Regardless though, you also get a quest for seemingly completing this first centralised hub, you get a cool non-combat pet and a blue, I mean I'm really torn on this.. 1) because it sets a precedence for other zones, is it really fair that one zone gives a cool pet compared to others, and for seemingly nothing related, I mean its a mini treant which is like massive and just awesome, but I don't really see what it has to do with the questing we have been doing in the zone realistically. I could understand if it was a conclusion to the zone as a whole but the fact you get it in the middle of the zone for seemingly doing nothing *that* epic seems wrong, it just seems to be here to reward anybody who rolled a worgen and followed a natural quest path. Maybe I'm wrong here but the Azshara zone features another cool feature as the goblin follow-up zone and I feel like.. why should you be rewarding people for rolling a worgen/goblin over another race with the cool non-combat items.
Regardless though, the pet is pretty cool the fact it has interactivity with the environment is only a plus in the long run. Moving on to the questing, we are told to head to a twilight camp and do a few quests here to discover what they are doing in the zone, it's right around the bashal'aran area so I just took the taxi to there and headed straight there, the great thing about doing this quest here is that by entering from the taxi directly towards the questing area means you cannot miss the quest giver, along with the close proximity of the named npc you need to kill, which is always a great quest design, the only thing that is a bit wrong with this quest are the really low levels of these mobs here, I was level 15 going onto 16 in this area and these mobs were level 12, which is exceptionally low for quests that are cockblocked until you do the shatterspear vale quest series.
The quests in this area are pretty well designed though the ratios are about right between plans and npcs you need to kill and the quest in the area calls for the right number of elementals to be slain, which is a plus. The only other little bug was that the plans were often looking wrong, I.e they were a few pixels off where you feel they should be and were just floating in the area rather than looking nice on the tables/barrels in the area. Handing in these quests leads us to another set of quests towards ruins of auberdine where the zone turns entirely linear heading south with a bee-line towards Ashenvale in terms of questing.
The quests here in ruins of auberdine are really nice again and very immersive and a large variety, kill generic mobs quest with a twist, kill some npcs, an escort, a gather quest and a conclusion. Onto actual feedback and meanings though, there are plenty of elementals and the quest objective is probably considerably tame considering the respawn rate. I probably killed 20-30 elementals whilst doing the quests here compared to the 12 bracers requirement, perhaps increasing this to 20 would be a prudent thing to do. I like the fact that there are 2 quests in the area, whilst doing these that are impossible to miss because of their location.
I do wish the escort quest had more synergy with the area though and went to every npc to get their spirit for the quest in the area, it goes to the one in the inn obviously but it would just make perfect synergy to go to every one of these on our way out of the zone, since alot of the npcs you have to go to in this area are also close to the named npcs you have to kill that has really great synergy aswell. Mostly the intial 4 quests in this area have amazing synergy and it could be made better with the escort actually being more expansive, I do like how the escort is fast paced though so thats always a plus.
The named mobs also have great variety and aren't just bland npcs like they can sometimes end up being. The follow-up located within the zone is also a lovely epic conclusion to these quick fire quests, I always loved getting like 5 quests for one area and handing them all in at the same time along with them having great synergy the area feels streamlined, fast and well polished. Like in Nagrand doing the village (can't remember the name sunspring comes to mind..). The 4-5 quests there had great synergy and your xp just always shot up after doing those areas, which is just a great feeling.
Regardless though this last quest is pretty epic since it's like YOU AWAKEN AETHERION TOO SOON, with elementals incessant obsession with capitals, just like me seemingly :). The immersion of this quest is really great with the spirits you released in the previous quest coming to weaken him, I would have liked for him to be a raid boss or have alot more hp in elite form so you really get a sense of him being weakened instead of him just going from elite->normal status as it feels slightly underwhelming imo.
Regardless though, I think this 1 quest hub really epitomises great questing, fantastic synergy and alot of quests clustered in a small-ish area so you end up doing 5+quests at the same time, but don't feel like you are doing anything special to complete them, so it takes the same effort as say 2-3 quests in one area but with the added bonus of just "getting 2 quests for free".
That is actually it for this area though, which is perhaps surprisingly quick but I mean that is exactly what happens when you have a polished zone and there is really little feedback I can give :(, other than make more quest hubs exactly like this one.. they are just perfection imo, since you get the story conveyed, you are totally immersed in the action and it's just fast paced BAM action.
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