Tuesday, March 2, 2010

Druid level 5-10

Druid leveling from 5-10 will take you from Red Cloud Mesa to Bloodhoof village, just down the road. It’s also amazingly like 1-5 except there’s a great deal more travel involved as the various quests ask you to roam the environs surrounding the village. Still, the quests are very easy and unlike those found in Ellwyn forest, or not hidden in out of the way corners that you wouldn’t know about unless you happened to stumble across them at some point.

As you level from 5 to 10 you will gain a few new skills, like Thorns and Mark of the Wild, but nothing new in the way of combat abilities. What you do get are an update or two – namely to Wrath. Fighting mobs will feel largely the same to you in this level bracket as the last, except you can actually probably cast a couple Wraths at a mob and finish them off with melee when they get to you. My Wraths were hitting in the neighborhood of 30-35ish and I would use only about 15% of my mana casting 2 or 3 of them. By the time I killed the creature after a couple whacks with my dredger I was already back at 100% mana. Occasionally I’d have to throw up a Rejuv if I pulled more than one mob at a time, but other than that I never worried about healing and never had any down time to regen health or mana.

I find the story that unfolds in Mulgore a very telling story as Blizzard obviously paid great attention to the postural culture and influence of the race. And despite the roaming required from all the quests wasn’t overly burdensome. If you don’t have the option to use the heirloom items it might take longer, but I was able to level from 5 to 10 in a little more than an hour and still have a handful of quests to complete before I finish the zone. You will most likely find yourself leaving the zone at level 10 or 11, but it’s looking for me that I’ll be closer to 13 than 11 when I leave.

At level 10 you’re sent to Thunder bluff to learn the ways of the Druid. The elder sends you on your first trip to Moonglade where you complete a quick and easy quest, and back to Thunder bluff where you obtain another quests to defeat the dreaded Lunaclaw! Bear form is your reward but quite honestly, doesn’t mean a great deal to you at this point unless you intend to tank instances. If you are just intent on leveling, you should continue casting Wrath on mobs and finishing them off with melee until you eventually get cat form at level 20.