Frostbite me

I've been working on Frostbitten for many months. This achievement has soaked up dozens of hours of my life, which I've spent hovering or circling around the spawn points of rare elites, hoping to spot and tag them before the competition does. This endeavor has required mountains of patience and caused me oceans of frustration. To say that I've worked hard for this is an understatement.

Three of the rares on the Frostbitten list are tamable beasts often prized as pets by Hunters. All three live in Sholazar Basin--Loque'nahak, Aotona, and King Krush. That makes these rares some of the most difficult to kill, because you're not just competing with other Frostbitten seekers--you're also competing with Hunters who want to tame them, and the area is heavily trafficked by miners and herbalists who are likely to spot a silver dragon and kill it for its loot.

Before the patch, there was no question of whether I would kill Aotona or King Krush when I eventually spotted them. My stable slots were full, and I sure wasn't going to trade one of my lovely Spirit Beasts or my dear Roflz for a green t-rex or a purple parrot. But suddenly I have 20 stable slots, plenty of room to take home Aotona or King Krush should I choose to spare their lives and love them and squish them and call them Fluffy, instead. So yesterday when I was circling the Basin and I spotted Aotona, I flew to the ground not knowing whether I was about to tame her or kill her.

Well, my compulsion to collect new pets won over my desire to finish my achievement, and much to my surprise, I found myself dismissing my current pet and mashing Tame Beast frantically. But it wasn't working! The angry parrot kept trying to gouge my eyes out with her talons while, in my panic (finding/taming/killing rares is always an adrenaline spiking experience), I repeated this process--Call, Dismiss, Tame Beast--about eight times before I finally realized the problem. "You have too many active summons." Translated: I was running around with 4 pets in my active slots, which meant that in order to tame a new one, I'd need to go dump one of my pets at the stables. Or abandon it.

I wasn't willing to abandon one of my pets, and I knew that if I fled from combat and ran to the nearest stables, chances were high that Aotona would be gone when I returned. Someone else in this heavily trafficked area would spot her and either tame or kill her before I could get back. I sure didn't want to let the rare opportunity to snag a new pet or get credit for my achievement pass me by, so, with mixed feelings, I called my wolf and we killed the bird.

I shared this story on one of my favorite Hunter pet forums. Oops, bad idea. Turns out I may as well have painted a big red target on my back and run around shouting, "I kill tamable rares for the lulz!" based on the load of hate that I  found myself receiving in comments to my post.**

Some folks are of the opinion that killing the parrot makes me a very bad person. One commenter came right out and told me that I suck (oh, but she did add, "no offense"--bite me). Some Other Hunter might have been camping the area for days, waiting for Aotona to spawn, so she could be tamed. And this hypothetical Other Hunter clearly deserved the bird a hell of a lot more than I did.

Wait, what?

Now it's time to share my Hunter code of honor. As a Hunter who's spent countless hours camping and taming the elusive Spirit Beasts, I have a ton of empathy for the plight of any Hunter looking to tame a rare spawn. I've been there. I know how nerve wracking it is. And I understand, from very personal experience, the frustration of losing a rare spawn that I've been camping to somebody else who tags it first. It sucks, yo.

I firmly believe that no player should ever kill a rare spawn that a Hunter has already tagged and is attempting to tame. If you do this, you're a spiteful asshat, and what's worse, you're just ensuring that both of you will be continuing to camp future spawns, increasing the difficulty and frustration for everyone. Nobody wins. You've just ruined somebody's day for reason at all. This is the one rule that I believe should apply to everybody. Breaking this rule is the one reason I would label you a jerk, or tell you that you suck, or that I hope you get hit by a bus, for killing a rare spawn. Because that behavior is just flat out mean and wrong. If another player has tagged the mob, back off. It's over. Let them have their tame/kill, be a good sport, and wait for the next spawn.

That's the universal rule. Now, because I like to think of myself as a very considerate and respectful person, my personal code of honor includes several other rules for how I interact with other Hunters looking to tame a rare spawn:

1. If you're camping a particular spot, I will not camp right on top of you. If you were there first, I'll go somewhere else.

2. I will never kill a tamable rare mob just for its loot. If I spot a tamable rare in the wild, and I don't need to kill it for my Frostbitten achievement, and I don't want to tame it myself, then I will typically make an effort to contact other Hunters in the zone who might want to tame it. If no Hunters are around, I will leave the mob in peace and hope that some Hunter who's been camping will log in in time to give the beast a loving home.

3. I will make an effort to help other Hunters looking to tame rares by providing any information I might have about their predicted spawn times, locations, etc.

Okay? I honestly don't believe I'm some kind of selfish jerk when it comes to rare spawns. I don't interfere with anybody who has tagged a spawn, I don't camp directly on top of others, and I don't kill rare spawns "just because."

All that being said... I do not believe that Blizzard put rare spawns in the game just for Hunters to tame. I'm sorry, but just because you're a Hunter and you want to tame it, that does not entitle you to the spawn any more than any other player. Rare spawns are there for everybody. Yeah, they exist for Hunters to tame and have awesome rare pets. They also exist for achievement-hunters to track down and kill. And, although it does bring me a twinge of sadness to admit, they even exist for random players who "just" want to kill a rare for the extra loot it drops. In fact, since we had rare spawns and non-tamable rares long before the Achievement system even existed, one could argue that "just to kill it for its extra loot" is the original reason.

Now, whether you value any of these reasons more highly than another all depends on your personal priorities in-game. Who are you to say that because you really want King Krush as a pet, you are more entitled to him than an achievement-hunter who really wants to finish Frostbitten? That sort of thinking is pretty selfish. You're saying that your enjoyment of the game is more important than somebody else's.

One commenter in my original Aotona thread expressed a belief that achievement points are worthless. Frostbitten is worthless because it "gets you nothing" -- you don't receive a mount, a title, or a vanity pet for completing the achievement. Well guess what, dude? In case you haven't noticed, if you tame Aotona, you don't get a mount, a title, or a vanity pet, either. And you don't get an achievement. All you get is a purple parrot. And all I get for completing Frostbitten is an achievement. Who are you to say that one is more valuable than the other? They're all pixels on a screen, and I'm sorry, but your pixels are not any more valuable than my pixels. The time and effort that I've sunk into pursuing my achievement is not worth any less than the time and effort that some hypothetical Other Hunter has put into trying to tame the parrot.

Besides, much of the appeal of having a rare spawn pet lies in the challenge of finding and taming it. When I set out to tame a rare, I expect competition. I expect disappointment. I understand that I'm competing with the rest of the server--with other Hunters wanting a tame, with achievement-hunters, with random players looking for some extra gold and loot. I would never begrudge someone else taming/killing "my spawn" for any of those reasons. Because until I tag it, it's not my spawn. If I don't get there first, I'll congratulate whoever tagged the beast, and sadly but patiently wait for the next one.

It's all about personal preference. We all have goals in the game that make us happy. Some people like to collect pets, some like to collect mounts, some focus on raiding or pvp glory, and some people like to collect achievements. Some like to do it all! So long as we behave with kindness and respect toward other players, we should all be free to pursue our personal in-game goals without being judged.

**Footnote: Not all of the comments in my Aotona thread were negative. Although several people jumped on my back for killing the parrot, a few other very reasonable posters defended my right to pursue the Frostbitten achievement. To them, I am grateful. :)