Heart-of-the-Aspects
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50% off all Blizzard store mounts this week
This offer was just announced by Blizzard in the EU, and if previous promotions are anything to go by, it will be announced by Blizzard US very shortly. This offer allows the purchase of the Celestial Steed, the Winged Guardian, or the Heart of the Aspects for half price, which, in the EU, equates to €10 or £8.50. In the US, all three mounts are available for $12.50 each. With Christmas fast approaching, you may want to leave this article open on the computer of a family member, or a good friend, or maybe this is the perfect time to pick up a mount for someone special. If you're planning to give a mount as a gift, do remember that, while the codes can be redeemed on any account via the Item Redemption Page, they are region-specific, so players wishing to purchase a mount in the US will need to do so via the US version of the pet store. It follows, then, that players wishing to buy a mount in the EU need to visit the EU pet store. Within those regions, though, there are no country-specific limitations. Of course, these mounts count towards the various mount achievements available in-game, and with the changes in patch 5.0.4, are available on every character, rather than just on the one they were redeemed for. Mists of Pandaria is here! The level cap has been raised to 90, many players have returned to Azeroth, and pet battles are taking the world by storm. Keep an eye out for all of the latest news, and check out our comprehensive guide to Mists of Pandaria for everything you'll ever need to know.
Soul of the Aspects pet added to the Blizzard Store
If you purchased a Heart of the Aspects mount a couple of months ago and wished you had a tiny, baby version of it to slap on a leash and drag around with you wherever you go, you're in luck! Blizzard has just added the Soul of the Aspects vanity pet to the Blizzard Store for $10 USD. European players can pick up their pet over on the European Blizzard store as well. As your newest faithful companion pet, the Soul of the Aspects flies by your side through the skies of Azeroth, celebrating your adventures together with aerial summersaults and twisting corkscrews. The Blizzard store states that every character on your World of Warcraft account will receive this pet, so we can be fairly certain that it cannot be bought, sold, or traded in-game for gold.
Breakfast Topic: What's your favorite Blizzard art?
Blizzard hires some of the finest artists in the land to do its designs, concept art, world building, and settings. It's no surprise, then, that I adore the World of Warcraft concept art and am always delighted to see just how close in substance and style that the art team got in translating an image into a finished product. Suffice to say, Blizzard concept art is some of the best in the business. One of my favorite art pieces from the original World of Warcraft was a crashed zeppelin image that just always stuck with me. While my art book isn't next to me, I remember cracking open the book or at least a website and seeing that shot, analyzing it, looking at that little scale dude at the bottom. I have no idea what about the image is awesome to me. Maybe because the image eventually came back in spirit in the Cataclysm cinematic when that zeppelin over Orgrimmar hits one of the central buildings. That being said, we have not seen the concept art for the newest mount to hit the pet store, the Heart of the Aspects. I'm willing to bet it's pretty cool, and I want to see it. Which pieces of Blizzard concept art are your favorites? Let's show off our favorite Blizzard art pieces.
The Queue: Heart of the Aspects
Welcome back to The Queue, the daily Q&A column in which the WoW Insider team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft. Mathew McCurley (@gomatgo) will be your host for today. Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee! We're giving away a Heart of the Aspects mount! Go enter! Luotian asked: Are we going to have another jump in difficulty between Mists and Cata like we did between Wrath and Cata? Example: I recently leveled my Dwarf Shaman up to 80. When I went from ICC, where things died without a whole lot of difficulty, to Mount Hyjal I died. Repeatedly. I couldn't pull less than 3 things at a time, CCing things was a must, and they hit so much harder it was almost obscene. They seem to have tuned the starting zones to those in ICC gear-- none of my characters were, and I recall it being difficult every time. With RF making it *even more accessible*, will Mists be like that, making it something of a nightmare to level alts I don't run raid finder with up to 90? This is an amazing question. Potentially yes, and potentially no. Here's the problem: We don't have all of the information yet, so everything is speculative. The first thing to consider is whether or not an item squish or some sort of power balance system goes into effect before or just after the Mists of Pandaria launch. If mudflation is taken care of with an item squish, then there will be a more gradual power ramp-up through the expansion, and you shouldn't see too many gearing problems. On the other hand, if no item squish goes through, Blizzard might be preparing to get rid of these issues by giving players who are setting out into new content "earlier" than they should be because of increased experience gain gear to compensate. We saw those full level 80 sets of gear that were datamined a while back, so who knows?
Heart of the Aspects video and giveaway
If you haven't had the opportunity to see the new Heart of the Aspects mount in action and you really need to before you decide whether you want it or not, check out our video of the new mount above. If you want one but don't want to spend the $25 on it ... we may have you covered. Today, we're giving away one Heart of the Aspects mount from the Blizzard Store. To enter, leave a comment on this post between now and the same time tomorrow. To be specific, the contest ends on Feb. 16 at 9:00 a.m. EST. Winners must be legal residents of the United States or Canada (except Quebec). You may only enter once, and winners must be 18 years of age or older. One winner will be chosen at random. Click here for complete, official rules.
Heart of the Aspects mount now available for $25
While patch 4.3 was on the PTR, dataminers discovered a pretty slick-looking mount in the game files: the Heart of the Aspects. We all speculated as to how players might receive it, and today we found our answer. You can buy it from the Blizzard Store for $25, adding it to your stable of real-money mounts alongside the Celestial Steed and Winged Guardian. Update: Blizzard has released their official announcement.
Patch 4.3 PTR: Heart of the Aspects and other new mounts
Patch 4.3 has a new mount we're all very curious about, the Heart of the Aspects. What we're curious about is how we're going to get our grubby little mitts all over it. Is it a heroic Deathwing drop? Or do we get it for completing a raid wide meta-achievement? Is it for killing Deathwing without the aid of the Aspects, the way Mimiron's Head dropped in Wrath? That last one seems unlikely to me, with the way heroic difficulty is accomplished now, but I can't rule it out. Also interesting to note is Experiment 12-B, also new in the most recent data push. What does he look like? Where does he come from? Is it for killing Ultraxion? Another possible meta-achievement mount, as we speculated the Life-Binder's Handmaiden could be? At this time, I have no idea -- but it's new and shiny and I'm sure we'll all want one. We've included the video from MMO-Champion behind the cut, so you can get a look at the Heart of the Aspects mount in motion.
