I had hoped to find a threat like this today (as opposed to starting my own).
I just hit 20 tonight with my Tauren druid, and level 19 was probably one of the longest-seeming levels I've ever endured. I'd been running around the Barrens doing a quest here, farming some leather there. I was getting very tired of bear form. For whatever reason, there has been next to nothing on auction by way of level appropriate gear, and it was taking me so long to kill anything/everything to skin that I just couldn't stand to farm for very long in the hopes of topping up my skill such that I could make my own armor.
As a level 19 Tauren Druid, I was getting overrun by level 15 Venture Co. humanoids around the Sludge Fens (or whatever that place is you have to go to for your water form in the NE Barrens). I got in there for my water form easily enough at level 16...at level 19, trying to quest there was an excercise in lunacy. I just couldn't kill them fast enough to keep them from running off and gathering a couple of friends before they came back. I only died a couple of times overall, but it was so painfully slow...I just couldn't stand it.
Every once in a while I'd swing by Thunder Bluff or Ogrimmar and check the auction. Doing a search for All leather armor in the range level 17-19 range by slot wasn't showing me lists of things I couldn't afford or that just weren't suitable for me. The searches were coming up with nothing most of the time.
To be honest, I haven't really done a ton of forward research on my druid, so believe me when I say I was pleasantly surprised that cat form was a purchased ability from the trainer rather than a quested ability. I got stuck in Thunder Bluff for a short while attending to some guild matters, and then it was off to try out the new horned lion thing...
First stop was Crossroads to get a feel for the basic mechanics. In bear form at level 19, even the level 11-12 striders just outside Crossroads were tedious to kill. Not dangerous, just tedious. Imagine my surprise, then, when I zeroed in on one in cat form and flat-out obliterated it in a hail of white and yellow numbers.
O.
M.
F.
G.
I couldn't believe it. You mean I can actually farm leather with even a tiny bit of efficiency?!?! I was having so much fun I wound up farming a stack of light leather without even thinking about it, just cruising around shredding all of the underleveled mobs I could find.
Ahh, but level 12 mobs are no test of how much easier cat form would make leveling. The real test had to be on same level mobs, and they had to be mobs I had fought recently in bear form. I stopped in at Crossroads again to unload the vendor trash and grab a flight to Camp Taura(something). I went SW out of the camp to try my luck on some level 20/21 thunder lizards, wind serpents, and zhevras. Obviously, the fights took a little longer than the level 12 mobs, but they still went by so much faster than when I fought them in bear form. It was amazing. While there, I noticed a level 26 rare spawn wind serpent and a level 24 named thunder lizard. I was planning on logging for the night anyways, so I decided to give them a shot.
I used Prowl to close the distance in order to avoid the other aggressive mobs and unfortunately, the wind serpent got away in the process. That left a thunder lizard 4 levels above me to test whether or not the increased damage output combined with periodic healing could make up for the reduced armor/HP. It most certainly did. In fact, for the last 1/4 of the named mob's HP, I had a level 21 thunder lizard add zapping me from a distance. I survived to kill both mobs.
I'm absolutely loving cat form right now. I still have a bunch of level 15-18 quests in my log that I avoided because they were too tedious and I can't wait until tomorrow when I can log in and clear them out with the quickness. I should be 21 in record time.
Edited, Oct 19th 2007 12:01am by AureliusSir
Edited, Oct 19th 2007 12:02am by AureliusSir