Comments on: RFC: Cats, Rake and Prowl

By: Satra

Satra — Sat, 24 Jan 2009 22:41:05 +0000

This is just based on my experience with my own cat, but I would DEFINITELY recommend a cat! So far, Ive found my way out of many tricky situations thanks to my lovely companion! Alas, there are pro’s and con’s.

Pros- their prowl is useful for hiding when in enemy territory and matches well with the NE shadowmeld- not to mention they look absolutely fantastic!
Cons- They aren’t quite as durable as some other pets, and when using dash they draw aggro easy.

As for Rake and Prowl? Well, I don’t have rake but I’m planning to obtain it sometime Soon, so I cant say much on that. But for Prowl- I use it A LOT and its very, VERY useful for stealth hunting and much more! I also have come to notice that Cats are good for PvP, Damage dealing, Soloing and grouping- so they are adapt very well to a lot of situations. Ive never gone raiding before I im not sure on that one.

Talents I’m fond of are Dash, More useful in PvP then anything else, I also use Prowl and Growl the most. Those are my favorites, But I avoid cower because I usually need my pet to tank alot. She even does good in dungeons If we lack a tank!

I suppose I can spare my favorite PvP technique. if your guarding the flag. Have your use prowl, make it stay next to the flag and put it on aggressive and Shadow in the corner. This way if any stealthing druids/rogues sneak in, your pet will attack them ASAP, thanks to aggressive! And they’ll never know whats coming!. So all in all, I definitely recommend Getting a cat as I pet.

(I have a NightSaber stalker, her name is Sasha. I got her at level 10 and im level 60 now, so ive spend 50 levels with her and loved every minute of it!)

-Satra

By: Kumlan

Kumlan — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 03:35:56 +0000

somehow, I feel, as much as dps is concerned, cats do outweigh most pets (including exotic) I havent tried spirit beasts but wasps / gorilladin / devilsaurs / wolves pale in comparison to the cat. Needless to say, after reading all the above posts, i’ll probably retame a cat, and take up a stable slot in place of my useless jormungar >.< also, jz wondering, do cats scale with AP or agi?

Armory link. http://www.wowarmory.com/character-sheet.xml?r=Thaurissan&n=Kumlan

By: scott

scott — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 14:58:59 +0000

I’ve recently resumed using a cat on my lvl 70 nelf hunter (30-31-0) post 3.0, and after some testing have found it quite a good pet; I found Boo held aggro considerably better if he opened with prowl than with charge – and having dash makes the prowl speed just about bearable… so I would say for PVE always take dash, but skip charge.

An additional note on prowl – the main reason I think most people dislike it is because it causes their pet to travel slooowly, when you’re walking around town or running from one fight to the next. The way I got around that was to turn prowl’s autocast OFF, and then activate it as needed via explicit /cast command from within my combat macro (I bundled it together with Hunter’s Mark and /petattack), thus making it more of a true alternative to charge.

I haven’t got an opinion on rake; I leave it on autocast and assume having it in combination with claw gives my cat a bit more overall dmg (?).

Otherwise in re: talent points I’ve found it expedient to spend cat talents on DPS boosting things wherever possible – as with DPS classes, DPS pet talent points usually are best spent on things that help the pet do what it was designed to do (i.e. kill stuff quick before it has time to inflict much harm) rather than try to branch out and be something it isn’t…

By: Zwingli

Zwingli — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 20:26:26 +0000

A thought on agro…

Ferocity pets weren’t designed to establish and keep agro like a tenacity pet. So, it isn’t a shame/dishonor for us to pull agro from our cats. Again, I’m not using my cat at the moment, I’m using my spirit beast. I often find myself using an MD and an FD every now and again. That being said, survivability is wonderful. I’ve been able to handle many 2-3 man quests with me and my beloved Ru’Ahk (even with his gimped dps). I will only assume that the same can be found with our beloved cats as well.

By: Palladiamors

Palladiamors — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 18:31:03 +0000

When you say fragile, I hope your just refering to them taking a bit more damage then tenacity, because ferocity pets actually require less in the ways of mend pet then tenacity. Of all of my pets, I have to heal my ferocity pets the LEAST. Bloodthirsty, frenzy, serpents swiftness, and cobra reflexes tend to keep my wolf and cat alive through a lot more punishment then they ought to live through. So far I haven’t had a problem soloing any two or three man quests using my wolf or cat. Marksman and survivals mileage will vary, of course, but cobra reflexes and bloodthirsty are still there, and that is a fair part of the equation.

By: Ketari

Ketari — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 17:12:03 +0000

The Cat “nerf” is that initial damage scaling is going from 7% to 6%. The DoT’s unchanged.

Yea, wtf?

By: Nessima

Nessima — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 07:54:58 +0000

ohh btw forgot to add
Im beastmaster and my ap is 1522

Link to my profile on armory

http://eu.wowarmory.com/character-sheet.xml?r=Chamber+of+Aspects&n=Nessima

By: Nessima

Nessima — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 07:53:15 +0000

I LOVE my cat, and i dont plan on changing her after the nerft.
I never ever use prowl, and rake is just on autocast :)
She cannot hold aggro when solo if i dont use intermidation (or however that bm stun is spelled) or md to her… but she is my favorite pet and will be with me till the end of norrath :)

By: Hechojazz

Hechojazz — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 05:45:46 +0000

I’m still leveling – 73 now in Dragonblight. I’m specced 52/12/0 now, working to max out Longevity before starting to put more points in MM. My AP is listed at 1472 now on the armory -

http://www.wowarmory.com/character-sheet.xml?r=Nazgrel&n=Hechojazz

I’ve had trouble with pulling aggro from my cat since the expansion, and I also am not super pleased with its relative fragility compared in particular with Tenacity pets. I have both a Gorilla and a Croc now as well (and an Eagle).

I still take the cat when I run instances or group for quests. But as a solo tank I just find myself spamming Mend Pet too much, and pulling aggro when I wouldn’t with one of my other pets.

I am not having the Prowl/Cower bug problem, at least since I put both skills on my pet action bar. Hopefully Blizz will fix this soon though.

By: Rikaku

Rikaku — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 22:52:14 +0000

It’s interesting to read this. I notice alot are saying “Cats dont hold any aggro”. Which is interesting to me because I actually have a hard time pulling aggro off my cat in a PvE battle. (Mind you PvE fights are about 15-20 secs in length on average).

I’m curious (purely for my own interest): To those who say their cat is holding no aggro; what’s your spec and AP at?