We've got a new design for the front page. We fired our old webmaster and hired a professional, one of those super genius 5 year olds or something.
What else is new? WoW's in the throws of the "end of expansion blues" as general interest and activity goes into something of an Ice Age. Soon there will be about 5 active players on the entire server, all huddled together to ward off the cold and dark. But don't worry, Cata will fix it.
Also, SCII has stolen the soul of several people and even now whispers in their ears like a ghostly lover.
Told you I'd be back in short order and this time we're in the DANGER ZONE!
To start I'd like to point out that Rae is the worlds largest and worst liar. Since she has decided to avoid answering inquires about the previous title truthfully, probably because of the fact it'd assuredly be uncomfortable and perhaps embarrassing, I shall endeavor to multiple that possibility because...because...I'm Front Page Guy, super hero of truth and stuff. Anyways, the previous title's humor is as follows "The penis on the ground". Yes its a little vulgar but that's Rae for you and its simply the minor delirium in mistyping. A juvenile play on words that makes any rational person go "I like sex but I don't think I can admit it because others might thing I'm not a prude and ship me off to the nunnery". Seriously though, that woman is more devious then anyone thinks. Besides being addicted to soft-core porn shes at the top of my list of people most likely to kick small animals for fun.
So the picture. There is a giant angry peacock in a dress, a wolf-man-bear-pig, a cyclops, an Iron Dwarf who looks like they are trying to power fart, a prot pally getting owned by a DK's bone, a regular and boring looking holy pally, some horrific Halloween monstrosity and a snow wolf that thinks its part rocket ship, oh and some indistinguishable mishmash of color that looks like it might be on fire over on the far right, that is meek little Merc. I won't talk much about the glowing eyes staring out of the ice block. Simple fact is Blizz failed at the story and lore for LK. Just straight dropped the ball on what could have been one of the best gaming moments in gaming history. Don't get me wrong, the fight is challenging and long, just the way a boss fight should be. It's one of those fights that leaves you a little drained after each attempt and when you finally beat it, the sense of accomplishment is a larger reward then whatever shiny purples he happened to have. But I can't help but feel disappointed that such an iconic figure for the last umpteen billion years was so casually handled. Anyone who played WC3 literally played AS Arthas. So hes not just another end boss in some raid. His cinematics in WC3 were worth watching over and over again. But now he is just dead, the entire process assumed the cliche mantle of the evil genius that leaves large gaping holes in their plans for the sole purpose of a super hero defeating them. I guess it should have been obvious that Blizz was going to mishandle it after the comedy that was ToC got placed into the entire ordeal. *shrug* I suppose a proper conclusion is always one of the hardest things to create. After all its not like...
The pen is on the ground
No, that isn't a picture of the worlds best keg party and yes you have to whisper Rae if you want the first title explained. The picture is the result of more grinding then a Puerto Rican $5 pole dancer or imagine, if you would, Rita MacNeil in a string bikini giving a lap dance. Sure at first there is an amusement factor. But after the 10th, 15th, etc time your starting to wonder if your being punished for some great cosmic crime like perhaps putting mittens on kittens. I've never really been all that great with the maths so I lost count of how many single digit percentage wipes we've had over the last couple of weeks. But, hes dead and all his tentacles and copious amounts of slime with him. I swear, he was the worlds largest receptacle of filthy fluids. A digital representation of a Japanese slime Bukkaka dispensing Hentai tentacle monster. Um...don't google some of those words if your at work. Anyways, I'm sure some corporate, middle age business man, wearing his used vending machine bought panties, is constantly furiously giving himself a wrist injury as his female BE gets smacked around by Prof P. "Motto...MOTTO!" *cough* So yeah I think it is safe to say that the altar of our kill is built upon the tears of frustration by many and the bemused ignorance of those getting the piggy back ride. That's the dark joke about the ignorant though, they don't know its them. Much like sitting down at a poker table. If you can't spot the donkey, start sweating. More to come in the future I'm sure, but not too much, that'd just spoil everyone.
ICC! Yeah you know me!
Excuse the cheesy title and whisper Mac for an explanation. So, the first wing of ICC is cleared and first impressions are positive. It's clean, its crisp, it smells nice, and its generally well designed. The 10s are about what you'd expect for a 10N raid instance and the step up to 25N is well thought out as its significant enough to make it feel "grander". Fun mechanics have been thrown in here and there, offering changes of pace for each successive fight. The instance itself its an orgasm for the eyes after ToC and the loot looks like someone other then one of the Blizzard Dev's 5 year old child scribbled a drawing on used toilet paper with a crayon. If there is one complaint though its the "scene" your required to sit through each time you want to engage Saurfang. One can only hope that Darth Vader will get tired of how lame it is and stop masturbating with his Sith powers long enough to choke the shit out of Saurfang.
I also want to take a moment to bring everyone's attention to a pressing matter of grave importance. I want to know wtf we can't use the giant fucking cannon on the front of the Horde ship. The thing's massive, the shells it has as ammo are bigger then two Taurens wrapped up together in intimate bovine burger making. So we can't angle to shoot the Alliance Gunship, fine, we'll just kamikaze the damn thing down like its an American carrier. DD is a testament to the fine use of living projectiles, or at least he would be if he'd managed to hit a 400 foot long flying wooden boat... But I regress, now your going to tell me that the door at the top of the tower is going to take XX number of days for the engineers to open? First, the engineers are clearly busy smacking the ground randomly, that seems less then useful, and second and more importantly we can't use the Gunship to blow open the door? Does the big gun on the front of the Horde ship even work? Who designed the fucking thing? P.E.T.A.? Well, I guess that would explain why its animal shaped.
Trick or Treat
After taking it a bit easy last week because of Halloween (after all, Eliss was getting drunk again and Babe was busy planning the annual baccanal for her coven), we got back on track on our path thru TOGC(25). We proved that we are more than just a trifling gnome, and Lord Jaraxxus was banished to the nether last night. Perhaps our arrogance will be our undoing, but everyone in the guild should feel proud of the further steps we've taken in our growth as a guild.
As a side note, the slow week around Halloween didn't prevent another accomplishment from occuring for the guild. A dedicated 10 man crew walked into TOGC(10) the Thursday before and not only got our first guild kill on Heroic Anub, but did it in perfect style with all 50 attempts still available. Congrats to all who achieved a Tribute to Insanity, an achievement that is appropriately named for anyone who is a member of our little band of nutttiness.
Oh, and a shout out to Blizz for making these kills useless for screenshots. We could throw a pic of a normal Anub kill up there and no one could tell the difference. Ah well, saves us on bandwith...
Steps Forward
The front page has not been updated in some time, mostly because of the <yawn> factor associated with the opening of the Coliseum. Each week a new boss opened up on normal mode, each week we knocked it down shortly after it opened. Onyxia came out, and the old gal isn't much less of a loot pinata than she was when she was ranked at level 60.
A couple of weeks ago, the decision was made to push ourselves beyond the normal mode encounters. Quite simply, there was no challenge to them for us. Pushing into 25 man Heroic Colsieum was a definite step up for us guild wide. Any chance of success required all of our members to look hard at their position and output in a raid.
Last night, that dedication paid off with a major step forward. Heroic Beasts went down, making us the 9th guild on Bloodscalp to make any progress in Heroic Coliseum. I'm extremely proud of this step that we took together as a guild. Its made even more enjoyable by the fact that we did it through strong internal growth of our members, rather than bringing in some short term hitters to push us over the hump.
So, congrats to all who particpated in the kill- step one is down, with more to come. Icecrown is on the horizon, and NGD is poised to be at the forefront of the attack on Arthas!
"Special" surprise guest post courtesy of hatchling Eliss.
Once upon a time there was a giant hideous tentacle monster named Yogg-Saron. All of the other tentacle monsters made fun of him because he liked to swim in his own juices. Because he had no friends, he made an imaginary one named Sara, but this offended the other monsters because he was always playing with himself. So they dumped him on the first planet they could find.
Lonely at first, Yogg finally found a friend who wouldn't make fun of him. He named his friend General Vezax. Oh the fun they had. Apparently they also shared needles because Vezax is fat with gooey blood.
One day, No Good Deed decided to stroll in and ruin everything. Now Yogg is a cranky tentacle monster waiting for No Good Deed to come back so he can seek revenge for the havoc they caused.
And now we will take a moment to honor those who gave their lives so break up this unholy union.
Admetus: After open wound contact with some black blood, she contracted the herpes. Soulcatcher is still testing negative. In a later unrelated event she was hit by a bus.
Kharma: Bored to death.
Raevlyn: Mana starvation.
Nightwater: Killed by Mustrum for trying to mine a pure saronite vein.
Mustrum: Died in a saronite vapor trying to mine the same saronite vein.
Trebek: Stranded in Kel'thuzad's room months ago, he decided to drink the green water rather than die of thirst. Two runes of teleportation and some conjured water were discovered on his person.
An Orthodontist's Wet Dream
He may be the Beast with a Thousand Maws, but its hard to see how he actually eats anything with that underbite.
Has anyone ever explained why all powerful Old Gods like to spawn their avatars in the least hospitable areas? This one has roots over in some very nice woodlands- trees, eagles, insane furbolgs ready to provide dental work on command. Instead, it decides to masquerade as a screaming woman at the bottom of a saronite mine, then show up as the world's ugliest potato (clearly grown behind the Iron Curtain- in Soviet Russia, potato eat YOU).
So, when ten of us finally headed in to kill it last night, we had to go all the way down in to a dank, moist hole, and then spend the fight sloshing around in a pool of liquid. About halfway thru, we realized this wasn't water we were walking in. Yogg has been alone down there for a long, long time, and using the restroom in a prison facility is always a dicey matter. Still, we thought that alternative was better than the possibility of what he might have been producing while looking up Sara's dress for all those years. I mean, this stuff was knee high on a Tauren, and we had lady blood elves wading around in it.
So, another Old God has bit the big one, despite the omnipresent ass beams and tendency to swallow intact the folks trying to kill it. The chaos of this fight makes it one of the best we've encountered, and the kill itself was very satisfying. Now all that awaits is to do the same thing on 25s- oh, and to deal with the space invader who is trying to "re-originate" the planet like a Genesis device.