5 Things I Am Sick of In Northrend

5) People still at level 73 farming Nexus incessantly.
Some people seem to have a very bizarre idea of how the game works. I understand that when we hit Hellfire Peninsula, all the quests led you right to the Citadel's doorstep (er, balcony?) and within that mighty fortress, there was some loot that could potentially take you all the way to 70.
Any small bit of research will tell you that that is not the case this time. Don't get me wrong, there's some good gear in there. I got a very nice mainhand dagger. It lasted me 3 levels. It was replaced by a quest reward green. Am I getting through here? Nexus is not something you put on farm status. You will get something better very soon. Move on.

4) Mining Drama.
Okay, maybe I'm coming at this one a bit unsympathetic because my medium of choice comes from just about anything with more than 2 legs. I'll admit, skinners have it easy. But my god, people, it's just a freaking saronite node. There's two whole professions that have a reason to grab it - odds are, someone else might have seen it at the same time as you, and then it's just a question of reaction time and situational factors as to who gets it first. It's not a slap in the face, it's not a rallying cry for changed mechanics. It's just a mining node.

What I'd like to see is for engineers to be able to make actual land mines that you can place in certain areas - they don't do any damage but they throw you back 50 yards, without respect to faction. The world would never be the same.

Because miners are jerks.

3) Rampant Wussiness
"Waa. Gundrak's too hard. I don't think I can do Halls of Lightning on heroic. Let's run heroic Nexus again. I'll just settle for badge gear. Waah."

Pansies.

2) The Healing Shortage
Again, lacking some perspective here, but is it that bad to heal? Really that painful? I get that the whole climb to 80 is a lot harder when you're set up just to keep other people alive, rather than doing damage. But between the fact that half of the quests are vehicular now (especially the phased ones that you can't get help on) and that getting help from all those other players you're keeping alive won't have any impact on the amount of experience you get for each quest turn in, and it seems like it should be doable. Not to mention, totally worth it for the thousands and thousands of instance runs you will be able to go on. Every single run has come down to one issue - no healer. I've sat for hours - HOURS - waiting for someone to pop on with maybe even an offspec healing gear set to let us do what we need to do. Druids, priests, pallies and shammies - it's time to pony up. Take off your little DPS gear, find your mp5 stuff, shift your talents around and do your damn job.

And don't give me any crap about waiting for dual spec. It's not an easy thing to implement, I don't care what they say. If we get it in the next patch we are going to be lucky - in the meantime, keep the damn tank alive.

1) Phase Noobs
Okay, so I guess I'm a little ahead of the curve. I read the beta forums. I followed the blogs when all the information on new things in Northrend were coming out. I realize, now, that I am in the minority.

And that's fine. You can play the game however you want. Including, apparently, with blinders on. But I can't fault people for just not knowing what's new in the world now that Wrath has come out.

My issue is that phasing is so damn hard to explain.

Unless people have some frame of reference for how phasing works, explaining to somebody that "I'm not here, but I'll be here soon after you turn in the quest" just makes them scratch their heads. One of the best tutorials in the concept is the Death Knight starting zone - you go to the fields, kill some guys, then come back later and things are different.

So that's fine. But man, some people just get bitchy when you tell them "I can't help you, you're phased".

I guess that's really what it comes down to. I get that some people are playing at a different pace than me. I'm looking forward to when we all start to fit into the same stride again.

Welcome to Northrend!

That's what the sign said way back when, when WotLK came out. 

After a fun night at Best Buy, waiting in the cold till midnight, the game was bought thanks to the charitable contributions of a friend, the account was upgraded, and the fun began. I hit 80 exactly 10 days after the expansion came out. 

A lot of people hit it before me on my server. Even more people did not. But the one thing I've noticed is that you have the gung ho players, and the players who aren't so gung ho. Among the not so gung ho are those using Quest Helper, an addon that is meant (somehow) to help you quest (and yet is broken and does not). 

I've noticed the people following the little -------- lines -------- from one destination to another are more often than not finding that they're going places where the quest they are on don't have a presence. They're looting mobs that aren't going to drop the quest items they need. They're also not exploring and finding the drop quests that mobs so often have that are enticing but easily skipped by the focused QH user. I'm somewhat saddened. (You will notice I do not make links to this addon.)

My method was quite the opposite. Using the Achievement for each Zone to track my progress, I did every quest in order of their appearance in my quest log, even when new quests were added, or group quests appeared. In this fashion I was able to level, get the money I needed to save for things I wanted, and I could spend my time progressing rather than taking lots of little steps back. Additionally, I did the Zones in order of their appearance in the Achievement roster. I hit 80 in Grizzly Hills, long before I was heading into the higher reaches of Zul'Drak, Storm Peaks, or Icecrown. 

The week I hit 80 was the week I got Loque'nahak. 

All said, I'm still feeling quite ahead of the game. 

Now, the thing is, a lot of people wouldn't do things this way, and I'm by no means saying my way was best, but I certainly hit 450 in Mining and Engineering just fine, I'm about 4k away from my motorcycle, and I'm feeling pretty good with my bear, spirit beast, cat, rhino, and owl. I'm revered or exalted with nearly every Northrend faction. I have 25 lovely dailies I can do a day. And Cooking's even 450 already without much fuss. Who could ask for more?