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Borean Tundra - more thoughts
Aug. 9th, 2008 01:14 pmOkay, if you take the boat from the bigass Stormwind Harbor, you arrive at the Alliance-held part of Borean Tundra. (I believe to get to the Alliance part of the Howling Fjord, you have to catch a boat in Wetlands... not sure)
I mentioned in an earlier post how they didn't re-use a lot of the standard architecture from previous Alliance towns. And that holds true even outside the Keep. Nearby is the mostly abandoned farming community of Farshire. Apparently, those wise and deliberate leaders of the Alliance did not consider the fact that much of Northrend is held in the icy grip of the Lich King to be a major deterrent to sending poorly armed farmers out to grow crops.
*sigh*
The only major problem I have with Borean Tundra is that it seems like it was laid out by someone who liked having every possible type of terrain on one map. Basically, large chunks of the zone do not feel like "tundra". Heck, some of it look temperate. But really, it's beta, and I'm sure I'm not the only one finding the crazy quilt of terrain very confusing. Speaking of confusing, it can be very easy, prior to restoring use of your flying mount, to have to backtrack because you've fallen off of a cliff. In the middle part of the Borean Tundra (or at least what I've explored of it), you can't travel in a straight line for very long.
One thing to note in Borean Tundra is that you can very quickly start doing quests for the mages of the Kirin Tor (aka the Dalaran mages). Right now, these quests don't seem to give any Dalaran reputation, which is, in my opinion, pretty stupid. Even if it's just a little bit, it should be there. However, these quests do serve one very important purpose. One of them (a chain quest) ends up taking you (via a scripted dragon ride) to Coldarra, one of the sub-zones of the Borean Tundra. This sub-zone is going to be popular because it contains The Nexus, where the Dragon Malygos is residing with much of his dragonflight. There are going to be two wings of the Nexus - one five-man for roughly 71-73 level characters, another five-man for 80th level characters, and a level 80 raid dungeon.
Also to note, there was a patch today (or late yesterday)... new Blacksmithing stuff got added. It is now possible to Smelt Saronite bars (these are the next material up from Cobalt). Two ore = 1 bar. 10 bars = 1 Hardened Saronite bar. And apparently, Mining is going to be getting a cooldown combine. Titansteel is going to require 1 Titanium bar and 4 Eternal Earths (made by combining 10 Crystallized Earth per Eternal Earth) = 1 Titansteel bar. 20 hours later, you can do that again. (And there are some Blacksmithing items that require 5-10 Titansteel bars.)
Also, and this is sure to make Blacksmiths happy (even if it was suggested for Engineering long ago)... Blacksmiths are going to be able to make new belt buckles... which when placed on a belt, add a socket. They might also be setting self-only bracer socketing items.
And there is still nothing in Engineering.
I mentioned in an earlier post how they didn't re-use a lot of the standard architecture from previous Alliance towns. And that holds true even outside the Keep. Nearby is the mostly abandoned farming community of Farshire. Apparently, those wise and deliberate leaders of the Alliance did not consider the fact that much of Northrend is held in the icy grip of the Lich King to be a major deterrent to sending poorly armed farmers out to grow crops.
*sigh*
The only major problem I have with Borean Tundra is that it seems like it was laid out by someone who liked having every possible type of terrain on one map. Basically, large chunks of the zone do not feel like "tundra". Heck, some of it look temperate. But really, it's beta, and I'm sure I'm not the only one finding the crazy quilt of terrain very confusing. Speaking of confusing, it can be very easy, prior to restoring use of your flying mount, to have to backtrack because you've fallen off of a cliff. In the middle part of the Borean Tundra (or at least what I've explored of it), you can't travel in a straight line for very long.
One thing to note in Borean Tundra is that you can very quickly start doing quests for the mages of the Kirin Tor (aka the Dalaran mages). Right now, these quests don't seem to give any Dalaran reputation, which is, in my opinion, pretty stupid. Even if it's just a little bit, it should be there. However, these quests do serve one very important purpose. One of them (a chain quest) ends up taking you (via a scripted dragon ride) to Coldarra, one of the sub-zones of the Borean Tundra. This sub-zone is going to be popular because it contains The Nexus, where the Dragon Malygos is residing with much of his dragonflight. There are going to be two wings of the Nexus - one five-man for roughly 71-73 level characters, another five-man for 80th level characters, and a level 80 raid dungeon.
Also to note, there was a patch today (or late yesterday)... new Blacksmithing stuff got added. It is now possible to Smelt Saronite bars (these are the next material up from Cobalt). Two ore = 1 bar. 10 bars = 1 Hardened Saronite bar. And apparently, Mining is going to be getting a cooldown combine. Titansteel is going to require 1 Titanium bar and 4 Eternal Earths (made by combining 10 Crystallized Earth per Eternal Earth) = 1 Titansteel bar. 20 hours later, you can do that again. (And there are some Blacksmithing items that require 5-10 Titansteel bars.)
Also, and this is sure to make Blacksmiths happy (even if it was suggested for Engineering long ago)... Blacksmiths are going to be able to make new belt buckles... which when placed on a belt, add a socket. They might also be setting self-only bracer socketing items.
And there is still nothing in Engineering.