Mania’s Arcania

There are a lot of factors that go into choosing the perfect pet. In fact, when you are high level and trying to decide from almost 700 different possible pets, the choice can be downright complicated! But luckily, choosing your first pet is a lot simpler.

This series of articles sets out to answer the question “What should I tame first?”. It is aimed at players who are new to the hunter class — if you are an advanced hunter looking for a full-blown analysis of all the factors that go into choosing a pet, this guide may be a little basic for you.

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Final name: Skytalon

Here’s the next entry in our ongoing “contest”: Name! That! Pet! [add canned applause here]

Today we have a request from Caiti from One Among Many. Her level 70 Tauren hunter Hawkspirit needs help finding a name for her owl. The owl has also just hit 70!

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It’s been almost a week since I last posted — which believe me was not my intention! And to be honest, the posts before that were a bit spotty and thin. But the good news is that the full-time contract that’s been taking up so much of my time ended today. I’m working another contract (part-time) and I’ve got some piecemeal jobs coming up, but that extra 40+ hours a week should give me a bit more time to be around.

(The bad news, of course, is that it’s the holidays. I’m not a holiday person — I have no trips planned and if I get my wish I’ll manage to avoid seeing my family entirely. But it’s an open question whether anyone else will be around to see me being around. *grin*)

On the agenda: a long-overdue update to Petopia, more useful content for this blog, the return of Kaet, more pets to name, and — if I can get the coding to work out — a special secret surprise. :>

Anyone else notice this? Mount up and your pet disappears, as normal. Use Fresh Holly to transform your mount into a reindeer and your pet … reappears? How very odd!

I haven’t tried Preserved Holly yet, but I would suppose it works the same way.

Regardless, Cloud is having some holiday fun following me across Azeroth, just like in the old days.

Want your own level 70 ghost wolf, no effort required? Then the Public Test Realm is where you want to be this weekend! Pre-made level 70 hunter characters come complete with a level 70 ghost wolf — already at Best Friend loyalty and with 350 training points just waiting to be spent. The wolves do start out unhappy, however, and the characters don’t come with any food, so be ready to dash to the nearest butcher before your wolf runs off!

Terry Pratchett, author of the Discworld series, has anounced that he has a rare form of early-onset Alzheimer’s. (Via Eating Bees.)

I thought it was bad when Thomas Covenant died. I’m going to be crying for days.

Final name: Skittels

This episode of Name That Pet is brought to you by Faeldray of Petaholics Anonymous, who’s young hunter Khaja is looking for a name for her bear.

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I haven’t been following the PTR much lately — shoot, I’ve barely had time to check in on my own blog lately! — but I noticed this evening that Hortus announced that pre-made level 70 characters are now available to be copied to the PTR. Unfortunately the PTR is down until tomorrow, but that just gives the characters time to copy, I suppose.

Anyway, if you’ve been wanting to see what this next minor patch has in store from the eyes of a random level 70 character, now is your chance!

Just a quick post today to make sure everyone is aware of the Child’s Play charity raffle at The Bronze Kettle. Petopia is donating a 2008 calendar to the mix! So make sure you buy a bunch of tickets — even if you don’t win a prize, you’ll still be a winner.

So a few weeks back I got this bee in my bonnet and decided that I wanted a 2008 calendar with pictures of my favorite pets. It was a lot more work than I expected to put together, but now that I’ve got it I thought you guys might want to see it. :> I used Cafe Press for the printing, so I went ahead and set up a small Cafe Press shop for Petopia.

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