The Queue: What I need is a good defense

Welcome back to The Queue, WoW.com's daily Q&A column where the WoW.com team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft. Mike Sacco will be your host today.

I was up so late at the local Irish redneck bar's karaoke contest -- I'm in the finals next Thursday, for singing Fiona Apple's "Criminal", booyah -- that I pretty much forgot I was supposed to write The Queue today. I tried to explain to Alex and Adam (after stumbling home) that I owned that song and I should be off the hook, but they disagreed. So here I am, 3:19 in the morning, answering your questions.

Kavu kicks off today's Queue.

Kavu asked...

Question: I just hit 63. With WotLK extending the cap to 80, is Aldor vs. Scryer such a big decision anymore? Also, should i worry about grinding rep to get lvl 70 gear, or will it all be replaced by greens in Northrend?

Good question, and an easy one.

Completely ignore the Aldor/Scryer stuff and just bust your ass leveling until you get to Northrend at 68. The gear you get in Northrend for completing the first bunch of Borean Tundra quests will destroy your BC items in terms of stats, so just plug away until you get to 68, take the boat, and put your long johns on.

Clansey wants to know...

I was leveling through Howling Fjord again on my pally; and ran into the quest in Utgarde Catacombs where you have to bring a Sacred Relic from the depths back to a dying "Ares", and then ultimately back to Irulon Trueblade. It's then revealed that the sacred relic is The Ashbringer by a disguised Tirion, etc etc. My question is: Whos is Ares? And how did the Ashbringer somehow get itself into Utgarde Catacombs?

Ares the Oathbound was, apparently, an acolyte of Tirion's who was chosen to carry the Ashbringer to Northrend. He and Tirion took separate boats to make sure that either Tirion or the sword would be saved if the Scourge came upon them in the water. If what I see in Valgarde is correct, that's Ares' boat you see chained to the cove outside, en fuego.

Ares and some other knights were ostensibly attacked by the Scourge in an attempt to hide the blade before Tirion's arrival, so before he was mortally injured, he hurled the Ashbringer into a pit teeming with mindless undead who wouldn't understand the weapon's significance. That's where you came in.


PB wonders...

With Triumph badges dropping in all heroics, will the vendors still be outside ToC selling full sets of Level 232 gear? Or will it be like the current emblem venders in Dalaran selling 2 tier pieces?

Full sets of Tier 9 are still available outside the Coliseum on the 3.3 PTR, so it looks like everything's staying the same in terms of availability.


Bfree380 just has to know...

Just wondering if the level 80 heroic dungeons will stay heroic for 80, or if they will be scaled up to 85 with the expansion. I'm not sure if level 85s running 80 heroics would even be remotely fun. Thanks.

You're exactly correct, that wouldn't be fun at all.

You won't be running a level 85 Oculus, don't worry. You'll almost certainly be running any of the 10 heroic dungeons shipping with Cataclysm, including the retuned Shadowfang Keep and Deadmines.


jtrain asked...

I see this 'vote to kick' option in the new random dungeon tool as one that has the potential to be abused if they don't put enough safe guards in place. Will you get the 15-minute deserter debuff if you are kicked from a random dungeon? I could see 4 griefers doing what they do best and chain-kicking the 5th member of the group over and over again just to be annoying.

I highly doubt you'll get a highly dedicated team of four griefers ready to waste quadruple time getting someone into a heroic group, but to be clear, you get the debuff for starting a dungeon, not leaving it.


Maxpowr inquired...

Do you think Sintharia and her 'son' Dargonax will return in Cataclysm? I know they are considered "deceased" but we also know Blizzard loves to bring back people from the dead.

For those unfamiliar, Sintharia was Deathwing's prime consort and Dargonax was Deathwing's "son", created of Black Dragonflight and Netherwing genetic material, in the WoW novel Night of the Dragon. He was basically an enormous -- apparently larger than Deathwing -- monstrosity that would've been an unstoppable behemoth if "brought to term". Thankfully Mary Sue Rhonin Redhair and his fabulous dinosaur army stopped him with a magic wand, or something.

Either way, I don't know if we'll see Sintharia, but I did see someone that looked an awful lot like Dargonax would've in the flythrough of the new Blackrock Caverns dungeon in Cataclysm. I tossed an image up as the header for this post.


Joozu asked...

At BlizzCon I remember hearing that Hyjal will be full of action because the world tree there is regrowing. I'm sure Blizzard wouldn't give the night elves their immortality back, but is there any info on if that part of the lore will be talked about at all (e.g. quests explaining why night elves will remain mortal) ?

Also, second question.

With the level cap only going up by 5, how large of a change will there be with gear level? Example: coming from BC with purples on, I didn't have any gear to upgrade to until level 76. Will the gear scale accordingly to compensate for only 5 levels of progression, or will I be doing heroics at 85 with my ice crown purples?

For the first question, Ragnaros is laying siege to Nordrassil, and if he's successful then it could mean no more chance of immortality for the night elves. I'm sure that it'll be a hot topic in the zone, especially if the rumors are true and Malfurion's coming back.

For the second question, we'll have no idea what the level 80-85 gear will be like in terms of item level, but as soon as the beta starts we'll let everyone know that information.

Have questions about the World of Warcraft? The WoW.com crew is here with The Queue, our daily Q&A column! Leave your questions in the comments and we'll do our best to answer 'em!