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.

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We're pretty sure that people have been signing up like crazy for the Wrath of the Lich King beta ever since signups opened up. For the pragmatists out there, however, you might be interested in knowing more about the beta and the beta opt-in mechanics before taking the plunge.

To that end, Blizzard CM Bornakk provided folks with a handy opt-in FAQ for Wrath, which we've posted below. Feel free to read it and head on over to your account so you can sign up for the beta, if you so choose. That being said, if you haven't been assured a spot yet, we wish you the best of luck in being chosen for the beta.

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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!

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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.

Who would you attach to a bundle of bottle rockets?

A GnomeA DwarfMy raid leaderThe person that gets a beta key before meYou're insensitive! I don't celebrate the 4th of July!Vote
Gnomes

• Small and light weight.
• Fidgety - they might get out of the twine holding them on the rocket.
• Won't survive reentry. They have no padding on them like Dwarves.
• Gnomish engineering. It scares me a little bit.
  


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

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[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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.)

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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?

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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?

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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!

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Wrath of the Lich King Beta Opt-In FAQ

You can sign up on the WotLK beta Opt-In page since yesterday, it gives you a chance to win an invitation to the upcoming WotLK beta; Blizzard will randomly select players that registered on the Opt-In page.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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