching to develop their language and communication skillsWhat I am doing now is both a desperate try to get things back to normal, but also something that has never been done here before. have figured that I will have to use my students' interests in my teaching in order to reach them. Considering I play WoW myself, that should be easily done. But I also get dead tired of listening to them chatting every single minute about Wow and never put any effort in school work. So I need help, suggestions, ideas from other WoW players. Back when I was a young-un, the big distraction for me was Dungeons and Dragons. We'd sit in the back of the room drawing up dungeons on graph paper. In addition to walking uphill in the snow, both ways, to school, the personal computer hadn't been invented, much less WoW-not that that's a bad thing; I look back on my time in school and am grateful MMOs didn't exist at all, or my barely 2.5 gpa back then would have seemed honors worthy.I can't offer any advice on #1, so I'm hoping some other educators chime in on this one. In terms of #2, it's been my observation that most WoW players need language and communication development themselves, so good luck with that.Anyone who's taught instead of daydreamed learned able to help out?Got questions? Don't wait! Send them to us at ask AT wowinsider DOT com and your query could be up in lights here next week.

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Ask WoW Insider: My Girlfriend won't let me level

Welcome to today's edition of Ask WoW Insider, in which we publish your questions for dissection by the peanut gallery -- now with extra snark and commentary by one of our writers. This week "Lovelorn in Azeroth" writes in: WoW-Playing Girlfriend DramaOr rather, "Here, don't level or do anything that'll give the character you play all the time any XP while I start to level a level one character that I hate playing all the time up to your character's level, and then make your character keep pace with mine! That way, everything will be super-special-awesome!"Dear WoWinsider,My name is [name omitted to protect the... something] elven fire mage of Area 52. Over three months ago, my girlfriend and I agreed (willingly, for the most part) that I should pause my leveling to allow her to roll up a new toon that would catch up to me, and allow us to adventure together across Azeroth on equal footing. Fine and dandy, non?

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Ask WoW Insider: Old-time raiding?

Welcome to today's edition of Ask WoW Insider, in which we publish your questions for dissection by the peanut gallery -- now with extra snark and commentary by one of our writers. This week Jane writes in:Hi there, WoWinsider. Perhaps you guys could help me. I started playing WoW about 6 months ago While I've done my share of TBC raiding, I'm fascinating with pre-TBC raids, and sometimes I manage to find a pug for them. I still didn't get to see most of MC, BWL and Naxx, even though I really want to.The problem is it's impossible to find groups who do these raids anymore. I realize that the loot is no longer useful on most of them, but the game isn't really a greedy loot chase, right? It's about exploring and facing new challenges. Nefarian and Kel'Thuzad would still be quite a challenge for many players, and they're really cool loe [lore? ED] -wise speakingPerhaps if you publish my mail on the advice column, the WoW Insider readers could help me find a server in which there's a lively pre-TBC raiding guild or community?Thanks in advance.I feel your pain. While I started WoW within a month of launch, due to a molasses-like leveling pace I hit 60 after TBC launched. I missed out on all the good raids and wish Blizzard would implement more quests that required you to go back to the Old World, especially the raid zones. It seems the only time my main leaves Outland is to run Karazhan.However, that doesn't mean you can't still run them, or that you need to find a new server. A quick post on the official forums for your server might reveal a chat group you can join to PuG a raid -- I know Argent Dawn has at least one. If you're in a good guild, you could just ask if folks are interested in doing an old-world raid. I ran one in my guild and it went off well, and every now and then we toy with the idea of running another one but it never seems to get off the ground.However, if you don't mind moving servers and want to hop over to Llane, you could join this person's guild – they are recruiting specifically for old-world raids.What do the readers think? Is there much interest in old-world raiding on your server and what advice can you give Jane?Got questions? Don't wait! Send them to us at ask AT wowinsider DOT com and your query could be up in lights here next week.

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Ask WoW Insider: How do I get off standby?

Welcome to today's edition of Ask WoW Insider, in which we publish your questions for dissection by the peanut gallery -- now with extra snark and commentary by one of our writers. This week, reader CS writes:A number of months ago the old guild I had been in for nearly 2 years broke up due to varies reasons so I found a new raiding guild.They are decent raiders, not the top raiding guild but a strong one still and our raid leader is good but I find myself on standby alot still.If the reason is because of my lack of experience with high end raiding or something else ok but how can I fix the problem if they wont tell me that there is a problem?It's because when you sign up for a raid, you're forgetting to give the raid leader a little baksheesh, Seriously, the only solution is to attack the problem head-on and talk to raid leader. I was all set to talk out my butt offer some kind advice, but I remembered this question sounded familiar so I'll be lazy and point you to this write up in our raiding column, Ready Check. Marcie has answered the question better than I could.How about you, oh others left on standby -- how have you gotten off the kids table?Got questions? Don't wait! Send them to us at ask AT wowinsider DOT com and your query could be up in lights here next week.

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About the Bloggers: Mark Crump

Twice a week, our writers will tell you more about themselves, and let you get to know them and the characters they play a little better. Click here to read more About the Bloggers. What do you do for WoW Insider?It seems I spend about as much time convincing the leads that I'll start blogging more any day now, really. Seriously, when I topic comes to mind I write about it. I like tossing out ideas for discussion. I've also recently resurrected Ask WoW Insider from the grave.What's your main right now?A level 70 Night Elf Hunter. I had no idea they were as ezmode as they are -- I just missed the creature handler from Star Wars Galaxies.For the Horde or Glory to the Alliance?Alliance, obviously. My story is the usual one where I had a friend on the server so I rolled there. Naturally, she didn't make it out of her starter month. Once I got over the feeling of abandonment with the help of a wonderful shrink in the Mage's Tower I was fine. I actually had two characters around the same level: the hunter and an Undead priest. When I decided to level up I flipped a coin and the priest lost. I'm still working on him as an alt, though.

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Ask WoW Insider: What does a naked level 60 mage do?

Welcome to today's edition of Ask WoW Insider, in which we publish your questions for dissection by the peanut gallery -- now with extra snark and commentary by one of our writers. This week, reader Meliv writes:Hi WoW Insider! I need some good advice. About August I leveled a mage to 60 but due to my very crappy computer at the time I could barely play in Outland so I decided to quit. However, to stop the addiction pulling me back I sold all my gear to repay some old debts and deleted my characters. Now it's December and my situation has changed, I (kindly) asked a GM to restore my Mage and now I'm back in the game. Only problem is that I'm completely naked with no money and no gear. What should I do?There's a joke about what naked mages, sheep, and money we'll leave on the table.As an aside, never delete your character. As WoW addicts we tend to treat quitting WoW with the same seriousness Gene Simmons takes monogamous relationships. Instead, have a spouse or friend do it for you, That way you have someone else to blame.You haven't said what you've got for professions, so I'll assume you have none. What you're going to want to do is earn enough money to grab two gathering professions -- it's short money so don't sweat it. If you're lucky and have a few quests that just need you to chat with an NPC to complete, wrap those.The lazy way is to level your gathering skills up enough to get some OK gear off the Auction House and then head to Outland to run quests. Outland's quests give decent gold and items as rewards. Heck, you can even try running a few as a naked level 60 and see what happens -- it's not like you need to worry about repair bills. Just expect some odd looks. Or tips.The forward-thinking way is to level up your gathering professions and keep leveling them through 70. That way you'll pretty much guarantee you'll have enough gold for your flying mount.How about you, oh wise peanut gallery: Any advice for the freshly-restored?Got questions? Don't wait! Send them to us at ask AT wowinsider DOT com and your query could be up in lights here next week.

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Fear of hackers may make me play WoW on a Mac full-time

I use a Mac as my production machine. I don't want to get this too much into a Mac v. PC war, so lets just leave it with this: I find I am more productive with my workflows in OS X, and I have the added bonus of not worrying too much about what nasties are included in my downloads. I've been drinking Apple Kool-Aid from a sippy cup for over 10 years, so for me playing WoW on the Mac isn't some life-altering decision. My PC is nothing more than a game/media conversion console. But this whole hacking thing is making me think seriously of playing WoW on the Mac full-time. Sure, I've had WoW sessions of a decent length on my Mac, but not complete PC abstinence. In full disclosure mode, I've worked in IT for over ten years, and many of those years with a dotted-line relationship helping out our Security group. So, I've got a decent understanding of How Not Do Stupid Things On Your PC.Back in my EverQuest days, we had "hacking" problems, but usually those could be traced back to someone doing stupid with his or her account: they used a powerleveling service or gave their password to a brother or guildie who then did something bad. With WoW, though, it seems much more nefarious. Sure, you give your password away you don't have much of a leg to stand on; I'm not going to say anyone deserves anything, but you've got no moral right to get indignant. Am I just reacting to this with a "oh noes, the sky is falling!" paranoia. Maybe. But when you hear of guild websites getting hacked to install keyloggers, peripherals shipping with keyloggers/viruses installed, it's tough to blame the user. There are always two sides to every story, but I'm getting the feeling there are a lot more true innocents in this battle, including our own Amanda Dean.

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Gaming By Mark Crump

Heartless gamer delays dinging 70 as long as possible; writer sympathizes.

Heartless Gamer sent in his (or hers) story of an intentional delay in dinging level 70 here. He says:"Also, the auction house was full of bargains when I started. I easily replaced nearly every item on my character with a TBC green for just a few gold per slot. Due to the mudflation of items in TBC, I was far more powerful than most players that started TBC at it's (sic) launch. This made the first few levels relatively painless.Unfortunately, there are a couple things that surfaced due to my late start: lack of groups and level 70 gankers."As a recent level 70 dinger, I can certainly sympathize with taking the long route. Not as bad as college, though; I'm on the 20+ year plan there. I did a mad dash to 60 to do the TBC review (a pace that would have made Cartman proud), did the review, got burnt out and logged in again mid-summer and got to 65. Eventually the embarrassment of writing for a WoW website and not being 70 got to me and I ground it out."In the end, levels 60 through 69 came and went and 70 arrived. In reality, I am back at level 1. I'm just a baby 70, barely able to hold my own in dungeons five levels below me"I feel that pain. I was a level 70 hunter in quest blues and greens, steadily holding the bottom spot in the DPS charts--I'm pretty sure the healer was ranked higher. After running some instances to get my Kara key things got a little better, but the saving grace for me was my first Kara run--the Loot Gods bestowed favor on me and I had a four-drop day in Kara, and then Murmur dropped the Sonic Spear that night. Now that I'm half-epiced, gemed and enchanted things are a lot better.How about you? Any of you take the scenic route to 70? Will you take your time getting to 80 when Wrath launches or rush like there's no tomorrow?

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Gaming By Mark Crump

Breakfast Topic: Are guilds like the Corleone family?

Near the beginning of the classic film The Godfather, a nervous funeral parlor owner sits near Vito Corleone, wishing the Godfather to do harm in his name. The Godfather acquiesces his request and says, "Some day, and that day may never come, I will call upon you to do me a service in return."Near the beginning of a game night, a nervous guild member logs in and types "/gu looking for healer for Shadow Labs run so I can get my Kara frag." There is silence for a bit, and finally the sole guild priest online says "I will grant you your wish. Some day, and that day may never come, I will call upon you to run my alt through Gnomeregan."Guilds often revolve around the concept of "you scratch-a my back, I scratch-a yours." After all, that guildie that was there every time you needed an instance run for your Kara frags, whom are you to refuse the request when he or she needs a fifth for a heroic?How much back-scratching do you in your guild? Are you more likely to help those whom have helped you, or are you ready to make anyone asking for help sleep with the fishes?

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Gaming By Mark Crump

Breakfast Topic: Attunement, hassle or not a big deal?

I recently dinged 70, finally after a long haul. Naturally, I was all hopped-up to run Karazhan until I learned I needed to first complete an arduous attunement process. Ok, I've known for months that I needed to do this, and it's not that arduous at all. It got me thinking about attunement in general, though.Frankly, my initial reaction to any sort of flagging was negative. I started in EverQuest and its Planes of Power expansion each tier required its own flag. Once guilds got far enough along, latecomers like myself were well and truly screwed as most guilds weren't inclined to go do any back-flagging. They'd usually mumble something along the lines of "how the hell are we going to progress if we're holding newbies hands through the same zones, day after day." Thankfully, pictures of the guild leader and a goat came in handy.Thankfully, WoW has few attunement needs--Kara being the most common. Even almost a year later my guild is more than willing to help me through the process--it seems everyone has two or three alts needing this, so groups have been easy to come by.

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Gaming By Mark Crump

Breakfast Topic: What if guilds were like pro sports teams?

Now, this post is in jest, so ease up on the "OMGTHATDNVRHAPPEN" comments, ok? Roll with me on this one.Lets say you're in a guild that's a little deep in the rogue position and you need a healer, what with Binxie going down with career-ending spousal aggro. And let's say the guild leader knew of this other guild with a healer that's, shall we say, not having a career year. Oh, he does fine on the trash mobs, but when he needs to make that big save on the boss, he chokes. Plus, their guild leader's wife is playing again, so he lost his starting job to her. You've got extra rogues; they've got an extra healer.Now, what would usually happen is the guild that needs a healer would poach him. Even though that guild would probably be glad to be rid of him, hard feelings would likely ensue. What if the two guild leaders could work out a trade? Say, the one looking for a healer could offer up a rogue and a hunter to be named later? Or a rogue and two alts?What about you? Who in your guild would you trade for a used codpiece just to be rid of?

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