WoW Rare Spawns: June 2012

Saturday, June 30, 2012

Elwynn Forest Rare Spawns

Elwynn Forest is a lush wooded valley in central Eastern Kingdoms, and home to the great human kingdom of Stormwind (which also happens to be the home of another rare). It is also the starting zone for the human race.

The first rare young humans could potentially run across in Elwynn Forest is Gug Fatcandle, level 4. Gug spawns in front of the closed mine entrance north west of Northshire, and he drops a 4-slot bag called the Fatcandle Bag.

Mother Fang (level 9) is also a very neat looking spider for new hunters to aim for if you like eye-catching skins. There is more info, screenies, etc. about her in this post: Mother Fang.

Fedfennel and Gruff Swiftbite (both level 9) can be difficult to pull by themselves depending on where they spawn in. It is possible to pull and kill their adds and then run out of range to reset these rares though.

Speaking of adds, Thuros Lightfingers (level 9) spawns in a small camp with three adds very close to him (two adds pictured in the screenshot below). If you try to pull him all four will follow you. I was able to take on all of them with my ironman toon (you can see the hairy fight at the end of the video below) but it sure had me a bit nervous so be careful!

All of their spawn timers seem to be fairly close to the 30-45 minute range.

Click Map to Enlarge

Some screenies of these rares in order by level and as you will find them in the world. ~

Gug Fatcandle, Narg the Taskmaster & Fedfennel

Gruff Swiftbite, Mother Fang & Thuros Lightfingers

Another new ironman toon (Ironstevey, shaman - still alive) downing all of them. ~

Update 12/2812: To see more rares in this zone added in patch 5.1 check out this post: Elwynn Forest - Tamable Rares added in 5.1.

Tuesday, June 26, 2012

Dun Morogh Rare Spawns

Dun Morogh is a snowy region located in Central Eastern Kingdoms, it is also the starter area for both Dwarves and Gnomes and home of the great Dwarven City of Ironforge. Dun Morogh is also home to six rare spawns ranging from level 4 - 9.

The first one you will likely encounter when starting a new toon in Dun Morogh is Gibblewilt, a crazed leper gnome found just southeast of Gnomeregan. He is quite humorous to watch as he talks to himself, points this way and that, and throws his hands up laughing when he apparently tells himself a good joke.

Both Timber and Bjarn are tamable by hunters, and would make nice first rare pets for new Dwarves.

Great Father Arctikus is much higher level than everything else in the cave he patrols in, so lowbies questing in Frostmane Hold - be careful. He also has some odd phasing issues that I noticed when I was watching him. He was walking over and through walls, and at one point he phased out entirely only to reappear elsewhere in the cave...

Edan the Howler can be found at the back of The Grizzled Den (cave west of Kharanos).

Hammerspine can be found way at the back of the cave in Gol'Bolar Quarry. He has an enrage that HURTS. Fast-forward to the end of the video below and you can see how he left my poor ironman rogue with 1 health.

Click Map to Enlarge

All six rares, in order by level. ~

Gibblewilt, Timber & Great Father Arctikus

Edan the Howler, Bjarn & Hammerspine

In the video below Ironstevie the doomed rogue can be seen hunting down all of these rares. As you watch the video you'll see why she ended up dying, I took far too many risks on her from the get-go. ~

Friday, June 22, 2012

1st Blogiversary Contest, and the winner is...

Ok, so I'd just like to start this off by saying I had a heck of a hard time picking a winner for my 1st Blogiversary Contest (which was to tell me what your favorite rare in the game is, and why). There were just so many great entries! If you haven't read them all yet, I have each one listed in this post 1st Blogiversary Contest Submissions. If you have a few minutes to spare I definitely recommend reading them, there were some wonderful stories that were submitted.

So without further adieu I'd like to announce the winner, and the winner is Erinys of the Harpy's Nest Blog with her submission: A rare thing: Humar the Pridelord!

I chose Erinys' entry because ultimately...it was awesome. It was so well-written, and the content so emotional, it actually got tears welling in my eyes as I neared the end. The story she tells about the bond between hunter and pet, and ultimately the loss of that pet was just heart-wrenching and she did a beautiful job telling it.

If you haven't read it yet, PLEASE DO! Here is her entry copied directly from her blog post:

My favourite rare spawn in game is this fellow here, Humar the Pridelord.

Way back in vanilla, my husband started playing a hunter as an alt with the eventual intention of making it his main for a period. As he levelled he started looking around on the internet, researching pets and looking for interesting ones to tame. That search took us to Petopia amongst other places and in the end lead to the Barrens. As a low level Night Elf hunter on a Horde heavy pvp server this was not an easy plan, however he persevered and was rewarded by a loyal companion who kept him company for a long time. Then when I came to make a hunter of my own, I followed in his footsteps, running from Theramore up into the Barrens to tame my very own Pridelord.

There was however a problem, back then levelling pets was horribly painful and because certain pets had different attack speeds, sometimes you just had to let go… a process which always left me feeling devastated.

———————-

The hunter and her shadow, a huge black feline slid through the forests of Ashenvale, instinctively keeping to the shade. Their passage was silent, paws and feet making no noise as they glided over twigs and heaps of dead leaves. As they neared the border with the Barrens, the Night Elf slowed her pace, her unease translating itself to her companion. The cat whined softly, rubbing his head against her leg. ”Sshh”, she reached down and stroked his thick fur, “almost there boy, almost there”. In reply, he licked her hand, his tongue rough as bark.

They picked their moment, waiting until the Orcs guarding the rampant were distracted by a party of young Trolls, arrogant and brash on their first trip to Ashenvale. Moving in tandem like a well oiled machine, they worked their way deeper and deeper into enemy territory. The cat scouted ahead whilst the Elf shadowmelded beneath the heavy squat trees. Had any eyes seen them, it would have been clear that this was an old familiar pattern.

On a hill over looking the Crossroads, they stopped for food and to gather their strength for what was to come. Thick steaks for the cat, donated by a dinosaur whose curiosity had done him no favours and dumplings from home for the hunter. After they ate, they stretched out and gazed down at the busy town beneath them. ”Remember all the fun we had here boy?”. The cat purred, rubbing his head against her. “Hunting all those cowardly Horde. There was that warrior, the Troll, we chased her half way to Orgrimmar didn’t we”. He growled, showing a touch of fang and she smiled, patting him. “You liked the taste of Troll didn’t you boy”. The two of them lay in companionable silence, reliving their glory days, as they stalked living prey across the barren landscape of their memories.

As dusk fell, an observant watcher would have seen two moving shadows drifting towards Ratchet. A hunter, her violet skin and height marking her as a Night Elf walking lightly in the pawprints of a large black cat who ran a little ahead, turning back every minute or so to make sure she was still there. As they covered the dusty ground, the hunter’s thoughts returned to the first time she had followed this path. That nervousness in the pit of her stomach, the tension in her grip on her bow, both feelings she had thought were long gone came swimming up from the dark depths of her memories. Sensing her distress, the cat paused for a second, licking her hand to reassure her.

Just above the Goblin settlement of Ratchet, they came a halt, pausing to listen to the sounds of drunken partying mingling with the drunken yells of the dock workers loading ships for Booty Bay. Closing her eyes for a moment, the hunter let her thoughts drift back to the days when she too had frequented those parties, waking up to a throbbing headache, foreign sheets and the golden eyes of her cat, regarding her and her new friends expressionlessly as he guarded her belongings from quick fingered thieves.

“Almost there boy, almost home”. The cat whined in agreement and led the way, past gnarled and twisted trees, their thick branches providing the only shade and through thick grasses which cut at your legs, flicking back like whips. Before she realised it, they were back at that spot, the right place under the right tree. Sitting down, their backs to the broad trunk she tried to put her thoughts in order. Stroking his fur, she found herself gazing down at the white marring the thick black coat. In her head, the white hairs melted into snow and the temperature dropped as the parched earth grew a snowy blanket. Out of the shadows, the bridge at Dun Baldar crystallised into being. The acrid smell of gunfire caught the air, the heavy thud of war drums and the twang of her bow strings replaced the Goblin sea shanties but most importantly, the large feline shape at her side, the shadow which tied all these memories together bounded like a kitten through her subconscious.

Ragged breathing pulled her from the safety of the past, “it’s alright boy, you’re home now”, blinking back tears from her silver eyes, she held him close. She felt the last rough stroke of his tongue across her hand, one last goodbye before her friend slid into the realm of memories and dreams, leaving her alone beneath the open sky. Digging the grave was easy, leaving him in it, far harder. Looking down at her closest friend, so small and somehow diminished in death, she found herself cursing her race, condemned to keep leaving those she loved in the cold damp earth.

Walking away, followed by nothing but her own lengthening shadow, she wiped away her tears. Then before beginning her descent into Ratchet, to the tavern in which she intended to drink until all this was just a bad dream, she looked back. There in the half light, she saw him again, standing proud before the tree. A sea breeze caught the branches, shifting the light and revealing nothing but long grasses, shattering the mirage. “Goodbye old friend and good hunting”, raising her hand in farewell, the hunter, her heart breaking headed into town alone.
——————–

Now of course, it’s a different story as all my hunters have more than enough room to house him. That emotional bond with my virtual pets is just as strong however, the one thing guaranteed to make me mad in pvp is to persecute my pet. You can /spit spam me until I’m drenched or laugh at me until you cry and you won’t get a reaction. Hurt my pet though and you better be ready to die, over and over again.

Congratulations Erinys! What a fantastic story! ^-^ As you are aware for your prize you can choose any one of the $10 companion pets from the Blizzard Store. Just let me know which one you would like and we'll work out the details from there!

Wednesday, June 20, 2012

1st Blogiversary Contest Submissions

I am no longer taking submissions for my 1st Blogiversary Contest, which was to tell me what your favorite rare is and why, and I would like to thank everyone who submitted an entry. I received entries in several different forms including blog posts, replies to my original contest post and by email.

I think everyone should get a chance to read all of the entries before a winner is picked, so I would like to share them with you. I have quoted the entries received via email and as a response to the contest post below so that they can easily be read in one place. For entries received via blog posts I have included links directly to the posts. Definitely check them out if you haven't yet - they have some very nice visuals to go along with their responses (images will carry no weight when the entries are being judged as not everyone was able to submit them).

(Entries are listed in the order they were received.)

Entries Submitted via another blog (with links to posts):

From Cymre of Bubbles of Mischief ~ http://www.bubblesofmischief.com/2012/06/07/my-favourite-rare/

From Navimie of The Daily Frostwolf ~ http://frostwolves.blogspot.com/2012/06/my-favourite-rare-spawns.html

From TotA of Tome of the Ancient ~ http://tomeoftheancient.wordpress.com/2012/06/08/my-favorite-rare-spawn-tlpd/

From JD Kenada of Amateur Azerothian ~ http://arcanewordsmith.wordpress.com/2012/06/11/rave-rit-rares/

From Erinys of the Harpy's Nest ~ http://harpysnest.wordpress.com/2012/06/15/a-rare-thing-humar-the-pridelord/

Email Entries:

From Caden Reigns ~

"My greatest rare moments come down to two that are probably unoriginal, but how similar to one another my experience finding them was sets them at the forefront of my mind. The two rares in question were the Time-Lost Proto drake and Aeonaxx. When Wrath was in beta and the Violet Proto Drake was datamined I immediately knew I wanted it and started doing holidays at max speed. But when I learned that there was another version of the proto 'just flying around' Storm Peaks I thought it would 'easier' to camp that instead. Two weeks of semi-constant camping later I was fed up with it, I had slain Vyragosa too many times and was sure every time I had to log off that my mount had been snagged by some gnome or undead that I saw in the seconds before I logged off. So I gave up camping, and only passed through Storm Peaks on the way to dailies and eventually Ulduar. It was just after the first phase of the argent tourney was implimented, before the raid/dungeon was there, that I was flying between there and the Hodir to do dailies when suddenly, as a I was flying through the small canyon with all the harpies, and NPCScan started blaring. I thought it was just Vyra again but when I looked at the box there was a bronze dragon in the picture instead of a blue one. I flew at TLPD so fast and jumped off my mount so quickly without thinking that I nearly died from fall damage after tapping the drake. Bit one enraged regen and a bunch of other cd's later I had an awesome new mount.

The reason Aeonaxx is so similar for me is because after like-wise camping for quite some time at the beginning of the xpac, one day I get on my shaman to do the Therazane dailies and as I'm flying there I'm once again surprised to find an actual rare I want in the npcscan box. Luckily for me Aeoanaxx catches you when you jump off your mount cause that's a fall I wouldn't have survived."

From Rob George ~

"What follows: A story about my encounter with Rekk'tilac after a Molten Core wipe six years ago. And a condensed version detailing what happened.

“BY FIRE BE PURGED!” roared the elemental embodiment of molten fury, hurling a roiling sphere of blistering heat in my direction. Before my rotten flesh went up like the kindling it was, I managed two things. I hurled the Shadowbolt I had been conjuring up, the fel energy coursing towards Ragnaros’ molten core, neatly paralleling the own fiery ball heading my way. And I also uttered an “Oh”, as though the outcome of our particular battle was in anyway destined to end in my victory. As though, in this spar, my teammates and I had any chance. And so I died. Again.

Rotten luck, that. Though I can’t say the sadistic part of me didn’t enjoy watching my compatriots go up in flame. And oh, what a dramatic character Ragnaros was, practically chewing up the scenery in between swings, each outburst rife with passion and flare for the dramatic. To be fair, fire is a passionate element.

So here I sit. I had long since settled with the notion that death, or redeath, for me, was part and parcel to this world. I even had some vague form of consciousness as a corpse, being able to watch the world turn, or my allies burn. But the leader of my ragtag band of mobs did not seem to enjoy my candor, or our lack of results, and called our soirée after we had only failed three times!

Madness. I called him on it, and he made sure no one took the time to resurrect me. Well, fine! Two can play the Laziness Card. With effort, I willed my soul depart from its mortal coil, appearing in a grey-washed land of the Searing Gorge, positioned precariously on the lip of Thorium Point. Watching my allies depart around me, I sighed looked out across the bleak landscape, out towards the mountain where my corpse lay.

Excuse me, while I wax philosophical, for just a moment. How dead am I, right now? A Forsaken, who has died, and is now a ghost. Using the laws of convoluted playground grammar, I should be alive. I’m un-undead. If only such childhood games were true! Alas.

Where was I? Oh, yes. Laziness. It would be fair to call me lazy. Sedentary. Lethargic. But I can explain my lack of effort by saying that my body is rotting and I don’t have the muscle for it. Or the nerve. Or the mind. I don’t have much, is what I’m getting at. I did have a lot of cash, though. That always helped. So it was with a heavy coinpurse that I turned to the ephemeral image of a woman, knowing full well the weakness that would overtake me and my physical belongings. Oh, the repair bills!

With a snap of my fingers and a nod, I felt my soul wrenched out of the world of bleak greys and instead a land of vibrant, soot colored wastes. What a positive change.

Accompanying this shift in venues was the angriest, most bloodthirsty spider I had ever seen. Something I could have easily taken had the floating ghostly tart not left me weak and frail. I threw a weakened curse at it, followed by some flesh decaying afflictions, but it was all for naught. It hurt me far more than I hurt it. I cast it back with some harrowing magic, watching it flee in terror.

Knowing that I was on a mountain, I had nowhere left to turn. So with gestures arcane, I summed my faithful hound, Gzaanom. He was weak, sure. I wouldn’t tell him this, but I usually used my imp more, just because my allies demanded it. So I ordered my felhound forward, and it obeyed, as it was summoned to do.

What follows is a condensed version of the most boring fight of my entire unlife, life, and various states of death and undeath. I hurled bolts of eldritch wrath from a wand, and occasionally used my own life force to heal my hound. For ten minutes.

Sighing, I knelt down to look at the corpse of the red-furred embersilk spider, carefully poking around it with a boney toe. Heaving a sigh, I dug my hands around it for awhile and pulled forth my spoils. A fang, and a magical battleaxe that I had not seen on the spider’s personage until that time.

Sometimes life is stranger than fiction.

I had just wiped, miserably, in Molten Core. It wasn't much of a surprise. Molten Core was still "new" and Ragnaros has only just been slain for the first time a couple months prior. But wipe we did.

And when I got to the graveyard, I immediately remembered that I was lazy and running back was boring. So I used to the spirit healer. Looking around, I saw a rare spawn! And attacked it. It kicked my ass, and I had to fear it. I remember I dealt no damage with rez sickness. But my pets did the same damage either way.

Gzaanom, halp!

Ten minutes might be an exaggeration, but it took a long damn time to kill that spider with a wand and Felhound's piss poor melee damage!
Anyhow, that's my story. Rekk'tilaaaaac! The fire tarantula thing in Searing Gorge.

This rare spawn means a lot to me because of nostalgia, plain and simple. I enjoyed this game the most in Vanilla, when my dial up connection could raid Molten Core and Blackwing Lair and I was an asset to my team. Now dial up just allows me to faff about, collecting mounts and pets(117 mounts, 129 pets, respectively). And the sheer length of time it took to kill Rekk'tilac made him stand out."

From Silvia Castañeda ~

"I'll have to say that there are THREE rares in the history of my hunter that are truly, truly meaningful for her, but the most important has to be her first pet.

Dishu: Her first pet and rare. Was tamed back at 2006, leveled all the way to 15 before trying to tame her (because the cub adds that spawn)... Ran all the way from Darkshore to the barrens and kept looking for her under the trees she spawns, after several ganks, finally found her on the northernmost spawn point, and proceeded to clear the other lion adds. Thanks to her cubs I ended dying a lot and running away too much, however, in the end I managed to tame her. I really felt like the most accomplished hunter at that moment, since on the alliance side nightsabers and snow leopards where the most common cats for hunter, I kept getting whispers from other similar level hunters ''where did you got that pet?!''.

To this day, Dishu it's still on my hunters stable. She may no longer be her principal active pet (Deth'tilac being now) or the rarest of all (stable is full of them), but she is definitely the one with the most sentimental value of all other pets."

From Nicole Emerson ~

"After doing some PVP and seeing many hunter's with a green spider which I fell in love with, I went on a hunt to find where to get it from. After a little snooping around on the net I found out it was a rare spider called Kirix which was a rare in Molten Front. I'm the type of person that likes to figure things out so I tried Ice traps, Frost traps, silencing shot and deterrence, after all of that not working I turned to other things like Elixir of Mighty Speed, Blood lust and time warp.

I was killed many time's and on a graveyard run just as I rezed there where three alliance players killing him. I was guttered but he was soon out again only 4 days after and at a better time for me to get my wow friends in to give me buffs and heal, which may I add did not work. :/ After trying many times a hunter sent me a whisper saying I should get on the floating rocks and this was how he had tamed Kirix, so I took his advice and off I went. I went back to pots, buffs, traps and help from friends and it all failed yet again so I was reluctant to go on the net to see how other hunters had tamed him.

One hunter had been getting on the floating rocks which I had tried, the other was a little rotation of Frost traps, Disengage, Deterrence and Tame Beast. After many trys and with many fails I come to the conclusion that the little rotation was not work for me. So I went back on the net to snoop some more, I found nothing of use to me. But when I tabbed back into game a hunter was taming him and succeeded! Which I cant say I was not upset about. I sent a whisper to the hunter asked how he had tamed Kirix which he would not tell me ;( which I thought was a little evil on his part. Not long after I was told by my friend that her hunter had tamed Kirix only the other day! Which I have to say I got mad at myself for not being able to tame him. I was lucky one early morning about 3am he was out! And I was determined to get him this time! After failing for over an hour my friend who had tamed him only days ago came online.

I asked how she had done it her reply was I have two words for you "core hound!" and so I went off to search for a tameable core hound. After having to do quests to get into molten core and tamed me a core hound I did not expect Kirix to still be there but he was! So with my Elixir of Mighty Speed and my pocket healer and the buff from the core hound and the little tip off getting on the floating rocks I got him first time!! I was a very happy bunny, and now every time I see Kirix or even see someone with him it makes me smile as I think back on how long and hard it was for me to get him as my pet.

I also went on to have a really good day that day, as I was doing my dailies in Deepholm when my NPC went off telling me Jadefang was out! Which I killed to get the little spider pet. So Kirix is my favourite rare and a very long a waited rare for me. ^^"

Replies from Original Contest Post:

From Kamalia of Kamalia et alia ~

"My favorite rares are Olm the Wise, Aotona, and Arcturis.

Olm the Wise has always made me think of Hedwig. I think it's somehow appropriate that Olm is now a ghost owl, because of how Hedwig took an Avada Kedavra for Harry at the beginning of Deathly Hallows. I didn't manage to get the original white version of Olm tamed, but I do have the new spectral version in my stable -- I named it "Minerva".

I love the parrots, so I'd been planning to tame Aotona as soon as my Hunter got to level 76. I thought I might have to camp for awhile, but to my great delight, my Hunter saw Aotona flying around as she was coming down on the parachute from Archmage Pentarus's plane! She hurried to dismiss her regular pet and get in range to tame Aotona. I was so nervous that another player would come along and disrupt my tame, but thankfully no one did!

Even though my Hunter leveled as Beast Mastery, I wasn't particularly interested in most of the Exotic pet families. I felt like she should have at least *one* Exotic pet to use while in her Beast Mastery spec, though, so after a great deal of deliberation, I decided to tame Arcturis and name it with an anagram of the name of my husband's Bear Tank. I was busy with the Argent Tournament at the time, so every day after doing the sword quest, I would fly by Arcturis's spawn point on my way back to the Tournament, instead of just hearthing or taking a flight path. For days and days, I never saw Arcturis. One day, I saw a Night Elf Hunter at the same spot -- so I gave him a wide berth and hoped he wouldn't be there again the next day! After two or three weeks, I finally saw Arcturis. No other players were around, so I was able to tame him without interference. Whatever other pets come and go in my stable, Arcturis will stay."

From Trinity ~

"I am an 85 Troll hunter on Uldum US but when I was working for my favorite rare the beautiful loque'nahak spirit beast I was at level 80 about a year ago. What made this such a memorable rare was this was the first pet or rare in that matter that I ever camped for Loque took me about a week to get with 6+ hours each day I saw him dead about 4 times in that week and that really got me mad. Eachtime my NPC scan went off I would nearly have a heart attack seeing the majestic beast just suddenly pop on my screen. I would scramble to click on it just to find it dead. FOUR TIMES. But on that last day I was getting ready to start my typical route to camp so I log in and suddenly he is right there in front of me I lay down my frost trap hit tame beast and caught my first spirit beast this sparked the journey to camping and I have caught every spirit beast since that besides Karoma but I'm working on that right now."

From Akabeko aka the red cow of red cow rise ~

"My favorite rare spawn is Jadefang. I'm not much of a camper in WoW, because even when I have the time for it, I'm too impatient! But one day shortly after Cata I was home sick and thought well, since I'm just streaming TV anyway, why not park myself in Deepholm and see if that spider that drops the pet shows up? (I'm not a hunter, so I was planning to kill Jadefang for the cute spider pet) I had saved the bomb quest that you need to blast yourself into her lair, so I ran into the cave and parked myself, in kitty form and stealthed, right by her spawn point. Then I went back to poking around online and rolling around on the floor in a fever-induced delirium.

I realized that a human DK was hanging out halfway towards the entrance of Jadefang's lair. I assumed they were camping as well - of course, right, why else would you be up in that cave? But they kept jumping. The movement was really annoying me for some reason. I would see the motion out of the corner of my eye and nerdrage! YOU THERE. WITH THE JUMPING. CUT IT OUT. I didn't know if they could see me hiding in the back of the cave, so I didn't interact with them. The whole time I was afraid they would steal my mob (not that I expected it to spawn).

Then suddenly...Jadefang spawned! I screamed and spammed Swipe in a frantic attempt to tag it. Seconds later, I had my very own tiny shale spider! Then, guiltily, I looked at the human DK. THEY HAD GONE AFK. I laughed about my luck all the way to my hearth."

I can tell a lot of time and thought were put into these, and I enjoyed reading each one of the entries as they came in. I plan on reading all of them again before I pick a winner. As stated in my original contest post I will announce a winner some time before June 23rd. The winner will receive a companion pet of their choice from the Blizzard Store.

Saturday, June 16, 2012

Ashenvale Rare Spawns

Ashenvale, a beautiful ancient forest in Northern Kalimdor and home to the Night Elves, has been heavily scarred recently by ongoing attacks from the Horde's lumber camps, cursed dragonkin, and the demons of the Burning Legion. Even though this zone has faced it's share of troubles over the past few years I still think it is one of the most gorgeous zones in the entire game. (Pre-cata Ashenvale was my absolute favorite zone, no contest.)

This zone is also home to a dozen rares ranging from level 21 - 26. Darkslayer Mordenthal can be found attacking Ashenvale Outrunners south of Splintertree Post, and both him and Apothecary Falthis can only be attacked by Alliance players.

Both Mist Howler and Ursol'lok can be tamed by hunters, unfortunately neither have unique skins.

Under-geared people (this means you ironmen toons!) be careful pulling Akkrilus. Several felguards and fel hunters need to be cleared out before you can reach him at his alter. Once the way has been cleared he will have two fel guards on either side of him, and in my experience pulling either felguard will also pull Akkrilus - and he cannot be pulled by himself. (If you skip to about 6:30 in the video below you can see my ironman warrior was nearly killed by him.)

All of these rares are on fairly short re-spawn timers. Funny, she doesn't look druish... Lady Vespia's timer is around 10 minutes, where Terrowulf Packlord (one of the few remaining worgen in game with the original badass skin) has a longer one probably closer to 30min - 1hr or so. The rest of the rares in the zone fall somewhere in between.

Click Map to Enlarge

Some screenies of all twelve of these rares as you'll find them in the zone in order by level. ~

Darkslayer Mordenthal, Mist Howler, Price Raze & Apothecary Falthis

Lady Vespia, Branch Snapper, Rorgish Jowl & Ursol'lok

Eck'alom, Oakpaw, Terrowulf Packlord & Akkrilus

My Ironman toons (Ironsteve the druid & Ironsteva the warrior) taking these rares down. ~

Tuesday, June 12, 2012

Salyis' Warband & Galleon - MoP World Boss

(Updates toward bottom of post.)

Chief Sayis' Warband, Blizzard did a wonderful job on this model!

After maintenance this morning I logged into the beta to do a few quests in the Valley of Four Winds before going to work. The moment I logged in I noticed people in general chat looking for more to help down a rare world boss. Naturally I was curious and offered to join in.

It turns out this boss is actually an entire war party called Salyis' Warband. The party is made up of several saurok (reptilian humanoids) who man two huge cannons on top of a kodo-like beast called a mushan named Galleon. The party is led by Chief Salyis (seen standing on Galleon's head).

I'm not sure yet if the War-band spawns in any other locations, but when our group attempted downing them we found them on the Rumbling Terrace shooting cannonballs over the river. I put a red dot on the map below to show where we found them.

Click to Enlarge

This boss has 261 million hit points and has a few abilities to be aware of before you try taking it down. Taken straight from the dungeon journal:

Fire Shot: Saurok Skirmishers riding on Galleon's back fire flaming crossbow bolts at random players, inflicting 15,000 Fire damage.

Stomp: Galleon stomps the ground, inflicting 100,000 Physical damage to players within 100 yards and knocking them down for 3 sec.

Cannon Barrage: (this one you need to watch out for, ouch) Chief Salyis orders his minions to fire off eight powerful cannon blasts. Each blast inflicts 600,000 Fire damage to players within 10 yards and knocks them back.

Salyin Warmonger: Chief Salyis' Warmongers periodically jump down from Galleon's back to engage players. The Warmonger uses an ability called Impaling Pull to bring a distant target towards them and inflict 15,000 physical damage.

Chief Salyis can be seen standing atop Galleon's head

Our group failed miserably as you can see in the video below. In all fairness though we had far fewer people than we should have, everyone was level 85-87 other than myself at 88 and someone not in our party pulled and initiated combat early. We didn't reform after the wipe, but this little bit of footage should give a little bit of an idea as to what to expect for this boss.

This boss wasn't around when I got home from work, but I can't wait to give it a try again with a larger group!

6/15/12 Update:

I got into a raid group last night that was able to kill him. We had a LOT of people there this time and it went much more smoothly. Here is the video of the kill. ~

9/7/12 Update:

I checked Galleon's loot table this morning and found a pleasant surprise. It would seem that just like the other rare world boss Sha of Anger, Galleon will be dropping a mount! It looks like it's going to be a ground mount called Son of Galleon, learned by Son of Galleon's Saddle. I'm not sure what the model looks like yet, but I'm really hoping that it looks just like Galleon himself. ^-^

Darkshore Rare Spawns

Darkshore, a shadowy forest bordered by both mountains and sea, on the north western part of Kalimdor, is home to nine rares. These rares range from level 12 - 19, and for the most part are lower in level toward the northern end of the zone, and get higher in level as you move south.

Shadowclaw and Strider Clutchmother are two notables in this zone as they can both be tamed by hunters. Shadowclaw is also a unique hunter pet and looks exactly like the alliance Striped Nightsaber mount, making him a nice find for lowbie hunters. He is stealthed, so he can literally sneak right up on you while looking for him if your around his level. Strider Clutchmother travels with two smaller tallstriders which will attack when she is attacked or if you try to tame her.

Click Map to Enlarge

All of these rare are on incredibly fast re-spawn timers, somewhere in the 10-15 minute range sounds about right. I actually leveled one of my ironman toons from level 12 to 24 on three rares in the zone without questing at all. As you can see from the screenshot below, I repeatedly killed Strider Clutchmother (20 times), Shadowclaw (49 times) and Lord Sinslayer (38 times). You can also see in the screenshot that Lord Sinslayer had last been seen only 9 minutes before I started attacking him in the shot. (I believe I was actually working on another blog entry while this toon waited shadowmelded for the re-spawns.) ;)

SilverDragon showing us just how often these guys are up

As usual, here are some screen shots of these rares in order by level, and exactly as you would find them in the world. ~

Lady Vespira, Shadowclaw & Flagglemurk the Cruel

Licillin, Strider Clutchmother & Lady Moongazer

Carnivous the Breaker, Firecaller Radison & Lord Sinslayer

One of my newest ironman toons (Ironsteva, warrior) taking them out. If she can do it, anyone can! ~

Friday, June 8, 2012

Alani The Stormborn - the New Aeonaxx/TLPD of Pandaria?

(Updates toward bottom of post.)

The new Aeonaxx/TLDP of Pandaria?

Flying high above the Vale of Eternal Blossoms glides a gorgeous majestic dragon named Alani, The Stormborn. (Perhaps a reference to Daenerys Targaryen, mother of Dragons, aka. Daenerys Stormborn from GRRM's A Song of Ice and Fire series?)

Alani is a level 92 silver dragon leading me to believe that we may just be seeing a glimpse of the next Time-Lost Proto-Drake/Aeonaxx. At least that's what I'm hoping for because WOW would this make an amazing looking mount!

Look at that Gorgeous Face!

Alani has 1264k hp. I watched her fly around the zone for about 15-20 minutes with my eagle eye and she patrolled all the way from the most eastern side to the west, making it a very large patrol area. She was generally flying fairly high in the air, but did occasionally dip down low enough to the ground that she probably would have been within range to hit with a ranged spell.

Click to Enlarge

She cannot currently be attacked on the beta, as she is surrounded by an aura called Nimbus Shroud which obscures her from attackers. I did however find on wowhead an item called the Sky Crystal, which according to the tool-tip will break her out. You need to combine 10 Skyshards to create the crystal, but where they come from I have no idea yet.

I have some footage of Alani flying around the zone below so that you can see just how beautiful this dragon is yourself. ~

All I know is if she does turn out to be what I'm hoping for I know where I will be spending a LOT of time in the future...

Oh so very pretty...

Update 7/5/12:

I finally reached level 90 in beta and with the lovely ability of flight I was able to talk to Loh-Ki <The Storm Watcher>, a pandaren who can be found meditating on the mountainside at Ruins Rise overlooking the Vale of Eternal Blossoms. Loh-Ki has a few clues for us as to how to engage Alani.

This is his story:

Legends tell of a great battle that took place in this very vale, turning the golden fields to crimson with the blood of many brave monks. The armies of Lei Shen the Thunder King, emperor of the mogu, fought brutally, but were eventually overcome.

For days following the fall of Lei Shen, the vale was shrouded in a cloud of the deepest black. Summoned by Lei Shen in his final moments, the otherworldly storm blanketed the vale with rainfall and struckjagged spears of lightening into the hills.

(Story continued below)

Loh-Ki's Story

The blood of the fallen was washed away by the storm and carried to Whitepetal Lake, turning the waters a deep red. With its final breath, the storm struck the center of the lake, igniting the very water itself. the lake burned with a crimson hue for many days.

When the blaze subsided, a cloud serpent hatchling could be seen flying around the center of the lake. its scales sparkled with storm and fire, and where it flew, great clouds formed in the sky. My people named it Alani, the Stormborn.

They say that Alani can only see the flash of the greatest lightning, and may only hear the echo of the greatest thunder. Should you wish to get her attention, you will need to harness the very essence of the sky that spawned her.

Now the "very essence of the sky" that Loh-Ki said will get her attention, is very likely the Sky Crystal that I mentioned earlier. I am still uncertain where these come from but I'll update as I find anything out! =)

Here is some better footage of Alani and where you can find Loh-Ki on the mountainside. ~

Update 8/1/12:

It looks like the Skyshards, the item that we will need ten of in order create a Sky Crystal which will break Alani out of her Nimbus Shroud, is a very rare drop off of regular mobs. Someone in my guild looted one off of a mob while doing dailies in Vale of Eternal Blossoms a couple of days ago. Note that these shards are bind on pickup, so in order to break her out it is going to require a lot of play time on one particular toon.

Update 8/25/12:

As predicted, it does seem that Alani does drop a mount. On the beta someone has recently collected enough Skyshards to create a Sky Crystal and down her. Upon killing her, he received Reins of the Thundering Ruby Cloud Serpent, which looks just like Alani with the addition of a saddle.

Big thanks to Graveyard on the Lost Isles beta sever for the screenshots!

Here is a video below of someone killing her and looting the mount from her on beta:

Using /mountspecial

In order to be actually learn this particular mount, and any of the Cloud Serpent mounts, you are going to need to have learned Cloud Serpent Riding from the Order of the Cloud Serpent. Their main quest hub is located at the The Aboretum in Jade Forest. Reputation is increased with them by completing daily quests and handing in Onyx Eggs (similar to the Netherwing rep grind back in BC). The eggs can be found scattered about near the area that the dailies are completed. They award +500 rep each.

Also, as a reader pointed out in the comments below you will need to be exalted with the August Celestials to learn her in addition to the order of the Cloud Serpent. Reputation can be gained with this faction through dailies. Check out WoWhead's August Celestial's Preview for more detailed information on how to gain reputation with them.

Wednesday, June 6, 2012

First Blogiversary! ~ Contest & Giveaway

It's officially been a year today since I started this blog with my first post about using NPCScan to find silver dragons, and what an amazing year it has been! I've since posted 165 posts (probably about 85-90% of them specifically relating to rares, and I have had a blast doing so.

This blog was created specifically with the intention of helping others find rares in game, and I think I've done a decent job sticking to that theme. I've written the occasional post related to in-game holidays, mounts, and of course the WoW Ironman Challenge (which I've been quite obsessed with recently), but ultimately I try to and would like to continue trying to keep it mostly "rare" themed.

I've had a lot of fun hunting these rares down, taking screen-shots, writing about them -- and I think above all, I have really been enjoying the feedback from the community.

I've also had a lot of fun playing around with the blog itself. I'm still totally a blog noob, but I really enjoy messing around with the colors and gadgets, trying to figure out what looks best, while still making sense and not being a total eye-sore. My biggest goal recently was to make navigation a little easier, which I have sort-of succeeded at, but I'm still not done with it. My goal for the next year is to continue trying to make navigation easier, while of course adding new content.

Stats:

Stats are fun. Plain and simple. Because they are so fun here are a couple of stats from my blog from the past year: