The expansion is just a few short days away, and with it comes a new set of dungeons for us to explore. At our usual Friday and Saturday 7:00 PM raid time, we will be visiting Utgarde Keep and the Nexus!

These are the first two 5-man dungeons that players will visit in the Wrath of the Lich King. We will divide up in as many 5-man groups as possible and conquer these relatively simple dungeons for some new phat loots.

With less than a few weeks before release, WoW Vault and Sprawl's Scrawl present guest writer JaconKin with his extensive in-depth preview of what you will be facing out in Northrend come November 13th. This special edition issue features numerous screenshots and an unique preview of what is to come. Don't miss it!

Brewfest runs into October 4th so you have all week to try for the exclusive Brewfest Kodo mount shown below. Up until now, we have had two drop for Z Guild. Vione and Kaaldin are the first two lucky winners.

We will continue to gather around 6 PM daily to get everyone their epic trinkets and to take shots for the Kodo mount. Ideally we need at least a tank, healer and two dpsers, but the more the merrier!

Our very own Sprawl spent the last week beta testing Warhammer: Age of Reckoning. If you are interested in trying out Mythic's latest MMO, be sure to check out this three part article that covers Sprawl's adventures and experiences in the Warhammer universe.

• Warhammer from a Warcraft Perspective
• Warhammer from a Warcraft Perspective, Day 2
• Warhammer from a Warcraft Perspective, Final Day

Over the summer, Z Guild has been struggling hard with 25-man raiding. While we did manage to down our first Tier 6 boss last month, an accomplishment we should all be proud of, attendance has been spotty at best. As we move closer to the expansion pack, which is a mere 8-10 weeks away, attendance continues to get worse. We have attempted to compensate by recruiting new players to fill the roles we are missing, but it has been nothing more than a Band-Aid fix as people continue to get burnt out in regards to raiding.

The Guildmasters and Officers of Z Guild find themselves in a position where they must decide to either ramp up recruitment, or decide to take a different path. Our guild has always been a "Friends and Family" guild where every new member knows a current member in real life. It has always pained me that we have been recruiting these last few months, despite picking up a few worthy additions to the team. So do we continue recruiting or do we address the fact that our current player base just isn't interested in raiding 25-mans at this time?

As such, we have decided to cease 25-man raiding until the expansion. This wasn't an easy decision to make as many of us had plans to be at Illidan before Wrath of the Lich King is released. However, each week is merely an exercise in futility as we cancel the scheduled 25-man raid. On top of this, the 10 bonus points awarded for a cancelled raid has really skewed our point system providing little incentive for a new player to join our raiding team this late in the game.

1. There will be no more scheduled 25-man raids until the release of the expansion.
2. Friday 6-9 and Saturday 6-9 will be reserved for Karazhan and Zul'Aman runs. If attendance is such either those nights that we have 25 players, we can and will attempt a 25-man instance.
3. We will use a pure rolling system until the expansion. We will continue to take into account mains vs. alts.
4. The point system will be frozen and "paid out".

The point system payout is calculated as follows. First we will sell all the items in the bank that was used for or acquired by raiding (my discretion). Items will first be offered to the guild at half price, and then sold on the auction house. 75% of the gold in the bank will be divided up proportional to CURRENTLY ACTIVE point holders. For example, if there were 5000 total points when you add up every current raider's pool, and I have 300 points, I would get 6% of the gold being paid out. The actual payout will occur at the end of this month.

I would like to stress that this is not the end of Z Guild. We have been around since 1994, well before raiding was even conceived. However, we realize that some of you joined the guild to raid. We would like to offer you a home here at Z Guild, but we understand should you choose to move on. While disappointment is expected, we hope each and every one of our friends understands this decision. No one is quitting WoW, but this time before the expansion pack is typically slow and unpredictable. Think of it as a small break before we get back to "the grind". I personally look forward to leading you all into Naxxramas and beyond.

On Friday, August 15th, we were short the required raiders to visit our typical 25-man instances, so we decided to visit a classic... Molten Core!

For the second time since the release of the expansion, we one-shotted every boss in Ragnaro's domain. It was pretty close though, we wiped on a 10 pull of Corehounds and almost lost against Baron Geddon. We managed though, being overpowered and such.

On Sunday, August 17, at noon, we spammed the heck out of guild chat and played an hour of trivia. We tried a pool of general questions, but they were too wack, so we defaulted back to our typically selection of WoW-based trivia questions.

Our former reigning champion, Telaria, aka Ithximir, was defeated by the returning warlock Dandrent by a single point! Over 910 gold in prize money was awarded to participates.

Every so often, we take over guild chat to play a little trivia. The idea is simple. Trivia questions are asked on guild chat. The first one with the correct answer wins 10 gold, which will immediately be mailed to them. The questions are from a huge pool of categories and stolen off the Internet.

Trivia-for-gold night is this Sunday, August 17th, at Noon PST / 3 PM EST, and it will last exactly one hour. Drop in anytime during this hour for your chance to win. Access to guild chat is the only requirement to play.

On Friday, we one-shotted Rage Winterchill in Mount Hyjal, but we struggled on Anetheron for the rest of the night. We managed to get him down by the end of our 3-hour raid, setting the stage for Saturday.

We returned on Saturday as expected, and one-shotted Kaz'rogal quite flawlessly. Then on our second attempt for the night, we dropped Azgalor for Z Guild's first Tier 6!

For those that are in the dark, Naxxramas is planned as the first raid dungeon in the Wrath of the Lich King expansion. They are retuning the encounters down from their original 40-man size for smaller raid groups of 10 and 25-man sizes.

On Friday, August 22nd, Z Guild will return to this classic WoW dungeon to relive the excitement, and get a little taste of things to come. There is a short attunment process, that is relatively simple. Be sure to read this thread for more information.

Sprawl is back with another look at the upcoming Wrath of the Lich King expansion right from the beta servers. This week, we take a look at the Nexus, one of the first dungeons players will encounter in Northrend.

This issue of Sprawl's Scrawl includes screenshots and basic strategies for each of the major encounters. It also includes complete video footage of each of four bosses!

Uh oh, Sprawl has sworn his soul to the Lich King in Blizzard's new expansion. Our favorite Rogue turned Death Knight Initiate prepares to slaughter and burn the settlement of Havenshire in a grand scheme to destroy the Scarlet stronghold of New Avalon all in His name.

Read part one of this multi-part Sprawl's Scrawl fan fiction series based upon the starter quests of the Death Knight in World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King: In Service of His Darkness, Part 1.