Everyone who has met me in World of Warcraft knows that I’m a pet collector. A pet collector of the crazy kind, even. As such today, the day of patch 3.3, is a good day. Four more little pets have been added to the game: An albino snake and a calico cat, which can simply be purchased, and a pug that will require unknown amounts of dungeon running with strangers. Fun times.

Finally, there is the core hound pup. As much as I will want its little fire dripping maws, I won’t be getting one.

Getting a core hound pup requires having an authenticator attached to your account. I hate authenticator tokens. They’re small and easily lost, they make login take longer, and they run out of battery at the worst times. Not to mention that once you have an authenticator attached, it becomes your only option for logging in, so if it does get lost or damaged, or does run out of battery, you will have to go through a lengthy process involving proving your identity to Blizzard. Really fun times.

If it was just a matter of buying the token, I would. But attaching it to my account? I don’t want that kind of pain, because I’m not an idiot. See, I have a secure user name: It is unique to my WoW account, and not published anywhere. I have a secure password: A randomised, appropriately long string, that is unique to my WoW account, and not published anywhere. I am not vulnerable to phishing: I do not panic and mindless click links in random emails from “Blizzard”, or get my hopes up when someone offers me new mounts or pets for free. My computer is secure: I do not suffer from the self-destructive behaviours that result in viruses and keyloggers being installed.

I do not need the authenticator. I do not need this pet.