Posts with tag aaron-rosenberg

Warlords of Draenor, the next WoW expansion, will feature a trip to a world we've only seen one version of. Although we've visited Draenor in game, it was the shattered version of a world post-Horde, taken over by Illidan Stormrage, his allies, and the Burning Legion. Now called Outland, there's very little to see of the old Draenor in the wake of Ner'zhul's disastrous attempt to open portals to other worlds in the hopes of continued Horde domination.

In Warlords, we'll be visiting an alternate version of Draenor -- a version in which the corruption of the orcish race was halted. This alternate version will highlight and showcase former faces of old in a new light, through the meddling of Garrosh Hellscream. Now united as the Iron Horde, the orc clans of Draenor past have turned away from the Legion, instead embracing their strength on their own. But just because this is an alternate version of Draenor doesn't mean there isn't material out there to be found about these characters. The situation may be different in Warlords, but there's a pile of relevant material that will help players understand exactly why the cast of Warlords are a force to be reckoned with.

New around here? WoW Rookie points WoW's newest players to the basics of a good start in the World of Warcraft. Send us a note to suggest a WoW Rookie topic, and be sure to visit the WoW.com WoW Rookie Guide for links to all our tips, tricks and how-to's.

Even if you're not a roleplayer, it's almost impossible not to find yourself swept up by some aspect of the hundreds of compelling stories tucked into the World of Warcraft. The question is, how can you dig deeper? Where do you find more? The answer: Books ... Manga ... Comics ... RPGs .... Page after page after page of glorious lore. Blizzard approves the storylines and lore included in the Warcraft and World of Warcraft line of novels, although you won't find a straight and clear progression across the whole line. Not every story and character crosses over from books to game (and vice versa).

Besides the Warcraft novels, WoW-starved readers can chew through enough manga, roleplaying game books and gaming guides to sate any lore feeding frenzy. The best part? You enjoy +Lore bonuses to your online play experience. Even the RPG books add color to the overall picture. Follow us beyond the break for a basic reading outline to escort you down Warcraft's path of lore.

During Day One of BlizzCon this past weekend, I was given the opportunity to sit down and talk with author/novelist Christie Golden, the woman behind the best selling Warcraft novel Arthas and the upcoming Cataclysm novel(s) which we learned about in this very interview. I asked her questions about her personal background in Warcraft, her writing process, and what it's like to work with Blizzard's worlds.

WoW.com: If you don't mind, we'll kick things off with a question I pretty much ask everyone... Horde or Alliance?

Christie Golden: Yes.

WoW.com: Good answer!

Golden: Seriously, I play both, and I love them both. I have characters on both sides, I don't prefer one over the other.

WoW.com: That definitely comes through in what you've written in the universe, starting with Horde material and then moving onto Arthas. When you say you've played both, how far? Are any of them level 80?

Golden: I've been so busy with all of the writing I've been doing lately that I haven't been able to hit 80, I haven't seen as much of Northrend as I've wanted to. Around 70 is where I'm stuck for now.

Here's a few bits of WoW book news from our friend Medievaldragon over at Blizzplanet. First up, the good news: Aaron Rosenberg and Christie Golden have been nominated for a "Best Adapted" award from the International Association of Media Tie-in Writers (just proving that for everything in the world, there's an association for it) for the World of Warcraft: Beyond the Dark Portal book that they wrote together. Pretty groovy, and supposedly well-deserved -- if you ever sit down to read any of the Warcraft literature, we've heard that's a great place to start. Winners of the prizes will be announced at GenCon this year, so good luck to the writers there.

And secondly, a bummer for those who've been waiting on the audiobook versions of the Warcraft books -- Medievaldragon says that he heard from Tantor Media, the company behind the productions, that they've been postponed. He's convinced that they've only been held off temporarily, but we're not so sure -- given the current economy, Tantor may have figured it wasn't worth the licensing and the trouble. But you never know -- apparently they've all been recorded, so perhaps we'll see them at some point in the future, even if it's only in digital form. We certainly hope so.