🚀 go-pugleaf

On 18 Dec 2014 00:06:53 GMT, Urbin <urbin@invalid.invalid> wrote:

>Well, of course I couldn't resist. I activated my free 10 days tonight and
>just spent about 6 hours playing :-)

Hehehe :-D

>At the start I found the guided quest line to be a bit too guided for my
>taste (the starter area) but once I had built my Garrison and actually got
>to freely quest in SMV I quite enjoyed myself. After about 3 hours I hit the
>XP cap (1 point below 91), but the console still tells me how much XP I'm
>getting. So I'm wondering if this is counted but not awarded and if I might
>end up turning 92 or something as soon as I bought the expansion...

Hmm, that is a good question! Possibly not, but it might, I'm afraid I
don't know. Would be quite handy if it did, as then your completed
quests would count for something and you won't be trying to level
having already done half the quests ;-)

>So far I've built the barracks and found myself three followers that I have
>sent on a few mission. I cannot upgrade my town hall (there is a level
>requirement of 93 and some quest requirements on it). For anything else I
>lack the plans. Will those be awared based on quest progress? Or are these
>drops?

They come from a quest which starts from a random drop, which usually
comes at a particular point in the main questline. I'm afraid I don't
know when, as they changed that system after I did SMV on beta and
I've only levelled Horde characters since; I know exactly when it
drops for them! You'll also be able to upgrade the town hall earlier
than 93, if you reach the right part of the questline; I upgraded at
92 on my warlock alt, for example. Again, I can't tell you which part
that is, they changed it after I last levelled an alliance character
:-)

>Also, I've had random drops that tought me level 700 Herbalism, First Aid,
>Cooking and Archeology. I've raised my herbalism to about 635 and my Arch to
>about 625, First Aid just to 604 (cloth drops are rare as always) and
>haven't tried cooking yet. I guess I'll get the drop for fishing when I get
>around to throw my hook :-)
>
>How do I learn level 700 Alchemy? I haven't seen any trainers yet. Shall
>just craft yellow/orange pandaria recipes to hope for a random profession
>drop again? Or are there trainers somewhere and if so, where?

You'll learn that at the same time as you get the quest drop for the
building plans: you get a profession-specific drop, complete a short
chain, and get handed plans for the alchemy building plus an item
which teaches you up to 700 skill. You'll also learn some starter
recipes, the rest you can buy in your building (or in Stormshield, the
main alliance town), for tokens, which you can craft one per day (you
learn the recipe when you learn the 700 skill)

>I've found and killed about four rares, they drop nice blues, however those
>(and the blues from some of the treasures I find) have +Int on them half of
>the time despite being labelled as "appropriate for my spec (survival)".
>They look more like Shammy gear to my eyes. Is this a bug or intended?

Intended; rare drops aren't meant to be set to your spec, it's just
quest rewards and dungeon loot which do that. The loot from rares is
pre-set, always the same, except it can upgrade itself to a higher
quality if you're lucky. Of course as a priest, all my upgrades were
usually on strength gear!

>I've got a few green drops that require 91, as well as the bandages and a
>quest item drop, so those will probably be of little use to me.
>
>I love how the lumbarjacks at the start of the Garrison quest say "Ready for
>work" exactly with the voices from the early (non-wow) Warcraft games ;-)

Yep, the Horde peons use the old warcraft peon voices too, love it :-D

>I have completed the quest achievments for 3 or 4 subzones in SMV and
>explored it all (though that caused my one and only death when I walked up
>Socretar's Rise to get the FP. Oops, all mobs are "boss" mobs to me :-)

You just found a lvl 100 questing area :-) I suggest you don't go and
find the island to the south of the zone either; it's another lvl 100
area (or, approach *carefully* and stay in the water, can probably
discover it on the map without aggroing stuff!)

>Anyway, I had fun and plan to enjoy the next 9 days, too.
>
>I planned to not buy the expansion but am now debating if it is worth it
>just so I can level up during those 10 days (hoping not to loose the free
>game time if I do buy). If I don't I guess I'll just quest as far as I can
>go at 90.99999 and once I hit a zone that is too high level I'll just resort
>to (re-)visiting old content. I'll sleep on it and see.

Whichever you choose, I'm sure you'll have fun, the levelling content
is absolutely brilliant, I loved it :-) So many familiar names and
faces around (you might not remember him, but Exarch Maladaar who
you've met a few times in Tanaan/SMV was in Auchenai Crypts, for
example :-)), it really brings back the memories, and the rares and
treasure made it very fun gaemplaywise as well.