The trouble with happiness
by Eliah Hecht 
Nov 16th 2007 at 3:01PM
In certain ways, playing a hunter is about depletion. You have to worry about running out of ammo, running out of mana (although not as much since Aspect of the Viper was introduced), running out of range to fire your weapon (though thankfully there's no longer a dead zone), and of course you have to worry about your pet running out of happiness. Which means we have to carry around stacks of food in our bag space, which let's not forget is one bag smaller because every hunter needs an ammo bag, and often some extra ammo on top of that. For some reason, I've never thought about this before: why do we need happiness at all?Sure, it's a nice mechanic at first, adds flavor to the class, but I really like this suggestion by Killernuts (*cough*) of Arthas-H: remove happiness once your pet reaches the top loyalty level. After a while it just becomes a pain; at best I click an AddOn button every once in a while when the alert pops up, and at worst I have to take a break from what I'm doing to scrounge up some food. Or instead of removing it based on pet level, how about based on player level? Make a trainable skill at, say, 30 that keeps pets happy. You can use food to boost their happiness faster (useful with a newly-trained pet), but you don't have to.
At least one nice change is already slated for the pet feeding department: pets will be able to be fed in combat "at some point in a future patch" (Nethaera). So I guess that's nice, since indeed it does suck to lose what can be a significant portion of your damage just because you haven't been obsessively monitoring that little smiley face. Prior to 2.3 it was possible to feign death and then feed one's pet, but this has been "fixed".
Filed under: Hunter
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
dpoyesac Nov 16th 2007 3:15PM
Sure, make pets permanently happy. That's fine. Also, make armor for warriors permanently repairable, let warlocks summon without soulstones, and rogues can poison their weapons without, you know, actually having any poison in their bags.
Also, we can give free epic mounts and candy canes to everyone! And everyone gets a free PvP title, just for showing up! And no more winning and losing in Alterac Valley, it just leads to low self-esteem!
So, um... no. Needing to feed your pet every so often isn't really that big a deal.
niko Nov 16th 2007 3:14PM
Please, stop with the QQ'ing on this. Pointless crying about having to feed your pet. Seriously?
You were doing fine in your examination of the hunter's issue with "depletion", but you totally lost cool points when you started crying about pet happiness.
Stop feeding your own pet sometime and see if they continue to stay happy. Or loyal.
Lame.
mizatt Nov 16th 2007 3:22PM
They should give pets an ability like cannibalize so they can feed on enemy corpses
bennet Nov 16th 2007 3:33PM
I don't mind feeding my cat - in a game that doesn't have a ton of roleplay elements built in, it reminds me that he is a companion, not a disposable thing like my warlock pets. Fizzwidget's Feed-o-matic or some other quick feed mechanism eliminates what minimal pain is involed, and as for having enough food...I don't think I've run out of smoked talbuk venison since Burning Crusade came out.
feedingtimeathezoo Nov 16th 2007 3:34PM
I agree with Eliah. The pet feeding mechanic is pretty pointless once they're your best friend.
The trainable skill in combination with requiring the pet to be at the top loyalty level is a good idea. Props to Eliah.
And hey, when the heck are we going to get some additional stable space??? Three slots is not enough.
Ahoni Nov 16th 2007 3:36PM
I made a macro ...
/cast Feed Pet
/use
Just shift+click on the food in place of . Bind that to an unused key (I used Delete) and boom, 1-click (do I owe Amazon anything for using that?) feeding. Really not all that hard.
Stoneblade Nov 16th 2007 3:45PM
With regards to pet feeding, I've always been of the opinion that a stich in time (and Feed-o-matic, also), save nine. I'm far more concerned about the lack of certain species' skills and the lack of a streamlined levelling system for pets than I've ever been about their happiness levels.
Razelore Nov 16th 2007 3:51PM
First off, I don't play a hunter, so you can ignore this or start flaming now (a do play a lock, so there's all the ammo you need).
There seems like there could be lots of interesting solutions to this:
1) Make it a talent somewhere in the Beast Mastery Tree, call it Contented Companion or something, it means your pet can no longer loose happiness except through death.
2) Make it a skill you can learn from a pet trainer, something obscenely high level.
3) Have more pet specific foods that would double or triple the time before the pet looses some happiness.
4) Change it so pets can't loose happiness in combat, except for that lost from death.
Of course, I could be overlooking some major things. Just wanted to try to stimulation conversation upwards instead of it just being a place for trolls to whine about hunters.
Chris Anthony Nov 16th 2007 3:55PM
I'm torn on this issue. On the one hand, one of my "mains" is a hunter, and it's a pain to realize that my boar has dropped to Content and I don't have any Smoked Talbuk Venison left. On the other hand, it's a valid point that a real-life pet that's unfed will become unhappy very quickly. (On the gripping hand, if WOW pets obeyed the rules of real-life pets, we'd be hip-deep in boar and cat dung.)
#2, you make a valid point: many classes have costs associated with the basic operation of their class. On the other hand, hunters have two money sinks on which their basic class functions depend: ammunition and pet food. (Although it's strictly possible to gather pet food, I don't really recommend it past the early levels.) So there's that to think about. (Unless you're just being dismissive out of hand, in which case I'm not sure why I'm bothering.)
Kavaa Nov 16th 2007 6:43PM
Ok, well as a 70 hunter Im not one you would think would disagree, but feeding your pet is a necessary part of being a hunter. Im not talking lore or any crap like that. Think about it this way, when happy they have +125% dam increase. What would the point of that being permanent be. I could possibly see setting the 100% mark as a base at 70 but its like using potions, stat food, or weapon buffs (oil and such) its just part of the game.
What I would like changed is where you get the food. I primarily use a cat, and with meat and fish as a diet, I hate having to run from town to town before an instance run only to find they sell fruit...
In my opinion, Stable Masters should have food for sale of all types. it would make sense if they care for your pets. Considering the stops a hunter has had to make to get ammo(thank you for the new ammo vendor), food, water, and then get to the instance. it can be a real pain and gives people to hate hunters that much more.
Im happy to hear you are going to be able to feed your pets during battle, but remember this wont do much good unless you recall your pet. Damage or poisons will cancel out the feeding effect. This really will only be for long boss fights. (seems like a "duh", but some people dont know that)
Hornface Nov 16th 2007 4:02PM
@9 Buying pet food is for suckers. Get a pet that can eat fish, level your fishing and cooking up to something reasonable, then spend an hour fishing open water in Outland. You'll have more stacks of Blackened Trout than you can use in a month.
Almus Nov 16th 2007 4:03PM
I do play a hunter. That said I think we should need to feed our pets, hell I think our chars should need to eat regular meals as well. If I go for 3 days w/o eating I don't think killing that yeti is going to continue being an easy task. What I would be all for is a mechanic where if you have food in your bag you can designate it as "pet food" and when your pet drops below the top level of happiness you would automatically feed it. The pet feeding addons basically do this anyway why not build it into the game? Now, you would still have to be careful that you didn't run out of food, but even in a fantasy game there should be some elements of realism.
Brian Nov 16th 2007 4:15PM
I pay a hunter and I am so SICK of all this whining. "please Blizzard!, Please give us easy mode!" I have always had food for my pet as it's dirt cheap. It takes no brains to feed your pet. Get a life.
As for the "feed pet in combat" what kind of BS is this? We have a dedicated pet HOT! Use it and train your pet for avoidance and lower levels of resistance. My pet dies if it gets critted. Fine. I die if I get critted. Any other deaths are due to poor hunters. If you don't want to think about your pet roll a mage.
The pathing bug is a genuine bug, but the rest? Utter rubbish by a bunch of whiners who don't want to have to think about what they are doing. L2P.
Trapr Nov 16th 2007 4:27PM
I too play a hunter lvl 70 dwarf and I don't mind feeding my pet but do have an idea. I have said before that a pet should have a 2-4 slot bag of its own to keep food and as long as the bag is full pet happiness stays at 125%. I have mentioned before about what can become a lack of bag space having to carry pet food, our food, water, mana pots, bandages...etc and being 1 bag slot short because of needing a ammo pouch/quiver why can't the pet have it's own bag for food only?
Passit Nov 16th 2007 6:16PM
I wish we could play with our pets too... like dance or pet them... to keep them happy... doesnt that make sense?
alex Nov 16th 2007 4:40PM
ONly thing that bugs me about pet happiness is the fact that when my character is idle or AFK unmounted the pet loses happiness, if im mounted it does not. So if i get up to answer the phone and forget to mount i come back and my pet is unhappy. Also if im inside an inn afk i cant prevent the happiness loss i have to go outside. Makes about as much sense as no mounts in BB.
amasen Nov 16th 2007 5:23PM
I love the mechanic...
It gives me joy in PvP to 1-2 shot a hunters pet that uses it as a line-of-sight free, 100 yard ranged weapon. Pets are so ridiculously over powered that they have to have some down side... Note: this should not be limited to just hunters... Warlocks should have to do something similar.
No, unless pets are removed from the game to balance out how foolishly out of control they are, then they need to have a down-side.
Mecandes Nov 16th 2007 5:58PM
I don't mind having to feed the pet; that's one of the things about pet ownership... it's just like how the Sprite Darter Hatchling is my favourite small companion pet -- because the quest line involved nurturing and feeding it.
In real life, however, I have never had to feed a pet a dozen times a day. Why not reduce the feeding time to once or twice a day once the pet hits maximum loyalty? The mechanic will still be there, and it will still feel like "feeding your pet."
They've got a couple of foods now that will buff pets -- but why not take it a step further: nerf pets innate abilities just a teensy bit, and then make it so that all sorts of different foods give them different sorts of useful buffs. :)
Sqeakerbeaep Nov 17th 2007 5:01AM
@2 every so often? yeah, right, its like constant since the new patch, the pet is always mad, and you constantly have to feed it, go thru a stack of meat in just 2 or 3 hrs. thats not "every so often" its expensive.