Pets and Raids

[farslayer77]

Played around with a warlock today . My pet vanished 3 times for no discernable reason I could see. Also noted that wandering around to see the sights is a bad idea P By the time I got to stormwind my gear was useless and I was broke P. Note to self follow the linear progression of quests and zones or go broke exploring . :p

Kind of discouraging in light of the fact that I like to push the envelope and experiment with a character. :lol: Will wait till the death tax gets toned down substantially. Having a few linkdeaths could put a big dent in the bank account in a hurry.

Anyways the pet poofing thing was not a big deal at low levels. A post by a raid warlock about pets on raids got my attention though. Apparently pets get slaughtered by AOE effects. So its mister imp or nothing on raids atm. I hold out hope for warlocks getting some adjustments down the road for raiding pets.

Hopefully some longtime pet players from previous mmporgs can make some suggestions /nudge Akasha P.

[Akasha]

*nearly falls over from the nudge*

I've made a couple of suggestions in game relating to the pets, but I try to remember that they probably get sick of hearing "In EQ the pets were...." ;) I'm assuming (correct me if I'm wrong) that the Imp was the pet that kept disappearing? He probably got eaten, check for any mobs that look like they are licking their lips.

I'm glad they tweaked the pets so that when running they kept up with you, and so long as you have them on Passive they won't run off to attack things. I'm not sure if it's intended or bugged at the moment but the Felhunter doesn't keep up as well as the other's. I know I loose my pets if I jump off a cliff, as it's still in game that if you get too far away they will poof... or if you're really lucky (and you send your pet into attack a mob at the bottom of the cliff while he is at the top) you get this massive train! So... I've heard :oops:

Running at lower levels to sight see is not the best of idea's haha, but at higher levels I say go for it! Course running through Stranglethorn at level 20 isn't the best idea... just trust me on that one.

I haven't been on a raid yet (obviously) but I know that in general AoE's tend to munch my pet... something I was just thinking about last night. I know pet's used to be hit with the mana song ( or what ever it was that Paladin's had ) but since they changed Pally's around I'm not sure if it still works like that. *Looks at Thor*

Last night I had the Felhunter out (while his spell is bugged I am SO in love with this pet) and we were getting mobs that were doing some AoE's. I noticed he went down a little faster than I did when hit, but then he only has 919 HP's atm. Warlocks don't have any resists spells, and we can't make our pet's drink potions to absorb some of the damage (depending completely on what each mob cast) so on a raid they are somewhat useless.

From talking to a couple of members from a raiding guild I have been told that Imps are really the only option. If you summon a pet that does damage (Succubus or Felhunter) then they get munched by the AoE and you spend more time resummoning them than doing any damage yourself. If you summon a Voidwalker to tank off adds then he either has to be so far away from the AoE mobs that you risk getting more adds, and that's if you're lucky enough to not have the mob he's tanking casting an AoE. Over all the Voidwalker last a little better than the damage mobs, but as he does crappy damage he's again, not really worth it.

I know that a couple of the raiding Warlocks have tried all having Succubus and Felhunters to try to interrupt the casting of the AoE.. (Imaging 5 Warlocks with 5 pets that can interrupt, even with refresh you can still do it) but a couple of misses and bye bye pets. Guild leaders just aren't wanting that downtime / risk so it's Imps only.

It's a hard one to balance... make them more resistant to spells and they become overpowered, all of a sudden you will have raiding guilds with 20 pets to do the damage. You could possibly make their resistances work off what ever yours were, but given they are not pets like in EQ (their demons you are controlling) that probably wont sit well with the role-players / story line followers. We can't give them gear like in EQ (not saying that's a bad thing ;) ) so giving them resist items is kinda out. At this stage, to be honest I can't think what really would be the best move to go.

Course the Infernal was meant to be our "raid pet" but don't get me started on that one :x

[farslayer77]

Yah stamp out the summoned gear for pets and it was essentially useless by the time we got it in EQ imho. SOE was consistent on pets for a long time though. They were either useless or died so fast to AOE's on raid level mobs. That they were not worth the bother may as well do some substandard nuking rather than waste mana on pets.

And with the shard storage stuff chain casting pets is not a viable tactic.
Coupled with the obilgatory keep a soulstone buff on a resser tactic. If it hasn't been used as a raid tactic yet it will be soon :p

To be fair we should have some DPS parses on the imp damage on raid mobs.

I just do not want see the warlock class be in the: thanks for asking but we have a warlock in our guild already category :p /random guild officer tells you "if you have ever considered rerolling we can always find room for another priest/wink :p

[Krizald]

I actually saw people levels 1-3 wandering around the Undercity. I had to bite my tongue and not ask them how they got there without getting dusted by one of the darkhounds wandering around outside. I agree that it's a good idea to follow the quest progression, but it never hurts to head off the beaten trail every once and a while. Just make sure you're not five levels below the local critters.

[Akasha]

If you're running to the city of your race.. IE running to Stormwind from the Human starting Area, that's relitevely simple. Running to Darnassus from the Human starting area.... yeah not so much. I ran to IF as a level 1 :-p But the tram helped with that.

Even though it only costs a couple of copper, I never repaired the newbie armor as you just loot replacements when you fight. ;)

[SeeEs]

Anyone tried exploring in the buff to cut durability costs? :oops:

[Fain]

This is exactly why I went full boom for my talents.. I had a overwhelming feeling that pets would be screwed in raids.

Happy more and more that my choice seems to be working in my favor, as the infernals are a toy and don't get boosted by anything in the other trees.

[Kegerdar]

My succubus dosent keep up with me very well, when i look back she is a mile away

[Akasha]

That's really interesting, and possibly a bug. I know, ages ago anyway, they patched in that Pets now keep up with owners and I never had any problems until I got my Felhunter. I just assumed he was fat :lol:

[Bullet]

If Blizzard don't make Warlock pets raid friendly then I will be forced to play two classes at once... Warlock being my first choice obviously, and a priest or some other char to raid with my guild. I did that in EQ when I stupidly made a Cleric alt which I leveled up and somehow it became my main without my consent.

They could make the Pet resists work off the owners, but I really don't to go back to "Raid at 8pm, make sure you wear your resist gear" :roll: I did 3 bank fulls of gear in EQ to cater to what ever we were raiding and I don't really want to be doing that again. Give me one maybe two sets of armor only please.

Felhunter's Spell Lock looks interesting though, maybe that will help with raids? And as far as Infernal / Doomguard being the raid pet... as they state at the moment the only thing it will be raiding is you