I'm Not Dead! Mists of Pandaria So Far

That's right!  I'm still here!  I'll admit to feeling a bit guilty that it's been almost a month since Mists of Pandaria has come out, and I'm only now writing my first blog post about it.  There's certainly no lack of things to discuss.  The problem is just the opposite, in fact.  There's so much that most of my free time is spent actually doing it.

I think this is a common phenomenon among the blogging community.  Most of my favorite bloggers have done a post or two, but nothing like the torrent I half-expected to bombard my RSS feeds.  People are ironically so busy in Azeroth, there's not enough time left to write about it.

A lot of what's keeping us busy is great.  The questing in Pandaria is top-notch, even if my main experienced it as a sleepless 48-hour blur to 90 (I had done it all in beta, including the finished Jade Forest, just so you don't think I took the great questing and story work for granted).  I had, against my earlier judgment, decided to start the expansion with dual gathering (Mining and Herbalism), hoping the extra experience would mean getting to 90 quicker.  In fact, I actually think it hurt me, as time spent running to and collecting nodes distracted me from quests.  The gathering XP was also rather underwhelming, particularly at higher levels.

Much as I rushed to 90, by the time I was there, the Realm First professions had long been done.  The initial demand for my gathered mats had come and gone; prices were declining much more rapidly than anticipated.  Given that, I decided to use those materials to level my own professions.  There was enough to get my Alchemists all started on their daily Living Steel transmute and my Scribes all started on their daily Scroll of Wisdom cooldown.

And let's not forget that once you reach max level, that's where the game truly begins.  In this case, the name of the game is dailies. Oh, gods...so many dailies.  In theory, these should be sorted by priority.  Blacksmiths will want to jump right into the Klaxxi dailies (which can actually be started at 89).  For Leatherworking, Tailoring, and Enchanting, you'll want to get started ASAP on Golden Lotus, since you'll either want Golden Lotus themselves, or one (or in the case of Enchanting, both) of the two factions gated behind Revered Golden Lotus rep.  Obviously, there are pieces of gear unique to each faction as well, but those will vary by class and are better covered by various class blogs out there.

Amidst all the craziness, make sure you don't forget the Tillers, either.  While their quest line can be started as early as 85, it's another one of those things that only really opens up at 90.  At that point, you can begin earning rep with them.  Simply harvesting your crops each day will yield a bit of rep, but to speed the process along, we've got...more dailies!  These are generally a bit quicker and easier than any of the other dailies, with regular quests interspersed a bit more frequently.  You'll want your Tiller rep up ASAP, so that you can unlock more plots and the ability to grow Motes of Harmony.

(Note that within the Tillers rep, there are also individual Tillers members, who have their own friendship bars going from Stranger to Best Friend.  While getting these up eventually can be fun, the rewards for doing so are almost entirely cosmetic.  They do not affect your main Tillers rep in any way.)

Now, while it's best to prioritize and make sure you know what to do first each day, the reality is that, time permitting, you may want to do them all each day.  It's time consuming, but I know that personally, between raiding and gold making, there's not a single one of the factions listed here that doesn't still offer me some advantage.  At least I should be exalted with Golden Lotus and Klaxxi in a few more days, so that should cut down on the daily load considerably.

One thing I definitely recommend is that when you do your dailies, particularly if you're going to do all of them, you bring a friend.  Between killing things faster and talking while you quest (either in person or over Vent or some other voice program), the dailies go by much quicker than if you're alone.  This also tends to help prevent burnout, as well as keeping you accountable on the very likely occasion that you're tempted to skip a day.

Now, I was actually going to continue this post by going into an in-depth discussion of what I'm doing with all of my professions, but this post has already gotten a little on the long side, so expect another post within the next couple of days instead.  Also, I realized today that MySales has been off since 5.0.4 launched.  I've corrected that problem, so you can look forward to weekly summary posts again starting next week.  For now, I'll simply show I have been doing fairly well, by posting a liquid gold summary:

We're practically coming into the home stretch at this point, and I've passed the 750k milestone, if that's even a thing.  How am I getting there?  I'm afraid I'll have to leave you in suspense for now, but check back soon.  Who knows?  It could be up as soon as I finish tomorrow's dailies.