“What the hell’s going on out here?”

Strange things are happening. I spent the weekend on beta playing with old guildmates I haven’t seen in at least ten years, if not longer. That didn’t happen with Classic or any of the Classic expansions.

I’m telling you, there’s something different about WoW: Forever. This doesn’t feel like a reunion weekend. It feels like we’re going back, only we’re going to do it responsibly this time. LOL!

I mean, Frostheim and BRK are debating Hunters on X.

There’s a spark, smoke, and fire. Will this fizzle out, or did 2026 roll back to 2006?

I have no idea, but if a wild Euripides suddenly shows up, then – mic. test 1-2-3, more stable slots 1-2-3, remove the dead zone 1-2-3.

If WoW: Forever is poised to turn Azeroth into an undiscovered country, then the last thing I want to do is spoil it for myself.

That means rolling a Dwarf Hunter in Beta is off the table. It also means rolling a Human Hunter is off the table, as that’s my likeliest alt. Rolling a ‘Nelf or Blue-elf was never on the table.

Which leaves me with the noble Tauren. Mulgore is beautiful. And I need to know if I can handle the Barrens’ chat before I truly commit to Forever.

1. My job/career – 26 years in one place. I retired in May, so WoW may eventually surpass this.
2. Lived in the same house. Again, 26 years. I sold it when I retired.
3. Have been married to my wife—twenty-two years and counting.

Thank God, those sound vaguely important.

I created Darkbrew. I hit “Enter” and was slowly immersed in Earl Boen’s sonorous narration.

“…in these perilous times, the defense of the mountain kingdoms falls to brave dwarves like you. The spirits of the ancient kings watch over you, and the very mountains are your strength. The future of your people is in your hands.”

There I was — axe in hand, no pet at my side, and, more importantly, no old friends waiting in Coldridge Valley. Instead of stepping out of a time machine, it felt like Peter Pan returned to take me back to Neverland, but I was all grown up. The answer was no.

When Burning Crusade Classic launched, I asked again. No. When Wrath of the Lich King Classic launched — my all-time favorite expansion — I wanted the answer to be yes so badly. I tried. I really tried. But without Euripides, Frostheim, and the rest of the crew who made that expansion special, Northrend was just a frigid ball of ice.

Cataclysm Classic came and went. Mists of Pandaria Classic — another favorite — is winding down, and the answer is still no.

Now, Blizzard has me asking this question again. And if ever there was a chance for the answer to flip to yes, it’s World of Warcraft: Forever.

Azeroth 2004, but with roads not taken? A modern take on the old game? A Dwarf Hunter and his pet as the showcase class, battling, as BigRedKitty famously labeled them, a cockroach Paladin!?

The answer to the question, can you go home again, must be yes!

Beta starts this week. The game launches November 4th.

Between shifting hosting platforms and migrating this blog site, I question whether my first post was truly this Brew of the Month post. I’m sure I did a more introductory post, right?

This post titled The Facts of Life is more of what would’ve expected starting out. To be fair it was only published a couple of days after I got things rolling.

What a journey it’s been and continues to be. Although I don’t really blog much, I still play WoW, and I still play Darkbrew and about 20 other Hunter characters.

When I started this blog, WoW was still a toddler at five years old and was in the midst of Wrath of the Lich King (still my favorite expansion). Blogging was the way to inform folks about the game. Youtube, Twitter, and streaming were all in their nascent stages or didn’t exist at all. Podcasting was a thing though, and it was this same year that Euripides and I launched The Hunting Party Podcast.

While I won’t commit to doing a lot of blogging, I will commit to doing more of the Hunting Party Podcast starting with this – an all-star reunion show!

That’s right, yours truly, Frostheim, Euripides, Michele Morrow, BigRedKitty, Zeherrah, and the current crew of Delirium, Bendak, Ms. Foxxy, and Synthparadox will band together Soon (TM) to catch on up what we’ve been doing these many years.

I’ll share out more details when I have them, but yeah, it’s happening.

If you’ve spent any amount of time reading The Brew Hall these past twelve years, thank you! It means more to me than you’ll ever know.

Stay thirsty and remember to drink your Darkbrew Lager.

I wrote 10-ish in the title not because it hasn’t been 10-years, it most certainly has. But as you are aware the posts have been few and far between these last few years. I’m pretty sure I’ve written something each and every year, but this site has hardly been a den of activity.

I’d love to tell you that I’m about to change all that, but I’ve written revival posts in the past, and they’ve gone nowhere. That said, I’ll likely keep this site alive for at least another year.

Now as to what I’ve been up to, I’m still playing World of Warfcraft, and I’m still playing Darkbrew. But like the previous three expansions, I’m taking a bit of a hiatus. I started Battle for Azeroth full of enthusiam and played every day until our guild cleared Uldir.

Once that happened, I began to lose interest. I haven’t logged in much these days, although I suspect one day soon I’ll wake up and feel that urge to logon and get all caught up.

As for the Hunting Party Podcast, I don’t quite know what to say about it. None of us have really had the desire to get behind the mic. and talk Hunters this expansion.

I’m not ready to call it quits though. You see, the Hunting Party Podcast also turns 10 this year, and if the show is to end, I’d like to do it right. I don’t know what “right” is, but it’s not this.

I’m going to hit up the HPP crew and see what we can do to either carry on, pass it on, or end things in a more dignified and celebratory fashion.

I don’t think we’ll get to episode 300, nor do I think we’ll do anything as epic as episode 100, or the episode 200 send-off, but I’d love to talk a little BfA, Classic WoW, and maybe get a reunion with Euripides, Frost, Arth, and more.

Stay tuned, and thank you to everyone who’s been here the last ten years. Tempus fugit, and Happy Hunting!

• Mage Tower artifact appearance for Beast Mastery? Check.
• Heroic Antorus cleared and violet bird mount obtained? Check.
• Completed the Insurrection questline and obtained the Arcanist’s Mana Saber? Yes, and what a pain in the ass that was. I was still playing and raiding when Nighthold was a thing, so I don’t know why I didn’t complete it then.
• Survival artifact weapon obtained? Done. Is it wrong that I did the quest as Beast Mastery?
• Lightforged Draenei and Void Elves unlocked? You bet.
• Void Elf Hunter rolled? Of course.
• Joined new guild for BfA? See cleared Heroic Antorus above.

There are still a few things I could chase after before BfA. The artifact fishing pole comes to mind. For the most part though I’m ready for the next expansion. I’ve stayed away from the beta, and have only dabbled on the PTR, although I plan to give the PTR a closer look.

As for the Hunting Party Podcast, we’re still on an irregular schedule. We tentatively plan to do a show on the evening of June 25th. Once we get closer to BfA, I hope to get back on a normal schedule.

Until next month, maybe sooner?

So what does this mean for Hunters? Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but if you don’t like these new looks then “Fluffy” the gorilla will have undergone a transmogrification of the worst kind when you call her from your stable. This change is retroactive and affects all existing pets. Like it or not, you’re pets are changing.

I encourage you to head over to Petopia to see the full list of updated pet models, but here are a few of note.

I like the black gorilla, but I’m not fond of the other variants. The only gorilla that I have tamed is the white one. He’s named Lightbrew, and there are only two pets with that skin in the game, Tsu’Kalu in Stranglethorne and  Uhk’loc in Un’goro. I checked the Battle for Azeroth alpha and both of them are updated to the new model.

Crabs are another pet that got updated, and I’m dying to see what Karkin looks like after the update. I don’t know if the image truly captures his new look, but if it’s accurate he’s quite different in Battle for Azeroth.

My favorite update is the Hyenas. They look fabulous. I’ve always preferred the red one from the old model, but now there are several colors that have my attention.

It’s fashionable to say “it’s only Alpha and things may change”, but I’ve got a feeling these changes are here to stay, and I wouldn’t be surprised if more are on the way.

Anyway, I’m in. I’ve barely had a chance to kick the tires, but Alpha is definitely the right term to use to describe things. Don’t get me wrong unfinished World of Warcraft is still better than a lot of games, but the lack of polish and detail is noticeable. Most notable is the lack of sounds. The opening zone is much too quiet.

Character copies are disabled so I’m running around with a premade Void Elf Hunter. Add-ons are also disabled so I’m stuck with the default UI, which looks a lot like it did when the game launched in 2004.

Battle for Azeroth doesn’t go live for six months, so it’s still early in the process. I look forward to seeing how Hunters evolve.

I took the picture just this morning. It’s the view from my tiny place on St. Thomas. I’m there now, and I was there in March of 2009 when I hatched up this little idea for a WoW Hunter blog called The Brew Hall.

It’s hard to believe that we’re about to turn nine. Time does indeed fly. I’ll have more to say about the site and how it got started next month. For now, I wanted to let you know where things stand today.

If you look at my latest posts, you’ll see that the last time I wrote anything about World of Warcraft was September 6, 2016. That’s by far the longest I’ve gone without writing a word about Hunters or World of Warcraft.

That’s something I wish to correct, but it won’t be easy. My interest in World of Warcraft is at an all-time low. My subscription is still active and I intend to keep playing. It’s just lately I haven’t been logging into the game. In fact, I’ve yet to set foot in the Antorus raid. That’s just one of many things left undone right now. I hope to begin correcting that when I return home.

So why the falling interest in World of Warcraft? It’s partly due to that fact that I’ve been playing the game since 2004. Thirteen years is a long time to be doing anything, let alone play a video game.

The other reason is Star Wars. With the revival of this historic franchise by Disney, I found myself writing and podcasting about a Galaxy, Far, Far Away. Star Wars is my first love, and as I started reconnecting with it, I spread myself too thin.

You probably noticed that in the last couple of years I expanded The Brew Hall to include topics on Star Wars: The Old Republic (SWTOR) and Star Wars. You also probably noticed that I was publishing more articles on those topics than I was World of Warcraft.

My interest in Star Wars hasn’t waned. In August of 2016 I started a SWTOR podcast called State of the Old Republic. It’s doing great, and my efforts got me into BioWare’s Influencer program. I get to work with other content creators, talk to the game’s developers about their plans for the game, and test out upcoming content. It’s a great gig, even if most of the information is subject to an NDA.

The work that I’m doing for SWTOR isn’t going to stop, but I do want to put more effort back into The Brew Hall and World of Warcraft. With that in mind, The Brew Hall will once again be World of Warcraft only. I don’t know how often I’ll write, but I’m going to set a goal of at least once a month.

Regarding the Hunting Party Podcast, well that’s still going on as well. Like The Brew Hall it too has seen a lull with one and two month gaps between episodes. This is something we plan to correct as well.

Nine years is a great milestone, and I want to see the blog turn ten, but I want to do it in way that reflects more than just a decision to keep the lights on.

Thanks to all of you who have supported the blog and podcast all these years.