Since the blues told us any new changes to patch 2.4 would show up in the PTR patch notes, I decided it might be profitable to save copies of the patch notes every so often and run diff on them to see if anything's changed. It looks like there were some changes today; here's what I found that we haven't discussed in full yet:

• The benefits of drinking out of combat have been delayed. It will now take five seconds before the full benefit of the mana regeneration will come into effect.
• Hunters will no longer spin around if they cast Aimed Shot or Steady Shot while facing away from their target.
• Arcane Explosion: The damage cap for area of effect damage on this spell has been increased by approximately 50%.
• Drain Mana: This ability no longer increases in power from bonus spell damage effects. Base points of the effect increased by 50%.
• Queue times for arena matches have been reduced. Players will now be able to enter matches faster than previously.


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The Care and Feeding of Warriors would like to pretend to be an exhaustive and comprehensive overview of warrior issues. Unfortunately, they're letting Matthew Rossi write the thing, and he's equal parts obsessed maniac, egotistical loon and occasionally informed poster. Proud pappy of three level 70 warriors, we think he may have been dropped on his head a lot as a child. That would explain why he enjoys playing the class that gets hit all the time.

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This is a public service announcement from all of us here at WoW Insider: there is currently no beta running for Wrath of the Lich King. This means that if you receive an invitation that claims to be for a Wrath beta, it's definitely a scam and you should under no circumstances click the links therein. If there were an actual Wrath beta, you would surely hear about it here and/or on the official website. If you have signed up for any alleged beta test, it would be a good idea to change your account password as soon as possible; you can't be too safe these days.

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Quote from Blizzard staff"eSports is one of the most exciting facets of online gaming today," said Mike Morhaime, CEO and cofounder of Blizzard Entertainment. "We're pleased to expand World of Warcraft's tournament options for players who want to focus mainly on the competitive aspect of the game."

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Yes, it's that time of the week again. Our illustrious podcast goes live tomorrow afternoon at 3:30pm EST on WoW Radio, and while it probably won't be as crazy as last week, we've got another fun-packed show for you. This week, Matthew Rossi will be on with Turpster and I, so we'll hear what he has to say about warriors and shamans in 2.4. Plus, we've got Love is in the Air news to cover, as well as Brutallus running rampant (and M'uru going missing), and what an official version of mobile WoW might mean.

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After a short hiatus last week (due to the Friday evening patch 2.4 mayhem), the phat loot is back, this time with an axe that not only has one of the best names in the game, but can give you a little ranged help as well.

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Last month, rumors were running around about World of Warcraft moving to mobile phones. While we won't exactly be able to play World of Warcraft on mobile phones, we may soon see a mobile service for World of Warcraft gamers.

The plan came to light a bit more clearly earlier this month when a patent filed by Blizzard was found describing a new mobile service called BattleChat. During DICE 2008, Blizzard's co-founder Frank Pearce revealed more on about this:

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Attunement is one of those subjects that divides WoW players. You either think people should have to work to get into high-end dungeons, or you think they should be open to anyone with the guts to try. Of course, you're more likely to fall into the first camp if you yourself had to do that work, hence the recent controversy over the attunements for the Black Temple and Mount Hyjal being removed.

Well, it turns out that if WoW lead developer Jeff "Tigole" Kaplan had his way, attunement would be much less of a pain. He dropped the following information in a thread on "Attunement and Alts" in the general forums today:

• They would like to make it so getting a Karazhan key or a heroic key gave all your other max-level alts access as well.
• They're looking into guild and raid attunements, but "no promises."
• They're interested in doing server events to open up content, like the AQ war but, Tigole says, with more fun dailies and fewer boring collection grinds.


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Gear changes

Paladin
Season 1/2 Gear now has resilience.

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When I reported this morning that the Restoration Druid arena sets were having their four-piece bonus changed from +15% outdoor movement speed to -0.25 sec to Healing Touch casting time, many druids were, reasonably, upset. Perhaps you will be pleased to learn that in the next PTR build, the bonus is being changed again, this time to -0.2 sec to Regrowth casting time. Furthermore, the Feral four-piece bonus (movement speed increase) will now apply to Cheetah again (source). Are you druids mollified now?

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Ready Check is a weekly column focusing on successful raiding for the serious raider. Hardcore or casual, Kara or BT, everyone can get in on the action and down them some bosses. Srsly, that punk took my pink Huffy 10 speed.

It never fails. Every time I say something about raiding, I get comments about how people miss the old 40-mans, how the 10-man to 25-man transition doesn't even make mathematical sense, or even how everything should just be 5-mans. (Is that even technically a raid?) So today we're going to chat a bit about raid size and what it really means.

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It looks like the first set of changes for World of Warcraft's 2.4 Patch on the latest PTR has finally arrived. This is in line with the progressive changes Blizzard promised to gradually implement over the course of testing the new patch.

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On the World of Warcraft forums, gamer Penance asks a question some of you may have also wondered on. Basically Penance asks if the honor system outside of the Battlegrounds are the same as PvP while inside.

While taking part in PvP in Battlegrounds, players who die 50 times will no longer reward honor when they are killed again. Penance wants to clarify whether the same holds true outside the Battlegrounds. The short answer is no.

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Hardcore players are frustrated with game changes that benefit more casual players. Casuals are overwhelmed by the amount of play time required to be competitive in the endgame. This brings up the question of who deserves to see the complete story unfold.

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Reader Zedlav sent us these two shots of crabs that were supposedly found by the WoW Model Viewer by his friend, and apparently are in the PTR client in advance of Wrath of the Lich King. The names "Forgotten Crab" and "Icecrown Crab," we're told, were made up by his friend, but that font on the pictures looks familiar to me-- if you know where these pics came from, let us know and we'll credit them further.

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Insider Trader is your inside line on making, selling, buying and using player-made products.

With news of new recipes and crafting tweaks in patch 2.4 flooding in, it's hard not to get excited about what Wrath of the Lich King might hold for our favorite professions. The trades in WoW aren't currently necessarily aging very gracefully, yet fresh directions seem perfectly attainable with a little design effort.

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Ian Beckman (whom we interviewed a while back) recently released a DVD-style commentary video about his latest machinima, Azerothian Super Villains, Episode 5. In the video, Ian, and guest star Michael DeCamp, discuss the making of ASV5, as well as reveal some surprising facts about the film. At almost 11 minutes, it's quite informative.

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Today marks the last day of the Valentine's inspired World of Warcraft holiday, Love is in the Air. Player Kraver of the Quel'Thalas server decided to use the gifts he received during the event to show his affection for Tyrande Whisperwind, leader of the Night Elves in Darnassus. Who did you shower with rose petals for the event?

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That was quite a big push to the PTR last night. In addition to Primal Nethers and Nether Vortices not being BoP, resilience affecting mana drain (which was buffed for warlocks), five new jewelcrafted trinkets, etc., several of the class sets were also changed:

• [Paladin] Season 1/2 Retribution gear has resilience now (previously added, here for completeness)
• [Paladin] Healing arena sets 4-piece bonus changed to "Increases the healing from your Holy Shock spell by 30%" (was "Reduces the cooldown of your Hammer of Justice by 10 sec")
• [Druid] Restoration arena and PvP sets 4-piece bonus changed to "The casting time on your Healing Touch spell is reduced by 0.25 sec" (was 15% increase to the outdoor movement speed)
• [Druid] Balance arena and PvP sets 4-piece bonus changed to "Your Wrath casts have a chance to reduce the cast time on your next Starfire by 1.5 sec" (was 15% increase to the outdoor movement speed)
• [Hunter] Gronnstalker's Bracers: 22 haste rating changed to 22 crit rating
• [Mage] Season 3 arena set 4-piece bonus changed to "Reduces the cooldown of your Blink spell by 2 sec" (was 0.15 sec reduction to Polymorph casting time)
• [Shaman] Elemental Season 3 arena set 4-piece bonus nerfed to 50% chance to avoid interruption caused by damage while casting Lightning Bolt (was 70%)


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My first post on WoW Insider was about a friend of mine being hacked, this time it's about me. I woke yesterday and tried to copy a character over to the public test realm as I've been doing often lately. I got a password error. I tried to log into my account- same thing. My email had this happy little surprise for me:

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Sometimes it's necessary to put a new spin on something tried-and-true. That's what Blizzard plans to do with the format for the Global World of Warcraft  Arena Tournament. Whereas the emphasis was on adventuring before, the focus will now center more on tactics.

In a nutshell, participating WoW players will be allowed to create instant level 70 character, complete with epic gear, on realms specially designed for the tournament. That way, players will be able to focus more on the competition instead of other details that may bog them down.

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Sure, World of Warcraft players have hunted her down, but why not simply draw fanart of her for a change?

That's what Cyril Roland did for Lady Vashj, and now Blizzard blue poster Vaneras has honored the artist by calling attention to the work of art on the European WoW forums.

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Nethaera promised that patch 2.4 would be progressively tested, and we are now seeing that she was indeed correct. Some major changes have been applied to the PTR tonight:

• Nether Vortices can now be purchased for 15 Badges of Justice (and 7g20)
  
• Both Nether Vortices and Primal Nethers are no longer bind on pickup
• Retribution Paladin season one and two armor now has resilience
• Resilience now affects mana drain


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In addition to the big change of Nethers not being BoP anymore, some other changes were pushed to the PTR tonight:

• Commendation of Kael'thas has had its dodge rating bonus reduced from 380 to 152
• Five epic trinket jewelcrafting recipes have been added, all with passive benefits and on use effects. See this MMO-Champion screenshot for materials.
  
• Crimson Serpent: +33 Int, + 49 Stam, use: +150 damage/healing for 20 sec (2 min cooldown)
  
• Empyrean Tortoise: +42 def rating, use: +165 dodge rating for 20 sec (2 min cooldown)
  
• Shadowsong Panther: effective stealth level increased by one, +80 attack power, use: +320 attack power for 15 sec (2 min cooldown)
  
• Khorium Boar: +84 attack power, use: summon the Khorium Boar to fight for you for 30 sec (5 min cooldown)
• Seaspray Albatross: +18 mp5, use: restores 900 mana over 12 sec (3 min cooldown)


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