Blizzard Watch Podcast

This was the first week of Midnight Season 1, so we started off talking about the new dungeons and raids -- and what we got in our first Great Vault of Midnight. Our hosts that raid also did a bit of a post-mortem on how the addon apocalypse is shaking out in practice. And speaking of the revamps for Midnight, our first Trial of Style since the transmog revamp is now live, and it is not going well. There are plenty of other things to explore, though -- maybe even a little too much? Delves and dungeons and Prey and housing and now a raid, and its accompanying Race to World First? It's kind of a lot.But to slow it down a bit, both the upcoming patch to Mists of Pandaria Classic and the new music video collab with Aurora really hit all those nostalgia buttons.

Liz Patt took a spin in the hosting chair for the first time this week, with Joe and Liz and Cory on board to keep her on her toes. The raid schedule for Midnight is enough to keep anyone on their toes, not to mention Mythic dungeons, Delves, and ABUNDANCE. Not everyone is a fan of ABUNDANCE, for technical reasons, though it's been adjusted a bit to try to cut down on the lag. If that wasn't enough, we also have a ton of new information about patch 12.0.5, including a Dave the Diver-like spearfishing adventure.With Liz Patt hosting, the Diablo franchise was given its due, with season 12 starting, and more information about Lord of Hatred. The crew is bemused at another step Diablo 4 is taking to be more like Diablo 3, which actually has a seasonal rollover coming soon. They remembered to flick the drinky bird.We also had some indie news. The Subnautica 2 lawsuit just wrapped, and the details are so, so stupid. We also talked a bit about former Overwatch developer Jeff Kaplan's new project, The Legend of California. We're also excited to see what dinoflask makes of the announcement of the open world western, and Jeff's 10 hour long "development and chill" stream.

Midnight released last week, so this week our podcast crew shared their first impressions of the expansion. While most of their experiences have been positive, there were a few small points where things didn't quite gel the way they wish they would. Of course, nearly everyone's highlight of the expansion thus far is how almost every NPC tells Turalyon to shut his cake hole, but the storytelling and questing has been a blast, even if we can't get into the Vault yet.Less exciting was the first true set of Hearthsteel bundles to hit the battle.net shop, including a beautiful tree. We're salty about the pricing aspect, but have to admit it's a pretty nice tree.Our special guest host this week, columnist Chris Chesno, was on hand to discuss the new Diablo 4 Paladin, which has a trial coming up this week. Plus, oh yeah, there's a Hearthstone expansion releasing next week.

Midnight, the latest expansion for World of Warcraft, released this week, so that's most of our discussion. We tried to keep it spoiler free, but it's kind of hard when you just hate a particular character so [spoiler] much. We talk zones, transmog, decor, and how revisiting these places is hitting all the right nostalgia buttons.But of course, there's always more to come, from the weird little staggered raid schedule to house parties for upgrade tokens (which is a real thing), this is just the beginning of Midnight.There was also a small smattering of Diablo news, with season 11 ending next week, on March 10. Okay, Diablo, we see you.

Midnight releases into early access later this week, and then full release next week, so for now the crew is pretty much just in waiting mode. Even if you didn't get early access, you can still get into the action because the pre-patch event will go on until the very last minute. In the meantime, there's also the Outland Cup, and the new Trading Post (which, as always, our cohosts have a ton of opinions about).Plus, the hosts would like to nap, which I can support, but they'd also like to nap while mounted and driving around which seems a little irresponsible.Oh, and by the way, there's going to be an Overwatch mobile game. Yeah, that was pretty much our reaction too.

There's always a lot of news to discuss, but this week there was specifically a lot of news to discuss for all the very best Diablo games: Diablo 2, Diablo 4, Diablo Immortal, end of list, apparently. All three of those games are going to have a new Warlock class, with Diablo 2 getting it immediately, the others slightly later. This is the first new class for Diablo 2 in 20 years, and the second one coming with Diablo 4's upcoming Lord of Hatred expansion (the other being Paladins).There was also a lot to discuss in WoW, as the Lunar Festival began, with zero holiday decor in sight. We don't think a fish tank is too much to ask. Speaking of cute disappointments, Hearthstone released another of those gatcha pets for even more money than before and it has us nostalgic for the days of horse armor. Seriously.And since Cory was joining us, there was a little spot of Heroes of the Storm hopium, which included a new patch and skins.