Pookie, Snuggles and Hobbes What Pet Should I Choose and Why?

So when deciding on my first post I tried to think of the most common question I see people ask on forums and blogs about their hunter.

"Hai I just made a NE hunter and am level 10 what pet should I use and why?"

And

"Hai I trained my pet with XxX is this good or is there something else I should use?"

Now while at first these seem like the typical noob questions that everyone flames and makes fun of in reality its probably one of the most important questions faced by a hunter. Possibly the most important. Now you can say questions of how x armor piece is going to improve my DPS or which ranged weapon is better are the most important. Realistically though these questions are answered over and over and can be backed up by statistics and numbers.

Slower weapon for pvp burst, high dps with good attack speed for raiding, more RAP higher crit more Mp5 Etc.

Heck it's been shown time and time again the best DPS by armor piece can be calculated via a spreadsheet taking into account everything from rotation to latency (see cheeky on the US forums). But what these sheets cant calculate is how your pet choice effects your playing. All of that aside your pet can have easily as much of an effect on your performance as you gear so why is asking about pets a bad question? Its not its a great question.

So after all that blah blah here's the Shifttusk take on what works for what situations:

1) Leveling - now its been a while since I leveled my hunter (ages actually) but for me there was one simple answer. BOAR. Boars used to have pretty low DPS but their ability to immobilize and cause high threat give newer hunters a ton of room for error while leveling. And their higher HP reduces downtime. Plus the immobilize isn't a bad deal for pvp at all.

2) Ima PVE Raider! - So this does somewhat fall into the realm of spreadsheets. Basically the rule of thumb is cat/ravager are the best unless the hunter is BM and reaches a gear mark. At around 25-27% unbuffed ranged critical a BM hunter will show a dps boost using a windserpent. Basically due to the fact that they proc enough GFTT to generate the focus to drive lightening breath. LB causes well more than 2x the dmg of claw but sucks up double the focus. Now one thing to note!

Lightening Breath Crit Rate SUCKS!

Claw is much better for maintaining Ferocious Inspiration. Using Cheeky's spreadsheet and a little testing I've seen about 30dps more using LB over claw. BUT my FI went from around 90% up time to about 75%. If you're in a high dps party in a longer fight the lower FI up time could mean an overall loss of raid DPS. Its nitpicking the numbers a bit but in addition to the dps they provide BM hunters are looked at as a party buff and you should pay HUGE attention to your FI. Unlike a mage or priest hunters need to work at keeping their buff up just like sunder armor and FF for druids.

3) Level 70 PvP - So here's my new domain. This is what I've been up to for about a month now and of course can use some tips at points. So what I've found is this:

Scorpions Pwn You!

Now sure did blizard nerf the ridiculously exploitable scorpid poison DPS for raiders? Of Course! Does this make the scorpion a little less effective in PVP. Sure I used to love the additional armor negating dmg on a warrior while kiting them but its not big deal.

So why a scorpion? It has no dash! It has significantly lower dps than a cat. and its UGLY!

Well lets look at a hunters strong points in arena play (arguably the most important pvp venue at 70). Hunter have many issues in arena but lets look at what they are currently good at and how the scorpion assists in this.

• Spreading Dmg and Wasting Healer Mana/GCD's on healing a non focused target or dispelling - So spreading dmg and wasting heals on a non focus can be attained with any pet really and multishot is a great asset for this. DMG spreading is one of the strongest points of a BM specced hunter in 2s/3s. Specced 41/20/0 a BM hunters multishot still packs a decent punch with mortal shots and his pet can be on an off focus target inflicting serious dmg. This forces a healer to split healing, spend more mana and possibly lead to a screw up in which you can drop the focused target or even the healer. I've had many an occasion where my pet has taken a significant chunk out of a healers HP pool where I have beastwrath/rapid fired onto the focus target. At this point he the healer has to heal the focus, drops to 20-30%hp due to the BW'd pet and i quickly hop onto the healer with arc/multi/auto and drop them. The second portion of this is where the scorpion excels. Lets say you put your pet onto a healer. Your pet is killed but his poison is ticking for the next 10 seconds on a close to OOM healer. This healer has to waste his GCDs cleansing the poison so he can get out of combat to drink. If paired with a rogue the opposing healer needs to spend a ton of mana cleansing your scorpid poison stack off a focus target to be able to clear off wound poison so he can heal effectively.
• Viper Sting Insurance - Viper sting, yep you know that spell pve players never use. That one that was never used in pvp at 60? Its one of your best tools in arena. Mana draining a healer means an eventual end to the heals our focus is receiving. But Druids, Paladins and Shamans can dispel viper sting. But since dispel mechanics are random a stack of scorpion poison on a target reduces the chance of dispel from 1/1 (100%) to 1/6(16%). With an only 8 second duration this really helps keep your viper sting effective at draining a caster (even offensive) and locking in a win.
• Keeping Biotches in combat. An OOM healer is far from done if they can get out of combat. Out of combat = time to drink. Drink = 800mp5. Drink = bad. What will end up happening is a healer will call for a ccer to get a pet off them or kill it. With scorpid poison even if your pet is CC'd or killed you have an aditional 15 second (10 sec poison duration plus 5 to get out of combat after last dmg) window to get a shot in on the healer to keep them from drinking. This is invaluable. It also keeps a dpser from being able to bandage for 10 extra seconds.

Now alot of people complain about a lack of dash for getting into combat fast. Heres the problem if your pet goes in without other dps going in. Your pet is going to die. He has 0 resilience and a smaller HP pool. Defend your pet in arena it is one of your most important tools.