It’s not good design to force you not to either. lol
Either way, you’re going to be forced to use a Spirit Beast or another very-specific Pet - if you’re “worth your salt.”
I raid, and I care. In fact, Raiding is my favorite part of the game.
You care too because it wouldn’t matter that you had to use a Spirit Beast if you didn’t.
the thing is for a tenacity pet there is simply no reason to use anything but a SB… Regardless of the other pets there is only the SB as far as tenacity as the others are pointless no matter how bad the heal gets its still more of a heal than any other tenacity pet… With the heal being so useless what ever use anything but a ferocity pet now?
And that’s my point. Unless you can come up with a competitive alternative for every other exotic beast family, your entire argument is basically “Blizzard should have done what I can’t, so they’re just lazy”.
Oh no, you’ll only have Exhil and Turtle, like the other two specs. Or BM hunters running any other pet. Like, your own arguments are defeating you here. You’re arguing that these pets should have mandatory level mechanics, but you seem to think pets are chosen by “spec identity” instead.
Would you still be using your Spirit Beast, for it’s “spec identity”, if it lacked the heal, had no purge, and was a Cunning pet with, say, the dodge defensive (ie. what a Fox has)? If so, why do you care the heal was nerfed? If not, what happened to your precious “spec identity”?
That is the problem I have with the current pet system. It forces you to choose your pet based on mechanics rather than looks or identity. Any change that reduces the “required” nature of certain pet families, like removing the pet purge and yes, like nerfing Spirit Mend, I think is a good thing, because it’s moving us more towards picking pets for looks and identity, rather than being forced to us, say, a freakin worm or hog or snake because they happen to be mechanically required based on their spec and family abilities.
Why should BM uniquely gain all of this crazy extra durability compared to the other two specs? Heck, even at 10% every 30s, Spirit Mend is still healing and extra survivability that BM gets and the other two don’t. BM should get extra pet stuff for being specialized so, but why should they just gain a boatload of durability because of that?
I agree. Fully, in fact. That’s why I’ve been advocating for a long time for pet look to be completely separate from their mechanical functionality. Spec would be freely selectable, and each spec would have a mini talent tree, like they did in Cata or MoP. The existing utility effects would be in those trees, as well as spec-oriented passives.
Pick whatever pet you want, then spec if for what you need it to do. That’d be my ideal systems. I can transmog my armor and weapons without regard to the mechanical power of the items I’m transmogging to. Why should my pet’s look be shackled by hard-locked mechanical ties?
You’re right. Perhaps instead I should say, hardcore raiders are (typically) not willing to sacrifice mechanical superiority for identity or looks when it comes to pets.
If Spirit Beasts were mechanically inferior, they wouldn’t be used by most hardcore raiders, no matter how much they might like their looks.
If Spirit Beasts were not as mechanically superior as they currently are, you might actually see one of the other 11 exotic families show up, or perhaps rares from non-exotic families.
I’m trying to reach a point where what pet you use is based on personal aesthetic preferences, identity, and any sort of memory value you’ve given the pet, without the game trying to force or even suggest you towards or away from certain pets.
Pretty sure the heal is still stronger for survivability than Ferocity’s leech is for BM, considering how much of BM’s damage counts as “pet damage” rather than personal damage for leech. Combined with the defensive, Spirit Beast is still the best option, defensively, for BM. Even with the nerf that’s true, unfortunately true.
I doubt it. Leech will heal for a lot more over the course of an encounter. Which takes a bit of pressure off the healers, too.
I know I’ll be running Leech. 15% leech is nothing to be sneezed at. Remember that 10% from spirit mend is not instant, it’s a HoT - just like leech, except leech isn’t on a CD.
BM gets at most a quarter of it’s damage from sources that leech to the hunter rather than the pet. Ferocity’s leech aura is innately a quarter as strong for BM as a result. Something tells me 10% leech, or even 15% with AotB, on 25% of your damage, much of which will be overhealing, is quite a bit inferior to a 10% heal on a 30s CD and a 20% damage reduction cooldown.
Like be serious here. You can run Ferocity if you want, but don’t try to pretend that Spirit Beasts aren’t still going to be the default option for BM in SL.
I doubt this figure (only 25%). I’ll do some more testing.
ETA
Just did some quick testing on a dummy (in my pvp spec).
Abilities that leech healed from equaled about 45% of my Dps. Probably a bit more if we wanted to include azerite procs / essences.
https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/cvjAGCq3JbTk2pmX#fight=36&type=damage-done&source=21
Current #2 rank BM hunter on Shad’har (I skipped #1 because it’s a Chinese or Taiwanese player, and translating is a pain).
The only abilities that heal the hunter from his ability set are Auto-Shot, Cobra Shot, Barbed Shot, Lethal Strikes, and his potion. So that’s 24.46% of his damage, of which 5.51% is borrowed power.
Stomp, Kill Command, Basic Attacks, and pet auto-attacks all heal the pet, not the hunter. So ya, 75% of BM’s damage, if not more, does not leech heal the hunter.
Ahhh, maybe my quick test was bad. I had calculated “Kill Command” was healing me.
ETA - yeah, confirmed, kill command doesn’t leech.
Either way though. A 10% HoT is pitiful, and rather meaningless. Sure, it’s better than nothing, but let’s face it, it’s not going to “save you” like the current iteration of spirit mend can.
It’s not supposed to save you. That’s my point. Spirit Mend was far too strong before, making it the only option, and causing it to dominate BM’s survivability profile (and substantially amplify it compared to SV and MM). Nerfing it was a good thing. What’s supposed to “save you” is Exhilaration or Turtle.
And despite your assertions otherwise, there’s zero chance a ferocity pet is going to become the default over a Spirit Beast for BM. The leech, on less than a quarter of your damage, is utterly pitiful compared to the max HP, DR cooldown, and on-demand heal from a Spirit Beast, even at ~1/3rd it’s BfA strength.
Spirit Beasts will still probably be the default raid pet for BM, but it won’t feel quite as mandatory as it is right now.
7% more health is probably good for a tank. It’s not going to help a BM much, unless it’s a 1shot mechanic, and that extra 7% is enough to stay alive.
The DR of 20% for 6 secs, on a 3 min CD… yeah. Like that’s not really going to do much either.
The 10% HoT on a 30 sec CD is going to do what exactly?
I get that you thought Spirit Mend was OP to begin with, and I probably agree with you.
So, back on topic - Massive Nerf to Spirit Mend on SL! 
I find it utterly hilarious that’s you’re discounting all of that, and yet somehow think 10-15% leech on 25% of your damage is definitely better.
You’re just bound and determined to see this nerf as making Spirit Beast useless, aren’t you?
Well, believe what you want. I’ll give you 20 to 1 odds that come SL, the dominant guidance will still be to use Spirit Beasts in raids. They just won’t see as much use, if any, in M+.
And my point is, massive justified nerf.
So pet rez is increased pet healing decreased and pet defense is worse…ugh yep hunters gonna be super rough
How did you get this from what you quoted?
Uhm, no? I’m not.
Have you mistaken me for someone else here or?
And my point is that: Yes, it’s good to achieve a balance so you can pick w/e pet you want based on personal preferences towards visuals. But if they opt to reach that stage by essentially making everything pets bring useless, or for the most, barely helpful, then…what’s the point to even have such elements?
Balance is good, but when the strive for perfect balance pushes everything else aside, when balance is the only thing that really matters, it can result in changes to the design which a lot of people don’t like.
If you care much more about being optimal rather than anything else, then that’s a choice in itself. A strive for balance is good, but it shouldn’t take precidence over designing things to have an impact(and feel like they do) and usefulness.
I never said that.
Because having things such as strong pet based heals or DRs and more, it fits.
It makes sense for BM to have them.
I’m not saying that only BM should be as strong/durable. Quite the opposite. I’m saying that removing/destroying abilities/effects with an impact on your gameplay just because it’s easier than the alternative, is the wrong thing to do.
True to a degree. But…pets aren’t armor.
Why not?
Again, not because of Spirit Mend being too strong but rather other abilities in comparsion are lacking in strength.
There’s a big difference.
I honestly can’t think of a single time the current iteration of Spirit Mend has saved me. It may have, but it’s never felt strong enough to do so.
My 160 Hunter receives a heal of 732 and 5 ticks at 488 (totaling 3172 over ten seconds). That is not going to save anybody except in very edge case scenarios. My spammable non-crit Arcane shot does 1187 damage every 1.5 seconds. One Aimed Shot does just shy of 4k damage. If somebody gets saved by this thing, they should buy a lottery ticket.
The most irritating thing about this change is that I have no reason to use a Spirit Beast now. The other pets have an advantage, and that SUCKS since since one of the six talents for BM is “Exotic Beasts.”
Make me mad to even think about it.
They are trying to make all these “I don’t want to be forced to use a Spirit Beast” people happy at the expense of the rest of the hunter population.
I HATE this class design team.
Aren’t other exotic beasts good like corehounds, silithids, etc…
What advantage? Any non-exotic Tenacity pet has the same HP and DR cooldown abilities, and lacks the heal. The only benefit they’d provide is if you need the pet defensive for some reason (in which case you’re probably using a Clefthoof anyway) or an MS or snare (rarely relevant in PvE).
As for Ferocity, you might need to pull it out for lust, but lacking that need (ie. shaman or mage on hand), the leech certainly isn’t strong enough for BM to use it. As I pointed out above, at most ~25% of BM’s damage leech heals the hunter rather than the pet (all pet damage, including Kill Command and Stomp, heal the pet, not you).
And Cunning? Well, movement speed is almost always useful, but Master’s Call has precious little PvE utility (especially with Posthaste already on the table), and given our already superb mobility, I feel like more HP, a second DR cooldown, and an on-demand heal are still substantially stronger than any other pet.
I mean, really, what other pet do you think beats a Spirit Beast, and in what situations? Clefthoof already beat them for soloing, even in BfA, but Clefthoof are also exotic, so that doesn’t really trip your Exotic Beasts issue. MS and/or snare could be solid in PvP, but they don’t have a ton of utility in PvE in most cases. And pet defensives are generally useless outside of soloing. So what pet do you think beats a Spirit Beast, and why?
You keep say 25% of a bm hunters damage is the hunter. When you look at the breakdowns its 47-53% keep in mind we are getting new skills depending on covenant that will shift it as well. Also if animal companion is no longer top dps the damage shifts more to the hunter.
Or are you too under the misconception that Kill Command and Stomp count as “hunter damage” for the purposes of leech? Because they don’t. To reiterate, literally the only things that leech heal the hunter for BM are Auto-Shot, Cobra Shot, Barbed Shot bleed, Kill Shot come SL, and most damage from borrowed power effects. Right now, those effects make up ~25% of the hunter’s damage. I don’t see covenants shifting that towards 50%, especially given the loss of focus generation to BM due losing all those crit corruptions, and thus the hilarious Wild Call proc rate.
Not entirely sure here but, it sounds like you misunderstood what he/she said. I think he/she’s refering to the BfA iteration of Spirit Mend when saying that “it has the potential to save you” and that the SL iteration won’t be capable of doing so, apart from some very niche situations like you said.
In BfA, Spirit Mend has most certainly done it’s part in saving me from death in various encounters. Both directly and indirectly.
Leech is far more effective now than Spirit Mend, which is now useless in every situation. Spirit Beasts are now the weakest of all pets.