And me these questions seven… that doesn’t rhyme…

So I was tagged-but-not-really by Anea (more like commanded, by virtue of reading her blog) to participate in this meme. I apologize if this is too arpeeish.

1. What is your name, and where did it come from??

My name is just Rhidach. I prefer not to speak my family name these days, after the befoulment of Quel’Thalas. My name is Thalassian for “Elf-under-arms”. Fitting, I suppose.

2. How old are you, and what is your birthday?

I am 65 seasons of age. Which may be surprising to the mortal races, but makes me barely an adult.

3. Are you in love, and with whom?

I have no time for love.

4. What is your favorite mount, and why?

My trusty Warstrider has borne me into battle with Scourge scum many a time. He is my unwavering companion and I would trade him for no other steed, be it the equines of my order, or some… ugh… Kodo.

5. Do you prefer a certian type of Azerothonian meal, and where do you get it from?

Dragonfin Filet, perfectly cooked over an open flame, and best prepared after being plucked from the frozen waters of Northrend. I make it myself over a fire oft prepared in the bowels of some dark place for a quick boost to my fighting spirits and strength.

6. You know those giant mushrooms in Zangarmarsh? What is your theory on how they came to be, and why they are so huge?

Fel magic perhaps? Alien biology? Who knows? Such an odd question to be asked.

7. If you saw the Lich King walking towards you, what would you do?

Gut the bastard or die trying.

wtb the Argent Tournament hippogryph

I don’t care if it’s a dopey recolor, it’s touching the ground!

Achieving great things in the kingdom of the spiderfolk

This past weekend my buds and I did an achievement-o-thon in Azjol-Nerub and the Old Kingdom. We managed to bang out every achievement those two instances had to offer except for two–one being Party’s Over, which we already had, and Volazj’s Demise, which we tried a few times but couldn’t nail down. I’m going to share the strategies we used so you can pick up these achievements too. [...]

We’re NOT in a dress again

mmo-champion.com is all over the PTR for 3.1 coming out today and is data mining like their life depended on it. I’m not going to recycle the notes they put up, but I’ll have a more thoughtful analysis when the dust settles.

In the meantime, onto more important things… Tier 8!

Over at Maintankadin, one of the posters found the helm/shoulders to Paladin Tier 8 in this thread.

Which means… we’re in a dress again…

Here’s the art from the booklet that came with the collector’s edition of WotLK that main suspected would be either the Shammy or the Pally T8:

Eh, it’s kind of cool. But, it’s really hard to tank stuff when you keep stepping on your skirt.

UPDATE: Ah, my panic was premature and thankfully shortlived. Here is the true Pally T8.

Bravo, Katamai at Maintankadin, for digging this up.

So… Robopallies or Pallybots?

The Argent Tournament in Patch 3.1?

Just saw this news as I was about to turn off the PC for the night: Zarhym announces a new world event in 3.1: The Argent Tournament.

• 
  
  
• The ability to prove your worth to a capital city of your choosing through our new mounted combat system (still in development)
• New daily quests to construct the great Argent Crusade coliseum for glorious battles to come
• All new rewards – new items, titles, banners, tabards, pets, mounts, and more
• All new achievements
• Many more festivities, and more to come in future content updates!

This sounds… really, really cool. And it’s completely unexpected. Grats to Blizz for pulling one out of left field.

Would it be too much to ask for a new Argent tabard, and perhaps a fancy Argent Proto-drake mount like they seem to have plenty of at the Argent Stand in Icecrown?

Malygos 25 down!

Great show by Enveloping Shadows tonight! We really put the Spell-Weaver in his place.

If you’re guild is attempting this fight, I cannot recommend enough this addon. It’ll tell you how your stacks of the damage debuff are doing, how uch energy and how many combo points you have, and provide an all around better interface.

I went from being incapable of keeping three stacks on Malygos to rocking an 18 stack by the end of the night.

(And I’m secretly relieved that as a second tank I wasn’t dead weight… phew.)

6×6

I was tagged by Samodean at Hardcore Casual to do the sixth screenshot from the sixth folder meme (again with the memes!). Here’s mine:

Ah, my army of Glacier Penguins. Today Icecrown, tomorrow the World… or at least the colder parts of it.

It’s a small Azeroth, after all (or, fountain coin for your thoughts?)

My buddy Palehoof started quite the meme today when he grabbed a meme from the ‘Hoof realm forums and posted it on the general forums. Pale asked everyone:

[I]f someone caught your coin from the fountain in Dalaran, what would it say on it?

I jokingly replied to the thread “I wish, I wish I didn’t kill that fish” (oh, The Simpsons). If you asked my character though, he’d probably say something very Paladin-y, like “For the war dead of Quel’Thalas” or “I will fight the Scourge until it ends me.” Something heroic and foreshadowing his eventual evisceration at the hands of some raid boss.

I’m not really an RPer, but there’s something to be said for those little flairs that give your character a little life. For that reason I always wear the Argent Dawn tabard on Rhidach, as well as carry Uther’s coin (technically he touched it once, right?) in my inventory.

Anyways, great discussion idea Pale!

Tanking Etiquette Tips #1: Do Not Want, er, Taunt

Hey, you know what’s more fun than fighting a mob? Fighting off another tank at the same time!

If you’re a tank, I’m sure you’ve been in that situation before: you have aggro on something in a multi-mob pull. The other mobs start going down, and one tank is suddenly unoccupied. Those angry little lightning bolts pop up over his head, and suddenly that Bile Wretcher isn’t so interested in you anymore.

There is absolutely nothing ruder than this. It is, with minimum cliche intended, a slap in the face.

It’s like turning to the tank that’s currently holding the mob and saying “hey, I don’t trust you to tank this so I’m taking over” or, more appropriately, “hey, I have the attention span of a gnat, gimme.”

In my guild’s Naxx runs there is a DK tank that has a terrible, terrible habit of doing this. I swear Dark Command (or whatever their taunt is called) is part of his normal tanking rotation. Invariably I find myself engaged in taunt tennis with him, because he will just. not. give. up. on tanking that damn mob.

If you don’t have something slamming its face against your shield, it’s ok, take a deep breath. Just auto attack, apply judgements, hang on in case the guy tanking it goes kablooey.

Just don’t taunt, (pardon the language) it’s a dick move.

Raid Story Catch Up

I wrote that tanking etiquette post, I swear, and it’ll be up shortly. But I needed to play catch up a little bit with my raiding stories.

Where did I leave off? Oh, yes Monday.

Monday we had left the military wing, Sapphiron, and Kel’Thuzad. We started at the earlier raid time once more, 7 server/8 eastern. We marched in with the full 25man complement, and then realized we were about to attempt Razuvious with only one priest. Woops.

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