Looking Back At Legion, Looking Forward Towards Battle For Azeroth

I’ve been meaning to write a post regarding what I appreciated in Legion and what I’m looking forward to in Battle For Azeroth. 

The Best of Legion

Getting Pathfinder for Flying has to be the top moment.

 I could see people were getting it easy peasy in just a few weeks, but the reputation grinds and the Broken Shore completion were really unpleasant.  The next time around (BFA) I’m going to make certain to do every single quest everywhere, to do every single thing that might be an achievement I can do, and it will be quicker this next round.

My Frost Mage Gets Her Artifact Weapon

I had a terrible time getting my Frost Mage to the Broken Isles because I could not beat the boss in her Artifact Quest.  Every other character had no trouble.  She was just stuck in Draenor.  It was very sad.  Then one day I tried it again and she got it!

Soon thereafter, I changed her to Fire Mage and she’s had a much better time of it.

Suramar

I loved Suramar.  It was like a mini-expansion, completely different from every other area in Legion. The story was really well done, though it might have ended a bit sooner.  At first I hated Suramar City, but as I got better gear and could easily take on the roaming elites, it was fun.

I loved that in disguise my Feral Druid looked like a beautiful cat.

Even the Suramar Swim Form disguise was great.

Looking Forward To These In Battle For Azeroth

Pirates, Tales of the Sea, Yo Ho! 

I feared Battle for Azeroth would be all icky and PvP filled, but it isn’t at all!  The Horde are barely seen, I suppose unless you’re in Warmode or a certain city in Stormsong Valley.

I have a lifelong love of pirates and sea stories and this expansion is a dream.  It’s sort of amazing they took three large geographical areas and gave them all different takes on seafaring superstitions and monsters.

The quests in Tiragarde Sound and Drustvar really flow well from one area to the next.  You’re drawn along by story and your own desire to explore.  Does it get better than that?

The city of Boralus (Alliance side, of course) is, I think, the best drawn out city they’ve ever done.  It sprawls, but in a natural way a city would sprawl, right down to the docks.

You can get boat rides everywhere!  In addition to flight points you can take ferries from one place to the next.  The oarsmen and women are often telling stories or making comments as they go.

Herbs grow in some unexpected places.  Like the sides of buildings, or on trees, or in rivers, or by the seaside.

I love the dungeons.  I’d like ten more!

See you in Boralus!

Sixteen Characters Now In Motion

Rotating nine level 100s apparently bores me, so I now have a total of sixteen characters on two servers in the rotation.  Several are in Draenor, one in Pandaria, a couple in Northrend, and there’s a new little Gnome Hunter preparing to enter the Frosthold mine.

The levels go much faster for anyone not in the Broken Isles.  I queue the Northrenders and Pandaria for dungeons, and bypass them for Draenor (the expansion that put me off dungeons in this game).  I’m planning to send each character in the required dungeons for Broken Isles quest and crafting requirements, though I don’t appreciate being forced to do so.

I’m having too good a time with this rotation, I think, and it occurred to me suddenly that once all my 100s are at 110 I’ll have to figure out how that works out since it becomes El Grindaroony. 

Maybe each day a different character gets a shot at World Quests and whatever else is a must do at level cap.  I can see in advance I am unlikely to do Mythic Raiding or Raids so, it might be 110 and done on those folks till the next expansion.  Luckily there are a boatload of characters in the wings.

A Rotating Tour Of The Broken Isles

I’m reading with interest everyone’s reactions to Legion.  In truth, after playing through the beta, I didn’t like it, though I couldn’t put my finger on why.  I’m still not sure.  I don’t feel that way at all now that I’m working my way through the Broken Isles, rotating one level each for nine characters.   They get the level and I move onto the next.

I’ve never done that before, and I’m surprised at how much I’m enjoying it.  There isn’t any burnout for me, no grind of any kind.  All of the characters play differently, have different Trade Skills, and I’ve placed them all over the map.

Even if two characters are working in the same area, they aren’t played one right after the other, and I just send one in another direction so they aren’t doing the quest lines in the same order either.  And, rather than anyone being low geared and left behind by the end, they’ll all be geared and at max level pretty much together.

The Rotation

Feral Druid Alchemist/Herbalist                      Aszuna

Retribution Paladin   Blacksmithing/Mining    Stormheim

Assassin Rogue  Leatherworking/Skinning      Val’Sharah

Destruction Warlock    Inscription/ Herbalist    Aszuna

Havok Demon Hunter      Herbalist/Mining      High Mountain

Frost Mage     Tailoring/Enchanting                  Aszuna

Beast Master Hunter   Tailoring/Skinning         High Mountain

Feral Druid   Alchemist/Herbalist                     Val’ Sharah

Elemental Shaman    Mining/Herbalist            Stormheim

Frost Mage Adventures

My Frost Mage finally completed the Artifact Quest Sunday.    First though, I had a wily desperate thought.   I’d see if I could just sail her off the edge of Dalaran and get to the ground below.

I slunk around the edge of Dalaran till I found what looked a good place to jump that would take me to dry land.   I got out a Goblin Glider (I’d never used one before) with its 2 minute timer –plenty of time to get to ground!  And jumped.

I kept waiting for some fakey–oops you’re dead for no reason message, or the despicable “Fatigued” notice but no.

I made it!  Got out my Water Elemental and headed down the hill to slowly and patiently build up some xp, maybe get an armor drop.   That last is actually sillier than the rest. I have seen zero cloth armor drop as loot.  Leather, Plate, Mail only.

I was unable to take on more than one mob, dead.   It took forever to kill even a single mob.  Discouraging so I gave up the plan and ported out.

Around midnight, your close personal friend The Gutless Wonder went in after Badassbadoopie or whatever his name is.  He killed me once then, mofo nasty boy, he was DOWN.

The Mage Hall is right up there in coolness with the Paladin and Rogue Halls.  Lots of ancient tomes, balconies you can jump over and float down from, paintings with eyes that move.  Note the painting looks like a certain Game of Thrones character.

Transmog This Stinkin’ Thing Off Me, Please

I pay no attention to Transmog, and never have.  I have a couple of nice dresses from events in the bank, that’s it.  This means I hate having to go to the Transmog guy to get bovine and other headwear the heck off.   Mooooo.

How Big Is It?

I noticed a guy next to me at Darkmoon Faire with a really large fishing bobber this weekend.  Did I say Big Bobber Big _______?   No.

Nor did I say:  “My, that’s a Mighty Big Bobber you have there”.   Clearly I thought it, but see, this is why you don’t want mic chat in games where something like that could pop out of your mouth.

I found my own Bobber Of Unusual Size at the fishing supplier in Stormwind.  They’re great.

Love My Wurm

You know how it is with a Hunter, you have to get a new pet as soon as you get to a new world area because your current pet can’t handle anything.   I grabbed a worm thing.  As it turns out I love him.  Great pet, looks huge compared to my dwarf Hunter, and in battle he gets bigger yet and glows like fire and looks kind of majestic in a wormy way.

The Rogue Plot Thickens

Who writes the Rogue stuff? They are just the best.   You have to investigate a report of a body in the class hall.  Yikes.

Legion: So The Plan Was…

I meant to just start out in Legion with my Tailor and Alchemist from the two servers where I have high level characters.  Those are usually the most useful crafts in any game, in my experience.

I’d have a Feral Druid and a Frost Mage in one place, the other would be a Hunter and a Druid. 

Once I started the Artifact Quests aka the Class Quests, I found them to be really interesting, and different from each other so I’ve been working on the quests for each class where my characters are at 100.  Only two of them went in with ilevels over 680.  One was around 650, a couple in the 620s.

The plan then was to get them through their quest series, establish them in their Order Halls, set them in place all over the Broken Isles.

Two characters had a pretty easy peasy time of it.   Others, not so much.

Druid

My Druid sailed through–the one at 680.    I like the Emerald Dream area, it suits the Druid well.  Bad news, in addition to her Aluminum Mask Face, in Feral form she now looks like Scar from the Lion King.  I just can’t look at my character anymore.

Warlock

My Warlock with only 654 hardly took any damage.  It was over so fast I thought something was missing.

The Warlock Class Hall looks like hell, literally, and I’m not happy the entrance is in the Underbelly.  Why not a portal or some other location?

Paladin

My Paladin with an iLevel of 625?  Did get killed a couple of times, but her healing abilities, though not feeling as powerful as they once were, kept her alive and she made it.

I honestly thought it was odd to have the class order hall in the Plaguelands of the Eastern Kingdoms.  Why not somewhere on the Broken Isles?  However, when I walked into the vault, and saw the rather wonderful underground setup, I was amazed.  I thought the entire ceremony of induction, and the quest line for her were really quite touching.

Demon Hunter 

Not a fan of the Demon Hunter quest or the hall itself.   Lesson learned in the artifact part, you have to kill every single mob in the place before you get the Boss.  Zzzzzzz.

I dislike circular structures, whether they be buildings or in game cities and the Demon Hunter Hall is a circle.  I really really don’t like having to float over to the place from the edge of Dalaran every time you go there.

Hunter

The Hunter quest is good except for the middle part where you’re in Ulduar.  It just doesn’t feel like a Hunter-y place.  I would rather that she could choose a Bow over a Gun as her weapon.

The Hunter Order Hall area is great though, and really feels evocative of the class.

Frost Mage

My Frost Mage at about 625 has not been able to beat the boss in her quest yet.  In any other area of Azeroth, she could start questing in the new area, level up, get a few pieces of upgraded armor, and go back in after the (Redacted).  

 The Nasty Boy

No no. If you can’t complete this, no order hall, and thus no way to get to the Broken Isles.   I came so close a couple of times.  Changed my rotation and talents.  Used every skill she has.  She’s died at least ten times.  Soooo.  I sent her to Tanaan, cone of shame city.  Except, every objective area had people there and all the mobs were dead.  I got a single piece of useable armor.  Then I thought to look at her shards and went to the Stormwind Vendor and bought a few pieces and whoa now 647.  Babaloooey.   Additionally, my hard working alchemist gathered enough materials to send her a few Legion level Healing Potions and Rejuvenation potions.  I am hoping they aren’t on the same timer, as often they are not.  If she can get down to the nub with bad butt boy, and use one of those, she’s got his horsehairs in a snipper.  Hahaha.  Sorry, really frustrated on this one.

Rogue

The very best quest and order hall goes to the Rogue.  The entire thing is so well thought out and written just brilliantly.  My Rogue is an Assassination Rogue, also with a low ilevel.  She had no trouble though, except for figuring out the how of her quest.  It really was a puzzle, and it was a case of observation, and timing and use of her skills.   I was stuck at the last part trying to get into the Stormwind Keep.    I logged out and sent another character to fly around the keep to see if there was another secret type entrance I never knew was there.  Nope, you have to go right in the front door.

I really hated to see all the guards in my beloved Stormwind out to kill me, it was sort of jarring.

So you think that was super good as a quest and a tale and you get back to Dalaran and there’s more to the story.  So cool.

Also in the Underbelly, this has a secret entrance from a Dalaran shop with a door that swings out just for Rogueish types.  So immersive.

Onward into the Breach (I think that’s the phrase)

I still have a boosted Elemental Shaman to do.  I thought I should auto-level a class who has lagged behind forever.  Problematically, they’re level 100, but you still aren’t familiar with how to play them well, so she may get trapped in Class Quest Hell too.

Everyone is getting sent to various lands.  I think it is just great not to have to drag every character along the same path.  They’ll all get there eventually, but the game play for each of them is so different, we shall see.   I stop to fish with everyone.   I would like to start cooking quests, but am not seeing any available.  You can get Legion level Archaeology just by working a dig site.  Good to know.   I find myself switching between characters several times during the evening, so maybe they’ll all get to the top around the same time.

PVP Test: Die, Snowzilla Die! (Joking)

Ms. up for anything went into the PVP test.  I thought I’m maybe too much of a target with my foofy girl characters, so I created HIM:

If you’re going to be a guy, be DookNukem.   It’s the only way.

I chose a Warrior for additional oomf.   My highest on live is level 92, so I was at least familiar with the class.  I chose the talents I thought would do the most damage, it being PVP and all.

So many awesome moves!   I was sure I would clean up the place.

I imagined that you’d be dropped right into some big battle, but no, you have to queue for a Random Battleground.

So the queue was 13+ minutes and I got bored.

Finally WE’RE IN!

Everybody splits off going all different ways.   I try my moves on a few guys and spend lots of time at the boneyard, oddly much of the time sent there by Snowzilla.   The first time it happened, I noticed I was Team Leader. Hahahahahaha.

Despite my many deaths, I came out right in the middle of the leader board, which I was pretty pleased with.  I may or may not go back in.

Legion Report From The Dead Duck

I’m not dead all of the time, but it certainly does happen far more than I would normally experience.  I’m not certain if I’m not playing the Havoc Demon efficiently or if the world is a bit harder to navigate.  Both are factors, I’m sure.

I noticed on the Beta Boards someone else saying that the Demon Hunter seemed almost all powerful in the starter area, but as soon as they were out in the larger world, they were having a significantly different experience.   As I quest and get better gear, my survivability is improving.  I still need to tweak my rotation and play.

Demon Hunter

I’m liking the class.  With all of the movement options as part of the play style, the character is incredibly mobile.   I still haven’t mastered the Art of The Glide, which is causing me problems every time I have to return to the Class Order Hall on the Fel Hammer.  You need to leap and glide from the edge of Dalaran’s floating city over to a platform, then transport to the Fel Hammer.  Luckily a bat creature catches me and drops me on the platform each time.

I’m planning on playing this character through to 110 and beyond.  Having a brand new class to play in an all new area makes the game extra new and exciting for me.   Normally, I’d want to try the classes I’m familiar with as well, but I think my time is better spent leveling and gearing my Live characters as close to iLevel 680 as I can get them before the expansion comes out.

Dalaran

The city looks as it always does, except that the Underbelly is an Instant Death situation for non-PVP players like myself.  After exploring briefly (I thought a quest called The Royal Summons must be down there), I could barely get my character out of the Underbelly alive, with multiple deaths and tries for the exit.  Ouch.  Beware the Underbelly.

I have not found a single repair npc anywhere out in the world so at this time you always have to return to Dalaran to repair and sell junk. 

The Open World Approach

This is one of my favorite things.  You are able at any time to go to any area of the Broken Isles to quest.  You’re never under the level of the mobs because it all adjusts to your current level.

One thing this does is, it spreads the population out over the entire Broken Isles.  You’ll never be the only one dragging your lowbie character or alt through an area everyone else has already done.   There will always be other people there questing or leveling or looking for resources.  Even at the top, when people are at 110, those Daily World Quests will have players all over the map.  It just seems like a great way to make the world more viable, and populated, and fun.

Crafting

My Demon Hunter appears to have no self heals at all which is a bad situation.  I think each class should have some sort of heal, in addition to having consumable options for staying alive.

I picked up Alchemy and Herbalism to give her a shot.  For Alchemy, you could buy the Apprentice level skill then get a quest right away to get Legion Level crafting.  With Herbalism, you can pick up herbs in the Broken Isles with Apprentice level skills.

Very exciting to me is, while you’re out questing, there are npcs with Alchemy and Herbalism quests, with materials for completion being available right in the area you’re in.  I love that as a way to integrate the professions into the game world once more.

One of these quests gave me a recipe that heals for 500,000 instead of the usual 68k.  I’m sure the ingredients won’t be easy to find, but it increases that treasure hunt feeling you get when you’re looking for resources as well as killing your way through the world.

Unrelated to Alchemy, but I have gotten two Cloth drops from mobs so far, and I love that much better than just cranking out some cloth as a Daily task.  Adventure! Discovery! Treasures galore!  I’m in!

World of Warcraft: Legion

I didn’t know that Legion refers to a group of demons, did you?  I skim along in my religion as I do in most things.  Just passing through!

It seemed like a good idea to spend some time reading posts and forums about the new Blizzard Expansion today, and I am, as always with a game I love to play, excited.  It’s about time Elves were featured, they’re not the aloof, we scorn all but ourselves elves found in other games.  They take selfies!

 
 Not being a Lore Junkie, but being an Elf Friend, I’ll enjoy getting more of their back story.

While many seem to have an attitude that says Show me why I should stay, Show me why I shouldn’t leave, Show me why I should pay you, my thought is, when will it be available? When can I play?  This time around I should have at least 5 max level characters to send to the Broken Isles, all my favorite classes.

When a game I play brings out new content, I always wish for a new class to try out, a new area to explore, and a raised level cap.  Five is puny, truthfully, but ten is great.  I want new and interesting additions to the crafting system (we didn’t get that last time and nothing has been said this time).  I wish for a good story, and I want surprises.  As an avid dungeon fan in World of Warcraft, lots of five person dungeons…give me TEN! (There may be 9 incoming which is not bad at all).

Right on the Legion site there is a beta opt-in option.  I was thinking I wouldn’t do it again so as not to ruin the story and experience, but plink!  I hit it immediately.  Last year I spent all summer playing in Draenor and I didn’t want to play anything else at all.  The people playing in the beta were a really good crowd, smart, knowledgeable, helpful.  Sort of like the ideal server population you’d like to find someday.  It was an excellent beta experience.  Crossing fingers, see you there!