Dailys can be Dangerous

I have always been somewhat of a Daily Quest fanatic since their induction to the game in Burning Crusade. Being a fairly active person I liked the idea of questing even at level cap and I found playing the auction house, while profitable, rather boring. The only problem was that with the old system, the daily quests never changed. You would do the same ones over and over again until it got to the point of going into auto pilot, knocking off the limit in less than 30 minutes and remembering little to nothing of the experience. Cata's daily system has changed that to a certain degree. While some quests never change, they did add a little variety to certain zones, with some daily quests only appearing randomly, or having them generally change each day like the cooking and fishing daily did in Wrath.

There are also a plethora of zones which contain daily quests so you can easily reach the limit of 25 without doing the same daily quest hubs every day. Only the Twilight Highland's quests are annoyingly repetitive but since you can also gain reputation with those necessary factions via use of the tabards they can be skipped. The "Wack a Pygmy" quest in Uldum is one that I will do just for the chuckles and I can't imagine ever getting old.

Tol Barad has become my new favorite daily quest zone. Why? Because doing the dailys there are a challenge every time. Unlike the Wintergrasp daily quests they don't have to be done while pvp or during the Battle Ground situation. However the mobs that litter these two islands are no joke, some of them hit quite hard and respawn rapidly. For a new 85 (as you can't enter the zone until then) they can even become overwhelming. With 34 different quests to cycle through are is always variety and the items they have available are useful for more than just pvping, including but not limited to a pet and two mounts, a flying and a land. One of the most frequent complaints I hear about Tol Barad is that you CAN NOT fly there. Personally this is one of the things I LOVE about the Islands, it brings us back to the basics of remembering how to move around without the advantages flying gives us. Everything is hostile and attacks come from all directions, threat in a questing zone is not something we have had to deal with for a LONG time. I find it refreshing.

There is one other random thing that has added an element of spice to the daily quest grind. Deathwing and his sporadic visits.  Now I made the mistake of complaining that the first of my toons to get the "Stood in the fire" achievement was an alt. Then when Daraia got hit I was afk and missed it completely. Apparently Deathwing heard me mouthing off, because since then I have been hit FOUR TIMES while trying to do my daily quests, if he keeps this up I am going to be VERY grateful for my guild perk which reduces durability damage.

A case for Pickpocketing

 For years I have been advocating for rogues to pick pocket as a way to level their lock picking with out having to wander all over Azeroth looking for boxes, however with the recent changes to lock picking effort is no longer required. So why bother taking the time to riffle through those humanoid pockets? It is only a few silver after all right? Wrong. If you are not one of the sticky fingered set who can't seem to stop the compulsion to see what that mob or boss just may be hiding you may be missing out on some really nice goodies added this expansion.

Flame-Scarred Junkbox is our newest pick pocked locked box, it is what you can sometimes find in these boxes that may be of the most interest to us. I will try to cover the vast majority of them but Blizzard has granted us an unexpected treasure trove you shouldn't miss.

Three epic weapons, all of which are good for us. They have about a 1% drop rate, so it isn't going to be every day you will find one, but they are all BoE. The Spinerender is a throwing weapon, The Twilight Blade is a nice slow dagger, and the Krol Decapitatior is the upgraded version of the Knol Cleaver we saw back in Wrath.

As before you will occasionally find trade supplies such as uncut rare quality gems. You will also find some Inscription supplies which otherwise can only be obtained via limited supply off select vendors. Deathwing Scale Fragments, Bleached Jawbones, Silver Charm Bracelets, and Perserved Ogre Eyes are all used by Scribes to create blue level items at the higher end of Inscription and will fetch you a nice price on the Auction house. These aren't the best trade items however. Located ONLY through pick pocketing are the Polished Bronze Rivets. ANYONE wishing to have a Tailor craft him a High Society Top Hat is going to need 8 of these babies. While the location of the actually recipe is still unknown start stock piling these if you get them because they will be worth their weight in gold shortly.

I can hear you now, well ok Dar, I can see the money making opportunities your presenting but those are still few and far between. What about all the other pockets I have to go through trying to GET those? Fear not. Today's high level rogues will find more than just empty wallets. There will always be the prerequisite few silver but they have also added another item which is just for us. Rogue's Draught is a BoP Health pot. This means not having to fork out cash to your local Alchemist for Mythical Healing Potions. Now we have always had the chance of getting healing pots from pick pocketing. These however are the only ones that have been designed specifically for us and with the recent changes in Cata where mobs are no longer dropping them VERY useful to have.

There is one other thing to consider in regards to pickpocketing. At present gear levels Crowd Control has returned and a great many rogues are out of practice in placing saps. Some have never done it before period. Pickpocketing is a great way to practice outside of a raid or instance situation. Personally I found my saps to be one of the more consistent forms of CC in my guild runs as while glyphed they can last almost 3 minutes usually allowing us time to kill a full pull before getting to the sapped one. Practice placing saps without all the advantages of Subtlety spec. Those who farm places like Grim Batol or the Fractured Front in Deepholm specifically for boxes will highly advocate for using Subtlety, and it does make box farming easier, but all specs should know how to sap with out relying on Subtlety's extra advantages.

There are lots of macros out there you can use to assist you in pick pocketing, for those who are concerned about mobs noticing you with your hand in their pockets there is the following:

/cast Sap
/cast Pick Pocket
/cast Ambush

A popular one I have seen credited to Lilyn  for those who just want to farm but not kill anything is:

#showtooltip Pick Pocket
/console targetNearestDistance 5
/targetenemy [noharm][dead]
/cast Pick Pocket
/cleartarget

So is it really worth losing a minor slot just to pick up the Pick Pocket glyph? That is a totally personal choice but I try to have a least one spec with it. Then again I have always had sticky fingers and the ability to pick a pocket from the same distance I can place a sap appeals to me.

BBQed

Sadly it wasn't on Dar but on one of my alts. I did manage to pull myself together enough to get a screen shot. It happens so fast that you really don't get a chance to do much more than realize that your screen is going red, Deathwing is coming, he is unbelievably huge and BOOM your dead. So far I know only two others that have gotten hit. One, my mount farming partner, logged onto his Hunter in the Plaguelands to get one of the new pets and got it, not even realizing what happened, it was only the achievement popping up in Guild Chat that told the rest of us. Then later he missed out on getting it AGAIN on another alt by walking into a building, our healing lead who he was questing with got it because SHE was standing out side the building.

I will admit, the aftermath is pretty amazing.

Know Your Rogue Lore: Lilian Voss

As a newly arisen Forsaken you encounter a young woman by the name of Lilian Voss. Like you she has recently been resurrected into the life of the walking undead, however she is not adjusting well. The Forsaken have a fairly simple philosophy about the recently awakened, you either serve Sylvanas or you die permanently. They give you the illusion of choice but that is the sum of your options. They will grant you some time to come to grips with this if they feel there is potential for you to come around to their way of thinking. It is this "give her time" path that is left open for Lilian and leads to all sorts of interesting encounters.

Lilian Voss is no ordinary corpse. To be perfectly honest she doesn't really have a classification other than "undead" but there are a few things that lead me to place her in the "rogue" family, not the least of which being that when she first runs off you find her hiding out behind the rogue trainer or displaying our trade mark skill "stealth".  A Scarlet Crusader in life, her father is an area ranking priest who groomed her to be a weapon against the undead. Unfortunately with her recent transformation her usefulness to him has reached its end. Lilian finds herself torn between the life she once lead and one she now finds herself presented with.

The Scarlet Crusade is very aware of what Lilian is capable of. When Lilian attempts to contact her father, thinking he will protect her, she instead discovers that despite who she was in life,  the Scarlet Crusade holds true to its ideals. Her Father orders her execution at the hands of her one time friend. Declared a "witch" along with all the usual foul names they bestow upon the Forsaken, she escapes, bewildered and enraged.

It is when faced with second death that Lilian's true nature emerges. Lilian's education while living was very well rounded. Not only was she trained in the traditional assassin arts of stealth, weaponry, and martial arts but also sorcery.  When you first stumble across some of Lilian's handy work it is the evidence of this added element that grabs your attention. All of Lilian's kills glow with purple fire. The Forsaken generally prefer that corpses remain in one piece, (spare body parts or future Forsaken you understand) so this could be a problem. However Lilian demonstrates that while this is her preferred method of disposing of people, she can show profound creativity, as displayed with Captain Sanders, who she suspends by one foot at the outskirts of his camp.

When you encounter Lilian for the final time at Captain Sander's corpse she lets you know that she could easily dispose of you just as she has all the others but instead she is going to allow you to help her obtain her revenge. Her father High Priest Voss, is hiding surrounded by flunkies in his tower to the west of Scarlet Monastery. For creating a killer, rejecting her in her hour of need, then ordering her death, Voss must now reap the rewards. You need only to escort Lilian there. As a rogue this is of course incredibly easy, you can both stealth by every thing, however as any other class you will also find it rather simple as Lilian will quickly dispatch the Scarlet Guards in the area. (It reminded me a bit of the scene in Blind where the Rogue was entering Stormwind Keep, not quite that quick but impressive for a level 10.) Once you get to the tower don't let Lilian out of your sight because she quickly gets to the matter at hand, confronting her Father, if you blink, you will miss it.

After delivering her final embrace Lilian disappears, but her mark remains on those who have encountered her. As High Executor Derrington remarks "With power like hers, we could do incredible things." Lets explore that for a moment. The Deathstalkers are in shambles after Varimathras' betrayal of Sylvanas, many question their loyalty, constantly looking over their shoulders. Now lets say they manged to bring into their ranks a recruit like Lilian and adopted her methods? Sylvanas right now is fighting a war on two fronts not just literally with the Alliance but also within the Horde and their perceptions of  the Forsaken. At the moment she is winning the physical war as she bolsters her troop numbers from the deceased, making the Horde despite themselves dependent on her.  If Sylvanas can also rebuild her feared Assassins into something even MORE than they were before...the Hour of the Forsaken could indeed be at hand.

Confirmation

I don't know how many of you have taken the little Darkmoon Faire "Discover your Destiny" class test but if you haven't take the time to, do so. One of the interesting things that I have noticed from others who have taken it and gotten unanticipated responses is that they often claim that there is "no way" they could POSSIBLY play that class and enjoy it. Often they will state that they have "tried in the past" and it was "awful" or that they have no interest to begin with. What many fail to realize is that many of the classes have undergone significant changes over the years and that class you once despised might actually be pretty fun now.

My mount farming partner for example took the test 9 times and kept getting "priest".  Now he plays a Resto Druid as his main and played a Hunter before that, with a Mage, a Paladin Tank and a Rogue hanging around as alts. Priest was CERTAINLY not what he was expecting to find, however after getting the same result so many times he figured he should just give into the inevitable and try it. So far he is loving it, and at the rate he is going will have her to level 80 by the time Cata hits.

Others of us just got confirmation that yes indeed we are playing the proper class. For both the plate wearer and I it went even a step further in that the pictures that accompanied them were frightening close to our Avatars. I will admit to being shocked to seeing a female human, usually it is a male or a night elf. The description was certainly apt in how Daraia would react as well.

So how about the rest of you? Any of you take the quiz? Any surprising answers? Confirmations? Going to give any of those suggestions a try?

Expansion Events in Review

This past couple of weeks have been rather eventful. First we were invaded in Real Life by out of state relations fleeing from the Palins. Then my computer decided to have software issues so I couldn't get to the blog. All this meant that my original intentions for dealing with the Elemental invasion got thrown out the window. Today the Shattering will take place and a new world order introduced, so lets look at each of the previous expansions and how Blizzard handled those events. What makes an event successful? What did they do right and what things need to be reconsidered?

Burning Crusade

The Dark Portal Opens was the very first expansion event we ever had and we were all so excited that we really didn't care that there wasn't much to it. One world boss in the form of Highlord Kruul who was a 40 man raid so unless you were a hunter and kited him back to one of the major cities or part of a major raid guild you didn't really get the chance to do much with him. The other part consisted of standing in the Dark Portal killing emerging demons the day before launch so you could get your complementary tabard. (Or breaking out into all out war with the opposing faction which was a whole lot more fun.)

Those of use who were around for the BC event all remember Kruul's rampages through Orgimmar and Stormwind, but I only vaguely recall the party at the Dark Portal. Even though I had an event commemorating Tabard every time I stumbled across it in my bank it didn't evoke any lasting memory. While the IDEA was good, the execution still needed some refinement. More people needed to feel a part of what was taking place. BC was definitely a "High Level Only" thing.

Wrath of the Lich King

The Zombie Invasion was an event where people really began to express their opinions about these "expansion events" this was now our second and it really changed the whole facet of the game. With the BC event, if you were not a High level character, unless someone kited Kruul to you, it didn't really have an impact. With the Zombie Invasion there was NO place you could hide. BG's, Cities, the country, Outland, starting areas...EVERYWHERE was effected. If it wasn't being over run by high level mobs from the Lich King's Ziggurats, fellow players were infecting others and turning people into ghouls. People generally either loved it or hated it.

However if you were high enough level to really participate you could walk away with some interesting little souvenirs. I know the Haunted Memento is still very popular on my server. There were also the recolored Paladin tier 2 sets, just enough to get the look, not the greatest stats on them but that was ok, I still have all of mine kicking around in the bank. Then all of the little "vanity" type trinkets you could get from killing the various mobs and turning in the Necrotic Runes. (Come on having that Pally from the Argent War Horn bubble hearth was always a riot!) Not only that but killing those mobs gained you reputation with the Argent Dawn, which for some who hadn't bothered was a nice bonus eventually leading to a title and achievement if you managed to reach exalted with both them AND the Argent Crusade.

One of the major problems with the Wrath Event in my opinion (and it was VERY minor) was the introduction of major lore figures with no in game explanation. Suddenly the humans had a king with bad hair and an even worse attitude, dragging a blood elf rogue who was FRIENDLY through Stormwind. Thrall had Garosh, the whiner, now turned hot head challenging him for leadership of the Horde and no one knew why he was even out of Outland. Confusion was really the name of the game with the Wrath event if you didn't happen to have access to the out of game information.

Cataclysm

Now we have just completed the Elemental Invasion. The perscription with this event seemed to be "options" as in, if you want to participate you could, but if you don't you could really pass the whole thing right by. Even right up until yesterday there were individuals logging in who had absolutely no idea what was going on. Now a fellow blogger was protesting how simple the invasion was, he wasn't alone. The problem I found with this "invasion" was that especially in the case of sprawling Stormwind, you needed a good size raid in order to successfully "defend" it. The first day of course this was not a problem, after that is was like herding cats. There was also the issue of the bugged rifts in which no elementals would spawn at all so you just had to wait around an hour for the defense to "fail", the same with trapped citizens.

I did enjoy the bosses that a successful defense opened up for several reasons. One, many of those bosses were ones I had not seen in years, and others had never seen as they leveled up, because they were located deep within longer dungeons or were once a part of tedious quest chains to be summoned only. Second, the gear they dropped was generally useful to newer level 80's or alts (that was mostly what I saw running those dungeons) as it was all 251 level. Third, it was a GREAT way to rack up huge amounts of Justice Points as you could chain run them and each kill was worth 16 Points. The very last day they kept the bosses available the entire time so that is all we did, chain run those 4 bosses.

As for the elementals themselves....enough with the elementals ok? You can only kill so many of them before it gets WAY to tedious. At least during the Wrath event you were getting rep, or stones to turn in for stuff. With this batch you got a feat of strength if you killed one of each type, a daily quest you had to make sure to pick up because it never showed up on the screen and a buff (different ones for each type of elemental). Yippee. No pets, no titles, no tabards, no nothing to clutter our bags with or at least make it KINDA worth while to go after the stupid things. So generally we all avoided them because unlike the Zombies, the NPC's could kill the elementals if they were out in the wild and they would eventually disappear on their own if they stayed to long. Are we REALLY suppose to take this threat seriously?

Now I didn't mind the quests so much. Some have complained they were to simple. The thing is they were for ALL level groups, so really, were you doing major trek all over the kingdom quests at level 5? No, that comes later, after you have established yourself as a "Kingslayer Hero" in full Epic gear with flying mount, THEN you traverse the universe slaying dragons. These quests did their simple job of introducing us to all the major players in Cataclysm. We now know who the first major "Bad Guy" is going to be, (because you know we aren't ready to take on Deathwing yet) and some Ogre by the name of Cho'gall who is hooked up with some Old God. We know that Thrall has gotten himself a female friend by the name of Aggra, another Shaman, his teacher, who eventually he plans to make his lover, and bride. (Something Thrall has desperately needed in his life.) We know a new cult has sprung up and that King Varian is handling things with as much tact as the TSA, this is going to result in the Defias showing back up, madder than ever.

The Elemental event did what it was suppose to do. There were parts of it I liked better than the Wrath event (the bosses) and parts that needed work (the elementals). I mean if we could have gotten a PET off of them or calmed them down or used totems on them or SOMETHING other than just mindlessly killing them all the time THAT would have been nice. I actually liked that the quests gave us a basic idea of what was going on and what was coming so players are not so dependent on out of game sources. There are still some things that will be a surprise or are just contained in the out of game books to make them worth reading.

Over all this is our third expansion and this game has undergone A LOT of changes as have we as players. When Burning Crusade was introduced about 8 Million people were playing World of Warcraft. The vast majority were still considered "Gamers" at heart with back grounds in table top and computer RP gaming or family members where that was true. Fast forward to today where we have 12 Million people. Console gamers have a much greater portion of the demographic, as well as what many term the "casual gamer". These are not individuals who pour over spread sheets or research everything that is coming out before it is released. Lets be honest if it isn't happening right under their nose, they have no clue what is going on. They either don't have the time or the inclination. Expectations of these types of gamers are very different and lets be honest OUR expectations have changed as well.

Do I have a favorite of the three? No. They have all done their jobs. The one nice thing about Blizzard is that they always learn from each thing they do. What works, what doesn't, how can they improve. As much as we may gripe and complain they DO take the feedback they get from their customers into consideration as well as what they have in their over all game design. As I read in the recent Magazine sometimes that feedback will lead them into a completely different direction than where they were originally planning to go.  At this point I am ready to go into Cataclysm.

Elemental Invasion Phase 2

The next portion of the elemental invasion has taken place, but it is VERY minor and easy to miss if you don't happen to know to go looking. If you haven't been able to participate yet, don't worry the previous quests are still in effect and can be done they have only added a few more. Again this guide will be done from the Alliance perspective (Sorry Horde). 

If you head over to the Stormwind Bank you will see that the Earthen Ring contingent has two new quests this week. One is offered by the leader of the group Erunak Stonespeaker who sends you to Stormwind's harbor to find Courier Tormun. Tormun is suppose to be delivering some tablets discovered in Ulduar to King Magni Bronzebeard from his Brother Brann, but they haven't heard anything from him, Erunak wants you to go check and see if he has shown up yet.

Now something interesting about this quest is that Tormun is not where he should be. You will find him near the dock leading to Darnassus NOT the Northrend Dock. Talk to him and you will discover that his companions have all been killed and he is under attack by a Twilight Cultist astride a Black Drake (hmm, where have we seen one of THOSE before?) Near Tormun is a crystal which he instructs you to use, it will grant you the ability to combat the elementals that are attacking at the Cultist's behest. You want to use the opposite ability to the element you are fighting, so fire to water, water to fire and air to earth. Once the elementals are defeated the portals will disappear and the tablet will appear. You pick that up and head to Advisor Belgrum at the Hall of the Explorers in Ironforge.

If you haven't had the opportunity to read "The Shattering" this is your chance to be introduced to a little bit of the lore that is discussed in that book. Those tablets you deliver are going to have a profound effect on the Dwarven people and you are now directly responsible for bringing them to them, congratulations!

The other quest you can pick up outside of the Stormwind bank is a "bread crumb" quest from one of the Earth Ring Emissaries. He sends you off to Ironforge to consult with their representative stationed there, a Wildhammer Shaman by the name of Stormcaller Mylra. Mylra needs you to help get rid of all the little earth elementals that are causing the earthquakes in Ironforge. She gives you a bag which contains a potion and a totem. Once you drink the potion you are able to see the little elementals for 10 minutes. All you have to do is drop the totem near the elementals. I personally found that doing this in the trenches was a little less of a hassle than trying to run around competing with everyone else.

Of all the phases of the Pre Cata event this is the "quietest" one in my opinion. Really little happens to progress the story, but that is ok. It gives those who have missed things a chance to catch up, those who are scrambling to complete those last few things at much more time to do it before the true craziness really descends. From this point on the pace will begin to increase, so hold on, it is going to be a bumpy ride.