This is a guide for hunters that want to know what pet they should use and why based on the abilities, pet talent trees, hunter spec and situation.
Therefore, it is a comprehensive guide, as to how pet families interact and optimize with the situations they are put into, as well as the hunter they are accompanying. This does not mean it is the only guide or that the observations in this guide are the only ones to be made. Please note that while all suggestions to pet situation optimization are calculated in detail, includes multiple factors and a grotesque amount calculations to get the results it is still highly likely that the writer (me) would have missed something or forgotten to think of another situation that would also be ideal. Therefore, any suggestions in this regard would be greatly welcome.
* = Exotic pet (need 51p BM talent)
| Pets |
For Pet management and to learn how focus works see my Focus section.
| Focus |
| Focus Hunter Spec |
| Beastal Discipline |
| Go for the Throat |
| Focus Generation |
| Focus Management |
| Helpful Macros |
| Problems |
| Suggestions |
Pets:
Pets might have been in WoW a long time, but they perhaps did not become quite as complex until they hit WotLK.
While reading this guide you might notice that it seems you can't truly optimize a pet without going Beast Mastery, this isn't really a surprise... it's called Beast Mastery, not "Pat yourself on the head and rub your stomach Mastery." That being said, to any hunter that feels with the emphasis placed so much on pets in the beta, you do not need to be Beast Mastery speced to take full advantage of the utilities your pet gives you.
Cunning Pets
Cunning Pets are mostly used for PvP. This however is not their only use. Cunning pets can also be used for a utility pet or as a way to get extra focus for a pet that uses high focus abilities or any at all. Cunning pets are also good for any hunter that has a hard time with mana.
Tree Abilities
There are other universal pet abilities in this tree but I am lazy and am not covering them yet to possibly ever, unless someone wants to type, something up then I will put it in.
Mobility: This is a great ability for letting your pet catch up to your target. If a player can not run away from your pets attacks it's harder for them to cast spells, making your pet a bigger pain in the butt, is does however, also make your pet a much prettier target to kill. (Could be a good thing depending)
Carrion Feeder: Possibly, not quite as useful in PvP as PvE, but it does mean that if you do rez your pet in a Battle Ground or Arena you could probably find a corpse handy to feed it. This could make your purse a little happier and give your pet a good heal.
Feeding Frenzy: Great for getting a target down. Since when a target's health is low also happens to be the time you need to get it down the fastest so as to help decrease the chance some one will get a heal off etc and you have to kill the target all over again.
Cornered: A good deterrent for people trying to kill your pet. Since when its health is low, it does more damage... how much of a deterrent I have no idea. The fact that it also makes it less likely to be critically hit does gives it a better chance of living through the irritated assault likely to be thrust upon your devoted companion.
Owl's Focus: Priceless ability for any hunter really. One- it means that you can use any high focus ability right then (assuming it is not on cooldown and you have micro managed your pet abilities well enough for it). Second- Focus management becomes much much easier.
Roar of Recovery (30F 6m): This is probably one of the main reasons why hunters will use cunning pets outside of PvP (though the ability is equally good in both situations) mana regen is always welcome and having 20% of your mana back gives you another push in your damage. The fact that this is only a 30-focus ability just makes things that much sweeter since you are that much more likely to have the focus on hand.
Bull Headed (40F 3m): Not much to say here since this is basically a pvp trinket I'll let you figure out why it's awesome.
Bats
Sonic Blast: (20 yds) 80 Focus Instant: minute cooldown
Emits a piercing shriek, inflicting 49 to 69 Nature damage (Rank 6) and stunning the target for 2 sec.
This is a great ability for PvP, (and general utility) although fairly precarious to use. Many people look at the stun and go "Holy Shiz man! I'm totally gunna use that for PvP ALL the TIME!!" and forget to factor in that its an 80 focus ability meaning that with out Owl's Focus (which while awesome is also unpredictable) you need to be able to come up with 80 focus the second you need to use it. (look at Helpful Macros for some ideas on how to help with Focus management) Also, note that a stun can stop anything while a silence will only stop spells and some limited abilities.
Do use:
-You want the extra range because the target is likely to be further away or you do not want it to escape
-You want the target in one place for as long as possible
-You want to interrupt a cast or ability.
Do NOT use:
- When a mob is first hitting a tank, so that the tanks can (Pally) block and gain extra threat or (Warrior/Bear) are hit and gain extra rage.
This ability is best:
- When not placed on auto cast
Bird of Prey
Snatch: (5yds) 40 Focus Instant 1 min cooldown
The bird of prey grabs the enemy's weapon with its talons, causing 49 to 69 (Rank 6) damage and disarming them for 6 sec.
Another great PvP/Utility ability! Shocking! I know! This one also happens to be easier to use though not as often as some of its other brothers of the Cunning. With the fact that it costs only 40 focus and then tempered by the fact it has a 1min-42sec cooldown makes this ability much more situational but also much more viable. The min cooldown actually becomes a boon when figuring out WHEN you want to use snatch and the 40 focus makes it much more likely that you will simply have that focus instead of having to make way for it. One thing that most players forget is that even though this ability it optimal for melee damage classes it still has viability for lowering any classes abilities in general, since it also takes away the stats you get from your weapon while it's snatched.
Do use:
-There is a player, or mob, that has a weapon, attacking you or a party/raid member and you need the damage decreased.
-You suspect that abilities using weapons to greatly increase the damage are coming up and you figured you'd be mean
This ability is best:
-When not be placed on auto
Chimera*
(Please note this is an Exotic pet and you MUST have the 51pt BM talent to tame it)
Froststorm Breath: (30yds) 40 Focus Instant 10 sec cooldown
Your pet simultaneously breathes frost and lightning at an enemy target, inflicting Frost and Nature damage and slowing the target.
This is a great utility ability (shocking) and great for trying to prevent things from getting to you so you can riddle them with arrows like an over glorified pin cushion. Something that people might not have considered is that it is also a great damage ability, it does not depend on armor and even if your target has high Frost or Nature resistance, it likely does not have both. the 40 Focus and the 10-7 sec cool down makes it so that you could likely impede the targets progress pretty much indefinitely though more details would be needed to know how indefinitely and for how much.
the fact that it is 40 focus does however mean you will need high focus regen in order to use it continuously along with other pet abilities.
Do use:
-You want to slow the target getting to you so you can do more damage
-You want to slow the target to extend time before it gets to a trap
-You want to do fairly guaranteed damage
Do NOT use:
-Before the tank gets to it, but really no ability should be used before the tank gets to it...
Dragonhawk
Fire Breath: 50 Focus Instant 10 sec cooldown
Targets in a cone in front of the caster take 111 (Rank 2) Fire damage over 2 sec.
The dragonhawk has a AE cone ability making it's use much more precarious then other pets. Dragonhawks have very high potential DPS but they also have to be used with skill, not only from the hunter but also from the hunters group. In order to optimize the pets damage you would want to position your pet so that all the mobs are in it's cone, this could very likely mean having the tank make sure the mobs are all in front of him and then using the dragonhawk to attack a side mob as to increase th chances of the rest of the mobs falling within the Dragonhawk's DPS cone.
Do use:
-For AE DPS from the cunning tree.
Do NOT use:
-When the AE cone could break CC
-When the AE damage would steal aggro from the tank.
Nether Ray
Nether Shock: (20yds) 30 Focus Instant 1 min cooldown
Instantly lashes an enemy for 49 to 69 (Rank 6) Shadow damage. Also interrupts spell casting and prevents any spell in that school from being cast for 2 sec.
Nether Shock has a 1min-42sec cool down and a 30 focus Cost meaning that it should be easy to use this ability at any time making it that much easier to time and interrupt the right spell especially if you have this bound to a easy to reach key. In addition, as far as I am aware you cannot trinket out of a silence (although that is something of a double edge sword if you want them to use up their trinket) It is also range making it difficult for someone to get away from even if they try to blink away or immobilize your pet. Though something to keep in mind when using a interupt/silence pet is that it only works on spells, so for an all melee team it's not as helpful.
Do use:
-Any spell caster situations such as a high damage spell or an inconvenient heal.
-When it must absolutely right now be interrupted
This ability is best:
-When not put on auto cast.
Ravanger
Ravage :( 5yds) 80 Focus Instant 1 min cooldown
Violently attacks an enemy for 81 to 115, stunning it for 2 sec on next attack.
Like Sonic Blast (which is almost a carbon copy of this one) Ravage is a high focus ability with a decently long cooldown. The biggest difference in the two abilities, aside from damage, is the fact Ravage is used on next attack while Sonic Blast is not. Now a player might look at this and just blow the Ravanger off as a useless pet, but it actually fills an interesting niche. Because the stun is on next attack there is likely to be a small delay from when you push it to when your ravanger will actually stun that target. That actually means that your stun COULD effectively last longer. As long as the time difference is fairly small and the target doesn't get enough time to do anything useful you're still holding the target a good distance away from you and the delayed time is still extra time for you to stand and shoot. Granted this is a specific niche and would only work SOME times but hey, at least it is something right?
Do use:
-When you want to hold the target in place or interrupt spells/abilities.
Do NOT use:
- When a mob is first hitting the tank, so that the tanks can (Pally) block and gain extra threat or (Warrior/Bear) are hit and gain extra rage.
This ability is best:
- When not placed on auto cast:
Serpent
Poison Spit :(30yds) 35 Focus Instant 10 sec cooldown
Spits poison at an enemy, dealing 96(Rank 3) Nature damage over 8 sec.
This is another one of those pets that is very difficult to understand. Granted that the last rank of the ability is not in and if you are BM speced, you could keep it up with a 7sec cooldown instead of 10. You would be wasting a whopping 1 second of the dot if you did that though, which depending on ticks could actually be very bad. I would suppose this is a slight attempt at making up for the fact that scorpid is not in the cunning tree (a poor attempt) since the caster would only need to dispel one poison before getting to one of the hunters stings. sooo...
Do use (weak):
-You want an extra poison to try to keep your stings from being dispelled
-You MUST have nature damage because you like it and it is pretty
-You need a ranged attack because you cannot get your pet to the target, like ever.
-you think serpents are pretty and that pets should be pretty and wow a serpent that is so cool zomgs awesome.
Do NOT use:
-If you want the target to be CCed, as this is a DoT
-Ever... wait yeah... ever.
Silithid*
(Please note this is an Exotic pet and you MUST have the 51pt BM talent to tame it)
Venom Web Spray:(20yd) 80 Focus Instant 2 min cooldown
Sprays toxic webs at the target, preventing movement for 4 sec and causing Nature damage over time.
Venom Web Spray is just like a spiders Web attack, exsept this one also does damage. Basically it's a shorter Bear trap that your pet can do.
Spider
Web :(20yds) 80 Focus Instant 2 min cooldown
Encases the target in sticky webs, preventing movement for 4 sec.
Not shocking that this is a PvP/utility skill as this is the PvP/utility tree. Web is however slightly more intricate then you might expect. It lasts longer then the silences or stuns but it also has a longer cooldown 2min-1min 24sec. It can be trinketed out of and it has a high focus cost. You also need to remember that Web does not stop any ranged spells or abilities. Web is great if you need some extra help trapping a target, but so are many other pet abilities. Web is actually the most useful to be used on a non-mage/BMhunter/Feral druid (anything that can double trinket really) after an intimidate, so that you have the most time to keep the target in one place to therefore maximize your damage. This is kind of assuming that other things are NOT hitting you but so is every other ability that does the same thing (such as stuns) and this one lasts longer.
Do use:
-Keeping a single target in once place for as long as possible
This ability is best:
-When not placed on Auto cast, though technically Web is good when ever.
Spore Bat
Spore Cloud (5yds) 50 Focus Instant 10 sec cooldown
Dusts nearby enemies with spores causing 20 Nature damage every 3 sec for 9 sec and reducing armor by 700 (Rank 6).
I just want to say that this is probably one of my favorite new pet abilities. It has so much hope, so much possibility, so many ways in which I might over use it and make is scary over powered. Just so much... That being said literally Cunning tree is the worst place for this skill to be in (for me). The fact that spore bats are in this tree almost makes me want to cry myself to sleep every night. I will explain why. For a utility pet, a Spore bat is not bad. It increases the groups DPS, and the Cunning tree has all its utilities to further make it that much nicer as a group help. You will have to make sure that nothing that is CCed is in melee range, but assuming you have a semi competent tank and a semi competent hunter it should not be that difficult. So why do I hate this pet being in the Cunning tree? With its 700 armor debuff you would say, "But Soilgheas that's like 700 armor penetration! that's Sweet!!" to which I say yes good sir it is, in fact, 'sweet'. What I would like to point out is the 5yrd range. That's melee range that means even with mobility and your pet hugging other players asking them what's up, they are going to be able to get out of your pets melee range as things currently stand. How is that you might ask? Well it is because WoW is an MMO and like all MMOs positioning is not exact, your computer is feeding back to their server that then feeds back to other peoples computers that then interrupts data that you then react to and that your reactions are then sent back to the server. It means that things are not always where they appear to be, which means that while your pet -seems- to be on the target's butt he is very likely just behind the target's butt.
Do use:
-To increase damage
-To Add a DoT
Do NOT use:
-Around CCs
WindSerpent
Lightning Breath (20yrds)50 Focus Instant 10 sec cooldown
Breathes lightning, instantly dealing 99 to 113 (Rank 6) Nature damage to a single target.
Windserpents are probably one of the higher DPS pets in the Cunning tree and can be very useful for any hunter that it looking for more of a balance in their pet. The windserpent does very well in single target DPS while also having a ranged attack. This means that your pet can still do damage even if it is not right on the target and also makes it harder for mobs/players to run away from it's damage. It does somewhat sadden me that this ability has had a cooldown added to it, but I can easily see why that would be considering the new pet systems.
Windserpents are great pet for any hunter to add some DPS to the cunning tree.
Do use:
-You need ranged damage
-You want more DPS from your cunning pet.
Do NOT use:
-There is no real reason to not use per say, but if you are looking for utility over DPS then there are several pets that can do that.
-
Ferocity Pets
Ferocity pets are obviously DPS pets. Again, that does not mean that DPS is their only function and that therefore they are only useful in groups. Many hunters will use a Ferocity pet for Soloing if it can stay alive and hold aggro to help shorten the downtime between mobs. While PvPers will use these pets for some of their special abilities, and if they are mostly focusing on damage.
Tree Abilities
There are other universal pet abilities in this tree but I am lazy and am not covering them yet to possibly ever, unless someone wants to type, something up then I will put it in.
Improved Cower: Actually more useful then you might think. Cower (like Growl) does not interrupt your pet's other abilities meaning as long as your pet has enough focus it will cast it no matter what. in addition, with a BM spec the 20sec cooldown goes down to a 14 sec cooldown, which means that the 20% damage reduction is up about 50-70% of the time. Having cower up every cool down also, means helping your pet manage aggro. Though that is something, you will have to leave to your own discretion, as you do not need more aggro management then that of your pet over aggroing.
Blood Thursty: Probably the best up keep talent in all of the pet trees. It means you do not have to pay as much attention to your pets health bar for just the average random damage it receives and you do not need to feed it.
Charge: (35F 25s): The one second immobilize that is on pet charge is semi negotiable as to usefulness, great for putting a Warrior in combat as far as PvP is concerned. The 25-18sec cool down is not long and it's pretty nice in conjunction with the non-continuous dash (if used properly) as making sure your pet is continually at your targets heels (timing your dash to be used in-between your charge cooldowns)
Heart of the Phoenix: Not as bad of an ability as people make it out to be. Although blizzard is still working on making it so that your pet does not die to simply rez and then die again. (I'm figuring a 2 sec no aggro no damage to or against buff would probably fix that so it is out of phase for 2sec) especially when (depending on your spec) just having your pet alive is a nice bonus.
Lick your Wounds: Truly best when used in conjunction with Heart of the Phoenix since your pet only comes back with 10% health it means you just slap this on with a mend pet and your buddy is up and roaring to go. Also handy for when your pet is low on health (not being hit) and you cannot spare a heal.
Spider's Bite: Pretty much one of the reasons why the ferocity tree is the DPS tree. Although your pets innate crit is pretty low (5% on it's own) there are several Beast Mastery talents that improve it (10% from Ferocity and a kind of percentage based of how many Arcane Shots, Steady Shot, Kill Shots you make [Cobrastrikes]) Not quite as big of a DPS boost for non-BM hunters though.
Rabid (60F 30s):Fairly Nerfed from what it was before for non-BM hunters Since you have to reset your 25% AP bonus every 30 seconds where as a BM hunter with a 21 second cool down can keep their 25% bonus up indefinitely. Large Focus drain.
Call of the Wild (100F 5m): Pretty nice damage boost for an all-physical group, less so the fewer physicals you have in party. Nice 5min- 3min 30sec cooldown. Works well with Rapid Killing talent, and the 3min cooldown Rapid Fire that goes with it if you have both improved versions. Although goes just as well when you have neither. The Focus cost pretty much requires some useful pet Macros to guarantee you the current 100 focus cost.
Carrion Bird
Demoralizing Screech (5yrds) 20 Focus Instant 10 sec cooldown
Blasts a single enemy for 33 to 61 damage and lowers the melee attack power of all enemies in melee range by 210. Effect lasts 4 sec. (Rank 5)
This ability is obviously used for lowering melee attacks. It also stacks with any player debuffs of the same nature, such as Demoralizing Shout. It has a 10-7sec cooldown meaning it can be up about 40-60% of the time. This is a good over all damage decrease mitigation for improved survivability. Combined with the ferocity tree's innate damage boost a Carrion Bird is not a bad pet to bring to a Party or Raid for a good utility + damage pet.
Do Use:
-To decrease melee damage done by the mob/player
Do NOT Use:
-When you do not want to aggro nearby passive mobs.
Cat
Prowl: Instant 10 sec cooldown
Puts your pet in stealth mode, but slows its movement speed by 40%. The first attack from stealth receives a 50% bonus to damage. Lasts until cancelled. (Rank 3)
Let me just say this ability would be SO much nicer if not broken by charge.... which makes me sad, on the inside. It costs no focus, which is nice but kind of unnecessary since your pet could just regenerate focus before going into combat while stealthed. It also makes the Cat an interesting Night Elf PvP + Damage pet. Though I very much doubt you would ever get the 50% bonus to damage the Prowl + Charge + Intimidate is a freaking nice combo, and you would with some skillful use of dash and charge be able to keep your pet on the target most of the time.
Do use:
-For Surprise attacks
Do NOT use:
-For over all DPS when not in PvP since the speed decrease far outweighs the damage increase
Devilsaur*
(Please note this is an Exotic pet and you MUST have the 51pt BM talent to tame it)
Monstrous Bite (5yrds) 25 Focus Instant 10 sec cooldown
Your devilsaur ferociously bites the enemy, causing 4 to 6 damage, and boosts its own attack power by 5% for 12 seconds. This effect stacks 3 times. (Rank 1)
Hunters have pretty much been frothing at the mouth ever since Devilsaur with its ability and size has been released. The 15% + 25% = 40% full damage increase makes the Devilsaur the highest DPS pet currently in game. However, it does take a few seconds to build up the extra 15%. I do find it somewhat ironic however, that hunters have been bashing this ability because of its 4 to 6 damage. Because if you really thought about it if the ability was just the 15% increase and nothing about the 4-6 damage they would still be the best DPS pet in game.
Do use:
-When you want the highest DPS possible
Do NOT use:
-There is no reason to not use (except for possibly the enormous size though that seems to be more of a bonus for hunters at this point). Unless you want a different pet, but then if that is the case why are you using this one? o.0
Hyena
Tendon Rip (5yrds) 25 Focus Instant 20 sec cooldown
Tears at an enemy's legs for 49 to 69(Rank 6) and reducing movement speed by 50% for 6 sec.
Hyenas are a good replacement for a Chimera if you do not have the 51point BM talent to grab an exotic pet. The fact that the Hyena is in the Ferocity tree really shouldn't be a huge deterrent since it's still damage and so even with out the PvP talents it should still be perfectly viable for what it does. Out of its PvP context the Hyena is seriously awesome for a little extra time between trap cool downs and for kiting in general. The 50% movement reduction is nothing to turn your nose at and with a 20-18 sec cooldown and 6 sec duration; it should not be hard to Tendon Rip, Concussive Shot your Trap target to keep them from the rest of the group and yourself.
Do use:
-For kiting a mob or player
Do NOT use:
-On a mob, that is ment for the tank. The Slow just adds to the stupidity of sending your pet in early.
Moth
Serenity Dust 75 Focus Instant 2 min cooldown
The moth's wings produce a cloud of dust that increases its attack power by 10% and heals it for 2415 over 15 sec. (Rank 8)
I think there are a lot of hunters that turn their nose at this pet seeing that it is not the Highest DPS pet (for BM hunter only) nor does it really provide a lot of utility. What they forget is one of the uses I mentioned for Ferocity pets. The Solo hunter tank. This ability not only improves your Pets DPS and Aggro but also heals itself for a very decent amount. Nice if you are soloing. Then figure out that one of the mobs is actually a little bit more then you can handle. Just pop Mend Pet and then Serenity Dust (in that order assuming you needed to turn off some auto casts to gather up the high cost of 75 focus) managing a single 75 focus cost should not be overly difficult with some well placed pet macros.
Do use:
-For Soloing or even for a DPS boost.
Do not use:
-For low aggro, as currently this ability causes massive amounts of AE aggro.
Raptor
Savage Rend (5yrds) 25 Focus Instant 1 min cooldown
Slashes the enemy with the raptor's talons for 49 to 69 damage, and causes the target to bleed for 20 damage every 3 sec for 15 sec. Successful critical strikes with this ability temporarily boost the raptor's attack power.
Raptors used to be the highest DPS pet for Beast Mastery hunters. Though considering you need Cobra Strikes, which is a T9 Beast Mastery talent, to really make the Raptor's ability work all that well Moths would be by far a better over all DPS chose even with the longer cool down since your pet only has a 5% chance to crit on their own unless blizzard changes the mechanics. This is assuming that Blizzard fixes the massive aggro generated by Serenity Dust. As it stands there is still a single bonus of Raptor vs. Devilsour and that is the fact that the Raptor (when used with a BMs 3 guaranteed crits) has a 10% bonus right away instead of having to build up to a 15% bonus over 16 seconds, though this is still a fairly week argument for the Raptor. The most I can really say is that I hope that Blizzard fixes this ability so you at least only have to get a crit within the 15sec that Savage Rend is up increasing your chances to get the 10% damage increase.
Do use:
-To milk possible DPS however slight
-To get an instant +10% damage increase
Do NOT use:
-If you are looking for the over all highest DPS
Tallstrider
Dust Cloud 50 Focus Instant 40 sec cooldown
Your tallstrider kicks up an obscuring cloud of dust, causing all enemies within 10 yards to miss their next attack. Lasts for 8 sec.
Really, this ability is so awesome, has so many uses it could be put into any talent tree, and makes me uber, uber happy. The guarantee miss works as a very bizarre kind of interrupt since they are garneted to miss their next attack (not useful against heals). That means, if you time it right, you could very possibly make a Fire/Arcane mage miss their PoM-Pyro, or another Hunter miss their Aimed-Shot (although players could still change attacks before it went off as to choose their miss). In addition, it's all enemies in 10 yards meaning your guarantee to miss can be more then one target greatly improving survivability as a whole. the 40 - 28 second cool down also makes it so you could reasonably improve the Tanks damage mitigation by a fair amount. The amount increases the slower the mob/s attack.
Do Use:
-To improve survivability and possibly prevent annoying debuffs.
Do NOT use:
-While there is no reason that makes it so that it would hurt to use this ability, it is often times nicer to use it at very specific times and therefore a good idea to keep it off Auto cast.
Wolf
Furious Howl 60 Focus Instant 10 sec cooldown
Party members within 20 yards of the wolf receive an extra 45 to 57(Rank 4) damage to their next Physical attack. Lasts 10 sec.
This ability even at rank four is really nothing to turn your nose at assuming you can maximize its affect. While in it's current state it would have a hard time maximizing you and your pet's damage, as long as all the physical DPS is in the same party and willing to be within the 20 yards it's not quite so bad. That being said this ability is horrible for Survival Hunters with Sniper training. I am very much hoping that with the improved ranks comes improved range. Considering that all the other pet abilities were improve from 20 yrds to 40yrds it's actually pretty likely. Also, note that with a 10-7 sec cooldown and a 60 focus cost, this is a freakishly high focus drain and you would need a LOT of focus regeneration to keep it up.
Do use:
-To improve over all Physical DPS.
Do NOT use:
-If you have very low focus regeneration, unless this is literally the only pet ability you wish to upkeep at all.
Tenacity Pets
Tenacity pets are in the tanking tree, and like the other pets they can be used for Utility and some of them have some okay DPS out put. Blizzard is hoping to use these for Solo pets, Group pets, and even as Off tanks in some instances. Tenacity pets can also be used for their improved survivability and some special abilities for PvP.
Tree Abilities
There are other universal pet abilities in this tree but I am lazy and am not covering them yet to possibly ever, unless someone wants to type, something up then I will put it in.
Blood of the Rhino: Important pet tanking talent. Really if you want your pet to viably tank for more then just you then you need this ability. That being said pets that are only tanking for the hunter and not taking enough damage to need the improved healing and (currently) slight improvement to health can skip this talent for some bonus DPS.
Pet Barding: Another important Pet tank ability again get if you want your pet to tank bigger and badder mobs, but if your pet is (again) not taking enough damage to justify this ability then you can again go for some improved DPS.
Guard Dog: Pretty much a must for any Tenacity pet. One it makes your Growl that much better and two it makes your pet that much happier, literally.
Intervene (40F 30s): Probably my favorite ability in any of the pet third tiers. My biggest beef with this ability is actually the icon choice... why a turtle? I mean if I was going to pick something to run at high speed towards an ally to jump in and start taking damage... turtle is somewhat low on my list of animals that truly represent that persona. That being said this ability used in conjunction with Roar of Sacrifice makes it so that the healer and the tank have that much more time to adjust to the out of place mob. Intervene should however never be placed on auto cast since the pet will randomly choose someone to cast intervene on and loose pretty much all of it's effectiveness while also, more then likely, actually hurting the pets threat generation and damage.
Last Stand: Identical to the warrior ability with (oddly enough) the exact same name, the only thing that really changes between the two is the icon picture. Last stand is another 'oh crap' ability for the tanking 'oh crap' tree. Luckily is has no focus cost meaning you should hot button it and use it when needed.
Taunt: I really have a hard time understanding the long, long, long, LONG cooldown on this ability. Considering that, the longest taunt for any of the tanks is 15 seconds and the shortest being 8 seconds. (the 15 second is the Pally taunt, which taunts three targets off a player) The best reasoning I can figure is that Blizzard did not want pets with this ability accidentally on auto cast so as to not constantly have the pet taking aggro off the tank. Personally I'd rather something closer to at least a 30sec cooldown and just tell the other hunters about /petautocastoff Taunt.
Roar of Sacrifice (60F 3s): Pretty awesome though I am interested to see if Blizzard will actually allow this ability to possibly two shot the hunter's pet. Really with a 60 focus cost and a 3 second cool down this ability should really only be used as a delay tactic to help the healers get to other party/raid members or as an "oh crap the tank is dying HELP" button. Pets do not actually have that much health to begin with though last I checked...
Bear
Swipe (5yrds) 35 Focus Instant 10 sec cooldown
Swipe three nearby enemies, inflicting 81 to 115 (Rank 6) damage.
Swipe is probably my favorite solo tank ability. The three targets goes very nicely with hunter abilities such as multi shot meaning you can conserve your mana a little bit more with just 3 targets instead of trying to use Explosive Trap, Volley, Explosive Shot. the threat is more then likely not the same as a Crocolisk with everything hitting it or a Gorilla with Thunderstomp. Both of those abilities have long cooldowns where as Swipe does not meaning that you do not need a lot of down time assuming you are able to keep up your mana. As a side note to Beast Mastery hunters with Invigoration, Swipe has three targets and therefore three chances to Crit.
Do use:
-When you want to kill three targets at a time.
Do not use:
-When you want to kill three targets at a time by massively over aggroing all of them, but you should never look to over aggro your pet really...
Boar
Gore (5yrd) 25 Focus Instant 10 sec cooldown
Your boar gores the enemy for 37 to 61. Causes double damage if used during a Dash.
I still have a hard time with Boar not being in the Cunning tree simply because in the cunning tree you can have Dash up 100% of the time. Dash does last 16 seconds meaning that you could probably kill a single mob... possibly two before the effect wore off and then maybe you'd have enough down time to effectively have Dash up most of the time you are in combat... semi-unlikly though. That being said Boar is the lowest cost to damage single target tank so far. A Scorpid with Scorpid Poison does have more single target DPS over time (currently). Gore however is not a DoT, which is something to keep in mind when choosing a pet.
Do use:
-For a single target kill (good for mana efficiency) and an efficient focus cost.
Do NOT use:
-For AE tanking.
Crab
Pin (5yrd) 80 Focus Instant 1 min cooldown
Pins the target in place, and squeezes for 108 (Rank 6) damage over 4 sec.
Back when this ability was a 6-second pin with a 20-14second second cooldown it was pretty much the god of all tank pets. Screw taunt and all those other abilities the crab did not even need threat it could hold the target in place. As is stands now Pin is an over glorified Web. Only with out the range and some damage added in. Makes it so it is not as useful for PvP and could only be used as an emergency sudo-taunt for groups. The focus cost is high, meaning that you might have to play with some pet macro's to make it highly viable.
Do use:
-As a tank with a shorter (high cost) emergency taunt (assuming the person who is being hit knows enough to move away and the mob/player is not ranged.)
Do NOT use:
-If you are looking for over all higher threat generation instead of a sudo-taunt/save.
Crocolisk
Bad Attitude (5yrd) 25 Focus 5 yd range Instant 3 min cooldown
Snap back for 129 to 183 damage at any target that strikes you for the next 45 sec.
Bad Attitude has the lowest focus cost for the highest amount of damage, single target and AE; it also has a long cool down. 3min-2min 6sec leaving anywhere from 2min and 15sec to 1min and 21sec void of no counter attack. With all the bonuses, you are likely putting Croc's up there as probably the best tanking pet in the game. I do not here is why: One-The mob/player HAS to be attacking the Croc for this ability to be effective. Two- The second that they are no longer attacking the Croc the Croc has very limited ways of gaining the threat back, and lastly Third- the Croc while having high threat has no burst threat meaning you would need to let this ability warm up a bit before laying down heavy AE damage. That does not mean that the Croc is with out its uses.
Do use:
-For AE damage that is not going to obliterate everything in a short amount of time. (note you will need the Croc's threat to warm up a bit before laying into the mobs)
Do not use:
-For high burst threat.
-For threat that has a short cooldown
Gorilla
Thunderstomp (5yd) 60 Focus Instant 1 min cooldown
Shakes the ground with thundering force, doing 153 to 177 (Rank 4) Nature damage to all enemies within 8 yards. This ability causes a moderate amount of additional threat.
Before BC Gorillas were the only AE damage pets. Now, more then a few pets deal AE damage. Gorillas still have their place in the hearts of hunters everywhere I know for me that I have used my beloved monkey to stomp through lowbie dungeons. To get right to the point how thunderstomp stacks up now is really the same way it stacked up before. Thunderstomp is a massive burst AE threat-generating machine. That means that if you have more then a few AEers and you want to clear an area but need them to be off of you and your group for little while, you grab your monkey, thunderstomp, AE like mad and congratulate yourself on the piles of dead bodies. With a 1min - 42-second cooldown it should not be horrible to just move from one group to the next, depending on set up time.
Do use:
-To generate burst AE damage and threat
Do not use:
-As a continues threat generation tool.
Scorpid
Scorpid Poison (5yd) 30 Focus Instant 4 sec cooldown
Stings an enemy for 55 Nature damage over 10 sec. Effect can stack up to 5 times on a single target.
Scorpids were once considered one of the main PvP pets for hunters. The 5 stack of poison that the scorpids stacks on a player would make it so that even with abolish poison it would be difficult to get to the hunter’s sting there by making it easier to Viper sting any of the healers or mana DPSers. To be honest that’s still what I would mainly recommend them for. Though the scorpid is not in the cunning tree, the fact that it is in the tenacity tree still makes it so that they are innately harder to kill, albeit less threatening then a cunning pet. You can also use a scorpid for a single target threat much like the Boar. You could even have it switch targets continually to have it keep threat on multiple targets; the 4-3second cool down makes it considerably less difficult with a 10sec duration (slightly complicated). There are also other pets that fill the capacity of multiple target tank with out the complexities if that's your style.
Do use:
-To help keep your stings from being dispelled.
-To keep threat on one to maybe three targets
Do not use:
-On anything that needs to be CCed as it is a DoT.
Turtle
Shell Shield 10 Focus Instant 3 min cooldown
The turtle partially withdraws into its shell, reducing damage taken by 50% for 12 sec.
Turtles are great for to reducing damage in general when used in conjunction with Roar of Sacrifice. The cooldown is slightly daunting but the duration and 50% decreases more then makes up for it. If you're looking for a pet to use when you are not familiar with the situation and think you might need an extra oomph a turtle is a great choice. With a 3min-2min 6sec cooldown you could probably use this ability about twice a boss fight or about every other pull.
Do use:
-As an emergency help in damage mitigation.
Do not use:
-When your main goal is high threat and not damage mitigation.
Warp Stalker
Warp (30yd) Instant 15 sec cooldown
Teleports to an enemy up to 30 yards away and gives the pet a 50% chance to avoid the next melee attack. Lasts 4 sec.
Warp is kind of like a funky Charge only with a longer range, and it's mitigating damage instead of increasing it, which kind of works since it's in the tenacity tree. The biggest difference in Warp vs Charge is actually more to the fact that you can use warp when your pet is actually attacking the target. That means that your pet can get a no focus cost 50% chance to dodge every 15-11 seconds, which is pretty awesome.
Do use:
-As a tank pet, that can get to its target quickly.
-As a tank pet, with a extra damage mitigation.
Best when not used for:
-For high continues aggro purposes.
Worm*
(Please note this is an Exotic pet and you MUST have the 51pt BM talent to tame it)
Acid Spit(30yd)40 Focus Instant 20 sec cooldown
Your worm spits acid at an enemy, causing 48 to 66 (Rank 6) Nature damage and reducing its armor for 30 sec.
Focus:
(Focus calculations based on WotLK information and assume that Focus will regen like Energy and Mana [considering that focus is just a fancy way of saying 'a pet's energy' that assumption really isn't going that far.])
Focus Hunter Spec
Obviously, the spec that you have as a hunter affects the effectiveness of your pet. Beast Mastery having the most talents that affect their pet, shocking I know, and survival having the least (although I could see them making hunting party also generate focus).
Now I'm not actually going to cover EVERY talent that improves your pets’ skills since I actually figured in a bit of it in just explaining the pet abilities. That being said Focus is unavoidable in how you manage your pet and how it's going to be able to effectively use its abilities, which means it gets its own section. :-)
Beastal Discipline
Go for the Throat
Focus Generation
So far, focus generation has been straightforward. Now we enter Go for the Throat (GftT).
GftT is based off the hunter’s crit. So the hunter gets 25 or 50 focus (depending on how many points you put in it) every time s/he crits. Now if you take the average hunter with shot rotations, weapon speed crit chance etc. You tend to average around 1 shot every 1.2 - 0.7 seconds, and about 20%-40% crit rating. (this is semi factoring in pots, traps, debuffs etc) All this means is that a hunter can average a crit about once every 8-2seconds, but for simplicity sake we're going to average all this and say 4. (consequently if you were to just work off the average and not figure in when your crits are happening or the focus that your pet can't hold and therefore wouldn't be counted your pet would generate an additional 125 focus every 10 seconds)
So by now you might be thinking "WOW that's awesome, I'm generating a quarter to HALF my pets focus bar every 4 seconds?!?!? That's amazing screw focus generation I'm going to have more focus then I know what to do with!!"
WRONG
Here is how it actually works: For those of you that hate calculating numbers I've written how it works in a Story and in math. Therefore, if you hate math you can read the story and skip the math. If you love math can skip the story. I do recommend the story since it is much easier to understand. While for those of you who want to skip focus generation and go straight to focus management you can skip down to that as well.
Story: For a moment stop thinking about WoW and think about those small packs of M&M bags you can buy at the store. In any given pack of M&M's you have a verity of colors red, green, blue, purple whatever. Now if you were to dump out that bag of M&M's and see how many you had of each color you would probably have more of one then another, infact you might have only two reds, no greens eight blues five purples and nine browns. However; if you were to buy say 20 M&M bags and dump them all out on the floor putting all the colors together you would end up getting roughly the same amount of each color in total (if you don't believe me try it out), the more bags you bought the more it would end up averaging out. This is how percentages work. You have an amount of chance (say 20%) of getting one color out of five every time you take an M&M out of your M&M bag. It would be nice to think that since you have a 20% chance that you will end up getting an even amount of each color since that would seem to be the most likely out come, but just like the real life M&M bags with hunter crits, you would be just as disappointed. You are in fact (using M&Ms to hunter crits) not actually even getting out a single M&M every 1.2 seconds you're actually grabbing one, then three, then two. The times between shots and the amount of shots, you make at a given instant fluxuates based on abilities and even your auto shots (or the M&M's you eat). In addition, if you were to think of crits as a single color, say red, then you probably would not be getting one red M&M for every five you grab. Infact in any five given M&M's you could actually be grabbing zero to five red M&Ms each time, and even if you did grab five red M&Ms at once it will still eventually average out over time and the amount that you eat would come to the same percentage.
To sum up my little story it means that the most likely scenario of your pet generating extra focus is that you would actually get a couple to even several crits in a short amount of time. That your pet can only hold 100 focus at ANY given time. You would then end up generating more focus then your pet can use or even hold onto and after your little spurt, you would likely generate NO extra focus for quite some time leaving your pet focus starved and unable to use its abilities so that it can generate either threat or damage or both.
Math: In order to get your own chance to crit, during a given amount time, you have to take the amount of shots you make, Arcane SS Multi etc, then add in how often your auto-shot goes off. You then take that number and use the percentage that you would not crit, and times that number to the power of the amount of shots you took.
Example: pure SS rotation with a 3-second auto shot and we'll say a 25% chance to crit the equation would look something like this:
2 second SS x 3second Auto-shot = 6seconds, 6/2 + 6/3 = 5 shots in 6 second you then take 6/5 and get 1 shot about every 1.2 seconds on average. You would then take the number of shots you made at any give time, so 6 seconds and 5 shots, then you calculate your chance of NOT getting a crit; we've stated this as a 25% giving us a 75% chance to NOT crit. You then calculate that by multiplying it to the power of the amount of shots you took so o.75^5 OR 0.75x0.75x0.75x0.75x0.75 = 0.23737)... if you then take that and reverse it you have about a 76% chance to crit at least once in those 6 seconds, 94.4% chance in 12 seconds (for at least one crit.)
The equation given is an example, in order to truly get a good idea of your chance to crit over a given amount of time you would have to literally calculate each shot as its happening. Every calculation is also just as blatantly relative considering that even with a 1% chance to crit it is still possible that it will crit or that with a 99.9% chance to crit that it is still possible it will NOT crit. It does however give a good picture to people who enjoy math and yet still somehow view a percentage chance to crit as a likelihood at any kind of pinpoint rate.
The reason why this is all so important to understand in focus generation is that it gives you a good idea of about WHEN you will be able to use your pet abilities. For a hunter a percentage chance to crit is always a good thing it can never hurt their damage to do more damage (unless that extra damage draws aggro, but that is what FD is for). For a pet, a percentage chance to gain a pre-determined amount of focus is bad. Granted focus is focus and so any addition is better then no addition at all. Nevertheless, that being said, with an addition happening randomly it means that any hunter will not be able to exactly determine if they can even use their focus dump abilities on a regular basis. It is then even more difficult to determine the likelihood of a hunter being able to use higher cost ability at any given time except for the guaranteed time of a pets base focus generation. (1 focus every 0.1 seconds for any hunter 2 focus ever 0.1 second for a hunter with Bestial Discipline)
Focus Management:
Helpful Macros
There are 4 macros in which you can use to help manage your pet abilities.
/use _______
/petautocaston ______
/petautocastoff _______
/petautocasttoggle ______
The worst thing about any of the /petautocast macros is that they have no modifier other then the command its self. /use can use modifiers but it's like clicking the ability and therefore requires a bit of attention time.
You could use /petautocasttoggle ____ for all of your abilities and make a sudo pet bar where you could just toggle on and off the auto casts.
You could also mix some /petautocasttoggle pet ability buttons with some /use ___ buttons with a few modifiers (such as [modifire:alt] different pet ability)
alternatively, you could do something like this:
Focus Dump:
/petautocaston Claw/Bite/Smack
/petautocaston Wolverine Bite/Rabid
/petatuocasttoggle Growl/Cower
/petautocastoff Intervene/Bullheaded
/petautocastoff Roar of Recover/Call of the Wild/Roar of Sacrifice
Bullheaded/Intervene
/use Bullheaded/Intervene
/petautocaston Bullheaded/intervene
/petautocastoff Claw/Bite/Smack
/petautocastoff Wolverine Bite/Rabid
Roar of Recover/Call of the Wild/Roar of Sacrifice
/use Roar of Recover/Call of the Wild/Roar of Sacrifice
/petautocaston Roar of Recover/Call of the Wild/Roar of Sacrifice
/petautocastoff Claw/Bite/Smack
/petautocastoff Wolverine Bite/Rabid
Family Special
/petautocasttoggle Family special
/petautocasttoggle Family special
/petautocasttoggle Family special
/petautocasttoggle Family special
/petautocasttoggle Family special
The Pet ability/Different Pet Ability means that it's in a different tree and I therefore expect you to make a different macro. Though Technically the largest one (Focus dump) is very large by two lines. Therefore, you could probably fit in the other macros into just one and only have three different ones for the Focus Dump, maybe only two. (I would probably put these macros on the side bar and then bind my number pad to them then for the 3 different focus dumps bind the 3 buttons to the same number key just with ctrl+NP and alt+NP.
The idea behind these macro's is that you could just turn off your focus dump abilites inorder to que your higher focus cost bet abilites.
This is just my own idea; there are many different ways to macro pet abilities.
Problems
The biggest problems I've seen with the pets are:
-Go for The Throat. (the percentage to add a big block of focus is just so bad)
-Pet macros limitations
-There are also several pets that fill very very small and specific niches to almost none at all (such as the Serpent) these pets might want to be looked into.
Suggestions
-For Go for the Throat: Just make it so that the pets generate focus over a small period like 2.5-5 seconds (as a buff). Then make it so that if the hunter crits again in that time that it just adds another 2.5-5sec buff. (In example of what to do: Like if two different druids cast Rejuvenation on one tank, one druid's Rejuvenation would not refresh the other, therefore a hunter could crit two times and the extra buff would not refresh or affect the other.)
-Another idea for GftT to have more a likelihood to not waste focus would also be to simply increase the amount of focus a pet is able to hold (like 200 instead of 100)
-For pet macros: Just make it so that /petautocast____ worked like any of the other /use or /cast macros so that a hunter could just use three to four buttons for all their pets and pet families it would probably be enough since you would be able to turn auto cast on and off with a button. Then hunters should be able to manage their pets focus without too large of a problem.
Misc:
If you want to add anything to my guide, have comments, or suggestions then you can e-mail me at Soilgheas@gmail.com