Welcome to the latest World of Warcraft newsletter from Ten Ton Hammer.
The Overpull, where we gather most of the things we should and
a few we probably shouldn't.

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src="http://images.tentonhammer.com/newsletters/wow/mishapsmayhem.gif"
alt="Medeor's Mishaps and Mayhem" />

Here we sit almost three months into the expansion with
things percolating quite nicely for World of
Warcraft. The expansion is a tremendous success,
server congestion is a good problem to have (for short periods and they
better fix it!) and most people are excited about the upcoming content
patch. This is where the wheels come off the joy bus and Blizzard does
what Blizzard does, which is deliver great content at a snail's pace.
Typically this is acceptable because the fit and finish of the game
polish is so thick you can see a reflection of that black velvet Elvis
painting behind you. This time though, a serious misfire on the patch
was allowed to roll onto the live servers blowing up Northrend via
Wintergrasp as the Arenas tumbled too. The forums were awash in hand
wringing and wailing, but Blizzard fixed the lion's share of the server
issues and will continue to plod back into the good graces of most
players. They always do, otherwise the game would not continue to set
subscription records more than four years after the launch. 

The most
interesting change in the tide is the overall casualness of the game
now. We now have the ability
to walk away from the game and not be left way behind. With the content
so
accessible, I can log in and run heroics, or even jump into (heaven
forbid) a pick up group for Archavon or even Naxxramas. On the
flipside, I don't have to
log in every night to keep up with my homeys. They gain some
incremental bonuses as they run heroics almost every night, but I'm not
being left in the dust like I would have been with the Burning Crusade.
The game is definitely alt-friendly and tailor made for casual raiding.
Did you hear that noise? It was the hardcore raiders driving into
oncoming traffic shouting "Blizzard, why have you forsaken us?!

This week has ushered in Elder-mania. No matter where I turn,
an Elder is standing in a cone of light trying to fill up my bags with
worthless coins (well mostly worthless). The achievement system has
probably saved Elder week from being completely ignored this year. I'm
as interested in gathering achievements as I am STDs, so I try and stay
away. As a matter of fact, I'm playing the achievements like a golf
game, the lowest score wins. If I compare achievements with someone in
my group and they have double the points I do (like those
insane enough to go after the Loremaster title), I'm pretty sure we
won't have much in common unless they like beer.

Speaking of achievements, get ready for love to be in the air soon as
Valentine's Day approaches. Don't look for me to be handing out hearts,
unless they are the ones I kept from Wintergrasp.

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alt="Now on Farm or That's a Wipe" />
In this section we'll look at the hits and misses taking place in the
game. For example:

Paladin 30 yard
taunts are "Now on Farm," while the
fallout from patch 3.0.8 definitely qualifies as a wipe. 

If the queue times
for some servers don't come down, we'll
definitely be calling that a wipe soon too.

It's safe
to say that the whole of Northrend is now
on farm status as the content is fun, interesting and extremely
accessible. The hardcores are probably calling the level of difficulty
a wipe, but my merry band of casual raiders is still chewing through it
all and having a great time.

The href="http://www.azcentral.com/sports/cardinals/articles/2009/02/01/20090201spt-cards.html">Arizona
Cardinals definitely qualify as
a wipe. They had to make one measly
defensive stand to win Super Bowl Rings and got an href="http://i206.photobucket.com/albums/bb19/youdumbcat/EpicFail02.jpg">Epic
Fail instead.

Overheard this week:

• "Don't stand
  there...Ok, does someone have a battle rez
  available?"

• "Oh man, who
  pulled that group? Get back over here
  and die close."

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alt="Caverns of Time" />
Ah the good old days, when the game was entirely different from the
game we play today. Do you remember when all of your gear
could be
changed during combat (as opposed to just weapons as it is
now)?
Players had whole sets of equipment to change out during fights.
Casters carried sets heavy with spirit and would change mid-fight to
gather some mana until switching back to DPS clothes. We all had macros
or used Outfitter type mods to strip down to our skivvies if a wipe was
imminent. Ah the good old days of  copper sized repair bills.
Can
you imagine how much more difficult the game would be if we could do
that now?

Speaking of the old
days, remember when the old Arcanite Reaper was
the be-all-end-all clothy killer. I cleaned my
Arcanite Reaper on more
cloth-wearers than Rafael Nadal href="http://www.theage.com.au/ffximage/2007/01/28/svSPLIFE_narrowweb__300x445,0.jpg">picks
his seat in a 5 set match. The
less cool Arcanite Champion was a
great sword too, but it never matched the oh-crap factor of that axe as
it came whistling overhead towards a foe. Ah the good old days.

Have a great week, thanks for reading,
Medeor