Leveling Poll Closed. And the Winner is...

Claren!

Claren the Druid won by a landslide. Now that the votes are in, who can tell me why? What's so great about Druids? Did Claren win because she's the only class that can heal that I had in the poll?

Post-Weekend Update: It's a Poll!

I played quite a bit this weekend but didn't accomplish much because most of the time was spent wrapping up an RP story arc with a Modan Co guildmate. I reached Honored with the Knights of the Ebon Blade and picked up a nice cloak. I'm also halfway to having enough gold for my epic flying mount. Being 80 is nice for getting more gold! My current goal is to get Revered so I can pick up the Flameheart Spell Scalpel.

Now that I'm 80, I'm wondering who I should level next. Choices:

1. Cordelaine, level 58 Night Elf Death Knight - Moon Guard.

She has purple hair and is bad ass. I have not yet decided much about her backstory. Probably your general "hero of the Alliance dies and is raised as a Death Knight by the Lich King and is then freed from his grasp at the Battle at Light's Hope and regains her free will" or something like that. She definitely wouldn't be pure good or evil. More an "ends justify the means" type. Like Frijona, but a little less "protector of the small." There's an excellent Death Knight RP guild on Moon Guard with several Modan Co alts.

2. Eadwacer, level 20 Draenei Hunter - Moon Guard.

I'm pretty sure I wrote about Eadwacer before. She's adorable, with the dark blue skin and white hair buns. Her story was that she had a powerful position with the Draenei before the Exodar crashed. After the crash, she lied low and begun going by an alternate name (Eadwacer) learning the crossbow and the languages of the new land. It's very loosly based off the Anglo-Saxon poem Wulf and Eadwacer. Logged into her recently to pick up her level 20 mount.

3. Lorei, level 17 Blood Elf Rogue - Scarlet Crusade.

I'll be leveling her occasionally for sure, since I created her in order to get a look at the Horde side of things before Cataclysm launches. Haven't thought of what she's like IC all that much. She's on Scarlet Crusade so I can play with a friend of mine who is leveling a Death Knight over there. 

4. Claren, level 17 Night Elf Druid - Moon Guard.

The only way I'll level her would be to turn her into a Troll once Cataclysm hits. I don't know what it is with Druids. They sound so awesome, but I just can't get into it. However, I'd love to have a Troll one, and going through levels 1-15ish as a Druid again just doesn't sound appealing.

5. Something Else?

Or, I could roll something new. But probably not. The only new characters floating in my head involve Goblins and Worgen. (Thinking Goblin Hunter and Worgen Mage.)

Since I'm not exactly sure what I'm going to do, I've decided to make it a poll! It's on the left. You will vote, wont you?

Note that I didn't list Sprynklez. I've decided that in Cataclysm Srpynk is going to become a Priest. She's going to give up her stabby ways and devote her life to "The Great Lightbulb in the Sky, Master of Knowledge, Creativity, and All Things Soft and Fluffy."

Tips for Your Brand New Druid

The first few levels as a Druid are hard. I know this because I've been through them at least five times. The thought of being a Druid appealed to me since before I even started the game. I wanted to be able to morph into a cat and run around. The first alt I ever made was a Druid, and I think I actually got her to 18 before I eventually decided to transfer Fri over and deleted the Druid because I didn't want to spend the money to transfer over a level 18 character. If I wanted another Druid, I could just level it again. I started another Druid on my new server to level up with a friend of mine, but he got sick of his and that left me without much incentive to continue leveling mine. That happened again with another friend, and somehow even though I kept deleting my Druids for whatever reason (I know pre-barbershop I deleted one at about level 8 just because I didn't like the hairstyle anymore) and then recreating them again because it still sounded appealing. Also, I loved the character I had in my head.

Claren (and all her previous reincarnations) is an idealistic environmentalist. Lots of love for nature, constantly spewing whatever fact she hears that supports her cause regardless of how little evidence it may have, maybe even making stuff up because it sounds good. Perhaps she's spent too much time in bear form or in the Emerald Dream. Now that I've finally noticed my Druid creation/deletion habit, I've determined to not delete Claren even if I get completely sick of her. For instance, I've decided to stick her at level 16 until 3.2 comes out so I don't have to level up to 30 for her travel form. (I have taken her to the barbershop twice.)

Some tips for the first few levels:

1. You will die. You will die all the time. I thought maybe by the time I was on my nth Druid I'd be able to manage without dying. Nope. Being able to wear leather (a change from my clothie warlock) doesn't help. Two mobs at your level might kill you. Three will for sure unless you're lucky.

2. Remember your racials! As a Night Elf, wisp is awesome for slowing down leveling time by getting back to your corpse faster. Shadowmeld is also great since the patch changes for getting away from a mob of mobs. Taurens have war stomp to get them away. Use war stomp, cast regrowth, then cross your fingers and ruuuuuuuuuuun!

3. The first 10 levels are particularly painful becasue you don't get your bear form right away. Then you get your bear form and it's cool having lots of HP but then your damage sucks. Still, I suggest getting your bear form right away. At the very least, it's fun to do your bear dance. Once you have the form, you can start off by casting damage at your targets and then morph into a bear as your HP goes down.

4. Contrary to pretty much every single guide I have read, I suggest going Balance for levels 10-19. Why? Because in my opinion, it's better to be able to kill as much as you can as quickly as you can with magic instead of taking forever to swipe something to death. Perhaps this is just because I'm a caster and that's what I'm used to. Then once you hit 20, it seems like a good idea to respec to Feral because you can do DPS in your cat form. I'd put the first 5 points in "starlight wrath", the second two in "improved moonfire" and finally the last 3 in "moonglow" before respeccing at 20.

5. Entangling roots is an awesome spell. I found myself using it so often even when fighting only one mob. I'd cast moonfire then add the entangling roots. They'd stick while casting wrath, which would usually break the roots, and then I could still cast wrath again before casting another entangling roots to stick the mob in place again. For longer fights I'd find myself basically slowly kiting the mob using entangling roots. The main problem with this is it really drains up mana. You have no idea how many times I've tried to lifetap myself on my many Druids!

6. This took me a couple Druids to figure out, but you can cast a second wrath (or cast any spell) as soon as you've finished casting wrath. You don't have to wait for the previous wrath to actually hit the target before casting again. You'd think, as a Warlock, this would have been obvious. But this was not the case.

7. Remember when creating your Druid that her or his hair or fur color will determine the fur color of your Druid's forms in 3.2. Because I knew I'd probably be staring at an animal at least half the time, I gave my Night Elf dark blue hair so she'll have pretty black fur once the patch comes out. Here's a handy guide to what hair color goes with what on the new forms.

Interestingly enough, Wow Insider posted a guide on this topic while I was considering writing this post. They go much more in-depth than I do with macro suggestions, what the spells do specifically, more spell rotations, etc. but they suggest speccing Feral right away. 

Coming Soon: Something Warlock related! Maybe! Also, I might be fooling around with the template, so just bear in mind the site might look a little wonky for brief periods of time. Just reload the page if that happens.

Friday Linkday: July 17, 2009

Hurray it’s Friday! Here are the links of the week:

1. Draele of Rantings of the Afflicted has an excellent idea about a new voidwalker ability, Void Strike, based on the Pain Strike ability of the voidwalkers in Nagrand. The warlock Q&A hinted at a new damage dealing ability for voidwalkers other than just having them punch people with their bright blue fists. This is a very well-thought-out idea.

2. Gryphonheart Items – Addon Review – Some of my guildies use this addon for creating RP items. This is a lovely and informative review of the add-on. (From Too Many Annas.)

3. Feeling burned out? I haven’t lately, but this is still a good reminder of why WoW is so much fun to play. (From World of Snarkcraft.)

4. Fashion Faux Paws - I haven’t mentioned yet how much I hate how the T9 set looks, given that they all look so similar. (Does anyone actually like them? Anyone at all? As my co-GM says, “Fun is the easiest thing to nerf.”) This post from Rolling Hots describes how particularly ridiculous the Druid set looks. Very funny!

Coming Soon: What Frijona and the gang are up to this weekend!

Friday Linkday: July 10, 2009

Now that I'm back to blogging, I've decided to add a new feature: Each Friday I will link to several wow-related blog posts that I find particularly interesting. Without further ado, here are this Friday's links:

1. On Heirlooms - Are heirloom items that increase leveling speed to alts fair to new players? The Pink Pigtail Inn argues that it is inherently unfair. Read the comments--some good arguments in there. As someone who hasn't hit 80 yet, it actually makes sense to me. I want to explore the content for the first time. When I get to leveling my alts more, it will make more sense to me to move through further.

2. Shared Topic: What if There Were WoW Lobbyists? - The Twisted Nether Blogcast asks what WoW players would try to get accomplished if we lobbied politically, a question which is particularly targeted to US players. As someone who works for congress, I can honestly say that we don't lobby--because we don't care. As long as our right to game isn't on the line, I think we'd just assume stay out of it. (If you want a more amusing answer, check out what Destructive Reach has to say.)

3. Groups are using the acheivement system to control who is allowed on certain raids, so of course people have come up with ways to fake it. (From Mystic Chicanery.)

4. I created my Druid, Claren, to try out the new forms, which according to this Wow Insider post, may not have been the best idea. Still, it's a fascinating read about the "history" of Druids. (I put history in quotes because it has nothing to do with their history lore-wise, but how they were played in the game.)

Returned!

Six months after I quit playing and blogging (a hiatus which just happened more than it was actually planned) I have returned. The hiatus just happened in that I found myself not wanting to login. To be fair, I told my guild I would be going away for an indefinite period of time. Eventually my subscription ran out and for months I decided not to renew it.

My return to Azeroth was sparked by my friend who would occasionally email me with some new feature Blizzard had added in that he thought I'd enjoy. Nothing enticed me quite as much as when he told me about the leveling changes to patch 3.2. I thought the best way for me to get into the game again would be to roll an alt, and the ideal alt for me would be a Druid, because I found the new forms very appealing. Playing my Druid, Claren, has been fun and I've gotten her up to level 16.

I also found myself wanting to try out Horde and a PVP realm, so after some research I rolled a Troll Warrior, Renaza, on Twisting Nether. I'm loving the warrior class, which is strange because I've always seen myself to be a caster at heart. Still, there's something exciting about the metal clinking of her chain armor as she charges a target. She's at level 11. I'm trying to only level Claren and Renaza while they are in rested XP so I'm not wasting my time.

The original plan was to retire Frijona for the time being and basically start over, but I've found myself wanting to play her more and more. I'll probably hop on her this evening, perhaps just to see if I can still remember how to play the class!