WoW 5.0 - Mists of Pandaria

How about for a priest or pally:

Bear Rescue
Bar Rescue
Panda Bar Rescue

fangblackbone wrote:

How about for a priest or pally:

Bear Rescue
Bar Rescue
Panda Bar Rescue

DesignatedDriver?

Elycion wrote:
DeThroned wrote:

Despite people hating my name (Dethunter was taken so I used Dethunterz). Apparently the z is bringing my name down to awful levels. I don't want to restart though so you guys will just have to deal. :)

I'm assuming the name is intended to match your GWJ nick, so it's intended to be "Det-hunter"? Sadly, in game it reads as if you were shooting for "Death Hunter" which is totally not a bad name if you're a 11 year old boy. :)

I feel bad being the curmudgeon who pointed that out.

kilanash wrote:

DesignatedDriver?

I'm pretty sure 13 letters is the limit for a character name.

Is there a way to skip some or all of the Jade Forest quests?

I finally got my third toon to Pandaland and I don't want to do the ... same ... damned ... quests ... for the third time in a month.

I hopped on Sherm yesterday and followed the quest train: off the beach and to the first town. I did the quests to the south and west of Pawdon Village, which leads me to Pearlfin Village to the east.

I went north to Nectarbreeze Orchard and did a handful of quests there.

I also went northeast to the Temple of the Jade Serpent, but I couldn't find anything.

Is there a quest hub I'm missing that doesn't require clearing out 3-4 other hubs?

Enix wrote:

Is there a way to skip some or all of the Jade Forest quests?

I finally got my third toon to Pandaland and I don't want to do the ... same ... damned ... quests ... for the third time in a month.

Is there a quest hub I'm missing that doesn't require clearing out 3-4 other hubs?

No. You aren't missing anything. The problem is really a combination of two things.

a) Jade Forest is very linear. Each of the quest hubs basically leads into the next few. You can't really "skip ahead" because you'd be doing the story out of order. A lot of the quests depend on the particular stage of the Horde/Alliance conflict, or following Loremaster Cho around. This isn't necessarily a bad thing. However...

b) Jade Forest is the only Pandarian zone with quests you can get at level 85. Every other expansion you've had a choice (Hellfire or Zangar, Borean or Fjord, Hyjal or Vashj'ir). But even if you get to Valley or Krasarang, all the quests will be greyed out until you get to 86.

I see why they try to pigeonhole people into doing Jade Forest first, but I personally think it was a somewhat poor design decision, and it still would have been nice to at least have the option to skip it instead of having to wait until you level first.

If your character has, say, still all of Twilight Highlands or Uldum open, would that, in combination with MOP instances, be enough to bring him to 86?

Umm.. while it was possible to skip HFP during BC, you needed to be fairly well geared in order to do so back when it launched. Now you can, but that's only because player power is much higher than it was what, 5 years ago now at that point? Not exactly a fair comparison. Wrath and Vanilla are really the only times you've had choice in your starting zone.

As for JF being linear, to a point it is. Eventually, you'll go through and clear out all the quest hubs. But once you get 3 or 4 breadcrumbs going, you can skip around, which isn't exactly linear by definition.

Last, they put a heavy nerf on experience from the prior expansion. If you're looking to skip content, dungeons and mining/herbalism are going to be your best bet.

AnimeJ wrote:

Umm.. while it was possible to skip HFP during BC, you needed to be fairly well geared in order to do so back when it launched. Now you can, but that's only because player power is much higher than it was what, 5 years ago now at that point? Not exactly a fair comparison. Wrath and Vanilla are really the only times you've had choice in your starting zone.

I don't remember it being all that bad, but it probably depended on class and spec, too. But my point was not so much that it was optimal to skip straight to Zangar at level 60, but that it was possible to do so because there were actually level 60 quests there. That is not the case in Pandaria - all the level 85 quests are strictly in Jade Forest. This makes it the only expansion to date where all of the quests you can acquire at the old "maximum level" are concentrated within a single zone.

Thanks for confirming my suspicions, all.

Between killing mobs, picking herbs (anyone need any green tea?), exploring and the guild XP bonus, Sherm is nearly 86. I figure I'll save a second run through the main Jade Forest quest lines for Lil' I, who's really my No. 1 alt.

I don't have any problem with the starter area -- it's wonderful in a lot of ways. But bringing three toons through there back-to-back-to-back is like watching the same movie for the third time. It's fine, I guess, but there's a ton to do in this x-pac, and I'd rather not do the same thing all over again so soon. I admire anyone who can do it. That's just not my thing.

There are some quests outside Jade Forest that are open to 85s, and those are the starter cooking quests in Halfhill. I knocked those out this morning and cranked up my second farm. If I'm going to max out cooking, I need more carrots, scallions, etc., than one toon can provide at this point.

@ Carg: I figured out the answer to my question the other night about the i450 alc trinket. About three mobs in, a quest dropped that will let me get the Mists version of the stone. Great, right? The roadblock: I need three Golden Lotus to finish the quest. Like that's going to happen.

Enix wrote:

@ Carg: I figured out the answer to my question the other night about the i450 alc trinket. About three mobs in, a quest dropped that will let me get the Mists version of the stone. Great, right? The roadblock: I need three Golden Lotus to finish the quest. Like that's going to happen.

Well, if you have a spare Spirit of Harmony lying around somewhere, you can trade it for exactly three Golden Lotus at the Shrine of Seven Stars once that character gets there. And the Lotus aren't soulbound, so it doesn't even need to be that specific character. That's probably not much consolation at this point, but at least it's something.

Keldar wrote:

Well, if you have a spare Spirit of Harmony lying around somewhere, you can trade it for exactly three Golden Lotus at the Shrine of Seven Stars once that character gets there. And the Lotus aren't soulbound, so it doesn't even need to be that specific character. That's probably not much consolation at this point, but at least it's something.

Oh, I know. Sherm is basically a transmute whore and herb farmer, and I don't really need the trinket to do either. I was happy to see the quest drop right off the bat. The mats I needed, however, crushed my soul.

It's odd that the one ingredient you need for every end-game flask is rarer than my raiding achievements. Meanwhile, I trip over ghost iron nodes en route to picking up the 3-4 herb notes lighting up my mini-map.

I'm starting to think that this is a case of be-careful-what-you-ask-for. It does seem that Blizzard listened to some of the pre-expansion whining from the hardcores.

Enix wrote:

There are some quests outside Jade Forest that are open to 85s, and those are the starter cooking quests in Halfhill. I knocked those out this morning and cranked up my second farm. If I'm going to max out cooking, I need more carrots, scallions, etc., than one toon can provide at this point.

One of the first things I did was run all my alts to Halfhill. I've had my main's farm going for a while (exalted a long time ago) plus 16 other plots from my alts. You can farm at 85, even though you can't expand your farm at all. Takes some time, but I essentially have two farms already. One other guy in my guild had a full set of 85s, so he's had them all farming from day one. If you do this, you're better off heading due west from the airship (at least as Alliance), picking up the flightpoint in Krasarang (Zhu's Watch) and then going on into Halfhill from there. The flight from Paw'don Village to Halfhill through Zhu's Watch is direct; otherwise you have to go way north to the center of Jade Forest (forget the name, but the main village just west of the Jade Temple).

Keldar wrote:
Enix wrote:

@ Carg: I figured out the answer to my question the other night about the i450 alc trinket. About three mobs in, a quest dropped that will let me get the Mists version of the stone. Great, right? The roadblock: I need three Golden Lotus to finish the quest. Like that's going to happen.

Well, if you have a spare Spirit of Harmony lying around somewhere, you can trade it for exactly three Golden Lotus at the Shrine of Seven Stars once that character gets there. And the Lotus aren't soulbound, so it doesn't even need to be that specific character. That's probably not much consolation at this point, but at least it's something.

And once you're revered with the Tillers, 10 plots for one day gets you a spirit of harmony as well if you plant Songbell, so at least there's a way to work around the sparsity of lotus nodes. That's basically my plan for flasks for now; 20 plots gets me 6 flasks, which is enough for my raiding each week.

Sounds like a good plan, Robkid. And thanks for the flight tip. I think my main is still flying north through Jade Forest and then west through 4 Winds to get to Halfhill.

Keldar wrote:
AnimeJ wrote:

Umm.. while it was possible to skip HFP during BC, you needed to be fairly well geared in order to do so back when it launched. Now you can, but that's only because player power is much higher than it was what, 5 years ago now at that point? Not exactly a fair comparison. Wrath and Vanilla are really the only times you've had choice in your starting zone.

I don't remember it being all that bad, but it probably depended on class and spec, too. But my point was not so much that it was optimal to skip straight to Zangar at level 60, but that it was possible to do so because there were actually level 60 quests there. That is not the case in Pandaria - all the level 85 quests are strictly in Jade Forest. This makes it the only expansion to date where all of the quests you can acquire at the old "maximum level" are concentrated within a single zone.

There were definitely classes that could handle it out of the gates; hunters and tank classes in particular could manage it fine. But beyond that, I know a lot of folks who struggled some skipping the zone as a whole.

Made it to Pandaria this weekend and did the entirety of Jade Forest. The Hozen storylines were definitely some of Blizzard's strongest and unique ever, but large parts of the zone just annoyed me and struck me as both hamfisted and tailored to sell more gametime to minors in Asia. I hope that with leaving that zone I'll also be leaving that trying too hard vibe of "look, we made an expansion out of kung fu panda and every hilarious bit from the movie got its own quest" behind.

So, a couple of days ago I hit exalted with the Golden Lotus.

Before Pandaria, I loved doing daily quests. In cata and Wrath they were an amazingly easy source of cash. But MAAAAN, Pandaria has made daily quest rep grinds pretty tedious. So when I saw that I was about to cap Golden Lotus, which would essentially remove 15 dailies from my schedule, I was elated.

So when I turned in my final daily quest and picked up my final Treasure of the Vale, guess what happened to drop from it?

A Skyshard.

My first Skyshard to ever drop after a MONTH of doing dailies in that zone. I was soooo looking forward to not needing to to do another daily or kill another Mogu in that zone. And now... this.

Just when I thought I was out...

I abandoned my first main (a hunter) because of the Argent Tourney dailies. I figured I'd rather level characters and make money on the AH house than to do the same quests in the same order every damned day.

This time around, I'm going to do one rep faction a day, maybe two. Or maybe none. Or maybe do all the Tillers quests I can do (which can be an ordeal if you're trying to raise the friendships as well.) Screw the gear. I'd rather run dungeons than kill x/gather x at this point.

At least Blizzard gave us plenty of different daily quests. I'm still seeing new Tilllers dailies at Halfhill.

I have no problem with questing. I'm Loremaster in every continent. I actually really like questing. So, daily quests are actually pretty enjoyable to me.

In fact, most Pandaria dailies are pretty fun with neat twists. The Klaxxi hub has the super powerful buffs that are fun as hell. The Tillers hub has the very relaxing zone and good quest variety. The Anglers is amazingly short (I usually finish their quests within 5 minutes) and rep progresses fast. The Cloud serpents hub is VERY generous with rep and is a very short grind (I finished them first.) Those are actually pretty fun hubs.

It's just the others that seem tedious. The Golden Lotus has just a ridiculous number of dailies (over 15 by the end) that only give like 100 rep a piece. I would seriously spend an hour doing GL dailies alone, ick.

Shado-Pan dailies are really not all that fun either. They usually involving areas that are over-crowded with competing players and mobs that hit pretty hard. It's very easy to accidentally pull too many mobs in those areas.

The August Celestials is just so painfully slow. You get 4 dailies that offer like 200 rep a piece. And you start neutral with them. Not fun.

I think the worst part about this is that the not fun ones (not including Klaxxi) have all of the valor gear locked behind their rep wall.

I guess the plus side is that I am done with the rep on GL, Klaxxi, Sky Serpents and Tillers and I can start cutting some hubs out now.

Luggage wrote:

Made it to Pandaria this weekend and did the entirety of Jade Forest. The Hozen storylines were definitely some of Blizzard's strongest and unique ever, but large parts of the zone just annoyed me and struck me as both hamfisted and tailored to sell more gametime to minors in Asia. I hope that with leaving that zone I'll also be leaving that trying too hard vibe of "look, we made an expansion out of kung fu panda and every hilarious bit from the movie got its own quest" behind.

I think it depends on the zone. I can remember one set of quests with some really cheesy cutscenes. Things become more mundane storywise after that first zone. It felt sorta strange to me that Pandaria started out kinda dramatic (sometimes overly so), while the rest of it felt a lot more par for the course.

Crimeny wrote:

So, a couple of days ago I hit exalted with the Golden Lotus.

Before Pandaria, I loved doing daily quests. In cata and Wrath they were an amazingly easy source of cash. But MAAAAN, Pandaria has made daily quest rep grinds pretty tedious. So when I saw that I was about to cap Golden Lotus, which would essentially remove 15 dailies from my schedule, I was elated.

Yeah, I'm not liking the structure of it so much either. Staggering out faction progression like they did is not something I like, especially for my DK alt.

So I can understand restricting flying to level 90 players only so people actually get to experience the continent Blizzard created. What I can't understand is putting a friggin' wall in between the level 88+ zones and the rest of the continent. And exactely one way over it. I spend about an hour today riding up and down the wall until I finally gave up and took the boat ride from Wrathion's tavern to Kun-Lai. Looks like the Ox gate is the only way to cross the wall without flying mount.

Also, is my memory just bad or do the 5 new levels take forever? I am pretty much playing 1-2h a night and rarely make more than 25% progress.

@ Luggage: I dinged 90 after only a handful of quests in Kun-Lai. That was after clearing out all of the first two zones (Jade Forest and Four Winds).

I'm not surprised there's only one way across the wall without a flyer. Blizzard set up a few more funnels than usual this time, and the Ox Gate is one of them. Why? You got me.

As for leveling, it didn't seem to take that long. Seems like most of the regular raiders in GWJ-A were at 90 after about a week. I took about 3 weeks or so because I'm a tourist.

Ugh, I really hate to say it but, I have this nagging desire to create an undead monk.

I was so clear of WoW. I have tons of other stuff to play instead. But the idea of an undead monk just cracks me up.
Has anyone rolled one yet? Impressions?

Anyone so enamored by the monk that it is now their main?

fangblackbone wrote:

Ugh, I really hate to say it but, I have this nagging desire to create an undead monk.

I was so clear of WoW. I have tons of other stuff to play instead. But the idea of an undead monk just cracks me up.
Has anyone rolled one yet? Impressions?

Anyone so enamored by the monk that it is now their main?

I liked them when i was in beta... Both the dps and healer variant were fun.

Enix wrote:

@ Luggage: I dinged 90 after only a handful of quests in Kun-Lai. That was after clearing out all of the first two zones (Jade Forest and Four Winds).

I'm not surprised there's only one way across the wall without a flyer. Blizzard set up a few more funnels than usual this time, and the Ox Gate is one of them. Why? You got me.

As for leveling, it didn't seem to take that long. Seems like most of the regular raiders in GWJ-A were at 90 after about a week. I took about 3 weeks or so because I'm a tourist.

You can actually get up the wall from the Dread Wastes. There is a little rope you can scale up the wall with.

Or, see if anybody on has a flying 2-seated to get you to the Vale.

Luggage wrote:

Also, is my memory just bad or do the 5 new levels take forever? I am pretty much playing 1-2h a night and rarely make more than 25% progress.

Your memory is bad. The new levels take about as long as leveling in Cataclysm used to, before the XP requirements were lowered. If you're just coming up from leveling 80-85, Pandaria is going to seem slower because the XP requirements for 80-85 were reduced significantly.

fangblackbone wrote:

Ugh, I really hate to say it but, I have this nagging desire to create an undead monk.

I was so clear of WoW. I have tons of other stuff to play instead. But the idea of an undead monk just cracks me up.
Has anyone rolled one yet? Impressions?

Anyone so enamored by the monk that it is now their main?

I decided after about 30 minutes on the beta that I loved the monk, so I stopped playing them in beta and decided to bench my stable of 85s. Leveling was great, 90 is great, and going from a severe altoholic to somebody who focuses almost entirely on one character has been a very interesting change.

Luggage wrote:

So I can understand restricting flying to level 90 players only so people actually get to experience the continent Blizzard created. What I can't understand is putting a friggin' wall in between the level 88+ zones and the rest of the continent. And exactely one way over it. I spend about an hour today riding up and down the wall until I finally gave up and took the boat ride from Wrathion's tavern to Kun-Lai. Looks like the Ox gate is the only way to cross the wall without flying mount.

Also, is my memory just bad or do the 5 new levels take forever? I am pretty much playing 1-2h a night and rarely make more than 25% progress.

Not true. There's only one way into the Vale, but that doesn't take you to Townlong or Dread Wastes. You get to both of those places from Kun Lai.

So I've been noodling around with panda bears, dipped a toe in the new content with a druid, etc. and decided to play a little on a pally I have had sitting on 80 for some time. Recalling that on some other toons the gear gap between Wrath (no endgame gear) and Cataclysm was somewhat significant, I decided to check the AH on a whim to see if there might be anything out there to blow a few gold on to help out in the first zone. Happened to stumble across...

Bjam's Door Breaker

WOAH, BABY! Level 80, ilvl 409.

I judge, and if I'm lucky, I get a Crusader Strike or Exorcism off before the mob is in a pixelheap. I'm rarely able to time a Hammer of Wrath. Activate Inquisition, Guardian, or Avenging Wrath? Forget about it. Dungeons are downright hilarious.

If you are leveling something who likes to two-hand things in the face, and are not interested in the journey of leveling through Cata for the Xth time, but rather the destination, this is definitely your huckleberry.

Mine was a steal at 1600 gold from what I've learned.