Stone Collecting

[Clatong]

I saw some information on this when the stones first came out, but not very much recently.

When I'm looking to gather some upgrades stones (as opposed to the times I want to fish for carps, or upgrade my battle pets to rare by finding a rare in the wild), I typically do the 7 Pandaria trainers as well as the legendary daily quest. This usually nets me 1-2 stones for my 1.5-2 hours of work, which I think is decent.

I've not tried to "farm" the stones by battling specific pet types in the wild. Does anyone have experience with this method netting better than 1-2 stones every couple hours?

In general, what methods do you find work best for collecting upgrade stones?

[Jadax]

I level my pets on wild. I probably get a family stone every 3 hours or so, and a BoU stone once in a blue moon.

[Peanutty]

It felt to me like "farming" stones in wild was better before 5.2. After 5.2 I have not gotten a single stone off a wild battle.

I usually get 1 or 2 (sometimes 3) stones a day doing Panda area trainers + Uldum, Icecrown, Netherstorm, Deadwind Pass, Winterspring. If I can stand it I'll do the fabled beasts chain as well but my tolerance for that has dropped.

The other option of course is to trade for stones. I'm sitting on a lot of stones now that I don't need them anymore. I always keep an eye on the pet trading forum for possible trades.

[Tiggindy]

From my experience, farming stones in the wild is kind of a hit or miss proposition. You're much more likely to get stones from bags, unfortunately, the bag stones are random, so you could keep getting undead stones (for example).

Unless you have exceptional luck, you won't be getting anywhere near the amount of stones you get for doing the bag dailies. Based on my experience, I'd call the 1 stone every 3 hours (double the bag time investment) to be optimistic as well. YMMV

As the other poster mentioned, you can do trades with other peeps via the trading forum here.
I also found that peeps who weren't that into pets would sell you stones as well if you ask in trade. Then again, you may not have a ton of gold to be able to just buy them outright, I was also probably paying more than they were worth too.
Of course, this only works for tradeable pets, but that's fewer stones you have to find.

I'd say keep doing the dailies and look for stone trades when you can. If you need specific types, by all means farm for them if you have the play time.

[Petal]

I have never gotten a stone off the wild. All mine have come from bags.

[Opallena]

I typically get 1-2 stones a day out of tamer bags when i do all of the ones that give stones, and I level pets to 22 off of wild pets but its very hit and miss for me... usually once every 2-3 hours ill get a stone, or sometimes not at all.

[Kagalii]

For me tamer baggies have been pretty much the sole source of stones. I cannot tell you how many hours I spent in the Heartland in Vot4W killing critters to level pets. Never gotten a critter stone off wild battles, this is over months of using that place for most of my leveling. So in my experience stones from wild battles are extremely hit or miss. However, tamer bags are a lot more consistent. Yeah, some days I don't get any from bags, then other days I've gotten 3-4. The only real drawback is when you need only certain kinds of stones there is no way to control which you'll get from bags. That's why I'm sitting on 29 undead stones lol.

[Gilneas]

The tamers tend to be my largest source overall, but sometimes I get streaks of getting them off wild battles (which for me means I've got a lot of aquatic stones... friend primarily levels pets off of the serpents in JF so he tells me he's pretty well stocked on dragonkin ones). Though I do get times where I never get any off my aquatic battles for a long long time (leading to the tamers being more reliable for me).

[Saasan]

Maybe it's just my luck, but I seem to only get stones at slightly lower lvl zones, or at least not in Pandaland. I don't believe I've gotten a single stone in Pandaland even though that's where I do my pet lvling. It could be because I did almost all my lowbie stuff pre-5.2 though. Has anyone else noticed a difference in drop rates relative to zone?

[Anasa]

I've gotten a Critter stone, an Undead stone and a Mechanical stone, all from pre-Pandaria zones after 5.2. I got the Mech stone off the Robo-bears in Everlook, the Undead off a Scourged Whelpling, and I don't remember where I got the Critter (but I know it was pre-Pandaria, because I had nothing high enough yet)

So they *are* dropping from wild battles after 5.2. Where I've never gotten a single one is in a tamer bag.

[Anasa]

Update: Last night I got a Humanoid stone from a Kun-Lai runt. So they are dropping in Pandaria. I had two level 25s, and a level 24 (that dinged from that very fight)

[Clatong]

Excellent info everyone, thanks. Seems like the general thought is to go for tamer bags, at least why a variety of stone types are needed, and then trade/farm wild critters for the specific type that are left - probably beast, flying, and critter.

[Ladymagical]

never had much luck with wild stones myself... only had 1 drop from hours upon hours of leveling pets against 23-25's however the tamer bags I usually get a least 1 per round of all pandaria tamers excl fable beasts...

[Zedxrgal]

Are these the pet battle dailies that you're receiving the bags? Sorry if it's a dumb question. After over a month I've not got a single stone from wild pet battling. So it's certainly not reliable.