I stood in the Amphitheater of Anguish with the crowds cheering wildly—not for me mind you, but rather for the lightning-spewing, 20 foot tall magnataur bearing down on me. Far above, the goblin fight coordinator egged the crowd on as I pondered the circumstances that had brought me here. It began with a fishing pole.
I’d been idly drowning worms in the sewers of Dalaran, trying in vain to fish up a giant rat, when the fellow next to me caught one. I congratulated him on his catch and took a peek at his equipment. His fishing pole was significantly better than mine and imbued the wielder with the ability to breathe underwater! Striking up a quick conversation, I find this pole could be easily attained by anyone with an exalted reputation with the walrus people I used to steal puppies for so many moons ago. I decided then and there to improve my standings with them and now was a good enough time as any to start.
There are three dailies to assist with Walrus reputation, inconveniently spread out over three zones along the southern shores of Northrend. As I flew around completing them, I mused that I was fairly close to an achievement for doing a stupidly large number of quests (140, I think) in the Borean Tundra. With just nine quests shy, I stuck around and visited old haunts to see what I might’ve missed. It turned out that most of them involved some mines and farms extremely close to where I’d first landed on the continent. I grinned when they were completed and I tucked the “Nothing Boring about Borean” achievement away and began flying east.
Without realizing it, I’d already begun searching for quests I had missed in Dragonblight. I found them in the northern reaches of the zone and in no time, I was gleefully collecting ore and bones for goblins, deforesting harpy-invested woods in a sawblade-shooting mechanical exoskeleton, and killingtenrats as needed. After winning the achievement, I flew northeast…to the Storm Peaks!
I lacked a couple dozen quests in the Peaks and they took me into spider-filled caverns and across snowy plains, and finally into a dwarven hold. I’d been worried as the achievement required 100 quests in the zone and now, with 93 completed, I was down to two I had found: an elite harpy that had kicked my butt twice (she was very good about encasing me in ice and nuking me to oblivion) and a ‘collect a few rocks for the mountain king’ dealie. Given those choices, I hoisted a pick axe and set to work combing the cliff side for ore-like protrusions.
Upon returning to the king with my sackful of dirt, I was pleased to note that a long quest arc was opened and I was deep in uncovering a plot that involved the creation of an iron colossus when the achievement was reached. I mounted my gryphon and moved to leave.
King Underthedirt: “Hey—where are you going.”
Me: “idk…Zul’Drak? There’s like way too many I need in Howling Fjords”
King: “No—I mean, what are you doing about the colossus?!”
Me: “Huh?”
King: “The iron colossus? The thing you’ve discovered the evil armies are even now assembling with dark armor plates crafted from an unholy alloy of iron and pure saronite from deep within the earth’s crust? Even now I need you to destroy the forges so tha—“
Me: “Yeah…about that. I’m not saying your problems aren’t important, it’s just that I think it’d be better for both of us if you found an adventurer more willing to commit to a long-tem questline.”
King: “But—“
Me: “It’s not you, it’s me. Just keep that exclamation mark over your head and the right person will come along soon.”
I left the King there and flew down to Zul’Drak as promised. This was rough, no bones about it. After finishing the Drakuru story arc I had left in my log for many weeks (great ending I won’t spoil like everything else in this blog), I was still seven quests shy of the magic 100 for the zone. Fortunately, I found a number of 3-man group quests, which shaved the number down to three.
At some point I decided that most (but not all) three man quests can be solo’d if you plan accordingly and can back it up with a little grit and a lot of gear. If the mob has under 130k health, I can generally handle it without concern.
All other quest avenues exhausted, I found myself in the Amphitheater of Anguish, a largish arena-like affair. The encounters were scaled for a five player team, but a pair of well-geared 80s (tank/healer combo) could handle it well enough. Each battle is a quest in and of itself, and each encounter is progressively more difficult.
Each time I had swung by the area, I saw people fighting various giant monstrosities. Returning now, I found another pair of adventurers engaged in mortal combat. They had progressed beyond the first encounter and I watched a paladin and druid team make short work of a giant magnataur, before getting nearly pasted by a vicious air elemental. At that point, I lent assistance from the stands, throwing down a few extra blasts to aid the paladin’s struggle when it looked like things were getting too rough. In time the team bested all of the champions and the paladin hearthed back to points unknown.
I attempted the first quest and hopped down into the arena proper and was soon pitted against a giant worm—it stole my lunch money, but I managed to get it down to 10% health before being bested. Halfway back, I receive a resurrection offer from the very friendly druid who had teamed with the paladin. I readily accepted and she offered her assistance in the battles to come. Knowing a great offer when I see one, I seized the opportunity and this time the worm was slaughtered quickly.
The second fight was against the magnataur and as he strode into the arena opposite me, I regarded my opponent closely and began my pre-combat preparations: trinket, trinket, arcane power, icy veins, mirror image, pray. As the creature charged, I noticed he was enshrouded in crackling electrical energy. With horror, I realized this area of effect attack was quickly killing off my mirrored selves, leaving me the most viable target. I unleashed my arcane fury carving chunks off his hide when the druid, in her treeform, stepped up her healing. Suddenly the magnataur dashed off to stomp my savior. I tried in vain to draw the aggro back to myself, but in the end the tree was felled. Now at a fraction of his health, he and I raced to do the other in. It was scarily close, but I stood victorious.
I checked my quest counter as the druid revived—99/100. Only one more fight was needed and my helper was still game—she joked that she’d “just run faster next time”. I grinned, spoke with the goblin fight master, and the arena darkened as a swirling air elemental blew in. Oddly, the elemental posed less of a threat than the magnataur and was summarily dispatched. The druid asked if I was ready for the next, but I told her that I was done and thanked her very much for the kind assistance and slipped her a hundred gold for her trouble. She was pleasantly surprised, but I’m a firm believer than unexpected help should be amply rewarded.
After speaking to the goblin one last time, I received my achievement for Zul’Drak. Next stop, back to the Fjords!
Tuesday, September 7, 2010
Friday, September 3, 2010
Perils of Pantslessness
I decided I wanted a quick and easy heroic dungeon to get my "daily random" out of the way before settling in for a quiet evening of reflection before an open bar, so I decided to trick the random queuer into giving me a dungeon substantially less painful than Halls of Reflection. I did so by slipping out of my pants. If college should've taught me anything, taking off ones pants will end in trouble and today was no exception.
I watched my gear score drop by a respectable chunk, then traded out my staff for a fishing pole and grinned as it plummeted. This would be a cake walk! Never being one to leave well enough alone, I also shuffled out of my boots, robe, and hat. My tabard covered my gnomish dignity and I queued up. A short while later, my group assembled and we landed in Utgarde. I was tickled pink. I -love- this dungeon or did anyway.
Our party was a rough mix: rogue, warrior, hunter, myself and a paladin healing. As a note, I really don't have an issue with paladins healing. Well equipped, they can handle five-man heroics with ease. Ours was not well-equipped. In fact, all of our party was in the 2.8-3.4k Gearscore range. No matter, for my glass cannon is large!
I chuckled and quickly dressed as visions of us plowing through the dungeon with a couple of frosties waiting at the end. The warrior moved forward to pull the first skeletal abominations...
For those of you unfamiliar with Utgarde, it's a pretty snazzy dungeon laid out like a castle populated with various undead and evil norsemen. I'm certain there's a great story behind it I haven't bothered to read, but I digress.
We lay utter waste to the first few bosses and I'm having to be very careful not to pull too much aggro from my targets. I'm outputting nearly twice the damage of the next highest player and that makes for tricky tanking. The heal-adin is doing fairly well keeping both the tank and me alive and we only lost the rogue once on the first boss, a valkyr named "Svala Sorrowgrave".
Fighting her is fun-- there's an extensive cutscene as she bargains with some demon thing, then rips into the party, flapping around, trying to sacrifice them and occasionally flying out of melee (but not nuking) range. After burning her down in nearly record time, our team morale was high.
We proceeded through the halls and room and soon found ourselves against the second boss fight: Gortok Palehoof. This one starts off in a large room with five giant statues: firbolg, worm-thing (jorgmund? Jaegermeister?), rhino, umm...something else... and Gortok, the centaur.
A glowing ball of reddish energy floats along, animating each in turn. None are particularly difficult and each get burned down rapidly. This was shaping up to be exactly what I had envisioned: a swift run. Ah misplaced arrogance, thy name be "Strev".
Our comeuppance came shortly thereafter when we reached the third boss fight, Skaldi. This has the most complex mechanics, so detailed explanations are in order.
Phase one of the fight begins on one end of the castle ramparts. He hops on his faithful drake and flies away as legions of his troops appear at the far end of the rampart and begin charging. At this point, normally the group will charge and meet them halfway to minimize the amount of time in the 'death zone'. I call it that because periodically Skaldi's drake will hover near the far end and unleash a torrent of frost breath, leaving half of the rampart a death zone, ticking off a few thousand health a second. Our warrior was having none of that and stood his ground.
The first couple of waves swarmed us and I had to fire off a couple of rounds of blizzard back to back to help save the tank, who was completely overwhelmed. The paladin couldn't quite deal with the massive amounts of damage hitting the warrior. Now a few of the enemy had me in their sights. I hastily turned invisible to reset the aggression against me and barely survived the initial onslaught. Each time I'd try to AoE attack, the enemy would peel off to come after me and there were far to many to single target. It was beginning to become manageable, but then the frost breath hit us, wiping half the group including yours truly. From there, it all went to hell.
Our second assault fared a bit better. The warrior charged down the tight passage and we held our own against the enemy, picking up a couple of harpoons along the way. Unfortunately, the frost breath still caught a party member unawares and he was laid out cold. (sorry) I was still having issues with aggro control, but we defied the odds and made it across. At the far end of the rampart are a few harpoon guns. We loaded them and fired on Skaldi's mount. He landed as the drake died and "Phase 2" began in earnest.
The party member who had died to the frost breath was, naturally, the paladin so without healing our end was bitter and swift. Undaunted, we returned to try again.
Arriving again on the dread rampart, I noted the boss had fully reset and we'd have to run the gauntlet and shoot down the drake again. Terrific. This time through, I had swapped to my old leveling Frost spec and it handled the throngs better. The slowing effect added to blizzard meant the tank had much more time to regain control and I only sacrificed a few hundred damage per second. This time we were going to do it or so I thought.
One of Skaldi's special attacks is a devastating whirlwind you MUST run away from. It does gobs of damage to everyone nearby and our beloved paladin did not get the memo. Insert team wipe here.
By this point, we're getting a bit frustrated, but decided to give it one more go. We storm past the ramparts with relative ease and again face Skaldi. The team knows when to avoid the whirlwind and I happily nuke away. Even with all of this, the healer simply can't keep up with the damage being dealt. Shortly the only three left standing are Steve, myself, and Skaldi, who has now been whittled to seven per cent health. Despite the cheers from my dead companions, I'm unable to withstand two shots from the Norseman from Hell and the wipe is official.
We're about to pack it in, when the Paladin takes one for the team and suggests dropping him from another healer. I waste no time initiating the vote and before we can get back to the ramparts, we're joined by a Shaman named "Shamwow" and with our new-found friend we plow through both Skaldi without a lick of trouble as well as the final boss, King Ymiron.
Ymiron parades around, stunning the party every few seconds as he calls on ancient spirits to help him, but he should not have bothered: his fate was sealed the second we had him targeted.
In the end, the repair bill cost nearly 50 gold and I had died more than I would before a typical Halls of Reflection team disbanded. So from now on, I'm going to do what I should have done all along: keep my pants on.
I watched my gear score drop by a respectable chunk, then traded out my staff for a fishing pole and grinned as it plummeted. This would be a cake walk! Never being one to leave well enough alone, I also shuffled out of my boots, robe, and hat. My tabard covered my gnomish dignity and I queued up. A short while later, my group assembled and we landed in Utgarde. I was tickled pink. I -love- this dungeon or did anyway.
Our party was a rough mix: rogue, warrior, hunter, myself and a paladin healing. As a note, I really don't have an issue with paladins healing. Well equipped, they can handle five-man heroics with ease. Ours was not well-equipped. In fact, all of our party was in the 2.8-3.4k Gearscore range. No matter, for my glass cannon is large!
I chuckled and quickly dressed as visions of us plowing through the dungeon with a couple of frosties waiting at the end. The warrior moved forward to pull the first skeletal abominations...
For those of you unfamiliar with Utgarde, it's a pretty snazzy dungeon laid out like a castle populated with various undead and evil norsemen. I'm certain there's a great story behind it I haven't bothered to read, but I digress.
We lay utter waste to the first few bosses and I'm having to be very careful not to pull too much aggro from my targets. I'm outputting nearly twice the damage of the next highest player and that makes for tricky tanking. The heal-adin is doing fairly well keeping both the tank and me alive and we only lost the rogue once on the first boss, a valkyr named "Svala Sorrowgrave".
Fighting her is fun-- there's an extensive cutscene as she bargains with some demon thing, then rips into the party, flapping around, trying to sacrifice them and occasionally flying out of melee (but not nuking) range. After burning her down in nearly record time, our team morale was high.
We proceeded through the halls and room and soon found ourselves against the second boss fight: Gortok Palehoof. This one starts off in a large room with five giant statues: firbolg, worm-thing (jorgmund? Jaegermeister?), rhino, umm...something else... and Gortok, the centaur.
A glowing ball of reddish energy floats along, animating each in turn. None are particularly difficult and each get burned down rapidly. This was shaping up to be exactly what I had envisioned: a swift run. Ah misplaced arrogance, thy name be "Strev".
Our comeuppance came shortly thereafter when we reached the third boss fight, Skaldi. This has the most complex mechanics, so detailed explanations are in order.
Phase one of the fight begins on one end of the castle ramparts. He hops on his faithful drake and flies away as legions of his troops appear at the far end of the rampart and begin charging. At this point, normally the group will charge and meet them halfway to minimize the amount of time in the 'death zone'. I call it that because periodically Skaldi's drake will hover near the far end and unleash a torrent of frost breath, leaving half of the rampart a death zone, ticking off a few thousand health a second. Our warrior was having none of that and stood his ground.
The first couple of waves swarmed us and I had to fire off a couple of rounds of blizzard back to back to help save the tank, who was completely overwhelmed. The paladin couldn't quite deal with the massive amounts of damage hitting the warrior. Now a few of the enemy had me in their sights. I hastily turned invisible to reset the aggression against me and barely survived the initial onslaught. Each time I'd try to AoE attack, the enemy would peel off to come after me and there were far to many to single target. It was beginning to become manageable, but then the frost breath hit us, wiping half the group including yours truly. From there, it all went to hell.
Our second assault fared a bit better. The warrior charged down the tight passage and we held our own against the enemy, picking up a couple of harpoons along the way. Unfortunately, the frost breath still caught a party member unawares and he was laid out cold. (sorry) I was still having issues with aggro control, but we defied the odds and made it across. At the far end of the rampart are a few harpoon guns. We loaded them and fired on Skaldi's mount. He landed as the drake died and "Phase 2" began in earnest.
The party member who had died to the frost breath was, naturally, the paladin so without healing our end was bitter and swift. Undaunted, we returned to try again.
Arriving again on the dread rampart, I noted the boss had fully reset and we'd have to run the gauntlet and shoot down the drake again. Terrific. This time through, I had swapped to my old leveling Frost spec and it handled the throngs better. The slowing effect added to blizzard meant the tank had much more time to regain control and I only sacrificed a few hundred damage per second. This time we were going to do it or so I thought.
One of Skaldi's special attacks is a devastating whirlwind you MUST run away from. It does gobs of damage to everyone nearby and our beloved paladin did not get the memo. Insert team wipe here.
By this point, we're getting a bit frustrated, but decided to give it one more go. We storm past the ramparts with relative ease and again face Skaldi. The team knows when to avoid the whirlwind and I happily nuke away. Even with all of this, the healer simply can't keep up with the damage being dealt. Shortly the only three left standing are Steve, myself, and Skaldi, who has now been whittled to seven per cent health. Despite the cheers from my dead companions, I'm unable to withstand two shots from the Norseman from Hell and the wipe is official.
We're about to pack it in, when the Paladin takes one for the team and suggests dropping him from another healer. I waste no time initiating the vote and before we can get back to the ramparts, we're joined by a Shaman named "Shamwow" and with our new-found friend we plow through both Skaldi without a lick of trouble as well as the final boss, King Ymiron.
Ymiron parades around, stunning the party every few seconds as he calls on ancient spirits to help him, but he should not have bothered: his fate was sealed the second we had him targeted.
In the end, the repair bill cost nearly 50 gold and I had died more than I would before a typical Halls of Reflection team disbanded. So from now on, I'm going to do what I should have done all along: keep my pants on.
Thursday, September 2, 2010
The (Lich) King and I
Over the course of my explorations I encountered Creepy Ghost Kid (CGK) several more times. Each time he kept underscoring the hopelessness of my fight against the Lich King.
I tried pointing out that was patently obvious, given the hopelessness of my fights against the Horde, the guy on top of the Death Coil, dinosaurs, Hogger, and many small furry mammals. Not to be dissuaded, CGK took it upon himself to show me himself by transforming me into the Lich King during key points of his history.
The first of these was the battle against the demon Mal'Ganis. Given that I had no warning whatsoever I'd be piloting the Lich King's body like a vehicle with unfamiliar abilities and powers, it went rather poorly. At least I should say when Arthas originally engaged the demon, I'm certain it didn't end with him sprinting across Icecrown screaming, "GET IT OFF! GET IT OFF! DO OVER! DO OVER!"
The cooler transformation was the fight with Arthas against his own men. My goal was to slaughter a hundred of his troops (killhundredrats?) and raise them as ghouls. It was an utter slaughter and aside from a little mana management issue, they posed no threat whatsoever, which was CGK's not-so-subtle point.
Over the course of everything, I discover that the frozen lump I had found at the bottom of the Citadel was, in fact, Arthas' heart which he had carved out to remove the last vestiges of his humanity-- embodied in CGK. I reported this back to Fordring who was all "Well, let's go get it then!"
After scraping the seared flesh out of a "borrowed" Acolyte's hood, I donned it and joined similarly garbed guardsmen outside the Dark Cathedral, where a procession would be taking the heart. Fordring, the guards, and I slipped in and the worshipers apparently took no note of the fact their recruitment policies had grown noticeably lax.
We took spots at a pew and tried to look as inconspicuous as poorly disguised ardent followers of the Lich King could be and after a moment the heart was carried inside. Fordring made his presence known by bum-rushing the lot of them, and the MFLK himself appeared!
Very Important Dialogue Ensued as Fordring tried to determine if there was anything in the King that could be redeemed. Finding there was not, he cleaved the black heart in twain (I've always wanted to legitimately use that phrase) and all hell broke loose.
Fordring faced the King. The guardsmen faced the cultists. I faced absolutely nothing, because I'd be damned if I was taking off my disguise in the middle of all that crap. In the end, the Lich King began casting "The Lich King's Fury" and the survivors bolted through a portal one of our mages opened.
The Lich King survived our encounter, but at least we got rid of that damn kid.
I tried pointing out that was patently obvious, given the hopelessness of my fights against the Horde, the guy on top of the Death Coil, dinosaurs, Hogger, and many small furry mammals. Not to be dissuaded, CGK took it upon himself to show me himself by transforming me into the Lich King during key points of his history.
The first of these was the battle against the demon Mal'Ganis. Given that I had no warning whatsoever I'd be piloting the Lich King's body like a vehicle with unfamiliar abilities and powers, it went rather poorly. At least I should say when Arthas originally engaged the demon, I'm certain it didn't end with him sprinting across Icecrown screaming, "GET IT OFF! GET IT OFF! DO OVER! DO OVER!"
The cooler transformation was the fight with Arthas against his own men. My goal was to slaughter a hundred of his troops (killhundredrats?) and raise them as ghouls. It was an utter slaughter and aside from a little mana management issue, they posed no threat whatsoever, which was CGK's not-so-subtle point.
Over the course of everything, I discover that the frozen lump I had found at the bottom of the Citadel was, in fact, Arthas' heart which he had carved out to remove the last vestiges of his humanity-- embodied in CGK. I reported this back to Fordring who was all "Well, let's go get it then!"
After scraping the seared flesh out of a "borrowed" Acolyte's hood, I donned it and joined similarly garbed guardsmen outside the Dark Cathedral, where a procession would be taking the heart. Fordring, the guards, and I slipped in and the worshipers apparently took no note of the fact their recruitment policies had grown noticeably lax.
We took spots at a pew and tried to look as inconspicuous as poorly disguised ardent followers of the Lich King could be and after a moment the heart was carried inside. Fordring made his presence known by bum-rushing the lot of them, and the MFLK himself appeared!
Very Important Dialogue Ensued as Fordring tried to determine if there was anything in the King that could be redeemed. Finding there was not, he cleaved the black heart in twain (I've always wanted to legitimately use that phrase) and all hell broke loose.
Fordring faced the King. The guardsmen faced the cultists. I faced absolutely nothing, because I'd be damned if I was taking off my disguise in the middle of all that crap. In the end, the Lich King began casting "The Lich King's Fury" and the survivors bolted through a portal one of our mages opened.
The Lich King survived our encounter, but at least we got rid of that damn kid.
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
Icecrown Adventuring
After the exciting adventures in the Citadel proper, I decided to pursue a somewhat nagging problem: when I had shown up to the front door, the vast majority of my group weren't visible. I could see their 'dots' on my mini-map, but that was the only proof I had they were in the area until I was inside the portal.
I deduced it must have been a 'phasing' dealie, which I'd seen before...notably during the Wrathgate saga, but now I was intrigued. Why was it phased here? More importantly, what did I need to do to be 'in phase' next time?
I flew around the entrance and watched hordes of undead battle the staunch Ebon Blade defenders. There were no quest keepers-- the answer must lie elsewhere.
After searching through the zone, I found what might have been the answer: a ragtag group of Ebon Bladesmen standing around waiting for me to help them. All total, they gave me a half-dozen quests around the area and into Crystalsong Forest. My reward was a "bread crumb" quest that took me to a small encampment on a ridge. I was tasked with planting a banner atop a ridge and defending it against waves of undead. My kind of mission!
I flew over to the ridge only to find another player engaged in the same quest. I landed nearby and watched with bemusement as he and a squadron of NPCs fought against the teeming throng. An aura was eminating from the banner that effectively kept my mana topped off, so I knew when it was my turn, I'd have little problems spamming Blizzard as much as I liked. In the meantime, I passed the time watching villagers running around trying to repair small burning huts that had been constructed on the overlook.
Much to my surprise, when the other player finished my quest updated as successful. I immediately felt slightly guilty for not killstealing-- err, helping-- him out, but he was gone in a flash, presumably to turn in the quest. Naturally I followed suit.
I got sent back to the same ridge, but when I arrived, I discovered that it was a phased zone as well. The burning hovels had been replaced by a formidable tower now populated by vendors, a flight path, and a guy called "Fordring". I recognized him from the Citadel, so I figured I was on the right track.
My adventures from that point varied widely from one end of Icecrown to the other, as I killtenratted my way to glory. I was sent to fields of undead, the floating gunship Skybreaker, and even to save some hero I probably should've known from becoming a servant of the MFLK in undeath. Finally, I was sent to the Citadel, to a secret area underneath.
My mission? Killtenrats. I really should know by now. Afterwards, it got a bit more interesting.
While attempting to set off some explosives under the citadel (Ah ha! Maybe this will change the terrain!), I was blown into a pit and fell for a long while. I braced myself for the impact, but landed in a pool of water. When I climbed out, I saw I was in a large subterranean cavern populated with enough tentacled Lovecraftian critters to give a bus full of Japanese schoolgirls nightmares for life. There was also a spectral child who demanded I collect blood from them (The Lovecraftian horrors, not the schoolgirls).
After doing so, the creepy kid bade me check out a frozen lump in the water, but afterwards sent me back to the surface via a convenient nearby portal.
I had a feeling I'd be seeing this kid more in the future and I was right.
I deduced it must have been a 'phasing' dealie, which I'd seen before...notably during the Wrathgate saga, but now I was intrigued. Why was it phased here? More importantly, what did I need to do to be 'in phase' next time?
I flew around the entrance and watched hordes of undead battle the staunch Ebon Blade defenders. There were no quest keepers-- the answer must lie elsewhere.
After searching through the zone, I found what might have been the answer: a ragtag group of Ebon Bladesmen standing around waiting for me to help them. All total, they gave me a half-dozen quests around the area and into Crystalsong Forest. My reward was a "bread crumb" quest that took me to a small encampment on a ridge. I was tasked with planting a banner atop a ridge and defending it against waves of undead. My kind of mission!
I flew over to the ridge only to find another player engaged in the same quest. I landed nearby and watched with bemusement as he and a squadron of NPCs fought against the teeming throng. An aura was eminating from the banner that effectively kept my mana topped off, so I knew when it was my turn, I'd have little problems spamming Blizzard as much as I liked. In the meantime, I passed the time watching villagers running around trying to repair small burning huts that had been constructed on the overlook.
Much to my surprise, when the other player finished my quest updated as successful. I immediately felt slightly guilty for not killstealing-- err, helping-- him out, but he was gone in a flash, presumably to turn in the quest. Naturally I followed suit.
I got sent back to the same ridge, but when I arrived, I discovered that it was a phased zone as well. The burning hovels had been replaced by a formidable tower now populated by vendors, a flight path, and a guy called "Fordring". I recognized him from the Citadel, so I figured I was on the right track.
My adventures from that point varied widely from one end of Icecrown to the other, as I killtenratted my way to glory. I was sent to fields of undead, the floating gunship Skybreaker, and even to save some hero I probably should've known from becoming a servant of the MFLK in undeath. Finally, I was sent to the Citadel, to a secret area underneath.
My mission? Killtenrats. I really should know by now. Afterwards, it got a bit more interesting.
While attempting to set off some explosives under the citadel (Ah ha! Maybe this will change the terrain!), I was blown into a pit and fell for a long while. I braced myself for the impact, but landed in a pool of water. When I climbed out, I saw I was in a large subterranean cavern populated with enough tentacled Lovecraftian critters to give a bus full of Japanese schoolgirls nightmares for life. There was also a spectral child who demanded I collect blood from them (The Lovecraftian horrors, not the schoolgirls).
After doing so, the creepy kid bade me check out a frozen lump in the water, but afterwards sent me back to the surface via a convenient nearby portal.
I had a feeling I'd be seeing this kid more in the future and I was right.
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