Posts with tag daniel-howell

Being honored ingame with an NPC or an item is, I think we can all agree, the height of player cool. Not that this will ever happen to me, mind you. Realistically, the only thing I expect to get from Blizzard is a letter bomb, or possibly a bloodstained horse head for going live with that article on the Death Grip bug, and perhaps I deserve it. To this day I feel kind of bad, or at least I do until I remember my guild leader's Death Knight sending a goblin NPC flying off the dock, and then I laugh and laugh, and realize that I am a terrible person who should probably be locked up somewhere.

It's fun to wonder, though, and I've settled on two wishes. The first would be making my beloved main into a Thunder Bluff NPC among the Druid trainers, kitted in full Tier 6 with an Origin of Nightmares. She would be friend and counselor to all young Druids and full of unsolicited advice for them, most of it incorrect. The second, less dignified, and perhaps more realistic legacy I would leave to the game is a series of cow-shaped impact craters at the bottom of various Northrend cliffs and in Crystalsong under the Dalaran sewers' exit pipe, in tribute to the several falling deaths incurred while mindlessly jumping from heights without the benefit of Cold Weather Flying. Little signs could be posted below informing players of the sites' historical significance, although I'm not sure how Blizzard could squeeze the phrase "Oh shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii.........." onto the flavor text.

On the chance that Blizzard ever decides to honor your august self ingame, what would you want honored and how?

We've already seen Blizzard developers give subtle, in-game nods to hard-working WoW community personalities. These special folks have gone an extra mile in helping us all feel like one big community. They help bring joy, fun, and some extra knowledge to help us all get a little more out of our game time, and they've gone a long way towards making our play a little smoother. For example, when well-known Resto4Life blogger Phaelia tapped out due to focus on family, Blizzard gave her a shout-out with the in-game item, Phaelia's Vestments of the Sprouting Seeds.

It's been four months since our good friend Daniel "BigRedKitty" Howell announced his own break from World of Warcraft. He's been desperately missed, and his fans created a goodbye video for him in April. It's just not the same firing off a gun or notching an arrow, without the watchful eye of BRK helping us out.

Blizzard has tipped their own hat to BigRedKitty with the inclusion of the BRK-1000 in patch 3.2. It even drops from the Argent Crusade Tribute Chest, though that's probably just happy circumstance. The BRK-1000 is a fairly respectable Hunter weapon and is appropriately a gun. The very best part? It smells faintly of raspberries.

[Thanks to Ken for the tip!]

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Patch 3.2 will bring about a new 5, 10, and 25 man instance to WoW, and usher in a new 40-man battleground called the Isle of Conquest. WoW.com will have you covered every step of the way, from extensive PTR coverage through the official live release. Check out WoW.com's Guide to Patch 3.2 for all the latest!

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Our good friend and colleague Daniel "BigRedKitty" Howell has announced on his blog that he is taking a break from World of Warcraft. He's taking time off of the game and his blog to, as he says, "rededicate myself to my family." He thanks readers for their attention and kind words, and hopes that everyone will understand his decision, as well as examine their own lives to make sure that they focus on what's most important to them.

We of course wish him well -- BRK was an excellent contributor to our site and podcast, and we commend him on making the decision to do what's right for him and his family. We hope that everything turns out OK. And as many of his commenters have said, we wish him the best of luck in everything, WoW-related and otherwise.

Phaelia of Resto4Life, you'll remember, also closed her blog down recently, also choosing to focus on her family (and the sapling about to grow into it). Trying to figure out a good balance between your free time and your work and family life is a tough thing -- our Azeroth Interrupted column has covered exactly that battle. And as even Blizzard says, if any other part of your life is suffering because you're choosing to play this game or be a part of this community, it's time to make a break. Raiding the wilds of Azeroth is a lot of fun, and it's possible to do it while leading a healthy life. But if that balance ever gets thrown off, it's time to take a step back and do what's right for you and those closest to you.

Our podcast was rip-roaring this last weekend -- BigRedKitty was on board to talk Hunter nerfs with us (and talk Hunter nerfs we did -- there's a lot of Hunter talk on this show), and we also went down the upcoming changes for patch 3.0.8 (including all of those mage buffs), Turpster helped us dissect the ideas of dual specs and achievement looting, and of course as usual we answered reader emails and chatted live with everyone in the chat.

The show is now right there below, and also available on the side of our site, and of course in iTunes as usual, where it's been phenomenally popular -- just the other week, we appeared on the top Games and Hobbies podcasts lists, along with tons of other great podcasts (and even some of our favorite Warcraft-related shows). We appreciate every bit of support we get over there -- if you've subscribed to get the shows weekly or have left a review (hopefully glowing, though constructive suggestions are fine as well), thanks very much.

And of course we'll be back next weekend as always -- we tape the show live on Ustream every Saturday afternoon at 3:30pm Eastern. Thanks for listening, enjoy the show.

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

Listen here on the page:

Our podcast is back on the virtual airwaves (and by that we mean our Ustream page) tomorrow afternoon at 3:30pm Eastern, and we have the man himself, BRK, back on to talk about the biggest story of the past week: the Great Hunter Nerf of 2008. Turpster is also on with us, and we'll make sure to talk about more than Hunters -- there's news about dual specs, achievements and the rewards that come with them, and of course all of the class changes to cover.

Plus, we'll be chatting live and answering emails as usual -- you can send us a note right now at theshow@wow.com. The show goes live at 3:30pm Eastern (here's a time zone converter), but I'm usually on a little while before that, playing some music and chatting with people about what's new in the World of Warcraft, so if you want to come by a little early, feel free. And if you can stay late, do that, too: the aftershow seems to get better and better every week.

And of course we've placed the stream right on this post after the break again, so click the link below to head on down and meet some other listeners in the chat. See you tomorrow for the live show!

So, Wrath of the Lich King is here, and it is awesome. We here at WoW Insider want to make sure you have all the tools you need to oil your guns, string your bows, and feed your pets.

Let's take a moment and review all the basic sources of information you can use to help propel your level 70 Hunter into Northrend, on to level 80, and then on to greatness!

GENERAL TIPS

• Scattered Shots offered some basic tips for Hunters getting ready for Northrend, including some suggestions for levelling specs
• There's a few tweaks still needed for the sake of Hunters even at release time, but Scattered Shots shows you how to handle those bugs in the mean time.
• Make sure you understand the new defensive setting for pets
• BRK display Green Arrow's oldest trick in Freezing Arrow and a new Wolf.

TALENT TREES

• Take an in depth look at Beastmastery from Scattered Shots
• Don't forget to read BigRedKitty's 3.0.2 Talent tree guide

PETS

• What is the best looking pet? David Bowers has you covered with a list of the most beautiful critter-killers available.
• Our Beast Mastery and Exotic Pet special features covered some of the specific families you may want to use: Bats, Chimaera, Core Hounds, Devilsaur, Silithid, Spiders, and Worms.
• BigRedKitty takes it a step further with videos of Hunter animals in action: Gorilla(din), Mammoth (it counts, in BRK's mind), Crocolisk, Bat, and Raptor, the Rhino, the Sporebat, Wind Serpent, and Worm, the Crab, Cat, and Serpent, and everyone's favorite screen-shaker, the Core Hound.
• Yeah, Petopia was updated
• Experimenting with pets is now a little easier, since pets level faster than in Burning Crusade

PROOF OF AWESOME

• How about a Hunter pet tanking Gruul?

Tonight's the night. May your arrow (or bullet) fly true!

Our podcast was back on the air last Saturday, and we were happy to welcome two very talented bloggers to the mix: both Daniel "BigRedKitty" Howell and John "BigBearButt" Patricelli, authors of our BRK and Shifting Perspectives columns, respectively, were aboard to chat with us about whether the endgame is just too easy lately (or whether it's nice that some people who couldn't before are seeing instances and getting loot), the new boss in Karazhan, and how abruptly the zombie event ended. We also hit on Blizzard's almost-mistake with the class forums, and if we really deserved that three-day credit due to lag and queues lately.

We answered emails as well -- BRK gave some great AH tips for when to get rid of your primals and mats before Wrath, and BBB helped a listener out who was wondering if he should play a Druid or a Warlock to 80 first. And I got some good glyph hints and tips out of the guys in terms of what to put in those glyph slots for Hunters and Feral Druids. If you have a comment or question for the show, feel free to send it along to theshow at wowinsider dot com, and you might even hear it on next week's show.

Perhaps most exciting, we worked a lot last week to make sure the quality of the show was better, and I think for the most part it worked -- we didn't have a single disconnect during the chat, and you should find that the tinny voices in the recording are gone as well. It's not perfect yet, and there's more we want to add into the mix, but we're working on it. The iTunes feed is still on the fritz, but the RSS feed below works just fine for me and it should for you, too. Be sure to tune in next week at 3:30pm Eastern -- we do this live every Saturday, and it is a darn good time.

[Ustream] Listen to the unedited recording in Ustream.
[RSS] Add the WoW Insider Show to your RSS aggregator.
[MP3] Download the MP3 directly.

Should be a great show tomorrow on the podcast, as we welcome two terrific WoW bloggers to the table. In one place together for the first (second? third?) time ever, both Daniel "BigRedKitty" Howell (who has his own very popular, very well-done podcast, by the way, if you haven't heard it yet) and John "BigBearButt" Patricelli will be in attendance. And we'll be talking about, as usual, all the biggest stories from the past week in Warcraft, including how the new Kara boss is going (and almost gone), whether Karazhan itself is too easy these days, and that whole class forums megaton yesterday (that turned out to be a dud, more or less). And we'll cover the end of the zombie event, too, and whether or not it worked the way Blizzard planned it to, or if they cut it short early because of all the griefing.

The show will air live at 3:30pm Eastern (time zone calculator) over on our Ustream page. Lots of people have had questions about how to get the show lately (and of course, it hasn't helped that our feed is going through some growing pains), but all of your questions should be answered in our last podcast post. And we're working on the quality issues, too -- I can assure you that the recording issue has been fixed, so no more tinny voices this week.

But you don't want to wait until the recording anyway -- join us on the Ustream page tomorrow (or just come back to this post -- the stream is embedded after the break), and you can chat with us and other listeners live, as well as vote in polls and participate in a rumored "aftershow" that's been popping up after we're done recording lately. See you tomorrow!

This past week, as we do every Saturday, we sat down on WoW Radio to record the one and only WoW Insider Show (recently chosen by our friend Patrick, we'll remind you, as one of eight podcasts geek gamers shouldn't live without), and results of that session are now on WoW Radio (and in iTunes, where you can and should subscribe to recieve it in the brand new iTunes 8 for free every week). BRK and Duncor joined me, and we chatted about:

• How recruit-a-friend has changed the game, when you can now go from 1-60 in just 20 minutes
• Whether it was fair or not to remove those "first to 80" titles -- Duncor especially had a strong opinion on this one.
• And we had a spirited discussion about Achievements -- I'm for them, BRK isn't so much.
• We answered email as well, and we did a live Ask a Beta Tester session, since we were all three in the beta, about Death Knight DPS, what it's been like playing my usually Resto Shaman as Elemental in the beta, and what the Ret Monkey has been up to lately (looks like he didn't actually spec Prot as we'd hoped).

I think it's a particularly good show this week, so definitely give it a listen. And do visit us in iTunes -- subscribing to the show would be great (and believe me, subscribing to shows in iTunes 8 is a definitely improved experience), or just leave us a review letting us know what you think. If you have feedback you want to send directly, the show's email address is theshow@wow.com.

We'll be back on WoW Radio next Saturday again -- if you've never tuned in live to IRC and the live stream, definitely make time for it around 3:30 Eastern, it's a lot of fun, both talking to all the great people in the channel and hearing us spout our thoughts about the World of Warcraft live. See you next week!

The latest episode of our podcast is now up for listening over on WoW Radio, and in there, Daniel "BigRedKitty" Howell, Duncor the Dependable and I all break down the Wrath beta at length, talking about what we're most excited about (and what you're most excited about, too).

• We talked about the rumored changes coming to raiding mechanics, including the much maligned potion sickness and possible changes to crushing blows.
• Since BRK was on, we chatted about our Hunters (mine is almost 69, hopefully 70 soon) and what he expects for the expansion, from exotic pets to new pet talents.
• We talked about the new, smooth regen mechanic and whether it helps or not.
• And we talked at length about Inscription, how it works, and whether we were into it. I'm very into it, the other guys not so much.

And of course we answered your emails -- if you have a question, comment, or insight on the show, you can email us at theshow@wow.com, and you could even hear your email on the next show.

Which is going to be a good one, by the way -- as you may have noticed, next weekend is our 50th show, so we'll have to do something fun. More singing? Giveaways? Drinking by the host? You'll have to tune in and see. As always, enjoy the show and we'll see you next week.

Our podcast is back this afternoon, and it's going to be a doozy. We'll share with you some of the best entries in last week's beta key contest, and we'll do what we always do: talk about the biggest stories in the past week of Warcraft. I can tell you right now: this week's show is going to be almost all about the Wrath beta, because there's no bigger story than that. All of those amazing Green quest rewards will probably get a mention, as will what we've seen of Inscription and all the other new stuff so far.

And since BigRedKitty will be making his triumphant return to the podcast (and I'll be on with him for the first time since I've started leveling my Alliance Hunter), we'll talk Hunter stuff as well -- I definitely want to hear what he has to say about all these exotic pets we're seeing. And while I can't guarantee it, there's a rumor that none other than Matthew Rossi will be stopping by -- I hear he's excited about something called Titan's Grip?

Should be, as always, a terrific show. Tune in to WoW Radio at 3:30pm EST, join everybody in the IRC channel at irc.mmoirc.com in the #wowradio channel, and as always, if you have questions or concerns for us to answer (or just want to tell BRK how awesome he is), drop us an email at theshow@wow.com. See you this afternoon!