67. Apocalypse Boat and Trees

Text from “Off the Beaten Path” on Epic Dolls #67!

PLACES TO SEE

NORTHREND – WOLK
Apocalypse Boat

While you are traveling through the frozen wintery world of Northrend, here is a spot to visit or at least be apprised of should there be any impending catastrophes! Stationed atop a mountainous terrain just north of Wintergarde Keep, Dragonblight, is a warm fire, a cabin and a… boat.  What? A boat atop a mountain?? Yes! It appears as though someone had been stashing away supplies and a boat in the event of a melt-down. This spot has been deemed the Apocalypse Boat, and with good reason!  It is fully stocked with guns, bombs, food, ammo…and a couple of books for a long journey!

If you get a chance, stop by. If you are not able to fly, there is a path winding up the moutain from Wintergarde keep.   Thanks to Jaero for telling me about this location

AZEROTH – MAIN WoW Game
The World Trees…

One of the main story-lines in Warcraft involves the “world trees.” There are three specific world trees with direct influence to the world and story, they are Nordrassil, Vordrassil and Teldrassil .

T

he World Tree known as  Nordrassil, which means “Crown of the Heavens”, was grown from a single seed of G’hanir, the original tree that belonged to the raven demigoddess Aviana. Nordrassil was planted on the summit of Mount Hyjal, blessed and proffered by the Dragon Aspects, it granted immortality to the Kaldorei while it protected the well of eternity. Nordrassil was destroyed in the Third War as was the well of eternity. Remnants of the tree can be still be seen in Mount Hyjal. The Caverns of Time instance “Battle for Mount Hyjal” deals with the battle at the summit.

Vordrassil was an attempt by the ancient druids to plant another world tree thousands of years ago. When the tree became fully grown, it had to be destroyed as the tree had become tainted. When the tree fell to the earth, it shattered into three large pieces which make up homes to the furbolgs in Grizzly Hills, Northrend. It can still be seen there and a subsequent quest exists to discover what dire power has been awakened under the ground, tainting. and destroying life.

Teldrassil (meaning Crown of the Earth) is the current world tree located off the west coast of Kalimdor. While it is not a place horde are likely to venture out to, it is the home of the Kaldorei and the capital city known as Darnassus. It can be traveled to easily by the Dranei  who can take the boat from Azyremyst, and can also be reached by the Alliance who can sail from Stormwind to Darkshore. Although Teldrassil is considered smaller by World tree standards, it is still massive. Through lore and quest lines, it becomes apparent that in order to have a successful World Tree there are components that are required such as a healthy tree acorn, grown and blessed by the dragons and a well of eternity’s fresh water to sustain it and the protectors assigned to it. Without these or one of these components, something goes terribly wrong.

Fandrel Stanghelm, the current archdruid, could not live without eternal life and together with other druids created Teldrassil. While you are discovering and exploring the beautiful land of the night elves, you will encounter  things which lurk in the shadows that should not be there… things living off of the power and slowly corrupting this world tree. You will also discover that not all the druids and elves agreed to creating this new world tree and it was done against their consent.

QUESTS
OUTLAND – Burning Crusade

It is interesting to remember that when you venture to Outland, that the fascinating floating lands that remain are the vestiges of the world known as Draenor, the home world for the orcs. An attack was made using the Dark Portals in an effort to annihilate the orcs and it was the use of these various portals that wrenched the planet apart.

An interesting quest series called the Vision of the Dead (or What the Soul Sees for Horde), leads you to create a tincture that when completed will allow your character to see the world of the dead forever. You then begin seeing the ghosts of Ancient Orc Ancestors all over Nagrand who appear to be on their way to the Ancestral Grounds and also to the crystal of Oshu’gun.

Role Playing Tips

Role Playing offers players a creative opportunity to act out their characters as if living in the world of Warcraft. For me, it is an artistic outlet to venture into the world and be my character. I consider it an escape, like the type of thing you would encounter when playing D&D or other RPGs.

I am going to talk briefly about three things:

• Do you need to be a writer?
• What is the age of your character?
• What is your character doing currently and why?

Many players have asked if they need to be a writer to be able to role play? Although we have talked about using a RP addons to display a character description in the past, it isn’t required. Neither is being a writer. You can make simple notes about your character to remember basic background information and just in case another RPer begins asking about your character in and effort to get to know them. Even though the game mechanics don’t currently allow for this, you should have a full name for your character at the ready. My character goes by “Stardancer” but her full name is Xielie Stardancer and in certain circles an additional family is also known called, SpiritWillow. If you have a covert type of character, maybe one that workds for S7, then maybe you have just the single name.

Something that comes up in role-playing from time to time is age. What IS the age of your character? If you are playing one of the elf races, number of years is relative as they could be hundreds of years old. The War of Ancients was 10, 000 years ago and Quel’Thalas was founded 6,800 years ago. It definitely can be confusing to players when dealing with races that are long lived. What I did that helped me with my druid Stardancer was to look at the Warcraft story timeline and determined where and when I thought Star would most likely have been born. I picked her being a child somewhere after the Sundering of the Well of Eternity, somewhere around  5, 500 years ago.

The reason for knowing a general age of your character is to know where in the story of Warcraft your character belongs, what they might know about the current history, or what their knowledge would be on certain events that have been occurring or what has happened a long time ago and… how do they know this?. Do they know it personally because they have lived it? Heard it in rumors? Read it in a library? Or maybe their parents told them in stories or they are from a culture with an oral tradition? Do you need to know all the game’s lore to participate in this? No, but it is helpful to take a glance of at the timeline and read the information presented in quests.

What is your character doing currently? This is where the small talk occurs when interacting with other RPers. Jotting down a few notes and knowing a little about why your character happens to be where they are and what they are doing is important.

I figured out that this needs to be more than just, “Why thank you for asking. I have been working in Northrend to help to defeat Arthas.”  Just because your character is doing quests in an area doesn’t seem to be enough.

Since Star is a druid, explorer, and an herbalist… is she may be asked, “What brings you to Dalaran?”  She would stop to regard the inquiry and state that she is merely passing through the city. Star may relate that she was in search of a rare herb in order to create a special salve known to help cure infected wild life and plants. By following the recommendations of a learned alchemist where to find such herbs, she could state that she wound up in a crystalline wooded land and discovered the remnants of the Kirin Tor. These mages there informed her of the city hovering above, known as Dalaran and how she might be able to reach it.

That’s just one thought as to what she is doing and why. The idea is that when RPing, spark a conversation and make the reasons for a character being in a specific place have meaning. I haven’t written all that out, I just made mental notes of why she would be somewhere in case it came up in conversation.

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Written and Recorded by Stardancerelf

Background music is taken from World of Wacraft, Blizzard Inc.