What I have already noticed in the Borean Tundra is the fact that the quests themself are very easy: Laiskajaakko flies past the 'kill 10 foozles' and 'collect 5 dingies' in such a breeze that it amazes me. The questlines which you can point out from the first two quests go quest by quest till the final part, which is a group quest.
Greatness!
Or then it isn't. Even though the expansion has been around for a half a year, the majority of the population is already capped, or speedlevelling an alt. This leaves the Northrend for the most part as void and empty as the Old World or Outlands is. Except of course the farming areas, which are another story completely.
So I'm questing on a lovely storyline, the suspense is growing and I'm killing the baddies/mosters/foozles left and right and speaking with different NPCs here and another there only to realize that the climax of the storyline is a fortified brickwall which won't budge.
Very rewarding. Especially as you can see the lovely, shiny reward for the quest when you are about to accept -or have just accepted- the quest, which states "Suggested players (3)". It doesn't matter if its 2 or 4, it's enough for a normal, green wearing toon to stop dead on spot.
The difference in difficulty leading to the climax compared to the climatical ending is huge.
No wonder the toons I've met in Borean Tundra have only done a couple of quests here and a couple there and then moved on...
Completely other issue is the war-aspect I mentioned in earlier posts. the aggro range for the Nerubians or the Kvaldirs is so large that you can easily go around them without being attacked. And you can still beat one up while another stands nearby, targetting you but doing nothing.
Come on. Blizzard, you have technology to make wonders like Phasing, but you still cannot make an AI which could live up to some logic in the game. How lame is that?
Then again, the quests beyond Valiance Keep and Warsong Hold start to show promise in both storytelling and visuals: the freeing of the kidnapped mages at Beryl Point for the Kirin Tor mages residing at Amber Point is just beautiful. Even though the quest itself was a bit of a disappointment due to the pushover nature of the 'evil' mages and dragonkind.
Laiskajaakko's journey continues.
