Schooling Scholomance

[MongoJerry]

Several hours later, I logged back on to find that Alexi Barov had indeed respawned. Woohoo! Kronos wasn't online, but Kupeludo, the warrior in our earlier Scholomance party, was. Perfect. Since he had collected the four deeds along with the rest of the party, he would be just as interested in getting the head of Alexi Barov as I was. In addition, I knew I could recruit a lvl 60 rogue friend, lem, to help. Not only is he a good friend and likely to be just as curious about this strange quest as I, but I also keep him well bribed with stacks of fadeleaf. (Rogues use fadeleaf to create blinding powder, a hot commodity on the PvP server as you can imagine).



Kupeludo and lem came over to the Bulwark and proceeded to rip Alexi Barov a new one, while Neriad stood there looking pretty. (She does that very well). Remember that 976 crit that Neriad received from Barov? Here are the hits that Kupeludo received according to the screenshots I took of the battle:

Alexi Barov's Rupture is absorbed by Kupeludo.
Alexi Barov's Rupture is absorbed by Kupeludo.
Alexi Barov hits Kupeludo for 64 (48 blocked).
Alexi Barov's Sinister Strike was parried by Kupeludo.
Alexi Barov hits Kupeludo for 158.
Alexi Barov crits Kupeludo for 216.
Alexi Barov's Kick parried by Kupeludo.
(At this point Neriad casts Renew on Kupeludo. Glad I could be of help!)
Kupeludo suffers 107 Physical damage from Alexi Barov's Rupture.

Disgusting.

Kupeludo and I looted our heads of Alexi Barov (who knew that he was actually a hydra?), and the three of us headed back to Chillwind Point. It was at about this time that a GM responded to my still open help request ticket. I suppose I should have abandoned my ticket, when Kronos received his answer, but sometimes you get different answers from different GM's, and I wanted to get the full scoop on this whole Alexi Barov respawn situation. It's a good thing I did, because I ended up talking to a more knowledgeable GM.



This GM (Xilven or something close to that) told me that Alexi Barov does in fact respawn, but he's on a long respawn timer by design as a punishment on the Horde for letting him die. He's the quest NPC who gives Horde players the same "get the four deeds" quest that Weldon Barov gives alliance players, you see. It was then it hit me. The Bulwark and Chillwind Point are not only similar to one another, they are mirror images of one another. Consider:

1. Both camps lie on the border of the Western Plaguelands and are where quests for the Western Plaguelands are given.

2. Both camps have Argent Dawn stationed in them, including Argent Dawn quartermasters.

3. Each camp has only one faction NPC guard -- High Executor Derrington (pictured above) at the Bulwark and Commander Ashlam Valorfist at Chillwind Point. Both commanders protect the main body of their camps from players of the other faction, but both are stationed far enough away from their respective Barov brothers that they won't interfere with any attacks on them. The commanders aren't elite, by the way, so they can be killed easily.

4. Each camp has a Barov brother who is murderously competitive with the other. At Chillwind Point, Weldon Barov asks Alliance adventurers to retrieve the four family deeds and then kill his brother Alexi. At the Bulwark, Alexi Barov asks Horde adventurers to retrieve the four family deeds and then kill his brother Weldon.

So by killing Alexi Barov, who has a long respawn timer (some have mentioned the figure of five hours, but I can neither confirm nor deny this number), alliance players are indeed fulfilling Weldon's wish about not needing to "worry about an unscrupulous gang of mercenaries seeking [his] head." In this case, the "unscrupulous gang of mercenaries" is a group of Horde questers. If Alexi is dead, then Horde players can't get the quest to kill Weldon, so Weldon is safe, relatively speaking. Considering the symmetry of the outposts and quests, I suspect it works the same way on the Horde side. Alexi asks Horde players to kill Weldon so that he doesn't have to worry about being killed by alliance players. This is a neat concept.

In the heat of the moment, after dealing with the irritation of having to wait several hours to get another chance at Alexi's head, I told the GM that the long respawn timer was also a punishment on alliance players who would not be able to complete their quests in a timely manner. Now that I understand the logic of the story and mirror image nature of the two brothers, however, I'm leaning toward liking the long respawn time. Of course, I already have my head of Alexi Barov. If I didn't, I might not feel the same way.



One of the fun things about visiting the Bulwark as an alliance player is that even though it is technically a Horde outpost, the Argent Dawn is a neutral organization that will treat horde and alliance players equally. Alliance players can turn in scourgestones to Argent Officer Garush as you can see above.



In addition, alliance players may purchase potions from Argent Quartermaster Hasana. It turns out that Hasana is right on the edge of where a level 60 player would aggro High Executor Derrington, so if the player comes from the north and doesn't get too close, he or she can purchase potions without needing to fight Derrington. So an Alliance player could spend all day buying out potions from the Bulwark's Argent Dawn quartermaster and prevent their purchase by members of the Horde. There are some great spots in the hills to the north of the outpost to hide in while waiting for potions to respawn at the shop. This would be an awfully boring and tedious way to grief members of the another faction, but I've heard of other more boring and tedious methods of griefing being employed.



So we got our heads of Alexi Barov and returned them to Welden. What reward did we get? A trinket that calls forth three "servants of the House of Barov to fight, cook, and clean for you." This is the funniest and best trinket ever.



The servants last for 15 seconds and the cooldown time is only 10 minutes. Unlike, say, the Mithril Mechanical Dragonling or the ever popular Gnomish Battle Chicken, these servants of Barov are level 59-60 and therefore actually hit their targets from time to time. (Why can't the mechanical dragonlings and chickens have the same level as the summoning character so that they can be somewhat useful at higher levels?) Plus, most importantly, they're hysterically funny. They even had a somewhat practical moment in a PvP situation. While taking the above screenshots of the Argent Dawn in the Bulwark today, a level 52 shadow priest jumped me from behind and started blasting away. I recovered somewhat (it helped to be level 60), but being jumped while equipped and spec'd for instance running, I was still at a disadvantage. Partway through the battle, he got a Silence off on me and probably had me dead to rights, so out of desperation, I hit the button for the Servants of Barov trinket (apparently you can still activate trinkets while silenced). On a practical level, they acted like a poor man's curse of tongues as they hit and stuttered the shadow priest. But the biggest effect they had, I think, was the, "What the h*** are those things?!" effect. I swear I could almost see the other player's confused look through the computer screen. Those extra seconds they bought me let the silence wear off and let me finish off the attacking priest. It felt good.

(Incidentally, any chance of a truce to allow Neriad to travel to places and get screenshots and all? I'm trying to benefit everyone here. Yes? No? Worth a shot...).

This "PvP" quest to kill an NPC in an outpost of the opposing faction is very fun, and I hope more such quests are implemented at some point. These kinds of quests would be especially fun on the PvP server, where players can intentionally make it more difficult for members of the other faction to fulfill those quests. For example, some of the ganker/PvP guilds of both factions could post a guard or two near their respective Barov brother around the clock to jump any members of the opposing faction who try to complete the "Last Barov" quest. I highly recommend that they do so. The fact that such a system would leave I and a few friends as being some of the few to own this nifty trinket is by no means my motivation for this recommendation.

Well, that was a fun and unexpected excursion, and it made us wonder if turning in the quest to kill "The Butcher" would lead to further quests.

UP NEXT: The Blood of the Innocents