Friday, August 25, 2017

Collecting Non-Wild Argus Pets In Patch 7.3

Here are the non-wild pets from Argus in 7.3 and how to collect them.

Note that zones are time-gated/locked behind quest progress. At the time of this writing, zone progression is expected to be the following:

  • Week 1 - Krokuun and Antoran Wastes
  • Week 2 - Mac'Aree

Certain Argus pets (wild and non-wild) will be unavailable until players unlock the zone the pets reside in.

Here are the non-wild battles pets in a rough/tentative order in which collectors will likely have access. Major credit goes to @patf0rd for discovering/helping figure out how to collect these pets on 7.3 PTR.


Krokuun

Docile Skyfin and Fel-Afflicted Skyfin - 1 in 6 drop from Fel-Spotted Egg
The egg has a chance to drop from Panthara rare elites on Argus.
In addition to these 2 pets, there's a chance of looting 4 mounts from the hatched egg.

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Antoran Wastes

Cross Gazer - "Quest" turn-in to Orix the All-Seer
You'll find this NPC in a cave under the eastern-most portion of the main bridge that crosses the fel-lakes on Antoran Wastes. Orix will have multiple quests that you can turn in to receive rewards, and the Cross Gazer pet is one of those rewards.

To complete Orix's quests, however, you need to collect Intact Demon Eyes. So it's a quest...but it's kind of like a purchasing from a vendor.

The only way to collect Demon Eyes is to get a buff called Agent of the All-Seer. You can get this buff by finding and click on objects called All-Seer's Focus, located throughout the zone. There are also two items you can receive as rewards from Orix that will also give you this buff, All-Seer's Draught and Gift of the All-Seer. They cost Demon Eyes though.

Collect 1,000 Demon Eyes for the quest A Pile of Intact Demon Eyes and you'll have your pet!

Tip: Save 200 Demon Eyes and spend them on Gift of the All-Seer first. This item is not consumed on use, so you'll have a renewable source of the buff to collect more Demon Eyes.

Rebellious Imp - Drop from Mother Rosula
Location of this rare elite is northeastern Antoran Wastes, inside a cave, past 2 Imp others in their fel pools. She is not always spawned. Respawn timer is unknown. She can sometimes be the objective of a World Quest.

You will see her "rare" status on the minimap (a golden star), however you won't be able to target or interact with her.

To spawn Mother Rosula, you first need to collect 100 Imp Meat from the imps inside the cave. Combine the 100 pieces to create a Disgusting Feast, which can then be used to summon her.

The pet is not a 100% drop rate.

Uuna - Drops from The Many-Faced Devourer
First you'll need to obtain Call of the Devourer (likely a zone-wide drop), and then collect Ur'zul Bone, Imp Bone, Fiend Bone from objects on the ground.
  • Imp Bone - (65.89 19.42) Located in the Den of Fiends (same cavern system as Mother Rosula) in northeastern Antoran Wastes. The bone can be found on the ground in front of the second imp mother's pool of fel.
  • Ur'zul Bone - (50.39 56.15) Located next to an alter and a large bone spine protruding from the ground at Collector's Hovel, northwest of the Felfire Armory.
  • Fiend Bone - (52.37 35.33) Located behind a small pool of fel at Scavengerss Boneyard, south of The Spirit Crucible.
After obtaining all 4 items, head southeast of Scavenger's Boneyard. You'll find a marked spot on a pile of bones that you can interact with. Combine the 4 items to create a Bone Effigy and spawn the rare elite.

The pet is not a 100% drop rate.

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Mac'Aree

Grasping Manifestation - Drops from Ataxon
Location of this rare elite is east of Shadowguard Incursion (the pavilion icon on the ledge in the purple area of the map). It is not always spawned. Respawn timer is unknown. It can sometimes be the objective of a World Quest.

The pet is not a 100% drop rate.

Thursday, August 10, 2017

7.3 PTR: Time-Gated Pets of Argus

UPDATE: Blizzard has clarified the time-gated Argus progression timeline.
“Week 1” is currently active on the PTR. This includes the first two story chapters and their related unlocks, including World Quests in the first two Argus areas.
“Week 2” will activate tomorrow, August 16. This includes the next couple chapters of the story, access to the third Argus area, and Invasion Points
“Week 3” will activate Friday, August 18. This includes the remaining story chapters and the rest of 7.3’s non-raid content, such as the Seat of the Triumvirate dungeon and access to the Netherlight Crucible.

This would mean the following Argus-dropped pets will be available in the following order:
  • Week 1 of 7.3 - Docile Skyfin, Fel-Afflicted Skyfin, Rebellious Imp, Cross Gazer, Uuna
  • Week 3 2 of 7.3 - Grasping Manifestation
  • Unknown - Cross Gazer (possibly week 1) and Uuna

Edit: Thanks again to @patf0rd for helping confirm whether or not Ataxon is available as a rare spawn even without Western Mac'Aree quests unlocked.

Edit #2: Per Gamescom 7.3 preview, they might have changed the zone order? Instead of Krokuun to Antoran Wastes to Mac'Aree, they're now saying Krokuun to Mac'Aree to Antoran Wastes.

If the latter is the case, this changes the order of which non-wild Argus pets we'll have access to:
  • Week 1 - Docile Skyfin, Fel-Afflicted Skyfin, Grasping Manifestation
  • Week 2 - Rebellious Imp, Cross Gazer, Uuna

If this is not the case and the progression will be as initially announced (Krokuun >> Antoran Wastes >> Mac'Aree):
  • Week 1 - Docile Skyfin, Fel-Afflicted Skyfin, Rebellious Imp, Cross Gazer, Uuna
  • Week 2 - Grasping Manifestation

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UPDATE #2: New information has confirmed that Cross Gazer will likely be available week 1 (unlock Antoran Wastes). Thanks to @patf0rd for helping unravel the mystery of Cross Gazer!

Players must get a buff called Agent of the All-Seer to loot Intact Demon Eyes. This buff can be obtained by either clicking on All-Seer's Focus located throughout Antoran Wastes, or by using items (All-Seer's Draught and Gift of the All-Seer) rewarded for turning in Intact Demon Eyes.

These Intact Eyes can be turned into Orix the All-Seer, located in a cave under the very eastern part of the Antoran Wastes bridge that spans over the fel pools. Turn in 1k Intact Eyes and you'll have your Cross Gazer pet!

It's unknown if there are any pre-requisites (other than unlocking the Antoran Wastes zone) for Orix's quests.

****

Also thanks to @patf0rd, we have some clarification on Uuna and The Many-Faced Devourer rare elite. This companion will likely be available during week 1 (unlock Antoran Wastes).

Obtain a Call of the Devourer (likely a zone-wide drop), and then collect Ur'zul Bone, Imp Bone, Fiend Bone from specific types of mobs objects on the ground. Combine them to create a Bone Effigy. Using this resulting item will spawn the rare elite.

It's unknown if Uuna is a 100% drop rate or not. It's also unknown if there are any pre-requisites for looting these items. Uuna is not 100% drop rate off of the rare elite. Thanks yet again to @patf0rd for figuring out how to collect this companion!

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Note: See above UPDATES above for information on which pets will be time-gated. The NPCs that have a chance to drop the pets CAN spawn as normal rare elites (not part of a WQ). It's unknown if the pets will only drop when the NPCs are up as rare elites or if they will also drop when they are spawned as WQs.

I've been doing some Argus testing on the 7.3 PTR, and noticed something interesting that might be important for pet collectors.

TLDR; a few Argus pets that drop off of rares might be locked behind quest progression, which will be time-gated (over the course of a few weeks) for everyone.

Initially, rares and rare elites behaved similarly to most WoD spawns. Consistent spawning with a "once per day, per character" type of mechanic. In the most recent PTR build, however, this seems to have changed. For a few NPCs, at least.

This is only my own speculation, but there seems to be a couple of different types of 'rares' on Argus. World Quest rares (think Demidos and Orumo the Observer, only drops loot when their quest area is active) and normal rare spawns (once per day, per character types).

After this week's PTR patch, one rarespawn (Ataxon) suddenly seemed to changes its behavior. Prior to the patch, it was up every day and marked as a rare (giant gold star) on your minimap, and it also dropped loot. Post-patch and although Ataxon was spawned for me, it was not flagged as a rare and killing it yielded no loot at all.

I did some research on Wowhead and it turns out Ataxon (plus another rare that drops a pet) is likely tied to Argus World Quests. This might mean they will only have loot for you during their active WQ (similar to Demidos and Orumo).


On the other hand, Naroua appears to have two IDs for the same NPC. One for the rare that's spawned all of the time (thanks to @patf0rd for confirming), and one for the rare that's the objective of a WQ. The other two NPCs only seem to have one ID (for their WQ).

So what does this mean for pet collectors? If the two rares are only available for loot when their WQ is active, the pets that drop off these two NPCs will be gated by quest progression. To unlock WQs for certain regions of each Argus zone, you need to complete specific portions of the Argus story.

For Mother Rosula WQ - complete quest The Burning Heart
I believe this takes place toward the end of the quest chain at Krokuun, and during transition to the next zone, Antoran Wastes.
For Ataxon WQ - complete quest Seat of the Triumvirate: The Crest of Knowledge
Mac'Aree seems to be the final zone you'll head to, so this quest chain will take longer to access. There's an earlier quest, Sigil of Awakening, that unlocks Mac'Aree WQs in general, however I've completed that and Ataxon was still not available for me. This leads me to believe that you need to complete the quest that specifically awards Western Mac'Aree WQs (this is where the NPC is located).

During the recent Developer Q&A with Ion Hazzikostas, it was clarified that the Argus story will follow a time-gated model.

From Wowhead liveblog of the Q&A: Argus should have lots of stuff to do -- it has 5 chapters and you'll have lots of stuff to do. The second week, you'll unlock invasion points and the second zone. After the second week, you'll unlock the Netherlight Crucible and the dungeon, the Seat of the Triumvirate.

The noted rares above, if they are indeed tied to WQs, will depend on your own quest progression and time-gating. Pet collectors will probably be unable to jump right in and collect these specific pets. But I should mention that there are MANY other pets that will be readily available for collecting in 7.3. Pet collectors won't be without anything to do. ;)

Anyway, this is still the PTR so the above is all subject to change. These are just my initial observations and speculation - ones that I wanted to share with the community as early as possible to try and stem confusion. I know how frustrating it can be to feel unsure of what's "supposed" to happen and if you're doing something "wrong", especially in Legion where gating/time-gating is noticeably prevalent.

Last but not least, a couple other quests/NPCs that also drop pets but I've found no information/details on:

  • (World?) Quest - A Pile of Intact Demon Eyes (see Update #2 at the top of this post!)
  • drops Cross Gazer
    Area/zone? At what point in the quest chain is this available?
  • NPC - The Many-Faced Devourer (see Update #2 at the top of this post!)
  • drops Uuna
    Area/zone? Tied to a WQ? Or spawned consistently with a once per day, per character loot mechanic? At what point in the quest chain is it available?

If you have any information on these two, or any corrections/clarifications on any of the above, please let me know!

Monday, August 7, 2017

7.3 PTR - Argus Wild Pet Colors

I couldn't wait for the new wild pets found on Argus in 7.3, so I did some testing on the PTR. It turns out that 4 out of the 12 new wild pets will come in at least two colors. If there are other wild pets that come in various skins, I haven't seen them yet -- please let me know!


Antoran Bile Larva (Antoran Wastes) - comes in green and red



Bile Larva (Krokuun) - comes in green and purple



Pygmy Marsuul (Mac'Aree) - comes in blue and yellow-green



Skyfin Juvenile (Mac'Aree) - comes in blue-orange and orange-white


The two larva pets share the same coloring (green), so if you're looking to collect all available colors you'll only need to collect two of one and then the remaining color of the other larva pet. Or you can collect two each - to each their own! I believe these pets do come in at least a few different breeds... all the more reason to collect more? ;P

Personally, my favorite out of the four is the Skyfin Juvenile. Such a neat looking pet in such vibrant colors!

I'm SO looking forward to collecting all of the Argus wild pets in 7.3! While I enjoy making sure my collection is complete with all possible pet colors, I'm a little glad that there's only a few that have different skins. Otherwise I think my Pet Journal would overflow hehe.

It's a bit surprising that there's no 'Argus Safari' (collect all wild pets of Argus) achievement, but that's ok. There's plenty of pet content coming already. ^^;

Wednesday, August 2, 2017

Twilight Now Available From Blizzard Store

Yesterday it was discovered that a new mount and pet would be coming in the near future, however it wasn't clear when they would be available.

Spoilers: The answer is today, they're both available from the Blizzard Store today!


Twilight is a new little kitten using a similar (but tinier and cuter) appearance to the new Argus felines (example: Darkfang).

She changes colors - blue (I believe this is her default), purple, and yellow. This adorable new kitty also enjoys sitting on your lap (target and emote /sit), dancing with you (target and /dance), and climbing onto the Pilfered Sweeper!


The pet and mount combo costs $30, and Twilight by herself costs $10.

I absolutely didn't expect Twilight today. A future promotional pet of some sort, yes. But color me completely surprised at how soon she was released. We only just had a preview yesterday! What a pleasant surprise it is, though. :)

Tuesday, August 1, 2017

7.3 PTR - Argus Pet Battle Content

UPDATE: Developer Jeremy Feasel has pointed out that the Crysa and Environeer Bert encounters are using some new tech on the PTR. Their pets will scale down to match the highest level pet on your team! :O


The quality of the trainer pets do not change, however the abilities they have available to them does change depending on their scaled level.

Some really interesting stuff here! If this initial trial goes well, I wonder if we can expect to see this tech deployed to all trainer battles? It might make getting into Pet Battlers much easier for newer players.

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Gigantic pet update in today's PTR build. Will update with more detailed information once I'm able to go through it all.

Summary:
  • New achievements (Family Familiar-style but for Argus)
  • 23 new pets, 12 of which are wild from Argus

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New achievements break down:

Unlike Family Familiar which only requires 12 out of the total number of trainers, it sounds like each achievement under Family Fighter requires defeating all 18 of the following Argus Pet Battle World Quests/pet NPCs:
  • Baneglow
  • Bloat
  • Bucky
  • Corrupted Blood of Argus
  • Deathscreech
  • Earseeker
  • Foulclaw
  • Gloamwing
  • Gnasher
  • Mar'cuus
  • Minixis
  • One-of-Many
  • Pilfer
  • Retch
  • Ruinhoof
  • Shadeflicker
  • Snozz
  • Watcher

UPDATE: According to developer Jeremy Feasel, all 18 pet NPCs will be spawned indefinitely and can be battled even if their World Quest isn't active. Hooray!

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New pets break down: Wowhead has a list with images of the new pets here, plus an early preview of a datamined pet, Twilight Kitten.

A text version of all datamined 7.3 pets can be found here.
  • Wild pets: 12 (Argus)
  • Drops: 5
  • Quest reward: 1
  • Achievement reward: 1
  • In-game holiday event: 1 (Winter Veil)
  • Vendor: 1
  • Unknown: 2

Twilight Kitten, which is not listed in the Pet Journal currently, also falls under "unknown". However, @perculia has stated that the datamined info says it will be from the in-game Blizzard shop.
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