Gnomes rain down on WoW players

In-game adverts are generally regarded as a bad thing, even when gamers are assured they will play a small and non-invasive role in the gameplay. Sometimes though, they can prove to be incredibly inventive and amusing. It's rare, but it happens.

Possibly in order to get around the latest patch to World of Warcraft, which had a spam-hammer component to fight back against the gold farmers which are currently plaguing the realms of Azeroth, one company has gone to extraordinary lengths to get some in-game publicity.

Using what Kerri Knight calls "the age-old client-side memory hack", advertisers for Wowmine.com rained down a message of biblical proportions outside Ironforge Bank; spelling out the web address with the bodies of dead gnomes who rained out of the sky in an unholy torrent of midgets.

Blizzard was quick to react and sent in teams to clean away the mess.

Blizzard reps have since asked the community to help tackle the problem via the WoW forums, just in case the gnomes (or worse) strike again;

"I ask that any player that witnesses these to report them straight [sic] away. If you feel so inclined, you can also post the realm name, and zone here and I can see what can be done about getting them handled that way. Please, once they are reported, leave the bodies alone, and do not linger around, or huddle near the bodies."

That's right folks, move along - there's nothing to see here except the piles of dead gnomes. Nothing at all.

Hate gold farmers? Think virtual worlds should be taxed, or is the whole thing way out of proportion? Put your answers on a postcard and send them to this thread... in handwriting form only please.