A Shaman's Life

Wilhelm writes about taming his first hunter pet and Syncaine is forced to learn how to play a rogue. One of the great things about Classic is that all the classes are very unique both in terms of gameplay and in terms of world view/narrative as it's portrayed through their class quests.

Shamans for example have their totems, and those totems have meaning to them. To you they may just be glowy sticks on the ground that give you buffs, but to a shaman, every totem they've acquired had its price.

I mentioned in my post about picking a class that I didn't actually level a shaman to cap until Wrath of the Lich King, but I did at least dabble in the low levels back in the day. Also, a lot of class mechanics were still intact in early Wrath anyway, though there were additional conveniences such as a decent UI for totem management.

One thing I'd completely forgotten though is that totems took up bag space back in the day. What, these items that my character is supposed to be carrying around with her at all times actually go into my bags? What does this game think it is, some sort of roleplaying game or world simulation? Shocking.

Something I hadn't entirely forgotten were the quests to acquire each elemental totem, though apparently I'd forgotten when you get the first one. I actually made it all the way to level ten without acquiring a single totem and was then surprised when my trainer offered me the quest for the fire totem, which I knew to be the second one. Turns out I'd completely missed the one for my earth totem in the starter area, something I immediately had to go back and rectify.

Shamanism mostly seems to be about imbibing strange liquids and then seeing things that other people don't see. The earth totem quest has you going to a place where all you see is a rock, but then you drink some sapta and ooh, a giant elemental appears! Groovy.

Shamans also like going to weird corners of Azeroth that you wouldn't even know exist if you're not a shaman yourself. For example the fire totem quest has you climbing an extremely narrow path in the very corner of Durotar to visit an elemental shrine on top of a high mountain. I actually thought I might have mentioned that one on the blog when I did it for the very first time back in the day, but I can't find any evidence of it now.

The quest also asks you to steal something from some cultists in a cave in Durotar, and I went to completely the wrong cave at first and spent about twenty minutes killing mobs inside until it started to dawn on me that something might be wrong. Then I googled the correct location, yet still had trouble finding it for ages because again, it requires you to follow a very specific path just to find that one small cave with half a dozen cultists in it who are just there to have their stuff stolen by shamans.

But the worst/most interesting one is the quest for your water totem that you get at level 20. Ask any shaman about their call of water and watch them break out into cold sweat at the mere memory. It's not actually hard... but for some reason it involves a ridiculous amount of running around.

You start just south of Ratchet, then get sent to the Southern Barrens, then to Hillsbrad Foothills (!), then back to the Barrens, then to Ashenvale, then back to the Barrens again, then you get sent back to Ratchet and since that's where you started you think that you might finally be done but nooo, one more detour to Silverpine Forest (!) please before it's back to Ratchet once again. And all that on foot, because remember, in Classic you don't get mounts until level 40. I suppose the fact that shamans also get the ghost wolf ability at level 20 soothes the pain a little, but it's still quite a trek to make for a single low-level quest chain.

Ironically, the call of air is then really easy from what I remember... though I might be wrong, as my tauren shaman hasn't gotten to that one yet.

Anyway, while all that may sound a bit ranty, I actually think that these quests are really neat, and the fact that you have to pay attention or overcome some obstacles just makes them more memorable. That every class gets these little stories that form a shared experience among all members of that class - and that class only - is pretty cool.