World of Warcraft, the most successful MMO in history, has hit a recent low of 10.3 million subscribers as of the end of September, according to Gamasutra.  That’s down 14% from a peak of 12 million in 2010, and from 11.1 million at the end of June.  Blizzard is planning a number of steps to bring that number back up again, including a promotion that includes a pass to the upcoming Diablo III with an annual pass to World of Warcraft.  The fourth expansion for World of Warcraft, Mists of Pandaria, releases soon.

World of Warcraft is the source intellectual property for a variety of licensed products, including Cryptozoic’s World of Warcraft TCG, which was apparently unaffected by the downturn.  It held steady as the #5 collectible game in the mass channel and was up a tick to #4 in the hobby category, according to ICv2’s Top Collectible Games charts for Summer 2011 (see “Top Collectible Games—Summer 2011”).  Of course, with the relative size of the markets, only a tiny percentage of the MMO customers are required to make the TCG a hit. And the TCG’s sales seem primarily driven by factors internal to the game, including the popularity of the Loot cards.  The next release, the World of Warcraft TCG Fall 2011 Class Starter Decks, shipping early in December, has sold out from the publisher in advance of release (see “WoW Fall Class Starters”).