TTR 2.4.0: Like My Kite?
I spent some time today on the Tournament Test Realm, which was … interesting, to say the least. You make a character like normal, but when you log in the character is level 70 with some very basic equipment (like Primal Mooncloth bags, a mount, and 5000 gold). You buy your weapons and armor and gems and enchantments and whatnot from vendors (which takes an awful lot of time because they are all lagging like crazy), and if you run short of cash you can go to the Paymaster NPC to get more.
Then, assuming you are a hunter, you go to the Beastmaster NPC and pick out a pet. The Beastmaster stocks 15 pet families (out of 23), and when you choose one a happy level 70 loyalty 6 pet of that family appears next to you. There is no choice in terms of looks, but you can teach your pet whatever skills you like — all hunters automatically know the top rank of all the pet skills.
This makes for a nice testing environment for pet stats — at least for those 15 families — since I can easily switch between them without having to level anything. Plus, I can try a variety of equipment and see directly how the scaling varies. The only problem is the lack of scrolls to test direct buffs to the pet, but I found a couple of friendly druids and paladins to help with that.
There were no real surprises with the stats testing I did, although it’s nice to know that the damage, armor and health mods for the families haven’t changed while we weren’t looking. I’m going to write up some comments about my testing later. Blizzard’s choice of pet families to include on the TTR (and by extension in the tournaments) is fascinating to me, and I’ll definitely have more on that later also.
For today, though, I wanted to share the biggest surprise from the TTR: the dragonhawk pet. As you can see in the pic above (click it for a larger view), when you ask the Beastmaster NPC for a dragonhawk you get something rather unexpected. First, it’s the black dragonhawk skin which is not available on a tameable dragonhawk so far as I know. That’s really neat!
And second, it’s dead. Sure, it follows you around like a pet should, and it seems capable of attacking, but … it’s lying stretched out flat on the ground, quite visibly dead.
I suspect that Blizzard inadvertently used the model from the dead black dragonhawk mounts on the Isle of Quel’Danas, and that those models are set to dead as their default position.
I named mine Kite. The pic above has him posed on the side of a hill so you can see him better, but usually he floats along about a foot above the ground, completely flat. He has no animations at all and particle effects (like the Feed Pet effect) don’t seem to play on him properly.
At any rate, it’s exceptionally creepy.
20 Comments
Does it stay dead if you send it to attack something?
There’s nothing to attack on the TTR besides other players, so I didn’t try it out. However, dragonhawks can use Fire Breath at will, whether or not they have a target, so I did try Fire Breath — and nada. No animation, no fiery breath particles. But the cast did happen — it showed up normally in my combat log.
So I assume that the ‘hawk stays dead even while attacking.
That sounds like fun… I’m gonna have to get my butt on there. Hmmmm, what to make… what to make?
Aagh, zombie dragonhawks!
Oh, there is a dragonhawk in that pic. I couldn’t seen to get past the deliciously digital gratuitous ( @ )( @ )’s. BELF BOOBIES!!!!
Very pretty skin for them. Shame about the death. Maybe they plan on giving us Undead Hunters? (just kidding :) )
Well, it’s terrible that they are dead zombie hawks, but that is one cool texture/color for a hawk ^.^ Sure hope they get around to making a few in the shadows of Quel’Danas (Or whatever it’s called…)
If not, grey tameble dragonhawks will do… *hint hint, blizz*
=D
I wish blizz wouldn’t be so lazy, that and reopen the island! what are the dead mounts called? I’d like to do some research and see what they looked like before mean blizz made it unreachable >.> at any rate, this pet is cool
I’m reminded of Monty Python’s Dead Parrot sketch :)
Thanks for making me smile!
Very nice looking skin indeed. I love it
That skin is very nice! The dragonhawk looks great too! It’s great that Blizz would give us a dead pet, just like the bird in Dumb and Dumber… “pretty bird”
“He’s not dead, he’s, uh… he’s restin’. Lovely ‘hawk, innit? Beautiful plumage.”
“He’s pining for the howling fjord!”
“It’s not pining, it’s passed on. This dragon hawk is no more! It has ceased to be! It has expired and gone to its maker! This is a late hawk! It’s a stiff! Bereft of life, it rests in piece! If you had animated it properly it would be pushing up the daisies! It’s metabolic processes are now only of interest to the Explorer’s Guild! He’s off the twig! He’s kicked the bucket, he’s shuffled off his mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the choir invisible! THIS IS AN EX-DRAGONHAWK!!”
Yeah I copied from wikiquote and modified it for WoW and dragonhawks. Also, if you are wondering what the Explorer’s Guild is search wowwiki for that.
It’s great to see I am not the most geeky person in the world, knowing all the quotes and brick-a-brack ^.~
BTW, what dead mounts..? I am curious now.
No, you’re still the most geeky person. I looked the quotes up and modified them. :P
Haha maybe I still am. Btw if you want to see the other skins for dragon hawks (there are alot more!) look it up on model maker… they realy need to insert more of those skins!
Heh, I’m now actually liking it more with the description zombie dragonhawk! I love its eyes too. I’ll be really tempted it they put that in game – which of my pets to give up for it?!
*stable angst*
what kinds of pet familys were there?
The dragonhawk mounts used at the Isle of Quel’Danas flight point, and for the bombing run quests on the island are broken on the PTR – no animations, and while you’re flying on them your character doesn’t show up. It looks like they have used the same broken model for the TTR dragonhawk pets.
For pet families, I would expect dragonhawks, cats, raptors, ravagers, wind serpents, boars, scorpids, wolves, bats, owls, carrion birds and warp stalkers to all be on the list (since they all either have at least three decent active skills on the live servers, or a very powerful PvP skill in Scorpid Poison).
For the remaining 3 families… I would expect a bear to be there, then maybe a gorilla and a turtle due to their unique skills. (Yeah, I know I could go check easily enough, but it is more fun to try and guess – I’ll be curious to see what my hit rate is like).
Well since we have undead bears and boars why not dragonhawks?
Love the moddel thou and i hope to see more dead pets!
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