anniversary Two Years of Icy Veins!

[Damien 1,514]

Two years ago on this day, Vlad and I launched Icy Veins. You can go to http://old.icy-veins.com to see the site exactly how it was on the day of the launch. At the time, we had only 1 raid encounter guide (Chimaeron) and 3 class guides (Fire Mage, Frost Mage, and Holy Paladin). It probably doesn't seem much to those who recently started coming to our website, but back then, putting these guides together felt like a lot of work. Anyway, we kept working and over a year later, we had a complete offering of class and encounter guides (plus a few other goodies, like transmog and event guides). Then Mists of Pandaria hit the shelves, and our 5.0.4 class guides got heavily linked on MMO-Champion, which is when most our of current visitors discovered us.

Thanks to this exposure, our traffic increased enough that we now both make a modest living off the website. This is great news for us because our efforts have finally paid off. We've been working full time on the website since day 1, so we took a huge gamble, as we could have both probably had successful careers in our respective fields. It's been difficult financially for the both of us, but those days now seem to be behind us. This is also great news for you, our readers, because it means that we will be able to keep working on the website for the foreseeable future, and we have many plans to make Icy Veins an even better resource.

This 2-year journey hasn't always been a pleasure cruise and there have been a few hard moments, like when our Dragon Soul encounter guides were not as successful (traffic-wise) as we had anticipated them to be, or when Diablo 3 was released and our traffic was divided by 2 over night. Fortunately, our work has always been very positively received, and whenever we were going through a bit of a crisis, there would always be a message in our mailbox to praise our work, and it would make us confident again, ready to get back to work.

So, many thanks to everyone who has supported us over the past 2 years, your kind words never went unnoticed (be sure of that). There are people that we would like to thank especially, because they really helped us a lot:

• our respective wives for putting up with our hobby-turned-main-occupation;
• Michael Oglesby, for helping us (originally in his spare time) with design work and usability issues;
• Zagam, our Warlock moderator, who is doing a terrific job with his Warlock section;
• Boubouille and Chaud from MMO-Champion for pushing our website into a different category when MoP was released and for the continued support since then;
• the Ask Mr. Robot team, and Vee in particular, for the all interesting discussions on stat weights/priorities and for the advice regarding advertising solutions for our website;
• all the community team at Blizzard, especially Zahrym and Nethaera, for noticing our work and often promoting it, and for sending us those awesome prizes for our Christmas contest;
• the development team of Simulation Craft for making such a wonderful and useful tool.

[Zagam 1,982]

Always glad to be of service to those who designed a high-class, well-thoughtout and endorsed website that is often referred to as the go-to place for the best information! The fruits of your labors are well-deserved! Don't forget to thank yourselves for having the dedication, patience, and courage to pursue what you enjoy and love!

[JvChequer 43]

I'm really impressed how IV turn into one of the greatest websites about WOW in only 2 years.

Gratz for all the work, for all the effort put on it and for the whole community you guys made.

And without this site and Zagam, I would not be half of the player I'm today.

[ragebarr 153]

Cheers! And you might say your Dragon Soul guides were not quite as expected traffic wise, but I perfectly remember that it is when my guild was stuck on H-Hagara that I discovered this *awesome* website. Ever since then, it's been my number one reference for anything strategy or class-related for WoW. (Hell, even Zagam got virtual fans right now, my team's warlock can almost never stop being in awe and telling me how Zagam helped him improve through these forums). Hopefully one day we can get more class forums as active as the warlock's one (Especially the warrior one :P ).

Once again, thank you to Vlad and Damien, and all the forums posters who make this community one of the best in all WoW :)

Keep up the good work, and I raise my glass (well, beer bottle at the moment) to the continued success of Icy-Veins!

-Rage

[RunicLovePotion 9]

Just to mention, I love Icy-veins and I am not in a exactly well know place. I live in Brazil, in the middle of the Amazon Rainforest (not as wild as you might think) and I always make sure that everyone, friends or foes, are reading the icy-veins guides for the sake of a good DPS.

[Krazyito 521]

Wow. I remember the site looking similar to that when I first found it. I first found this site from my Mage friend back in T12, but I remember vaguely coming across that old site once before. I'm pretty sure my friend read your guides and learned about all the magey goodness from your original guides (unfortunately he does not play any more).

I know I got the most active during Dragon Soul by suggesting improvements via facebook comments. I always loved the idea of having well thought out guides in one area and was determined to help out in anyway I would to provide helpful information as I did the content.

Admittedly, I kinda fell away from the website at the end of Dragon Soul because we finished clearing content and I had nothing to add. When I first heard about the forums, I made an account, but was not very active at all since it was just another website for me to check (since I was lazy I didn't want to do it, heh) But as MoP came around and I saw that you were making new guides I got into the forums and started doing the best I could to suggest information and came to love checking the forums for more interesting information.

You guys have done a superb job with this website and almost always improve upon suggestions given to you. You deserve it and I hope it keeps getting better.

[Vladamyr 169]

I had been using your site since August of 2011 for the mage guides, October of 2011 is when I started recommending your raid guides to my guild. Love the site and the community, and I hope it keeps growing. Thank you Vlad and Damien!

[Sajakain 104]

Icy-Veins is, in my opinion, the premier site for class and raiding guides. If anyone asks where to go for information on these topics I always tell them "Icy Veins". (I've actually had debates haha).

Great site, guys. Keep up the awesome work and I look forward to seeing where this site goes in the years to come.

- Sajakain, [uS]-Fenris

<End Game Theory>

[Daowen 27]

The work you did from day 1 on the old Icy-Veins up to now and future is amazing. Always have been using your website for info/guides and everything. And like other said, always directing people here, as in my opinion it's the best and most mature place to go to if you need Wow info.

It's good to hear you can make a living out it, and i hope you guys keep continuing the good work you do :)

Big thanks to everyone involved and making this the best place

[benjam1997 18]

gz on the 2 years

[Edina 2]

Icy Veins is my site of reference for several months now.

I can't keep recommending it, event to non english readers/speakers.

Félicitations !

Continuez encore longtemps comme ça..

[Noel 2]

I have finally decided to create an account just to tell everyone how wonderful this website is and to say congratulations to Icy Veins (and also because I realized i can't post as a guest anymore). Cheers!

[Damien 1,514]

I have finally decided to create an account just to tell everyone how wonderful this website is and to say congratulations to Icy Veins (and also because I realized i can't post as a guest anymore). Cheers!

Thank you for your kind words :) Guest posting was only ever possible in the comment section (and it still is :P)

[Owewa 3]

I started WoW on the first day of retail 2004 when nobody knew anything and the web was a curiosity to most. Scouring the web for info became a part of playing WoW when one of the first big guilds published a guide for killing Core Hounds in MC.

I found a link to Icy Veins at Elitist Jerks when I searched for Panderia warlock info in September 2012. In the present galaxy of fansites and detailed videos, Icy Veins and AskMrRobot are my home base, and I am happy to donate to both.

In addition to their knowledge bases, these sites present user interfaces that are original and colorful, and always work properly. Such a wonderful gift to the WoW community.

Spangles warrior tank

Owewa destro lock

Tokiko shadowpriest

Pacodelucia frost DK

Edited March 27, 2013 by Spangles

[Damien 1,514]

I started WoW on the first day of retail 2004 when nobody knew anything and the web was a curiosity to most. Scouring the web for info became a part of playing WoW when one of the first big guilds published a guide for killing Core Hounds in MC.

I found a link to Icy Veins at Elitist Jerks when I searched for Panderia warlock info in September 2012. In the present galaxy of fansites and detailed videos, Icy Veins and AskMrRobot are my home base, and I am happy to donate to both.

In addition to their knowledge bases, these sites present user interfaces that are original and colorful, and always work properly. Such a wonderful gift to the WoW community.

Spangles warrior tank

Owewa destro lock

Tokiko shadowpriest

Pacodelucia frost DK

That's very nice of you, thank you :)

[Peelyon 416]

Think you guys have come really far, and the recognition you have got from various sources is well deserved!

As always keep up the good work!

[Krazyito 521]

I remember a time long ago when Damien and Vlad had time to make detailed guides for each role. That was one reason I loved this site. Though I read the raid leader PoV regardless since I want to make sure I know what others are doing in the raid in case I have to pick it up or something.

I'm sure you guys are always busy and have many ideas that you want to get out but just not enough time in the day to do it.

Take your time, and do it right and awesome as always.

[Damien 1,514]

I remember a time long ago when Damien and Vlad had time to make detailed guides for each role. That was one reason I loved this site. Though I read the raid leader PoV regardless since I want to make sure I know what others are doing in the raid in case I have to pick it up or something.

I'm sure you guys are always busy and have many ideas that you want to get out but just not enough time in the day to do it.

Take your time, and do it right and awesome as always.

Thanks :) The reason we stopped doing those perspective guides is lack of time and also lack of interest from our readers. Raid guides already don't bring many visitors, compared to transmogrification and class guides, but perspective guides bring about 10 times less, so that just wasn't worth the trouble of maintaining them (and that became even less after Blizzard added the Encounter Journal). That's why we started doing those class-specific threads.