Long time collector, but only started battling recently and I’m having a hard time beating a couple of the Draenor trainers so that I can upgrade my menagerie. I have gathered around 300 polished pet stones and was thinking of buying a few Ultimate Battle training stones. Which pets are going to give me the most bang for my buck? I do have some really nice pets (Anubisath, Unborn Val’kyr, Chrominius, etc) but am curious to hear from more experienced pet battlers.
Ikky is probably the most leaned on pet, used in every pet battle dungeon, and in 75% of the flying family achievements.
Zandalari Anklerenders (or ones with Black claw / Hunting party. With at least 1 S/S breed
Lil’Bling is one of the top mechanical pets. Paired with Tranquil Yeti and Clockwork Gnome is a really strong mechanical strat.
A flying pet with call darkness / nocturnal strike can usually take out 2/3 of the trainer pets. I use Northern Hawk Owl as they can be caught in Highmountain so you only need to level it from 23.
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Uborn Val’kyr and chrominus are two good pets to use it on as they are used for the shadowlands pet world quest. Outside of that, I would suggest looking into Xu-Fu’s strategy guide to see which pets are commonly used.
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Runeforged Servitor
Pet Bombling
Lil’ Bad Wolf (if speed higher than enemy teams’)
Arachnoid Skitterbot
winter rageling
alpine foxling
out of the dozens of max lvl pets I have runeforged servitor is the one I use the most by far. Nothing special just hits like a truck and has a ton of hp. the fact it can heal itself and revive at 20% health is a plus.
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There are so many to recommend, OP, so what I’ve done in the following list is include the ones I use in my WoD dailies for power leveling new pets (since you mentioned the WoD masters) and added in the ones I find indispensible above and beyond that.
As to the Ultimate Battle stones, I don’t recommend buying them unless you just REALLY want to. Instead, I recommend getting your Safari Hat and buying pet treats from your menagerie once per day and running the 6 dungeon master battles. Those six battles, when used with the Safari Hat, a Lesser treat, and a Greater treat will get you two pets from 1-25 every day for only 15 coins instead of spending the (is it 60 per?) on the ultimate stones. I now actually have so many of the yellow stones that I level 3 every time I do the WoD dailies, but in the beginning, you can count on two per day.
This takes me roughly 1/2 hour - 45 minutes to finish all six (that includes travel time), and when you’re done, you’ve gotten 2-3 new level 25’s for the price of 15 coins.
In addition, every alt you have will receive an Ultimate stone for raising the town hall of the garrison to rank 3 and taking the menagerie quest. I recommend doing that if you have alts because they’re free. This is how I leveled my first teams to 25 after getting the menagerie. Also, don’t discount the captured wild pets you get from later expansions. They come in at level 23 and take no time at all to pull up to 25.
I don’t buy the blue stones, either. I check for WQs that drop them and have always had plenty on hand.
Okay. On to the list:
1.) Parasitic Boarfly - wild capture in Tiragarde Sound.
This pet is the strongest of the flying class that I have. You have the Lift-Off and Drain Blood abilities usable together, and if you get a P/P, it will hit EXTREMELY hard. I use this pet in two of the WoD daily master battles, and he is frequently on my capture team, as well.
I named mine Nigel. Nigel is my favorite pet. He’s ugly, but he’s amazing.
2.) Nexus Whelpling - wild capture in Coldarra, Borean Tundra
This little dragon has the Arcane Storm/Mana Surge combo, and it will kill anything that flies, including Nigel. The only other pet that has this combo available is the Stormborne Whelpling, which drops from a rare (100% drop, though, so it’s worth doing). I have both. They’re called Dean and Sam, respectively. When you’re in a pet battle with really hard flying legendary pets, you’ll want to have one of these little guys. I use Dean in two of my WoD dailies.
3.) Ikky - quest drop in Spires of Arak
This bird has the Black Claw/Flock combo, which is extremely powerful. You need him. You just do. It doesn’t take long to do the quest chain, so go get him. I don’t use him at all in my WoD dailies, but I surely use him in many, many other battles.
4.) Mechanical Pandaren Dragonling - engineering crafted pet f/MoP
This pet is used in a LOT of strategies, and I use it in two of the daily WoD pet master battles for power leveling pets. He comes out for lots of other stuff, too. Worth getting. Absolutely.
5.) Iron Starlette - quest chain in Blasted Lands
Get one of these. It is a one-shot for many pet battles, and there are still WQ battles in SL that I one-shot with this guy. Look up the quest chain and get one. He is still the most frequently-used mechanical pet in my collection. Lil’ Bling (recommended above) is also very good, and you’ll find him used in many strategy recommendations, but get the starlette first. He’s a necessary staple, IMO, and I use him in one of the WoD dailies.
6.) A Rabbit
Any rabbit will do. The rabbit pets all have nearly identical ability sets, and what you’re looking for is the Flurry/Dodge/Stampede combination. It’s an undead killer, and I use my rabbits in several of the harder Mechagon WQs and Maldraxxus WQs.
My personal favorite is the Dust Bunny from Dalaran (special wild capture in Legion Dalaran). All of my rabbits are named for types of cloth. My Dust Bunny is called Corduroy. He gets rotated into my teams a lot.
7.) A Maggot - wild captures in many zones
Mr. Grubbs is a maggot pet, but there are many others. What you’re looking for is a high health pool and the Consume/Leap combination. This is a humanoid killer, and you’ll need at least one (preferably two) for the Tarr the Terrible encounter in WoD. These little guys are surprisingly useful, and I end up rotating one in a lot more often than I thought I would. Consume is powerful, and pets that have it in a useful 2-round combination are worth having. Maggots are just the easiest to obtain. Find one that you can capture at level 23 and bring it to 25 the traditional way or with yellow stones.
8.) A Snail - wild captures all over the place
You need one with Absorb, Shell Shield, and Dive. That’s…pretty much every snail. I use the Rapana Whelk, but the Silkbead Snail is also very good (arguably better if you get the H/H because of its high health pool). Get one with a H/x breed so you have a big health pool at 25 rare, and you’ll use it a lot more than you think. I use the Rapana Whelk in the Tarr the Terrible WoD daily for leveling pets alongside my maggot, and it works every time.
Once you have the above, you can do all of the WoD dailies with a 2-pet strategy, rotating new level 1’s in as you level them. I could stop here, but let’s go for 10, shall we?
These final two pets are for the Sir Galveston pet battle in Legion Dalaran. When Sir Galveston is up during pet week, you can spam level pets from 1-25 until you run out of bandages using the 2-pet strategy. So…get these and wait for the opportunity to befall us again. It’s amazing.
9.) Lofty Libram - wild capture in post-Cata Hillsbrad Dalaran location
This pet doesn’t come out often for me, but it’s a flying magical book, and it’s pretty flippin’ awesome. Get one, level and rare it. When Sir Galveston pops up, you’ll be glad to have it. If you want a full magical nerd set, then go for the Lost Quill, as well, which is easy and quick to obtain as a treasure in Revendreth.
10.) Scourged Whelpling - wild capture in Icecrown zone
This pet is very good to have in general. As an Undead dragon whelp, I end up using this guy in lots of things. Mine is a P/S named Toby. You’ll use him when Sir Galveston pops, but you’ll find yourself using him often whenever a solid Undead class is needed for something, as well.
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Wow! Thanks for all that great info! I really did not know anything about the dungeon master strategy and garrison town hall unlock. I ventured into “Wailing Critters” yesterday and did ok on the first 3 battles, but got trounced at Scumm Jr. and it felt pointless to keep going so i left. lol I figured maybe I wasn’t ready for pet battle dungeons yet. So I went back to battle one of the Draenor trainers and almost beat her. Five times. Ugh. That’s when I started to realize I needed some stronger pets, or at least pets that had strong heals or some other strong CC. I don’t have the Safari Hat yet…I’ll read up on how to obtain that for sure.
I’m relieved to see I have many of the pets you listed as good ones. I do have a lot of good pets, they’re just level 1, sadly. That’s why I was eager to get my menagerie up in time for Squirt and for the next battle pet event in Feb.
Again, thanks for your input and suggestions, I appreciate it! And I love your pet names and how much thought you put into them. (I do the same)
I cheese it and use my level 1 Ikky for the Shadowlands WQs lol But he seriously does seem to have some good abilities! He’s actually one of the ones I was considering because I really need another flying pet. Thanks!
Lots of good info here, thanks! 
The pet battle world is huge, so it takes a lot of patience for someone like me who just wanted to “do it all right now.” ha ha ha
The garrison is just such a massive part of the whole thing, so I always recommend starting there.
You get a purple stone for each alt that gets a rank 3 town hall and then takes the opening quest from the menagerie (the one to find the rock near the mine and bring it to the menagerie). These stones are account bound, so you can mail them all to the same toon and gather your pet stuff in one place.
ALL of the pets you use in master battles/WQ’s/dailies should be rare quality. For this, we have the blue stones. It’s worthwhile when capturing pets in the wild to try and get rare ones, but don’t drive yourself crazy looking for them. If you get one of the right breed and level…you can lift it to rare with a stone.
Check the pet WQ’s in BfA and SL zones (don’t forget the void assault zones in Panda and Uldum) every day for blue stone drops. Collect these on your main pet battle character and keep them with your yellow and purple stones. You’ll go through the blue stones on a regular basis, but I have never had to buy one…yet.
For individual battle strategies, don’t be afraid to go look them up from other people. Hazelnutty has a lot on her channel, and I love Lapz Gaming channel for his pet strategies, as well.
If you don’t have the pets they use, then try looking at what they did that worked and see if you have a pet that might do something similar. To me…it’s just plain fun. It’s like a break from WoW without leaving WoW, and there are days when I’m in danger of burnout on the main game, so I just hang out in my garrison and do pet stuff.
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How did you gather so many polished pet stones. I cannot find a way to get any of those. Where are you getting them from?
Do you mean the blue ones or the purple ones?
The purple ones come from vendors, from opening a menagerie in a rank 3 garrison (every alt that you do that with gets one), or from the pet week PvP quest that comes around every so often in the main quest hub.
If you want the blue ones, they come from vendors, various pet supply reward bags, and pet battle world quests. I never run out of these. I’ve yet to have to buy one. Sometimes, the WQ’s for the blue stone rewards dry up for a couple of weeks, and they get harder to find, but if you check daily, they come around often enough that you can build up quite a stack of them.
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