REALLY squishy pets

[Nyth]

lvl 120, admittedly only 280 item level I'm still finding the pets to be much squishier than before. I've been doing solely tenacity pets and I still have to heal rather often. Stag, Devilsaur, ect hasn't been any better. Anyone else had better luck?

Keep in mind that “tenacity” doesn’t mean “tank pet” anymore. Tenacity does give a bonus to pet and hunter health but it’s not as tanky as it used to be. Your best bets for tanking solo pets are actually pets from the ferocity group - namely core hounds, scalehides, and gorillas. My scalehide has been my favorite - he’s got a 1min cd damage reduction ability (50% for 12 sec) and all ferocity pets have hero and provide leech. I rarely have to mend my scalehide. Core hounds are slightly better I think but I hate core hounds personally.

This. Scalehide is definitely the way to go for contant farming. Best thing is that the 1 min CD is up practically every pack you pull and the leech scales very good with beastcleave meaning you can AoE tank quite well with a Scalehide (or Corehound if you prefer exotic pets).
Simply MD barrage everything on the pet, pop mend pet for some extra early healing and kick ass. Most important aspect is to never drop beastcleave. Beastcleave'd claw/bite/smack heals your pet up to nearly full every time it goes off, if one of the basic attack goes off without beastcleave your pet is likely to die.
You can also opt for clefthoofs/gorillas; but I found the 1 minute cooldown to be more consistent and up for nearly every pack.

Tenacity pets simply aren't tanky pets anymore. (Bit of a shame since turtles and several other tenacity pets make much more sense as tanks).
I somewhat hope blizzard fixes this, maybe by giving tenacity a different bonus (e.g. 100% extra healing received from mend pet) to make them better tanks; if not for AoE then at least for ST. A lot of these changes would have virtually no impact on end game PvE or PvP if done right.
ATM the only tenacity pet that can slightly hold it's own is the spirit beast due to the strong heal.

Tenacity is now the raid / mythic+ branch of the pets. The extra health and cooldown are quite good and you generally don't need BL for raids and for M+ you can swap between uses.
Cunning is still best for PvP and also really good for just running around or doing old content as the speed bonus adds up.

In that regard all pet talent branches still have their uses, only ferocity and tenacity are kinda swapped if you try to think of it in a logical manner.

[Rawr]

I think the best tanking pet so far is the Clefthoof, Stubs (Brokentoe) helps me solo things like the Blighted Monstrosity.

[Sukurachi]

Today was absolutely unbearable.
I was questing in Voldun, having hit 120 very recently, and I swear I had my finger on my pet heal button through every. single. fight.
Not against rares, not against bosses, not against scenario mobs.. these were just regular mobs for quests (of the "kill 12 adorable bunnies" sort).

I finally did one "boss" at the end of a particular quest chain, and even with a Warrior there helping, my pets died FIVE times during that fight. I had to rez them 5 times! That is preposterous.

It made me so angry I had to stop playing, and am now reconsidering continuing my subscription. The game is supposed to be fun. This was NOT "fun" in any way, shape, or form.

[WerebearGuy]

Putting my two pennies in for frustration. Wanted to use a cunning pet because I wanted my good ol' low-poly pterrordax pet out. I'm not used to my pet dying when a faint fart goes off, so I didn't really have mend pet ready. I managed to beat a rare with my lovable dinobat, but that was after two revivals. I swapped over to a freshly tamed ankylodon, and had literally zero issues. Whipped out a Spirit Beast, basically went afk due to security and confidence. Cute birb though? A meat grinder would've been a more relaxing trip than that.

I had to make sure I didn't boot up the beta, but then I realized we're on live servers now. Why does it still feel like an unfinished early beta?

[Sukurachi]

So there it is.
Blizzard has, in effect, made it difficult for me to use the pet I WANT to use by making it entirely incapable of handling regular mobs.
Like I said, today's questing SHOULD have been fun, the story was fun and all, but having to rez my pet 5 times in a fight so completely pissed me off that it took away ALL pleasure. I just logged out and played Solitaire instead.

[Rawr]

Well there are many pets with Shield Wall or Dodge to choose from till you get some gear, I suggest a Ferocity or Tenacity. I'm not sure what your gear ilevel is at so that's all I can suggest.

[Daetur]

So there it is.
Blizzard has, in effect, made it difficult for me to use the pet I WANT to use by making it entirely incapable of handling regular mobs.
Like I said, today's questing SHOULD have been fun, the story was fun and all, but having to rez my pet 5 times in a fight so completely pissed me off that it took away ALL pleasure. I just logged out and played Solitaire instead.

I sympathize, I really do- but I don't think it's unreasonable to expect a hunter to keep a stronger tank pet on hand for those tougher challenges. Many of those 3-man miniboss quest mobs like you describe having to rez your pet 5 times during are meant to be done by three players.

Asking a hunter to pull out a different pet if they want to solo it doesn't seem like an unfair trade, and with Mend Pet, your choice of pet should be fine for tanking regular quest mobs as long as you aren't overpulling in lesser gear. If you're having trouble with regular mobs, you need to get used to maintaining Mend Pet more judiciously, which isn't a terribly hard task- and is roughly equivalent to other classes' self-healing and self-maintenance abilities.

[Teigan]

I tend to run around with three categories of pet, at least: my photogenic screenshot pet, my favorite of the day/week/month and/or my newest, and one that can take a beating for challenging things. The photogenic one is a hawk and the flavor of the day is hexed goat. The tanky one is a scalehide. They're awesome, with having lust and a shield.

[GormanGhaste]

I may be in the minority, but I actually enjoy having to maintain my pet's health this expansion. Between Mend Pet and Exhilaration, all of my pets seem to do ok. Maybe I have a non-standard talent build? I don't know.

[Sukurachi]

My issue isn't with my pet dying during 3-man miniboss battles!
It's with REGULAR mobs.
The battle where I had to rez my pet 5 times, despite also having a Warrior with me on the fight, was a single-person mini-boss, not a multi-player boss.

My ilevel is just under 300 (if i recall, like 295 or something). I only hit level 120 a few days ago.

[Bashkarr]

I definitely have noticed that my cunning pets are made of paper, but for one or two mobs at a time they're manageable. I usually run with a plain ferocity wolf, however, and we have no problem tanking upwards of 4 or 5 mobs at a time as long as I'm paying attention and just have mend pet worked into my regular shot rotation as a use-on-cooldown. It's not much different from any other damage mitigation ability of any other class which you should have to use to solo play anyway-- you're healing your pet instead of yourself, but your pet is essentially an extension of your character so it's basically the same as a self heal. Currently at lvl 120 in about 289ish gear. The tenacity spirit beast with the self heal is nice, but that ferocity leech is a lifesaver, especially in big packs where you can spread the AOE beast cleave damage and bring in more leech heals.

[Valnaaros]

Part of it is gear. It gets a bit easier with higher gear. At 338 I am able to pull large groups and keep my wolf alive for a while.

And I agree with Gorman. I prefer having to work to maintain my pet's health rather than it being a bar that barely moves.

[Rykochet]

I was using a scale hide as a tanking pet. I have actually started using a Corehound instead. Their moltenhide ability also heals them for the damage it does because of leech. Moltenhide + beastcleave + mend pet I'm pulling around 8-10 non elites with pretty good success.

[Quiv]

beast cleave + frenzy stacks + leech does ALL THE HEALING

good point on the corehound though. I just wish I could stomach them!

[Khoovi]

I've found this too, and noticed a distinct difference after my legendaries shut down at 115, maybe I had got lazy and too much used to my extra heal from Roots of Shaldrassil, and extra pet clout from Apex Predator's Claw, but I've been playing BM for a long time and will happily leap into the fray and deal with many multiple assailants.

However I seem to have got squishier and squishier, till when I hit 120 there was a distinct anticlimax as I felt like a paper cannon at Upper Corlain ... barely managing 2 mobs at a time when normally I happily manage several toe-to-toe. Seemed to be constantly healing and resurrecting my pet, feigning death and trying to keep my own health up, and it was also taking soooooo long to take down each mob !

What gives ?

I will look more into that ferocity leech as above, thanks for the tips, and may try that scalehide but, I do like my other pets

[Quiv]

I jumped back on my nightborne hunter alt to level him some more and there was a stark noticeable difference in squishiness from before prepatch (Same gear, full heirloom etc). I died for the first time in I can't remember. At this point in the game, I have leveled so many alts that I take the same efficient paths each time, so I wasn't deviating from the norm. My ferocity pet and leech didn't help any at 94. 1 mob I'm fine, but if I grab more than 1, I'm sweating. I'm just glad I am in the realm of WoD treasure farming because once I hit Legion, its just gonna be invasion farming and I'll be done with him for a while. Still alarming though, this wasn't a problem pre-patch.

[Daetur]

My issue isn't with my pet dying during 3-man miniboss battles!
It's with REGULAR mobs.
The battle where I had to rez my pet 5 times, despite also having a Warrior with me on the fight, was a single-person mini-boss, not a multi-player boss.

My ilevel is just under 300 (if i recall, like 295 or something). I only hit level 120 a few days ago.

I haven't had any problems with non-elites pulled solo, even fresh at 120, and I don't use a Ferocity pet for routine play. Are you using Intimidate to stun and give your pet extra time to heal up, while keeping Mend Pet running at all times? Using Exhilaration to heal them to full when they get very low?

I'm a little baffled, because I just haven't had this experience with any of my pets, and my gear should have been pretty much the same as all of yours from 116- fresh 120.

[Thwip]

My issue isn't with my pet dying during 3-man miniboss battles!
It's with REGULAR mobs.
The battle where I had to rez my pet 5 times, despite also having a Warrior with me on the fight, was a single-person mini-boss, not a multi-player boss.

My ilevel is just under 300 (if i recall, like 295 or something). I only hit level 120 a few days ago.

I haven't had any problems with non-elites pulled solo, even fresh at 120, and I don't use a Ferocity pet for routine play. Are you using Intimidate to stun and give your pet extra time to heal up, while keeping Mend Pet running at all times? Using Exhilaration to heal them to full when they get very low?

I'm a little baffled, because I just haven't had this experience with any of my pets, and my gear should have been pretty much the same as all of yours from 116- fresh 120.

Actually, you are experiencing it if you are having to roll mend pet constantly. You just didn't realize. I've never spammed Mend Pet so hard in normal open world content in the last 8yrs as I have this go. If any of us are having to use Exhilaration just to keep our pets from dying, on simple open world pulls, that's not what that's really for. That's a self heal, not a pet heal. It's for emergencies to keep your own self from dying, but I find I've been using it way more and nearly on CD. I don't like spamming it on my pet as then I don't have my own defensive outside of Disengage and Feign Death. Disengage can be woefully unhelpful in areas with tight packed mobs. (LOOKIN' AT YOU NAZMIR) Also, Intimidate does not help if you pull 3+ packs of mobs, which is what most people are having issues with.

I'm also curious what you ARE using if not a Ferocity pet. For a while, I was using a Spirit Beast and having to use it's own heal on it to keep it up when I pulled more then 2 things. Not all of these instances were when I pulled things myself. Some were pats that landed on me while I was slowly killing things. (I feel like I'm constantly out of Focus. Can we have the build/spend style back? I hate Focus regenerating on it's own.)

I'm also going to preface that after I hit 310ilvl, that it didn't feel so bad with a Scalehide as well. I'm also going to say that I have not had a single issues soloing elites. It's just packs.

Quiv also has me concerned that lowbie leveling is going to be a bitch and a half now.

[Sukurachi]

Thwip answered better than I could.

[Rawr]

I'm sorry I just don't get the complaint about spamming MP as you only have to hit it once every 10 sec in a tough fight. I'm from the mind set of "I'm so glad it's not channeled anymore" so hitting it every now and again is fine for me. Also learning how much is too much is just part of playing, if more than one is too much then passive pull, LoS, Trap pull, do what you need to to only get that one or group up. Find a pet that works for you, there are so many options right now I'm not sure how anyone could feel "forced" to use one kind of pet. I actually enjoy the soft pets because them make you think about what you are doing, no more "MS/Barrage and area and done", should I save my Exil for myself or my pet, should I use a Tenacity for extra wiggle room or Ferocity for the Leech, should I passive pull the boss to me or can I take it with the extra mobs, if I MD that guy to my pet around the corner will the Pat get agroed too? I really enjoying this expansion. It's do-able