The World According to BangAnalyze

It’s been a couple of weeks (three actually) since I posted.  I actually have been taking a break from my main character due to some guild drama.  That and I’ve been toying around with a druid on the Antonidas server (Maverick).  I’ve never really played a caster toon all that seriously before, but since the druid is really a hybrid, it makes it somewhat easier!  I guess I should also mention that since it’s summertime, the temptation to sit on the patio at Cadillac Ranch in Irving, TX and relax and consume adult beverages is overwhelming.  If you ever happen to be in the area - try the Kobe beef tacos … they are awesome!

I’ve still been rolling through Ulduar twice a week with the guild, but there are a couple of folks that I would just as soon not hang out with.  That having been said, there’s absolutely no reason to cut off your nose to spite your face, and so I’m sticking with the Ulduar raids to learn the encounter and help out the rest of the folks in the guild as best I can.

Stay tuned - there will be more from the adventures of Tovarich and Maverick coming soon!

Woot!  Hit Exalted with Netherwing faction this morning, completed the final required quest to get my free Netherwing drake and promptly dropped my 1000g to pick up the remaining five drakes.  I don’t have a favorite, although the Veridian Netherwing drake does stand out.  I have to admit, I was very lucky with my Netherwing Egg drops - I picked up eight eggs three days in a row which shaved two full days off my rep grinding.

So now that Goal #1 is completed, here’s what’s left:

• Get to Exalted with the Alliance factions mainly by doing the Argent Tournament quests / dailies, with perhaps a few Cloth Quartermaster turn-ins here and there for good measure.  I’m doing this so I can buy all the mounts for each race (and get the title of Ambassador among other things)
• Get to Exalted with the Netherwing faction.  Why?  So I can buy the Netherwing drake mounts.
• Farm Baron Rivendare until he drops the skeleton horse.  I’ve done a couple of dozen solo runs now, and since he hasn’t dropped it, it’s becoming a matter of personal stubbornness.
• Get fishing up to 450.  Fishing is one of the tradeskills I’m not all that fond off.  I hated it in Everquest, and I’m not especially thrilled with it in WoW, but … there are some benefits.  The introduction of the Fishing Daily quests is making it far more palatable to grind up fishing than just sitting there for hours.
• Have 20,000 gold in the bank.  There’s really no reason for this other than the only thing I’ll be spending money on other than repairs - is mounts.
• Finally – get myself a drake or two.  If I can get to 50 mounts, I get the Albino Drake, and with a little luck, maybe the Mysterious Egg will yield a Green Proto-Drake.

And the progress report:

• I’m about halfway through Revered for both Ironforge and Stormwind, so I figure about two months doing nothing but Argent quests to finish those at a rate of 1,000 rep per day. 
• Since I’m apparently persona non grata in ten man groups in my guild, I will probably do a couple of Baron Rivendare runs tonight and pray that the gods are smiling. 
• Fishing is just going to happen when it happens - the daily quest is a nice motivator to fish at least. 
• I had just over 5,200g in the bank this morning … and promptly spent 1,000g on mounts.  Ah well, I knew that was going to happen.  Of course, since I’m only doing the occasional guild 25-man run, my repair bills are much lower!
• I’m up to 21 mounts now.  Next up for the focused rep grind will be the Sha’Tari Skyguard and their stable of Nether Rays.  According to my research it should take 30 - 35 days to get from Friendly to Exalted.  Hopefully it doesn’t wind up taking that long, but … whatever.  I am sort of patient.

OK, back to the grind!

For most, Mother’s Day is a day devoted to family time.  For me, it’s a ME day.  I’ll be doing laundry, cleaning the kitchen, doing the groceries – and of course, playing World of Warcraft.

This morning, I got up early to get my usual run through of Netherwing dailies out of the way.  For the second straight day, the gods were smiling on me – another eight egg haul = 2,000 free rep.  In two days, I’ve gotten to the halfway point of Revered rep.  And I still haven’t done the “Earning Your Wings” quests – the quests themselves just annoy me.  At this rate, I should have my Netherwing faction quests completed by Friday at the latest – meaning I get to spend some $$$ on new mounts!

But the Netherwing quests aren’t the only ones I’ve been focusing on.  I’m halfway through Revered with Stormwind as well courtesy of the Argent tournament quests.  Since I can only get 1,000 rep per day, it will be another couple of weeks till I can go get all the horse mounts.  After that, I’ll take care of the Ironforge rep (almost halfway through Revered there also) and then worry about the other two.

I would like to say that I’ll be doing some raiding this weekend too, but for the second week in a row, my services are not required in Ulduar.  That’s 0/2 for guild Ulduar raids so far.  I’m betting that if I stick with the guild, I might get to run a 25-man Ulduar sometime in August or September.  I’m not really surprised – I’m not part of the “in” crowd in the guild.

Speaking of the “in” crowd, there’s been quite a bit of drama this week in the guild.  First, a couple of stand up members, Betoken and Darkstone left the guild.  I liked both of them very much, and loved running instances with them – their loss will be keenly felt.  I suspect that I won’t be part of the guild too much longer at this rate – I don’t agree with the way that the guild is dividing into the haves and have-not’s.  The guild’s leadership is way too focused on their own progression and to hell with everyone else. 

I took particular exception to the asshole – that means you, Sunderwu – who told me that if I wasn’t part of the “core” group to just go find Pick Up Groups to run with rather than “wait for the guild raids” to gear me up.  Wonderful hypocrisy from a prick who looted 21 out of the 621 looted item drops on guild 25-man Naxxramas runs.  Those 21 drops – second most for all guild members.  I guess it’s OK for him to get geared up by the guild but to hell with everyone else.

Anyways – back to chores and grinding.  At some point, I probably should pick a second character to level up just for variety’s sake …

A quick nod to my fellow Bon Jovi fans there!  The Netherwing faction grind is going better than expected.  I’m halfway through Honored and I still haven’t completed the “Earning Your Wings” quests which would give me around 3k rep I think.  Actually – I’ve been avoiding that quest line because I suck at the flying part of the game.  I’ve been reading up on tips & tricks and I have a couple of new things to try tonight to see if I can get through these six races.

But – things are definitely looking good, although I suspect that with a bit more luck around Netherwing Egg spawns, I might already be done with Honored and working on the push to Exalted and a bunch of new mounts!

What would also be nice would be the ability to grind rep by killing mobs outside of a quest – even if killing the mobs was only worth 10 to 25 rep, that would be a huge boost.  Ah well, if only I was a Blizzard developer.  Nevertheless, I’m hoping to finish off Honored by the weekend, and spend next week grinding up to Exalted …

Another early morning, another half dozen quests for Netherwing completed.  My standing with the faction is now Honored, which means that the Booterang daily quest is now available.  Every now and then Blizzard tosses in a quirky quest – usually a nod to the Warcraft RTS series.  The quests usually involve waking up lazy peons and getting them back to work.  Normally, you have to hoof it around on foot, but since the Netherwing quests require flying skill – you can tag the Peons from the air.

I must admit, that it is somewhat satisfying to fly around and throw stuff at mobs.  That having been said, the region in which the Disobedient Dragonmaw Peons are found is a bit of a nightmare to navigate on a drake.  Lots of elevation changes, outcroppings and even the occasional mob to avoid – but I suspect with a bit more practice, the flying bit will get easier.

One thing I did notice is that, like the Netherwing eggs, there seem to be very few Disobedient Dragonmaw Peons to target.  I can only imagine the frenzy when Burning Crusade content was the latest available and everyone was trying to get their Netherwing faction.  Even this morning, being the only one out there, it took me around ten minutes to find twenty Peons to chastise.

Still – I did get most of my Netherwing dailies done and I’m sitting at around 625 points into Honored.  At this rate, it should take me about another week or so (assuming no eggs) to get to Revered …

Not a bad WoW night, I must admit.  Despite several wipes on Emalon (that’s why you don’t rush in boys and girls!), I managed to net just over 150g and knock out all the daily quests I wanted to.

The guild is working on getting 10- and 25-man Ulduar runs together – which means I need to make even more money to foot the hefty repair bill that will no doubt ensue.  Personally, I would have no objection doing another dozen 25-man Naxxramas runs and then tackling Malygos and Sarharion for a while instead.  But, I’m not the guild raid leader so …

… and apparently I’m not part of the “core” group for our 10-man Ulduar CST group.  On one hand, that means smaller repair bills.  On the other hand – progression comes to a screeching halt unless I want to PUG those runs.  I think not, somehow.

OK, that’s it for today.  Up with the dawn patrol again tomorrow and back out to Shadowmoon Valley to farm Netherwing rep.  Tomorrow’s goal is to get 1,000 points into Honored.

I felt like crap last night, so I wound up going to bed very early (no, I’m pretty sure it isn’t H1N1, but who knows).  Got up this morning and figured I’d try and get through my Netherwing dailies before going to work.  Of all the repeatable quests, the one involving the turn-in for Netherwing eggs is the most annoying.  If you get lucky enough to find egg spawns, you can truly rack up some quick faction.  The problem is finding the spawns up.  All the research I’ve done on the eggs indicates that they are on a one hour respawn timer.  Of course, that make it a complete crap shoot.

This morning, I was lucky enough to find five eggs up – a quick 1250 Netherwing rep.  In two days, Tovarich has gone from hated to 3/4 of the way through Friendly.  I’m rather pleased with the progression – I still figure it will take another two to three weeks at least of daily rep grinding to reach Exalted.  As with all dailies, you can make some reasonable cash doing the quests – this morning I’m up around 50g from quest rewards, loot and junk drops.  All in all, not a bad return for an hour’s questing.

I finally decided that trying to blog about all kinds of stuff simply wasn’t working, so I whacked everything and decided to start all over again with a new focus.  World of Warcraft.  Why not?  After all, I spend anywhere from twenty to forty hours a week playing the game, so why not keep a journal about it … right?

Tovarich is my main toon.  He’s a L80 Protection-spec’d Night Elf Warrior on the Icecrown server.  He’s part of the Winds of War guild.  In the grand scheme of things, his gear isn’t terrible – a few pieces of Tier 7.5 gear and just under 27,000 hit points unbuffed.  He’s done 10- and 25-man Naxxramas several times, some heroics here and there, and even taken a pounding in 10-man Ulduar.  In other words, a fairly serviceable tank. 

My problem with playing Tovarich is that I never really decided what to do with him once I hit L80.  I played around with the dailies, got to Exalted with the Argent Dawn / Crusade factions, Knights of the Ebon Blade and got the tradeskills up to a decent level, but … now what.  It’s sort of sad, but I do miss the level grind every now and then.

So today, before logging on, I made a list of what I want to do with Tovarich when I’m off soloing.  Here it is:

• Get to Exalted with the Alliance factions mainly by doing the Argent Tournament quests / dailies, with perhaps a few Cloth Quartermaster turn-ins here and there for good measure.  I’m doing this so I can buy all the mounts for each race (and get the title of Ambassador among other things)
• Get to Exalted with the Netherwing faction.  Why?  So I can buy the Netherwing drake mounts.
• Farm Baron Rivendare until he drops the skeleton horse.  I’ve done a couple of dozen solo runs now, and since he hasn’t dropped it, it’s becoming a matter of personal stubbornness.
• Get fishing up to 450.  Fishing is one of the tradeskills I’m not all that fond off.  I hated it in Everquest, and I’m not especially thrilled with it in WoW, but … there are some benefits.  The introduction of the Fishing Daily quests is making it far more palatable to grind up fishing than just sitting there for hours.
• Have 20,000 gold in the bank.  There’s really no reason for this other than the only thing I’ll be spending money on other than repairs - is mounts.
• Finally – get myself a drake or two.  If I can get to 50 mounts, I get the Albino Drake, and with a little luck, maybe the Mysterious Egg will yield a Green Proto-Drake.

Not terribly lofty goals, but they are things that will take a good deal of time to complete.  I figure by the time I get through doing all these quests and assuming that the stars align and I get a few lucky drops, it will be time for the next expansion – and a whole new level grind!