I woke up yesterday morning eager to log in to the PTR and explore, only to find out that I would have to wait until the evening for such a foray into testing because of a new patch they were putting through. When the servers came up again and I finally logged in, I was surprised by what I saw, or rather what I didn't see.

Several male models in the game seem to be missing a leg. The current lack-of-leg conspiracy is spreading even to certain NPCs, a fact I can attest to because I witnessed poor Harrison Jones with the same affliction in the vestibule to Zul'Aman. To be specific, the illness affects certain boot models, causing them to vanish entirely from the character's left leg. When the boots are removed, the leg assumes it's normal opacity.

Does this mean someone is infecting footwear with invisibility? Will we log in one day to find our heads too have disappeared? We will keep a close watch on this crisis and report to you whatever grizzly details we encounter. Let it be known that WoW Insider will not stand idly by while characters' limbs begin to disappear.

It's time once again to celebrate our mageness with Arcane Brilliance, and this time we're going where I certainly have not gone before: the PTR. I finally got my character transfers to go through, and my immediate thought was to slip on into the PTR and check out how the changes to mage spells and talents affected my character with the addition of Patch 2.3. A lover of experiments, I figured one was in order, and so happily spent the morning blasting things in the name of gaming science.

The parameters of said experiment were the following: I used the same spec on both the PTR and the live server, and decided that for simplicity's sake I would record data on three separate types of spell damage: using only Fireball, using only Scorch, and using my normal spell rotation. Now, you'll notice that my spec is a basic fire spec, newly reclaimed after some time spent as a blended POM/Pyro mage. I have decent gear, not the best, not the worst. I would say that I wear middle-of-the-road items, some Tier 4, Spellstrike and Spellfire, and the enchants and gems I have are also of the meh category. They aren't terrible, but I haven't had the opportunity to deck out this mage with all the snazzy +12 spell damage gems I would like. So the following are the experiences of a mage with some lower-end raiding gear, a fire spec, and a curious nature.

Druid root is very good for crowd control outdoors due to it working on any mob type, but most instances and raid zones are indoor only. In Burning Crusade the Druid class got a new spell, Cyclone, that worked indoors as well, but with a 6 sec duration (and diminishing returns), it was only effective in limited situations.

Druids have asked loud and long for more reliable crowd control abilities. And now it looks like they might get it.

Player Wisperella recently specced Moonkin and feels she would be more desirable in groups if the Druid Entangling Roots spell were usable indoors. With a 27 second duration and a 1.5 second cast time that can already be made uninterruptible through Talents, it could make Moonkin an integral part of many groups. Especially since Moonkin with their high armor won't get squished so easily trying to crowd control a mob that's pounding on them.

Community Manager Eyonix responded that an idea along these lines is "possible" in the Wrath of the Lich King expansion. He couldn't guarantee that it would happen, but let us know that he has been campaigning for it "a very long time."

Time will tell if this will be one of the handful of new abilities Druids will get in the expansion.

This just in: In addition to the latest Patch 2.3 updates we just noted, the various heroic instance keys will no longer require "Revered" reputation with the various factions around Outland. "Honored" is now sufficient to get you in to Heroic dungeons everywhere.

This raises myriad questions: Does this devalue the heroic instances at all, or does it simply open them up to more players? Is it a slap in the face to all those who had to grind their way to revered up to now, or is it just the natural progression of opening up content for more and more people to access as time goes by? Will anyone run regular Steamvents, Shattered Halls, or Shadow Labyrinth when they can just skip to the heroic versions? Will this get thousands (or millions?) of players who got burned out on the rep-grind back into the game?

World of Raids once again has the latest breaking news on the latest Patch 2.3 Public Test Ream changes! Today's class changes seem to be mostly happy buffs, especially for hunters and rogues and paladins, as well as a slight nerf to warriors beyond the jump. Also read on below for Guild Bank prices, New Arena Season 3 weapon models, a Field Repair Bot change, as well as a few new engineering toys.

Hunters:

• It looks like hunters get their version of Mortal Strike after all: Aimed Shot now reduces all healing done on the target by 50% for 10 seconds, in addition to the regularly increased damage.
• The dead zone has not been eradicated, but it has been reduced to just about 1 yard. Why not just get rid of the dead zone and be done with it? Is Blizzard paranoid about the possibility of using melee and ranged abilities at the same time through latency bugs or something?

Rogues:

• The rogue talent "Aggression" is being improved so that its damage bonus applies to Backstab as well as Sinister Strike and Eviscerate (at +2/4/6% with each rank).
• Shadowstep now has a 30 second cooldown in addition to being usable out of stealth. Its range has been changed from 0-20 yards to 8-25 yards, and its +20% damage bonus now applies to whatever special attack you make next (i.e. Sinister Strike, Hemorrhage -- even Eviscerate or Rupture). Could this make it beneficial to non-dagger rogues as well?
• Hemorrhage has received a huge buff: It now increases physical damage dealt to its target by up to 36 (increased from 10!), but its number of charges has been reduced from 30 to 10. This should make hemo rogues more desirable in groups, and also increase the benefit from having more than one in a raid -- but is it really enough?

Paladins:

• The "Fanaticism" talent in the retribution tree now reduces the paladin's threat by 30% at the highest rank in addition to 15% increased critical strike chance with all judgements.
• The protection talent "Precision" now gives a +3% chance to hit with spells in addition to melee attacks.

Happy Saturday-- hope your Fall weekend is going well. Once again, it's time for us to roundup all of our great weekly features in one post for your perusing pleasure. Enjoy!

All the World's a Stage: Oh, the drama! When to /ignore
Sometimes, you get just roleplayed out.

Azeroth Interrupted: It's OK to AFK
And if you hearth before you do it, you get rested XP!

Officers' Quarters: Rank and file
Scott covers the best ways to organize your troops.

/silly: The tension is mounting
A special treat for Gnomes.

The WoW Insider Show: Episode 7
2.3, the Toyota ad, and yes, we do, in fact, talk about Paladin DPS.

The Light and How to Swing It: Maximizing Paladin DPS, Part 1
Chris talks about Paladin DPS, too, but in a much more practical manner.

Build Shop: Priest 41/20/0
Elizabeth tackles a Discipline Priest build-- no easy task.

Shifting Perspectives: Drops for Druids in Zul'aman
What you Druids will be druling (get it?) over in the next raid instance.

Guildwatch: Revenge on the old GM
Tales of sordid drama, triumphant downings, and recruitment listings from around the realms. Where "I make $150,000 a year" is proof that I'm right.

BigRedKitty: A video special event
BRK shows you, video-style, how to chain trap on Moroes.

Know Your Lore: Sargeras
KYL tells the story of the biggest (known) bad guy in Azeroth.

Two Bosses Enter: Princess Huhuran vs. Magtheridon
Which one will walk out of the arena, and which one will be dragged out?

Totem Talk: Pre-raid gear - belts, bracers and boots
Matthew tells you Shamans what to wear before you hit the big time.

Learn2Raid: Your first raid
From the comments on the post: "A very well written and informative post. I wish I had this kind of guide when I first started raiding." There you go.

Insider Trader: Tools of the Trade
Addons you'll need to become a master crafter.

The Care and Feeding of Warriors: Exploring the PTR
Matthew breaks down what he sees happening in 2.3.

Ask WoW Insider: Places you didn't know existed
Are there still new places to find in Azeroth?

Phat Loot Phriday: Talisman of Binding Shard
A legendary necklace that's only available in legend form.

After the success of Unlimited Escapism 1, 2 & 3 as well as I'm So Sick how does master Machinimist Baron Soosdon top himself? With Unlimited Escapism Vol 0 of course. His latest Machinima piece is almost done, but he didn't want to leave his loyal viewers waiting so he cranked out a new Trailer for it.

DO NOT click the You Tube embedded link above. It doesn't do justice to the surreal beauty of the mind-bending visuals. Instead, go to the Warcraft Movies page for the trailer and click on the Stage6 stream. It's like having widescreen HD on your monitor. The YouTube link is like watching a VHS copied one too many times.

The final movie is due sometime next week.

Previously on Moviewatch...

Well unfortunately, it seems my request is not to be. As commenter so2 pointed out the other day, Illidan is not actually a humanoid, so he's not affected by the Beerfest goggles that turn everything into a Gnome (Alliance) or a female Orc (Horde). Bummer-- I really wanted to see Illidan as a tiny little Gnome guy.

However, as you can see above, Gruul is technically a humanoid. And thanks to reader Nate S., we've got a picture of Gruul in his lair, looking as attractive as a female Orc can look. I don't know how much Mudder's Milk you have to drink to make Gruul look that attractive, but it's got to be a whole lot of alcohol.

Of course, the other thing about Gruul is that as the fight goes on, he gets bigger, so I'm still curious to see if, while wearing the Gnome glasses, you could get a picture of the raid fighting a giant Gnome (heck, who needs the glasses-- Blizz, here's my official request for a giant Gnome instance boss in Northrend). And I think a lot more experimentation is needed with these goggles, anyway-- can we see Thrall as a Gnome or Bolivar Fordragon as a female Orc?

Update: Ask and ye shall receive. Thanks, myrlin!

Dedsxy of Drak'thul sends us this shot taken while flying over some of the highest peaks in Blade's Edge Mountains. That perpetual burning sky -- on the verge of an angry sunrise at all times of day -- combined with those unfriendly spikes don't make for a warm welcome to potential tourists. But the Ogres can be very friendly once you get to know them!

Do you have a unique shot of Azeroth or Outland that you'd like to show off to the rest of the world? Tell us about it by e-mailing a copy to aroundazeroth@wowinsider.com, with as much or as little detail as you'd like to share with the world!

For those of us with hunters that aren't quite up to max level as of yet -- and I include myself here -- there is good news in store as well. There are several new pets available in Dustwallow Marsh, namely the Noxious breed of windserpents. With a level range of between 35 and 39, these would make great pets for those preferring the melee hunter role (there are more than one of these out there, right?)

I am sorry to tell you that there have been a couple untamable models added to the game, including an Orange Dragonhawk and a lovely brown Amani Eagle. Let's hope that Blizzard changes their mind about that bird in the future, because I know of a couple of people that would love to have one.

For a complete list of the new Patch 2.3 pets, check out the Mania's Arcania page here.

[via Mania's Arcania]

NPR has touched on World of Warcraft before, but with less than pleasant things to say about the game. This time the game was featured the report was given in a better light, largely in part because of the fact that the reporter interviewed her own guild. That's right, she's a player, and so provides an overview of the game from the perspective of someone that knows it intimately.

Celeste Headlee, or as I prefer to call her Rosetta of the guild Vengeance, talks about the social aspects of the game. Rosetta interviews members of her own guild, and includes chat sessions in her piece from a particularly bad Prince Malchezaar fight (and might I say the in-game voice chat she uses sounds a lot clearer than when I tried it.) She says that WoW is the modern-day Cheers, a meeting place where players gather mostly to socialize. This game may even be a model for a future virtual workplace, where people log in to meet about their projects using an avatar in a game like WoW instead of a video conference call.

While I think the idea of the modern Cheers is a bit silly, I do have to agree that I log in to spend time with my friends. No matter where I move to or what job I happen to get, those friends I have met in WoW will be there for me whenever I need them, and vice versa. It is the social aspect of an MMO that makes it so enjoyable, and I have made more friends in WoW than I have in any other online game.

As per your requests, last week we went a little "husky" and had an item that everyone could get. This week, we go Orca Phat, and show you an item no one can get-- anymore. The only legendary amulet in the game really is legendary nowadays, in that no one's seen it in a long time.

Name: Talisman of Binding Shard
Type: Legendary Necklace
Armor: N/A
Abilities:

• +13 Strength, +5 Agility, +8 Stamina
• +24 Fire and +24 Nature Resistance, which in the old days of raiding, was a huge deal for tanks in MC and AQ.
• Equip: When struck in combat, inflicts 4 Nature damage to the attacker. That's not much, but it was a nice little bonus back at level 60 (which is when this Talisman dropped) in terms of damage and threat for tanks who are getting attacked all the time. Also, the effect puts the lightning shield graphic on your character, which is fun.
• All in all, a nifty neckpiece for tanks at level 60. At least it was, before it got pulled from the game! *insert scary musical sting here*

How to Get It: The year was 2005, and Molten Core, the 40 man raid, was big stuff. Not only did Tier 1 gear drop there, but Tier 2 gear did as well, and all the bosses had almost completely different loot tables than they do now. In Patch 1.4, Blizzard decided to even this all out, buff a lot of the gear down in the raid, and have only Tier 1 gear drop in MC (most of it anyway-- I think Rag may have still dropped Tier 2 gear).

Anyway, none of that matters anymore, right? So while they were tweaking around the loot tables, one of the devs accidentally put this legendary necklace in Baron Geddon's table. It wasn't, we're told, even intended to go live, but since so much work was being done on the MC loot, it accidentally went out there anyway. And of course, it dropped.

Noktyn, an Undead Warrior from Nurfed (yes, of the UI) got the drop, and you can see a screenshot of the raid above. As soon as it dropped, the GMs realized something had been given out that shouldn't have, and took it off the loot tables. But they let Noktyn keep the necklace. Unfortunately, I can't seem to find him on the Armory (there are no 60+ Undead Warriors-- Nurfed is a US guild, right?), but even if he was still playing, odds are he would have taken it off long before now, as it's not really Legendary grade any more. And of course, no one else can ever get the item, because it's never been seen on the loot tables since.

But it is cool to think that the Orange necklace is still out there somewhere, waiting to fall into the lap of some boss we may someday face. Of course, if it ever does show up again, Blizzard will have to rename it. "Noktyn's Talisman" has a nice ring to it.

Getting Rid of It: You can't. because you don't have it. But if you did, a vendor would give you 3g 36s 25c for it. And while it probably disenchants into a Nexus Crystal, we just don't know for sure. Because no one's ever disenchanted it, you'll never know-- maybe it disenchants into a beautifully tasty piece of Key Lime Pie.

Dshpls tells the story of his friend's girlfriend's family over on the forums-- mother, father, sons and daughter all play World of Warcraft together. As a lot of players say on the forums, it's not really all that weird anymore-- WoW is showing up on commercials and even grandmothers play the game-- but it does still seem like a rare occurrence. My parents just aren't the videogame type, and my brother and sister were never that interested, either, so I always think of WoW as a more social activity than a family one.

But then again, whenever I abandon this bachelor life of "gaming blogger" and settle down in a house with a few more bedrooms than I need, I'll probably be inclined to do a little family gaming myself. As our own Robin Torres can tell you, gaming with family is just as fun as gaming to get away from family, and probably more fulfilling, too.

When you sit down to grind EOTS marks for the Season 1 Arena awards this weekend, will your family be sitting next to you yelling to get to the Blood Elf tower? Or are you glad they're on their own, playing Sudoku and golf, rather than the videogames you love so much?

Now, a little while ago, Blizzard implemented an Arena points system, where as long as you ran 10 arena matches, you could stock up points and then use them for Arena weapons. So raiders (who didn't PvP much, but wanted the weapons) would save up their points even if they lost, and buy the weapons once they'd saved enough. Arena players, however, cried foul-- they said the Arena weapons had become "welfare epics." So Blizzard required a good Arena rating to buy those weapons.

As of Tuesday, it's Hallow's End in Azeroth, and there is now a Headless Horseman event in Scarlet Monastery's Graveyard. Everyone I know (including me) has run the event multiple times, and Epics are dropping like Hallow's End candy. So here's the question: should Blizzard really be giving out Epics for an event that takes just a few minutes and only a modicum of skill? Aren't these as "welfare epics" as they come? Is the Horseman event too easy to be giving out loot like this?

Now, obviously, the rings and helm that the Horseman drops are hardly the Arena weapons that Blizzard had to put behind a rating. Though they are Epic, they're not that amazing-- one trip through Karazhan could probably replace all of them. But Karazhan is a ten main raid, and this is an event that can be done with as little as three people once every day (and I wouldn't be surprised to see it soloed by some ambitious Paladin before long). Already, three days into the event, my guild was running a 66 Mage in there just to get a "free" epic ring for him to use, four levels from now. Isn't that a bit much?