Silent Ice, Raging Fire (Part III)

Sorry for the delay, but here we pick up with Khraden’s revalation.

((( Continued )))

Silent Ice, Raging Fire (Part II)

Picking up where we last left off, Khraden completes his conversation with Afrasastrasz at Wyrmrest Temple.

Silent Ice, Raging Fire (Part I)

Afternoon folks…

I’ve got a little series coming up that I’d like to share. It isn’t a blog on a specific subject, but one of my own writings that I thought I’d toss out there. Maybe let you all get a feel for it, and even toss around some editorial comments.

The story is called “Silent Ice, Raging Fire.” It is a compilation of the life of my World of Warcraft Paladin, between the expansions of Wrath of the Lich King and the Cataclysm. It has a couple of twists and turns, and even a little love story attached.

It is a pretty rough draft. I’ve only gone over it a couple times, and made changes here and there, but haven’t really proofread it fully yet. I’m pretty sure that the chronology should be in place, but any comments are welcome.

We’ll start it, after the break…

Mogolympics and more…

Evening all…

Long time no see.  I’ve had the beta for a while now, gotten to experience some of the new goodies coming to us in September (25th) but not as much as I could have.  Been busy around the Lionbearer household.

Transmogolympics

First up, a little side project.  I signed up to participate in the [Trans]mogolympics.  It was randomly decided that I would represent the Mag’har. It made for a fun little project to work on.  I’ve been told that I can display my flagbearer, but nothing more… so here he is.

Mag’har Flagbearer

On that note, I’ve completed all of the transmog outfits, and will be posting them here once the competition is underway. Check out the [Trans]mogolympics site over at Arcane Wordsmith for more information.

On the homefront

On a completely different subject, my wife and I have been busy at work on opening a bake shop, aptly named “Happy Cake.” She’s acquired a building and has been working day and night on getting it ready for a grand opening.  I truly wish that there was more that I could do to help out, but my day job has otherwise taken up my time. She’s really excited, and I am ecstatic and so proud of her working on making a dream come true.  It’s cost a pretty penny, but we’re sure it’ll be successful.  Fortunately we didn’t have to pay to have a website built… cause I do that for a living, haha (that’ll be coming soon as well).  To top it off, my oldest will be turning 5 next month, so we’ll have a really busy year coming up.

Happy Cake: Cakes, Cupcakes, & More

Amateur writing

I’m not sure if you all remember me mentioning that I was working on a sidestory/RP/fanfic pertaining to my own characters (in fact several).  Well, I finished one of them, it’s a little over 25 pages long. It’s a very rough draft, and I’m sure has all kinds of errors all over it, but I want to share it with you all.

I’m going to start a series of posts that include about 5 pages a piece. It’ll be posted here on this blog, as well as my other Horizon’s Blade writing blog.

 

I hope to see you all on September 25th, God willing, I’ll be joining you on the journey into the Mists of Pandaria.

Mopping up leftovers

It’s been a while.  I always say that lately it seems.

Anyway, a good bit has happened since I last left something of substance here.  Including getting a chance to got o Blizzcon and seeing the new Mists of Pandaria in person, hitting up the demo, and watching the class panels.

A lot has already been written across the WoW blogosphere, so I’ll try not to repeat too much of it. Instead here are some interesting upcoming changes that I have noticed, and think will keep me playing even into the next expansion.

Pandaren - Samwise Didier

First up… Pandaren, love them or hate them, they will still have a place in my heart.  I remember seeing a lot of artwork by Samwise Didier, one of the penultimate WoW artists on the Blizzard staff, and its focus on the pandaren. I may be mistaken, but I believe that he may have been the creator of the race in the first place.  Of course letting the story tellers move it along beyond his art, I still leave him at the top of that group.

There are those who still think that the Pandaren were some “April Fool’s Joke,” yet those also ignore anything you say debunking this, and talk mean to their mothers.

The Pandaren have been around since Warcraft III, in fact Chen Stormstout assisted Rexxar in taking the first steps into a new Horde, only to take a separate path, not to be seen again.

I guess the only other reason that I am a big fan of the Pandaren is the Asian influence that inspires the art.  I have been a HUGE fan of Chinese and Japanese art since I was in 8th grade (I’ll even have a hipster moment and say that I was a fan of Japanese art and culture before it was cool).  From what I saw at Blizzcon, the environment and artwork of this new expansion is going to be amazing. An entire continent, and even a giant turtle (though I do think of it as a bit silly, but just imagine the size of a lot of things in WoW), covered in beautiful artwork, both architectual, and natural.  I thought that I was impressed when I first saw Darnassus when I began playing WoW some 5-6 years ago, but it can’t even light a candle to what I saw in Pandaria.

Well, enough of my babbling, onto another subject.  Next up, is the new talent trees.  N0w, most of you have already heard of or seen the new trees, and their new “choice” mechanic every 15 levels.  It is a huge step away from the 71 talents to choose from back in the old vanilla days. Despite a lot of folks disliking the new path that Blizzard is taking, I am actually a fan of it.  Most core abilities are going to be simply given to you, just because you are a specific class/specification combination.  I was excited about how they did this initially with Cataclysm, but this goes even further.  I guess it is an over simplification of the abilities system, and I am not that big of a fan of not being able to actually hit up your trainer to learn new abilities.  However, will be a nice improvement when you have a ton of alts, though that isn’t everybody.

The choices that are available though, seem to fit into their “fun talents” methodology that they have been working towards.  It’s just a big change, and change is scary to some people.  I am personally a fan of it, as there are a lot of abilities that I have always wanted to have on my Holy Paladin, that I just couldn’t get because it was only available to other specializations. (Hello Repentance, I can’t help it… I’m a supporting type character.)  This is going to change come MoP.  Now, I do not deny that the EJ guys will eventually find the “right” build, and begin the cookie cutter cycle again; however, I do not believe that it will be a simply cookie cutter build like it used to be.  Instead it will end up being a fight-by-fight type of build, where the choices made are depenedant on the situations that you face.  This will provide a nice little bit of complexity, and will separate the good players from the great players.

Alright, lastly, though it’s coming out before Mists of Pandaria (in fact it should be released in patch 4.3) is Transmogrification/Void Storage. I literally jumped for joy… ok I didn’t jump, but I was excited, when I read about this. Do you remember me writing about this a while back.  Yeah, I’m a bit of a hoarder, and I have lots and lots and lots and lots of stuff in my bank, most of it I will never actually wear because of the stats… but now… oooohhhh now, I will have a hayday with transmogrification.  I will be a very poor Pally soon.  I have already hit several old instances to scrounge up old gear, gear that I can almost not fit into my bags or my fully sacked bank… all of them Soulbound.  How about you?  Are you going to be having fun with the new Transmogrifications?

Well, I know it was a rambling hodge podge of topics, but hey, it’s been a while.  And with limited resources, you gotta do what you can.  Hope to see y’all again.

Whimper

A Short Story, and Introduction of Shadowidget 

I put together a little bit of an RP background for my little gnome rogue known as Shadowidget. It’s a little short, but places him where he is today. 

Let me know in your comments what you think. 

Flixan Shadowidget

 

  

Nostalgia’d

Nope, I’m not dead, or MIA, or AWOL, whichever you’d prefer. But I am peeking my head over this pile of work that I’ve had lately. With a mix of a busy work week, and magically turning our pool from deep green to blue, all while prepping for a trip with the kids to visit some family out of state. Let’s just say that there hasn’t been much WoW time in there. I’m lucky to get my daily Ahune kill.

Good Old Elwynn Forest.

Anyway, on to the subject of this post, nostalgia. When it comes to WoW, I’ve been part of the game if not the community for nearly 4 years now. I’ve seen classes rise and fall, and have seen those class raiders learn and grow along with the raids they explored. I’ve watched as instances sprung up from the forest floors, and carve themselves into mountainsides. Let’s just say that I’ve seen a lot, and remember most of it.

As of recently, with the lull in content, and the anticipation of the new expansion, I’ve made the decision to go back and do every instance that I can, soloing them if possible. I believe that I’m still a few short when it comes to old world dungeons, which I really want to complete as they very well may become unavailable. While doing this, I have finally completed my Explorer achievement, and can now say I’ve been everywhere in Azeroth. In addition I’ve put a decent dent in the Loremaster achievement along the way.

One instance though, brought a rush of nostalgia beyond that experienced from the others I had been through. I believe that this instance seems to have that effect on a lot of folks. This place was my first step into raiding, and provided me with my very first legitimate piece of tier level gear. You see, I have been playing a long time, but have never actually raided until the end of BC. I never had the time or ambition to raid in Vanilla, and kind of regret that, though the time was spent on more important things, like getting my personal self to where I am today.

Warning, incoming wall of text.

More Cataclysm Speculation

I’ve had another little brainstorm recently. Blizzard had their latest Cataclysm Press Event, and during their event they mentioned Cho’Gall as being the final boss of the Grim Batol (now known as the Bastion of Twilight), and when certain things are accomplished, the ground will open up and a secret “ultra hard” boss and “horrible secret” will be revealed. Well, speculation went flying in all directions since then.

First was that some folks noticed black dragon eggs down in the lava beneath the floor (I have yet to see the video, so I’m not sure). These eggs were apparently surrounded by lava. This would lead me to believe something pertaining to the Black Dragonflight being part of the secret boss encounter; however, a lot of folks mention the possibility of an Old God, or even a resurrected C’Thun being revealed.

This is understandable, as Cho’Gall has been getting a little freaky with the Old God prophecies, and has even transformed into a two headed massive tentacled chicken monster. Yes, he already had two heads, but one of then has now grown a beak… don’t ask me why.

*Cluck cluck*

A lot of folks have speculated that he just may be possessed by C’Thun’s spirit, since he is in Ahn’Quiraj doing his thing, and that “eyes” are appearing on his body. I however feel a bit differently; I do agree that he is being transformed and influenced by an Old God, but those “eyes” look more like beaks if  you ask me, which just may be the asthetic of a different Old God (there are likely 4 or 5 Old Gods on Azeroth).

It would be interesting for another Old God to make an appearance, especially with the giant Faceless Ones being dug up across the landscape of Darkshore and the Twilight Highlands. But I also feel that is getting to be a bit old, and something new should be done.

Well, my personal idea goes down a different road. Cho’Gall is apparently residing in Grim Batol. Grim Batol was once home of the Wildhammer, and eventually were pushed out by the Horde, who took the place up as a base of operations during the Second War. It is also where Alextrasza was held against her will to breed red drakes for the Horde to use against the Alliance. She too was eventually freed by Rhonin and Krasus, and Grim Batol was again left an empty, dark place.

Well, during the course of “Night of the Dragon”, Grim Batol was also the home of Sinestra, prime consort of Deathwing. Here she was experimenting with creating a new Dragonflight, much like Nefarion had, but using Black Dragons and Nether Dragons from Draenor. She was somewhat successful, in fact a massive Twilight dragon known as Dargonax had successully grown to full maturity. Among his siblings were lesser Twilight Drakes, and likely Halion, the second and likely only remaining mature Twilight Dragon, who will soon be revealed as attacking the Ruby Sanctum.

Well, upon the completion of Night of the Dragon, Dargonax had destroyed the experiments being conducted, and Sinestra along with it. However, this is not specifically said as the details are a bit sketchy. In addition upon the closing of the book, it was said that deep below Deathwing also stirred.

So, what am I getting at? Well, it has been nearly confirmed that Nefarion and Onyxia will be returning, and apparently working together in Blackwing Decent. This would leave a damaged and defeated Sinestra (who, by the way, did show up during the Burning Crusade and spoke of her Master, alluding to Deathwing, during the Netherwing quest lines).

Lady Sinestra

With her being such an integral part in Deathwing’s plan to create a new dragonflight, I have this sneaking suspition that she will be back, and very possibly as this secret boss. Now, what would make her so “ultra hard mode”? Well, since she was supposedly “destroyed” by Dargonax’s explosive end, she may have been brought back to life, much like Onyxia and Nefarion are supposed to be. However, since she was in such close contact with Dargonax, and the experiments being conducted, she very well may have been infused with the nether energy of the Twilight drakes making her a full Twilight/Black Dragon hybrid. This is a lot of power to be held in one creature, so likely will be very hard to defeat.

I guess that we’ll have to wait and see, but I hold tru to my speculation, we’ll see what comes of this.

What do you think is below Grim Batol? Could it be another Old God, or something worse? Leave me some comments on  your ideas.

What if? – Arthas: Part 1

Good morning everyone…

I have thought about doing a series like this for a while. I’ve always been one to be really into the Lore of World of Warcraft, and as such wanted to think about situations that could have changed.

I’m going to start out this series with a good ‘ol paladin turned Master of the Scourge, appropriate for a Paladin blog 🙂

Today’s “What if?” topic: Arthas Menethil, Prince of Lordaeron.

Today’s topic started with some incredible fan art from one of my very favorite artists, pulyx. (I hope to get written permission, but until then, here is a link to his DeviantArt page, all credit goes to him and his incredible talent. In fact, all the art featured in this article are by Pulyx! Incredible work).

King Arthas Menethil (by pulyx)

What the art above shows, is Arthas Menethil if he had not persued Frostmourne, and instead continued to learn under Uther, and eventual rose to power after the natural passing of his father.