So after a long break due to other commitments, I’ve decided to try and do a guide for the raiding with leashes pets. As always, the post is up at: http://www.theheratik.net/pets/. Good hunting!
Celestial Tournament Posts
Switching Sites
Hello All!
I know I’ve been rather silent the last few (hundred) days. Mainly I’ve been busy with work, but I’ve also tapered back on my WoW time quite a bit in favor of different games. So it goes at the end of any expansion.
However, I’ve also been a bit frustrated with the blog itself as there are a number of things I’d like to do are difficult or impossible with a WordPress site (as cool as it is at just blogging). So I’ve switched domains and am messing about in a full-fledged web framework.
My new URL for the pet blog is: http://www.theheratik.net/pets/. I’ve moved all of my posts and am using a much simpler looking site with much nicer CSS. It’s all moved in and even has an RSS feed for those that like that.
I’m hoping to have some new content up there in the next week or so, and I’ll likely cross-post a little bit on my WP blog until I feel like we’ve all settled in.
Thanks for your patience!
Nik the Heratik
New Patch Blues
Hello! I hope you all have had fun with the new patch. I’ve been too busy with RL stuff to write anything up, but I had a lot of fun with the Celestial Tournament, even when it’s had a few frustrating moments.
I also discovered from the dailies that my guide for probably 4 of the fights will need to be updated, some majorly and none of the changes were nerfs to the fights. On balance, this is a good thing as it means Blizzard is continuing to try to keep pet battling as engaging as possible.
Just makes me wish I had more time to enjoy it…
Update Time
Raiding With Leashes II
My lowly banker succeeds where my big bad DK could not. So it goes…
I finally picked up my Tito, but I had to do it the expensive way and purchased a Coilfang Stalker and Lesser Voidcaller (aka the screaming shadow meanie) for 7k and 3k. I just haven’t had the time or inclination to run those two raids every week. I enjoyed the achievement quite a bit. Karazhan was especially fun since I had 5 toons that could clear it. SSC turned into a chore after the first week, though I sort of liked running TK. It was fun to figure out how to take out the different bosses on my toons, even though only my (blood) DK could clear the last bosses in either SSC or TK.
Screaming Shadow Meanie!
Lashtail Hatchling
Rescue me!
So I haven’t blogged this before, but I had attempted getting this baby about 8 months ago, first on my Frost Mage, and then on my Blood DK. I didn’t have the gear + mad skillz to solo the guy before the nerf. But thanks to a tip from Tamer Liopleurodon, I found out that they made it so the boss is soloable. In fact, for many it’s probably easier to solo than to duo, as the insta-death mechanic is still around for more than one player.
Cutest quest text eva? You bet!
I went and cleared it in about 15 mins on my DK as I still knew all the tricks (protip: having an invisibility belt helps). Then I tried it on my poor frost mage and he failed miserably. I had to tangle with two of the mini-bosses before getting to the last guy, and neither of them had even looked at my Blood DK. Of course, being a clothy makes it all extra annoying.
And then I found out that popping mirror image actually turns the insta-death mechanic back on. And my poor clothy is too undergeared (and underplayed) to solo the guy without the images. Still I got my pet, even if it was on the DK, and that’s the important thing!
Yes dearie, I am your mummy!
Battle Notebook
I did my 10 wins this past week, and I tracked the fights again, but haven’t done a writeup for it yet. I may or may not get to it before the weekend. Those posts take much longer than you’d think if you want to do it right.
I’ve got another 10 or so pets to level 25. Including some I should have leveled awhile ago (like the Phoenix). I played with them some, but I’ve been playing with other games lately (sacrilege, I know) and haven’t done as much dailies or PvE battling. I always come back for more however, especially since the new patch looks to have alot of cool stuff!
Anyone for Raiding With Leashes III ??
Pet Battle Notebook #2: I’m back!
So I’ve moved house and it took probably 2.5 weeks to get decent Internet. That kind of makes it hard to blog about pets. Especially since I didn’t really get to do any pet battling that whole time.
But I’m back! And I’ve got better hardware and faster net so it’s extra fun. The most amazing thing so far is that now that I’m playing with the effects on, I get to hear all the cute—and sometimes pitiable—noises the pets make while battling. Kind of makes me feel bad when I beat up some of them now, but it’s still fun!
Warning: this is alot of repetitive stuff. If I do this again, I’ll likely summarize it quite a bit. But this should give some idea of how things went and what kinds of teams I faced those two evenings.
Session #1
I decided to try a few different teams from the post in #1 and see how I liked them. I also kept records over the two sessions I got to play before the move. Unfortunately, I lost the records for one of those sessions. So it goes… but I still remember enough to at least give you an update on the second session.
The Team:
Gilded Moth with Slicing Wind, Cocoon, and Moth Dust.
Feline Familiar with Pounce, Call Darkness, and Prowl.
Spectral Porcupette with Powerball, Spectral Spine, Spectral Strike.
This team was very similar to one of the suggestions I mentioned last time (Blind Team 2). Though I really didn’t get the hang of it.
The first three teams it faced were:
Direhorn, 
Clockwork Rocket Bot, 
Restless Shadeling (Win).
Fiendish Imp (which beat me bad), 
Menagerie Custodian, Restless Shadeling (Loss).
Kun-Lai Runt, 
Lil’ Ragnaros (also hurt), 
Lil’ XT (Loss).
The main issue with these is that I had nothing that matched up well and they all did enough damage that my Blind didn’t seem to matter.
I decided to swap out the Moth for:
Soul of the Aspects with Claw, Deflect, and Surge of Light.
One of the great things about this pet, is its ability Surge of Light. That ability does double damage during the weather effect Darkness, which isn’t caused by the Blind debuff itself, so Elementals do not avoid it.
Then I faced:
It was a very close match mainly because of how hard it is to kill those Emperor Crabs. After seeing more KLRs, I decided to swap my Spectral Porcupette for:
Ghostly Skull with Slash, Spectral Strike, and Unholy Ascension.
Unfortunately, the next team I faced was:
This team swapped continually and eventually had three pets at 20% health when I lost. It was very frustrating and made me wish I had a way to stop the swaps.
I decided to swap the Skull for
Festival Lantern with Burn, Flash, and Light.
This was one of my go-to pets with previous Blind teams.
I faced the same Imp, Spiderling, Custodian team and this time I won because I had a way to burn down the Mechanical. It was close though as they missed twice in a row one time.
So to recap, my current team is:
- Feline Familiar with Pounce, Call Darkness, and Prowl.
- Soul of the Aspects with Claw, Deflect, and Surge of Light.
- Festival Lantern with Burn, Flash and Light.
I stuck with that for several matches. I next faced:
This was a close matchup, but my opponent swapped out a nearly dead Sunreaver for the Whelpling and ended up with a ton of buffed humanoid damage from Surge of Light. I next faced:
Unborn Valkyr, 
Thor, 
Son of Animus (Loss).
This was close as Animus had 10% left on his failsafe when he finished me off. Next was:
Snail, 
Crab, and 
Elwynn Lamb (Loss).
This was someone pretending to be a newb (they didn’t even name their pets) but the team was well put together and had enough healing, especially from the crab, that I couldn’t finish them even with Call Darkness. Next was:
Chicken, 
Darkmoon Monkey, and 
Chipmunk (Win).
This team had lots of DoTs from the eggs, bananas, and nuts that were raining down, and it might have been smart if they had a Lightning dragon to go with it. I had a small setback when Surge of Light missed, but managed to win on my Lantern vs. their Chicken.
- Emperor Crab,
Electrified Razortooth, and Kun-Lai Runt (Win).
I had faced this team earlier, but it wasn’t even close this time as my Lantern rocked them.
- Unborn Valkyr, Thor, and Son of Animus (Win).
Another repeat, only this time I led with my Beast to try and draw out their Mechanicals. They still started with the Valkyr, but my Beast wiped it out pretty fast and the Lantern destroyed the rest of their team.
- Kun-Lai Runt,
Anubiseth Idol, and Direhorn Runt (Loss).
No Mechanical or Undead damage on my end made this a tough loss.
- Fiendish Imp,
Netherspace Abyssal, Direhorn Runt (Win, Loss).
Their swap attacks missed twice the first battle due to the Blinds being thrown around, and I think frustrated them a bit. They led with the Abyssal the second time instead of the Imp and then I lost.
At this point I was seeing so many Beasts that I decided to swap out the Feline Familiar for:
Crow with Alpha Strike, Call Darkness, Nocturnal Strike.
The text team I faced was:
Pandaren Fire Spirit, 
Chrominius, and 
Amethyst Spiderling (Loss).
I lost that very closely with their last pet at 10%. Then I faced:
The Anubiseth was too hard to kill, again.
I then decided to do a complete swap to one of the Lightning teams suggested before:
- Restless Shadeling with Arcane Blast, Plagued Blood, and Death Coil.
Peddlefeet with Rapid Fire, Lovestruck, and Love Potion.
Golden Hatchling with Tail Sweep, Call Lightning, Cyclone.
The first team this faced was:
Infected Fawn, 
Crawling Claw, 
Lost of Lordaeron (Win, Loss).
This team seemed to be very laggy the first round so it wasn’t a very good test. I faced them again in the next round and a bad swap at the end cost me a very close match. I then faced:
The claw was a huge difference maker and makes me wish I was more lucky with my digging. I decided to swap my Shadeling for:
Firefly with Slicing Wind, Cocoon and Swarm.
The next team I faced was:
Snowman, 
Stunted Direhorn, and Kun-Lai Runt (Win, Loss).
They fled after my Swarm + Storm managed to wipe out the Direhorn. They led with KLR the second time which was a much better match up for them.
At this point, I swapped in my Clockwork Gnome for Peddlefeet so my team was:
- Golden Hatchling.
- Firefly.
Clockwork Gnome with Railgun, Blitz, Build Turrets.
The next team I faced was:
- Crawling Claw, Bananas, and Menagerie Custodian (Loss, Win).
The first round was a close loss with a few misses on my side making a difference. I won big the second round by swapping a few extra times to keep my Gnome alive until the end.
For those keeping track, my overall W/L was 10-13. With the best team being the Feline Familiar, Soul of the Aspects, Festival Lantern which went 6-4.
The most common pets I faced were the Kun-Lai Runt, the Fiendish Imp, and the Stunted Direhorn or Pygmy Direhorn. Those were often pair with another swapper like Netherspace Abyssal or Crawling Claw and I also saw Anubiseth Idol several times.
In summary, I’d say I was most impressed by the Soul of the Aspects + Darkness combo and the Lightning Storm + Turrets combo. The Festival Lantern is still very strong as well. The Spectral Porcupette didn’t seem to work the way I played it. Peddlefeet was kind of a mixed result, and neither of the Undead pets I tried panned out.
Session #2
Again, I lost the notes I had for it, but the overall record was much better.
The Teams:
- Wild Golden Hatchling with Tail Sweep, Lightning Storm, Cyclone.
- Clockwork Gnome with Railgun, Blitz, Build Turrets.
- Landros Lil’ XT with Zap, Heartbroken, Tantrum/Boom Bot.
This team did well, but Lil ‘XT never really felt like he pulled his own weight. It was difficult to get a Heartbroken combo off and when it did, it rarely survived to get the tantrum off. Swapping to Boom Bot didn’t help much.
So I swapped Lil ‘XT for:
Scourged Whelpling with Tail Sweep, Call Darkness, and Plagued Blood/Dreadful Breath.
This did much better but, again, the Whelpling would rarely survive long enough for Dreadful Breath to do that much damage and there were too many swaps involved to get Plagued Blood to stick to any one target. Facing all of these swap teams makes it more difficult.
I tried swapping the Whelpling for a 
Pandaren Air Elemental, which worked a bit with all of the extra dots, but it felt a little fragile. So I swapped it for a Pandaren Fire Elemental.
My final team was:
- Wild Golden Hatchling with Tail Sweep, Lightning Storm, Cyclone.
- Clockwork Gnome with Railgun, Blitz, Build Turrets.
- Pandaren Fire Elemental with Flame Wave, Immolate, Cauterize.
This team rocked the rest of the night. I would open with the Golden Hatchling to do Lightning Storm + Cyclone, then the Gnome to Build Turrets, and then I would sometimes swap to my Elemental and sometimes not depending upon the match up.
The Flame Wave was very good as it hit their entire team with Lightning damage. I just had to time it so that it wouldn’t remove my turrets. One time, I faced another Lightning + Clockwork Gnome team and being able to wipe out their turrets when I felt like it made it feel much easier. The same for the Lil’ Rags + Fire Trap teams I was facing. Toward the end of the night, I dropped Cauterize completely in favor of Conflagrate and it made the combo seem even more powerful.
I still managed to lose to a few teams, but it made the swap teams less of a problem since forcing me to swap to either my Elemental or my Gnome were actually a bonus as they both teamed up well with Lightning Storm. The only tough teams were the Anubisath Idol with Sandstorm, but even those weren’t that bad as long as I made sure to use Lightning Storm after their Sandstorm and then just bring in the Elemental which completely negated Sandstorm when they reapplied it.
By the end of the second session, I had more than made up the deficit from the first session, had gotten past the 50 Level 25 PvP wins achievement, and still wanted to play more.
Pet Battle Notebook #1: Teams Galore!
So after the previous week’s experience, I decided to try and do some research. And whaddya know, most of the really annoying teams I’ve come across are referred by, and many likely trace their origin to, this discussion thread. Thanks, Liopleurodon, for originally bringing this PvP Treasure Trove to my attention!
You can read through the whole thread, and I encourage it, but I’ve decided to pick through some of the highlights and try to organize it a bit. While I haven’t tried them all (yet), I have been on the receiving end of many of them and will put in my 2¢.
Begin Gigantic Wall of Text:
Burn Team 1
Fel Flame: Flame Breath, Scorched Earth, Conflagrate
Corefire Imp: Rush, Immolation, Wild Magic
Scourged Whelpling: (H/H breed): Tail Whip, Call Darkness, Plagued Blood
or
Sunreaver: Fel Immolate, Extra Plating, Call Lighting
I’ve seen this team, with Lil‘ Ragnaros as the elemental variation, many times.
As Annimositty (one of the lead contributors) says:
If you go with the Whelp your team’s key to victory is using Immolation/Scorched earth with Plagued Blood to heal ur entire party. It’s powerful and nearly impossible to counter.
If you go with Sunreaver your team will be focused more on the Lightning weather. You can use you Fel Flame to dps without fearing weather or change it if it’s working agaisn’t you. Also using Wild Magic in this weather is powerful since it will amplify any Dot, Immolation, and Call Lighting’s added bonus damage.
I haven’t tried to pick apart this team as well as I maybe should have. I did okay against the Sunreaver variation with my Blind team last week. They didn’t seem to break out Call Lightning as often as they should have and having two pets with Elemental attacks made it tough for their Mech.
The Whelp variation was tough. I managed to pull out a few wins by getting some lucky misses from them. The key to this is to try and trap and kill the imp before it can swap. It likely helps having a critter to counter the other two pets.
Burn Team 2
Netherspace Abyssal (P/S): Immolate, Immolation, Nether Gate
Sen’jin Fetish: Flame Breath, Wild Magic, Dark Simulacrum
Phoenix Hatchling: Peck, Cauterize, Conflagrate
So this team has the same synergy between Wild Magic/Dot’s however unlike the last one it doesn’t use weather to cause damage. The thing that makes this team strong is the ability abyssal has to spreed burns to your enemy team/bring phoenix to conflagrate.
Phoenix is a quick striker, you only bring him in to conflagrate and swap him out. Losing him earlly gimps ur team. However Fetish’s ability to live past death always gives him the ability to set up you pheonix hopefully with a Wild Magic/Burn on. It’s near impossible to survive a conflagrate with Wild Magic on.
I’ve seen this one a few times, more often with either a Corefire or Fiendish Imp (with a second Nether Gate) than with the Fetish. And sometimes with a Lil’ Rags instead for the elemental.
While you can often anticipate the swap (or swaps), if you’re slower than your opponent, the loss of turns can make it hard to come back no matter how good your build. When I’ve done well is when they’ve managed to miss their Nether Gate as it throws them off their game.
Anubish (AKA Anubisath Idol) Groups
Anubish Idol: Crush, Sandstorm, Deflection
Emperor Crab (P/P): Snap, Renewing Mist, Shell Shield
Feline Familiar: Onyx Bite, Stone Skin, Prowl/Devour
I tend to like a variety that can counter almost anything, rather than using 1 dimensional pets or strats which depend on swaps at the right time.
That’s likely the reason you don’t read much about Anubisath groups in that thread, but you will see plenty of them in PvP. Normally, their job is to stop those dot, swarm and lightning storm type of attacks from working, and that’s what the group above is geared towards. But more often than not, they simply outlast your hardest hitting pet leaving the rest of your group easy prey for the rest of their team.
The idol, and the team, does have two strong weaknesses: their attacks tend to miss more, and they are still vulnerable to larger single target attacks. So change it to darkness and put up your own misses if you can, and use a quick, bursty team if you keep getting them.
Kun-Lai Runt (KLR) Teams
Frosty: Diseased Bite, Blizzard, Ice Tomb
KLR: (P/S breed) Thrash, Frost Shock, Deep Freeze
Tundra Penguin: (H/P breed) Peck, Slippery Ice, Belly Slide
That’s the only team I’ve seen in the thread featuring the KLR and it does have some synergies going on. Of the many times I’ve run across this pet, they rarely bother with synergies, going instead for hit them as hard and fast as you can teams.
Basically, you’re more likely to see one teamed up with a Direhorn or an Anubish Idol than a penguin.
Lightning Teams
Corefire Imp: Rush, Immolation, Wild Magic
Zandalari Kneebiter (P/P): Hunting party, Black Claw, Bloodfang
Wild Golden Hatchling: Tail Sweep, Call Lightning, Cyclone
also
Wild Golden Hatchling: Tail Sweep, Call Lightning, Cyclone
Peddlefeet: Rapid Fire, Love Struck, Love Potion
Lil’ Ragnaros: Sulfuras Smash, Conflagrate, Sons of the Flame
I’ve tried the second one, and variations thereof, though my raptor isn’t leveled yet for the first one. I’ve hardly ever ran into one of the lightning teams, so there’s the unique factor going. The problem is that it’s weak to Undead, teams with swaps, and teams with Sandstorm (like Anubish), and that’s half of your competition!
More Lightning
Fel Flame: (H/H breed): Flame Breath, Scorched Earth, Conflagrate
Wild Golden Hatchling: Breath, Call Lightning, Cyclone/Lift Off
Landro’s Lil’ XT: Zap, Heartbroken, Tympanic Tantrum
Key Abilities: Scorched Earth/Call Lighting + Heartbroken + Tympanic Tantrum
This team’s main strategy is heavy team damage. Landing a successful Heartbroken Tantrum will secure your victory. Using Scorched Earth as the method to activate Heartbroken is the key (since most people will avoid attacking XT while the Heartbroken buff is applied).
If you can land a Heartbroken buffed Tantrum with Lighting Storm active then the game is as good as won. Fel Flame is also a perfect defence from your own weather. He can take advantage of a Lighting Storm without getting hurt by it and if the weather is backfiring on you, you have the option to change it.
Also a Pandaran Air Spirit is bomb in storm. Slicing Winds-Whirlwind-Cyclone/Arcane Storm is a great move set to be using in storm. You will lose some of that nice single target dps Fel Flame can pull though.
I tried this team, but the XT is so slow it’s hard to survive the swap and get the damage going. Same vulnerabilities as the previous which makes it harder to execute. Might be interesting to try it with the Air Spirit and something besides XT.
Last Two Lightning
Pocket Reaver (H/H breed) : Metal Fist, Quake, Fel Flame
Wild Golden Hatchling: Breath, Call Lightning, Fly
Sapphire Cub: Lash, Rake, Stone Rush
also
Tiny Bog Beast: clobber/lash/poison lash
Scourged Whelpling: tail sweep/call darkness/plagued blood
Tranquil Mechanical Yeti: Thrash/call lightning/ion cannon
These two seem more promising, especially with the Direhorn runt teams you run across. I believe the suggestion in the thread was to replace the Yeti with a Sunreaver in the second team.
Blind Team 1
Ghostly Skull (Breed 7/HP breed): Shadow Claw, Spectral Strike, Unholy Ascension
Enchanted Lantern: Burn, Flash, Light
Gilnean Raven (S/S Breed): Alpha Strike, Call Darkness, Nocturnal Strike
This allows you to freely start and swap pets and have the pet swapping in benefit from the debuffs/weather the pet before it places.
It also adds a crazy amount of defence through your lantern to avoid those heavy hitters and allows you to use Light without having to use flash as a set up (plus u can use flash to blind those pesky elementals or b4 u die to set up your raven or skull)
Attentive readers will notice that I’ve been running a Blind team myself these past few weeks. This build is similar to what I’ve been running only I’ve used a Penguin with slippery ice in place of the skull. It may be that I’m not using it right, but the skull hasn’t been as effective against most of the teams I’ve run against. A lack of speed makes it much more vulnerable to swaps and other CC. The lantern is awesome, however.
Blind Team 2
Spectral Porcupette: powerball, spirit spikes, spectral spine (counters KLR, rabbits, ice lance, most flyers)
Feline Familiar: pounce, call darkness, prowl (counters anubisath, tail sweepers, healers)
Imperial Silkworm: consume, moth balls, moth dust (counters conflag, aquatic, KLR also)
I started out this past week with a team like this. I’ll have the full write up soon, but they didn’t do so well together. Partly because of the abundance of Mech based teams. So I kept the familiar and tried different pets until I found a group that did.
Lil Rag: Sulf Smash, Magma trap (goes well with mines) Sons of flame
Darkmoon Tonk: Missile, Minefield, Ion Canon (because the animation is amazing)
Netherspace Abyssal: Hp breed with Crush (for dragons) Explode (because its going to be at least 800 damage) and Nether Gate (to pull a pet out into mines)
This combo really goes well together. Amazingly well in fact. Only weakness is how slow lil rag is and the Abyssal is kinda slow as well.
Minefield + Force Swap is very common right now. The Tonk’s ion cannon has a tendency to sink your team, though I’ve also seen a robot with sticky bomb instead of the Tonk.
When I’ve done well against this is when I’ve managed to blind or otherwise cause the swap to miss. Putting a fast pet with CC on the Tonk is also key as that can keep it from using its Ion Cannon. Every time I have I tidal wave type pet, which is the other counter, I end up seeing a KLR or hand of gimmick team for the next 4 battles.
Conclusion
Lots of people are talking about pet PvP on the Interwebs. Read about them a bit, but remember that what works for you on your server is what counts. So play around with these ideas!
Update Time
If you haven’t read the new Guide for Beasts of Fable you might want to start with that. Or not, It’s totally up to you. But the other thing you all are probably interested in is about wrangling down the PvP so I’ll start with that.
Pet Battle PvP
It was much more difficult this week than last week. I think alot of people brought their A game and since mine’s a B- at best, there were a number of close (and a few not-so-close) losses. Then the casuals started waking up at around 9:30 or 10 AM server and I could keep up again.
Blind Team
I started out with a few weird flying groups, like a Harpie + Qiraji Guardling just to see what it was like and that didn’t go well. So I took the winning team from last week: Eye of the Legion, Gilnean Raven, and Mr. Chilly, and played around with it a bit. Only instead of keeping the Eye (for the third weekend in a row), I swapped it out for a newly upgraded Festival Lantern with Burn, Flash, and Light.
So I would generally open with the Raven and Pop Call Darkness and Nocturnal Strike, swap in my Penguin and use Slippery Ice and Ice Lance. And then they’d be taking double Elemental damage and have an extra 30% reduced chance to hit my team.
This worked pretty well. Well enough to get me at least half of my wins. Even the pro players were thrown enough that I could usually steal one win away even if they had it figured out for the rematch. You would think that Dragonkin would be the weakest link, but Call Darkness managed to keep them in check if they only had one. And having a magic pet that would suddenly start popping Elemental damage three turns in, like the Lantern did, really threw the Mechanical teams off. I did really well overall against the Undead + Flying and Mechanical heavy teams I was seeing.
Fresh Ideas
Then I started to see teams with a double swap, and an Anubisath Idol with Sandstorm + a really fast Hopling and I didn’t do so hot. Swapping in the Eye of the Legion from last week wasn’t enough to start winning again and I decided to try and build another team.
What didn’t work this week:
- Festival Lantern + Pandaren Earth and Water Spirits. Didn’t try this for too long, but the Mud Slide was supposed to stop the double swap teams I was seeing from using Crawling Claw and Fiendish Imp or Bone Spider to wear me out. Of course, then I stopped seeing the swap teams as much. And it didn’t matter as I didn’t have the firepower to shut them down. I did manage to wipe the floor with a double Mechanical team, at least.
- Scourged Whelpling/Wolpertinger + Rapana Whelk/Ghostly Skull + Blighted Squirrel / Infected Fawn. I was still being beaten up by that double humanoid team and I tried Undead heavy and a few critter heavy teams and nothing was working. Then they disappeared for an hour or so and I started winning again.
What did work:
- Living Sandling + Festival Lantern + Eye of the Legion. I brought out the Sandling to try and help with a Celestial Dragon + Spawn of Onyxia team and it kind of worked. An elemental that could punch threw them off balance. The sandstorm and quicksand slowed them down and since one of them at least used Moonlight often, that actually helped my other two pets.
- Tide Skipper + Festival Lantern + Living Sandling. Having an Aquatic that looks and hits like a Humanoid threw off the Undead teams a bit. Same for the Dragonkin teams. Then I started seeing stuff that threw me for a loop, like a scourgling + humanoid or triple swap teams and I started losing narrowly a few times in a row.
- Clouded Hedgehog + Festival Lantern + Jade Crane Chick. This lineup is weird enough that I think it just managed to confuse them as much as anything. I flat out stole a win by having my blind cause them to miss two killing blows. But there were two highlights: 1) When I beat a double dragonkin team with my Flying + Magic team. I managed to get Shattered Defenses up and swapped in my Hedgehog to Counterstrike one to death, and my Lantern wore the second one down enough for my Hedgehog to finish them. And 2) when I finally beat up that double Humanoid team (that had picked up a Rabbit with Dodge + Burrow for fun). I got a bit of luck in that they had no Mechanical and therefore no answer to my Beast pet.
Long Story Short
You can find a good team but as soon as you start winning with it, they’re gonna swap it up on you. That being said, I think my Blind team and the Hedgehog team might be something to keep in mind for next week.
Raiding With Leashes II
I didn’t raid Kara, though I hit SSC on the one toon that could clear it, and TK on three toons and I didn’t get a single pet. The shadow pet from TK is getting around 2-3000 on the AH, but that would still leave the Coilfang pet from Vashj. I’ll just run it again next week.
Pet Collecting
I managed to tame a rare Kun’lai Runt (finally), and an Amber Moth. Had some key upgrades, including my Festival Lantern, the Perky Pug (which I’ve sadly neglected), the Tiny Flamefly, and the Tiny Goldfish. I’m capped out completely for Undead and Dragonkin upgrades, which is frustrating as those stones dropped as well. I played the AH a bit and managed to pick up two Tiny Carps for 2.5k each. That just leaves the Red Carp to try and Fish or Purchase. Also have two pets from the 2.2 raid that I could go for, although they’re weighing in at 8-10k for now. That’s too pricey for me right now.
Beasts of Fable III: The Tough Trio
These last three are quite a bit more difficult, but they’re still not that bad if you have the right pets. If you’re going to skip one group though, these might as well be them.
Just a reminder: Elite pets are Elite.
No-No
Meet No-No and Family.
No-No is a tough customer at the best of times. She doesn’t have heals, she just hits very hard and the order in which she does her abilities is hard to predict.
The Abilities
Tail Slap hits very hard, Dive hits hard and lets her avoid your best attacks, and Beaver Dam tends to be used at the most inconvenient times. This makes her one slippery character.
Choose Wisely
It’s obvious you’re going to need some Flying pets with firepower, however, the way that she times her abilities makes it harder than usual to use Shattered Defenses to win.
Use Squawk to slow her down and use Flock to break through her dam.
The easiest way to keep up the debuff, is to just keep using Flock with your first pet. This has the added bonus of breaking down her dam quickly so she has less chance to avoid or block the attacks of your second pet.
Use Reckless Strike to bring her down to size.
You need a bursty Flying pet to make the most of the Shattered Defenses debuff. After that, any good Flying attacker should be able to finish her off.
Gorespine
Gorespine is slightly different from the other Beast BoFs, but not all that different.
The Abilities
He has a bleed and a spiky shell, which makes it a fairly bad idea to use Call Lightning or a Swarm type ability. He also has a hard hitting Critter attack to go with his bleed.
Choose Wisely
Darkmoon Tonk says: ‘Hai there, I got a surprise for you!’
Bring two hard hitting Mechanicals and this guy is relatively easy. If you don’t know by now, see Kafi and Greyhoof for further details.
Ti’un the Wanderer
I’ve saved the hardest for last, and let me tell you, Ti’un the Wanderer is one tough nut to crack. He doesn’t heal, which is a very good thing, but his shell shield makes him invulnerable to most small attacks.
The Abilities
It’s very hard to predict when he’ll use his abilities. He has Shell Shield which he doesn’t decide to use until later on in the fight; usually just after you’ve started any swarm abilities. He has Pump which he’ll sometimes use early but often will save until your pet’s health is low enough that it can finish it. Every other turn he just uses Tidal Wave to wipe your entire team down very slowly.
Choose Wisely
Bring magic pets to keep him from washing your team away.
All of his attacks are Aquatic, so bringing a team of magic pets is the key. They should be hard hitting pets as his shell completely absorbs DoTs, Flurry, and any other moderate to small attacks.
Legs is a very good choice for this as you take reduced damage and can hit him with Pump and Surge of Power on consecutive turns. I sometimes start with Legs just to “Prime” the pump, then switch to a Fox/Wolf to Howl and then swap and hit him with an attack buffed by Shattered Defenses.
If you have three hard hitting magic pets, a pet with Shattered Defenses isn’t required, but it does make the fight a bit easier. In any case, don’t worry to much about type of damage, just make sure it hits hard enough to get through his shell.
Conclusion
I hope this has given you all some ideas about how to approach these BoF quests. There are lots of different ways you can take them down depending on your stable, and you can practice your strategies on them even if you’re not doing the quest, so feel free to try and find out what works best for you!
Beasts of Fable II: The Easy Threesome
This next batch is probably the fastest and easiest to get to if you just want to knock down one of these a day. That being said, they’re still Elite, so you still need a good choice of pets if you want to take them down.
Lucky Yi
Do you feel lucky, Yi?
Lucky Yi is a fast Critter that always hits first, can heal pretty well, and often crits you. But all you need is a good Beast damage combo to beat him.
Choose Wisely
Say hello to my little friend!
Whadda know, it’s just like the Big Friendly Caterpillar from BoF I: Bleed, Crouch, and Stampede to win.
And if you’re feeling really ambitious, bring a pet with Maul:
Press ‘3’ to Finish Him!
You have much to learn, Grasshopper!
Greyhoof
Greyhoof is like Kafi only with better real estate. Also, doesn’t have that annoying ability that makes him move faster.
The Abilities
He starts out hitting very hard, then buffs himself to hit even harder! If you have a pet that can slow him down or speed your team up, bring it to avoid the occasional stun. Otherwise, just bring your hardest hitting Mechanicals.
Choose Wisely
I knew there was a reason why I let them shoot me out of a cannon several hundred times at the Darkmoon Faire. I just couldn’t remember what it was!
Skitterer Xi’a
Skitterer Xi’a is probably the hardest of the three. He’s got two hard hitting Critter attacks and one hard hitting Aquatic attack, but nothing too devastating and no heals.
Choose Wisely
Ideally, you’d use a Humanoid that does Flying damage to reduce the damage you take. But you can bring any three hard hitting Flyers, including one that has Flock, and you should do okay.
Conclusion
Much faster and a bit easier than Beasts of Fable I. You should be able to fit this into your daily schedule even if you don’t feel like flying all over Pandaria to do the rest.
Nik's Pet Battles 