So, now that phase 1 of the Shattered Sun Offensive is over on many servers, phase 2 is in full swing. Phase 2 is a little bit smaller than phase 1, but you can still do all the phase 1 quests just fine, so it's more of a question of deciding how many you want to fit into your daily rotation. So what about the phase 2 quests? Progression needs aside, are they worth doing?

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Cloth is like the gathering profession for everyone. You don't have to pay to pick it up, and there are no skills to level. Because of the sheer number of tailors, the amount of cloth tailoring eats up (not to mention first aid), cloth gathering can be a lucrative pass-time. Failing that, it can provide for your own cloth needs without having to hit the auction house.

This week's Insider Trader will be going in-depth into the world of farming for cloth, and tackling the following issues:

• The best areas to farm the cloth you need.
• How to alleviate some of the boredom.
• Ways to make the most out of your farming stints.

We will also be covering cloth that can be obtained by even level ones, and not just level 70s, as well as information about what it is used for, and who is going to want it.

• Linen cloth. (lvl 1-15)
  
• Wool cloth. (lvl 14-30)
  
• Silk cloth. (lvl 28-40)
  
• Mageweave cloth. (lvl 38-50)
  
• Runecloth. (lvl 50-62)
• Netherweave cloth. (lvl 58-70+)
• Felcloth. (lvl 50-60).

Whether your career hinges on stacks of cloth or you're looking to finance your other exploits, you won't want to miss this week's guide.

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Our second polearm ever is a brand new shiny piece from Sunwell Plateau, perfect for Hunters who want to talk softly and carry a big stick.

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Apparently Blizzard spent some time rebuilding all the player models for Patch 2.4 in order to increase performance. What exactly does this mean to us players who loves the way our characters look? Absolutely nothing. You won't notice any differences in the models at all -- except, that is, if you happen to play a human female. Then you might look deep into your characters eyes and notice a certain "Stepford-wife" look, like a "2000-yard stare," as if her "irises are popping out of her head."

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As exciting as Patch 2.4 has been so far, most of the attention has been on the all-new content on the Isle of Quel'danas. WoW Insider has put together a comprehensive walkthrough of all the daily and Shattered Sun Offensive-related quests to help guide you so you can coast your way to Shattered Sun rep and earn more than a few Gold along the way. Among the few additions that didn't get as much of the spotlight but deserve mention are the new PvP daily quests, so players can spice up their PvP routine beyond the usual daily Battleground quest. Now even hardcore PvP enthusiasts can earn some Gold on the side while killing enemies. How cool is that?

Click on the links after the jump to find out more about the new PvP dailies that exploded with Patch 2.4.

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The Care and Feeding of Warriors plays catch-up this week with Patch 2.4. Matthew Rossi has been tanking the new five man, doing badge runs, and being obscenely lucky on drops this week, to the point where he's almost embarrassed about it. The word 'almost' was used advisedly.

So this week I've been running around doing as much of the new content as I can, dailies, the new five man, an abortive run into Sunwell Plateau (no matter what your friend in the Illidan guild tells you, you cannot heal that instance in Karazhan gear, not that I really expected to survive) and of course the usual raiding, which includes our badge runs into Kara and ZA. As primarily a tank, I usually pass on DPS gear unless no dedicated DPS players need/want them, so while i have a few good pieces it hasn't been my main focus.

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With the implementation of the 2.4 patch in Blizzard's World of Warcraft, a few bugs seem to have slipped past the initial testing phase on the Public Test Realms and into the game's live version.

The most recent issue was identified by WoW forum poster Zargg as he explained that the central sound channel seems to have been compromised upon the application of the 2.4 patch. This led to a lack of certain sound clips tied to the hardware sound in the game.

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Gamers on the Street logs onto U.S. servers to get the word from the front on what's going on in and around the World of Warcraft.

I'll admit it: I haven't hit the Sunwell yet. My new main is a fresh 70 ("virgin" might be an appropriate word to describe her, except that – well, I PvP), and my guildies and I are simply overwhelmed with the number of things on our to-do lists right now. None of us is much interested in braving the crowds to see the new content; we'll get there once the furor has died down.

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Though no servers have reached phase 3 of the reclaiming of Quel'Danas, it's always good to be prepared. Many servers began Phase 2 just yesterday, and phase 3 is well under way. My server sits at around 14% complete of retaking the Armory after Day One, and I expect this to pick up over the weekend. Within a week, many of us will likely be transitioning into the most anticipated of the phases.

Why is it the most anticipated? Well, as soon as this phase begins, you gain access to a General Goods vendor, someone to repair your armor, as well as a handful of new daily quests. As you progress through this phase, you also gain access to the new Badge of Justice rewards vendor. The ultimate goal of this phase? Capturing the Sun's Reach Harbor.

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Laij of Laughing Skull believes that the new battleground matching system is a blow to PvP guilds. He said, "The new patch and matchmaking system has just nerfed the hell out of any pvp guild. Why run BG premades anymore? All you do is get matched up with other premades that are going to drag games out extremely long." Unsurprisingly, this was not particularly well received.

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It's been a while since PvE machinimator, Kerp, has documented his journey on Warcraftmovies. However, it looks like Patch 2.4 has brought him out of hiding. He captured footage of his experience with the mighty Kalecgos.

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Since World of Warcraft patch 2.4 went live, certain players have been complaining about the long queue times in the battlegrounds. Apparently, pre-made groups who join the instance have to wait longer than others.

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Are you interested in which phase each Realm is on in the race to complete the Shattered Sun Offensive? Well then Masterdragon has the list you need. He has compiled a list of all of the servers and which phase is currently being worked on. Drysc has blessed the thread with a blue post congratulating him on his endeavors -- and presumably to make the list easier to find.

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We've got plenty of blue posts to cover today, but you can probably expect more "unofficial" news for tomorrow.

Sunwell Plateau world first kills
We had plenty of them on the PTRs but hey, they're still world first kills (and bosses were slightly modified since their last appearance on PTRs) ! The first 3 bosses of the Sunwell Plateau have been killed, the following guilds got the world firsts :

• V A N Q U I S H (US-Cho'gall) was the first guild to kill Kalecgos.
  
• Blood Legion (US-Illidan) was the first guild to kill Brutallus.
  
• Curse / SK-Gaming was the first guild to kill Felmyst. (And before you ask, yes, Curse guild left meet Your makers to join SK-Gaming, you can read a full interview about this change on SK-Gaming.)
  
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WotLK Bestiary - Taunka
The bestiary page for World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King has been updated with a new creature and two pieces of concept art from the upcoming expansion. Learn more about one of the new species you'll encounter in Northrend, the tenacious and stoic taunka.
Quote from: Blizzard (Source) This tenacious, stoic race knows all too well the rigors of living in the harsh and often deadly wastes of Northrend. Over time, the taunka - whom many believe to be ancestral cousins of the tauren - have adapted, but only by forcing the land and the elements to yield to their will. The taunka's relationship with nature, unlike that of their tauren brethren, has been one of constant struggle and grim perseverance.

Although the taunka may seem dour or even cold to outsiders, those who come to know them will soon recognize an embattled race of survivors characterized by colossal hearts and unshakable resolve.

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Still planning to head over to Blizzard's Worldwide Invitational in Paris? If you haven't bought your tickets yet, we've got some bad news.

The event's official site has just announced that all tickets for this major gathering are now sold out. Not bad at all, considering that tickets sales began just barely a week ago.

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 Aside from addressing bugs, another matter Blizzard representatives are pretty busy with is explaining the new mechanics for World of Warcraft's patch 2.4. One such clarification is with regards to the level mechanics for engineering pets.

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Patch days are usually wild, crazy things, full of massive world PvP and competing for quest kills and standing on top of mailboxes on a new mount. Which is why it's somewhat disturbing to see a screenshot of a brand-new area looking like The Birds. Jilira, of Perenolde's Black Dragon Clan, suggests that her servermates are waiting for 100% completion of the Sunwell opening. To me, it looks more like they're gearing up for a race around the world. What do you think?

Do you have any unusual World of Warcraft images that are just collecting dust in your screenshots folder? We'd love to see it on Around Azeroth! Sharing your screenshot is as simple as e-mailing aroundazeroth@wowinsider.com with a copy of your shot and a brief explanation of the scene. You could be featured here next!

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Everyone these days either has a blog or a guild site that they post to regularly; and it's especially common amongst the World of Warcraft and the greater MMORPG community. One of the neat features of most of these sites is that they allow you to subscribe to other blogs, like WoW Insider. The software of these sites and tools can put up our headlines in easy to access places, so you and all your friends can stay up to date on the latest World of Warcraft news.

Getting this setup might seem like a hard thing to do, but it's really not. In fact, with our guide, complete with pictures, you'll be able to get WoW Insider's latest news on your site in no time! We give you step-by-step instructions for sites and software like Guild Portal, Guild Launch, Blogger.com, Word Press, vBulletin, Google Reader, Outlook, and more. We also tell you the info you need to get our news setup on any other site.

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When things get pretty crowded, some people respond by moving to a new location. In World of Warcraft, that means moving to a new realm. Thus, WoW player Martineau was wondering if Blizzard has any plans to open a new, non-transfer PVP realm.

Martineau became curious after having stumbled upon Alonsus, the non-transfer PVE realm listed in Blizzard's paid character site. If Blizzard can do that for PVE players, Martineau reasoned, why not have a new realm for PVP fans as well?

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Whenever I see free character transfers, I always check to see if my realm is on the list. It never is, probably because it's medium population (though apparently it also has to do with queue times). I don't think I would seriously consider transferring, even for free.

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Drysc is keeping a post up-to-date of all the latest hotfixes that are happening. Patch 2.4 went live without too much trouble this last Tuesday, yet there is a slow but steady stream of issues popping up in the game. Each morning for the next few days we'll let you know about all the hotfixes that have come out the previous day. You can also check out all of the hotfixes for Patch 2.4.

Yesterday's hotfixes include:

• Veneratus the Many now spawns correctly.
  
• The Horde Spirit Healers in Alterac Valley will once again teleport Horde players to a different graveyard if the current once gets captured by Alliance.
• Kael, RoS, and other bosses will now cast all of their spells. No more Kael'Thas without birds.


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You may want to read this, just in case you haven't been online over at the World of Warcraft forums recently. Blizzard CM Bornakk visited the WoW forums earlier to announce that Blizzard would be implementing a series of rolling restarts for the realms, starting at 5:00 a.m. PDT.

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It should be remembered that we reported back in December 2007 on the cool World of Warcraft edition Dell XPS M1730 laptop. Aside from having excellent specs for Blizzard's MMO video game, the gadget also came in with several WoW giveaways.

While there's no doubt that the said laptop is a must have, one still can not help but grunt about its pricing. At the time of its release, it was being sold for almost US 5,000. The good news, however, is that Dell has announced a price cut for the gadget.

According to the official page for the WoW-inspired Dell XPS M1730, the laptop can now be bought for just US 3,999 - a thousand dollars dropped from its original price. We know it's still a bit pricey but the giveaways and the specs remain the same.

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WotLK Bestiary - Taunka
The bestiary page for World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King has been updated with a new creature and two pieces of concept art from the upcoming expansion. Learn more about one of the new species you'll encounter in Northrend, the tenacious and stoic taunka.
Quote from: Blizzard (Source) This tenacious, stoic race knows all too well the rigors of living in the harsh and often deadly wastes of Northrend. Over time, the taunka - whom many believe to be ancestral cousins of the tauren - have adapted, but only by forcing the land and the elements to yield to their will. The taunka's relationship with nature, unlike that of their tauren brethren, has been one of constant struggle and grim perseverance.

Although the taunka may seem dour or even cold to outsiders, those who come to know them will soon recognize an embattled race of survivors characterized by colossal hearts and unshakable resolve.

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2.4 Hotfixes

Drysc added several new hotfixes to his sticky post. (src)

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Our recent article on the undocumented changes for World of Warcraft patch 2.4 mentioned a bug with the Reliquary of Souls. Apparently, that boss (along with a couple of other bosses) didn't cast their spells as they were supposed to. Well, it's come to our attention that the specific bug plaguing those bosses has been found and fixed.

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It's a small world after all even if we're talking about the expansive MMORPG World of Warcraft, and that's why Blizzard is offering free character server transfers from March 28 to April 4. Now's your chance to leave that overpopulated server or seek new friends in another realm, because the offer is only good for citizens of selected high population realms looking to inhabit less crowded places.

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The latest update to come in from the World of Warcraft's official forums is that several servers have already completed the first phase of the Sunwell World Event daily quests - a multi-segmented grind of several daily assignments.

But now those reportedly on phase two of the four-part Shattered Sun Offensive are steadily on their way to a fifth (if not already at 50 ) of the Sun's Reach Armory, while simultaneously completing the portal side quests - an invaluable resource, says Blizzard's Drysc, of invaluable teleportation.

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Hold onto the your wigs and keys, everyone, we're not quite done Ironing out the kinks from 2.4 yet. Bornakk's announced yet another run of rolling restarts, this time starting at 5 am PDT today. Each realm will be down for 15 minutes, and the entire process should take about an hour.

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