Sneak Peek: Guardian Cub Tradable Pet
A new pet is coming to a Blizzard Store near you and ... you can trade it and sell it at the auction house!
Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)
Coming soon to a Pet Store near you: the new and titanically cute Guardian Cub companion. You’ve soared across Azeroth on the majestic Winged Guardian. Soon, you'll be able to purchase a pint-sized Guardian of the Titans sidekick to accompany you on your adventures.


Stunning good looks and adorable, supersized eyes aren’t all this new pet has going for it. The Guardian Cub is also the Pet Store's first tradable pet, meaning it can be swapped between characters in-game or given as a gift to guildmates, friends, family, or that special someone -- no adoption papers necessary. Due to his finicky nature, each Guardian Cub will only give its allegiance to one owner, meaning it’s a one-time-use pet that permanently binds to a single character. Be sure to choose a master wisely.

Look for the Guardian Cub to arrive in the Blizzard Store in the weeks ahead -- in the meantime, we've prepped a mini-FAQ to explain how this flying friend will differ from other Pet Store companions.

Q: How does the Guardian Cub pet work? How is it different from other Pet Store pets?

Unlike the other Pet Store companions, the Guardian Cub is a tradable, one-time-use pet that permanently binds to a single character upon use. When you purchase the Guardian Cub from the online store, the character you designate will receive a bind-on-use item to carry in his or her inventory. You can either use the item yourself to permanently add the pet to your character's collection (consuming the item in the process), or -- after a brief initial cooldown period -- you can trade the item to another player so he or she can add it to one of their character's collections. Note that once the pet has been added to a character's Companions list, it can no longer be traded, so make sure you're giving the cub a happy home.


Q: Will I be able to carry more than one Guardian Cub at a time?

While a character can only have one Guardian Cub in his or her Companions list, you can have as many in your inventory as you like. Please note that Guardian Cub items do not stack, so each one will take up a bag or bank slot.


Q: How much will the Guardian Cub cost in the Pet Store?

The Guardian Cub will be priced the same as the other Pet Store pets ($10 USD). All sales of the Guardian Cub are final -- no refunds will be given once a purchase is made.


Q: Why did you decide to make the Guardian Cub tradable?

Since the introduction of the Pet Store, many players have been asking for ways to get the companions we offer there without having to spend real-world cash. By making the Guardian Cub tradable (much like the BoE mounts from the World of Warcraft Trading Card Game), players interested in the new pet will have fun, alternative in-game ways to get one. In addition to trading the pet, players can give the Guardian Cub as a gift to another character for a special occasion; guild leaders can use them to reward members for a job well done; and so on. We also hope this change will help reduce the number of incidents of scamming via trading for invalid pet codes.


Q: Could I put the Guardian Cub up on the auction house to try to make some gold if I wanted to?

While our goal is to offer players alternative ways to add a Pet Store pet to their collection, we’re ok with it if some players choose to use the Guardian Cub as a safe and secure way to try to acquire a little extra in-game gold without turning to third-party gold-selling services. However, please keep in mind that there's never any guarantee that someone will purchase what you put up for sale in the auction house, or how much they'll pay for it. Also, it’s important to note that we take a firm stance against buying gold from outside sources because in most cases, the gold these companies offer has been stolen from compromised accounts. (You can read more about our stance here.) While some players might be able to acquire some extra gold by putting the Guardian Cub in the auction house, that’s preferable to players contributing to the gold-selling “black market” and account theft.


Q: Are you changing the other available Pet Store pets (e.g. Lil' Ragnaros, the Pandaren Monk) to work this way?

No, the other available Pet Store pets will continue to work as they always have.


Q: What about future Pet Store pets?

It's too early to say how we'll handle future Pet Store pets. We made this change in response to feedback from players looking for alternate ways to get the Pet Store pets, and we're always looking into other opportunities for improvement. We're interested in hearing what players think of the Guardian Cub when it launches, and we hope you'll have fun with this new flying friend.
This article was originally published in forum thread: Sneak Peek: Guardian Cub Tradable Pet started by Boubouille View original post
Comments 729 Comments
  1. Weeksie's Avatar
    I can see them adding gear soon, but with no stats, purely aesthetic. Possibly BoE. What's the harm in this? Now we have a gold sink, and peoe aren't going to be scammed by *this* pet. Hopefully it'll never happen again if they continue making eveverything tradeable.
  1. mmoce6d6578c3b's Avatar
    Oho seems like they're gradually preparing the switch to free to play?
    Or they want to combine the "best" of both worlds : subscription AND f2p-like cash shop?

    Anyway, I thought of coming back with the next xpack.
    It probably won't happen now.

    Amazing how a developper can have its reputation go from stellar to rubbish in such a short time.
    Thanks again activision
  1. david0925's Avatar
    This is an online forum. People need to exaggerate about everything and jump in the bandwagon without using the those brains of theirs.
  1. Powerogue's Avatar
    still waiting on our Diablo-esque auction house where we can buy items for real money. >.> it's clearly inevitable at this point.
  1. Archermit's Avatar
    Cannot wait to see what ppl charge for the pet, i see gold sellers selling for 10k gold only 9 euro so i will not pay for than 8-9k for the pet
  1. Awbee's Avatar
    I wish they'd sell this for 7$, and have another version available for 15 gold, which would be sent to all your characters.
  1. MysticalOS's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by dotSeed View Post
    Isn't $10 a little excessive for a single use pet? The others apply to all characters, include future ones, right?
    couldn't agree more. it's a terrible deal for a one time use pet if you aren't ac tually going to use them for gold.
  1. Idoru's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Snowe View Post
    lets see... i have 100euro and can buy 10pets. Each pet sells for 20k. 100euro=200.000Gold Ok, buying 'gold' is now allowed.
    100 other people on your server has the same "bright" idea .... Pet sells for 1k or less.
  1. Viterian's Avatar
    The one thing I noticed with many of the comments here concerning the Blizzard pets mostly fit into one category, begrudging others what and how others spend their own money. Simply concept is to just stop counting other people money. No one has any business in how others use their money. If we all think about it we all are spending real life money and time playing a imaginary game.
  1. Welkin's Avatar
    But I like my pets account bound
  1. Bloatedhouse's Avatar
    It's brilliant of Blizzard, since it seems like more and more people are willing to use rl money on ingame gold .. Obviously they might just as well earn them self something of this. Well played Blizz.
  1. noteworthynerd's Avatar
    You know, I normally defend Blizzard, but how is this any different than condoning gold selling/buying? Instead of doing it directly (i.e. you pay me 20k for $10), there's a pet in the middle (you pay me 20k for a $10 pet).
  1. Welkin's Avatar
    But I like my pets account bound :/
  1. mmoc69f1075d14's Avatar
    You guys who are screaming that this is the end of WoW are probably the same people who buy gold from outside sources that sometimes use compromised accounts. There has also been a rise in gold sellers trading game time for gold.What you dont realise is that Blizzard not so long ago started to set watches on accounts that held a lot of gold for suspicious activities as they were normally gold seller accounts hoarding (which has led to less compromised accounts but still hacking and trading game time for gold). Blizzard as a business loses out to this, but also encourages people to find quicker and more efficient methods of gaining gold to sell.

    I would say that a lot of you on here are screaming martyrs, I know plenty of people who have bought gold, I wont say for sure that I havent and I know plenty of top end guilds that buy in lots for new patches to buy the latest BoEs at huge prices. Blizzard cannot beat gold sellers with their current model, its a simple fact.This is an efficient and non-gamebreaking way of allowing people to buy gold out of game for people that maybe dont have the time to farm it. Dont bother saying its easy to aquire gold in game, we all on this forum know that (speaking for the majority) but we are the minority of WoW players, many only play 2 hours a week and dont have the time to invest their downtime in reasing complex gold guides.


    This will protect accounts, peoples credit cards and Blizzards integrity. They are not about to sell epix so please calm down.If you need an excuse to quit WoW, you may as well just quit because this will only have positive effects, I for one will be buying it from the AH not out of game.
  1. mmocdce59f885c's Avatar
    This is just a step too far. It's bad enough that the rich are rewarded simply for having money in real life without this mentality earning them an advantage online as well.
  1. mmocf3b228c4c6's Avatar
    Selling gold "legally". Called it.Anyway it won't be worthwhile, but hey.
  1. mmocaee1542d48's Avatar
    making useless companion pets when they should be concerntrating fixing there game shows again blizz want more $$$ fro mstupid worthless crap off there store, gj blizz way to get ur prioritys in order
  1. Aethicus's Avatar
    It's not selling gold and it won't hurt the economy. It's no different than if player A decided to give player B 20k for no reason. That doesn't hurt the economy what-so-ever. You all just want something to complain about. Quit crying.
  1. Accaris's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Taldred View Post
    This is just a step too far. It's bad enough that the rich are rewarded simply for having money in real life without this mentality earning them an advantage online as well.
    Rich people won't be buying these pets. Rich people aren't stupid enough to think that these pets are a worthwhile investment.
  1. Rummer's Avatar
    Just a lot of worthless complaining in the long run over something that has already been done time and time again via the mounts/pets from the TCG. People are basically just flipping shit over old news, the only difference being that these are not a random chance item that you have to hope to get from a pack of cards, or buy on ebay, they are available for direct sale, and rather cheap. To people thinking that they'll break the AH though, I highly doubt it. End of the day it's not -that- cute of a pet, and people thinking something that is readily available from the Blizzard Store will sell for as much as the TCG stuff, borders on insanity. The biggest punch in the face will come when thousands of people actually buy this pet expecting it to sell for thousands, then happily jumping in game to discover that there are like 500 of them on any given AH. The only real issue I personally have with this pet is that they're making it single use(?) and the excuse they're giving for that is that you can 'give it to your friends'. You could do that with the old pets too, you just had to give them the redemption code and they'd get it for all of their characters. Sincerely hoping they do something to make it account bound once you give it away. Like an account bound pet that's in a gift bag you can give away... something to that effect.

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