Go Go Vicky-the-Viking!

It's here. WotLK has finally arrived, so how do I feel about it?

The Good:
* Graphics are a bit shinier - I like the new textures on the Vrykul, and prefer the old-style gothic, rather than Outland style Sci-Fi.
* There's 2 new starting areas - I wasn't sure about this at first, but now I think it's a great idea, it reduced the amount of people trying to finish the same quests all at once. Also, when I level my next character I'll use the other starting area, so it won't as much of a grind.
* DeathKnights - They look good, I've only got as far as creating one, rather than playing it fully, but I like the style.
* Trainers in Starting areas - Good idea, my skinning skill is now only a couple of points away from the new max, and my herbalism skill is well on the way too.
* Faster respawn times - I'm guessing this was intentional, but with hundreds of people all wanting the same mobs, this is a very good idea.
* Nice area design - The starting area was huge, so once you were out of the arrival area, you didn't feel like you were walking on top of everyone else.

The Bad:
* Graphics are a bit shinier - Yeah, they look nicer, but they strain the system just that little bit more, so I've had to reduce alot of my video settings. This had an extra problem, read on;
* Unexplained Quests - Some of the quest descriptions could do with a bit more detail, I'm not a lore freak, but I would like to know which area to hand in the Vrykul weapons that one quest asks for, instead of just telling me the name of the quest giver. And when being told to raise my hand at donkeys, I figured it out right away, but it wasn't explained the you have to 'emote' at them.
Also, one quest asks you to use a harpoon to destroy some buildings, no problem, I found the harpoons, but there's only 2 for the entire realm to use, and the quest takes around 5 minutes, so there were queues of people waiting to use them. And, when I finally got to use one, I couldn't figure out what to shoot with it, so after wasting another few minutes I realised that you can't even see the targets unless you turn your viewing distance up... Tut tut Blizz.
* No Auction House - I'm not sure if there'll be one in Dalaran, but it's a bit of an arse that I have to keep my HS set to Shatt, and catch a boat back everytime I want to go to Northrend.
* Glitched Mobs - Almost every mob of one type was glitched (Spores), there were about 30 spawned, but only 2 / 3 worked, so you had to wait for those ones to respawn several times to complete a quest.
* Chat Spam - This isn't Blizzards fault, but I've had to turn of general chat because of the amount of bullshit people are talking in general chat.


The above list looks like I hate alot of things about the new expansion, but I don't really. All the problems are more 'Annoyances' rather than reasons not to play. Overall I love the look and feel of the new stuff, and the first dungeon run 'Utgarde Keep' was a simple Tank-n-Spank run to break us into the dungeon content of Northrend.
I managed to make it to level 71 within a few hours, although some people had been playing since the midnight launch, and still hadn't managed that.. the slackers!
I also got a few nice quest rewards, and one or two drops, which have improved upon the greens that I had left over from Pre-WotLK, and improved my haste rating to the point where, when my Quick-Shots procs which is almost all the time, my shots take only 1 second to cast.
That's the minimum possible time. As soon as my shot is released, the global CD is up, and the next shot is ready to fire, so it maximises DPS.
It was all a little bit too easy, most mobs were level 71 or lower (I could probably just set my pet to aggro, and let it clear the place out) but as I logged off things were starting to get a little bit more challenging... but only a bit.
So, I'm looking forward to playing with more of the new stuff later tonight, after work. And will probably reach 72 by the end of it.
Although I'll probably have to spend an hour at the AH first though, working out how much to sell all my new drops for. Auctioneer will help, but it's not going to be very accurate for a while.