Project Lore

Blizzard has updated their website with some background information and screenshots regarding the new raids coming in patch 3.2. While I'm not a huge PvE fan, I am a big lore fan. My issue with PvE raids is having to dedicate so much fixed time to play every week and having to trudge through trash and wipes. This opinion may be an artifact of being on the cutting edge of content in vanilla WoW; I'm aware that instances and raids are much shorter than they used to be. The Crusader's Coliseum instances are described as similar to the Ring of Blood style questlines, where players fight a series of bosses in succession. This sounds a lot more fun than fighting through trash. A lot of players groan when they hear Ring of Blood, but I really enjoy those style of fights. The twist on this is that there are 2 dungeons, a 10 man and a 25 man, each with a Normal and Heroic difficulty setting. The normal mode does not seem to have any "hard modes", so that guilds that have cleared a raid don't have to choose between clearing an instance and getting gear or progression. Once you finish the normal mode, you can proceed to the Heroic mode. On the heroic version, hard modes may be in play, and the main feature is a new take on the whole "Immortal" achievement that's been haunting us since Naxxramas. Heroic mode has a fixed number of attempts you can make, and every time you wipe, that number is decremented. Once you run out, you are locked out. The less you wipe, the better your loot. Blizzard has released some details on a few of the bosses:

Beasts: Your first challenge will pit you against a group of terrifying beasts the Argent Crusade captured in Northrend, including (but not limited to) a magnataur and not one, but two jormungar wyrms. Scourge: Some call the lieutenants of the Lich King fearsome creatures made of pure nightmare, which is doubtlessly a fitting description. How the Argent Crusade managed to capture these fiends remains a mystery; what's less mystifying is your fate should you fail to overcome this challenge.

As far as lore goes, this seems very contrived. Take a read of their introduction to the Crusader's Colliseum:

The time to strike at the heart of the Scourge is drawing close. Clouds blanket the skies of Azeroth and heroes gather beneath battle-worn banners in preparation for the coming storm. They say that even the darkest cloud has a silver lining. It is this hope that drives the men and women of the Argent Crusade: hope that the Light will see them through these trying times, hope that good will triumph over evil, hope that a hero blessed by the Light will come forth to put an end to the Lich King's dark reign. So the Argent Crusade has sent out the call, a call to arms for all heroes far and wide, to meet at the very doorstep of the Lich King's domain and to prove their might in a tournament the likes of which Azeroth has never seen. Of course, a tournament such as this needs a fitting stage. A place where potential candidates are tested to the limits of exhaustion. A place where heroes... become champions. A place called the Crusaders' Coliseum.

I imagine if the United States armed forces captured prisoners of war and had their fun beating them up we wouldn't fare any better in combat. Fighting monsters on the Lich King's doorstep seems so silly. The new Coliseum itself looks pretty cool. Are you a fan of this new style of no-trash, multi-mode raids, or do you want the standard version of dungeon-based gameplay?

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Obvious Pun It's quite sad that we are able to make this a column, but the death of MMOGs is inevitable in the industry.  Some games just never meet the company's expectations.  Others flounder after launch, and a few are supplanted by follow-ups or sequels.  As shocking as it may sound now, there will even come a time when our beloved World of Warcraft is taken offline.  Although knowing Blizzard it'll be supported, at least in maintenance mode, for a very, very long time after it loses its massive popularity. As noted in the original dust biting post, losing an MMOG is never a good thing.  As human beings we like to see "our" products succeed in the market for the simple reason that we spent money on them (HD DVD).  We supported them (Dreamcast), therefore we want them (Virtual Boy) to last forever so our investment seems sound.  The ugly side of this trait is that it causes us to tear down competing products as evidenced by the WoW vs WAR debate.  A practice that is both pointless and harmful to the industry at large.  Rather than cheer that our MMO "won", let's mourn the loss of someone else's cherished hobby. The Matrix Online (MxO) had a mix of classic MMOG issues at launch.  The title by no means broke sales records or gained a huge following.  In many opinions this is thanks to the degradation of the intellectual property before its release.  Way to go Matrix Reloaded & Revolutions.  Despite this, it kept enough subscribers aboard to stay afloat and support its continued development.  After all, it is doubtful that Sega, Monolith, and later Sony, would have kept the game alive for four plus years if it was bleeding money AIG-style. Enough melancholy, let's get to the good stuff, the single feature that kept MxO alive and well for over four years, story progression.  While I didn't get hooked by MxO due to its odd gameplay, I was line and sinkered by the IP the title was based on.  The link between the two projects forced me to keep an eye on the game's big events.  You see, MxO was given official canon status of Warner Bros.'s The Matrix universe.  What this means is that everything that happened in the game officially happened in The Matrix storyline.  I've never heard of another video game taking over as a product's main form of progression, but the idea fits perfectly into an MMO. Monolith Productions took things even further with Live Events, which were carried to Sony Online Entertainment's development as well.  In these scenarios crazy stuff could and did happen (ie Machine/Human truce broken).  The events and people partaking in them became legends.  For example, let's say that by sheer luck and skill your character managed to hold off a passageway leading to the center of Zion during an event.  Your act of bravery, if discovered and appreciated by other players, could be added to the story of the event, thus cementing yourself a place in the official story of The Matrix.  Forget about having an impact on the game world, you'd have an impact on the official game/movie/comic lore.  Forever!  How cool would that be? Check out this post by the lead game designer, Rarebit, if you are interested in finding out what The Matrix Online brought to the overall story.  Hopefully a more comprehensive update is made in the near future.  Perhaps the silver lining in the closure is that MxO will be going out with one final bang before it shuts down at the end of July. From the goodbye post: "The team will also be whipping up an end-of-the-world event. It won’t be quite the same as having over 100 developers in the game as Agents like when we ended beta, but we have 4 years of tricks up our sleeve. It’ll be a chance to revisit all the things that make MxO the memorable experience it is. And how could we pull the plug without crushing everyone’s RSI just one more time?" Now what am I going to follow for my SyFy (sorry, I mean sci-fi) fix?

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Wintergrasp barely got a mention in the first draft of the patch 3.2 notes, but the outdoor PvP zone will in fact see some major changes in the new patch. The updated patch notes show the following changes: To provide players with a more transparent notification of when Wintergrasp battles occur, as well as better control zone population and stability, several changes have been made.

• Players now have the option to queue for Wintergrasp from a Battlemaster in any capital city or by simply entering the Wintergrasp zone.
• Queuing will begin 15 minutes before each battle. If chosen, you will automatically be teleported to the zone. Any players in the zone who have not been chosen from the queue will be teleported out when the battle begins.
• The queue system remains active for the entire battle. As soon as a player leaves, a new one will be chosen from the queue.
• Trying to enter Wintergrasp during an active battle for which you have not been chosen will teleport you out. Please note that, as you are now able to fly over Wintergrasp, you will only be teleported out if you try to land and join the battle.
• Level 80 players get higher priority in the queue than lower level players. In addition, a random selection of queued players will be taken from both the Battlemasters and the zone itself.
• The queue will accept up to 100 players from each faction, resulting in a maximum battle of 200 players at a time.

There are several major implications of these changes. First and most obviously, servers with a large discrepancies in faction populations should have more balanced fights. Blizzard's original strategy to combat population imbalances in Wintergrasp was to adjust the Tenacity buff, but even with 20 Tenacity stacks, the server-side and client-side lag made gameplay difficult, and CC spells like stuns overwhelmed the underdogs. Tenacity is (presumably) not going well, and I think the mechanic will remain useful and should be expanded to Battlegrounds. One hundred players on each side is still a huge number; that's two and a half raids on each side if the battle is full. Horde players on the Proudmoore sever occasionally need a second raid, but I doubt we often break 100. The Alliance, on the other hand, well outnumber us, and getting capped at 100 will increase the Horde's chance of victory significantly. Most Horde players on Proudmoore don't even try to defend Wintergrasp as the Alliance almost always captures it. Since 3.1, Archavon's Log reports that the Horde has defended Wintergrasp 7 times and captured it 303 times, while the Alliance has defended 673 times and captured it 302 times. This is almost certainly a product of sheer numbers in this case. It is unclear if the queue will try to put players in at the same rate between factions; that is, in battles where only 20 players of one faction show up, the other faction's numbers will be limited. I've never played Wintergrasp on a low population server, but I imagine if they implement this change, it will be well appreciated. Gear checks, like the ones used in Battleground queues, could also be implemented to ensure that the factions have similar numbers of well geared and not-so-well geared players. They already select against lower level players, and they have the infrastructure to do gear selection from their Battleground code anyway. I think this could be valuable as well; Battlegrounds with similarly geared players is more fun, and they already showing wants to match similiar players in PvP, such as matching twinks with twinks. Another major implication is where players will be when Wintergrasp is starting. You can almost always see people huddling around where the portal will open before attacking Wintergrasp. Now, those players can queue, go do other things, then get ported to Wintergrasp when it starts. This will be especially handy for Battlegrounds, especially if you are on a server that is likely to have a wait to get into Wintergrasp. It will be interesting to see where players who aren't queued get teleport to if they attempt to enter Wintergrasp; perhaps they will get a debuff warning like when you fly into a no fly zone then sent to Dalaran near the Wintergrasp portal. Its a sort of a reinstatement of "ghetto hearth", where you get a free "teleport". I wouldn't be surprised if these "Battlemasters" become queues like the battlegrounds and you are returned to where you entered from after the battle. Additionally, with the teleport in place for the start of the battle, where will it place players? Its very strategically valuable to get positioned at a Workshop before the battle starts to capture it or start churning out vehicles. There are many unanswered questions, and I'm sure we'll hear more once the PTR is up. Are these changes necessary to balance Wintergrasp, or is capping it taking away from its original purpose? Will you be angry if you are doing your fishing daily and get kicked out of Wintergrasp?

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Alex, Jeff and Juggy are back with their toons Bowbins, Winterstrike and Steev to go on a mount run in Sethekk Halls. Maybe this time the three of them can coax a mount from the summond Anzu. Or maybe they'll wipe... Who knows? Find out in this episode of Project Lore.

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When patch 3.0 hit, I dropped Engineering for Herbalism to prepare for Wrath. I thought it would better complement my Alchemy, and raw materials like herbs were likely to be in high demand as people level their professions. I thought that the Lifeblood ability would far outweigh the benefits of Engineering as far as usefulness goes, as the Engineering item enhancements do not stack. Months later, I'm wondering if I made the correct choice. Lifeblood is barely useful in PvE; healers don't expect me to cast a small heal over time and the health I regenerate in that period is unlikely to save me before a healer gets to me. It doesn't provide me with any stats. It is questionably useful in PvP, and I've been eying other professions like Jewelcrafting to provide me with more usefulness in raiding and arena. Blizzard has very much begun to treat professions like they treat classes: diverse, but all useful. Hardcore raiders will spend thousands of gold to squeeze out another dozen or so DPS, and Blizzard wants players to choose the professions they enjoy, not the profession that they should choose in order to best perform in content. All the different professions have comparable buffs to each class in both PvP and PvE situations, often in the form of bonus stats. These often take the form of special item enhancements, like Enchanter's ring enchants or Scribe's shoulder inscriptions, or passive abilities like Toughness. To me, Lifeblood is not nearly on the same footing. It has its uses in some situations, but having to use another action bar slot or hotkey as opposed to doing an enchant or getting a passive enhancement for a lesser effect gives me a sour opinion of Herbalism's PvE/PvP usability. As far as money making, some professions have some ability to make money by doing things you normally do while questing and exploring and an ability to make money by spending time on just the profession. Usually, this is in the form of gathering and crafting. For example, engineers can craft epic BoE items and collect from gas clouds they encounter in the world. Miners can mine from nodes that they find while out and about and can smelt ore into bars. Tailors can craft BoE items and have the Northern Cloth Scavenging to find more cloth while killing mobs. Either way, most professions are designed to be able to be lucrative both passively while roaming in the world or by investing time into them. Professions that satisfy this are Enchanting, Engineering, Tailoring, and Mining. I consider these professions to be much more appealing than the others. With the carpets from tailoring, I just may pick up Tailoring on my main (rogue). Its interesting to note that these professions are generally considered not to have a direct "complement", like Alchemy/Herbalism or Skinning/Leatherworking. For now, if Frost Lotuses weren't selling for 30 gold or more on my server, I'd be dropping Herbalism for something else right now, because it gives few benefits compared to other professions. The only benefit I would miss is being able to track herbs, which helps immensely for some of the Cooking dailies. As far as effort required, some professions are very easy and some are very difficult. Inscription requires you to stock a lot of herbs, pigments, and inks, and also requires you to sell a wide variety of glyphs to make the same amount of money as the other professions. Enchanting can be difficult to market - many players have an enchanter in their guild or someone they know rather than check the AH or shout in trade. Inscription seems very unappealing on a main for me for this reason and that its hard to "passively" make money. I think this needs work in the long run. What professions did you choose? Do you ever switch professions, and why?

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If you are a regular to the Project Lore Blog then you probably already know my in-game addiction, non-combat pets.  The cute designs and animations of most of the vanity pets have allowed my love of animals IRL (I've owned or own ferrets, various aquatic beings, cats, dogs, turtles, and so on) to easily segway into the digital realm.  I was so bad in the early days of WoW that I had two bags dedicated to the useless little critters.  Image explaining my lack of fire pots to my hardcore raiding buddies because I grabbed my bag of cockroaches, cats and parrots (my first in-game pet) instead.  Woops. With the Midsummer Fire Festival back in action I've once again trudged off to Slave Pens to melt Ahune.  All in an attempt to score a Scorched Stone, that, according to WoWHead, has <2% chance of dropping.  I began my audacious task this morning with a bunch of guildies, and if the pet dropped our first round of attempts you better believe this post would have a much different tone.  Obviously, the mini MC mob continues to elude me.  And my attempts are already done for the day on Solidsamm. Here's the issue with Ahune, and the only piece of loot that keeps him interesting, people lie to get to him.  Don't believe me?  Just spam "LFG Ahune Must Have Summon" and see how many people will @ you who either A) have used their daily summon or B) haven't done the quick quests to get the summon yet.  The rule that I have always gone by, and been asked to comply with, is that if you don't have the summon (or can't provide one on an alt) then you aren't allowed in the group.  The last thing pet collectors would want is to lose the Scorched Stone roll, probably the only one they will see in the short time span, to a random unappreciative player who didn't even contribute an attempt.  But it's difficult to tell who actually has a summon left and who doesn't.  The only trick I've seen is to make sure that your quest log says everyone else in the party is on the same quest.  Not a flawless system, as they may not have picked it up yet.  Anyone have any other ideas? The moral of the story is that if you can't contribute a summon, then DO NOT GO TO AHUNE.  I am even referring to guildies.  If you aren't absolutely 100% positive that you can pass such a sought after item, then don't go under any circumstance.  At level 80, with a crappy non-80 healer, the encounter is ezmode (Ahune didn't scale up for Wrath), so they don't need your "help." Outside of the pet and the achievement, there is no reason to go to the Ice Lord.  Save yourself the drama and just sit it out. This has been a Public Service Announcement by Pet Lovers Everywhere (TM). Titles (Alliance/Horde) are not for me, but I am sure there are many of you out there already hard at work on your respected recognition.  Outside of Ahune's sacred gift I am working on a Captured Flame for the priest and enjoying the fire works, juggling and general summery fun that the Festival brings to Azeroth.  Perhaps I should work on my thievery...What are you goals? The Midsummer Fire Festival ends July 5.

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With all the Patch 3.2 hullabaloo (and it's impending release on the PTR), it's easy to forget about other things that might be going on in the World of Warcraft. This Sunday marks the beginning of the seminal Midsummer Fire Festival, a gala event that recognizes the Summer Solstice and runs through the United States' real life Independence Day. Though most people don't celebrate the Solstice on Earth, it's an important holiday for Azerothians the world over. Despite the relative absurdity of lighting fires on the hottest days of the year, there's a lot more to see and do since its makeover in 2008. Below, I will detail what you need to check out to, ahem, "get your fire started." Update: Apparently, Blizzard has added fires in Northrend this year. Unfortunately, it seems as though you cannot repeat any of the fires you honor/extinguished last year for more blossoms, possibly preventing you from being able to complete the Midsummer set for the pole-dancing achievement. Word on the street is that this is a bug, but we have yet to receive an official response. Keepers of the Flame

Most world events have you running around willy-nilly collecting all sorts of strange objects, and Midsummer is no exception. If no new ones are added in Northrend, there are a total of 62 bonfires spread throughout the other three continents. These tend to be stationed at various faction-specific outposts in nearly every zone (there are none in the Plaguelands, Searing Gorge, Deadwind Pass, Azshara, Un'Goro Crater, Moonglade, or Felwood). When you come across one of your own faction, you're offered the chance to "honor" it and will earn 5 Burning Blossoms (the event's currency) and some experience (or several gold if you're level-capped). Likewise, if you find one of the opposite faction, you can choose to stamp it out for 10 Burning Blossoms and more experience (or about double the gold). Be warned, though, that it will flag you for PvP and, as other players are likely to be participating in the event, you'll might have to get a little sneaky. Many of the achievements for the holiday are centered around honoring or extinguishing these fires, so it's well within your interest to do so if you're itching for some points. Save for a few, it's not terribly hard to find all of them, just time consuming, and you actually get a nice chunk of extra change or xp out of it for relatively little effort. Note, however, that you can only honor or douse each fire once for the duration of the event.

Stealing Fire

It wouldn't be WoW without a little bit of racial conflict thrown in, would it? Each of the eight main home cities has its own sacred flame pit which you can "steal" by looting. Obtaining one will allow a player of level 50 or above to activate a quest in which they simply have to turn to the flame in to a Festival Talespinner. For each turn in, they will have their choice of event-themed consumables and a whopping 25 Burning Blossoms. Of course, turning a flame in is the easy part. Getting it in the first place is where the challenge begins! As a rogue, I had an immense amount of fun trying to sneak into the Alliance's cities. Sometimes avoiding the guards was tougher than avoiding the players. Enemy faction players still pose quite a problem, though, as there will almost certainly be plenty near the flame, where most of the daily quests and mini-games take place. I can't speak from an Alliance perspective, but each of their cities posed a unique problem (aside from, perhaps, The Exodar). Making the run for Darnassus' portal resulted in several deaths last year (note, this is not necessary for the City Flame, but it is for the bonfires in the Night Elves' starting zone, which you might as well grab if you're in the area), Ironforge's flame is located on the complete opposite side from the city's entrance, and Stormwind's practically demanded a dangerous trip right through the Trade District (though the addition of the Docks area may or may not make things easier). Let's not forget about the wandering superguards that can see through any manner of stealth, either. If you don't have a character capable of sneaking about, expect people to organize regular raids on the opposing factions' cities. While they sometimes end up in an "every man for themselves" kind of melee as people scramble for their chance to grab the flame, just keep on trying and you're sure to get it eventually! Turning in all four flames will open up A Thief's Reward, a simple quest that will allow you to obtain the Crown of the Fire Festival, which is necessary to complete one of the Achievements.

Enjoying the Festival

If you're not one for traveling (or you're simply not a high enough level to fully participate in hunting flames), there are still other ways to enjoy Midsummer (although "enjoy" may not be the operative word). You see, near the City Flame of each home town, there are several mini-games that you can engage in, even at a lowly level one. The problem is that my memories of them contain no merriment or fun, only pain and a heck of a lot of suffering. OK, well, Torch Tossing isn't so bad. This game requires you to stand near a bonfire and, within a specified amount of time, toss torches so that they light up braziers several feet away. The goal is to aim at the braziers lit up with an arrow, which will change constantly, much like the classic game Whack-A-Mole. Timing is key, so make sure that you bind the torches you're given to a hotkey, so that you only really have to worry about aiming the green reticule that appears on the ground. It may take several tries to get Torch Tossing down, but at least it's not as treacherous as the dreaded Torch Catching. Starting from the bonfire, you have to click on the lit torches in your inventory, which will send it arcing behind you in a semi-random direction. Your goal is to run over to where you think it's going to land and "catch" it, which will toss it back up in the air again. The initial quest asks you to do this four times in a row, while the daily version requires ten volleys. This may not seem very difficult until you actually try to catch a torch for yourself. First of all, it's not entirely accurate. I found that, last year, I had to slightly lead where I expected the torch to fall in order to catch it. Second, the shadow that you're supposed to use as a guide has a habit of fading out or or disappearing altogether. Considering that the last time this event ran there were no advanced shadowing options, this problem may have been rectified by now. Lastly, there are probably going to be other players attempting to catch torches at the same time, and it's not hard to lose sight of which one is yours, causing you to miss completely. If that weren't enough, missing a torch will cause it to explode on the ground, scorching you for several thousand damage in the process. If you are not careful, you can die catching torches! So why would you want to do this? Once you've run out of flames to honor/douse/steal, which may happen during the first several days of the event, this is going to be your primary means of obtaining more Burning Blossoms (5 for each, plus some gold). After you've worn yourself out playing with torches, why not relax by spinning around a giant blazing pole? Sounds like a blast, right? In Midsummer's version of a ribbon dance, simply clicking on the flagstaff will send your character whirling, accompanied by a stream of multi-colored flame. There's an achievement for dancing around for 60 seconds in full Fire Festival Regalia (this does not require the crown obtained from the City Flame quests, only the shoes, mantle, and dress, which can be bought from event vendors); otherwise, it will give you a 10% stacking experience buff (3 minutes added per 3 seconds of dancing, up to 60 minutes).

Frost Lord Ahune

You think everyone would just like to chill out during the hottest days of the year, but Azerothians have to battle the cold, literally. A holiday-specific boss called Ahune, The Frost Lord appears in the depths of The Slave Pens, a 5-man dungeon underneath Zangarmarsh in Outland. Frost Lord Ahune The questline needed to fight him begins with a Festival Talespinner and you must be level 70 in order to complete it (though, I believe it is possible to participate in the encounter, even if you're a few levels lower). There are two different encounters with Ahune (who looks like a dark blue version of Murmur or Ragnaros), one for either the normal or heroic version of the dungeon. This is not a hard fight at all, and since Blizzard has not upgraded him from last year, it's going to be even easier. However, there are a few quirks that make it fun. The first phase is an add phase, during which Ahune only takes a quarter of the damage inflicted upon him. Ranged DPS can do little to hurt him, and melee shouldn't even bother at all, as Ahune will flick them away if they try to get too close. So forget about the boss and focus on his summons, which should comprise of one elite elemental and several smaller ones. After 90 seconds, he will submerge and go into Phase 2. At this point everyone should be attacking his exposed core. He will not summon adds while submerged, but he will cast Ice Spears that will shoot up from the ground and knock players into the air. Likewise, be wary of the ice slicks covering the ground, as you can slip and fall on them. After 30 seconds, he'll come back up again. This cycle will repeat until you defeat him, with the only change being that he will summon additional adds every time he goes back into Phase 1. As for rewards? He gave out some pretty sweet cloaks last year, and there are a few of the usual, unique trinkets event bosses tend to hand out like a Scorchling Pet or the Deathfrost Enchantment. Also, by returning the Shards of Ahune he drops, you have your choice of two tabards.

The Rest of the Fest

Festival vendors offer the following items (and their costs, in Burning Blossoms) for purchase:

• Handful of Summer Petals - 2 BB - Using these will shower a fellow player in the sweet flowers of Summer.
• Mantle of the Fire Festival - 100 BB - Equipping these will post two large braziers on your shoulders (also festive during Hanukkah!).
• Vestment of Summer - 100 BB - A nice, long Summer dress that casts an orange glow over your body and causes your hands to flame up when you /dance
• Sandals of Summer- 200 BB - Wearing these shoes causes a small fire to form around your feet, though being a troll, I'll never know the pleasure of fine footwear!
• Brazier of Dancing Flames - 350 BB - Dancing? Fire? I'm noticing a trend here... this brazier will summon a tiny, hot-footin' female elemental (looks like a Draenei) to shake it for you. It will respond to your emotes and using /dance while targeting it will turn your character into a larger version of the elemental.
• Captured Flame - 350 BB - Summons a "Spirit of Summer" pet, which looks like a small, red-colored wisp.
• Elderberry Pie - 5 BB
• Fire-toasted Bun - 5 BB
• Midsummer Sausage - 5 BB
• Toasted Smorc - 5 BB
• Bag of Smorc Ingredients - 5 BB - Allows you to create the Summer favorite at campfires around Azeroth.
• Fiery Festival Brew - 2 BB

Note that, even if you collect every Blossom possible during the event, you will not be able to purchase everything. If you're going for achievements, I'd spend all of your Burning Blossoms on the clothing first, which should leave you enough for either the Brazier of Dancing Flames or the Capture Flame. The former, in my opinion, is the better reward. On the note of Achievements, it seems that the Alliance and Horde will received slightly different titles upon completion. Here's the lineup:

• Flame Warden/Flame Keeper of Eastern Kingdoms - 10 AP - Honor all of the fires for your faction in the Eastern Kingdoms.
• Flame Warden/Flame Keeper of Kalimdor - 10 AP - Honor all of the fires for your faction in Kalimdor.
• Flame Warden/Flame Keeper of Outland - 10 AP - Honor all of the fires for your faction in Outland
• The Fires of Azeroth - 10 AP - Complete the above three achievements.
• Extinguishing Eastern Kingdoms - 10 AP - Douse all of the opposing faction's fires in Eastern Kingdoms
• Extinguishing Kalimdor - 10 AP - Douse all of the opposing faction's fires in Kalimdor.
• Extinguishing Outland - 10 AP - Douse all of the opposing faction's fires in Outland.
• Desecration of the Horde (or Alliance) - 10 AP - Complete the above three achievements.
• King of the Fire Festival - 10 AP - Steal all of the opposing cities' flames and complete the quest "A Thief's Reward."
• Ice the Frost Lord - 10 AP - Kill Ahune, the Frost Lord in the Slave Pens.
• Burning Hot Pole Dance - 10 AP - Dance around a ribbon pole for 60 seconds while wearing all three pieces of the Midsummer clothing set.
• Torch Juggler - 10 AP - Juggle 40 torches in 15 seconds in Dalaran.
• The Flame Warden - 20 AP - This is the event's meta-achievement. You need to complete: The Fires of Azeroth, Ice the Frost Lord, King of the Fire Festival, Desecration of the Horde (or Alliance), Burning Hot Pole Dance, and Torch Juggler. Your reward is either the title of Flame Warden (Alliance) or Flame Keeper (Horde).

I would personally recommend completing all of the fire honoring/dousing/stealing achievements first, so that you have plenty of Burning Blossoms to buy all of the Midsummer clothing with. Ahune can be done at pretty much any time, and the others are relatively easy to complete. There are a few other, minor aspects to the event, including the ability to receive buffs (or extinguish them) utilizing the bonfires scattered throughout Azeroth, as well as a daily quest from the Earthen Ring called Striking Back, which asks you to kill a Twilight Cultist out on the Zoram Strand in Ashenvale.

Personally, I'd have to say that, since its revamp, this is one of my favorite world events in the game, and probably the first one I took seriously. I won't lie, I look forward to stealing the Alliance's fires all over again! What about you guys and gals? Share some memories or thoughts about the Midsummer Fire Festival in our comments section! This is a lengthy article, and it contains a lot of information, but I may not have covered everything you wanted to know. If you have any questions, please feel free to post those, as well.

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Earlier this year, we saw PETA launch their campaign in WoW against seal slaughtering. Now, The Spreading Taint guild and The Stonewall Family guild on the Proudmoore server are hosting their annual GLBT (gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender) pride celebration. This year, it should be even bigger than the past four years its been held. The highlights of the event include a "pride march" from the Crossroads to Ratchet and onto Booty Bay. Players organize "floats", where are themed groups of players walk together. This year, "Spider Pride >8<" has been receiving a lot of attention. The winning float members get all sorts of prizes, including lots of vanity pets from The Spreading Taint's guild bank. Here's an idea of what you might see among the floats:

• Bears in the Woods!
• Willy Wonkers & the Chocolate Cake Factory
• Spider Pride! >8<
• The Real Houseboys of Silvermoon City
• Gordok Ogre Float
• Priests with Pom Poms
• The Bunny Float
• Proposition Taint
• Proudmoore Divas

Other events include the "nude dueling tournament", where characters duel with no gear on, with a grand prize of a Mechano-hog. A "crafting fair" where everyone donates their profession skills to whoever needs them will be going on for much of the day, as will fashion shows and many other fun distractions. There will be a streaming radio station for everyone to tune into the day's events and appropriate music, and The Spreading Taint wants to invite everyone who decides to visit Proudmoore to join their "Tainter for Today" guild, which will allow visitors to interact with all the Taint guilds in their chat and join in on the fun. If you want an idea of what its like, check out the videos from last year. Many people will be recording the days events, so keep an eye open for the videos! Hope to see you there!

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One thing I love about raiding is comparing the different raids to each other and seeing how boss fights and dungeons evolve from patch to patch. While leading raids I often catch myself comparing boss strategies to other bosses we have defeated in the past. When explaining Thaddius in Naxx the comparison is always made to Mechano-Lord Capacitus in the Mechanar, and when talking about Elder Ironbranch's root ability Illhoof's demon chain ability comes to mind. With all these similarities going on it is always refreshing to see new abilities we are not used to. It seems like as you progress through raid content each dungeon has a few key lessons that the raiders must master, and when they do they will be stronger players for the rest of their WoW career. In BC I always had the impression that Magtheridon was designed to teach us how to coordinate raid members and get everyone clicking at the same time, Tempest Keep was there to teach us how to CC trash and deal with adds during boss fights, and Hyjal seemed to teach us how to deal with trash and bosses when you couldn't control the pace. In more modern times Sartherion (with drakes especially) seemed to teach us how to avoid standing in things that would kill us, Malygos taught us how to use vehicles to defeat a boss, and Naxx taught us how to mindlessly AOE trash and zerg bosses (JK!). So this all brings us to the question. What is Ulduar trying to teach us? Besides being a bit of an introduction back into the world of real raiding, it seems to me the key lesson from Blizzard is this: DPS control. This means not only high DPS, but know when and where to apply it, and more importantly when to stop. We see it as early as fights like Razorscale and Deconstructor. For Razor you only have a short window in which to DPS the boss, and you need to make sure you hit her hard when you can. Deconstructor takes it up a notch with controlled DPS on his heart. Too little and the boss doesn't die fast enough, too much and you are looking at a double heart phase and too many adds. Down the road we see bosses like Mimiron and Freya when killing things at the same time are essential to winning the fight, so it is really important to not kill the head or that stormlasher too early. This entire lesson culminates with the big man himself, with controlled DPS needed in all phases of Yogg Saron. Making sure the guardians all die in the pool, and not when they are ferried over, then killing the right tentacles at the right times, while saving lots of burst DPS for the brain just seems to drive the lesson home. DPS is not about pure numbers but applying the right amount of damage to the right targets at the right time. Understanding this is what will separate the best raiders from the rest. With Ulduar Blizzard is making sure we are learning our lesson. How do you guys feel, what lessons have you learned in Uldaur, or even other raids?

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Good lord.  You do a post on just recently announced content and the day it goes live Blizzard drops a cavalcade of new information on the WoW playing populace.  I don't know about you, but when this much information comes out at once I tend to become overwhelmed.   Sure, there isn't much to digest rogue-wise (yay Axes! </sarcasm> Daggers fo' lyfe yo!), or even priest-wise, so that cuts out most of the critical thinking that goes into patch notes for me.  With nothing to QQ about I have been focusing on the little gems and locating overlooked modifications. For example, the ability to level in battlegrounds (via quests, not killing people, which would be cooler) is one hot tamale.  It's also a feature that has been requested for some time.  When this was originally discovered pre-patch notes, people were worried about the state of twinking.  Well, Blizzard has all those level 19 rogues in VanCleef gear covered with the power to turn off XP gain.  That feature is simply huge and goes well beyond twinking to "classic" servers.  While not exactly the same as a vanilla or TBC locked server, turning off your XP gain can enable nostalgic gamers to level a character to 60, or 70, and play as if it were 2004, or 2007!  In the end I think this is a great solution to the classic server problem.  It enables those rosey-eyed gamers to (almost) get what they want, but doesn't cost Blizzard much of anything. My fellow vanity pet collectors are likely rejoicing over the new critters we can add to our stables.  It isn't just a token addition either.  Sure, the Argent Tournament has another one, and you can go the cheesy way and purchase one from Breanni, but the true nuts will be out in Un'Goro, Stranglethorn Vale and numerous other areas farming the pets from elite raptors across Azeroth.  A total of 8 vanity pets have been added to the game (not including Argent Tournament rewards).  Pet owners aren't the only players getting some dinosaur action.  Horde players can pick up a poisonous Ravasaur mount from the trainer in Un'Goro.  Yes, the mount is Horde only. We also have more profession changes.  The biggest one that I came across was the change to potion stacking.  No longer will raiders have to dedicate a full bag to their assorted potions, as they will now stack to a respectable amount, 20.  Of course I foresee most raiders filling their bags with stacks of 20 anyways, crazy blocks that they are.  In Cooking we have the tweak to the Chef's Hat.  The fashionable cookware not only makes you looks good, no to mention dedicated to the art of cuisine, but enables Wolfgang Puck impersonators to cook faster.  I'll be picking up one of these bad boys for that utility.  Still no concrete data on the "increase benefits" to the Engineering goodies though, but it's nice to see that Potion Injectors give an added 25% benefit when used by a tinkerer.  Gas cloud discovery is being moved to the Mote Extractor and off the Goggles.  What the hell took so long? Call of the Crusade is shaping up to be a nice patch.  It may not have an ostentatious sized raid like Secrets of Ulduar, but it does have a copious collection of changes.  What diamonds in the rough have you most excited?  Perhaps actual (epic) diamonds?  Maybe the bloating of the Dalaran Sewers Arena map?

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