As the new school year settles in, I find myself having less time to game than normal. I have some new classes to prepare for, which takes quite a significant amount of time in reading, writing, and practicing (I am teaching guitar for the first time). Regardless, as you know by now, I lean toward the casual gamer side of World of Warcraft, even with the lack of time available, I find myself not even having enough time for even a minor trip into Azeroth. In all honesty, I have about an hour a night, if even that, for WoW.

Not sure about you, but I agree with the Buddhists in that I try to get every second possible from a given moment, the cliché here is: To live life to its fullest; though, I doubt many know what that means. Regardless of what I do, I hope that it counts in some way - and yes, that includes my WoW time. In order to get the most of my time, PVP might just be the ticket.

You have to realize, in the years I've played, I have only toyed around with PVP. I've never been totally dedicated to it. A while back I decided my mage would be my PVP character and I changed her spec, ran some battle grounds, tried an arena or two (lost every fight), but never went fully after it. Since I started playing, with the exception of my paladin and now my death knight, I have run primarily clothies. I didn't want to retune my paladin, so I asked the guild which of my toons I should change over for PVP — they all had a resounding cry for the mage. It seems a good frost mage is a solid spec for that style of play, so I set her up for PVP.

She is fun in the battle ground, not so much in the 2v2 arena fight (note to self: don't go into a 2v2 fight with another clothie). In the battle ground, though, a frost mage is a fun nuisance to many players. With the ability to slow a player down or freeze one in place, they can be as annoying as the kid who constantly asks "why?" Alas, as much fun as the mage is, I have since fallen in love with Sedagive, my death knight.

All right, I have to be honest here. There are some things that old farts like myself should avoid. PVP is most definitely one of them. PVP calls for quick reflexes. PVP calls for quick thinking. PVP calls for being a vindictive schmuck. I have at least one of those categories, easily. But I am slow in both reflex and reaction time. My experience with PVP, for the most part, has been as the one who gives the most honor points to the Alliance - or arena points to opponents. I am sure there are several in my raid group who have asked themselves: who is that schmuck (yes, they are all familiar with Yiddish insults) getting killed all the time?

World of Warcraft Frost Mage

Which is why I am shifting gears and going with Sedagive.

As tough as mages can be in a battle ground, they are just too squishy. Yes, it is quite fun to be high up there throwing spells around, watching Alliance players get frustrated moving so slowly, laughing while the sheep wander aimlessly about. But once an enemy player gets close enough, it is "Ta-ta for now" little mage. So, Sedagive it is. I have gone against death knights and had my fanny handed to me every time. Blink is useless against them with their death grab. If they have their shield barrier up, well, a spell won't do too much. Not to mention, they have two interrupts, sometimes three depending on the race.

Since I started Sedagive on the PVP thing, I figured I needed to begin with some sort of leg up. She had zero PVP gear, so I spent a few thousand at the auction house for a low end PVP set to get her started (thank you and you're welcome to the person who made the set and sold it in the AH). I have changed her spec, too. She started as unholy, though recently I have been toying around with frost; the few fights I have been in, outside of a battle ground (since shifting gears, I haven't had time for a battle ground, yet), have proven a bit better with frost.

All right, another tidbit about me: I am impulsive at times. I could have spent my time reading about specs for PVP, gear, and the like for Sedagive. Of course, I didn't bother. I just went and re-trained, headed back to do Tol Barad dailies, ran into some Alliance players, had my fanny handed to me. I re-configured my tool bar, found some more, re-configured again, found another player, and won. In my new state of mind, frost is where it's at, baby!

A good game is open to a variety of play styles. With World of Warcraft, there are even places for people like me. I would love to be able to spend more time in Azeroth, but reality demands my time more so, now, which is (for the time being) my priority. So, with a change in real-world priorities, comes the shift in Azeroth - and Blizzard is open to this, they provide a good number of options for play styles out there. End game aspects of the game are there for those who have both the capacity and ability to sit at their computers and play for many hours straight; dungeon running and PVE (think here: Tol Barad and Firelands/Molten Front dailies) is perfect for those who have a couple of hours to play. PVP is perfect for a player like me. I can run two battle grounds and hit some dailies in an hour; enough to feel the adrenalin course through my system, have fun, and the like. Then I can shut it off and get back to reading, writing, or running some scales.

What do you all think? What, in your real-world life, keeps you from adventuring in Azeroth? How do you spend your time with World of Warcraft as a result? I'm sure many of you have more experience with PVP than this old fart. Any tips for arena fights? What do you think I should do with Sedagive? Keep her frost? Go back to unholy?

You can let me know in the comments or via Twitter @wow_wisdom.

For more World of Warcraft Wisdom, click — HERE.