I know I’m not the only one out there with a mage alt.

If I’m not playing Frost, with my gigantic sonorous bff Blubs by my side, I feel like I’m missing something. A mage needs a familiar. My mage’s typical chosen familiar is a little offbeat, but if you’ve been hanging around this blog for awhile you’ll probably guess that it’s my Perky Pug. But dogs aren’t the iconic companion of a mage. At the point I rolled my mage, cats were the property of Donni Anthania in Elwynn Forest, and my blood elf is far too fabulous to go paying cross-faction prices. Then, another option arose.

If you play a mage, you will want to add the Feline Familiar battle pet to your arsenal. If you don’t, you should probably start. You’ll still want to add this pet to your arsenal in any case, because it is a fantastic battler, with a unique range of abilities.

It’s one of 3 Beast pets with Magic abilities in Onyx Bite, making it nice against Flying pets but super vulnerable to Mechanicals.

It also has Stoneskin, making it a strong defensive choice as well. Prowl almost always makes for an excellent combo. Also, oddly, this pet uses Call Darkness, which is coming into vogue as a heal breaker. If you choose that move though, you need to be careful to time it and your Devour ability, depending on which moveset you use. It rounds out its moveset with Pounce, which is good offense but really contingent on your opponent.

This battle pet is only available during Hallow’s End, which is starting up on October 18th for North America realms. You purchase it with Tricky Treats, the Hallow’s End-only edible candy currency. You can get those from the treat buckets scattered in the inns across Azeroth (with associated achievements for grabbing them all), or various daily quests as well. I really enjoyed the one where you ride over Stormwind and plant stinkbombs everywhere.

This cat is one of the few companion pets to follow you while you’re on a flying mount. This seems a little goofy, because it’s a cat and all. What it lacks in wings, it makes up for on a teeny tiny flying broom.

A cat after any mage’s heart, good or wicked.