Posts with tag icecrown-raid

We've seen the leaks and the datamined information, but it's all official now -- Cryptozoic has released the WoW TCG card and loot information for the next expansion to the Worldbreaker set, War of the Elements.

Cryptozoic invites all WoW and TCG players out to Darkmoon Faire Chicago this weekend, April 1-3, at the Donald E. Stephens Convention Center. This is Cryptozoic's first Epic Con, their new traveling gaming convention for all games, not just the trading card games. There is going to be plenty of fun awaiting attendees, so hit the jump for all of the activities planned this weekend.

Cryptozoic has just announced that War of the Elements, the first WoW TCG Worldbreaker expansion, will be released worldwide on April 26, 2011. The expansion is being released in four languages at the same time around the world, a first for the trading card game. War of the Elements also features loot cards, as usual, for WoW players to redeem cool pets, mounts, and other in-game items from WoW TCG cards. War of the Elements will include Landros' Lichling, Fool's Gold, and the Savage Raptor mount.

War of the Elements will also feature two new dragonflights: the bronze and blue flights, with respective leaders Nozdormu and Kalecgos. What is interesting is that the TCG has solidified Metzen's statement that Kalecgos would become the new leader of the Blue Dragonflight and plays up the importance of these two flights in the coming patches and content in Cataclysm.

Ever since acquiring the license to the World of Warcraft Trading Card Game, Cryptozoic Entertainment has been making a huge push to make the game even more accessible. This doesn't mean just accessible for people familiar with hobby games -- it also means accessible to someone who's a huge World of Warcraft fan, but never got into hobby games.

One of the steps in this process was the release of the Assault on Icecrown Citadel Four-Player Game. You might be familiar with the "raid deck" format (utilized previously with Molten Core, Onyxia's Lair, Magtheridon's Lair, Black Temple, and Naxxramas), wherein a group of players play cooperatively against one of their friends, who's controlling the boss(es) of the dungeon. But there's a stumbling block for those who want to just jump right in and play a raid: you have to buy your own cards and construct your own deck if you want to play as anyone but the bad guy.

Assault on Icecrown Citadel changes up the format slightly, instead putting players in the roles of Tirion Fordring, Jaina Proudmoore, and Sylvanas Windrunner as they battle the Lich King. Each hero has their own themed deck included in the box, along with Arthas' boss deck, meaning that the moment you pick up the game, you can crack it open and play.

I'm not a huge hobby gamer. I played Magic: The Gathering in middle school, but the WoW TCG is pretty much the only card or board game I play with any regularity. And I have to tell you: Assault on Icecrown Citadel is an absolute blast.

We reviewed it, and now it's your chance to own it! The fine folks at Cryptozoic Entertainment have provided us with ten WoW TCG Assault on Icecrown Citadel Four-Player Games to give away to you, our lovely readers. If you want a chance to get your hands on one of them, all you have to do is comment on this post between now and 11:59 PM on Sunday, March 21st. We'll randomly choose ten winners and they'll get an Icecrown game of their very own!

There are some rules, of course. The contest is open to legal residents of the US and Canada (excluding Quebec). You must be 18 years of age or older to enter, and you can only enter once. Multiple entries by the same individual will be disqualified. And please make sure the email address attached to your account is up to date -- that's how we'll get a hold of you if you win!

Full giveaway rules are here.

Good news, everyone! Your faction specific Icecrown Citadel buff is now 30%, meaning things just got a little more lenient in ICC. Now's your chance to capitalize on the content in there to get alts ready for Cataclysm, finish off those drakes you've been lusting after, or just proudly wear that Kingslayer title.

Here at WoW.com, we're on a Daily Quest (which we try to do every day, honest) to bring you interesting, informative and entertaining WoW-related links from around the blogosphere. Is there a story out there we ought to link or a blog we should be following? Just leave us a comment and you may see it here tomorrow! Take a look at the links below, and be sure to check out our WoW Resources Guide for more WoW-related sites.

Well, summertime raiding may not be easy, however it'll definitely get easier as the buff from Icecrown Citadel slowly inches its way up to the 30% mark -- but I'm a sucker for a Gershwin reference. While some will invariably be outside living it up in the sunshine, others like myself will be avoiding the evil daystar at all costs in an effort to remain blister-free from its threatening rays. Seriously, I turn a shade of red eerily reminiscent of the sparkling pony pictured above. What's left for us sun-sensitive people to do? Why raid, of course -- and there are plenty of blogs that have something to say about raiding:

• Bible of Dreams would like to politely remind everyone that when your raid leader says everyone, this means YOU.
• World of Warcraft Philosophized has some raiding advice for people who raid infrequently.
• Addicted to WoW posted an interesting piece on WoW raiding and motor learning.
• Blessing of Fish gives us a short guide to raiding standards.
• The Healz Squad has some advice on how to be a good raider.
• Tree of Life hands out some raid detention slips.

Want to be a sultan of swing healing? A champion of Chain Heal? Totem Talk: Restoration will show you how, brought to you by Joe Perez, otherwise known as Lodur from World of Matticus and the For The Lore podcast.

You have broken down the front door, taken out the Lich King's chief physician and beaten down his vampire cadre into a sparkling pulp. Now it is time to take out the Lich King's aerial core by heading into The Frostwing Halls and taking out some Frost Wyrms.

You've seen them everywhere in this expansion and with good reason. The Lich King has been raising an army of these former dragons to do his bidding. They range everywhere from Icecrown, as you would expect, but are also everywhere from the Howling Fjord to Sholozar Basin. These creatures are raised from the bodies of dragons from both the Blue Dragonflight that have been defeated by the scourge as well as any dragon remains found in the Dragonblight.

These twisted forms have no memories of their previous lives nor of the world beyond death. They are intelligent beings capable of strategy, tactics and deception, but their lack of memories of their former life, combined with their unwavering desire to serve their dark master with all the power available to them, makes them very difficult opponents. The goal here is to take out their queen and the last obstacle between you and the leader of the scourge.

Bornakk has announced a handful of in-game hot fixes on the official forums today. They're pretty much all Icecrown Citadel boss ability nerfs and tweaks, and should fixes a few annoyances with some battles, stretching from Marrowgar to Sindragosa. The full list is after the break.

Rotface probably has the best name in World of Warcraft. Can't you just see a pair of elementary school kids standing out in the playground, yelling at each other? "Well, you're a Rotface!" "Well, you're just a Festergut!" The comparison's pretty apt when you hear Rotface's voice, too. And then that voice gets even better when Professor Putricide yelling, "Good news, everyone! The slime is working again!"

Rotface is the mirror twin of Festergut. I usually raid Festergut first, and then go to visit Rotface. Rotface manages to be both a DPS check and a coordination check in a single fight. This is because Rotface does things to your raid. The longer you let Rotface stack up these things, the more difficult Rotface becomes. It's not necessarily that the damage increases as much as you're increasing the likelihood that something will go wrong. It's therefore best to burn him down as quickly as possible, even while trying to handle the coordination elements of the fight.

Jump behind the cut and let's check out the fight.

Every Sunday (and the occasional weekday) Spiritual Guidance offers holy and discipline priests advice on how to wield the holy light and groove to the disco night. Your hostess Dawn Moore will provide the music.

As promised, today I will be discussing 25-man Icecrown Citadel loot in a special edition of Spiritual Guidance. Additionally, I will be giving my assessments on tier 10 set bonuses for those of you who are still deciding how to spend your badges. Finally, I'll be offering up the counter arguments that readers left for the 'who to gear first' debate from Sunday's column.

We have a lot of things to discuss, so let's jump right into it!

Every Monday Scott Andrews contributes Officers' Quarters, a column about the ins and outs of guild leadership.

It's no secret that tanks are generally in short supply. Blizzard has admitted as much and even designed the Death Knight class specifically to entice more people to taking up the tanking role. They've gone away from fights like the notorious, original implementation of the Four Horsemen encounter that required 8 fully geared tanks and given us more fights like Rotface that only require 2. But for a 25-player raid, you generally need 3.

So what about those fourth tanks? They find themselves riding the pine:

Dear Scott,

I have been playing WoW for just under four months and have worked my butt off to make my Warrior the best tank that I possibly can. I get numerous compliments about my ability and pride myself on being liked by all. I have joined one of the top raiding guilds on my server, but I am finding problems getting selected for raids.

Currently we raid 3 nights a week, and on average, we have 35-40 people showing up EVERY raid night. Obviously, you cannot take 40 people into ICC25 and therein lies the problem. The current state of raids encourages guilds to take 3 tanks at most, and at times, the third tank is running in an offspec, most likely dps. I am one of five tanks in the guild, and the newest of the bunch. All gear is about equal. The other four get selected for raids on a nightly basis based on seniority. I have remained diligent and have shown up for raids every night without fail, only to be told there is no need for me tonight.

Every Sunday Spiritual Guidance offers holy and discipline priests advice on how to wield the holy light and groove to the disco night. Your hostess Dawn Moore will provide the music.

Hey ladies! Hey fellas! You know you're doin' good 'cause they're jealous *Pop-Pop* And they only hate ya 'cause you're a go-getter *Pop-Pop* Pop ya collar - Don't let 'em sweat 'cha! *POP* No clue what I'm talking about? Trust me, it's better that way. Though, if you don't know why I'm talking about popped collars, let me direct you to the picture above. It would seem popped collars are all the rage in Icecrown Citadel. I don't know what Blizzard was thinking with this, especially for priests. If anything, warlocks and mages are the frat boys of WoW. Or paladins. Well, whatever it is, this week I'll be talking about loot drops in Icecrown Citadel.

But first, a story.

Balance druid performance has been noticeably lagging in raids. While moonkin have long had a problem being too easily +haste-capped with Wrath, there's another issue on the not-too-distant horizon in the form of the "lunar +crit cap." Essentially, when a lunar eclipse procs and the player turns to the Starfire portion of the rotation, the combination of raid buffs, gear, and procs make Starfire crits all but inevitable. While this may sound like a welcome DPS increase, it does have the unhappy result of the spec seeing increasingly less benefit from the +haste and +crit that exists in abundance on Icecrown raid gear.

Blizzard has known about this for a while, but the issue with Nature's Grace and the soft +haste cap isn't easily fixable without impacting both Restoration and Starfire (where the NG proc is still useful), and the +crit cap is the effect of unintended stat inflation in Wrath. Enter Zarhym on Wednesday to announce news of a possible change to the Earth and Moon talent in a future mini-patch, granting 2/4/6% spell damage to the moonkin, up from 1/2/3%. While this isn't set in stone (and Balance players are already aware that an overhaul to the Nature's Grace issue probably won't happen until the Cataclysm content patch at the earliest), it's been greeted as a decent short-term fix. It's also a means of improving the scaling of what remains the moonkin's best stat (+spellpower).

Zarhym did warn that the change may not go through in this form, and we're also waiting for news on when this mini-patch will hit. Stay tuned for future announcements.