Plodding onwards
That’s what it feels like, as I continue leveling. I am not bored of leveling yet, but I am getting fidgety. People running heroics left and right and I have yet to run more instances, which are the heart of the game for me. Kadomi is now 77, and I really did not know how much I missed flying until I had it again. In celebration, I explored the zones I haven’t touched on Kadomi, which gained me the Northrend and World Explorer achievement. Just so you know, Brann Bronzebeard, your tabard sucks. It’s ugly, my guild tabard > dwarf tabards. I also found my new home and favorite zone ever, Sholazar Basin. Why? Saronite nodes whereever you fly! I had bought all saronite so far, but yesterday I flew around like mad to get enough saronite for two Saronite Bulwarks and a Saronite Protector for guildies and me. Hooray!
I am still questing in the Grizzly Hills at the moment. After the epicness of Dragonblight, Grizzly Hills was a let-down. Pretty zone, but I get to kill worgs and deer for their meat? Very exciting. *yawn* Thankfully, the quest quality improved, and I did enjoy the Drakuru quests, all the old buddies from Zul’Aman, including Harrison Jones, and the Titan storyline. However, I wish that the Dun Argol quests didn’t require you to ride back to the freaking place six times in a row. Another thing I really loved was the worgens. Can’t wait to do that final quest of the chain. Thumbs up, Blizzard, bringing back old villains is awesome.
I finally managed to run Ahn’kahet, which I found very enjoyable, both as tank and as resto shaman (who is 74.5 atm, another reason I am leveling so slowly). The visuals are quite stunning, the boss encounters are all pretty fun, good stuff. I did enjoy it more with the group of my shaman, as we were of the right level for the instance, in the group I tanked for, we were all way too high-level for the place, me being the lowest at 76. This week I really need to push harder to see more instances, I definitely want to get Drak’tharon Keep and Violet Hold done.
I finally completed my gear spreadsheets, both for Kadomi and Garande (the shaman I keep talking about). I think I have my ultimate shopping list for pre-Naxx and pre-heroics, which I am going to share with all of you tomorrow. It didn’t seem very tough to accomplish.
Speaking of gear, I have started making the pieces of Tempered Saronite that are better than my old tanking gear, and with heavy heart I have replaced a lot of badge gear already. Aside from those pieces, nothing much has changed. I love my new Saronite Bulwark that I just crafted. I replaced the Zul’jin axe with Crimson Cranium Crusher from the Amphitheater of Anguish chain in Zul’Drak. Gosh, this thing is huge. It’s so ugly. It’s stats are so awesome. Mwah. This will have to serve as my tanking weapon until I get Crescent of Brooding Fury.
Three Car Garage (10 player)
Volazj's Quick Demise
Storming the Citadel (10 player)
I've Gone and Made a Mess (10 player)
Nerf Gravity Bombs (10 player)
As a warrior tank – you’re not concerned by the slow speeds of both the CCC and Crescent of Brooding Fury?
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admin Reply:
December 1st, 2008 at 8:43 pm
No, not concerned at the moment. The end-goal before I start hitting Heroics and Naxx will be Eternally Folded Blade with its 1.6 speed, but as I level and work on getting gear, the Zul’Drak axe will do just fine, with the racial bonus for me. The max damage of the mace is a lot higher than my previous axe that I will be building threat faster even with a slower weapon.
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The quests in Storm Peaks lead to getting rep with Son’s of Hurin, which needs to be exalted for the good shoulder enchants. You might want to get started on those at 77 since it is a long reputation grind.
I got the Eternally Folded Blade on my second run of Halls of Lightning. It is serving me well. Note that the instance is supposed to be for level 80 but we ran it with varied levels of 75-80.
Tankette´s last blog post..Getting caught up
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Hawksong Reply:
December 1st, 2008 at 10:01 pm
I agree: The Sons of Hodir rep should be started before 80. They have the only PvE shoulder enchants in the expansion, the questline just to become “friendly” is long, and it opens up three daily quests at friendly (with 2 more at honored, I’m told). All this is in addition to the decent quest rewards and XP.
I don’t know the exact quest that kicks off the chain, but it starts at the goblin outpost K3 in Storm Peaks.
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admin Reply:
December 1st, 2008 at 10:09 pm
Thanks for the advice, then I’ll head there once I am done with Grizzly Hills to get that started.
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Tankette Reply:
December 2nd, 2008 at 7:37 pm
The starting quest is “They took our men” in K3. When you are in the mine for that quest you end up getting quests from the Crone. Then it is a long quest chain to complete. Plan on 5-8 hours to get through those quests.
Then plan on 3 weeks of doing the dailies to hit exalted unless you want to devote hours looking for Everfrost Chips (which are hard as heck to find!). If I am actively searching, I average finding one per half hour. That’s a lot of boring searching for the 350 rep they give. You are probably better off to just keep an eye out for them while doing the dailies instead of spending all the time it takes to find them.
There are a total of 6 dailies. Three open up at Friendly. Two more open up at honored. I can’t remember if the 6th one, Thrusting Hodir’s Spear, opens up at honored or revered. That quest is hard. Even after doing it 5 or 6 times it still takes me 2-3 attempts. A failed attempt means death and repairs (you can unequip your gear to avoid big repair bills).
I have about 6-7 more days of dailies to hit exatled depending on my luck with finding Everfrost Chips.
Tankette´s last blog post..DPS makes a big difference
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I just dinged 80 last night and cant wait to get into some 80 instances and heroics. I should be able to get my 540 defense with a few enchants, so uncrittable is very close.
Darraxus´s last blog post..Ding 80!!!! About damn time.
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admin Reply:
December 1st, 2008 at 10:09 pm
Grats!
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Wouldn’t Crescent of Brooding Fury be a much better tanking weapon? It’s a pretty easy to obtain quest reward.
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Aargh, I need to learn to read, somehow I read “until I get Eternally Folded Blade.” /embarassed
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Well, I had the sun eater all through leveling till I got Eternally folded blade. After which I ran H. Pinnacle for the Epic sword out of there (it didnt drop *sad*) but my first day though naxx I got the: http://www.wowhead.com/?item=39344 (I dont know how to do the item codes
)
So it was a fair upgrade
I’ve been running H. VH for the pants out of there off the last boss – http://www.wowhead.com/?item=43500
Getting close to 80 now =D Congrats
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You should consider getting this weapon: http://www.wowhead.com/?item=44734. It is a very easy group quest.
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admin Reply:
December 2nd, 2008 at 11:02 am
That’s the same group quest that also rewards with Crescent of Brooding Fury. As orc axes are better for me because of the racial bonus.
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Tensas Reply:
December 2nd, 2008 at 3:04 pm
Ok, not sure what speed of the weapon means for a warrior. As a protection paladin, I don’t want a slow weapon. So, the racial bonus wouldn’t be as good as the speed.
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Tankette Reply:
December 2nd, 2008 at 7:44 pm
Faster is better but it isn’t a giant difference. I tanked a lot of the instances with the Crescent without any difficulty before getting the Eternally Folded Blade.
Tankette´s last blog post..DPS makes a big difference
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Just picked up the crescent myself. Although I think I should have taken the mace reward being a dwarf. My fault for questing with my 2yo on my lap.
Saronite nodes are indeed all over the place in the basin, however so are the damn gold farmers, at least on my server.
Getting ganked by 2 level 80s as you try to mine the elusive Titanium node is very frustrating.
Looking forward to your shopping list.
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Tankette Reply:
December 2nd, 2008 at 7:42 pm
Ice Crown has a lot of nodes with a lot less people farming. I usually spend an hour a day farming ore. I start in Sholazar and see how hard it is to find ore that doesn’t have someone on it before deciding to move on to Ice Crown or not. There are several nodes in Ice Crown that you can’t mine because the mobs will ovewhelm you but many are available without killing any mobs or just a few of them.
I generally get about 6-10 titanium ore and 10+ stacks of saronite ore per day.
Tankette´s last blog post..DPS makes a big difference
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