quelserrar
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Returning to a paladin's vault
Back in January of 2013 -- nearly two years ago now -- my rogue alt became my main. Part of the transition process involved sifting through the dusty depths of that character's bank, discovering treasures (and trash) long forgotten. I documented the process back then and, while my main isn't changing, I've decided to document the process once more while I go through banks in preparation for Warlords of Draenor. Today, my paladin is up to bat. My history with my paladin is complicated. Though my priest was my main for most of my raiding career, the paladin was my favored alt -- if not my favored character altogether. There simply wasn't a need for more paladins in my raid, so I avoided pulling the trigger and changing mains until mid-Wrath of the Lich King, where the raid was willing and able to accommodate a paladin. I continued investing significant time into my paladin throughout those years, however, and accrued a whole bunch of stuff. Back in the day, I loved the lore and flavor of the paladin and its numerous class quests -- while playing that class, it felt like I was playing someone truly special in the world of Azeroth. As such, I attached a great deal of sentimental value to the many class quest rewards. Verigan's Fist still holds a place in my collection, now moved into void storage. I also discovered I still possess a Holy Mightstone, a secondary reward for the old level 50 class quest, which I meant to use on the Lich King when I first met him in battle. Given my paladin has Shadowmourne, it's safe to say I forgot to use it. At this point, I never will, but I'm keeping that Mightstone anyway.
WoW Archivist: Memories of Dire Maul
The 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? Last week I said we'd be visiting Dire Maul in-depth this week, and we're going to do exactly that. Dire Maul was added in World of Warcraft patch 1.3 all the way back in March 2005. As I pointed out last week, Dire Maul attempted a great number of things that Blizzard has never tried to do since. It was also one of the few instances that was given a lasting relevance throughout an entire expansion phase of the game's life -- from the day it was implemented in patch 1.3 to the final day prior to the launch of The Burning Crusade, players had a reason to venture into the three wings of Dire Maul that wasn't simply grinding for currency. Dire Maul was one of the last bastions of adventure and discovery in our dungeons. That isn't to say all instances afterwards were bad, that's not true at all, but never again did we have a 5-man dungeon that you were free to explore and discover the secrets hidden away in its dark corners. It's a style of dungeon we haven't seen since, and with the prominence of the dungeon finder in World of Warcraft these days, it's one we're unlikely to see ever again.
Know Your Lore: Quel'delar, the Sister Blade
Welcome back to Know Your Lore, WoW.com's column about the story behind the game we all play. A featured questline in Patch 3.3, the story of Quel'delar is available to any player who attains the Battered Hilt, which can drop from any mob in the Icecrown Citadel 5-man dungeons. But what's the story behind this ancient and powerful weapon? Long ago, the night elves and the five Dragonflights worked together with great ceremony to forge a set of incredibly powerful prismatic swords, intended to be the first line of defense against any evil that would challenge the races of Azeroth: Quel'serrar, the High Blade, and Quel'delar, the Sister Blade. Quel'serrar was gifted to the night elves, but ultimately nearly destroyed. For thousands of years it remained partially intact with the Shen'dralar of Eldre'thalas, who anticipated that one day it'd be possible to reforge the blade. Only recently did this occur, with heroes reforging the blade in the flames and black heart of Onyxia, broodmother of the Black Dragonflight. The blade's triumphant return to its full glory brought great joy to the night elves, who thought the blade lost forever. Its sister blade, however, followed a different path. This writeup contains spoilers from the Quel'delar questline and should be avoided if you want to be surprised when Patch 3.3 launches.
Breakfast Topic: The Moment
They don't happen often, but when they happen, you remember them forever. My wife successfully taming Loque'nahk. The forging of my Quel'Serrar. Our first complete clear of Ahn'Qiraj. Even just sitting on my mount as the sun rose on Menethil Island and realizing I'd spent nearly an entire night with my then-girlfriend chatting in-between bouts of killing various and sundry things. Those little moments that make up the memories that keep people playing. One of the ones I've enjoyed the most in game, oddly enough, is a small set of linked quests available in the Dragonblight where you end up doing the same quest effectively twice, once as a mid 70's character getting help from your future self, and again as your level 80 incarnation going back in time to provide that help. I don't know exactly why but it's one of my favorite aspects of the game and one I've made sure to do over and over again.Of course, they're not all good. One of my good in game friends delights in telling the story of the night my wife was patiently waiting for Lupos, a rare spawn worg from Duskwood, as she wished to tame said beastie for a pet. Lo and behold, as soon as she took a break for her biological means I linked a green drop in guild. As you can imagine, going on four years later I still hear about this from her when tempers are short. I've often wished Chromie would let me go back and stop that one, but so far no dice.So now dear readers I ask you for your moments, be they great, terrible, or greatly terrible (or terribly great, even).
Patch 3.2.2 PTR: New Onyxia loot revealed
Onyxia's loot is coming into focus on the test server, and we here at WoW.com's secret headquarters are pretty much sitting here drooling and gabbling incoherently over it. As promised, we're seeing the promised buffed up Onyxia loot, but it looks like Onyxia's been doing some raiding of her own, coming back with upgraded versions of some other classic raid loot as well. Also, the Quel'serrar is back.The promised helms are in, and so far, it looks like they're the same color and model as the old T2 exactly, and they are still class restricted. Luckily, they have stuck with the improved itemization and stat outlays that have come into play since vanilla. In fact, you'll exactly see multiple versions of many helms dropping, one for each basic playstyle of the class. For example, there's tanking, healing, and DPS versions of Judgment. If there's one downside for this, it seems like it means it may take a lot of runs until you see the helm for your exact spec drop.
Whither Quel'Serrar?
I am hugely, massively, ridiculously excited about the new level 80 Onyxia raid. Completely, dementedly gleeful. But one small thing does nag at the back of my head: what happens to Quel'Serrar? Will Warriors and Paladins still be able to obtain it? And what about the Mature Black Dragon Sinew? Will Hunters be able to complete their Lok'delar and Rhok'delar? Or will these quests become relics, no longer able to be completed?On the one hand it would seem very odd to go through the rest of the quest chain for Quel, then take the Unfired Ancient Blade in to level 80 Onyxia to complete The Forging of Quel'Serrar in order to run back to Dire Maul and pick up a 20 level out of date tanking sword, no matter how cool it looks. But since the quest doesn't specify what level she is, it might be possible (It was possible to complete a Naxxramas quest from before TBC launched in the current 25 man Naxxramas). However, unless Ony will continue to drop the sinew, I can't see how folks could possibly complete the epic Hunter quest chain. Does that mean those quests will be gone from the game?Since I don't play a Hunter and I already have Quel'Serrar, this is all kind of academic to me. But I do wonder: my dearest hope is that they actually update the Quel quests (or make an entirely new one) which allows you to get an updated Quel'Serrar. Perhaps Quel'Zaram? I guess I might as well dream big while I'm at it. Bornakk's post certainly hints very strongly that there will be a successor to Quel dropped from Onyxia.
Continuing quest chains (and a new [fake] Quel'serrar!)
A few weeks ago on Phat Loot Phriday, I wrote about the Essence of Eranikus, a cool little trinket from the dragon in Sunken Temple. It's actually part of an unfinished questline-- a few steps after you get the gem from Eranikus, the questline ends in Winterspring with no explanation as to what happened with the rest of the story. Like many players (including myself), Falandan wants to know if Blizzard has any plans to finish up this series of quests.Tseric answers on the forums, and says that while Blizz is leaving their option open, the main problem with returning to unfinished quests (The Missing Diplomat/King of Stormwind is another) is that they'd have players of a high level doing low level quests. Either that, or they'd have to interrupt the normal leveling game, and you'd be doing quests in the same line with ten (or more) levels between them.But while that's an obstacle Blizzard is considering, apparently it's not going to stop them from revisiting some old questlines: reader anobolic (thanks!) sends a link to this flickr account, with what looks like an extension of the Quel'serrar questline!If you've got Quel'serrar now (not sure yet if Blizzard will give it back to you if you've sold or destroyed it for some reason), you'll be able to do another set of quests (rumored to involve another dragon, and maybe even an Undead Onyxia-- she's back?!?) that will either get you the Daughter of Quel'serrar (more purple for paladins), the Son of Quel'serrar (for warriors), or, if you're the first person on the server to complete the quest, Quel'serrar Reborn (and apparently you get a "dragonslayer" title with that as well). Oh, and there's also a rumor of a Quel'serrar shield to come. Very cool! Of course, all this is rumor so far-- it's not even certain that this is coming in patch 2.1 is real at all (see Update) -- but if Blizzard is rewarding those who worked for the High Blade with another questline to work through, it's a good sign that we might see updates to the old unfinished ones as well.Update: Commenters are casting doubt on the authenticity of the pictures. Stuff like this could be easily photoshopped, and we have no other source for it, so take the info about Quel'serrar with a grain of salt.Update2: Commenter Leggend (thanks!) says this is proof the images were just adjusted in Photoshop. Oh well. Maybe someday Blizzard will actually finish off some of these old questlines.
Phat Loot Phriday: Quel'Serrar, the High Blade
Big swords are cool, and this one is no exception. Plus, it gives you a reason to run an often overlooked endgame instance. A lot. Like, over and over again.Name: Quel'Serrar a.k.a. "The High Blade"Type: Epic Main Hand SwordDamage / Speed: 84-126, 2.00 (52.5 DPS)Abilities: Only obtainable by Warriors and Paladins, sorry Rogues Chance on Hit: Grants the user 20 defense and 300 armor for 10 seconds (an ability like that just screams Main Tank Weapon) Looks pretty, like an Epic Elven Blade should. How to Get It: This one actually has a quest behind it-- before you start, you'll need to be in or with a guild that is running Onyxia. Nowadays, that's actually hard to find, so make sure you've got that before you start the quest off.What you'll need is actually another item, called "Foror's Compendium of Dragon Slaying." It's a book (about dragon slaying, natch) that drops in Dire Maul-- reports say it's about 1% random drop from all the bosses, but in reality, it's probably less than that. As in, this is a really, really rare drop. However, it is not BOP, so you can sometimes find it in the AH-- usually it'll run you about 300 gold, but it's been known to sell for thousands before.Once you've got the book, you want to go to Lorekeeper Lydros in the Dire Maul Library-- it's inside DM North, and he's the same guy you get the Dire Maul enchants and the Mage water quest from. He'll give you something called an Unfired Ancient Blade, and that's where Ony comes in-- you've got to get her to breathe on the blade to forge it for you. In combat, you drop the blade in front of her, and then when she's dead, you use the blade on the corpse, and then boom, you've got... the Treated Ancient Blade. One more FedEx quest back to the librarian, and you've got the shiny sword. Now hit stuff with it!Oh, and I forgot-- all the quests involved give some pretty good XP. So you might make a note now, and then look this one up on your way to 70.Bonus Useless Trivia: If the name of that book looks familiar to you more veteran players, it's because yes, the name comes from Blizzard's Furor: he's a former Everquest player who now works as a WoW Quest Designer. He must know a lot about slaying dragons.Getting Rid of It: The quest item itself is BOP, of course. Sells to vendors for 7g 59s 70c.
