I love most of the battlegrounds. Oddly enough, even as Horde, Alterac Valley is my favorite. Warsong Gulch is the exception. Maybe because of it's small team size, it seems really difficult to get organized and the games drag out. Now I don't necessarily need honor from WSG, but I do need marks for some of my gear. Should I just go in with the intention of getting a single mark, offer no resistance to the opposing team, and collect my singular mark. That's not my style. I'm in it to win it like Yzerman.

Aparently not every feels the same as I do. Pigskin of Medivh is unimpressed with mark farming. Even if it's a premade losing team, there are still often folks who get pugged into their groups who can't do much alone when they lack the support of their team. She's hoping for a response from Blizzard.

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.

Chloroform of EU-Magtheridon isn't interested in waiting. He listed his grievances in the EU-PVP Forum, "Balance issues, queue times, destroying premades, AFK problems, uneven teams, world pvp screwed by 9000yd aggro range ultra guards." Like many others, Jasse of EU-Bronzebeard blames the arena for the death of PvP.

In case you were wondering, there will be premade characters for the 2.4.3 PTR before all is said and done, according to Hortus. There's no word for sure on why they're needed, what gear they'll have, or when they'll come along, but they'll be here. You'll need an account that had Burning Crusade activated before these PTRs went live, and when the time comes, you'll be able to sandbox it up with a fresh new premade while you help test the patch.

This phase, says Hortus, is also not intended for testing Season 4 gear, since it was already tested on a previous PTR. Besides, with 4 days left until Season 4 goes live, the 2.4.3 patch won't be on live servers until Season 4 is well underway. That said, it looks like most (but not all) of the Season 4 gear is still on the PTR right now, so if you want to go check it out, you can fly up to Area 52 on the PTR and check out Big Zokk Torquewrench's wares. Of course, you can also expect us to give you all the Season 4 news you need in the next few days here at WoW Insider as well, including gear guides.

Also, Mages and Warlocks are reporting that their self-buff armor spells are now no longer dispellable on the PTR servers. That's a nice chunk of mana you won't have to waste recasting after a stray Purge in PvP. We'll be watching the PTRs for more undocumented changes, oddities, and happenings, so be sure to keep it here for the rest of the testing cycle for all the news and analysis you'll need when the patch goes live.

Laij of Laughing Skull believes that the new battleground matching system is a blow to PvP guilds. He said, "The new patch and matchmaking system has just nerfed the hell out of any pvp guild. Why run BG premades anymore? All you do is get matched up with other premades that are going to drag games out extremely long." Unsurprisingly, this was not particularly well received.

What is notable is that the thread has elicited a response from Drysc who said "Fair and challenging gameplay? The horror..." This comment opened Drysc (as a Blizzard representative) up to both criticism and support from readers. Some cheered him on for calling out the whining of the original poster, others said that class imbalance makes battlegrounds imbalanced.

My favorite part of the Public Test Realm is pre-made characters and gear vendors. Not because it's "free epics" or anything like that, not because it's particularly anything out of my reach, but because I get a fun little preview of what my characters may look like down the road.

I'm very picky when it comes to style. I adore the style of Warcraft, but other games(and even some cartoons and movies) have turned me off from them by not having an art style that grabs my attention right away. So that being said, I'll admit that even in the highest points of the Black Temple, my upgrade choices are sometimes dictated by what looks the coolest. If the ugly items are a massive upgrade for me, I'll just put them at the end of my list and hold off from looking like a freak as long as possible.

Being able to toss on full Tier 6 the last time they did pre-mades on the Public Test Realm wasn't about being super powered for a week or two for me. It was a glimpse into the future. How cool will I look a few months down the road? What if I'm going to be wearing a clown suit!? That'd be horrible! Let's log onto the PTR and find out!

Sure sure, you can always use the dressing room feature on the live servers, but nothing is quite the same as actually putting it on and running around in it. I spent a little time on the Arena Tournament PTR doing this with clones of my lower level alts, but I was disappointed to heart all of the PvE content, including mobs out in the world, have been deactivated. How am I supposed to look awesome without level 1 boars to slaughter?

Once Patch 2.4 goes live, we will most likely be able to queue up for all of the major battlegrounds as premades. There will always be PUGs, since even the three battlegrounds that allow premade groups to play have them. Sideways of Korgath posted a thread on the official forums on the most annoying PUG player archetypes. The original list included:

• The Aloof - This guy appears to be guarding a flag or, but the chickens at the farm in AB are actually doing a better job. It's hard to say whether he's AFK, chatting in vent, or just didn't get enough sleep last night, but a guy caps the flag behind him and he doesn't even notice. If he's in gulch and the enemy flag carrier runs by, he just keeps on doing whatever it is he's doing as if nothing happened.
• The ADD - This type of player just can't live with less than continuous action. The concept of defending a flag is foreign and distasteful to him. Therefore if he is defending something and no enemies show up within 30 seconds, he moves on despite the fact that he is leaving the flag unguarded for a friendly neighborhood rogue to ninja.
• The Instance Mob - This type of player makes you swear aggro generation applied to players. He simply cannot understand why he hasn't been able to kill anything despite the fact that he put forth his best damage attacks against the protection specced shield wearing warrior that had 2 priests, a paladin, and a druid healing him. Much like I expect Rend Blackhand or Nefarian would, he attributes his ineffectiveness to inferior gear.

Hortus, the PTR community manager, announced a few hours ago that pre-made characters are going to be enabled on the patch 2.3.2 PTRs, starting today. This often-requested but seldom realized capability means anyone who can get on the PTR can get a level 70 character there of any class they want. This time around they'll be geared up in Arena Season 2 and heroic badge reward gear, and will start with extra Badges of Justice to get whatever other gear they might want; "don't even ask" for other gear, warns Hortus and his spinny hat. In a later post, he says that the PTRs will not be up tonight, and are expected to be available "sometime late tomorrow."

While the idea behind pre-mades might be testing new content, I have other intentions. I tend to use pre-mades as a way to test specs or classes I haven't gotten a chance to experience at level 70, to see if it's worth respeccing on the live realms or leveling a character up to 70. It's also a fun chance to play with gear you might not have on the live realms without having to work for it. Personally, I plan on making a ret pally, a resto druid, and some sort of shaman, since those are all classes I've never gotten very high with, and I'd like to see what their endgame is like. What sort of fun will you be having on the PTR?

When the Public Test Realm is up, any player who has had an active account since November 2006 can copy their character over to help test the new update. During the Patch 2.1 Public Test phase, I copied my L64 feral druid over and respecced to Balance. Fortunately, I had a decent set of Balance gear with me and was able to give the spec a good test drive. I enjoyed it enough that I eventually went Balance when I hit L70 on the live servers.

With Patch 2.2 currently on the Public Test Realm, Blizzard is allowing players to copy up to 4 premade L70 characters to the Test Realm. This time, I decided to see what it was like to play some other classes I long admired, so I copied a shaman, a priest and a rogue.

Each toon starts out with a full set of raid gear and PvP gear for different specs as well as plenty of trinkets, rings, weapons, drink, bandages and gems. They also get epic mounts, both land and air. They have none of their talent points assigned, so you can spec them immediately, but you will have to find a trainer to get the higher levels of any spells/abilities you pick up in your talent tree.

Read on for my impressions on each class after the jump.

Premade level 70 characters with "high level raid dungeon equipment" are now available to be copied to the US Public Test Realms.

There are two catches:

1) You have to have The Burning Crusade in order to copy and test these characters because they are level 70.

2) There seems to be a 3 day wait time.

Do you want to play with Patch 2.2 sporting some free epics? Go here and start the copy process. Blizzard asks that you allow the copy process to finish before logging into the Test Realm. There is a Copy Status page where you can check your progress.

This is an excellent opportunity to not only play with the new features (and bugs) in 2.2, but also to try out a class/race combo you may be considering rolling -- all tricked out in purples.

Have fun! ... in 3 days...