Azuarc's Lich King Journal, entry 8: Arrival at Dalaran
I finally made it to Dalaran. It took me a long time, with good reason. Even though Dalaran is in Crystalsong Forest, the most central of all the zones in Northrend, there are only three ways to get to Dalaran, all of which involve teleportation. Two of them involve being or knowing a mage. Everyone else has to wait until level 74. (Mages get a teleport earlier than that, but not a group portal until 74, if I understand rightly.) Seeing as I'm not a mage, and don't know any mages on beta, I just waited until I got to level 74. It took me every quest in two VERY large zones, plus exploration experience of three others, before I finally reached that magical level.
There was a guy in Valiance Keep that had a gray quest from the moment I arrived, and was still gray at 73. I finally realized he was the questgiver to lead you to Dalaran. By the time I reached 74, I also had the flight point for the Alliance base at the other starting zone for Northrend, which was closer, so this is a pic from the guy in Valgarde from Howling Fjord. I think I might have seen a few other silver !'s that could have led you there as well, though.
He actually teleported me there, which was rather kind of him. This was my first view of the city:
The direction-givers of Dalaran (who are not guards) had a VERY long list of stuff to point me toward, including "points of interest," which more or less led to every single area mentioned on the map. Oh, I bet you'd like a map, wouldn't you?
Well, getting a teleport to the city the first time was all good and fine, but it was for a quest. I won't be able to do that again later, so there better be another way up to the floating city. The other end of the quest was the city's teleport mage. The follow-up was instructions on how to use the teleport crystal behind her, which will transport the player down to the ground below, where there is a similiar crystal to port back up. (And no, it does not work before level 74. I stumbled upon it when I was 73 and finishing up Dragonblight.)
The city itself is rather majestic, so I'd like to give you a sampling of scenic shots before talking about anything in the instance.
- Thumbs: 10, 12, 13, 18, 19, 28, 36, 45, 46, 47, 55
OK, that's a lot of imagery to take in. The place is beautiful, however it's also smaller than I expected. For what will become the center of the universe for both factions, I feel like it should be bigger. However, it does have a lot of things in it.
First of all, there's an Alliance- and a Horde-only section of the city. When I tried to enter the Horde area, (sanctuary, mind you,) this happened:
Krasus' Landing is the section of the city where the flight master can be found, and perhaps equally importantly, the cold weather flying trainer. You cannot actually use flying mounts in the city regardless, but at least when you finally reach level 77, you'll be able to train it easily enough. And no, you do not need to have an epic mount. 225 is the riding skill for a normal flier.
There was also the normal flightmaster. Here's my collection of flight points so far. Mind you, I haven't even BEEN to four zone yet. (Well, ok, I stepped inside one of them, and I ran through the rest with no mobs anywhere one night when the server was lagging weirdly.) That's still a lot of flight points already, though.
I don't know much about the lore here, but apparently Dalaran is being led by a fellow named Rhonin, who is of some fame among the bookreaders. Next to him is the third Windrunner sister. (Alleria, Sylvannas, and now finally Vereesa, who arguably might be the only one still alive.)
The Alliance only section has portals to all the major cities, including Shattrath. It also has portals to each of the battlegrounds! (I didn't check this out yet, but I will. I'm sure you'll want to know what's up with PvP.) The other noteworthy item in the faction sections of the city are the badge vendors:
Check out the stuff for sale...
Now, I have no idea what "binds to account" means, but notice one important thing about the items -- they scale with level, beginning at level 1. In other words, they get better as your level increases. I'm wondering, then, if this means you can actually buy equipment for your other characters. It would be an interesting and bizarre way to set up your twinks, but at least the playing field is sorta even...
Oh, there's two badge vendors for two kinds of badges. I don't know what an Emblem of Valor is, as opposed to an Emblem of Heroism, but obviously it's something completely different. I didn't troll the items too intensely, but I will try to dig up some more dirt on the matter.
While we're talking about badges, let's talk about another kind of token -- tradeskill tokens. This is what I encountered from the Jewelcrafting tradeskill vendor:
How do you get these tokens, you might ask? Why, by doing daily quests for your tradeskill! (Actually, they aren't daily, just repeatable.) A
chalcedony is the basic blue-socket gem, in case you're curious. The initial quest just takes the equivalent of a blood garnet. The follow-up I got was a bit more involved, however.
The trainer also had plenty to try to teach me.
I also found a cooking trainer in town who had 5 different repeatable quests for me...once I took one, the others went away. It's a safe bet that these are the five rotating daily quests, and it just makes them all available for the beta. However, I had plenty of cooking recipes to train as well.
Oh yes, there's one other part of the city we haven't mentioned because it's not on the map...the Sewers. In fact, when you arrive in the sewers, you realize that they have their own map, and there was actually a dropdown to switch "floors" for Dalaran. Kinda makes you wonder if instances will have maps some day.
Perhaps the most significant thing in the basement are training dummies. There are several (level 80) battered training dummies, as well as one that was the equivalent of a raid boss. They just take damage without dying or fighting back...which is exactly what theorycrafters needed!
Also down here are the arena vendors, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and a guy who returns your lost keys to you.
The very last thing I found in the sewers was a drainpipe. It leads...out.
The view from up top was beautiful, but there wasn't any real way down except...
(I rezzed, ran over to the crystal, and ported back up np.)
This page last modified 2008-09-17 19:22:37.
