Feeling Good About WoW Again

Beautiful Meadow, Somewhere in Draenor

This morning, I woke up really early yet again and after catching up on my overnight Twitter feed, I really didn't feel like doing anything work-ish so I logged into WoW with the intention of just doing my Garrison stuff.

That was well over 3 hours ago and I've only just about managed to tear myself away. Not only is my gold making coming along nicely but my Garrisons and followers are leveling up and my guild is slowly coming back to life. A big chunk of that three hours included chatting to the newest member of my guild, Clarky from Twitter. We've been friends on bnet for a while but now he's come to join us on my server so it's even easier to chat.

Amarochi from Twitter has also joined us and there's another who's leveling a baby alt to join us shortly. I've also heard from an old guildie on Facebook that he's resubbing next week and that really made my day! He and I go back almost to the very start of my WoW adventures and he's been there for me in some of my darkest times. Not that unusual of a story but considering he was only 16 at the time and I'm easily old enough to be his Mom, it's a friendship I cherish even if some may think it a bit weird!

In other news, I've started my DK on her journey to garrison life - leveling in blood spec is fantastic! Yes, my DPS might be lower but as I don't spend any time running back from the graveyard, it feels much better. She's virtually indestructible - so far anyway!

I also got my first profession to 700 this morning - not Leatherworking on my main as you might expect but Fishing! How sad am I? Even more sadness about that though - I didn't do more than 2 fishing dailies so I've basically done it the long, slow way but I have a bag full of stuff to use for Alchemy on my Hunter or to sell on the Auction House. It's an easy profession to level while spending time chatting to friends in game and I was playing Mini Warriors on my iPad at the same time too so it didn't take that long!

Max Level Fishing - 1st WoW Profession done!

Another great thing is that I finally got the mission to get my Selfie camera - yes, I know I kind of ranted against the selfie camera when it first came out but that was because my Twitter feed exploded with so many pictures. It's all calmed down now though and I don't intend tweeting them. I'll probably use a few here if I remember to use it!

The best thing about this morning though is that even though I've logged off, I do feel like I got something done today. OK, it may only be a game but I've been in a bit of a funk and been going through my days like a barely functioning zombie. Today, I got something done and I'm blasting through this post and I have a gazillion other things I want to do and I feel like I can do them all right now! It's been a long while since I felt this buzzed about anything so thank you WoW, you gone & done it again for me!

Have a great day everyone xxx

PS: If you play on EU servers and fancy joining us, just drop me a comment here or over on Twitter @Nevahaddict - we're not raiding or anything, pretty much just social for now but if we get enough people, we can do anything! :)

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Back In World of Warcraft & Addicted Again!

Last weekend I made a concerted effort to get back in to WoW to do some leveling. I certainly never meant to take such a long break but I think it's actually been good for me. I've said a few times on the Journal of Marcus Ty podcast that I feel bad about not playing but still podcasting about gold making so there was always that little nagging feeling in the back of my mind too.

Well, I made the effort and earlier today I made it to about 98.5 so not too far to go until I hit 100 on my first character. My fav guildie is still around although he had taken most of his alts out of our Guild but this morning he brought one back and handed over the Guild Master rank to me again. I didn't even ask for it, but I have to admit, it felt really good to be in game and chatting again and being GM of a guild that I helped create back in early 2010 just topped off a good morning.

I also have a new friend from Twitter who, it turns out, plays on my realm too. Once I hit 100 and gear up a little, I shall introduce the guys and we can all go kill shit together. It could be fun and reminds me of a joke - a Pally, a Warrior and a DK walk into a bar... lol

As for goldmaking - I'm getting there. It's taking a while to get my head around the garrison buildings and the various traders who seem to appear out of nowhere but I've started shuffling materials between alts now so hopefully, soon I'll have a better grip on the Auction House too.

I haven't been taking many screenshots either but I'm really enjoying questing through the zones for now. I'm sure it will be a different story when I level alt number 4 or 5 though!

In the meantime, I'm now poodling through the Spires of Arak. I probably should be in the next zone, but I decided to do the Loremaster and Exploration parts as I took this first alt through so I'll be that much closer to getting flying for my alts when it gets released. So yeah, I'm enjoying WoW again. I didn't realise how much I missed it or how quickly I'd get addicted again but I had a really tough fight with myself yesterday morning at 6am when I woke up! I had to stop myself logging straight in and spending all day in game.

This morning is a lazy Sunday though so I've already played 3 or 4 hours today! I love faffing about in my garrison and I've picked up quite a few new followers this week so they are all off on missions. I can't wait until I get my boatyard (or is it a dock?) but that will have to wait a while yet.

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500 Words a Day - Challenge Failed!

Snuggle Time!

I don't know what made me think I could keep up with the 500 words a day challenge whilst staying with my fella. To be honest when he's not at work, I have absolutely zero inclination to sit at the PC and do a post. I just want to snuggle down and enjoy my limited time with him.

This past weekend was a prime example - on Saturday, I had arranged to spend the day with his Mom. We were going to the Botanical Gardens here in St Louis to take some flower photographs and just get to know each other a bit but the weather decided it was not to be so we had lunch and chatted all afternoon instead.

That evening, Cold took us both to a lovely Italian restaurant on the Hill called Zia's. Oh my gosh, I've been there once before and remembered enjoying the food but this time, I enjoyed it even more than before! I even made room in my tummy for the gluten free chocolate fudge slice - talk about rich and heavy but it was absolutely heavenly!

Sunday and Monday disappeared in a haze of playing computer games, eating out and just hanging out together. I can't wait until I have my own PC here so we can play games together instead of one of us watching the other play. I have so much still to learn about how to set up my keyboard for optimum playing and I'm sure he's going to think my bad habits are crazy slow but I haven't been playing games all my life after all.

We're working our way through the Vikings TV series in the evenings - I think we're halfway through season 2 already and I'm loving it. It's not the fastest moving story but the slow, calm and very deliberate storytelling is keeping me entranced through each episode. It's definitely not recommended viewing for anyone who is squeamish about blood though! The Vikings were a violent bunch with a completely different set of standards to our modern world after all.

So I'm going to give up the challenge for now but I'll start again in June, once I get back to the UK and settle into my old routine. I'm still going to keep writing here in the meantime. I enjoy writing but I do struggle with inspiration sometimes, hence the waffling on about mundane life stuff!

I've started playing World of Warcraft again - well, I've logged in to send my followers on missions so far and had a great catch up chat with my favorite guildie but I fully intend to get my Paladin leveling again today - or maybe tomorrow. I'm feeling my other blog nagging me to get some posts done too!

Just in case you were wondering - Marcus and I are planning on recording a new episode of the Journal of Marcus Ty podcast this week so I'll have something to talk about, now that I'm playing again! As I'm so far behind in this expansion and am pretty clueless as to the state of the Auction House and economy, I'm going to use his WoW Gold Guide to get me back up to speed but in the meantime, it's back to snuggling for me!


image ©Sue Tupling on Flickr under Creative Commons licence

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Check out my other projects
Gifts for Gamers and Geeks

and my photography site
HVS PHotography

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Return To Stormwind - Again!

After writing my post the other day about my feelings for World of Warcraft, I realised that I was being silly by not using some of my stash of gold to buy a token. Ok, so yeah, maybe it is twice the price in gold of the US realms but then I have so much gold, even buying 6 or 12 months gold tokens isn't going to dent my gold balance.

I haven't been feeling the pull to play like I used to but I do sometimes wish I could just pop in for half an hour here and there so now I can and guilt free too! So yesterday, I patched my World of Warcraft, updated all my addons and resubbed for 6 months with gold tokens. I didn't get the best deal because what's a couple of thousand gold here and there huh?

I spent a happy hour or so, doing my garrison stuff on the three alts I've got to Draenor and then I went hunting for my heirlooms to fill that tab up. I'm pretty sure I've lost a bunch of heirlooms somewhere - probably in the mail as I'm terrible for just leaving stuff in the mail system!

I know I had a full set of plate heirlooms but I couldn't find them anywhere - even using altoholic to search alts on other realms. But it's not a huge problem - again, I have so much gold just sitting around, I can easily buy all the ones I might ever need from the Guild vendor.

I can't remember if that's all of them though. I've forgotten so many little details like that. Not only have I not played any length of time since last summer but I haven't leveled a new alt since well before then either.

I head out to the States this week so I don't know if I'll be able to play much for the next three weeks either but it felt good to be back for a little visit at least! It was sad to see the state of my guild though - only one guy still playing by the looks of it but he was always my favorite guildie anyway so I sent him a little note in the mail to say hello!

I think gold making might have to take a back seat for a while - I never did get my head around all the garrison options and I barely even know what the names of all the herbs and crafting materials are, let alone how to make best use of them.

So my first goal is to get my Paladin main to level 100 - she's almost level 94 now so she has a long way to go yet. I might even update my Zygor leveling guide to get there quicker! After that, I don't know - maybe I'll focus on her Leatherworking and see if I can understand all the profession changes or perhaps I'll level my Hunter. I don't know - I think I'm just going to take it easy, pop in when I feel the urge and see where I end up.

It did feel good though - there's so many new things popping up in real life to learn and deal with, WoW was like slipping on an old comfy pair of slippers at the end of a long day!

(500 Word Challenge - Day 10 word count 555)

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Check out my other projects
Gifts for Gamers and Geeks

and my photography site
HVS PHotography

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How I Feel About World of Warcraft Right Now

DC Universe Online Character

I started playing World of Warcraft in the middle of the Wrath of the Lich King expansion and played constantly until the middle of Mists of Pandaria. Somewhere along the way, I lost the first guild full of people I thought were friends but we rebuilt and I made a whole new bunch of friends. It wasn't the same though, the new bunch were lovely people but we didn't have an obvious leader so we just poodled along, doing various bits in game together in a very haphazard way.

Eventually I found myself so wrapped up in gold making and blogging about the Auction House, that I began to feel my guild obligations were intruding and I found more and more excuses not to do group content. I let my subscription lapse early last summer but I resubbed for a month just before Warlords of Draenor was released. I got my Paladin main to level 94 and my warrior to 92 before my month ran out and I've been meaning to resub ever since.

WoW just doesn't have the pull it used to have for me now though. I haven't played since before Christmas - not through any conscious decision but more because I am distracted by trying to build an online income for my future and if I'm not working or reading about that, then I'm vegging out in front of Netflix, crocheting like a crazy old lady!

My Baby Bank Alt

I thought I'd resub when the WoW tokens became available but I haven't yet. I begrudge paying almost 40,000 gold for a token when I can get one for 20,000 gold on my US account! Unfortunately, I don't have Warlords of Draenor on my US account and I really don't want to pay out for that until I know I am going to play! It's a catch 22 situation - pay for WoD on US account & use cheap tokens or pay out in gold instead to play on my EU account.

The other thing that's suffered by me not playing is my podcast with Marcus Ty (the Journal of Marcus Ty) - I just don't feel right being on a show about gold making in World of Warcraft when I haven't played for almost 6 months! I think I am going to bite the bullet and go with my EU account though - I love podcasting with Marcus and once I have the current crochet project finished, I'm going to have to give it a break. Anything can become an addiction for me it seems so I have to pull back when I start accumulating a stash of materials that I'll probably never get through!

Will I start writing again on my AH Addict blog? I honestly don't know. I haven't kept in touch with the current gold making situation but from the few tweets I see in my Twitter feed, it looks like a tough proposition these days. If I find that I am making gold fairly easily then I will probably write about it but I doubt I'll ever write as frequently as I used to. That's a shame though because I am proud of what that blog became for a while and it's sad to see it just sitting there, unloved by me these days.

I haven't stopped gaming completely though - I've been playing Heroes of the Storm with Cold on his days off and some of the free games I review for One Minute Gaming have caught me too. Whoever it was who suggested Cooking Fever has a lot to answer for! I just opened my 5th restaurant in that mini ipad game and I can't see me stopping anytime soon!

Cold and I have also dipped back into Titanfall and Path of Exile recently. Titanfall was fun again after 5 months of not playing - I cannot believe how quickly you lose the skills so I was absolutely awful at it! We've just downloaded DC Universe Online to give that a try later today. My superhero is gorgeous even if I do say so myself and I love the character build options. The fighting and movement stuff is going to give me problems though I think!

I'll let you know how that goes tomorrow probably!

(500 Words a Day challenge, Day 3 Word Count - 711)

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Check out my other projects
Gifts for Gamers and Geeks

and my photography site
HVS PHotography

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V is for Video Games

It feels strange to call them video games when most of the games I play are on my iPad or my PC but the dictionary says I've got the right word so here we go!

I've been playing World of Warcraft since 2009 and writing about it since late 2010 but I remember Space Invaders back in the late 1970's and was fairly addicted to that even back then. Over the years I've played lots of different games and spent hours of fun, bashing buttons at arcades at the beach too. I particularly enjoy the strategy/resource games like Settlers & Sim City. I think I like those because I play solo and at my own speed, without the need for speedy reflexes & movement, something I struggle with in the multiplayer games but then I wouldn't have so many wonderful people to chat too if I didn't play online!

World of Warcraft is in a bit of a lull for me right now while we're waiting for Warlords of Draenor so I've been playing quite a few other games. I'm really looking forward to Wildstar being released on 3rd June and I'm kinda hoping my operation will be scheduled for the week before! I'll be off work for 2 maybe 3 weeks so it will give me something to take my mind off my discomfort! I was lucky enough to get into the closed Beta and have picked up a few of the keys for the current special weekend Betas. I could pre-order but I'm torn between buying the Wildstar US version or the EU one! So for now, I'm hanging on, hoping something or someone will help me make my mind up!

Most recently, I've been lured into League of Legends by Cold and we've met up with a few Twitter peeps in there too (hellooo Amarochi & LegionHopper!). I'm really enjoying it when I play against the AI at beginner level! I'm really not very good at the intermediate level though! If you'd like to join us on Sundays (afternoon US time, evenings UK/EU time) then send us a friend request. If you haven't played before, it's free so just download & install it and tell them NevToo sent you!

I'm also playing Clash of Clans with a new clan and we're all suddenly re-learning how to attack strategically. The new Clan Wars expansion was a bit of a shock to my system for sure! I'd been using a cheap army to just farm resources quickly but that method of attack doesn't work in the Wars!

And of course, there's Hearthstone - the free to play collectible card game (CCG) by Blizzard, the makers of World of Warcraft. I enjoy a game now & then but I haven't stayed addicted to it as I did with WoW. Even now that it's been released for the iPad, I have still only played 1 or 2 games! As you can imagine, with 2 blogs and countless other games on the go, I don't have a huge amount of time for it!

Some of the games I do try to find time for are the free apps I review for my One Minute Gaming segment - which reminds me - I need to do some more for this weekend! You can read my reviews here by clicking the page link at the top of the page.

So yeah, I'd say I'm fairly well covered in the video games department - not saying I'm a geek or anything although I definitely have geekish tendencies! I have a long way to go to earn my full fledged geek card I think!

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