80!

I woke up this morning, logged in, and started questing. I was only about 40% away from 80, and at about 1:30....DING! I was really excited, and I got to see more of the Icecrown zone while doing it. I did a quest that involved me fighting Illidan as Arthas, which was cool. One thing I really like is the visibility of the Lich King in the expansion. When Illidan was introduced, there was nothing but him sitting in Black Temple waiting to be killed. Arthas makes appearances in many (if not all) of the Northrend Zones, and it's great. Plus, you get to hang around with crazy lore figures like Darion Mograine and Tirion Fordring. I'm loving it.

Last night I finished the Sons of Hodir questline (it's like 33 quests), and actually hit honored with them, so I now have the rare shoulder enchants available. Most people start at neutral after completing the questline, but with the Human racial bonus I was only about 2k rep away from honored, which I picked up quickly doing a couple of the dailies and such. There are a couple quests in the chain that grant 22000 reputation, which is meant to bring you to neutral. But, with the human 10% increase, you get an extra 4.4k rep, which brings you into friendly. This is most definitely the biggest benefit to the racial bonus that I have seen in my playing days.

Tonight I'll try to hit up the daily dungeon to keep working on my rep with the Argent Crusade, since I don't think I'll be heroic ready after freshly hitting 80. And I finally reached the 5k gold I needed for epic flying! And with a 300g loan from my friend I was able to buy myself a Swift Blue Gryphon, and it's awesome.

And, Zach Yonson over at WoWInsider has posted up what I think is a great gear guide for Holy Paladins once you hit 80. He focuses on Crit Rating, which I definitely think is more important than haste and mp5, but he also has a haste-focused article posted up too, which is linked in his article.