20121226, mercredi

A. Lots of LFR for the Mistweaver monk.

1. looted new gloves, iLevel 483 replacing 463.
2. looted new boots, iLevel 483 replacing 476
3. purchased new iLevel 489 shoulders from Golden Lotus QM, replacing iLevel 450
4. moved up from average iLevel 470 to average iLevel 474.
5. completed all LFR raids, 2 for Mogu, 2 for mantids, 1 for Terrace of Endless Spring.
6. reached 5000 total VP.  Found 1000 VP a week ceiling to be a bit restrictive.
7. spellpower, combat mana regen, haste, crit, and total health were all increased after appropriate gems, inscriptions, enchantments, and reforging were applied.

B. My experiences with MoP LFR has led me to update my methods for spell sequencing.

1. Before a raid fight is joined, I place Jade Serpent statue where I think it will do the most good. When I cast Soothing Mist, so does the statue, but always to an injured party different than the target than I picked.  If I damage enemies, the statue casts 50% of my damage dealt to an injured ally.  This is Eminence.
2. ==>Keep myself healed; cannot heal if dead.
3. I cast Renewing Mists on myself.
4. If I have the chi, I cast Chi Wave on myself.
5. If Mana Tea is has been generated, I consume it.
6. I apply Master Mana potion or Water Spirit if I'm critically low on mana
7. ==>Healing others.
8. Both RM and CW bounce on to heal others after my character.
9. I cast Soothing Mist, usually on the tank or the off-tank.  If those two are doing fine or are out of range, I pick the DPS in most trouble.
10. While I channel Soothing Mist, I look at the status of Surging Mist and Enveloping Mist.
11. If one of the tanks is in bad shape, I apply Enveloping Mist.
12. If one of the DPS is in trouble, I apply Surging Mist, which I have glyph-configured to travel to the lowest-health team member within 40 yards.
13. Applying Surging Mist often generates enough extra chi to enable Enveloping Mist; both are instant casts if cast during the channeling of Soothing Mist.
14. If a large number (say 10+) of team members are in trouble, I cast Revival, which delivers up to 137,000 HP to members who are in eyeshot.  Unfortunately, Revival has a 3 minute cooldown.
15. Return to placing self-heals that are chain heals.
16. ==>Contingencies.
17. Kite as necessary.  Enemies do leave those pools of nasty stuff behind.  The add-on GTFO helps here for alerting one to bad stuff on the floor.
18. Get mage food if possible; it restores mana the most quickly between battles.
19. Get health stones from warlocks if possible; they restore 24% of total HP in combat, and have 3 charges.
20. When I am stunned, I can still cast Cocoon.  Sometimes I cast this on one of the tanks.  Other times I cast it on myself; absorbs 140k damage, lasts 12 seconds.
21. If a team member is in seriously in trouble, Thunder Focus Tea will double the value of Surging Mist.
22. I avoid using my offensive attacks during dungeons and raids, but if I am under attack, I usually reply with kiting or (a) Rushing Jade Wind and (b) Spinning Crane kick.  These damage the enemy, but also passively engage Eminence; Spinning Crane delivers AoE healing directly.

C. Mechanics that seem of little use.

1. Healing spheres.  No one I have observed seems to have any awareness of these.  Even if pointed out, no seems to use them.  At iLevel 474 and my current config, the ones generated by my Mistweaver are worth 44k healing.
2. Uplift.  Expensive (2 chi) and useless (only 25k HP healing).
3. The web page http://www.noxxic.com/wow/pve/monk/mistweaver/heal-rotation-and-cooldowns which has several wrong names, and the descriptions often do not match current usage.

D. The Shadow priest, Kronospriest, reached level 90.

    http://us.battle.net/wow/en/character/uldum/kronospriest/advanced

and got through a few Heroic MoP dungeons.  I'll be trying out some Holy priest builds since I've seen such strong performances in dungeons and raids.

20121219, mercredi

A. My warlock made it to level 90.

   http://us.battle.net/wow/en/character/uldum/Chronoslock/advanced

With average iLevel 447, the lock has moved up to number 2 in strength, passing my lycan DK,

   http://us.battle.net/wow/en/character/uldum/chronoslycan/advanced

whose effective average iLevel is 443.  Both have a number of runs in heroic dungeons, and have benefited in terms of armour enhancement.  Coming up next is my shadow priest,

   http://us.battle.net/wow/en/character/uldum/kronospriest/advanced

whose average iLevel is 421, and character level is 88.

B. My lead character is still the mistweaver monk,

   http://us.battle.net/wow/en/character/uldum/Chronospanda/advanced

whose average iLevel is 470, despite the link; that app seems not to honour armour upgrades.  (The bracers were upgraded to 466; the staff to 480.)  This character has a number of LFR runs, and has hit the weekly limit of 1000 valor points the last two weeks.  Armour pieces from the raids has been big pluses.

C. Antonidas realm.

This last week my total time in Uldum characters passed my total time in Antonidas characters.  Antonidas was my main realm from January 2007 until January 2011, when I started playing in the Uldum realm, and joined the guild Dungeon Crusaders.

When I cruise through the Antonidas characters to try to apply what I've learned in the guild, I see that I just don't have enough time.  My to do lists in Uldum are lengthy for the time I have on hand.  Further, the game discriminates very strongly in favour of guild members over individuals.  There is no catching up, which makes me sad.

D. For various historical reasons, in other realms I have characters that are

1. all PvP, or
2. all Horde, or
3. death knights (experiments).

 I'll likely not get back to these.

E. Guild Wars.

I played Guild Wars from mid-2005 to January, 2007 plus off and on (mostly off) after that.  I still have all my characters...GW is subscription free.  During the years that I played WoW, GW introduced a number of changes which allow the player much more ability to configure characters and game play.

This is the direct opposite of the trends in WoW, where configuration has been steadily eroded and the dumbing down of the game has been relentless.  Recently I've spent a number of hours on advancing the setups of my GW characters, in increments, and have been pleased at seeing resulting improvements in game play.  In MoP, one can obey the Noxxic strictures about armour and find the correct spell rotation for your class and spec.  Then one is likely to succeed; otherwise, failure at some level is very likely.

Guild Wars 2 has more flexibility than GW1, and keeps the subscription free model.  Its initial cost is less than the subscription to WoW for 6 months.

20121211, mardi

It's almost the supposed Mayan Apocalypse!  Oi.

A. While skimming (they are long)

1. http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/7349425617 
2. http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/7004016082?page=1 
3. http://wow.joystiq.com/tag/cross-realm-zones/

the contrarian in me got interested.  I saw a huge number of comments, with a small number of ideas; that is, the usual mix.

B. Some of the more often repeated refrains on how to get subscribers to return:

1. Make more races.  Alternately, remove some of the existing races.
2. More specs per class, usually 4 per class was advocated, like the 4 in druid.
3. Add another faction, as in Alliance vs Horde vs x.  Perhaps x is neutral, perhaps not.  Sounds like the pandas.
4. Keep CRZ.  Drop CRZ.  Improve CRZ.   (Cross Realm Zones)
5. Model upgrades (vanilla races look 'old' or 'ugly' compared to say, goblins).
6. Model configuration extension on character creation: taller/shorter, beefier/thinner, more hair styles and colours, body art, various ages, and so on.
7. Spend some real gold on in game icon art, which often looks dated and inappropriate.
8. Make all classes available to all races.  Or, cut down on the number of classes particular races can use.
9. Write tank specs for all classes.  Alternately, don't do this, ever.
10. We have farms in Mists?  So let's have player housing, guild bases, permanent flying fortresses.

C. Yikes.  In reply to the piles of suggestions I saw, I'd go for (in order)

1. removing some races, notably pandas, goblins, and worgen.  Add the Mogu as a playable race.
2. reducing the specs per class.  Druid tanks?  Absurd; one swipe of an axe and a flesh bear is dead.  Shadow priests?  Contradiction. Throw out the specs that are just too ridiculous.  Of course, beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
3. having a believable neutral faction?  I like this idea.  Perhaps the Mogu will have a resurgence, reclaim Pandaria, and expel the interlopers (Horde and Alliance) from Pandaria.  That would be one expansion.  A second expansion would be the Mogu invasion and conquest of Kalimdor, where Orgrimmar and Thunder Bluff are crushed and burned to the ground, along with all Alliance settlements and bases.
4. CRZ just degrades rendering and frame rates.
5. I like this idea.
6. I like this idea.
7. I like this idea.
8. No, a thousand times, no.   Gnomes, dwarves, goblins, and pandas should never be death knights.  Pandas should never be rogues, warriors, paladins, shaman, warlocks, mages, priests, druids, or shaman.  They look either too stupid (males) or too cutesy (females).  Lots of races should not be shaman or druids.
9. Tanks should be protection warriors or protection paladins.  I'd say delete tank specs for other classes.
10. Blizzard wrote other games, notably StarCraft and Warcraft.  These involve building lots of structures and using those to further your game play.  In StarCraft, the aim of your opponent is to destroy all your structures.  In Warcraft (users have told me repeatedly), one spends much effort in building structures for enjoyment and wealth, only to have them destroyed for the fun of marauders.----So, Blizzard came up with World of Warcraft to get away from those models.  Since Blizz introduced phasing, I guess they think they can go back to structural crafting without the complaints that marauders bring to the surface.
11. Yes, sure, right.  The inevitable call will come (many thousands of times)...'we must be able to destroy the Alliance barracks in Theramore' or 'we of guild x demand the right to raid and burn and utterly destroy the guild base of guild y.'

D. More comments...about dumbing down WoW and driving away subscribers.

1. The severely reduced talent trees offer fewer choices; many of these choices are useless.
2. Gutting of other configuration.  For instance, hunters no longer use mana; the focus model is very limiting.  There is no way that I know of to extend or modify it.  Mana-using classes have the size of their mana pools decided by the game, not by choices of armour and enchantments.
3. The character slot for relics, wands, bows, and thrown items has been removed.  I liked all of those, and feel the opposite about Blizzard for yet another 'I think you are stupid' design decision.  The loss of ranged attack versatility hurts.
4. The class/spec successful spell combinations have often been reduced to perhaps 4 to 6 spells.  Fire mage comes to mind, as does certain parts of Mistweaver monks.
5. I have benefited personally from the dumbing down of spell combinations.  Some of my alts in either Antonidas or in Uldum have not been used regularly for a while.  When I come back to these alts, I see the Simon-says aspect, and say to myself, 'ok, just use these 5 spells in this rotation and I can do dungeons in PuGs.'   There is no need to master the character.  But then again, there is less character to master (all races, all specs, all talent trees).
6. For me, that has been truly helpful, since I can revive old alts and look successful in execution.  But lets face it: I might as well be playing Guild Wars 2, which limits you to 10 spells equipped.  Period.  GW2 is free of subscription costs.
7. The noxxic website is now (my opinion) authoritative for any class and any spec.  Noxxic gives one a clear map on how to choose armour for any character.  This has been enabled by the lobotomized talent tree, and the corresponding simplification of internal character mechanics.  For instance, hunters used to be able to benefit demonstrably from increments in strength, agility, intellect, and stamina.  Intellect has been removed.  Since the ranged slot has gone, the need for close-in strength is gone.
8. This makes armour choices very clear cut, and re-forging 'guidelines' are all very precise.  Follow them, and the short spell rotations, and you will do well.  Otherwise, not.
9. That is, don't think about it, follow the reduced rule set, and you will succeed.
10. Again, I have benefited from this.  Since I have too many characters, I need short cuts, and Mists has provided this in abundance.
11. Currently, I'm having fun with it, but I no longer see the distinction that put WoW well above other games.  That has been surgically removed.
12. If I hear a solid rumour that the Mogu will conquer Azeroth, perhaps I'll change my assessment.

20121204, mardi, Antonidas realm

I've been ignoring my Antonidas characters all too much.  Here's a snapshot of some of the higher level characters.

Name	Lvl	Class	Tree	Role	GearSc	Av_iLvl	Prof1/lvl	Prof2/lvl
Chronosten	86	DK	Frost	DPS	10,861	390	Inscription/581	Herbalism/561
Chronosnine	85	Mage	Fire	DPS	10,119	364	Enchantment/440	Tailoring/412
Chronosone	85	Warrior	Arms	DPS	9695	349	Blacksmithing/525	Mining/525
Plutozero	83	Hunter	Marksman	DPS	6333	292	Leatherworking/478	Skinning/533
Kronosnine	64	Warlock	Affliction	DPS	1073	84	Alchemy/281	Herbalism/331

---

For many of my Antonidas characters, this is the first time through the Darkmoon Faire to get XP and essentially free professional +5 advancements.

It's also a golden time for mid to lower 80's characters to jump in average iLevel.  I took the arms warrior from 312 to 349 in about 20 minutes using the auction house.  Those armour changes took the warrior's GearScore from 8000 flat to 9695.  Jumps like 316 to 390 are relatively cheap; some were as low as 12 gold.

Working with a guild in the Uldum realm has shown me much about evaluating armour for particular choices of class/specialisation.  The MoP material made much of this possible for me, since a lot of the cheap armour is made by crafters who are taking their professions to level 600.

Playing in Antonidas offers some strong bad shocks.  When my Uldum characters need something, they often look in the guild bank instead of the auction house.  If that fails, they can ask a guild sibling to make the item in exchange for materials.  In Antonidas, I feel the lack of level 600 enchanters acutely in my set of 10 characters.  There's no guild bank; going on dungeon runs for gear is always with PuGs; there are no guild perks.

20121203, lundi

A. Since my last post,

1. The Mistweaver monk's average iLevel rose from 456 to 461.
2. The Mistweaver finished a raid as healer, 4th in total healing of 6 healers.
3. The Warlock reached level 89
4. Level 90 Dungeon Crusaders Egal, Githeiah, Chronospanda, Azeld, and Flynt got some achievements in WotLK 25-man raids, then we hit a snag.

B.  Regarding the healing of the 36 million HP dragon in the WorLK raid (the dragon needs a net heal of +18 million while being actively damaged),

1. Found this discussion of single target healing (not my usual effort, which is AoE) of value:

    http://www.noxxic.com/wow/pve/monk/mistweaver/heal-rotation-and-cooldowns

I'll be using chi more regularly as well as mana, and the healing spell rotation is different.  Noxxic's toplevel recommendations are:

• Healing Sphere Pre-place if at all possible so your target can self heal later.----of course, the dragon does not move, lol
• Soothing Mist Maintain at all times on your healing target. Builds Chi.
• Enveloping Mist Use to heal low to moderate damage. Costs Chi.
• Surging Mist Use to heal high amounts of damage. Builds Chi.

For AoE, I use Renewing Mist, with Enveloping Mist and Surging Mist for minor+ emergencies, so this is a change.  I'll be casting

      Expel Harm-builds Chi
      Chi Brew---refills Chi.

a lot more.

2. Toward the end, they recommend changing glyphs to  use

    http://www.wowhead.com/item=85692 [Glyph of Mana Tea]

I can make this glyph with inscription and apply it.  This should increase the effectiveness of Mana Tea in this situation.

3. According to the link Egal sent regarding 5.1 hot fixes this coming Tuesday, the total damage absorption done by

    http://www.wowhead.com/spell=116849 [Life Cocoon]

will be increased by 100%.  In my healer's current configuration, the absorption is 130,345 HP. 
This spell has a 2-minute cooldown, so I could cast it 3 times on the dragon during our 7 minutes. 
It only lasts 12 seconds, but buffs other healing spells by 50%, as well as doing the damage absorption.

4. I'll need to measure whether the buffs in the spirit world actually update combat mana regeneration for the better.  My feeling on the matter after 3 wipeouts was that it made things considerably worse, but I need to do some measurements.

5. I got quite a number of stuns/sleeps/paralysis/whateveritis during this encounter
    ....no healing done
    ....always take damage
    ....mana regen seems to stop altogether.

I have no suggestions on how to avoid those.  I get them despite listening to GTFO and kiting when I think it will help.

6. Might help to have another level 80+ player there to do keep the enemies off the healer and the dragon.

20121128, mercredi

A. Lead character summary:

Name	Lvl	Class	Tree	Role	GearSc	Av_iLvl	Prof1/lvl	Prof2/lvl
Chronospanda	90	Monk	Mistweaver	Healer	13,625	456	Inscription/600	Herbalism/600
Chronoslycan	90	DK	Unholy	DPS	12,911	441	Inscription/600	Herbalism/600
Chronoslock	88	Warlock	Affliction	DPS	12,086	421	Engineering/600	Mining/600
Kronospriest	88	Priest	Shadow	DPS	11,974	415	Leather/600	Skinning/600
Chronosdruid	86	Druid	Balance	DPS	10,979	390	Enchanting/600	Tailoring/580
Chronosmage	85	Mage	Fire	DPS	10,376	373	Leather/411	Skinning/468

---

B. So, I have the production professions Inscription, Engineering, Leatherworking, and Enchanting covered at level 600.  At level 90, these characters will have more work to do acquiring extra recipes for high level items that have reputation requirements and the like.

My Tailoring has not quite reached 600, but Azeld and Egal have that covered.  For Inscription and Enchanting, there are other guild toons at 600, and Leatherworking has another guild toon close to 600.

I have the gathering professions (Mining, Skinning, Herbalism) covered, as do several other characters in the guild.

In order to get to the best recipes for Engineering, Leatherworking, and Enchanting, I'll need to bring the warlock, the priest, and the druid to level 90.   Perhaps this is not as relevant for Enchanting, and Azeld has that one covered in any case.

C. My lead character is now the Mistweaver healer, which I brought up from scratch after MoP came out in late September.  I made the character so that we would have an in-house, toplevel healer for the guild.

The 5.1 patch has introduced both nerfs and buffs on Mistweavers, and we've yet to see how that pans out in heroic dungeons.  If the nerfs prove to be dominant, I may equip Kronospriest to use the Holy second Tree.  There will be a learning curve of course.

D. Other characters I'm developing

1. Kronosnetank---Night Elf, level 25, monk, Brewmaster, Mining (for toughness).
2. Chronosmonk---Human, level 52, monk, Windwalker.

I'm using both questing and dungeons to level up these characters.
The Windwalker only has the Tiger stance, so I'm running it only as DPS.
The Brewmaster (tank) is still somewhat lacking in tanking spells, and I've run him as DPS (Tiger stance), while questing using tank spells (Ox stance).

E. Lead characters, level 90.

1. Tank---Flynt; second, Tungar.
2. DPS---Egal, Githeiah, Ricket, alternates Azeld, Chronoslycan.
3. Heals---Chronospanda.

F. Characters 85 to 89.

1. Heals--Miress (86), Hertha (86), Jespi (86)
2. DPS--Kronospriest (88), Chronoslock (88), Mcmaniac (86), Chronosdruid (86), Bigblueone (85), Zesto (85), Chronosmage (85), 
3. Tank--hm....?Mcmaniac (86), ?Dazled (84)

20121122, jeudi

Happy Thanksgiving.

A. Regarding the upcoming 5.1.x patch, Egal sent me some of the rumoured changes to come for  monks in general:

• Monk
  • Spear Hand Strike now costs 10 energy (was 30).
  • All healing spells which cost mana have had their mana cost increased by 10%.
  • The energy costs of Legacy of the Emperor, and Legacy of the White Tiger have been reduced to 20, down from 50.
  • The energy cost of Healing Sphere has been reduced to 40, down from 60.
  • The Tiger Power provided by Tiger Palm now reduces target armor by 30% with a single application and no longer stacks.
  • Stance of the Fierce Tiger now increases the Monk's movement speed by 10% in addition to its other effects. This movement speed increase stacks with other effects.
  • The healing provided by the Healing Sphere base spell has been increased by 20%.
  • The chance to generate 1 Chi while channeling Soothing Mist and Crackling Jade Lightning has increased to 35%, up from 25%.
  • The Power Strikes talent now grants the Power Strikes effect every 22 20 seconds, which causes the Monk's next attack to generate 1 additional Chi.
  • The Healing Elixirs talent now grants the Healing Elixirs effect every 18 seconds, which causes the next Brew or Tea consumed to heal the Monk for 10% of maximum health.
  • Mistweaver
    • Enveloping Mist is now available at level 16, down from level 34.
    • The healing provided by Chi Burst and Chi Wave has been reduced by 25%.
    • You now have a chance equal to your crit chance to generate double the amount of Mana Tea charges.
    • Renewing Mists now travels to 2 additional targets (was 3 targets).
    • The mana cost of Soothing Mists has been reduced by 33%.
    • Haste for Mistweavers is now 50% more effective through Stance of the Wise Serpent.
    • The healing provided when detonating Zen Sphere has been reduced by 25%

Changes about monks that refer to Energy are about Windwalkers (dps) or Brewmasters (tanks), not Mistweavers (heals) who use mana.   At level 30, Mistweavers choose one (not two, not three) among {Chi Wave, Zen Sphere, Chi Burst}.   I chose Chi Wave, so I don't have Zen Sphere or Chi Burst.  At level 75, I chose Diffuse Magic, not {Dampen Harm, Healing Elixirs}.

B.   Point by point, for the changes that would affect my character,

1. "All healing spells which cost mana have had their mana cost increased by 10%."  That's a nerf.
2. "The chance to generate 1 Chi while channeling Soothing Mist and Crackling Jade Lightning has increased to 35%, up from 25%."  Some spells require chi rather than mana, so that's a buff.  For each 4 chi generated, 1 Mana Tea is produced, so there is collateral good.
3. "The healing provided by Chi Burst and Chi Wave has been reduced by 25%."  OK, that's a nerf.  Chi Wave is one of my top performing healing (and damage) spells.
4. "You now have a chance equal to your crit chance to generate double the amount of Mana Tea charges."  That's a buff.  More mana tea means fewer tight mana situations. 
5. "Renewing Mists now travels to 2 additional targets (was 3 targets)."  If Renewing Mists currently hits 3 targets (sounds about right), then adding 2 more means that Renewing Mists (a Heal over Time spell) will cast on entire 5-toon dungeon teams.  This seems like a big buff, but if they also weakened its effect per toon, it might be a break even.
6. "The mana cost of Soothing Mists has been reduced by 33%." Soothing Mist is the central spell.  Reducing its mana cost by a third is a huge buff.
7. "Haste for Mistweavers is now 50% more effective through Stance of the Wise Serpent." I use only Stance of the Wise Serpent when I'm Heals.  Haste is the second most important stat according to Noxxic.  So this is a buff.

So there was two nerfs, and five buffs.  We'll see how it actually works out.  I see from this that I am not the only one having mana shortage problems with Mistweaver monk.


C. An un-trumpeted nerf on Mistweavers was on the fall back spell Revival.  As I remember using it in dungeons, Revival topped off (made 100%) each team member's health, and dispelled magic, poison, and disease effects, all in one shot, instantly.   Its 3 minute cooldown made it a spell I had to use carefully.

In the last week or so, I noticed that it no longer did the job, and indeed, the text of the spell changed.  It now heals all members for 108,599 HP in my current armour.  The dispels and cooldown are the some.

This is a huge difference.  For most of my team mates, 108k HP is less than one third of their total health, whereas it used to restore 95% in extreme cases.  The ace in the hole spell is gone.

D. I'm debating starting to use the monk spell 'Zen Meditation'.  Here's the text:

Channeled, 3 min cooldown
Reduces all damage taken by 90%
and redirects to you up to 5 harmful
spells against party and raid
members within 30 yards.  Lasts 8 seconds.

Being the victim of a melee attack
will break your mediation,
cancelling the effect.

I remember during the Seige of Niuzao Temple (Heroic) dungeon, Flynt in particular and almost everybody got affected by very damaging spells that prevented casting or executing melee.  This would include at least long stuns, silencing, putting to sleep, and the like.

This looks like a good trade-off.  If team members determine that they would greatly benefit from this, then I could (1) stop healing and (2) use Zen Meditation to take away the mind-stunning (or whatever) spells.


   

20121116, vendredi

A. I've started the Klaxxi and Golden Lotus dailies on my Mistweaver, and figured that while I was at it, I'd take the unholy DK along as well.

1. The growth rate in Valor points using the dailies is a bit too slow for armour acquistions, so I hope to get some heroic dungeon runs in with other guild members for both characters.
2. The Mistweaver's average iLevel is 446, the DK's is 441.  They have a long way to go. 

B. Crafting, my characters.

1. Chronoslycan and Chronospanda are both 600/600 in Herbalism/Inscription.  The lycan has a few more recipes.
2. Chronosdruid is 579/600 in Tailoring/Enchanting.
3. Kronospriest is 585/560 in Skinning/Leatherworking.
4. Chronoslock is 600/595 in Mining/Engineering.

I have five other characters in the guild, but none of them are authorities.

C. Crafting, authorities.  That is, if you need something built for you, and you can supply the materials, contact these characters (after checking their recipe set in the Guild UI first!):

1. Alchemy--Githeiah; second, Ricket.
2. Blacksmithing--Bakrad; followed by McManiac, Flynt.
3. Enchanting--Azeld or Chronosdruid.
4. Engineering--Chronoslock.
5. Inscription--Chronoslycan, Chronospanda.
6. Jewelcrafting--Tungar.
7. Leatherworking--Kronospriest.
8. Tailoring--Egal or Azeld.

I'll be bringing along my crafting characters (priest, druid, warlock) in MoP in order to perfect their professional standings.

D. Guild Bank.

1. So, I'm the bank officer.
2. I've re-aligned the fourth tab so that it contains a lot of current glyphs, as supplied by the toplevel scribes.
3. Sixth tab--is mostly populated with products of Jewelcrafting, as supplied by the authority, Tungar.  I've added a couple of items (cogwheels, analogous to jewels) from Engineering, and shoulder buffs from Inscription.
4. Seventh tab--is mostly populated with products of Enchanting, as supplied by the authorities, Chronosdruid and Azeld.  We've dropped a few other buffs in this tab, a few from Tailoring, and a few from Leatherworking.  This needs re-populating in my view, but I've found that to be expensive.
5. Other tabs....IOU.  Some of those need cleaning up.
6. If you don't see something in the guild bank, contact the appropriate authority as described above.
7. More to come later on this.

20121113, mardi

A. Since my last comment, my healing character

      http://us.battle.net/wow/en/character/uldum/Chronospanda/advanced

has been through 71 dungeons, all as heals.  Altogether, the misteaver has done 145 dungeons, 142 as heals.  For a nice summary of spells, monk in general and mistweaver in particular, see

     http://www.wowpedia.org/Monk_abilities

B. My character Chronospanda reached level 90 early today.  Here's a snapshot:

1. GearScore....13,052
2. Average iLevel, 442
3. Spell Power, 14,337
4. Mana Regeneration, rest, 11,731 per 5 seconds
5. Mana Combat Regeneration, 8,865 per 5 seconds
6. Melee attack power, 28,673
7. Bubbles, worth 24,085 healing when walked through

C. Pluses:

1. The mistweaver is a surprisingly good solo quest character.
2. Touch of Death, Spinning Crane Kick, Jab, Blackout Kick, Crackling Jade Lightning, and Spear Hand Strike are some of my favourites.
3. Mistweavers add healing spells and abilities in the later (post 67) levels:

           Mastery---added mastery makes generated healing spheres more effective
           Summon Jade Serpent Statue
                        ---the statue executes Soothing Mist while the healer does
                        ---this can help heal the healer or dps members while the healer heals the tank
                        ---lasts 15 minutes (enough for almost all fights)
                        ---hits friendly targets within 40 yards of it.
           Revival---instantly brings all party members to full health;
                       ---cures all members of poison, magic, and bleed effects
                       ---has a 3 minute cooldown (ouch)
           Zen Meditation
                       ---have not tried this yet; could prove a last ditch way to save the party
           Rushing Jade Wind
                       ---talent based skill; delivers damage and buffs both sides of Spinning Crane Kick.

D. Minuses, problems to be ironed out:

1. Running out of mana.  I'll choose armour with more Spirit as it shows up.  When I am completely out of mana, I can cast almost no healing spells.
2. Channeling---is an essential part of Mistweaver practice.  When enemy bosses use rotating ray damage spells (see Jade Serpent or Stormstout Brewery), the healer has to interrupt channeling Soothing Mist or else take damage that can be significant.  When Soothing Mist is stopped, the Jade Statue stops channeling, and instant spells become long cast.
3. Long cast spells---Enveloping Mist and Surging Mist are instant if Soothing Mist is being channeled.  See above.  If Soothing Mist is interrupted, these spells have 2 second and 1.5 second long casts.  These cast times are really annoying in the heat of a fight.

E. Comments on healing processes.

1. I try to remember in each dungeon run to cast 'Legacy of the Emperor' to buff all party members.
2. Priorities.
3. ---I try first to keep the designated tank alive and in good health.
4. ---I try to keep all dps members alive.
5. ---I try to keep my healer alive.  The other 4 can usually finish a fight and resurrect me if they get most of the way through an intense fight
6. Spell sequencing.
7. ---For long fights, I cast Summon Jade Serpent Statue to keep healing flowing to more than just the tank.  (The statue heals the tank if only the tank is receiving damage.)
8. ---I cast Chi Wave (my talent choice) at the start of each healing session; this spell gives some healing to all my allies, and some damage to nearby enemies.  Chi Wave usually accounts for 90% of damage that I deal.
9. ---I cast Renewing Mist on the tank.  This gives healing over time.
10. ---I channel Soothing Mist on the tank.  This invokes the Jade Serpent Statue, heals directly, and makes Enveloping Mist and Surging Mist instant casts.
11. ------->repeat the last 3 steps, but pay attention to the next 5<---
12. ---I watch the health of tank and dps.
13. ---If someone loses a chunk of health, say 40%, I cast the mana-expensive but effective Surging Mist.  This spell supposedly sends a chunk of healing to the single party member currently with the least health.
14. ---During heavy fighting, I invoke Enveloping Mist on the tank.  This delivers ~140k healing points over 6 seconds.
15. ---When things are going really badly, for 2 members or more, I cast Revival.  This fixes just about everything instantly, but has a 3 minute cooldown.  That is, it delivers 105k HP to each team member,  and dispels bad magic, poison, and disease effects.  One should note that this does not make the problems go away that the team is facing.  It's a temporary reprieve.
16. ---If the tank seems overmatched temporarily, I cast Life Cocoon, which makes the tank very hard to kill for 6 seconds.  2 minute cooldown.
17. Additionally, 
18. I drink using the Mana Tea spell to get mana renewal.
19. I drink potions in a pinch.
20. I ask the tank to wait if I need 250k or so mana regeneration.
21. If my healer gets attacked directly, I use Spinning Crane Kick to heal me (and party members near me) and to damage enemies until I kill them or the tank and dps claim them.

20121029

A. My mistweaver,

    http://us.battle.net/wow/en/character/uldum/Chronospanda/advanced

is now the veteran of 70 dungeon runs, 3 as dps, 67 as heals.  The character's level has risen to 67 and is close to moving on to Northrend and the WotLK material.

B. New healing skills

---Healing sphere
---Uplift
---Mana tea
---Thunder focus tea

show a lot of promise, though I have yet to master them all.

C. Since MoP started, the mistweaver monk is the first I've seen that can exhaust its mana pool.  This makes Mana Tea (funny play on words, there) a real blessing.  I can refill an empty pool in 5 to 7 seconds following heavy encounters.

D. Healing Sphere does not yet make sense to me.  Laying down spheres does not take all that long, but it does take some time.  Most of the tanks I encounter are in quite a hurry.  I need to figure out how to do this quickly.

E. Uplift and Thunder Focus Tea are both of the form 'spend more chi, get more done' so they have their uses for burst healing.  I just need to practice on these two.

F. On dps/questing side, Crackling Jade Lightning has shown its usefulness.  With a talent choice, Paralysis gets a 20 yard range, which makes it more versatile.

20121026

A. Since 20121012, my level 14 mistweaver monk has progressed to level 54, and has had 40 dungeon runs, 3 as dps, 37 as heals.  At this point, the mechanics of the mistweaver seem stronger to me than those of holy priest or restoration druid.

As a questing character, my mistweaver is not particularly strong, but still serviceable.  I found both holy priest and restoration druid to be only slightly better than useless for questing.

I waited until level 33 to start running the mistweaver as heals.  At level 49, the character was fairly robust with the healing spell set

------Soothing Mist
------Renewing Mist
------Chi Wave
------Surging Mist
------Enveloping Mist

By level 54, the following have been added:

------Life Cocoon
------Spinning Crane Kick
------Chi Brew

plus some improvements in questing (or dungeon) survivability.

B. I have not been running my level 51 Windwalker (dps) monk much lately, but I have been quite satisfied with its spell set, particularly spinning crane kick and fists of fury. The windwalker is my second favourite dps character, though well behind my unholy death knight.

C.  The third version of monk is specified by 'Brewmaster,' and is designed for tanking.

I have completely stalled on my level 14 panda monk Brewmaster.  The male panda is just too awkward and gawky looking for my taste.

I have created a new Night Elf monk Brewmaster that uses mining to build its toughness.

As with the mistweaver, it looks like the brewmaster will not be all that good until perhaps level 35.

I started playing WoW (World of Warcraft) in January, 2007.  Here is my current lead character:

      http://us.battle.net/wow/en/character/uldum/chronoslycan/advanced

I play mostly in the Uldum realm, secondarily in Antonidas, and not so much in a few other realms.  In Uldum, I run with the guild Dungeon Crusaders.  I play with the Alliance in most realms, though I started with the Horde, and retains some Horde characters.  I play the DPS role almost exclusively these days, but I hope to get into healing and tanking.

A. Things I like about MoP so far:

1. Tumbleweeds--not realistic, but nicely done.
2. Lightning storms, clouds, rain--love it.
3. New shoulder armour buffs in Inscription
4. New devices in Engineering, notably tinkers and the trinkets with +600 cogwheels.
5. Kites for transport
6. One can choose class and specialisation when dealing with some vendors.  This makes the choices the vendor offers much more relevant.
7. The DPS version of the monk class has been a lot of fun, at least on a human character.

B. A sampling of the changes I don't like about the MoP contraction (it was not an expansion).  Much of this was present in the 5.0.3 wound (it was not a patch).

1. The castration of the talent trees.  The amount of tuning a player can do is strongly reduced.
2. The new offerings in the stunted talent trees are remarkably not useful.  For some classes, the eighteen possible choices contain perhaps one or two that I want for that class.
3. The elimination of prime glyphs, plus turning minor glyphs into meaningless appearance changers means that one has 3 meaningful choices for glyphs, not 9.  Why inhibit configuration choices of the players this much?
4. The castration of profession trainers.  There is no longer any need to separate them, since they do not have separate offerings.
5. Automatic installation of new spells on level up.  The game puts the new spell glyph where it wants on your action bars.  This is irritating at best.  I would much rather buy the spells and install them where I want them, when I want to do it.  When this automatic install occurs in a dungeon run, it is a pain.
6. Pandas are ugly in appearance and have stupid-looking movements.  The males remind me of Kung Fu Panda, which I did not care for in the least, but was commercially successful and quite well-known.  I am continually reminded of a non-WoW property being used in WoW.
7. Pet battles.  This is strongly derivative of Pokemon, a very long running anime television series and card game--which I do not care for in the least, and hate to see imported to WoW.
8. Panda newbie area: the cursed pools are a direct ripoff of Ranma 1/2, a Japanese anime series (and manga) which ran for seven years.  This makes at least 3 direct 'borrowings' of popular anime series.  Someone more familiar with anime and manga would probably find even more examples.  Blizzard should do better; this smacks of intellectual property theft.
9. The elimination of the tie between the size of total Intellect and the size of the mana pool: again, Blizzard decides for you what should be determined by individual planning and effort.  My mana using characters no longer manage mana, since they are no longer able to exhaust it. One would conjecture that mana will be eliminated in all classes, just as it was eliminated in Hunters, in favor of something limiting and not controllable, such as focus.
10. The dropping of reputation based buffs for head gear.  What was Blizzard thinking?
11. The elimination of the 'ranged' slot: there is no longer separate slots for wands, bows, guns, and relics.  This continues the 'dumb-down everything' trend noted above.  For hunters in particular, the tactics are changed.  One does not have to separate near and far combat.
12. Multi-looting.   This seems like a good idea, but the implementation is seriously flawed.  About half the time, my characters get stuck looting.  No, it is not all the time.  Having one's characters freeze in place, while the game may or may not complete the auto-loot is dangerous for the characters' health, especially in dungeons or near high spawn rate areas (hozen and the like).
13.  Cooking, farming, Tillers---what is this?  Farmville?  Yet another ripoff?
14. Some of the primary/secondary professions were just too easy.  Getting from 525 skill level to 600 was almost effortless.  Mining, Inscription, and First Aid come to mind.

C.  As I take my level (89, 87, 86, 85) characters to level 90 I'll have more comments.  Also, I will have more to say about what I've outlined in A and B above. As I take my three monk characters (one DPS, one healer, one tank) from level one to as high a level as far as I can stand working with them.  My level 30 DPS character is my favourite so far.  The healer (level 14) might be OK, but the tank (level 13) is really foul so far.  Hopefully the tank will improve.