After this past week’s Tuesday maintenance, World of Warcraft players were treated to two brand new pre-Cataclysm events.  For the Horde, players were able to travel to Sen’jin Village to aid in reclaiming the Echo Isles, which will be a new city in the upcoming expansion.  Alliance players were given the chance to aid High Tinker Mekkatorque in liberating Gnomeregan, the lost city of the gnomes, which will also be an upcoming city in Cataclysm.  The events added something fun and different to Azeroth, though many players have reported that the events were not released without a hitch.

As someone who plays both Horde and Alliance characters, I actually logged into my extremely neglected World of Warcraft account to experience the events.  Zalazane’s Fall ran smoothly when I experienced it on Wednesday evening, but many players on various servers have been reporting that Jun’do the traitor stays immune to all attacks, causing the event to glitch.  Every now and then the timer for the event stays at zero, which also glitches the event.

Alliance players are also seeing some difficulty with their respective event.  High Tinker Mekkatorque often times will freeze in place, preventing the event from continuing.  As of Wednesday the 8th at 5:20 PDT, Blizzard announced in a thread on the official forums that High Tinker Mekkatorque should no longer freeze in place, though some players may still be having some difficulty with him and are encouraged to submit an in-game ticket.  There is a possible “work-around” for the event until they have a permanent fix in place, but Blizzard is unsure of when such a fix will be available.

I tried completing Operation: Gnomeregan last night, and High Tinker Mekkatorque is still freezing before entering the city.  There are apparently a few tricks you can use on your server if he is still freezing.  Some players are stating that if you don’t travel down into the tunnel before High Tinker Mekkatorque, this can prevent him from freezing.  Hopefully Blizzard rolls out a fix to the events soon so everyone can experience  them way they were meant to be.

Keep your eyes peeled to that thread for future updates!

We will be bringing the Aion servers and the website down at 4:30 a.m. PDT, September 7, 2010 (more) for an extended maintenance.
During this downtime we will be applying Aion: Assault on Balaurea (2.0) to the game and servers; you can find the expansion notes listed in the PowerWiki.
We estimate it to take no longer than 8 hours.

Thank you for your patience!

Greetings Daevas!
After the European Aion team attended gamescom 2010 two weeks ago in Cologne, Germany, the turn has now come to the North American team, attending PAX this weekend in Seattle along with a few guests from Europe. This week you can taste the release of Aion: Assault on Balaurea as it’s just started to download via the NCsoft Launcher. Don’t panic if it stops at unexpected percentages along the way. It’s an incremental patch and will be finished before the servers go live. 
We hope you are as impatient as we are to expand your wings and finally glide into Balaurea! With only a few more days remaining, how will you prepare for the release of Aion: Assault on Balaurea? What are the first things you will do on Tuesday? Tell us all about it over in the official forums.

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Question of the Week
Cerafina of Perento asks:
“With the launch of 2.0 in a few days, will my current XP be reset to 0% of level 50? Also what happens to my current soul debt?”
Hey Cerafina.
When Aion: Assault on Balaurea goes live on the 7th September, as was the case with the release on the Korean servers, you’ll find that your current experience will still be 100% of level 50 – obviously only if it was that before. This means that once you’re in game all you’ll need to do is kill one monster or complete one quest to tip yourself into level 51. In regard to your soul debt, the soul healers of Atreia aren’t of the understanding kind, and you will still owe the same amount you did before the expansion. This means that you’ll be able to pay it off in full and gain a slight advantage when it comes to gaining experience points to level. I hope this answer quells the rumour that experience points will be reset to the beginning of the level when you first log in after Aion: Assault on Balaurea goes live!
With the expansion so close to going live, we wanted to remind you about the exclusive pets that are available from certain retailers and the levelling guides in our PowerWiki to help you get off to a bang:
Asmodian Leveling Guides: 51-52 and 53-55
Elyos Leveling Guides: 51-52 and 53-55

For those of you lucky enough to have made the trip to Seattle for PAX; look out for the exclusive Tutty N’ Beans swag packs and the Aion: Assault on Balaurea Launch Party with a special concert from the Wonder Girls. For the rest of us, you can always follow the action on the NA NCsoft Events page.
Do you want the Aion team to answer your question or discuss a topic of your choice? Send an email to community_aion_en@ncsoft.com with your character name, server, and question!

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In Other News
Let’s take a look at what’s been going on in the Aion community.
Five Brave Elyseans vs. Tahabata
Rheeza from Vaizel sent us this video, showcasing a 5-man effort to take down Tahabata (without a plate class). After successfully doing so, they were lucky enough to see a Tahabata Tome drop.
“No Point” AMV by Nill
We posted a link to Nill’s music video called “Behind Enemy Lines”. This is a previous work of Nill, but quite impressive and worth having a look at!
Aion Insanity – the lighter side of Aion
Qaz posted this neat video over in our forums. It’s a bit like switching between TV channels.
Nightflower’s Guides
Nightflower of Zikel has been creating several wonderful guides to the new Single Player instances in Assault on Balaurea.
Don’t forget to send us your Eye on Community creations or contributions to community_aion_en@ncsoft.com!

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Knowledge Is Power
Remember to follow the Community Team on Twitter and Facebook to stay on top of the Aion news!
Aion Facebook Page—Become a fan today!
Aion Steam Gaming Group—Join our Steam community!
Tamat (NA Community Manager)
Ayase (UK Community Manager)
Arathaur (FR Community Manager)
Imhotep (DE Community Manager)
This article series is a way for us to highlight current, interesting, wacky, passionate, intriguing, dramatic, or just plain awesome things going on in the community. Please send your submissions to community_aion_en@ncsoft.com.

—The Aion Community Team

Player-run guilds emphasizing the gold-farming profession have become popular in some games. At least one guild, in World of Warcraft, has chosen to name themselves “Gold Farmers”, specifically to mock such operations. Another mock guild was set up on several European servers called “we farm gold u buy” [sic], a clear dig at the usually poor typing and grammar that Chinese gold farmers often have.

Much derision was poured on websites that advertise and sell in-game items and property when many of them closed briefly and could not carry out transactions over the Chinese New Year. Players took this to be incontestable truth as to the identity of those involved in the farming and selling of virtual items.

Characters in World of Warcraft are tied to specific user accounts. User accounts can be used on all servers, or realms. Characters can be moved between servers in the same region (e.g., from one European server to another, but not from a European server to an American one) for a fee. As of this time, one may move a character from a Player Versus Player (PvP) realm to another PvP realm, or a Player Versus Environment(PvE) realm, but one may not move a character from a PvE realm to a PvP realm. The two playable factions currently in the game are the Alliance and Horde both consisting of five different races each. There are a total of 9 playable classes. The Burning Crusade expansion added one new race to each faction (the Blood Elves and the Draenei).