Cataclysm Realm Firsts

World of Warcraft has had an achievement system built into the game for the last couple years. The vast majority of these achievements are things everyone theoretically can do if they play enough or are good enough. These achievements are worth points (that do nothing tangible, it's just a number you can make bigger) and sometimes also grant extra things like titles, pets, or mounts. The rest of the achievements are what they call "Feats of Strength". These tend to be things you could have done in the past but can't do anymore due to changes in the game over the last 6 years. Things you may want to have a record of, but which other people can't do so it wouldn't be fair to have them be worth points. Others are things people theoretically _can_ do but it would be unreasonable to do so. (Such as Insane in the Membrane which took me the better part of 6 months to get done.)

A few of the Feats of Strength are for doing something first. The first to clear a dungeon on hard mode, or the first to hit max level. With the next WoW expansion due to come out any month now it's time to think about the impending Realm First Feats of Strength. I didn't get one of these last expansion (starting at level 55 with no trade skills meant a lot were out of reach) but really want to get at least one this time around. The first two WoW expansions I was starting over with a new main; this one I'll be sticking with my current character so I have a big gear advantage for the first couple levels.

Sky made a post recently about how he intends to turn a massive amount of gold into realm firsts for his two crafting professions. I have a less massive amount of gold but still a pretty substantial amount and could try to do the same... Only problem there is we're both Jewelcrafters. There's no Realm First Loser achievement, so getting second place is right out. Sky has more than four times my gold, but I think the amount needed to get to max is less than what I have. I definitely think I could get it over him, but I also think if I try for it that he could get it anyway. There are many different achievements I could go for, so I figured I should take a look at all of them and see if there isn't a better way to spend my time and money than going for the same thing as my friend.

Now, for historical data I could look at worldwide or just at Vek'Nilash. Vek is pretty widely regarded as a terrible server with not a lot of players so getting these things 'should' be easier here than on an average server I would think. Unfortunately there's no easy way to get worldwide data but I can easily get "Americas" server data, so we'll go with that.

Level 85.

• Took 1 day Americas, 2 days Vek.
• Involves just playing a lot for a couple days and focusing on questing and maybe running each dungeon once to do the quests.
• Can be 'cheesed' by having an out of group healer or body-puller to just drag mobs to you. I believe a guy from France did this last expansion and got it done in less than a day.
• Or by having someone else play for you when you sleep.
• Should probably stock up on flasks and food beforehand.
• Low downside to trying and failing. Even without achievements I'd be playing a lot on expansion release.
• Assuming comparable leveling speeds may come down to who has the better sleep schedule timing.

Level 85 Death Knight

• Took 2 days Americas, 4 days Vek, took me 10 days. (I was actually closer than it looks, but once it was clear I wasn't going to win I got other stuff done and went back to work.)
• Nothing special compared to the above. Is a potential consolation prize if I lose out on 85 in general.

Level 85 Night Elf

• 1 day Americas, 3 days Vek.
• Same as above. Note that all three of these achievements can be 'tracked' in real time. I can get updates on what level everyone is and can push harder or abort as needed.

Max Level Herbalism, Skinning, Mining

• All done same day both Americas and Vek.
• I don't have any of these tradeskills right now and don't want them longterm. (They give worse raiding bonuses than jewelcrafting/blacksmithing.)
• Could be used in conjunction with another trade skill to alleviate the gold cost of powerleveling it.
• Americas the guy who got first miner also got first blacksmith. The same is true on Vek. (Different guys.)
• Has the big upside that if people are paying through the nose to get these achievements (hi Sky!) then by being a gatherer you can make a mint. I'm not sure what I'd do with a mint, though...

Max Level Fishing

• All done the same day. Presumably by people who went to a midnight release, went to a trainer, bought the skill, hearthed to Ironforge, and fished until they hit max.
• I do still need to catch Old Ironjaw, so fishing for a few hours in Ironforge isn't the end of the world for me. It does make it extra unlikely to get the level 85 ones if I spend 6 hours not leveling.
• I do like fishing, and I'm pretty sure I was the world first DK to get the Salty title for fishing. The internet isn't being a lot of help here but it took me barely a month to get it. Certainly one of the first, anyway, and it would be nice to have a realm first related to fishing.
• If I spend the first 6 hours of the expansion fishing in Ironforge and don't get Old Ironjaw or the realm first it will really, really suck.
• Or I could find a nice expansion fishing hole and get new fish to cook with while striving for the achievement...

Max Level Cooking

• 1 day Americas, 6 days Vek.
• No one cared enough about cooking to power level it last expansion on Vek.
• Not even sure how you'd try. Kill lots of beasts? Focus on fishing pools? Get everyone in your guild to mail you meat? If they did the same mechanic with the spices then you probably would want to get people in your guild to loan/sell you spices to start.
• Being a cook really has no benefit.
• On the plus side, I do have the faster cooking hat!

Max Level Firstaid

• Same day Americas, 1 day Vek.
• I'm sure this goes to someone who buys/borrows all the cloth early on.
• Being a tailor undoubtedly helps for scooping up the bonus cloth.

Max Level Archaeology

• The level 80 version of this achievement hasn't been handed out yet and apparently does exist. So there are two up for grabs here: first to skill 450 and first to skill 525.
• Archaeology looks awesome. You can get epic weapons and armor for level 85, along with pets and mounts. It looks like something that someone into optimizing their routes will be able to level faster than other people. I expect someone with time and skill will beat someone with time. (As opposed to fishing, for example...)
• I want to level it eventually since apparently it will grant a minor raiding bonus. In order to level the skill as I level in game I'd need to go back and power level it anyway. If there were no achievements I'd probably go back and do this right away, or level in dungeons when my guild had a group together and otherwise do excavating.

Max Level Blacksmithing, Jewelcrafting, Engineering

• The tradeskills which require mining mats to level.
• Americas they were all done same day. On Vek it took 2 days for blacksmithing and 4 for the other two.
• Unless the raiding benefits change I'll want to level blacksmithing and jewelcrafting eventually anyway.
• I expect it will be substantially cheaper to do so a couple weeks after launch, but there's no guarantee that will actually hold. It really depends a lot on how much inflation exists in new quest rewards and in how many exploiting farmers we have.
• Getting high level jewelcrafting early means making a fortune prospecting ore and cutting gems.
  

Max Level Tailoring

• Took 3 days in Americas, 7 days on Vek.
• Would help get first aid.
• There's no way I'd keep it longterm, so I'd be picking it up solely for the achievement.
• I know next to nothing about it. Did it take that long because of cooldown issues? Or would it just be buying massive amounts of cloth?

Max Level Enchanting

• Took 2 days in Americas, 12 days on Vek.
• Wow, Vek was really bad at getting this done last expansion.
• You can turn massive amounts of cash into greens into enchanting mats fairly easily.
• You can enchant scrolls now (though you could last expansion too) so it wouldn't even be a huge waste of money to do so.
• Being in a guild that runs a lot of dungeons and will want to enchant their blues for heroics provides lots of opportunity to get 'free' skill-ups.
• I suspect someone else in my guild will already be going for this, so I'd be in the same boat I'm in for jewelcrafting.

Max Level Leatherworking

• Took 3 days Americas, 12 on Vek.
• Uh... Double wow. Vek was really, really bad at getting this done.
• I don't really want to be a leatherworker.

Max Level Alchemy, Inscription

• Alchemy was same day/4 days. Inscription was 2/10.
• My rogue alt is currently max inscription and I have no intention on leveling it again. Sky wants to do alchemy and if I'm going to challenge him on something it'll be the one I already have, thanks.
• I could try to hit max on my rogue, but I'd really rather have these achievements on my main. If no one gets it in 7 days though maybe I'll double back and scoop it up...

Interestingly, it looks like there's a new one added in not for players, but for guilds...

Realm First! Working As A Team

• First guild on the realm to obtain 525 skill points in all professions and secondary professions.
  
• I think more than anything else I want this one.

So, what should I do? There's lots I want, which may be the biggest danger. If I go 85% at a bunch of different things will I get any of them? (If it was last xpack and I was going for cooking or inscription the answer is yes, otherwise no.)

I like the idea of picking up mining and angling towards first miner/blacksmith/85 DK. I also like the idea of just doing archaeology. And then I like just fishing and turning those fish into potential cooking. Tailoring into first aid has a certain appeal as well. And part of me still wants to take Sky head on and charge for jewelcrafting. Or if it turns out my guild has everything covered but something specific I could dive into that and aim for the guild achievement...