Reflections From The Pond

Posts Tagged ‘Daissy’

Well, of course I was gonna visit the barbershops when they opened up in Ironforge and Stormwind. My RL visits to the hairdressers are always pleasurable, and besides the actual haircut it includes gossiping, a scalp massage and a glass of wine or two. Of course I wanted to treat my loyal WoW girls to that as well :-)

And now there was this achievement too! Being the achievement nut that I am I just had to take the flock to get stylish(er).

First one out was Jools.

Her old look with that long blue braid on her shoulder wasn’t very cool, it was a bit of an strict old-maid school teacher look, not at all appropriate for my sweet Holy priest.
Now she has a soft shoulder-length bob haircut with a slightly side-swept bang and a white ribbon to hold the longer hair back from her face.

She didn’t dye her hair but kept the cornflower blue color since it sets off her reed facial tatoos nicely.

Next one out was Joaquime, my feral druid.

Like Jools, Joaquime also kept her original hair colour, but unlike Jools she kept the long tresses, not feeling truly feral without a mane of hair in caster form as well.

She has a slightly stricter hairdo now, no more hair getting in her eyes as it is gathered in a loose braid at her back, holding it back from her forehead with that gorgeous tiara.

Paynne went to the hairdresser’s as well, but after quite some time trying out the different hairdos and hairdyes available, she realised that there really is no such thing as improving pure perfection.

She did try out a set of larger earrings, just for the sake of the achievement, but she had to go back right away and get her old ones back.

Tessye had similar problems, there really was no other hairstyle that looked good on her no matter what combination of colours or styles she tried out, so after a lot of agonising in the barber shop chair she decided to keep her golden brown hair curled up on her head – the perfect hairstyle for a sneaky rogue.

She was daring enough to try out a new eyebrow ring and nose ring instead of her old earrings, which actually look kinda cool on her.

Larue dyed her dark curls light greyish blond but she didn’t really feel comfortable in that hair colour so she had to go back and get rid of the dye job. With that dark skin of hers the dark hair colour looks much better.

A good friend tells me that half the job when tanking is to convince the group or raid that you are capable of dealing with any issues or emergencies that may arise – in other words: you gotta look like you know the drill ;P

As such, it was way overdue with a makeover for my little warrior!

Her pink pigtails is gone, replaced by a darker reddish colour and a thick ponytail down her back. Now she looks like a real warrior and would get into any over-21-nightclubs without a hassle!

So, achievements all done, new looks for a few, and generally overall satisfaction with looks all around! Now, all I need is that scalp massage and the glass of wine…

After having commited full-scale war on the Furbolgs and Giants in Winterspring, I finally got my sweet pink-ish tiger! (Ok, its more lavender than pink, but still…)

It was one happy gnome that went riding around Shattrah that night :-)

The grind to Exalted with the Wintersabre Trainers was a long one, but not that painful. The worst part was waiting for the mobs to respawn, since they are the quest mobs for another q as well.

I had company a lot of the time too, a paladin friend (Crusader Aura ftw!), and a sweet mage I met there who also wanted that cute tiger.

So, now its lvling time for Dizzie!

So when you are out adventuring, and you just happent to meet that cute fellow adventurer that makes your heart double beat, what do you do? Why, you flirt, of course!

Sadly though, Tessy comes across like a hot-air-head when it comes to flirting. She really needs some practice in this area, because what kind of strong handsome stranger would be attracted by lines like “You got me all a-flutter”, “My turn-offs are rude people, mean people and people who aren’t nice” or “I need a hero”? Only guy to fall for that is someone who was behind the door when the conversational skills was handed out, thats for sure (but then again, maybe it isn’t conversation that she is angling for?).

Jools and Joaq both are a little more flirty, and they like to say things like “There’s nothing like sleeping in the forest under the moonlight”, “Sure, I’ve got exotic piercings” and “If I wasn’t purple, you’d see I was blushing.” Well, at least it seems they are both truthful when they say that “I’m the type of girl my mother warned me about.”

Szorcha is more direct and to the point, she knows what’s going on and what she expects, so when flirting she boldly states “I’ll have you know I can flatten steel with my thighs”, “I like tall men”, and “I’d like to see you in a kilt”. She also prefers not to waste too much time as she says “Enough with the flirting. I know you think all dwarven women look the same”, but she likes to seem at least a little hard-to-get, so she claims that “I won’t fall for a bad pick-up line, you gotta try two or three at least.” You go with Szorcha, you better be prepared, she wants it her way.

Larue is not that much of a tease-flirt either, she rather directly hints that “The nights are so chilly on this planet” and when she thinks she’s certain to score she says “Are you thinking what I am thinking? Good. Bring ample supply of butter and goblin jumper cables”. Butter? Better not ask unless you want to experience it.

Paynne is very picky when it comes to flirting (mostly because she feels that no-one can really compete with her knight in shining armor, the valiant paladin Stauros), so she usually settles for the more careful phrases like “I do not find you completely disagreeable” and “Your ability to form a complete sentence is a plus”, indicating that she is really not very interested in anyone else.

Dizzie is more verbal and spontaneous, she can say things like “You are cute” or “At this time, I think that you should purchase me an alcoholic beverage and engage in diminutive conversation with me in hopes of establishing a report” but once in a while her engineering interests shine through, like when she exclaims that “I don’t feel that a 1-10 scale is fine enough to capture subtle details of compatibility. I would prefer a 12-dimensional compatible scale with additional parametes for mechanical aptitude and torque.” What can I say, it is lucky for her that she is cute ;P

Now Rancour is sure of herself, “I know, my natural beauty is intimidating”, and she is sure of what she wants “You’re the type I’d like to sink my teeth into”, but “I won’t bite you where it shows.” If the prospective lover seem hesitant when he hears this she asks “Aren’t you going to ask me out?”, but to be fair she also warns him that “When enraged, and in heat, a female troll can mate over eighty times in one night. Be you prepared?” Well, are you?

Another one who is sure of herself is Sweetsheeks, who tells you that “My mana tap bring all the boys to the yard”, “Do you believe in love at first sight, or should I walk by again?” and “Is that a mana worm in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?”. If you get down to business too fast she tells you that “No, no I won’t do that. But my sister will”. Or if you are lucky, maybe you will hear her say “Normally I only ride on epic mounts, but … let’s talk…” or “I’m addicted to you, baby.”

And the real Tess, how does she flirt? Well, I think most of my girls have some fun flirt lines, and maybe I’ll use them sometimes, but I have a few nice ones of my own too. So, if you are a cute strong adventurer out doing heroic deeds, maybe we will meet and maybe you will find out what they are…;P

Dizzie is now 850/12000 Revered with the Wintersabre Trainers!

She has unlocked the third quest, the Rampaging Giants, and done it once. I don’t see her doing it many more times though, since the ride down to the far south of Winterspring takes a while and you have to kill (at least) 8 lvl 59-60 Elite Giants. Easily doable solo for a lvl 61 Fury Warrior with some new green Outland gear sure, but it still takes a lot of time.

She has abandoned her first plan of only doing the Winterfall Intrusion quest, and does the Frostsaber Provisions quest as well. The drop rate of the quest items still suck, and the mobs themselves rarely drop anything useful, but killing them gives xp and it feels so much better to turn both the quests in and get 500 rep per visit to Rivern than running back and forth and just get 250.

Also, sometimes you have to wait for respawns of the Winterfall Shamans or Ursas because someone else has been there killing them, and you might as well have something useful to do while you wait.

An unforeseen bonus of killing bears and chimaeras for the Provisions quest was also that there are quite a few veins of Thorium around in Winterspring, which she never would have discovered taking the fastest route between the Winterfall Village and Frostsabre Rock all the time. Thanks to this, she has now managed to level her mining to 315 and her engineering to 325!

So, while there still is about 32 more hours of grind to do, it actually seems doable now!

Pretty pink tiger, here I come!

Related post: The most mind-numbing grind ever?

Do you know what this is?

This is a Frostaber Mount, purchasable by those who are Exalted with the Wintersaber Trainers in Winterspring.

I just know Dizzie would look so cool on a mount like this, the pink and lavender stripes of the tiger matching her pink pigtails just beautifully.

As the avid readers know Dizzie went through the portal to Outland at the tender level of 58. She picked up some quests, set out to do them and died. And she died. And she died again. And again. Her aggro range seemed to cover all of Hellfire Peninsula and she could hardly take down one mob on her own, let alone two or more.

On closer inspection, her gear was perhaps not all that up to date, her pretty blue Knight’s Cloak of the Bear was for lvl 29, her cool Herod’s Shoulder for lvl 37, and so on.

I called out for help and my husband came to the rescue. With his help Dizzie managed to finish the quests, get some new green imba gear, double her HP and AP and ding 59 in about an hour and a half.

She headed back to the old world then, figuring she could do some easy questing there now that she was a little better equipped. She had a lot of unfinished quests in Winterspring, so she set course to the snowy north.

And there, surrounded by pink-purple hostile tigers, on a huge cliff shaped like an inverted fang, she found Rivern Frostwind, Wintersaber Trainer, and the Wintersaber Mounts. And she knew she just had to have one of those.

What can I say? A pink-haired girl’s gotta have a pink-furred mount, right? (Yeye I know it’s lavender, but it’s still pink-ish)

The only way to get rep with this small faction is to do the quests they offer. You start at 0/3000 Neutral and there is one quest available – Frostsaber Provisions. You have to kill Shardtooth bears for 5 Shardtooth Meat and Chillwind chimaeras for 5 Chillwind Meat. The droprate is horrendous, it must be something like 20%. The meats don’t drop unless you have the quest, and once you have the 5 meats required they don’t drop no more until you turn the q in and take it again. The mobs rarely drop anything useful but a lot of Big Bear Bones that won’t stack and thus takes a lot of space in your bags, and Dizzie is a miner/engineer and can’t skin the damn dead carcasses.

Anyways, this quest gives 250 rep per turn-in.

After having done the Frostsaber Provisions 6 times and reached 1500/3000 Neutral another quest opens up – Winterfall Intrusion. This quests asks you to kill 5 Shamans and 5 Ursas in the Winterfall village east of Everlook, it’s repeatable and gives 250 rep per turn-in.

If you have done the quest Winterfall Activity killing the Winterfall mobs will also give you rep with Timbermaw Hold.

By this time Dizzie had dinged 60 as well and flown off to Dun Morogh to get her a Swift Yellow Mechanostrider. The epic rider made the trips between Frostsaber Rock and Winterfall Village a little faster, and she was not as often thrown of her mount while trying to avoid the numerous mobs littering the area.

She skipped doing the Frostsaber Provisions q because of the bad droprate and concentrated on killing furbolgs. A completion of the Winterfall Intrusion quest can be done in about ten minutes if there are no other distractions or obstacles, like a thorium node that needs to be mined, bag space that needs to be freed, or having to wait around for respawns because someone else has killed the mobs you need.

Dizzie is currently at 1000/6000 Friendly and research shows that another quest that gives 350 rep will open up at Honored. However, that quest requires riding down to the south part of Winterspring to kill some elite giants there, and I think the rep grind it will be faster if I skip this. Will probably do it once in a while, just to alleviate the possible boredom of doing what was referred to as the most mind-numbingly grind ever found in WoW.

So, if I only do the furbolg-killing quest, ECT (estimated completion time) of the rep grind will be about 42 hours in total, 3 of which I have done, 38 of which I have left to do. If you think this is insane, consider that before TBC these quests only gave 50 rep per turn-in, making the ECT to something like 5 times longer, or about 200 hours.

Dizzie will also have the benefit of the better Outland gear she’s wearing and the increasing level difference between her and the mobs will make them easier to kill or avoid, so it won’t be too bad I think. I hope.

I don’t have to worry about gearing her up either since a sweet friend gave her a surprise gift consisting of the full Fel Iron set, complete with two Fel Iron Hatchets, enchanted with Fiery Weapon, for her Dual Wield.

This is a grind best done while watching Lost or some other TV-show (laptop ftw!) to avoid death by acute boredom or broken windows from the computer-hurled-through-it-syndrome and I will definitely try to do it while rested so she at least gets some xp out of it.

These 152 quest turn-ins I have left to do will give about 760 k xp (1 520 mobs x ~500 xp/mob rested bonus) which will mean that Dizzie will get her pretty pink tiger at about level 62.

And then she will be as ready for Outland as she can be!

(As a curiosity, the Winterspring Frostsaber seems to be the only epic land mount that only requires 70 riding skill.)

The little warrior rode her trusted Mechanostrider across the barren red wastes of the Blasted Lands, taking good care to skirt the roaming helboars and felguards. She followed the old and worn path through the crater rim and came to a halt at the inner edge of the crater.

The Dark Portal was ahead of her, green-glowing, carved in stone, leading to that other world, the Outland. Many had gone before her, many would come after, but this time, this one time, it was her turn to pass through the void, spanning the dimensions between the worlds.

She approached the other-wordly thing with trepidation, her heart beating fast and her senses all on maximum alert, thrilled and terrified at the same time.

The thing was huge, it loomed above her and she had never felt so small and insignificant in her entire life. The gateway itself swirled in greenish colours before her, almost hypnotically. She felt as if it was trying to lure her in, beckon her to come enter the glowing enticing mists of the portal, and suddenly she was not at all sure she wanted to go through.

What was on the other side? Was there really another world?

For a fleeting moment she considered turning back, riding back to her old world, never going through the portal. But then she took a deep breath, and without really making a conscious decision about it, her body leading and her mind tagging along, she stepped through the gateway.

The green mists felt oddly cold to the touch, the passage through them felt like it took forever, she was floating in space, time elongating and then snapping back in an instant as she stepped through on the other side.

The portal was high up on a stairway and the view of the new world was breathtaking. It was all different. The sky was red, streaked with nebulae and stars and planets never seen in Azeroth. It was beautiful beyond words and the little warrior was just standing there at the top of the stairs, looking in awe and delight and wonder at the new world unfolding beneath her.

All fear and worries and second-thoughts were gone, she was thrilled and excited about exploring this new world like she had the old one, one adventure after the other, and she ran down the stairs, giddily, happily, joyfully, ready to go find friends and quests and fame in this new strange place…

My gnome warrior Dizzie is happily lvling up nowadays. She is fury specced and its one of the cutest things I have ever seen, watching her charge away to a mob and start hitting the tall ugly thing with her glowing [Phantom Blade] (made for her especially by my adorable <3 husband) and some off-hand axe.

As she hit 44 she went to Tanaris to start questing there. Picked up the wastewander water quests and the ones that lead you into Pirate Cove. You would have thought she’d be 45 within some hours with all these easy questing and the rested bonus.

Well, think again. Tanaris seemed to be filled with sad no-life coward hordes and Dizzie spent more time running from the gy than actually getting any xp.

I never attack horde players when I see them, no matter what level or what they are doing. I just leave them be.

All (and I mean all, every single one I saw) of the horde players I encountered in Tanaris that day attacked Dizzie sooner or later. If they were of about equal level they snuck off when they saw her and waited until she was already in combat before they went for her, if they were some ?? lvl helping out some lower lvls they just attacked her on sight.

An all too frequent sight in the Tanaris desert :-(

(I know I am on a pvp server and should get used to it – I started playing here because the kids were playing here and by the time I found out that there were servers that didn’t allow ganking I had too many characters and too many new friends on this server to really like the idea of changing servers. I think many people are like me in this aspect.)

Dizzie has crap gear. She sucks at pvp. She generally just ambles merrily along, picking up quests and doing them cheerfully, not bothering anyone. However, this constant running from the gy was beginning to get on my nerves and I decided to get some revenge.

I logged Tessy, my rogue, flew her off to Tanaris and parked her in the Pirate Cove. She also has crap gear, she also sucks at pvp but she is a lvl 70 subtlety specced rogue, she doesn’t have to be good to kill lvl 50 wankers.

And kill them she did.

Some idiot lvl 51 priest, who did see Dizzie but skulked away and didn’t start dotting her until she was fighting some freeboter. Shadowstepping rogue = dead priest. He got oneshotted twice and then he got the message and disappeared.

A group of three, some lvl 65 pally helping a 43 or so warrior and mage. Killed them all once and then one-shotted the warrior and mage some times, sapping the pally when he was trying to ress them.

A moonkin druid, same lvl as Dizzie and hadn’t been trying to kill her at all so I was beginning to think it might actually be a human playing and not some sad loser al-quaida hangaround. But guess what, ofc he started spamming moonfire on her when she was fighting two mobs at the same time. This particular druid I followed all the way to Steamwheedle Port and made sure he didn’t get to turn in any quests. Had to run from the NPC’s a few times though, but hey, so what?

And then I asked myself…did this make me any happier? The sad losers were still sad losers, they were not gonna start acting like decent human beings no matter how many times I killed them. Dizzie was still dead and not getting any xp.

No, it was definitely not making me any happier.

It is said that revenge is a dish best served cold and I think I see the meaning of that proverb now. Revenge while being pissed off is not a good thing, it only makes you feel even more saddened and disgusted.

I just don’t get it. Yes, its “only” a game and yes, its “allowed” to kill characters in the game, but do you always go around doing everything just because its “allowed”? CS is a game where the only objective is to kill the enemy players, WoW is not. You don’t lose anything by letting enemy players live (ofc they may be sad gankers as well and come back and try to kill you, but that is not likely if you are of a higher level).

Ok, you might wanna do it for the honor (if ofc you even get honor, guess its more than probable that some of the morons don’t realise that you don’t get any honor when you kill players that are grey for you). So you get what, 5 honor?, for killing me. If you want honor go play one of the bg’s, more honor there than you could possibly get by killing random world encounters.

Or maybe you want to show off how good you are at killing opponents? Well, if you think that its showing off killing someone several lvls below you or someone who is already engaged in a fight, you need your head examined. Maybe the results would show that you have a brain or at least some cognitive capabilities, but I really doubt that.

I think that those who go around killing other players in have the same mentality as those who don’t help people with prams or wheelchairs get on the bus, they are the same kind as those who can’t be bothered to hold the door open for you but rather let it slam shut in your face – hey! it would have taken me a few secs to wait and hold the door open, cba with that!

It just saddens and disgusts me that a game I like to play so much seems to be overflowing with such rude a***holes.

It’s a good thing I have met so many nice and friendly people too, otherwise I’d have no hopes left for humanity…