Farewell & Hello

It's been months since I've posted in the blog. No point in going through the wherefores and the whys. Basically, some changes happened after returning from my raiding absence to make me rethink the whole raiding thing. I've been spending 80-90% of my WoW time leveling & gearing my feral druid, Rhus. It's been great. I reclaimed that missing something about the game that I lost when I became burned out from raiding. So in June, it was a quiet farewell that I made to raiding with QSS. Beroth is still a "friend" in the guild and I still keep tabs on their progress.

So, what am I doing? Playing Rhus with a small group of friends. We are unfortunately too small of a group to do Kara runs and some of the group is still raiding with various guilds, so there's been no pressure to find the extra people to do it.

Early in the summer I challenged myself with a question. Could I get myself geared enough to tank all the heroics without ever setting foot in a raid instance? The answer, with some help, is still undecided. I've had to farm a lot of material and/or rep for "charity epics." I've spent lots of coin on buying patterns for BoP gear like the Boots of Natural Grace. I got my Cenarion rep for Earthwarden & my SSO+Scryer rep to make the Shattered Sun Pendant of Resolve one hell of a nice piece of gear. The other part has been a big PvP grind. I've already collected 3 pieces of the Merciless Gladiator's Dragonhide set and am working on a 4th. It's an excellent Kara-level bear alternative and can be worked on at your own pace.

I've also spent hours reading through the blogs of two friends and excellent Feral Druids: Karthis' Of Teeth and Claws & Flyv's Warcraft Blog. Both blogs have been invaluable in teaching me about attack rotations, gear itemization & for giving me ideas about what to go after. Rhus (my druid) may never be as geared as them or see the bosses they see, but I like to think that I'm making the most of things. Damn has it been fun trying to get non-raid Alts through heroics, learning to PvP on a completely different toon & trying to get my 2x2 team up and running.

I'm working on some questions for Karthis & Flyv about specific gear and for heroic strategies. Since I only get 4-6 badges per week & can only grind so much honor and/or reputation, I've got to be selective about my wishlist.

More to come? Perhaps...