Proposal: Pet Mog. (Solution for stable slots)

[SlickrockGhost]

If you want to complain about a hunter pet being rather impersonal once you get to it, that's an issue that has existed since stable masters existed, and won't be solved ever, probably. That can only be solved if you gave player housing and it included personal stables.

Have to say I miss the days of BC when I had the red lynx as Alliance, and no one else had it (except for Horde, who were quite displeased with me... )

We've reached a point where every hunter has Loq.. and Chromangus, etc.

[Valnaaros]

Too true. I would love if they did bring back pets that not everyone could get. But at the same time, then we'd have to deal with the toxicity of others.

[Qraljar]

That can only be solved if you gave player housing and it included personal stables.

Man, on this note, I'm so bummed out that Trueshot Lodge didn't have something like this. I would have loved if there had been a big stable area that used the same tech that the garrison mount stables did and let us see our own pets walking around, eating, sleeping, etc. For being such a large part of our class identity, pets didn't feel like they had much of a presence in our order hall.

Yeah, the Hunter lodge felt a bit shoehorned in.

I think having some form of stables, even if it's in an instance where only a hunter and/or their group members could go, would actually be far better than going to a Stable Master NPC who pulls them out of the void.

Then, if you summoned them from the stables in the middle of nowhere, while they still teleport to you, essentially, you can at least give the excuse that they're coming from your stable, not a random stable master in Stormwind.

[SlickrockGhost]

Too true. I would love if they did bring back pets that not everyone could get. But at the same time, then we'd have to deal with the toxicity of others.

Yep, but we best not go down that road here again.

[Teigan]

Imagine tracking Loque'nahak for days, struggling against achievement hunters and the unmentionables, to finally tame him, and then straight away get rid of him because 'oh, I have his skin now'. I feel it reduces the drive to really 'hunt' if the pet you tame simply becomes a skin that you unlock.

It's not as special as it used to be anyway.. There isn't a tame now that has the feel of Loq/Krush/Aotona. The rares now either have a short respawn time, a common beast with the same skin, or they're part of a quest chain that everyone can follow.

The old days are gone regardless.

Just because something is not, subjectively, "as special" doesn't mean that it should be made less special. Taming Loque is still not easy, especially on a populated realm. I check up on the old guy sometimes and I usually see someone camping for him.

But that aside, I have, for example, a random shoveltusk that I adore. There is an entire zone full of his clones. But he is my shoveltusk. And that makes him special. Just because something is common doesn't make it meaningless. If I had a skin of him and draped it over the anonymous pet shaped scaffolding that a mog system would provide, or however the mog system would work, it would not make that form into my shoveltusk. My shoveltusk would have vanished and been replaced by an appearance. Instead of having many pets, I would have none. At that point, I may as well go Lone Wolf and be done with it.

[Chya]

If you want to complain about a hunter pet being rather impersonal once you get to it, that's an issue that has existed since stable masters existed, and won't be solved ever, probably. That can only be solved if you gave player housing and it included personal stables.

Have to say I miss the days of BC when I had the red lynx as Alliance, and no one else had it (except for Horde, who were quite displeased with me... )

We've reached a point where every hunter has Loq.. and Chromangus, etc.

Yep, why feel shouldn't keep getting more stable slots. Bring back having a choice, maybe wouldn't see so many with the same pet then. Maybe I'm wrong on what's causing this problem, do correct me then. Is kinda hard using, say 1 spirit beast when everyone has them all. No choice just tame them all.

[Chya]

I'll also be clearing out some in my stable, Veph. There are several that I haven't touched in a very long time, and I could easily get them again if I wanted to.

I love to collect minipets, but you're right, they're just becoming a faceless mass at this point. I forget about most of them, and the only ones I really care for are those which are particularly good in pet battles. The same applies to mounts. I usually just use the Xmog Yak, a two-person land mount, a two-person flying mount, a water strider, and a mount or two that fit with with each of my individual characters. I actively farm for more mounts but, honestly, I rarely use the ones that I farm for. I would hate for Hunter pets to become this.

Not interested in some mog pet skin collection tab.
Agreed, will be cleaning my stable out too. If no longer use a pet much, no point in keeping them. They're companions not a collection.

[Quiv]

Until they can think of some elegant solution, I would like to see the stable slots periodically increase proportionate to the number of tameable skins (or at least in proportion to the rare and hard to get skins). Maybe by like 5 or 10 every xpac, something reasonable. We are very disproportionate now, and as time goes on, theres more and more reasons people keep fuller stables. This isn't a long term solution though, because 100, 150, 200 slots seems impractical and unwieldy (or to use an unhelpful word: clunky).

I think the stabling system needs rebuilt honestly. I don't know if pet "mog" is the answer, there are some technical questions I have with it (such as how do skins retain names). And has been pointed out, I personally don't want it to become battle pet tab 2.0. Plus theres the whole connection to different pets that can be lost. The OP is thinking outside the box, and that I think is precisely what we need! I say flip the whole system on its head.

And we need to keep in mind theres nothing wrong with having a large stable. Theres no need for anyone to defend it as if having a full stable needs to be justified by default. Its just a personal preference. Same goes for having a small stable. Its all fine. I am convinced that if they care enough to devote the time to it (a very big IF), there is a solution that can reasonably accommodate both sides of the coin.

[Qraljar]

I'm fairly sure only one side needs to be accommodated. At least, that is my view. If you don't want your stables filled when they add new slots.. just don't use those slots?

[Valnaaros]

Yeah, it really is just one side that has to be accommodated, but the other side has a point in that there has to be a line drawn. The more slots that become available, especially when it goes into the hundreds, the more ridiculous it will become and Hunter pets will become the next Mount and Battle Pet.

[Delphinie]

What about something like the device we get to change Hati's appearance except we can use it on wild animals we can tame to change the appearance of our current pet for a time?

[Qraljar]

Yeah, it really is just one side that has to be accommodated, but the other side has a point in that there has to be a line drawn. The more slots that become available, especially when it goes into the hundreds, the more ridiculous it will become and Hunter pets will become the next Mount and Battle Pet.

/shrug

I don't know, really. The moment you strayed from max 5 pets, that was kinda the danger.

I think having the option is fine. If you don't want to use it because it feels impersonal, by all means, don't?

That seems practical enough for me.

I don't know, the "pets feel impersonal." for me stems from something different than the amount of stable slots, so having more or less stable slots doesn't change or improve that for me. All it does is give me the chance to see if I might enjoy some new pets without having to throw my old pets away.

[Vephriel]

It's easy enough to say don't use them, but if they're there and I have pets that I like well enough, they may as well sit there. I still keep plenty of extra space in my stable, but having the empty room just removes any need or incentive to care what's in there and things pile up, so to speak. It's like having a house that's too large for your needs. Sure you might not need to use all of the rooms, but clutter accumulates anyways just because there's the space for it to. I don't really know if I'm explaining this well but, it's just my personal feelings on the matter.

[Qraljar]

It's easy enough to say don't use them, but if they're there and I have pets that I like well enough, they may as well sit there. I still keep plenty of extra space in my stable, but having the empty room just removes any need or incentive to care what's in there and things pile up, so to speak. It's like having a house that's too large for your needs. Sure you might not need to use all of the rooms, but clutter accumulates anyways just because there's the space for it to. I don't really know if I'm explaining this well but, it's just my personal feelings on the matter.

You're explaining it well, but practically, I think my point remains.

For people who want the option, giving people a lot of slots that they can choose to use or not use is more of an option than giving no new slots. You, if you don't want to use more than 5 slots, already have more options to do that, than they do to have more slots. That doesn't mean your point is not valid, but what is their alternative? Suck it up? Clean out their stables anyway?

[Valnaaros]

I think you said it very well, Veph. Made perfect sense to me.

[Valnaaros]

In the end, there really isn't a way that can please both sides. If you give more slots, then Hunter Pets start becoming like Pets and Mounts and you're just collecting for the sake of collecting or filling the empty space. If you leave it as it is, then those that want to collect as many pets as possible will have to choose between the ones that really mean something to them, those that have somesort of value to them (like glitch pets), and the ones they just have collected.

Even if Blizz did something like having us buy slots with gold, this whole thing will always be an issue. There will be those that will fill up to the max amount of slots and then will be wanting more.

[Vephriel]

Yeah, I'm not really trying to sway anyone to my side, I think it's unfortunately just a messy situation no matter how you approach it and both sides will have strong opinions. I guess we'll just have to see what Blizzard decides in the end and live with it, whichever way that goes.

[Qraljar]

I think the people that care enough will always pick their favorites, their main pets.

The people that don't care about pets much, or see them as buffbots, will tame whatever flavor of the month pet there is.

The people that care about rarity will tame the newest Loque.

The people who want to start a zoo will do so too.

Which, I guess, is more power to those people.

[Teigan]

I agree that, kinda like flying vs no flying, the genie is out of the bottle. Going beyond 5 pets was the beginning of a change whose outcome we still don't know. I would appreciate if Blizzard would come down on some side of this, but I honestly doubt it is an important issue to them. Given the general feel of the game of late, and trends like account wide achievements and transmog and massive pet journals, a "pet mog" would not surprise me. It seems like a way to quiet the complaining once and for all from the hunter community concerning stable space. I would be disappointed. I would be honestly saddened. I would threaten to quit the game or not play my hunter during the ensuing storm that would surely follow, but in the end, I would still play my hunter. And my pets would feel even less like individuals. And more class flavor would be gone. And the magic of an epic tame would be eroded. And the new hunters would never understand what the old hunters meant by any of it. And the game would continue.

Disclaimer: I speak only for myself and am not an authority on anything. This is only an opinion.

[Qraljar]

Every expansion, a Hunter version of Pathfinder that unlocks more slots?