Locked into two year minipet?

My Warrior (the second char I made) got a mini Shiro while the rest of my chars got a hydra. I was thinking maybe it had something to do with play time on the characters, as all the rest of my characters had about the same amount whereas I played my warrior the most.
Dunno, maybe I'm just theorizing.

1st year pets I got
3 Bone dragons "gave 2 away two friends at the time"
1 whiptail dev

Should get my next 4 2nd year pets in a week or 2
so will post back here what they are.

Edit the whiptail one I never played only used it for storage slot
but the others I played about the same amount of time on each.
So maybe it is to do with "playtime" as Sharp.Edges theorizes???

if someone got 3 bone dragons out of 4 pets these **DEFINITELY** aren't random

All I've gotten is trolls, ever, on all characters.

5 whiptail devourers on all my first year pets

Guildwiki is showing between a 70-75% chance of getting a white, of which there are 8 of. So, even with ten characters you are quite likely to get ten whites - the pigeon hole principle shows that for those people there will be duplication of *at least* 2 minipets, much more likely to be three or four duplicated. Remember there are only 14 yearly mini-pet gifts, many of us are looking at 10+ characters getting them, even if only 5 or 6 are then there is a high degree of probability of getting duplicates.

Add in that you most likely have a little over a million players with multiple characters per account and only 14 pets one*should* be able to see it will be quite common for duplicates, even at the high end. In fact, it would be strange to see otherwise.

Random is MORE than enough to justify this, in fact it is suspected as such. With over a million account and multiple characters per account one would expect some even worse than what is posted here.

Myself I've now had 8 open theirs, I have two hydras, two burning titans, and the rest are not repeated (the Titans are the only non-white). I should be on to my second birthday in a short while, my account is over 2 years old but my oldest character is not quite there yet (23 months, do not know how much longer I have).

I got 3 burning titans, 2 whiptail devourers, 2 Necrid Horsemen, Hydra, Temple Guardian, & Jungle Troll. Yr 2 starts this weekend.

I got a troll, necrid horseman, jade, shaman, turtle, juggarnaut, fire imp, and a thorn wolf.

Nothing great, but no duplicates.

I got 2 Wallows, a Jade Armor, a Temple Guardian, Jungle Troll and a Shiro for my first year minipets. The Shiro was cool.

I got a Madragor and Wind Rider for 2nd year. Next one comes up in November.

So far I've gotten all different miniatures on each of my characters.
1 Whiptail Devourer
1 Hydra
1 Jungle Troll
1 Siege Turtle
1 Kirin

Although I did get the Siege Turtle a few months after I bought a Siege Turtle.

I think it's a bit pointless trying argue that we shouldn't be able to recieve the same pet twice on an account. I would certainly be happy to recieve 2 or more Gwens, and I'm sure others would too.

For the 1st year I got only white minis, with double siege turtle, double temple guardian, and double troll. All on charecters I actively play.

Then my 1st character, which I haven't played since October 2005 and I use as storage, got a Lich. Recently instead, my ele got a heket.


So in my opinion the less you play with a character, the better is the minipet you receive ...

If that is true, my assassin which I barely play should have got a good mini, it got a hydra. On one of my accounts there are two PvP chars with less than 2 hours playtime between them, they are about 10 months old so I wonder what they'll get. Do PvP char even get minipets?

One of the few things i've ever really complained about in this game with any passion is that some people get mini's worth 100K+xx for their birthday, and some get mini's worth 20k. Thats tripe. Let us choose which we want, and then nobody would need to sell theirs at all.

And the fact that some people are getting multiple 'bad' pets while other people get multiple 'good' pets just makes it worse.

"Hey cool, I got two mini-gwens and three bone dragons! What did you get?"
"Uh... five whiptails and two elves." =(

so far ive had a devourer, a jungle troll and a temple guardian.
my brother has had a bone dragon and and a kirin.

no duplicates yet, but ive only had 3 of 8 chars reach 1st birthday.

So... you're all being given something for free and now you're complaining that what you got isn't good enough? I find it hard to sympathise, to be honest.

Do you have kids? Try this trick with them next holiday... Give one of them an iPod or something really expensive, and give the others a package of socks or some crayons.

It's not right for anybody to get upset, right? I mean, it was free for them and you didn't *have* to give them anything...

It's all about expectations. Most every one would be happy to get a true random present, but the fact that people get 2, 3, 4 repeated presents across only 6-8 characters, is not random. Like I got a hydra, and if my next 3 presents were all hydras, would that seem random/fair?

first year: 2 mini wallows, 1 hydra and the one char that i didnt even realize was 1 until he was 18 months old... wait for it...wait for it... mini wallow. (that theory sucks)
second year: 3 mini harpies (pawnt)

this is no fun? i want my money?

(well thats what everyone would say, i really dont care THAT much... just i always hate thinking that wammo got all his neat stuff from some random bday pres, thats just an awful thought)

What I noticed is that the toons I created within the same month received the same minipet.

Example, my ranger and my rit both turned one within one week of each other, in June and both got siege turtles.
My Warrior and my Necro who had birthdays in February and April got different mini's, a shaman and a rot wallow.
Makes me think what pets your character gets is partially related to when they were created.

I don't think that comparing kids to the (in theory) more mature people who play GW is particularly helpful in this case.

You seem to be coming from the perspective that everyone should get a present/minipet of equal value, which sounds lovely in theory but I'm not sure how it would work in practice, other than everyone receiving exactly the same gift for their birthday, or maybe a gift of cash instead - and to be honest, I would find that much more boring.

Maybe my perception of minipets and birthday gifts is different to the previous posters - to me they're just a nice bonus, fun but in no way important or worth getting worked up about.

You are right that Anet doesn't HAVE to give us anything, so personally I think it's nice that we get anything at all. I've got one birthday minipet btw, a Whiptail Devourer. If I get another one (or two, or three), I'll probably just sell them for a couple of K each and enjoy the completley free money that I got for doing absolutey nothing.

How about having only a single tier of rarity for birthday minipets and alternate, reward-for-effort based sets of more prestigious pets?

It doesn't have to be 'in theory' at all, which is what irks me. One very simple solution is to let people choose, just like at the end of Factions or Nightfall with the green item rewards. How is it fair that you get a whiptail that you will have a hard time selling for more than maybe 5k, when there's someone else out there who gets to sell their bone dragon for 100k +40ecto? (These were the actual prices for quite a while...)

On the whole, I appreciate the gift and I think minipets are quite entertaining for what they are. I just think that if ANet could be a little more fair with their generosity.

Do not know about you, but I am not a kid. I'm fairly used to the idea that some get things others do not get - there are people make more than I do and less than I do. In fact, it is something of an insult that you think we can not look beyond what a simple child feels. Though I suppose that is fairly low on the insult scale, just kinda disappointing that you look for us (and by implication yourself) to be no better than children.

In any extent - outside of your parents the world does not revolve around you. It is best you learn that, of all the ways it doesn't revolve around you randomly giving a minipet based on a few levels of rarity is pretty low on the irritating scale. You need to *really* stay away from the lottery - you will be VERY disappointed especially given that is *real* money.

So now you assume that he must be kid, because he stated opinion what you don't agree.

Overlooking the fact that the majority of GW players ARE children... It was an analogy. No implications were made, other than the ones you imposed yourself. You don't like the kids analogy? I'll try another.

How much you make at your job is very largely based on choices and actions YOU make, but hows this for you then. How would you feel if your co-worker performed the exact same tasks that you do each day and you were both were given the same salary, only each year they got a $50k bonus and you got coupons for a Happy Meal(tm)? The employer is under no obligation to do that, so you're going to sit there and take it because 'life isn't fair'? You'd sit there and eat your chicken mcnuggets in silence? Life may not be fair, but you don't have to roll over and take it when it isn't fair.

And don't tell someone how they should feel about something. Realize that i'm not here gnashing my teeth and raging against the system. I'm defending my opinion and offering up a valid alternative to an existing system.

Oh, and playing the lottery is a choice, and when you make that choice you accept the risks. Minipet gifts have NO resemblance to that. A more accurate analogy (lol) would be if I played the 9-Rings game. You won't find me complaining because Ring 1 won six times in a row and I was in Ring 3 winning nothing.

please show me your numbers on this, especially since the majority of gamers in the world are 24-35 year olds.

people ACTING like kids doesnt count.

The reason they give identical pets to all of your characters on the same birthday: possibly to encourage players to trade their unwanted duplicates around for other minis, or for other goods...?

I just received my 2nd mini Thorn Wolf -> NOOOOOO

Why duplicate... T_T

No, actually try and pay attention to what you read.

No, they aren't - most are teenage and up (in fact, due to the rating *all* should be and that is the lowest person the game should be targeted towards). By that time they should have learned not everything is "fair" and not expect it. In fact, I would say they mostly do but some still think they can whine enough and get what they want. Unfortunately some adults think that way too.

And that never happens? Uh huh. People get promoted and better bonuses that do *less* than others all the time and it has been that way for many many many years and will continue to be so. You only have two choices - take it or quit and in either case whining and complaining about it only makes yourself unhappy.

Not to mention this analogy breaks down in that you are not doing any work at all for your mini-pet. There should be no expectation of all being equal in gifts. Are you angry that all your hard work of not deleting a character isn't truly compensated?

I didn't tell you how to feel, I pointed out that we are not children and there is no reason to compare us to them. I then pointed out that the only people on this planet that will usually try and create an equal playing field are your parents and if you continue to feel that this equality should occur you will be unhappy. Given your analogy I find that what I said is supported - you can be irritated all you want, you will either learn that is the way the world works and get over it or you will be a unhappy person much of the time.

Playing this game is a choice and what mini-pet you get is part of playing GW - I see no difference.

And then why is making it all equal the "fair" thing to do - why should someone who only purchased one of the games and has 200 hours get the same mini-pet as someone who has purchased all three plus character slots and has 4000 hours in game? Seems like that latter person has a VERY valid gripe in that case - much more valid than getting the short end of random. Why is it that your class of player would be the only ones whose whining should be the one that gets fixed?

Random is the general accepted answer in video games - you don't get to select your drops either. It still allows there to be different levels of rarity while not screwing any particular class of player (note, that is different than screwing and *individual* player). Until you have something that allows *both* of those things you are not giving a viable solution.

Eh, in the end it isn't going to be changed so we are back to what I said - the world doesn't revolve around you and you are going to have to learn to accept it or whine, gripe, and be unhappy.

Sorry to burst the bubble on this thread I have 7 characters and 7 different mini pets of which there are 3 that are 2 year pets. Maybe cause you get your pets all opens on the same day I don't know, I got mine on each respective B-Day as I log in at least 3 times weekly I don't open the presents on the same day.