Common Courtesy

Too often people are greedy jerks on the internet - especially in online games. Anonymity, much like being part of a huge mob, turns people into major idiots.

Now in MMORPGs, there are terms for such people; Loot Whores, Ninjas, Greedy SOBs, you get the picture.

Now this person I grouped with wasn't exactly one of those, not quite... but what they did was definitely inconsiderate. A guild member who I helped get attuned to Ogri'la the other day needed help with one of the group quests in Ogri'la. Guardian of the Monument

Party setup was as follows, Me the Feral Tank, Guildmate BM Hunter (party leader with lag problems to boot), Arms/Fury Warrior, Holy Pally Healer, Combat Rogue. Of the 5 members, 3 were on the quest, and those 3 were also not the most geared 70s out there. The Warrior, like me, had his Netherwing and Nether Ray mounts, and more Epic gear than me (Mostly PvP, but on a PvP server that's what you NEED). So basically he and I were helping these people new to Ogri'la.

So we get to the big Simon Says marker and I start directing people where they need to be and asking who wanted to use their shards to activate the Guardian, when the Warrior dismounts and activates it before anybody was ready. So the Simon Says game doesn't go properly because people weren't ready, and the Guardian comes. Now I'm not sure if the fight is harder if you mess up the Simon Says part, but this guardian really isn't that hard either way. Just WHY did the guy start the event before anyybody was ready? The Guardian goes down, and hey, nice! A blue Apexis Crystal! Everybody Greeds because this is a pick up group for the most part, but wait a minute - Why did the Warrior NEED it?? I'm a little annoyed but just get past it and we all head back to the Skyguard base so those who needed to could turn in the quest.

Wait a minute what's this? Why is this Warrior now walking on the ground on his dragon with me on autofollow?? I should have been mean and played a trick on him. I considered it... but I'm too nice.

Suddenly he comes back and says "Follow" and flies north to the Fel Cannon place and then says "If you provide the Shards to summon Need the blue crystal everybody else pass" Huh? Now in general that's not a bad idea - but when you've already Needed a blue crystal without telling anybody this "rule" and you also don't even give anybody else the OPTION to use their shards to summon... that's crap. If you want this to work - at least do a /roll on who uses their shards to summon and basically get the blue crystal. His method was rude and greedy, and not a good example to these new-to-Ogri'la 70s.

I am not Exalted with Ogri'la yet - I haven't done their quests for a while because I haven't needed to - I was going for Skyguard rep as Ogri'la doesn't have anything I really want (other than their Tabard, since I somewhat collect those). I still have close to 800 Apexis Shards in my bags, no idea how many I have in my bank. The Warrior claimed to have over 4k. It costs 35 to summon the Guardians. I thought the way he went about it was lame and inconsiderate.

Ogri'la Attunement for everyone!!

Last night we got a bunch of our new 70s (and some of the older ones) "Attuned" to Ogri'la.

I would have rather been getting us Keyed for Kara, even though that may be obsolete VERY soon. I still want it done.

Anyway, the Big Bear Butt Blogger has some excellent guides on Daily quests, but this one here on becoming Neutral with Ogri'la is very useful.

I have killed all of the slobbering sons of Gruul; Slaag, Maggoc, and Grulloc, but when I initially did their quests (1, 2, 3) I was lucky enough to tag along with a horde group killing the three so I didn't have to fight at all. Unfortunately I didn't know that I could also tag along for the last two parts, Grim(oire) Business, and Into the Soulgrinder.

Last night I tanked them all and Slaag was the hardest part. He has some cone shaped acid breat that comes out and knocks you back quite a bit - so the best thing to do is have all the non-tanks inside while you tank him in the doorway, with your back to the wall so you don't get knocked back much. We wiped the first time because we had no idea what was going on. Other than that, these guys are all pretty tough - but easy with a good group.

Netherwing Drake and more!

Yesterday, or was it the day before yesterday...?

Argh! I hate you Daylight Savings!!

Actually I am mad at Daylight Savings Time (DST) because it has messed up my Arena schedule. My partners in doing PvP (and doing it badly, but we are improving!) are in Australia... in fact in one of the states of Australia that DOESN'T have DST, so they come online an hour later now, which makes it difficult to get the 10 Arena matches done... especially when we are starting late anyway. So instead we tried to raid Thunder Bluff with 3 people... a 62 Druid that yelled in Stormwind trying to start it all... a 70 rogue (guildmate and Arena partner) and myself. More on that later.

Most exciting news of the night - I can finally stop using that Silver Nether Ray, which just makes me nauseous now bouncing up and down like that, and have gotten myself a Black Netherwing Dragon! Okay, so technically it's "Onyx" but whatever. I think if you were to look at the Netherwing Market, over 80% is Onyx. The only one I would even consider getting is the Cobalt, but it's not as cool as the Onyx.

So here we are - pictures of the gloriousness - oh and you can see my new shoulders I talked about as well! (Thankfully... no visible flowers - at least I don't think so)

So there you have it. Definitely cool - because Dragons, are definitely awesome.

So back to the Thunder Bluff raid. We didn't have much time - my partner and I were considering trying to get our Arenas in (only an hour and a half left 'til rollover and 2v2 queues are horrid), when somebody yells they are starting a stealth raid of Druids and Rogues to Thunder Bluff and we're meeting in Theramore. So we decide that sounds fun. On the flight to Menethil I ask my rogue friend, "So... how many people do you think will be there?" He says..."3" And he was right. We probably should have spent the time helping a guildie in the Blood Furnaces, but we were already on our way when they asked, so we had fun making horde run around trying to find us.

One thing I don't understand... when we attacked NPCs in Thunder Bluff, Bluffwatchers, the lvl 65 guards popped out of nowhere and started beating on us, and as soon as we get one of them down, another shows up. I'm pretty sure this doesn't happen in Stormwind when it gets raided. Am I wrong? Or is this a Horde only effect? Interesting.

Visiting Thunder Bluff brought back some good memories. TB is quite confusing at first - but once you get to know it - I think it's one of my favorite cities.

And finally - if you are going to "stealth raid" an enemy city - you should probably do a couple of things:
a) get some of your own guildies to come with you and don't expect people to come if you just yell in a major city
b) be a level or 5 higher than the basic city guards so you can sneak by them
c) 3 people isn't a raid
d) Enjoy it no matter what - because the confusion of the opposing forces really can be a funny thing to watch! Stealth FTW! (I still wish Catform had vanish...)

Netherwing Dailies: Not So Friendly Skies

The Netherwing quests are important.

I mean come on. After you do them a LOT you get a Dragon! You also get Gold! LOTS of GOLD! You DO like Dragons and Gold don't you?

If you DON'T like dragons or self-earned gold I might have to wonder a few things about you... But I digress.

Last night was a very interesting one. I started doing the Netherwing Dailies for more Gold (Remember GOLD! = SHINY!! = Awesomeness!!) and rep, beginning with finally finishing "The Not So Friendly Skies" quest to get the Netherwing Relics from the Dragonmaw Transporters.

I hate this quest. It takes far too long for what you get out of it. So usually I spread this one "daily" over a couple of days. I'm not alone either! Kestrel over at Kestrel's Aerie (Not a druid blog but a very good read anyway) feels the same way too. So I thought some observations on how to more efficiently do this quest might be in order.

So here is my little guide to doing this quest. In other words... This guide is WAY too long for what it entails. You have been warned.

In my experience there seems to be 3 spots where you have a good flow of Transporters to kill, have just enough time to heal yourself a bit, and kill. I have ranked them in order from the most constant to least. Of course - Which one is best for you might be different, so I suggest you try all of them if you can and decide for yourself. The usefulness of these spots also depend on who's killing what where - which might be why I was ganked by Horde later - which I will tell you about after this list.

1 - Best - "The Docks" (Coordinates ~75, 78.4)

• Pros: Consistent Flow of Transporters; Good pulling distance; Fast
• Cons: Dragonmaw Ascendants Nearby;
  

Just to the Northwest of the Transporter Docks where those two Dragonmaw Ascendants are (I hate those guys), there is a spot where a Nether ray floats around and often there is a Netherbloom there as well. Quite close to the docks - but if you stay towards the edge (but still safely away) the ascendants will leave you alone and you can safely pull the transporters. Kill the Nether Ray and you have a VERY nice spot for farming the Relics. If only the drop rate were higher so you could get this over with faster. Ignore the transporter that just stands there at the end of the dock - (at least on my server he's standing there) he doesn't move. I pull with Feral Faerie Fire usually RIGHT after they take off from the dock. They then fly straight down to you and you can kill them. If you pull before they take off, they run back down the docks by the Ascendants and around - so if you are a caster this might be better than pulling them right after they take off as it gives you more time to blast away. If you get in a rhythm here, they respawn shortly after you kill them - making this the fastest place to kill them in my experience. Only bad things about this spot - don't aggro the Ascendants, watch out for the respawn of the Nether Ray (if you are out of mana they start draining it and don't stop, so I couldn't shift back into cat to waste him so be careful!), and watch out for gankers.

2 - Next Best - "Dragonmaw Stronghold Peaks" (72, 76 and there abouts)

• Pros: Fairly safe; Easy pull; Not too much competition (usually); Good stream of Transporters if you are lucky; finally nice Air Elementals and Nethers Ray things below to farm for [Motes of Air] and [Fel Glands] for the "Slow Death" Netherwing Daily (fun quest but I have some issues with it...)
  
• Cons: Sporadic spawn rate at this path is ridiculous sometimes; Nothing else to do here - you're just sitting on a peak unless you want to get carried away killing rays and elementals anyway...
  

Just South of the Dragonmaw Stronghold there are two peaks that conveniently fall right under the paths of a couple of Transporters that fly out from the stronghold. Doesn't take long for you to see where they are if you just watch where they spawn. If you get a good respawn rate (I think it depends on who's killing transporters in other spots) it can be fairly consistent. Kill and hope the relics drop fast! There aren't too many bad things about this spot - it probably would have been closer to number one if the Transporters spawned more consistently.

3 - Last Best - "Floating Island" (73.5, 76.5)

• Pros: 2 convenient paths of Transporters to choose from. Probably the best spot if you are in a group because you can get two at a time if you are lucky.
• Cons: Probably the most used spot (varies on how many people are doing this quest I think!)
  

Just North West of the Docks, a bit further North and West than where you camp the Transporters for spot number one. The first of the two paths comes straight in from the North on the NE side of the island - swoops in from high, you can even melee this guy instead of ranged pulling. The second path flies in from the higher island to the East - he follows the Southern edge of the island just out of range, then veers North at the Southwestern edge of the island where you can pull him as he flies over you - ranged pull only. The Southwestern route seems to be the most constant one on this island - probably because people are killing the Northern path from the Peaks. This is the easiest spot probably - but I think because of the competition this place ranks lowest. Also the transporters are sometimes buggy and fly off away from you after you pull them, which is really annoying.

My Experience

I first flew to my #3 floating island spot (my list wasn't cemented in ranks then and that one is the most accessible), there were 2 Horde there killing them - a Belf Pally and Tauren Shammy. At first I didn't see them though (Lag Grr) so I pulled a Transporter and as I "entered combat" and began wailing on the orc in kitty - I noticed that while it hadn't been grey before, suddenly it was and me killing this guy would do me no good - and the two hordies suddenly popped out of nowhere and killed him. I flew away to find a different spot for farming the transporters, because it's not fun getting into a gank-fest whilst doing the Netherwing Dailies! I still don't know how that pally could keep stealing my pulls though.

I flew to the Docks and proceeded to kill about 20 of the Transporters and accumulate five of the Netherwing Relics, which is actually a pretty good drop rate for this quest, when the Pally and Shammy appear and start stealing my pulls again. I was quite annoyed and moved a bit closer to the Ascendants and spam-moonfire pulled, figuring if I got enough aggro they couldn't steal my pull (which was correct) and they then attacked ME. I killed the Transporter (wasn't going to let them have THIS one) and they finally wore me down. (Both of them had a mix of Kara and s3 gear - and I have mostly s1 gear with a few s3 pieces and some quest rewards)

I flew back from the Scryer base ready for payback and laid into the Shammy getting him to about 10% before the Pally noticed what was happening (:p) and they both went all out against me. I was down to about 10% myself when a fellow Druid Helstrike (recently Resto-specced) happened by and joined in the fight, healing me (Nice guy GAL (sorry!) - we've helped each other out in the mines a few times - and shocker of shockers - she actually read this blog!! And LIKED it! Wow) and turned it into a fun and long lasting fight. The Horde had better gear than us but we were definitely holding our own and wearing them down when a Horde Rogue showed up - he had comparable gear to mine, which shifted the odds back to their side. I switched to the Rogue because I have a much easier time against them, but both the pally and the Shammy were healing away so we eventually both died - but it was a lot of fun. I think that my killing the Transporters at the docks had dried up their paths, so they came to find out why. :)
Further testing will be required. If only I didn't hate this quest. :p I still have 5 more relics to get to turn that one in.

Most of the time, even on a PvP server, places like Netherwing and Ogri'la have an unspoken truce so people can complete the dailies - but when somebody starts ganking (and I promise it's never me!) it turns into all out war - it's kind of funny, but sometimes really annoying. I'll have a rant on Ogri'la soon enough!

Hopefully this *little* (extremely bloated) guide will help somebody complete this annoying quest a little bit faster - and maybe even enjoy it a little bit!) :)