Stop Leveling Your Alts, Now!

For me, the greatest piece of WoW news for the day was the fact that Blizzard will probably introduce a Tome of Cold Weather Flight in patch 3.2. This news was announced on MMO Champion, WoW.com and probably other sites. If this goes through, you all have me to thank for, dear friends.

I jest, of course. Or do I? It's funny or merely coincidental but every time I cancel my subscription (and I do it on a monthly basis because I don't want my credit card to be charged automatically), the reason I give Blizzard for my cancellation is that I'm upset at not being able to fly through Northrend as soon as I land there. I keep telling them that ok, it may be fun to go through Northrend on horseback the first time but when I have to level another and another and another alt, it becomes very boring and daunting. I won't kid myself: this change is not my own doing. However, I'm sure a lot of other people have complained about the same thing and finally Blizzard has listened.

I am very glad they did. This will make leveling a lot easier, for alts at least. We still have to pay the 1000G "tax" but 70-80 will go a lot faster. 1000G is nothing though, compared to the speed and convenience of riding an epic mount from 70 to 80.

So how does this new item work? Well, some people are having trouble understanding it so let me explain.

• The Tome of Cold Weather Flight is a heirloom item.
• It will cost 1000 gold same as the Cold Weather Flying skill.
  
• It can be acquired once you reach level 80 from Mei Francis in Dalaran. He's the mount vendor NPC.
• The Tome is account bound, meaning you can mail it to any of your characters that are of the same faction and on the same realm.
• It can be used at level 68 to learn Cold Weather Flying, meaning as soon as you hit Northrend.
• It is consumed when used. Here's where the confusion lies. "Why is it consumed if it is account bound?", people are asking. Well, that's because it's a one-use item. It cannot be sold or traded to another character unless it's the same account, faction and realm. This also ensures that an individual won't be able to buy this Tome unless they have at least a level 80 character.

That's it in a nutshell. It seems like an amazing change and for that reason I've decided I'm not going to level any of my alts before patch 3.2. As it is, I have too many things to accomplish on my 3 level 80s. My alts are a 70 rogue, an almost-72 warlock and a 66 shaman. For the shaman it's gonna be a twofer: both the mount changes and the amazing totem changes will benefit him.

What can I say, I'm really excited about patch 3.2. It seems like Blizzard keeps on pushing great stuff with every major patch and for that I love them. I can only imagine what patch 3.3 will bring. I do have a couple of ideas though: an overhaul of the ammunition system for hunters and the shard system for warlocks.