Three down two to go!

Slowly getting closer to Crusader title. Fighting on the Elekks ... argh! Next up the dwarves, then the gnomes.

Alterac Valley

Alterac Valley battleground (AV BG) is a love or hate bg. Personally I love it and have been in so many with different alts/servers, I lost track a long time ago. Right now its regained popularity as its a great way to grind xp if your sick of kill 10 more whatever quests in Outlands or Northrend.

In fact, Sassi did her last three/four levels to 80 in battlegrounds, mostly AV. (An AV weekend was sweet with the extra honor!) Nice to pick up a few achievements (Loyal Defender - 50 kills in your base) on the way too!

The DK's have been stagnating in the mid 60's (Death Knight), but with the xp in bgs I'm slowly leveling them. Honestly I haven't any interest in most of the Outlands quests so until they're Northrend ready its AV time! Also there are no real plans for either as far as endgame raiding, daily grinding, achievements chasing, etc., goes either. They're both just for fun (horde 63 and alliance 65).

Since AV gives the best xp at this level, that's what they're doing! It doesn't hurt that I enjoy AV, and still queue both the hunter and shadow priest. I mean, where else can 40 people queue up and overcoming all the diverse opinions and personalities, the afkers, the 'all Offense' or 'all Defense' proponents, or the people that just scream in chat that we're all losers even before we leave the cave?

When it comes together its great, when its a fail... its a horrid fail!

This is what I love to see -

This is one of the 'shouldn't have happened BGs. The alliance was ahead by 150+ points but the 'all in for Drek' crowd won the day (who needs defense=/fail). So the contiued run in/out dying/rezzing and the Horde beat us by 5 points!!! The Horde so deserved that win! 5-0 I'd say unbelievable but I've been on the winning side at 4-0 so I know it can happen.

This screenie is from a week ago, when I was on Sassi. Defending the base I was wondering what was firing on me - when I looked up and saw this gryphon! Apparently some industrious alliance in the AV had summoned him - his attacks are pretty hard hitting for the non-bubble wearing crowd. I hadn't seen this before so found it interesting!



Makes me wish for the days of vanilla wow with the epic 3 hour to 3 day battles that actually requirred strategy and teamwork. The zergfest that it is now is what so many of us know and are comfortable with now, unfortunately.

What I've been experiencing alot of lately

My DSL line has apparently become a tasty treat for squirrels, or so I'm told by the AT&T line repairman.

The big BUT, I don't always lose my signal doing other things, so I'm suspecting we need to re-evaluate the Add-ons and see if we maybe have a contributor to the problem there too.

It's very frustrating needless to say!

Hillsbrad Tourism

Biya (Horde DK) is leveling her herbalism to supply her scribing needs. She hasn't started making $$ like Greaf (Alliance DK), so she's been out working away on herbing. Her choices were Hillsbrad, STV or Wetlands. Hmm two gangtastic places or a predominately Alliance area (Wetlands is the fastest imho). **Added note if you aren't using Gatherer or some sort of marking add on you should!

Oh what the heck Hillsbrad - fond memories getting attacked by a guy hiding in the bushes dressed like a pirate when I was a wet behind the ears noob and at least you can see the 'red' guys most of the time!

Hillsbrad is the first place most people experience world pvp and ganking on PvP servers with the never-ending back and forth fight between Southshore and Tarren Mills. Having done my share of wiping the towns, being killed at all levels and in different parts of this zone (both sides) - it is definitely not for the faint of heart! Hmm maybe all the trees in STV would have been a better hiding spot. Like a glowing footed horse that screams every time you mount can be hidden!

Anyway, Biya, being a DK and not having leveled there is herbing, and doing her explorer achievement. While she's been making her tour she visited a couple of places that are a bit interesting -

The big pink hole that use to be Dalaran - I wish I could have seen that take off. All my Horde characters when in the vicinity of the former Dalaran location must make a few grind loops trying to get the black kitty as I'm way to cheap to pay hundreds of gold for it!

The normal places are visited (Sassi is actually finishing missed quests from this area for Exalted status with Under City and the Loremaster title so more screenies to come!)

One of the places that was finally visited, the mysterious island off the coast - Purgation Isle A 'must visit' for the Hillsbad exploration.
Seemingly innocent its full of spectral elite mobs, and once you're on it it becomes gloomy, depressing colored.
This is what is up top - nothing. More elite mobs, but no secret 'ah ha!' I found it anything. So why is it there? Why level 60 elites in a 20-30 zone?

Next stop to pay respects to Mr. Stark.

Had to run by and see George Candarte - UC leatherworking supplies guy tucked back in the hills near the wall and Kris Legace - freewheeling tradeswoman on the backside of Durnhold.

Hillsbrad is a fun area to level with interesting questing. A great place for mining, herbing and skinners (the yeti cave skin and coin ftw!). Its full of lore and for more awesome times - post level 68ish - the Caverns of Time - seeing all the movers and shakers back before they were important NPC's in the game. Love it!

Raene's Cleansing or I'm a Furbolg

Raene's Cleansing is a long quest line, with an interesting reward... if you don't complete it! At about Step 7, you will have completed a 'rod of transformation' which will turn you into a furbolg. It isn't a difficult quest - just lots of running about

You can continue to about Step 10 (for the xp), but past that you will lose the rod. Otherwise you can keep it and become one of these -

All my Alliance characters are going to get this before the Cataclysm and Ashenvale is Hordi-fied!

The 'lock is leveling

I'm still toying with which of the Alliance gang to work on to max level, but had decided to move Frothe out of the semi-twink state she's been in. The 10-19's were fun, but with the xp in BGs, the need to twink or not is gone for me.

So, she dinged 20 and has her new mount - 'locks are so cool - who needs a saddle or bridle for a fire-filled demonic horse!
And new demonic fiendy - Domanda - the succubus the boys love to have out!
New spells, questing and of course more PvP time - if you like PvP, playing a gnome is a must as they're PvP magnets! Frothe originally was created to annoy my 'gnome-hating-red-is-dead' PvP oriented daughter! Just playing Alliance makes her grind her teeth - a gnome is pure torture!

Otherwise, Frothe will likely do a bit of leveling in BG's as well as instance runs for gear. There are certain quest lines/areas, I enjoy so I won't miss those.

Acheivement-wise, I doubt I'll go full out like I've been doing with Sithi - too much time to get them all! But, I am debating changing her professions, as she has been herbalism/engineering for the benefits at 19. I'm thinking she'll drop herbalism in favor of tailoring. I have enough others that do gathering professions and tailoring may be beneficial for her.

Frothe is coming up on her 2 year birthday during Brewfest, being the second character I created when I first started on WoW, she's one of the two that have the Wolpertinger (didn't play during Brewfest last year - deep in Warhammer lust!), so she'll have to do something special at the end of the month!