From a tiny acorn...

I have a job. A proper job, with responsibilities and budgets and everything. I'm also married, and I don't live with my mum.

All things that may surprise the man on the street when it comes to their idea of someone that plays online games. However, also things that mean that my playtime is pretty limited. Generally speaking, I'll play on the laptop, at night, after my significant other has dropped off to sleep. This gives me maybe a couple of hours play at most (work in the morning, remember), making it difficult to commit to prearranged group things.

I've currently got a couple of characters that I play on. My main (if I can still call him that) is a level 80 hunter. The problem is, being limited to what I can do means that at 80 I was running out of things to do; I'd maxed fishing, which originally filled in some time, I got the Explorer title, and the Ambassador title from the Colliseum quests, but then what? Keep running the dailies? Some Wintergrasp maybe?

I took the decision to use some of those Stone Keeper's shards to buy some Exceptional Stormshroud Shoulders for a new Druid alt, and I've been running him up through the levels. It's been a while since I've levelled from scratch, and it's amazing how quickly the levels have flown past; the new levelling changes brought in, combined with the 10% XP boost from the shoulders makes things fly along.

I've also been running with the Tourguide addon, in conjunction with Jame's levelling guide. For those of you not familiar with it, Jame's levelling guides are great, particularly for those light on time, or those that have levelled already. I used his website whilst levelling my level 80 hunter, which encourages a little more interaction with your environment and the quest text, but for this alt I installed Tourguide which gives you a list of places to go, quest to pick up, monsters to kill in the most efficient order, along with a big green GPS style arrow pointing in the direction of the next objective. Great for those with limited playtime, maximising your XP gains.

So, in the past few weeks I've managed to get my druid up to level 66. This has been through a combination of questing, and a bit of BGs now that they give XP. It was great finally being able to contribute in places like WSG without being twinked out completely. In fact, once I got to the mid-50s, I levelled almost exclusively in Alterac Valley, having heard about the great XP to be gained on wow.com. OK, so hardly any PVP goes on, but for those looking to get levelled up quickly it's great.

I also dual specced, so I'm now Feral / Resto. Resto's a great place to be in AV - I'm finding myself really useful, sitting there HOT'ing people. My first main was a Paladin, so I think that's where my heart lies.

So, next time I'll talk about the trials and tribulations of a new druid, learnign the ropes, and the challenges of playing late at night.