Any excuse fer a party’s got tae be guid, right? But when ye add fancy new clothes, festival buns and a big monster tae kill that just makes it even more brilliant! Lunar festival’s a great time tae have fun wi’ yer friends but aw mine seem tae be a bit less in the partyin’ mood this year…

My first lunar festival happened to coincide with rolling Mharai. I’d missed it on Aurik due to playing during summer (when I didn’t have Uni work to complete) and I wanted in on it wholesale whilst I had the chance. Being on an RP realm meant that the outfit probably wouldn’t just lie gathering dust in the bank all year, too! Despite being level 15 I hauled my Tauren rear around the world (with help from a rather kind Paladin) and got myself some coins, bought a dress and a suit and paraded around quite happily in them whilst eating festival buns, having great fun as I did.

This year, though, I have Aurik, Avarix and Dryn. None of them need the professions items (rocket launchers, fireworks and festival suits / dress) and, being on a PvE server, they aren’t likely to see much use of any festival gear I get them. It kinda takes the fun out of the festival if you’ve ‘done it all before’ when there’s nothing much new to get.

Now you might say “Wheesht you, you’re getting something for nothing!” but I point here to the fact that Blizzard has updated most of the other yearly events so far.

Hallow’s End was the first to see this in TBC (I think) with the addition of the Headless Horseman event in both Scarlet Monastery: Graveyard and the small starting towns. This was an absoloutely brilliant idea, in my opinion, as it not only got people back to an old instance (one well loved by most people I know) but also gave some pretty nifty items - the Sinister Squashling was a cute-if-creepy addition to the growing number of non-combat pets and the Swift Magic Broom was something I used until it dissappeared. Of course, there were also the shiny items such as the Ring of Ghoulish Delight which many people felt was a little unfair due to similar items costing heroic badges. I’m on the fence with that one as it allowed me to gear up just that little bit quicker but wasn’t an item which I kept for that long (I believe I replaced it with the first Violet Signet)

Brewfest brought with it the chance for my mount-collecting Tauren to get herself a Swift Brewfest Ram. I know there was a little bit of soreness on the alliance side regarding this but it also gave everyone the chance, alliance side, to get a ram without either rep or battleground tokens.

Children’s week. Who didn’t have a laugh at the new pets from the quest in Shattrath? Not to mention getting to enjoy running their ‘charge’ for the day behind them on their epic mount? Ok, so I’m not cruel enough to do the last bit but, still, I really did like going about and seeing the little scenes acted out by my rather snide little blood elf orphan.

Those three had the most major changes but there were also some small additons to Winter Veil - Handful of Snowflakes was added - a nice addition for those who had run out of Handful of Rose Petals to torment their raid leader with, and some new toys / items were added to the Christmas day present boxes.

So, why nothing new for Lunar Festival? Or did I miss it? Will we see anything new for the ‘Love is in the Air’ Valentines event or, perhaps, for Noblegarden? Personally I’m hoping so as I feel that adding some ‘replayability’ to their events means higher participation and, to me at least, brings about a greater depth of fun in the game.