Spirit Mend

[Bellatryx]

And in a 10-man raid there are more important players to keep up than hunters (ie. the tank), so having a pet which can give you a small possibly life-saving heal would be beneficial and help the healers. It's not implied that the hunter would be off-healing or anything.

I see where you're coming from but my main pre-ICC was a healer and if I found out one of the hunters was healing a target, I'd be wondering why they had to. Either I'm slacking or struggling, or one of the other healers is. If that's the case, they shouldn't be there.

Any good 10-man raid will take raid healers and tank healers. If they can't do the job, they shouldn't be there. Wiping is part of raiding, not everyone is going to be geared for certain fights, that's what gear up is all about

Don't have to tell me that, I've been playing a main tank healer and an off-tank healer for a good 2 years now since Wrath came out and my beloved hunter was in my eyes and my guilds eyes.. useless. I was mostly saying if you can do anything to heal yourself and keep some of the pressure off the healers especially since the new dungeons and raids we will experience in Cata will be a good boost from what happened in Wrath I think its worth it. It'd be close to the same effect of using a potion but with a small HoT attached.

And looking at how healers are going to be in Cata, even though I don't have a beta key to actually experience the first hand of healing in dungeons thus far it would possibly help with the learning curve in the days ahead. =P

[Worba]

I think both sides make some good points. The current "raid pet" metric says that only pets that allow for maximum (personal) DPS are valid for raids; right/wrong/simplistic/etc this is the current thinking behind wolves uber alles... and if we extend this same metric to the new cata pet spells then it follows that only a limited subset will qualify, and that the others will scorned by the folks at elitistjerks, and so the general goal of making all ferocity pets equally raid viable falls short - using the current metric.

And to be fair I do need to revise my earlier statement about ferocity pets having equal viability for raid dps - clearly someone with a +5% crit bonus is going to contribute more DPS than someone with a 2 second stun every minute or 2...

However the other side of the argument, I think, is that the introduction of buffs/debuffs will make hunters more versatile - possibly enough to even cause the EJ crowd to stop laying as much emphasis on the pure DPS angle like they do now with wolves, since after all your +5% crit bonus won't stack with similar effects from players who already can cast it (more and more likely the larger the raid)... whereas in that same scenario the spirit beast would be contributing more with his heal (which never gets "overwritten" like a buff).

Also speaking of spirit beasts... does anyone know what their second ability is? If they were to have a DPS boosting ability the whole question of heals vs dps would become sorta moot at least as it pertains to them...

[Geebs]

Don't have to tell me that, I've been playing a main tank healer and an off-tank healer for a good 2 years now since Wrath came out and my beloved hunter was in my eyes and my guilds eyes.. useless. I was mostly saying if you can do anything to heal yourself and keep some of the pressure off the healers especially since the new dungeons and raids we will experience in Cata will be a good boost from what happened in Wrath I think its worth it. It'd be close to the same effect of using a potion but with a small HoT attached.

And looking at how healers are going to be in Cata, even though I don't have a beta key to actually experience the first hand of healing in dungeons thus far it would possibly help with the learning curve in the days ahead. =P

Haha we both went healer for the same reasons then, I feel your pain

But oooh I see what you mean, using Spirit Mend as a pot/healthstone etc in a raid. Yes, I can see that being useful. These days I don't really use them but when you're learning new raids they can come in handy to keep you up a bit longer. (Almost made a Viagra joke there, but I won't!)

Gosh, in Cata healing is all up in the air for me, I've got 3 healers at the moment and I haven't the foggiest which one to play lol.

[Bellatryx]

Don't have to tell me that, I've been playing a main tank healer and an off-tank healer for a good 2 years now since Wrath came out and my beloved hunter was in my eyes and my guilds eyes.. useless. I was mostly saying if you can do anything to heal yourself and keep some of the pressure off the healers especially since the new dungeons and raids we will experience in Cata will be a good boost from what happened in Wrath I think its worth it. It'd be close to the same effect of using a potion but with a small HoT attached.

And looking at how healers are going to be in Cata, even though I don't have a beta key to actually experience the first hand of healing in dungeons thus far it would possibly help with the learning curve in the days ahead. =P

Haha we both went healer for the same reasons then, I feel your pain

But oooh I see what you mean, using Spirit Mend as a pot/healthstone etc in a raid. Yes, I can see that being useful. These days I don't really use them but when you're learning new raids they can come in handy to keep you up a bit longer. (Almost made a Viagra joke there, but I won't!)

Gosh, in Cata healing is all up in the air for me, I've got 3 healers at the moment and I haven't the foggiest which one to play lol.

I was basically forced into healer by my guild but I fell in love with it after a while. Now, I'm actually falling back in love with being a hunter and I can't wait for the new patch to come out so I can have myself a cute little OP troll hunter. lol

[Geebs]

Also speaking of spirit beasts... does anyone know what their second ability is? If they were to have a DPS boosting ability the whole question of heals vs dps would become sorta moot at least as it pertains to them...

Nothing at the moment. We've got:

Attack, Claw, Call of the Wild, Charge, Prowl and Rabid to do/help damage.

[Kalliope]

That's a DEBUFF on the mob, not a damage ability. There's a difference, and that's EXACTLY what Lovcat was saying in the post originally quoted here.

The point is that multiple pets have access to many of these buffs/debuffs. You DO in fact have more options than before.

Heroism, +Stats and +Crit aren't debuffs on a mob.

Those are BUFFS on the RAID. They are still considered differently than straight damage-dealing abilities, which is the point that you've seemed to miss.

Yes, you have more options than before, but you're still limited, which I thought they were trying to avoid? I'm not disputing the fact we have more options; my point was that people will be choosing certain pets for their 'damage upping' abilities, rather than their looks

I'm not disputing the fact that particular pets will have to be brought for particular buffs/debuffs - on occasion. The point is that across the board, hunters will not be forced to bring any particular pet. As I have said before, your experiences may vary depending on your situation. But this is NOT going to be a situation where ALL hunters will ALWAYS have to bring a particular pet to a raid. If you have a warrior tank, then a raptor will be unnecessary. If you're in a raid with multiple hunters, no mages, and no shamans, only ONE hunter might be asked to bring a corehound....but the other hunter won't necessarily have one out.

This has been said before in other threads, but it bears repeating: if you want to min-max for raiding, then you will bring whatever pet is required for your particular composition. For a pug, it is much, MUCH less likely that anyone will give you a hard time for bringing a particular pet, since it's just a pug anyway and raid compositions are generally trash.

I am quite happy that we will no longer see raids with only wolves or only cats. It's boring.

[Geebs]

I was basically forced into healer by my guild but I fell in love with it after a while. Now, I'm actually falling back in love with being a hunter and I can't wait for the new patch to come out so I can have myself a cute little OP troll hunter. lol

I got frustrated with the big BM nerf and got kicked out of PuGs for being a BM hunter. Was fed up with the hassle I got so I went healer and, like you, fell in love with it - so much that I have 3 healers now.

But also like you, my time away from my hunter made me fall in love with it all over again. Getting Loque'nahak was a huge thing for me (100+ hours and 3 weeks hunting to get it) and I don't want to feel pressured into taking another pet over it. Hence my idea of giving special abilities via a talent or 'ability' point. Why not add in Spirit Mend alongside heroism etc to give us the option. I'm toying with race changing my Nelf to what I wanted in the first place (Human Hunter) or levelling up another one as Human...providing I like the changes they give Hunters when Cata goes live.

[Geebs]

Those are BUFFS on the RAID. They are still considered differently than straight damage-dealing abilities, which is the point that you've seemed to miss.

I don't think I've missed the point at all... I agreed that they're not straight damage-dealing abilities...

I am quite happy that we will no longer see raids with only wolves or only cats. It's boring.

Couldn't agree more

[Geebs]

Anyhoo, it's nearing 2am and I need sleep, regardless of how much I like chatting Huntery stuff

Thanks for the chat, folks <3

[Kalliope]

Those are BUFFS on the RAID. They are still considered differently than straight damage-dealing abilities, which is the point that you've seemed to miss.

I don't think I've missed the point at all... I agreed that they're not straight damage-dealing abilities...

Ah good, then it's just a question of wording.

I am quite happy that we will no longer see raids with only wolves or only cats. It's boring.

Couldn't agree more

The more I think about it, the more excited I am to wander around major cities and "pet watch" again. And pug 25s ought to be more fun too, just from a pet-watching perspective.

(Nightnight Geebs!)

[Turgus]

Spirit Mend is only 1 of the 2 abilities that the Spirit Beast will have. (being an Exotic Pet)
What will that 2nd ability be?

When I went over the various abilities that the exotics have one of them is a target buff/debuff (snare/increased casting speed, etc)
While the other is a buff for the group members (stamina /increased stats/ increased haste)

To me Spirit Mend takes the place of the Spirit Beasts target buff/debuff, but not its group buff.
Just what its group buff may be, well who knows?

Maybe it will be Spiritual Strength, an Attack Power Buff, or maybe Spiritual Insight a Intelligence/Spirit Buff, etc.
Blizzard is probably still working it out.

Here are the stats for Spirit Mend that are on the Warcraft Hunter Union Website. http://www.warcrafthuntersunion.com/

Spirit Mend: The Spirit Beast heals the currently friendly target for (1237 + ((RAP * 0.35) * 0.5)) plus an additional (475 + ((RAP * 0.35) * 0.335)) over 10 sec. 40 sec cooldown.

Personally, with just the playing around that I have done with a calculator, it turns out to be not the greatest heal, but not a worthless one.
For instance, lets say the changes go through as is and on your BM hunter you have 5k AP. (My hunter as AT LEAST this amount)
Just how much will you be healed for?

2112 instantly with 1061 over 10 seconds for a total of 3173.

That is 10% of my hunters health in PvP gear. (Sure I don't have the best PvP gear) and it is 14% of my hunters health in PvE gear.
With a cooldown of 40 seconds before Longevity (with Longevity a cooldown of 28 seconds) it is far from worthless.

When you combine this with Spirit Bond (2% of your health every 10 seconds) you can help the healers out quite a bit.
Without regular Health regen a hunter with my hunter stats would heal 8935 Health or 41% in a just a minute.

Now, this is with Wrath gear and Wrath stats. I have no idea just how good it is in Beta.
But from what I read earlier:

Doth777 Wrote:
I just used mine and was healed for nealy 14k over it's short duration. For a pet heal with no cost and a 28second cooldown, I'd say that is damn good.

It seems to be even better in Beta than my number crunching would show.
Is this better than a snare or a debuff? I am not sure. It will all depend on what you are doing. (An All Hunter Group doing instances together?)

But this ability is definitely something new, cool and very interesting for us to tool around with.
Of course, some people will love it, and some will hate it.

But considering Spirit Strike is gone and not coming back (like all DPS abilities.)
I feel this ability fits pretty well with the Spirit Beast theme and what kind of ability they would that would set them apart from their regular counterparts.

[Slickrock]

Two more thoughts...

1) I think it's highly probable their second ability (along with cats) will be prowl.

2) Would we be complaining if sporebats were the ones with the healing talent? I think the real issue is that they took away a very cool spirit strike and replaced it with something some of us see as booring, or at least not fitting of a set of rare beasts. (We'd likely have this complaint regardless, since spirit strike actually had an animation with it, and that got taken away).

[Bellatryx]

2) Would we be complaining if sporebats were the ones with the healing talent? I think the real issue is that they took away a very cool spirit strike and replaced it with something some of us see as booring, or at least not fitting of a set of rare beasts. (We'd likely have this complaint regardless, since spirit strike actually had an animation with it, and that got taken away).

^^ This.

[Doth777]

1) I think it's highly probable their second ability (along with cats) will be prowl.

Currently Loque's 2nd ability is indeed Prowl. Personally, I'm not a fan of Prowl, taking my pet longer to reach my target and begin dps for a damage increase on one attack, so I hope it will be replaced down the road, but that's just me.

[Tahlian]

I kind of have to agree with that. If every other Exotic gets 2 "ZOMGSHINYABILITIES" and the second one spirit beasts get is...Prowl...that's not particularly exotic or exciting. Nor does it really bring anything to a raid or party because with Camouflage, your pet's sneaking with you anyway.

It may well be time for Prowl to belong to Cats only like Play does foxes, or for it to go the way of the dodo entirely.

[Kalliope]

2) Would we be complaining if sporebats were the ones with the healing talent? I think the real issue is that they took away a very cool spirit strike and replaced it with something some of us see as booring, or at least not fitting of a set of rare beasts. (We'd likely have this complaint regardless, since spirit strike actually had an animation with it, and that got taken away).

Actually, the ability they should have, but they're not exotic to have it, is blessing of kings, based off of what the NPC spore cloud does. Tossing 'em out there as healers isn't a bad idea, but the only positive effect of spore clouds is the mini-kings buff.

Spirit beasts do not yet have a raid buffing secondary ability. They could have the spirit strike animation reinstated for that.

[Worba]

1) I think it's highly probable their second ability (along with cats) will be prowl.

Currently Loque's 2nd ability is indeed Prowl. Personally, I'm not a fan of Prowl, taking my pet longer to reach my target and begin dps for a damage increase on one attack, so I hope it will be replaced down the road, but that's just me.

Do we know what cats' ability is?

In 3.0 beta they originally had cats getting just prowl, but after the ensuing outcry they decided to add rake as their pet skill and to make prowl kind of an "extra"; if they are taking a similar approach with cata it could mean the presence of prowl on loque may not actually be its "second slot" e.g. it's just tacked on sort of like fox play but the actual 2nd slot is still forthcoming...

One can hope anyway.

[Anyia]

Doth777 Wrote:
I just used mine and was healed for nealy 14k over it's short duration. For a pet heal with no cost and a 28second cooldown, I'd say that is damn good.

It seems to be even better in Beta than my number crunching would show.
Is this better than a snare or a debuff? I am not sure. It will all depend on what you are doing. (An All Hunter Group doing instances together?)

I'm thinking I might end up loving running with Spirit Mend and 2pc T5 for solo stuff - heals all around!
In fact, I can see myself using that combo when learning new boss fights too. Alive hunter & pet is far more dps than dead hunter & pet!

[Seolla]

Why is everyone complaining?

Look at it this way:
- All pet special attacks/abilities became some sort of buff/debuff
- All of these buff/debuff does not stack the same type that is provided by actual characters
- Raid buffs/debuffs got spread across many more classes in Cataclysm
- Therefore, in any high-end 25man raiding guilds, you will easily have every single buffs/debuffs covered
- Therefore, all hunter pet abilities are pretty much redundant...
- ... with the exception of Spirit Mend!!

- So from a min-max point of view, Spirit Beasts are the best for a BM hunter, because as bad you guys making Spirit Mend out to be, at least it does something, which is infinitely better than nothing.

Or maybe I'm missing something, or misunderstanding something...*PS havn't read through the entire thread, so please point out if theres anything wrong with this reasoning.

[SpiritBinder]

.
Or maybe I'm missing something, or misunderstanding something...*PS havn't read through the entire thread, so please point out if theres anything wrong with this reasoning.

Ya... kinda <.<

Main arguments are:

How viable the healing ability is for a group. (yes we all know that it will get a second ability, even if is prowl atm, and that its a beta, things can change)

The strength of the ability, buffing/de-buffing/pvp/solo, considering we are talking about a spirit beast, not something you can just skip down to the local park and tame variety of pet.

The possible loss of the animation of SS, you gotta admit it is kind of cool.

Any high-end 25man raiding will most likely be 10 now as they will share the same loot table. Therefore you will most likely be asked to bring a pet that is adding to what your 10 man is missing. (less likely to be a spirit beast if it does not buff/debuff for group benefit)

etc..

Actually worth the read if you have time, there are lots of good arguments for and against, leaving myself just waiting to see how it pans out.