Cataclysm Gathering Notes, Part 1

Since profession training is broken right now in the beta, I've focused my early efforts on gathering. The first two zones only have one kind of ore: obsidian. They also have three kinds of herbs, but the most plentiful is cinderbloom. Stormvine is pretty rare in Mount Hyjal and so far I think we've only spotted Azshara's Veil in Vashj'ir. I've spent a few hours questing through each zone, so I'm pretty confident that's all we're going to find in terms of variety.

If you've peeked at all into the new recipes, you'll see that there's another kind of ore in the Smithing lists: pyrium. There are also several other herbs in the Alchemy list. We're not seeing any sign of those, so our next priority is getting into the higher zones. The next zone up is Deepholm, a level 82-83 zone. The bad news is that you MUST be level 82 to enter. Access is granted via quest in Stormwind(Orgrimmar), which unlocks a portal for you. Needless to say, I've had to halt my gathering activities and do some leveling so I can unlock the quest.

Since we've got three gathering skills to investigate, I'm prepping two different toons to cover them. Last night I got my premade hunter to level 82 and she's currently working the skinning duties. Once they fix profession training I'll add Herbalism to her repertoire. My rogue is already capped in Mining, so I'll just let her handle that. She's currently level 81, so my next project is to get her to 82 so she can mine in Deepholm. My daughter has already scoped out Deepholm and tells me she didn't find any herbs or ore there yet. It may not be implemented, but I'm trying to prepare my toons so we'll be ready when it is. In the meantime, we're building a stash of the current herbs/ore so we'll be ready to blast through professions when they're unlocked :)

I've also been tracking the new Cooking and Fishing dailies for you guys. So far the Cooking one doesn't appear to be rotating, but Fishing is. I'll compile another post with those for next time.

If there's any thing you want me to check out in the Beta - feel free to post it in the Comments!
Posted by Kaliope at Saturday, July 31, 2010
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8 comments:

  1. Woot! Great work, Kaliope! What kind of trains are you getting from obsidian? Node-only? Or can you level by smelting?
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  2. Looking forward to the next update, nothing to add other than thanks!
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  3. Right now I get zero skill ups from mining/herbs/skinning. Illustrious training is not yet implemented, so we can't skill up at all from the current cap. I will have to test out your questions after they unlock the new levels. Meanwhile all the herbs and ore I have found require 425 skill, so I just farm my booty off and save the mats for later
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  4. Sep 16
    I took my lvl 80 druid herbalist to Obsidian Forest tonite and went from 450 to 525 gathering Cinderbloom. I got 22.2 stacks of Cinderbloom and 76 Volatile Life.
    I received almost 4000 XP per node.
    It wasn't easy pickings there. The dragonkin hit for 5-9K damage, and move very quickly and on a lvl 80 there is a fairly large aggro range. However, there are battles going on, and you can pick nodes while the dragonkin are engaged as long as you are quick. The grave site is on the east side :)
    Regards

    September 17, 2010 2:15 AM
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  5. I took my lvl 81 druid to Uldum last night. In terms of herbs, all I found was a few scattered Cinderbloom in the desert areas, and the Whiptail along the river banks down to the sea. Some of the spawns have crocodiles close by, but they seem to have a smallish aggro range, and are slow moving so can be kited or rooted or killed (they hit for about 3-5K damage on my lvl 81 with just blues and greens armor wise).

    Getting Whiptail here is going to be a chore when a lot of ppl are looking for it. Hopefully it will turn up in some other zone.

    I also wonder if it is just my experience, but it seems like there have been a lot of nodes that are hard to collect in druid flying form, many of which seem to be near mobs. In the Beta I get the error message "You are flying" and have to reposition myself before I can harvest the node. Sometimes I just can't find a position and have to land. I wonder if this is just me or if it is Blizz's method of slowing down druid herablism toons.

    Regards
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  6. Didn't experience that issue, Brian. As a Tauren herbing is so super-quick that even if under attack by a mob it usually completes between their hits, then I just fly up and out of range.

    Uldum herbing is kinda disappointing - reminded me of herbing Tanaris, nodes are few and far between.

    Least favourite place I'll be herbing is Vashj'r - as flight form doesn't work, and herbing with the Seahorse mount requires constant dismounting and fighting off nuisance mobs - just like non-Druids have to farm! :)
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  7. I have a thingy that I would like to know. I'm planning to be very fast on leveling and I wonder where is the best place to place your character before Cataclysm hits.
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  8. Unfortunately you'll have to start in a city no matter what your leveling plan. I believe you need Azeroth flying to enable flight in Mount Hyjal. Which would require you to camp in Darnassus, learn Azeroth flying from the trainer and then hoof it to Hyjal.

    For Vashj'ir I would camp in Stormwind by the bank. Pick up the Hero Board quest and then head for the SW docks. I believe you need the Hero Board quest to activate the cut scene that takes you to Vashj'ir. From what I've heard in Beta, people who don't have the quest just stand on the dock all day waiting for the boat. It appears to be phased to that starter quest.

    Due to the use of phasing for Vashj'ir and the need for flying to get around Mount Hyjal, I don't think you can just camp in an adjacent zone and jump right in. I could be wrong on this, I haven't actually attempted to get to Mount Hyjal without a flying mount. But I believe in the long run it would slow you down vs other questers who can fly from hub to hub. Hyjal is not designed for ground mounts.

    Personally if it were me I'd do Mount Hyjal first because it's just easier to get around. Vashj'ir will be unpopular with power-levelers due to its additional aggro problems and lack of flying mount access. The seahorse you get eventually moves at land mount speed.
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