The Darkmoon Faire begins!
by Alex Ziebart 
Dec 4th 2011 at 8:00AM
If you weren't able to check out the Faire on the PTR and you're utterly lost as to what to do there, no worries. Our test realm coverage may help you out a little.
The one question everybody seems to be asking but nobody thought to answer is: How the heck do you get to the Darkmoon Island? Do you fly there? Is there a boat? No, neither of those things. It's much easier than that. The former carnival grounds in Elwynn Forest (just south of Goldshire) or Mulgore (just west of Thunder Bluff) will get you there. Go to one of those two areas, find the great big portal to Darkmoon Island, and you're on your way. Going through the portal will even earn you what is possibly one of the easiest achievements in the entire game: Come One, Come All!
Players that enjoy collecting purely cosmetic items like mounts, pets and transmogrification outfits are going to be making some of the most difficult World of Warcraft decisions they've made in a very long time thanks to the Darkmoon Faire. The Faire offers many things, but they all cost precious Darkmoon Prize Tickets -- tickets which are in extremely limited supply. If you're chasing a pricey mount, you may not be able to get anything else this month!
What are all of you planning to pick up first with your tickets? Personally, I'm going for the pets. I've never been either a pet collector or a mount collector, so I have a very low number of both. Pet Battles in Mists of Pandaria caught my interest, however, so I need to start building up my stable of pocket monsters before the expansion rolls around. Mounts are still pretty low on my list of priorities, so I may even go after heirlooms and replica gearsets before I ever look at that Darkmoon Dancing Bear.
Brace yourselves for what could be some of most exciting updates to the game recently with patch 4.3. Review the official patch notes, and then dig into what's ahead: new item storage options, cross-realm raiding, cosmetic armor skinning and your chance to battle the mighty Deathwing -- from astride his back!
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 4)
loop_not_defined Dec 4th 2011 8:07AM
Death Knight Tip for Darkmoon Faire:
Path of Frost is great for getting out of the water and back to the cannon shoot game, but TURN IT OFF before trying again. You WILL die.
kvanje Dec 4th 2011 8:34AM
I had no trouble surviving the with with PoF on, it only seemed to do around 80-90k damage.
eirinefrostblade Dec 4th 2011 8:54AM
Same. Forgot, hit the water, damage, sank. It's not awful. Granted, I'm max level, which mght make a difference.
Skyrei Dec 4th 2011 9:06AM
Just depends on your timing
razion Dec 4th 2011 9:29AM
Actually, eir, level has no impact on fall damage. Only distance fallen and other modifiers (such as the Path of Frost glyph) will reduce fall damage.
Muse Dec 4th 2011 1:36PM
And more importantly: direction. Tilt your character (not just your camera, use right mouse button) DOWN (look at your feet) and you'll go through water safely even with PoF on. Same with Shammy water walking.
Amanda A. Dec 4th 2011 1:45PM
If you turn your camera so you're looking down upon your character, you'll sink into the water, even with path of frost and similar effects on. Good for those dungeons where you drop into water and you know someone will use it....
Chetti Dec 4th 2011 2:44PM
Yeah... this tip works for priests too, that use levitate to get out of the water and back to the shore. I forgot to turn it off before I launched again, when I "landed" it looked like I was still floating. When I moved my camera to see what was goin on, it seems that since I couldn't fall into the water, the launcher scooted me across the water. I was WAY OUT away from the target and the shore. lol
kat47 Dec 4th 2011 2:46PM
I also learned the hard way to remember to turn levitate off. I was getting frustrated wondering why the game kept bugging out and sending me into the middle of the ocean then...oh. But hey it was 3 am at this point :P
DragonFireKai Dec 4th 2011 8:08AM
I think the Ideas for the fair were pretty good. The mini games are fun, the zone has a good atmosphere, and the profession quests are great for alts that need to clear something like the great Thorium Hump in JC/BS. My only complaint is that the rewards are far too expensive for a daily hub that's only available one week a month. It's something rediculous like three years to earn all the rewards available. I know I don't have the dedication to cram in eight sets of dailies every week its available.
Cyno01 Dec 4th 2011 2:50PM
Its about 6 months for all the mounts and pets, which isnt too bad, probably about the same as the argent tournament IIRC, ontop of the daily fair games, you get the darkmoon field guide thing, which makes items drop in dungons and BGs that you can turn in for more tickets.
Cyno01 Dec 4th 2011 3:28PM
Heres what i was talking about.
http://www.wowhead.com/item=71634#comments:id=1566916
Skrotus Dec 4th 2011 7:56PM
6 months? I don't think so, the 5 daily quests give you 1 ticket each. The artifacts give you 5 each but they can only be done once each.
For all pets and mounts, you need 900 tickets...
Jason Dec 4th 2011 9:07PM
I agree... 1 ticket for a daily is too low. Also, I wasn't able to do the cooking or first aid daily on the second day for some unknown reason, just wasn't available to me. So I was only able to get 3 tokens from the dailies.
loop_not_defined Dec 4th 2011 10:06PM
You can get 135 tickets from the Darkmoon Adventurer's Guide alone, as Cyno01 linked. So that's at least one pet you can get, right now.
Cyno01 Dec 4th 2011 11:14PM
@ Everybody, heres a comment i made on the exact subject, looks like, unless i made some big error, you can get about 160 tickets a month, so more than one pet, not quite one mount, 6 months for all the mounts and pets.
http://www.wowhead.com/currency=515#comments:id=1589546
Half your tickets come from artifacts, which you get just going around your business with no real extra effort, not a big problem.
Collected Dec 4th 2011 8:23AM
Agreed DragonFireKai. I think the games should give a token for success every time you play rather than just one per day per game. Would it really hurt them to do this for the transmorg gear? Blizzard seem to enjoy hanging rewards on the end of a stick like a carrot.
mem0ryburn Dec 4th 2011 8:36AM
That doesn't really help the problem of everybody and their mother complaining of a lack of endgame content though does it. Sure it's only one week a month but it's something to stick around for if your into it.
mem0ryburn Dec 4th 2011 8:39AM
"your" /facepalm
Skyrei Dec 4th 2011 9:10AM
I believe daily quests are more about pacing yourself and less about taking forever to get what you want/need.