No Surprise!

Ok well it's no surprise I am not playing WoW at the moment. This is not uncommon as I usually take a long break when the warm summer weather arrives. I would like to apologize for not making this post sooner now that summer is coming to an end. I have not yet gotten the itch to get back to Azeroth but with the Fall on the horizon it will not be a shock if I am back to get baby Dakona finished and adult Dakona ready for the new expansion in the near future. If and when that happens I will be back to update my blog and I hope you will continue to check in from time to time. I want to thank those who have not given up on me and thank you to those who have made comments in the past few months.

I hope everyone has had a great summer thus far and I hope you all squeeze out the last stretch of sunny weather left!

xoxo
Amber

Getting Distracte...err Closer

Oh how that warm weather calls to me. Yes it has been tough to log in these past few months but some snow yesterday had me running back to Azeroth with my tail between my legs. Adult Dakona has already retired to her summer slumber and I predict she will stay there until early fall. However baby Dakona refuses to go down and continues to crawl a long at a snails pace. She now has Borean Tundra, Howling Fjord, Grizzly Hills and Dragonblight under her belt. She is currently over half way through Zul'Drak and is itching to get to Sholazar Basin where her bestest friend awaits her. Baby Dakona stumbled across Har'koa who is the mate of Loque'nahak while questing this week.

Seeing Har'koa has been motivation to finish up the Halloween like Zul'Drak and get to the peaceful tranquility of Sholazar Basin. I have two spirit beasts on Team Dakona right now and will be hunting Loque the second I get there. I have XP capped myself at 80 to keep myself focused and will work hard to get myself to the next set of zones soon.

Tag I'm It?

I've seen this a few times on other blogs lately and was surprised when Sesamee tagged me on her blog Shooting Azeroth.

Apparently the premise is as follows:

• Go into your image folder
• Open the sixth sub-folder and choose the sixth image.
• Publish the image
• Challenge six new bloggers.
• Link to them.

 I didn't have six image sub-folders so I just took the sixth image in my screenshots folder. As a blogger I randomly take screenshots here and there when I think I see something worth snapping, so the photo that I am sharing has no real meaning to it.

It's just Dakona on her Time Lost Drake stopping for a rest. I don't know where that is... maybe Wetlands? I think it's a pretty picture, nice scenery.

Now the fun part is finding some fellow bloggers who haven't already been tagged, I'm a little late to the party but here are my tags:


http://piercing-shots.blogspot.com/

http://mindlesswow.blogspot.com/

New Adventures

Everyone's character looks like their age could be anywhere from 16-60 depending on the race you are. As a blood elf I fall at the younger end of that and I've sometimes wondered about the years "before" I took control of Dakona. Now I'm not much of a role player, but in order to have played this game for so long I've had to relate to Dakona and assume parts of myself are in her. Anyone who knows me, knows that I HATE questing. In fact Kecco my paladin and my original toon was leveled from 50 to 70 from only healing instances since I refused to play Retribution. I currently have every class that a blood elf can play with the exception of a warlock and all are level 85 with the exception of my priest who is level 80. How they each got leveled up is a mixture of "run throughts", which is when a high level friend clears out instances while you stand behind collecting free XP, battleground matches which I'm ashamed to admit were probably mostly afk'd while multitasking and instances when I got near 85. My point is, between six level 85 characters I probably did the same amount of quests that most people do on one toon. Dakona to date is still the only character of mine who did the level 80-85 quests and only because of the reputation I needed to get the shoulder and helm enchants. So again I reiterate, I hate questing.

Fast forward to a few months ago, and I'm sitting here wondering about the adventures that Dakona could of had and I wonder about her story. I don't know why, I guess I was having a weird day but I got this urge to create another Dakona and quest each zone as like a prelude to her life and giving her a past that I could associate with my main Dakona. Sounds like a bad movie I know, and here we have me, someone who hates questing, suddenly wanting to quest each zone while acquiring the Loremaster achievement a long the way. I had been visiting the Petopia web site on a regular bases and knew they had a guild on Nesingwary US that seemed like a good setting to keep me company during my adventures. As I created this younger Dakona I have to admit I did have doubts this sudden motivation would wear off shortly.

Five months later and I now find myself spending more time than ever playing this younger Dakona and having a blast doing so! Baby Dakona is now level 80 and has completed the questing achievements for Eastern Kingdon, Kalimdor and Outlands. I am currently working on Northrend and once finished will only have Cataclysm left. I can safely say I have done more quests on this toon than I have ever done on all the toons I've ever played since I started playing. Playing a baby Dakona has given me a chance to see all the parts of the game I had missed when I use to fly through the lower levels. I have bonded with some new pets and rekindled relationships with some old ones as well. I can't say it's been all roses as some of the zones brought me to my limit but I was able to prevail and now sit less than a dozen zones away from finishing.

I have had some really emotional moments, including being appointed "Queen of the Orges" in Blade's Edge Mountains, which almost brought me to tears one night. After being appointed "Queen" I realized I was a few quests short of the achievement and had to go back and kill Orges to obtain a quest they dropped. I almost didn't make it cause it was so upsetting. Upon killing them they would say things like "Me honored... queen kill me", "Queen think... there really is... an Ogri'la?" I was torn up for weeks! Now I never look at Orges the same way and I take great honor in my Queen status.

I've run into all kinds of moments like this a long the way, most are happy including these little baby murlocs who followed me around for hours while I quested in Borean Tundra which I definitely enjoyed. I am now entering zones where rare spawns happen so I've had to try and stay focused while not wandering. Although I just finished Grizzly Hills where yes I did swing by and get Arcturis since he just happened to be up (wink). I've also started doing the Netherwing rep quests in order to obtain the Netherwing Drakes. I have no idea why, I guess anything I haven't done with my main Dakona I feel a need to explore.

For those wondering if I've been neglecting the "adult" Dakona, the answer is no, currently I am focusing on her gear and I've been doing LFR each week. I don't need anything anymore from LFR but I do it for the valor. I got super lucky this week while getting into a 10 man group for the first time I had a tier piece drop on 3 straight bosses and won the legs and shoulders. I also won the crossbow from Warlord Zon'ozz so I've been a happy camper for the last few days. I know this is a lengthy blog entry but this is what happens when I don't check in regularly. I do plan on updating baby Dakona's adventures and hopefully I don't burn out down the home stretch. I've had to turn off the XP option just so I stay focused. Getting near the end, there are certainly more distractions now than ever. Here's to finishing strong!

Update 2012

It's been a while since I checked in, but as I said at Christmas it's not due a lack of WoW activity. In fact this is turning into one of the most enjoyable periods of WoW I've had in ages. I'm still on the dying server of Scilla, and I joined a predominately all Asian guild that speaks very little English but I'm loving life and the new LFR set up. But the most exciting news is I have put together my transmo set!. It took about 5 Black Temple and 3 Hyjal runs to get everything but I finally got it all and I'm pretty stoked about it. I've come to hate Shamans in the last few months, having to roll against them for tier and of course the stealing of hunter gear by Shaman healers, so it's ironic I now look like one but after hours of research I think this is the best look for Dakona.

For those wondering where all the pieces came from, here it is.

Head: Mechanized Snow Goggles
Chest: Golden Links of Restoration
Shoulders: The Wavemender's Mantle
Hands: Spiritwalker Gauntlets
Waist: Naturalist's Preserving Cinch
Legs: Frozen Forest Kilt

I think I look pretty cool and I'm excited that the polearm from DS matches it perfectly as well. I'd love to get some opinions and I'm curious what any other hunters have come up with.