Catriona R
10/21/2012 10:17:00 PM
On 21 Oct 2012 20:18:17 GMT, Urbin <urbin@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>The completionist in me is still there, so I had a look at some of the pet
>battle related achievments, then I started flying around the two continents,
>trying to tame what I missed and trying to have a go at some of the NPCs.
>After finishing the first quest line of 5 or 6 in the southern half of the
>eastern kingdom, I was given two new quests to beat 6 each on the two
>continents. Interestingly enough, at this point I was also able to get the
>low level quest from Orgrimmar on my level 1 monk. I then flew to the NPC
>(just south of Orgrimmar) with my dwarf hunter, beat the NPC, handed in the
>quest, but then couldn't get the follow up quest. When I relogged on my orc
>monk, I could pick it up, it sent me to Crossroads. Relogged to the hunter
>again, beat the NPC there, but then had to run my level 1 monk to
>Crossroads to get the followup quest. That reminded me a bit of our naked
>gnome race from IF to SW many years ago :-) Lots of corpse runs. When it
>showed, that the next step would be in Ashenvale, I decided to use my level
>6 tauren druid instead. Flew him to Orgrimmar, then exited throuh Aszhara
>(thought that would be quicker than going through southern barrens, except I
>hadn't realised that I need to go through the night elf camp to cross into
>Ashenvale. Lots of scary "skull" guards. Having a spammable HOT available
>helped, but I still died about 4 or 5 times. Once in Ashenvale all went well
>and I battled another round. Next stop Stonetalon, I don't think getting
>there with a level 6 druid will be much fun and I have no higher horde
>chars. Ah well, can't do the last 2 or 3 from this chain, then.
That sucks, I'd suggest a deathknight, but you have to quest through
the starter zone which may take more time than you'd like. If you
decide to try with the lowbie after all, you may find the best route
into Stonetalon is going west from Crossroads, I think at least in
Northern Barrens you shouldn't aggro much, and there's only a *few*
aggro-ish points within Stonetalon itself.
>Anyway, back to other things: Capturing a pet in each zone. I made my way
>around the Eastern Kingdoms first (with three level 12 pets), captured what
>I could, skipping the higher zones for later. When close to Undercity I
>tried to win a pet battle in there for the horde capital achievment, but
>while flying in for a quick World Event success was feasible, pet battling
>takes too much time and I got whacked twice by guards. Only much later did
>it dawn on me that easiest way to get that achievment was using a level 1
>throwawy char from each faction. Must remember, that achievments are account
>wide now!
Hehe yeah, it's much easier using alts! I'm not sure *progress*
towards all achievements is accountwide, so you may need to just use
one throwaway alt and give him a tour of the cities, but certainly the
complete achievement is accountwide (I'm glad I have my old Alliance
rogue at lvl 85 still :-))
>After I moped up the Eastern Kingdoms (as far as I could) I switched
>continent and got serious about collecting as many different pets as I
>could, if possible at least uncommon or preferrably rare. The good thing
>about this is, that it helps to level up the pets. I now have 3 at level 17
>which let me beat all 6 NPCs in Kalimdor and I should be able to battle pets
>in all zones except Silithus (and the Cata ones) but by the time I'm done
>with all other zones, Silithus should be possible, too.
>
>Next I plan to repeat the same for those zones in the Eastern Kingdoms that
>were previously too high, by the time I'm done with them, my pets should be
>ready for Outland (though considering they are now at level 17, I wonder how
>Outland, Northrend and Cata are spaced, considering I've seen level 23 pets
>in Pandaria; less than 6 levels for three expansion... I wonder if levelling
>will again slow considerably).
Outland ranges from lvl 17-19, HFP is 17, and it's 19 by Shadowmoon,
and goes up gradually in between, think most are 18. Be warned the
trainers go up a lot more in difficulty, I managed to beat most of
them (even the one with lvl 23 pets...) but gave up on the final one
which has lvl 24 pets, given my group are still 21-22. Seems I'll need
to go through Northrend and even some Cata zones before I get high
enough to defeat the last Outland trainer, seems a little odd but oh
well.
>Anyway, I'm having a blast. Thinking about it though, I wonder if this is
>really still WoW. I mean, pet battling could really stand on its own as a
>mini game of sorts, there would be no need for the whole World of Warcraft
>background. Is this Blizzard's new way of keeping people longer who are no
>longer into the "main" thrust of WoW? I don't really care, though, it's a
>lot of fun and it actually occupy me long enough that I won't have time to
>quest through all zones before November 4...
Hehe it certainly is a lot of fun, but do try and see the zones as
well! :-)
>Anyway, just thought I'd post an update. The fact about being able to
>compete against the other factions pet NPCs but not being able to pick up
>the follow-up quest might interest some of you.
That's a useful one indeed, if you want the rewards on your main! I'm
doing it the eays way and just using the other faction alt for those
battles, but it's a handy option indeed.