World of Warcraft patch 2.4.3 notes forecast cheap mounts, fun pets

We all knew that World of Warcraftpatch 2.4 was going to be the last major milestone before Wrath of the Lich King released. Who could have forseen that Blizzard would be making such major changes to the original gameworld in the newest changes to the PTR? Massively's sister site WoW Insider has the full patch notes for 2.4.3, and there are a number of really interesting tweaks going on there.

• Mounts are now available at level 30, and it only costs 35 gold to grab the Apprentice Riding skill. You have to figure this is purely designed to keep players intersted in alts before the expansion.
  

• Some non-combat pets are receiving tweaks to make them more enjoyable, and a whole new critter is now in the game - a Nether Ray Fry for players Exalted with the Sha'tari Skyguard.

• Haris Pilton, the unique namealike in the World's End Tavern, has apparently launched a new line of bags and jewelery. Will these be real items, or just story pieces similar to what Griftah offers from his inventory?

• Pretty much every class has gotten a slight tweak to their abilities, with the high-level Rogue Subtlety talent Cheat Death receiving a pretty serious nerf.

• Numerous changes to old world content in Tanaris, STV, Winterspring and other zones are noted.

• The devs have added some basic utilities to the game, like an alarm and a stopwatch.

• Players can be summoned into Heroic raid instances.

• Other world tweaks and bug fixes, including replacing the bats outside of Silvermoon and Tranquillien with the Dragonhawks from the Isle of Quel'danis.

If this is the kind of change we can now expect from a minor patch, what will 3.0 (WotLK) look like? Stay with Massively and WoW Insider to find out.