PTR 3.1 – Build 9626
Only a few days after the 3.1 PTR goes up and we already have a new build! The official patch notes don’t appear to have been updated yet, but MMO Champion noticed some hunter pet changes while looking at client data. (Note that this method can be innaccurate, which would mean that these changes are not happening. We’ll have to keep an eye out an see how it goes.) Allow me to quote from MMO Champion:
- Thunderstomp (Gorilla) has been removed as a pet skill and replaced by Pummel – Pummel the target, interrupting spellcasting and preventing any spell in that school from being cast for 4 sec. (20 Focus, 5 yd range, Instant, 10 sec cooldown)
- Thunderstomp is now a pet talent available to any Tenacity pet. Now your bears, crocs or ESPECIALLY CRABS can join in the AE tanking fun.
- Savage Rend (Raptor) now temporarily boost the raptor’s damage by 10% for 30 seconds.
- Furious Howl (Wolf) now only affects the wolf and its master, duration increased from 10 to 20 seconds.
(Incidentally, my head has been buried in Java all day. So thanks to those intrepid readers who e-mailed me about this new build and/or posted on the comment thread for the last build — I appreciate your efforts to help keep me and other hunters up to speed. *grin*)
93 Comments
Oh man oh man oh man… I shouldn’t get excited yet, but the prospect of my warp stalker being able to thunderstomp and hold the aggroes…
It’s really hard :D
‘Thunderstomp is now a pet talent available to any Tenacity pet. Now your bears, crocs or ESPECIALLY CRABS can join in the AE tanking fun.’
IF THIS STAYS TRUE I WILL BE A HAPPY HUNTER.
Screw gearing up I can just farm for pony! \o/
My Hydralisk can now come out of the stables and annoy everyone with his constant complaining!
Happy day happy day.
This makes me wonder whether the 51pt BM skill will be going back to 5 points since they’ve basically thrown in a must have talent where we would have tamed a gorilla instead. I’ll be glad to see less gorillas but I’ll be sad to see less of a reason for keeping mine and making a turtle that much more attractive.
“Incidentally, my head has been buried in Java all day”
You too? Lol. D:
I am /so/ excited about the Thunderstomp change O_O Finally I have a reason to use a tenacity pet!
byebye gorilla!!!!
I’m going back to a bear methinks. <3 bears
Is no one else pissed about the wolf nerf? Do any of our pets have anything that buffs the party now..?
Also, I’m surprised about the thunder-stomp being for all tenacity pets. I suggested something like that back when they had the pet suggestions forum, glad some people noticed and may have repeated so Blizz acknowledged.. . . . Still doesn’t make up for the wolf-destruction though. ><;
Er Kikaku, as someone explained, this fixes, the wolf’s howl, as now it WON’T be overwritten for you or wolf by shout or BoM. This is a FIX not a nerf, and granted that most groups I run have a paladin anyways, as tank or healer or dps- or a warrior.. that needs to l2play, this is a blessing in disguise.
Time for good ol’ Turkle to make a reappearance.. and Bad Attitude now looks like one of the strongest Tenacity Talents out there (behind Bear’s swipe because of long cooldown)… Time for me to stop complaining and go plan Tree…
Can someone please check if the “new” Furious Howl will now stack with Blessing of Might or Battleshout?
It´s now only affecting the Wolf and the Hunter so i guess it should, but we all know Blizzard and what strange things they do.
This means gorilla’s will not be the best tanking pets anymore, and I will teally miss mine if I deside to replace him.
And boo for bliz for changing wolfs howl.
Ghostcrawler mentioned they specifically changed Furious Howl to only work for the Hunter and Wolf so they could let it stack with Blessing of Might/Battle Shout. The initial idea was for FH to be a replacement if no warrior or paladin was present, but since that happens like… never, they decided to make it a little more useful outside of 5 man groups.
New thunderstomp means we now have a host of:
Bearadin
Crocadin
Crabadin
Oozadin
Wormadin
Yeh!…
Just wish I could find somewhere with an updating Pet Talent Calculator that will reflect these changes…
Wow, what a day!
First, Lost comes out with a killer episode, then I learn that Thunderstomp will hopefully be trainable by all Tenacity pets. When Thunderstomp became the best tanking talent, I became sad that the boar I’ve had since lvl 30ish was going to be in a perpetual stable… I also loved the rhino, but alas, the long cooldown on the knockback ability made it crappy to AE tank with.
I’m guessing that this ability will probably be the final tier for the venerable BM hunter, which is fine by me since I’m BM for life (at least until dual-specs allow me to play with survival :-P).
If this goes through, I will finally look at using another tenacity pet. Huzzah!
Apparently, I’ve been told Thunderstomp is going in the place where Intervene is currently in the tenacity tree – so you don’t even have to be BM spec’d to get it for your tank!.
On the Furious Howl ‘nerf/buff/fix’ issue, I actually like this. Being selfish, and not in a ‘serious we’re going to be the first on the realm to clear this raid’ guild, it’ll personally help my DPS and, in reality, it doesn’t actually help the raid DPS at all anyway at the moment.
Apparently its going to replace where Intervene is in the tree.. so it will be accessible by all Tenacity pet owners…
The top tier for tenacity pets will be Wild Hunt and Silverback
# Silverback (2 ranks) – Your pet’s Growl also heals it for 1/2% of its total health.
# Wild Hunt (2 ranks) – Increases the contribution your pets get from your Stamina by 20/40% and attack power by 20/40%.
Thunderstomp being available to all Tenacity is great…
Also been looking at this…
Raptors went from:
Savage Rend – Slashes the enemy with the raptor’s talons for [rank] damage, and causes the target to bleed for [rank] damage every 5 sec for 15 sec. Successful critical strikes with this ability temporarily boost the raptor’s attack power.
To:
Savage Rend – Now temporarily boost the raptor’s damage by 10% for 30 seconds.
With Longevity the cooldown on Savage Rend goes from 1min down to 42 secs so thats a 10% increase to dps for the raptor almost always up.. (12secs down).. I think they will be jumping back up the dps table now also
Thunderstomp for every tenacity pets is welcome.
But what are they given to Cunning and Ferocity for BM hunters? Higher DPS, self healing? That’s not fascinating.
I have some idead maybe more fascinating.
New talent for Cunning (BM hunters only): trap carrier (1 min CD)
When activated, your next frost trap, immolation trap, explosive trap or snake trap will be placed on your pet. The trap will be triggered when your pet hit the enemy. The pet must be within 5 yards to use the ability. The trap will stay on the pet for 1 minute.
For Ferocity (BM hunters): stinger
Each time when your pet hit the target with its special ability will refresh your serpent sting, viper sting, or scorpid sting. (like Chimera shot but no secondary effect).
Ferocity get Wild Hunt and Shark Attack
Shark Attack (2 points total) Requires 1 Point in Rabid, and 15 points in the tree.
Your pet deals an addition (4/8%) with all attacks.
And Cunning get Wild Hunt and Grace of the Mantis (same GoM as already in Tenacity Tree)
So each tree shares Wild Hunt and get the extra Talent which differentiates them (GoM not so much haha)
I read the change to Thunderstomp and I immediately thought “uh-oh! After the change to Rhinos people are going to be mad!” but then I read on. Perhaps this is why they nerfed the Rhino spell, because knockback by 10 yards + AOE within 8 yards seems kind of counter-intuitive.
Personally I can’t wait to see my little Warp Stalker Thunderstomping! It’s such a great solo-levelling ability that it’s nice to see all of our pet tanks getting it.
Hmm – maybe GoTM is just a ‘placeholder’ talent in the Cunning tree while they work on the real one?
Although, I can see why it would be useful for those pets as well – the Cunning ones are good PVP pets and GoTM would help to try and stop your pet getting one-shotted with a huge crit.
Tbh in pvp, if your pet is going to die, it’s gonna die. Because chances are if it’s anything like AV or WG, if your pet gets out of sight, or into a bunch of alliance, it’s dead. No ammount of minus damage buffs are gonna save it.
For true survivability why not HotP? Or just make it a talent the hunter learns at lv 76/78/80, whichever, so all pets benifet from it and you’d not have to sacrifice durability/survivability for damage.
Yeah I agree there alright… your pet is gonna get more crits against it when in pvp than it ever would in pve…
Letting your pet outta sight or into a bunch of alliance?.. well thats gonna end up as a fail nomatter what talents it has.. characters die, nevermind pets, when bombarded by a group to be completely honest… so the only solution there is to try and avoid that situation…
I think with the un-nerfing of KSpirits and SSwiftness along with the changes to the pet trees that we should see a huge buff to BM… I’m happy with the changes currently and infact I think we’re gonna see them realise they may have to use the bat a small bit again to reign us back in…
But all in all I think its a good result and hopefully the numbers that come back from test will show we are back in the game again…
I love the changes to Thunderstomp, but I wonder about Pummel… forgive me for saying this, but that ability needs a bit more “Oomph!” (maybe an overall stun) for targets that aren’t casters because I think it will be useless on non-casters….. I’m all for silencing casters for 4 seconds on a given spell school….. but it looks like the sort of skill you really need to watch and do it manually (either by macro or the by clicking it on the pet action bar) whenever you’re fighting casters. I’ll have to wait and see since there is no damage listing yet on that skill or if it simply just interrupts/silences a mana-using mob only — making it useless for anything else. I know a lot of people are sick of gorillas, but I just had to point that out.
Finally, someone important noticed my 3 months worth of complaining to tenacity pets (apologies to all the GMs I annoyed).
Hydradile is my tanking pet anyway. But Thunderstomp + Bad Attitude = Awesomeness.
My dual specs are gna be SV dps / BM tanking. First ever time I’m gna take Catlike Reflexes
>_-
Sry for double post^
Pummel seems okay. Without doing damage, it SHOULD only auto-cast when the target is casting. If they make it do damage the pet will never have it timed right. Plus, 4 seconds every 10 a school can be locked out is a good down time for a single-specialised caster.
/cheer at not needing to tame a monkey to get that pet skill.
GC indicated that the current CD on Pummel is a holdover from Thunderstomp. Expect to see it go up into the same ball park as Nether Shock (i.e. around 40 seconds).
One of GC’s other comments also suggested that Roar of Sacrifice would also be making an appearance in the Cunning tree, since that is currently one of the key talents that makes Tenacity pets so popular in PvP.
I think Pommel would have to not be set to auto-cast. You’d have to manually cast it when it’s the right time – much like Intimidation is now. I wonder if Pommel would interrupt caster bosses though like back in Kara with Juliet’s healing spells (which I don’t think intimidation did). Could make it worth bringing your gorilla out for particular bosses fights as well.
# Wild Hunt (2 ranks) – Increases the contribution your pets get from your Stamina by 20/40% and attack power by 20/40%.
Just to clarify as I havent been able to download the ptr patch.. Is this suggesting that it increases the current contribution by 40% (i.e. 30% of stamina = 36%/42%) or increases the total contribution (i.e. = 50%/70% of stamina)?
The former seems at best to give it ~1500+ health, the latter gives it ~4750+ health. So the former is marginal whereas the latter actually gives the pet some true survivability.
So can anyone tell me which is correct.
Guys, read the changes carefully. This change does NOT mean all Tenacity pets get a Thunderstomp-type ability.
Thunderstomp is GONE. Pummel is not a replacement for it.
Thunderstomp did damage, Pummel only affects spellcasters.
Thunderstomp generated extra aggro, Pummel does not.
Thunderstomp was 8 yards range, Pummel is 5.
Thunderstomp would aggro and hold aggro on a group of mobs out to 8 yards.
Pummel is only going to interrupt casting on casters within 5 yards.
Pummel in no way will allow you to do what you could do with Thunderstomp. I am very disappointed.
Korzak – read the changes very very very carefully.
Pommel is a brand new spell for Gorillas. Thunderstomp has now been added to the Tenacity tree for all tanking pets in the spot where Intervene used to be – so all hunters can spec Thunderstomp for their pet if they want to.
Intervene has been moved to a higher tier.
Hahaha, I am an idiot. I am the one who should be reading the posts carefully. this is what I get for posting online before having morning tea :)
Wow, any Tenacity pet can Thunderstomp…this opens up a LOT of potential! :)
finaly my hydra and Gezzarak can tank groups =D
But downer on the wolf howl, it was really nice to have with you in a party with no pally to give better ap buff.
oh well. i see our pets still gets some lovin but these are talents ALL hunter pets can get (unless all are in last tire) so this will bost Survival and MM a lil bit too. Im stil wanting so see the BM hunter itself get something extra.
Thanks Wardley, I was just typing that out :)
So does this now make Bears the kings of the AoE grind?
Thunderstomp and swipe both pop pretty fast. Versus melee mobs, that’s a lot of AoE going off.
Ok, we really, really, REALLY need more stable slots. I currently have: LSD wasp of doom (never getting rid of), spirit beast (also a permanent slot), a spider (gogo BG PvP), a moth (I’m unique. Yay.), and a gorilla (will definitely dump this if the T-Stomp change goes though and get a warp stalker. [Wish Gezzerak was still tameable. /sigh]). But now I will want a wolf. I could dump the moth but…raiding with a moth is a sign of a real man baby.
So does this mean that the bears will be in favor with two aoe abilities, swipe and thunderstomp, on relatively small CD’s? I won’t miss my butt-scratching fugly gorilladin much, but now I wonder what will be best after him. I’m thinking the croc CD is too long and it only uses bad attitude on strikes against you. According to Mania:
Bad Attitude
Snap back for [rank] damage at any target that strikes you for the next 45 sec.
Melee Range
Instant 2 min cooldown
Swipe
Swipe nearby enemies, inflicting [rank] damage.
20 Focus Melee Range
Instant 5 sec cooldown
So I’m seeing some big-bear-butt in my future. What do you guys think?
‘Bad Attitude
Snap back for [rank] damage at any target that strikes you for the next 45 sec.
Melee Range
Instant 2 min cooldown’
The CD on bad attitude is much smaller for BM hunters, 1.4min or something like that- and even tho it only works on mob strikes against it, that’s still a damn decent ammount of damage, I’ve seen mobs kill themselves on my Yasindra’s Crocolisk, and on Ryai’s Hydralisk, it dishes out 210/240 dmg per whack. Just because it has a long CD doesn’t mean it’s completely useless, when played right it is as good or better than Swipe.
yes bad attitude cd is bloody long and only affects mobs attacking the pet, meaning its useless in pvp. but for solo grinding, TS + BA, i see it working quite fine. the cd should be gone(or almost) by the time uve got to loot/skinn everything and collected up 5-10 mobs again.
Oh, it’s not so much the damage I’m looking for, it’s the hold power of the aoe’s. Personally, I use a tanking pet to tank. Period. I dish out the damage fast enough for their damage to be somewhat insignificant as opposed to their tanking/threat/aggroing ability when grinding and farming, it’s just their ability to HOLD the dang mobs that is paramount in my book. So with a bear’s thunderstomp, swipe, and growl, I’m thinking this will be the next king of tanks.
I do realize other pets will be able to thunderstomp and tank, but even with my gorilla I pulled aggro. I’m thinking maybe the bear could be like my old boar and that will not happen as much.
RIP Boars ;*( I still have a beautiful armored one in my stable that I’m loathe to give up.
Oh, thank you hy, I look forward to comparisons of these two pets!
YES YES YES
Lovely Trinket ( my turtle) will now no longer be look at as a trash pet
hmmm for holding aggro.
im not sure if Bad Attitude generates extra aggro.
also ive never had a bear so i cant say if the Swipe causes axtra threat eather.
sorry my bad typing.
Ok, well, I remember -not so long ago- some hunters using Bears for their aoe swipe that allowed them to aoe tank, although not as well as the gorilladin. I assumed swipe generated threat. Can anyone confirm?
‘hmmm for holding aggro.
im not sure if Bad Attitude generates extra aggro.’
It does- it generates enough threat for me to squeak by with a mend pet when there’s multiple mobs on the Hydralisk- now granted it’s NOT alot of threat, but it’s still threat, it’s like a Retribution aura or Thorn’s buff.
Wow, I’m really looking forward to my turtledin. I have an 80 turtle in the stables for tanking odd mitigation stuff, and had a gorilla for it’s great aggro. Now I can ditch the gorilla for something else.
Wow, I just realized my Hydra is going to be an aggro god with snapback. Between that and my turtle, I expect a future pet nerf.
IIRC, anything that causes retalitory damage (I.E. Thorns, Bad Attitude, and Retribution Aura, etc.) causes threat to the player/pet that’s causing the mob to take the damage. I see crocs being very good AoE tanks. (If they have their inhalers with them, that is)
Oh boy, I just realized this and I just found something to make me happy. My beloved armored boar will get thunderstomp and I can lvl him up for some nostalgic good times! He will be usable again!
ha ha… reading through the posts on here.. seems like everyone is as giddy about these changes as I am… haha…
Mania I hope your loving our new found “-adin” pets aswell!…
never in all my years of being a Hunter, have I felt this happy.
Not the rumor of ammo removal, not the new pet talent trees…
My crab, who I’ve had as a solo pet since lvl 11, back in 2006, long before they were “cool”, now is all sorts of Awesome-sauce! Stomp those mobs, Kayrab!!
Double post sorry…
I still think it would have made more sense to turn the existing “Taunt” into the AOE Taunt … the now “Thunderstomp” for tenacity pets… and then that way we would pick it up anyway on the way to Silverback.. as it is then Taunt is going to be a useless talent now we have another aggro manager.
Growl and Thunderstomp together will mean you never need Taunt. (infact Growl on its own (With Guard Dog obviously) was adequate for single targets – sometimes you could still pull aggro from pet but it wasnt a permanent problem… MD and FD aswell of course if needed)
So why now do we even have “Taunt” … in the tree replace it with Thunderstomp me thinks
Looks like it’s time to go get my boar back. I missed that little piggy.
I hope this goes live! I was really disappointed in my pets’ ability to (not) hold agro no matter how I spec’d them or myself. Long live Thunderstomp!
Oh, and Long Live those raptor changes! I may finally be able to use my dark greenish raptor, the whole reason I made my hunter :P
What about silithid wasps?
You know, I’m not sure what changed, but I’m getting very good test results for Devilsaur and Spirit Beast. Devilsaur is breaking 4k dps at times, averaging at 3.9k dps, and Spirit Beast is also hitting about 3.7k dps. The only way my cat is catching up is if that (rogue ability i think it is) rogue ability to increase the damage of bleed effects is up.
Hey Rikaku…
Those are some nice numbers and I’m seeing similar and some higher even over on the EU Forums aswell… most are clocking in around 50-55% damage done by pet… stats for AP and Stamina for the pets because of Wild Hunt are also pretty impressive I must add..
In work now so havent had to chance to get on the ptr myself yet but im looking forward to it now…
Only problem Im having is the tenacity tree should be reshaped to :
Guard Dog 2/2 -> Thunderstomp 1/2 -> Silverback 2/2 and Taunt removed completely.
Is the Devilsaur your using spec’d straight DPS as we spoke about yday or does it also have the survivability talents?
Apolz – typo in above post – should read:
Guard Dog 2/2 -> Thunderstomp 1/1 -> Silverback 2/2
That way we remove the now redundant Taunt if pet is gonna multi tank will need the SB health also so may aswell link them together…
Yea, I don’t understand why pets even need a taunt. It has absolutely zero solo use due to feign death and its use in a five-man is extremely limited. If pets were viable off-tanks in a raid situation, I could see having a taunt actually being a good thing but since most bosses will one-shot a pet anyways, no use at all.
Well its definitely not needed now…
Growl + Guard Dog + Thunderstomp + Misdirection + Intimidation + Feign (emergency)
Single Targets:
Only difference is remove Thunderstomp and again plenty of aggro.. there should almost never be a need for Taunt imo. Get rid of it and we save ourselves a lost talent point that is invaluable in the Tenacity tree.. the other trees are looking pretty nice currently (again 1 extra point might make or break it though)
I jumped for joy when I first read about this change to Thunderstomp! It means I can get my warpstalker JubJub back!! Always loved warpstalkers,and they are sooo much better looking than gorilla’s! (not hating,just saying is all..lol)
Thank you Blizz!!
Kitairra
Haha, I actually removed my golden scorpid for a Sapphire Hive Drone. Gave him the same name since I roleplayed him as changing class and sprouting wings (ala the old Ogrebattle games,) since they kinda look like flying scorpids anyway with just a little bit of figure reforming. The prospect of a scorpadin (an almost true golden paladin even!) is very tantalizing. My pvp rundown hyena may be taking early retirement since going into Pvp with a huge wasp looks and sounds way cooler to me, and I don’t dare part with my trusty blacksting…
Jaegar, I agree that the tenacity tree would be better suited having Thunderstomp replace Taunt. Here’s hoping it happens!
I am as happy about this as everyone and I am extremely optimistic that of any changes, this will make it through! Accordingly, I had to post for no reason other than to share in the joy and express excitement at waiting to see the piles of mobs I can aggro on my nearly indestructable turtle tank… I wonder how many can be pounding away since there is no worries about Mend Pet pulling them off… Yippee!
Jaeger:
Devilsaur is specced straight DPS, like I mentioned yesterday. The numbers were crazy this morning, though it seems a hotfix went through to fix the bug. If this is the case for BM hunters now, I’d start stacking up on AP now more than ever if BM take the 51 talent. My Spirit Beast is bringing the pain on the ptr @_@
Yay! Fear Buster, the thunderstomping blue crab!
This is a very good change if it actually happens. Thunderstomp made gorillas a practical requirement for serious pet-tanking. It does mean that every Tenacity spec will have to include it though.
id just wish they could add some kind of increase damage effect to ferocity pets since raptor and devilsaur will now the most wanted dps pets, ctas will also be good tho.
i just wanna use my loque wish is the pet i most ever liked
hmm thunderstomp for all tenacity? w00t i can use gezzarak for tanking, i always hated gorilas, theyre dumb looking in wow.
with the new only bm talents i guess we can now reach damn survival hunters
It looks liek the crocolisk will become THE pet for AOE farming now. I’m just kicking myself that I ditched my Oooze-adin. :(
ON a TOTALLY Different note – but related to pets – Mania could you possibly find out if any of the new cat models (shown on MMO-Champion) will be tameable?? Those spectral tiger mobs look soooo awesome!!
Also any word on wether our black warpstalker is tameable again? Or if Blizz considered it an actual Bug that will never be put back? :(
Oh man, hydralisk with thunderstomp and bad attitude is going to be sweeeeeeeeeeeeet.
Intervene was so hard to make work anyway that I’m glad to see it moved up in the tree to optional territory. :] Silverback and Wild Hunt will be awesome.
Doublepost, whoo, but I had to reply to this–
“Taunt” is not aggro management. Taunt is for emergencies, just like with all the tanking classes. A paladin doesn’t taunt to gain aggro; he uses consecration, shield of the righteous, hammer of righteousness, etc. to build it. Righteous Defense and Hand of Reckoning are for EMERGENCY situations, where non-tanks have aggro, or another tank needs a mob taken off them.
If you were having your pet taunt every time it was off cooldown as a part of aggro management, you were Doing It Wrong, I’m sorry to say. You may notice in the Taunt tooltip that it “has no effect” if the target is already attacking the pet; that’s because it behaves like a TRUE Taunt effect and automatically raises the pet’s threat over the threat of the mob’s current target. This is in contrast to a pet-Taunt effect, which simply increases the pet’s threat by a set amount. This is the same difference as exists between the way Distracting Shot used to function, and the way it functions now, only the Distracting Shot effect resets the hunter’s threat to its original value after it ends, while Taunt doesn’t.
So Taunt will still be a worthwhile talent–provided you know what it does, and how it works.
Leozero:
Why can’t you use your Spirit Beast? Mine (on the PTR) is blowing my cat out of the water right now. Devilsaur is beating him only by 200 DPS. Raptor might be just below the Devilsaur (maybe, havent tested) but a 200 dps difference isnt going to make or break any raid fights.
Triplepost! I’ve been corrected on my description of exactly how Taunt functions:
Even so, I hope it now makes sense why we have Taunt in addition to other high-aggro pet abilities. :]
This is awesome. Now I can use my novelty slime for grinding!
Greetings!
A quick question regarding spiders: Are there finally any other “bone” spiders (new WotLK model) except those of quest phase 1 near the Argent Crusade camp in Icecrown that can be tamed?
@Ansawa: Granted Taunt is still a useful ability, but I always thought it was lame being in the final tier after Guard Dog. I like Jaegar’s suggestion of a swap with Thunderstomp… I’m not picky though… as long as I can get TS with any tenacity pet, I’m excited.
It would be a concern in my mind if the new Thunderstomp pet talent was placed too high in the Pet Talent Tree. I would want to access this one at a relatively low level for its dominant usefulness in leveling and farming. I wouldn’t be to great if it was there to assist in aggro for 75 – 80 or something similar!
@Bidzill: That wasn’t my deal with Jaeger at all. I do agree it should be lower in the tree, maybe, but assuming that Growl and Thunderstomp make Taunt “unnecessary” shows a fundamental misunderstanding of what Taunt is for. It’s not for building or maintaining threat; it’s for getting threat back when a mob is on something else.
Doublepost again!
@Ryinnik: They’ve said Thunderstomp will be where Intervene is in the tree. I think that’s…third tier? So it’s accessible in the mid-50s, if I’m doing my loose math right.
Hmmm…
While I like the sound of every tenacity (tanking ) pet being able to generate aggro, I don’t like the fact that, once again, Blizzard will overlook lower levels. As a lower level hunter I count on my gorilla for aoe. If the other post are correct, hunters won’t gain the ever useful aoe TS for an addition 20 or so levels.
Sure, for level 80′s it doesn’t truly matter where in the talent tree the TS is, so shouldn’t Blizzard keep the level requirement for TS around the same level. Second tier would make TS accessible around the level you first tame a gorilla so noobs aren’t harmed in the frenzy to fix a problem(tenacity aggro)
Btw…
If any experienced hunters can keep on eye on pet changes that would be extremely helpful for a lowbie I’ll appreciate it.
I just can’t seem to find any “buffs” to hunters that don’t apply to the higher levels. I meen, BM takes a hit and the fix is incorporated with a buff to the final tier talent. TS gets applied to all pets, but only to high enough levels.
So grab a crocolisk if AoE aggro is a big deal at that level. Sure, it sucks a little to have to change pets, but sometimes that’s the choice you make.
The first Gorilla in Petopia could be tamed at level 32 – that was when a low level hunter (like me!) could tame a gorilla and use its wonderful aggro management all the way to 80. So in fact despite being extremely happy about the change, it can be viewed as a low level hunter nerf if it is no longer going to be accessible until level 50 something.
You’ll need 7 pet talent points to get Thunderstomp, which means that you’ll need to have a level 44 pet, I believe.
Mania with the win. <3
OK,I see this now…. Thunderstomp on Croc = SICK! Thank goodness my slime and hydra will be usefull. If this stays, Tenacity just got a whole lot better. now, let’s hope they dosomething this good for Ferocity and Cunning.
i see pummel being overpowered for hunters in future :)
Hey Ansawa.. sorry time-diff here so only getting back to you now…
No I wasnt misunderstanding the purpose of Taunt, I am straight up saying it is not necessary… if your pet needs to grab attention from a mob then it has growl(buffed with guard dog) and Intimidation, it should take no more than 1-2 growls max for the pet to take the mob off you, usually as soon as it hits the mob its likely to turn unless your unloading on it and in which case then its your own fault for continuing aggro that you dont want..
If its coming at you and you dont want this then you should be in defensive mode – there are so many abilities to slow/stop the target for your pet – trap, concus, disengage, feign, deterrence, etc etc… there are plenty of mechanics there to shield yourself if needed for that 1-2 secs before pet gets aggro – I honestly can say I have only used Taunt once when I had it … and because of that I respec’d pet to take it off and put the very valuable point elsewhere in the tree where it would make a difference on a much greater frequency…
Granted if you feel your play style requires you needing Taunt then fine but it should be a secondary talent – ie not part of the chain needed to access the final tier.. similar to the way lionheart is – standalone. That way people can still take it if they so desire but it isnt mandatory to get Silverback..
TS will be used, a lot, Taunt will not and so the one with greater frequency should be the one that fits into the chain where putting points into it doesnt damage your point-count. Otherwise you using a point just to open the tree and then talent sits there.
WRT Hunters of lower level losing TS from their gorillas, personally I dont think this is a bad thing… I never had a gorilla until recently.. when they became so overpowered it was a no brainer to go get one.. but before that I found it to be a much better learning experience to be able to use your class fully rather than “TS + Volley” which a lot of the hunters starting out now (not saying anyone here) do far to frequently… you had to watch your aggro on mobs and deal with it effectively and use more talents to achieve this.
Not being granting TS ’till 44 will no doubt improve their understanding of all the talents and the class and its role as a whole…
At least thats my opinion anyway…
Double post sorry –
Apologies – I have just seen now on Mania’s newest thread that Silverback is stand-alone and has no pre-req’s… meaning I dont need Taunt – :)
Problem solved… Yeh!
This is awesome news re: TS – initially setting it up as gorilla-only seemed like bad case of RP > game balance, so on top of making the tenacity tree alot more palatable this also restores my faith in Blizzard’s sense of judgment.
Now if they could just get around to fixing dragonhawks and wind serpents…
kinda off topic but does anyone know if they fixed the animations of the vargul blighthound? last i checked it had a running animation but more often than not it would use a fast walk, and had no swim or jump animation
My guildies are going to be really, really happy to hear about the new Thunderstomp changes.
For some reason, my guildies really like my ghost worm, SpookyJonson. I always feel bad when I bring him to groups though because, well, he’s not a gorilladin. But we can’t take all the butt scratching, and everyone finds it awesome that they can actually SEE THROUGH my huge worm and that he’s not blocking everyone’s view like some of the other larger pets. I really hope these changes go through so he can somehow mysteriously Thunderstomp!
Hmm… I like the thunderstomp-thing – now I have a new skill for my Hydra :>
But I really don’t like the Furious Howl change – I mean, they just did the same to Call of the Wild, and now Furious Howl too? I mean, is there any reason left to have a wolf then? Well, exept if you really love them ofc. :P
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