Category: World of Warcraft

[World of Warcraft] Here we go again. Can’t even log in to play if I wanted to. Staring at “Authenticating” gets old.

Ladies and Gentlemen at Blizzard, it is way past time for you to get your shit together. If there is some valid reason why you can’t fix these problems, please do share. Otherwise, hire some nerds and get cracking. Bah.

[World of Warcraft] Only had a brief moment to play last night after patching. I spent some time pickpocketing badges for my Ravenholdt quest as well as some hunting around the area for fun and profit.

By the time I was done my rogue made level 26. One of his new skills is “Cheap Shot” so I look forward to testing that out soon.

[World of Warcraft] It’s patching time which has been a rough situation for Blizzard and I in the past. It has been possibly the biggest gripe I have with them. Thankfully, they don’t patch very often so I don’t deal with it much. (Boy isn’t that sad.)

I logged in and found myself stuck on “Authentication”. Same thing three more times. Fourth try is a charm and I connect to start the patching process.

60.52 MB patch
Start time – 8:18 PM
Finish time – 8:30 PM
Download rate: ~80 KB/s
Upload rate: ~40 KB/s

Hey, not too shabby!

Update: I patched my second machine on March 24 during the day and was downloading the patch at ~500 KB/s. Nice!

[World of Warcraft] New Content Patch Tomorrow – 3/22/05. The new content patch you’ve been waiting for will be available after tomorrow’s weekly scheduled maintenance.

[World of Warcraft] Playing a rogue you would think I would be used to using the various tools of escape available to me. I think all my years of playing a tank has left me with a “fight to the death” mentality. I’m not used to running away.

Last night I was doing a quest that involved killing two farmers near Tarren Mill. I found and eliminated one of them right away, but the other farmer was in the middle of an orchard and surrounded by three or more farmhands.

I tried to pull him and kill him before I died to the swarm of farmers. I almost had him and then he ran off. I took chase and got killed by the group. On my second try, I remembered this new “vanish” skill I had. It allowed me to enter stealth mode during a battle.

Pulled again, three more followed and started pounding on me so I vanished and they all turned and went back to farming. Sweet. I tried another spot to pull, same situation. Vanish, how I love thee.

I found an angle that I thought would only bring the farmer and perhaps one other. I shot an arrow and luck was on my side as only Farmer Getz came after me. Slice, dice, goodbye Getz. Quest completed.

Headed back to Tarren Mill and noted that, yes, the Alliance level 60 goon squad was attacking the level 50 guards again. I really have to wonder at the motivations for them. That looks boring to me, but whatever floats their boat I guess.

I still have about 10 badges to pickpocket from the Durnholde dudes so I’ll head back there next time. Should have no problem hitting level 26 on my next session.

[World of Warcraft] Last night, instead of working on the Ravenholdt Manor quest I decided to stick around Tarren Mill and do some of the quests available there. Two of them were to collect parts dropped off creatures nearby; bear tongues, spider ichor and mountain lion blood.

The Alliance had a large group of level 60’s running around picking on the level 50 guards so it made for some crowded landscapes at times. Are they having fun or are they bored?

During my hunt, I spotted some level 40 Griffons or something like that across a field. For some reason, they came all the way across the field to kill me. I was not anywhere close to them. Since they would probably kill me again, I chose to use the Spirit Healer for the first time.

After paying for repairs on my equipment, I went hunting again. I started fighting a bear and was having a real tough time. Little did I realize that I had a 10 minute penalty on me from using the Spirit Healer. I almost had the bear killed when a spider ran from across the field to finish me off. Two deaths in five minutes, new record for me. I swear I was an aggro magnet last night.

After sitting out the rest of the penalty, I finished up the two quests and hit level 25. That’s three levels in the past four days of gaming (and one was only for 30 minutes). Not bad at all.

[World of Warcraft] My Rogue trainer recently gave me a quest, simply to “find” Ravenholdt Manor. The only information provided was to search in Hillsbrad. So, I journeyed to Tarren Mill and made that my base of operations for the evening (I am a night person).

Tarren Mill always seems to be a hotbed of activity. Alliance and Horde often come together in skirmishes around the town. I myself have taken up my blades in defense of the town on occasion, but tonight I had more important plans; to find Ravenholdt.

I first hiked south and eventually ran into a town which appeared to be controlled by the Alliance. I was attacked by some guards and was almost knocked out. How did they know I was there? It was as if they could smell me out. I came over a hill and looked down to see two guards on a full out charge right at me. Thankfully, I had the Warchief’s Blessing on as without that I would have been beaten to a pulp. As it is I was beaten to within a thread of a pulp.

I walked west, only to find creatures strange and powerful, too much for me to handle. I did manage to do a little mining in this area so all was not lost. Back to Tarren Mill.

I surveyed my incomplete maps. Noting the empty areas to the east, I decided to head that way. Once across the river, I found a well hidden path up into the hills. The path ended at the entrance to a cave, guarded by Alliance guards. Well, at least they appeared to be Alliance at first glance. They allowed me to pass but not without first giving me a sly smile.

I entered the cave and discovered it was actually a tunnel. I walked along until I spotted a treasure chest. Well, being a curious sort of fellow, I had to investigate. I looked around, nobody here to see me. I inspected the outside of the chest and was just about to open it when I noted that it was trapped. I could not figure out any way to disarm the trap, so I left the chest planning to revisit it later.

Exiting from the end of the tunnel, I arrived at a building guarded by more guards. They seemed surprised to see me, but at least they were not hostile. I was told to go upstairs and have a chat with someone named Fahrad. A brief greeting was followed by an assignment, go back outside and see if the guards had any tasks for me. Feeling a bit weary from all my travel that evening, I decided to call it a night.

I told one of the guards that I would be back shortly, after some sleep and a supply run (need to mix some more poison for my blades). Perhaps I’ll see if I can’t disarm that trapped chest as well, hehe.

Irvine, Calif. – March 17, 2005 – Blizzard Entertainment today announced that World of Warcraft, its massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG), has surpassed the 1.5 million subscriber mark*, underscoring the game’s continued success around the world. Building on its record-breaking debuts in North America, Korea, and Europe, World of Warcraft has reached global peak concurrency – the number of subscribers playing at the same time in each market – of more than 500,000 players.

Read the rest here.

[World of Warcraft] I spent some time today getting my Rogue to level 24. Two levels in the last two days played, not bad for me. I only got two new skills so that was somewhat lame; an improved skill of one I already had and a new skill to detect traps.

My brother and I went through Shadowfang Keep and the Meteor Shard dagger (that Inhibit and I had tried so hard to get a few weeks ago and failed many times) dropped on the first try. Sweet dagger too. The most enjoyable part of going through Shadowfang Keep this time is that we stealthed through all the way to the end. Was a challenge for me at level 24 to not be detected, but I did it. Great fun.

I also spent some time travelling on foot, running from Sun Rock Retreat through Ashenvale and down to Crossroads. Then back to Ashenvale, over to Sludge Fen, back to Ashenvale and finally over to Orgrimmar. That was a lot of running around, but I was able to clean up several quests that had been gathering dust.

At one point, I was running along a mountain ridge between Ashenvale and Sludge Fen and all of a sudden it got very dark. I walked over to the edge and looked down on Demon Falls Ridge or something like that. Looked really creepy. I wondered what that area was all about, but I was not ready to jump in there unprepared.

I also recently found the schematic to make mechanical squirrel pets. I was hoping I could make some decent money selling them but so far it seems a poor seller. Too bad, I think they are kind of cool.

All and all it was a very fine WoW weekend. Indeed.

Up next: Ravenholdt Manor – Rogue Quest