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Posts with tag dragonmaw

Know Your Lore: Alexstrasza the Lifebinder

Welcome to Know Your Lore, where each week Alex Ziebart brings you a tasty little morsel of lore to wrap your mind around. Sweet, sweet lore. Mmmm. Have suggestions for future KYL topics? E-mail us!

Know Your Lore has covered the benevolent dragons in Warcraft before, but I've decided to highlight a few of them in preparation for Wrath of the Lich King. I feel that saving the best for last is a bunch of crap, so I'm going to start with my personal favorite: Alexstrasza. Admittedly, it isn't terribly hard for her to seal that favorite slot right now. Deathwing and Alexstrasza are the only two Aspects we've been exposed to in a very direct way for a substantial amount of time. To make things even better, she's a headlining character in Wrath.

Alexstrasza is one of five Dragon Aspects chosen and empowered by the Titans prior to their departure from Azeroth. Each of the Aspects was given a domain that they would protect, and have the power to control. Alexstrasza's domain is perhaps the most broad: Life. While all of the Aspects are interconnected and have some sway over one another, Alexstrasza is perhaps the most connected to the others because of her connection to life. Many use this to say she is the 'leader' of the Aspects, but as far as we know, they don't really have one. At least, not until Wrath. Maybe.

Continue reading Know Your Lore: Alexstrasza the Lifebinder

Maintenance for June 17th will be short

Here's a heads-up to all our North American night owls early risers and Oceanic readers: It's Tuesday morning, and that means maintenance. Luckily, it's a short one today. Bornakk has said that they expect most servers to only be down a half hour, starting at 5AM PDT and ending a 5:30AM PDT. There are some extra servers that will be down slightly longer, until 6:30AM PDT. Those servers will be listed after the break. Aussies can rejoice as well, as any Oceanic servers not on this list won't be taken down until 5AM AEST (Which is noon over here on the American west coast).

For the list of servers that will have a longer downtime, read on:

Continue reading Maintenance for June 17th will be short

Ask a Lore Nerd: The world may never know


Welcome to Ask a Lore Nerd, WoW Insider's newest weekly feature column. Have a question about the story and lore of the Warcraft universe? Click the Comments link below, ask your question, and blogger/columnist Alex Ziebart will answer you in a future installment!

Let's leap right into things, and see what Tyler wants to know, shall we?

Question: If the Ashbringer is really the Light's answer to Frostmourne, then why isn't anyone trying to use it, or destroy it? Is it because that Tirion Fordring has it? If he does, in WotLK then, he needs our help to weaken the Lich King and let him use it?

Answer: Nobody is using the Ashbringer right now because nobody has the Ashbringer in its true, Light-blessed form. Last we knew, the Ashbringer was still in Highlord Mograine's hands in a Corrupted form. The latest Know Your Lore covers the events leading up to that in a little more detail. Currently, we either need to purify The Ashbringer or forge a new one to be able to use it against the Lich King.

Continue reading Ask a Lore Nerd: The world may never know

Epic weaponsmithing weapons no longer unique

MMO Champion has pointed out something that should make Warrior and Shaman weaponsmiths rather happy: all one-handed epic weaponsmithing weapons will be non-unique as of 2.4.2. Combine this with the fact that the Main Hand designation is being taken off of most weapons as well, and you can see where this is going. Dual-wielded Dragonmaws, anybody?

If you can scrape together the mats, 2.4.2 should be a very good time to be a dual-wielding weaponsmith of the non-Rogue variety. The 2.7 speed on the mace and axe weapons means that your Windfury and Whirlwind will be very happy. All you have to do now is hope you have enough badges, gold, or pull with your raid leader to get all the Primal Nethers and Nether Vortexes ready to go.

Breakfast Topic: Most hated daily quests


In light of the recent inquests against our least favorite races, mobs, mob abilities, or tankadin writers, it seems only fitting to ask; what is your least favorite daily quest?

Now that the cap has been raised to twenty-five, and a slew of dailies has been added as of patch 2.4, many players are finding themselves spending a few hours on daily quests each day. Personally, there are a few that I enjoy doing most days, including the bombing runs, and some that I'd rather avoid if I didn't need the gold to fuel my rather Outlandish habits.

I'm not sure if I could pinpoint a single culprit though. The longer quests bother me up front, because I get bored spending half an hour each day mowing through the same exercise. As such, the Shadowmoon Valley quests might be my least favorite, because aside from the competition, they take forever.

Which daily quests are giving you a daily headache, and why?

A night on the town, Karazhan style

We've talked about 2 manning Karazhan, Shaman-tanking Karazhan, and Paladining Karazhan. But just when you thought it was safe to grab a plain old boring 10-man Karazhan group with actual varied classes with decent gear and consumables and stuff, here comes one more permutation, and this one perhaps the most offbeat we've reported on yet.

It all started, Don Claus of the Stormwardens guild on the US Dragonmaw server tells us, with a pretty simple comment: "I'd love to see Tankin tank Prince in a dress." The Stormwardens decided to take it one step further and just slap suits on everyone. What followed is a story of a group revellers seeking to join the fabulous night life of Karazhan.

Continue reading A night on the town, Karazhan style

Know Your Lore: Grim Batol

If your first time discovering Grim Batol was anything like mine, it ended in horrible, bloody, unexpected death. That experience sums up Grim Batol rather well. The fortress has stood roughly 250 years, give or take a couple decades, and has changed hands more than once during that time.

Before we get to Grim Batol itself, we need to take a look at a little piece of Dwarven history: The War of the Three Hammers. You see, the Dwarves of Azeroth, just a few hundred years ago, all carried one banner. They were the Dwarves of Ironforge, plain and simple. Their society was a large one, and their wise and powerful king Modimus Anvilmar was highly revered. Amongst the Dwarven society, though, there were three clans that stood above the rest. The Bronzebeard Clan, the Dark Iron Clan, and the Wildhammer Clan.

Each of these clans played a very specific role in the Kingdom. The Bronzebeard, led by Thane Madoran Bronzebeard, were the military arm of the mountain city. They were soldiers and defenders. They were the sword and the shield, and the clan closest to King Modimus Anvilmar. The Wildhammer, led by Thane Khadros Wildhammer, lived in the outlying regions of the Kingdom, in the... well, the wilds. Scouts, hunters, things of that sort. They held little real power within the city proper, and they didn't really like that. The Dark Irons, led by Thane Thaurissan, were mages and sorcerers. They were also jerks.

Continue reading Know Your Lore: Grim Batol

And you thought your guild was hardcore

Everyone is getting ready to experience the new quests, professions and zones of the Burning Crusade -- everyone, that is, except one guild. Six Feet Deep on Dragonmaw Horde will be /gkicking anyone who quests, works on professions, explores new zones, or does anything outside of participating in pre-formed guild five-man instances to get them to 70 as fast as possible.

As the guild leader, Chitsu, says, "You will log into the game, and look for an officer. One of the officers will assign you to a 5-man group. The 5-man group will run the appropriate instance level over and over again until someone has to leave, at which point the officer will assign a replacement. No questing, no BGs, no grinding solo ... there will be plenty of off-hours downtime to goof off if you wish, but during prime-time, I swear to Thrall I will /gkick your (expletive deleted) if you are screwing around with stupid (expletive deleted) instead of participating in the leveling grind."

I don't honestly think I can say anything, as I am humbled by the depths to which certain people take this game way, way too seriously. The forum thread is great though, as Chitsu tries to defend his plan to an entire incredulous server.

I doubt any of you are going to these lengths, but does your guild have any specific plans for how to level in the Burning Crusade?

EU Server Transfers Announced

Thundgot has announced upcoming server transfers and new transfer-only realms to be introduced over the next month.   These are still subject to change, but hopefully will give EU players an idea of what to expect.

April 17th - 21st
Shattered Hand and Ragnaros --> Frostmane (new realm)
Bladefist and Daggerspine --> Outland (new realm)

April 24th - 28th
Warsong and Skullcrusher --> Stonemaul (new realm)
Burning Legion and Stormscale --> Grim Batol (new realm)

May 1st - 5th
Dragonmaw and Spinebreaker --> (to be decided)
Burning Blade and Stormreaver --> (to be decided)

May 8th - 12th
Zenedar and Ravencrest --> (to be decided)
Dunemaul and Deathwing --> (to be decided)


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