The 2009 Legends of Norrath championship is scheduled to be held at the Gen Con Indy gaming convention, which kick off Aug. 13 and runs through Aug. 16. The next championship qualifier will be held this weekend and begins tomorrow, Aug. 1, at 10 a.m. PDT. The first and second place winners will earn $500 and $200, respectively, as well as a trip to Gen Con and the opportunity to compete for the title and their share of the $25,000 prize purse.

For more information, check out the official rules and the events calendar. There's no fee to enter the championship qualifier, so there's no harm in building a deck and giving it your best shot this weekend. Even if you don't earn a trip to Gen Con, you could place in the top 16 and win a booster box or some booster packs.

If you're looking to participate in some Legends of Norrath events, you now have two more to add to your list. The Big Game Hunt scenario is currently available and runs through Aug. 12 at 2 p.m. PDT. The first time you win you'll get the Nathsarian Ring of the Mighty promo card and either the Moonsfang's Cub loot card for EverQuest or the A Tames Stag loot card for EverQuest II. The armor ring gives your avatar +1 damage bonus for each of your abilities.

Also, the July Loot Tournament will be held this weekend. Queues begin at 7 a.m. on Saturday and end Sunday at 9 p.m. For 10 event passes you'll get a Forest Giant Verdant promo card and either an EQ Combine Shield Ornament or EQII Tapestry of the Frozen Treat loot card, as well as three Storm Break booster packs.

We already reported it yesterday, but now it's official: Storm Break, the seventh Legends of Norrath expansion, was released today! The set adds more than 240 new game cards to the mix and marks the end of the Ethernauts saga.

Even though the expansion's now available, there's one new Storm Break preview article to check out if you're interested. Game Designer Evan "Heimlich" Lorentz explains how existing Legends of Norrath rules are used in new ways in Storm Break, such as the Lookout and Protector keywords.

Don't forget that sealed deck tournaments are scheduled to take place throughout the weekend starting Friday to commemorate the launch of Storm Break. You can find out more about the tournaments here.

Storm Break, the seventh Legends of Norrath expansion, is scheduled to be released tomorrow, July 9. In honor of the occasion, Sony Online Entertainment has six Storm Break sealed deck tournaments planned throughout the weekend. They'll be held at 11 a.m. and 5 p.m. PDT on Friday and at 10 a.m. and 5 p.m. on Saturday and Sunday.

For 20 event passes, you'll get a Storm Break tournament sealed decks and four Storm Break booster packs, as well as an exclusive City of Exiles promo card. Use the sealed deck and three boosters to construct your tournament deck. The first-place winner of the 256-player event will win 10 Storm Break boosters.

The expansion is the conclusion of the Ethernauts saga. You can find out more about the set in this introduction article, or read about how faction will be used in the final installment of the "trilogy." More information on this weekend's tournaments can be found below.

ODUS!  Details are sketchy at the moment, but the expansion will explore Odus, what happened to it, and the lore lines of Kerra and Erudites.  The level cap will be raised to 90, with more Achievement Points available to put into expanded AP trees.  Sentinel's Fate is planned for a February 2010 release date.  All Fan Faire attendees will get Beta access and a free digital copy.

Planned for release at the same time as the expansion will be a new starting city:  Halas. 

EQII is now on a three month Game Update cycle.  GU53 will feature auto-mentoring, where one can down-tier one's character without mentoring another toon.  This will allow players to explore grey content for experience and achievement points.  GU53 will also open up the Shard of Love, where players might discover the fate of Erollisi Marr.

In LoN News, the final set of the Ethernaut saga, Stormbreak, is scheduled to be released in July. 

And in Station Cash news, Character Transfers will soon be available via the Station Marketplace.  You'll be able to get your transfer for $25 worth of Station Cash.

Fan Faire will be held in Las Vegas this week from June 25-28, but that's not the only SOE event going on this weekend. The June Loot Tournament kicks off Saturday at 7 a.m. PDT for Legends of Norrath players and runs through Sunday at 9 p.m.

For 10 event passes you'll get three Against the Void booster packs, a Forest Giant Ancient promo card and either the Nimbus of the Dead loot card for EverQuest players or the Crocodile Collar loot card for EverQuest II players.

As always, you can compete in the tournament for additional prizes if you live in the U.S. The competition is void in Arizona, Connecticut, Iowa, Maryland, Nevada, Tennessee and Vermont. 

Interested Legends of Norrath players will have two opportunities this week to show off their skills. Starting Thursday, June 18, you and three companions will be able to participate in the Bloody Kithicor 4v1 raid. If you can defeat Bahgresh, General of the Agents of Discord, you'll win the Chestplate of Vindication promo card. Also, victorious Mages will receive Dragon's Marrow, Priests get Donal's Breastplate of Mourning and Scouts get Ragebringer.

Once you've done that, get ready for the next Legends of Norrath Championship Qualifier event this weekend! The competition begins at 10 a.m. PT on Saturday, June 20, and the top two players will win a trip to Gen Con Indy 2009 to compete for the world championship title. More information can be found on the Championship Qualifier page on the game's official site. The next qualifier round will be held July 25-26.

The next Legends of Norrath promo weekend will begin at 2 p.m. Pacific time today and end at 10 a.m. on Monday. Over the next few days, you can expect to see two new promo cards drop in EverQuest and EverQuest II.

The two cards are the Plainsman Healer and the Plainsman Supporter. Whenever combat ends involving the Plainsman Healer, the unit will heal 1 damage on a friendly legend combatant. As for the Supporter, it gets +1 damage bonus for each friendly legend combatant.

Sony Online Entertainment has announced on the official Legends of Norrath site that Storm Break, the final chapter of the Ethernauts saga, will be released in July. The expansion will add more than 240 cards to the mix.

All you EverQuest and EverQuest II players will also have access to some new loot cards, including new horse and hydra mounts, a flying dragon illusion for EQ players, and a once-daily item-repair cloak for EQII players.

More information can be found on the Storm Break page of the official site.

Sony Online Entertainment has announced that 13 original pieces of artwork from Legends of Norrath and PoxNora will be featured in the EXPOSÉ 7 digital art book, which is touted as "the finest international collection of digital art." These images were selected for the publication from a pool of more than 6,000 entries. The book contains 391 pieces of digital art by 288 artists from 51 countries.

You can order the art book online through the Ballistic Publishing's Web site, as well as view a small preview of the book's pages to get a glimpse of the type of art that was selected. A list of the titles and artists of the chosen SOE pieces can be found in the press release after the jump.