Northrend Blues

I can't wait for Cataclysm. My favorite part of every expansion is the xp nerfs to the previous content for leveling. Now, I'm a person who really likes the little things in the game. I read the dialogues from each NPC, and I wonder if someday the meat vendor in Crossroads will end up marrying the Innkeeper in Orgrimmar, but there's only so many times I can read and experience the same thing and still enjoy it.

First trip: Horde Druid.

When Wrath came out I jumped straight into Northrend. Because a guild of us were all trying to zoom through content and start raiding right away I skipped past most of this stuff and ground out quests and mobs as fast as I could so I could hit 80 in a week. I lost sleep, I missed lore - somehow I totally missed the wrathgate event, if you can believe it - and because I started raiding right away I didn't fully explore all the zones.

Second trip: Horde Shaman.

At some point I got tired of people talking about shamans and having never played one, so I did more of the quests and got to see the wrathgate, and learned about the different factions in Northrend and how the whole storyline worked. I took my shaman to 80, and then I stopped before I got to Icecrown because I got talked into playing Alliance.

Third trip: Alliance Shaman.

The quests for Alliance are different than the Horde of course, and in my opinion you get a much better storyline on the Alliance side. The plot is richer, the characters are more vibrant, and true to Alliance form, they send you on more errands so you get to know the lay of the land better than on Horde side. I liked this trip a lot, but after leveling two shamans back-to-back I got burned out and had to do something else.

Fourth trip: Horde Warlock.

After a long break during which I farmed on my horde druid and leveled up an Alliance Paladin almost to 80, I went back to Horde and did the trip again with a Warlock. By now I was sick of Northrend, but thanks to new changes in the game I was able to level almost exclusively in battlegrounds and only saw the northrend starting zones.

Fifth trip: Alliance Rogue.

Let's be frank - if I didn't have a compulsion to complete this rogue just so I could run around and spam Fan of Knives, I'd never finish leveling him. They nerfed the xp gains from battlegrounds, so the best way to level is in groups and questing... and I'm sooo tired of questing in northrend. I just want it to end. It's boring, time consuming, and doesn't feel at all like I'm playing for fun, which is a terrible way to feel about a game. But when I finally crank out the last five levels, I'll be done and I'll have earned my 80.

And then maybe I'll start leveling a hunter...