I have been trying to inject as little WoW talk into this blog as possible, but with the new patch today I could not resist. A new dungeon (or a slue of new dungeons more like it), lots of pvp changes, levelling becoming even EASIER (yay my dk will have a 150% flyer in northrend. itll be a joke to hit 80 now). Despite the fact that I have not been raiding for a while now due to scheduling conflicts, I am still really excited about the new dungeon and hopefully I will be able to find a raiding guild suitable to my needs.
This new patch changes a lot for paladins in pvp, and this is of most interest because my paladin is still my main pvp toon. My priest is a close 2nd, but I think I am most at home with paladin mechanics. That being said...they are throwing a wrench into my paladin mechanics:
Seal of the Martyr? Axed
Exorcism in pvp again? Yes, but theres a dark side.
Flash of light putting a hot up? Pro
The biggest change for me is that I have no idea what seal to use in pvp anymore. Command doesnt judge for anything at all (something like 1k?) and can be parried/blocked/etc. Vengeance requires a substantial ramp up time (15 secoonds? sigh), which means if I manage to stick someone who is planning to kite me (everyone), not only must I do this for 15 seconds, but if I get peeled for 10 seconds I have to start the whole process over again. Perhaps it wont be so bad because once I get vengeance stacking it will do massive damage? I dont know. I have not spent any time on the PTR to test.
Disc has been nerfed with the changes to penance (10s cd->12s cd), but I do not think that is such a big deal. A bigger deal is that mages and shadow priests now have a 20% mortal strike? Really? I am deathly afraid of mage/lock teams in 2v2 now because that is going to be a rediculous team. Shadow cleave in 3v3 will be a force to be reckoned with as well (spriest/lock/healer).
Only time will tell. Another cool change is that heroism and valor badges are gone, so I will be able to gear up new toons even easier doing heroics/naxx25 etc. Should be pretty cool. I am not sure how serious my DK will be, but when he hits 80 in a couple weeks (wishful thinking since I am moving in 2 weeks) I will be able to gear him to the teeth very easily.
Some RL news: Like I said just above Jackie and I are moving to Dublin on the 19th of August. That is the move-in date, but I am sure it is going to take us a week to get all our stuff out. This area is brimming with business so I am optimistic I will be able to find a job. The rent is more expensive so having an income is of paramount importance. That is all for now folks, I will write another entry in a couple days I expect. Cheerio.
A blog about all things Priest in the World of Warcraft. Topics include: Gearing Tips, Healing Talent Specs, Strategies for current and future PvE encounters, PvP assistance and more!
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
Monday, July 27, 2009
The southern drawl
I would like to preface this with a disclaimer: All my friends and family who live down south should not take this post personally. I know that is asking a lot (and you will see why), but keep an open mind.
The other night I was walking home from the corner store after getting some milk (I drink so much milk that I have to go every few days and get a gallon) and it occurred to me that many people labor under the impression that having a southern drawl or accent makes you stupid. I do not disagree, but I would like to explain myself in that regard.
As you may know, I grew up in a small town in South Carolina (<3). Everyone around me (virtually of course, there are always exceptions) spoke with a southern accent. No surprise there, I hope. I, however, have always labored (mostly unconsciously, but I will get to that later) to suppress this accent. For one, it comes with a certain stigma of being unintelligent. As we all know, this is poppycock because there have been many great minds from the confederate states.
How does this all fit together to make something worthy of a blog post? I played devil's advocate when I was thinking about this assumption and said to myself: Ok, so southern people are stupid. If this is true, why do we think this and is there any truth in it? It is difficult to define intelligence of course, but I will leave it up to the reader to define it in their own words. I see intelligence as a multi-faceted quality which is honed throughout one's life and contains things such as knowledge (general and specific), reaction time, problem-solving, visualization (being able to rotate objects in your mind) and many many other things that are not really the point.
So southern people almost all have one thing in common: their accent. So maybe the southern stupidity hypothesis is explained by this (partly or wholly). But certainly we cannot judge someone based on their saying words slightly differently than other people right? Well, that is what I am here to address.
Whatever your stance on the topic, you will undoubtedly agree that some people think this is true. My thinking on this subject is that there are certain types of intelligence that some people just do not care about. One being social rules for conversation and speech. Do you stand up everytime a woman comes to join your dinner table? I doubt it, and I would never do that sort of thing, but some people see it as a courtesy due to women. Some people also believe that conversing in an articulate and courteous way is of utmost intelligence.
Ok ok, I see I am getting off on a tangent here. Are southern people stupid and is this because of their accent? I think, not all of them and yes, respectively. An accent is certainly something you can control (I am living proof, though I do slip into a different speech pattern when I am at home. A topic for another post), so with so much stigma around the accent, why not just pay attention to your speech and stop it? Most southerners do not realize they are speaking in this way, especially since everyone around them is doing the same.
So, why does this make them stupid? Language is our most valuable possession as humans. We can do things that no other species can. We can lie and cheat and swindle and hood-wink and all sorts of other terrible things that are impossible without detailed communication. Though many species do steal and lie, it is nowhere near as sophisticated. The point I am trying to get across is that language is of utmost importance when deciding how intelligent a species is. Language is the gateway to someone's thought processes.
If you know someone who is always saying like and uhm and thing in their speech, it means either they do not have much information about which they are speaking (or just dont put the mental strength into trying) or their brains just do not work fast enough. One measure of intelligence is processing speed. So since southern people slur words and push words together or create new words altogether, does this mean their brains work differently than other people's? My view on this matter is painfully obvious.
So what do you think? Is language a gateway to the inner workings of a person's brain, or is it just a random process that gives you no information at all? To me, I do not see how you could argue that language gives NO insight into how smart someone is. The fluidity and clarity with which you speak has great reprocussions on many aspects of one's life. If you cannot speak clearly, you cannot expect to ever get a job where one of your primary duties is to communicate information. Though as I said earlier, most people with accents do not realize they have accents. An accent is a deviation from the normal. If the normal IS the accent, then it technically is not an accent to them.
I will leave it off here, but feel free to comment or email me with reponses.
The other night I was walking home from the corner store after getting some milk (I drink so much milk that I have to go every few days and get a gallon) and it occurred to me that many people labor under the impression that having a southern drawl or accent makes you stupid. I do not disagree, but I would like to explain myself in that regard.
As you may know, I grew up in a small town in South Carolina (<3). Everyone around me (virtually of course, there are always exceptions) spoke with a southern accent. No surprise there, I hope. I, however, have always labored (mostly unconsciously, but I will get to that later) to suppress this accent. For one, it comes with a certain stigma of being unintelligent. As we all know, this is poppycock because there have been many great minds from the confederate states.
How does this all fit together to make something worthy of a blog post? I played devil's advocate when I was thinking about this assumption and said to myself: Ok, so southern people are stupid. If this is true, why do we think this and is there any truth in it? It is difficult to define intelligence of course, but I will leave it up to the reader to define it in their own words. I see intelligence as a multi-faceted quality which is honed throughout one's life and contains things such as knowledge (general and specific), reaction time, problem-solving, visualization (being able to rotate objects in your mind) and many many other things that are not really the point.
So southern people almost all have one thing in common: their accent. So maybe the southern stupidity hypothesis is explained by this (partly or wholly). But certainly we cannot judge someone based on their saying words slightly differently than other people right? Well, that is what I am here to address.
Whatever your stance on the topic, you will undoubtedly agree that some people think this is true. My thinking on this subject is that there are certain types of intelligence that some people just do not care about. One being social rules for conversation and speech. Do you stand up everytime a woman comes to join your dinner table? I doubt it, and I would never do that sort of thing, but some people see it as a courtesy due to women. Some people also believe that conversing in an articulate and courteous way is of utmost intelligence.
Ok ok, I see I am getting off on a tangent here. Are southern people stupid and is this because of their accent? I think, not all of them and yes, respectively. An accent is certainly something you can control (I am living proof, though I do slip into a different speech pattern when I am at home. A topic for another post), so with so much stigma around the accent, why not just pay attention to your speech and stop it? Most southerners do not realize they are speaking in this way, especially since everyone around them is doing the same.
So, why does this make them stupid? Language is our most valuable possession as humans. We can do things that no other species can. We can lie and cheat and swindle and hood-wink and all sorts of other terrible things that are impossible without detailed communication. Though many species do steal and lie, it is nowhere near as sophisticated. The point I am trying to get across is that language is of utmost importance when deciding how intelligent a species is. Language is the gateway to someone's thought processes.
If you know someone who is always saying like and uhm and thing in their speech, it means either they do not have much information about which they are speaking (or just dont put the mental strength into trying) or their brains just do not work fast enough. One measure of intelligence is processing speed. So since southern people slur words and push words together or create new words altogether, does this mean their brains work differently than other people's? My view on this matter is painfully obvious.
So what do you think? Is language a gateway to the inner workings of a person's brain, or is it just a random process that gives you no information at all? To me, I do not see how you could argue that language gives NO insight into how smart someone is. The fluidity and clarity with which you speak has great reprocussions on many aspects of one's life. If you cannot speak clearly, you cannot expect to ever get a job where one of your primary duties is to communicate information. Though as I said earlier, most people with accents do not realize they have accents. An accent is a deviation from the normal. If the normal IS the accent, then it technically is not an accent to them.
I will leave it off here, but feel free to comment or email me with reponses.
New Direction
Nothing much has changed since the last time I put up a blog post. It has become clear to me that even if (when) I get a job, I will not have enough material to post often enough and have it be interesting. So what I am going to do is write about random thoughts that come into mind. Some will be social commentary. Some will be random bemusings born from boredom (borndom, if you will). So here we go.
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