It’s time to catch up on a couple of things!
Beta Key Contest Ended
Our heroes of the storm beta key giveaway contest has ended! Tommorow we will contact the winners via Direct Message on twitter!
If you did not win, have no fear! There are other give aways going on in the community, as well as by blizzard themselves! Here are a few of them:
Podcast Episode 57
Tweetin’ While WoWin’
Blizzard has released a new preview of the twitter functionality coming to WoW in 6.1.
It’s easy to get started; all you need is a Twitter account! Under the Social section of the in-game Interface options, just check the Enable Twitter Functionality option, and then the Sign In button. You’ll be taken to a standard app approval page that will allow you to send out Tweets using the in-game UI.
Once you’ve authenticated the app, you can initiate a new Tweet by typing /share into chat, or by clicking the small share icon 
that’ll appear in-chat next to Achievement and item drop notifications. You can also add an Achievement or item directly to a Tweet with the Twitter UI open by shift+clicking the Achievement or item.
Tweets from within World of Warcraft are only ever initiated by you, and we will never automatically send out Tweets on your behalf—we’ve disabled Addons from sending them too. Our goal is to make it easier for you to Tweet while playing World of Warcraft, and more convenient to share fun moments with friends.
Of course if you don’t use Twitter or don’t want to see any of this stuff, just don’t check the ‘Enable Twitter Functionality’ box and it’ll stay out of your way.
We’re excited to see how people enjoy this new feature, and encourage everyone to jump on the 6.1 PTR to test it and provide feedback.
FAQ
Q: When authorizing the World of Warcraft app it says authorizing it will let you see who follows me, allow you to change my profile, and some other things; why do you need access to do all that?
A: The Twitter app authorization system only has a few tiers of access that we as app developers can choose from, and the one we chose was the most basic with the least access required. It will list out a bunch of features this integration does not use, and have no plans to use, like those mentioned. The World of Warcraft Twitter app only exists to allow you to Tweet while playing WoW if you want to, and only you can initiate and send out a Tweet.
Q: So I’m going to see a bunch of Tweets in-game now?
A: No, there’s no in-game Twitter feed; this feature just sends Tweets outside of the game.
Q: What if I don’t want to see anything related to Twitter in-game?
A: If you don’t authorize a Twitter account through the Interface option you won’t see anything related to the feature.
Q: Are you going to start requiring Twitter use for in-game activities?
A: No, we just think it’s a cool convenience feature for those who do like sharing their gaming activity on social media—if you don’t like doing that, no problem.
Q: Isn’t this going to cause a lot of spam, or issues with people sending out inappropriate content from the game?
A: This doesn’t add any functionality that isn’t already achievable through Twitter. This simply makes it more convenient to link items and share achievements and screenshots while playing.
Q: Is there a separate login per-character, or is this account-wide?
A: Your Twitter authorization is Battle.net account-wide. Any WoW license (as well as any characters) within the same Battle.net account will be able to Tweet from an authorized Twitter account. You’d want to sign out of Twitter through the Interface options before logging out of the game if you don’t want the authorization to persist between logins.
Q: My child uses my WoW account sometimes; will they have access to Tweet from my Twitter account?
A: The Twitter authorization will remain active until you log out of it through the Interface options.
Q: I don’t use Twitter, but I do use some other social platforms, when could this be implemented for those?
A: We’re starting with Twitter, but the /share functionality certainly could be expanded to other social platforms if you would find it useful. We’d appreciate your feedback and ideas on where we could go next.
Q: This seems cool but I haven’t tried Twitter yet, how can I get started?
A: Twitter has a helpful guide to get you started, and we maintain a list of official and employee accounts right here that you can follow to start building your list.
Q: How moddable is this by Addons?
A: The UI is fairly locked down to keep access to sending Tweets secure, and ensure that you—and only you—are choosing when to send them. Addons may still perform some light functions, such as helping to populate the chat field in customizable formats.
6.0.3 Hotfixes: February 10
Hotfixes continue to make their way out into the game, check out the newest fixes below:
Here you’ll find a list of hotfixes that address various issues related to the recently released World of Warcraft patch 6.0.3. Hotfixes are updates we make on our end without requiring you to download a new patch. Some of the hotfixes below take effect the moment they were implemented, while others may require your realm to be restarted to go into effect. Please keep in mind that some issues cannot be addressed without a client- side patch update. We will continue to update this list as additional hotfixes are applied.
Hotfixes have been listed by the date they’ve been implemented.
Patch 6.0.x Information
- Patch 6.0.2 Now Live and Survival Guide
- The Iron Tide: 6.0.2 Patch Notes
- 6.0.2 Hotfixes
- Patch Installation & Troubleshooting
February 10
Classes
- Warrior
- Armor Sets
- Tier-17 4-piece set bonus should now be correctly generating 6% increase to both critical strike and attack speed (was incorrectly generating 6% attack speed and 5% critical strike).
- Armor Sets
Raids, Dungeons, and Scenarios
- Blackrock Foundry
- Beastlord Darmac
- Fixed an issue that could cause Faultline’s Epicenter ability to persist in the environment after the raid has wiped.
- Iron Maidens
- Iron Will now increases damage dealt by 0.5% (down from 1%) every 10 seconds (up from every 20 seconds) after triggering on Normal and Heroic difficulty.
- Blackhand
- Blackhand’s health has been reduced by 5% on Normal and Heroic difficulty.
- Iron Soldier’s health has been reduced by 15% on Normal and Heroic difficulty.
- Blackhand’s Massive Shattering Smash ability now deals 25% less damage on Normal and Heroic difficulty.
- Blaze should no longer be dealing increased damage to players with the Incendiary Shots debuff.
- Stage Three’s Overheated effect should no longer incorrectly trigger player abilities that activate from being attacked.
- The following hotfix from yesterday, February 9 was reverted. Blackhand’s Marked for Death is back to a 15 second recast during Stage Two.
In Stage Two, Blackhand now casts Marked for Death every 16 seconds (up from 15 seconds).
- Beastlord Darmac
Items
- Darmac’s Unstable Talisman, Furyheart Talisman, and Goren Soul Repository can now trigger its effect from heals as well.
- Frostwolf Fishing Journal can no longer be sold to a vendor and no longer has a sell price.
World Event: Love is in the Air
- Crushing the Crown: Fixed an issue where the Crown Chemical Company Wagon in Darkshore was not granting quest completion credit.
Raids, Dungeons, and Scenarios
- Blackrock Foundry
- Gruul
- Gronnling Laborer’s Gronnling Smash ability now deals less damage.
- Reduced the damage that Gruul’s Inferno Strike deals to 10-player raid groups on Normal and Heroic difficulties, but increased the rate at which damage scales with raid size. Larger raid groups should find the damage relatively unchanged; smaller groups will find that the ability now deals less damage.
- The Blast Furnace
- There’s now a berserk timer for the encounter at the 13 minute mark.
- Iron Maidens
- Admiral Gar’an’s Penetrating Shot no longer targets players who are riding a loading chain.
- Fixed a situation where Tricks of the Trade (Rogue) or Misdirection (Hunter) could cause the Deckhands to go into evade mode.
- Blackhand
- [Requires a realm restart] Beginning with the new raid timer, Blackhand will consistently drop universal set tokens at the same consistent rates as other bosses in Blackrock Foundry.
- If the Siegemaker’s Fixated target dies, it should now Fixate on the closest target.
- Cast time for Iron Soldier’s Explosive Rounds ability should now be scaling smoothly with raid size and should no longer have breakpoints where the damage ramps up more than intended at 16 and 26 players.
- In Stage Two, Blackhand now casts Marked for Death every 16 seconds (up from 15 seconds).
- Players no longer take falling damage upon landing after receiving Blackhand’s Massive Shattering Smash.
- In Stage Three, Blackhand’s Attach Slag Bombs ability now prefers players that are not affected by the Impaled debuff.
- Gruul
Battleground and Arenas
- Druid’s Starfall and Sunfall no longer targets players that are capturing a PvP point in Arathi Basin, Battle for Gilneas, and Eye of the Storm.
Bug Fixes
- Alliance characters that complete the Primal Combatant achievement are no longer being told to go to Orgrimmar to receive a reward.
- Fixed an issue where characters that log out on the Deeprun Tram may be unable to log back in.