Welcome to the seventh blog post in the “Warcraft Community’s Top Things To Do Before WoD” series!
This is one of the most fun of the blog posts we’ll be doing. Mainly because I love mini-games… but every adult has an inner child I think ^^
Pet Battles
I KNOW everyone has their own opinions of these beauties, but I’m going to put them in because I love them. And lots of people suggested them. But primarily because I love them. Not gonna lie.
If you’re truly bored and you’ve never tried pet battles, this is the place for you. It’s not like Pokémon, I promise. Ok, a tiny bit, but it’s worth it. There are lots of achievements up for grabs, from PvE to PvP, collecting, battling and completing goals. If that isn’t tempting, how about all the cute pets you can have? Or how about completing the Celestial Tournament? I’ve recently completed this and I have to say, although it’s really frustrating, the adrenaline when you finally complete it is a-may-zing.
There are many many people who write about pet battles and I couldn’t possibly mention them all. However, I will link a couple of guides to get you started:
- WoWhead. This is a pretty conclusive guide to the whole tournament, including the set-ups for all teams and alternative pets. It doesn’t always use store bought pets either which is good. The comments are also really helpful from other players and their experiences. I recently found a comment buried deep down and it worked perfectly after over an hour of trying different combinations of pets.
- WoWWiki has a clear description of strengths/weaknesses near the bottom of the page.
- Liopleurodon. I love her and her blog. Very helpful, very approachable. Highly recommended (even if I don’t really understand the technical talk!). Lots of in-depth strategies and guides here.
- Matt (aka Heallarious) is a pretty cool guy and has helped me a lot with pet battles. He’s also a contributor to this project so if you’re looking for a basic, workable guide, this is for you.
- Warcraft Pets. Some good information here on pets and where to obtain them.
Singing Sunflower
This is a fun little mini-game called Peacebloom vs Ghouls based up in Hillsbrad which is similar to the Plants vs Zombies game. You work your way through the levels and if you’re successful you get a very cute little battle pet, the Singing Sunflower. I actually found it quite tricky to get the hang of, and it took about an hour to obtain my little pet. Worth doing, for sure… and really fun too!
Hearthstone
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’ll know that Hearthstone is the new card game from Blizzard. It definitely deserves a mention here, although it isn’t technically World of Warcraft, it is based upon the game.
Neither of us are Hearthstone impresarios – we have done enough to get the shiny Hearthsteed mount, but that’s all. Here are a few tips we can give you. Google will probably be just as helpful :p
- Remember, it’s just a game. Definitely not worth throwing your pc out the window for
- RNG sucks
- The more you play, the better you get. Even if you loose every game like us.
- Watch other people play (via Twitch etc) as this does help your understanding
- For the mount, you must win 3 games. All we did was go full offensive: used a beginner shaman deck; used as many minions as possible in the deck, put as many minions/totems down as possible to overwhelm the other player, then full nuke. It wasn’t pretty, but it worked like a charm.
This isn’t technically a mini-game I suppose, but I always enjoy them, so I couldn’t miss it out. Part way through the quest line, you’re lead underground to explore the area and have to complete the games above. If you haven’t quested in Badlands, I recommend passing through to complete this quest chain as they’re really fun.
The Skyrace
It’s amazing, but I’ve written about it before for the project so I won’t repeat myself… click here to read.
This is again related to the Order of the Cloud Serpent’s rep grind. When the daily called “Catch!” is up, speak to the quest giver to be given a ball to play catch with your little serpentling. Catch it 25 times for the achievement.
It’s a pretty simple game, truth be told, but can be tricky because of the mobs and scenery in the vicinity. It appears the quest is still bugged however, so your tries are cumulative – if you drop it, start again and it should count towards the 25. Whether they will fix this remains to be seen. Anyway, it’s a fun achievement!
Ugh I can’t believe I’m putting this here, as I’m not a fan, however if you like a mindless grind with lots of reward, this is for you. The whole thing awards plenty of mounts and it’s not hard. The mini-game itself is a jousting tournament between yourself and Champions of other factions. It’s pretty fun the first few times. 4 months later, perhaps not so much. Needless-to-say, only one suggestion by @Ngakma for the Tournament, BUT if you want pretty mounts and pets I encourage you to go play being a Knight.
There are probably many more, please feel free to add them in the comments below. Definitely give them a go if you haven’t already!
Contributors_____________________________________________________________________________________
- @Eolien_WoW
- Matt @Heallarious
- Velgana – click for post
- Tome of the Ancient – click for post
Mr and Mrs WoW 