Finally a year after I started this journey (I did take a long break in the middle to focus on raiding) it is complete!
I did 2,843 quests and all I got was this stupid T-Shirt ;P
I knew once I had Loremaster of Kalimdor completed it would be a downhill ride to finish off the meta.
I had only to complete quests in 3 zones of Icecrown-- Borean Tundra, Storm Peaks, and Icecrown Glacier.
I started in Borean and knocked out those quests and also completed the D.E.H.T.A's Little P.I.T.A. achievement. Nothing special, just save some animals, kill some bad guys, and then assassinate Harold Lane. Eco-Terrorism, for the win!
Then on to Storm Peaks. Some interesting quests there. I got to find out what happened to Muradin Bronzebeard.
Finally, Icecrown. The quests here are a pain in the ass. You only get a few at a time, and they take a while to complete. Then you have to fly back and forth across the zone a lot. This was slow going. It took me a couple really solid sessions to finish all of these quests. probably 8+ hours, and I already had 30 quests done when i started.
A very interesting quest series is in Icecrown. First, I had no idea at all you could go beneath Icecrown Citadel. That was crazy. Then, I did a quest where I ended up falling down this incredibly deep pit (you can't see the bottom from the top) and to my great surprise, fell into some ancient Nerubian city below. Wow.
I fell into a pit of water, were there was this shadowy shard. I touched it, and then I was warned that I should not have done that. I met this kid, Matthias Lehner down there, and as time went on, I realized the shard at the bottom was the frozen heart of one Arthas Menethil.
The boy's name, Matthias Lehner is an anagram of Arthas Menethil. Through the quests he offers, you learn more about the story behind the Lich King. This is one of those great quest chains where Blizzard does a great job of telling a story and rewards the player for paying attention and actually reading the quest text and thinking about what they just witnessed.
There is some speculation that this may just be an image created by Yogg Saron to do what the Old Gods do best-- manipulate the living; and this is not a projection of the last shreds of goodness left inside of The Lich King.
Anyone who has seen the Fall of the Lich King cinematic knows that Arthas is redeemed just before he dies, so the destruction of the frozen heart must not totally wipe out his humanity.
10/20/2010: Loremaster of Kalimdor completed.
10/20/2010: 3000 Quests achievement completed, rewarding a new title: the Seeker.
I am now Loremaster of Eastern Kingdoms, Kalimdor, and Outland.
Remaining are: Nothing Boring About Borean, The Summit of Storm Peaks, and Icecrown: The Final Goal.
Storm Peaks and Icecrown have some quests already completed, but I have done a whopping five quests in Borean Tundra.
Getting Kalimdor done wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. When I finished Eastern Kingdoms, I had something like 400/700 done for Kalimdor. It looks like a tough climb at the time but I did some research.
First, if you are going after Loremaster, you MUST use the EveryQuest addon. It is an invaluable resource. Combined with the LightHeaded add-on it can show you data from wowhead inside the game client for tips and clues on the location of certain mobs/NPCs/items you need.
My first steps were to clean up unfinished quests around Kalimdor. I started in Teldrassil / Darnassus then moved into Darkshore, through Ashenvale, then into Felwood and Winterspring. Then I swung down through Tanaris, Un'Goro (Linkin's boomerang chain completion), Thousand Needles and Feralas.
Then I hit up quest hubs I knew that I had never touched when I initially leveled up way back in the dark ages of 2004/2005.
The big untouched quest hubs for me were in:
Ashenvale: Forest Song
Azuremist Isle: Azure Watch
Boodmist Isle: Blood Watch
Desolace: Nijel's Point
Dustwallow Marsh: Theramore, Mudsprocket, etc.
I finished off in Dustwallow. Once I got to about 650 quests, I knew it would be a fairly smooth home-stretch, and it was. I nailed 700/700 on my 3,000th quest which was totally unplanned but awesome.
I became "that blogger." The one that starts a blog then drops it a month later.
My guild folded up the tent on raiding a couple weeks before Patch 4.0.1 dropped, and since I have been catching up on my progress toward Loremaster.
I am now Loremaster of Eastern Kingdoms, and about 630/700 for Loremaster of Kalimdor.
I completed all of the quests in Azure/Bloodmist isles, and the new quest hub in Forest Song, Ashenvale.
Now, I'm in the process of going around to each zone and cleaning up quests I missed. It looks like Swamp Of Sorrows will be the zone where I'll complete my 700 quests, as I have never quested there.
In 3.2, I think-- Blizzard added an API whereby add-ons can query the server for your character's quest history. An add-on called Everyquest has a database of every quest in the game, and when you query the server it hides all the quests you have completed.
This has proved invaluable for picking up those little quests I missed before and for those pesky quests that start from item drops.
...A Nagrand Slam to be precise.
I took a quick break from decrepit old-ass quests to try and punch out a couple nagging achievements in Outland. I had just a handful of quests left in Terrokar, Nagrand, and Blade's Edge to finish off Loremaster of Outland. Terrokar was a breeze. Found a couple quests in the lower city and around Auchindoun and busted them out in no time. Nagrand... different story.
I was totally stuck at 70 quests and couldn't find anything ANYWHERE, so I did some research. Turns out I missed an escort quest from Sunspring Post. The Totem of Kar'dash So then I was stuck at 71. Whee.
I did more digging, and found a lead on a quest chain in Shadowmoon Valley called Altrius. I had done quests for Altrius before, but he was offering me nothing. I went out to Shadowmoon and sure enough, at the Sanctum of the Stars (I'm a scryer) there was that one quest. I flew back out to Nagrand, and ol' Altrius was offering me 3 new quests to kill a few demons. They were spaced across all of Outland in a giant Triangle. Zangarmarsh, Netherstorm, and Shadowmoon. That brought me to 74. Then he offers one last quest: Illidan's Pupil where you just listen to his story, click, 'complete' and gather your achivement. 75/75-- DONE.
Happy Halloween, beezies.Sidetracked by holiday events and raiding TOC25 normal and TOC10 hard, I'm still managing to push forward with progress. I got to run Lower Blackrock Spire about four times. I wish dungeon quests were laid out a bit more sensibly. The way they are now, you wind up running a dungeon several times as different quest areas give you quests in there. Sometimes you finish one, and get a follow-up to go right back in. /argh.
Quest of the Day: Mother's Milk
One of the quests that Ragged John in the Burning Steppes gives you, Mother's Milk requires you to go into Blackrock Spire (lower, of course) and engage in battle with the giant spider matron: Mother Smolderweb
Druids should be pretty familiar with her, as she used to drop our Wildheart Boots. Epic druids could solo her back in the day, as we could stealth though basically the entire instance in cat form.
Anyhow, she puts a poison debuff on you that's called "Mother's Milk." Occasionaly it procs and causes you to be snared in a spider web for a few seconds. It's pretty annoying and it has no duration. You have to either cleanse it off yourself or be "milked." For the quest, you must leave it on and go have Ragged John "milk" you.
It's another example of how quests generally used to be more odd back in the early days of WoW.
The horseman cometh
Ah, Hallow's End is upon us again. This year I am actually working on achieving Hallowed be thy Name
I started out with none of it completed, and find myself just needing Sinister Calling and a whole bunch of candy buckets. And G.N.E.R.D Rage.
Sadly, the quests associated with the event are not counting toward my ultimate goal of The Loremaster but it's a fun diversion, nonetheless.
In other news, my regular 10-man ToC/ToGC group now has Twin Val'kyrs down on hard mode. Faction Champs was hard, but it was fun. I'm starting to hate TOC less... starting.
These innocent-looking crystals are actually poop. Cliff Giant poop.Quest of the day: AzshariteDescription
The ancient cliff giants of the southern region of Azshara consume the rock and buildings of the land for sustenance. The excrement from their consumption is a highly malleable and extremely strong crystal known as Azsharite.
The formations litter the southern arc, but few are ever recovered due to the extremely violent nature of the giants.
You are to venture south and recover enough of the Azsharite for the creation of the weapon's body. My felhounds will aid in the recovery of the crystal
There is one recurring theme in WoW quests other than grueling travel, inane "talk to the guy next to me" quests, and helpless escort-ees; it is definitely poop. This poop comes in two distinct varieties: The crystal formations as shown above, and these little fellas as shown to the left. If they eat rock from the land and buildings, why do they seem to eat trolls... and then poop them out whole? Blizzard: your lore is paper-thin, lol.
I'm 430-something quests done in Eastern Kingdoms, and just under 400 in Kalimdor. Raiding is cutting into my questing time. Heroic Northrend Beasts 25 in TotGC still proves elusive. The tanks continue to get rofflestomped from 100% health to zero in 0.2 seconds flat. What great design. Let's not make it more FUN, let's just make the encounter based on whether or not the RNG decides to kill your tank. Woo-hoo.
I fell into a pit of water, were there was this shadowy shard. I touched it, and then I was warned that I should not have done that. I met this kid, Matthias Lehner down there, and as time went on, I realized the shard at the bottom was the frozen heart of one Arthas Menethil.
