Curse

bennyandthejets · May 16, 2011, 10:07 AM // 10:07

Hello,

I just picked up my first 4 heros this weekend, love them! I did some reading & learned that heros can have pets just like players. I was considering having all of my heros pick up ranger as a secondary, keep their attributes all in primary profession, all pick up dire wolves & replace 1 skill with comfort animal so they could use them, then disable it so they dont waste energy when the wolves take damage.

Is this a viable strategy? Forgive me if this sounds just silly, but on paper it seems like it would be pretty effective. 7 extra meatshields to take damage/body block & do damage?

Has anyone tried this & was it effective?

Thanks for your time!

distilledwill · May 16, 2011, 10:12 AM // 10:12

I think plenty of people have tried it and its a lot of fun. I wouldn't say it's the most efficient build in the world, but anything goes really!

aspi · May 16, 2011, 11:06 AM // 11:06

I Have tried it and still use it with my ranger and paragon. Just I do it with less pets, I dont want my monk to be useless when his pets dies and also my ST rit has none. But even with 5 lions and one spider its pretty fun

RedDog91 · May 16, 2011, 01:27 PM // 13:27

It won't be effective unless you only want the wolves there as meat shields to take some aggro.
The reason being that the amount of damage pets put out is dependent on the tamer's level in BeastMastery. If you have less than 7-8 points, the pet will only be dealing around 5-10 damage per hit. If you go 10+ you can get the pet to deal around 17-25 per hit.

Lukyboy · May 16, 2011, 01:29 PM // 13:29

It sounds like alot of fun, but it isn't really effective

The AI of the pet is pretty bad. It takes quite a long time for them to switch targets, their attack speed isnt that great, and one of those 7 pets will eventually aggro an extra group that you did not want to fight.

On top of that; You need quite a big investment in Beast Mastery for the pet to deal some reasonable damage, and some skills to buff it (like an IAS or something) Having just Comfort animal isn't really enough.

Also, if a pet dies, it disables the entire skill bar for ~10 seconds. So, if your monk has a pet and it dies, he can't heal for the next 10 seconds (which sucks

)

They're not very good meat shields either. All level 20 pets have 80 AL, which is more then your caster heroes will have. So the enemy will still want to hack away at your 60 AL monk, rather than your pet.

Sure, it's funny to see 7 wolves chasing after that Kournan soldier. But there are far better options for hero teams

KotCR · May 16, 2011, 01:42 PM // 13:42

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lukyboy

They're not very good meat shields either. All level 20 pets have 80 AL, which is more then your caster heroes will have. So the enemy will still want to hack away at your 60 AL monk, rather than your pet.

Yeah, but then that's easy to change by using the right runes on your casters, upgrades on their weapons, and giving them shields. Or just use Paragons or Dervishes for the bulk of your healing instead, though somebody would probably have to go /mo to bring some of the appropriate prots and perhaps forfeit a pet in the process.

As said, anything goes, though. Certainly more effective strats out there, but I don't see why it wouldn't work with the right supporting builds.

You'd have to pay alot of micro attention to your pet's control panels though.

Riot Narita · May 16, 2011, 01:55 PM // 13:55

Quote:

Originally Posted by RedDog91

The reason being that the amount of damage pets put out is dependent on the tamer's level in BeastMastery.

Worse than that - the skill blackout when a pet dies is also dependent on Beast Mastery.

No points in BM -> long blackouts (No skills for 10 seconds!)
Lots of points in BM -> "short" blackouts (4 seconds @ 12 BM)

Hence:

Quote:

Originally Posted by aspi

I dont want my monk to be useless when his pets dies and also my ST rit has none.

Voodoo Rage · May 16, 2011, 02:24 PM // 14:24

Pets is the hands of heroes is just terrible. What you will see are lots of pets standing around doing nothing in battles until your hero is done casting and starts wanding the enemy.

Skyy High · May 16, 2011, 05:34 PM // 17:34

You can get some hilarious results, but putting 0 points in BM is asking for trouble. Skill blackout was designed specifically to discourage people from bringing pets just as meatshields without dedicating any part of their build to them.

Chrisworld · May 16, 2011, 06:59 PM // 18:59

For added fun, make sure one of your heroes is a Necro (or maybe you are) and you can have a minion army on top of the wolf army + your own party. Lol, lots of stuff on the screen.