Run To You

Today's post is about being unfaithful. I am not talking about the week I spent playing Diablo, or the heinous crime of changing your main character. I am talking about something far worse, a Hunter changing his pet.

I didn't pick a pet at level 10 and stick with it for the rest of eternity it is not that king of a bond. In fact I am not sure what my first pet actually was. My earliest memories was of a bear I found in Loch Modan. This bear was a faithful servant but he would often do his own thing, and I don't mean I was being a bad hunter, there was something seriously wrong with his AI, and the pathing in the early days was pretty poor compared to how few problems we have to day. This bear would just attack anything it felt like, and in the end, I was forced to put him into retirement by the rest of Guild.

 

The next pet I can remember was a short passing phase, the Wetlands actually had mottled purple Raptors. It was like being savaged by a slightly angry Barney. Part of the reason for my memory being hazy was the wonky system that Blizzard used to use for pet skills. You would have to trawl through resources like the wonderful Petopia to find the skill you wanted to upgrade and then find a beast with with that skill and level to tame. Once tamed you would have to feed your new pet the right food then watch it fight several mobs in order to learn how to teach that skill. Also the pet would often be several levels below your character level. Just typing the above description I am left open mouthed at the complexity of being a hunter in the original game, and the number of pets required to train 7 levels  of Dash, Gore, Claw and all the other skills that pets had back then.

 

 

Another pet disaster happened when I wanted to tame a Gorilla, I had either seen somebody else with one or read about how Uber they were. I even persuaded a group to escort me into Stranglethorn Valley. Yes, Stranglethorn Vale was a scary place back then when it was one zone. The mobs went from level 30 - level 40 and travelling to Booty Bay for the first time was a dangerous activity. My first attempt to get the Gorilla ended in utter failure when I discovered I was not at a suitable level to tame a level 40 Gorilla on my noob level 30 Hunter. Thankfully I took some bodyguards with me. In those days it was just something to laugh about. If you wasted 30 minutes of somebody's time for a fools errand in the modern game, I am guessing they would be very annoyed.

 

I also had a moment when I collected Elite mobs from levelling experience. In particular I remember running with an Elite boar from Redridge Mountains who will be familiar to anyone who has levelled an alliance character. 'Bellygrub' probably claimed as many casualities has Hogger used to. It was one of those mobs that was a real handful for the unprepared. 'Tummybug' as I christened him, was a great and faithful companion for many levels until, I discovered Winterspring many months later.

 

 

Winterspring is a beautiful zone, with its pink and purple colours on the snow covered slopes. It was here I discovered the Wintersabre Trainers and the mount that coveted most. I fell in love with the Saber Cats, and chose the White Striped Saber. From that point forward 'Bobcat' as been ever present at my side.

 

 

'Bobcat' was with me through the Burning Crusades, Wrath of the Lich King and Cataclysm. More recently we have explored the wonders of Pandaria. 'Bobcat' has seen it all, except some of the Raids in Lich King when it became very popular to take a wolf as the pet of choice. My choice for that expansion was the Grey Saber Worg, a scruffy mangy thing, but at that point it was the best DPS available to a hunter so needs must.

 

 

Now this weekend I was working my way through the Klaxxi dailies when I noticed this stunning looking Elite wanting to eat me for breakfast. I dispatched with the first one, examined the beautiful model lying prone in front of me. Removed it's glorious pelt, and went to look for a stable master to park one of my pets into the retirement kennel. In the end it was 'Bobcat' that was retired, I could not justify running with 2 cats in my stable of 5. With a tear in my eye, I went back to snare myself a new friend from the Dread Wastes. 

 

 

Meet 'Bobcat' Mark II, the modelling is so much better and the paws are no longer bigger than it's head and the colour and marking are simply gorgeous. I hope to have as much fun with new 'Bobcat' as the old one. Only time will tell.

 

 

Achievements and More Pets

My standard Warcraft routine is Looking For Raid after the weekly reset and move round to Tol Barad and Wintersgrasp at the back end of the week. In between I will try to finish off some achievements. The easiest way to get achievements for me is to do legacy raiding. My main character has polished off Vanila and TBC (except for Tempest Keep ). Naxx is mostly covered but I changed to Shaman healer for the other 3 raids in WotLK. A 10 or 25 man Ulduar would uncover a plethora of achievements for me. These forays are few and far between so I often fill my time trying to get furry cuddly companion pets.

Blizzard armory made the job far easier for the average Joe by showing what pets are owned and which are not. Of the 4 pages of pets many are specials Collectors Edition, Blizzard Store, Blizzcon or Trading Card Game. These Pets are lost to me and unless I become a Diablo III millionaire I will never own them. The remaining obtainable pets are World Drop, Seasonal, Darkmoon Faire, and Argent Tournament.

World drop are a pain in the backside and I have no stamina for endless farming. The only pet I regularly try for is the Fox Kit. This can be done whilst killing spiders (lovely skinnable spiders) in Tol Barad for commendations.


Seasonal pets are mostly from Children's week. I missed the first 2 events and spend subsequent years chasing the pets. Every year they seem to add more, but hopefully I will catch up this year I am still missing 5, Curious Wolvar Pup, Legs, Peanut, Scooter the Snail, and Whiskers the Rat.

The Darkmoon Faire, is due to start this weekend. I have yet to make a dent on the pets here and still need to collect, Cub, Monkey, Tonk, Turtle and Zeppelin. I hope to obtain at least one this time round.
I am not lover of the dailies here, but I don't mind the profession based quests. Just wish I could do the fishing quest as a daily, 35 skill ups a month would save a lot of time. Yes I know I am anal trying to get all my secondary skills to max before the arrival of the Pandas.

On the subject of boring or just plain annoying dailies, you can't beat the Argent Tournament. There was nothing wrong with several of the quests, ie. go here and kill bad people come back and get reward. The big problem was ride a mount and try and knock someone off. The problem I found was that I could get a lead and then lose all my shields by going for the kill and not keeping a close eye on the defence, and then it was game over. This was like a chess match but it seemed to last for much longer. To get to become a champion takes some considerable time but with all those pets on offer, I might need to review my strategy.

Last night with very limited playtime I decided to the The 'Unbeatable?' Pterodactyl: BEATEN achievement. Everybody I know hates this quest and the Jousters fly like a gold brick, but it's only 10 very annoying quests to get through. I am currently 6/10 of the way through it. After this high octane excitement, it was off to the Molten Front. The reason for this legacy activity is to hope that one day Zen'Vorka will give me his cache and it will have something of use in it. At 30 Mark of the World Tree, this has not been a very happy exchange. This time was different the RNG gods shone down and awarded me Scorched Stone. The best bit is I now have no reason to do these quests again except on my Gnome Rogue Engineer who needs the recipes especially the Flintlocke's Woodchucker.