Sand and Bugs

That's all that's been in my WoW life the past few days.

Sand.

And bugs.

Lots of bugs at that, and I don't see it letting up for at least a few more days. I've started up the quest chain for the Scepter of the Shifting Sands, the quest that allowed one person on the server to open the Gates of Ahn'Qiraj on the server they are playing on. This chain was said to be the longest quest chain in the game, and I believe it! Still, even after two expansions, and from what I've seen one of the more convoluted quest chains ever devised. Every leg of the chain had at least one quest that required a raid of level 60 players to complete it, including runs into Onyxia, Molten Core, and Blackwing Lair, and fighting other mobs on the outside world. It was nuts! Today with level 80's it's a lot easier but still, long and convoluted.

And I haven't even reached that part yet! First, I have to kill bugs. Lots of bugs! In order to start the Shifting Sands line I need to get to Neutral reputation status with Brood of Nozdormu, the cadre of bronze dragons in old world Azeroth. EVERYONE starts out at the very bottom rung in faction with them, 0 out of 36,000 reputation in the 'Hated' status. In order to get to where you can start building rep you have to first complete two quests.

First quest is to simply travel to the entrance of the Caverns of Time and see if a bronze dragon, Anachronos, is still around. If he is you go back and report so and then you are sent on the next quest: bring back the head of Broodlord Lashlayer, the third boss of the Blackwing Lair raid. So basically the point of this quest is to see if the player is actually ready to even do this chain. If he's not capable of doing BWL quality raids then there really is no point in him going on (at least this is what it was when the level cap was 60).

Finally, when you hand in the head, you can start in on the reputation grind for Nozdormu's brood. Oya!

The repeatable quest is The Path of the Righteous, and it involves the part with lots of bugs. Sand and bugs. Go to one of the three major hives in Silithus and collect two-hundred carapace fragments from the silithids who live there. When you turn in this quest, you get 500 reputation with 'The Brood'. Remember what I said earlier. Everyone starts out at Hated reputation with 'The Brood', and in order to continue on with Shifting Sands, you need to build your rep up to Neutral with 'The Brood'.

To emphasize:
From 0 to 36,000 reputation in Hated status
Then from 0 to 3000 reputation in Hostile status
Then from 0 to 3000 reputation in Unfriendly status
And once you crawl out of that, you're at Neutral status.

So, the bottom line is, I have to repeat a quest to get 200 fragments from these big silithid bugs (pictured above) who drop anywhere from 1 to 4 fragments each kill. Each repeat of this quest snags me 500 reputation points. Combine these facts with the numbers above and imagine what's in store for my poor orc shaman Dakore. Currently he's at 13,000 out of 36,000.

Like I said, Sand and Bugs. 0_O

To top it all off, one of the items that needs to be acquired in the later parts of the quest chain drops of Onyxia, one of Old Azeroth's major raid bosses. The next patch is bringing a major revamp to Onyxia in order to celebrate the fifth anniversary to WoW, which means she's being upgraded for level 80 players to raid. The item she drops for the Shifting Sands quest chain is supposedly going away, possibly not being able to be acquired anymore. If this is true, then it's also possible that people who haven't got that item before that item is lost will not be able to finish the chain.

That majorly sucks. Now I've got time working against me to get this reputation grind done and get the quest to kill Onyxia done as well.

Thankfully though, the patch did not happen today, so I can assume it's happening next Tuesday. That means I have a week to get the rep grind done and Onyxia killed and get that item. The rest can likely be done afterward, at least I hope so anyway.

Now you might be asking, "why?" Why put myself through that nutty bullshit? Just to say that I actually did it I suppose. Senseless? Maybe, but I am going to get it done. The good news is that as a level 80 elemental shaman, I can pretty much two-shot groups of four with Chain Lightning and a Thunderstorm to follow up, so at least it's sort of fast going. I can't imagine what it must have been like for that one poor sap in the one guild that were doing this chain to open the gates for the server way back in the day. Back then, everyone was still just level 60, and these bugs were all still level 60 elite mobs. Now it's a lot easier.

In the end, I think for killing as many bugs as it's going to take to get to Neutral status with 'The Brood', I think I should get a title: Dakore, The Living Raid Canister.

UPDATE: Now just a big under 18,000 out of 36,000 rep in Hated. Halfway through the biggest rung! Yay!