I want my D3 BETA!

OK Blizzard, I still have yet to figure out your process for selection for beta keys. If it's completely random then I can't really have any complaints, but it does seem that there are certain people out there who receive a beta key just by asking. I'm talking about bloggers, shoutcasters, etc. Sure I'm not a regular blogger, but I feel there should be some sort of reward for being a loyal Blizzard gamer.

I'm sure many people have played a lot of Blizzard games, but lets just go over my past with them. I started out with Warcraft II, never played the first one, but I played that game endlessly, beat both campaigns, and lots of skirmishes both on a LAN and computers. Pretty much the same can be said of Starcraft. I got into that one a little late, say a year after release, but nevertheless, that would make it 11 years ago. Fast forward to Diablo II, and I'd say I played that game more than Warcraft II and Starcraft combined, and not by a small margin. I leveled at least 3 characters over 80, and did countless hours of loot runs. Warcraft III comes next, and yes I of course played through the campaign, plenty of online play, just never made it through the campaign.

So that brings us to WoW. Do I really need to tell you how much I've played this game? I have a blog about it! I've been playing since about 4 months after it was released, I don't even want to think about how much the monthly fees add up to, but I'd like to think I've invested more money in Blizzard than the majority of people out there. Just think, I have leveled 6 characters past level 80, 2 more past 70, and yet 2 more past 60. That's at least one of each class over level 60.

Starcraft II, I haven't done much online play yet, but I played through the campaign and a lot of Nexus Wars.

So, should I receive a beta key for Diablo III? That's up to Blizzard to decide I suppose, but I'd like to think they at least look through current Battle.net accounts and have some sort of selection process other than just picking randomly. I have all those games registered on Battle.net, so it's not like Blizzard is clueless about me owning them. Hell, I've lost my Starcraft disc two or three times and had to replace it each time.

Come on Blizz, let me get a beta key.

It's been a long time

Yeah nobody reads this, but I want to go ahead and do this anyway. New expansion? Well maybe not so new anymore, but new enough!

I didn't know they could make the quest progressions better after Wrath, but they managed to do it again. I love how the quests flow, how some just pop up and don't make you return to the questgiver to turn it in. It's great! Not only in the new zones, but in the new quests they replaced in the low level zones.

Thousand Needles is awesome, I played through it a few times on both factions, I'm a big fan of the new underwater element they added to the game. Which brings me to Vashj'ir. Not sure if it's my favorite new zone, because Hyjal just brings me back to Warcraft 3 and the memories of playing through it the first time. I had such a hard time with that level.

I have a few new characters to comment on. I made a Worgen warrior, and got him up to level 60 pretty quick. It took like 8 months to get my first character that high in vanilla WoW, but this guy went ridiculously fast. My druid is 85, first there of course, with the paladin behind him at 84.

Oh, I've been soloing Heroic Underbog randomly with my hunter at level 82 in an attempt to become exalted with Cenarion Expedition and get the hippogryph mount. It's monotonous, but it'll be worth it. I got the Wintersaber mount with my priest too, that one went pretty quick once I upgraded her flying skill. That one has been in the works for a while, so I was pretty happy to get there.

Hmm, shaman at 82, got my DK to 80 somehow, he was really easy to solo with, almost like the pally, but can't heal himself. Warlock at 74 or 75, she's the one I'm working on right now until I get out of her rested XP range. I went destruction for leveling and I'm excited for chaos bolt. I first went with a warlock for a felguard, but I gotta see this chaos bolt in action before I change specs. I'll have that felguard later.

Rogue is still 70, he probably won't budge for a while, and the mage brings up the rear, at, umm, something around 50, but I can't remember. He'll be the next project. The whole water elemental as a pet thing really helps for soloing, mages were pretty rough before, almost as bad as rogues.

Ok, that's enough for now, I might update a every now and then though. Who am I even talking to, nobody reads this!

Rogues, my only weakness

As you may or may not know, my very first character was a rogue. He was the first to reach level 60 in vanilla WoW, and I even started doing some instances before the first expansion was released, then I pretty much gave up on him to play a druid and priest, and eventually others.

The thing about rogues that I have trouble with is their lack of healing, especially with their low armor value and the fact that they are pretty much melee only. This results in fairly slow leveling in comparison with most other classes, who tend to either have a healing spell they can use, or stick to attacking from range and don't take much damage. Warriors are the exception, but they have much better armor to mitigate damage.

Why am I bringing this up? Because I have started leveling my rogue again. Getting to endgame content on four other characters has shown me the new stuff rogues have gotten since I left mine behind, and I want to check out what I've been missing. I also am getting a little bored with endgame stuff and need something else to do for a while.

The transition is a little different than normal for me. I think it's a combination of just how long it's been since I played a rogue, and the fact that my main is a feral cat druid with very similar controls.

So far things are going well, but I need to level my first aid skill to keep downtime to a minimum. Other than that I'm finding it to be much less of a grind than before. I'm not sure if I chose better talents or if rogues are just better now than they used to be, but where I was usually resting every two battles I can fight many more in a row now.

So for now it looks like I will be working on my rogue. I think I will shoot for getting him to level 70, then I will probably need a break from him, but I want to get through Outland at least before it comes to that.

My main goal at this point is to get epic flying for my priest. She's been at level 80 for so long and still flies around like slow poke. That's why I'm back to questing again. It seems to be the fastest way to earn money for me at this point.

80s Madness

A couple weeks ago I went on a binge and leveled up my shaman all the way to 80. It seems to get faster and faster with each successive character, but I'm not planning on doing too much leveling in the near future. Surprised? I was too, but I have other things to focus on.

First off, I have no idea what I want to do with Keldreth, my hunter. At first I was going to use her to farm Heroic Underbog in an attempt to become exalted with Cenarion Expedition and buy the hipporgryph mount. Only problem is her gear isn't good enough to for her to be able to solo the instance, so there goes that idea. For now she's on hold.

Blackbare will continue to be my main, running Heroics with my friends and guildmates to gear up. I've gotten some pretty lucky drops, and he's well on his way to having all purples. That's about all I use him for at the moment, but I will have to quest through Ice Crown eventually, even if it's only to get money from the quests.

Vonari is a little different. She will be running BG's and just be my PvP character for now. I have geared her up in a few instances, but I'm thinking she will just stick to getting most of her gear through PvP.

Avialle gets to be my guinea pig at gearing up on my own. I've been running normal dungeons with her for gear, and now she can queue for most of the heroics as well. I'm gearing her up strictly on my own, without guild help, just to see if I can do it without getting too frustrated with PuG's. It hasn't been bad so far, this new cross-server LFG tool really works well.

As for all the lower level characters, I probably won't be using them much for a while. Now that the endgame stuff doesn't require such long playing sessions to get anywhere, and the fact that I have 4 characters that are at that level, I think I will stick to playing them the majority of the time. Probably better to save the others for Cataclysm anyway.

Bigger and Better

Well it finally happened, I got a new computer, and for the first time in my life it's a Mac. Actually it's a little overwhelming. The screen is huge, it runs super smooth, and even though it's a Mac, I can still run Windows on it as well if I want, so I can still load up any of my old games if I want.

A new computer with a huge screen also means WoW looks amazing. I can bump up all the video settings with no lag whatsoever, and I'm pretty sure I don't have to worry about any graphics card conflicts or anything like that while I'm in the middle of a game.

On to the progress update. I have been leveling my shaman almost exclusively, only playing other characters when my friends are running instances and such. She's level 75 right now, and is just finishing up in Dragonblight, which puts her on track to hit 80 sometime in the next couple weeks depending on how much time I get to play.

I don't know why, but I'm really liking the shaman and the huge burst damage she gets with her enhancement build. Sometimes it's a little ridiculous. One swing of the mace and the enemy just lost half it's HP. Other times nothing procs and I'm stuck in a drawn out battle. Kinda interesting how that works.

I actually think that maybe the shaman could be my BG character. The burst damage, combined with spirit wolves to add a little damage while healing me, and my summonable elementals make it seem like a pretty good choice for a little PvP. It will take some practice though, I still get ganked all the time.

On a side note, Blackbare is getting much better geared. I've gotten lucky on some drops in various instances and he's slowly but surely getting there. He also managed to reach exalted with Sons of Hodir and is now able to get my shoulder enchants for me. They increased the rep gain on each turn in, so it doesn't take nearly as long as it used to. I think I was exalted in a couple weeks.

Not much else to update on right now. The pally has gained a few levels, but still in her 20s so not much to talk about there. For now I will concentrate on getting Avialle to 80 and then figure out what I want to do from there.

Classic!

That's right everybody, Blackbare is now a Classic Dungeonmaster!

Alright, maybe for a level 80 it isn't the most difficult task to complete, but before going for the achievement I had only been to maybe half of the instances the original game had to offer, but now I have seen them all, and I think I can understand why people are so drawn to it.

My first character I got to level 60 was my rogue, and this was before the first expansion, so I had a chance to run a few of the end game instances. My experience with it wasn't too great. Being a rogue it was very difficult to find a group, as there was never a shortage of DPS characters needing groups.

Now I get to see them in sort of a different light. Sure I can blow through them really quick on my own, but trying to think about what it would be like for a group of level 60's trying to make their way through one of those instances makes it very interesting.

I'm able to skip so many mobs, the loot doesn't matter, and the bosses go down easily for me. An instance like BRD was just so big, I can't imagine working my way through it at that level. I really can see why instances have become more and more streamlined starting with the first expansion. They were big and epic before, but just took too much time for me to want to run through them constantly.

Next up, time to get my hunter ready to solo Heroic Underbog, or get a better attempt in at least. She'll be questing in the Storm Peaks first, then moving on to Icecrown if her turtle pet hasn't hit 80 by then. The new patch just decreased the amount of experience for a pet to gain a level too, so this should go more quickly than it was.

Besides that, I plan on taking my druid to the new Heroic instances with my guild, and hopefully get some crazy gear out of it. Blackbare has really become my instance guy, and the funny part is that since we have such a good tank in the guild that leads us through, I end up running everything in cat form as DPS. Not really what I expected his role to be, but hopefully I can eventually get an off-spec set and go boomkin as my dual spec. Oh that would be sweet. I wouldn't mind trying healing either at some point.

Retro WoW

So in the process of going for the Classic Dungeon Master achievement, I also joined my guild and a few others for a run of Blackwing Lair. It was quite the experience, and now I know that I would have never been able to raid in vanilla WoW.

The group itself wasn't bad. We had some well geared people who knew the instance, and the rest were just along for the ride. The first hickup we had was attunement. Sure you don't have to be attuned anymore, but without it you have to run through UBRS to get in. We decided to just become attuned.

Well we eventually did it, but only after I got stuck along with two others at one part behind a gate that apparently doesn't open after the boss is killed. So we had to get summoned back and run back through the instance. One player even fell into the lava in Blackrock Mountain and we pretty much left him to catch up with us.

So we're all attuned and make our way into BWL. This is quite the instance. Lots of different mechanics for the boss fights. With 11 level 80s we didn't really have much trouble with the fights, it was the other players we had problems with.

One of them pretty much singlehandedly held up the party for a good half hour or more as he had died in the instance, released (after we told him not to), and came back, only to be killed by respawns from the first boss' room. When we went back to rez him his body was nowhere to be found, and so he had to run back again.

This wouldn't be so bad, except that he didn't get attuned somehow, so the run back wasn't just to the beginning of BWL, but to UBRS, and then you have to run through that to the entrance to BWL. It was quite the ordeal, and all I could do was sit there and wish we hadn't waited for him.

It got me thinking about the 40-man raids people used to do at level 60, and the horror stories I heard about them. With all the troubles we had with just one person out of 11, I don't know how the 40-man groups ever made it. Sure if it was all in the guild you probably are all on the same page, but even then there are hold ups, and after this weekend I really don't think I'd have the patience for stuff like that.

In the end we got through it, but it took an hour and a half, and I went into it expecting to spend less than an hour. At least I can cross that off the list of old world content I want to see that I never got the chance to before.

Next up: finish the last few dungeons for the Classic Dungeonmaster achievement. I tried BRD with my friend this weekend as well, but we got lost, as neither of us has done it before, so I think we might have to use a walkthrough. We're n00bs...

Can't fight it

I knew I'd be drawn back into this game at some point. For a while there I was just questing every so often when I really had nothing better to do, but I now find myself with more goals to accomplish that are actually attainable for me.

First off, I want to beat all the classic dungeons. Right now I'm working my way through everything but the level 60 stuff, and the last ones I need are Sunken Temple and Zul Farrack, which will be easy enough for an 80 druid. Next up comes level 60 5-man content, which should also be easy to solo. Luckily I've already done all of Dire Maul, that place took forever, I don't know how people did it in vanilla WoW.

Last on the list would be the raid content. At this point I'm not sure how this will go at my level. Can I solo it? Do I need help? And how much help do I need? Anybody experienced with this that has some advice?

Next up is getting epic flying for all my 80s, which is just going to take lots of money, so that goal is pretty straightforward.

Last on the list at this point is getting a Cenarion War Hippogryph for my hunter. This will require running the Coilfang Reservoir instances on Heroic a lot, and I expect I won't be able to get help every time, and I can't do it myself with what I have right now, so I am working on making my hunter good enough to solo it.

How am I doing that, you may ask? Well first I switched to a tenacity pet for the better survivability. Before I had used a core hound, but now I brought out the turtle. Only problem is I need to level it up to 80 now, so I just plan on questing more. More money for me and XP for my turtle at the same time.

I also crafted the entire PvP hunter set with my druid and sent it over. Took a while to farm all that leather, but now that it's done I have the recipes to be able to deck out my shaman in the same gear when she hits 80. Sure it's not quite as good as stuff you'll pick up running instances, but it should do.

I'm hoping that will be enough, but right now I have no idea. I could very well finish all these tasks and then enter the instance, only to find out I still can't take it solo.

That being said, I think I might start blogging regularly again, so keep a look out!

Yes I'm still playing

It's been a looooong time since my last update, and I don't expect to be posting regularly anytime soon, but I've made some good progress recently despite my lack of time to play.

I've been pushing Keldreth to get up to level 80, and she's 79 right now. I expect she will be 80 by the end of the week. Going through Northrend as a hunter is very different than with my other characters. I can solo almost any elite quest, the regular mobs are never a problem and there is hardly any downtime. This makes for faster XP gain because I pretty much don't have to sneak by any enemies.

Right now I have just finished up in Zul Drak and have moved on over to Shalozar Basin. By the time I was at this point on either of my other 80s they were only around level 77 or 78, which meant that after finishing Shalozar they still had to do some questing in another zone to get the rest of the way. At this rate my hunter will be 80 before she even finishes up in this zone, leaving lots of quests and gold to be had from questing the higher level zones.

I have sort of put my Horde characters on hold. I like that I went through to level 40 on Kunzagah, the mage. Knowing that the entire old world will be reconfigured when the new expansion comes out, I'm glad I was able to play through much of this old world as Horde. I will probably save at least two characters to play through when the expansion comes out.

On a side note about the expansion, I'm very excited about the Worgen being a playable Alliance race. Sure they're pushing it on the lore to make it work, but that's not really something I ever cared that much about. As far as I'm concerned, if Blizzard writes some ridiculous lore to make they're games better, then I'm all for it.

I plan on making a Worgen Death Knight right off the bat, but I also want to quest their new starting zone, so I'll have to make another character for that, class TBD. It's going to be very interesting to see how the old world turns out with the release of the expansion, but it's been in need of some work for a while, and while we may lose those familiar quests that us alt addicts are used to, it opens up so much new stuff for us to explore and compare to how it was before. I predict it will be awesome.

What have I been up to?

Yes I know it's been a long time. I expect lots of the people who used to read this have since given up and moved on to blogs that actually update. I'm not sure if I'm coming back, but it's been a long time since the last update and I feel like I should get you up to speed with what I've been doing this whole time.

First and foremost, Vonari is level 80. Actually she's been there for a while now, and fully decked out in the crafted PvP set that she made for herself. I got a chance to run some BG's with her, and it was really fun. My friend brought his paladin and kept me alive while I burned down the bad guys. We got some really good teamwork going sometimes, making it almost seem easy.

Having said that, I haven't played her or Blackbare for quite a while. I tried tanking some instances with Blackbare, and it was fun (mostly due to the tips I got from reading the BBB), but it's just too time consuming for me. I can't dedicate that much time to the game. Don't get me wrong, sometimes I play for hours at a time, but it's never planned, I have the option of logging whenever I want.

I also started getting Keldreth on her way to 80. She's finished up Howling Fjord and is now on her way through Borean Tundra, but I'm putting her on hold for a while. Avialle is making her way through Outland; she and Deadbare both made the jump over to the new server as well, but they won't be joining the guild until they reach level 70.

Actually my most recent endeavor has been making some progress on my Horde characters. I'm finding it to be very fun making it through good old Azeroth as the opposing faction. Most of the quests are brand new to me, as well as the classes I'm using, so it's a completely different perspective from what I've known.

So far Kunzagah (mage) and Shanaera (warlock) have been the characters I play the most, trading off as each one gets through their well rested XP bonus.

I really like the damage the mage puts out, but I can see how just casting frostbolt over and over would get boring. I might have to think of a way to change things up later on.

The warlock is fun as well. It has the feel of a hunter with it's pet, but it also has the damage output of a mage, and those DoT's can really do some damage. One thing I didn't plan on but that works out really was having her take herbalism, which gives you Lifebloom, and in combination with Life Tap I never have downtime due to low mana. It's also great to use in combination with Health Funnel to keep your pet alive.

So if you haven't looked at the armory profiles in a while, you might be in for a big surprise, and I will try to get back in the groove of posting every so often, but I'm thinking it will only be when I have something more than just little updates to talk about.

Leave of absence

I know it's been a while since my last update, and that's because I always update from work. That being said, I got laid off last week and as such I haven't been at work to update. You'd think that means I would have more time to blog, but I guess I like to do other things online when I have full internet access.

Anyway, I probably won't be updating for a while, at least as long as I'm unemployed, so check out my blogroll for some other great blogs, assuming you don't read those ones already.

And if anybody lives in the San Francisco Bay Area and knows of any civil engineering jobs, feel free to let me know, any and all help is appreciated.

For now I have lots of time to play WoW, and once I start a new job I will be sure to update you on all of my escapades.

Slow week

It's not so much that I haven't had time to play this week, it's just that I've had other things to do with the free time I would normally use to play WoW. I don't think it's burnout, just different priorities at the moment, but this weekend might see a change in that.

I never realized how many different TV shows I watch during the week, and they aren't really shows I can just half pay attention to while playing WoW, I need to focused or I won't know what's going on. Part of it is that last year we had the writer's strike and lots of shows either had short seasons or didn't even air.

Luckily I'm almost fully caught up now, and I should be seeing more free time soon, which means I will be pushing my way to level 80.

I'm not only excited to get to 80 just so I can try my hand at some PvP. I also want to go back and run some of the old instances and raids. I want to do all the attunements from vanilla WoW, then fight through places like MC, BWL, and AQ.

I actually got asked to do BWL by a guildy, but at the time I was busy with other stuff and wasn't going to have time for it anyway. Now I'm hoping there will be some interest for some fun runs through old content that I was never able to experience but have heard a lot about.

Of course the fact that I can earn achievements by doing those instances is a plus, but I think the main reason is to see those places for myself. I know it won't be quite the same as a full blown 40-man raid at level 60, but just to be in those various fights that I've only seen screenshots of before would just be awesome.

Well it looks like I have even more to look forward to once I get to level 80, and I'm really starting to see the benefits of being in a guild with what I can do once I reach that point and start looking for fun activities to do.

Weekend Progress

I'm making my way further into the Howling Fjord, and so far I haven't had any trouble completing the quests there, even soloing some group quests. I'm now on the last quest hub, at least as far as I remember, and should be moving back to Borean Tundra very soon, where I'll hopefully blow through quickly and be able to move on to new places.

Somehow soloing has been really easy for me on Vonari, but it wasn't always that way. Up until Northrend I pretty much had to skip every group quest unless I had somebody to help me. There were a few I could solo, but mostly I got past those through luck more than anything else.

Now I'm going through the elite quests as if they're just tougher normal quests, instead of quests that are impossible without help. I was able to take out the pirate in the cave and the giant bear that eats him, even though the bear was immune to fear. Then I went after the ice dragon and got him on the first try as well.

I'm finding that most of the time my PW:Shield holds up until the debuff wears off, then I can re-apply immediately, and any health I lost is given back by VE. It's really very convenient, and it's fun getting the hang of all the skills I don't normally use against regular mobs that allow me to stay alive in a longer fight.

I'm hoping this practice at staying alive in longer fights will help me out in PvP as well. Sure it's not quite the same, but some of the tactics used to keep myself alive are similar, and the more precise reactions are something I need to work on as well.

For now it's just sticking with the leveling and making my way to 80, but once I get there I think things are going to start getting really interesting. I'm hoping this time around the end game will be a much better experience than it was in vanilla WoW, and with all the new stuff that has been implemented since then I think it will be.

Still fun the second time

I was a little worried that running through the Howling Fjord quests for the second time would get a little boring, but so far it's still almost as fun as it was the first time through here on my druid.

I'm getting close to hitting 71 on Vonari, and she has finished off the quests around Utgarde Keep and most of the stuff with the Vrykul towns up on the cliffs above. It's really helpful to have been through here before and I have a pretty good idea of what to do for the quests.

Obviously I have to use some different strategies to complete certain quests, and that's probably one of the reasons why it's not becoming monotonous. I really like the spirit world quests where you get to see the history of the Vrykul. The new quests are just so much better in comparison to anything pre-LK.

I also hope to level my professions while I level up to 80. That was the whole reason I made such a big deal about leveling them to that point. I don't want to have to do any profession grinds again.

I think up to this point I never really had the tools to level up a profession without outside help. Now with three characters at level 70 or above, I think I my characters will be able to provide each other with plenty of mats to keep from getting stuck, except for those few recipes that require atypical mats.

That's about all I have to update on at this point, plus it's Friday (Friday the 13th for that matter), and I'm ready for a good long weekend.

Still can't decide

So I'm leveling my priest, Vonari, through Northrend now. I finished up what I wanted in Borean Tundra, which got me about halfway to 71, then headed over to Howling Fjord to make my way through that zone.

I'm really starting to remember why I like playing my priest. Actually I think I say something like that every time I switch characters. I just like them all. They each have their own playstyles, and I find them all appealing, although each in it's own way.

At this point it's really looking like Vonari was the right choice to level alongside my friend as we make our way through Northrend and eventually start getting into some PvP action. Actually, I'm not sure how a priest/mage combo will hold up in 2v2, but we'll see how that goes when we get there.

I was actually asked recently by one of my guildies which character was my main. I had to tell them I'm really not sure. I have three characters at or above level 70, another two at level 60, and various lower levels on the Horde server. I just can't choose one to say it's my main.

Then they ask which is my favorite. Yet again I don't know. I just can't choose one. The only reason I'm leveling Vonari right now is to play alongside my friend, and the reason I chose her was because I thought she would make a good partner for his mage to do arenas with.

There were no favorites, just me trying to figure out the best way to do things. I could just as easily have said that Blackbare was a good choice because he was furthest along, and I'm sure he'd do just fine in arenas as well.

What it all comes down to is that I can't choose just one character and stick with it. I know lots of people can, and I used to, but when I started that first alt I just couldn't go back to playing just one, and it just escalated from there.

After thinking about how things will go when I actually get to 80 and start getting into PvP, I don't think it will stop me from leveling my alts. I won't be doing arenas or BGs every single time I'm on, which means I will be playing a different character.

I just have so many other things I want to do in the game with other classes to stick to just one, and in the impossible event that I am able to accomplish those goals, we have a ridiculous number of achievements that I can go after. I don't think I'll ever run out of stuff to do, even if I don't ever raid.

Grand Masta

It took forever and my funds are running dry, but I finally managed to get my priest up to grand master tailoring and enchanting, which means she's ready for Northrend. Had I known that leveling these two professions together would take such a toll on my gold I would never have chosen them, but too late now.

I think the worst recipe yet has to be the Runed Adamantite Bar. The mats are just ridiculous, and there's no way to get them without help from other professions.

Primal Might has to be made by and alchemist, and the transmute can only be performed once per day, so even if you manage to find someone to do it for you, and you have your own mats, you're still going to pay a lot for it.

Then the Adamantite bar requires a blacksmith, and those are way more expensive than the mats needed for it because they know enchanters need them.

The rest of the mats aren't quite so hard to come by...if you only needed one or two of them, but 8 Large Prismatic Shards is a lot, especially considering how infrequently you get them from disenchanting. Luckily one of my new guildmates had some extras he was willing to part with. What a nice guy.

Well at least that part is past me now, and tailoring wasn't nearly as bad as enchanting was, plus I could DE all the crafted cloth to get more mats.

I sent my priest to Northrend shortly after and made my way to the profession trainers to up my skills to Grand Master. Actually I only had enough money to be grand master in one profession when I got there, but after a few quests I went back and got the other one, although I don't have money to buy any of the recipes now.

I started out in Borean Tundra again, but I'm thinking I'll head over to Howling Fjord after finishing off a few more of the quests since I really liked that zone much better, and my friend is leveling over there right now anyway.

I'm finding a lot less stamina on the cloth drops in Northrend, but much more spell power and intellect. Luckily I don't get hit much because I am almost always shielded, so I'm wondering if this was done on purpose since clothies try not to get hit much anyway and would rather see bigger numbers. I sure don't mind.

For now I'll be pushing my priest as far as I can until I run out of rested XP bonus. I'm sure my friend will get to 80 way before I do, but I just can't stand leveling at the normal rate, so he'll have to wait around before we start our arena team.

I'm still undecided on a spec to go for arenas. I'll be pairing up with a mage, so I'm thinking shadow will be good if we focus fire and just burn down opponents really fast. I was thinking discipline for a while, but I think with two squishies we're just gonna need all the damage output we can get and hope it's enough to kill them before they get to us.

Well, with duel specs coming up I guess I can just try out both and see which works best. It's going to get interesting.

Luck of the draw

I logged on yesterday for one purpose, and that was to farm some Fel Scales to level up Blackbare's leatherworking. I remembered them dropping fairly often from ravagers, so I made my way over to Hellfire Peninsula to grind them out.

Going by the guide I found, I would need enough to make 10 boots to get to 350, plus some extra since the recipe would go yellow at 345. This meant I would need over 20 Fel Scales, and I wasn't sure I would have enough leather to make them all either.

Well, it didn't go that quickly, but I did get 20 Fel Scales and also a good amount of leather, so I decided to try my luck and see if I could just get to 350 without more farming.

And guess what? It worked! I made 5 boots with the recipe in yellow and got a level each time. Not only that, but I still have some leather left over that I can send over to my priest to make some tailored boots.

I had actually expected that task to take a little longer, but now that it was done I still had time to play. I sent Blackbare to Stormwind, grabbed all the Borean Leather out of the bank that he had been collecting, then sent him to Northrend.

Once there I trained up my leatherworking some more and with all the Borean Leather I was able to get him up over 380. That's over 40 levels in one night, and probably a new record for me. I sent all the crafted stuff to the priest to disenchant.

Now it was time to get Keldreth's (that's the hunter's new name) herbalism up to Northrend level. Obviously this won't get done in one night, but I was surprised how fast it did go. She started off at 35 (pathetic for a 70, I know), and after running around Elwynn and Redridge she got a few levels past 100. It wasn't very eventful, just lots of running and one-shotting mobs that decided to pick a fight.

The interesting thing was, just about every time I picked something it gave me a level, even the yellows and greens. Actually I only remember one or two times when something didn't give me a level. Looks like last night was my lucky night for leveling up professions.

The next place I'm sending her is the Wetlands. I decided to do the traveling last night so I can go straight into gathering next time. I stopped off at Ironforge on the way and put up the herbs she had just picked for auctiong. May as well make some money since I don't really need them for anything. Then I sent her over to Menethil to log out.

I guess I was worried about this profession leveling for nothing. I really thought leatherworking would take much longer. Herbalism is going pretty quickly too, although I think once I get into the Outland stuff I will have a little tougher time of it, but at least it's not stressful like a crafting profession, and I'll actually be making money from it rather than spending.

Soon enough I'll be able to level the little hordies a bit more before I dive back into leveling my priest to keep up with my friend. I'm pretty sure I'll get left behind, but I'll at least try to stay close.

I'm actually really looking forward to trying out arenas, but I'm wondering if I should do some BGs first to gear up before I head in there. I'm thinking I'll probably just go straight to arenas, but when I'm not doing that I'll do BGs on the side to grab some PvP gear so we'll gradually become more competetive. I'll really need some practice figuring out how to play a priest in PvP.

Lost my name

I made the jump yesterday. Switched three of my characters over to the Eredar server to play alongside my friend. He's only level 60 right now so I still have a little time to play the hordies before he's caught up, but he plays a lot more than I do so it shouldn't take too long.

I have decided to use my priest to level with him. I'm not really sure about how that's going to end up in PvP later on (him being a mage), but if that doesn't work out I can always level somebody else up to 80.

Actually, the only thing I wasn't happy about was my hunter lost her name. I really liked Aluvia, but apparently somebody already has that name on the server. I checked Armory, but I didn't see the character on there, so either their account is closed or they aren't level 10 yet. Either way, I think I should get priority, being level 70, but whatever.

I can't even remember what I named her right now. I updated the Armory links on this page, but her's will have to stay unchanged until I get home and figure out what I named her. Not that it's a bad name, I actually like it, but I just can't remember it at the moment. I also had her name her core hound, Corey (get it?), because I felt bad he's been fighting for her all this time without his own name.

Besides that I didn't actually do much in the game. I decided to take this chance to level some more professions. Blackbare got his leatherworking a little higher, although he needs a bunch of Fel Scales to get anywhere, so I'll have to do a little farming. Vonari's tailoring and enchanting are both coming along, but she's out of money. She's just going to have to live with being poor until her professions are leveled all the way up.

I'm thinking I better head back with my hunter and level her herbalism. I'm running into some enchanting recipes that require different mats and I really don't want to pay AH prices for them if I don't have to. I'm hoping it will go quickly, I'll have to find some guides one where the best places to go are and then just gather, gather, gather. Hopefully I can also sell all that stuff as I go and maybe fund Vonari's profession leveling.

So with all that going on, I'll have to distribute my time better. I want to play the hordies, but I also want to get my professions up to Northrend level in time to play alongside my friend. That might mean making some sacrifices, I'm just not sure what those are going to be yet. Looks like I have some thinking to do.

#3

That's right, I got my third character to level 70 this weekend, and got to do some pretty cool quests in the process.

First I set out to help Oronok, gathering tubers and destroying slayer eggs, but then he asked me to find his sons and help them out. Those quests got very interesting, with different mechanics that we don't get to see very often in our questing.

The first was fairly straightforward. Kill nagas, find a key, and open a chest with it to get the item. Only thing is, the item doesn't have to be in the chest, it could just be a bunch of random items, so you have to keep doing this until you find the right chest. This one went pretty quickly and I got it on the second chest.

Next up sends you to the southwest camp of demons. This son is dead, but his spirit wants you to do something for him. You have to first free his soul, then find his bow so he can help you on the next step. Once he has his bow, he basically becomes a pet, except he has a mind of his own. This made things go pretty quickly, and we downed the required mob and completed the quest.

The last son had me ambush a courier and then disguise myself as a blood elf to deliver a note to the commander at Eclipsion Point. I actually liked the ambush part the best. You set a package in the road across the bridge and then hide until the courier is distracted by it, then you rush in and take him out. The rest was similar to any of the disguise quests, except all the dragonhawks can see through it so you have to stay out of range. Still very fun.

After finishing up those quests and a few more I hit level 70, immediately dropped everything else, and made my way back to Shatt, where I ported to Stormwind and learned all my new skills.

I'll be setting my hunter aside for a bit in order to level my mage. I also need to see how far my druid's leatherworking can get with what she provided to him. If it's not enough to get to the Borean Leather recipes I'll have to do some farming. The priest's enchanting I'm not too worried about though. I still have my shaman, and maybe my rogue, that need to get through Outlands, and they should give me plenty of items to disenchant for mats to get her through the levels.

I checked out my mage for a bit this weekend too, enough time to complete a quest and then fly around to wrap up a few loose ends so I can start in on finishing off Ashenvale and then probably move on to Thousand Needles. I'm hoping to get at least a couple levels before his rested XP bonus runs out and I have to switch off. Leveling goes so much faster at these lower levels.

Left behind

I feel bad about my rogue, Deadbare. He was my first character, my first main, first to 60 (which was the level cap at the time), and pretty much is the reason I've stuck with this game so long.

Once Deadbare got to level 55 or so I was starting to feel the pull of the alt. I had made it so far, but the grind to get to 60 was starting to wear me out, and I felt I needed a change. So I made Blackbare, my druid, and had a great time leveling him, since I convinced my friend to also create an alt and level alongside me.

As I went, I switched off playing the two, and Deadbare ended up making it to level 60. At that point the game really opened up for me. I was able to go to all those level 60 instances I had heard so much about. I could get some awesome gear, and eventually join in raiding with my guild.

Well, it didn't go quite as planned. Rogues and hunters were a dime a dozen, so getting into a PUG was nearly impossible. It was made even harder by the fact that priests were considered the only viable healing class and warriors the only viable tank class. Sure we had paladins and druids that could heal or tank, but they didn't have all the tools they do now.

So after a bunch of runs to Strat and Scholo, and a few LBRS and UBRS runs with no upgrades dropping I was starting to get very frustrated. I was making some money, and eventually bought a few of the gear upgrades that were BoE, but even those weren't a big help because my guild was fairly strict on gear requirements to get into the raids.

I was playing my druid more and more because I just couldn't justify spending time in the game if all I was going to do was sit around Ironforge for hours trying to get groups together that were just going to fall apart before the end of the instance half the time.

I started thinking about how to fix this. I thought maybe if I were to create a new character of a class that is in demand I can actually accomplish something. So I made a priest, Vonari, and while I was planning on healing in the end, I leveled her as shadow to go faster. I never got her to 60 before BC came out and bumped up the level cap.

So after trying out a few other alts, making some horde characters to see what it was like, the expansion came out and introduced a lot of new stuff to the game.

I had always wanted to try a shaman, and now I could make one on the Alliance side. That was fun for a while, then I left the brand new starting areas and was back in the old world again, with all the same quests to do. I wanted to see Outland.

At that point my druid was also close to being able to go to Outland, but not quite. Deadbare could though, and I sent him out to see what it was like.

After a few of the quests I had replaced most of my gear, including the stuff I had spent all that money on so I could get close to being able to raid. It was sort of disheartening to know how much work I had put in and was now having everything replaced with quest greens. I decided to get my druid to Outland instead and would come back to Deadbare later.

Well that never happened. Deadbare still sits at level 60, hanging out in Ironforge as a bank mule. It's a little sad, but I guess the bad end game experience I had with him sort of makes it hard to pick him back up, and now that I have so many other characters to level he's getting left behind.

Will I come back to him eventually? I'm not sure yet. The rogue talent trees have changed so much in the past couple years, and it would be fun to see what he's capable of now. I also have so much to do on my other characters that I don't know if I'll get around to playing him again. He's going to be hard to fit into my other plans.

Funny how attached we can become to our characters and actually start thinking of them as real people with feelings.