Zao Now Brown Cow
It did occur to me that if I kept my big mouth shut you wouldn’t know about all my failures. I thought about it and you know what? There are all kinds of blogs that tell you all about how they did stuff successfully so I see it as a public service to report on my failures for those like me. If you’re out there … maybe I’m alone … yoohoo! Crap, maybe I AM the only one … anyway.
I may frame that screen shot. It might be the closest I’ll ever get to completing the Celestial Tournament. Right now I’m too demoralized to go back. I’m beaten … dejected. I hate stupidhead Zao. Of course this isn’t fair as it wasn’t his fault, it was mine.
After FINALLY admitting to myself that no matter how many hours I stayed in there I was not going to get Zao down, I went a few places to read more on the fights and in one of Tamer Liopleurodon’s videos she mentioned something I never thought about. I had used up all my big guns early on in an attempt to GET TO the Celestials without thinking that I would be sending in the second string after the tamers were down. Poor planning on my part.
When my initial Zao team didn’t succeed I was pretty much left with … well … leftovers. I tried EVERYTHING, I think I was in there for hours. What made it even worse was on the second to the last attempt I managed to scrounge a Wild Jade Hatchling with Call Lightning and two Zandalari raptors with Hunting Party and got him down to 88. Coming so close made it worse.
To my credit (hahaha) I did stop before stooping to sending critters and level 5s out to certain death but I DID NOT WANT TO CONCEDE. I finally came to my senses and left the tournament, head hanging.
I will say, something I never thought would happen did. RNG took pity on me. I have been looking in every Crane Nest since the patch dropped. Nothing. Apparently in an attempt to cheer me up RNG put a Azure Crane Chick in the first Crane Nest I checked. Thank you RNG, I take back all those nasty things I’ve said about you. Honest.
So everyone’s down but Zao. But I’ll have to rearrange my teams before another attempt so it’s back to the drawing board for me. Don’t throw all my heavy hitters out early. And why in the name of Elune is my Darkmoon Zeppelin not level 25? Geeeeeezzz …
September 26, 2013 at 11:31 am
Grats on the pet!
Sorry about your luck with the tourney. I know BBB and Navi posted some teams to use.
September 26, 2013 at 12:28 pm
Thanks! There are many great teams out there that people have been kind enough to post but a lot use pets that are in my other teams. I have to sit down with pen and paper and figure out the best path. Who knew this pet battling was going to require all this planning, lol!
September 26, 2013 at 3:21 pm
Um, cough, your friend Matty posted some too that her friend Turk wrote…and here I am not even knowing there were crane chicks. Color me clueless.
September 26, 2013 at 5:24 pm
Oh thank you Matty! I can’t remember anything unless I put a post-it note on my forehead! Another great resource I forgot!
September 26, 2013 at 11:37 am
Aha. We both suffer from Long Range Planning issues.
My best work on long range planning occurs when I’ve some ideas on what to make for dinner. What are we doing this weekend? I can’t think that far out!
This is very different from a short attention span. My attention span is perfectly… Oh look!
September 26, 2013 at 12:31 pm
Yeah … me and planning, so not good at it. I always want to run spontaneously around like a crazed butterfly and have things just work out serendipitously while I sing Kum ba yah!
September 26, 2013 at 11:42 am
Pandaren Water spirit + Alpine Foxling! It is a great combo and I saw you have level 25s of both of those!
And my Darkmoon Zep is not 25 either… Nor is my tonk. I definitely need more mechs.
September 26, 2013 at 12:36 pm
I read a method for Zao and based my team on that, it included a Fox. The problem was they claimed the fox would survive three rounds and mine went right down without even getting to howl. Maybe Zao just got lucky, lol. Maybe I need a healthier fox!
September 26, 2013 at 7:40 pm
Just use your water spirit first putting out geyser and then whirlpool, then shoot it with some pathetic water spray and it dies, then bring out your foxling who howls right away and then the geyser and whirlpool should hit for double damage and you can then go and bite it to death.
I don’t have a lot of max level multiples except for emperor crab (because you said it was good so I had two diff breed ones) and also amber moth because I was dumb and didn’t realise I already had a max level one when I levelled another… but turns out it’s an awesome pet anyway so having two was good!
September 27, 2013 at 5:36 am
Ah … That’s a different plan, I must try it!
September 26, 2013 at 12:18 pm
You can do it! I know when I started I tried to use a different pet for every team. I’m not a fan of multiple pets / various breeds so you are forced to be creative. I’m sure with all the tips out there, you’ll have a winning combo very soon. I’m rooting for you!
September 26, 2013 at 12:38 pm
Thanks Cym! I don’t have multiples either and boy I was wishing I did about then and I didn’t realize I was so light on Mechs. I’m going to need to spreadsheet this stuff!
September 26, 2013 at 12:35 pm
So close. And I applaud you for that, because I don’t have enough pets leveled to try it yet. And even after I do I’m not sure how long it will take me to get up the guts to give it a shot! Good luck on trying again!
September 26, 2013 at 12:41 pm
Thank you! It was really fun while I wasn’t trying to do the whole thing. Trying to figure out teams to use and getting ready. I was shocked though that with so many level 25s it seemed I had leveled all the wrong ones, lol.
September 26, 2013 at 12:41 pm
I found myself in the same boat. I used all of my good pets to beat the previous three and then was left a bit dumbfounded by how hard the last four actually were. With few pets to chose from they steamrolled me over and over again. Much planning is needed!
September 26, 2013 at 12:44 pm
You are so right! I didn’t give enough thought to what would happen once I got past the tamers, I seemed to have tunnel vision about them and when the main course came, yikes!
September 26, 2013 at 1:33 pm
My girlfriend and our Monk buddy are currently *obsessed* with pet battling, and I’m ready to jump head first in to it.. I think, lol. I leveled my Terrible Turnip up to 8 just to go around the starting zones collecting other pets, but have yet to start grinding out levels on anything else.
Any good starter pets you reccommend?
September 26, 2013 at 2:59 pm
I know there are lots of method to leveling pets but I found Ratshag’s advice to be good. Get two Scorpids with Rampage to 25 and then put a baby pet on their team. I level my babies on Marsh Fiddlers in Halfhill area. I start them there at level one as usually they survive one round with a Fiddler.
As soon as they’re level 10 or so I put them on teams and battle the easier tamers with them like Farmer Nishi and they’re level 25 before you know it!
September 26, 2013 at 3:01 pm
Sage advice, thank you!
September 26, 2013 at 5:33 pm
Get a dragon too.
September 26, 2013 at 3:01 pm
Oh, starter pets. Hmm, I’d have to say I love my mechanicals a lot and I also am quite attached to my Emperor Crab, he’s my go to guy a lot!
September 26, 2013 at 3:04 pm
I’m noting a lot of players saying they use mechanicals a lot. I just got a Lil Bling, so maybe I’ll start leveling him with the Moonkin Hatchling and something else.
September 26, 2013 at 3:16 pm
Grats on that Bling!
September 26, 2013 at 2:14 pm
The Celestial Tournament just isn’t even an option for me. I am NOT GOOD. I tried it once on the PTR and realized that it was way out of my league. IMO, people who can make ANY headway in there are just awesome, so just keep being awesome. lol
September 26, 2013 at 3:04 pm
Yeah, they are tough aren’t they. Those Celestials don’t pull their punches! I’m going to try again but this time I’m making lists and trying to be organized if it kills me!
September 26, 2013 at 2:29 pm
I still haven’t set foot in the Celestial Tournament so you’re one step ahead of me! I think, deep inside, I know I don’y have enough pets of the right classes to do it so I’m just avoiding it. I really need to (wo)man up just get in there – even if I get completely and utterly destroyed!
September 26, 2013 at 3:09 pm
I know, while I have a whole lot at 25 they are for the most part not Celestial Tournament material. But watching people’s videos they used pets that I wouldn’t ever have thought of to good effect. I am not that creative but I do now wish I had multiples of some of my mechanicals for the tournament.
September 26, 2013 at 3:02 pm
How the heck did you beat Xu-Fu? He’s the one that makes me want to tear my hair out.
September 26, 2013 at 3:15 pm
My first team bombed on him but the second team I made did fine. Unfortunately it’s the same team I would have wanted to use on Zao. Clockwork Gnome, Darkmoon Tonk and Tranquil Mechanical Yeti.
I had to use up two teams on some of them as the first didn’t work so I ran out of willing bodies, lol.
September 26, 2013 at 5:22 pm
Same here, Xu-Fu was my nemesis, teaching me that I need a more refined pet selection at level 25. Having 80 or so pets at 25 is not enough, when they aren’t the right type. I definitely need some duplicates of some pets …
September 26, 2013 at 5:26 pm
I know, I really wish the Darkmoon Faire was in town as I could sure use some duplicate Mechanicals. Even my semi-good teams really need a backup team because it’s hard to not have bad luck on at least one of the celestials.
September 26, 2013 at 5:52 pm
You’re braver than I am. I took a quick look, got stomped by the first one and won’t be back until I level more pets 😛
Hehe…you’re not alone. My blog is called Mis-adventures, not Leet-adventures. For epic failures check out my “First Dead” screen shots.
September 26, 2013 at 7:28 pm
I know! You really have to spend some time putting thought into these teams. It’s not enough to have a lot of pets they have to be the right ones, lol.
I’ll have to find that, I’ve read of the mis-adventures of your Death Noob but I don’t think I’ve seen those screen shots.
September 27, 2013 at 12:47 pm
This pretty much sums it up…
http://wowmisadventures.wordpress.com/2013/03/14/
September 27, 2013 at 1:38 pm
LOL! That would be me too but I’m too chicken to go in LFR. Cat stays away from those things only the Warlock’s ever been crazy enough to try.
September 27, 2013 at 8:48 am
[…] was glancing through posts on my WordPress dash (I miss you already, Google Reader!), I ran across this post from Tome of the Ancient. Frustrated with not being able to defeat Zao in the Celestial Tournament, […]
September 27, 2013 at 5:10 pm
huh?!? you guys have waaayyyyy too much time on your hands. I play for, what, 15 minutes, and I am ready for bed. Must be nice to be insomniacs. 😛
September 27, 2013 at 6:04 pm
But … but … the pets! Most important, lol!