Tobold's Blog
Wednesday, September 27, 2006
 
Need epic mount

I've been saving up money for some time now with my Horde characters, and got over 1000 gold, because I'm afraid that the flying mounts from the Burning Crusade will cost a lot. The idea was to skip the epic mount, because moving at 200% speed instead at 160% speed isn't worth that much money, and I would rather have gone straight from normal mount to flying mount. Unfortunately Blizzard didn't want to allow that.

Patch 1.12.1, which was introduced this week, changes the system how riding works. Mounts, normal and epic ones, are now very cheap 10 gold and 100 gold respectively, minus 10% for being honored and another minus 10% for having sergeant rank. But to ride a normal mount you now need apprentice skill in riding (75), which costs 90 gold to learn. And to ride an epic mount you need journeyman skill (150) in riding, which costs 900 gold to learn. It seems bloody obvious that riding a flying mount will need expert skill (225) in riding, and cost even more. Plus you can't get the riding skill for flying mounts without having bought the riding skill for epic mounts. You need to learn epic mount riding now, and as the actual epic mount is then comparatively cheap, you can't save much money by not buying it.

I'm sure the gold sellers of World of Warcraft are dancing in the street for joy. As the flying mount isn't "optional" like the epic mount used to be, and you now need to learn riding the epic mount before getting the flying mount, every level 70 player needs to spend a huge amount of cash. Some will farm that for themselves, the others will pay somebody to farm for them. And Blizzard does everything to encourage this farming by bad game design.
Comments:
<---- Too poor for epic.
 
If you get a rare/pvp/quest mount, you automagically get the skill to ride it, as of today. However, despite looking, I did not see if that is true going forward. i.e. if my ever-poor Priest wins the Baron's mount, will I get epic level riding automatically? I have ~300g currently, and every bit of that is being allotted for a +healing enchant and not a pony.

I didn't realize you couldn't skip either. I had, and still have, zero plans to get an epic mount. I don't have the time nor desire to farm gold for it. I'd planned on doing the quest series at 70, and then figuring out what I was going to do.
 
Well, unless you plan to only move fast in the outland, you would need an epic mount anyway.

Flying mounts can only be used in the outland, and alot of the new content is in Azeroth.
 
Well, whoopiedoo...

I was playing with the idea of returning to Azeroth after the expansion, but if it requires a lot of grinding to even have a chance of getting around in Outland...

Meh.

I also wonder what this will do, in the long run, to the player base of WoW. I mean, raid dungeons are one thing, but entire zones not being accessible without a hideous amount of grinding or buying RMT gold?

If so, meh again and screw the responsible designers and the kodos they rode in on...
 
Tobold,
Long time reader, first time poster. Great blog! Now, with the pleasantries out of the way, let me comment by saying that Blizzard's mount scheme is perhaps the dumbest thing I've heard of yet.

I'm very much a casual gamer (no raids) and have long lamented the lack of non-raiding, non-grinding end game content. I was greatly looking forward to the BC expansion. Now, it seems, it too will be a grind fest for coin to get the flying mount.

I think Blizzard's plan to limit flying mounts to the Outlands is asinine anyway. For the price, we should be able to fly that sucker from continent to continent. Hell, that baby ought to work in EQ2, DAoC, and Super Tecmo Bowl to boot!

Anyway, thanks for the great blog. Keep up the good work.

Cayman
 
Hmm... This aspect of mount system change didn't occur to me. it would be extremly stupid and strange of Blizzard to have it work as Tobold assumes. Espceially when they have clearly and repeatedly said getting flying mounts will be easy, and I findy it hardy to imagine 1000g will be to lvl 70 what 100g is to a lvl 60.

Of course i don't need to worry since I play a druid - the class with a flight form at lvl 68. (now, if only i will get some balance or feral gear... )
 
Er...I havent been playing for a week and probably won't be on for another month or so. Can someone really fill me in on the Epic mount situation? I bought myself an Epic Mount a couple of weeks ago...does this mean I now cannot ride it until I pay 900g to become a Journeyman Rider? That's 100g more than what my Epic Mount cost me.

Excuse my french, but, WTF???
 
@anonymous:
It appears they're addressing the issue with people who had their mounts before the patch: see official forum
 
If you already had an epic mount before the patch, you should have gotten the appropriate riding skill for free with the patch. There were a few cases where that didn't work (e.g. people who already bought their epic at level 59, and you need level 60 for the riding skill), but it seems Blizzard is trying to sort that mess out.

I still assume that you will need 225 riding skill for the flying mount. Even if the training to 225 just costs 300 gold like James suggests, you still need a total of 1200 gold to get from level 40 mount to flying mount. Of course it is likely that at level 70 you will earn gold a bit faster than at level 60, but it is still a high sum.

You can only buy the flying mount at level 70, which means that all the "casual" Burning Crusade content for leveling to 70 will be accessible without that mount. I don't know what exactly will be on the part of Outland that you can only reach by flying, but I guess it will be a mix of level 70 soloing and raid content, kind of a "new Silithus". As long as you just solo, you can probably live without it. If you are in a raiding guild, and if there is really a raid dungeon only accessible by flying, getting the flying mount will be something that is expected from you, just like getting an Onyxia key is expected from you now.
 
Epic mounts are expensive, but considering how much time is spent traveling in this game, well worth the gold.

I'm a cheapskate as far as virtual money is concerned but I'm still puzzled by "veteran" level 60s who haven't purchased an epic mount yet.
 
I got in tonight and I have 150 Riding Skill and my Epic Mount. Cool. Glad I didn't get screwed over by the patch like some people are claiming.
 
From everything that I have read about BC you will need the flying mount to reach some dungeons and they will also be required IN some of the dungeons to reach the next "area" of the instances.
 
Yeah i have heard that too.. And not only to some dungeons.. But allso in some areas of outland.
 
Hmm I have a night elf hunter lvl 60. I do Naxxramas, AQ20 / AQ40, BWL, MC, ZG and I need to say, when you raid 5 days a week you earn money like hell. I got + / - 20g in one evening so that's 100g in a week. Farming in the day not included. Min the repaircost for my tier 3 set I come to 50g I earn a week for raiding. And another 50g a day for farming, doing quests and earn reputation. So that's 400g a week x 4 weeks in a month = a nice 1600g. I guess it will be easy as hell if you just spend some time at doing quests for reputation and just raid like hell.

Btw if you loot a object at lvl 60 you can sell it on a vendor for like 80s - 2g. But that are lvl 60 mobs, so if you are killing lvl 70 mobs you will earn way more gold / object you sell at AH or sell at a vendor. So guys it won't be that hard :)

Libris
 
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