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. Alex Ziebart will be your host today.

Many of our questions today are related to Patch 3.2 again, but don't take that as an indicator that it's all you can ask of us! We'll field pretty much anything WoW related in The Queue, so don't be intimidated. Just hit the comments and ask away!

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Lesley, our European writer, is out of our virtual office at the moment and isn't available to write up the EU maintenance notice for all of you. So I'm doing it. To try and make the experience authentic, please read this post in a very poor fake English accent. No, wait! A fake German accent. Yeah, that's way more awesome. Do that.

Like the (or should I say das) North American realms, European realms will largely consist of rolling restarts with only a few exceptions, which we'll get to in a moment. Rolling restarts will begin at 05:00 CEST and should be finished by 07:00 CEST.

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We here at WoW.com are on a Daily Quest to bring you interesting, informative and entertaining WoW-related links from around the blogosphere.

Did you know you get to be a crab for one of the Midsummer quests? That's me doing my Ghostcrawler impersonation.

• Wowraid has a good Thorim Hard Mode strategy.
• LoreCrafted, WTT: [RP], and Too Many Annas are running a Midsummer Night's RP story contest.
• Noobding has some fun tips for the Midsummer Fire Festival., including "Always walk sideways when in crab disguise... otherwise you're pretty obviously not getting into the whole crab thing properly."
• Critical QQ has a good QQ-slapping take on the emblem changes in Patch 3.2.
• World of SnarkCraft has published part one of Learning to Weigh Your Stats.


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User Interface: Quest creatures and objects will now show on the player's world map.

• A skull graphic will be placed on the map in the general area where creatures players must kill can be found.
• A glowing skull graphic will be placed on the map in the general area where creatures can be found that drop quest objects.
• A gear graphic will be placed on the map in the general area where players must loot objects found in the world.
• A chat bubble graphic will be placed on the map in the general area where players must interact with a specific NPC.
• X marks the spot on the map where players must reach, discover or explore a designated area.
• A yellow question mark graphic will show on the map to provide the location of a NPC whose quest the player has completed.

I'm sure a certain group of players will be mad at what they see as a further dumbing-down of questing, although another group will be pleased that they don't have to tab out to Wowhead or use a mod like Carbonite anymore.

Keep in mind they're also making the quest log double-paned, with a full list of quests on the left side, and the text of the selected quest on the right. This eliminates the need for a mod like DoubleWide (pictured).

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Information after the break. Keep in mind some of these are certainly placeholders. The priest healing 4-piece, for instance, is strictly worse than the priest healing 2-piece Tier 8 bonus; there's no way it would go live like this. Some of the bonuses don't even make any sense, like the Warlock 4-piece. Datamined info is always suspect.

Set	2-piece bonus	4-piece bonus
Death Knight DPS	Your Blood Strike and Heart Strike abilities have a chance to grant you 180 additional strength for 15 sec.	Your Frost Fever and Blood Plague abiltiies now have a chance for their damage to be critical strikes.
Death Knight tank	Decreases the cooldown on your Dark Command ability by 2 sec.	Decreases the cooldown on your Unbreakable Armor, Vampiric Blood, and Boneshield abilities by 20 sec.
Druid feral	Decreases the cooldown on your Growl ability by 2 sec and increases the duration of your Rake ability by 3 sec.	Increases the damage reduction granted by Barkskin by 10% and increases the critical strike chance of Rip and Ferocious Bite by 5%.
Druid balance	Your Moonfire ability now has a chance for its periodic damage to be critical strikes.	Increases the critical strike chance of your Starfire spell by 5%.
Druid resto	Increases the critical strike chance of your Nourish spell by 5%.	Your Rejuvenation ability now has a chance for its healing to be critical strikes.
Hunter	Reduces the focus cost of your pet's abilities by 50%.	Increases the critical strike chance of your Steady Shot ability by 5%.
Mage	Increases the armor you gain from Ice Armor by 20%, the mana regeneration you gain from Mage Armor by 10%, and converts an additional 25% of your spirit into critical strike rating when Molten Armor is active.	Increases the critical strike chance of your Fireball, Frostbolt, Frostfire Bolt, and Arcane Blast spells by 5%.
Paladin tank	Decreases the cooldown on your Righteous Defense ability by 2 sec.	Decreases the cooldown on your Divine Protection ability by 30 sec.
Paladin DPS	Your Righteous Vengeance talent now has a chance for its damage to be critical strikes.	Increases the critical strike chance of your Judgements by 5%.
Paladin healing	Increases the duration of your Judgements by 10 sec.	Increases the critical strike chance of your Holy Light spell by 5%.
Priest DPS	Increases the duration of your Devouring Plague spell by 6.01 sec.	Increases the critical strike chance of your Mind Flay spell by 5%.
Priest healing	Decreases the cooldown on your Prayer of Mending spell by 2 sec.	Increases the critical strike chance of your Prayer of Healing spell by 5%.
Rogue	Your Rupture ability has a chance each time it deals damage to reduce the cost of your next ability by 40 energy.	Increases the critical strike chance of your Hemorrhage, Sinister Strike, Backstab, and Mutilate abilities by 5%.
Shaman enhancement	Decreases the cooldown on your Lava Lash ability by 2 sec.	Increases the critical strike chance of your Stormstrike ability by 5%.
Shaman resto	Increases the healing done by your Riptide spell by 20%.	Increases the critical strike chance of your Chain Heal spell by 5%.
Shaman elemental	Increases the duration of your Flame Shock spell by 6.01 sec.	Increases the damage done by your Lava Burst spell by 0.021 sec.
Warlock	Increases your pet's critical strike chance with its abilities by 10%. (0 yd, cast: 0 seconds, val1: 10)	Increases the damage done by your Immolate, Corruption, and Unstable Affliction spells by 0.011 sec.
Warrior DPS	Berserker Stance grants an additional 2% critical strike chance, and Battle Stance grants an additional 6% armor penetration.	Increases the critical strike chance of your Slam and Execute abilities by 5%.
Warrior tank	Decreases the cooldown on your Intervene ability by 5 sec.	Decreases the cooldown on your Shield Block ability by 20 sec.

And here are the stats on the relics. I'm just glad to see another tanking idol for druids; I was afraid we'd be stuck with one per expansion again. Still unknown is how these relics will be attained; my guess is Emblems of Triumph (which drop from the new raid).

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Feitan has posted another terrific set of WoW-related icons over on WoW LJ. Combine all of those with the first set, and throw in all of the other ones we've collected for you in the past, and you've got a really nice set of perfectly-sized choices from World of Warcraft to use as your icon on whatever service needs an avatar.

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Achievements aren't the only thing that can be datamined. MMO-Champion has the new class changes, some of which were not listed in the patch 3.2 PTR notes. Of course these are all subject to change, and some game file changes never even make it to testing, but here's what I've noticed that's new.

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15 Minutes of Fame is our look at World of Warcraft players of all shapes and sizes – from the renowned to the relatively anonymous, the remarkable to the player next door. Tip us off to players you'd like to hear more about.

Did you know that players on Argent Dawn-US have their own soundtrack? Fellow AD player Aspeth -- aka DJ Aspeth of Sao Paulo, Brazil – has been posting trance mixes on the AD forums since she was a lowbie DJ still spinning her first talent points. Now, she jet sets from continent to continent (hope the screenshots for this profile make it in before she hops her next plane for Europe; if you don't see them, you'll know why!) to mix it up for a ballooning fan base entranced with the Aspeth sound.

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Call of the Crusade Achievements
Below are the new achievements for the upcoming Arena dungeon of the Argent Tournament - Call of the Crusade.

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Updates
10:45PM CEST - Added more achievements - Feats of Strength, Pilgrim's Bounty, Pirate's Day, Day of the Dead, Vault of Archavon.
10:00PM CEST - Added the remaining class changes.

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I was reading my print copy of Entertainment Weekly today, which features their Summer Must List. They listed their Must Dashing Duke as Henry Cavill from The Tudors. Cavill says that World of Warcraft is on his Must List: "It's fairly addictive." In an interview with JustJared.com earlier this year, Cavill said that he also plays Eve Online. As a geekgirl, I say yay to more gamer hunks.

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The first patch 3.2 PTR client is now available for download, which means it's available for datamining. The ever-resourceful people at wirebrain have done just this to all the achievements found in the client, and have unearthed some interesting new details. We are unable to verify this information right now, but here's what they've found.

Read on after the cut for:

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We're running late on this one (the beginning of the month was quite busy), but it's not any less exciting: congratulations go out to our latest Guild of the Month for May: the Dragon Knights on Area 52. They sent us a nomination along with many other guilds in the game, and were selected for their originality, community, and raiding performance. Among other interesting things about the guild (which you can read in the second half of this post), they run a guild podcast, an email newsletter, and even a lotto, all along with raiding competitively and leveling up as a guild.

In addition to being profiled here on the site, the Dragon Knights will also win a raid pack from Swagdog.com, where they (and you) can pick up customized shirts and hats with their guild name and logo printed on them. Our Guild of the Month contest is ongoing, so stay tuned to the site for the next chance to nominate your guild to be recognized here on WoW.com. Read on to learn more about the Dragon Knights and why they're our winners for May.

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"Bring the player, not the class" has become a cliché by now. However, there's been new discussion about it lately on the official forums. This portion of the discussion focuses on an exception - healers. While Blizzard's player-centric design mantra tends to apply pretty well to DPS (and often tanks), it isn't really true for healers.

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So now that a lot of the dust has settled from the big 3.2 patch notes bombshell last week (and before it gets all stirred up again by the PTR starting up), let's reflect a bit. Specifically on the fact that unlike all of the instances in the game so far, the Crusaders' Coliseum will let you run it four different times (in 10-man and 25-man normal, and 10- and 25-man Heroic) every raid lockout period. We talked about this on the podcast: that's a lot of running the same content. But Zarhym replies with what Blizzard's thinking on this is. Currently, when you go to Ulduar, you have to decide as you go whether you'll take on the bosses' hard modes or not, and once your decision is made, that's it for the week. But with four different modes, running normal won't lock you out of Heroic, and vice versa. You've got the options to choose from.

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Dead Memories - Ulduar was created by Endac to display Ulduar to those who have not seen it, or maybe to show off his guild's skills in dominating the raid instance. He created his video with a twist, however. Dead Memories - Ulduar is shot through the perspective of a single visitor, who's plagued by nightmares and dreams about the place.

Endac says he doesn't think his video is "super fancy," but I actually think that's fine. His movie is straddling a line between machinima techniques and raid video techniques. I like the sense of wonder and (sometimes) horror his main character emotes to the audience, even while navigating through the terrific battles inside Ulduar.

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Has Arthas finally decided to leave his fortress and take the five-minute flight to attack the city of Dalaran, famous for its poor aerial defenses? Not exactly. Toie on Emerald Dream sent in a picture of the uncommon Deadly Gladiator's Frostwyrm mount hovering above Dalaran, piloted by a priest in Shadowform. I honestly don't think I've seen a single one of those mounts in-game. Remember in early TBC, when everyone was complaining about the ease of arenas and "welfare epics" and people running around in blues and arena shoulderpads? Yeah, those days are gone forever.

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I warned you this was coming, and now it's almost here! Join us for WoW.com's It Came from the Blog Midsummer Fire Fun and let's go desecrate some Alliance flames! For the Horde!

Actually, we have a lot of players who normally play Alliance -- this isn't a jingoistic event. It's just an excuse to get together and have fun. We may even pick up an achievement or two. Here are the details:

• When: Saturday, June 27th, 5PM Eastern (2PM Pacific, 3PM Server time)
• Where: The Midsummer Fire Festival site in the Court of the Sun, Silvermoon City on Zangarmarsh, U.S.
• Who: Any Horde character who is not in the service of the Lich King. (Death Knights are recommended as long as they have finished their initial quests and have been accepted by Thrall.)
• How: Just send a tell to Robinella or any It Came from the Blog member to get an invite to the raid and the guild

More info is after the break.

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Yes, it's that time again, the time for the Midsummer Fire Festival. Unfortunately, a series of mishaps, bugs, and a lack of meaningful upgrades from last year's celebration have soured the festival for a lot of people, but there is at least some comfort, as we'll have a few Midsummer's fixes rolled out tonight. The only problem is that it will reset all progress on most half-finished achievements, so if you're in the middle of working on the Midsummer's stuff already, you may find that all your hard work was no more yielding but a dream, so to speak.

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For most of vanilla WoW and Burning Crusade, my main was a Druid. I healed, I tanked, I DPS, I raided, I PvPed, I did everything with him. He was a great character, I found the class fun (Yes, even before patch 1.8, thank you very much). But somewhere around mid-Burning Crusade, I just plain burnt out on Druids. I don't know if it was just one too many bad raids, if it was just familiarity breeding contempt, or what, but I switched to a Hunter and never looked back.

When Death Knights were announced, I knew that was my new class, and I also knew that my Druid was probably doomed to be level 70 for good. I'd focus on my Death Knight, then my Hunter, then probably my Shaman for heals, followed by my Warlock. My Druid would just languish in Shattrath unless I was really, incredibly bored.

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Sometimes you'd like to know that there are other MMOs out there, right? Our sister site Massively can provide you with everything you need to know about all those other shiny MMOs! Check out this roundup of the latest news from the wider MMO world.

	LotRO Book 8 releases today Massively has been following the latest content update for Lord of the Rings Online, which is Volume II Book 8: Scourge of Khazad-Dûm. We've now learned via MMeOw that Scourge of Khazad-Dûm will release on June 23 (US/Oceanic)! As a bonus, players can already download the patch; the update weighs in at a fairly hefty 600mb and links can be found in the official announcement on the LotRO forums.
	Hands on with the Aion Closed Beta 2 Welcome back to Aion. Yes it's Closed Beta Test 2 weekend and this time round I'm rolling Asmodian to explore a very different side of the shattered planet of Atreia. During CBT1 we showed you the lower half of the planet, a land known as Elysea and home of the angelic Elyos. I walked you through the character creation process, the first ten levels as a frail mortal, the Elyos ascension quest and those first steps into Sanctum and Verteron. Now it's time to visit the upper half and home of the Asmodians, the continent of Asmodae.
	Rumor: FFXIV beta may begin by September Ah, rumors. We know the game was just announced, but there are three major reasons this rumor carries some weight. For one, Final Fantasy XIV has a 2010 release date, which makes sense considering the development team claims to have been working on the game for nearly five years now. Also, the dev team has expressed that they'd like to have a longer beta than the one Final Fantasy XI had -- one which was only around four months long.

	Massively's exclusive Runes of Magic in-game item giveaway Attention all Runes of Magic players! We're proud to announce our participation in a brand new promotional giveaway for Runes of Magic in which you can get your hands on a special piece of an in-game armor set. This armor set is compiled of elements given away at various MMO sites running the promotion. For our part, we're giving away 10,000 key codes that will unlock the gloves in this set, while four other sites (yet to be named) are giving away the rest of the pieces. Gather codes from each site and you could have yourself one fine outfit.
	Vacationing in Vana'diel Summer has arrived, July is only just around the corner and with it comes the gaming drought. This seems an opportune time to explore an old favorite, write about it and try to make it as interesting as possible. I figured, what MMO is less known about and more curious than Final Fantasy XI?
	Betawatch: June 12th - 19th, 2009 This has been a fairly busy week for betas, which is great for us! The announcement of Dungeons and Dragons Online going free-to-play led to a new closed beta for that system, while Jade Dynasty moved from closed to open beta. We also added two newcomers to the list: Sudden Attack, which is in closed beta and Monato Esprit, which has reached its final stage of beta testing. With our gigantic beta key giveaway yesterday, Cities XL is now officially in the closed beta ranks.
	Has EVE's most powerful alliance fallen? Band of Brothers (renamed KenZoku) was once the most powerful alliance in EVE Online with a stated goal, even here at Massively, to control all of the game's New Eden galaxy. Now, KenZoku has reportedly left the contested, lawless frontier of 0.0 space after months of resisting the combined forces of rival alliances.

3.2 PTR Character Copies Available
We're getting closer to the release of Patch 3.2 on test realms and it seems that character copies are now activated. Premade characters are available and you can already copy them on both continents.

• US PTR Character Copy
• EU PTR Character Copy

Recent In-Game Fixes - 6/22/09
Quote from: Bornakk (Source)6/22/09

• We are in the process of applying an in-game fix that will restart all of the quests associated with the Midsummer Fire Festival event and allow players to complete them once again. If you are in the process of completing an achievement such as Extinguishing Kalimdor, this fix will reset your progress and you will need start over. This fix will require realms to be restarted.

Blue posts
Quote from Blizzard staffResilience more effective in 3.2
I think you are dividing the bucket too cleanly into “classes that can survive” and “classes that can’t.” There has been a vigorous debate for some time within the community (and not just this forum) about damage and healing being too high in PvP. While some classes are worse than others, those are also the classes that received additional nerfs. Overall we need for characters to be a little more survivable when being beat on. They need a little more room to come up with a counter of some kind so that too many fights are not “use your ability within this 1 sec window or lose.” (Source)

More Mana Regeneration needed in 3.2 Arenas?
That assumes that caster mana is balanced around 30 second fights. It isn’t, and we aren’t talking about suddenly going to 30 minute fights. It could very well be a problem in practice, but we think it’s premature to assume that all dps casters are going to run out of mana now. There can be something between the two extremes of dying in 2 GCDs and having endless matches where the team to go OOM first loses. There can be something in between a sprint and a marathon. (Source)

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