Snowballs are zipping through the air; mischevious-looking little people in red and green are running all over creation; Greatfather Winter stands by a decoration-laden tree offering gifts to all. What does this mean? That the Feast of Winter Veil is here!

Take a moment to check out our new page about the Feast of Winter Veil and see what the season has in store for you!

Happy Winter Veil!

Should you want to migrate your character(s) any time soon, then please make sure you read this.

Send in your 1.9 Test Server screenshots over at World of War.net.

Players are adding new Interface Customisations every day over at UI.WorldofWar.net. Check it out and see if there's anything to your liking.

Azzor has announced a movie contest with 25 prizes to be won!

Great-father Winter looking a bit perturbed? GU comics explains why..

BlizzPlanet has published an interview with Luke Johnson, author and developer of Warcraft RPG books.

My! You're a tall one! Blanc managed to find Ironforge.

Have a great weekend!

Links on this news post may expire over time and some are created by other companies/individuals that are neither affiliated with nor supported by Blizzard Entertainment.

We have just updated our World of Warcraft Wallpapers section with a new wallpaper featuring Tirisfal Glade. We have also updated our Blizzard Fan Art Section with three new pieces of artwork.

Starting with the Warcraft Weekly. Episode 20!

Greetings to our oldest (as far as we know) WoW player: Forzatoro

Thinking of moving? find the schedule for Character migration until Christmas here. And specifically, phase 8, here.

Do you gank someone doing an escort quest? It's being discussed here, join in..

Greetings traveller. You come seeking knowledge do you not? Xarantaur's Lore Q&A can be found here.

To close off, here are some Open Role-Playing stories:

• Realm of Dragons
• Stonetalon Mountains
• Christmas in Moonglade
• Rise of the Gurubashi

*Links on this news post may expire over time.

Due to player testing on the Public Test Realms, some small adjustments have been made for the future paladin talents. Check the last changes in our Paladin Talent Calculator preview.

Amongst the corruption of Felwood, one tribe of furbolgs has escaped the taint which has ravaged their homeland: the Timbermaw furbolgs. Those adventurers, who seek out Timbermaw Hold and prove themselves to be friends of this shamanistic tribe, can learn from them the ways of crafting powerful armor and the secrets of their healing talismans.

Take a peek at the new Timbermaw Hold faction changes coming in our next content update "The Gates of Ahn'Qiraj" and see which rewards dedicated adventurers can gain by helping the furbolgs of Timbermaw Hold.

To continue to alleviate the queues on some of the most populated realms we move on to the eighth phase of migration. This phase starts Monday, December 12th and will last until and including Friday, December 16th. Note, however, that we reserve the right to close down or redirect any migration at any time based on the population of the involved realms. Please keep an eye on this thread for updates about the eighth migration phase.

To not increase the load on the database during peak playing hours the migration will be open only between 03:00 and 15:00 CET (GMT/UTC +1) each day. We might choose to not allow migration on Wednesdays, due to the additional load when a huge amount of players log in after the maintenance.

The following migration between English realms is part of this phase:

Deathwing	–>	Talnivarr (new realm)
Stormscale	–>	Talnivarr (new realm)
Bladefist	–>	Emeriss (new realm)
Kor'gall	–>	Emeriss (new realm)

Something Awful has published a very interesting article on The Art of Warcraft: "A Year in Review"
And they didn't stop there. You may also find out How to Properly Enjoy World of Warcraft

Panda Hideout has a new poll. This week's question is: Do you usually gank players? Hot contenders, so far, are "Sometimes" with 48% and "No" with 34%.

World of War.net has added a lot of useful info on professions, be it blacksmithing or skinning, here's your stuff. And they have added a new Macro's section, which you will find here.

The Chalice of Silvermoon, "hot new segment of WoW Radio," now have their own site. Go here to find some very interestind tidbits and downloads.

Have a great weekend!

*Links on this news post may expire over time and some are created by other companies/individuals that are neither affiliated with nor supported by Blizzard Entertainment.

We have just updated our World of Warcraft Wallpapers section with a new wallpaper featuring Thousand Needles. We have also updated our Blizzard Fan Art Section with six new pieces of artwork.

We have just added a new payment option for customers living in the Netherlands and Austria: direct debit payments. To use this option, you must be a resident of one of these countries with a bank account originating from there. If you meet that criteria, simply log into Account Management and change your payment option to direct debit if you would like to use this method of payment. Please note that you can only select this option after setting up your account; it cannot be chosen when creating your account. If you have any questions about this new payment method, please contact our Billing Department for more information.

Purchase a World of Warcraft as a gift and get 20€* back! As part of getting into the holiday spirit, we have launched this special offer to World of Warcraft subscribers. In order to participate in this offer, simply read the email sent to the address associated with your World of Warcraft account and follow the instructions given therein. If you did not receive the email, please check to be certain that your email address is listed correctly in the Account Management section and that the email was not marked as spam and placed in your Junk email folder.

This offer applies to World of Warcraft subscribers living in one of the eligible countries, who had an account active on November 23, 2005. The eligible countries are: Germany, France, The United Kingdom, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, The Netherlands, Austria, Spain, Belgium, Switzerland, Finland, Italy, Greece, Poland, Hungary, Portugal, The Czech Republic, and Ireland. For more information you can contact our customer support team using this webform.
* Denmark: 150 DKK, Norway: 155 NOK, Switzerland: 30 CHF, Poland: 80 PLN, Hungary: 5000 HUF, The Czech Republic: 590 CZK, Bulgaria: 40 BGN, United Kingdom: 13 GBP, Sweden: 190 SEK.

Starting with the Warcraft Weekly. Episode Nineteen!

We have permanently banned more than 2,500 accounts during the last several weeks. Read more here.

Phase seven of Character Migration lets people migrate to two new Realms: Trollbane and Mazrigos.

Add-ons for every day rogue life

Honor, XP & Reputation, Hits and Crits... what colours at what level? Find out here

Ever get ganked? You know you’ve been ganked when...

*Links on this news post may expire over time.

Tomorrow's regularly scheduled maintenance will begin at approximately 3:00 AM Paris time in order to apply a minor patch. This patch adds content for the upcoming holiday festivities in Azeroth! You can review all of the changes contained in patch 1.8.4 here.

Please note: this patch is not The Gates of Ahn'Qiraj, the content patch currently running on the public test realms. To read more on The Gates of Ahn'Qiraj, view the 1.9 patch notes located here.

All realms are expected to be back up at 11:00 AM Paris time. We greatly appreciate your patience and understanding in this matter.

To learn more about our patching methods, please read the information contained on our Patch FAQ.

We have just posted a sneak peak of the Paladin Talent changes that will be featured alongside many other improvements in our next major content patch, The Gates of Ahn'Qiraj. So, take a moment to check out our special Paladin Talent Calculator to see what changes you might want to plan for your Paladin. Additionally, all Paladins will have their talents reset when the patch is released.

To continue to alleviate the queues on some of the most populated realms we move on to the seventh phase of migration. This phase starts Monday December 5th and will last until and including Friday December 9th. Note, however, that we reserve the right to close down or redirect any migration at any time based on the population of the involved realms. Please keep an eye on this thread for updates about the seventh migration phase.

To not increase the load on the database during peak playing hours the migration will be open only between 03:00 and 15:00 CET (GMT/UTC +1) each day. We might choose to not allow migration on Wednesdays, due to the additional load when a huge amount of players log in after the maintenance.

The following migration between English realms is part of this phase:

Bloodscalp	–>	Trollbane (new realm)
Burning Blade	–>	Trollbane (new realm)
Daggerspine	–>	Mazrigos (new realm)
Stormreaver	–>	Mazrigos (new realm)

As part of our continuing commitment to keep World of Warcraft free from abuse, we have permanently banned more than 2500 accounts during the last several weeks which were involved in the use of cheats and/or hacks using third-party software or were otherwise violating our Terms of Use. We will continue to take an aggressive stance to ensure that the gaming environment remains an enjoyable place for our customers by actively pursuing those who would seek to violate the principle of fair-play, as well as breach our Terms of Use and policies in this way.

Thank you for your understanding and cooperation in this matter. Should you have reason to believe that you have evidence of or information regarding the use of cheats or hacks, please feel free to send us an email at WoWAccountReviewEU@blizzard.com for us to investigate or submit a GM ticket in-game.

Interview with Vaneras! Wowi.dk interviewed Vaneras and you can find it here (it's in English!).

One of our players decided to take poor Gamon out of Orgrimmar and show him some of the world. Enjoy Gamon’s grand day out.

Some other interesting tidbits on Wowi.dk:

• Do the Danes play Horde or Alliance? Go here and find out.
• They have started a Christmas contest and winners will be picked on the 24th of December.

Questicles?! Ya rly, they exist, or at least Woody over at GU Comics says they do.

Leaked 1.9 Patch Notes on Penny Arcade. You'll find them here.

World of War.net has some goodies on their site:

• Heroes of WoW - Chapter 15
• Several new guides, among them guides for Druids and Warlocks.

Have a great weekend!

Links on this news post may expire over time and some are created by other companies/individuals that are neither affiliated with nor supported by Blizzard Entertainment.

As we were wrapping up Wednesday's maintenance tasks we detected an issue with part of our infrastructure and the network, which affected 20 English-speaking Realms and caused an unexpected delay to the maintenance process. After some troubleshooting we resolved the infrastructure issue, while simultaneously working with our provider to identify and solve the network issues. We were finally able to locate and replace the faulty hardware, restoring all the Realms to full functionality and allowing everyone to log in again.

One full day of compensation will be added to each active account which had a playable character on the affected realms.

The English-speaking Realms concerned are:

• Balnazzar
• Bloodfeather
• Darksorrow
• Defias Brotherhood
• Frostwhisper
• Genjuros
• Haumarush
• Hellscream
• Kor’gall
• Laughing Skull
• Lightning’s Blade
• Magtheridon
• Neptulon
• Nordrassil
• Ragnaros
• Sylvanas
• The Maelstrom
• The Venture Co.
• Twisting Nether
• Vashj

We'll be adding this extra day to players’ accounts within the next week.

We would like to offer our sincere apology for this unexpected interruption to play time.

We are happy to announce the winners of this year's Hallow's End Contests! The winners of the Hallow's End Screenshot contest are: Naranana on Illidan, Brong on Skullcrusher, Karesh on The Venture Co., Kortvokst on Dragonmaw, and Thezón on Gorgonnash. The winners of the Hallow's End Recipe contest for the English language are: Thrartok on Argent Dawn, Moth on Sylvanas, and Dyth on The Maelstrom. You can view the winning screenshots and recipes for all languages on our special Hallow's End Contest Winners page. Congratulations to all of our winners and thanks to everyone who participated!

BradyGames has published a helpful new resource for World of Warcraft fans: the World of Warcraft Atlas. This book includes detailed maps of all of the regions in World of Warcraft, information about the NPCs found throughout the world, and helpful close-up maps of every town in Azeroth. Additionally, the World of Warcraft Atlas is available in French, German, and English. So, check your local game store or book store to find out where you can get this useful new book!

As always, the latest Warcraft Weekly can be found here.

Thundgot posted the Upcoming Armor Changes.

And more information on the latest character migration.

One of our faithful forum Tr... posters has left us. Wormsborough will be missed.

What do YOU do when you get ganked? Share your thoughts here.

On a similar note, share with everyone, your favourite gank stories. You may do so here.

Well well, an old thread just got bumped, check out 'You know you play WoW too much when...'

Share your Guild's accomplishments in the new 'EU Raiding Guild Progress Thread - II.'

Trying out the Public Test Realm? Share your suspected issues here.

*Links on this news post may expire over time.

Since World of Warcraft has been released, a lot of major content and many improvements have been added for the players' enjoyment. From Battlegrounds to the Dressing Room; Blackwing Lair to the Stranglethorn Fishing Extravaganza; from Zul’Gurub to the Darkmoon Faire, there have been many additions to the World of Warcraft. If you think you might have missed some of these new features, check out our new Implemented features page!

• The Alliance Herald has released a new issue, number 7 this time. Be sure to check it out.
• WoW Azzor.com has added a Hunter guide.
• You can also find some new guides for the Alchemist and the Warlock on the guides page of WorldofWar.net.
• There's also a new map of Dire Maul in their cartography section, while the UI section has a new feature; you can now add notes for yourself on each mod. Also ever-growing, of course, is their World of Warcraft database.
• While over at WorldofWar.net, make sure to check out their poll about turning our game franchises into movies. Another interesting poll this week can be found over at WoW Vault, asking which class has the best looking tier 2 armor.

Have a great weekend!

Links on this news post may expire over time and some are created by other companies/individuals that are neither affiliated with nor supported by Blizzard Entertainment.

Stay in the loop with our World of Warcraft News Archive!