The Master Looter

A few hours before the server went down for maintenance, I finally finished my 730th Kalimdor quest to complete the Loremaster achievement! Last week I was at a standstill in the low 700’s with no more quests seemingly available. However, a little searching around led me to the final few quests to reach the grand total of 730:

I found a quest in Booty Bay that sent me back to the Mirage Raceway. I am not sure how I missed this while doing the long chain of quests from there, but it gave me a couple more quests toward the achievement.

I stopped in Tanaris and did the Tooga escort. I had a feeling I had missed this one, having discovered it for the first time when leveling my druid.

Blackmoss the Fetid in Teldrassil dropped an item that added two quests to my total.

I did the escort quest at the Master’s Glaive in Darkshore that I had missed earlier. Then, after farming hundreds of the Twilight cultists, a book finally dropped, giving me another quest to add to the tally.

After all that I was stuck at 723 quests. My only options left appeared to be the Tier 0.5 quest chain, or grinding rep with Brood of Nozdormu for the Scepter of the Shifting Sands quest chain. I decided on doing the former.

After many flights back and forth to Gadgetzan, many boat rides between Theramore and Menethil, and many Scholomance runs to get the Lightforge Bracers to drop (there were none on the auction house) I made it to 728 quests complete. Continuing the quest line led me to a Baron run in Stratholme, and then to Dire Maul. Turning in the quest at Dire Maul gave me number 729, and I expected the next part (turning in ogre warbeads) to be number 730 – but ended up with a surprise when freeing the NPC inside Dire Maul North gave me credit for the achievement.

The loremaster tabard is pretty cool – it has a giant exclamation point on it!

Today the 3.0.8 patch is supposed to go live, which reduces the number of quests required down to 700. As much fun as it was running all over the place to do that quest line, I do think it’s a smart move on Blizzard’s part in lowering the requirements. Perhaps they could even divide the quests by area as they have done with Outland and Northrend? Just my 2 cents.

Achievements, Questing & Leveling

Some folks raid and run heroics day and night, to take down the mightiest of bosses, and reap the most epic loot available. There’s so much more to explore in the World of Warcraft, though. I definitely enjoy raiding; it’s my number one reason for playing. However, I find a special joy in exploring the dungeons and quests once forgotten. The achievement system implemented with Wrath of the Lich King is a fun way to find something different to do, to break up the “grind”.

Here are a few off-the-beaten-path achievements I have been working on and/or completed:

World Explorer: Many folks in my guild has been going for this one, and for good reason – it’s fun to explore!

Loremaster: Having completed every quest in Outland and Northrend, I travelled back to Azeroth to complete many low level quests. The Kalimdor achievement is significantly more difficult to achieve, requiring a much higher percentage of quests complete. With the help of this list of easy to miss quests, I reached a grand total of just over 700 quests complete. Getting to 730 seems like it would be rather difficult, but this will be lowered to 700 with the next patch.

Outland Dungeon Hero: Having completed many Outland heroics pre-Wrath without receiving achievement credit, I ventured back to Outland with a couple of warrior friends to revisit these heroics. At level 80, Outland heroics are quite enjoyable to 2-man or 3-man. All you need is a tank and a healer; add extra people to make it go faster if you want to. While burning down heroic Magisters’ Terrace in under a half hour, I even picked up a tanking enchant formula.

Classic Raider: Level 60 raids are a great way to blow off some steam. Entry level raids such as Molten Core, Zul’Gurub, and the Ruins of Ahn’Qiraj are easy to complete with a PUG by brute force alone. Having a raid leader who knows the boss fights, and a group using ventrilo is extremely helpful for the Temple of Ahn’Qiraj and Blackwing Lair. Onyxia can now easily be soloed by several classes!

Achievements