Hallow's End Round Up

There's still a few days left to Hallow's End; it's scheduled to run through Tuesday.

It's been quite eventful so far. We've poked a little fun at it. Here are the events we've covered:

Bob for Apples

Scare Some Monsters

Enjoy the Decorations

Trick or Treat an Innkeeper

Do the Orphan Candy Quests

Visit the Wickerman Festival

Participate in the Southshore Quests

Buy Candy or Treats from the Special NPC

Links:
Hallow's End Pages from Blizzard and wowwiki.

Hallow's End - Fright

I noticed a nice surprise from the Pumpkin Treats. You know, the ones that are quest rewards for so many of the Hallow's End quests and that you can buy from the Candy Shopkeepers.

Well if you're "on the candy" while you're fighting (they last 20 minutes a pop) there's a chance that you'll "Spook" your enemy as shown in this picture:

Hallow's End - Southshore

There are a few Hallow's End quests with action that takes place in Southshore. It's a well chosen location for Horde and Alliance because there are gathering points for each rather close together:


Stinky Quests:
The Horde quest: Stinking Up Southshore which is given by Darkcaller Yank, you may remember I mentioned her in the Wickerman Festival post. The goal of the quest is to get Horde players to go to the Alliance town of Southshore and throw stink bombs. (She also gives you this Southshore quest: Rotten Eggs.)

The Alliance Quest:
Alliance characters are asked to take the quest "The Power of Pine" in which they are given a tool to clean up the stink bombs from the Horde. The tool has a 24 hour timer.



Now if the Alliance folks would just not kill every Hordey that tries to flow a stinkbomb there might just be some stink to clean up.

Update 10/30/06:
I went back with another character to take a screenshot of the 24 hour timer on the Stink Bomb Cleaner and was surprised to find at that very moment a Horde player threw a stink bomb. I never ran so fast to clean anything in my life:


There was one consequence of finishing the quest though - you become PVP flagged (something my interface rarely, if ever, sees).

Hallow's End - Trick or Treats

You can visit any Innkeeper once an hour to Trick or Treat. But the results are random - you don't know which you'll get - Trick or Treat:

Tricks:
For a brief period of time (less than a minute) you may be turned into a toad, a cat, or other familiars:



You may also be given a random costume which lasts an hour:
This is me as a wisp Hearthing:

I also like that you can dance in the same form as your costume:

You can ride a mount or fly while you're in most disguises:

Unless your disguise is a Shape Shift:

(Yeah I was not happy.)

Treats:
Hopefully what you'll get is a Treat. Masks, costume wands or candy.

Masks
Here are some masks in action:



Candy:
The candy as Doeg put it "the best food in the game." They restore 3% of Health and Mana per second for 25 seconds.

Lollipops

Candy Bars

Candy Corns

Hallow's End - Wickerman Festival

Outside of the Undercity (to the west side) is the Wickerman Festival. An NPC, Darkcaller Yanka, let's anyone who stops by know that the festival happens every night at 8:00 pm (according to your server).

At 8pm the Banshee Queen shows up (actually apparently Banshee-time is 2 minutes earlier than Server-time):


And she reminds everyone about the purpose of the Wickerman Festival: (She's met with many cheers of course.)


Here's more of the speech:

Children of the Night, heed your Queen's call!

I join you in celebration of this most revered of nights - the night we Forsaken broke the Scourge's yoke of oppression ! It is this night that our enemies fear us the most. It is THIS night that we show our enemies what it means to stand against the Forsaken!

Now is the time to shake the world to its foundations! NOW is the time to remind those who would enslave us that we shall never yield!

NOW is the time of the Forsaken! Power to the Forsaken - NOW AND FOREVER!!!

And then the effigy lights on fire. As he burns, piles of embers show up on the ground. If you open one you can "smear them on your face like warpaint" (nope, it doesn't show up on your character) and get a wicked Wickerman Buff. I caught the granting of the buff on screen here:



Your body does a really cool quickening kind of pose for a second there when you're zapped. The buff is called the Invocation of the Wickerman and it provides for Increased Health and Mana regeneration by 25% and Stamina by 25% for 2 hours.

The related alliance quest is to Crash the Wickerman Festival. (Beware thar 3 be Wickerman Guardians there.)

Hallow's End - Orphan Quest

One of the Hallow's End quests is an Orphan Quest.

Here's my cheat sheet:
(You'll need 2 open quest slots)

	Alliance	Horde
Phase 1 Get Starter Quest	Go to the Human Orphanage - Located in one of the free standing buildings in Cathedral Square in Stormwind.	Go to the Orc Orphanage - Located in the Valley of Honor in Orgrimmar. It's a building to the left of the mining trainer. (71,22)
	Starter Quest Link on Thottbot	Starter Quest Link on Thottbot
Phase 2 Pick up the Candy (No xp.)	Visit 3 different Inns. Get the quest from the Innkeeper and do the requested emote to get the candy.
	Stormwind (/flex for Nougat) Ironforge (/chicken for Mint) Darnassus (/dance for Marzipan)	Orgrimmar (/flex for Nougat) Undercity (/chicken for Mint) Thunderbluff (/dance for Marzipan)
	Find Talvash del Kissel (Mystic Ward of Ironforge 36,3) Get quest then do the /train emote for a gumdrop.	Find Kali Remik (Sen'jin Village Durotar 56,74) Get quest then do the /train emote for a gumdrop.
Phase 3 Take Candy to Orphan (1,650 xp+ 100 Faction and 30 Treats)	Return all 4 pieces of candy to the Orphan at the Orphanage

And here's me willing to look like an idiot for a piece of candy:

Hallow's End - Bob for Apples

Throughout the holiday Innkeepers also have a barrel of Apples to bob. You can hold five (one dunking's worth) of Apples at a time but no more. In some cases the barrel is not exactly next to the Innkeeper. In Ironforge, for example, it's upstairs.

Here's the Apple Barrel in the Undercity:


And here's the Apple Barrel in Stormwind:


What is that they say about the Horde players generally being more mature?

Hallow's End - Candy Shops

During Hallow's End two vendor's show up and sell some unique treats:

Katrina Shimmerstar in Iron Forge

Rachelle Gathena in Orgrimmar

You can even buy those fun Hallow's End Pumpkin Treats (that are quest rewards for a number of other Hallow's End quests) from them.

Hallow's End - Decorations

Hallow's End doesn't pull any punches when it comes to decorations. The pumpkins, candles, hats, skeletons, skull lights, ghosts, witches hats, etc.). appear everywhere. I collected some pictures from around Azeroth:

Undercity:(Which gets my vote for best Hallow's End decorations)


Gadgetzan:


Stormwind Fountain:


Ghost in Thunderbluff:


Table in Goldshire: (I don't remember the paper Skeleton and the Witches Hat from last year.)


Pumpkra in Undercity: Now that's a big pumpkin. Seriously you have to see this thing.


Skull Closeup: (I saw these orange lights hanging around and wanted a closeup to see what it was - turns out they're skulls.)

2006-October Events

As I mentioned, September was a yawner but October looks like it's going to shape up twice as nice! Hallow's End has always been full of fun little content and decorations. But with the Harvest Festival thrown in as well it's going to be a busy month. Too bad this is a terrible time for me at work!

From the Events Calendar for October:

Event	Dates
Harvest Festival	Tue October 3 - Mon October 9
Darkmoon Faire (Elwynn)	Mon October 9 - Sun October 15
Hallow's End	Wed October 18 - Wed November 1*
Call to Arms: Warsong Gulch!	October 6 - October 9
Call to Arms: Arathi Basin!	October 13 - October 16
Call to Arms: Alterac Valley!	October 27 - October 30

During a Call to Arms, emmissaries from that Battleground will be found in the major cities, and honor/faction rewards for performing objectives in that battleground are increased.

* One month ago this was going to run from the 14th through the end of the month. When I checked it again after the Harvest Festival information was released we seemed to lose a few days (now starts on the 18th).

I know it must be tough as a developer to keep dates straight (I blame, but cannot yet prove, copying and pasting of previous year data!) . It just makes it also tough as a player to plan ahead when dates keep changing and :

1. Holidays are one of my favorite parts of the game, so I want to find time to play them and
2. I also have to juggle real life needs (In this case getting a ton of work done before November 1st). The good news for me is that I have to travel to a conference the second week of October. Luckily that's during the Darkmoon Faire which is around every month.

I'm also going to try to watch when Hallow's End actually ends. Does it matter that October 31st is a Tuesday? Will it be effective on November 1st or not in effect on November 1st? (I think I would read it as in effect on that date an I think Blizzard means it won't be.)