So I’ve given up sleep for the time being. Tuesday just kinda bombed for me on the expectations scale and I need to do something to try to get the mind to slow down.
Part of it might have been seeing “Kick Ass.” I’m not sure if I liked it or not and left the movie feeling pretty unsettled. I think I expected more humor than there was. I mean, if you like a little kid with a crass mouth, yeah, I guess this would be a pretty funny movie for you.
But it rang with some pretty ugly realistic feeling moments. A dad’s vengeance pulling in his young daughter to a world of violence where she thinks its all a game to kill people. And where a young man who wacks off to porn and fantasizes about his teacher gets a reality check about being a ‘super hero’ when he gets stabbed on his first attempt and brutally hit by a car – which gets much of his bones covered in metal to replace the breaks and ruined nerves that allow him to take some incredible beatings.
The reality was, he did it because no one else was doing anything. They were just standing and watching the violence. No one was taking a stand but ‘one naïve kid with dreams’ or something like that. The dirty truth of the reality. Something terrible happens and people just stand and watch the show. And why I continued to watch the movie despite being kinda disturbed by the little kid, Hit-Girl – I was won over by the mentality of why the kid did what he did.
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Paladins – Healing Hands
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Q: Will healing hands be a paladin-centered tranquility, or something we have to run around to keep people in range of?
A: The idea is that it matters where the paladin is, so it won’t be raid-wide like Tranquility will be in Cataclysm. We will make sure the magnitude of the heal is sufficient that it’s a button the paladin wants to use. The cooldown and duration aren’t set in stone either.
Just a few moments on this since it bugs me. The spell is an aoe heal that is a healer centered hot. Possibly, this spell will last for 6 seconds. And possibly, it will only be recastable after 15 seconds. They’ve said the range will be limited. Probably 15 – 20 yards is my guess.
So we’re expected to either (1) have a raid being all nice and stacky-stacky for us or (2) move constantly to a group to heal them. With one, I doubt you’re going to have many raid or instances where you want everyone to stand atop one another. Even now when you try, you are lucky because folks have this dislike for overlapping characters outside the RP taverns bedrooms. And with the movement, you are basically asking the games weakest moving healer to move to heal.
Once more I look to former statements as to why you would want to bring a paladin for raid healing purposes when you have the much more efficient Priest, Shaman and Druid? The mechanics of this spell need some serious tweaking and right now, judging by the responses from GC on the Healer forums about this spell, we’re not going to see them until its running through beta and folks can start showing why its such a bad idea as it is right now.
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Paladins – Leveling made Interesting…again?
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I remember in the beginning of BC when I understood nothing of paladin specs or purpose. All I knew from FFXI:Online was Paladins should be able to tank and heal. And I played off of that mentality. Granted I always had friends with me while I leveled her but I was never ‘bored.’ I had to put up a short duration seal, I had to judge and put one up again, I had to heal myself (I had no idea what bubbles were and leveled up without realizing I had them … yeah… haha) frequently and I was always picking fights with mobs I had no place picking fights with.
Then when I romanced the horde with my horde paladin Kaee, I leveled her up as holy. Because they had since simplified paladin leveling so you only needed to renew your seal every so often, and your judgements blended into specific types (aka: light, wisdom, justice). There was no thrill of danger leveling her. In fact, I leveled very rapidly.
Then Wrath hit and leveling as holy was my only solution to make things interesting. And I was still soloing all the group quests (except for that minatore with the blood worms. I couldn’t dps him down fast enough. But I outlasted and whittled down every other boss there was).
With Cataclysm coming, and some of the changes announced, I laugh because it seems they’re trying to spice it up a bit. Give some extra moves to the new paladin on the street so leveling has a bit more to it then the current “judge and go get a drink” mentality.
Crusader Strike will be a core ability for all paladins, gained at level 1. We think the paladin leveling experience is hurt by not having an instant attack. Retribution will be getting a new talent in its place that either modifies Crusader Strike or replaces it completely.
I kinda disagree on it being hurt. You put a seal up and auto swing and you win pretty easy in those first 10 levels. (Which have been super simplified, holy shit they nerfed the leveling of it so much). But it will make things more interesting certainly to sit there with your two hander again.
Holy Shock will be a core healing spell available to all paladins.
This is kinda neat for this leveling process as well. Especially if they let you get it in the early teens. Dunno if they would or not. But for either self healing or a little spike damage, this could be pretty fun! I might have to level a third paladin just to experience this. Actually I may end up trying it anyway to see the new quest layouts that they spoke about at Blizzcon last year.
With the changes coming from gutted talent trees, I’m absolutely curious about what it would be like LEVELING another paladin. And perhaps when Kaae is 85 I might explore this. If only worgen could be paladins.
‘Aight. I’ll leave off here for now. Its 5:30 am and I think I’ve managed to get myself tired out enough to sleep! Good night blog!
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