Lights. Camera. Drama.

This week has been a lucky week for moi. On Wednesday, I received a free month of Wow from the lovely CTRL ALT WoW crew! CTRL ALT WoW is a weekly World of Warcraft podcast hosted by four crazy WoW fans: Aprillian, Ashayo, El Jeppy and Vrishna. They discuss WoW politics and the entertaining process of creating alternate toons on multiple servers. 


I started listening to them about two weeks ago from a Ladies of Leet acquaintance of mine and I find them quite hilarious. When I heard my name at the end of the latest podcast, my mouth was literally opened. I had to play the end part like three times to make sure I was hearing right because I usually do not win anything. So this is a shout out to the CTRL ALT WoW crew, for making my WoW dreams come true. I love you guys! I cannot wait to return to the game!


In other news...

I received the Geek Girls Unite Award from the lovely Ray J! I must in return list ten geeky facts about me:


1. I am a casual WoW player. Been playing since Burning Crusade.
2. I am a popular culture geek. I know almost 90% about Hollywood and the entertainment industry. I have dozens of celebrity gossip, fashion, and media blogs listed in my Google Reader to prove it.
3. I am a video gamer, but have not play video console games for years. I still have skills. ^_^
4. I have a blog. 
5. I am a social media addict.
6. I went to Smith College.
7. I still have my Pokemon cards lying somewhere in the house. I remembered when having a holographic Charizard, Blastoise, or Venusaur 1st edition card meant you were a Pokemon master in training.
8. I took two years of Japanese at college and now in the process of relearning the language. Has not been hard until I start writing the kanji again.
9.  I was born into the world of 90s and 00s anime shows. I want Toonami back on Cartoon Network.
10. I read tech and social media blogs. (Mashable, TechCrunch, and Gizmodo to name a few). 


To keep the tradition alive, I am giving this award to:
Johana @ The Mercurial Wife


Johana has been my most active commentator and online friend. Her blog is amazing! She even helped me redesigned my Tumblr blog! Check it out! If Johana used her web design skills to make my blog links functional, then she is a certificated geek! :) Grats Johana! Come on down and claim your award! 


Finally, the Picture of the Week! Have a wonderful Memorial Weekend! Speaking of which, what are your plans for Memorial Weekend?

I have thought about switching to Wordpress. I've decided to not go with that plan. But I have decided to start a smaller, new blog on Tumblr! Expect it to come out next week! It is going to be separate from this blog. I have collected hundreds of random pictures online over the years. So many pictures, I have at least three USB flash drives full of them. Now, I can showcase them in a more simplistic form. I can find really good pictures, videos, and quotes. Expect to see my carefree, artistic side. Hopefully by Monday, I will post the Tumblr url. If you have a Tumblr blog, I want to connect with you.

In other news!

Last October, I confessed that I am a female WOW player. Today, I come as a WOW fan, video gamer, and Blizzard Entertainment customer. You don't have to play World of Warcraft to know about the culture, you only need to know someone who lives inside the game. I have not played since February 4th, but that has not stopped me from writing about the game's third and possible final expansion installment, Cataclysm.

Cataclysm is coming soon everyone. Blizzard will probably launch it in late summer/early fall of this year. The volcanic ash incident in Iceland alone is a sure testament of modern-day Azeroth's willingness to change into the drastically, unrecognizable world depicted in Cataclysm. For the last three weeks, I have been analyzing the new Cataclysm preview class changes with exhilaration and worry. I love video games that challenge the mind and transcends the imagination, similarly to what Hollywood mega blockbusters are suppose to do when you enter the movie theaters.

But with the new influx of new WOW players and the stupidly easiness in leveling toons and professions in the game, I have created this proposal to help Blizzard developers out there through the process of this expansion pack in order to regain the trust and satisfaction of its customers and innovate and improve beyond the first two expansion packs: Burning Crusade and the Wrath of the Lich King. Declaimer: If you are not a WOW fan and is reading this, try to catch up!


1. Make sure Tree of Life is efficient in PVE and PVP. In WOW, you can play characters from ten different classes. One of the classes that you can play is a druid. I have a level 72 druid. In the preview, Tree of Life is a passive ability, meaning that if you were to spec in the restoration druid talent spec, you can play as a tree. Now Blizzard wants to make the ability into a cool-down based talent. If this happens, please have TOL last between 30 seconds to 2 minutes, longer than the deep demonology warlock's Metamorphosis talent. Also, I encourage Blizzard to provide resto druids with some, if not all of the Tree of Life buffs when not in form. If not, resto druids will be more susceptible to polymorph effects (mages) and stuns in pvp and arena.

2. Give warlock players a reason to PVP again. I have a level 80 warlock main and I cannot tell you how many times I was defeated in arena and battlegrounds by rogues, paladins, and pretty much every other class other than a priest. We are know that warlocks are still at the bottom of the PVP (Player vs. Player) totem pole. Even if a warlock has a 1,000+ resilience rating and knows his/her class, he/she will still have problems with most classes fifty percent of the time. The lock's closest relative, the mage, makes a more formidable than the warlock because of its various defensive and offensive spells (ice shield, crowd control, etc.). I am excited about the new changes for the warlock class, but they are more geared towards PvE and raiding. Grant warlocks more useful pvp survivability abilities!

3. Give rogues a reason to kill. I also have a level 80 rogue. Rogues are probably one of the only classes to be gear and Cool-down dependent. Their skill comes from the mastering of its several defensive and offensive cool-down based abilities such as cheap shot and gouge. When all the CDs are down, they are useless and swishy. Rogues are fortunate to receive the Smoke Bomb ability, but what happens when a rogue activates it and cannot use its spells because the cool-downs are up? Is 10 seconds enough? Also, fix Vanish and Cloak of Shadows. I did not played WOW during the Vanilla days (2004-2006), but I will tell you is that if you are suppose to vanish within the naked eye, you are suppose to not be seen.

4. Nerf the paladin class. This statement is very self-explanatory. Blizzard made this hybrid class almost unbeatable in every form of combat sequence in the WOTLK expansion pack. When beta testing PTR realms are opened to the public soon, I hope Blizzard keeps in mind that the balance of all classes should be the most important goal in the game. Otherwise, there will be another influx of paladins or your customers will lose interest in the game and quit.

5. Make sure the new level 85 dungeons and other content are challenging. Blizzard has more than 10 million customers worldwide and counting. Your customers should work for the $15 monthly subscription. Do not make leveling their toons to level 85 like a walk in the park. Currently, a new player can easily level to 80 in less than a month and farm level 80 heroic dungeons for level 200-232 gear in less than a week. If you want to keep your customers, make sure the heroic and raiding dungeons are harder to play as a group. As a result, it will allow players to actually think about the content, the group dynamics, and their avatar abilities more intimately than easily defeating bosses and mobs.

6. Finally, Skill is more important than gear. Bring back Vanilla. When a recruiter or internship coordinator analyzes job applications, he/she is looking for potential candidates with some level of experience and personality. When I play WOW, I intend to play with skill. I may not have the best available gear, but I as least have the dps (damage per second) or heals or tanking abilities to defeat any foe in my way. You can always get gear, but skill takes practice. Unfortunately, most WOW players only care more about the shiny new level 277 gear you got from Heroic Icecrown Citadel 25-man than the level of skill it takes to master your particular class(es).

This is the reason why I do not like the current gear score system or Blizzard's call to eliminate the gear score system: The Equipment Potency Equivalence Number System. Either way, guilds and groups will still  use gear ratings to discriminate against others that have below-average or decent gear. Blizzard wants WOW players to manage their toons' mana and energy more efficiently than ever before in Cataclysm with the new stat changes, but how does that filter into the current gear vs. skill politics? With skill comes great responsibility. To become a great player with the best gear and skill is rare, but should be one of the most ultimate goals of any WOW end-game player.

Other than this, I look forward to the new expansion pack and more hours of epic leetness!


Do you play WOW or know someone who plays it? If so, what do you think Blizzard has in store for us in Cataclysm? What do you agree or disagree about my proposal?  If not, what did you not understand about this blog post? I can clarify some points via comments below.

As you may not know, you have to shell out a load of cash to get an iPad or any of Apple's amazing products. I also know that us poor folks can only dream of getting our hands on one....maybe two to three years down the road... but as least we get one, right?! Now, if an iPad magically arrived at my doorstep this morning, here are the five things I would instantly do on my iPad:

1. Play World of Warcraft. I would intently use the iPad's touch-screen keyboard to miraculously keybind all my toons's spells and special attacks, so I can finally raid Icecrown Citadel and kill the Lich King. I do not care if it is not humanly possible yet, I want a freaking iPad!

2. Watch my favorite shows and movies during my spare time. What is more relaxing than to watch the Legend of the Seekers or Glee with the touch of my index finger? The pixels of each screenshot emits so much holy light, that I would feel like I was witnessing IMAX resolution without playing the extra $20.00.

3. Create posts and articles for my blog and connect with friends on social media. I would tell my blog followers that I blogged my new posts using the iPad, then continue to brag that I was chosen to be given a gift from the Greek gods of Mount Olympics. Bragging rights is equivalent to street credibility in the tech world. To be the cool cat with an iPad among millions of Twitterers will only get you so far. That is why you must bring along your iPad everywhere you go to draw out every hobo, hipster, and other non-existent person from hiding out in the darkness.

4. View my favorite magazines in HTML5 Format. Since, the iPad does not support Flash (I still am confused with the whole Adobe v. Apple ordeal), I could read Wired, Wall Street Journal, and other magazines and newspapers in the new HTML5 language. I want to experience what it is like to virtually "flip" over amazing, glossy photographs without the hussle of accumulating paper and garbage overtime.

5. Try out the iPad applications. Buying an Apple product is a blessing in disguise. Buying and testing out the thousands of iPhone, iPod, or iPad applications is an even greater privilege (if you have the $$$). Since, I do not possess an iPhone, I am missing out on the cool iPhone applications everyone has been taking about. With that, I would ask my Twitter friends for possible recommendations and research on my own to figure out which iPad applications are the best and coolest around.

What five things you would do first if you had a iPad? 

Nowadays, I don't play as often as I used to when I was younger unless you consider World of Warcraft a game at all. WOW is life for many addicted players. Trust me, I know some. At times, I thought it was but overall it's not. It consumes your life once you are addicted to it, but it is not life to me. It combines technology, communication, epic pwnage, noobs, and guild drama into one whole package. I started playing January 2008 after watching the legendary Leeroy Jenkins video in a "History of Video Games" class my junior year at Smith College. I played the 10-day trial version and I was hooked ever since.
Two years later, I have invested my time in two avatars, a level 80 duel specced rogue and warlock, hundreds of quest lines, and hundreds of hours in fun dungeons. You don't want to know how many times I have gotten myself into REALLY bad pugged raids. It is a shame. WOW may seem worthless to the non-WOW user, but for people who are into technology and connecting with hundreds of peoples across the world to level your players, the ganking of other players in player vs players territories, and obtaining the best pve and pvp gear around, it may be worth it. But be aware of the addiction. I had to check myself a couple of times because I was getting so consumed into the game. So, don't let it take over your soul.

Now, I have stopped playing to do more productive things during my leisure time. Once in a while, I might pop out of nowhere to reconnect with friends and former guild members I have met since joining the WOW phenomenon two years ago.  But more importantly, I have far better things to do with my life like pursuing my career and leaving the "nest" (God parents these days) on my own. :D

I am back from a well-deserved vacation playing WOW (its all over for now) and job hunting online (wait I still am ><). God, four months has passed. However, I will make the commitment to writing a blog or two everyday from now on since I'm at home and unemployed at the moment. Here are the crazy things that have been bothering me in the past few weeks.