Ok, I've recently been playing my Iksar Shadowknight more lately, and I've been hearing some mixed reviews about having their pet.
Some people say they don't bother with the pet because its too weak.
Other say its helpful because it adds extra DPS.
On one hand, I can see people who aren't use to playing with a pet not wanting to have the skele there, it could be a burden.
But for those used to playing a pet class (I have and have in the past played a beastlord, mage, shaman, and I guess enchanter kinda counts) the extra DPS could really potentially be useful.
I can also see if at some point you just stop getting pet upgrades, your pet might not even hit anymore, so in that case its just a waste of mana. But I don't know if thats the situation.
Your thoughts?
(PS I didn't see a thread on this - checked quickly - if there was one feel free to link it in response and I'll read that)
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Shadowknights: Pet or NotFollow
At your level (10) you should absolutely always be using your pet. He is adding a significant amount of damage at that level. As you progress into the 30-40's you will be less and less impressed with his damage output, but he is still adding something. Whether that little bit of extra damage is worth listening to the constant cackling and the mana to cast him is situational and ultimately up to you. As you get into the 50's the pet seems to get stronger again.
Pets have no built in aggro anymore, so they are much easier to use now than they used to be. If you can afford to put some mage-summoned gear on your pet, like the Girdle of Magi'kot, your pet might even have more hitpoints than you do :) That's a nice advantage to have when you want to get out of a bad situation and need your pet to tank a while.
Pets have no built in aggro anymore, so they are much easier to use now than they used to be. If you can afford to put some mage-summoned gear on your pet, like the Girdle of Magi'kot, your pet might even have more hitpoints than you do :) That's a nice advantage to have when you want to get out of a bad situation and need your pet to tank a while.
A friend of mine plays a SK. He uses the pet for DPS. When he is getting low on HPs, he backs off and lifetaps while the pet tanks. Once he is ready or the pet is low, he jumps back into melee.
Use, of course, is up to you but IMO, why not have that extra DPS? And, as Samatman said, nice to have to help you out of a bad situation.
Use, of course, is up to you but IMO, why not have that extra DPS? And, as Samatman said, nice to have to help you out of a bad situation.
If you're soloing the pet has its uses as DPS, but if you're the puller/tanker in a group I would lean against even summoning it. He'll intercept pulls and scatter mobs, making things that much slower.
I've never reached the higher levels as an SK, but from what I've seen your pets get dramatically better by the high-end game(49+). Up until that most of your summons will be green to you. It's up to you whether you want to use them or not, really. Some do, some don't. It probably won't dramatically change your character's life.
I've never reached the higher levels as an SK, but from what I've seen your pets get dramatically better by the high-end game(49+). Up until that most of your summons will be green to you. It's up to you whether you want to use them or not, really. Some do, some don't. It probably won't dramatically change your character's life.
IMO use the pet. However, this is a big one: Learn to make pet guard if you are pulling solo or in group. I have seen SK's with pet following, messing up pulls badly. It can be hard to back a pet off, and keep it backed off, once he starts hitting. If you are not yet back to the group, you are fighting by yourself until group comes or you get pet off. If group comes to you, may get more adds and so on.
When I solo, I make sure pet is guarding far enough back from mob path and then I pull to him (my little groupie). He still comes a bit quicker than I would like sometimes, but not too bad.
When I solo, I make sure pet is guarding far enough back from mob path and then I pull to him (my little groupie). He still comes a bit quicker than I would like sometimes, but not too bad.
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Pets have no built in aggro anymore, so they are much easier to use now than they used to be.
For example, my Shadowknight was in the Warrens at level 12. Normally, unless I'm at 10% or less hp (causing mobs to frenzy), green con mobs like guards, most rabids, etc won't attack or join in a fight. However, when my lvl 4 pet was up and involved, they would happily social aggro his boney *** and then jump my Shadowknight by association. Not a big issue for a lvl 12 twinked SK but, at higher levels, a greenie swarm like that could be deadly.
Belkira wrote:
Wow. Regular ol' Joph fan club in here.
Having raised a SK to only 34 so far, I have found the pet to be useful in a lot of situations.
Not sure what happens with pet aggro now, but in the past I would not use my pet solo in a dungeon because the pet would tend to aggro lots of green cons and thus me. Even so, in a dungeon or tight quarters, and in situations where you may need to zone frequently, I would not use the pet.
A common tactic for me when soloing is to park my pet in a spot, then aggro a MOB with engulfing darkness (snare DoT), kite a bit while adding Heat Blood and the various syphon debuffs. The pet a provides useful DoT when you decide to melee, so I pull to the pet. If the pet can gain aggro you are also free to fire off a few spells (like Fear) un-interrupted if needed.
In a group the pet can also provide a bit of DPS. Usually I am not the puller, so when the pullee arrives, I send in pet, fire off some spells or arrows, before joining the fray. One thing to watch out for in a group is crowd control--YOUR crowd! With many pets in a 6-person group, things get a bit crowded so find a good spot to park your pet.
The pet can also afford you time to escape. While soloing if I
get a bad pull, one mob is snared but others may attack. If the pet can detain these briefly you have more time to escape.
Anyone else notice since the last patch if their pet seems to get stuck alot? Very annoying if you need to go looking for
it. So if I was going to move around alot in a zone, I would park the pet in one spot and pull to it, or send it away and make a new one in the new spot.
I keep a few extra junk weapons or shields to give my pets. Seems to help its DPS. (My pet's will cannot proc velium weapons yet!) I also give it any junk armor I loot. Don't know if that helps.
I use the spell Strenghten Death. If you are grouped with anyone casting Haste and they feel like hasting your pet, Haste will overwrite Strenghten Death. Me being a big Ogre I seldom use the Pet-only shrink spell except for fun. I like to practice my Abjuration spells on the pet though (Endure Cold, Endure Disease) to skill-up in this important casting category. I know, I could just as easily cast it on myself repeatedly, but it's more fun that way.
Another use for your pet is if you are hunting green-cons. Send in the pet to kill them and you do not have to chase after them when they run. (Just keep an eye on where they die!)
So SK pet is not entirely usless, just use it differently than the other pet classes do.
Edited typos
Edited, Wed Apr 14 12:01:17 2004 by Dothammer
Not sure what happens with pet aggro now, but in the past I would not use my pet solo in a dungeon because the pet would tend to aggro lots of green cons and thus me. Even so, in a dungeon or tight quarters, and in situations where you may need to zone frequently, I would not use the pet.
A common tactic for me when soloing is to park my pet in a spot, then aggro a MOB with engulfing darkness (snare DoT), kite a bit while adding Heat Blood and the various syphon debuffs. The pet a provides useful DoT when you decide to melee, so I pull to the pet. If the pet can gain aggro you are also free to fire off a few spells (like Fear) un-interrupted if needed.
In a group the pet can also provide a bit of DPS. Usually I am not the puller, so when the pullee arrives, I send in pet, fire off some spells or arrows, before joining the fray. One thing to watch out for in a group is crowd control--YOUR crowd! With many pets in a 6-person group, things get a bit crowded so find a good spot to park your pet.
The pet can also afford you time to escape. While soloing if I
get a bad pull, one mob is snared but others may attack. If the pet can detain these briefly you have more time to escape.
Anyone else notice since the last patch if their pet seems to get stuck alot? Very annoying if you need to go looking for
it. So if I was going to move around alot in a zone, I would park the pet in one spot and pull to it, or send it away and make a new one in the new spot.
I keep a few extra junk weapons or shields to give my pets. Seems to help its DPS. (My pet's will cannot proc velium weapons yet!) I also give it any junk armor I loot. Don't know if that helps.
I use the spell Strenghten Death. If you are grouped with anyone casting Haste and they feel like hasting your pet, Haste will overwrite Strenghten Death. Me being a big Ogre I seldom use the Pet-only shrink spell except for fun. I like to practice my Abjuration spells on the pet though (Endure Cold, Endure Disease) to skill-up in this important casting category. I know, I could just as easily cast it on myself repeatedly, but it's more fun that way.
Another use for your pet is if you are hunting green-cons. Send in the pet to kill them and you do not have to chase after them when they run. (Just keep an eye on where they die!)
So SK pet is not entirely usless, just use it differently than the other pet classes do.
Edited typos
Edited, Wed Apr 14 12:01:17 2004 by Dothammer
Devilwind wrote:
I also give it any junk armor I loot. Don't know if that helps
Use the pet whenever possible. The more you use it, the more proficient you become at being a pet commander, and understanding the mechanics of all pets. And I'm of the "more DPS is good" school of thought.
I would tend to agree that when you're the puller for a group you may be better off not summoning the pet. There may be times your pet refuses to back off long enough to get the mob in the position you want.
The most effective way to deal with this is graphically illustrated below. This positioning will keep the mob out of your pet's aggro/assist radius for the couple extra seconds it takes to position it.
<---- here's the mob and boy is he ticked! Eep! 
<---- here's you. Run faster! 
<---- here's your group, dozing, picking their noses, etc. 
<---- here's Lobobtik, just waiting for you to come on home. I can't speak to the SK pets and not hitting mobs at high levels. From what I hear, magicians suffer similarly.
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Actually Yanari, I like your character models better than the Luclin models. What do I have to change in my .ini file to have them look like this?
Jophiel wrote:
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Pets have no built in aggro anymore, so they are much easier to use now than they used to be.
Just wanted to point out (cause not everyone will know this) that this now *only* happens via assist agro. Pets are now considered "neutral" to pretty much everything, so you wont get proximity agro just from wandering past a group of greenies.
It used to be that SKs didn't bother with their pets because they'd get dragged into a fight against every mob they walked past in a zone because they'd agro on his pet even though they would not agro on him. That was fixed quite a while ago.
However, as Joph says, if you are fighting a mob in an area where there are green mobs, but those mobs wont agro on you because of level (but are socially "friendly" to whatever you are fighting), they *will* engage if you use a pet since the pet might be low enough level for them to agro on.
Honestly though, most of us would pull a mob away from his green friends to fight him anyway (to get out of range of healers if nothing else), so this probably isn't that big of a problem. I can certainly see some situation where it might though...
For the most part, I'd say go ahead and summon it. It's extra dps. That's always good. In a group, even when pulling, you can position your pet so as to avoid too much trouble. If you're pulling on a raid, I'd lose the pet though. But the rest of the time, go ahead. Extra dps is extra dps. Every little bit helps...
King Nobby wrote:
More words please
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