Think Tank

Many years ago when dinosaurs roamed the earth and Warcraft’s graphics didn’t look quite so outdated, WoW was released and I started my Very First Character, a Paladin lovingly named Anyth. For the interested, the name “Anyth” originated from the Dark Age of Camelot random name generator and I recycle it on many of the games I play as my “generic female name”. I couldn’t tell you now what her spec was, nor how effective she was (I’m guessing really “bad”), but it was a fun little character that I mothballed due to the sheer amount of time it took to kill each enemy. My main became a hunter and I played it until I quit (the first time) prior to Burning Crusade.

With Cataclysm due out in two months, things are winding down and many of the 80th-level crowd seems content to just wait it out, instead of running raid after raid in the hopes of getting a small upgrade to an epic weapon that will be vendor trash four minutes after the expansion’s release. This is directly reflected in the volume of 25-man raids canceled by my guild and my own general apathy of trying to land a spot in a Vault of Acheron raid post-Wintergrasp victory. I still battle in Wintergrasp every chance I get, just due to the “fun” factor, but the Vault itself holds no allure. Hence, this is the perfect time to play an alt!

I blew the cobwebs off Anyth and moved her over to the Whisperwind server. As my name was already taken by “new Anyth”, “old Anyth” became Cyandra. Her level 52 glory was perfectly preserved in mothballs: glyphless, talentless, and a curious assortment of odd trash filling her inventory and bank. Given the sheer staying power of the class, I decided to make her The Ultimate Tank. (We’ll all laugh about this one in weeks, mark my words.) I specced her out as Protection and charged out into the Plaguelands to smite evil and such. A few minutes later, I’m flying back to Stormwind to buy all of the skills that had changed in the past few years.

The next few hours was a Voyage of Discovery, as I had no idea what any of the powers did. I had a vague grasp that there were seals and blessings and there should be a lot of smiting going on, but there didn’t seem to be much beyond ‘auto-attack’ I could do consistently. The forums weren’t a lot of help, as most just seemed to assume you already had all of the skills necessary for your “969 rotation”. (It took a stupidly long time to discover this meant “alternate skills with a nine second cool down with those with a six second one”). After more delving and experimenting, I found the Secret of Leveling a Prot Pally: use point blank area of effect attacks to clear massive amounts of trash.

By level 54, I had it down pat: run around like an idiot, avoid pulling casters, and use passive skills to re-actively kill things. Shield spikes, retribution aura (which I didn’t realize I had), and consecration became my new best friends. It was amazing how little play my weapon itself was getting. At level 55 I wondered if I could handle the Outlands. Months ago I had thought that the Outlands had a level 58 entry requirement. That, like many other things I Know to be Fact, was horribly wrong. Anyone can walk through the Dark Portal, it’s just that you have to be level 58 to take the shortcuts from various capital cities or receive quests. I wasn’t interested in quests, just raw volumes of ill-gotten experience. Having no fear, I ran my charger through the Portal then gazed upon the demon-covered landscape of the Hellfire Peninsula.

I rode around a little bit looking for something that might be killable. Most of the weakest mobs were four levels above me, so I gave a small pack of demons a try. Running back from the graveyard, I made a note that the ones that drain mana should be avoided at all costs. Exploring south of Honor Hold, I stumbled upon a long series of animal skeletons half-buried in the earth. Each skeleton was being picked apart by a handful of vultures. Once more, into the fray!

The buzzards exploded. It was glorious. They don’t cast, stun, knockdown, poison, disease, or anything. They just hit very quickly for fairly negligible damage. Realizing a gold mine when I see it, I began to make a game of seeing how many I could round up at once. The answer is “ten”. Ten flapping beasts four levels above me. I can certainly see why people enjoy playing these. Unfortunately for me, a couple of others were making their way through the birds as well, so my pulls were frequently reduced to five or six at a time. Still extremely rewarding, but a little slower. I merrily ground up the birds until Cyandra hit 56, picked up her new skills, then called it a night.