TURTLES! I LIKE TURTLES!
Well, someone had to say it.
Panzer has been my primary tanking pet for a heck of a lot of years. I can't even remember when I first decided that I needed a nice, pink (well, grey with pink on, but I always call him 'pink') turtle for tanking. It's been that long. I was young. There were only three stable slots. My Panzer occupied one for quite a while until it was obvious that he simply couldn't handle the threat needed (this was back in the day when turtles had a +20% armor, but a -10% ATK). When we were allowed five slots instead of three? He became a constant part of that.
Panzer has been tanking for me and my guild for nearly that amount of time. He has main tanked heroic instances in Northrend and Burning Crusades, handled raid-level tanking for a few locations, and even done progression-level offtanking in places like Icecrown and Ulduar, back in the day. i don't raid as much any more, but he has still occasionally popped out to be main or offtank for a few instances and group quests.
Nowadays, he is still my primary go-to tank for anything that I want to try soloing. Group quests, instances, old-style raids. With the MoP changes, he has been getting some vacation time, since the only things I solo are handleable by tenacity pets with no shell shield, but come MoP, I strongly expect my Panzer to be once more by my side. Particularly since I can respec him as a DPS turtle for questing!
Panzer has 'changed skins' at least three times during his lifetime. He has been a green turtle (I love the color), an ancient Sea Turtle, and even Terrorpene. And yet, all of these, after running with for a while, I have been unable to bond with them and released them for my beloved pink pet. It's possible that I may try again in MoP with a dragon turtle, as the sounds they make are extremely appealing to me. However, at the same time, Panzer is Panzer. I find it difficult to believe, after releasing Terrorpene for getting him back, that any other turtle could replace him just as he is.
EDIT: Realized I should have some pictures of my beloved.
Here he is after progression-level offtanking in Sarth:
Progression offtank at Kel'thuzad:
A duo of MGT when I was level 80:
Doomwalker at 80? Child's play!
