WoW Classic is up and running and I've been bitten by the nostalgia bug. Here is a revised version of one of my earliest ever posts on this blog about making money as part of the levelling process. The original was written in the early days of The Burning Crusade but since most of my alts were low level its very relevant for Classic.
So many people seem to struggle to make enough money in Warcraft. Here are some tips to make it a lot easier.
1: Buy the biggest bags you can afford and upgrade them when you can. Bigger bags means you can carry more stuff and spend more time in the field.
2: Create a second character that is to act as your bank and salesperson. Give them a starting fund and mail all your saleable items to them. Run them up to the nearest capital city and let them log out next to the mailbox. This means your main character has less downtime between trips. Postage is very cheap, a handful of copper per transaction.
3: A little later, consider making another bank alt and parking them at the neutral auction house in Gadgetzan. Cross faction trades can be quite valuable.
4: As soon as you can afford it after level 5, get trained in at least one gathering skill, preferably two. Gathering skills that work well for novices are probably skinning and one of mining or herbalism. Remember to buy the equipment needed as well. Enchanting is a good gathering skill for more experienced players, when used for its disenchant ability.
5: Take the items you gather and sell them on the auction house. Ores can be sold, as can bars. Just check to see which has the higher going rate. Herbs and leathers sell fairly well, though unprocessed hides tend not to be so successful. Befriend a leather-worker and pay them to process them for you.
6: Never throw away loot. Take any of the grey equipment and sell to the vendors. Any cloth that you aren't using yourself should be kept and sold on the auction house. White and Green quality items can be used or sold on the auction house. Bind on pickup items can be disenchanted. Blue bind on equip items should be sold on the auction house or directly on /trade channel in cities.
7: Know the value of items. External websites often have average values for items but each server is different. Make sure you check the auction house or ask in /trade before selling or auctioning white or better items.
8: Install an auction house mod to assist in pricing. Auctioneer was my go-to in original wow but doesn't appear to have a classic remake yet.
9: Take some note of the deposit costs to list items on the auction house. Plate and Mail items are often quite expensive to list so be sure you set a price that will sell. Also be sure to put both a bid and a buyout price on items, since lazy people will hit buyout to get the item instantly rather than wait for the auction to expire. Items without buyouts often do not sell.
10: Take advantage of people's laziness. Many vendors around the world have recipes for sale. Some are limited run items on a timer. Nearly all of these can be bought and resold on the auction house for at least 300% profit. Be careful not to flood the market with any one item.
11: Resist the temptation to buy anything except bigger bags from the auction house. The gear you get from quest rewards and instance dungeons is more than adequate to level up in. Don't waste money on getting low level items enchanted either. You will soon outgrow the item.
12: Pets can make a modest to rather nice profit. Cross-faction pets can be even better if you have some way of transferring them via the neutral auction house or in cooperation with another player.
13: Be aware of the most common and beneficial crafting recipes and sell your harvested materials in partial stacks that are either slightly less or slightly more than the most common recipes. eg. a bag may require 9 raw cloth, so sell stacks of 8 and 3 on the market, with the cost per cloth being higher on the 3-stack.
14: Use the mail system as very cheap 30-day storage rather than spend money on bank bag slots. Use extra alt characters for additional storage - just level them up enough to get to the nearest city with a mailbox and bank.
15: Hunters and Druids make decent farming characters with their tracking skills and shape-shifting abilities respectively.
16: Spend a bit of time while levelling just killing humanoid characters to farm cloth drops. This is most effective when you out level the mobs somewhat but while they are still green for a bit of exp.
17: Do not just throw away certain items like milk, feathers, eggs, meats. These are needed for various things such as cooking recipes, some leather-work and tailoring, and hunter pet food. Even breads and mushrooms may have better than vendor prices on the auction house.
18: Watch for opportunities to buy cheap stuff from players for later sale. A metalworker may be crafting green items to level up. You can buy them cheap in bulk, then resell to an enchanter who disenchants them for materials. Build a network of contacts, or your own alts, that can make use of trade synergies.
19: Revisit lower level zones and instanced dungeons when you are significantly over level. You can clear the dungeon very fast and gather large quantities of materials. I used to make 10-15 gold per run through RageFire Cavern from cloth and green drops at the end of original vanilla WoW. Stockades in Stormwind was not quite as valuable.
20: Look for exploitable mission mechanics. The Barrens mission that summons a white lion can be attractive to hunters looking for a somewhat unique pet. A horde player could assist an alliance hunter to access this unique mob and be rewarded through the neutral auction house. Some missions generate waves of humanoid NPCs to fight, some of which drop cloth. The triggers for this can often be reset.
Using these tips it is easily possible to have the gold needed for your skills as you level and your basic and epic mounts. The same strategies will serve you well all the way till max level, where you can change your professions to do crafting if you wish.
Showing posts with label newbie. Show all posts
Showing posts with label newbie. Show all posts
Thursday, August 29, 2019
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
Pet choice for the levelling hunter
Here I am expanding on what was an already long comment on Mania's latest RFC: whats-the-weakest-leveling-pet. I am slowly in the process of revising my own pet reviews and this RFC is something I feel fully qualified to comment on.
My original comment is number 59 on Mania's site. I've reposted it here and expanded some.
****
Back in October last year I wrote a review of every pet family available to low level hunters. Blizzard have made several changes to pets since I last updated my post but it is still broadly relevant now.
The reviews are at: http://wowdecrypted.blogspot.com/2008/10/hunter-pet-reviews-pre-wrath-patch.html
The main changes since then have been the change to +5/+5/+5 to family stats, adding thunderstomp as a talent for all tenacity pets and tweaks to furious howl and rake.
Mania specifically asked – “For this post, I am mostly interested in levelling and questing before level 40 (although I would love to hear your thoughts on higher levels as well). That’s pre-exotics, and also pre-Thunderstomp for the Tenacity pets.”
Pets get their first talent point at level 20. The first few points make little difference to pet usability, its only when a bunch of talents stack up that it is really noticeable – usually around level 40. The biggest factor then in the lower levels is the pet’s family skill.
Diet can be removed as a factor in pet choice by use of the minor Glyph of Mend Pet. Spam mend pet a few times out of combat and your pet is happy again.
So, what factors make a good family skill for use by a low level “noob” hunter?
– aids in threat management.
– has a short cool-down or longer uptime.
– ease of use.
So, in the 3.1 environment:-
Poor: (5 families)
Bats – Sonic Blast
- 2 second stun and small damage on 20 yard range, long cooldown. Sometimes seems to stutter.
Birds of Prey – Snatch
- limited single target/ humanoid only effect on long cooldown.
Moths – Serenity Dust
- Heal over Time and 10% attack power boost on long cooldown. If left on autocast its often too little too late. Tied to a macro its much more useful. The healing is at best 20% of the pets health for most of the level ranges considered here. Rated poor because its tricky to use well.
Tallstriders – Dust Cloud
- Causes all attackers within 10 yards to miss one attack. 8 second duration, 40 sec cooldown. Hardly worth the effort. What I hadn't considered here is the AOE threat generation. In my testing last year I found they couldn't hold aggro very well on a single target compared to others in the same talent tree.
Crabs – Pin
- a 4-second channelled pin that does little damage on a longish cooldown. This skill is never available when you need it and it's channelled nature makes it more difficult to use successfully. Like most of the immobilise moves, it gets better when tied to a macro.
OK: (7 Families)
Dragonhawks – Fire Breath
- smallish direct damage and 2-sec DoT on fast 10-sec cooldown. The problem with this skill is its 20 yard range - the pet has a tendency to "stutter" into range before it eventually gets its attack off.
Ravagers – Ravage
- decent damage attack, with a 2-second stun. The long 40 sec cooldown is the main issue here. Like other stuns, its better bound to a macro.
Spiders – Web
- 40 second cooldown, 4 second immobilise. Its a bit better than bat's Sonic Blast, simply because its more likely to fire off at a useful time and lasts longer. Much better when bound to a macro.
Wind Serpents – Lightning Breath
- 20-yard range, 10 sec cooldown smallish nature damage attack. The 20-yard range and stutter effect are the problem here.
Boars – Gore
- decent damage, 10 sec cooldown melee attack. Its special bonus is tied to successful use of the charge talent, so should go off about every 2nd fight. Rated as OK simply because other pet's specials don't require talents to be effective.
Turtles – Shell Shield
- 12 seconds per minute of 50% damage reduction. Its pretty nice in an emergency, but on too long a cooldown for general use, plus it doesn't help retain aggro.
Raptors – Savage Rend (Demoted from "good" for this revised post!)
- 1 minute cooldown medium damage + medium damage DoT. Its extra damage boost only comes into play when the pet gets a crit hit using this ability. Low level hunters will not see the benefit from this.
Good: (8 Families)
Serpents – Poison Spit
- 30 yard range, 10 sec medium-high nature damage DoT (8 seconds uptime). It also has a slowing effect on casting times. This ability is great. The 30-yard range means the pet gets off its first shot at the same range the hunter does most times. It has a short cooldown and is effectively up 80% of the time. The anti-caster effect is an added bonus.
Carrion Birds – Demoralizing Screech
- 10-sec cooldown AOE Attack Power debuff (that generates threat) to all in melee, with 100% uptime AND a single target medium-damage attack (also generating threat), thats also available widely at any level you like? Sign me up!
Cats – Rake
- 10 sec cooldown, low damage, low DoT melee attack that has almost 100% uptime. Easy to use, decent ability that can occasionally be paired with a successful Prowl.
Hyenas – Tendon Rip
- 20 sec cooldown low-medium damage melee attack with a 6-second slow. Like all disabling moves, this would be better on a macro but even autocast the combination of duration and cooldown means its ready to go when needed most fights. The damage it does is a nice threat boost too.
Raptors – Savage Rend (moved to OK section for this revised post)
Wolves – Furious Howl
- 40 sec cooldown, 20sec duration Attack Power boost for both pet and hunter. For most fights this is a better than 50% uptime DPS boost that is fairly easy to manage. This skill was reworked somewhere between 3.0.3 and 3.1. It is a much better levelling skill than when initially reviewed.
Bears – Swipe
- 5 second cooldown (!) AOE melee damage. Uncomplicated and deadly. It appears that the front-facing limitation has been removed in a recent patch. One of the best skills available for a levelling pet.
Crocolisks – Bad Attitude
- 2 minute cooldown, 45 sec uptime melee AOE medium-high reactive damage. This skill is interesting. Every attacker that hits the pet takes damage. Every single attack, for 45 seconds. Great for AOE aggro generation and generates significant damage in the right circumstances. Probably better taken off autocast and tied to one of the hunter's attack buttons so its not triggered too early.
Scorpids – Scorpid Poison
- 10 second cooldown medium-low DoT nature damage with 100% uptime. Simple to use. Rarely resisted. Sustained aggro generation.
Not available to low levels: (12 Families)
Chimaeras – Froststorm Breath
Nether Rays – Nether Shock
Silithids – Venom Web Spray
Sporebats – Spore Cloud
Core Hounds – Lava Breath
Devilsaurs – Monstrous Bite
Spirit Beasts – Spirit Strike
Wasps – Sting
Gorillas – Pummel *lowest level gorilla is level 32.
Rhinos – Stampede
Warp Stalkers – Warp
Worms – Acid Spit
By the time a hunter can get one of these pets, they and the pet have significant talent points to spend. Individual family skills make less difference in most cases than appropriate talent choices. The exotic pet families usually combine skills that are similar to others reviewed above. Also by this stage, most hunters have learned a thing or two about playing their class, further smoothing out the rough edges in family skill differences.
What pets would I recommend? Probably Bear and Carrion Bird for most playstyles. Both are AOE, but only in melee range. Serpents are awesome if you are regularly going against humanoids. Thunderstomp for tenacity pets, available at the earliest at level 44, is an awesome addition. Ferocity pets become essentially unkillable once they get bloodthirsty by the mid-30's.
My original comment is number 59 on Mania's site. I've reposted it here and expanded some.
****
Back in October last year I wrote a review of every pet family available to low level hunters. Blizzard have made several changes to pets since I last updated my post but it is still broadly relevant now.
The reviews are at: http://wowdecrypted.blogspot.com/2008/10/hunter-pet-reviews-pre-wrath-patch.html
The main changes since then have been the change to +5/+5/+5 to family stats, adding thunderstomp as a talent for all tenacity pets and tweaks to furious howl and rake.
Mania specifically asked – “For this post, I am mostly interested in levelling and questing before level 40 (although I would love to hear your thoughts on higher levels as well). That’s pre-exotics, and also pre-Thunderstomp for the Tenacity pets.”
Pets get their first talent point at level 20. The first few points make little difference to pet usability, its only when a bunch of talents stack up that it is really noticeable – usually around level 40. The biggest factor then in the lower levels is the pet’s family skill.
Diet can be removed as a factor in pet choice by use of the minor Glyph of Mend Pet. Spam mend pet a few times out of combat and your pet is happy again.
So, what factors make a good family skill for use by a low level “noob” hunter?
– aids in threat management.
– has a short cool-down or longer uptime.
– ease of use.
So, in the 3.1 environment:-
Poor: (5 families)
Bats – Sonic Blast
- 2 second stun and small damage on 20 yard range, long cooldown. Sometimes seems to stutter.
Birds of Prey – Snatch
- limited single target/ humanoid only effect on long cooldown.
Moths – Serenity Dust
- Heal over Time and 10% attack power boost on long cooldown. If left on autocast its often too little too late. Tied to a macro its much more useful. The healing is at best 20% of the pets health for most of the level ranges considered here. Rated poor because its tricky to use well.
Tallstriders – Dust Cloud
- Causes all attackers within 10 yards to miss one attack. 8 second duration, 40 sec cooldown. Hardly worth the effort. What I hadn't considered here is the AOE threat generation. In my testing last year I found they couldn't hold aggro very well on a single target compared to others in the same talent tree.
Crabs – Pin
- a 4-second channelled pin that does little damage on a longish cooldown. This skill is never available when you need it and it's channelled nature makes it more difficult to use successfully. Like most of the immobilise moves, it gets better when tied to a macro.
OK: (7 Families)
Dragonhawks – Fire Breath
- smallish direct damage and 2-sec DoT on fast 10-sec cooldown. The problem with this skill is its 20 yard range - the pet has a tendency to "stutter" into range before it eventually gets its attack off.
Ravagers – Ravage
- decent damage attack, with a 2-second stun. The long 40 sec cooldown is the main issue here. Like other stuns, its better bound to a macro.
Spiders – Web
- 40 second cooldown, 4 second immobilise. Its a bit better than bat's Sonic Blast, simply because its more likely to fire off at a useful time and lasts longer. Much better when bound to a macro.
Wind Serpents – Lightning Breath
- 20-yard range, 10 sec cooldown smallish nature damage attack. The 20-yard range and stutter effect are the problem here.
Boars – Gore
- decent damage, 10 sec cooldown melee attack. Its special bonus is tied to successful use of the charge talent, so should go off about every 2nd fight. Rated as OK simply because other pet's specials don't require talents to be effective.
Turtles – Shell Shield
- 12 seconds per minute of 50% damage reduction. Its pretty nice in an emergency, but on too long a cooldown for general use, plus it doesn't help retain aggro.
Raptors – Savage Rend (Demoted from "good" for this revised post!)
- 1 minute cooldown medium damage + medium damage DoT. Its extra damage boost only comes into play when the pet gets a crit hit using this ability. Low level hunters will not see the benefit from this.
Good: (8 Families)
Serpents – Poison Spit
- 30 yard range, 10 sec medium-high nature damage DoT (8 seconds uptime). It also has a slowing effect on casting times. This ability is great. The 30-yard range means the pet gets off its first shot at the same range the hunter does most times. It has a short cooldown and is effectively up 80% of the time. The anti-caster effect is an added bonus.
Carrion Birds – Demoralizing Screech
- 10-sec cooldown AOE Attack Power debuff (that generates threat) to all in melee, with 100% uptime AND a single target medium-damage attack (also generating threat), thats also available widely at any level you like? Sign me up!
Cats – Rake
- 10 sec cooldown, low damage, low DoT melee attack that has almost 100% uptime. Easy to use, decent ability that can occasionally be paired with a successful Prowl.
Hyenas – Tendon Rip
- 20 sec cooldown low-medium damage melee attack with a 6-second slow. Like all disabling moves, this would be better on a macro but even autocast the combination of duration and cooldown means its ready to go when needed most fights. The damage it does is a nice threat boost too.
Raptors – Savage Rend (moved to OK section for this revised post)
Wolves – Furious Howl
- 40 sec cooldown, 20sec duration Attack Power boost for both pet and hunter. For most fights this is a better than 50% uptime DPS boost that is fairly easy to manage. This skill was reworked somewhere between 3.0.3 and 3.1. It is a much better levelling skill than when initially reviewed.
Bears – Swipe
- 5 second cooldown (!) AOE melee damage. Uncomplicated and deadly. It appears that the front-facing limitation has been removed in a recent patch. One of the best skills available for a levelling pet.
Crocolisks – Bad Attitude
- 2 minute cooldown, 45 sec uptime melee AOE medium-high reactive damage. This skill is interesting. Every attacker that hits the pet takes damage. Every single attack, for 45 seconds. Great for AOE aggro generation and generates significant damage in the right circumstances. Probably better taken off autocast and tied to one of the hunter's attack buttons so its not triggered too early.
Scorpids – Scorpid Poison
- 10 second cooldown medium-low DoT nature damage with 100% uptime. Simple to use. Rarely resisted. Sustained aggro generation.
Not available to low levels: (12 Families)
Chimaeras – Froststorm Breath
Nether Rays – Nether Shock
Silithids – Venom Web Spray
Sporebats – Spore Cloud
Core Hounds – Lava Breath
Devilsaurs – Monstrous Bite
Spirit Beasts – Spirit Strike
Wasps – Sting
Gorillas – Pummel *lowest level gorilla is level 32.
Rhinos – Stampede
Warp Stalkers – Warp
Worms – Acid Spit
By the time a hunter can get one of these pets, they and the pet have significant talent points to spend. Individual family skills make less difference in most cases than appropriate talent choices. The exotic pet families usually combine skills that are similar to others reviewed above. Also by this stage, most hunters have learned a thing or two about playing their class, further smoothing out the rough edges in family skill differences.
What pets would I recommend? Probably Bear and Carrion Bird for most playstyles. Both are AOE, but only in melee range. Serpents are awesome if you are regularly going against humanoids. Thunderstomp for tenacity pets, available at the earliest at level 44, is an awesome addition. Ferocity pets become essentially unkillable once they get bloodthirsty by the mid-30's.
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
Hunter Pet Reviews -Revised Edition 3.X
I had a partially complete review of all pet families as a draft post. I referred to it in a couple of other places but since its now superseded by the release of wow 4.0.X I've trashed it and will just post this place-holder. I intend to put up a review in the revised world but this is likely to only get done well after Cataclysm is released, so sometime after December 2010.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Wow Self Improvement
I had a party written post here but was rudely interrupted by work. It got autosaved as a draft but appeared to nuke my blog... it just showed a blank page!
Luckily all is well now.
I've posted here several entries that show ways to make gold. You have to read through my walls of text to find it but there are specific details in there showing what I did on several servers. Some of the same posts could serve as walkthroughs for new players, particularly the hunter and druid ones.
The main tips posted in "Cure the Cash Flow Blues" are the core truth to self-sufficiency in money. They are such simple concepts that I am astonished that players late in the game have any difficulty with funding essentials. A high level character just has so much greater earning capacity than any of my lowbie alts! I can well understand that a genuinely new player will struggle early on but someone who has played for sixty or seventy levels should surely know something about the game.
One of the things that I offer to members of my guild is loans for mounts. The introduction of the cheaper level 30 mounts has reduced the need for these. Level 30 mounts are cheaper and easier for most people to obtain than the old level 40 ones were. Partly this is due to there being a lot more gold around than there was.
Guildies looking for a loan have to convince me that:
1: they really NEED the item/mount they are borrowing money for.
2: they have made a decent attempt to get there on their own.
3: they have the capacity to repay the loan in reasonable time.
4: that they aren't likely to just take the money and run!
Back before Blizzard introduced the guild bank, most donated funds were intermixed with my own personal funds. Nowadays the money pools are quite separate. Though as guildmaster I have unlimited access to the guild bank funds, all mount loans have continued to come from my own pocket. I choose to do this because the fairly high risk of non-secured loans means I will take more care in assessing the loan than I might if it was "just" guild money.
That first point above, NEED vs WANT, is probably the key.
The first mount makes a massive difference to a character's ability to get around and get things done. The basic flying mount in Outland is similarly a "NEEDED" boost. More recently a few have had loans for cold weather flying in Northrend, also a "NEED".
Warlocks or pallies asking for a mount loan at 30 get laughed at. People looking to upgrade their 60% mount to an epic 100% mount at 60 generally fall into the "WANT" category and will most likely be denied, as will those asking for ~5,000g for their epic flyer. People wanting loans to buy epic weapons, or anyone who thinks they can "twink" their main at my expense generally get a lecture!
If you can't convince me that what you want is a "NEED" and not just a want, then you had better do what one guy did recently: secure your loan.
A guy just new to the guild wanted a significant loan for northrend flying.
Normally, someone who had been in the guild for only a day or so would be told a blunt "NO WAY!" but this guy was sensible. We discussed all the points above:
1: NR flying meets my "Need" criteria for most people. (Yes)
2: He wasn't asking for the whole lot, but had been caught short. His reasons for that were reasonable, but not great. (Maybe)
3: He had some ability to repay via trade skills but suggested questing was his primary income. (Maybe)
At this point, I would have turned him down except that his answer to point 4: above was a winner.
4: will he take the money and run? No, because he secured his loan with a number of level 80 epic items worth far in excess of the loan amount. He was quite rightly concerned that _I_ might be the one doing a runner!
This particular loan was repaid in a short period of time in instalments and he got his items back as COD mail messages for the final payments.
Another guildie has been trying to convince me to loan him funds. He's been around for quite a long time and otherwise would get a loan, except at the moment he fails miserably on point 3: repayment. I have pointed him to my blog in the hope he will read the other messages here and do something about his economic situation. (If you are reading this, fellow guildie, the post isn't entirely directed at YOU, since there have been many others fitting the same criteria!)
This goes a lot further though than just money.
WoW is a game that is both easy, yet complex. Most classes are tuned so that they can be levelled up even if played poorly. Crap gear choices hardly matter in the lower levels. Awful talent choices are barely noticable until the mid 30's or even higher. Poor group skills are able to be overcome by getting runthroughs, or simply leveling outside of instances/group quests.
Most players seem willing to listen to advice or do a bit of research on how to better their play. There are a significant number however who are willfully ignorant.
Maybe I'm just getting less tolerant of newbies as my time in game increases but some of thses are examples of the ignorant:
The warlock who stands in melee right next to the tank, frequently casting drain soul instead of using DOTS. When queried on this, he said he likes using "both kinds of attacks" (melee and spell), and needs to drain soul for healthstones.
The SV or MM spec hunter who refused to use a pet at all becasue it was "insignificant DPS".
All those characters who need-roll on loot that is inapropriate for their class, or those need-rolling on gear for their alts.
PUGgers, or guildies, that AFK in the middle of an instance without explanation, or leave whenever they feel like it. (yes, RL happens. if you really have to go, just say so; dont leave the rest of us hanging!)
The player (usually DPS classes) that aggro extra mobs before the tank gets a shot... and that then winge when the healer lets them die!
The people that complain they have no quests left to do. There are well over 3,000 quests available to each faction and only about 800 are needed to get you to maximum level. If you really have finished an area, move on to another location. Mostly you just need to look harder in the zone you are in. Use the wow website zone guide as a starting point.
Ah well. This post is turning into a rant when it wasn't really meant to. The point is, there are many many places to turn to for information if you only had the motivation to look!
Luckily all is well now.
I've posted here several entries that show ways to make gold. You have to read through my walls of text to find it but there are specific details in there showing what I did on several servers. Some of the same posts could serve as walkthroughs for new players, particularly the hunter and druid ones.
The main tips posted in "Cure the Cash Flow Blues" are the core truth to self-sufficiency in money. They are such simple concepts that I am astonished that players late in the game have any difficulty with funding essentials. A high level character just has so much greater earning capacity than any of my lowbie alts! I can well understand that a genuinely new player will struggle early on but someone who has played for sixty or seventy levels should surely know something about the game.
One of the things that I offer to members of my guild is loans for mounts. The introduction of the cheaper level 30 mounts has reduced the need for these. Level 30 mounts are cheaper and easier for most people to obtain than the old level 40 ones were. Partly this is due to there being a lot more gold around than there was.
Guildies looking for a loan have to convince me that:
1: they really NEED the item/mount they are borrowing money for.
2: they have made a decent attempt to get there on their own.
3: they have the capacity to repay the loan in reasonable time.
4: that they aren't likely to just take the money and run!
Back before Blizzard introduced the guild bank, most donated funds were intermixed with my own personal funds. Nowadays the money pools are quite separate. Though as guildmaster I have unlimited access to the guild bank funds, all mount loans have continued to come from my own pocket. I choose to do this because the fairly high risk of non-secured loans means I will take more care in assessing the loan than I might if it was "just" guild money.
That first point above, NEED vs WANT, is probably the key.
The first mount makes a massive difference to a character's ability to get around and get things done. The basic flying mount in Outland is similarly a "NEEDED" boost. More recently a few have had loans for cold weather flying in Northrend, also a "NEED".
Warlocks or pallies asking for a mount loan at 30 get laughed at. People looking to upgrade their 60% mount to an epic 100% mount at 60 generally fall into the "WANT" category and will most likely be denied, as will those asking for ~5,000g for their epic flyer. People wanting loans to buy epic weapons, or anyone who thinks they can "twink" their main at my expense generally get a lecture!
If you can't convince me that what you want is a "NEED" and not just a want, then you had better do what one guy did recently: secure your loan.
A guy just new to the guild wanted a significant loan for northrend flying.
Normally, someone who had been in the guild for only a day or so would be told a blunt "NO WAY!" but this guy was sensible. We discussed all the points above:
1: NR flying meets my "Need" criteria for most people. (Yes)
2: He wasn't asking for the whole lot, but had been caught short. His reasons for that were reasonable, but not great. (Maybe)
3: He had some ability to repay via trade skills but suggested questing was his primary income. (Maybe)
At this point, I would have turned him down except that his answer to point 4: above was a winner.
4: will he take the money and run? No, because he secured his loan with a number of level 80 epic items worth far in excess of the loan amount. He was quite rightly concerned that _I_ might be the one doing a runner!
This particular loan was repaid in a short period of time in instalments and he got his items back as COD mail messages for the final payments.
Another guildie has been trying to convince me to loan him funds. He's been around for quite a long time and otherwise would get a loan, except at the moment he fails miserably on point 3: repayment. I have pointed him to my blog in the hope he will read the other messages here and do something about his economic situation. (If you are reading this, fellow guildie, the post isn't entirely directed at YOU, since there have been many others fitting the same criteria!)
This goes a lot further though than just money.
WoW is a game that is both easy, yet complex. Most classes are tuned so that they can be levelled up even if played poorly. Crap gear choices hardly matter in the lower levels. Awful talent choices are barely noticable until the mid 30's or even higher. Poor group skills are able to be overcome by getting runthroughs, or simply leveling outside of instances/group quests.
Most players seem willing to listen to advice or do a bit of research on how to better their play. There are a significant number however who are willfully ignorant.
Maybe I'm just getting less tolerant of newbies as my time in game increases but some of thses are examples of the ignorant:
The warlock who stands in melee right next to the tank, frequently casting drain soul instead of using DOTS. When queried on this, he said he likes using "both kinds of attacks" (melee and spell), and needs to drain soul for healthstones.
The SV or MM spec hunter who refused to use a pet at all becasue it was "insignificant DPS".
All those characters who need-roll on loot that is inapropriate for their class, or those need-rolling on gear for their alts.
PUGgers, or guildies, that AFK in the middle of an instance without explanation, or leave whenever they feel like it. (yes, RL happens. if you really have to go, just say so; dont leave the rest of us hanging!)
The player (usually DPS classes) that aggro extra mobs before the tank gets a shot... and that then winge when the healer lets them die!
The people that complain they have no quests left to do. There are well over 3,000 quests available to each faction and only about 800 are needed to get you to maximum level. If you really have finished an area, move on to another location. Mostly you just need to look harder in the zone you are in. Use the wow website zone guide as a starting point.
Ah well. This post is turning into a rant when it wasn't really meant to. The point is, there are many many places to turn to for information if you only had the motivation to look!
Friday, October 24, 2008
Hunter Pet reviews -pre wrath patch 3.x
[last update 15 Dec 2008]
*****
Forthcomming PTR 3.0.8 patch includes nerfing for scorpid poison and cat rake as well as several other hunter nerfs. Volley will be reduced by 30%. I suspect that this will actually help gorillas (and carrion birds and crocs and bears as well) maintain aggro on groups.
I'll revise the below pet families once the changes hit live servers.
*****
Note for patch 3.0.3:
Some exotic pets got a boost in overall DPS. This should make 51-point Beastmaster specialists happy, since their special benefit is now more on a par with the other tree's 51 point talent. The difference however should be minor, enough so that even BM specialists do not need to take exotics to be viable.
Cat's Rake ability has been weakened somewhat. I'll have to retest and compare them with raptors. *done*
The cost for pet specials has been reduced to 20 (from 25) focus. This should help autocasting priority so they go off more frequently when cooldowns are up.
*****
There are a great many changes in the way pets work in the new expansion. Inspired by the fine work done by Znodis at The Mystic Hunter I've attempted to do a quick PvE focused guide to pet choices.
More than at any time in wow history, all pet families are now viable as levelling pets. They can also probably all serve well enough in PvP, Arena and as tanks in instances. Properly specced Tenacity pets can even tank heroic instances, as evidenced by the competition going on now at Big Red Rhino
My reviews were done on various hunters in the level 20 to 30 range. They all spent the first 12 talent points in marksmanship, to get the go for the throat talent, then moved over to beastmastery. None of these hunter alts has particularly spectacular gear for their level. I used aspect of the hawk for most fights, switching to viper when low on mana.
Pets get a talent point at level 20, 24 and 28. Nearly all pets were freshly tamed wild ones, so started out up to 5 levels below the hunter. I spent talent points in dash/dive or charge, then the next in cobra reflexes. Some hunters had bought the glyphs for mend pet and serpent sting, both a minor boost to overall longevity in the field.
None of the Outland only, Northrend only, or exotic pets were able to be tested due to using low level hunters. These reviews are only of families available to hunters as they level up. Nearly all families are accessible by the mid 20's, so there's plenty on offer.
Cunning
The pets in the Cunning families are not always first choices for a levelling pet. They are mainly aimed at PvP and utility in groups but can still serve admirably as a general use companion.
Bats: Tested Vampiric Mistbat*
When testing Dragonhawks on a level 21 hunter, I also grabbed a bat from the same area then levelled them up to 20. Bats are ok as pets and their stun effect will be useful in PvP, but like other disabling effects its on a too-long cooldown to be useful as a general use pet. Little Vlad, my bat, would tank several similar level mobs easily enough but struggled against tougher opponents. This was one of the last pets I tested so perhaps rushed a bit. Bats are decent but not great pets for levelling.
Birds of Prey: Tested Strigid Hunter.
Blizzard stole my screech AOE effect from this pet. Snatch has plenty of potential in PvP but I'm not yet convinced of its effects in PvE. This pet has barely left the stables since patch, so this test is not yet complete.
Chimaeras: Exotic, Untested.
Dragonhawks: Tested *
All the lower level Dragonhawks used to be the weaker "caster" pets pre patch. That has thankfully been fixed in the 3.x world. Their flame breath attack has been nerfed back to being a single target effect rather than a short range AOE. Unfortunately they also seem to suffer the range attack bug that some other pets now seem cured of - they "stutter" forward until in range of their breath. Once in melee they are ok, autocasting breath fairly reliably but the initial attack is annoying. Overall, the Dragonhawk did rather well as a levelling pet. He made short work of Luzran and Knucklehead, then burnt down several adds that had joined in all without much trouble. Quite a likeable pet, despite its flaws.
Nether Rays: Outland only, Untested.
Ravagers: Tested Ravager Specimen.
A ravager makes a decent enough pet. I like the various animations, especially swim. Easy diet, strong dps. The special attack is a 2 second stun but on a longish 40 sec cooldown so doesn't see much usefulness in PvE. Might be better bound on a macro. The ravager has most definitely fallen from its perch as the favourite raiding pet.
Serpents: Tested Deviate Viper.
The serpent special attack poison spit is quite a useful one. With a 10 sec cooldown, its ready to go frequently during fights. It is both a DoT and an anti-caster debuff. It seems that the run-back-to range behaviour that these guys used to have before the patch has gone. A serpent with Dash is a really nice companion.
Silithids: Exotic, Untested.
Spiders: Tested Wildthorn Stalker.
I grabbed a random spider while travelling through Ashenvale. Pre-patch, a spider was a barely adequate pet. Now they are pretty handy creatures to have at your side. Mine easily tanked two mobs 4 levels above it with only mend pet to keep it going. The 40 second cooldown on its web ability is a bit long for levelling use, but if bound to a macro rather than autocast is a handy trick for preventing fleeing mobs. It will be extremely useful in PvP as well.
Spore Bats: Outland only, Untested.
Wind Serpents: Tested Deviate Stinglash.
Once the premier raiding pet for well geared hunters with lots of crit %, Wind serpents have never been one of my favourites. The 10sec cooldown on their lightning breath means its available often in a fight... but its rather underwhelming. Serpent's poison spit is faster, does more damage, shoots further and has a nice debuff that LBr lacks. They seem to have had the annoying run-to-range bug mostly fixed which is nice. The little winged snakes tank reasonably well and have some really nice skins but I'd prefer some other pet. Raiders might still be interested if LB scales with ranged attack power, but poison spit doesn't. I have no data either way as yet.
Ferocity
The ferocity families generally offer skills aimed at increasing damage. They generally lack the pure toughness and survivability of the tenacity pets but make up for it by killing things quickly. Raiders will favour Ferocity pets when they are not expected to tank. A ferocity pet will likely prove to be a good choice for a general use companion.
Carrion Birds: Tested Swoop.
Screech pre-patch was one of the best skills for hunters taking on multiple opponents. It is pretty much unchanged in 3.02, remaining single target damage, and multiple target debuff. I've only briefly tested my original pet, a Swoop from Mulgore, but it looks like it holds up fairly well. Carrion birds were lesser cousins to Owls pre-patch but now have come to the fore as levelling pets.
Cats: Tested Ghost Saber, and several others. (re-tested for 3.0.3)
Cats were third on the DPS totem pole pre patch. Testing by other hunter bloggers indicates they may now be top, at least until the exotics get their buff in a forthcoming patch. (* implemented in 3.0.3). Regardless, cats are an awesome pet. They come in a huge variety of skins to chose from at every level range making them readily accessible. Prowl, though it will be turned off most of the time, makes a nice addition on the occasions it can be used. Rake, the main family skill, is on a short timer, does reasonable damage and is a DoT. It is listed as bleed damage, so some monsters will be immune. Overall, cats still make great pets.
The slight reduction in damage on rake that was introduced in 3.0.3 makes little difference. Rake still contributes roughly 14% of the cats damage output vs 3% for raptor's Savage rend.
Core Hounds: Exotic, Untested.
Devilsaurs: Exotic, Untested.
Hyenas: Tested Hecklefang Stalker. *Updated*
Hyenas are ferocity pets with utility in pvp. Tendon Rip is one of the disabling moves with the shortest cooldown of the lot at 20 seconds. It is also a slight DoT but it is mostly its slowing effect that makes it nice. Hyenas also have a fairly extensive series of animations and interesting sound effects. A better than average pet for levelling.
Moths: Tested Vale Moth.
Moths are a curious inclusion in the ferocity tree. Their family special "Serenity Dust" is both an attack power buff and a minor heal to the pet, helping it fight and survive longer. It is on a longish 1-minute cooldown so isn't as useful as it could be for a levelling pet but does help in most fights. The only currently tameable moth for low level characters is the dirty white one in Azuremyst isle, past a bunch of high level guards making it a hard tame for horde players. It might just be worth the trip though; in my fairly limited testing, the little flying bug tanks like a champ and the self-heal keeps it going longer than otherwise. It also goes quite well with one of the moth small pets as a companion.
Raptors: Tested Deviate Slayer. (re-tested vs cat in 3.0.3 patch)
Raptors are yet again second string cats. Savage rend is a slightly more powerful version of cat's Rake, but its on a way too long cooldown of 1 minute. This makes it useful in most fights if you are pulling one at a time but not so good if you have a bunch at once, or chain fights really closely. A fierce raptor is a fine companion to have at your side. Mine helped me mostly-clear wailing caverns solo at level 23 - but frankly wasn't as good as the trash pet cat I took in originally.
The retest at patch 3.0.3 indicates that the long cooldown on rend is really hurting. Savage rend represented only 3-4% of the raptor's total damage output. Cats are still much better.
Spirit Beasts Exotic, Untested.
Tallstriders: Tested Fleeting Plainstrider.
Tallstriders need some love. Their Dust Cloud skill has some possibilities as an AOE grinding skill but has too limited an effect and a stupidly long cooldown. If left on autocast, it will be used at the start of a fight, before you've gathered a bunch of mobs and its special effect will be wasted. As a member of the ferocity family, a tallstrider does decent damage and its talent tree has some excellent abilities but then again, so does every other ferocity pet. There are far better choices. Almost any other pet is a better choice!
Wasps: Outland only, Untested. (The ones in Azeroth are all untameable at this time).
Rumour has it that wasps suffer slightly lessened damage per second than other similar pets. This is believed to be a bug!
Wolves: To be tested*
I had a brief test of an Ashenvale wolf at the time I tested spider. They did ok, but their family skill is mainly a group oriented ability. For a levelling pet, they are like a slightly buffed tallstrider.
Tenacity
The tenacity family mostly have skills that improve their ability to tank... by increasing damage, by debuffing enemies, or by protecting themselves. Tenacity pets at higher levels have talents that make them viable tanks or off-tanks for parties in instances, something that is beyond the reach of most other families. They also make good choices for solo play but are perhaps less useful in PvP.
Bears: Tested Ashenvale Bear and similar.
Bears are great pets. Charge makes them fast enough to get to the enemy and their family skill, Swipe, is a fast, damaging, MULTI TARGET attack. Bears are great for the kind of limited AOE grinding that most levelling as a hunter seems to consist of. They are tough as nails and hold the attention of a small group through any mend pets needed. The charge animation on a low-level bear looks like an attack wombat on a skateboard! There are a fair variety of looks to chose from and they are reasonably well animated. Overall, a great pet choice.
Boars: Tested Corrupted Mottled Boar, and others. (Bugfix to gore in patch 3.0.3. Needs retesting)
Several patches ago, Boars were THE premier levelling pet. Their gore and charge abilities made for the single best threat generation in the game. That has all changed now though. All Tenacity pets can get charge and gore has been somewhat nerfed. Gore is still a pretty good skill with a shortish cooldown but there are better tenacity pets to look at. Still a good choice for pet.
Crabs: Tested Encrusted Surf Crawler. *Updated*
Crabs get Pin for their family skill. Its a 4-second immobilise (not stun) and channelled DoT on a sadly long 40-second cooldown. I feel this is of more use on a pvp cunning pet than a tenacity tank and the cooldown is far too long for general use. Like the other tenacity families, a crab does fine but lacks that extra something to make it a great pet.
Crocolisks: tested Deviate Crocolisk.
Bad attitude has potential as an AOE grinding skill. It is a bit like Druid's thorns spell, in that its reactive damage to any attacker. It has a long 2 min cooldown but also lasts for 45 seconds so should last through most fights and be ready to go again when you pull the next bunch. Crocolisks have an incredibly annoying breathing sound and somewhat dubious animation which probably put me off this pet too quickly. I'll have to test again more thoroughly... with sound off!
Gorillas: To be tested* (Note: the lowest level Gorilla is level 32, a bit high for this project.)
I've grabbed a gorilla on my level 43 hunter. Even unfed, poorly talented and with only leather gear on the hunter, this guy is dynamite. Thunderstomp is absolutely brilliant for AoE work. The combination of TS, volley and aspect of the viper makes levelling and farming activities so easy! This guy is quite clearly the best available pet for levelling. I'll be going back and continuing to work on this, with a properly equipped hunter and a tanking focussed pet talent tree.
Rhinos: Exotic, Northrend only, Untested.
Scorpids: Tested Silithid Creeper. *Updated*
(Patch 3.0.3 reduced the damage of the scorpid poison skill, but also reduced the focus cost of the ability. This may make this pet more viable)
As a tenacity pet, Scorpids are nice hardy little tanks, able to take on several mobs around their level at once. Scorpid poison is a decent enough skill with a short cooldown. The problem for lowbie hunters is that its competing for focus with the claw skill. This means that it often fails to go off at all, or gets only one or two in a stack. Turning off claw allows full 5-stacks to build up quickly, but it decreases your dps.
Turtles: Tested Oasis Snapjaw. *Updated*
Shell Shield is the defining ability of Turtles. It's 50% damage reduction for 12 seconds every 1 minute. This could potentially be the strongest pure tanking pet in the game, great for taking on tough elites, or perhaps tanking in heroics. However, in the lower levels he's just slow and boring. I might re-test this family on my highest hunter to see if one with a bunch more talent points is better.
Warp Stalkers: Outland only, Untested.
Worms: Exotic, Untested.
*****
Forthcomming PTR 3.0.8 patch includes nerfing for scorpid poison and cat rake as well as several other hunter nerfs. Volley will be reduced by 30%. I suspect that this will actually help gorillas (and carrion birds and crocs and bears as well) maintain aggro on groups.
I'll revise the below pet families once the changes hit live servers.
*****
Note for patch 3.0.3:
Some exotic pets got a boost in overall DPS. This should make 51-point Beastmaster specialists happy, since their special benefit is now more on a par with the other tree's 51 point talent. The difference however should be minor, enough so that even BM specialists do not need to take exotics to be viable.
Cat's Rake ability has been weakened somewhat. I'll have to retest and compare them with raptors. *done*
The cost for pet specials has been reduced to 20 (from 25) focus. This should help autocasting priority so they go off more frequently when cooldowns are up.
*****
There are a great many changes in the way pets work in the new expansion. Inspired by the fine work done by Znodis at The Mystic Hunter I've attempted to do a quick PvE focused guide to pet choices.
More than at any time in wow history, all pet families are now viable as levelling pets. They can also probably all serve well enough in PvP, Arena and as tanks in instances. Properly specced Tenacity pets can even tank heroic instances, as evidenced by the competition going on now at Big Red Rhino
My reviews were done on various hunters in the level 20 to 30 range. They all spent the first 12 talent points in marksmanship, to get the go for the throat talent, then moved over to beastmastery. None of these hunter alts has particularly spectacular gear for their level. I used aspect of the hawk for most fights, switching to viper when low on mana.
Pets get a talent point at level 20, 24 and 28. Nearly all pets were freshly tamed wild ones, so started out up to 5 levels below the hunter. I spent talent points in dash/dive or charge, then the next in cobra reflexes. Some hunters had bought the glyphs for mend pet and serpent sting, both a minor boost to overall longevity in the field.
None of the Outland only, Northrend only, or exotic pets were able to be tested due to using low level hunters. These reviews are only of families available to hunters as they level up. Nearly all families are accessible by the mid 20's, so there's plenty on offer.
Cunning
The pets in the Cunning families are not always first choices for a levelling pet. They are mainly aimed at PvP and utility in groups but can still serve admirably as a general use companion.
Bats: Tested Vampiric Mistbat*
When testing Dragonhawks on a level 21 hunter, I also grabbed a bat from the same area then levelled them up to 20. Bats are ok as pets and their stun effect will be useful in PvP, but like other disabling effects its on a too-long cooldown to be useful as a general use pet. Little Vlad, my bat, would tank several similar level mobs easily enough but struggled against tougher opponents. This was one of the last pets I tested so perhaps rushed a bit. Bats are decent but not great pets for levelling.
Birds of Prey: Tested Strigid Hunter.
Blizzard stole my screech AOE effect from this pet. Snatch has plenty of potential in PvP but I'm not yet convinced of its effects in PvE. This pet has barely left the stables since patch, so this test is not yet complete.
Chimaeras: Exotic, Untested.
Dragonhawks: Tested *
All the lower level Dragonhawks used to be the weaker "caster" pets pre patch. That has thankfully been fixed in the 3.x world. Their flame breath attack has been nerfed back to being a single target effect rather than a short range AOE. Unfortunately they also seem to suffer the range attack bug that some other pets now seem cured of - they "stutter" forward until in range of their breath. Once in melee they are ok, autocasting breath fairly reliably but the initial attack is annoying. Overall, the Dragonhawk did rather well as a levelling pet. He made short work of Luzran and Knucklehead, then burnt down several adds that had joined in all without much trouble. Quite a likeable pet, despite its flaws.
Nether Rays: Outland only, Untested.
Ravagers: Tested Ravager Specimen.
A ravager makes a decent enough pet. I like the various animations, especially swim. Easy diet, strong dps. The special attack is a 2 second stun but on a longish 40 sec cooldown so doesn't see much usefulness in PvE. Might be better bound on a macro. The ravager has most definitely fallen from its perch as the favourite raiding pet.
Serpents: Tested Deviate Viper.
The serpent special attack poison spit is quite a useful one. With a 10 sec cooldown, its ready to go frequently during fights. It is both a DoT and an anti-caster debuff. It seems that the run-back-to range behaviour that these guys used to have before the patch has gone. A serpent with Dash is a really nice companion.
Silithids: Exotic, Untested.
Spiders: Tested Wildthorn Stalker.
I grabbed a random spider while travelling through Ashenvale. Pre-patch, a spider was a barely adequate pet. Now they are pretty handy creatures to have at your side. Mine easily tanked two mobs 4 levels above it with only mend pet to keep it going. The 40 second cooldown on its web ability is a bit long for levelling use, but if bound to a macro rather than autocast is a handy trick for preventing fleeing mobs. It will be extremely useful in PvP as well.
Spore Bats: Outland only, Untested.
Wind Serpents: Tested Deviate Stinglash.
Once the premier raiding pet for well geared hunters with lots of crit %, Wind serpents have never been one of my favourites. The 10sec cooldown on their lightning breath means its available often in a fight... but its rather underwhelming. Serpent's poison spit is faster, does more damage, shoots further and has a nice debuff that LBr lacks. They seem to have had the annoying run-to-range bug mostly fixed which is nice. The little winged snakes tank reasonably well and have some really nice skins but I'd prefer some other pet. Raiders might still be interested if LB scales with ranged attack power, but poison spit doesn't. I have no data either way as yet.
Ferocity
The ferocity families generally offer skills aimed at increasing damage. They generally lack the pure toughness and survivability of the tenacity pets but make up for it by killing things quickly. Raiders will favour Ferocity pets when they are not expected to tank. A ferocity pet will likely prove to be a good choice for a general use companion.
Carrion Birds: Tested Swoop.
Screech pre-patch was one of the best skills for hunters taking on multiple opponents. It is pretty much unchanged in 3.02, remaining single target damage, and multiple target debuff. I've only briefly tested my original pet, a Swoop from Mulgore, but it looks like it holds up fairly well. Carrion birds were lesser cousins to Owls pre-patch but now have come to the fore as levelling pets.
Cats: Tested Ghost Saber, and several others. (re-tested for 3.0.3)
Cats were third on the DPS totem pole pre patch. Testing by other hunter bloggers indicates they may now be top, at least until the exotics get their buff in a forthcoming patch. (* implemented in 3.0.3). Regardless, cats are an awesome pet. They come in a huge variety of skins to chose from at every level range making them readily accessible. Prowl, though it will be turned off most of the time, makes a nice addition on the occasions it can be used. Rake, the main family skill, is on a short timer, does reasonable damage and is a DoT. It is listed as bleed damage, so some monsters will be immune. Overall, cats still make great pets.
The slight reduction in damage on rake that was introduced in 3.0.3 makes little difference. Rake still contributes roughly 14% of the cats damage output vs 3% for raptor's Savage rend.
Core Hounds: Exotic, Untested.
Devilsaurs: Exotic, Untested.
Hyenas: Tested Hecklefang Stalker. *Updated*
Hyenas are ferocity pets with utility in pvp. Tendon Rip is one of the disabling moves with the shortest cooldown of the lot at 20 seconds. It is also a slight DoT but it is mostly its slowing effect that makes it nice. Hyenas also have a fairly extensive series of animations and interesting sound effects. A better than average pet for levelling.
Moths: Tested Vale Moth.
Moths are a curious inclusion in the ferocity tree. Their family special "Serenity Dust" is both an attack power buff and a minor heal to the pet, helping it fight and survive longer. It is on a longish 1-minute cooldown so isn't as useful as it could be for a levelling pet but does help in most fights. The only currently tameable moth for low level characters is the dirty white one in Azuremyst isle, past a bunch of high level guards making it a hard tame for horde players. It might just be worth the trip though; in my fairly limited testing, the little flying bug tanks like a champ and the self-heal keeps it going longer than otherwise. It also goes quite well with one of the moth small pets as a companion.
Raptors: Tested Deviate Slayer. (re-tested vs cat in 3.0.3 patch)
Raptors are yet again second string cats. Savage rend is a slightly more powerful version of cat's Rake, but its on a way too long cooldown of 1 minute. This makes it useful in most fights if you are pulling one at a time but not so good if you have a bunch at once, or chain fights really closely. A fierce raptor is a fine companion to have at your side. Mine helped me mostly-clear wailing caverns solo at level 23 - but frankly wasn't as good as the trash pet cat I took in originally.
The retest at patch 3.0.3 indicates that the long cooldown on rend is really hurting. Savage rend represented only 3-4% of the raptor's total damage output. Cats are still much better.
Spirit Beasts Exotic, Untested.
Tallstriders: Tested Fleeting Plainstrider.
Tallstriders need some love. Their Dust Cloud skill has some possibilities as an AOE grinding skill but has too limited an effect and a stupidly long cooldown. If left on autocast, it will be used at the start of a fight, before you've gathered a bunch of mobs and its special effect will be wasted. As a member of the ferocity family, a tallstrider does decent damage and its talent tree has some excellent abilities but then again, so does every other ferocity pet. There are far better choices. Almost any other pet is a better choice!
Wasps: Outland only, Untested. (The ones in Azeroth are all untameable at this time).
Rumour has it that wasps suffer slightly lessened damage per second than other similar pets. This is believed to be a bug!
Wolves: To be tested*
I had a brief test of an Ashenvale wolf at the time I tested spider. They did ok, but their family skill is mainly a group oriented ability. For a levelling pet, they are like a slightly buffed tallstrider.
Tenacity
The tenacity family mostly have skills that improve their ability to tank... by increasing damage, by debuffing enemies, or by protecting themselves. Tenacity pets at higher levels have talents that make them viable tanks or off-tanks for parties in instances, something that is beyond the reach of most other families. They also make good choices for solo play but are perhaps less useful in PvP.
Bears: Tested Ashenvale Bear and similar.
Bears are great pets. Charge makes them fast enough to get to the enemy and their family skill, Swipe, is a fast, damaging, MULTI TARGET attack. Bears are great for the kind of limited AOE grinding that most levelling as a hunter seems to consist of. They are tough as nails and hold the attention of a small group through any mend pets needed. The charge animation on a low-level bear looks like an attack wombat on a skateboard! There are a fair variety of looks to chose from and they are reasonably well animated. Overall, a great pet choice.
Boars: Tested Corrupted Mottled Boar, and others. (Bugfix to gore in patch 3.0.3. Needs retesting)
Several patches ago, Boars were THE premier levelling pet. Their gore and charge abilities made for the single best threat generation in the game. That has all changed now though. All Tenacity pets can get charge and gore has been somewhat nerfed. Gore is still a pretty good skill with a shortish cooldown but there are better tenacity pets to look at. Still a good choice for pet.
Crabs: Tested Encrusted Surf Crawler. *Updated*
Crabs get Pin for their family skill. Its a 4-second immobilise (not stun) and channelled DoT on a sadly long 40-second cooldown. I feel this is of more use on a pvp cunning pet than a tenacity tank and the cooldown is far too long for general use. Like the other tenacity families, a crab does fine but lacks that extra something to make it a great pet.
Crocolisks: tested Deviate Crocolisk.
Bad attitude has potential as an AOE grinding skill. It is a bit like Druid's thorns spell, in that its reactive damage to any attacker. It has a long 2 min cooldown but also lasts for 45 seconds so should last through most fights and be ready to go again when you pull the next bunch. Crocolisks have an incredibly annoying breathing sound and somewhat dubious animation which probably put me off this pet too quickly. I'll have to test again more thoroughly... with sound off!
Gorillas: To be tested* (Note: the lowest level Gorilla is level 32, a bit high for this project.)
I've grabbed a gorilla on my level 43 hunter. Even unfed, poorly talented and with only leather gear on the hunter, this guy is dynamite. Thunderstomp is absolutely brilliant for AoE work. The combination of TS, volley and aspect of the viper makes levelling and farming activities so easy! This guy is quite clearly the best available pet for levelling. I'll be going back and continuing to work on this, with a properly equipped hunter and a tanking focussed pet talent tree.
Rhinos: Exotic, Northrend only, Untested.
Scorpids: Tested Silithid Creeper. *Updated*
(Patch 3.0.3 reduced the damage of the scorpid poison skill, but also reduced the focus cost of the ability. This may make this pet more viable)
As a tenacity pet, Scorpids are nice hardy little tanks, able to take on several mobs around their level at once. Scorpid poison is a decent enough skill with a short cooldown. The problem for lowbie hunters is that its competing for focus with the claw skill. This means that it often fails to go off at all, or gets only one or two in a stack. Turning off claw allows full 5-stacks to build up quickly, but it decreases your dps.
Turtles: Tested Oasis Snapjaw. *Updated*
Shell Shield is the defining ability of Turtles. It's 50% damage reduction for 12 seconds every 1 minute. This could potentially be the strongest pure tanking pet in the game, great for taking on tough elites, or perhaps tanking in heroics. However, in the lower levels he's just slow and boring. I might re-test this family on my highest hunter to see if one with a bunch more talent points is better.
Warp Stalkers: Outland only, Untested.
Worms: Exotic, Untested.
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Instance roles
Just thought I'd put down some ideas for tactics in small groups and low level instance running. This isn't the complete guide, just various tips and tricks.
The same roles are mostly valid in higher level instances but class specialisation has a noticeable effect; no more rogue tanks in higher instances please!
In any group there are certain roles to be filled. These can be filled by various classes at times, but obviously some classes suit a role better than others.
The Roles:
The TANK
A tank is the character doing the up close and personal melee combat with the monsters (MOB, NPC). Their role is mostly to soak up damage and prevent the mob from attacking other group members. Other aspects of this role are preventing spell casting and preventing fleeing. Damage dealing is NOT the primary requirement here, but is important in "holding aggro".
Warriors and Paladins are the tank of choice due to much better armour than other classes. Bearform Druids get boosted armour and abilities to handle this role well. Rogues, Hunters and Shamans can tank lower level instances if there isn't someone else available. No spell casting cloth wearer should ever be the primary tank. Warlock and Hunter pets can tank to some extent but have real aggro management problems.
The OFF-TANK
Similar to the TANK above, the OFF-TANK is a secondary Tank. They have a more specialised role in groups. The off-tank's job is to manage any ADDs (additional monsters) or mobs that break away from the main tank. Spell caster interruption and flee prevention are high priorities here. A general awareness of the combat zone is needed. The Off-Tank must be alert for ADDs or re spawns, capturing their attention and either managing it or drawing them to the main tank.
Almost any non- cloth wearer can be a suitable off-tank in lower level instances. In larger groups it is a warrior, druid or pally that takes this on; in smaller groups Rogues or shammys work well. Hunter pets are often acceptable off-tanks and some of the hunter and mage abilities are useful for mob management.
The PULLER
This is a role where a solo player moves away from the group and attacks the next mob to bring them back to the main group. It generally requires some form of ranged attack, so almost any class can do it.
Pulling is an art form; do it wrong and you will draw far too much aggro and wipe out your group. Done well and just the selected mobs are drawn away from their friends and onto the party's main tank.
The outright best class for pulling is the Hunter. Hunters have a number of abilities that make them great pullers, the main one being the Feign Death ability. At least one of their attacks is a slowing/stunning missile shot and they can place traps and their pet in the way of any incoming mob. They can also then feign death to pass the pulled mob over to the main tank. A failed pull done properly will kill only the hunter and not wipe the whole party.
The next best pullers are probably whoever is the main tank. There are a couple of special varieties of the pull though:
The sheep pull :- a mage uses the pollymorph spell to "sheep" one of a group of monsters. The rest of the mobs then charge straight for the mage. It is the job of the tank to get aggro off the mage really quickly.
The SAP pull:- a stealthed rogue uses SAP or another stunning attack to take out one of a group of enemies.
The DPS
Damage Per Second. People with this role have one main function: making mobs dead really quick. The trick to this is that you don't want to just spam your most devastating attacks, since you will draw more aggro from the mobs and possibly take them off the tank and onto yourself. This is bad... healers are mostly too busy looking after the designated tank and healing everyone just isn't efficient. DPS classes that pull off the main tank too often wont be invited back!
The stand-out classes here are Rogue and Mage. Both have awesome damage dealing abilities... but as noted that can also be a problem. If you moderate your damage output so that you are running at about 80% of max you should be ok. Other good classes are cat-form Druid, shadow spec priests, Shammy, Hunter, some warlock pets and warlocks.
DOTS
Damage over Time (spells). Mostly this is the domain of the priest and the warlock, but other classes have some skills in this area. Damage over time effects are useful for weakening enemies and killing off fleeing mobs.
Can generally be used on multiple mobs at once without pulling them off the tank or off-tank. Be aware that most of these effects will break crowd control.
The Crowdie
Crowd control is an ability that only some classes are good at. It involves assisting the off-tanks in removing any ADDS or just handling the extra mobs above and beyond what the main tank can handle. Rogue sap and gouge abilities, Druid root spell, mage freeze and sheep as well as various hamstring attacks are all aspects of this role. Hunters have traps that can immobilise or slow mobs as well. They get much better at higher levels but are initially quite limited. Priest and warlock FEAR abilities are also useful but run the risk of causing more problems!
The Buffer
Most spell caster classes have some role to play here. Apply bonus effects on other party members outside of combat. Remember to boost pets if applicable. Some pets buff as well.. warlock imp most noticeably.
The Healbot
Not the most glamorous of roles perhaps, but essential none the less. Priests, druids, shammys and paladins are just about the only real contenders here, though anyone with first-aid skill can assist. Without your healers, a group will die often and quickly. Another aspect of healing is of course resurrection. Warlocks have an interesting role to play here, in that they can create stones for healing and soul-storing, as well as having the abilities to drain life to keep themselves alive.
When healing, look after the main tank as much as possible and only assist others if the tank is managing well. Also note that your highest level spells are not always the most efficient.
The same roles are mostly valid in higher level instances but class specialisation has a noticeable effect; no more rogue tanks in higher instances please!
In any group there are certain roles to be filled. These can be filled by various classes at times, but obviously some classes suit a role better than others.
The Roles:
The TANK
A tank is the character doing the up close and personal melee combat with the monsters (MOB, NPC). Their role is mostly to soak up damage and prevent the mob from attacking other group members. Other aspects of this role are preventing spell casting and preventing fleeing. Damage dealing is NOT the primary requirement here, but is important in "holding aggro".
Warriors and Paladins are the tank of choice due to much better armour than other classes. Bearform Druids get boosted armour and abilities to handle this role well. Rogues, Hunters and Shamans can tank lower level instances if there isn't someone else available. No spell casting cloth wearer should ever be the primary tank. Warlock and Hunter pets can tank to some extent but have real aggro management problems.
The OFF-TANK
Similar to the TANK above, the OFF-TANK is a secondary Tank. They have a more specialised role in groups. The off-tank's job is to manage any ADDs (additional monsters) or mobs that break away from the main tank. Spell caster interruption and flee prevention are high priorities here. A general awareness of the combat zone is needed. The Off-Tank must be alert for ADDs or re spawns, capturing their attention and either managing it or drawing them to the main tank.
Almost any non- cloth wearer can be a suitable off-tank in lower level instances. In larger groups it is a warrior, druid or pally that takes this on; in smaller groups Rogues or shammys work well. Hunter pets are often acceptable off-tanks and some of the hunter and mage abilities are useful for mob management.
The PULLER
This is a role where a solo player moves away from the group and attacks the next mob to bring them back to the main group. It generally requires some form of ranged attack, so almost any class can do it.
Pulling is an art form; do it wrong and you will draw far too much aggro and wipe out your group. Done well and just the selected mobs are drawn away from their friends and onto the party's main tank.
The outright best class for pulling is the Hunter. Hunters have a number of abilities that make them great pullers, the main one being the Feign Death ability. At least one of their attacks is a slowing/stunning missile shot and they can place traps and their pet in the way of any incoming mob. They can also then feign death to pass the pulled mob over to the main tank. A failed pull done properly will kill only the hunter and not wipe the whole party.
The next best pullers are probably whoever is the main tank. There are a couple of special varieties of the pull though:
The sheep pull :- a mage uses the pollymorph spell to "sheep" one of a group of monsters. The rest of the mobs then charge straight for the mage. It is the job of the tank to get aggro off the mage really quickly.
The SAP pull:- a stealthed rogue uses SAP or another stunning attack to take out one of a group of enemies.
The DPS
Damage Per Second. People with this role have one main function: making mobs dead really quick. The trick to this is that you don't want to just spam your most devastating attacks, since you will draw more aggro from the mobs and possibly take them off the tank and onto yourself. This is bad... healers are mostly too busy looking after the designated tank and healing everyone just isn't efficient. DPS classes that pull off the main tank too often wont be invited back!
The stand-out classes here are Rogue and Mage. Both have awesome damage dealing abilities... but as noted that can also be a problem. If you moderate your damage output so that you are running at about 80% of max you should be ok. Other good classes are cat-form Druid, shadow spec priests, Shammy, Hunter, some warlock pets and warlocks.
DOTS
Damage over Time (spells). Mostly this is the domain of the priest and the warlock, but other classes have some skills in this area. Damage over time effects are useful for weakening enemies and killing off fleeing mobs.
Can generally be used on multiple mobs at once without pulling them off the tank or off-tank. Be aware that most of these effects will break crowd control.
The Crowdie
Crowd control is an ability that only some classes are good at. It involves assisting the off-tanks in removing any ADDS or just handling the extra mobs above and beyond what the main tank can handle. Rogue sap and gouge abilities, Druid root spell, mage freeze and sheep as well as various hamstring attacks are all aspects of this role. Hunters have traps that can immobilise or slow mobs as well. They get much better at higher levels but are initially quite limited. Priest and warlock FEAR abilities are also useful but run the risk of causing more problems!
The Buffer
Most spell caster classes have some role to play here. Apply bonus effects on other party members outside of combat. Remember to boost pets if applicable. Some pets buff as well.. warlock imp most noticeably.
The Healbot
Not the most glamorous of roles perhaps, but essential none the less. Priests, druids, shammys and paladins are just about the only real contenders here, though anyone with first-aid skill can assist. Without your healers, a group will die often and quickly. Another aspect of healing is of course resurrection. Warlocks have an interesting role to play here, in that they can create stones for healing and soul-storing, as well as having the abilities to drain life to keep themselves alive.
When healing, look after the main tank as much as possible and only assist others if the tank is managing well. Also note that your highest level spells are not always the most efficient.
Thursday, July 10, 2008
Instance Runthrus - The worst thing you can do for a friend.
Taking your low level friends through an instanced dungeon with your high level character is just about the worst thing you can do to "help" them! Its generally quick and easy and they get good gear from it as well as reasonable exp but is still evil.
Catching a ride on your coat-tails means that the newbie is getting good gear without having to work for it. This spoils their sense of achievement, not only for the dungeon concerned, but their questing/levelling until their gear again falls behind. Levelling becomes too easy and becomes boring quickly.
It teaches them nothing about how to play their character. Most runthrus just involve the newbie looting the corpses of the slain - there's nothing educational in that! Lazy, ignorant newbies get themselves into higher level dungeons with no idea how group play works. They become a liability that no-one wants to group with.
It builds the expectation that you will always be available to help them out. More runthrus, free stuff, mount money... the expectation never ends. Giving in to any of this just feeds more begging behavior. Stop the rot at the start and don't do it!
All this of course mostly applies to someone's first character. Runthrus for alt characters are less evil though some of the problems remain. Of course its almost necessary for Twinks to receive runthrus - but twinks are their own brand of evil anyway.
What sort of things can you do to help newbies without spoiling them? Well, I suggest doing things that remove some of the frustrations of low level play.
Give your newbie a set of 8 or 10- slot bags. Bag space limits really suck. Dont give out higher than 12-slot bags though, thats making things too easy.
Clothies could be given a wand. Priests especially suffer from crap DPS in the early levels. A wand, plus instructions on how to use it, are a great help.
Its generally not worthwhile giving gear or enchants to those below level 20, since they will outgrow anything too quickly. Twinks can damn well pay for anything they want!
The best thing you can do for your newbie friend is advice. Wow is a reasonably complex game with a lot to learn. Genuine newbies are likely overwhelmed by it all.
NEVER give money to lowbies.
Remember, runthrus are a disservice to the newbie and the whole wow community. Stop the rot!
Catching a ride on your coat-tails means that the newbie is getting good gear without having to work for it. This spoils their sense of achievement, not only for the dungeon concerned, but their questing/levelling until their gear again falls behind. Levelling becomes too easy and becomes boring quickly.
It teaches them nothing about how to play their character. Most runthrus just involve the newbie looting the corpses of the slain - there's nothing educational in that! Lazy, ignorant newbies get themselves into higher level dungeons with no idea how group play works. They become a liability that no-one wants to group with.
It builds the expectation that you will always be available to help them out. More runthrus, free stuff, mount money... the expectation never ends. Giving in to any of this just feeds more begging behavior. Stop the rot at the start and don't do it!
All this of course mostly applies to someone's first character. Runthrus for alt characters are less evil though some of the problems remain. Of course its almost necessary for Twinks to receive runthrus - but twinks are their own brand of evil anyway.
What sort of things can you do to help newbies without spoiling them? Well, I suggest doing things that remove some of the frustrations of low level play.
Give your newbie a set of 8 or 10- slot bags. Bag space limits really suck. Dont give out higher than 12-slot bags though, thats making things too easy.
Clothies could be given a wand. Priests especially suffer from crap DPS in the early levels. A wand, plus instructions on how to use it, are a great help.
Its generally not worthwhile giving gear or enchants to those below level 20, since they will outgrow anything too quickly. Twinks can damn well pay for anything they want!
The best thing you can do for your newbie friend is advice. Wow is a reasonably complex game with a lot to learn. Genuine newbies are likely overwhelmed by it all.
NEVER give money to lowbies.
Remember, runthrus are a disservice to the newbie and the whole wow community. Stop the rot!
Tuesday, July 8, 2008
Hate, aggro, threat - Managing NPC hostility
An understanding of "aggro" in World Of Warcraft is key to your success against computer controlled opponents. When you understand how mobs react you are able to control the fights to ensure victory.
First, what is "aggro"? The terms hate, threat and aggro are often used interchangeably. They all mean essentially the same thing: how annoyed the mob is at you. This is a measurable, numeric value. The higher it is, the more that mob hates you.
Each term overlaps the others but there are certain loose definitions:
Hate: The numeric value measuring how much a particular mob "hates" you. Each mob keeps a separate value for each combatant in range. These values go up or down as the fight progresses depending on the actions of each combatant. Hate values on each mob are tracked separately.
Threat: The value added to a mob's hate list for each action performed in combat. Each attack adds threat, some special abilities remove threat. Tracked independently by each mob.
Aggro: Loosely defined as being the focus of attention from a mob. "Holding aggro" means you are the one who the mob hates the most and will be attacked by it if possible.
Aggro radius: An area about each mob where it can detect and react to hostile combatants. The aggro radius around individual mobs can interact with other mobs of similar type to cause a chain reaction of hate activation.
In general, actions done by a combatant cause threat to one or more mobs, increasing their hate levels towards that combatant. NPC's can have threat and hate towards each other as well as towards players, if the npcs are of hostile factions. Some actions cause hate to all mobs in range, others only to the mob affected by the action.
On to some examples. A young Cryptography, neophyte undead rogue, is standing safely out of range of a single skeletal soldier near the Agamand Mills. Crypto is well beyond the skeleton's aggro radius, so it does not yet know he exists. As Crypto walks towards the skeleton, he crosses the edge of the aggro radius. Immediately, the skeletal soldier is now aware of Crypto and starts rushing towards him. Crypto now "holds aggro" from that skeleton. Being a cowardly soul, Crypto immediately runs away. The skeleton pursues Crypto for quite a distance before breaking off and returning to its starting location. Crypto caused no threat from any attacks, but, since he was the only one on the skeleton's hate list, he "held aggro".
Some little time later, Crypto returns to face the skeleton. He now knows roughly how close he can get before triggering its aggro radius, so stays carefully outside that range. With careful manoeuvring, he can be in range to attack with his bow but still be outside the aggro radius. He sees an opportunity and shoots the skeleton! Instantly, Skelly-boy is made aware of Crypto's presence - an arrow in the ribs being a rather pointed indicator of something being wrong - and rushes over to chastise the young rogue! After a few exchanges of blows, Crypto is taking the worst of it and runs away again. This time, Crypto made several threat-generating attacks on the skeleton but since he was again the only one on the threat list he still "held aggro" and thus the mob's undivided attention.
Deciding the skeleton is too tough to tackle alone, Crypto teams up with another neophyte undead. Mortified is a young mage, barely out of the academy. She's brash and impulsive, supremely confidant in her abilities but aware of the limitations of wearing cloth armour. The plan is discussed beforehand and Crypt will attempt to "pull" the skeleton with his bow before Mortified opens up with her fireball. A few quick shots should smash the nasty skeleton!
Crypto again walks up to just outside the skelly's aggro radius. Mortified is standing some ways back. Crypto fires his bow and the skeleton rushes towards him waving the large axe vigorously. Mortified starts casting fireball, which completes and zooms off to splash explosively against the skeleton's chest just as it reaches Crypto and takes its first swing. Immediately, the skeleton roars and rushes over to Mortified, smashing her to the ground in a few swings of his axe despite Crypto's best efforts with his dagger in its back! When Mortified is dead, the skeleton turns its fury on Cryptography, who almost manages to kill it before also falling to its attacks.
What happened here is that Mortified's potent fireball attack mean that she overtook Crypto on the skeleton's hate list. Mobs attack the one they hate the most... which was the tissue-paper clad mage. Crypt's attacks with bow and dagger did not generate sufficient threat to retake aggro before the mage died. Mortified "stole aggro" and died because of it. Next (and only) target on the mobs hate list was Crypto, so once Mort died, Crypt was targeted and killed.
A little later, after respawning and healing up, Crypt and Mort wish to try again. This time, Mortified will wait a bit before opening up with her fireball. Hopefully Crypt will survive long enough in his better armour to finish off the skeleton.
Using more or less the same tactics as last time, Crypto gets just within bow range before attacking. Mortified is somewhat further back but waits before casting. The skeleton, arrow bouncing loosely in its ribs, charges at Cryptography. When it gets close enough, Crypt stabs it several times with his dagger and manages to take only a few blows from the creature's axe before the first of Mortified's fireballs crash into it. This time, the skeleton goes down! Crypt is in fairly good shape and Mortified is completely untouched. Victory and loot is theirs!
This time round, Crypto built up a reasonable amount of hate before Mort' s high-threat fireballs kicked in. By waiting a few seconds before opening up with her attacks, Crypto was able to "hold aggro" throughout the fight and his much better armour meant that they both survived long enough to finish off the skeleton.
(I will post this now but plan on editing it later.. got to do some work!)
First, what is "aggro"? The terms hate, threat and aggro are often used interchangeably. They all mean essentially the same thing: how annoyed the mob is at you. This is a measurable, numeric value. The higher it is, the more that mob hates you.
Each term overlaps the others but there are certain loose definitions:
Hate: The numeric value measuring how much a particular mob "hates" you. Each mob keeps a separate value for each combatant in range. These values go up or down as the fight progresses depending on the actions of each combatant. Hate values on each mob are tracked separately.
Threat: The value added to a mob's hate list for each action performed in combat. Each attack adds threat, some special abilities remove threat. Tracked independently by each mob.
Aggro: Loosely defined as being the focus of attention from a mob. "Holding aggro" means you are the one who the mob hates the most and will be attacked by it if possible.
Aggro radius: An area about each mob where it can detect and react to hostile combatants. The aggro radius around individual mobs can interact with other mobs of similar type to cause a chain reaction of hate activation.
In general, actions done by a combatant cause threat to one or more mobs, increasing their hate levels towards that combatant. NPC's can have threat and hate towards each other as well as towards players, if the npcs are of hostile factions. Some actions cause hate to all mobs in range, others only to the mob affected by the action.
On to some examples. A young Cryptography, neophyte undead rogue, is standing safely out of range of a single skeletal soldier near the Agamand Mills. Crypto is well beyond the skeleton's aggro radius, so it does not yet know he exists. As Crypto walks towards the skeleton, he crosses the edge of the aggro radius. Immediately, the skeletal soldier is now aware of Crypto and starts rushing towards him. Crypto now "holds aggro" from that skeleton. Being a cowardly soul, Crypto immediately runs away. The skeleton pursues Crypto for quite a distance before breaking off and returning to its starting location. Crypto caused no threat from any attacks, but, since he was the only one on the skeleton's hate list, he "held aggro".
Some little time later, Crypto returns to face the skeleton. He now knows roughly how close he can get before triggering its aggro radius, so stays carefully outside that range. With careful manoeuvring, he can be in range to attack with his bow but still be outside the aggro radius. He sees an opportunity and shoots the skeleton! Instantly, Skelly-boy is made aware of Crypto's presence - an arrow in the ribs being a rather pointed indicator of something being wrong - and rushes over to chastise the young rogue! After a few exchanges of blows, Crypto is taking the worst of it and runs away again. This time, Crypto made several threat-generating attacks on the skeleton but since he was again the only one on the threat list he still "held aggro" and thus the mob's undivided attention.
Deciding the skeleton is too tough to tackle alone, Crypto teams up with another neophyte undead. Mortified is a young mage, barely out of the academy. She's brash and impulsive, supremely confidant in her abilities but aware of the limitations of wearing cloth armour. The plan is discussed beforehand and Crypt will attempt to "pull" the skeleton with his bow before Mortified opens up with her fireball. A few quick shots should smash the nasty skeleton!
Crypto again walks up to just outside the skelly's aggro radius. Mortified is standing some ways back. Crypto fires his bow and the skeleton rushes towards him waving the large axe vigorously. Mortified starts casting fireball, which completes and zooms off to splash explosively against the skeleton's chest just as it reaches Crypto and takes its first swing. Immediately, the skeleton roars and rushes over to Mortified, smashing her to the ground in a few swings of his axe despite Crypto's best efforts with his dagger in its back! When Mortified is dead, the skeleton turns its fury on Cryptography, who almost manages to kill it before also falling to its attacks.
What happened here is that Mortified's potent fireball attack mean that she overtook Crypto on the skeleton's hate list. Mobs attack the one they hate the most... which was the tissue-paper clad mage. Crypt's attacks with bow and dagger did not generate sufficient threat to retake aggro before the mage died. Mortified "stole aggro" and died because of it. Next (and only) target on the mobs hate list was Crypto, so once Mort died, Crypt was targeted and killed.
A little later, after respawning and healing up, Crypt and Mort wish to try again. This time, Mortified will wait a bit before opening up with her fireball. Hopefully Crypt will survive long enough in his better armour to finish off the skeleton.
Using more or less the same tactics as last time, Crypto gets just within bow range before attacking. Mortified is somewhat further back but waits before casting. The skeleton, arrow bouncing loosely in its ribs, charges at Cryptography. When it gets close enough, Crypt stabs it several times with his dagger and manages to take only a few blows from the creature's axe before the first of Mortified's fireballs crash into it. This time, the skeleton goes down! Crypt is in fairly good shape and Mortified is completely untouched. Victory and loot is theirs!
This time round, Crypto built up a reasonable amount of hate before Mort' s high-threat fireballs kicked in. By waiting a few seconds before opening up with her attacks, Crypto was able to "hold aggro" throughout the fight and his much better armour meant that they both survived long enough to finish off the skeleton.
(I will post this now but plan on editing it later.. got to do some work!)
Sunday, July 6, 2008
Training weapons is not such a drag.
(Edit for Wrath of the Lich King: These guys seem to no longer give weapon skill training.)
Something I discovered during a bugged event in Stormwind about 3 years ago is also of value currently to anyone above about level 55.
In Blasted Lands, in the area around the dark portal, are several "Servant of ..." creatures. They are the objects of a quest in the zone that I've never bothered with. They are interesting however in that WITHOUT the quest, they are essentially immortal. Below 5% health, they go transparent. You cannot bring them below 1%, since you are supposed to shatter a crystal... but you can't do it if not on the quest.
This is useful because you can stand there bashing on them with a variety of weapons and get skillups. Some classes may even be able to AFK the whole fight while training!
Wowhead links are:
Servant of Allistarj
Servant of Grol
Servant of Razelikh
Servant of Sevine
Something I discovered during a bugged event in Stormwind about 3 years ago is also of value currently to anyone above about level 55.
In Blasted Lands, in the area around the dark portal, are several "Servant of ..." creatures. They are the objects of a quest in the zone that I've never bothered with. They are interesting however in that WITHOUT the quest, they are essentially immortal. Below 5% health, they go transparent. You cannot bring them below 1%, since you are supposed to shatter a crystal... but you can't do it if not on the quest.
This is useful because you can stand there bashing on them with a variety of weapons and get skillups. Some classes may even be able to AFK the whole fight while training!
Wowhead links are:
Servant of Allistarj
Servant of Grol
Servant of Razelikh
Servant of Sevine
Friday, July 4, 2008
Talent Choices
At level 10 your character gets to select their first talent point. Each level from then on gives you another point. Talents provide boosts to your existing abilities or add in new ones and can play a very significant part in your overall development.
Each character class has three skill trees to select from. In general it is best to concentrate in one particular tree rather than selecting from all of them. As you reach the highest levels in the game you may be able to open up a second tree.
There are heaps of websites that give suggested talent builds for max-level characters. There are also some that tell you where to pick talents as you level. Everyone seems to have their own opinion as to what talents are best. Personally I look for the following when selecting talents for levelling:
A boost to main attack damage, hit, or critical rating.
Reduction in cost or speed of main attack.
Reduction in mana/energy/rage cost for commonly used abilities.
Increased health/mana regeneration
I also look for talents that increase movement speed early in the talent trees. I hate slow walking!
All of these help you to kill stuff more quickly, with less downtime between fights. This will mean that you can complete quests and level more quickly.
Each character class has three skill trees to select from. In general it is best to concentrate in one particular tree rather than selecting from all of them. As you reach the highest levels in the game you may be able to open up a second tree.
There are heaps of websites that give suggested talent builds for max-level characters. There are also some that tell you where to pick talents as you level. Everyone seems to have their own opinion as to what talents are best. Personally I look for the following when selecting talents for levelling:
A boost to main attack damage, hit, or critical rating.
Reduction in cost or speed of main attack.
Reduction in mana/energy/rage cost for commonly used abilities.
Increased health/mana regeneration
I also look for talents that increase movement speed early in the talent trees. I hate slow walking!
All of these help you to kill stuff more quickly, with less downtime between fights. This will mean that you can complete quests and level more quickly.
Monday, June 30, 2008
Out with the old, in with the new part 2.
This one should be a lot briefer than the other post!
I mentioned that I rolled a Draenei Hunter on the alliance side of a server where I have existing Horde. This server has a few of my friends from Dath'Remar who are already semi-established.
Draenei males are new to me. They DO look awkward and hugely top-heavy. Looks aside, they are perfectly capable as hunters. I rushed through the first 5 levels in about 45 minutes, slightly slower than the average because of lots of chatting.
I had finished with the newbie zone and was attempting the fishing quest in Azuremyst Island when my friend showed up. Her character is a level 23 paladin, also a Draenei. We were members of a party and the level difference is quite large, so the exp I got per kill was dramatically less than if solo. Having my own personal defender however made rushing through the early quests very easy. Since the majority of my exp was coming from questing, I pushed through lots of the Azuremyst stuff very quickly. Progress seemed to follow along about the same as it has when I've done the quests solo. I hit level 10 at a very fast 3 and a half hours then completed the taming quests solo.
My pally friend was joined by our other hunter friend and they both farmed the blood elf bandit for his mask for a while. I attempted to re-tame the cat from the last stage of the hunter quest, but it timed out and he despawned. As a replacement I grabbed the nearest cat. Not quite as successful as the Tauren from yesterday. With my new pet in tow I rushed through the furbolg related quests up north, spending about 20 minutes killing every Murloc in sight, even long after the quest was completed. I renamed the cat "Purrgatory". He dinged several times chasing the fishmen.
Once done with quests on Azuremyst, I headed over to Teldrasill to get skills and grab a owl pet. I ran out of time so have logged out in the inn at Dolannar. Since this guy had assistance from my friend, I didn't work as hard on self-funding as I normally would. I got a 2g starter fund, with which I bought 3* 8 -slot bags and upgraded my sword. I bought cooking, fishing, first-aid skills, and have again gone with skinning and mining as gathering skills. One annoyance is that the skinning trainer will not talk to you until after you complete the first of the furbolg quests.
Anyway, a quick visit to the AH selling my paltry collection of leather and ores got me about 3g, of which 2g was mailed back to my friend to repay the "loan".
Somewhat redeming myself for earlier foolishness (check the comments), I was walking back to town when I was rudely attacked from behind. My new pet went nuts and I lucked out on the loot: [blood elf bandit mask] This adds to the 2-3 others that my friends have already farmed. We will be looking to flip these over to the horde auction house if they sell for lots more there than on Alliance.
These two new projects have cost me 4 alts on other servers.
RIP
Aula, 22 Human Warlock (f)
Larceny, 15 Gnome Rogue (m)
Leaflitter, 16 ish Night Elf Hunter (m)
Acrinomy, 16 Orc Warlock (f) (yes her name was a spelling error!)
I mentioned that I rolled a Draenei Hunter on the alliance side of a server where I have existing Horde. This server has a few of my friends from Dath'Remar who are already semi-established.
Draenei males are new to me. They DO look awkward and hugely top-heavy. Looks aside, they are perfectly capable as hunters. I rushed through the first 5 levels in about 45 minutes, slightly slower than the average because of lots of chatting.
I had finished with the newbie zone and was attempting the fishing quest in Azuremyst Island when my friend showed up. Her character is a level 23 paladin, also a Draenei. We were members of a party and the level difference is quite large, so the exp I got per kill was dramatically less than if solo. Having my own personal defender however made rushing through the early quests very easy. Since the majority of my exp was coming from questing, I pushed through lots of the Azuremyst stuff very quickly. Progress seemed to follow along about the same as it has when I've done the quests solo. I hit level 10 at a very fast 3 and a half hours then completed the taming quests solo.
My pally friend was joined by our other hunter friend and they both farmed the blood elf bandit for his mask for a while. I attempted to re-tame the cat from the last stage of the hunter quest, but it timed out and he despawned. As a replacement I grabbed the nearest cat. Not quite as successful as the Tauren from yesterday. With my new pet in tow I rushed through the furbolg related quests up north, spending about 20 minutes killing every Murloc in sight, even long after the quest was completed. I renamed the cat "Purrgatory". He dinged several times chasing the fishmen.
Once done with quests on Azuremyst, I headed over to Teldrasill to get skills and grab a owl pet. I ran out of time so have logged out in the inn at Dolannar. Since this guy had assistance from my friend, I didn't work as hard on self-funding as I normally would. I got a 2g starter fund, with which I bought 3* 8 -slot bags and upgraded my sword. I bought cooking, fishing, first-aid skills, and have again gone with skinning and mining as gathering skills. One annoyance is that the skinning trainer will not talk to you until after you complete the first of the furbolg quests.
Anyway, a quick visit to the AH selling my paltry collection of leather and ores got me about 3g, of which 2g was mailed back to my friend to repay the "loan".
Somewhat redeming myself for earlier foolishness (check the comments), I was walking back to town when I was rudely attacked from behind. My new pet went nuts and I lucked out on the loot: [blood elf bandit mask] This adds to the 2-3 others that my friends have already farmed. We will be looking to flip these over to the horde auction house if they sell for lots more there than on Alliance.
These two new projects have cost me 4 alts on other servers.
RIP
Aula, 22 Human Warlock (f)
Larceny, 15 Gnome Rogue (m)
Leaflitter, 16 ish Night Elf Hunter (m)
Acrinomy, 16 Orc Warlock (f) (yes her name was a spelling error!)
Sunday, June 29, 2008
Out with the old, in with the new.
This weekend was the first time in a while that I have had a decent chunk of time to actually play Wow. I spent quite a lot of time on my bank alt on Dath'Remar, buying and selling stuff on the auction house. On the theory that money in my bags is idle money, I've re-invested about 700 gold in speculative items. There are now about 300 separate auctions up with my name on them. I had quite a few sales while I was still putting items up so my balance only decreased by about 200g in the process. When I next log on I expect to see several pages of "auction successful" mail and a much healthier bank balance.
One bad thing is that I seem to be stuck with several mail and plate items above level 60. My banker is an enchanter, but not yet high enough to disenchant these items. Unfortunately, quest rewards at the 60+ level seem to give better gear than random greens, so they rarely sell. Mail and plate are particularly nasty, since they cost a fortune in AH fees for every listing. Not quite sure what I'll do with these yet.
With the rest of my time I started two new projects. Friends and guild members on Dath’Remar have created alliance alts on another server. I already have several alts on that server's Horde. It's been an unwritten rule that I won't play both factions on a single server, even when the game will allow it. I've now broken that rule. It's a "normal" pve realm, so it IS possible to play both sides on the one server. I've created a male Draenei hunter, and have a remaining character slot for another bank alt, probably a NE druid.
On another server, I deleted an unused alt and created both Tauren Hunter and Tauren Druid. I don’t think I've ever had Tauren Hunters before. I spent several hours working on these guys and have kept rough notes on their economic progress. Part of the reason for creating these was to demonstrate clearly how taking two gathering professions at the very start can cure your money blues. I followed most of my own tips from my earlier post: Cure the Cash Flow Blues
First, I generated both characters at the login screen. I chose Druid for their flexibility and hunter for ease of use and farming ability. I'm not sure I'll ever work on these guys enough to get them very high level so they have to be useful in the lower levels. It helps that I like both classes a lot!
First character to start was the hunter. Its been a while since I've rolled a Tauren, so I sat through the intro movie. Essentially, the Tauren owe their continued existence to Thrall and the Orcs. We are supposed to hate the centaur. That's OK.. Centaur are humanoids and drop lots of cloth and coin.. I'll have no trouble farming them and will be doing something for our tribes!
The first few quests in the Tauren starter area are all about proving your worth to the tribe. One quest chain continues all the way until about level 12. Hunters make short work of the early quests, often killing the monsters before they get close and since most are neutral you can always engage at maximum range. Bag space is however at a premium. Sell the useless bread and water you start with, it’s unnecessary and wastes space you need for questing.
My hunter had reached level 2 before completing even one quest, and was less than a bar from level 3 by the time I'd got back to town. I sold all the junk I had scavenged and bought the first few skills from the trainer. Still too little money left over to buy another bag. Off I go to complete more quests. Again these early quests are easy since all the monsters are non hostile until you engage them. They were substantially tougher though and my axe was deployed a lot more. Hunters really suck in melee, but at this level there's almost no choice.
By the time I hit level 4, I was quite a distance from the village and bag space became a problem. I needed 4 of the available 16 bag slots for quest items so I tried to keep only stackable items in the other slots. I had to throw away several grey items before Ii managed to kill Sharptusk, grab his head and hearth back to town. Ding level 5, and still not enough money to buy a bag. Oh well, off I go to Bloodhoof village for the next stage. Elapsed time to level 5: 39 minutes and change.
I kill a few wolves that were close to the road on the way to Bloodhoof. This plus travel experience lets me ding level 6 at about the same time as I pick up the quests in town. I see that the fire festival is set up to the south east, so I go over there and restart the fire and collect a few more fire festival quests. The next series of Bloodhoof quests all involve hunting animals for their parts, so off I go killing tallstriders, wolves and cats. Bag space here is at an absolute premium. I think 10 of 16 slots were needed for quests in this area, so I had to stagger them somewhat. Quests to the south of Bloodhoof all completed, I returned to town, trained up and found that I had a little extra cash left over.
In my other post I’ve suggested skinning and mining or herbalism as good combinations for moneymaking. Both herbalism and mining are not good for hunters, since they interfere with your tracking abilities. There is a skinning trainer in Bloodhoof , and cooking, first aid and fishing trainers, but for mining I needed to go to Thunder bluff. I bought both the skinning knife and mining pick in preparation. Training complete, I activated the "rite of vision" quest and followed my ghostly wolf guide up to the mountain cave west of TB.
I spent quite a lot of time killing the harpies near the cave. One type is a caster and is easy to fight as a hunter since they stay at range. The other types are melee but not too hard to kill. I had only one close call where I was attacked by a patrolling wolf while fighting two harpies. The Tauren racial thunderstomp ability saved my behind then.
Once I'd collected enough claws and linen from the harpies, It was off to kill Dwarves further south. The quest goal here is to collect "broken tools"... but the little guys only dropped "mining pick". The first time I did this zone this was confusing! You have to collect the 5 mining picks then travel to Thunder bluff and "break" them at the forge there in the city.
By the time I had made it to TB for the first time, I had hit level 8 and was really struggling with both lousy hunter melee skills and no bag space. I sold off all the grey items, broke the dwarven tools and visited the auction house.
After going AFK for 10 minutes while auctioneer scanned the entire auction house I came back to sell my extra white gear. I had several stacks of leather and ruined leather, as well as linen and some meat to sell. Leather seemed reasonably priced, so I listed mine. Ruined leather is almost worthless but the AH average was still better than just vendoring it, so I listed those as well. Linen cloth is often a great seller, since everyone needs first aid skill, and it’s used for newbie tailoring as well. On to the AH went my stacks.
When I tried to list my spare wolf meat, I noticed a problem. Auctioneer was telling me that each piece was worth ~700 gold and that I couldn't match the lowest price. WTF? lobwbie meat, that you can get for free killing level 5 wolves at 700g? No way. It usually sells for a handful of silver each at best. What had happened is that someone has tried manipulating prices. They listed several items at 700g, and then listed most of their stock at a "more reasonable" 2-3 gold a stack, hoping to fool people into buying it at the inflated price. This would still be many 100's of percent higher than the usual price.
I put my few pieces of meat on the AH at about 3s each. With the last of my remaining silver I attempted to find under priced items on the AH that I could bid on or buy out and resell. There was only one item I could afford, a crunchy spider leg. I bought it, but then couldn't afford to list it.... and I'd also forgotten to buy the mining skill. Stupid!
I ended up vendoring the mining pick and one piece of spider meat to afford the mining skill, then off I went to continue questing. I headed south along the mountain ranges, killing the last few cougars needed then headed off to Bloodhoof. On the way I saw Mazzaranache respawn. I am tempted to go pick him up once I hit 10! Back in Bloodhoof I finally scrounged the cash for the mining pick a second time and handed in as many quests as I could. The nearest quest remaining was the level 6 one to kill bristlebacks to the west of Bloodhoof. It was close to the mountains where I had seen some copper mines so I went off collecting first.
I mined several nodes of copper then headed into the bristleback's cave. Careful targeting made the kills quite easy, especially the casters. Lots of cloth, some coin, and even a couple of chests made the loot pile up rapidly. Deep inside the cave were the poachers, the last guys I needed for the quest. These were also quite easy since they are hunter types and stay at range as well. I cleared the whole cave, looted the chest, mined the three copper nodes and was about to hearth back to town when I realised that it was still on cooldown. Damn, I'll have to fight my way back out. Here is where I made my biggest mistake of the night.
On the way back out, I found a patrolling bristleback entering a previously cleared area. I needed to get past him, so I engaged. Just as I finished him off, another respawned right next to me and attacked, right in melee range. This fight took a lot longer... too long in fact, because two more ranged guys had also repopped further up the corridor and were hammering me with arrows. Even a health potion wasn’t enough to save me, trapped between fresh respawns behind and ahead.
I made it to almost level 10 before my first visit to the spirit healer. With just a little more care this could have been avoided. Ah well.. I ended up in town without having to use the hearthstone cooldown so its not all bad. Resurrection sickness wasn't an issue for a below level 10 character but the cost of repairs was a concern. I hadn't repaired at all up to this point as I was replacing crap grey gear with more crap grey all the time.
Hand in all the quests and I dinged level 10. Yahoo! Elapsed /played was a shade over 4 hours of which maybe half an hour was stuffing about in town or AFK eating dinner.
Level 10 for a hunter is the most exciting time... you get the three-part taming the beast quest line that ends in you getting your first pet! Hooray!
The quest for Tauren involves capturing in order:
An Adult Plainstrider (tallstrider)
A Prarie Stalker (a wolf)
then a Swoop (carrion bird)
I had the fire festival buff on while I did these quests which nearly resulted in some dead animals. Each time they were hitting me they were taking some fire damage. The wolf was down to about 5% health at the end, but thankfully survived just long enough!
Each of these creatures are quite close to Bloodhoof Village making this a fairly painless exercise for Tauren compared to other races. The plainstrider is neutral so is even easier than otherwise.
When I completed each stage I dismissed the temporary pet just before engaging the next one. The plainstrider reverted to neutral while I was on the bridge just north of Bloodhoof, then fled off south to his home. The wolf and the swoop were both found in the same area, so when I released the wolf he immediately engaged me. Ungrateful wretch! Luckily he dropped a claw I needed and some leather.
Swoops, in the wild, have a knockback caster interupt ability "swoop". This seems to be supressed when using the taming rod during the taming quest. Its back in action again when you release the bird however! I intended training the exact same swoop used in part three of the quest as my first real pet. This proved much more challenging than I expected though, since he managed to get off the swoop ability twice during the taming, forcing a restart both times. Each taming attempt used up mana and I had to wait a few seconds to get enough for the final tame. Also, the fire festival buff was still going and the poor swoop was taking damage each time he hit me. When the third taming attempt finally succeeeded, I was at about 7% health, almost no mana and my new pet was down to under 20% health as well.
Welcome Accipter, my first pet. I wonder if I'm unique in taming one of the EXACT beasts used in the taming quests as the first ever "real" pet? Anyway, he was initially very unhappy with me and since I hadn't yet completed the final stage of the training quest, I couldnt feed him! Off I went immediately to Thunder Bluff for training!
During all this time, not one of my auctions had sold and I had not yet been lucky enough to find a new bag, nor had I had the spare cash to buy a new one. Bag space was still very limited! With hearthstone, skinning knife, mining pick, fishing rod, a stack of bandages, a stack of healing pots as permanent items, as well as partial stacks of leather, copper, linen etc as tradeable items there wasnt much left in the old backpack. I had been keeping a stack of meat aside for pet feeding but mush have vendored it somewhere along the way since I had only once bit of meat on hand for feeding Accipter. He was momentarily less annoyed but soon reverted to unhappy. Now I have a pissed off pet and no food!
The solution presented itself in the form of fishing from the lake in TB... however I hadn't yet leveled fishing skill, so nearly all of the attempts were unsuccessful. I even bought a lure for the rod which helped a bit. At least I got enough fish to bring Accipter to happy state before I returned to adventure. We killed the harpies just north west of TB for a quest, and spotted and killed the ghostwolf for his hide. Accipter dinged several times and I hit level 11 before returning to town and retiring for the night.
I relogged in as my brand new druid and rushed through the initial quests. He dinged level 5 in 42 minutes, but he also found 2 bags, one off the very first kill! He made it to level 6 and Bloodhoof village in under an hour before I logged him out and quit wow for the evening.
Now for the good bit:
Just now I logged in again to my hunter to check his auctions. Last night he had 2 silver and change. This morning, he's got 2 pages of "Auction successful" mail messages and a much healthier bank balance of 6g, 75s with about 20 more unsold auctions waiting.
Best sellers were stacks of copper bars, at about 3g, leather at 1.5g for several stacks, and linen making up most of the rest. I also had a single silver bar and 2 malachite from chests that sold as well.
6g is more than sufficient to pay all the training costs up to level 20. I'll be able to buy at least 8-slot bags for both characters, but will look into 10 or 12 slotters first. The most cost -effective ones tend to be the 16-slot netherweave bags, since there are lots of "lazy" high level tailors making them but they are out of my price range for now.
One bad thing is that I seem to be stuck with several mail and plate items above level 60. My banker is an enchanter, but not yet high enough to disenchant these items. Unfortunately, quest rewards at the 60+ level seem to give better gear than random greens, so they rarely sell. Mail and plate are particularly nasty, since they cost a fortune in AH fees for every listing. Not quite sure what I'll do with these yet.
With the rest of my time I started two new projects. Friends and guild members on Dath’Remar have created alliance alts on another server. I already have several alts on that server's Horde. It's been an unwritten rule that I won't play both factions on a single server, even when the game will allow it. I've now broken that rule. It's a "normal" pve realm, so it IS possible to play both sides on the one server. I've created a male Draenei hunter, and have a remaining character slot for another bank alt, probably a NE druid.
On another server, I deleted an unused alt and created both Tauren Hunter and Tauren Druid. I don’t think I've ever had Tauren Hunters before. I spent several hours working on these guys and have kept rough notes on their economic progress. Part of the reason for creating these was to demonstrate clearly how taking two gathering professions at the very start can cure your money blues. I followed most of my own tips from my earlier post: Cure the Cash Flow Blues
First, I generated both characters at the login screen. I chose Druid for their flexibility and hunter for ease of use and farming ability. I'm not sure I'll ever work on these guys enough to get them very high level so they have to be useful in the lower levels. It helps that I like both classes a lot!
First character to start was the hunter. Its been a while since I've rolled a Tauren, so I sat through the intro movie. Essentially, the Tauren owe their continued existence to Thrall and the Orcs. We are supposed to hate the centaur. That's OK.. Centaur are humanoids and drop lots of cloth and coin.. I'll have no trouble farming them and will be doing something for our tribes!
The first few quests in the Tauren starter area are all about proving your worth to the tribe. One quest chain continues all the way until about level 12. Hunters make short work of the early quests, often killing the monsters before they get close and since most are neutral you can always engage at maximum range. Bag space is however at a premium. Sell the useless bread and water you start with, it’s unnecessary and wastes space you need for questing.
My hunter had reached level 2 before completing even one quest, and was less than a bar from level 3 by the time I'd got back to town. I sold all the junk I had scavenged and bought the first few skills from the trainer. Still too little money left over to buy another bag. Off I go to complete more quests. Again these early quests are easy since all the monsters are non hostile until you engage them. They were substantially tougher though and my axe was deployed a lot more. Hunters really suck in melee, but at this level there's almost no choice.
By the time I hit level 4, I was quite a distance from the village and bag space became a problem. I needed 4 of the available 16 bag slots for quest items so I tried to keep only stackable items in the other slots. I had to throw away several grey items before Ii managed to kill Sharptusk, grab his head and hearth back to town. Ding level 5, and still not enough money to buy a bag. Oh well, off I go to Bloodhoof village for the next stage. Elapsed time to level 5: 39 minutes and change.
I kill a few wolves that were close to the road on the way to Bloodhoof. This plus travel experience lets me ding level 6 at about the same time as I pick up the quests in town. I see that the fire festival is set up to the south east, so I go over there and restart the fire and collect a few more fire festival quests. The next series of Bloodhoof quests all involve hunting animals for their parts, so off I go killing tallstriders, wolves and cats. Bag space here is at an absolute premium. I think 10 of 16 slots were needed for quests in this area, so I had to stagger them somewhat. Quests to the south of Bloodhoof all completed, I returned to town, trained up and found that I had a little extra cash left over.
In my other post I’ve suggested skinning and mining or herbalism as good combinations for moneymaking. Both herbalism and mining are not good for hunters, since they interfere with your tracking abilities. There is a skinning trainer in Bloodhoof , and cooking, first aid and fishing trainers, but for mining I needed to go to Thunder bluff. I bought both the skinning knife and mining pick in preparation. Training complete, I activated the "rite of vision" quest and followed my ghostly wolf guide up to the mountain cave west of TB.
I spent quite a lot of time killing the harpies near the cave. One type is a caster and is easy to fight as a hunter since they stay at range. The other types are melee but not too hard to kill. I had only one close call where I was attacked by a patrolling wolf while fighting two harpies. The Tauren racial thunderstomp ability saved my behind then.
Once I'd collected enough claws and linen from the harpies, It was off to kill Dwarves further south. The quest goal here is to collect "broken tools"... but the little guys only dropped "mining pick". The first time I did this zone this was confusing! You have to collect the 5 mining picks then travel to Thunder bluff and "break" them at the forge there in the city.
By the time I had made it to TB for the first time, I had hit level 8 and was really struggling with both lousy hunter melee skills and no bag space. I sold off all the grey items, broke the dwarven tools and visited the auction house.
After going AFK for 10 minutes while auctioneer scanned the entire auction house I came back to sell my extra white gear. I had several stacks of leather and ruined leather, as well as linen and some meat to sell. Leather seemed reasonably priced, so I listed mine. Ruined leather is almost worthless but the AH average was still better than just vendoring it, so I listed those as well. Linen cloth is often a great seller, since everyone needs first aid skill, and it’s used for newbie tailoring as well. On to the AH went my stacks.
When I tried to list my spare wolf meat, I noticed a problem. Auctioneer was telling me that each piece was worth ~700 gold and that I couldn't match the lowest price. WTF? lobwbie meat, that you can get for free killing level 5 wolves at 700g? No way. It usually sells for a handful of silver each at best. What had happened is that someone has tried manipulating prices. They listed several items at 700g, and then listed most of their stock at a "more reasonable" 2-3 gold a stack, hoping to fool people into buying it at the inflated price. This would still be many 100's of percent higher than the usual price.
I put my few pieces of meat on the AH at about 3s each. With the last of my remaining silver I attempted to find under priced items on the AH that I could bid on or buy out and resell. There was only one item I could afford, a crunchy spider leg. I bought it, but then couldn't afford to list it.... and I'd also forgotten to buy the mining skill. Stupid!
I ended up vendoring the mining pick and one piece of spider meat to afford the mining skill, then off I went to continue questing. I headed south along the mountain ranges, killing the last few cougars needed then headed off to Bloodhoof. On the way I saw Mazzaranache respawn. I am tempted to go pick him up once I hit 10! Back in Bloodhoof I finally scrounged the cash for the mining pick a second time and handed in as many quests as I could. The nearest quest remaining was the level 6 one to kill bristlebacks to the west of Bloodhoof. It was close to the mountains where I had seen some copper mines so I went off collecting first.
I mined several nodes of copper then headed into the bristleback's cave. Careful targeting made the kills quite easy, especially the casters. Lots of cloth, some coin, and even a couple of chests made the loot pile up rapidly. Deep inside the cave were the poachers, the last guys I needed for the quest. These were also quite easy since they are hunter types and stay at range as well. I cleared the whole cave, looted the chest, mined the three copper nodes and was about to hearth back to town when I realised that it was still on cooldown. Damn, I'll have to fight my way back out. Here is where I made my biggest mistake of the night.
On the way back out, I found a patrolling bristleback entering a previously cleared area. I needed to get past him, so I engaged. Just as I finished him off, another respawned right next to me and attacked, right in melee range. This fight took a lot longer... too long in fact, because two more ranged guys had also repopped further up the corridor and were hammering me with arrows. Even a health potion wasn’t enough to save me, trapped between fresh respawns behind and ahead.
I made it to almost level 10 before my first visit to the spirit healer. With just a little more care this could have been avoided. Ah well.. I ended up in town without having to use the hearthstone cooldown so its not all bad. Resurrection sickness wasn't an issue for a below level 10 character but the cost of repairs was a concern. I hadn't repaired at all up to this point as I was replacing crap grey gear with more crap grey all the time.
Hand in all the quests and I dinged level 10. Yahoo! Elapsed /played was a shade over 4 hours of which maybe half an hour was stuffing about in town or AFK eating dinner.
Level 10 for a hunter is the most exciting time... you get the three-part taming the beast quest line that ends in you getting your first pet! Hooray!
The quest for Tauren involves capturing in order:
An Adult Plainstrider (tallstrider)
A Prarie Stalker (a wolf)
then a Swoop (carrion bird)
I had the fire festival buff on while I did these quests which nearly resulted in some dead animals. Each time they were hitting me they were taking some fire damage. The wolf was down to about 5% health at the end, but thankfully survived just long enough!
Each of these creatures are quite close to Bloodhoof Village making this a fairly painless exercise for Tauren compared to other races. The plainstrider is neutral so is even easier than otherwise.
When I completed each stage I dismissed the temporary pet just before engaging the next one. The plainstrider reverted to neutral while I was on the bridge just north of Bloodhoof, then fled off south to his home. The wolf and the swoop were both found in the same area, so when I released the wolf he immediately engaged me. Ungrateful wretch! Luckily he dropped a claw I needed and some leather.
Swoops, in the wild, have a knockback caster interupt ability "swoop". This seems to be supressed when using the taming rod during the taming quest. Its back in action again when you release the bird however! I intended training the exact same swoop used in part three of the quest as my first real pet. This proved much more challenging than I expected though, since he managed to get off the swoop ability twice during the taming, forcing a restart both times. Each taming attempt used up mana and I had to wait a few seconds to get enough for the final tame. Also, the fire festival buff was still going and the poor swoop was taking damage each time he hit me. When the third taming attempt finally succeeeded, I was at about 7% health, almost no mana and my new pet was down to under 20% health as well.
Welcome Accipter, my first pet. I wonder if I'm unique in taming one of the EXACT beasts used in the taming quests as the first ever "real" pet? Anyway, he was initially very unhappy with me and since I hadn't yet completed the final stage of the training quest, I couldnt feed him! Off I went immediately to Thunder Bluff for training!
During all this time, not one of my auctions had sold and I had not yet been lucky enough to find a new bag, nor had I had the spare cash to buy a new one. Bag space was still very limited! With hearthstone, skinning knife, mining pick, fishing rod, a stack of bandages, a stack of healing pots as permanent items, as well as partial stacks of leather, copper, linen etc as tradeable items there wasnt much left in the old backpack. I had been keeping a stack of meat aside for pet feeding but mush have vendored it somewhere along the way since I had only once bit of meat on hand for feeding Accipter. He was momentarily less annoyed but soon reverted to unhappy. Now I have a pissed off pet and no food!
The solution presented itself in the form of fishing from the lake in TB... however I hadn't yet leveled fishing skill, so nearly all of the attempts were unsuccessful. I even bought a lure for the rod which helped a bit. At least I got enough fish to bring Accipter to happy state before I returned to adventure. We killed the harpies just north west of TB for a quest, and spotted and killed the ghostwolf for his hide. Accipter dinged several times and I hit level 11 before returning to town and retiring for the night.
I relogged in as my brand new druid and rushed through the initial quests. He dinged level 5 in 42 minutes, but he also found 2 bags, one off the very first kill! He made it to level 6 and Bloodhoof village in under an hour before I logged him out and quit wow for the evening.
Now for the good bit:
Just now I logged in again to my hunter to check his auctions. Last night he had 2 silver and change. This morning, he's got 2 pages of "Auction successful" mail messages and a much healthier bank balance of 6g, 75s with about 20 more unsold auctions waiting.
Best sellers were stacks of copper bars, at about 3g, leather at 1.5g for several stacks, and linen making up most of the rest. I also had a single silver bar and 2 malachite from chests that sold as well.
6g is more than sufficient to pay all the training costs up to level 20. I'll be able to buy at least 8-slot bags for both characters, but will look into 10 or 12 slotters first. The most cost -effective ones tend to be the 16-slot netherweave bags, since there are lots of "lazy" high level tailors making them but they are out of my price range for now.
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
Cure the Cash Flow Blues
So many people seem to struggle to make enough money in warcraft. Here are some tips to make it a lot easier.
1: Buy the biggest bags you can afford and upgrade them when you can. Bigger bags means you can carry more stuff and spend more time in the field.
2: As soon as you can afford it after level 5, get trained in at least one gathering skill, preferably two. Gathering skills that work well for novices are probably skinning and one of mining or herbalism. Remember to buy the equipment needed as well. Enchanting is a good gathering skill for more experienced players, when used for its Disenchant ability. In a pinch, Jewelcrafting's Prospect ability can be considered a gathering skill, but requires a supply of ores.
3: Take the items you gather and sell them on the auction house. Ores can be sold, as can bars. Just check to see which has the higher going rate. Herbs and leathers sell fairly well, though unprocessed hides tend not to be so successful. Befriend a leatherworker and pay them to process them for you.
4: Never throw away loot. Take any of the grey equipment and sell to the vendors. Any cloth that you aren't using yourself should be kept and sold on the auction house. White and Green quality items can be used or sold on the auction house. Bind on pickup items can be disenchanted. Blue bind on equip items should be sold on the auction house or directly on /trade channel in cities.
5: Know the value of items. Websites like Thottbot often have average values for items but each server is different. Make sure you check the auction house or ask in /trade before selling or auctioning white or better items.
6: Install an auction house mod to assist in pricing. Auctioneer is one of the best: http://www.auctioneeraddon.com/ Auctioneer requires a daily 10 minute scan of the auction house to get full pricing details. You should do this for at least a week then keep it up to date by a complete scan every few days from then on.
7: Take some note of the deposit costs to list items on the auction house. Plate and Mail items are often quite expensive to list so be sure you set a price that will sell. Also be sure to put both a bid and a buyout price on items, since lazy people will hit buyout to get the item instantly rather than wait for the auction to expire. Items without buyouts often do not sell.
8: Take advantage of people's laziness. Many vendors around the world have recipes for sale. Some are limited run items on a timer. Nearly all of these can be bought and resold on the auction house for at least 300% profit. Be careful not to flood the market with any one item.
9: Resist the temptation to buy anything except bigger bags from the auction house. The gear you get from quest rewards and instance dungeons is more than adequate to level up in. Don't waste money on getting low level items enchanted either. You will soon outgrow the item.
10: Create a second character that is to act as your bank and salesperson. Give them a starting fund and mail all your saleable items to them. Run them up to the nearest capital city and let them log out next to the mailbox. This means your main character has less downtime between trips. Postage is very cheap, a handful of copper per transaction.
Using these tips it is easily possible to have the gold needed for your mounts at 30 and 60. The same strategies will serve you well all the way till level 80, where you can change your professions to do crafting if you wish.
1: Buy the biggest bags you can afford and upgrade them when you can. Bigger bags means you can carry more stuff and spend more time in the field.
2: As soon as you can afford it after level 5, get trained in at least one gathering skill, preferably two. Gathering skills that work well for novices are probably skinning and one of mining or herbalism. Remember to buy the equipment needed as well. Enchanting is a good gathering skill for more experienced players, when used for its Disenchant ability. In a pinch, Jewelcrafting's Prospect ability can be considered a gathering skill, but requires a supply of ores.
3: Take the items you gather and sell them on the auction house. Ores can be sold, as can bars. Just check to see which has the higher going rate. Herbs and leathers sell fairly well, though unprocessed hides tend not to be so successful. Befriend a leatherworker and pay them to process them for you.
4: Never throw away loot. Take any of the grey equipment and sell to the vendors. Any cloth that you aren't using yourself should be kept and sold on the auction house. White and Green quality items can be used or sold on the auction house. Bind on pickup items can be disenchanted. Blue bind on equip items should be sold on the auction house or directly on /trade channel in cities.
5: Know the value of items. Websites like Thottbot often have average values for items but each server is different. Make sure you check the auction house or ask in /trade before selling or auctioning white or better items.
6: Install an auction house mod to assist in pricing. Auctioneer is one of the best: http://www.auctioneeraddon.com/ Auctioneer requires a daily 10 minute scan of the auction house to get full pricing details. You should do this for at least a week then keep it up to date by a complete scan every few days from then on.
7: Take some note of the deposit costs to list items on the auction house. Plate and Mail items are often quite expensive to list so be sure you set a price that will sell. Also be sure to put both a bid and a buyout price on items, since lazy people will hit buyout to get the item instantly rather than wait for the auction to expire. Items without buyouts often do not sell.
8: Take advantage of people's laziness. Many vendors around the world have recipes for sale. Some are limited run items on a timer. Nearly all of these can be bought and resold on the auction house for at least 300% profit. Be careful not to flood the market with any one item.
9: Resist the temptation to buy anything except bigger bags from the auction house. The gear you get from quest rewards and instance dungeons is more than adequate to level up in. Don't waste money on getting low level items enchanted either. You will soon outgrow the item.
10: Create a second character that is to act as your bank and salesperson. Give them a starting fund and mail all your saleable items to them. Run them up to the nearest capital city and let them log out next to the mailbox. This means your main character has less downtime between trips. Postage is very cheap, a handful of copper per transaction.
Using these tips it is easily possible to have the gold needed for your mounts at 30 and 60. The same strategies will serve you well all the way till level 80, where you can change your professions to do crafting if you wish.
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