Elkwinkarma — Undead Warlock, Guild Leader, Technologia

Report — Uldaman

On a recent trip to the Badlands to help Bonky, Acon, and Metalvonmosh tangle with some dragons, I came across several persons of questionable character who had lost items in the Uldaman archeological dig. Of course, upon seeing members of the Technologia guild defeat about three dozen dragons of elite status, these persons immediately set out to acquire our services.

Uldaman is a very strange place. There is some mysterious ancient magic hiding deep within depths of this Titan vault. Magic that under normal circumstances and lesser hands should be left alone. But that is not the Technologia way. Sensing the opportunity for adventure and for some gold-producing loot, we took on the set of quests laid before us.

From a tactical standpoint, according to the best intelligence we could find, Uldaman is best attacked with a solid of group of at least five, with an additional five in support being even better. For our first foray, we took only five, Bonky, Keres, Catervarri, Myrlin, and me. This made the going a little slow because each set of enemies had to be carefully approached, surrounded and then flanked.

And there are a variety of enemies within Uldaman. Areas close to the entrance are inhabited by dwarf miners hunting for valuable ores and ancient artifacts. Dispatching them was a simple matter as they are unskilled in combat. Looting their bodies we found several kinds of strange metals — they should prove valuable to the goblin engineer who commissioned us to collect it.

A little further inside are troggs. You would be hard pressed to find a fouler humanoid in Azeroth. Somehow these foul beasts have formed an alliance with the dwarves when it comes to the excavating of riches in Uldaman. Upon further investigation, it became obvious that the dwarves allowed the troggs to hang around because the troggs possessed special knowledge about how to open doors to the more ancient areas of the vault. It was this information we were commissioned to extract from either troggs or dwarves as required, anyway we could. We chose violence — it never fails to deliver.

In one corner of one of the many tunnels in Uldaman we came across two dwarves plotting some sort of treachery. One was known as Eric the Swift – the name was earned honestly – if was the fastest little dwarf I had ever seen. But he wasn’t fast enough to escape his demise at our hands. Nor was his companion: GalgannFirehammer.

On the work bench where these dwarves were potting was a book that explained how to open the locked door to a secret chamber using the Staff of Prehistoria and the Gni’kiv Medallion which together delivered the magic necessary to get to this forbidden place. This was the only clue we needed to force our way into that locked room to discover its secrets. Much to our surprise, one of the secrets was that the room was guarded by a huge Titan woman named Ironaya who came at us like a banshee. After a prolonged battle we were able to defeat her with sustaining too much damage ourselves.

Once inside, we discovered several pieces of fine armor, which we divided amongst ourselves and then proceed to the next section of the dungeon. In the back of our minds was the sheer size of Ironaya, we couldn’t help but think that we were on the brink of discovering something terrible and dangerous. But that is what we were there for after all.

After taking a moment to replenish our strength we pressed on. For the next 2000 feetwe were fighting our way through wave after wave of nasty cave-dwelling bats and scorpions, identified locally as scorpids. These beasts could be easily defeated by a group of adventures of our size and experience if it were for the sheer number of attackers. Their massive zerg techniques meant we had to carefully and completely annihilate them before we moved up, which slowed our progress considerably.

Eventually we made our way into the next phase of the ancient ruins, where we had to contend with small groups of troggs, many of which practiced a rare form of rudimentary shaman magic. For the most part this magic was ineffective and the troggs were easily dispatched. However, the fierceness with which they fought to keep us out of the next area filled us with a strange sense of foreboding. Something was deep in the bowels of this place and we were getting close to discovering what it was.

And then we came upon it. We opened these huge three story tall doors to discover a very ominous set of statues residing in a circular room. A room or two back we had witnessed a similar situation, only on a much smaller scale. In the center of each of these rooms was an altar. Touching this altar in the previous smaller room reanimated the stone statues, which attacked us in waves. These creatures were not alive in the true sense of the word, but they were dangerous.

However, this large room had a very significant difference. In the center of the room was a 60 foot tall statue of Archaeda  — they idea of fighting him in a reanimated state sent a shiver down our collective spines. Had we bitten off more than we could chew?

But we could not turn back, we were committed to finish what we started. We approached the altar and touched it. Archaeda came alive and started to curse our existence; he attacked and we defended ourselves. Sensing our combined power was a threat, he began to annimate the other statues in the room. We were quickly overwhelmed by the sheer number of enemies and defeated.

Fortunately, I had considered that possibility and had made arrangements with Myrlin to place his soul in my trust. With the soulstone in place, Myrlin was able to return from the next dimension and then resurrect us all from our pending death transformations. This arrangement gave us time to consider our options.

We decided to attack Archaeda with a flanking attack. We would spread out so that he could concentrate his wrath at one area. He would have to direct his attacks at each one of us and he would have to control all of his minions closely to make them most effective. If his minions were left to their own devices, many would become confused and ineffective.

The plan was brilliant in its simplicity and in its effectiveness. We defeated Archaeda during the second encounter, but it was close — I was actually the only one left standing at the end. But that was enough, and after some more resurrections we were granted access to the main vault. It was full of gold, platinum discs, and other valuable armor and weapons.

The discs actually lead us to an apparition that explained the origin of troggs and dwarves and gave us an opportunity for more adventures. We also discovered a necklace that would require an expert appraiser to determine its value. I think the Orc salvage company I heard about in Orgrimmar should be able to help.