Christmas is approaching fast. I need to take some time off coding, thus I have decided to spend my precious vacations on… coding.

Hey, no surprises there. So this is me starting a new project. When I first started thinking about it, I saw Java code. After talking to a few friends, one of them suggested Python. This caught me off guard because I’ve always wanted to get my hands on Python but never got around to it. Everywhere I turn I hear the name Python. I am certain I will spend 500% more time than just doing it on Java, but what if I like it?

This enterprise makes it all the more crazy when one considers all the requirements. What I’m planning on coding is a tool to help WoW players manage their reforging needs. If you don’t know what that is, reforging means taking an item in the game and converting 40% of one of its stats to something else the item doesn’t already have. This is made complicated when considering there are desirable limits to how much of one stat one needs (anything above is essentially wasted) and the conflicts that arise when players start high level min-maxing. Their items will already have ONLY stats that interest them, at that time reforging takes on nightmarish proportions. To my knowledge there is no such tool available, only guidelines as to how to proceed or already set final tables of gear and their reforging. The former is just advise, the later offers no input on what to do when one does not have the complete item list in his possession.

I have run on this problem myself, the famous need that proceeded the solution, and after running many scenarios and wasting many in-game currency to the task, I stumbled upon an “algorithm” of sorts that proved effective on the next few gear I acquired. It is still in its infancy though, but I am convinced that a computer program can exist that produces good results without resulting in brute force. A brute force approach might be simple for a computer programmer, but this is a hobby of mine (yes, I’m weird) and I don’t care for brute force solutions when it comes to my hobby.

Furthermore, there still is a nagging feeling that trying to program a reforging assistant will ultimately prove that there is either more than one or no solution to the reforging “problem”, which is why there is no such program yet. We will just have to see. Wish me luck.