Have you ever started a pet battle against wild pets and seen the backline pets with blue frames. “Huzzah! A rare plop-weasel! I’ve been looking for one of those!” And then a second or two later the frame changes to gray, as if to say “NO! NO RARE FOR YOU! You do not deseeeerve them…” Heck, at times I’ve even seen purple frames.
Is there a reason for this other than to crush hopes and dreams?
I have never seen that,
That’s never happened to me. I’ve never even heard of it until now. But I can say that sometimes the breed I see when I look at the pet in battle is not the breed I get when I capture it.
My Lost Limb, for instance, looked like a S/B when I was battling it, but when I captured it, I ended up with a P/P.
This I know about. Or at least knew about once, when it changed. But memory fades.
The gist is that when in a wild battle, capturable pets’ Power is reduced, so they are easier to beat. As best I recall, Power is reduced by like 25% or 33% - something like that. Addons like Battle Pet Breed ID have to compensate for this, so I suppose I could look up the numbers there. But I can’t find the original documentation around the change.
What’s happening is the initial frames you are seeing are the frames from the last battle you did and the color change to your current battle is a bit delayed. It’s been a thing for quite a few expansions now. I don’t know if the default interface has this problem or if it is an addon though.
That would explain it! Thank you!