Slick as five da la megaphone - Friday, 5 December 2008
Last night we faced the first real fight of the expansion, three drake Sartharion. It's by no means an easy fight at all, right off the bat you're handicapped, reduced health, more damage taken, lots of adds. From the outside, the fight looks like a giant clusterfuck, waves of lava going side to side, whelps and fire elementals running around, void zones popping everywhere, purple drakes flapping around, and a huge fire breathing dragon.

The fight felt impossible at times, I mean when Sartharion breathes, you're hanging on for dear life, and on top of that there is so much more going on that isn't part of your section of the fight. If anything this is really a fight for our healers, the damage is immense and comes from all directions. Like I always say, when things go wrong, people look at healing first, but when things go right, the healing is transparent. And if you have bad healers, man good luck in doing anything if you have bad healers, but if you have great healers, you're going places. Bane, Dsx, Naiteru, Quse, Run, X, Ymbryne, nice work. You too Durrhea!

UPDATE: The 10 man version is much more difficult but also done.


Yes yes, would you like some WoW with your UI? It helps me yell at the right people.


Once guy, now girl, still gay. $15 and some serious melonballing gets you girlparts!

And can we please fix the dating system already? Everything gets marked a day later than we do it.

Time flies when you're having fun - Wednesday, 26 November 2008

Careful, that first step is killer

It's true, it seemed like just last week we were clearing Sunwell. Wait, we were clearing Sunwell just last week! That's right, as of this past thursday 11/20, we have cleared all this expansion has to offer, just a week after release. Sartharion, Malygos, and Kel`Thuzad all completed, although Kel`Thuzad was kind of a gimme from before, and well Sartharion, my mom could kill Sartharion.

Despite the lack of content we are facing right now, i'd like to congratulate our guys on a job well done with the fast level grind. Rizzen and Fortune made it to 80 in record time, a good day ahead of anyone else, followed by the rest of our guys hitting 80 on saturday.

The server-first announcements are a nice touch.


Kel`Thuzad was... well he was Kel`Thuzad and Sartharion is a cheap date

Retired from TBC: Conquest - Tuesday, 11 November 2008
A bunch of people told me that the gear from Sunwell will carry you into Naxxramas, so we farmed. We also had a few class reassignments and needed gear... supposedly, so we farmed. And in the interest of having a fun off-season and since Sunwell only took one day to do, so we farmed. Honestly I don't know if I could have put up with farming much more if they didn't patch it. Putting that big patch in turned WoW into a big hawhawhaw-what-if fantasy fest.

"Haw haw haw what if soandso ability really did XXXXX amount of damage every hit, that would be awesome!"
They put it in.
"Haw haw haw what if they made it so that soandso-class could cast this spell and hit the whole raid, that would just be tooooooo strong!"
They put it in.
"Haw haw haw what if they made ret paladins and moonkins usable in a raid, that would be... something!"
They put it in. They put everything in. It turned WoW into this big fat ball of laughs. Everything was too easy, everything was too fast, everything fell over, everyone got to see the raid game.


The funny thing is, they're actually both chicks... oh except for Grumps

On the flip side, our very last Sunwell, we managed to get a second bow to drop for our hunters which fulfilled their life long dreams of not having to carry ammo and validated the need to make laser noises every time a hunter shoots. Take a good look at the picture above. Svif once had a chick hit on him in a supermarket, admiring his Gwar shirt, went to the prom with his sister wearing a Gwar shirt, and has eaten a Gwar shirt. One of the previous is untrue. Grumps married a canadian, yes I did not capitalize canada, and did not once again. All of the previous is true. But they're both great hunters in an endless field, nay, boundless ocean of complete lemons. Real diamonds in the rough, real cornerstones of our foundation, real goto guys... except for Grumps.

Peace out, lay out, we're outta here.

Well well, look whos back in town... - Tuesday, 9 September 2008
With TBC behind us now we've been enjoying our time off from pushing through content and have settled into various projects here and there. For one thing, we've been selling Sunwell gear and ZA bear mounts to people and earning our raiders some spending money. Some of us have been trying out Warhammer Online: Age of WoWening. The new MMO which looks just like WoW, plays just like WoW, Waaaghs just like WoW... ButItsReallyMoreLikeDAOC. I'm sure it'll be great fun for a few months, then everyone will sluice out back into WoW when the fighting dries out. A nice diversion. Finally, some of us have been playing beta.

Wrath of the Lich King beta brings us Northrend, death knights, inscription, ten more levels, and massive revamping of all the classes. Daggers are back in style, tanking warriors do massive damage, raid support extends beyond groups, and much much much more. However let us not forget the return of the immortally beloved Naxxramas.

Naxx, in a nutshell, is still Naxx. In its first beta release at least, nothing has changed. Hell, Grobbulus still drops his level 60 items. In fact, everything pretty much still hits for the same amount of damage, we just have four times the stats as we did the first time around. The bosses are still identical with only the four horsemen changing and even at then, the fight remains the same. And of course the original badass makes his long awaited and triumphant return, Kel'Thuzad. Well what do ya know, our strat still works, and we still got it baby.


Achievements are still a little broken I guess...

KJ flushed into Sunwell in counter clockwise fury! - Saturday, 26 July 2008
Quiet people spoke up, sleepy people woke up, everyone wanted to put more time into it, we went long a couple of nights and no one even bothered to tell me that raids ended ten minutes ago. We improved on every attempt, gained more control over the fight with every passing try, we would give up no ground and would fight every inch of the way. And in the final moments the voices are loud, the attitude is intense, the focus is razor sharp, eyes are keen... and then the cheers echo out in sheer glory!

This kind of fight is what I play these MMOs for. We invest heavily into it and learn what the fight does, develop our own strategy, refine that strategy, and push it harder and harder until the target falls over, or in this case, gets flushed into a toilet of sunshine.

To the untrained eye, it may seem like we had trouble on Kil'jaeden, that he is difficult, and that we took a month on him. However to the slightly intoxicated eye, the slightly heart-medicated eye, the mostly-happy-sometimes-angry eye, he really wasn't all that and took just over a week after we got everything in order and began to work the fight. The level of play required is certainly deserving of the final boss in Sunwell as the final fight of this expansion. Kil'jaeden tests your raid on all the knowledge of the fights that came before it, Kalecgos' positioning, Brutallus' test of strength, Felmyst's raid movements, Twins' endurance test, M'uru's teamwork. This fight is the accumulation of all that came before it and a great fight it is. Not to mention the theatrical value, it's got henchmen, treasure, a villain, a hero(us, fuck Kalecgos), and of course, a damsel in distress. There's good, there's evil, there's sacrifice, and there's triumph, what more could you ask for in a closing to an expansion?

And with that we say goodbye to this expansion and look forward to welcoming in the next. So soon will it be that we're recruiting again, leveling again, and raiding again.

Oh yeah and hey, Thrall went down like a cheap hooker.


7/24/2008 42nd US and 89th World


This is my first year leading Conquest on my own after my near-decade here, so i'd like to take this space to thank some people who made it as smooth as it went:

Nokk and Tae - We know that teams live and die with their tanks, so thanks for being there every single day and never quitting on me.

Bane - Thanks for making everything run seamlessly while never missing a single day. I used to be Conquest's war machine, but you run it better than any of us ever has. Bane's loyalty knows no bounds.

Jandy - Thanks for doing everything that needed to be done and volunteering to do all the *actual* work that needs to be done, and doing it better than anyone else could and with unmatched enthusiasm.

Rizzen, Jandy, and Ymbryne - Thanks for doing all the research, answering all my questions, finding bodies when we needed bodies, and watching those new bodies and letting me know how they're performing.

My hard 100% raiders - Thanks for making Conquest, Conquest. I know who you are and your endeavor for perfection does NOT go unnoticed.

My soft 100% raiders - Great job, we couldn't have done it without you. I understand the sacrifices you make for your hobby, and to do it well.

Everyone who left under unfavorable conditions - Thank you for being the contrast of what it means to have character, for making me appreciate my teammates more, and for driving us to rise above you.