The problem with hunter pets is all the good ones are Cunning and/or have crappy family abilities. When we started getting info on BFA I was SO excited for the new hyena models cause hyenas are one of my favorite animals. But they were locked into Cunning. At least their mortal strikes ability is useful in PvP so even though I hardly Ever PvP when I did my adorable hyena was usable.
Fast forward to Shadowlands news and we get this gorgeous new fox model. Sadly, they are also Cunning and have the crappy dodge ability that is useless even in PvP. Dang. That’s okay cause unicorns are cool. They’re tenacity and have tranq/dispel so yay! Except today they’re being moved to their own family with the useless dodge ability. Cool. Oh what? CLOUD SERPENTS?! I’ve wanted one of those since MoP! How cool, what do they- oh. They’re serpents. Cunning AND crappy dodge ability.
Now I know everyone has different tastes and maybe all these pets are lame to someone and all the pets they like happen to be ferocity/tenacity and/or have the tranq ability. I know Hunters are also getting their own tranq shot so the family ability isn’t that important, but that doesn’t mean anything for all the useless Cunning pets that aren’t even good for PvP.
When we got the pet revamp, we were told it was to give us more choice in pets, but we actually have far less choice. When I could pick any spec, it didn’t matter too much if my pet had a lame family ability. As long as Lust, Brez and whatever buffs were covered by other classes, I could bring whatever pet I wanted and perform optimally. In BFA you’re disadvantaged in raiding if you don’t use a dispel pet that also should be ferocity for lust or tenacity for defensive utility and you’re disadvantaged solo if you don’t use a ferocity pet, more specifically a Clefthoof.
Ultimately I feel like we need to go back to choosing our pets’ specs. With the addition of tranq shot, no family ability is much more desirable than any other for raiding so as long as the pet can lust or offer tenacity’s defensive cooldown, it’s a good pet. Even though soloing with my hyena vs rhino was night and day, my cats also did a decent job because the leech is great and the dodge ability is actually useful solo. As it stands, the only way I’m going to be able to use any of the pets I really want to in PvE is to put them in my stable and use Animal Companion. I don’t think anyone would be sad to have pet spec choice back but I know there’s at least some hunters that are disappointed when they find out the cool pet they want to use is Cunning.