Blizz calls it "earthquake"

I still call it "pancake". In the Naxx "let's see if we know how to play still" PUG we were in last night, they called it "Cookie of Death".

Seriously, what were the artists thinking?





p.s. Kuan was cracking 10,000 dps last night on the boss fights in Naxx. He's on the lookout for the Nerf Bat of Damocles, hanging up over his head.

Ahhh, the 4.0 patch is here.

Everyone's talent trees are destroyed, the guild interface is different, and stats on equipment, gems, glyphs, all changed...

Day 1: My addons were trash. I was still using FuBar with a bunch of ***Fu addons. Well, now I'm using ChocolateBar with a bunch of Broker_* equivalents (except for ToFu, which I adore and still have bridging in via Fubar2Broker). I spec'd Ikoli - it was a wild guess. Just her main, haven't tried the offspec yet. Kuan's main spec was easy. Well, easy is relative. Anyhow, concluded, based on the graphics and animation, that the new 31-point elemental talent is more appropriately called "pancake". And that was the end of Tuesday night: 2am and I headed to bed.

Day 2: More addons are clearly trash. Much as I hate it, clearly Recount is necessary. I glyph'd Kuan (see there was a reason I messed with Ikoli first). Checked out Sen'jin Village for changes - the event is gone, and Gadrin has a level 10 cleanup/gathering quest with no followon. Filed a bug: when Kuan summons or dismisses his Sen'jin Fetish, the drums loop forever. And it's a different drum line every time so I was pretty drummy after a while! Got Kuan his 25 mount achievement. Spec'd his offspec and glyph'd that. Got Mornara to make some gems for Relic slot, and Reforged gear to swap Hit for Mastery. Headed to the target dummy (absolutely the most happening place in the entire game right now), to find out Kuan was spec'd for waaaayyyy too much mana regen, and respec'd him again. By then it was midnight and Mornara decided she wanted her Gurubashi trinket. I headed over there with Kuan and he got his first kill of the 4.0.1 patch: some Paladin who was flattened by a single Lava Burst. Went into ZG just to be appalled at raid UI and then to bed.

Day 3: Found the X-Perl wow ace repository and downloaded the alpha, and later, an oRA2 beta. Put them in game and... got busy with real life. No game for me. Time to head to bed.

...

OK despite the facetious tone that's really what was going on. Basically the Elemental Shaman has a talent that allows 1:1 spirit for hit. And mp5 has been removed from the game so suddenly Kuan has a lot of spirit. He started out with something ridiculous like 480 hit, so I reforged the excess to Mastery. I need to inspect the gems more closely - hit is now a blue gem thing instead of yellow - so no reason for Kuan not to pick up a lot of purified - if I can move more hit to gems and reforge more gear I probably will.

It's gonna be a while before I have all my characters sorted...

Random Ulduar and Drake screenshots

Last gasp of the Ulduar drake run screenshots. I promise.


After you defeat the Keepers, the Gate of the Keepers unlocks. Of course you can't get close enough to open it until you defeat a faceless thing. But it looks very cool when it opens.



Here is the letter that Brann sends you with the drake. Of course they had to give the baby drakes to us! Stupid dwarves can't ride a drake!

Algalon sometime soon...

When you kill the Assembly of Iron on either of their hard modes (Steelbreaker or Runemaster last) a disc drops from them. This disc starts the chain to unlock the door to get to Algalon.

I was too busy going "holy crap I won the roll" to take a screenshot of the disc in my bags. Also you pretty much immediately turn it in at the back of the room in which you fought the Assembly of Iron. Brann and his Explorerer's League lackey help you work the console and you determine that you need to get the sigils from the four watchers. Of course since all four watchers are various sorts of fucked up by Yogg you've got to beat them without destroying their sigils.

How do you do that? I'm so glad you asked. Coincidently enough, its the exact same way you beat them to get your achieves for the 310% speed drake.






I remembered to take pictures of the sigils. They are actually pretty cool. Very thematic, especially when combined into a group of the four of them.




Once you present all four of them to the console. You get Celestial Planetarium Key



So sometime in the not too distant future we'll try Algalon. Once you aggro him you have one hour per lockout to attempt him. After that hour is done he disappears until your next lockout.

Brewfest

Brewfest ended this week. Kuan and Eeyan and Mornara and Viljo all got the Brewmaster achieve.



Brewfest, like most holidays is pretty silly. The daily set of quests to get the tokens involves either throwing mugs at Dark Iron dwarves or riding very easily tired rams around.



Also, Mornara may have gotten a bit drunk while in Dalaran...

Mornara the Tank

After fighting demons and fel-orcs and naga and ogres in Outland, Mornara and Ikoli took the goblin blimp to Northrend. The ice and snow of Northrend is quite a change from the arid and demon infested remains of Outland. Mornara is also conflicted about fighting the Scourge. She knows they are servants of the Lich King, and therefore must die. However, it wasn't all that long ago that she was a slave of the Lich King. So Mornara willingly kills the Scourge she faces, but with every death she wonders if it should have been her fate to die.

Mornara was strong enough to be chosen as a Death Knight instead of consigned to the ranks of the ghouls or other lesser members of the Scourge. And her strength combined with Fordring's determination are the only reasons she's free to fight for the Horde again. So every Scourge that Mornara kills makes her wonder and thank the elements and ancestors that it isn't her dying beneath someone else's axe. Even though she is sure both the elements and the ancestors stopped listening to her after she became a warlock, let alone after she was turned to the Lich King's service.

***

Mornara started venturing into dungeons with Ikoli and a few others. It's a test of all of them. Ikoli is there to heal everyone and Mornara is there to be the punching bag for everything they are facing. Specifically she is there to make sure that she is punched, or hit with a sword, or clawed by a dragon, or stomped on by a giant instead of anyone else, and especially instead of Ikoli. Because Mornara is wearing plate armor and wraps herself in the icy presence of a Death Knight she is a lot harder to hit and can take a lot more damage when she is hit than Ikoli can in her cloth robes.

Mornara started out just doing this with a few other people, but has since moved on to more dangerous places. These places need 10 or 25 people. Here Mornara is one of 2 or 3 people assigned to make sure their enemies are not attacking the cloth-wearers in the back.

She has even ventured into Ice Crown Citadel, the Lich King's stronghold. It is hard for Mornara to be there. The voice of Arthas calls to her still. She does her best to ignore him, but the whole citadel gives her flashbacks to Acherus before the Knights of the Ebon Blade were freed by Tirion Fordring.

OMG SQUEEEEE!

Why yes, that is Mornara riding on a Rusted Proto-drake


Mornara and Kuan have been running a half DF half regular pug of Ulduar 10 for the past two weeks. Over the weekend we got all of the keepers and Vezax. For the past two nights we've been working on getting Yogg+1. It's a brutal fight even in ICC gear, but we finally got it.



Die Yogg-Saron, DIE, you insanity inducing tentacled thing of wrongness.



One of the people who was with us for all of this was Talaitha. She's been playing since vanilla and is an awesome mage. She was very pleased to get her drake as well.



Oh yeah, my drake is fierce and fast and so very awesome! Roar!

Mornara the Death Knight, part 2

Now Mornara was free of the Scourge. But she didn't have a plan for what do to next. She had her armor, her deathcharger, and a few gold pieces, but no sense of purpose, no will driving her forward but her own. So she decided that since she was once again part of the Horde she would do some work for them.

Mornara's memories of the land and her time before being part of the Scourge were hazy in most places. She started her work by going to Razor Hill and Sen'jin village. The orcs and trolls there looked at her with distrust to start, but as she did simple tasks for them they grew to trust her more.

Wanting to make something beautiful after her ugly life as a member of the Scourge, Mornara took up the professions of Mining and Jewelcrafting. And as she re-explored the land she mined all that she saw. Soon her mining drove her exploration. She rediscovered Durotar, the Barrens, and Thousand Needles. And her mining fueled her skill in Jewelcrafting.

Not having any clear purpose Mornara joined up with a Troll priestess named Ikoli. She specialized in healing. Ikoli seemed happy to journey and fight along side Mornara. Because Ikoli could heal and Mornara was good at killing they tended to cut a swath through anything that stood in their path.

Mornara the Death Knight

I do not fear death, Mornara thought, as she walked through the streets of Orgrimmar. The calls for her execution increased as she got closer to Grommash Keep and Thrall. A glob of some guard's spit dripped down one cheek, and a rotten apple bounced off her shoulder. She fought to keep her temper and to keep from killing all who insulted her so. It was not that long ago that she was a feared and dreaded member of the Scourge, and if she still was she could call upon an army of undead to slaughter all these infuriating peons.

But that could never be, for she was no longer part of the Scourge. She was a Knight of the Ebon Blade. Not, thankfully, the Lich King's slave anymore. And if she and her brothers and sisters in arms were to survive they needed the goodwill of both the Horde and the Alliance. So she was sent here to present a letter from Tirion Fordring to Thrall. After Tirion Fordring had defeated the Death Knights at Light's Hope Chapel, he had spared them. And Darion Mograine, the leader of the Death Knights had vowed to help defeat Arthas.

A blush crept up Mornara's cheeks at the thought of their defeat. Though she was very glad to be free of the Lich King, it was still embarrassing to have been defeated by a pack of Paladins. She did not fear death, but she did hate defeat.

Mornara made her way to Grommash Hold. As she passed the guards at the entrance more spit and rotten fruit landed on her. Though the guards let her enter the throne room, several of them stood between her and Thrall with bared blades. Mornara approached the foot of Thrall's throne and knelt. She passed the letter from Tirion to Thrall, and remained kneeling while he read it. She would have preferred to die on her feet, if such was to be Thrall's response, but she had already been defeated at Light's Hope Chapel.

Fortunately Thrall had a more open mind than many of the citizens Mornara had passed on the streets. He allowed Mornara to join the Horde, because he trusted Tirion. Tirion was the human who sacrificed his life to free Eitrigg. The only other human to sacrifice themselves for an orc was Taretha. And because of this Thrall pardoned all the Death Knights who were former members of the Horde. He agreed not to attack Acherus, despite the Knights of the Ebon Blade being one brotherhood there, both Horde and Alliance.