I'm bringing back up...

The thing that makes World of Warcraft so enduring – playability, diversity and sheer size aside – is the ability to have more than one character.

We all, I would think, have what we consider our mains. In my case, it is, of course, my Undead Warlock, Inoperante. He is my raiding and achievement toon (whore, my Guild would say!) and the one I began life in Azeroth with (if you ignore the failed attempt at a Night Elf Warrior that is).

But one can get very bored playing one character all the time, especially when the only thing left in the game to do is raid – and the same raids at that. The urge to log in each day fades until you end up not bothering to play at all.

So we turn to our ALTs. There are members of my Guild that have so many ALTs at level 80 it’s untrue. Me, I have just one, Slabs, my Tauren Warrior. Running a Guild lacking tanks kind of puts the onus on you to level one – so I did. In retrospect I should probably have rolled a Paladin for that task, but I did always want a warrior, hence the Night Elf anomaly!

It’s amazing how quickly I got him geared too. A few runs of Trial of the Champion, part runs of Ulduar and one full run of Trial of the Crusader and I can tank most bosses (skills aside – they lack, as my Guild mates would tell you!). Not only that, I can, without any effort, put out over 3,000 DPS in my Arms spec.

This has helped me retain my love for a game that otherwise would have bored me eventually.

And yet…there are classes and races I just cannot and will not play. For starters I am Horde. I will always be Horde. I cannot, for some reason, play Alliance. Despite starting there in my WoW career, I just can’t do it. What that says about me, I don’t know…

I am indifferent to the Night Elves, Humans and Draenei but I hate – HATE – Gnomes. I gank every one I see, I have to.

Dwarves, however, is a different story. I could play a Dwarf. Nothing stupid like a Warrior, but a Dwarf Hunter – yes, I could play that. If it wasn’t for the Alliance connection I would have a Dwarf. Bless there little woollen socks.

Other classes I won’t (can’t) play are Mages and Rogues. I simply cannot level a Mage, I just don’t have what it takes to make it work for me. I don’t enjoy it. Rogues are less annoying, but I find the early levelling really slow. The DPS just isn’t high enough for me to feel like I can progress.

Death Knights are clearly overpowered. I have one, Juggernought, that I play purely for the stress relieving damage output! I could never play one seriously though. Paladins are also overpowered, but in a more acceptable way. However, I find the 12-25 levels SO difficult to get through. I made it to 30 once…but have since deleted him. I regret it now…

I have a level 50-odd Hunter who I pop on now and then – though it has been a while! Hunters are fun but too similar to my Warlock to bother with too much.

So with Slabs happily gearing up and still questing for Gold, Inoperante very much my main, what am I doing now? Something, I am told, is insane – levelling a Priest…as Holy! My thinking is that I have a DPS and Tank class…I need a Healer. Logical, right?

Well, maybe, maybe not…but it’s the challenge that will keep me interested in World of Warcraft for many months to come. It will fill the gap between Icecrown coming out (surely less than a week or two now?) and Cataclysm launching (and then we’ll have Goblins and Worgen to play with!), that’s for sure.

And who knows…maybe, just MAYBE, one of these characters will supplant Inoperante as my main. I hear that happens too…

Do you use ALTs to keep your interest up? What classes and/or races do you favour or can you simply not play? Let me know in the comments.

Noblegarden a pretty awful World Event if I’m honest – but it DOES carry a very nice title and for that reason alone it’s worth doing (as well as the overall achievement for completing all World Events, of course).

Inoperante the Noble

The title in question is “[character name] the Noble” – isn’t that great?

What is nice about this event is that you can do it in a few hours. I did it in around three of hours of actual game time, spread out over Sunday. I’ll go through each achievement and what’s required but also pass on a very handy and possibly surprising tip on how to gather the eggs you need for this.

Ok, so you start by speaking to a Commoner in your preferred capital city. He sends you off to the nearest starter town. For the Horde this is Razor Hill, Brill, Falconwing Square or Bloodhoof Village. You Alliance people will know your capital cities and starter towns better than I.

Now you’re sent hunting for Brightly Colored Eggs. These are hidden around the starter towns, behind bushes, boxes, rocks and buildings. The first quest is The Great Egg Hunt. You will need to gather 20 brightly colored shell fragments, which you’ll get when you open the eggs, along with a Noblegarden Chocolate, so you’ll polish this one off as you gather these chocolates.

Your first achievement will also be done at this point: I Found One!

Your second quest, to be completed at the same time as the shell fragment one, is A Tisket, a Tasket, a Noblegarden Basket - find 10 chocolates. And you’re off and running. Now here’s the gear you will need to complete the achievements.

• Blossoming Branch
• Spring Flowers
• Spring Robes
• White Tuxedo Shirt
• Black Tuxedo Pants
• Elegant Dress
• Spring Rabbit’s Foot

You can get these required items two ways. Firstly, you can buy them for a varying number of eggs. DON’T! All these items drop from the eggs you have to collect to get the chocolates. As you have to collect a minimum of 105 eggs to complete three of the achievements, hold off on purchasing until you HAVE to.

TOP TIP: You may well think that the best time to collect eggs is when the server is quiet, as you’ll have less competition. You’d be wrong. What you want to do is be on when it’s busiest. Every time an egg is collected another one spawns. This allows for fast collection if you find the right spot. Here’s how I did it.

In Razor Hill there is a patch of cactii to the right of the barracks as you face it. If you stand in the middle of this, positioned just right, you’ll never have to move. There are three egg spawn points here. Point your camera directly down and you’ll see the eggs spawn in a triangle around you. One in front, one just behind on the left and the other just next to you on the right.

If the server is busy enough and there are a large number of people running around collecting eggs in Razor Hill, these eggs will spawn just about fast enough for you to collect them before anyone else gets there and you never have to move! I collected all the eggs I needed in about an hour.

There will be similar locations in all the Alliance and Horde villages if you can find them.

With that in mind, these are the Achievements to complete and how to do it:

• Chocolate Lover
  Very simply, eat 25 of the chocolates you get from the Brightly Colored Eggs.
• Chocoholic
  Slightly less simply, eat 100 chocolates. Fortunately, the 25 from the previous Achievement count!
• Noble Garden
  Buy a Noblegarden Egg from the Noblegarden vendor in any village (costs 5 Noblegarden Chocolates) and head to Silvermoon City (Horde) or Stormwind City (Alliance) and ‘hide’ it. This basically means putting it on the floor inside the city. You can then loot it for a chocolate and maybe that elusive pet / clothing / flower!
• Dressed For The Occasion
  Find the Elegant Dress in one of the Brightly Colored Eggs. The Achievement text is very specific on this – find it in an egg. Which I did, but can you get the achievement by buying the item? I haven’t tested this but this is Blizzard – I doubt it!
• Sunday’s Finest
  Obtain the White Tuxedo Shirt and Black Tuxedo Pants from a Brightly Colored Egg. Like Dressing For The Occasion, random drop and I don’t know if it counts buying them. Keep farming those eggs!
• Blushing Bride
  Once you have got your full Spring Tuxedo, find any player wearing the Elegant Dress and /kiss them. Simple as that, and the best place to find them is usually by the Noblegarden vendor in any of the villages where you collect eggs.
• Desert Rose
  Get your Spring Robes and travel – in this order for the Horde – to Thousand Needles, Tanaris, Silithus, Desolace and finally hop continent to the Badlands. Once you arrive at each Flight Point, wander out into the desert (you don’t have to go far) until your location changes and ‘Use’ the equipped robes to plant a flower. Aww…
• Spring Fling
  You MUST have the Spring Rabbit’s Foot pet for this one. If it hasn’t yet dropped from a Brightly Colored Egg and you have done everything else, then by all means buy it for 100 Noblegarden Chocolates, but if you’re still egg-collecting then wait, it might drop. Mine did. Learn the summon and bring the little critter out. To get this achievement, you need to find someone else with their rabbit out in each of the Noblegarden villages for your faction. The bunnys, God bless ‘em, will meet, fall in love and, well, hump! ‘Lo and behold, a baby rabbit will be born. Do all four villages and you have your achievement.
• Shake Your Bunny-Maker
  By far the hardest achievement to get. No matter what server you are on or what faction you are there will be a distinct lack of females of one race or another. On my server it is female Dwarves. The problem is, they have to be level 18+ – so camping the starter zones is no use at all! Anyway – equip your Spring Flowers (again, an egg drop or buy if you must) and go in search of a female of every race. Use the Spring Flowers on them to plant rabbit ears on their head and you work your way to success. Dalaran is an obvious place to do this for the opposition faction, but for your own, head to your busiest capital. Many more players over level 18 there. BE CAREFUL! If the character already has the buff (look for a carrot icon or bunny ears on their head) then yours won’t count. Find one without the carrot icon buff or wait for it to be removed / wear off. 
• Hard Boiled
  And finally…do this with a Guildie or friend. Both grab your Blossoming Branch and head out to Un’Goro Crater. You’re looking for the Hot Springs. Bring up the map and it’s the big lake on the left of the map, south of Marshall’s Refuge. Stand on the shoreline and get transformed into a bunny. Now stand still until you lay an egg and…pop! Don’t forget to return the favour for the kind soul who travelled with you though!

Now…you don’t need to complete ALL those achievements to get the title. You only need complete I Found One!, Chocoholic, Hard Boiled, Spring Fling, Noble Garden, Shake Your Bunny-Maker, Desert Rose and Blushing Bride. Which is near enough all of them really! It does allow you to purchase certain items instead of getting lucky on the random drop, that’s all.

Congratulations, you have now completed the Noble Gardener achievement and can proudly wear the [name] the Noble title!

I get the idea it might be quite fun to work at Blizzard…

Out of sheer boredom myself and three friends decided to tease Stormwind. First it was just ganking any low levels that happened to wander in and out. Then it was taking out the odd 80 that showed up to see what was going on. But then we had an idea…

If we got far enough into the city, would we be able to make them think a full on raid was inbound to take out King Varian. Turns out…we could.

With me charging through the city on my Dreadsteed heading directly for the King’s chambers and my friends pulling guards wherever they could, the effect was one of mass hysteria!

Stormwind was suddenly full of level 80s looking for the 30 or so Horde they thought were descending on them. Hilarious. Especially as I was hiding quite happily in the Canals, Unending Breath applied waiting it out.

Sadly, I got bored of that too and thought I’d see if I could ride out the main gate to safety. Turns out no, I couldn’t.

Thank God for a Naxx25 run tonight!

Spotted on a Guild website:

What does that even mean? Who came up with this guild name? I mean the initials are ED… not something you’d impress a girl with… come to think of it, “I play WoW” isn’t away to impress a girl anyway. Actually, I was at a bar once, talking about WoW. The girl next to me said, “Hey, you play warcraft? Me too.” It was awesome, till I found out she was Alliance. Then I told her to fuck off.

ROFLMAO!