Not So Ascetic

Following my plan from yesterday, I stripped Aeth down to bare bones in order to see how close I could get to a character that might actually be challenged by Old World content. With no glyphs, no talents, no buffs, and no gear except a Simple Black Dress and Embroidered Boots...

... Aeth ended up just shy of 40k health and just over 20k mana.

The mana really isn't an issue; since spells cost a percentage of base mana now, the actual spell costs scale pretty well. In this configuration, she can manage a couple of Flamestrikes or just short of a dozen Fireballs before running OOM.

Damage seems to be... kind of OK. In a Redridge, she was still one-shotting most mobs with a single Ice Lance. Moving on to Searing Gorge, mobs were still taking 1-2 shots to down - not bad, but not quite the kind of fight I was looking for. If I could downrank spells, that would help, but unfortunately, downranking is a thing of the past. Oh well.

Health is the real issue. Aeth didn't even have 40k health, fully buffed, at the end of Wrath! So essentially, when doing Old World content, even stripped down, I'm still in god mode... incredibly hard to kill and doing a whole lot of damage, even without any buffs.

To make this work, I think I need the opposite of (the original) Martin Fury - I need a shirt made of nerf. I'm thinking of a BoA item that scales your health, mana, and stats by whatever percentage is needed to put you in the level mid-range for your current zone. Call it an "Ascetic's Hair Shirt", let me equip it to scale me to the right power level, and I'd be happy.

For the time being, though, it looks like "Operation: Ascetic" is a failure. Curse you, my expanded health pool!

Continuing Resolution

I've been continuing to run through Old World zones with Aeth. Completed the quest chains in the Swamp of Sorrows, and started in on Redridge last night. Questing makes for a much nicer "waiting for the LFD queue to pop" activity than archaeology, fishing, or even mining.

Which makes me think.

Aeth is significantly overpowered for even level 60 quests in the old world, which means that I can blow through them rather quickly. While I don't particularly mind this, I find myself wondering if there's some way to make the quests a little bit more challenging, even for someone at level 85.

Here's some thoughts on making questing in the Old World a little more challenging (and, hopefully, more fun)...

Drop The Buffs. When I'm questing in the old world, there's no need to scarf down my daily doses of Pickled Guppy, or make sure that I've got Mage Armor and Arcane Brilliance up. If I pick up a buff from some other source, drop it if I can.

Drop The Gear. Without all her fancy gee-gaws, Aeth will have a whopping 207 intellect and 183 stamina. That should put her at about the same level as a geared-up level 50 mage or so. I'm thinking about picking up a Robe of Apprenticeship or maybe just even a Lovely Purple Dress to run around Azeroth in. Use the equipment manager to swap items in an out, and Aeth can both look stylish while running around the Old World killing murlocs, and be Cataclysm heroic-ready when the LFD pops!

Drop The Glyphs. This is a little more annoying than just not buffing, but by erasing my current set of glyphs, I can loose that little bit of an edge that they give. I've got a second spec (fire) that I only use occasionally on Aeth, so I can repurpose that spec to be my "questing, no glyphs" spec.

Drop The Talents. Along that line, if I'm going to have a "no glyphs" spec, I might as well reset my talent points and... not take any talents. No Netherwind Presence, no Torment the Weak, no Presence of Mind or Improved Arcane Missiles or Missile Barrage or... hmm. You know, maybe I'll take some talents. I'll start with nada, though, and see how tough things are then.

Drop the High-Level Spells. Stick to classic lower-level mage spells - nothing, say, past level 60 or so. Just move them off of my button bars and forget about them.

As I think about this, I'm intrigued. More on "Operation: Ascetic" as it progresses.

And for music monday, a bit of Jethro Tull...