So the beta is finally open and all the info on the expansion is leaking out. The cap has been raised to level 70 and the end game instances are opening up. Its pretty clear now that The Burning Crusade is going to be released at the end of November barring any major screw-ups on Blizzard's part.

Here are some things everyone should be comfortable with:

. Rep from Azeroth has little impact on the expansion. being exalted with ZG, CC, Thorium Brotherhood, Timbermaw, Argent Dawn, etc, etc has no practical application at level 70.

. gear from BWL gets replaced by level 63 in the new 5 man instances. gear from Naxx will be replaced between 67-70.

. There is no "gap" at 60. What I mean is if you level a new character, theres no significant difference going from 54-55 or 60-61. You don't "stop" to run scholo/strat/ubrs dozens of times, you simply decide to stop questing in Azeroth at some point and head over to Outland to continue leveling, maybe running dm/scholo/ubrs once or twice.

. Most of the first few weeks of the game will be spent in 5 mans and Karazhan at level 70. So the shift from 40 man raiding guilds to 25 man isn't going to be disruptive for a while.

. The new mounts cost varying amounts, from 1000g to the non-epic flying mount to 5000g to the epic flying mount (minus discounts). You need lots of new items to grind up professions. Gold is good.


So the question burning in my mind, and I am sure in many others, is what do you do know if you are in a fairly successful raiding guild right now? You are probably spending lots of time farming mats/consumables in order to raid aq40 or naxx and spending a good chunk of money on repair bills.

Are you thinking of rerolling for the expansion? Should you reroll now or wait till you can reroll a blood elf/draeni? Make your current main your "farmbot" and roll a new main?

Does it make sense for your guild to keep pushing in naxx? Or should you all just start farming for gold now so you are well prepared for the expansion?

Quite frankly the most optimal route is to just sell your current character (if geared well) and reroll come expansion. However I mostly play to enjoy time with guildies. Naxx is a bit draining however, in that I may spend more time online farming than actually raiding in a given week. Should I just stop raiding, farm & raise gold while still socializing with guildies? It seems like a bad thing to do, but while seeing Heigan or Gluth die the first few times was cool, now I just dread how many pots I have to drink before each fight.

I don't think any of the other TBC topics really fit this well, so just wanted to throw this out to see what other people who are going hardcore into Naxx are thinking. I can't even imagine how guilds who have a chunk of people who actually got into the beta are handling this, hopefully not cranking up the recruiting machine.

Until the day of the expansion, we're going to raid as normal. Naxx gear being useless straight away is a myth, it'll help you level for sure. Once the expansion hits, we're going to become a bit more relaxed while people level/reroll, and then at some point we might get serious about raiding again if we have enough people interested.

It's had an unexpected effect on me.

I've never been one to get overly ticked off over wipes and stuff but even the best of us get that little vein bulging behind our eyes on wipe night. You get a little antsy, start looking for the guy who screwed up, the raid leader starts sounding tired... you know the drill.

For me, it's been liberating. I could wipe a million time and not bat an eye. We're working on AQ40 now, ping ponging between Sartura and the Bug Trio. Lots of wipes. Don't care. It's fun and it's even more fun than it otherwise would be because I'm not staring at another year until other stuff becomes available. I go in, win or lose, and have just as much fun either way.

I made the decision of playing my warrior in the expansion so I stopped raiding. I do think i'll be taking my warlock to 70 but I would rather play the warrior first, especially since there are no tanking capable characters in my little perma-group of friends.

I'm rerolling, Draenai Shaman for the good of the guild, or whatever. My current main is goign to be an herb/mining farm bot. I've already decided, and dissed all my resist gear to sell for a jump start on my shammy. What would be a dream come true is if Blizzard would release just Exodar and Quel'thalas, so those of us who are going to be the Draenei Shammys and BE Pallys can get a jump start on the 1-70 grind. But it's not gonna happen, so I farm and I wait.