Back to Dickheadland

I check WoW news on a daily basis, sometimes more than one time per day, specially when new releases are coming. And the other day I saw a pair of news on MMO-Champion thatI'd like to highlight here in my humble blog. Both are connected also.
First thing is the frost lotus droprate. I've been complaining about the low rate in the last weeks with my guildmates. I remember some months ago you could farm Scholazar Basin and in one hour maybe get a stack of 20 lotuses. Those were the good old times. Then the drop rate was severly nerfed to 1% and all the alchemists started craving for them. And while Blizz made other professions that needed high level materials easier (no longer cooldown on titanium transmuting, purchaseable arctic fur and snowfall ink) it let Alchemy in the cold dark alley. I never understood why it offered the option to purchase an item like arctic fur (rare quality) and not the frost lotus (uncommon quality) when you have more need for lotuses than furs. You'll be quaffing potions and flasks on a daily basis (specially if you're raiding), but you're not using the furs to craft gear or enchant yours on a daily basis, so why not offering the option of purchasing the lotuses as they did with the snowfall ink? After all both rely on Herbalism and either they could ask for a stack of icethorn (since herbalism level required to gather is higher than lichbloom) or create a new skill simmilar to milling where you "transmute" X icethorn/lichblooms into a lotus. But no, nothing was done and getting these damn flowers was a nightmare that demanded a lot of time grinding an area.
Then I saw this info where the drop rate was being incremented by 50%. "About f*cking time!" I thought first. And seemed to work because the first two herbs I gathered dropped a lotus each one. But then as I continued getting herbs no more lotuses dropped. Then I saw the base drop rate was 1%, so an increase of 50% means the drop rate is now 1.5%. Ridiculous to say the least.

The second notification (see at the end) again made me cheer: finally frost lotus was available for purchase ("about f*cking time!" again), and eternal elementals too (and a new flying carpet design plus required mats reduced in high level tailoring/leatherworking/blacksmithing recipes). And all I needed for it was a humble frozen orb, those that were gathering dust in my bank after Jurnak reached 450 in leatherworking (yep, as I said before wouldn't take long).
Oh wait a minute! Frozen orbs?? No... it can't... be!! OMFG! They're back! No, not the orbs... the dickheads who click Need on frozen orbs in random pugs! You thought they were almost gone? Nooooo!! Frozen orbs are no longer these useless items you'd probably be putting into AH after winning one in a pug. So expect everybody to go Need on them. I'll change my way of rolling and let the orb the last one (they always appear on top, so it was the first to be clicked Greed). If everybody goes G then fine, no problem here. But as soon as someone goes Need I'll be needing too, and I won't give a damn shit about what the others say.

Self-sustainable

I've realized that despite the blog being based (supposedly) on my amount of alts I talk very few about them. Well, leveling 10 characters in a realm is no easy task, neither is giving to almost all of them two main professions. It costs a lot of time and money, but once you have every profession mastered then you realize that time and money was a good investment for the future. Welcome to self-sustainability.
I rarely buy things from the AH, just some recipes I'm missing or some mats I won't farm personally because either would take too long, I'm busy with other things or I'm in a rush to get some skill up to get that desired recipe. Also I rarely sell goods in the AH, except for uncommon and rare uncut gems. Almost everyhting I produce I reuse it on another char. And I've become so used to this that it's difficult for me to think how I'd do without all professions covered. I realized it was hard when the other day I decided to level a retri pally I have in another server. I have other alts in that server too, but they're very low level and without any professions, save for leatherworker if I remember correctly. The pally is a blacksmith since it's a good profession to provide gear at low levels. But then I missed my enchants on gear, the glyphs... this brought me back to the early times of WoW where even my main character didn't have his professions maximised and I had to spend tons of money in the AH or looking for someone to enchant or create something specific. Frustrating most of the times at least.
Although I have all professions I don't have all available specs (same as characters, I have all classes at max level but I don't have all specs), but since WotLK came out that doesn't make a big difference. Kurnak has always been armorsmith, weaponsmith was more attractive at level 70 in the TBC era, but he continued the armorsmith path. Now in WotlK I haven't seen any difference between both. Vurnak was fire tailor in TBC but when Wrath came switched to shadow tailoring since back then the shadow gear was better for mages and this meant other casters could use it (my shadowpriest and warlock). He is also enchanter (my only character without any farming profession). Turnak is jewelcrafter, the most demanded profession in guildchat, with enchanter on second place. Since I do the daily JC quest every day I've collected almost all available recipes. Murnak is alchemist. He chose elixir master since transmuter didn't seem so attractive back then and potions weren't as useful. In my opinion the alchemy profession needs some revamp since WotLK was launched. The extra flasks creation doesn't proc as often as in TBC (and back then wasn't that much too), so doesn't seem that chosing a speciality is such a good investment nowadays. Blizz should do something about it and change the way it works, like having to spend less mats to create flasks if you're elixir master instead of this random proc, access to specific recipes (like weaponsmiths and armorsmiths), and so on. Grimbol is the inscriber, the new profession that came with WotLK,it's a joke to level it since even high end items like the Darkmoon Faerie cards aren't that expensive to produce in mats terms. Surnak is a gnomish engineer. This profession was a pain to level and I don't find it very useful to be honest. It's a pity since both specialities (weird gadgets and big explosives) sound very fun, but in the end you won't be using a lot of what they both offer. The most used items I've seen are the flying machine, the rocket boots enchant to run around and the repair bot (the normal one, since Jeeves is such a money/time sink). Blizz acknowleged back in TBC that engineering needed "more love" and they created the flying machines, but still I think this profession is way behind others in utility terms. Finally Jurnak is the leatherworker. I got elemental leatherworking since back in vanilla WoW seemed the most suitable for rogues, the only leather user I had back then. I'm still trying to reach 450 (445 atm) and it's a pain since getting the quantity of required mats for a single item is prohibitive, either in time or money, but I'll get there eventually.
Aside from the main professions all have maximised First Aid and (almost all) Cooking. Got three miners (so I can produce 3 titansteel bars per day if needed) and three herbalists. Only Kurnak has Fishing at max level, but that's enough (since I find it a boring profession to level).
Thanks to all the chars providing all the professions I can produce virtually anything needed for my characters or for guildmates. This also means that I have to dedicate several hours (not every week tough) to farm mats for flasks or food, but this allows me to raid with all needed buffs available. If you're also playing several chars I totallyr ecommend trying to cover as many professions as possible. You'll be running to the AH or emptying your guildbank less and less.