WoW Junkie

Fresh off the presses is the latest edition of the Gadgetzan Times! Featuring unique stories for each language and all new content, the Gadgetzan...

Blizzard added a limited preview of the tier9 class sets that will be offered in patch 3.2, Call of the Crusade, and theyre doing things a little...

Welcome back to The Queue, WoW.com's daily Q&A column where the WoW Insider team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft. Michael Sacco will be your host today.

Here's a Queue question straight from me to me: What do me and panda bears have in common? The answer is rings around our eyes, though I'm pretty sure that pandas have them genetically and not from staying up until seven in the morning watching Veronica Mars.

But of course, what does that question have to do with The Queue? I could say "I guess you'll just have to read on! Excelsior!", or I could just tell you that it's because people asked about Pandarens today. Let's start off with some basic questions first, though.

iamnotacarebear asked:

The question i have is with this increase of running the heroics, is the red heroic drake going to be removed? I would hate to see this happen, but i wouldn't be surprised.

Good question, IANACB!

Continue reading The Queue: Panda-monium edition

Filed under: The Queue

The Queue: Panda-monium edition originally appeared on WoW.com on Fri, 03 Jul 2009 22:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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For those of us who like to collect stuff in WoW, one of the cooler announcements for patch 3.2 was the inclusion of a whole new set of raptor hatchling pets, dropped around the world by rare and elite raptors. Of course, it was also an announcement of dread for serious collectors who can tell horror stories of killing thousands upon thousands of slimes and dragons for rare pets before. But will it be all as bad as that? WoW fansites have been on the case.

Mania, maven of Hunter pets, has also been looking into the drop rates and drop mobs, and has compiled a handy chart on her blog. Between Mania and the news on Warcraft Pets, it seems we can mostly confirm that the rare raptors (such as, for example, Takk the Leaper) will always drop their pets, while those that drop only off elites have a very rare drop rate more similar to the aforementioned slimes or dragons.

Continue reading Patch 3.2 PTR: Finding the Raptor Pets

Filed under: Patches, Items, Tips, Achievements

Patch 3.2 PTR: Finding the Raptor Pets originally appeared on WoW.com on Fri, 03 Jul 2009 20:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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So I've talked recently about life as an RPer, and how we seem to interact with our characters just a bit differently. Sometimes, whether we like it or not, a certain character and their back story just grab hold and won't let go, and we find ourselves coming back again and again, just to see where the story leads.

Of course, sometimes the character goes just the opposite way, and no matter what you do, your stories fall flat and you don't feel enthusiastic about logging on. It may be because you can't stand the character's personality anymore, it may be because your normal group of friends has hit an RP rut or even taken a break for a while themselves, it may be a variety of other things. Recently, Anna of Too Many Annas wrote a pretty awesome article about how to refresh a flagging RP character using 5 Rs: Relax and Rest, Reintegrate, Refresh the Character, Retcon, and Reroll/Reskin.

What's sort of cool about this list is that you can even apply a lot of the principles to characters in general, even if you're a non-RPer. Anna's covered the RP angle pretty well, so I'll mostly focus on this other angle.

Continue reading The Five Rs of Character Revitalization

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Tips, RP

The Five Rs of Character Revitalization originally appeared on WoW.com on Fri, 03 Jul 2009 19:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Two Bosses Enter ... but only One Boss Leaves, in WoW.com's series of fantasy death matches. This season's bosses come from the five-man instances of Wrath of the Lich King.

While last week's Two Bosses Moorabi/Trollgore matchup was downright gory, this week's battle appears no less likely to end up in a bloody mess. This week, we'll see King Dred of Drak'tharon Keep tear into Jedoga Shadowseeker and her minions inside Ahn'kahet: The Old Kingdom.

The ground rules:

• Assume that the opponents share similar levels, health pools and comparative overall damage output.
• In order to give Jedoga access to her minions, we'll set this deathmatch in her stomping grounds in Ahn'kahet - but we'll provide that King Dred arrives on the scene with a raptor posse of his own.
• Don't get caught up in gameplay mechanics and what actual players might do in each encounter.
• Focus on the three S's: style, story and scale.
  

Can a ruthlessly bloodthirsty priestess hold off a rampaging Devilsaur? Join us after the break to cast your vote for who you think will emerge this week's victor.

Continue reading Two Bosses Enter: Jedoga Shadowseeker vs. King Dred

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Features, Lore, Bosses, Two Bosses Enter

Two Bosses Enter: Jedoga Shadowseeker vs. King Dred originally appeared on WoW.com on Fri, 03 Jul 2009 18:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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BlizzCon approaches! Preparing for BlizzCon is your regular source for tips on how best to prepare for Blizzard's gaming extravaganza.

Every con I have ever been to, gaming-related or otherwise, has resulted in a bunch of people getting sick afterward -- usually including me. I've heard it called Con Crud, confluenza and the grunge. Whatever the name, it's pretty much the same: cold and flu symptoms that lay you low after attending a convention. As we've discussed before, I'm no doctor, but there are some experts out there with tips on building your immune system in the weeks before BlizzCon.

• Sleep: Get 7 to 8 hours a night. Sufficient sleep helps us reduce stress on our bodies, which makes them stronger for fighting illnesses. It also helps us maintain a healthy weight. Late night raiding sessions and/or small children make this more difficult, of course, but it's a worthy goal.
  

Continue reading Preparing for BlizzCon: Protect yourself against Con Crud

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Events, Fan stuff, BlizzCon

Preparing for BlizzCon: Protect yourself against Con Crud originally appeared on WoW.com on Fri, 03 Jul 2009 17:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Haven't done a shield in a while, so here's a cool-looking one to try for in Ulduar this weekend.

Name: The Boreal Guard (Wowhead, Thottbot, Armory)
Type: Epic Shield
Armor: 7960 (223 Block)
Attributes:

• +39 Strength, +92 Stamina. Pretty standard for a tanking shield.
• Two sockets: Red and Blue. This is what pretty much puts this baby over the top in terms of endgame tanking shields -- get some extra Strength, Stamina, and/or Defense in there, and this shield matches up against stuff that drops from the very hardest bosses in the game.

Continue reading Phat Loot Phriday: The Boreal Guard

Filed under: Items, Analysis / Opinion, Instances, Screenshots, Raiding, Phat Loot Phriday, Bosses, NPCs

Phat Loot Phriday: The Boreal Guard originally appeared on WoW.com on Fri, 03 Jul 2009 16:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The other day, we posted that Blizzard had trademarked the name "Cataclysm," and right after that, the community exploded with speculation: is it the name of WoW's next expansion, Blizzard's next-gen MMO, or some other project? Nothing is guaranteed yet (is it ever with Blizzard?), but the Internets have pretty much landed on the new expansion as the answer. "Cataclysm" actually means "a momentous and violent event marked by overwhelming upheaval and demolition," but it also has a pretty specific relation to water, and that's got lots of people thinking that it's the name of the Maelstrom expansion. In fact, The Sundering, or the world event in Azeroth's history where the Well of Eternity was destroyed and the Maelstrom (that swirly thing in the middle of the map) was created, was referred to as "the Cataclysm." So there you go -- pretty solid evidence, even though, as I said, nothing is guaranteed until we hear it from Blizz.

Stropp's got an interesting piece of speculation that says though "Cataclysm" is still probably the next expansion, the event the word refers to has yet to happen. He claims that if Blizzard really wants to speed up the 1-50 leveling process, they should just destroy Old Azeroth as we know it, and just have all the new characters start at level 50. That would be pretty nuts, but then again, Blizzard's never shown a real affinity for the old content, and by the next expansion, we'll be heading up to level 90 or even 100.

Continue reading Finding Blizzard's Cataclysm

Filed under: Night Elves, Analysis / Opinion, Blizzard, News items, Expansions

Finding Blizzard's Cataclysm originally appeared on WoW.com on Fri, 03 Jul 2009 15:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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I love this comic from the very talented miggy over at WoW Ladies, not only because it's funny, but because she's got a point. Back when the Battle for Mount Hyjal instance in the Caverns of Time appeared in game, we all wondered why we were going there in the first place -- unlike the other CoT instances, there were no dragons to fight or strange factions messing with the continuum. All that could happen in there is that we'd screw everything up and ruin time as we know it (and given all the wipes that went on in there, we probably did). But with the Argent Tournament, Blizzard seems to have gone even further: not only is there no clear reason for us to do it, but we're actually ignoring the threat at hand.

As you know if you've read Sacco's excellent (and completely spoilerrific) guides to the Coliseum raid and the Tournament 5-man, there is a tacked-on reason we're doing all of this stuff, and it's that the Horde and Alliance want to send their strongest people to go after Arthas, and the Tournament is a way of sussing out who's most worthy. But though that makes for some great lore cutscenes, doesn't it still undermine Arthas' strength? How powerful can the guy be if there are so many people lining up to kill him we have to fight over it?

Don't get me wrong, we're definitely looking forward to the Coliseum, and it's definitely brought some interesting things and rewards to the game. Just like CoT, in the light of the lore and the MMO genre at large, it's a great addition. But it is funny that the great Lich King's main tactic seems to be to have us fight it out between ourselves way before we ever bother taking a shot at him.

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Fan stuff, Instances, Expansions, Raiding, Lore, Bosses, NPCs, Wrath of the Lich King

Wrath of the Who? originally appeared on WoW.com on Fri, 03 Jul 2009 14:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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