How are you guys lvling your pets right now?

[Darkchyld]

where do I get the stones you mention that add levels? I got a few from bags and stuff, but is there a steady way of getting them like the flawless ones from the vendor? I am only up to northrend as far as trainers go, but I have my menagerie for getting pet tokens each day!

The daily/weekly quest from garrison menagerie NPC and Kura/Erris also gives leveling stones.

[Wreathy]

Every day I take my Teroclaw Hatchling to Ashlei in Shadowmoon Valley, with one to two two levelling pets...slowly but surely. Also use the race specific stones etc. And I'm waiting for the Pet Battle week next week for that triple xp. Still haven't done Celestial Tournament so I'll use that to level all pets needed that aren't 25 already.

[Lolfixheal]

I tried the Sternfathom yesterday and I was utterly dissappointed. What shit XP that was And no stones neither as MoP/WoD.

[Paladance]

Every day I take my Teroclaw Hatchling to Ashlei in Shadowmoon Valley

Speaking of Ashlei, what is the most time-effective way of taking her down?
I take a lvl 1 carry pet plus two dragons with me and beat her within 12 rounds.
Is there a faster method that can take her out in 11 rounds or under?
(I'm a min/max fanatic)

Tested a Dark Whelpling with [ability]Tail Sweep[/ability]/[ability]Roar[/ability]/[ability]Deep Breath[/ability] (the last one against Tally) and it took 13 rounds. Maybe something with [ability]Explode[/ability] or [ability]Body Slam[/ability] to not swap the pets at all?

[Uduwudu]

Hi,

One round difference with Ashlei. is not that big a deal for me. I have been working on strategies for levelling the pets from 22 to 25 easily enough, and having the 3rd pet be able to pop a bomb, ends the fight easier and faster. Still takes 4 fights at 23 and 4 fights at 24, and sometimes 5, but in general, cutting those down some would be a better option in my book. I work Ashlei for taking pets from 15/16 to higher up (usually 19), so that I can use them higher up. Some pets, for example, at 19, I can get them a hit or two in the upper level areas (Legion good for this), and they level really fast, at that point ... 2 fights and they are 20, 2 fights and they are 21, 3 fights and they are 22 and so on ...

I suppose this strategy changes once I have all pets at RARE (only 35 to go) and then just use all the PC's to get leveling stones, at which point, I will likely just do one pet a day kind of thing, as far up as I have stones.

One nice thing about having a better ability to get PC's and stones ... if you are fighting a Pet you need, and the son of a gun is Poor or Common, you just go ... so what. Capture the pet and use the stone, and it saves the hassle of waiting, and trying to find a Rare and it is not the one you really want ... you might be looking for an H/S and you get a dang'd B/B and that is just a HUGE time waster. This has been the case for the pets in the Halloween thing, where I needed to get 3 of them, and I simply noticed quickly that Rare and Uncommon's were not happening in the first 27 fights, and I just took the first of each pet that I wanted and used a Stone on them this morning. Case closed ... no sense wasting time on the rest, but I got them all.

Reason for saying that, is that the pace of the Pet Charms and Upgrade Stones these days, means that you can easily bring up the pets with the stones, although, I recommend playing them from 1-6 and kinda get a better idea of some of their abilities, however, some of them you do not get to see how good they are until later. Thus, my playing them 1-6 and 23 and 24th levels is important for helping play better and be more flexible on the use of pets and which abilities. The really tough ones to learn to use at high level, are like Ruby Sappling and the like, or even any of the Fawn's, and it was strange to me to see a list of Critters for the all Critter team and no Fawn's in there ... for example.

For me, the middle is the grind, not the beginning or the end. Heck, I still have like 32 Uncommon (Green) level 1 pets to Upgrade and then level ... on my list, and something like 75 pets at level 6, 7 and 8.

[Peanutty]

I've gone back to the old reliable - MoP tamers. In under an hour each day I can get an alt about 70% of a level, and add a good chunk of levels on 11 of my newer pets. Win-win, even if I'm losing out on artifact points and gear on the alts, as I don't really play them much anyhow.

[Uduwudu]

Once a pet of mine hits 21, I cap them using four level stones.
Rinse, wash, repeat.
Personally, it's not worth the time/effort to battle out those last few levels.

It has been, actually ... every so many fights or leveled Pets, you get a Blue Stone for free.

For me, though, it is more about learning the pet's abilities and how to use them ... for example, if you spend some time at the Timeless Isle, you gonna learn how to defend Moths very quickly, and they can be tricky, as there are at least 4 different ones in there, and they can be nasty ... a couple of those on P/P, and you might as well cancel the fight, and move along to the next one. But, in general, it's not too bad. Or you can go to Stroheim and do all those Squirrels, Mice ... and left overs from the Twilight Highlands!

I think it depends on the needs for the stones ... if/when I no longer need to turn anything to Rare, then I will probably just level everything up and be lazy ... but I am not sure that just reading about Pet X is the same as actually using it and learning how it's abilities stack against other Pets. BUT, yes, that could be me just meandering and thinking a bit.

[Jerebear]

Every day I take my Teroclaw Hatchling to Ashlei in Shadowmoon Valley

Speaking of Ashlei, what is the most time-effective way of taking her down?
I take a lvl 1 carry pet plus two dragons with me and beat her within 12 rounds.
Is there a faster method that can take her out in 11 rounds or under?
(I'm a min/max fanatic)

My fastest Ashlei team:

P/P Infinite Whelp (breed matters)

Tailsweep
Tailsweep
Tailsweep (first enemy dies)
Swap to carry
Swap to infinite whelp (doodle casts sleep on himself...Ashlei will swap him out)
Early Advantage (wrecks 3rd pet)
Tail Sweep (kills 3rd pet)
Tailsweep
Tailsweep
Tailsweep
Tailsweep (doodle dies)

11 rounds. You can sometimes get 10 rounds if you use Early advantage at the end and it double crits...but the odds of that are not great

[Jerebear]

As far as how I level: I have an alt do the MoP and Draenor Circuits. Only takes an hour so it fits nicely into the buff foods. Once a pet hits 23, I use stones to finish it. I do it on an alt to reap the player EXP benefits. I think it is around 3/4 a level for me to do all 17 tamers..roughly.

[Painbow]

Yesterday was Squirt day in the EU and I dedicated 3 one-hour long sessions of time to leveling some pets. I don't know if the Weebomination strat still works. Instead, I used an S/S Bronze Whelpling and my Spectral Tiger Cub. You can sub the Spectral Tiger Cub for Widget the Departed, as well. Tail sweep Deebs until he dies, then use Early Advantage on Tyri. Bronze Whelpling will die, and then bring in Spectral Tiger Cub/Widget. One Spectral Strike and Tyri is down. Bring in level pet, then bring back spectral tiger cub/widget and prowl > spectral strike. This fight only fails if you get bored and stop paying attention. One fight takes about 1 min 15s, give or take. It really depends on how much you pay attention to the fight.

Anyhow, I did this with a level 100 alt and with three one-hour sessions, I leveled 36 pets from 1-25 and my alt reached level 102. I also got to re-watch some Sherlock. Pretty decent. The only downside to this strategy is that the pets are pretty difficult/expensive to obtain (and it might fail if you zone out and tail sweep too long).

Nobody commented on your post but your bronze whelp/spectral tiger team for Squirt is the best I ever used. It's really fast. WOW! Thanks a lot, dude.

[Jaladar]

Still using Enchanted Broom/Weebom with Squirt when she rolls around in the garrison and it still works great. Using the pet treats and the Safari hat I get from 1-24 in 3 fights, then either 1 last fight or a leveling stone to 25. Quick fights too.

[Painbow]

Still using Enchanted Broom/Weebom with Squirt when she rolls around in the garrison and it still works great. Using the pet treats and the Safari hat I get from 1-24 in 3 fights, then either 1 last fight or a leveling stone to 25. Quick fights too.

I've tried the broom team but I'm telling you, this is one of those rare teams that feel like they were made for the fight. I already got 3 accounts doing the battles right now. It's SO fast and efficient. It couldn't be anymore perfect.

Edit: Just timed it. 1:19 per fight with this team.

[Uduwudu]

Hi,

I will likely work on Squirt on the next set of pets, but in general, I do not use Ashlei for ny pets under 900 hit points, to be safe, and simply work on mitigating the charge from the goat with the Decoy (Mechanical Dragonling), and then finish the fight with the leveling pet. So that means that I can get about 5K points and it is up from 15 to 19 or 20, and such, and that would be once a day.

My biggest issue right now is something like 80 or 90 Pets at 6, 7, 8 and 9 ... only 31 Greens to upgrade, 29 of those Level 1 and cats mostly probably. No Whites or Grays. But, if the stones keep coming like they do on my characters, I'll just bring them up with Stones from there.

I make a point of playing all my Pets from 1 to 6 (Orgrimmar and area near Crossroads perfect for it) and then around Legion for 22, 23 and 24 to the top, since many of those pets are just left overs.

As mentioned in another post, I'm really more concerned with knowing the pets I have and level, so I can play them. Leveling a pet you will never play (like the healers and dot'rs), is sad ... there has got to be a hidden strategy in those, or they would not have been thought of or added!

[Ravyn]

Nobody commented on your post but your bronze whelp/spectral tiger team for Squirt is the best I ever used. It's really fast. WOW! Thanks a lot, dude.

I can't take credit for this team! I found it on the official forums - I think it was the US forums - while googling Squirt strategies. But I'm really glad that my post helped somebody!

I really love this team, but unfortunately, the pets aren't the easiest to come by (I was pleasantly surprised to see that the bronze whelpling I farmed turned out to be S/S, so I didn't even have to buy one). I will be using it today for a few hours as it's Squirt day in the EU Honestly, it doesn't get much better than ~5 mins to level one pet, except for super Squirt days during the pet battle bonus week (which sadly the EU won't have for a long time).

As mentioned in another post, I'm really more concerned with knowing the pets I have and level, so I can play them. Leveling a pet you will never play (like the healers and dot'rs), is sad ... there has got to be a hidden strategy in those, or they would not have been thought of or added!

Healers and DoT pets can be very effective in PvP pet battles. In fact, in my experience, I really learn the pets best through pvp pet battling. Most of the PVE pet battles are very predictable, so it's more about repeating the same steps over and over rather than predicting your opponent's moves and reacting. PvP pet battles can be really frustrating in the beginning when it feels like all you do is lose, but once you've got some experience your win-loss ratio should get better Plus, you also have a chance to win pet charms, upgrade stones and battle stones for winning PVP pet battles, and you don't even have to leave Dalaran to battle.

[Uduwudu]

Hi,

AND ... I think this coming week is going to be the Pet Battle bonus ... so, in my idea of things is to save all the 22, 23 and 24 pets to level with less fights. It's usually 4 fights at 22, 23 and 24 (at 24 is 495x4=1980) so instead of 12 fights we might get these done in 8 or 9 fights and probably better.

The only question is if it is better to go get all my 6, 7 and 8 levels up ... I have something like 75 or 80 of them turkeys, so you know where many stones have been going!

I'm leaning towards seeing if doing the battles at lower level is actually more beneficial than the battles at higher level. If so, then the stones get used at high level, and so forth.

Any ideas/thoughts anyone?

[Gorlab]

...
I'm leaning towards seeing if doing the battles at lower level is actually more beneficial than the battles at higher level. If so, then the stones get used at high level, and so forth.
...

There is no question that using the stones at higher levels is by far more beneficial. Think of it this way, a single fight gives you an amount of xp, which as your pets rise in level is less of a percent of a level. Whereas a stone always gives you a level. On Squirt day for example 3 fights takes you to 22 (with all 3 +xp bonuses in effect) and then 3 stones takes you to 25. So 3 fights and 3 stones. Instead if you use 3 stones to take a pet to level 4 and then the same fights will take you 4 fights.