Patch 3.3 Eases Rep-Grinds – For the love of Hodir…
Patch 3.3 was recently released and initial fervour for all the new content meant the realms strained under the weight of some many players attempting to get into the new instances all at once. Meanwhile, for those with some time to spare, patch 3.3 brought some other nice benefits…
First, let me start by saying that if any of you reading this have already done the Hodir rep-grind to get your revered or exalted shoulder inscription, please simply stop reading this post right now to avoid getting really annoyed. For the rest, I’ll see you in the next paragraph…
Being the type of player that does not mind the repetition of raiding (an activity of my choosing) but that hates with incredible intensity the enforced labour-mechanic of rep-grinds to get things like the Hodir shoulder inscriptions (an activity NOT of my choosing), Broliant had never pursued the Hodir rep for the new shoulders and simply “made do” with the Aldor enchants of TBC. Even when the venerable ‘Relic of Ulduar’ became BoE and purchaseable, I still could not find within myself the justification to spend around 1000g+ on the relics needed.
So, there I was on the eve of patch 3.3’s release chatting to the guys on vent and I mentioned one neat thing I’d heard that was supposedly in the patch – the fact that all top-level Arcanum (Head Enchants) and Inscriptions (Shoulder Enchants) were now BoA (Bind on Account) items, meaning that you could do the rep-grind on one char only then buy the Arcanums and Inscriptions you needed for all your characters. “Pretty sweet” I said, “I may even do the rep-grind now, it almost makes sense!”
Then one of my fellow officers said something along the lines of “you can buy rep-tokens with badges, don’t you know” and so off I went, straight to the Badge of Triumph vendor in Dalaran, to check it out. I’d already confirmed the “BoA” status of Arcanum at the Ebon Blade vendor in Icecrown. Now I was also able to confirm what my team-mate told me… and so I bought one “Sons of Hodir Commendation Badge” for a cost of one “Emblem of Triumph“. Normally it awards 520 rep with the Sons of Hodir… but I’m Human so add 10% and I got 572 rep. And went from having “no standing at all” with Hodir to being somewhat “Hated”. Ooops.
Hmm, I thought. Even though I have many Badges of Triumph which I have no other use for, this will take some doing. Maybe I should do the quests first. Off to Stormpeaks I went, spent a couple of hours doing all the quests leading up to the Hodir quest-line and eventually there I am standing in front of Thorim ready to hand in his two main quests – the main “Mending Fences” quest and “A Spark of Hope”… and hahahahahahaha… see the image below…
That’s right – each quest hand-in awarded me with 31,460 rep with the Sons of Hodir. I went directly to revered with that nice jump! I then ran back to Dalaran, bought around 35-40 more of the “Sons of Hodir Commendation Badge” and hit exalted. I then went straight back to Dun Niffelem and bought an exalted-level Arcanum for Broliant and another for Balgardner.
So, the instances might be borked entirely while we wait for the “new patch smell” to die down a litte… but there are still some nice discoveries to be made.
-B-