WoW Journal - 24-May-2006

I leveled my shaman to 41 yesterday. As I'm still avoiding the horrible Stranglethorn Vale, I'm discovering level 40 quests in other places, some of which were even new to me. One very nice, hidden, level 40 quest is in the Dustwallow Marsh. There is a hut with a guy named "Swamp Eye" Jarl, who gives very bad quests (best avoid doing those), but in his garden is a freshly dug grave. When you click on it first, you find a hand. Bring the hand to Brackenwall Village gives you a reward, but no clue that the quest isn't finished. You need to go back to the same grave, and by further digging find a head. From that starts a quest where you boil the head in a troll voodoo cauldron in Grom'Gol to make him speak, which then gives you a quest to find a necklace from crab men in Dustwallow Marsh. After handing the quest in at Brackenwall, you are sent to Orgrimmar, where you get the choice between two very nice blue rings. Well worth it, and I guess not many people did that quest.

From there I moved to Arathi, going to another area which is a bit hidden, Faldir's Cove. You can only get there by swimming from Hillsbrad or Wetlands, or by jumping off the cliffs near Stromgarde. In the cove is a stranded pirate ship with the crew giving you lots of level 40 quests, many of which you can do together by fighting naga under water a bit further out at sea. No problem for a shaman with a water breathing spell, but other classes are advised to bring a water breathing potion.

The reason I'm playing my shaman is that my level 60 characters can't find a group to where they want to go. I joined a new guild, but it has few level 60 chars. So besides helping them do Uldaman or Sunken Temple, I'm not dungeoneering any more. Yesterday people from my old guild asked me whether I could help them in UBRS, but it turned out they only needed somebody to unlock the door for them, and already has a priest, so I couldn't join with Kyroc to get my Drakki's blood. I was joking about my career development in my old guild, from guild master to doorman. :) I could probably have joined their Onyxia raid, but I didn't want to go with my warrior, and the priest, as mentioned, still needs the last step for the key.

What I noticed is that in the virtual "hierarchy" from the top uber guilds, to raiding guilds, to non-raiding guilds, down to the non-guilded people, the class mix changes. Basically in WoW there are too many people playing solo classes like hunters, and not enough people playing healers. Thus all the priests are very sought after, and quickly get recruited into raiding guilds. So if you try to gather a group from small, non-raiding guilds, there is never a priest to be found. That is rather annoying, because while I could just play my priest, I still need to go to the bar in BRD with my warrior. I grinded Thorium Brotherhood faction to honored some time ago already, but that doesn't help me much if the recipes sold as reward for having achieved the faction are in the middle of a dungeon I can't find a group for.
- posted by Tobold @ 8:09 AM Permanent Link