Death Knights and everyone else, professions easier

Just in case you were hoping that due to Inscription or any other of the huge profession changes coming in Wrath of the Lich King, you'd get another expansion slot, Bornakk confirms that you will not -- despite all the changes to professions, the way that characters choose them will not change.

But Kevin G (who kindly sent us this tip -- thanks!) brings up another interesting profession topic -- just how are Death Knights going to deal with leveling up their professions? Surely, since Blizzard doesn't want them running around level 1 areas like noobs, they wouldn't actually have to level up from the beginning, would they? As hilarious as the thought of a black armorclad bringer of devastation chasing wolves around Elwynn for their leather is, it's probably a good bet that Blizzard will avoid that scenario.

But how? We have no idea yet. We do know that Blizzard wants to make things easier for people leveling professions all the way up (especially from the higher levels), so maybe there'll be a plan in place that Death Knights can get in on (maybe a quest to do, or a simple charge of a few hundred gold, since that's probably what it would cost to just buy the lower level stuff off the AH). Either way, hopefully we'll see a solution that's both easy on Death Knights and fair to characters who've leveled it up the hard way.

Wotlk: New tier gear video

Fresh from the alpha leaks that have been coming our way is a new video posted on Vimeo that shows new Wrath of the Lich King gear for Hunters, Mages, Priests, Rogues, and Warlocks. We don't know what tier level (ie: 7.5, 8, 9) this gear is for, but we do know that it fits the overall model of previous tier gear.


When you watch the video you'll notice that not everything is done yet. Obviously, this is because the game is still in alpha. And remember that these models could be completely thrown out and replaced with something different. My personal favorite is the rogue gear.

Give it a watch and get yourself some of these juicy alpha leaks!




Note:1. Blizzard has only added in Priest, Warlock, Mage, Rogue & Hunter Tier Sets.
2. They are under the file names of (example) Helm_Robe_Priest_G
(G=Tier, A=Prophecy, B=Trans, C=Faith, etc)
3. Mage helm does NOT work yet.
4. I apologize for the missing particle textures on Hunter helm & shoulders.
5. I apologize for the crappy quality, it would have been much better but Sony Vegas decided to give me errors about the video size.
6. Please enjoy.

The Wrath Alpha is not open to the public

We've mentioned this already, but let's reiterate something: Though the Wrath Alpha client is floating around out there, be very very careful about what you download or try to access. The Alpha servers are not for you, and attempting to download the client isn't wise. My recommendation is simply to not do it.

We all know how many accounts have been stolen due to keyloggers hidden in links, ads, and other things. Keep that in mind before you click on a download link. A dirty .exe with a filename disguised to look like a Blizzard downloader for the Alpha client is out there. There are probably more than one. Nobody wants to lose their account, and we don't want you to lose yours, either.

Music from the Wrath of the Lich King login screen

Allegedly, this is the music that you'll hear at the Wrath of the Lich King log-in screen. I love it! It achieves just the right blend between savage and graceful, haunting and heroic, and of course it contains the main WoW motif that we all have come to know and hum at inappropriate times (or is that just me?). I've seen this file in a couple places now, and if it is fake, it's extremely well-done. Kudos to Blizzard, assuming it's not fake; this is another piece in a long line of great atmospheric music.

Blizz updates Death Knight site

They may be slower than all the fan sites to release info, but when they do put up pages, my do they make them pretty. Blizzard has updated their official Wrath of the Lich King page with some more information on the Death Knight class, including discussion of their class role and some sketches of their capabilities. This is nothing we haven't already seen, from that time a week or so ago when every site except us got invited to Blizzard HQ a few weeks back, but if you missed that, here's the highlights:

All you need to be able to create a DK is to have a character of level 55. This allows you to create one DK per realm, on any realm(s) you choose. If you're on a PvP realm, the DK must be the same faction that you're already playing.

DKs start at level 55, and can be made in any race you want (subject to PvP realm faction restrictions).

The DK can tank for 5-mans and raids; Blizz claims that "his or her damage output while tanking will be respectable."

DKs can also spec for DPS, using both melee and magic.

Like every other class, they have three talent trees. Each tree has an associated presence -- presences are like auras that only affect the DK; they give a buff, and you can only have one on at a time, but they don't limit ability choice like warrior stances.

Blood: the DPS tree. Blood Presence increases DPS by a percentage.

Frost: the tanking tree. Frost Presence increases threat and raises damage mitigation by a percentage.

Unholy: the grab-bag/PvP tree. Covers diseases and summons, like the DK's ability to raise ghouls. Unholy Presence increases attack speed and, allegedly, lowers GCD.

The DK runs on a unique ability system. He has six runes that he can inscribe into his weapon, in any chosen combination of Blood, Frost, and Unholy. Many abilities have a rune cost, which deactives the given runes. They refresh after a cooldown period.

Using runes builds Runic Power, which is similar to a warrior's rage, and decays over time. Many abilities draw on Runic Power to function, or are enhanced by the amount of Runic Power available.

The DK can summon various creatures. Ghouls can be raised from the corpses of mobs and players, and if you make a friendly player into a ghoul, that player can choose to control the ghoul and use its skills. The DK can also raise an Army of the Dead, which sounds like a swarm of weak, uncontrollable creatures. Finally, DKs come with the ability to summon a regular-speed deathcharger, with a quest for the epic version available later.
The only information there that I don't remember from before is that Unholy Presence lowers the GCD, and that the summoned mount is a deathcharger. Hopefully, it looks something like the deathcharger, or else many frustrated DKs are going to be running Strat a lot. Also, although we've seen the armor set pictured on leak sites, this is the first official confirmation we have of it. I like the style, no question about it, even if he does look like a walrus man.

Druid tanking is up in Wrath

In the recent explosion of news about Wrath of the Lich King, Ten Ton Hammer had an interview with Jeff Kaplan and Tom Chilton, where they asked some solid questions on why exactly we needed another tanking class.

To quote the Ten Ton Hammer interview with Jeff Kaplan and Tom Chilton;

Chilton: We're kind of designing the Paladin tank to be the best AE tank, and we're designing the Warrior to be the best sheer mitigation tank, and we're designing the Death Knight to be the anti-spellcaster tank.

From that statement, at least, you can see that the subject of a feral druid's place in the end-game main tanking plan doesn't even get a mention. You might think that, as far as the designers are concerned, a feral druids' future tanking viability is merely an afterthought.

But that doesn't mean that in the new expansion, all of the new Talents will only be buffing up the Balance and Resto trees.

Oh, no. Not hardly.

No, I have seen what is currently active for the new Talent trees up to level 80, and I can assure you, we may not be in the forefront of the developers' minds when it comes to 'cutting edge' tanking, but we have NOT been forgotten.

Follow along after the break to find out more!

Currently, Druids, when specced fully into the Feral Talent tree, perform very well as a combination of melee DPS and tank.

But with great DPS potential, comes the inevitable trade-off.

While we can do pretty darn good against three mobs, we do not have the AOE multi-mob abilities of the Paladin. While we can soak up a ton of physical damage and laugh about it, we remain weak against spell damage. We have excellent mitigation and hit points, but we have limited means to endure massive spikes of damage or enraged bosses.

This is not going to be changing much in the expansion.

We will be getting new Talents that will help improve our current strengths, and they will also help fill in a few of the gaps in our key weaknesses. But we are not going to suddenly find our gameplay changing dramatically, as we did when Burning Crusade brought Patch 2.0.

In the following discussion, I'm going to talk in general terms about the changes in the Feral Talent tree. We are in the very earliest days of the WotLK Alpha, and everything is subject to change by Blizzard without notice. But I think it's still valuable to look at where things are now as a clue as to what we will see go live this winter.

The first thing worth mentioning is that, In the Druid Feral Talent tree currently active in the Wrath of the Lich King Alpha, some abilities have been moved to different tiers.

For example, Feral Charge has been moved much deeper into the Feral tree, requiring more of a commitment to Feral to obtain it's sudden charge and spell interrupt. That seems to me to be a change based on PvP considerations, but it's interesting to see that they have put that much thought into various possible PvP specs based on the new trees.

Other currently existing Talents are gaining 'Improved' versions, that simply make them more efficient or desirable. Again, these tend to require a deep investment into the Feral tree.

As an example of this kind of change, Mangle is getting an Improved version that requires more points be spent into it, but that will serve a dual purpose of reducing the Mangle cooldown when in bear form, or reducing Mangle's Energy cost when in cat.

That may not seem like a drastic change, but as the current core Feral combat ability, it will certainly serve to have a big impact on our Threat or DPS output.

With the brand new Talents that are active in the Alpha, we see that Blizzard is aware of some of our current issues, and has placed Talents deep in the tree that we can choose to take to optimize our damage output or survivability.

For example, there is a new Talent currently in the fourth Tier of the Feral Tree that directly adds Expertise, and also refunds a percentage of Energy lost from missed attacks. This will be a very nice Talent to have early in the Feral Tree, since so much early leveling in Feral is done in cat form, but at the same time, tanking in later levels requires successful hits to establish threat, and having Expertise will dramatically help those attacks strike home. With the current lack of gear with Expertise on it for bear tanking, it's nice to see this going in.

Another new Talent that shores up a weak area is very, very deep in the Feral Talent tree. Currently, Thick Hide comes very early in the tree, and increases armor contribution from items by 10% when fully specced 3/3. Well, the new Talent deep in the tree builds on this further by adding another +10% armor contribution from items, which is nice enough, but it also serves to reduce all spell damage by 10% as well.

What was it we are notoriously weak to? Spell damage? Oh yeah, right.

There are a few other new Talents in the Feral tree that I'm not going to mention now, since they serve to either increase our DPS output from direct damage and DoTs, or cause the enemy to be slowed and increase their spell casting time, weakening their ability to fight back. That's excellent, I'm not going to complain in any way about Talents that increase our damage potential or weaken an enemy, but they're not major new additions to a Feral druids' arsenal.

But our new 51 point Talent is a very welcome addition. With a full 51 points invested in the Feral Talent tree, we will obtain a new instant-cast ability that will be welcomed by every bear tank. With the activation of this Talent, all Stun, Fear, Snare and Movement Impairing effects are removed, and depending on the form you are in, either your Energy regeneration rate will increase, or your max health will increase for a short period of time.

The ability has a five minute cooldown, but for the dedicated Feral Druid, we will finally have an "oh heck" button of our own.

What's that I hear? Is that the sound of a thousand bear tanks cheering in delight?

I hope so. I certainly hope so.

It may be true that, when compared to other tanking classes, we are not intended to be straight main tanks.

We are hybrids, and we are not limited to simply 'hold and survive'.

In the end game, we sacrifice ultimate tanking excellence by bringing higher damage output when tanking, straight DPS when our tanking isn't needed, and the chance to off-heal and battle rez, Remove Curse and Remove Poison, and provide Faerie Fire and MotW.

Being a hybrid and recognizing our strengths and using them smoothly is the key to being a great Druid.

And it also may be that Warriors and Paladins and Death Knights will get their own tanking Talents that will inspire awe and envy in the Druid set.

But with what we've seen from the Alpha so far, it's clear to me that, no matter what happens, having a bear tank with a strong cat DPS set and high +Healing set along for the ride is something that will only be a force multiplier to any instance run or raid.

I am speculating here based on what I see from the WotLK Alpha, it's true.

But I think that, as far as we are concerned my furry brothers and sisters, the future looks mighty bright.

Mighty bright indeed.

I have to give serious thanks to War Tools for providing us with a look at the Druid Talent trees from the WotLK Alpha. If you find that War Tools is getting slowed down from all the hits during the day, you can also find links to some of the new Feral Talents at the Big Bear Butt Blogger site, provided again by War Tools.

Mages in WotLK: I'm re-speccing frostfire

As you are likely already aware, the internets exploded yesterday with what is apparently leaked details from the friends and family alpha of Wrath of the Lich King. Arguably the biggest part of this news was that we apparently have access to very early versions of the new talent trees for several of the existing classes. Being the responsible, conscientious Mage columnist that I am, I immediately pored over the Mage talent trees, devouring this very premature, more than likely never-to-see-the-light-of-day info like a starving man would tear into a steak.

Of course, as we all know by now, information coming out this early is almost guaranteed to differ radically from what actually makes it live. Still, it serves a purpose. Even if none of these spells and talents reach the live servers unmolested, at least we're getting a glimpse into Blizzard's development process, and possibly seeing the direction they intend to take our beautiful class in.

We like Blizzard around here, and since they made it clear that they do not want us posting the new info directly, I won't be specifically listing the new Mage talents here. You can find those on the WotLK information Wiki, so click away. When you're done, come on back and join me after the jump, where I'll give my take on what the expansion appears to have in store for Mages.

Ok first things first:

Frostfire? You did see that, right? Here we have a spell that apparently will do what Fireball and Frostbolt do now, only all at once, in the same spell. It doesn't show up in the talent trees, so it looks like a trainable spell for all Mages. Just what is the purpose of this? The damage looks to be a little low if it's intended as a replacement spell for both spells, but you can't argue with the versatility of it. We've long wondered if there would be a dearth of frost-resistant or immune mobs in Northrend, and this could be the answer to that. If you're a Frost Mage, and Frostbolt is your bread and butter, and you find yourself having to do quests that require you to destroy a nest of Icy-Winged Snow-Worms of the Tundra that are all immune to frost spells, you might become frustrated. If you have this spell, though, you're golden. At this early stage, it seems like it might be designed to allow frost or fire Mages to remove the signature spell of the other school (Fireball or Frostbolt) from their action bars and replace it with this one. Maybe. Intriguing, without question.

As far as talents go, the new 51 point talents look phenomenal. I'm going to have to say there is no way on god's green earth that the 51 point Fire talent, Living Bomb, makes it live without some changes. The guy who datamined it had to have gotten those numbers wrong. He just had to have. Even after we learn what the damage output actually is, though, that looks like one seriously cool spell. And the name is pretty much perfect. Isn't that what a Fire Mage is anyway? A living bomb? I have dizzying visions in my head of charging into a crowd of folks on the bridge in Alterac Valley, opening with a rank bazillion Blast Wave, following it with a Dragon's Breath, and then popping Living Bomb as a chaser, and of course, dying right afterward. I will dream tonight of cooking Gnomes and Night Elves en mass. What happy dreams they will be. Feel free to flame me for Horde-bias. I like setting fire to Gnomes and Night Elves in large numbers, and if that's wrong, then I don't want to be right.

The Fire tree in general looks to be geared even more toward insane burst damage, low survivability, and big, frequent crits. In turn, Blizzard seems to be solidifying the Frost tree as the survivability/control tree even further. This is borne out by the 51 point talent in that tree, Deep Freeze, which is apparently an instant cast stun on a fairly short cooldown. Here's the thing, though, it seems to only work on frozen targets, so it's a good thing they appear to have added new ways to apply frozen-status. There appears to be a new talent in the 35 point tier that looks like a must-have for Frost Mages. Fully talented, it gives a 20% chance for every frost spell to cause frozen status to your target. That seems to mean that you'll be able to freeze things far more often than you can now, pummel your target with a couple of Ice Lances, and then stun them for another 5 seconds right before they break out of being frozen. Couple that with an improved, longer-duration and more powerful Water Elemental, and Frost Mages should be in for a nice expansion.

The Arcane tree looks to see a lot of changes, most notably the reintroduction of spirit as an important Mage stat. Ok, so it's important now, but you have to admit that it isn't as important as it probably should be. There are two new talents in the arcane tree that involve spirit directly, one that increases your total spirit the way Arcane Mind increases your total intellect, and one that increases your spell crit by a flat percentage of your spirit, a la Mind Mastery for your spell damage by way of intellect. It'll be nice to have a good reason to gear for spirit again. The 51 point talent in the Arcane tree, Arcane Barrage, looks to be a pretty straight-up damage dealing option. It's instant-cast, it's mana intensive, and I have no idea how it would fit into any sort of spell rotation, but that's probably looking way, way too far ahead at this point.

There are a couple of other notable changes to existing talents in this tree. Arcane Focus has improved immeasurably, making the entire Arcane tree more mana-efficient and apparently doling out free spell hit to boot, and then only requiring 3 talent points instead of 5, just in case you were still on the fence about taking it. I have the feeling this talent will change, but if it stays like this, I lust after it. Did you see Prismatic Cloak? Right now, it's not much more than a small damage mitigation talent that only PvP Mages ever take, and then only if they can't find somewhere else to put the points. If this leaked talent tree is right, though, the expansion will allow this talent to--brace yourself--make Invisibility useful. For 2 talent points, this will reduce the fade time of Invisibility by 4 seconds. That means when you want to drop aggro, or just pop out of sight in an Arena match, it'll only take you 1 second to do so. Wow. I might actually hotkey that spell if this goes down. There's even a positive change to Magic Attunement, making it something I might actually take. Increased range on my Arcane spells? Yes please. Think of an extra 6 yards on Polymorph, and Arcane Missiles, and Slow for a second. Just think about it. Well? Pants still dry? I know mine aren't. And not just because my kid spilled apple juice on me, either: because I peed in them.

Let me reiterate that nothing here is set in any kind of stone at all whatsoever. None of this leaked info is anything even remotely approaching what will actually happen. But it does suggest a direction for us Mages. Right now, that direction is looking pretty awesome. We're getting a lot of what we've asked for: sweet, sweet DPS improvements for every tree, and nicely boosted utility in several situations. Does this mean a return to the top of the DPS meters? Who can say? The expansion is still a full beta, about 62 thousand PTR patches, and probably something like 8 months away. Absolutely anything can happen. To me, though, this leaked info looks suspiciously like a step in the right direction. I'm optimistic.

As a self-diagnosed whiny Mage, it's very, very nice to feel that way.

Let me know what you think, fellow Mages. I didn't have space to mention every tidbit out there, so let me know what I've missed. Looking forward to eating Sweet Potato Pie while riding tandem with a Death Knight on your new warp stalker mount? I know I am. Impart to us your wisdom, robed flame-slingers of Azeroth, and I'll see you on Saturday like always.

Wrath of the Lich King Site Updated

Blizzard has just updated the official Wrath of the Lich King web site with new information about the upcoming expansion. Visit the new death knight class page to learn more about the death knight's class role, and make sure to check out a brand-new wallpaper featuring the expansion's titular villain. Also, the new gameplay features page offers a preview of some of the quest, dungeon, and faction innovations going into World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King.

No new character slots for Wrath of the Lich King

If you're planning to make a Death Knight on your favorite server, and you're an altoholic (I myself am guilty on both counts), you've probably already thought about your delimma, and Bornakk drove home the point today: There are still no plans to make extra character slot for WoTLK. Just like the problem you may have had deciding what characters to delete to make your Draenei or Blood Elf, you'll have to make the same decision again.

I suppose it's understandable. I'm sure it would be a rather large jump in server storage space needed to give everyone a massive amount of extra characters. Still, It's going to be tough for a lot of people to delete or transfer a character so they can play their new Death Knight with their friends, I imagine.

Bornakk does point out that at least, with the level 55 creation level, you can start the Death Knight on a seperate server and get a feel for it before deciding if you want to delete or transfer a character on your main server. Still, I know that half the fun for me is getting a good name reserved for my character, so I've personally already deleted a lowbie Draenei Paladin from my main server in order to create a placeholder character with my chosen name.

WoTLK Friends and Family Alpha Patch Notes leaked

MMO-Champion has just posted what appears to be the patch notes for the WoTLK Friends and Family Alpha. This is an unconfirmed leak, but everything on them would appear to check out as legitimate. They're pretty barebones, but there's some intriguing information to be found:

Death Knights are playable, although the starting quests and talents are not complete.

Spells and Talents past 70 are available for the Druid, Mage, Priest, Shaman, Warlock, and Warrior classes

You can head to Northrend via Menethil Harbor and Theramore for the Alliance, or Undercity and Ogrimmar for the Horde

The Howling Fjord, Borean Tundra, Grizzly Hills, and Dragonblight are the zones currently open for testing.

Utgarde Keep, Utgarde Pinnacle, The Nexus, and Drak'tharon Keep are currently available for testing.
If they already have talents for quite a few classes past 70, it would seem to suggest that they are further along on the expansion then we think. Hopefully, if these patch notes ring true, we'll hear about those talents soon. You can read the full Patch notes behind the jump.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
- World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King: Friends and Family Alpha
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Welcome to the World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King Friends and Family Alpha. The list below contains information on the current available content available for testing and general information. This information is subject to change.

General
- The continent of Northrend is now available! To travel there, visit one of four transportation masters in either Orgrimmar, Undercity, Theramore,or Menethil Harbor.
- Transportation between Howling Fjord and Borean Tundra can be found at the Tuskarr villages in those zones.
- NPC Transportation Locations
Horde:
Undercity to Vengeance Landing (Howling Fjord)
Orgrimmar to Warsong Hold (Borean Tundra)
Alliance:
Menethil Harbor to Valgarde (Holwing Fjord)
Theramore Valiance Keep (Borean Tundra)

World Environment Zones
- The following zones are available for testing: Howling Fjord, Borean Tundra, Dragonblight, and Grizzly Hills

Dungeons
- The following dungeons are available for testing:
Howling Fjord: Utgarde Keep (70-72)
Howling Fjord: Utgarde Pinnacle (80)
Borean Tundra: The Nexus (70-72)
Grizzly Hills: Drak'Tharon Keep (74-76)

Classes
- All Classes are available for play. Spells and talents will be available for testing past 70 for the following classes: Druid, Mage, Priest, Shaman, Warlock, Warrior
- The Death Knight Hero class is now available for play.
Creating a new Death Knight will start you at level 55 in Eastern Plaguelands.
No starting quests are implemented though Death Knight abilities will be available for testing.
Several Death Knight talents, although they will appear on the talent pane, are not yet implemented.

Professions
- The following tradeskills are available to train up to 450: First Aid, Herbalism, Mining, and Skinning.

WoW, Casually: Wrath of the Lich King is for casuals too

Each week or so, Robin Torres writes WoW, Casually for the player who has 2 hours or less to play at a time.

You may have noticed that there has been quite a bit of news about Wrath of the Lich King lately. In that news, there are some very wonderful things in store for those of us with limited playtime. There is also a lot of resentment because of that from some of the players. In this column, I'll be discussing what we casuals have to look forward to in the next expansion and I'll be defending what is essentially our right to participate in the WoW lore and endgame.

What I won't be discussing, like I used to, are the casual friendly events in the schedule. If you look in the right hand column of this page, you'll see a great calendar of Upcoming Events. So check there for the latest Call to Arms weekends, Holiday events and It came from the Blog activities.

Join us after the jump for the news and perhaps a little ranting.


First the casual-friendly news:

5-man instances will take less than an hour to complete

: It often takes so long to find a good group, that it's hard to squeeze instances into our play sessions. Blizzard has declared their intentions to even have the heroic versions of these dungeons take no more than an hour.

Death Knights are the FastPass to high level content

: Yes, the powers and features of the Death Knight class look awesome, but there is also a side benefit to the way they will be implemented. If you have a level 55+ somewhere on some server on your account, then you can create one level 55 Death Knight per realm. This is great news if you don't have the time to level a character on a server where you have found friends with similar schedules. It's also a good thing if you have altitis and would like a jumpstart in getting to the parts of the game you haven't reached yet.

Casual Raiders get to share in the story, too

: I tend to write this column for those who have an hour or less to play at a time. But some casual players set aside larger blocks of time and just don't play every day. If you have the opportunity, this is a good idea so that you can share in the 10-man raid fun. The best (and possibly most controversial) news about raids for us is that all raids in Wrath of the Lich King will be available in both 10 and 25 person versions. This means that everyone who can at least participate in 10-man raids can now experience all of the endgame lore, even Arthas.
And now we come to the part where I will attempt to debunk some common misconceptions about the casual player's validity as a WoW gamer. (There may be some ranting.)

We are dumbing down the game:

A lot of commenters and forum posters think that making the game casual friendly is making the game less of a challenge for those who have the time and inclination for high level PvE and PvP. The new raids in Wrath of the Lich King will all have 10-man versions, but these raids are, according to Drysc, not going to be easy and they are not going to have the same loot or prestige that the 25-man versions will. All this does is allow 10-man raiders to share in the story and have a progression path in the endgame that can be completed with fewer people and less time. But the prestigious world firsts and the best PvE loot in the game will still only be available to the hardcore raiders.

We're unskilled:

I've addressed this before. Even if some casuals don't have the skills required to 25-man raid due to lack of time to practice, most are very skilled in what they do have time to do. We are about maximizing our playtime and don't have the in-game leisure to be bad at what we do. But let's say they are right and we are less skilled than the players who have more playtime. Does that mean that the game should only be for the best? Do you have to take a test to play any other MMO, single player game or even a sport for that matter? Sure, in order to be on a team, you have to try out. But everyone is allowed to play pickup games and many league activities (pool, bowling, etc.) have handicaps to allow all levels of players. It's the diversity of the player-base that makes this game great, not the egos of the elitists.

We're lazy:

This one really gets me. I see it shouted out in the Trade Channel and in the comments here on WoW Insider. We don't deserve to have anything worthwhile in the game because we are too lazy to raid. Balderdash! Most casual players don't raid because we don't have time to raid. We work hard in our real lives and have other priorities than spending long periods of time in-game. Casual players tend to have full time jobs, some with lots of overtime. We have wives, husbands, children, other non-gaming interests and even other MMOs. Of course, raiders have real lives, too. But successful raiders have opportunities like understanding spouses, jobs with no overtime, schools with flexible schedules -- things that many of us don't have if we want to thrive in our real lives. Casual players are usually the opposite of lazy. If anything, we work harder to have the most fun we can have when playing WoW.

The game does have some inconveniences and unpleasant side effects due to a group of players, but it's not the casuals. It's the cheaters. Arena cheaters and Gold buyers are the ones causing us to have less fun in our favorite hobby. Win Trading and the point/team buyers and sellers are turning Arena into a Gold competition instead of the best of team PvP. People who buy Gold are not only causing our cities to be filled with spammers, but also are dumbing down the game to be nothing more than a virtual credit card swipe. Casual players are actually playing the game. We may be roleplaying or bringing up multiple alts or soloing to 70 or PvPing -- but we are playing.

I think the changes will be great for all players from the hardcore raider to the weekend casual. There is something for everybody. We all deserve a great game and it looks like we're going to get one.

Vivendi earning statement hints WotLK to be released in second half of 2008

Vivendi earning statements announced today hint that Wrath of the Lich King is expected to be released the second half of 2008. This would also fit into dates that we've seen on sites like Amazon and Gamestop.

This is also significant in that it's the first time an official confirmation of a release time frame has come out. And being that this is the data sent to Vivendi investors, it comes with a good bit of clout.

Additionally, the statement tells us that World of Warcraft now has 10.7 million subscribers, up from 10 million at the end of 2007.

The exact paragraph in the statement is after the break. And of course, stay tuned to WoW Insider for all the latest Wrath of the Lich King news.

From the Vivendi press release today (emphasis added):

"Very good operating achievements were offset by non recurring or calendar impacts: the first quarter of 2007 included notably the successful launch of the first expansion set World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade (the second expansion set is anticipated to be released in the second half of 2008) and the favorable settlement of a tax litigation."

"Vivendi Games continues to make strong headway with Blizzard Entertainment, inc and World of Warcraft ®, adding 2 million incremental subscribers compared to end of March 2007; After reaching the 10-million-subscriber milestone at the end of 2007, World of Warcraft's subscriber base grew to more than 10.7 million by the end of the first quarter of 2008.

A comparison of the first quarters of 2007 and 2008 performances is not representative because the first quarter of 2007 included the hugely successful release of World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade. Blizzard Entertainment's second expansion, World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King, is scheduled to be released in the second half of 2008."

Wrath will have mounts with passengers

Some more information on Wrath has bubbled to the surface. This is like Christmas every day for me! I'm very excited. New bits in today's installment of Facts of the Lich King:

Some Wrath mounts will be able to take passengers (!), and ground passenger mounts will work in the old world as well! This sounds awesome -- although it might be boring to be the one who's not driving, it could also let you take a break. And being able to cart around lower-level characters in the old world will really speed up those instance runs.

Trainers and AH will stay in the old world. Not surprising, but incredibly irritating. At best, it's a minor inconvenience and burns your Hearthstone timer. At worst, you're stuck in Stormwind for an hour when you could be doing much more interesting things, all because you wanted to respec or buy some mats. Not to mention the leveling-up process -- going back to the old world every level to train was obnoxious in BC, and it'll almost certainly be obnoxious in Wrath.

Dalaran will be in one of the final Northrend zones. I'm not sure where I stand on this. Shattrath being in one of the earlier BC zones meant that players raced to it to be able to get back and forth between Outland, and possibly skipped content. On the other hand, if you have to go back to the old world just as much in Wrath as you did in BC, it'll be a giant pain not to have easy access to portals while you're leveling. We'll see.

Blacksmiths may be able to add sockets to items that don't have them. Obviously this will have to be balanced with caution, since it could easily become overpowered; there are some nice gems out there.

They want all professions to have some unique draw, similar to the epic BoP blacksmithing weapons. I approve.

One new metal will be Cobalt. The new cloth is Frostweave, but we knew that already.

Lake Wintergrasp (the outdoor PvP area) will have daily quests, a continent-wide buff, and probably something like today's Spirit Shards. I plan to stay well clear of it, but hopefully the world PvP fans will have something to keep themselves entertained.

Chamber of Aspects will initially be a short Onyxia-like raid, and they may use that area to expand with other aspects later if they want to.

Another raid, in the Nexus, will allow players to ride on the back of drakes and use their abilities during the fight. This sounds quite chaotic and also pretty cool.

The devs think they didn't reward PvE enough in BC, and will try to reward it more in Wrath. I tentatively agree; PvP seems to be an easier way to epics for many players.

We may see PvE ladders on the Armory, so we don't have to resort to WowJutsu. Honestly I like Jutsu, so we'll have to see what the Armory brings to the table.

They want changing runes, for DKs, to be somewhere in between as difficult as respeccing and easy enough to do it between fights. Reset at inns, perhaps? Or anywhere, but with a 60 second cast time?

DKs can use maces, as well as swords and axes. For some reason I thought maces weren't going to be allowed, but I guess swords and axes would be pretty limiting, and would also restrict Blizz's itemization potential.

Blizz plans on introducing some more money sinks prior to Wrath, so we don't all go into the expansion with several thousand gold. Good luck making them attractive, guys -- I didn't fall for your silly "of the Shattered Hand," so you'll have to do better than that.

The Death Knight class revealed

Via Gamespy and Worldofwar.net, we finally have a good idea of what rolling a Death Knight will be like. A lot of the rumors seem to have panned out, but others have not. All I know is that at this point, I am full speed ahead to make a Death Knight my new main come WoTLK. There's a lot of meaty info to dig into, so let's get to it after the break.

Creation and initial play:

Death Knights will start in a floating citadel similar to Naxxramas at level 55, and go through a series of quests that will establish their story and background in the Eastern Plaguelands.

All Indications are that Blizzard still plans to allow all races to be Death Knights, as Worldofwar.net's reporter saw Tauren, Dwarf, Gnome, and Orc Death Knights.

You must have an existing character of level 55 or higher to create a Death Knight.
You can create one Death Knight per realm per account.

You will not need to do any unlocking quests or sacrifice a character before you can create a Death Knight.

The Death Knight will start with a wide range of abilities, as it is assumed that someone with a level 55 character has the experience to handle them right off the bat.

They will start with a 60% speed summoned Death Charger as a land mount, which be upgradable via quest much like Warlock and Paladin mounts.

The Rune system:

The Death Knights' Rune meter will appear below the Health Bar.

You will be able to place up to 6 runes in any combination of Unholy, Blood, and Frost on the meter.

The Runes will be consumed by use of abilities, but will refresh like a Rogue's energy Meter.

There will be a secondary bar called Runic Power, which will be filled on the use of Runic abilities, but will decay over time much like Warrior rage.

Runic Power will be used with moves that drain all Runic power and have powers and effects that are stronger depending on how much Runic Power was used. In this way it will be much like the Warrior's Execute ability or the Rogue's finishing moves.

According to Gamespy, Blood runes will mostly cover the tank abilities (which clashes with previous information saying Blood runes were DPS, as well as with the function of the Blood Presence blow), while Frost will deal with Crowd Control.

Death Knight Abilities:

Presences: Much like Paladin Auras or Warrior stances, Presences will be powerful one-at-a-time self-buffs that will probably determine whether the Death Knight is taking on a Tank or DPS role in the group. Worldofwar.net reported on 3 presences, as follows:

Blood Presence will increase the Death Knight's DPS and provide a small healing effect when the Death Knight is hit.

Frost Presence will increase the Armor and Threat of the Death Knight.

Unholy Presence will provide increased attack speed and decreased global cooldown, and is being billed as the PvP presence.

Death Coil: It will not fear like the Warlock version, but will act like the WC3 version also used by Death Knights in that game, damaging enemies or healing friendly undead targets.

Army of the Dead: This ability will temporarily summon a small army of Undead that will fight for you. It will apparently be channeled, which makes me think it will be closer to an AE attack like a Druid's Hurricane than an actual pet ability.

Raise Dead: This will raise an actual nearby corpse, including one of a fallen ally (even in Arenas) to fight for you as a Ghoul. An ally so resurrected will have the option to control their character as a Ghoul. Ghouls will get abilities to cause diseases, stun, and fear among other things, but it seems like they will be temporary pets all the same - at least, I assume PCs will eventually be allowed to resurrect rather than stay slaves of the Death Knight.

Grip of Death: Pulls the enemy toward you and forces it to attack you (Probably a taunt effect, though It'd be great if the pulling effect works in PvP).

Blade Strike: Attacks the target and applies a disease.

Blood Strike: Deals Damage based on how many diseases are on the target.

Chains of Ice: Roots a target, then applies a snare that lifts gradually until the target regains full mobility

Death Knight Role:

As expected, Death Knights will be DPS/Tank Hybrids. As previously known, they will not use shields, but will rely on a high parry rating and the proper presence (likely the Frost one from worldofwar.net's report) to mitigate damage. As DPS, they will not do as much damage as a pure DPS class, but will bring extra flavor and utility to the table in the form of some minor crowd control, ghoul pets, and the use of diseases to deal extra damage and cause debuffs. Worldofwar.net also mentions that Tom Chilton, in his Death Knight presentation, told them that they are leaning toward letting all tank types do more DPS while tanking.

Final Thoughts:

For the most part, we got most of what we expected out of the DKs, plus a lot more clarification and a look into some intriguing new aspects of their abilities and mechanics such as Runic Power and Ghoul summoning. I did notice that some old leaked abilities such as the Unholy Aura spell didn't receive any play, but if that's because they were scrapped, fake, or just not mentioned, we probably can't say for sure until the Beta drops. All I know for sure is that I am hooked, and am more dedicated than ever to having a new main when WoTLK hits.

Questioning the fate of 25 mans in Wrath

With the barrage of Wrath of the Lich King news we've received recently, one little tidbit stuck out in the bad way. Don't get me wrong, I'm very excited about quite a bit of it, this one thing in particular just struck me as odd.


The mention of there being both 10 and 25 man versions of every raid zone is interesting, but makes me worry from a logistical point of view. I like the fact that it means more casual players can see the content, I like the fact that it means the content actually exists for the casual players.

I wonder, though, what it will do to 25 man raiding. I can't speak for all servers, but on my server(or more specifically my raid group) the gear that comes out of boss fights is just a way of progressing to the next boss. It is largely unimportant to us until we come across something like Brutallus, in which the gear is absolutely necessary to have to progress. Seeing the characters, bosses and the encounters is far and away the most important part of raiding.

This may be my perception talking, but it seems interest in 25 man raids overall has gradually gone down with the introduction of arena gear and how easy it is to acquire badge loot. The draw of 25 mans is primarily to see things like Illidan and Kil'jaeden, and the gear is secondary. To make the same zones able to be accessed in an easier form seems to me that it would be just make the 25 man scene worse.

Will the encounters differ between the 10 man and 25 man versions? Yes, probably. Most likely, even. However, it is still, overall, the same content. You can turn Ragnaros blue and make him cast Gravity Lapse and Polymorph and in the end, you're still in Molten Core. The fight is different, but he's still Ragnaros and you're still in the zone you were the other day or even earlier that day.

The draw of gear has lessened dramatically over the course of The Burning Crusade, because raiding isn't the only source of that gear. The draw of the content will fade, because even if the fights change you're encountering the same guys in a setting that looks identical.

Personally, I think unique content in the 25 man would be the only way to really make this work. Bosses you can't see in the 10 man. Scenes or events you can't see in the 10 man. Things other than gear that you can take out into the world and have an impact. Nothing says Blizzard isn't doing this, it is simply something I feel is necessary. We don't know either way, but I really hope we see something like this.

Now, I won't go as far as to say this is the end of raiding. I don't think it is. If you're going into Wrath with an established raid group that was successful in The Burning Crusade, you'll do just fine. The impact will be on the recruiting end. If you lose an important member of your raid, replacing them will become much more difficult. The draw of 25 mans will be minimal.

Heroic 5 man dungeons still have some draw because they only take 5 people and less than an hour of your time. A heroic raid is going to be a much larger time investment and it's much more challenging to schedule and organize. Better gear and Badges of Justice 2.0 just aren't going to be enough to fuel a raiding community. Unique content is going to be a must, or 25 mans are going to end up in a tight spot, I think.

More Wrath of the Lich King Coverage

Blizzard sees the Death Knight as a kind of multipurpose tank. He can't use a shield, instead picking between dual-wield and two-hander setups. The Death Knight will get something called presences, which work somewhat similarly to Paladin auras in that once activated they'll stay on until you switch them off. Unlike auras they'll only apply to the Death Knight. Those that Blizzard showed off included a blood presence, which augments damage per second (DPS), and an unholy presence, which apparently is best used for PvP as it increases attack speed and the speed of your global cooldowns.

Along with the presences comes an entirely new resource system. The Death Knight won't use energy or mana or rage to activate abilities, but instead use a system of runes and runic power. As lead designer Jeffrey Kaplan explained to us, the Death Knight will be able to equip combinations of runes (blood, unholy, or frost types) onto himself and consume those runes to pull off his special abilities. Once used, the rune will then enter a cooldown phase, set right now at 10 seconds. Kaplan explained it won't be that much of a pain to switch around your rune setups, but you won't be swapping them in and out after every fight.

As runes are consumed you'll build a runic power meter which can be used to fire off different types of skills. And it sounds like the Death Knight will have plenty of weird skills and abilities to use. No word yet on the specifics of his talent lines, but we did get to see abilities like plague strike (bonus weapon damage and damage-over-time effect), death coil (spell that does damage or heals undead friendly targets), and cage of ice (freezes target in place). The Death Knight will also be able to place disease-type debuffs on enemies for special effects. For instance, he can use a blood strike ability that does an amount of damage based on how many diseases are currently affecting a target.

Beyond that there are even stranger abilities such as grip of death, which physically pulls a target toward you and forces them to attack, which is useful for tanking. Instead of a pure resurrection spell, the Death Knight can raise ghouls either from the corpses of fallen enemies or from group members. If you target a dead foe, the ghoul will then function like a pet with the ability to stun, apply diseases, and huddle to survive burst damage. When used on a deceased friendly target, the player will be resurrected... but as a ghoul. So they don't get their own body back, but they can run around like a crazy person in ghoul form for a while. Death Knights also get a deathcharger, a class-specific steed, in both normal and, after a questline is completed, epic versions.

The other major addition in Wrath of the Lich King is the new continent, Northrend, which sits in the north of Azeroth's in-game map, in between Kalimdor and the Eastern Kingdom. Blizzard says it's overall a larger area split into a larger number of zones than Outland, the fantastical territory added in last year's Burning Crusade. From what we saw, this seems to be true, though we only got to see four new areas, the starting zones of Borean Tundra and Howling Fjord and two mid-level zones called Grizzly Hills and Dragonblight. Before we get into those, we'll talk about two other zones Blizzard detailed that were inaccessible during our hands-on time.

First up is Zul'Drak, a large zone blanketed by misty grey skies, trees covered with thorny growths, and strange lanterns and lights bobbing throughout. The zone itself is built as a tiered ziggurat sort of thing, so as you progress to its center you'll be moving upwards across levels of land. It gives the zone an odd, artificial look, since the ground is mostly flattened to accommodate its artificial topography. The trolls of the zone apparently sacrifice various woodland animals to gain new types of powers, though we weren't specifically told what they were. Across paths and winding through the arches of overhead aqueducts float groups of bats, and as you move higher into the zone you'll find more and more snow on the ground.

Also in the zone is Drak'Tharon Keep, a stone-walled dungeon wreathed in cobwebs and populated by trolls, abominations and other oddities. There's also a giant T-Rex boss, which was included mainly because Blizzard thought T-Rexes are cool, which they are. Eventually you'll move outside of the dungeon and into outdoor courtyards, then up the keep's ramparts to a final boss encounter atop a tower. Though the final boss skin had not been applied to the character model there, the scene was still impressive as there loomed a menacing Necropolis (remember from Warcraft 3?) in the background.

Then there's Sholazar Basin, an area Blizzard described as being a sister zone to Un'Goro Crater. It's a tropical zone with lighter skies than Un'Goro's heavy green mist, circular in shape, and features jutting stone structures dotted with crystals. Populating the zone are the wolvar, wolverine people, and the oracles, an evolved type of murloc, who function as opposing factions. You can quest for both sides for reputation gains, and it'll be easy and expected for you to switch between the sides. Longtime World of Warcraft players will also recognize famed hunter Hemet Nesingwary, who's crashed his ship in this zone and is actually being opposed by an environment-friendly group called D.E.H.T.A. (Druids for the ethical and humane treatment of animals).

Of all the zones shown, Dragonblight seemed to be the largest. Its landscape looks sort of like somebody dropped a concrete plate onto a mountain range, with grayish, violent spikes of land jutting up in unnatural formations. Around the zone can be found graveyards for the five aspects of World of Warcraft's dragon-kind, which range from lush idyllic gardens to menacing fires and caves and all are ringed with dragon bones. It seems Arthas has taken notice of all this and started corrupting and resurrecting the remains, bringing them back into the world as ferocious frost wyrms, which from what we saw were floating toward Wyrmrest Temple at the zone's center.

The temple serves as a meeting place for all the types of dragons and seems to be under attack. We say "seems" because all the animations aren't in yet. When you get up to Wyrmrest's base you can see tens of dragons in the sky along with frost wyrms, but they don't do much aside from float around. Occasionally a few dragon models would fall to the ground dead, giving us the impression that there was, in fact, a fight going on up above.

You can fly up there too. By talking with an NPC at the base it's possible to ride up to the Wyrmrest's peak, which turns out to be quite a distance up, on a dragon's back. At the summit you talk to a huge elf named Alexstrasza the life-binder, whom will likely give you quests and let you gain reputation. Ambassadors for all the other dragonflight aspects ring the top floor as well. From there you can head back to the ground or go to the middle of the temple where there are more NPCs who would, we'll assume, give you more quests. Underneath the temple was a green glowing heart-like object hovering in midair and an instance door which, unfortunately, wasn't activated when we tried to walk through it. According to Blizzard, inside will reside a raid target.

Also in the zone is Naxxramas, one of the raid dungeons in the game. Blizzard has switched up how the raid progression works in Wrath of the Lich King. Now all raid dungeons can be attempted by either 10 or 25-man groups. Jeffrey Kaplan filled us in on more of why this decision was made. Blizzard says it will continue to monitor the community's feedback on how this works, and if changes need to be made, they will be.

A few other sections in Dragonblight are the Wrath Gate, where you'll meet Arthas for the first time, and the crystal vice, a section filled with ice giants and large worms, with phantom-like walrus people, hyenas, polar bears in the outlying fields. The Scarlet Crusade makes an appearance here as well, only now they're known as the Scarlet Onslaught. Like the rest of the zones, Dragonblight was an interesting area to explore because it wasn't just a flat expanse. The terrain varied quite frequently, the line of sight was often broken up by irregular landscape formations, which gives everything a more authentic feel even if there are floating scourge temples above barfing down some type of greenish filth.

Before we get to the expansive starting zones, there's still Grizzly Hills, which proved to be the most visually appealing area. It didn't seem strikingly new like the content in Outland, but it had more of a naturalistic feel. Think redwood forest and you'll have a good idea of how it looks. The zone's clear skies and bright sunlight illuminated the forest floor underneath gargantuan trees, the centers of which were sometime carved out to accommodate a winding pathway. Like Dragonblight, the terrain was rough, uneven and hilly, and contained plenty of micro-areas to keep things interesting, including spots where bands of wild horses galloped. Players will find Venture Company representative milling about, as well as a Furbolg colony and number of Worgen who've taken up residence in a fallen city-sized tree. New types of dwarves are wandering around as well. They dwell, not surprisingly, in structures tied to snowy mountains and in a sister city to Ironforge. In a brief fly-through of the place, we can say the city looks just like Ironforge with the same entrance and same walkways ringing its outer edge. The main difference is this city has an open roof and earth giants hurling boulders down into it, doing damage to the stone architecture already overgrown with plant life.

Then, finally, there are the starting zones. Borean Tundra and the Howling Fjord are located on the eastern and western sides of Northrend. Blizzard implemented a nice feature where you can quickly warp between the two zones and Dragonblight by talking to dockmasters at the camps of a walrus-like people. So if you don't like the Howling Fjord, you can just flip right over to the Borean Tundra. In the Alliance starting towns we checked out there were also portals to Shattrath and instant warps to Menethil Harbor and Theramore Isle.

The Borean Tundra is a large, desolate area, and the one in which we spent the majority of our time questing. Landscape features included spikes of land in the center topped with Dalaran wizards in some instances, an expanse of gnome-constructed pools, arid plains across which packs of rhinos roamed, and jagged rocks ringing sea-side murloc huts. We followed a few quest lines out there, including running missions for D.E.H.T.A. tasking us with eliminating hunters and divers in the area and working for an undercover agent in a murloc village. The agent had infiltrated the murloc encampment by donning a murloc suit similar to the one given out to attendees of last year's Blizzcon event. By running a few quests for him, we got the ability to actually talk with murlocs in the camp, have one of them repair our equipment, and run quests for them against an infected camp across the cove.

More Death Knight news and clarifications via the CMs and Ten Ton Hammer

Having had a few hours to sleep and then a few more to digest the new information on the Death Knights, I'm finally getting a clearer picture of what the Death Knight will be able to do and how they'll fit into the existing hierarchy of classes, and I have to say, I'm still just as excited. There's a lot of questions that have risen from a lot of corners, but new information has come to light that may answer at least a few of them.

First, let's look at some of the clarifications the CMs have been offering, and clear up some other questions from the comments of this morning's article about how creating a Death Knight will work:

You have to have a character of at least level 55, not exactly level 55, to unlock the Death Knight.

You do not sacrifice a character to make the Death Knight. They will be a completely new level 55 character.

It is one Death Knight per realm, but not per an account. You can have multiple Death Knights on different characters.

The unlock is currently account-wide. You can make your new Death Knight on any server, and on either faction (unless it's a PvP server where you already have characters).

Anti-Magic Tanking and other Death Knight tricks

This is also a good time to link yet another useful Death Knight article, this one by Ten Ton Hammer, which covers another aspect of the Death Knight's role. Just like the Paladin's niche is AE Tanking, the Death Knight's niche will be Anti-magic tanking (which will probably translate well to anti-magic PvPing). Ten Ton Hammer lists a few of their Anti-Magic abilities, as well as clarifying some of the other abilities we've already heard mentioned:

Anti-Magic Shell: This ability uses a rune to surround the Death Knight in a shell that absorbs 75% of the damage from the next incoming spell and converts it to runic power. We've seen similar abilities before from Banshees, so it certainly fits within Scourge lore.

Mind Freeze: All TTH says about this ability is that it interrupts casting, but with a badass name like that, you'd think it'd do more.

Strangulate: One of the Runic Power finishing moves, which drains the Death Knight's Runic Power to silence a target for up to 5 seconds and cause some damage.

Death and Decay: It causes AE Damage, of course, but apparently also has a chance to fear affected targets.

We also learn from the TTH article that raising a Ghoul will last for 2 minutes. No mention if you can raise the same corpse more than once. Despite the two-minute limit, TTH quotes Tom Chilton as saying that he expects Ghouls to be one of the class defining features of the Death Knight, so it sounds like they'll be rather powerful while they're up.

Death Knights: Taking Your Jobs?

But there's two questions that seem to be on everyone's lips right now: Will Death Knights usurp tanking spots, and will Death Knights be overpowered?

On the subject of Death Knights being overpowered, I think Drysc stated it most succinctly in this post. You need to understand two things: First, the presentation on Death Knights given by Tom Chilton and reported on by the gaming media this morning was made about a class that is still very much in the Alpha state. There is a lot of play testing to be done on Death Knights before WoTLK goes live (Hopefully sometime before 2009), and many things could be changed and tweaked before then.


Secondly, We have only thus far seen new talents and skills for the Death Knight class. However, every class will be getting 10 more levels, and new skills and talents to go with them. If Death Knights are getting all these amazing abilities, it stands to reason that other classes will be getting abilities to match.

lt's also understandable that other tank classes are a bit put out by the possibility of Death Knights horning in on their territory. I play a Druid currently, and I already envy Death Knights from what we do know -- and I plan to play one. That said, I wouldn't despair just yet. As I mentioned in the last article, Worldofwar.net has quoted Chilton as saying that they are looking at having all tank classes be able to do more DPS while tanking. You may be a little put out by the thought of a Death Knight tanking alongside a risen Ghoul while putting out mega-damage via stacking Blood Strikes and a few Strangulations on caster trash, but the developers, I think, have given a definite sign that they're not about to neglect the other tanks. I do very much think we'll see enough love for all classes that no-one should feel too left out.

And one final note: Deathchargers are cool and are not lame at all. Ever since I saw Baron Rivendare astride one, I have wanted one, and I cannot wait to get mine when I roll my Death Knight.

Wrath of the Lich King Hands On

It's an odd feeling walking into Blizzard's studio to see new World of Warcraft content. The game has experienced such an insane degree of success it's easy to think it wouldn't matter if Blizzard charged 30 bucks (USD) for a new continent called Popcorn Festival Explosion Land populated entirely by non-violent plush kittens that randomly mrglmrgl like murlocs. It probably wouldn't be the best long-term business decision and would irreparably violate the consumer-developer bond of trust, but you've got to believe it'd still be gobbled up by the public.

Before we get into the details, we should let you know that Blizzard still has no set release date for Wrath of the Lich King. Like its other publicly-known major title in development, StarCraft 2, it'll be done when it's done. From what was shown off at a presentation and the things Blizzard indicated were still under development, it sounds like there's still quite a bit of work to do.

One of the most prominent features of the new content is the addition of a new class, the Death Knight. Though we didn't actually get to play the class during our hands-on time with the game, we were given some details about how he fights and plays. If you have a level 55 character, which you likely do if you're still playing the game at this point, you can head to the character creation screen and generate one Death Knight, limited to one per server. Once created, you begin your time with him in an all-new starting area at level 55, which includes story bits explaining why and how you broke away from Arthas. Interestingly, this means you won't actually be able to see any of the new content as a Death Knight until you've leveled to around 70, which means you'll be plowing through Outland again.

Children's Week in Wrath

With The Burning Crusade, Children's Week was given a new tier of quests, based in Outland. Either this year or the last, I'm sure most of you have done these quests. Rather than replacing the old ones, it was simply an addition to the holiday.

If Children's Week receives the same treatment in Wrath, I'm itching to see what the rewards will be, or who(what?) we'll be escorting. The rewards in TBC were based off of the new content, so I have my doubts we'll have any accurate guesses for Wrath's installment at this point, but wrong guesses are still fun to make. Penguins? Walruses? Baby Bornakks?

And what will we be escorting? A baby Tuskarr? A baby Nerubian? Who knows! Like I said, I doubt we can make any accurate guesses at this point in Wrath's development, but it's still fun to think about.