555555

That number, shit you not, was given to me by my authenticator.

What does it mean?

It means that I finally got a chance to log in and play some WoW!

Work is still kicking my ass and I’m at least a month behind on all the blogs that I read.

But, I did get a chance to sample some of the new things that came in with the Sundering. Or Shattering. Or whatever the hell it was called.

…

So what have I been able to squeeze in to my limited play time?

I picked up my Smoldering Murloc Egg from the BlizzCon feed.

I apparently can’t find the screen shot of the cute little bugger himself. He was broken for a while, had the animations and sounds for the Murloc Marine companion from last year’s BlizzCon.

Somehow I barely managed to squeeze in all the big event stuff. I was disappointed I didn’t get to keep my iniate’s robe or the sandwich board for the quests in Orgrimmar.

You have to admit, for a doomsday cult, they dress their followers pretty snazzy.

I nominate this for the best quest ever:

If you don’t get the reference, I’m sure Google can help you.

Spent some quality time with Cairne before he was killed.

That cow could tank. His son does a good job tanking as well.

OK, I have to say something about the elemental invasion event.

Compared to the Wrath event with everyone turning into a zombie, I think it provided less of a disturbance for the people that did not wish to be involved. Even if you were in an affected city, business could be conducted as usual. Personally, I didn’t have an issue with the zombie invasion, I had a lot of fun with it, but I remember the forums were a mire of whining.

The elemental invasion was very cool in theory. Except to participate, you pretty much had to already know what was going on and have your ass parked in Orgrimmar or Thunderbluff (SW and IF on Alliance? I dunno, didn’t get to check it out) and be waiting. I was trying to participate while working, spent several hours checking on the city and an invasion didn’t happen for 5 hours. Or I just missed it every time I looked at the screen.

Ultimately, I did manage to snag the Tripping the Rifts achievement as well as kill all the old elemental bosses. But it felt very rushed and I really only knew what was happening because Tir had the time to research it out.

Never before had I wanted so much to be at or near gold cap.

It showed up one more time at 200k and I haven’t seen it since.

WANT.

/cry

Anyway, so far the changes have been pretty incredible.

The landscapes are new and exciting.

Orgrimmar is badass and now a little confusing to get around in.

Haven’t had the time to try to raid. Work is the primary culprit, and that turkey day holiday, and being sick, and finally getting to realize my first WoW wish.

That’s right.

I *finally* got my blood elf warrior.

The very first class/race combination I ever wanted to roll was a blood elf warrior.

Talk about disappointment.

I ended up with a night elf warrior because it’s all about the pointy ears.

So after three years of playing (my god, it’s been that long now?) the youngest member of my belf clan has finally seen the light of day.

Let me say, leveling a warrior with BoA chest, shoulders, and a Bloodied Arcanite Reaper?

O-fucking-P.

I’m one and two shotting most things my level.

I am missing the class quests to get abilities. Defensive stance straight from the trainer and I’m sure Berserker will be as well. I know it makes leveling easier and caters to a larger population of players, but some of those quests really made the abilities feel special.

But there are some good changes as well.

Mail box 10 feet from where I zoned in at.

Training dummies in the starting area, complete with a quest to use a new ability on them.

Profession trainers in the first town you come across. All professions.

Class trainers everywhere.

Flight points up the wazoo.

The spell book tells you what you get and when.

When you ding it tells you when you have a talent point to spend.

So far, the questing has been smooth with very little frustration – even with drop quests. I might not have gotten all 4 zhevra hooves off the same animal, but I only had to slaughter 4 to get them all. AND I was leveling with Tir’s holy cow and he could loot the hooves off the same animal.

Instances have been great. Use the dungeon finder, zone in, pick up the quests from the NPCs conveniently located at the entrance. Kill shit. Turn in quests. Zone out. The new Shadow Fang Keep is awesome. Same layout, but all new creatures and a little bit of story to boot.

Looking forward to what December 7th will bring. Or December 9th if the bastards at Amazon are serious about the delivery date of my collector’s edition. /grrrr

With so many of the changes in place prior to the official release of Cataclysm, I’m not sure what I’m most excited about to see or do.

How about you guys?