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Blood Pact: Newbie tips for demonologists
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Blood Pact for affliction, demonology, and destruction warlocks. Today, Megan O'Neill visits the last warlock spec for Cataclysm newbies and rerollers, before diving back into Mists of Pandaria speculation. One torment ended as I finally received my beta invite. Then another started as I began to get error #132 over and over again. Whether it's my old toaster of a laptop's problem or maybe beta is just really unstable right now ... you and I are still stuck with old Cataclysm warlockery. So let's finish out the newbie tips for those who are reacquainting themselves with demonology before Mists of Pandaria. As a class with all three specs dedicated to DPS, warlocks always have one spec that serves up first in simulations. In the standard Patchwerk-style, no-holds-barred contest, who's king of the lab? It's a question I've been asked recently by some dissatisfied moonkin in my guild who are considering turning to the dark side. (After all, everyone knows we have cookies!)
Blood Pact: MoP talent calculator spells out more changes for warlocks
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Blood Pact for affliction, demonology, and destruction warlocks. This Monday, Poneria of Fel Concentration finishes zoning into the Defense Against the Dark Arts post. That must be a mage's name for the coolest class column around, because who needs defense when you can gleefully wield the Dark Arts? Greetings, my fellow masters of minions! Warlocks continue the trend of small talent calculator changes followed by intriguing snatches of development clarified by community managers. Set your pets to passive for now as I go over what's changed. In the coming weeks, we can delve into more specific topics and theories. Spells get streamlined for leveling A level 1 ability called Demonic Tactics allows the Imp, Voidwalker, and Succubus to act more intelligently. I'm tempted to say it's a name for the guardian-like actions of the newly rolled warlock's pet, only to be replaced later by the pet bar with Control Demon. But traditionally, the pet bar comes at level 10 along with group features like Battlegrounds, while the Succubus isn't introduced until level 20. If, instead, Demonic Tactics is meant as a better artificial intelligence for pets overall, why isn't the other baseline pet, the Felhunter, included? I'll wait for clarification. After Malefic Grasp was first revealed in the November Class Q&A to be not demonology as we all expected but affliction, I've learned to not assume anything anymore.
Know Your Lore: The Dragon Soul
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. It was a tiny, small, inconsequential disc. Golden in color, simple in appearance, the talisman was far more dangerous than any could comprehend. Well ... almost anyone. The goblin servants of Neltharion, the Earth-Warder, created the object, and even they weren't truly aware of just how terrible that creation truly was. For the golden disc held not only the power to tear through the Burning Legion; it held the power to control every dragon, every flight in the world -- with the exception of Neltharion, of course. For he would rule them all. The voices told him so and promised him glory above all creatures of the world, mortal or immortal, no matter how insignificant. The Burning Legion was simply an army of pests to be eliminated, as were the kaldorei; the War of the Ancients was a petty squabble marring the glorious moment of his ascension. It was only a matter of time. The Dragon Soul was perhaps the most dangerous creation in existence, and it was held in the claws of a dragon that was most certainly completely insane. Today's Know Your Lore contains some information regarding Thrall, Twilight of the Aspects, the 4.3 5-man dungeons and the Dragon Soul raid. If you're avoiding spoilers, I'd skip this for now.
Patch 4.3: Blizzard's official preview of the Well of Eternity heroic dungeon
Today seems to be a huge day for patch 4.3 news, as Blizzard has just released a second 4.3 dungeon preview, this one for the Well of Eternity. After opening the gateway to the past in End Time, players will be transported back in time to Azshara's palace during the War of the Ancients to retrieve the Dragon Soul. Sounds easy enough, right? Yeah, not so much -- the Dragon Soul is busy hovering over the Well of Eternity and being used to open the portal that will allow Sargeras into the world. In order to retrieve the Dragon Soul, players will have to fight and defeat the enemies that stand in the way, including Queen Azshara herself. Also seen in Well of Eternity are two names that should ring a bell to those familiar with lore -- the pit lord Mannoroth, whose blood is responsible for the corruption of the Orcish race, and Varo'then, head of Queen Azshara's personal guard. We already know what happens to Mannoroth and Varo'then in the future, so what will happen if we mess with them in the past? It seems as though all this mucking around in time is something players will have to be considerate of, however. According to Zarhym, "The tragic events which took place at the Well of Eternity must ultimately come to pass, leading to the Great Sundering, the creation of the Maelstrom, and the loss of countless lives." I don't know about anyone else, but I'm looking forward to saying hello to the younger versions of Tyrande, Malfurion, and Illidan. Check out the official website for the full preview, with plenty of images and more information on the various bosses in the dungeon. Brace yourselves for what could be some of most exciting updates to the game recently with patch 4.3. Look at what's ahead: new item storage options, cross-realm raiding, cosmetic armor skinning and your chance to battle the mighty Deathwing -- from astride his back!
Know Your Lore: Lore Q&A-palooza
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. Warcraft has a huge story behind it that stretches back over three expansions and an original MMO, three RTS games, and expansions to those RTS games. It covers novels, comics, manga, short stories, and even books, quests, and items currently found in World of Warcraft. The sheer amount of information out there can be a dizzying, massive pile of stuff to keep track of for the average player. Though Cataclysm's done pretty well with incorporating story and lore into gameplay, there are still tons of question out there left to be answered. Cataclysm doesn't cover everything. That said, this week I decided to mix it up a bit and answer some lore questions from previous posts. To mix it up even more, I also put a call out on Twitter for everyone's burning lore questions. I won't be doing these too terribly often, but if you've got a question that isn't answered in this post, feel free to leave a comment and I'll come back here next time I decide to do a Q&A. Let's get started, shall we? @ericisgame from Twitter asked: How many Old Gods are there currently and how many do you think will be eventually revealed?
Know Your Lore, Tinfoil Hat Edition: The "death" of the Old Gods
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. Once upon a time, there was a little planet called Azeroth. A shining jewel of the universe, this little planet was chosen by the Titans, blessed by their presence and organized into a perfect representation of order and beauty. But that order and perfection wasn't to last. At some undefined point in the little planet's future, malevolent proponents of chaos, creatures simply called Old Gods, visited Azeroth's surface and quickly decided to ruin the harmonic vision of the Titans with their own brutal, corrupt, and chaotic one. The Titans realized something had happened and returned to find the world they had so carefully balanced in a state of utter chaos. They immediately launched an assault on the Old Gods, but they discovered something strange. The Old Gods had fully integrated themselves with the matrix of the little planet, placing a strange malaise on the inhabitants. If the Old Gods died, so too would Azeroth -- and so the Titans imprisoned the Old Gods deep beneath the earth where they could do no further damage. They set to work repairing the planet, leaving various safeguards behind to watch over the world. Satisfied, they left -- and they haven't been seen on Azeroth since. Today's Know Your Lore is a Tinfoil Hat edition, meaning the following is a look into what has gone before with pure speculation on why it happened. The events presented are events that happened in Azeroth's history, but the conclusions are merely theories and shouldn't be taken as fact.
Speculation: The War of the Ancients' connection to Patch 4.1's legendary staff
From the leaked information about the potential legendary staff from the next tier of Cataclysm raiding, we are slowly processing the information we have and coming to some pretty neat, yet speculative, conclusions. From images of the staff, we see what looks like a wooden body with an elaborate head, very much reminiscent of the Firelands motif we have seen so far. However, the staff components, labelled in the model view in stages, give us the ultimate clues that lead us to believe that the next tier of raiding will include the War of the Ancients, or at least deal with going back in time to when Malygos, Ysera, and Nozdormu were at their strongest.
Know Your Lore, Tin Foil Hat Edition: The final boss of Cataclysm
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. The image above was taken from a blog post I made back in January of this year, a post discussing possible links between the Old Gods, the dragonflights and Deathwing. Unfortunately, not more than a month or so after it originally aired, several points in the post were disproved, largely due to the release of the Stormrage novel and revelations contained therein. But with the release of Cataclysm and the events playing out on beta servers, I feel this deserves another look -- because what we are potentially looking at is a sequence of events that prove that Deathwing isn't really the one responsible for all this disaster we're going to see on Azeroth, nor is Deathwing the one we should really be worried about. Please note that this post is a "Tin Foil Hat" edition. It is pure speculation based on events already presented in Warcraft lore and certain things I've seen lurking around the Cataclysm beta servers. There are potential spoilers for Cataclysm in this post -- but only if my mad, deranged theories are somehow correct. However, I am going to include several screenshots from the Cataclysm servers, so if you'd rather not be spoiled in any way by the upcoming expansion, I'd advise steering away now.
Cataclysm Press Event: War of the Ancients raid confirmed
World of Raids got to sit down and have a chat with Game Director Tom Chilton during the recent Cataclysm press event, and along with information regarding raids, classic dungeon revamps and new instances was the revelation that the Caverns of Time will not be ignored in the coming expansion. In fact, players will be seeing a very familiar event that had a whole trilogy of novels written about it: The War of the Ancients. The War of the Ancients covers the events of the Sundering that originally split Azeroth into the shattered continents we see today. As yet there's no information as to what kind of role players will have in the war, although Chilton did say that this will not be an event that is available upon release -- it will be part of the progression on the fight against Deathwing. Despite this, I know many players will be excited at the chance to finally see the events of the war firsthand. The biggest question in my mind though is which timeline we will be addressing; the original one, referenced in Warcraft III, or the timeline of the War of the Ancients Trilogy, and whether or not Broxigar, Rhonin and Krasus will make an appearance. Check out the full interview for more details on raids, instances, and questlines that are old favorites.
Know Your Lore: Current Alliance Politics -- the Night Elves, Part 2
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. WARNING: The following post contains spoilers for the novel Stormrage by Richard A. Knaak. Readers still in the middle of the novel may want to veer away from this post, as I'll be discussing events covered over the course of the book. Now that we've established what happened to Tyrande and Malfurion (in the midst of wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey ... stuff), we can begin to pick apart what happened in between the Sundering, the Third War, and present day. Tyrande Whisperwind is currently leading the night elves along with Archdruid Fandral Staghelm -- and Staghelm has a history that also stretches back thousands of years, one that's led him to his current less-than-friendly leadership. Fandral Staghelm was born about 1,000 years after the Sundering and studied the druidic arts under Malfurion Stormrage, soon rising in ranks and becoming one of Malfurion's top lieutenants as well as training many of the new Druids of the Wild. Where Malfurion was even-tempered and kind, Fandral was hotheaded and aggressive, frequently clashing with Malfurion, and nowadays Tyrande over how night elf society should be run. He holds many strong beliefs that echo the beliefs of ancient night elves, including the belief that night elves are the supreme race on the planet, all other races are inferior, and night elves are the only "true" druids. Charming, isn't he?
WoW Moviewatch: RFC for Free
It looks like Nyhm has a new competitor, Coma Niddy. Last month, he released an audio parody of NERD's Lapdance (Not safe for work), RFC for Free. Yesterday, he came out with the video, which does a pretty faithful job of representing the attitude of the song. Mystrana, the female voice in the chorus, submitted the video to us.Yddin, the star of the video, laments about the fact that, since he's level 70, everyone wants him to run through Ragefire Chasm. While the editing is pretty good for his first video, some of the timing and delivery of the song itself feels off. I really enjoyed it, though![Thanks, Mystrana of Demon Soul!]If you have any suggestions for WoW Moviewatch, you can mail them to us at machinima AT wowinsider DOT com.Previously on Moviewatch ...
Know Your Lore: Nozdormu the Timeless
Welcome to Know Your Lore, where each week Alex Ziebart brings you a tasty little morsel of lore to wrap your mind around. Sweet, sweet lore. Mmmm. Have suggestions for future KYL topics? E-mail us! Or, if you have a question for our sister column Ask a Lore Nerd, e-mail us those, too! Nozdormu is the fifth and final dragon aspect, since the filthy Netherwing aspect doesn't count! Silly mutant spawn of Deathwing, thinking they're special or something. Anyhow, Nozdormu the Timeless is the aspect of the Bronze Dragonflight, and was given his power by the titan lord Aman'Thul. Nozdormu has power over time and can, technically, alter it to his whims. Though he's capable of doing such, he is meant to watch over the timeline and prevent it from being altered by outside forces.Nozdormu, more or less, oversees the Caverns of Time. Or rather, he has in the past. Currently Nozdormu is preoccupied with some uberpowerful anomaly in the timeline, and has left his prime consort Soridormi in charge. You would think the Timeless One would have all the time in the world to get things done, but his history in Warcraft thus far says otherwise.
Know Your Lore: Malygos the Spellweaver
Welcome to Know Your Lore, where each week (except for last week, sorry guys!) Alex Ziebart brings you a tasty little morsel of lore to wrap your mind around. Sweet, sweet lore. Mmmm. Have suggestions for future KYL topics? E-mail us! Or, if you have a question for our sister column Ask a Lore Nerd, e-mail us those, too! Malygos the Spellweaver, Lord of Magic, is the fourth Dragon Aspect that we'll be looking at in Know Your Lore's series on the great dragons. Malygos was empowered by the Titan Norgannon, charged with guarding all magic and arcane knowledge. He calls the Nexus in Northrend, his home.The Aspect of the Blue was one of the more wise of the Dragonflights, and described as the most friendly of them. He was close to his 'siblings' back before the War of the Ancients, especially Neltharion of the Black. You know, before Neltharion went loco.
Know Your Lore: Alexstrasza the Lifebinder
Welcome to Know Your Lore, where each week Alex Ziebart brings you a tasty little morsel of lore to wrap your mind around. Sweet, sweet lore. Mmmm. Have suggestions for future KYL topics? E-mail us!Know Your Lore has covered the benevolent dragons in Warcraft before, but I've decided to highlight a few of them in preparation for Wrath of the Lich King. I feel that saving the best for last is a bunch of crap, so I'm going to start with my personal favorite: Alexstrasza. Admittedly, it isn't terribly hard for her to seal that favorite slot right now. Deathwing and Alexstrasza are the only two Aspects we've been exposed to in a very direct way for a substantial amount of time. To make things even better, she's a headlining character in Wrath.Alexstrasza is one of five Dragon Aspects chosen and empowered by the Titans prior to their departure from Azeroth. Each of the Aspects was given a domain that they would protect, and have the power to control. Alexstrasza's domain is perhaps the most broad: Life. While all of the Aspects are interconnected and have some sway over one another, Alexstrasza is perhaps the most connected to the others because of her connection to life. Many use this to say she is the 'leader' of the Aspects, but as far as we know, they don't really have one. At least, not until Wrath. Maybe.
Maintenance for June 17th will be short
Here's a heads-up to all our North American night owls early risers and Oceanic readers: It's Tuesday morning, and that means maintenance. Luckily, it's a short one today. Bornakk has said that they expect most servers to only be down a half hour, starting at 5AM PDT and ending a 5:30AM PDT. There are some extra servers that will be down slightly longer, until 6:30AM PDT. Those servers will be listed after the break. Aussies can rejoice as well, as any Oceanic servers not on this list won't be taken down until 5AM AEST (Which is noon over here on the American west coast). For the list of servers that will have a longer downtime, read on:
Select realms to undergo maintenance (updated!)
Drysc reports that a number of realms are under investigation for performance issues and will be undergoing a scheduled maintenance at 5:00 AM PDT on Wednesday, March 12 with a foreseeable downtime of 1 hour (update: Zorayn notes that downtime will be extended to 2 hours as opposed to one). As Drysc edits the thread, realms are added (or removed) regularly. From a quick perusal of the realms, it seems as though it is the Nightfall Battlegroup that is affected. Blizzard currently lists the affected realms as follows:Aerie PeakAltar of StormsAlterac MountainsAnvilmarArygosBlackwing LairDeathwingDemon SoulDoomhammerGnomereganIcecrownJaedenarKel'ThuzadLethonOnyxiaSentinelsTanarisThe Venture CoUldamanUndermineDrysc further notes that other Battlegroups are under close observation and will be taken down for maintenance should any issues arise that might require it.
Does Kil'jaedan's defeat animation hint at further lore?
var digg_url = 'http://digg.com/pc_games/New_boss_mob_death_animation_movie_pulled_from_WoW_files'; Tipster Kronack sent us a link to this video, which shows the Sunwell Plateau's final boss, Kil'jaedan. The animations look to be his initial summoning and his final defeat. I'm pretty impressed by how awesome he looks, but what really intrigues me is what these animations could reveal about the lore behind the encounter - and what follows it. We still don't know much about the Kil'jaedan encounter, since Blizzard is mostly focusing testing on the Eredar Twins these days -- when the dungeon is even activated -- so most of what we have for now is speculation. That said, there's still some pretty good things I can see in these animations. Anyway, I'll be using Black Temple and Sunwell Plateau lore spoilers to explain what I think, so If you don't mind that and want to speculate along with me, please, do join me after the jump.
Know Your Lore: Grim Batol
If your first time discovering Grim Batol was anything like mine, it ended in horrible, bloody, unexpected death. That experience sums up Grim Batol rather well. The fortress has stood roughly 250 years, give or take a couple decades, and has changed hands more than once during that time.Before we get to Grim Batol itself, we need to take a look at a little piece of Dwarven history: The War of the Three Hammers. You see, the Dwarves of Azeroth, just a few hundred years ago, all carried one banner. They were the Dwarves of Ironforge, plain and simple. Their society was a large one, and their wise and powerful king Modimus Anvilmar was highly revered. Amongst the Dwarven society, though, there were three clans that stood above the rest. The Bronzebeard Clan, the Dark Iron Clan, and the Wildhammer Clan. Each of these clans played a very specific role in the Kingdom. The Bronzebeard, led by Thane Madoran Bronzebeard, were the military arm of the mountain city. They were soldiers and defenders. They were the sword and the shield, and the clan closest to King Modimus Anvilmar. The Wildhammer, led by Thane Khadros Wildhammer, lived in the outlying regions of the Kingdom, in the... well, the wilds. Scouts, hunters, things of that sort. They held little real power within the city proper, and they didn't really like that. The Dark Irons, led by Thane Thaurissan, were mages and sorcerers. They were also jerks.
Two New PvP Realms
Two new PvP realms have been brought online today - Demon Soul and Jaedenar. These realms are on the new World of Warcraft site with all new hardware and are open for character creation. The reaction on the forums to this is surprisingly negative, as numerous players chime in with complaints on realm time zones (they appear to be EST servers), the realm type (still no new RP-PvP realms?), and the lack of Oceanic-flagged realms. I can't claim to understand the need for these new realms, but here's to hoping there's a master plan that we'll see eventually.
