Ho ho ho! Ah huv tae admit, ah love the christmas season an’ ah widnae miss the celebrations fer anythin’ - especially no them ragged-arsed scourge buggers.  Food, drink, dancin’ an’ bein’ cosy inside watchin’ the snow ootside. No that different fae normal in Ironforge but it’s whit yer drinkin’ an eatin’ that makes the difference… *ahem*

I’ve been busy, maybe more than some others, an’ it’s taking me a bit longer to get back into the blogging swing and get writing regularly when there’s so much cool stuff going on but I made a special slot in my schedule, logged off, put aside my doodles and pulled up a blank page in Wordpress for this. World events, I love them, and I will wax lyrical at ye mercilessly and pitilessly with my take on them!

So, Winter Veil,  the holiday season vaguely associated with Christmas - Snow, presents, special food, drinks and corporate enterprise!

Achievements

For many, all that they will be concerned about this holiday season ar the associated achievements so lets look at what we have:

Merrymaker - Alliance // Merrymaker - Horde

Not to onerous, in my opinion, and it certainly looks to be less painful than some of the previous ones.

• On Metzen
• Scrooge (A) // Scrooge (H)
• Tis’ the Season
• Simply Abominable
• Bros. Before Ho Ho Ho’s (A) // Bros. Before Ho Ho Ho’s (H)
• He Knows if You’ve Been Naughty
• With a Little Helper From My Friends
  
• Fa-La-La-La Ogri’la
• Crashin’ & Thrashin’
• Let It Snow
• The Winter Veil Gourmet
• A Frosty Shake

Some of these quests might be a pain for low levels, new Death Knights and those who hate PvP.  I was a bit surprised at “Fa-La-La-La Ogri’la” as it requires you to have done a quest chain which people even hard a hard time getting a group for just prior to Wrath never mind post-wrath. I guess there will be groups made and suchlike but it seems a little unfair that some will have to go through a lot more than others just to get their achievement.

The Horde version of Bros. Before Ho Ho Ho’s has a lot fewer NPC’s to visit but at least one of them is in Icecrown and far hader to get to for lower level characters.

Once again we get a pvp-based quest and, whilst I’m not as much of an anti-pvp-er as some, 50 HK’s might be a bit wearing since the costume doesn’t persist through death.

Let It Snow will also be interesting given that I’ve not yet seen an Orc Death Knight on our server - I’m sure a bit of pvp for the previously mentioned achievement will solve that, though, or running around Dalaran in th early evening.

Quests

Winterveil has always had a few fun quests (most now with associated achievements) and I have to admit I rather like this, in a world event.  Quests allow you to get into the spirit of the event within the ‘format’ of the game and often introduce the story better than a simple collection of dailies and repeatable quests.

• Metzen the Reindeer
• The Reason for the Season (A) // The Reason for the Season (H) (and follow up)
  
• Stolen Winter Veil Treats (starts a chain for seperate Horde and Alliance versions)
• Treats for Gratfather Winter (A) // Treats for Gratfather Winter (H)

It would have been nice to get something new here, other than the quest which simply allows yo to ‘buy’ preserved holly.

Items

Winter Veil comes with lots of gifts and presents and suchlike as well as some seasonally associated items. Some are associated with achievements and some not, but most are fun to have and collect.

Winter Garb

• Red Winter Hat // Green Winter Hat
  
• Red Winter Clothes // Green Winter Clothes
• Winter Boots

To craft 1 set you’ll need:

• Clothes: 4 bolts of runecloth (20 peices of runecloth), 1 bolt of woolen cloth (3 pieces of wool), 2 red or green dye & 1 rune thread.
  
• Boots:  1 copper bar,  1 bolt of woolen cloth (3 pieces of wool), 4 rugged leather & 1 rune thread.

The rune thread can be bought from most tailoring or leatherworking suppliers or a trade goods vendor.  Wool cloth is easily garnered by making a quick run through stockades if it’s too expensive on the auction house and runecloth can be picked up by the dozen in Tyr’s Hand in Eastern Plaguelands or a quick trip to Stratholme.

Rugged leather and copper will need to be bought unless you have the associated gathering skills (though if you do the above ‘Treats for Greatfather Winter’ first you might get the copper you need!).

Alliance tailors with the requisite levels will usually have a pattern sent to them to make the red winter clothes and Horde tailors  get the green winter clothes pattern sent to them.  However, vendors also sell the pattern - red in Ironforge, green in Orgrimmar and since they are goblins and thus neutral, if you fancy getting a hold of the othe faction’s pattern colour you can have a go at corpse-running your way through an opposite-faction city.  It took me three ‘tries’ on my level 65 tailor to get into Orgrimmar, buy the pattern and hearth out and I’ve already made a reasonable profit selling green costumes on the Alliance auction house.  *Grin*

The  Winter Veil Disguise Kit is a quest reward costume that you’ll also need for an achievement.  Proper winter clothing!  It should turn up in your mail box some time after completing the quest line started by Stolen Winter Veil Treats.

Food

• Gingerbread Cookie
• Egg Nog
• Hot Apple Cider

These are all recipes trainable during Winter Veil and are needede for the Winter Veil Gourmet achievement.  The necessary materials are relatively light:

• Cookie:  1 small egg, 1 holiday spices
  
• Egg Nog: 1 small egg, 1 ice cold milk, 1 holiday spirits, 1 holiday spices
• Cider: 1 sparkling apple cider, 1 holiday spirits, 1 holiday spices

Remember you will need extra to make the 5 cookies needed for ‘Treats for Greafather Winter’!  Everything except the small egg is buyable from a vendor - the milk comes from any low level drink vendor (the nearest one usually being the innkeeper) and the rest from the Smokeywood Pastures vendor.

Small eggs, at this time of year, can go for silly prices on the AH given how easy they are to get.  If you can’t be bothered then fair enough, but if you have a spare hearth and don’t want to pay silly AH prices for things then go to Westfall, Azuremyst, Darkshore, Mulgore,  the Barrens or Eversong Woods and kill one of the many low level creatures which drop small eggs.

• Graccu’s Mincemeat Fruitcake

This is required for ‘Tis the Season and is contained in items you get in the mail after completing some of the Winter Veil quests - Treats for Greatfather Winter and Metzen the Reindeer.

Fun Stuff

Also contained in the special gifts sent from Greatfather Winter, can be:

Recipes

• Formula: Enchant Weapon - Winter’s Might
• Plans:  Edge of Winter
• Schematic: Snowmaster 9000
• Recipe:  Elixir of Frost Power
• Pattern: Gloves of the Greatfather
• Pattern: Green Holiday Shirt
  

Other

• Mechanical Greench
• Preserved Holly

Revelers

During the holiday season, you can blow a kiss (/kiss) to a winter reveller and recieve:

• A Handful of  Snowflakes
• Fresh Holly
• Mistletoe

These are all used in some form for the achievements and the mistletoe, if it’s still the same as last year, will give a small spirit buff if you use it on another person.

Enjoy the Event!

10 comments

Runnin’ this way an’ that, seems everyones busy doin’ the strangst things these days - tyin’ up loose ends before they go on tae the battle in Northrend is the best ah can figure… No other explanation as tae why they’re all so worked up is there?

One of the biggest changes patch 3.0.2 brought to us (apart from barber shops) was the achievement system.  I was quite excited to see some of the achievements and, on beta, poked them a little bit but I didn’t really get a sense of how the achievements system would play out in live.

The dust isn’t entirely settled yet (despite me managing to put this post off for almost two weeks now!) but I wanted to put down my thoughts on the system.

Fun

The purpose of playing a game is to have fun and whether your fun is levelling quickly, doing raids and instances, levelling professions, collecting pets or mounts, pvping or just doing silly things the achievements system has something for you.

On the most basic level there are achievements for hitting every 10 levels until 70 (eventually 80), for completing instances, for levelling first aid and there are those which require a bit more coordination - running old-world raids as well as Outlands raids, flag carrying all three flags in a WSG without dying.  There are also the silly / fun ones such as ‘fall 65 yards without dying‘ and one which asks you to bake a delicious chocolate cake.

Ding

The achievements system gives more than just some simple, silly fun, though - it gives ‘purpose’.  It’s something to do and was terribly well timed given that people would otherwise be lounging around Shattrath not doing much (like many were pre-patch).  Things you may have wanted to do will now often grant you achievement points.

I had wanted pre-patch, for instance, to get exalted reputation with all of the capital cities.  It was one of those things which hovered at the back of my mind - a goal, a completionistic happy little thought.  However, there were other things to do or I couldn’t be bothered - a general lack of motivation, really.  Then Blizzard came along to hang a huge carrot in front of me.  “Here, go do that rep grind that you wanted to do and we’ll even give you a ‘ding’ and a shiny title for it…”

Really, achievements are ‘dings’ or level-up equivalent for those at the level cap.  When you’re levelling there’s always another level that you’re striving for and then you hit the cap and, for a bewildering moment, there’s a feeling of ‘what now?!’.  Even a raider such as myself gets this feeling from time to time - a new first kill every few weeks is not the same gratification as a level ding and so many (such as myself) turn to alts to get their ‘ding’ fix.

Lately, however, the alt grind has been getting boring (I really, really don’t like lowbie alliance quests) and I’ve been at a bit of a loss.  Since the patch? I’m more at a loss as to which thing I want to do first! This can, though, be troublesome if you have multiple alts which you consider ‘mains’.  K at More Dots addresses that topic here.  It was a subject I wrestled with myself to begin with though I’ve decided to mainly concentrate on getting achievements primarily on my main, Avarix and a few certain ones on my druid (Guardian of Cenarius title suits her more!).

Difficulty

The difficulty level of achievements varies widely - some of them will be impossible to do on your on, others are hard unless you have a lot of time to invest in grinding (either for gold, reputation or the like).  This is much like WoW in general though - people have the time to invest in raiding or ‘hardcore pvp’, others do not.

Some achievements are harder for some classes - being the sole flag carrier for a winning WSG as a holy priest, for instance, is going to be a lot harder than as a protection warrior.

Others, yet, are impossible - many feats of strength are for things which are not possible any more - gaining event items from years past - the [Yellow Brewfest Stien] for example.

However, there is something available for most people and I don’t believe the varying difficulty is a flaw in the achievements system any more than it is a flaw in the game itself.

/hate

There have also been a lot of people who say they dislike or hate the achievements system. Although Sydera, (Matt’s leafy ‘new’ co-blogger), has written about the downsides of the achievements system (and I do agree that tanks / healers can get the rough end of something like this) I do think that a lot of the general complaints are unfounded.  I do not agree with Sydera about seeing the guild messages as being like spying.  I feel closer to my guildmates now more than ever as I see what their preference in achievements is, I can congratulate them on small milestones and can find out where their main interests lie.  This may seem a bit odd for some but we’re a very social guild with quite a few members and I sadly cannot keep up with every single one of them on a day to day basis.

As Voyna says, over at The Egotistical Priest

If someone tries to tell you that achievements are stupid…let them. Smile and laugh, because they’re right. You don’t gain anything that will truly make a difference in any aspect of this game (with the possible exception of RP).

It is stupid.

But I’ll tell you what, I’m having a lot more fun with this “stupid” stuff than they are bemoaning the inattendance of raiders, I’ll tell you that much!

For me, a lot of the stress of the pre-wrath raiding wind-down has been removed, I’ve seen more guildies on than I’ve seen in months and they’re all crawling over content that’s well out-of-date.  I’ve gotten to run old-world instances which I had trouble soloing simply because I didn’t know my way around them (Dire Maul) and spent a whole lot more time in general grouping and having fun with guildies since the patch hit.

The achievements system will ‘wind down’ a little soon as people start to level again, with people who’re dedicated to goal achievement or completionism keeping the candle burning outside of world events.  Personally I’ve not rushed to do all my achievements - I know that when the levelling rush is over, post Wrath release, I’ll have a bit of free time, I’ll want something to do and I’ll go there to get my fix.

The whole thing, in my eyes, is the biggest method of introducing replayability into WoW that they’ve done so far and I, for one, am in love with this ‘revitalisation’.

Some others achievements sytem reads:

• Big Bear Butt
• Part Time Druid
  

2 comments

Just when ah’ wis gettin’ rid o’ the hangover fae Brewfest Hallow’s End arrives.  Ah dinnae ken why we celebrate the Forsaken’s holiday but, well, ah’m no gonna gie up a chance fer a wee celebration!

Hallow’s End is here again and I’m enjoying it immensely! This is the holiday of silly amounts of sweeties, copious costumes and er… bountiful bats?

Last year, Hallow’s End was the first of the revamped holidays.  It had a new boss, new shiny loot and quests in the starting towns.  It was the beginning of the truly interactive world events - ones which lured even those who had never thought to do a world event before.

It did this by giving away shinies - rings equivalents to the badge loot ones, as well as brooms, a non-combat pet and a plate helm with some funny on-use effects.  I had wondered how they would deal with this holiday, the first of the revamped, when it came to this year - many people are well geared and we’re close to the new expansion. Would it be more or less challenging? Would they keep the same format?

Well, it seems that for the most part the event for this year is very much the same but with the addition of some new loot - [The Horseman's Blade] and [The Horseman's Reins]!

Phat Lewts

For a lot of people, the event is simply a nice way to get the loot mentioned above, a chance to deck out a new alt in some purples or to get a hold of some items which are a just a little bit different or funky.  [The Horseman's Helm] amused me when I first saw it and the one-use effect of his blade is rather neat.  The [Sinister Squashling] and [Hallowed Helm] alongside the [Magic Broom] and perhaps even the Horseman’s Reins make up what has become the ‘usual fare’ for events - mounts, flavour items and pets.

Unusual or Unfair Holiday Drops ?

The story of the Headless Horseman - a vengeful spirit gone mad - is a nice addition to the Halloween theme (ghost stories!) and I can see why they give items pertaining to the actual ‘boss’ but it does seem a tad unfair that two of the high quality items he drops are only for a limited subset of classes - neither my druid nor shaman can use either item.  It would have been nice if they had added some fun on-use to the hallowed helm or something.  He drops the rings, of course, but it’s more the fun effect which I feel many classes miss out on - the laughing helm is wonderfully iconic.  I’d say the [Frostscythe of the Lord Ahune] somewhat made up for that but it excludes rogues and paladins.  It’s not a major issue but perhaps a nice mace or dagger for the next big holiday boss drop?  The scythe, helm and sword are very noticeable and different and are the sort of thing you keep even when they are no longer ‘useful’.  I’m not advocating giving everyone free and easy items of this sort (as making them more common would, I guess, take a little of their ’specialness’ away) but it would be nice to see a greater variation.

Trick or Treat?

Trick or Treating is a little less tedious than the Ancestors quests from the Lunar Festival or the Midsummer Fires - there are a lot fewer of them (as they’re restricted to places with inns) and each is very close to a flight point.  The quests also give a decent amount of experience (around 890 for my level 22 paladin) and a little gold (3g 75s at 70).

Holiday Achievements

The other addition to the holiday is, of course, achievements associated with it.  I have a post centred around those in the works so I won’t go into too much detail on them here but I do think the achievements system has really boosted the attendance of the event - those who do not care about the ‘epix loot’ are still struggling to get themselves a pet or a pumpkin helm for the event.

Of course, given it’s a limited time event the trouble has already started concerning achievements - people want them to be realistically available within the timeframe but others complain that it’s not really an ‘achievement if it’s easy.  I won’t step into the argument now but it does seem that the complaints about this have made some items easier to get -  the squashling and helm drop in trick or treat bags since the last maintenance  and some of the sub-achievements will even be excluded from the ‘title’ achievement - the one to get 20 of the masks.

In total there are around 160 achievement points available for Hallow’s End.

Random Decoration

Hallow’s End has my favourite decorations - the pumpkins and candles etc. are so very ‘wow’ in theme and give the whole place a creepy feeling.

Other fun things which come alongside the Hallow’s End festival, which makes it somewhat unque, are the critters running around - Black Cats roam the streets and bats fly overhead.  Killing a black cat will even give you bad luck!

Holiday Overload

I’m in two minds over Hallow’s End time-wise.  Obviously they can’t move ‘Halloween’ but having another of the ‘big’ yearly events happen so close to the last has actually made me want a little break from the festivities.  I think, though, this may be a consequence of not just the events being close together but also the addition of the new patch and the pre-Wrath event.

Of course, having zombies running around and plagues spreading whilst everyone is running around in skeleton or ghost costumes is a stroke of genius and very nicely timed on Blizz’s part.

Enjoy the rest of the festivities, though  I fear they may be a little overshadowed by all of the real undead walking around…

4 comments

It’s jumpin’, there’s a buzz in the air, people are feelin’ stirrin’s deep doon and its like some sort o’ adrenaline rush goin’ aroon.  Old friends are poppin’ up, people are goin’ back to their roots… Everyone’s heard that there’s somethin’ brewin’ up north and they’re sortin’ their afairs.  It’s excitin’ but ah’m no half feelin’ that ah could be doin’ wi’ a quiet corner and a wee pint an’ a hauf.

Pets, mounts, achievements, inscriptions, new pets, new talent trees, new spells, new addons, new layouts, new everything!

On top of that, every five minutes someone asks “what’s a lexicon of power” followed shortly by “and where do  I find that?”.  Inscriptions are making stupid amounts of gold on my server (especially the few minors available) and people are asking a million questions about the who, where what and why of them. Oh and people complaining about the spam caused by people getting achievements.  Especially when you take 10 people to do the Leeeerroooyyy! one and everyone’s achievement hits the guild at once…

Things have been utterly crazy.  I know it’s all a little ‘old news’ now but, personally, I’m only just coming off of the new-content high!

And then they decided to hit us with Hallows End, too.  Evil buggers! More on that in another post.  On that note - expect a little pick-up in posting from now on.  Despite a rash of unfortunate circumstances and busyness combined with a little bit of writers ‘doubt’ I am slowly working myself back into the writing saddle (and dear god how many metaphors did I murder there?).

Coherency, right.  Well, this post is a quick roundup of the smaller things which won’t get a post of their own in the coming few days or so.

Patch went pretty nicely for us Europeans - most of our realms were only an hour late coming up and, although we’ve had a few outages, and a little experience of the mount and pet bug (where they ‘disappeared’) things have been otherwise relatively less failurefull than the usual major patch.

Oh, except the ding every two minutes as everyone completes an achievement.

Haircut Stuff

Matt challenged people to post their changed ‘do’s’ so here are the three I changed (I can’t bear to change Aurik - there’s no hairstyle which I think looks better on him).

Avarix

Went for a very similar look here but I wanted a floofier ponytail as I was sick of the current one I had ’sticking’ to my back.

Jhai

Jhai’s let her hair out and grown it out a bit.  Was getting a bit tired of her ’schoolgirl’ look - something I hadn’t anticipated when I made her (the look, not the geting tired of, ahem)

Dryn

At first I was going to leave Dryn as-is but I decided, screw it, he needed a change and, to be honest, I’m glad I did. Of course, 7gold+ seems a bit steep for getting someone to tie your hair back!

Achievements Stuff

Whilst I will write an extended post on my thoughts on later, I was quite pleased to have achieved one particular goal not long after the patch:

• Ambassador of the Alliance

Of course, I’m equally saddened that I didn’t quite get:

• Shop Smart, Shop Pet Smart

48 pets… and probably hours of grinding red whelps in the vain hope one would drop for me.  Of course, I was delighted to have grabbed a Firefly (something I’ve wanted for ages).  I’m hoping to grab myself a [Sinister Squashling] and a [Magical Crawdad Box] (another pet I utterly adore) to make up the last two.  Of course the latter requires several other achievements to come first, such as Master Fishing!

Hunter Stuff

Talking of pets, Dryn spent a whole lot of time hanging around the Barrens after the patch. I had been checking over my usual pet-lover-haunt to pick which of the nice, shiny new pets I wanted.  I picked out a nice Netherskate and went off to tame it.  When I was browsing, though, a familiar face cropped up.  Takk.

Now, Takk and my hunters (yes, multiple, I keep starting them and abandoning them around level 20-30…) have a long history.  My first ever WoW char, even before Aurik, was a Moo Hunter called Ouranosin.  He made it to his 21st level before I rerolled to play with my other half on the alliance side.  I had seen the raptors the game had and thought ‘hey those are funky, I wants one!’ and saw that Takk, a lovely, black skinned raptor, would make a perfect companion to my pure white bull Tauren.   It took me a looong time - Takk was a rare, hit hard and fast and I was, to put it bluntly, a noob.  The kind of noob hunter who is up there alongside their pet hitting with their weapons! /sigh

The next few hunters also aimed for Takk but all ended up getting something else (Ghost Cat, Tallstrider, Wolf) as they bypassed the level to get Takk.  Dryn has had a Tallstrider (Aoi) and then a Carrion Bird (Horizon) as his main pets as well as, briefly, his ZG tiger (Monsoon).  Sadly I had to let Monsoon go but I just wasn’t feeling close to him as a pet - cats aren’t really my thing.   I took him to STV and let him go before continuing on to Ratchet.

Cue spawn point camping, ala BRK. 3 days later and Dryn got himself a new companion and I’m glad I did.

The auto-level was the factor that spurred me to go after him now - I couldn’t have levelled him enough before with how little I play my hunter- but level 65 is a fine level of pet for a marks hunter who pretty much only grinds and I now have a companion who I’m truly happy with - and in a small homage to the kitty I’d had to let go I’ve named my new raptor Typhoon.

I also have to say that since the patch I’ve been enjoying my hunter immensely… He’d always been my ‘gather bot’ character whom I didn’t bother to gear beyond lucky drops (*coughspear*cough)  and I hadn’t really ‘enjoyed’ the hunter class so much but now I’m really feeling the love - I have a tonne of new toys and, I must say, misdirect, readiness, misdirect, is just insanely nice when you have a slightly lesser equipped tank and some t6 dps!

Look ma, I’ma big hunter now! *ahem* ( big thanks to those in BA chat who helped me spec him on patch day!).

Epic Stuff

No, not the wearing kind, the skill kind!  I’d been dithering for a while about getting Avarix an epic mount.  My shammy is my main now but he’s still fluttering about on a slow flyer.  He has no gathering skills, though, and rarely ‘goes anywhere’ as he’s done questing etc.  However, the last few days have shown how annoying it is to be stuck back on a slow flyer for questing and so, when I went to pick up the trick-or-treat candy in Shadowmoon Valley I couldn’t resist and spent the windfall I’d made from inscription to pick Avarix up a shiny new mount.

All I can say is wheee~~

I’m sure I’ve forgotten something I meant to add here but I’m too eager to begin a few other posts I have in mind to work on this one too long *ahem*.

2 comments

Well, ah huv tae admit.. ah’m fond o’ havin’ a wee critter or two aroon’ the hoose.  Especially mah wee dragon - it’s like a part o’ the family, ken?  Still, seems some types are goin’  a wee bit overboard - the headquarters here is overflowin’ wi’ a’ sorts o’ critters!

Things have been a bit quiet around here, I apologise.  Between a bad cold and some in-game activities (like running all over the world in search of pets) I’ve not had time to post.  Hopefully things should return to normal some time next week when my cold will hopefully subsided and I’ll have oh-so-much I want to talk about!

So - pets! I’m a bit mad about them - maybe not so much as some but I likes to hoard and napture any I can get my paws on.  Each of my characters has a signature pet or one which means something particular to them, or is special to them even if only by virtue of being ‘first’.  Mharai had her [Magical Crawdad Box],  Avarix has his [Scorched Stone], Jhai has her [Captured Flame] and Aurik has his [Sprite Darter Egg].

Overachieving

Any others who are pet mad will know of the new achievement in Wrath which requires you to collect 50 pets.  But what about those who like pets and maybe have a few stashed here or there and maybe want to quickly make up the difference, or those over-achieving completionists who must have every achievement available but have never really been into pets before?

I just thought I’d post some quick resources and tips for those who don’t already have vast collections, much as I did not before last week.

Two of the best places to get pet information are, undoubtedly, warcraftpets and the wowwiki page on small pets.  Both have comprehensive lists of the available pets and their relative rarity.

You best ’starter set’ will come from getting all faction starter pets - they require no rep, only the time to go and grab them from whichever hermit, crazy lady, random vendor or emo undead guy happens to ‘breed’ them.  A trip to your own or the neutral auction house means you may also be able to grab some cross-faction pets and if you have no luck with this then you might consider a post on your realm forum asking some people from the other faction to list them.

Most of the rest of the pets available, though, require rep, grinding, or quests.  Some simple ones would be the chicken quest in Westfall (available to horde with some alliance help), and going to The Deadmines for a green wing macaw.  Harder quests include the Lower Blackrock Spire Worg pup / Spiderling quests (soloable as a stealth class or those classes with some form of survivability - I did it as a resto shaman, aggroing only three groups and each time using an elemental to save my rear) and rep grinds such as Sha’tari Skyguard (which has very few dailies and only small increments from mob kills.  Getting a firefly, hyacinth macaw or any of the dragons will take some considerable grinding unless you’re lucky.

Reputation / Skills

Now is a good time to do some dual purpose grinding - Exalted with Sporeggar and Sha’tari Skyguard both give access to pets (plus tabards) and hunting whelps has such a wide level range that you can almost always be skilling up skinning.  Want that white kitten from Lil’ Timmy?  Get your fishing pole out and get some skill points whilst you wait for him to spawn!

Gaining fishing skill means you can have a shot, eventually, at catching Mr. Pinchy and you might as well do the Crocolisks in the City fishing daily if it pops up as that gives you yet another chance at a pet which you cannot get from any other source.

I’ve gained almost 200 skill points in skinning, 50-60 in fishing and gotten a faction exalted just whilst going for this achievement and I expect to get another faction soon - I’ve also seen bits of the world I’ve not seen for ages.

Cross Faction Sales

This is the time for many enterprising individuals to make a pretty penny by grabbing some pets and travelling to their local cross-faction Auction House.  Even better if you are able to get a hold of them and sell them at an even higher price on your faction auction houses to avid collecters!

Critter Collections

I know a lot of people recently have been posting their various hoards of ore or herbs and the like so here I offer my hoard: pets! I have two sets - pets for my druid and pets for my shaman - and this screenshot is now a few days old so I’ve added some engineering pets to it as well as a white kitten carrier.  This of course does not include the around 12 or so pets each character has in their bags / banks so both characters are well on their way to the achievement come patch day.  You don’t even want to see our guild bank after three of us decided to put some ’spares’ in for other guild members, hehehe.

Only a few days left until the patch, though, so you better be fast if you haven’t started your collection!  Wrath should make it a lot easier to meet the 50 pets needed, though, so if you don’t want to run all over the world doing silly quests and sillier grinds then you might want to hold off.  Happy hunting!

4 comments