Casey "Malgayne" Monroe from our sister site Wowhead has been chatting with Jeff Kaplan, one of the lead designers for WoW, and he's got a lot of great stuff about what Blizzard is thinking about doing in the future.

While everything here brings exciting possibilities and encompasses a wonderful future, let's keep in mind all of it is still in the design phase and it could be modified or further progress to the project(s) could come to a halt at any moment. Even if development on said project(s) continue, then it certainly isn't going to be in the game anytime soon!

That said, on to the good stuff!

Blizzard is looking at an internal way to rate guilds in both a PvP and PvE respect. Obviously this is a huge undertaking with so many variables to consider! Progression, killing percentages, group makeup, and player moving guilds are just a few of the things that need to be looked at!

While there are many off site choices for rating guilds, using the different requirements, none are sanctioned much less programmed by Blizzard. It doesn't take much consideration to see that a system put in place by the developers would easily and quickly out perform any competition.

The studio is also looking at a system to give bags "preferences" so that items will automatically sort into the bags you specify. Crafters and loot hogs everywhere rejoice gleefully!

A dance studio is under consideration, but the amount of work it takes may push this some distance down the pipeline. Jeff mentioned that it hasn't been talked about publicly much, due to the nature of the project, and the concern about the sheer amount of resources that will be required. Since it takes as much time to add a new dance as a new creature there are obvious design issues to deal with but, if implemented, it could string together unique moves to make your own dance!

I know that raiders everywhere are crying in pain at this point - but the wonderful thing about WoW is how well it encompasses all types of players, not just the hardcore!

Jeff mentioned that they're planning to resolve the Ashbringer storyline in 3.3, though what we can expect to see is still a mystery! You may (or may not) know that it is rumored that Ashbringer is the opposite of Frostmourne, the Lich King's weapon! So expect to see some really great stuff come out of this!

For the achievement system that we'll see in WotLK, you can expect to see (at some point) gameplay achievements which are both 'account wide' and some that are 'guild wide'! Of course, these achievements wasn't revealed (can't be spoiling everything!), but it opens the door to some great speculation!

If you'd like to get in on the action happening at BlizzCon, check out our photo gallery, and of course we'll be covering the event with updates throughout the weekend, so stick around!!!