Disclaimer: You better sit down as you read this post.
It happened and I make no apology for it. I blame it on the pets! I went Alliance. I know, I know it shocks me too! I did it for my love of all things pets, that is a valid and worth reason right? Right? For those who have known me a long time and my dedication and diligence in collecting pets, it seems like a natural extension of my passion (addiction) for all things cute and adorable in WoW. Some might recall back in the day when we had to keep out pets within our backpacks and bank slots, along with our mounts. It wasn’t until the dev’s added the much appreciated mount and pet storage tab, which not only freed up much needed back space, but it also allowed us to go forth and collect even more pets!
With the current circumstances as they are for pet collecting, it was only a matter of time before this was to happen to where I rolled an Alliance toon in order to collect the Alliance only pets, in addition to gaining all of the new Pet Battle achievements. Blizzard very slyly made quite a few of these achievements only possible by way of having a toon of each faction, which of course plays right in to those who not only want to collect pets but also obtain achievements. Well played Blizzard, well played indeed!
So taking the plunge to the “other” side, I created a Pandarian monk. If you have not tried the Panda race, I certainly would cajole you into rolling one. They literally roll too! I think that is one of my favorite abilities they have! The particular spec I chose was that of a healer, known as a Mistweaver. I have to say that I am having a blast playing a healing monk. Very fun indeed!
One of the first things I did when I was able to do so was join a guild. I certainly didn’t want to play within a vacuum and have no social interactions with other players, hence I started to browse through the guild recruitment tab and found what seemed to be the type I was looking for. Three days later, I was promoted with access to the bank, as well as invite privileges! Two thoughts ran through my head when that happened. First, I was completely taken back, for anyone who has run a guild for a long enough period of time knows well to be cautious and somewhat guarded in terms of any new recruit. That is not to say that the new member is treated in an unwelcoming fashion, it just comes through the years of experiences where unfortunate things can happen when you allow for a lot of “entitlements” right off the bat. Secondly, I must have made a good enough impression with the gm, for she was really pleased with my cheery demeanor and disposition within guild chat to have warranted a promotion so fast. Just me being myself and roleplaying how the Pandarian are to my way of thinking!
Suffice to say, that it was refreshing to be in a position on non power and just happily roll along…literally! The other facet is that I have been in character in guild chat, being that it is a role playing realm. Within my Horde guild we tend not to role play and keep guild chat pretty lose and happy-go-lucky, for that is the type of environment I want to surround myself with. So it is certainly a different mode of playing to keep within character all the time, which has been fun thus far!
Am I going to be a “switcher”? Certainly not! Though having said that, I will continue to play my Alliance monk and check out the different nuances and quests that they have to offer. One thing for sure, I will defiantly make a Horde version of my monk! So there you have it, Kern went “Alliance”, blame it on the pets!
(Oh! One last thing to add…on the collectors edition MoP soundtrack, my favorite track is entitled “The Traveler’s Path”. Listen to it here. It is a wonderful song that I find myself listening to often. Well, I finally found out where the song is placed within the game as I was adventuring through the starting zone of the Pandarians, so I made sure to take a screen shot of me next to Loremaster who was singing it. Talk about awesome!)
