Goblin Journal: A dream come true

I skipped out on the summons to Stonetalon Mountains and returned to Orgrimmar to get ready for my trip to Booty Bay. There were auctions to manage, training to catch up on, and networking to be done. Aside from collecting my auction earnings, I generally avoided the non-goblin areas of Orgrimmar. Then again, it's filthy and smelly and even though it makes my heart clench with longing for home... I don't want to be there. We've set up little more than shacks and patchy tents - that's fine for roughing it in the country! - but we are better than that. I want us to get our collective act together and make something more of what remains of the Bilgewater Cartel!

While I was in the city I got another surprising piece of news - a candidate interested in apprenticeship! I had gotten a fairly decent stream of applications after posting my advertisement, but most failed in the early stages. Then, since revealing myself as an environmentalist, the apps have all but dried up. Until now! She's young, surprisingly so, but she survived the exodus from Kezan and the Isles and has been befriending animals in the Barrens or something. I know, kind of weird (and here I can barely get on with my water elemental), but she has a good head for figures that can only improve with age. That, and I'm low on options. Unfortunately, I didn't have time to meet her before I left for Ratchet, so I'll have to make my initial assessments based on her written responses.

The trip to Ratchet was uneventful. I managed to catch a caravan from the city gates to the Southfury River that borders the Barrens. We passed through much of the surrounding marshland and I was glad I hadn't tried to take my trike through that. The orcs told me that it had all been desert, but the Cataclysm caused the river to flood. All that standing water baking in the sun stinks!

At the river crossing, I had the option of driving my trike through the Barrens, following the road to the Crossroads and then to Ratchet, or shelling out for passage on a tugboat downstream. The prices were outrageous, but my good mood meant I only haggled a little. Soon, we were chugging along at a good clip, watching the banks rush by and wildlife wander aimlessly about. When the sun set, the passengers went belowdecks and awoke to sounds from the docks. I like the water just fine, but mostly from a looking perspective and not from a pitching, rolling boat perspective, so I decided to spend the day in Ratchet and set sail for Booty Bay in the evening, when all the sailing would be done overnight.

Ratchet is one of the cities run by the Steamwheedle Cartel, so I was eager to see how they do business. Although most of the main tasks - auctioneering, banking, vendoring - were managed by goblins, there were a handful of other races managing their affairs. Although they are a neutral faction, many goblins were half-wary of my affiliation with what has traditionally been their major competition. I stopped asking questions about their trade and tried to just soak in the atmosphere.

Then there was another boat ride, which my stomach is begging me not to remember. But, soon after that! I was stepping off the boat onto the docks at the famed port city of Booty Bay. It was...glorious. How can I even describe it, Journal? I must have stood there gaping for years while the dock exploded with workers hauling cargo to and from the ships. The docks reek of fish - it gets better as you go further into the buildings - but the whole city is covered in a permanent aura of salt. That's relatively familiar, although I am continually surprised by the lack of underlying smog.

Because it's built against a long, rocky coast directly over the sea, the buildings have mostly grown up along the cliff rather than out. I stayed on the ground level at first, wandering aimlessly from shop to shop. I haggled, bartered, and negotiated with the best, and even picked up some new tricks! There are enough skilled vendors to make any goblin sigh. Weaving through them are guards - Booty Bay Bruisers, they call them. These toughs really drive home the fact that this is a pirate town. I've always considered my business a fair one, but what with all of this roughing it as a mage, I'm beginning to wonder just how pirate-y I've become.

And yet, they seem a little more open than Ratchet. I found myself in the inn for a drink and a chat, and once they recognized I was a mage from my robes, I was swamped with quests! I'll never turn down a parchment if it guarantees gold - or something of equivalent worth - but I held off leaving until I had really explored the city.

Then, it was down to business. Pirate business. I met with Baron Revilgaz (who, by the way, is the only man to make me reconsider relationship of a romantic nature), and he immediately set me to infiltrating the Bloodsail Buccaneers. I had to do all manner of menial tasks to rise enough to get close to the information and people that I needed, but fortunately I'm not so old that I can't swab a deck or dive for clams! The longer I was among the Bloodsail, the more relaxed I became about my treachery being discovered. The most terrifying moment was when they asked me to bring them the head of Fleet Master Seahorn. We had to sacrifice one of the milk cows to get a tauren lookalike head, but the Bloodsail know so little about tauren it worked like a charm.

When I finally returned to Booty Bay to warn the Baron about the impending attack, I was significantly greener than when I left. Working abovedecks all day will do that! We dispatched of the attackers with few casualties, and I got to spend my evening dining with the Baron himself. I'll leave the rest to your imagination, Journal...

Akabeko the Insane

Insane in the Membrane

Last week, I became officially Insane. I made sure my Insane buddy was online, then turned in the last of my lockboxes. He really deserves a ton of thanks for not only providing advice and motivation, but generously donating his leftover Darkmoon card mats and even farming lockboxes for me!

I wish I had kept track of fun tidbits like gold and time spent doing things. (It's probably good that I did not) I can say that I bought librams for 50g or less and Pristine Black Diamonds for around 100g; I installed Gathered specifically to farm Blood of Heroes, although now I use it for more typical farming.

Bloodsail was my first rep, achieved on September 24, 2009. Then, even though my plan had been to salvage goblin reps first, I procrastinated and had to avoid goblin towns. Gadgetzan bruisers are particularly persistent, for the record. I got frustrated running Dire Maul and switched to pirate massacre, which was not a good idea. Soon I was back in Dire Maul and finished Steamwheedle in record time. Of course, by then I didn't need librams anymore, so I sent them to my Insane buddy and felt like I was helping him at least a little bit.

I leveled inscription and herbalism on a DK to make me Darkmoon cards, and a rogue to farm lockboxes. I made quite a bit of gold from pickpocketing and remember, that's only half I had to farm for myself! I tried one round of half-looting the lockboxes, but I don't recommend it.

My buddy sent me a fun emote macro he made to randomly emote something indicative of his mental state after completing the grind. Although it's old news for a lot of other "the Insane"s out there, I'm still really excited I finally finished this grind! It took over 1 year, 7 months to complete, so I feel like I kind of avoided the Insane-making part. Still, it accomplishes a goal that I planned and executed, and I join the good company of others who have it.

I wonder what the grind is like post-Cata? :)

GOODBYE FOREVER DIRE MAUL

Steamwheedle is done!!! I realize that I still have lots of pain in store for Ravenholdt and DMF, but I can hardly describe the sense of elation at never having to run Dire Maul for keys again. My methods up to this point took a meandering path. After finishing with Bloodsail, I began running DM for keys and librams. However, I had abysmal luck with key drops and hadn`t yet begun to appreciate even the measly 75 rep that Ogre Suits netted me. Simultaneously, I was watching the AH and grabbing up Pristine Black Diamonds and librams. Many of my PBDs came from my old east coast server and were from 50-100g. I`m not sure what they go for now over there, but on my new server they are around 400g. So I ended up getting most of my Shendralar rep items from the AH. When I hit Exalted with them I looked again at the Insane handbook. I no longer needed the rare diamonds or librams, and what`s more the hourly pirate rates were supposed to be better. So I moved out to Ratchet and the killing spree began.

It really didn`t seem so bad at the time. In my moonkin spec I could put Insect Swarm on everything in range (even behind me!) and was able to make excellent time running across the top of the pirate hangout, down the slope nearish to Northwatch Hold, and then running back towards Ratchet. It was quick, painless, and dull enough that I could zone out chatting in guild or singing showtunes or what-have-you. Doing this brought me out of Hated (with Ratchet) a very important milestone. The Hated block is the longest consecutive rep section and it was incredibly discouraging to see it creep towards Hostile at a snail`s pace. So, I think just for sheer peace of mind, switching to pirates was not such a bad idea. I stayed there until I maxed out my Ratchet gains at 99% Honored.

Feeling confident, I went to Tanaris next. The mobs are still easy enough to kill with one dot (by this time I had made my OS feral for old world soloing and was moonfiring in Resto). Because they drop mageweave in Tanaris, I started looting sporadically and ended up with a very nice stash for leveling 1st aid on my Cata alt. At first I was chugging the Volatile Rum to make bag space, but started sending it to my bank alt when I could. When it sells I can usually get about 5g per rum. The Tanaris pirates are less plentiful and have a slower respawn rate. I think for my purposes this wasn`t necessarily a bad choice in grinding location, but it did have some downtime and more frequent lowbie competition (although I always invite hordies to help).

Friendly with Everlook!

When I hit 99% Honored with Gadgetzan, I moved to STV and started in on the Venture Co. population. This was a huge mistake. They are few in number, have a long respawn rate, and don`t drop much of anything. I made slow progress out here until my partner in insanity asked me about my progress. When I confessed my frustration, he told me that he had gone entirely from Hated to Exalted solely through DM runs. Reluctantly I allowed myself to be talked back into DM. This was an excellent idea.

I amassed rune thread, bolts of runecloth, and rugged leather for tannin turnins and returned to the dreadful Kingdom of the Ogres. Luckily, the first few runs back were 1 or 2 key runs and served as positive reinforcement when the trend turned to 0 or 1 key runs. In my case, it seemed to be about 5 good runs followed by 5 disappointing ones. However, I could always turn in tannin, was getting tons of librams to send my friend, and was making a respectable profit thanks to my Argent Gruntling, Jeeves, and extra repairbots. My mailbox helped with librams as well.

For a long time Guard Slip`kik was my BFF for keys. Whether I had Freed Knot or not, Guard Slip`kik would come lumbering around the corner and Bam! A key.

Aside from him, I had good luck with the warlocks and brutes nearby, and occasionally with the locks near the tannin upstairs or the Gordok Bushwacker himself. The first and second bosses were consistently stingy. I had more luck with the trash near the first boss (I pull the entire courtyard).

Last night, with just a tiny sliver of rep left to go, I used up all my keys and tannin and found myself with only 400 rep to go. For old time`s sake I went to Ratchet and killed everything in sight until...

The Goblins love me!!