COWER

I've not really found a use for it. When raiding or doing heroics I always misdirect to the tank, so neither myself or my pet pulls aggro there. When soloing, my pet needs all the aggro he can handle, so no point to use it there either.

I use it in BGs where my pet will often be subject to focus fire, so at least I can pull him out safely. Unfortunately, it doesn't work 40% of the time since I keep forgetting to look at my pet's HP bar in a chaotic mess.

I also keep it active in dungeons for when my pet needs to dump a lil' mob hatred. Otherwise, when I'm trying to solo an instance I keep it on to make sure my pet stays alive when things get hairy. Besides this I found can kite and kill most Elite mobs anyway, even if 3 of them are chasing me (unless one of them manages to CC me, in which case it's gonna be a ways back from the Spirit Healer).

Thanks for the replies, guys.

Here's a specific inquiry- When you're soloing content at your level, do you have any problems keeping your pet alive if you're NOT using Cower?

I've *never* had a problem with my pet keeping aggro if I have Growl on and I'm MD to it, even when using Cower too, but I'm wondering if maybe it truly is a waste of my pet's Focus. Does it really help so much?

I guess only time and testing will give definite answers, but I'm still curious to hear everyone's thoughts on the subject.

I use it primarily for the 40% damage reduction, which is great on a Turtle (as of 4.1 I believe Shell Shield and Cower stacked, though I'm unsure if they do now). The cooldowns used to be shared, but now they've been put on separate timers, ensuring more pet survivability. This and Shell Shield actually enabled me to solo 6 out of 8 Wailing Caverns bosses at level 20, but I have yet to test it at higher levels and instances.

I only quest and PvP and the first thing I ever do with a new pet is turn off cower. I don't want it!

Cheers,

D

I also turn it off first thing...