To be honest, I'm not really sure it needs to be that much faster... it's a weird sort of state where there both isn't all that much to buy, and a whole lot. If you want to get every last tabard/mount/pet, sure, that'll take way too long. But realistically, you can get the mount, pet, and tabard of your faction in five weeks or so or champion dailies; a lot of dailying, but that's for something in each "slot". The mechanical rewards are outright worthless if you're actually raiding, and even if you aren't, you can get all of the applicable ones in less time than that, even with the possibility of multiple specs.

Of course, this is a big assumption to make; I know there's definitely people who really want as many of the pets and mounts as possible, and if they're adding new ways to get the seals in the future, they may well add new rewards to make it worth the effort. And that brings up a seperate issue; unless there's a burning need for one of the equipment rewards (a freshly 80'd alt needing a purple weapon or whatnot), there's no reason not to just save the seals until 3.2 appears on the PTR. It's not like flavor items ever go "bad", and if by some chance they remove a particular item from the vendor, there will doubtlessly be ample PTR warning and you'll be in a perfect position to pick it up. Hedging your bets, if you will.

I've noticed an interesting anomaly in the Champion's arena area of the Argent Tournament. All the races present are championed by 1 male and 1 female representative... except for the Night Elves. Is this a matter of Blizzard adhering to the lore, where hunters and sentinels are generally women amongst the Night Elves, or is this for a more prurient reason?

While it's nice that we finally have another way to grind major city rep, I can't really understand the point of adding this event. Why did Blizzard add this?

1) For people who don't raid, it's a way to get some epics pretty easily.

2) pet/mount collectors, and people who want to sell pets to collectors (anyone seen one up for auction yet?)

3) People who like titles (the "of <<city>>" ones are very nice)

4) Another avenue for gold via dailies

I think you answered your own question there. Runecloth was going to become more and more annoying as time went on, and this is a far cleaner way of allowing people access to the city reps. The Argent Tournament really isn't going to be obsoleted as time goes on, like a Raid would, so its a good investment for them design-wise, as people are probably still going to be doing it a year from now.

Likely set up for 3.2.

Does anyone have any tips for Thunder Bluff champions? I can beat every valiant and all other champions easily, but these just destroy me. My usual tactic is to circle around them spamming shield breaker, then quickly going in for a charge + thrust combo. However with the Thunder Bluff champions their thrust (which they use reactively when I charge them) hits so devastatingly hard I bite the dust before they do.

For all valiants and champions I've found the same strategy works. Build up 3 defend charges. Go talk to them. Shield break->Charge as they move to the center. Stay in close (refresh defend if you need) and trade thrusts with them until they break off. When they do, get a bit of distance shield break->charge and get in close and repeat until you win. I find it very rare I end a fight with less than 50% health and I don't think I've lost one since the start when I was just learning it.

I haven't really noticed too much consistent difference between the champions and valiants of different races. I recall on the PTR they did different things but as far as I can tell, using the above strategy, all of them don't really seem to react differently at all.

Of course, they could've implemented a Netheweave turn in and / or a Frostweave turn in, as well. It's not really clear why they didn't ever do that in TBC or Wrath.

Probably for the same reason that they spent hundreds (probably thousands) of man-hours on the SSO faction and Isle of Quel'Danas dailies (although thankfully this time around they just brute-forced anti-ganking measures with an unremovable buff, instead of easily avoidable guards!), or the AQ opening events, etc. It makes the game feel epic, and gives players the impression that they're actually affecting the war effort or whatever. It gives those who don't enjoy / can't raid more stuff to do, and adds back-story and context for raids. It's a great way to offer beginner level gear or vanity pets / mounts to those who are interested, without just throwing them onto existing vendors for increasingly exorbitant prices.

There's also the distinct possibility that they are testing out 'mounted' combat in preparation for a raid encounter in Icecrown Citadel, similar to all the vehicle quests while levelling, then seeing them implemented in Ulduar. I wouldn't be at all surprised if the initial IC encounter was some sort of cool mounted charge across the citadel's courtyard or something, culminating with a boss fight before entering the citadel proper.

Regarding mounted combat itself, I actually didn't even notice varying 'strategies' employed by different races. The combat itself seems extremely simple. I can easily do the 3 valiants in a row without healing, and almost always 4 champions (sometimes I heal after the 3rd). Don't pay attention to your defended buff on your character's buff list, as it doesn't reflect your actual defended level; once you get it to 3 stacks, it'll stay there permanently. Pay attention to the graphic surrounding your character (3 small green shields for 3 stacks, 2 medium yellows for 2, 1 large red for only a single stack), and prioritise keeping it at 3 stacks above all else. The only really threatening move that you'll have to deal with is a charge + shield break combo, which will remove 2 stacks and leave you taking damage from thrusts until you build it up again. Anything else, you can very easily rebuff your stack to 3 before the enemy gets another hit on you. I've found that hugging the enemy and darting out for quick shield breaks to generally be the best way to remove their stacks, then using charge liberally once they're low.

The dailies themselves seem quite profitable, especially with the champion and valiant ones doubling up (10 scourge and the mounted combat outside IC Citadel), and the extra 40g from bags if you're rep capped. I think I'll most likely end up doing those two only while doing champion dailies, since I'm in no rush to gain extra titles, or access to extra loot which I can't yet afford. Certainly there's no way I'm going to bother flying all the way down to Grizzly Hills / Dragonblight / Howling Fjord (unless it lines up with JC or Fishing daily) for the various 'sword' quests.

Every mounted opponent (even the dreaded Boneguard Commander) can be defeated by playing conservatively. Basically, if you both have 3 shields, then thrusts remove the same % of damage from them as they do to you. If you have difficulty jousting, then simply trade blows. As soon as they move, throw a shield breaker to drop them to 2 shields, close immediately to prevent them from doing the same or charging, and put a couple thrusts in at 4 times the shielded damage until they raise their shield back to full. Keep on whacking.

It's slow, but completely safe. As long as you don't allow them to reduce your armor, while you reduce theirs from time to time, you win by attrition.

My strategy is quite simple.

Always engage the opponent by removing the first layer of defense. At the tournament Shield Breaker is a better choice than charge, because the opponent starts with 3 layers. At the Citadel, Lieutenants pop with one layer, thus charge+thrust combo is a good choice.

Once the opening made, thurst 1 times or 2 and start circling the guy. You should manage to Shieldbreak again having your opponent down to one layer or 2 if he reinforced. Try to shield break while moving towards your opponent. The client/server delay can sometimes be on your side. I observed that I could go towards the opponent, Shieldbreak at minimum range and saw the spear leaving my mount at melee range.

Just after the opponent should try to leave melee for charge opportunity. Charge him before he does, try to shield break while circling in order to come back in melee.

Your opponent is now denfenseless and thrust can now hits very hard.

For your defense, always keep your defense available to rebuild a layer as soon you lose it.

With this strategy I managed to beat 4 champions and 3 valiants in less than 6min30.

You can defeat ever NPC opponent, except Taurens, while taking less than 1-2k damage (My best is defeating a champion while only taking ~400 damage). Taurens are are 'harder' because their model is large and it messes with range checks.

Thrust is on it's own cooldown. All other abilities share a global cooldown among them.

How to win:
Start with 3 Shields
Open with Shield Breaker as you run towards them.
Thrust immediately.
Move a few steps away from them while turning towards them with the mouse, but using strafe to still be moving away. Be mashing Shield Breaker.
As soon as you see you're casting Shield Breaker stop strafing so that you point right at them, Thrust.

Repeat this until they have 0 shields, then on your 'strafing out' run do a charge instead of Shield Breaker.

NPCs will never see you as at minimum range for shield breaker or charge long enough for them to use the abilities. You'll never have less than 3 shields and all they'll do is thrust a couple times.

As it is the combat with NPCs is entirely a time sink with no bit of skill or luck involved. But such is most of WoW

Some announced upcoming changes to the mount rewards, in the next patch (likely 3.1.2).

So then it sounds like for an extra 5 days' of dailies and 2000g (with exalted faction discounts), we'll be able to get a total of 11 (2 for each faction, plus the hippogryph) mounts from the Tournament? Or am I reading that incorrectly?

That's correct.

Current model mounts that are unpurchased will be available for 5 Seals and 500g if you're exalted with the faction.
New model mounts will be available for 100 seals and no gold, if you're a Champion of the faction.
The Hippogryph remains at 250 seals.

If you've purchased a current model mount already for 100 seals, it'll be replaced in your spellbook with the new model mount. You can rebuy the old model mount for 500g and 5 seals if you want it.

The NPCs are quite bad at realizing you're in range for abilities. If you're doing what I describe you're constantly in and out of range for Thrust/Shield Breaker and apparently they just can't use an ability unless you're solidly in range for a second or two.

I did notice that NPC shield break has a 0.5s cast, and if you're in melee range when the cast ends the spell fails. Also when their AI tells them to attempt a charge, they will not attack you at all until they decide it's time to charge or give up because you're too close. If they attempt an early charge or attempt a charge a few times in a row, you can often kill them taking almost no damage, especially if you're good at using the burst damage combo of shield break -> charge/strike at the same time, followed by a shield break after the charge.

Edit: I removed the old post that was wrong. I had >500ms latency when I wrote it. I currently kill all of them fast like this:

3, 1, 2, (run in before it actually throws), 1, [shield if applicable,] 1, repeat

Time to kill 3 valiants: 42s
Time to kill 4 champions: 1min 5s

That's the slow way to do it, Watlok.

Open with a charge and melee them until they try to open up some range. Spam charge so you do it the moment they are at range and can't charge you back, then as you circle around with your charge speed also throw a shield breaker and close to melee. They'll be at 1 or 2 shields for several swings (and you should still be at 3, if not you can easily reshield) and then they'll start running to range again so you charge -> break -> melee again.

with the technic I posted upper, I managed to kill all 4 champions and 3 valliants in something like 5min30, never needing to use heal between any of the champions nor the valliants.

I understand the desire to improve efficiency, but after the PTR nerf of these NPCs in mounted combat, do we really need to be talking about how to defeat them? If there's some new and interesting addition to the Argent Tournament in 3.2, that's one thing, but for now it feels like you're just discussing optimum strategies for killing Hogger.