Wild Pet Spawning Change 5.1

[Quintessence]

Mumper revealed on Twitter that there will be a change to spawning in the upcoming patch:

"Speaking of rare spawns, they will all use a startup timer in 5.1. This will stop them from all spawning at once on restarts."

So it looks as though restart camping those especially hard to find pets might be coming to an end. What does everyone think about this change? Is it a good thing, a bad thing, or somewhere in between?

[Index]

Hmmm, I'd be fine with it if they fixed the ultra rare stuff (looking at you Minfernal and Scourged Whelpling) to either spawn more often / more spread out or simply make them rare secondaries. I'd be quite happy burning through 300 pets to get one, it'll be faster after all

[Arcana]

Camping for a rare anything to spawn is not my idea of a good time or a fun mechanic. I wish they'd come up with something else, yes like a rare secondary... at least that way you can be doing something like pet battles instead of twiddling your thumbs!

[Mastr]

Does the server reset time depend on the time for your specific server or for that of the shared CRZ? The new shared zones dont always have the same time as my home server.

[Direbane]

Does the server reset time depend on the time for your specific server or for that of the shared CRZ? The new shared zones dont always have the same time as my home server.

I'm inclined to think it's specific to your particular server.

I say this based on my own experience hunting Minferal. I was there at server reset and got back into my server relatively quickly. There were Minfernals everywhere, but I appeared to be the only person there. I looked at my chat window and I read "Transfer Aborted: Cross-Realm Zone Offline" or something to that affect.

So, that tells me that A) The server reset timers regarding pets/other rare spawns are specific (Read: Isolated) to your specific server and, B) The Cross-Realm aspect of the system is on it's own reset timer.

That being said, by the time I'd completed 3 battles I was once again surrounded by people from other servers. So, while they appear to be on different timers I'd say they aren't too far apart from each other.

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As far as the upcoming change is concerned, I don't think it'll solve anything.

I think it's an attempt (Granted, a well-intended one) to solve a problem that's a product of a system that's inherently flawed in the first place. I don't believe this change will result in any significant improvement because it doesn't address the underlying problem with acquiring rare/coveted battle pets.

As it stands now anyone wanting one of these pets knows that in order to stand even a chance of getting one they have to be there when they spawn. That means either parking a toon there and leaving it there, or arriving and just waiting until the server goes down then restarts. Either way, it's time wasted with just...waiting.

Inject this change, the timer is somehow delayed, or staggered, from the server restart timer. The only thing that changes is people no longer at least know when they need to be in the area. Instead they'll feel compelled to either permanently park an alt in the area and frequently leave what they're doing to log into it and check, or frequently leave what they're doing on their other toon and fly over in the hopes they'll see one there. Option two isn't really viable as I'm sure we can all agree that anyone who isn't there when it spawns stands next to zero chance at seeing it - they're always camped.

That's the design flaw of CRZ. It doesn't matter what the activity is like on your own server, we now know that there is likely to always be people there looking/hovering/waiting for the elusive pet. In my case with Minfernal, there 12 people that I could see from my vantage point and only 2 of them were from my server and that was at 5 AM PST.

Ultimately, this change only alters the way in which people waste their time hoping for their reward, it does nothing to alleviate the waste itself. I agree that a better alternative would be to allow pets like these to show up as secondaries (Even if only a small chance at that!) in other battles as opposed to the way it is now, even with this upcoming change. That at least means people wanting this pet are both engaged in active play and still benefiting from their time invested by leveling other pets in the process.

At any rate, those are my thoughts on this upcoming change, I hope all of it made sense. Perhaps down the road a better solution will be implemented.

[Mastr]

I agree, I feel this is a poor design. I set my alarm early this morning to be on during server reset to take advantage of all the new spawns. I was on by 3:53 and at 3:58 I saw the message saying all of my dailys have been reset. No mini infernal spawns. Waited around till 4:12 with still no luck. I then popped over to Sindragosa's fall and no spawns there. I thought I could beat the system and at least have a chance at a rare before they changed it.

So now anyone who wants the achievement has to sit and camp for days just watching for green paws. I understand how to get rare pets, until MoP shipped I had every one of them, but this mechanic is punishingly dull. The worst part is, is that this is the intended mechanic. No farming tokens to buy it, killing other pets to get a secondary or checking a zone for weather. This is a completely passive experience on the players part.

This reminds me of one of the worst aspects of Vanilla, sitting in Kargath on the bench waiting for a guild member to drop to get a spot in MC. At least that was unintended.

[Poofah]

A daily quest reset is not a server reset, that's why you didn't get new spawns. The server has to go down for some amount of time and then come back up, e.g. on Tuesday maintenance (if there is one), or rolling restarts.

I think it's probably important to note that our behavior is precisely the behavior they are trying to dissuade:
for people who know the system and are seeking rare versions of pets (ie us), this is clearly a bad change, since we're now forced to camp continuously instead of just for 5 minutes after a restart. But for more casual pet collectors it's probably good. Now there will be a snowball's chance in hell that there will be a Minfernal up when you happen to fly by Felwood, as opposed to zero chance currently.

The real problem is that supply is just not high enough for some pets to satisfy demand. Since we don't know how often they're programmed to spawn, we don't know if this is working as intended or not, but I suspect that it is. The intent is likely for the most dedicated pet campers to get theirs first, and as demand is satisfied then the rest of us will get ours eventually. This has been the design for most aspects of the game since forever. However, I don't like it one bit that Pet Battles (fun!) are coupled to spawn camping (not fun!). Competition for spawns is precisely what makes rare pets rare, however, and without difficulty in getting certain pets we'd be bored with the system in short order. So, I don't see an obvious solution to this.

[Talmar]

I agree that this isn't going to solve anything. If anything it will make it a bit worse. At least now, you know you have a chance, slim it may be, that there will be pets available after a server reset.

I've had alts parked at both Sindy's Fall and Felwood and never seen them, however, I left work to be at home when servers came back up knowing I have a chance.

That is how I've managed to acquire both the Minfernal and Scourged Whelpling. I was still very lucky for both as when I logged in after a server reset my realm wasn't first and logged into people beelining for pets. I was able to get to 1 and 1 only before they were all snatched up by other campers.

I still have those alts there in hopes of upgrading from Poor (minfernal) and common (whelpling) to something better. If I get to battle one and it's teh same I simply log off so someone else can get the pet who doesn't have it.

With this change and my limited playtime I don't forsee ever getting a chance to upgrade via battle. I'll be hoping for some battle stones come 5.1

I do like the idea of making them be rare secondary or tertiary pets for other pets in that zone.

[Vhale]

Makes it sound like Everquest style camping and makes me happy I got my one that was stuck in a tree. I agree with the comments that I doubt it will help much. If anything, it will be worse if they keep having to restart. After all, those daily restarts made it easy for some people to get one heh.

I'm going around and gathering up rare forms of common pets now that Halloween is done with. I think the last difficult one I need is weather based, the silithid in Tanaris. I could wait for the safari hat so the ones I"m using to battle get more exp, but I dun wanna

[Ragingfurball]

I thought it might be a good idea at first, but after reading and thinking about some of the previous posters concerns, I do have to agree that this will only result in more camping and less actual pet battling. Have mega rares pop up as secondaries would be a good idea to help spur players on to battle more, instead of standing in one spot for days on end.

At least with the old method we knew when to be on and when to camp, which actually cut down some of the 'required camping' time. I believe blizzard might be going in the wrong direction on this particular 'fix'.

[Mastr]

The whole idea of rares is to give the fanatical players a reason to keep playing. We will jump through whatever hoop they put before us and all we are asking is that it be just a little interesting as we are performing as expected.

My favorite mechanic so far has been the new Noblegarden mount. If you recall, you slowly collected tokens to get to a certain total while having the chance to get it instantly. There must be some amount of time they want us to waste for each pet. Some only take a few gold to get, others maybe a quest line, or 1/100 drop rate up to 1/5000 drop rate. Each one of those rates has an average amount of time to acquire. This is where statistics bites us in the rear. Its not that bad if you take 30 tries to get a 1/10 drop but with increasing rarity the time spent can increase exponentially. For example it took me 417 solves to get the crawling hand back before the buff to the drop rate and increase in spawn points.

I would love to see a chance for a random rare spawn so anyone flying by would have a shot at it, while at the same time giving a path to the committed. If it takes on average x hours to get a pet, make the token path be 2x or 3x or whatever. There would still be the thrill of getting it instantly but also giving us a timetable knowing that we will get it. That way we may even take longer to get the pet but the process will be much less frustrating and boring.That way blizz gets more of our time and we get our pets!

The whole CRZ is still a mystery to me as to why they implemented it. Easier access to rares is the only plus to a low pop server and now they removed that. I wish we could toggle off CRZ so if we wanted more people to interact with, we would have that option. My biggest fear is that I'll finally target a miniferal and get ganked during the fight and lose it.

[Quintessence]

My hope is that with the change to the spawning for rarer pets the spawn rate will be increased significantly. I can see people still camping and waiting for hours on end, but more frequent spawns throughout the day and not just at server restart might ease the hunt for many collectors. But that's just a hope and until we experience the new spawn timers firsthand, there's no telling how it will work out. :\

I would love to see a chance for a random rare spawn so anyone flying by would have a shot at it, while at the same time giving a path to the committed.

This is something I would really like to see too. Although for wild pets, I'm not sure how they would add another source for those that dedicate themselves long enough. A wild pet vendor? Drop from the Grand Master daily bag?

[Misstic]

After getting 1 hour and 30 min sleep today to be on for the server restart it STARED early. Dont know how early maybe by only a few minutes but sure enough ALL the Minfernals were GONE as was the Scouraged Whelplings. I think this new way will be MUCH better because one or two people wont be able to burn through the entire place looking for a damned rare of a pet that is already ledgendary to find, so tired and annoyed at this game right now!!!

[Mastr]

I set my alarm as well, but not for when it was scheduled to go back up, but when it went down. I then opened up the login screen and realm status page and had coffee and read the news for 1.5 hours. Immediately after the server went up, I logged in, grabbed one miniferal and then logged second toon and lots of scourged whelplings were still up and snagged one. Attacked a second whelpling but felt guilty about trying for a rare so I didn't get any others. Then went off to get a snowy owl.

You have to log on seconds after the server comes up. They were gone in no time. Be sure to use this trick while it still works.

Also please don't try for rares, let others have a shot. But it is your money and you can play the game anyway you want.

[Vhale]

It's not hopeless now to login and try to find a rare at random. I got all my pets this way except the giraffe calf and flayer. Granted, they are not rare versions.

[Ragingfurball]

This is something I would really like to see too. Although for wild pets, I'm not sure how they would add another source for those that dedicate themselves long enough. A wild pet vendor? Drop from the Grand Master daily bag?

A wild pet trader! Like the ink trader. ie: You can trade a number of wild, rare quality pets in order to purchase a specific pet. Such as trading in 10 rare quality pets that you have (squirrels, rabbits, Polly's, etc.) for a rare quality Snowy Owl. I would gladly trade 10 or 20 rare quality pets that I have extras of to get something I don't have the time to camp days and days for.

[Mawder]

Why can't this be hotfixed now instead of waiting until 5.1? In my view this change makes it so that you have an equal chance of finding a pet spawn any time you visit a zone. This change is good because everyone is on equal footing. Everyone can camp, only a few can wait till server reset.

PS: This is my first post, although I have posted before, those seem to have been deleted. I wish the moderator would have told my why my post got deleted. I was asking about Pet Trainer battle XP rewards.

[Bistromath]

Im happy with just camping, and waiting for rares to spwan. I have almost all battle pets as rares, and i normally just take pets and level them in that area while i wait.

I belive haveing a "pet vendor" is a bad idea, why, because you can just go get low lvl rare pets pretty fast and turn them over for a very rare pet. I camped the Snowy Owl for 3.5 hours (found 2 UC, 6 Poor, and 1 Rare) while there i leveled 6 pets from 16 to 20 while killing Snowy Owl pops, and normal pops.

The only 2 pets i have a problem with are like most others the Infernal, but i also hate the Giraffe Calf. I have Uncommons of both. I just would hate to see people walking around with very hard to get pets casue the traded it at a vendor or got it from the pet supply bag.

[Quintessence]

PS: This is my first post, although I have posted before, those seem to have been deleted. I wish the moderator would have told my why my post got deleted. I was asking about Pet Trainer battle XP rewards.

Off topic, but you can still find your post here. It probably got bumped off the first page of that particular section of the forums. You can always try doing a search for your post if you can't find it.

[Mawder]

When I visited http://www.warcraftpets.com/account/comments/Mawder/ it has 0 comments so I thought that was the way to see my comments.

PS: This is my first post, although I have posted before, those seem to have been deleted. I wish the moderator would have told my why my post got deleted. I was asking about Pet Trainer battle XP rewards.

Off topic, but you can still find your post here. It probably got bumped off the first page of that particular section of the forums. You can always try doing a search for your post if you can't find it.