Since I haven’t been around much lately, I figured I’d let Ghostcrawler do my posting for me. Here’s some of the interesting (to me at least) things he has said lately. And just so I’m not a complete slacker, I’ve added a call to action (borrowed from Pike) and a mini-rant at the end.
The Ferocious pets were intended predominantly for PvE use. We figured a pet with a stun would not be very popular in a raid encounter compared to a pet that just did more damage. (It is possible in a 5-player dungeon that the stun might come in handy).
Since “Ravage” has traditionally been a stun, it made sense to put them in the Cunning tree.
We are willing to make changes to make the Cunning tree more viable for PvP and other situations. Frankly, most of the community feedback on hunters has been on their shot damage or on which pet provides the highest dps boost in a raid setting. More feedback on hunter pet families and their talent trees would be useful. Too often, though, this discussions wander off topic into the role of the pet or the hunter in general.
Ideally we’d like to see nearly every Ferocious pet and the occasional Cunning pet feel like they were valid choices for PvE and nearly every Cunning pet and the occasional Tenacity pet feel like they were valid choices in PvP. Our priority lately has been on the hunter trees themselves though.
On pet ability utility vs. damage (among other stuff — follow the link for the whole post):
There is a trade-off between damage and utility. We specifically gave some hunter pets raid buff / debuff options in case your group, esp. a 5 or 10-player group, has trouble having access to that bonus. I have seen a lot of wasps out there lately.
But as I also said, more parity among pets is something we want to pursue. Currently most of the hunter discussions on the forums are about SV-MM-BM differences or PvP however.
It’s good to know that pets haven’t fallen off the radar as a major part of hunter balance, and I am especially glad to know that Blizzard would like even more parity among pets. They’ve made great strides so far and I look forward to seeing how they continue. Faster would be better in my opinion, but … if we have to wait then we have to wait.
(Oh, and here’s the mini-rant, as succintly as possible: I really wish that “PvE” didn’t automatically equal “raiding” in every Ghostcrawler post I’ve seen recently. I understand why it does; I just wish it didn’t.)
But setting that aside: As Pike was kind enough to point out on the our own forums, that first GC post I quoted contains a hidden call to action:
More feedback on hunter pet families and their talent trees would be useful.
And Pike is right — pet feedback is right up our alley! So if you’ve got the time and the inclination, lend a hand and let Ghostcrawler know how the pet families and talents stack up.
I just had to point out the new release content for Hunters in 3.1.
” * Consumable ammunition has been removed from the game. Arrows and bullets no longer stack, but are not consumed. Ranged attack speed bonus gained from quivers and ammo bags will be preserved in a different capacity.
* A new tier of hunter pet talents have been added. In particular, this allows Beastmaster hunters to improve their damage per second (DPS) with their 51 point talent.
* Hunting Party – this talent has been reduced to 3 ranks and also grants a passive bonus to the hunter.
* Piercing Shots – this talent has been changed. Your Aimed, Steady and Chimera Shots cause the target to bleed for 10/20/30% of damage dealt for 8 sec.
* Sniper Training – this talent has been changed. After standing still for 6 sec, you gain a 2/4/6% damage bonus to Steady, Aimed and Explosive Shot.
* We are also looking to add additional trap functionality to Survival.”
The only thing I care about is the new pet tier specifically aimed for BM 51 pt utility. Yes. Yes please. This is something the 51 pt should’ve been.
1. Let us pick ANY tree for a pet to have, not just one of the three assigned by family.
2. Buff pets huge in PvP. Put in “Pet Armor” that hunters can buy with Honor and Marks that beefs pet armor way up.
EDIT to above:
Pet armor would only work in BG’s, just like the special bandages and such.
One thing that has only seems to have been mentioned in passing by several posters is the CD time on many pets’ special abilities. Bad Attitude, Snatch, Savage Rend, etc. all have TOO LONG of a cooldown. Let’s face it, if the cool down is much longer than 10 seconds it’s essentially useless. I’d like to see all pets special abilities set to the same CD time.
The only problems with the Croc, are that Bad Attitude only affects mobs that are attcking the croc, and it’s long cooldown. Those are the only reasons I use a Gorilla over the Croc… That and the fact that the Gorilla stands silently next to you, while the Croc demonstrates his breathing difficulties.
If you’re going to round up a number of mobs with a Croc, turn off Bad Attitude, then turn it back on once you have all the mobs gathered up and attacking it. You may also want to turn off the Focus Dump and hit Kill Command, before turning on Bad Attitude. Turn the Focus Dump back on after Bad Attitude triggers. It will hold threat with no problem, and will out dps a Gorilla.
The biggest bonus of the Croc over the Gorilla, is that Thunderstomp is Nature damage, anything immune to Nature will just laugh at your Gorilla. Bad Attitude is Physical, and there isn’t much around immune to that.
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My problem is even with a misdirect/multi-shot to start the fight, my only pet to hold AoE aggro off a heal is the Gorrilla (even though it’s only 78). My 80 Slime-alisk doesn’t seem to do the job. All my other pets (80 Ghost Saber, Chimera, and Wasp) fail on single target aggro holding if a heal gets involved.
I think the other AoE pets (not just tenacity) need to be buffed to allow them to hold AoE aggro tank better. Maybe make Growl a threat multiplier on pets rather than a fixed threat gain.
And Tenacity pet taunt it pretty much useless as a pet tanking tool. It’s cooldown is longer than even untalented Beastial Wrath as it stands. And once the taunt occurs there’s no way to maintain the aggro lead (except for Crocolisks) because unlike normal tanks there is no advantage to threat generation just because they have aggro.
I’m not completely sure if this is entirely relevant, but I noticed an annoyance with the Tallstrider’s Dust Cloud that I kinda wish they’d fix…
That being that the dust cloud tends to aggro critters and otherwise neutral things. The most glaring example of this, that I’ve seen, was on the Tuskarr’s baby-stealing daily. My Tallstrider would activate dust cloud and would aggro the Wolvar pups, causing them to attack the poor bird, alongside the den mother.
I’ve also noticed occasions wherein, if the pet is on defensive, that it would chase down and kill a nearby critter, like a rat or beetle, after it had finished combat with the primary mob.
I dunno if something like this has been said before, due to the vast amount of input on this topic already, but in my humble opinion, id be interested in seeing how things would work if they opened up all three trees with each pet. for instance, a gorilla you could spec ferocity… and get some extra dps for whatever with it, or a cat that could tank…. it would certainly make things interesting, and could allow a hunter and their pet a more interesting experience. I know some wont agree with it because of the whole “a tank pet cant dps….” kinda deal, but I dunno, it just seems to me like it would be a neat way to have more fun and assure that the notion of cookie cutter pets and builds are a way of the past. and if not opening all the trees, maybe completely redesigning them… for instance, make them more like the hunter tree itself with more class specific moves that what we have now. for an example, take a wasp. give it a ferocity talent tree, but in its tree it gets lets say an improved sting, that not only armor mitigates, but causes a reaction to the sting doing x amount of dmg over time. it prolly sounds stupid, but im shooting from the hip here. /shrug
I know it’s more of a pet-peeve of mine (pun definitely intended), but I’ve had a pet owl since I first tamed it on Teldrassil at lvl 10. I liked to do everything with him, but as of 3.0 owls are classified as birds of prey are are thus moved into the cunning talent set. However, vultures and ravens got moved into the ferocity talent set.
Now, it may just be me but when I think of Bird of Prey, I think of something more… ferocious than a vulture or raven. To say that a buzzard can take down an eagle is false in real life, and if Blizz tries to base WoW in real life at all, I think something needs to happen here. This is true for snatch and screech too. Carrion birds snatch up dead things (shiny objects in the case of ravens) and take them away. Owls and eagles strike their prey quickly and efficiently, crippling if not killing them… much like screech. Furthermore, in the Cunning tree lies the talent… Carrion Feeder! It’s counterintuitive that Birds of Prey and not Carrion Birds have access to that.
I realize that this may seem like one of the most trivial points to be made about WoW, but GC asked for feedback on pets and here is some. Coming from a long-time hunter who is very attentive to detail, this has been bugging me since 3.0 hit.
What I would like to see done is just a switch of the two families. Straight across. All Birds of Prey become Carrion Birds and vice versa. The raven skin is a toss up to Blizz b/c I think they have it shared with a Hawk (Bird of Prey). I think it would be a very sensible move for Blizz to make this change.
I am using a plain strider currently (I have had the clutch mother for about 3 years and found she finally came into her own with the pet changes). I leveled her up and found shes bad to the bone now ;)
I have found shes almost as good as the gorilla for keeping group agro. The dust up that he does for mobs to miss is great. Its odd but she stays alive longer too due to the heal she does on himself. I found in some cases, my gorilla just drops to fast even with me healing him.
I would think as a tanking (tenacity) pet they would stay alive longer.
I suggested (shortly after the topic came up) two things: one, make roar of recovery function more like a mana tide totem (with necessary buffs to the totem or nerfs to the roar to make them similar in CD and mana restored) being party-wide. My other suggestion was tree swapping. Example: why are wind serpents and dragonhawks cunning pets? Neither of their abilities do anything other than straight-up damage so I suggested moving them to ferocity and move the hyena and tallstrider to cunning.
I was looking for a new pet on Petopia when i came accross this discussion, and have read all the posts. I’m not the most knoledgable hunter out there, and opinions are just that, opinions, but i have some suggestions on the general problems mentioned throughout the topic.
1. pet skills: To make the wolf not a pet topped by battle shout or blessing or might, make furious howl a skill that increases damage taken for enemies, god knows lots of mobs have it and a raid type of debuff would be useful, couple amour reduction with increased damaged for scorpids to counter the stack reduction, and make dust cloud deal minor damage to hold threat for tall striders. Also give crocolisks the ability to hit the nearest 5 enemies every 5 seconds for bad attitude instead of the current skill, allows easier aggro control. right there are 3-4 new ways to hold aggro, making gorillas not the only aggro pet out there. also, i agree chimeras are like hyenas, therefore, froststorm should freeze for 3 seconds, then daze for several seconds,giving a exotic pet better skills and distinguishing the chimera.
2. Pet Trees: lots of peple say that theres not enough aggro, or pets die too much, etc. so heres what i think: make the turtle invulnerable for a short time, and take its 50% damge negated and replace improved cower with it, having growl a 10 yard radious around the pet would be good, and intercept generate aggro. also, since ferocity pets have lick you wounds, shorten the CD on it and switch bloodthirsty with owls focus on cunning. After all, owls focus is like the SV lock and load skill, more suited to dps, while a boosted bloodthirsty cunning pets would survive longer.
3. The bigger picture: make exotic pets tameable by all hunters, and have a skill for BM to raise dps or armour pircing for thier pets, make mend pet an instant heal i.e short casting time then instant heal instead of healing time. Finally (and a couple people have mentioned it) make all pet trees available for every pet, but with one difference: even if we do that, it wont restore the hunters freedom and control over thier pet manegment and raising. To trully accomplish that, we need to have each pet’s special skill be part of a slot that can be overwritten with another skill (that the pet could reasonably learn i.e a scorpid couldn’t lean a bears swipe, but could learn a snakes poisen spit, or a worms acid spit) and give pets talent points every 2-3 lvls instead of 4 so they could be more versatile, and maybe duel pec in 2 trees.
P.S i disagree with the idea of getting rid of pet lvling, blizzard put in the 5 lvl max difference so a lvl 12 wouldnt have to be trained to 70 or 80, but hunters will still not abandon an pet they grow bored of, because having to train a new pet another 5 lvls is a bit time consuming. Also, part of the joy of being a hunter is watching your pet grow. Take away that, and you might as well give them random names like lock pets or DK ghouls.
I am not sure if anyone has really discussed this in the thread, but what I want to see in pets is one that lives during raid. We get more of our damage from our companions then anyone else; and yet in raids pets drop all the time; and so does our dps. No other class straight up loses a depended upon source of damage; they aren’t prevented from casting a spell except in cases where something is immune. I know some locks use their pets for some dps, but I don’t think the dependency is as great. Plus locks have an ability where they can sac their demon to gain a bonus. This is something I wouldn’t mind getting for hunters; maybe not sac the pet but tied into dismiss. All locks have to do is reconjure a demon after they sac it; no different then resummon pet after dismissal. That way, when we are fighting a boss that a pet can’t live on; we can trade it for a buff.
If any more people could post on the first link it would be appreciated
I think Growl needs some work :S My pets can’t pull aggro, other then my serpent Hailfire, even with Cower off. It’s tough, since I’m in BM and not very good at close-range. It makes a difference, wether you’re a lvl. 27 noob like me or a lvl. 80 person doing some Raid. Pets need better aggro. Also, mine drops dead in instances sometimes, leaving me in a position of vunerability. Pets need more buffs :S Or at least armor :S
I am surprised at a lot of the above comments.
Threat is not an issue on single target mobs unless you are trying to take on an elite or heroic mob. The reason is (and I am a mix of 10/25naxx so well geared) my pet doesnt hold aggro for a whole fight when I burst damage but with the damage output the mob is dead before it gets close.
The danger is when the pet (that is not a gorilla) is trying to fight multiple mobs in pve I can either single nuke and risk aggro or aoe nuke and always gain aggro. For most mobs in pve it is easy for Barrage specced MM to just drop the barrage on yourself and let mobs hit you than worry about pet aggro (which I agree is wrong and defeats the point of the pet).
Some other comments are true… pets are dead in seconds in the pvp that Ive been to.
Even in pve (raiding) pets can die too easily in some encounters (e.g. Heigan)
My suggestions/thoughts (and I would appreciate if someone can pass them on to US forums as Im EU here) – Just to point out these suggestions are not all cumulative.. some are variations on the same theme to give different options
Pet survivability in pvp needs dramatic improvement
Pet survivability in pve needs minor improvement for ferocity/cunning and greater for tenacity. Buffed raid Health for dps pets should be around 20-22k and for Tenacity pets should be around 30k.
Avoidance should work on encounter damage with area effects that arent considered aoe (e.g. Heigan Lava, Grobbulus Clouds etc)
Pet damage mitigation should be higher for pets but especially Tenacity pets i.e. Increased armour, Increased dodge (suggestion the talents – AotM/AotDH for dodge, Aspect Mastery & Survival Instincts for damage reduction – are carried over to the pet much like Hit% is)
Tenacity pets should be capable of tanking heroics and OT in raids (some of the above mitigation is to facilitate this)
Mend Pet increased – Pets only generally benefit from aoe heals. In the rest of the cases it is up to a hunter to heal the pet. The ticks on this are no where near high or fast enough to keep a pet alive if (a) it draws aggro in heroics/raids (b) it takes aoe/encounter damage on some raid bosses
Pets should not benefit from buffs but scale with hunter gear/stats better instead. (There must be some coding already in place as pets dont get Thaddius charge debuff)
Aspect of the Beast V1.1 Ranged damage -50% (like AotV), Tanking stats of pet increased e.g. +100% Armour, +75% health, reduces chance to be critically hit by melee by 6%, reduces duration of stun and snare by 50%, bonus dodge (the damage reduction brings the hunter down to a tanks level of damage whilst giving them a tanking option)
Aspect of the Beast V2.1 Melee damage improvement for pet & hunter e.g. +50% or 100% melee damage, cannot use ranged weapon
Aspect of the Beast V1.2/2.2 As per v1.1/2.1 but instead of a traditional Aspect it becomes a Spell with a cooldown or duration. It could act like the Warlock Demon Sacrifice spell but instead it provides the hunter with the bonuses as per v1.1 if a tenacity pet is sacrificed or v1.2 if a ferocity/cunning pet is sacrificed. (i.e. something like +200% armour +50% health, +24% dodge (instead of IAotM))
With any of the versions of above I would recommend removing the aspect from general hunter abilities (cos I doubt many hunters use it anyway) and put it as 31, 41 or 51 point BM talent. This will allow hunters a different role such as melee or tanking using pet/themeselves and also gives a viable reason for Dual Spec to actually have value for a hunter. My preference is V1.1/1.2 although for the pet lovers here I would have thought V1.1 would their choice.
Pet Collars/Armour – Pets could be given armour slots or a slot for collars. Alternatively Collars could be a hunter trinket OR if the ammo slot & quiver goes completely then could be used like Librams etc
These items would buff the pets abilities/stats. Initially they could be slotted into boss loot tables or just as token vendor items.
Gemstones could be created to improve pet abilites/stats and hunters could slot those at the expense of their own stats. The programming is there as early Tier items used to have pet buffs.
If anyone thinks I have any valid ideas I would be happy for you to post them to the appropriate US Blizz suggestion forums as I am from the EU.
Cheers
the best way to fix the pet balance would be make all the trees availible to each pet and modify current aoe for pets under fericity give there ability a dps bump to single targets not multiple( a raid buffed fericity gorilla dumping aoe would just be op) for the cunning tree give the famly abilty an added stun/slow or cast reduction this should contain both in the tree and be selectible witch you prefer.
and for the tenacity tree grant an ability that cases the family skill to hit as an aoe with a threat modifyer
this would require some family skill changes as a baseline none speced such as turtle shell sheild would have to also do damage of offer a debuff,
any pet that currently has an aoe ability would have to be single target unless speced for tanking, and bad attitude would have to be offensive not defensive,
if blizz would do this im sure we would see alot more variaty in pet choices accross the board, turtles doing 1500 dps in raid, or tallstriders helping to kite dks in ab, and moths tanking 4 lvl 80 elites sounds cool to me