I've been running around with my 46 Paladin. Two weeks ago, I joined a new guild mostly because I was teaming up an awful lot with the guild leader Hercularies and his friend Cutenessanna so it was just like three paladins all the same level running around together. Last night, I knocked out 90% of the quests in Feralas with them (get Gordunni cobalt, find beast museik, get grimtotem horns, get Wildpaw manes, etc.) and wearing the Tattered Dreadmist Mantle (which traded armor for 10% experience boost), I was able to spike to 48. Wahoo! At this point, I only have three quests left that I will do here... Darter Sprite Museik, Kill Stinglasher and kill ten silithids. After that I should be near enough to 50. If not, I'll clear our Searing Gorge, and then proceed to Felwood, and maybe Hinterlands. I hope WPL/EPL and Badlands can take me to 58.

But of course, vacation is next week so nothing is really going to happen.

Hey Blizzcon starts today! I hope some wonderful news comes out.

Patch 3.2.2

According to various sites, 3.2.2 should be released soon, which updates Onyxia to 10-man and 25-man instance, with better loot... like T-2... huh?  Why would you do a 10/25 for level 70 gear.

My priest hit 51 last night.  I've finished up the moderate quests in Feralas but Ungoro is 52-54's.  Those bloody tar lurkers followed me all the way to the river.  I think I either need to go clean up Searing Gorge (40-50) or Felwood.  Staying away from Swamp of Sorrows/Badlands/Hinterlands/WPL at the moment... I hate random aggressive wandering creatures.

Tattered Dreadmist Robe

Final Tasks which Exalted me with the Argent Crusade

• 1000 rep from four Argent Tournament quests.
• 2000 rep from a quick heroic Nexus run.
• 800 rep from three Argent Crusade quests at Argent Vanguard in Icecrown that I forgot I needed to do but were there to put me over the edge.

I love my 10% xp bonus!!

In other news, it looks like Cataclysm is the 3rd Expansion Pack for WOW. They are unleashing Worgen and Goblin races for the factions so people can level all the way back to eighty again. Yikes!

Well I caved. Last year, I knew I wasn't going to have time to get geared/raid/powerlevel into Ulduar... but then I wanted heirlooms, and to get heirlooms, you need argent crusade reputation [rep], and to get rep you have to do heroics, and to do heroics, you can't be the tard in all blues.

Gear Bought From Auction House

Ebonweave Robe (level 200) +105 spellpower, +68 hit, 1500 gold

Ebonweave Gloves (level 200) +77 spellpower, +51 hit, 300 gold

Enchant Weapon +50 spellpower, 150 gold

Enchant Gloves +28 spellpower, 150 gold

Sapphire Spellthread, +50 spellpower to pants, 150 gold

I also changed spec to destruction, and now my little lock is at 1750 spell damage. It's a big boost from 1499, and I am really mowing things down in as little as 2-3 buttons.

Last night, I got in groups for heroic Nexus and heroic Utgarde Keep. Each dropped about 2000 rep, so now I'm cruising at 18500. I will shoot for an instance tonight and with a few dailiestomorrow, I should be exalted.

Wow. As in, I was in a 5 man pug heroic UP and wow, my DPS was sad. After about half the instance, the number two guy (warlock) had 70k damage and I had 7k. Granted, I am not in raid spec (destruction). I am not in raid gear (epics). To be fair, I was probably about as threatening as a fly on a horse's rump. Gumdam, I knew all this going in but still...

So just FYI...

Level 80: You are in 80-90% blue gear and should be doing about 1500 DPS. At this point, you run heroics constantly for more blue gear (probably approaching 1700 DPS, which you enchant to about 1850-1900 DPS).

1900 DPS: Now ready for end game raids, also known as "instances that drop purples". Basically run Naxxramas to start, then Ulduar and Trial of the Champion in Icecrown until the next patch (Icecrown) where you and your 2000+ DPS friends take down Arthas.

I guess that's basically it. What wasn't in there was endless running of all the instances for Emblems of Triumph and Epics tokens. The enchant for spellpower on a sword alone is 900 gold. That's nine days of [casual] dailies.

I guess this is why casuals take the easy way of upgrading gear: expansion packs.

Terms used today:

UP: Utgarde Pinnacle, an dungeon at the top of Utgarde Castle meant for level 80 players.

DPS: Damage Per Second, used contextually to mean I filled a damage dealing role (not tank or healer). 1500 seems to be the concensus of where you start once you hit 80.

Dailies: Repeatable quests (like kill 10 kobolds) that are available every 24 hours.

So about everyone I have talked to is disgruntled with the new Coliseum in 3.2.

Here are the steps to use it:

1. Become exalted with Argent Crusade so it unlocks

2. Beat it on regular mode (drops Champion Seals which btw, right now only item of value is an epic weapon; I'm not going to mention the collector mounts/tabard/banner because they're collectibles). BTW, the instance is just a round arena where 1-5 bosses come out and you down them... instance done thereafter (and fyi, Blizz is only unlocking one boss per week).

3. Do it again in heroic to get an emblem of triumph

4. Turn in 40/50/60 emblems of triumph for one piece of T8 gear.

It's actually a lot easier for a casual like me, but at the same time, running it 50 times for one piece of gear... yuck.

So last night was several rounds of login fail or server crashes. If you made it past that you were faced with a wall of lag crits.

I hopped on this morning and some differences I found:
- Undercity on the map has a new, darker color.
- Changed the quests of some of the Argent Tournament
ie, previously
Kill 10 scourge is now Kill 10 converted heroes.
Kill 15 scourge is now Kill 15 undead cultists.
Kill 10 scouts, 3 lieutenants, 1 commander is now Kill 3 commanders.

There were a few new quests from Sunreavers and two easy Black Knight quests that rewarded one and three Champion seals.

Warlock land mount cost all of 33 silver.
Paladin epic land mount cost 1 gold 45 silver (no questing required, just buy from trainer).

FYI, I am still only 6600/21000 until exalted with Argent Crusade, so as of yet still cannot see what the Argent Crusade quartermaster is offering.

OMG! 3.2 is out

Today is patch day... August 4, 2009.

Which means;

All of my level 20 alts will be getting land mounts..
Three level 40 alts will be getting epic mounts..
I may try to get 50 mounts on my warlock..
I have 70 Champion Seals, enough to get one heirloom from the Argent Crusade Quartermaster (unfortunately CAN'T -- need 15000 more rep with Argent Crusade)..

The sad downside is my brand new Death Knight is getting sapped by the slow ebbtide of DK nerfs. No more free powerlevelling until level 80.