How are mage pets as tank on phinny? Are they currently viable for group content and if so, will they continue to be viable in the upcoming expansions?
They can tank light blues (1-3) easy with just the mage healing. Dark blues they can tank (1-2) with just the mage healing (if they do nothing else), but might have to use some clickies to make it work. Even con+ or named that just hit harder is pretty much a no go. If you have a healer in your group you can do more, but it is more of a drain on mana.
Pretty accurate. There are a number of factors that can make your pet more survivable: -Pet focus (big increases in defensive stats) -Epic 2.0 (4 sec defensive stun proc) -Healing Focus -Buffs (clr aego line especially) With anguish focus, 2.0, and a 1-40% heal focus on a buffed water pet I can stay ahead of damage on a white con in MPG pretty reliably, but I would have to use long cooldown abilities to kill the mob because I'm pretty much chain healing. In a full group the water pet can be a good substitute for a tank in a zone like MPG. The earth pet is even better as a tank but you lose out on dps and of course you need to get it buffed. But the pet pales in comparison to a raid geared warrior, paladin or shadow knight, and that is as it should be.
Had to finish off the last 50% of Creator with mage water pet tanking (no epic, group focus, druid buffs), and it did at least as well as my 70sk (crappy gear, ~250aa) had been doing, with no slows and druid heals. The bigger issue with pet tanks is lack of AE aggro. Single pulls or CC is a must.
With as high as levels are now, is the mage epic worth doing? Do the buffs matter with all the other buffs we can add from AA and such? Back in the day the mage epic pet was incredible but I don't know what is the up to date info since I just came back to the game.
Epic pet is good until pop launch for group content, but it's pretty bad on raids against MotM mobs since it generates a lot of threat.
Just leveled up a mage on Ragefire. In my 50s now and my pet tanks in pretty much every group, including LDoN’s. AoE is not that bad either, you just need to target swap a lot. With the recent changes to pet taunt it makes it even easier. I recently tanked Veskar with a Shaman healer killing almost all red mobs and we were able to non-stop pull with no healer mana issues using a water pet. A good player tank is Always better, but I would prefer my pet over a badly played tank any day.
