Patch Day

So patch 1.10 is hitting the servers... some new things like the weather will be interesting. I darn hope they finally fixed the teleport exploits in DM. As patch days are always a pain with the updates for all addons, etc. we decided to cancel our scheduled raid to Onyxia, not worth the hassle on a patch day. Instead I'm thinking about attending the Voodoo Lounge Party. ;) Too bad i cleaned up my quest log long ago, so the Quest Experience to Gold Conversion at Level 60 is not really useful for me. The conversion rate is supposed to be 6 copper per xp. Priests get a total revamp in this patch, you think they will still sing "I can be your healer baby.." after the patch? I definately like the ideas behind the Lightwell and the new Spirit of Redemption. Why is it the talent calculator for priests is not updated on the EU website, but only on the US one? If you look at a Comparison Report between PTR and official 1.10 notes, there are some minor tweaks. The pic shows Olvi having his first amorous tête-à-tête with Onyxia during our last raid. Well done mate!

Talking about patches, I'm delighted to hear that with patch 1.11 there will be a multi-use item replacing the Aqual Quintessence at revered with the Hydraxian Waterlords.

Recently i ran into the mysterious druid Gowin (Atrocity) who was riding his new Swift Razzashi Raptor. Talking to his guildies the stories about how he obtained the raptor are different. Some say he was wandering in Zul'Gurub alone for days, talking to plants and beasts... and when he resurfaced he had a new companion. Other say his dice got jinxed by Jin'do. ;) But it's not like hes a Warlock DJ or something. A fine mount indeed, although i assume he has to feed it a lot. I saw Isanaara has a raptor as well, that makes two on alliance side now.

See you in the next snow-storm... I'll be busy to update my addons today. =)

EDIT: As a lot of UI functions got changed there are several problems with different mods. Wowwiki has compiled a list with broken addons - this list also points to some quick hotfixes (eg. DiscordActionBars or SuperInspect) to save you the hassle of reading through all the forums. Most addons will be upgraded through the next two days tho.

BBQ in Molten Core

Equilibrium (EQ) headed down into the Core again... we were invited to a BBQ with Ragnaros. On our way to the big torch, we started to warm up against Baron Geddon. The temperature reached a cosy point and we started to have some serious fun during the fight. Did you ever apply Bouquet of Red Roses on a large boss? *chuckles*

After breezing through the rest of the Core, we visited ol' Domo again, who already had this small present chest ready for us. Needless to say he told us our friend Ragnaros already had prepared the BBQ for us. After two and a half weeks of raiding together Equilibrium took down Ragnaros on the second visit to him, in the first go! It was a very clean and good fight, only a few people down after the torch was extinguished. Great work everybody!

Of course we had to compensate the lack of epic gear for some by bringing a few drinks for the BBQ... but if he goes down so fast, you barely have time to drink all the Rumsey Rum Black Label we brought. Uuups, now i told ye our secret strategy. O.o The rum will not be BoP anymore after the next patch by the way.
But it's not like we used laser-beams or something. *wink*

Staff of Command

You might remember the news about Lord Valthalak from the upcoming 1.10 patch. I recently saw a screenshot that shows you can get the nice looking staff as a drop. That seems to be a good incentive.. together with the interesting glow on it. Talking about glow on weapons, if you are an enchanter or just looking for a good looking enchant on your weapon, have a look at glowchart. This websites features all enchants and showcases the glow attached to them... very nicely done.

While the contests on the PTRs are running some Blizzard employees decided to have some fun. Not only did they turn the King's room in Stormwind into and odd battlefield... no, they also gave some players the battleground fun of their lifetime: Killing "dupe bugs", fighting as giants and as they needed a break they let Lord Kazzak do their dirty work. O.o

BlizzardAntics.wmv shows the part from Stormwind and afterwards some BG action. WSGCrazy.wmv shows the same BG battle but from a different perspective. In one of the videos you can also see a druid in bear form dancing on the hind legs! Maybe a new dance that will come with 1.10 as well? If you like the dance, look also at this short clip: Badger & Mushroom

Ongoing Raid Activities

Equilibrium (EQ) ventured down into the Core again. Up to Shazzrah there had been no problems... Sulfuron and Golemagg went down directly without much time to object. The first real test should be Major Domo. After the proper setup, we took him down in the 2nd try with 36 people. Taking into account that approx. 40% of the raid has never been there before, an awesome job. Ragnaros himself behaved a bit more bitchy and survived at 24%... but well, for the first visit at him with this group, not bad at all. I'm quite confident he'll surrender to us very soon. =)

Talking about raid activity, i can recommend this addon: Carnival - Raid Swapper. It will listen to a specific syntax and others can switch places in the raid themselves without the raid leader having to do it. If you work with people you trust, a neat and slim addon. Works great.

Another addon that looks very promising, tho still in beta it seems, is GBLootHelp. I could not test it yet, but will do so soon, it will make the job of the masterlooter far easier, as it will collect items to store (like cores, scarabs, etc.) automaticly.

Do you remember me talking about my Disgusting Oozeling? He (or it?) has accompanied me since and has been a grateful companion. So i decided to train him in dwarven combat ways... as hes too weak to hold an axe, there was only one way: beer battles. To my surprise, the oozeling is *very* fond of Dark Iron Ale! You throw a mug near him and he starts to guzzle it down:


So if you happen to visit the bar in BRD, bring me some... the oozeling is always thirsty. =)
Maybe i can train him for the battlegrounds... as Blizzard is still talking about cross-realm battlegrounds still being worked on, perhaps that will be an advantage then.

Ruins of Ahn'Qiraj

So finally we managed to get a raid going into the Ruins of Ahn'Qiraj (AQ20) during the weekend. It's so nice to see new content... i think we all enjoyed our first trip. What you realize immediately after the first few steps into the ruins is, that AQ is a vast place. Large rooms with enough space to fight in, you only have to be careful with the pulls. The first boss you encounter is Kurinnaxx - a scorpion-like bug. In the sum up pretty straight forward fight, you only have to be on the move all the time. Caused us not much trouble.

One other thing you realize, and of course immediately start to dislike, is the need to collect a ton of scarabs & idols if you have use for your class quest rewards. My bank is already full and i have no idea how to store all the stuff. Would i pay 200g for another bankslot, just for the convenience not to switch to a storage char? Yes i would. The second fight in AQ20 is truly an epic battle... General Rajaxx is surrounded by his army, consisting of different waves of captains and soldiers. The picture shows Lieutenant General Andorov, who still has some business with Rajaxx and he and his soldiers will assist you in the upcoming fight, that can easily take 20-30 min. depending on your mana regeneration rate. If your group is good in crowd control and does not give in to the chaos, the fight is quite easy as well. Althogh very annoying: If you wipe the whole encounter will reset and you have to fight all the waves again. It will be interesting, if the rumours are true and Blizzard will fix it so you can't keep the NPCs away from the battle against the waves. If they change it and they will join from the start it will require even more coordination to keep them alive. If you keep them all alive, you'll get a nice reputation bonus (1000 CC rep) after the fight. Andorov died on us shortly before the end.. bummer. Weak humans, what do you expect... hes not even wearing a chest armor, poor bastard.

The third boss we encountered - and you can see on the picture - was Moam. As we did not have the right class mix for ez-mode, it was a tough fight and we did not get him down. But we sure learned a lot and the next time the beginning will be cleared quite fast i think. Thulf was lucky and i won a Manual of Heroic Strike IX (increases melee damage by 157) during our trip. yay! So 1/3 completed... need to go back. On a sidenote, I'm searching for an enchanter who knows the Formula: Enchant Gloves - Threat. If you know of someone on AD who can do this, please tell me. We had a very fun night in AQ20 and I'm eager to go back and see more of that place.

Memory Lane

While watching the Suicidal Noobs taking a trip down memory lane, I looked through my own screenshots as well. Amazing how many memorable snapshots you find of events that already slipped your mind as they are half a year or longer gone. I found an old screenshot from Thulf being a lot younger and wearing Battleforge armor (lvl 24) - as you can see at the beard, back then in beta i was younger. *grins* When looking at "old" screenshots i always have this idea about organising an event that takes you back to places that burned into your mind. Like the Horde Runners in Loch Modan, the Dragon Narillasanz near Hillsbrad and many more. Those should make a nice pilgrimage back into the ol' days... one day we should visit the memories still haunting us.

Talking about "clothes", i installed a new addon called UndressButton. And NO, it's not as kinky as it sounds... but fun nontheless. The mod adds a "reset" button to your dressing room. Finally a way to try on eg. new shirts without having to strip down your armor first, etc. As for the kinky part, you can also dress your target now. Always wanted to see that stubborn paladin in a pink dress? Here you go... ;)

You might remember me ranting about exploits that caused the DM books and the Ace of Warlords to flood the auction house? Yeah right, Blizzard fixed it? Hmmm.. on some servers the ace is still at 4g !! If you watch this video about a well known teleport hack, we can really hope Blizzard takes the thumb out of their butts and get's started on fixing this stuff. I know they do work on those things, but it takes them forever to investigate and close loopholes - until then the economy is already screwed.

Pirate Punishment

While the questline for the dungeon 2 sets take you across Azeroth, players complain that atm the tier 0.5 is unavailable to pirates. You remember those players getting their reputation with Booty Bay down, to gain favour with the Stranglethorn local pirates? Exactly, apparently the Bloodsailor Admirals can't talk to one of the quest givers. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, read Yarrr!, An Adventures of Neriad. You are able to obtain the Bloodsail Admiral's Hat, which can summon a Blood Parrot. But as we can see with the questline for the dungeon 2 set, Blizzard is not really paying attention to the pirates. Same goes for the fishing tournament if I'm right, pirates can't talk to the quest giver. In my opinion they should invest some time to create a new quest/vendor hub at the pirate base. Right now, you can't do anything else and only for that hat, I'm not sure if it's worth to destroy your faction with the goblins. It was a nice start/idea from Blizzard to add the pirate stuff, but unfortunately they never finsihed it. It's the same with the Wildhammer Clan.

The player Arving started a new project on AD, called The Voice, it's an Argent Dawn related online Newspaper. Looks very promising i definately like the idea.

Do you like mages? Do you like PvP? Then this video is for you: Nexius10MageWSG.wmv
"There be no shelter here, the frontline is everywhere." Ten Mages rocking WSG, nice pvp video. *cough* nerf mages *cough*

Concerning the upcoming changes to high-end instances, there is an interesting thread discussing the changes with a lengthy blue response from Eyonix. My favorite quote from it:"Unless of course someone threw a snowball at you while you were trying to run away from the disease cloud in Scholomance."

Firepower

Since the public test realms (PTR) are buzzing with activity a lot of infos are pouring in about the changes concerning the new itemization. A lot of items in instances like BLackrock, Scholomance, etc. will be changed. In addition we'll get a few new recipes. The one interesting for us alchemists is the Elixir of Greater Firepower. It will be a random drop from one of the Dark Dwarves as far as i know. In addition we'll get new bags for herbalist, Cenarion Herb Bag (20) & Satchel of Cenarius (24), and enchanting, Enchanted Mageweave Pouch (16) & Enchanted Runecloth Bag (20), ingredients. The materials to craft those bags are quite fair, no big surprises.

Beside new items, a lot of focus lies on the new dungeon 2 (or tier 0.5) sets. WoW China released a sumup with all the stats, here is a translation. Although it is said that the sets will not be that interesting for the raiders, they will be appealing for casual gamers and some items are great for pvp. In total it is a very long a tideous questline you have to pass, including a 45 min Baron run, to finally be able to upgrade the last parts. The picture shows the final raid boss, Lord Valthalak, you have to summon in UBRS and kill, he is supposed to be a tough enough cookie. Sounds like some serious fun, doesn't it? I think it is a good idea Blizzard will limit the high-level instances and prevent those silly ez-mode class raids to Scholomance or Stratholme. Already people are bitching on the test realms they think its to hard to run those instances in a group o'five. What?!? C'mon, it was fun with a small group *before* they nerfed those instances. Stop whining! Where is the really challenging content for small groups? I know none... if we want to have fun, we run those instances with four people. When it comes to challenging content that requires skill, beside raids, WoW is just too casual. And somehow i doubt that will change in the expansion, but we'll wait and see.

Shirt Galore

I recently ventured into Scholomance to brew a "few" Flask of the Titans, always a good investment for a tank. While having some fun, as i haven't been there since forever, I remembered the Butcher has this special shirt. As soon as i mentioned it, he goes down and drops Sawbones Shirt. O.o Talking about the devil...
Chew was so nice to pass on it for me. yay! Afterwards we went into BRD to help some working on their FR gear. We realize one of us does not have the BRD key yet. Ok, we go after Fineous Darkvire... and he drops for me the Master Builder's Shirt. YAY! So finally my shirt collection is complete, as i recently also acquired a Sleeveless T-Shirt.

Yesterday we went down into Molten Core for the first time with our new raid community Equilibrium (EQ). We had a great night - all of us were amazed by the fantastic performance: All bosses up to Shazzrah down in the first try, well Magmadar was in the second. As we had a bunch of people with us who have never been in the Core before, a great job! Looks very promising and I'm quite sure we'll be back in BWL quicker then i thought. The picture shows us celebrating our successful raid in Bruuk's Corner. (What you don't see is the Doomguard Margajuh brought seconds later, after he asked some random people if they could help him summon a "friend". *chuckles*)

A video showed up with a Dancing Blood Elf Male. Looks like they will increase the polygon count in the expansion. But seriously, doesn't this dance reminds you of.. something?!? Another short clip with some dancing and emotes from Blood Elves you can find here.
This morning i ran into someone in Ironforge riding the Swift Zulian Tiger. Not bad, but not exciting either. I don't like those sabers...

Major Update

Well, to make a long story short: I'm back. =)

There has been so much stuff going on during the last weeks, I'm not sure if I can update you on everything and some things you might already know.

First, and most important: I changed my raid community. All of Custodes Fati, we left the Gathering due to contrary opinions about the behaviour of some people and about how some things in general were managed. No hard feeling from my side for most that stayed behind. Some I won't miss, but i also left behind some great companions - so it was not an easy decision. I wish them all the best and hope they'll be able to overcome their issues. If you read this (and are raiding with TG), you are probably one of the peeps I'll miss. ;)

So what did we do? We started a brand new raiding community called Equilibrium, which gives me and my guildies the great opportunity to finally adventure together more again. We asked around and got a large groups of friends and friends of friends together. We're settings things up as we speak and hope we're back to full speed very soon. I'll be posting a link once we got the new portal design done.

On a sidenote, it's interesting what kind of drama a "split" like this always involves. Kind of like if a couple splits up and some friends feel like they have to "decide" which side they like now. IMO that's silly, but exactly what happened concerning the behaviour of some. But well, let's move on...

Ahn'Qiraj

Finally the gates are open on Argent Dawn. After the drama that unfortunately happened on most realms - including large forum flamewars fueled by the usual forum trolls - we got the gong vibrating. It was saturday 10am. Perfect to take a small break and have breakfast with WoW and some bugs. ;) The server acted shaky, not as bad as on some other realms, i think we had like three crashes during the initial event (maybe more during the day). After the gates opened we gathered some people to fight some mobs that spawned in Silithius, but the lag was so bad, nearly no chance to perform melee attacks as the mob was always "out of range". So it did not make sense to stay. I kept checking back as i wanted to get a shot at the three hive quests, but most raids went straight into the instance it seemed. On AD not a single colossus went down. bummer.
The picture shows Selenia, who rang the gong, on her new legendary bug mount. The players carrying the scepters had to take a lot of bullshit before the event, so i think they deserve their bugs. :)

As i just came "back" i did not had time to adventure into AQ yet, but i intend to do that very soon.

Stuff

I updated my mod section a bit, as i recently switched and changed some mods. I definately enjoy SuperInspect, especially that you can keep inspecting when the player leaves range.

The X-Fire WoW Movie contest had some great movies participating. The WoW Machinima community is astonishingly creative. I enjoy the high-quality movies people recently release. Absolutely great! Talking about Machinima i regularly visit craftingworlds (website from Tristan who created the "save the murlocs" campaign), that guy is very creative. kudos. I laughed when i watched the two parts of his "switcher" campaign. Go and have a look, it's well worth it.

Did you see the new official events calendar yet? Finally a tool to look up which side of the world the next Darkmoon Fair will be.

Because i got bugged by several people asking me "How the hell did you win that fishing contest in STV? I never make it..." I decided to post a guide about the contest soon. So keep checking back, heh! *wink*