Darnassus Kinda likes Mae
Spent an hour or two running around Darkshore doing Darnassus quests. Was reasonably productive, combined with some morrowgrain and runecloth turnins, Mae is now half way through revered, just over 10000 rep to go until she gets exulted. I prefer to think of it as 133 stacks of runecloth or 172g at the very minimum. She has yet to start questing in Ashenvale but will get there soon and she may have missed some quests back in Teldrassil. If she gets really desperate she could do the human (you no take my candle) and draino lowbie quests for the 'spillover' rep that could bring.
Doing these lowbie quests has all the annoyances of the high level quests (running around trying to find whatever) with no challenge in the fighting. Once you find something you spend a minute killing and then it's having to go back to turn the quest in.
She had someone else 'LOL OMG' at her in Auberdine. They asked why a level 57 dwarf was knocking around those parts but accepted my explanation that she was after an epic saber. They asked where she got her shoulders from but I can't remember. Quest reward I think. They are huge Flash Gordon things, very 80's and a bit of a disaster.
Is it ironic that while I was one-shotting thistle bears my guild were downing a Fel Reaver? Disgraceful selfishness.
After some time I got tired of this and went to Winterspring to unwind with a nice killing spree. The Winterfall camp was occupied so did a few laps of the frozen lake. Could kill two or three ghosts a minute so was over 30K XP/hr. Rattled up a few bubbles of experience in less than an hour. The ghosts things dropped a little runecloth but not a useful amount.
Winterfall with Emphasis on the Fall
6am so hit the Winterfall camp while there is no competition. Spent an hour there killing relentlessly (apart from mana breaks: did need these). More sparse runecloth drops, still not worth farming these. I managed to hit around 40000 XP/Hr, it was up at about 55000 XP/Hr till the rest bonus ran out, and that was with no boost from quest turnins.
I got a couple of interesting things:
- a black lotus herb. These are apparently worth 20g EACH. Could be another reason there are always folk around these camps. A horde came and went while I was there, a 60 so he probably wasn't grinding XP.
-
a blue drop
Only it was the 'Ace of Portals' 
WTF? I would need seven more blue cards drop to make the set. Vendor trash?
Plaguelands
An hour of repetative killing was enough so I headed for Western Plaguelands to quest a bit and see if the runecloth was more plentiful. The ghouls weren't all that generous with it. I did the next cauldron and it was so easy. I remember doing it as pooky at about level 52 and it was a sword and board slog. At 57 Mae just stormed it. Still got about 7000 XP for it and two more cauldrons to go.
On to a lumber camp to let some termites loose. This was more fun, there were level 59's about and I think they may have been pally self-healers so I would either use intimidation to stun them before they could heal or save an acrane shot/multishot combo to blast them when their health got low.
Mae is currently shining but I can remember having the same feelings with Pooky at these levels. It's a good feeling, like you have wtfpowned Azeroth. None of this implies that Outlands will be easy.
Tools of the Trade
I've bought Mae a level 58 green bow in readiness. She hasn't held a bow since about level 40 and I'd like to get her skill up in case an epic bow drops. I figure that she can use it on the lowbie quests and skill up that way. It's a fast bow, 1.7 seconds (even faster when her Serpents Swiftness talent kicks in) so she will be using her arrows up in 68% of the time. I prefer guns (especially BIG GUNS). Fast weapons may be better for the higher crit rate and repercussions from that such as more Go for the Throat procs but I don't have that talent (yet). I'd rather my ammo lasted longer.
Also picked up a level 65 gun, the Gunblade, for 30g as it seemed like a bargain for an Outlands blue.
Strategy
Mae is an hour and a half from 58.
When Mae gets to 58 I am thinking of sending her to Outlands for a bit, long enough to pick up some nice Outlands gear. Then I think she would be better off doing Azeroth quests: Eastern Plaguelands, Silithus and maybe Burning Steppes. She'll be doing more pure XP grinding as she seems to be quite good at it. I think this plan has a few advantages:
- She gets maximum experience from Azeroth quests while the XP is still good
- The ridicuous XP rewards from the Hellfire quests will go towards getting her through the nasty increase in XP requirements that occur at level 60
- When she returns to questing in Outlands she will be a higher level and will find the quests there a bit easier.
- She will need fewer Outlands quests to get to 70. At 70 the rewards from the remaining quests are cash and she will be in need of a flying mount. At 70 Azeroth quests are grey.
Using this method she may not get to 70 quite as fast but she may have an easier time of it. It's not like I'm keen to start on Outlands, been there, done that, still hate Zangarmarsh and I've not been reading good things about Blades Edge Mountains. From my experience with Pooky I have a nasty feeling that a lot of Outlands is just a big pain. I think I'll stick in Azeroth while the game is still enjoyable.
If Outlands for Mae proves to be as tedious as it is for Pook I will have to review how I am spending my time and how much it all matters to me. Yes, Outlands is close and I'm already worried.
Peter's Moblog
Ace of Portals - 25-100g on my server. Vendor it and kick yourself, that's like half the runecloth you need ;)
I can't remember if i said this already, but the castle bit south of the flight point in eastern plaguelands has elites that drop runecloth. They may be a little high for you, but try one at a time and see.
I don't really remember Blades Edge Mountains, did it in like 2 days or something, just followed levelling guide and that was it.
I think you'll find Outlands much easier on a hunter.
If you could bear healing, you may want to consider speccing healing on Pooky and just getting them doing instances healing people rather than questing. That way you'll get your Rep up (which is a great thing to do) and you'll save lots of quests until you're 70, at which point they will be easy cash. It will take a while to level this way, but if you're not enjoying them so much anyway it's worth considering. However, you will need some healing gear, instances get quite hard.