or maybe something uplifting…

I started playing a Gnome Warlock a week or two ago and I was stunned at how easy it was to go from level 1 to level 12. I guess part of it is just that I’ve done it a few times before, but with no rest XP this character still just rocketed through everything. Warlocks are tough in PvE. I don’t know if this was always the case or if they got buffed in the 2.0.1 patch but I’m really enjoying it now. Right now I’m letting him rest up so I can grind out some levels even faster. I thought it’d be a good time to write up some of the quests I cruised through.

The early levels are easier once you’re on your second or third character but each starting zone is a little different and nobody likes running back and forth more than they need to. I like to just jump right in some times, but if you take the time to read about the quests you’ll be doing then you can stack them up and get more than one thing done at a time. Generally it means getting a quest before you go somewhere so that you can kill mobs or gather stuff while you’re there.

I started off with my Gnome in Coldridge Valley. The quests there are very straightforward and lead to getting you to the inn then out of the valley and into Kharanos. The passage to Kharanos has some Troggs in it that you’ll be able to easily fight off after level 4. On the other side of the passage you can follow the road east and north up to Kharanos. Set your hearthstone to the inn there (talk to the innkeeper and make it your home). There are three places that I picked up quests in the area, but there are probably some more around that I haven’t done. First there are a couple around Kharanos itself. Next there are a few from Stonegrill’s Depot. Third was Brewenall Village. When you arrive in town your quest log is probably very nearly empty so pick up all the quests as you see them, there’s no reason not to.

I’ll break up the quests by the area you get them. The areas you have to visit in order to complete the quests overlap with these. Read the rest of “WoW: Quests for Gnomes & Dwarves around level 10″…

The Wetlands is an area up north of Loch Modan. The major city here is Menethil Harbour. Menethil isn’t a capital city so it doesn’t have a bank or all the trainers. It does have a gryphon point, an inn and boats leave from the docks here that will take you to Auberdine and Theramore, both on the continent of Kalmidor. Taking the boat to Auberdine will also get you to Teldrassil in just one more hop. Theramore is a good place to find quests that take you up past level 30. Theramore is also home to the trainer for Artisan First Aid and Artisan Fishing (Artisan meaning skill level 225 to 300).

While in Menethil Harbour you’ll also find plenty of NPCs with quests for your characters in the range of level 20 up to level 30. I went through a lot of these quests once a while ago with my human mage. My hunter cruised right through the 20s in Duskwood and never made it out to the Wetlands for any quests. Now I want to take my level 27 warrior up here and see if it’s not too late. Even if it is, I have an upcoming gnome warlock who’ll be ready to do some damage here.

So what I hope to show today is four sets of quests that are good sources of XP that aren’t hard to figure out. They all revolve around killing stuff, getting quest drops (that is, loot for quests from killing things), and running from place to place. The rewards aren’t great but there are a couple. I’m also not going to cover all the quests in the Wetlands. The ones I’m interested in start and end in the Wetlands; they don’t make me spend time waiting for boats to go find an NPC just for a few XP that I could’ve had more quickly by grinding.
Read the rest of “Queststacking in the Wetlands around level 20-28″…

I listened to a talk John Ostrem gave at the 2006 Emerging Telephony Conference. I got the podcast from ITConversations. His talk is about LiPS, the Linux Phone Standards Forum. The talk went well enough and I learned a little bit but I was left wanting to know more. I guess that’s a good side-effect for a standards group. LiPS seems to be interested in the middle layers of software on a mobile phone. They’re not in the kernel stuff, that’s something that OSDL is working on. They’re not at the top layer, that’s up to application developers and left for various handset and service providers to differentiate themselves. LiPS sounds like it’s there to work with the in-between parts. The window management and some of the UI mechanics - not UI details like layout or design but maybe widgets or something under there.
Read the rest of “Looking at Linux and Phone Standards”…

Yesterday I talked about some quests that work well together in Arathi Highlands. Since the nearest inn is over in Southshore (and some of the quests tie together), I also wanted to put together a nice stack of the quests in and around Southshore. The idea is that most of the quests here all involve fighting in the same area and some overlap so you can do parts of them at the same time.
Read the rest of “WoW: Quest Stacking in Hillsbrad and Southshore”…

There are two things I’d like to get done around Arathi Highlands and the Hillsbrad foothills. One is a quest series to get a pair of Lightstep Leggings - they’re a quest reward I noticed look pretty good for my level 38ish hunter. I’ve done this area once before with my mage, this time I want to be a little more efficient and I thought writing it up could help other players with their quests. Level 38 is kind of high for this area but I had her down in Stranglethorn Vale for the last few levels.

Lead up to an Escort Quest

The first part of Hints of a New Plague? just requires you to go find a couple NPCs. It starts in Southshore (map), which is in the south of Hillsbrad. There’s a gryphon point in Southshore and a Gryphon point in Arathi Basin. After picking up your quests in Southshore you can fly to Arathi Basin then keep heading east to find the Go’Shek farm. Go around the farm to the ridge above the northeast side and you’ll find Quae and Kinelory standing up there. Read the rest of “WoW Quest Help for Arathi Highlands”…

This looks like a pretty good level 38 hunter build to me. It’s kind of like the build I had before the patch but with the benefit of thinking of things all at once. As you’re working your way up the levels in any class, the instinct is to choose the talent that gives you the most immediate benefit. Last week, for example, when my hunter hit 38 I took Bestial Swiftness and watched my owl take off and tear in to the next raptor in STV.

In contrast, when the time comes to respec by choice or as a result of a patch, there’s a different strategy at work. You can step back and look at what gives the most overall benefit. I think it’s a good idea to respec every 15 or 20 levels at a minimum. Based on my experience you can make the greedy choices then rearrange things when better options open up.

So with the latest patch, 2.0.1, I had to respec my hunter. I had to respec all my characters. So far I wrote about my level 48 Mage and Candace wrote about her level 28 Priest Spec. Today I’ll reason through what I think is a good hunter talent spec at level 38 or so.
Read the rest of “WoW: Level 38 Hunter Respec after patch 2.0.1″…

Respec my Mage

I’m in the same boat as everyone else on WoW with Tuesday’s release of patch 2.0.1 I have to respec all my characters. I did this for my Mage back after patch 1.11 when she was around level 27. That build worked out pretty well for me but then around level 39 or 40 things really got tough for me. I liked the idea of doing AoE grinding but I’m just not very good at it. It’s nice to knock out six murlocs at once and get that burst of XP but most of the time I get swarmed and flattened. The long runs back to the corpse end up taking up too much time for me to really learn to AoE effectively. If you have a partner to heal you then I’m sure AoE grinding can work out really well for a pair of a mage & priest. I solo with my mage 99% of the time. With that in mind I respec’ed to mostly Fire around level 42.

It only cost me 1 gold at the mage trainer (though the price goes up if you respec again). The difference was amazing. I could kill things one-on-one, which was the case for most of my PvE questing. Now after patch 2.0.1 I’m going to go back to pretty much the same build. Here’s a link to my new build, now a level 48 human mage. Read on for the explanation. Read the rest of “Mage Talent Respec after the 2.0.1 Patch for WoW”…