Within Arms Reach of 70
stargrace 
I think World of Warcraft has some incredibly beautiful views, especially if you’re a fan of the art style (I realize not everyone is). This holiday weekend was spent divided between a few games (as usual) and I made some nice progress in them all. My priest managed to inch her way through level 68, and is part way through level 69 at the time of this post. I’m incredibly excited about this. No, I can’t afford one of the new flying mounts, and no, I don’t expect the game will change that much for me once I’ve reached 70 – but it’s a step in the right direction. As I’ve said numerous times before I’ve played WoW off and on since release (mostly when I wanted to escape to a game that didn’t require my full attention, as Tipa puts it in her latest post) and I’ve never been close to ‘end game’ or the level cap. Reaching level 70 is the first step towards that goal.
Yesterday also marked the completion of some nice pieces of gear that I crafted. I realize that WotLK will probably void any gear that I make that was from Burning Crusade (this stuff is primal mooncloth) but I really like the set bonus, and I’m still very excited about having made them all myself. The pieces (there are three) took a lot of farming, I needed 19 primal life, 11 primal water, and 12 primal mana, plus 33 netherweave bolts and 22 arcane dusts (I’m an enchanter and a tailor so those were not difficult). These pieces will be my first three pieces of ‘purple’ gear – and the fact that I crafted them myself just makes it even more sweet to me.
For once I actually looked up some information on talent trees, and then instantly wished I had done so a long time ago. I changed the heal spec I had on my priest, as well as her dps spec, and instantly noticed how much easier the new specs were on my mana. I also changed around the spec to my Deathknight, to an ‘all blood’ spec for now, which means it plays almost exactly like a shadowknight from EQ2 with life taps. Being able to heal myself is a great deal and that spec is apparently going to be the ‘tank spec’ once Cataclysm comes out.
I’ve been contemplating who to work on ‘next’ as the priest continues to level. Torn between my 46 shaman and my level 8 druid – I’ve had a level 45 alliance druid before, but I must have deleted her quite some time ago. The DK also happens to be my alchemist, and requires level 68 in order to specialize. I inched her way to level 60 over this weekend and purchased her flying mount, so at least that’s taken care of.
I hope everyone else has had a fantastic weekend so far, no matter where you find yourself. Happy gaming!