136 – The Instance: You've Been Through A Lot With That Sack

Jeff Kaplan Is Movin’ On Up
Already in the big leagues, Blizzard announced that former World Of Warcraft Game Director Jeff Kaplan has been promoted to lead the team that is developing the secret “next-gen MMO” that Blizzard has been talking about not talking about for the last year and a half. The announcement came, surprisingly, as a post in the World Of Warcraft forums from Tigole himself.

Love Is Sort Of Up In The Air
As we record, the Love Is In The Air event just finished a few hours ago in World Of Warcraft, and players have just finished, or failed to finish, all of the new achievements that make up the Fool For Love meta-achievement, and earn the “The Love Fool” title. This is the first Holiday Event in WoW that has caused abject complaining and downright unhappiness in player communities.

More Info On Two Spec Mechanics Coming, Eventually
The community face of Blizzard, Naethera, posted an interview she did with Ghostcrawler, AKA Blizzard Senior Designer Greg Street a couple of days ago, on the subject of two-speccing coming to WoW. We’ve got a link to the entire article in the show notes, but there were a few highlights that we just have to touch on here.

Murloc Hides Are About To Get Thicker
The 2009 World of Warcraft Arena Tournament is nearly here. Starting tomorrow (February 17, 2009), players will be able to sign up to compete in this year’s exciting competition. The tournament will feature an online qualifier played on our special tournament realms. Top teams will proceed to their respective regional finals and compete for a chance to reach the global world championship – with cash prizes totaling over $200,000. These realms have been outfitted with level 80 character templates and the latest epic gear from Wrath of the Lich King. As an added bonus, there are exclusive rewards that players can earn by participating in the tournament, including an Armored Murloc in-game pet. Top teams will also contend for a chance to achieve the “Vanquisher” title for their live characters.

Town Cryer
Matt A. writes: Hey Scott and Randy was wondering if there was anyway I could be on the show with you guys sometime and just talk warcraft.

Ryan P. writes: If you could live in any one zone in WOW which would it be? As for me it was The Highlands for a long time but after BC I would have to say Nagrand would be it. I love the rolling hills and green grass.

Jason W. writes: I am a little concerned about the “macro of the week” given on this podcast. Was it a joke and it gets you just to beg for gold or is it an actual macro to get gold in some “secret” fashion? If it is truly a way to get gold, will it get you banned if you use it?

Those Wildstorm Wallpapers
Blizzard posted the tenth Wallpaper image from Wildstorm this week – and it’s now a long enough series of imagery for your desktop or screensaver that we have to insist that you go have a look. The series of images are more than an advertisement for the WoW monthly comic book, they’re a showcase of the art that Wildstorm has been putting on that series’ covers for the last few months. Between December and January, the series went from cover art by Samwise Didier and Ludo Lullabi to work that is now being done by Jon Buran and Tony Washington, and it’s a change in style, but not a dropoff in quality.