So, Cataclysm is now "live" near a month and everyone's had some time to explore all the "new" things.
Plenty of new things to be annoyed at, plenty of bugs discovered and see them "not" getting fixed.
And then there's Archaeology. A whole new kind of boredom in itself.
Also, Wowwiki is DEAD. Don't use it anymore. More on that later.
So, let's do some ranting.
Archaeology
If you're a fresh level 80 and want to try a new way of leveling then I'd encourage you to pick up Archaeology. It's the new secondary profession that every character on the server will get access to. Funny enough you get a LOT of XP from it, and within no time at all you'll find you've gained your very first level without even touching a single mob or quest.
Personally I went from 82 to 85 using it, and found I could've easily started earlier.
Now, a few tips if you want to get the most out of this.
* First of all, buy the fasted riding skill that you can. Seriously you will need it.
* Be a mage, or find a guild you can join that is at least level 8 so you have the -15 minutes of cooldown on your hearthstone.
* Pick up engineering, and/or any other form of travel toys like the Dalaran teleport ring, the argent crusade tabard, the black temple necklace and the BRD mole machine. It all adds up, trust me.
With that sorted, you'll want to just fly around and "do" the skill with as little flight time as possible all the way up to 100 skill points. Until you get there "do not" complete any projects. Once you've reached 100 skill points, put in whatever scrolls and tablets you've got and blow away to 120 or whatever. Stick to a single continent - Kalimdor for horde, or Eastern kingdoms if you're alliance. Make "sure" you check the town board and get the new portals unlocked so you'll have easier travel access. Especially for Kalimdor this is a blessing.
Once you reach 300 skill you're able to go to outland.
Don't bother, unless you're also after some of the achievements. Yes it's boring and you're looking for a new place to fly around in but just bear with it for now. At 375 skill you could go to outland. Again don't bother. At 425 things get interesting, now you'll have access to "potentially" getting some of the worthwhile rares and Tol'vir artifacts. There's only a 13% chance or so for a new dig site to spawn. At a great annoyance you'll mostly be completing common artifacts for them though, so you'll be spending a long time cursing them for not spawning more, and cursing the Night elves for having so damn many dig sites.
At any rate, use whatever boosts you got, you'll be Illustrious Grand Master in no time. Though it won't seem that way. And yes it's a dreadfully boring and frustrating skill to raise.
Player versus P...ractically nobody?
Once you've reached level 85 you'll have access to Tol Barad. A new PvP zone in the same theme as Wintergrasp. One faction controls the island and some extra daily quests, the other does not. And this gets fought over every two or so hours.
Most of the time this meant horde was defending and in control of the daily quests and raid instance with a single boss, and laughing at the alliance for failing to attack. That is, until blizzard in it's infinite (retarded) wisdom decided to give 1800 honor points to the "attacking side" if they won.
Now, the defending side simply does nothing at all. Barely 10 people sign up if that at all, and the attacking side gets a free 1800 honor. That is, if you even get onto the island because half the bloody server is signing up for that 1800 honor, and the "battle" as it was before is now non existent. It's simply turned into a tag 'n turn pve content of which the only purpose now seems to be free honor.
Way to go blizzard. Another successful "fix" that screwed over anyone trying to have some fun at PvP.
Wowwiki is DEAD
Indeed, it's dead. Don't bother going there anymore you won't find anything but advertisements, spam, goldsellers and the shell of a poorly updated site.
However, WowPedia is now in place as it's successor. Looks familiar you say? Well, there's a perfectly logical explanation for that.
In short, Wikia - the host, and now owner of wowwiki felt the site needed more advertisements to get a better revenue for the site. The site's admins and general userbase disagreed, then wikia claimed the site for itself and put up the advertisements anyway. The contributors and most of the staff of the original wowwiki moved to create a new site WowPedia, where all new updates etc are now being done.
In short, WowWiki is dead. You can stop using it now.
Squirrels!
Yet more squirrels and other critters to /love. You'll need to be level 85 to be able to complete this one.
Sorted by zone:
* Alpine Chipmunk: Mount Hyjal
* Grotto Vole: Mount Hyjal
* Rock Viper: Mount Hyjal & Silithus
* Rockchewer Whelk: Shimmering Expanse in Vash'ir
* Sea Cucumber: Vash'ir
* Highlands Turkey: Twilight Highlands
* Yellow-Bellied Marmot: Twilight Highlands
* Rattlesnake: Twilight Highlands
* Oasis Moth: Uldum & Lost City of Tol'vir
* Mac Frog: Uldum - In ramkahen as you teleport in.
* Baradin Fox Kit: Tol Barad - contested island
* Sassy Cat: Tol Barad - Rustberg village
* Wharf Rat: Tol Barad - Rustberg village
Some critters also exist in other places, but these are the easiest to get.
Friday, December 31, 2010
Happy christmas and a merry new year
So, Cataclysm is now "live" near a month and everyone's had some time to explore all the "new" things.
Plenty of new things to be annoyed at, plenty of bugs discovered and see them "not" getting fixed.
And then there's Archaeology. A whole new kind of boredom in itself.
Also, Wowwiki is DEAD. Don't use it anymore. More on that later.
So, let's do some ranting.
Archaeology
If you're a fresh level 80 and want to try a new way of leveling then I'd encourage you to pick up Archaeology. It's the new secondary profession that every character on the server will get access to. Funny enough you get a LOT of XP from it, and within no time at all you'll find you've gained your very first level without even touching a single mob or quest.
Personally I went from 82 to 85 using it, and found I could've easily started earlier.
Now, a few tips if you want to get the most out of this.
* First of all, buy the fasted riding skill that you can. Seriously you will need it.
* Be a mage, or find a guild you can join that is at least level 8 so you have the -15 minutes of cooldown on your hearthstone.
* Pick up engineering, and/or any other form of travel toys like the Dalaran teleport ring, the argent crusade tabard, the black temple necklace and the BRD mole machine. It all adds up, trust me.
With that sorted, you'll want to just fly around and "do" the skill with as little flight time as possible all the way up to 100 skill points. Until you get there "do not" complete any projects. Once you've reached 100 skill points, put in whatever scrolls and tablets you've got and blow away to 120 or whatever. Stick to a single continent - Kalimdor for horde, or Eastern kingdoms if you're alliance. Make "sure" you check the town board and get the new portals unlocked so you'll have easier travel access. Especially for Kalimdor this is a blessing.
Once you reach 300 skill you're able to go to outland.
Don't bother, unless you're also after some of the achievements. Yes it's boring and you're looking for a new place to fly around in but just bear with it for now. At 375 skill you could go to outland. Again don't bother. At 425 things get interesting, now you'll have access to "potentially" getting some of the worthwhile rares and Tol'vir artifacts. There's only a 13% chance or so for a new dig site to spawn. At a great annoyance you'll mostly be completing common artifacts for them though, so you'll be spending a long time cursing them for not spawning more, and cursing the Night elves for having so damn many dig sites.
At any rate, use whatever boosts you got, you'll be Illustrious Grand Master in no time. Though it won't seem that way. And yes it's a dreadfully boring and frustrating skill to raise.
Player versus P...ractically nobody?
Once you've reached level 85 you'll have access to Tol Barad. A new PvP zone in the same theme as Wintergrasp. One faction controls the island and some extra daily quests, the other does not. And this gets fought over every two or so hours.
Most of the time this meant horde was defending and in control of the daily quests and raid instance with a single boss, and laughing at the alliance for failing to attack. That is, until blizzard in it's infinite (retarded) wisdom decided to give 1800 honor points to the "attacking side" if they won.
Now, the defending side simply does nothing at all. Barely 10 people sign up if that at all, and the attacking side gets a free 1800 honor. That is, if you even get onto the island because half the bloody server is signing up for that 1800 honor, and the "battle" as it was before is now non existent. It's simply turned into a tag 'n turn pve content of which the only purpose now seems to be free honor.
Way to go blizzard. Another successful "fix" that screwed over anyone trying to have some fun at PvP.
Wowwiki is DEAD
Indeed, it's dead. Don't bother going there anymore you won't find anything but advertisements, spam, goldsellers and the shell of a poorly updated site.
However, WowPedia is now in place as it's successor. Looks familiar you say? Well, there's a perfectly logical explanation for that.
In short, Wikia - the host, and now owner of wowwiki felt the site needed more advertisements to get a better revenue for the site. The site's admins and general userbase disagreed, then wikia claimed the site for itself and put up the advertisements anyway. The contributors and most of the staff of the original wowwiki moved to create a new site WowPedia, where all new updates etc are now being done.
In short, WowWiki is dead. You can stop using it now.
Squirrels!
Yet more squirrels and other critters to /love. You'll need to be level 85 to be able to complete this one.
Sorted by zone:
* Alpine Chipmunk: Mount Hyjal
* Grotto Vole: Mount Hyjal
* Rock Viper: Mount Hyjal & Silithus
* Rockchewer Whelk: Shimmering Expanse in Vash'ir
* Sea Cucumber: Vash'ir
* Highlands Turkey: Twilight Highlands
* Yellow-Bellied Marmot: Twilight Highlands
* Rattlesnake: Twilight Highlands
* Oasis Moth: Uldum & Lost City of Tol'vir
* Mac Frog: Uldum - In ramkahen as you teleport in.
* Baradin Fox Kit: Tol Barad - contested island
* Sassy Cat: Tol Barad - Rustberg village
* Wharf Rat: Tol Barad - Rustberg village
Some critters also exist in other places, but these are the easiest to get.
Saturday, December 04, 2010
A hundred Glyphs and more
So, what should you expect to find in WoW if you've been out of the game for three months or more? Well, you probably have 7 days of free playtime waiting for you. (I did) So, I decided to use those and get ready in the next few days before Cataclysm officially starts and the race for the first level 85 begins again.
Not that I'll bother going that fast, but hey, it's always fun to see a bunch of tools slave themselves half to death on trying to be first. Some will actually succeed too.
Ah yes, Cataclysm. A time of great changes, some good, some bad.
The first thing you'll notice upon "trying" to log in, is a series of patches.
~5 GB, another ~1.5GB, and one or two ~200MB. When you do finally get that done you'll encounter the new login screen. Deathwing himself.
Don't worry though, you'll encounter him again soon enough... (Que ominous music here)
Upon logging on, you'll notice the higher quality character selection screen as well as new backgrounds for some races. Quit messing around and get in there.
Dalaran, which is where most people will have left their characters.
Find the flight trainer and learn 310% flying skill if you didn't get it for free. Then visit your class trainer and learn the new skills. Most important of all will be "Mastery".
Talents
You'll also notice all your talents were reset. (Press "N") Heck, the game will probably have told you so upon logging on, but depending on your addons you might have a hard time seeing that message in between all the LUA errors. (Mapster and Routes were causing a lot here, about 20 per second)
WoW works surprisingly well without addons nowadays, though bartender, fubar, shadowed_UF and Prat are still addons I'd not really be able to do without anymore. Luckily those seem to work fairly well after a quick update.
Anyway, the new talent interface is awesome!
No more cursing and respeccing due to a mis-click.
The short trees are kind of sucky though... But I guess they had their reasons.
Glyphs
Next to the talents tab, you'll find what's left of your Glyphs.
And, you'll also notice you now have nine slots instead of the previous six. All neatly divided into groups of three: Minor, Major, Primal Glyphs. There's also a scrolling list on the right showing you what glyphs you have learned and have not yet learned.
So... That's where I'm at right now.
8x lvl 80 chars, all needing a few dozen glyphs to fill that nice and useful list.
Need herbs, inks, etc.
Then, I find out there are NEW glyphs that my mage hadn't learned yet. (even though he was all done a few months ago) So he has to start doing research again and read some books as well.
The Rest
Then, well, aside almost every city being changed. The landscape wildly different in areas, as well as completely new areas, more auction houses, and every single quest being reactivated. There's plenty to do for now.
Just, be careful of Deathwing.
He IS out there.
And he WILL get you.