WoW Petopia Community

Just would like to share my first bonded pets per character, and would love to hear other stories as well!

First, let's take a trip to waaaay back when. Back in vanilla WoW, Miacoda was on the Thrall server, and her name was Muraco. Once she got to level 10, she wanted a wolf, so a friend of mine helped me get past the dreaded Wetlands run to get to Dun Morogh, where I tamed my first pet, Sheeba.

I thought Sheeba to be the essence of beauty. I just loved to watch her run, and look at her. She was just so pretty. I have no idea why I let her go, I was so stupid to do so.









I wish I had more screenshots of her, I can only find a few. Sheeba was Mia's faithful companion for such a long time. We went through so much together. I don't really remember when I released her, or why (I absolutely regret the choice now), but I think it was some time before Burning Crusade... perhaps either right before or right after I switched to Argent Dawn. I miss her though, but I havent been able to re-tame her and feel that same bond, so in lore terms, I've basically decided that Sheeba died while protecting Mia. I took this screenshot a while back, I just saw it as a powerful image at the time, so I guess I could say she was protecting Mia from an omgwtf scary elite shark when she died.



After Sheeba, I bonded with a few other pets... none were quite as strong as the bond with her though until Wrath of the Lich King, when I tamed Krush. That bond is even stronger than the one I had with Sheeba. But, I'll always cherish those memories I had with her. There's always something special about that first pet. ^^

So yeah. A little back story there, hehe.
I'll post about my alt hunters later (I need to find screenshots, and take a few new ones), I'm very interested in reading other peoples stories and what not! ^^

When I picked up the game for the first time in Vanilla, I started out as a night elf hunter. My boyfriend and I were newbies together, and on those first characters we made it into the mid-forties I believe.

On this character (named Vephriel actually, the first incarnation of her), I had my initial inkling of a pet bond with a grey raptor.



Sadly I don't have any surviving screenshots from Vanilla, but I remember the thrill of choosing that particular model because I loved the colour, and seeking out to tame it. It was incredibly difficult at the time. I had my eyes set on a Deviate Stalker from the entrance of the Wailing Caverns. This is back when they were Elites, and I was just a low level night elf newbie. My boyfriend and I took up most of an afternoon just getting into the The Barrens. We had started on a PvP server, and back then there were more people out and about in the world. It was a terrifying trek, getting lost, ganked, turned around. We made it there though, and together we fought our way into the caverns against the Elite mobs, keeping an eye out for the stealthy raptor that I was after.

The raptor actually found me first, we were moving through the tunnels and came to the part with the water on the floor. It stealthed up to me and surprised me, but somehow I got him tamed and he became my first special pet. His name was Sinthom (just a name I came up with), and after that he was the only pet I ever used on that hunter.


Later in Vanilla my boyfriend and I really wanted to switch to Horde, so at some point we left our original characters and created new ones. My main before The Burning Crusade was a male tauren hunter, oddly enough. Once again, I experienced the beginnings of a pet thrill on this character. This time, it was a rare.

Humar.



I had found out about this unique black lion, and I knew he was perfect for my character. I researched online about how he was rare, and one day I traveled up to Humar's tree in The Barrens and did my first big camp. I laugh about this now, but I sat under that tree for 4 hours and waited. That's such a drop in the bucket compared to camps I've done since *cough* Aeonaxx *cough*, but at the time it seemed the pinnacle of dedication to sit 4 hours for this particular beast in the game. I remember my boyfriend making fun of me for sitting there staring at an empty spot in front of the tree for so long. When Humar finally spawned I barely survived the tame because I hadn't known he called upon his pride for help. The tame went through just as I died. I wish I could remember the name I picked for him, but I can't for the life of me. In any case, that was my tauren's special pet, and even long after I stopped playing that character I was loath to delete him because I felt like I couldn't delete all that time spent over the camp (lololol). I did, in the end, delete that tauren, but it wasn't until late BC, or possibly even WotLK, I can't recall.


Anyways, for my final story we reach The Burning Crusade, and I started the blood elf Vephriel. My third hunter, and my third (and this time final!) main character. Long before Skorn came along, Veph tamed an armored black boar. This was Frankenswine, a piggy I became deeply attached to, and who would one day evolve into his intended model - the undead boar.



I've always loved pigs, they're one of my favourite animals, so on Vephriel I really wanted to try taming a boar. When I saw on Petopia the undead model, I was instantly in love. I had to have it. The only creatures that used this model at the time, however, were the Plagued Swine in the Eastern Plaguelands, and they were all level 60. That seemed like a lofty level to me, as I had never really made it very high on either of my previous main characters.

With that goal in mind, I decided to tame a different boar as a sort of placeholder until I reached level 60. I chose the black one from RFK as it was too awesome looking, I loved the idea of a battle pet with armor.

This pig went on to become an absolutely outstanding leveling pet. Boars were BEAST back in the day, they had incredible aggro capabilities, and no matter how many attacks I shot at a mob initially, Frankie could always peel them off me as soon as I sent him in. I really came to love that boar, he helped me survive through anything, I felt like I could take on the world as long as he was by my side.

Hitting level 60 was a milestone, and exciting in its own right, but I had never forgotten my intention of getting one of the undead boars, so instantly after reaching it I raced over to the Plaguelands and Frankie took on his true form.




I feel like all of these past pet experiences slowly built up to me understanding the bond that could develop between a hunter and their pet. Then one fateful day in WotLK I found my OTP (One True Pet). *hugs Skorn*

Mine is definitely Tetsusaiga (Echeyakee).



Way back in the day in Vanilla, my brother and I had re-rolled a couple of night elf hunters. I tamed a tarantula and named it Prickles, then released him and tamed and released a couple of other things. My brother had gone all the way to Horde territory to name a bat. Back then, or at least on our server, we never saw hunters with pets from the opposite faction like that. Everyone kept asking him questions about where he got it, etc.

That drove me to want to tame one of these neat critters myself. We trekked to the Barrens to see what's what, and I found a lion and named him Regal. I kept him for a little bit, and he was neat, but he still wasn't quite what I was looking for.

I checked out Petopia and ended up seeing him, the most beautiful creature in the game - Echeyakee. I knew that instant I had to have him. We went back to the Barrens and sat and waited. I don't believe the website back then had noted that he was spawned for a quest, so I waited for who knows how long. I want to say it was my brother that finally looked it up for me and found out how to get him to come out.

He went to make a Horde character. I was going to wait there while he leveled it up just enough to get that quest. It wasn't too long after (a couple hours probably) that this undead fellow came running up. There was no Real ID back then, so I had no way to know whether that was my brother. I assumed it was. He summoned the lion, then stood back and cheered as I tamed him. I believe at that point I called my brother to thank him, and he told me that wasn't him. Some random stranger had taken pity on me, and let me tame his quest mob. I was so happy and thankful to this random guy.

I named him Tetsusaiga, after Inu Yasha's sword in the anime of the same name. It was made from the fang of his father and has a little white tuft of fur at the hilt (is that the correct word?). It is also extremely powerful. I thought it was a fitting name.

There did come a time when stupidity overtook me, and I let him go. It was in WotLK where we still only had five stable slots. I was so excited about taming spirit beasts and devilsaurs and all that, so I released him. Stupidest thing I've ever done. It actually took a few months for me to really feel the void after losing him. He was always in the back of my mind, but it wasn't until a while after that I started to feel literally sick to my stomach about the whole thing. I tried taming Sian-Rotam, since in my story I had let him go in Winterspring to father a tribe of his own. It didn't work. I then went and tamed another Echeyakee and named it Tetsusaiga, but it somehow felt...lifeless and empty. I was heartbroken.

But then, I read a story or two here on the forums of people creating tickets to have a pet restored, and that if you got a nice GM it would actually work! I was thrilled. I opened a ticket, and sure enough, probably a day or two later, the real Tetsusaiga was waiting for me in my stable with a lovely letter from the GM. He was level 80, which was the level he was when I released him, and he had a low pet ID (I noticed on the armory that pets tamed long ago have lower numbers than pets tamed recently). I knew it was him.





He is almost always in my active pets now. He gets a break every once in a while, but for the most part he can be found standing by my side, as he has since level 20-ish seven years ago.



Edit: Hehe, I forgot the GM called him "Tetsusaiga the Elder". :3

Aww, I love to hear about stuff like this. I think it's fun to look back and remember things like this. Just some of those memories that make people smile, it seems.
And you're not limited to just posting Vanilla screenshots. ^.^ That's just all I had of Sheeba, hehe.

Mine was definitely my lion Rayne
from 10-60 I had sooooo many different pets and none of them lasted more than a few days before Id go off and tame a new pet. When I got to winterspring and did the quests the summoned him I fell in love with him and just had to have him. Once I hit 60 I had a friend do the quest so I could tame him. Took about 20 some tries (knew nothing about freezing and taming at the time lol). Ever since that day hes been with Boni and I never take him out of her call pet 1 slot. I don't believe Ive ever stabled him lol.

I used to have loads of screenshots on the laptop I started wow on, but that one got a virus and had the hard drive wiped clean.

Ursa! <3 I loved him ever since I first saw him on Petopia, before I even started playing WoW.

Much like there is no Shepard without Vakarian, there is no Kalliope without Ursa.





(Full size pics on my blog; the forum has eaten this post no fewer than three times already.)

For me it was my Flamingo of Death.

He was the third pet I tamed. I'd already gotten a cat and wolf while questing in Mulgore. One evening, I was running from Thunder Bluff to Bloodhoof Village and there was Mazzranache crossing the road up ahead. I dunno why, but I decided that I absolutely had to tame that bird. I got to town, quickly logged over to my warrior and mailed my hunter enough money to buy his 3rd stable slot. Fortunately, it went through right away (yeah, it was vanilla, when even mail between chars on the same account could take an hour to get through). I logged back to the hunter and ran out in the direction I'd seen Mazz strutting along. There he was. It wasn't a difficult tame, but he did manage to take a good bit of my health off. I decided to name him Peck, since he'd sure pecked the heck out of me before deciding to be my companion.

Peck was my first pet to reach 60 and 70. He was the 2nd or 3rd to get to 80. He's still my favorite pet and I'm sure not gonna let him go. In the past he's saved the day when a heroic was about to wipe and even managed to let the 3's arena team I was on win a match by the skin of our teeth. (I'd forgotten to swap pets before the match started. It ended up down between me and a warrior, both about one hit away from being dead. Peck's dust cloud saved me from getting hit so I could finish the warrior off). When I was in Eye of the Storm for the first time, Peck was my only level 70 pet. He kicked some butt in there and the others in the PuG declared him the Flamingo of Death.

Tallstriders may not be the 'best' pet for most situations, but I couldn't bear to part with my buddy Peck.

My Sepulchrave, a Strigid Hunter grey owl from Teldrassil. He was my first pet at level 10 and I kept him until 60, when I replaced him with Clarice, a pure white cat from Winterspring. This was back in BC, when you could only have 2 hunter pets, as the third slot had to be saved for temp pets that taught you pet skills.

Doom ur story made me sad... poor wolfie

Before I started to play a hunter i read every article online i could find about hunters. Tårnfalks( back then known as Tivoli) first tame was Müsli. She´s been with me every since.

I love her to bits and pieces and this little darling have brougth me back to WoW more times then i can recall. I know she is just made of pixels but ever since i tamed her snowleopards to me have been know as Müsli.


She is everything to me. I remember running as lvl 10 all the loong loong way from darnasus to dun Modr (or however the area outside if is spelled)

I remeber how slow she was chasing after pets . Back then pets chase speed was not the same and my friend Reeba had King Bangalas and she thought it was funny that my Müsli was soo much slower then her Whiskers.

To me, WoW is not WoW without Müsli. She is THE most important thing to me in Wow and will NEVER leave my stables. I´ve tried upgrading her to a riding model but to me the cat model is just Müsli and she will always be that. My hopes is that the old cat models get an upgrade, not to the fluffy tigers but some upgrade so they are still "old cats" but with smother graphic.. Kinda like the coyote someone redone to be more smooth (atm dont recall who it was)

Müsli´s name came instinktly to me and eventhough many find it silly i love my serial killer cat. She is every thing to me and i love her.. i really do feel love.. eventhough she is only pixels. And to me this model is still the most beautifull pet in WoW

Dont have Vanilla shots but here are some recent ones of my beloved cat







The breakfast dish she is named after.. It is logic to me

Hehe. The first pet I ever bonded with was Takk The Leaper. I first saw him on Taluwen and it was instant love. I kept his name as Leaper. He was my rare spawn tame too.

There's kind of two for me. My first pet for Mindala was a grey Durotar boar, named Baradis (one of the names of Elbereth, from Tolkien). A purely practical choice, rather than any aesthetic one, but he went with me for most of my levelling time and I still have him. He's a great tanky pet, and his butt-wiggle animation is so silly I love it. So it was a slow-build kind of love. I couldn't get rid of him.

The first pet I deliberately sought out was the ghostsaber; mine is Anevka. Like Twitchapher above, I did it at a fairly low level, and it wasn't easy, and I must have opened a hundred cat statuettes before she came out. Never getting rid of her either.

On Innis, my very first character in vanilla (female night elf hunter. Original.), I'd not gotten the whole pet-vibe for a long time, taming and releasing pets just for fun. It wasn't until she'd reached Winterspring that I'd felt something for a pet. The first time I saw Rak'shiri I had to have him. Shiekah and Innis went just about everywhere together for the longest time. I can't remember what happened between the end of vanilla and the end of TBC, mostly because my time on WoW was sporadic as I didn't have broadband where I live and thus could only play during the holidays. I'd like to hope that he was there when I found Innis' next bonded pet (Nuramoc) and when I eventually deleted her. Sadly, no screenshots survived.

Come Wrath I'd fallen in love with blood elves and created my new main, at the time a female named Lakita. I'd loved the pretty dragonhawks in the starter area, knowing I had to tame one. I named the one I tamed Argaroc, a misspelling of Argorok, a boss from Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. The bond was instant and they did everything together. I'd even started some minor roleplay with him and a friend using the dragonhawk's original version of flame breath; an AOE DoT. We even did PvP together, one thing I despise immensely. We would be the only ones to protect the flag, and it was during one such time that I discovered Arg's favourite RP trick: to hang off his master/mistress' or even a friend's collar and flare his wings, giving the appearance of that person having wings.

After some time when I found I prefer to play as a male blood elf Arg still tagged along with Varethyn for a while but it wasn't the same. I'd let him go for other tames, such as Rex (ironhide devilsaur), Myst (ghostsaber and Lakita/Varethyn's second bond) and eventually Kuma (Arcturis) and Lobo (Skoll, now Faron). Roll on to when we could have 5 stable slots, I finally began to miss my dear dragonhawk. I put it off for a while for who-knows-why but now Argorok (properly spelt) now happily follows Varethyn as his main pet both in-game and RP.

It all began with my male Tauren's wind serpent Adanedhel.



When I leveled him, I couldn't decide on the pets I wanted to have, but still wished to try out as many different kinds as I could. So I set myself a "pet challenge" and rolled random pets on the Petopia site to level with every 10 levels. I had a boar, I had a hyena, I had a vulture...but when I got this gorgeous wind serpent I really fell in love. I used to RP him as a gift, they did not meet in the wild. Cere had rendered a service to a Blood Elf who bred wind serpents and gave a hatchling to the Tauren as a thank you. According to the rules of my game, ten levels later I set him free and he never returned to my stables as other bonds were formed.

Once my race-change for the Tauren came through, and he turned into a female Troll, I decided to go and tame red pets for the newly born Mozag. I tamed a whole bunch of them, and for fun included a skin that I had never liked:



Mortician, or as he is now known: Mort. I don't know why we grew so attached so quickly, but I know that if there's only one pet that can remain, it's him. Mozag is quite distant in a way, even from her other pets, there's no real bond or connection between most of them. Either grudging respect or a sense of "team" because they must work together to survive. Only Mort has managed to cross those barriers, and he remains the only creature in the world for whom Moz feels tenderness.



For Zsofia, Peikko is her love. I use a number system in my head to rotate my pets while I level and do dungeons so that I give most of them an airing at least now and then. Peikko is almost always in Zsofia's rotation, out of chance. The bond grew very quickly, and I realised quite soon that whenever I didn't have him out, I didn't feel right, as if something was missing. These two are very close.

Snapdragon, Lomelinda's first bear:



He was the bear that got me into bears in the first place, as I couldn't stand the models before. I fell in love with that rolling, bumbling run and the adorable faces. I gave him up eventually as he didn't fit her stables, but her second bear Daisy has never quite reached the level of importance as did ol' Snappy.



For Lindorindel, the bond with Gabilgathol was forged instantly. The moment the tame went through, I fell in love irrevocably. I don't really know what it is about these two, but there is no Lindy without Gab, and no Gab without Lindy. Probably the strongest bond I've had with a pet since my first hunter and his adoration of Hathor (I've depicted this so many times in various threads that I won't go into it again, but here's a thumbnail, because by rights she should be in every thread about special pets) -



Alburga's old cat Marlowe was her first love. This cat and her had been through so much together, and I always considered him her rock. The only one of her pets that was there for her during her difficult moments. Eventually I decided that his look wasn't right for her, and I realised that he was fading, although the bonds of nostalgia held them together. A young male cat, Byron, took his place as the protector, and during a very emotional RP session, I imparted the news that Marlowe had passed on. It was a wrench letting him go, but I feel that this was the natural progression of their tale.



Artaxias has been the king of Garshanga's stables since level 10. He remains the king now. They just look and feel RIGHT together. I can't wait to be able to spec him as ferocity and take him out and about with me more.

Zinzil's scorpid Kal is her first bond.



I was utterly mesmerised by how well the two suited each other, and his rich golden tones looked so good next to her as they ran around in Durotar leveling. I was so surprised, as this skin has never appealed to me before. He'll definitely be staying in my stables, even if other pets have bonded more strongly since those days.



Dawnsong and Blossom have been best buddies since the beginning. Time and again, this bear protects her mistress both when out and about in the world as well as tanking heroics. I know I can rely on her.



At level 10, I made the epic trek on foot as a Blood Elf to the Human starting area. It has been one of the longest and most painful of my runs (although going to Eversong as a level 10 Alliance is still worse), because at some point reason left my mind and I thought I'd take a shortcut through Duskwood. And I do mean through Duskwood. I died constantly. Every worg, every spider was on my tail, and my resurrection times were ridiculous. Eventually, painstakingly, I made my way to Elwynn, and the relief was palpable when I realised that I could finally hold my own against the mobs. Finally I spotted my target, a large snarling wolf female whom I promptly tamed and named Claudine. I really hate this wolf model, and expected to dislike the pet, but instead love blossomed. Whenever these two are together, I feel like some sort of action is required. They're the bad girls, out for some mayhem.

And Finally, Lazuli's Amber:



I don't like crabs much and couldn't wait to tame something else for my Goblin as soon as I hit level 10. I had thought about a raptor, but decided that I'd like to try one of the monkeys instead. I have never regretted that decision. The bond that grew and the story that unfolded became one of my dearest. I had originally planned a white fox as Lazuli's signature pet, but fate had other ideas. While my Pearl is still precious to me, Amber is just that little bit more special.

My first real bond with a pet, actually didnt happen until Wrath, when Jeli was still back on Runetotem.

I had heard whispers of the bugged pets in Sholazar basin. And instantly was intrigued by the thought of having a hydra. I figured I would nab it now and see what happens when Blizz hotfixes them. I mean, they would just make them all croc's shortly after I get one...right? It took a bit to get the quest but finally the summon quest was up and I ran over to tame my Hydra. I wish I remember what I had named him at first.. I almost tamed the slime too, but back then I had 5 stable slots and it didnt seem practical. Anyway, Blizzard would take these guys away eventually, right?

Boy was I ever wrong, and happy for it.

Almost immediately I fell for him. The angry heads fighting, the sounds, the shocked whispers I got. I was careful not to take him out too much back then so I could keep him as long as possible. Once they were made untamable I was waiting for him to be removed....but it never happened.

I loved running around with him and decided one day to make a better name for him. I voiced this on my guilds vent and my guild leader said jokingly that I should call him Shenanigans. SO as a joke, I did. And It was like my Hydra came to life to me. He became a definate he to me then instead of an it. My friend and I were alwasy made fun of because back when there was 5 stable slots we would always stable clean when we were bored...but Shenanigans could never leave. Not because he was no longer tamable...but because I couldnt bare to part with him. No other pet til then did that to me.

Heres one of my fave pics. Right after I downed the Lich King the first time. The friends I made from this raid are still with me. And love Shenanigans almost as much as I do XD It's a running joke that they invite Shenanigans to their raids and not me.

The lions in WoW hold a very special place in my heart.

The first hunter I ever created, Khau, had at one time tamed all three lion models: The Rake, Echeyakee, and Humar the Pridelord back when stable space only alloted three pets total.

I knew having one stable full of lions was an impractical choice but the idea of not having them all tore me up on the inside! Eventually, I went ahead and created some additional hunters, Auroryn and Ghiselle, for the sole purpose of acquiring one of the two lions Khau needed to give up. Khau kept his Humar (Tsavo), Auroryn tamed her Echeyakee (Seraph), and Ghiselle got her Rake (Maksim).

I started playing Wow shortly after BC came out. My first hunter was my female Tauren Larkania, but I didn't play her more than up to level 19 before I started my Orc Morga.
I've always been fascinated by tigers and I would SOOOOOOOO love to have one as a pet in real life. That's not possible so my goal was to tame a tiger as soon as my orc reached level 10. I finished the taming quests and set out to the islands in front of Durotar. Back in BC and Wotlk there were Durotar tigers instead of trolls on these islands. They were between level 10 and 12 I think and the first pet I tried to tame was of course level 11. He killed my orc faster than he could run. I ran back, rezzed and was killed again. When I noticed my mistake I had almost reached level 11 by killing other pets annoying me. But then I tamed a level 10 tiger and it worked. I named this tiger Arod. The name comes from one of the horses in lord of the rings but it was a strong fitting name for my new tiger.
I have tons of pics of Morga, so prepare for a picture spam. Most screenshots were taken during burning crusade so crappy graphics inc.
In Muglore:

Defending the flag in Warsong:

During halloween event Arod wanted to catch the apples himself:

Arod being bored in thunderbluff:

In the Barrens:

At level 70 in one of the BC dungeons - King Morga and Arod:

Reaching level 60 in Silithus:

Having fun with eyes of the beast in Orgrimmar:

Questing in Outlands:

Raising the little venomhide hatchling to a riding raptor


Arod will always be the pet I have the deepest connection to. He will never leave Morga's stables. When Cata came out and the Durotar tigers were removed I feared he would get removed out of my stables, too. But Arod was still there and I was relieved.
Perhaps I will add pics of Finduilas and her Hönir, but I have tons of pics of these two, too, so they deserve a seperate post.

Finduilas wrote:Arod being bored in thunderbluff:

Being bored... Or catching the rain on his tongue? Hehehe

I would say bored, Arod never was a playful cat. And he doesn't like being a model for screenshots. He's all the protector and big evil cat that's there to defend Morga. But perhaps he was mad about the bad weather and was snapping at the drops