Magic

Okay, I haven't been posting as regularely as usual, I know, but that's just my lazyness. Last weekend I found out that my friends like Magic The Gathering, which is awesome, although almost all of my cards date from 2000-2002. Which is too old to use for tourneys and such. The nearest city, Hoorn, has a shop there where Friday Night Magic is played, for which they use the Standard rules (Only the newest sets, >=60 cards in deck). I would have preferred that they would use Vintage instead (all sets are allowed, >=60 cards in deck), so I could use my current deck. Although I am rusty, I should be able to get into it again if I play often enough with my friends.

I used to play it, started out with the Portal set (the starter set they had back then), but there was no one else that really played it, so I quit MTG, but didn't get rid of my cards. Other stuff like Yu-Gi-Oh! (>.< I hate that show) came by, but were infested by people that can't play. So they cheat. And ofcourse, when they play a card, the effects have to go ASAP, but when I play one, it has to be read 10 times. Lame. I'm a social gamer, so I really like this kind of stuff and the shop in Hoorn has stuff like Warhammer demos, which I would like to see someday. Yeah, I'm a total geek like that. I just hope it won't eat too much of my WoW time, I would have to make this blog a WoW/MTG/whatever blog then... Nah.

If all goes well, then next Friday we get together for some 3v3 MTG action (3-headed giant rules).

PvP and me.
A fellow blogger posted this as a comment on my view of the 2.4 patch notes:

"For the blue PvP stuff.
It was intended for PvE guys (and rerolls) who wants to have the minimum resilience needed to enter into the Arena competition with a chance to not being crush in the very beginning.

Sorry, but the "welfare" epics is not quick at all to have."

Okay. Apparently you don't get my point. I dislike PvP, so anything I say about that should be taken with a grain of salt saltmine. I like to poke at the PvPers, just like how I like to poke the people in trade chat. And to be honest: a few hours/days grinding is less work than having to gather 24 men/women/children to raid SSC/TK with you. Yes, KZ is welfare epix too to me. Arena, however, is no piece of cake if you wish to do Arena "professionally".

Aliens, Predators, but no popcorn

I went to see AvP2 last night, since me and my friends are all fans of the franchise. We gathered at my place at around 16:00 and we had to catch the 16:30 train. We all rushed into the train, after waiting 10 minutes on the train. First ticket check. We got to Amsterdam CS (CS=Central Station), where we got hungry. We only has 20 mins to score us some food and one fo my friends was certain that there was a KFC nearby. Well, there is no KFC on A'Dam CS. No delicious chicken, so we went to the Burger King, land of the luke-warm shoesoles. We all got some food and went for the train (can't really rush there, sine I can't run). Second ticket check. Arriving at the Amsterdam Bijlmer ArenA station, we were still hungry, but this time we had all the time in the world.

We were supposed to get the tickets at 19:00, and we were there at 18:10. I went in the cinema and saw the huge line to the counter. No way. Ya way, since Pathé ArenA has 14 movies playing in 14 different rooms, so yeah... Alot of people. Luckily you could get the tickets from an ATM too, bypassing the entire row. At 18:15 we had our tickets and our hunger. Luckily, at the station, conviently located just outside of the cinema, there was a Burger King. So we ate there again. We stayed there in the tiny fast food shack for 30 mins, "enjoying" our meals (Actually, the King Wings are quite good. Not KFC quality, but still).

Once we got inside, we got apprehended by some employees from Coca-Cola. They were making photos of people at their Happyness Factory background with polaroids. "Want a picture? It's free!", they asked. Us: "Sure." So we all got a picture (standing relatively stil lfor 6 photos is long) and they asked us which movie we were going to see. "Alien vs. Predator 2", a friend of mine replied. "Oh, that's a bad movie, I left in the break. The movie is just about that guy getting a girl, with aliens on the background. She died of kidney stones before the break though.", they said.

We were all well stuffed with burgers and soda, so we didn't bother with getting more soda and popcorn, assuming that we had a break somewhere in the middle. We sat down (free seating FTW) and watched the trailers for Rambo and 10.000 BC, which both appealed to us... Anyhow, we were watching the movie, but we weren't in some small town, we were in our capital. Which means that you get so see alot of oddities. Or idiots. Like we had. Everytime someone died in the movie, some girls on the 3rd row began to laugh uncontrollably. Luckily this ended before the real action started.

The following section contains spoilers, which are unavoidable when I go into detail what I liked about the movie. Which I will. Because I can.What I liked about the movie that, unlike what the minimum-wagers from Coca-Cola said, is that the fight between the Predator and the Alien is where it is about. Ofcourse, there are humans which you get some info about, others get some more. But, the humans are expandable. One of the main characters is killed just as fast as any other. No monologue of 3 hours before death, nothing. For example: Jess, one of the main characters, freaks out and runs off. As she runs past a T-section in the corridor, she gets nailed by the Predator's shuriken. Why? Because she was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Also, the movie doesn't mind dismemberment, gore or whatever. If someone gets killed, it is paired with the amount of blood it deserves. Which is alot. Aliens are ruthless and it shows.

Anyhow, after the movie ended (no break, so no popcorn :( ), we ate at the BK again, since we were hungry... again. We got back to A'dam CS, but not before the same conductor that we had on our way to the cinema had to see our tickets... again. This is the 3rd ticket check, usually, my tickets aren't checked. We were on CS again, and we weren;t hungry. No, I was thirsty, so we got ourselfs a drink. Ice tea for me, and other beverages for the rest of my party. As we wanted to walk the stairs to the platform, the security officer wanted to see our tickets. 4th check already, like WTF? I blame the baseball cap one of my friends was wearing.

We got on the train, got back at the station after another ticket check and went home. If I had an X-Box 360, I'd join 2 of my friends, who were going to play Gears of War on XBL at 00:30.

But we had no popcorn.

Funny Video

I don't often post video's, related to my blog or not. But this one is so funny (atleast to me) that I have to post it.

On zee bandwagon: Patch 2.4

So... With Patch 2.4 information coming in, I thought "why not jump on the bandwagon and post my own thoughts on the patch notes?" So here is me doing the patch notes.

General

• Characters will now retain talented spell ranks so when they retalent they do not have to relearn the spells from trainers. (Source)
  
• Spell Haste: Spell haste now reduces the global cooldown on spells, down to a minimum of 1 second. This change does not apply to melee and ranged abilities. (Source)
  
• Patch 2.4 will remove the restriction for Ritual of Summoning that prevents you from summoning players into instances. Provided the player meets the instance requirements, you'll be able to summon them in from anywhere in the world. (Source)

Okay, handy that you won't be able to forget your spells after you respecced. The spell haste is good for Elemental Shamans and other casters.... Ah! No more restriction on the summoning! When someone DCs and we need to replace him, we can just summon him. Nice. Waiting on people to enter the instance is a waste of raid time.

Items

• Once every 24 hours, through Enchanting (not Alchemy) you'll be able to split a Void Crystal into two Large Prismatic Shards. This is through a new recipe that's being added in 2.4. (Source)
  
• Gems obtained through Heroic difficulty instances are no longer Unique-equipped. (Source)
  
• Players will now be able to purchase level 70 Superior quality (blue) PvP items from reputation vendors in Outland. (Source)
  
• Items intended for Retribution Paladins have had their stats adjusted. Retribution Paladins should see an increase in dps as a result. (Source)
  
• Players can now only carry 80 Conjured Manna Biscuits at a time. (Source)

• 
  

Great! Our guild bank's raid items tab is almost filled to the rim with void crystals... And no large prismatic shards. Now I would be able to get all of Mongoose's mats from the guild bank. Heroic gems are no longer unique-equipped. Good, now I can dive for all those gems in the depths of my bank. Unless someone can hand me a non-flammable source of light, I won't be able to retrieve them from the [Depths of My Bank's Impenetrable Darkness +1]
...PvP gear. WHAAAAAAAT?! Don't we have enough tiers of useless e-peen enhancers? We have Season 1, which is just mindless BG grinding, Season 2 and Season 3 is just getting owned patiently in Arena. Who in their right minds would get blues when they can get (welfare) epics?

Retribution Paladins will get a buff to their DPS... Coolies. When Thunderia, our guild's Retridin, returns he can rock the top of the damage meters even harder (with some WF, AP, STR and morale boost from our friendly neighborhood Overlord Shaman, ofcourse).
The last one is tricky... you see, there was no cap on how much of the food you could take. One player could take 25 stacks. Now just 4. Instead of 1 player ninjaing everything, you need (25/4=) 6.25 players now. You can't divide players, so you might get a stack yourself one day (note: this shaman and his cohorts only take 1 stack each when in a raid).

PvP
Arenas

• Shadow Sight in patch 2.4 is now going to increase damage taken by 5% rather than dealing damage over time. The duration has also been reduced from 21 seconds to 15 seconds. (Source)
  
  

PvP

• Players will now be able to purchase level 70 Superior quality (blue) PvP items from reputation vendors in Outland. (Source)
  
• We've reached a point where we're now confident that applying diminishing returns to honor is no longer necessary, and we're currently planning to remove it with the 2.4 patch. (Source)
  
• Players that have the resurrection sickness debuff will not be worth any honor, and if a player dies 50 times or more during a battleground they won’t be worth any honor for the remainder of that battle. (Source)
  
• What the removal of diminishing returns means for you is that as soon as you defeat an opponent that rewards you honor, you will receive that honor, and you will be able to spend it right then. There will no longer be an estimate, and you will no longer need to wait until the next day until you can actually spend it. Your achievements through honor-based PvP will be instantaneous. (Source)

Meh, PvP. Well, here goes. With Shadow Sight on, you will die 5% faster from rogues. Atleast you will still see them coming.
We already discussed the blues, moving on. No more diminishing returns. Erm... That means that I am worth full honor every time you kill me, right? Oh, phew, in a BG I am only worth honor the first 50 kills you make on me. So no more honor from me after the first 10 minutes.
Yay! You get your honor instantly now, no more stupid estimates, which are always wrong. Still, meh, PvP.

Dungeons and Raids

• All 25-player raid bosses that drop set tokens will now drop an additional token! (Source)
  
• All 25-player raid bosses will drop more gold. (Source)
  
• Gems obtained through Heroic difficulty instances are no longer Unique-equipped. (Source)
  
• Loot dropped by Doomlord Kazzak and Doomwalker has been changed to Bind on Equip. In addition, the cash dropped by these bosses has been significantly increased. (Source)
  
• Scale of the Sands reputation will now be awarded in Hyjal at a much higher rate. (Source)

My favorite part: Dungeons and Raids. Not to be confused with Dungeons and Dragons, that is an entirely other franchise. More tokens will drop from 25-man bosses. Cool, now Warlocks can get their Tier 5 set much faster now (Warlock loot always drops with us, even pre-TBC, when all the Warlocks had all their gear). More gold aswell, meaning relatively lower repair costs. They will still be high though. Gems have been discussed already, do you really have to list everything under multiple catagories? Kazzak and Doomwalker will fill our guild banks and auction houses now... And a faction where 94% has only heard of will grant more rep. Okay, cool I guess.

Professions
A new daily quest will be added for fishing. It's available from "the mysterious old man" near Silmyr Lake outside of Shattrath. (Source)

Yeah! More daily quests! Daily quests are boring and repetetive... Give us more so we can switch daily quests with another when they get boring. This means that I have to level my fishing further though.

Interface

• When you loot a Bind on Pickup item that only you can pick up (such as Heroic Badges) you'll no longer see the confirmation dialog. (Source)
  
• When you loot a Bind of Pickup item the confirmation window is going to list the name of the item in the window/ (Source)

Finally! This is what we wanted since we could solo Wailing Caverns! What took you so long?

And then there are some nerfs/buffs to various classes for which I need to know what it all means before I can make sarcastic comments about it. Meh. Not worth my time.

The Eye, AvP2 and Halo

Last night we made some great progress. We cleared 3/4 of The Eye in one night, while we only slain Al'ar and Solarion once before. Which is great, it really is. And I even got me a new weapon... again! Al'ar dropped his talon for me. Which is great too, I'm all shiny now, I do more damage, so great. Nice and shiny. But... Yeah, ofcourse there is a downside.

We have another TK raid up for tonight, but not geared enough for Kael'Thas (I think), so it might be another night of wipes and the accompanying repair costs. I am never gong to get my epic flyer at this rate. But, there is another downside:

Can you guess it yet? No? Look around at the lovable Tauren Shaman on the page. Look closely. What is he wielding? Yep, Netherbane and Fury. Which is not Talon of Al'ar and Netherbane. And that is terrible. Well, terrible is a big word, but... I have to redo the background and header now, if I want to stay up to date.I know that it's a minor edit in CS2 (Photoshop, not Counter-Strike, CS stands for Creative Suite), just replace picture A on layer #3 with picture B. However, this is boring and I don't like to be bored. Then again I am lucky enough to have waited with an image at the bottom (also called a footer) and one for behind my xfire profile. Which would require me alot more editing. Also, Quinceh wants me to make him a background. k.

Anyhow, I'm going to see Alien vs. Predator 2 tomorrow with my friends. Unfortunatly, the nearest cinema where they play it is in Amsterdam, about 60km away. And we go by train, so we need to switch trains often. Joy. But I'm sure it will be worth it. I liked all of the movies and so do my friends, which means that it is very likely that we will enjoy ourselves. But one of my friends is still 15, and the movie is for 16 years and older. So I hope he won't get caught, or if he does, that they will wave it away, since he turns 16 next wednesday.

And I saw Halo 3 for the first time today at a friend's place. I like it alot, it's fun and pretty. And Forge mode rocks. It;s like Garry's Mod, but then in Halo. Stack up explosives and watch it explode. Preferably when someone is close enough to get killed.