I have a new love, and his name is podcast. I don't know what corner of the internet I missed, but listening to postcasts just wasn't something I'd ever gotten interested in.
Until now.
Now I am obsessed with listening to podcasts. When I'm at work, while driving, even while playing! Here's what I've been listening to:
The Hunting Party Podcast - hosted by The Warcraft Hunters Union's own Frostheim, OutDPS's Euripides (these two guys also write regular articles over at Wow.com) and Darkbrew from The Brew Hall. They'll tell you everything you need to know about hunters in a fun and entertaining way. My heroes!
Call to Auction - A podcast about making gold, and lots of it. With hosts Markco from Just my Two Copper and Euripides (him again?!?) you'll crack up while learning how to make more gold than a Goblin.
The WoW Insider Show - If you read WoW.com you should listen to this show. And if you don't read WoW.com, what's the matter with you?!?
The Instance - Another hilarious podcast that keeps me in stitches. I adore the intros they use for the segments! This podcast about all thing WoW is hosted by Scott Johnson and Randy Jordan. I insist you read the introductions for these guys on their page, they're too funny to miss.
Take a listen, you won't be disappointed!
Showing posts with label warcraft. Show all posts
Showing posts with label warcraft. Show all posts
Thursday, September 9, 2010
Sunday, September 5, 2010
Pets... for all!
I'll admit, I chose the hunter class for the pet. There was just something magical about the thought of adventuring with my trusty companion at my side. One of the things I am the most excited to see in Cataclysm is the stable expansion. I just can't get enough fuzzy little creatures!
But hunters are not the only ones with trusty companions. No, I don't mean Warlocks with their back-talking demons, nor Mages with their sloshy water elementals. No! Not even Shaman, Druids, Shadow Priests or Death Knights. (Hunters are still the "pet class" ... right?)
No, I say! The critters! Sure, they're weak and cower at the sight of an aggressive monster, but they're there! They're at our sides! They go good on toast!
Just for fun
I am of course talking about the massive amount of non-combat pets currently available in the game. Of the various collectibles in the game, non-combat pets are some of the most diverse and difficult to obtain; especially with many of the pets only available at the various real-world events Blizzard hosts. At a grand total of 158 pets you can spend a long, long time collecting these pets, but after the first "OMG where did you get THAT! /jealous" you'll be hooked.
Where to start
Every avid pet collector should start at Warcraft Pets. Run by an adorable little female Gnome named Breanni, this is a one-stop resource for both building and keeping track of your collections. She also keeps us up to date on the latest and greatest in the world of pet collecting in her news and updates section.
With the first achievement reward (an adorable little skunk!) at 50 pets, beginning your collection can be daunting. Luckily you can buy quite a few pets from vendors. Nearly every race has at least one pet for sale in their home town, the exceptions of course being Trolls and Gnomes, as they do not have a home town. There are rumors of new racial pets for these two races in Cataclysm, but there are none in the live game at this time.
Below are the vendors for the various races. You'll want to note that you of course cannot buy the opposite factions' pets yourself, but they are often on both the normal and Neutral Auction Houses. Or, if you have a friend willing to help, you can log on to a character of the opposite faction, buy them, then use the Neutral Auction House to make the swap. You can't buy the auctions out yourself, but this is what the friend is for!
The Alliance
Ironforge - Technically this cute little bunny is found in Dun Morogh
Stormwind - These kitties can actually be found in Elwynn Forest, sold by the Crazy Cat Lady
Darnassus - Here you'll find couple of owls, sold by the Owl Trainer
The Exodar - Fluttery and colorful, you can purchase the moths from Sixx the Moth Keeper
The Horde
Orgrimmar - It could be argued that these snakes are actually the Troll pet.
Undercity - It figures the undead would have a roach for a companion.
Thunder Bluff - Our tall Tauren teammates will sell you a puny prairie pup. (Mmmm, alliteration.)
Silvermoon - Not precisely in Silvermoon, you can add Dragonhawks to your collection in Eversong Woods.
With a bit of running (or maybe a handy mage), a little gold and maybe a buddy, your collection quickly goes from 0 to 17. You may notice that some of the links I provided contain pets I didn't mention. Some are also from vendors, such as the red moth, but are harder to acquire at a lower level without help. From here I recommend you begin picking up pet from the other, scattered vendors, scour the auction house and begin setting up shop in some of the drop locations for the rarer pets. You'll soon find yourself with a collection to be envied.
Oh, and say hi to Breanni in Dalaran. She's a great resource for pet collecting, both in and out of the game!
But hunters are not the only ones with trusty companions. No, I don't mean Warlocks with their back-talking demons, nor Mages with their sloshy water elementals. No! Not even Shaman, Druids, Shadow Priests or Death Knights. (Hunters are still the "pet class" ... right?)
No, I say! The critters! Sure, they're weak and cower at the sight of an aggressive monster, but they're there! They're at our sides! They go good on toast!
Just for fun
I am of course talking about the massive amount of non-combat pets currently available in the game. Of the various collectibles in the game, non-combat pets are some of the most diverse and difficult to obtain; especially with many of the pets only available at the various real-world events Blizzard hosts. At a grand total of 158 pets you can spend a long, long time collecting these pets, but after the first "OMG where did you get THAT! /jealous" you'll be hooked.
Where to start
Every avid pet collector should start at Warcraft Pets. Run by an adorable little female Gnome named Breanni, this is a one-stop resource for both building and keeping track of your collections. She also keeps us up to date on the latest and greatest in the world of pet collecting in her news and updates section.
With the first achievement reward (an adorable little skunk!) at 50 pets, beginning your collection can be daunting. Luckily you can buy quite a few pets from vendors. Nearly every race has at least one pet for sale in their home town, the exceptions of course being Trolls and Gnomes, as they do not have a home town. There are rumors of new racial pets for these two races in Cataclysm, but there are none in the live game at this time.
Below are the vendors for the various races. You'll want to note that you of course cannot buy the opposite factions' pets yourself, but they are often on both the normal and Neutral Auction Houses. Or, if you have a friend willing to help, you can log on to a character of the opposite faction, buy them, then use the Neutral Auction House to make the swap. You can't buy the auctions out yourself, but this is what the friend is for!
The Alliance
Ironforge - Technically this cute little bunny is found in Dun Morogh
Stormwind - These kitties can actually be found in Elwynn Forest, sold by the Crazy Cat Lady
Darnassus - Here you'll find couple of owls, sold by the Owl Trainer
The Exodar - Fluttery and colorful, you can purchase the moths from Sixx the Moth Keeper
The Horde
Orgrimmar - It could be argued that these snakes are actually the Troll pet.
Undercity - It figures the undead would have a roach for a companion.
Thunder Bluff - Our tall Tauren teammates will sell you a puny prairie pup. (Mmmm, alliteration.)
Silvermoon - Not precisely in Silvermoon, you can add Dragonhawks to your collection in Eversong Woods.
With a bit of running (or maybe a handy mage), a little gold and maybe a buddy, your collection quickly goes from 0 to 17. You may notice that some of the links I provided contain pets I didn't mention. Some are also from vendors, such as the red moth, but are harder to acquire at a lower level without help. From here I recommend you begin picking up pet from the other, scattered vendors, scour the auction house and begin setting up shop in some of the drop locations for the rarer pets. You'll soon find yourself with a collection to be envied.
Oh, and say hi to Breanni in Dalaran. She's a great resource for pet collecting, both in and out of the game!
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
Cataclysm: Day One To-Do list
I'm sure everyone planning to purchase Cataclysm on release day has some idea of what they will be doing Day One. I, however, have flip-flopped so often that I don't even know what I want anymore. Everything just sound like so much fun! So far, I have narrowed it down to:
Level my 80s (Hunter)
Leveling my currently level-capped characters is always the first thought I come to. I probably will end up leveling my hunter right from the get go, but it's always so tempting to consider leveling a new character because of new races or classes, leveling my professions and in general checking everything out. Cataclysm presents a whole new kind of temptation, however.
Starting Over
With the release of Cataclysm our characters' homeland is changing; and not just changing, catastrophically changing in a lot of cases. This means everything from new sights to new quests to a potentially all-new leveling experience. This is going to be a real problem for me, as I currently have 9 of 10 on my home server. The final spot is already saved for a Worgen, but I also want to transfer my Shaman make to home-base, so I'll have to delete some one.
Leveling the new Races
This is by far the most tempting to consider. I'm super excited about the new Worgen zone, and I've heard great things about the Gobs. (Great green gobs of greasy grimy gopher... sorry.) Lore is something I've always been supremely interested in, and the lore behind what's going on with these two groups is nothing short of epic. And speaking of lore...
Lore, lore, galore!
There is soooooo MUCH going on on the lore front in Cataclysm I am honestly not sure what I am most excited about. If you've read the new intros Blizzard released you already know *SPOILER ALERT* that Cairne is killed in some sort of duel with Garrosh (/spit) , everyone but the Tauren are booted from the main parts of Orgrimmar, the Trolls re-take Echo Isles and Thrall leaves the leadership to ol' angry orc. And that's just the horde! The alliance get a new puppy, loses a leader to a terrible tragedy, welcomes back old friends, and a big hole opens up in their backyard.
So what will I be doing on release day? Probably tearing my hair out, trying to do everything at once. And I'll love ever minute.
Level my 80s (Hunter)
Leveling my currently level-capped characters is always the first thought I come to. I probably will end up leveling my hunter right from the get go, but it's always so tempting to consider leveling a new character because of new races or classes, leveling my professions and in general checking everything out. Cataclysm presents a whole new kind of temptation, however.
Starting Over
With the release of Cataclysm our characters' homeland is changing; and not just changing, catastrophically changing in a lot of cases. This means everything from new sights to new quests to a potentially all-new leveling experience. This is going to be a real problem for me, as I currently have 9 of 10 on my home server. The final spot is already saved for a Worgen, but I also want to transfer my Shaman make to home-base, so I'll have to delete some one.
Leveling the new Races
This is by far the most tempting to consider. I'm super excited about the new Worgen zone, and I've heard great things about the Gobs. (Great green gobs of greasy grimy gopher... sorry.) Lore is something I've always been supremely interested in, and the lore behind what's going on with these two groups is nothing short of epic. And speaking of lore...
Lore, lore, galore!
There is soooooo MUCH going on on the lore front in Cataclysm I am honestly not sure what I am most excited about. If you've read the new intros Blizzard released you already know *SPOILER ALERT* that Cairne is killed in some sort of duel with Garrosh (/spit) , everyone but the Tauren are booted from the main parts of Orgrimmar, the Trolls re-take Echo Isles and Thrall leaves the leadership to ol' angry orc. And that's just the horde! The alliance get a new puppy, loses a leader to a terrible tragedy, welcomes back old friends, and a big hole opens up in their backyard.
So what will I be doing on release day? Probably tearing my hair out, trying to do everything at once. And I'll love ever minute.
Sunday, August 29, 2010
Loremaster: Why you should waste your time
Loremaster. It seems like a lot of work, and it is. Why would anyone want to do this achievement? For a silly title and tabard? For the achievement points? For "e-peen"? What a waste of time.
This seems to be the attitude of many people I have encountered since I made the decision to spend a large portion of the remaining time before Cataclysm working toward completing this achievement. My boyfriend has been the most vocal and persistent in his opinion of how I have chosen to spend this time. To him questing is silly and time consuming. This is his attitude when he's "benefiting" from the quests by receiving XP and the concept of questing for fun is completely foreign to him. He feels the remaining time would be much better spent gathering gear, leveling alts and generally "preparing" for Cataclysm. For him the LFG tool and Battlegrounds XP has been a godsend because he no longer has to do those "silly quests" to level and obtain gear upgrades.
But then, he also doesn't care for the story. The lore behind the raid. The reason the characters do what they do.
I feel that I am preparing for Cataclysm, in my own way. I feel that I will better appreciate the changes to the zones if I've visited them recently, and if you are like me you haven't seen some of the zones in years. And some of the quests I skipped way back in Classic are truly nothing short of epic. While I completely agree with Blizzards decision to revamp a lot of the old zones and quest chains (and as much as some quests are epic, other lines are truly awful. If I have to locate one more conspicuously absent animal bodypart...) a lot of the old content is still worth doing. An example would be our friend Tirion Fordring.
Anyone who has been to Icecrown Citadel knows Tirion for his speech at the beginning of the raiding instance. "This is our final stand. What happens here will echo through the ages..."This really is his final stand (latest is actually more accurate); he has made others through out Azeroth and the Outlands.
This seems to be the attitude of many people I have encountered since I made the decision to spend a large portion of the remaining time before Cataclysm working toward completing this achievement. My boyfriend has been the most vocal and persistent in his opinion of how I have chosen to spend this time. To him questing is silly and time consuming. This is his attitude when he's "benefiting" from the quests by receiving XP and the concept of questing for fun is completely foreign to him. He feels the remaining time would be much better spent gathering gear, leveling alts and generally "preparing" for Cataclysm. For him the LFG tool and Battlegrounds XP has been a godsend because he no longer has to do those "silly quests" to level and obtain gear upgrades.
But then, he also doesn't care for the story. The lore behind the raid. The reason the characters do what they do.
I feel that I am preparing for Cataclysm, in my own way. I feel that I will better appreciate the changes to the zones if I've visited them recently, and if you are like me you haven't seen some of the zones in years. And some of the quests I skipped way back in Classic are truly nothing short of epic. While I completely agree with Blizzards decision to revamp a lot of the old zones and quest chains (and as much as some quests are epic, other lines are truly awful. If I have to locate one more conspicuously absent animal bodypart...) a lot of the old content is still worth doing. An example would be our friend Tirion Fordring.
Anyone who has been to Icecrown Citadel knows Tirion for his speech at the beginning of the raiding instance. "This is our final stand. What happens here will echo through the ages..."This really is his final stand (latest is actually more accurate); he has made others through out Azeroth and the Outlands.
It starts in the corner of Western Plaguelands. I suppose the location may qualify as being in Eastern Plaguelands... Tirion is located in a small corner of the world between Eastern and Western Plaguelands with his Hammer and his Horse. He starts out by asking you to help him clear his homestead and the surrounding area of various plague-beasts as well as provide him with a free lunch.
After you have completed the first three quests Tirion offers, he rewards you by letting you "put your feet up" and listen to his story. And it is a sad one. He tells you of his exile and his decision to live out in the back end of no where (and it really is) to watch over his young son, Taelan, while Tirion himself lives his new life as an exile. Unfortunately he has no way of influencing events and his son turns to the Scarlet Crusade in the absence of his father. Tirion then sends you on a chain of quests to make his son remember his roots and hopefully abandon the Scarlet Crusade and turn back to the Light. I won't ruin it for you, but trust me, this quest chain is a must.
Tirion also makes a brief appearance in the Outland... sort of. He actually is found in Old Hillsbrad, the first Caverns of Time instance. He stands with several others in Southshore in discussing Ashbringer. While this isn't really part of Loremaster, it's still a fun visit for any lore-hounds out there.
In Wrath of the Lich King Tirion returns with a bang... or maybe a flash. Deathknights encounter him "first" (in a lore progression sense) with his support of our new cohorts against Arthas. He even manages to cleans the Corrupted Ashbringer, and item with an epic story arc of its own. He's also the "Supreme Commander of the Argent Crusade" a faction that is new to Wrath; a combination of the Silver Hand and the Argent Dawn.
Finally, and massive spoiler alert here for anyone who would like to see the results of the final battle with the Lich King, Tirion was nearly the Lich King. And when I say nearly I'm talking holding the Lich King's helmet in his hand speaking of him being the only one... though we of course know that Bolivar Foredragon wears the dread crown in the end. Who knew the fellow I helped by clearing out those pesky bats would be so important.
Wait, Bolivar Foredragon? Who is THAT?
And that question, and others like it, is why I am loving Loremaster. (ha, didn't think I'd get back to it did you?) Could I have done Icecrown Citidel without knowing who these characters are , what they've experienced and what they stood for? Sure, and many, many players do. And there's nothing at all wrong with that. But this moment, this interaction between some of the most influential characters in the game is just so much more... meaningful when you know how they got there. And more to the point when you, YOU, helped them get to where they are.
And if you don't know who Bolivar Foredragon is, look him up. Sadly the quest chain that made me love this character was once the attunment for the old Onyxia Raid if you played as Alliance back before they revamped her. You still can help him out in the Wrathgate quest chain however, and if you haven't done this chain yet, do it, you won't regret it.
If you're not interested in the Loremaster achievement but are still interested in participating in some of the more important happenings in the World of Warcraft here are some of my favorite moments:
Tirion - Tirion's quest chain starts with the three quests [56] Blood Tinged Skies, [56] Carrion Grubbage and, [56] Demon Dogs
Saving Sharpbeak - A longish quest chain with a heart wrenching ending! (Less of a lore hotspot and more of mass amounts of cuteadorablness.)
Netherwing Rep - I know this is a rep grind, but I feel this is a must-complete for any lore-hounds out there. When you're finished you not only get access to some cool mounts, but you also get to single handedly ruin some very long term plans...
Wrathgate - Do this. No, don't argue. Just do it.
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