Weekend Part Two (28 Oct) - Waylaid By Minutiae

Weekend Part Two (28 Oct) - Waylaid By Minutiae

Saturday Morning - Fist encountered a few hiccups getting started on Saturday morning. She had hearthed back to the Filthy Animal Inn at Dalaran, and when she rose the next morning, the entrance to the inn seemed to have disappeared! Fist didn't think she'd had anything alcoholic to drink, but then, if she couldn't remember drinking, that could be one sign she'd really drunk herself silly.

After a little investigation, however, she discovered the truth. Someone thought that it would be hilarious to block the entrance to the inn with a giant. That giant was apparently kited into the city and killed at the entrance to the inn. The poor fellows name was Gymer, King of the Storm Giants. Further research unearthed more information, no kiting was involved. Gymer, apparently, has been known to wander away from wherever he is in Dalaran. There have been no eyewitness sightings of anyone killing him, but numerous sightings of Gymer dead at various places around Dalaran. Gymer was once also found in the inn, quite alive, but unable to find his way out. One wonders what that is all about.

After letting that puzzle go, Fist got ready to head back out to Grizzly Hills. She still had choked bags to clean up, but even after clean up she still had too much stuff. Fist plodded over to the bank to drop off the mostly leathers of various types she has been collecting - but the bank was full! Not a single spot left open. Gah, now what? Fist had already dumped a bunch of leathers on Mery, and Mery said No Mas! Mery was annoyed enough that she was doing crafting for Fist that she could get no skill credit for because she needed to be level 65 to go above the 375 skill that Mery had maxed out at. Fist was none too happy hearing that, worried that she might be sidelined so that Mery could level from 60 to 65. That wasn't going to happen, both JB and Philly told Mery. The leatherworker in this family is going to be Fist. Sorry, Mery.

Fist was having trouble skilling up her leatherworking do to severe shortages of heavy leather. Fist had already made a trip to Dustwallow Marsh to farm the dinosaur packs and den of dragons (favorite spots to get heavy leather), which helped, but that takes time, and she needed a LOT of heavy leather.

Another approach would be to get some high end leatherworking bags to store all that leather stuff, making room for non-leatherworking items. Mery was tapped to check it out. Mery could make a 20 slot bag, but there was also a 28 slot bag that a vendor in Nagrand had the recipe for. Hoping to settle an unhappy Mery down, Mery was given a chance to get out of Orgrimmar and show off her wonderful towny outfit (complete with matching mount and pet, she always added) in Nagrand's Garadar. Mery enjoyed the trip, but unfortunately came back empty-handed. The vendor who had the recipe was in the Mag'har faction. What has that got to do with anything? Mery has not done the quests in Nagrand where the Mag'har are rediscovered and friendships made. The vendor was hostile to Mery.

So, what should have happened, is that Fist should have gone herself and then sent the recipe over to Mery to make. Sigh, the day is getting away from Fist and she hasn't earned a single experience point yet. But if you have to get something done, Fist sighed again, it's best to just do it yourself.

Fist took the portal from Dalaran to Orgrimmar, then the portal from Org to the Blasted Lands, and then the portal from the Blasted Lands to Hellfire Peninsula. She then hopped on her mount and flew to Garadar, where she had spent a lot of time getting friendly with the Mag'har. Fist found Provisioner Nasela easily enough (since Mery had already located her for Fist). After an "oh no!" moment when it looked like the recipe wasn't there, Fist found it. She got not only that recipe, but four others as well.

Feeling she was getting back on track, Fist sent off the recipe to Mery so she could make the 28 slot bag. Well, she thought she would send off the recipe. It was soulbound. Fist wanted to scream. She had another conversation with Mery, who had already said she had a recipe for a 20 slot Leatherworker's Satchel. The mats for it, though, would cost Fist a 100g off the AH. Pay it, Fist said, gritting her teeth, I'm good for it. Fist got her bag, and managed to shoe horn all of her "stuff" into the bank.

Fist had one more bungle to confess. When she is finally able to make that 28 slot bag, it won't be for leatherworking stuff. What? She just assumed that a bag made by a leatherworker would be for leather stuff. She completely ignored the name on the bag: Reinforced MINING Bag. Fist should have gone to bed earlier Friday night.

There was yet another delay to follow. Fist knew that she would quickly be stuck with overloaded storage again, given the amount of skinning she was doing. She needed that skinning to skill up her leatherworking, so she couldn't not do it. It appeared that Fist would have to go back to Dustwallow Marsh. But Wild came to her rescue, sort of. Wild was at the AH on other business, but, knowing Fist's plight, he checked on the price of heavy leather. To his surprise a good bit of it had been posted at prices way below what the seller could easily have gotten. Wild quickly snapped it up, cheap even by Wild's stingy standards (or he wouldn't have spent his own gold on it).

That, most unfortunately, created yet a new challenge. Wild has not organized his bags, like JB and Philly had been pushing him to do. Wild could not retrieve the leather from the mail because he had absolutely no where to put it.

Fist, who was getting more and more frustrated and antsy, picked on poor dead Gymer, loudly complaining to anyone who would listen - Would SOMEONE find a way to get Gymer's corpse out of the doorway! Yes, the giant's corpse was still draped over the entrance to the inn. There was nothing to do but make Wild tidy up his bags enough to be able to send Fist the leather. The whole morning shot.

Wild figured he could blow the whole afternoon, too, re-organizing his bags, in between naps. Once he got started, though, he kept at it. The first things to go were things he could vendor or destroy immediately - essentially, any gear that was not part of the current MoP set or under consideration for transmogging. That opened up a few slots in Wild's bags, but not many, since Wild had way too many ideas on what he wanted to do with mog sets. Sure, Wild could have probably sent along that leather Fist wanted at that point, but then Fist would have run off to play. Wild had gotten interested, and now Fist had to wait. It was a bit astonishing just how much gear Wild had held on to! Some of it went all the way back to vanilla WoW, such as trinkets, rings, etc, that were special rewards with no sale value, but made for good memories. Of all of that stuff (unsuitable for mogging), Wild decided to keep only the Tier 1 Cenarion set along with the Staff of Dominance which goes with that set. Wild also likes the Cata Tier set called Deep Earth, and has full sets for both healer and moonkin. Those will be kept. After that, though, things got a lot messier. Wild finally decided that it was a good time for a nap, sent Fist her leather, and made for his hammock. A good thing, too, because Wild has two bags in his bank full of feral gear that he hasn't even gotten to yet.

Once Fist heard that Wild had started snoring, she and Mery emptied every bag they had and managed to get enough heavy leather. It didn't take long to run that down, though, and Fist started on the gear made with thick leather. With Mery's help that held out a long time, but there was still not enough thick leather, now, to keep skilling up. Even with Mery's bank bags starting to look unusually empty, Fist had to call a halt. Fist's leatherworking is at 240, still well behind Mery's 375. Given how much time has passed, Fist decided to take Sin's earlier advice to let rested xp grow, wipe it out right before the baseball game, and then farm thick leather during the game.

Fist went at her leatherworking again after a trip to Un'Goro Crater. Fist didn't think she had much of an AoE attack for farming mobs, but she came upon a method that worked extremely well. She used her Crackling Jade Lightning spell, which has a 50yd range, to tag mobs. The spell is channeled, so Fist would just break the channel right after tagging the mob. Fist could then run around, tagging mobs, until she had gathered a crowd. Since the mobs were pulled from every direction, Fist had to get them lined up facing her, so she would do a fast roll to get ahead of them, turn, and as soon as the they got to her, she slammed them with Fists of Fury. Those that survived that melee range AoE assault were treated to another one, Spinning Crane Kick (which, incidentally, heals Fist). None of the various level 50-55+ mobs survived that. Fist is up to 260 skill in leatherworking, but is again out of leather. Now it's rugged leather that she is short of. I know engineering is tough to level, but the leatherworking profession is a serious pain. Fist is starting to wonder if Mery set her up, letting Fist do all the hard work so Mery could find an easier profession.

Later - The fog of leveling seems to have settled around Fist and it is getting very tough to keep track of day, zone, and quest. The notes written to jog the memory don't seem to help much. So, the following covers what dim memory there is, and the few things that stood out.

Fist remembers it raining in Un'Goro Crater killing things while the Chargers plowed through the rain and mud in Cleveland in a more hopeless adventure (San Diego Chargers debacle - losing to a 1-4 team with a final score of 7-6).

Fist loudly proclaiming that Leatherworking SUCKS! when she ran out of rugged leather at skill 270.

A level 55 paladin in the Crater, visiting from another server, who asked Fist if she could help him with the Lar'korwi quest. Fist had recently done the quest, but it had already become just one more blur of hundreds. But, sure, what else did she have to do? The paladin not only needed help, he needed someone to hold his hand. He had apparently never heard of wowhead, and was completely clueless. But it was a sincere cluelessness. After letting the paladin lead Fist around in circles for a few minutes, Fist called a halt. She checked on where Lar'korwi could be located, and led him to it. Fist waited for the paladin to do the ritual that would invoke Lar'korwi, but nothing happened. Finally, Fist asked him if he had the ingredients required. More long pauses. Fist suggested that there was meat involved. The paladin must have had much larger bags than anyone in WoW, because it took an endless time for him to look. When he finally acknowledged that he didn't see anything that might be what was needed, he mumbled, "I must be really stupid." Fist sighed, but, she's been there before, baffled by what was supposed to a simple quest. Fist then remembered that the meat actually came in a pouch. She asked the paladin to look for that. Another long wait, and then the paladin exclaimed, "I found it!" Fist then had the paladin place the pouch on the handy rock there for that purpose, and low and behold, Lar'Korwi came. Fist waited for the paladin to tag the beast so that he would get credit for the kill. When he did get it tagged Fist was going to help kill it faster, but for some reason the beast did not grey out like it should have, and Fist did not want to mess up a proper kill - which would force the paladin to have to do the whole darn thing over again. Instead, Fist played healer from his limited arsenal of such, mostly popping a healing bulb on him when necessary. I don't know what gear he was wearing, but it took him a good while to finally finish off the level 52 non-elite and collect the head. The paladin was extremely grateful, and Fist rather enjoyed the break from killing endless dinosaurs and losing football.

Somewhere along the way Fist went back to the Grizzly Hills to continue questing. It's a big zone with several quest hubs. The one quest that stands out - due to Fist's fuzzy ineptitude - was the Ursoc quest. Usroc is a monstrous elite bear. The quest provides a bearish helper to aid in the fight, but unlike the modified quests that gutted every other elite quest Fist has tackled, this one appeared to be the original. The helper (yes, he has a name, but who ever remembers the "helper?") can be asked to help DPS or heal. Fist chose DPS, and the two other trotted down a mountain lane to the dead end where Ursoc appeared. Fist mangled up a first attempt, not fast enough or smart enough at using his limited healing abilities. Fist got Ursoc down to under 10%, but Fist died.

On the second attempt, Fist did great, and while it was a tough fight, it was Ursoc who died. Ecstatic, Fist automatically skinned him, like she does without a thought on every beast she kills. The problem was that Fist needed the carcass to complete the quest. Sigh.

For the third attempt, Fist opted to make the helper a healer, just for something different. That turned out to be easier, and Fist finally got both the kill and the quest completion. It was nice to find a quest that put up a bit of a fight.

Somewhere in there Fist reached level 79.

Sunday was bracketed by another sporting event - Game #4 of the World Series. At least the Tigers put up the semblance of a fight, taking the lead twice before eventually bowing out of the contest. The 4-3 loss completed a string of personal losses that may never be broken (but could be extended): over the past few weeks I have seen the San Diego Chargers put together a string of three straight losses. I saw the St Louis Cardinals lose three straight, ending my hoped for trip to see a World Series game, and then watched four straight losses by the Detroit Tigers. For those counting, that is TEN straight sporting event losses. Somehow, it's probably my fault that the National Hockey League is on strike from fear that no team could win a game with me alive to jinx them. At least I can't jinx the Chargers game at home on Thursday night - I'm sure that game will be blacked out due to lack of interest by San Diegans after that miserable Browns game.

Fist, meanwhile, had to put all that sports stuff behind her and keep working. Grizzly Hills kept her fully occupied a very long time, but the gold mine finally petered out with Fist still a little short of her goal.

It was a little serendipitous, then, that Fist found herself heading for the Nessingway Base Camp in Sholozar Basin for her next stop. The Nessingway Camp is where Wild made it to level 80.

Along about midnight on Sunday, Fist also made level 80.

PS - When Fist got back to Dalaran after reaching level 80 - Gymer was STILL stuffed in the doorway of the Filthy Animal Inn. Fist patted the fat giant on the rump and went to bed.