OH EM GEE

OMGWTFBBQROFLMAO!

They listened. :D

They actually listened, and we are finally given what we've asked for! Thank you Blizzard! Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!

Zarhym, you are my star upon the earth! You come bearing such amazingly good news. I had Yrovi keep engineering, not wanting to drop, not wanting to relevel something like Jewelcrafting or Blacksmithing. It would be tedious, expensive, awful in every way. I spent so much time and gold getting to 450 engineering and now you come and make my day! You get a muffin. A fancy, internet muffin. Also a virtual hug. Just for this news.

Of the new stuff, the Dalaran AH is spectacular, Jeeves looks super-cool (though I'll probably never get him...), and all the improvements to regular stuff has made my day, totally.

Midsummer: Be Kind, Rewind

So the Midsummer Festival has been reset, allowing Seona to go back and visit all the fires she had before for a second time... getting the blossoms, coin, and experience all over again!

This is great news, as it means she'll be able to level a little more than before. Of course, due to time constraints, she didn't exactly hit a whole lot of the fires to start with, but still, this is nice. Also, those two dailies are still available, and they give really good experience as well, around 5500 experience for each of them. That's pretty amazing at level 45.

Unfortunately, Yrovi hasn't come out to play at all lately, but I'm not giving up on her, yet. There's still the meta-achievement to take care of, as this is more or less when she started last year with events, so she won't even have to do everything again. Just desecrate a few fires, steal some Alliance flames, and take care of Ahune... nothing major, right? ;)

The more Seona runs around on Caliburn, though, the more I desperately wish 3.2 were live. The regular mounts are so slow! I occasionally pop onto Ziir (my banker DK) and his mount is so speedy, especially with the pale horse talent, that going back to Seona's warhorse is agonizingly slow. If 3.2 were here, she'd already be on her charger, and it is really difficult to run around knowing that. I should be grateful, of course, that this isn't vanilla WoW and that the option will be here soon enough, but I'm impatient today. :p

All-in-all, this holiday couldn't have come at a better time for Seona. She'll speed through the rest of her 40's and by the end of the holiday, you'll probably find her in the plaguelands, kicking dead-dude butt in the name of the Light and Argent Dawn. She'll have gotten nearly all of the old-world flight points, plenty of coin for training and such, and new clothes (if all goes well, of course).

P.S. Turns out that battle Seona participated in last week was part of a huge storyline from Al'shar lo Dor'ano, another RP guild. They had a prisoner in the Stockade and the Horde had come in order to free him again, porting back to Silvermoon. In our zeal, we retaliated by taking out Grom'gol and then boarding the Zepplin to Orgrimmar. Cool, huh? I'll have to find out more and see when other events are occuring. I'd like to see how this plays out.

Midsummer: Experiences

Seona ding'd 45 last night. 95% of her activitiy involved the Midsummer festival. I imagine that the entire festival (if she could do it all, which she can't) would net her 5+ levels. That would really be spectacular, meaning I could skip straight to the plaguelands, my ultimate old-world goal for leveling.

To get her there, there are two daily quests she can complete, each giving some experience and coin: torch tossing and torch juggling. On top of that, there are plenty of fires to visit, both to honor the flames and desecrate them (each giving experience, coin and blossoms). It will be an excelent reason to travel the world a bit and get flight points. In fact, I did some running about in Kalimdor last night, getting Seona some of the flight points in the Night Elven lands, including in Feralas. She's actually resting in the Inn inside Teldrassil as that was the last fire she got to before Caliburn nearly collapsed from exhaustion. Poor beast carried her all over last night.

Speaking of, I desperately want 3.2 to hit. Caliburn will get an upgrade (he's the warhorse, in case you're confused as all h3ll), and Seona might just get a second mount for less important occasions. Heck, at the rate I'm going, I may get to 60 before it hits... which may not actually be a bad idea. I didn't really think about this, but wouldn't it be cool to do the questline for the Epic mount right before it changes? The major drawback to this is, of course, the cost... I'll have to think about it. I mean, it matters for blood elves, because they get the training, the mount, AND a tabard that they can't get any other way. Dwarves just get the traning/mount, and it's way cheaper come 3.2.

Heh. On second thought, maybe she won't get to the quest. Spending that much gold for a mount seems silly now, with the changes coming. The lore is amazing, yes, and it has nice experience gain, but I'd rather push forward with basic questing in order to hit Outland/Northrend/80 as soon as possible. I mean, participating in more guild events is important to me, and that's something that level 80 will bring, I think. The festival will give me the levels, but I'll need to get more efficient at traveling to the fires. Hopefully I'll get a level a day. Outlands, here I come!!

Midsummer: Time to Play With Fire

The Midsummer Fire Festival has arrived yet again in Azeroth. Fires blaze up all over the world, each faction paying homage to the fire spirits. The Horde and Alliance each visit their own faction's fires... and desecrate the fires of the opposite faction. One of the longer holidays of the year, this will run through July 5th, giving both my mains plenty to do.

In fact, Yrovi will finally get dusted off again after about two weeks of inactivity. Her motivations are purely for the achievement. She still needs all the Outland fires and Northrend ones, of course, along with several other items she wasn't able to get to last year due to being under-level. When she completes them all, she'll be one Meta-achievement closer to the mega-meta.

Seona, on the other hand, will no doubt approach this holiday very differently. For one, this is a major holiday, so no doubt there will be truckloads of roleplay to participate in. Secondly, this holiday is pretty much run exclusively through quests. Quests = experience, so that makes me a happy panda. In fact, the pacifist has already said that he's gained about four levels already and he hasn't completed everything, yet. He's in his mid-fifties. With Seona only in the Forties, this means she might make level 50+ with this holiday alone. That would make me jump for all kinds of joy, especially since leveling has been slower lately. As an added bonus, I can dance at the ribbon pole for the Ribbon Dance buff, giving me 10% extra experience!

I'm trying to keep to certain areas, mainly the Eastern Kingdoms, and plan to take Seona to the plaguelands ASAP, since the Argent Dawn is there, and it's a leveling Paladin's paradise. It's been difficult getting there, though, due to a sudden lack of quests (well, aside from Booty Bay... ugh.) I had hoped the Hinterlands would offer more, but no luck there. It seems I've run through quite a lot of the quests there, maybe all of the ones Alliance-only (I know there is a robot chicken escort quest out there, but I can't find the stupid chicken...).

If the holiday delivers, though, I'll be able to blaze past the next few levels. Seona is currently at level 44. With only six levels to go until 50, I think I can actually make it to Outland by the end of the holiday. That would be amazing. The next major patch will bring lots of increased leveling tricks with it as well. At this rate, Seona will be in Northrend in no time at all.

A First War

Seona has experienced a bit of RP with her initial joining of the Kingship of the East: a nice, quiet picnic at the edge of Crystal Lake in Elwynn.

Last night, she recieved her second dose... and what a dose it was. She had made her way back to the Hinterlands to attempt to further prove herself to the Wildhammer dwarves, only to get a rather frantic-sounding call from a member of the Kingship asking for all who were able to come to Stormwind at the behest of another guild.

Seona immediately called back into the stone, letting Lord Cendall know that her hammer was his to command, if it could be of use. Well, on the way back to the city, Seona was invited into a large raid and things got interesting from there. While she had no idea what was happening, she got some tidbits of conversation while joining the front lines in Stormwind around the Stockades. The Horde had infiltrated Stormwind and were breaking one of the prisoners out!

Long story short, they managed to escape and the group did a full on chase and scouting through the Eastern Kingdoms to hunt them down, leading to Kalimdor and the very gates of Orgrimmar. That's where Seona and the raid got their asses handed to them. They were a more or less full raid of 40, nearly all level 80 (though a few 70's were mixed in, along with Seona and a young rogue from the Kingship rolling 43 and 30), but they appeared to outnumber the Alliance 3 to 1, at least. The Horde, led by the guild Nyx, easily pushed the group back through Durotar into the Barrens, where they had to retreat yet again, some through a portal to Theramore, but most into Ashenvale. Unsucessful, morale was low and the warriors were beat down and tired. Cendall saluted those of the Kingship that had answered the call, and relieved Seona of duty, where she promptly used her 'stone to return to the Hinterlands.

Luckily, the dwarves there gave her a bed and some bandages.

Seriously? That was HELLA FUN! We lost. Oh, how we lost, and I never stood a chance. Honestly, the best I could do was buff with Kings and try to stomp some totems before I was singled out and one-shotted. I did more corpse running than fighting. But, you know, I stood proudly side by side with members from my guild and wore their colors, fought with honor, and did some roleplay. It was fun, engaging, and I got to participate in something bigger than myself. All in all, I'd say I'm having more fun now than I ever did before in this game, and I'm not even level 80, yet.

Can't freaking wait for the next time I log on. :D

A New Recruit

Seona Lightstone is officially a Recruit of the Kingship of the East. Pledged to her new king, she will do all she can to uphold the honor of her new guild in all matters, great and small.

It's quite exciting. I never thought roleplay would be this much fun. I mean, I doubt I'll be grabbing up the new D&D handbook anytime soon, but "acting" my character is fun. Seona was able to speak with the queen and king of the Kingship over a wonderful picnic by Crystal Lake in Elwynn forest surrounded by other members of the guild. While it was a touch overwhelming, especially since it was a very large group, nearly all at level 80, and all of them experienced roleplayers, it gave me a real taste of what this group is all about.

I definitely got the impression that there was a larger storyarc going on underneath everything, which is just cool. I mean, here you have a group of people (the guild has over 200 toons, to give perspective),creating a story within the larger story of the game. WoW will neverget old for them, because they write their own adventures, act out their own stories within the larger world. It's really quite amazing.

There's still a ton I have to learn, though. They use emotes in a really unique way, for example, nearly all of them custom (not hard, but not something I'm used to). They understand the lore far better than I do, I believe, and they really do have some major story arc going on that I'm not yet fully aware of, not to mention too low of a level to participate in. Thankfully, they definitely have various events that occur often, like the picnic I was able to witness and participate in (I even got some fishing in!), so I'll get a chance to hone my RP skills before I hit level cap.

This is going to be a whole new ballgame... and I'm oh, so ready to play. :D

Scheduling: Two Mains

Whenever you meet someone and say, "World of Warcraft? Oh, yes, I play" the next question is always, "What's your main?"

Yrovi is, of course, my main, seeing as she's the only toon I have at level cap and the one I (used to) play the most. My goal, though, is to actually have two "mains", one Horde and one Alliance. I think that for all this time, I've really only been using half of the game I play so often, and pay $15 a month for.

So, how do I honestly say, yes, I have two mains, and yes, I play them both about the same? I pretty much have to schedule time. Throughout the week, I'll play Yrovi and Seona on alternating days. Really, it's the only solution right now. Hopefully, with about 2-3 hours of play time in the evenings, I can get a level out of Seona every night I log in to her. Yrovi will continue plugging away at her goals, mostly rep grinds. Weekends are free-for-all, where alts come out to play and I can work extra on Seona.

In fact, just this weekend, I knocked out another three levels on the little lady dwarf pally, so she's finally over level 40. This means that at some point this next week, I'll be hoping to sit for that interview with Kristyl of the Kingship. I'll need to flesh out some backstory before then and really figure out Seona's character for the interview, but that's not hard. She's my character, after all.

I've also given one of my alts on ED a bit better backstory: Leodry, the soldier.

His full name is Leodry Emmerich (which means "work or labor", something a warrior/blacksmith knows all about) and he's definitely not a huge fan of humanity anymore after witnessing the destruction of Strathome as a knight's squire, where he promptly deserted the army. Still, he's returned to the front lines and is working his way through the dwarven lands, desperately hoping he won't run into any old soldiers who might remember him from his younger days. He's adorable, really. :D

With Seona fleshed out, and hopefully joining a guild soon (Actually, I hope to catch Her Majesty this evening for our little interview, which hopefully goes well. I'll make a quick reference card for Seona, I think.), and well on her way to level 50+, things are looking up. Keeping her rested is helpful, too, but it's not always easy to do as I level quickly. Oh, and those mount changes are going to be amazing for my alts and for collecting mounts. Can't wait!

This Will Bring Me Back

Holy. Crap. o.O

Huge change posted by the floating skull of doom on the general forums. This is what I get for stepping away for a bit and not paying attention to the forums.

So, mounts are going to be revamped yet again to allow quicker travel at lower levels. Exciting stuff here, for sure. This means I actually have several alts that could get mounts when this goes live instead of much later. That could make a huge difference in how fast I level these toons. A very tiny part of me is crying, outraged that they'd make it so easy for the newcomers and super-causuals (conviently fogetting that I'm one of them) and demanding a refund, but I beat it back into its dark corner and go back to cheering for all my alts.

Regular land mounts are to be trained at level 20 and even cheaper. Epic land mounts are trainable at 40. Now wait, now wait! 40? Really? Jeebus, that's huge. Does this mean my epic Paladin mount for Seona is a quick learn at 40 for about 60 gold? This is mind-boggling. Flight is now learned at 60, and epic at 70, as usual. Crazy, truly crazy.

I definitely didn't expect this change, especially out of nowhere like this. It feels like something in from left field, but I'm not about to look a gift horse in the mouth. Of course, this doesn't come around until the next major content patch (3.2), so there's still time before it goes into effect, but this is a really big change.

With that patch, many of my toons will be eligible for mounts:

Purah, my death knight, will be able to get flying. I might even get him the skele-chicken all DKs can get. Untainted and Mål are a stone's throw away from 40, meaning they'd be able to get epic ground mounts. I have at least 5-6 toons in the mid-20's and they'd all be eligible for regular training... the gold I'm going to need!!! Oh, man!

What I've just noticed, though, is that this means no low-level toons will be getting exalted with a second faction before hitting the appropriate level for training. You're stuck with your faction's mounts. Interesting. I know quite a few Belfs, for example, that despise the "cocks colored like rainbows," to quote Nyhm. Still, I'm not going to complain. This is huge.

Yrovi will be farming a bit to earn extra gold. Most of those 20-somethings are on Gul'dan and might actually get me to play those toons. I haven't played my warlock in awhile... and now I'll have a whole new reason to push to 40 on Seona. Wow. There's work to do.

Treasures Untold

So in preperation for my move into my new house, I've obviously been packing up all my stuff. I had no idea I owned all this junk, but I do and I've got to pack it all up. While packing, though, I discovered a box in my garage with lots of old software and manuals, including Heroes of Might and Magic I, II, and III along with some of their paperwork, like the quick-guides and such. Heroes of Might and Magic was the first series that I became truly obsessed with, starting with Heroes I and every installment since then (that was Mac compatible, of course). These turn-based strategy games were my first serious foray into computer gaming and I'd stay up for hours late at night playing, trying to beat the computer.

Now, the old disks obviously don't play on any new Mac, ever since they switched over to OS X. But, because I'm a crazy Mac lover, along with my parents, I still have my ancient iMac. You remember those? The ones that were all bubble-shaped and colorful? Well, mine wasn't exactly colorful since it's "graphite" or grey, but, hey, it's old and it still works. I dusted it off and plugged it in and heard that glorious startup sound. Ah, memories. :D

I'm pretty sure the internal battery is shot, though, because it thought it was December 30, 1969 and the hard drive was named some strange string of numbers and symbols or something, but I fixed it all up, popped in the disk and fired up the game. Ah, to hear the midi music and see the crappy animations and sprites gave me a little bubble of joy! For a game from 1995 (I can't believe it's over 10 years old now!), it's addicting. I decided to run the campaign and started as the Knight, since they have the cheapest units. "Lord Ironfist" built up his castle and took the central town on the map, earning victory! /cheer

I started the second map of the campaign, but since it was getting late, I saved and shut down. While it's certainly no WoW, it is tons of fun. I have Heroes II and Heroes III as well, and I think I still have Heroes IV on my shelf in my room. Freeverse semi-recently released Heroes V for Mac, but it's plagued a bit by bugs in the software, which is a real shame. I bought it anyway, of course, as a download on my laptop. :D

I think as a side thing, especially until I get internet installed in my place, I'll be running through the campaigns of the games, especially Heroes III. I personally think that III was the absolute best of the entire series, the most polished. Pity I don't have the expansions for it (and checking amazon.com, the mac version of Heroes III complete is about $150!!! Geeze!!). Well, probably a good thing, otherwise I'd probably hardly ever play WoW again. lol

To Exalted: the Rep Grind

Yrovi is working her way towards a Netherwing drake. They're quite striking and beautiful, I think, and it's something I didn't do when Burning Crusade was the current content. There are days when I wish I had started playing earlier, or had rerolled earlier, or started playing during beta when I really wanted to... well. Hindsight is 20/20, right?

There are several reasons why we choose to grind reputation in WoW, though it's usually for some kind of reward, like a new mount, or special enchants (Sons of Hodir, anyone?), or for achievements. Regardless, nearly all rep grinds start at Neutral and you move your way through the ranks to Exalted. To get fully Exalted with a faction, you have to accumulate points of reputation (Neutral to Exalted). Neutral is 3,000 points and can often be done in a single day, maybe two; Friendly is 6,000 points; Honored is 12,000 points; Revered is 21,000 points; and Exalted is 999 points. You're considered Exalted by the game the moment you get that 42,001 point, but to do it "properly" you go ahead and the the rest of those points. I mean, since you just grinded out over 42,001 points, what's another 998, right?

For me, the hardest bit is getting through Revered. Neutral and Friendly takes very little time, and Honored just twice as long as that, generally. If I'm really focused on gaining rep with a certain faction, getting through Honored goes fast. It's when I get to Revered that I always plateu. It takes forever! Perhaps it's because the daily quests (or, gods forbid, the total killing grind) are stale by this point and 21,000 points are obviously going to take longer to accrue than the 18,000 I had just gotten. Getting to Revered with some factions is all it takes, depending on their rewards, especially in Northrend, but there are some great vanity items at Exalted that I want at some point.

Like the Netherwing Drakes. In fact, there are no other rewards from this faction, just the drake, at Exalted. It's otherwise a completely pointless grind. It's interesting, though, from a lore perspective. Outland is unique in that it is a seperate planet, completely removed from the Old World of Azeroth. It's a little forgotten, to be honest, especially its lore, except by the countless Death Knights that level through there, not that any of them care about the lore. There are other factions in Outland that give rewards, though they are all outdated at this point, aside from the vanity items, like pets (sporebat baby?) and mounts (Cenarion Hippogryph, something I'll get eventually).

I haven't been playing like I used to, haven't had time to spend hours doing daily quests. Still, I much prefer those to simply a kill grind. Getting a nice chunk of rep all at once is nice, and is more satisfying for me, although the constant, slow increase that a kill grind gains is also easily measured. I think the only drawback is, of course, that it's terribly boring and certain classes with nice damage and AoE capabilities have a distint advantage. Pre patch 3.0, my prot warrior would have been the worst possible toon for a kill grind, although it's much better now with shockwave and thunderstomp and cleave. Having a Fury build as my secondary talent tree is nice, too, with whirlwind. But kill grinds are terrible for me, personally, so I'll stick to daily quests.

According to WoWJuJu.com, a lovely reputation calculator site, I have about 5 days left to get to exalted with the Netherwing. That's only if I do all the dailies each day. Probably not going to happen, just because those dailies are actually quite time-consuming. They require a bit of travel and three of them are underground, where I can't use a mount, so they take quite a bit longer to complete. The rest are just generally time-consuming, requiring travel.

Regardless, I'll be done soon enough, and won't ever have to go back there. I'll get my free drake, buy the rest, and put Outlands behind me again for awhile. At some point, I'll go back for Sporregar and Cenarion Circle reputation, but I'm not ready for those, yet. Those involve kill grinds/instance grinds and I just don't want to do it, not right now. I have rep to gain in Northrend.

Like the Oracles, which I still haven't done, and Argent Crusade, Wyrmrest, Kirin Tor, etc. I've been taking my sweet time with everything, and it's time I either stepped up or shut up, especially when it comes to heroics and badges. I say to myself, "Hey! I want to raid!" but I don't put forth any of the effort to actually prepare for it, like gearing up. Supposedly, I could run it now. I'm defense-capped, after all, and I've been told that 10-man regular Naxx is easy mode. Still, I know for a fact I could still use work, and I hardly have the best entry-level raiding gear available. I don't even have my gun, yet, and that's a major upgrade seeing as it's a BiS item for a tanking warrior who hasn't raided, yet. Heck, maybe it's BiS until Ulduar. I don't know. I haven't raided! :/

Whatever. Like I said, it's time I either put up or shut up. Either I start running 5-mans again, or I don't mention it anymore and rely on reputation gear and other such things. Hell, there's still plenty to do if I don't end up raiding. There's my offset to complete. There's rep to grind, which is what this little post is more or less about, and there's still tons of achievements to get. I won't be bored, I won't be quitting, and I won't get tired. But, really, if I'm going to get stuff done, I need to prioritize. Drake? Or PuGing another Heroic run? Oracles Rep, or farming mats for the tanking gun? Decisions to make, and time to make them while I go poison a few more grunts. I mean, really, with only 5 days worth of dailies left, I might as well do them. ;-)

Yrovi Says Hi

Managed to jump on WoW this weekend for a few hours, including my recently ignored main. Yrovi worked on some Argent Tourney stuff, then tried to hop over to Outlands to fly to Shadowmoon valley and see those Netherwing dragons. Unfortunately, she didn't actually get that far. I was interrupted on the way, having to stop in Terrokar, so that was a little unfortunate.

Still, she's on her way, so when I log on her again, I'll head to Shadowmoon to do more undercover work. I figure I have a week's worth of dailies to still do to get exalted. I may try to do the cannon questline in order to speed it up a touch, but the mats needed are a pain the behind to get, I think. We'll see. I need those dragons for the 50 mount achievement (bought the white skeletal warhorse from the Argent Tourney, so I think I still need 19 more... it's sexy). I need to speed it up anyway, seeing as patch 3.2 is going to expand the tourney again. I'm always falling behind with this stuff.

Forgot just how much gold I have thanks to dailies on Yrovi. I've been playing on ED, which has more or less been a complete re-roll for me, trying to figure out the market and such, and it's shocking to realize I have around 2k gold available, suddenly. I've also been trying to get enough materials to craft a sweet tanking gun using my neutered profession, as it's something I could really use for stats and such. Too bad the mats are crazy expensive or I'd farm more in order to sell the guns for profit. It'll require a farming run in Wintergrasp for eternals, though, soon. I need water and air (15 of each, damn) for the gun. I have the titanium (10 bars needed) thanks to a good price on the AH, as well as the saronite (easy to farm, had tons of that, needed 20 bars), and just need to snag a frozen orb (either from a heroic run or from the AH). The final part is a vendor item, so that'll be that.

I'll get a nice, big Stamina gem for the gun once it's done (would love a Stormjewel, but too expensive and I'm not that lucky). I've got to increase my health pool somehow, as I'm still terribly lacking in that department. I'm also tempted to buy the Troll axe from the tournament as an upgrade to my current one. The Red Sword is obviously better, but that relies on a drop and one from a Heroic I don't think I'm ready for, seeing as I haven't run any 5-man content in awhile. I practically need to start over again and run the basic heroics for badges and such before I do anything else. Something like Utgarde Keep and the Nexus, easy stuff to get back in the groove, with nice, easy badges. There are still plenty of upgrades in these instances, too, when it comes to drops, especially if I want to flesh out my off-set, as it's comprised of mostly quest stuff atm. At least the Sen'jin axe would look freaking sweet. ;-)

I think I even have the tokens for it, even with my mount purchase. If I don't I will in a couple days of work, no problem. One day, if I manage to get a group for the [Threat From Above] quest. The one good thing about taking a long break from Yrovi is that the Tourney quests are still interesting and fun. They were getting stale earlier.

Seona also leveled and is sitting at 37, nearly 38, in Theramore. Keeping her rested, I think I'll make 40 by the weekend. Hopefully then I can take an hour or so to speak with the recruiter and make my way into my dream guild. :) All my other toons are taking a break till this happens, I think, aside from Opalandra. She also leveled this weekend. I think bouncing between these toons will keep the two leveling ones rested well enough to make their journey short and sweet. Also, short quests I can complete in the morning before work? Yes, please, give more.