necroaqua
Grandfathered
Intro to Pet Battling
With a focus on unlocking the Dalaran portals to Wailing Caverns, Deadmines, and Gnomer (and Strath and BRD in BFA)
The goal of this “guide” is to unlock the portal from Legion Dalaran (and actually the BfA city too) to WC and DM (and gnomer). It is not a short or easy journey...so really this is just an intro to pet battling with a bit of streamlining. I didn’t really plan on making this a full guide - these are mostly just my notes on what I did and how I went about it. I don’t plan on keeping it up to date or even formatting it nicely. Basically all of the strats are taken from various guides (linked in whatever section), with my notes/updates on top of them. Again, this is not something I will keep up to date or even work on formatting nicely - its an info dump that hopefully someone will find helpful if they want to unlock the ports. But since you only need to unlock things once per account, I can’t really go back and test/fix new things.
Also sorry F2P players - pet battles aren't available to trial accounts. For vets - if you pick up game time and unlock the ports, they WILL be available and usable once your sub lapses (but no more pet battling).
I'll also note that you'll need a level 110 to accept the WC/DM quests and a 120 if you want to accept the gnomer/strath/BRD quests.
Guide parts:
Mechanics
PHASE 1 - START THAT SHIT
PET LIST
Phase 2 - this is TF2 so lets get a hat
Phase 3 - level that shit up
Phase 4 - Dungeon time.
Hey - you did it. Pat yourself on the back. How much time did you waste to get a measly teleport or three? Well, as long as you’re happy. Broken Isles Dal is that much better of a hearth for your twink. Or if you can find the pet area in the BfA city, you can port from there too.
So now you either hate pet battles and are done for a while, or you’re looking for more. If you’re looking for more…
With a focus on unlocking the Dalaran portals to Wailing Caverns, Deadmines, and Gnomer (and Strath and BRD in BFA)
The goal of this “guide” is to unlock the portal from Legion Dalaran (and actually the BfA city too) to WC and DM (and gnomer). It is not a short or easy journey...so really this is just an intro to pet battling with a bit of streamlining. I didn’t really plan on making this a full guide - these are mostly just my notes on what I did and how I went about it. I don’t plan on keeping it up to date or even formatting it nicely. Basically all of the strats are taken from various guides (linked in whatever section), with my notes/updates on top of them. Again, this is not something I will keep up to date or even work on formatting nicely - its an info dump that hopefully someone will find helpful if they want to unlock the ports. But since you only need to unlock things once per account, I can’t really go back and test/fix new things.
Also sorry F2P players - pet battles aren't available to trial accounts. For vets - if you pick up game time and unlock the ports, they WILL be available and usable once your sub lapses (but no more pet battling).
I'll also note that you'll need a level 110 to accept the WC/DM quests and a 120 if you want to accept the gnomer/strath/BRD quests.
Guide parts:
- Pet Battling Mechanics
- Phase 1 - first pets and first leveling strat
- Phase 2 - unlock MoP trainer dailies and safari hat
- Phase 3 - level shit up
- Phase 4 - dungeons
Mechanics
Hopefully you’ve played pokemon, because this shit is like pokemon. This is going to go over the very basics - feel free to skip if you’ve ever done any pet battles before. Pets have 3 stats - health, power, and speed. HP is obvious, Power is more damage, speed determines who goes first.
Breeds - Pets can often have different breeds. Get the addon (see phase 1) to make it easy. Pets breeds basically consist of two stat bonuses. Health is H, Power is P, Speed is S, and Balanced (some of all 3) is B. So you’ll often see pets referred to as S/S or H/P or P/S or B/B, etc, etc. Various pets will prefer stats based on their family and moveset. Many pets, especially those that come from holidays or boss drops, will only have one breed.
Family - Each pet has a family that it belongs to. Each family has a family it resists and a family it is weak too. Families also have a special ability. You can hover over the family in game to see. This can influence what breed and moves you might take. For example, Humanoid pets gain 4% of their total health if they deal damage that turn - so H/H is a good breed for them.
Moves - Theres a ton of moves. Read them. Take note of their cooldown, if it is a multi-round move, if it gives any buffs/debuffs, or if it has any other synergies. Also note moves that say something like “this always goes first” have “priority”. A move will priority will always go before normal moves, regardless of speed. If both pets use a priority move, then speed matters again. Also keep an eye out for “false swipe” moves - those that deal damage, but won’t reduce a pet below 1HP. You definitely want one of these to help you catch pets. You can always pass the turn as well. Useful when managing cooldowns or avoiding certain damage-on-hit things.
Movesets - Each pet has 3 move slots, and each slot has 2 choices. The combination of these moves will often be referred to like this: (1,2,2). So first move in slot 1, second move in slots 2 and 3.
Experience/Levels - Pets start at level 1 and max level is 25. A pet will gain experience if it “participates” in the fight and is alive at the end. This is further defined as the pet having been active at the end of the turn. Options are: leveling pet needs to either start the fight and attack once. Leveling pet is swapped in and then swapped out the next turn. Leveling pet comes in after another pet dies (and is swapped out first thing). Also if the active pet dies on the last turn and the pet comes in.
You can get https://www.wowhead.com/item=116429/flawless-battle-training-stone which will give a pet a single level. Save those for leveling something at 24 or 23. Some of them have pet family restrictions. You can get https://www.wowhead.com/item=122457/ultimate-battle-training-stone which will instantly level a pet to 25. Definitely make good use of those.
Rarity. Your pets can be trash (gray), common (white), uncommon (green), or rare (blue). Most pets you’ll want rare if you can. Enemy trainer pets can also be epic/legendary (with higher stats than your pets). Wild pets almost always have random rarity/breeds, so you can search several spawns to try to find a rare one. You can use a Flawless Battle Stone to upgrade a pet to rare (from anything). So save those and use them appropriately. Some have pet family restrictions, so use those first if you can.
Capturing Pets - You can capture a pet by throwing a trap at them when their HP is <35%. Using a False Swipe pet makes this very easy to set up. You can only catch 1 of the enemy pets in a battle and you still need to win the battle, so make sure you have some decent pets who can finish off the other enemies. Pets will usually lose 2 levels when you catch them. You might only be able to catch pets that are equal to or below your currently highest leveled pet.
Caging Pets - Many pets can be caged and then traded/bought/sold. This can be a great way to get pets that drop from raid bosses, and you might be able to make some money too. You can’t learn a pet that is higher than your highest level pet - but once you’ve gotten a single pet to level 25, you can buy any of them. Battle pets are also account-wide, so when buying a pet - check undermine journal to see if there are cheap ones on another server. You can mail the BoA epic guild tabards to a level one to transfer gold (at a 75% loss, but shouldn’t be an issue for 200g or whatever). Example - check https://theunderminejournal.com/#us/bloodscalp/battlepet/1155
Healing - You can heal/revive pets in a few ways. First is that at the end of a battle, your living pets gain some health. Second is that many pets have healing moves. Third is the “Revive Battle Pets” ability on a 8min cd. This starts at 3-4 mins cooldown when you log in to prevent insta healing on other toons. Fourth is that any stable master (turn on the minimap icon for them) will heal your pets for 10 silver. Finally you can get consumable pet bandages which will heal your pet (you’ll get a ton, use liberally).
Breeds - Pets can often have different breeds. Get the addon (see phase 1) to make it easy. Pets breeds basically consist of two stat bonuses. Health is H, Power is P, Speed is S, and Balanced (some of all 3) is B. So you’ll often see pets referred to as S/S or H/P or P/S or B/B, etc, etc. Various pets will prefer stats based on their family and moveset. Many pets, especially those that come from holidays or boss drops, will only have one breed.
Family - Each pet has a family that it belongs to. Each family has a family it resists and a family it is weak too. Families also have a special ability. You can hover over the family in game to see. This can influence what breed and moves you might take. For example, Humanoid pets gain 4% of their total health if they deal damage that turn - so H/H is a good breed for them.
Moves - Theres a ton of moves. Read them. Take note of their cooldown, if it is a multi-round move, if it gives any buffs/debuffs, or if it has any other synergies. Also note moves that say something like “this always goes first” have “priority”. A move will priority will always go before normal moves, regardless of speed. If both pets use a priority move, then speed matters again. Also keep an eye out for “false swipe” moves - those that deal damage, but won’t reduce a pet below 1HP. You definitely want one of these to help you catch pets. You can always pass the turn as well. Useful when managing cooldowns or avoiding certain damage-on-hit things.
Movesets - Each pet has 3 move slots, and each slot has 2 choices. The combination of these moves will often be referred to like this: (1,2,2). So first move in slot 1, second move in slots 2 and 3.
Experience/Levels - Pets start at level 1 and max level is 25. A pet will gain experience if it “participates” in the fight and is alive at the end. This is further defined as the pet having been active at the end of the turn. Options are: leveling pet needs to either start the fight and attack once. Leveling pet is swapped in and then swapped out the next turn. Leveling pet comes in after another pet dies (and is swapped out first thing). Also if the active pet dies on the last turn and the pet comes in.
You can get https://www.wowhead.com/item=116429/flawless-battle-training-stone which will give a pet a single level. Save those for leveling something at 24 or 23. Some of them have pet family restrictions. You can get https://www.wowhead.com/item=122457/ultimate-battle-training-stone which will instantly level a pet to 25. Definitely make good use of those.
Rarity. Your pets can be trash (gray), common (white), uncommon (green), or rare (blue). Most pets you’ll want rare if you can. Enemy trainer pets can also be epic/legendary (with higher stats than your pets). Wild pets almost always have random rarity/breeds, so you can search several spawns to try to find a rare one. You can use a Flawless Battle Stone to upgrade a pet to rare (from anything). So save those and use them appropriately. Some have pet family restrictions, so use those first if you can.
Capturing Pets - You can capture a pet by throwing a trap at them when their HP is <35%. Using a False Swipe pet makes this very easy to set up. You can only catch 1 of the enemy pets in a battle and you still need to win the battle, so make sure you have some decent pets who can finish off the other enemies. Pets will usually lose 2 levels when you catch them. You might only be able to catch pets that are equal to or below your currently highest leveled pet.
Caging Pets - Many pets can be caged and then traded/bought/sold. This can be a great way to get pets that drop from raid bosses, and you might be able to make some money too. You can’t learn a pet that is higher than your highest level pet - but once you’ve gotten a single pet to level 25, you can buy any of them. Battle pets are also account-wide, so when buying a pet - check undermine journal to see if there are cheap ones on another server. You can mail the BoA epic guild tabards to a level one to transfer gold (at a 75% loss, but shouldn’t be an issue for 200g or whatever). Example - check https://theunderminejournal.com/#us/bloodscalp/battlepet/1155
Healing - You can heal/revive pets in a few ways. First is that at the end of a battle, your living pets gain some health. Second is that many pets have healing moves. Third is the “Revive Battle Pets” ability on a 8min cd. This starts at 3-4 mins cooldown when you log in to prevent insta healing on other toons. Fourth is that any stable master (turn on the minimap icon for them) will heal your pets for 10 silver. Finally you can get consumable pet bandages which will heal your pet (you’ll get a ton, use liberally).
PHASE 1 - START THAT SHIT
First thing. Gonna need a couple of addons.
If you don’t have a single stone and don’t have any level 25 pets - make a demon hunter and do the quests to get a garrison and then the resources to upgrade it to lvl 3 so that you at least have one.
When you get some stones, then here is what you want to use them on.
Zandalari anklerenders/kneebiters (either one works) have a cool combo of Black Claw (gives a debuff that adds damage to each hit) and a stampede move which hits several times. Its a great combo that is useful for many strats. They also both have a “if this kills a pet, heal up” move - which makes them fairly self-sufficient when carrying a pet (especially against critters). Our first leveling strat requires it (and not the black claw combo). These are usually fairly cheap on the AH.
Finally Anubisath Idol is a beast of a pet. Its already rare and only has one breed (H/H which is amazing for humanoids). The idol has attack moves in slot one. Slot two has sandstorm (changes weather, weather reduces damage taken for all pets) and a damage reduction option. And slot 3 has Deflection (aka protect in pokemon) which will completely negate the opponents attacks that turn. As a humanoid, it heals each turn it does damage, so between healing, damage reduction, and deflect - you’ve got a pet that will live for a loooooong time. Its also one of the two pets we need for the MoP leveling strategy.
Then we need to catch some pets. Consider waiting to catch pets until you have 3 pets at level 25 (including your false swipe pet). You can also check the AH to see if there are any level 25 pets for sale really cheap. They probably won’t be particularly good, but getting some pets of various families is a solid idea.
GO CATCH
For low level wild pets, killing them is often faster than forfeiting, and you’ll get more respawns.
LEVELING STRATS:
The second post has all the leveling strats.
Theres a huge section on MoP Tamers (requires Idol + Emerald Proto-Drake). These require you to have done the pet trainer battles of classic, outlands, wotlk, and cata - but that will unlock you the safari hat and is worth it. This is what phase 2 is all about.
For just grinding - there are smaller sections on killing critters (requires Zandalari ankle/knee and 90+ level) or aquatics (requires one of the above birds, can be done on any level).
I’d recommend leaving a toon at a grinding spot and then moving to phase 2. See how far you can get in phase 2 with just the few pets you have leveled. When you run into a trainer you can’t beat - then level up a pet from below that counters it. Once you’ve finished phase 2 you’ll want to come back and level up the pets required for the dungeon(s) you want to complete.
- Pet Breeds - Shows Pet Breeds using the 2 letter system (anytime you see H/H or P/P or whatever, this is what its referring to).
- http://www.curse.com/addons/wow/petbattle-info - Shows the enemy pet’s moves and cooldowns.
- Optionally, the Rematch addon. It isn’t required, but it is an amazing overlay that includes things like a queue of leveling pets, saved teams (including a “leveling pet” slot) for a given trainer, saved notes (copy + paste from guides/wowhead comments to avoid alt tabbing), better filters, and a whole ton more. If you plan to do any pet battling after unlocking the dungeons, then this is a very good addon to grab.
If you don’t have a single stone and don’t have any level 25 pets - make a demon hunter and do the quests to get a garrison and then the resources to upgrade it to lvl 3 so that you at least have one.
When you get some stones, then here is what you want to use them on.
- False Swipe pet (see below)
- Zandalari Anklerender/Kneebiter (P/P or P/S)
- Anubisath Idol (drops from AQ40 - easy to farm but can take weeks depending on rng, but see about buying one from AH)
Zandalari anklerenders/kneebiters (either one works) have a cool combo of Black Claw (gives a debuff that adds damage to each hit) and a stampede move which hits several times. Its a great combo that is useful for many strats. They also both have a “if this kills a pet, heal up” move - which makes them fairly self-sufficient when carrying a pet (especially against critters). Our first leveling strat requires it (and not the black claw combo). These are usually fairly cheap on the AH.
Finally Anubisath Idol is a beast of a pet. Its already rare and only has one breed (H/H which is amazing for humanoids). The idol has attack moves in slot one. Slot two has sandstorm (changes weather, weather reduces damage taken for all pets) and a damage reduction option. And slot 3 has Deflection (aka protect in pokemon) which will completely negate the opponents attacks that turn. As a humanoid, it heals each turn it does damage, so between healing, damage reduction, and deflect - you’ve got a pet that will live for a loooooong time. Its also one of the two pets we need for the MoP leveling strategy.
Then we need to catch some pets. Consider waiting to catch pets until you have 3 pets at level 25 (including your false swipe pet). You can also check the AH to see if there are any level 25 pets for sale really cheap. They probably won’t be particularly good, but getting some pets of various families is a solid idea.
GO CATCH
- Emerald Proto-Whelp (catch 3 uncommon or rare P/P). Can use stones to upgrade bad ones of the right breed.
- If you want to level up a lowbie (see leveling strats post), then you’ll want to catch 3x Northern Hawk Owl. They are always rare with a single breed, and you don't have to level them since they are caught at level 23 and can start carrying immediately. Catch 3 of them to rotate between them so you don't need to heal as much.
For low level wild pets, killing them is often faster than forfeiting, and you’ll get more respawns.
LEVELING STRATS:
The second post has all the leveling strats.
Theres a huge section on MoP Tamers (requires Idol + Emerald Proto-Drake). These require you to have done the pet trainer battles of classic, outlands, wotlk, and cata - but that will unlock you the safari hat and is worth it. This is what phase 2 is all about.
For just grinding - there are smaller sections on killing critters (requires Zandalari ankle/knee and 90+ level) or aquatics (requires one of the above birds, can be done on any level).
I’d recommend leaving a toon at a grinding spot and then moving to phase 2. See how far you can get in phase 2 with just the few pets you have leveled. When you run into a trainer you can’t beat - then level up a pet from below that counters it. Once you’ve finished phase 2 you’ll want to come back and level up the pets required for the dungeon(s) you want to complete.
PET LIST
IN GENERAL:
OTHER GOOD OPTIONS (helpful if you need new families for safari hat)
https://www.wowhead.com/notable-battle-pets-by-family-guide
- Anubisath Idol
- Emerald Proto-Drake (get 2 or 3, P/P ideally)(green or blue)
- False Swipe pet (like terrible turnip)
- Rabbit (S/S) - useful in so many fights, allows defeating thundering spirit
- Mechanical Pandaren Dragonling - useful in many fights, allows defeating thundering spirit
- https://www.wowhead.com/npc=97126/northern-hawk-owl - very solid flying pet, useful if you want to level pets and a lowbie toon. always rare and a good breed and you catch at level 23
- Iron Starlette or Runeforged Servitor. Prob worth having 2 total of these
- Unborn Val’kyr (B/B). May want to use an upgrade stone if you have one.
- Dream Whelpling (optional, but similar to emerald proto-whelp). Use the NPC in legion dalaran to queue for LFG, solo xavius and then you can catch pets. Get rare/uncommon ones. P/P ideal, but P/S and P/B not terrible.
- 2 Zandalari Anklerender/Kneebiter. P/P or P/B or P/S. Ikky is an ok backup.
- An aquatic frog or strider?
- Mechanical Pandaren Dragonling
- Menagerie Custodian/Cogblade Raptor/Lil Bling/Rocket Chicken
- Snail (H/P ideally, but H/B works) - https://www.wowhead.com/npc=98446/mudshell-conch (better H/P breed) or https://www.wowhead.com/npc=64352/rapana-whelk (easier to find, plenty of spawns, but slightly worse H/B breed)
- Rabbit (x2)(S/S). Spring Rabbits are always S/S and are super cheap on AH, but are green. Check dalaran for the special carpet to find dust bunnies. Otherwise any S/S rabbit - ideally rare.
- Pandaren Fire Spirit or Pandaren Water Spirit or Blossoming Ancient or Broot/Blossoming Ancient (if you already have it)
- Blossoming Ancient (if $$$) or Broot (if have druid 105+) or Singing Sunflower or Fozling?
- Immolate/Conflag Elemental(s) - like Pandaren Fire Spirit, Pheonix Hatchling, Spirit of Summer, Fel Flame, etc
- 2 Snails (H/P ideally, but H/B works)
- 1+ Frog (with water jet/healing wave/frog kiss)(easy to find while grinding at mistfall village)
- 1 Strider (easy to find a rare one when grinding in mistfall village)
- A couple of single pets with https://www.wowhead.com/pet-ability=906/lightning-shield - there are some on Isle of Thunder that are also elemental, which is great. Prob not worth farming for rare versions - green will do.
- 2x Bunnies and a Zandalari Knee/Ankle, which you should already have by now
- Chitterspine Skitterling (catch a P/S from nazjatar)(can prob be replaced with ikky/zandalari kneebiter if you don't have BfA - but its worth catching one if you do)
- Lil Bling
- Rabbit x2
- Mech Panda Dragonling and/or Emerald Proto Whelp
- Humanoid (like your Idol)
- Any decent beast
- Another critter with Scratch (or another bunny)
OTHER GOOD OPTIONS (helpful if you need new families for safari hat)
https://www.wowhead.com/notable-battle-pets-by-family-guide
- https://www.wowhead.com/npc=98386/eldritch-manafiend and/or https://www.wowhead.com/npc=98385/erudite-manafiend - solid backup pet that is always rare and caught at level 23)
- Chrominus
- Yellow Moth (or other moths) (P/P)
- Axebeaks/Crow/Gilnean Raven (nocturnal strike combos) (S/S if possible)
- Kun-Lai Runt (P/P)
- Nordrassil Wisp (S/S)
- Darkmoon Tonk
- Sunreaver Micro Sentry
- Fragment of Anger
- Mr Bigglesworth
- Snails (H/P is best, but H/B works and rapana whelks are easy to farm)
- Rabbits (S/S)
- Black Claw + Stampede pets (zandalari ankle/knee, ikky, chitterspine skitterling, foulfeather)
Phase 2 - this is TF2 so lets get a hat
Basically we need to beat the tamers in classic up through pandaland in order to unlock the full set of pandaria trainers we need. That also puts us at 39/40 towards the safari hat - so swap over to the other faction and do the very first trainer quest to get us the hat.
I’m not going to go into these fights. The wowhead comment below breaks it down in the separate achievement pages, and those tend to have the coords and basic strats for beating them. Early trainers are low level, but they will ramp up to level 25 and then be epic quality. Once you get to the pandaland trainers, you can use the MoP Tamer Dailies section to defeat those. The ones before that are all you. Your Idol and Emerald proto-drake will do a lot of work because they are so useful - but look at the enemy pet lineups and consider countering them with whatever level 25 pets you might have. Iron Starlette is a notable way to get past a number of difficult pets due to the Wind Up > Supercharge > Wind Up combo. Black Claw + Stampede/Flock (Zandalari Ankle/Knee or Ikky) are also good combos that can take down tough opponents (especially magic opponents that can only take max ⅓ their HP in a single hit).
https://www.wowhead.com/achievement=7499/taming-the-world#comments:id=2139836
Don’t forget to swap to a toon of the opposite faction and do 1 trainer over there to hit 40/40.
Once you’ve gotten the pandaland trainers done, the pet trainer in shrine will have a couple more quests for you - pick up the one for the elemental spirits. Three out of the four spirits can be done with our Idol/Drake combo. The fourth one can’t, but a rabbit and a mechanical pandaren dragonling can take it down - and those are two pets that are good to level anyways.
Turning in that quest allows you to choose one of the four spirits as a pet. All 4 pets can be gotten from the bags that you get from their daily quests - so you can eventually get them all (they can also be caged and bought/sold on AH). Here are my notes on your options:
I’m not going to go into these fights. The wowhead comment below breaks it down in the separate achievement pages, and those tend to have the coords and basic strats for beating them. Early trainers are low level, but they will ramp up to level 25 and then be epic quality. Once you get to the pandaland trainers, you can use the MoP Tamer Dailies section to defeat those. The ones before that are all you. Your Idol and Emerald proto-drake will do a lot of work because they are so useful - but look at the enemy pet lineups and consider countering them with whatever level 25 pets you might have. Iron Starlette is a notable way to get past a number of difficult pets due to the Wind Up > Supercharge > Wind Up combo. Black Claw + Stampede/Flock (Zandalari Ankle/Knee or Ikky) are also good combos that can take down tough opponents (especially magic opponents that can only take max ⅓ their HP in a single hit).
https://www.wowhead.com/achievement=7499/taming-the-world#comments:id=2139836
Don’t forget to swap to a toon of the opposite faction and do 1 trainer over there to hit 40/40.
Once you’ve gotten the pandaland trainers done, the pet trainer in shrine will have a couple more quests for you - pick up the one for the elemental spirits. Three out of the four spirits can be done with our Idol/Drake combo. The fourth one can’t, but a rabbit and a mechanical pandaren dragonling can take it down - and those are two pets that are good to level anyways.
Turning in that quest allows you to choose one of the four spirits as a pet. All 4 pets can be gotten from the bags that you get from their daily quests - so you can eventually get them all (they can also be caged and bought/sold on AH). Here are my notes on your options:
- Pandaren Fire Spirit - A solid elemental type pet with a strong Immolate/Conflagrate combo. Can be used for WC and GNOMER. Probably the best choice if you only care about these dungeons.
- Pandaren Water Spirit - A solid aquatic with water and heal moves. Can be useful for WC. Note that a lot of strats used it for howlbombs due to it having Whirlpool and Geyser - but howl was nerfed and those are now on the same move slot. Still a solid elemental pet though.
- Pandaren Earth Spirit - Not really useful for our dungeon runs, but this is the fight that we can’t easily do with idol/whelp, so it might be harder to farm if you’re looking to collect them all. But the fight is fairly easy once you level up a few pets...so not super important.
At this point you should have your safari hat (wear at all time when leveling pets), the dailies for pandaland trainers and elemental spirits, and at least the Idol/Drake ready to level things up.
So go back up to that list of pets. Start obtaining and leveling up the ones from WC and/or Deadmines. Note that completing WC/Deadmines for the first time will give you a purple upgrade stone - so you can use that to level a pet for the next dungeon. Keep an eye out for the Sign of the Critter week - as its triple experience. So doing dailies that week will level pets from 1-25 in like 3 trainer fights.
If you have any stones that give one level to a pet (or a specific family of pets), then those are good to use at 23/24 which take the most experience. You can find these with BfA pet battle dailies to help you level.
Now, the HOW to grind is below in the MoP Tamer Dailies section. Do that loop once per day. Pick some toon that is less than max level but won’t have trouble if they aggro and you that alt can level up from the exp from battles and dailies.
Once you’ve cleared the trainers, if you want to grind more that day, look at the grinding strats. Theres one that can be done on any level toon. I made an allied race char and corpse ran it over to the village. It’ll sit there grinding pets and sitting in dungeon queues until it hits max level and unlocks the racial armor.
If you don’t care about leveling a lowbie - theres some other good options. A 90+ can grind critters with one of the many level 25 beasts that has a devour-esque move that heals if it gets a kill.
Theres also boring strats on repeatable trainer battles in legion that are supposedly very fast, but very monotonous. The trainers rotate daily and I don’t know what pets are required to do that, but you can look it up if you have a ton of pets. I’m assuming you don’t want to level a ton of pets just to enable leveling the limited number of pets we need.
Finally check if the darkmoon faire is in town. There are two pet tamers that you can battle daily and give good exp (and like 15 dmf tickets per day). Check their wowhead pages for possible setups to see if you have the pets to beat them with a carry pet. Might as well do those for the tickets if nothing else - the darkmoon tonk is a really good pet to buy, and you can work towards that 1000 ticket mount.
So go back up to that list of pets. Start obtaining and leveling up the ones from WC and/or Deadmines. Note that completing WC/Deadmines for the first time will give you a purple upgrade stone - so you can use that to level a pet for the next dungeon. Keep an eye out for the Sign of the Critter week - as its triple experience. So doing dailies that week will level pets from 1-25 in like 3 trainer fights.
If you have any stones that give one level to a pet (or a specific family of pets), then those are good to use at 23/24 which take the most experience. You can find these with BfA pet battle dailies to help you level.
Now, the HOW to grind is below in the MoP Tamer Dailies section. Do that loop once per day. Pick some toon that is less than max level but won’t have trouble if they aggro and you that alt can level up from the exp from battles and dailies.
Once you’ve cleared the trainers, if you want to grind more that day, look at the grinding strats. Theres one that can be done on any level toon. I made an allied race char and corpse ran it over to the village. It’ll sit there grinding pets and sitting in dungeon queues until it hits max level and unlocks the racial armor.
If you don’t care about leveling a lowbie - theres some other good options. A 90+ can grind critters with one of the many level 25 beasts that has a devour-esque move that heals if it gets a kill.
Theres also boring strats on repeatable trainer battles in legion that are supposedly very fast, but very monotonous. The trainers rotate daily and I don’t know what pets are required to do that, but you can look it up if you have a ton of pets. I’m assuming you don’t want to level a ton of pets just to enable leveling the limited number of pets we need.
Finally check if the darkmoon faire is in town. There are two pet tamers that you can battle daily and give good exp (and like 15 dmf tickets per day). Check their wowhead pages for possible setups to see if you have the pets to beat them with a carry pet. Might as well do those for the tickets if nothing else - the darkmoon tonk is a really good pet to buy, and you can work towards that 1000 ticket mount.
Phase 4 - Dungeon time.
There are already plenty of guides out on wowhead and such that go over how to clear these dungeons, so rather than reinvent the wheel, I’m just gonna link them and give general advice.
Note that the first time you clear the dungeon, you CAN heal. Bring a stack of those bandages and ignore the silly comments on “fight this last because you can use a skunk to heal your team” because we don’t care. Don’t worry about your pets surviving any given fight if you can beat the opponent as you can heal up later. Guides will also suggest having 2+ copies of a few pets for if/when one dies. You can get by with 1 most of the time, though some fights will use 2 of the same pet on a single team - so look for that.
If you’re having trouble with any particular fight - go to the wowhead comments for that specific NPC. Usually there will be several strats in the comments. Find one you have the pets for or is close enough. And remember that RNG can fuck you over, so sometimes it just takes a few tries.
This guide is good for WC: https://www.wowhead.com/pet-battle-challenge-dungeon-wailing-caverns
This one is a bit out of date, but can contain alternate strats if the above ones aren’t working:
https://www.wowhead.com/wailing-caverns-pet-battle-challenge-dungeon-with-6-pets
For deadmines go here:
https://www.wowhead.com/pet-battle-challenge-dungeon-deadmines-guide
And finally gnomer if you care:
https://www.wowhead.com/guides/pet-battle-challenge-gnomeregan
Strath is still new and guides are somewhat meh, but its easy to do the first time:
https://www.wowhead.com/guides/stratholme-pet-battle-challenge-dungeon
BRD too as of 8.3. This one looks hard, tho it may have gotten nerfed?
https://www.wowhead.com/guides/pet-battle-challenge-dungeon-blackrock-depths
Note that the first time you clear the dungeon, you CAN heal. Bring a stack of those bandages and ignore the silly comments on “fight this last because you can use a skunk to heal your team” because we don’t care. Don’t worry about your pets surviving any given fight if you can beat the opponent as you can heal up later. Guides will also suggest having 2+ copies of a few pets for if/when one dies. You can get by with 1 most of the time, though some fights will use 2 of the same pet on a single team - so look for that.
If you’re having trouble with any particular fight - go to the wowhead comments for that specific NPC. Usually there will be several strats in the comments. Find one you have the pets for or is close enough. And remember that RNG can fuck you over, so sometimes it just takes a few tries.
This guide is good for WC: https://www.wowhead.com/pet-battle-challenge-dungeon-wailing-caverns
This one is a bit out of date, but can contain alternate strats if the above ones aren’t working:
https://www.wowhead.com/wailing-caverns-pet-battle-challenge-dungeon-with-6-pets
For deadmines go here:
https://www.wowhead.com/pet-battle-challenge-dungeon-deadmines-guide
And finally gnomer if you care:
https://www.wowhead.com/guides/pet-battle-challenge-gnomeregan
Strath is still new and guides are somewhat meh, but its easy to do the first time:
https://www.wowhead.com/guides/stratholme-pet-battle-challenge-dungeon
BRD too as of 8.3. This one looks hard, tho it may have gotten nerfed?
https://www.wowhead.com/guides/pet-battle-challenge-dungeon-blackrock-depths
Hey - you did it. Pat yourself on the back. How much time did you waste to get a measly teleport or three? Well, as long as you’re happy. Broken Isles Dal is that much better of a hearth for your twink. Or if you can find the pet area in the BfA city, you can port from there too.
So now you either hate pet battles and are done for a while, or you’re looking for more. If you’re looking for more…
- WC and DEADMINES and GNOMER and STRATH challenge mode. You can repeat these dungeons once per week without being able to heal/revive to earn some rewards.
- Celestial Tournament. This is a big challenge (no heal/revive) on the timeless isle. Theres a set of 3 weekly rotating tamers and then the 4 celestials. The 3 weekly groups means you’ll need a solid stable of pets depending on the strat. Might require some adapting if you’re missing some pets. The first completion gives you 3 tokens, and each one after that gives a single token. You can buy the really cool celestial pets for 3 tokens each, so you can buy one really quickly, but will need 10 total completions to get all 4 celestial pets. GL. https://www.wowhead.com/guides/defeating-the-celestial-tournament-pet-battles
- Elekk Plushie. Theres some fun achievements for getting an Elekk Plushie to 25 and for having an Elekk plushie on your team while fighting a ton of trainers. The plushie is not actually alive so it mostly just sits there - though it has a ton of HP to tank hits and has a couple of non-useless moves.
- PvP Pet Battles. IDK - its like pokemon. Build some cancerous combo and try it out.
- Pet collection. Go look up cool/interesting/good pets and farm them. Theres legion class hall pets, secret pets like the hivemind mount, old raid boss pets, etc, etc.
- Start leveling pets to sell. If you don’t mind the leveling part of things, consider leveling pets to 25 and selling them. You can also turn uncommon pets rare with extra stones to further increase the price.
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Zandalari Anklerender
Bite
Primal Cry
Devour
