The weekend isn't over yet, so I hope the lead in for this post isn't premature. Wild isn't quite done, and if he doesn't wrap it up before I publish this post, I guess Wild will have egg batter on his face.
Since the last report, Wild has completed all but two of the achievements needed to win his Chef's title. The latest include:
Critter Gitter - Wild charmed 10 penguins with critter bites to build a private penguin army.
Dinner Impossible - Loved this one. Wild had to join all five level 80 pvp battlegrounds and cook the raid a Great Feast in each one. Wild even stuck around for the fights. Officially, Wild lost four BGs, but won the Eye of the Storm and even got a pvp achievement for winning in less than six minutes. Wild credits his Great Feast for the win. ;-) Of course, Wild didn't know what was going on in Eye of the Storm, but hey, over the course of those five BGs Wild earned four pvp achievements, including getting his 500th honor kill. See, cooking isn't all about stoves and stuff, Wild got to kill people, too. Hmm, I hope I didn't get those ingredients mixed up. Alliance tarts, anyone?
Second That Emotion - Wild had to make and then nibble on such interesting cuisine as Last Week's Mammoth (better than last month's mammoth) and Bad Clams.
The Northrend Gourmet - Cooking up all 45 recipes offered in Northrend.
Sous Chef - Learning at least 100 cooking recipes.
Probably the most interesting recipe in Wild's growing cookbook was Kungaloosh. It took a little bit of sleuthing to get that one. The recipe is given by a quest, and the quest giver is right in Dalaran, but there were pre-quests to be completed before that quest could be obtained.
The investigation led Wild to Sholazar Basin, where Wild received a quest from Grimbooze Thunderbrew called "Some Make Lemonade, Some make Liquor." Wild collected fruit from local trees in this lush zone. Then, for a followup quest, Wild performed a timed event where I had to mix all the ingredients and operate a pressure regulated stove. Wild had five things he had to have instant access to as the quest giver yelled out instructions, and in the middle of that a horde player on one of those huge mammoth mounts decided to stand in the middle of the operation. I've heard of opposite faction players trying to make a player fail a quest, but it was pretty irritating seeing a fellow horde do it.
Wild got it done, anyway. After completing the second quest, a third had Wild taking the resulting brew around to several npcs for taste tests. Finally, Wild returned to Dalaran, met with the quest giver down in the sewer section of the city, and received the Kungaloosh recipe. Surprisingly, this recipe is actually useful and fun at the same time. The functional part is that it restores mana when you drink it, just like many other easily purchased items do. But the drink also makes you tipsy, and getting a little high before or after a fight gets big "fun" marks in raids. Seriously. The ingredients for Kungaloosh are cheap and can be bought from vendors, so there is no grinding for ingredients, either. Wild now carries around a stack of Kungaloosh as a staple of his food and drink buffs.
The Outland level 70 daily cooking quest is what is keeping Wild from finishing. There are four quests, and one of the four is randomly available each day. Wild has gotten three of them done, but the wow random number generator gods have yet to give Wild a chance at the fourth one, Revenge is Tasty.
The other achievement Wild hasn't finished is also related to the daily cooking quest. Completing the daily awards a Crate of Meat or a Barrel of Fish. The recipe Skullfish Soup can only get gotten as a random drop in the Barrel of Fish. So far, it hasn't dropped for Wild. Wild has to cook that recipe in order to complete the last of the 26 recipes in The Outland Gourmet.
Those are the last two things Wild has to do to get his title.
In the meantime Wild didn't let a little thing like losing 10 emblems ruin his weekend. On Saturday he signed up with the Dungeon Finder for a random heroic so he could at least get the 2 frost emblems that awards.
Wild signed up at 1204pm and then went fishing. He didn't have to fish long. At 1216 Wild got an invite, but one of the DPS that signed up declined to go. The rest of us went back in the queue (at the top of the list, we are told), and less than a minute later there was another invite.
When the instant portal cleared, Wild found himself in the Culling of Stratholme (CoS). JB and DER have two manned the level 60 Stratholme, so they know what is in there. Thousands of trash mobs, and quite a few bosses. It took JB and DER hours to clear the place, doing all of the bosses (even the optional ones) in order to get the achievement for clearing it. The "Culling" version at level 80 is the same layout, but the time of the event is different and there were a lot fewer bosses to deal with. Arthas was our guide, and the final boss was Mal'Ganis, who we defeated, but who would escape Arthas' attempt to finish him off. Total time from start to finish was 31 minutes.
There was only one item of loot of any value to our group, and Wild won it. It was the fast flying mount the Bronze Dragon, which drops in CoS from the second to last boss, the Infinite Corrupter. It's a timed fight, so it only drops if the group gets to and kills the boss fast enough. Wild has his flying bird form, and a flying carpet, and other common wyvern flying mounts, but this is his first dragon mount. While it's not that rare, it is a bit special, as it's sized slightly smaller than the other dragon mounts and has bronze/yellow colored scales. Wild definitely likes his new mount.
Philly was busy as well. She cleared all of the main quests in Nagrand and moved on to Blade's Edge Mountains, and has DINGED! to level 69.
I know Jocelyne had aspirations of joining the Andro/Lao team of pvpers in the 20s bracket, but she has not gotten any time to pursue that and remains a level 14. Not wanting to lose out completely, Wild did give EZ a very late night opportunity. Philly sent EZ the family's two heirloom items, and EZ got into two Warsong Gulch matches with her experience gain turned back on. She started at 88% of the way to level 20. In that first WSG EZ was the only level 19 among a bunch of much lower level pvpers on the horde side. EZ found herself ganged up on by two pally 19s almost constantly while the rest of the allies slaughtered the babies. It didn't last long, we lost, and the xp bar only moved up to 91%.
EZ waited almost twenty minutes for a second match, and had skilled up her fishing from 0 to 50 by the time the invite came. The situation was reversed in the second match, as we had three 19s and most of the allies were level 16 and under. EZ and two druids could take the allie flag at will, and we played keep away for awhile, with EZ able to kill lower level allies with two flame shocks. EZ got one of the flag caps once we decided to end it. The victory catapulted EZ to level 20 and 6% beyond, for a 15% gain. Welcome to the level 20 bracket, EZ.
It was very, very late, but EZ insisted on getting her level 20 talents, and wanted to get her mount, and also had five quests from Wailing Caverns that she had completed weeks and weeks ago, but had not turned in so she could stay at level 19. The questing turn ins, which also included the daily pvp quest, padded EZ's xp to 56% of the way to level 21. Being as late as it was, though, EZ had something of a personality malfunction. The stout shaman was in Org, but she hearthed to Thunder Bluff, and then went to the tauren starting zone at Bloodhoof Village to get her mount. Or maybe she just wanted to visit with Rheebah. She certainly wasn't going to be allowed to have a kodo mount. So she went back to Orgrimmar and made the long run to Sen'jin Village in southern Durotar. That's the troll starting zone, and maybe EZ was thinking "I'm a shaman, JB is a shaman, and JB got her mount here, so . . ." Only JB is a troll, and the mount sellers in Sen'jin wouldn't let EZ have one of their raptor mounts. You see, EZ isn't a troll, she's an ORC. She's the only orc in Wild's family, so I guess the confusion is understandable - well, maybe not. So, she headed back to Org for the third time - the orc mount stables are right there in Org, near the pvp Battlemasters area.
What made up for the long confusion was the black wolf mount that EZ ended up with. The black wolf is a new mount, and the Wild family has always wanted someone to have one, and now we do.
Sunday Night - Wild was in game Sunday night to see if there would be a raid. The raid calendar was empty, so no 25 man was scheduled, but I still had hopes that the raid leader would at least get a 10 man going. As it turned out, there was a run being set up, but it was for an established guild ten man. Apparently, lacking enough guildies to form a 25 man raid, that guildie premade raid group is using Sunday as a raid night for their 10 man.
Wild watched the raiders join up at the Icecrown Citadel, which topped out at 8 guild raiders as the 6pm start time passed. There were maybe three other guildies in game, counting Wild. About ten minutes later, the raid leader for the guild's other 10 man, which I'm not sure is even running right now, came in game. He's a druid moonkin/healer, and he got an invite. Their tenth raider must have been a non-guildie (they have a couple of non-guildies in their group), as they wrapped up invites and headed into the instance.
I know it's the holidays, and a lot of folks just aren't around, but it's a little sad that the best our guild can do right now is field one somewhat exclusive 10 man raid. Wild is not happy that he isn't getting much raid time.
On the culinary front Wild was halfway successful with his Chef Title ambition. The Skullfish Soup recipe dropped and Wild was able to complete The Outland Gourmet achievement. However, Wild did not receive the "Revenge is Tasty" daily cooking quest, getting "Soup for the Soul" for the third straight day, so there is no success to report. Only a matter of time, now, though.
PS - On Monday morning Wild picked up another daily Outland cooking quest. For the fourth straight day, it was "Soup for the Soul." Sigh.
PSS - My raid news ended on something of a downer, so I felt I needed to to add that on Monday Wild got some promising news on the raiding front. More on that in the next post.
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