The Scourged Whelpling does actually exist
Stop the presses. Turn off the internets. Scourged Whelplings do exist. This battle pet had become my white whale before patch 5.2. It was announced that the spawn rate of this little guy would be upped for the patch, but I didn't believe it. Once the servers went live, I jumped onto the character I had logged out over the whelp's spawn point in Icecrown, to no avail.
There were campers everywhere. But what did I expect, a field of whelps? A few days pass and I check in again late at night to nothing, but as my logout timer counted down, a little green paw appeared on my map.
YES.
I had finally captured a Scourged Whelpling of my very own after months of camping. The whelp was rare quality, to boot! So what's so special about this dragon? First off, this dragon is not exactly a dragon. The Scourged Whelpling belongs to the Undead family of pets, so it brings an interesting combination of strengths and abilities:
Slot 1 Shadowflame or Tail Sweep
Slot 2 Call Darkness or Death and Decay
Slot 3 Plagued Blood or Deadful Breath
The Scourged Whelpling is weak against Critter abilities and has high defense against Dragonkin abilities. With such a diverse moveset, the whelpling is strong against Dragonkin, Humanoids, and Magic opponents -- some of the toughest battle pet families out there.
What abilities you choose to go with would depend on a few things. Shadowflame versus Tail Sweep comes down to whether or not you're faster than the opponent. There are only two breeds of whelpling, H/H (health) and P/S (power/speed). If you capture a H/H whelpling, you may be good to go with Tail Sweep in most cases, and it will proc that extra hit. Otherwise, with a P/S whelpling, Shadowflame may be the way to go, unless you know ahead of time your opponent is faster.
With Call Darkness, players have the option to run a high-synergy team, taking advantage of the ability's Blind effect. Like other pets with Call Darkness, the Scourged Whelpling could work well with the Pandaren Monk's Fury of 1,000 Fists, Crow's Nocturnal Strike, Nordrassil Whisp's Light, and the Ghostly Skull's Spectral Strike. Keep in mind when using a weather-based team, any Elemental pet will be immune to those effects.
If you're not running a weather-based team, Death and Decay is your other option for the second slot. It's a great DoT ability with decent damage, and the best part? It sticks around even through an opponent's pet swaps.
Between Plagued Blood and Dreadful Breath, the former is usually ideal. Plagued Blood persists through pet swaps, and is especially useful if you have a battle pet that uses multi-hit abilities -- Stampede, Build Turret, Nut Barrage, and the like. For every hit the pet makes, it will be healed. So, Plagued Blood can serve as a great boost in healing for the whelpling and your team. Dreadful Breath's main downfall is that it's a three-round ability, and that can be iffy to wait through if you're taking high damage. It whittles down the opponent's team, so if you're confident that the whelpling can take those hits throughout the duration of Dreadful Breath, go for it! I still recommend Plagued Blood for the healing, especially if you're not making use of Call Darkness.
Overall, the Scourged Whelpling is a very strong battle pet, and worth the wait. Have you captured yours? What battle pets still elude you?
