Well it’s that time of year again.  Time to adopt orphans and show them all around Azeroth and beyond.  This year, Theshat and I completed the meta achievement [For The Children] .  That means we only have one world event left to complete [What A Long, Strange Trip It's Been] and we get our [Reins of the Violet Proto-Drake].  The Midsummer Fire Festival will be coming in June, running to July 4th.

We were somewhat surprised with the pvp element for the meta, [School of Hard Knocks].  What we thought would be the most difficult part turned out to be the easiest.  In Warsong Gulch , the alliance came into our flag room, picked it up, and them dropped it for us many times over.  We did have to yell at a one or two idiots who took that as a sign to try to kill the alliance rather than let them be, since they were trying to help us, and we were returning the favor for them.  In Alterac Valley and Arathi Basin , it was the same.  The only hard one was Eye of the Storm .  There, the Alliance were zerging the flag, making it hard for us to get our achievements done.  Ultimately though, we did it, and are happy.

We still would like to get the Dalaran Orphan quests done, but are still bugged.  We did them when they put them out in 3.2, but since they still haven’t been reset, we can’t do the other ones.  Here’s hoping they fix them.

There’s more to talk about, raiding and such, but I’ll save that for another post.

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I don’ t know how I missed this one, but Bullworth released Raid Eats 3 a couple of weeks ago.  This time Kungaloosh is on the menu.

And today, WoW.com posted another one of Bullworth’s latest, this time a parody of Mythbusters.  Enjoy!

Ok, so I’m getting bad about updating lately.  I’ve been raiding more and more lately.  We’ve been doing some BC raids to get the achievements, and running current raids to work on getting gear and stuff.  Mostly it’s been a lot of randoms, raids, and dailies.  I have posted all the current achievements I’ve been getting to the gallery.

Kind of tired tonight so not much to talk about, but I do want to post some thoughts on upcoming things later.

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Well, I got a followup email from creative labs.  They are sending me a replacement USB cable, free of charge.  So, yay!  I guess it pays to use twitter and some blog complaining after all.

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Well, it looks like being noisy enough got some answers. After talking to Creative on twitter, and with an email exchange, I got confirmation that the USB cables will be available for purchase as replacement parts soon.

Ok, so I made a favorable review on the new Creative Labs World of Warcraft headset.  Well recently the usb cable to charge my headset broke.  The tip came out and it won’t go back in.  I wrote creative labs for support.

Their exact reply:

“Dear Timothy,

Thank you for getting back to us.

We apologise that we are unable to sell you a new cable to replace the current one which is faulty. This is because we do not sell them in loose or individual units since all our parts and accessories come together as a whole package.

Best Regards,

Sherry Z
Worldwide Customer Response
Creative”

Really?  Really Creative Labs?  You don’t sell replacement accessory parts?  What kind of bullshit is that?  You don’t have a spare usb cable for the headset laying around?

Now yes, I realize I could go out and buy another cable somewhere, but I really like the braided cable this comes with.    What the hell Creative?  You can’t put a cable in an envelope, charge me a nominal fee, and send me a replacement?

Bah

Pissed off at Creative now

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Did I ever mention how much I HATE bad tanks?  I’m not talking about the ones who can’t hold aggro against a DPS that does crit after crit and pulls the mobs off the tank.  I’m talking about the “oh btw, I like to chain pull” and then charges in, pulling a dozen or more elites in a heroic, then blames the healer or the rest of the party when we all wipe.

Last night, Theshat and I were in a random heroic, and wound up in Utgarde Keep .  Right after all the buffs were distributed and we all fed on a lovely [Recipe: Fish Feast],  the tank, who had something like 56,000 HP and a gear score of well over 5800, announced “Fair warning, I like to chain pull this place”, and before we could say anything, he proceded to charge in and pull every single mob in the hallway..ALL OF THEM.  As we’re trying our damnedest to DPS them all down,  of course, we each pull a few off of him and we all end up wiping.  Oh and did I mention he was a Death Knight?  So, after we wipe, he doesn’t apologize, he just said “sigh..I guess normal way then”.  And after we again all buff up, he starts pulling, and before we even finish the current batch of mobs, he runs ahead to the next batch, leaving us all behind, the healer frantically trying to keep us all healed  AND HIM AS WELL, as we’re getting damage because he stopped tanking the group and is working on the next group already, out of the healer’s range.  Then, as we’re trying to DPS things down, he keeps running ahead to pull even more, taking the mobs with him that we’re trying to kill, pulling them out of the range of us casters who have to stand still to cast.  To top things off, he kept on /tapping his foot at us for being “too slow”. Yeah, I couldn’t wait for that one to be done to get away from that clown.

The other kind of tank I really hate is the “hostage” tank.  We’re in ToC heroic 5 man, about to work on The Black Knight, when the tank suddenly announces “Roll greed on the [Frozen Orb] or I let you all die.”  He refuses to pull until some of us say yes. Then of course, once the fight is done, we’re all waiting for the roll to see what he does.  He didn’t roll,waiting for all of us.  So, I figured “hell, I never agreed”, and rolled need.  We all knew he had every intention of rolling need on the orb.   Everyone rolled need too, so he got pissed and left (and of course, he didn’t win the orb).   I’m so glad that 3.3.3 will change that to greed only.

The last kind of tank I can do without, is the ones who when we’re about to go up against a final boss, doesn’t check to make sure everyone is ready.  We were in Azjol-Nerub , about to go up against Anub'arak.  I hadn’t crossed over into the platform yet, as I was about 1 seconds behind everyone else.  The tank charges, and the wall goes up, separating me from the rest of the group.  So, they have to 4 man the boss, and the healer has the balls to call me a noob.  If the fucking tank would have waited one more second, I would have  been on the platform and ready to fight, but no, the tank had to be in a rush and not ask if we’re all set.

Ok, rant over.  Overall though, we ended up running 7 dungeons yesterday and 4 on Saturday, totaling 11 on the weekend.  Not bad overall.

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The new plushies I ordered from Blizzard came in today.  The [Gryphon Hatchling] and [Wind Rider Cub] are just so adorable!

And, here’s my entire WoW plushie collection:

That’s all for now. No news yet today.

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By no means am I an expert audiophile, nor a sound engineer.  I am a gamer and entertainment enthusiast who likes the most realism he can get in sound.   This review is written as such.   If you’re looking for a professional reviewer, look elsewhere.  I will be as objective as possible.

Ever since it was announced last August, I’ve been anticipating the availability of the Creative Labs WoW headset.  Today, I finally received mine.      I ordered mine through Amazon.com on Thursday for a retail of $159.99, and after overnight shipping, it came to $181.95.  Your shipping cost may vary and tax of course, depending on where you live. Continue Reading »