• visit all the elders you can (solo, prowling, stealth, invisible) - you will hit a problem with Upgarde Pinnacle and Gundrak
• a bunch of friends willing to go the extra mile to help you out ( this includes babysitting your char for the more difficult quests and taking you in the dungeons)
• lots of time and coffee

So you will need to get to lvl 80 in 1 week. Start visiting the normal elders (not dungeons) and the ones from the dungeons where you can get without having to fight your way in. This should not take more than 1 day. In the rest 6 days you have left you will need to do 1 level per day so better start questing.

The last 4 levels will need to be done in about 3 days. Here is where the friends come into play. You will need at least 1 friend (lvl 80 offcourse) to help you with the quests marked as Group because they do give an insane amount of experience for the time it takes to complete it (like killing an 80 elite takes 1 minute and get a bucket of xp and a quest to collect some stuff takes longer and gives a drop of xp). Another thing to do are daily quests that also give some very nice xp.

So here you are on the last day of the event at 22:00 hours and still 50% of level 79. You say to yourself “I’m not going to make it but I must try or the last days when I played like a mad man will mean nothing”. So you get your mount ready and go get some more quests. At 23:30 you still need about 500k xp but you sudden realize that you have about 10 quests not turned in. A glimpse of hope starts to be seen. Go and turn then in….. 300k still needed. Your friends are about finished with their raid so you ask one of them to help with some group quests. Even if it is late he accepts.

You start dragging your friends all over the map for those hard quests, you manage to get lost on the map and to die like a fool a couple of times but you’re nearly there: 1K left.

Now comes the “fun” part: it’s 1:30, everybody is tired and can’t keep their eyes open but they stick with you and help you do 2 instances to get to the elders. During one instance you finally ding making you a very happy person and in the end you do get the tile 2 hours from the event closure.

I would like to thank Patricus, Jensomething, Belgua, Neoublie, Rijje and all the others for helping me get older and elderly.

PS: Sorry about the ninja looting for that herb. Could not think that clear after 3 days staight of WoW.

PS2: Got a whole bunch of items to sell after this (bank is full, bags are full… not even a little space for some honey tea)

In the meantime (in the small hours of the night, after the raids), Cinn managed to hit level 17 and, lo and behold, the LFG interface is open to me!

The one and only attempt was met with failure: we decided to go to Deadmines (or Minas de la Muerte), but only one member was in Westfall. I was in Exodar, another member was around Kalimdor… and the two other were messing around in Darkshire. After asking for 10 minutes if someone would come help summon, the guy in Westfall left. After another 10 minutes of the two idiots still messing around (and dying) in Darkshire, I decided it was too late to play with such people and went to sleep.

Better luck next time, I hope. In the mean time, I’ve been taking noob healer lessons and I hope we don’t wipe too much when I manage to get a group.

Judging by the people I still kept finding even in level 40 PUGs with the mage, it will probably be a painful experience.

My relationship with my new guild is… interesting. The guild master is a nice guy who plays a level 65ish warlock, who knows my Spanish (especially WoW-related) is limited and helps me out. He even offered to send me gold 30 minutes after meeting and got me some bags the day after. In turn, I’m a small deity with my level 74 and 80 characters, since all the other guildies only have low-level toons.

All would be fine - without the communication problem. Someone asks about a quest. I know where he’s supposed to go, but all I know so far are the name of the classes, the fact that Stormwind is Vientormenta and… that’s about it. And when you’re dealing with people who don’t even have coords, it can get tough.

But so far it’s still fun. My little druid is level 14 and just learned Cure Poison, and in the process I finally got to do the sickly deer quest! I’ve been wanting to do it ever since I was a baby draenei running around Darkshore and I was very sad it was druid-only.

How can you not feel sorry for the poor deer?

People make them all the time, so what’s so special? Well, I was tired of some recent guild drama, and since a friend kept talking about the French server she joined, I figured I’d get two birds with one stone: get away from the stress and improve my language skills.

Thus Cinn was born, on the Spanish Exodar server.

She’s level 11 and so far I’ve proven two things to myself.
1. I can get by even without money help from my main/guildies. I made 2 gold in about 8 hours played and got some decent bags already (the thing I miss most of all is the 16-slot bags all my alts are equipped with from level 1…)

2. My Spanish is good enough to talk to people. My first successful “conversation” was actually an argument, but I can understand most of what’s said to me and can reply in a coherent way.

However, the major problem is… also the language. WoW has a lot of internal slang, and my Spanish classes didn’t include the proper way to call instances or how professions are translated. There’s no ‘LF’ since that’s an English abbreviation, I’m still trying to figure out what instance Murallas is, hell, I can’t even remember what Stormwind is called! (Ok, I do, it’s Vientormenta.)

And the main issue isn’t understanding. If I click a linked item I see the English name and most things are easy to figure out through translation, but it’s difficult to communicate. How do I tell a player I made money on the AH since I have no idea how to say “auction house” in Spanish?

But so far I’ve been ok. I’ve memorized the most important things and, being level 11, there’s not much interacting to do. I managed to land myself in a guild after I signed their charter, and the guild master is a nice guy who’s patient with my Spanish. Seeing as I know more about guild than he does, I’m useful to him too, so it’s a fair trade.

I’m downloading the Spanish language files as I type and I’ll give it a try, but I think having everything in Spanish will be too confusing.

295 comments later, it was clear people didn’t agree on one answer (of course). And that no one seemed to have the same experience as I did. Rather than adding comment 296 which no one would read, I figured I’d make a post out of it.

Why?

The opinions most prevalent through the comments were:
1. (Men) No, you’ll have to hold her hand and give her money all the time;
2. (Men) No, you need your own space;
3. (Women) Yes, I play and I give my boyfriend money;
4. (Men) Yes, she’ll understand you better, but have her create a char on another server;
5. (All) Yes, playing with your partner is fun!

I won’t rant and rave about the misconception that girl = won’t be able to play = a burden, because it seemed like the people who said this hadn’t actually tried to play with the girlfriend.

People I know

So far, all the girls I know who play with their boyfriends/husbands do perfectly well on their own. Ok, it might be because I’m in a raiding guild, so I only get to meet those girlfriends who have proved they can play, but they are girls and they do play with their partners, so they meet the definition. And they range from college students to mothers who go AFK during raids because the baby is crying to mothers who also have children in the guild, so it’s a pretty diverse group.

My story

I started playing because my boyfriend (then just friend) bought me the game and bugged me to install it. “It’s just like chatting on Yahoo Messenger, only with a character in front of you.” Seeing as I spend ages chatting online and love meeting new people, this was a good argument.

And yet I hated the game in the beginning. Too many buttons, too confusing, how should I know what I’m supposed to do etc. (I’m not much of a gamer, and my last RPG was Diablo 2.) So he made an alt and played with me until level 40 (with the occasional boost). I’m sure I was pretty annoying at start, because I’m impatient when learning something new, but aren’t all noobs?

The rest is history, as they say: followed him into a lovely guild at level 60, been there ever since, met a lot of helpful people and turned into a half-decent player at a point in time. Thanks to several guildies, not him, because his knowledge of warriors is about what mine is about moonkins, i.e. not much.

The money thing

I don’t recall ever asking for money, but I had 1500 g forced on me when I reached level 70 because “epic flying is so cool, get it NOW, don’t wait until you grind the rest of the money”. We argued, but he won, I took the money and flew away into the sunset.

As for the rest: I don’t need my hand held (except when I get lost in an instance, but I do that IRL too so it’s nothing new), I make my own money, I’m going to pay for my second epic mount as soon as my mage gets to 77, and I only take advantage of him when it comes to health pots. Hey, it’s not my fault that he’s an alchemist and my warrior is a squishy plate wearer who thinks she can tank and takes on more than she should… I usually pester him about boosts, but it almost never works… thank God for bored guildies.

Raiding

Another seldom-mentioned problem was raiding. One advice on Wow Insider was to make sure you didn’t share tier tokens. I had no idea what tokens were when I rolled my warrior, but I happily shared the token with my druid boyfriend and we never had a problem. If he has more DKP than me, he should get it, what does the relationship have to do with it?

As for favoritism… pfff. Right. People assume that because he’s the raid leader I get preferential treatment. Nothing could be more wrong: I get scolded during the raid with all the rest when we do something stupid, and I get extra bitching IRL too. My only priviledges are being able to choose when I raid without bothering to unsign off our raid planner and getting priority in case someone doesn’t show up… but seeing as I’m not that crazy about raiding every night, I don’t use those priviledges too often.

So?

The key point here: don’t generalize. Don’t expect people to change just because they’re in a game. A clingy person will be clingy IRL too, an independent person will want to keep being independent in-game. If she starts playing, of course she’ll be a noob - weren’t you? It’s the personality that will decide what happens next, not the sex.

Here is my first machinima, based on a Romanian song named “Amintire cu Haiduci” (Outlaw Memory) by Vali Sterian. Even though the song it’s in Romanian, I know this web site has many Romanian viewers so this post is mostly aimed at them :)

Amintire cu Haiduci in Grizzly Hills from Sirg on Vimeo.

For the other readers, in Romanian history, centuries ago, there were bands of highwaymen or outlaws (hajduks), somewhat like Robin Hood, who hid in the forests and mountains to strike upon the rich, usually the occupying Turks or invading Tatars, plunder their wagons and wealth to give it to the poor. Thus we have many legends and songs about famous outlaws, some which existed and others who are just fantasy. This machinima is about them, a memory of a distant past.

later edit - I have problems embeding the movie in the page, it seems the editor doesn’t allow that kind of code, so you’ll have to click the link :/

Obviously you`ll find many beats here along with the great hunter Hemet Nesingwary. For the first time ever he`ll actually do some hunting, instead of sitting in his camp bossing you around.

You`ll get to ride a mammoth,

a crocolisk, (notice the detail of the landscape, this is done using the tips here)

and for the grand finale, a Titans` creation.

In the Basin you`ll find two opposite factions. You can`t have good reputation with both at the same time, it works like the Scryer-Aldor or the 2 tribes of centaurs in Desolace. Make sure you read the quests, they have a funny way of talking. The Oracles (”big tongues” that consider you a “dryskin”) and the Frenzyheart Tribe (”puppy-men” that look like racoons) hate eachother and you`ll have a series of quests. Don`t worry, you can always switch sides. The Oracles seem friendlier and cuter so I chose them. You`ll also unlock many daily quests for the faction you`ll choose.

Into the Basin - 75/75 completed

Level: 78

Next stop: Storm Peaks.

Grizzly Hills is a nice forest filled with wildlife, giants, dwarves, the vrykul people and trolls. I didn`t find anything special on this map but I did like the Silverbrook story (they hide a dark secret) and the daily quest that involves burning mindless troll zombies at Drak’Tharon.

You`ll get to ride a badass dragon

and a pretty wild mustang.

Level: 76

Next map: Sholazar Basin. I told you I really like forests!

“Please don`t kill me, I`m scared!”

Apart from undead, the Scarlet people, the worms and the various wildlife you`ll find dragons. Lots of them.

Dead ones.

Live ones and sexy ones.

The dragon tower is impressing as well.

The Tuskarr`s return in another village on the shore. They are quite inventive, they found a way to use Carrot on a Stick.

You`ll come across a new version of Sylvanas Windrunner which I must say looks more adapted to the lore, because the old skin was that of a Night Elf. Also she looks more of an Elven Ranger now.

Might of the Dragonblight: 115/115 completed.

Level: 74

Going the the Grizzly Hills because I am not in the mood for Zul’Drak right now. I am a druid after all, I enjoy forests more.

Utgarde Keep is nice and easy. I also did the Nexus (nice music in there, Trance-like) and both spider instances. The feeling of large spaces is in there too, especially in Ahn’Kahet the Old Kingdom. Azjol’Nerb is very short and fast.

I met the Tuskarrs too, I plan on getting exalted with them for the penguin vanity pet. Despite the fact that a LOT of people were trying to kill the same mobs for the same quests, the respawn is fats. Two areas sucked, Ember Cluth (took me ages to put my claws on the little Proto Drakes) and Gjalerbron (the 2 Putrid big guys for the quests resawned in 100 years and the area was farmed by a lot of players). Apart from that, no complains. The quests in Skorn are nice too (cutting corpses in pieces) and the quests involving shit are back (Scare the Guano out of Them) - collecting bat poo. Seems that someone at Blizzard was really affected by 2 Girls 1 Cup LOL.

Best NPC on this map: McGoyver <Pro>. Need I say more?

The map has plenty flight points and quest hubs, make sure you don`t miss any quest. I completed the “I toured the Fjord” achievement (130 quests) but I estimate there are about 140 quests in the area so it`s unlikely you`ll have problems completing the achievement.

Level: 72. Next map, Dragonblight!