News and Updates <Archived News>

NEW FEATURE! I often receive suggestions to add a forum to this site. However, I lack the time and resources to integrate it with the site (at least for now). But this community really needed something to allow members to more easily share their news with one another. Hence the new Latest Comments feature.

This feature includes all comments updated within the past three days, listed chronologically with the most recent updates shown first. So when you have something new and exciting to share, the community is more likely to hear about it. Additionally, feel free to direct comments to specific members. For example, you can type "@Breanni: Hi Breanni!" to say hello to me.

In addition to this feature, members will notice the following upgrades:

• The comment character limit was doubled from 1000 to 2000 characters.
• Special markup was added so members can easily link to other members' profiles.
• MVP (and admin) comments have been color-coded to match their titles.
• Members can easily report offensive comments.

NOTE: While working on these upgrades, I rewrote several stylesheets. So if any pages look strange, simply hit the refresh button in your browser.

Much of this work is paving the way for the highly anticipated Pet Comments, which will be coming later this year. I hope you all enjoy this new feature as much as I do.

Bornakk, an official WoW forum moderator, finally broke the silence about the new pet that was gifted to attendees of last weekend's Worldwide Invitational. To correspond with the big announcement of Diablo 3, attendees will be able to redeem an Archangel Tyrael pet! So it looks like Mini Diablo will finally get some competition from his own universe. This pet won't be available until patch 2.4.3 goes live. I intend to add it to this site around the same time.

Tim Howgego, better known in the WoW community as El of El's Extreme Anglin', has put together an impressive map of WoW's most established online communities. This fascinating visual study includes database sites like Thottbot and Wowhead, blog favorites such as WoW Insider and World of Raids, and it even includes an axis of evil in the form of gold sellers and botters. Nestled to the southwest is a small group of islands that represent niche fansites. Breanni Island (woot!) has the honor of being situated right between Mania Island (Petopia and Warcraft Mounts) and Tim's own El Island.

My thanks to Tim for giving this site its own island. Let's hope it's big enough for me, the WarcraftPets community, and our combined total of 100,000+ collected minipets.

TWO THREE NEW PETS! The next patch will give us collectors a whopping three new pets! The first is the Nether Ray Fry (pictured), which requires "exalted" with the Sha'tari Skyguard (and 38 gold) to purchase.

The second new companion brings several new concepts to what a small pet can be. The Ethereal Soul-Trader is a life-size travelling buddy who doubles as a specialized vendor, allowing its owner to purchase neat cosmetic items. One such item even allows you to change your other small pets into ravenous Flesh Beasts.

The third new pet follows the trend of "life-sizing" companions. This one is a Coyote Spirit which, oddly enough, is summoned by a hat, much like our old Bloodsail Parrot. Earning this pet will require doing a new quest in Old Hillsbrad on heroic.

Patch 2.4.3 offers a variety of treats for pet collectors. In addition to three new pets (see above), here's what we can expect regarding small pets:

• Numerous flying non-combat pets have had their flight height modified to no longer skim along the ground: captured firefly, dragonhawk hatchlings, moths, owls, parrots, phoenix hatchling, spirit of summer, sprite darter, and tiny sporebat.
• Clockwork Robot Bots fight amongst themselves again...without attacking people in the arena. Well... they'll blow up other Bots in the arena, but you know what we mean.

Patch 2.4.3 has hit the test realm, and since it doesn't appear to be a huge patch, it could be be out as early as mid-July or sooner.

Two more minipets are rumored to be released in Wrath of the Lich King. As many people hoped, there will indeed be pet penguins to collect. At least two different types of penguins have appeared so far—one pictured at right. Additionally, there are rumors of a scarab beetle pet, similar to the scarab minions created by the Crypt Lord hero-unit from Warcraft III.

I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm stoked for this next expansion.

I'm in the process of creating a new guide for the site—one that's been requested for quite some time. Tentatively, I'm titling it Peripheral Pets & Items. It will cover many of the pet-like entities found in the game that aren't true companion pets. For example, it will include combat pets, jewelcrafting figurines, and other pet-like entities, such as the Pet Rock, Steam Tonk, and the Weather Machine. It will also cover pet-related items like Papa Hummel's Old-Fashioned Pet Biscuits.

If you have any additional suggestions, be sure to send them my way.

WarcraftPets.com went offline Saturday afternoon due to a transformer explosion where the server is housed. Luckily, there was no permanent damage, but the site was forced offline due to power restrictions in the surrounding area. Crews had been working diligently since Saturday evening to restore power and to bring all of the effected servers back online.

I apologize for any inconvenience this has caused.

A picture turned up on the Internet in recent days that suggests a new baby dragon whelp will join the pack. This one is appears to be a Frost Wyrm Whelpling. Those of you who've played Warcraft III will remember the mighty undead Frost Wyrms who hailed from Northrend, the continent featured in the next expansion. So I'm betting that this little fella will make his debut in Wrath of the Lich King, which is expected to hit stores in late 2008 or early 2009.

Further speculation suggests that this could be the special Collector's Edition pet. It would follow logic, as The Burning Crusade Collector's Edition gave us the Netherwhelp, a creature indigenous to Outland.

Many of you have indicated that you're currently trying to collect the baby croc pets and you're having little luck. I'm right there with you. But remember, these pets only drop from the bag rewarded from the Crocolisks in the City fishing daily. The other four fishing dailies will, unfortunately, never drop one. So if the crocs are all you're after, be sure you're not doing the wrong quests.

Additionally, remember that the odds of getting one of these crocs is about 1.2%, or 1 in 80. So there are really two factors of luck involved in finding a baby croc: having Crocolisks in the City come up often on your server, and being lucky enough to have a croc drop from the bag you get.

I feel your frustration. In the past two weeks, this quest has only come up on my server once. And yet there are other collectors who have already collected all 4 among their alts (with undoctored screenshots to prove it). What can I say? Luck is fickle.

I've further enhanced the new public comment feature in two ways:

First, I added the ability for members to format links within their comments so that others can simply click the links without having to copy and paste the entire URL.

Second, I updated the Member Profiles and Top 50 listings so that an icon appears next to those members who've provided a comment. This allows you to easily identify individuals who have something to share. That'll come in handy the next time we're all looking for something to pass the time on a Maintenance Tuesday.

NEW FEATURE! Have you ever wanted to share the story of how you got your latest pet? Or perhaps you've wanted to share your characters' names and realms with other so you could meet and talk pets in-game. Or maybe you simply want to tell everyone about your top 10 favorite pets. Now you can!

The new public comment feature allows you to post anything you choose, so long as you respect the User Guidelines. Update your profile today!

NEW GUIDE! Children's Week begins on May 1^st, and what better a way to welcome this highly anticipated event than with a new guide! The all-new Guide to Children's Week is the most thorough guide you'll find on the subject. It includes a Children's Week FAQ, as well as maps and walkthroughs for every Children's Week quest.

Be sure to bookmark and refer to this guide throughout the event, as you quest your way to those adorable Children's Week companions!

In patch 2.4, a new kitty was added to the bedroom above Stormwind's main inn. It's a Siamese cat named Fuzz. Those of you who've read my Q & A with the Site Creator might recognize the name.

A year ago when I first launched the site, I mentioned that I had a Persian cat nicknamed "The Fuzz" (her given name is Jezebel). She does look a lot like the Siamese WoW model. A few visitors to this site suggested this new animal NPC might be an in-game tribute to me. It's probably just a coincidence, but I wonder...

I've returned from attending to my mother's passing and soon I'll be updating the site with some new content. But first, I want to offer my heartfelt thanks to everyone who took the time to contact me with their condolences. I was very close to my mom. The outpouring of support from this community has really helped. I'd like to share a quote from one visitor, Ralph from Holland, whose comment really struck a chord:

"Things like this make you put things into perspective again. Its fun to collect and enjoy virtual things, but in the end it's the persons in our lives that count most and that we should invest time and effort in."

That statement couldn't be more true. You never know when someone you love is going to pass. Take some time out of each and every day to remind the people you love just how much they mean to you. There will always be time for Warcraft.

Sometimes things happen in our personal lives that turn our reality on its end and force us to change our plans at the last minute. One such tragedy just occurred within my own life. After a brief but courageous battle with cancer, my mother passed away peacefully in her sleep last night. Therefore I will not be updating this site for at least a couple of weeks, as I will be busy attending to other matters.

The Verdict
Still, I did want to resolve the voting that I opened last week. Out of more than two hundred votes thus far, only 8 people thought the Goblin Weather Machine should be included on this site as a small pet. So you won't be seeing that device in this database, although you are still free to collect it.

Please note that while I may not be here to update the site, I will still be checking my messages from time to time. I will also be monitoring and moderating the site remotely.