For tomorrow's WoW Insider Show (which you can hear live at 3:30pm EST on WoW Radio), the lunatics have taken over the asylum!

Mike Scramm is on vacation, and he has left the show in the hands of John Patricelli (the Big Bear Butt) this one time. Since one chance is likely all I'm getting for this, we're pulling out all the stops by having the Turpster, Matt Rossi, AND Dan Whitcomb on hand to talk about all things hot in the news of WoW Insider from the last week.

We'll of course be talking about Patch 2.4.2, the 'epicness' of ten manning Arthas in the upcoming expansion, changes to scare beast and growl, and the possibility of Wrath mounts with passengers.

We may also be able to fit in some time to talk about the recent break up of the guild Death and Taxes.

And as is the tradition on the WoW Insider Show, we'll have reader mail, which you can send to us at theshow@wowinsider.com, and we'll be chatting in IRC as well at irc.mmoirc.com in the #wowradio channel.

It promises to be an experience, so make sure you don't miss it.

Tune in tomorrow afternoon, Saturday, at 3:30pm EST over on WoW Radio. See you there.

This last week on the WoW Insider Show, which is now available for listening on WoW Radio, we celebrated Mother's Day by inviting on both Amanda Dean, and her mother Linda Emrys, who is herself a WoW player. We also had Robin Torres on, who not only writes for us here at WoW Insider, but also is the mother of a two-and-a-half year old. Turpster and I were both on, but we didn't do much more than ask questions this time around -- the ladies got in some good discussion about what it's like to play WoW as a mother, how this game might actually help you raise children, and what it's like coming to WoW as someone who doesn't have a lot of gaming experience. If you're a casual gamer (or just know someone who is), the show should be really interesting to you.

And even if not, we were able to squeeze some great Wrath of the Lich King discussion in there after all of Friday's revelations, including what's up with the Death Knights, how 10/25 man raiding will change, and all of the other zone information we heard on Friday, from Dragonblight to Grizzly Hills to how what we see in the Borean Tundra gives us clues about what the next expansion might be.

I thought it was a pretty good show, but if you have other opinions (or any opinions, really), feel free to share them by emailing us at theshow@wowinsider.com. And don't forget that while you can listen to the show either in WoW Radio's archives or on iTunes, you can also hear us live every Saturday afternoon at 3:30pm EST/8:30pm GMT.

Hope your Mother's Day was excellent, and enjoy the podcast!

For tomorrow's WoW Insider Show (which you can hear live at 3:30pm EST on WoW Radio), we're doing something a little special for Mother's Day: we've got mothers! Amanda Dean is actually bringing her mother on the show, and Ms. Emrys, (aka SpaceLady) is a WoW player herself, so we'll chat with her about what it's like to come to games via World of Warcraft. Robin Torres will also be joining us, and she's got little ones of her own, so she'll tell us what it's like to be a WoW player while also running your own little "guild" in real life. And Turpster will return after his absence last week -- all we can say about him is that he's a bad mother... shut yo' mouth.

Plus, we definitely can't ignore all the Wrath of the Lich King info that dropped last night, so we'll definitely be talking about vehicles, Death Knights, the 10/25 man instances, and all of the other huge information that Blizzard dropped on us like a ton of level 80 bricks. And as usual (as if all that wasn't enough), we'll have reader mail, which you can send to us at theshow@wowinsider.com, and we'll be chatting in IRC as well at irc.mmoirc.com in the #wowradio channel.

Whew! It's a mother of a show. Make sure to tune in tomorrow afternoon, Saturday, at 3:30pm EST over on WoW Radio. See you there.

Both Duncor and John "BigBearButt" Patricelli were on the podcast with me last Saturday, and despite my being a bit behind (Liberty City claimed most of my time last week), the show went really well.

• We chatted a lot about the mounts of Warcraft, including why you can't ride most of the bug mounts outside of AQ.
• We talked about how to make raiding faster
• We hit on a number of player events, including John's post about those crazy Druids in Nagrand, and our own It Came From the Blog fun
• We talked about what we're looking forward to in Wrath of the Lich King (I can't wait for the five man instances)
• And we answered lots of emails -- a few more jokes, a little advice, some good thoughts about Trinkets (and maybe putting an extra inventory slot in there), player housing, and lots of making fun of Duncor for quitting the game.
• And we figured out the real pronunciation of melee -- here it is.

Definitely give it a listen -- there's a lot of good stuff in there. As usual, the show is available over on WoW Radio, or in iTunes if you'd rather get it that way.

And here's a special announcement: This coming week on the WoW Insider Show (which will be live on WoW Radio at 3:30pm EST on May 10th), we'll have a special Mother's Day edition of the podcast. Not only will we have Robin Torres (who is herself a mother) on with Turpster and I, but both Amanda Dean and her mother will be live on the show as well. Moms and WoW -- next week on the WoW Insider Show.

Q: How many Warlocks does it take to change a lightbulb?

A: Just one, but he needs two other people to click on it.

Yes, that's the kind of quality humor that you'll hear on this week's podcast (and the best joke is right at the end of the show). It's now available for listening on WoW Radio and also in iTunes. This past Saturday, Turpster joined me, Eliah Hecht, and Matthew Rossi for a little discussion about all things WoW in the past week. We got in some good discussion about speccing as a mage and lots of other reader emails, as well as:

• A chat about just how much information Blizzard keeps about us
• Whether old world PvP nostalgia is just that, and what can happen with world PvP in the future
• Will Naxxaramas' migration to Northrend mean Tier 3 is going bye-bye?
• And we chatted about the "brutal" ratings required on Brutal Gladiator items in season 4, and why they're there.

Plus of course instant feedback from the IRC channel, and the usual wackiness. If you liked the show or have a comment for us, feel free to send along a note to theshow@wowinsider.com, and we might even read it next week live on the virtual air. Thanks for listening, enjoy the show.

Multiboxing -- we've mentioned it quite a few times here on WoW Insider, and it's always been a controversial subject. While the game is quite clearly not designed around players playing multiple characters at once, Blizzard has stated that they have no problem with it -- as long as people are paying for each account they use, and not using third-party programs to control their characters, Blizzard is fine with it.

But I, Mike Schramm, personally have always been quite against the idea of multiboxing. Lots of folks have used macros and programming to control multiple characters all the way up to level 70 and beyond, and some have even taken teams of characters into PvP areas to win battlegrounds and gain honor, or even win the arena seasons, and all the rewards that come with that victory. In my opinion, that's a horrible mockery of the way the game was designed -- this is a social game that is meant to be played with other players, and to pit one person with five computers against a real-life team of five people just isn't fair or interesting. Sure, you might be able to control the movements of five characters with skilled programming and control, but the other team has to coordinate five human minds all together, a much harder and more interesting act, in my personal opinion. I am firmly against multiboxing -- it's not the way this game is meant to be played at all, and while Blizzard may be content to make more money off of someone paying for many accounts, I'm not content to be stuck in a game with them.

Which is why, this Saturday on the WoW Insider Show over on WoW Radio (at 3:30pm EST), our guest will be Xzin, one of the most notorious (and popular) multiboxers the game has ever seen.

Man, with all the patch 2.4 news flying around today, you might feel a little overwhelmed. Well, worry no more, because just when you need something a little silly and lighthearted, the WoW Insider Show comes right along, with Episode 30 now available on WoW Radio and iTunes. This past Saturday, Turpster and I, along with Amanda Dean and Elizabeth Wachowski of WoW Insider, had a sit down to talk about all of the biggest news in the past week of Warcraft, including, but not limited to:

• Our favorite trinkets (mine I picked only because the tooltip uses the word "fecundity")
• What "counts" in terms of leveling as fast as possible
• Elizabeth talked to us for a bit about the lore of the Burning Crusade, and both the high and low points of it
• We chatted about the best starting areas in the game (there was a strange split over the Dwarf/Gnome area for some reason as well)
• And finally we hit on Amanda's Azerothian General Election, which you can still vote on right now -- Thrall is still winning, so Alliance, you better grab your sword and fight the Horde.

We did check in reader email, too, and Turpster says he's headed to 70, so we asked for your input on what kind of reward (or punishment) we can give him if he makes it before Wrath -- if you have a suggestion, email us at theshow@wowinsider.com.

And speaking of Turpster, you've got to see his new TurpsterVision over at Massively today -- it's a spectacular tale of a galaxy long ago and far away, if you know what I mean.

One of my favorite WoW podcasts(besides our very own, of course) is Casually Hardcore from WoW Radio. They're a very fun bunch and they cover the topic of age fairly often in their fan mail.

I realize a lot of young people play WoW, but I haven't had much direct experience with the really young crowd. As far as I know, I've only played with someone under 16 a couple of times since late 2004. I'm 21 now, and I'm actually the third youngest person in my guild, and there's only a few others younger than I am in our entire guild alliance. We probably just fall short of 200 people across all of the guilds, so the idea of people so young playing WoW is actually quite strange to me. I see parents saying "AFK, my daughter needs me" more often than kids or teens saying "sorry guys, I have school in the morning."

While there are definitely mature younger people playing WoW(I like to think that I was/am one... maybe) but I haven't honestly had much experience with the younger crowd at all. I'm willing to bet money that my guild's average age is somewhere in the high 20s. What about you guys, willing to take a guess? Is your guild younger? Older? A mix of all sorts?

Yes, indeed, after a short trip away from the podcast, I will be back on tomorrow afternoon, live on WoW Radio at 3:30pm EST. Turpster is supposed to be there as well, and both John Petricelli (the Big Bear Butt blogger) and Matthew Rossi (who, I hear, once wrestled a bear and won) will be on the show with us. It'll be a rip-roaring adventure as, I'm sure, we'll chat about all the recent changes in patch 2.4, as well as all the kerfluffle over tanking and protection specs, and why Blizzard is banning a famous Arena hunter. We'll also hit on when patch 2.4 might go live, and of course we'll be reading listener email (which you can send to us at theshow@wowinsider.com).

Should be fun, and I don't know about the rest of the guys, but since I'm in Chicago, I'll likely be celebrating St. Patrick's Day, so I'll bring green beer along (for everyone of age, of course). Tune in to WoW Radio tomorrow afternoon at 3:30pm EST to join us for the WoW Insider Show, the best bear-related WoW podcast you'll ever find.

The 28th episode of the WoW Insider Show included myself, blogger Amanda Dean, Druid columnist John Patricelli and Turpster in an hour of lively discussion on this week's hot topics. Stories covered included:

• The debate raged on over when, or even if, is it acceptable to go afk without notice?
  
• The latest rollbacks on the PTR for Warlocks and Shaman and why players shouldn't be ready to quit over temporary tests on that server Blizzard so cleverly dubbed the Test server.
• The effects of the Lifebloom nerf and how Blizzard may have not seen the results they were looking for.
• Amanda Dean talks about introducing her Mom (hi Amanda's Mom!) to WoW and how she is handling her first few levels in Azeroth
• Each participant on the show gave their personal opinion on what playable race they would choose if a new one were introduced to the game.

If you missed the show, there are plenty of ways for you to listen today including the Flash player on the WoW Radio site, free iTunes download or mp3 file. And you can listen in live every Saturday at 3:30p ET on WoW Radio.

[Listen] to this week's show.
[iTunes] Subscribe to the podcast in iTunes.
[RSS] Get your favorite reader in on the fun.

As scheduled, our good friend Duncor (and his co-host Cadwallion) on WoW Radio's WoW Things Considered podcast sat down for an interview with three guildies from Vis Maior, the guild that's been rolling through the PTR so far. It's a good interview -- Duncor and Cadwallion go through Vis Maior's (not Vis Major) history, how they've moved on to the PTR and begun raiding there, and what they think of the new content.

It's interesting to hear not only from a guild that has been around for a while, but is just now coming into the spotlight. And it's also cool to hear what the GMs are doing for the guilds testing the new content on the PTR -- they've deathtouched trash a few times, and even spawned "flaskators," which are NPCs which will give out consumables and other raiding standbys.

They also tackle the debate of whether "world firsts" actually count on the PTRs. Vis Maior does agree that PTR kills don't necessarily count if they're just being tested, but a world first kill of a "final" version of a boss should count. Duncor and Cad don't press them on this, unfortunately, but I'd disagree -- the only way you know a boss is final is if it is on the live realms, so only live realms should count. Still, Vis Maior sound like a great bunch of people (they sound like they really love to raid, which is always good for a high-end guild), and what they've done so far on the PTRs is definitely impressive. Kudos to them, and nice job to WoW Radio on the interview.

We've mentioned this a couple of times on the WoW Insider Show already, but just in case you've missed it, here's a reminder that Duncor and Cadwallion of WoW Radio are going to be interviewing Vis Maior, the guild that is cleaning up the bosses on the patch 2.4 PTR server so far, this Friday, March 7th at 7pm EST. And they're looking for questions from you -- if you've got something you want to know from the guild, just drop your suggested question in this thread over on the WoW Radio forums.

When we asked Duncor about it on Saturday, he said one of the things he wants to ask is whether Sunwell is progressively harder than Black Temple and Hyjal or if it's equal to those, and though Blizzard has said Sunwell is meant to be the hardest raid instance (the end of Burning Crusade's endgame, basically), I'm interested to hear that answer. And I also would like to hear some discussion on a question suggested by The_Milkcat in that thread, about the difference between world first kills on the PTR and on the live realms.

So it should be a good interview. Throw your suggested questions in the forum thread if you have them, and make sure to tune in to WoW Radio on this Friday, March 7th, at 7pm EST to hear Duncor and Cadwallion chat with Vis Maior.

This past weekend (before we knew the Pats couldn't go undefeated for a whole season-- that's what they get for beating my Rams in 2001), WoW Insider took to the airwaves of WoW Radio for the 23rd episode of our podcast, and the results are now live over on their site, and ready to assault your ears with a fine mix of insight and insanity. Turpster was out this week, but Duncor skillfully filled in alongside myself and WoW Insider's own Alex Ziebart. We talked for a minute about Groundhog Day, and then ducked into the email inbox (the address is theshow@wowinsider.com, if you've got something to tell us), and then we talked about the most popular posts of the past week:

• Mojo the frog, and whether it was Blizzard's mistake or our exploit.
• Addons and how to raid with (or without) them.
• Your crazy pick for the favorite 5man (Mana Tombs was robbed)
• And that piece of loot that you couldn't live without, but never could seem to live with

And we also tried breaking out some new "loot-names" for easy bosses: Loot Reaver, and the Loot Below. One I liked from an email that didn't get mentioned on the show this week: "The Chest Event" in Karazhan. Funny. Check out the show for more, and don't forget to tune in next week as well: same loot time, same loot channel.