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Wrath of the Lich King Classic: summary of changes

Posted: Sat Jun 25, 2022 10:53 pm
by Wain
Summary of pet-related changes for Classic Wrath of the Lich King
(when compared to Classic BC)

I'm starting to work on a database for WotLK Classic. The site won't be available for some time.
For reference, the Internet Archive version of Petopia from close to the end of WotLK: https://web.archive.org/web/20100528131 ... topia.com/

Pet Skills
- The Classic/BC pet skill system is gone. No more pet skill training & levelling (but there are now talent trees).
- Pets know at least one unique family ability, plus Growl, Cower, and a focus dump. They know these when you first tame them.
- The family abilities have changed from BC.


Pet Talent Trees
- The talent trees introduced in Wrath have the same names as the specs we still use: Cunning, Ferocity, and Tenacity. But instead of just a set ability per spec, there's a tree of talents to progress.
- Each family uses a specific tree.
- You buy talents with "talent points". Your pet gains talent points as it levels. Starting at level 20, pets get 1 talent point every 4 levels.
- Pet talents appear in your spellbook and can be added to your toolbar like any other spell/ability.
- Health, armor, and damage modifiers are now linked to the talent tree, rather than the individual family. So, all Cunning pets have the same health modifier.


Pet Loyalty & Happiness
- Loyalty has been removed. They'll never run away.
- Happiness still exists, and happier pets will do more damage.
- You can still increase your pet's happiness by feeding it, but also some pet talents and glyphs help (need to check up which).


Pet Families
- Exotic families are new in Wrath.
- There are 9 new families, 7 of which are Exotic. This brings the total number of families to 32.
- The new non-exotic families are: Moths and Wasps.
- The new exotic families are: Chimaeras, Silithids, Core Hounds, Devilsaurs, Spirit Beasts, Rhinos, and Worms.
- Owls were renamed "Birds of Prey", and now include other birds of prey.


Pet Levels
- If a wild pet is > 5 levels below the tamer then it'll be levelled up to 5 levels below the tamer. Old, low-level stabled pets will be levelled up the same way when first removed from the stable.
- To level, pets require 10% of the experience of a player of the same level (was previously around 16%).


Pet Diet Changes
- "Raw Meat" and "Raw Fish" were removed again. They only existed during BC.
- Bats now eat meat.
- Gorillas, Tallstriders, and Turtles now eat bread.
- Nether Rays now eat fungus.
- Hyenas no longer eat fruit.
- Serpents no longer eat fish.


Pet Stats
- Health, armor, and damage modifiers are now linked to the talent tree, rather than the individual family. So, all Cunning pets have the same health modifier.
- Pets now get 45% of their owner's stamina added to their own (up from 30%).
- Pets also benefit from hunter hit and critical rates (need to check how much).
- Pets now have base resistances to various damage types. The % amount is the same as the pet's level (so, a level 20 pet has 20% resistance to Arcane, Fire, Frost, Nature, and Shadow).


Pet Looks
- WotLK was when colour-changing pets became a thing. This is a sucky thing to track but it shouldn't be too hard these days.


Pet Stables
- Two more pet stable slots are available for purchase in Wrath, bringing the total to four stable slots and one active pet. In addition, the removal of pet skill training means hunters no longer need to keep a slot free for taming pets to learn new skills from.

Re: Wrath of the Lich King Classic: summary of changes

Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2022 8:01 am
by GormanGhaste
Looks good Wain!

I remember having one of those color-changing raptors from ZulDrak.

I believe we also got two additional stable slots at the beginning of Wrath? So five pets instead of three.

Re: Wrath of the Lich King Classic: summary of changes

Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2022 11:52 am
by Wain
GormanGhaste wrote: Sun Jun 26, 2022 8:01 am
I believe we also got two additional stable slots at the beginning of Wrath? So five pets instead of three.
Oops! Thanks. I've added that now :)

Re: Wrath of the Lich King Classic: summary of changes

Posted: Tue Jun 28, 2022 6:17 pm
by PrimalTazza
I could be wrong but I swear I ran a raid with someone just a couple days ago who had a color-changing ravager. I think it's the Rip-Blade Ravager from Blade's Edge? I'd have to go check myself, but I don't have an open pet slot right now. I suppose it wouldn't be too hard to re-level my cat...

Re: Wrath of the Lich King Classic: summary of changes

Posted: Fri Aug 26, 2022 11:16 pm
by Wain
BTW, here's the REALLY ROUGH version of the site I'm working on:
https://www.wow-petopia.com/classic_lk/

Some of the pages haven't been updated yet (including none of the guides!), there's no banner image (one is in the works), and many of the colours still need adjusting. But I'll be going for a blue scheme. I was worried it wouldn't work with our Petopia green pet images, but I think they fit ok.

Re: Wrath of the Lich King Classic: summary of changes

Posted: Mon Aug 29, 2022 10:15 am
by Wain
The Wrath site is really starting to shape up!

https://www.wow-petopia.com/classic_lk/


However, I still don't have the banner up (waiting on the artist for a transparent version), and that's kind of glaring.

The other major things to do are: finish the "summary of changes" page, and write a page about talent trees (with a link to the Wowhead talen calculator).

But it's finally getting there :)

Re: Wrath of the Lich King Classic: summary of changes

Posted: Mon Aug 29, 2022 12:51 pm
by Vephriel
ahh look at that blue! it looks great Wain, really excited for this era of Classic, it's where I wanted to reach ultimately and where I'll park my Classic character if they should go further after this :D

Re: Wrath of the Lich King Classic: summary of changes

Posted: Tue Aug 30, 2022 8:50 am
by Amyliz
It looks great Wain!! I'm so excited to relive all the great things about Wrath. I've already been looking through the new pets that will be available dreaming of adding new friends to my stable.

Re: Wrath of the Lich King Classic: summary of changes

Posted: Tue Aug 30, 2022 9:28 am
by Ana
Looks awesome!! Makes me miss the abilities we had back then

Re: Wrath of the Lich King Classic: summary of changes

Posted: Tue Aug 30, 2022 10:22 am
by BradBlondebeard
It is great to see the wotlk classic site up!

A couple notes based on the OP:

1. All families get 5% bonus to hp, armor, and damage in 3.3.5 and in beta/prepatch. From the 3.1.0 patch notes:

"Cunning, Ferocity and Tenacity pets now all have +5% damage, +5% armor and +5% health bonuses.
This should make more pet families feel viable, while additional talents have been added to distinguish
a pet’s abilities based on its specializations."

2. Pets benefit from the hunter's hit in the following way:

Pets only receive a benefit from the hunter's hit at integers. So if the hunter has 7.99% hit, the pet would have 7%.
A hunter that is hit capped against their target will cause their pet to also be hit, spell hit, and expertise capped (won't be dodged) against that target
If the hunter is not hit capped, the pet will be proportionately not hit, spell hit, and expertise capped against that target. So against a boss that requires 8% hit to be capped, if the hunter has 4% hit (half the base rate), the pet will miss, spell miss, and get dodged at half the base rates of 4%, 8.5% and 3.25% respectively.
Pets do get hit from the hunter talent Focused Aim, but they only benefit about half as much as they should for the expertise. I believe Heroic Presence from Draenei works similarly, but I'm not sure.

3. As far as I can tell, pets do not directly benefit from crit rating on gear. or crit in general. Pets indirectly benefit from the talents Cobra Strikes (steady, kill, and arcane shots crits have a chance to make pet attacks crit) and Go for the Throat (hunter crits give the pet focus). If pets do benefit directly from crit I'd like to know.

4. Experience required to level pets should be 5% of hunter's required experience. (Not sure if this is correctly implemented on beta/prepatch). From the 3.3.0 Patch notes:

"Pet Leveling: Hunter pets now need only 5% of the experience a player needs to level, down from 10%."

From messing around on the site a little bit, I get the following error when clicking the Search For Pets button:

Fatal error: Uncaught Zend_Db_Statement_Mysqli_Exception: Mysqli prepare error: Table 'petopia.abilities_lk' doesn't exist in /srv/php_lib/ZendFramework-1.9.2/library/Zend/Db/Statement/Mysqli.php:84 Stack trace: #0 /srv/php_lib/ZendFramework-1.9.2/library/Zend/Db/Statement.php(110): Zend_Db_Statement_Mysqli->_prepare('SELECT ability_...') #1 /srv/php_lib/ZendFramework-1.9.2/library/Zend/Db/Adapter/Mysqli.php(381): Zend_Db_Statement->__construct(Object(Zend_Db_Adapter_Mysqli), 'SELECT ability_...') #2 /srv/php_lib/ZendFramework-1.9.2/library/Zend/Db/Adapter/Abstract.php(467): Zend_Db_Adapter_Mysqli->prepare('SELECT ability_...') #3 /srv/php_lib/ZendFramework-1.9.2/library/Zend/Db/Adapter/Abstract.php(706): Zend_Db_Adapter_Abstract->query('SELECT ability_...', Array) #4 /srv/www/heimburg/www.wow-petopia.com/htdocs/classic_lk/search.php(181): Zend_Db_Adapter_Abstract->fetchAll('SELECT ability_...') #5 {main} thrown in /srv/php_lib/ZendFramework-1.9.2/library/Zend/Db/Statement/Mysqli.php on line 84

Thanks!

Re: Wrath of the Lich King Classic: summary of changes

Posted: Tue Aug 30, 2022 11:32 am
by Wain
BradBlondebeard wrote: Tue Aug 30, 2022 10:22 am A couple notes based on the OP:
Thanks so much for this feedback! I really don't have much time to test LK Classic so your feedback is invaluable.

I've fixed the search page. It was the result of one change I made yesterday :P

I've made a number of changes to the differences page on the site:
https://www.wow-petopia.com/classic_lk/differences.php

At the time of writing I've only adjusted the "difference to BC" section and am about to make changes to the "differences to retail" section.

One thing I was wondering, if you have the time, could you please give me a simpler explanation of how pets benefit from hunter Hit? Just the basics I'd need for the site :)

Thanks again!

Re: Wrath of the Lich King Classic: summary of changes

Posted: Tue Aug 30, 2022 11:58 am
by BradBlondebeard
Hmm, perhaps this for hit:
----
Against a boss (8% miss chance base)

Every 1% hunter hit gives a pet

1% melee hit
2.125% spell hit
0.8125% reduced chance to be dodged

Note hunter's hit is not rounded up. If a hunter had 0.99% hit the pet would not gain any benefit.

The talent Focused Aim gives the pet 1% hit per talent point but only roughly 0.4% reduced chance to be dodged.
----
I'm assuming most people care about bosses, but the values would be different for other level differences.