It’s now been exactly one week since I started up my World of Warcraft account, and so far, so good.  I managed to hit level 22 this past weekend, Sunday morning in fact, which was quicker than I had anticipated.  I hadn’t set any goals or expectations with regards to my play time in WoW, aside from just trying to enjoy it as much as possible.  I told myself I wasn’t going to take it seriously, I wasn’t going to become a slave to the “level as fast as you can” monster, I wasn’t going to play every free moment I got.  Turns out, I’ve been hooked, and this weekend saw me logging in whenever I could, not because I felt I had to, but because I genuinely wanted to.  It certainly helps that I’ve got a couple friends, both WoW veterans, in-game who have joined up with me now and then for some questing.  I joined up with Kuarlos Saturday evening and together we took care of a few group quests on Bloodmyst Isle.  In the picture above you can see us taking on the level 20 undead elite dragon Razormaw.  Actually, what you see is Kuarlos taking on the dragon while I stand back and drool over how cool Razormaw looks and take some screenshots.  Yep, that’s me, the perfect group mate.  Granted, that screenshot was taken right at the beginning of the fight, but still, I haven’t even engaged the target.  I’m literally just standing there.  I did manage to throw Kuarlos a heal or two later on, and I also jabbed the dragon in the belly with my staff, but ultimately Kuarlos deserves credit for the kill.  I guess it was fairly obvious too, because afterwards I apologized for not really doing anything because I was busy taking screenshots, to which Kuarlos replied, “yeah, I figured as much”.

Such is life when you group up with a blogger I suppose.  In the past I had always expressed a preference to the ‘realistic’ look of EverQuest II over the stylized WoW graphics, however, I’ve really become a fan of WoW’s look.  I don’t know if it comes out in the screenshots so much, but everything in the game looks downright cool.  Testament to that is the fact that I’m almost constantly hitting the screenshot button.  The picture to the left is of Kuarlos and I taking on Sironas at the end of the “Ending Their World” quest.  This is the final encounter in the quest which has you fighting your way up a mountainside while protecting an NPC who is laying explosives down along the way to detonate the Vector Coil.

The “Ending Their World” quest is another of those quests that do a great job of making you feel like a hero, like you’re accomplishing big things in the world.  Case in point, after speaking with Exarch Admetius to turn the completed quest in, he tells me that I have saved “the whole of Bloodmyst and Azuremyst, securing the Draenei way of life on Azeroth!”  After his little speech, I turned around and left the building only to be greeted by a procession of soldiers and other onlookers, all cheering my name.  Yes, it was totally cheesy, but I ate it up, and thought it was pretty cool.  I almost forgot to take a screenshot of it.

With the Azuremyst Isles saved, it was time to move on to Kalimdor and a quick boat ride took me into Auberdine.  I grabbed a few quests there but most of them were a little below my level, but I did come across one which took me into Ashenvale Forest.  I was quite excited about this because this was my first foray into contested territory.  I was on high alert while running through the zone, keeping my eye out for any Horde scum, but alas, this was not my day for PvP as not a soul was to be found.  I love the look of the zone though, especially the little “pieces of flare” sprinkled throughout, like the statues in the screenshot above.  That’s me in my Ghost Wolf form which gives me a 40% run speed boost, which makes trekking around the zones so much easier.  I’m looking forward to my next few levels in Ashenvale and I’m really hoping I run into some Horde soon.

It’s certainly been a fun first week in WoW, and I think the key to my enjoyment has all been about attitude.  With no pressure to level up, or get this or that phat lootz, all that’s left is for me to just enjoy the experience.  Of course, the first twenty or so levels of any MMO are usually the “easy part”, so I won’t get too ahead of myself at this point.

What is a “proper” raid set up? Is it the perfect mix of classes, the mix of friends, making sure everyone is included, or making sure everyone in the guild is rotated fairly? If the former, there are countless threads with facts and opinions on EQ2Flames and other sites on the perfect class combination. If the later, what is fair?
I would hate to be a raid leader who has to decide who sits and who raids. The sole reason I raid nowadays is because my wife plays geared out Defiler. The only Defiler in the guild. Our guild is couples oriented where most of the people who play are husband and wife. Our raid leader often feels obligated to let the couples play together on raids otherwise giving those who would normally sit a raid spot.
Fact: Sony made Shadowknights the least desirable class to have on raids.
Fact: We have 2 SKs in our guild and I, being the less uber, am often asked to sit.
Fact: I am hooked up with a highly desirable Defiler and a raid leader who allows us to play together. Yay for me!
This last fact often makes me feel guilty for making another class who clearly is needed on the raid sit out. And this last fact has led to a tiny tidbit of guild drama that happened on our forums and in game.
The crux of the drama can be summed up in one quote:
“What kind of a raiding set up allows 2 Guardians, 2 SKs, and Bruiser to raid while sitting out a Necromancer?”
If I break it down this is what happened.
1 Guardian is our MT (need him), 1 Guardian is an officer and is learning the encounters to be MA (need him), 1 Bruiser is DPS and an officer (I guess we need him), 1 ShadowKnight is former MA and officer (I guess we need him), and 1 ShadowKnight who is poorly speced for tanking and has a hot Defiler wife (Yay for me!). On the flip side, we asked a DPS, life burning, rezzing, FDing Necro to sit.
It doesn’t take a Rocket Surgeon to see who should be sitting. I am more than willing and my feelings don’t get hurt when I am asked to sit. I watch jealously over my wife’s shoulder as she sees zones that I only wish I were playing in.
My “Finest” moment that I will never forget is when I was asked to sit out of my first DeathToll run. I was talking about it for a week before hand I was so excited that I was finally going to see this end game zone I only saw in random screenshots. At the last moment I was sat out for an empty spot because the officers decided my resists weren’t high enough and in hopes someone “better” would log in. The spot remained empty till the end of the raid. I sucked it up and laughed about it… after. This also happened the night our guild finally took Pawbuster down. BUT I AM OVER IT!!!!
Issues like this seem to bring the worst out of our guild members. Feelings get hurt and people type with out thinking first. Going into a raid tonight the issue is still up in the air.
Should be interesting…

Ordeth has been questing in Bloodmyst Isle lately, the second of the two major islands of the Draenei starting area in the Azuremyst Isles. One of the first quests I came across there was Declaration of Power, from Kessel at Kessel’s Crossing. The Naga from nearby Wrathscale Lair had attacked Kessel’s camp a few days earlier, and he wanted to send a message to their leadership. Ordeth was asked to deliver that message by finding the Naga’s leader, Lord Xiz, slay him, and then drive a Draenei banner through his dead body. Sweet, I like revenge quests. So off I went to slay some snake-people. Wrathscale Lair is an old night elf ruin just north east of Kessel. It didn’t take too long to hack and slash my way to its top, slaying Naga along the way, until I was face to face with Lord Xiz himself. Fueled by revenge, Ordeth made short work of Xiz and drove the Draenei banner through his skull. Message delivered.

I’ve committed myself to make a conscious effort to really experience the content in World of Warcraft, and in that vein, I’m doing my best not to reference quest helper sites. The quest descriptions I’ve received so far have all done a very nice job of pointing me in the correct direction anyway, but I did come across one quest that had me hunting around Bloodmyst Isle for a while, searching for specific mushrooms. This has allowed me to see more of the area than I most likely would have if I just plotted a course for whatever coordinates I needed for my updates. While wandering around the other day I stumbled upon a ritual being performed by four Felsworn on top of some sort of glyph marking. Just as I was thinking to myself, “hmmm, looks like they’re summoning something,” a level 14 Felguard named Tzerak appeared, shouted something to the zone, and promptly killed the four summoners. It was pretty cool to watch, and as he started to walk away I quickly hopped down behind him and put an end to his short-lived existence. He ended up dropping Tzerak’s Armor Plate, which started the quest Signs of the Legion.

Upon inspecting Tzerak’s Armor Plate, Vindicator Aalesia in Blood Watch informed me that Tzerak and his group of minions in the area were renewing their contacts with the Burning Legion, and of course, if we don’t stop them, we will be overrun. The reason I point this quest out is because it is one of the many quests that tie in to the overarching Warcraft lore. I’m finding that one of the great benefits of actually reading the quest text has been that I’m increasingly drawn towards the lore, and subsequently drawn further into the world. It also helps a bit that I decided to play through Warcraft III before I entered WoW, and I’m often referencing WoWWiki to get background information on a lot of the characters I come across. It’s just really cool to see something in game that I previously saw or read about outside of WoW, and it furthers the illusion that my character really is in another world, not just another set of pixels on a screen.

Being third plate fighter in a raiding guild places me in an interesting position. Not Main Tank and not Main Assist. It puts me in the awkward position of having to pick up adds if things go wrong and usually puts me in the caster group with no fighter buffs in a DPS spec with DPS gear equipped.. Luckily, a Shadow Knight has damage spells which can take advantage of the occasional Troubador that joins the group. That is my usual placement in our raiding structure.
Last night as we were beginning our assault on The Temple of Kor-Sha, word came down that our usual MA would not be available. I didn’t have to worry about taking over MA duties because our Bruiser would be able to take that role. I was then moved up into the group that our usual MA occupied.
Now, DPS for me has always been a challenge. I have to work HARD for it. Refining my gear, maximizing spell order, making sure to debuff before throwing a certain spell to maximize the damage. I had never made the top 6 positions of the Damage parse ever. On this night I learned that it isn’t what you know, it’s who you know. With a Dirge in my group along with an Illusionist, a Fury (Agitate me!), a Mystic (Bolster!), and a Swashbuckler I was 4th on the Damage Parse list. All time highs. I was drunk with power giddily laughing at the destruction I was dishing out.
All at once as I was in my glory…
“Warghoul, we are going to need you to MA tank!”
“But, but, but… “
I was maliciously thrown into the secondary group and buffed for hit points and defence. I stripped off my DPS gear and threw on my Tank gear. I stared with regret at my AA spec and wished that I had used my respect mirror to spec for Hate.
The first pull on trash went fairly smoothly. Losing aggro wasn’t really an issue as our Guardian could take the mob at will and he did. Feeling confident we went into the next battle. This was my first named mob I had tanked in Tier 8. I pulled Uthak the Cruel while our Guardian kept Aktar the Dark occupied and our Bruiser plucked the mezzed adds one by one. I popped every trick in my SK arsenal to keep Uthak on me, losing aggro only once and yelped for my Dirge to “Magnetic Note” it back to me. It went like clockwork and before too long the encounter ended with us being the victors. Our luck continued all the way to the twins Zarda and Kodux.
Kodux was my target. The goal was to keep the twins separated and keep their health with in 10 percent of each other. All the while aggro switches from random target to random target teleporting the victim away from the tank.
To sum up the long battle up into a sentence: My throat was sore from the endless string of profanities that spewed from my mouth as I think I had aggro for about a total of 10 seconds throughout the long fight. Despite my frustration the twins fell on our first pull.
We went toward the Overking and sized up the encounter. We have not yet beaten this boss and that night we failed again realizing quickly that we needed our standard raiding force and ended the raid early to leave a nearly empty zone for us to return.

The great black hole known as World of Warcraft has sucked another player into its swirling vortex… me. This is actually the second time I’ve had an active subscription to WoW, and the third time I’ve played. The first was just a seven day trial, where I played an Orc warrior up to level 19 before going back to EverQuest II. The second time I actually subscribed and played during my EQII down times. I leveled a Dwarf warrior to 29 before realizing that I just couldn’t sustain two MMO accounts at the same time, so again, I went back to EQII. Ever since then, WoW has been swirling around in the back of my mind, rising up now and again, calling for me to return. As per my usual, I gave in. The difference this time is that WoW will be my only active MMO subscription.

I managed to spend a bit of time in Azeroth this past weekend with my newly created Draenei Shaman, leveling to thirteen. I started a new character mostly to join a friend on a different server, and also because I remembered not enjoying the warrior experience a whole lot. One thing that really stands out for me in WoW is the short character introduction when you first create a character. In just a few seconds, it sets up the race’s background and how you ended up where you are. It pulled me into the game much better than other games that just plop you into the world after you’ve created your character. I’d argue that WoW has no peer when it comes to logical starter quest progression; it’s so easy to see where you need to go right from the start. While the beginning quests are of the typical “hunter/gatherer” type, I found they’re framed very well within an over-arching storyline, and I was genuinely interested in reading all the quest text I came across. In addition to the standard quests, there are Shaman specific quests that I came across which provided me with my totems, a device unique to the Shaman class. The first totem, the Totem of Earth, was provided by the Spirit of the Vale after a very basic quest, but basic as it was, the story behind it was presented very well. Continuing my Shaman’s rite of passage, I received my second totem, the Totem of Fire at level ten after another very well done quest. I’ve found these quests have helped my Shaman feel special, and unique, and they’ve made me feel closer or more invested in my character, if that makes any sense.

Even at the lowly level of thirteen, I’ve already seen and done some really cool stuff. I’ve been given temporary wings so I could safely glide down from the top of a mountain, and I’ve been transformed into an invisible panther to quickly whip across the zone. The panther, from the Totem of Vark quest, was an especially cool effect which turned the world into a shadowy version of the spirit world. I’ve also donned a tree disguise in order to infiltrate a secret meeting that allowed me to uncover a traitor. In addition to some of the cool quest mechanics, I’m also very impressed with the variety of mobs. Again, WoW does such a great job of making you feel like a hero, like the things you do matter. I find it refreshing to be tasked with taking out a two-headed beast dog like The Kurken, which actually looks tough and epic, even though it’s only level twelve, as opposed to just a bigger version of a rat model for example.

Finally, I came across one quest which just made me laugh, which I’ve pictured to the left; I like these little pop culture references (Star Wars in this case). Over the next little while, I’ll continue to play when I can; I’m in no big rush to level up. I’m really enjoying this latest foray into WoW so far, and am very much looking forward to exploring more of the world. Playing on a PvP server, I’m eagerly anticipating setting foot into contested or Horde territory, but that’s still a few levels away. We’ll see if I change my tune after being ganked ten times in a row. Regardless, you’ll be able to read about it here.