Mid-way birthday thoughts and second chance chests

Halfway through the birthday month, I’ve been pondering the month-long fest this year compared to the week-long fests in previous years  And a heads-up on Second Chance chests through Sunday, 9/16/18.

Normally I look forward to the birthday celebration, a week in which there’s both Double Gardening and Double Pets, B.O.X.E.S. and Lost Pages…  So much going on it’s impossible to participate in all of it and, unless you have unlimited Crowns to spend, choices to be made about pets vs. gardens.

Knowing it was a 10 year anniversary this year, I wondered ahead of time if there might be a month of celebrating instead of a week.  As a potential, it seemed like a neat idea.  In practice, I think the stretched out thing is kind of less exciting than the week.

To cover such a long spell they’e been rotating through the member benefits, so there’s been one or two in play the whole time.  The thing is, they rotate among them a lot anyway, so other than the fact that something is on every day instead of just 4 or so days a week, isn’t a big shift.

Personally, I’ve loved the full week of pets and gardening, because it gave time (after, of course the initial elder harvest, as I always have completed gardens sitting in wait for these events) to plant some seeds other than the very fastest-progressing and get them to elder harvest during the event.  And a chance to really work on pets.  The one extra day for gardening this time meant a bunch of things I planted didn’t make elder harvest in time to double.

I never caught the dates for the B.O.X.E.S. so I participated a bit but was waiting to finish some garden stuff and then realized they were gone.  Not personally a big fan of the Lost Pages stuff as I’ve always found the rewards don’t equal the level of difficulty — and the scarcity of the Spellwrits makes it time consuming to defeat 10, especially in light of the tiny XP and not-very-exciting rewards.

Birthday Quest minus present

I thought the little quest was a fun idea but the glitch meant it was days after several of my wizards completed the quest before the present was collected, which took a little wind out of that one for me.  Haven’t even picked up the quest for quite a few wizards, so that’s a little fun to look forward to before the end.

Through Sunday they’re doing the free second chance chest thing.  You can only get one free chest per boss per day, so farming won’t help you.  But you CAN move from boss to boss, collecting extra drops at each one, if you’re so inclined.

Lost Pages thru July 15th

2018

KI has had Lost Pages going for a couple of days now and will continue to offer it through July 15th.

There are a series of quests to various worlds and some special “Spellwrit” creatures in the mobs.  Generally you have to defeat 10 and it takes a long time because they’re so scattered you can only get one in your circle at a time.  When you’ve finished those defeats there’s a dungeon.

Supposedly you get special drops though I’ve never found I got anything outside the norm for whatever area I’m in.  The mob ones have higher health than whatever is usually in the area so it’s a lot of fighting that’s harder than normal for nothing extra in the way of return — at least as far as any drops I’ve ever gotten.  Also adds very little XP relative to the time it takes to complete the quests.

If you’re bored, though, it does give you some quests you don’t normally have and some different creatures to battle.

Birthday Celebration ending; more free stuff

Kingsisle put out the announcement below.  You have till October 1 to get the free crowns, packs and elixirs, but the double rewards stuff ends September 17, as do the Five Boxes and Lost Pages events.  You also have until October 1 collect the other free birthday stuff.  See here for the list of birthday events and the dates.

Thank You to Our Wonderful Community
We’re ending our 9th birthday with a special “Thank you!” for sticking with us through thick and thin.

You never cease to amaze us, and we are ever grateful to our loyal fans.

Redeem the code ‘BirthdayBash2017’ for a gift of 1250 Crowns, 3 energy elixirs and a Farley’s Gardening Pack in Wizard101, and 3 energy potions and a Snack Pack in Pirate101.

This giveaway ends Sunday, October 1st, 2017 at 11:59pm US Central Time. In order to be eligible for this giveaway, your account must have been created prior to September 12th, 2017. No new accounts created after this time will qualify. Keep in mind, there is only one redemption per account and the Crowns are non-transferable.

See all our Birthday details here: https://www.wizard101.com/game/happy-9th-birthday

Birthday extended

September 6, 2017

KI announced yesterday–the original end date–that the birthday celebrations will be extended because of the DDOS attacks (see here for their announcement, keep scrolling down) which have been keeping many players from participating.  This includes everything; double pets, double gardens, BOXES, Lost Pages, extra rewards on daily assignments and PvP, double monstrology, etc.  So far they’re not saying when this ends.

I know from comments I’ve seen that in some parts of the world they’ve still never been able to get back on since the attacks started last Thursday so I’m hazy as to whether the plan is to keep it going until some point after everyone gets back on???  I’m having intermittent problems with the same glitches I previously noted so I gather there are ongoing issues in many places.

I’m both pleased and daunted as the celebration always leads me to spend more time on the game than usual.  I’ve been gardening quite a bit on three accounts (I often give a month of membership to one of the two non-member accounts during these events), hatching with some very kind and patient wizards on the Facebook Wizard101 for Non PvP Players group, and that of course leads to lots of the dreaded pet training (those of you who’ve read this blog for a while know how I feel about that 😬).

I’ve barely found time to take a couple of wizards through any of the BOXES — not very encouraged to keep trying by the zero sonic springs I’ve garnered so far (the only reason I do it at this point).  As I’ve mentioned before, I find the Lost Pages event is too time consuming/difficult relative to the rewards you get so I’ve not worked on it at all.

The way the Spellwrits are scattered, it often takes the whole 10 fights to get the total you need and the Spellwrits are always quite a bit higher health than the normal mobs in the area.  The dungeon then takes a bit of time and has a boss that’s tougher than the usual bosses in whatever area.  And I’m always flabbergasted at the tiny amount of XP I get for the time all that takes as well as the relatively innocuous drops.  If there are great drops, I’ve sure had no luck at getting any.  I generally do so much better just questing…

Looks like some plants for which I thought I’d just get a few double mature harvests are going to make it to elder while it’s still double–though I’m starting to see signs they’ve slowed down the plant timers.  As a just-in-case I’ve planted some Couch Potato and/or Evil Magma Pea gardens today for a few wizards who already raked in two elder harvests (plants already there the day it started and then planting and harvesting another round) in hopes of replenishing both some mega snacks and my hatching-diminished gold supplies.  If the event keeps going even a few more days I’ll get the gold back up for sure and possibly make it to another elder harvest.  My pets will be eating a lot of seeds 🙂

Anyway, if you’re fortunate enough to be in one of the areas where you can get on the game, keep on enjoying the birthday party!

 

9th Birthday celebration started today

Every year Kingsisle runs a birthday celebration week, usually starting in the first week of September, and this year’s began today and runs through Tuesday, September 5, 2017.

You can log in on the Wizard101 site and pick up free items.  The Professor’s B.O.X.E.S. quests are back as well as the Lost Pages quests.  Members get double pet xp,  double gardening drops, double animus in Monstrology, and free training point buy back.

I’ve had a bunch of gardens sitting at elder harvest for weeks so it took several hours today to harvest, keep moving things around through the Shared Bank and into attics and Seed Vaults and popping to the Bazaar to sell TCs and miscellaneous snacks.

It’s a great time to buy treasure cards at the Bazaar as most gardeners have too many at this time.  Same thing for snacks.  Such big harvests, so many snacks…  The treasure card exception is gardening treasure cards, as everyone gets busy gardening during these double rewards events and that means they’re buying up gardening TCs.

Lots to do.  Good time to maximize benefits from gardening, pets and monstrology.  It’s always fun so enjoy!

Lost Pages through 7/9/17

June 19, 2017

Today KI launched a lengthy Lost Pages event–three weeks–ending on July 9.  If you’ve never participated, see Harold Argleston for the opening quest.

There are quests on a number of worlds and all involve fighting a bunch of  “spellwrit” creatures and then a dungeon.  The Spellwrits usually – but not always — are from the opposite school from the usual one for that creature and they appear kind of ghostly, or at least white.

These creatures generally have considerably more health than their normal counterparts.   You have to defeat 10 of them and most of the time they’re so scattered through the mobs that you can only get one at a time, so it’s a lot of fights.  You don’t get a very high XP for the huge amount of time it takes and, though you can supposedly get good drops, I’ve never gotten anything noticeably better than the normal drops for the area.

You might be guessing I rarely bother to participate any more, but it IS something different and you might get better drops than I have.  If you’re looking for something new to do in the game, here’s your chance to take a break from questing and help find the lost pages.

Birthday Celebrations and Level 90!

Last night, after days of gardening and noting Morgan was on the tip of making level 90, I ran her around Avalon a bit to collect the last couple of scrolls and collect her quest points and it was enough to get her there!  Promethean — woo hoo!  And then I turned on the computer today and logged in to tend gardens and discovered KI has launched the annual week of birthday festivities as of today, September 2, 2016.

Elder Harvest

It’s a week of Double Garden Rewards, Double Pet Rewards,  special gifts, AND they’re running both the Five B.O.X.E.S. and Lost Pages events!

When they suddenly ran a Double Garden Rewards event a couple of weeks ago, I figured they might not do it again for the birthday celebration.  I’d gotten a bunch of gardens to elder harvest and had them waiting for this event.  So I’m excited I got to collect doubles then and I’ve had time to get some longer-growing crops to elder harvest in time for this round.

Last year I found it tough to get as much of all these things in as I wanted to, so I can tell you you’ll have to do some juggling if you want to enjoy it all — and maybe devote your entire free time to it :-).  If you, like me, can’t afford to keep buying energy elixir, it’s especially challenging to have double garden rewards going at the same time as double pet rewards. The free giveaway includes one free energy elixir, so for one of your wizards you can use up all your energy on the garden and then refill and go train pets.  For the rest, which to do, which to do…

And since they added those great sonic spring-using recipes for sale in the B.O.X.E.S., I want to spend lots of time completing B.O.X.E.S. in hopes of getting some sonic springs dropped.  Personally I choose that over the Lost Pages as I think the return in drops for the time spent is better…

Have fun everybody!

Save

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Lost Pages again

I’m a little late posting, but KI is running a Lost Pages event and you have till the end of tomorrow to participate.

These quests begin with Harold Argleston and send you to several different worlds.  Each quest involves some sort of “spell writ” mob creature.  You have to defeat 10 of them and they’re generally so few and far between that you wind up only getting one per battle.  Their health is quite a bit more than other creatures in the area though I haven’t received drops that are better than normal.

After you get the 10, there’s a dungeon, generally with one battle against mob creatures and one boss battle — against the student who’s under a spell.  Each world with a quest has a Dee’s mirror, which you use to get into the dungeon.

Supposedly there are good drops but I’ve never gotten anything very exciting.  You also get a surprisingly small amount of XP and, because of the many battles it takes to get 10 spell writ beings, they’re quite time consuming for the small return.

However, if you enjoy these or are looking for a change of pace from the usual, you have some time to do as many of these quests as are you are qualified to do (they’re tied to your wizard’s level).

After the party

The birthday celebration is over.  There were so many things going on, I just never got around to some of it.  I’ve had some unmet goals in gardening and pets and it was just too tempting with both Double Gardening and Double Pet Experience going on; I put pretty much all my time into those and never got around to much else.

My third account is the one on which I don’t usually carry a membership and for which I’ve been largely unwilling to spend crowns other than to buy some zones.  I did spring for 12 Evil Magma Peas a while back, which I’d parlayed to 30 during another Double Gardening event.  This time I turned the 30 into 120!

Also managed to double a 17 Pink Dandelion patch twice so I now have enough extra PDs to craft a Seed Vault.  Well, ignoring the I-have-no-Silver-Trumpet-Vines-yet issue, which means I have no way to get the five Braided Vines the Seed Vault recipe also requires.  Heather has hit Celestia and since I got a one month membership so the 3d account could participate in the Double Gardening/Pet stuff, I’ll be whizzing her through there and hopefully will pick up some seeds.

On that account I also started out with something like 12 Couch Potatoes received in drops and had doubled enough in the last event to have 30.  The timing was right this time to harvest more than once, so I’m up to 128!  That means double the mega snacks too.

On the second account I did pretty well also.  From a base of 12 Evil Magma Peas I paid for, I had gotten up to 60 in the last couple of Double events and this time I went up to 180.  Finally I can get far enough ahead on mega snacks to quit gardening for a while.

I don’t have accurate figures for the first account as I bought more seeds without keeping track and have doubled so much over three Double Gardening events that I’m having trouble getting a count.  It took me an hour of shuffling stuff around in Seed Vaults, Attics , Houses and Backpacks to get all the Evil Magma Pea seeds that went into the Bank out and distributed among all six wizards’ various storage options.  I’m talkin’ a LOT of seeds!

As I’ve hit the final harvests in gardening I’ve been leaving the various gardens unplanted.  I’m SO looking forward to a spell of not being required to sign into every account twice every day in order to take care of plants!!!

Pet training, as usual, has been bittersweet.  I’d finally gotten a couple of pets on the first account with Spritely, Spell Defy, Unicorn, Energizing Battery and a variety of fifth talents (many of which I’d still like to get rid of…).  I hatched like crazy across accounts, figuring if I could get a few generations down on each I’d have something close to what I wanted.  Then I could start passing pets through the Shared Bank on the other two accounts.

On the second account my luck so far appears to be fair to middling.  I have some leveling up to do before I know for sure, but it looks like I”ll have to do a couple more generations of hatching off the first account pets.   I do have a few who look pretty good if the last talent comes out okay.

On the poor third account, my luck has been out.  I keep getting pets, even after something like four levels of hatching with one of the good ones, who manifest crappy talents that go back a couple generations before I even started this round of hatching.

I spent WAY too many hours playing the game to get that many seeds and to create and at least partially train a couple of dozen pets.  Thank goodness for the gardening success, because the pets, as always, have left me feeling as if I put in more effort than it was worth.

I never did get to make that foray into the Five B.O.X.E.S and Lost Pages quests.  Although I’ve done the Marleybone and Mooshu boxes a number of times each I’ve never managed to take notes the way I did for the Wizard City box so my plans to post similar guides to those boxes didn’t materialize.  Other than a few Spellwrit battles, I accomplished nothing in Lost Pages.

There was so much going on, it felt kind of exciting, but proved to be too many things happening at once to be able to enjoy all of it.  I mentioned before, seems like a “birthday month” might work better, a different event each week.  Or as they did for Halloween last year, let some of the events last all month???  How about you — did you have fun?  What did you choose to do among the special birthday events?

Lost Pages event is back

The special Lost Pages event is back through Feb. 22.  The event consists of five quests in Wizard City, Krokotopia, Mooshu, Avalon and Azteca.

The farthest I’ve ever gotten is the Mooshu quest as I don’t have any wizards past Zafaria yet.  Today I’ll focus on the Wizard City quest.  First there’s some running back and forth between NPCs in the WC Library and Ravenwood.  Then you’re sent to Triton Ave.

In each place there’s a special mob creature to fight. In Wizard City (Triton Ave.) it’s Spellwrit Screamer, a ghostly looking version of the normal Screamer who has become Storm instead of Myth.  You have to defeat 10.  Their health is 315 and they’re pretty easy to beat.

When you’ve defeated the 10 head back to Ravenwood and the Library and then you’re sent back to Triton Ave to Dee’s Mirror, located just outside the entrance to Haunted Cave.

Don’t forget to “mark location” after defeating the Screamers; you can use the port to Commons button, get the rest of the quest and port back to your marked location.  Unless you like a lot of running around, in which case forget the pesky porting.

After entering Dee’s Mirror you’re in a room with a dungeon sigil.  I’ve generally teamed up for this–it’s a popular quest, so it’s usually not much of a wait to get a full team.  It’s not so much that it’s all that hard, I just enjoying teaming up when it’s easy.

The dungeon has two levels.  First you fight some more Spellwrit Screamers (four if there are four of you).  Then you head up a level to meet Kestrel Blackstorm (Storm, 1055) and Rotting Fodders (Storm, 150; number variable depending on how many in group).

Rewards are keyed to a combination of your level and the difficulty of the opponents.  Supposedly there are some good rewards though I have yet to get anything great.  XP is also kind of low for how long it takes to do these (for instance, 25 XP for the tower).

I mostly do these because it’s fun to do something different. Since I solo a lot, I also enjoy teaming up for a change, in circumstances where there’s generally not a long wait.  Check it out, it’s fun!