Your World Will End Tonight!

World of Warcraft Client Patch 4.0.3a will be Live tonight!

The Shattering of Azeroth

In the frigid wastes of Northrend, the final battle against the merciless Lich King ended in victory for Azeroth's defenders. Upon returning home, veterans of the unforgiving conflict against the Scourge were showered with praise for their valiant sacrifices, while the honorable dead were mourned. Yet as hope flared anew in the wake of the Lich King's fall, Azeroth's native elemental spirits grew confused and erratic, setting off a series of deadly natural disasters. Horde and Alliance leaders scrambled for clues about the troubling state of the world, but nothing could have prepared them for what was to come.



Without warning, the corrupted Dragon Aspect, Deathwing, erupted from the stone heart of Deepholm, the domain of earth within the Elemental Plane. Jagged fissures were torn across the earth, and monstrous waves pummeled coastal regions. From Thousand Needles to the Blasted Lands, the surface of Azeroth was reforged through violent upheavals. Now, the Horde and the Alliance must defend their homes against Deathwing and his minions, burdened by the unsettling fact that the world as they know it has changed... forever.



Azeroth Shattered

Deathwing's return has had an immeasurable impact throughout the Eastern Kingdoms and Kalimdor. Players will notice drastically altered terrain, thousands of new quests from levels 1-55, and updated level ranges for some zones to improve the questing flow.



New Race/Class Combinations

In the wake of a world on the brink of destruction, members of the Horde and Alliance have taken to new cultures and studies, mastering crafts previously foreign to them. Many existing playable races now have new class combinations. Check the official World of Warcraft: Cataclysm website for a breakdown of the new combinations.



General

The World of Warcraft: Cataclysm cinematic trailer and login screen have been added to the game.


Experience required to gain levels 71 through 80 has been reduced by 20%, which increases leveling rate by 25%.




Classes: General

Due to several talent revisions for select classes, druids, paladins, priests, and shaman have had their talent trees reset.


The damage and healing done by players from levels 1-79 has been retuned, with the base points of almost all spells and abilities reduced. This was done to bring combat times at low levels to a more reasonable length. For most abilities that deal weapon damage, the weapon damage percent now rises per level until level 80, and starts at a lower percent.


Healing Rain, Efflorescence, Holy Radiance, Holy Word: Sanctuary now have a diminished effect when healing more than 6 players at once.


Mortal Strike, Furious Attacks, Wound Poison, Widow Venom, Permafrost, Improved Mind Blast, Monstrous Bite, and Legion Strike now reduce healing by 10%, down from 25%.


Effects which are broken from taking too much damage (Fear, Frost Nova, Entangling Roots, etc.) now break automatically from about half as much damage taken as before.



Death Knight (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)

Death Pact now heals for 25% of maximum health, down from 40%.


Death Strike now heals for 25% of damage taken in the last 5 seconds, down from 30%, and will heal for a minimum of 7% of maximum health, down from 10%. The tooltip may not yet be updated to reflect this change.


Icebound Fortitude now provides 20% damage reduction, down from 30% (now 50%, down from 60% when talented), and has a 3-minute cooldown, up from 2 minutes.



Blood

Rune Tap now heals for 10% of maximum health, down from 15%. The tooltip may not yet be updated to reflect this change.



Glyphs

Glyph of Rune Tap now heals for 5% of maximum health, down from 10%.



Bug Fixes

Frost Fever critical strikes now apply the correct amount of bonus damage.



Druid (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)

Bear Form now provides 10% bonus health, down from 20%.


Nourish no longer consumes Omen of Clarity.


Rejuvenation has had its mana cost increased by 30%.


Soothe now has a 1.5-second cast time.


Swipe (Cat Form) can now be used even if the druid does not have a primary target selected.


Thorns: beginner tooltip revised to no longer imply the spell could be kept up at all times. In addition, Thorns damage has been reduced by 60%.



Balance

PvP set bonus redesigned. While not in an Eclipse state, critical attacks against the druid restore 5 Solar or 7 Lunar energy, whichever is more beneficial. This effect can only occur once every 6 seconds.



Feral

Brutal Impact now increases the mana cost of spells on the victim by 5/10% for 10 seconds, down from 15/30%.


Leader of the Pack now heals for 4%, down from 8%.


Survival Instincts now provides 50% damage reduction, down from 60%, and its cooldown has been lowered from 5 minutes to 3 minutes.


Swipe (Bear Form) damage has been reduced by 20%.


Vengeance is no longer cleared on exiting Bear Form, and instead is cleared upon entering Cat Form.



Restoration

Empowered Touch now procs from Healing Touch as well as Nourish.


Heart of the Wild: the Bear Form Stamina bonus from this talent is now 2/4/6%, down from 3/7/10%.


Malfurion's Gift no longer has Fury of Stormrage as a prerequisite talent.


Natural Shapeshifter now also increases Tree of Life duration by 5/10 seconds.


Revitalize is now a 2-point talent, down from 3. It provides a 20% chance to return 1/2% of the druid's total mana on periodic heals from Lifebloom or Rejuvenation. This effect cannot occur more than once every 12 seconds.


Swift Rejuvenation is now a 1-point talent, down from 2. The global cooldown reduction this talent provides to Rejuvenation remains 0.5 seconds.


Symbiosis: heal-over-time spells (Rejuvenation, Regrowth, Lifebloom) can no longer benefit from this Mastery merely by refreshing themselves. A different heal-over-time spell must be present.



Glyphs

Glyph of Healing Touch now reduces the cooldown on Nature's Swiftness by 10 seconds after using Healing Touch, up from 5 seconds.


Glyph of the Treant (new) allows druids to keep the original treant Tree of Life look... if they must. Must they?



Bug Fixes

Blood in the Water now refreshes Rip to the correct value.


Flight Form now properly appears in the trainer window before Expert Riding is learned.



Hunter (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)

All special attacks based on weapon damage (except Scattershot) are now normalized.


Scare Beast is now available at level 36, up from level 14, and has had its training cost updated.


Deterrence is now available at level 78, up from level 36, and has had its training cost updated.


Disengage is now available at level 14, down from level 78, and has had its training cost updated.



Glyphs

The level requirements for glyphs that affect Scare Beast, Deterrence, and Disengage have been altered to correspond with the level changes of these abilities.



Bug Fixes

The Core Hound pet ability Ancient Hysteria now places its own unique debuff on affected players that has the same effect as Sated and Exhaustion.


Certain pets should no longer forget how to Dash.



Mage (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)

Arcane Blast now increases damage of the next Arcane Blast by 10% per stack, down from 20%, reduces cast time by 0.1 seconds per stack, and increases the mana cost by 150%, down from 175%. In addition, the base cast time of Arcane Blast has been lowered to 2.35 seconds.


Arcane Explosion now costs 15% of base mana, down from 18%.


Arcane Missiles damage has been increased by 5%.


PvP set 4-piece bonus changed to increase damage by 5% instead of providing 5% Haste.



Arcane

Arcane Barrage damage has been increased by 5% and its cooldown is now 4 seconds, down from 5 seconds.


Arcane Concentration: Now has a much higher chance (13/27/40%) of entering a Clearcasting state. This effect cannot occur more than once every 15 seconds. The tooltip still states that there is a 3/6/10% chance, as it averages out to approximately the same chance with the internal cooldown applied.


Arcane Specialization again increases arcane damage by 25%.



Fire

Blazing Speed no longer dispels movement slowing effects (it still dispels effects that totally stop movement).


Fire Specialization again increases periodic fire damage effects by 25%.


Molten Shields now also causes Blazing Speed to dispel movement slowing effects in addition to its current functionality.


Pyroblast base mana cost is now 17%, down from 22%.



Frost

Deep Freeze: the cooldown on this ability is no longer reduced by Haste.


Early Frost now reduces Frostbolt cast time by 0.3/0.6 seconds, down from 0.35/0.70 seconds.


Fingers of Frost proc chance is now 7/14/20%, down from 10/20/30%.


Frost Specialization again increases all damage against frozen target by 25%.


Reactive Barrier is now triggered by any damage which causes the mage's health to be below 50%, even if the mage was already below 50%.


Shatter now also increases Frostbolt damage by 10/20% against frozen targets.


Shattered Barrier duration is now 2/4 seconds, down from 3/6 seconds.



Glyphs

Glyph of Evocation now heals for 40%, down from 60%.


Glyph of Deep Freeze now increases damage done by Deep Freeze by 20% (no longer increases Frostbolt damage against Deep Frozen targets).



Bug Fixes

Improved Polymorph now correctly shares diminishing returns with controlled stuns.



Paladin (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)

Exorcism damage has been increased by approximately 50%.


Holy Radiance now has reduced effectiveness on targets over 8 yards away from the paladin.


Seal of Truth: periodic damage from Censure reduced by 25%.



Holy

Beacon of Light now lasts 5 minutes, up from 60 seconds.


Blessed Life: the effects of this talent cannot occur more than once every 8 seconds, up from every 2 seconds.


Illuminated Healing absorb shield now absorbs 10% of the total amount healed, up from 8%. Each point of Mastery increases the effect by an additional 1.25%, up from 1%.


Light of dawn has been redesigned. It no longer has an enforced cooldown, now costs Holy Power instead of mana, and scale in direct proportion to the amount of Holy Power used. In addition it now heals the 5 most injured group targets (including self) in a 30-yard frontal cone.


Protector of the Innocent no longer triggers from self-heals.



Protection

Divine Bulwark now grants 2.25% less block chance per point of Mastery, up from 2%.


Holy shield no longer increases chance to block. Instead, it increases the amount blocked by an additional 10%, for a total of 40% damage blocked.


Shield of the Righteous: Contribution of attack power halved (now 60% with full Holy Power) and base damage brought up so that a level 85 paladin in Heroic dungeon gear deals the same damage with no Vengeance, but Vengeance has less impact.


Shield of the Templar now reduces the cooldown of Guardian of Ancient Kings by 40/80/120 seconds, down from 1/2/3 minutes.


Wrath of the Lightbringer now increases Crusader Strike and Judgement damage by 50/100%, up from 30/60%.



Retribution

Crusade now also has a proc on kill to increase the healing done by the paladin's next Holy Light by 100/200/300% for 15 seconds, in addition to its current effects.


Divine Storm: This ability has been redesigned. It no longer consumes Holy Power and instead costs 5% of base mana. It shares a cooldown with Crusader Strike and hits all nearby enemies for 60% weapon damage.


Pursuit of Justice now has an 8-second internal cooldown, shared with Blessed Life.


Rebuke no longer initiates Auto Attack.


Sanctity of Battle now also causes Divine Storm's cooldown to be reduced by Haste effects.


Zealotry no longer consumes 3 Holy Power, but still requires 3 Holy Power to use.



Glyphs

Glyph of Beacon of Light now makes Beacon of Light free, instead of increasing the duration by 30 seconds.


Glyph of Divinity has been redesigned. It now grants the paladin 10% of maximum mana upon use.


Glyph of Light of Dawn now increases the total number of most injured targets healed by 1.



Priest (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)

Binding Heal now provides roughly double the amount of healing.


Prayer of Healing has had its mana cost reduced by nearly 30% and its base points and Spell Power coefficient increased by 20%.



Discipline

Divine Aegis is now always triggered by Prayer of Healing in addition to critical heals from all other spells.


Grace has been increased to 4/8% stacking 3 times, up from 2/4% stacking.


Inner Focus now works with Binding Heal, but no longer works with Heal.


Power Word: Barrier has been redesigned. It no longer acts as a shared absorb shield. Instead, all affected friendly targets take 30% reduced damage for the duration of the shield, which is now 10 seconds, down from 25 seconds.



Shadow

Shadow Orbs: redesigned slightly. The Shadow Orbs continue to increase damage done by Mind Blast and Mind Spike and stack up to 3 times, but now when the priest casts Mind Blast or Mind Spike (consuming the orbs), the priest gains a 15-second duration buff (Empowered Shadow), which increases the damage done by all Shadow periodic spells. Empowered Shadow does not stack. Mastery increases the damage bonus of Shadow Orbs and Empowered Shadow by the same amount, 10% with the base 8 Mastery, and an additional 1.25% per Mastery.


Vampiric Embrace healing to the caster has been reduced to 6%, down from 12% (there was a tooltip error which stated that the self-healing amount was 15%). Party members still receive 3% healing.



Bug Fixes

Dark Archangel now correctly increases the damage done of certain abilities by 4%.



Rogue (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)

Deadly Poison base damage and attack power coefficient have been increased by 30%.


Recuperate now restores 2% of maximum health, down from 3%.


Venomous Wounds base damage and attack power coefficient have been increased by 30%.



Combat

Aggression now increases damage of Sinister Strike, Backstab, and Eviscerate by 7/14/20%, up from 5/10/15%.


Bandit's Guile now gives 10/20/30% increased damage as the rogue gains greater insight, up from 5/10/15%.



Subtlety

Executioner no longer affects Recuperate.



Bug Fixes

Bandit's Guile now applies more consistently to all of the abilities it's supposed to modify.


Player guardians and temporary pets now stop attacking when a rogue uses Vanish, but city guards will not.



Shaman (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)

Chain Heal mana cost increased from 17% to 20% of base mana.


Earthliving Weapon now only has 25% of its full chance to proc from a single hop of Chain Heal.



Elemental

Elemental Reach now also increases Searing Totem range by 7/15 yards.


Fulmination now has a Spell Alert visual associated with it, which appears when the shaman gets to 9 Lightning Shield charges.



Warlock (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)

Bane of Agony damage has been reduced by approximately 12%.


Bane of Doom damage has been reduced by approximately 12%.


Corruption damage has been reduced by approximately 12%.


Death Coil damage has been reduced by approximately 12%.


Drain Life damage has been reduced by approximately 12%.


Drain Soul damage has been reduced by approximately 12%.


Immolate damage has been reduced by approximately 12%.


Incinerate damage has been reduced by approximately 12%.


Rain of Fire damage has been increased to be more comparable to other area-of-effect abilities.


Searing Pain damage has been reduced by approximately 12%.


Seed of Corruption damage has been reduced to be more comparable to other area-of-effect abilities.


Shadowbolt damage has been reduced by approximately 12%.


Soul Fire damage has been reduced by approximately 12%.



Demonology

Hand of Gul'dan damage has been reduced by approximately 12%.



Destruction

Chaos Bolt damage has been reduced by approximately 12%.


Conflagrate damage has been reduced by approximately 12%.


Shadowburn damage has been reduced by approximately 12%.



Bug Fixes

Drain Life: The Soulburn version of this was charging 17% of base mana instead of 12% like the normal version. This has been corrected.



Warrior (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)

Cleave damage has been reduced by approximately 17%.


Execute damage has been reduced by approximately 17%.


Heroic Strike damage has been reduced by approximately 17%.


Overpower now does 125% weapon damage, down from 150%.


Rend base damage has been reduced by approximately 17% and percent of weapon damage per tick lowered to 25%, from 30%.


Shield Block now only increases block chance by 25%, but excess block that pushes avoidance plus block to over 100% is now converted to critical block chance.


Slam now costs 15 rage, down from 20, and now does 125% weapon damage, down from 150%.


Victory Rush damage has been reduced by approximately 17%.


Whirlwind now does 65% weapon damage, down from 75%.



Arms

Mortal Strike now does 150% weapon damage, down from 185%.


Second Wind now heals for 2/5% of total health, down from 5/10%.


Strikes of Opportunity now does 100% weapon damage, down from 115%.



Fury

Blood Craze now heals for 1/2/3% of total health, down from 2.5/5/7.5%.


Bloodthirst damage has been reduced by approximately 17%.


Raging Blow now does 110% weapon damage, down from 150%.


Unshackled Fury now gains approximately 50% more benefit per point of Mastery.



Protection

Critical Block now grants an equal amount of block chance and critical block chance (1.5% each per point of Mastery).


Devastate no longer provides bonus threat.


Shield Slam: Contribution of attack power reduced to 60%, down from 75%, and base damage brought up so that a level 85 warrior in Heroic dungeon gear deals the same damage with no Vengeance, but Vengeance has less impact. In addition, Shield Slam no longer generates 30% bonus threat from its damage.


Vigilance no longer provides 3% damage reduction, but still refreshes Taunt and provides Vengeance.



Glyphs

Glyph of Bloody Healing increases the healing received from Bloodthirst by 40%, down from 100%.


Glyph of Intimidating Shout no longer causes targets to flee slowly, but roots them instead.


Glyph of Shield Wall increases damage reduction to 60%, but increases the cooldown from 2 minutes to 4 minutes (talented).



Bug Fixes

Taste for Blood should once again proc on every other tick of Rend.



Achievements

The Gladiator reward mounts now award Master Riding.


What A Long, Strange Trip It's Been now awards Master Riding.



Items

Mysterious Egg now takes only 3 days to turn into a Cracked Egg and has a slightly greater chance of awarding the Reins of the Green Proto-Drake.


PvP set bonuses now provide 70 of stats such as Agility, Intellect, and Strength (down from 100) at 2 pieces, and 180 of these stats (down from 300) at 4 pieces.



Professions

Perfect Gem Cutting and Mixology have been removed as trainable skills and are instead passives profession abilities. When players reach the appropriate skill levels, they will start getting bonuses from Mixology (they must know the recipe to gain the benefit) and/or cutting perfect gems (depending on their profession, of course).



Alchemy

Alchemy recipes now require Crystal Vials. Deathwing broke all the others because he's mean (or because he didn't want alchemists to carry 5 different vials around with them).



Engineering

The Engineering Tinkering enchants will no longer provide their bonus stats, but the activated effects will stack with other enchants. In 4.0.1 the stats were there (but hidden) and are now removed.



Bug Fixes

Several epic gem transmutes that were missing from the trainer have been added back.



Bug Fixes

Certain area-of-effect abilities are no longer ignoring the area-of-effect damage cap.


Mobs and NPCs should no longer appear to randomly gain or lose health during combat.


Re-summoning pets in Battlegrounds should no longer count towards a player's total healing done.



Known Issues

Some tooltips may not reflect the most recent changes to certain abilities.


Worgen hunters are currently unable to learn Dual Wield.


The achievement Explore Tol Barad will not be possible to complete upon release of World of Warcraft: Cataclysm.

Just weeks to go till Cataclysm

With just weeks to go till Cataclysm is upon us I have sound a new spark of excitement I have stoped playing the Beta and started getting ready for the expansion.
The first thing you want to do is clean out your bank get rid of all the crap and make room for all the new crap! Old food and pots will be junk as soon as the xpac hits so dump it now! keep only what you can use to get you to 85.. The same goes for all the gems! You will be getting blue gems that are better then lvl 80 epic gems!.
If you are looking for a quick xp boost you might want to stack your 25 daily quests up ready to hand in as soon as it goes live! That’s right you can do the quests the day before or even the week before the xpac goes live and hand them in on the 7th of Dec when you can get XP again and you will be close to level 81 in 60 seconds :P.
Know where you want to start! Shop around see what quest lines look the most fun for you!
Have your hearth stone set to a city you can start in remember Dalaran will have no portals!
Plan your time off work! Your going to want to focus on WoW for about 3 days to get it out of your system!
I’ve been raiding ICC for about a year and its been so long since my main (Jeanos) has seen any real new content of had any upgrades, its one thing doing it on the beta or reading about it on line but it’s a hole other thing experiencing it with your real toon getting new gear getting new pets and or achievements with your main toon.
Oww its like the build up to Christmas when you was 5.

Cataclysm Prologue - Elemental Invasions Started

The elemental invasions just started, new quests NPCs are available in capital cities and elementals will randomly spawn in zones!

New quest NPCs are available in capital cities.
Elementals will randomly spawn in questing zones, destroying the rifts in those zones will reward you with Tripping the Rifts.
Elemental Invasion on Wowpedia.org

Tripping the Rifts achievement

Rifts appears everywhere, including Northrend and Outland. (Apparently, this isn't true anymore and you might be able to get your achievement by destroying rifts anywhere, you won't be able to loot lower levels Mysterious Objects)
Rifts seems to spawn at the beginning of each hour (01:00AM, 02:00AM, etc) pretty much everywhere in the zone, however there are confusing reports about this and some people reported them spawning in the middle of the hour. If you arrive in a zone and can't find rifts, you probably just have to wait for a respawn.
You have to kill rifts of your own levels to get the achievements, if you're level 80 look for them in Northrend.
Rifts are destroyed by killing elementals, each elemental death lowers the health of the rift.
The Mysterious Object looted from rifts gives a daily quest with gold/XP reward.

Rifts zones by Type (Source)

Tripping the Rifts achievement map:

Fire
1. Westfall
2. The Barrens (Between Razorfen Downs and Razorfen Kraul)
3. Dustwallow Marsh (Inside Theramore near Armory; North of Witch Hill)
4. The Hinterlands
5. Searing Gorge
6. Blasted Lands
7. Winterspring
8. Hellfire Peninsula
9. Zul'Drak (South of Zeramas; East of the Reliquary of Pain; In the middle of Zeb'Hakkar)
Water
1. Silverpine Forest (East of Shadowfang Keep; South of the fork in the road east of Sepulcher; West of Dead Field towards the shore)
2. Ghostlands
3. Wetlands (On the shore near the Bluegill Murlocs and the two ruined ships; Between the Greenwarden and Dark Iron Dwarf Camps)
4. Thousand Needles (Darkcloud Pinnacle)
5. Stranglethorn Vale
6. Swamp of Sorrows (Stonard)
7. Un'goro Crater
8. Zangarmarsh
9. Shadowmoon Valley
10. Dragonblight (Agmar's Hammer; Wintergarde Keep)
11. Icecrown

Wind
1. Darkshore
2. Hillsbrad Foothills (Southshore; Tarren Mill)
3. Duskwood
4. Arathi Highlands (South of Circle of West Binding; Hammerfall)
5. Eastern Plaguelands
6. Terokkar Forest
7. Netherstorm
8. Borean Tundra (Magmoth)
9. Sholazar Basin
Earth
1. Loch Modan
2. Redridge Mountains
3. Desolace
4. Western Plaguelands
5. Burning Steppes
6. Silithus
7. Nagrand (Laughing Skull Ruins)
8. Blade's Edge Mountains
9. Howling Fjord (Wyrmskull Village near the hut Alliance players witness the visions of the past)
10. Grizzly Hills
11. Storm Peaks (Gnoll Camps west of K3; Maker's Library)

Cataclysm Cinematic Intro

WoW 4.01 is live! will you be ready for Cata?

World of Warcraft Client Patch 4.0.1


The latest patch notes can always be found at http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/patchnotes/
The latest test realm patch notes can always be found at http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/patchnotes/test-realm-patchnotes.html


Cataclysm Systems Patch


World of Warcraft: Cataclysm will be in stores on December 7, 2010 and the time has come to prep for the official launch by implementing its first major patch. Players can experience many major game and user interface systems updates in the first official patch for the upcoming third expansion, patch 4.0.1.


General


Cataclysm Launcher Update


The new Cataclysm Launcher allows you to stream game data while you play. This will reduce the time you spend downloading, installing, and patching World of Warcraft. We'd like to get your feedback on the toolset and gameplay experience. Please head to the forums here for additional information: http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=26726066731


Reforging


Players can now visit special Reforging NPCs in capital cities located near Enchanting trainers. 40% of any one secondary stat on an item can be allocated to add a new secondary stat to the item. The stat being added cannot already exist on the item. An item cannot have more than one reforged stat at a time, though the Reforging of an item can be undone and changed.


Dungeons & Raids


Flexible Raid Lock System


Icecrown Citadel and Ruby Sanctum now use the new Flexible Raid Lock system. This system provides the opportunity for a character to defeat each raid zone’s encounters once a week. A character may now complete the encounters during the week with different raids of either 10 or 25 players.
Learn more about this feature by visiting our official forums here: http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=27026324753&sid=1


Icecrown Citadel

Dragon Age Destiny Trailer HD

The Dragon Age Destiny Trailer is out and it is a sweet clip but.. it tells us nothing about the game.. it’s not game footage all it just a cool fight seen. I loved the first game and played it through twice but the expansion was a real letdown I like allot of other people I know never finished the Dragon Age: Origins – Awakening (Expansion pack) let’s hope BioWare never pull a stunt like Awakening again!

Dragon Age 2 The Facts!

1. When will Dragon Age 2 be released?
Dragon Age 2 is set for release in North America on March 8 and March 11 in Europe.

2. Which systems is Dragon Age 2 being released on? Will they be released at the same time?

Dragon Age 2 is being released simultaneously for PC, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.

3. Do I have to play Dragon Age: Origins before playing Dragon Age 2?

You do not have to play Dragon Age: Origins to fully experience Dragon Age 2. It is a perfect starting point to enter the series.

4. Will I meet romanceable characters?

Yes. You will be able to engage in romances with certain NPCs in your party and throughout the world.

5. Where does Dragon Age 2 take place?

Dragon Age 2 is set in the Free Marches, with much of the plot focused on the city of Kirkwall, an ancient port city that was once the center of the global slave trade.

6. When does Dragon Age 2 take place?

Dragon Age 2 takes place sometime after the Blight of Ferelden, as the Darkspawn and other threats emerge to endanger the world again. The story unfolds over the course of a decade as you rise to power and change the world.

7. Will I meet familiar characters in Dragon Age 2?

Dragon Age 2 is set in the same world as Dragon Age: Origins, and you will cross paths with many of the same individuals and groups that you encountered before.

8. Will the Dragon Age 2 story react to the decisions I made in Dragon Age: Origins?

Yes. If you import your Origins playthroughs, you will experience the consequences of the choices you made previously. However, this is not necessary to fully experience Dragon Age 2.

9. What will my character be like?

Your character in Dragon Age 2 will be a legendary figure in the history of Thedas. Not only will you hear people respond to your conversations, but your character will also be be fully-voiced. You will play as a human male or female of any class you wish: Warrior, Mage or Rogue.

10. Will there be new spells and abilities in Dragon Age 2?

Yes. We'll reveal more details over time, but there will be many spells, abilities and specializations to choose from and customize your character to your liking.

11. What is the story like?

The Dragon Age 2 story will be a non-linear framed narrative. You will have unprecedented control over the directions your character goes and the sequence in which the story unfolds.

12. What is combat like?
Dragon Age 2 will feature reactive combat, allowing you to take real-time control of your character in melee, ranged or spell combat. You can pause the game to assign tactical actions to each party member, or take direct control of any individual character while the customizable tactical AI directs the others.

SWTOR Space Combat Sneak Peek

Some new info on space combat, has been revealed from the gamer magazine pcgamer.com. After the magazine was scanned and translated, here are some of the new details.

Ships will be customizable with upgrades earned through space combat.
Upgrades probably won’t be entirely new weapons but incremental power increases.
James Ohlen said, that player’s ship will be cosmetically different, but will all use blasters and missiles.
Character abilities and stats will not affect space combat.
Missions are supposed to only take a couple of minutes.
BioWare will implement PvP and co-op in the future.
Quest objectives are given on the fly via character voice-overs.
Terrain collision is very real. Flying into an asteroid will be devastating.
Side quests for each mission will rotate as well to make the missions more repeatable.
Later missions will be more complex and difficult.
All Player ships have roughly the same size and power.
The design’s of the four unknown player ships will draw inspiration from existing ships.

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• Space combat has been confirmed for SWTOR! (massively.com)
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• BioWare Confirms Space Combat For Star Wars: The Old Republic (escapistmagazine.com)
• Space Combat Confirmed for The Old Republic (1up.com)
• Star Wars: The Old Republic Space Combat! (mmocrunch.com)

The Guild Game On Music Video

That's right Felicia Day and Sandeep Parikh get down and boogie again with there new Music video Game on

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xMrN3Rh55uM


Purchase the "Game On" music video here:
http://bit.ly/gameonVIDEO

and the MP3 here:
http://bit.ly/gameonMP3
http://amzn.to/gameonAMZN

On on iTunes

GAME ON CAST
Codex: Felicia Day
Zaboo: Sandeep Parikh
Vork: Jeff Lewis
Clara: Robin Thorsen
Tinkerballa: Amy Okuda
Bladezz: Vincent Caso
"Real Life": David Mattey
Zaboo Stunt Double: Victor Lopez
Dancers: Adam Ackerman, Charity Baroni, Marissa Cuevas, Gerald Espinosa, Anthony Gonzales, Marcelin Jurbina, Julie Koehler, Ashlee Malyar, Guy Nemer, Kenneth Rivera
Extras: Jamie Kale, Grant Kimura, America Young
Clara's Pool Boy: Stephen Ayers
Surprised Thug: Jason C. Miller
Thugs: Jamison Boaz, Austin Coppock, Jeffrey Damnit, Derek Jones, George Rockwell, Thom Williams

Produced by Felicia Day & Kim Evey
Directed & Edited by Sean Becker & Kim Evey
Line Producer: Gabe Uhr
Director of Photography/Colorist: Chris Darnell
1st AD: Ryan Lacen
2nd AD: Andrew Seely
Key PA: Milana Vayntrub
PA's: Jonathan Higgins, Jase Lindgren, Kris Swain, Ben Terrill
1st AC: Emily Ibarra
B Camera Op: Vahae Papazyan
C Camera Op: Cameron Chaves, Geoff Goodloe, Barry Gribble
Sound: Greg Benson
Audio playback / PA: Andrew Cichowski
DIT: Gabe Uhr
Production Designer: Greg Aronowitz
Art Director: Bryan Fulk
Art Dept: Mazin Dajani, Alina Khanjian, Amber Sinne
Costume Designer: Michele Dunn
Assistant Costume Designer : Kristin Ingram
2nd Assistant Costume: Michelle Fitzsimmons
Wardrobe Assistant: Sinead Mahoney
Choreographer: Chantal Robson
Fight Choreographer/Stunt Coordinator: Thom Williams
Gaffer: Rob Grower
Best Boy Electric : Jeremy Mennel
Dolly Grip Sarah Schulte
Swing G&E: Justin Rettke, Terry Lin, Aaron Fairley, Brian Corral
Makeup: Jennifer Jackson & Ashley Joybeck
Song Produced by: Jason C. Miller
Song Co-Produced by: Jamison Boaz and Russell Ali
Mixed by: Jamison Boaz
Music by: Jason C. Miller, Jamison Boaz and Russell Ali
Lyrics by: Felicia Day and Sandeep Parikh
Live Percussion by: Maulik Zaveri

Mos Eisley Radio Spills the beans on Space Combat in SWTOR!

If you don't listen you need to! The DJ's from MER let the wamp rat out of the bag at Comic-Con with news about Space Combat in SWTOR, to get the full scoop you will need to listen to episode 22.

Continuing with our summer of amazing guests, this week Scott Johnson of The Instance and the FrogPants network of shows joins us to discuss all things SWTOR! We take another step back to discuss what makes a great gaming podcast, whether or not Bioware has the formula in place to make a fantastic game (hint: they do!), parenting and MMOs, and in general completely geek out on our most anticipated game of the next year. We also hit the recent news, including the announcement of ship combat at Comic-Con 2010 and the newest playable planet (which is actually a moon), Nar Shaddaa.

Also, stick around after the show is over to hear us geek out even more on what we’ve been playing (mostly Starcraft II) and some of the games we’re looking forward to in the coming months.

Winner Gamingface.com is now in the WoW Cataclysm Beta

Thanks to this photo I now have a WoW Cataclysm beta key. I checked The Instance just as I went to lunch and found this

" Link  Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to patronize The Instance fan page on Facebook.


On that page, I have just created a new photo album called “WoW In Real Life”. Now it’s time for you to get creative. Post one photo to the photos page that fits the description:


“…your WoW things juxtaposed with real-world things, or just real-world things that remind you of WoW.”


It could be a picture of your collector’s edition of WoW on a snow sled. Perhaps your FigurePrint on vacation in the city. Perhaps you have an actual pet pig named Hellboar. We will select one photo at 8PM PDT today. It will be a photo that is funny/weird/beautiful/catchy. You have four hours.


Good luck!!"

So I posted this photo and I got me a Key!

Don't steep on your own Freezing Trap! Jeanos the Hunter (entity guild on Nagrand)

A big thank's to theinstance.net ,If you don't listen to the podcast you need to!! It rocks!

OMG to I play Cataclysm or SC2!! OMG What will I do!

The Instance WoW Cataclysm Beta Key give away!

I spend a lot of Time listing to pod casts on the way to and from work, and for almost 2 years now I have listened to the Instance with Scot Johnson and Randy (I am fine thanks for asking) Deluxe. If you’re in to WoW the Instance is a must! I have tried lots of WoW podcasts but the instance is the only one I can recommend It’s clean well presented witty and informative, All they need is to get the very hot Felicia Day on more frequently! And big new this week over at the instance is that they are giving away WoW Cataclysm Beta Keys!!

We’re happy to announce that every day for the next 25 days, The Instance will give away two keys to the World Of Warcraft: Cataclysm beta test, courtesy of Blizzard Entertainment! As we build up to our landmark 200th episode, we want to give you the chance to beta-test and be among the first to experience the coming cataclysm.

Every day, starting tomorrow – Friday, July 23rd – Scott and Randy will each give away one of two unique codes that unlock your access to Cataclysm. To win,......Read on

MMO-Champion Cursed

Boubouille broke the news that MMO-Champion has fallen to the dark side and sold there sole to Curse.. I have seen lots of great sites get chewed up over the years by bigger sights and although it might be a win/win for MMO champ and Curse it might be loss to the loyal readers of MMO-Champion. I do hope Curse are smart and leave MMO-Champ the way it is, I would hate to see all the crap add that plague Curse end up all over one of the best WoW sites in the net!



Press Release
San Francisco, CA – July 19, 2010 – Curse, Inc. announced today the purchase of the #1 World of Warcraft news site, MMO-Champion.com. The site was bought from Major League Gaming for an undisclosed amount.

MMO-Champion is a natural fit for Curse which already possesses the largest repository of add-ons available for MMO (Massively Multiplayer Online) games such as World of Warcraft, Warhammer Online and Runes of Magic as well as extremely popular forums for Runescape, Aion and Final Fantasy XIV. The World of Warcraft news site attracts 7 million unique visitors and more than 80 million page views per month (Google Analytics WW, June 2010). The combination makes Curse the #1 MMO destination online.

“The acquisition of MMO-Champion markedly sets Curse apart from the competition,” said Hubert Thieblot, CEO and Founder. “Not only does the addition solidify Curse as the largest MMO destination on the web, but it plays a central role in delivering a complete Curse MMO solution. Curse is now the ultimate resource for MMO news, forums, databases, and add-ons.”

Gamers and advertisers alike will benefit greatly from MMO-Champion’s purchase by Curse. In the next few months, visitors can expect an updated page design and improved user experience. To insure the site’s strong content offering will not be compromised, Fabien Bonte, the site’s founder and administrator, will be joining the Curse staff as a full-time employee. Advertisers can take advantage of Curse’s extended reach into the core MMO market, making MMO gamers easier to connect with than ever. For more information about Curse and MMO-Champion, please visit www.curse.com.

SWTOR Its all about the Music! Video.

A big part of any game is the music, and the music is one of the things I miss most about Star wars Galaxies. Just listning to John Williams music takes me to another world! In SWTOR we will be getting 5 and 1/2 hours of new Star Wars music! OMG for me just that will be enough to get me to buy this game the day it comes out!

The emotional experience of Star Wars™ comes to life in new music created exclusively for The Old Republic™. From soft melodies that ring in the forest of Alderaan to the magnificent booming of a battle scene on Ord Mantell, a talented team of composers, musicians and developers came together to create a magical score for the game.

Watch Developer Dispatch: Music of The Old Republic to see what goes into weaving the familiar Star Wars riffs with a new original score. And learn how music impacts the thrilling moments in video games as well as movies.







http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xTIUVGakoYE

The Old Republic is going to kick ass! Group play video

Seeing videos like this enforces my conferences in BioWare The old Republic is going to kick ass!

During E3 we gave live demos of multiplayer game play in The Old Republic for the press. Now we want to share the demo with the community! This demo shows how a diverse group of players use their abilities to complement one another in battle.

Commander Narlock readies his troops for an Imperial assault. As he does, all four Republic classes; a Jedi Consular, Jedi Knight, Smuggler, and Trooper join together to assist in fighting off the attack. Watch as each player does his or her part to take on the enemies, and beat the Imperial Troopers and Imperial Breach Droids.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dmtkHrmLff0

Site Rebuild www.gamingface.com

In the little spare time I have I am working on gamingface to make it sleeker and easy to read on mobile devices. Please leave feedback on www.gamingface.com and let me know what you do and don’t like about the changes. When I am happy with the changes I will apply them to all 15 RSS sites that we run here at gamingface.

Go out with grace please..

As a GM I have had to gkick lots of people over the years and I also have had people leave because of the ways we did things in the guild. Let’s not bull crap my guild is not the greatest in the world and it’s not for everyone I’m not the best GM in the world and I have a life outside of the game, So I understand if the guild I run is not for everyone. There is 2 ways you can leave a guild that’s get kicked or gquit, but no matter what it is you need to do it with grace. If you have someone leave your guild because it was not working for them of wish them well and move on if the guild you was in removes you because you was not up to scratch? Thank them for having you ask them what you could have done to make it better! Whatever you do, DO NOT DO THIS! VVV

Warning bad language in this Video!



And you know what I think it might be a chick!



.

I feel the need the need of driving something!

I got the driving game itch and I found someone selling the Logitech MOMO wheel and pedals. I was thinking about the g27 but at $400+ I just could not justify it. With the Momo at ¼ the price of the g27 and all the crazy prices on steam for racing games I’m in for some fun time! Looks like the Man room is getting a cool gaming upgrade!

.

SWTOR Hope Cinematic Trailer

Here's the newest cinematic trailer you have all been waiting for...

In the years before the signing of the Treaty of Coruscant, the Sith Empire sought to crush the Republic's morale by destroying Alderaan. See one of the pivotal battles of this conflict in our second cinematic trailer: Hope.

The Battle of Alderaan. The Republic's gravest hour. Recently promoted to Darth, Malgus launches the first of many surprise attacks that would become his trademark during the Great War, perfectly timing the assault with a feint that pulls the Republic fleet light-years away.

Thousands of assault droids and hundreds of Sith set the heart of the Republic ablaze, and Alderaan's few defenders are swept away with ease.

Unknown to Darth Malgus, small groups of Republic Troopers are stationed on Alderaan, some recovering from wounds, others are awaiting orders. As these brave soldiers take to the forests and mountains to fight a guerilla campaign against Malgus's forces, the Republic fleet rushes back to repel the invasion. With time running out and Alderaan's capitol threatened, it falls to Havoc Squad, the elite Republic Special Forces unit, to coordinate one last desperate stand against Malgus' vastly superior numbers.

Here's the first cinematic trailer in HD released at E3 2009 for those that have not yet seen it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=494v0LLIi0k

Also check out the latest Sith Warrior Trailer available here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CR2-wvXPSMc

Check out our SWTOR blogs here 



.

Lord of the ring online Free To Play!

I must say as a lifetime member of LORO this is a great move by Turbine! I stopped playing due the lack of other players. I’m going to reinstall it for the first time in 2 years just to see what happens. I do hope it works for them! Good luck guys!

Free-to-Play opens up more choices and options so you can play your way. When LOTRO Free-to-Play is available, you can download the game for free and start playing without a subscription or even a credit card.


Anyone can join the game for free as a Free player when LOTRO Free-to-Play is available. You will automatically be upgraded from Free player to Premium player status with your first purchase of Turbine Points in the LOTRO Store.


And for a monthly fee, LOTRO's VIP program offers the best value and the most options for players who like the convenience of having unlimited access to all of LOTRO's game content and features. If you are already a subscriber, just maintain your active subscription to be automatically upgraded to VIP!



The Lord of the Rings Online™: Frequently Asked Questions

1.What is The Lord of the Rings Online™?
The Lord of the Rings Online™ (LOTRO) is the award-winning online role-playing game set in J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth, the greatest fantasy world of all time. In LOTRO, you can explore the legendary world of The Lord of the Rings™ and create your own unique Middle-earth adventure. Join with the world's largest fellowship of players to fight the ravenous hordes of the Dark Lord Sauron, and forge your own legend.

2.What is Free-to-Play?
Free-to-Play opens up more choices and options so you can play your way. When LOTRO Free-to-Play is available, you can download the game for free and start playing without a subscription or even a credit card. Earn free Turbine Points as you advance your Hero and adventure throughout the massive world of Middle-earth. You can spend these points in the LOTRO Store to access hundreds of convenience items as well as expansion packs, premium content, potions, character-customization options, and more. If you choose to, you may also purchase Turbine Points in the LOTRO Store.

Torchlight fun

If you’re like me and dyeing to get your hands on Diablo 3 you will be pleased to know the is relief ! I went to the extent of reinstalling Diablo 2 in hope of scratching that Itch…. But playing a 800X600 locked game on a 1680x1050 LCD sux balls.
Torchlight is sooo much like Diablo it’s amazing blizzard don’t rip them a new one or try to, But I guess it’s just like all the FPS’s out there a lot’s feel the same but are different enough not to cause trademark issues.

About Torchlight

Word of Ember blazed across the land, and the town of Torchlight flared to life.

Ember is the essence of magic and the keystone of alchemy; it lures the restless with promises of power and riches. Miners burrowed deep beneath the dirt streets of Torchlight, discovering veins of the ore richer than any found in living memory- but they were not the first to covet these mines. The miners broke through into the buried past, a dangerous labyrinth of caverns and ruined civilizations, twisted creatures and the bones of those who came before. Evil bubbles up from the depths and threatens to overrun this town as it has so many others. The heart of a villain has infused the Ember, and his darkness seeps through the veins. To survive, the townspeople must break the cycle of destruction; they need a champion who can destroy the evil at its root. Removing the source of the rot may purify the Ember, but it is a long and perilous journey. The champion must battle through rock and fire, through lost cities and ancient tombs, into the palace of the villain himself.

The adventure is set in the mining settlement of Torchlight, a boomtown founded on the discovery of rich veins of Ember – a rare and mysterious ore with the power to enchant or corrupt all that it contacts. This corruptive power may have dire consequences however, and players set out into the nearby mountains and depths below to discover the full extent of Ember’s influence on the civilizations that have come before.

Players will choose from among three character classes, and venture from the safety of the town of Torchlight into randomly generated dungeon levels, with a huge variety of creepy monsters, endless variations of loot to find, and quests to complete. The endless randomization ensures a long-lived gameplay experience.

This game is a crap load of fun!! You can download the 3 hour demo for free and if you want to keep playing pay $19.99 to unlock the full game. So its time to give that Logitech G9 a workout and get clicking!

Be a Jedi! view this video you will.

This is the best Star wars recap I have ever seen. Enjoy.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0z_TU4Gw5o&

WoW Cataclysm Beta Opt-In!

Get those opt-ins ready for the World of Warcraft: Cataclysm closed beta! The sundering of Azeroth is nigh, and you don’t want to be left out in the cold of Northrend when you could be enjoying the sun-drenched beaches on the goblin isle of Kezan. To ensure you’re opted-in and eligible as a potential candidate, you’ll need a World of Warcraft license attached to your Battle.net account, have your current system specifications uploaded to the Battle.net Beta Profile Settings page, and have expressed interest through the franchise-specific check boxes.

So get your opt-ins set up, updated, and ready; we're worgen real hard to get the beta going soon!

Mittoni bring your games to life video

I kinda feel like this when my wife comes in when I'm raiding!

Combat in The Old Republic

Whether you dream of beating the odds with just your luck and a blaster, or imagine restoring order to the galaxy with Force powers and a Lightsaber, you’ll have your chance in Star Wars™: The Old Republic™.

We’ve talked a lot about how The Old Republic is innovating on storytelling in MMOs, and now we want to share with you how combat in The Old Republic will deliver a new level of excitement for fans. Check out our latest Video Documentary that focuses on Combat to get an inside look at how we’re bringing dynamic Star Wars™ action to life in Star Wars: The Old Republic!

Watch Combat in The Old Republic now!

Appholes!

I know it's not gaming but it had to be said!

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Appholes
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Tea Party

Blizzard killing 25 man raids in Cataclysm!

I run a 25 man raid guild on an Oceanic server. We have to have 3-4 sub ins due to lag issues and other things, like the fact that some fights need 2 tanks and others need 3. If Blizzard run with the idea posted in the forums on 27 April (and re-posted below), I can see it killing our 25 man raids.

I like the 10 vs 25 man loot but this new idea has problems. For example if we have the same lockout for 10 and 25 man and we want to work on a new 3 boss encounter, on the first night if we don’t have 25 online we can go and do 10 man raids instead but the 2nd night if we do have 25 online but we saved to 10 on that first night, 5 people would have to sit out while 20 get to be in 10 man teams! It's no good the other way around either. If we start with 25 on the first night and then don't have 25 on the 2nd night ... more problems. Even if you have the same raid ID for 10 / 25 man you will still have the problem of having to sit out up to 14 players if you are 1 player short. Ridiculous!

Having 10 / 25 on separate lockouts gives us something to do on off nights on our main toons. Some people do not like having to tank if their main is a healer or dps. This will either force people to have multiple alts and not give them the options they currently have for their main characters.

Separate lockouts gives us more content for no extra effort from the devs. As it is now we have raid content for 3 nights of the week only, that’s with 25 on 2 nights and a 10 man on 1, leaving 4 nights of dancing in Dalaran, looking for something to do on your main.

Quote from: Nethaera:

We're continuing to refine the raid progression paths in Cataclysm, and we'd like to share some of those changes with you today. Please enjoy!


The first of the refinements being made is that we're combining all raid sizes and difficulties into a single lockout. Unlike today, 10- and 25-player modes of a single raid will share the same lockout. You can defeat each raid boss once per week per character. In other words, if you wanted to do both a 10- and 25-person raid in a single week, you’d need to do so on two different characters. Normal versus Heroic mode will be chosen on a per-boss basis in Cataclysm raids, the same way it works in Icecrown Citadel. Obviously the raid lockout change doesn't apply in pure Icecrown terms though, as this change goes hand-in-hand with a few other changes to raid progression in Cataclysm.

Depressed gamers everywhere - get over yourselves!

Over the last couple of weeks I have noticed, as I've read over the blogs in our RSS feeds, that a lot of people seem to be bored with WoW, or have complaints about things that Blizzard are doing. Even the podcasters are literally depressing to listen to!

"it sucks to pug" ... "nobody is friendly in raids" ... "everyone must min/max and it's no fun" ... "the game is too easy" ... "that mount should not be for sale" ... "vote with your wallet, don't support Blizzard"

Frankly, I am absolutely sick of it! Of the complaining ... not the game. These kids complaining about their pugs and raids need to get off their fat arses and do something else if they're not having fun! If you don't like the group you're raiding with ... find a new one! Don't like that mount that Blizzard is selling, well, you don't need to frakin buy it! No one is holding a gun to your head!

For me, the guild I run has a blast raiding. Quite often we've literally had to take a five minute break due to too many people being in fits of laughter. Sure, we're not the best raiding guild on the server, but we don't care. None of us ever need to worry about pugging 5-mans because we do it in groups together. People just expect entertainment, friends and fun to be handed to them on a silver platter. You have to find it and help make the game fun. If your GM is a dick wad, start your own guild ... set a laughter rule ... kick the qqing elitist jerks out and get back to what this game is all about ... having fun. And if it's not fun, don't blog about it, just walk away!

How not to apply to a guild!

OlgariusRulezAll — April 07, 2010 — This is my application for the best guild in Durotan-US. I play the hardest class in WoW. My rotation consists of 17 buttons non macro'd, including mongoose bite. Pal Talk me at: OlgariusRulezAll6767.

150 active WoW blogs and counting!

Just added some new WoW feeds to Gaming Face. We are up to about 150 active WoW blogs. The feed is updated about every 15 minutes, so for the latest news in the WoW blogosphere, check out wow.gamingface.net or click the GF WoW Feed up the top. If you run a WoW or MMO blog and we're not linking you, please let us know.

Come in Spinner! Celestial Steed Mount

Blizzard just added 2 new items to the pet store The Blizzard Pet Store has just been updated with a couple of fun new choices that you can get for your characters. Continuing in the theme of cute, miniaturized bosses, we have Lil' XT, and the Celestial Steed is the first-ever mount to be available through the service. Of course, the Pandaren Monk, Lil' KT, and the Wind Rider Cub and Gryphon Hatchling plushies are still available there as well.
Head over to the Pet Store to see what's available.

At the time of posting I was in Position 80368 and have to wait over 5 hours! So let's look at that for a sec 80,000 x $25 = $2,000,000 in sales in line at this time!

For all you non WoW players this is a digital ingame item, it’s a flying horse for your Avatar to fly around on.
Yes it’s a sexy mount but wow ... someone a Blizzard is getting a pat on the back right now!

Supreme Commander 2 - the Prequel in Design

I have no doubt that Supreme Commander 1 was one of the best RTS games of the last five years ... sorry, not was but still is. The expansion for it, Forged Alliance added the extra features to the game that gave it a new life. So, I was quite excited when I saw that Supreme Commander II was being launched this month. To top it off, Steam even put it on special for the pre-orders. What a bargain! But after a really dodgy product launch, the reality hit ... this was in no way shape or form a Supreme Commander 2. It's a sequel only in story but not in maps, gameplay, graphics or anything else. As I played the first missions I was baffled as to why the graphics were not as good as in Supreme Commander 1. Jumping into skirmishes, I discovered that the maps were not even a quarter of the size of those in number 1, or the expansion. None of the maps require any type of naval units either. The maps included with the game are designed in a way where you can't do anything physically practical with the ships or the ocean. There are no island maps (etc).

So, what would drive a developer to release a game that's not as good as its prequel? Why would you dumb down a game? Take out features? The answer of course is ... console. Supreme Commander II was designed for console gamers. It was dumbed down so that it will run on the Xbox. I am not dissapointed that they made a console version of this game but I am dissapointed that they tried to release this as a sequel on PC. Give me this new story line on the old engine and allow me to use all the maps from the first game and the add-on. Give me back all of the glorious graphics that made Supreme Commander 1 a truly brilliant game. If I was able to return this game, I wouldn't think twice about doing so. Unfortunately, Steam doesn't allow for refunds. I guess that's why they had it on special for pre-orders. Once the word got out about how crap with game is on PC, no one will want it. But hey ... If you're looking for an RTS game on a Xbox, this game could be fun ... but it's only a shadow of what number 1 was on the PC.

StarCraft(r) II: Wings of Liberty(TM) Beta Test Invitation!

Yep thats right they are out and I just got it in the mail!

Congratulations, this is your invitation to the beta test for Blizzard Entertainment’s StarCraft® II: Wings of Liberty™! You are receiving this email because you attended a special Blizzard Entertainment event, participated in a related contest or promotion, or have otherwise been selected to join the beta-testing process. This email contains your beta key along with instructions on how to get started.

As a beta test participant, you’ll have the opportunity to experience the multiplayer gameplay of StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty and explore the social-networking, matchmaking, and other new features of Blizzard Entertainment’s revamped Battle.net® online-gaming service. Throughout the StarCraft II beta test, you’ll be able to take part in cooperative and competitive battles as the terrans, protoss, and zerg -- and at the same time, you’ll be helping test the stability of the Battle.net service and fine-tune the game balance prior to launch. The developers look forward to hearing your feedback and seeing you on Battle.net!

I'm off to PLAY!!! will report back soon!

Make-A-Wish Foundation Receives $1.1 million donation from Blizzard Entertainment

February 17, 2010 08:30 AM Eastern Time

The Make-A-Wish Foundation® Receives $1.1 Million Donation from Blizzard Entertainment

Contribution to Help Grant the Wishes of Children with Life-Threatening Medical Conditions Around the World

PHOENIX--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The Make-A-Wish Foundation today announced a $1.1 million donation from Blizzard Entertainment, a premier developer and publisher of entertainment software. The donation is based on 50 percent of the total sales during November and December 2009 of a special in-game pet, the Pandaren Monk, for Blizzard's award-winning, massively multiplayer online role-playing game, World of Warcraft®.

“This generosity is helping us bring hope, strength and joy to children when they – and their families – are facing an unimaginably difficult time in their young lives.”
On Tuesday, Feb. 16, Blizzard made the presentation during a special ceremony at the company's headquarters in Irvine, Calif. Blizzard invited 15 wish children who are also gaming enthusiasts and their families to enjoy an exclusive learning experience with the World of Warcraft development team, including an inside look at how the game is created.

“We've had a long relationship with the Make-A-Wish Foundation, and we're proud to support the priceless work they do for children,” said Mike Morhaime, CEO and cofounder of Blizzard Entertainment. “This donation also reflects the spirit and generosity of our players – their enthusiasm for World of Warcraft and for supporting a good cause made this possible.”

I love this Song!

Boom De Yada WoW - Eng Subtitles



And
Boom De Yada - The Making

The World of Warcraft Lich King Figure by DC Direct - UGO.com

What you see here is the first image of the Lich King figure for the World of Warcraft collectibles line by DC Direct. read on : The World of Warcraft Lich King Figure by DC Direct - UGO.com

Global Agenda just took a headshot form Kyle Bennett

I had a bit of a look some weeks ago at Global Agenda, a new MMO from Hi-Rez Studios. Too be honest, the first thing I thought was that it looked a lot like Tabula Rasa ... and that was enough to keep me away. I have no idea why some developers beat a dead horse. How many times do you need to see Si-Fi FPS style MMOs fail?
But to see developers take on a failed idea and then let bad community managers or developers say stupid things to its community, amazes me. I get how hard it is developing a game but if you have no fracking idea what you’re talking about, don’t talk to your community!

Kyle Bennett, the owner of the hugely popular hardcore PC hardware review site, HardOcp.com said:
“What has me a bit riled up is that Hi-Rez Studios is locking out the users of Eyefinity,TripleHead2Go, and SoftTH from enjoying their hard earned computer hardware when it comes to playing Global Agenda.”

Read on and see why it’s dumb to piss off your community!

What to do, where to go in SWG

Sony online Entertainment sent out an email to all their Star Wars Galaxy members, inviting them to come back to the game for the month of February for free! When I received this email, I thought what the hell, let’s see what they’ve done. When I last played this game three years ago, I had a few max level characters – an elder Jedi, which I spent months levelling to be an uber elite character, and also a master Bounty Hunter, which has a full set of Madalorian armour and is extremely wealthy.
When I logged in, I found most of my houses in the game had been packed up. This was a feature Sony introduced a while ago to clean up some of the abandoned houses throughout the Galaxy. Unfortunately, for players coming back, this means that the first hours of their gameplay involves unpacking houses and sorting out where all of their stuff is. For me, this took about 2-3 hours of gameplay.
While I was unpacking my house I got whispers from old guild members and got invited back into my old guild that I had founded five years ago. The current guild leader gave me some gameplay hints and told me what I needed to do for the new content in the game.
The new heroic dungeons that were introduced in a recent patch involve simple quest lines to give access to these instances. Apparently there are five heroic instances in total and the guys in the guild told me about the improvements you can make to your character. But after showing them what I had, so far as geared was concerned, we discovered that there wasn’t much I would need to be competitive. So after three years, SOE have managed to provide little to no improvement to characters, apart from their appearance. It really seems like SWG is more like a World Sim than an Epic heroic adventure. It’s more about setting up houses, cities and communities than epic battles against epic villains.
For me, the first time around, I loved it and levelling my characters was enthralling. The first time you discover new worlds were good times ... exciting adventures. But when you get asked to go to the same place to do similar quests over and over again, it gets boring real fast. There are only so many times you can be expected to kill the same NPCs for a loot item.
Good luck Sony. I don’t think I’ll be hanging around – but thanks for the free re-trial!

WoW Lady Deathwhisper 25 man raid guide by Gamingface.com

Another WoW ICC 25 man raid guide from us here at gaming face.

Raiding etiquette

You know, I don't ask a lot from my raiders.know the strats of the bosses we are fighting ... come prepared with flasks, food, what ever else you might need during the raid and listen to the raid leader. It really annoys me when you spend two and a half hours for a couple of nights trying to progress through a new boss and it becomes extremely obvious when someone asks a really stupid question, that they haven't read a strategy. These people think it doesn't become obvious about who does and does not know the fights and who does and who does not lie when they get asked if they have read the strategy and watched the video guides. I would have asked maybe four or five times over the last week if everyone had read the guides and watched the videos. When you get no reply you just presume everyone has done the minimum expected research. What these people don't realise is that all the raid leaders notice when people ask obvious questions that are explained in every guide - that they have not read the strategy and then have not done their research and they have lied to the raid. These people then wonder why they get put on standby for future raids. My advice to any raider is to be honest. If you've read the strategy but don't quite understand it, ask questions. If you have read the strategy and it was four weeks ago and you've forgotten exactly how it goes, ask for a re-cap. If you have not read it at all, don't try and wing your way through, ask to have the fight explained or ask for time to go and read the strat. Attempting to wing it through will only get you caught eventually. Although it might not matter too much in pugs, in the guild scenariojavascript:void(0), it's definitely going to piss people off.

The MMO report!

The MMO Report are doing a great job and if you have not seen the show you need to check it out!

PC Games - E3 2010 - Star Trek Online

Wow killing Porn?

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Mangros ICC Raid Boss fight quick links!

Lord Marrowgar - First boss in ICC Lower Spire

Wowwiki: http://www.wowwiki.com/Lord_Marrowgar
Wowhead: http://www.wowhead.com/?npc=36612
Tankspot: http://www.tankspot.com/forums/f206/59646-icecrown-lord-marrowgar.html
Gamingface: http://www.gamingface.com/2010/01/wow-25-man-icc-raid-lord-marrowgar.html

A dodge-the-flame, omgkillthestuneffectbeforeitkillsme, whirlwind fight. Be prepared with macros for instant target switching.

Lady Deathwhisper - 2nd Boss in ICC Lower Spire

Wow armory update and 3d model Viewer

looks like Blizzard have been working hard giving the armory new fetchers Flash 3d model of your toon on your blog anyone? want to show off your new gear?

3D Model Viewer
Every character profile now has a 3D model viewer that displays the character in his or her currently equipped gear, and accurately displays the character's physical features, hairstyle, and helm/cloak display as they appear in-game. Mousing over the character model window brings up a control panel with the following controls :

* Camera controls: To rotate the camera around a character, click and hold the left mouse button while moving the mouse left and right, or click the arrow buttons in the top left of the window. To zoom in and out, use the mouse wheel while hovering over the character window, or click the zoom buttons in the top left of the window. To move the character within the frame, right-click and drag the character in the window (or on the small square in the bottom left corner of the window).
* Animations: Each character has a selection of animations that they can perform. Use the arrows next to the animation's name to cycle through them. The available animations are determined by the character's class and currently equipped weapons.
* Capture pose: If you are logged in, you can set the default pose of any character on your account. Use the camera and animation controls to create a pose, then click the save icon to set it as the default. All visitors to the character's profile will then see the character in that pose.

* Play controls: The rewind, pause, and fast forward buttons allow you to fine-tune a pose for a character.

* Fullscreen mode: You can view the character in a fullscreen display against a selection of backgrounds. All controls will continue to function in fullscreen mode.

* Embed: You can embed a standalone, interactive version of the character's model viewer in a compatible website, such as a social networking site, guild website, or forum.

* Options: Extra options include selecting a background in fullscreen mode and toggling the display of a character's helm, cloak, or tabard.

(At this time it looks to be bugged in some browsers like Google chrome but is working fine in IE and Fire Fox.)

Character and Calendar Feeds
You can export your character information and calendar events to other websites and applications using the Armory's new customization tools. These features can be accessed through a logged-in character profile or through the Armory's main navigation menu.

* Character Activity Feeds: ( Check me out )

Each character's activity feed shows the most recent in-game actions of the character that can be recorded by the Armory. These include achievements, boss kills, item acquisitions, and more. Character feeds can be customized using our customization tool, then exported as RSS feeds to your RSS reader of choice. Refer to the Character Feed FAQ for more details.

* Player Calendar Feeds: Another new Armory tool allows you to export in-game player calendar data to online calendars such as Google Calendar. The tool can aggregate up to five characters on your account in a single feed, and is automatically synched with the characters' in-game player calendars. Refer to the Calendar Feed FAQ for more details.

Blizzard authenticator the newest hacking tool!

Over the last weeks, two of my guild members have been hacked. Neither of them had an authenticator. The players were online and got booted off by the hacker. They then got an email saying their account password had been changed but when they went to login to change their password back they got a message asking them to put in their authenticator code! The hacker attached the authenticator to their account, preventing them from changing their password. NP just call Blizzard right? Wrong ...

The hacking happened, in both instances, 15 min after Blizzard tech support closed down for the day, giving the hacker 12 hours to clean out the account. Putting an ingame ticket in is a waste of time as you get no reply for over 24 hours.

Do we not pay Blizzard enough? What will it take to get support during prime time gaming hours? How can a hacker attach an authenticator to an account so easily? Why are you not required to confirm this action by email or even have a window of 12/24 hours that would give the user time to secure their account?

There are lots of things Blizzard could do to stop this but do they want to stop it? Getting hacked is a sure way to convince a player to get an authenticator! If you don’t have an authenticator by now and you play WoW, you are mad, you will be hacked, it’s just a matter of time!

WoW 25 man ICC Raid Lord Marrowgar Guide

After breaching the fortress, players will face a legion of undead guards directed to repel any invaders. Commanding the defenders is Lord Marrowgar, a monstrosity fused together from the bones of the undead. This is our 25 man raid guide video for the fight.