A collection of random funnies and thoughts and things that I found cool.
First, one of the most awesome letters ever. I have nothing against Apple (I own a MacBook as well as an iPhone). But Sean Connery absolutely rocks:
Secondly, there been a bit more talk lately amongst the healing team in our guild about healing assignments. I've blogged about this before, talking about how we've never really done them. As Lorosia (our pally) recently described, he tank heals, our priest raid heals, and I "flit about" throwing hots on the tank and the raid. I think by "flit about" he is just admitting to his mad jealousy of our awesome ability to heal on the run... as well as the fact that we look much better in dresses than pallys do. :p
Anyways, I think my issue with healing assignments is that I've always just tried to do everything. Chanti mentioned to me the other night how his history as a druid healer in a 25 man guild meant that he healed the MT or the OT or the raid. Not trying to do all 3 like I do. I just have to learn to trust the other healers more... which I'm sure my mana bar will thank me for. The rest of the raid will probably thank me as well since I won't be crying out of a hymn of hope half the time.
Finally, some thoughts around cookie cutters. I wish there was more openness to diversity within the game, whether that is in specs or boss strats or whatever. In terms of specs, I do understand that you're trying to maximize your toon given the current environment. And I totally agree with trying to maximize dps or healing or survivability or whatever. But I sometimes wish that our talent trees were designed to be more flexible given what you want to do.
On a similar note it seems that we often just read a new boss' strats on some major site and go into a new boss fight with our cookie cutter specs and apply these cookie cutter strats. Think about how many thousands of guilds are doing it the same way.... going in with raid members with the same specs and applying the exact same strats. It just seems to be so robotic in a way.... almost taking out the uniqueness or individuality of your raid. Though I guess that is where that ever present WoW catch phrase come into play? That its the people that make it unique?
Anyways, I mean my head knows that this is the most optimal way (the best specs, the best strats)... but I guess I'm saying that a small part of me wishes there was a bit more diversity. Or more openness perhaps to figuring things out and doing things as they make most sense to you or your raid.
And as a corollary to this idea of being open to things outside the norm, German artist Uli Westphal's Mutato project shows an archived collection of non-standard fruits, roots and vegetables found at farmers markets. He shows how there is an incredible variety of forms, colors, and textures, that only reveal themselves when lawfully enforced standards cease to exist. The produce that he has photographed would never pass the regulation required to be sold in our grocery stores (yes, even Whole Foods).
"The complete absence of botanical anomalies in our supermarkets has caused us to regard the consistency of produce presented there as natural. Produce has become a highly designed, monotonous product. We have forgotten, and in many cases never experienced, the way fruits, roots, and vegetables can actually look (and taste). The Mutato-Project serves to document, preserve and promote these last remainders of agricultural diversity."
A sample of the type produce he has captured:
His full archive here and a nice summary article here.
I find his project fascinating and his "mutants" absolutely beautiful.
One of the biggest issues I'm having in switching to a pally healer is that I just don't have the ability anymore to HEAL ALL OF THE THINGS. It's teaching me to trust the other healers (and humility, too). It's definitely interesting, and I was wondering if it was something that druids tend towards (since we can spread ourselves so thin if we aren't careful).
ReplyDelete@Middle of Forest: Very true. I wonder if druids are worse at spreading ourselves thin than other classes. I wonder if priests or shammys are as much as "MUST HEAL EVERYTHING!" like we are.
ReplyDeleteSean Connery does rock, especially because he has more class than to write that letter: http://www.snopes.com/humor/letters/connery.asp
ReplyDelete@Anachan: lol yeah. I just read that its a fake letter too. http://scoopertino.com/exposed-the-imac-disaster-that-almost-was/
ReplyDeleteI was just imagining Sean Connery saying I am fucking James Bond in his Scottish accent. Boo.
http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/308229
ReplyDeleteAmusing explanation of the hoax:
"...it's another example of how that the internet allows anyone to take a whole, finished thing, and strip away an element they want to centre on. In the context of the whole spoof, the letter is preposterous. On it's on [sic], in the land of twitter, it's plausible... or at least just plausible enough.
"The rest is a beautifully done "what would a letter from Sean Connery be like..?". Would he still use a typewriter, how would he swear, is he still lost in the image of the Bond days..? It's all plausible enough to the collective image of him to make people think 'this could be true...' "
We actually don't do healing assignments in our ten man... Our healers all three like to be flexible and they've worked together enough to anticipate who's doing what. They all are concerned that a healing assignment will make someone only focus on that to the exclusion of some necessary pick up if a healer is incapacitated.
ReplyDeleteI just wanna say, that I do a pretty pitch-perfect Sean Connery and reading that letter out loud made me giggle quite a lot.
ReplyDelete