Friday, August 10, 2012

Grinding for Archaeology mounts?


So remember that pet and mount you never ever ever got from Tol'vir solves? And how you hated having to bust ass all around Kalimdor for a measly 1 Tol'vir dig site and 3284091238 Night Elf dig sites?



THECLAW
My rogue got lucky, but you may not have!
Well, my pals, those days are over - and honestly, if you're currently trying to get that mount, STOP NOW.

Here's the scoop (and this isn't a full archeology preview, I'm just here to let you know that the Tol'vir mount WILL BE YOURS):

All those extra white/grey items you used to get doing all your other solves are now (with Mogu and Pandaren solves) white items with an on-use that puts them in a crate. Once you have maxed out archeology (which takes very little time in Pandaria) you can trade those crates in for any pre-MOP fragments you like! I had about 25 boxes to turn in when I maxed out my archeology so I got 25 boxes of Tol'vir fragments - they each had 6-9 fragments each and I was able to do 7ish Tol'vir solves right then and there.

Of course, I didn't get the mount to pop but it's only a matter of time, right?!

If you're into achivements, there are some achivements that require you to solve 20 of each white item for the Mogu/Pandaren items so right there is 20 boxes of Tol'vir fragments per achivement!

Not only are you going to get all your Pandaria archeology items and achivements, you will simultaneously be working towards that elusive Tol'vir bug mount.

For a complete archaeology preview, check out the Wowhead Archaeology Preview by she of the best socks, Perculia

Wednesday, August 8, 2012

Lulls and Changes

Expansion transitions are interesting times. People start to review what they need to finish before they have to worry about leveling again; old achievements, battleground goals, profession material farming and more. So a few posts have been circling about that are listing what folks are trying to finish up before the Mists of Pandaria comes to Azeroth.

Profession Work

With my main swapping from priest to guardian, I had to look at what I needed to get Kalbeari raid ready (aside from leveling her to 90). Currently, I have Leatherworking and Skinning but have gathered all of the mats needed to level Jewelcrafting once Mists hits and I've leveled Leatherworking.

The problem with this set up is that I've recently found out that Alchemy will blow JC out of the water for my choice of second crafting profession. Currently, the Guardian druid mastery is scaling things like armour elixirs and potions, (GC confirmed that it is intended) and with the Alchemist perk Mixology, it's clear that I'll have to farm mats for yet another profession.

The plan is to level in Mists with LW and Skinning, then drop Skinning and powerlevel my second profession - Alchemy.

Filling Time

There are things that Kaleri has that I would like Kalbeari to have, so I've been leveling my cooking and fishing so that she'll be self-sufficient. I picked up a Dalaran ring, and a guild cloak for easy transportation back and forth.

I've been doing mount runs every Tuesday with Serrine and Serrath two guildmates of mine, and so far we have: an Ashes of A'lar (mine), a Blue Drake from Malygos (Serrinne) and an Azure Drake from Malygos (to Serrath). Not bad for about a month's work!
Caw! Caw!
Raising some gold is a priority, too. I've never been super rich in WoW and with the introduction of some big gold sinks (Grand Expedition Yak, new JC mounts, Black Market Auction House) I'd like to have some extra gold.

I've tanked an LFR on the Beta, watched a bunch of livestreams and videos, recorded my loot list and have generally been itching for new content. I want to make sure I'm as prepared as possible!

Blog News

With main-swapping comes the consideration of what this blog will be once Mists rolls out. I originally intended to write about priests and raiding but I feel that once I am no longer playing my priest I won't carry the same authority that I did in Cataclysm.

I've asked my friend Sara (@SerrinneWoW) if she would be interested in writing some posts come Mists of Pandaria for priest related info, so expect to see some posts written by her in the future. (Plus that means I can keep part of the blog name the same - bonus!)

I'll still be here, but you can expect some more tank-centric and druid related articles from me in the future.

The url of this blog may be changing, not sure to what yet - have to pick a good name! If you notice some funky things happening with the layout and background don't worry, it's just me futzing around with some changes for Mists.


What are you doing to prepare for Mists? Are you taking some time off between expansions? What are you up to in the meantime?