I’m sorry that I haven’t been blogging at all lately. The officers have made the decision to stop raiding until the expansion, and things have just been slow. I have been sleeping more. I found time to grind out the honour for my 40k PVP trinket. We’ve been dropping in on Onyxia, AQ20, and ZG when we’ve had the people online (we tried AQ40 last night, and that first boss would have been completely doable with ten people if it hadn’t been for all of those mind controls!).
I guess I can’t complain, I was getting pretty burned out. There are some who have left to raid with other guilds until the expansion hits, but I think I’ll just hang out here, shooting shit, PVPing, and raiding old stuff.
One of the things I have been thinking about lately is getting ready for the expansion. In terms of consumables and gold, I think I’m okay. All of the stuff we can farm now is going to be pretty obsolete in the expansion (except for Void Crystals, apparently!), and Pookies has always been very low maintenance on the gold side of things.
My focus has turned to seeing what achievements I can knock out before the expansion hits. There are the “just hanker down and do ‘em” achievements, such as exploring the entire map. I’ve been looking at which factions I can grind to exalted to without too much outside help. And, with Brewfest upon us, there is the Brewmaster achievement.
Now, there are some achievements that can not be completed until next year’s Brewfest, after achievements have been added to the game. However, there are also a couple of achievements that you can get ready for NOW so that you knock the achievements out immediately when they are released or free up some tokens during next year’s Brewfest.
There is an overall achievement (as there is for every world event) called Brewmaster. This achievement includes eight sub-achievements that involve Brewfest.
- Strange Brew requires you to sample different brews available for purchase during the festival. Due to the duration on these items, you will have to wait until next year to complete this one.
- The Brewfest Diet is similar to Strange Brew, but involves food instead of booze. Brewfest food items carry the same duration as the brews do, unfortunately.
- Brew of the Year involves joining the Brew of the Month Club. The membership is available from the Brewfest vendor for 200 tokens. You won’t actually be able to complete this achievement until you sample the last brew in August of 2009, however, purchasing the club membership this year will allow you to complete the achievement before next year’s brewfest. Please keep this in mind: once a new brew is introduced, it becomes available for purchase (presumably only to BotM Club members) from a BotM Club vendor in IF. This means that even though you will most likely not receive retroactive credit for trying brews before patch 3.0 is released, at that time you may go to the BotM Club vendor and purchase any brews that have been released in the past! (At least … I think that’s how it should work, the people commenting on this achievement on Wowhead seem to be thoroughly confused.)
- Drunken Stupor and Down With The Dark Iron should not be able to be completed until next year, as both require you to complete the achievement during Brewfest (and there is no way, in my mind, for WoW to track whether or not you’ve completed the One Time When I Was Drunk … quest prior to the release of achievements).
- Direbrewfest and Does Your Wolpertinger Linger? should be easily completed retroactively so long as you keep a drop from Coren Direbrew and your item for summoning your Wolpertinger in your inventory or bank until achievements can be completed.
- Disturbing the Peace is an achievement not like the rest. Although there is no way you will be able to complete the achievement until next year (as it involves dancing in Dalaran), you can start preparing for it this year by buying three pieces of Brewfest clothing. Then, next year all you have to do is get drunk and dance on the streets of Dalaran to wrap this one up.
So between the BotM Club membership and the three pieces of Brewfest clothing, you’re looking to spend 550 tokens this year if you want to do everything you can in order to prepare for the Brewmaster achievement.
If you haven’t done a single Brewfest quest yet, don’t despair: if you start today, you can still get 550 tokens before the end of the festival! You’d have to pull off a couple of perfect keg runs, but you could obtain a total of 565 tokens (by my quick and possibly inaccurate count) between today and the end of the festival if you don’t miss a single quest. (Head on over to Wowhead for a detailed post on Brewfest 2008.)
Pookies Is Not A Bear 