This is madness!

Two posts in one day!

*hands out brown paper bags to those who may find themselves hyperventilating*

No, really, I just have some things to think about with regard to my pet situation in-game, and I'd like to write about them here and see if I can't coax a couple more of you lurky-type people out to help me with this whole thing.

The Problem:

3.2 is here, and brought with it a new Spirit Beast. He is blue and sparkly, and, well.. new. Which makes him very want-able for me. That whole SHINY thing.

The Arguments:

He's rare, just like the other ones, so not a lot of people will have one. I'm guessing Beast Mastery is still going to be the redheaded stepchild of the Hunter Spec family for a while, which cuts down even farther on how many people will actually be out there looking to tame him.

He's a Spirit Beast, and not a cat, which adds to the whole "different" feel.

He's a Spirit Beast, and my stables already hold the other two. He would totally be a "vanity" pet, because he uses the same skills as the other two. Plus he wouldn't see raids or instances unless somewhere down the line the whole pet family gets a buff. Devilsaur is still topping the charts as Best DPS Exotic, so Chompy will always be by my side when I go through an instance portal.

(side note: I totally don't get the people going all OMFG WTF about the set of skills this guy has. Yeah, he's not a cat MODEL, and he has Prowl. So what? If you've quested in Hinterlands, plenty of stealthy wolves out there. Plus, the pet family name is totally Spirit BEAST not Spirit Cat or Spirit Wolf, so none of the Claw/Bite arguments hold water for me either. The pet family has these skills. Blizzard chose to give the first two examples of this family cat models. So what.)

In order to tame him, I have to give up someone who's been there for quite a while. Let's go through the choices, shall we?

Chompy the Devilsaur: Not happening. See above comment re. Best DPS Exotic pet. Also my only level 80 pet at the moment.

Beauregarde the Chimera: Probably candidate #1 for replacement, except for the fact that I spent four days camping the silly thing because it was purple and gorgeous. Has not been out of my stables for more than showing off in ages. Still level 75. Rare, but I could possibly camp him again and re-tame him should I change my mind later.

Leshya the Grimtotem Spirit Guide: Also not happening. This guy is totally not replaceable AT ALL since Blizzard hotfixed the mechanic that allowed him to be tamed in the first place. Still level 75, but also a regular wolf, and the only pet available to me should I ever spec out of Beast Mastery.

Sidhe the Spirit Beast: Loque'nahak. The first Spirit Beast I tamed, and totally a fluke that I even managed to get him in the first place. I blogged about taming him, and personally, I think that story is one of the best things I've ever written. Rare, but again, re-tameable. Level 78, because I was working on leveling him when the patch containing Gondria came out. To release him would feel like a bit of a waste, as he counts for the rare-killing achievement, and if I'm not going to have him as a pet I may as well have killed him instead of taming him.

Zingarnor the Spirit Beast: Gondria. Currently level 79, and of the two cat models, my personal favorite. He was relatively easy to find, but his name has some history, and I couldn't transfer it to the new wolf because the first Zingarnor was a cat, and it just wouldn't feel right.

The Plea:

I can't decide this on my own. I've got a problem with doing things on impulse, and should I happen to fly over this guy before I've totally decided one way or the other, it would be extremely difficult for me to resist releasing the chimera and taming him. Advice pleeeease??!

Yahoo, I got it!

I got me a new pet! I am so excited.. I was on a long time last night waiting for him, and he never showed up. Then tonight when I came home, I hopped on for a little bit, and did a quick patrol of the three areas where he might be found. He wasn't in the first place I looked, which was the most common of the three, from what I read. So I flew over to the second place, and all of a sudden, there he was, in all his purple glory.

May I introduce my violet chimaera, Beauregarde! (Thanks again Skittles, for the name!)

The Story of Ted

All right, my danged request for name help has barely (pun intended) been up, and I'm ready to pull rank and skip the whole poll part of this thing entirely.

I have to explain why though.

Softi has suggested Ted. Ted as a name for a bear is full of win, and I can think of three reasons that this is so.

1. Ted E. Bear
2. I have never had a pet named Ted. The closest I have ever come is Bruce, my green raptor from the Wetlands back when I was just a wee hunter.
3. The Story of Ted.

And here I go storytelling again.. this one is sort of an inside joke with my hubby.

We were questing in Hellfire Peninsula, my hunter and his warlock, back before we got to level 70. We were doing the quest where you have to disrupt the portals, and there are several sorts of demons wandering around. Hubby says, wow, those are cool, and proceeds to enslave one. He sends it after another demon, and I start giggling.
Hubby: What's so funny?
Me: That poor demon was probably so confused. He thought his buddy was coming over to say hi, and instead he starts beating him up! He was probably like, 'Oh, hi, how are.. HEY! What's the deal! OWWW! Cut it out! That's it, you're off the bowling team, Ted!!'

From then on, all the demon NPC's with the Felguard model were named Ted. I believe we named some of the other ones, because he enslaved one of everything at some point. There was Bob, and maybe Fred, and I think Susan for the female ones with 6 arms.. but Ted stuck. We moved on to Shadowmoon eventually, and when we got to the demon camp, it was, "Oh look honey, Teds!"

I made a draenei mage, just to play around with, and asked hubby what I should name her. What else but Ted? But that was taken, so her name is now Tehd.

So I think it only fitting that my new bear friend be named Ted, and many thanks to Softi for the reminder! :)

OK People, I need your help!

I have done the unthinkable.. last night I released Jacqueline back into the wild and headed off to Winterspring to tame something new. A type of pet that Asara has never had in all her career as a hunter. At one point or another she has tamed every tamable sort of animal up there, except this one. At 55 she got an all-white Frostsaber Cub, then she picked up one of the blue kitties with white stripes, and Rak'Shiri a bit later, as well as one of the big white owls (named Orly). Last night.. she tamed a bear. I'm going to pretend that it's not in partial preparation for the release of the expansion and the (promised) pet talent trees. Because with the addition of the bear, she will then have one of each type of pet. Cat for DPS, Wolf for "utility", and yon Bear for uber tankage. But that's not really why I did it.. because I'm not preparing for WotLK at all. Nope. Not I.


The help part? This poor bear needs a name, and I am at a loss. Here is what he looks like (image from Petopia):



I'll be taking suggestions in my comments section until lunchtime or so, then I'll put up a new post with a poll, so you all can vote on your favorites! Depending on the number of submissions, I may extend suggestions out for the whole day and do the poll tomorrow. I'd just feel bad to work on leveling him up and have him still be called just "Bear". Thanks everyone!! :)

Cuteness!

I am a packrat. Virtually and otherwise. I have been collecting in some fashion little pets that you can get in various ways in WoW. Some people call them "vanity" pets, because the only reason they're there is for looks. Over all of my characters I've amassed quite a few! And now I have a way to display them.. Thanks to Phaelia over at Resto 4 Life, who found this excellent website!

My collection can be found here!!