Adventures in Twinking

Dammerung and I and some other Sidhe Devils are cooking up some twinks to play in the battlegrounds together. Initially we were going to do level 19 twinks, and then decided upon 29 instead, which was a bit of a relief, partly because Warsong Gulch is my least favorite BG, and partly because in reading about how to build a 19 twink, it sounded a bit intense. To maximize your character, you need a small army of level 70 friends willing to run you through dungeons repeatedly to get the BoP drops (again, mindful of not getting too much XP, so this means them clearing the place out and then bringing you in for the boss kills), walk you through lengthy quest chains, and lead you safely through all the areas you ever hope to explore during your career. I totally understand the point of twinking guilds — these characters are not easy to build alone. I don’t have the resources to build the perfect twink, but even building a pretty good one was requiring that I outline a fairly specific plan of attack. The 29 twink seems to have a lot more possibilities for outfitting with BoE drops and PvP rewards, it seems, plus there’s a lot more room for preparation during leveling. I’ll still probably be asking for help with some quest chains, but the process won’t be quite as intense. 🙂

So, this weekend, I spent time leveling my new little rogue, hoping to get her into the BGs for the first time.

Part I: pre-Twink

As I’ve mentioned elsewhere, I’m not that big into melee DPS. I’ve only recently started really enjoying my cat druid (now that she’s in her 30’s), and I think I might like the rogue even better. At first it was kind of boring, but now that she can dual wield and has a few other tricks under her belt (hiyaaaah! *kick!*), I think I might want to start another rogue to level to 70 at some point.

Anyway, she finished off Dun Murogh, and then I took her to Elwynn to do the green quests there. There were quite a few other players in the area doing the same quests, so I kept my head down, hoping not to party with anyone because I wanted to get as much XP as I could. I helped a few people out of sticky situations (usually involving murlocs), but otherwise minded my own business. At one point, I was standing by a quest giver and another player also there whispered me: “Can u use swords?” I said yes. “U want [sword of some sort with +1 agility]?” I said that it would be better than what I had, but that I hadn’t trained in swords yet. “Come get it,” they said, and invited me to a group. I joined, met them, they gave me the sword, and I thanked them. I did a few emotes, bowing and so forth, getting ready to say goodbye. “Wow u need better gear. Need sum gold?” HA!!! I told them no thanks, that I’d be fine…

I had to chuckle, given my plans for this toon, but honestly, before a character gets into their 20’s, I really don’t pay attention to what they’re wearing and only upgrade with quest rewards or things I find. It’s not uncommon for me to hit level 20, accept a quest reward, and find that I am replacing a piece of vendor trash. Really. My gear was apparently so pathetic at this point, a random kid was pitying me and offering me gold!

Part II: First Forays into Warsong Gulch

As soon as I hit level 13, I was itching to go into Warsong Gulch, but to avoid the wrath of my teammates upon seeing such a lowbie in there, I decided I’d stay out of until at least level 16. (This was the level Dammy suggested I might actually be able to survive.) At 16, I finally equipped the +agi gear I’d bought in the AH, and entered the queue for WSG. Within a minute or two, my baby rogue entered the battlegrounds for the first time.

Thoughts: 1) Starting at the top of the map instead of the bottom is weird. 2) Although I wasn’t doing tons of damage, my improved gouge very often incapacitated the enemy long enough for one of my teammates to slaughter them, so I still felt useful. 3) It is weird to fight the Horde. I find myself confused by the alerts when the flags are picked up and captured (wait, was that us? oh no…), so I hesitated to say anything encouraging in /bg like I normally do.

We put up a pretty good fight, but ended up losing the BG. I queued again, already addicted.

As useful as I felt in that first shot at WSG, I felt useless the second time. I was getting one- and two-shotted all over the place. It seemed that the Horde twinks were finally out to play, and man, was it frustrating. It wasn’t as bad as one of the BGs the next day, where they camped us by the graveyard farming us for honor for so long that we eventually stopped rezzing just to get them to cap the last flag and end the BG, but it was frustrating. It felt like we just couldn’t get/keep the enemy flag, nor could we defend our own. Gah. Another loss.

After a break to grab some flightpaths, I decided to go back in one more time. This was Saturday night, just after midnight, and I wasn’t sleepy, so what the heck… This time, the Alliance twinks were out! Lots of my team’s guild names had “twink” in them, and I noticed quite a few folks with enchantments on their weapons. We destroyed the Horde. It was amazing. We capped the first two flags pretty quickly, and upon grabbing the flag the third time, our twinked out flag carrier stayed down on the Horde side of the map and ran around. The enemies came up to him and he’d stab them a few times and down they’d go. I ran around next to him in case he dropped the flag, but he never did. I sprinted around him, gouged and kicked his attackers, and soaked up the honor. After about 5-6 minutes of messing with them, he ran the flag back and we won. It was pretty freaking cool to watch.

Part III: Gearing in the Deadmines

Sunday, I worked on the Deadmines quest chains. From what I’ve read, the most desirable chest armor for level 19 twink rogues is the Blackened Defias Armor, a possible drop off VanCleef. Many guides warn that you may have to have your level 70 buddies kill VanCleef numerous times to get it (so plan ahead, mindful of XP, etc). I was just planning to get the also desirable Tunic of Westfall instead, which is a quest reward from killing him. I wasn’t going to stay at 19 for long anyway, I suspected, and it has nice agility on it. I worked my way through the Defias Brotherhood quest line until I got to the escort quest, and then asked if anyone in the guild might help me out. Ash immediately volunteered and met me in Westfall. Yay!

We burned through the escort quest and then made our way into the instance. I picked up red bandanas and goodies for the other quests, along with loads of ore and cloth. Ash was an aggro machine, though I did get into trouble a few times. He’d run in the room and try to gather up all the mobs, and sometimes they’d notice me before they noticed him, so I’d get smushed. Staying outside the room wasn’t always safe either because of the sneaky patrols in there. I could defend myself against a non-elite, but the elites usually killed me in a couple hits. Ow!

We had great fun though, and I only died a few times. (On the bright side, I’m pretty good at navigating my way into that instance now.) Sneed’s Shredder dropped the Buzzer Blade, which was a huge upgrade in DPS for me. I picked up a weapon for my other hand that gave me more agility, but I can’t remember what it was (not a blue, anyway). The Blackened Defias Belt dropped, which was pretty exciting because I picked up the Leggings in my last Deadmines run and never equipped them on my old rogue. Yay!

We had a few close calls as we worked our way up the boat, thanks to my large aggro radius. Ash kept us alive though, and slaughtered everything in our path. (I was down to 10 health once — hehe, close one!) We got up to the top and he killed VanCleef. I looted everything else first, and then finally VanCleef. The drop? The Blackened Defias Armor. 😮 /hug Ash

So, maybe I will stick around level 19 for just a little while after all… 😀 I won’t have the perfect twink gear, but what I have so far is pretty darn good. I’ll now level to 19 and bide my time in WSG until my partners in crime get their twinks built.

Fun!