mrderekftw

Hi Gronnrock, I just started on Elysium today because I've been feeling major nostalgia for the old days playing WoW. Back at release of Vanilla I was just a kid and I remember being so blown away by the game. I couldn't stick to a toon though and ended up kind of falling off. I feel like I never did my gave my first toon (a Night Elf Hunter named Halfrugen) a good enough run, so I remade him today. The first few levels were hilarious fun. I was reading quest text out loud and laughing at some of the old quirks of the game. I got in my first party in the spider cave there with a very friendly chap who showed me where a quest giver was. We chatted a bit about our experiences with the game (we both played as kids) in between killing spiders. We added each other and went on our way. Kept on questing and had a few frustrating deaths at the hands of furbolgs (just the beginning of course, lol). When I was doing that quest at the furbolg camp where you farm the shamans, I noticed a bunch of players were competing for kills so I partied up with everyone in the camp. They were thankful that I took the initiative. With our combined efforts we crushed the camp and finished up the quest very fast. Everyone was very courteous and supportive. I took the quest where you hunt the satyr (in the cave behind town) and decided to run it solo. I died a couple of times but took down the boss easily enough. I saw a warrior-priest pair make some poor choices and wipe which I thought was kind of funny lol. I was a bit salty because they didn't invite me even though I helped them out. The funny thing about levels 1-9 is that you can't chat! The only communication you have are emotes and party invitations. Once you get in to a group then you can use party chat, but you have to get there first. So there I was in the cave trying to communicate with emotes and such. It was silly and fun! The absolute highlight of the day was running the big furbolg cave with another hunter that I met on my way in. They had played the game back in TBC and so we talked about all the memories that it brought back. That cave certainly caused a lot of frustration for us both! We were a pair of level 7 and 8 hunters with no pets so it was a bit of a slog--we died over ten times! But we had a really optimistic and joyous spirit about running it together. Because we were both so determined, we kept chugging forward after each wipe. We learned from our mistakes, improved our strategies, took the best encounters that we could, and suicided when neccessary to clear enough mobs to get through an area. In the end we collected every quest item, killed both bosses, found a chest, completed the quest you pick up inside, and took a level each before hearthing back to camp. That run definitely ranks up there among my funnest experiences playing video games online! Or just playing video games in general. So grateful to this community and the people running these servers to have created the opportunity to enjoy this game once again--perhaps, even, to enjoy it better than I did in the first place, Happy leveling, Derek