Pets of Martapa

As I spend some of my free time I should be writing playing World of Warcarft, I began to think, what would the people of Martapa keep as pets?  Well, how would this affect my campaign or even my novels.  In most cases it won't, but you are going to have that character who wants a pet or that NPC that really would look good with a pet.

When my husband and I played Noshi and Sebastion as roleplaying characters, Sebastion had a red-tailed hawk named Kawani.  (If pronounced right it means "April" in Cherokee.)  It made his character stand out.  And it can make any character stand out.  On World of Warcaft my husband, kids and I play on a roleplaying server, so you come up with cool backgrounds for your character and try to role play them with that in mind as you bash bad guys.  My main has a sprite darter named Apple (now that you can change the names of companion pets...hurray!).  My first hunter only has one hunter pet who is a hunting cat and there is a good reason for that in roleplaying terms.

So here are some suggestions on how to handle pets/companions for your characters.
1)  If the class comes with one (rangers/druids/mages), make sure it is appropriate.  No man eating lions for the mage's familiar and no lizards for the ranger's companion (unless, perhaps they are a secondary companion).
2)  Don't let them have the powerful ones at 1st level, maybe when they get 20th and they have a darn good reason!  My husband told me if I rolled a 20 on a familiar roll I could have a pseudo-dragon...darn, but I'm good!  But to balance that (since I was 1st level) he made her hard to maintain and it took a lot of my gold I should have been using to research to make sure she was happy.
3)  Remember, pets are people, too!  During battle, where are those special pets?  This is to make sure the players don't just get the pet and forget about it, especially if they give them some special bonus or something.  My pseudo-dragon had magic resistance (I think, :) ) but I had to know where the heck she was at all times.
4) Do they add to the roleplaying?  Sometimes a pet can help fill out a character.  My first ranger had a coyote.  He was playful and a big coward.  But he was the tension breaker when my ranger would get down on herself (she had a confidence issue).  Maybe that person on the verge of quiting or just not bringing out the best in their character just needs that little shove of a pet.