NCSoft has scheduled yet another Double XP Weekend* for Aion, and fan reaction has noticeably dimmed from “Oh yeah!” to “meh”.

Recall last December when fans celebrated the first Double XP Weekend as a great solution to the grueling leveling grind since it doubled the progression gained from killing monsters, crafting and gathering. But with more and more Daevas reaching max level, the bonus xp has lost its appeal.

Instead of a Double XP Weekend, some Aion gamers proposed three alternatives:

Double Abyss Point weekend. This is one of the more popular choices should NCSoft branch out its bonus weekend set-up. Faster Abyss Point gains result in three-fold benefits: faster rank climbs, larger contributions to Legions, and quicker accumulation of Abyss gear.

1 Kinah Soul Heal weekend. The game implemented the first reduced soul healing weekend last month and became a hit among Daevas who no longer had to shell out thousands of Kinah.

“Double” drop rate weekend. This one’s self-explanatory but a more accurate name for this would be higher drop rate weekend. More loot = happy people. And if naysayers predict this will just lead to a “welfare epics situation” (like in World of Warcraft) well I’d say they quit being a snobby Grinch. No one’s asking for free DP loot–just a couple of hours of sanity from mob grinding.

It would be great to have a bi-monthly rotation covering these perks, but then again it’s just the greedy me talking. How about you guys, would you warm up to a set calendar schedule for different “bonus” weekends?

*Aion’s Double XP Weekend starts 8pm Apr 23 (Fri) and ends 8am Apr 26 (Mon), both on server time.

Top raiding guild Paragon is showing the rest of the World of Warcraft how to defeat the mighty Lich King in heroic 25-man mode by releasing a three-part, three-POV video and full combat logs. (For now, the only ones exempt from browsing through both are the guild of EU Nazjatar who garnered the second world kill after Paragon).

Raiding guilds preparing for what is arguably the most difficult fight in the Wrath of the Lich King expansion should pick up a pointer—or twenty—while watching the coordinated kill. Paragon chose a mash-up of reels from three members: a combat rogue, a restoration shaman and a holy priest.

Though the outcome is inevitable, it’s hard not to get caught up with the excitement caught on Finnish vent. All three videos are even available via torrent download at the official Paragon website for scheduled viewing or upload.

The guild has also released the combat logs of their successful kill at WoWMeterOnline. Those insecure about their raiding e-p33ns should proceed with caution: the DPS charts for the fight are nothing short of amazing.

The “low end” for DPS breaks at 7,400 and tops at 10,000 with an equivalent 9 million total damage done. Click on the individual bars per class (no mage though) to study their rotation tactics, and maybe you could be that much closer to gaining The Light of Dawn achievement and title yourself.

The zhevra mount, both adored and reviled due to its semblance to a fanciful unicorn, is galloping to retirement after Blizzard Poster Bashiok announced a new prize mount for the World of Warcraft’s recruit-a-friend program. There’s no shoot-to-kill order though so current owners can keep their zhevras as a souvenir.

Madagascar no longer exports these horned beauties

In place of the zhevra, Blizzard is giving away the more scrap metal X-53 Touring Rocket. It’s a technical upgrade since it can now seat two toons (for traveling together) and scales to the highest mount skill of the owner, which means up to 310% flying speed if you have a 310% speed mount. The scaling flight speed of X-53 can quicken your travel time across Outland and Northrend as well as in revamped Azeroth when the upcoming Cataclysm expansion allows flight in the old world.

Strap on your seat belts, this one's a wild shark

Speculative trivia: We think the X-53 Touring Rocket mount was named after a modified F/A-18 Hornet (now designated as X-53) used for flight technology research under Boeing and Air Force. Spew out this trivia gem in guild chat whenever a friend trashes your X-53, and we promise a renewed respect for your hunk-o’-metal mount.

Aside from the reward change to X-53 mounts, the recruit-a-friend program in WoW remains the same. It still gives veterans and their recruits linking privileges that help them level up and adventure together. Both veteran and recruit can summon each other to each other’s location–beat that warlocks!–and awards triple experience up to level 60. Of course the bonus xp won’t register if you’re just one-shotting gray mobs at the starting levels.

X-53 will be available anytime soon, so if you want to get your hands on it, hijack a friend to become the next WoW addict. And don’t forget to install seat belts.

Seems like a certain World of Warcraft guild is living up to its lofty name. Paragon, an all-Finnish guild in Lightning’s Blade (EU), has clinched the impressive world first by downing the Lich King in 25-man heroic mode after “more than 170 tries” just a few days ago.

The encounter was heroic all right, compared to other bosses in Icecrown Citadel, some of which only took a single attempt to finish. The hard work paid off handsomely though with awesome loots as seen in this kill shot from Paragon’s Azizrael.

Funny this was how the most frequently asked question wasn’t about the fight strats. It was “Who got Invincible?”

Deathly majestic, that’s what I would call Arthas’ beloved horse now carrying his new master, the warlock Tsukky.

With this 25-man heroic achievement accomplished, Paragon will probably take a well-deserved break until the next raid dungeon opens up. Blizzard has said this will be the Assault on the Ruby Sanctum with a tentative release for Patch 3.3.5 or just before Cataclysm.

Maybe then, rival guild Ensidia will have recovered from their controversial exploit ban and challenge the now-dominating EU guild for future world firsts. (And the match up is heating up as we speak.)