Most of his ideas have been suggested before in the more hardcore areas of the WoW online community, such as more varied avatars and more world events, but I always find it entertaining to read about WoW from non-traditional sources. even if they are repeating things I have heard before. However, his basic argument is pretty interesting…Chris maintains that the World of Warcraft is so good and so successful, that it leaves very little incentive for Blizzard to innovate. Moreover, other MMORPG makers will simply copy WoW and not bother to bring anything new or groundbreaking to the table. The article is a pretty good read, and you should definitely check it out.

What do you guys think? Could the success of WoW stifle new, creative ideas? Could Blizzard use some of those creative ideas for themselves?
From www.wow.com.

Submitter Meredyth of <The Boisterous Few> on Ravenholdt writes, “Thanks to being surrounded by a deadly cloud at all times, the shadow priest is immune to the deadly mist traps in the upper spire of Icecrown Citadel. She inhales the noxious fumes as if they were a refreshing spritz on a summer’s day. The shadow priest is also a notorious liar.”

Do you have any unusual, beautiful or interesting World of Warcraft images that are just collecting dust in your screenshots folder? We’d love to see them on Around Azeroth! Sharing your screenshot is as simple as e-mailing aroundazeroth@wow.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. Please include the word “Azeroth” in your post so it does not get swept into the spam bin. We strongly prefer full screen shots without the UI showing — use alt-Z to remove it. Please, no more battleground scoreboards, Val’kyr on mounts, or pictures of the Ninja Turtles in Dalaran. Older screenshots can be found here.

In season seven, we saw beast cleave (beast mastery hunter + enhancement shaman + holy paladin) win the majority of high-profile tournaments and become quite popular. Very few saw it coming. Beast cleave, of course, got handed several nerfs (only one of which was serious) which many considered a death knell, but the composition is still very strong. Towards the end of season seven, protection warriors (and to a lesser extent, protection paladins) were the new flavor-of-the-month craze. Again, almost no one saw it coming.

The new season is slated to be quite different from previous arena seasons in WotLK. Resilience is getting a huge boost in effectiveness, increasing the benefit of wearing PvP gear in arenas. Some people (even on arena junkies) are stating that PvE gear will be even better in PvP because of the change. The idea is that arena players can get away with donning more loot from dragons because the added resilience benefit will make up for the forfeited survivability. While I might be wrong here, that sounds like terrible logic.

One gladiator is predicting the shift to more survivability will benefit warlocks, warriors, and druids. The same poster believes mages and rogues will be harmed, while everyone else will keep status quo.

So, I ask you, breakfast readers: What are your predictions for arena season eight?

Valafar of <Sanguine Brood> on Exodar couldn’t wait for Carnival to get some beaded trinkets this year. Donning a glittery costume, complete with angry-drama-guy mask, he headed out to the Eye of Eternity for the weekly raid quest and walked away with five Emblems of Frost and Emblems of Triumph. And unlike at Mardi Gras, he didn’t even have to take his top off to get them.

Do you have any unusual, beautiful or interesting World of Warcraft images that are just collecting dust in your screenshots folder? We’d love to see them on Around Azeroth! Sharing your screenshot is as simple as e-mailing aroundazeroth@wow.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. Please include the word “Azeroth” in your post so it does not get swept into the spam bin. We strongly prefer full screen shots without the UI showing — use alt-Z to remove it. Please, no more battleground scoreboards, Val’kyr on mounts, or pictures of the Ninja Turtles in Dalaran. Older screenshots can be found here.

Exactly like clockwork, every week comes to a conclusion and I send a mail around asking what everyone’s weekend gaming plans. And slightly less like clockwork, our writers chime in, one at a time, laying out their elaborate plans for the empty space of two full days before them. This week, however, was a bit different…

• Michael Gray (@writegray): I’m getting married to the person who makes my whole world possible, and starting a new home for us to watch the world spin ’round us.
• Chase: I think we all just got 1up’d.

Yes, somehow all of our plans seem a bit puny in comparison. But for those of you who still care about the rest of us, you can read on for what the rest of the team is up to this weekend. (And answers to this week’s bonus question: what’s your favorite caffeine consumption method?)

• Adam Holisky (@adamholisky): Star Trek Online. I should hit the level 16 cap in the beta this weekend.
• Alex Ziebart (@aziebart): I’m marrying Michael Gray and drinking a boatload of Mountain Dew Throwback.
• Allison Robert: Getting my shammy to 80 and power-leveling jewelcrafting on him. Nothing says peace of mind like having a gem-spouting automaton!
• C. Christian Moore (@thearenaguy): Last week to PvP in the season. Yep. Also, giving the 60 paladin the BC trial to get all that cool gear.
• Chase Christian (@madsushi): Going to be making the most out of our 10 Putricide attempts this week, would like to have him under control before the next wing is released. There will be much theorycrafting and spreadsheeting happening.
• Christian Belt (@ihatewarlocks): Working all weekend, but when I’m not, I’m leveling a baby warrior tank through the dungeon finder. And to the six-year-old hunter who rolled need on Jang’thraze the Protector last night in Zul’Farak and then refused to give it to the tank, your parents should be ashamed. And as for caffeine, it comes in two forms: Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups and original flavor Mountain Dew.
• Daniel Whitcomb (@danielwhitcomb): Continuing to build out my druid’s healing set with tons of Heroic dungeon Finder runs. I’m also getting ready to hopefully finish the Loremaster push on my death knight once I sort out a proper addon suite to help me out. On the caffeinated beverage front, Dr. Pepper and Mocha Espressos are my weapons of choice. In the interest of (slightly) healthier living, however, I now try to limit myself to the Diet form of the Soda (no more than 2 a day) and no more than 1 mocha per week.
• Dominic Hobbs (@DMZduffry): Rebuilding the lock’s UI and changing priest offspec to holy. For caffeine it’s tea or full-lead Coke (Pepsi is for mages) from a well-chilled can.
• Fox Van Allen (@foxvanallen): I’ll be spending a couple hours running a raid that I thought I’d never have to revisit (ToC) to farm a trophy I never thought I’d need to buy a tier chest piece that’s slightly worse than the one I paid about 10000g to craft. All so I can put on a pair of pants I looted off a dead monstrosity.
• Kelly Aarons (@Cadistra): Drawing like a madwoman. Need to get tons of art done before my wrist surgery, so… yeah. If I get onto WoW, gonna continue the epic choice battle between Sholazar and Zul’Drak. As for caffeine, it goes in mouth.
• Lisa Poisso (@emused): Following the Girl Scout cookies sales gang up and down the street, while wishing I were playing Star Trek Online and drinking lemon ginseng tea.
• Matt Low (@matticus): Going to crash Michael’s wedding. I mean, uh, raid ICC stuff on my alts.
• Matthew Rossi (@matthewwrossi): I drink four 2 liter bottles of soda a day. I also run a lot of raids, which I expect I’ll be doing this weekend. No, seriously. Four 2 liter bottles a day. I can have my wife verify if needed.
• Robin Torres (@cosmiclaurel): Toontown and Dungeon Finder leveling. My favorite caffeine consumption method is chocolate covered coffee beans — but that is only used in emergencies. My daily caffeine intake is Irish Breakfast Tea and Green Tea with soy milk and organic sugar in an enormous mug, which is really more of a bowl with a handle.

And so, readers, it’s your turn — what are you up to in game this weekend? Getting married is not required for participation in today’s post and sharing your preferred caffeine consumption method is purely optional.a

Sam Raimi will no longer be directing Spider-Man 4, and neither will anyone else for that matter. Sony Pictures announced today that they are canning the current Spider-Man franchise and will be rebooting it in the summer of 2012 with an entirely new director, cast, and crew.

Raimi’s decision to withdraw from the project supposedly stems from the summer 2011 release date, and how it would compromise the creative integrity of the film. This all comes after news that complications in the Spider-Man 4 script threatened to delay the film.

For Blizzard fans, this could mean that Raimi is now free to shift his focus to the World of Warcraft movie. However, Mike Fleming of Deadline Hollywood cites an alternative project option to the Azerothian epic, The Given Day, a novel written by Dennis Lehane, author of Shutter Island and Mystic River.

No official announcements from Raimi or Blizzard yet, however Fleming is a very reliable source for rumors in Hollywood.

[Thanks to everyone for the tips!]

We here at WoW.com are on a Daily Quest to bring you interesting, informative and entertaining WoW-related links from around the blogosphere.

• Righteous Defense tells you what not to do during Rotface.
• As a paladin tank, I totally agree that Tanks and Healers Should Get The Biggest Rewards.
• Vodka has a very good video of the Rotface and Festergut fights.
• Euripides of OutDPS has a great set of tips for the hunter facing Lady Deathwhisper.
• Stoppable Force has a great breakdown of physical vs magical damage for death knights in relation to the Lady Deathwhisper encounter (or any encounter for that matter).

A nasty bug with the 2-piece Tier 10 bonus for Elemental Shamans reared its ugly head recently when a player attempted to use Elemental Mastery. The bonus, which is supposed to reduce the cooldown on Elemental Mastery by 2 seconds each time Lightning Bolt and Chain Lightning is used, instead puts the 31-point Elemental talent on a whopping seven day cooldown. This is akin to the bug found with the Hunter ability Call Stabled Pet, which puts the ability on an even more staggering 25-day cooldown.

Ghostcrawler immediately responded to the concern as raised on the official forums, stating that the problem happens only in cross-server instances and that raiding shouldn’t be affected. Elemental Shamans sporting two pieces from the Frost Witch’s Regalia would probably do well not to activate Elemental Mastery while in a dungeon using the Dungeon Finder until a fix is found. Ghostcrawler stated that Blizzard is working on the issue.

Today is the last day of WoW.com’s 12 Days of Winter Veil contests and we’re finishing big with four, count them four, giveaways. First, we’re giving away two BlizzCon 2009 goodie bags, including all original contents. Winners will recieve, among other things, a code for Grunty The Murloc Marine in-game pet, the Noobz Raynor action figure and an official BlizCon 2009 authenticator. You can view the full contents of the goody bag in the gallery below.

The contest is open to legal residents of the 50 United States, the District of Columbia, and Canada (excluding Quebec), and everyone who enters must be 18 or older. To enter, leave a comment on this post before 11:59pm ET Sunday, January 3, 2010. Please be sure to use a real email that you check often to enter, so we can contact you should you be one of the winners. You may enter only once and two winners will be selected randomly. Each winner will receive 1 BlizzCon 2009 goody bag with a retail value of US$125. Click here to read the official contest rules.

We here at WoW.com are on a Daily Quest to bring you interesting, informative and entertaining WoW-related links from around the blogosphere.

• “When is a rockstar tank not a rockstar?” asks the Big Bear Butt.
• Merrymaker Lissiel says “These types of weapons are good for all resto druids, and everyone should either be getting a staff with haste, or a main hand + off-hand haste combo.”
• Matticus proclaims loudly and proudly, “I learned 7 important healing lessons from this one quest!”
• Spicytuna turns towards Blizzard and asks, “Why can’t we give thumbs down to the dungeons we don’t like, just as we can in WarCraft III?”
• “This has been a crazy year,” muses Pikestaff as the hunter takes a trip down memory lane.