Posts with tag emerald-dream

The World of Warcraft is an expansive universe. You're playing the game, you're fighting the bosses, you know the how -- but do you know the why? Each week, Matthew Rossi and Anne Stickney make sure you Know Your Lore by covering the history of the story behind World of Warcraft.

As a leader, Tyrande Whisperwind holds the distinction of being the oldest living native racial leader on Azeroth and the most enigmatic. Though we know plenty about the other various racial leaders of the Alliance, Tyrande has remained a quiet figure working behind the scenes, rarely speaking up. In fact, most of Tyrande's appearances have been in novels and Warcraft 3 -- in World of Warcraft, she's barely had any screen time at all.

But even though Tyrande isn't much of a presence in World of Warcraft, she's arguably one of the strongest leaders the Alliance has. Not just because of the length of time she's been leading the Night Elves -- over 10,000 years -- but because that time has afforded her the opportunity to fine-tune her leadership. Tyrande doesn't possess the brash nature of Varian Wrynn or even Genn Greymane, the temper of the Dwarven Council of Three Hammers, or even the quiet vigilance of Velen. What she does possess is the intelligence to know when alliances are necessary -- and the patience to deal with even the most frustrating of allies or enemies.

The WoW Archivist explores the secrets of World of Warcraft's past. What did the game look like years ago? Who is etched into WoW's history? What secrets does the game still hold?

This week's edition of the Archivist will be a little different than what you may be used to seeing. Rather than exploring a specific event in World of Warcraft's history, we're going to look at a bit of antiquated game design. Specifically, we will be looking at one of Blizzard's old development practices: trying to hide content development in progress on live realms.

Before I begin, I want to note that to my knowledge, none of the hidden locations outlined in this article are accessible anymore. If there are still ways of accessing them on live realms, I want to request that none of you discuss the methods of entering these places on our site. Blizzard hid these places for a reason, even if it didn't do it very well.

Follow along for a look at the Emerald Dream, an early Outland testing ground, and other Z-axis shortcuts and secrets.

The WoW Archivist explores the secrets of World of Warcraft's past. What did the game look like years ago? Who is etched into WoW's history? What secrets does the game still hold?

Who says every content patch needs a new raid tier? Patch 1.8, released Oct. 10, 2005 (just slightly under one month after patch 1.7), laughs at your raid tiers. It was actually quite a small patch as far as content goes, and there wasn't anything particularly world-shattering in it, but it still did something interesting: It built up future content. Patch 1.8 implemented the following:

• The Dragons of Nightmare world bosses
• A revamp of Silithus
• The groundwork for holidays such as Hallow's End and Winter Veil

None of these things, on their own, were very large events. They were cool pieces of content, but they weren't supported by a raid or dungeon. Quite the opposite -- they laid the groundwork that would herald a raid coming in a later patch.

Let's dig in, shall we? First the patch notes in full, then the analysis.

The World of Warcraft is an expansive universe. You're playing the game, you're fighting the bosses, you know the how -- but do you know the why? Each week, Matthew Rossi and Anne Stickney make sure you Know Your Lore by covering the history of the story behind World of Warcraft.

He is the Lord of the Forest, a union of the heavens, and the earth. One of the most powerful and influential demigods in Azeroth, Cenarius and his teachings have led to the development of the druids, and no other demigod has been as closely involved with mortal affairs. It's no surprise that the son of an Ancient and the closest thing Azeroth has to a goddess is so powerful -- and his connection to the Aspect Ysera made him even more so.

He is the White Stag or Apa'ro, as the tauren call him. Malorne, an Ancient who served as a protector of nature, was rumored to have roamed the forests of Azeroth long before the night elves ever came into existence. He is the father of Cenarius, and unlike his son, he meddles little with the affairs of mortals. But his love with the goddess Elune resulted in the birth of his son, and his later association with Ysera guaranteed his son would be raised safely and with the right kind of guidance.

She is the Dreamer, Aspect of Nature and guardian of the Emerald Dream. Ysera has always been held in high regard by the night elves, who were bound to the Emerald Dream with Ysera's blessing. But her relationship with Malorne resulted in a son she didn't expect. Though not his mother by birth, Ysera was just as much a mother to Cenarius as Elune -- perhaps more. After all, it was Ysera and the Emerald Dream that helped shape Cenarius into the demigod we know today.

The World of Warcraft is an expansive universe. You're playing the game, you're fighting the bosses, you know the how -- but do you know the why? Each week, Matthew Rossi and Anne Stickney make sure you Know Your Lore by covering the history of the story behind World of Warcraft.

Once upon a time, there was a little planet called Azeroth. A shining jewel of the universe, this little planet was chosen by the Titans, blessed by their presence and organized into a perfect representation of order and beauty. But that order and perfection wasn't to last. At some undefined point in the little planet's future, malevolent proponents of chaos, creatures simply called Old Gods, visited Azeroth's surface and quickly decided to ruin the harmonic vision of the Titans with their own brutal, corrupt, and chaotic one.

The Titans realized something had happened and returned to find the world they had so carefully balanced in a state of utter chaos. They immediately launched an assault on the Old Gods, but they discovered something strange. The Old Gods had fully integrated themselves with the matrix of the little planet, placing a strange malaise on the inhabitants. If the Old Gods died, so too would Azeroth -- and so the Titans imprisoned the Old Gods deep beneath the earth where they could do no further damage. They set to work repairing the planet, leaving various safeguards behind to watch over the world. Satisfied, they left -- and they haven't been seen on Azeroth since.

Today's Know Your Lore is a Tinfoil Hat edition, meaning the following is a look into what has gone before with pure speculation on why it happened. The events presented are events that happened in Azeroth's history, but the conclusions are merely theories and shouldn't be taken as fact.

The World of Warcraft is an expansive universe. You're playing the game, you're fighting the bosses, you know the how -- but do you know the why? Each week, Matthew Rossi and Anne Stickney make sure you Know Your Lore by covering the history of the story behind World of Warcraft.

Planes and planets, demons and mortals -- we've covered the gamut of the Warcraft universe in the past few weeks, including rampant speculation. With BlizzCon 2011 not too far away, people are already talking about what may or may not be announced, including whether or not we'll see news about the next Warcraft expansion and what that expansion could be.

Beyond all of that, however, we have the matter of identifying who exactly the real bad guy of this expansion is. Is it Deathwing? Is it the Old Gods? We don't know, and we won't know until we're closer to the expansion's end and dealing with Deathwing personally -- but whether Deathwing will be the final boss of this expansion is something that's still up in the air. Matthew Rossi wrote an interesting article last week questioning whether Cataclysm has too much potential content, and it's an excellent question. Given all we've seen of the expansion so far and the sheer amount of plot threads that have yet to be addressed, it makes one wonder exactly what else will be revealed in the months to come.

The World of Warcraft is an expansive universe. You're playing the game, you're fighting the bosses, you know the how -- but do you know the why? Each week, Matthew Rossi and Anne Stickney make sure you Know Your Lore by covering the history of the story behind World of Warcraft.

Last week, we talked about arcane magic (including fel energy and shadow) and the magic of the Holy Light (which also has shadow as a kind of opposite force). If that's not confusing enough, this week, we talk about the magic of shaman and druids, either of which could in its own way be called natural magic.

In part 1 of this series, we talked about the various means by which magical energy can be tapped. One of these magical "fonts" is the Emerald Dream, a kind of palimpsest dimension that lays beneath and mimics Azeroth. It is, essentially, the first draft of creation, the blueprint to which the world would be returned to in the event of reorigination. It's Azeroth before the original Sundering, before intelligent life, as it was the second the Titans considered their creation complete. The reason Ysera of the dream is charged with protecting and safeguarding the Dream is that it is the world's base state.

The World of Warcraft is an expansive universe. You're playing the game, you're fighting the bosses, you know the how -- but do you know the why? Each week, Matthew Rossi and Anne Stickney make sure you Know Your Lore by covering the history of the story behind World of Warcraft.

Where does magic come from?

Specifically, in the Warcraft universe, where does it come from? That's actually a complex question, because there are many different kinds of magic practiced in the setting as a whole. We know of the nature magic of the druids and the elemental magic of the shaman (and that these two disparate types of magic often seem to relate to each other while remaining discrete; we know of the fel magic practiced by warlocks and the Burning Legion, and the pure arcane arts of mages. There's also the Holy Light as demonstrated by priests and paladins, the shadowy magics also tapped by some kinds of priests and warlocks as well, and even the raw necromantic power that seems unique to the Scourge, some Forsaken, and death knights. All of these different kinds of magic are magic, and yet each seems to draw from its own source.

Just on Azeroth, we have seen many kinds of magical power and many focusing points, or fonts, of various kinds of power. Several have descended from one another, while still others have intruded due to the interference of various entities. One thing is clear, that there are many paths to power beyond that inherent to the average denizen of the world.

What, therefore, are these sources of magic?

The World of Warcraft is an expansive universe. You're playing the game, you're fighting the bosses, you know the how, but do you know the why? Each week, Matthew Rossi and Anne Stickney make sure you Know Your Lore by covering the history of the story behind World of Warcraft.

The events of the novel Stormrage may not have happened in game, but they still have an effect on upcoming events. While the book was released much earlier this year, the events in the book hadn't really played out until now; they occur sometime after the defeat of the Lich King yet before Deathwing shatters the world in Cataclysm. Unfortunately, we will not directly see the events presented in Stormrage occur in World of Warcraft.

Despite the lack of events regarding the resolution to the Emerald Nightmare storyline in game, things have been resolved -- to a point. On top of all of this, not only does the novel The Shattering by Christie Golden make several references to Stormrage, but certain events we see in the upcoming expansion also reference key elements to the novel. Yesterday, we began to delve into what exactly happened between Malfurion's time in the Emerald Dream and present day; read on for the conclusion of the story and its effects on the Azeroth the characters we play know and love.

Please note: The following post is all about Stormrage and contains spoilers for the majority of the novel as well as the upcoming Cataclysm expansion. If you're planning on picking up the book, turn away now, lest ye be spoiled for eternity!

The World of Warcraft is an expansive universe. You're playing the game, you're fighting the bosses, you know the how, but do you know the why? Each week, Matthew Rossi and Anne Stickney make sure you Know Your Lore by covering the history of the story behind World of Warcraft.

The events playing out in game right now have long-lasting repercussions on future lore, but there are also events playing out that aren't present in game. The Shattering by Christie Golden details some of these events, but there's another book out there that also has an effect in upcoming events. I'm talking about Stormrage by Richard A. Knaak, which was released earlier this year and covered information regarding the Emerald Nightmare.

Even though the book was released some time ago, the effects of the book haven't been felt. This is because as far as timelines go, Stormrage hadn't really happened yet -- or has it? The book takes place somewhere between Wrath of the Lich King and Cataclysm, and though we don't see any of the events in the book played out in game, we see players from the book and the repercussions of the book's events. Today, we're going to give an overview of what's in the book and how it affects what's going to play out in Cataclysm.

Please note: The following post is all about Stormrage and contains spoilers for the majority of the novel as well as the upcoming Cataclysm expansion. If you're planning on picking up the book, turn away now, lest ye be spoiled for eternity!

Day 2 at BlizzCon 2010 saw the two most traditionally popular panels (the class Q&A and the general Q&A) go live, but there was plenty at the convention to keep you busy even if you were among the two or three people there not interested in developer panels.

• Liveblogs We liveblogged the World of Warcraft class Q&A and the World of Warcraft open Q&A panels and transcribed two previously unannounced DirecTV interviews with Greg Street (Ghostcrawler) and Tom Chilton. If you're looking for player complaints, developer snark or news on future game changes, you'll find 'em here.
• People, interviews and events Matticus caught up with Andy Salisbury for a preview the WoW magazine's third issue, and Anne Stickney interviewed both Richard Knaak and Christie Golden. Robin Torres put together a gallery of the items Blizzard auctioned off to benefit Child's Play, one of them a painting of characters in the upcoming DC Horde comic series. We also took lots of pictures of this year's art gallery. On a non-Blizzard note, someone took a nasty spill during Friday's dance contest.
• Friday recaps Lisa Poisso observed some happy realm meetups, we recapped an impressive costume contest, and Matticus wrote about the live raid and Paragon's ill-fated defense of Orgrimmar.
• Future content The Emerald Dream (or should we say Emerald Nightmare?) was confirmed as a future addition during the general Q&A. We don't know if it's going to be an expansion, a patch, a raid or something else, but developers promise that seeing it "is a matter of when, not if."
• New worgen cinematic The cinematic panel was a lovely peek at how the Blizzard team created the recently released Cataclysm cinematic, but it was also notable for the debut of long-missing cutscene that will power the Gilnean leveling experience forward.
• Revenge of the login dragon Angry about being voted out in favor of players' favorite candidate for warchief, Abesik Kampfire, the "login dragon" makes an ear-shattering return for the Cataclysm login screen.
• Closing ceremonies The Warcraft III and StarCraft II tournament winners were crowned (the WoW tournament was still in progress), and Paul Sams, Blizzard's chief operating officer, even started to talk a little about the company's new MMO ... or so we thought.

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BlizzCon 2010 is upon us! WoW Insider has all the latest news and information. We're bringing you liveblogging of the WoW panels, interviews with WoW celebrities and attendees and of course, lots of pictures of people in costumes. It's all here at WoW Insider!

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There are a lot of questions that come up from the WoW community at events like BlizzCon. Will we ever have player or guild housing? Why doesn't Blink work right? Where's my moose? One question that keeps coming up is will we ever see the Emerald Dream or its corrupted version, the Emerald Nightmare?

While there is no announcement for an exact date or even which expansion it will appear, Alex "Valnoth" Afrasiabi (lead world designer for World of Warcraft) has finally answered this for us, and that answer is yes. The problem comes down to a matter of finding the right place to fit it in. This might mean something in patch 4.2 or all the way in patch 6.2. It really comes down to when it will fit in the game storyline.

At least we now know that it is something they will do.

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BlizzCon 2010 is upon us! WoW Insider has all the latest news and information. We're bringing you liveblogging of the WoW panels, interviews with WoW celebrities and attendees and of course, lots of pictures of people in costumes. It's all here at WoW Insider!

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Welcome back to The Queue, our daily Q&A column in which the WoW Insider team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft. Mike Sacco will be your host today.

I'm completely out of witty intros. It's Sunday! Deal with it!

DarkSpade asked:

Was the WoW miniatures game ever officially announced as dead or is it still out there flapping in the breeze? Any chance of it coming back?

The license for the WoW Minis game was originally held by Upper Deck, a company with whom Blizzard no longer does business. Cryptozoic, who picked up the WoW TCG license, did not pick up the Minis license. I think you can probably extrapolate the status of the WoW Minis game from there.

The World of Warcraft is an expansive universe. You're playing the game, you're fighting the bosses, you know the how, but do you know the why? Each week, Matthew Rossi and Anne Stickney make sure you Know Your Lore by covering the history of the story behind World of Warcraft.

WARNING: The following post contains spoilers for the novel Stormrage by Richard A. Knaak. Readers still in the middle of the novel may want to veer away from this post, as I'll be discussing events covered over the course of the book.

Now that we've established what happened to Tyrande and Malfurion (in the midst of wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey ... stuff), we can begin to pick apart what happened in between the Sundering, the Third War, and present day. Tyrande Whisperwind is currently leading the night elves along with Archdruid Fandral Staghelm -- and Staghelm has a history that also stretches back thousands of years, one that's led him to his current less-than-friendly leadership.

Fandral Staghelm was born about 1,000 years after the Sundering and studied the druidic arts under Malfurion Stormrage, soon rising in ranks and becoming one of Malfurion's top lieutenants as well as training many of the new Druids of the Wild. Where Malfurion was even-tempered and kind, Fandral was hotheaded and aggressive, frequently clashing with Malfurion, and nowadays Tyrande over how night elf society should be run. He holds many strong beliefs that echo the beliefs of ancient night elves, including the belief that night elves are the supreme race on the planet, all other races are inferior, and night elves are the only "true" druids. Charming, isn't he?

Emerald Dream is a big collaboration move created about a half dozen machinima personalities. The lyrics were written by Gigi, who obviously also did a large number of the vocals. But you can also hear Sharm and Princess Superstar performing in this piece. Other collaborators include Bloodvein Movies, WoPairs, Teagen and Kam. The video is in part intended to bring some attention to snowleopard.org, so take a moment and go check out that site after you've seen the video.

Emerald Dream is a pretty interesting music video, and I think it definitely grows the "belf rap" genre by leaps and bounds. The music is refreshingly original, although I'm sure as soon as I say that someone will point out that I don't recognize the original version. Even if that's the case, the lyrics and beat were both intriguing. I felt like the overall narrative was much stronger than most music videos, and it definitely raises the bar for these performers.

The video was obviously beautiful. I think if we were to ever see the Emerald Dream archetypified in the game, this must be how it will look. My hat's off to the machinimators who created this video.

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