One of the Technology writers, Murad Ahmed, from the U.K. Times went to BlizzCon this past week and apparently had a pretty good time. I'm positive he doesn't actually play the game, and he admits to being a little lost, especially when it comes to the frenetic action of the professional arena tournament (although, truthfully, I often have a hard time following it too). But he did seem to hit upon the major draw of the convention -- namely, getting to hang with your fellow gamers, and hopefully guildies if you're lucky, and enjoying a giant get-together where the person next to you is virtually certain to get a WoW-related joke.

As a bonus, Mr. Ahmed got to interview James Taplin, one of our readers (BlizzCon attendees will know him as one of the people at the WoW Insider meet-up, and later the 3rd place winner in the /silly competition), who confirmed that the social aspect of both the game and convention are really the big attraction. I think it's precisely that aspect that has a tendency to be somewhat overlooked by the mainstream media (although let's face it; it's probably not something you'll pick up on unless you've played the game with people you genuinely like), but the Times also covered the WorldWide Invitational here, so they're no strangers to Blizzard events. While there's no information in the article that's really new, it's an interesting and generally positive perspective on the convention.

Thanks to James and Rhys for writing in!

This Friday and Saturday, Worldofwar.net will be holding two "level 1 character" race events on as-yet undisclosed U.S. servers. 5 Worldwide Invitational cards, entitling the bearer to a Wrath of the Lich King beta key and a Tyrael pet, will be awarded to the winners. The character you enter in the race must be level 1, cannot have any weapons or armor equipped, and will be disqualified if you die, disconnect, or try to sneak any stat-enhancing item on the toon. Apart from saying that they'll be holding the races at 6:00 PM server time on both days, they're staying mum on which server or starting area they'll be using in an effort to minimize potential cheating or a mob of ganking spectators.

Two things: I'm not sure how they're planning on splitting 5 WWI cards among the winner/s of two races, so you'll probably have a slightly higher chance of winning a card in one out of the two events. Secondly, although they haven't given out server names, they do say that both races will take place at "18:00 PST (server time)," so it's possible that both will happen on Pacific servers. They'll post the server names and starting areas on their site before each race starts, so check back, and good luck!

From the 2008 Worldwide Invitational, we learned of a new way that we'll all be grinding faction reputation come the expansion. Namely, you will be able to become a faction's Champion.

This is not a permanent change, and you are not stuck with only one faction, Instead, you simply put on the tabard and la! You are the new Champion.

We were told that if you run a Coilfang dungeon wearing a Lower City tabard, you will gain the usual reputation for the Cenarion Expedition from the dungeon, as well as Lower City reputation. Supposedly, the tabards, usually acquired at exalted, will be moved to friendly or honored.

While this makes me and my hard-earned tabard collection a bit sore, the prospect of earning reputation for any faction that I need, without running their dungeons over and over, is quite appealing. Here are the Champions we know of so far:

1. Argent Champion
2. Ebon Champion
3. Champion of the Kirin Tor
4. Wyrmrest Champion

The descriptions are all the same. For example, "You champion the cause of the Argent Crusade. All reputation gains while in level 80 dungeons will be applied to your standing with them."

To me, this seems to call the original quotation into question, as the current description makes it sound as though, instead of gaining reputation from the dungeon, and from the tabard, your dungeon reputation will simply count toward whichever faction's tabard you are wearing.

Of course, that is still mightily handy. We'll be able to run the dungeons that contain the gear we need, while acquiring the reputation we desire.

Blogger DeSlisser was in Paris recently when he came upon a strange sight in a store: A comic book called "WaoW" that covered the journey of a newb in the world of "Razemoth" as he looks for a dungeon to level in. It's very definitely suppose to be Azeroth, and even the dungeon he eventually finds is clearly the Deadmines. The comic book, however, does not seem to be an official Blizzard product.

Of course, we've seen pirated Warcraft items before, but this would be the first foray I've heard into the world of pirate comics. The phenomenon is widespread enough in Japan that it has its own convention simply for the selling of these books that, according to many, violate Intellectual Property rights.

So perhaps Blizzard is getting to that point too. Will they crack down on comic books like "WaoW?" Should they? After all, they don't crack down on WoW fanart. But then again, most WoW fanartists don't try to sell their work in bulk either.

[via Tobold]

This one's been flying under our radar for a while, but I'm not sure why -- I happen to be one of the affected. Still, while everyone was spending the past few days worrying about tickets for this year's BlizzCon, a whole other set of folks were worrying about last year's BlizzCon. Specifically, the beta keys they received there. Originally, they were all told by Belfaire that there was going to be a wave of invites after August 1st that included people who'd recieved beta keys from Dell, or for attending BlizzCon '07 or this year's WWI. But now we're almost two weeks past that date, and we (I was one of the folks who entered a key from BlizzCon '07) haven't seen any beta keys at all yet.

Last Thursday, about a week ago, Belfaire acknowledged there was a problem on the forums, and asked people to enter their names if they'd input their beta keys and hadn't recieved a beta email (here's the BlizzCon thread, and here's the Dell thread). But there's been no answer since then, and I certainly haven't recieved a key at all. In fact, we've heard from people who got invited to the beta through the random opt-ins, which means these keys we paid for haven't done thing number one for us.

To tell the truth, I'm not that concerned about it -- I really enjoy seeing new content on the live realms rather than on the beta or test server, and there's certainly enough Wrath beta news coming through here on WoW Insider about the beta to keep me satisfied. But the beta is only going on for so long, and every day that passes without invites sent to Blizzard's biggest fans (the ones who've spent money on the Dell deal and attended Blizzard's invites) is more of the beta key wasted. I doubt we'll be able to use them again, so it's a shame Blizzard hasn't let us use them yet.

Thanks to everyone who sent this in!

If you're not completely holed up in a cave somewhere, you're probably aware that some big sports event called the Olympics is happening in August. Of course, August also marks the start of a new season for our friends over at WoW Radio, who are holding a contest to celebrate their onslaught of shows. In keeping with the Olympics, WoW Radio is calling their August contest "Pass the Torch", and are giving away twenty (!) Worldwide Invitational cards as prizes. Just in case you didn't know, those cards contain the codes for a key to the Wrath Beta and a mini-Tyrael pet.

How do you join? Simple. Listen to their radio shows! Starting August 8 (or what the Chinese consider to be the lucky 08/08/08), five of their radio shows will be their torch-bearers. During each show, there'll be an 'Olympic ring' -- you'll know them when you hear them, according to WoW Radio -- containing a secret word. The five secret words will form a phrase, which you should then send to their e-mail address to be entered in their grand prize draw. Winners will be announced on the 15th of August on Blue Plz! Head on over to WoW Radio now and keep an ear out for those secret words!

On the WoW forums this morning, there was renewed gurgling about the desire to be able to respec more easily, specifically between PvP specs and raiding specs. Blue Blizzard poster, Bornakk, reconfirmed what had already been discussed at the Worldwide Invitational -- that the developers are working on a way to have two swappable talent specs. They are still working out the details but it sounds like something that's definitely coming because the Blues could've easily let this thread just die of atrophy.

I'm not sure I agree with some posters who say that respeccing is a "huge pain." It's an inconvenience, yes, but then so is flying from one zone to another or waiting in line for battlegrounds. Also, as for the cost, 50 gold is merely a grain of sand to someone at level 70. (And if it isn't then, dude, what the heck are you doing out there? Buzzing on Bash Ale all day?) Conversely, how would having two different specs at your disposal make the game "too easy," as other commenters posted? My eyes are rolling so much that they may come right out of my head. (This is exactly why I try not to read much of the forums.) There was much musing about how the respec mechanic might be best implemented -- by player posters, not by Blues -- including ideas for 24 hour cool-downs, respec token systems, higher costs, lower costs and, for some reason, portals and summoning.

Regardless of what mass opinions are, Blizzard's developers seem to be looking hard at what the ramifications of twin specs would do to the game's balance. They obviously spend a lot of time studying how PvP and PvE are played and seem to have an affinity for splitting these two gameplay styles and I don't think they will make it as simple as a mouse-click in Wrath.

Numerous reports are coming in that the Wrath Beta keys are making their way to players now. Attendees of last year's BlizzCon in Anaheim, California, and the Worldwide Invitational in Paris, France, received a card with a code for a "future Blizzard title" as part of their goody bags. Wryxian confirmed over at the official forums that the said title was Wrath of the Lich King and urged everyone to register their codes immediately. Players who do so will be prompted to enter the codes from the cards as well as their e-mail address, as Beta access information is sent through e-mail.

Reader Phi mentions that it doesn't matter when the codes were claimed. She registered her code right after BlizzCon last year while her boyfriend registered only yesterday after Blizzard's announcement, and both received their keys today. If you're one of the lucky few who attended either Blizzard event or managed to snag a beta code through other channels like eBay, registering the code should see you receiving invites in the mail. WoW Insider's Elizabeth Harper, who attended both, received two invites to the Beta eight minutes apart from each other. The official e-mail from prompts players to follow the step-by-step instructions over at Blizzard's official Beta page. Thanks to everyone who tipped this in!

I was lucky enough to go to E3 this year with the Joystiq crew last week, and while I had planned to cover some stories about WoW for you guys, the biggest story I came back with was: that there was no story. I didn't hear or see World of Warcraft mentioned once. When Blizzard said they were not showing at E3, they meant it -- I didn't even hear a competitor mention their name.

There was one mention of Blizzard at the Activision press conference on Tuesday. Mike Griffith name-dropped Blizzard once just to say the merger had happened, but there was nothing at all about World of Warcraft or any of Blizzard's properties. And I had planned to try out the Novint Falcon controller with WoW. I did try it out, and it is an interesting, if expensive, PC game controller, but Novint told me they didn't have it working in a form they wanted to show off with World of Warcraft yet.

Kind of strange that the biggest game in the world didn't get a single mention at the biggest game show in the world, but then again, it's not that weird when you consider that E3 has scaled way down by magnitudes from past years. Companies aren't as interested in the event when there are many, many other ways to market and show off their games to journalists, and considering that Blizzard has invested heavily in not one but two giant events of their own this year, it's no wonder they don't want to spend any money at E3. Shame that we couldn't bring you more WoW coverage from LA last week, but we'll be back there in October, and there'll be plenty of news to report then.

Having been to the Worldwide Invitational, we were hot to turn in our key that gave us a pet Tyrael. Running hither and yon in the Undercity, we finally found the NPC for the turn in, said the magic words and voila! A floating, lightning-winged avenging angel was ours for everyone to ooh and aah over.

Well, kinda. It doesn't really do anything. There are no animations other than floating. Don't believe us? Check out the video above. At least Sleepy Willy had the good manners to fall asleep occasionally.

EDIT: Apparently he will dance with you if you target him and use the /dance emote.

So you went to Blizzard's Worldwide Invitational and received a card with a mysterious code for an in-game item (which we later discovered was a miniature version of Diablo's Archangel Tyrael, to be added in patch 2.4.3)... but are now at a loss at how to pick up your adorable new companion? The new new Mini Tyrael is claimed in a different place than any other in-game items -- so for those of you who attended WWI (or picked up a code on eBay), here's what you need to do...

Each week Arcane Brilliance serves up a big slice of Mage-cake. Of course, Mages have a very different idea of what it means to "bake" and then "frost" something, so Mage-cake might not be quite what you're expecting. Unless of course you were expecting a blackened husk of indeterminate (vaguely Gnomish) origin frozen into a block of ice, in which case you'll get exactly what you thought you were getting.

So last week was fun, huh?

I have to say, I expected some controversy, but nothing like that. My earlier column about how much I love being a Mage got 32 almost universally positive comments, which seemed quite respectable to me at the time. This one, in which I bemoaned what I perceive to be a very fixable problem with the class (the fact that our DPS doesn't balance out our incredibly poor survivability) is at 200 and counting. Reading through them over the course of this week, terrified to post any sort of response lest I be torn limb from limb and devoured, it seemed like there was no middle ground. Responses ranged from "Please consider discontinuing this article from here on" to "I think this is the most well written piece on this site that I've ever read." Of the 200 responses, I'd wager 150 or so were negative.

So what have I learned? You guys prefer optimism. Apparently.

This week, I went in search of things to feel good about. I do still love to play my Mage--much moreso than any other character I have--and I truly want to be optimistic about the direction we're headed as a class. Once I went actively searching for happy thoughts, I found they were out there, in abundance. In fact, many of them were suggested within those same 200 comments.

You see, as it turns out, Frostfire Bolt has the potential to be very, very nice. In fact, Frostfire Bolt could actually change everything. Come back after the jump to find out why.

Record company EMI Classics has announced the release of Video Games Live Volume One, a recording of the famous traveling orchestra (led by friend of WoW Insider Tommy Tallarico) that plays videogame music, including that of the Warcraft, Starcraft and Diablo series. You may have seen the group last year at BlizzCon, this year at WWI, or (likely) this year again at BlizzCon, and they got rave reviews every time they played.

The recording was conducted by Tallarico, recorded at Abbey Road, and features the Slovak National Orchestra, The Crouch End Festival Chorus, and "the videogame pianist," Martin Leung. The CD will have eleven tracks (full tracklist after the jump), and will feature music from a slew of terrific videogame soundtracks, including our own Warcraft series (and Civ IV, which is probably the best music I've ever heard in a videogame, ever). EMI plans to release the CD in America on July 24th, and in Europe and the rest of the world on August 20th. It should be available for digital download right now in the UK, and an iTunes exclusive release will be available on the 20th.

Sounds like an amazing recording -- fans of Video Games Live will certainly enjoy it. You can see the full tracklist below.

If you missed the WoW PvP action at the Worldwide Invitational, now's your chance to catch up. Selections from the 3v3 Arena Tournament action in Paris, including the final match between Council of Mages and Improved Clicks, are now available for download at the WWI tournament page.

If you're interested in improving your PvP game, it's amazing how much watching videos of good players in action can help. You learn a lot about how to use your class, and how other classes operate when you look at them from a 3rd person point of view and watch for patterns.

Of course, if you need a bit more help getting a handle on the action, you can also check our coverage of the tournament, as well as Amanda Dean's wrap-up thoughts.

Last Saturday, as always, we sat down and spent about an hour discussing the latest and greatest in the World of Warcraft, and the results are now online for your listening enjoyment. Turpster and I were both on, as well as John "BigBearButt" Patricelli, and Kyle Horner, a blogger on our sister sites Massively and Big Download.

• Turpster talked with us about WWI, what he thought of the big event in Paris, what it was like to play a Death Knight, and why he thought it was even better than last year's BlizzCon (including why this year's BlizzCon might be even better).
• Kyle spoke with us about being a player who's just now getting back into WoW, and what he's excited for in the next expansion.
• We talked a little bit about TCG cards, and whether it's fair for Upper Deck to give away the TCG loot.
• Mages didn't get a lot of news during WWI, so we chatted about what they might get before Wrath of the Lich King.
• We talked about the timing of the beta, and what the plan is for the rest of the Wrath release.

Definitely a fun show (and it features the only time I've ever gotten really angry at Turpster, though it turned out to be no big deal, and he's probably not fired from the show. Probably.). Give it a listen over on the WoW Radio page, and if you have a question comment, or insight about something we said, don't hesitate to email the show itself -- theshow@wow.com is the address.

Thanks for listening as always, we'll see you next week.