"Chrono rating" would make warlocks unstoppable killing machines, I'm afraid.

Wasn't there some sort of Tauren update to their race/lore in Northrend? Somewhere in my mind I have this as being stated somewhere in an interview for WotLK...

Yes they said they wanted to focus on fleshing out Tauren and Dwarven lore in the expansion.

Taunka - WoWWiki - Your guide to the World of Warcraft

The way I'd design it is this: all your talent points are spent for you when you make the character. However, once you complete the quests to break free of the Lich King's control, you are given a one-time free respec, representing your new ability to think for yourself and make your own critical decisions.

This also makes balancing and creating those intro quests easier because all the Death Knights will be completely identical, no variation from talent choices.

I wouldn't be surprised if they end up completely breaking the game for the first few levels of DKs--five talent points per level for the first ten levels, with the new talent tiers somewhat matching new spells that are coming in.

They have a bit of flexibility in introducing the death knight because, unlike other classes, you have to have had some WoW experience and a certain amount of game knowledge can be assumed. I'm not sure what can actually be elided, aside from obvious nub-town quests like "this is a flightmaster!", but they can certainly accelerate the learning curve for class abilities. I would expect around a dozen activated abilities on a new character, plus a smattering of self-buffs (auras, armors, 'blessings'), with another two to six abilities introduced per level. They can start off with some more advanced stuff like crowd-control, interactive abilities, 5-minute cooldowns, and whatnot, much earlier than normal.

The presence of frost runes, and presumably a frost tree, raises the question of what sort of crowd control capabilities a DK will have. This may very well define how they differ from a warrior in PvP (unless it's just a frost-based hamstring). It could also be a way of giving the tank tree some PvP viability while still having a lowered damage output, if frost does end up being the tank tree.

From a Jeff Kaplan interview regarding WotLK:

PC Feature: WoW: Wrath of the Lich King, #2 - ComputerAndVideoGames.com

Who is Zitron? Is that "hot tip" from Tigole or the interviewer?

Actually, starting level they mentioned (50-60) might suggest that it will start in old WoW end game undead zones. Imagine how great it would be to have starting quest hub for DKs right outside the Stratholme.

It doesn't seem to be a direct quote but the article is based on his interview. Ed Zitron appears to be the interviewer.

I'd imagine then that this is just the interviewer's wishful thinking/guesswork, rather than based on anything Tigole mentioned, or Tigole would be quoted. Archdruid as a hero class would overlap entirely with current Druids if WC3 is anything to go by.

Hmm.. tusked moose is all good... but those glowing eyes are just freaky.

Shovel tusks were fairly obviously designed by an idiot with artistic flair but no clue about biology. Digging for food with tusks, fine. But with the tusks situated where they are, a shovel tusk can't eat anything it digs up. Look at it. How's it supposed to get its mouth anywhere near the ground? The only time you'll ever find tusks situated like that is on an animal with some kind of manipulative organ to bring food up to its mouth (e.g. elephant's trunk), or on an animal that's browsing vegetation above ground level. For a ground-foraging animal, you need a long snout and tusks that project above the snout, not below - see wild boar for an example.

Maybe it has a really long tongue.

But yeah, maybe its the lack of sleep but just thinking about the inability to eat because I have no hands and there are these huge tusks blocking my mouth is making me ill.

"Thick Shovel Tusk Leather" needed for 425-475 leatherworking!

I personally like the description of its... appendage as an antler, despite the lack of any sort of pedicle.

Presumably the creature sheds the entire top of its skull after mating season and runs around for half the year with its brain exposed to the elements.

It's kinda tongue in cheek. I was mainly tickled by the fact that they tried to rationalise the design (tusks are for digging in snow) and got it wrong (they'll all starve because they can't eat). I'm quite happy to call myself an idiot in terms of artistic ability, so turnabout is fair play.

Nothing concrete, but an interesting statement from Tigole regarding attunements:

Not seen this here anywhere yet.
WoR have posted this:

Thats kinda weird. You'd figure if it's just for one spell, they could make it basically like this:
Totem of Healing Rains - Items - World of Warcraft

No reason to have the Up to, just increase the damage by a base amount. I guess it's not supposed to be affected by talents though.

I thought I read somewhere that they didn't want these things to just be bonuses to spell damage or spell healing but rather to add unique and interesting effects to the spells. It will be sad if we all just enchant our spells with threat gains, damage gains, and healing gains that only benefit us (no group benefit).

My guess is that for lower ranks of Fireball you will not get the full +50 dmg.