Monday (4 Apr) - The Battle for Andorhal

Monday (4 Apr) - The Battle for Andorhal

Java's journey from Stranglethorn Vale (STV) to the Western Plaguelands has already been told. What Java wanted to keep quiet was that it could have been a whole lot easier. When Java finally reached Chillwind Camp, he met with Commander Ashklam Valorfist, an alliance npc death knight that was leading the alliance against the armies in Andorhal. Java thought the name sounded very familiar. Yep, definitely familiar. In fact, there was an npc at Booty Bay in STV who offered Java a flight directly from Booty Bay to Chillwind Camp to meet up with, yes, Commander Valorfist. Java hadn't finished questing in STV, yet, so he declined. And then forgot all about it. Oh well.

Commander Valorfist inducts Java into his army the second Java stepped into camp. The alliance were having to battle both scourge (Lich King forces) and forsaken (horde forces). This battle takes Wild way, way back to Vanilla WoW, which is when Wild was doing these quests. Looking through Java's eyes, the contested city of Andorhal looked different, but it was hard to place why. In Wild's day, I don't think the quest line (on the horde side) involved trying to take the city. Perhaps horde were defending. Cata may have advanced the story, too, so the goals may be different now. Anyway, Java was sent into the city to meet up with the forward forces and join the attack.

Java battled several varieties of bad guys - desiccated corpses, ghouls, abominations, and the undead forsaken. The mid-to-high level 30s mobs were no match for Java. Java was joined at one point by another alliance player. I assumed he was working the same quests, but he was much lower level than Java. Where Java could step past mobs without aggroing them unless I wanted to, every hostile in the city took notice of the new guy. In seconds he was on the run from several mobs. Java tried to help, but the guy ran away from Java, instead of towards me, and Java couldn't catch up to him before he was killed. Java tried to rez him, but he did not accept it. Maybe he was too embarrassed.

There were several other quests that I would have liked to provide the lore for, but for some reason they aren't linked in a way I can find them. The culmination of the battle for the city was the killing of three level 35 elites. Java was level 41, but even so I am always a little cautious against elites as you never know what tricks they might have. Java had no trouble, however, downing the first two. The third elite was the commander of the forsaken, Koltira.

Koltira was so formidable, Valorfist told Java that once Java found and engaged Koltira, Valorfist would come and help finish him.

Java found Koltira and as soon as the battle started Java knew Koltira had no chance. Java pounded Koltira down to minimum health so fast that Valorfist would be looking at Koltira's corpse by the time he arrived on the scene. Koltira knew it, too. Valorfist arrived, started to engage, and Koltira immediately wanted to bargain. The two leaders then ignored Java and talked about a temporary truce. The scourge was the enemy of both Koltira and Valorfist, and they agreed to work together to rid the town of scourge. Koltira further agreed to retreat from the field and give up Andorhal to the alliance. The two leaders respected each other, but they were not friends. Valorfist warned Koltira that there would be no mercy should they face each other on the field of battle in the future.

Java went on to do some more quests in WPL, mostly love the earth stuff by ridding area beasts of corruption brought in by the scourge. When Java came back through Andorhal, the battle was over and the city was in the hands of the Alliance.

Java's mission wasn't quite completed, though. Not far from Andorhal is a large, somber crypt. Java came to pay his respects to the man entombed there. The placard reads: "Here lies Uther the Lightbringer. Uther lived and died to defend the kingdom of Lordaeron. Though he was betrayed by his most beloved student, we believe that his spirit lives on. He continues to watch over us, even as the shadows close in around our ruined land. His light is the light of all humanity - and so long as we honor his example, it shall never fade."

Uther was the first death knight to go into battle against the Horde. Canonized as a saint, Uther was a great teacher and mentor to a student who would far surpass Uther's abilities, and ultimately betray and murder him. That student was Prince Arthas, or by his later name - the Lich King.

Monday - Jabba the Hut (aka, Java the Tank)

Java's first random dungeon of the day was Razorfen Downs (RFD). We had a priest healer. In addition to Java, we had a mage and an elemental shaman for DPS. The tank was a druid. With virtually every bear druid on the horde side having changed race to the colorful troll, it was odd seeing the plain grey/brown coloring of the alliance bear druid.

This was one of the more eccentric groups Java has been a part of, and Java includes himself as one of those eccentrics. The bear tank started in on the first mobs before anyone could even pick up the quests at the start. Once we were engaged for real, the mage got separated from us and for a dozen pulls was no where to be seen. The tank didn't seem to much care who was with him or not; he just kept pulling.

We'd been at it for 15 minutes or so when it became clear even to directionally challenged Java that the tank didn't know where he was going. Called on it by the shaman, he admitted that he could remember nothing about the dungeon. The priest knew what bosses we were after, but wasn't as sure about the route to take to get there. Between the priest and the shaman, they picked a direction and we plunged forward.

Java was doing way more damage that rest of the raid, topping at around 350 DPS, and the bear tank finally stopped and told Java - "You tank, you're the one holding all the aggro anyway, and I can go cat DPS." Talk about the blind leading the blind. I liked the shaman. He took the lead, Java next to him, and when we encountered mobs Java stepped up and engaged them. No group of mobs could resist Java's Divine Storm. Some time later the mage got separated again and died. He went offline. We never got anyone to replace him.

We reached the escort quest. Java was told to get it going, but none of us thought to clear the mobs in our way first. That guy we were supposed to escort started running the second we let him go and aggroed several groups of mobs in just a few seconds. Java sacrificed himself, holding on to all those mobs and killing about two-thirds of them before running out of mana and going down. The others had beat feet to safety.

Forced to rez at the graveyard, Java was deposited back at the entrance. Java was, of course, lost. The druid went back to tanking and the three of them went back to tackling mobs while Java eventually found his way back. I don't know how we managed to finish the thing, but we must have as Java got his satchel of goody (singular, because there is never more than one item in there). It was the quest turn ins that we'd almost bypassed that DINGED Java to level 43.

So, just so everyone knows what the important part was: Java wants to pound this home - Java tanked about half of RFD. :-)

Monday night Java got into another group that also could not seem to stay together. This was in Scholomance, a huge place full of every kind of mad, undead being you could think of. Not a place to wander about alone, although it happened with us several times. We even had one wipe, on Rattlegore. We didn't clear the room of the skeletons, and with all the stuns both the warrior tank and Java went down. Things really got confusing after the wipe. The tank decided to go ahead and turn in the quests he'd completed so far while we waited, and we wound up with him and another player in one part of the dungeon and Java and the mage in another. The fifth quit the group, and by the time the new player arrived at the entrance the two that were at the entrance had already headed further in. We waited and waited, and then discovered that each group thought the other group was coming to them. So, Java and the mage decided we'd move to them. On the way, the mage was Blinking forward, and bypassed a mob group around a corner that Java didn't know was there and the mage didn't bother to mention. Java, level 43, was faced with three level 41 elite mobs. It took time, but Java killed all three by himself. This was the first time I truly felt the awesome ability of a paladin to keep himself alive.

There are thirteen Boss encounters in Scholomance. I think we did about five of them, but that included Darkmaster Gandling, the final boss. Nobody really wanted to go back in and find the rest. We turned in our quests and left. Java averaged 328 DPS, well above the other players, but the warrior tank didn't complain - much - about Java pulling aggro.

Java wrapped up Monday night with a good WSG, winning 3-0 and DINGING! to level 44 in the process.