Cataclysm beta report -- Goblins, dragons and other awesomeness
I played through the first half of Azshara last night on my goblin warlock. She's now level 20. Blizzard really outdid themselves on the humor in this zone. Not every quest is humorous, but I giggled my way through an awful lot of them. I know the worgen areas aren't nearly as finished as the goblin ones, but they're going to have to do something really special to top the goblin experience. Both the level 1-12 zones and the 12-20 Azshara zone are an absolute joy to play.
Oh, and I've run into two new quests in beta (one in Azshara, one in...Redridge? Westfall? I can't remember right now, but it was when I was playing Skar) that continue Blizzard's streak of poop jokes. /facepalm
There are a number of spoilery YouTube videos floating around showing Deathwing-related awesomeness in the Badlands, and after questing through the entire zone on Skar, I have to say there are just as awesome to do first-hand as they are to watch in videos. The trio of quests starting with "The Day Deathwing Came" are hilarious, but the serious lore stuff in another quest chain made me squee in lore-geeky delight at the future implications.
There's a new, neutral goblin town up on a mountain top in the north-east part of the Badlands. A goblin there gives you a quest to go find "Rhea," a researcher in the Lethlor Ravine who's looking for assistance. Upon finding her, she tells you she's doing research into the black dragon breeding process, and asks you to bring back some of the eggs in the area, plus some dead whelps.
When you return to her with these she reveals two huge bombshells:
1. She's really a red dragon, not the goblin she appears to be.
2. She has a mature female black dragon, Nyxondra, hidden in a force field, kept prisoner to lay eggs.
O_o Wow, the red flight is playing hardball here! You'd think after Alexstrasza's ordeal in Grim Batol they'd be a bit more leery about the whole "forced captive breeding" thing, but I guess desperate times call for desperate measures.
While acknowledging that this is an awful, difficult thing to do, Rheastrasza assures you that their ultimate goal is to find or produce an uncorrupted black dragon whelp, in hopes of redeeming the flight.
Damn it, Blizzard, stop teasing me like this! You've thrown Illidan, Kael'thas and Arthas under the bus, sending them unlamented to their graves as unredeemed, unrepentant villains. Are you seriously going to dangle this plot thread in front of me now? >_<
Now, granted, nobody's talking about redeeming Neltharion himself, but in raising a new generation of black dragons to take their place as earth warders, as in ancient times. Which is awesome! But still, I swear Blizz does this just to screw with my fangirly head. :p
*ahem* Anyway, so Rhea has a gnome accomplice over at Agmond's End who she hopes can analyze the samples of eggs and dead whelps you gathered, plus some eggs from the captive female. There's a lot of running getting help from various people, doing the whole "I'll help you if you help me first" deal, but eventually you retrieve a titan artifact from a newly-unearthed ruin. Once activated, this little glowy round doohickey scans the three samples and finds Old God corruption in all three, but somehow works some Titan magic and uses the salvageable bits of the two eggs and the dead whelp, and produces a new egg that conforms to the Titan's original specifications for black dragons. WOW.
Rhea immediately sets out to hide the egg, but the black dragonflight is hot on your trail. Leading the search is our old friend from the Searing Gorge, Kalaran the Deceiver, a.k.a. Kalaran Windblade, a.k.a. Kalaran the Annihilator. With a little NPC help, you slay him and his troops, then also take out the female dragon formerly held captive by Rhea, Nyxondra.
Then it's time to check in with Rhea at the hiding place of the egg, a cave in the hills above the ruins of Kargath. She makes you wait outside, hidden in the brush, while she goes inside to check on the egg. This turns out to be a very good thing, since you've been followed. You aren't able to control the camera as you view Rhea (once more in goblin form) inside the cave...
...and then the camera turns around and you see what she sees...
DEATHWING THE DESTROYER...and Murky.
ROFLMAO!!!! XD
Even though Skarlette herself is still physically standing out in the bushes, the game camera is in the cave, so apparently Murky followed it. I can't stop laughing at that screenshot. It's like, "Hey guys, 'sup? What's going on in here?" "MURKY, DON'T TURN AROUND! OMG!" Bwahahaha!
Things stop being funny at that point, though, since ol' D.W. goes into burninate mode.
RAWR! OW! IT BURNS! EEEEEE!
And then he's like, "Screw you guys, I'm goin' home!"
Fortunately, he doesn't see you hiding in the bushes.
However, he's been outsmarted. The egg he just incinerated (along with poor Rhea) was NOT the uber-special uncorrupted one. That egg is safe and sound at an undisclosed location along with the vice president.
The quest chain ends with your gnome ally rewarding you for your help.
The End.
So what does all this mean for the future of the black dragonflight? Darned if I know, but it's awesome! XD
Oh, and I've run into two new quests in beta (one in Azshara, one in...Redridge? Westfall? I can't remember right now, but it was when I was playing Skar) that continue Blizzard's streak of poop jokes. /facepalm
There are a number of spoilery YouTube videos floating around showing Deathwing-related awesomeness in the Badlands, and after questing through the entire zone on Skar, I have to say there are just as awesome to do first-hand as they are to watch in videos. The trio of quests starting with "The Day Deathwing Came" are hilarious, but the serious lore stuff in another quest chain made me squee in lore-geeky delight at the future implications.
There's a new, neutral goblin town up on a mountain top in the north-east part of the Badlands. A goblin there gives you a quest to go find "Rhea," a researcher in the Lethlor Ravine who's looking for assistance. Upon finding her, she tells you she's doing research into the black dragon breeding process, and asks you to bring back some of the eggs in the area, plus some dead whelps.
When you return to her with these she reveals two huge bombshells:
1. She's really a red dragon, not the goblin she appears to be.
2. She has a mature female black dragon, Nyxondra, hidden in a force field, kept prisoner to lay eggs.
O_o Wow, the red flight is playing hardball here! You'd think after Alexstrasza's ordeal in Grim Batol they'd be a bit more leery about the whole "forced captive breeding" thing, but I guess desperate times call for desperate measures.
While acknowledging that this is an awful, difficult thing to do, Rheastrasza assures you that their ultimate goal is to find or produce an uncorrupted black dragon whelp, in hopes of redeeming the flight.
Damn it, Blizzard, stop teasing me like this! You've thrown Illidan, Kael'thas and Arthas under the bus, sending them unlamented to their graves as unredeemed, unrepentant villains. Are you seriously going to dangle this plot thread in front of me now? >_<
Now, granted, nobody's talking about redeeming Neltharion himself, but in raising a new generation of black dragons to take their place as earth warders, as in ancient times. Which is awesome! But still, I swear Blizz does this just to screw with my fangirly head. :p
*ahem* Anyway, so Rhea has a gnome accomplice over at Agmond's End who she hopes can analyze the samples of eggs and dead whelps you gathered, plus some eggs from the captive female. There's a lot of running getting help from various people, doing the whole "I'll help you if you help me first" deal, but eventually you retrieve a titan artifact from a newly-unearthed ruin. Once activated, this little glowy round doohickey scans the three samples and finds Old God corruption in all three, but somehow works some Titan magic and uses the salvageable bits of the two eggs and the dead whelp, and produces a new egg that conforms to the Titan's original specifications for black dragons. WOW.
Rhea immediately sets out to hide the egg, but the black dragonflight is hot on your trail. Leading the search is our old friend from the Searing Gorge, Kalaran the Deceiver, a.k.a. Kalaran Windblade, a.k.a. Kalaran the Annihilator. With a little NPC help, you slay him and his troops, then also take out the female dragon formerly held captive by Rhea, Nyxondra.
Then it's time to check in with Rhea at the hiding place of the egg, a cave in the hills above the ruins of Kargath. She makes you wait outside, hidden in the brush, while she goes inside to check on the egg. This turns out to be a very good thing, since you've been followed. You aren't able to control the camera as you view Rhea (once more in goblin form) inside the cave...
...and then the camera turns around and you see what she sees...
DEATHWING THE DESTROYER...and Murky.
ROFLMAO!!!! XD
Even though Skarlette herself is still physically standing out in the bushes, the game camera is in the cave, so apparently Murky followed it. I can't stop laughing at that screenshot. It's like, "Hey guys, 'sup? What's going on in here?" "MURKY, DON'T TURN AROUND! OMG!" Bwahahaha!
Things stop being funny at that point, though, since ol' D.W. goes into burninate mode.
RAWR! OW! IT BURNS! EEEEEE!
And then he's like, "Screw you guys, I'm goin' home!"
Fortunately, he doesn't see you hiding in the bushes.
However, he's been outsmarted. The egg he just incinerated (along with poor Rhea) was NOT the uber-special uncorrupted one. That egg is safe and sound at an undisclosed location along with the vice president.
The quest chain ends with your gnome ally rewarding you for your help.
The End.
So what does all this mean for the future of the black dragonflight? Darned if I know, but it's awesome! XD