All Races Available in Patch 5.0.4

Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)

With the release of patch 5.0.4, we’re making all the races of Azeroth playable by anyone, no matter which version or expansion of World of Warcraft they own. This includes the enigmatic pandaren, who will become available for play when Mists of Pandaria is released on Tuesday, September 25. We want the entire World of Warcraft community to be able to embrace their inner goblin, blood elf, worgen, draenei, or pandaren from the moment they step foot into the world of Azeroth.

Now, the only hard part will be choosing a name. Who will you be next?

Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)

I've seen some confusion about when pandaren character creation will be accessible.

Just to be clear on the announcement, we're making it possible for people to create a character of any race, regardless of what expansions you've purchased. So if you only have the original game (which now has The Burning Crusade included), when patch 5.0.4 hits you'll be able to create goblin and worgen characters as well. And, once Mists of Pandaria is released, you'll be able to create pandaren characters, regardless of whether or not you own Mists of Pandaria.

So it says all races, what about though all classes? Just because Pandaren become available for play regardless if you have MoP or not, does this include the new monk class?
No, you'll need to upgrade your World of Warcraft license to Mists of Pandaria in order to unlock the monk class. The same is true for leveling from 85-90 and gaining access to the continent of Pandaria.

Looting in Mist of Pandaria explained

An explanation of the looting way in current cataclysm and the next expansion.
Here is how looting works in today’s Raid Finder groups:

1.     The boss dies.
2.     The game randomly decides which items off of the boss’s loot table drop.
3.     The group rolls Need, Greed, or Pass on each item.
4.     If you were raiding with a group of friends, you might discuss who should get each item. Even if you ultimately lost, hopefully you are happy that a friend got an upgrade and that your group as a whole is now a little bit stronger.
5.     But if you’re in Raid Finder, you are quite possibly alone with a bunch of strangers.
6.     So, if you can Need, you probably do, because there’s no time for discussion, some of the rollers may be AFK, and even if you piss someone off, you aren’t likely to have to pay the social cost of doing so since you’ll never see them again.
7.     The highest roll wins.
8.     Drama ensues.

Here’s how the new Raid Finder system will work in Mists of Pandaria:

1.     The boss dies.
2.     The game automatically decides who won some loot, and gives those players a spec-appropriate item.
3.     Some players may still get mad, but hopefully they are mad at the laws of probability and not at the rest of the raid.

Read the full blue post here.