sorry if this is another dumb question. i know that you can get stats from random events or by using exp from battle quests, but how do you get exp if your pet is too weak to fight anything...? does increasing a pet's level also increase its stats?

You can train your pet at the Training Center c: Training Level doesn't increase the other stats, but you can't train the other stats more than 2.5x your pet's Level through the training center, so if the only thing you have available to train is Level, you'll need to increase it first.

There are also stat boosting items, but at the early levels, those are going to be significantly more expensive than just using the training center.

It’s been a minute but I think you could probably gain stats with battle quests too and then you can spend exp on stats I believe. Need to get together some battle gear which I’m sure the battle forum has better information on that than I ever could. Shinwa hands out boosters that you can throw into your vault for when your pets leveled up more and Quentin gives out mage items that can be turned into the mage >.> sorry my memory is rusty and I’m on my phone.

Please for all things battle related read the guides in that forum. I only say this because I didn't and I screwed up my pet training badly. When you make level increase it RAISES the cost of training other stats. So it's best to not let it get too far ahead. I also highly recommend using auto training if you're looking to build a battle pet fast. Depending on your csc flow (its 25 csc per auto train) you can easily have a T4 pet in a month or less. Just make sure you manual train level...