With World of Warcraft's Plunderstorm over, the alpha finishing up the tour of the new zones, Season 4, and Mists of Pandaria Remix coming soon, there’s so much going on in World of Warcraft currently it’s harder than ever to keep up with it all. That said, it’s time to do a rundown of everything I’ve been up to the last few weeks in WoW.
Alpha Adventures
Last week, we got our first look at Hallowfall during The War Within's alpha, which was a refreshing pace change from The Ringing Deeps. I didn’t spend much time there, partly due to having a hectic week that week but also primarily because as soon as I loaded up The Ringing Deeps, I immediately felt the same way I do in Zaralek Cavern. Which is to say, it felt very dark and closed in. Despite how beautiful Zaralek Cavern is, I never seem to manage to spend much time there, no matter how much I need to do there.
I was a little worried about Hallowfall because it’s still underground, and there are light zealots. Thankfully, I enjoyed the characters I met throughout the storyline, and the zone itself is a delight to roam around in. The whole storyline and all the sidequests I did were intriguing, and all seemed to point toward bigger reveals coming later. Even a very peculiar fish who just wanted to return to the water and had a few other small tasks, it was totally not creepy or old godish at all.
I also did not expect much from the giant crystal in the ceiling shifting between light and void, especially in alpha. I figured it would be a quick transition, and that would be it. I was completely wrong, though. One transition is part of the storyline, which causes a whole thing in the story, but that transition goes quickly. However, after I had completed the story, I was trying to get a picture next to a lynx that was roaming around, and the transition seemed like it came out of nowhere. It started at the ceiling and traveled down the crystal until it had switched to the void version. Words can’t do it justice, but I was amazed when it happened.
This week has been another busy week, so I haven’t spent much time on the alpha. However, I did have the chance to run through both dungeons - Ara-Kara, City of Echoes, and City of Threads. Both were a lot of fun, though Ara-Kara has a section reminiscent of the scavenger hunt in Tazavesh. In this case, we had to find some hidden operatives rather than trade things with people to find a password. I’m not sure if there is a randomness to the locations for these mobs; it definitely seemed like there’s a lot of unused space if they are always in the same spots they were when we ran through it.
Additionally, the look and ambiance of both of these dungeons were extremely fitting, and it felt like we were wandering through another society. Ara-Kara reminded me of Court of Stars in that it felt like we were wandering around an actual functioning city—well, aside from the section flooded with extremely deadly poison, that section isn’t exactly functioning anymore. Meanwhile, City of Threads felt a lot more like breaking into a giant spider den and had an overall more natural look while also feeling distinctly unnatural and creepy. Maybe it was all the webbing everywhere, but the City of Threads is distinctly spidery.
Dragonflight Season 4 Adventures
The first few weeks of the last Dragonflight season have gotten off with a bang, and I’m already enjoying it much more than the previous final season in Shadowlands. One big reason for this is all of the Dragonflight raids were a lot more fun and interesting than the raids during Shadowlands, so returning to them again has been a treat. It’s also been interesting to see the relative difficulties for each raid next to each other. I wouldn’t have thought it previously, but Abberus seemed far easier than the other two raids.
The rescaling of difficulties in M+ has also gone much better than I was expecting. After the ease of last season, where completing +20s on time was much easier than it had been previously, I was concerned that the rescale might be too drastic. Of course, I have also regularly referred to doing +15s in Legion as “back when 15s were hard,” so as much as I enjoyed getting the 20s done, I also missed them being harder. I’ve been enjoying the slower pace of pushing keys and how it feels like an accomplishment to get them done. I know some players miss last season's relative ease, but I prefer them to be harder rather than easier.
Aside from that, I am working on the huge A World Awoken achievement so I can get the bestest boy Taivan. I had difficulty figuring out everything I needed to do because so many different achievements go into this meta, and the in-game interface isn’t great when you need to go back and forth between different achievements. Thankfully, a friend pointed me to wowtrack.gg, which has helped me a ton with deciding what to focus on. All I had to do was sign into my BattleNet account, and it showed me exactly what I needed to do. There are also links to the Wowhead page for the achievements if you need more information on what is required to complete the various sub-achievements.
The biggest issue I’ve run into with this is trying to get all of the Zaralek Cavern and Forbidden Reach achievements. Forbidden Reach has been a problem mainly because I keep missing the rares I need by seconds, and I miss every Primal Storm except fire. It’s just all-around frustrating. Plus, since I’m so busy zipping around trying to get to rares in time, I’m having difficulty finding the 100 small treasures I need. I wish I had spent more time in both zones when they were current content, but so many other things were asking for my attention during those patches.
Mists of Pandaria Remix will be starting in a couple of days, and I’m looking forward to playing through that, though I can’t decide what character I will make for it. Of course, while I’m doing that, my achievement hunting will be put on the back burner, and I’ll likely be on the alpha a lot less. There’s just an overabundance of WoW things going on right now! It’s a little bit overwhelming, and I’m not complaining; I am looking forward to getting to a bit of a lull, though, so I can rest.
