Services and the Atonement

WoW Race Change

In World of Warcraft there are a bunch of wonderful services which any player can take advantage of fully. Some of these services include character transfers, name changes, race changes, faction change, character customization, etc..... You might be wondering why a player would like these changes and what makes them so great? Well my friends I want to share with you one reason why I love it a lot. Lets say you are a level (lvl) 85 Holy Paladin and you are PvPing (Player Vs Player) and you are one day tired of losing all the time to the Horde, wouldn't it be nice to change your faction and your race because of the mistake you made in picking the wrong faction? Because of these special services that Blizzard provides many players can make the changes that they need to or more importantly want to make.

Now what if I told you there was service that made it so WE (we meaning mankind or people) could repent of our sins and be forgiven, making it so we changed our old ways and made a new us, how would that make you feel? This change that I am referring to is the Atonement of Jesus Christ.

Recruit A Friend

So Happy!

In the World of Warcraft there's this great program called recruit-a-friend.It starts with Blizzard (the creators of WoW) allowing you to send out invites to your friends who don't play the game. Your friends are then given the chance to open up a trial account in which they can play online with you side by side, level up three times fatser, and see if they like the game. 

They should play WoW together!

I think this is a genius idea! First off you get to start playing an awesome game with someone you actually like, and not only that, but you're progressing so much faster than if you started on your own. At the same time, you or your friend are  not really losing anything. The trial account is free, and there's not really any risk or things to buy until he's found out that he'd actually like to play the game. You on the other hand get to play with someone that you know in real life, share something that you enjoy with them, and maybe even get a sweet mount in the process.

Member Missionary!

The recruit-a-friend program is a lot like member missionary work...

Epic Guild (Part 1) -- Apostasy

Imagine for a second that you're in an epic raiding guild. You have the best guild leader, and class officers. No one stands in fire, or goes AFK randomly. Healing and tanking are spot on, and the dps literally nuke bosses. You've cleared all content, and of course have downed heroic Ragnaros. Besides all that your guild also gets along. There's no loot drama, and players take advice without emo-raging.

Precarious Situation is Precarious

Then slowly the epic guild loses its leetness. For starters your guild master decides to leave WoW for a bit, due to drama on the server and massive amounts of hate on the forums. He of course leaves the guild in the hands of the competent officers that he's carefully selected. Thats fair enough. He also still pops in from time to time to see how everything is going, but slowly things start to go downhill.

With peple hating on the GM do you think that the officers would be free from hate too?

Reading FTW

Hello to all my friends out their reading today, Horde or Alliance I would like to thank you all for reading Elder Russel Cabral's posts as well as mine... As I said in my (Thank you for the support!),  Today I want to share with you the stats on how we are doing and relate that to why its been great to see you read. When Elder Cabral and I started this blog we had no idea that it was going to take off really fast. This was when Elder Cabral posted some stats on network blogs in (WoW Are You Doing?)  as you can see we were hitting some high numbers for two elders starting a blog in the middle of the month. It is because of you we have been able to achieve our goal, and we hope that you will continue to read this blog and learn something new. Just as you have learned by reading our WoW blog, you too can learn even more from the scriptures themselves. Jesus Christ himself said In John5:39   39¶^aSearch the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which ^btestify of me. As you can read the Savior told us to search the scriptures, the lords apostles and prophets here on the earth today have repeatedly told us that we need to search the scriptures diligently.

                                                                        

My friends I can tell you this much, I have seen the effects of not studying the scriptures and let me tell you this, you will never learn anything about the plan that our Father in Heaven has in mind for us, I can also tell you from experience that reading the scriptures can and will bring peace to our minds, and answers to our questions, the reason why is because God is our loving Heavenly Father and He has spoken to us through His prophets and apostles in the olden days as well as in our time... I really hope that you all at least give the scriptures a chance to help you out in your life.  I will give you this one promise my friends. If you read your scriptures at least 10 minutes a day you will feel the spirit of the Lord in your life more and you will begin to know what the plan is for us in our life today. I love you all very much. Thanks for reading

                                                                                                                                                                        

AoE French Toast

"We'll make it to Laurel... Someday!"

Every six weeks as a missionary, we have the opportunity to transfer from the area in which we serve. I love transfers and being able to travel through the state, and seeing all the other missionaries serving in their respected areas. Yesterday I got on a members van to travel from Missoula to Laurel, Montana and on the way we encountered a wild Elder Theodore Butler and his companion Elder Freeman. Lols ensued. 

French Toast-- Yummy Breakfast or AoE damage in Disguise

So we met up at this restaurant named The Hanging 5 or something like that in Butte, Montana (yes, there actually is a town named Butte) to have breakfast. We all ordered, and Elder Butler got some French toast with a fruit and whipped cream topping. (This is important-- listen up) The order came, and soon the French toast's topping was half on the table and a quarter on Elder Butler's pants and a quarter on the floor. I was sitting next to Elder Butler, so I of course absorbed some of the AoE French toast's damage. Those unfamiliar to WoW might want to note that AoE means Area of Effect. Although most of the RL (real life) French toast AoE hit the floor and table's edge, both Elder Butler and I received some damage to our pants...

Purpose to life (2) Where do I go when I die?

Today what I want to talk about is something that I feel a lot of people have asked me over the course of my mission. The question, "Where do I go when I die?" I have had that question asked to me a lot so today I am hopefully going to answer some of those questions for you. So we talked about in our previous post (Purpose to Life (Part1) What's my purpose in life? ) What we are supposed to be doing while we are alive.What I want to do is share with you a quick WoW story with you. When I was in a BG (Battleground) You tend to get hurt a lot in battle to the point to where you will die, now when we die in WoW we go to what is called the spirit healer, which you just kinda wait in the Graveyard until the time is up for you to get resurrected.  Just like in WoW all of us have to die, there is no way around it, but death is not the end! Let me share with you some more scriptures. In 1 Peter 3:18-20, Peter talks about what happened to Christ after he died...

Another Roflstomp: One Shotting Rogue

Any gamer reading this has been one shotted before... simply, being one shotted means that you just died in one one hit, or extremely quickly. Any Halo player has probably experienced the one shotting capabilities of a sniper head shot, spartan laser, or well-placed rocket. Similarly, if you've ever player Team Fortress 2, you may have been one shotted by a spy's backstab, soldiers critrocket, or walking into an intelligence room packed with level three sentries!

WoW players also experience the thrill of being one shotted. One day (back in my noobier days) I was peacefully strolling through the Barrens... then BAM!!! Out of nowhere I was ganked, roflstomped and successively tea bagged by Alliance scum! Fast-forwarding to 70...

Our Quest Hub

Patch days very well might be the best days to play and not to play WoW. On one hand, you have a bunch of new content that you would like to experience. Maybe some new quest lines that end up in epic gear, new battlegrounds and pvp gear, or especially new raid instances (firelands) that your guild wants to get server first kills on. Then on the other hand you have the lag. Then more lag. Then the server crashes in the middle of your boss fights, or you get ganked at the new quest hubs,  and so on and so forth. 

You'll see a lot of these at quest hubs

I have quite a bit of experience with the lag, quest hubs, new raids and battlegrounds, but out of the aforementioned things, probably what I have most experience in and has caused the most grief to me are new quest hubs. For one thing, new quest hubs always have a bunch of Alliance there. Then, when you actually go out of the neutral zone, you have to deal with the possibility of being ganked while questing...

We Wear Epics

Cataclysm Login Screen

So you've just booted up your computer and fired up some WoW. You type in your username and password and login to the World... of Warcraft. Being the good Horde player that you are, you appear to have last been in the Horde capital city Ogrimmar, probably trading in all the honor points you've racked up from ganking all the Alliance (scum). As you journey on your trusted Kodo through Ogrimmar you notice all of your comrades and start inspecting their gear. You of course wear all epics. It would be shameful to walk around otherwise in blues and greens! All of a sudden a belf paladin Gladiator walks by, wearing the guild tag of the number one raiding guild on the server, and most likely the best 3v3 team on the battlegroup. After you get over the initial shock and doubtful thoughts such as "this guy has absoulutely no life" you start to appreciate the man and his BiS (best in slot) gear. He wears epics!

Epic Lewtz FTW!

A short time ago I wrote a blog entitled "If Everyone Wore Nametags" about how we as missionaries wear name tags and represent the Savior Jesus Christ. If you've left your house sometime since 1830 you have probably seen Mormon missionaries walking around...

Rise Above Mediocrity: Stop Keyboard Turning and S-Keying

Movement in WoW is a big thing! Imagine running away from a huge group of Alliance that is running towards you. Maybe your first instinct would be to use the s-key, which moves your character backwards. Or then again, a better answer might be to use the "a" or "d" keys to turn around, and then use the "w" key to run away. Both would work if you were trying to get away, but they are not the best answer!

So what is the best answer? How do we get away from enemy players or mobs that are trying to harm us without backpedaling slowly using the s-key? Or how can we turn faster than using the "a" or "d" keys? The answer is very simple!..

Loot and Prayer: The Waiting Game

Good ol' Naxx

Anyone that is familiar with raiding in WoW knows that what you want doesn't always drop. I remember raiding Naxxaramas with my guild as a fury warrior and hoping for two handed weapons to drop. When the weapons did drop, I always lost the rolls and the weapons went to other players. I would seem to always get armor, and did well on the dps charts, but weapons would have made me so much better. As time went on I continued to raid, and as we farmed Nax I eventually got my weapons-- but it took time. It would have been very easy to just give up and quit, but that would not have given me the chance to get those weapons now would it?

As missionaries, we tend to ask people to pray quite a bit. That is something that I really enjoy about the message that we share...

A WoW BoM Expansion Pack

Cataclysm Expansion Pack

Expansion packs just might be the thing a gamer looks forward to the most. For those of you out there that don't know what a expansion pack is, it is an addition or supplement to an existing game (also see Elder Butler's post Life is like an expansion pack). Expansion packs allow a gamer to play the same game that he loves, just with newer exciting content. 

I remember a while back when Wrath of the Lich King launched. I had started playing WoW during the later end of Burning Crusade expansion, so I was ready for more content, and being able to start off a new expansion instead of just starting in the middle. It seemed that once players got to 80 though, there was a lot of QQ (players complaining and crying about the game)...

"I Would Learn the Healer's Art..."

Tauren Warrior

The first character that I rolled in WoW was a Tauren warrior (I figured that being a big cow would help me to pwn more effectively). Quickly did I learn though that warriors were quite ineffective without a healer. Sure mace stun was fun, but it seemed like I was waiting for rezzes in the graveyard more than I was out getting hks.

Before patch 3.1 hit, (which introduced the Ulduar raid) I decided that I would re-roll a healing class. After careful consideration I decided on rolling a paladin. The paladin in the words of Athene was, "a holy character!" Going from level 1 to 80 leveling a retribution was quite similar to rolling a warrior, but at 80 things changed. The re-spec to holy and the new abilities proved very foreign (like Korean foreign) to me.

WoW Holy Paladin

A few weeks ago, this experience was brought back to my remembrance...

If Everyone Wore Nametags

Leeroy Jenkin's Name tag

Have you ever wondered how easy it would be to remember people if they all wore name tags? I was thinking about it a few days ago and it seemed like a pretty awesome idea to me. As missionaries we get to talk to a whole bunch of people (which is great), but a lot of the time I frankly don't remember their names. It might even take me a few times meeting them to actually remember. 

So in my thinking I took it a step further...

Yells and Whispers

RL Gnome and Tauren /Yell

I really enjoy the chat interface that is given in WoW. There are of course different channels that you can be in and read what players are saying. Probably the most packed and trolled channel is trade chat, but of course there are the guild, raid, bg, zone defense, and other general channels. Two of the "channels" that I wanted to focus a little more about would be whispers and yells.

A yell functions much like a yell IRL. It pops up as red text and everyone around you gets to see it. On the other hand a chat whisper is a lot quieter...

Happy Mothers Day

Happy Mothers Day to all of the mothers out their and especially to my mom. Today I am going to dedicate this blog to my mom as well as the other mothers. First of all I want to tell everyone today that my mom is the best! you might be thinking yeah yeah we have heard all of this before, now tell us what makes her so special. Well let me tell you some of my moms traits that she has. 1) She is very patient with me. When I was growing up my mother would always try to teach me many things that I would later need when going on a mission. She taught me patience,diligence,hard work, and many other things. 2)She is very motivating...

Get Out of the Fire Noob!

In PvE there is a simple formula to winning. If you know the boss fight, do your job, and get out of the fire, you will ultimately get fat lewts. It sounds simple enough, but sadly there are many "bads" and "noobs" that decide that they want to exchange their lives for foot warmth. While the success of a raiding guild could be attributed to leadership, communication, and patience, the downfall of guilds and boss attempts might very well be that there are too many noobs standing in the fire.

There is a solution to this! The easiest way to avoid death by fire, void zones, poison, and otherwise treacherous things under foot is to get out of there as quickly as possible...

Who are my friends?

You're in an intense Warsong Gulch right now and your beating off a ton of Alliance, you are getting ganked by a bunch of these Alliance noobs, and you're about to die, All of a sudden your enemies fall around you! You look over and see a Tauren warrior standing next to you.  You thank the warrior and in return make a new friend. In many cases playing WoW I have had the chance to make many new friends in the game. One of my best friends that I met while playing in the game is Jake. Jake and I have done a lot of Battlegrounds together as well as questing,instances,raids and in all just hanging out and talking,many times when we were in Battlegrounds I would heal him and then there were other times I would sacrifice myself in order for him to stay alive long enough to cap the flag in Warsong Gulch. In the Holy Bible we can read something very similar to what I did in WoW...

WTB Rez!

I remember vividly the time that I spent re-rolling a paladin. You see, back in those days, paladins still had to do a quest to get the spell "Redemption," which allows the player to resurrect (bring back to life) a player that is dead. Normally a player who has died would have to "corpse run" back to their bodies. This would place the character at the nearest graveyard, after which they would have to run back to their dead bodies in order to resurrect.

The spirit seperating from the body at the time of death is in fact a true principle...

Be An Example Unto The Players/Believers

For just a moment I want you to take a minute and think about an old saying in life. "The FIRST IMPRESSION is a LASTING IMPRESSION." How true is that?  Many times when I was playing WoW I would always ask players for help or I would always ask questions about the game. Many times they would tell me that I needed to learn how to play (L2P.) So what did I do? I learned how to play the game! I watched other players and checked out their stats and what it was they did that was different from what I did...