Warlords of Draenor - Day 7

Day 7 - Barracks to level 2. I also maxxed out my Mining and Jewelcrafting to 700/700 skill level. I built a stables and it gave me a quest to go to Shadowmoon Valley. My daily fishing quest also wanted me to head over there.

 

 

Before heading out to Shadowmoon Valley, I had to fix my transmog. With both my Holy and Ret sets sharing several pieces of armour, I had to go with a single transmog.

 

I was surprised to find a neutral Orc town, Exile's Rise, run by the Shadowmoon Exiles. I grab the flight path then do the stables quest.

I ended up exploring the whole zone, killing all the rares and collecting all the treasure I see.

TLDR - Full of Alliance, No Blood Knights

Shadowmoon Valley gets 1 out of 5 Phoenix Insignias.

Warlords of Draenor - Day 6

 Day 6 - I hit level 100 early on and upgrade my garrison to level 3. I pushed my Pet Menagerie to Level 2, but I haven't done the pet fight daily there yet.

 The rest of the time, I was questing in the Spires of Arak.

The story expanded on the history of both the Apexis and Arakkoa civilizations. It is also about three gods and the major impact each of them has on the Arakkoa in their history. It was a compelling story that adds depth & context to the older Outland Arakkoa Content.

One of the quests Hot Seat was bugged for me. I was inside the crystal so I couldn't see anything. Luckily if I grouped with someone else who was doing it, I got quest credit. The rest of the time my time in Spires of Arak was bug free.

The Goblin Town, Pinchwhistle Gearworks, not as compelling story. It had the usual Goblin levels of humour but it just felt like filler.

Spires of Arak has plenty of jumping puzzles too. If they added flying to Draenor it would entirely ruin the fun. But I know plenty of people who don't like jumping puzzles.

Arak Star
Between Arak and a Hard Place

TLDR - Strong Story, Zone itself is interesting, Quests above average.

Spires of Arak gets 4 out of 5 Phoenix Insignias.

I was level 100 just after I started this zone.

Warlords of Draenor - Day 5

 

Day 5 - After a few chores in the garrison, I head off to Talador.

This expansion has been very kind to me. First with all the Frostwolves content. I have been a member of the Frostwolves guild since 25th Jun 25, 2009 (and my warrior Atain has always been part of that clan in his backstory). 

 But now in Talador we got Blood Knights. Lady Liadrin, Blood Knight Matriarch, is leading the Sunsworn (Belf Magi/Rangers/Blood Knights) in Talador to fight the Burning Legion in Auchindoun and the Iron Horde in Shattrath City. As usual I will avoid spoilers as to the shape this story takes, but I loved it.

The quests weren't as strong as Gorgrond, but leveraged with a far more compelling story. Wonderful music again.

 

McTacky's Note To self: I really need to get a Son of Animus to fit in with my fellow Blood Knight peeps. A good Blood Elf must always keep up with the latest in fashion and Blood Golems are so hip right now.

 

You have become unfashionable Sunreaver Micro-Sentry!

 

I want More Talador
Don't Let the Tala-door ...

 

TLDR - Story excellent, quests strong.

Talador gets 5 out of 5 Phoenix Insignias.

I was level 99 when I finished this zone.

Warlords of Draenor - Day 4

Day 4:  Lumbermill, Storehouse and Gem Boutique are all upgraded to level 2.

 I returned to Gorgrond and discovered there were some new quests! It seemed that by choosing the Sparring Pit, the quest giver had been phased out earlier. With it all fixed, many of my issues about the zone having a weak story was resolved. While the story is still not as strong as Frostfire Ridge, the quest design is excellent.

 

 

The local Pet Tamer, Cymre Brightblade was a difficult fight with two of the pets being able to restore their health to full after dying. After several attempts I made a team to defeat the powerful archaeologist.

Putting the Gore in Gorgrond

Gorgrond Monster Hunter

 

 With the additional quests plus the ones I hadn't done yesterday filled out the zone a lot more than what appeared to only be scattered with Bonus Objectives & Monster Hunting without much of a story connecting them. There was now a story and the movement though the zone was cohesive.

 

I didn't encounter any quest bugs today which was good. The Quests and the Monster Hunting was fun, but the story in the end still let the zone down.

TLDR - Quest design excellent, but story is weak.

Gorgrond gets 3 out of 5 Phoenix Insignias.

I was level 97 when I finished this zone.

Warlords of Draenor - Day 3

 

So I began my third day in Draenor!

 

 

The first thing I did was camp out the slow spawn rate Fishing Shack Quest. Eventually I got my four kills and unlocked the shack and then upgraded it to level 2.

 

There was a 'debate' in General Chat. Should you take a Mining Node if a fellow Horde is near it. I am on the side that you wait and see if that Horde is a miner or not before touching that node. I learnt that lesson way back in the day in Badlands during Classic.

 

With Frostfire Ridge finished, I headed over to Gorgrond. The story here is no where near as strong as the Frostfire Ridge story, but I enjoyed the quests here.

 

I caught a couple more new pets and managed to reach Level 95 before having to log out for a few hours.

 

 

When I came back I found myself in a 17 hour queue to get back in.

In the end I was in the queue from 5pm to 8:44pm, with a server shutdown scheduled for 10pm.

 

 

During the hour-or-so I was able to play, I managed to hit Level 96 and saw more of the green side of Gorgrond.

 

I haven't finished the zone yet, so no rating yet.

Warlords of Draenor - Day 2

So I logged in for my second day of Warlords of Draenor!

 At the start of my second day I head to my garrison and finish the previously bugged quest.

After doing some quests I push my garrison to level 2 and are able to choose some buildings. Jewelcrafting, Supply Depot and a Lumber mill. Upgraded Mine to Level 2. Was unable to finish off the Fishing Quest because the respawn rate is low and a lot of people are camping it.

 

I showed my Lumbermill guy what a Tree looked like. I don't think his hat is Health-And-Safety approved

You'll Get Caught Up In The... Frostfire!

I ended up finishing all the Frostfire Ridge Story. I won't be posting spoilers, but you get to know a group of characters from the Frostwolves over the coarse of the zone and aid them in a series of quests. The quests themselves were over-crowded I'll have to do the zone again on an Alt to fully appreciate them. The quests being overcrowded and buggy didn't help either.

I finished the day at level 94.

TLDR - Liked story & garrison. Didn't like bugs at chokepoint quests.

Frostfire Ridge gets 3 out of 5 Phoenix Insignias.

Warlords of Draenor - Day 1

 

8:45pm Server Time: We all receive the quest and head to our nearest copy of Khadgar.

 

Adventure in Tanaan Jungle with McTacky's Boss, Lady Liadrin. They are both holding their Quel'Delar. Did some quests with my guildie Biship.

 

McTacky under a stone with the Frostwolf Carving. It is near where the garrison should be, but a bug prevented the quest [Establish Your Garrison] from being completed.

 

 There was a server restart, but everyone was removed from Draenor. No one on the Saurfang Server could get back on to Draenor. Transfer Aborted: Instance not Found.

This situation is still ongoing at the time of this post.

But you could still queue for dungeons so I went and did Bloodmaul Slag Mines twice with guildies Navi, HK, and Xyn before midnight. I had fun in the dungeon!

I got to level 91 though the Dungeon and Pet Battling in Pandaria.

All about the Pet Battles

In the lead up to the new Pokémon remakes of Sapphire and Ruby, I have been doing a lot of Warcraft Pet Battles.

Pro Pet Mob - I kept levelling and levelling pets. My first dozen pets were levelled to level 25 the old way of grinding random fights. The next dozen were powered by random world fights in Four Winds with the higher level pets there to do the actual kill.

During the lead up to my [The Longest Day] a month ago, I started levelling up teams of pets to deal with the Tamers in Pandaria. After [The Longest Day] was done, I ended up with a collection of pets that could defeat the tamers around Pandaria and levelling my other pets became much faster.

Even with [Pro Pet Mob] completed, I am still levelling pets.

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[The Celestial Tournament] - This took longer to prepare for than Longest Day. I found it to be a nice strategic challenge. Find the right three pets for each fight and use the right moves at the right times without the ability to heal. My favourite pet the [Phoenix Hatchling] didn't end up on any of the teams, but I ended up having to level up a lot of pets I hadn't levelled up yet.

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Grey/White Elimination - I no longer have any poor quality pets and only have two common quality pets. I've been traveling Azeroth collection Uncommon/Rare versions of all the pets I have and releasing my old Poor/Common pets. Once the last two Common Pets are replaced, there won't be much time before WoD, but I plan to start hunting down Rares to replace Uncommons.

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Breeds of Pets - So far I haven't cared about collecting certain breeds of battle pets. All I have worried about so far is the quality. Then I ended up with a pile of [Iron Starlett] over all my alts and I can only keep three as learned, the only difference between them is their breed. For the quest time I had to consider - which was the best [Iron Starlett]s for me to keep? Health/Health, Power/Power, Health/Power, Health/Speed, Power/Balance? I had levelled a P/P to 25, only to realise Power+ was overkill and perhaps more Health or Speed would be better to level next.

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Friendship - I've had a lot of help with my Pet Battles with Crooked, Luxy and Navi. Beyond strategies, they put me onto the PetBattle Teams addon to help manage all the large number of pets I now have.