Meet the Family (Patch 5.3)

Patch 5.3 brought 30 more stable slots to the table (a mixed blessing, depending on which hunter you're talking to). For me, this meant planning out who was coming home and attempting to guess at which new pets would be popping up. Naturally, no amount of planning covered either half of the taming sprees. There are always some surprises!

Kalliope:

The pets who I knew were coming back were Tantalus, Orion, Amalthea, Icarus, Pygmalion, and Galatea. Tan had only left so I could get Polaris back before the rush of restoration requests. The rest had all remained as minipets. In the end, only Icarus kept his tiny counterpart. While I have many pets who like being in both my minipet lineup and in one of my stables, these forms had (with the aforementioned exception) only been a way to keep them near me. They weren't their proper colors, so it wasn't really them. Bringing them home for real was a very happy event, as well as a relief, since both of the rares (Amalthea [Stompy] and Pygmalion [Ironeye the Invincible]) were up when I first looked.

There were two impulse tames. Delphi called me after I fetched Tantalus. The bond was instantaneous. I've run with her almost non-stop since the tame. Amazingly, I've never actually clicked with an arcane wyrm before, though I've certainly admired the Spirits of the North since first entering Northrend. In the end, the tame felt partially premeditated, but I really had not expected such a strong bond. The other impulse tame was the product of good fortune. When I went into Deadmines to bring Icarus home again, there was a Brilliant Macaw up around where Mr. Smite used to be. Of course there was. I have always adored that skin since I first saw it on Skywing in BC. I'd tried to make it work on Kallimon, but it didn't take. This was my chance to rectify that. It didn't hurt that I felt terribly guilty about lucking into a spawn that others (and I) have had trouble getting. And so Leda joined the family.

The last pet Kalliope picked up was Eros. He was a PTR pet who had somehow managed to charm me. I kept telling myself that this was far too much effort for a tame that I wasn't sure was going to work out on live. I should have realized I was wrong when I was able to easily get on top of Ban'thalos's tree twice in a row without effort. But I didn't. Instead, I understood just how wrong I was when Banny spawned not long after I arrived. Eros had missed me! And so marked the easiest and least painful tame of Ban'thalos I'd ever had. I don't even care that he breaks my naming scheme; he just was not working as a minipet.

Kallimon:

Kallimon always manages to surprise me. As far as I knew, he only had three pets returning: Chili the green shale spider, MaqueChoux's natural size silithid, and Pacane. Naturally, this did not go according to plan. Both MaqueChoux [Haarka the Ravenous] and Pacane [Nychus] refused to spawn, and I delayed grabbing Chili, who had been Jadefang. This meant that I had time to run around impulse-taming things.

That's always where the trouble starts.

Thanks to Blasto and Bubin, I allowed myself to tame three regular-size pet versions of three of my favorite minipets: Zevran, Fenris, and Kaidan (who was a stretch, since his dragon whelpling minipet has no hunter pet equivalent). This was, of course, a terrible mistake, since I've been doing nothing but running around with Zev and Fen in minipet form to begin with. The same is now true of their larger forms, though now Fenris has the edge in terms of time at my side. Hopefully this will eventually pass; they just don't fit Kallimon's main theming. But hey, there's stable space to do that now - and besides, there's enough of them for a stampede.

Unexpectedly returning home were Jalapeno and Doberge, the latter taking a new form in Hugeclaw. Jambalaya will undoubtedly not be thrilled that his competition has returned, but the stable is so huge now that he can deal with it.

Pacane and MaqueChoux finally came home, so I decided to cheat and pick up a shale spider from the Jade Forest. But that meant he wasn't Chili - so after settling on naming him Rockefeller, I went back to Northrend to pick up Chili in his favorite form: a red demon dog.

After all this (and no spawn luck on Spiteflayer), I ticketed for Pompano's return. Like his sister Papillote, there was only one form he ever truly clicked in. Of course, a twist of fate has even changed this storyline. When Pompano was restored, he came back in his original green form instead of Spiteflayer's yellow. According to the GM who had sent him home, Pompano wanted to peck my face off for leaving him in the Twisting Nether for so long. Unfortunately, PetEmote confirmed this as true, as well as revealing a newfound cocky attitude. (Kallimon seems to be a magnet for that type of pet. Sigh.) Pompano was pleased that he'd caused so much trouble. Well, fine then. He can stay green.

Mind you, this is the short version; I ran around backtracking and circling between spawn points much more than it sounds like. How Kallimon takes more of my effort than Kalliope does is beyond me.

It's strange how (with the mental inclusion of Cadmus) my stables are dead even with each other at 35 pets. Completely unplanned. There may be some utility pickups in the future for both, but this will serve for now.

Hatchling Direhorns Followup

As anticipated, the Hatchling Direhorns have been made friendly to players and all previously tamed hatchlings will remain white.


At least those who were worried about their white direhorns changing will be set at ease by this news. :) And hey, at least the babies are even better eye candy now: there are more colors!

Transcription:

Hey guys, quick update from Kalliope on the 5.3 PTR. As expected, the baby direhorns are now marked as friendly to players, so they can no longer be tamed. All existing tamed babies on the PTR turned into white direhorns. This not only confirms that no unintended pets will be making it to live servers, but the existing direhorns tamed from here will be unchanged. Oh well, better luck next time, pet seekers!

Where the Wild Things Are: Hatchling Direhorns

If there's one thing some hunters can't get enough of, it's the unintentionally flagged baby pets. Meet the reskinned Hatchling Direhorns from the Isle of Thunder.


The odds of hunters getting to keep the new Hatchling Direhorns are incredibly low, like the other unintentionally tameable baby pets that preceded them. Most likely, the current version of the hatchlings will be grandfathered out and the new baby direhorns will have a new id and be untameable. So don't get your hopes up!

Transcription:

Hey everyone, Kalliope here with a very unlikely to stay, but still adorable tame from the PTR.

Yes, we're back on the Isle of Thunder at the Zandalari-controlled pen of rotating dinosaurs. On some days, there are baby raptors who are friendly to players and on others, there are tameable white dire horns. On the 5.3 PTR, these dire horns have been changed to blue babies. As of right now, they are still tameable, though it is highly unlikely that they'll remain that way. While there's a chance that white dire horns tamed now will morph into the babies after patch 5.3 hits, there's no guarantee that the babies won't get a new id number prior to the patch going live. Still, if you've got the stable space and you're a gambler, you can try.

For the latest news on the baby dire horns and other hunter pets, be sure to visit Petopia and the Petopia forums. Back on the Isle of Thunder, this is Kalliope, showing you where the wild things are.

1,000 subscribers!

Viewer Kevin Crysler is subscriber #1,000! I can scarcely believe there are so many of you. :)

Thank you all for your support! We've come a long way since the MoP beta and will continue to journey through Azeroth in the months to come. :D

Brawler's Guild side note from the PTR

While not exactly pet news, Brawler's Guild enthusiasts will be pleased to know that Bruce will be returning with a few upgrades in patch 5.3.

Yup. Rockets AND lasers. Bruce is just that awesome. Did not see if he's rank 9 or 10.

Where the Wild Things Are: Portent in Patch 5.3

Today's update includes some minor plot spoilers for patch 5.3 and this post contains a NSFW image at the bottom, so consider yourself doubly warned!

Suffice to say that certain events directly impact Portent (previously) and he has compensated for them.


Transcription:

Hi guys, Kalliope here with a quick update from the patch 5.3 PTR regarding our good buddy Portent. This involves minor plot spoilers for the patch, so you've been warned.

Warchief Garrosh has mutilated a sizable section of the Vale, right in the middle of Portent's path. Instead of the softly rolling yellow hills that Portent walked over before, there is now a steep drop to the dirt of the new mining quarry below.

But Portent does not care that there is now a quarry filled with goblins in his way. Oh no, he walks where he pleases, be it straight down a rocky cliff face or back up said rocky cliff face, underneath buildings or over dangerous drilling equipment.

Portent does not care what some "warchief" or "safety experts" say. In fact, he has changed his path to deliberately walk over these things. Portent goes where he wants and he does not care what you think.

He leaves his paw prints where he pleases and does not care that they are harder to see. This is HIS Vale and we're all just unwelcome guests in it.

I'll be watching to see if he decides to start piloting shredders in a future build. If he does, you'll hear it first here and on the Petopia forums.

The TLDR version:

Where the Wild Things Go: Patch 5.3 Stable Expansion

Yes, you heard right - as of the current patch 5.3 PTR build, Blizzard has retracted its "hunters are not crazy cat ladies" statement and given us a whopping 55 stable slots!



I personally can't imagine filling all 55 spaces on either of my max level hunters, but will happily pick up the few pets I had to set free who never quite worked as minipets. How will this change impact your hunters? Show off your new planned families in this thread on the Petopia forums!

Transcription:

Hey everyone! Kalliope here on the patch 5.3 PTR, just about to visit the stable with my good buddy Tiresias. Now, let's see, who do I have on this copy of Kalliope....wait a minute, what's this? What are these extra pages? It looks like...more stable slots?! Fifty of them, in fact, plus five for our active pets, for a total of 55 pets! It looks like the Blizzard devs have changed their minds about hunters not being crazy cat ladies after all. That's good news to many of my subscribers and the hunter community at large. It doesn't look like there are any restrictions on the extra slots at this time - hopefully that won't change. If you're in need of a fainting couch or just want to scream with joy, be sure to visit Petopia and the Petopia forums. This has been Kalliope showing you where ALL the wild things go.