Duplicate Pets

[Thadjosh76]

How do you decide which ones to keep and which ones to release? Or does it really matter if you have plenty of space for them?

[Harpooha]

There was a time when I used to keep various breeds of pets. I briefly considered collecting different color variants of the same pet. And when there were rumors of pet breeding being introduced, I kept M/F versions of some pets.

But eventually, I realized it really doesn't matter. There are a couple of pets that I keep different breeds because I find them useful (Crow, Nexus Whelpling). A couple because they are a pain to capture and breeds might matter (Flayer Youngling, Dust Bunny). And all 3 breeds if the Minfernal just because.

For most pets, it really doesn't make a difference. There are some that might be useful to have extras if you use them in pet dungeons of the Celestial Tournament. But having 3 versions of a Rabbit is kind of pointless.

[Gráinne]

Some species come in different colours, and some people collect the different colours,

Many species have different breeds that are better in different situations. For example, a P/P Power breed of Ore Eater may be ideal for situations where its shield must mitigate a large hit, while an S/S Speed breed may be necessary to take the move advantage in others. Most people settle on one breed to collect, the one they use most, but others will pick up multiple good breeds.

Then there are the Very Useful pets, that can be slotted into a lot of battles. Many people keep multiples of these, even when they are identical, so that they can use them again without healing. This comes in handy especially for the Celestial Tournament and Pet Dungeons.

Some duplicates may be kept for trading, especially since they can be caged on different realms.

Finally, never underestimate the power of laziness. If you have duplicates, but aren't pressed for space, why go clean out your closet when you don't have to?

You might be interested in my survey of pets held, here:
https://eu.forums.blizzard.com/en/wow/t ... 2019/20349

[Uduwudu]

Hi,

There are some fights and places where the difference was important ... I had problems with the Fjord Worg Pup against the Squirt pets, until I finally learned that the type I had was not doing it ... and went and got the right one, brought it up, and no more issues.

When you get to the really high level, that is 1000, 1100 and more pets, having duplicates does you not a bit of good, for me, and to use the example above the Nexus and Stormborne have just about the same numbers, and you could easily had a different Nexus Whelpling, instead of duplicates if you want to use both of these on the same fight (and I do a lot!!!) ...

In general, at the lower number of pets, you need the one that either takes the most damage, or takes the least amount of damage, but since "defense" is measured here by a spell that takes it out (Dive and such), and that means that a lot of fast pets are better, if you end up getting that one hit before the enemy pet. Remember that in the past couple of years, some of the newer pets by the trainers have insane speed numbers and you can't really get around them, other than mitigate the damage, or avoid it altogether.

I imagine that the right thing to say/help with is dependent on how you play ... if you take your pet battles seriously and do the weeklies religiously and work on levelling all the pets, I imagine that duplicates won't be necessary, but there used to be ("used to be"!) some fun fights, that you needed 2 Iron Starlettes, 2 Val'kyrs and a couple of other fights, and in the case of the Val'kyrs, the different stats are more advantageous than the same ones. Again, it depends how you go into the fight, I think, and how you try stuff out, but after a while, I did not like losing so many pet battles, so started paying attention to the stats and breeds and all that, and now, it's like ... 95% or more win percentages ... and most of those are the really new battles that are not quite decided as yet, or what folks have tried is still not working right.

Suggestion:
Xu-Fu has a lot of pet battle information for the dungeons ... and you really should try one of the Celestial Tournament (once each week for 3 weeks to get a pet!), but the important thing you learn is how you can use other pets in your listing ... and that was really helpful for me.

[Gertwine]

I just spent an hour removing duplicates because I couldn't trap any more because I maxed out at 1000. Is there a way that I can increase the maximum allowed?

[Quintessence]

I just spent an hour removing duplicates because I couldn't trap any more because I maxed out at 1000. Is there a way that I can increase the maximum allowed?

You can purchase a Pet Journal size increase (Pocket Pet Portal) for 1000 Polished Pet Charms, or earn this item by completing the Battle on the Broken Isles achievement. Using the item will increase your Pet Journal to 1500.

Once you've used that item, the next upgrade is the Interdimensional Pet Portal. This will increase your journal to 2k. You'll need to have learned the previous item first before being able to use this one.

[Gertwine]

Thank you so much.

[FuxieDK]

How do you decide which ones to keep and which ones to release? Or does it really matter if you have plenty of space for them?

I never keep any duplicates, and I don't look at breed AT ALL.

[Uduwudu]

I never keep any duplicates, and I don't look at breed AT ALL.

Hi,

it is an acquired taste, and perhaps it is not exactly necessary, if you work/understand the mechanics (and the code!!!) to be able to counter it differently.

But there are some things that are very noticeable, that make a difference in a fight and how well you do or do not do ... Ex: One strat on Squirt was using the Ford Worg Pup, but right after the speed buff for his team, the first enemy pet attacks and the amount of damage difference between these is very different ... their "defense is the same" but the amount of damage is different ... 325 (PP) versus 289 (HP) ... and the HP breed was not able to do his part and take down the 1st mob, which the PP pet most often can, all depending on the critical hits of the opponent ... if he hits 2 of them restart the fight!

So, in some ways, depending on what you do next, makes a difference, but you need the Fjord Worg Pup to get the Howl out for your next pet to hit big.

I'm not convinced it is absolutely necessary to use the suggested types, however, when you see the listing of the various fights on Xu-Fu, a different breed of the same pet is often the difference between winning and losing ... AND YOU DO NOT WANT TO DO THE WHOLE THING AGAIN, which you have to, so you can get the bit you need to get a pet next week, or the week after!

But if you are collecting pets for fun, sure, who cares? And I do collect them because for me they are the best part of the game, since they ruined the improvements with mythic this and that for "special" folks, and left all the rest of the players behind ... I'm one from the start, and I still have not gotten past M3 or 4 on any character of mine ... but I can tell you that not many folks have as many pets or won as many pet battles ... or I would not list that high.

[FuxieDK]

I never keep any duplicates, and I don't look at breed AT ALL.

Hi,

it is an acquired taste, and perhaps it is not exactly necessary, if you work/understand the mechanics (and the code!!!) to be able to counter it differently.

But there are some things that are very noticeable, that make a difference in a fight and how well you do or do not do ... Ex: One strat on Squirt was using the Ford Worg Pup, but right after the speed buff for his team, the first enemy pet attacks and the amount of damage difference between these is very different ... their "defense is the same" but the amount of damage is different ... 325 (PP) versus 289 (HP) ... and the HP breed was not able to do his part and take down the 1st mob, which the PP pet most often can, all depending on the critical hits of the opponent ... if he hits 2 of them restart the fight!

So, in some ways, depending on what you do next, makes a difference, but you need the Fjord Worg Pup to get the Howl out for your next pet to hit big.

I'm not convinced it is absolutely necessary to use the suggested types, however, when you see the listing of the various fights on Xu-Fu, a different breed of the same pet is often the difference between winning and losing ... AND YOU DO NOT WANT TO DO THE WHOLE THING AGAIN, which you have to, so you can get the bit you need to get a pet next week, or the week after!

But if you are collecting pets for fun, sure, who cares? And I do collect them because for me they are the best part of the game, since they ruined the improvements with mythic this and that for "special" folks, and left all the rest of the players behind ... I'm one from the start, and I still have not gotten past M3 or 4 on any character of mine ... but I can tell you that not many folks have as many pets or won as many pet battles ... or I would not list that high.

First of all, I don't do any PvP. It believe I have done 3 PvP matches since MoP, so that by itself makes breed less important.

And when Xu-Fu have a strategy that use a specific breed and it doesn't match my pet, I'm more likely to find an alternate pet or totally different strategy, that go out and find the proper breed and stone it (to blue 25).

99% if the time, breed play no role.

[Uduwudu]

...
First of all, I don't do any PvP. It believe I have done 3 PvP matches since MoP, so that by itself makes breed less important.

And when Xu-Fu have a strategy that use a specific breed and it doesn't match my pet, I'm more likely to find an alternate pet or totally different strategy, that go out and find the proper breed and stone it (to blue 25).

99% if the time, breed play no role.

Hi,

I can not do PvP nor do I wish to ... bad eyesight and 3 surgeries on the right eye makes it impossible to do something as "fast" as PvP and do well. At 70, PvP is more for kids than us old foggies!

I have not been able to get to 1100+ pets by ignoring some of the suggestions out there ... and again, all the fights in the "dungeons" are measured too close to not pay attention to the breed and I go into it knowing which breed I need ... and here is the hard part ... I have various characters collecting Charms from dailies and such, so I average 500/600 PC's every day, and thus the choice to pick up a Poor pet of the kind that I could use, becomes more important than trying to do 37 fights only to get a blue one that is not the one you would like to get! You just take the Poor one and stone it ... end of story and I still have 500+ PC's and about 50 more coming from 3 different Mission dailies ( 7 characters on missions) ...

Breed has to play a role, otherwise there would not be a need for programmers to design it ... it would seem like nothing but an exercise in confusing you and I and making sure that we do not win as many Pet Battles ... and this has been, for years my biggest complaint about some pets (mice, rabbits, and many critters) where they have like 5, 6 or 7 breeds and some numbers that Pet Battler shows are insane ... I saw one, I still remember it 333/210 ... and you know that pet is going to get just blasted silly for the highest level of damage, unless you have the abilities to counter it, and because of the high damage amount. Now if the pet shows 305/289 ... it makes better sense, as is the case with moths ... and take 3 moths to the 2 fights that you use them (both in Tiragard), and watch how well they do ... now switch to a low number on defense, and you will have a hard time getting through and get the easy PC's. One uses Moth Balls, and the other Moth Dust ... and in both cases the numbers do matter ... so I'm not sure, or convinced that the 99% that you mention is true ... probably more like 80%, but I'm not going to stop and measure that ... I'm over 95% of fights won in the past several years and the ones I miss, I used the wrong key or ... oppppssss ... forgot to set that up right!

A lot of this is much more of an issue when you have more pets to level, and less PC's ... once you get to the level where you are getting enough PC's your theory changes some, and keeping/using stones is less of a problem ... heck, if I were to buy pets right now, the cheapest is about 80/85K and I have like 3 Purple Stones, 2 Blue Stones, and 600 PC's and at least 25 of the different pets like flying, Undead, Mechanical ... etc

[Uduwudu]

Hi,

BTW ... just another thought ... a friend of mine had 400 pets and was having a hard time, and get this ... on both Alliance and Horde, on the same server, he had 12 characters, and only 1 was 120 and doing dailies ... I showed him one day how my 7 characters all did missions (8th on the way at 109) and picked up PC's ... and if there was a Pet Battle somewhere where you could get 18 PC's you can bet your Wheaties that all of the characters will do the pet Battle and bring home 96 PC's ... although nowadays I do not need to do this anymore ... I get a good amount off the dailies and it is much faster and easier ... but the fun is finding a pet battle that gives you a blue ... get at least 2 or 3 characters to do that fight if you can so you can get the 3 stones.

I don't think there is a right or wrong way, and I do not doubt the breed choices, but I can easily say that the suggestions for me have been better than otherwise over the past several years.

BTW, if you have (let's say) 400 pets and 300 of them are not all the way up ... please get a calendar and mark when SQUIRT is on ... a few years back, I got something like 600 levels in one day (over 50 fights, and took almost all the low levels I had all the way to 17/18/19 or so, and from then on I could use them as a 3rd pet on most battles ...

I think, in general, that once you get most of the pets you have all the way up, things get simpler ... but now, at the 1100 level of pets, you are lucky to get one pet per week, so your number of stones and such increases like crazy!

[FuxieDK]

...
First of all, I don't do any PvP. It believe I have done 3 PvP matches since MoP, so that by itself makes breed less important.

And when Xu-Fu have a strategy that use a specific breed and it doesn't match my pet, I'm more likely to find an alternate pet or totally different strategy, that go out and find the proper breed and stone it (to blue 25).

99% if the time, breed play no role.

I can not do PvP nor do I wish to ... bad eyesight and 3 surgeries on the right eye makes it impossible to do something as "fast" as PvP and do well. At 70, PvP is more for kids than us old foggies!
..................
I have not been able to get to 1100+ pets by ignoring some of the suggestions out there ... and again, all the fights in the "dungeons" are measured too close to not pay attention to the breed and I go into it knowing which breed I need ...

I beg to differ.... Very much so, indeed.

Sitting at 1246 unique, rare level 25 pets, I have never ever paid attention to breed, always leveling the first I got my hands on. I don't even have an addon to display breed.

I have completed every single dungeon (BRM actually got harder, not easier, after the nerf, because I couldn't be arsed to change strategies after they were already developed) and Family Fighter achievements (except the PvP ones), and only once or twice did I have to switch a pet, because then one I had was the wrong breed. This cannot come down to luck, always having the correct one.

Breed caries little to no importance in PvE play.

And regarding PvP... It's no faster (or slower) than PvE. It's still turn based; there is no differemce, except it's a player controlling the moves and not AI.

[Sights2020]

Hello
Tekulve here

I started pet battles in 2012 and have had 3 WoW accounts over the last 8 years. This discussion is interesting. The key word here is "matters". I would say most players ignore breeds or avoid refering to them when possible.

There are 2 instances when knowing breeds offers an advantage:
1) Gold making- there are perhaps 8 to 10 pets you sell on the AH that sell better due to breed (s/s zanda kneebiter, p/p zanda anklerender, s/s bronze whelp-for Squirt, p/s Iron Starlette-for legion wq- s/s hyjal wisp.etc ) In these cases, the level 25s also sell readily. I make gold selling level 25 pets(about 3 million/month) Many WQ Legion repeatable pet carry battles are easier/rng free when you use certain breeds-all detailled for you on the XuFu site.
2) Pet pvp
Over 3 accounts I have about 1500 pet pvp wins. Any experienced pet pvp player will tell you breed matters. Just look at the top tier pets..specific breeds are listed (on the XuFu pet pvp tab). This is because breed dictates 'initiative' and that can be the margin of victory..especially if you have the speed advantage at the final round.

Of course you can do plenty of pet content without knowing pet breeds well. At the same time, I wanted to offer a couple of examples where knowing breeds could improve your experience.

Tekulve