I just read an interesting article about World of Warcraft and its number of sales in 2008. According to Media Control the first three places in the sales-chart for all computer games go to Blizzard’s World of Warcraft. First place is the latest addon “Wrath of the Lich King” followed by the classic WoW client. The third place goes to the second addon “The Burning Crusade”. This impressively shows again how successful this game is after all those years… congratulations Blizzard, in my opinion you really deserve it!

If you understand German, you can read the entire article here.

Last Friday a few of my guild-mates, some random players and I got the archievement “For the Alliance!”. To complete this archievement you gotta kill the leaders of the four major horde cities (Ogrimmar, Thunder Bluff, Undercity and Silvermoon City). Ideally you’d start the different raids very late at night so that you don’t face too much resistance from other enemy players. Most of the time we were 40 people, with the usual amount of skilled and unskilled followers . After killing the last horde leader and completing the archievement you also receive the mighty Black War Bear, a fast land mount with 100% movement speed increase. Just a suggestion before you start: turn off ALL graphical effects and lower your screen resolution… you’ll need all the frames you can get !

We started with Thrall, the leader of the Orcs in Ogrimmar. After killing him for the first time you also get the archievement “Death to the Warchief!”.

Afterwards we rode to the Tauren city Thunder Bluff to kill Cairne Bloodhoof. Here you’ll receive the archievement “Bleeding Bloodhoof”.

The third city on our agenda was the Undercity and its leader Lady Sylvanas Windrunner. After killing her you also get the archievement “Downing the Dark Lady”.

Last but not least we’ve killed Lor’themar Theron, the leader of the Blood Elves in Silvermoon City for the additional archievement “Killed in Quel’Thalas”. Immediately after killing the last of the four leaders you’ll receive a letter with your reward, the angry and cool looking Black War Bear !

Actually you’d already be able to learn the artisan riding skill (300) once you reach level 70 but in most cases you won’t have enough gold by then . It’s by far the most expensive skill in the game and offers no discount… no matter how much reputation you’ve got with the various fractions. If you’re proud owner of – now better seat yourself – 5,000 gold you can learn it at different places. Compared to that fortune the standard epic flying mount is a real bargain with just 200 gold. I recently could finally afford the artisan riding skill + the standard epic flying mount *yeeehaaa*. Just like before with the upgrade from a standard land mount to an epic land mount, you basically take the standard flying mount in an armored and better looking version with much more speed: 60% –> 280% flying speed. Druids have to complete a quest in order to learn the swift flying form by the way.

If you’ve got enough reputation with a sepcific fraction you can also buy a special epic flying mount instead. But in this post I just wanna show you the standard epic flying mounts for the Alliance as well as Horde.

Today I wanna show you THE best video I’ve ever seen based on WoW models… “The Craft of War – BLIND”. This is just awesome work and needs to be seen as well as spread. So go on and do whatever you can to forward the link or video to as many people as possible . Also I obviously wanna thank Percula for this amazing piece of work… you rock dude!

Video-link

In my opinion the level 80 instance Utgarde Pinnacle is the hardest and most challenging dungeon so far in WoW. It’s still a lot of fun but if the teamwork isn’t as good as flawless or if the players are not heavily equipped (at least the healer and tank) you’ll most likely won’t make it. For a tank though, you can get some really great drops for all your hard work . The first boss (Svala Sorrowgrave) drops Svala’s Bloodied Shackles, the second (Gortok Palehoof) the Reanimated Armor and the third (Skadi the Ruthless) the Amulet of Deflected Blows. If you haven’t got any better trousers yet or if there’s nobody else who needs them, you could also get the Ancient Royal Legguards from the fourth and last boss (King Ymiron)… but they aren’t really tank material.

Here’s a link to a detailed map of the new continent Northrend for everyone who might be interested in it. It was originally made by Ron Sholtis (thanks for your work) and is pretty high-res.

I just edited it a little bit to show the level-range of all zones and instances/raids as well as all flightpoints.

I’ll try to keep the map and all its information up-to-date but if you still happen to find any mistake or have any suggestions, feel free to drop a comment below .

Northrend World Map

The level 71-74 zone Dragonblight might perhaps not be the most beautiful area out there but it contains THE best quest(-line) ever made (see the previous post). Apart of this quest-line, all other quests you can get there are very thrilling as well. Even though some people complain that you have to run there and back all the time while questing in Dragonblight, it’s definitely a must-do zone!

Today I wanna give you a detailed description of the by far very best quest-line in WoW! These quests are seriously the best stuff I’ve seen/read in years! Heck they could make a movie out of it… it’s that thrilling and good! The quest-line is divided in 6 main parts. After completing the first 5 you get the Archivement “Veteran of the Wrathgate” but you owe it to yourself to continue and finish the entire quest-line… seriously! “optional” quests are those that can be done while undertaking the main quests with little to no extra effort… so you should definately do them as well.

Part I:
1- The Lost Courier
2- Of Traitors and Treason
3- High Commander Halford Wyrmbane
4- Naxxramas and the Fall of Wintergarde
5- Flight of the Wintergarde Defender
6- Return to the High Commander

Part II:
1- Rescue from Town Square (optional: The Fate of the Dead)
2- Find Durkon!
3- The Noble’s Crypt
4- Secrets of the Scourge (obtained from the tome to the right of Necrolord Amarion)
5- Mystery of the Tome
6- Understanding the Language of Death
7- A Righteous Sermon

Part III:
1- The Demo-gnome
2- The Search for Slinkin (optional: The Bleeding Ore and Not in Our Mine)
3- Leave Nothing to Chance
4- Understanding the Scourge War Machine

Part IV:
1- Into Hostile Territory
2- Steamtank Surprise
3- Scattered to the Wind
4- The Chain Gun And You
5- Plunderbeard Must Be Found! (optional: Breaking Off A Piece)
6- Plunderbeard’s Journal
7- Chasing Icestorm: The 7th Legion Front
8- Chasing Icestorm: Thel’zan’s Phylactery
9- Finality

Part V:
1- An End And A Beginning
2- To Fordragon Hold!
3- Audience With The Dragon Queen
4- Galakrond and the Scourge
5- On Ruby Wings
6- Return To Angrathar

IMPORTANT: if you get the same bug I experienced after completing Part V and do NOT see any cinematic video showing the Wrathgate, you should wait before continueing with Part VI and watch the video here instead. I don’t really know why but I heard already several times that some people (just like me) don’t see the video ingame. But due to the fact that Part VI is a lot better once you’ve seen the video you should watch it online first.

Part VI:
1- Reborn From The Ashes
2- Fate, Up Against Your Will
3- A Royal Coup
4- The Killing Time
5- The Battle For The Undercity

Congratulations you just finished the best quest-line ever created and got a new, cool Archivement !

I just wanted to wish you all a Happy New Year 2009! Go out and celebrate now and have a successful new year !

Happy New Year 2009!

Once you’re done with the level 72-74 instance Azjol-Nerub you can continue straight on with the level 73-75 instance Ahn’kahet (The Old Kingdom) right next to it. This is just what my guild members and I did and in there you can also get a great tank chest drop called Battlechest of the Twilight Cult from the third boss Jedoga Shadowseeker. So for warrior tanks it’s even more worth it to visit this instance as soon as possible .