Ah, memories...

Everyone who has played World of Warcraft has select moments in their character's or characters' travels that truly seemed epic, awe-inspiring, breathtaking, rib-bustingly funny, or plain memorable. If you had to list the 10 most memorable moments of your WoW career, what would you choose? The first time you looted a purple item? The time you and a friend stealthed through an opposing faction city and assassinated their food vendor? Or maybe it's that long-awaited first kill on a tough raid boss? Well, after brainstorming on the train home earlier in the week, I came up with a list of 15-20 striking memories from my Paladin's travels, and narrowed it down to a top 10. Drumroll please!

10. Hillsbrad Foothills 40 vs. 40 PvP

Who remembers the time before cross-realm battlegrounds? The only way to strike up a dependable large-scale PvP encounter was to attack an enemy town and illicit a response from the nearest major city. On my server at the time, the best location was the Hillsbrad Foothills, more specifically the ground between Southshore and Tarren Mill. Whenever I was in Ironforge and I saw an alarm go up in general chat or local defense that Southshore was under attack, I dropped what I was doing and hopped on a gryphon, because those massive raids battling it out for supremacy in Hillsbrad made for a raucous good time.

9. Completing the Soulforge set

I ran Stratholme undead-side to kill the Baron so many times just for the Lightforge pants to complete the dungeon set, and immediately turned them into Soulforge. Not many people finished off the dungeon set upgrade quest, but I did every single step, and was very proud of my accomplishment.

8. Standing my ground in Southshore

I was level 60 and on my way to Scarlet Monastery to run a group of level 30-40 players through a few of the SM instances. When we landed in Southshore, there was a lone Tauren, PvP flagged, standing just out of range of the Southshore guards. His guild tag was "and two stealthed rogues", which I perceived to be trouble. However, one of the lowbies saw a red name and went over and whacked the Tauren. Well, unsurprisingly, two Troll Rogues came out of stealth and stabbed my lowbie charge. I wasn't about to let that deed go unpunished, so I flagged up and bashed one Rogue good, battled it out with the Tauren and the other Rogue until they decided to retreat to Tarren Mill. My other lowbies beat on the Tauren enough to help me bring him down. The second Rogue did escape to the safety of Tarren Mill, but I was pretty pumped, having taken on 3 Horde effectively by myself.

7. You have discovered the Gates of Stormwind

I played all the Warcraft RTS games. I had always wanted to see the city of Stormwind from a ground view, after playing through the previous games and reading all the instruction booklets filled with backstory and lore about the city and its inhabitants. When I walked through the gates to the human capital for the first time, I was not disappointed. The architecture, the statues of the fallen Alliance heroes, and the grandiose nature of it all was simply breathtaking.

6. My first Hakkar kill

Hakkar was far and away the most inventive fight I encountered before the expansion. Contrary to player nature, it was a fight where you had to jump into danger rather than out of it, and was fairly complicated for a 20-man encounter. My guild worked on him for a while before finally grasping it, but having the hunter pulling the Sons of Hakkar, the entire raid moving into/out of poison, the tanks all handling Hakkar, and simply the entire raid working as one unit was invigorating.

5. Stratholme

I loved everything about Stratholme. The hordes of undead. The embers in the air. The Scarlet Crusade holding onto the last bastion of life in the city. The realization that Balnazzar was in control of the Scarlet Crusade and was masquerading as a human. The 45-minute Baron run. Slaughter Square. The history of the location itself, being where Arthas descended into madness and started slaughtering his own people to save them from the undead plague. Everything.

4. Entering the Dark Portal

The day I loaded up The Burning Crusade, I stepped through the Dark Portal in Blasted Lands. The battle between the Legion and combined Alliance & Horde forces at the foot of the Portal, combined with the visuals of the sky and the new zone, with Hellfire Citadel in the distance, left me standing there just watching for a few minutes.

3. Tooooooo sooooooooooooon...

If you raided at all before The Burning Crusade, you know what I'm referring to. The first time Majordomo Executus summoned Ragnaros from the fiery depths in Molten Core was truly epic. A swirling mass of fire and brimstone, a gigantic glowing orange hammer, and a rumbling voice that reverberated the entire cave left me awestruck. After that, the encounter itself was intense! Several 1% wipes made the final kill that much more exquisite.

2. You have received [Sulfuras, Hand of Ragnaros]

Crafting my legendary hammer took me months of scrounging for materials and scouring the land for Sulfuron Ingots - my guild was pretty lucky with Eye drops so we had one drop before me, and the Warrior who received it used up the guild store of ingots. So I coordinated with both Alliance and Horde guilds to gather enough materials. The killing spree to the Black Anvil in Blackrock Depths for the final craft felt like a victory parade.

1. You have slain Illidan Stormrage

I posted previously about my guild's first Illidan kill. With guildmates falling over all around me and Illidan's health low, I hit Divine Shield and charged at The Betrayer with reckless abandon. To my disbelief, and with a little help from our Enhancement Shaman ankh'ing up and dropping his fire elemental totem, Illidan died with only myself and the Shaman surviving. It was, by far, the most intense moment of my WoW experience.

Well, that's my list. What's your's?