New Day, New Beta Patch

another beta patch was released tonight. i'm happy to say that this one seems pretty stable so far. note: the changes/updates to the cataclysm pet list was as of the beta patch prior to this most recent on. no pet updates for beta patch 13117 yet.

i just hit friendly with my guild, but unfortunately this didn't reduce the price of the guild rewarded companion pets. i'm going to keep grinding out the rep to see if there's a discount at a higher reputation.

things to do in no particular order:

Forgotten Surprises

taking a small break from the beta and pet hunting/research, i decided to clean up my computer a little bit. even though i dread cleaning in general, sometimes you find really neat stuff that you forgot you had.

these screenshots were taken a while ago but i completely forgot about them. until now! on with the adorableness!




cuteness overload? :D

Does Want! - Dark Phoenix Hatchling

we're in luck! warcraftpets brings us a video preview of the dark phoenix hatchling! it has the same model as the phoenix hatchling, but instead of a red/yellow color scheme it's primarily pink/purple. it's gorgeous nonetheless and i can't wait to get my hands on it! i'd love for the two phoenixes to interact with each other when the two meet. i can just imagine the glorious swirls of color that would ensue as they play with each other. but i doubt there will be any sort of animation between the two.

the video description mentions that it costs 300 gold which is something i'll have to double check for myself once i log into the beta. a few patches ago it was only 75g (plus the achievement unlock requirement and a guild revered reputation). 75 to 300 is quite a jump up in price, but totally worth it if you adore collecting vanity pets imo. i wonder if once exalted there will be a discount on the guild rewards/companions.

quick note on the achievement for this companion:

"All reputations are retroactive. If you have the rep now, it will count in the guild achievement. Also note that the reputations have to be separate. Having Argent Dawn at exalted on 8 members still only counts as one towards the achievement.

Also, don't forget that this achievement requires revered guild faction for any of your reputations to count."
- Mumper

so check list time!

Rustberg Seagull - Update

looks like the price of the seagull has dropped from 60 tol barad commendations to 48 as of the latest beta patch. it still requires an honored rep with your alliance/horde tol barad faction.

tol barad seems to be similar to the wrath of the lich king's wintergrasp. (not sure about the actual PVP, but in terms of zone and access, it's not that different.)

it should be noted that there are two sections to tol barad - the actual battle field where the pvp takes place, and tol barad peninsula where your faction's NPCs and other things are located. you must be level 85 to take the portal to the peninsula, but you can queue up for the actual battle at level 80. unlike wintergrasp you cannot fly within or directly to either zone.

once in the tol barad peninsula (not the battle field), you'll find your faction's quartermaster and some daily quests. the dailies will earn you a tol barad commendation (and some reputation, i'm guessing) once completed.

there may be other ways to earn the commendations (winning the battle perhaps?) but i haven't had a chance to find out.

so the seagull companion may be a pet that we'll have to wait until we're 85 before going after, but who knows. if we can start earning tol barad currency early on, maybe we'll be able to buy it by the time we hit 85 (when we can port straight to the quartermaster.)

personally i'm not all that excited about it. i've never had any interest in pvp of any kind. but if it's for a vanity pet... i will suffer through it! *determined* i might have to drag some friends along to help out and keep me from ripping my hair out though.... ;P

Well I'll Be Damned - Tiny Shale Spider

if you haven't read already, warcraftpets.com has a small summary of one of the new cataclysm companions, the tiny shale spider. specifically, "He's very tricky to reach, requiring quest access and a bit of ingenuity."

i didn't quite understand what this meant. was it a creature that was phased out? would you need to do a quest to summon it?

well tonight i went and tried my luck, and now i understand completely. @_@

i won't go into too many details because, quite frankly, i'm still pretty stumped and i'm 99% sure my find was an accident, bug, glitch, or whatever you want to call it. i'm going to have to do some more research on this one before i can write up anything with confidence.

but i will tell you this: jadefang is in an area of the caves that is absolutely IMPOSSIBLE to get to under normal circumstances. how i managed to get up there... i have no idea. i.. just... i'm at a loss for words over this situation.

this pet will be by far one of the hardest to obtain come expansion (unless i can figure out this puzzle of getting in, over, and up). not only is it from a rare spawn, the mob is in a hidden, hard to reach area. plus think of all the competition! for the companion pet that it drops AS WELL as jadefang itself (i think it can be tamed by hunters). there were already quite a few people running through the caves, and since most were max level... i'm guessing they were after the same thing i was.

so i know what i'll be doing for the next few days, trying to figure out just how in the world i'm going to do this come live release because i honestly don't think i'm going to get THAT lucky again. x_x

oh and i forgot to mention, yes, the pet is bind on pick up. :(

Lantern Preview and Turkey

i'm taking a break from the elementium geode hunt. there's only so much ore one toon can handle before exploding!

Lantern Preview
while on break, harval pointed me in the direction of one of wowhead's most recent blog posts. it features two 3D model previews of the possible enchanted lantern pet. there's even a 3D model of deathy, the blizzcon 2010 redeemable reward!

strangely, though, the lanterns are labeled as "draenei" and "blood elf" lanterns. could this be hinting at race specific companions? perhaps a pet that changes depending upon the owner's faction/race? that would be pretty awesome and a first for vanity pets!

Turkey
something else that caught my eye was a white murloc egg that teaches the companion spell for terky. i'm not sure if this item/spell has been sitting in the database for a while now, or if it's entirely new. wowhead says "Added in patch 4.0.0."

i don't want to get anyone's hopes up but... WoW's anniversary is around the corner and blizzard has been known to send out a gift for all those who log in during that special time of year, yea? it's around thanksgiving day, isn't it? mashed potatoes and terky, anyone? *cough*baby murloc dressed in a turkey costume please*cough*

well, we'll see. :)

**update: re: terky - rhapture found some info on the white murloc egg and terky that's pretty dated. over 2 years to be specific. it may have been a china-only iCoke promotion. :( so it's probably unlikely that we'll be seeing this companion any time soon. i guess i jumped the gun when i saw this pet. my desire for a baby murloc was too strong!

Pets With... Cooldowns?

so mmo-champ is reporting that in the most recent beta patch the guild page and the guild herald companion pets will have pretty long cooldowns. 4 hours for the herald and 8 hours for the page. according to their tooltips, these two companions only last 5 minutes once summoned, so it makes me wonder with such long cooldowns and short durations... how on earth do we classify them? are they TRUE companion pets, or are they to be considered more in line with an item like jeeves? (should be noted that jeeves is listed under "combat pets" on wowhead.)

this is somewhat of a puzzle for me. obviously jeeves is NOT a non-combat pet. it definitely does not meet the requirements to be even considered a companion. let's refresh our memory on what it takes to be a vanity pet (as defined by warcraftpets.com):

to be considered a TRUE vanity pet..

Cataclysm Old World Pet Changes

while doing some searching on the beta forums, i came across this post: Old World Pet Changes List, posted last week. it covers the changes of currently existing companions. this includes: pets that are missing, pets that have changed location, pets that are easier to get in cataclysm, pets that haven't changed, and pets that need more info on/possibly missing.

if you are on the beta and have some time to check out any of the old world companions, help out by posting any new information on that thread so everyone may stay up-to-date and well informed.

hopefully even those who are not on the beta can view the thread linked above as it will come in handy (if kept updated) come expansion release. being a huge fan of staying organized and keeping lists, i'll definitely be adding it to my bookmarks!

Mini Jouster Bug

can you tell what's wrong with the following screenshots?
hint: there's three things wrong here.

(click on the second image to enlarge)
answers are found after the break!




if you answered that..

Lil' XT - Take Two..?

since we all know and love (or hate lol) lil' xt, available from the blizzard petstore, one of the newest datamined companions (Landro's Lil' XT) has many collectors slightly confused and wondering. or is it just me? :P

well maybe there's some hope just over the horizon to answer the blazing question of "what the hell, another one?"

wowtcgloot.com has an interesting news post up currently up, showcasing what could be a hint to what landro's lil' xt is and how it will be obtained.

the tooltip on the item listed in their announcement states:

"landro's lil' xt - binds when picked up, unique.

use: a near-perfect, goblin-manufactured knockoff of the wonderworks original."

could this mean a second lil' xt? this time from the upcoming new loot cards?!

so far i've found no other information regarding this... evil twin clone. but it makes you wonder, huh? well only time will tell...