Reputations for the Rides

Backtracking Reputations

Since I’ve been working on reputations and they can be such a long grind, I thought I’d start with a few that would allow the purchase of a mount and work towards the “Leading the Calvary” Achievement (who doesn’t want an Albino Drake?)

I have about 27/50 for the Achievement, and after purchasing what I can I’ll still be a few short.  This will leave random drops, working on reputations and a couple of World Events.

I already have enough reputation to purchase the Oracle’s Mysterious Egg and can get the dailies for the Hyldnir Spoils bag.

While doing a bit of research on available mounts and how to get them, I was quite surprised at how many options there are – everything from drops, reputations, rewards and PvP.

It looks as if getting 50 mounts isn’t difficult – just time consuming.  The Achievement for obtaining 100 mounts well, that will be difficult.

Everyone already knows how much I love PvP and instances, so reputations are the best (although slowest) method for me at the moment.

Random drops are just too unpredictable, although I’ve made a bet with myself that the Reins of the Green Proto-Drake and Reins of the White Polar Bear with drop long before I get the Recipe: Delicious Chocolate Cake.

If I win the bet, I get a piece of Chocolate Cake to celebrate.  If I lose the bet, I get a piece of Chocolate Cake as comfort food.

Looking over my reputations, I found a few I initially thought might be quick to reach Exalted and allow me to purchase a few more mounts:

Stormwind: 16838/21000 Revered
Ironforge:  11040/21000 Revered
Exodar:  7467/21000 Revered (Oops – neglected that one!)

Other than PvP there are few options to reach Exalted:  the ubiquitous Cloth turn-ins; repeatable quests that provide little reputation, or picking up low level quests.

Cloth turn-ins (20 per turn-in) are particularly horrendous:

Stormwind:  56 turn-ins
Ironforge: 133 turn-ins
Exodar: 181 turn-ins

I can only hope there is a Cloth sale at the Auction House.

There is one more reputation for a mount I had completely forgotten….

Winterspring Frostsaber

I found the Wintersaber Trainers when I first started questing in Winterspring.  I really wanted one of the beautiful purple cat mounts and started the reputation grind, however at level 58 it was a painful, mind-numbing and often fatal experience – and that was just the starting quest.

I believe I actually made it to 1500/3000 Neutral before giving up and moving on as I had unlocked the Winterfall Intrusion quest.

Note:  The reputation points for these quests has been greatly increased since the early days when each quest turn-in would give about 50 or 75 reputation points – my hat’s off to those who reached Exalted before the increase – you deserve a special Achievement for it!

So, back I went to Winterspring to visit my old friends the Yeti and Dragonkin, and determine just how much of a grind it would be to finally reach Exalted and buy the mount.

I worked a couple of hours on gathering the meat for the Frostsaber Provisions quest until I reached 0/12000 Honored and unlocked the third quest, Rampaging Giants.

Even with the increased 250 reputations points per turn-in (for the first two quests) and the “perks” of being a level 80, it’s still a boring, mind-numbing grind.

Here is what I found based on my own observations:

Frostsaber Provisions (250/turn-in)

Advantages:

• close to the quest giver reducing travel time
• both mobs dropping the quest meat spawn in same area (possibly shared spawns)
• mobs re-spawn quickly
• if you are a skinner you can get a ton of leather

Disadvantages:

• quest meat has low drop rate
• sometimes only one type of mob with spawn in an area requiring further travel

Winterfall Activity (250/turn-in)

Advantages

• the furbolgs will drop beads that can be turned in for Timbermaw Hold reputation
• drops coin, cloth, Green items and the odd Blue item
• it is close to the area for Frostsaber Provisions to run a circuit and gain 500 reputation per turn-in for both quests

Disadvantages

• there are fewer Shamans than Ursas, and shared spawns will not always provide enough Shamans to avoid waiting for a re-spawn
• slow re-spawn time
• many, many players competing in the village for quests and reputation unless one manages an “off” hour when no one else is there – I haven’t seen that myself yet so I just don’t bother with it

Rampaging Giants (350/turn-in)

Advantages

• 350 reputation points per turn-in

Disadvantages

• the giants are only found at the opposite end of Winterspring from the quest giver increasing travel time significantly
• might require a group for lower levels

The best way to decide a strategy will depend on your server population, level, class and whatever tools you have to make the grind and travel most efficient.

I usually go with “Time is Reputation Points” – time I spend traveling, waiting for re-spawns, competing with other players, etc. is lost reputation points, so I try to make it as efficient as possible.

After running the quests for a while, I found that I could do two Frostsaber Provisions turn-ins for the time it took to complete one Winterspring Activity quest (lots of competition, slow respawns.)

Completing both in a circuit would give me 500 reputations points, and two Frostsaber Provisions would give me 500 as well.

I had set my option to Auto Loot and was skinning the mobs, but when I turned it off, looted only the quest meat and didn’t bother skinning, I could fit three Frostsaber Provisions turn-ins (750 rep) for the time it took for a circuit.

The Rampaging Giants quest didn’t make the cut – I could do 4 Frostsaber Provisions (1000 rep) in the time it took for one giants quest.

Keep in mind that at level 80 I was getting the quest meat a lot faster than I did at level 58 so the low drop rates were not much of a problem.

No matter which quest or quest circuit gives you the best advantage, be prepared for a long road to Exalted.

And don’t forget to pick up the quests again after a turn-in – nothing worse than grinding for a quest you don’t have in your quest log….

Just for the Record

Recipe: Delicious Chocolate Cake – 0
Recipe: Skullfish Soup – 0
Jeweled Fishing Pole – 0
Bone Fishing Pole – 0
Reins of the White Polar Bear – 0
Reins of the Green Proto-Drake – 0

What I Got Instead…

Stinky Cheese – 3
Large Hoof – 1
Fisherman Knife – 1
Worthless Glass – 1
Unusual Compass – 1
Mysterious Egg – still hatching