This last year has been an amazing one for the Agony team. As many of you know the Agony team has been together for 7 years, and with 2007 now upon us, another year of MMO slaughter awaits.

This year the leadership of Agony (that's me) got married in real life to an amazing woman. She has been a wonderful addition to my life and I honestly don't know where I would be today without her... so to my darling wife Michelle who many of you know as Arlie, thank you for being you.



I want to take a moment to also thank my leadership team. Stromm, Agbar, RD, Monox, and Arlie. You folks have been integral in the success of this guild this past year, so thank you.



This year Agony sustained significant changes. We made the plunge to a brand new server and resumed our quest for being hardcore in an attempt to relive many of the great days we had in EverQuest. Ysera is our new home, and in half a year we've accomplished killing more content than many guilds do their entire lifetime.

There is of course one particular creature I want to throw a huge FU out to and that's Firemaw. This son of a bitch gave us more problems than any other mob we've encountered. The sad part is, he's not even a hard mob, but we just had severe mental block when it came to fighting him. Ysera however changed the attitude of the guild, and when we went head to head with him he was trivialized our first pass through. A lesson to all... attitude and drive goes a long way in conquering content...



The jump to Ysera also opened new doors for Agony. Content we had very little chance at ever encountering on our old server due to over-population was available. So, of course ... we plowed that down too...


The gates of Ahn'Qiral were prematurely wrecked on our server by the painful thing everyone knows as server transfers. On the verge of opening the gates as a joint effort with an Alliance guild Empyrean... our gates were jacked open 2 hours before server reset by a transfer with a scepter. So not only did our guild, but every other player on our realm got screwed out of the world event that only happens once per server. Such is life... we went into AQ anyways and plowed that content too, and then the joy known as Naxxramas opened up.



Now we had a choice... knowing that The Burning Crusade was only a few months away we had to decide. Do we spend time clearing content that's been beaten for months (AQ), or do we take the plunge, undergeared, and see if we can conquer Naxxramas. We chose Naxxramas, and I'm thankful we did. Naxxramas has proven to be by far some of the most in-game fun we as a guild have ever had. The content is well tuned, very difficult, and just downright creative.

Hey Stromm... what are Frozen runes for?



Anyways... this year was also filled with a bunch of PvP for Agony. During the holidays this year we decided to raid Stormwind after the DK citizen changes. We were in for a rude awakening when hundreds upon hundreds of guards spawned and whooped the snot out of our guild. However, we bounced back, recovered our bodies and plowed deep into Stormwind. We eventually took over the tram area and crushed every bit of Alliance that stepped foot inside, a truely fun experience. Thanks to all the Alliance who came over to play.



This year was also filled with lots of fun server lag and bugs. The image below depicts what happens when one person decides "Oh shit I have aggro, I'm going to run to zone in!" .. yah, well needless to say practically the entire zone chain aggro'd off of the bugs warping around through the ceiling and provided almost a solid hour of entertainment and corpses. Oh, yah ... SKWISHY DOWN! We also saw some pretty funny shit happen in Naxxramas. One evening the server had a massive spike and our entire guild was dead, but the server hadn't quite registered it and so we were able to walk around freely in Naxxramas as ghosts, but on peoples screens it looked like corpses sliding across the ground. Hysterical to say the least. We also were subjected to a bugged Ragnaros, where he popped up from the lava but wouldn't take any damage... he could of course deal damage, but couldn't receive any. That was a nice hour long waste of time.



Overall 2006 was fantastic... the team pulled together stronger than ever, and our goals and objectives were clearly laid out. We had a blast, and really enjoy our new server and the community around us.

Agony's 2006 annual BBQ went off without a hitch as well. Our biggest turn out in guild history with over 40 people in attendance. My new house was broken in properly with dozens of people battling in the pool, throwing crap at each other, and just having a good time. No Agony BBQ would be complete without that "one" unique experience for the party that everyone remembers... and this year was a Guitar Hero mini-tournament... we're not really sure how we went from a drunken pool party to playing a video game, but it was a shitload of fun... unfortunately we had no puking Durger this year... but there's always next year!

I want to extend a huge thanks to everyone on the Agony team. This year you guys have gone from good to great, you had the right attitude and drive and it showed. Thanks for letting me continue to drive this fast moving train. Let's hope that 2007 brings us as much fun as 2006 has.

Lastly... I want to say that no animals were hurt during the filming .. er screenshot process... com'ere little cow... ooooh yah, you like that don't you baby?

-V