Tuesday (23 Oct) - Spiders!

Tuesday (23 Oct) - Spiders!

Fist enjoyed her Burning Crusade dungeon runs (up to level 70) with JB, and was eager for more opportunities. With Lao's assistance, Fist moved up to the dungeons of Wrath of the Lich (up to level 80). They chose the spider dungeon, Azjol-Nerub (level 74), in Dragonblight. Wild remembers this dungeon mainly for having to scramble about on large nets of spider webs, hunting for hard to see holes that pass for passageways to deeper levels.

Early in the run, Fist, at level 73, figured she could help by doing a little dps. Her healing abilities in windwalker spec were almost nil, made worst by the fact that one of  her two healing spells required Chi, which could only be generated through combat. After getting swatted and bitten a few times, Fist decided her best approach was to stay out of the way as level 90 Lao cut a swath of death through the mobs and bosses.

No matter the level, some boss fights can be tricky. There was the bug boss, for example, that would burrow underground and then pop back up in random places. Fist had to stay on her toes to keep from finding a big bug bursting out of the ground under her feet. Lao wisely kept a shield up around Fist during that short battle.

The dungeon run did finish off the three bosses, but their plan to do more than one dungeon had to be curtailed due to real life intrusion, and Fist had to leave. Fist had started the dungeon 18% of the way to level 74, and the dungeon kills doubled that number, to 36%. Later on, Fist returned to the dungeon to turn in the three quests she had completed. With help from the monk buff, Fist's xp leaped from 36% to 65%. Fist also gained two fine pieces of gear.

Much later in the evening, Fist was able to return to Borean Tundra to hammer out a basketful of more quests. Like Outland, the Northrend questing seems to be unchanged from when Wild did them. It's still early, though, Borean Tundra being a "starter" zone for level 70s, and Fist has yet to encounter a quest with an elite to defeat (ie, to see if elite quests had been dumbed down to non-elite like the Nessingway quests in Outland).

Fist hearthed back to Dalaran, having reached level 74.

I think for future dungeon runs Fist will switch to healing spec (mistweaver) so that she can more easily take care of her own health and still do some DPS. That is one of the great advantages of being a monk, and Fist needs to spend more time working on that. Her mistweaver gear is not as good as her windwalker gear, but it's as good as the quest rewards she has gotten, which is not bad.

As Fist continues to pursue ever higher levels, the length of time to complete each level gets longer. Fist started with an average three levels a day, slid to two per day when she hit the 60s and has slowed to a single level per day now that she is in her 70s and in Northrend. Fist will try to at least maintain that, but even that pace is not likely possible once she transitions out of Wrath and into the Cataclysm expansion, levels 80-85. At least there are only five levels instead of ten.

Steady as she goes, as the Navy would say.