Ghostcrawler posted on the Blizzard Damage Dealing forum this evening looking for some feedback specifically about the way that Defensive pets now behave:
We recently changed the way defensive stance works for pets. In the old design, the pet would not attack a target that you were attacking until it did something to generate threat – typically attacking you. In the new design, as soon as you attack a target, the pet will attack the target too. Our thinking was that this made defensive a little easier to use and you still have passive to override that behavior.
However, we have heard from some players (hunters mostly, though this isn’t just a hunter issue) that they prefer the old defensive stance. We wanted to get a little more feedback from players on the issue.
In order to keep this readable, please don’t stray into other hunter or pet issues that don’t directly affect this topic. Also please don’t attempt to redesign the feature (such as having four stances).
Personally I really like the new behavior and I’d be sad to see it changed back, but I know that not everyone feels the way I do. (I also don’t think that an option to toggle between the two behaviors really counts as ‘redesigning the feature’, but I know what GC is getting at with that.)
Anyway, if you have a moment you should definitely wander on over to the feedback thread and leave Ghostcrawler your feedback.
[update] The official feedback thread maxed out, but there appears to be an unofficial continuation thread that is gathering more feedback. If you haven’t yet gotten a chance to leave your feedback, I’d suggest posting it there — at least until they expand the original.
If you have hunter’s mark in a macro with pet attack, you’re hitting hunter’s mark, the pet attacks, you start to shoot
If you don’t have it, using the new system, you still hit hunter’s mark, then you start to shoot, and the pet attacks.
It is exactly the same, only the order changes slightly. very slightly.
Whilst I can see the new way might seem simpler I agree with Jester that for the variety of different ways of fighting mobs it actually takes more work.
I have always had used a macro for most of my shots that includes /petattack rather than use it on Hunters Mark, and kept one attack button for pulling without petattack . Tbh in pve non raiding a mob doesnt last long enough to mess around with marking.
PS Remember European players cant ever post to that US forum so comments we post here need to be passed on.
Ah, so you actually are arguing that the new Defensive stance can be effectively replicated with the macro system. Like everyone else arguing that perspective, you’re wrong – what you get by doing that is not the same as the new defensive stance and it is nowhere near as good.
I enumerated all of those problems in response to Cal: it doesn’t respect pet passive, it doesn’t help with volley, and the simplistic version most people come up with doesn’t allow you to mark a target other than the one you want your pet to be attacking (even if you yourself have switched to a different target).
The most impressive element for me is the way the new Defensive stance interacts with Volley: when you Volley a group of mobs, then your pet will keep attacking until every single one of those mobs is dead. That’s seriously cool, and the only way to replicate that with the old pet AI was to tell your pet to attack each mob individually. By the time you did that, the mages and locks would have killed everything.
Drina: the thread capped out, so those of us that play on US servers can’t post in it any more either.
With regards to your macros though, you can just switch them around and put a /petfollow in the shot you use for pulling.
It took a while to get used to the new Defensive Mode, however now when having played around with it a bit, I actually like it better than the old version. I love my pet being smart and following my attack pattern.
If I don’t want my pet to attack because it could draw additional mobs or similar, Passive Mode and a Misdirection if applicable has done a great job. If there’s a pack you’re pulling back, I misdirect 1-3 and then feign, switch Passive Mode for Defensive Mode when the rest of them are close. Works fine for me, the pack will almost always follow their misdirected brethren/sisters. Got Misdirection macroed so it targets my pet if I don’t have a focus. Haven’t really added any micro-management in my opinion, on the contrary made things simpler and more logical to handle.
I’ve always used macros for the pet Modes… one for attack/follow and one for aggressive/defensive/passive. Because I just hate the basic pet bar and keep it hidden. As well I macro important non-autocast abilities. Never ever do I purposefully let a mob come at me, hit me, and then let the pet react. Which was exactly what the old Defensive Mode did differently from the new version. Everything else has worked the same old way. If I forget to put it on passive before trapping/attacking a mob the pet shouldn’t touch… I see that as my own fault. :P
Really wouldn’t like the old Defensive Mode back, at least not if it would mean the current Defensive going into today’s Aggressive as some has suggested. Aggressive Mode is nice when BGing in my opinion, especially when guarding a spot to find pesky stealthers (Yes, works like a charm for me).
“@Lilita
You completely miss the point, as do others who think this is a good change.
You could mimic the CURRENT functionality easily under the old system. You cannot mimic the old functionality with the new system. If you wanted your pet to attack, you could make it attack with a simple macro.”
I’m not missing the point, I just don’t particularly care. The thread called for feedback of opinions, and I gave mine. Saying that we ‘completely miss the point’ is insulting and really rather rude just because we like a change. The fact that I like a change doesn’t mean squat about some point, especially when I didn’t even comment on it in my post.
Who knows, maybe I like micro-managing more than having absolutely no thought put into choosing what stance my pet is in. I like having the option to evaluate which would be best in the situation and actually having something different from a slightly-pumped-up-passive to get the job done. I find that it makes the game more interesting to me, hence I like the change.
Nimizar said: “Hmm, I wonder if the two sides of this argument split fairly neatly down raider/non-raider lines.”
Except that much of the support I’ve seen for this change comes from lackadaisical solo hunters like myself, who really appreciate the behavior for … well … lazy Sunday afternoon soloing. I do see the split you mention, but I think there’s another split between when we might call … hmmm … power hunters, I suppose, and non-power hunters as well.
@Everyone: Just a gentle reminder: I don’t want this thread to just be arguing, so please be careful about snide or dismissive generalizations on either side. Not that there’s been much of that — so far I think it’s been fascinating seeing how different people use their pet behaviors in different situations. (I have to wonder, though, if Ghostcrawler expected this amount of feedback.)
I’m going to chime in here with how much of a non-issue this is. The Pet Attack/Mark macro has worked perfectly for 2 years and it automatic to me at this point. This new Defensive stance adds a bit of flexibility, perhaps making PVP more interesting (no huge arrow announcing “You are about to die”) but overall unimportant to the PVE environment.
As far as “stance dancing” good hunters have always had to do this to keep their pets alive during aoe’s (pre-avoidance) and special boss fights (post-avoidance) so again, this is nothing truly new.
If blizz likes it, keep it. If they don’t make sure the change gets noted in the patch notes so that everyone knows. :)
Some situations I find the new one quite annoying. But then again, if you always want your pet on defensive, what’s wrong with using passive? A little Ctrl+1 is all that’s needed along the way.
I prefer the new system, hands down.
I like the new defensive stance a lot. I find it very useful for raiding : )
I personally like the old defensive stance.
And aggressive stance do have its use, though very seldom. Some quests need you to protect a fixed object, and enemys will spawn from random direction. In this case, the best way is to make your pet “stay” beside the object and be “aggressive” that it will automatically attack every incoming enemy.
Blizzard has said that they will make pet action bar “more flexible”, every icon could be removed and replaced by pet’s abilities. My suggestion is to make one more action icon in pet’s skill book to include both old and new versions of defensive stance. The hunter can choose which he likes to put on pet action bar.
while i would much prefer for them to change it back to the way it was, there are others things they should change that are of more importance imo.
Wait….Wait……..This is actually an issue?! Seriously?….Wow.
I mean,yeah,okay…I suppose pressing another button would be so time consuming,
god knows that Elekk could get away in the half a nano-second between button
presses…”rolls eyes”
What about our bag issues? Or our Arrow issue? Off topic I know,and not really
the place to bring it up,but there are waay more important things to talk about
than this,really.
And for the record,just so Mania doesn’t delete this(~.o),I’m getting used to the
new stance.But managing our pets is what we do…we’re hunters!!
Kitairra
I love the new way defensive works! It makes a lot more sense. You shoot something, naturally it’s gonna charge you, so your pet leaps to the defensive and stops it before it gets to you. Makes sense to me. Took some getting used to but right now I wouldn’t change it back to the old way if they asked me to. If for some reason I don’t want it to do that I just use passive, then I control it’s every move. That doesn’t happen very often though.
I noticed that change as soon as Patch 3.0 went live and I started my Quel’Danas dailies. I targeted and shot at a naga and suddenly my pet charged in. It’s really quite annoying and that should be the way Aggressive stance should work.
I personally don’t mind the way it is now for PVE. I was recently introduced to a pvp scenario that really brought home how bad it is in some circumstances:
I see a guy getting ganked and I dismount and start shooting at the guy but I have a feeling the rogue that just vanished is gonna show up behind me at any moment. If I put my pet on defensive, he’s automatically attacking my target. If I put my pet on passive and the rogue ambushes me, my passive pet is gonna sit and watch me die. Yes, I know, I can tell my passive pet to attack the rogue but the time it takes me to change target to rogue, pet attack and intimidate is time not spent wingclipping, trapping and getting range.
Macros can go a ways to fix most of these I suppose though.
I think the way it is now is of benefit to the new hunters. A major benefit.
Before, how many times have you seen a new player shoot a mob, start to melee before the pet attacks? Too many times, I bet. This is a huge aid in training a new hunter in how to play.
Switching between stances is not such a biggie for the experienced player.
I don’t think it’s a game-destroying change, but I definitely prefer the old defensive. Before the patch, I kept my pet on defensive most of the time, so that if an add started beating on me and my trap was on CD, my pet would pull it off of me. It was convenient. Now, I just don’t use defensive at all and keep my pet on passive all the time, because I absolutely do not want my pet to attack everything that I attack. It lowers my dps in some situations where I’m pet-tanking and switching targets often and requires a bit more micro-management, but I’ll live. Still, I think an option in the combat options UI to flag this behaviour on or off would be ideal.
Also, for the record, I never use macros to control my pet’s behaviour. For instance, I often would like my pet to off-tank one target while I mark and kill another. For every hunter that does use such macros, and every hunter that finds it a nuisance to micro-manage your pet’s target, I have two words: mouse wheel. If you have a wheel on your mouse, and keybind wheel-up to pet attack and wheel-down to pet follow, you’ll never go back. It’s the most intuitive set-up ever: you want you pet to attack a target, scroll the wheel toward it. Pet attacking something you’d rather it not, or need to pull him back from a whirlwind-ing boss, scroll the wheel back towards you. It makes Ctrl+1 & Ctrl+2 seems like an incredibly slow and awkward interface by comparison.
The post count is maxed, so I can’t reply on their thread, now. But I agree with Seidouyumi’s (and others) idea:
“Change this from the Defensive Stance to the default behavior for Aggressive Stance.
Not having Aggressive Stance automatically mean the pet attacks everything would be a great idea, I think.”
I love the way the new defensive stance works, passive is very useful, and I never use aggressive. I agree with Seidouyumi in that blizzard should eliminate aggressive stance and replace it with the new defensive stance and then add back the old defensive stance.
Personally, I understand that Macros can fix most of these, but I really don’t want to make a macro for all of my stings, all of my shots, and my AoE abilities. When I open fire on a target, depending on the pull situation, I may open with a sting, a concussive shot, or even with Multi-Shot.
And, if I were to macro these things in the prior setup, as such:
/cast Serpent Sting
/petattack
It would still send the pet in while on Passive.
So I would need to macro all of my stings, all of my shots, and all of my AoE abilities… twice? Or maybe have to do something to where I put a conditional modifier on the macro itself to check what “stance” the pet is in? Sure, for the more advanced hunter’s out there that’s not a problem.
I’m sure that macroing the four stings I use (serpent, wyvern, scorpid and viper) and the shots I use (Aimed Shot, Arcane Shot, Multi-Shot, Steady Shot, Concussive Shot and Distracting Shot) not to mention Volley isn’t much for some people. I think though that spending that much time I reinstall the software for my toon’s specific macros, (20 in total, not counting kite macros, timer macros, and my Shot Rotation which would bring the total to a minimum of 26) is an uneccessary usage of time. Also not to mention reserving the 20+ macros as well as 20+ places on my action bars for things I currently do with only 13 slots and no macros isn’t something I think is necessary.
Why do I think the current system of allowing my pet to defend against what I’m fighting on defensive, be aggressive when I want to be aggressive and be passive when I want it to do nothing is simply easier, and saves me both time and precious bar and macro room.
Since I am not allowed to post to those holy US forums – playing on EU servers, and nothing gets relayed to the US or is getting ignored :(
Restore the old defensive – a pet running to the nearest target is nothing that any sane mind would describe as “defensive” behaviour!
I’m used to pull mobs to the fighting spot, with this new mechanic, I’m forced to micro-manage the pet – this is a real bad design!
Make this “chase after the arrow” stance the new aggressive one and give us back the old defensive one!
I gotta say, on my hunter, I dont mind it. But on my Warlock, it drives me crazy because it wastes mana and, when I group, keeps the main tank from getting the aggro because the fel runs and attacks. And before anyone says “Put it into Passive, d’uh!”, I like having defensive on to keep my squishie self safe while I dps the hell out of something.
Before:
Aggressive – crazy attack everything within 100 mile radius – only good in pvp
Defensive – only attacks what attacks the hunter or pet AFTER it attacks – not sure what this was ever good for
Passive – attack only when told – good in raids and nuetral cities
Now:
Defensive – attacks your target – great for everything but tightly packed raids/instances
Pros of change:
More DPS! – Your pet is already on the offensive when you are. No macros, no hitting extra buttons, super easy. Also, no annoying shuttle race between the hunter and the enemy. Target dead, run back to hunter, mark new target, run to target….bleh.
Cons of change:
You have to be a little smarter about when to use defensive stance…thats really no difference than being smart about when to use each stance.
The biggest complaints are “I don’t like change, and you could use the macros to make your pet attack.” To which I respond “I like change, and you can still use the macro with passive.”
It’s a great change, and those that don’t like it, can avoid it and still play just like they did before.
Why not just have four stances instead of three, keep the new defensive stance and add the old one also. I love the new way it works, but I understand it can be a problem in some cases. Kill two birds with one stone by just having both :)
Sometimes I want my pet on a different target than I do. For example taking out a Mob’s pet. I want on the pet (since I can sustain the damage) and I want the pet building aggro on the Mob so that when I finish killing the pet, I can burn down the Mob without fear of pulling aggro. And if you send the pet in and have to switch to Passive to make his stay where you want, he runs back to your side until you send him in again. imho, Thats just too much like WORK.
I can see good application for the idea in some ways. So I like Ghanur’s idea. Keep passive the way it is. Make defensive go back to the way it was before 3.0.xx, and make aggressive the way defensive is in 3.0.xx. This doesn’t “redesign” the system by adding a stance. I don’t know of any hunter that used or uses the “aggressive” stance as it is. But for those that like the 3.0 Defensive stance it would allow us to keep the best of both worlds.
Geez, I went to go post and it was already locked. Well at least enough people said it was good for me to feel better about not being able to give feedback.
I read a post that said passive doesn’t override? I know for a fact if my pet is on passive and I shoot at something it will NOT attack it even if it hits me. I raid several nights a week and we went back to Al’ar for some insance we miss him reason? lol
I dont’ send my pet in on that fight until he’s come to the middle of the room. My pet stays by me same as it did before on passive.
On the idea of a third stance, whew I bet wow’s heads are getting ready to explode hehe
I think while soloing the new stance is more intuitive and smoother but it doesn’t make or break the class for me either way.
I have my macro to mark and send pet in ready just in case
I think it is bad, because if you shoot something in a group of mobs that won’t come together if shot, the pet runs in and pulls them all. Like the old way more
Yep, it’s locked…hot issue, I think, and you can even see that here.
Funny how human nature makes us all resistant to change, even in a game. Something is different and it has a polarizing effect…
That said, I like the new mechanic more than I dislike it, although I do see some valid points posted here as to the cons of it…perhaps I have just gotten used to it. I have not had any major problems with it, and with growl on in solo play, my pet has been grabbing aggro 95% of the time anyway even when following my 1st shot. I have used misdirect more than ever in solo play lately, but I’ve also been doing a lot more group mob farming as well. I do prefer it in raids, actually, because my pet is now always on the same target as I am whether it be a single pull or group mob.
I do like the comment about changing the current (and old) AGGRESIVE to what is post 3.0 Defensive, making the current (new) DEFENSIVE work similar to the pre 3.0 Defensive and leaving Passive as is. As someone who’s dwelled quite a bit in BG’s over the past 6 months, even their the functionality of Aggresive doesn’t work as advertised nearly as well as it should, so it would not be nearly the kind of loss that some might claim it would be. Their is a lot of benefit in the BG’s for the new Defensive, however.
Just my two cents, even though I can’t post for GC…maybe we’ll get lucky and this forum will be viewed as well by Blizz.
I personally think that this would be the best way to make defensive stance,but I hate having to go to my pet’s actionbar to get him to go charge in after the enemy.
I like the new stance for my hunter, but not for my lock. With my lock, if I want to fear and dot something, I have to put my demon on passive, and thenm switch it back. It’s quite annoying. Personally, I think that we should have the ability to switch between the new and old stances.
P.S. I think the forum is closed, because I can’t post :(
I like the new way, personally. If I shoot something and my pet runs towards the mob/player and I dont want him to, I just tok him on passive for a few seconds til I want him to attack, then I put him back on defensive.
If I want him to attack a mob other than what I’m attacking, I just target what I want him to attack, and send him to it with the pet attack button -just like the old way- he’ll stay on what you tell him to attack instead of attacking whatever you’re shooting at the time.
I feel as though I’m doing -less- micromanagement now than with the old stances. :P Much easier for me.
I personally quite enjoy the new defensive stance. I find it makes it easier to farm . . . not having to tell you pet to attack everything all the time. That being said, i find defensive stance in raids problematic, as you have no idea which target your pet will switch to, so passive is required anyways. But overall the new defensive is great . . . i feel if I wanted the feel of the old defensive, just put your pet on passive and keep telling it to attack targets.
I do love the new defensive behavior. So much easier to do in dailies and farming. I only have a problem in raids or groups, since I never know what my pet would attack first.
Here’s my concern…
I’m set to bring my Gorilla into Kara tonight where he’s going to be Main Tank. In order to keep him from charging his happy monkey butt into the mobs when I MD them onto him, I’m going to have to go passive then defensive, and hope like heck the MD sticks or I’ll be doing a lot of FDs.
We had the same issue last night when we ran some lower level guildies through instances and needed to do Hunter pulls. Had to set the pet to passive, hope the MD sticks, and oh yeah, then remember to send the pet in.
It would be nice if they’d throw another stance button in there … make the existing one passive-aggressive and the new passive-defensive or something. The raiders would certainly appreciate that, I’m sure…
I too prefered the old “shoot and manually send pet in if you want to” approach to this… the pet usually charges in and pulls additional mobs now, and I really don’t want to have to keep putting it on passive, shoot, send it in and put it back to defence etc.
Maybe they should just add a new stance – Cautious (waits until the hunter has been hurt) and then everyone is happy!
To start with I find that I’m not able to change any of my macros – since I still want to use them when the pet is passive. Thus there isn’t a macro saving.
Advantage:
AoE – Pretty much all the times when I want to send my pet in but couldn’t because I’d interrupt the volley.
Disadvantage:
Pet control issues – Combined with dash, swoop, ranged abilites, etc., there is often no way to hold your pet back once they have decided to attack.
The various modes could be renamed PvP, Soloing, Raiding and be more accurate than the current name choices.
I find I’m switching between modes far more often than I used to. And despite the problems I like the new defensive for soloing and AoE. My primary dislike is that the pet seems to occasionally take a liking to something off in the blue and run off.
My only other wish is the petfollow and petpassive worked slightly better for positioning purposes. As it stands petfollow is only useful either when it doesn’t have aggro and no AoE is occurring or when it is combined with petpassive. I wish it would work until your pet got to you or you told it to stand/attack.
Lulz. By the time I found it, they’d locked the thread. :P
I like old defensive because I’m used to it, and because I end up on trap duty all the time. (And believe me, Defensive RUINS trap plans, especially when you’re using a silithid… *cough*) Will I get used to the new one? Yes. Did I prefer using my /cast HM /petattack macro? Yes. I want more personal control over my pet without having to control EVERYTHING he does (Passive). Buuuuuuut…. meh. n.n; I’ll deal with it whatever they decide to do, I just find the new one more annoying than helpful.
Oh yeah. One more thing. If you have your pet trained with dash/dive and Boar’s speed… they will DEFINITELY beat your tank to the mobs, especially if you have a pally tank that just shield-bashed the pull.
Sooooo… You end up with a lot more buttonmashing as you switch from stance to stance so your pet doesn’t blow by the tank and get the group wiped.
I think the best bet to remove issues with pet breaking CC shots is to have the pet only auto attack after an auto shot has occurred. This will remove the issues of Wy-shots being broken and ice traps popped.
So keep the new defensive stance, just have the auto attack coincide with the hunter’s auto attack.
The thread is maxed already! And too soon! If they read this, PLEASE don’t change this! It is a change that I like. And I have gotten used to it and it works great. It is great for soloing. It is good for PvE instancing. It is good for PvE raiding. I don’t PvP so I could not tell you on that. But please don’t change the stances!
Gunsnbutter Excelsior/Uther
I think they could solve all the issues by changing Def stance to it’s old form, but adding a new ability to the pets that you can toggle on and off.
[Sentinel]
When in defensive stance, your pet will attack the Hunter’s target upon the Hunter’s attack.
I’ve had some time to think, and now I am just aggrivated. Not to try and derail this or anything, Mania, but so many classes, ours included, have serious issues that need looking into, and they target THIS?! ……*Shakes his head*
I like it. They only problem I seam to be having is my pet pulling agro back OFF me after I shot the target and got it after me. Maybe pump normal growl back up a bit, not alot but just enough so that tank pets with taunt are still better for tanking. Meh what do I know I’m just a huntard *grin*
There seems to be a lot of players that enjoy this change, so I’m not going to say they should change it back. However, I did MUCH prefer the old defensive and I’ll probably still largely ignore Defensive in favour of Passive.
I really never thought it was so horrible to press a button to make your pet attack in defensive is all. I went into keybinds and changed pet attack to something that was easy for me to press and it made a big difference. The new defensive does change how many more buttons I have to press. I guess it’s just my playstyle. I like having control.
Unfortunally, I missed the forum topic before it got full.
I play on EU so my account is not good to log into US forums.
I hope this opinion might help if someone from Blizzard comes here and read this (and they should, imho).
Make it simple: remove Aggressive mode, which is totally useless and barely used, and put the new devensive-attacking mode instead.
Then leave the old Defensive and Passive as they have always been.
Just that. Almost no reason to use aggressive, and everythng that could be done in old Aggressive can still be done with the “attacking-defensive”.
/wave
I’ve read all the above posts and it seems to me that the main concern is “Stance dance” and Macro use…Anyone ever thought to try just making a Stance/attack marco? one that for example Puts the pet in the desired starting stance, then your desired attack(s) then puts pet into next desired stance…
For me though, I’ve never felt the need for macros..aside from some fun ones like:
/cast Scatter shot(rank)
/e casts magic missiles
(yes my FF theme extends to emoted attacks lol)
But yeah, Hunters are one of those reduculously easy characters to play, and honestly if its just to hard for you to click to a new stance, then…thats just sad.
I like the active roll that pets take now, they feel more like and extended part of my character and having them auto-attack my targes make it feel more like a companion rather then a dumbe beast.
It was harder before they changed the def stance, I’d have to manually sent in my pet, then wait till he got there then open fire, now I open fire and he goes rushing off to head them off.
For dungeon runs, I usually set my pet on passive for the first bit, until I get the feel of the group, then set it over to Def. If I am the one pulling the mobs, then I usually keep him of passive and do the whole manual pet attack thing like before def stance was changed.
Come to think about it…aside from running lowbies through dungeons, thats about the only time I use aggresive stance…I find it almost usless for anything else, but thats just my opinion on that.
Make Pet stances give bonus’ like Warrior stances, kthnxbai.
Seriously, I’d like it.
Honestly though, with some of these lower mobs, having the pet on aggressive leads to the thing dying before I can even get a shot off. Which means no loot or Experience. This leads to too much micromanaging for us Hunters.
Honestly, I have no problem with the current stance… Except for one thing.
Say, for argument’s sake, I’ve decided to go back and slum some old quest zones like Durotar or Tirisfal, either for rep or achievement purposes… I pull something, the pet sometimes has seemed to reach the mob before the shot does and kills it, making it impossible for me to loot said corpse. It doesn’t always happen, but it does happen.