- Spent an hour and a half (three underwater breathing pots) underwater fighting lobsters and opening lobster pots, seeking the Big Iron Fishing Pole. No luck. Ran out of breathing pots. Picked up a stack of Strangleweed but because of my disparaging remarks about Oily Blackmouth yesterday there were no schools of these around for me to make more pots and the farming is about five times more tedious when you have to keep surfacing for air. There are 'air pockets' on the bottom of the sea but it's still far easier to use pots. The time would have been better spent farming Thorium and spending the proceeds on a pole in the auction house but now the challenge has been thrown down.
- When I ran out of pots I continued with my cunning plan: continue swimming south from Desolace to Feralas to get to the Feathermoon Stronghold and the Master Alchemist for Artisan Alchemy training. By swimming I avoided all the level ??? nasties that were on the land route. You are now reading the wafflings of an artisan alchemist! Alchemy is still stuck at 205, not really into artisan territory and I couldn't train any new recipes but I can see what I have to look forward to and it is a motivation to go flower picking. I now have the flight path and can return whenever I need to. I have three orange recipes, most useful is mana pots but they need goldthorn which is in short supply. I can buy it in the auction house for 7g a stack but I'm determined not to spend my way through alchemy levelling and the pots I could make are worth less than that.
- Flew back to Desolace, Nigels Point, to do a little more levelling as I was only ten minutes from level 38. Ran to Kodo graveyard and looted some skull bones and this did the trick.
- Couldn't resist the lobsters so went back to that area. I was looking for Oily Blackmouth schools and ventured too close to the village there and was ganked by the level ??? horde guards. Did the corpse run back from Kodo graveyard (so I knew the way!) but still no Oily Blackmouth. Tried a bit of diving and was underwater messing about with my inventory when I drowned: oops, no breathing potion.
- Used spirit healer and hearthed to Hillsbrad and flew to Ironforge for a spot of training and to study herb stocks in the bank. Training was forgettable next rank stuff and I didn't have enough herbs to make anything although I had enough oily blackmouth for one more breathing pot.
- Time for a quick trip to Arathi highlands to look for Goldthorn. Found one yielding three leaves (or whatever the unit is) and then knocked off an easy quest I had left over in my log, killing sixteen syndicate whatevers in ten minutes. Despite having 'Track Stealthed' I tried the trick of pressing tab to target any nearby stealthed enemies and it works a treat, they light up like christmas trees. I tried the Hunter 'Flare' ability which I think is supposed to reveal stealthed enemies but that proved totally useless: it gives a tiny target area on the ground where you send the flare, then you wait while the flare does a feeble arch, then it goes phut on the ground and nothing's there. I hope I didn't spend good money on that 'talent' (no I don't care about detecting rogues in pvp).
- I swapped back to Colin and although he was only level 35 it was disappointing to see his dps is only 35, 10 less that Tiddles who, being a cat, has more base dps and 'Cobra Reflexes' on top. I've got my doubts about whether it is worth levelling both him and Tiddles. The only thing he has going for him is the fact that he is on maximum loyalty which increases the available training points. If I dumped him and decided to pick up another tank pet later on I would have to wait for its loyalty to build up before I could train it. During that time it's agro management in particular will be poor until I can train it to Growl (which reminds me of an interesting observation: you can teach scorpids to Growl so I guess this is the difference between scorpids and scorpions, the latter don't often growl). The question is do I really need a tank pet?
- The bigger question: what to call the impending level 40 mount? The answer to both these questions could be to dump Colin and call the mount (inevitably a ram) Colin II in his honour.
WoW Daily News Issue 107
Submitted by Peter on Fri Jun 01 2007 08:03
about 1 year ago
Peter Says:
Fri Jun 01 2007 12:45 about 1 year agoI have heard that a boar is an excellent tanking pet, thanks to it's 'Charge' ability which makes it fast to engage the enemy, stuns it briefly and the boar is also a tough opponent. It eats anything.
My main problem with boars is purely aesthetic: I'd rather have a cool animal like a cat or a bear running beside me than a pig.
Looking here there is a gap in available boars between levels 26 and 50 and I don't fancy levelling one up 12 levels.
Also I would be making bacon jokes all the time 
I'm into cat dps at the moment: saves me mana and arrows!
Peter
Galoheart Says:
Fri Jun 01 2007 18:19 about 1 year agoI'm laughing abit on your wrestling with the underwater potions. You've used more than i ever did. Anyway id think i did mention on a tip before to go out your way to collect "Goldthorn & Wild Steelbloom" and a few others. Goldthorn grows on rocks or hill mounts or hill sides in rocky areas. Tip: Arathi & Badlands.
Waffling as a Alchemist, yeah its amuzing!
Could have easily just collected 8 Fadeleaf in Arathi Highland, sell it and net you 6g, buy that fishing rod and no money lost. :)
Too bad you never got a Boar when you were in a level to get one. Makes great tank.
Peter Says:
Fri Jun 01 2007 22:00 about 1 year agoI can't enthuse enough about using the underwater potions on tedious diving missions. Not sure I can be bothered with the one hour versions though. Pity the swim speed potion only lasts 20 seconds, not half an hour. Nerf druid swim form.
Not long till level 40, then I'll be mounted and I'll do more farming.
Peter
Ogga Says:
Fri Jun 01 2007 22:08 about 1 year agoI named my boar, "Guapo".
Nothing like hearing on Vent, "oh no, Guapo is dying!" from the other party members.
Also, at high level, you rarely see the armored boar. As for raising it's level, just go farm green mob areas while you gather herbs. The more you kill, the faster they will level :)
Peter Says:
Sat Jun 02 2007 08:06 about 1 year agoOn urban's advise I went herb farming in Arathi and it was quite profitable: goldthorn, fadeleaf etc.
Another great thing about being a hunter: while the pet is busy fighting you can pick flowers! Just make sure to hit monster once to tag it for the XP.
Peter
Comments are Closed
Peter's Moblog
Have you tried a Boar?
Seriously, head over to RFK in Barrens and grab you a Boar to level up. Boars rock socks when leveling.
just my opinion, which is very important to me :)