If you're playing World of Warcraft this weekend and see a legion of pink-haired gnomes charging at you, don't worry—you've just found yourself in the middle of the Running of the Gnomes. It's an annual player-run event where players roll a gnome and race all the way from Gnomeregan to Booty Bay to raise money for breast cancer awareness.
Organised by Dravvie, Running of the Gnomes raises money for The Pink Fund, a charity that provides financial assistance, from housing to insurance, to people with breast cancer. As well as racing, you can donate here. In 2017, the event managed to raise more than $16,000.
Since 2017 Blizzard has marked the event with a micro-holiday that takes place on every server, complete with cheering NPCs, though the player-run event only takes place on Scarlet Crusade-Feathermoon, so that's where you'll want to be if you want lots of competition. It begins at 7 pm ET on October 12.
There are two WoWs now, of course, and Classic players will also be able to participate on the Bloodsail Buccaneers server. You'll even have time race in both games, as the Classic version won't kick off until 7pm ET on October 19. The route is a bit trickier in Classic, but if you've already participated in the race before, you might be up for a new challenge.
Dravvie recommends showing up early so you can get a guild invite, or you can head to the Discord channel where the race is being planned and get an early invite. There's an FAQ, too, which you might want to check out if you're a first timer.
After having to buff event rewards 4 times in a year, WoW director Ion Hazzikostas admits there's 'a pattern' and that 'we may tend to err on the conservative side'
World of Warcraft might not have invented the wheel, but it certainly made it popular—and 20 years on, the MMO titan has fundamentally changed gaming's DNA
