Blizzard Watch

Blizzard Watch Podcast Uncut: Still mad about transmog, still excited about Player Housing

This week's preshow is mostly raves about Dispatch and I can't be even a little bit mad about it.

It's kind of fun to watch Phil, Matt, and Joe discuss the narrative-heavy game while trying their best to be vague enough to not spoil any plot points. Liz appreciated that, because she hasn't really played&n...

Lore Watch Podcast: Ethereals, Class Quests, and more

This week we have four listener questions answered by our lore experts Joe and Matt.

First, they discuss the Ethereals and what their timeline is in relation to the timeline on Azeroth. Has this race existed for years, decades, milennia -- or something different entirely. They pivoted to the dragons and their aspects, ...

Tavern Watch Plays Starfinder, Episode 3: A little warm, but it beats dying

It's time to take to the stars in search of interplanetary adventure as Tavern Watch plays Starfinder's newly-released second edition. This system blends the crunchy, high player choice character building of Pathfinder with a wholly original science fantasy setting, and there's really nothing like it. If yo...

Blizzard Watch Weekly: One week closer to Player Housing

We're one week farther into 2025 which means we're one week closer to Player Housing, which hits early access on December 2. But in the meanwhile, there's still news out there, so I've rounded up everything that happened last week and everything coming up this week to help both of us keep track.

Here's what you need to ...

Blizzard Watch Podcast Uncut: We're not mad about transmog, just disappointed (and also very mad)

In this week's preshow, our cohosts are playing The Outer Worlds 2 so they're debating the efficacy of high Charisma as opposed to lockpicking. 

A new set of Magic the Gathering cards was released, this time featuring Avatar, not the James Cameron one, the anime one, and Joe has thoughts...

Lore Watch Podcast: A casual discussion about Blood Elves

As we make our way toward Midnight, Joe and Matt are making sure we know what we need to before the expansion launches. Chief among those things is the lore of Blood Elves.

It starts with the Highborne and the schism between Night Elves and High Elves, which eventually led to the Blood Elves and the creat...

Tavern Watch Plays Starfinder, Episode 2: Expedition to the computer core

It's time to take to the stars in search of interplanetary adventure as Tavern Watch plays Starfinder's newly-released second edition. This system blends the crunchy, high player choice character building of Pathfinder with a wholly original science fantasy setting, and there's really nothing like ...

Blizzard Watch Weekly: Blinded by science (or maybe that's the void)

I can stop staring at the login screen any time I want. Any time I feel like it. I just don't feel like it right now is all. It's perfectly fine.

If you, like me, have lost track of the week already I'm here to help with a rundown of what’s happening in the world of our favorite games last week, as well as wh...

Blizzard Watch Podcast Uncut: BlizzCon. Beta. Battlestar Galactica.

If you're here for the preshow I hope you like trains and snow and broadway musicals, because that's what our cohosts are serving up.

Train travel can be fun and inexpensive or it can be incredibly long and expensive without much wiggle room -- but trains will get you to Broadway without having to park a car, so that's ...

Lore Watch Podcast: Deep, cosmic questions from the Diablo and WoW universes

Because we aren't all constantly filled with existential dread, Joe and Matt are answering some deep questions asked by some of our listeners.

The first concerns the afterlife in Diablo, namely where we all go when we die. Heaven and Hell in the world of Diablo aren't really in keeping with our re...

Tavern Watch Plays Starfinder, Episode 1: We'll take the third option, where nobody dies

It's time to take to the stars in search of interplanetary adventure as Tavern Watch plays Starfinder's newly-released second edition. This system blends the crunchy, high player choice character building of Pathfinder with a wholly original science fantasy setting, and there's really nothing like ...

Blizzard Watch Weekly: Welcome to the new beta (it’s a lot like the old alpha)

There’s not much longer to wait for the Midnight beta to launch, but if you’re waiting for the latest news about Midnight (and/or player housing), you may as well catch up on last week’s news first. Here’s the rundow...

Blizzard Watch Podcast Uncut: Our WoW Player Housing is haunted, and more scary stories

In this week's preshow, the crew goes Halloween!

They talk about what they did to celebrate spooky season over the weekend. From historic ghost tours to mall hopping to old man candy, it seems like they had a great time. But it's not all ghosts and ghouls. With a pseudo-horror film lead in, they also discuss a slew of ...

Lore Watch Podcast: The Sunwell: its origins, its past, and its parallels

As we head into Midnight, we know this act begins with a direct assault on the Sunwell. But what is the Sunwell?

Our Loremasters Joe and Matt discuss the history of Xal'atath's next target. The Sunwell isn't even the only well of power to be found on Azeroth -- they discuss the Well of Eternity, and the N...

Blizzard Watch Weekly: Eyes on the prize (the prize is the Midnight beta)

Here at Blizzard Watch, the staff has been abuzz about Midnight ever since it was announced, but this week we're a little more abuzz because the beta test was just announced — and that brings us one step closer to launch. But if yo...

Tavern Watch Podcast: We have Spelljammer at home

On the Tavern Watch Podcast, a mention of a crowdfunding campaign for Lodestar leads us to discussing areas where the community has picked up ...

Blizzard Watch Podcast Uncut: WoW UI changes make it harder to change our UI

This week in the preshow we talked a lot about other games -- what we've played, what we've liked, and what our various unplayed games are.

Also, Liz has finally caught on to my master scheme of recommending her good games on Steam, so someone else's account is just as much a disorganized mess as mine is. If you prefer...

Lore Watch Podcast: Multimedia influences on World of Warcraft

In the first of three questions we answered this week, a listener wanted to know some of the influences our hosts Joe and Matt see in WoW from literature, movies, and myth.

They talked about a slew of varied media, from 60s sci-fi (no, not that one, though yes, that one) through comics. There are a lot of cultu...

Blizzard Watch Weekly: It's PTR time for Blizzard games

We're in the midst of a busy PTR season with both WoW and Diablo 4 running test realms right now — though Diablo'sis only running for a few more days — which makes this weekend a great time to test out new game features. (The besttime to test out new game features would have been last w...

Blizzard Watch Podcast Uncut: Player housing highs and Diablo 4 lows

In this week's preshow, we're all a little bit weird.

The crew spent a while talking idiosyncrasies, which led to the explanation of "Liz Noises." These are not swear words, believe it or not, because Liz leads by example, but she has to focus very hard on Windwalker Monk or she pitches herself off a cliff, according t...

Lore Watch Podcast: The lore of Vampire: The Masquerade

Matt and Joe sit down this week to discuss Vampire: The Masquerade: its lore, some of the source material that inspired it, and how it rippled vampires forward in pop culture.

They break down what you need to know about the history of vampires in this setting, which goes back almost to the beginning of hum...

Tavern Watch Plays Shadowdark, Episode 3: What lies below

It’s spooky season here on Tavern Watch, so we’re playing something appropriately spooky — Shadowdark! But a spooky old-school-esque system isn’t enough on its own, so we’re diving back into one of the most classic horror tabletop game modules of all time — the original I6: Ravenloft for&nbs...

Blizzard Watch Weekly: Housing, housing, more housing (and a few other things too)

Player housing continues to dominate our thoughts and dreams, as the entire Blizzard Watch team jumped onto the PTR to playtest housing as a group. It hasn't always gone well, but at least we're having fun — and hopefully y...

Blizzard Watch Podcast Uncut: Blizzard Watch Podcast: Player Housing wishes and dreams

During the preshow, the crew discussed the games that just keep rolling out the new content, from WoW through No Man's Sky, all the way through the never-ending content churn that is the Star Wars universe these days. Star Wars is, by the way, a kids' movie, and retconning it to make the wr...

Lore Watch Podcast: Even more stories we'd like to explore through Timewalking

Now that we've seen Timewalking a bit, a listener asks the Lore Watch team what other events in Azeroth's history we should get to go visit through that system.

While the listener suggests the War of the Three Hammers -- which Joe and Matt are on board with -- the response runs the gamut of Azeroth's history, from anci...

Tavern Watch Plays Shadowdark, Episode 2: Never trust strange furniture

It's spooky season here on Tavern Watch, so we're playing something appropriately spooky -- Shadowdark! But a spooky old-school-esque system isn't enough on its own, so we're diving back into one of the most classic horror tabletop game modules of all time -- the original I6: Ravenloft for Adva...