Happy Tuesday Morning, everyone. Patch 5.4.7 is out on the PTR, which means, even if it's not a content patch, we got lots of cool news coming in. I admit to being a little too bummed out by those poor dragons, but even I'm still pretty excited at the prospect of getting my free 90 boost a little earlier. Now I really need to decide between my priest and my rogue.

Of course, beyond patch 5.4.7, we still a lot of other news, including Hearthstone's open beta, new female human model previews, and our usual roundup of guides. As of this writing, there is no announced downtime, but why not take a break and read up anyway? The usual roundup is below.

Hot news and features

• The updated human female model has been revealed by Blizzard.
• Bashiok posted on the new system requirements that the new character models might bring.
• Patch 5.4.7 is on the PTR, and with it are new character upgrades and mount models, including a flying raven lord that may be the reward for buying the Warlords of Draenor collector's edition.
• Timeless Isle weapons will be ilevel 489 in patch 5.4.7.
• PvP gear will be ilevel 550 in patch 5.4.7.
• Hearthstone's open beta has begun in both the US and EU.

• Check out the latest patch 5.4.2 hotfixes for January 21 and January 24.
• Check out the latest updates on US Connected Realms.
• The Iron Skyreaver mount is now available for purchase at the Blizzard store.
• The Starcraft II Arcade is now free to play.
• As WoW takes on more microtransactions, Olivia examines the good, the bad, and the ugly of it all.

Class news and guides

• Celestalon recently asked what class abilities you'd save from the button bloat purge.
• Scattered Shots compared beastmastery and survival raiding.
• The Care And Feeding of Warriors has a guide for newly-90 protection warriors.
• Encrypted Text wants rogue buffs.
• Blood Pact talks about using boss mods effectively.

Dungeons, items, professions, PvP, and more

• Olivia examines what battleground win-loss ratios really tell us.
• Blizzard is pretty happy with the bonus roll system.
• Should reputation reward gear cost gold or Valor Points? I make an argument for the former.
• Want to get some more battle pets up to level 25? Here's a guide for you.

Odds and ends

• Death Knight Love Story is a new WoW fan film that includes voices like Brian Blessed.
• Lifehacker recently published an article about real life lessons you can learn in WoW.
• Know Your Lore sums up the first part of the Cataclysm expansion. We also tackle the current problems with story progression in WoW.
• Ever wonder what Lord of the Rings characters would look like as Hearthstone cards?
• 15 Minutes of Fame talks to a TEDx speaker who told the story of how he used WoW to fight his anorexia.
• The official WoW site now has a fanfiction forum.

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Tags: downtime, last-week-in-wow, maintenance, realm-downtime, realm-maintenance, roundup, roundups, scheduled-downtime, scheduled-maintenance, server-downtime, server-maintenance, server-status, tuesday, tuesday-downtime, tuesday-maintenance, tuesday-morning, tuesday-morning-post

Filed under: Realm Status, News items