I think the most important thing to consider is not whether Mikari's Pet's DPS is too high (after all it's rather close to what we can predict with the models we have), but rather why the hunter's personal DPS is so _low_.

Did Mikari have high latency? This wouldn't affect the pet so it'd skew the balance.

I agree with you. If this is what Blizzard is planning for BM's, I like it.

Now, all hunters need to manage their pet on pet-unfriendly fights, and BMs will definitely lose more of their dps on these fights than MM/Survs. But that's balanced by BMs outdpsing MM/Survs on pet-friendly fights. So, no one spec then ends up being the best spec for all boss fights. That makes the game more interesting to me.

Not really. It just means that the BM Hunter gets swapped out on pet-instagib fights, and SV/MM are not welcome.

What you refer to as double dipping affects all hunters, not just BM, and all of our dps gets balanced around it because all of our damage gets balanced around the pet being out and attacking. It's not new to this expansion. Plus this only applies to buffs, which are limited. Gear accounts for more of a boost over the course of an expansion cycle, and that scales more slowly for pets. The buffs are going to be the same (roughly) from the beginning of the expansion to the end, so while pets may start out strong (mostly because we're used to them not scaling very well at all), they even out. If, for example, you get 1000 AP in upgrades between Day one of the xpac and the near-final Arthas patch, your pet doesn't double dip. It gets 20-30% of that (my apologies for forgetting the exact number), because you can't directly equip the pet with the same gear as the hunter for boosts the way you can give both a hunter and a pet a Battle Shout. Additionally, there are some buffs (encounter buffs, zonewide buffs) that don't affect the pet at all.

Now, the scaling modifiers (happiness, pet tree, BM tree) may boost that number, but those are akin to any damage boost that effectively boosts the "coefficient" you get from an ability. We have to keep in mind that the pet jump is going to appear pretty huge at first, because we're going from 0% scaling on pet abilities to well, something. Aside from the DoT portion of Rake apparently having a bugged coefficient, it seems too early to tell whether things are way off. Even Mikari's numbers don't tell us much about what the other classes were doing gear/skill-wise or how things will look as they scale up. GC (or was it Koraa) did say that their data/testing shows hunters as the "kings of dps" so they are certainly taking a look at it in the dps passes.

I wouldn't trust that 15% figure too much. If BM hunter pets went from 30% to nearly 50% of total damage then it's likely that MM/SV pets are going to increase their share as well. BM isn't the only tree with new pet dps talents. As for the loss of the pet dealing a more severe blow to BM hunters, that isn't new, either. Plus, people have been harping about how the end BM talent "only" adds survivability, but maybe this is a signal that people should start caring more about those kinds of things to hedge against the risk of losing so much of your damage when the pet dies. Plus, they've made it easier to recover pets mid fight.

Perhaps. The exact details will matter. Maybe the raid needs the extra AOE dps and mana regen of SV. Maybe BM skill can reduce the chances of pet giblets. Maybe the new MM talents will make it more attractive...

Latency is in the 400-500 range due to it being a server hosted in the US, I also don't have an epic ranged weapon, and a few other slots haven't been replaced by naxx gear. TBW is currently broken in beta currently also, with a 1.17 minute cooldown on Bestial Wrath I'm sure that's a good chunk of personal dps also.

That's basically exactly what i was saying. The special is probably one of the best pet specials there is but that isn't what is causing pets to put out almost 2000 dps.

Pets put out such massive DPS numbers because of their melee attack. They scale extremely well with AP/%-based modifiers, which pet's get aplenty (through talents/abilities and buffs).

And not forget Frenzy + Cobra Strikes. All that haste really stacks up in the end. Even with more with Windfury Totem.

The upside is that with BM you always have the ability to rez your pet quickly, and with extra talent points from Beast Mastery you can grab heart of the phoenix (which is bugged currently, you can rez your pet within 7 minutes (due to longevity) but you get a 10 minute debuff to keep you from using it again )

Sartharion isn't so much a skill check as a "did your pet happen to pat correctly this time" check. From my experience:
1st death: I recall pet to me, he runs into a tail swipe, gets punted and crispified
2nd death: I recall pet to me, he pats and ends up slightly behind me and crispified again
I stopped rezzing after that.
Not exactly a fun encounter for BM. Now if you could say heal your pet through the damage, that I might call skill, having to actually do something proactive to insure your pet's survival and thus your dps. Rather than doing something proactive (recalling your pet) and hoping it aligns itself correctly with you. I'd much prefer the type of fight where good attention to your pet nets you benefits (like Felmyst, if you are really on top of it you can keep your pet up) vs. the type of fight where bad pathing/luck means a dead pet (Like Archimonde where even if you don't use your pet you can both get feared and watch your pet b-line straight into a doomfire). At the time I was using a devilsaur, and yeah the massive hitbox is probably an issue (I've watched him melee from about 20 yards behind a boss, it's like the Tauren hitbox x10, quite amusing). I have no idea what to do about Sapph, it's pretty much find iceblock-> jiggle pet into position put on stay -> pray. I'm hoping they fix both encounters to where speccing 3/3 avoidance lets your pet live, though at low health, so you still have to manage the pet, but aren't subject to 1 shots.

As for BM, from my own experience in 10 mans, and practice dummies, it's the highest single target dps output spec for hunters when they hit 80. I think this is largely due in part to how well pets scale from raid buffs more than how much a hunter's pet scales with gear. On a longer time scale, with better gear it'll likely flatten out. Right now they seem incredibly strong due to the flat increases from raid buffs. In essence I think, and fervently hope, SV and especially MM will catch up to / surpass BM.

Was just talking to my hunter buddy and thought of something. Before people scream nerf pets or anything like that, people need to realize that while a hunter pet may be doing 2000 DPS now, thats about all they'll do throughout the expansion. A BM hunter with T7 equiv gear's pet is doing 2000 DPS now, however, when that hunter is in T9 gear or so, that pet will still probably only do maybe 200 or so DPS more, and that is months from now. I know they are scaling really well with AP right now, but part of that is really coming from the buffs in a raid, and not so much from the hunter. Not saying they don't get a good chunk of the hunter's AP and such, but they don't scale nearly as well with us as they do from the raid buffs and the like.

Granted, this could be completely wrong. However, all I am saying is a BM hunter's pet's damage isn't going to go up nearly as much as the actual hunter's is as it gets gear. So other classes will probably catch up as the gear gets better.

Apparently I was beat, didn't read the last part of the post above mine. =(

I found myself able to heal my pet through 10-man Sartharion lava wave rather easily, though in one my wasp was able to avoid all but 1 lava wave due to my positioning. In 25-man I believe the damage on the lava wave is ramped up though.

For Sapphiron, I'd just call my pet back and dismiss it when Sapphiron is taking off. Then recall it when Sapphiron lands. The problem would arise if YOU end up getting icebolted before your dismiss finishes.

And for the record? On Heigan, I find it easier to have my pet behind me during the dps phase, and to toss a mend pet on it and have it melee Heigan through the dance. The aoe does trivial damage to a pet, and mend pet covers it (the pet's health won't drop below 75% if you toss a second mend pet on it towards the end of the dance).

The main problem with rezzing a pet mid-fight is, of course, if it dies it loses all its buffs, which is a fair bit of a DPS loss. Though it will regain some of them (totems and possibly battle shout, triggered buffs and etc), so that's one reason to minimize pet death. Even with Heart of the Phoenix this is a concern. Still, it's better than no pet at all.

Of course, the easiest way to handle this would be to simply make abilities like the Sapphiron instagib breath and Sartharion's lava wave not affect pets, like so many other abilities do not. I don't know if Blizzard will do that though.

The damage is, I believe, 1000 every second for 10 seconds, in addition to some initial damage. Your mend pet won't outrace it, but the pet should come out alive. That's in 10 man. I believe the damage is almost 3 or 4 times that in 25 man.

Hi, im following this thread from the very beginning, because i dont have a Beta Account myself to keep me up to date.
Now how come you see this high Pet DPS like its working as intended ?
I really hope they get the Pet DPS/Scaling down to what it is now and start focussing the Hunters DMG on ranged abilitys.
Is there any hint in a blue Post that I missed where its confirmed this high dps from Pets is wanted?
I raided Naxx with my Hunter pre BC and through BC I played a Mage so im not very up to date just starting, because I want to go with the Hunter in wotlk. What i remember is the Pet being a good DoT and nothing more while doing good dmg with MM/SV and I hope for this 2 Trees it´ll go be like the good old times.

Oh its worse than that.

Currently, pets can have 90 resistance to all easily.
In LK, pets will have 80 resistance at level 80.

If you take 3/3 resistance talent, 9% damage reduction, your pet will take the same percentage of damage that he did in BC. Non-damage effects will obviously be more effective against it because the actual resistance is lower (as a percentage of maximum as well as absolute).

And of course in BC you could go higher than 90, too.

(Don't want to sound too negative, but this is something I pointed out as an issue very early, shut up about while pet resistance was level*1.5 and am now very concerned about again)

Don't count on it! BM was the number one DPS spec for all of BC, and at the moment this does not actually look likely to change. I, for one, fervently pray it does not. I do not want a return to the bad old days of yore, when only MM/Surv was a viable spec and BM was mocked more severely than Ret Pallies ever have been.

I'm still a tad bitter.

Subject to the pet changes to survivability promised by blues and the probable adjustments and balancing to DPS classes yet to come.....

I'm a huge fan of where our pet to hunter damage ratios seem to be (thank you for the data Mikari) as I had always been hopeful that BM hunters would indeed be Beast Masters, Marksman hunters would be more self focused and Surv hunters would have other survivability tricks (not sure how this will actually pan out in LK). Having two trees more focused on player DPS and one tree more focused on pet damage (50/50 is a secsi balance imo) gives us some variety and options for PvE, raiding, BG's and to a (much) lesser extent Arenas.

Does anyone have any similar reports to Mikari's for MM or Surv hunters for the same or similar encounters? I'd love to see some general data to compare - clearly there will be differences in spec, gear, raid composition, skill etc. It would be great to at least get a feel for Hunter vs Pet DPS comparisons.

On the other hand, some of us are concerned how at how ridiculous BM is now, compared to the other specs and other classes. It's actually exceeding what SV could do with the 20% scaling Explosive Shot, and we all saw what happened to Explosive Shot. It's beating every other class/spec by hundreds of DPS currently, which runs fairly contrary to stated design intentions. I'm not even going to touch the personal preference bit of feeling that BM is less interesting to play than a Destruction Warlock, which is saying something.

Couple more questions for you, Mikari:
What spec was Hunta on that Patchwerk kill?
Were they geared comparably to you?
Do you have, or are you willing to provide, some parses of your dps as either SV or MM? I'm sure a lot of us without a level 80, PvE-geared hunter would love some numbers on the other specs in an actual raid environment; premades are well and good, but they leave me with less AP and hit than your pet and no raid synergy, so they're not terribly effective for comparing specs that may scale in different ways.

I think we need more data before we can make definitive judgments--obviously, solo-buffed on test dummies is not syncing up very well with an actual raid environment. Maybe I'll see if I can generate some later...

I'd like to use the devilsaur, but its huge model sometimes causes me problems. I remember at one point when I was questing in buildings, the devilsaur would clip through the ceiling and aggro mobs on the level above :P Made for an interesting experience.

a) Pet threat won't be an issue unless they do a very substaintial fraction of our dps - into the 70% range. That won't happen (I don't think it's even that high in beta with a cat). If they are lower, other classes would be pulling aggro first.

b) Blessing of salvation doesn't exist anymore, all tanks just produce that much more threat.

c) 2k dps isn't a big number anymore (not that I expect it to remain where it is).

d) Yeah, I doubt bm hunters will be needing to feign.

Oh dear. I kind of assumed the size change was just applied to the model and not the hit box. That's interesting.

Is that the actual damage, or after taking Avoidance into account?



This is unrelated, but I wish they would make the Silithid Wasps tamable in addition to the Zangarmarsh and Ayamiss models.

I wish they would classify AoE-applied DoT's as AoE spells on the pet, so Avoidance works for them. Random secondary target spells should also count to Avoidance, in my opinion.

I assume the DoT from that dragon fight you're talking about is similar, and doesnt take Avoidance into account. (much like the DoT from pre-Najentus elemental trash, or those Blood Mages AoE spell on the way to Terron, etc.)

I've done both Sartharion and Sapphiron recently and on Sartharion the lava dot was doing 2000 a second per second on the pet, it is healable if you mend pet immediately. As for Sapphrion there was a few times where my pet didn't path behind the ice properly and the bomb didn't instagib the pet, maybe it got changed recently?

As for threat, tanks generate so much I haven't had to FD on bosses at all really.