Lich King Impressions, Part 2

A little more time has passed, and I've experienced a little more of what Wrath of the Lich King has to offer. Here's my thoughts on a few more things about the new expansion.

Death Knights:
Yes, I did create a death knight. I originally created it just to sit and collect rested experience, but I did get a bit burned out on leveling my druid so fast, that I have played on my DK for a bit. The starting quests are very well done and I love the new "phasing" mechanic they've taken to new levels in this expansion. These quests - especially the final battle at Light's Hope Chapel - are truly epic. Although, I do wish there were more moral choices available to you and I was hoping they would flesh out exactly why you turned sides a bit more than someone telling you Arthas is a bad guy and you believing what they say immediately and without hesitation.

Dalaran:
This is the Shattrath of Northrend. For the most part, I love Dalaran. I like how the shops all over the place are no longer filled with just NPCs stocking grey or white items that you'll never use. When you go to an off-hand item vendor, you can actually buy off-hand items with the new badges you get from heroic dungeons and raids. The same goes for many other types of weapons and armor. I also adore the amount of new RP items they added into the city - you can buy anything from flowers to cakes, wine to vanity pet products.

The city includes both a horde and alliance area, complete with portals to all the other major cities of that faction (including Shattrath), as well as portals to queue you for battlegrounds and to send you to Lake Wintergrasp. Below the streets of Dalaran is a sewer system with arena vendors, a place to duel, an inn, a bank and plenty of places to fish and just generally hang out from the more lag-filled streets above.

Another defining feature of Dalaran is that the entire city - save for the flight master area - is a no-fly zone. This lends more to the real city feel of things and helps with immersion. You no longer have half the city's population floating above at various places. It actually looks and feels like a real city, unlike Shattrath.

Grizzly Hills:
My leveling has progressed now to Grizzly Hills, a zone which I adore. I love the high Rockies feel to it - crisp mountain streams, forested areas, wood cabins and more. I think its my new favorite zone, for the most part. The only problem is that the quests are laid out in a very haphazard fashion. While the three zones previous to this - Howling Fjord, Borean Tundra and Dragonblight - concentrated their quest hubs in a few fairly close-together areas, Grizzly Hills two main settlements (on the horde side, anyway) have about a dozen quests each, and then you're done with them. You spread out to other very small quest hubs scattered all over the zone, and sometimes its hard to figure out where to go and when.

Sholazar Basin:
I really enjoyed this zone, I'm not sure why. Out of all the zones I quested in while still gaining experience, this is the zone I spent the least amount of real time in. Still, its one of the coolest zones. It has Nesingwary, Titan lore and a mini-war between two new factions, The Oracles and the Frenzyheart Tribe. I really enjoyed the quests to choose your faction (I went with The Oracles) and the Titan lore quests (I loved how they connected Un'Goro and Sholazar, that was cool). This is also arguably one of the best zones for herbalism and fishing that I've seen so far. The sheer abundance of herbs (mostly Adder's Tongue) is so amazing that I had nearly a dozen stacks of the stuff by the time I was done questing there, and I still skipped a bunch that I could have picked.

Storm Peaks:
I went here after Sholazar, instead of to Zul'Drak, because I'm not too big on troll lore. I'm kind of glad I did, also. I did the Sons of Hodir quest chain, so I can start working on rep with them now (for the shoulder enchants and such). Also, much of this is a continuation of the Titan lore, and I'm really enjoying those quests. Not too long after questing here, I hit 80 with my druid this past weekend.