Exalted, two new areas, one long night

Thanks to running the SSO dailies for the past two weeks, last night I got this nice message:
Which also means that I now get these goofy messages from the NPCs:
But that's not even the big news. Last night, thanks to knowing people who know people, I made it into some new content.

I was literally one minute away from logging out for the night when Udevil got on vent and said that Origin was running a Lurker raid (SSC) and had several open slots due to a scheduling snafu. (They had both Kara and SSC down for the same night.) I glanced at my whiteboard and saw that the Spell Damage requirement for SSC was 900. I just got my [Spellstrike Pants] the day before and hadn't had a chance to properly gem them, but I was standing at 856. I had just finished a boatload of dailies and had some 350g and 20 Badges on me. It was a theoretical possibility that I might get close to 900. I asked Udevil to confirm that 900 was the requirement, which he did, and the guys thought I should go for it.

Ranii stepped up and offered to cut some gems for me, as the selection on the AH was pretty thin for reds. 300g got me one [Crimson Spinel], and 15 Badges got me a second. Slons offered to whip up some [Mystic Spellthread], and Ranii had the [Primal Mana] for it.

Holy crap, this might actually happen.

Skipping to the good part, it did happen. I was summoned and within a minute had two [Runed Crimson Spinel] and my spellthread. I got off the second elevator in SSC with exactly +900 Spell Damage.
Hi, ma!Wicked cool, eh?

Unfortunately, 4 wipes later we still hadn't downed Lurker. On the first 3 wipes I was in the last 3 or 4 people to die (being the very last on the first wipe), so I felt pretty confident that I had it down. But then 90 seconds into our fourth attempt I was the first one down. I was falling into the water as the Spout hit me. I hadn't tried to cut it close -- I jumped as soon as I heard the call. But I hadn't been paying enough attention to DBM and thus didn't have enough warning, as I was only a few degrees off from the tank that bought it at roughly the same time. We were the only two down, but the truth is that we just didn't have enough DPS.

Eventually the RL called it, as the fish had respawned. Everyone ported to Shatt and was told to head up to Gruul's. Awesome!

Maulgar and his crew took three attempts. There was some confusion as to healers and tanks and Hunter misdirects, so the Mage tank kept going down. I macroed a PWS for my focus, set it to the Mage tank, and spammed it whenever the timer was up. I doubt it helped all that much, but every little bit, right?

On to Gruul!
Grr! Arrgh!

Gruul was a one-shot. We didn't have much time left on his Enrage timer, and the tank got to the point where he was being hit for almost 10k a shot, but the healers kept him up and the band played on. I managed to avoid most of the cave-ins, only missing the animation on two of them. I ran out of mana literally as Gruul went down: a Flay was cut short with an oom message (stupid bug), so I know I had exactly one left. Gruul dropped a second into it. That was just too cool for words.

I came out in DPS just behind the other Shadow Priest, Caspin, who was the raid leader. For it being my first time at Gruul and not being sure of myself, I'm not unhappy with that.

It was a long night, but it was fun. I honestly didn't think I'd make it into SSC any time soon. I'd been hoping for a Gruul PUG, but this worked out so much better.

I do it on the daily

My Daily rotation doesn't require any rep grinding to start, nor any group quests. (Ogri'la and Netherwing Dailies require a bunch of group quests before you can get to the daily quests.) It does, however, presume that your server has unlocked all of the SSO quests.

Start in Shattrath. Pick up:

1. [Maintaining the Sunwell Portal] from Nasuun at the Quel'danas portal (10g)
2. [The Multiphase Survey] from Haronem on the upper tier by the BG ramp (9g)
3. [Gaining the Advantage] from Mordin by the flight point (16g)
4. [Sunfury Attack Plans] from Torvos right next to Mordin (10g)

Fly to Nagrand.

1. Fly to Oshu-gun. Don your [Multiphase Spectrographic Goggles] and get your 6 multiphases.
2. If you are a skinner, while at Oshu'gun, kill any [Aged Clefthoof] or [Clefthoof Bull] mobs you see. Fly back toward Garadar and kill more clefthoofs until you've got all of the [Nether Residue] you need. You should also get a few [Oshu'gun Crystal Powder Sample], [Clefthoof Meat], and [Thick Clefthoof Leather] which are good for Halaa and the AH.

Approximate time: 15-25 min.

Fly to Blade's Edge.

1. Head north to Bash'ir Landing.
2. Kill ethereals until you get your [Bash'ir Phasing Device].
3. Phase, then kill [Phase Wyrms] and pick up [Smuggled Mana Cell]. You should get a few [Mote of Mana] and [Apexis Shard] Save the shards for the Ogri'la questlines later.
4. If you need to farm [Mote of Fire] for crafting, head east and kill off a few [Searing Elemental].

Approximate time: 15-25 min.

Fly to Area 52.

1. Run west to Coruu and kill BElfs until you get your [Sunfury Attack Plans].
2. If you need to grind Consortium rep, head south and kill ethereals to get [Zaxxis Insignia]. It's not worth any gold, but it does convert to rep.

Approximate time: 5-10 min.

Hearthstone back to Shattrath and turn in those 4. The whole trip should get you 45g and several mats for crafting or the AH. If you're lucky, the whole trip will take 30 minutes. If the drops aren't so good, it might take an hour.

Port to Quel'Danas. I'm not going to bother detailing the SSO Daily quests here, as they are all on one place.

• [Further Conversions] (9g), [Arm the Wards!] (9g), [Crush the Dawnblade] (12g), and [Open For Business] (12g)
• [The Battle Must Go On] (10g), and [Know Your Ley Lines] (12g)
• [The Air Strikes Must Continue] (9g), and [Keeping the Enemy at Bay] (8g)
• [Don't Stop Now...] (12g) and [Disrupt the Greengill Coast] (12g)

Approximate time: 60-90 min. Revenue: 105g.

Pick up two more quests before you leave Quel'Danas: [Ata'mal Armaments] (18g) and [Rediscovering Your Roots] (14g).

Hearthstone back to Shattrath.

Fly to Shadowmoon Valley.

1. Fly out to Ata'mal Terrace.
2. Kill Shadowmoon orcs until they drop enough [Ata'mal Armament].
3. Fly to Skettis.
4. Pick up [Fires Over Skettis] (12g) from Doryn.
5. Bomb the eggs.
6. Land and talk to the Skyguard Prisoner to pick up [Escape from Skettis] (9g).
7. Help the Skyguard Prisoner escape, then fly back to Doryn.
8. Fly to Razorthorn Rise.
9. Kill [Razorthorn Flayers] until you get a [Razorthorn Flayer Gland].
10. Use the gland on a [Razorthorn Ravager] and get it to dig up [Razorthorn Root].

Approximate time: 25-45 min. Revenue: 21g.

Fly to the Throne of Kil'jaeden in Hellfire Peninsula.

1. Talk to Seyla to get [Blood For Blood] (12g) and [Blast the Gateway] (10g).
2. Use your [Sizzling Embers] so that your [Fel Flare] is out as you kill 8 [Fel Spark].
3. Kill [Wrath Herald] to get [Demonic Blood].
4. Use the blood on the [Felblood Initiate] to de-elite them, then kill them.
5. Use the flare to blow up the gateway then turn in the quests.

Approximate time: 15-25 min. Revenue: 22g.

Fly or Hearthstone back to Shattrath. Port to Quel'Danas and turn in the last 2 quests for 32g. Use the [Darnarian's Scroll of Teleportation] to get back to Shattrath.

Total quests:	20 Dailies.
Total revenue:	225g, several greens, some crafting mats.
Total time:	2h 15m to 3h 45m.
Realistic time:	3h.
Wage:	70g-80g per hour.

While you can certainly farm for stuff that will AH for more than 80g per hour, call it 100g per hour including all of the extra motes and greens that you get, it won't be nearly as varied and far more boring. It also probably won't get you nearly as much rep as the Dailies will. You get a ton of SSO, some Skyguard, and even some Consortium if you kill a few extra things along the way.

During the Midsummer Fire Festival, the Daily [Striking Back] is good for 7g and can be done in under 5 minutes including travel time while you are in Hellfire. If you make it back to a main city at any point, you can also do [More Torch Tossing] for 12g and, if you have enough skill, [More Torch Catching] for another 12g. If you are geared and can get a good group, you probably want to do [Summon Ahune] on Heroic for the extra badge instead of one of the torch quests.

That should leave you with 2 free Dailies. One, of course, should be the Daily Heroic for the Badges. The other, also of course, should be the Daily Battleground for the Honor. If the Daily BG is AV, I suggest you take the time to do it before all of your other Dailies. You have a better chance of getting Biscuits in AV than any other BG, and an 80-stack will easily last you the rest of the day.