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Unfortunately Breja and Lanntonio were unable to make it for the interview but Jen and Nevik held down the fort and had an absolute blast talking all things wizard, allergy placebos, and a dash of Final Fantasy with Jaetch.

Jaetch is an active forum member over at DiabloFans, so be sure to keep an eye out for his posts (which you can easily find through his profile) if you’re interested in elevating your wizard-play to the next level. Also be sure to check out his YouTube channel for his future endeavors into producing video guides.

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In this episode:

* We read, and respond to, a couple of emails we received from our wonderful listeners. This batch comes to us from Str8UpJack and Master Do. Thank you for the email! Keep them coming, really!

* We received tweets from @HomeTownHero008, @scanline75, @Rilandune, @JCMonkeyD3, @ecwctechguy, @CodyGreeson, @Healzonwheelz, and @Torrack1714. Thank you for your tweets. Don’t forget that you, too, can send in your thoughts via social media outlets such as Facebook, Google+, and Twitter.

* In honor of Diablo 3 turning one year old a lot of artists put together some amazing pieces of art, and Blizzard compiled a blog post highlighting all of them! We highly, highly suggest you head on over and check out all of the art!

* If you were a fan of the Book of Cain – which we talked about in episode 6 – we recently found out that Insight Editions is hard at work at putting the final touches on a follow-up of sorts, the Book of Tyrael. Expect this 148 page book of expanded lore to drop sometime in October, that is if, of course, it isn’t delayed.

* Are you a comic book fan? Did you have the foresight to make preparations immediately following the conclusion of Comic-Con 2012 and will be attending Comic-Con 2013? Surprise! Blizzard will have a presence at San Diego Comic-Con 2013 (running July 18th through the 21st) and will have exclusive swag for you to snag.

* We have a GAME DIRECTOR! We repeat, we HAVE a GAME DIRECTOR! Josh Mosquiera will taking the reigns behind the third installment of this amazing franchise, and he had a message for all of us! We’re behind you Josh, and we hope you’re a HUGE fan of the wizard!

* Our dear friend from France, Master Do, shared with us his little Lego “Demon Hunters”. Thank you Master Do for being such an inspiration! And don’t forget to submit a comment to this episode with your caption for Master Do’s Demon Hunter Ambivalence!

Links for you to Visit:

* Logical FilmsPR decided to put together a fan film based on the worst class in the game, errr we mean the Puke Doctor! Alright, alright … the Witch Doctor! Check it out, it’s pretty cool!

* If you aren’t getting enough puke action in your Diablo 3 game-time, ChromeOnRust shared a video highlighting a build he is using that is fairly MP10-viable, the BatDog!

* In case you’re not a fan of the puke doctor (like Nevik) then maybe you’re looking for a fun wizard build that has a very specific theme. Behold the NINJA WIZARD! Jaetch decided that his secondary wizard wasn’t getting enough love and put together this themed build for fun-sies.

* Tatasinke is back with another edition of his Paper.li newspaper, the New Tristram News. Check it out and subscribe!

Song of the Show:

You’ll notice that following the close of our show there was a piece of amazing music. For our very first “song of the show” Nevik decided to share with you the amazing “Serious Danger” by A_Rival (@8bitpimp) from his brand new album TRUTHCANNON. If you like what you hear, then buy the entire album (you can preview the entire thing beforehand if you wish) and check out his older work too!

Have a Diablo III related comment, question, story, or rant that you’d like to share with all of us? Send your email, or short audio comment, to Show@ShatteredSoulstone.com.

Show Links:

• Email the show, Nevik, Jen, or Breja
• Twitters: Show, Nevik, Jen, Lanntonio and Breja
• Check out the show’s Facebook fan page and our G+ Page
  

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Check out Audible for your FREE, no obligation 30 day trial including a free 1 credit book. Go to bit.ly/sspbook to start your trial today!

If you would like to join in on the fun – and we hope you do! – Lanntonio is running these hardcore gaming nights generally every Tuesday night around 6 pm Pacific / 8pm Central / 9pm Eastern. All you need to do to join in is have Mumble installed and setup and hop on our mumble server (details can be found in the sidebar).

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From Insight Editions comes another stunning book filled with lore and artwork from the Diablo III “universe”. Diablo III: Book of Tyrael will be released on October 1, 2013. Personally, I cannot wait to get my hands on this book!

My experience playing through Diablo III has made me a huge fan of Tyrael. If you’ve played through Normal Difficulty of Diablo III, then you already know that Tyrael started out as the Archangel of Justice on the Angiris Council. He chose to give up his immortality in order to help the Nephalem on Sanctuary (and he does help the players through many parts of the Diablo III game). What’s not to like about a character that makes such a huge sacrifice in order to help others?

Diablo III: Book of Tyrael is intended to be a companion edition to Diablo III: Book of Cain. In other words, Diablo III: Book of Tyrael is not a novel (like Diablo III: The Order, written by Nate Kenyon, is). This time, players will get an in-depth look into the mind of Archangel Tyrael. The book is a chronicle of Tyrael’s involvement in the Eternal Conflict that wages in the Diablo “universe”. You can also expect to find more amazing illustrations that are wrapped within covers that are as detailed as what we saw with Diablo III: Book of Cain.

What else will it contain? From the press release:

As a former archangel of the High Heavens, Tyrael ranks among the most important and influential characters in the Diablo franchise. Here, in this illustrated and comprehensive tome, he reveals never-before-known secrets about the history of the world, the dark threats that yet face mankind, and his decision to join the ranks of humanity as a mortal.

In addition to plenty of writings from the viewpoint of Tyrael, the book will also include some writings from Leah and Deckard Cain. There will also be a fully removable family tree. I cannot help but wonder whose family tree that is! I suppose it could be Leah’s family tree. Maybe it is a family tree that connects all of the Archangels? We are just going to have to wait and see.

It seems to me that you wouldn’t necessarily have to have read Diablo III: Book of Cain before you can dig into Diablo III: Book of Tyrael. They aren’t exactly a “series” (like what you would find with novels). Each can stand completely on it’s own, and will enhance the information that is found in the other. I tend to think of these type of books as one part “Monster Manual” and one part “story time”. You can start with either one, and compare it to the other, without getting “lost”.

In this episode, we celebrate Diablo 3 leveling up IRL and then we get down to business by discussing what we’ve been up to in-game: Breja returns to his altoholic ways,  Lanntonio mucked around with his hardcore monk, Nevik attained a few more paragon levels, and Jen CLEARED NORMAL with her launch night demon hunter, Thirtyseven.

Check out Audible for your FREE, no obligation 30 day trial including a free 1 credit book. Go to bit.ly/sspbook to start your trial today!

In this episode:

* We did NOT receive a mountain of emails like we normally do from you, our wonderful listeners. We were genuinely shocked at this given what happened when patch 1.0.8 went live. Nevertheless we LOVE hearing from you with your emails! Keep them coming, really!

* We received tweets from @scanline75, @HomeTownHero008, @Torrack1714, @eG_acefisher1, @Smokimus, @shawno, @Healzonwheelz, @Rilandune, and our very own @QueenofHaiku! Thank you for your tweets. Don’t forget that you, too, can send in your thoughts via social media outlets such as Facebook, Google+, and Twitter.

* With Diablo 3 turning a year old we decided to take a look back at the past 12 months. From controversies to triumphs we covered most of it thanks to the immensely handy article, Diablo 3: A Look Back, over at DiabloFans.com. Also be sure to check out Blizzard’s official blog post, The Road So Far.

* Assuredly you will notice that we have a NEW INTRO! Thank you to @JCMonkeyD3 for providing us with our new intro. We LURVES it!

Links for you to Visit:

* We referenced interviews that Archon the Wizard conducted with Travis Day and Wyatt Cheng during his 36 hour gaming marathon. It’s three hours long so strap in. However, if you’d like the juicy tidbits from these interviews Flux from Diablo.IncGamers.com penned them down for all of us: Travis Day Interview Highlights, and Wyatt Cheng Interview Highlights.

* If you’re anxiously awaiting the Playstation 3 version of Diablo 3 Sony recently sat down with Production Director John Hight as well as a few other key members from the console team.

* Tatasinke is back with another edition of his Paper.li newspaper, the New Tristram News. Check it out and subscribe!

Have a Diablo III related comment, question, story, or rant that you’d like to share with all of us? Send your email, or short audio comment, to Show@ShatteredSoulstone.com.

Show Links:

• Email the show, Nevik, Jen, or Breja
• Twitters: Show, Nevik, Jen, Lanntonio and Breja
• Check out the show’s Facebook fan page and our G+ Page
  

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Check out Audible for your FREE, no obligation 30 day trial including a free 1 credit book. Go to bit.ly/sspbook to start your trial today!

Once again this episode is light on the game-talk and heavy on discussion, but a little birdy tells me that the next episode in this series will be very in-game centric, and may just be massive enough to split into two.

If you would like to join in on the fun – and we hope you do! – Lanntonio is running these hardcore gaming nights generally every Tuesday night around 6pm Pacific / 8pm Central / 9pm Eastern. All you need to do to join in is have Mumble installed and setup and hop on our mumble server (details can be found in the sidebar).

Download Now | Subscribe in iTunes

Check out Audible for your FREE, no obligation 30 day trial including a free 1 credit book. Go to bit.ly/sspbook to start your trial today!

In this episode:

* We read, and respond to, another mountain of emails we received from our wonderful listeners. This batch comes to us from Torrack, Master Do, and Commander Bird. Thank you for the email! Keep them coming, really!

* We received tweets from @Dienforce, @shawno, @Rilandune, @Medros, @eG_acefisher1, @Daladria, @HometownHero008, @Lylirra, and our very own @The_Breja! Thank you for your tweets. Don’t forget that you, too, can send in your thoughts via social media outlets such as Facebook, Google+, and Twitter.

* We discuss, at length, the arrival of patch 1.0.8 and the infamous gold dupe bug that proliferated the softcore community and the fallout from for as long as it was available to be exploited. Darkest day in Diablo 3′s history? Quite possibly, but we wrap up the discussion with some positives that we can hope to see come from this debacle.

* In case you don’t follow us on Twitter and missed the exciting announcement, ALL of the Shattered Soulstone will be in attendance at Blizzcon 2013! GET HYPE! We can’t wait for November, but thankfully it is still a ways off to give us plenty of time to plan out what special things we’ll be doing at Blizzcon.

* Next week we will see Diablo 3 turn one year old (well, based on its launch day at least ^^) and we will be holding an event to celebrate! For more details head on over to our Diablo 3 Anniversary Event page.

* We also see the return of a certain special sound-bite. No idea what it could be, really. No really, we have no idea. Nope. Definitely couldn’t be related to something red and intoxicating. NOPE. No way.

We’re still looking for intro submissions for our Intro Contest. Prizes haven’t been nailed down, but at the very least you could win a $20 (US) Battle.net Balance Card! Send your intros to Show@ShatteredSoulstone.com. Keep them shorter than 45 seconds (30 preferably) and make sure to utilize royalty-free music or music from Diablo 3. Deadline for this contest has also not been nailed down, but we’re hoping to have a new intro in time for the anniversary of Diablo 3 going live.

Links for you to Visit:

* Sibcoe and Dred are back and joined by a familiar voice from State of Diablo 3 past as Ken rejoins Red Team Gaming to discuss the current state of Diablo 3 in the 18th installment of Red Team Gaming’s on-going series: State of Diablo 3. One warning though, this episode is a little more heavy on language and is at times NSFW, so we will only be including the link.

* Tatasinke continues to pump out regular editions of his New Tristram News paper.li newspaper. Check it out and subscribe!

* Xanth produces the fantastic column, One Life to Live, over at Diablo.IncGamers.com and recently had a chance to share the enthralling story, Knocking at Death’s Door, of hardcore (near)death of Galxx, a paragon 90 barbarian played by a 54 year old Chicago’ian woman. If this doesn’t get you pumped to play hardcore, we don’t know what will.

* Artist ChaoYuanXu recently completed a breath-taking piece of art featuring the Archangel of Justice (well Wisdom … now), Tyrael. Check out ChaoYuanXu’s other amazing pieces of art over at chaoyuanxu.deviantart.com.

* Back in April Blizzard shared the amazingly cute fan art by Crimson-Nemesis with their Fan Creation of the Week blog post on the official site. Check out more of Crimson-Nemesis’ artwork over at crimson-nemesis.deviantart.com.

* Finally we round out a trifecta of art with an amazing rendition of Mephisto’s Visage by artist/sculptor Evernight. For more pictures of this amazing piece of art, check out the forum thread created by Evernight.

Have a Diablo III related comment, question, story, or rant that you’d like to share with all of us? Send your email, or short audio comment, to Show@ShatteredSoulstone.com.

Show Links:

• Email the show, Nevik, Jen, or Breja
• Twitters: Show, Nevik, Jen, Lanntonio and Breja
• Check out the show’s Facebook fan page and our G+ Page
  

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Joining us for this round table was 9pad (@9PadGaming), Dave Dienforce Adams (@Dienforce) from the now defunct Diablo Off the Record and Dungeon Crawler podcasts, Jaime (@JCMonkeyD3), Jesse aka Saintly Demon (@HomeTownHero008), Mach1, Overtime, Scanline (@scanline75), and Torrack (@Daladria).

If you couldn’t make it to our Patch 1.0.8 community round table fret not, there will be more round tables in the future. You can expect a round table for each substantial patch as Diablo 3 matures into the game we all want it to be. So go download Mumble to join in on the fun with us.

Quick Note: You’ll notice at times the audio during the round table community isn’t quite all … that great. Somehow Nevik’s recording levels didn’t mesh well with Mumble. It’s still quite listenable, but hopefully next time it will be a lot better.

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We will be celebrating Diablo III’s launch anniversary with a very special gaming night. How special you may ask, well, let’s just say that everyone will be slaying demons in their birthday suits.

That’s right. We will be playing brand spanking new randomly chosen hardcore characters with nothing equipped except for the weapons we find from the demons we slay as we go. Oh, and did we mention that we will be running these games on Monster Power Level 10?

So, how do you, the listener, participate?

As with our gaming nights we will be holding our Diablo III Launch Anniversary event on Mumble, so make sure you have Mumble installed on your computer and go through the audio setup wizard if you haven’t already done so. (The wizard is pretty easy to follow and shouldn’t take more than a couple of minutes to complete). Then look to the sidebar to the right to find the details for the Mumble server we maintain for our listeners.

So when will we be holding this anniversary event?

Wednesday, May 15th at 6 PM Pacific / 9 PM Eastern

Make sure you clear your calendars on Wednesday, May 15th at 6pm Pacific / 9pm Eastern. More than likely we won’t start EXACTLY at this time as some “pre-show” will definitely occur to loosen everyone up.

Hope to “see” you there!

Check out Audible for your FREE, no obligation 30 day trial including a free 1 credit book. Go to bit.ly/sspbook to start your trial today!

Once again this episode is light on the game-talk and heavy on regaling us all with the many, many deaths that occurred. At some point we will be hosting a more in-game focused hardcore gaming night with a special rule-set, we promise!

If you would like to join in on the fun – and we hope you do! – Lanntonio is running these hardcore gaming nights generally every Tuesday night around 6pm Pacific / 8pm Central / 9pm Eastern. All you need to do to join in is have Mumble installed and setup and hop on our mumble server (details can be found in the sidebar).

Download Now | Subscribe in iTunes