Horst Pechschwinge is 17 years old – Happy Birthday, WoW Patch 1.6

On July 12th and 13th, 2005, a new era was heralded in World of Warcraft. Until then, the Molten Core was still the ultimate for raid-enthusiastic fans, but with WoW Patch 1.6 a whole new abyss opened up for clever and battle-tested adventurers: the Blackwing Lair. A.k.a. Blackwing Lair. Aka business administration. And for some, even Blackwing Aerie. Who was this Horst? Well, a brand new raid with tough and imaginative challenges. Do you remember your first trip to Blackrock Heights? I’ll take you on a little nostalgic tour and maybe you’d like to share your memories of your first visit to Papa Lord Viktor Nefarian and Co.

/w Gz to level 60, are you coming to business with us?

I remember it exactly like it was yesterday (and it wasn’t). In the summer of 2005 I had just decided to level up a character in WoW with which I might have a chance of getting into one of the alliance raid guilds on my server. I didn’t have a clue about raids, all the trimmings, the dangers, the challenges and the patience required in 40-man raids back then. But I wanted to do more than just play dungeons, so I decided to level a priest because priests were always wanted in my guild.

When I then put the long ordeal up to level 60 behind me and in the guild chat on the raid evening rather without ulterior motives, but with a lot of enthusiasm “Ding!” wrote, I got a message from our guild leader just a split second later. Did I want to do business administration? I was flattered. Our guild struggled through Molten Core at times, barely setting foot in Blackwing Lair.

Crazy! To crazy?

At the same time, I also wondered if our GM was insane. On the way to the max level, I had wisely collected a few items that would help me as a healer. But I was also the priest with whom you could just about complete a run through Strat – because I was so blind and didn’t check that I could buy a skill like “Big Heal” from the class trainer. Because sorry ey, but the skills were pretty expensive!

I was flattered. I wanted to go to business administration. But I didn’t want to spoil it for anyone. With a guilty conscience weighing as much as five tons, I allowed myself to jet into Blackrock. My guild had been wiping Razorgore for an hour, and compared to most other MC fights, the fight was an extreme step up in terms of complexity – orb control, party distribution in niches, extreme area damage… I held me quietly in the background, just trying not to get killed quite as often. That was so hectic. But also absolutely exciting. My eyes sparkled. I understood: Raids were exactly my thing.