The Queue: I've gone viral
by Mathew McCurley 
Feb 13th 2012 at 11:00AM
No, not the hip, internet viral. The bad viral where you throw up for a week and can't ingest solid food.
At least I got my Lovebird. Let's answer some questions.
Shulkman asked:
Is there a use for Dark Iron Residue anymore? I believe it was used for Rep with Thorium Brotherhood, but not sure if that's still current, and I can't seem to find anyone to turn it in to.
Yes, you can still use it for reputation turn-in quests Gaining Acceptance and Gaining Even More Acceptance. You have to be friendly with the Thorium Brotherhood to get these quests.
To be honest, people don't do much of the Dark Iron Residue quests any more for reputation because it's so easy to farm up some Lava Cores and Fiery Cores from the Molten Core to turn in for almost 1,000 rep a piece. Also, how many times can I type "core" in one sentence? Apparently, the answer is three.
xenothaulus asked:
Will I have the Violet Proto-Drake on all my characters, and will that mean they all get the superfast flying? Because I've already bought it on most of them anyway and have been wanting to on the rest.
We have no idea since we don't exactly know what Blizzard's policy with account-wide achievements is going to be; however, I would assume that if your character got the achievement with the epic flying+ package deluxe, then all characters would get that as well. It seems almost stupid to have the gold sink in the game at that point, right? So maybe it won't behave that way.
I still like my idea of giving all characters who purchase a mount from the pet store the highest flying available.
Touphemia asked:
Hi Queue!! I am a toddler Paladin (as in, I'm still bright eyed and fresh faced, but I'm level 57). I love prot! Flinging shields and the hammer ability and shield holy power dump... they all look and sound amazing! My concern though, is that I'm not blocking much at all. I'd love to block more often than 5%, since blocking is awesome, bit I can't seem to find any way to increase my block without mastery.... Am I missing something? Is there a stat I can enchant or stack to make me block more? It'd be nice to be able to use Reckoning and Holy Shield!
You are missing a crucial ingredient in paladin blocking -- mastery. As you get into the 80-to-85 game and start acquiring gear with mastery on it, your block will skyrocket. As for now, blocking isn't even that crucial. Remember that the game has been tuned in such a way, as Blizzard does with each expansion, that tanking is barely tanking until the later levels. Don't worry about the block, stay bright-eyed and excited, and when mastery comes, you'll be extremely happy.
Sergel asked:
What's the best bar in WoW? Persoanlly I'm fond of Ironforge's
This is easily The Grim Guzzler in Blackrock Depths, hands down. It's got a band, a succubus waitress, hilarious antics, and dark iron dwarves, everyone is welcome, and it's in one of the coolest instances in the entire game. I'll sometimes use my Mole Machine to just go and hang out in the Grim Guzzler. Best bar, easily.
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!
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 6)
rTwelve Feb 13th 2012 11:03AM
Flying around Dalaran this weekend looking for Alliance to shower with Petals, I remembered the existence of Archmage Landalock and his weekly raid quests. I wonder, why did Blizzard not include a Cata version of him late in this expansion? It would have been a nice incentive for players to go back and do BWD/BoT/T4W/FL pugs this patch.
Caz Feb 13th 2012 11:27AM
I agree wholeheartedly. Not only because the weekly raid quests were a fun diversion from the norm, but also because my guild got started raiding a bit late this expansion. We're now working on both Firelands and Dragon Soul regular, and also doing LFR Dragon Soul; but no one except me seems interested in going back to do the first three T11 raids. A weekly quest might at least get us in the door.
Homeschool Feb 13th 2012 12:00PM
I imagine it's because raiding has been less accessible up til the introduction of LFR. In Wrath you could PuG the first few bosses in most any raid; in Cataclysm, not even most guilds have been so lucky.
Of course, with the new Valor point allocations, perhaps the weekly quest (at least that style) is no longer relevant. I do rather miss the ICC weekly quests, featuring some fun bonus mode in the instance. We always looked forward to those.
Pyromelter Feb 13th 2012 12:05PM
The best answer I can come up with for any number of these questions is that whoever made game implementation decisions in wrath is not making them in cataclysm. I've heard it said that there are 2 teams for wow; one will be working on building an expansion while the other will be coding for the current expansion. Each team is responsible for it's own xpac, so that the team that builds the expansion then works on it for the next 2 years. So for example, the BC team is the same team that made cataclsym, and the Wrath team is currently working on MoP.
Because there are a whole list of things that blizzard did very right in wrath, that they messed up on in cataclysm. Epic gems and raid quests are two of the more outstanding things from wrath that were not implemented for cataclysm, especially considering that so many people thought raid quests would become the norm.
Jack Mynock Feb 13th 2012 12:41PM
What would a weekly raid quest even reward? In Wrath there was no cap on Frost Badges, so the weekly was always worth doing (unless it was Malygos). With LFR the VP cap is easier to reach than its ever been, so the incentive would probably need to be something else, especially if its going to involve subjecting themselves to trash-lands again.
Jaq Feb 13th 2012 2:05PM
I used to feel bad for Archmage Timear, who with 3.3 and the removal of the Archmage Timear Foresees dailies merely became the guy who said "hey, go see Landalock." I went through Dal last week on a pally I was leveling and went to see what the weekly was for old times sake (it was XT) and felt bad for poor Landalock.
I half expected when he turned up as an assistant for you during the Protectors of Hyjal quest to say "oh hey, when you're done here, think you could come back to Dalaran? You won't believe the backlog of work for the Council of Six there is these days!"
Jaq Feb 13th 2012 2:18PM
Something else I just remembered, right after I posted this:
Never mind the weekly raid quest, whatever happened to the rotating weekly quests inside ICC?
While I can see the weekly raid being set aside at the launch of Cata, since the purpose of the weekly raid quest was largely to make sure you kept running old content, why did the model of offering a quest of some sort inside the raids die? It could have offered gold and the same random bag of loot the ICC ones did, with a chance for one of the 359 BOEs in it. Why did that go away? There are chances for these quests in BoT, BWD, and FL with just slight modifications to the existing trash. The Atramedes trash, the drakes on the lower level of BWD, the trash gauntlet before Val and Ther, Kar just in front of Rhyolith, all of these could have been reworked into quests like the ones in ICC. Yet they didn't do it. It did seem like raid questing would become more common and it just vanished in 4.0. Very odd.
SamLowry Feb 13th 2012 2:46PM
"So for example, the BC team is the same team that made cataclsym..."
That explains a lot.
Blayze Feb 13th 2012 4:27PM
Hell, that explains everything.
Noyou Feb 13th 2012 8:58PM
By the way, feel better Mat :) And grats on your Love bird.
Cyno01 Feb 13th 2012 8:32PM
"and the Wrath team is currently working on MoP."
If thats the case, im that much more excited for MoP.
Lurile Feb 13th 2012 11:08AM
Best bar is the Alliance Dalaran bar. Beer garden, that is all.
Shinae Feb 13th 2012 11:19AM
As a Horde roleplayer, I've long been envious of the awesome bars that the Alliance got in their cities, including the beer garden. At least the Filthy Animal is pretty good, and it was really the first bar that the Horde ever got.
lumacman Feb 13th 2012 12:52PM
I strongly disagree. The best bar in the game is in shattrath. World's End. Best place to catch 'Leet Tauren Cheifteen
VioletArrows Feb 13th 2012 12:56PM
@Lurile On my main server, I've never even *once* seen another soul in that beer garden. I could easily get away with erping in the middle of it (NOT THAT I WOULD SHUT UP) and nobody would come back there. :p
Ringo Flinthammer Feb 13th 2012 1:36PM
The beer garden having no Brewfest changes makes me sad.
Noyou Feb 13th 2012 4:52PM
I so agree. I also think we need some better bars. For instance, in Ironforge all you have is two hole in the wall types of places. I would thing the Dwarves would want their pubs to be a little more integral than they are. That said, there are some nice balconies there to sit and have a drink on. So almost by default, I will give the nod to the Dalaran beer garden. Close second would be a tie between the world's end and the bar on the barge in thousand needles. Bar fight?
Verine Feb 13th 2012 5:01PM
And yet, they don't sell beer there!
musicchan Feb 13th 2012 6:43PM
I'm actually quite fond of the look of the Orgrimmar bar, after the Cata update. That wall of bottles is truly stunning and I wish they would use it in more places.
neminem Feb 13th 2012 8:36PM
My favorite bar in WoW is my cast bar. :p