Update – 06/28/11: See this post for an up to date, comprehensive look at all of the taming challenges arriving today in Patch 4.2! Also, be sure to have a look at the user-submitted screenshot gallery.
Look at this interesting bit from the latest 4.2 PTR patch notes…
- 8 new rare tamable beasts have been added, each of which provides a unique taming challenge. Will you be the first hunter to tame Deth’tilac, the rarest and most powerful of them all? Players will need to progress through the Hyjal Regrowth and Molten Front daily questing areas in order to unlock access to the full gamut of taming challenges.
Hot damn!
I can’t say I’m excited about the daily quest grind, but the unlocking of the new rare pet taming possibilities is very intriguing. I’m hoping that all of these “taming challenges” can be completed solo, or perhaps… have to be completed solo. I like the idea of implementing more feats of strength for solo players.
I have a feeling that Deth’tilac will be one o’ them fancy new lava spiders. I wonder what the others will be..?
Updated Taming Challenge Pet Info:
Here are links to my individual posts about the eight known taming challenge pets.
- Ankha: Spectral Frostsaber (white)
- Magria: Spectral Frostsaber (blue)
- Ban’thalos: Spectral Owl (green)
- Kirix: Green Lava Spider
- Solix: Orange Lava Spider
- Skitterflame: Red Lava Spider
- Anthriss: Yellow Lava Spider
- Deth’tilac: Purple Lave Spider
Update – 06/08/11:
Two new rares have just been discovered on the PTR. They are not part of the taming challenge series of pets. Neither are exotic and both of them are very bitchin.
Have a look…
Deth’tilac – Tough tame. Gotta get him below 20% (figure it out) not 2 mil. I followed behind Deth while a horde was kiting and dpsing (I really intended to help him out but …). When I saw the 20% point reached (I think around 1.75 million), I dismissed my turtle and started taming (Horde was taming too). My tame finished first and I got him. The horde burned me down ’cause I laughed at him and I let him kill me – I earned it. I spawned in front of the guy a couple more times for another laugh with Deth on passive so he could kill me a couple more times. Meanest I’ve ever been to a Horde hunter. It was sweet!
Oh and Skitterflame and Anthriss are not unqiue skins. Skitterflame (red spider) shares the same skin as Cinderweb Spinners and Anthriss (yellow) shares the same skin as Cinderweb Creepers.
Kirix shares skins with Cinderweb Broodling but as those can’t be tamed right now I guess he is still unique.
This is what I’ve seen/been told/or done on PTR and it works.
Kirix we will need to utilize our nature res aspect (as mentioned in Kirix post)and someone on PTR speculated we would need to also apply our nature damage at the start – so I figure serpent sting and snake trap? Can’t confirm that one as this is one spidy I haven’t seen tamed or tamed.
Deth’tilac is a pure solo kite tame, the trick is if he touches you, you get one shot, if you were thinking of taking a tank in or group to help this won’t work as again he one shots whomever touches him. You have to kite while slowing him right down with your stuns (traps + shots.) It takes a long time to chip away at him. Remember your distance once you can tame because if you get excited and start taming once you can and you’re not at max distance when you started your tame he will still one shoot you as he will reach you before tame is over. My hot tip is if you want to do him, clear the kite path first as there are many Cinderweb spiders (look just like Skitterflame) around him and if they get to you they slow you down and Deth’tilac catches up.
Solix, like Deth’tilac, is about slowing him down, kiting and making sure he doesn’t touch you. You have to move him over all blue rune symbols without him touching magma. If he touches magma you got to re kite him until he clears all symbols without touching magma. Like Deth’tilac don’t let him touch you and you have to use frost trap apparently at each symbol as well.
Skitterflame is all about freezing him. He melts your freezing traps but he also cools down, once he is cooled you can tame him.
Anthriss – there is a large magma pool next to him, just get under that (yes you take damage) and it’s all about fast taming him before you die from fire damage.
The two Gondria re-skins is to tame without armour on, buff food is handy.
Ban’thalos is, like mentioned, tagging him in the air and surviving the fall. Engineer’s have no trouble as parachute cloak makes this an easy tame for them, the disengage trick helps. The next thing is he hits hard so you also need to freeze trap him. So engage, survive fall, lay trap, freeze, tame.
As far as I know you need to do firelands dailies to unlock parts to get to the spiders (Deth’tilac) being deep into the chain – but the spirit beasts are in areas where you don’t need to do dailies to unlock. I’ve been doing dailies so can’t confirm that so unsure if the Spirit beasts are phased or not.
I just attempted Deth’tilac and a few people (Horde and Alliance) attempted to “help” me bring his HP down. Once he was below the 30 mil HP line when you are supposed to be able to tame, it wouldn’t work. I’m assuming this is because other people were on his aggro table… either way he ended up dead before I could try again, then the alliance who were there killed me. =(
Haha, yes, it would be fair, but not as nice!
Grats to all those who can have spirit wolf AND be in SV spec, like Gar…
Theres also a stripey spirit beastie cat on the PTR, Ahnka:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=do8jWcQ2ZbU
The dude who made the Ahnka video said all 8 new beasts are Spirit Beasts that limit them to only BM!! OH PLEASE BE TRUE!!!! THE WAILING AND GNASHING OF TEETH WOULD REACH BIBLICAL PROPORTIONS!!!! =P (Not to mention that it would cut down on the camping quite a bit)
And just so we’re clear…I really have nothing against MM and SV. It’s just you shouldn’t be able to have your cake and eat it too. If you want max DPS, no SBs for you. I think that’s fair. Amirite?!
LOL @ Lawman – I’m with you. My secondary is SV only for rare times when DPS is an absolute must. I play BM 99%. If you want the spirits, master the beasts!
HELLZ TO THE YIZZEAH, BRUDDA!!!!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sgl18eSFpIU one of the new rare (pet)
Hahaha Lawman, I could hear the cries of the masses if they’re BM only, hopefully though one or two would be exotics, that would be awesome. However, I’ve noticed more and more hunters rolling BM spec, it’s been rare in a group these days to see one that’s not, especially since the dps has leveled out a bit.
As long as they work it to where you don’t have to share spawns with every other Hunter on your server, I’m all over this.
If you’re going to have to worry about camping the mob, tagging it and people killing/stealing it while you’re jumping through these hoops…I want to cry just thinking about it.
Given the fact that that the targets were referred to in the patch note as “8 new rare spawns” I think it is highly unlikely that these will be beasts that have a triggering event or action that forces them to spawn. I certainly wouldn’t classify that as “rare”.
What I DO hope they do (although I can only imagine how hard it would be to code this in the game) is create spawn points for the rares that are unique to each hunter. Something along the lines of a random “breadcrum” chain of clues that might lead one hunter to a cave and another to a ridge, etc. This would allow for the “taming challenge” aspect while avoiding the scenario that Narth fears where 10 hunters are camping the same spot and, rather than lose the tame, a jerk hunter ganks the beast while another is attempting the tame.
Let’s face it…if it is a taming challenge then it will probably be something like the old Krush tame or a level appropriate Terrorpene tame where the degree of difficulty on the tame is very high, but not impossible if properly prepared. It would be hard to allow for this kind of “challenge” if people are jammed into one spot.
But it certainly would increase the degree of difficulty by a ton. =P
Now to announce that it is specific to BM only……MUWAHHAHAHAH!!!! >=)
Chances of an achievement(s) are highly unlikely since it’d be the only class with them. Solo achievements for all classes in general, that’s possible.