Ahh, Shattrath City, the gleaming jewel in the tumultuous hell that is the Outlands, where Alliance and Horde mingle amidst /wave and /glare, where Aldor and Scryer test the others’ defenses openly, and where demons of lag can quickly turn your gameplay into a mere slide show. In this last of the RP City Tour articles, at least until the next expansion, walk with me as I share a few tips about where the good places are to go here for some potentially good RP times.
Before getting in to deep, I should mention that this will be an incomplete article. If I had thought sooner, I would have written this much earlier, before I had chosen the Scryer as the faction to align my character with. Because of this, my character could not visit the Aldor Rise to scope out the good RP places there. What I have found are the places on the Scryer’s Tier and around the Lower City, and they are some good ones. However, know that once I have another character leveled enough and that has chosen the Aldor faction, I will most certainly amend to this article.
Taking cues from Ironforge and the Undercity, the Blizzard wizards built Shattrath City in a circular design, making it fairly easy to move around in. No place is far away from any other, and is made much more so by the fact that the vast majority of characters found here have flying mounts. You’ve read me talk much about character traffic in the cities of the earlier articles. Honestly, that’s nothing to the character traffic flowing around Shattrath, and is the main cause of the intense lag I experience when visiting the city. With that, I still believe that Shattrath is a city primed for some excellent RP, and once I get a RAM increase under my computer’s hood, I’ll be bringing my share of it here.
As usual, the map to the left shows the locations with potential for RP events, whether large or small. Starting in the Lower City section, and with what I feel may be the best place for RP here, look to the World’s End Tavern marked with the skull. While not vacant of NPC’s, the ones that are here really add to the RP ambiance, I feel. A waitress walks about as if taking and delivering orders, there’s a very drunk ogre near the bar, a socialite and her pet to be seen, and small rooms off to the sides of the main room for some space. I think the main draw of World’s End may be the empty stage, just waiting for some Troll karaoke, or a group of scantily clad dancing Night Elves looking to make some fast gold.
The tavern does also have a fully stocked bartender, provided the ogre isn’t drinking it all, which is always a plus. However, since it’s located in a neutral part of the city, you’ll often find opposing factions of all types coming and going. Now, I’ve not had a character engage in combat within the city walls, so I’m not sure what would happen, but this sets up one of the best RP moments I think you could have: a bar fight. Back in my Dungeons & Dragons days, a bar fight was something to beware and expect, and made for some highly entertaining gameplay. When the shout “drawn steel” rang out, you just knew things were about to get exciting. Of course, it all depends on your character’s personality, and the Shattrath City guards, but I can envision such a good time happening in a place called World’s End. Maybe I’ll have to test it out myself.
A number of X’s mark other locations in the Lower City. In actuality, they seem to be small hastily constructed and grouped refugee camps. However, their occupants, for the most part, seem to have abandoned them, and if you look closely at the collection of ragged tents and draped overhangs, you’ll see they don’t look any different than some flea market stalls. So, all of these places have the potential to house a small guild of PC vendors hawking their wares. I would love to hear such an announcement over the Trade channel one day of a band of RP merchants directing us to their stands for the best prices on everything in Shattrath.
As we move the tour to the Scryer’s Tier, there’s another X here, this one marking an empty wagon shop that could be used by a PC much like any other shop. An advantage of selling up on the Tier is one of being in close proximity to the Scryer Inn and NPC vendors, which both draw in a good amount of player traffic. The Scryer Inn (marked with the moon) is also another place to remember. It’s small, yes, but very cozy and comfortable, decorated in true blood elf fashion. With the food and drinks available from the Innkeeper, this would be a great place for some relaxing RP when the need arises.
The star marks the only empty house on the Scryer Tier, and could very well be used by a PC for his RP home. Sadly, none of the chairs here are usable, and the whole place is rather dull, but there’s room enough. I don’t know about you, but I can’t wait until Blizzard introduces woodworking and carpentry into the game. I’m going to have a character get so rich from making nothing but chairs. But I digress.
At the other end of the tier from the house (blue square) is a very similar building, at least on the outside. The inside looks like it should be a small meeting hall of sorts, with short stone benches in the main room and desks in the two small rooms off to the sides. Could be used by officers of a guild as the guild office, a place for guild meetings (provided everyone in the guild is Scryer), or any number of other uses.
The two green triangles mark the place of more buildings similar to the house and hall, though smaller and very empty. A small group of five to ten PC’s could probably make use of these without getting in the others’ way. The orange circle is where you will find an open veranda of sorts, with a few NPC’s standing around some drink laden tables as if on a lunch break. I don’t think this would be a bad place for a reception, or even perhaps a small party and celebration. With the Scryer Inn just at the other end, it’s a good close walk for those who get too drunk. Remember, never drink and fly!
The last place I want to show you is marked with the purple diamond, and is nothing more than a covered section of red carpet bracketed by braziers on each side along the length. This is one place I have in my mind as a possible location for a couple of RP events I may hold in the future. The red carpet should be a good clue as to what potential RP could be had here. I have not tested this theory out yet, but there doesn’t look to be any guards around close enough or wandering through for an Aldor aligned PC to aggro, which could very well be a good thing if that is so. Just have your favorite warlock and friends use Summon to gather those so aligned up to the place, make sure they don’t roam too far, and a good time could be had by all. If anyone has tried this out, please let me know!
So, with that, we come to the conclusion of this RP City Tour series! I do so hope that I have shown my fellow roleplayers something that they can make use of, and that you now go and make use of it. As it always is and will be, I do my best to share my thoughts and views on ways to better your RP experience within WoW, so, please, RP!
