These posts will remain here in the Cranky Old Gnome Classic.  I don’t want to loose them, or the comments attached to them, but I also want to separate the old from the new.

Anyway, if you are still interested in what I have to say about life and such, you can keep your links and RSS subscriptions the same, as www.thecrankyoldgnome.com is where all my new stuff will be.  If all you want to do is reminisce about the old days, then you’ll need to change your links to reflect this sites new address www.crankyoldgnomeclassic.wordpress.com.

“[Insert clever final sign off phrase here]“

~Fizz

I see one of 3 things happening:

1. I love the expansion, it fires me up about the game again, and I continue much as I have been; passionately and intelligently discussing the game while occasionally tossing in non-WoW-related anecdotes.
2. I only kind of like the expansion and grow bored with it rapidly.  I no longer have anything interesting to say about the game, because the game no longer holds my interest.  I let my WoW account lapse, and stop updating this blog until eventually I make one of those lame ‘farewell posts’ and 2a) stop posting, but leave all the previous posts up or 2b) delete this blog in its entirety.
3. I loose interest in the game and/or writing about it, but still want to continue blogging.  In that event I would 3a) stop posting on this site and ‘freeze’ it–locking posts and comments–but move it to a domain name that I don’t have to pay to renew every year; 3b) completely stop posting about the game, but leave the site as is and continue to blog about whatever tickles my fancy under the guise of ‘The Cranky Old Gnome’; or 3c) archive all the WoW related posts (re: delete from this website and store them either on a free domain name or just my own hard-drive) and only talk about non-wow things.

I can’t predict the future so I can’t really say which of these things will happen.  I do know which ones are most likely.  Regardless of whether or not I enjoy Cataclysm I will keep blogging.  If I no longer want to post about World of Warcraft related topics, I will probably let this site revert back to it’s original “http://crankyoldgnome.wordpress.com/” domain name, but leave all the posts up and continue to allow comments.  Then I will probably start up a new site, and talk primarily about what it’s like to work in the entertainment industry.  Maybe call it something like “A Hard Day’s Work”.  Or something.

Now, here’s a story about my creepy roommate.

I awoke at 330am to a strange noise coming from the kitchen. It was this metalic crunching noise, over and over again. *ka-chunk* *ka-chunk* I slowly crept in and found my (drunk as all get out) roommate stabbing a can of tomato sauce with my butcher knife.

When I asked him what the hell he was doing he paused, and slurred, “Well, you packed up the can opener.”

Not really knowing how exactly to respond to that (aside from ‘oh yes, how selfish of me to pack up my own can opener’), I said, “Tha…t knife is for food, not metal! You’re going to dull the fuck out of it!”

Through his drunken haze, he looked at the knife, then back at me (by this time I’d moved aaaaaaaaaaall the way across the room–as he was still holding the knife…and drunk…), looked at the knife, looked at me, and garbled, “nah, it won’t dull the knife bro.”

Again, not knowing how to respond to the magnificent triumph in logic and reason, all I could muster was, “Yes it will, that’s how knives work!”

He started up again, mumbling something about how it stabbing a metal can totally won’t dull the knife, and how uncool it was of me to pack up the can opener, but I interupted him and said, “Look the bottom line is, unless you want to buy that knife set off me, then do not use my knives as can openers. I don’t care what you do or do not believe about how knives get dull. I am telling you right now, do not. Use my knives. To open cans.”

After what seemed like an eternity, he finally put the knife in the sink, grabbed a fork, and went back to stabbing the can.

Just four more weeks…just four more weeks….
Just four more weeks….just four more weeks.

“[Insert clever sign off phrase here]“

~Fizz

With that, I’m just letting y’all know I’m not dead, and that I fully intend on coming back to the game and to the blog.  But for now, I’m on official hiatus until Cataclysm actually comes.  At which point I’ll start up again for reals.

One a different note–Operation Gnomeregan started yesterday!  My reaction to it? The event itself was lots of fun.  Fighting for the glory of the gnomes was fantastic.  And, despite my political differences with the High Tinker, it was an honor fighting along side him and the myriad of other characters they introduced (whose names I don’t remember at the moment).  However, the ending left me feeling…empty.  ‘Is that it?’ I thought.  I mean, at least in the Fall of Zalazane we actually get to kill Zalazane.  At the end of this little Operation, Thermaplug is still alive, and Gnomeregan is still full of radiation.  All we retook was the surface.  Really?  That’s it?  That’s poppycock.  Poppycock I say!  I sure as hell hope that something more happens when Cataclysm drops. Cause if not, what the hell was the point?

Also, I know I could probably find out by researching the beta stuff, but I’m really trying my damnedest to avoid spoiler info about Cataclysm.  It’s been a real challenge by the way.  I’ve pretty much given up on reading all my usual WoW blogs because I don’t want to risk it.  So don’t go posting spoiler info in the comments or I will be very disappointed in you.

“[Insert clever sign off phrase here]“

~Fizz

PS: Oh yeah, one more thing, I finally downed the Lich King the other night!  It took us 134 attempts.

If, by the way, you want a detailed explanation of the video settings in World of Warcraft, someone named Natala has done a magnificent write up on the official European forums.  Link.

Ok so I’m sure every single person that has played World of Warcraft has at some point experienced game lag.  It can be immensely frustrating to zone into Dalaran and try and get across the city in spits and spurts.  I actually avoid going to Dalaran if I can, preferring to use Shattrath as my hub point.  But I have discovered a few things that you can do to help reduce lag.

The setting that helped reduce my lag in Dalaran more than absolutely anything else, by a wide margin was reducing the view distance to its lowest amount.  Don’t get me wrong, I love when I can increase the setting to its highest.  In fact, I think that changed my game play when I ‘discovered’ the setting.  I change this setting a lot.  Unless I’m in a raid/heroic or questing, I have the view distance all the way down.  Just be aware that if you increase the view distance it will reload the UI every time.

Also, turn the shadow quality all the way down.  Unless you have a fancy system with super graphics, this setting will just drain your resources.

Next, if you are in an area with a lot of ground clutter (plants specifically), you’ll want to reduce the Ground Clutter Density and the Environmental Detail.

The rest of the settings don’t really do a whole lot in your average area.  Well, I guess having player textures on a low setting is helpful in Dalaran.  But aside from that I haven’t really done much testing to see if anything is consistently a major drain.  Usually I just have everything (minus the aforementioned settings) at their medium setting, and that suites me just fine.

Oh by the way, make sure to keep projected textures on.  Complicated technobable aside, if you turn this off you’ll die in fires.  Because you won’t be ale to see them.

Moving on from the video settings the other way you can reduce your lag is by turning off addons.  Seriously.  Do you really need to be running quest helper, auctioneer, gatherer, and cartographer while you are raiding?  Probably not.  Think about what you will be doing during your particular game play session.  If all you are going to be doing is hanging out in the city, you can probably turn off your raiding addons.

Outside of the actual game you can help improve game performance by not running other applications in the background.  Every application you run uses up your machines resources.  If you are running a lot of other things, there will be less resources for World of Warcraft.  My machine is old and tired so I don’t run anything except WoW and Ventrilo.

Finally, I prefer to use a wired internet connection rather than a wireless connection.  Again, I’m not smart enough to explain the whys and wherefores, all I know is that the game runs slower on a wireless connection and is less laggy on a wired one.

So, hopefully that has helped you out a little bit.  If you are a smart computer person, please feel free to explain and expound.  But don’t be an ass about it.  I don’t need to be ‘proved wrong.’  I don’t need some smug ass telling me what a fool I am.  Sorry…I recently had an encounter with a smug and arrogant ass that decided it was more important to prove me wrong than actually contribute anything constructive to the conversation.

But by all means, if you are a computer person and can explain it better and correct anything I might have gotten wrong, and can do it without being a douche, I welcome the input.

For now though I just hope to be able to relieve some of the pain and agony of Dalalag.

“[Insert clever sign off phrase here]“

~Fizz

I used to live in China Town, right next to the fish market.  It was a god-awful place; smelly, crowded, dirty, and, well, full of fish.  I hate fish.  I hate the taste.  I hate the smell.  I hate that everyone in the world is completely convinced that all I need to do is just try their version of [insert fish name here] and I’ll totally love it.  I hate fish so much that I actually get a little bit angry that the best buff food in World of Warcraft is [Fish Feast].  But I digress.

The apartment was a 5 bedroom place occupying the 5th and 6th floors at the back end of a 6 floor walk up.  I’m willing to bet that the guy who invented the elevator lived in a 6 floor walk up.  In fact, he may have lived in a 3 floor walk up.  There were some days that I would come home and seriously consider just sleeping in the lobby.  Well, technically there wasn’t really a lobby.  Just a stair well.  See, you would enter the building on street level and be at a set of stairs.  From there you would go up one flight and go through another big, heavy, self locking door, and then you would finally be in the building proper.  Then you could get to all the apartments.

Now I have never, thank god, had any trouble with roaches during my tenure in New York City. *knock on wood*  But about once every winter I have to put up at least one mouse in my house.  That China Town apartment was the worst though.  It seemed like every other week I saw a mouse.  I set up humane traps and caught a few, but there was one crafty little bugger that always seemed to escape my clutches.  I knew it was the same mouse because he had a very distinctive white spot on his back, not to mention the smug attitude he carried with him whenever our eyes locked.

I’d managed to chase him out of my apartment once, but he just ran right across the hall into another apartment.  And then a few days later had returned to pilfer the fresh batch of cookies I had laying out to cool.

I hated this mouse.  And I was determined to get rid of him.  Not by killing him–but by banishing him from my building.  I wanted the satisfaction of knowing I had outwitted him, rather than just knowing I steamrolled him with brute force.

One night, as I lay passed out on the couch, the TV test pattern flickering through the room, I heard a *scritch scritch scritch*.  At fist, it didn’t really register in my semi-conscious dream state.  But then I heard it again, *scritch scritch scritch*, and I had a jarring flash of realization.  “Mouse in the house!” I yelled as I bolted straight up and clicked on the light.  I paused for a moment, as I noticed the clock that read 2:34 am and hoped that I hadn’t woken my roommates.

I slowly scanned the room, peering in every crack and crevice.  Suddenly I saw a shadow dart from the kitchen to the bookshelf by the front door.

“Ah-ha!” I thought, “You’re mine now!”  There was no way out of the corner this mouse had run to.  I had recently plugged up the hole over there with a copper mesh so I knew his escape route had been cut off.  I decided the best course of action would be to set up some barriers around the bookshelf that would force him to run in only one direction: straight out the door.

I began to set up a mouse-proof barrier that I was sure would do the trick.  I grabbed anything I could get that was nearby, as I didn’t want to take my eyes of the bookshelf.  I was afraid that if I let down my vigil that the mouse would seize upon the opportunity to vanish once again into the night.  As I was nearing the completion of my mish-mash wall I opened the door in anticipation of scaring the mouse out into the hallway.  I propped open the door and was about to grab my shoes when I saw the little bugger make a mad dash out into the hall.

Despite being ill-prepared for it, the chase was on.  There was no way I was going to let this mouse win this fight.  Still holding a cup that I was going to use to fill the last small gap in the anti-mouse wall, I took off after him.  I think he was as surprised as I was that I had actually given chase that rather than try and get under the doors of another apartment, he just continued on down the stairs.  Flight after flight I chased him, periodically trying to catch him with the cup I was holding.

Eventually we got to the 2nd floor of the building, to the secondary door I mentioned earlier.  He wriggled his way under it and I flung the door wide and lumbered my way forward.  I was halfway down the stairs when I heard the door slam shut behind me.

The sound of that door slamming was deafening.  The screech of the hinges, the rushing sound of wind as it cut through the air, and the heavy thud as it locked into place–the sound rang throughout the building and shook me to my core.

Then came the awful realization.

‘My keys,’ I thought, ‘I forgot my keys!’

Because that mouse had bolted before I was ready for it I had forgotten to grab my keys.  And my shoes.  And my robe.   So there I was, running down the stairs in my underpants with no way of getting back into my apartment, chasing a little mouse who, in a way, had outwitted me rather than the other way around like I’d hoped..  But, by damn, I was going to get rid of that mouse!  I followed through and chased him the rest of the way down the stairs, opened the door, and let him run off into the cold February night.

That did leave me with a pretty big problem though.  The building I lived in didn’t have an intercom system or doorbells at the entrance.  It was the middle of the night so it was incredibly unlikely that anyone would be passing through anytime soon.

I banged on the door for a solid twenty minutes.  I banged on the walls.  I even banged on the exposed water pipe that snaked its way past the door frame.  But it was a futile effort.

I wasn’t quite sure what to do at this point.  I really didn’t want to wait 4 hours for someone to finally come through on their way to work.  Besides, what would I do?  I sure as hell wasn’t going to sleep.  And being in my underpants and sans shoes, walking around the city was out of the question as well.

For about twenty minutes I sat there on the steps trying to figure out what to do.  Then I had a thought.  If I could someone get to my window, I could get in as it wasn’t locked.  All I needed to do was get to the rear of the building.  It did mean that I had to go outside though.  I psyched myself up, got my blood pumping to stay warm, and headed outside.  I used the cup that I had brought with me to prop open the door so that I didn’t get stuck in a worse predicament.  I walked up and down the block, looking for a pathway to the back of the building.  I even checked to see if the cellar was open.  But no dice.  Then I tried the fire escape.

It was a little tricky, as fire escapes don’t go down to ground level except by way of an extendable ladder that was juuuuust out of my reach.  I had to drag over a trash can to even have a remote hope of reaching it.

So there I was, 3 in the morning, February, China Town, NYC, in my underpants, standing on an overturned garbage can, with no shoes on, jumping up and down trying to reach a fire escape.  Thank God in Heaven nobody walked by.  I’m really not sure how I would have explained myself. (‘um….I’m just doing a routine fire escape safety check?’)

Eventually I managed to grab hold of the ladder and pull myself up.  I crawled my way up the rickety contraption, using all the mental energy I had to keep it from ripping out away from the building.  (Can’t you just picture the headline? “Nude prowler found dead in fire escape collapse in China Town”)  I got all the way to the top and discovered that the fire escape did not in fact go all the way to the roof.  I guess I just hadn’t realized it while I was still on the ground.  It’s not that parts were missing or that it was supposed to go all the way to the roof.  It only needed to service the top floor apartment and that’s exactly what it did.

Standing there on the ricketiest fire escape known to man, 6 stories up, in the freezing cold as the snow began to fall around me I have to admit I started to crack ever so slightly.  I contemplated just scaling the side of the building to the roof.  I was at the end of my rope and was cold, angry, and desperate.

After seriously considering imitating spider man, I decided on an equal ridiculous, but decidedly less insane solution.  On the 3rd floor of the building there lived a set of missionaries.  As luck would have it, they were from my same church, and I had met them once or twice.  Out of other options, and starting to develop hypothermia I decided that I would go down to their apartment and knock.  I took a deep breath and headed down the fire escape, and hoped with all I had that I found the right window.  I wasn’t quite sure which floor was which because I was so disoriented.  But I started at the top and worked my way down.  The 6th floor was out–that was the cranky old lady with the annoying dog.   The 5th floor was out because that’s where the sister missionaries lived, and it was already awkward enough without dragging what were essentially nuns into the mix.  I didn’t know who lived in the 4th floor.  The third floor was the one I was aiming for.

When I got there I stood outside the window and said a silent prayer, hoping I was at the right window.  I took a deep breath and knocked.  And waited.  And nothing.  I knocked again, louder this time.  Suddenly I saw the blinds open a slit, and immediately snap shut.  Then ever so slowly open again–just a teeeny bit–and then snap shut.  Then it opened again, as did another teeny slit in the window next to it–and snap shut.  Then nothing.  I knocked again.  Then four slits (there were four guys living in the apartment).  I was beginning to loose patience.

“It’s me from across the hall. I’m cold, I’m in my underpants, and it’s snowing.  LET ME IN!”

After deliberating amongst themselves as to whether or not I was who I said I was they opened their window and let me in.  I don’t know if they believed I was who I said I was or if they just decided that a dude in his underwear freezing to deal on their fire escape was too crazy to ignore.  Either way, I climbed in and without a word I walked through their apartment and out the front door.

I walked up to my apartment, put on some clothes and shoes, grabbed my keys and went downstairs to get the cup still propping open the front door.  After I retrieved it I went back upstairs and cleaned up the mess that I made.  Two hours had passed and I was exhausted.  I turned off the light, splayed out on the couch, took a deep breath, and tried my best to forget the entire evening.

Sleep was just about to grab hold of me when I heard the worst sound I’ve ever heard in my life.

*scritch scritch scritch*

“[Insert clever sign off phrase here]“

~Fizz

(pause for gratuitous booby joke)

(moving on)

It just seems like a really mean thing to do.  I mean, kill the Dark Irons and destroy their base of operations — that’s war.  But going in and stealing their pillows so they have to rest their heads on rocks is just…mean.

“[Insert clever sign off phrase here]“

~Fizz

Take a break from the game.

This may seem like an odd suggestion to include in a list about continuing to play the game, and even odder to list it first.  But you’d be surprised by how much it can help.  My dad always says that you should stop while you are still having fun.  One example that stands out in my mind is when we (my siblings and I) would go sledding as a kid.  If we stayed out too long, invariably one of us would get tired and cranky and angry (which would sometimes lead to injuries).  But if we stopped before that happened, we would still want to go sledding the next day.

If you log in day after day and do the exact same thing(s), you will get tired and cranky and angry.  The game won’t seem fresh or exciting.  It just becomes a boring droll.  By taking a break you allow your mind to relax and focus on other things for a little while.  You forget about the tedium and stop thinking about how many more frost emblems you need for that next gear upgrade.  It’s a great way to break the gaming habits that you have formed, and the ruts that you have dug yourself into.

And when I say to take a break, I don’t mean take a day off.  I mean take a week or two, or even a month off.  Actively do something else.  Find another game to play.  Hang out with your friends.  Go outside.

Work on an obscure or extensive achievement.

There are plenty out there, both solo and group achievements.  My top recommendations are World Explorer (see the world), Well Read (read about the world), The Loremaster (quest the world), To All the Squirrels Who Shared My Life (love the critters of the world).  If you are able to play with friends I would recommend Classic Dungeonmaster, Classic Raider, and their Outland counterparts.

If you don’t like questing, don’t do the Loremaster–but if you do decide to work on the Loremaster, don’t let it turn into a grind.  Read the quests.  Learn the lore of the game.  Don’t just hop from quest to quest.  Also, avoid the quests that are just reputation grinds.  Nothing will steal away pieces of your soul like trying to get exalted with the Zandalar Tribe.

Try a new style of gameplay.

If you are primarily a player vs. environment style person, try player vs player.  If all you do is pvp, try questing for a little while.  If all you do is quest, try breaking into the raiding world.  There is a lot to do in WoW.  Go into it with an open mind though.  Who knows, you may find that you actually like what you previously thought you hated.  Don’t lay any pressure on yourself.  Don’t switch to raiding expecting to get Conqueror of Ulduar.  Don’t start PvPing expecting to become a Gladiator.  Just go in and try to have some fun–and bring a friend along who is experienced with whatever you’re trying.

Run heroics in an interesting way.

Run without a tank or healer.  Run with all paladins or all druids.  Go as fast as you possibly can, chain pulling the whole instance.*  Try not skipping any mobs or any bosses.  Only wear gear you found in Ragefire Chasm/Stockades.* (This one isn’t my idea. Source.) Go through the whole instance walking backwards.  Try doing it first person shooter style with the camera zoomed all the way in. (Warning: this can be extremely disorienting, especially as a gnome tank.)  Or come up with your own crazy way of running through Halls of Stone or Utgarde Keep for the 5th time in the same day.  The possibilities are limited only by your imagination.

*Only do this if you have the permission of the entire group.  Best done with guild mates/friends.

Play the Auction House.

This one might not be for everyone, but it can be quite fun if you can do it well.  Plus, you can learn all about economics and statistics and other cerebral stuff that you never bothered to learn in high school because you couldn’t figure out when you’d ever use them in your real life.

Organize guild events.

Have a dance party on the steps of the Ironforge bank.  Gather everyone up on a lvl 1 toon and walk from Stranglethorn Vale to the Ghostlands (lvl 80 protector optional).  Have someone come up with a quest that the guildies can do–maybe an escort quest.  I bet all sorts of fun can be had with an escorted character that’s smarter than an NPC.  They could help or hinder the process in all sorts of crazy ways.

Roleplay.

Number 6 brings me to the next suggestion–try out some role playing.  There’s plenty of it out there.  Yes, a lot of it is terrible, but a lot of it is really good and lots of fun.  Get those creative juices flowing.  Write yourself a little story and act it out in game.  This topic could take up it’s own post and there are plenty of resources out there on the internets from people with much more experience than I so I will point you to wow.com’s regular role playing articles and leave it at that.

This is obviously by no means a comprehensive list.  There is so much you can do to keep the game interesting, but it does take some work on your part.  Blizzard can provide you with a game but they can’t play it for you.  You’ll get out of it what you put into it.

I do have one last topic that I want to talk about.

Leveling an alt.

This is probably one of the most common suggestions I come across when people talk about keeping the game interesting.  I’m sort of divided on it.  Yes, if you don’t have any alts, leveling a new character can be a great experience, especially if you do it with the other faction than your main.  You get to experience new content (new to you anyway), you get to learn a new class, and you have the chance to learn new professions.  It can be a great way to get re-energized about the game.

However.  Leveling an alt can sometimes be detrimental to keeping your interest.  If you hate leveling, just recently hit 80 for the first time, or already have a gaggle of alts, this may make you more miserable than you were before.  If all your doing is leveling a different class through the same content that you’ve already gone through 5 other times, you may end up hating the game more than you did before you rolled your alt.  Level an alt at your own risk.

“[Insert clever sign off phrase here]“

~Fizz

Also, I like to make sure that I don’t get stuck or  complacent in my game play.  I’m a little obsessive compulsive and kind of a control freak, so I tend to like things the way I like them because that’s the way I like them.  The problem is that often allows me to fall into bad habits and prevents me from correcting mistakes.  So every once in a while, a good addon/wtf flush is a good thing.

When I start fresh I have a chance to rebuild my UI from the ground up.  I take everything I have learned over the past few months about tanking or healing or any other aspect of the game, and I try to incorporate it into my gameplay.

I hadn’t planned on doing that for this particular patch, but since I’ve been experiencing issues logging in, I figured this was as good a time as any to start the process again.

My goal this time around is two fold.  First is to find a good set of every day utility addons, and configurations for them.  These addons would handle things like questing, banking/auctioning, professions, mail and so forth. (I already have a good idea what those addons would be.)  Second, I would like to improve my set of raiding addons.  Right now everything feels so cluttered.  All the information is there, it just doesn’t get displayed in a very clean and efficient way.

My three biggest hurdles right now are buffs/debuffs, ability procs/cooldowns, and action bars.  I’m decently sure I can find something to handle the first two, but I’m struggling with the third–primarily because I don’t like action bar mods.  I really like the default action bar set up that blizzard has.  I like those giant birds hanging out at the bottom of my screen.  I like the relationship between the action bars and the utility/bag bars.  I just wish that there was a way to resize and move that frame.  Because I need a little more space on the sides and if I could resize the action bar frame (but keeping the default skin) I would be golden.  Until then I will just keep angsting away about it.

The other thing I may do is change some of my key bindings for my shaman.  Most of the healing I do is through healbot so I could probably move around some of the healing spells and just put in more dps spells.

“[Insert clever sign off phrase here]“

~Fizz

And for those of you who have no idea what the Ice Stone disaster of 2009 was here’s a brief recap.  During the 2009 Love is in the Air event there existed a bug.  A fairly annoying, then amusing, then annoying again bug.  For a few days, at random intervals there would be a server wide emote that said, “The Ice Stone has melted!”  Nobody had any idea what was going on.  Most people had no idea that the Ice Stone was related to summoning  Lord Ahune, and those that did were confused because the midsummer event was months away.  So, people all across the internets started coming up with various theories and amusing jokes about it.  This post is my take on it.

Bulletin from the Gnomeregan Gnews Gnetwork

We regret to inform you that as of 2:35pm, EKST (eastern kingdom standard time), the Ice Stone has melted. Not 24 hours from the appearance of the first signs on this catastrophe, the denizens of Azeroth are beginning to pick up the pieces of their shattered lives. Confusion and fear hang in the air; rumor and conjecture abound; the one thing we do know is where the mighty Ice Stone once stood lies only a puddle.

Reports have been coming in all afternoon and we at GGG have learned that the Frozen Sea has risen nearly 20 feet, flooding coastal towns all across Northrend. Valiance Keep and the first two levels of the Warsong hold now lie underwater. The survivors that were able to flee inland are beginning to look for their loved ones. Members of the Cenarion Circle with help from the Taunka’le and the Tuskarr have set up refugee camps on what is now the new Northrend coast. Sadly the basin of Sholazar has been completely flooded.

Northrend is not the only region to be hit. The dramatic shift in temperature has caused wild weather fluctuations all across Azeroth. Torrential rain has hit the Barrens and floods have traveled as far south as Tanaris. Fires have sprung up in the forrests of Elwyn and Duskwood. There are even rumors that the rise in global temperature has begun to melt the Frozen Throne itself! The Lich King could not be reached for comment.

Likely it will be many months before the climate settles to a more natural state. In the meantime a call has gone out to the leaders of the Horde and the Alliance to work together to heal the lands. However the current political atmosphere does not bode well for this plea. King Varian Wrynn was quoted as saying, “I don’t care if that damn Ice Rock or whatever has melted. So what if the sea is rising? The Alliance has a navy. The Horde doesn’t. Suck it.” When asked if he had any reply Thrall said simply, “Your mother. kek.”

We were able to contact High Tinker Geblin Mequatorke and he has promised to put his best Gnomes on building an artificial Ice Stone–just as soon as they finish taking back Gnomeregan. He was quoted as saying that it, “should be any day now.”

For now all we can do is watch over the Puddle Stone. And make sure it doesn’t freeze.

End Bulletin

“[Insert clever sign off phrase here]“

~Fizz

The clip in question runs from 4:44 to 6:23.