According to a post by Wryxian on the EU forums Arena Season 5 will be ending April 14th and Arena Season 6 will begin one week later. Remember all arena points, teams and personal ratings will be reset with the new season.

You can read the original post after the jump.

Once again the testing schedule for Ulduar has been updated.

On North American test realms you will be able to test the Hodir hard mode on Tuesday March 31st starting at 7PM EST (GMT -5) and the Iron Council hard mode on Wednesday April 1st starting at 7PM EST (GMT -5).

On European test realms you will be able to test General Vezax hard mode on Wenseday April 1st at 19:00 CET.

As for hard mode testing Shirts of Uber will be made available again.

More info and the original posting after the jump.

We recently reported that Blizzard Entertainment has formalized design and distribution guidelines for addons. There were a number of changes, including the fact that developers can no longer sell their addons. Since that time a great majority of the community have voiced their concerns with these new changes, so we decided to talk with a lawyer who's well-versed in such things. Connie Mableson played a role in the now famous MDY vs. Blizzard case and she has some interesting theories about what Blizzard is intending to do now that third party addon authors cannot sell their creations. "Based on all the changes Blizzard is making, I believe the Blizzard business model is to "Monetize" UI Mods/add-ons by developing them in house and offering them for sale to players " said Connie. Unfortunately when we approached Blizzard about this theory, they had no comment.

ZAM: Hello Connie, thank you for taking some time away from your practice to answer our questions about some of the legalities involved in Blizzard's most recent addon policy changes. I understand you're something of a WoW player yourself!

Connie Mableson: Yes, I play WoW almost daily.  Probably too much .  I use add-ons particularly for raiding, keeping track of players in raid, and for DKP.  Our guild's main raid leader has over 100 mods he uses from time to time.

ZAM: Let's start by talking about the new policy that was announced by Blizzard Entertainment on Friday.  Coming from a legal standpoint, what do you think of the policy overall?

BlizzCast Episode 8 has been released, and it is packed full of information on World of Warcraft, StarCraft II and Diablo III. Diablo fans especially will want to check out the 15-minute interview with Lead Technical Artist Julian Love and Senior Artist Mike Nicholson as they discuss the special effects we'll see in Sanctuary, as well as the latest changes to the UI.

As far as WoW is concerned, Game Director Tom Chilton answered two questions regarding Wintergrasp and the game in general. The first question asked why aerial combat was not implemented and if we can expect to see it in the future. Chilton said it wasn't polished enough to make it into the game, but they'd still like to try and make aerial combat work at some point. The second question revolved around expanding the Wintergrasp system in general, especially ranks. Chilton said there really isn't room for additional ranks since it's not reasonable to expect a player to have time to attain it and enjoy it.

As for the Diablo III interview, Love and Nicholson cover all sorts of effects, from the fact that there's about 35 ways for any given monster to die, to how they created the new fury system. There's even a short video of the new fury system in action on the page, as well as new Diablo III and StarCraft II screenshots, so check them out.

How many of you have ever wanted to go for the Glory of the Hero achievement and get a Red-Proto Drake? Well thanks to the work of one our fellow CMs Tyrandor you can now read our guide on how to get it done!

You can view the entire guide here on our wiki and you can discuss about it in the forums here.

As we've mentioned, the second novel based in the Warhammer Online universe was recently released. Well, Warhammer's not the only MMO focusing on books. I'm sure many of you have read a Warcraft novel or two, and now you have the chance to preorder a limited hardcover edition of "Arthas: Rise of the Lich King." It comes in a leather gift box with author Christie Golden's signature.

The novel, as the title suggests, focuses on Arthas Menethil's dark journey toward the Frozen Throne. So if Wrath of the Lich King has piqued your interest in Arthas' story, this book may be worth picking up. Golden has written 25 novels, including "WarCraft: Lord of Clans." She even launched TSR's Ravenloft line with "Vampire of the Mists." The Arthas novel will be released on April 21.

So what are your thoughts on MMO novels? Do you read books set in the World of Warcraft or are they not worth your time?

It's time again to look back at our features and most noteworthy news articles of the week on ZAM.com. Keep reading below and after the jump for links to stories on everything from our list of the top 10 MMOs we'd like to see to our IRC chat logs with EverQuest II developers.

ZAM Features

Exploring LOTRO with Turbine: Part II: We continue our discussion of of Lord of the Rings Online and Book 7 with members of the Turbine team. Check out part 1 first if you missed it.

Courtesy in MMOs: Dead, or Just Hiding?: Editor Sam "azerian" Maxted discusses courtesy in MMOs and how he has no time for beggars.

EverQuest Inspired by D&D Campaign: We uncover an EverQuest lore secret by talking to Tony "Vhalen" Garcia about his work on EverQuest, EverQuest II and all the things in between.

Age of Conan: What They Did Wrong: Editor Christopher "Pwyff" Tom follows up his interview with Age of Conan's Producer/Director Craig Morrison to discuss Funcom's mistakes.

While World of Warcraft is a virtual game, its impact can be seen in the real world. Blizzard has posted two player-submitted stories about how luck can change everything, as well as photos from WoW players in China celebrating the Lunar New Year. Check them out to see how the game is reflected in the lives of these players.

If you'd like to submit a story to Blizzard, you can do so here. And if you have any stories or photos, feel free to share them in our general forum.

Back in October, Wryxian announced on the official European forums that Blizzard was working on combining battlegroups of different languages to create higher populations for both battlegrounds and arenas. Well, the Cross-Language Battlegroups are now available for testing on the PTR, and this weekend's testing will be focused on battlegrounds. Here's when you can participate:

"On Saturday 28th of March, focused Battleground testing will take place between 18:00 and 20:00 CET. On Sunday 29th of March, focused Battleground testing will take place between 16:00 and 20:00 CEST (remember to adjust the clock!)"

You can read Wryxian's full announcement here. Not all battlegroups will be merged, and the Russian-language one will not be affected.

You know the elderly think things were better when they were young; that ice cream was sweeter, summers were hotter and you were grateful for what you had? Given what I've been seeing in MMOs of late, I could be on my way to joining them. I've been shaking my head over the past few months at the way some people behave online. I don't know if it's just the servers I've been playing on, but increasing numbers of players seem to want something for nothing, and aren't afraid to step all over you in order to get it. I'd like to start by addressing something that most of us will have seen in MMOs, and which some may even have participated in when we were newbies. This topic, ladies and gentlemen, is begging.