World of Warcraft patch 4.3 now live:

The agony of waiting is over. At last, the final major content patch of Cataclysm has been released. The various major features of the patch have already been covered in some detail on this blog and in other locations, so I won’t spend a lot of time explaining what’s new. Instead, I’ll let you know my experiences with the patch so far.

I’m rather excited, so forgive me if my thoughts are scattered.

The trailer:

Now, I love pretty much everything about this patch, and I don’t want to be one of those whiners, but this trailer… sucks. They couldn’t even get Metzen to do one of his patented ominous voice overs?

The last patch trailer this lame was Call of the Crusade’s, and it had the excuse of also being a lame patch.

But, luckily, the patch itself is more fun than the trailer.

Stylin’ and profilin’

I’ve been going nuts with transmogrification across all my characters. It’s a little expensive, but worth it, in my view. No more ugly clownsuits.I look like a proper Blood Elf now.I’m also in love with my free Tyrael’s Charger mount from the annual pass. Never again will any of my characters have to ride one of those hideous Horde wyverns!

Oh, VanCleef’s Battlegear, I wish I could quit you.

One great thing about transmog is that it’s available to all levels. My lock isn’t even level 70 yet, but she can be styling, too.

New dungeons:

I’ve only done the first new dungeon, End Time, so far. It lived up to expectations pretty well.

The mechanics for each boss were very unique and fun. In particular, Murozond, the final boss, is possibly my favourite fight out of all the dungeons and raids I’ve done to date. The ability to rewind time is simply awesome. I spent the whole fight spamming my most powerful cooldown abilities. I also rather enjoyed killing Sylvanas, even if it is an alternate timeline.

It was nice and short, which I like. Never was a big fan of the two hour grind dungeons we’ve seen so much of this expansion. As far as difficulty goes, I actually found it very easy, but that might have been down to the awesome gear my group had.

My complaints with the dungeon are minor. It’s full of invisible walls and feels very claustrophobic, which is quite disappointing when you consider the spectacular ruined vistas you can see but not reach. I also would have liked a bit more detail to the story. If this really is the conclusion of the Infinite Dragonflight arc, it leaves a lot unanswered.

The rest:

I haven’t tried the Raid Finder yet, so no comment there. It’s item level requirement is surprisingly high (372), but that’s probably a good thing in the long run.

I have the pleasure of having two of the classes I play buffed this patch. My paladin finally has an AoE heal that actually heals, and I feel like a god. My only concern is for the inevitable nerf that will come to holy paladins; we can’t possibly be balanced at this point.

Recount hasn’t been updated for the new patch yet, so I can’t say exactly how much my mage’s DPS has increased, but even just doing Molten Front dailies, I noticed a big difference in how quickly things died. No longer will people have strokes when they find out I’m not arcane spec.

So, yeah, I like this patch.

What about you? How are you liking Hour of Twilight so far? Tried the Raid Finder yet? What’s your transmog set?

Of Sparkly shoulders:

I had another random bought of raiding luck the other night, and this one was a doozy. As my paladin, I got PUGed into a guild run of Firelands that was on Majordomo Staghelm, which is my favourite boss of Cataclysm so far. Not only that, but I did so without the raid leader insisting on 7/7 heroic experience, a blood test, and a rectal exam.

We killed him with only one wipe, and that was plenty fun, but then it got better. The paladin token dropped, and for just once in my raiding career, I had a good roll.

(Apologies for the less than stellar screenshot. I was too excited.)

I’ve never been happier to disenchant an item than Pauldrons of Ambition. No more ugly, crappy Troll shoulders. I’ve had those things since my first ever ZA run back in the spring, and I was starting to think I’d be saddled with them until Mists of Pandaria. Normally, I don’t care too much about gear, but spending more than half a year without upgrading a major slot is a bit much. Plus, this is the first piece of tier not from valor points I’ve gotten for any character all expansion.

Then, we went on to fight Ragnaros, something I honestly didn’t expect to do until the next expansion. We wiped our faces off for an hour without even getting him to 50%, but it was interesting. This was the first time I’d ever fought an end tier boss while it was still relevant.

It did convince me I’m not interested in proper progression raiding.

I must have done something right, though, because the other people spent the whole run trying to convince me to join their guild.

Aside from being insanely hard, I didn’t find it a terribly interesting fight, either. Just a lot of hammer-smashing and fire-dodging; he doesn’t even move. Staghelm, Rhyolith, and even hated Alysrazor all felt more epic. Great visuals, though.

Of Bribery:

Regular readers may remember my epic nerd rage over the Fangs of the Father legendary quest chain in 4.3, and how it excludes all non-rogues and non-raiders from a very important piece of the storyline.

I’m still pissed, but there may be some hope. I’ve learned that, while one does need to raid to start the chain, the first stage — nearly half the chain — requires only one thing from the Dragon Soul raid, and it’s very simple to get: a decoder ring pick-pocketed from the fourth boss.

This means that if I can bribe a raiding guild to let my rogue into their run just long enough to get that ring, I can still do a good chunk of the chain, and get some very powerful — if not quite legendary — daggers in the process. (Hey, just because gear isn’t my main goal in playing doesn’t mean I don’t like getting it when I can.)

Operation: Pay-Off is a go.

I’ve already started a thread in the official forum for my realm, and I’ll put out feelers to the few raiders I know. If you have a raiding guild on Antonidas US and would like some easy money, please get in touch with me. I’m not a very wealthy player, but what I have is yours if you can get me that ring.