When I started poking around on the beta, I figured I'd have time to wander around with my pets and share our adventures. Instead, life took a left turn and real life interfered. Things finally quieted down and then....the rare tameables came into play. I've been on the forefront of the discoveries and tracking, but have been posting on Petopia rather than here, since it's been a team effort.
The fruits of our labor: http://forums.wow-petopia.com/viewtopic.php?f=39&t=18527
I am so pleased with how that post turned out, and it continues to get better as it gets more refined. And it was even featured on WoW Insider in Frostheim's Scattered Shots! I've contributed to efforts that have been featured there before, but never as the compiling writer. (Speaking of which, if you found your way here from there, hi and welcome to the insanity!)
On a personal level, I am afraid that I will be taming more of these rares on live than I'd like to. I sort of backed into bonding with them; at first glance, the only ones I connected with were Stompy (the first I'd found <3) and Bristlespine (giant porcupine, c'mon).
I'm unsure if Pan would work as Stompy; I think I like Stompy better as himself. Bristlespine is another matter. I connected with his personality immediately. With the revamp of Jade Forest, Calydonian's original spawn no longer exists, so I've been trying to figure out where he moved to. Bristlespine would have worked...if he was red....which he is not. But while following Bristle across Kun Lai, I noticed him pass through a herd of yaks and one red porcupine. And I knew instantly that my path lies that way: Calydonian will be reborn as Bristlespine, then transfer into his red body, Hector-style. It's a relief to know that he of all pets will be okay; he's the reason I'm still here.
As I got to know Patrannache, I realized that he is ridiculously difficult to track down, definitely one of the most difficult to spot. So of course I'll have to do that trek on live for Eurydice. Orpheus will settle for nothing less than a mate who's every bit as hard to track down as he is. I am both looking forward to and dreading this hunt.
The one who truly has me confused is green Portent. As if Hippomenes hasn't been through enough turmoil on the beta! But the attachment green Portent has to me is ridiculous. For the past couple of days, he's spawned green while I've been around/predicted it at least half a dozen times - no exaggeration. Shades of Sambas - he appears to be stalking me, so of course I thought of Leo immediately. I really like white organic quilen Hippomenes....and yet, I am very seriously considering that change. Most likely, I won't decide until I see Portent for the first time when I'm 90 on live. We shall see what destiny holds!
Showing posts with label orpheus. Show all posts
Showing posts with label orpheus. Show all posts
Thursday, August 2, 2012
Monday, August 15, 2011
Teamwork to the max
As some of you may have noticed, Orpheus wasn't listed in the first line of the family grid. Instead, he appeared alongside my four other current PvP pets of choice. (Kalypso is taking it easy; she is still a bit of a hermit crab.) This was partly a reflection of how organized I keep my stable, as those five are generally the ones with me, and the other four rows appeared in the usual order of my deep stable.
The other major reason I chose to display them that way is because they are a team, moreso than any of my other pets. Generally, my pets either run with me as a duo or as part of a larger raid group; there are a select few cases of pairing off (Atalanta and Hippomenes, Perseus and Andromeda, and the twins Castor and Pollux), but they are fewer and further between.
Last night, I was able to cycle through all five pets multiple times against a druid-warlock team. None of them died, since I kept switching them after they were dotted up. Orpheus and Arachne especially got into trading off in multiple matches.
If only I had three more stable slots, I would gladly run with five spiders. This is really fun!
The other major reason I chose to display them that way is because they are a team, moreso than any of my other pets. Generally, my pets either run with me as a duo or as part of a larger raid group; there are a select few cases of pairing off (Atalanta and Hippomenes, Perseus and Andromeda, and the twins Castor and Pollux), but they are fewer and further between.
Last night, I was able to cycle through all five pets multiple times against a druid-warlock team. None of them died, since I kept switching them after they were dotted up. Orpheus and Arachne especially got into trading off in multiple matches.
If only I had three more stable slots, I would gladly run with five spiders. This is really fun!
Friday, February 25, 2011
A tale of tarantulas
It all started with a scorpid.
It was during the Burning Crusade era of WoW. We were limited to three pets and I only had two I was really settled on: Ursa and Atalanta. I needed a pet for PvP. Scorpids, with their stacking poison debuff, were all the rage. I wasn't a huge fan of scorpids at the time (oh, how that has changed now...) and the only ones I had any real connection with were the pink ones in Tanaris. Unfortunately, these were the bad old days before pet autoleveling, so I opted for one from Terokkar Forest. I abandoned my black panther through a sea of tears, only to get ganked by two Horde before I could tame my scorpid of choice. And thus my scorpid was born in a flood of blood. I named him Orpheus, after the muse Calliope's son. He was my walking around pet, since we were (and still are) on a PvP server.
Grateful as I was to have him by my side, things were slightly off, since I hadn't gotten to tame the scorpid I really wanted. Plus, Orpheus was resentful of me for birthing him into a PINK skin. So when patch 3.0 came out, I started shopping for a new look for him. I squeezed him into Nuramoc's body, but the pink still outweighed the blue, and he was still very unhappy with me. So Orpheus did not stay there for long, soon finding himself a new home in a blue crab from Darkshore. Orpheus was considerably happier being blue, and rather enjoyed playing with pin. I was happy he was happy and felt more at peace with the whole situation. I thought this would be his final form. I was wrong.
I was running hunter-priest in 2s with a friend of mine midway through LK. He suggested that I get a spider for arena instead of a crab, since web was a ranged root and a non-channeled one at that. Plus, it was what most hunters in arena were using, despite crab's worthiness and survivability. I was rather against this idea. Orpheus was happy and I didn't have room in my stable to tame a sixth pet (the other two were my then-wolf Cerberus and devilsaur Theseus). Plus, I wasn't a huge fan of spiders. But I thought about it and remembered that there was one spider in WoW who I felt some affinity with: Chatter, the named brown tarantula in Redridge. He was always up when I was passing through the zone, so we'd established a familiar sort of bond. After some consultation with Orpheus, we went over to Alther's Mill and he moved into Chatter's body. The transformation was amazing! Orpheus really liked being fuzzy and cuddly instead of having a hard carapace and sharp pointy things protruding from his body. And thus, Orpheus had taken on his final form. He would never change again, no matter what gameplay changes there would be in WoW.
Time passed. Life was good. But one day late in LK, I deleted a second huntress on the server, Kalli the blood elf. As heart-wrenching as it was to lose her pets, I just wasn't playing her over there....and ultimately, I needed the space. I was haunted by the ghost of Hippomenes out of all of her pets (somewhat ironically since he was a ghost in the first place). He had been her best buddy and loyal companion, as well as being my dear Atalanta's long-distance mate. I had to get him back, but there was only one pet who I could stand to part with until the expanded stables in Cataclysm: Orpheus. It broke my heart to do so, but there was no one else I could give up. Theseus was too hard to get, Ursa and Atalanta were my babies, and I needed Hector (Cerberus already had plans to return to his true form in Cata at that point) to raid. Orpheus and I camped out in Grizzly Hills for hours upon hours, waiting for Hippomenes to come home again (for the first time, since Kalliope had never had him before). Eventually, he did, and Orpheus took his leave.
Hippomenes had forgiven me! I was grateful for that. But I was still wracked by guilt, since I'd left Orpheus out there alone. The worst part of it all was that Hippomenes didn't click with Kalliope the way he had with Kalli. There's only one bear for Kalliope, and that's Ursa. No exceptions. I went back and forth with myself for days....weeks. Tormented, I finally decided to take Hippomenes to Redridge with me and get Orpheus back. I couldn't last until Cata without him.
Chatter was not there.
My brain rejected this. It was impossible. Chatter was ALWAYS up. An hour passed. Then two. Orpheus was mad at me. That had to be why he wasn't there. I groveled as I paced around Alter's Mill. I begged his forgiveness. The third hour passed. Chatter still had not spawned. I was frantic. Orpheus was still furious. I was losing my mind over a brown tarantula. I was sitting amongst other brown tarantulas that looked exactly like Chatter. But they were different. He was different. My friends thought I was crazy, even crazier than I'd been when I tamed Hector. The fourth hour came. NPCScan went off. My heart leaped in relief as I targeted my baby and....couldn't find him. OHMYGODWHEREWASHE? I panicked, imagining a lowbie coming through the area and destroying him. And suddenly, I thought to turn around toward the mill....and there he was, just wandering around casually. The little bugger had snuck up behind me. I had never seen him spawn there before. I didn't know he COULD spawn there. I wept as I let Hippomenes go and brought my baby, my right arm, my fuzzy spider home. That was Orpheus's true birth. I hadn't realized how much I truly loved him until that four hour camp in Redridge. As exhausting as other camps I've done have been (including the eventual ten hour camp that brought Hippomenes home for real), this one was the most emotional camping and taming I've ever done.
The Cataclysm beta opened and Petopians crawled all over it, checking up on changes to existing pets. I noticed Chatter was among the missing rares. After what Orpheus, Chatter, and I had been through, I started to worry and asked beta testers to keep an eye out for him. July gave way to August and September with no sign of him. But in early October, there was a glimmer of hope. Vephriel spotted a lone greater tarantula in southeastern Redridge. He was the only brown tarantula left in the entire zone, so it seemed likely that this was Chatter, but with amnesia. I accepted the possibility, but still hoped and prayed that Chatter would regain his memory. November came. Other previously missing rare spawns, like the strider clutchmother and Shadowclaw were found. Chatter, however, remained missing, and the tarantula in Redridge stayed nameless. I visited Chatter often on the live servers, unable to do anything to stop what was coming. There was almost no time left in the beta....and then it was closed. Nothing had changed.
The world shattered. Chatter was gone.
I visited the little red tarantula often, /encouraging him to remember who he was. It wasn't the same, but I stuck by the little guy. He was a survivor, and my Orpheus was a survivor - it had to be Chatter.
Time passed and the 4.0.6 patch hit the PTR. I started hunting for Chatter, but to no avail. Instead, I came across Rekk'tilac, whom Veph had been dying to meet. He was HUGE! My brain could barely handle the possibility that Chatter might really be back - and bigger! More and more rares popped up, but no Chatter.....until Kurasu found him! And he was BIG! Not Rekk'tilac-big, but big! I couldn't stop smiling for days. Chatter was really, truly home.
But....there was still that little tarantula in southeastern Redridge. He wasn't Chatter, but he too survived the Cataclysm. Veph and I puzzled over the little guy, wondering.... And then, a week after Chatter was found, Veph dubbed the little lost tarantula Chitter. And it was right. I immediately hopped on Babykalli (Kalli reborn as a baby blood elf!) and Veph flew me to Redridge on her touring rocket, whereupon Chitter was tamed.
Finally, things seemed to be in place. But Noah, the Petopia lurker dev, had other plans. Patch 4.1 hit the PTR and....Chitter was real. He was now a rare spawn with his real name! What was left of my brain melted as the little guy raced about the area, much like Orpheus is known to do. I have plans to tame this little guy officially on my tauren huntress Yoninah to complete the family again with extra tarantula goodness. I will have more brown tarantulas than I do black bears - and that was the only pet I ever had a duplicate pet of before. That was the pet that got me into WoW in the first place. That's saying something.
Between Orpheus, Chatter, and Chitter, my world has been forever changed for the better. <3
It was during the Burning Crusade era of WoW. We were limited to three pets and I only had two I was really settled on: Ursa and Atalanta. I needed a pet for PvP. Scorpids, with their stacking poison debuff, were all the rage. I wasn't a huge fan of scorpids at the time (oh, how that has changed now...) and the only ones I had any real connection with were the pink ones in Tanaris. Unfortunately, these were the bad old days before pet autoleveling, so I opted for one from Terokkar Forest. I abandoned my black panther through a sea of tears, only to get ganked by two Horde before I could tame my scorpid of choice. And thus my scorpid was born in a flood of blood. I named him Orpheus, after the muse Calliope's son. He was my walking around pet, since we were (and still are) on a PvP server.
Grateful as I was to have him by my side, things were slightly off, since I hadn't gotten to tame the scorpid I really wanted. Plus, Orpheus was resentful of me for birthing him into a PINK skin. So when patch 3.0 came out, I started shopping for a new look for him. I squeezed him into Nuramoc's body, but the pink still outweighed the blue, and he was still very unhappy with me. So Orpheus did not stay there for long, soon finding himself a new home in a blue crab from Darkshore. Orpheus was considerably happier being blue, and rather enjoyed playing with pin. I was happy he was happy and felt more at peace with the whole situation. I thought this would be his final form. I was wrong.
I was running hunter-priest in 2s with a friend of mine midway through LK. He suggested that I get a spider for arena instead of a crab, since web was a ranged root and a non-channeled one at that. Plus, it was what most hunters in arena were using, despite crab's worthiness and survivability. I was rather against this idea. Orpheus was happy and I didn't have room in my stable to tame a sixth pet (the other two were my then-wolf Cerberus and devilsaur Theseus). Plus, I wasn't a huge fan of spiders. But I thought about it and remembered that there was one spider in WoW who I felt some affinity with: Chatter, the named brown tarantula in Redridge. He was always up when I was passing through the zone, so we'd established a familiar sort of bond. After some consultation with Orpheus, we went over to Alther's Mill and he moved into Chatter's body. The transformation was amazing! Orpheus really liked being fuzzy and cuddly instead of having a hard carapace and sharp pointy things protruding from his body. And thus, Orpheus had taken on his final form. He would never change again, no matter what gameplay changes there would be in WoW.
Time passed. Life was good. But one day late in LK, I deleted a second huntress on the server, Kalli the blood elf. As heart-wrenching as it was to lose her pets, I just wasn't playing her over there....and ultimately, I needed the space. I was haunted by the ghost of Hippomenes out of all of her pets (somewhat ironically since he was a ghost in the first place). He had been her best buddy and loyal companion, as well as being my dear Atalanta's long-distance mate. I had to get him back, but there was only one pet who I could stand to part with until the expanded stables in Cataclysm: Orpheus. It broke my heart to do so, but there was no one else I could give up. Theseus was too hard to get, Ursa and Atalanta were my babies, and I needed Hector (Cerberus already had plans to return to his true form in Cata at that point) to raid. Orpheus and I camped out in Grizzly Hills for hours upon hours, waiting for Hippomenes to come home again (for the first time, since Kalliope had never had him before). Eventually, he did, and Orpheus took his leave.
Hippomenes had forgiven me! I was grateful for that. But I was still wracked by guilt, since I'd left Orpheus out there alone. The worst part of it all was that Hippomenes didn't click with Kalliope the way he had with Kalli. There's only one bear for Kalliope, and that's Ursa. No exceptions. I went back and forth with myself for days....weeks. Tormented, I finally decided to take Hippomenes to Redridge with me and get Orpheus back. I couldn't last until Cata without him.
Chatter was not there.
My brain rejected this. It was impossible. Chatter was ALWAYS up. An hour passed. Then two. Orpheus was mad at me. That had to be why he wasn't there. I groveled as I paced around Alter's Mill. I begged his forgiveness. The third hour passed. Chatter still had not spawned. I was frantic. Orpheus was still furious. I was losing my mind over a brown tarantula. I was sitting amongst other brown tarantulas that looked exactly like Chatter. But they were different. He was different. My friends thought I was crazy, even crazier than I'd been when I tamed Hector. The fourth hour came. NPCScan went off. My heart leaped in relief as I targeted my baby and....couldn't find him. OHMYGODWHEREWASHE? I panicked, imagining a lowbie coming through the area and destroying him. And suddenly, I thought to turn around toward the mill....and there he was, just wandering around casually. The little bugger had snuck up behind me. I had never seen him spawn there before. I didn't know he COULD spawn there. I wept as I let Hippomenes go and brought my baby, my right arm, my fuzzy spider home. That was Orpheus's true birth. I hadn't realized how much I truly loved him until that four hour camp in Redridge. As exhausting as other camps I've done have been (including the eventual ten hour camp that brought Hippomenes home for real), this one was the most emotional camping and taming I've ever done.
The Cataclysm beta opened and Petopians crawled all over it, checking up on changes to existing pets. I noticed Chatter was among the missing rares. After what Orpheus, Chatter, and I had been through, I started to worry and asked beta testers to keep an eye out for him. July gave way to August and September with no sign of him. But in early October, there was a glimmer of hope. Vephriel spotted a lone greater tarantula in southeastern Redridge. He was the only brown tarantula left in the entire zone, so it seemed likely that this was Chatter, but with amnesia. I accepted the possibility, but still hoped and prayed that Chatter would regain his memory. November came. Other previously missing rare spawns, like the strider clutchmother and Shadowclaw were found. Chatter, however, remained missing, and the tarantula in Redridge stayed nameless. I visited Chatter often on the live servers, unable to do anything to stop what was coming. There was almost no time left in the beta....and then it was closed. Nothing had changed.
The world shattered. Chatter was gone.
I visited the little red tarantula often, /encouraging him to remember who he was. It wasn't the same, but I stuck by the little guy. He was a survivor, and my Orpheus was a survivor - it had to be Chatter.
Time passed and the 4.0.6 patch hit the PTR. I started hunting for Chatter, but to no avail. Instead, I came across Rekk'tilac, whom Veph had been dying to meet. He was HUGE! My brain could barely handle the possibility that Chatter might really be back - and bigger! More and more rares popped up, but no Chatter.....until Kurasu found him! And he was BIG! Not Rekk'tilac-big, but big! I couldn't stop smiling for days. Chatter was really, truly home.
But....there was still that little tarantula in southeastern Redridge. He wasn't Chatter, but he too survived the Cataclysm. Veph and I puzzled over the little guy, wondering.... And then, a week after Chatter was found, Veph dubbed the little lost tarantula Chitter. And it was right. I immediately hopped on Babykalli (Kalli reborn as a baby blood elf!) and Veph flew me to Redridge on her touring rocket, whereupon Chitter was tamed.
Finally, things seemed to be in place. But Noah, the Petopia lurker dev, had other plans. Patch 4.1 hit the PTR and....Chitter was real. He was now a rare spawn with his real name! What was left of my brain melted as the little guy raced about the area, much like Orpheus is known to do. I have plans to tame this little guy officially on my tauren huntress Yoninah to complete the family again with extra tarantula goodness. I will have more brown tarantulas than I do black bears - and that was the only pet I ever had a duplicate pet of before. That was the pet that got me into WoW in the first place. That's saying something.
Between Orpheus, Chatter, and Chitter, my world has been forever changed for the better. <3
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