Veteran Dungeon Bonanza

Wine Tasting

Last night Chaide and I went to my first ever wine tasting. It was Tuscany wines, and was a lot of fun. I am new to the world of wines, having always preferred various takes on Hard Ciders and hard liquors, particularly Whiskies. I found three that I liked, and we're going to start a list of wines we'd like to purchase whenever we feel like wine, or have guests.

As we're also looking to start a family soon, I felt compelled to do some research on how/if pregnant women are even allowed to go to wine tastings. In today's culture (at least in the USA) there's so many mixed messages on what women can and can't do while pregnant, and after a bunch of research it was... still mixed messages. The biggest bit of clarity I saw was to know your own limits, speak with your doctor, and be safe. Women that make careers off of being wine tasters/crafters suggest the "spit method" while pregnant, and paying attention to your body's reactions of how you normally feel when a buzz starts. If the buzz starts, they suggest laying off of it and eating/drinking water.

I truly had a lot of fun, and we had a nice dinner afterwards. It was great to get out on a date night, and I hope to continue doing the wine tastings, no matter what the pregnancy situation happens to be. Especially since next month is Rosés and Summer Whites. I'm very much looking forward to that one!

Guild Meeting

This weekend we spent a lot of time in WildStar. We had a guild meeting on Sunday to discuss some upcoming items and address any questions folks had. It was the most successful meeting to date! We had so many folks that we had to expand TeamSpeak to hold 30 people instead of the 25 we had it at originally!

Not only that, everyone bounced over to Myrick's plot (Doom Kitty's other half) and had fun RPing during the meeting. One of the guild members loves doing raffles, and so raffled off two CREDD, a bunch of dyes, costumes, housing plot items, and the Snarfelynx mount (that another member kindly donated).

I'm so amazed and thankful for how far the guild has come, and the community we've built. While we use our forums a bunch, we're trying to get people to sign up on Anook and understand that while the Guild is based in WildStar, we're all pretty much multi-gamers in different types of games, and this is a way to stay more connected when folks need/want a WildStar break, or are just having fun with their newest obsession (*coughBattlefrontcough*).

Veteran Dungeons

Outside of the guild meeting, and a Stalker/Slinger Class Pow Wow for the guild, the weekend was busy with some Veteran Dungeons. I think I ran three or four over the weekend? Friday night we tried a Vet Skullcano, and just couldn't down Redmoon (I think our lowest was 6%). However, we'd been going for a fair amount of time by that point and were just exhausted--it was midnight-thirty for us.

Saturday night we ran a Veteran Sanctuary of the Swordmaiden, and downed it fairly easily. We had the most trouble with Rayna Darkspear (the fire boss) and spent a good hour on her alone. I think we got the final boss (spoiler free) in four attempts total? Overall, it was a great run, and we spent three hours in there on vet, which isn't bad at all considering running newer players through the normal at level 50 can still take two hours, sometimes.

Sunday, while Chaide finished out lesson plans for the week, I finally completed my first Ultimate Protogames. We had the most trouble on Bev-o-Rage (fuck that hallway!), but got it down after a good 45-60 minutes. While we only wiped two or three times on Hut Hut, it was the longest considering how long the game itself can take, especially if he catches the ball after a fumble.

Gear Woes

I've been having some trouble keeping aggro off of a fully raid geared warrior we have in guild (who is the sweetest guy ever, and loves running this stuff with us because raiding no longer really fits in his schedule--plus he's over the four nights a week even though he got some server first kills) with my Frenzy build, and it has been almost demoralizing. I feel bad hollering at him when he's at 90% aggro, because I know it sucks holding back on DPS.

Luckily, like I said, he's a nice guy, so it doesn't aggravate him (too much, at least, it seems that way, I mean, I hope so). I think my biggest issue overall is the lack of Stalker Tank gear that has dropped for me as of late. Most of our DPS is rocking purples and I've been stuck in, well, blues. Granted, they're mostly ilvl 58, but I'm still "rocking" ilvl 53 gloves. :\

I am happy to announce that after completing two Vet dungeons that drop purples, I now have an ilvl 61 chest piece, an ilvl 61 shield (I think it's a shield, either that or implant), and I'm working on the imbuements for my ilvl 65 shoulders off of Bev-o-Rage (which are outrageous at 10 plat a pop, though the Warrior was so sweet and gave me the cash for them!). Now I'm just looking forward to downing Veteran Skullcano so that I can purchase the Glory Gear (ilvl 61)!

So, while I'm not there yet, I am having a slightly easier time keeping aggro. Because, really? I hate spamming Nano-Field. It isn't my tank style. And why would I tank if I didn't enjoy the build?