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WoW's 10th Anniversary celebration starts tomorrow
It's kind of amazing to realize that WoW turns 10 tomorrow, and we get Molten Core and Southshore vs. Tarren Mill to celebrate. The fine folks at Wowhead have a detailed guide to the anniversary for you to look over. You can get an epic ilevel 640 helm, a weapon glow effect, mounts and pets from MC, titles from the new battleground, and of course the celebration package in the mail with an item to boost your reputation gain with Warlords factions. It's not often that an MMO gets to be this big this long. We even got to see 10 million subscriptions for the 10th anniversary. Party time!
Blizzard releases World of Warcraft's 10th Anniversary details
So, today the folks at Blizzard posted more details about the upcoming 10th Anniversary of World of Warcraft, featuring the Tarren Mill/Southshore deathmatch BG and the revamped level 100 40 player LFR version of Molten Core. One thing we now know for sure is that Molten Core will become accessible on November 21 (a week after the launch of Warlords itself) and last until January 6th, 2015. This gives you a little more than a month to get to level 100 and run the revamped Molten Core. It's a little worrying to me that you'll have to hit 100 and run this content (remember, it's a 40 person LFR) during the holiday season, but that's what we are currently being told. Also, thanks to the folks at Wowhead we also know that there are four helmets you can get when you defeat Ragnaros - an updated Crown of Destruction and plate, leather and cloth versions. In addition, Ragnaros drops the Core Hound Chain as well. The new battleground will have a 90-99 and 100 version, and winning either version of the Southshore/Tarren Mill battleground will reward you with the Tarren Mill Terror title for Alliance players and the Southshore Slayer title for the Horde. Rated PvP play will begin on December 2nd, and the first raids will begin opening at that time with Raid Finder and Mythic difficulty opening the next week. A full schedule for the raid releases is incoming. So that's how things stand so far. Looks like you'll want to get to 100 as quickly as possible if you're looking forward to that Molten Core LFR or the Southshore/Tarren Mill deathmatch.
World of Warcraft will offer minipets and nostalgic gameplay for its anniversary
As World of Warcraft gears up for its 10th anniversary in November, Blizzard has announced its plans for celebrating. Of note, the team is creating a 40-player raid finder version of Molten Core for "max-level" characters, who can "relive the experience of hunting down Ragnaros and his minions" and snag a new mount and achievement. A new deathmatch-style battleground will also be opened in an attempt to replicate the early Tarren Mill/Southshore PvP experience. If you don't really care about nostalgic raids and PvP, how about some free stuff? WoW will bestow a Molten Corgi minipet on everyone who logs in during the event.
World of Warcraft's 10th anniversary preview
Ten years is a long time. Ten years ago, in 2004, I was 20 years old and entering my third semester of college--also entangled in endless piles of paperwork while I prepared to spend a year studying at the University of New South Wales in Sydney for the calender year 2005. Ten years ago, in November 2004, World of Warcraft officially launched. The mark that WoW has left on the gaming industry is indisputable--but we're not here for musing retrospectives. At least, not yet. We're here because there's going to be a whole bunch of fun in-game events to celebrate WoW's first decade of existence, and Blizzard has given us a lovely preview of what at least a few of them are.
WoW Archivist: The battle for Hillsbrad
WoW Archivist explores the secrets of World of Warcraft's past. What did the game look like years ago? Who is etched into WoW's history? What secrets does the game still hold? Almost ten years later, people still talk about the Southshore versus Tarren Mill battles, the most infamous and celebrated world PvP in WoW history. They go on about how glorious it was, how they'd like to see that kind of intensity return to world PvP. It's not often, however, that they discuss the details. If you want to know exactly what it was like to fight in those battles, keep reading. I lived it. My old tauren hunter still bears the scars. Pull up a bench and pour yourself a glass of ale. I will tell you about the war. Why Hillsbrad? Several places on Azeroth in classic WoW had two faction-specific towns in close proximity. You had Astranaar and Splintertree in Ashenvale. Arathi Highlands featured Refuge Pointe and Hammerfall. Theramore and Brackenwall squared off in Dustwallow Marsh. A few others had proximity also. So why didn't any of these pairs become as legendary as Southshore and Tarren Mill? The fact is that battles did happen here -- some fairly major ones, too. World PvP ran rampant in the early days, even on PvE realms, and even before the honor system arrived to reward you for doing it. Many raided faction villages for the simple joy of denying your enemy a stronghold, a questgiver, or a flight point. Such players sought out undefended towns, which these others often were, at least when you first struck. Other players wanted resistance. They wanted to march forward as part of one vast army of players into an equally imposing force. They wanted the chaos, the rush, the endless bloodshed, the death cries of their foes echoing all around them. And they knew exactly one place you could find that experience, at virtually any hour of the day or night. It had to be somewhere. Early forum threads began to buzz about such battles taking place. As word of mouth spread, more players wanted to make it happen on their own realm. It became the thing to do. But why there?
WoW Archivist: 11 moments from WoW's history that should become scenarios
WoW Archivist explores the secrets of World of Warcraft's past. What did the game look like years ago? Who is etched into WoW's history? What secrets does the game still hold? Next year is WoW's tenth anniversary. It's hard to believe, but it's true! If the typical timeline holds, the next expansion will release a few months prior to that anniversary. You have to believe Blizzard wants to pull out all the stops for this milestone. What better way to celebrate ten years of WoW than by crafting scenarios to relive the best moments? It's possible that Blizzard is planning a time-based expansion centered around the Bronze Dragonflight. The Keepers of Time could send us on missions, much like the Caverns of Time dungeons of expansions past. Only instead of lore moments from the distant past, they could be moments from WoW's own history, including events driven by the community and removed content that players may not have been able to experience. Here are 11 examples that I would love to see. 1. The Blood Plague What: The Alliance seizes a rare opportunity Where: Original Orgrimmar When: Patch 1.7 As WoW Archivist previously covered, the Corrupted Blood plague began when players used "creative game mechanics" to export a boss ability into the general population. The unstoppable and highly contagious plague debuff devastated cities around the world as thousands of players and NPCs alike succumbed to it. The resulting chaos became an excellent model for how real-world diseases could spread. This scenario would take place at the height of the plague and have different versions for Alliance and Horde. Alliance players would accompany NPCs on a strike into Orgrimmar. They would take advantage of the deadly outbreak to make an attempt on Thrall's life. Horde players would defend the city and their Warchief while trying to contain the plague. Why Orgrimmar? Due to the time frame, Blizzard could reintroduce the original version of the city.
Know Your Lore: Update on current Horde politics
The World of Warcraft is an expansive universe. You're playing the game, you're fighting the bosses, you know the how, but do you know the why? Each week, Matthew Rossi and Anne Stickney make sure you Know Your Lore by covering the history of the story behind World of Warcraft. Around this time last year, Know Your Lore did a series on the politics surrounding both Horde and Alliance, along with some predictions as to what was going to come to pass. Some theories were right, some were wrong -- but as far as the Horde is concerned, there has never been as tumultuous a time as right now in Cataclysm. While some of the conflict is out in the open, other signs of discontent are found in hidden away or in discreet areas, out of sight unless you're directly looking for them. Garrosh Hellscream's reign as Warchief kicked off with a bang. The first few weeks of his rule as Warchief saw the destruction of Orgrimmar and its subsequent rebuilding as a result of the Shattering's devastation. In addition, the Horde found a new set of allies in the quirky, greedy, and often bizarre goblins, something that could be construed as either good or bad, depending on which way you look. On top of all of this, the duel with and subsequent death of Cairne Bloodhoof affected Garrosh deeply and caused him to create a closer alliance with the tauren race, giving them a special section of Orgrimmar in contrition for what happened. Garrosh seems to have a somewhat level head on his shoulders and the best of intentions at heart, but a closer look reveals that the Horde is no longer as united a front as it was in the days of vanilla ... and some of that blame can be placed squarely on Hellscream's shoulders.
WoW Moviewatch: Southshore
Southshore is a music video by PallyPowerXIX. PallyPower is a relatively new machinima creator, just now learning the ins and outs of creating WoW videos. The video has rough spots, but I found myself absolutely loving this movie. The music selection is just astounding; I've already jumped and bought the music for my collection. The story told in the animation matches the haunting music very well. Story-based machinima buffs will find the use of a strong narrative refreshing in what is still essentially a music video. The animation isn't fancy, sure, but it supports both the music and the story. My hat's off to PallyPower for a great job on a first machinima; I hope you keep going. Interested in the wide world of machinima? We have new movies every weekday here on WoW Moviewatch! Have suggestions for machinima we ought to feature? Toss us an email at moviewatch@wowinsider.com.
Breakfast Topic: Transformed by the blood
This Breakfast Topic has been brought to you by Seed, the Aol guest writer program that brings your words to WoW.com. Spoiler alert: This post contains fairly heavy lore spoilers for the Cataclysm expansion. If that's not your thing, you should stop reading now. In Cataclysm, during the quests in Silverpine Forest, Horde players learn that human refugees from Hillsbrad have fled to Fenris Keep, and our glorious Banshee Queen Sylvanas sends us with a loyal val'kyr to kill and raise the poor humans as Forsaken, to bolster their forces in Silverpine. Using the new on-the-go questing feature, Sylvanas informs players to find and convert the human leaders inside their keep. This is when things get a little hairy, as the keep is guarded by elite worgen guards. Battling through, the players find themselves arriving at the middle of a meeting between the big names of Southshore and Lord Darius Crowley.
The Classifieds: Old school a go-go
The Classifieds brings you weekly updates on news from around the WoW community. Have guild news or a Random Act of Uberness to share? Email TheClassifieds@wow.com. Is it just us, or are players revving up the retro vibe to record RPMs? From retro and classic raiding to world PvP events, players are chasing away the pre-expansion blues by rocking and rolling some classic Southshore-Tarren Mill action. Case in point: a massive mix-up on Anachronos (EU-A) being organized for next weekend by <The Stormwind Crusaders>. "The aim of this event is to enjoy this epicness one more time before Cataclysm flushes Southshore away like Atlantis," write event organizers, "and of course for the generation of players who kinda missed the epic fights in the old days. (Yeah, I had to force some guildies to Google 'Southshore vs. Tarren' because they didn't understand that it's 100% wow cult!)" Organizers are hoping players from both factions will transfer or whip up a new death knight to come relive the epic tug-of-war battles of old on June 11 from 21:00-23:00 server time. Check the official realm forums for more details. As often as we discuss zones and aspects of the game that will be changed in Cataclysm, it hadn't yet occurred to me for some reason that the epic Southshore/Tarren Mill battles of yesteryear will be forever wiped from our slates. If you never had the chance to submerge yourself in the madness back in the day ... Yeah, this is worth a pool of tears to drown your sorrows in. Talk about pure, addictive, adrenaline-fueled fun ... My first character became a Knight-Lieutenant, in fact, off kills made in the fields outside Tarren Mills. My brother-in-law and I would roust each faction from their respective homes every weekday afternoon to kick off the action, tempting them out with the prospect of an easy kill on the two little clothies scuttling along the roads. ("Easy"? Not for a second; we knew every dirty trick in the book.) I heartily endorse more recreations of these tug-of-war epics before Cataclysm alters the killing fields playing field forever. Let's crack open The Classifieds ...
Cataclysm starting zone lore and other new details revealed
PC Gamer UK was lucky enough to get the chance to grill Blizzard about the upcoming Cataclsym expansion, and they came away with quite a bit of new information, which is available in their latest issue, as well as as in the PC Gamer Podcast.If you don't want to be spoiled, do not follow the break, I'm warning you now. There's a couple major story spoilers, especially regarding the origins of the goblins and worgen.
Old Azeroth through rose-colored glasses
Sometimes denial works for you, and I think that's why I like this forum thread so much. It's full of nostalgia for a simpler time, when PvP meant going to Southshore and murdering some Alliance, when the encounters in Molten Core were the most epic thing in the game, and speaking of epics, when seeing a player outfitted with all purples meant that they'd be raiding for weeks with 39 other people. This thread willingly looks back and sees things not as they were, but as we remember them: super fun, refreshing, and completely empty of the problems and quibbles we have to deal with today.Of course, Azeroth's past wasn't really like that. It was hell organizing 40 people to do one boss, much less a whole night of raiding, and if the organization didn't get you, the server lag and disconnects would. Southshore and Crossroads PvP made for great stories, but in actuality, it was really just a zerg fest, and no one actually won, it was really just everyone throwing away their nights because there was nothing better to do. And epics -- well, it was actually pretty cool when epic gear meant something. But boy was it disappointing when you went whole weeks of raiding without getting any loot at all, without even a Badge of Justice for your efforts. Or when you had to disenchant a tier piece because the Paladin set dropped yet again.Do we want to go back to those days? Probably not -- while there are definitely some good things about them, there were all kinds of issues that have since been solved (and that many of the nostalgists tend to forget about). But every once in a while, it's nice to look back through rose-colored glasses and remember when.
Breakfast Topic: Nostalgia vs. reality -- fight!
There's an interesting post on the forums that's become a catalogue of what old-time players miss most about classic WoW. While it's become a pretty thorough compilation of iconic moments, there are admissions that, well, maybe some of the stuff that's fun to look back on wasn't actually that much fun at the time. The examples include trying to get past a 40-man raid of the opposite faction into Molten Core, the boredom of raiding as little more than a glorified Decurse-bot, the countless guilds who broke up on Vael, and the fun of Tarren Mill/Southshore PvP that had the ancillary effect of making leveling in Hillsbrad such a nightmarish experience.I'm seeing the first glimmers of such nostalgia for BC content start to emerge, and hearing a Sunwell PuG advertised as a "fun run" the other day left me speechless for a moment. It's equal parts compelling and unnerving; part of me misses the struggle to down bosses in Tiers 4, 5, and 6, but I also remember ugly M'uru wipefests. Everyone likes looking back on the first boss kill, nobody likes remembering the 45-minute trash respawn timer in SSC, and I like to think that as the game has "grown up," it has also gone resolutely forward.But then, I'm not an old-school WoW player on the level of these forum posters, and I'm also not sure that the nostalgia for BC content will ever approach that for classic content. Is, say, Black Temple going to be looked upon as fondly as its classic counterparts like AQ40 someday, or is the classic "classic" and irretrievable for a reason?
Know Your Lore: Stalvan Mistmantle
Welcome to this week's edition of Know Your Lore, bought to you today by assistant lore nerd Daniel Whitcomb. Stalvan Mistmantle, an inhabitant of Duskwood, is one of those guys who just sort of sits there in lore, provoking admiration in some, malaise in others, and a lot of questions in others. Most Alliance have likely at least heard of him, but if you've leveled exclusively in the Horde, you may never have met him. His story is presented in a very sinister fashion, but as to the man behind the quest, and how exactly he came to surrounded by Necromancy and horror, that is a little less clear. As an Alliance member, you first hear of Stalvan through a vision of Death received by Madame Eva. Specifically, she senses Death in the future for her granddaughter, and hears a name in her visions - Stalvan. Heading to Daltry, the town clerk, you begin your investigation. As you continue it, you find out more and more about Stalvan's life. Strangely enough, although it starts out benign, and in fact paints him to a pleasant fellow, an itinerant wanderer and country teacher, spirits appear and try to end your investigation violently. In addition, you often find yourself cursed simply from handling his old belongings.
Neutral Factions: An idea whose time has passed
Neutrality in factions started with the Steamwheedle Cartel and only got worse. It seems that once you get to the level cap, most of the intense rivalry between the factions, at least as expressed in the PvE game, peter off to nothing. Almost every faction accepts both Horde and Alliance fighters. In Burning Crusade, they even share the same capital, and it looks like that will be happening again in WoTLK with Dalaran -- despite that fact that, 50 levels earlier, the Horde utterly devastated Dalaran's holdings in Silverpine Forest and Hillsbrad. The general argument for this change is that at higher levels, most people learn to put aside their differences and fight the greater challenges that threaten to wipe both sides out. My problem with that line of reasoning is that up until the end game, what we're trying to wipe out is each other. In the Ghostlands, the Night Elves are involved in extensive operations to attack the Blood Elves. In Ashenvale, the Horde is constantly attacking the Night Elves, including setting up spy posts and killing their animal companions. In the southern Barrens, the Dwarves are willing to wipe out the Tauren to set up their excavations. In Lordaeron, the Forsaken have the stated intent of wiping out the alliance, devastating one settlement and even making a preliminary attack against Southshore.
Challenging Chilton on old world PvP nostalgia
Players are reacting to (quite a few things, actually, in) the Tom Chilton interview we linked to earlier, but one of them is rubbing a lot of older players the wrong way -- when Gamespy asks Chilton about world PvP, like the kind that took place between Tarren Mill and Southshore, he called any fondness for that "nostalgia" -- he says that people didn't really like it at the time, they only want to go back to that because they're nostalgic for it.Fortunately, we here at WoW Insider keep all of our old archives online, and as you can see, most people did actually enjoy the old Xroads and SS/TM world PvP -- I have fond memories of fighting in Ashenvale as well. But Chilton isn't wrong that there was complaining (isn't there always?): it was usually just complaining that those were the only places any real PvP happened. Nowadays, we've got BGs and Arenas, and actual rewards for world PvP, but it's still a little hard to come across one of those all-out battles that used to rage in Xroads or south of Tarren Mill. Most of the time, the only reason those battles were going on was because, well, what else did you do besides raiding at 70? Now that there's more choices, no level 70 would waste their time fighting lowbies in SS -- there are much more epic rewards doing dailies or fighting in the Arenas.There's no question that nostalgia definitely makes things better, but Chilton is wrong to dismiss any wishes for SS/TM-esque world PvP as simple nostalgia. Blizzard has a tough line to walk here -- they're being asked to encourage, by careful planning, something that always happened spontaneously in the past (and mostly because PvPers didn't have much else to do). It's not nostalgic to think that it was fun (it was fun), but nowadays we've got choices that are fun and give epic rewards, so old world PvP just doesn't compare for most players.
Breakfast Topic: Old school world PvP
Reader Ekrim sent us a tip to let us know that when all instances crashed on the Earthen Ring server over the weekend, Horde-led raids descended on to Stormwind and Ironforge. Word quickly got out to the Alliance and an epic battle ensued for the next hour until the entire server was brought down to fix the crashing problem. Not an unprecedented event, but certainly fun.This reminds me of old school world PvP at Southshore/Tarren Mills (on my server). There was no goal or objective other than to overrun the enemy town before they overrun yours. It was pure, unadulterated, unmitigated fun. Blizzard experimented with structured world PvP in Silithus and Eastern Plaguelands, and then some more when they launched the Burning Crusade expansion, but they failed to capture the lawless, unpredictable quality of the good old days when we just did it ourselves.Which brings up the topic at hand: why aren't we doing it ourselves anymore? Because of the lack of Honor, welfare epics or Arena rankings from the proceedings? When's the last time you've spontaneously joined in on a mass world PvP party for fun and not for profit?
How I tamed my dragonhawk in 8 easy steps
Etherjammer wrote in detailing how he was able to tame a dragonhawk at level 10. Now, this was intriguing enough that I decided I needed to try it. In his blog post he describes a journey that starts in Menethil and ends in Fairbreeze Village. What's the caveat? You run dead. Since my hunter is level 40 I decided to start my jog in Southshore where she is currently bound. If you decide to try this at a lower level, I would suggest swimming up from Menethil to Southshore and beginning your death jog from there. Step one: Die: I would suggest stripping off any gear you care about and let a nasty (or three) eat you. Step two: The jog begins: The first leg of the journey takes you up past Tarren Mill and Strahnbrad. From there follow the road west to Chillwind camp.
Know Your Lore Special: The Caverns of Time Southshore Easter egg hunt
var digg_url = 'http://digg.com/gaming_news/World_of_Warcraft_Old_Hillsbrad_Easter_Eggs'; In a video game, Easter eggs are hidden features or areas that are meant to please the game's serious players. So it's only appropriate that on Easter we explore the biggest Easter egg in WoW. The point of the Caverns of Time: Durnholde instance is to go into Durnholde Keep, free Thrall, and fight off some dragons. You can get some pretty nice mid-60s items there. But for those of a more explorative mindset, the real gem of this instance is Old Southshore. If you wander off the beaten path, you'll discover the Alliance stronghold hasn't changed too much in seven years ... and you may just meet some familiar faces. Read onward for a guide to the Easter eggs of Old Southshore.
