Okay…the World of Warcraft Questions thread is getting reaaaally long…29 pages and over 1000 posts.
I’m proposing that we make this the new WoW discussion thread and retire the Questions thread. Other than that, I don’t have much of an OP to post. Have at it!
A worthy idea, jayjay. I was thinking some time back that the other thread was getting a bit daunting for people to get into.
So, here’s an issue that I (and I’m sure others) would appreciate a discussion about: the success of PvE and PvP talent builds. There are a lot of boards where there are discussions of builds, but they are either too jargon-loaded for me, or they seem to be contentious in a way that I can’t discern between the sides.
Personally, as I rarely group, I’m more interested in PvE solo builds. It’s for this reason that I’m currently working up a Frost Death Knight (currently level 63).
Of course, I understand that the next patch is going to make some significant talent tree changes, so perhaps any discussion of builds is a bit premature anyway.
If you roll a DK it doesn’t matter what spec you are, in fact, you could take no talent points whatsoever and still come out on top. Once you pick a race, sex, hairstyle and name, it’s basically automatic win. Death Knights are the new hunters in PvE (and PvP).
Heh.
I’m havin fun with my DK (I don’t do PvP though).
That means a hit with the nerf bat is in the works.
More specifically, they’re nerfing Frost in 3.1, according to the PTR patch notes. Don’t know how much of it is going to carry over to live servers, though.
feels better about his DK being UNHOLY/blood
That’s my build, too. Well, originally I was BLOOD/Unholy, and the survivability of that beats over-level paladins’, but it was taking a long time to kill things. So I switched over to Blood/UNHOLY and now I have amusingly named ghoul pets. I do miss my bloodworms, though. Li’l squishy pink grubs…
My detailed Shaman posts were in part due to the fact that I didn’t have time in game to help you once I invited your new alt into the guild. So your new Shaman helped create the discussion. 
I’ll admit that the some people will be faster with a key a push and click, but for my UI needs that’s much harder than finding an icon already on the screen. Sounds like what you like too. I’ll post an annotated screenshot tonight.
I once had an extreme case of altitus, especially in CoH, but I’ve eventually gotten over it. I have no advice except keep trying classes until you find the one you really like. With dual specs coming out, I’ll be able to adjust my Shaman’s role to whatever I’m in the mood for (except tanking, which I’ve never liked anyway).
My submission for MPWoWSIMS: my class impressions from my roughly 4 years of on-and-off playing:
Hunter: My long-term favorite. A real PVE leveling machine. I’m currently level 68 only because I spend so much time on trade skills, the auction house, and getting my Ambassador achievement. With my Beast Mastery talents, I never have to heal my pet, even after fighting 6 mobs (unless Elites are involved), and it’s a rare day when I personally take any damage. With Feign Death, I really, really have to work at dying. I can kill one mob after another without any downtime at all.
Druid: Probably my second-favorite, though I only have him to level 40. I like the flexibility, the hybridness of the class (magic, melee, healing and shapeshifting). With healing and bear form, survivability is great, and with cat form, damage-dealing is good.
One of the reasons I prefer the above two classes is that I am almost-100% solo PVE. I rarely group (not that I’m against it; it just works out that way). Others that I’ve played:
Paladin: This was actually my first character, started 4 years ago. He’s level 54, and has been for a very long time. I chose a Paladin because I wanted a “simple” class for my first WoW experience. The low damage dealing made it murder to level up solo. Admittedly, the class is better with recent changes.
Mage: I found it a lot of fun, but I ended up having to stop and drink every mob or two, especially after level 35 or so. He’s at level 40, and likely to stay there a long time, as the kill-stop-and-drink cycle makes leveling a real borefest.
Warlock: This might move into favorite slot number 2. I’ve only got him up to about 22, and haven’t played him in a while, but with the pets he’s very much hunter-like. Mana issues arise, though. In think the damage-over-time spells work better for grouping.
Priest: Not the ideal solo class, even as Shadow spec. But I loved playing a “healer” in City of Heroes, and if I start grouping more, I’ll spec my Priest that way. He’s only about level 20 right now.
Warrior: I’ve only played him to level 14. For solo play, probably not ideal. I think the Druid, in bear form, offers the same basic behaviour, but the Druid has a lot more options available.
All of these opinions are skewed by my own style of play and preferences. If I’ve mischaracterized a class or maligned one unfairly, do tell.
It’s the jet-propelled mount that I like best. Though the pet ghoul is nice as well.
I’m just wondering…is your spec the one you used while leveling, or did you respec at 80?
Mana issues - have you been using Life Tap? It converts health directly into mana, which is why Stamina is a somewhat important stat for warlocks. In the last expansion and in the 60s somewhere, I grouped with a warlock (while on my priest) who claimed “out of mana” on an instance boss when he had a full health bar. My head nearly exploded.
Those DoT spells get better at lvl 30 if you’re Affliction spec and take Siphon Life, which transfers health from your target to you. Lay on some DoTs, add Siphon Life DoT, then hold down Drain Life and “drain-tank” your target while the DoTs and your pet work on it. You shouldn’t have much problem with health using that method.
On my server I have so many alts. MY main is my 80 Mage and my alt list goes like this: 65 Tauren Warrior, 48 BE Priest, 45 BE Paladin, 18 Tauren Druid, 12 BE Rogue, 8 Troll Shaman. In order of creation I thik it went like this: Mage, Priest, Rogue, Warrior, Druid, Paladin, Shaman.
I’m finding after a lot of dungeons/solo play/pvp, that I don’t like nor am I good at playing tanks. I’m good at healing, but I find that I end up watching the bars and not the fun bosses which makes it less interesting on my part. So I came back to range dps, my favorite. Hit a button, and watch the boss pound on the tank and meleers.
That’s my leveling spec. (The only respecs I’ve done are when they’ve changed the talent trees and given a free respec.) Enhancement is generally considered the best leveling spec, at least up to 60. Restoration talents are mostly focused on healing and gearing for Elemental before Outland is problematic.
For the order of filling out my talent trees, put points as far down the tree as possible (anyone else think it’s silly that the talent trees grow down?), covering the talents I have. I picked my talents for damage over survivability, except for Improved Ghost Wolf, which is so useful. I should point out that my talents are designed for solo play. If I was going to be doing a lot of instances, I’d spec differently, putting more points into utility talents.
There’ll be talent tree changes in 3.10, so expect changes (and another free respec). By the way, it looks like changes will almost all be buffs for Shamans.
Melee attacks are on the numbers, in the lower left bar. I use these the most. Alt-numbers above that are ranged attacks; I use these next most often. Control-numbers have my shields, that I refresh as needed. Shift-numbers are for healing spells of different types. In the corner of this area, closest to the character are “emergency” spells. Things with long cooldowns like Spirit Wolves and trinkets.
Central bars have my weapon enchants, movement options and emotes.
The right bar, with small icons and between the character and bag area, is for totems. Each column is for a particular element. From left to right is air, water, earth and fire. That’s the same order they’re shown under the character portrait. That makes it easy to know which totems have been killed. I put more frequently used totems toward the top. At the bottom of this area, I’ve put professions and few miscellaneous stuff.
Hope this helps. I know my icons and can find my spells quickly. Of course, that assumes I actually know what I want to do at any moment. 
Anyone have a idea how long it will take for the next patch to go live on the normal servers?
I’m going to guess Tuesday. It’ll be updated during routine maintenance. I think that was when 3.0.9 went out, wasn’t it?
and here is my UI
as you can see, talky chat is to the left, not talky stuff [skill ups, honor, rep, loot] is to the right.
Left side of the viewscreen is where the party members go, to the right is quest list, my backpack is usually the only bag i run with open, XP bar is across the top making a separator, my omen is dead center above and sitting on the xp bar.
along the top of the skill up chat screen is the bag bar and wow bar [talent, spell book and such] the key bag is tucked in to the right
All my spells, and pet and DK bar are between the chat boxes.
I use titan, fubar, CT mainly, with atlas and a few others. I found the elite frame and stuck it on because i liked the look=) omen for threat, and some other odds and ends. I really dont have ct_raid set up fully because so far I am mainly soloing or duoing.
Recent paladin changes have strengthened the class enormously and made it a bit easier to play.
Oh, my, yes! Two-minute duration Seals, Judgment doesn’t consume the Seal anymore…I don’t like that they’ve shortened the duration of the pally-bubble drastically, though (got caught but good on that one right after they changed it).
