World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King Previews

[GameBanshee News]

IGN and GameSpy have both conjured up new previews of World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King after spending time in the expansion's beta test. A snip from IGN's article:

First, however, you've got to do some basic quests to acquaint you with the nature of the Death Knights. Starting off, you must forge your runesword, a fairly simple task since Acherus is full of battle-worn swords. Take one, use it in the runeforge, and you've got a runesword. Next, you must engrave a rune onto your sword, imbuing it with power. There are a number of difference runes to pick from; cinderglacier will boost the power of your frost or shadow spells, frostfever will inflict disease and cause frost damage, swordshattering increases the chance to parry, and so on. Whatever you choose affects the look of your sword, as well as the effect on it, like flame or frost.

With sword in hand, you discover why Death Knights are so cool. You basically have to kill an unworthy Death Knight initiate in battle in order to join the club. So it's a bit like college hazing, only a tad more extreme. Take out the initiate and you prove yourself to the boss, who then gets you ready for the conquest of New Avalon.

And a snip from GameSpy's article:

The boat from Stormwind to Northrend dropped us off in a zone called Borean Tundra. Judging by where we landed, the name seemed appropriate, with large chunks of ice sticking out of the water.

Right off the docks was Valiance Keep, where we set our hearth at the inn (we figure we'll be questing a while, and Valiance Keep has quick access to Stormwind), and found some nice new level 70 food for our warrior. There's a gryph master right outside, but since this was our first stop in Northrend, we didn't have anywhere to fly to just yet.