One in a Million badge

So while I was in the middle of my interview crisis my friends let me know about a new badge!  Some few people were sporting a "One in a Million" badge.

How do you earn this amazing badge you ask?

I'm happy to tell you.  Since a picture is worth a thousand words it goes something like this...

My helpful minions Duncan Starstone and Suri Spiritcaller who worked out the details to achieve this amazing feat helped me get my badge.  So if you see me in the game I'll be sporting this ultra-rare badge.

Yep.  You can hit for a million. (but not more) I don't want to spoil the fun experimentation for all of you but we achieved it with a lot of traps and about 22 blades.  The setup usually involves leaving the fight, getting more supplies and tools and then joining again all to set up your buddy.  So this one takes a lot of prep and a fair bit of thought and loyal friends who are willing to spend an hour and a bit setting you up.  Naturally you'll want blades from death, balance, some per pip multipliers like fire's new trap or storms blade and all the treasure cards a treasure noob (I use the term affectionately) can carry.

If you achieve this and want me to post a pic let me know by commenting and I'll work out a way to get the images.  If you post them to some place you have access to and send me the public link I can grab them and post them that way or I can give you my email.

Anyway, have fun!  I know all you fellow perfectionists out there are already either have this badge or are making plans.

enjoy!

Vale

Ryan Lifegarden has a one in a million hit here:   http://www.wizard101central.com/forums/album.php?albumid=28411&pictureid=321620

New Target Bundle Card

My friends and I were seeing monkeys!  Turns out there is a super cool new bundle card.

It has a rickshaw mount (cool!)
Samurai looking gear and a bow!
It also has a pagoda you can put in your house that apparently is a cheating boss tower thing... an idea that we presented here a year or so back!  Woot!  Gotta love how KI works in things that people suggest.  So don't be shy about your cool ideas because eventually they will come around given the generous geniuses at KI.

Target is looking like a good place to shop in the near future.

Vale

Pet a Palooza - A Pet Picture Selection

Here are a few of the interesting real and virtual pets we had submitted for the contest.

They won't let me sleep here but they let me sit as much as I want.

I'm cute now but just wait until I pounce on your head during the night... 

 Yo quiero everything!

So if you own a lion-fish does that make you a lion tamer or a fish tamer?

Sled dogs navigate by the stars, didn't you know? 

 I thought wolves were endangered not undead...

Some people say I have a big nose but I think it just makes me look distinguished... what do you think?

 So you finally came to see your godfather about your problem heh?  I always take care of family.  Let me make some calls...

 You can't resist the cuteness

 Never mind what I'm wearing... how does my hair look?

 A slug or a frog? It's hard to say...

 The Fire brigade

 The godzilla of hamsters Hamtaro is about to escape and save the city

 fire burnin' on the dance floor

 Marvin the martian's lesser-known brother Nottinin

 I see your future...

 Not sure I want to know what this pet is!

 I swear somebody said the word "walk" was it you?

 Sorry, that's too far away... mind if I just rest here?

 Don't bother me... I'm dreaming about eating your Carls JR left overs

 Where are Wise Men and Joseph?   I'm ready to start... Do you think the rose is too much?  I thought it would add a splash of color. Should I use a english accent or a southern?  O right, I don't have any lines...

 A halloween surprise that I never want to see again

 Staff, 100 gold, boots, 200 gold, color coordinated cloths 600 gold, a mysterious electric bird for a pet? Priceless.

 Sinister was my middle name but I changed it to Princess

 You spend too much time in your garden you end up finding one of these

 The ghost of Christmas past I think...

 Icey and Epic... just how I like my pets!

 Ghost riders colossus in the sky

 If you look cute one time a day, you'll never have to find a new place to stay

 Ordinary piggle bellies had no stars but the star-belly piggles had stars on thars

 This guy is ready for the races

 You can't resist my happy smile

 Don't touch my garden!

 New racing stripes for this guy

 Have you seen my container of hot cocoa?

Stay there while I hypnotize you!

 Today I'm going to sleep, then look over then fence... and then sleep again.

 Paparazzi?  Well, I'll pose for just one and then I'm outa here.

 You will be powerless against the cute ears

 Let me know when the barber gets here.  This time I'll let him finish cutting my hair before biting him.

 So how did my towel get left outside on the doorstep?  Oh wait, that's Fido.

 You ready to give up yet?  I'll just keep staring at you until you give me what I want.

Man! All the litter boxes were occupied.  I guess this works in a pinch.

 You know you wanna give in!

Thanks to everyone that submitted!  There were too many to include all of them but I wanted to try to get a few of them up for people to appreciate. 

For those that didn't win I want to encourage you to submit often in our contests.  Your chances of winning something are almost always really good.

Pet a Palooza Winners - Finally!

The contest has finally come to a close with a lot of interruptions including trips out of town, interviews, technical difficulties including having to do surgery on my wireless router.  I thank you all for your patience and hope that you don't die from anticipation!

In my haste I forgot to track what the codes are that were assigned to random winners.  (those that didn't win by cutest pet but won by just being lucky) 

The possible things to win are:
Prudent Hound
10,000 crowns
5,000 crowns
Energy Elixir

Here are the lucky winners for cutest pet:
Both of these entries had Cupigs!  They are a very rare drop from Jade Oni and well, you just have to see them to know how cute they really are with their pink bellies, little angel wings and pinned up diapers...
Baby Girl
James DragonCatcher

Then we had an QUOTE-Oh my gosh cute-UNQUOTE hummingbird "pet" submitted by

Katie Summershade Not far behind a kitty

Cheyenne Dragonrider

Then we found a very unique pose for a cat that just had to win something... relaxing cat
Robert Darkheart

Ginormous hamster also couldn't be denied a reward
Destiny Soultamer

A very cute fairy pet also made the cut
Kyle Wildgiver

Some other cute pets that received various types of prizes (crowns or pet or elixir) were from:
Arrondey
Jason Goldriver
Sophie (whatif110)
Chay P.
Jolena Raney
Morgan Mythcaster (for the self-potty-trained cat)
Iridian Liontamer
Chase Freak
Heather Nightbringer

Some ugly pets had such a spooky look or "ew" factor that only a good hearted wizard could love them.  (these won various types of prizes) Some of these were owned by:
Destiny Wildheart
Paige Dreamcloud
Stephanie Frostweilder
Tanner Heath

The remainder of the prizes are of various types as well and were assigned randomly so as to make sure that the remaining entries all had an equal chance at winning something.  Those random winners who may have won an elixir, or crowns 5k, or crowns 10k or a Prudent Hound are:
Angel Winterbreeze
Talon Deathdreamer
Dakota NightBloom
Taryn Stormrider
Jarod (Chimera)
Mark Silversword
Emma Benesch
Christina N.
Jacob Skullrider
Tudor Ioan
Autumn Starwalker
Michael CrowSpear
Duncan Stormthief
Destiny Moondreamer
Daniel Deathcaster
Matthew SC
Dylan Bearblood
Blaine Anglefist
Julian Hetherington
Richard Titanfist
Axel
александър жечев (Dasdfgh)
Molly Starmender
Jack Qiu
John Spiritshade
Rosalyn SilverTalon
Amber Dragonhunter
Cole Lifespear
Matthew Lifeflame
Abhi Sambangi
Johnnycentral1
Robert Griffinglade
John LegendMancer
Marie Marshall
Mr.L G.
Xavier Palacios-santana
Austin Phillips
Brian Anglespear
Jason ThunderShield
Elijah Tucker
Awesomesauce (pranav)
Alura RoseBlade
Devin WildHeart
Angela Shadowgarden

So if you actually entered the contest AND are listed here, please watch your email.  Since there are sometimes several wizards on the game with the same first and last name you will have to watch your email to confirm that you are the right wizard.  I have email addresses for each of these entries and will be sending out the codes through the rest of today and maybe part of tomorrow.  We've never had this many prizes to give out before or so many entries so we're in uncharted territory.

Congratulations to the winners and a big thanks to all that entered!  I hope you keep coming back and entering because the odds are strongly in your favor to win something.

As soon as codes go out I'll post some of the pictures :)

Vale

Compiling Pet Winners Into a Post

I know! It's been a long wait and I hope it will be worth it!  I stayed up until the wee hours of the morning but it just enough time to compile all the entries and judge winners and use random.org to pick other winners.  I'm compiling a post of winners and will be mailing out the codes through the balance of the day.  So if you see your name go up but haven't received a code yet just watch your email. 

Please stand by as I compile the winners into a huge post...

Vale

Contest Update - Friday! and Amazon job update

I got through half the entries and still have half to go but finally have a free chunk of time so I'm going to post and hurry and work on it!  I'm aiming to post winners late Friday.

So I just got done the 6 hour long interview with Amazon.com and am relaxing at the hotel now.  Wow.  That was in-TENSE!  The guys were super friendly and I hit it off with some and had an ok interview with others.  8 people talked to me in the space of 6 hours and it was totally nuts...  a lot of whiteboarding and problem solving.

First was the hacking test.  Great!  I'm a lateral thinker so I pretty quickly showed them how devious I could be.

The second and third ones went super great with no real gotchas.  I even had to eat while being interviewed. (AWKward)  Then I had an interview where I felt like I wasn't giving the guy the answer he wanted so I said "I can sense I'm not getting to the heart of what you want to know".  Then he gave me a hint and that's all I needed to nail the answer. (yay)

Then I had a couple interviews that were good but I knew I messed up on a question but I tried to talk through it and showed that I did know some of the lower level stuff.  It seemed to help but I was still bummed because it seemed like I opened a little door for doubt. :(

The thing that made me feel most awkward was that I was way over-dressed.  I just wore dockers and a striped long-sleeve shirt but these cool nerds were hanging out in jeans and tshirts and sporting scraggly beards and stuff.  I probably looked like a prude!  Yikes!

Well, for good or bad it's done and we'll have to see if they thinking I'm worth moving out here.

Here in Seattle it's super cloudly and misty (like the mists of Avalon :)

K. I better get back to processing contest entries.

Thanks for all the kind comments and support.

Vale

Closing the Pet-a-Palooza contest

I'm in the process of reviewing the entries for the Pet-a-Palooza contest.  There were a lot and I'm making progress as fast as I can.

The minute I'm done I'll post the winners up and send them an email with their code.

Good luck to everyone that entered!  As usual random.org will be picking the lucky entry number and the twins will be picking the cool pets and cute pets.

~
On the job front, I had yet another interview with HP today when I had been expecting a casual lunch with the team.  Something tells me that opportunity may be going away.  Something didn't feel right today.  There was an air of apology about government processes etc.  Not that things went badly. In fact it went pretty well, but I'm almost never wrong when it comes to gut feelings.

On the up-side I'm on my way to a full day long interview with Amazon.com on Thursday so I'll be trying to update things between flights and prep.  Wish me luck!  I hear "intense" doesn't even begin to describe the experience and they say that with each half hour session they only get tougher and more technical. So, let's hope that I can remain smart while having limited access to chocolate. :)

Vale

Wizard stories of supportive friends - please submit

I was writing a thank you to KI for a very kind thing they did for me.  When I was writing the email I got a little sappy and mentioned some cases where Wizard has helped me or friends of mine through tough times. 

I'll give a couple small examples...

When I got a call that my brother had been in a life threatening car accident there was nothing I could do.  But my friends gave me a lot of comfort and helped me get through the worry.  In time he made a full recovery against all the odds and is walking and working again.  (he's a rocket scientist :)

When my mom died of cancer my friends were there to help me through it.  That's not to say my IRL family and friends didn't help--they did a lot.  But it was a real comfort to have an expanded circle of friends who wanted to know how things were and were willing to talk or not talk about things depending on my mood when I had time to play Wizard. 

I could go on and on but I found a lot of understanding and kindness from friends on Wizard101.  Have you?

Post a comment with your story as a thank-you to Wizard101 staff that work so hard to make the game a true community.

See you on the game,
Vale

p.s. to go to the pet-a-palooza page click the tab or go here: http://icewizardsrule.blogspot.com/p/pet-palooza.html

Pet a Palooza update

Hey, there's an update on the pet contest so check out the pet page here.

http://icewizardsrule.blogspot.com/p/pet-palooza.html

On the job poll, it seems like HP is winning.  What do you think?  Put in your two cents by commenting on the last post.

Thx,
Vale

Pet a Palooza

IT'S BAAAAAAAAACK! 

Pet a Palooza!

(See our new Pet a Palooza tab in just below the Valerian' School Banner for up-to-date details)

This fierce hound is a Wizard exclusive pet for Valerian's School for Wayward Wizards!

We're going to be giving away a bunch of codes for "Prudent Hounds", codes for 5000 crowns and codes for 10,000 crowns and energy elixirs.

Send me a pic of your pet for a chance to win. If you don't have a pet send me a pic of someone elses pet. We'll have a random prizes and prizes for cute pets and ugly pets! Judging will be subjective but I think it will be way fun!

This contest is closed

For those of you in grade school you should have your parents send the email for you. And I'm recommending you send a picture of your pet only (no people if possible). Codes will be returned to the email address that sent the entry.
I'll set up a raffle-copter contest for additional chances to win by using social media to bump Valerian's School!

Keep coming back for more chances to win!
~ Valerian Nightbringer