WoW Journal - 13-February-2006

Another long weekend spent playing mainly Kyroc, advancing him a further two levels to 54. I'm not sure if it is the lure of level 60, being finally able to play with all your friends, that is making me race so much, or if the level 45+ content of the game is really so much better.

Friday night I spent with a group in Blackrock Depths. At 52 I was a bit too low for the place, but usually that is okay for the healer. We took an original path, as we didn't have a key, first through the arena, then to the top of the open gate which you need to close with the key if you want to go towards the bar. Jumped from the window there, and arrived directly at Incendius. That has the advantage that you then first encounter the architect who drops the quest item, and then head past the vault towards the statue where you can get the key. And then you are already close to the lock to close the gate. So we went further in, skipped the general and the golem master, to arrive at the bar. We did some bar quests, and fought the bouncer to open the door leading still further in. Unfortunately by then my level 52 was definitely getting too low in level, having a far too large aggro radius and pulling mobs without wanting to. Plus we had been in there for several hours, and it was past midnight. My group wasn't happy about it, as they wanted to continue past the hall of seven towards the MC attunement, but I really couldn't continue and quit for the night.

The remainder of the weekend I didn't do any extended dungeon crawls. Joined a guild group for DM east that needed a healer, but somebody had to leave unexpectedly and we never got even to the first boss. Sunday I participated in a Maraudon group, but only the last part, a "princess run" including the two other bosses in that corner. While killing the princess gives a great sword for fighters, the staff it gives for casters isn't really good. And I had noticed that Maraudon was a lot less popular than other dungeons, never saw anybody looking for group for there in the city chat, so after doing the princess I abandoned my other Maraudon quests, which had turned grey to green at level 54 anyway. I guess the problem is that the place is too huge, with its 3 branches, if you want to do the dungeon completely it would take you up to 6 hours with a group of level 50.

So what got me from level 52 to 54 this weekend was doing quests, mostly solo, in Felwood and Un'Goro. It helped that I knew which things were important for later on, so I did the Felwood Cleansing quest to be able to gather night dragon breath and whipper root tubers, plants that heal you and restore your mana, and that work on a different timer than the potions. I also did the quests for activating the crystal pylons in Un'goro, where I got crystals to increase my spirit and to heal me, unfortunately there isn't a direct mana giving crystal. For fun I started the Legend of Zelda cameo quest in Un'Goro. The final reward isn't really good for a priest, Linken's sword and boomerang, and the quest involves lots and lots of traveling. But its a fun quest, with some interesting elements like killing yourself with a potion on the Gadgetzan graveyard to talk with a ghost. And of course it gives xp, and not too shabby at that.

I also did all of the Valentine's event quests I could get hold off. The quest line for the Horde isn't really good, with no xp and just a stupid dress as reward, except that it teaches you how the remainder of the event works. So I spent some time using cologne on myself, giving love tokens to NPCs in Undercity, Thunderbluff, and Orgrimmar, and collecting small gifts into collections. There are three types of these small gifts per city, and you need 5 of each, before you finally arrive at a Horde gift collection, which you can use to vote for your favorite city leader. No xp, just a 1-hour buff as reward, but at least I did it once. Oh, and every hour you can get some random items. The bag of candy only produces useless heart candies with phrases like "I love you" on it, and no in-game function. Fortunately my wife plays WoW too, so I could mail her some of those, I'd guess for the average player they are completely useless. Much better are the boxes of chocolates, which contain a selection of chocolates of 4 types, giving different 1-hour buffs. Then there are rose petals and arrows which you can use on other players, so that they either have a rain of rose petals around them or a cute little goblin cupid pet flying behind them until they next take a gryphon or teleport. As many players aren't very romantic, they quickly discovered a much more original use for these: stick them on an enemy rogue on the battlegrounds, and the rose petals or goblin cupid will always give his position away, so he can't sneak up on people very well any more. The final present I got was another type of arrow, this time for myself, so I have a goblin cupid pet now as well. And while the other Valentine's items all have a duration of only 10 days, it seems the cupid pet is not limited.

I really like all those seasonal events. They aren't for the power gamers, as they usually don't give very useful rewards. But you do get stuff like clothing, non-combat pets, food, or polymorph items which are just fun. This weekend there were two seasonal events ongoing at the same time, the lunar festival wasn't finished yet, and the Valentine's event had already started. I'll miss the lunar festival when it ends, because it turned out to be highly useful for the teleports. My hearthstone is bound in Undercity, and to go to Felwood or Winterspring it is a lot quicker to use the lunar festival teleport to Moonglade and take the timbermaw tunnel, than to first ride the zeppelin to Orgrimmar and fly from there.

In spite of all the Valentine's love around, I must confess committing one really evil act. I was on the boat in Booty Bay, to go to Ratchet. The only other player on the boat was a dwarf, who for reasons unknown to me decided to annoy me. He turned his PvP flag on, started insulting me in words I couldn't understand, used /rude emotes, jumped around me a lot, and obviously wanted to provoke me into a duel. So I waited until the boat had just started moving, cast Mind Control on him, and jumped him off the boat. *Evil grin*

There is still so much left to do for Kyroc. I haven't finished Felwood, nor Un'goro. And then there are lots of other zones for this level, the Blasted Lands, Burning Steppes, Searing Gorge, and the two Plaguelands. That is how WoW should be: An endless ocean of possibilities. The only fear I have is whether I will be able to find something fun to do at level 60. Well, worst case scenario is playing at 60 just enough to get some decent gear, and then leveling the next character to 60, until the expansion enables me to level Raslebol and Kyroc again.
- posted by Tobold @ 8:37 AM Permanent Link