Phew, writing that title took longer than the actual review... Kidding. Anyway, if you are asking why, who, where, when, or any other "wh" question, hold your breath. I'm gonna answer as fast as I can (or in this case, as fast as you can read). Briefly stated, after a short talk, we 32 Gamers (*not an actual figure) decided that instead of writing a big, chunky, twelve page review each time a new WoW expansion pack comes out, it would be wise for both your eyes and my hands to just keep you updated with the latest changes each major content patch brings to the game.

So six months into the second expansion, patch 3.1 introduces Ulduar, probably the biggest instance in this game yet. The story starts with our always inquisitive dwarf friend Brann Bronzebeard, whom you may remember doing some quests for, while leveling up your character. Barely escaping from Ulduar when he realizes this is the lair of the evil Old God Yogg-Saron, banished by the Titans there, Brann manages to get to the mage city of Dalaran just in time to warn Rhonin, leader of Kirin Tor of the imminent danger the awake of this evil entity poses.

Both King Wrynn of Stormwind and Thrall were invited to an urgent meeting, but the unexpected sooner arrival of the horde representatives ignited another conflict between the two factions, with Jaina trying to calm things down as usual. The conclusion is that Yogg and his mind controlled minions must be stopped at all cost, but each of the two factions will go their own way and gather their best heroes to try and do so...

But the 14 new bosses in Ulduar are just one of the few additions to the game. In fact, there is more epic lewt than anywhere you might have raided before. This of course can be obtained with the help of a proper 10 man Normal mode raid, or the full 25 man Hard mode, where the rewards are of a slightly higher quality.

However, there is an interesting new twist to all that: Hardcore modes for each boss. Similar to Sartharion where you could get additional items if you kept one, two or all three of his aid drakes alive, if you perform additional challenge tasks during a fight and manage to down that boss, your rewards will be superior. The tasks can be something like keeping all the three towers up during a fight instead of destroying them, each adding an extra special attack to the boss for example - just so you get the big picture.

Vehicles have been finally made more responsive, and it's a pleasure to ride in a choppa' - even if many were disappointed that the bike along with some of the newly added mounts lost their "independent" hit points. You see, you had to take down the bike's ~5k hit points in order to dismount the rider before the patch. But this is only fair for everybody, leveling the field in the PvP area.

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To take full advantage of vehicles now that the siege engines and all that are proven to work properly - see Wintergrasp - a new challenge has been introduced for solo play. And about time I might add, don't get me wrong, raiding and doing the same daily quests can be fun to a certain point, but you can't always find the right amount of people or just get bored of the latter.

This new challenge is called the Argent Tournament, nothing more and nothing less than a Jousting tournament where you get to be a knight just like in the movies. Equipped with a long lance, you will gain some new abilities while on your competition horse. Charge being the most important of course, a shield with up to three stacks, normal attack and a range throw to weaken your enemy's defenses.

As you complete daily challenges including jousting but some other things as well such as killing scourge for the Argent Crusade or kissing frogs to find a princess (yes, I know...), you go up in rank as a Valliant and eventually a Champion for the city you represent. Each of the major cities wants YOU to defend their pride and honor, and as a reward you gain reputation with them and the ability to buy several items in exchange for the Champion badges you earn.

In any way, you should be a champion with all your major cities if you complete all the quests for a month.

The vehicles theme persists in Ulduar as well, albeit only for the first boss fun encounter, and some minor things here and there. As you start the instance, a couple of bikes are needed to pour tar on the ground, and catapults and siege engines are used to ignite it and lay waste to thousands of dwarfs and mechanognomes.

Many players have complained Naxx was too easy for them. Truth be told, I've wiped tons of times with pick up groups, but yeah, in a more organized environment it was way easier than Sunwell, of course. And still, Blizzard's future vision involves as many players enjoying new raid content as possible. Yes, Ulduar is more difficult, the 25 man version can be especially hard combined with hardcore modes for bosses, but I totally agree this should be kept accessible for everyone; it's a pity really to lose parts of the game because you don't have enough time to spend in it or just don't work well under a mean guild that does the job done.

Along with the mentioned changes above, there are a few technical changes asked by players for quite some time now: dual spec for a character and more user interface tweaks. For the modest sum of 1000 gold, you can purchase dual talent: the ability to spec differently and change your spec off combat in 5 seconds. Hybrid classes benefit the most because they now can easily switch between tank, healing or damage dealer roles, but pure classes are also encouraged to maximize their dps and survivability in every situation by having a different PvP and PvE build. Or who knows, just have two PvP specs that you switch as you please. Anything goes.

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Arena unit frames have been added to the game so you can enjoy a better arena experience with the default interface. And speaking of arena, the rating system has been reset: it starts from 0 now and only goes up. Following this change, required ratings for items have been lowered a bit. They are still high to prevent unskilled players to just farm for items. And shout at me again, but I agree with Blizzard again here.

Along with the big changes mentioned above, hundreds of achievements have been added to the game along with the usual tweaks to various classes. Death Knights are of course upset because they've got the nerf bat the most, but to be honest they are still strong in both PvE and PvP, being in fact one of the few hybrid classes that can end up on top in many boss fights and still be very good for PvP.

And speaking of PvP items, you should know a new boss has been added to Vault of Archavon, the Wintergrasp instance. Emalon the Storm Watcher, Archavon's "step brother" drops Tier 8 and Furious Gladiator gear, and can be found in both 10 and 25 man versions of the instance. He is a lot harder to get down, and you will probably need sustained high DPS and a group that knows how to move and what it's doing to "finish the fight".

Conclusion

There are plenty of things to still talk about and to discover, but I feel I've bored you enough already, and the essence is here. It's now easier to talk about final thoughts than it was six months ago when I wrote my Lich King review. For me, this patch completes the big picture and makes Wrath of the Lich King a successful addon that raises the bar even higher for future content, but at the same time makes you want to play more, and experience more things the game has to offer.