I’d been mulling over the idea of taking an Alliance character through WoD. Why?

– I paid for the entire expansion. I therefore wanted to see the entire expansion. At least, the starting zones. I think I want to see a garrison that isn’t swamped in snow. I. Hate. The. Cold.

The “ugly” races get the “ugly” weather? Thanks Blizz!

– There are some cool folks who play on the Alliance side, and at some point I may want to have a toon ready to rock and roll with them.

– I dropped a chunk of gold and upgraded a number of heirloom items to 100.

The problem was time. Specifically, that I was leaving home for two weeks and would not have access to WoW by any means other than mobile desktop on my phone. That was fine for my follower’s garrison missions, but not for anything else.

If I was going to be AFK for two weeks, I wanted this character to start amassing garrison supplies as well as potential gear from follower missions. He could also get XP, gold, and various other goodies that came from patch 6.1.

Also, being the master of time management, this decision came the night before I was about to leave. That meant between packing my tooth brush and phone charger, I had to squeeze in leveling a character to the point where he had a garrison and at least one follower.

There was only one practical solution: level up a Horde character, then faction swap him once I got back.

It made sense. I’d run the Horde starting zone five times already, so I knew how to do it quickly. I wouldn’t be distracted by anything new on the Alliance side. Plus, I had an Orc DK that I wasn’t planning on doing anything with anyhow. He had professions that could make him some gold once he went to the Blue and Gold.

Ninety minutes later, my DK was standing in his garrison sending two (soon to be three) followers off on missions. He didn’t have many resources, so I’m hoping resource reward missions will be coming soon for him. But for the next two weeks, I’ll have something extra to work on.