My First Day in Pandaria

Months after seeing the majesty of the Jade Forest on the beta for Mists of Pandaria, I finally made my first foray back onto the island yesterday. I picked up the basic game at the local game store at midnight, but because we live on the east coast I wasn't going to be able to stay up until 3 AM when the expansion went live. Instead I went to bed because unlike some others I did not have the luxury of taking any time off work to play. I did manage to leave a bit early though, and all the way home I couldn't stop chanting, "Pandas Pandas Pandas Pandas!"

Eating a hasty dinner, my wife and I logged in together. She had actually already gotten to play, but spent the time leveling professions, waiting for me before actually heading to Pandaria. Elionene is and will always be my main, so along with Lal, we got sent on a special mission for the King of Stormwind to the mysterious new found land in the south. I enjoyed the quest set up quite a bit. I'm excited to experience new stories and lore again. 

I won't spoil any specific quests or things here for those that may have not have seen it all yet, but we played well into the evening and made it probably 65% of the way to level 86. In that time, I feel like we'd barely made a dent into the Jade Forest having just arrived at Dawn's Blossom before we stopped. In that time we had defeated horde forces, befriended two new races of people, and fought off an invading force of a third new race. And that was just the beginning of the zone.

As I said before when I was in the beta, the setting of Pandaria is beautiful. It's seemingly endless and so full of color. The Pandaren villages are bustling with activity, and there's always something to new and interesting around every corner. I found myself content just to look around and click on various NPCs to see what they had to say. One of the meditating Pandaren in the first village told me, "You are only good for ordering food at restaurants and spending your guild's money!' That made me smile. Later on, at Dawn's Blossom, a little Pandaren girl showed me she could burp. It was most impressive. 

One particular area had me in awe at the design. The Den of Sorrow is a small cave with water shrines inside, and a waterfall as well. A main story line quest takes you inside, so you shouldn't have to worry about missing it. The calm atmosphere of a haunted cave with the sound of falling water was so peaceful. Speaking of the sound, I was sure to turn up my music volume while playing, so I could enjoy the wonderful music in the new areas. One of my guild members was thrilled to hear a string duet in Pearlfin Village that was wonderful indeed. If you happen to be in Dawn's Blossom stop by the local inn, The Drunken Hozen, for what must be some of the best music ever composed for World of Warcraft. I heard several different songs upon leaving and entering the inn over the course of the night. They were all great.

The quests flowed smoothly from one to the other, and I have to say I'm enjoying the new quest reward system where everything you get is good for your class and current spec. As a hunter, spec doesn't really dictate gear choices that much, so that was one less thing to worry about. None of the items were upgrades to my normal Dragon Soul gear yet, but as we continued on the stat difference started to close. One quest even gave us a new vanity pet!

While there were plenty of the regular kill and fetch quests, there were a few other quests that stood out. A set of three or so quests have you reliving a story as three different story tellers. Along with being fun and different, there was a small story reveal that propelled you onward. I thought it was really cool. If you want to make sure you don't miss it it's part of the quests in Pearlfin Village, which you should arrive at shortly after leaving the first Pandaren village of Paw'don, and involves the Alliance NPCs from SI:7.

I'm looking forward to continuing the story tonight, and maybe try our the first dungeon of the zone, Temple of the Jade Serpent.  I ran it during the beta, but it wasn't quite the same as running it with a guild group at level with quests. As I've done in the past, I plan to write a lore post about each dungeon, and how it fits into the overarching lore of Pandaria and the World of Warcraft. Happy hunting, and see you in Pandaria!

There Will Be Posts

The Mists beta inspired me to write again, yet I've done very little of it since then. I've also not been in the beta since then. Part of me wants to save it for the actual experience, and so my hope is that when that time comes, you'll start to see this blog come to life again.

Our guild finished up the legendary quest line in Dragon Soul for one of our rogues. We decided then to take a break from raiding to play other games and hopefully avoid burnout before the next expansion is released. A few of us have joined up to fight the spawn of the burning hells in Diablo III, while others are just taking time away from gaming altogether. The hard part now is going to get everyone back together, so we don't forget about playing WoW. We're such a small guild that unless it's a raid night, you're unlikely to see more than a few people online other than yourself at any given time.

As our last hurrah before the break, we did make a run through Karazhan on some level 70 characters. The fights and mechanics were still fairly easy with just class and balance changes, but it was fun to see that place again. I'll never get tired of the opera event or the scenery of Kara. It's still the best raid in the game, in my opinion.

What is everyone else doing as the Cataclysm ends and the Mists are set to appear?

Azeroth. Population: Lots of Zombies

They're everywhere! Well, at least in the places I've been. It appears that some mysterious crates showed up in Booty Bay, leaking a strange substance that when touched turns you into a ghoul after 10 minutes or so. Looks like Arthas is sending a calling card. The Lich King is on the move.

Thankfully, the Argent Dawn has already responded to the threat and placed healers at vital points near Alliance towns. (And maybe Horde too, but I don't know what they're doing.) If you get infected, you just need to find a healer and they'll be able to cleanse. Paladins, Priests, and Restoration Shaman can also purify your diseases if they are so inclined.

We'll have to watch for the increasing threat from the Lich King. It seems the disease is already growing stronger against the ability to cure it. What will happen when we cannot cure the disease at all?

So what's really going on? Well, this new in game event is heralding the coming expansion. It's a lot of fun, but it's also causing a lot of grief. Especially, my guess is, on role play servers. If we play this straight, no one should want to be a zombie. And if you do get infected, you should be relieved when a friendly Paladin or Priest cures you. We should be trying to push back on this new Scourge and seek information on doing it in a more permanent way. Unfortunately, even on Moon Guard, and other realms, a lot of people want to be zombies, and throw fits when someone cures them.

Add to this that since NPCs can be affected, many quest givers seem to be zombies or dead. For some reason people that become zombies like to flock to the early zones. I know that Auberdine was totally infected last night, and I can only imagine what the scene looked like in Goldshire. These days are not going to be pretty for people doing early questing. It's also been found that you can go to Shattrath where no one can attack you because of the neutral flag of the city. So you can run around turning people into zombies without fear of repercussion. Even Khadgar becomes a zombie.

So the mechanics of this new world event have caused the griefers to rise to the surface, people purposefully becoming zombies so they can kill quest givers and turn unsuspecting people into zombies. Again, role play would dictate that you try and avoid being a zombie at all costs. But IF you do become a zombie, then you should act like a zombie. But even then, you can have some respect for the player base and not run to a lowbie zone on purpose to cause problems for people.

I'm wondering how long this even will last. I've heard that it will gradually change as we get closer to the Lich King, but I wonder if the potential for griefing will continue. It's going to make the current holiday events and leveling a little harder to accomplish if I have to avoid zombie attacks all the time. But that's actually pretty realistic. If a zombie break out actually did happen, it would probably interrupt a lot of day to day activities.

It's Here!

We downloaded patch 3.0.2 last night and installed it. I actually had to make room on my hard drive to accommodate it. This thing is big! Then we joined the millions of people around the world as we signed in to the server and....waited to retrieve our characters. And then we waited for game to load. But hey, we got cool new loading screens to look at.

Actually, it took so long we set the laptops aside and started watching the TV show Chuck from Monday night. We got about halfway through it when we noticed that our characters got logged in. Of course things were buggy, our addons didn't work (so we disabled them), and everywhere you went was really crowded and thus our frame rates were low.

The first thing I noticed were the new achievements since as soon as you log in you achieve a bunch of stuff. Then my first thought was click my pets and mounts and make them the spell items and free up some bag space. As soon as I learned my first vanity pet I got the achievement, "Can I keep him?" Very cute. Of course, everyone and their dog has that achievement.

It was about this time that we got booted. So back to watching TV and waiting to load again. We got back in and it was immediately apparent that the pets and mounts we had just learned were no longer in our spell books. Oh, and we didn't have the items either. /panic. Apparently we were not the only ones affected, and we saw later on that it was a known problem and had something to do with display issues. I'm still waiting for the hot fix to this. I want my hippogryph back!

With that out of the way, Lal and Elionene headed to Darnassus to learn new abilities and talents. We chose Darnassus because we figured it would be the least crowded. Throughout all this, we had gotten on vent with a couple guildies and were talking back and forth about things. A few people in the guild were grinding their inscription ability. One of our members made it to 350 last night. He's crazy. Lal kept her Discipline/Holy build, moving a couple talents around to grab some of the new talents. Elionene stayed Beast master and went 51/10 into Marksman. I have the extra points for my pet and the ability to tame exotic pets, but for now I'm not sure which exotic pet I want. Another hunter in the guild made his way to Azuremyst Isle to tame the newly available core hound, The Kirken. He collects all white pets and mounts, so I was excited for him to get the only white core hound in the game. He's still deciding on a name. In homage to the mob and his quest, I would call him Kirkenstocks.

Salthier logged in and specced 51/10 Feral. I had to give up omen of clarity, but I really wanted to try out the new Berserk talent. It looks pretty crazy. I'll just have to grab omen when I get to level 71.

After doing all of this, and exploring the new Stormwind Docks, and seeing the hole where Dalaran used to be (and picking up the Going Down? Achievement by falling into the crater) it was already getting way past my bed time.

I heard through the guild forums that the server was still buggy. People were getting kicked every 30 to 60 minutes. And all of our addons are still a little finicky. Some work, but others some cause problems. Outfitter is especially MIA.

The other thing I really wanted to check out was the new calendar option. I really like how it looks, and that you can create your own events, but it's lacking in its ability to allow people to sign up. You can't just post a raid or event and have the whole guild see it. You have to invite people individually. There is a Mass Invite option that was always grayed out for me, so I'll have to take a look at that again. If you're interested in knowing more, Gun Loving Dwarf Chick wrote a fantastic blog post on it. I'm hoping Blizzard adjusts it to be more useful in the near future.

Tonight I'm hoping to try out my new talent trees in some dungeons or quests or something. We have a guild meeting, after which we are going to pub crawl and try and pick up the achievement to drink 25 different beverages. Should be fun.

Lessons in Lore - Kel'Thuzad

Because we had a long weekend and I forget to put it up last week, here's a lore post for you.

Kel'Thuzad was a high ranking member of the mages of Dalaran at the time of the second war. About 20-25 years ago. He had long been interested in Necromancy and was one of the key people who interrogated Khadgar about Medivh after the Guardian had been killed in his tower. His goals and views often differed with others in Dalaran, which made him all the more susceptible to the calling of the Lich King.

When Ner'zhul was made into the Lich King, he sought out people who may be willing to be his hands as they worked out his plan to weaken the inhabitants of Azeroth before the arrival of the Burning Legion. Kel'Thuzad was a prime target and he responded just as the Lich King had hoped. Drawn by the Lich King, Kel'Thuzad went to Northrend and offered his service to the Lich King in exchange for immortality and power beyond his wildest dreams. His mission was to return to the Eastern Kingdoms and begin a secret following of people that would worship the Lich King and undeath as a religion of sorts. Eager to prove his worth, Kel'Thuzad was more than happy to do this. And so was created the Cult of the Damned.

Eventually, the time to unleash undeath upon the people of Lordaeron came. Kel'Thuzad and his cult put cauldrons filled with the plague of undeath in towns around Lordaeron that were actually controlled by the cult. There is actually a quest involving these cauldrons in the western plague lands. This plague is what turned normal humans into the undead that would then mindlessly serve the Lich King. Many members of the cult were eager to sacrifice themselves in this manner. While undergoing operations in Brill, Kel'Thuzad was found by Arthas and Jaina Proudmoore. Arthas eventually killed Kel'Thuzad in his fight against the Scourge, but it was only the beginning of the end.

Haunted by Kel'Thuzad, Arthas was eventually driven into the grasp of the Lich King and became a servant himself. He then recovered the remains of Kel'Thuzad and burned a scar of death through the city of Silvermoon to the Sunwell where he resurrected the mage as a Lich, destroying the Sunwell in the process (or so we thought). Kel'Thuzad, along with Arthas, were then able to draw the Burning Legion into the world by summoning Archimonde, who then proceeded to wage war against the alliance and horde forces in Kalimdor, and was killed in the process. Arthas was then called back to the Lich King to protect him from Illidan, who had been tasked with destroying the Lich King for his betrayal of the Legion. Arthas prevented this and was reborn as the Lich King himself. Throughout all of this Kel'Thuzad kept a low profile, supporting the ultimate goal of the Lich King to be free of the Legion and to rule as he saw fit.

This culminated in Kel'Thuzad overseeing the Scourge operations in the plague lands from his citadel of Naxxramas. Within the context of the game, he was defeated by us, the adventurers in the game, but his phylactery, the source of his power, was given to the wrong hands, and not destroyed. This meant that Kel'Thuzad lived on. As of today, when Patch 3.0.2 is loaded, Naxxramas will have moved to Northrend, to fight another battle of the Lich King. I don't know all the details, but I'm eager to find all of the reasoning behind the move of Naxxramas and Dalaran in the expansion.

Gruul is a Big Meanie, and Other Thoughts on Raiding

With the 3.0 patch on the very near horizon, a few people in the guild have been after the Champion of the Naaru title which culminates in killing Gruul, Nightbane, and Magtheridon. Veritas as killed Nightbane, and with a coalition of other guilds, Magtheridon. Last night we tackled Gruul's lair.

The first thing that happened was that 8-10 people we expected from a guild didn't show, so we spent some time talking with other guilds and finally getting our 25 people together. We go in, we clear the trash, and we sit down to talk about High King. Sheesh, this guy is complicated. 5 mobs, five different types of tanking. We had a good guy directing us though, and we killed the group on our third try. Loot is passed out, people are happy, let's keep going.

Kill some more Ogres, and suddenly we're standing in a big room with a large Gronn staring at us with his one little beady eye. We discuss the strategy and we all run in and position ourselves. I figured out where to stand so that I don't get thrown around too much when he does his ground slam, so the shatter doesn't hurt me too badly. But the tanks are having some aggro issues and then a group of people go down during a shatter and the chain reaction starts. Raid wipe.

So now people have seen the fight and we go back in and try it again. We do a lot better, get him down to 40% or so before the raid dies again. By this time, people are a little tired, cranky and I think we spent some time filling some spots. Which of course meant that the trash respawned and we had to clear it again. That's fine, we want our titles!

Gruul again, and this time we have some new tanks who seem to be better on the aggro. It's going really well until the ground slam throws everyone together and people die. We are still plugging away, but our DPS isn't high enough to plow through the growths. I succumb to a cave in that I don't move out of quickly enough. More people leave the raid, we try to fill spots, but then the trash comes back again. Yeah, we've been there awhile. It pretty much ends the night, and while everyone had pretty high spirits throughout the whole thing, we are really disappointed we couldn't get him down.

25 person raiding is not my thing I don't think. And as mentioned before, I don't even want to think about what 40 person raiding was like. It's really satisfying when you do get it right and the boss goes down, like we did with Magtheridon last week, but the frustration and difficulty of making it happen makes me wonder if the benefits don't outweigh the costs.

In Northrend, all of the raids will be have 10 person versions. I'm excited about this, but also a little daunted. I'm a raid leader now in the guild, so I'm planning to push to 80 and be one of the first to gear up for Naxraamas. As a guild, we really want to progress, and we really want to see all of the content that's out there. So the question for me then, is how do I make this happen?

We've been pretty casual about raiding. Tonight we're going to complete our first full Karazhan clear when we kill Netherspite. I want to try and maintain that easy going attitude where raiding is done for fun AND for progression, and we don't have to sacrifice one for the other. But if we want to be able to progress through these 10 person dungeons, we'll have to make some changes about how we raid. And that's where I'm a little scared. I don't want to turn us into a hard core raiding guild. That's not Veritas. But we do want to do these raids.

It starts with the leader, of which I am one, so I'm going to do my best to lead by example. Step 1 is that I'm going to do my research on gear minimums for these raids, and make sure that people are at those minimums before we go into the first raid. It just makes sense, and it will mean less frustration in the long run. If people know that they have to be geared, and we don't make any exceptions, then there will be less confrontation in the long run. No one can claim that gear is what prevented us from killing a boss, for example, and then point out the ungeared person. It's just a matter of learning the fight and practicing.

Step 2 is a consistent team. This is where most of the problem lies. I imagine we'll get to level 80 and eventually 10 people will be geared to go into Naxxramas, the first level 80 raid, and we'll start going. But as more people get to top level and geared, when do they get to go? If you have a lot of people switching in and out of the team each week, it just means that it's going to take you longer to complete that raid, by virtue of gear being distributed more widely, and having to teach more people about the fights. So one of two things has to happen:

a) Have a loot system that rewards the more consistent people first, so that overall progression is kept as high as possible. Cons) The less consistent people aren't going to get first chance at loot, and that can cause some drama.

b) People that get to 80 and geared after we have a full team have to wait until we start a second team before they can start raiding. Cons) People waiting can get impatient, and feel left out.

From what I've seen, Veritas is going to lean towards the second option before we start establishing loot DKP. And that's fine. Ideally, after we get one group, the people who want to form a second group will help each other get to that point. This is probably what I'll stress. It's sort of how we did Karazhan, but it will need to be more structured for it to work, and for us to not be doing Naxxramas for six months before we clear it.

Step 3. You can't make everyone happy. And trying to make everyone happy will eventually make some people unhappy. Most likely the raid leader trying to make everyone happy. But at the same time, there has to be a general feeling of well being amongst your members that we are raiding, we are progressing, and we're all in this together, whatever stage we're at. Otherwise they'll just get disgruntled and leave. And we've had a fair number of people leave recently for reasons I don't fully understand, but that are related to how we raid. That alone tells me something has to change.

Thankfully I'll have 10 levels to think about it and plan for it before we finally take our first steps into the home of Kel'thuzad.

Lessons in Lore - Malygos, The Spellweaver

Malygos is the Dragon Aspect of Magic, and the leader of the Blue Dragonflight. At the beginnings of the world, the Titans left the dragon aspects in charge of affairs on Azeroth. Alexstrasza, the life giver, of the red dragonflight. Ysera, she of dreaming, for the green dragonflight, who we talked about before in reference to the Emerald Dream. Nozdormu, leader of the Bronze dragonflight, keepers of time, and the ones in charge of the Caverns of Time. And lastly, Neltharion, the earth warder, master of the Black Dragonflight, who corrupted, is today known as Deathwing.

Back in the day, before the war of the ancients and the fall of Neltharion, Malygos and his blue dragonflight were most intent on the uses of, the science of, and the art of magic. They were the most knowledgeable of the flights. Neltharion and Malygos were very close, as like to each other as brothers. This made it all the worse for Malygos when Neltharion betrayed them. Neltharion created the Dragon Soul, perhaps influenced by the Old Gods, and sought to bring the whole of the dragonflight under his power. Malygos was tricked into believe in the Dragon Soul was beneficial, and helped to convince all of the other dragons to join in giving power to the Dragon Soul. Instead, it gave Neltharion, now Deathwing power beyond power.

Deathwing proceeded to attack the dragonflights, nearly eradicating the entire host of Blue dragons. Malygos, retreated to his abode in Northrend, rendered mad by the loss of his fight and the betrayal of the Earth Warder. It would be many years before he was heard from again. The dragonflight was eventually able to free them from Deathwing's control, but the Dragon Soul, now called the Demon soul, ended up in the hands of the Dragonmaw orcs, who used it to capture and enslave the red dragonflight. The tale of their internment at Grim Batol is told in The Day of the Dragon by Richard Knaack. Krasus, of the red Dragonflight seeks the aid of Malygos to free the Red dragonflight. Malygos is at first reluctant, still mad with his loss. Krasus is eventually able to convince him to help by explaining how Deathwing is still at large, and was not completely defeated during the War of the Ancients. In the end, Alexstraza is freed along with the rest of the red dragonflight and pledges to assist the humans in their time of need for their part in rescuing her from the orcs.

The reason that this is important now is that we will be able to see Malygos at work in Northrend. It seems he has finally awoken from his madness, but he has seen what has become of the world over the last 10,000 years and is displeased. The humans are using arcane magic in greater amounts, and he fears that they will draw the burning legion to the world much like the High Elves did in Azshara many years ago, at the time Malygos lost his sanity. So he decides the best thing to do is wage a war against the humans, and especially against the wizards of the Kirin Tor. In response, the Kirin Tor move Dalaran to fight a double war against the Lich King, and against the Blue Dragonflight.

I'm actually a little upset by this development. First of all, I find it confusing that Malygos, who is one of the oldest and wisest of the dragon aspects, thinks that war with the Kirin Tor is a good option. For one thing, we've already beat down the Burning Legion in Outland and at the Sunwell. It's not like all the magic use is going to really cause them to be any more of a threat. On top of that, he's supposed to be coming OUT of his madness, but it seems like he's just jumping into a new madness, as the actions he is taking now have repercussions beyond just a typical war, such as the harnessing of ley lines and the effect that has on the world. So Malygos, who should know better, is creating new problems by trying to war against a single problem. On top of this, because of her oath to the humans, Alexstraza and the red dragonflight are helping the Kirin Tor fight against Malygos. I don't see how this can end well.

Malygos will be a raid boss in Northrend, similar to the Onyxia and Magtheridon now. Will we really be able to kill him? Is that the only way to handle the situation? And what will the repercussions of killing a dragon aspect be? I am at least looking forward to how these questions will be answered. And I'm thrilled that we'll be able to participate in these raids and the lore with 10 people.

The Lich King

Yes, the Lich King. He's the focal point of the upcoming expansion, and he was an undeniable focus of the lore leading up to World of Warcraft. But who is he? Why is he? And what does he really want? Why have we not heard anything from him recently, other than the undead that roam the plague lands? Let's start at the beginning.

Back on Draenor, about 70 so years ago, the orcs lived peacefully with the Draenei. The orcs were a shamanistic clan society who met yearly for festivals with the other clans. Each clan had a lead shaman, but the head of all shaman was Ner'zhul. It was Ner'zhul that was deceived by Kil'jaeden into thinking the Draenei were a threat and must be eliminated, so Ner'zhul started teaching the shaman to be warlocks, and things went down hill from there. However, before the Draenei were completely wiped out, Ner'zhul realized the deception, but it was too late. His apprentice, Gul'dan, was all too eager to please Kil'jaeden, and took over in leading the orcs to nearly wipe out the Draenei and build a portal to Azeroth, where they would continue their reign of terror. Ner'zhul was not killed after refusing to help Kil'jaeden anymore. He was kept around, and closely watched by Gul'dan.

Eventually, the orcs destroyed Shattrath. A few Draenei were able to hide out in Zangarmarsh with Velen, and the orcs concentrated on building their citadel and portal on the Hellfire Peninsula. Blackhand and Gul'dan organized all of this and then lead the orcish horde through the portal to Azeroth. Ner'zhul stayed behind at the Black Temple. During the second war, the portal was destroyed from the Azeroth side, and the resulting explosion on the other side injured Ner'zhul, who retreated with his clan to the Shadowmoon Valley. The clans fell to fighting each other and were in disarray. Eventually Ner'zhul was roused by Teron Gorefiend, who had discovered how to create other portals. Ner'zhul, using items that were obtained for him from Azeroth began to seek the power of these portals. One of the items he had recovered was the skull of Gul'dan and the evil forces of now dead apprentice affected Ner'zhul. In his madness for power, he ordered members of the horde into the unstable portal. It was through this recklessness, and the resulting distortions from the many portals opened, that Draenor was destroyed and became Outland.

As for Ner'zhul, after entering the portal he was captured by Kil'jaeden and tormented endlessly until little of his physical body was left. It seems Kil'jaeden had never forgiven him for going back on his oath on Draenor. After all of this, Ner'zhul agreed to serve Kil'jaeden again. Kil'jaeden took what was left of the spirit of Ner'zhul and put it into a suit of armor which he then incased in ice and placed in Northrend on Azeroth. Ner'zhul ceased, and the Lich King was born, his power magnified many times. The idea was for the Lich King to weaken the masses of Azeroth for the impending entry of the Legion. To make sure he obeyed, Kil'jaeden set several Dreadlords over the Lich King to watch him.

Eventually, the Lich King drew Kel'thuzad to his will and created the Cult of the Damned which spread the plague throughout Lordaeron. Terenis Menethil, the King of Lordaeron sent his son, Arthas, to investigate, which lead Arthas to Northrend. Here the Lich King continued his plan, coaxing Arthas to take up the cursed sword, Frostmourne. Arthas slew Kel'thuzad, but was submitted to the will of the Lich King. Upon returning to Lordaeron, Arthas slew his father, and the city was lost to the Scourge. After that, Arthas summoned back the Kel'thuzad as a Lich so that he could summon Archimonde and the Legion to Azeroth. This happened, but the combined might of the people of Azeroth proved too much, and Archimonde was defeated at Mount Hyjal.

With the Legion defeated, the Lich King was free to reign as he saw fit, and not as a lackey of the Legion, but he feared retaliation, and rightly so. Kil'jaeden found and used Illidan to fight against the Lich King. The Lich King in turn called upon his pawn, Arthas. In the end, Arthas won out, defeating Illidan before the Icecrown Citadel. Illidan fled to Outland, and Arthas ascended the mountain where he broke the frozen thrown and put on the armor of the Lich King, becoming once with the spirit that had once been Ner'zhul.

This is where things were when WoW began. The Lich King was newly bound to the man that had been Arthas. He still controlled the undead scourge that was ravaging Azeroth, but his power was diminished, and he now had the forsaken, a rebellious faction of the scourge led by Sylvanas Windrunner, to contend with as well. The people of the world were dealing with the black dragon flight and the many different troll threats, as well as the silithid of the old gods. With the opening of the portal, the Burning Legion was once again the first and foremost foe. The adventurers of Azeroth poured into Outland to relinquish control of that land from Illidan and the Burning Legion. Now with Kil'jaeden being forcefully kept out of this world, the Lich King has decided it is time to make his move.

We don't know what will happen, but something will cause us to turn our eyes to Northrend and recognized the threat that is the Lich King. And that he still hungers for power and control, and the destruction of all life.

Of Elves and Horses

It seems I'm finding it hard to write on Tuesdays since I don't have nearly as many interesting things to write about macros and addons as I do other things like lore and character development. It's not that there aren't macros and addons to write about, it's just I don't tend to think they're that exciting. I've got an idea for next week, but if I ever have trouble finding something to write about on a Tuesday maybe I'll substitute a light lore post instead.

In other news, Salthier achieved exalted status with Stormwind this last week, enabling me to get a Swift Brown Steed! This completes my goal of having him as an ambassador to Stormwind. It took a lot, and I mean a LOT, of rune cloth. Between Lal and I, we had about 700 pieces in our alt guild bank, and I bought about another 60 gold worth from the auction hall. I did do some of the quests in the starter areas, but I decided soon after that that I would prefer to spend gold rather than time working on the reputation. It all worked out in the end. Now I might look into getting exalted with all of the major cities to achieve the ambassador title that is coming with the expansion. While milling around Elwynn forest, I picked up a pet cat from the crazy cat lady, just so I could get a picture like this one.

Bogdan and Nadya didn't see much play this last week. I have a cool picture of them meeting the fire elemental on Azuremyst when Bogdan did his fire totem quest. I keep saying every week that I hope we play them more, and that's still true. The more I think about it, the more I really want to level my shaman up before the expansion comes out. I just have to convince Lal to want to play her mage! In a related note, we went to our local gamestop and pre-ordered two copies of Wrath of the Lich King. We're psyched.

Elionene got to go to Zul'aman last night, and we had a blast! We got the first two bosses down and almost made it to the third one before time, repairs, and respawns forced us to call the raid. Next week, Lal will be going, and we plan on taking down boss number 3 as well as hopefully getting one of the timed chests. It's a challenge, but we all really love it! There's talk of doing a two boss only run on Saturday for anyone who wants to go, since it resets every 3 days. I'd love to get in on this, but I'm not sure if we'll have the power to do it, unless everyone from last night wants to go again, but I don't think that's the case.

I'll leave you with this picture of Salthier, dead in Shadow Labyrinth. Before the third boss, Vorpil, is a room with patrolling mobs in the middle and mounds of skeletons on the sides. The skeletons can be pulled and AoE killed. I told my group that we'd be pulling the last two groups of skeletons together instead of seperately. Famous last words as we did kill them, but I bit it.