King Krush, my newest Exotic Pet, leveled to 80 last night while doing Heroic Drak’theron, so before I logged off I did a real quick and very crude DPS comparison between my 2 Exotic Ferocity pets. The results were pretty predictable. While Loque’nahak’s damage has been buffed a little, it still needs some work to be on par with the Devilsaur.
My crude testing consisted of 2 minutes precisely of pure white damage on the Boss Target Dummy in Ironforge and no pet specials or Kill Command. I just fired off auto-shots to proc Go For the Throat. The end result was the Devilsaur edging out the Spirit Beast to the tune of 21 DPS. Both pets have the same identical spec, which looks like this. Again, this is an inconclusive test considering no specials were used and I wasn’t raid buffed, but it does insinuate that Monstrous Bite wins out a little over Spirit Strike.
My talent spec isn’t for maximum raid DPS. It’s more of a DPS-centric PvP build. I have 5/5 Endurance Training, Spirit Bond, 1/3 Cobra Strikes, Aimed Shot, and only 1/2 Go for the Throat. I still do quite well with this spec in heroics, and my first trip to 10 man Naxx had me topping the meters on occasion. Anyway, that’s why the DPS may look a bit low to some of you well-geared folk with the ideal raid spec.
Spirit Strike did not miss at all, but it only crit twice out of 16 casts. I think that next time I’ll stretch out the testing to say five minutes. That should give me a better average for Cobra Strikes procs.
I do think it’s a good idea for Blizzard to make the Devilsaur the top DPS pet for Beast Mastery Hunters. It would be a bummer for all BM Hunters to be pigeon-holed into getting Loque’nahak in order to maximize their DPS. Taming the Spirit Beast is not something a lot of Hunters would want to be forced to do. Devilsaurs on the other hand are easy to get. No days and weeks of camping there – all you have to do is grab Tyrantus or a random one from Un’Goro Crater.
It would make things interesting if the Spirit Beast did have a slight advantage in certain raid makeups, or versus particular bosses. I need to do a little research on how Spirit Strike scales with Spell Power.
So what did this prove..? Nothing so far, but it’s the only testing I’ve been able to do up until this point. I’ll keep working at it and post more on this DPS comparison later.
The “thundery wolf” is actually just a different skin for a Spirit Beast, does the same dps as the cats (and has the same specials.)
has anyone tried the dps of the newthundery wolf thing from the storm peaks? its artwork/skin, whichever you prefer, is alot better than the devilsaur or sprit beast
I understand where you’re coming from in regards to the Spirit Beast and Devilsaur DPS needing to be the same. It would be nice if Loque’nahak was more or less an attractive alternative form of DPS (which already is pretty much the case).
Personally, It doesn’t bother me that Loque may ever-so-slightly trail the Devilsaur. If the dps were as good or better, Loque would become the new Broken Tooth or Humar, meaning every Hunter would have it as their pet. I really like having uncommon pets. Regardless of how difficult Loque is to seek out for most, eventually every BM Hunter would have her.
I also see other benefits to Loque’nahak over the Devilsaur. Loque has a ranged nature attack for one. It’s very possible that Loque could, and does out dps the Devilsaur in certain high-armor boss encounters. In addition to that, Spirit Strike and Prowl are both better skills to have in a PvP setting. Loque may not be “the pet” for BM PvP (even though that’s an oxymoron nowadays), but she’s actually a pretty decent choice. Spirit Strike can negate a Warrior’s charge, put a DoT up to keep opponents from bandaging or Rogues from stealthing, plus the Spirit Beast can still attack while snared.
My crude test was inconclusive, so take what I said about the damage comparison with a grain of salt. To really compare the two pets will require a few 2-3 hour Naxx runs. BRK raids with Loque’nahak, so her DPS can’t be all that far behind, if at all.
Even though Loque’nahak is one of my favorite pets, I may be a bit biased in my opinion due to having tamed Krush. Devilsaurs as a whole don’t do it for me, but there’s something about a big green one. He just plain rocks is all I have to say. Not to mention he’s the King. 😉
And if Kel drops a green crossbow I’m passing on it. 😉
I agree that the spirit beast should not be the best dps, but he should at the very least provide as much DPS as the Devilsaur. Many hunters, as you say, will not want to hunt for days or weeks for the pet and they shouldn’t have to, but those of us that do should not be rewarded with an exotic pet that does less than an easy pick up.
In addition, I might argue that a pet is like any other piece of gear. By your argument, I shouldn’t have to run an instance over and over and over to get the best piece of gear based on a roll of the dice. It should be just an easy pick up. Working to get Loque’Nahak is at least as difficult as a boss in naxx and should provide an equally coveted reward, not a gimped one.
What if you downed the last boss in naxx and you got crossbow that did less damage than most green bows?