I've been wanting to get in to World of Warcraft for a while now, and every time an expansion has dropped I have tried. However, every time, I run in to an area infested with spiders or a quest involving defeating the little scamps and I simply cannot progress. If it isn't clear by this point (or evident by the topic title), I have a mild case of arachnophobia (heretofore known as spiderphobia, as that is easier to type). It's a pain in this context, as I have really gotten in to the WoW business leading up to these walls and I do want to see the endgame which everyone keeps on raving on about, except the spiderphobia keeps me from getting anywhere the good stuff. I'm sure there are many people out there in the same conundrum.
 
So I ask you, long-time players of the WoW, is there a path (racial or otherwise) in this game which involves as few spiders as possible (preferably none)? Or do I have to wait patiently and hope The Old Republic is a capable competitor to WoW?

They are not gonna take out spiders just for the spiderphobes. Sorry dude. 

I have no answer, but I just had to respond because I know someone that is like that. I don't think he actually won't do it, but he will go well well out of his way in MMOs to avoid spider things. Thought it was unique.

I am scared shitless of spiders in real life. Seriously. I get paralyzed only by their presence. But it didn't stop me from making the game ruin my social life.

fake spiders are not as scary as real spiders. just in case you didnt know

There's lots of places where you can level nowadays, so you can skip a zone and visit another leveling zone if need be.
Don't play an Undead or Human, those have spiders in their starting areas as part of their quests.

I don't mean this in an insulting manner, so please don't take it as such, I'm just curious. I understand fear of Spiders, but what about them in the game scares you? I mean, realistically speaking, they can do no harm and it's not like they're realistic looking? 
 
But to be more helpful, I'm pretty positive the Human path has no spiders up to level 20 (Edit: The duder above me disagrees. I honestly can't recall spiders here though. But they probably know better, so maybe skip human). Or maybe there's one cave with them. Either way, just read the quest. It'll say if there's spiders. Skip quests with spiders. 
 
Avoid undead zones. 
 
I believe Dwarves and gnomes are safe too. 
 
I think Orcs and Trolls are safe too.. at least I don't recall spiders there. 
 
Never played Tauren.  
 
I believe the night elf starting zone has spiders. 
 
The best advice I can give is either just read the quests and they'll usually say if there's spiders. If there is, run away. Or just push through it - they aren't going to hurt you, but as I do not have a phobia, I guess I can't really understand.

You must overcome your fear of spiders with violence, as I did. 
I now live with a mentality of it's either me or them when it comes to spiders, and have learned to accept that the only path through life, involves encountering spiders. 
Virtual spiders is the first challenge you must face.

The best way to get over fears, is to confront them. Trust me when I say that the spiders in WoW will only hurt your character, and will not jump out of the screen to molest you. 
 
Confront them knowing that they aren't real, and it will help you with your Arachnophobia.

I'm scared of Elves. I think they should remove them

Maybe you can mod the game so the spider models are replaced with rabbits or something.
 
Also, game spiders don't jump at you, or teleport closer to you when you aren't looking, or crawl over your face while you're asleep.  So they really aren't as bad.

What is this?  I don't even....

If you get to the Wrath of the Ling King content, you do not want to group for Azjol Nerub or  Ahn'kahet: The Old Kingdom. Blizzard seems to be proud of several spider models they made for this expansion. They do look cool and are, appropriately, the only things in these dungeons.

" @Ryax: And that's why they're called irrational fears - they have a habit of ignoring logic or reason or reality.  For the record, this (http://www.27bslash6.com/images/spiderdrawing.gif) is fine by me, some of the giant tarantulas in WoW's human progression, aren't so cool. "

Overcome your fear and burn or smack the spiders in WoW around.

Even if you could devise a path to never encounter a spider throughout your experience in WoW (and I'm sure you could) you would inevitably run into hunters that have them as pets.  I haven't spent a great deal of time playing WoW since Burning Crusade, nor have I ever spent a great deal of time playing a hunter, so I can't speak to the popularity of the spider as a pet at the moment, but I'm sure plenty of them exist.

Try to think of them as pixels.

World of Warcraft isn't really a linear game - if you don't care for a quest, just drop it, and go elsewhere and pick up another one. There's tons of areas without spiders, so provided you're willing to do a lot of quest/area hopping, you should be fine.
You know, I'm downright terrified of spiders in real life too, but after years of playing against all types of grotesque monsters in video gaming, my arachnophobia just isn't triggered by virtual spiders anymore. In my case, my mind eventually just started to render them as what they are: a meaningless blob of pixels, and not any type of threat. Point being, I think the more exposure you have to spiders in video gaming, the less it will concern you (the same could be said of real life, of course).

Honestly, there are so many ways to level now that I think you could probably avoid spiders entirely if you really wanted to. Now, I haven't played in over a year, but my advice would be to explore other zones. If a zone has spiders in it, there is usually a different place you can go to level that will most likely not have them.  
 
I agree with avoiding undead, night elves, humans, etc because they have spiders in their starting zones, although keep in mind you can always leave those zones and level in a different starting zone (I leveled my druid in Durotar for example, I just like that zone better than Mulgore). Don't let the spiders keep you from playing a race that interests you.  
 
If you ever find yourself completely trapped with no zones to quest in, there are always instances you can run (although you might want to look up the dungeon on WoW Wiki before you queue up just to make sure there are no spiders). I believe you can also level up from Battlegrounds, although I found this to be much slower than questing (you will have fun though, I got my mage from 78-80 doing BG's and it was awesome.
 
Unfortunately, spiders are quite common enemies in WoW, so you may have to go out of your way to avoid them. However, I think World of Warcraft is worth the effort. Although I haven't played the game in a long time (mostly due to time constraints and money) I still recommend it to anyone who has the time and can afford the fee. It has quite a stigma attached, but I cannot think of a game that has brought me nearly as much entertainment. Definitely in my top 5.

"You know, I'm downright terrified of spiders in real life too, but after years of playing against all types of grotesque monsters in video gaming, my arachnophobia just isn't triggered by virtual spiders anymore."

Same problem here man, but any insect for that matter. I couldn't play twilight princess because of that so imagine how great my fear is. It would be kinda cool if I could get advice on how to confront this. One of the tips I got was to play it from a distance or minimize the screen until they look small enough and when you feel comfortable with it make them look "a bit bigger" so to speak until you've finally conquered said fear. Haven't tried it yet but seems helpful. 

Can't people who say "get over" your  spiderphobia just shut up? It isn't as easy as it sounds, just by telling people to get over it they won't overcome there fear. I have a hugh fear for spiders and I have stopped playing WoW completly but I think that a "No Spiders" toggle would be great! THink of how many more players could enjoy WoW and how mcuh profit Bliizard would make or they could just create a world without spiders so there won't be needed of a toggle button.

I don't like spider or any crawling insect for that matter but not to the point of not being able to punch them in the face in a video game. So it's hard for me to understand the problem you are facing. 
 
But I really doubt that you could have an option of "no spider". If they do, they open the box for every phobia. "No water", "No high place", "no bat", etc. I'm not saying that it's stupid because I respect people who have those fear as much as anybody. But it's probably not manageable since there's a lot of phobia that should be taken into account.

Can't people who say "get over" your  spiderphobia just shut up? It isn't as easy as it sounds, just by telling people to get over it they won't overcome there fear. I have a hugh fear for spiders and I have stopped playing WoW completly but I think that a "No Spiders" toggle would be great! THink of how many more players could enjoy WoW and how mcuh profit Bliizard would make or they could just create a world without spiders so there won't be needed of a toggle button.

@BombKareshi said:

@AssassinsDude96 said:

Can't people who say "get over" your spiderphobia just shut up? It isn't as easy as it sounds, just by telling people to get over it they won't overcome there fear. I have a hugh fear for spiders and I have stopped playing WoW completly but I think that a "No Spiders" toggle would be great! THink of how many more players could enjoy WoW and how mcuh profit Bliizard would make or they could just create a world without spiders so there won't be needed of a toggle button.

You registered just to post that? I think we've found ourselves a sockpuppet!

Would you have preferred he'd make a blog post first? lol

cant you replace the models for mobs in wow? I know people have been doing that for mounts. But they have a ton of different spiders in wow, maybe not worth it.
 
http://www.wowwiki.com/Category:Spiders

Problem is that spiders are a major mob type in WoW. Hell, you're not even safe in cities--hunters can walk around with them as pets. I'd also imagine that there are Star Wars spider variants in Old Republic.

@Darklight: I understand that but Blizzard would get a lot of more players if they made toggles but i don't think they should make toggles for "No Water or high places" that kind of ruins every role-playing-game

I would suggest changing the model of the spider to something nicer, like a cow. Model changing is very easy and there's tons of guides on how to do it on the Internet.

It would probably be best to confront them in a game first, no? Therefore WoW could perhaps help you.

We had a warlock in Wrath that was afraid of spiders. He could manage, but only if he didn't look at them too often. On Maexxna in Naxx, we had to face him away from the boss so he didn't see it. Luckily, warlock, so he could stand sorta sideways and still DPS. Every goddamn time he was webbed there was an AAAAHHHH on mumble. We still brought him though, since it was fucking hilarious having an ultra scared warlock standing sideways, flinging shadowbolts in fear of a huge spider.

One thing I haven't heard mentioned is if you are intending to play and avoid all spiders, for the love of god do not run heroic Deadmines.

@Keldrath: as a fellow arachnaphobe i can confirm that this man speaks the truth, first time i ran that with guildies they knew what would happen, i did not.

They still maintain my freakout was one of the funniest things they'd heard in some time

I still maintain they are all cunts