That’s Dolanaar. Darnassus is the capital city.
Oh. Stupid night elf names all read the same to me anyway.
Three actually, if you swim from Westfall you can enter through the harbour and then you can use the canals to navigate most of the city, only real danger is Officer Brady and his Hooked Net.
It took me forever to understand the difference between Aldrassil and Teldrassil, too.
Oh! You can also take the boat directly from Auberdine now 
Darnassus is the capital. The lowbie town in greater Teldrassil is… ah crap, I’m blanking on the name.
And it’s still not that hard (of course, I did it on an 80 with a fast mount). You just facepull your way through the porter, then ride like bleeding hell for the druid’s enclave. Once you’re over that last bridge, hang a right, bypassing the warrior’s terrace, and out over one of the side hills of the front gate (bypassing the paired guards at the arch). Once you’re out of Darnassus, you’re home free as long as you keep an eye out for the (very rare) sentinels on the road. Once you get in sight of Dolanaar, cut cross country. The fire’s on the edge of the town, away from any major npcs.
Oh yeah, I completely forgot about the Harbor.
Yeah Stormwind security is like a sieve. The only thing it’s got going for it defense-wise is all the canals, which force you to weave around alot and provide choke points for invaders.
Also, if you do end up dead, you can blow the 25% damage costs and just res at the spirit healer, which is right next to the fire. (Which is how I did it on my DK last year, when there were a buncha level 80 Allies hanging around Darnassus).
I’ve gotten through Darnassus on more than one occasion just running straight through. NPCs can’t keep up with an 80 on an epic mount, and you can lose them in the Teldrassil wilds. Of course, it helps if there aren’t any PCs around.
Well, the Alliance inn *is *part of our enclave–it’s just set up with two separate entrances instead of one main one like the Horde. Everything connects in the back, though–the inn isn’t a completely separate building.
You’re saying you were seeing exactly the same twinks every time? That would be odd. It could be that they’re just avoiding activities that give the largest amounts of XP.
And you can even get around *that *somewhat with a DK or a Shaman, either of which will let your ass run all over the canals.
If I’m trying to infiltrate an opposite-faction capital, I prefer avoiding what guards I can. I don’t remember if a lvl 75 (the capital guards) can knock a lvl 80 of his/her mount, but I don’t want to find out, either. That’s when things go pear-shaped.
Meh, we don’t even bother to defend SMC or TB on my server; those are freebies. If you’re hitting Undercity or Org, then we pay attention.
Meanwhile the NElves get their enclosed playpen of a newbie zone while our trolls and orcs get their newb area rampaged through at will by the local Alliance jerks who love killing quest NPCs.
OH NOES! The Crossroads is being attacked!
Really? To tell the truth, I don’t think I’ve ever actually gone back into the Alliance inn (on my Alliance toons) farther than the bar. Most of the time, it’s 'port, let the client catch up, run out the door.
Y’know, it’s a good thing Alliance can’t actually read Barrens General. They’d probably try even harder to completely sterilize the zone for the sake of public safety.
This is the stereotype, but it’s old news; Barrens General has been as dead as any other noob-leveling zone for a good long time. All of the stupidity has migrated to Trade.
I don’t want to be annoying, but a lot of this discussion isn’t really doing much for me, so if people still have things to say about getting started I’m afraid I’m going to miss them in the chatter.
Except in UC, you can’t see how many enemy players there are near the fire until you’re right in the middle of them, thanks to that little wall in the “gate” you have to go around.
I love the way the timing of the boat from Auberdine matches up so well with my belf paladin’s speed when she’s on an epic mount and has her Crusader Aura turned on: Get off the boat, ride directly through the portal, ride straight through Darnassus and out into Teldrassil, ride directly to Dolanaar, put out the fire (or whatever holiday thing you’re trying to do), remount and ride straight back the way you came, and when you get back to Rut’theran Village, there’s the boat waiting for you again. It hasn’t been sitting there the whole time - it’s traveled back to Auberdine at least once, and the timing just works out great. My pally never has to stop or wait at all. The only danger is the chance that a guard in Darnassus might get a lucky hit that dismounts her.
The hardest part is getting on the boat in Auberdine, but I found a good way to do that, too. I found a spot just on the forest-side edge of Auberdine, next to a small building directly across from one of the entrances to the inn. You can sit there on your mount without getting PvP flagged, and none of the guards will aggro … and you can see the boat arriving from Teldrassil (you can’t see the dock - you see the boat crossing the last bit of sea). As soon as you see the boat, just ride straight into and through the inn, race down the dock, and you can get onto the boat just as it’s pulling in.