Ciderhelm

WoW's Impact on MMOs

Fri, 6 Jun 2008 04:00:00 GMT

This podcast covers the impact and the innovation World of Warcraft, the future for other developers, and the future for World of Warcraft. This podcast is divided into three primary themes. First, we discuss the approachability, community, and coding of Warcraft. Second, we cover both the pitfalls and the successes of new MMOs, with particular emphasis on Age of Conan and Warhammer Online. The third subject we cover is how we expect World of Warcraft itself to evolve to meet it's competition.

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Guild Relations 5

Wed, 4 Jun 2008 04:00:00 GMT

This podcast answers member-submitted questions on guild management. Questions primarily revolve around addressing concerns with individuals in raids, as well as raising expectations across the guild.

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Velhym's Movie Review

Mon, 2 Jun 2008 04:00:00 GMT

So with the help of Ciderhelm we're taking my blog to the Off-Topic Tankspot Podcast. Included you'll be hearing about the next months of what's in theaters, a few other topics, Angelina Jolie's breasts, and my initial (non-spoiler) impressions of the new Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and whether or not I recommend seeing it.

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State of the Podcast

Fri, 30 May 2008 04:00:00 GMT

Welcome to the TankSpot podcast.

I wanted to touch base quickly regarding the state of our podcast. I know you guys are bearing with us and haven't raised complaints, but it's hard on us not to be putting out regular content without an explanation.

Podcasts have become a semi-necessary function of the website. They began around the same time that we started to need individual donations to run our webserver, and they were in part created to solve that issue by providing a service that went above and beyond. It's become clear that when we have an exceptionally well done podcast that helps people out, particularly when they're tank related or guild related, people are more likely to give back.

So on the one hand, the podcasts are an integral part of the site, and with thousands of listeners, they reach an audience that we don't always reach with articles.

On the other hand, the success of this site has been driven by the fact that hardcore gamers are running it. We're not here because we want to make money, or because we're professional forum admins, we're here because we know what the heck we're talking about and we like to help people.

The downside to being hardcore gamers, of course, is that we're hardcore gamers. We push what we do very hard. With Age of Conan just releasing, both Lore and I have invested enormous amounts of time into leveling there. This is how we'll be approaching Wrath of the Liche King as well. In Lore's case, this time spent leveling is in addition to raiding Sunwell -- his guild is currently on M'uru. In my case, this is in addition to maintaining the servers -- and as you may have seen last week, that gets to be extremely time consuming. For those who aren't aware, TankSpot is the primary site on the server, but we also host other fansites and blogs that are not part of TankSpot -- you might have seen other sites you visit go down when we do. This immediately pulls all of my attention off anything else I'm doing.

There is another major project that is sapping time we might otherwise be spending on podcasts -- a full Protection guide that will be implemented sitewide into TankSpot. Though it may not have it at launch, this, too, will have a lot of audio recordings to help people quickly learn what they need to know.

What does this all mean for our listeners?

Basically, bear with us. We're going to be busy for at least 1-2 more weeks. We'll try to get podcasts out during this time, but we can't guarantee they'll be terribly on subject or terribly in-depth. You can help us with these by submitting questions, because those offer such an easy way to jump into detail on subejcts we might not think of.

The Guild Relations podcast will continue as normal. That is the only format that I feel we nailed from day one, because the questions I'm getting are so solid and allow so much depth to them. Guild subjects are also much easier to work with, since they deal with universal and broad principles of people and how they interact. It's much easier to have an interesting podcast about people than it is to have an interesting podcast about, say, tanking rotations.

Anyway, thanks for putting up with the delay. We'll be back and running once our time clears up. You'll see a skeleton schedule until that point.

Speed and Efficiency

Wed, 21 May 2008 04:00:00 GMT

This podcast answers member-submitted questions on guild management. The majority of time is spent discussing speed and efficiency in raids. Other questions are related to Summer-time schedules, main tank gearing, recruiting friends from other guilds an balancing multiple 10-man groups.

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269 Marmot Jokes

Fri, 16 May 2008 04:00:00 GMT

While the name may be misleading, there is a discussion of the number 269, an explanation of marmots, and a string of good and bad jokes throughout this podcast. The best part? We've normalized our sound output for the first time, and the wide volume differences between speakers has been smoothed out. Beware this means this may be louder than previous podcasts. Enjoy!

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Deathknights

Mon, 12 May 2008 04:00:00 GMT

This podcast is general commentary on the recently released information regarding Deathknights. The primary focus is on the announced abilities involving tanking.

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Evensfell

Fri, 9 May 2008 04:00:00 GMT

Welcome to the world of Evensfell! This podcast introduces players to the story and background of browser-based game as well as detailed notes on some of the design philosophy. This is set to Greensleeves, a personal favorite.

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Time Management for Raiding Guilds

Wed, 7 May 2008 04:00:00 GMT

This podcast answers several user submitted questions regarding guild decisions and management. How do the three tank classes stack up against each other in raids? How can I recruit an officer? Are /roll systems fair? What is an ideal guild size for progression? The second half of this podcast covers the principles of time management for raiding guilds.

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Measuring Your Effectiveness

Mon, 5 May 2008 04:00:00 GMT

This podcast covers how you can effectively measure yourself as a raid and 5-man tank. It covers player interactions, situational awareness, mods, cooldowns, and gear issues. It also answers member-submitted questions regarding 490 Defense for Illidan flame tanks, how Expertise measures up, and how to handle a large number of abilities at once while tanking.

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Diet Pepsi & Conan

Fri, 2 May 2008 04:00:00 GMT

This podcast is a discussion of Diet Pepsi. It also happens to contain a large segment on what we're allowed to discuss regarding our Age of Conan experiences now that the NDA has been partially lifted. This podcast should be of interest to soft drink enthusiasts.

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Main Tanking

Mon, 28 Apr 2008 04:00:00 GMT

This podcast covers the social aspects important to functioning within raiding guilds. It is an overview of the most common views on tank status, organization, and rank, as well as expectations for new tanks. This podcast will be most useful for unguilded or new tanks who are looking at joining a raiding guild.

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Games For Gamers

Fri, 25 Apr 2008 04:00:00 GMT

This podcast is a discussion of our favorite genres and games we've enjoyed over the years. It begins with a comparison between console and PC games and develops into covering both RPG and RTS games. This should be of interest to any long-time gamer.

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Guild Relations #02

Wed, 23 Apr 2008 04:00:00 GMT

This podcast answers several user submitted questions regarding guild decisions and management. Is there anything wrong with skipping Kael'thas and Lady Vashj? Should loot priorities be used? What's the best approach to min/maxing a raiding group? How do you handle a fluctuating guild with a small hardcore base of players?

Listen, Read & Respond on TankSpot.com!

Web Resources

Mon, 21 Apr 2008 04:00:00 GMT

This podcast covers various web resources available to WoW players and their relative importance. This will be most useful for new players and new tanks. This also introduces a new format which will allow us to cover noteworthy community discussions over the week.

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The Grand Experiment

Fri, 18 Apr 2008 04:00:00 GMT

This podcast covers several subjects on MMOs and web design, with particular emphasis on the upcoming Age of Conan release. This is presented as an undirected dialogue.

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Understanding Tank Gear

ciderhelm@gmail.com — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 04:00:00 GMT

This podcast covers many of the details regarding tank gearing choices for Warriors and Paladins. It begins with some of the trivia and an explanation of where stats for handling damage and stats for building Threat are in relation to each other. It includes a lengthy advice and suggestions section covering gear choices, gems, enchants, and other aspects of gear theory. Whether you know a lot about theory or not, this will be a good way to pass farming time.

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Tabula Rasa Made Us Appreciate WoW CMs

ciderhelm@gmail.com — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 04:00:00 GMT

This podcast covers Tabula Rasa, a new MMO, and the issues it had with it's community approach. This will be entertaining listening for Tabula Rasa players or visitors who play multiple MMOs. It will be useful for those looking at the community approaches of World of Warcraft, Tabula Rasa, and other games.

The Friday podcast is an off-topic discussion. These are unscripted discussions with a general subject, and do not have a transcript or pre-recorded outline available.

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Mechanizing Your Guild (Part 1)

ciderhelm@gmail.com — Wed, 9 Apr 2008 04:00:00 GMT

This podcast will offer a perspective for guild leaders, raid leaders, and officers of raiding guilds at all levels of progression. I've been a guild leader for a highly successful guild and have been a member of another highly successful guild. I know all the mistakes you're going to make, because I've made them myself. I'll help you avoid the rest.

Today's topics are going to be guild theory, leadership and administration, mechanization, and the basic principles of building a guild that is truly built around it's raid functions. As part of this, I'll cover WWS reports and other metrics.

This podcast will be bi-weekly.

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Interface, Keybinds, Macros & Hardware

ciderhelm@gmail.com — Mon, 7 Apr 2008 04:00:00 GMT

This podcast will be useful to any World of Warcraft player who wants or needs to learn more about effective game control. The information is relevant to players of all levels of progression. Class-specific advice is given for Warriors and Paladins.

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First Broadcast

ciderhelm@gmail.com — Fri, 4 Apr 2008 04:00:00 GMT

Thanks to Veneretio of TankingTips.com for giving me the idea to push this.

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