Somewhere, off the chain of blogs and their reading lists, I followed a link to some of the warcraft machinima videos on youtube. I watched that one, then several more, then heaps of them. There are a wide variety of quality and styles amongst them.
Here are just some of the ones I liked.
First, some Weird Al songs done with warcraft scenes:
Amish Paradise
Ugly Girl
Then some of Nyhm's works:
Hard Like Heroic
Ni Hao (A Gold Farmers Story)
Just Loot It!
Nyhm has several others, look for more by phrog801.
One of his regular collaborators is "Summergale", the female vocalist in many of Nhym's movies. A very popular work is:
Ulduar
Ulduar was a collaboration between Summergale and Cranius on vocals, and machinima creation by Legs. Also worth a look are LegsMachinima's other movies.
Cranius has put out a few of his own vids. A few use other people's music, some are his own creations. These are some of the best:
Big Blue Dress
Highwayman
Darrowshire
The Lament of Captain Placeholder
Probably the most technically polished of the vids is Percula's
The Craft of War: Blind
This is more of a movie than a music video like most of the others. "Blind" has generated nearly 5000 comments on youtube so is obviously very popular.
There are heaps more out there. A fair few are basically raw in-game footage, but others are well crafted stories or videos like the ones I've linked here.
What are some of your favourites?
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
Stupid Mistakes
You might have noticed that I've not posted in a while. Real Life has severely hampered my game and blogging time recently. Things are still madly busy but at least I get to log in again now.
My last post here was about missing the target of getting my epic flyer within a month. Well, just after that post I re-invested about half my net worth back into the auction house. Then I got side-swiped by real life and didn't visit my VeCo characters for ages.... so long in fact that about 2,500g of auction materials and sales messages have expired from my banker's mailbox!
Ooops!
(The mail hasn't just expired from the auction house, its also expired from my mailbox, so is gone completely. About 2500g gone forever just because RL snuck up on me!)
Ah well. I've already started rebuilding funds but of course it will take some time to fully recover.
My last post here was about missing the target of getting my epic flyer within a month. Well, just after that post I re-invested about half my net worth back into the auction house. Then I got side-swiped by real life and didn't visit my VeCo characters for ages.... so long in fact that about 2,500g of auction materials and sales messages have expired from my banker's mailbox!
Ooops!
(The mail hasn't just expired from the auction house, its also expired from my mailbox, so is gone completely. About 2500g gone forever just because RL snuck up on me!)
Ah well. I've already started rebuilding funds but of course it will take some time to fully recover.
Monday, March 9, 2009
28 days later
Abject Failure.
On the 7th of feb I was chatting to Ahami on VeCo about our blogs and what I should do next. I had my freshly rolled Deathknight with a small starter fund and a beginning enchanting skill. The challenge was set: make enough gold for epic flyer within a month.
Easy!
Well, maybe not.
I also ran the same challenge on my other new DK on Cael as well, but with less funds, and less effort. Both characters started the challenge at level 58, fresh from the newbie zone.
On VeCo, I invested heavily into improving the enchanting skill. I hit around 200 in the first few days but also spent a lot of the starting money in levelling up instead of reinvesting into the market. It took several bidding/disenchanting/selling cycles to get back to the starting point. By about mid-month I was edging above 1000g and starting to realise that I may not meet the target!
Over on Cael I farmed some low level instances (stockades, Deadmines) several times to get starting materials, as well as buying stuff from the auction house. With less money to start with, I concentrated on re-investing what I had. By mid month I was barely at 200 skill and 500g. I had put a lot less effort into it though.
On both servers I tried to log in to process auctions every 48 hours but often missed it. At the end of the month on Cael I had about 1500g in cash and ~700g in pending auctions. On VeCo, I had a little over 3000g in cash, ~900g in unsold auctions and maybe ~400g more in unprocessed materials. This was well short of the ~6500g target.
On both servers there were some mitigating factors. On Cael I invested about 200g into the guild I joined. I also levelled enchanting by enchanting most items in the guild bank, instead of trying to sell the enchants or placing them on vellums for sale. On VeCo, I yet again splurged the 100g to start a guild bank for some randoms who got me to sign the charter. Of course, the guild was disbanded a matter of days later when the GM lost enthusiasm! I've been foolish enough to do this several times now... maybe one day I'll learn!
Also on VeCo, I spent some of the time farming leather and cloth, which I passed off to my friends there to help level their trade skills. In return I got bags and a certain amount of green items. From a purely financial outlook I should have just sold the materials, but the social benefits will more than recoup any loss in the longer term.
Ah well. Both DK's are now level 60 with minimal playtime. They are both continuing to reinvest in the enchanting materials market and over time it is paying off.
On the 7th of feb I was chatting to Ahami on VeCo about our blogs and what I should do next. I had my freshly rolled Deathknight with a small starter fund and a beginning enchanting skill. The challenge was set: make enough gold for epic flyer within a month.
Easy!
Well, maybe not.
I also ran the same challenge on my other new DK on Cael as well, but with less funds, and less effort. Both characters started the challenge at level 58, fresh from the newbie zone.
On VeCo, I invested heavily into improving the enchanting skill. I hit around 200 in the first few days but also spent a lot of the starting money in levelling up instead of reinvesting into the market. It took several bidding/disenchanting/selling cycles to get back to the starting point. By about mid-month I was edging above 1000g and starting to realise that I may not meet the target!
Over on Cael I farmed some low level instances (stockades, Deadmines) several times to get starting materials, as well as buying stuff from the auction house. With less money to start with, I concentrated on re-investing what I had. By mid month I was barely at 200 skill and 500g. I had put a lot less effort into it though.
On both servers I tried to log in to process auctions every 48 hours but often missed it. At the end of the month on Cael I had about 1500g in cash and ~700g in pending auctions. On VeCo, I had a little over 3000g in cash, ~900g in unsold auctions and maybe ~400g more in unprocessed materials. This was well short of the ~6500g target.
On both servers there were some mitigating factors. On Cael I invested about 200g into the guild I joined. I also levelled enchanting by enchanting most items in the guild bank, instead of trying to sell the enchants or placing them on vellums for sale. On VeCo, I yet again splurged the 100g to start a guild bank for some randoms who got me to sign the charter. Of course, the guild was disbanded a matter of days later when the GM lost enthusiasm! I've been foolish enough to do this several times now... maybe one day I'll learn!
Also on VeCo, I spent some of the time farming leather and cloth, which I passed off to my friends there to help level their trade skills. In return I got bags and a certain amount of green items. From a purely financial outlook I should have just sold the materials, but the social benefits will more than recoup any loss in the longer term.
Ah well. Both DK's are now level 60 with minimal playtime. They are both continuing to reinvest in the enchanting materials market and over time it is paying off.
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!
Sunday, February 15, 2009
What a DK can do for you
The wonderful folk at Blizzard have now allowed the creation of Death Knights on any realm, so long as you have a character somewhere that is at least level 55. Apart from DK's being a fun class to play, this opens up a host of ways to make money on a new realm.
Each time I've completed the DK starter zone, I have had a starter fund of about 25g. Its not much, but its a lot better than the handful of silver a level 5 character would have when reaching the big city for the first time. It is more than enough to start searching the auction house for bargains.
Death knights start the game with no trade skills except first aid. The old standby gathering professions mining, skinning and herbalism will need to be levelled up from scratch, but it is insanely easy to farm the newbie areas on your epic mount. Even the low level materials can fetch a decent sum on the auction house. Dual gathering works well as always.
The one massive advantage that a newly minted DK has over any other starter class is of course that it is high level and well equipped at the start. They make brilliant farming characters, easily able to run through any lower level instance. Unholy spec seems to be the easiest here, with better AOE abilities. Blood spec makes a decent alternative that is able to self-heal even when swarmed by half an instance's monsters. Frost spec is viable also but not quite as good as the other two in a farming role.
At level 58 or so, probably the best instance for farming would be Scarlet Monastary. Lots of silk cloth, reasonable quantities of green items and heaps of vendor gray make this definately worth your time. Shadowfang keep is another smallish instance that is worth farming, particularly if you have skinning as a profession. Lots of the BOE blues in SFK are valuable for sale to twinks.
The instances inside Orgrimmar and Stormwind, Ragefire Chasm and The Stockades respectively, are worth considering. RFC is much better in this regard, dropping a large ammount of linen cloth and loads of low level greens. Stocks drops linen and wool cloth in decent ammounts but has a very poor rate of green drops. The main reason for quickly farming either of these instances is their proximity to the vendors and auction house!
Death Knights are a boon to anyone starting fresh on a new realm even if the DK itself is not your primary character. I almost miss starting things "the hard way".
Each time I've completed the DK starter zone, I have had a starter fund of about 25g. Its not much, but its a lot better than the handful of silver a level 5 character would have when reaching the big city for the first time. It is more than enough to start searching the auction house for bargains.
Death knights start the game with no trade skills except first aid. The old standby gathering professions mining, skinning and herbalism will need to be levelled up from scratch, but it is insanely easy to farm the newbie areas on your epic mount. Even the low level materials can fetch a decent sum on the auction house. Dual gathering works well as always.
The one massive advantage that a newly minted DK has over any other starter class is of course that it is high level and well equipped at the start. They make brilliant farming characters, easily able to run through any lower level instance. Unholy spec seems to be the easiest here, with better AOE abilities. Blood spec makes a decent alternative that is able to self-heal even when swarmed by half an instance's monsters. Frost spec is viable also but not quite as good as the other two in a farming role.
At level 58 or so, probably the best instance for farming would be Scarlet Monastary. Lots of silk cloth, reasonable quantities of green items and heaps of vendor gray make this definately worth your time. Shadowfang keep is another smallish instance that is worth farming, particularly if you have skinning as a profession. Lots of the BOE blues in SFK are valuable for sale to twinks.
The instances inside Orgrimmar and Stormwind, Ragefire Chasm and The Stockades respectively, are worth considering. RFC is much better in this regard, dropping a large ammount of linen cloth and loads of low level greens. Stocks drops linen and wool cloth in decent ammounts but has a very poor rate of green drops. The main reason for quickly farming either of these instances is their proximity to the vendors and auction house!
Death Knights are a boon to anyone starting fresh on a new realm even if the DK itself is not your primary character. I almost miss starting things "the hard way".
Thursday, January 8, 2009
Reflections on my pixelated fixations.
According to my account information, Azeroth has been my part time home for three years now. I had heard of World of Warcraft ages before, probably sometime around release date but had resisted the temptation to join. It was only after watching a friend play and later sharing his account for a bit that I signed up myself. Initial dreams of levelling up to join my friend and his guildmates soon fell by the wayside as I dabbled in altitis, falling further behind as those more focused players forged ahead towards 60. I was not new to Azeroth exactly, having played Warcraft 1, 2 and 3, as well as most of their expansions. Blizzards other games, Diablo and Starcraft also got regular workouts. The 3-d "Roleplaying" world in an MMO was different to the strategy games I had mostly played before. I loved the game!
My first character was an undead warlock on my friends account. I managed to level him up to about 15 or so in the relatively rare times I got to play. I had fun but probably made every rookie mistake in the book. When I got my own account started, I made an effort to re-create the same character. He still exists, gathering dust along with all his guildmates on one of the US servers, since there were no Oceanics available back then. I ended up inheriting the guildmaster position as most former members transferred off or quit the game. My friend had moved on to another guild to try raiding but found the time difference too difficult. He and some others had also started alts on Alliance on one of the first Oceanic servers. Of course I followed as well, generating one alt of each class and of each race/gender combination. Nearly all of these characters made it to the low 20's before abandonment. I continued creating characters on every oceanic server as they opened up "reserving" my spot. Each of these got levelled up to at least the early teens as well. Before long I had over 20 characters to manage.
My friend fairly abruptly quit the game about June 2006, and most of the other friends and guildmates I had made had dispersed all over the place. Another RL colleague had level 60's on another server, so I played there for a little bit and continued to shuffle between all the various alts for a few months. One evening I was mucking about on Dath'Remar, on an under-used Rogue I'd created some weeks earlier, when the Tirisfal Glades newbie chat was reasonably active.
Someone was moaning about how he couldn't get into a guild, since they were all full of transferred level 60 raiders who were not interested in lowbie scrubs. Several others piped up in agreement. I offered the obvious solution: Make one yourselves! There was a bit of discussion back and forth, mostly about how it was too expensive so I offered to raise the funds myself. 10 silver is a large amount to an unassisted lowbie newb like myself, so I actually spent a couple of hours grinding and _vendoring_ linen cloth and the like to scrounge the cash. By this time, the newbie crowd was all around level 10.
Since this was an alt on a server I was unlikely to visit again soon, I offered to general chat the funds to get that guild started, and were there members willing to sign up? Sure enough one chap called Stickykey volunteered to be guildmaster and there were enough people around to get the charter signed in short order. Several names were discussed before my suggestion was picked as the most likely. Thus was Crimson Legion born.
Guild mastery changed hands several times between Stickykey and myself that evening as we established ranks and set up guild powers. Stickykey had never had access to the guild controls before so basically palmed the role over to me to set up. Ranks established, guild powers loosely defined and about 30 people recruited, I logged for the night.
I forget the exact sequence of events, but Stickykey was going away for a while so I was going to be "temporary" guildmaster. The new guild kept gathering members rapidly and there were enough sensible people in officer positions to keep it running smoothly even when I also didn't log in for a few days early in the piece. We had over 100 members in the first few days then recruitment started to die off a bit as we left the newbie areas. Some players and myself created extra alts and returned to the newbie zones for more recruiting, though even in these early days we did NOT spam the chat channels .... we just offered assistance or grouped up with people and recruited from there.
By the first weekend it was clear the guild needed some structure and basic rules. There had been some silly behaviour and some people left because of it. I searched the web for free forum hosts and found one that looked vaguely suitable. We had a competition to design a guild tabard, and a donation drive to raise funds for it. As usual, I was spending too much time on alts and my main was falling behind the other members as they rushed into the 20's and 30's. We even recruited a few higher levels, most of whom left fairly soon after for late game guilds.
After some discussion on our forums, a revised rank structure was put in place. I organised a few guild wide events that drew reasonable participation levels. Raiding against the Night Elves became a fairly regular event, often involving other guilds as well. Our core leadership group settled in to their positions and we kept a lookout for more talent to join us. Stickykey made a few brief visits but was missing most of the time without much explanation.
By December, we had grown to nearly 300 members and our highest were nearing the level cap at 60. Everyone was eagerly awaiting the release of The Burning Crusade. My stable of alts had grown yet again and I had got most of them on Dath to around level 20. Crypt was nearly 40 and looking forward to his mount.
We lost a few members to raiding just before TBC release, then quite a lot more in about February as people hit 70 and wanted to raid then. A core group of officers moved out and formed a splinter guild only for higher levels. I transferred guild leadership temporarily to Xera, an officer and founding member, who was leaving that night to join a raid guild. Xera then transferred guildmastery back to my alt Decrypted. Cryptography joined the new splinter guild.
Over the next few days I found the demands of actively participating in two guilds to be too much hassle. The leadership team of the new guild were taking it in a direction I didn't feel comfortable with and I missed out on lots of things in Crimson Legion while mucking about on Crypt, so in a short time I quit and rejoined CL.
The splinter guild lasted about 2 months before internal drama, and possibly bank thefts, caused it to almost disintegrate. A few refugees returned to Crimson Legion, others moved on to other guilds and a handful persevered. Eventually the remaining guildmaster quit, handing control over to the bank alt of one of my officers. There are still 6 members listed on the armory website but these are dead accounts or otherwise inactive.
We periodically go through cycles where members leave, convince others to go with them and start a fresh guild. More often, a member will quit to start a guild with their school friends. Nearly all of these attempts are unsuccessful and a lot return to the CL family.
One recent exception has been Poshmina and her guild. Posh was in CL for only a month or two but was a very talkative and active member when she was here. She left, poaching a number of our members and has gone on to establish what looks to be a very successful guild. They had 275 members when I last looked, including a higher proportion of max level characters than we maintain. I wish them every success!
People come and go all the time, but the essential core of the guild has remained strong. We hit 500 members about 6 months after handing in the charter, despite semi-regular purges of inactive members. I have mentioned in another post that there are limitations imposed by the game that have caused us to keep below the magic 500 from then on. We hit that limit again just last night so we are due for a purge again.
About the time of our first anniversary, an interesting bug manifested itself. Some officers were playing around abusing the demote and remove powers, then re inviting or promoting the victims. Somehow this bugged out and Mannak got guildmaster rank alongside Decrypted. Now, Mannak is a nice enough guy but he should have been about rank 4 or 5 at the time, not a higher officer and certainly not co-GM! Some people made accusations of hacking but I seriously doubt it. It was interesting trying to fix this... he couldn't gquit, becasue the guildmaster powers couldn't be passed on. I couldn't demote him back to his normal rank, because of course he was the same rank as me. Eventually I petitioned it and a Bliz Gamesmaster sorted it all out. I took the opportunity to have Cryptography re-instated as guildmaster and Decrypted gladly stepped down from the hot-seat.
In August 2008 I took an overseas holiday. Before I left I transferred guild master rank to Sebra, one of the rank 1 officers. I think she did an excellent job looking after the place but she was in a hurry to transfer it back once I returned. Any of my top level officers could have held the spot while I was away, but I know Sebra through work which would make sorting out any issues easier. Everything went smoothly except for the guild bank bug that I posted about in another message.
Crimson Legion celebrated its 2nd birthday in October 2008. We have maintained membership of around 400-500 members throughout our existence and are reasonably free of guild drama.
A solid core leadership group have kept it alive and thriving. I am intensely proud of their efforts. World of Warcraft is still a very interesting place to be and I have no intention of leaving any time soon.
Thank you to my guild members for making it a place I'm happy to return to.
My first character was an undead warlock on my friends account. I managed to level him up to about 15 or so in the relatively rare times I got to play. I had fun but probably made every rookie mistake in the book. When I got my own account started, I made an effort to re-create the same character. He still exists, gathering dust along with all his guildmates on one of the US servers, since there were no Oceanics available back then. I ended up inheriting the guildmaster position as most former members transferred off or quit the game. My friend had moved on to another guild to try raiding but found the time difference too difficult. He and some others had also started alts on Alliance on one of the first Oceanic servers. Of course I followed as well, generating one alt of each class and of each race/gender combination. Nearly all of these characters made it to the low 20's before abandonment. I continued creating characters on every oceanic server as they opened up "reserving" my spot. Each of these got levelled up to at least the early teens as well. Before long I had over 20 characters to manage.
My friend fairly abruptly quit the game about June 2006, and most of the other friends and guildmates I had made had dispersed all over the place. Another RL colleague had level 60's on another server, so I played there for a little bit and continued to shuffle between all the various alts for a few months. One evening I was mucking about on Dath'Remar, on an under-used Rogue I'd created some weeks earlier, when the Tirisfal Glades newbie chat was reasonably active.
Someone was moaning about how he couldn't get into a guild, since they were all full of transferred level 60 raiders who were not interested in lowbie scrubs. Several others piped up in agreement. I offered the obvious solution: Make one yourselves! There was a bit of discussion back and forth, mostly about how it was too expensive so I offered to raise the funds myself. 10 silver is a large amount to an unassisted lowbie newb like myself, so I actually spent a couple of hours grinding and _vendoring_ linen cloth and the like to scrounge the cash. By this time, the newbie crowd was all around level 10.
Since this was an alt on a server I was unlikely to visit again soon, I offered to general chat the funds to get that guild started, and were there members willing to sign up? Sure enough one chap called Stickykey volunteered to be guildmaster and there were enough people around to get the charter signed in short order. Several names were discussed before my suggestion was picked as the most likely. Thus was Crimson Legion born.
Guild mastery changed hands several times between Stickykey and myself that evening as we established ranks and set up guild powers. Stickykey had never had access to the guild controls before so basically palmed the role over to me to set up. Ranks established, guild powers loosely defined and about 30 people recruited, I logged for the night.
I forget the exact sequence of events, but Stickykey was going away for a while so I was going to be "temporary" guildmaster. The new guild kept gathering members rapidly and there were enough sensible people in officer positions to keep it running smoothly even when I also didn't log in for a few days early in the piece. We had over 100 members in the first few days then recruitment started to die off a bit as we left the newbie areas. Some players and myself created extra alts and returned to the newbie zones for more recruiting, though even in these early days we did NOT spam the chat channels .... we just offered assistance or grouped up with people and recruited from there.
By the first weekend it was clear the guild needed some structure and basic rules. There had been some silly behaviour and some people left because of it. I searched the web for free forum hosts and found one that looked vaguely suitable. We had a competition to design a guild tabard, and a donation drive to raise funds for it. As usual, I was spending too much time on alts and my main was falling behind the other members as they rushed into the 20's and 30's. We even recruited a few higher levels, most of whom left fairly soon after for late game guilds.
After some discussion on our forums, a revised rank structure was put in place. I organised a few guild wide events that drew reasonable participation levels. Raiding against the Night Elves became a fairly regular event, often involving other guilds as well. Our core leadership group settled in to their positions and we kept a lookout for more talent to join us. Stickykey made a few brief visits but was missing most of the time without much explanation.
By December, we had grown to nearly 300 members and our highest were nearing the level cap at 60. Everyone was eagerly awaiting the release of The Burning Crusade. My stable of alts had grown yet again and I had got most of them on Dath to around level 20. Crypt was nearly 40 and looking forward to his mount.
We lost a few members to raiding just before TBC release, then quite a lot more in about February as people hit 70 and wanted to raid then. A core group of officers moved out and formed a splinter guild only for higher levels. I transferred guild leadership temporarily to Xera, an officer and founding member, who was leaving that night to join a raid guild. Xera then transferred guildmastery back to my alt Decrypted. Cryptography joined the new splinter guild.
Over the next few days I found the demands of actively participating in two guilds to be too much hassle. The leadership team of the new guild were taking it in a direction I didn't feel comfortable with and I missed out on lots of things in Crimson Legion while mucking about on Crypt, so in a short time I quit and rejoined CL.
The splinter guild lasted about 2 months before internal drama, and possibly bank thefts, caused it to almost disintegrate. A few refugees returned to Crimson Legion, others moved on to other guilds and a handful persevered. Eventually the remaining guildmaster quit, handing control over to the bank alt of one of my officers. There are still 6 members listed on the armory website but these are dead accounts or otherwise inactive.
We periodically go through cycles where members leave, convince others to go with them and start a fresh guild. More often, a member will quit to start a guild with their school friends. Nearly all of these attempts are unsuccessful and a lot return to the CL family.
One recent exception has been Poshmina and her guild. Posh was in CL for only a month or two but was a very talkative and active member when she was here. She left, poaching a number of our members and has gone on to establish what looks to be a very successful guild. They had 275 members when I last looked, including a higher proportion of max level characters than we maintain. I wish them every success!
People come and go all the time, but the essential core of the guild has remained strong. We hit 500 members about 6 months after handing in the charter, despite semi-regular purges of inactive members. I have mentioned in another post that there are limitations imposed by the game that have caused us to keep below the magic 500 from then on. We hit that limit again just last night so we are due for a purge again.
About the time of our first anniversary, an interesting bug manifested itself. Some officers were playing around abusing the demote and remove powers, then re inviting or promoting the victims. Somehow this bugged out and Mannak got guildmaster rank alongside Decrypted. Now, Mannak is a nice enough guy but he should have been about rank 4 or 5 at the time, not a higher officer and certainly not co-GM! Some people made accusations of hacking but I seriously doubt it. It was interesting trying to fix this... he couldn't gquit, becasue the guildmaster powers couldn't be passed on. I couldn't demote him back to his normal rank, because of course he was the same rank as me. Eventually I petitioned it and a Bliz Gamesmaster sorted it all out. I took the opportunity to have Cryptography re-instated as guildmaster and Decrypted gladly stepped down from the hot-seat.
In August 2008 I took an overseas holiday. Before I left I transferred guild master rank to Sebra, one of the rank 1 officers. I think she did an excellent job looking after the place but she was in a hurry to transfer it back once I returned. Any of my top level officers could have held the spot while I was away, but I know Sebra through work which would make sorting out any issues easier. Everything went smoothly except for the guild bank bug that I posted about in another message.
Crimson Legion celebrated its 2nd birthday in October 2008. We have maintained membership of around 400-500 members throughout our existence and are reasonably free of guild drama.
A solid core leadership group have kept it alive and thriving. I am intensely proud of their efforts. World of Warcraft is still a very interesting place to be and I have no intention of leaving any time soon.
Thank you to my guild members for making it a place I'm happy to return to.
Tuesday, December 16, 2008
Trade skill synchronicity
One advantage of rampant altitis is having most trade skills covered. This enables efficient use of almost any materials and much less wastage while levelling up.
My highest level characters are generally equipped as gatherers. They farm materials while I level up and mail them on to the trade skill alt. Crafted materials are made up and then either mailed to the banker alts, or passed on to another alt for more crafting.
Cryptography my "main" rogue is a skinner and leather worker. I've kept up the skinning but LW has lagged behind. Occasionally I'll make a bit of effort to get it going again but usually find some other distraction. Mostly the leathers are sold on the markets. I have considered dropping LW on several occasions but have resisted so far.
My new Death knight Cryptoknight is a herbalist and enchanter. This is my main farming character at the moment since AOE farming of low level areas is supremely awesome. He uses the enchanting almost exclusively for disenchanting of BoP items in instances. Herbalism is still quite low but is progressing and every one of the mats found is passed on to another alt for use. Excess enchanting mats are passed on to the banker for resale.
Mortified is my primary bank alt. She's now a level 35 mage, so has increased her maximum trade skills to 300. Enchanting is the main priority at the moment. She disenchants almost everything that gets sent to her from other characters and sources hundreds of items each auction session. She is also an accomplished tailor. Both tailoring and enchanting were level capped at 225 for a long time but now have room for expansion. Tailoring provides gear for my cloth wearing alts and also supplies market and disenchanting opportunities. Eventually I'll have to get her out and questing for more levels to keep up.
Afterdeath is a lowbie priest. She was originally herbalism and alchemy but has dropped herbalism in favour of inscription. Eventually I'll have to get some her some levels but for now I am well below the level cap on either trade. Herbs are supplied by Cryptoknight then used in either inscription or herbalism. Inscription is starting to supply decent glyphs for my alt army or for guild use but is also making lots of weapon and armour vellums for my enchanters. I do not use a lot of potions on any alt and those that I do use are higher skill ones.
Rigormortis my warlock blacksmith and miner has been transferred off the server. He is now the highest level alt on his new realm and may end up dropping the blacksmith in favour of enchanting or something. He used to supply reasonable green and blue items to my lower level alts, or supplies for disenchanting. Mining of course is always financially rewarding in the AH.
Decrypted is a miner/blacksmith. Both of these have been neglected since Rig did most of the work. He's also a warrior and probably the least likely alt to be properly played any time soon. When I originally planned out the trades, he was going to be an armour smith to complement Rig's Sword smithing. Not sure which way he will go though I do have three plate-wearers now.
Ashnazg my Paladin is also a neglected character. Mining and jewelcraft are his token efforts. One day I might actually spend some time getting this guy levelled up since AOE farming is so fun on the Death knight! When and if I do, Ash will add further to his current trade skills.
Methane my druid gets an occasional workout. He is purely a gathering character with skinning and mining as professions. Most of his output has been passed on to my lesser leveled alts. I chose to make him a dual gatherer becasue druids are so versatile. Stealth in cat form, travel form, swimming form and flight forms all make for a character that can get to places easily.
Insolence is a blood elf warlock. I originally had jewelcraft and mining but dropped jewlcraft for herbalism a while before wrath was released. Now that Cryptoknight has much better herbalism I am considering going back to jewelcraft! Either way, she is my primary non-enchanter bank alt and doesnt get much sun at the moment. Jewelcraft generated a lot of enchanting materials but there are many other low level jewelcrafters producing rings and necklaces so theres not a lot of profit at the low end.
Cyanade the shaman is a skinner and leatherworker. For a long time I was passing scraps to her from Crypto's lower level adventures, so her leatherworking skill isnt too bad for the amount of play she gets! Back in the day I had planned that my two leatherworkers would specialise in one of the three types but that is still a long way off if it ever happens!
Last but definately not least is Kytlin, a hunter just barely short of level 50. Mining and engineering are her professions. Both are lagging behind where they should be, mostly becasue being a hunter is so much fun I forget to mine! Engineering so far has just been a massive gold and materials sink with very little to show for it. I have the gnomish remote control trinket that is supposed to be good on mechanicals... but I cant even remeber trying it out!
Anyway, the synchronicity part of this is the several chains of supply that I can have between my characters.
A fair few quests require crafted items. In theory, my alt army has been able to supply most of these... but in practice, the AH has been too tempting. Alchemy, Blacksmithing and Engineering crafted goods are the ones most often needed in quests. Be aware that the quest rewards are often worth a lot less than the cost of the crafted items!
Most craft skills can make objects that fuel the enchantment market. A large proportion of tradeskill gear gets consumed this way. If you are not an enchanter, be sure to price your junk greens on the AH at a price that is attractive for disenchantment. Blue gear is rarely worthwhile either to craft for sale, or for disenchantment.
My current best chain of recycled crafts is this: Herbalist farms herbs. Inscriber mills them for ink, then makes weapon or armor vellum. Enchanter uses farmed enchanting mats to place enchantments on the vellums, which then are passed on to other alts for use or resale. If everything works out I could get 4-5 skillpoints on three characters from the same stack of herbs!
My highest level characters are generally equipped as gatherers. They farm materials while I level up and mail them on to the trade skill alt. Crafted materials are made up and then either mailed to the banker alts, or passed on to another alt for more crafting.
Cryptography my "main" rogue is a skinner and leather worker. I've kept up the skinning but LW has lagged behind. Occasionally I'll make a bit of effort to get it going again but usually find some other distraction. Mostly the leathers are sold on the markets. I have considered dropping LW on several occasions but have resisted so far.
My new Death knight Cryptoknight is a herbalist and enchanter. This is my main farming character at the moment since AOE farming of low level areas is supremely awesome. He uses the enchanting almost exclusively for disenchanting of BoP items in instances. Herbalism is still quite low but is progressing and every one of the mats found is passed on to another alt for use. Excess enchanting mats are passed on to the banker for resale.
Mortified is my primary bank alt. She's now a level 35 mage, so has increased her maximum trade skills to 300. Enchanting is the main priority at the moment. She disenchants almost everything that gets sent to her from other characters and sources hundreds of items each auction session. She is also an accomplished tailor. Both tailoring and enchanting were level capped at 225 for a long time but now have room for expansion. Tailoring provides gear for my cloth wearing alts and also supplies market and disenchanting opportunities. Eventually I'll have to get her out and questing for more levels to keep up.
Afterdeath is a lowbie priest. She was originally herbalism and alchemy but has dropped herbalism in favour of inscription. Eventually I'll have to get some her some levels but for now I am well below the level cap on either trade. Herbs are supplied by Cryptoknight then used in either inscription or herbalism. Inscription is starting to supply decent glyphs for my alt army or for guild use but is also making lots of weapon and armour vellums for my enchanters. I do not use a lot of potions on any alt and those that I do use are higher skill ones.
Rigormortis my warlock blacksmith and miner has been transferred off the server. He is now the highest level alt on his new realm and may end up dropping the blacksmith in favour of enchanting or something. He used to supply reasonable green and blue items to my lower level alts, or supplies for disenchanting. Mining of course is always financially rewarding in the AH.
Decrypted is a miner/blacksmith. Both of these have been neglected since Rig did most of the work. He's also a warrior and probably the least likely alt to be properly played any time soon. When I originally planned out the trades, he was going to be an armour smith to complement Rig's Sword smithing. Not sure which way he will go though I do have three plate-wearers now.
Ashnazg my Paladin is also a neglected character. Mining and jewelcraft are his token efforts. One day I might actually spend some time getting this guy levelled up since AOE farming is so fun on the Death knight! When and if I do, Ash will add further to his current trade skills.
Methane my druid gets an occasional workout. He is purely a gathering character with skinning and mining as professions. Most of his output has been passed on to my lesser leveled alts. I chose to make him a dual gatherer becasue druids are so versatile. Stealth in cat form, travel form, swimming form and flight forms all make for a character that can get to places easily.
Insolence is a blood elf warlock. I originally had jewelcraft and mining but dropped jewlcraft for herbalism a while before wrath was released. Now that Cryptoknight has much better herbalism I am considering going back to jewelcraft! Either way, she is my primary non-enchanter bank alt and doesnt get much sun at the moment. Jewelcraft generated a lot of enchanting materials but there are many other low level jewelcrafters producing rings and necklaces so theres not a lot of profit at the low end.
Cyanade the shaman is a skinner and leatherworker. For a long time I was passing scraps to her from Crypto's lower level adventures, so her leatherworking skill isnt too bad for the amount of play she gets! Back in the day I had planned that my two leatherworkers would specialise in one of the three types but that is still a long way off if it ever happens!
Last but definately not least is Kytlin, a hunter just barely short of level 50. Mining and engineering are her professions. Both are lagging behind where they should be, mostly becasue being a hunter is so much fun I forget to mine! Engineering so far has just been a massive gold and materials sink with very little to show for it. I have the gnomish remote control trinket that is supposed to be good on mechanicals... but I cant even remeber trying it out!
Anyway, the synchronicity part of this is the several chains of supply that I can have between my characters.
A fair few quests require crafted items. In theory, my alt army has been able to supply most of these... but in practice, the AH has been too tempting. Alchemy, Blacksmithing and Engineering crafted goods are the ones most often needed in quests. Be aware that the quest rewards are often worth a lot less than the cost of the crafted items!
Most craft skills can make objects that fuel the enchantment market. A large proportion of tradeskill gear gets consumed this way. If you are not an enchanter, be sure to price your junk greens on the AH at a price that is attractive for disenchantment. Blue gear is rarely worthwhile either to craft for sale, or for disenchantment.
My current best chain of recycled crafts is this: Herbalist farms herbs. Inscriber mills them for ink, then makes weapon or armor vellum. Enchanter uses farmed enchanting mats to place enchantments on the vellums, which then are passed on to other alts for use or resale. If everything works out I could get 4-5 skillpoints on three characters from the same stack of herbs!
Friday, December 5, 2008
So much to do in so little time!
So its several weeks since Wrath was released and the queues have died down. At most times of the day its possible to log in without waiting though most of the realms I check are "full". My main problem now is that I have too many things I want to do yet limited playtime available.
On VeCo, I have just last night levelled my hunter to 30 and got his mounts. My time on VeCo has been fairly short since my last blog post. Each visit I would work on the auction house for a while, then march out and work on my hunter. He has been using three of his 5 pets in rotation. Bear, Carrion Bird and Cat have seen the most action. Of the three, probably the Carrion Bird is the most generally useful. The bear is a great little tank but the limitations on positioning with Swipe make him a bit hard to use effectively. Cats as usual are awesome single target tanks. Without any form of AOE, they require frequent retargetting to handle groups. Both Bear and Cat could regularly handle 1-3 same-level mobs without too much trouble. Bear has slightly better survivability and cat kills quicker but otherwise theres not much difference.
My Carrion Bird however was significantly easier to use than either of the others. Screech will hold the attention of any additional mobs long enough to allow the primary target to be burnt down. If you can wait long enough for two screeches to go off before using mend pet there should be no problems with aggro. Earlier casting of mend pet would sometimes cause problems.
Changeabull and Replaceabull, my druid and shammy alts have mostly remained in town. Changeabull is at level 18, fully rested, so should get level 20 and cat form the next time I actually make use of him. Poor Replaceabull is still level 6 and hasnt been touched for months. He might end up becomming a true bank alt for the others.
VeCo mercantile activity has been going quite well. On each of the 5-6 times I've logged in, I've hit the AH pretty hard. Traceabull scans the whole auction house to set baseline values then uses auctioneer's scan ability to find loads of disenchantable items.
On any particular scan, Trace will find upwards of 500 auctions to buyout or bid on, just for disenchantable objects below skill level 225. The buyouts are immediately disenchanted and then relisted. Quite a few of the bids are outbid by other people but even so I can expect another 200+ items to arrive in the mailbox over the next 48 hours. All these will be disenchanted and relisted as I find them.
At this time I am being fairly indiscriminate on what materials I'll try to sell. Any object that can be disenchanted with the current maximum 225 skill is fair game. Often I have won auctions on ridiculously low bid prices, even when the buyout was set well above average. Even some blue items have fallen into my hands in this manner.
The resulting shards, dusts, essences etc are relisted on the auction house. In most cases, a greater essence sells for less than its component parts, so I break them apart and sell the lesser essences. I still sell some as greater essence though as it seems not everyone is aware they can be split in this way!
Another thing I do to increase sales is set stack sizes to less than 10 or 20.
Many things I sell in groups of 2 or 3 or 5. Shards I usually sell individually. Mostly this is because the enchants that require these materials use small quantities, but it is also because some people cannot do the maths to see that my prices are actually a bit higher than the average!
When listing my auctions, I will sometimes buyout my competitiors if they are sufficiently undercutting for me to relist and still make a profit. I also look to see opportunities to bid cheaply on otherwise overpriced materials.
So, does all this market stuff make any money? Hell yes!
I have repeated this cycle about 5 times since my last post. In the initial round I invested just under 200g into materials, out of a net worth of about 350g at the time.
Last night's scan saw me invest about 700g in new materials. I have about another 700g worth of unsold auctions and about 1400g in cash. Total net worth would be edging close to 3,000g, nearly all earned within the safety of capital cities. Time spent on purely AH related stuff would be no more than 4 hours in that period.
On VeCo, I have just last night levelled my hunter to 30 and got his mounts. My time on VeCo has been fairly short since my last blog post. Each visit I would work on the auction house for a while, then march out and work on my hunter. He has been using three of his 5 pets in rotation. Bear, Carrion Bird and Cat have seen the most action. Of the three, probably the Carrion Bird is the most generally useful. The bear is a great little tank but the limitations on positioning with Swipe make him a bit hard to use effectively. Cats as usual are awesome single target tanks. Without any form of AOE, they require frequent retargetting to handle groups. Both Bear and Cat could regularly handle 1-3 same-level mobs without too much trouble. Bear has slightly better survivability and cat kills quicker but otherwise theres not much difference.
My Carrion Bird however was significantly easier to use than either of the others. Screech will hold the attention of any additional mobs long enough to allow the primary target to be burnt down. If you can wait long enough for two screeches to go off before using mend pet there should be no problems with aggro. Earlier casting of mend pet would sometimes cause problems.
Changeabull and Replaceabull, my druid and shammy alts have mostly remained in town. Changeabull is at level 18, fully rested, so should get level 20 and cat form the next time I actually make use of him. Poor Replaceabull is still level 6 and hasnt been touched for months. He might end up becomming a true bank alt for the others.
VeCo mercantile activity has been going quite well. On each of the 5-6 times I've logged in, I've hit the AH pretty hard. Traceabull scans the whole auction house to set baseline values then uses auctioneer's scan ability to find loads of disenchantable items.
On any particular scan, Trace will find upwards of 500 auctions to buyout or bid on, just for disenchantable objects below skill level 225. The buyouts are immediately disenchanted and then relisted. Quite a few of the bids are outbid by other people but even so I can expect another 200+ items to arrive in the mailbox over the next 48 hours. All these will be disenchanted and relisted as I find them.
At this time I am being fairly indiscriminate on what materials I'll try to sell. Any object that can be disenchanted with the current maximum 225 skill is fair game. Often I have won auctions on ridiculously low bid prices, even when the buyout was set well above average. Even some blue items have fallen into my hands in this manner.
The resulting shards, dusts, essences etc are relisted on the auction house. In most cases, a greater essence sells for less than its component parts, so I break them apart and sell the lesser essences. I still sell some as greater essence though as it seems not everyone is aware they can be split in this way!
Another thing I do to increase sales is set stack sizes to less than 10 or 20.
Many things I sell in groups of 2 or 3 or 5. Shards I usually sell individually. Mostly this is because the enchants that require these materials use small quantities, but it is also because some people cannot do the maths to see that my prices are actually a bit higher than the average!
When listing my auctions, I will sometimes buyout my competitiors if they are sufficiently undercutting for me to relist and still make a profit. I also look to see opportunities to bid cheaply on otherwise overpriced materials.
So, does all this market stuff make any money? Hell yes!
I have repeated this cycle about 5 times since my last post. In the initial round I invested just under 200g into materials, out of a net worth of about 350g at the time.
Last night's scan saw me invest about 700g in new materials. I have about another 700g worth of unsold auctions and about 1400g in cash. Total net worth would be edging close to 3,000g, nearly all earned within the safety of capital cities. Time spent on purely AH related stuff would be no more than 4 hours in that period.
Monday, November 17, 2008
Wrath of the impatient player
Its YOUR fault. Yes, you over there. You and your 1500 mates ahead of me in the queue. I cant play on my main realm, nor my secondary realm. All those Death Knights are spoiling my fun.
Ah well.
Luckily, I play on several realms, some of which are in the US time zones as well as the oceanic ones. There is no way I'm waiting through an hour long queue when my playtime is at best 2 hours. I have lowbie hunters and druids with lots of rested exp to use up, and some decent funds to invest in the market.
So that's what I've been doing since wrath hit the servers. VeCo at 4am server time is without a queue. There are 15000+ items on the auction house and my enchanter alt is currently maxed at 225 skill. That is a fair amount of enchanting materials available. I invested about 200g in bids and buyouts on green items, disenchanted the lot and put the resulting materials up on the market. Nearly all of that stock sold first time through and I've re-invested the money into more raw materials. I will continue to reinvest into enchanting materials for a while yet. I am also aiming to get my hunter/enchanter to level 35 fairly quickly to improve his disenchanting abilities. If I am fast enough, that will enable me to capitalise on the crop of deathknights needing level 60+ enchantments.
I've been online enough to have seen several realm-first level 80 achievements, as well as those maxing various profession skills. I would expect that nearly all realm-firsts for classess will be done by the next weekend at the latest.
My hunter is going reasonably well. I've grabbed a bear pet for him to level up with and also to evaluate some of the criticisms people have had with swipe. Mania on her maniasarcania blog has asked for comments on bears performance. Bears are single target tanks with some AoE ability to help control adds. They are not really suitable for true AoE and volley pulls. This is reflected in the comments on the thread. The main difficulty is positioning the mobs all in the front aspect so the swipe can hit all of them. Volley is only available at level 40 and above so switching to a gorilla or croc then would make sense.
Ah well.
Luckily, I play on several realms, some of which are in the US time zones as well as the oceanic ones. There is no way I'm waiting through an hour long queue when my playtime is at best 2 hours. I have lowbie hunters and druids with lots of rested exp to use up, and some decent funds to invest in the market.
So that's what I've been doing since wrath hit the servers. VeCo at 4am server time is without a queue. There are 15000+ items on the auction house and my enchanter alt is currently maxed at 225 skill. That is a fair amount of enchanting materials available. I invested about 200g in bids and buyouts on green items, disenchanted the lot and put the resulting materials up on the market. Nearly all of that stock sold first time through and I've re-invested the money into more raw materials. I will continue to reinvest into enchanting materials for a while yet. I am also aiming to get my hunter/enchanter to level 35 fairly quickly to improve his disenchanting abilities. If I am fast enough, that will enable me to capitalise on the crop of deathknights needing level 60+ enchantments.
I've been online enough to have seen several realm-first level 80 achievements, as well as those maxing various profession skills. I would expect that nearly all realm-firsts for classess will be done by the next weekend at the latest.
My hunter is going reasonably well. I've grabbed a bear pet for him to level up with and also to evaluate some of the criticisms people have had with swipe. Mania on her maniasarcania blog has asked for comments on bears performance. Bears are single target tanks with some AoE ability to help control adds. They are not really suitable for true AoE and volley pulls. This is reflected in the comments on the thread. The main difficulty is positioning the mobs all in the front aspect so the swipe can hit all of them. Volley is only available at level 40 and above so switching to a gorilla or croc then would make sense.
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.
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