As of like 3 days ago the necro pets have been taking a huge beating. I do not know what changed. It looks like Mage pets may have had a similar change by looking at the other thread.
this really true? What other thread? Every "pet gimped" thread has been ruled untrue, according to forums
Swarm pets previously did 10k dps and now they are doing about 7k dps. Regular pet did about 4k dps auto and now does about 3k. Both swarm and regular pet are also getting stomped more against any con higher than a light blue. Is pet focus broken on live? Did test changes go to the live server? Is this some other kind of bug?
I just re-subbed and tested. The problem is it's been about a year since I played, so everything was really foggy. First I went out to the level 101+ static WK zone mobs that I used to farm (the hooded guys near that Lady dragon from questline). An EM19 mage air pet with max defensives could tank two yellow con mobs without needing any defensive cooldowns. It would die to 3 yellows without using frenzied/fortify/groundswell stance but that's as I remember from before. I just now plowed through those mobs 2-3 at a time at a rate similar to what I remember, no problems. Then I went into a HA to test. I remember 'A Helping Hand' was fast and easy. An easy way to test 3 dark blues was I went linkdead for a minute after I pulled them. Came back and my cleric merc on reactive was keeping my pet alive vs 3 dark blues with no cooldowns. Then I moved on to the imp mephits at the burning building. Again pulled 3 and used no tanking cooldowns. Pet got smacked down to under 10% hp and I had to pop Groundswell + companions blessing and that plus the merc dug the pet back up. That is as I remember it. I always used to have to CC a mephit or use cooldowns if I was gonna tank 3 at once. I don't remember what the pet and swarms damage was from before to compare. But tanking-wise, I am not seeing anything game-breaking here. I'll post this in the other thread too. Too bad a named hasn't popped yet to try.
Did you ever test with your necro warrior pet? I do not play a mage so all of that data is useless to me. Necro warrior pet never was able to tank 2 yellows or 3 blues btw.
My necro warrior pet was tanking even cons (single, I was cc'ing the other) without needing cd's once when my Mage pet died. Although I was using swarm pets which were ripping aggro occasionally. I box Mage/Nec. After a bit more extensive testing, the pets do seem to be underperforming in a "spiky" way. For example, 2 level 100's in WK HA had me popping literally every single cooldown I had (staggering) to keep up EM19 air pet, and even then, I had to use a clutch replenish AA at 5% or he'd have been done. That has never happened before, and I've killed hundreds and hundreds of those HA mobs in past. However, em19 air pet was able to tank Harlow (Helping Hand AA named, I'm still trying for evoc aug) with cooldowns no sweat. I also killed Shoon and Roon (for like the 20th time, how dare they path right through my camp) last night one right after the other (so staggered cd's) with nec/mag in like 2 mins apiece with 2 cleric mercs on reacticve. No sweat to tank, but I burned them down pretty hard Sorry, I'll do a bit more testing with necro pet, normally don't pay as much attention to his tanking but I do see a decrease on Mage pet
All pets should not be equal. Base mage pets should better then other pets at their roles but its getting out of hand how big the gap is now when everything is factored. Especially now that there is/was a universal nerf to pet mitigation and ac from focus effects when non mage tank pets suffer from the following: Being 60K hps behind because of base pet stats and missing the extra 10% hp bonus from pet AA. At least 12% behind in mitigation from pet AA probably more with base stats difference. Don't come summoned with full armor and jewelry for the extra ac, hps, mitigation and mods. Some don't have access to: Pet Defensive Disc Spell Secondary Pet Rune Spell Defensive Recourse from Long Offensive Proc Spell - Recourse Promised Heal Line Spell for Pet If something was broken with pets then fix it for sure but you have to realize a universal fix for what you see from one breaks the weaker versions. You can't tune mage tank pets to be in reason or the other lessor tank pets then fall flat on their face unless you close that gap created from missing AA's and spells to catch them up some.
So I'm going to try to understand your point here. Let's say a mage earth pet tanks X% better than a necro pet. If they each have a 20% reduction in tanking ability (throwing out random numbers... the % isn't important), it will bring Nec/Bst pets below the threshold needed to tank adequately? If that's accurate (ignoring the percentages), then I'd agree that those pets should not be nerfed to that point (or at all for that matter). Still, if we're throwing out "should" statements, the earth pet should tank better than necro and beast pets by a significant margin. Really they should have more HP, mitigation, etc. For a long time the order of pet classes went Mage>Beast>Necro; at one point Necro pets were little more than a speedbump/visual DoT. I'm certainly not saying that's how it should be, but the gap has generally been getting smaller for Necros, not larger. Now if a max AA raid Earth pet has 195k HP, those numbers would make Nec/Beast pets have ~120k HP. I have no idea if this is correct or not (I don't have a raid Nec pet to test), but my impression was group Nec/Beast pets have 140k-ish HP. If this is wrong, then never mind. I personally think the jewelry thing is stupid... As a mage I hate having to summon pet gear for people, so I'd be completely in favor of it being automatic. Still, I believe there are workarounds to have a large supply of pet gear (parcels? or something of that nature to store it), so it's not like you can't have it. Since there are 3 real pet classes (and Mage/Beast share spells 2-4), I assume you're referring to necros with those 4 spells. The first spell you listed blocks 50k (basically worthless in todays game), has a 2 minute refresh, and locks out the second spell you listed. Again, we share 2-4 with Beastlords. Necros do have other abilities (lifetap proc and a very powerful avoidance buff), but the former is a very small heal and the later has a 6 second cast time. We could look at all the cool abilities beasts have (strong single target heal, HoT, Defensive stance buff, Spell mitigation buff, short duration max HP increase buff), but we all know they don't make them better tanks that the earth pet (combined with the fact that beasts themselves can tank somewhat). So looking at buffs alone really isn't the best comparison, though if you think Necro pets need a boost in one of those departments, you're welcome to petition for it (rather than bringing mage pets down). If this nerf does go through (and I'm hoping it doesn't) I think it'd be interesting to see disc-like abilities for each of the individual pet classes to add some extra uniqueness. I certainly don't think Nec/Beast (or any of the pets) should be made too weak, but if we're "closing the gap" I think mages should be able to slow, FD on demand, do ghetto CC with root/snare, tank ourselves, and be able to solo with no pet. Obviously giving us all that is a terrible idea, but the best pets in the game (by a wide margin) are what mages have going for them. Without that we're a crappy wizard who can't port or kite. Necros and Beasts aren't nearly as focused on pets as Mages are and they have other tricks up their sleeve. If our pets aren't special we get to... Coth? Now I'm not in favor of anyone nerfing anyone. But this "throw mages under the bus" stuff won't get us anywhere. I certainly hope Nec/Beast pets remain a strong and viable option post nerf, as long as mage pets are stronger (since all pets definitely aren't equal).
Reading ftw instead of just assuming. No one is throwing mages under the bus or wants them nerfed at least not based on my post if you actually read it. The first line of my post was all pets should not be equal and that mages should have the best base pets, at their roles. Was this not clear enough? My raid focused, 4k AA pet, with a few spell slots dedicated to keeping him alive and with merc healing support now almost dies to dark blue con mobs. This is my warrior tank pet. He is a yo yo of hps now dangling at the empty end non stop. Nevermind yellows and whites where its even more of gamble at times as he often loses. He can just barely manage singles where as previously he handled single trash with all this support reliably. Even before any changes he wasn't tanking 2 or 3 at a time nor was he embarrassing tank classes with what he can do outside of silly stuff like mezz not landing on pets. My pet even with supposed broken factors was already so far behind that he simply managed group trash with raid focus rather then just overpowering it. So yes I am saying the X% universal pet reduction that seems to have gone live has put my Warrior pet with a raid focus, 4k pet aa and all his support spells below a reasonable level for group trash mobs. Because of the gap that existed prior between mage raid focused pet tanks and the other pet classes tank pets(they seemed to tune for mage tank pets) was to big. Your definition of significant margin and my differ. Im sorry if you think a 60K hps gap (roughly what it is), at least 12% passive mitigation from extra aa lines (probably more) along with the host of extra defensive spells at your disposal (you claim are useless) paired with full pet armor at all times is fair but its not. Well at least not now as our pets no longer function as they should with a raid focus. The gap was to big. Necro and beast pets need to remain relative to mages pets otherwise when a universal change like this goes thru our pets fall below the threshold of whats required if tuned for mages. Nec pets possibly beast pets go from tanking one trash mob with raid focus pretty reliably to barely hanging on and mages earth pets simply go from tanking 2-3 at a time no sweat down to 1 or 2 with raid focus. Basically not missing a beat while the others classes tank pets are now awful. The gap should exist but it needs to be much closer, at least now with this ill thought out changes, so our pets can also tank trash mobs reliably especially with raid focus. Just throwing up numbers but mages pets should be something like 5% more mitigation, 10% more base hps, 15% more dps before you factor in buffs, pet procs, etc. Armor and jewelry should be included in this gap otherwise the gap just grows to big again if its in addition to. This gives them distinct advantages over other pets but doesn't provide to large a gap so that the others can't even function properly. Mage pets simply need to be better and be to the point that let a mage do what he needs to do with his tool set. What other classes have or don't have is irrelevant except if it impacts how powerful their pets adjustments need to be. So a beast healing for much more should be factored in, just as a necro ghetto slow should be factored in. Envy for snare, root, fd, etc should not. This should be a boost to other pet classes pets somehow not the other way around or mages pets just start to have the same issues. You opinion on pet order is just that opinion. Mages specialty pets have always been the best at their role even before the gap grew to what it is now. Which again didn't matter until these recent pet nerfs. Mage > bst/nec(based on the pet up) is what is should be and no one claims otherwise. This is pretty much how its always been the differences you might have seen making it mag>bst>nec were caused not from the base stats of the pets but stuff like pet offensive aa or spells that some classes were left off of or defensive spells and AA some classes don't have. But Mage >>>> nec/bst(based on the pet up) is a problem when universal fixes come along that tune based on mag. As the gap makes the other two classes pets so far behind that after any nerfs even with raid focus they can't actually tank. Necros have two pet spells one warrior meant for tanking and one rogue meant for dps. Our warrior pet has almost always tanked well, except when all pets sucked, and been about equal to a beastlord warder in this regard while falling well behind its dps. Our rogue pet has always dps'd well and been about equal to a beastlord warder in this regard while flopping on its face should it get aggro. Our pets separately equal a beastlords warder we just have to pick in what regard and can't do both dps and tank at the same time at a warders level. Its a choice based on the scenario. The offensive gap closed some because after x amount of years we also finally got an offensive pet AA disc to restore (not close the gap) the previous dichotomy among the pet classes. The duration and power still needs to go up some and we still need help with runes, healing, defensive and an offensive no hit limit pet proc buff. As you keep saying there are 3 main pet classes. When runes were nerfed, pet da was nerfed, pet focus was nerfed we took the exact same hits you did for our already to begin with watered down pet. Yet you were then somewhat compensated back by getting two pet rune lines back (we should have been on that spell), a promised pet heal (we should be on that spell), unlimited proc counter offensive spell with prism skin recourse (we should have that spell line as well). We got left off putting a bigger gap back in. No on wants to change mag > bst/nec(based on pet) but the gap slowly evolved to mag >>>> bst/nec(based on pet) which still wasn't a problem until they nerf and tune based on the strongest leaving the other two broken. The gap between the pet classes doesn't need to be as large as it recently turned out. And no losing some of that gap back to where it traditionally fell doesn't entitle you to otherstuffs as it never should have gotten that big or out of whack to where it was without some seeing it becoming a problem. There should be class specific differences and unique spell lines and AA but the other pet classes need to stay in the ballpark and also be included in what are the general pet class spells which in this case necros were not in a few cases.
I am sorry if my post offended you or seemed like an attack on your class. I really do want nec/beast pets to be able to tank sufficiently for your needs. With that in mind, I did completely read your post and I'm aware of what you said. Quite frankly the current state of affairs makes absolutely no sense. Me and a mage friend spent an hour trying to determine what changed in earth pet tanking, and we can't figure out what (the max hit decreased, but that doesn't impact tanking). I haven't seen any parses for necro pets (and I don't have a raid pet to go out and try), but anecdotally it seems necro pets have changed and that makes zero sense whatsoever. This whole nerf smells fishy because they hit all the wrong places. Our swarm pets weren't the problem, our earth pet max hit (and aggro generation) wasn't the problem, and certainly necro/beast pets weren't a problem (personally I don't think mage pets are a problem either, but that's not my decision to make). If someone could point out what exactly changed on necro pets (mitigation? avoidance? HP? something else?) it would probably be much easier to revert the nerf. Regardless, what happened was wrong. I'm very sorry that your pet sucks at the moment and I certainly think it should be able to tank at least one blue con, if not more. That being said, I've gone out with group geared necros who have tanked 2 blue con mobs at a time pre-nerf without a sweat. Regardless, I agree no tank was envious of necro pets' abilities, and even group necro pets should at least be able to get by (again, if not more). However, all of that currently hinges on anecdotal evidence, from which it's hard to make a judgement. I never claimed my defensive spells were useful, I actually supported necros for the most part. Of the spells you listed, the 1st one and the 2nd one are on a same timer (so you can't use both), and any good mage would choose the 2nd over the 1st since it has a fast cast, a lower recast, no negative effects, and blocks more damage. Other than the 1st, the spells you listed are very useful, and we share all of them with beasts. I certainly agree you should get the 2nd spell since it was a response to the rune nerf we all went through. However, both Mages and Beasts have had the third spell for like 10 years (no reason necros couldn't have it though) and the 4th spell we've had for 7 years (again, no reason why necros shouldn't get such a spell), so they weren't a response to the rune nerf. I actually said the pet defensive spells necros have are currently useless, which should be looked into. Beyond spell affects, I agree your pets should not fall below the threshold. The number of mobs a pet can tank isn't the best measure, since there are so many variables. A raid focused pet could tank 3 mobs in heroic adventures with some runes thrown in (a group pet was a struggle), but could not tank 3 in ToR, for example. On the other hand if you had a real healer or two healer mercs it probably could tank 3. With that in mind it's hard to assess anecdotes without specifics. And again, without knowing what this nerf actually did, it's hard to make claims about what to fix (I can't find any numerical evidence earth pets were nerfed tanking wise). Really I think it makes more sense to tune your pets based on what you feel you need rather than based on mage pets, and I'm gonna assume the numbers you used (10% HP, 5% more mitigation) were more arbitrary than anything. I'd still like to see some sort of parse, but I'll take your word that the base stats have Nec/Beast pets 60k below Mage pets. DPS is really a different topic, so I'm not gonna comment on that. As for the various toolsets of the classes, they most certainly do factor in. For many years, necros were the kings of soloing not because of their pets, which sucked, but because they could kite. Mages had the strongest pets because they couldn't pull, slow (which used to be an even bigger deal), or root/snare (which can definitely be used to handle an add). The game has evolved a long way since then, with many run speed change immune mobs and pulling is less of an issue in a lot of content. Still, why does ghetto slow factor in but being able to root an add away from your pet does not? If I get 3 mobs I can either fade (only works every 5 minutes or so) or tank them all head on. In many cases necros have other options. Again I think your pet should be a viable tank, but those abilities are why mage pets are significantly better. On the topic of pet order, I didn't say that's how pets should be, but how there were. In PoP beasts could actually tank PoP trash (not easily but they could) whereas mages could not. Nec pets had no chance. Over time pet roles have changed, and adding more ">" signs doesn't really illustrate anything other than Mage pets>Nec/Beast pets. Again, DPS is a much different issue. So I think we can both agree that the nerf is wrong, makes no sense, and should be reverted. The mage class is balanced around having strong pets. I don't really care if Beasts and Necs have strong pets too, but really I do want my pet to be noticeably stronger (10% more HP is rather small in most content, as is 5% more mitigation).
As you say dps is another matter entirely as it doesn't prevent a pet from doing something just impacts how much. I said 15% base but thats before your pet AA disc which is twice ours and lasts like 5 minutes, your pet proc AA and spell proc AA. All of which put you guys way way ahead dps wise as you should be completely fine with that. Your pets are probably 3x or more our pets dps which is fine. Tanking is another matter. I don't have specifics of what changes went in as far as mitigation, avoidance, hps, hits etc. I don't have them prior either as I don't often parse that stuff out and relied on the more parse oriented necros to say pets are better or worse because of x, y or z. I just know I've been shown prior that raid nec warrior pets were about 120-130K hps tops. Even that number really doesn't matter when compared to mages as all I want is for my warrior pet to tank trash mobs without issues again. Frankly trash mobs with a raid focus should be a joke if group focused warrior nec pets are to serve a role of tanking with support. The only reason I pointed out all those differences is based on what I am seeing is that they tuned based off what raid mag pets could do instead of nec/bst. Thats an issue when the gap tanking wise was so big. As raid focused nec warrior pets are weak undergeared tanks now verse even singles in the group game and mages went from 2-3 at a time np to it being an issue at times. What mages have or isnt all that useful or is situational really doesn't matter to me unless all of it is being used as a factor to tune all pets, which appears to be the case. Prior to any changes or whatever bug this may be I could careless that your pet had 60k more hps, at least 12% more mitigation, always armor and all the other spells you had to make your pets that much better. As long as my pet could serve his job it was fine he was worst at it then yours. However if they tune based off of what you can do with your pet and all the extra then mine needs some major changes to get him back to the point he can do his job again. With a raid focus this should not even be coming up in my opinion verse single trash mobs. So they either need to tune off of raid focused mag tank pets and then boost up nec/bst raid pets up accordingly somehow so they can still function but still to a lessor degree. Or balance around whats ok for a raid focused bst/nec pet to handle and accept that because of 60K more hps, at least 12% more mitigation, always full armor, extra runes and heals that mage pets will probably double the capabilities of nec warrior pets. But its one or the other. Making mage pets tuned as they want in the group game with raid focus cripples the lessor pets because of the gap that exists.
There are both root and snare clicks for mages now. Just because some are not aware of them or can't be bothered to farm charge having drops isn't really a concern. I have seen various mages pull off some amazing feats of CC or pulling both solo and 2 boxing utilizing pets, these various clickies and knowledge of various mage tools and abilties. Everyone loves to muddy up the waters at times.
DPS is tuned around the class and is irrespective of tanking beyond aggro generation. I'm not sure to which disc you are referring to (DPS? or Tanking?), so I can't comment on that. Snare and Root clickies are available, but I believe they have something like 5 minute refresh timers. The point is that necros have a larger toolset than mages (I have a lot of tools on 5-15 minute refresh timers, but I pull much faster than that), which somewhat offsets their weaker pets. As for the rest of your post, I actually completely agree. A group focused Necro pet should be able to tank one trash mob in a current content zone with a current content focus, in my opinion (granted that's just my opinion), irrespective of a mage pet. That means with an EM16 pet focus (which *should* be dropping somewhere in T2, though I haven't found it), the pet should be able to tank 1 mob in Argin/ToR. If you or the devs have other standards that's fine, but that's my arbitrarily created standard. Unfortunately I have no power so I can't make that happen. As I've said, I can't find a numerical difference in earth pet tanking. It's possible there is one, but for the life of me I can't find it. Without know what changed beyond "tanking" for necro pets it's somewhat hard to ask for a correction. At this point we really need a dev to make a thread saying "this is the problem, this is what we've done, and this is what we want you to test." Right now someone is making seemingly arbitrary changes that haven't addressed what they were trying to resolve. At least some kind of dev comment would be helpful.
Frenzied Burnout - pretty sure this lasts like 5 minutes now and was the pet aa disc I was referring to. Classes: MAG/254 Skill: Melee Target: Pet Range: 100' Resist: Beneficial, Blockable: Yes Casting: 2s Duration: 42s (7 ticks), Extendable: Yes, Dispelable: Yes 2: Increase AC by 180 4: Increase Melee Haste v3 by 30% 7: Increase STR by 35 8: Increase Chance to Flurry by 15% 9: Increase ATK by 580 10: Increase Chance to Hit by 16% 11: Increase Hit Damage by 176% We are getting sidetracked but yes the snare and root clicks might not be as fast a reuse for a mage and yes the classes have different tool sets. Mages have other means to help with CC or in those situations that may or may not be equal but they do have options and abilities that necros dont have. As you said your main pet can tank 2-3 at a time you have a lot more tools for that, your beefed up swarm pet is probably equal or just under my main pet which can then handle another mob or two if you choose to have two or three of them up at once. You also have about a zillion other pets to keep another mob busy to buy you time to gate out of town or buy time for other tricks of the class that might not be common knowledge like companion of necessity or whatever before you even need to consider root or snare. Again I have seen some amazing pulls from box teams with coth or some form of it that drops the summoned toons aggro in certain circumstances. Point of all this being woah are not mages to the point that they are so bad that suddenly if nec pets were brought closer in terms of tanking or even some dps for that matter that mages then deserve fd or snare in return. Again a gap is needed for sure its how much of a gap is reasonable. No matter what you say that gap was closer prior to all the activated offensive and defensive stuff that mages received over the past 1-5 years. If the gap is again closed somewhat to where it was for the 8-10 years prior to that because that gap has gotten to large. Doesn't to me then entitle you to downplay everything else the class is capable of so you can ask for a better snare or root option.
All I have to say is lol. Aristo was testing potential pet nerfs prior to Argin Hiz launch I believe. We were given like 8 hours or something before Beta was taken down to 'test them'. It was also said we would have ample time to test them further and give feedback to him on the matter before changes went live. Assuming what people are seeing is not a bug, misinformation, sun in their eyes ect. One would believe Aristo did not revert some changes back or some went through and allowed for pet nerfs to go live without informing the player base. However, without any type of data '10 years ago on May 5th my pet tanked 2 mobs, but 3 years ago on Sept 12th he was only able to tank 1' is unacceptable and does ABSOLUTELY nothing towards any type of an argument to push any agenda. If this is a bug, get some relevant and concise data. Accurately display the buffs used, the debuffs used and please make it last more then 2 minutes. Bickering and all of this none sense does nothing at all outside of anger people. Why would you even be comparing two different classes abilities in a pet thread stating that nerfs were done? It is off topic entirely and posts should be removed 100%.
There really isn't much to show or even look for for some us as we don't have before data to compare to nor know what would look out of place to begin with. My pet could have 300 less ac, could take +5 in di rounds now, could be avoiding stuff 50% less or could be taking -55% from heals and I would not have any clue other then before he tanked this type of mob without issue and now doesn't. The necros who used to parse all this stuff out for the community and would notice if certain numbers found now look off have since retired thanks to the deathbloom nerf, aa slow nerf, all the pet related nerfs prior, the dot crit effects/bard songs/bp nerfs along with the impending epic and dot stacking nerfs.
Has anyone actually checked to see if their EM focus isn't functioning for whatever reason and that's what's causing the issues?
My earth pet EM focus is working fine, and quite frankly I don't see anything wrong with main pet tanking. I haven't seen any actual evidence of a change in tanking (same HP, avoidance, and mitigation). To my knowledge what has changed is RS pet HP (to around 110K) and earth pet max/average hit, which have both decreased. I don't have a necro pet to parse.
I can't echo this sentiment enough. I keep checking these threads to see if anyone has posted any parses to compare with the ones found here: https://forums.station.sony.com/eq/index.php?threads/pet-mitigation-parses-and-discussion.210068/ There is a wealth of "before" info, would be awesome to see some "after" info.
But sir, that thread was started by a warrior specifically to destroy the way of life of pet users everywhere, thus (despite the abundance of varied data there) is not relevant and should be purged from the boards for the good of the nation! (See: the # of lock this thread! it's class envy! replies on said thread) There's nothing at all wrong with using anecdotal evidence to discover the possible existence of a problem. When it's identified, though, that's when empirical evidence needs to be gathered to ascertain the validity of the observation, otherwise it's useless information. The amount of "my pet could tank 4 yellow cons last Thursday night but now can only tank 1 blue con this mornin omg stealth nerfed" posts on this board are absurd.
