Ideas: Pet Family Rework for Shadowlands

[Skelelmyrn]

I'm sorry to be that person, but I disagree with all of Wain's suggestions. I don't want to see any pet families merged as I feel, for me, it diminishes the uniqueness of the pets. Many also just don't make sense to me. Ravagers and Silithids share one skeleton, but otherwise are generated from totally different origins. Foxes, wolves, and dogs are all canines, but they have totally different habits and behaviors. As a long time zoology fan, I just don't see the reasoning or the need to unite families. In fact, I did not approve of the Rylak\Chimaera merge but I accepted it because Rylaks had only had one expansion of existence. Most of these other pet families have been in existence for years and these changes would make me feel as if those let's identities were being drastically changed.

As for the exotic suggestion, it just sounds a bit convoluted and problematic to program and balance in the game.

The only suggestion I can maybe get behind is allowing the selection of pet specs again; however, with the new pet spec bonuses, I think every pet would be set as ferocity most of the time and never changed.

Just my thoughts.

[worgpower]

I think it made no sense that rylaks had their own family since they’re just a type of chimaera, but I still see your point about the families, I’m in love with animals and it wouldn’t make sense to merge foxes and dogs with wolves or silithids with ravagers since they’re from different worlds and habitats

[Bowno]

Lmfao! Thats okay. I thought it was funny!
I saw it and was like "oh god", but I figured everyone was using dark theme ;P

[Vephriel]

Linking this really great pet write-up that Bendak shared on twitter:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1PW4 ... sp=sharing

[worgpower]

I completely agree on what it says, but I also want pets to also improve rather than too many buffs, like a basilisk used to petrify the target, or the quilen able to Rez others for dungeons, and even thunder stomp was good, charge would be good too, maybe not now since we have barbed shot or kill command, and maybe cunning pets can have the corpse eating thing again instead of devilsaur, I hope you all will know what I mean by bringing back old abilities and stuff

[Vephriel]

Muffinus is opening up a discussion regarding hunter pets, which is really heartening to know that they're listening and looking for polite feedback!

https://twitter.com/Muffinus/status/1287232388490125313

[worgpower]

I don’t really like the idea of the Pokémon battle system. I wish pet battles could be that you can control your pet and press attacks like on a normal toon or a mind controlled creature, and can press abilities while running, walking, and jumping, would of been more fun this way, but the only thing that should remain is the cage throw and capture

[Maor]

Hello! I realise I won't be a familiar face around here, but I'm a long-time lurker that has been closely following the reaction to this thread. I normally tend to avoid posting because I don't feel strongly enough about something to overcome the anxiety involved with putting my opinions out into the world to be judged by anyone. This changed when my favourite developer, one Mr Jeremy Feasel, mentioned on Twitter that were they to be made tamable then Raccoons would be classed as Rodents. That comment was quite surprising to me and rattled around in my head until I remembered this thread and it all crystallised. I now have an opinion strong enough to post: I REALLY don't like how pet families in WoW currently work.

Specifically, I think they are inconsistently applied in such a way that they are at an unsatisfactory midpoint between specific and general, and should be changed to be either one or the other. Lizards and Scalehides best exemplify this. Diemetrodons are Lizards, while Basilisks, and Crocolisks (which are clearly biologically related) are their own unique families. You could argue that they have distinct features (petrification, semi-aquaticness) that differentiate them. Okay, in that case, why are Thunder Lizards grouped with the other Scalehides? Shooting lightning from your face is I think as much a differentiating factor as petrification, and certainly more of a difference than Crocolisks have! Well done, you can hold your breath, have a biscuit. Contrarily, Snapdragons are included with Lizards despite being genetically engineered amphibious Fish-Wolves. Quite why they can be Lizards but Crocolisks can't, I am afraid I do not know. Likewise, and in response to the tweet that started me on this path: if Raccoons are Rodents because they eat trash, then logically Bears should also be.

Just to clarify, I do not think this is a gamebreaking issue, just something that could be a more satisfying system than it currently is. Also, while I feel strongly that there should be changes made, I feel much less strongly about whether those changes should favour specific or general families. I've noted preferences for both directions in this thread. Accordingly, I'd like to present two scenarios:



Scenario 1: Specific Families

Split each different model into its own family. Remodels can stay in the same family as their original, as can non-biological additions.

i.e. Rylaks are once again separate from Chimaera (and now so are the Outland Chimaera), but the Rylaks with Engines are still Rylaks. There's only one family of Bears.

Each family receives an combination of a spec, an ability (with perhaps several variants of each) and an exotic ability that's BM only.

With 200 stable slots we now have significantly more slots than pet families for the first time, so there's the room needed for these distinctions

Examples:
Thunder Lizard - Ferocity, Lightning Slow, Blood of the Rhino
Wind Serpent - Cunning, Lightning Slow, Magic Damage Reduction
Mushan - Ferocity, Scale Shield, Blood of the Rhino



Scenario 2: General Families

Much like Wain described in the OP, merge a whole bunch of families together, changing the names if necessary. Families are loose groupings based on an in-universe (and therefore potentially faulty) understanding of their biology. Ideally each remaining family should be similar in some obvious way, but have internal variety from having multiple models.

Here are the families that I'd choose (with some accompanying commentary):

Apes - Gorillas, Monkeys
Nothing much else fits. Maybe yetis if it's decided they're more beast than humanoid.

Behemoths - Clefthooves, Scalehides.
The families are clearly similar enough to merge, but I couldn't justify keeping either name. Elekks and Mammoths could also hypothetically go here.

Birds - Birds of Prey, Carrion Birds
There's been confusion and overlap here since the beginning. Make it official, I say.

Cats
While I was admittedly tempted, I think adding Hyenas here might cause a riot.

Canines - Dogs, Foxes, Wolves.
I believe technical names such as Ungulates have been preemptively vetoed, but I think Canine is probably common enough parlance to not be ruled out due to this.

Crawlers - Crabs, Krolusks, Scorpids
There's a good case for putting Scorpids with Spiders instead but I'm not sure if an Arachnid family falls afoul of the Ungulate Rule.

Dinosaurs - Devilsaurs, Direhorns, Raptors
Relatively uncontroversial I think. Brutosaurs here too if I've been a good boy this year.

Feathermanes - Chimaera, Feathermanes
The flying hybrid-beast category. May need a new name.

Flies - Moths, Wasps
Flying insects. I think the name works as we have fireflies in one family and butterflies in the other, but am prepared for someone to yell at me because neither are true flies.

Gorecrowns - Goats, Oxen, Stags
The obvious horned/antlered ungulate group that is easily conceptualised together but much harder to name. This was my best effort.

Hounds - Core Hounds, Stone Hounds
I agree with Wain in the OP and think both hellhound types belong here with the other special dog-adjacent mythical beasts.

Insects - Beetles, Water Striders
A group of grounded invertebrates that could maybe broaden to include others such as Snails, though that would probably require another name change.

Lizards - Crocolisks, Basilisks, Lizards, Warp Stalkers
Originally I had the six legged 'lisks separate, but as I mentioned earlier, Diemetrodons are in Lizards already. There's not a huge number of models here so it might be better to have them stick together.

Mechanicals
As is. I have no idea how you could justify adding anything, and there's good variety here already.

Ravagers - Ravagers, Silithids
Draenor Ravagers are very similar to the standard Silithid. Without the restrictive naming of the Silithids family holding back their addition, we could finally see tamable Kunchong.

Rays - Sporebats, Rays
I love Sporebats but with a similar body shape and inexplicable air swimming they're basically fungus rays.

Riverbeasts - Riverbeasts, Turtles, Toads
A broad catch-all group of semi-aquatic creatures, oddly I think the name still works.

Rodents
Only two models currently but there are so many potential tames on the critter/beast line that I'd love to see here. Beavers to start, as they've been tagged as beasts since Mists.

Screechers - Bats, Pterrordaxes.
Non-avian, non-insectoid fliers. Many wild Pterrordaxes and Bats have a screech ability so while they are evolutionarily unrelated, grouping them is not the biggest stretch.

Serpents - Hydras, Serpents, Wind Serpents
Sneks. Hydras are a bit weird here, but are ultimately serpentine even if they are a bit, err, leggier than the others.

Spiders - Shale Spiders, Spiders
A pretty easy addition and Spiders have enough variety to not need to be merged further, though there are possibilities.

Striders - Cranes, Tallstriders
A category of flightless avians because the combined Bird family was big enough already. The flightless Teroclaws and the Raven Lord ought to go here too.

Worms
As is, I think, because the individual Worm varieties are distinctive enough to make it a real pain to put anywhere else. If Insects is broadened for Snails and the like then Worms could be included there too.

The others that I'm not sure where to place:

Blood Beasts - I've never been keen on the two creatures here being grouped, so my favoured option is to split them up. Crawgs should probably be with the Toads they once were. Ticks are a bit more difficult to place, but could go in Flies, Insects or maybe even Ravagers. Together, I can't see a good place to add them to.

Spirit Beasts - Personally I'd prefer them spread around their lookalike families, but I can see an argument for just keeping them as is.

Dragonhawks - Their body shape makes them somewhat similar to Rays, but with their two-things naming I think the hybrid-beast Feathermanes could actually fit better.

Bears, Hyenas - Neither of these fit nicely in any of the other groups. Potentially they could go together in a group of miscellaneous Carnivorans that aren't obviously Canids or Felids. Most of the other candidates for such a group (like the Mongooses and Raccoons) are critters and so sadly rather low-poly.

That brings us down from over 50 to 25 or fewer families, eliminates both single-model families and exotics, and makes the whole system both more consistent and future-proof so that new families don't end up having to be added every expansion to accommodate new pet availability.


One last note is that I'm broadly in favour of the points in the OP about changing your pets spec, bringing weaker pets up to parity, and doing away with the exotic distinction, regardless of any changes to families themselves.


That's a load off my mind. Thoughts and comments are welcome.

[DannyGreen]

I think complaints about families not fitting together like Dogs, Wolves and Foxes don't really hold any ground, when you put Parrots seaguls and Toucans in the same family, likewise the entirety of scalehide is just different species of dinosaurs all together.

But on the note of Scalehides. They actually are the best example of how to fuse families.
Simply take the ones close enough, and merge them. You don't need Carrion and Birds of Prey. In the same way you can probably just slap Lizards, scalehides, crocs, basalisks and even direhorns into the scalehide catagory.

[Valnaaros]

Some families I agree could be merged, but there are some that are unique enough that they should remain their own family. For example, basilisks should remain their own family since they have the ability to turn creatures to stone/crystal, which Crocolisks and Lizards cannot do. Warp Stalkers are unique in their ability to teleport. Scorpids should remain their own family due to their way of attacking and poisoning predators, which crabs and krolusks cannot.

[Maor]

That's fair, I think the loss in flavour for some families is definitely a downside to mergers. Personally I think the biggest loss in the way I had them merged previously would be Frost Breath for Chimaeras; I can't see all of Feathermanes getting a breath weapon out of nowhere.

What surprised me though was actually how few families would be affected in this way by the mergers due to ability erosion over the expansions. Wind Serpents' Lightning Breath and Dragonhawks' Fire Breath went away in Warlords I think, and Warp Stalkers haven't actually warped since Cataclysm!

As for the families in question, I feel that Scorpids getting Pin is reasonably flavourful and would make up for losing stinging to a certain degree. Basilisks losing Petrification is a fairly big flavour hit, though to be fair it already functions identically to a Crocolisk cracking your ankles so arguably the damage has already been done. Otherwise (apart from Chimaeras which I already mentioned) there doesn't seem to be too much more flavour damage unless you really happen to like the Sporebats' Spore Cloud or something.

Rearranging the mergers in some other way could improve things. Scorpids could join with Wasps (and maybe Worms?) to make Stingers, displacing Moths to the other Insects; Chimaeras could join Dragonhawks and maybe Wind Serpents to make an element-breathing group, which I'll call Spitters for now because I can't think of a good name. Basilisks remain an issue as nothing else that I can recall uses Petrification in that way in WoW.

[Bambu]

I'd like it if families became a purely cosmetic thing and we could customize what abilities each individual pet has. Also choose spec again.

Being able to customize each tame a bit would add lot of personality to them I feel. "Here's my Cunning Tortoise with Stealth and Dunestrider because he's a rebel and is besties with Zoom"

Families and appearances unlocked by tomes and stuff I really love. I would like them to be account-wide though, having to send hunters I make the book to tame feather manes or going way out to isle of giants to learn dinomancy is a pain.

Taming stuff is my favorite part of WoW. I'd really dislike if pets just became appearances to collect or something, making each one fill a niche and not having to worry about if you like the family or not would be great for me though. I hate having 10 spirit beasts in my stables that all do the same thing. >_<

Idk if I make sense, it's 4am.

[Xota]

I'd think if families were _purely_ cosmetic, then they'd just become appearances to collect. Plus it is nice to be able to look at a hunter's pet (friend or foe) and have some idea about what might be coming. I can see, without asking, that they can/can't remove Raging in our mythic+. Or I know there's a likelihood they're going to put a mortal strike on me (or the person I'm healing).


Giving some pets dual families (Wain's #4 point), and/or giving pets limited choices of abilities (depending on those families) I think would thread that needle and make everyone a little bit satisfied and a little bit disappointed. Your spirit beast crab can could choose two from: snare, crab-ability-2*, heal, tranq, but it wouldn't be able to pop a dodge CD. If you're not a BM, your undead devilsaur would get to choose 1 from: mortal strike, feast, and whatever 'undead' pet talent there might be. A plain bear would only have bear abilities to choose from, auto-shield wall plus a new one*.

Secondary families would be things like Spirit, Undead, Mechanical, Fiery, Rocky, Feathermane (the base families would be like cat, stag, wolf, courser), fungal, void, arcane


* there should be some new base abilities, the 6 aren't enough for this. Especially since there's two versions of shield wall. ideas for others:

• resistant: mend pet removes 1 curse, magic, poison, disease, or bleed once every 10 seconds.
• charge: once a minute, you pet can charge an enemy up to 60 yards away (no snare, stun, or bonus damage)
• flying combat, your flying pet has figured out how to fly and fight at the same time
• ranged attacks, your pet can use a basic attack up to 30 yards away, if it can't reach the target otherwise (throw/spit)
• incapacitating roar (aoe disorient)
• shattering grasp (break immunities)
• prowl (reworked: normal movement speed)

Secondary families could include things like heal (Spirit Beasts), updraft (feathermane), molten hide (fiery), spell reflect, roar of sacrifice, self-resurrection