New around here? WoW Rookie points WoW's newest players to the basics of a good start in the World of Warcraft. Send us a note to suggest a WoW Rookie topic, and be sure to visit WoW.com's WoW Rookie Guide for links to all our tips, tricks and how-to's.

Want to add high-powered functionality and high-octane style to your interface and controls? Add-ons, dear readers. You need add-ons. Also known as mods, add-ons can be such powerful upgrades to your gaming experience that some players consider them mandatory beyond a certain level of play. You can get add-ons that show you how much threat you've built as a tank, add-ons that show how much DPS you're doing relative to other members of the raid, and add-ons that show you who needs Dispel Magic now. There are add-ons that let you reconfigure and move your hotbars anyplace on your screen, add-ons that show you how much gold you have on each of your other characters, and add-ons that point the way to the area where your quest objective awaits ... Sweet stuff, indeed.

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

• All Things Azeroth is doing a podcast a day during the month of November.
• Myth Busted: Fast Weapon Upgrades at Big Hit Box.
• World of Matticus talks about his guild's recruiting strategy and how he's using the World of Raids recruiting tool.
• Moonglade talks about the Aim for Hybrid DPS.
• Pikestaff of Aspect of the Hare looks at the Long and Winding Road in WoW and the WoW-blogosphere.

Go Phillies!

Each week Dominic Hobbs brings you Blood Pact. "Much like your life as a warlock, it is important to learn from what we find in the world... before twisting it to our will." ~ Summoner Teli'Larien

We're not hunters. We don't wander about shopping for a pet that catches our eye, like some fashion accessory. We reach through into the nether and wrest demons into this world, binding them to our will. We maintain our bond to this demonic denizen of the shadow, summoning them to our side at need. They are not pets, some companion for the terminally lonely and friendless, they are minions. They are our servants and slaves, powerful beings controlled through dominion, not feeble minded animals cooing for snacks.

This week I will start a review of our minions -- what they can do for us and how best we can use them. My aim is for this to be of use to anyone new to the class and these minions as well as more experienced players looking for tips and tricks. After the break we start right off with our pocket-mage.

This week on Totem Talk we're going to continue the leveling with coverage of going from level 41 (so actually a little beyond SM, but "Razorfen Downs to Outland" or "Uldaman to Outland" didn't really have the same zing) to level 68, which is the level at which you can board the boat to Northrend. Some basic things to consider before getting to the meat of things.

• It is this writer's opinion that these are the levels that really define your spec and role. It's in the 40's that you can actually have enough talents and have trained enough skills that the real potential of each spec comes through: your elemental shaman actually feels and plays significantly differently than your dual wielding enhancement shaman, and while both can still heal, resto really starts pulling ahead here.
• Shamans were originally designed as 'offensive hybrids' to balance out the paladin's 'defensive hybrid' nature. Since shamans and paladins are no longer designed in opposition those roles have blurred somewhat, but elements of the original intent still show through. Keep in mind that two of the three shaman trees are DPS oriented, and at these levels the fact that one is a ranged DPS while the other is melee will not seem as distinctive as those roles become in raiding/instancing.
• Gear will start to drop in Outland that is more optimal for individual shaman specs. Before then, mail with spell power and/or MP5 is still somewhat rare on the ground in Azeroth outside of the various instance blues that drop. You're just going to have to work around it, annoying as it is.
• Shamans are pretty bloody flexible. I have a friend (Hi Will) who has leveled an orc shaman to 80 as resto, and is working on an alliance shaman as well. Again as resto. And he kills things just fine. It's slower, yes, but it can work, so if you have a spec you really like don't despair of leveling with it as a shaman.

Okay, now to talk about what you'll be doing for 28 levels.

I know -- most of you will hear the word "chatlinks" and think of horrible times in Trade channel where people are spamming the names of abilities and items in different ways, from nonsense to offensive. But chatlinking is a skill that isn't talked about much, and there definitely are place where it's useful (telling guild members about an item that might help them, or linking an enchant to show what mats it needs). So, encouraged by this thread over on Epic Advice, let's run through a few of the ways you can put links to items in the chat channel.

Welcome to Lichborne, your weekly peek into the world of the death knight. Your host, Daniel Whitcomb, is enjoying the most wonderful time of the year, when a death knight can hang around in his natural habitat all day long without seeming creepy. Or no creepier than usual, at least.

As you approach the end game of WoW, one thing you may find out quickly is that the proper use of macros is a great way to take your game to the next level. Sometimes they streamline moves, other times they allow you to perform actions that would be otherwise impossible. Death knights are definitely no exception, and though we'd be here all week if I went through all the ins and out of macro theory, or even death knight macro theory, I figure right now is still a good time to get you started.

Let's look at a few basic essential macros for the various roles and trees of the class.

We had a fun show as always on our podcast last Saturday -- Gregg Reece joined Turpster and I to talk about the most popular stories of the last week. We talked at length about Hallow's End and how it's going for everybody, the new LFG system coming to patch 3.3 and what to expect in there, as well as last week's developer chat on Twitter and whether or not Blizzard should do it again.

And of course we answered your emails, and actually went longer than I think we ever have before. Not three hours long -- we're only doing that if we can get 25,000 followers on Twitter (and hey, though we're not there yet, we're actually moving pretty steadily towards that). But it was a nice long show this past week, full of the usual information and fun. Hit it up to listen on any of the links below, and enjoy -- we'll be back next Saturday afternoon as usual.

Get the podcast:
[iTunes] Subscribe to the WoW Insider Show directly in iTunes.
[RSS] Add the WoW Insider Show to your RSS aggregator.
[MP3] Download the MP3 directly.

Listen here on the page:

New around here? WoW Rookie points WoW's newest players to the basics of a good start in the World of Warcraft. Send us a note to suggest a WoW Rookie topic, and be sure to visit WoW.com's WoW Rookie Guide for links to all our tips, tricks and how-to's.

You're level 80 now, you've picked up a few sweet upgrades from five-mans and heroics, and you're ready to try a PuG into Naxx. You've found a group that's looking for members, but you're not quite sure how to answer the raid leader's demand: "What's your DPS?" The best way to figure out what your raid DPS, of course, is to measure it while you're raiding – but if you haven't started raiding yet, you can't really do that, can you?

The first thing you'll need in order to figure out what kind of DPS (damage per second) you're capable of putting out is an add-on that keeps track of your performance. Recount is popular and widely acknowledged as a fairly accurate tool. There are plenty of alternatives on all the major add-on sites. Select and install the DPS meter that appeals to you.

Our podcast is now ready for your downloading pleasure, and I have to say -- it was a good one. Nothing flashy, no once-in-a-lifetime guests (though both Turpster and Matticus were on with me, and those guys are definitely one-of-a-kind), but it was just a good solid podcast, with some great discussion about the latest PTR build and Lord Marrowgar, the Battle.net changeover, and our very first predictions about when we might see patch 3.3 on the live servers. Turpster's even got some money riding on his guess already.

Plus we answer your emails as usual, and that's always a good time -- you can email us anything you want (including some mp3s for intros if that's your thing) at "theshow AT wow dawt com". If you like the show, don't forget to go hit us up on iTunes -- you can subscribe to the show there, or leave us a good rating or review if you like. Thanks for listening as always, and enjoy the show!

Get the podcast:
[iTunes] Subscribe to the WoW Insider Show directly in iTunes.
[RSS] Add the WoW Insider Show to your RSS aggregator.
[MP3] Download the MP3 directly.

Listen here on the page:

I haven't played a tank in a while, so I haven't had to mess with stats at endgame for a long time. Though my paladin is slowly getting there, so this little macro over at Honor's Code might come in handy. Parry and dodge are very similar abilities -- both of them help you to completely avoid damage from bosses as a tank. But they do have a very few important differences (Parry speeds up your next attack swing, and is affected by diminishing returns at higher levels of the stat), so when you're gearing up at endgame, you want to make sure to balance them out in the right way.

I just posted a little while back that the Darkmoon Faire needed a change, but apparently there's still some benefit to be had over there -- Valdesta of WoWGrrl has found at least one way to keep the Faire interesting. She's been keeping a character over there, apparently, and periodically checking in on what the vendors have. They sell not only little pets and miscellaneous items like the Heavy Leather Ball (which often sell for a tidy profit on the AH, since people aren't always aware that the Faire vendors sell them), but there are also vendors there who sell profession items like herbs, motes, eternals, leathers, and so on.

And as anyone who's ever levelled a profession knows, those are often worth their weight in gold, not just on the AH, but in terms of leveling up your own alt professions as well. As Valdesta says, it's worth camping an alt over there just to check in during raiding downtime or on a flight path with your other character, for the same reason you should always check and see just what other vendors around the world might have for sale -- sure, you won't make much with just one buy, but over time, picking up cheap crafting mats from the DF can lead to some solid profits on the AH.

We first heard about Vivox's Puggable service back at the Austin Game Developers Conference -- Vivox is a company that runs voice chat for online games, and Puggable is their attempt to target the WoW audience with a quick and easy way to put a group into voice chat. The site is still in a closed beta, but it's slowly opening up, and so as soon as we got a chance to jump in and test the service out, we took it.

So what's the verdict? While Puggable's basic mechanics seem to work (by following their instructions, you can get a group into voice chat), the system itself is not quite ready for prime-time. Not only does it have an installation process that most cautious WoW account holders will scoff at (you have to install an Internet Explorer or Firefox addon, and restart your browser to use the service), but the real draw of the system, being able to browse and see player information at a moment's notice, aren't all there quite yet. Read on for our experiences.

Here's a neat tip from Amiyuy of the WoW Ladies Livejournal group. Personally, I don't mind the "fog" effect that sometimes pops up in game -- I experienced it most recently while doing OS the other day, though it pops up on the haunted Borean Tundra coast and a few other places ingame as well. But a few people don't get along with it too well; like the drunken blur effect, it can be somewhat overwhelming for those with a weak stomach.

Fortunately, there's a way to turn both of those off -- you just have to dive into the config.wtf file in your World of Warcraft installation's WTF folder (open it up with Notepad on Windows or TextEdit on Mac, though be careful in there, and save a copy before you do it: if you accidentally edit anything else, it could cause problems on your game), add SET ffx "0" to the end of the file, save and close it, and then you shouldn't see that fog effect any more.

Today, All the World's a Stage concludes a series on "how to be evil," bringing the bad guy back into your fantasy roleplaying, complete with ideas, methods, warnings, and practical examples. Be sure to check out steps 1-3, steps 4-6, and steps 7 and 8 on the path to evil!

Your friends keep telling you, "you can't play Arthas, man! Nobody's going to believe that your little human death knight is actually the Lich King in disguise. Get real!" But your idea just won't go away. You admit that creating a human death knight named "Ahrrthyss" might not be the best way to go about it, but you're in this guild which is devoted to fighting the Scourge, and you want Arthas to be a part of your story, not just an NPC who shows up in some quests and at the end of a raid.

We've already discussed a number of ways to be a villain in WoW – so you look at them to see if you can get one of them to work for you: The most obvious is to just start a new character and designate it to be one of your guild's antagonists, but the problem here is that making Arthas as an actual player character is way too Mary Sue. Such a tactic usually only works for very subtle villains (more like flawed heroes really), or for short-term possession, and your guild has done 3 "possessed by the Lich King's power" type stories already. You need something new! Another choice is to create a disposable villain, perhaps, some agent of the Lich King, which could be interesting, but still doesn't put you in touch with Arthas himself.

But there is another way, which many people have not thought of: to put the villain entirely in the shadows of the background, let him never actually be seen, but let his effects be felt based on what happens to the heroes. Arthas can indeed play a huge role in your story, without ever having to appear in person. It has been done to great effect before, even in novels. Sauron, anyone?