Seri sez: Varian Wrynn is a Douchebag.

Ah, progression nights. There’s nothing quite like new content to invigorate a raid team, is there? That’s what 99% of our applicants say they raid for… to see new content. It’s exciting to step into a new instance, wide-eyed and quivering with anticipation. What will the first boss pull bring? Death. Yes, the first boss usually brings lots of death, but that’s OK. We’re professionals, and what happens in the instance stays in the instance. Right? We pick ourselves up, we dust ourselves off, we try again. Except, this time we’re not crawling through the sewers of Black Temple, ruthlessly slaughtering all the potential witnesses to our folly along with the boss in question… we’re in a farking arena. There are spectators, for crying out loud. Not to mention that douchebag, Varian Wrynn.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m familiar with the lore. I know he’s got a few bones to pick with the orcs over that whole “razing Stormwind” thing and the “enslaved gladiator” thing (you’d think he might have a small aversion to arenas after that, but oh no..), not to mention the “Wrathgate incident” and the slight misunderstanding as to the Horde’s involvement. He hates us, I get that.

We’re used to bosses taunting us with pithy comments as they grind us into paste, but the derisive comments from the bleachers are new. “Is this the best the Horde has to offer?” he asks, with a snort and a toss of his hair, as we’re dying in fires and being beaten about the head and shoulders by filthy little snow rats. “Worthless scrub,” he taunts, with a sneer, from his lofty perch.

Come down here and say that to my face, you self-righteous windbag!

At least when bosses taunt us we get the satisfaction (eventually) of killing them. I engaged in some speculation this weekend with a guildie or two about whether or not the taunts from the bleachers made progression nights more stressful. You know… I think they really do. It gets on your nerves after a while; I can’t decide if this is great design on Blizzard’s part or a really crappy idea.

One thing’s for sure: I’d love to be able to have a helpful DK Death Grip that mofo down and start a diplomatic incident. Alas, Jaina would probably just freeze us all and spirit him away again. Lucky for us, she’s not by his side 24×7. Weekly trips to Stormwind to blow off steam after Heroic ToC are starting to sound more and more appealing.