Northrend Dungeon Hero!

DraNgNon and I were heartily tired of Kuanchichi and Viljo not having the Northrend Dungeon Hero achievement. Heroic Occulus was the only dungeon we were missing. And we were having a lot of trouble finding people who weren't afraid of trying the instance. It seemed that just about every person we talked to had run it once and didn't want to run it again.

So last night we asked our good friends Siazi and Xstal if they'd run Heroic Occulus with us. They said sure and brought a couple of their characters: Jataka, to heal, and Xianv, to dps. They already had a pally tank from our guild <Thwarted Destiny>. So the 5 of us went to H Occulus and kicked butt pretty handily. The only wipes we had were 2 against the 3rd boss, Mage-Lord Urom, while we were figuring out the best way to kite him, and then one on the final boss, Ley-Guardian Eregos, when we didn't realize there was an invisible wall and we failed to run sufficiently away from his phased damage.

I know we had a good group, and worked together reasonably well. However we weren't over geared for the instance and we did wipe a couple of times while figuring things out. This leads me to believe that all the people who won't do Heroic Occulus are wimps. If they don't want to do it because they honestly don't like the drake mechanics that is one thing. But if they are afraid of how difficult the instance is they are pussys. Now I do admit that with Kuan and Viljo on the amber drakes it was actually pretty easy, since the two of us could talk to each other and we did the timestop on the enrage pretty easily. But even without the two of us talking to each other I don't think it would be that hard, so people who are afraid of it are wimps.

Anyway after Occulus the same group went to Culling of Stratholme. It's kind of depressing to see Arthas becoming evil, but it is a fun instance. And even better Viljo got his Bronze drake!! yay bronze drake. I owe the pally tank big time. He and I were the only ones who didn't have it and he passed.

We probably should have gone to bed after that but instead we went with another group to Halls of Lightning. That too was a pretty speedy run. And it helped a newly level 80 priest get some more rep, though not a lot of gear dropped for her.

Character swapping

In two - no, three - different, unrelated discussions, I'm reading about people I don't know very well trying to sell off WoW accounts and characters. About other people who "control multiple accounts not in their name" becuase they bought a bunch and play them.

I just wanted to mention here that while I'm not a big fan of any online services' TOS/TOU, including Blizzard's, I'm just against that sort of behaviour. I think that characters have personalities, no matter how much you try to avoid role-playing it IS an RP game. And part of that personality is in the player's head, and does not survive a transfer. (I've also noticed part of it doesn't survive a server transfer either, becuase the "personality" of the character is part of its interactions "growing up" and interacting with the server social context surrounding it.)

Just wanted to mention that.

Considering how often it's coming up, I think it's a symptom of Blizzard messing up the game content. People are hitting the "I have finished the game" sense of completion and now want to move on. Bad move, Blizzard.

Anticipation

Later tonight, when we're done with some real life things, Kuanchichi and Viljo will hit Exalted Sons of Hodir.

That means the time sunk into this grind will be freed up for all sorts of other activities. I will probably replace it with running raids and instances, or prepping for such. I've almost forgotten what that's like...

I will also resume processing and uploading screenshots, which has been shelved meanwhile.

and and and

Ikoli is 60 now as well

Orgrimmar looks just a little bit different from the back of a fressly acquired Swift Blue Raptor.

Tylara the Blood Knight

She's 60 now. Of course that meant drop what she was doing and start the quest to become a Blood Knight. It's high time for Tylara to wear her proper tabard.



And ride a proper Thalassian Charger.

Dual Specs

Dual specs are here!

Well ok, they will probably be here with the 3.1 patch. And really who knows how many months it will be before that comes out. I don't think there is anything up on the PTR right now.

Anyway dual specs! I tried to do some research into a good mage PvP spec. But I can't seem to find, or just don't know of, any PvP equivalent to Elitist Jerks.

I'm thinking that for Viljo I will go arcane for a PvP spec. I'm still not a fan of Frost.

Full Arcane

Arcane/Frost - Arcane with enough Frost to get Improved Blizzard and Icy Veins

Frost

So please, oh Loyal Readers, point me in the correct direction.
All 3 of you... :P

Sons of Hodir, redescribed

DraNgNon and I are heartily tired of doing the Sons of Hodir dailies. However, due to prsssure from our guildies, we feel like we have to work on them all the time, regardless of the fact that we are closer to exalted than all but a few of them. Anyway, we're doing the Sons of Hodir quests every single day, and it feels like a second job.

So last night as we were running around we thought of ways the quest text should be changed. Most of them don't really need to be changed, at all. I mean, just what were the developers thinking of when they came up with Polishing the Helm, Blowing Hodir's Horn, or Thrusting Hodir's Spear? All I can really do is waggle my eyebrows suggestively, say "bow chicka wow wow", and of course say all those quest names again in a lecherous voice. Hodir likes it Hot and Cold, bow chica wow wow. You could throw in a suggestive hip thrust if you want, too.

For Spy Hunter its clear that the orange text while you're following the worg around should be changed. Currently you see stuff like "clearly on to something...." worg charges off and changes direction 5 or so before finding the iron dwarf infiltrator. I think it should be changed to "clearly on something..." since that wolf has got to be smoking the good stuff, what with all his direction changes.

Feeding Arngrim is a quest where you are supposed to throw the tooth of a giant fat ass blue santa at a worm, then beat the, now disembodied, worm until said giant fat ass blue santa comes and eats it. I think that the name of the NPC should be changed from Arngrim the Insatiable to Arngrim the fatass. It'd be much more amusing for those of us forced to do these stupid quests every day.

If anyone has more suggestions or how to fix the quest text please share.

Red and Bronze

Clara wanted me to post this

a good day of Wow

Kuanchichi got many more achievements today. What I decided was that he would get the Cooking one. I am an idiot and didn't realize after 30-Northrend-Recipes there was another one for like 45. But since the Cooking quest needed Dinner Impossible, which is really a PvP quest, Viljo and Kuan bounced around a few battlegrounds to get it.

While we were at it, we tried out Wintergrasp. That was enormous fun and I will want to do it again. But we picked up some PvP achievements there. After that we ran a few quests in Icecrown, just enough to get Kuan Revered with Ebon Blade so his melee hat could be properly enchanted.

Then we ran around doing old-school coins. But that got tiring so we decided to run Heroic Hall of Lightning. We were in a group with a tank and mage from Ides of March, and despite a couple or three wipes, we got the quests done from Sons of Hodir. Only one of them yielded rep though, disappointing us all as the rest of party also needed it.

All kinds of shaman gear dropped in this run, but it was pretty much not as good as what Kuan had, until Loken dropped [Mail Girdle of the Audient Earth]. This was a great upgrade for Kuan's healy set, wahoo.

The priest who was with us left after that but the tank and mage wanted to try the timed run of Stratholme. Yes, Blizzard likes timed runs in Stratholme so much they put it on the level 80 Caverns of Time version as well as the level 60 version in EPL. I noticed Ratrider on and idle in Dalaran, so asked her if she'd heal, and she did! She said she even had the mount so that's one less person to roll.

We were tearing our way through and made it with plenty of time to spare. And there they were, [Reins of the Bronze Drake]. To our shock, not only did Ratrider pass, so did the two from Ides. Only Kuan and Viljo rolled.

Well, Viljo has a dragon already. Now Kuan does too!

some achievements

Kuanchichi got some achievements tonight.


1) Elder - yes, all the Lunar Festival Coins have been gathered, finally!

2) Better off Dred - the last coin was next to King Dred, after all, in Heroic Drak'Theron.

3) 400 Staves. Okay, Blizzard doesn't think it's an achievement, but Kuan is now maxxed out all weapons.


What he didn't get was Revered Ebon Hold, he's stuck at 11558/12000. Quest time in Icecrown I guess, and time to swap to Argent Crusade tabard.

I will edit this post later with screenshots. But for now, it's bedtime.

OK, editted.

level 58, mining 300...

Clearly, it was time for Tylara to go through the Dark Portal.



And so she did.

big fat blue Santa Claus

Kuanchichi is now revered with Sons of Hodir.

These dailies take a long time, have no variety, and pretty much preclude my doing much else in the game. Karaghiosis still thinks I am a slacker, too.

Now he's revered, Kuan has another daily to feed their king. Big fat blue HUNGRY Santa Claus.



I'm starting to feel like it's work, not a game. Two more weeks to go til Exalted, depending on what our next Halls of Lightning run brings as they gave us non-daily quests for that.

I wonder if Eeyan will be started on their grind by then.

Wyrmrest Exalted

Viljo got Wyrmrest Exalted a couple of weeks ago. I wanted to get the Reins of the Red Drake, however I didn't have enough gold to cover the 1600g it cost and still have money for repairs and such. So I waited a couple of days and a while ago bought them! I just hadn't posted pics yet because I was busy flying around on my drake!

Wrathgate

A week ago Eeyan and Telt finally finished the runups to Wrathgate. They were doing this with Evallen and so we all did the last bunch of quests together. I really like the Wrathgate setup and event(s). And while we had done them before as Kuan and Viljo, Evallen hadn't done it at all. And she'd been good, as far as I know, and not snooped online ahead of time.

So full of obscure and cryptic warnings we all headed over to Wrathgate for the battle. We told Evallen to make sure she was in fullscreen mode, and had her sound up. And then we all started the Wrathgate event...

It was, of course, awesome. Poor Saurfang, both younger and older. And poor Bolvar, though we don't actually know his fate. His body isn't there, just his shield. But it could have been burned away. Or it could have been taken by the Lich King. Who knows? I'm sure we'll find out eventually though.

And most of all poor Thrall. He has put years of work into peace between the Horde and the Alliance. And with one betrayal from Varimanthas and the Apothecaries all that was blown away. Because of course the Alliance will only see the Forsaken Apothecaries and think it's all the horde. Never mind that Varimanthas tried to kill Sylvanas, and the apothecaries did kill many Horde soldiers.

But I do think that Evallen has been playing more WoW since she experienced the Wrathgate. Which, of course, was the desired result of that story line. It's pretty impressive how leading up to it you have no idea just how awesome it will be. The first time you see it you're expecting a quest to go kill a bunch of abominations or maybe some conversation to read. Not an epic battle that ends with the Red Dragonflight using cleansing fire (that blooms into yellow and orange flowers) on everything that was there.