Yes folks, that’s a freakin’ undead riding a freakin’ raptor riding a freakin’ rocket shark with freakin’ lasers. Click the image above to embiggen and get yourself a new wallpaper.

I’m done – that’s the most epic thing I think I can possibly see.

And it all came out of a forum thread where some random person started whining about the Maelstrom not being “epic” enough for them in the Cataclysm beta. The poster complained:

What I meant was, I thought Deathwing was supposed to have bursted through the crust on Eastern Kingdoms. Then it turns out he came out through the Maelstrom?
I would expect the Maelstrom to be a far more epic place than it is currently, at the very least significantly larger than what it is. I mean–you have to consider it’s large enough to score its own spot on every map of Azeroth….
Not to mention…flying into the Maelstrom…really?…..I mean…….
*facepalm*..

He actually managed to get a blue post about this from Valnoth, a Lead World Designer at Blizzard working on the changes coming to Azeroth, who said this:

Maybe I missed the memo on levels of “epicosity” or something, but I’m pretty sure the Maelstrom is a CLASS 10 epic zone. Though I guess it is missing sharks with laser beams patrolling the waters and Arthur Fonzarelli jumping across it with water skis. And dinosaurs.

What’s beautiful about this is that he could have just left it there. But no, oh no – he didn’t. He decided to take it up a notch, and came back later with this gem:

After reading this post I called for a meeting with TOP TOP MEN (that’s two tops) in order to figure out a solution to the problem at hand. Frankly, I think we hit a home run. The next 4.0 build (or the one after) should have a Maelstrom that’s between 10 – 50x more epic than what currently exists.

Buckle yourselves into your computer chairs or face being blown away!

That’s right – the result is what you have above. The collaboration between these fine developers and designers, some TOP TOP MEN (damn right) who truly know what is and is not epic. And that, my friends, is epic.

Thanks to the World of Warcraft Livejournal Community for the scoop! ….and the new wallpaper.