There is a famous quote that comes from Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet that goes:
“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet;”
In WoW terms, no matter what moniker you choose to bestow upon your companion pets, it will remain just as adorable as it was before your renamed it.
As many of you have already noticed, patch 5.0.4 made your collection of companion pets become account-wide. This means that many of you have duplicate copies of some of your pets. (In my case, I have a whole lot of kitties.) All those little guys are going to need a good name!
There lies the difficulty. Those of you who struggled to come up with the name of your main characters are going to run into the same dilemma as you try and rename all those companion pets. Looking for some inspiration? Try some of these suggestions.
Honor your IRL pet
Many of us have had a beloved pet pass away. Some of you who know me well may remember when my cockatiel, Little One, passed away. Although there are several other cockatiels in the flock, alive and happy as can be, I still miss Little One. I always will. I just so happened to have a companion pet cockatiel, which is mostly grey in color, just like she was. For me, the perfect name for this pet was “Little One”.
I realize that not all of you have had birds as pets, but you might have had a cat or a dog whom you miss. You now have the opportunity to memorialize your pet in one of your companion pets in WoW. There are plenty of cats, a couple of bunnies, some snakes, a turtle, and a corehound pup that might be a great choice of in-game memorial for your pet.
Be Inspired By Another Game
Those of you who listen to Shattered Soulstone know that I really enjoy playing Diablo III. I decided to rename some of my companion pet cats after some of the demons in the Diablo “universe”.
Watching “Belial”, in the form of a little White Kitten, follow me around in WoW makes me giggle. I cannot wait until an unsuspecting player gets into a Pet Battle against what they think is a harmless White Kitten (but who just might be the Lord of Lies himself).
My Orange Tabby Cat has been renamed “Azmodon”. The Silver Tabby Cat is now known as “Baal”. I had to play around with the spelling in order to get it to work, but I now have a Bombay Cat called “Deyablo” and a Calico Cat called “Mefizto”. My Cornish Rex Cat is now known as “Lilith”.
Get Literary
You could rename your companion pets after characters from your favorite children’s book. For example, my Smolderweb Hatchling is now named “Charlotte”. I am considering renaming Mr. Wiggles as “Wilber”. Any of the rat pets could be renamed as “Templeton”. Your Spring Rabbit could become “Bunnicula”. The Hyjal Bear Cub could be renamed as either “Winnie” or “Paddington”.
If All Else Fails
Don’t like any of these suggestions? Time to do what gamers have been doing since the early days of D&D to name a character (or, in this case, a character’s pet). Get out the Baby Name book, and start flipping through it! Something in there is bound to catch your attention. Or, try one of the dozens of online baby name websites, and start scrolling.
How did you decide to rename your companion pets?
Most of my pets are currently un-named, however there’s three exceptions.
My Alliance Moonkin hatchling is named Lisaanna after the primary author of Restokin. My horde moonkin hatchling is named after one of the moonkins in my guild who we good naturedly make fun of. And finally ma Lil’Tarecgosa is named after the guildie who got the first Tarecgosa legendary.
It’s fun to be in a dungeon with the horde moonkin out with guildies and make the passing reference that it was 6 guildies in a 5 man dungeon.
[…] A Pet, By Any Other Name… Need help naming all those companion pets in WoW? Here’s some advice. I wrote this for the […]