Blizzard Beefs up World of Warcraft's Recruit-a-Friend

It appears that Blizzard has beefed up their World of Warcraft recruit-a-friend program rather substantially. There have been rumors that this was coming for a while now, but the details are still a little surprising. Benefits include triple experience, being able to summon your friend from anywhere in the world, free levels, free gametime, and even a free mount if your friend signs up for a two-month subscription. All of these are subject to several quid pro quos, but it looks like Blizzard is really trying to ramp up their player base for the expansion.

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[michaeltoe]

Blizzard has been increasingly adding out-of-game rewards for people who spend more money (WoW TCG being an example) and this is the first time that those rewards have affected gameplay. You can level three times as fast if you can get a friend to sign up, or (and more likely to happen) you decide to multibox. This shows Blizzard has lost their scruples about abusing this business model. It's only a matter of time before they start charging money for in-game content that should otherwise have been covered by the subscription/price of the game.