A Month in an MMO Life: April 2016

Not an MMO, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=3442785

I went from 'A Week in an MMO Life' to a 'Month' since I haven't been playing or posting much.  However, I did some gaming over the last month and I'll count this as my April post even though it is posted in early May.

I recently bought two copies of Baldur's Gate Enhanced Edition on a Steam sale for my daughter and I to play together.  I remember buying it as soon as it came out in 1998 (I believe it was December).  I'm pretty sure it was the first computer video game I played with another person over the internet.  I don't even remember who it was, but at that time I believe I was still active on CompuServe and it was likely someone else who posted there.  We didn't get very far together and I also didn't get very far by myself.  

One of my daughters has recently showed an interest in Dungeons and Dragons, so I thought this could be fun to play together and maybe I could finally complete the game and play the sequel.  I died early on going off by myself, so we'll have to see if it gets any traction or not.

I still log into World of Warcraft most days, but haven't done much besides daily Garrison tasks, bi-weekly auction house sales and periodically making sure my in game mails don't expire.  I did level my Shaman who has been at level 19 for years to level 20 to get the achievement (and logged into Hearthstone just long enough to see the cross game bonus was there).  I also have started fishing for Felblight for upgrading my gun and joined my first Lord Kazzak kill for the Felblight from him as well.

I played some Minecraft with my daughters, but I would rather play on our Mojang server and they would rather play with mods they have discovered so it has come to something of a stand-still.

I would still like to try out Black Desert Online sometime.  What I have read about exploration and crafting makes me believe it would be something I enjoy, even if I don't play it long.  Stargrace has also made me want to try out Wurm Unlimited, though it is probably a game better suited to someone who has more playing time than I do.

The World of Warcraft Legion expansion now has a date:  August 30, 2016.  I plan to get it upon release (probably with Amazon Prime's 20% discount on new games).  That gives me four months from now to close out a few things with Warlords.

A Week in an MMO Life: Slow Progress

I guess fishing isn't a bad analogy for how I have been playing MMOs

'Slow Progress' could be the title for pretty much all my 'A Week in an MMO Life' posts since I started this blog, except for the few times I haven't made any progress at all.

So I guess it's appropriate that I accomplished one of those achievements that rewards slow steady activity, Learning from the Best.  My hunter, Kanter, has been fishing since I was using it to feed my bear back when that was a requirement.  I had finished the Nat Pagle quest back in Vanilla when it was required for maximum level fishing.  I thought about getting the 'Salty' title, but collecting the coins in the Dalaran fountain were too much even for me.  When the Angler reputation appeared in Pandaria, it didn't take me long to get to Exalted, but at that point I was still a long way away from being Best Friends with Nat Pagle and I decided I would rather do other things.

However in Warlords of Draenor, I could gradually get Lunkers while catching fish that I used to sell when some of the level 100 food wasn't available on my server.  I knew I was starting to get close so it wasn't a huge surprise when it finally happened about a week ago.  Now there is decision about what to do with the coins.  I will probably get Nat's Drinking Hat which is a decent upgrade to the Weather-Beaten Fishing Hat I am currently using, though I like maximizing the number of Enormous fish I catch by using the +200 fishing lures while the hat gives you +150 fishing.

I also finished the quests in Spires of Arak with my mage so she'll eventually be able to get the Salvage yard when she gets her third small plot at level 100.  She's over half way through level 97 now, so with a few more quests she'll be able to finish her quest to level 100 in Nagrand.  The main purpose there is to upgrade Kanter's gun with her Engineering.  That would be three max level characters and I might be tempted to level my druid and warrior who already have garrisons at that point to get the Quintessential Quintet achievement and have access to max level profession characters for everything except for Inscription.

I still haven't done the raids required to finish the third chapter of the Legendary Ring Questline.  Doing LFR is really unappealing to me, but since I was able to get it done for Chapter 2, I will probably eventually do it for 3 as well.  Once my Mage, Kantrina, hits 100, it'll be time for me to evaluate how else I can avoid doing LFR, but still play WoW.

A Week in an MMO Life: Wandering

Not a screenshot from World of Warcraft!

After reading about Heart of Thorns, particularly from Inventory Full and Kill Ten Rats, I decided to go ahead and download Guild Wars 2, particularly since the original game is free.  The download took a VERY long time (I ended up just letting it finish over night) and even after it finished it still had to patch again.  I only played through level 5 so I don't feel like it's enough even for a mini-review, but I don't feel like it's the game for me.  I will try to give it another chance, possibly over the holidays.

My middle daughter and I played Don't Starve Together again and I felt like we made more progress this time.  It is nice because my daughter knows more about what she is doing, so she can be in control and I can help her, particularly by gathering what she needs.  We still died from the hounds when they appeared, but we at least had spears to protect ourselves and have some gardens and clothes in preparation for winter.  We'll see how that goes the next time we play.

I am still playing World of Warcraft, but I haven't been doing much other than basic Garrison activities and auctioning enough to still buy the now more expensive Tokens to keep the game free.  I would expect the cost to keep going up until the expansion arrives when a influx of players will include those who don't want to wait to buy things.  It was hovering around 20,000 gold in the US after the release for several months but is now over 37,000.  In the EU it has always been more expensive and is now at 61,000 gold.

I was able to use the Garrison to gather the stones required for the second part of the Legendary quest.  I need to do two parts of LFR to complete it, but haven't been able to find the time and inclination to do it.  Again, maybe it'll be a holiday thing since I am so close.  It also should be pretty quick to level my Mage to 100 but she has been stuck at 95 for more than a month now because I just don't have the inclination to play.  I may let my subscription lapse in December and just wait until Legion comes out.

Since my last post Blizzcon happened and I'm generally pretty positive about what I have heard about the Legion expansion.  For someone who doesn't care about raiding, it is usually pretty easy to sell things early in an expansion so it should be easier to justify paying for it knowing that the subscription for it will probably be covered by Tokens.  However, the Demon Hunter doesn't appeal to me that much (I'll probably eventually play it like I did the Death Knight primarily to see the starting quests) and I don't even know how I would use the Level 100 character upgrade so there isn't a reason for me to buy it early.  I'll probably just purchase it a week before it comes out so I can be ready.

I really seem to be in a gaming lull.  It'll be interesting to see if something changes that.  All the talk about Fallout 4 has been fun, but, though I have been playing computer RPGs since the original Wizardry, the post-apocalyptic setting has never really appealed to me, so I'll probably wait until I can get it for $10 or so.  My daughters may spark some gaming as well, particularly if something takes off over the holidays.  I played a little Diablo III with my  middle daughter but it didn't seem to appeal to her.  I'll probably go ahead and buy myself a copy assuming it goes on sale for $10 again.  I really enjoyed the first two games, but I still feel it is rather dark to play in front of my daughters so I'd rather play other games where I am more comfortable playing with them, or at least with them watching me. 

A Week in an MMO Life - Happy Halloween

Halloween at the Garrison

Ever since I completed the prerequisites for flying in World of Warcraft, I haven't been very motivated to play.  I did go ahead and finish the first set of dungeons for the Legendary ring upgrade.  It was generally quiet, though I did get kicked once for forgetting to turn off growl.  I turned it off as soon as I was asked, but was still kicked.  I felt bad about it briefly, but it really didn't hurt to have to take an extra day.  I have started the second set of quests which will require some raids.  We'll see if I get them done or not.

I started doing the daily Halloween quests for the Garrison decorations.  I have the jack-o-lanterns and the pets so far and I figure I'll go ahead and capture the three pets (an undead rat, maggot, and spider) since I'm not sure how available they will be outside the holiday.

WoW tokens have gone up in price significantly, but I still have plenty of gold for them, so I don't mind continuing to subscribe and get a few things done in the game.  I still want to get my mage to level 100 in order to use her Engineering to upgrade Kanter's gun.

With all the talk about Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns, I went ahead and downloaded the client since the original game is free.  I started up the game once, but then realized I need to pick a server.  I'd be interested in any suggestions, but I don't plan to play much.  I just want to get a better sense of how it plays.

Halloween is one of my least favorite holidays.  I did like the candy as a child, but I didn't like going up to (relative) strangers houses as a child and don't enjoy doing it with my children either (though it is fun to see their excitement for getting all the candy).  However, I have a vacation coming up next week and I always enjoy Thanksgiving and Christmas and I know those will be here soon.  In any case, I hope you enjoy your Halloween!

A Week in an MMO Life: Pets and Flight

Pet Menagerie finally built.

Yes, I should probably be titling these 'A Month in an MMO Life' given how often I've been posting them, but I can always dream that I'll start posting more.

With the Pet Battling triple experience weekend a couple weeks ago in World of Warcraft, I finally built the Pet Menagerie.  I had done almost no Pet Battling, so I was starting from two Ultimate Battle-Training Stones from my two level 3 garrisons and a bunch of pets I had gathered through years of playing WoW.  I used the first comment on the Pet Versus Pests Wowhead entry (with 201 up votes at the time) as my guide.  From there I targetting getting a frog, a Dancing Water Skimmer, a fox, and a moth to at least level 20.

I used my Ultimate Battle-Training Stones to level my Terrible Turnip and Sprite Darter Hatchling to level 25.  The Terrible Turnip has a 'Weakening Blow' that will never kill a pet you are battling, so you can make sure you don't kill it before capturing it.  I took my mage (who both wasn't max level and had a port) to the Vale of Eternal Blossoms to capture the Dancing Water Skimmer and Yellow-Bellied Bullfrog.  Battled there until I had two uncommon skimmers and a rare bullfrog and also leveled some of my moths at the same time.  From there is was a quick trip to Kun-Lai Summit to capture an Alpine Foxling Kit and was lucky enough to get a rare on one my first battle.

I was able to win the three pet battles needed to complete the Pet Versus Pests quest with just those pets, including two moths I had leveled, at level 20 or higher which allowed me to build my Menagerie.  Moving it to Level 2 was just a matter of some gold and garrison resources.  I completed one of the daily quests but at this point I have 15 pets at level 20 or higher and to try to build a full collection is daunting.  I'm not sure I want to spend the time doing it or finishing the 150 pet battles to get the Level 3 Menagerie.  At least I can say I've built all the Garrison buildings (except the PvP one).

I also was able to find the time to finish two of the last three achievements I need for the Draenor Pathfinder achievement that allows flying in Draenor.  Whenever I had some time, I would check to see if one of the Securing Draenor quests I hadn't finished was in my garrison and would run it.  Once I was down to four assaults, I just paid for them at my garrison with resources from my Garrison Quartermaster.

I also finished the Master Treasure Hunter achievement.  My missions had given me the Shadowmoon Valley and Gorgrond maps so I started with those.  Once I had done most of them I realized I'd need one more map to finish it, so I bought the one for Nagrand from Grakis in Stormshield.  I'm not sure this was the best one to pick because quite a few were difficult to get to.  Fortunately, I didn't need that many after having gathered most of the treasures from the previous two zones, so it was just a matter of looking for others if one was very difficult to get to.  I enjoyed the scavenger hunt aspect of this, but not as much as I thought I would.  It felt like they were generally reasonable in Shadowmoon Valley but in Nagrand you would often have to find an obscure path to the treasure.

So I only have one achievement left to earn Flying in Draenor, Tanaan Diplomat.  There are three reputations you need to level to Revered and while one of them is pretty straight forward, the other two are going to be quite a grind.  Once again, I'm not sure if it is worth it or not.  I didn't mind being grounded in Draenor.  I'll try to post more about that later.

A Week in an MMO Life: The Garrison Campaign

Kantra riding an Amperial Construct in front of her Nagrand portal in her Mage Tower

It has been a long time since I last posted.  I'm hoping to at least get back to a weekly post.  Thank you for those of you who are still reading!

Sometimes in a game when I get close to completing something, I stop and do something else.  It isn't a conscious decision, but I just don't want to do that last step.  I'm not exactly sure why, but I think part of my unconscious reasoning is that I'm enjoying it, I'm not sure what to focus on yet and it's easier if I just don't complete it.

This happened to me with the Garrison Campaign.  I have had one mission to complete for a few months now, but I finally completed it last weekend.  In a month where Blizzard has  taken some heat for losing 3 million subscribers and doing things wrong, I do think this was a good idea for casual players like myself.  In previous expansions, it felt like the only way to get the end game story was to participate in a raid or a long set of daily quests.  I do agree with others that it was advertised as well as it could have been, though I don't have a specific suggestion how they should have done it.

Almost simultaneously to completing the Garrison campaign, I also completed the Got My Mind on Draenor Money achievement which let me upgrade my Garrison Bank and have my own Traders for Transmogrification and Void Storage which is nice.  I have upgraded most of the buildings to level 3 now.  I may try to level the Trading Post since I have quite a few tokens that can help with the reputations.  I am not at all interested in PvP, so I'll never get the Gladiator's Sanctum.  The Inn is unlikely since I haven't been doing dungeons, but I guess there is still a chance I will do them with my priest who should be overpowered with Garrison gear.  The Mage Tower doesn't seem worth grinding all those Ogres and we'll have to see if I ever decide to build and upgrade the Pet Menagerie.  It's possible since it is a solo friendly activity.

Speaking of the Mage Tower, I did finally grind enough Ogres for one of the ports and chose the one in Nagrand since it's the most difficult to get to.  I was trying to figure out what the Amperial Construct was for and read that it allows you to port between two places in your Garrison.  I will definitely be using that to port to my Salvage Yard from my mail box since I do that everyday.

I will be sticking around to see WoW 6.2 and see what is in it, particularly since I can pay for it with game gold now, but I doubt I'll still be playing at the end of July.  Hopefully more about that in another post.

Since my last post a month ago, I reached my three year anniversary on 5/5, as part of the original Newbie Blogger Initiative.  The 2015 version will be done in a week, but you can still join at their web site.  Maybe I'll even take part in the last talk-back challenge.

A Week in an MMO Life: My Two Day Cycle

Kanter with his upgraded gun and swirly belt

Since my last post, I accomplished two of my likely goals in World of Warcraft:  getting the Gun and Gloves for Kanter and getting Archaeology to 700.  Next on my list is what I am calling my 'Gluttony Achievement.'  I have a lot of food being passed around between different characters since it isn't worth much but I hate to sell it.  This will be a great way for me to get a little use out of it getting the food achievements and then I should feel better selling it.

I thought I'd talk a little about my daily ritual.  I am not playing much (part of the reason I want to quit), but I only think I've missed one or two days of these tasks in the last couple of months because they are pretty painless.  At one point I was trying to harvest the mine five characters and it just took took much time.

On the two level 100 characters (Kanter and Kantra) I do the following:

• Complete missions
• Visit the Salvage Yard.  The BoE items go to my Mage, Kantrina.
• Upgrade followers from the items
• Run the missions with the priority on the weekly raid item, then leveling followers, then gold or items to upgrade my followers
• Harvest herbs (both are level 3)
• Harvest ore (one level 3, one level 2 since I didn't want to spend the extra time harvesting the level 3 mine since I didn't need the ore)
• Gather the built up crafting resources, do the daily crafting and replenishing the crafting resources (Alchemy on Kanter and Enchanting and Tailoring on Kantra)
• Since Kanter only has one craft, I have a bank and deposit everything extra there.  Kantra has to go to Stormshield every week or so to put things in the bank.

In addition on Kanter I:

• Visit the Dwarven Bunker.  My followers are pretty well equipped (670 iLvl+) at this point from the bunker, the salvage yard and missions.
• Visit the Trading Post.  There is a different item that you turn in that builds garrison resources over time
• Get my daily 'Savage Blood' transmute.  It requires the Alchemy resource and a potion made out of the standard fish, both of which I'm swimming in.

On Kantra I:

• Gather the components from the Barn (if available).
• Visit the Inn weekly to get a new follower.

I was gathering hides for tailoring but now I'd rather go to Nagrand for the elite hides that provide Savage Blood for crafting, but, as mentioned before, I can't solo it yet.

Every other day I do the following on my other three characters that have Garrisons:

• Complete the missions
• Start new missions
• Gather the built up crafting resources, do the daily crafting and replenishing the crafting resources

This is pretty quick and so I can usually do everything in 45 minutes or less every day.  I also try to go through my BoE items that have accumulated on Kantrina weekly and auction, sell or disenchant them.  I don't sell a lot of them these days, but it can get a lot more gold than disenchanting them if I'm lucky enough to find a buyer.

There is so much more I could be doing even in addition to my wish list from last week, but I don't have the motivation.  I see that 6.2 is in the works.  I think I may stick around to see what's there before I take my next break.  I am looking forward to other games, maybe I'll say more about that next time.

A Week in an MMO Life: Heading Downhill

Selfie at my Garrison with Iorek (no, I didn't use the tweet feature)

I haven't posted for a while because I haven't had a lot of motivation to play recently.  Once I reached level 100 on my priest I realized I don't want to do the group activities and I haven't had much else I wanted to do.  I did upgrade her garrison so I have a salvage yard in addition to the crafting building and that has been nice.  I made one unsuccessful to use the large traps with her in Shadow form along with her bodyguard.  I also went once with a guild mate which was nice and I may try as a Holy priest healing her bodyguard and see how that goes.

I have modified my Garrison pattern because it was taking too much time.  Now I only visit the garrison of my two level 100 characters and do all the daily tasks.  For the other three characters, I only go every other day and only perform the mission and craft tasks.  Mining takes too much time (to do it five times) and I'm satisfied with taking enough advantage of the crafting dailies every other day.

There are things that I want to do before I quit again, and others that I may do, and some I probably won't do.

Want to do:

• Craft gun and, possibly, gloves for my hunter, Kanter.  I have a high level bow from a mission, but I always think Dwarves look better with a gun and I like using crafting.  The gloves are the last thing keeping me from getting the Epic achievement and are also significantly lower iLvl than the rest of my gear.  I need more Savage blood for this, but through the transmute and the ability to gather it through the Barn, I should be ok.  I could use some of my Primal Spirit for it if needed as well.
• Use crafting and sell the proceeds.  Every expansion I always build up a lot of crafting items but usually don't use them.  With the Garrison dailies, I've had incentive to gather even more than usual.  This time I'd like to actually use them.  This should also get all my crafting professions to 700 except for Inscription (see below).
• Finish the Garrison Campaign.  I have been on the last step for more than a month now and haven't bothered to finish those quests.
• Use the Mage Tower in my Garrison.  I have tried all the buildings in the Garrison except the PvP specific Gladiator's Sanctum, the Mage Tower, and the Pet Menagerie (see below).  I have no desire to try out PvP but I'd like to at least see how the Mage Tower that allows fast travel around Draenor works.
• Advance Secondary Professions to 700.  Fishing is already at 700. I have a lot of spare fish and meat so cooking should be trivial.  Archaeology will be a little more work, but I'm already over 600 and I'd like to get it done before I quit.
• Build Level 3 Storagehouse.  I'm less than 250 gold from being able to build it, so it'll be nice to have void storage access even if I don't use it much.
• Gluttony Achievements.  I have food in storage and being mailed back and forth between different toons.  It should be trivial for me to have Kanter have a gluttony day and eat everything he needs for several achievements.

May do:

• Build the Pet Menagerie.  With 6.2 Blizzard provided a stone that allows each level 100 character to advance a pet to level 25 (the highest level).  With the two I have it should be a pretty easy task to finish the battles to build it.  However, since I don't see myself using it, I'm not sure I can be bothered.  The completionist in me may be motivated by being so close to having all the garrison buildings that I might actually get it done.
• Level Bodyguard.  My priest has been using her bodyguard some but doesn't have much reputation with him.  I'm told there are places where it is easy to build the reputation.  If I'm going to quit anyway, I'm not sure it makes sense, but I could at least see how the reputation helps.
• Achieve Silver on Healing Proving Grounds.  This is required for Heroics and I'd like to get it done, but since my motivation for both dungeons and raids is pretty low, I'm not sure it's worth the bother.

Probably won't do:

• Build Level 3 Trading Post.  I only need to get one Draenor reputation to exalted and at least one is close, but I don't feel much need to do this.
• Build Auction House access in Trading post.  This required 18 different parts from zones, dungeons, raids, invasions and other thing.  I have two so far, but I don't think I can be bothered with this.
• Build Level 3 Pet Menagerie.  This would require quite a bit of pet battling and while I might do the little bit to build the building, I'd be very surprised if I did enough to level it.
• Raid.  I have a decent iLvl on my hunter and could probably build it on my priest pretty quick, but I don't have much desire either for LFR or for trying to become a regular in my guilds raids.
• Complete Legendary quests.  This would require both heroic dungeons and raids and I just don't think that's what I want to work on.
• Level Death Knight, Kintri, to 90 and build Garrison.  She is level 80 and it probably wouldn't be that difficult, but I don't care much for the Cataclysm leveling and don't think I can be bothered.
• Advance Inscription to 700.  I would probably need to level my Death Knight to do this.  It would be nice to have all professions at max level for the first time ever for me, but not enough to do the leveling (at least not today with the above priorities).
• Complete Draenor starting area quests.  I have a Draenor Shaman sitting at level 17 or so that could pretty easily complete the remainder of the starting area.  However, there isn't any incentive outside of having done it, so I don't see it happening.

There are a lot of other things I probably won't do, but those are the most likely of the unlikely ones.  

A Week in an MMO Life: Gone Fishing

Fishing!  What MMOs are for, right?

This has been another couple of weeks without a lot of progress in World of Warcraft.  I'm not sure if this is a sign that I'm starting to enjoy the game less and it will be time for a break or I am just in a lull.

Kanter now has a iLvl over 640 without having been to any raids or more than 2 Heroic dungeons.  I keep thinking I will spend an evening getting some quests done in the Heroic dungeons but it doesn't happen.  The good news is that my iLvl is high enough that I shouldn't be a burden in them.  I still don't like random groups and that is probably part of the reason I have put them off.  

Kanter has been doing the Garrison Campaign quests and now only has three more left.  He was generally getting one a week but he skipped one week when I was out of town and I was able to get two done this last week.  I'm not sure if that's a coincidence or not.

I was able to take Kantra to Spires of Arak this last weekend, finished the quests for the Salvage Yard and got her to level 98 so I can do the quests in Nagrand now.  In theory once she is level 100 I will get the Silver Healing Proving Grounds achievement and start running dungeons with her using the Inn quests for extra rewards.  Given my almost complete unwillingness to go to dungeons as DPS, I don't know how willing I will be to do it with a healer but we'll see.  Questing with her is much easier with her Death Knight follower, but I did manage to kill him (and myself) just before I hit level 98 by pulling two groups accidentally.  Fortunately I was almost done with that quest and had to do just one more quest solo before I reach my goal of getting the level.

Because I have Garrisons with toons for all professions except for Inscription, I have been building up a lot of the daily components needed for crafting.  I am hoping with the follower, gather Savage Blood won't be too difficult with her once she hits level 100 and I can use those components more.

I also finally finished up some of my fishing goals.  The Level 3 Fishing Shack requires catching 700 enormous fish.  That was too big of a goal, so I decided to use the daily fishing quests to reach it, catching which ever of the 7 fish was specified and ignoring it if I had already reached the goal.  Once I got close on a specific fish, I decided to finish off the quest once I needed just one additional 5 minute lure that lets you catch a much higher percentage of the required fish (usually between 10 and 15 in a 5 minute period for me).  

Finally, I was down to three fish left.  I realized at this point I'd be ignoring most of the dailies, so I went ahead and caught all the fish I needed once I had the last two quests.  The final fish, the Sea Scorpions, have no daily quests, so it was just a matter of grinding them out and I finally did that and was able to upgrade my Fishing Shack.  Now to get Nat Pagle as a follower and decide if I want to grind my reputation up with him.  I made to to 'Good Friends' in Pandaria, so we'll see if I can take the last step to get to 'Best Friends' in Draenor.

A Week in an MMO Life: Time away

Where most of my time has been spent in game.

The last two weeks I haven't played World of Warcraft or any MMO much.  As is usually the case, it isn't so much the game as it is not knowing what I want to do and real life getting in the way. 

For most of the last week I have been visiting my parents and they don't have internet access.  I visited Chik-fil-a one day to use their free wifi in order to do my garrison runs on my 5 characters that have a garrison and make sure none of the mail I send between characters gets deleted but I have managed to do without.  It has been good to spend time with my parents and let them get to know my youngest daughter better.

Prior to that, I still wasn't playing much.  I raised Kanter's (my Hunter) iLevel to over 635 with a nice upgrade from a garrison quest and I have plenty of parts for everything I want except for my gun upgrades for Kanter.  I finally raised my x to level two for my priest, Kantra, so she can have a tank as a companion.  It does make questing and gathering a lot easier on her and I now plan to do the same for my mage.  I don't think it would make much of a difference for Kanter since he hasn't had issues anything he has done, but for a cloth not pet class, I can see it as a big help.

This should have encouraged me to level my priest since it'll be easier and it will give me access to the Savage Blood from her barn needed for the gun upgrade mentioned above but I just haven't allocated the time to do it.  I also still have four Heroic Dungeon quests that I would like to get done with Kanter but I really don't like queueing for anything in WoW.  Part of my reluctance is that since I don't play that much I don't know the fights and I don't have confidence in my ability to contribute.  Also, I'd rather use my limited play time in an environment where I know I won't run across bad attitudes.

Since I started this blog, I wanted to be able to enjoy an MMO where I only spent one night playing it in a dedicated way.  That was the origin of this blog's name.  Right now, I am squeezing in time to do my garrison activities and, while I enjoy that, too, I don't have time where I am making real progress and once I get back home, I will try to set aside a night to do that.

A Week in an MMO Life: Trials

Not really related, but I did try out the (a?) glider in Nagrand with my Talbuk

I hope everyone reading had a Merry Christmas and has a Happy New Year!  I did quite a bit these last two weeks.  I hope this doesn't just come off as a list.

Followers:
I have my 20 Followers on Kanter and can't decide if I want to level my Barracks or replace it with another building so it stays at level 1 for now.   My Salvage Yard finally coughed up some armor for my followers so now I have 3 iLevel 630 followers and they give me better quests including some for more follower gear.  The iLevel 630 quests also give iLevel 640 (?) gear for my character so that's been a nice boost for him.

Alts:
My first two characters, my hunter and priest were pretty well set.  I knew I was going to use my Druid, Kantree, to instant level to 90 since he had two professions none of my other 90 toons had (leatherwork and skinning).  Once I used the instant level, I had to try out the intro quest and once he had the Garrison, he needed to be able to use the Barn and by that point, it made sense to get him to 92 for the Mine.

By the time Kanter hit 100, I was starting to accumulate a lot of things to be Disenchanted by my enchanter, Kantrina, so I thought I should get him a Garrison, too so I could use the materials and since she is also an Engineer, it only made sense to get the level 2 Garrison so she could start producing the Engineering dailies as well.  Once you have the level 2 garrison, you might as well get to level 92 so you can get the Mine again, right?

At this point my enchanter had used up most of her supplies on the dailies and work orders and I had a surplus of ore to use.  Someone suggested that I could use the ore with a Blacksmith to get more enchanting supplies, so I started leveling my Blacksmith Warrior, Kantro.  Once he had the Forge I could have stopped, but it didn't seem right that my only miner didn't have a mine, so today he reached level 92.  This is what leads to having  five toons with Mines.  I have gone back to leveling my priest who was stuck at level 94 and I'm looking forward to having a level 3 Barn and to try out the Inn with her (assuming I ever learn how to heal).  Right now I'm happy with where my other toons are, but I suspect there will be something that encourages me to do more than the work orders, crafting dailies, mining, and follower missions.  It does take some time just to do that.

Stables:
I spoke about the stables in my last post and at this point have 7 of the 8 mounts you can get from them (and the Mountain o' Mounts achievement).  I am glad I had vacation because it did take a little while to bring all 6 mounts each day to their next battle.  The battles were not difficult for my hunter though it was odd not having a pet.  Each mount takes between 7 and 12 battles but the way I did them (maybe it's how it always works out), there were always two on the same battle each day so I would have three places to visit each day and the respawns were pretty quick.  If you have a specific item in your pack when you defeat the last of these battles, you also get one more mount, a pretty cool armored pig, so I got that as well.  There is an 8th mount available for completing these battles with another more difficult item in your pack, but I'm in no rush to get it.

Trials:
I knew if I wanted to go on Heroic Dungeons or raids I would need to complete the Silver Proving grounds achievement, so I started working on it a couple weeks ago.  Leveling a hunter is very easy (after leveling the priest, druid, mage and warrior, I know this well), so I wasn't very well prepared for it.  I first had to figure out the best way to get AOE damage (I needed to put Barrage on my bar and I learned that using multishot causes my pet to do AOE damage, too).  Then it was more a matter of practice.  Learning to move and shoot again.  Learning to interrupt when needed.  Learning to more quickly switch targets.  I play on a laptop and for questing it's fine, but for this I had to move to where I had larger monitor and a mouse rather than just a track pad.  I did eventually get the Silver achievement and went on my first (and only so far) heroic random dungeon.  I thought the trials were pretty effective and I'm sure I'll do better DPS (particularly for AOE) and I'll be more likely to hit interrupts because of it.

Molten Core:
I thought that I would work on the Legendary ring quests this weekend, but one night a few people in my guild said they'd be going to Molten Core so I went along.  I've heard nightmare stories about some of these runs, but this went pretty well.  We did have one point where someone added a second hound pack in the middle of when we were fighting the first and they kept regenerating until someone manufactured a wipe.  Otherwise I think there may have been one other wipe, but after my experiences in Vanilla, this was trivally easy and it was fun to see it again on level.  Yes, I am now a proud owner of a Core Hound Mount more than a week before it'll be done!

It's been a busy week (and yes, I played more than one night this last week ;)).  I still don't have a definite direction.  I would like to work on the Ring quest with Kanter but would rather go with someone in my guild if I can.  I would like to try a Normal raid with the guild as well thought I'm not interested in being good enough to do Heroic or Mythic and I don't want to get in the way.  I'll be interested in leveling my Priest to 100 and then trying the Healing proving grounds.  I mentioned before I had finished Bronze during Pandaria.  Once I get that done, I would like to try to do the daily Inn quests on her, but that means dealing with random groups and I'm not sure how that will go.  I'm still doing the fishing dailies and I'm about half way to getting my level 3 Fishing Shack which will lead to another series of tasks for Nat Pagle.  There is also the Pet Menagerie just sitting there with an available quest and Syl kindly provided a guide for a newbie like me (I think my highest level pet is level 4 and I only did that because my daughter wanted to try it).

I have plenty to keep me busy.

A Week in an MMO Life: Level 100

Kanter flying on a flight path since no flying otherwise in Draenor

Recently Kanter reached the new max level,100, in World of Warcraft.  As is the case these days, this isn't as much a sign of completion as an ability to start many other things.

Before I go into the future, I want to talk about questing.  I liked the Yrel story as much as I've seen it.  I've done all the quest achievements except for Nagrand and I have no desire to do the 'Bonus Objectives,' areas where you kill so many of different kinds of mobs for a reward.  That said, I liked the Pandaria quests better.  I seem to be in the minority, but I liked the stranger in a strange land setting and I think the time travel is something of a cop out, though I understand why they did it.  More on that in another post if I ever get to it.

The Garrison has a lot to keep me busy, maybe too much.  I feel compelled to get all my herbs and ore every day, along with the daily crafting activities.  Kanter is doing the Alchemy dailies, Kantra, the Tailor and Jewelcrafting ones, and Kantree has just started the Leatherworking ones.  Note that they mostly aren't daily quests just daily activities at the garrison station and daily cooldowns for core crafting components.  That is an improvement from Pandaria:  you don't feel overwhelmed with dozens of dailies once you reach max level.

Kanter picked the Lumber Mill  as his first middle size plot item and harvesting has been happening pretty naturally along with quests.  It does seem to keep my garrison stocked with the supplies I need.  I've only had to wait overnight once to build or expand on a plot.  I'm also looking forward to getting the Follower who works in the Lumber Mill.

When I improved my garrison to level 3, I received three new plots and got the Stables, Trading Post, and Salvage Yard.  I really like that the Stables displays a random set of my mounts every day.  I also like the quests to raise more mounts, but it's becoming too much now with four mounts I'm working on at the same time.  I'd rather they would have serialized them.  You don't have to take all the quests but it'll be difficult for me to not work on all of them and with six to work on, that will be a lot.  The ability to gather while mounted is very helpful and with it and the speed buff at level 3, I don't think I'll ever get rid of it (particularly since I can play with the other buildings on my alts).

The Trading Post has been neutral.  As of now it's just a way to turn gathered ingredients into garrison provisions.  I like the Lumber Yard better for that, but I may eventually not want to wander around and I can get the components her from the Herb Garden and Mine located in the garrison.  The Auction House would be nice to have, but it looks like it won't be easy to get it.

So far, the Salvage Yard has been a bust.  Only some of the garrison quests yield salvage and I haven't gotten anything interesting from it.

I'm also not very happy with the Garrison quests.  I've only tried to solo quest and it seemed too crowded and took too long.  The second time wasn't as bad because there were fewer people, but I still don't like it.  I had the option for a similar quest with the same 800 Apexis Crystal reward at Socretar's Rise but when I completed my quests there, I was only 18% done and couldn't be bothered to grind the rest.

I've always found Fishing to be a relaxing diversion in WoW even though I don't like it in real life.  I'm using the dailies to get my 100 fish of six different types for Draenor Fisherman achievement.  After that, I can work on getting Nat Pagel as a follower.

When I started, I thought I would probably advance my Hunter and Priest close together, but I've been focusing on my Hunter, Kanter, so far, probably a sign that I'm not that interested in group quests.  I would like to have my Mage, Kantrina, have access to the Enchanting and Engineering plots, but I don't have any incentive yet to bring my Warrior since mining isn't an issue with the Garrison mines and nothing is compelling me to get Blacksmithing at this time.

In summary, I'm enjoying Warlords of Draenor, but I'm not sure I'll do much group content.  The Garrison works well integrating a base into the game and the quests have pulled me along, but so far I can't be bothered to gear up for the normal end game content.

A Week in an MMO Life: Loremaster of Northrend

Avatar of Freya zapping out flowers to kill the Scourge while Kintri looks on

The Loremaster achievements in World of Warcraft are an obvious one for a casual player who likes to quest.  Finish (almost) all the quests in a zone and get an achievement, complete it for all the zones in an expansion or continent and get a meta-achievement and finish them all for all expansions and continents and get a meta-meta-achievement.

This probably would have been doable for me except they didn't start until the Wrath of the Lich King pre-patch came out so you didn't get credit for most things you did before then.  It is one thing to do the quests as they come out and another to go back and re-do quests to get an achievement.  In any case, I find it convenient because it tells me what quests I haven't seen completely, so I can go back and see it with my alts as I bring them up.

As I mentioned a few times already, the last zone I needed in Wrath was 'Sholazar Basin.'  I'm not at sure why I hadn't done this zone up until now.  I had done a lot of it with Kanter, my hunter, since I wanted to get the toys you can get with Oracle reputation there.  Once Kintri, my Death Knight, hit level 75 and was able to level her Inscription profession, her next goal was to finish Sholazar Basin to get the Into the Basin achievement which would yield me the Loremaster of Northrend achievement.  That is what I did over the last two weeks.

There are three major threads in Sholazar Basin:
1. Nesingwary's Safari, which was also in the original game and Burning Crusade,
2. The conflict between the Oracles and the Frenzyheart Tribe and
3. The guardians left by the Titans fighting back the scourge with Freya above being the most obvious manifestation.

The starter quest from Dalaran sends you to Nesingwary's Safari and so it's the first set of quests you do though they all get interspersed.  As in the other two continents, these are primarily a kill a bunch of animals to get some quest to kill some special animals.  These do get a little repetitive, but there is enough humor thrown in to keep it interesting.  The final quest was the best, even if I didn't complete it as I was supposed to.  Wrath was the expansion where they introduced the ability to ride special vehicles for quests and in this one you get to ride an mammoth with Nesingwary aboard and use it to help kill a dragon.  The whole theme of capturing a mother dragon's babies in order to be able to kill the dragon makes me uncomfortable, but it was kind of fun to run around on the mammoth trying to lead the dragon onto traps.  I actually didn't realize Hemet Nesingwary was dropping traps until too late, so the mammoth died and I had to fight the elite the rest of the way without her help.  Fortunately, I was a little over-level by this point and Death Knights are strong even though I don't know what I'm doing with her, so I was able to finish her off pretty easily.  This also netted me the Hemet Nesingwary:  The Collected Quests meta achievement for finishing all three sets of quests.

The Oracles and the Frenzyheart Tribe are both pretty adorable and amusing so their quests are fun.  I do remember it getting a little repetitive doing the Oracle quests with Kanter so I could get the toys, but when you are just going through the opening sets of quests, it is fun to play both sides.  The Oracles are the 'better' side since they want peace and are trying to get along, but the Frenzyheart are a lot of fun with their proud attitude.  At the end of the quest line in order to kill a boss you have to either kill the Oracle or Frenzyheart with him.  The one that remains makes you honored with that faction and hated by the other.  Since I was already revered with the Oracles on Kanter, I chose Frenyheart for Kintri, but it doesn't really matter unless I eventually decide I want to get the exalted reputation achievement.

Once I finished those quests I was only a few quests away from having the Into the Basin achievement and finished that with some quests helping Freya with the Scourge.  Those quests also got me to level 80 as well, so it was actually a pretty nice way to get the last four levels in Northrend to be ready for the Cataclysm zones.  Freya eventually sends you to Un'goro crater in Kalimdor and if you weren't already aware of the similarity of the two zones, they make sure you get it.  I actually didn't have to do that quest to get the achievement and I'm pretty sure I already did it on Kanter, but I'll do it again to see the ending.

Now the question is what to do next.  My guildmate is pretty confident the pre-expansion patch will drop in the next two weeks and that makes sense, so I don't want to do anything that takes too long.  I could work on getting the Silver Healing Proving Grounds achievement, but it's going to change significantly with Warlords, so it seems like a waste of time.  I could try to take Kintri through Cataclysm so I'll have a max level in every profession, but I don't think I can bring myself to do those quests again after having taken Kantrina and Kantro through them recently.  Also, it'll take a long time to get my other five toons to use their professions in Warlords, so who knows when I'll get to the last one.  I could try to get some more mounts.  I'm close to 100 at this point.  I could finish off the Draenor starting quests with my shaman, since it seems a shame I haven't seen them all.  The fact that Wilhelm named it the worst zone in World of Warcraft isn't exactly encouraging but it should be pretty easy to get done it two weeks.  What to do.  I could just take two weeks off and only do my farm when I feel like it.  There will be plenty to do soon.

A Week in an MMO Life: Done with Dragonblight (almost)

Revisiting the Kalu'ak with my Death Knight

I didn't accomplish a lot in the last week, but I did reach my goal of level 75 on my Death Knight, Kintri in Dragonblight in World of Warcraft.  Looking at Wowhead it showed that Sholazar Basin is level 75-80, so I thought I'd reach level 75, go back to Dalaran and Stormwind, level my First Aid, Herbalism and Inscription up to Cataclysm levels and then head on to Sholazar Basin to finish up my Loremaster achievement for Northrend.  I did level my professions and I always find pleasure in doing that, even if it is relatively mindless.  However, it didn't work out like I expected because when I looked up the introductory quest for Sholazar Basin (near the Flight path in Dalaran), it required level 76.  So, I've decided to return to Dragonblight this week to get to level 76.  I'm not sure if I'll start Sholazar Basin yet, but I'm pretty sure that'll be my next goal.

So what did I do?  Pretty much the quests in Star's Rest and Moa'ki Harbor.  Star's Rest works pretty well as a quest hub.  There is another confrontation with someone talking to the shadow of the Lich King, just to keep our minds on the end goal, but it was generally your regular collection of kill, gather and visit quests.

I like Moa'ki Harbor more, which is good because it was one of the three quest hubs for the Tuskarrmageddon achievement that I finished with Kanter, my hunter, so I visited it a lot during Wrath.  As a pretty regular fisherman, I coveted (and eventually purchased) the Mastercraft Kalu'ak Fishing Pole, not just for the 30 additional fishing skill, but also the ability to breath underwater.  With it and the Reins of the Water Strider and the Angler's Fishing Raft from Anglers Reputation in Mists I have the option to swim under water, walk on the water/land, or raft of the water and fish.  These little things make me happy.

There is something very pleasant for me about the Walrus-like Kalu'ak.  I generally like animal races, but, also, in all their quests they just seem very centered.  I always feel uncomfortable with the repeatable quest to gather Snowfall Glade Pups and I had to do it many times to reach exalted with the Kalu'ak.  Yes, they try to justify it with saying that they are saving the pups, but killing their elders to take them away just seems wrong.

So that was this weeks brief visit to Dragonblight.  I should reach my goal for level 76 there next week and possibly I'll start working on Sholazar Basin.  I don't mind the thought of leveling to 80 in Northrend, but the thought of getting to level 85 so I can reach max level in my professions doesn't seem like fun at all.  I guess that says something about my experience with the Cataclysm questing zones.

A Week in an MMO Life: Ready to Boost

Brief visit back to Silithus

I remember spending a lot of time in Silithus in World of Warcraft getting Nature Protection gear and gathering Silithid Carapase Fragments for our guild.  It is a zone that changed very little with Cataclysm, which gives it a stronger sense of nostalgia than many of the zones I visited. 

To go back to where I left off, I completed the demon killing quest line in the Blasted Lands which included a visit to the Altar of Storms.  I remember seeing it on flights, but I had never done this quest line, so it was interesting to finally see why it was there and overall it was fun even if there was a lot of back and forth to the quest giver in a cave.  Surwich was a very odd addition to the zone.  It added a very different appearance and a totally separate quest line about a misguided druid to the zone that had been pretty consistent up to that point.  I received my zone achievement before I completed the quests but I went ahead and completed them so I could see the end of that quest line.  I will avoid the Surwich quest if I ever come back again.

Once I finished the Blasted Lands I was almost at 60 and the easy thing to do would have been to take the portal to Outland and finish up there.  However, I decided to use my Moonglade portal (given to all druids), take the long flight to Un'Goro Crater and then run to Silithus from there.  In Silithus was nice to have the same quests and quest givers that I remembered, but the first quests are quite a grind and some people were wiping out the Twilight Geolords almost as soon as they appeared.  After a few pack and forth trips, during which I hit level 60, they left and I was able to complete the early quest lines.  Still, like in the Blasted Lands, it was nice to see a busy zone.

One thing I noticed is that when I reached level 58, Flight form appeared, but since I was still in Azeroth, it required a Flight Master's License to use it.  This is another incentive (at least for druids) to visit Outland right away, but I am still much more interested in seeing the post Cataclysm quests than the early Outland quests that I've done 5 times before.

Now I'm ready to use my Level 90 Boost, but I'm still not sure when I will buy the Warlords of Draenor expansion.  I don't particularly want to have a 5th farm and I plan to take my priest and hunter into Draenor first, so I'll keep my money until anticipation gets the best of me.

With that primary objective accomplished I started leveling my death knight, Kinter, in the Borean Tundra in Northrend so I can use his Inscription profession.  This is my fourth time doing those quests, but they are some of the best quests in World of Warcraft.  Once I hit level 73, the mobs turned green (less experience), so I went to Dragonblight, another great zones for quests.  I look forward to making it to level 75 there and then I'll be ready to finish the quests in Sholazar Basin, the last I will need for my Loremaster in Northrend.

That will give me 3 out of the six Loremaster achievements, but I don't see myself ever finishing Kalimdor and the Eastern Kingdoms.  It says something about persistence as well as the ease of leveling that a casual player like me will soon have 5 max level characters and another in her 70s.  I have considered leveling both my shaman and a monk, since I know little of those classes, but I, like most of the other World of Warcraft players, am ready for something different now.  Bring on the Warlords.

A Week in an MMO Life: Catching up

It is nice having others playing, but can't you loot the corpses?

I haven't been posting much and I'm not sure why.  In any case, the good news (if you are me and want to write or if you want to read what I'm writing) is that I have three more posts in process.  I wonder if having more to read has meant less time to write.  In any case, in honor of the end of Blaugust (and Labor Day holidays), you get two posts in three days.  Congratulations to all those who participated!

Be the Cat

For the last few weeks my focus has been leveling my Druid, Kantree, in World of Warcraft to 60 so I use my instant 90 and have a max level Leatherworker (and Skinner) but only to do it when I am rested.  When I spoke about this last I had just started Feralas, which had been one of my favorite zones, and since then I've done the full Feralas, Thousand Needles, and Ungoro Crater zones and I'm about half way through Blasted Lands at level 58.

After being impressed with the changes in earlier zones, I was disappointed to see that the Sprite Darter quest series is gone in Feralas.  Overall, I guess there was more continuity to the zone, but that quest chain was one of my favorites and I like the old Feathermoon Island that is also no longer an Alliance town.  I spent many days fishing there in Vanilla and it's just not the same.  

Thousand Needles had probably the biggest change in any zone when the Cataclysm happened since it's flooded now.  However, I think the changes are good.  The earlier race track quests were amusing and I remember enjoying the griffin ones in the other area, but they were totally disconnected from each other and not very long.  The new set of quests gives you a boat to travel around in  (unfortuately, it only works in Thousand Needles) and I found it entertaining even if the quests were rather spread out.

The quests in Ungoro Crater seem very similar to what I remember when I leveled my warrior there during Burning Crusade.  That is probably a good thing, since they were fun then as well.  There is again a little more continuity and you get to turn into different creatures including a dinosaur (that someone used to kill one of the quest givers when I was trying to turn in a quest).  Fun zone!

I was amazed at how busy Blasted Lands were when I started questing there.  As a skinner, it was nice having all the extra skins to gather though it seemed like often times people wouldn't loot the corpses (as was the case in the screen shot above).  So far I've been enjoying it and I've been amazed it is so busy, but not so busy that it is difficult to complete the quests.  Anyone know why?  In any case, I'll reserve judgment until the end.   So far I've liked all the quest changes except for Feralas.

Death Knight Easy Mode

When I wanted to play and my rested buff hadn't built up on my Druid, I have been leveling my Death Knight, Kintri from 65 to 72.  I'd like to get her at least to 75 before Warlords of Draenor since she is my only character who has Inscription and I've built up many Inks and Herbs for her to use.  While I feel like I've learned my cat form while leveling up my druid, for my Frost Death Knight I just press one of three (now four) keys, which ever are available with an effort to hit them when they are lit up.  I guess I should look to see what they and others do, but things die so quickly with this method that there isn't any incentive to do it.

It says something that I don't remember most of the leveling I did from 65 to 70.  I did spend 68-70 leveling in Netherstorm since it is the only area in Outland that I haven't completed.  Now that I've switched to Borean Tundra in Northrend I am enjoying myself more.  I'll keep playing here until the quests or mobs turn green (less experience).  I'm not sure where I'll level except that I must do Sholazar Basin (once I get to the right level) since it is the only zone in Northrend where I don't have the quest achievement.

Next?

So I'm pretty close on my immediate goals of getting my Druid to 60 and my Death Knight to 75.  I'm not sure what I'll do next.  I might try to learn healing on my Priest, but that might be too much work.  I'm very close to having 100 mounts so that should be an obtainable goal.  Any suggestions?

A Week in an MMO: Exploring Azeroth again

Kentrei helping the Stillpine on Azuremyst Isle

I have started three posts since my last one, but I couldn't seem to get the motivation to actually write any of them, so you'll just get another summary of what I've been doing, primarily in World of Warcraft.

Rediscovering Cataclysm

I leveled four characters to 60 before Cataclysm and didn't have much incentive to revisit the zones afterwards.  The idea of the druid always appealed to me, but I like my hunter and I'd rather heal as a priest, so it never became a priority to level him.  However, since I plan to get Warlords of Draenor and I'd rather get the max level leatherworking profession with the included Instant Level 90 character offer, I've decided to level my druid to 60 and finally see some of the Cataclysm zones.

I'd like to see entire zones if possible, but I'd also like to take advantage of rested experience.  From my experience finishing up Stonetalon mountains and Desolace and starting on Feralas, that'll mean starting at level and becoming too high until you end up skipping a zone.  I enjoyed both new zones and Desolace seemed like a huge improvement from how it was originally.  After all this time I still distinctly remember looking at the quests where I could gain favor with one of the centaur groups but lose favor with the other.  Now the quests have been overhauled to unite the groups, leading to a much more satisfying experience for me at least.

Rediscovering Burning Crusade

I don't remember when, it might have been towards the end of Burning Crusade or Wrath of the Lich King, I decided to create a Draenae Shaman so I could experience the starting zone and the class (since I hadn't done anything significant on the Horde side).  I probably got about half way through Ambermyst Isle when she just became another bank and game mail location where I could send things without losing them.

Finally this month I have finished Ambermyst Isle and am now progressing through Bloodmyst Isle.  I was a little surprise to see there wasn't an achievement for Ambermyst Isle, though I'm doing it more for the experience and the lore than for the achievement.  I've said several times I don't see myself getting the Loremaster achievement, though I guess that could change.  It has been interesting finishing off these different zones together because it is easier to contrast them.  I think it is improved from the original starting zones, but I didn't find it nearly as involving as the Pandaria or Cataclysm zones.

Finishing off zones

As part of finding things to do, I went back and finished a few zones.  Kanter had been fewer than 10 quests from finishing both Blades End Mountain and Nagrand so I finished those off.  The WoW Pro leveling add made it easy to find the quests that I missed and generally it was fun revisiting that world I spent so much time in years ago.  I did run into one dilemma in Nagrand.  I had finished what I thought was all of the quests, but didn't have the achievement.  Eventually I figured out that it was because I hadn't done the Ring of Blood series of quests.  

For those who don't know, this is a series of progressively more difficult fights designed for 5 people that ended with what was at the time a good weapon.  Now it is trivial for a level 90, but when I showed up a level 64 player was already battling.  I had the decision to make whether or not I should help.  I asking the player, but it was a Horde character, and though they responded back, I couldn't read what they said.  I started to watch but once I saw the character have less health than the NPC they were fighting, I decided to help.  I can remember fighting on Timeless Isle and having people stand around as I died when the mob I was fighting had a sliver of health left.  I think it was the better decision given what I know, but others could have fairly acted differently.  After the fight they emoted a 'No' to me, so I think they would have rather tested themselves and it's unfortunate that they probably won't have that chance again with that character.  Certainly if someone asks you not to help them, you shouldn't, but in this case I had to act on the information I had.

Finally, during Wrath I had decided to complete the Icecrown quests with my priest.  She did many of them, but there were a set that required a group and I wasn't able to get a group together (being very late doing the content like I normally am).  Now I was finally able to complete those quests to get the 'Icecrown:  The Final Goal' achievement. I only have 'Into the Basin' to finish the Loremaster of Northrend achievement, so I'll probably get that done with my Death Knight.  I was very pleased with how the Pandaria Loremaster achievement was pretty easily done with two leveling characters and it will be nice to have Northrend done as well.  There really is a big cinematic change from Burning Crusade to Wrath, particularly in the quests.  It was a nice contrast to see them so close together and, again, I think it was an improvement.

I had to create a crest, right?

Introducing the Den of Iorek

For years I've thought about creating a guild to help with my pack rat mentality (yes, selling things would be a better way, but I'm not there).  Finally this last month I received help from my guild mates creating a personal guild, the Den of Iorek.  My favorite pet has always been the first bear that I tamed with the hunter quest around level ten about 10 and a half years ago.  I thought about putting Kanter in the name, but decided I would much rather honor his faithful companion and the character he's named after.  The guild bank seems huge and though it took me a little time to understand how it worked, I have two characters in the guild and the ability to add a whole lot of space for a lot cheaper than the cost of Royal Satchels.

I Can't Heal

About the time Kanter, my hunter, hit level 60 in the original game and I saw the number of hunters in my guild, I thought I'd like to level a priest and heal.  Kantra was born soon after and did some healing in the original dungeons, and even a little in Cataclysm, but never went on any raids.  I was thinking I might try to raid with her in Warlords of Draenor and keep thinking how I might want to prepare for that.  I don't want to do LFR and, even though I started the Legendary Cape quest line, I'd rather play with people I know.  I kept thinking I would try her in the Proving Grounds and finally got to it this month.  

I know Bronze is supposed to be easy, but as someone who has almost never healed and not in years, it was a learning experience.  For those who haven't done it, you travel to the Temple of the White Tiger and talk to an NPC who queues you for a solo scenario.  Once there, you have a series of fights with a five person group and you in the role of Tank, DPS, or Healer.  The first fights start out easy, but they get progressively harder and by the last (5th) fight I was always running out of mana. I think putting down the Lightwell put me over the top.  I guess it should have been obvious, but I've done so few dungeons or raids since the Lightwell was introduced, that I wasn't used to seeing it even.  

At least I was able to do Bronze and it might be enough to let me heal some dungeons or raids.  I would like to go back and try to get the Silver achievement, but I'm not sure I want to work that hard.

What's next

Besides finishing up getting my druid to level 60 and Bloodmyst Isle, I'm not sure what I want to do.  I am close to 100 mounts, so that is certainly achievable.  A day at a time I am producing Jard's Peculiar Energy Source so I should soon have my Sky Golem and Pierre to go with Jeeves.  I'm interested in trying out a monk and that could be a good third character for the Den of Iorek.  Maybe I'll try out my healing in groups and see if that's really something I want to do.