Breaking Out

I have finally, FINALLY left The Crossroads behind. Having eventually done a pretty extensive set of quests in the Eastern Kingdoms (primarily in Hillsbrad, Arathi and Alterac), I managed to grind my way to level 35 by doing a grand clear out of my quest log and actually hit this magical ding in Desolace.

The reason 35 is magical is because last year, in patch 2.3, Blizzard significantly enhanced the quest content in Dustwallow Marsh to help with the generally long grind up to 40. And 35 is where it all kicks off. So off I went to Brackenwall Village, there to be sent out after all manner of weird stuff, and along the way opened up the flightpath at Mudsprocket and made contact with the third mini-hub in the region, Tabetha's Farm. The Other Half is around six levels ahead of me, and when he travelled this path flew through 35 to 40 (oh look, Shadow form and a mount) in no time at all. And based on the fact that about three hours play the other evening saw me ding two levels, I suspect I'm going to follow a similar trajectory.

Dustwallow is an odd region. Because its road is so circuitous it's always felt like somewhere it took forever to get through, a feeling made worse by the echoing emptiness that it used to offer before all of these extra features were added. And it's crawling with pretty tough mobs that frequently lurk in water or the undergrowth, so taking shortcuts always used to be a bit of a pain.

And it's got a lot of Alliance activity, due to the large transport hub in Theramore, so the ever-alert eyes, honed to new heights of paranoia in Hillsbrad, are constsntly in action looking for red names in the distance. I got particularly pissed off the other evening when I deliberately didn't attack a Human Mage who had just finished the last 'What's Haunting Witch Hill?" questline fight and was therefore somewhat depleted in health and mana. Honour suggested I leave him alone, but five minutes later, just as I was coming out of a similar scrap, WHAM - Fireball out of nowhere and before you know it I was dead and he was jumping up and down on my body.

So it's just me who tries to act with a little nobility then?