Two grinds down, plenty more to go

Finally getting a couple of Kel's rep grinds out of the way. She's slowly plugging along with Golden Lotus, and hit honored with them a few days ago. It's kind of funny, I hear so many people complaining about their dailies, but I don't really have any problems with them, other than wishing they gave more rep. 110 rep per quest, with guild perks, does seem kind of ridiculous, but eh, I guess it could be worse. At least there are plenty of them, and different hubs gives me enough variety that it doesn't get too boring.

A night of onyx egg hunting got Kel within 500 rep of the Cloud Serpents before other people farming them finally chased me away, and the next day a couple dailies finally finished it off.

The ceremony was one of the coolest things I've seen in the game so far.

Sunset is gorgeous, and he and Kel have bonded pretty well over the weeks of raising and training him. And it was fun enough that I'm probably going to go ahead and just do the grind on alts for the other serpent mounts, rather than spend the gold to buy them. Especially since they'll need the training to ride them, anyways.

I finished Kel's Tiller's rep in the same morning, although I was slacking on her quest to get Hoahn's (sp?) vote to join them, so I need to finish that before her farm will be upgraded. Then I'll most likely continue doing some of the dailies for rep with individual NPCs and the cooking token, but I think I'll stop wasting a slot on Yoon's planting daily. Yes, I know I can just dig up the plant and put in whatever I want afterwards, but it seems like more waste to me, and I never bothered.

Besides dailies and alt-leveling, I'm still happily addicted to pet battles. My 'main' team of Rawr the guardian cub, Starlight the celestial dragonling, and Coal the black panther cub, are all levels 21-22, and I've been working on getting a few others leveled up for subs. My little Chuck (the only croc I was able to get from that darned fishing daily) is tearing things up on his way to join them, and I've got a couple others of different types that I'm trying to work on as well. It's been a bit more difficult with the couple green-quality pets I'm trying to level, like Ale the wolpertinger. After fighting with so many rare pets, the uncommon ones seem squishier, if not less powerful. I'm hoping that will be fixed after the upcoming patch, when I can hopefully upgrade my favorites to rares. I've also been catching any green-or-better quality pets that I don't have to fill out my pet journal (although I have settled for lower quality for pets I don't plan on using, like the spiders *shudder*), which was up to around 260-ish unique pets the last time I looked. \o/

Quick recap of my alts- Windstar is still sitting at 88, which is getting frustrating. I want to level her, I really do, but every time I plan on logging on her and going questing, something distracts me. At least I'm still getting on her to make her Scroll of Wisdom every day. In fact, all she needs now to make her level 90 epic staff is the spirits of harmony, which she should pick up while she's leveling. Whenever that might actually happen. :P

Rynia just hit 87 last night, and is about to start on Kun Lai, which is still my favorite zone, even if a few of the quest chains are starting to get a bit tedious.

Jahira got to join in an instance spree with Feathermoon friends, and has healed her way to 86 while doing hardly any questing. Oops? Druid healing has been fun, even during the 'holycrap everyone is dying at the same time what do I do' moments. (I'm looking at you, Stormstout Brewery.) She did get to boomkin in the last instance of the night, which really just helped me decide that I totally fail at boomkin'ing, and will probably just focus on gearing her up for resto, just keeping her balance spec for questing and dailies. I just hope my self-confidence gets better before I get any chances at raid healing. :P

My Hordies are still being neglected, but hopefully that will change soon. I think I give up on poor Jorren, for now at least, and will be working on getting Rajji up to 90. Mostly, I just want at least one Horde character leveled before the patch, so I will be able to see all the new stuff from 'both sides of the fence'. And I've been wanting to play with a hunter again, so this will hopefully all work out. Sis will be leveling Booggah as well, which means Go Go dual hunters! I just hope we don't have too many issues with gear drops in instances, but I'm not really worried about it.

That's pretty much everything worth mentioning for now. Time to get some pet battling in while I wait for sis to get home from work. /Waves (Sunset waves too)

Second! And some catching up

Big news first-

Finally conquered my altoholicism \o/

Yes, Kal is finally 90! With maxed blacksmithing, and working on getting her cooking up, for RP purposes mostly. It was a kind of frustrating grind, since I'm not used to playing a class with limited survivability (although maybe I was just 'doin it wrong'). It didn't help that most of the instances I queued for, she would get thrown into one already in progress. Which means very little chance of gear drops, and no chance of getting the dungeon quests done (and thus no quest rewards either). Waiting 30+ minutes to get in for one boss is annoying, and a option for only fresh instances for the dungeon finder would be a nice addition in a future patch. (Hint hint, Blizz >.>)

I haven't started on dailies with her yet, and I'm not sure I will until Kel is done with at least some of her rep grinds. I really don't want to burn myself out too quickly, and besides, I never really planned on making Kal a 'main' raiding character anyways. She will be doing Tiller's dailies whenever I can stand them though, because growing her own motes of harmony is too useful to pass up. And she'll be going back to Dread Wastes to finish the Klaxxi quests for her blacksmithing patterns.

Kel has been having a bit of a break while I leveled Kal, but I've been trying to do at least her Tiller's and Cloud Serpent's dailies. She's currently revered with both, and her serpent is finally big enough to ride! And also surprised me by getting first place in the very first race I tried. Honestly, I was expecting to get last place for a few attempts, until I got the hang of it, but apparently it's easier than I thought. He's so pretty, too.

Oh, and I found that picture of her new buddy, Nightshade. I am totally in love with the Pandaria tigers. Especially their idle 'chuff' noises. Have I ever mentioned that tigers are my second favorite big cats IRL? (Next to snow leopards.)

Rajji has gotten a couple new friends, too. Continuing his little theme with having green pets, meet Jazri the crane and Mala the gem-kitty.

Jazri was a planned tame, although I did try for a white crane first. That one didn't quite click, so Raj trotted all the way to Dawn's Blossom for Jazri, and it was an almost instant bond. Mala was more of an impulse tame, and I'm not completely sure he's going to keep her, considering all his other cats which he has stronger attachments to. He still has a couple stable spaces left though, so we'll have to see.

For the rest of the gang, my altoholicism has been going a little crazy, but so far Windstar has gotten up to 87 and is starting on Kun Lai, which is becoming a favorite zone. Rynia is 86 and currently starting on Valley of Four Winds, although I may take her back to Jade Forrest and finish a few quest chains that I skipped. She also has managed to max out both her alchemy and archeology. Rajji and Bearkat are both still 85, although I have done of few of the beginning quests on both of them, and Tarren is just short of 86. Jorren is 86 as well, and in the Valley, about to start on his farm, if I can stop getting distracted and actually do the intro quests. >.<

I've also started my Panda monk, Sunre (pronounced Sun-ray), and I'm having fun with him. A few dungeon runs last night got him up to level 20, so he got to buy all his level 20 turtle mounts. While he rides around on my brewfest kodo. >.>  Hey, at least I'll be ready if they ever add another mount-collecting achievement?

Speaking of collecting, the pet battles have been a ton of fun too. I finally found a guardian cub in the AH sort-of-almost reasonably priced, and now him and my celestial dragonling are both my highest level pets, at 17. I have a few others around level 10, but for now I'm just trying to get those two leveled up enough to start catching Pandaria pets, because so many of them are so stinking cute and I would really love to have them. (Civet kittens, anyone?) I've also been catching any new uncommon-or-better quality pets I've come across, and I'm up to around 230 unique pets. Not much longer til the 250-pet achievement!

I think that's all the important news for now. Now I get to decide which toon will be the next to 90. I'm sort of torn between Windstar and Jorren. I would like to have a max-level Hordie, but I tend to miss my friends when I'm playing on Horde-side, and with Jorren on Wyrmrest Accord, not Feathermoon, it will be even worse. I do miss my little DK though, so I'll probably at least try to get a few quests done before it gets too boring/lonely.

/Wave

First!

I am tired as heck, so just a short post for now.

First of all, Kel is finally 90!

It kind of took me by surprise, so I almost missed the screenshot. Work and my altaholic-ing was interfering, too, so getting to 90 took a bit longer than I meant it to, but it was fun. Now Kal and Windstar get to fight over my attention for a while, until I figure out which one I want to level more. (At this point, probably Kal. I think.)

She has a couple new friends as well. I can't find my screenshot of her black tiger Nightshade, so I'll have to take another one and post it later. And then there's this guy -

First time Kel got in the Mogu Palace (or whatever it's called), he was standing right at the entrance, just waiting for her. Kel and I both are totally in love with him, in fact between him and the spirit beasts, I don't think Kel's marksmanship spec is gonna be used much at all any time soon. Rajji is probably going to be leveled soon now, just so I can go get another quillen. Most likely one of the grey stone ones, which means not until Raj is 90. *Sigh*

And one last thing to mention. Sis went and tamed Savage with Wildlark on, I think, the second day of the expansion. So, after seeing her have such an easy time, I decided one afternoon to take Maxwill out and see if I could find any tracks. Well, I did.

It was a long hunt. Between dodging/killing all the mobs in the area, I kept losing the tracks. Then I would find the end of the trail, but misjudge my flare and get stuck waiting for the cooldown. It was a ton of fun, though, and totally worth it once Max spotted and nabbed him. His name might not be all that original, but it totally fits him, after that search.

And that's enough for now, since I'm getting to the point where I can't stay awake anymore. Next post should be a bit sooner, I think. If I can stop playing long enough to write it, that is. ;)
/Waves

Prepared?

Only 2 more days until everyone rushes off to the island of Pandaria. (Those poor pandas won't know what hit 'em.) I think most of my characters are ready, I still need to clean out a few banks (including Burning Valor's guild bank, yeesh what a mess >.<), but most everyone has good enough gear to make the first bit of questing easier. I don't have as much gold on most of them as I had wanted, but it shouldn't be too hard to save up while questing and stuff. Having to shell out 10k for Talia's decoder ring didn't help much... (Yes, Talia finally got to pick Hagara's pocket. Getting things at the last minute is kind of a thing for me, apparently...)

My tentative leveling plan is going to be Kel (of course), then probably Windstar, Talia, and Rynia. Although Kel being first is the only one that's set in stone. My second account won't even be upgraded to MoP for a few days to a week, but definitely getting Kal and Jahira leveled once that's taken care of. As far as my hordies go, I will probably just be leveling them when I get bored or when my Alliance friends aren't on, which happens a lot during the day. Not very surprising since most of them are Pacific time zone, though. I am planning on making a pandaren monk (getting the new class and race all in one toon :D), but it's not going to be a 'main' character, so I'm going not going to try to rush it up to max. I don't want to deal with the huge starting rush, and I want to actually learn and enjoy things with it. So my monk leveling is going to fit the character personality I've planned, taking things slow, relaxed, and easy.

And now I'm going to show off a bit. A lot of my game time lately has been spent on getting the characters I'm playing the most transmogged, and here is some of the results:

Kal-

rawr

Arien-

BWL is annoying to get into, but at least all this stuff dropped relatively quickly \o/

And Caderly-

Handsome fella, ain't he?

I thought I had more screenshots, but apparently I've misplaced them. Oh well! I guess Kel, Jahira, Talia, and Rynia get their own post later. Along with Bearkat, and maybe I'll actually finish Taarren's set soon. If her stuff would actually, you know, drop... :P

That's enough rambling for now, I think. I have a rogue that needs new daggers >.>  And possibly attempt one last raid finder on a couple toons. And run Windstar through the scenario a couple more times for that stupid polearm which has dropped for two other characters... who can't/won't use it. -_-
/Waves

Keepin' Busy

Haven't posted anything for a while, so I guess an update is due, huh? Well, for starters, since the 5.something patch has finally come out, I went and uninstalled the beta from my computer. I hadn't been doing much on it lately, with my lag problems and all, and I figured live stuff would keep me occupied. On that note, Talia, Jahira, Caderly, and Kalenedral are all raid-finder geared by now. Maxwill and Rynia aren't, but I haven't been playing on them much, so it doesn't bother me.

Speaking of Max... Sis has been camping for the blue version of Madexx, and I've been keeping an eye out for her whenever I happen to be in Uldum. So when I was tinkering on my shaman Taarren, I did a quick fly-by to check. He was red, not blue, so just for kicks I switched over to Max, found him again, and boom new pet. Rust says "Hi."

Yes, Max still has his polearm equipped. Don't worry, I switched it for his crossbow right after the screenshot.

And now back to Taarren, I've been playing her again since the patch, and last night she finally joined my level-85 crew.

She's been a load of fun, now that I have less to keep track of with totems and stuff. I think I'm probably switching her 'main' spec from enhancement to elemental for Mists, especially with the new spec-related quest rewards that Blizzard is doing. The only issue I've been having with her is the fact that her elemental gear was noticeably lower than her enhancmemt set. After getting her Firelands starting stuff and Thrall's quest chain done, her gear is much more balanced now, though. I'm looking forward to starting on heroics, and I've started collecting the T2 look-alike set for her transmog.

And now a short update on a more serious note... The main reason I haven't been posting much lately is because my depression problems have been hitting me really hard lately. Between issues at work, certain things going on with my family, and a crapton of other stupid little things, there just hasn't been much to be happy about, outside of Azeroth. And it's really hard to be interested in blogging when all I want to do is hide from the world. My sister, WoW, and a very good friend have been a big help in not letting everything get too bad, and I'm starting to feel a bit better, but there probably won't be much changing as far as blogging goes. When I have something that I think is worth sharing, I'll share it, but I don't want to chase people away with "FML" type posts, because seriously, who would actually want to read about that?

So, anyways, that's about it for now. /Waves

P.S.- Socks the chair-stealer says "Hi"

Sometimes, I think I really do have no life...

Well, to start with, two of my hunters have new friends. Firstly, Kerrowyn finally reached the frostsaber-taming level. Rolan says 'Hi'.

Then, a couple days ago Windstar spotted a certain someone while herb-picking in Twilight Highlands. There was a short panic attack when I got Max out there and couldn't see him, but then I realized I was looking in the wrong place. Then I couldn't seem to hit the right button for his taming macro. I still managed, and he didn't even hurt Max much during the tame.

I'm not completely dead set on the name, but so far it seems to fit him.

And last but definitely not least, I have my... *counts on fingers*... 12th (I think?) max level character.

Thanks to my awesome friend, she had the valor-point bracers and boots waiting, and I had made the epic belt and chestpiece with Kel's leatherworking. The rest of her gear wasn't very impressive, but at least she could get into normal and troll heroics right away. A few PuG groups and one guild run later, she had enough justice points for a necklace and got new shoulders and an off-hand dagger, and could queue for HoT heroics. My guildies and I did End Time, which was fun even though nothing dropped for her, and by then it was bedtime. I'm planning on continuing to run stuff later today, after I get off work, so hopefully she'll have more loot-luck then.

And speaking of work, time to run. /Waves.

Prelude to Mists - Kelesaria

I've been trying to get a few story ideas straightened out in my head, mostly about what my characters have been up to recently, as well as possible reasons for them to make the journey to a Certain Place (no spoilers!) when the expansion comes out. Kel's is the first, hopefully with the rest of my 'RP mains' to follow soon. Enjoy!

********
Kel stared at the dark waters of the lake, oblivious to the adventurers flying past over her head, on their way to or from the island of portals in the center. She only reacted with a slight twitch of one ear when her sister joined her. Jahira settled next to her eldest sibling, and both elves sat in companionable silence for several long moments.

Finally, Kel shifted her seat slightly, turning just enough so that she could see Jahira out of the corner of her eye. “I’m worried,” she confessed.

Jahira raised one eyebrow questioningly. “Mind elaborating on that a little? I’m a druid, not a priest.” That prompted a brief chuckle from her all-too-serious sister, but it quickly faded. “I haven’t seen or heard from Drac in several months. His last letter said somethin’ about goin’ into The Dream.” Kel frowned. “I know it’s supposedly settlin’ down, with the main source of the corruption taken care of, but still...”

Jahira frowned as well, tilting her head slightly in thought. “Hmm... Most of the Elders seem to think it’s safe enough now, but they are making a point of telling the younger ones to be cautious. I’m not sure what I might be able to find out, but I’ll keep my ears open for you.”

Kel nodded and gave her a warm smile. “That’s all I was goin’ to ask. Thanks in advance, hon.” Jahira smiled back and leaned over to give Kel an affectionate hug. She then stood and took two steps away before shifting into a large stormcrow. With a loud ‘squawk’, she took off and headed in the direction of the small cottage she shared with Windstar.

Kel watched her flap away, then turned back to her silent contemplation. After a moment, a large shaggy head nudged it’s way under her arm. She absently stroked Sabre’s forehead, and he made the soft, whining rumble that he made only for her, when he knew she wasn’t happy. Kel sighed quietly, and leaned onto the strong, furry shoulder beside her. “I hope he’s alright, my friend. Aessina watch over him, and may she bring him back to me soon.”