Meet the Family: Patch 5.2

It's been quite some time since I last updated my official pet roster, so with patch 5.2 coming in, now is definitely the time to check in with the family.

My stable's been overall stable in terms of who's stayed this expansion, though several have made skin swaps, shrunk down to minipet size, or grown up from minipet status since my last update....or some combination thereof. It's complicated.

Arachne rejoined my active ranks prior to MoP, only as Amthea rather than Jadefang. Psyche went from raptor to tallstrider and hasn't looked back. Hippomenes ended up turning his nose up at green Portent after all and remained a white organic quilen upon MoP release. (He still pairs nicely with Atalanta, since they're both off-white.)

Pan (black goat) ended up not working out, leaving room for Amalthea (Stompy) to step in. Unfortunately, my ever-crowded stable meant that she ultimately had to drop down into minipet form as a Summit Kid. Orion made a similar change into my Stunted Shardhorn.

Medusa preyed upon my sentimentality on the 5.1 PTR and managed to completely bond herself with Sparkwing (who happened to be the first unique skinned rare I'd ever discovered fully on my own, which meant the cards were stacked), which meant that I was completely at their combined mercies...especially when Sparkwing spawned right in front of me when it came time to officially meld the pair on live. Such cheaters, both of them. How could I possibly resist those charms?

A series of random events led to Laelaps (Karoma) joining my stable on what I thought was a temporary basis. I should have known better; I'd already gotten attached to her when I tamed a regular wolf that kept wandering into one of Karoma's spawn points and named her for the first time...she asserted her personality even that early. But out of respect for Polaris (Arcturis), I let her go after a few days. This, of course, was a massive mistake and after much hemming, hawing, and repeated denials, I filed my first pet restoration ticket ever to get her back. Laelaps has hardly left my side since. I definitely never saw that one coming. Polaris ended up dropping into Baby Blizzard Bear form.

Jason, who I had decided to stabilize as yellow from his color-changing self, became my second pet restoration ticket not long after I got Laelaps back. Just another example of my pets knowing what's best for them better than I do. Knowing Jason, I should have seen that coming too. He especially likes being part of a stampede, since it means he gets to change colors every five minutes.

Pygmalion, who had changed to a basilisk when Jason stabilized, took a brief hiatus before coming back to me as a Scalded Basilisk Hatchling minipet. Ultimately, this was a good thing, since it reunited him with Galatea, who returned as a Tol'vir Scarab. Other former pets who returned as minipets include Odysseus (Darkmoon Monkey) and Penelope (Darkmoon Hatchling).

Scylla, who charmed me unexpectedly as a teal worm, did so again as a pink silkworm when she flipped off of a tree branch to nibble on my face. I will never know how the other silkworms on that tree branch didn't aggro....whatever happened, it was a very clear sign that not only did she want to change forms, but it had to be rightnowthissecond. She did that just before the silkworm burrow animation was added on the 5.1 PTR - it was glorious.

Somewhere in there, Tantalus took a brief lack-of-space-induced hiatus, but he came back - he always does. Achilles did the same, after making it to live as Ironback. Unfortunately, Ironback had just been killed when I went to retame him, which threw me off badly...until I checked for Terrapis, who came running right up to meet me and ended up suiting Achilles's personality even better than Ironback did. Go figure! Of course, not long after that, the noisy Slateshell Wanderers appeared on the 5.2 PTR and Achilles insisted on changing forms yet again. I have noticed that my stable has overall become bossier, as well as more intent on griefing me. I'm not thrilled by this revelation.

The only truly new pet who's joining the family in patch 5.2 is Tiresias, the blue dire horn...and even he has a storied history. I originally had my heart set on an orange dire horn and indeed went through the majority of the PTR with Tiresias as orange. However, one day I logged in and he was blue! More colors had been added to the table his spawn comes from and he had been grandfathered in with this new color. I thought to myself that this wasn't a big deal; it'd be a Calydonian situation again. But by the time I got back to his spawn on the rock on the Isle of Thunder, Tiresias had completely melded himself with the blue skin. I hadn't even liked the blue skin, before or after the color change! But of course, again, he knew better than I did; this is his true color.

Did I say my stable's been stable? I'm not so sure now.

At any rate, all buffs are and have been covered, which is utterly amazing to me. Even more amazingly, I have strong bonds with almost every pet...thank goodness. I'll probably let Psyche fully turn into my purple tallstrider mount if I ever get the chance to tame Cadmus; I am far too attached to Tantalus.

If I can someday "correct" the colors of my pets-turned-minipets, I would actually be 100% happy....so long as no new shinies win me over. Every time I swear I'm done, something I never knew I wanted calls to me....(not the case with Tiresias; I always wanted a triceratops).

Kallimon's stable actually did undergo some major changes since I last updated his stable chart. the lesson to be learned here is that I shouldn't have massive amounts of stable space available, because if I do, it will be filled.

I recounted the adventures of the lava spider siblings before, and not much has changed with them since. Cayenne's been getting used to combat in her minipet form, so even though she's still a little sweetheart, she isn't shying away from fighting like she used to. Sugarcane's basically established herself as a hermit, which is why I went slightly nuts trying to get to know her better. None of them will budge from my stable because Stampede exists, so I'm resigned to an army of lava spiders. At least it's a pretty army.

In MoP, Chili swapped from a red hellhound into Jadefang. It started out as a swap of convenience, but he clicks far better in this form anyway. Dogs are just too small for trolls. My former Shango Jalapeno jumped into my Tiny Shale Spider to avoid Jambalaya's territorial wrath.

Bait molted, shedding her Jormunger skin for Gnath's. Amusingly, this is the skin color Scylla was originally supposed to be, but it never clicked. She also picked up a new worm brother in Slimey, who is just too adorable for words.

Ravigote gave up his feathers and became a supermodel Venomspine. I can't recall offhand how many forms he's gone through, but this one seems to suit him for a change.

Pacane, who had disappeared from my stable, found new life in Nychus. Somehow, the lone raptor persona suits her far better.

Blasto is still planned to swap to pink whenever Kallimon actually hits 90, which may not be until the next expansion, at the rate I'm going. It's just as well. I have no idea where I'm going to put Chipotle (Degu) when Kallimon does hit 90. MaqueChoux will most likely return to minipet-only form....again.....but we'll cross that bridge when it comes.

Potentially finalized MoP roster

I knew there was no way I was going to make it into MoP without a full stable.  I did know that, even when I posted back in May about having three spots open.  Jason returned and Achilles moved over from beta.

Somehow, I neglected to write about losing my last spot to another returning pet.  Medusa finally settled into a green wind serpent from Wailing Caverns.  The short version: Medusa was originally a green Outland wind serpent.  We parted ways over the years and a previous attempt to turn her into a regular green wind serpent failed.  Then while running Caelan's alt through WC, she made eyes at us, so we ran the instance a bunch of times until we'd both tamed that spawn. Medusa insisted that we both tame; she was very cranky about it.

So, meet the family as I know them:

There actually haven't been many changes since the last big family post, just skin changes.

Eurydice had previously rejected a pink crane skin, but embraced it once Patrannache started wearing it.  It didn't hurt that Orpheus, who is an expert on long, punishing camps, was turning cartwheels at the prospect of my losing my sanity camping for his wife.  Thanks, Orph; can always count on you for that.

Hippomenes did in fact settle into the green Portent skin.  This was an absolute non-surprise, since he pulled the same stunt that Loque did when he became Hip's new form.  After I hit 90, green Portent stopped stalking me and refused to spawn.  Then when I did get him, it was only after an eight hour camp.  Then of course he was green again the next time I saw him.  Sigh.  Between him and Eurydice, I will go crazy in MoP.  This is a fact.  At least Atalanta is happy.  She's kind of into the statue hubby, since she was born from a statue herself.

On the plus side, Calydonian will not have to go through Bristlespine in order to be himself.  After a short heartbreak (the porcupine who appeared to be him was not tameable when I first tried), Calydonian became himself again.  Not a moment too soon; I've been getting terribly used to him being white....and he's just....not.

Pan decided to stick with his original spawn on the Veiled Stair.  Not Stompy, not Welcome Goat - the little guy staring off over a cliff.  It's rather dreamy.  Rather un-Panlike.  Wouldn't be the first time one of my pets had a different personality than their namesake, though.

Pygmalion changed skins a while ago, after the old world basilisk skins won me over.  But it wasn't until this latest build that he felt right.  Deatheye, the rare spawn basilisk in Thousand Needles, suits him more than a common one.  After all, Pygmalion was the Large Loch Croc - he deserves a unique skin from a rare.  It's just...him.  It didn't hurt that Galatea returned briefly as Rockhide either.  If I had any sort of true bond with her, I'd be in trouble.

I only just now realized that Hip and Leo are next to each other on the grid.  That's utterly typical.  My pets are such trolls.  I share this as a warning to others - beware of trolling pets.

I think I'm pretty much done, short of Pan being there instead of Cadmus (I'm fond of Pan, but it's not the same).  Of course, I always say that....  But really, I think I'm more or less good this time.  Every buff is covered but kings and I just can't click with a shale spider.  Hope everyone else's stables are shaping up well!

Best-laid plans and wild things

When I started poking around on the beta, I figured I'd have time to wander around with my pets and share our adventures.  Instead, life took a left turn and real life interfered.  Things finally quieted down and then....the rare tameables came into play.  I've been on the forefront of the discoveries and tracking, but have been posting on Petopia rather than here, since it's been a team effort.

The fruits of our labor: http://forums.wow-petopia.com/viewtopic.php?f=39&t=18527

 I am so pleased with how that post turned out, and it continues to get better as it gets more refined.  And it was even featured on WoW Insider in Frostheim's Scattered Shots!  I've contributed to efforts that have been featured there before, but never as the compiling writer.  (Speaking of which, if you found your way here from there, hi and welcome to the insanity!)

On a personal level, I am afraid that I will be taming more of these rares on live than I'd like to.  I sort of backed into bonding with them; at first glance, the only ones I connected with were Stompy (the first I'd found <3) and Bristlespine (giant porcupine, c'mon).

I'm unsure if Pan would work as Stompy; I think I like Stompy better as himself.  Bristlespine is another matter.  I connected with his personality immediately.  With the revamp of Jade Forest, Calydonian's original spawn no longer exists, so I've been trying to figure out where he moved to.  Bristlespine would have worked...if he was red....which he is not.  But while following Bristle across Kun Lai, I noticed him pass through a herd of yaks and one red porcupine.  And I knew instantly that my path lies that way: Calydonian will be reborn as Bristlespine, then transfer into his red body, Hector-style.  It's a relief to know that he of all pets will be okay; he's the reason I'm still here.

As I got to know Patrannache, I realized that he is ridiculously difficult to track down, definitely one of the most difficult to spot.  So of course I'll have to do that trek on live for Eurydice.  Orpheus will settle for nothing less than a mate who's every bit as hard to track down as he is.  I am both looking forward to and dreading this hunt.

The one who truly has me confused is green Portent.  As if Hippomenes hasn't been through enough turmoil on the beta!  But the attachment green Portent has to me is ridiculous.  For the past couple of days, he's spawned green while I've been around/predicted it at least half a dozen times - no exaggeration.  Shades of Sambas - he appears to be stalking me, so of course I thought of Leo immediately.  I really like white organic quilen Hippomenes....and yet, I am very seriously considering that change.  Most likely, I won't decide until I see Portent for the first time when I'm 90 on live.  We shall see what destiny holds!

I need to stop....really, I do.

Yep, another one followed me home.  Again.

Basically, I think too much.  After saying that Kalliope wouldn't have a turtle going into MoP, I started thinking about turtles.  Again.  I adore the WoW turtles and I'd tamed every color but one on various hunters, and that color was planned for completing a set of four (yes, that set of four turtles).  No offense to Terrorpene, but like Loque, I have trouble seeing him as anything other than himself, and the rest of my turtles are clearly defined.

The thing is, I need a dedicated tank.  Ursa's going to be DPSing - a lot - in MoP.  So I figured I might as well try taming Ironback, the turtle I'd set aside for the set of four, since the odds of my ever leveling that hunter to finish the set are incredibly low.  I had no clue for a name, though, and that was the kicker.

I figured it out the moment I detoured to visit Old Cliff Jumper.  I still see OCJ as Hector's heart, regardless of his now having Deathmaw's appearance.  He is OCJ.  And that was when it clicked.  Achilles, Hector's rival, would come from across the zone from him.  And he was grey(ish), which drew a connection to Achilles's quilen form.  I'd felt bad Achilles lost the quilen battle, but he was always doomed to lose once Hippomenes entered the ring.

So now I had a concept.  But would it work?  Achilles had a very specific vibe on the beta, and turtles are nothing like quilen.  I flew over to the east coast of the Hinterlands to find out.

Ironback was up, which wasn't terribly surprising, though I realized how rarely I'd seen him in the wild before.  I had no preconceptions of him prior to taming, which was a relief to me as I hit tame.

 
It works!  Achilles still throws his head back to howl, even though he's a turtle now, which makes him the only howling turtle I've ever had....as well as incredibly weird.  I always liked how strong and rocklike Achilles was - and he still is.  Looks like he's going to stay after all!  I should have known.

Suddenly, everything became clear

So Jason was apparently sending me a message when he kept "flashing" me with his white skin vs. his natural yellow.  But I didn't understand that until I summoned Atalanta for the first time since taming Jason.

I don't write about Atalanta often, even though she goes back with me almost as far as Ursa does.  She's a very quiet cat.  It's funny; she doesn't seem to be bothered that she doesn't run with me in raids very often anymore, despite her being my first go-to dps pet.  It's like we got old together; neither of us is interested in hardcore raiding anymore, though we like the occasional workout.  She doesn't mind Leo's bossiness and understands that he has to go with me sometimes because of his official Lucky Lion status.  She was the one who volunteered to leave my stable the night before our stables expanded just so Hippomenes could come home without causing me grief in terms of competition from other hunters.

Atalanta's quite an enigma.  I'm figuring a lot of this out even as I write it here now.  But what I figured out a couple of days ago was that Atalanta wanted to be a ghost saber again.  I'm not sure now if she insisted on trying a regular snow leopard skin or if I pushed her (in hindsight, I'm thinking it was the latter, which I regret).  I just hadn't felt things were right with her after I retamed her after the patch.  It only took six statues and she was the first cat to spawn.  That had never happened before.  I thought she was just eager to come home...and she was.  But things were just...off.  It was like Beignet - unless Beignet was stalking the hell out of Kallimon, it wasn't really her.  If Atalanta wasn't being elusive and hiding from me, then something was wrong.  I....I can't explain how they had both come home with me, but weren't themselves....it doesn't seem like both things are possible.  But that's how it goes with pets.  Just like it makes no sense that solid snow leopards in pictures can still be her....but they are.  She just knows how to make herself easier to "photograph."

All of this because Atalanta the snow leopard's butt was too glowy in comparison to Jason's white version.  Well, that and Jason and I took an impromptu land walk from Uldum to Darkshore for no apparent reason the night before....another big indicator that I needed to be there.

Atalanta and I set off for the ruins and found absolutely nothing for the first dozen statues or so.  So I let her loose to go find her own statue.  Sort of a hunter's version of hide and seek.  The very next statue I found was near where I'd released her.  I was shocked it had been so easy!  But then the cat inside was level 20.  It wasn't her.  But the timing....what if it was?  Then the night elf guards stepped in and took the decision out of my hands, killing the poor innocent cat.  I realized that Atalanta wasn't so foolish as to spawn near dangerous NPCs, not at any level.  I kept looking.

Two more level 20 cats spawned, both fairly soon after the first.  Neither of those was killed, as I feigned them off.  I'd never run into three 20s before finding her before, nor had I had to pick up more than 19 statues before.  I was getting anxious, especially as I was having a lot of trouble locating statues from time to time.

Then I saw it.  Statue 23.  It was facing a bush.  And somehow, I knew.  I knew that this was her.  And yet, I still didn't screen capture that statue as a precaution.  No matter; I digress.  I clicked the statue and there indeed stood my beautiful Atalanta in her level 19 glory.  She didn't attack me, something which had never happened before with any of the cats - ever.  I tamed her and she was back.  Really and truly back.

Welcome home, Atalanta.

First world beta tester problems

When quilen were first flagged as tamable, I hadn't really paid attention to them before.  I was vaguely aware that they looked like weird cats.  Beyond that, I knew nothing.  I tamed one, learning as I did that they had been swapped to the worg skeleton, but were only appearing as one color: the gray stone.

I didn't expect to like these things that had barely gained my attention, but there was something about his strong back and confident posture...and yet, he didn't feel at all like Hector.  The same-yet-different vibe prompted me to easily name him Achilles.

I was a goner the moment I saw him scoot forward while howling.  It was just so silly and ridiculous.  Something Hector would do.

I was antsy wondering what color Achilles actually was underneath that stony exterior.  I hadn't seen the quilen before the change, so I figured he'd change appearances once the skin bug was fixed.  I settled on the white organic look for what I preferred, but was still curious to see which skin I'd actually tamed blindly.  Most of all, I worried that Achilles only worked with the stone skin.  After never bonding with a shale spider, I wasn't sure how that would work.  But his eyes were the most gorgeous shade...

Then the next build hit.  And it turned out that not only were my worries justified, but things were worse than I could have imagined.

The quilen were back, organic and colorful.  But they were also back on the cat skeletons.  I couldn't compare the new red-skinned Achilles to his original form.  Not only that, but I hadn't even unstabled him yet and I knew he wasn't himself anymore.  This body didn't suit him and he had left it.  Worse yet, even though it wasn't Achilles, it felt familiar.

I realized what it was.  Hippomenes wanted to come with me.  So I grabbed him from the stable, already starting to understand the position I was about to be in.  Another trip to the instance.  Hippomenes lagged his way toward the gray skin.  I wasn't sure if it was a sign or just the lag.  We tried it, but it didn't click right.  We went back again and changed him to white.

I couldn't believe it.  Hippomenes actually worked in this weird liondog form.  That was when I really started worrying about Achilles.  I was attached to two entirely different quilen.

As if that wasn't bad enough, I slowly realized more and more that I can't stand the cat skeleton for the quilen.  The yawns.  The lousy posture.  The fact that they look like every single other cat.  But my loyalty is to Hippomenes.  I'm rooting for him in this.  He and I have been through two hunters and four separate tames.  I have probably spent more collective time camping for him specifically than any of my other pets.  (There is a good deal of overlap with my time spent camping specifically for Arcturis, who takes first place on that count.)  He's Atalanta's lifemate.  I don't know Achilles beyond our positive initial meeting.  But I've never liked his namesake; there's a reason Hector is Hector.  Still, if Hippomenes isn't himself, I wouldn't begrudge Achilles my quilen position.

So now I have absolutely no idea what will happen.  If they have the cat skeleton, it's easy; Hippomenes stays.  If it's the worg skeleton, I have no clue which of the pair will click.  One?  Both?  Neither?  Impossible to tell ahead of time.  And the kicker is that the worg skeleton will most likely win.  It should win; it's the better skeleton for the family.  But it sure leaves me in an awkward position personally.

I have never been in a position like this before.  I wouldn't wish it on anyone.  Unfortunately, all I can do is wait for the next build and hope for answers and closure one way or the other.

Overhauling Stables: Untangling Kalliope's Mess

Redoing Kallimon's stable was rather tame.  I know exactly which pets I have and haven't bonded with since I play him so infrequently.  But it's different with Kalliope, since I get to see even her stabled pets.  Though inactivity and fully intending to quit playing WoW helped me get some distance from her pets, there was one deciding factor that really tipped the scales.

Calydonian changed everything.  The moment porcupines were confirmed as a real new family, I realized that I finally had five main pets to run with.  Then I ran an instance or two with them - Ursa, Atalanta, Orpheus, Hector, and Calydonian - and it was confirmed.  I didn't want to run with anyone else.  I had a full core to my active non-BM stable for the first time ever.  And that was when things finally started to fall into place.

I could bring my favorites anywhere.  Orpheus would lead the PvP charge and Ursa the PvE.  But where would that leave all my other pets?  Oddly, I'm more inclined to rotate the others in for fun or buffs just because I know that my core group can always be with me.  Going casual helps; it means I'll most likely run with a BM offspec, which means all of those pets will get rotated in too.  It's very freeing knowing that my main pets will always get a chance to come with me.  Never again will I hardly ever see Ursa.

So with all of that in mind, I looked to my pets and saw who could shrink down to minipet size and which few were going to have to leave entirely.  A couple surprisingly morphed to new forms as I was checking out new families on the beta.  And still, even with new additions, I'm going to have empty stable slots.  It's quite amazing.  The whole process took me by surprise, so unlike previous journeys through my stable, it was undocumented.

Thanks to the five locked stable slots on the beta, I was forced from the beginning to decide who I absolutely couldn't live without.  Space was at an absolute premium and I had to release a number of pets there just to ensure that I had space to tame new families.  Though I cursed the additional limitations, ultimately, I learned a lot about my bonds with particular pets.

I was surprised that Andromeda wanted to stay.  I was at a loss for a name for my fen strider, but she stepped right in - and suddenly, I saw her for who she really was.  She was no dragonhawk, even the blue one with the pretty wings I am so fond of...from a distance.  This was her.  Tall, graceful, light on her feet.  She even brings the stars with her.  I got a completely different vibe from Blasto.  How funny that Andromeda followed a similar path to Perseus, where the second form clicked after the first did not.

It was somewhat less surprising that Pygmalion eased my conscience about considering releasing him by easily slipping into basilisk form from his green crocoliskness.  Most shocking was the revelation that we both wanted the purple rather than the green.  He's been the boss of me since he got me to save him from becoming Gosh-Haldiir, so I suppose that if he wants to turn things to stone as a form of artwork, that's his prerogative.

Arachne was the first to volunteer for minipet duty.  In fact, no sooner had I picked up the little green tarantula minipet, she had moved into that form and stayed there.  Whenever I log in on live now, I'm surprised to still see her sitting in my stable as Kirix, waiting for MoP.  Her transition of all of them has been the most seemless.

Circe was another easy transition.  She'd already taken three forms with me, so shrinking her from Aotona into the parrot minipet was a natural evolution.  Besides, I still had Icarus, who had been my #1 parrot from the beginning.

Except Icarus will also be transitioning to minipet form.  I have adored Ol' Beaky from the first time I saw him.  Out of all the birds, Icarus was my surprising top pick.  Except in the end, I know in my heart that I never bonded with him as much as I did Perseus (who shares the same family buff).  I just can't do flying pets.  Castor and Pollux are the two exceptions.  I find anything with wings difficult to idle with overall.  At least he's reunited with Daedelus, who long ago took the form of my minipet seagull.

Psyche was a hard call.  I tried to encourage her to morph, but she wouldn't have it.  It was pink raptor or nothing.  So she'll be shrinking.  For some reason, Kalliope with a devilsaur works, but Kalliope with a raptor feels weird.  Between Psyche and Andromeda, I'm losing two debuffs I won't be replacing.  And because I'm casual now, I don't care.  I'm bringing my bear, dammit.

The most difficult transition was that of Hippomenes.  I would not have a blog if it wasn't for him.  My 10 hour Loque camp prompted storytime to move here.  And yet....I've finally admitted to myself that Kalliope only has room for one spirit beast in her heart and it belongs to Polaris.  It's Arcturis's fault.  I never wanted a spirit beast until he came along.  And so Hippomenes will become a white saber kitten (snow leopard if one gets added) so he can be with Atalanta all the time.  He always did like being fussed over and being a kitten will get him that sort of attention again.  It's a little weird, but it'll work.

Linus and Pandora won't be staying.  Both were essentially forced on me due to needing their family abilities and there are no minipet equivalents for them anyway.  Kharon will most likely be joining them.  I get the feeling that I have yet to find the right turtle/beetle for me, if there even is one.

Leo is a complete wild card.  He never gets out; Atalanta has the monopoly on cat utility.  And yet, because of his name and what he represents to me, I can't let him go so easily.  Besides, he's still my good luck charm.  No, I think Leo will be staying, against all reason.  He's meant to be with me, no matter how much I try to resist.  I do not know how or why this happened, but he has an unbreakable hold on me.

The newcomers are less numerous than those shrinking or leaving, but they seem to have already carved some niches for themselves.  I've already written about Calydonian at length.  I won't go into it again here.  Suffice to say that he somehow manages to catch my eye during stampede, even though he's the smallest pet in there.  There's just something about that porcupine.

Achilles was a bonding shock.  His name came to me unbidden.  Achilles has never been one of my favorite characters; he killed Hector after all!  And yet, that's why he works so perfectly as a quilen.  I tend to see my exotics as being somewhat at odds with my non-exotics, since they displace the latter when I'm actually in that spec; it fit perfectly for the Trojan-Greek rivalry!  On the other hand, Achilles's parallels to Hector were quite surprising.  When I saw him howl while still scooting forward at top speed, I knew I had another lovably goofy dog on my hands.  I don't know what color he'll be in the end, but I do know he's staying, and not just because he has a battle res.

I was surprised about Pan too.  His noisy combat antics amused me from the moment I sicced him on a poor, unsuspecting victim.  He has so much personality!  Very few pets get a smile from me just by entering combat.  I feel like I don't really know him yet, since his wild version is not yet tamable.  While Achilles is open to a color change, Pan is dead set on being the lone goat on his cliff.  I don't know what color he'll be; I just know that he's mine.

Eurydice is one of the strangest cases I've ever seen in one of my pets.  I'd tried taming her as a snake and on an alt as a tarantula, but never truly felt anything for her.  The green crane keeping an eye on Dawn's Blossom strikes me as distinctly male.  And yet, the two shall one day merge to become my Eurydice....Orpheus's Eurydice.  In studying her, I realized why she's finally settled on this form.  Orpheus needs a partner he would write songs about.  He needs inspiration.  And yet, this is my Orpheus.  My right arm in PvP.  He needs a lady with survival skills.  Lullaby fits perfectly for the wife of the great poet.  She'll join him on the battlefield.

With all the changes, I probably should not have been surprised that one pet decided to come home.  But I was.

Tantalus returned!  I can't explain why he came back any more than I could explain why he left.  Our connection was forged, broken, and reforged.  I thought he required more attention than he actually seems to.  Perhaps he's trying to create balance in my dog situation (Hector and Tantalus being non-exotic; Cerberus and Achilles being exotic).  Maybe he just knew that he had a place in my stable again.  I don't know.  I have never completely understood Tan.  It seems we're on the same page now, though, whatever the reasons.  It's good to have him back.

So thus far, I'll have three empty stable slots.  All things considered, that's nothing short of a miracle.

After picking up Tan last night, I flew around Northrend for a bit.  No one was up in the Basin (somewhat unsurprising).  But Arcturis was.  As was Gondria, who had chosen to spawn near Atalanta's new birthpoint.  I'd never seen her there before, and I hadn't seen Arcturis in the wild in ages.  I took both appearances as a sign of approval from the cosmos and the game itself.

All is well.

A tale of tarantulas

It all started with a scorpid.

It was during the Burning Crusade era of WoW.  We were limited to three pets and I only had two I was really settled on: Ursa and Atalanta.  I needed a pet for PvP.  Scorpids, with their stacking poison debuff, were all the rage.  I wasn't a huge fan of scorpids at the time (oh, how that has changed now...) and the only ones I had any real connection with were the pink ones in Tanaris.  Unfortunately, these were the bad old days before pet autoleveling, so I opted for one from Terokkar Forest.  I abandoned my black panther through a sea of tears, only to get ganked by two Horde before I could tame my scorpid of choice.  And thus my scorpid was born in a flood of blood.  I named him Orpheus, after the muse Calliope's son.  He was my walking around pet, since we were (and still are) on a PvP server.

Grateful as I was to have him by my side, things were slightly off, since I hadn't gotten to tame the scorpid I really wanted.  Plus, Orpheus was resentful of me for birthing him into a PINK skin.  So when patch 3.0 came out, I started shopping for a new look for him.  I squeezed him into Nuramoc's body, but the pink still outweighed the blue, and he was still very unhappy with me.  So Orpheus did not stay there for long, soon finding himself a new home in a blue crab from Darkshore.  Orpheus was considerably happier being blue, and rather enjoyed playing with pin.  I was happy he was happy and felt more at peace with the whole situation.  I thought this would be his final form.  I was wrong.

I was running hunter-priest in 2s with a friend of mine midway through LK.  He suggested that I get a spider for arena instead of a crab, since web was a ranged root and a non-channeled one at that.  Plus, it was what most hunters in arena were using, despite crab's worthiness and survivability.  I was rather against this idea.  Orpheus was happy and I didn't have room in my stable to tame a sixth pet (the other two were my then-wolf Cerberus and devilsaur Theseus).  Plus, I wasn't a huge fan of spiders.  But I thought about it and remembered that there was one spider in WoW who I felt some affinity with: Chatter, the named brown tarantula in Redridge.  He was always up when I was passing through the zone, so we'd established a familiar sort of bond.  After some consultation with Orpheus, we went over to Alther's Mill and he moved into Chatter's body.  The transformation was amazing!  Orpheus really liked being fuzzy and cuddly instead of having a hard carapace and sharp pointy things protruding from his body.  And thus, Orpheus had taken on his final form.  He would never change again, no matter what gameplay changes there would be in WoW.

Time passed.  Life was good.  But one day late in LK, I deleted a second huntress on the server, Kalli the blood elf.  As heart-wrenching as it was to lose her pets, I just wasn't playing her over there....and ultimately, I needed the space.  I was haunted by the ghost of Hippomenes out of all of her pets (somewhat ironically since he was a ghost in the first place).  He had been her best buddy and loyal companion, as well as being my dear Atalanta's long-distance mate.  I had to get him back, but there was only one pet who I could stand to part with until the expanded stables in Cataclysm: Orpheus.  It broke my heart to do so, but there was no one else I could give up.  Theseus was too hard to get, Ursa and Atalanta were my babies, and I needed Hector (Cerberus already had plans to return to his true form in Cata at that point) to raid.  Orpheus and I camped out in Grizzly Hills for hours upon hours, waiting for Hippomenes to come home again (for the first time, since Kalliope had never had him before).  Eventually, he did, and Orpheus took his leave.

Hippomenes had forgiven me!  I was grateful for that.  But I was still wracked by guilt, since I'd left Orpheus out there alone.  The worst part of it all was that Hippomenes didn't click with Kalliope the way he had with Kalli.  There's only one bear for Kalliope, and that's Ursa.  No exceptions.  I went back and forth with myself for days....weeks.  Tormented, I finally decided to take Hippomenes to Redridge with me and get Orpheus back.  I couldn't last until Cata without him.

Chatter was not there.

My brain rejected this.  It was impossible.  Chatter was ALWAYS up.  An hour passed.  Then two. Orpheus was mad at me.  That had to be why he wasn't there.  I groveled as I paced around Alter's Mill.  I begged his forgiveness.  The third hour passed.  Chatter still had not spawned.  I was frantic.  Orpheus was still furious.  I was losing my mind over a brown tarantula.  I was sitting amongst other brown tarantulas that looked exactly like Chatter.  But they were different.  He was different.  My friends thought I was crazy, even crazier than I'd been when I tamed Hector.  The fourth hour came.  NPCScan went off.  My heart leaped in relief as I targeted my baby and....couldn't find him.  OHMYGODWHEREWASHE?  I panicked, imagining a lowbie coming through the area and destroying him.  And suddenly, I thought to turn around toward the mill....and there he was, just wandering around casually.  The little bugger had snuck up behind me.  I had never seen him spawn there before.  I didn't know he COULD spawn there.  I wept as I let Hippomenes go and brought my baby, my right arm, my fuzzy spider home.  That was Orpheus's true birth.  I hadn't realized how much I truly loved him until that four hour camp in Redridge.  As exhausting as other camps I've done have been (including the eventual ten hour camp that brought Hippomenes home for real), this one was the most emotional camping and taming I've ever done.

The Cataclysm beta opened and Petopians crawled all over it, checking up on changes to existing pets.  I noticed Chatter was among the missing rares.  After what Orpheus, Chatter, and I had been through, I started to worry and asked beta testers to keep an eye out for him.  July gave way to August and September with no sign of him.  But in early October, there was a glimmer of hope.  Vephriel spotted a lone greater tarantula in southeastern Redridge.  He was the only brown tarantula left in the entire zone, so it seemed likely that this was Chatter, but with amnesia.  I accepted the possibility, but still hoped and prayed that Chatter would regain his memory.  November came.  Other previously missing rare spawns, like the strider clutchmother and Shadowclaw were found.  Chatter, however, remained missing, and the tarantula in Redridge stayed nameless.  I visited Chatter often on the live servers, unable to do anything to stop what was coming.  There was almost no time left in the beta....and then it was closed.  Nothing had changed.

The world shattered.  Chatter was gone.

I visited the little red tarantula often, /encouraging him to remember who he was.  It wasn't the same, but I stuck by the little guy.  He was a survivor, and my Orpheus was a survivor - it had to be Chatter.

Time passed and the 4.0.6 patch hit the PTR.  I started hunting for Chatter, but to no avail.  Instead, I came across Rekk'tilac, whom Veph had been dying to meet.  He was HUGE!  My brain could barely handle the possibility that Chatter might really be back - and bigger!  More and more rares popped up, but no Chatter.....until Kurasu found him!  And he was BIG!  Not Rekk'tilac-big, but big!  I couldn't stop smiling for days.  Chatter was really, truly home.

But....there was still that little tarantula in southeastern Redridge.  He wasn't Chatter, but he too survived the Cataclysm.  Veph and I puzzled over the little guy, wondering....  And then, a week after Chatter was found, Veph dubbed the little lost tarantula Chitter.  And it was right.  I immediately hopped on Babykalli (Kalli reborn as a baby blood elf!) and Veph flew me to Redridge on her touring rocket, whereupon Chitter was tamed.

Finally, things seemed to be in place.  But Noah, the Petopia lurker dev, had other plans.  Patch 4.1 hit the PTR and....Chitter was real.  He was now a rare spawn with his real name!  What was left of my brain melted as the little guy raced about the area, much like Orpheus is known to do.  I have plans to tame this little guy officially on my tauren huntress Yoninah to complete the family again with extra tarantula goodness.  I will have more brown tarantulas than I do black bears - and that was the only pet I ever had a duplicate pet of before.  That was the pet that got me into WoW in the first place.  That's saying something.

Between Orpheus, Chatter, and Chitter, my world has been forever changed for the better. <3