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All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsThe Queue: Mists of the Naaru
by Mathew McCurley 
Aug 7th 2011 at 12:00PM
You know who I miss? The naaru. What's up with our wind chime friends? Are they all on vacation from fighting the Legion? I don't think I've spoken to a naaru since I helped out old crusader What's-His-Face in Icecrown, dying his slow and painful death just moments away from the fun and merriment of the Argent Tournament. More naaru! I hope the next expansion is called Mists of the Naaru and we get playable naaru because naaaaarrrrrruuuuuuuuuuuuuu ...
Arrohon said:
[In reference to yesterday's title image] If most of the TCG artwork is anywhere near the quality of that, I will probably have to start collecting them.
Yes, it is. We say it all the time, but it always bears repeating: The Cryptozoic artists are some of the most talented in the business. Big, big props to its art team for coming up with all of the amazing art that they do. I love it all.
Quaza asked:
Q4tQ:
Did the events of Thrall: Twilight of the aspects happen before or after his banishment to the four elemental planes? Nozdormu is there, but I don't see any other evidence.
The events of Christie Golden's newest book, Thrall: Twilight of the Aspects, occur before the events of patch 4.2 but after the events on patch 4.1, I believe. Or around the same time. Basically, Thrall happens before 4.2 but after Cho'gall and Nefarian have been taken care of and during the events of the Dragonwrath, Tarecgosa's Rest storyline. I will not talk spoilers here (when is it okay to talk openly about spoilers, anyway?), but the Dragonwrath, Tarecgosa's Wrath storyline has a bit that is addressed in the book. So we are essentially in Firelands -- at least the early stages of the invasion -- during the novel, but that Thrall/Aggra quest hasn't taken place yet. It's weird.
eresin asked:
Why is it that we cannot fly in the Molten Front area. The druid of the talons can fly about (the do save us when we fall if miss those silly platforms). I know the area isn't that large so it's not like it takes ages to get from one end to the other, but I was wondering if there was a specific reason we can't fly?
Or will we have "warm weather flying" introduced soon?
Blizzard designed The Molten Front with ground mounts in mind. Look at all of the quests that have you running up ramps, running through fire, falling into holes, doing jumping puzzles ... The biggest problem with flying in the game world is that all of those environmental challenges become null and void the second you hop on your flying mount, and that's sort of dumb. I like that some places like Tol Barad and the Molten Front are still ground mount only.
The reason you cannot fly in The Molten Front is purely a game design reason and nothing more.
alzeer asked:
Q for the Q
the artwork of deathwing shows his size to be as big as small town at least
how did he fit into the dark portal when he ran away to outland?
Dragons in the World of Warcraft have a knack for shape-shifting and changing their size. They do it frequently. In Thrall: Twilight of the Aspects, you learn a naughty little tidbit of information about Alexstrasza, Krasus, and their human forms. I won't spoil. You are more than welcome to tweet Anne about it, though. When are we doing that Know Your Lore about dragons and their human form activities, anyway?
Elazul asked:
Am I the only one that thinks Bolvar will be a Deux Ex Machina at some point?
No, a lot of people believe that Bolvar is being set up for one fantastical thing or another. But the fact remains that Blizzard is over and done with the Lich King story for now. Bolvar was used to patch up a hole and make for some compelling lore, and now it's over. We will not have any Lich King news or a unifed Scourge again for a long time, if ever. That chapter has pretty much been closed. However, would I like to see a little Bolvar influence? It might be pretty cool. A good faction of playable nerubians under the control of Bolvar would be nice ...
Have questions about the World of Warcraft? The WoW Insider crew is here with The Queue, our daily Q&A column. Leave your questions in the comments, and we'll do our best to answer 'em!
Filed under: The Queue
Reader Comments (Page 5 of 10)
Shade Aug 7th 2011 12:46PM
It's an age thing. Tenebron, Vesperon, and Shadron from OS were Twilight Drakes, while Halion was (the first!) Twilight Dragon
Flarebear Aug 7th 2011 12:46PM
Dragons are usually referring to full-grown dragons, such as Alexstraza and her consorts, and are usually centuries upon centuries old.
Drakes are young dragons - they're basically teenagers, as I understand. They're curious of us humans/orcs/etc. and let us ride them if we let them come along on our adventures, which is why we can have drakes as mounts.
AudreyR Aug 7th 2011 12:47PM
Drakes are adolescent dragons and are sentient.
You can look at Drake mounts as companions who agree to carry you on their back. Or, in the case of drakes from hostile flights, ones you have completely subjugated in some manner.
SaintStryfe Aug 7th 2011 1:56PM
Dragon Lifecycle:
Egg - Hatchling/Whelping - Whelp - Drake - Dragon - Wyrm
Amaxe Aug 7th 2011 2:52PM
In western folklore Drake and dragon both come from the Latin draco (from the Greek δρακων [drakōn]).
Germanic/Old English used Wyrm.
Blizz, I suspect, merely took the terms they thought would be interesting and ran with it.
Xantenise Aug 7th 2011 5:26PM
Drakes are teenaged dragons.
Arrohon Aug 7th 2011 7:06PM
Whelp=baby/child
Drake=Teenager
Dragon=Adult
Poor teenage dragons being sat on by giant cow men....
Henri Poincaré Aug 7th 2011 7:19PM
Wait, if drakes are teenage dragons, and twilight dragons are mutated, does that make twilight drakes... yes, here we go... Teenage Mutant Ninja Drakes?
That one Joey Aug 7th 2011 12:44PM
Why are relationships complicated?
AudreyR Aug 7th 2011 12:48PM
Because you wouldn't respect them if they were easy.
It something.
Hob Aug 7th 2011 1:40PM
Because life - for both people in the relationship - is one crushing defeat after another until you just wish Flanders was dead.
Steffan Aug 7th 2011 2:33PM
I was agreeing with you Hob until that bit about Flanders. Who the hell is (s)he?
Lemons Aug 7th 2011 3:22PM
You don't know who Flanders is!? Kids these days need to get off the internet and watch more TV.
jimforbes40 Aug 8th 2011 5:56AM
"Kids these days need to get off the internet and watch more TV."
Kids these days need to use the internet better!
Jimson Aug 7th 2011 5:53PM
In Steffan's defense, The Simpsons has only been a wildly popular TV show for 22 years.
Here's a link for you, my good man. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ned_Flanders
Excon Aug 7th 2011 12:50PM
So.... if Bolvar is the new Lich King..... and was once Alliance (and still probably fights for the good guys) do you think we will finally see an alliance undead style faction like they did to justify the Death knights except this time it would be a race and not a class because of this. I was always a fan of the idea of traitors on each faction to switch sides without choosing a new race and since their are many npcs of both sides helping each other.....
MusedMoose Aug 7th 2011 1:08PM
It's an interesting idea, but I highly doubt it. If I remember right, the Forsaken are the undead who retained some free will after being raised by the Lich King, while the majority of the Scourge are mindless or nearly so. Also, I don't think Bolvar is so much controlling the Scourge as keeping them in check, keeping them from rampaging all over the world. Why he can't just make them lie down and do nothing until they rot, I don't know; it's entirely possible that he technically is making them do that in Northrend but we can't see it because we still need to quest there. ^_^
Also, Blizzard is big on being able to identify races by their silhouette, so you can easily tell if someone's on your side or not, such as in PvP. For that reason, I doubt they would give the same race to both sides. It made perfect sense for the Death Knights - they were captured members of all races, just raised and remade.
Though I do like the idea of faction-traitor PCs, I don't see it ever happening. Bah.
Amanda A. Aug 7th 2011 4:59PM
Bolvar wants everyone to think he's dead. If he does come back openly (not as a corrupted, insane raid boss, please!) it'll probably be against a threat far larger than the Horde.
icepyro Aug 7th 2011 2:24PM
Uhm, not to sound condescending, but I would like to take this moment to point out that the former Lich King was Arthas. A man who not only led Alliance forces, but was also the king of Lordaeron, an Alliance nation. His original reason for going to Northrend was to obtain the power needed to defeat the enemies of Lordaeron. He was a very powerful paladin. A paladin. Champion of the Light.
The Forsaken are undead who are free of the Lich King's influence, just as Death Knights are, and players are even undead Humans. Humans of Lordaeron. Even now, a new Forsaken is a risen human from his grave in Lordaeron. The beginning quests do a lot to deal with being undead now.
The Alliance still rejected/rejects them on the principle that they are, in fact, undead. It ain't natural, man. Thrall accepted them because he's Thrall. Garrosh wishes they would rot too.
There are traitors of each race, but Blizzard has said (and I don't blame them) they will never mix the races and factions of playable races. It's just way too confusing if two enemies of the same race meet on the field of battle in a game like WoW.
Tabasa Aug 7th 2011 6:12PM
@icepyro - Alliance Death Knights would like a word with you.
The debate is ongoing as to who "struck first" between the Forsaken forces and the Alliance that made the original Forsaken unwelcome there, but there's quite a bit of evidence out there now debunking the whole "Humans are big meanieheads who hate undead and won't let them come over to play" thing.
As things stand now, the Alliance doesn't necessarily hate the Forsaken because they're undead, they hate them because they're the Forsaken.