Having a Homer Moment or D'oh

Well the shattering has hit Azeroth and zone have been nuked badly so like I most of the blogging community I rolled an alt and set forth to experience the new quest content.
Podling the Gnome Warlock was born (cliched I know)

I had fun in the gnome starting zone which is sooo much better than the old zone and is nicely worked in with the retaking of Gnomer.

While questing though I suddenly remembered it was the last day of the Thanksgiving event and a brilliant chance to level my cooking rapidly on my little Gnome rather than doing it the hard way. So I pottered between Ironforge and Stormwind merrily cooking the festival fair until it came time to head to Darnassus for potatoes.

(Now at this point remember I have not leveled an alt from new for over three years and spent all of Wrath doing high level stuff like raiding)

So I thought "Darnassus eh have to run it". Off little Podling set full of hope, after all his guide had done this before on a hunter and a druid at similar level back in BC days.
Boy things have changed a bit!

I got to Kalimdor ok via the usual route of the Wetlands and then onto Dustwallow Marsh which was a bit nastier than I remembered, however Jaina and all the crew at Theramore helped a bit by putting a bloody great road through the middle of the marsh. I had a few crocodile related deaths but made it through eventually and thought the worst was behind me.

Then I hit southern barrens and the wheels came off badly. Creature levels appear to have changed a bit so my aggro radius was huge, also blizz appear to have increased mob speed a lot so you cant out run them. I got eaten quite a bit.

But still I persevered and made it to the great rift. However the Alliance and Horde are now going at it big style in this area and this proved to be too much. There are really high level Horde (well compared to my level 5 Gnome) like fleas on a dog and I could go no further. Tail between legs I ported back to Ironforge and decided I would have to get a portal if one of the Guild Mages was on as I could not think of any other way to reach Darnassus.

I relayed my tale of woe on Guild Chat (bearing in mind I had been mucking about at this for 2 hours) and wondered if one of the Mages would be on in time when our DK tank Nightmare piped up with "lol mate why don't you just take a boat from Stormwind". "Boat from Stormwind when did that make it in the game?" I asked. "Only about two years mate" was the response.

As Homer would say D'oh!

Zetter

Saying goodbye to The Lich King

So its the end of the expansion and raiding has finished in the Kingdom Of Rust, we are all on a nice break until Cataclysm where the prospect of fighting for spawns awaits until raiding gets into full swing again.

I am looking forward to the expansion a lot but from a lore point of view I think I will be sorry to say goodbye to Arthas and his undead minions. I don't know why but I have always been fascinated and horrified by the whole Zombie/ getting taken over as undead thing.
I remember watching the Dawn of the Dead remake round a friends a couple of years ago and being quite disturbed by the whole zombie infestation thing. Especially at the start when the main protagonists daughter is infected and then kills her husband who also rises as one of the undead. I think its probably the whole idea of losing yourself so to speak but still being there that I find disturbing.
Personally I think I prefer the approach taken by Lt Gorman in Aliens (don't know if you have seen this) when he and Vasquez are cornered and about to be turned into basically lunch or alien breeders. He pulls out a grenade and takes a load of them with him rather than being torn to bits or eeeew impregnated. I think if I was in the same situation I would prefer to go out with a bang!

Anyway rambling a bit, but this is what I think makes Arthas and the Scourge such a great enemy, not only are people you are fighting beside killed by them but your friends suddenly get up and start trying to kill you! Take this section from the story of Kel'Thuzad's fall to the dark side

http://www.wow-europe.com/en/info/underdev/1p11/naxxramas/roadtodamnation2.html

damn disturbing or what.

From my point of view especially playing someone tied to the natural world like a druid it felt that you were really fighting for all you held dear as the alternative wasn't just death it was worse.


For cataclysm I don't think Deathwing has the same impact for me as an enemy. Yep hes a dragon and a damn big one at that but really he doesn't seem to have quote the air of evil about him as the scourge. Sure he can incinerate you and blast towns etc but the scourge not only killed you and obliterated your town but you got up the next day and munched down on the survivors. Also from reading the linked extract you probably were horribly aware of it.

So roll on Cataclysm but I don't think I will be as afraid of Deathwing as I was of Arthas and his Scourge horde.


Zetter