Sunday, January 31, 2010

Mornara the Warlock, Part 5

Story starts here.


Mornara has no way to tell how much time has passed since she was captured. Her days have shrunk to unconsciousness or fitful sleep on the cold stone floor, barely enough food and water, and beatings from the Death Knight and his ghouls. Mornara is only sure she is still alive because her muscles hurt from the beatings, and she's not entirely sure that means she's alive.

Any time Mornara tries to cast a spell or summon a demon she gets the splitting headache that feels like her brain is being stabbed by shards of ice. If she is so foolish as to try to cast in the presence of the Death Knight he chokes her until she starts to black out from lack of air.

Despite Mornara's resolve, the constant cold and hunger and pain from the physical beatings are starting to be too much for her.

Saturday, January 30, 2010

Mornara the Warlock, Part 4

Story starts here.


When Mornara next wakes she is alone in the cell. She takes a closer look around, but still finds nothing that could be used as a weapon. The cell is all smooth stone with an iron door. There are vents at the ceiling, but they are too small to fit anything more than fetid air and a faint blue light. The only thing she finds is a piece of bread and a wooden cup of water on the floor next to the door. Mornara carefully smells both the bread and the water. However, the pervasive smell of decay and cold covers any drugs or poisons that might be in the food.

Mornara has just finished the bread and is taking a last sip of water when the cell door opens. The same Death Knight enters followed by two ghouls. Before the Death Knight has a chance to react Mornara's fingers twitch and she sets one of the ghouls on fire.

The Death Knight growls and steps forward to grab Mornara's throat. He slams her into the wall and punches her several times as the ghoul burns out.

"Get rid of that useless carcass," growls the Death Knight.

The remaining ghoul slowly drags the charred ghoul corpse out of the cell. However, Mornara isn't paying much attention to it. The Death Knight has a firm grip on her throat and slams her against the wall a couple more times, not letting up the pressure on her throat.

Mornara reaches for the Death Knight's wrist. She tries to pry his fingers loose from her throat, but can't get any grip with his gauntlet in the way.

"You're a little more spirited than I expected." The Death Knight leans in so his face is right in Mornara's. She flinches as his breath brushes her cheek. "This will be more fun than I had hoped."

Mornara tries to kick the Death Knight, but he blocks her with a knee. Her hands clutch at his grip on her throat. She tries to get any sort of leverage on his fingers or failing that in the joints of his gauntlet. Black spots and flashes block Mornara's vision as she starts to run out of air.

The Death Knight pulls a vial from his belt pouch. He thumbs the stopper out and tips the contents into Mornara's mouth. Mornara gags and tries to pull away from the Death Knight, but he never reduced his hold on her throat. The thick black liquid burns her mouth and throat as it goes down.

Once Mornara has swallowed most of the contents of the vial the Death Knight lets go of her throat and steps back. Mornara bends over, coughing and wheezing. She spits to clear her mouth, "What was that?"

The Death Knight smiles evilly, "Not the Plague." He steps forward and swiftly punches Mornara in the face. She feels a painful crack and blood starts flowing from her nose. Still out of breath, Mornara gasps in pain and tries to use her sleeve to staunch the flow of blood from her nose. The Death Knight punches her squarely in the solar plexus. Mornara makes a choked noise and drops to the floor.

Mornara lies on the floor bleeding and gasping for air as the Death Knight stands over her. "We'll continue this later." He kicks her in the ribs for emphasis and then leaves the cell. Over the sound of Mornara's blood thickened breathing she can hear the click as the cell is locked.

Icecrown Citadel Dialogue: Gunship Battle

So in the previous dialogue post we saw how High Overlord Saurfang was ready to go save Bolvar Fordragon, just so he could help patch up Horde/Alliance relations. Once we get to the gunship Saurfang is all gungho to get to the upper spire and start kicking some Scourge butt. Unfortunately we get a slight interruption from the Alliance.



High Overlord Saurfang yells: Rise up, sons and daughters of the Horde! Today we battle a hated enemy! LOK'TAR OGAR!
High Overlord Saurfang yells: Kor'kron take us out!


High Overlord Saurfang yells: What is that? Something approaching in the distance.
High Overlord Saurfang yells: ALLIANCE GUNSHIP! ALL HANDS ON DECK!
High Overlord Saurfang yells: You answer to Saurfang now!
Muradin Bronzebeard yells: Marines, Sergeants, attack!
Muradin Bronzebeard yells: Move your jalopy or we'll blow it out of the sky, orc! The Horde's got no business here.
High Overlord Saurfang yells: You DARE board my ship? Your death will come swiftly.
High Overlord Saurfang yells: You will know our business soon. Kor'kron, ANNIHILATE THEM!

********
Side note: The most amusing part of doing these dialogue transcriptions is seeing the bits of our raid that get mixed in. I'm not transcribing them as well, since they aren't part of each fight's dialogue, but they sure are funny.

Lurker

Last night, before we went to sleep Kuanchichi and Viljo made a speedy excursion to Serpent Shrine Cavern. They hopped, skipped, and water-walked to the islands Lurker Below inhabits.



Once there they donned their fishing gear, and fished the Lurker Below up. It was pretty easy do to. We both remember when Kuanchichi and Smoovesta were the only two in the guild who had the skill to pull that boss.

Friday, January 29, 2010

Mornara the Warlock, Part 3

Story starts here.

Mornara groaned as something prodded her roughly in the ribs. She opened her eyes and looked up at the armored form and glowing blue eyes of a Death Knight. His boot had been what woke her.

"Good, you're awake." The Death Knight kicked her hard in the side. "No point hurting you until you're conscious to feel it."

Mornara gasps and rolls away from the Death Knight. She gets to her feet, still a little wobbly. As she starts to chant a curse, the Death Knight gathers swirling ice crystals in one hand. Just as she is about to send the curse on to him the Death Knight gestures and ice filled air swirls around her head and shoulders. Mornara feels like her skull is filled with shards of ice, all simultaneously trying to stab in and burst out. Mornara presses her hands to her temples, the curse completely forgotten. When the pain fades she lifts her head, surprised that her hands aren't covered in blood and also surprised to realize she had fallen to her knees from the pain.

"Tsk tsk," the Death Knight slowly shakes his head at Mornara. "No casting allowed. You might be stronger than the ghouls if we let you do that."

As Mornara gets to her feet again the Death Knight knocks on the cell door. Three ghouls come at his knock and the door is closed after them. The Death Knight crosses his arms and grins as he leans lazily against the iron cell door.

Mornara takes a quick look around her cell but aside from the Death Knight and the three ghouls the cell contains nothing but her. The stone walls and floor are bare of anything she could use to defend herself. And sometime before she woke up she was stripped of her weapons and magical armor.

The ghouls shuffle towards her and she takes an involuntary step backwards. The Death Knight's grin widens. Mornara scowls and steps up to punch the closest ghoul. As soon as she hits the nearest ghoul all three of them are on her punching and kicking. Thankfully there was no biting, but Mornara had trained very little and was much better at magical than physical combat. As the ghouls pummeled Mornara the last thing she saw before she blacked out was the Death Knight smirking.

Thursday, January 28, 2010

Mornara the Warlock, Part 2

Continued from Part 1


Mornara gasped for breath. She was tired and starting to run out of magical power. She had fallen back behind her demon so that she could have a short rest. But the undead kept attacking and she had to keep reinforcing her demon.

She chanted a curse onto a skeleton. With more curses and some shadow bolts the skeletons before her disintegrated. Mornara then turned to the large abomination that was beating on her voidwalker. She cursed the abomination and started to feed health into her voidwalker. However she was too late: one last smash from the abomination and the voidwalker evaporated in a swirl of shadow.

The backlash from snapping the link between her and the voidwalker stunned Mornara for a precious few seconds. It was just long enough for the abomination to charge up to her. As her vision cleared Mornara saw the abomination's backhand coming towards her. She had just enough time to throw an arm up in defense before she was tossed through the air. Her impact with a tree trunk knocked her unconscious.

Friday, January 22, 2010

Perky Pug

Viljo has apparently pugged with 100 random people. To commemorate this the WoW dev team sent me a letter:


Which contained a pet:


I am never going to pull this pet out. I don't really like pugs, and this one will occasionally wipe its ass on the carpet...

Thursday, January 21, 2010

Mornara the Warlock, Part 1

The young orc girl was strong in body and mind. She wanted to help the Horde. So she made the hot and dusty journey to the Valley of Trials. There she met with the different trainers. She had no interest in the elements or animals so the shaman and hunter trainers passed her by. She had a magical gift and was strong willed, so the warlock trainers chose her before the warriors or the rogues reached her.

After she learned a small bit of Thalassian she choose the name Mornara. In Elven, Mornara means black morning or black dawn. She had no idea how appropriate that name would become.

Mornara did well at her Warlock studies. She mastered several demons and found the shadow power of the warlocks to come easily and naturally to her.

Mornara traveled over much of Azeroth with a paladin companion, Tylara. They vanquished many evils and started to gain some renown within the horde.

Then Mornara and Tylara had a falling out. It was never clear what caused their disagreement. If it was that Tylara grew disdainful of Mornara's use of the Shadow and familiarity with demons. Or if Mornara grew tired of Tylara's holier than thou attitude and distrusted the blood elves' intentions. Either way Mornara parted ways with Tylara and struck out on her own.

Mornara still wanted to help the Horde. She heard that the Plaguelands were a good place to fight the recent and strengthening threat of the Lich King. She ventured there and participated in a few battles against the Lich King's undead minions. Mornara distinguished herself in the fighting with her determination and the strength of her magic and demons.

Wednesday, January 20, 2010

Oops...

So Mornara and Ikoli have been continuing to do random dungeons. And as much as I'd like to make yet another rant about stupid hunters or ret pallies who think they are tanking or that mage who thought it would be so helpful to pull for me, I really need to complain about that idiot tank who forgot to put Frost Presence on.

Wait, what's that you say? Mornara was tanking? ...Oh yeah,she was... I was that idiot tank, and I forgot to put Frost Presence up after swapping specs.

Now, in my defense I only forgot for the first 3 pulls in DTK. But that is balanced by the fact that I was not the one who noticed that I didn't have it up. In fact what happened, was that I lost aggro on that 4-pack at the end of the first hallway. While Ikoli finished rezzing the dead dps, I apologized profusely for losing aggro. On of them asked if I had Frost Presence up, and of course I actually didn't. So I apologized even more, put it up, and then we proceeded to smash merrily through the instance.

The moral of the story here is several things. First, check if Frost Presence is up, check it every time. Second, everyone makes mistakes. But the way to tell if the person is an asshole or not is in how they respond to their mistakes. If they don't fix them and apologize they are assholes. This of course is contingent on the mistakes being pointed out gracefully or at least not in an abrasive fashion.


Also: bonus points to Ikoli for managing to keep me alive for those three pulls even though I was missing the extra health and armor from Frost Presence. Ikoli is an excellent healer, and I never worry about dying with her behind me.

Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Outland Raider!



Because of the three day weekend Darkfall didn't have enough people on to do Trial of the Grand Crusader. We'd already done ToC and ICC and various people were saved to Ony or VoA. So we went to The Sunwell Plateau! Whee achieves!

Also the comparison between ToC and Sunwell is pretty stark. TOC is the lamest raid I've been in. It's one big room and you just stand there and listen to stupid bickering while waiting for the next boss. Sunwell, the art is awesome and the story and dialogue are so neat. Perhaps tomorrow I'll post the pictures of the monologue from Prophet Velen after you defeat Kil'Jaeden and while Velen rekindles the Sunwell itself.

Saturday, January 16, 2010

Chore Chore Chore

The PUGs and need for Frost Badges has done something very little in this world is able to: left me happy to take on office politics and bullshit code cleanup tasking at work on a three day weekend instead of log in to play. Becuase, after all, office politics is more fun than dealing with PUGs. And bullshit code cleanup has more visible tangible progress than picking up stupid greens and a couple Frost Badges, when I need 95 just to get one piece of gear.



I am so discontented.

Icecrown Citadel Dialogue, Intro

Blizzard has tried very hard to give WoW and in particular Icecrown Citadel a very epic feel. You're breaking into the Lich King's castle and you're gonna try to take him on. You are not doing this alone. Tirion Fordring and High Overlord Saurfang are there to help. I think that the opening dialogue between them and the Lich King is pretty cool so I've finallly remembered to take screen shots of the it.


Highlord Tirion Fordring yells: This is our final stand. What happens here will echo through the ages. Regardless of outcome, they will know that we fought with honor. That we fought for the freedom and safety of our people!


Highlord Tirion Fordring yells: Remember, heroes, fear is your greatest enemy in these befouled halls. Steel your heart and your soul will shine brighter than a thousand suns. The enemy will falter at the sight of you. They will fall as the light of righteousness envelops them!
Highlord Tirion Fordring yells: Our march upon Icecrown Citadel begins now!
The Lich King yells: You stand upon the hallowed ground of the Scourge. The Light won't protect you here, paladin. Nothing will protect you...
Highlord Tirion Fordring yells: ARTHAS! I swore that I would see you dead and the Scourge dismantled! I'm going to finish what I started at Light's Hope!


The Lich King yells: You could have been my greatest champion, Fordring: A force of darkness that would wash over this world and deliver it into a new age of strife.
The Lich King yells: But that honor is no longer yours. Soon, I will have a new champion.
The Lich King yells: The breaking of this one has been taxing. The atrocities I have committed upon his soul. He has resisted for so long, but he will bow down before his king soon.


Highlord Bolvar Fordragon yells: NEVER! I... I will never... serve... you...
The Lich King yells: In the end, you will all serve me.


High Overlord Saurfang says: The paladin still lives? Is is possible, Highlord? Could he have survived?
Highlord Tirion Fordring says: The power of the Light knows no bounds, Saurfang. He soul is under great strain, but he lives - for now.
High Overlord Saurfang says: Then we must save him! If we rescue Bolvar Fordragon, we may quell the unrest between the Alliance and the Horde.
High Overlord Saurfang says: Our mission is now clear: The Lich King will answer for his crimes and we will save Highlord Bolvar Fordragon!
High Overlord Saurfang yells: Kor'kron, prepare Orgrim's Hammer for it's final boyage! Champions, our gunship will find a point to dock on the upper reaches of the citadel. Meet us there!

Wednesday, January 13, 2010

Progress is dead

The need to acquire Frost Badges trumps all, and between the daily randoms, ICC, and the weekly raid, there is not really a lot of time left over, for questing, achieves, pvp, or anything else that is remotely fun to do in Wow.

Basically, it's become a giant chore.

:-(

Monday, January 11, 2010

that last dps

Whenever I run a random there is a wait before the dungeon window pops up. As I've mentioned in the past the time between queueing and getting the window is extremely dependent on your role. Tanks roughly .5 seconds, healers about a minute, and dps can go as high as 20 minutes or more. Because of that I'm never surprised to see this:


You know that last dps has fallen asleep at their keyboard. Or maybe they have tabbed out and are reading blogs. Either way it's taken so long for a group to form that they have tuned out. Hopefully they tune back in before the timer runs out...

Chicken

In the past Teltanara has been accused of riding a chicken. I am here today to prove that is a foul and untrue statment. In my defense I present this screen shot:



See! That gnome (ick) is riding a chicken. An actual chicken! Telt is riding a hawkstrider. Not a chicken!

Sunday, January 3, 2010

the New Eeyan

Eeyan and Telt pulled Halls of Reflection, which they still hadn't done, for their random daily last night. They also pulled three rogues as the DPS. This simply didn't work and after vote-kicking the tank, then wiping to red despite replacement better tank, the rogues dropped group. We oneshot everything once a ret pally and a mage were pulled in.

Last week, when running Forge of Souls, Eeyan picked up the axe [Nighttime]. An evaluation of it showed that it was not a big enough increase over the ever-cool-looking [Calamity's Grasp] to be worth switching specs until Eeyan got a decent sword for the offhand.

So lo and behold, what should drop in the end of Halls of Reflection but [Liar's Tongue]!!! And nobody else wanted it. So now Eeyan is Combat Swords, or rather H&S. I've never had him Swords before.

Here he is waiting on the steps of the Bank of Dalaran for Teltanara to come enchant the weapons.



Respeccing is expensive when you're dual-spec'd! Ugh. Anyhow for raiding, after comparing them, I used the spec (right out of Elitist Jerks), and for farming/outdoor questing, I have this spec. I haven't re-glyphed him yet.

Saturday, January 2, 2010

returning farmland to its natural state

Whenever I go travelling, I look around at the farms flanking the road, and wonder, how much prettier and better would the world be if it wasn't all cut up in square plots of furrowed land. Surely there is something unnatural happening to the water and temperature balance of the soil when we do that.

Like this; Ikoli travelled to Tanaris, just to see it all ploughed up.



O wait. That's not The World, that's Azeroth. I shouldn't be seeing little square plots of furrowed land there; that's a graphics issue in my WoW client.

I've been considering this state of affairs for days and finally tonight took the time to look up this problem on the WoW Mac Technical Support forum. Here's the thread about it, but I repeat the Blue instructions here:

1) Close the WoW application
2) Navigate to your main World of Warcraft folder
3) Open the config.wtf file in your WTF folder
4) Add the following line to the bottom of the file: SET gxapi "OpenGL"
5) Save and Close
6) Restart WoW

I tried it, and Kuanchichi then went to Tanaris. Kuan is nature-boy and really prefers to leave things wild, since then the Spirits are stronger. Upon seeing all was well, he relaxed.



Now if only I could just add a line item to some law and have that happen to The World.