Note to BlizzardFollow

My point exactly...



I challenge you to find where I wrote that. It is unwise to edit a quote because it is no longer a quote if you do so.

This makes little sense.



I know, look down..

See above.

My whole post is about unique abilities.
Warlocks are a lot more than their minions, IMO hunters rely more on their pets than locks. Also minions require no upkeep.


I never said it would be easy.



No need to patronise, you misunderstood, I mean make the abilities that pets currently have free.
They are not free even though they come with the abilities, thats why they start with a negative TP value.

IIRC, LB still scales with RAP. I believe, however, that the 1:1 ratio of spelldamage gains was changed.

There was a thread about it on the o-boards a week or so ago; I can't remember exactly what it was about, but it was something like that.

I don't use a Windserpent so I wouldn't know.

Casters still suck... They will still only have 100 focus and it is the focus that they will use for LB. So all in all they will have less HP and Armor than their no caster cousins.

Check Petopia to tell you where to get the non Caster version in the skin you desire.

I hope that helps.

Yeah, you still don't want a caster windserpent.

I have one of the two rare white ones which aren't casters. If you're looking for a unique skin, pick up one of the non-caster greens. I've NEVER seen anyone running around with one of those. Again, Petopia is your friend.

Note sure if anyone brought this up already or not, and if they did I apologize for parroting it. I only got about halfway through all the posts on this topic, and frankly, it's the crack of dawn and I'm so tired I'm about ten minutes away from drooling stupidly.

What I wanted to throw out is this question: Is the "uniqueness" the OP spoke about an actual in-game, mechanic ability, or just a cosmetic change? I saw mention of a mob 'leaping'. The impression I'm getting is not that he's saying 'a whole new ability' so much as 'different animations'. Certainly, Blizzard could program elite/named mobs with their own special animations. Have this leaping mob and a boar; both use the Dash, receiving the same effect, but instead of running forward quickly, the 'leaper' simply appears to jump. Not an actual change to the ability at all.

In that sense, pets could be unique. They would seem cooler for your efforts, while not being any performance fashion.

-If- the OP really -does- mean abilities like pre-normalization...well, then ignore me. I did claim I was stupid-tired.

the only thing i'd like on the area of pets is that basilisks and more other beasts become tameable.
because damn those zangar basilisks look cool.

there are still a lot of "beasts" untameable, those i want to tame some day.

i have to go both ways for one yes hunters getting nerfed in that way suxs, but on the other hand there is still one pet that i know that still is below the curve and plus i agree the other posters its not that big of a deal seeing as most of the pet cats=prowl, boar=charge, birds=dive, cant quite think of the other off the top of my head. All im trying to say is we just need to suck it up and show wow that were are still good even being that nerfed.

I just have a few points...

First, every pet should get dash/dive. Otherwise raptors and the likes get left in the dust. If they have dash/dive, they should get some other speed-boost (i.e. if boars didn't have dash it'd be okay because they have charge).

Second, to make some pets unique, what if it worked so that the HP/AC/DPS was modified a little? For example, cats have -2% health, +0% armor, and +10% DPS. So what if rare/elite cats had -5% health, -2% armor, and +15% DPS? Or if certain types of cats (like lions) had +1% health/armor, -2% DPS, (in comparison with other cats) where as some cats (cougars and panthers) had -1% health/armor, +2% DPS. This would make pets unique, but not specifically better.

Third, for more trainable pet abilities, how about attack speed increase? Rank 1 is trained at level 20, 5% increase, Rank 2 is trained at level 40, 10% increase, Rank 3, level 60, 15%, rank 4, level 70, 20%. The training points cost would be fairly high (similar maybe to same-level natural armor) to prevent you from going OMG DPS+TANKAGE! Now you can make your pet even more offensive or even more defensive.
OR an ability such as "Focused Discipline" or something, which would make a similar change to the second idea, which might give pets a base +1% to all stats, then -3% per rank below "medium" and +3% per rank above "medium". So wolves would just get +1% HP/AC/DPS, where bears would get +4% HP, +1% AC, and -5% DPS by having this passive on them.

Fourth, of course give every pet class a unique ability. But they're "working on that."

Fifth, every pet should have some tameable ability. Even if it's the same one for the class. I'd have tamed several pets to try out their class special, but they wouldn't have it or even anything, so those pets will get left out unless they look pretty. Of course this may be OP on the hunter side, so it's not all that important to me.

Sixth, as far as locks go, I think their VW has more HP/AC than we do. This is just based on lowbie experience, so I could be wrong. In VC my pet had less health and armor than a warlock's VW who was about 3 levels below me.

Seventh, it would be nice to tame some other pets. Especially basilisks, if they got the stun thing (could be used only every so often). It's fun though on my paladin hitting HoJ right as Crystal Gaze goes off so we're both stunned, but that's a different topic.

Eighth, it'd be nice if they found a way to give us some of the pets at in-between levels. Like ravagers. I'd prefer not having to tame one 30 levels below me or wait 20 levels just to get one.

I guess I had a lot of ideas, and I tacked a few on at the end, but the first four were really what I wanted to say. I feel those would make certain pets "different" without making them "better". You sacrifice some things to get more. If all of those got into play, you could get a bear with dash, more health, and less DPS.

EDIT:
On the trainable ability to increase attack speed, I'd also have it take up a slot (still be passive so you can't turn it off, but waste a slot), and also lower your one-hit-damage by 4%, so after investing in it you only get a 4% DPS increase at rank 4, rather than 20%.

Also, it would be nice to see a bigger variation between the classes. Right now, if you assume a base of 5000 HP, 5000 AC, and 100 DPS (just easy numbers to work with), a bear would have 5400 HP, 5250 AC, and 91 DPS. A cat would have 4900 HP, 5000 AC, and 110 DPS. While the HP and AC is fairly close, the DPS is different. SO maybe if cats had like 500 less HP/AC in the given example, and 5 more DPS, where bears had 500 more and 5 less, or something similar. As it is right now, the difference is minimal and really doesn't make cats any less better at tanking, but they are so much better at DPS.

EDIT EDIT:
For the second idea mentioned above in my post, make it so that rare mobs are more diverse (i.e. farther from "medium") and elite pets were more centered (closer to "medium"). I know I threw out about 6 different ideas on how to make them more diverse in their stats but I think they're all balanced (or would be after a month of testing rather than a minute of guessing, but the base idea is balanced) and would give hunters more of a variety, not less.

Edited, Apr 2nd 2007 12:14pm by skribs

Edited, Apr 2nd 2007 12:20pm by skribs