Project Lore

Welcome back to the Rogue's Gallery, readers! I know I said that I would wait until the next wing of the Icecrown Citadel raid dungeon was released to update this column, but I figured you might also want a quick run-down of the bosses found in the 5-man instances, as well. I'll be covering them over the next three days, hopefully leading into the release of Patch 3.3, itself. As you're probably aware by now, these 5-mans need to be tackled in the proper order to progress. You can't access one without having cleared and completed the quests in the others before it, and the first place you must go is the Forge of Souls. The Forge is home to a pair of rather... interesting bosses who oversee the operation of the soul grinders that, well, grind souls. Why souls and how do they grind them? Who knows, but it sure sounds malevolent doesn't it?! Bronjahm -- Who better to greet you at the doorstep of Icecrown Citadel than the jive-talking, boot-sliding Godfather of Souls? No, not James Brown, but you'd be hard pressed to tell the difference. Well, aside from being able to conjure up a giant storm of spirits, of course. While none of these bosses are going to truly tax players, it's still worth learning some of their tricks, and Bronjahm does have a handful up his sleeves. Everyone needs to be aware of his aforementioned Soulstorm ability, which creates a vortex of ectoplasmic turbulence dealing damage to anybody unlucky enough to wander into its path. Soulstorm's area of effect is donut-shaped, meaning you want to stay in the "hole" near Bronjahm. This doesn't seem tough at first, but once you're there, he'll start fearing players left and right, sending them uncontrollably into the spiritual spiral. If there's a Shaman in the party, make sure they throw down a Tremor Totem. Magic-users have even more to fear from the Godfather of Souls, whose heroic-mode skill Magic's Bane will cause anyone with in range to suffer the spell's normal damage plus that equal to half of the player's total mana. This ability should not kill anyone at max health, as it has an upper limit of 10,000 damage (15,000 on Heroic), but it can still cause some trouble. The last thing you really need to look out for is Bronjahm's Corrupt Soul, which drains health from a random player and creates a gem that the boss can use to heal himself. DPS needs to kill the soul fragment as soon as possible. Devourer of Souls -- While not quite as "comedic" as the Godfather, the Devourer of Souls is strange in its own special way. Based roughly on the Reliquary of Souls from Black Temple, this floating, three-faced monstrosity is probably one of the weirdest-looking bosses in the game. As you might assume from the boss' design, she can quickly rotate between several different attack modes, meaning that players really need to be on their toes during this fight and change their strat accordingly. Here are the three principal abilities you need to watch out for:

• Mirrored Soul: The Devourer will place a debuff on players that damages them as they DPS the boss. Unlike similar abilities, it seems that the damage done still hurts the mob, instead of merely being reflected.
• Unleash Souls: A pack of wraiths will be summoned to deal area-of-effect damage to players. The swarm doesn't hurt much, but they can't be targeted either, so it's imperative to run out of range if it becomes too much for the healer to handle.
• Wailing Souls: This laser-like "scream" will sweep the a portion of the room, causing high amounts of damage to anybody standing in front of the Devourer. This ability lasts for quite awhile, so make sure to get behind her and DPS away from the beam while you have the chance.

Each of these abilities features an on-screen warning. Learn them so that you can quickly react to whatever mode the Devourer of Souls is about to go into. After she goes down, your faction's hero will join you and a portal in the back of the room opens up. Proceed through it to reach the Pit of Saron.

Game Informer's Phil Kollar recently sat down to talk with Blizzard's Jeff Kaplan. Also known as Tigole, the former World of Warcraft Lead Game Designer actually spends most of his time on the company's next MMO project, but he nonetheless has some interesting experience to share. The four-page interview covers a lot of ground, and even though none of it is necessarily new, there is at least on pertinent piece of information we should be aware of going forward: we can expect to see another Wrathgate-style cinematic event play out somewhere in Icecrown Citadel!

"Cutscenes will always be something that we use sparingly, yes. We never want to interrupt gameplay too frequently or for too long of a period of time. The Wrathgate cutscene was a big experiment for us. It was our first foray into in-game cutscenes in World of Warcraft. I don’t think we’ve fully refined how we want cutscenes to work with future World of Warcraft content. We debate like crazy. We debate the length, we debate the frequency, and we have a lot of theories, but Blizzard is a really iterative development house. I think what’s going to have to happen is that you’ll see more cutscenes come into the game for us to really refine our strategy with them. We definitely have an eye toward more cutscenes, but at the same time, we don’t want to become just a cutscene game. Even before Cataclysm, in patch 3.3, there’s going to be a really exciting cutscene moment that’s going to be our next experiment with that."

I don't think it takes a rocket scientist to figure out what said cinematic might pertain to. Oh, I don't know, maybe the most important moment in World of Warcraft up until this point, perhaps? And I think it's the right choice, because unlike the felling of some of the game's other villains, there are a lot of loose ends that need to be tied up involving multiple characters. To have such important events taking place while your raid passes out loot just sort of kills the impact. Don't you agree? I also find it interesting how conflicted they seem to be over cutscenes. This is the sort of thing most game developers go through: how do you let the players experience the story? Now while that's more important for a contained, single-player experience, WoW's core game is expansive and involving enough to reward the player with a cutscene every once and while and not make them feel like they're watching a film. What do you think, readers? Would you like to see more Wrathgate-style cinematics in the game? If so, how far do you think Blizzard should take it?

Among  all the changes coming to the World of Warcraft when Cataclysm is released, one that it seems players are really looking forward to is the ability to use flying mounts in Kalimdor and Eastern Kingdoms. Not only will that capability allow us all to get around the Old World much, much quicker, but it also will ease the difficulty of maneuvering through (or over) zones of the opposite faction. And when it comes to PvP and arranging raids on enemy cities, flying is going to simplify getting your For the Horde / Alliance achievements. Not only will you be able to show up in enemy cities with virtually zero warning, but also you'll be able to shrink the amount of time between cities, which also then lessens the enemy's time to get organized at the next city. This is all fine and dandy, but how about enjoying more of a challenge: Aim to get in your raids (or at least one final one, if you already have the achievements) before Cataclysm hits. For me, one of the fun aspects of raiding enemy cities is the downtime. When 30+ Hordies board the Auberdine boats to Darnassus, Stormwind City or Azuremyst Isle, and others aboard dare do nothing beyond yelling warnings upon our arrival -- to me, that's excitement at its finest. And running through the unfamiliar enemy territory, hacking your way through guards and the scant brave PvPers, with virtually no idea where you are going -- that just adds to the hilarity. Another reason to get in your raids now: we still only have vague ideas about how the cataclysm will change much of Azeroth. While we know the cities will be redesigned to appear more 3-D for flight, and some may undergo style changes, it's still unclear whether all the cities will remain standing, at least in their full former glory, after the cataclysm. Any changes that cities do incur could also change the way they're raided. So get in your raids, earn that Black War Bear and represent your faction with pride. It's certainly not the challenge that it once was, but you can still have fun with the raids by limiting the number of people in your group and ambushing the hell out of the other side. Good luck!

WoWFlix is a column featuring videos from around the web related to World of Warcraft. If you find something you’d like to be featured, leave a comment or send a tweet to @Heartbourne.

 The following fan-made video contains major spoilers for The Frozen Halls, the series of 5-man regular and heroic dungeons available upon the release of patch 3.3. This video was made by vodka, a famous progression Alliance guild on Alterac Mountains. I remember back when they were on Mannoroth and my old Horde guild Reformation was competing with them for the server first Kazzak kill. This trailer is quite high quality. They definitely took some time working on capturing the multiple dramatic angles. For anyone who needs to get hyped up about patch 3.3 and its probable release on Tuesday, this will do it for you.

[caption id="attachment_8883" align="alignright" width="292" caption="How does he have time for a rap career?"][/caption] Being the official forums, people were complaining in them the other day.  With a subject like "I hope Blizzard gets PvE/P right in Cataclysm" I was mildly intrigued, but didn't give the post my seal of approval by responding (I hardly ever do).  The OP's main complaint appears to be with Wrath's state of healing.  More specifically, it is called "a huge cluster-bleep" due to PvE and PvP balancing of heals versus damage. Ghostcrawler agrees with the sentiments. Health pools will be much larger in Cataclysm and healing will be lower. That should help address some of the overly binary feel of PvP and PvE encounters. You'll still be able to kill people as well as be able to heal them. The pace will just be a little slower and both healing and killing should require more than 1-2 buttons. Here's how those health pools will become much larger, as promoted by GC himself. My knee jerk reaction is "awesome."  One of my main issues with WoW PvP has always been that it's over before it even starts.  With a larger health pool we should be able to be more tactical in our choices.  Cat-like reflexes and ganking will still be huge advantages, but it sounds like a keen mind will become more useful.  Maybe, just maybe, I'll get back on the PvP bandwagon (add collision detection and I'd be there in a heartbeat). The implications in PvE are just as dazzling, at least to my rookie healing abilities.  Heals will heal less than they do now, while players will have a larger pool.  The changes are geared towards raising the importance of tank avoidance, healing coordination, efficiency and tactical choices.  In short, Cataclysm shouldn't be about keeping the tank topped off by spamming your largest or fastest heals, but about choosing the correct spell at the right moment. One has to wonder how the modification to our health pools will change potions, enchants and healthstones.  No information was given on the avalanche of tweaks that will have to follow.  This is probably the best place to put the obligatory disclaimer.  This post is about an expansion that's a ways off.  The odds of things changing are fairly high. Overall, Ghostcrawler believes that the changes will slow down the pace of the game.  That's kind of odd though, because all I read was that we'll be getting ponies.  Or was it unicorns?

Tokyopop has released a new World of Warcraft-themed manga focused on the life (and subsequent unlife) of Thassarian, aptly titled Death Knight. You may know him as one of the quest givers from the Death Knight starting area, and he's also the resident Ebon Hold representative on Alliance gunship, "The Skybreaker." Indeed, as the first of his order to be released into the Alliance's care, he plays an important, if curiously muted, role in the lore. If you were ever curious to delve further, the manga intends to lift the veil on Thassarian's past. It begins as the Lich King forces his newest lieutenant to strike down an innocent woman, highlighting the inner turmoil every Death Knight seems to suffer from, and then quickly moves into a flashback of Thassarian's life as a young farm boy where he's either trading blows with his troublesome sister or his fellow soldiers. As any ambitious conscript in the Alliance army no doubt desires, Thassarian expresses his intentions to move up through the ranks and become a commander, but is threatened with the possibility of being a career grunt. The 23-page preview ends there, but it should be interesting to see how things develop from there and how he interacts with Arthas. Is he turned against his will or does he embrace the power the Lich King promises? And how does he manage to hold onto his latent humanity in the process? I suppose we all know how the story eventually ends, but I still like this format. As a stand-alone volume, I hope this manga sets a precedent for extended, visual biopics of our favorite Warcraft characters. Death Knight features 192 pages of Dan Jolley's storytelling and art by Rocio Zucchi. It should be in stores now for an MSRP of $10.99.

[caption id="attachment_8877" align="aligncenter" width="640" caption=""][/caption] Blizzard hates when new content kills old content, and with good reason.  If you put hours upon countless hours into something, you want it to be enjoyed for as long as possible.  Few people managed to clear vanilla Naxxramas before The Burning Crusade launched.  This is the reason why Naxxramas returned in Wrath of the Lich King.  Blizzard gated Trial of the Crusader to ensure that players didn't blow through the trash-less content, even with its multiple versions.  Doing so indirectly extended the life of Ulduar.  Icecrown Citadel is being handled a little differently though. Patch 3.3 is approaching fast, allowing various details on the raid to trickle out.  ICC will feature four versions per encounter like TotC, but raid leaders will be able to select the difficulty of the encounter on a per-boss basis.  The culmination in Wrath raiding will feature gated content as well.  However, ICC will be wing gated, meaning there will be multiple bosses (four) per lockout.  That begs the titular question, will ICC kill TotC raiding? I don't think so, and certainly not in the way that Ulduar killed Naxxramas.  The obvious reason is the gating.  Once you clear a wing in 10/25m, it only makes sense to go back to TotC to grab some badges, and possible upgrades that you may be lacking.  I believe that the main reason people will still be raiding TotC so often (or its heroic version, TotGC) won't be because of something Blizzard designed, but because of Patch 3.3 itself.  I am speaking of the flood of users that will return to World of Warcraft to be a part of the Lich King's final days. Every patch is marked by a dramatic increase of Solidsamm's gold deposits returning players, and Patch 3.3 should see an even greater return.  A greater return of under-geared players that are eager to participate in the finale that Icecrown Citadel is to bring.  What better way to gear them up than with quick and easy runs through TotC? What will it be raid leaders?  Are you planning on abandoning TotC as soon as possible, or are you going to farm it as long as a respectable portion of the guild needs the upgrades?

A while back, my fellow blogger iTZKooPA clued all of our wonderful readers in on how the Project Lore bloggers each chose our toon names (and in return, many of you shared your own stories with us, too). But sometimes, our names are long and, for whatever reason, they end up getting shortened considerably by our in-game friends. And those awesome names we painstakingly chose can get warped into something else. Let's take my many "Pixie-" based names for example. Pixiestixy, Pixielocks, Boypixie (on the PTR) -- they all inevitably get shortened to just "Pixie." And I'm fine with that. But then there's my main. Up until recently, I played almost exclusively with RL friends, so everyone just called me by my RL name. But then Locomomo joined a new guild, and my new crew still is split over what to call me. Some say "Loco" (crazy), and others say "Momo" (peach). I prefer the latter, but I suppose Loco fits me too, at times! So I decided I'd try to steer everyone to calling me Momo by creating an alt Pally named Momochi. But in the end, this may just add to the confusion because if I ever get her to level 80, then I won't know which toon friends are referring to if they just say "Momo." It's more confusing than I realized! Then, there's my husband. His main used to be called Horadric, as a tribute to Diablo. He liked the name, but not quite enough to adjust to people calling him that in guild chat and while on vent. Even worse - shortening the name led either to people calling him "Ho" or "Hor" -- neither great options. I went with "Hora," but I seemed to be the only one. So he changed his toon's name to Rolorolo, a double version of his nickname IRL. Now everyone just calls him "Rolo." It works. I suppose if you have a relatively short toon name with two syllables or less, you probably don't have to worry too much about what your nickname will become. But if you tend to the longer names, think first about what your nickname could become. You don't want to be stuck known as "Hor"... or do you? Has anyone else had interesting or unexpected nicknames stem out of their toon names?

Since the launch of Wrath of the Lich King I've had the unfortunate experience of being a part of four separate guilds.  In my WoW career that makes a total of six, one for vanilla, one for The Burning Crusade and a 400% increase for Wrath.  I joined each of these guilds with at least one high ranking member knowing that I will only raid once, maybe twice a week.  Raiding once or twice a week means I'm not considered a staple raider.  Yet, all but one of the guilds accepted me because I am a "good" raider.  What exactly does that mean? Here's my criteria for being a good raider, in order of importance from most important to least important:

• Accountability - Being accountable is important in raiding, but also real life.  When you say you'll be somewhere, you are there.  When you fail, you take the blame and make sure it doesn't happen again.  When you raid, you have any and all required goods - potions, full durability, gems, enchants and glyphs.
• Listening - There's a reason for the guild ranks.  In an ideal world *cough* the GM and officers are the most knowledgeable members in the guild.  They run it, and the raids, because they know the ins and outs of the game and the encounters.  A good raider will listen to these directions and politely interject if they have a differing opinion or another idea.  They will also grow to respect and trust the skills of other members.
• Technology - A good raider doesn't need a beast of computing, but they need a capable system with a dependable Internet connection (hearkens back to accountability). UI mods fall into this category as well.  Knowing which ones help you the most, don't kill your system and properly configuring them can be an exercise in frustration, but it's an exercise that is expected of you.
• Don't Be A Douche - Pretty self explanatory (I hope).  A healthy raider realizes that they are in a group with 9 to 24 other people.  They realize these other avatars are controlled by other human beings that have feelings, emotions and their own hang-ups.  The setting requires attention, concentration and coordination.  Don't break it by constantly saying your mom jokes, telling people they are "teh gay" or lambasting them for dropping the ball (unless it's a recurring issue, then tough love is acceptable).
• Class/Encounter Knowledge - Knowing your class is good.  Knowing an encounter is important.  Knowing these aren't mutually exclusive skillsets is another thing entirely.  Recognizing how skills and abilities of your class can make the encounter easier is the "skill" that many people are after (ie popping Cloak of Shadows to drop a DoT save healing time and mana, and cleansing time/mana).  Being adaptable to changing conditions - getting a loose mob off a healer even if you may die from it - is another sought after trait.
• The Extra Mile - Missing some of the above criteria?  Then make up for it by going the extra mile when you head into a raid.  Bring extra pots to help healers, level up that cooking so you can drop feasts, fish for feast materials, make sure to have a repair bot (less useful since Patch 3.1), help with guild funding (the in-game bank and IRL expenses), be open to respeccing to fill in holes or make yourself available for heroic farming.
• Enjoy It - Only raid if you enjoy it, otherwise you'll drag people down.

There's no way that every raid leader has the same notion of a good raider.  It's safe to say that the best of them realize that DPS and healing output aren't the only measure of skill.  Don't get me wrong, they are important, but by my standards there's a lot more to raiding than raw output. I'll take the 4.5K DPSing, generous, level-headed player in mediocre gear who's on time and prepared at 7:30PM over 7K DPSing prima donna any day.  What's your criteria?

[caption id="attachment_8847" align="alignright" width="300" caption="It's coming..."][/caption] What's so special about this release you say? What could possibly be changed or added to 3.3 this late in the game? Well, not much at all,  but that's just what is so exciting about Build 10952, because it is the first (and likely last) build to be labeled a Release Candidate! That means that Blizzard is more or less happy with where all the changes they've made are at right now and are looking to push this version of the patch onto live servers. Barring any further, unforeseen issues to fix or deal with, this is 3.3 that we'll all be playing with in due time. Like in the last post, I'm going to refrain from putting a specific date on the patch, but the fact that it features a change to the Winter Veil holiday should give you at least some indication of when they plan to drop it:

Achievements

• Merrymaker doesn't require you to complete Crashin' & Trashin' anymore.

Icecrown Citadel

• Essence of the Blood Queen - Now heals for 10% of all damage inflicted. (Down from 15%)

Druid

• Eclipse now increases damage done by Wrath by 40% (up from 30%) and the critical chance of Starfire by 40% (up from 30%)

Warrior

• Item - Warrior T10 Melee 2P Bonus - When your Deep Wounds ability deals damage you have a 3% chance to gain 16% attack power for 10 sec. (Down from 20% attack power)

Since this is likely the final revision, it might behoove you to once again familiarize yourself with all of the changes that are being made to the game in 3.3. Most people are probably aware of the major features such as Icecrown Citadel and the Dungeon Finder, but sometimes all those class tweaks can be a little harder to wrap your head around until you see them all in once place!