So, last night around 11pm, I dinged 70. It was definitely an epic journey that I will never forget. First off, I want to thank everyone in Core for all of their support. Without them, this would have been a lot more difficult and boring.
Now onto the meat of the story. I wanted to post something to this blog, voicing my general opinions on the Burning Crusade. Everything from the quests, the zones, the instances, etc. I forgot all of my screenshots at home, so I will hopefully be able to make a seperate post in the next day or two with all of my screenshots.
Levels
This was one thing I dreaded in TBC. I figured with the levels being anywhere from 400,000xp to 800,000xp, it was going to take days to get a single level. Damn I was wrong. I dinged 61 the first night I had TBC, and at some points, took out 2 levels in a long days playing session. Now granted, I had the week off work, so I had a good amount of time to play, but levels were on par with 50-60 levels. At some points, I was getting 150k-175k xp/hr. On average though, I would say I got 75k xp/hr though. In a marathon grinding session last night, I even went from 5% of level 69, to dinging 70 in a mere 6 hours. Congrats to Blizzard on getting this right.
Questing
This, to me, was the biggest change in TBC. The amount of quests you burn through from 60-70 is absolutely amazing. I dinged 70 in Netherstorm, but had only been there for maybe 6 hours, and didn’t even come close to completing half the quests in the zone. Every zone that I went through (Hellfire, Zangarmarsh, Terrokar, Nagrand, Netherstorm) is like this, with the exception of Blades Edge Mountains. There just weren’t enough quests there to keep my interest. I also found the quests in Blades Edge to be quite annoying. Most of them required 3 or 4 completely different objectives, and made for a very frustrating time.
The quest rewards were also very nice. Granted I only replaced about 4 pieces of my gear along the way, but I could see how a person coming through the portal in Tier 1 would replace almost every piece of gear they have. I am hoping to run some of the higher level instances in the next few weeks to be able to replace more of my gear.
Zones
The zones themselves are stunningly beautiful, as I have said in previous beta posts. You could literally explore for hours on end, and love every minute of it. Everything from the mobs, to the sky, to the mountains, to the plains of Nagrand…. stunning. Now, it’s really hard for me to pick a top 3 for zones, but here it is (know that I haven’t really been through much of Shadowmoon Valley yet)…
1) Nagrand - Clean, crisp, tons of quests, and it just feels nice. Plus, you get to see your first Netherdrake.
2) Hellfire Peninsula - For a first zone, this one is amazing. The quests are easy, yet unique. Great intro into TBC.
3) Netherstorm - TONS of quests, fairly easy mobs, amazing scenery. Just wait till you get to see it from above.
The Alliance & Ganking
This is my biggest surprise. I got ganked literally 4 times the entire time I played. There seems to be an understanding between all Alliance & Horde, to just quest and level, without PvPing. Now, thats not to say I didn’t see my fair share of ganking, but it was usually because someone accidentally AoE’d, stole a mob, etc… Thanks to any Alliance on Burning Legion that might be reading this.
I’m flying!
For 800g in training, and 100g for the mount, I bought my first flying mount last night. I wasn’t able to buy the epic version yet (5000g training, 200g mount) but should be able to get it fairly soon. Flying around Outland literally changes everything about travel in this game. And I can’t imagine how much more it will change whenever I buy an epic mount, seeing as how it flys the same speed as a gryphon. The things you are able to see from above changes the way you will do things in this game. You will just have to wait and see for yourself. My only gripe with the flying mounts, is that the non epic version should be 100% speed, not 60% speed. When I pay almost 1000g for a mount, it should be 100% speed in my opinion. But hey, I am flying so what do I care.
In Closing
I would give this expansion an A+. This expansion met (and exceeded) my expectations. I cannot imagine it getting any better than this, but Blizzard consistently surprises me. Thank you Blizzard, the devs, the CM’s, etc… You did a wonderful job.
for a flying mount, have u tested how high u can go or how low?
Great writeup and congrats. Can you solo any of the new dungeons yet? I read on the forums of of a 64 lock soloing blood furnace. Haven’t seen a vid yet but that is the rumour….