I’ve gotten a few questions about what we should be doing once 5.0.4 goes live on Tuesday, so I thought I’d put together a quick FAQ on preparing for the patch and offer my thoughts on the changes that you will be faced with.

How Should I Spec?

I think the first question that is on the forefront of everyone’s mind is “what do I do with these new talents”. Here is my recommendation:

I’ve already talked a lot about the talent trees in other posts, so I’m not going to go into too much detail again here. I will say that you should explore the other options in the 45 and 75 tier if you haven’t had a chance to play around with them on the beta. I would also encourage you to play around with the level 60 talents to get a feel for them as well if you haven’t been on the beta. However, when push comes to shove, these are the talents that I think will work best at level 85 for our last few weeks of Cataclysm.

What haste breakpoint do I need?

Since we are still at level 85, our haste breakpoints will remain the same. You will still want to have 2005 haste. Keep in mind, however, that you will be losing your idol. So if you had any haste on your idol, you will want to be sure to find somewhere to reforge or regem so that you are at 2005 again.

Do I really only have 100k mana?

You do! You will also be losing revitalize as a source of regen and intellect no longer has an effect on your mana pool or regen. From my play on the beta, I think that you will probably feel the pinch a little, but not an extraordinary amount at level 85. If you find that you are running out of mana too quickly during encounters try backing off of your rejuv use some. If that still isn’t sufficient, reforge some of that spirit back onto your gear. I ran at about 2600 spirit at level 85 on the beta, so if you are one of the players who dropped down below 2000 you will likely want to reforge some of that spirit back before stepping into your first post-5.0 raid.

Yea, yea. I know, I’m supposed to be talking about patch 5.0 and how to get ready for it. But I’m not! (I’m such a rebel! Look out now!). Instead I’m going to talk about something else: finishing games.

A couple of weeks ago I saw that there was a new Kingdom Hearts out for the 3DS. I just had to have it, and so I asked Brade if he could pick me up a copy so that I could enjoy it. He gave me the look, you know the one, it’s the one that says “but you have all of these other unfinished games (and unstarted!) that you can play!”. But none the less the next day he came home from work and lovingly handed me a copy of the new Kingdom Hearts and I was quite excited.

However, this copy of Kingdom Hearts, that I just had to have, is still sitting on my desk unopened and unplayed. Which is actually kind of sad, because I can play the 3DS without too much discomfort to my hands. And, well, it’s borderline tragic because hello it’s KINGDOM HEARTS. If you’ve never played the series, perhaps you don’t understand. But getting to kick ass with Mickey and Sora is just, well, magical (plus….Gummy Ships, just sayin’).

So…this past weekend while I was super quiet here on the blog, on the cusp of MoP, while expansion news was flowing faster than the chocolate river at Wonka’s factory, and while I was completely oblivious to pretty much all things involving WoW, this happened:

WARNING! SAP INCOMING!

It was really sweet, and under each option was commentary that made me laugh and smile. Brade really knows me very well and knew that I’d start with “no” and work my way around to “yes”, observing each option, and so the answers played off of each other. I don’t usually do “scrap book” type things, but I’ve tucked this little square of paper away to put somewhere safe so I can look back on it an smile as I remember it.

For those of you who don’t know my history with Brade, I met him in WoW. We started talking about books one night while I was up late farming Night Dragon’s Breath back in Vanilla, and things sort of went from there, and before I knew it I was relocating to Seattle. We’ve been together somewhere around six years now. He continues to make me laugh almost daily, and helps to keep me balanced. He allows me to be who I am, with all my (many) flaws, and doesn’t judge me for them. He celebrates my joys and helps me through my struggles. And, without fail, he always finds a way to make me laugh – no matter how worked up I am or upset I am, he always manages to coax a smile from me. And I love him for that.

He once did a guild update that talked about defining moments in relationships. I can’t say if his theory on defining moments is entirely accurate – but I can say that I have certainly had those moments where I’ve said to him “if I can’t share this with you, who can I share it with?!”. I do know that I can share anything with Brade. He is the one person that I can completely let my hair down with and know that he won’t think less of me, no matter how shallow my complaints may be, or how silly the things I let frustrate me appear. Someone asked me how I thought married life would be, and I told them that Brade and I have been together so long that I anticipated it would pretty much be the same, only with better jewelry.

It’s truly amazing where and how you can find happiness, and I don’t think other people should define those parameters for you. When all is said and done, the truth of the matter is that I’ve found someone that I want to grow old with and I’m thankful every day that he entered my life. I know that I am looking forward to our future adventures, and anticipate much laughter and many more smiles along the way.

There have been a lot of things over the past week, both in and out of game, that have made me want to throw my hands up and walk away in frustration. I cannot tell you how much I would love September 25th to arrive already, and put idle hands and minds to work with activity. However, I’ve ranted up and down for the past week about those things, and honestly I want this week to start off on a more positive note. You see, I grow younger at heart this week and I intend to enjoy that despite everything else around me.

As such, I’m only going to talk about things that have pleased me or brought me joy over the past week and coming in the week ahead. Maybe this is some hippy mumbo-jumbo, but it seems to me if I want to have a happy, upbeat, pleasant week I need to take control of that from the start and build a good foundation for it to thrive. Or something.

The Outback Adventure
So in the biggest of news of the week, I think, we bought a car. Well, more specifically, Brade bought a new car. I haven’t even gotten to drive it yet! (Granted, that might be because Brade has driven with me before…). Anyhow, we started our Saturday morning at 8:30 in the morning with Breakfast out, and then drove and drove and drove. And oddly enough the first car we drove ended up being the one that was overwhelmingly the favorite.

And so when we got home around 7:00 Saturday night, it was in a new Subaru Outback!

For those of you in the Seattle Area, I will tell you that Sonny over at Chaplin’s Subaru in Bellevue was amazing and provided one of the best car purchasing experiences that I’ve ever had. When all was said and done, the actual purchasing part of the car was one of the most painless things we experienced throughout the day. In fact, I would buy another car from him in a heartbeat. If you are in the market for a new Subaru, I would absolutely recommend going to visit him!

Resto Round Table
What happens when you put 4 resto druids in a room and mix? You apparently get almost two and a half hours of druid talk! We recorded the Waffle Cast resto roundtable on Friday night, and it was a lot of fun. You can find the pod-cast here.

On Enjoying Lunch with a Friend
I have a semi-regular lunch outing with my good friend Tikari. This past week he was kind enough to listen to me ramble not once, but twice, as I had an emergency OMG THIS JUST HAPPENED AT WORK situation that I needed to vent about. It’s one of my favorite parts of the week, as we get together to ramble and rant about WoW, Work and how NBC broadcasts the Olympics (ok, maybe not really that last part!). But mostly it’s just nice to have someone to regularly bounce thoughts, ideas and frustrations off of, and receive an ear or advice in return.

No…not like those ears that you collect at the Darkmoon Faire! Exactly what do you think we do out here in Seattle! Seesh.

This past week we went to a newer place in the area, and stumbled on the most delicious thing ever. EVER. Grilled Cheese Fondue. It’s basically a pot full of tomato soup, and you are brought these amazing grilled cheese dippers for them. I am fairly confident that I could have sat there and eaten it all day. In fact, when they lady asked if we wanted more dippers I all but yelled “OMG THAT IS POSSIBLE?!?!”. So. Good. I think I might even go back today for lunch, since I’ve done nothing but think about how delicious it was since Friday!

On Growing Young
If I’m quiet this week, it’s because I have big plans! Tuesday night a friend is treating me to dinner at my favorite steak house, and I’ve been drooling for almost a week in anticipation. Then Thursday we are going to see King Tut. I’m quite excited, as I’ve never gotten the opportunity before and I’ve heard that the exhibit is quite amazing. After spending some time with the Tut, we are going to dinner at another one of my favorite places, and then going to see Weird Al in concert.

I have never seen Weird Al before, but I have high hopes that it will be an evening of frivolity and laughter.

Then on Friday we are going to head to the zoo, weather providing. Last year when we went to the zoo I fed a giraffe. I was completely chicken and pretty much threw my branch into its mouth the second that freakishly long tongue started to head my direction, but it was still a lot of fun. This year I think I’m going to feed the elephants instead. Although I suspect I will likely be equally as chicken when that trunk starts to move in my direction.

At some point, we will probably also go see a movie. As Brade listed them off, he conveniently left Sparkle for last – and then pointed out all of the other fantastic options that he had previously provided, including Paranorman and The Odd Life of Timothy Green. I guess he really doesn’t want to see Sparkle if he’s trying to sell me on the two above

In short, I’m very much looking forward to the week ahead!

How have you all been? Do you have anything excited planned this week? Are you looking forward to anything coming up? What are you using for your anti-irritant for the week?

I wanted to let everyone know that I have been invited by the Team Waffle Cast group to participate in their Pre-MoP Resto Druid Round Table Friday, August 10 at 7:00 PST.

The round table will include:

• Jasyla of Cannot Be Tamed;
• Lissana of Restokin; and
• PvP Gladiator Starship

We will be talking about the changes we’ve seen in the beta, how we feel those changes will impact us as healers, and brainstorming for improvements that we’d like to see before launch. There will also be a Q&A segment at the end so please use the link above to send in any questions you’d like answered!

This post is really a really a recruitment post, and I will get to that part, I promise! However, there was a blue post yesterday that I wanted to bring to everyone’s attention. Remember how I indicated that I just got clobbered by good monks and paladins, and it felt imbalanced? Well, it turns out they are bugged.

It’s probably not possible to overcome that much of a difference. Fortunately, you don’t have to, because paladins and monks both had some egregious bugs that inflated their healing. We actually hotfixed those bugs but then a new build broke them again. Until you get a new build or we hotfix the issues again, you are probably better off comparing druid, priest and shaman healing. I apologize for any inconvenience.

Overall, I would recommend not deciding who you’re going to bench based on beta testing until we are very close to ship. It’s not a great strategy to try to get your character buffed either.

I am encouraged by the commentary that they want healing to fall where priests, Druids and shaman are currently, as skilled players in those three classes are competitive and relatively comparable. To be sure, there are absolutely things with each of those three classes that players will indicate is still problematic and in need of a fix. But it is encouraging to know that paladins and monks are being scaled back to a more reasonable and competitive position.

Now About That Recruitment!
As it turns out we have a few healers retiring from WoW at the end of this expansion. This leaves us in a position to pick up a couple of healers on our roster. Right now we are looking for a Paladin and a Priest or Shaman.

We have a very strong and competitive healing team, and I’m confident enough to say that our healers are some of the strongest players on our roster. We push each other to be better healers, and challenge each other every raid.

If you are interested in one of the open positions, you can find additional information at www.monolithwow.com. If you have any questions, feel free to email me or ask them below and I will be happy to answer them!

Heroic Scarlet Monastery

I finally had some time this weekend to get into a couple of LFR groups and do some raid testing. Having been unable to participate in almost all of the other testing because of the times testing was available, I was excited to get in there and see how druids played out in a raid setting. Even though this was just LFR, and the weakest of the 25 man raid settings, I was able make a few observations with regards to our stat priorities and our toolkit. As such, I wanted to talk a little bit about how I felt we fit into the overall picture.

I did two front half LFRs comprising of three bosses. The first one I did we couldn’t get past the second boss – as in grand LFR fashion a wipe meant half the raid dropping and having to refill (even in beta!). The second one I was able to kill all three bosses in the first half of the zone. Overall I found the bosses to be fairly fun; however I strongly suspect that the second boss will see a nerf to phase 3 in its LFR version before it goes live.

Let’s move on and talk a little bit about the healing. If you have any specific questions about the raid or bosses themselves, let me know and I’ll try to answer them to the best of my ability!