Please Give Us a Pretty/Useful Pet or Two in SotO

[Bastrii.3047]

There's very few choices in pretty pets that aren't terrible overall. In fact, the best pets are felines, excluding Jacaranda and Iboga - which are arguably two of the best pets, on top of being absolutely hideous. So if you want a pretty, functional pet, your choices are the lynx, tiger, and jaguar. Otherwise you take the Jacaranda because it's the best for DPS, or maybe the Fern Hound or other specific pet for the situation if you're playing support.

Can we get a pet that's both beautiful and useful? I'd love to see something like the Kirin join the list of pets we could take, or even just a normal deer. Hell, make a magic deer in SotO. Make it pretty, give it good DPS, and a useful ability, and all Rangers would thank you. Just make something that isn't a mishmash of random twigs and branches, or another reskin of a spider, or... *shudder*, whatever demonic miscreant you're going to shove onto us.

A general passover of pets is really needed, too. When 80% of players use the Jacaranda, it's not because the Jacaranda is over powered or pretty. It's because it's one of the few viable pets of the dozens we have. Not to mention a dozen of our pets are flat out reskins of other pets, and that's just depressing. Not taking the Jacaranda means you miss out on a ton of random AoE, consistent damage, a tanky pet that can self heal, and a snare CC. The only option one could argue is better is the Lynx, which has slightly higher damage - but it has half the health, no self heal, and gets melted. I'm pretty sure if the Devs looked at most used pets, the list would be 10 entries at the very top, and the rest seeing a sub 1% usage rate. And of the 10 most used pets, the majority would be starter pets that new players/alts never took off.

[Sirius.4510]

While there's some nuance in which pets are good, there are some general pain points in the whole system, yes:

• Most pets are irrelevant and don't get used. Different groups of players (PvP, WvW, general PvE, high-end PvE) have their favorites, and Soulbeast typically has a separate set from the other two specializations, but even so I suspect that less than half of ranger pets show up in any game mode's "frequently used" list.
• Controls could do with some upgrades. Mechanist's Jade Mech feels easier to work with than Ranger pets (although it's not without some issues either). Untamed took steps toward this but the control over F1/F2/F3 feels like it should be part of the base class.

It's probably not realistic to make every pet good without making them nothing but skins, which might be even less satisfying. There might be some middle ground though.

[CETheLucid.3964]

13 hours ago, Bastrii.3047 said:

Please Give Us a Pretty/Useful Pet or Two in SotO

It would be weirder if they didn't. Every expansion gave ranger a couple of new pets. Don't see why SotO would be different.

[InsaneQR.7412]

God no. Please make vanilla pets usable instead and give us a pet wardrobe system.

This would quench the need for new pets for a while and would allow for some customization.

Atm mainly expac pets are used 80% of the time and the rest are pets only used on soulbeast because most vanilla pets are trash when left on their own.

 

 

[Bastrii.3047]

4 hours ago, InsaneQR.7412 said:

God no. Please make vanilla pets usable instead and give us a pet wardrobe system.

This would quench the need for new pets for a while and would allow for some customization.

Atm mainly expac pets are used 80% of the time and the rest are pets only used on soulbeast because most vanilla pets are trash when left on their own.

 

 

There's 14 pets from Expacs. Not counting aquatic pets (95% of content is on solid ground), this leaves 38 pets.

5 Moas (similar models/animations)

4 Bears (similar models/animations) with an extra bear with a somewhat unique, though hideous, model (similar animations)

5 Drakes (similar models/animations)

4 Boars/Pigs (similar models/animations)

5 Birds (similar models/animations)

4 Spiders (similar models/animations)

5 Hounds (similar models/animations)

4 Felines (almost similar models, similar animations)

4 Devourers (similar models/animations)

So in truth, we have 9 pets to choose from with some flavor from the core game, because these pets - for the most part - act nearly entirely similar outside of their F2. The expansions did a good thing, and brought variety - but the variety is small. We don't have any really unique fantasy options. We have some really ugly ones that... personally, I would never tame, but like... nothing that looks super appealing nor any that could fit with any design. 95% of the time I'm in a city space, I just keep my pet stowed, especially in any segment where I talk to NPCs, or other players. They all look bad.

It's like... when you think of a Ranger with a cool pet, some amazing things come to mind, fantastical things. A *really good looking phoenix* that catches on *actual* fire would be a great option. Or maybe something like a powerful Elk with branches instead of antlers. The Kirins from Echovald are beautiful! I'd love to tame one of those. Or maybe a small dragon-like beast, or an oriental dragon would be cool (no, drakes/wyverns do not count). The "wyverns" (our choice in "dragons") look like scrawny pitbulls with wing arms. They're hideous. And they're both the same model.

The devs have rarely added nice options for pet that aren't disgusting. I want more variety in appearance. I'd also like it if all pets had relatively similar DPS as well outside of their F2.

The Rock Gazelle is a good, if simple design, for a pet they added. I'd like something more fantastical, or even just more common creatures to wiggle into the roster. I'd love to tame a deer, for example. A bad design is something like the Jacaranda, which just looks like a floating grass troll doll. It's... extremely ugly. But also one of the most effective pets in-game. So everyone chooses it.

[Gotejjeken.1267]

From competitive standpoint...

19 hours ago, CETheLucid.3964 said:

It would be weirder if they didn't. Every expansion gave ranger a couple of new pets. Don't see why SotO would be different.

I would agree, but have no idea what pets from EoD are useful---turtle I guess?

10 hours ago, InsaneQR.7412 said:

God no. Please make vanilla pets usable instead and give us a pet wardrobe system.

This would quench the need for new pets for a while and would allow for some customization.

Atm mainly expac pets are used 80% of the time and the rest are pets only used on soulbeast because most vanilla pets are trash when left on their own.

 

 

True; pets like felines have use in PvE, and dogs / birds in competitive with merged soulbeast.  The rest are...bad.  Yes, I know Drake Tail Swipe meme exists, still consider it sub-par for almost every situation except 'super awesome melee crash at mid' in sPvP.

Since I personally don't trust them to rework anything (see auto attack skills breaking F2 response times, etc.) I'd rather they just add at least one useful new pet.  Would be bad to have dog CC / mobility or bird mobility broken because they screwed something up with a wardrobe like they did legendaries....

Edited August 15, 2023 by Gotejjeken.1267

[WhoWantsAHug.3186]

Something super useful like smokescale, but condi dmg plz. 

[InsaneQR.7412]

We will get a land shark apparently.

Lets see how that plays out.

[Beddo.1907]

It seems like they want to use the old planned pets, that didn't make it in.
Since for some of them the issue was balance of the original mob, we could expect something decent.
Sand shark was confirmed and it has some good base skills.

[draxynnic.3719]

1 hour ago, Beddo.1907 said:

It seems like they want to use the old planned pets, that didn't make it in.
Since for some of them the issue was balance of the original mob, we could expect something decent.
Sand shark was confirmed and it has some good base skills.

Wouldn't surprise me - at least one of the weapons seems to be something they'd considered before but went with something else (rifle was considered for chronomancer but they went with shield instead).

[CETheLucid.3964]

On 8/16/2023 at 1:10 AM, InsaneQR.7412 said:

We will get a land shark apparently.

Neat! 🦈

[kharmin.7683]

On 8/16/2023 at 2:10 AM, InsaneQR.7412 said:

We will get a land shark apparently.

Lets see how that plays out.

Disappointed we didn't get one when PoF launched since those buggers were everywhere in the first map

[draxynnic.3719]

18 hours ago, kharmin.7683 said:

Disappointed we didn't get one when PoF launched since those buggers were everywhere in the first map

Personally, I'm disappointed we didn't get smogscales. That blinding field would be SOOOO much more useful for a pet than the smokescale's "the smokescale is invulnerable but to everyone else it's just a combo field" ability.