1.) People (especially healers/tanks) who queue for something just long enough to a.) ding or b.) get one more badge, and then drop group, are not earning any Pike Respect Points
2.) Nor are people who go “Pack plz Pack plz Pack plz Pack plz” when I need to Viper. EVERYONE OVERGEARS HALLS OF REFLECTION NOW, YOU WILL SURVIVE WITHOUT ASPECT OF THE PACK, PLEASE RELAX.
3.) HOLY HONOR, BATMAN WINTERGRASP
4.) Feral druid PvP taught me how to mouse-turn. It only took, what, three years to beat the keyboard turning out of me?
5.) Nothing against Sparkle Ponies or those who have them, honestly, but every time I see one I remember that I’m broke IRL. >_<
6.) Since when were moonkins tearing up Recount? What sort of madhouse world have I returned to? ( <3 )
7.) Attumen still hates me
8.) I miss the Mechanar
9.) Warlock-kiting the slimes in Maraudon is surprisingly fun
10.) ...melee is surprisingly fun, also. Especially when you are a goggles-wearing bear! >:3
P.S. I’ve thought about it, and I’m back, suckas. Can’t guarantee I’ll be writing about hunter stuff. Oh well. I miss the community <3
** Low level LFG! The LFG at 80, right now, is not on particularly good standing with me. Dungeons I’ve done a million times before and groups that are like RUSH RUSH RUSH RUSH ZOMG ZOMG RUSH RUSH LET’S ALL MAKE FUN OF THE HEALER AND DPS IF THEY FELL A BIT BEHIND THE TANK ON ONE PULL. Heaven forbid you’re new or an alt and still have a couple blues and people inspect you. I mean sometimes you luck out and get a good group, but meh. Needless to say none of my 80s will be getting “the Patient” anytime soon.
Low level dungeons, though, are awesome. Sure, half the time the groups have no idea what they’re doing and there’s no tank or healer, but frankly I’d take that over “AMG RUSH RUSH GEAR SCORE OVER NINE THOUSAAAAAAND” any day. Maybe that’s just me, though. Gimme my Deadmines and Shadowfang Keep and Wailing Caverns, please. …okay, maybe not Wailing Caverns.
** My warlock. So did this class suddenly decide to get awesome and fun when I wasn’t looking? I tried about three thousand times to make warlocks and suddenly it clicked, I guess. I just DoT things up, watch my screen fill up with numbers, and cackle when I Life Tap + Drain Life.
I'm in ur dungeon, toppin' ur recount
** Enchanters in groups. I get all excited when the little “Disenchant” button pops up. Even better, my ‘lock is an enchanter, so everybody gets all excited about her being in their group.
** Tower Defense games. This has nothing to do with WoW, but it does have something to do with “Things I Like Right Now”, which is the title of the post. So, nyar!
I have loved Tower Defense games since Starcraft’s battle.net back in 1999/2000 when you could find delightful gems like “Tower Matrix D” inbetween all the “$$$$$FASTEST MAP EVER$$$$$” games. Since then I’ve played dozens of Tower Defense games and I <3 them all. Desktop Tower Defense is my longstanding favorite, but recently I discovered that Neopets has one called Biscuit Brigade and I immediately had to throw everything aside and master it.
Yup.
** Bang Shishigami + Falcon Punch:
** Walking aimlessly around my apartment while wearing a trenchcoat, fedora, and pocketwatch, and pretending I’m cool because of it
** Iron Man
** Did I mention my warlock? Yeah. I like my warlock.
I’ve been thinking lately about moments in World of Warcraft that made me go all Keanu Reeves and say “…whoa”. There have been a lot of these moments. I decided to list them. When the list was threatening to become even longer than my blogroll, I had to make a rule that said “No boss kill/PvP/etc. moments”.
So without further ado…
Pike’s Five Most Epic WoW Moments (That Do Not Involve Boss Fights):
5. Like a Virgin… In Darnassus For the Very First Time
I know I’ve written about this before. I was level six on my very first character ever (who you may now know as “Tawyn”), in my very first MMORPG ever, and as far as I was concerned, my world was Teldrassil. This mysterious land of flowers and purple trees and boars and scary spider caves. And bunny critters that I kept accidentally shooting.
And then, somehow, I wandered into Darnassus, and I was floored. It felt like one of the biggest things I’d ever seen in a video game. The music helped to establish this impression. And suddenly there was a thing called “Trade Chat” which was filled with impossible-to-understand jargon like “WTS” and “LFG” and “DPS” and “My mats, your nether”. (haha, wow, who else remembers that one?)
This made a big impression on Wee Baby Pike, and to this day I am rather fond of Darnassus and I go there sometimes just to chill.
(…is that a summoning stone in the middle of Darnassus? WTB explanation.)
4. Blackrock Mountain: Wish I Knew How to Quit You
Blackrock Mountain, as a whole, is just the greatest thing ever. I mean… it’s a friggin’ volcano. With lava and giant crazy statues and stuff. I remember the first time I saw the Molten Core instance portal. It was one of those things where you just looked at it and you knew it was epic.
…Google Images is failing me here, but trust me, it was epic. Epic and huge. And you had to go through the longest (and one of the most awesomest) instances ever, BRD, to even get there and get “attuned”.
Also it just looks awesome from far away when you’re in Searing Gorge or Burning Steppes. So yeah.
3. Sparking Imaginations Since… Wait, it’s Frogger but with bombs?
When I went to fight Mimiron for the very first time I wasn’t expecting what I saw. I really wasn’t expecting it. So can you blame my jaw hitting the floor when an air-trolley-thing whisked me away to this?
Honestly I wish the picture did it justice. It really doesn’t. The place is huge. Huge and breathtaking and there are Frogger bombs at the bottom and a freaking Tesla coil in the center.
Okay, so, Tesla coils? Guys. Two reasons why Tesla coils are awesome.
Secondly, there are three historical sciencey guys that I have a major crush on.* Those three guys are: Issac Newton, Charles Babbage, and Nikola freakin’ Tesla.
Therefore, anything involving a Tesla coil and/or PewPew Lasers is instant win.
Also, air-trolley ride? A+++++ would ride again.
2. Wrathgate: Bolvar is Not a Crook (But Arthas Is)
Obviously this one was going to be in here. I love Dragonblight. And I love this questline. And seriously… the chills down my back still happen:
Oh Bolvar. Come back to Stormwind and ditch the Wrynn guy. He doesn’t love you like I do!
1. The Dark Portal: Because The Outlands Is Not a Lie
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: I’m not a big Hellfire Peninsula fan. I dunno, I know there’s some great quests and stuff there, but… but… ZANGARMARSH IS RIGHT THERE AND IT HAS GIANT MUSHROOMS. AND UNDERBOG.
However.
There is one thing in Hellfire Peninsula that kicks the pants off of pretty much anything else in this game.
And it’s not the Fel Reaver (anymore) and it’s not aggro’ing that one boss over and over and making him yell stuff.
…no, I want you to think back and remember when you first went through the Dark Portal. There, in front of you, was this war going on in front of your face and this giant level ?? demon thing who is waving his arms around and looking ready to turn you into his bedtime snack.
Every time… EVERY TIME I do it, it is just as epic.
Kudos, Blizz.
So, there ya have it.
I realize that I left out a lot of super epic stuff (for example, zombie invasion world event), but I was sort of trying to keep it down to… individual moments as best as I could, and the zombie invasion was more like an extended amount of awesome.
But what are some of your guys’ favorite epic moments?
—
* Don’t get me started on historical author/writery guys.
Happy Thanksgiving to those of you that are celebrating it today (such as yours truly!) In honor of the day, I present to you a short list of things in WoW that I am grateful for:
30 minute hearthstone. Yeah, yeah, we can all get together and talk about how “back in the day we had an hour long hearthstone and mounts at 40 and we had to walk through the Wetlands at level 6 to get to Stormwind from Darnassus”, but really, would YOU go back to having an hour long hearthstone? I didn’t think so ;D
The 30-39 and 40-49 battleground brackets. Post-twinks (for the most part), pre-Death Knights. Sooo delicious.
The fact that Argent Tournament dailies, while they make me want to bang my head into a wall, still somehow succeed in being over nine thousand times more tolerable than the Shattered Sun dailies
Coming up with the perfect name for new pets
Putting something expensive in the Auction House and waiting for the little mail icon next to your map to light up
Heroic Mech and running it a million times for a tank friend
Druid Epic Flight Form quest… quite possibly the best questline in the game.
The Mag’har, because they actually made Nagrand awesome, oh and while we’re at it,
Defending/attacking Halaa
Onyxia Whelpling
Baby Murlocs
Female Tauren, because we look awesome and there aren’t enough of us!
Snowman Costume, Picnic Basket, Orb of the Blackwhelp, Steam Tonks, Pygmy Oil, Haunted Memento, and all the other toys I carry around in my backpack
I could keep going, but alas, I should keep this list a decently manageable length before it turns into my blogroll or something. Above all though, thank you Blizzard for making an awesomely fun game, and thank you to all of you for reading and sticking around this long ^_^
Somebody made a character on Silver Hand to say hi to me (and give roleplaying a shot)! I’m quite honored. I’ve gotta thank you all again for your comments and support. It never ceases to amaze me that I’ve got an actual readership, especially because I started this blog mostly to have a place to ramble to myself and provide occasional advice to newbies.
Speaking of which, I’m going to try and provide more guides and “newbie advice”. I’ll definitely keep posting stories and anecdotes though, since a lot of people seem to enjoy them. But I’ll try to sprinkle some guides in here and there too.
Anyways! Level 70. I have to admit, the first few days I actually seemed to come down with an odd case of a Post-70-Funk; that is to say, this whole time I’ve been looking forward to 70 and I had all this stuff I wanted to do at 70, and then I got there and after the initial excitement wore out, I thought about the stuff I’d wanted to do and none of it sounded appealing anymore. However, I think it might have just been some exhaustion over the whole thing; because now after some rest I’m quite happy about being 70 again and I’ve made some goals to work on:
– Grinding marks/honor in PvP: For the Gladiator’s Pursuit set. Yes, it’s just the infamous “welfare epics”, but they are definitely not a bad start to a good set of PvP gear. I’ve already snagged myself Gladiator’s Chain Helm and I’m working to complete the set and get them all gem’d and enchanted up.
– Karazhan Key Quest Line: I’ve started this one already, got some instances ahead of me though.
– Getting Enchants and Stuff: The ever-so-illustrious BRK posted a list of good post-70 pre-Kara gear and enchants. Now I’m probably not going to follow this list 100% to the book but it’s definitely going to be my guide for the time being– and yes I want to work to get the enchants even on my fresh-out-of-Outlands-greens, because I want to be prepared to do my best if asked. First on my list is Glyph of Ferocity, which requires Revered with Cenarion Expedition. I lucked out here in that a.) I loved Zangarmarsh and spent huge amounts of time here; b.) I ran Underbog more than any other Outlands instance; and c.) I still have a lot of Cenarion Expedition quests to do in Blade’s Edge and elsewhere. And I’m already halfway through Honored. So hopefully this one won’t take too long.
– Work on gettingSonic Spear: My Survivalist’s Pike with +25 agi has served me long and well but it’s about time for an upgrade.
– Last but not least, Leveling the Pets: Tux is level 66 and Locke is level 68. I’m rather proud of my ability to at least keep them decently close in level with me in the final stretch, though obviously I’d like to get them both to 70. I figure I can do a lot of pet leveling while working on some of my other goals, such as the rep grinding/quests.
I’ve probably got some other stuff to do, but this is the list for the time being! Posted here so I can keep track of them… =P
Do any of you have any other advice for a newly-minted level 70 hunter? Or a newly-minted level 70 in general?
I sort of have a lot to talk about, but most of them aren’t things I want to make full-blown posts about. However, here is a random sampling of what has been on my mind and in my WoW lately:
1. The Dead Zone is gone and I still unconsciously back up to “get range” even if I don’t have to. I can’t help myself. It’s months and months of hunter training that I don’t know if I can undo. Heehee.
2. The Hellfire Peninsula music really has a very Holst-like feel to it. It feels right out of the Planets Suite to me. It makes me wonder if that’s where the game’s composers got some inspiration, or if I’m just being a geek. My money is on the latter.
3. I got my Epic Mount!
4. What’s with all the shaman-inspired Outlands gear? I keep finding myself choosing the leather rogue quest rewards over the mail shammy ones. Yes, my armor is taking a bit of a hit, and yeah I like Intellect, but come on… if you give me a choice between a +30 agi, +30 stam, +attack power leather piece, and a +12 agi +12 stam +12 int +magical damage/healing mail piece… I’m gonna take the former. I’ve heard other people say that shamans have an unusually high amount of Outlands stuff, but wow, I had no idea they were this prevalent.
5. I have been challenged! Namely, my guild has put forth a bit of a friendly challenge for those among us who are in our early-60s: to get to 70 by Christmas. A few people have even taken it farther and have a 100g bet on the line for whoever gets there first. I’ve agreed to participate in the challenge but at the same time, I don’t want that to be the sole reason I’m leveling. I’m playing the game for fun, afterall, not to see if I can beat my guildies to 70. So I’m going to maybe kick up my leveling just a notch, and then not worry about it after that. I’ll get to 70 when I get there.
6. Speaking of my guild, I really like it a lot. When I first started this blog we were this tiny little guild of about 20 people; somehow we seem to have exploded recently to nearly 100 characters and almost as many accounts. Some people have their tiffs, as you will see in all guilds, but other than that our guild is full of friendly and intelligent people who willingly donate money to others’ mount funds and run newbies through instances on a daily basis– seriously, we seem to have an abnormal number of high-level members who love running lowbie instances. It’s kinda funny really… watching the guild’s higher-levels all scrambling to be the chosen one who gets to help someone through Deadmines, which once culminated in a Grand Deadmines Race which involved people pairing off and seeing who could run through the fastest. Yes, I do love my guild.
7. I have transferred my tauren hunter to a new realm: The Venture Co. It’s an RP-PvP realm. See, I know I often mention how I find PvP realms to be irritating because of all the ganking that goes on. However, I recently got this little dream in my head of being able to say I’ve leveled to 70 on a PvP server, and being able to experience that and broaden my knowledge that way. But being on a regular PvP server, I really missed the RP, so I’ve compromised and moved to an RP-PvP server. I’m really happy with my new server so far, though admittedly I’ve only just transferred– but it makes me so dorkily giddy to see real roleplay going on, and it’s already made my little tauren about ten times more fun to play.
8. Right after the transfer took place and I hopped onto my tauren alt, I noticed something unusual… track humanoids not only shows humanoids on the minimap, but beasts as well! Has anyone else experienced that? I sent a ticket into Blizzard and a GM had me do the whole “disable-all-your-addons” dance, but it didn’t change anything so I have been informed that it’s being looked into as a bug. In the meantime… it’s, um, very handy for contested zones, so it’s staying up… *hangs head guiltily*
9. My main is now a Scryer. Aldors had a decent ring, but Scryers had an alchemy recipe, and I’m a bit OCD when it comes to my professions. Gotta catch ’em all!
10. I’d completely forgotten how difficult it is to keep two pets leveled up with you simultaneously, especially since I seem to be perpetually rested these days so I’m always getting double XP while my pets aren’t. I fear I may have to soon make a decision and have one pet stay with me to 70 and then come back and grind the other one later. On the other hand, at least leveling a pet that is 7 or 8 levels lower than you shouldn’t be quite as bad as leveling one that is several dozen levels lower than you… hopefully that’s the case, anyway.
