Apprentice Troubles

Apprentice Troubles

Tiphaine is not the patient type. Her new apprentice, Rakta, is expected to be a fast learner and quickly productive. So far things have not panned out that way.

Of course, Rakta had no problem playing in the level 1-10 kiddy pool for new recruits. She was outfitted with heirloom gear and could kill most anything with little more than a strong word. Once she was released from her training Rakta made her way to Goldshire, the nearest town to Stormwind. By the time she was level 10 she was starting to get a little peeved at all of the walking she had to do. Officially, new players must reach level 20 before getting their riding mount. But that rule is ancient, and Rakta saw many riders, both ground and airborne, with less than the twenty level requirement.

Tiphaine wan't very sympathetic. "Figure it out," she demanded. "Quit wasting time and fix it."

Rakta slogged her way from Goldshire back to Stormwind and visited Gryphon Master Dungar Longdrink. She had the money to buy a mount, but the Gryphon Master refused to sell her one. She pointed to her left. Flustered, Rakta followed Longdrink's pointing finger to Bralla Cloudwing, the flying trainer. Aha, now she was getting somewhere. However, all Bralla would say is that she needed to find a riding trainer. Where does she get a riding trainer? So she talks to the gryphon keeper, who sells the mounts. Rakta is told that she can't sell her a mount because she already purchased them, ie "already known." Rakta tries to take one of the mounts from her collections tabs and is gruffly told she "requires apprentice riding skills."

Tiphaine contains her fury, doing her best not to kill Rakta outright and find another apprentice.
Confused and desperate, Rakta is determined to kill her way to level twenty while keeping herself out of sight of Tiphaine.

Rakta retraced her steps back to the Eastvale Logging Company, where there is a riding trainer, Randal Hunter. Another fail, he gave Rakta the same runaround all of the others have given her.

Disgusted, Tiphaine put in a ticket to the Stormwind Mount Academy and verbally slayed them for a half hour for incompetance. Rakta got word of that second hand from Chaitee. Rakta is even more nervous, now, after watching a level 18 ride by on his motorcycle. Worse, following in the rider's wake is a level 7 on her wolf mount. Rakta thought about slinking into the Lion's Den (appropriate) and hiding. Instead, she resolutely headed out to kill things, hoping for a miracle.

There were no miracles. Rakta walked. And walked. And walked. It took time, but she killed things along the way and eventually entered the Redridge Mountains. Shortly after that she came upon Lake Everstill and the town of Lakeshire. Rakta picked up a flight path and started collecting quests. It was a busy little town, exactly what Rakta needed. When she was done, she still had plenty of daylight, but she wrapped up her business and took a flight back to Stormwind. Rakta was Level 20.

Rakta breathed a very large sigh. She paid the riding trainer the sum of four gold and change for the pleasure of earning her first riding lesson. Her red gryphon can cruise at 170% speed - on the ground only - and Rakta simply enjoyed the wonders of riding for awhile. She even tried to fly, and fell in the lake, and laughed the whole time.

Her pleasure was considerably blunted, however, when she learned that the next level doesn't come until level 40. This isn't right, but so far there has been no explanation.

It wasn't all about Rakta. Sista managed to get in some work, finally getting to the Iron Docks battle. With Talador wrapped up Sista made her way to the Spires of Arak. She is at level 96 +56% and with Rakta settled for the moment she should have more time.