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:
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.
Today we're going to take a step back from out pre-emptive study of Wrath subjects and look at something a little more old school. We'll get back to catching up for Wrath of the Lich King soon enough, don't you worry about that. I'm far too excited about the expansion to not come back to it soon.
Today we're going to look at Hakkar the Soulflayer, not to be confused with Hakkar the Houndmaster which apparently came first in the lore, but I don't really care which of them came first because the Blood God (that one's the Soulflayer) is way cooler. What the Soulflayer actually is is largely a mystery. He's a god, certainly, but Azeroth has many flavors of gods and demigods. He is probably just a Loa god, but our buddy Brann Bronzebeard seems to think he's more than that. Specifically, Hakkar might be the son of an Old God.
All the World's a Stage is a source for roleplaying ideas, commentary, and discussions. It is published every Sunday evening, (though it was delayed somewhat this time by technical difficulties).
Mary Sue is extremely unpopular with roleplayers. She comes along pretending to be the only daughter of Illidan and Tyrande's one-night stand, secretly spirited away and raised by furlbogs until she underwent a mysterious transformation that turned her into a human, seduced Arthas away from Jaina, and learned from him more than you will ever know about how to be a Death (i.e. Retribution) Paladin.
In fact, Mary Sue isn't just one person -- she is a demon-spirit possessing all those characters in roleplaying and fan-fiction, both male and female, who rely on clichés, melodrama, and/or supposed intimate relationships with one or more characters in the original story to such a degree that they actually try to upstage those characters, their fellow roleplayers, and indeed, the entirety of the original lore. Other roleplayers often see this sort of thing and get frustrated out of their minds.
And yet there's something about Mary Sue: she keeps reappearing all over the place, from seductive blood elf hunters who claim to be Thrall's secret lover, to angst-ridden human warlocks who insist that they are the half-demon offspring of Kil'Jaeden. What is it that continually attracts people to these ideas, couched in phrases like "tragic past" and "missing one eye" and "emits a deep sorrow that makes you want to cry?"
The answer is darker, more disturbing, than you can possibly imagine.
Last week, the undead frost wyrm of Northrend, Sapphiron squared off against the Troll god of Zul'Gurub, Hakkar the Soulflayer in a neutral arena to see who is the top boss. Did the Blue Dragon freeze out the competition or did the Faceless One slither into victory?
Though Hakkar has a mean damage/healing combo and an earlier Enrage timer, the votes confirm that Sapphiron's superior dps output and own healing & Enrage abilities would allow him to triumph over the Blood God. There was some debate about Hakkar's abilty to mind control the undead, but in the end only one boss leaves the arena.
Sapphiron moves on to the final four where he will face off against the winner of our next Two Bosses Enter showdown. Who will win when the Firelord of Molten Core, Ragnaros goes up against Kel'Thuzad, the Archlich of the Plaguelands? Voting starts tomorrow.
Welcome to the beginning of the third bracket. It's been six months since we began this battle of the raid bosses and we are down from 32 to just 8 contenders for the title. Here's the line up for the next four weeks:
Today, we jump into the first of these titanic battles with the undead frost wyrm Sapphiron vs. the Troll god of Zul'Gurub, Hakkar the Soulflayer. Who shall fall and who shall emerge victorious? Read on to decide for yourself and cast your vote!
Last week, two bosses entered a neutral Arena, the Old God C'thun and the bane of the Black Dragonflight, Gruul. Which one survived and which one got slaughtered in this battle of the boss mobs?
Let's just say C'Thun and his eye laser of instant death means this Ahn'Qiraj raid mob has a shiny new Tier 4 Leggings token to turn in right about now with more than 75% of the vote. There was some rallying around Gruul's ability to withstand a beating, but most of his abilities were useless against a knockback resistant C'thun.
This battle finishes up the second bracket of battles. We are now down to the final eight. Next up on Two Bosses Enter, the first battle of the bracket: Sapphiron , the undead frost wyrm vs. the Troll god of Zul'Gurub, Hakkar the Soulflayer.
For the second time in our Two Bosses Enter competition, Zul'Gurub's Hakkar emerges victorious over a lesser World of Warcraft raid boss. Leaving our competiton is Moam, whom our readers determined would simply be overwhelmed by Hakkar's Blood Siphon ability. (Though, seriously people, how do you siphon blood from construct made out of stone?) But skipping past the blood/no blood argument: Hakkar is a God, and Moam a mere construct. In terms of raw power, it's clear Hakkar should have the upper hand in this fight, as our readers determined:
Though last week's match is over, this week's match has yet to begin! Look for the next edition of Two Bosses Enter later tonight!
It's that time of the week again -- time to lock two World of Warcraft bosses into a life or death struggle for our amusement! We call our little game Two Bosses Enter, and each week we start with two bosses and inevitably end with one. But don't worry: our fantasy deathmatches are just for fun, the WoW Insider equivalent of arguing whether Batman could beat up Superman (as if that's even an argument -- Batman would totally win), and no actual bosses were harmed in the production of this article. But now, on to the show! This week we bring you Moam, all the way from Ahn'Qiraj in the Silithus desert, and Hakkar the Soulflayer, straight from the temple of Zul'Gurub in the Stranglethorn jungles. Who will walk away and who will be heading home? Read on to find out!
Two bosses entered, but now one will leave. In last week's edition of our fantasy deathmatch series, we considered a fight between Karazahn's Prince Malchezaar vs. Hakkar the Soulflayer. Though the fight was relatively close, with fairly even argument for either side in both our comments and our poll, Hakkar has emerged victorious in the end. Why? Hakkar's supporters cite his Blood Siphon ability as a killer -- he could simply keep himself healed up while Malchezaar pummeled away at him (since without adds, there would be no way for Malchezaar to poison himself). However, a number of readers point out that Malchezaar's infernal adds aren't targetable by abilities, and that Hakkar could only siphon from Malchezzar, something they believe could be DPS'd through.
But at the end of the day -- Hakkar had the votes and moves on to our next round. Be sure to check back later today for another episode of Two Bosses Enter!
Two bosses enter... but only one will get to leave in our series of fantasy deathmatches. Over at WoW Insider HQ, we've selected some of the most dangerous bosses to be found in the World of Warcraft today, and now we're pitting them against one another in a fight to the death where only one can be champion. And the best part of all this fun? You get to pick our winner! That's right -- after reading up on each boss, your votes and comments will determine who goes on to the next round and whose lifeless body gets a victory screenshot.
This week we're looking at Prince Malchezaar from Karazhan and Hakkar the Soulflayer from Zul'Gurub -- and before you balk that Karazhan and its inhabitants are much more difficult than those in the lower-level Zul'Gurub, I must remind you that the rules of our little game mean we attempt to consider these bosses on equal footing. That means they're both going into this fight with approximately the same level, health, and damage ability -- what we're debating here is how they fight, not which one has the most hit points.
If we've piqued your interest, keep reading for a rundown of each bosses' mad fighting skillz!
With all the recent news stories about WoW ruining lives, destroying children, supporting terrorism, etc., it's nice to see the media reporting on the positive aspects of the game. But this WoW-positive article has a surprising source -- the prestigious Lancet medical journal.
As reported by the BBC, Nina Fefferman and Eric Lofgren, both from the Tufts University Inititiative for the Forecasting and Modeling of Infectious Disease, have published an article in the Lancet about how virtual worlds can provide models for human behavior in real-world epidemics. The duo specifically focused on the "Corrupted Blood" epidemic of fall 2005, which virtually wiped out Orgrimmar and Ironforge on many servers.
The BBC article states, "Some acted selflessly, rushing to the aid of other characters even though that meant they risked infection themselves. Others fled infected cities in an attempt to save themselves. And some who were sick made it their mission to deliberately infect others." Fefferman added that since it's impossible/unethical to "cause" an epidemic in real life and see how human behavior influences its spread, virtual worlds may be the best model for this type of research.
However, she admitted that people are likely to take more risks with disease in-game than in real life, which sounds about right. Dying to tuberculosis is unlikely to cost you a mere five-minute corpse run, and I don't tend to see many people hiding incredibly infectious animals in bags and then pulling them out in the middle of a crowded shopping center, which is pretty much what happened with Corrupted Blood.
What do you think about this study? And, taking a broader view, does people's behavior in WoW accurately reflect their behavior in real life?
When I first saw the tiny thumbnail of this screenshot in my mailbox, I wondered what new, cool instance it had come from. Obviously I hadn't seen it before -- those high-reaching columns of green light with a warm yellow glow coming from the ceiling in the middle. The unfamiliarity wasn't immediately dispelled when I clicked on the screenshot, though I can now tell you that the image came from the very heart of the Sunken Temple, right at the altar of the Blood God Hakkar.
I have been there before... more than once, in fact! But it is apparently one of Azeroth's instances that I've avoided so much as to be unable to recognize it without explanation. Fortunately, Kragragh of Ataraxis on Undermine, who sent this shot to us, also provided me with location information! (If I realized ST had such amazing ambiance, perhaps I'd visit more often. Maybe it's a sign that I need to upgrade my video card?)
Do you have a unique shot of Azeroth or Outland that you'd like to show off to the rest of the world? Tell us about it by e-mailing aroundazeroth@gmail.com! Or perhaps you'd just like to see more of your pics from Around Azeroth.
Those of you who weren't playing World of Warcraft back in September of 2005 have probably never seen this footage or heard the extremely entertaining story that goes along with it. That September, Blizzard rolled out the 1.7 patch, which included a brand new raid dungeon called Zul'Gurub. And the final boss of Zul'Gurub was Hakkar, the Blood God and the Soulflayer. (A very challenging fight, until you figure out the trick to it.) And when Hakkar died, he left raiders with a parting present -- a damage over time debuff called Corrupted Blood, which did a reasonable, though not entirely deadly, amount of damage to any players present.
As far as Blizzard's design was concerned, this should have been it.
However, Blizzard overlooked a minor issue -- pets could get Corrupted Blood. And pets could be dismissed while they had the debuff and then re-summoned into crowded areas. (The debuff was short-lived -- so even if a player hearthed while under its effect, they wouldn't make it before it wore off. But when pets were dismissed, the debuff's duration was conveniently paused until they were re-summoned.) And the really fun part is that Corrupted Blood would spread to any nearby players. So, by this method, a few days in mid-September were spoiled for many a player in Azeroth, as Hakkar's plague went through the land, repeatedly infecting and killing players in major cities, while GMs tried to quarantine infected players and Blizzard scrambled for a hotfix.
Joseph sends in this shot of a fight with Hakkar, the final boss in the Zul'Gurub dungeon. Now, perhaps I'm biased, but I always though Hakkar looked pretty darned cool. A giant naga-esque snake creature with feathered wings and huge claws? Who comes up with this stuff?
Do you have a unique shot of Azeroth that you'd like to show off to the rest of the world? Tell us about it by e-mailing aroundazeroth@gmail.com! You can attach a picture file or send us a link to one -- and don't worry about formatting, we'll take care of that part.
GuildWatch is back again, covering guild drama, downed mobs, and recruiting announcements. We were crossrealm way before the battlegrounds were!
If you've got something to add to the weekly feature, be sure to get it right out to wowguildwatch@gmail.com, and we'll get it up here next week. Hot tip: write the address down now, and when your guild finally downs Hakkar over the weekend, be sure to let us know! This week's GW (not many downs, thanks to all the downtime) starts after the link below.
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).
Subscribe
