Sunday (26 Dec) - DING! DING! DING! DING!

Sunday (26 Dec) - DING! DING! DING! DING!

Wildshard slew his way to level 85 Sunday night in the Twilight Highlands. The DING! came as a bit of a surprise at 3am Monday morning. Wild was totally engrossed in killing pairs of mobs to complete one more quest before turning in a set of four completed quests which he hoped would be enough to level to 85. Killing mobs grants experience, too, and while pounding away at those mobs Wild got enough experience to level before he even turned in those quests. So no climactic event; just a very satisfying late night, business-like grind. Wild's druid friend, Rs, checked in on Wild around 1am, commenting, "You're up late, Wild." Wild responded with "80% to 85 and not sleepy yet." He came back with "Go cow go!"

Things did not look so rosy earlier in the day or even the weekend. There was this thing called Christmas that took a considerable chunk out of Saturday. Not that I'm complaining! We had a great day. But Wild, well, you know Wild. He fit in a little bit of questing, but Saturday ended with Wild at only 28% to 85.

On Sunday morning Wild really had to push to find quests, and by noon all of the obvious (and some not so obvious) quests in Vash'jr, Mount Hyjal, and Deepholm were done. There were one or two quests that stymied Wild, one in particular that required the killing of a level 84 elite elemental which Wild was frustrated with. But there was also Uldum, the Egypt-like zone that had blossomed in the desert south of Tanaris at the far southern end of Kalimdor. Wild had done some questing there already, and Uldum is by far my favorite zone. Uldum incorporates the Indiana Jones theme with a "Harison Jones" character leading the way. If you've seen the movies you'll be right at home in Uldum. There was nothing more surprising and exciting than being saved from a firing squad by Mr. Jones! Except for maybe the sudden appearance of another character from the movies during the climactic quests in the tomb. There were too many quests to remember, and in any event I don't want to give too much away, but I may assemble them together at some point.

Wild eventually ran out of quests in Uldum, and there was more real life to attend to Sunday afternoon. Wild did not get back in game until after dinner. Wild was 47% of the way to 85.

Wild knew he had to make a big push Sunday night. There was one more new zone, the Twilight Highlands, that Wild had yet to enter. The truth was Wild did not know where it was or how to get to it. Maps are a pet peeve of mine. Cataclysm rearranged the world differently than any other expansion. In BC the floating island of Outland came into being, and all level 60-70 leveling was accomplished there. With WotLK it was the new zone of Northrend, where all level 70-80 was done. In both of those expansions the rest of the world was left largely alone. In Cata the new land masses for leveling 80-85 were mixed in with the old land masses and scattered about the world. And all of the major sites catering to the Warcraft crowd just seemed to assume that everyone knew where these new zones were located. No map that I could find clearly shows the world changes that includes the simple labeling of each zone. Baffling and frustrating.

Wild was able to eventually deduce where Twilight Highlands was - it's pushed into the Eastern Continent south of the Arathi Highlands and butted up against the Wetlands. All of the other Cata zones had pretty clearly marked quest lines that not only provided a clear path to get to the zones, but also established portals in the main Horde city of Orgrimmar where players could teleport directly there. Where was the same courtesy shown with Twighight Highlands? There didn't seem to be any.

Wild decided to take the brute force approach, traveling to the Arathi Highlands and then flying directly into the Twilight Highlands zone. Wild completely mapped out the zone, but found no quests and nothing resembling a Horde town. Now that was strange. In desperation Wild went back to Uldum and rummaged around until he found a few more quests. When even that vein of quests petered out Wild reluctantly returned to Orgrimmar to clear his bulging bags and figure out what to do.

Orgrimmar had some quests. There were dailies - fishing and cooking. Wild needed to get into the habit of doing those each day, just as he's done with daily quests since they were invented. So he did them, and the xp was good. So Wild checked out some other local quests, did them too, and even considered doing the holiday quests since they were at least worth a little experience. Well, the holiday tree with the bulk of the quests is next door to the Warchief's headquarters. The Warchief and a couple of his aides had quests, but very early on Wild had checked them and they involved Azshara, which is a level 40-ish zone north of Org, and therefore Wild ignored them. Wild was really reaching, now, but what would it hurt to take another look at them?

To Wild's surprise the quests, which started with a "talk to me" quest that sent Wild to the southern border of Azshara, offered considerable experience. Well, that was intriguing. Wild took the quests. The Valley of Honor is the northern most area of Orgrimmar and was completely enclosed pre-Cata. Cata, however, opened another gate into and out of Org through the Valley of Honor. That path led directly into Azshara. Wild knew it was there but had never gone to check it out other than note that it had become the zone for the goblins, the new Horde allies. That is where the quests took him. That led to more quests involving a battle with the Twilight Hammer cult. And that led to Wild finding himself on a zeppelin along with an air lifted army headed for - the Twilight Highlands. Wild had finally found the quest chain which opened up the rest of the zone, and from there and until 3am Wild happily quested away. The main theme of Twilight Highlands involved an internal war between two factions of the Horde. That's another very interesting and lore soaked story that Wild had to rush through in his single minded leveling mode. When that internal strife got sorted out a new portal was established in Org next to all the other portals. Very well done, as all of it has been.

As a final wrap up I believe the lore and storylines behind the quests in the Cata zones were among the best that Blizzard has done. The zones themselves are gorgeous and creative. The addition of numerous cut scenes enhanced the story and was like the "glue" to the quests that was a terrific addition.

Now, Wild can't wait to get into Heroic dungeons and, very soon I think, guild raiding.

Oh, one other thing. Wild was so active over the weekend he earned the #1 spot on the guild achievements list for the week! Wild doesn't get anything but bragging rights, but it was nice to know that Wild was contributing to guild leveling. The MM guild is at level 5 and working hard to get to level 6.