The folks over at Ten Ton Hammer have a post with some anecdotal data about Hunters -- they claim that Azeroth's ranged DPS pet class is on a decline lately, and they've got only some guild application numbers to back the theory up. Mem over there says that there are a few diehard Hunters still floating around, and lots of alts, but that as a class, it's fallen off in terms of popularity for sure.

Is he right? Fortunately, there's a site that tracks numbers (as reliably as you'll find for public information, anyway -- certainly Blizzard has access to much more information) on exactly that. WarcraftRealms' list of classes over time does prop the "declining Hunter" theory up -- as you can see (from both Alliance and Horde totals), Death Knights took a nice bite out of all the classes for a little while, and Hunters have been on a pretty steady slope down since mid-January, when patch 3.0.8 hit the realms. That, of course, was the harsh Beastmaster nerf, and ever since then, Hunters have had some real trouble recovering (not to mention that all class playtime is declining in general -- despite their slope downwards, Hunters are still in the top three classes played anyway).

Is this the end of Hunters? Not at all -- Blizzard has already said that they are cyclical about balancing classes, and a heavy set of nerfs on one side of the cycle is usually accompanied by a burst of buffs on the other. Not to mention that the most interesting Hunter changes, the ammo revamp, hasn't yet found its way to the game. Reworking of ammo (in addition to some likely buffs there), will probably bring lots of Hunters back to the stables, so to speak. But it's true, Hunters are on a downward turn lately.

[via WoW LJ]

Today's WoW Moviewatch is a little bit of a repeat, but in an odd way. Shadowline1990's A Death Knight's Tale - The Battle for Light's Hope Chapel Cinematic Movie is another revisit version of the Death Knight closing cinematics. You might recognize Shadowline1990 as the guy who made The Culling of Stratholme - a WoW Cinematic Movie. This movie is, admittedly, more of the same idea.

Shadowline1990 took pieces of the in-game animations and voiceovers, and tried to make it into a more compelling cinematic experience. Shadowline1990 isn't the first person to do this with the Death Knight storyline, though, and he's very upfront to say he gives credit to Invisusira for having given the story this treatment first.

I'm not sure if Shadowline1990 knocked A Death Knight's tale out of the park the same way he did The Culling of Stratholme. While I think he did a (generally) good job with it, it didn't scream to me the same way Culling did. The video is attractive and well pieced together. The final product feels a little too-full. It seemed to drag on a little bit, but some of that is caused by the slower cadence of the voice acting.

In other great news, Shadowline1990 reports that his follow-up to Culling of Stratholme piece is nearly done. So, ultimately, there's a lot of good news to be had from him right now.

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Third in the class Q&A series is Death Knight. I thought it was going to be Warlocks, but I guess plans change. So far Shaman and Mage have been covered, and in each post the Ghostcrawler has been talking about the developer vision for the class past and future, as well as answering popular questions from the forums. What do they have to say about WoW's first hero class? Read on.

Introducing a new class to a game that didn't really have an empty niche was tricky, but they think they have succeeded - "perhaps too well." They like that there's a lot of room for variation in player skill.

In patch 3.2, they wanted to reduce DK AoE and defensive cooldowns, which they definitely did.

The resource system (runes and runic power) is a large part of what makes Death Knights unique. They also have a lot of medium-length cooldown (able to be used a few times per fight), and there's a lot of skill involved in knowing when to use them. DKs are also especially well-rounded, with a lot of versatility and a lot of tricks, which makes them at risk for being over-powered in PvP.

This was so cute we had to share -- that future Alliance kid at right is Cara's son Riley, no doubt owning it up on Daddy's Death Knight in the battlegrounds. That's right -- the DK who rolled over you with Howling Blast in Wintergrasp yesterday was actually played by a 9.5 month old baby. How's that burn feel? Cara tells us, and the pic was part of a "WoW you're a great father" theme for Riley's first Father's Day.

From all of us here at WoW.com, here's a shout out to all of the fathers out there, both Dads of players and Dads who are players themselves. Take a break from taking down Ulduar or grinding out those Argent Tournament quests and make sure to give your Dad a call (and/or the usual tie or socks) today. Or just send him an in-game email for those of you who play with your pops.

Happy Father's Day!

Death Knights are among the most-changed classes in the first PTR version of patch 3.2, which is not terribly surprising for such a young class. Because of such significant changes, all DKs will receive a free respec.

Blood Strike will scale more from disease (up to 50% per disease), while Frost Strike is receiving significant nerfs: it can now be dodged/blocked/parried, and only gets a 55% bonus from weapon damage, instead of 60%.

On the tanking front, one of our major cooldowns was nerfed, although DKs are still probably the king of tanking CDs (disgustingly powerful new Ardent Defender aside). Icebound Fortitude's CD was doubled to 2 minutes. Veteran of the Third War's Stamina bonus was cut in half, and Toughness was cut by a third.

Upper Deck has announced that the Death Knight class is coming to the WoW trading card game. Just like in the MMO, the class plays differently than any other -- their website has a series of previews posted that show just how different their DKs are. The class is designed to do crazy damage with two-hand weapons, and there are options to do extra damage by sacrificing allies or equip gear that provides you with solid armor even as you're churning out DPS. There are Death Knight Horde and Alliance allies as well, and each of them has a Death Knight-specific ability -- lots of Shadow damage, exchanging protection for more damage, and even some Frost-tree cold debuffs. And there are quests to go along with the Death Knight class as well, where DKs get extra bonuses for completing and playing certain quests.

Starting on June 16th, you'll be able to pick up 36-card deluxe starter decks for Death Knights at a store near you, and those decks will get inserted into the game just like any other class -- they come with a Hero to play, associated spells and quests, and three "Ghoul token cards" to play as allies. While this is the first time Death Knights will be playable as Heroes, the very first Death Knight cards were actually included in the Wrath of the Lich King Collector's Edition -- a pair of Ally cards named Lord Anton Nightbane (Alliance) and Conqueror Kagon Blackskull (Horde). If you like the TCG but have been looking for a new twist (or a way to bring your Death Knight character into the game), this definitely seems worth a look.

And speaking of the TCG, they are now on Facebook, so if you're a fan, go say hi over there as well. The MMO and TCG crowd still seem to run in different circles (though you'll definitely see the game at BlizzCon), but there are quite a few intersecting points between them.

[Guild Recruitment - City] It came from the Blog is now recruiting. We are an ultra casual guild where WoW.com writers join in scheduled events with readers. We have a tabard and even a Guild Bank (though usually empty). PST to Robiness if interested.

With the Midsummer Fire Festival coming up, we think it's time to revive the activities of our very own guild: It Came from the Blog. We will be announcing the date and time of our desecrating fires run soon, as well as other events that may or many not coincide with in-game holidays.

If you want to join us, make a Horde character on Zangarmarsh U.S. and ask an ICftB member for an invite -- many have the ability. I will also be popping in and out on one of my characters: Robiness, Robinelle, Robinella or Robinara. (Perhaps you see a trend?)

Events in the past have been for any level and the Midsummer Fire Festival get-together will be the same, but it is always easier to get around if you are mounted and/or old enough to defend yourself against mobs along the way. Also, there will be some events that are designed for higher levels. If you are interested in joining us, I recommend making a Death Knight on Zangarmarsh and getting it through the initial quests, so that it will be available when we start up again.

For more information about It came from the Blog, please read our FAQ.

Reader UI of the Week is back! Each week WoW.com will bring you a fresh look at reader submitted UIs. Have a screenshot of your UI you want to submit? Send your screenshots, along with info on what mods you're using, to readerui@gmail.com.

After a bit of a break, Reader UI returns with a nice set-up from Kraayliis, a Death Knight on Azuremyst-US (view large). Here's what he had to say:

I've just been working on setting up a clean UI that still retains the look and feel of a full UI while still minimizing the amount of clutter on-screen. I'm currently running WoW @ 1920x1080 resolution. This is my first shot at designing a UI so I just wanted to toss this out there to see what people would think.

I started using Btex for the background a few weeks ago and couldn't find what I wanted so I decided to draw my own.

In a discussion of tanking mechanics on the forums, Ghostcrawler made a long and in depth post about various subjects that helped consolidate one of the real problems with block and block value in Wrath of the Lich King. Not only is blocking something that only two of the four tanking classes do, but it's a pretty lackluster stat for boss tanking.

• Block as a mechanic is somewhere between avoidance and mitigation. Ideally it removes a fair amount of damage (vs. all damage) reasonably often (vs. rarely). If block is up 100% of the time it just becomes armor that you improve through a different stat. We have let block chances creep up frankly because the amount blocked is pretty trivial when bosses are hitting for 40% of your health pool every swing. If this still strikes you as too RNG, imagine abilities like Shield Block and Holy Shield that could guarantee 100% chance to block for a short period of time.
• We don't think block is cutting it as a mechanic, but the direction we are likely to take it is probably more of a change than you are considering.

The problem with block (which is really two mechanics in one, block rating which determines how often you block, and block value, which determines how much damage you subtract from a hit when you block it) is that for trash, it's inflated due to the block chance creeping upwards that GC mentions above. But for boss fights where a boss can either hit you physically for far, far more than you could ever block or hits you with massive magical damage that block does nothing at all against (well, unless you're a warrior in Tier 8 with the four piece set bonus) block has simply fallen behind the curve.

Warning: This article contains spoilers for the Wrathgate in-game event.

So Callouse of Vashj posted a theory on the General Forums that is so elegant that I'm sort of ashamed I didn't think of it myself. At the Wrathgate, we know that Arthas absorbed the soul of Saurfang the Younger into his sword. Evidence also points to the idea that he stole Bolvar Fordragon's body. This has lead to rampant speculation that we will eventually fight one or both as thralls of the Lich King.

But Callouse posits that we may end up seeing one and both at once. That is, we'll see Saurfang the Younger's soul in Bolvar's body.

Tanking Death Knights, don't buy those Glyphs of Icebound Fortitude just yet. The glyph is meant to make Icebound Fortitude a little more potent in PvP, where a DK is unlikely to have much defense on. But apparently (and this is news to me), there was a bug where it was giving benefits even to def-capped DKs, and thus many people were picking it up for PvE use.

As always happened eventually, Blizzard has spotted the bug, and they're going to be hotfixing it soon. The glyph will still keep its intended effect; PvP DKs will not see a change, most likely. But now I'm curious: what was the glyph doing for tanks? Was it adding 10% onto IBF at all times, or something?

While writing the most recent Shifting Perspectives column and browsing old records on Druid population statistics, I started to wonder about the various factors that play a role in how popular a class becomes. While Blizzard and Blizzard alone has the exact numbers on who's playing what, various fan sites have honed data collection strategies over the years and amassed a pretty impressive pile of numbers. This only got easier when the Armory launched in spring 2007, and by now I'd be surprised if players weren't at least broadly accurate about overall trends. If we can trust what we see, how we do best explain fluctuations in class popularity? Has Arena success (or the lack thereof) been as influential as we think? Is class population an accurate, albeit crude, guide to the overall "quality" of a class at any given moment -- or just a guide to the perceived "quality?" I'd be interested to hear what people think.

Having played a Druid since the beginning of Burning Crusade and observed it going from the second least-played class at 60 to the third or fourth most-played class at 80, I have my own theories about what's influenced Druid population numbers particularly, but I need to do a little more digging before I can be sure. However, I don't know whether any of it really applies to other classes, and the meteoric rise of the Death Knight is a thought-provoking (and somewhat troubling) trend.

In the absence of a ranged weapon or wand, Druids, Shamans, Death Knights, and Paladins all have an interest in filling the little slot directly to the right of their weapons with something good. You won't get the stats from idols, totems, sigils, or librams that pure classes will get from that slot, but with luck you'll significantly improve a core ability or two. However, because these items usually affect only one or two spells or attacks, they tend to be somewhat hit-or-miss in terms of usefulness, and many specs go for a while without having anything particularly good to put there.

Graylo at Gray Matter takes a look at the new idol available to Balance Druids from Ulduar-25, the Kologarn drop Idol of the Crying Wind. After running the math on its stats versus the Balance idols available for badges (Idol of Steadfast Renewal and Idol of the Shooting Star), he reaches the conclusion that this new i-level 226 item is a significant DPS loss compared to its i-level 213 cousins, even if the Druid in question is using Glyph of Insect Swarm and has the 2-piece Tier 7 bonus granting 10% additional damage to Insect Swarm. While I think it's probably a damage increase on very high-mobility fights, Graylo's math is pretty damning. It's hard to argue that a Tier 8 idol providing less than a third of the damage granted by a Naxx piece represents ideal gear scaling.

Bears in Ulduar-25 are looking forward to their first upgrade since the i-level 128 (!) Idol of Terror, but I'm not too sure about other classes. Do you have some hard choices ahead of you, or do you plan on using an older piece?

Blizzard has announced the final results of the qualifier rounds on the US Arena Tournament realms, and there they are -- you can see that Death Knights are probably the most dominant class in the lineup. Their teamup with a Paladin and a ranged DPS (specifically a Warlock, though there is a Hunter in there) is pretty devastating so far. Shaman have made a nice comeback as well, serving both as utility and healing on a few teams. And of course the old Arena standby of PMR finishes out the top ten.

Blizzard will invite the winners from the qualifying round into regional finals -- they will invite the top eight teams, but apparently, according to a few commenters in the forum thread, both "well then" and "GET TANKED" are somehow the same players on the same accounts (but different characters, even though they're same classes), and the same is supposedly true for The Phuox Den and Almost Eighty on Live. So we're not sure who they're inviting -- either these two teams will get to play twice in the tournament rounds, or Blizzard will pull in some more teams to fill in the spots.

Or maybe Blizzard will have to come up with something else: we're not entirely sure about which players are on those teams, but certainly Blizzard can check that very easily. At any rate, congrats to all of the winners so far, and we'll keep an eye out for the next round of Arena battles.