Friday, May 1, 2009 Pet Management and why we're not Hunters

So last night I tried out the 44/0/27 spec as I have been reading some good things about it. Basically you give up Dancing Rune Weapon and Blood Gorged for Unholy Blight and the Perma-Pet. Since the drastic nerfings of DRW so that Arena Blood DK's can't smoke their opponents, it made the 51 point talent rather lack luster for us PVE guys and has been put on the same table as Unholy Blight - which is a 21 point talent. So the real question came down to this for me...

DRW + Blood Gorged < Unholy Blight + Perma Pet

It's great to read other's thoughts and experiences on different builds but I'm more of a practical guy, I like to see things in practice before deciding. So that's what I did last night, put my new 44/0/27 build into 25 man Ulduar Practice.

First rule when raiding with a pet = Put your pet on passive

First Boss: Iron Council

Rotation is the same, just need to keep UB going at all times - Crap, overload! Put the pet on defensive then back to passive to peel him. Awesome, I spent more time then I would have liked making sure my pet was doing the right thing that I took a bit too long getting back into melee range after Overload.

Second Boss: Freya

Lots of things going on in this fight, sucked to have to micro-manage my pet. The fight went something like this for me...

RL: "Everyone on the Stormlasher"
Me: Hit Pet Attack and start my rotation on Stormlasher
RL: "Switch to the Water Elemental"
Me: Stop Attacking; Target Water Elemental; Pet Attack
RL: Tree up!
Me: Stop Attacking; Target Tree; Pet Attack; I start to attack
RL: Get the Snaplasher to 30%
Me: Stop Attacking; Target Snaplasher; Pet Attack; I Start to attack
RL: Finish up the Stormlasher!
RL: Tree Up!
Me: Stop Attacking; Target Tree; Put Pet on Defensive, Put Pet on Passive; Go to attack Tree - Tree is down, go back to Lasher; Pet Attack
RL: Who's ghoul is still on the Snaplasher!?
Me: Mine wasn't

TLDR: Correctly micro-managing your pet as melee sucks. In Naxx it wasn't an issue because it was Face-rollable easy, Ulduar there seems to be a bit more components for the fight. As Melee if there is a rune on the ground on the melee I have to move out of the way and then I have to micromanage my pet to do the same, which takes up time. As my Hunter I just keep standing where I am and can easily control my pet as I am not having to move myself first. I'm going back to my 51/2/18 spec, not because I don't think that the 44/0/27 sucks, but rather it's really good on paper but has some drawbacks in practice. Unholy DK's do get the perma pet but I have not seen many correctly manage their pet, I mean it is a whole other kettle of fish. And as a Blood DK I need to spend my time setting up my HS spam, not making sure my pet stays out of fires/voidzones/water walls/etc.