Tag Archives: menagerie

Manos, Hanos, Fatos

This Magical trio is another of the many fights that await you in your Garrison’s Menagerie. I’m not quite sure what this is supposed to reference. Maybe nothing. It seems like something though, doesn’t it?

In any case, reference or not, they will meet their match with the following team:

I used a slightly different team for the video, but my explanation should bear out either (and this one is slightly easier to obtain).

The first dragon has a weather change ability. Another thing to note is that, because our opponents are Magic battle pets, using a big move like Deep Breath would just be a waste since most of the damage will be absorbed by that Magic family racial. I find it the most useful to pick just a full team of dragons with dragon moves, but a case can be made for the Mechanical Pandaren Dragonling, as the only strong-defending Mechanical battle pet with the strong-offense Dragonkin moves.

The first thing Manos does is change the weather to Arcane Winds, and then he’ll attempt to combo that with Mana Surge for additional damage. The first thing you have to do then, is change the weather in return.

The Wild Golden Hatchling’s Call Lightning is fantastic, as is the Spawn of Onyxia’s Scorched Earth as used in the video. Another option is the myriad of Dragonkin pets with Moonfire. You want to avoid Darkness here though. The rest is relatively straightforward. Just beat him up until it’s Hanos’s turn to rumble.

Hanos is annoying because he has a dodge move. I like to use my Emerald Whelpling or Emerald Proto-Drake here. The style of dodge Hanos uses counts down, so I can use those dodge turns as a natural stopping point to cast a heal with either of those two. This can also be a good spot for the Mechanical Pandaren Dragonling to use Decoy.

The reason we avoided Darkness to counter the previous pet is because Hanos’ main attack, Sneak Attack, deals additional damage to blinded targets. He will also cast a Blind effect occasionally with Flash, so if you have an avoid to use, the turns where you’re blinded is the time to use it.

Fatos is the last battle pet you’ll encounter in this particular Menagerie fight. It uses Forboding Curse which is an additive debuff, but will make your pet slower, so this is a good spot to add a battle pet with Tail Sweep. This has some pretty good synergy with Arcane Slash, which deals additional damage when it’s faster. Its last damage move, Seethe, has a relatively wide range of damages as well, but is relatively straightforward. Just keep on using your Dragonkin moves to beat him up. I especially like the Infinite Whelpling here because that luck-based Sleep can put you at an advantage, but that’s up to you.

Then you can retire to your fishing shack, or whatever else it is you crazy kids are doing in your Garrisons these days.

Get off my lawn.

Tirs & Fiero

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Tirs and Fiero are two more pets that show up daily at your Garrison’s Menagerie daily, for either the Scrappin or Battle Pet Roundup dailies. This fight is pretty challenging, but I think I found a fun, unique way to beat it.

Here’s the team:

The Scourged Whelpling in particular has a few tricks up his sleeve. The rest of the pets do big Aquatic damage, which will eviscerate those Elemental battle pets. The best choice for these last slots are going to be magic pets with big Aquatic damage as well as dodges, but those are relatively quite rare. If you have a Syd The Squid hanging around after 6.0 that’s definitely a great alternate choice. Gnathus’s main move as the anchor is Swallow You Whole, and there are several other options which use that move as well. I would definitely try to pick one of those up, though.

So, firstly, that whelp has an odd moveset, and is kind of a weird choice in general, but the very first thing Tirs does when he steps up to the plate is cast Cleansing Rain. This means that this is probably the only time we’re ever going to want to use Dreadful Breath with our Scourged Whelpling, and here it really pays off.

tirsfierobreath

Each round of Dreadful Breath will do nearly 200 damage to both Tirs and Fiero. I can typically get both down to just about half health by the time the Whelp dies permanently.

After that, it’s all about the burst. Both Tirs and Fiero have incredible burst. Tirs will cast Pump, which you can deflect a few times with your Croaker’s Bubble. However, when Fiero comes out, all bets are off.

Not only does Fiero have a lot of burst, including the 50% accuracy RNG darling pictured above, but his regular abilities hurt pretty bad as well. The solution I chose is to out-burst the burst. Because of the mechanics of Swallow You Whole, once you can get Fiero to 25%, you win. And he already starts off at just over half health, so as long as you can get just a couple abilities to hit, you’re going to beat this fight.

Jahar, Samm & Archimedes

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This is the most fight this expansion. Hell, it’s the most fun fight to date.

I’m not being sarcastic for once. This fight is so, SO fun.

Here’s the team:

Since the pets we’re facing are all flying battle pets, those dragons with magic abilities are getting some serious airtime. Yep, again. Dragonkin pets with the Arcane Storm/Mana Surge combo are pretty nice here too, if you’d prefer. The first pet, Jahan, will even cast Arcane Winds on your behalf if you’re lacking on the combo. If you don’t have any Dragonkin with Magic damage, try pets with just magic offense. Pets with a Barrier, like the Coilfang Stalker, even make it so you could carry a lowbie here, though the first pet has some serious AOE so I like to err on the side of lvl 10+.

This fight is completely straightforward, except for one thing.

And this is what makes this fight SO fun. Because of the interaction of my magic-damage dealing Dragonkin pets with their Flying targets, even if they crit every attack the Flying pets won’t prevail here. In the meantime, your pets get to deal out incredible, ridiculous damage. It is absolutely staggering, even when you’re not critting.

If you don’t have the dragonkin pets with magic damage here, I’d swap for heavy-hitting Magic battle pets before just Dragonkin. The increased crit will be absorbed by a Magic battle pet’s family ability to a certain extent.

When watching the video, please know that I tried to contain my glee. I honestly did.

Since this fight is in your Menagerie, it’s like Santa comes once every couple of weeks.

The Beakinator

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Winner Most Ridiculous Name NA 2014

The Beakinator is one of the many rotating challenges you can face in your garrison’s Menagerie. He is a Flying battle pet, with his attacks split between Flying and Mechanical damage. But that Mechanical stuff is a doozy.

Here’s the team:

Because Beakinator uses a good amount of flying damage and is a flying battle pet, yet again we’re using our magic damaging dragons. In terms of swaps, the best option not shown here is the Emerald Proto. The dragons with the Arcane Storm + Mana Surge combo, like the Nexus Whelpling, are poor choices here. The most important thing in the Infinite Whelpling’s moveset is the Darkflame ability, which is shared by a few other battle pets. I’d pick dragonkin here if at all possible but the Dark Phoenix may be OK in a pinch.

I would definitely recommend sticking with either the Nether Faerie or Sprite Darter in the 2nd slot, because Life Exchange is so extremely useful against single-pet fights.

beakinatorstats

The scariest bit to avoid, just looking at Beakinator’s moveset, seems to be Wind-up. While it is a LOT of damage to take at once, our pets all have heals and due to the nature of Wind Up and our reduction from the Dragonkin racial for Alpha Strike, we’ll be alright with that.

Actually, no. The main threat here is Touch Of The Animus.

It’s a per-hit reflexive heal debuff. This is why the heal-preventing Darkflame on our last pet alive is so important. Before we get down to that battle pet, we can just swap out whichever pet gets that debuff. Because Alpha Strike is 2 hits, and due to the Boss buff, each round we stay in with that debuff will heal Beakinator for the equivalent of 500+ damage we’ll have to do to take those heals back off.

This is also why those multi-turn magic abilities, fairly common among the magic-damaging Dragonkin battle pets, are out. You need to be able to swap out ASAP, and though those abilities do excellent damage they lock you into the attack for far too long.

Beakinator is the objective of the first-tier Menagerie quests, Scrappin’ for Horde or Battle Pet Roundup for Alliance. I believe he may also be hungry for Froot Loops.

They’re Grrrreat? I may be stretching here.

Carrotus Maximus

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The third Pest in the quest Pets vs Pests (required to unlock your pet Menagerie at your level 3 Garrison) is by far the tastiest. Carrotus Maximus can be found near the herb garden in both the Alliance and Horde Garrisons.

Carrotus is the most challenging of the 3, in that you need to be a bit more aware of his attacks. That said, this is another relatively easy fight, so I’m going with a loose idea of what we’ll need more than a cohesive team.

My go-to pet here is frogs, because they hit pretty hard, have a heal for longevity, and can turn Carrotus into a frog. Always a boon in single-pet fights. You can tame a high-level frog in a number of relatively easily accessible places, including much of Pandaria. Striders have the hard-hitting Aquatic stuff down pat, with a heal but no additional frills, also tamed across Pandaria. I don’t like most crabs here, but that Moonshell Crab from the Shadowmoon Valley coast continues to be a great pick. In general, as long as you’re picking Aquatics and use a main attack other than Surge you’re going to be in good shape.

Carrotus’ moveset is unique. Peculiar, even. His only offense to speak of is Ironbark, which is why I’m so fixated on hitting hard. Ironbark applies a single-turn self shield a la Stoneskin, but with a lot more blocking power. Carrotus also uses Leech Seed to heal himself occasionally, but if you use an Aquatic pet, it won’ t heal him up as much.

The wrinkle here is that Carrotus is relatively slow, and also has Aged Yolk, which he uses to wipe off his own Ironbark?

I put a question mark there intentionally because it’s a little silly, but come on, what do you expect, great strategy? He’s a carrot.

So, that buff & debuff thing means that a Strider is really well-suited here, because you can prime Pump while the shield from Ironbark is active, and then use Water Jet until Ironbark wears off. Because most pets are going to be faster than Carrotus, using a big skill like Pump when Ironbark is down is a relatively easy order.

Just use big Aquatic hits, and Carrotus will go down easier than falling off a roof.

Here’s the video strat for this delicious pest:

Gorefu

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Gorefu is one of the 3 Pests you have to beat to complete the quest Pets vs Pests, required to unlock the Menagerie in your level 3 Garrison. You’ll find him near your Garrison’s fishing hut.

As long as you have 3 higher level flying pets that’ll do the job well. I do like the Crow (or Gilnean Raven) specifically, but as long as you have 3 pets that deal flying damage above level 23 or so, you should be able to beat this fight. Aside from the Crow, the pets I chose are tamed at a relatively high level, so don’t sweat it too much.

Gorefu is going to be slower than any bird you have, so if you’re using the Raven, you’ll want to just attack a bit at the start, until Gorefu casts Mudslide. After the Mudslide, you can use your Raven’s Darkness to overwrite it. I like this combo a lot, because Gorefu uses Feed, which will heal him for the damage it does, usually just over 300. With Darkness, healing is halved, and it also grants a chance that Gorefu will miss it altogether.

Alternately, you can use a pet with a dodge, like the Dragonbone Hatchling with Lift-Off or a moth with Cocoon. I’m generally bad at counting down turns, which is why I favor the Raven. If all you’ve got is a handful of Owls with no dodges, that’ll be okay as long as you can burn him down quickly enough.

Aside from Feed, this fight is relatively straightforward. If you’re having trouble and looking for a few more options in terms of a quick bird to tame at a higher level, the Sandy Petrel or Garden Moth in Jade Forest are easy pickups, using the portals from Orgrimmar or Stormwind. There are usually a few Silky Moths hanging around near the Hyjal portal, or the Oasis Moth in Uldum. If you’re starting from the Shrine in the Vale, there are usually a couple Gilded Moths or Effervescent Glowflies hanging around.