Is that a maggot in your pocket or are you just happy to see me? Mr. Grubbs & Fiona's Lucky Charm

I knew it. You are just happy to see that Alto's back. Well, maybe not full time yet, but trying to get one post out to you a week. We can try to at least.....

Last night, I was actually able to log in and play WoW. Not just a 10 minute auction post, but actually play the game. And where did I go? Crusader farm, of course! Well, kinda....




I was taking a leisurely ride on my chopper (and checking the view of the world) when I nearly ran into Fiona's Caravan, right between Eastern and Western Plaguelands. Not ever noticing this here before, I thought a "wowhead" search was in order....

The search tells me that she gives a "buff" that allows you to get a pet (after a few quests and a grind).  Fiona's Lucky Charm; it will give an extra silver'ish per mob, some gunk (errr....junk), and a chance at a pet, a little tiny maggot named Mr. Grubbs..

No, you can't sell him and make a shitton of gold, but you can have him follow you and it will help you on your way if you are a pet collector....and it only took a few quick quests (say that ten times fast) to get the buff, then after about 40 kills (all done in around 30 minutes- from first seeing her to getting the pet to drop) and looting of the Hidden Stash, I got my little yellow maggot. Ten bags later, he showed his little rotten face....I can only imagine if WoW was scratch and sniff (I am sure he would be a pungent little bug), I gots' me a couple of the little guy. Too bad they are BoP.....


Now, it's your turn. You heard me talk about getting crabs, now we got us a maggot. What is blizz gonna think of next? I guess it's only fitting that Fiona's Apple would spit out a maggot, she did look a little "grubby" in that video....

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Alto's Got Himself Crabs?! One Stop Pet Shop for Warcraft Pets!

Well, I shouldn't say "crabs", as I have only one.... This post is going to cover a great website with all the info you need to know about pets in WoW, for money or for Achievements. Although some may know about this site, those that don'e really need to check them out. This week, I will also be covering a great spot to find mounts as well....so keep an eye out! Now, back to what you came for.....

With my luck lately farming up the Formula: Crusader, I went to Terrokar Forest to fish up a PITA (pain in the ass) that has plagued me for some time. The dreaded and infamous Mr. Pinchy.

Five Highland Mixed Pools later, I got him. Now I didn't factor in back in BC how many times I tried fishing him up (probably in the mid to upper 500 times), but if you are feeling lucky, and want to check it out, let's roll. Not sure if there was a change to the droprate since 4.1.0, or if there was just a hotfix to Alto's droprates, but either way, it just seemed a bit too easy....

Fly to Terokkar Forest, there is a little spot in the lower right side of the map labeled "Terokk's Rest" (you can see the coords above, 67.8, 79.7). There are around 10'ish pools that spawn there, and basically when you start at one side, just hit the circle and by the time you get em all, the first ones are starting to respawn.

So after my tremendous luck there, I went to an old website that I used to venture to search a bit. The site that I am hitting on is WarcraftPets. The absolute only location you need for any pet in the wonderful game of WoW. Now what I mean by "any pet", is just....well.....see for yourself. In the pic below, there is a great search tab if you want to resell, farm, search by dropped, quested, or Blizz bought. Faction search? Yeah, it's there. Rarity? That too. They have em all, big and small.

Ok, ok. You don't want an ugly pet. I feel your pain. You want to see what is available.

Well, the folks at WarcraftPets got you covered...there is a "new" pet page that you can venture to. Wondering what "popped" in 4.1?  The Screenie to the left is the 4.1 page, and with a bit of searching there, you can see the same thing.

Now the last time I saw this site, it was nothing like it is now. Very easy to use, very easy to find great info on what you are looking for.


They even have added an addon section for anything from PetsPlus to BunnyHunter (which shows you how many times you looted "X" mob to get your drop- it's kinda like looking at your /played on your main....scary).

Instead of a "BoW WoW" post, I am going through some of my favorites lists this week and sharing with you some great websites that cover some great schtuff. Like I mentioned above, I will cover another favorite site of mine for mount hunting later this week. Now go getcha Crabs already!

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Speaking of Hacked Accounts and "Inbred Pets"

This morning, I woke up to a scary sight. My account had been hacked. I was not able to log in. Freaking out, thinking about loosing around 1 mil gold on one server (along with about 400K in banked goods), and about 400K on another server, this is an extremely bad situation to be in.. All the work that I have invested over the years (not even looking at all the cash I tossed them per month), I now have a dead account. I am sure you have read around the blogosphere on a few hacked accounts over the last week, and now you are reading one more.....


Then I woke up. Really. It was all a bad dream (or nightmare). A dream that I didn't want to come true....So hopped outta bed, turned on the coffee pot, and went to the Droid App Store. I downloaded Blizzards Moblie Authenticator. I set it up (very simple instructions, even I was able to figure it out, so it is completely idiot proof). You download the app, then it refers you to battle.net, you punch in a code, it sends it to your email, you click the link, and you are now Authenticated. Ahhh. Relaxation. Too bad I now have two cups of coffee in me, so I can't get back to bed....mmmm....the goodness of caffeine...

If you have hesitated on doing this, I would not wait a minute more. Most App style phones (Droid- iPhone) have this style of hookup, and it literally took me 5 minutes start to finish.

Now this might just be me, but upon logging in to WoW (only about 15 minutes later), I saw this in my mailbox.

Let's weigh this quick. I just secured my account, made it "literally" hack free, gave me a bit more confidence in Blizzard wanting to help me from the "hackers", and they give me a pet for notta?

I think it was a good decision. Are you authenticated? I hope that you have taken the plunge, and if not, I hope this post confirmed not just the ease of it (and on top of it, you don't have to wait for the keychain in the mail).



*Edit- I do want to add to be aware of what Authenticator you add, make sure it is blizzard...Now for Droid there is only one available, but I can forsee in the future (using my crystal ball) that sooner or later the scammers will find a way to have you download apps to snatch your account information. Only use the Blizzard one, with true blizzard logo's, or you can even go directly to the blizz site (battle.net) to their page to get the download from them.

Now before you say:

 "I am too safe. I watch what I download, what sites I visit, etc, etc, etc."

There are alot of folks that get hacked, for reasons unbeknownst (is that even a word? I dunno, but it sounds cool) to me. Basically, if you have ever used your email (that is linked to your wow account) for ANYTHING, you have a chance to get hit.

That isn't your comment? How about this one:

"I am smart. I have a seperate email that I do not use for anything else linked to my WoW account."

Do me a favor quick. Log into that account. If it's MSN, your email is out there. If it's Yahoo, it's out there. If it's gmail or googlemail, it's out there. If you got an email from "admin at XXXX", your email is on a list somewhere. Not trying to freak you out, but just get an authenticator. For your safety.

Do you utilize this free option from Blizz?

If not, did I convince you to do so?

Since that is done, I can update you on tomorrows post: I am working on a multi post "post" on readers emails.

Now don't take this the wrong way, as I don't want you to hesitate to email me, but please limit your questions to one per email, and if you are looking for a "how do I make money on my server, I have a 525 XXX, and a 520 XXX, and I do XXX right now" answer, please use my coaching program for those (there is a small fee for this).

As you know by now, I love to help out, but those questions are better off solved in person, and on your server (and are very time consuming....and at times, quite complicated) and that is why I refer you to the program (not because I am being a dick, I am sure you understand).

I am thinking about offering a free session to my readers, what do you all think on that? Would you be interested in a "free" one on one with Alto?

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Only Two Days Left! Get Your Achievement and Pet!

Love is in the Air, one of Blizzard's Hallmark Holidays, is nearing an end. For all you Achievement hounds and pet collectors, do not forget to pick up the little flying goblin, better known as Kwee Q. Peddlefeet.

All you need to get him is 40 Love Tokens (which are easy to get, it's a few dailies but since we are short on time, you have to go the farming route). Now if you don't mess with this event, here's a quick explaination:

Go to a Main Hub city for your faction, and you gotta get a Lovely Charm Collector's Kit to loot the charms from mobs.

10 Lovely Charms= 1 Lovely Charm Bracelet

*lovely charms can be "auto looted" from and mob that is "green" or above to you. In other words, if it gives experience or not. Obviously 85's don't need xp, but you can smash 80 and above to get em. It seems from my luck, plan on every two mobs for one charm.

1 Lovely Charm Bracelet= 1 Love Token

These can be converted at the same vendor that you purchase the pet from. Ok, now when you convert, save one Lovely Charm Bracelet to turn in, as there is a quest next to the vendor, depending where you are, it starts with "A Gift for a/the"...... and that turnin will give you 5 Love tokens (which will save time).

There are a few good places to do this (alot of folks hit Icecrown), but anywhere you choose to farm, the quicker the spawnrate the better.

Also take into consideration that you want mobs that actually have something worthwhile to loot (but....there's always a but, isn't there?.....you don't need to loot to get them, as they magically show up in your bags).






I recommend my previous posted about farming spot (here) as you might as well make it worth your while, I pulled 74 in an hour, not the greatest, but you will make quite a bank of gold there, and don't forget to pop a Potion while you are doing it....

So anyways, this guy is really not a "pet", more of a floating goblin. Nothing special, but hey, it's another to add to the masses, right?

Remember, you only have a few days left, so you better get to gettin'!


*Yeah, this obviously isn't a post gearing toward making gold, but like yesterday's post, some times you just need to take a break from the same ol' same ol. Amirite?

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A Reflection on Gold Gone By....

For three months now I have talked about making gold. I wanted to make a post on spending it, and give you all an insight into how I got where I am today. Some folks get in the gold game because they want to buy BoE gear. Some folks are pet collectors. Some enjoy buying mounts. Some just want gold to hit the cap. I just wanted the ability to buy everything. Yeah, everything.....

*a cloud of dust appears around my head as I relive days of old....bear with me...

What got me into the gold game was not being able to have money when I wanted it. Scratch that. Needed it. Back in Vanilla, as I was leveling, I was around level 50'ish. I wanted (ok, needed) some blue gear outta the AH and could not afford it (sound familiar?). So I started farming. 

While farming Un'Goro Crater (for mining nodes and the skins of Dino's there), this cat whispered me wondering what I was doing there (he mentioned that he was amazed that I could do that at my level). After talking to him a bit, we got to be "in game" buddies. A few days later, I recieved a tell from him "i gotta get you to 60. Now". They needed a rogue for their raids, as the main DPS just quit playing. To make a long story short, he helped me level through to "cap" and start raiding. The issue I had was that I was undergeared. After quite a few runs in Blackrock Spire, I was powered enough to become a part of the "team".  Next thing I know, I am raiding three nights a week, 6-8 hours at a time.....

The main issue that I had was getting pots and food for the raids. It was at this time that I got into the gold game. Back then, there was little in the area of addons for goldmakers (that I knew of). So I did my homework, and started flipping items. Then flipping vendor items. I started rocking, as I was good at it. So while others were farming herbs for the raid pots, I was playing the AH and farming mobs.

After starting on AQ 40, there was a falling out in the guild. Half the folks left to start their own on another server, and out of the other half, a few quit, and a few stayed. At the time, I was involved with work, and was in the midst of a hiatus from the game. I didn't find this out until returning around two months later....The game started to get stagnant. But I then realized. I enjoyed the AH, and enjoyed the "solo" game.

I have to say, as a rogue, I had quite a few options...(a big one was for the crusader enchant, as that was a quick 300g in the AH. I had another that was to stealth in BRD for fiery enchant. Lord Incendius "stealth run" for the Ace of Elementals was another nice one...) Basically, I found out how to play alone. In a game that really isn't based on solo (at the time). Fast forward....not really sure, but I think around 10K was my worth nearing the end of vanilla.

BC was a blast. Once I was leveled, Hellfire Ramparts and Coilfang had a few chests that I could pick solo and get hella blues. Well, if you didn't count the lockout on 5 resets per hour....

Then there was farming the rare mobs for their respective drops. Another fun time. Once again, not 100% positive, but I know I was six digits going into......

Wrath. Well, I took quite a bit of time away from the game during this period, I think I played the first few weeks to a month, then off and on throughout. This was when the AH game took front and center, and became my priority. Receiving many a Glyphmas presents in my mailbox, selling the bullets and arrows for hella profit (no, I wasn't one of the hundred stack scammers, but I had stockpiled even back then on the mats, and had a bud make me a ton of them, for HUGE profits, as he was first one that had them on the server, and I offered him half my profits if he didn't make them for anyone else but me. Good deal. Really good deal..... =)

So now back to my first paragraph of this post. For some reason, I got rambling a bit, and kinda enjoyed reliving my "life" on WoW, thanks for listening...(if you are still reading).

Back to topic. I have a horrible habit of buying the "new, never seen" items that blizz tosses out to us. Now I am not talking about loot cards, that is different in my eyes. My addiction has always been the new "gold sinks" that blizzard releases to us:

Vanilla had the BoE drops from MC/ZG and the amazingly powerful "Twisting Never" (I mean nether)

BC added Haris Pilton Bags- Along with a premium to fly

Wrath Added Travelers Tundra Mammoth, Mechano Hogs-  and "cold weather" flight

Cata Introduced the Vial of the Sands- With a premium to fly once again

Did you fall into any of these traps? Or maybe the Kirin Tor rings? Or .......?

Now I am expecting to hear about your "gold sinks", as I can't imagine you haven't bought anything "fun". So lemme know!

*And for the record; please, please don't say Mysterious Fortune Cards . =)

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