Filed under: Cooking, How-tos, Buffs, Well Fed Buff

Well Fed Buff serves up tasty dishes to boost your HP, stats and appetite - with that special WoW twist, of course.

Whatever the Fourth of July may mean to you, I think most of us can agree that it's a great day for grilling. Amid the symphony of pops and bangs coming from my neighbor's fireworks of varying degrees of legality, I grilled up these splendid ribs for your reading pleasure. Expect a taste that's slightly spicy but delightfully tangy.

Dry Pork Ribs are a low-level Cooking recipe and are edible by level five characters. They can be prepared at 80 skill. The mats for the in-game recipe are simple Boar Ribs and Mild Spices. It's nearly as simple in real life, just ribs and rub. Dry Pork Ribs restore 243 Health, and will give a 4 Stamina and Spirit buff for 15 minutes if you sit down and eat them.

Continue reading Well Fed Buff: Dry Pork Ribs

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Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Lore, Know your Lore

Welcome to Know Your Lore, where each week Alex Ziebart brings you a tasty little morsel of lore to wrap your mind around. Sweet, sweet lore. Mmmm.

Before we start this week, I'd like to let you guys know about a neat little thing we've set up for you. If you have requests for Know Your Lore or questions for that other column that I do, you can e-mail me at lorenerd@wowinsider.com ! I can't guarantee that I'll fill all Know Your Lore requests, but I'll certainly do my best. Now, on with the show!

My original intent with Know Your Lore this week was to go back to our preparation for Wrath of the Lich King with Kel'thuzad. I was pretty excited, because I adore the Scourge and c'mon, Kel'thuzad has to be awesome, right? Uh... no, not really, he isn't. He was shockingly boring and was only interesting in the context of the Scourge as a whole. He's definitely a pawn. He didn't stand up well on his own, so we're stepping away from the Road to Wrath a little longer.

Instead, we're going to focus on a topic suggested by my buddy Danny Whitcomb. Today we're going to look at Malorne, which conveniently goes pretty well with this past week's Ask a Lore Nerd. Malorne is one of many demigods in Kalimdor's history, but is/was generally regarded as one of the greatest. This makes sense, considering he and Elune hooked up once upon a time

Continue reading Know Your Lore: Malorne

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Filed under: Druid, Paladin, Warrior, Analysis / Opinion, Guilds, Raiding, Tank Talk

Tank Talk is WoW Insider's new raid-tanking column, promising you an exciting and educational look at the world of getting the stuffing thrashed out of you in a 10- or 25-man raid. The column will be rotated amongst Matthew Rossi (Warrior/Paladin), Adam Holisky (Warrior), Michael Gray (Paladin), and Allison Robert (Druid). Our aim is to use this column to debate and discuss class differences, raid-tanking strategies, tips, tricks, and news concerning all things meatshieldish.

This week in Tank Talk I'm covering the various stages a tank exists in during their time in a guild. Yesterday in Part I of the column I talked about the recruitment and applicant stages. These stages help clarify the beginning life of a tank within a guild. While talking about what these stages are and what they mean to the tank, I also covered how the guild can keep them happy while ensuring the best tanking possible is done.

The job of keeping a tank happy is arguably unique task when compared to non-tanks in that they are the ones which everything eventually comes back to in the game. If a ranged DPS dies, they're going to feel it in a longer encounter. If a healer dies they'll notice the healing start to lack. Finding a way to communicate everything to a tank and taking in their unique situations can be a challenge, but it is a necessary one.

Lets resume our look at the last few stages of a tank's life within a guild, starting with the raider tank stage.

Continue reading Tank Talk: Building and keeping your tanking corps, Part II

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Filed under: Items, Analysis / Opinion, Odds and ends, Humor, Phat Loot Phriday, WoW TCG

For the Fourth, we're going with the obvious choice: a hot little infinite fireworks trinket that isn't all that easy to get.

Name: Perpetual Purple Firework (Wowhead, Thottbot, TCGLoot)
Type: Epic (sometimes Uncommon) Trinket
Damage/Speed: N/A
Abilities:

• Use: Shoots a purple fireworks display into the air that explodes into a rain of sparkles.
• It has infinite uses (hence the "perpetual"), and a 30 second cooldown. The whole display itself lasts about 4 seconds, but it does like pretty purty.
• No level requirements, so anyone can use it -- provided you can get it.

How to Get It: Yes, it's a TCG item, but not one of the normal ones, where you just buy a booster and hope you pick it up. Nope, this fireworks trinket is part of Upper Deck's "points" program, in which points is just a fancy word for "spend more money!" Every booster pack you buy has a certain number of points in it, and when you've collected enough points cards, you can spend them on UDE's website for ingame items like this one. There's about 100 points per booster pack, and this item currently costs 3,000 points (it used to cost 10,000!), so you'd have to buy 30 booster packs (MSRP around $5, though you can find them cheaper and more expensive in different places, so about $150 total) to get enough points for the trinket.

Fortunately, we have eBay, where people are selling and buying the UDE points for as cheap as $15. Still not really a great way to get an ingame item (spending real money for virtual stuff, woo!), but if you really want to get your hands on this trinket, there you go. Otherwise, just do a few runs of Scarlet Monastery's Armory, and you'll have all the fireworks you need.

Getting Rid of It: You can't! Vendors won't take it, and it'll never run out of charges, so the only way to get rid of it would be to destroy it. And that would be like throwing money down the drain, which is something that TCG buyers would never ever do, right? Right?

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Filed under: Dwarves, Gnomes, Humor

I don't know if it's just the kid in me that likes to blow things up, but I always find myself aiming to make a few explosions happen around this time of year. As I've grown older and understood more about physics, chemistry, etc., I've come to make the explosions even larger. For instance, putting a bunch of fireworks in a barrel, lightening them all on fire at the same time, and then funneling the explosion towards the ground usually has a humorous result.

Humorous might be a few missing fingers, but they can be reattached. And really, who needs their middle finger for anything good?

This year I'm going to try to attach things to bottle rockets, perhaps 10 to 20 all tied together in a bundle. My goal is to see how high I can make things go up in the air. It's going to be a grand ol' time. And after all, what better way to celebrate the birth of America than to blow your own little part of it up?

All this talk about blowing things up has got me thinking though, which race would fit better on a rocket, and which would fly farther? Gnomes or Dwarves? Let's look at the strengths and weaknesses of both.

View Poll

Continue reading Gnomes or Dwarves: Which would be better to attach to a bottle rocket?

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Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Podcasting, WoW Insider Business, Odds and ends, Blizzard, WoW Insider Show

Our weekly podcast is back on the air tomorrow afternoon, and Turpster should be back at home in England, ready to tell us all about the rest of his WWI trip. I'll be on, along with John "BBB" Patricelli, and we'll also welcome Kyle Horner from our sister sites Massively and Big Download -- he's just recently gotten back into WoW, so we'll chat with him about what's changed since he left and why he's coming back. We'll also read your email (since we missed it last week, we'll have a lot to go through, I'm sure) as well as other tidbits from WWI, what's up with the Wrath world event, and when all of these beta registrations might actually start meaning something.

So join us, won't you? Just tune in to WoW Radio live tomorrow afternoon at 3:30 Eastern, and you'll be able to hear the show live on the virtual airwaves. And you can join us in IRC if you'd like as well -- either chat on the site, or send your IRC client of choice to irc.mmoirc.com and the #wowradio channel. And if you'd rather email the show, you can do that, too -- theshow@wowinsider.com is the address for all your complaints, queries, and general Turpster praise.

We'll see you tomorrow afternoon as always.

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Filed under: Druid, Analysis / Opinion, Expansions, Features, Humor, Factions, Talents, Interviews, Wrath of the Lich King, Hardware, [1.Local]

[1.Local] serves up a smattering of reader comments from the past week, from the sublime to the ridiculous.

The big news of the week, of course, was the flurry of news about the Wrath of the Lich King expansion let loose at the Worldwide Invitational. Readers dogpiled dozens of news posts with speculation, QQs and cheering alike.

But there was plenty of talk on other topics this week, as well. Readers debated the drawbacks of spec-flopping with theorycrafter Lhivera and weighed whether or not upcoming changes such as easing the process of faction grinding is in fact "dumbing down" the game. Linux fans discussed technical matters, while readers battled over druids' getting a regular res and whether multiboxing in PvP constitutes unsportsmanlike behavior.

And finally, we close our look back at this week with an in-character comment exchange over -- of all things -- this month's regular Consortium gem disbursement.

Join us after the break for this week's meatiest reader comments here at WoW Insider. Be sure to dive into the comments area of each thread (not this one!) and add your own thoughts - unlike your mama, we like us some hot, fresh backtalk.

Continue reading [1.Local]: Comment fireworks and fizzles

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Filed under: Herbalism, Fishing, Mining, Skinning, Alchemy, Blacksmithing, Cooking, Engineering, Leatherworking, Tailoring, Enchanting, First Aid, Analysis / Opinion, Virtual selves, Economy, Jewelcrafting, Features, (Professions) Insider Trader, Inscription

Insider Trader is your inside line on making, selling, buying and using player-made products.

This week, Insider Trader will be starting a discussion about trade channel in World of Warcraft, including its usefulness to its likability, abuse, and role in the game.

At first glance, trade channel is supposed to be a channel linking all major cities, providing a forum for craftsmen and buyers to meet up and exchange goods and services.

Within this context, players make a living, purchase gear and consumables, research goods and services, make friends and business associates, and learn the ins and outs of server economy.

Unfortunately, when asked their opinions of trade channel, many players describe it as annoying, useless, or offensive, and many keep it turned off permanently. Still others seem to hover in trade chat, spending a great deal of time in it either chatting, selling or sometimes, buying.

Continue reading Insider Trader: A discussion of our trade channel

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Filed under: Warrior, Analysis / Opinion, Instances, Raiding, (Warrior) The Care and Feeding of Warriors

One of the complaints I see from time to time on the WoW forums and even here on WoW Insider is, to paraphrase is, "there are all these level 70 warriors and yet I can't find a tank." I have a variety of responses to this statement as a protection warrior at level 70. It might be how you ask, for one thing: a polite tell from someone asking me if I'll tank heroic Ramparts once saw me taking an entire group of relatively new 70's through both heroic Hellfire instances. It's also possible that, while I am a tank, I don't feel like tanking for you with an hour to go before raid time, since I'll be tanking that entire time. But I'm curious about this mindset that assumes that with all these level 70 warriors, you should be able to find a tank.

I don't see "all these level 70 paladins and druids and I can't find a tank" nearly as often. Now, I understand that paladins and druids can heal, and the general populace finds that to be just as valuable. But I know there are a host of DPS druids and paladins out there. While they're derided to some degree (and unfairly so, but this column isn't named Matthew Rossi defends every one of the tanking classes if they choose to DPS - we know it's unfair, we'll let it go at that) there doesn't seem to be this absolute assumption that the first and best role of any class that can tank is to tank the way it seems to be there for warriors.

Now, I love tanking. I'm good at it, I enjoy the challenge, I stay up all night working on threat sets, avoidance/mitigation sets, stamina sets, I go to sites like Wowhead and look at shields all day. Tanking is my idea of a good time. So I'm certainly not arguing that warriors cannot, or should not, tank.

I'm arguing that they should not tank just because you want them to.

Continue reading The Care and Feeding of Warriors: On my treads

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Filed under: Machinima, WoW Moviewatch

We tried to hold out for Azerothian Super Villains - Episode 6, but it wasn't released in time for us to blog it this morning. In the meantime, we have a mystery machinimator on our hands! Ram, the creator of The Frozen Chronicles, registered for Vimeo in May, has no Warcraftmovies account, and barely uploaded the video anywhere. What we do know is that he submitted it to Blizzard's Worldwide Invitational machinima contest.

In all actuality, this short film is as much of a mystery as the creator is. Regardless of the plot, which was not mentioned in English or their native French, it is an amazing film. It looks like a sequel may be in the works as well!

If you have any suggestions for WoW Moviewatch, you can mail them to us at machinima AT wowinsider DOT com.

Previously on Moviewatch ...

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Filed under: Orcs, Items, Events, Odds and ends, Blizzard

What better way to celebrate the Fourth of July today than to sit outside with some good beer, some tasty BBQ, and a whole lot of cheaply made fireworks? Brom and Seku on the Llane server were kind enough to send us this picture they took of a firework they found at a store in Pittsburg, Kansas -- apparently the "Behemoth," made by the Consumer Fireworks company in China, not only "emits showers of sparks," it also blows copyright law completely out of the water. Very nice.

One more gigantic pic of the Behemoth and its Warcraft III orc cover art after the jump. If you do use fireworks (or break copyright law) today, do it safely, and have a great holiday!

Gallery: Orc Fireworks

Continue reading Warcraft III's Orc appears on fireworks

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Filed under: Screenshots, Around Azeroth, Galleries

In the United States, the Fourth of July is Independence Day -- the day when we celebrate our country's independence by blowing up a small part of it. If you can't tear yourself away from WoW long enough to watch the fireworks, this screenshot should provide all the pretty colors you need. Our unnamed submitter, possibly Jayvor on Sisters of Elune-US, painted the sky above the Isle of Quel'Danas (and some of its archers) red, green and blue. Are we looking at a video card error, some engineering gadget, or a computer that's discovered how to manufacture its own drugs? What do you guys think?

Do you have any unusual World of Warcraft images that are just collecting dust in your screenshots folder? We'd love to see it on Around Azeroth! Sharing your screenshot is as simple as e-mailing aroundazeroth@wowinsider.com with a copy of your shot and a brief explanation of the scene. You could be featured here next!

Remember to include your player name, server and/or guild if you want it mentioned. We prefer full screen shots without the UI showing -- use alt-Z to remove it. Happy Fourth, Americanos! I'll see you at the fireworks.

Gallery: Around Azeroth

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Filed under: WoW Insider Business, Contests

Happy July 4, everyone! Just a reminder -- you've only got fourteen and a half more hours to participate in this week's Caption This! contest. To participate, leave a caption for the above picture on the original post by 11:59 PM EST tonight!

Eligible winners (U.S. or non-Quebec Canadian residents above 13) will receive a 60-day gamecard for first place and a choice of one of seven World of Warcraft action figures (see original post for details) for runner-up. Remember to read the official rules for the contest here. Even if you don't get picked for the top ten, you can still participate by voting for the winners on Tuesday morning.

Gallery: Caption This!

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Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Odds and ends, Wrath of the Lich King

The Part Time Druid posted a bit of an existential question -- "Why do we WoW?" It was followed up over on the Altoholic. And while their musings on the motivations for gaming are notable, I'm happy they avoided questions around that horrible WoW-addiction issue. I'm not much of the navel-gazing type, so I wasn't concerned about why I play WoW, in and of itself. (Presumably, I get something out of it, so fair enough.)

But, with pre-expansion blues (and excitement) crashing down on our heads -- why are we playing right now? Our gear's about to go obsolete (and we're about to put on our green-quality clown-suits), our level cap's about to go up 10 levels, and the whole world as we know it is going to be radically different! Oh, yeah, and those guys are going to be around, stealing our tanking spots and doing Elune knows what else! (Anyone else notice they're the first class to have two words as part of their name?)

For me? Nothing special about the pre-expansion time period. I play the same reason I always do. I play with my girlfriend, I play with my friends. I play in the Arena. In a year, what I've done now might not matter to what I'm doing then. But what I'm doing now matters now -- and for now, I'm having fun.

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Filed under: Undead, Analysis / Opinion, Virtual selves, Odds and ends, Breakfast topics, NPCs

Lone of Bleeding Hollow asks when we'll see architecture, and immediately, a few other players pop up to shout out my answer: we already saw some Egyptian creatures and styles appear around Ahn'Qiraj. But his request for a specific type of architectural style is an interesting one: is there a kind of architecture you haven't seen in game yet that you'd like to?

A few people say they want to see Asian architecture, and as we pointed out a little while back, Darnassus actually borrows a lot from Eastern architecture. I'd like to see a city or village in World of Warcraft with a Northeastern United States, Cape Cod kind of fishing town feel -- Booty Bay is a nice fishing town, but it's a little too far south for my personal tastes. We are heading north for Wrath, however, and since there are not one but two coastal areas open up there, I might just get my wish. Fans of Viking and Norse architecture will also get their fill in Wrath, I'll bet, and consdering the Forsaken, as Neth says in the thread, are getting their own architecture, Gothic style will also be a highlight.

Are there any styles or cultures that you'd like to see represented in Azeroth that haven't been?

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Filed under: Items, Tips, Events, WoW Insider Business, Odds and ends

Yes, it's time once again for those of us in the United States to celebrate our nation's birthday with fireworks, BBQ, and hopefully a day off. From all of us here at WoW Insider to all of you, happy Fourth of July. And to everyone else outside of America -- get back to work, it's Friday!

As is traditional around Midsummer Fire, the capital cities of Azeroth should have free beer and food available this evening, as well as hourly fireworks displays to watch. If you ask us, the best place to see the festivities is Booty Bay -- nothing like seeing the explosions light up the sky above the Bay, though we've also seen some good displays in Stormwind as well.

No matter what you're up to this holiday, in-game or out, have a terrific and safe Fourth of July.

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Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Blizzard, Expansions, Wrath of the Lich King, Forum Post of the Day

With the Wrath Beta Opt-in available, we're one step closer to the expansion. We're all anxiously awaiting the time when the expansion is ready. I'm still having fun with the existing World of Warcraft, but I'm a bit antsy. There is a lot of frustration over existing conditions, especially when it comes to PvP.

Chloroform of EU-Magtheridon isn't interested in waiting. He listed his grievances in the EU-PVP Forum, "Balance issues, queue times, destroying premades, AFK problems, uneven teams, world pvp screwed by 9000yd aggro range ultra guards." Like many others, Jasse of EU-Bronzebeard blames the arena for the death of PvP.

Continue reading Forum post of the day: The future is not what it used to be

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Beta Opt-in FAQ
Yesterday's big news was the opening of the registrations for the WotLK Beta, Bornakk posted a FAQ about it on the official forums.

• WotLK Beta Opt-In (American Realms)
  
• WotLK Beta Opt-In (European Realms)
  
  

Quote from: Bornakk (Source)Q: Who is eligible for the Wrath of the Lich King Beta opt-in?
A: Any player who has both an active World of Warcraft subscription and World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade is eligible to opt in to the beta at (https://www.worldofwarcraft.com/account/beta-opt-in.html / https://www.wow-europe.com/account/beta-opt-in.html). The account must be active when the beta starts in order to be eligible to receive an invitation.

Q: Do I need to sign up for the Wrath of the Lich King opt-in if I have an unused beta key from a previous BlizzCon or Blizzard Worldwide Invitational (WWI)?
A: We haven’t announced which betas the BlizzCon or WWI keys will grant access to. Unless you’ve already been notified that you have a guaranteed spot in the Wrath of the Lich King beta, you should opt in if you want a chance to be invited.

Q: What previous contests and promotions will have guaranteed me access to the Wrath of the Lich King beta?
A: Frostmourne Fan Art Contest winners (to be announced in the coming weeks) or players who have purchased the Dell XPS M1730 World of Warcraft Edition notebook are guaranteed beta slots and do not need to opt in to participate in the beta.

Q: If I’m certain I’m already getting a beta invite from another source, will I be able to win another invite if I opt in?
A: Players may opt in to the beta even if they are already guaranteed a spot from another source. In the event you are selected to receive an additional beta invite, it may be gifted to a friend or family member.

Q: Will invites be sent on a first-come, first-served basis, or will invites be sent randomly?
A: Beta invitees will be selected randomly from the entire pool of players who have chosen to opt in. Signing up early doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll be invited sooner than someone who signs up after you.

Q: Does this mean the beta is coming soon?!
A: We are preparing for the beta but do not have an official date to announce just yet. Keep an eye on the official World of Warcraft site for more information.

Q: Is this the only opportunity I’ll have to get in the Wrath of the Lich King beta?
A: No. We will offer other opportunities for players to get in the beta. Keep an eye on the official World of Warcraft site and official fansites for more chances.

Q: How long will opt-in signups be available?
A: Players will be able to opt in until the beta closes.

Q: If there are multiple World of Warcraft accounts in my household, can I opt in with each of them? Or can I only opt in with one?
A: You may opt in to the beta with each account, though this doesn’t guarantee that every account in the household will be invited.

Q: Can I opt in more than once on an account, and if so does that increase my likelihood of being selected?
A: You can only opt in once per account. If you try to opt in a second time, you’ll simply get a message saying that the account has already opted in.

Q: If I receive a beta invite for one account, can I use it for a different account instead?
A: Yes. You will be able to accept the beta invitation on whichever account you like.

Q: Are there any character-level requirements to participate?
A: No, but keep in mind that you will need to have a level-55 character to create a death knight, and we recommend your character be level 68 or higher to play in Northrend.
Raidguru partnership : Hyjal Summit guides update
The second update from our partnerhsip with Raidguru.net is now online, the guides for Hyjal Summit have been updated on the site !





The Blizzard Store is now available in Europe !
Quote from: Blizzard (Source)We are proud to announce the release of the brand-new Blizzard Store! The Blizzard Store allows you to purchase Blizzard Entertainment games and other merchandise directly from the source. Here are some of the features of the new Blizzard Store:

• User-friendly interface makes your shopping fast and convenient.
• Search and browse products by major franchise categories as well as product type.
• Convenient online shopping tools such as saving payment methods and shipping addresses for future reference.
• Digital downloads: now you can purchase select Blizzard Entertainment titles as direct downloads, with immediate access upon payment.

We hope you enjoy the new Blizzard Store! There are also a few extra features you can use after registering on the store.

• You can register the CD Keys of your old Blizzard games and download them directly from the site, that's probably a good thing for all the people who've been looking for their Diablo 2 discs for the past few days.
• You will be automatically registered for the betas of upcoming Blizzard Games.

Comic
Here is the next honorable mention from this month's comic contest submissions.

"You want pet cereal"

Filed under: Druid, Paladin, Warrior, Analysis / Opinion, Guilds, Tank Talk

Tank Talk is WoW Insider's new raid-tanking column, promising you an exciting and educational look at the world of getting the stuffing thrashed out of you in a 10- or 25-man raid. The column will be rotated amongst Matthew Rossi (Warrior/Paladin), Adam Holisky (Warrior), Michael Gray (Paladin), and Allison Robert (Druid). Our aim is to use this column to debate and discuss class differences, raid-tanking strategies, tips, tricks, and news concerning all things meatshieldish.

This week on Tank Talk I'd like to step outside the technical aspects of being a tank and focus more on the psychosocial side of things. In particular I want to look at what happens when a tank is introduced into a tanking corps of a new guild, how to keep current tanks around, and how to deal with all those old tanks that have been in the guild forever.

For lack of a better phrase, I'll call the time from when a tank joining the guild until their eventual status as "god of all things tank" the life span of a tank. And perhaps the most important part of a tanks life is the new part, and it's something that I've been on both sides of the coin - the one doing the inviting, and the one being invited. Each is equally exciting. When joining a new guild I had not only the opportunity to see new content and progress to new heights, but also an opportunity to improve my skill and focus my ability to tank a mean game. And when I became class lead and eventually the guild's leader, I gained an opportunity to help new tanks become acquainted with our style of game play and watch them succeed and excel within the guild.

I like to look at there being mainly fives stages of a tank's life within a guild: Recruitment, Applicant, Raider, Senior Tank, and Mentor. Let's take a look at each of these and see how people in various stages can help usher a new tank into a guild's tanking corpse while keeping the old tanks around and happy. Since this is a long subject, today I'll cover the recruitment and applicant stages in a tank's life, with the raider, senior tank, and mentor stages coming in the second installment tomorrow.

Continue reading Tank Talk: Building and keeping your tanking corps, Part I

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