stompalina
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WoW.com on TNB and elsewhere
If you're around this evening and want to listen in to some extra podcast discussion, head on over to the Twisted Nether Blogcast page around 9:30 pm PST this evening -- our friends Fimlys and Nibuca of TNB have asked me to join them on their podcast, and it's sure to be a good time. We'll be chatting live with listeners, too, so if you've ever had questions about how we do things on the site or haven't been able to listen in to our own podcast, now's your chance.And speaking of the Twisted Nether Blogcast, they're also holding their own meetup at BlizzCon, just a few weeks away. Ours is on Thursday, but if you're around on Friday night, you'll be able to stop on by the Anabella again, and say hi to lots of great folks from the WoW community. Both Turpster and I will be there for sure, and there'll probably be at least a few other WoW.com staff members in attendance as well, so it should be a really fun night.And even that's not all -- our very own Turpster is also set to make an appearance on Rawrcast's live BlizzCon show on Saturday night of that weekend, where he'll likely be talking about everything we've seen at the convention, as well as helping out with some quality giveaways. Lots of great events and shows are being put on by the community around BlizzCon, and of course we're really happy to be a part of them.
The Daily Quest: Sometimes simple is best
We here at WoW.com are on a Daily Quest to bring you interesting, informative and entertaining WoW-related links from around the blogosphere. This Saturday, the guild Exodus will be joining Stompalina and crew on the Rawrcast. It kicks off immediately after our own podcast, so give it a listen! Part seven of Too Many Annas' epic Angrathar fiction has been posted. James Peripheral, one of WoW.com's user bloggers, tells the world why he plays MMOs. Why? Family. Big Hit Box supplies some very basic tips for players new to grouping as melee. All of you new Death Knights and Retribution Paladins might want to take a look. Ret Vets get a pass. Do you have children that play WoW? Are you concerned that they might be seeing things in chat channels that they shouldn't be? NoStockUI has some suggestions for the parent that wants their child's game experience to be a little safer. Click here to submit a link to TDQ
WoW Insider Show live today on Ustream at 3:30pm Eastern
Gonna be a good one (but is it ever not?) on our podcast today -- Contributing Editors Lesley Smith and Alex Ziebart will both be in the virtual broadcast booth with Turpster and I, and we'll be talking about the biggest stories in World of Warcraft over the past week, including patch 3.1.1 and all of the fixes that have been dropping lately, server outages and how bad they've been, what things are like in Ulduar so far, what the new 5-man might be, and the crack-in-a-twinkie that is Peggle in WoW. That's actually a lot of stuff -- we better talk fast.The show starts up at April 25, 2009 3:30 PM EST var date_span = document.getElementById("date"); var date = new Date(date_span.innerHTML); var monthname=new Array("Jan","Feb","Mar","Apr","May","Jun","Jul","Aug", "Sep","Oct","Nov","Dec"); var weekday=new Array("Sunday","Monday","Tuesday","Wednesday","Thursday", "Friday","Saturday"); var year = date.getFullYear(); var day_of_month = date.getDate(); var month = monthname[date.getMonth()]; var day = weekday[date.getDay()]; var hour = date.getHours(); if (hour > 11) { if (hour > 12) {hour -= 12} am_pm = "PM"; } else { am_pm = "AM"; } var minute = date.getMinutes(); if (minute < 10) { minute = "0"+minute; } date_string = day + ", " + month + " " + day_of_month; date_string += " at " + hour + ":" + minute + " " + am_pm; offset = -date.getTimezoneOffset()/60; if (offset >= 0) { offset = "+"+offset; } date_string += " in your time zone (GMT"+offset+")"; date_span.innerHTML = (date_string); over on our Ustream page, or you can just click below to find the embedded Ustream feed in the second half of this post. And of course if you can't make it to listen live today, don't worry, because the show will be recorded and available in its entirety (well, minus the preshow and aftershow that we usually do for the live listeners) on Monday as usual.Oh, and we owe you readers a big thank-you: our Twitter page did in fact hit 9000 followers this week (actually, over 9000), so it looks like Turpster and I will have to gussy up and turn on the cameras for a video show. Stay tuned to the show today for more information on that, and keep an eye on the site here for when we'll be doing it. It'll definitely be something to see. Get it? "See"? Video?
WoW Insider Show live this afternoon at 3:30pm Eastern
Our podcast goes live again today as usual, and it should be a good one. We're going to welcome Rogue blogger Chase Christian back to the show, Turpster should be along for the ride as usual, and we're planning to have an old friend on who we haven't seen in a long time: Duncor may be making his long-awaited return, which should be a lot of fun. Of course we'll be talking all about patch 3.1, including how the dual spec system is working so far, some of the major class changes that made it through, and what's going on with the Argent Tournament. And we can't forget about the Ulduar cinematic -- that was a fun bit of lore that popped up out of nowhere this week.The show starts at April 18, 2009 3:30 PM EDT var date_span = document.getElementById("date"); var date = new Date(date_span.innerHTML); var monthname=new Array("Jan","Feb","Mar","Apr","May","Jun","Jul","Aug", "Sep","Oct","Nov","Dec"); var weekday=new Array("Sunday","Monday","Tuesday","Wednesday","Thursday", "Friday","Saturday"); var year = date.getFullYear(); var day_of_month = date.getDate(); var month = monthname[date.getMonth()]; var day = weekday[date.getDay()]; var hour = date.getHours(); if (hour > 11) { if (hour > 12) {hour -= 12} am_pm = "PM"; } else { am_pm = "AM"; } var minute = date.getMinutes(); if (minute < 10) { minute = "0"+minute; } date_string = day + ", " + month + " " + day_of_month; date_string += " at " + hour + ":" + minute + " " + am_pm; offset = -date.getTimezoneOffset()/60; if (offset >= 0) { offset = "+"+offset; } date_string += " in your time zone (GMT"+offset+")"; date_span.innerHTML = (date_string); over on our Ustream page (or just check the feed right down on the bottom of this post), and we'll be chatting live with you during the show as well as answering emails that you send to theshow@wow.com. We'll see you this afternoon!And if you've got a little bit of time after the show, be sure to head on over to Rawrcast's Ustream page for their show, directly after ours. Our friend Stompalina is going to have none other than the inimitable Turpster, and apparently he'll be playing a game show that you can participate in. Turpster was also on The Instance earlier this week, too, so give that a listen if you just can't get enough of the T. Man that guy's like the Jaina of podcasts this week -- he's getting it on with everybody!Update: That Rawrcast show with Turpster is apparently next week, April 25th. So if you thought you missed it on Saturday, no worries -- tune in next week to catch it live.
Ulduar maps aplenty
Haven't loaded up the PTR and gone to check out Ulduar for yourself yet? The good news is you've got lots of ways to see it online -- in map form. Reader Evan B sent us the version in the picture to the right (click it for the full version, and it's big) -- he cut and pasted together the in-game map screenshots to make up a to-scale version of what the instance looks like. Our friend Stompalina also has a version, cut together from what looks like the minimap ingame, so you can get a little clearer idea of what the textures look like in each section of the instance.And StratFu sent us an interactive map of the Titan city, with hover-over tooltips on each boss and click-through information for what we'll face inside. Strategies are still being fleshed out completely (and remember, this is the PTR, so everything is subject to change). But if you're looking for as much info as possible on what's waiting for you inside the brand new raid of Ulduar in patch 3.1, there's lots of places for you to find it.
