Posts with tag pet-battle-system

We've asked for other minigames in WoW, but so far there's been no official word of anything on the horizon. The Plants vs. Zombies minigame is loads of fun, and the battle pet system is by far the most expansive minigame that's ever come to the game. Not everyone has the interest or time to invest in pet battling, so it was very exciting to stumble across the newest WoW minigame, just datamined in patch 5.3.

It's a game any player can have fun with. A game many of us have enjoyed ...

Say hello to Rock, Paper, Scissors!

That's right! Forget about the Singing Sunflower. Whether you're bored or want a new and improved way to decide who get's that Thunderforged weapon, this is it. OK, so this may not really be a new minigame -- datamining is a fickle thing -- but the spells are there for one purpose or another. We can dream, right?

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I find myself logged onto a different character every time I'm doing a round of pet battle dailies. It shouldn't be an issue, because pets are account bound, but there's just one little thing: Battle Pet Bandages. I never earn any on my main character -- maybe it's bad luck. It's very frustrating to end up with a defeated team, Revive Battle Pets on cooldown, and no stable master nearby. Oh, and no bandages!

Well, it feels like the devs really have been listening to the battle pet community, because they released a few quality of life updates on the PTR that (mostly) will make pet battlers happy campers.

• Battle Pet Bandages now stack and are Bind to Account.
• Level-capped players will now have a chance to earn Lesser Charms of Good Fortune after winning a pet battle versus a pet within 5 levels of the highest level pet on their team. Higher-level pets will offer a better chance to earn a charm.
• Winning a pet battle versus a team within 5 levels of the player's highest-level pet will now award player experience.

I'm so happy to see that pet bandages will be Bind to Account. Being able to funnel every precious bandage to one character will make things much easier -- especially for the altoholics out there. And three huge huzzahs to earning stuff while battling pets! It takes quite a bit of time to grind every pet battle achievement, even with power leveling newbie pets. So, earning rewards normally reserved for playing through PvE content turns pet battling into time well spent. I'm tempted to level a character solely through pet battles, now that winning one will grant player experience!

You can check out the full list of updated pet battle patch notes at the official site, but to make things easier we've compiled the complete list of notes after the break.

Now that MoP has been out for a few months, I find myself enjoying pet battles far more than I thought I would. That being said, it was only a matter of time before griefing made its way into this part of the game as well -- even if it is by turkeys. Yes, turkeys.

It all started with the rather harmless sounding "Triple Turkey." Unfortunately, it's not a sandwich I can nom on, but is instead something much more sinister in the world of pet battles. The Triple Turkey comp quickly became the flavor of the month for trolls in PvP pet battles, using abusing the irritating Food Coma ability to the max. If you've never encountered it before, Food Coma puts the opponent to sleep for two rounds, on a five round cooldown.

But that cooldown only applies to the turkey who casts it. So, we were left with creative individuals who would use Food Coma, swap to a second turkey, use Food Coma, swap, and so on.

Blogger and WoW artist Disciplinary Action has taken on the task of writing an idiot's guide to certain aspects of pet battles. Her guide sets out to provide a quick and dirty route to getting your hands on some of the achievements associated with pet battles, and does a great job.

She started with three level one pets, and spent some gold at the Auction House to get herself some level 20 ringers, then managed in the space of two days to get four pets from level 1 to level 25 -- not including the two level 20 pets -- as well as getting Continental Tamer, Taming Azeroth, which awards the title Tamer, and to make considerable progress towards the completion of World Safari, which awards the title Zookeeper. She already had two L25 pets, from a previous bout of battling.

Of course, with the seasonal elements of World Safari, she wasn't able to complete it within the space of two days. But by making wise choices she was able to progress on it while also dealing with the other taming-related achievements.

How did she do it? Do have a look at the blog post for all the details, especially the section on leveling three pets to 15 in an hour. There are several other hints and tips, but some key elements are laid out below. Bear in mind that you can't learn a caged pet of a level higher than your highest pet. Don't get carried away on the Auction House!

• Pick up two level 20 battle pets from the auction house (as long as you have a L20+ pet already), and use their strength to carry low-level pets through levels up to 15, then commence hunting for taming achievements.
• Use resources such as PetBattleArena or Wowhead's Battle Pet Map to maximize your pet gathering efficiency.
• Collect as many zone-specific pets as possible while moving through the world for Continental Tamer to contribute to World Safari.

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Mists of Pandaria is here! The level cap has been raised to 90, many players have returned to Azeroth, and pet battles are taking the world by storm. Keep an eye out for all of the latest news, and check out our comprehensive guide to Mists of Pandaria for everything you'll ever need to know.

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During Wrath of the Lich King, Blizzard gave us the Peggle and Bejeweled addons. In Cataclysm, we got an amazing in-game version of Plants vs. Zombies (which rewarded a Singing Sunflower pet that actually sang). Now in Mists of Pandaria, the latest addition to the growing collection of games within the game is the new pet battle system which is reminiscent of the beloved Pokémon series.

Well, beloved to everyone else anyway. See, Pokémon and I have a bitter past. It started when I was 12, and I told my mother the only thing I wanted for Christmas was a Gameboy and a copy of Pokémon Blue. It was an expensive gift to ask for from a single parent working two jobs, but I was desperate. In the months prior, all my friends at school had ceased socializing about comics and fantasy novels in favor of playing Pokémon. Every day at lunch they'd scarf down their meals then whip out their link cables and start dueling. Not having a Gameboy myself though, I was completely left out.

Sadly, when Christmas came there was no Gameboy. Instead I received a Pocket Pikachu, which was a weird toy pedometer crossed with a Tamagotchi. The idea was that you'd keep it in your pocket and as you took steps you'd earn currency to buy presents for Pikachu, who would then be your friend. The problem was the pedometer wasn't very sensitive to normal steps, so you were better off shaking it over and over. So for the next few months, while my friends continued to ignore me to play Pokémon, I shook a stupid, yellow pedometer up and down.

Anyway, long story short, I'm not too crazy about a pet battle system. And while I appreciate that Blizzard has made great efforts to integrate such an indepth feature into the game, I feel like they've missed out on the perfect opportunity to add a minigame to the game that would fit perfectly into Mists of Pandaria: mahjong.

• It shares its spawn with the Thundering Exiles in the area, so you must kill them for a chance at a Tiny Twister spawn
• It shares its spawn with any other type of wild pet in the area, so you must eliminate those for a chance at a Tiny Twister spawn
• Only X number of Tiny Twisters can spawn in a given length of time, so all you can do is wait

There is more evidence for that second option than any other, but without the ability to see the coding behind its spawns, we can't be too sure in any direction. In any case, killing the Thundering Exiles and eliminating other wild pets in the area would be a good way to pass the time while waiting for a Tiny Twister to spawn, so it doesn't matter which theory is correct, in any case. Engaging in all of the above applies in one way or another. All of that being said, if you rush out to Arathi Highlands immediately after a server reset, you'll find the place absolutely littered with these little guys and will have no problem catching one whatsoever.

My colleague Robin posted a brief piece with some of the Pet Battle addons you guys recommended on last week's Addon Spotlight, but you have all commented on her piece with even more addons, which brings us to today's Addon Spotlight! This is why WoW Insider's commenters are awesome. It's impossible for me to know about every fantastic addon out there, and that's where you come in! It's a collaboration, and that's more than fine by me.

From the midweek Addon update, I've drawn three fantastic Pet Battle addons, one of which I'm literally blown away by. It's one of those addons that seems so good it's almost cheating!

As an aside, do you like my Blizzard Community Manager battle pet team? What have you been naming your battle pets after? Zarhym doesn't get as much battling action as Bashiok and Crithto.

Let's get started...

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Every Thursday, The Overachiever shows you how to work toward those sweet achievement points. This week, crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and hear the lamentations of their women. With turnips.

I was an avid player of Pokemon Crystal and absolutely loved the game. It was hard not to when I had a Thick Club-armed Marowak with both Rock Slide and Bonemerang that hit everything like the fist of an angry god. Since Blizzard announced the new pet battle system for WoW, I have also been a fan of that -- never mind that it wasn't actually in the game until recently. If tear-assing around the world with a small, vicious creature that smites your enemies is wrong, I don't want to be right.

The pet battle system went live on a recent beta build for Mists of Pandaria, but I was one of the players afflicted with the crash bug on entrance to the actual battles. Suffice it to say that it is difficult to evaluate something when you are driven offline by doing it. However, that was fixed, and even though a bunch of LUA errors are still driving me out of the game at times, I return with tidings of great joy for prospective owners of dynamite rabbits.

You'll also find our early collection of pet battle posts helpful, although some of the information collected there has been overtaken by recent events.

Warning for those browsing on mobile devices: This is an image-intensive article.

With a release date finally forthcoming for Mists of Pandaria, we have less than two months until the expansion drops and even less time until we reach patch 5.0.4. With all that in mind, how do you pass the time until then? This week, we'll take a look at a few things death knights can do to look and feel their best when the expansion drops.

Solo to swell your stables

Soloing is a time-honored death knight tradition, and with the expansion winding down, it's the perfect way to pass the time. When choosing your soloing target, you may factor in nostalgia, transmogrification needs, or just plain ease of access. Another popular reason is grabbing mounts and pets. In the Cataclysm era, both Vortex Pinnacle and The Stonecore normal modes drop a mount.

Soloing same-level dungeons can be a bit hairy, but considering these two were in the game at the start of the expansion, you should find that even with Dragon Soul raid finder gear, you'll barely break a sweat in blood spec. As a bonus, both of these mounts will be going account-wide in Mists of Pandaria, so you'll be grabbing some possible stylish mount options for your alts as well.