Lame Pet Issue & a Record Breaker

Ok, so I get on the Test Realm for a few minutes today. First I will say that those who have Epic pets are now bored and don't even have anyone to race and have already messed up their pets stats enough that they can no longer do anything "fun" in the test realm. That was evidenced by just hanging out and people-watching for a bit, seeing what people were talking about.

Anyhow, I wanted to compare my two Grandmaster Storm's pets.

Heather Emeraldflame, my oldest wizard, has a Ancient Stormzilla(Taz,) which I have barely played with on the Test cause I had been messing with Dakota, her Storm Hound when I have been on...cause he just looks so cute running ;-)
When I first got on with Emeraldflame in the TR Taz only had a power pip chance of 4...and he still has that same chance since he has hardly done any training.

So, I get Danielle Thunderblade, who has not even been in the TR, hasn't even been to see Merle about the quest to get in there yet. And I look at her Teen Stormzilla, and he has 5% power pip chance!

Why is this? Taz is older and more experienced by default. Neither have had any real training done to them. So why does young Duncan have more of a power pip chance he is giving?

See, this is why the entire Pet training and all that seems like a big joke to me. This just shows there is no rhyme or reason to this. There is nothing you can really do to "groom" a perfect pet. You might get close. You might get a few traits you want. You might also get some you don't care for. But two Stormzilla pets with age really being the only difference and the older one is not as good as the younger?!?! Something doesn't gel right with that. Shouldn't Emeraldflame have a more powerful pet beside her in combat, as compared to Danielle....who really hasn't been around so long?

See, it's one of the many reasons I like having two-three accounts. I can compare and contrast these type of things. And, honestly, KI, this really makes no sense at all. If anything my older wizard should start with the better pet in this expansion. I mean Taz is Ancient. What would happen if he hit Epic? Would he lose another power pip percentage? It seem like that needs to be fixed!

Check out my Stormzilla's Stat Sheets here and see the problem:

Younger Duncan's stats:

Older Taz's Stats:

And now for something just plain bizarre...

In case you didn't see Kevin Battleblood's blog already, a few of us got together this night and did some funky damage using sacrifice minion. In FACT it IS the highest damage ever. Though I will be honest and say this is not your normal damage for the simple fact that this spell was never intended to be used in this way. Meaning it was never meant to be used to get a huge attack hit. It was intended to do a job: kill off your minion and heal you. Well, in this case the minion was hit so hard he healed too! It's pretty crazy....even though I am more of a pure damage person(Kevin, forgive me for that,) meaning I like a huge(number) hit from an attack spell that kills some enemies. I guess to some that doesn't matter....they just want numbers even without the kill(which takes away the fun...lol,) but it's something I always enjoyed more. "Behold! Aren't you impressed? The product pursuing refined linework matched with two-dimensional deformation! H'm! Now this is art! But my art doesn't end here! None of my works are static! When they have physical form, they're little more than models, h'm! But this explodes! And with that explosion, its essence is propelled to greatness, at that moment of becoming the true work of art I intended! And in that fleeting moment of grandeur that I see true art! H'm! Art is an explosion!!"...Naruto fans will get the reference ;-)

Enjoy Kevin's experiment coming to a conclusion here with Negative numbers as the result. He explains that more on his blog....I am no Mathematician xD



My footage(unfortunately my video recorder had issues, so I had to take the raw footage and chop it up, so it's not very in sync):



Screen Shot of hit(which is sorta cool looking):

First Thoughts on Things I have Seen in the Test Realm

Ok, so contrary to what some might believe who have followed me on Twitter; I am excited about some of the stuff I have seen in the Test Realm. I have seen a few negatives, though, as well....and I am going to be bluntly honest, as usual, about it.

I will start with what I saw that is good:

- The new pets I have seen so far are all pretty awesome, though I think the Gobbler pet is UGLY...lol.

-I love what has happened to level 48 pet stats. I mean to give a Storm person increased health and accuracy through their pet - TOO SWEET! And what I have seen happen to other level 48 pets is great too(for the most, there is one slight downside I saw, but will get to that.)

-The Pet Pavilion is awesome! There is so much one can do in there!

-Even though I have a severe dislike for PvP I think I might even have some fun in the Derby. And, yes, I do consider that a type of PvP...just with our pets.

-I LOVE the maze game, and the Cannon game is not too, too far behind on my enjoyment of it.

-I love having my pets out at my house. And doing this lets you leave them at home and not clog up your backpack; so now you can go out on those long hours of quests and farming and have a little more room in your backpack because your 20 or so Unicorns could stay home and play instead of being stuffed into your backpack....suffocating...

-I absolutely LOVE the new black Swiftshadow Wing Mount!!!...Ok, how many times have I ever said I wanted black wings?!?!....this is soooo great!...Now I have double-wings that match!

-I Love the new Crown staff, Celestian Trident, with the Ice attack. That thing is so awesome looking!

-I like seeing my pets stats increase as I play games, train them.


What I don't like that I see:

#1: My most major gripe: That we will NO LONGER BE ABLE TO TRADE CHARMED CARDS WE HAVE MADE! This is the most awful thing they could have done in the updates. This seriously hurts Storm, Balance, and Life people(who actually do more than heal or support.)
For the longest time I have made Steal Wards and Pierce cards for my Life and Storm people. Life, Balance, and Storm are the only schools that have no way to get rid of shields other than to completely destroy their entire set-up. We have no DoTs, and we have no shield breaking spells, or steal ward spells. I can not include Storm Hound as a reliable DoT, and it is not a learned spell, nor is Lightning Elf...which the pet that gives this card seems to only be for ranked pvp players to equip. This really hurts anyone who is trying to make a high hit. It makes you absolutely have to depend on having others do your work for you in a battle and I am VERY against that. Storm Hound only gives one card anyhow...and what if I am in the Labyrinth fighting all those Myth dudes? How am I going to be able to take care of that now? I would have to have someone else in there to break all those shields so I don't have to bust my own blades doing it.
For Life people this is especially awful. They don't even have the power behind their spells to work much past a 50% shield that a Balance mob might throw up. At least with Storm I can power past that and still kill!, though not past the 80% shields that even low rank mobs use.

I think the reason this no trade thing is coming is because of all the selfish people who made Warlord in PvP by making tons of Bolts and other spells to basically cheat their way to being Warlord. So now, by them doing that it is hurting the rest of us who don't even care to participate in that.
Just because you buy your way to a rank in PvP does not make you a good PvP player; that much I do know. How about you guys try using what you have actually learned(for spells) and your brains, and not your coins, etc.?

KI, if any of you happen to read this:
This whole problem could have been solved with banning most treasures from the arena, maybe except for a few exceptions...like let them have some healing cards but limit the number of treasures they have of this type of thing.

If anyone out there agrees and can see the problem this causes for many of us, please write in and urge KI not to let this happen. Or at least request they come up with a different way to even out the PvP playing field without it effecting the rest of us.

Ok...on with other problems...

-The commercial made it look like the pets could be called to you at your house, but pretty much all they do is run in circles and stay in the same general area. It would be nice if they followed you, came to you when called :)

-I know this is a bug but the pet games are crashing quite often, as is the Hatchery. It's so bad that you actually get stuck in them and have to shut down the game and log back in to fix it.
Also many games are acting like you already played before you even started. Like I hit "play" and the next thing I get is an "end" screen, as if I had just finished the game.

- Level 48 pets have lost at least one power pip! There goes 80% + for all who worked for that!

-The energy drain from training pets is too much.

1. It also costs way too much, with real money for kids to be able to enjoy this. A kid is gonna want to play these games as much as possible, maybe it might even be the one thing they want to do on here. So they play a game a few times and their pet's energy goes down to zero, or low enough not to be able to do any more games. So the only options one has is either wait....an extremely long time....like, "hey, kids maybe go to sleep and come back tomorrow and try again," OR you shell out 250 Crowns to refill your pets energy so you can continue to train and play with them...which costs real money, and WILL eventually lead to even more spam in the commons areas with kids begging for coin gifts from passer-bys.
   
2. The coin cost of the pet foods is a bit high when you want to buy a bunch of it to train your pet up even more. And is there even a inventory in your spellbook to see what foods you have on hand without having to play a game?...Having an inventory list of snacks would help when shopping.
   
3. The coin costs for the Hatchery are completely outrageous. Most kids or any normal players are lucky if they even have 50k, let alone 80k or more! It takes hours of farming to get that kind of money, usually...and that farming can only be done in higher level areas.
   

-You can no longer buy or sell pets at the Bazaar. Meh...really I don't care much about this one, save for if it wasn't for the kindness of Mr. Edward Icespear and the fact that he was able to sell an extra pet to the bazaar for me; I may never have got one single Sprite pet.

There also needs to be more explanation as to what all the numbers mean under a pet's characteristics/stats.

I will add to this in later posts as I see fit.

For now, here are a couple pics of Emeraldflame with those awesome wings and staff:


And as a random comment...I saw my evil twin today. I was on another wizard of mine so she probably wondered why I and my mom's wizard were starring at her...take a look:
She was a Ice wizard, but tell me she doesn't look, here, like Emeraldflame's twin, save for the pet name...though one of my others do have a ninja pig with that pet name, which I could have dug up if I really wanted(lol)...see Emeraldflame below:

FOG W101 Pet Hatchery Ad Found in Newest Issue!

I just received the latest Issue of Fun Online Games(FOG,) and on the back cover there this ad for the Wizard 101 Pet Hatchery. This is the July/August Issue, which also talks all about different mounts in an article inside.

Make sure you read the ad too. This pretty much confirms that the Pet Hatchery will not only be opening, but probably already will have been running by then, don't you think?

Now, if only the Test Realm would open up...