Someone to watch over me.

Ever since patch 3.1 and it's features was announced, I've been pondering the question of tenacity pets. Bunnyhop has been sporting a gorilla since level 32 - she started out with Fonzie, a Mistvale Gorilla from Stranglethorn Vale, and traded him in for Fonzarelli at level 64 - initially because of Thunderstomp, an ability which used to be gorilla-exclusive. Fonzarelli has been with Bunnyhop through thick and thin, and even though he's that kind of "special looking" pet everyone has, I don't think I could ever give him up.

However, nowadays any tenacity pet can learn Thunderstomp, while Fonzarelli has gotten a new ability: Pummel. I haven't tried it out yet, and even though it should have situational uses in PVE (interrupting mobs healing themselves or something similar), it feels very much like a PVP-move. So, I'm looking into other tanking pets, trying to find one with a more "all-round" family ability. With three "permanent" pets in her stable (Juno the spirit beast, Leah the wasp, and said gorilla) Bunnyhop is left with two slots for testing.

As I've just started this little project, and since I've been leveling a new druid, I'm still on my first two "contestants":

Judy the turtle - can use Shell Shield when things get hairy. This should be useful when soloing old world raids, and hopefully when trying to solo the sons of Gruul (to unlock the Ogri'la faction).

Butter the crab - uses Pin. OK, this feels like a PVP-ability - keeping rogues in place and such - but it might come in handy when you need to keep a runner from pulling an extra pack. But most of all, I'm attracted by the idea of having a red crab. If only he sang - then he'd be my new tank for sure!

It'll probably take me a while, since I want to level them up to 80 for testing, but I'm not really in a hurry. Doing the Argent Tournament- and Ebon Blade dailies, and going for the occasional farming run in Sholazar should have them both leveled within a week or two.

OK, I'm off for a walk in the evening sun - I'll be taking the turtle out for a spin later, and have Rahamra finish up Zangarmarsh (level 64 - w00t!)!

Books can lead to frustration. Ask me how!

Last night, and on and off since this morning, I've been camping books in Dalaran. My hunter is missing two books, my druid needs three, and since these girls are on two different accounts, they can camp the book they're both missing together. To make sure my PC doesn't commit suicide I've deactivated all addons on both characters, and have connected my laptop to the router, so I can browse teh internetz to pass the time. Because camping books is boring. Feel free to write that down.

On the other hand, I feel the reward is worth it, and even if the RNG factor is there, it's only a matter of time before you get it. Since I actually got the "Love Fool"-meta achievement done, and hence got all of the candies from the candy bags, I guess a lot of people (who didn't get said achievement) feel that I don't have the right to express my opinion on the Be Mine!-part, but I don't really think they read this blog :D So, here it goes:

If you ask me, it's just as it should be. What people really want out of completing these achievements is ultimately a 310% Violet Proto-drake, and yeah, I'd like that one too. The thing is, as far as I know, there are only three other ways to get a 310% mount (please, correct me if I'm wrong):

1. Arena. Be a part of a really, really great arena team, and get a super fast drake when the season is over.
2. PVE. Complete all of the WotLK heroic raid achievements, and get a super fast Black Proto-Drake.
3. Be incredibly lucky when rolling for an incredibly rare drop from a raid boss not too many people bother to kill these days, and get Ashes of Al'ar.

Piece of cake, eh? Honestly, when the 310% mount takes either a huge amount of skill, or a huge amount of luck on a loot roll to get your hands on, why do so many people seem to take for granted that they "deserve" this status symbol after having simply participated in seasonal events during one year? Reading discussions and arguments regarding this subject, it seems people want a gold medal for just showing up.

Now, some people say that you can't compare RNG with skill-based accomplishments, and while that is true, it isn't what I'm after. These are completely different races, and I believe the only thing they have, or should have in common, is the rarity of the "winners". Not a lot of people will get the Purple Proto within the first year, and I don't think a lot of people are going to get the PVE- or arena equivalents either. Unless you have the time+skill to be great at PVE/arena, it is, in some ways, a big lottery - get over it!

OK, rant-mode off. This book camping thing is leaving me a tiny bit frustrated and bored, which leads to walls of text.

A WoW-blog Moment.

I've been laying low during the last few days, doing dailies, checking up on lowbie alts - nothing special. I was just doing just that, turning my hunter's slow flyer into Sholazar Basin, thinking I might aswell do a couple of quests I had left in the northern parts, when I casually thought to myself: "There's always the chance I'll find Loque'nahak in here, I shouldn't pick up my gorilla for farming - I'd hate to ditch Fonz" followed by a "yeah, right, the spirit beast is RARE, I'll probably never even see one in the wild". But, wait a minute, what's that?

Right there, at 36,30, my adrenaline went up to insane levels - trap, tame, presto! No name yet, but I'll get there. Sadly, Raquel the devilsaur is no more, but to be honest, she always was a placeholder. Off to play with freaky cat-like super beast!

The Crazy Parade.

Today started out really good: I woke up all fresh from a night's good sleep, and had a quiet morning in front of the online papers, since my flatmate watched some alpine skiing event on TV in the other room.

Last night I got my draenei huntress a couple of new pets, since I realised a gorilla might be a bit annoying for everyone else if I use him for questing in Northrend, and quite stupid for general BM-hunter 101 activity in an instance. Not that I will ever give him up, though - I love him like crazy - but for precision work I'll probably be using another pet.

So, what's new in the stable?

First, I went to Winterspring, and picked up a Frostsaber Pride Watcher:

I really wanted to name him Sam Spandex, but that was a no go, so Spandex it is.

After that, I flew all the way down to Un'goro Crater (one would think I'd had enough of that place after camping for my gorilla, but no way!), to see if I could find another ferocious companion:

Lo and behold, the tamed version of that endlessly scary and annoying thing that squished you super dead around level 50 (the vanilla-WoW version of the Fel Reaver, I suppose) - a Devilsaur! This one doesn't have a name yet, but I'll get around to that.

A couple of days ago my huntress and her gorilla friend was in Zangarmarsh, kickin' some butt, and they stumbled upon Marshlight Bleeders, who give you a glowing debuff. The result?
Discorilla!!!

And yeah, he's got a name now - Fonzarelli. As in Fonzie, or The Fonz. If I ever find an even cooler pet gorilla, I guess I'm going to have to name him (or her) Arthur.

My baby!

Guess who finally decided to show up?

I'm in love. Seriously. Haven't decided on a name yet, but the important part is done - in my opinion one of the coolest skins/colours in the game! <3

(For anyone interested: I started camping at about 1 AM this morning, then there was a break for weekly maintenance, and I logged on again at about 10.20 AM. Uhk'loc spawned at approximately 1 PM, I abandoned my old pet, cleared the three mobs that were in the way, did the trap->wait for cooldown->aggro->2nd trap->tame-routine, and there you go!)

Off to level my new pet, I guess :)

Not very exciting, no.

Guess what? I'm still camping the gorilla. No, I haven't camped constantly since last night - Wednesday is maintenance day in Europe, so the server went offline at 3 AM, and was back up when I decided to try and log in at about 10.20 AM. At that time, I was alone in Un'goro Crater, so I'm assuming no one has been here and snatched him away.

A lot of people suggest that one levels up fishing while camping in there, to fight the boredom, and that would have been great, if it hadn't been for the fact that my darling huntress hasn't fished a whole lot before. I think she's got about 52 in fishing... But I'll get it up, some day. So, instead of fishing, I melee down the handful of gorillas that spawn around the spot where I'm standing, slowly getting up the skill in 2-handed axes (and the defense skill, of course). I do kind of wish I had brought several different melee weapons, though. Also, this is a pretty good way to get rugged leather for the Winter Boots people should be wanting this season!

What's really important.

OK, so... I have a recently dinged level 80 moonkin, a bunch of level 70s just waiting to get moving in Northrend, the Feast of Winter Veil goin on, and what am I doing? I'm camping the spawn point of a rare gorilla on my level 64 huntress. Looking good, aren't we?



Sadly, my faithful Fonzie will be abandoned the moment Uhk'loc spawns, and I'm obviously keeping him on passive - it would be so dreadful seeing the blue-white beauty die from thunderstomp.

I'm hoping that a lot of hunters are either doing Winter Veil stuff, or are grinding to 78-ish to try and get Loque'nahak, so that no one comes along to steal my baby.

(Yeah, yeah, not the best screenshot, but the boring ss kind of illustrates how boring it actually is to camp one of these rare spawns. And he's only on a 5-8 hour timer! Luckily, I have a blog to mess around with.)