If you are like me, it is very hard for you to hit the capture button on a pet when you don’t see that blue border on its portrait. When the pet you are hunting is a rare spawn, the urge to hit capture on it (or on an uncommon, or even poor pet), can be very tempting, especially if it could be awhile before you see another. It is even harder to accidentally kill a rare pet you’ve been hunting for, either due to over power or a damage over time. That last one actually hit hard when I was hunting for rares with pets that were all 3 or 4 levels higher than the targets. Below I am going to give you a few of my tips on hunting for pets in the World of Warcraft.
Critter Killing
When I was hunting for my Fluxfire Feline, and the Irradiated Roach I have yet to get, there is a very limited area to get the two, and that is the Toxic Airfield near New Tinkertown, as well as the Gnomeregan area outside of the instance itself. When I give the following advice, please note that macros used carelessly can lead to devastation as it is possible to target and kill a wild battle pet using class abilities. What I did to encourage Fluxfire Feline battle pets is to run around the airfield using an instant macro to one shot all of the critter versions of the Irradiated Roach. After a few times around, and making sure I cleared out any battle pet Snow Cubs, I would usually see a Fluxfire or two spawn, and after a bit of time, I finally fought a rare quality pet. This leads me to…
Capture, not Kill
When you think your next ability will bring that rare pet down to just what you need to capture, but instead you get a crit or an over power and kill the little critter, well that just frosts me. Thankfully, I have farmers at Halfhill who found just the thing for me, and the best part it this is a tradable pet. This means that even if you only have lower level toons, you can get one off the auction house to get your own savior. The Terrible Turnip is a pet grown on the Sunsong Ranch from a rare drop Ominous Seed, and this is a very special pet. It’s first and primary ability, Weakening Blow, is one that will necessitate using another pet to help out in finishing off the first few pets it will face, as it starts at level one, because the ability will never kill a pet, even if cast repeatedly. You see, Weakening Blow will always leave the pet with at least 1 health. This is THE pet to use if you want to capture your target pet without accidentally killing it.
Bringing the best you can to the fight
There is no doubt about it, when you are facing a veteran, experienced battle trainer, you definitely want to put your best foot forward. This means that you want to be bringing an all rare team to the fight, to ensure you have the best pets available. Eventually this will be epic pets, but those will come in due time. Right now, if the pet you have is not a rare, there are two items you can look for to raise it up. Flawless Battle-Stone is a family independent stone, which can be used on any pet family you choose. There are also ones for each specific family.
Say you want to raise that Ghost Skull named after everyone’s favorite community manager, which is not farmable and is an uncommon quality. You will need either the pure Flawless stone, or a Flawless Undead Battle-Stone. These stones are found by performing pet battles, with the best results being pets that are at least one level higher, by looking in your Sack of Pet Supplies, or by haunting your local Auction House, but that method could cost you anywhere from 10,000 to 100,000 gold depending on your server. I am told the Sack is by far the best bet for these stones.
Don’t bring a knife to a gun fight
This one may seem silly, but I have seen it a few times. Person builds their team out of their favorite pet, or a theme for a pet, and then realizes as their opponent mops the floor with their bunch of cuties that their favorites or theme are all in the same family, have all the same abilities, and the same weaknesses. If your enemy has an pet with attacks that are especially hurtful to that family, you could see your team of super stars become little more than a pile of bodies at the feet of your enemies. While there is no perfect team, there are definitely bad pet teams, unless you diversify what your pets are good against, and limit what is good against them.
What tips do you have for those trying to master the pet battle feature?
