Best starting location?

[Cryptoengineer]

I've dropped the dailies - I decided to run with the pack and try to get in
very fast, for the lulz.

But where to start?

I've seen three possibilities.

1. Speak with Khadgar near the Vistor's Center in SW or Org. He
gives you a quest 'The Dark Portal', and when you click 'Say the
word', ports you straight to Draenor, on the steps at the far
side of the portal.

2. Same, but pick up the quest from the notice board there.

3. Speak with Khadgar just below the portal in the Blasted Lands.

My suspicion is that 1 & 2 are Beta-only, and the 'real' start is
at the Dark Portal, #3. I'm going hearth in SW, but be at the DP
when the expansion drops.

Anyone heard differently?

pt

[Catriona R]

On Wed, 12 Nov 2014 16:37:11 -0600, Cryptoengineer

Post by Cryptoengineer
I've dropped the dailies - I decided to run with the pack and try to get in
very fast, for the lulz.
But where to start?
I've seen three possibilities.
1. Speak with Khadgar near the Vistor's Center in SW or Org. He
gives you a quest 'The Dark Portal', and when you click 'Say the
word', ports you straight to Draenor, on the steps at the far
side of the portal.
2. Same, but pick up the quest from the notice board there.
3. Speak with Khadgar just below the portal in the Blasted Lands.
My suspicion is that 1 & 2 are Beta-only, and the 'real' start is
at the Dark Portal, #3. I'm going hearth in SW, but be at the DP
when the expansion drops.
Anyone heard differently?

Your suspicion is correct, as I understand it. 2 days before the end
of Beta, I made a new alt, and that alt got an autoquest to go and
talk to Khadgar at the Dark Portal.

My understanding is that'll be the case for all of us, we'll get the
quest automatically in our logs and then just need to talk to Khadgar,
who's already standing there waiting for us. Tons of people at the
portal now, we just got our first world server crash, I'm surprised it
took that long!

[Cryptoengineer]

Post by Catriona R
On Wed, 12 Nov 2014 16:37:11 -0600, Cryptoengineer

Post by Cryptoengineer
I've dropped the dailies - I decided to run with the pack and try to
get in very fast, for the lulz.
But where to start?
I've seen three possibilities.
1. Speak with Khadgar near the Vistor's Center in SW or Org. He
gives you a quest 'The Dark Portal', and when you click 'Say the
word', ports you straight to Draenor, on the steps at the far
side of the portal.
2. Same, but pick up the quest from the notice board there.
3. Speak with Khadgar just below the portal in the Blasted Lands.
My suspicion is that 1 & 2 are Beta-only, and the 'real' start is
at the Dark Portal, #3. I'm going hearth in SW, but be at the DP
when the expansion drops.
Anyone heard differently?

Your suspicion is correct, as I understand it. 2 days before the end
of Beta, I made a new alt, and that alt got an autoquest to go and
talk to Khadgar at the Dark Portal.
My understanding is that'll be the case for all of us, we'll get the
quest automatically in our logs and then just need to talk to Khadgar,
who's already standing there waiting for us. Tons of people at the
portal now, we just got our first world server crash, I'm surprised it
took that long!

We'll see how it goes. My lock is logged out, flying immediatly above
K and the other VIPs. My server is medium pop, and I had no particular
problem logging in a little before MoP dropped. I hope to get on a
little after 2:30 AM, EST, then wait for the drop.

I found a pretty decent walk through of the first zone:

pt

[Catriona R]

On Wed, 12 Nov 2014 17:03:06 -0600, Cryptoengineer

Post by Cryptoengineer
We'll see how it goes. My lock is logged out, flying immediatly above
K and the other VIPs. My server is medium pop, and I had no particular
problem logging in a little before MoP dropped. I hope to get on a
little after 2:30 AM, EST, then wait for the drop.

You should be fairly alright then, so long as you get logged in well
in advance (login servers are vulnerable too). I'm on a very
overpopulated server, queues were nearly 4k last I heard, so our
launch was predictable!

15 mins to go, boom, world server down. Log back in having been ported
back to Shrine, laggy as hell and no city portals. Fine, I think, time
for the smart approach: Dalaran port ring (best 5k gold I ever
spent!), then on reaching Org, take the zeppelin instead of the
invisible portal. That worked, made it to STV, got a notice in chat
about Warlords of Draenor launching, cool... reached the border to
Blasted Lands and thought the heap of people stuck on the border was a
bad sign... yeah. Dc'd again.

Tried to log in again, 90% loadscreen, dc'd, "Error retrieving
character list" black screen. trying to login gets stuck on
"Connecting", so I guess we killed the login server too. Whenever it
goes further than "Connecting" I guess I'll be on the end of the 3k
login queue, ho hum. At least I can stay up all night, should be
playable enough in another 2-3 hours...

Finding the forums hilarious for the amount of tantrums - don't people
know by now that this always happens? Sure, it's frustrating but I've
come to expect it, so I can (mostly) laugh it off, really not sure
what anyone expects to happen with several million people hitting the
servers all at once. I highly doubt any company on earth has the
capability to survive what's effectively a very big DDOS! I'm actually
impressed the forum server hasn't fallen over too tbh...

[Catriona R]

On Wed, 12 Nov 2014 23:23:08 +0000, Catriona R

Post by Catriona R
On Wed, 12 Nov 2014 17:03:06 -0600, Cryptoengineer

Post by Cryptoengineer
We'll see how it goes. My lock is logged out, flying immediatly above
K and the other VIPs. My server is medium pop, and I had no particular
problem logging in a little before MoP dropped. I hope to get on a
little after 2:30 AM, EST, then wait for the drop.

You should be fairly alright then, so long as you get logged in well
in advance (login servers are vulnerable too). I'm on a very
overpopulated server, queues were nearly 4k last I heard, so our
launch was predictable!

Well, I was right about the intro experience being phased, it was
lovely and quiet there! Good work Blizz :-) Just a shame that tech
wasn't also applied to Frostfire Ridge, as it's a lagfest, eventually
managed to get through the quests into my phased Garrison, left it for
a new quest and boom, world server down. Kinda surprised it stayed up
for about an hour there tbh, hoping it doesn't take too long to
return. At least now I have my Garrison hearthstone for quick
returning if I get booted back to Shrine!

[Catriona R]

On Wed, 12 Nov 2014 17:03:06 -0600, Cryptoengineer

Post by Cryptoengineer
We'll see how it goes. My lock is logged out, flying immediatly above
K and the other VIPs. My server is medium pop, and I had no particular
problem logging in a little before MoP dropped. I hope to get on a
little after 2:30 AM, EST, then wait for the drop.

It seems lessons have been learned from our servercrashes when
everyone piled into Blasted Lands, should be a bit better spread out
for you US people:


"Khadgar has cast Mirror Image and some of you have probably already
noticed a few additional versions of his NPC around Azeroth. He's
there to help you get to Draenor once the expansion goes live!

We've had some time to evaluate the overwhelmingly positive response
to Warlords of Draenor as it went live for European players, and
realized getting you through the Dark Portal in an efficient manner is
important. When the switch from Mists of Pandaria to Warlords takes
place at 12:00 a.m. PST, you will automatically receive a quest titled
"The Dark Portal" that will direct you to visit Khadgar in the Blasted
Lands. However, now that we have four more Khadgars added to the
world, you can go to one them as well!

Here are Khadgar's locations:

Stormwind - next to the Hero's Call Board in the Trade District
Orgrimmar - next to the Warchief's Command Board in the Valley of
Strength
Shrine of Seven Stars (Alliance) - in front of the main entrance
Shrine of Two Moons (Horde) - in front of the main entrance
Note: if you happen to not receive the initial quest that leads you to
Draenor, have no fear! Just find your closest Khadgar and he'll lead
the way."



Now, if they could just find some way to stop Draenor lagging like
hell, that'd be even better. Interestingly they have phasing within
zones, some areas are fine, others are locked up completely, ofc the
lagged out bits are the ones containing the quest bottleneck I really
need to complete. So I gave up and went exploring, didn't get a lot of
exp but some is better than zero. World server down (again) now, maybe
it'll be less laggy when it's back...

[Polarhound]

Post by Catriona R
On Wed, 12 Nov 2014 17:03:06 -0600, Cryptoengineer

Post by Cryptoengineer
We'll see how it goes. My lock is logged out, flying immediatly above
K and the other VIPs. My server is medium pop, and I had no particular
problem logging in a little before MoP dropped. I hope to get on a
little after 2:30 AM, EST, then wait for the drop.

It seems lessons have been learned from our servercrashes when
everyone piled into Blasted Lands, should be a bit better spread out
"Khadgar has cast Mirror Image and some of you have probably already
noticed a few additional versions of his NPC around Azeroth. He's
there to help you get to Draenor once the expansion goes live!
We've had some time to evaluate the overwhelmingly positive response
to Warlords of Draenor as it went live for European players, and
realized getting you through the Dark Portal in an efficient manner is
important. When the switch from Mists of Pandaria to Warlords takes
place at 12:00 a.m. PST, you will automatically receive a quest titled
"The Dark Portal" that will direct you to visit Khadgar in the Blasted
Lands. However, now that we have four more Khadgars added to the
world, you can go to one them as well!
Stormwind - next to the Hero's Call Board in the Trade District
Orgrimmar - next to the Warchief's Command Board in the Valley of
Strength
Shrine of Seven Stars (Alliance) - in front of the main entrance
Shrine of Two Moons (Horde) - in front of the main entrance
Note: if you happen to not receive the initial quest that leads you to
Draenor, have no fear! Just find your closest Khadgar and he'll lead
the way."
Now, if they could just find some way to stop Draenor lagging like
hell, that'd be even better. Interestingly they have phasing within
zones, some areas are fine, others are locked up completely, ofc the
lagged out bits are the ones containing the quest bottleneck I really
need to complete. So I gave up and went exploring, didn't get a lot of
exp but some is better than zero. World server down (again) now, maybe
it'll be less laggy when it's back...

My solution to the mob mentality: I'm going to switch to playing Rift,
SWWTOR and DDO for a week...

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[Catriona R]

On Wed, 12 Nov 2014 21:23:16 -0500, Polarhound

Post by Polarhound
My solution to the mob mentality: I'm going to switch to playing Rift,
SWWTOR and DDO for a week...

A very wise choice for anyone on a super-high pop realm. This is just
ridiculous, it's so lagged out that I can't do the bottleneck
questchain I'm on, so I'm exploring and mining instead... been about 2
hours to do 2 bars worth of exp, since most of the zone is crazy
laggy. I have a friend who plays Alliance on the same realm, talking
to him on Battle.net whispers, he's absolutely fine other than the odd
dc, lucky sod! (95% Horde on our realm...)

I'm about to get over my dislike of dungeons, as it's the only option
available to me right now, I think...