Slain by Elf

Knifey's been taking it easy recently. The differing time-zones make teaming up with the rest of my party difficult and, after learning the lesson the hard way before, I don't want to get ahead of my friends so that we can't team up. There is also a certain ennui settling over me when playing solo, and with over 3,000 gold in the bank World of Auctioncraft isn't as necessary or fulfilling any more. So despite the levels flying past whenever playing, with everyone in the group gaining a level from running a handful of quests in the Western Plaguelands in about ninety minutes for example, there has not been too much advancement overall. But that level gained in the Western Plaguelands got me to 57, and that's just one level away from being able to pass through the Blasted Lands' Dark Portal to the Outlands.

I set myself the small target of reaching level 58, so that I could pop my head in to the Outlands and visit the Master profession trainers. This didn't take me too long to achieve with the large number of quests available in both the Plaguelands and Burning Steppes, without even needing to head to Winterspring or Silithus. I'm quite glad, to be honest. After I gained the significant 58th level and Knifey took his first steps in to the Outlands I was reminded of how big, full, and interesting the Outlands still is. I've spent too long in Azeroth, time I've already spent there in the past, and the new world opened before me may well be the reinvigorating push I need to get past this ennui and feel more excited about exploration and questing again. It shouldn't take long for the others to get to 58 and then the opportunities to explore Hellfire Citadel open up. When that happens the World of Warcraft can feel like a place of adventure again and not somewhere to pass the time.

There was another reason I made myself the goal of reaching level 58 ahead of time. My recollection was that the green drops from Outlands required at least level 58 before characters could equip the items, and that, for reasons I don't entirely agree with, are vastly more powerful than items found in Azeroth. I checked the auction house often, separate from my profiteering, for swords and dagger just out of my reach. Sure enough, there were some being offered for sale that were from the Outlands and having outrageous DPS values for their level, although I was wrong that they started becoming available at level 58, as some were showing up for my current level of 57.

I bought a level 57-required dagger to use immediately and found a level 58-required sword for the next level, both green quality, for around 20 gold for the pair. I swapped out my old weapons, both bind-on-pickup blue quality weapons dropped by boss mobs in dungeons, and only a couple of DPS below what I could reasonably get for my level. The old weapons were both giving about 35 DPS. The new weapons from the Outlands were both rated at 45 DPS. Maybe the stats on the new weapons weren't optimal for a rogue, but I didn't care. A boost of 10 DPS on the base damage of a weapon is an enormous boost to damage output, almost 30% more, and superior to anything I could find in Azeroth without killing a boss that requires a raid to defeat. This is the real reason why I aimed to reach 58 sooner rather than later, because now I am a killing machine that inhabitants of Azeroth can only fear.

Two Marrowbreakers have been killed, two more have been released. Two Marrowbreakers are on the loose and ready to kill. So far, our mission to prevent the murders in the city has not been going so well, with at least one fresh kill each night despite our best efforts. Our current plan is to let whatever happens tonight happen and hope that the creature we trapped outside of its lair tries to return, for we have now removed the obstruction preventing it from getting back in in the hopes that we will be able to find it inside come the morning.

Before we rest for the night we feel some sense of obligation to report the awakening and release of the metal demi-god to the commanding officer. When we do so there is some concern that any spread of this news amongst the general populace will cause panic and are told not to tell anyone about this. The slight problem with this request is that we had to tell the guards more-or-less what had happened simply to get an audience with the commander in the middle of the night, and those guards were busy being guard-like and telling all their chums. Nevertheless, we won't tell anyone else, we promise.

Getting back to Chez Dexter finds Dexter's butler ready to offer him a change of clothes from the sewery mess that his current set has become, and asks if there is any truth to the rumour that an ancient iron giant is coming to destroy the city. 'Oh, no, that's just silly hearsay, he's only coming to enslave everyone', replies Dexter, before realising that that wasn't much of a denial. Never mind, a quick bath, as good a night's rest as we can manage in a few hours, and a change of clothes and we'll be back in the stinking water looking for Marrowbreakers.

Come the morning and we head back in to the watery tunnel to the monsters' lair, which turns out to be empty when we get there. Undaunted, we head back in to the temple to seek them out. We note that the iron lord is no longer around, and whilst we note that two Marrowbreakers sneak up on us and attack. With some experience under our belts, some lucky rolls, and no one dying, we manage to defeat the pair of Marrowbreakers! This seems to be too much like actual progress considering all the time we've spent killing one only to awaken another. Such is the level of confusion we started wondering if we needed to release the final two Marrowbreakers from their statuesque slumber. I think we decided not to in the end, but it may be a matter for more debate once the metal giant has been defeated. Back to the surface!

Attacking with a melee weapon in to a grapple is more a matter of luck than skill, as there is an equal chance of hitting each grappling combatant. When we were attacking the grapple-happy Marrowbreakers we had to check to see if we hadn't hit an ally by mistake. With Tal in a grapple the DM had many occasion to ask us to 'Roll to see if you hit the Marrowbreaker or Tal.'

'Okay, if I roll high I hit it', or, 'if I roll high I hit the monster', came the reply.

In each case we had to clarify 'Who do you mean, Tal or the Marrowbreaker?' and there was much rejoicing. This probably irked Tal a bit, and if it didn't we must have pushed him over the edge when the second Marrowbreaker grappled with Dexter.

'Roll to see if you hit the Marrowbreaker or Dexter.'

'Okay, if I roll high I hit it.' <rolls die>

'... Wait, aren't you going to ask who he means?' asks Tal.

'Nope, it's pretty clear he means the Marrowbreaker to me.'

We entered town shortly after the murders started and were tasked to investigate and stop them. Our investigations found a pair of creatures were killing citizens, so we set out to kill or subdue the creatures. We set one loose and killed the other, but almost immediately afterwards we released a third in to the wild after we entered an ages-old temple. Feeling a pang of responsibility about this, as well as investigating the possible plot to end all life on the planet by a cult, we task ourselves to explore the temple fully, at which point we awaken what appears to be a demi-god. Everything we've touched has turned to gold so far.

The demi-god is placated for now, allowing us safe passage through the temple to look for the marrowbreaker and some clues as to the cult's plans. We find what we work out to be the charred and quite dead body of a cultist, leading in to a room that is missing what can only be a vital text or two. This means we are lagging behind the Red Hand Gang in their efforts to raise the Blood Angel and must gain pace quickly if we are to interrupt their ceremonies. We also find the released marrowbreaker, not entirely by surprise, and manage to defeat it. This is good news, as it brings the total of loose marrowbreakers back down to one!

With some more searching some clues are uncovered as to the purpose of the temple and how the acolytes were free to interact within it. Tal the tattooed volunteers his body to receive an extra piece of skin art to test a theory, which pays off when he is able to pick up the book without encurring the wrath of the demi-god. This book gives us some interesting and most useful information regarding the ritual of summoning we suspect is close at hand, and what is required to interrupt it. The tattoo also allows Tal to enter rooms we found that have even more statues of marrowbreakers. We test whether another member of the party, acting as an untattooed companion of Tal's, also has immunity, but this turns out not to be the case and ends up causing another marrowbreaker to be freed.

We started with two marrowbreakers terrorising the city. We killed one, found another, killed the other, and found yet another. With two marrowbreakers killed from the initial two at large we've reached the enviable position of having two marrowbreakers loose and aching to crunch in to bones. As we are pondering this position the demi-god declares that we are weak and will be enslaved, and by 'we' I mean 'all humans'. When he asks us to lead him to the outside world so that he can begin to subdue humanity we take the popular view of scarpering out the way we came, down passages and tunnels that the construct can't squeeze through. All except Tal, who feels some responsibility to his new-found metal friend and helpfully gives it directions on how to find and slaughter us after we escape.

It is a mixture of luck and judgement that two other marrowbreaker statues encountered in the temple remain as statues, but even so we will have some explaining to do to the authorities who hired us, particularly with a demi-god on a rampage, who we may well have helped find his way to the surface. With any luck the Red Hand Gang will cause the end of the world before we are asked to give the next status report.

'That is an Ice Gun.'

'Neat. What does it do?'

'Exactly what its name suggests.'

'So it's a gun made out of ice?'

'... okay, it's not exactly what its name suggests.'

Knifey has some thrilling new headgear! It's not Shadowcraft or anything fancy like that, but it surely must reduce any hostile character's ability to detect me near farms.

I chose engineering as one of my professions for Knifey partly because gnomes get a racial boost to the skill but mostly because it was a tradeskill that I hadn't full explored before. Leatherworking may have been a better choice for being a rogue but I was tempted by all the neat gadgetry that engineers seem to have at their disposal. Last night I was able to get to the old skill-cap of 300! I still consider this to be a significant milestone as it allows me to train for all the new materials and recipes found in the Outlands, and I am only a couple of levels away from going there.

My earlier concerns about the difficulty of reaching skill-caps after expansions are released seem to be misplaced. Getting to a skill of 300 used to be difficult, and I was concerned about the difficulty 'bump' in getting to 300 after which levelling up in the new, expanded zones would be like coasting downhill, creating an awkward and artificial boundary to cross in order to progress in professions. The amount of materials needed to get to the old, pre-Burning Crusade cap must have been reduced, as well as the availability of materials increased. Thorium still isn't as plentiful as mithril, but there certainly are more rich thorium veins scattered around than I remember from earlier times. Getting my engineering skill to 300 wasn't much of a chore either.

With some solo time on my hands I decided I'd see what I could do with my engineering skill, having left it at a skill level of 267 for a couple of weeks or more. I picked up a bunch of dense stone, 55 thorium ore, and some runecloth from the bank and went to the Great Forge in Ironforge. Making dense blasting powder saw me reach 270 easily enough, and I picked up training to make some new goggles. Ignoring the goggles I smelted all my thorium and started making thorium widgets. I had no idea what I would do with these widgets, but I felt it was making me more proficient. After making 15 widgets, taking my skill up to 385, I picked up training that allowed me to make thorium shells.

I used up the rest of my thorium making 1,000 shells in batches of 200 each, pushing my skill in engineering up to 290. I was pleased about my work so far, as it was quite easy to achieve and didn't require any further gathering of ore or expensive purchases from the auction house. But with the engineering trainer not offering any further schematics I felt my professional work was finished until I headed out to get some more thorium ore. I went back to the bank to deposit my remaining dense stone and runecloth, as well as the widgets I had created, when I was reminded that I had bought four schematics on my worldly travels that I hadn't learnt previously from lacking the understanding, but now I had the expertise to do so.

I plucked the schematics out of the bank and clipped them in to my engineering binder, checking what materials each needed. The new schematic for fused wiring had some remarkably simple material needs but still required skill to make, so I started with them. I needed some delicate copper wire and bought a few winds from the auction house, but there was precious little available. Luckily, this wasn't a problem, and I bought some copper bars, posted them to my jewelcrafting warrior Sapphire, who then made some wire out of the copper and posted them back. The essence of fire needed for the fused wiring was surprisingly cheap, and I had made 6 fused wiring components soon enough, getting my skill up to 295.

Sensing the finishing line, or at least the end of the stage, I flipped through my new schematics to see if there was anything I could quickly make to push me up to the old skill cap. The plans for the powerful seaforium charge looked good, and the materials were not expensive to gather, particularly as I had the thorium widgets fresh in the bank. After a cheap trip to the auction house to get some rugged leather, a visit to the Bronze Kettle for some spring water, and converting more dense stone to blasting powder, I made 5 charges. And with that I got my engineering skill to 300. It was a good night's work and nowhere near as oppressive as I imagined it would be, although perhaps helped in part by the racial profession boost.

But I was still a little disappointed. First, there were no useful schematics available on the auction house for me, even with my newly-gained skill of 300. Second, engineering still wasn't producing any items of much worth for me. The explosives never really seem worth using as a rogue, as I put out more damage than they do. The target dummies seem unnecessary when I can sap, sprint, or vanish to get out of trouble. All the goggles look cool but they are designed for cloth wearing spell casters, and gaining extra spell damage isn't that useful for a rogue. The seaforium charges may be able to open locked chests and doors, but I can pick those locks somewhat quieter anyway. Making my own ammunition is okay, but I don't think I've used 200 shells in total on my way up to the dizzying heights of level 56.

The trinket gadgets are interesting, but of limited use. I used the discombobulator a few times in Scarlet Monastery, or somewhere anyway, rescuing our healer from being a frog. The world enlarger is fun but useless. The jumper cables are about the most useful item to own, particularly with being able to vanish as a rogue and thus staying alive in a position to use the cables on fallen resurrecters. But on the whole engineering has been a way to convert profitable ore in to junk. A bit like real engineering, I suppose. I'll persevere with the profession though, as I remember seeing some high-level fellow wearing some leather goggles, so there is hope for making something else useful at some point.

One side benefit from hitting 300 in engineering is that I can send the rest of the ore that I mine over to Sapphire for her jewelcrafting endeavours, as she doesn't mine herself. Instead she makes jewellery from which she can then extract the essence and enchant her equipment with that essence. The combination of jewelcrafter and enchanter is working quite well so far, and should serve a warrior well for maintaining powerful buffs inexpensively, but it relies on a steady input of metal ore or bars from Knifey.

[Spartanb] says: 1s a joke
[Spartanb] says: Will tell jokes for money
[Spartanb] says: Will tell jokes for money
[Spartanb] says: 1s a joke
[Spartanb] says: Will tell jokes for money
[Knifey] says: Will you shut up for free?

'This metallic behemoth of a demi-god told us not to touch any of the objects on the altar, didn't he?'

'Right.'

'What if a gust of wind blew the book off the altar? Then it wouldn't be on the altar and I could read it.'

'But it would still be an object that was on the altar at the time the metal lord told us not to touch anything on the altar.'

'Yes, but the book won't be on the altar any more.'

'The book doesn't lose the property of being an object on the altar at the time we were told not to touch anything on the altar just because it gets moved after that time.'

'I dunno about that. I think it's valid way of getting to read the book.'

'Well, you can try to ask the iron giant if the defining characteristic of an object not to be touched is it being sat on the altar or if the objects themselves were just all handily arranged on a single item for easy grouping, but as he seems quite unresponsive right now, and that this catatonic state is probably our best chance of not being squashed in to human pâté for his toast, I would prefer you didn't argue semantics with him, okay?'

'Aww. It looks like such an interesting book.'

My recent investigation/killing spree in the Sunken Temple highlighted the need to use Ambush as an opening move, which I could achieve by having both a one-handed sword and dagger and using the dagger in the main hand. I then checked to make sure that my Sword Specialisation was proccing with its off-hand use, which it was. I left any thoughts about the relative damaging ability for another day. Specifically, yesterday.

I was buzzing around Azshara and after attacking many a monster I had a curious feeling that I hadn't seen a single extra swing from my Sword Specialisation talent. With the new combat log of patch 2.4, I didn't have to spend all my time scrolling back through hundreds of lines of hitting and being hit, although that didn't stop me initially. I then created a new filter that only reported extra attacks being gained. Sure enough, after a couple of dozen combats I still hadn't gained a single extra swing from the talent.

Being curious, I switched the dagger and sword so the sword was in the main hand, and attacked the closest mob. It happened to be a neutral turtle, but the attack was in the interest of science and so its life wasn't taken in vain. With the new filter in place, and the sword in my main hand, I got three Sword Specialisation procs in that one combat. That was a little too coincidental for my liking. A bit more swapping to and fro and I realised that the patch had not, in fact, changed the talent without telling anyone, as Sword Specialisation was still proccing with the sword in my off-hand. I also realised that the off-hand weapon doesn't hit as much as the main hand weapon, and so the talent won't proc as much naturally. So while it is good that I can wield a sword in the off-hand and get Sword Specialisation to proc, and a dagger in the main hand and be able to Ambush as an opening move, it doesn't do me much good in terms of actual combat damage.

Pondering over this more today, I remembered that I know that despite a character not being able to change armour mid-combat it is possible to switch weapons during combat, so all I had to do was start with the dagger in my main hand, Ambush the target, then switch the weapons over so that I could get the higher proc-rate and DPS of having the sword in my main hand. I also know that a macro can help me with this, after the hunters in my old raid group had to do something similar for the Nefarian fight. But I don't know much about macros.

Being fairly sure that I am not the only Rogue in World of Warcraft, and that there are people more versed in the ways of macros around, I checked in with the Guild of Assassins to see if anyone could help. What I found was a way to switch weapons between both hands. Perfect. From that, and my limited knowledge of how to use abilities, I thought I'd be able to craft a little macro to enable me to put the dagger in my main hand, Ambush my target, then switch the weapons back again so I end up with my sword equipped in my main hand. Unfortunately, a bit of testing on frogs in Darnassus, because I'd never kill a squirrel, showed the the macro wasn't working. It would only switch weapons once, and if I started with my sword in my main hand then Ambush wouldn't be triggered.

I couldn't correct this, and couldn't find any macro that would do exactly what I wanted, so I compromised and took out the second weapon-switch. All I had to do was run the macro until Ambush triggered. If I had a dagger in the main hand Ambush would trigger, my weapons would swap, and I'd end up fighting with sword-dagger. If I had a sword in my main hand Ambush wouldn't trigger, but the macro would leave me with dagger-sword and then would run a subsequent time with the previous result. And if I am running solo then I can just use Cheap Shot anyway and keep my sword-dagger configuration. The manoeuvre may be a bit of a kludge, but no more manual weapon swapping is needed and maximum Sword Specialisation extra attacks are generated.

This is the macro I am using:

/cast Ambush;
/script PickupInventoryItem(17); PickupInventoryItem(16);