Nicora has Blacky, who was originally Snarler. I tamed him because he’s black (one of my favorite colors) and he’s a wolf (one of my favorite animals) and because he reminded me of my RL dog, who passed away in May. Nicora also has a ghost sabre (just like everyone and their mother) who’s named Tonrar, which means “ghost” in Inuit. I tamed him because…well…he looked cool

Machalor has a thing for hyenas. They didn’t really appeal to me at first and I had tamed her first one, Chuckles the bluish-purple hyena mostly for the novelty. But then he stuck to the orc hunter like glue. And his strange aura of fierceness bordering on hysterical laughter really drew me in. And his bouncy run! And how could I forget the way his tiny tail swings around as he lopes along. This led to the taming of Machalor’s second hyena, Snickers the Scarlet Tracking Hound. Chuckles is enjoying his retirement in the stables (he might come back out again one day) while Snickers bounces along side Machalor wherever she goes.

Jorthwyn likes anything to do with Norse mythology, especially Odin. She has two pets right now, Freki the prairie wolf and Muninn the red and black carrion bird. Freki was named after one of Odin’s wolf companions and Muninn after one of his ravens. I know a carrion bird isn’t exactly a raven but it was the closest thing in the game. Freki is really neat because he’s one of those that barks every time you click on him but since Nicora already has a wolf, Jorthwyn needed something different. Which is where Muninn came in. I don’t really like the look of the carrion birds or flying pets in general but for some reason, ol’ Muninn is growing on me. His beautifully colored feathers sure help.

Aithne has gone through a lot of pets, including a ravager, a dragonhawk, and a pink tallstrider. Only two pets have stuck to her: a blue crab named Lapis and a dark blue raptor named Rath. Strange pets for a blood elf, I know, but they fit with her. I love Lapis for her shiny blue shell that just gleams in the sunlight and her name. Her name fits her beautifully. Unfortunately I know crabs don’t get much love in the skills department so I decided to get Aithne something else. A few tames later, I settled on Rath, who was a pain to tame but is too handsome and powerful to turn away. His name just popped into my mind at random but I love it and it suits him.

Brighit’s pretty much a one-pet Draenei. There was a brief time when she was going to tame cats exclusively but then I decided to create my night elf and make her my cat lady. Now Brighit is named after Brigid, a Celtic goddess of fire, who had a boar named Triath as her companion. This made my choice pretty obvious…Brighit was to tame a boar! I had shied away from boars before because it seemed like everyone had one. But then I decided that you can’t knock it until you try it and tamed a black one from around Ironforge and called him Triath (how imaginative). And he is awesome! He holds aggro better than any pet I’ve seen and his Charge and Gore skills makes killing things so much faster. Also, I will admit that he is cute and has lots of personality.

Fhionn is my cat lady. Cats are so popular in the game because they come in such a variety of skins that are all beautiful and they’re also known for some of the best damage. I too like the cats so it only made sense to have a character who had them as pets. Fhionn currently have two brightly coloured cats, Irusan and Neala. Irusan is an orange Durotar tiger that she traveled all the way to the Echo Isles for. He’s named after the Celtic king of cats. Neala, whose name is Gaelic for “queen” or “champion”, is the first yellow-leopard-skinned cat that you can tame in the game, a rare spawn called Dishu who, might I add, was a challenge to tame.  Why did I choose orange and yellow cats when they’re such a great amount of equally beautiful whitish or purplish cats? Because it seems that everything having to do with night elves is either white or purple and I was getting sick of it. When Fhionn runs around with her cats, they seem to glow brilliantly in the low light of Teldrassil.

Last but not least is Khaja, my newly created troll hunter. I’ve decided to have her tame some of the “colder” beasts, like scorpids and windserpents. She tried playing with a very cool-looking black-and-red scorpid but it just didn’t work out. Now she has one of the yellow serpents from Wailing Caverns and as soon as she’s high enough level, she’s going to tame one of the red-coloured ones. I haven’t decided which one exactly yet. Her current windserpent is named Blit (I don’t know why) and he’s beginning to grow on me. He’s quite graceful, except when he’s “running”. In addition, his ranged Lightning Breath attack seem to grab aggro fairly well.

…Wow, good thing that I didn’t actually post that in the comments of Mania’s article. It was long enough as it is!

Machalor did it! She now has a Scarlet Tracking Hound! Not without the help of two guildies of course

I had made one unsucessful trip to Scarlet Monastery with my guildie buddy Tty when Machalor hit level 33. No problem….except the hyena that spawned in the instance was level 34. >.<

Onto plan 2. Not only do I level to 34, but I also spend some time in Westfall collecting Magic Dust. Tty and I group again and a level 44 guildie also offers to help as well. Yah!

Armed with two Magic Dust and 2 great guildies, Machalor enters the instance. We kill everything up until the hyena, and then in the confusion of battle, we pull more mobs than we were suppose to, I use up both of my dusts, and the hyena dies. I’m disappointed but the others suggest that we try the next one. I agree and we take a crack at it. While my party members keep the mobs distracted, I focus on the hyena. After one broken freeze trap and two unsuccessful attempts to tame, I make it through with both me and the hyena still alive! He’s mine! I lavish praise onto my party members and head off into the sunset with my new pet at my side.

As for his name, I wanted it to follow the “laughter” theme that I had started with Chuckles. I enlisted the help of my brother and a thesaurus to come up with a good one. After scanning through a couple of the words, I yelled out “Snickers!” and we both chuckled at it. My brother then asked me, “What if someone thinks that he was named after the chocolate bar?” To which I responded, “Well, I’ll just have to explain the whole theme-naming thing…But he’s still full of chocolaty goodness!”

Don’t get my wrong, I love Jorthwyn’s pet wolf Freki and his unique barking ability. However…Nicora already has a wolf pet and I need variety in my pets. So once again I had the urge to look at Petopia and see what I could find. What I found was Lord Condar, a rare red and black carrion bird that spawns in Loch Modan. The tame wasn’t anything special. He was located in the southern area of Loch Modan and proved to be no trouble to tame. Now, I have to admit that I’m not really endeared towards carrion birds. They’re not exactly pretty and any flying creature in itself can be annoying at getting in the way of targeting the enemy. I would tame an owl (and Jorthwyn has but things didn’t work out) but let’s face it, every hunter has the same old grey owl because it’s the only one available until level 52.

I am warming up to this bird though, with his lovely colouring and his oh-so-wonderful Screech. And I had to name him Muninn, after one of Odin’s ravens. And no, he is not a raven, but he is a scavenger bird and he does have some black on him so it’s close enough for me.

Did I also mention that Jorthwyn is now level 20 and she’s trained in polearms? Sweet

Only Fhionn to go before I can cross off another on my to-do list!

Machalor went from level 29 to level 31.5 (so she now has the incredibly useful Feign Death) so she’s only 2 levels away from taming a scarlet tracking hound.

Aithne is now level 20! That’s one down, 3 to go to cross that off on my to-do list.

Jorthwyn is on her way to level 20, not with the help of quests in Loch Modan however. Has anyone else had problems finding quests in this dwarven area? Doesn’t really matter because now Jorthwyn and Freki are enjoying Darkshore, where there are lots of quests.

Brighit and Nicora…sorry, haven’t done anything with them.

The tame was uneventful in itself, after all, Jorthwyn was about 7 levels higher than him. I decided to name him Freki just like her old wolf. And he is just wonderful. Definitely worth the trip and the grinding. Every time he yips happily, it just makes me smile.

Want a special pet of your own? Here’s Petopia’s list. And here’s a video someone made of their own barking wolf:

As for character progress, I’m just trying to level everyone except for Nicora and Machalor up to level 20. I will post about Aithne’s tame of Rath, and I’m in the process of writing a beginner’s guide to the hunter class based on my experiences. So more to come soon!

Her main pet is Munnin, named after one of Odin’s ravens. Jorthwyn traveled all the way to Northrend at the tender level of 21 in order to tame him. Surprisingly, she didn’t die once on the journey.

Her alt pet is Freki, a prairie wolf that is found in Mulgore at level 5-6. Why did Jorthwyn travel all that way to tame a prairie wolf? Because they are one of only two kinds of pets that has the special behaviour of barking when anybody clicks on him. He was just too special to pass up and it makes me smile every time I hear him bark happily.

Jorthwyn’s Pets

Good old Snort on the other hand was an interesting tame to say in the least. I picked him because I sort of liked the purplish-blue hyena skin and hyenas are cute and ferocious looking at the same time. Snort happened to be the only blue hyena I could tame at level 24 and he also happened to be a rare. So after finding him, then getting distracted by real life stuff and losing him, I found him again and started taming. I was surprised to say in the least when he stood back and pelted me with green oozy stuff. At first I thought that it was some kind of ranged poison attack like the ones some spiders have. A hyena with a poison attack? That is really strange. Then it dawned on me. He was throwing snot at me! Talk about living up to your name. But now his name is Chuckles and alas, he no longer chucks boogers around. Now that would be a unique pet.