mounts
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Mounts and Vanity Pets in Patch 3.0.2
One of the coolest changes in Patch 3.0.2 is the way mounts and vanity pets work. Done as a way to save bag space, this is great news for collectors and might even spur other players to start collecting, too. On live servers, pets and mounts summoned through the use of an item. When tomorrow's patch goes live, these pets and mounts will become consumable, single-charge items that teach you a spell to summon the relevant pet or mount. The pet or mount will then disappear from your inventory. Don't panic, those simply become spells that you will be able to access through your Character panel. There's a tab there labeled 'Pets', which will contain two sub-tabs called 'Companions' and 'Mounts'. Selected pets and mounts will be previewed in the window, and you can easily drag your pet and mount spells to your hotbars. Pets are instant cast spells that can be cast while moving and activate the GCD. You can create macros and key bindings for pets and mounts just as you would any other spell. %Gallery-34349%
Mounts to be usable in water
During the Q&A Panel at BlizzCon, Blizzard surprised the audience by responding obtusely to the question of when mounts will be usable in dungeons. One of the most annoying things in the game is probably those times when you're trying to cross a stream or something, only to get dismounted and have to summon your mount again after you cross. Well, Ghostcrawler Tigole -- in a BlizzCon exclusive -- says that will soon be a thing of the past. All ground mounts will be usable in water in the first patch following Wrath of the Lich King. It took us a bit to confirm this because, well, it sounded like a joke. You all know how Blizzard loves to kid around.This probably means you'll be able to submerge with your mount. In one of the older patches in The Burning Crusade, flying mounts were adjusted so that you are no longer dismounted when coming into contact with water. That also made it impossible to dive into the water without manually dismounting from your flying mount. A different behavior will probably happen for ground mounts. Thanks to the change, we can happily cross this off the list of annoying things in the game. Patch 3.1 brings us Ulduar, dual specs, significant changes to all the classes, and more! We've got you covered from top to bottom with our Guide to Patch 3.1.
BlizzCon mount not usable until after BlizzCon
Another quick note here, which I'm posting because the team at BlizzCon is at the Lost Bar right now (I make absolutely no promises as to the sobriety of anyone involved); we've found out that the polar bear mount plus attached flag-bearing murloc given to all BlizzCon attendees and DirecTV subscribers isn't actually going to be usable until after the convention ends. I've just confirmed this with a friend of mine at the con who's logged into the game from his hotel's wireless as well, so this answers a few questions we've gotten about where are on earth all the mounts are with so many people attending BlizzCon or how to get them working ingame.So if you're headed back to your home or hotel and you've been hoping to get your mount (or, like me, you've just been waiting to see it), hang tight for a few days. With BlizzCon ending late Saturday, hopefully we'll see them active in the following week.
Breakfast Topic: The last week of Brewfest
Yes, counting today, there are just five more chances for you to down Coren Direbrew during the Brewfest holiday, so if you haven't gotten lucky and gotten a mount yet, better keep trying. And if you haven't started collecting tickets coins, better get to it -- odds are that you're out of luck for getting the ~550 you need for everything, but you can probably still get at least 200 to join the Brew of the Month club.Don't know how to drop Coren or do a keg run? We've got you covered on both. Personally, I got everything I needed (picked up two epics from Coren and joined the BotM club) save for the mounts, but those are so rare (and finding a group as DPS is so tough on my server) that I'm probably not going to bother. Fortunately, I'm looking forward to that other popular holiday that is just around the corner...How you doing on Brewfest? Finished early or just now realizing that the holiday ends on Saturday? Downed Coren every single day with no mount to show for it, or went in there once and are now riding around on a kodo?
Ask a Beta Tester: More on mounts and other things
Welcome back to Ask a Beta Tester, where we answer your questions about the Wrath of the Lich King beta! Most of our answers are short and sweet today, and we'll get started with Molly's question...What's the word on passenger mounts? Will they be a whole new level of riding skill, or will you simply purchase them individually? How much do these things cost?They use the same riding skill as regular ground mounts, but they tend to be on the more expensive side. The Engineering-made Motorcycles will be up to the market to price, but Traveler's Tundra Mammoth costs 20,000g. So the cost of the mounts themselves is what's going to be harsh, not an added level of training. That last one carries three people, by the way.
"Leading the Cavalry" achievement lowered to 50 mounts
Looks like our little survey of mounts available for the Leading the Cavalry achievement found some ground at Blizzard -- they've lowered the number of necessary mounts from 75 to 50 in the latest beta build. Seventy-five mounts is a lot, and even though, yes, we didn't actually count any of the mounts coming in Wrath of the Lich King (surely there are plenty there), Tauren especially would have trouble coming up with that many things to ride around.And as you can see, the prize for having way more mounts than you'd ever need is... another mount. You can nab an Albino Netherdrake (a few commenters say it's just a drake, but that model looks like a netherdrake to me) for completing the achievement. We can say this: it'll definitely stand out in a crowd. But the green and the white together? The skin may change before launch, but maybe we don't actually need to bother getting those 50 mounts after all...
Ask a Beta Tester: Championing clarification, raiding, and more
Quite a few people wanted some clarification on the Championing system mentioned in previous editions of Ask a Beta Tester, so I'll try to do just that: The Championing system is not retroactive, and by that I mean old factions are not included in it. You can't use this to grind Orgrimmar or Honor Hold or whatever in level 80 dungeons. It only applies to Wrath reputations, and so far, not even all of those. It only counts towards the 'big four' of Northrend as far as I can see. Those reputations are: The Kirin Tor, The Argent Crusade, The Knights of the Ebon Blade, and the Wyrmrest Accord. You should be able to get really, really high reputation with the Valiance Expedition/Warsong Offensive just through questing, but I wouldn't be surprised if we saw a Tabard for them soon, too. The little people like the Kalu'ak are, so far, not included in this system.Read on for more answers to your questions!
Breakfast Topic: Steak on eggs
After posting two articles concerning mount-related issues yesterday (Engineering mounts in Wrath and the changes to the Brewfest ram/kodo), I went back to Blackrock Depths with a group to have another crack at everyone's newest best friend, Coren Direbrew. This time I was in the company of a half-crazed warlock determined to get both Brewfest mounts. He'd missed his chance at the ram last year and sworn up and down that it would never happen again, only to be aghast at Blizzard's decision to make both mounts a boss drop. To him, I imagine, it was time to knuckle down and show that ugly, yellow-bellied, boot-licking, random-number-generator just who was boss. However, as the day wore on, he realized that -- insulting the random number generator? Not a good idea.
Is Leading the Cavalry possible?
I mentioned the Leading the Cavalry achievement earlier, the achievement that requires 75 mounts to... well, achieve. The big question is, is that actually possible? Let's find out!Let's use a Forsaken for our example, since they have no factors working against them like racial boundries on mounts. Keep in mind that some races will have a harder time, like Tauren can't use two of the five Horde mounts, and Gnomes don't allow anybody but Gnomes and Dwarves to use mechachickens.The Horde has Peacocks, Raptors, Wolves, Skeletal Horses, and Kodo. From a glance at Wowhead, there seems to be...
Ask a Beta Tester: Spell power, phasing, and more
The image above has almost nothing to do with the content of today's Ask a Beta Tester, but I found it funny so you get to deal with it. We'll jump right into things with Turfing's question... I have a priest alt getting close to 70. Planning on doing healing come Wrath. With the conversion to spell power should I be picking up healing gear or damage gear right now? How is, for instance, Spell fire stacking up against Primal Mooncloth? Is spellfire actually able to heal better right now in the beta? How about damage?I strongly recommend hopping over to Wowhead's Wrath site and doing some research on how the numbers turn out. In most cases, DPS gear has better DPS stats (hit, crit) and Healing gear has better Healing stats. The spell power numbers are just much, much closer. In your particular example, the Primal Mooncloth Robe has more spell power than the Spellfire Robe, but it has mp5 and the Spellfire has crit. A DPS spec/class would rather have the crit.A few weeks ago I covered the effects of the spell power change in Hybrid Theory, with some raw numbers to look at. You can read that over if you'd like, but I mostly just suggest hitting up wotlk.wowhead.com for specific items.For more answers to your questions, read on!
Breakfast Topic: Will you Recruit-a-Friend?
Ever since Blizzard introduced the new perks to the Recruit-a-Friend system, I've had it in mind that I might want that Zhevra mount for my collection. Now that Blizzard has unveiled their Swift Zhevra screenshot gallery, it's coming back into mind. Unfortunately, I've actually "recruited" four people since I began playing, all of whom I conveniently forgot to send the proper link to, so I have never received any benefits at all. It also means that I have no one left to sweet talk into helping me get a Zhevra. Are you planning to convince a friend to join the ranks of either the Horde or the Alliance, to the tune of some free playtime, a Zhevra mount, the ability to summon their character to you, and pick up triple experience for both monsters and quests, up to level 60? In addition, what do you think of the Zhevra mount? Do you adore it, or do you think it is silly, or out of place, lorewise? If you do recruit someone, will it have anything to do with the mount?%Gallery-18308%
Riding Crops and similar items to be removed
The Riding Crop and similar items have been in limbo since the beginning of Wrath's beta (maybe even the alpha). Originally, those items were turned into enchantments that are applied to a single mount so you didn't need to worry about them in your trinket slot anymore. Then mounts became abilities that you learn rather than items that sit in your bags, to free up bag space. This broke the new implementation of the Riding Crops, and Blizzard has been trying to decide what to do with them since then.They've decided. Riding Crops, Carrots on a Stick, Skybreaker Whip, all of that jazz? Gone. Done. No more. They're being removed entirely. (Edit: Okay, they're gone after level 70. So they're mostly gone. Riding Crop has a level 69 requirement, you get to use it for about 2 levels.) I hope you had fun farming up those Primal Mights to make Crops for all of your alts. I also hope you didn't want to keep them, because you're out of luck!Spells/abilities like Crusader Aura and On a Pale Horse will still work, but items will not do anything. Ghostcrawler says they have plans for new implementations of improving mounted speed, and my money is on sucking another 1,000g out of you for a flat 10% speed increase. After all, that's about what it costs to fly in chilly climates, apparently.
Riding Crop in flux
The Riding Crop. If you're level 70 (and not a druid) you probably have one, and if not, why not? Jeez, just buy it from your friendly neighborhood leatherworker already; they have few enough ways to make money without you cheaping out. However, everyone's favorite mount-speed-increasing item is going to be changing a little bit in LK. Blizzard realized that it's "no fun" to be swapping your trinket around all the time, even with addons, and that it's relatively common to be stuck in combat with the Crop equipped when you really want to have your Bladefist's Breadth or whatever. So they wanted to get the Crop out of your trinket slots. There was a brief period of time, reflected in some spells mined from the data files, when the Crop was going to be an item that would be right-clicked to enchant your mount with extra speed. This led to many people complaining that they would now have to buy one Crop per mount. Anyway, now that mounts are going to be learned instead of kept in the inventory, this doesn't work anymore, apparently. So Blizz is still undecided on what precisely to do with it. It does seem certain that it won't stick around in its current trinket form, and virtually certain that it won't disappear entirely, but everything else is up in the air. What do you think they should do?
WotLK mount "The Hog" confirmed
If you're a World of Warcraft player and you're born to be wild (I mean seriously, who isn't), you may be excited about the latest mount confirmation coming in Wrath of the Lich King. "The Hog" is a new mount that is currently in the Wrath beta, and is said to launch when the expansion goes retail later this year.Of course with most Wrath gear and mounts, there are stipulations on level and availability. From what we know right now, The Hog is not a temporary quest item, it is used just like any other mount. It can also only be used in Northrend and Outland. Previous rumors slated this mount for Engineers only, but it is said to have no Engineer restriction, so anyone can use it. Grab your fellow one-percenters and riiiiiide! One of Azeroth's millions of citizens? Check out our ongoing coverage of the World of Warcraft, and be sure to touch base with our sister site WoW Insider for all your Lich King needs!
Draenei on a tiger at level 30
I still really haven't wrapped my head around the fact that we can get mounts at level 30 yet -- for so long, it's just been a fact that you don't get to ride anything around until level 40 that I'm still surprised when I see someone under that riding around. But it's true, of course, and Truffled over on WoW LJ took full advantage of that fact, in addition to the recent changes to reputation at lower levels -- she ran her Draenei through both the Azuremyst and Teldrassil starting areas, and was able be riding around a Night Elf mount right at level 30, bought for the Exalted price.Very impressive. She says she hit Exalted only two quests after 30, and that she basically just did every single quest there was to find, save for the Raene's Cleaning end quest (so she could keep the rod). She doesn't mention /played time (all of the traveling probably added a little bit of extra leveling time in there), but however long it took, it was worth it, as she's one of the lowest non-faction Exalted characters we've seen. Nice job.
Mounts now welcome in Booty Bay
Tcher on WoW LJ comes through with an interesting change in the Wrath beta: mounts are now usable throughout Booty Bay. Personally, I've never had a problem navigating around there without a mount, but apparently it's a welcome change -- you'll be able to go all around one of the coolest cities in Azeroth without dismounting.Even more interesting than the change itself, though, is the thinking behind it -- apparently Blizzard is still tweaking where mounts can and can't go. And though it's a small complaint, this has always been an area that's been a little confusing -- why were mounts fine to use in Ironforge but not in Booty Bay? Why weren't ships ever considered "outdoors," but the crates on them are?At any rate, if Booty Bay stays changed through the updates on the live realms for 3.0, it'll be clear Blizzard is still tangling with their strange definition of "outdoors," and the rules on where mounts can and can't go, even in old Azeroth.
Wrath's Fetch Ball lets you play with your pets
This is hardly going to be one of the most amazing items in Wrath to those who clamor for epics and full dungeon sets, but for those of us who like the flavor that those cute little noncombat pets add, the Fetch Ball is a dream come true. The first thing you can see in this beta video is the pet and mount interface (which not only will let you choose pets or mounts, but also see a preview of each before you summon them), and the second thing you can see is, well, let's just say that Blizzard finally gave the noncombat pets something to do. And it's easy to get -- you can pick it up, along with a few other pet-related objects, from the NPC vendor named after the founder of the Warcraft Pets site.Incredibly cute, and we're so glad to finally see some life from the little guys who've been following us around all this time. And who knows what else this will open the door to -- today, the noncombat pets can fetch, tomorrow they can pick up our loot, play dead or even go to a minigame battle? Maybe the whole "noncombat" term isn't quite their style anymore.[via WoW Ladies LJ]
New mounts discovered in Wrath Beta
MMO Champion has dug up more amazing stuff from the Wrath of the Lich King Beta in the form of new mounts! A full gallery of the mount models are up on their site, and they look very interesting. If you don't manage to get your own Amani War Bear before the expansion hits the shelves, it looks like you'll get another shot at an ursine transport in Northrend. Model previews show several versions of a polar bear mount, from what look like ordinary bears (60% speed increase) to armored bears (100% speed increase) to... double passenger armored bears! Don't ask about the goggles, though.Are passenger-ready mounts usable anywhere? Or will they be zone-exclusive, similar to the bug mounts in Ahn'Qiraj? There's no way to tell just yet, but MMO Champion also has pictures of a three-passenger Alliance Wooly Mammoth. This means a Horde version is available, too, and likely to be part of a PvP scenario where the two factions have different mount skins. Speaking of PvP scenarios, there are also pictures of new siege vehicles as well as the previously seen Skeletal Gryphon Mount and an odd Blizzcon-tagged bear.
Wrath storage solutions
By now you have surely heard of the new Achievements system set up for Wrath of the Lich King. While this will finally give collectors an extra incentive and reward, players are a bit worried about their bag space. It was announced recently that non-combat pets and mounts would take up no bag space in Wrath, and instead, the item that currently houses the pet will serve to teach you a spell for summoning the pet, and then disappear. While this is a huge weight off of the shoulders of many players, when reading through the current list of Achievements, one begins to wonder where all of their tabards, battleground tokens, badges, holiday items, epics, trinkets, and the like are going to go. Although we don't have information regarding the storage of every item we'll soon be collecting, Tigole made the following statement:Your bags will be ok. I promise. Pets, Mounts, Heroic Badges, BG Tokens are all getting storage space.I wonder how badges and tokens are getting storage space. Surely, they cannot be turned into spells, and I don't have room for bags specifically dedicated to only one or the other, so I'm definitely interested to know what they have up their sleeves, and if any other collectible items will get similar treatment.
Mounts and small pets will take no bag space in Wrath
var digg_url = 'http://digg.com/pc_games/Mounts_and_pets_out_of_inventory_in_Wrath'; Many players love to collect vanity pets and mounts, and in Wrath there will even be Achievements for collecting certain numbers of them. Which raises the problem of bank space – after all, we only have so many slots, and we're already using a lot of them for extra reagents, crafting items, consumables, resist sets, and so forth. So how are we supposed to find the space to store 75 vanity pets? Fortunately, Blizzard has come up with a solution. Come Wrath, mounts and vanity pets will be learned as spells, CM Wryxian has just announced. The items that currently summon pets/mounts, like Sprite Darter Egg or Ashes of Al'ar, will serve to teach us the spells, at which point the item will disappear from your inventory and the spells will be found in your spellbook for all time (bindable to hotkeys like any other spell if you want). This should make collectors very happy: collect all you can now, and they won't take any space whatsoever once you learn them. Be sure to check out WarcraftPets for help on how to find them (that site's creator was recently honored with an in-game NPC). And everyone will gain at least two more inventory slots that are currently devoted to their ground and flying mounts (except people whose mounts are already summonable, i.e. paladins, warlocks, and druids). Excellent move, Blizz; this is even better than the vanity pet bags people have been asking for.
