It's the Little Things... (part 4)

Surf's up for Orlanna and Thrall in the Maelstrom

Beware The Maelstrom
Actually, don't beware. It's actually one of the all time coolest scenes I have ever seen in this game to date. Thing is, you can only go there once.  Teleportation to this spot where you can meet Thrall and his new squeeze is only available via a quest giver. Once you finish that quest, you cannot get another port back. Nor is there any other transportation method to reach it. So, my advice is, when you stop by on the way to Deepholme, take some snapshots and spend a few minutes looking around.

OMGWTFBBQ!?!

The Almighty Saarlac has come to Azeroth.

Ding!
Merinna reached level 85 in beta, doing 90% of the last level via archaeology experience points. There was no particular reason to do it that way other than that I really wanted to avoid seeing too much more new material. The downside on this kind of leveling is that Merinna is really undergeared for much of anything at 85. She still has a number of level 80 epics that probably need replacement from quest greens.

Flight Report
I took Evil Orlanna on a jaunt through over Stormwind this weekend just to see if aerial guards who had joined the cities were up to defending their airspace yet.  They are ready for that, in fact.  One shot to unseat a player and then they jump you after you have taken falling damage.

Air Guard still seems fairly weak to me, though. At high altitudes, there is nothing that will trouble a horde player (though I think perhaps an Alliance player could do it). At medium altitudes, it is fairly easy to avoid the patrols who don't seem to have particularly wide aggro ranges, nor do they fly over many corners of the city. If those airguards do spot you, they can be eluded by getting to street level. At low altitudes, guards on the ground can also fire at players, though their crossbow hits seem to only have a chance of unseating you.

I'm a little mixed in my feelings about this solution to protecting the skies of the cities. Players ought not linger, hovering over places. But still, it is much easier to infiltrate and then hide out in the city. More determined players than I will surely find out better ways to exploit these things. The air guards play cat and mouse, so to speak, but they are not strong enough to really keep players out of the air. I would frankly also prefer to see fairie fire effect put on players as well by the guard. Otherwise, we are just going to spend our entire time dealing with rogues who fly in, and vanish on the way to the ground.