There have been several "contests" on various websites so far, offering people a chance to get into the World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade beta testing phase. But none has looked so inviting (and so random) as the one that's currently running on WoW Vault. No challenging questions, no restrictions based on location, no artistical skills needed, just a whole bunch of luck. Plus a valid retail World of Warcraft account and in good standing as of October 8, 2006.

If you have that, go right ahead and read WoW Vault's announcement, then fill in the registration form. Note that the e-mail address must match with the one used with your World of Warcraft account, and the rest of the fields are pretty self-explanatory. Good luck submitting it, though, because a friend of mine keeps bugging me that he can't get through the first page (I guess their servers are having a rough time at the moment).

WoW Vault says they will "most likely pull 10 names every few days and announce them to keep this thing going for at least 2 weeks (with 90 chances to win this round!)", so you should have at least some chance of getting in. But believe me when I say this: it's well worth a shot!

In the meantime, the beta moves on, and so does my anorectic blood elf. I still haven't taken her on a tour through the Outlands, I'm affraid those beasts would rip what little flesh she has on her fragile bones in a matter of seconds. But I'm definitely looking forward to getting one of 'em "chocobos" this week!

Oh and a word of advice for all ye epix grinders: don't bother. There are lv. 61 blue items better than those purple things you have to grind for months at a time.

(N.B. Archive text, links removed)