GU Comics by: Woody Hearn

I logged in after the most recent WoW patch, to find several holiday "changes" had been made to the game. The bank, and several other buildings in Stormwind had Christmas lights hanging in them. And sure enough, there was a large Christmas tree inside the bank itself.

I inquired about it in Guild Chat only to find out that what I was seeing was just the tip of the proverbial iceberg. Claims that IronForge had devolved into one large snowball fight immediately caught my attention.

A minute later, I found the goblin vendors in Stormwind that were selling holiday specific goodies, including snowballs. I spent the next ten minutes embroiled in a snowball fight in and around the Stormwind bank.

After I'd wasted a couple of silver on snowballs, I grabbed a quest from the Christmas Goblins to go talk to "Greatfather Winter" in Iron Forge, who is basically the Dwarven equivalent of a Mall Santa.

I got plastered with snowballs while Mr.Faux Santa gave me a quest for cookies and milk. Apparently there were all manner of new holiday recipes, patterns, plans, schematics, and quests. For the engineers, there a schematic for building a snowball making machine. And for the collectors of interesting game oddities, one of the high level Holiday Quests, gives you a clicky item that turns you into a snowman.

Anyway, having seen Bad Santa, I figured it was quite possible that Mr.Faux Santa was probably just some dirty ol' bum who was trying to drum up the scratch to get his next bottle of cheap rum. And that idea spawned Today's Comic. Sure, I know it's not very full of "holiday cheer", hell it borders on downright cynicism... but I thought it was pretty funny at the very least.

And while I'm at it, I'd like to say thanks to Pallas of the Rubby Riders on Doomhammer. I needed a model for the comic, and that's who's playing opposite Greatfather Sitonmylap.

So, here's a bucket of kudos for Blizzard. All MMOs have their holiday festivities, but this is definately the elaborate implementation I've ever seen. And, I for one, enjoyed the crap out of it.

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