After traipsing through most of Zangarmarsh, the shroomy, spore-filled, dew laden swamp (like Seattle, only with larger insects), my journeys through Outlands continued.  Accompanied by my trusty dreadsteed and my loyal felguard (Mister Happy), we at last came to Terrokar Forest and the fabled, self titled, city of lights, Shattrath City.  As one narrator put it, in one of the many videos made of WoW, "Thats the place to be, yo!, it has it all, tons of people, portals, gryphons, buttloads of quests and rewards, its like totally the new Ironforge!" (Note: Shattrath is NOT the new Ironforge).

 

Upon reaching the inner sanctum of the city, youre greeted and taken on a tour of the city in a short quest called "City of Lights" (and you guys thought I was being original when I named the post =P).  On this tour we were introduced to the lower city, featuring questionable herb gardens, shifty merchants, and draenei bondage clubs (I would have included pics, but they might disturb some of our younger readers).

 

But toking on illegal felweed and draenei bondage aside, thats not what makes this place run (though it cant hurt tourism).  No, probably the most interesting feature is that you now get to choose between one of two factions and get faction specific quests, rewards and iced mocha lattes.  I havent had to make a decision this big since looking in my roomate's medicine cabinet (seriously, its like Moe's Tavern in there).

 

But what if you decide on Aldor and all your friends are suddenly best friends with the Scryers?  Does this make you a social outcast?  Almost certainly, it does, and you'll simply have to find new friends....Aldor friends.  This social experiment in terror may have dire consequences indeed, as we questioned a few brave individuals who preferred to not have their character names mentioned.  We asked simple questions, like, "What if you chose Scryers but say...your parents, who also played World of Warcraft, chose the Aldor faction?  Would this cause a unrepairable rift in the family?"  They of course, said it probably wouldnt, but I'm far more pessimistic, choosing instead to believe that these family gaps do exist, and are growing by the minute.

 

Before I picked a faction, I wanted to know a little more about these two factions, so I did what any other like-minded person with too much time on their hands would do, I took a nice long nap.  

 

..... (6 hours later) .....

 

What you're still here??  Oh right, anyway, I went to the most reliable source of info nowadays, the internet, where a list of rewards comparing both factions appeared on screen (in nice colors too!).  As a warlock, I wanted caster stuff, of course, but after looking down the lists of available rewards, I'm still undecided.

As I continue my travels in Outlands, I'll bring them to all of you lovely readers out there (all 3 of you).

 

Oh as a last little side note, since when you first enter Shattrath, the music is the standard WoW fare, you can try jazzing it up by throwing on U2's, "City of Blinding Lights" (thats right, its not just for Paris anymore =P). 

 

  

 

With WoW down for its weekly maintenance, I took a small peek at the open beta for the MMORPG, Lord of the Rings Online: Shadows of Angmar.

The races are human (male/female), hobbit (male/female), dwarf (male), and elf (male/female).

The classes are Burglar (debuffer), Champion (AoE, DOT'er), Captain, Guardian (tank), Lore-master (pets, spell dmg), Minstrel (healer), and Hunter (nuker).  The core classes seem the usual fare, for the most part, (i.e. the burglar sounds like the enchanter from Everquest for PS2, and the Champion sounds like a WoW Warlock without pets).

Sooo I tried out an elf lore-master, and proceeded through the tutorial level, making comparisons to WoW as I went, of course.

The first thing you'll notice is that melee combat is significantly slower than WoW, or at least I think it is.  The intro lvl is pretty painless, and one I remembered that I was a spellcaster, I was taking down stuff pretty easily, though not as fast as I'd like (though I admit, I am only lvl 1).

At the end of the tutorial a huge troll breaks through the gates and a pretty young looking Elrond appears and takes him down. (Bummer, I wanted to kill it, or at least be whacked by it.  Damn you , Elrond!)

From there, the game whisks you to some nearby ruins for a quest, but you dont have to stay there, if you follow the path, you'll quickly come across snow covered plains and a small camp , with quest givers and trainers, and the usual assortment of weaponsmiths, grocers, etc.

I think I'm going to try another class, maybe I can find one that can take stuff down a bit faster.  I dont really want to do hunter, even though it says nuker, I have a strong disdain for the class from WoW.  Silly me, I suppose.  Will definitely keep you guys updated on my progress though !

well I did it! I stayed awake for the whole Gamespot Paper Mario 4 hour marathon!

 

It really did look really nifty, not unlike the previous paper mario installments, with the new flipping into 3d twist. Sadly it only makes me want to play a wii more than i already do. Though with none of my charries at or near 70 in Burning Crusade yet, I fear I wouldnt have time at the moment. The pixelated look perfectly captures the paper-esque feel of the graphics though, and seeing bridges and stairways "drawn in" as you advance is a treat. One of the best effects is when you hit a star and grow to huge, epic size proportions and stomp and smash everything in sight, in New Super Mario Bros **** Very chic! Once I get a wii, I'll definitely have to give this one a run through!

 

Wow!  I just figured out I could read comments about various blog ramblings that Ive stuck up here ( blonde moment?) Yes most of the character ramblings are about wow, which is pretty much the only game I play nowadays, (besides periodic, brief forays into animal crossing ds).  My lack of consoles at the moment helps my wow time, though I do hope to get a few consoles in the future, most notably a ps2 (another one) a 360 and a wii.  I'm quite picky about games looking their best, so I wont be getting any consoles until I can acquire a nice hdtv to hook them up too. 

 

Ive added new pics to the profile, hoping to brighten it up a lil bit.  I guess the next step is to make a blog header kinda thing.  I dunno how well it will turn out but hopefully better than the too small profile banner. 

 

Its finally happened.  Ive gotten a good start in outlands recently with my 60 lock.  I dont care for the decor, but the quests arent any harder than previous quests, and after a good run of them around honor hold, Ive found myself at the draenei temple in the northwestern part of the Hellfire Penninsula.  The sad part?  Just about every quest reward or green drop has replaced one of my pretty epics!  sooo depressing.... my lock now looks like a freaky, no pants wearing, thigh high booted oddity, I mean, honestly, who looks like that in real life?   (besides me).  I may have to take up tailoring again, as I currently am 300/300 engineering/enchanting, after seeing some of those nifty netherweave robes and the stamina mods on those things.  More outlands goodness to come soon, I'm sure.

 

well I made a goofy looking (but wretchedly adorable) gnome mage, recently, but the charrie isnt turning me on, as I'd hoped she would, so I probably wont keep her.  I'm quite tempted to start a druid and see where/if I can get anything going with that.  My blood elf is still 55 and will probably stay that way for awhile, as I need a break from her and hunters in general.  Sadly, there used to be a time when I knew all of winterspring like the back of my hand, and playing there recently at 55, I couldnt even find the damn yeti cave!  I must be losing my touch. 

 

Hello True Believers!

 

Welcome to the bi monthly, general rambling I do from time to time. (or bi mon gen ram for acronym lovers).

 

Where have I been?

 

To put it simply, playing world of warcraft.

 

Well after all this time, I must be 70 and full of epics and uber right??

 

well....its kinda a long story...

 

I like low pop servers, soooo after ditching my previous servers that my 60s are on (for various reasons, people I dont like, etc)

 

I found a new server that opened soon after BC was released. Now I'm not gonna use any names (Shandris), but the guys on there are pretty nice overall, so I stayed.

 

My first charrie on there was an elf hunter , who got to the magical lvl of 41, and I picked hunter cause well, I mainly played caster types so I figured hunter would be a nice change, right??

 

Wrong!!!!

 

umm if you havent played a hunter, well...there are a few pros and cons that Im gonna list (in a nice, minty fresh format!)

 

-Pros-

 

1. Easily kills just about any solo mob in the game. (This is sooo true, cause I was burning through STV quests like acid through flesh), got the quest to kill Baggy (Bag'thera), a lvl something or other elite panther, found em, immolation trap, rapid fire, *psshoom! psshoom! (various low budget sound effects)* , and the thing went down, didnt even work up a sweat! (okay, first time, he killed me, but only cause a couple of his "friends" showed up, stupid panther, had to call his kitty crew to beat me). Then I had to kill Tethis, lvl 43 ? raptor (by the way if youre into taming raptors, he looks nifty), and I trapped again, sent my pet to eat him and kept shooting til he was roadkill. Then I had to kill King B, lvl 42? white tiger, with adds, well no prob for an uber hunter like myself, set immolation trap, sent the pet in, and zzzzap! he went down, his friends went down....yep yep...no problem.

 

Thats like the only pro for hunters, really. Now the cons.

 

-Cons-

 

1. Theres like a million of em running around. (I dont care which server you play on, youll prolly see more hunters than anyone else. Why? Cause lots of people think its the perfect class, its like playing the game on easy mode. You know those games where theres a difficulty selection menu at the start screen? there should be one for wow, and it should go something like,

Easy - Hunter

Medium - Mage

Hard - Priest

Extreme - Druid

 

or something, warlock should probably be on easy or medium somewhere, theyre like the hunters of the caster world, but much cooler and way more variety than a hunter. Now if you've read this far, and think I hate hunters, I dont. (omg I so hate hunters!) , nooo they have their uses, (I guess, somewhere).

 

2. Just about any class can be a hunter, so you have dwarf hunters, blood elf hunters, elf, draenei, human hunters running around ...(scratch human), but I digress..

 

umm back to my long winded story, anyway I quickly grew bored of the elf hunter. sooooo I made a draenei priest, and got her to 47. I soon realized that while I love caster classes, with a 60 priest on rexxar, lvling priest again seemed sooo repetitive. And since I dont like melee classes, I was in a pickle (dill pickle, that is)

 

What to do?? Switch to horde!

 

Soooo I made a hot blood elf (no really, shes tall and blonde, looks like a cheerleader from silvermoon university). Now I made a hunter, and I'll explain why, simply because I wanna see outlands, before my unplanned, unwanted, children do.

 

Sooo my cheerleader is now at the wonderful lvl 55, and I'm in another pickle (Del Monte!), which is, ....I met this nice dude on Shandris while I was messin round on the alliance side, nice conversationalist, (usually), and he has his lvl 61 pallie waiting for me to transfer one of my 60s over when they open the server on april 1st. But I dont know if i really wanna transfer (he wants to explore outlands together). I'm not a big fan of my 60s, havent played em in years and I screwed a couple of em up by grinding to 60 so their rep is horrible ...(I know I can go back and grind rep easy, but thats a snoozefest).

sooo....ill keep you guys posted on what happens...

 

In other news Ive been reading game reviews and for the first time since its launch I kinda wanna get a 360. Not that Ill have time to play for awhile, as MMO's like WoW eat up time. I was reading the UEFA review they just posted for the 360 and got to the part about golden tickets, and so I stopped reading, instead preferring to imagine that Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory is somewhere in the game.

 

Mmmm chocolate....

While my cable was out this week, I did get to finally install and try a few of the new additions in the Oblivion expansion pack, Knights of the Nine.  Some of the nifty new features include:

Frostcrag Spire:  a nifty new tower home for your brooding mage character, complete with alchemy enhancing lab, herb garden, and cavernous open spaces.  Theres also a spellmaker and enchanter, which are pretty much the same as the ones in the archmage's quarters, which you're probably familiar with if you are a mage.  Probably the neatest additions to the tower are mages guild portals to most of the cities, and a nifty little altar that , for a small fee of regeants, will create a storm, fire or frost atronach familiar that will follow you around, fight for you and cook and clean.  Nice!

Deepscorn Hollow:  The 2nd new home for your charrie, with a dark brotherhood-esque theme.  The hollow is underwater and in a deceptively large cavern, and once you upgrade it fully, it has a lovely dining area, coffin for sleeping, and a wicked looking shrine to the night mother, Sithis.  Very Atmospheric.

Quests include small chains, like restoring the Orrery in the Arcane University and a nifty underground pirate ship, guarded by the souls of the now extinct pirates.  Once theyre cleared out, the ship and its underground dock becomes your new home, where you can hire less than honorable merchants, trainers for the more subtle skills (sneak, security, etc), and take on a pirate crew, who you can send out to plunder once a week and theyll bring back your share of the loot!  If you've ever wanted your own pirate army to plunder for you, this is the way to go, short of buying your own yacht, painting it black and taking it out to international waters, anyway.

The expansion really gets going with the main quest though, apparently an evil demon/wizard/really bad thing is back and you are the hero of legend (that happens a lot), who must restore the order of the Knights of the Nine, quest for the Relics of the Crusader, and stop him.  Its a pretty nifty chain for an expansion and lots of fun.

Theres also a quest to find the razor of the now infamous daedra lord Mehrunes Dagon, which isnt a bad way to spend your time either, especially while youre waiting for your pirates to bring back your bounty. 

For anyone who loves Oblivion, this expansion should be a no brainer.  Highly recommended!

I'm still here.

My alliance exploits on Shandris havent been going well...actually theyve been going so not well that I'm thinking of creating a horde charrie on a friends server and possibly documenting the journey on here, not quite sure anyone would read it, but it might be fun to do.