WoW 4.3: Feast of Winter Veil 2011 News and Changes

Feast of Winter Veil is celebrated across Azeroth yearly, starting on the 15th December through 2nd January.

This year the, changes implemented were rather minor and subtle.

Feast of Winter Veil Meta Achievement remains unchanged this year

If you are still trying to obtain the Violet Proto-drake, or just complete the achievements to gain the Merrymaker title, this news is of interest.

No changes whatsoever, this year, regarding the meta-achievement.

New Quest

In middle of Nowhere, a new quest has been added, which can be completed on a daily basis.

On completion, the reward is a Stolen Present which has a very small chance to drop the new companion pet.

Quest Location

it's simple to get here. The snowman, giving you the daily quest is located in Hillsbrad Foothills.

Just take the path north from Tarren Mill and turn left, when you enter the snowy area.

This is another look at the quest giver and the boss you need to kill in the background in order to receive your reward.

Oh, Metzen...

Poor reindeer. His fate remains unchanged this year. You have to save him from the wrath of gnomes

The reindeer is named after Chris Metzen, one of the leading game designer, artist and voice actor of the Warcraft franchise.

New Companion

Lumpy, the new companion. Drops from a Stolen Present (Low Drop Chance). The elemental looks like a small version of Garr, the first boss from Molten Core.

Also, a new dagger for melees has been added. It's bind on equip so it is likely that if you're unlucky, you can just buy it in the auction house.

Presents from Grandfather Winter

Will be available to open from December 25 to January 2.

The unique item this year is Gaudy Winter Veil Sweater.

Here we can see how the sweater looks like. It has a click-on-use function to sing a song. Owning this sweater will grant you a Feat of Strength.

There's also a new achievement, which requires you to sing a song in the opposite factions' capitals.

This achievement isn't required however, for the "What a Long and Strange Trip it's Been" meta-achievement.

Achievements

From all of the achievements, I deem two somewhat not difficult, but somewhat time-consuming.

A Frosty Shake

During the Feast of Winter Veil, use your Winter Veil Disguise kit to become a snowman and then dance with another snowman in Dalaran.

If you happen to play on a low-populated server, you might have trouble finding a player to dance with in Dalaran these days. The disguise kit needed for this is sent to you by Grandfather Winter, a day after you complete talking to him.

The second achievement is With a Little Helper from My Friends.

Here you need to earn 50 honorable kills as a Little Helper from the Winter Wondervolt machine.

These machines are located inside all major cities.

They transform you into a gnome. In the disguise, you have to kill 50 players of the opposite faction. I'd recommend go Alterac Valley for this one. Remember, once you die, the gnome buff wears off.

e Stockade, a low-level instance with its entrance in Stormwind. Horde players who can fly should be able to fly straight in without much trouble if they can avoid the flying guards.

 

Speaking of holiday-spirit city infiltration, there's a small but affluent market of people who like wearing things you can't get without some pain. The vendors who sell these recipes sell green clothes in Horde cities and red clothes in Alliance cities. They're not picky about who they sell to, though. If you can fly in fast enough and get to them, you can pick up the recipe from your opposite factions' vendors. If it helps, here's a macro that you can bind to a button or that will buy the recipe without forcing you to find it on the vendor: "/run BuyMerchantItem(10,1)"

Changes since last year

Last year, we were able to turn Deeprock Salt into Preserved Holly, which, unlike the fresh stuff, would allow people to get the Fa-la-la-la-Ogri'la achievement. The salt went for as much as 35g while the daily was up, so a lot of people had been stockpiling it for this year's event. Unfortunately, Blizzard seems to have deprecated this particular quest, and I can't seem to find any other way to get Preserved Holly.