5.2 Minipet Changes (selection of WHEE!)

[Kurasu]

There's a lot of changes, but here's the batch that especially made *me* hop up and dance.

Battle Pet Bandages now stack to 25 and are Bind to Account.

This still means my lone l'il Hordie doesn't get to do all the Pet Battles, but now I don't feel bad doing my pet dailies on almost anyone. Plus, I can send over some stacks of bandages to my other characters, rather than having to vendor them!

Level capped players will now have a chance to each Lesser Charms of Good Fortune after winning a pet battle versus a Pet within 5 levels of the highest level pet on their team. Higher level pets will offer a better chance to earn a Charm.

I do dailies, so I'm not *as* thrilled by this as others (I do a fair job of getting my stack) but for those who don't? This is going to be a very handy way! Although going to need to challenge your pets to do it. Not too hard, fortunately.

Winning a pet battle versus a team within 5 levels of the player's highest level pet will now award player experience.

Pet battling my way to 90! YES!

Fleeing a pet battle will no longer despawn the pet that was being battled, but doing so will now inflict some damage on the fleeing pet battle team.
Disconnecting from a pet battle will once again respawn the pets you were fighting.
Any pet that has been killed in a pet battle will now never respawn.

This? Was the *PERFECT* way, IMO, to fix that exploit. Now if a pet is killed, it *stays* killed; you can't just kill it by accident and pop back in. However, it lets you escape to 'save a rare' easily for someone, or if you disconnect by accident, you don't have to lose your pet. This is gorgeous, IMO.

Elite Battle Pets have been added to the game world. These rare pets will spawn alone against an entire team. A new quest has been added to track progress as these new pets are hunted down, and defeating that quest will award the new Red Panda pet.

In a word: *drool* I wonder if the red panda will be a color changer, or if they're planning to put more skins in.

[Maizou]

Fleeing a pet battle will no longer despawn the pet that was being battled, but doing so will now inflict some damage on the fleeing pet battle team.

I will probably stop pet battling if the damage is more than 2-3%.

Unless they make the CD on Revive Battle Pets 3-5 minutes.

Why?

Enter battle, don't get what you want, or you're leveling, and you didn't expect say a flying type to enter the battle, and know it can beat you. Forfeit? Damage. Fight? Damage. I ALREADY ON LIVE go through ~20 bandages a day doing the tamers in Pandaria. There just are not enough Stable Masters there. I'd rather not spend 5 minutes flying across the zone and back.

You essentially end up being screwed over if you want to help someone find a rare, or if you need to abandon a pet battle for any reason. Hell, I forfeit pet battles all the time on the tamers to change which pet starts for them. Now I'll have to spend an extra 2 hours a day on the tamers flying to stable masters in between just trying to get the right pet to start.

They say the CD is 8 minutes because they say you shouldn't be taking a lot of damage in that time-frame, but this new rule changes that completely. You WILL take SUBSTANTIAL damage over time, even if the damage is just something like 5% a pet per forfeit.

This was a HORRIBLE way to address this. Forfeiting, IMO, should simply make you unable to pet battle for like 10 seconds. A penalty WITHOUT making the player waste a bandage for being helpful and king to other players, or spend a few minutes going to a stable master. I'd much rather take a 10 second debuff preventing me from battling for those seconds.

[Kurasu]

Enter battle, don't get what you want...

.... then you fight it anyway. This use of 'abandon' is exactly the reason they're making a penalty for running away. This way, people hopefully won't use it as much for 'It's not a rare; I think I'll just abandon and go on to the next'. It gives more people a chance to get the others in the spawn, rather than one person running through.

I ALREADY ON LIVE go through ~20 bandages a day doing the tamers in Pandaria.

That's a lot of bandages for 7 tamers. Possibly, you might want to consider making up teams that are better able to handle the tamers, instead of zerg treatment?

You essentially end up being screwed over if you want to help someone find a rare, or if you need to abandon a pet battle for any reason. Hell, I forfeit pet battles all the time on the tamers to change which pet starts for them.

So do I. Constantly. And this just means that I will have to be more prepared for the battle to be able to swap out if the one who starts isn't the one I'm hoping for.

This was a HORRIBLE way to address this. Forfeiting, IMO, should simply make you unable to pet battle for like 10 seconds.

10 seconds, for me, isn't enough of a debuff for a situation like this. My own thought, originally, was around a 2 minute debuff. Fleeing wasn't made to be a completely penalty-free way of getting what you're hoping for. Instead, it was made to get people out of a battle they knew was going to kill them. I personally think a little damage is a perfect balance for it.

[Maizou]

.... then you fight it anyway. This use of 'abandon' is exactly the reason they're making a penalty for running away. This way, people hopefully won't use it as much for 'It's not a rare; I think I'll just abandon and go on to the next'. It gives more people a chance to get the others in the spawn, rather than one person running through.

I abandon a battle for multiple reasons.

NPC Scan goes off, and I deem the Rare more important than the 500 exp. Or I enter the battle, expecting all water types, and a wasp is in the battle with it, and I know that wasp can murder me, etc.

That's a lot of bandages for 7 tamers. Possibly, you might want to consider making up teams that are better able to handle the tamers, instead of zerg treatment?

Jade Forest, Wind Spirit, Kun-Lai, Townlong, Fire Spirit, Dread Wastes, Water Spirit, Krasarang, Valley, Vale, Earth Spirit. That's 11, not 7. I also 2 pet all of them for experience for pets I'm leveling. Sometimes RNG is not on my side, and a moth sleeps me 3 times in a row, or I miss 2 times in a row, etc.

If you had bothered to armory my character, you'd see I have quite the selection of level 25 pets. I have every team for the tamers planned out methodically so that I can 2 pet each of them. (Except the Earth Spirit, as I can't figure out a combo that can 2 pet it, and the only ones I've seen others manage it on involve Blizzard Store pets) Normally, I wouldn't mention this, but I take offense to someone assuming I just zerg everything in a game like I have to go as fast as I can.

And yes, I know I can save bandages by going to stable masters, however, stable masters in Pandaria are as far away from the tamers as you can get in almost every zone.

10 seconds, for me, isn't enough of a debuff for a situation like this. My own thought, originally, was around a 2 minute debuff. Fleeing wasn't made to be a completely penalty-free way of getting what you're hoping for. Instead, it was made to get people out of a battle they knew was going to kill them. I personally think a little damage is a perfect balance for it.

You're going under the assumption people only flee for rares. I ONLY have 5 more pets I even need rares for. Wild Jade, Golden Hatchling, Scourged Whelpling, and 2 others I can't remember. However, I DON'T forfeit when they aren't rare. Why? Because if they drop a stone, then I wouldn't need to hunt the rare.

There are many reasons someone can forfeit. The MAJOR one is helping someone. Do you REALLY think I'm going to abandon a battle that damages my pets to help someone else? My sincerity goes out the door if it inconveniences me to the point I have to spend more time recuperating. I have no trouble stopping to help someone track a rare hunter spawn. I have issues HURTING MY PETS to help someone get a rare.

If I run into another rare Gilded Moth in 5.2? Sucks to be anyone who needs one. All 3 of the Rare Gilded Moths are being beaten by me for EXP (Sure, I could just beat the one and tell everyone else where the rares are, but after all, with Blizzard's logic, I wouldn't want to be helpful, now would I?). This is counter productive to the whole forfeit respawns the pet thing they're adding. It's being done to help players help others. But by causing it to damage us? A vast majority of players would rather take the EXP then help someone else. If I'm going to take damage either way, why the hell would I not get anything out of it?

Do I sound like a douche? Sure. But I don't care. I help people when I can. But when it hurts me to help someone, I will not. Plain and Simple. You find a 5 dollar bill on the ground. Do you keep it or give it to the homeless guy on the street? Most people would give it. Now, what if you knew giving it gets you a ticket from a police officer? Do you still do it? Some people still will, yes. However, the majority would keep it for themselves.

This change is completely counterproductive to getting people to help others.

[Kurasu]

Jade Forest, Wind Spirit, Kun-Lai, Townlong, Fire Spirit, Dread Wastes, Water Spirit, Krasarang, Valley, Vale, Earth Spirit. That's 11, not 7.

Ah, yes! You're right. Forgot about the spirits. I haven't been fighting them since I got my spirit pets.

I also 2 pet all of them for experience for pets I'm leveling.

Then potentially if you don't want to use 20+ bandages, it might be easier to use all three. If damage is the big issue, that would help remove the damage from the issue.

You're going under the assumption people only flee for rares.

Actually, I'm going under the assumption that the main *abuse* of fleeing is for rares.

If I run into another rare Gilded Moth in 5.2? Sucks to be anyone who needs one. All 3 of the Rare Gilded Moths are being beaten by me for EXP. This is counter productive to the whole forfeit respawns the pet thing they're adding.

Why's that? If the damage is a big issue, then the moment you see a rare, just disconnect. It's what was being done before, so you can just go back to doing *that*. That option has been re-added as well.

[Maizou]

rares.

If I run into another rare Gilded Moth in 5.2? Sucks to be anyone who needs one. All 3 of the Rare Gilded Moths are being beaten by me for EXP. This is counter productive to the whole forfeit respawns the pet thing they're adding.

Why's that? If the damage is a big issue, then the moment you see a rare, just disconnect. It's what was being done before, so you can just go back to doing *that*. That option has been re-added as well.

Because I have no desire to disconnect.

Disconnecting and Forfeiting not having the same penalties just adds to my point.

I'm not going to spend the 5 minutes it takes for my computer to actually re-load WoW to get someone a rare. >_>

Fact of the matter is, this is one of the stupidest changes to pet battles there has been. The first being the removal of pets respawning from disconnects/logouts in the first place.

I used to logout to get someone a rare. I won't do that anymore. I don't care if I did it before. If forfeiting accomplishes the same thing, but has a PENALTY FOR NOT FORCABLY CLOSING WOW, then something's wrong.

[Kurasu]

Why's that? If the damage is a big issue, then the moment you see a rare, just disconnect. It's what was being done before, so you can just go back to doing *that*. That option has been re-added as well.

Because I have no desire to disconnect.

Ah! I misunderstood. From the way you were talking, I thought that you were one of those players who had been disconnecting to give people a chance at the rare you'd just found. So instead, this doesn't impact your 'giving rares' at all, as you didn't do it?

[Maizou]

Why's that? If the damage is a big issue, then the moment you see a rare, just disconnect. It's what was being done before, so you can just go back to doing *that*. That option has been re-added as well.

Because I have no desire to disconnect.

Ah! I misunderstood. From the way you were talking, I thought that you were one of those players who had been disconnecting to give people a chance at the rare you'd just found. So instead, this doesn't impact your 'giving rares' at all, as you didn't do it?

I would indeed logout to do it.

You posted after my edit.

I will not do it after 5.2. If forfeiting and disconnecting do the same thing, but one forces you to forcably close wow and EXPLOIT to avoid a penalty, why should I do that?

In fact, you're the one talking about how it's to fix exploits, but then you're talking about the exploit of forcing a disconnect. >_>

Forfeiting should not damage your pets. Plain and Simple. I actually wouldn't even have an issue with it if they made it so forfeiting against a group with a rare in it did not harm your pets. I could suffer the damage if I'm just paranoid about another type of pet killing me. But taking damage because I want to help someone? That's redonkulous.

[Kalliope]

I'm not sure I understand why it's such an issue that your pets take damage now from a disconnect. You were already inconveniencing yourself by investing time to hold a rare for someone, both in the sitting part and in the reconnecting part. What's a little more time flying to a stable master afterwards? I tend to save my bandages for zones with stable masters that are inconveniently located, but then, I am also a notorious packrat.

[Maizou]

I'm not sure I understand why it's such an issue that your pets take damage now from a disconnect. You were already inconveniencing yourself by investing time to hold a rare for someone, both in the sitting part and in the reconnecting part. What's a little more time flying to a stable master afterwards? I tend to save my bandages for zones with stable masters that are inconveniently located, but then, I am also a notorious packrat.

Disconnecting does not damage your pets. Forfeiting does, according to the patch notes.

They made it so pets respawn when you forfeit.

I have a 22 slot bag full of 10 stacks of bandages. I'm not saying I don't have a lot. But with the new system, those would disappear quite fast.

As I said above, again in an edit, I wouldn't even have an issue if they made it so forfeiting against a group with a rare in it didn't damage your pets. As chances are, if you're doing that, you're doing it to help other players. Just seems idiotic that they'd punish players for trying to help others.

[Kurasu]

In fact, you're the one talking about how it's to fix exploits, but then you're talking about the exploit of forcing a disconnect. >_>

The exploit in a disconnect is that people were using it to get back a pet that was killed. Pets no longer respawn if they died, no matter what you do. So if you kill one by accident, the exploit of reconnecting is fixed. This behaviour of it was not an exploit, but a happy coincidence. Blizzard's returning of this effect (and the changes in the other way) says, to me, as much.

[Maizou]

In fact, you're the one talking about how it's to fix exploits, but then you're talking about the exploit of forcing a disconnect. >_>

The exploit in a disconnect is that people were using it to get back a pet that was killed. Pets no longer respawn if they died, no matter what you do. So if you kill one by accident, the exploit of reconnecting is fixed. This behaviour of it was not an exploit, but a happy coincidence. Blizzard's returning of this effect (and the changes in the other way) says, to me, as much.

What you're describing is still an exploit to bypass the damage though.

[Kurasu]

What you're describing is still an exploit to bypass the damage though.

Not at all. The disconnecting was put in deliberately. Using the disconnect to return the pet to the wild is nothing but a way to give back the pet, as it was before. It is, IMO, no more an exploit than using a pet bandage rather than spending silver for a stablemaster that's right there. Or using a stablemaster to save spending silver. If you want to be nice to someone by giving a rare back into the wild, the option is available to do it without penalty. If all you're using flee for is to get 'just the right rarity', which is the primary abuse of it is, disconnecting is still going to keep it from happening as you have to take the time to reconnect.

[Maizou]

What you're describing is still an exploit to bypass the damage though.

Not at all. The disconnecting was put in deliberately. Using the disconnect to return the pet to the wild is nothing but a way to give back the pet, as it was before. It is, IMO, no more an exploit than using a pet bandage rather than spending silver for a stablemaster that's right there. Or using a stablemaster to save spending silver. If you want to be nice to someone by giving a rare back into the wild, the option is available to do it without penalty. If all you're using flee for is to get 'just the right rarity', which is the primary abuse of it is, disconnecting is still going to keep it from happening as you have to take the time to reconnect.

...I'm actually done trying to debate this with you.

You're describing an exploit, although minor, and you're acting as though it's an intended thing.

They added the disconnect thing back in 5.2 because of people who genuinely disconnect. Hell, I got pulled out of battle today by a mob attacking my crane. Cause you know, having my whole team take damage because of that would be AMAZING! Not to mention it was a rare Twilight Fiendling I had been searching for, and SURPRISE SURPRISE, it despawned because of their hotfix. I later got one through a magic stone, but still, you know how INFURIATING it was to be pulled out because mobs can attack hunter and warlock pets while we're in a pet battle? If my pets would have been damaged because of this, which they will be in 5.2, I would have been FURIOUS.

Can you imagine constantly having your pets lose health because of this? They know about the issue, but they can't fix it, because it would involve forcing the pet to phase with you into the battle, which I'm pretty sure would require a re-working of the pet battle code. Unless they're actually working on fixing it, which I doubt, because why would they care that warlocks and hunters are screwed over by having their pets out while pet battling? >_>

And yes, I'm well aware these are PTR notes of a PTR that hasn't even hit the PTR yet. However, this is all we have to go on.

[Chimera]

Dismiss pets before battling......? Everything else i had to mention's been covered so thats all the advice i have to give to this :/

[Equeon]

I'm surprised more people haven't brought up the issues of farming and taking damage by forfeiting.

Yesterday it took me about 25 Venomspitter Hatchlings to get a rare. If this was 5.2, most likely, my pet team would have been dead 3 times over after all that fleeing.
However, the spiders respawn so fast, and there are so many of them in that area, it's not like my fleeing and despawning enemy pets inconvenienced any of the other people there.
Basically, Blizzard is trying to make it so you HAVE to fight the enemy team, even if there are no pets you need to capture there.
Now, this is for low-level pets. Imagine how bothersome it would be when farming for the higher-level 24 or 25 pets.

[Kalliope]

I'm not sure I understand why it's such an issue that your pets take damage now from a disconnect. You were already inconveniencing yourself by investing time to hold a rare for someone, both in the sitting part and in the reconnecting part. What's a little more time flying to a stable master afterwards? I tend to save my bandages for zones with stable masters that are inconveniently located, but then, I am also a notorious packrat.

Disconnecting does not damage your pets. Forfeiting does, according to the patch notes.

They made it so pets respawn when you forfeit.

I have a 22 slot bag full of 10 stacks of bandages. I'm not saying I don't have a lot. But with the new system, those would disappear quite fast.

As I said above, again in an edit, I wouldn't even have an issue if they made it so forfeiting against a group with a rare in it didn't damage your pets. As chances are, if you're doing that, you're doing it to help other players. Just seems idiotic that they'd punish players for trying to help others.

Rereading everything again, that actually makes even less sense then.

What Blizzard's done is added a way to pass a rare to someone else without quitting out, so long as you don't mind damaging your team. If you don't want to take the damage on your team, you can still disconnect and reconnect (as before). If you want to start a fight over for yourself, the same rules apply - you can choose to either disconnect and be inconvenienced, but take no damage, or you can forfeit and take the damage, but not have to restart.

I'll agree on this point, though: I wish that forfeiting against the NPC pet tamers didn't deal damage to my team, since some of them require a very specific order in order to give my team the edge it needs to win. That's with 25s that are built to counter that specific team, mind you. Sometimes, that one round of downtime makes a real difference. In my case, I'd just adapt by disconnecting and reconnecting, but my computer can handle such things - my old one would not have been as happy about it.
TL;DR: Allow non-damaging forfeiting against NPC pet tamers because you're doing to be fighting them again immediately afterward anyway and NEED that health.

I'm surprised more people haven't brought up the issues of farming and taking damage by forfeiting.

Yesterday it took me about 25 Venomspitter Hatchlings to get a rare. If this was 5.2, most likely, my pet team would have been dead 3 times over after all that fleeing.
However, the spiders respawn so fast, and there are so many of them in that area, it's not like my fleeing and despawning enemy pets inconvenienced any of the other people there.
Basically, Blizzard is trying to make it so you HAVE to fight the enemy team, even if there are no pets you need to capture there.
Now, this is for low-level pets. Imagine how bothersome it would be when farming for the higher-level 24 or 25 pets.

In the case of farming for a specific rare, I'd either be leveling pets on them or just rolling with a team of 25s that can heal themselves to destroy them easily. Even the Pandaria packs can be soloed by my bear, who can heal himself beautifully, and never takes extra damage due to the lack of mechanical pets out there. In the case of mechanical farming, I roll with my crab.

Forfeiting against wild packs is a convenience of time, and there are still some pretty quick counters to that - or at least ways of multitasking.

[Maizou]

Dismiss pets before battling......? Everything else i had to mention's been covered so thats all the advice i have to give to this :/

We shouldn't have to. No other class has to.

If I exit a battle in like, the dread wastes or townlong/vale, surrounded by elites, and my pet's not there, I'll be down to 30% health if not dead before I even have time to call said pet.

[Chimera]

No other class has to because they dont have pets -___-

5 or 10 secs, whatever length of time it takes to dismiss vs 5min to fly over to a stable master and back, id take dismissing the pet everytime.

If your surrounded by elites, why would you land there in the first place knowing you'd be kicked out of the pet battle and also most probably die? takes longer to do a pet battle in an equal lvl zone as your personal lvl being whacked on by elites then to kill the elites and safely do the battle with the pet uninterrupted.

[Kalliope]

We shouldn't have to. No other class has to.

No other class has to because they dont have pets -___-

Warlocks, undead death knights, frost mages all have pets.