Rep: Sons of Hodir

The Sons of Hodir are one of the most important factions to have reputation with (unless you happen to be a Scribe) because they control our much needed shoulder enchants. Where in Burning Crusade players had a choice to support either the Aldor or the Scryers,  in Wrath there are only the Sons of Hodir and they make you WORK to get THEIR enchants. Lets begin by covering who exactly this faction is then move on to how you go about gaining their favor.

The Sons of Hodir are not actually the biological offspring of Watcher Hodir as the name somewhat implies. Rather these Frost Giants are Hodir's creations. Servants designed to assist Hodir in his duties as guardian over the ice and snow. There is also some speculation that Hodir is where the concept of Father Winter first came about, his workers are just A WHOLE LOT larger than those of Santa Claus. When Prim Designate Loken betrayed the rest of the Watchers, Hodir disappeared from his Temple of Winter and the Frost giants believed him dead.  Before they could take the time to truly investigate however they found themselves under attack by their former ally Thorim who believed them responsible for the death of his wife. It is at this point that players first encounter them.

Thorim's followers, the Frost Vrykul and the Earthen, with the loss of THEIR leader to his grief are now in three separate camps. The Hyldnir, which are an exclusively Frost Vrykul female organization, have coped with their leader's despondency by continuing his war against the Frost Giants and battling amongst themselves in hopes of discovering one of them worthy to replace Thorim's deceased wife Sif. The idea is that if a NEW mate is found he will snap out of his stupor and get back to work. Of the Frost Vrykul males, they are treated as slaves to the females, (think blue skinned amazons). The rest of Thorim's Frost Vrykul followers have fallen to the thrall of the Lich King. The Earthen on the other hand have recognized that Thorim was deceived and battle alone against Loken's forces, continuing Thorim's work while he is unable to.

When players first enter Storm Peaks, not having a clue about any of this history they will discover that both the Hyldnir and the Frost Giants are hostile to them. In fact one of the goblin females located at the small outpost of K3 will ask for assistance in recovering her male colleges. Thus begins the long attunement like chain to discover exactly what is going on in Storm Peaks.

The first section of the chain which is sixteen quests in length begins with "They took our Men" from Gretchen at K3.  This part of the chain deals with learning about the Hyldnir and eventually becoming a part of them (via disguise). Once you are deemed worthy to be a fighting member of the Hyldnir you are asked to create bear riding  harness. This will send you on to an eight part chain in which you capture yourself a bear mount before entering competition to be Thorim's new wife. At the end of this section Thorim wakes up enough to explain what has happened and admits that he was deceived. It was the realization that he not only had lost his wife but one of his best friends that has sent him into deep depression. Finally he decides that purhaps it is time to attempt to repair the damage he caused so he sends you to help mend the fence so to speak.

While helping the Frost Giants against their common foe the Iron Giants you need to make sure you pick up the Slag Covered Metal off of one of the corpses. This will start a two part parallel chain which is needed to continue further. Once you have completed BOTH Mending Fences AND A Spark of Hope return to Thorim at the Temple of Storms. Now at this point you are Neutral with the Son's of Hodir. This means you can now land in their capital of Dum Niffelem with out fear.

Previously you would now see a variety of quests open up around Dum Niffelem, completing these will open the six daily quests. There is also a six part chain which sends you BACK to Thorim, now relocated to the Terrace of the Makers. Thorim has two quests for you The Earthen Oath and Loken's Lackeys. Once you have completed both of these Thorim asks you to accompany him to the Temple of Wisdom while he confronts Loken. It doesn't go well and in the end Thorim is captured just like Hodir was. When you report what you have seen to King Jokkum, the present leader of the Sons of Hodir he sends you to the Halls of Lightning, where Loken is known to be working. I personally find the quest he gives you rather disturbing as he wants Loken's lying tongue as proof he is no longer living.

Now since patch 3.0.8 there IS an easier way to get reputation with this faction. However you STILL have to do ALL the quests up to Forging an Alliance. Once you are neutral with the Sons of Hodir you can go to their quartermaster Lillehoff and turn in stacks of 10 Relics of Ulduar for 250 reputation each. The Relics drop off of pretty much any mob located in Storm Peaks or the Ulduar 5 man dungeons. Doing this can easily get you from hostile to exalted in just a matter of hours verses the WEEKS it use to take. Relics are also MUCH easier to farm than Everfrost. Not only that unlike Everfrost which is bind on pick up the Relics can be sold on the auction house so it is rather easy to pick up a stack if farming is not your thing.

Lillehoff has more than just the shoulder enchants to sell. Mount collectors will be interested in his TWO land mounts, the Ice Mammoth or the roomier three passenger Grand Ice Mammoth. Tailors will want to pick up the pattern for Glacial Bags, while these now have a 7 day cool down they will ALWAYS sell on the auction house for a decent amount. Leather workers can also find buyers easily for the Mammoth Mining Bag so that is recipe they should obtain.

At the beginning of Wrath players cursed this faction to all perdition due to the time consuming demand of grinding daily quests. Now they are MUCH kinder to the casual player. The only issue people seem to have is getting lost while working on the attunement chains. My encouragement would be to make sure you have a set aside a couple of hours of uninterpreted play time to work until you have access to Lillehoff.

Happy Grinding!

Dealing with Hackers

There is nothing quite like the feeling of logging into your Wow account only to discover that while you were off line someone else has been playing with your account, emptying bank and deleting characters you have invested so much time and energy in. I experienced this personally early during the Burning Crusade just before authenticators were introduced. Thankfully I logged on before the hacker could completely finish the job and was able to remove him. However it took me almost a week to get my three level 70 characters somewhat restored and all my lower level characters (ranging in level from 60-40) never did make it back. As one guild mate put it I financed at least one months rent and a big screen TV when they emptied me out.

Times have changed, the tools we have to protect our selves from these types of things have gotten more sophisticated but at the same time so have the hackers. Originally all you could do was change your password regularly, (this meant a MINIMUM of every month). You could make sure that password contained a variety of different characters such as a mix of letters, numbers and symbols. Never share you account name and password with ANYONE. Always use the same computer to play on, and never use a public connection. Run a virus scan daily. (I was actually running two different ones when I was hacked.) Spurn all modifications to the game, (which for some players is like asking them to remove a limb). In addition to these if you ran on a Mac the majority of hackers had not yet entered this field because of the low amount of potential victims. Doing ALL of these things generally kept you about 90% protected.

There are still some, (always someone who has managed to be lucky) who feel that doing all of these things is enough and if you are ever the victim of a hack it must somehow be due to your OWN failures. I have never quite understood this "blame the victim" mentality. Yes, there are some things you can do which almost INVITE a hack such as sharing your account and password information, buying gold or power leveling services, as well as purchasing accounts from places like Ebay.  While my sympathy is not as strong for those types of victims not EVERYONE who gets hacked has made these types of errors. The case can be made that the MAJORITY of hacks that take place may fall into one of these categories but you need to be careful to assume that ALL do.

When my account was hacked the investigator shared with me that there are basically four common types of hacks, Keylogger, Trojans, Bombardment and Middleman that players should be aware of. (He theorized that I was the victim of a Bombardment attack as there were a great many hit at the same time, how they got our account names was never discovered or at least shared with me.)  In addition to this are what is called "Phishing" scams. This is where you get an Email or website that appears to be legitimate but in actually is nothing more than a front for a hacker attempting to get your personal account information.

Keyloggers are when a virus is placed on your computer to track key stroke information. This type is used not only to obtain MMO passwords but bank information, social security numbers, etc. To this day these are the most common hacks the average player will encounter and placing an authenticator on your account greatly diminishes the possibility of this type being successful.

Trojans are where you THINK you are getting one thing (like a game modification) but in fact are getting a keylogger. Sites such as Curse.com attempt to do all in their power to keep these types off their data bases. It is this type of hacks that are most recently aimed at authenticators, the aim being to get victims to remove them or implement a Middleman hack which I will talk about in just a bit.

Bombardment hacks have become more prevalent with the introduction of Battle.net. This is where a hacker keeps hitting your account until they break in via a computer program. An easy way to deal with this is to make certain that your Battle.net Email is unique to JUST your Battle.net account.

Now the fourth type is one we are seeing more of in recent months, specifically because they are really the only way to get around the authenticators, the Middle Man hack. This is when the user THINKS they are logging in but in actuality are seeing a false screen which then records that information and allows the hacker to be the one actually controlling your account. The only weakness to this type of hack is that the hacker has to move fast before the victim realizes what is going on and can remove them.

Most hackers, once they have control of an account will do one or all of several different things. First they will empty out the character of all funds, vendor or destroy anything they can't market and then mail or trade all of that cash/items to ANOTHER character on the same realm.  Some will take the newly acquired character and use them to conduct FURTHER scams such as emptying guild banks, selling mount or pet codes, and discovering further victims to scam. Still others will IMMEDIATELY put the new account ON an authenticator to keep the victim from retrieving it. From there they can realm transfer, changing the name, race and even faction of the character allowing them to do even MORE destruction.

In the four years I have been an Officer and GM in a guild I have seen numerous guild mates fall victim to each of these types of hacks. We in fact implemented several policies PRECISELY to deal with the frequency of the attacks we saw.  These include requiring all officers to have an authenticator on their account, limits on withdrawals that can be made by guild members and officers. Even requesting specific codes before a character can be entered into the guild who claims to be member or officer alt. (I think one of the funniest ones of these I ever encountered was when a hacker attempted to impersonate ME while I was on vent conducting an officer meeting.) 

One of the most painful hacks I ever had to deal with was with one of our Military members. While he was serving in Afghanistan someone hacked his account and SOLD it. By the time he returned to the States and was able to attempt to try to recover it MONTHS had gone by. He endured SUCH a battle trying to get his account back only to have it hacked AGAIN while he was awaiting the delivery of his authenticator. In the end he just threw up his hands and gave up. Walking away from the game completely as a result of the overwhelm frustration.

Our guild for its size is VERY close knit. We can usually spot a hacker on an account quickly but you feel so impotent as you see them being victimized. You can report it to a Game Master if you happen to be fortunate enough to actually get a hold of one in a reasonable amount of time. You can also attempt to contact the victim to let them know they are being hacked. Beyond that you are pretty much limited to harassing the hacker and keep him from doing as much business as possible.

It can be difficult for your guild on a variety of levels when you have a member hacked as well. Not only do you have the loss of that player and any gear they may have acquired but if the hacker then uses the character to victimize OTHERS you may have to deal with the victims coming to YOU as a guild leader demanding restitution. We endured this with one of our younger guild members early in the Wrath expansion. In this case the hacker used our guild member's character to do the "mount and pet codes" scam. I spent about a week talking to various people who were cheated, informing them of our guild member's OWN victimization and encouraging them to prepare themselves for hacks on their OWN accounts. This despite having guild members proclaiming in trade chat that the character was under the control of a hacker and buyers should beware.

It is very easy to get over whelmed and become paranoid when discussing hacks. All it takes is for my computer's performance to go down to get me scouring my system for viruses. Blizzard works hard to promote account security and to make sure their players are aware of the various types of scams and attacks out there. However the best protection you have sits in your own chair. Be vigilant. Take precautions and if something sounds to good to be true it most likely is. Authenticators are the best $7 you can spend (the key fob ones are SLIGHTLY more secure than the phone app ones as the numbers are only good for about ten seconds verses a minute on the phone apps). Follow the other precautions mentioned such as the account name for your Battle.net account. Be skeptical of ANY Email you get supposedly from Blizzard. If it doesn't come on the Battle.net account email you can be CERTAIN it is NOT real. Like Blizzard says over and over NO ONE from Blizzard will ask for your account name and password.

Blizzard has greatly increased their ability to restore characters but it isn't easy. Sometimes they will just offer a "care package" in an attempt to speed the matter along. For those with nothing more than lower level characters this can be a viable option for recovery. Those of us with a large number of higher level characters decked out in full raid gear will usually opt out of this in favor of getting as much of our original stuff back. There are limits to what they can do however. I know for myself they were unable to restore the three bags full of enchanting mats and primals my priest had and some of my gear was missing enchants. However when the other option is starting over from scratch I learned to live with it. The preference is to just not have to experience at all.

The thing to remember is that technically Blizzard doesn't have to DO anything. They in reality OWN these characters we invest so much time and effort in. When they take the time to restore for us after an account compromise they are in fact doing us a FAVOR. They do everything in their power to educate their customers about the hazards of playing on line and what things we can do to protect ourselves. When it all comes down to it only WE can choose to take that advice or not. The control is COMPLETELY resting on OUR shoulders.

Proposed Cataclysm Rogue changes

FINALLY!!! So last night after the raid I looked to see if they had posted the newest information for the Cataclysm review (the rogue one of course, who cares about any other class?...well yeah I have alts but....anyway). To my great chagrin it was only to discover that I was to be denied until this morning....Evil Blizzard.

So what all do they have planned for us THIS expansion?

New Rogue Abilities

Redirect (available at level 81): Rogues will be getting a new ability to help them deal with changing targets. Redirect will transfer any active combo points to the rogue's current target, helping to ensure combo points aren't wasted when swapping targets or when targets die. In addition, self-buff abilities like Slice and Dice will no longer require a target, so rogues can spend extra combo points on those types of abilities (more on this below). Redirect will have a 1-minute cooldown and no other costs.

Combat Readiness (level 83): Combat Readiness is a new ability that we intend rogues to trigger defensively. While this ability is active, whenever the rogue is struck by a melee or ranged attack, he or she will gain a stacking buff called Combat Insight that results in a 10% reduction in damage taken. Combat Insight will stack up to 5 times and the timer will be refreshed whenever a new stack is applied. Our goal is to make rogues better equipped to go toe-to-toe with other melee classes when Evasion or stuns are not in play. This ability lasts 6 seconds and has a 2-minute cooldown.

Smoke Bomb (level 85): The rogue drops a Smoke Bomb, creating a cloud that interferes with enemy targeting. Enemies who are outside the cloud will find themselves unable to target units inside the cloud with single-target abilities. Enemies can move inside the cloud to attack, or they can use area-of-effect (AoE) abilities at any time to attack opponents in a cloud. In PvP, this will open up new dimensions of tactical positional gameplay, as the ability offers a variety of offensive and defensive uses. In PvE, Smoke Cloud can serve to shield your group from hostile ranged attacks, while also drawing enemies closer without the need to rely on conventional line-of-sight obstructions. Smoke Cloud lasts 10 seconds and has a 3-minute cooldown.

Changes to Abilities and Mechanics

We're also planning to make changes to some of the other abilities and mechanics you're already familiar with. This list and the summary of talent changes below it are by no means comprehensive, but they should give you a good sense of what we want for each spec.

• In PvP, we want to reduce the rogue's dependency on binary cooldowns and "stun-locks," and give them more passive survivability in return. One major change is that we'll put Cheap Shot on the same diminishing return as other stuns. The increase to Armor and Stamina on cloth, leather, and mail gear will help with this goal as well. 

• In PvE, even accounting for active modifiers like Slice and Dice and Envenom, a very large portion of the rogue's damage is attributable to passive sources of damage. Yes, they are using abilities for the entire duration of a fight, but we want to reduce the percentage of rogue damage that comes from auto-attacks and poisons. More of their damage will be coming from active abilities and special attacks. 

• We would like to improve the rogue leveling experience. Positional attacks and DoT-ramping mechanics will be de-emphasized at low levels and then re-introduced at higher levels for group gameplay. We are also providing rogues with a new low-level ability, Recuperate, to convert combo points into a small heal-over-time (HoT). 

• To complement the change to combo points, non-damage abilities such as Recuperate and Slice and Dice will no longer have target requirements and can be used with any of the rogue's existing combo points, including combo points remaining on recently killed targets. This will not affect damage abilities, which will still require combo points to be present on the specific target you want to damage. To coincide with this, the UI will be updated so that rogues know how many combo points they have active. 

• Ambush will now work with all weapons, but will have a reduced coefficient when not using a dagger. When opening from Stealth, all rogues will be able to choose from burst damage, DoT abilities, or a stun. 

• As we've done recently with some of the Subtlety abilities, we want to make sure more rogue abilities aren't overly penalized by weapon choice. With a few exceptions (like Backstab), you should be able to use a dagger, axe, mace, sword, or fist weapon without being penalized for most attacks. 

• Deadly Throw and Fan of Knives will now use the weapon in the ranged slot. In addition, we hope to allow rogues to apply poisons to their throwing weapons. 

• We are very happy with Tricks of the Trade as a general mechanic and as a way to give rogues more group utility, but we don't want it to account for as much threat transfer as it does now.

New Talents and Talent Changes

In Cataclysm, the overall feel of each of the rogue's talent trees will change, as we would like each tree to have a clearly defined niche and purpose. The talent details below are meant to give you an idea of what we're going for.

• Assassination will be more about daggers, poisons, and burst damage. 

• Combat will be all about swords, maces, fist weapons, axes, and being engaged toe-to-toe with your enemies. A Combat rogue will be able to survive longer without needing to rely on Stealth and evasion mechanics. 

• The Subtlety tree will primarily be based around utilizing Stealth, openers, finishers, and survivability. It'll be about daggers, too, but less so than Assassination.
• In general, Subtlety rogues needs to do more damage than they do today, and the other trees need to have more tools. 

• Weapon-specialization talents (for all classes, not just rogues) are going away. We do not want you to have to respec when you get a different weapon. Interesting talents, such as Hack and Slash, will work with all weapons. Boring talents, such as Mace Specialization and Close Quarters Combat, will be going away. 

• The Assassination and Combat talent trees currently have a lot of passive bonuses. We plan to dial back the amount of Critical Strike Rating provided by these trees so that rogues still want it on their gear.

Mastery Passive Talent Tree Bonuses

Assassination
Melee damage
Melee critical damage
Poison damage

Combat
Melee damage
Melee Haste
Harder-hitting combo-point generators

Subtlety
Melee damage
Armor Penetration
Harder-hitting finishers

The initial tier of rogue Mastery bonuses will be very similar between the trees. However, the deeper that a player goes into any tree, the more specialized and beneficial the Masteries will be to the play style for that spec. Assassination will have better poisons than the other two specs. Combat will have very steady and consistent overall damage. Subtlety will have strong finishers.

Can I say "interesting"? A few things really stood out to me from this proposal. (Yes I will always refer to them as "Proposed Changes" because we all know how they may WANT to do something but then discover it doesn't work "as intended" and things fall to the claws of certain crabs we know.


Redirect: The name kinda threw me. My first thought was "They trying to turn us into hunters?" Then I read further. To have the option of switching targets WITH OUT wasting combo points REALLY appeals. The cool down on it seems a little steep though. Hopefully we will get a glyph to shorten it like we did for Killing Spree.


Combat Readiness: Sounds like another "OH CRAP" button for those times your tank takes a powder. That and of course Pvp, the cool down on it seems reasonable as well.


Smoke Bombs: LOVE IT, sounds like I have an engineer in my pocket. This will be VERY interesting to see how it finally looks, but to have SOMETHING that can pull ranged TO YOU....YUMMY!!! My only concern is that it may suffer from the same issues as Vanish...but we won't talk about that.


Other Things of Note:
Cheap Shot on global cooldown diminishing returns. Saddening but not surprising. Have to bring rogues on par with the rest of the world I suppose. 

Removing weapon's penalties on moves such as Ambush sounds intriguing, will be interesting to see how that actually pans out. The removal of Weapon's specialization will definitely make life easier, being as I am a person who has to have ALL my weapon's skills maxed out it will save me a lot of time. 

The changes to the leveling experience also have me intrigued. I has already decided to level a Goblin Rogue come Cataclysm so I can't wait to see how things will work in the end. Not having to set up EVERY attack will certainly speed things up even more. 


Changing combo points so they won't be wasted when we have to switch targets....OH WHY HAS IT TAKEN SO LONG FOR THIS?!?!? For combat especially this is going to be huge. Tie into that the fact that Slice and Dice won't require a specific target to engage and this should equal a NICE dps increase. The UI changes regarding this will also be interesting to see as I have used a mod for so long I am not sure I even remember what the standard UI looks like....


Having Fan of Knives and Deadly Throw using our TROWING weapons just makes sense. The only problem I see with this is that it will effectively remove Bows, Crossbows and Guns from our loot lists. (Hunters may rejoice now.) I hope they decided to allow us to poison them up too. 


The incoming nerf to Tricks of the Trade makes me sad....it is about the only way I keep aggro on lesser geared tanks in Heroics. I can see it...I guess....still makes me cry a little inside.


The Mastery proposals threw me a little. Combat gets Haste and Subtlety gets Armor Pen? Does this mean that Combat might FINALLY get to do something OTHER than Armor Pen? Can't wait to see this in its final form as well. At the moment it sounds like we will be able to follow a single Mastery Tree with out really suffering, what a novel concept!

Know Your Rogue Lore: Elling Trias

This weeks Know Your Rogue Lore is inspired by The Daily Quests' Kelly Meeks and Drew Manser's most recent comic. If you haven't managed to discover them yet DO, they are a set of gifted artists. Now back to our regularly scheduled program.

Elling Trias is a humble cheese shop owner in the Trade District of Stormwind City. Or at least that is the impression he gives to the general passerby. However Elling's life was not always so circumvent and it should be noted that his shop is locate RIGHT on the main thoroughfare into Stormwind, just a short step from the Bank and Auction House, the TRUE major area of the city. Why should this make a difference? Because even now Elling can't keep his past behind him.

There is some debate as to how deeply Elling is still involved with the Stormwind Assassins and Mathias Shaw's other organization SI:7 but what IS obvious is that Elling is VERY aware of what is taking place outside his doors. In addition to that as a "humble shop keeper" he is able to maintain relationships with individuals closely associated with less savory groups like the Defias Brotherhood. All of this comes to light if you as an Alliance player stumble across a little quest chain known as "The Missing Diplomat". There is also a quiet hint in the Western Plaguelands that perhaps Elling is not as "retired" as he is attempting to portray.

So who exactly IS Elling Trias and how does fit into the over all scheme of things? Elling is a contemporary of Mathias Shaw and Edwin VanCleef. He was a part of the group who helped to maintain order and spy for Stormwind during the turbulent years of its reconstruction. However Elling is no fool, when injures cost him his eye he determined that perhaps a less "high profile" career would be the way to go. While traveling in Dalaran he took the time to drop a copper coin into the fountain expressing he wish to be able to pursue his true passion...cheese.

Presently Elling and his family (who consist of his wife Elaine, as well as sons Ben and Lucian) are focused on running their business. However don't assume that the Trias family is only working in wine and cheese. I highly doubt it is a coincidence that Lucian's shop is located RIGHT NEXT to the Horde district in Dalaran. Take into consideration the amount of merchandise he loses on a regular basis to thievery, he is either MUCH less talented than his father or running a front where profit is NOT the major goal.

Elling doesn't limit his dealings in information either. There is another quest chain Alliance players can stumble across at about level 16 called "The Unsent Letter", players pick up this little gem off of Edwin VanCleef's corpse. Follow this chain and eventually you end up at Mathias Shaw who sends you to collect a "favor" from Trias. (I LOVE the flavor text for this quest as Elling goes on about Deathwing being alive and attacking the city.) If you continue down the chain it quickly becomes evident that Elling has something to do with planning assassinations of nobles of...dubious loyalty. What is interesting about this chain is that it changed. Originally the quest ended with Lady Prestor who would tell you that the King is away on a "Diplomatic mission" (see previous Missing Diplomat) and rewards you for your "service" in his name. Since Wrath the quest now ends with King Varian himself who thanks you for your efforts and rewards you himself.

Now Elling, Elaine, Ben and Lucain are not the only known members of the Trias family. There is also speculation that a certain horde rogue trainer named David Trias may also be a relative, perhaps a brother who fell victim to the plague. This would make sense as familiarity with the rogue career is certainly rampant in the clan. In the end the most famous member and the one most beloved is the Master of Cheese himself Elling Trias.

Rep: Knights of the Ebon Blade

I'm not sure where I want to start with the story of The Knights of the Ebon Blade, a faction that some feel is truly the heart of the Wrath of the Lich King expansion. Not since Vanilla and the Cenarion Circle have we seen a group in which the CLASS you are can effect your reputation gaining abilities. There is no way you can discuss these guys without looking at Death Knights in general so lets begin there and move forward until we get ourselves to present day.

The Death Knights for Blizzard have undergone several reworkings. When they were first introduced in Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness they were really little more than mounted Liches. At that point in time Death Knights were the souls of fallen orc warlocks residing in the claimed bodies of Alliance Knights. With Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos they decided to get rid of the middle man and just go about corrupting former Paladins turning them into puppets of the Lich King. Unlike the original Death Knights this new incarnation were apt at both close quarter combat as well as ranged increasing their ability for terror on the field.

This brings us to their PRESENT incarnation. Now the ranks of the Death Knights are filled with both the fallen as well as the willing and deceived from various disciplines. Gifted fighters, their present abilities reflecting the previous two incarnations with a new twist. Their ability to control their own actions have been greatly increased, to the point that some of them have managed to escape the grasp of the Lich King and now work independently.



After the Battle of Light's Hope Darion Mograine gathered those willing to defect with him and took the floating necropolis Acherus over the Scarlet Enclave in the Easter Plaguelands as their new home. Once that base was established as a neutral ground for ALL Death Knights he sent representatives back to their original factions with letters from Tirion. With the former heroes once again welcomed amongst the Alliance and the Horde the Death Knights of the newly formed Ebon Blade fixed their eyes on Icecrown and gaining retribution for all that they have endured.

If you play a Death Knight you will reach friendly with the faction shortly after you gain your freedom from the Lich King, all other classes begin at neutral and really won't encounter the Knights of the Ebon Blade until Northrend. Most players will first begin gaining reputation with this faction at their quest hub in Zul'Drak. Here the Knights of the Ebon Blade are working in conjunction with the Argent Crusade but it is still VERY early in their relationship so distrust and disdain between the two factions is evident.

By the time you get to Icecrown and encounter the Knights of the Ebon Blade again Darion Mograin and Tirion Fordring are BOTH present so the everyday troopers are on their best behavior. However if you manage to take the time to listen to Darion (disguised as the Ebon Watcher) and Tirion discussing tactics at the Argent Vanguard you will quickly realize that the two have VERY different ideas about what it will take to win against Arthas. This divide is further demonstrated at the Argent Tournament where Death Knights have their own SEPARATE quest givers from those of other players. (Though the quests given are exactly the same.)

Aboard the flying ships the Skybreaker and Orgrim's Hammer players will encounter representatives of the Ebon Blade working with the Alliance and Horde military. Again the basic troopers express their discomfort with working with the Death Knights but by this time the specific representatives have earned their grudging respect. Thassarian and his friend Koltira Deathweaver start players on the quest chain to create a Ebon Blade stronghold, this time in the recently purged Shadow Vault. Once players complete the "Its all fun and games" quest line you gain access to both the Ebon Blade quartermaster and a wide range quests which will quickly get you to exalted reputation.

In total the Knights of the Ebon Blade offer 112 quests. Of those only seven are Death Knight specific. Eleven are daily quests all located in Icecrown. What this means is that while you won't really be able to work on gaining reputation with this faction until about level 77, it is VERY easy to get after that point. Once you have access to the quartermaster in the Shadow Vault you can also obtain a tabard and gain reputation while running dungeons as well.

Why is gaining reputation with these guys even important? Because at Revered you can purchase the helm enchant Arcanum of Torment which for the vast majority of dps classes is the enchant of choice. When Wrath was first released they also sold some of the best introductory epics available, however with the introduction of the tier gear for badges system this isn't as much the case any longer.

Happy Grinding!

Things that make you go WHAAAT?

For as long as I have played World of WarCraft there are still a few things that make absolutely NO sense to me at all. Things that just make me go "What were they THINKING when they made THOSE choices?" Do you ever have those experiences or is it just my sad twisted little brain?

Take for example the fact that Priest and Paladins CAN'T decurse. I mean they are SUPPOSE to use the power of the HOLY to do things right? Holy is generally considered the OPPOSITE of curses (ignoring Shadow priests of course). Wouldn't it be logical for them to be able to decurse? Along with that why can't Druids remove diseases? They deal in NATURE right? (Again ignoring when they are just mauling or chewing on things.) Wouldn't it make sense that THEY remove diseases?  But as you know that isn't how it works. We have Mages removing curses. What the heck does a MAGE have to do with curses? Other than the fact that Mages HATE Warlocks it makes no sense what so ever. Why can't WARLOCKS remove curses? They are the ones PUTTING them on everyone to begin with. THAT would make sense.

Have you ever stopped to consider the fact that we can tote 100+ mounts and/or non combat pets around with us at ALL times? I don't know about you but the thought of trying to lift just ONE mammoth gives me a backache and sure as heck should break blood elf in half. Let us also not forget just how much scat that would produce. We should be able to grow herbs in our bags if you think about it to closely. Other than the Forsaken and Death Knights the smell ALONE should have killed most of us off by now. Yet we do it every day without a second thought.

When they removed the weight limits and Tauren were suddenly able to ride chickens the cartoons we saw were laugh out loud funny but how can any mount FLY with one of those bovine on their backs? Only way that would make sense is with a bumble bee who defies logic to begin with. It is just something I think about every time the platewearer in the family pops out his beloved Argent Hippogryph. On the same theme of mounts, why is it that Gnome mounts are larger than any other Alliance members? Ever notice that? I mean I KNOW they have big heads but do they really need enlarged mounts to carry the extra weight? Tauren and Draeni it makes sense but Gnomes?

Armor designs, what are those artists SMOKING when they come up with some of these things? Most shoulders now a days would take out an eye let alone weight about 50 pounds and that is just the CLOTH. At least now most of the pants designs cover the knees. Not sure WHY they got hooked on capris there for a bit. Did someone forget to mention that it SNOWS in Northrend? The pickled heads we have had as Rogue helms these last few tiers just makes me shutter. Thank goodness we don't have to show them all the time. Which makes me wonder about the invisible armor. While I might appreciate it how much confidence can you really have in INVISIBLE armor?

Why is it that Forsaken ALWAYS have their spine, elbows and knees sticking out through EVERYTHING? Cutting holes in EVERY outfit they own has got to be annoying. You would think if they can get things to fit over a Tauren they would be able to NOT have their bones exposed all the time. Not only that but wouldn't you want to protect them? When you are barely holding yourself together to begin with some extra padding would seem to be appreciated.

Now I know this is a fantasy world so a certain amount of logic suspension is required. Yet sometimes even that suspension is pushed to the limits by some of the things we encounter every day and I just have to stop and wonder....What WERE they thinking when they made some of these decisions?

Know Your Rogue Lore: Gankly Rottenfist

Gankly Rottenfist is on of those fun characters who could almost be considered an Easter Egg. This elusive NPC appears randomly near the Nessingwary Safari in Nagrand. While his intended target is another random NPC named Kristen Dipswitch. (Originally her name was Kristen DeMeza a tribute to Blizzard Employee Caydiem of Forum fame.) He will also attack any others who happen to be in the area attempting to turn in or receive their OWN quests.

If players don't interfere Gankly jumps Kristen shortly after she rides up to the camp, killing her. He then rummages through her bags stealing her quest turn in. Once this is accomplished he attempts to turn the items in himself to Harold who promises him his "just reward". The results are vindication for every lowbie ever ganked by a higher level in Stranglethorn as Nessingwary and the other members of the expedition fill him full of buckshot. Turning him into their latest hunting trophy and a lovely rug for the center of the camp.

Gankly is considered a modern representation of every high level rogue who spends their time harassing lower level players attempting to turn in their quests. (Christian Chase would be proud.) Clad in the pvp Warlord's Vestments his fighting technique is rather poor for someone who should be VERY good at pvp. He is a Subtlety rogue who will stop at nothing less than death in taking out his intended victim. If you attempt to run away rather than fight him he will chase you endlessly. If he manages to kill you (which unless you are EXTREMELY poorly geared or a MUCH lower level should NOT happen) he will camp your corpse for about 5 minutes before despawning. He has VERY low health, just shy of 6k with VERY low damage output so few people should consider him ANY type of threat even at level 65.

Gankly has managed to collect for himself a cult type following as I know of individuals who happily hang out at the Nessingwary Camp waiting for Kristen to ride up since her appearance anticipates his own. I know of numerous individuals who have NEVER managed to encounter him but if you are so fortunate feel free to end his miserable life and Kristen will give you a nice little quest reward.