Filed under: Raiding, Wrath of the Lich King

Just the other day we linked to a GameInformer article in which Tom Chilton mentions a new raid coming soon that would take place in the Ruby Sanctum. To make sure there is no confusion around this, Zarhym hit the forums to tell us exactly what this raid will be.

A powerful war party of the Black Dragonflight, led by the fearsome Twilight dragon, Halion, have launched an assault upon the Ruby Sanctum beneath Wyrmrest Temple. By destroying the sanctum, the Black Dragonflight look to crush those that would stand in the way of their master’s reemergence into Azeroth and to ultimately shatter the Wyrmrest Accord - the sacred bond that unites the dragonflights.

The battle that is to come will surely deal a crippling blow to the Red Dragonflight, however, it is up to you to stop this unprecedented offensive and defend the Ruby Sanctum. First you must face the assault of Halion’s servants, Saviana Ragefire, Baltharus the Warborn, and General Zarithrian, before squaring off against Halion the Twilight Destroyer, a new and deadly force in this realm.

The Ruby Sanctum will feature 10- and 25-player content, Heroic difficulties and all-new rewards! Stay tuned for more information as we get closer to its release.

From the text, it sounds like we’re getting four bosses in the Ruby Sanctum, unless they’ve taken a Northrend Beasts gauntlet-style approach to the encounters, or perhaps even another council-style battle. Later in the thread, Zarhym suggest that this may only be the beginning of Deathwing’s attempts at shattering the Accord, so we may see the other Sanctums open before Cataclysm’s launch.

Patch 3.3.5: Assault on the Ruby Sanctum originally appeared on WoW.com on Fri, 19 Feb 2010 15:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Blizzard, Interviews, Wrath of the Lich King, Cataclysm

There’s an excellent interview with Tom Chilton, the World of Warcraft lead game designer, up on GameInformer. Lots of stuff we’ve heard before, but there are some interesting talking points. For example:

• They are looking into extending the dungeon finder to 10-man content.
• Chilton hinted that we may see a new boss in the Ruby Sanctum before Cataclysm launches
• They have a “general philosophical approach of getting the hybrids to where they’re close to the DPS classes when it comes to DPS roles. Otherwise, those specs just turn into joke specs.”
• They feel warlocks could use a boost to their DPS.
• Tol Barad, the Cataclysm equivalent to Wintergrasp, will be more of a Isle of Quel’Danas style daily quest hub instead of a farming zone.
• Before settling on death knights for Wrath of the Lich King’s hero class, they specifically debated necromancers and rune-masters.
• They feel that with all the accessibility work they did on end game PvE in Wrath, end game PvP has become harder to get into by comparison.

It’s a three page interview, so click through to read the whole thing! What really struck me reading this was that comment about hybrid DPS compared to pure. This “hybrid tax” concept has been harped on by posters on the official forums for a long time now, and this is a fairly straightforward way of putting it.

Tom Chilton retrospective interview on Wrath of the Lich King originally appeared on WoW.com on Thu, 18 Feb 2010 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Cheats, Bugs, Guilds, Raiding, Wrath of the Lich King, Achievements

Are you wondering what has caused all the ruckus in the raiding community the past few days? Have you been typing your fingers to the bone since Wednesday night, arguing for one side or the other in forums and chat channels? Whoever you are, or whatever side you’re on, in the still-burning aftermath of Ensidia’s ban, I feel some reflection is needed. Thus, I am going explain, to the best of my ability, what happened to cause such uproar in the raiding community this week. I am also going to, as the title implies, offer my speculations.

Continue reading Editorial: Thoughts on the Ensidia ban

Editorial: Thoughts on the Ensidia ban originally appeared on WoW.com on Fri, 05 Feb 2010 19:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: News items, Raiding, Wrath of the Lich King, Achievements

GuildOx reports that Paragon, from the European Lightning’s Blade realm, has defeated the Lich King and acquired the Frozen Throne achievement. While well-known guild Ensidia had defeated him yesterday on 25-man difficulty, they also employed some dubious techniques to win and later paid the price for it by having their loot and achievements removed.

Paragon, on the other hand, appears to have completed the encounter in an exploit-free manner and, according to MMO-Champion’s Boubouille, did it on their first try. Congratulations go out to Paragon on their clean kill. Now let’s see some of those heroic achievements!

Paragon scores world-first legitimate 25-man Lich King kill originally appeared on WoW.com on Thu, 04 Feb 2010 19:10:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Raiding, Wrath of the Lich King

We do not know whether or not this was used in the Lich King kills we’ve seen so far (Ensidia’s kill screenshot suggests they did), but Daelo hit the European forums to make the announcement that they’ve temporarily disabled Saronite Bombs and the Global Thermal Sapper Charge. What does this have to do with the Lich King? Well, Daelo says…

We just made a hotfix that disables the siege damage dealt by Saronite Bombs and the Global Thermal Sapper Charge. The siege damage of the bombs was causing the Frozen Throne platform to rebuild, which greatly decreases the difficulty of the encounter.

We’ll reenable the siege damage in a later update when the issue with the Frozen Throne is fixed.

It is a longstanding tradition for end bosses to be exploited in the most hilariously awful of ways, so seeing something like this isn’t all that surprising. Here’s hoping nothing else like it crops up.

Update: Ensidia has released a statement regarding their use of this bug.

Saronite Bombs and similar items disabled originally appeared on WoW.com on Wed, 03 Feb 2010 21:10:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Raiding, Wrath of the Lich King

Last night was the world first 10-man kill, tonight it’s the world first 25-man kill. The infamous Ensidia of Tarren Mill-EU has scored the kill, and there’s a news post on their website confirming it. They walked away with Glorenzelg, High-Blade of the Silver Hand and Fal’inrush, Defender of Quel’thalas. Well done, crew!

WoW raiding is a bit strange these days, because this kill is actually just the beginning of the road. Now we get to watch the hard modes, which is likely to take quite a bit longer. That’s our hope, at least. Will Ensidia walk away with hard mode Lich King as well, or will a group of underdogs come from behind? Will Stars show up in the spotlight again? Only time will tell.

Ensidia scores world first 25-man Lich King kill originally appeared on WoW.com on Wed, 03 Feb 2010 20:25:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Interviews, Wrath of the Lich King, Cataclysm

The latest edition of Blizzard Insider, Blizzard’s very sporadic email newsletter (and no relation to our old name, WoW Insider) has been released. Issue 32 features a note that the Starcraft II: WIngs of Liberty site has been revamped, blurbs about the mobile Authenticator and the Armory app, and some calls to buy their merchandise.

More interesting for WoW fans, though, is an interview with Scott Mercer (Daelo), WoW’s lead encounter designer, and Greg Street (Ghostcrawler), a crab who needs no introduction. They discussed the arc of Arthas and the Lich King from Warcraft II through World of Warcraft (congratulations again to Blood Legion on their 10-man world-first).

Please note that here there be spoilers for some details about the Arthas fight, so stay away if you want it all to be a surprise.

Continue reading Daelo and Ghostcrawler discuss the Lich King

Daelo and Ghostcrawler discuss the Lich King originally appeared on WoW.com on Wed, 03 Feb 2010 20:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Raiding, Wrath of the Lich King

About one hour ago, WoW.com was notified that Blood Legion of Illidan-US has scored the world first of 10-man The Fall of the Lich King (as well as The Frozen Throne.) Ten lucky Blood Legion members walk away with the Kingslayer title, and a… statue of Tirion Fordring? Well… okay. Why not? Congratulations, Blood Legion. Good luck on the hard modes next week!

Before everyone jumps to conclusions and bemoans WoW being easy mode, keep in mind this is only the normal mode of the 10-man difficulty. Blood Legion is a high end 25-man guild, so this kill was not what you would call “pure.” A kill this quickly doesn’t mean the encounter was trivial, because if that were the case we’d have seen many more kills last night. It simply means Blood Legion had an edge, to say the least.

Blood Legion scores world first Lich King kill originally appeared on WoW.com on Wed, 03 Feb 2010 05:25:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Wrath of the Lich King

Enigma is already hitting the Lich King this evening, and they’re livestreaming it for all to see. As of this posting they have 15 attempts left, so we’re in for quite the show. Considering it’s a livestream of the raid encounter there are bound to be spoilers in it. If you don’t want to be spoiled, don’t watch.

The embed has been placed behind the cut, because there are autoplay issues happening. The last thing we want is the stream starting up automatically for people that don’t want to see it. As a note, if the video is not playing correctly for you, just hit pause and then play again. If that doesn’t work, refresh.

Update: They’ve ended the stream. That’s all, folks!

Continue reading Enigma’s Lich King encounter livestream

Enigma’s Lich King encounter livestream originally appeared on WoW.com on Tue, 02 Feb 2010 18:20:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Raiding, Wrath of the Lich King

We’re in heavy spoiler territory yet again with datamined sound files straight out of Patch 3.3.2, so we’ve hidden the video containing them behind the cut below. Do not click through the break to watch the video if you do not want to be thoroughly spoiled. The sound files contain lines spoken before, during and after the final confrontation with the Lich King. If you do choose to watch/listen, please don’t run around spoiling your fellow players. Let them make that decision on their own.

Continue reading Patch 3.3.2: Fall of the Lich King sound files

Patch 3.3.2: Fall of the Lich King sound files originally appeared on WoW.com on Tue, 02 Feb 2010 08:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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