Raising the Bar

If you haven't heard, in patch 4.0.6, Blizzard changed the requirements for getting "The Exalted" title, and removed it from players that already had the achievement. The new requirement is apparently 50 exalted reputations.

Um. OK?

I'm not going to complain about this, really. I was planning on grinding out 50 exalted reputations (or more!) eventually, so it's not a big deal for me. It just means another couple of months before I get a title I'll never really wear (not so long as Aeth has Matron, at least).

On the other hand... with 4.0.6, we also got the achievement "Just Another Day In Tol Barad" for completing each of the 34 daily quests in Tol Barad. Some of which - I kid you not - I have seen only once, or have even yet to see, even after doing Tol Barad dailies for weeks. I've earned exalted rep with the Wardens twice over by this point, gathered enough commendations to get Aeth the Stump of Time and make good headway towards some of the other reputation items I'd like to get my hands on...

... and none of those quests count, apparently.

Grrrrrrrrrrrrr.

Now, that is a bit annoying. Couple that with the fact that you still can't Explore Tol Barad, and I've got to wonder if the folks at Blizzard have handed off TB development to a summer intern or something.

In other news... did my last Black Morass run with Aeth, and got her to exalted with the Keepers of Time, which got her her Burning Crusader achievement. Time to head into some Cata dungeons, I guess!

Or maybe not...

To finish of the evening last night, I ported to Dalaran and caught a taxi to Valgarde in Howling Fjord. A quick flight later, and Aeth was strolling into the normal version of Utgarde Keep solo, just to see what that was like.

About 20 minutes later, she was done. Trash mobs were approximately on par with the weaker non-elite Cataclysm mobs, but hitting for a whole lot less. I was using CC at the start, but quickly realized that was serious overkill. Even without mana shield up, I could down a pack of 4-5 mobs without dropping below 90% health. Of the bosses... Prince Keleseth? Downed without any trouble, even before he could summon any adds. Skarvald and Dalronn? Not an issue. Ingvar? It is to laugh.

Yeah, yeah - it was the entry-level normal dungeon in Wrath. At this point, Aeth seriously outgears the content. Still, it's amazing how easy this was. I'm sure Wrath heroics will be more challenging, but I'm not sure by how much.

Next stop, I think, will be the Pit of Saron on normal mode, to see how tough the high-end Wrath dungeons are. If that's doable, I'll have to give the Wrath heroics a try... maybe see if I can pick up some of the heroic achievements she's missing, like Chaos Theory and Less-Rabi. It would be a real kick to finish off her Glory of the Hero achievement by running solo or duo!