Pet not holding aggro

[Auzen]

Ok first off, I know there was another thread similarly named but it was closed with a redirect to another thread, and in that thread there was a mod saying that was the wrong place to post this info. So here goes:

On 2/18 I was fighting evil eyes in The Gorge of King Xorbb and my pet was able to hold aggro of the creature just fine. I would be sitting down when I told him to attack, and the creature would stay on him. I would nuke with the lvl 20 Bolt of Flame at around 70% and pet would still hold the mob (the fire pet is the pet im talking about, and the only one I will reference in this thread since it is the only one I use.) Occasionally I would nuke a little early and the mob would come charging at me, which is to be expected. But I would just let the pet hit the evil eye a couple times, then back up and pet would have it again.

Today I log in, and noticed for some reason when I was sitting down and sent my pet to attack ANYTHING, it would immediately charge towards me. So I would stand up and it would turn around and smack pet so I would sit down. The mob would instantly ignore my pet and bolt towards me again. Even if I waited until after the mob was below 50% life to sit down, all that damage being done by the pet, the mob would once again come directly after me. I tested it further by pulling a gorge minotaur with the lvl 8 Shock of Blades spell, which deals 35 damage. The minotaur would stay on me, through pet taunts and all, until it was dead. Not sure what got changed with the last patch, pets have lost all ability to hold any kind of aggro on a mob. Pretty much have put mages in a situation where soloing means standing up and watching your pet kill something or getting killed from casting 1 nuke.

Another thing I have noticed is on 2/18 my pet would occasionally swing with his offhand weapon and double attack with both his primary and offhand weapon, resulting in a quad attack. Today, it seems my pet has lost all ability to double attack. I tested this by giving my pet a summoned dagger in one hand, and a minotaur axe in the other so damage would display as slashing and piercing so I knew what hand he was swinging with. the pet swung with the offhand weapon 60-75% of the time roughly, and never once double attacked with the mainhand or offhand weapon. All this info is with the lvl 20 fire pet spell with the Torch of Alna focus item.

Thanks for your time and I hope I've included all the info necessary.

[Rand]

Same happening to me but apparently this is working as intended.

[Auzen]

I could understand reducing the amount of aggro that pets generate but taking their hate generation away completely sort of negates the point of them. Im in najena right now and its driving me nuts with these green skeletons ignoring my pet and coming to hit me so I cant med while I clear trash.

[Mygicmeen]

While I am not having problems with sitting, as I can sit most of the fight with a sea furry, but my pet has no aggro. Forget a fire pet, which is what I would normally use, I used my earth pet. My earth pet, as a Magician is my only form of cc. Its ineffective at best.

Now while that is rather a sepperate issue, today, my earth pet could not keep aggro, let alone root sea furies. Ive tested with multiple nukes, at multiple percentages, and these are my rough figures.

I can nuke at about 45% with my level 34 bolt spell. The sea furry will not charge me, though sitting is iffy.

I cannot nuke with my 49 bolt spell over 34%. Though leaving the furry low on health, not enough for it to start walking away, almost making my 49 nuke useless.

I can nuke with the level 44 magic dd at about 28% without a charge. But again its iffy.

Chaining pets is almost impossible. My pet simply could not get aggro to grab the sea furry from me. I have now died twice, once with fire and once with earth, because my pet couldn't get aggro back.

If this is working as intentded, I might as well make an alt. I am practically terrified to go and try and brake a camp I would normally have a problem with, for fear of having to chain my pet.

All of this means one thing. I am not a capable solo'er anymore. Im restricted to raids and groups, which was never intended on mages. I should be able to solo 1-50. And practically 1-60. I did it on live, and millions of others have. Why change it to this?

[Auzen]

Yep I feel the same way. This isnt how live was, and I sure hope they are looking for a fix to it. Because there's a couple ways to kill a pet class, and this is one of them.

[Mygicmeen]

http://www.xalmat.com/eqsummoners.com-old/eq1/guides/jochan-chain-pets.html

This is a link that describes how to chain pet. Its a very basic idea of the process, but none of it is possible with the way pets are now. The aggro from the low level spell, the regening of mana because you cant sit. Besides the fact your new pet cant get aggro off of you.

As far as I can tell, this is dated 2005. So unless pets had no aggro before that point (which I know its been this way for a very long time) and then SOE patched the aggro problem out. I dont think its working as intended.

[Auzen]

Alright! Our cries were heard, hotfix in less than 10m!

[uygi]

Necro in guild reports that his can now DoT and pet will hold aggro, but my mage pet is behaving exactly as it did all day before the fix.

[Nivar Quartz]

Ur pretty much killing off magician classes altogether, pets have to be on the same hate list as the caster, If I as a mag cant control my hate list versus my pets then its a wizard without snare.

On a seafury lets say, if my pet does 30% of the dmg, and then i nuke the seafury for 15% of its HPs, the pet should maintain aggro, it should be much higher on the hatelist.

People have been crying since time started that mags are OP, soon my OP 50mag <main> will be locked away because hes useless unless hes casting mob rods or food/water.

I went to test server awhile back and tested soling mature wurms at lvl 50, while there was some kiting involved I could solo, the only catch was it took 90% of my manapool per wurm, thats chaincasting and nuking. So after the nerf soloing anything drk blue or higher is done.

[Uaellaen]

relax, bugs happen ... im sure its already beeing looked into ...

[inyane]

Not sure that the hotfix actually helped.

lvl 7 chanter. skelly agro's on me due to proximity. pet gets
it down to 88% before it finally gets off me.
at this point, i have yet to cast a single spell.

let pet get it down to about 45% before I cast anything. Cast suffocating sphere.
initial 10 points of damage, I don't sit, mob agro's on me, and never gets off till dead.

so, basically, as a pet class, don't pull anything you can't tank yourself

[Ruinous]

I've resorted to pre-rooting anything I intend to pet tank as a necro class now. I've noticed it's gotten "somewhat" better since the hotfix, but it is still far from what it was before the patch hit.

Used to be able to pull with Vampiric Curse, which is generally higher aggro-generating than a normal dot, though the pet with 2 weapons and haste would still be able to peel aggro withing 5-10 seconds. Now it's out of the question. I generally have to wait til the pet has gotten the mob to 70ish percent before casting Vamp. Curse, and then still risk pulling aggro if I decide to sit. Root is an absolute must if I need to stack more than one DoT.

It would be nice to hear from a dev if this is intended or not :)

[Autotune]

I've resorted to pre-rooting anything I intend to pet tank as a necro class now. I've noticed it's gotten "somewhat" better since the hotfix, but it is still far from what it was before the patch hit.

Used to be able to pull with Vampiric Curse, which is generally higher aggro-generating than a normal dot, though the pet with 2 weapons and haste would still be able to peel aggro withing 5-10 seconds. Now it's out of the question. I generally have to wait til the pet has gotten the mob to 70ish percent before casting Vamp. Curse, and then still risk pulling aggro if I decide to sit. Root is an absolute must if I need to stack more than one DoT.

It would be nice to hear from a dev if this is intended or not :)


Not like it makes being a necro that much harder.


Feign Death.

[Ruinous]

Not like it makes being a necro that much harder.


Feign Death.

Yes, it's okay to justify faulty pet aggro simply because I can feign death.

A) That's mana wasted
B) Feign death doesn't always work
C) Just as useful as wasting mana to root as stated in previous post
D) Even WITH the use of feign death, as aggro currently stands, I'd need to cast it after every spell.

[xshayla701]

SO I heard from a little bird that sitting now adds 10% aggro (or something like that) - as intended. I DSed someone who was afk and was getting beat on by a mob and as soon as I sat down (out of melee range), I got aggro because the other person wasn't doing damage. Apparently this is working as it should now. (Right??)

But the pets not being able to hold aggro is not intended. I'm sure they're already working on it. THERE IS HOPE, MY FRIENDS.

[tocasia]

I'm so glad I'm not the only one having this issue!

I'm currently leveling my level 10 necro in North Ro by agro/fear kiting sand scarabs and dune tarantulas. First I send in the pet (making sure he cons dark blue to me so that he'd have a chance to hold agro) and then cast Clinging Darkness, then Poison Bolt, then Fear, then sit down to med until Fear runs out, repeat.

Before the patch I hardly had to wait any time at all before casting Clinging Darkness; my pet would have enough agro so that I could get the chain of spells off before the angry bug would charge me. The way things are now, I have to wait until the mob is below 80% health at least before I do anything. Additionally, before, if my fear was resisted, I could kite in circles with pet taunt on and Jobeker would eventually be able to pull the mob off me. Now, if fear is resisted, I can run, but the pet will never get agro back and I'm toast once Clinging Darkness wears off.

Is my pet supposed to be so nerfed? It was more tactically interesting when I could agro kite in the case of a resisted fear or two.

[Autotune]

Yes, it's okay to justify faulty pet aggro simply because I can feign death.

A) That's mana wasted
B) Feign death doesn't always work
C) Just as useful as wasting mana to root as stated in previous post
D) Even WITH the use of feign death, as aggro currently stands, I'd need to cast it after every spell.

not justifying it, more like telling you to quit crying so hard.

root > cast your spells > FD > sit

it isnt that complicated and it works. Even if you pull multiple mobs with your pet, he is on one, and 2 come after you. FD > they go to pet > stand up and sit, they will stay on the pet.

Also, pets are classified as warriors. Now your pet generates aggro like a warrior without proc weapons. hmmmm, i bet warriors every where are laughing at you guys crying.

and P.S. LOL @ Mana wasted and casting FD after every spell.

[Akalakamelee]

i played a mage on live, started one on this server.

aggro never worked like that, never. an adjustment did make sense, but not to that degree.
i started a druid because mages are pretty much worthless now. i did notice that my DoT with my druid has massive aggro. flame lick should not have that much aggro before it even does damage. it should not out aggro a caster nuke of around the same lvl.

[Nivar Quartz]

Pretty much ur nerfing lvling solo, this is def not classic. I know its ur server and this all probably sounded so great in a email between u all, but its simply not classic. I havent even logged on to the live server, but if this is how its going to be why would I not? neither are close to classic now.

BTW u already nerfed firepets ect once, remmeber?

[maegi]

enchanter pets don't get or hold aggro at all. You think mages and necros are bad try using an animation and casting any spell. Unplayable.

[Zigfreed]

odd. Im playing a chanter and havent really noticed a difference. /shrug

[maegi]

odd. Im playing a chanter and havent really noticed a difference. /shrug

what level are you and your pet? Maybe there's something related to that. I'm a 17 chanter and my pet's max level is i guess 16ish

[Auzen]

Yep..seems the hotfix patch did absolutely nothing to fix mage pet aggro. Fighting evil eyes with fire pet, I let him get the mob down to roughly 50% life before nuking with shock of flame for 96 damage, which takes off ~20% of their life. The evil eye will totally forget I even have a pet at that point and will attack me til its dead. The way I see it now, magicians have been turned into a cleric with a pet. All I can safely do is heal my pet. Soon as I do anything to the creature itself my pet becomes useless. Also, I cast malaise on an evil eye at 30% life (the first spell I cast the entire fight) and it bolted toward me and pet didnt get aggro back before it died.

On a side note I have noticed that since the patch fire pets no longer double attack. All my other pets can quad attack (i am lvl 24 with focus items for fire and earth) but the fire pet just dual wields. Dont know if this changes at higher lvls.

Please continue looking into this issue devs and thanks for your time.

[Rogean]

What pet were you using.

[Auzen]

Fire pet. Its generally the only pet I solo with.

[anotherfiz]

I've been fooling around on beta lately so i cant quite say if this is occurring on live but:

Pet agro is definitely *better* than it was 2 days ago, but it is still pretty bad. I still cannot sit anywhere within range of a mob I am attacking regardless of if i've attacked it or not. When i DoT (anything, be it EBOLT, Bond, Plague), the mob comes right at me, and after i FD and stand up, 1 tic of a dot will bring it back on me. I've tried this using charmed pets that quad for 120 and my normal summoned rogue pet.

The zone's ive experienced this in are Karnors and Howling Stones, but admittadly it semeed worse in Karnors.

[etplante]

I play a lvl 14 mage. I send pet in to attack without casting any spells. I still have to wait until the mob is at least down to 50% before I can cast a dd (lvl 8 shock spell) and even then I sometimes draw immediate agro.

I've only been on this server a week so I thought maybe that's just how it works here, I don't have previous experience on this server to compare to. But I've played pet classes a long time on live servers and the current pet agro seems broken here.

I still love the server though, amazing job and thanks for all the hard work.

[maegi]

One other thing not so much in line with what's previously been posted, but before all the patches and hot fixes a mob had to actually hit you for at least a point a damage before my pet would engage, now even if a mob misses me, the pet starts swinging. Just something I noted.

[Zigfreed]

I posted about just that here http://www.project1999.org/forums/showthread.php?t=27886 and was pleased to find out that chanter pets agroing on misses is the way it was supposed to work.

Nice tiny little boost

[Omnimorph]

I posted about just that here http://www.project1999.org/forums/showthread.php?t=27886 and was pleased to find out that chanter pets agroing on misses is the way it was supposed to work.

Nice tiny little boost

Is definitely an improvement in that sense. Standing close to a mob so it hits you for 120 is painful, if they swing and miss you it's like a win :D

[YendorLootmonkey]

i played a mage on live, started one on this server.

aggro never worked like that, never. an adjustment did make sense, but not to that degree.
i started a druid because mages are pretty much worthless now. i did notice that my DoT with my druid has massive aggro. flame lick should not have that much aggro before it even does damage. it should not out aggro a caster nuke of around the same lvl.

Clearly you've never used flame lick on Live. It was on par with Disease Cloud for snap aggro. It's an AC debuff as well as a DoT, which explains the instant aggro. It actually feels like flame lick aggro is weaker than it was on Live, to be honest.

[Tzadarkath]

This is getting quite retarded. 34 Firepet cant hold aggro from a lvl 2 nuke until mob is at 75% hp...

Died 2 times already today in Unrest basement due to this shit

[inyane]

yeah, all my alts that use pets are on hold for now, until this gets addressed.

on the other hand, i've grouped with more mages in the past few days than I have in the past year :)

[etplante]

As a mage at level 15 I send in fire pet on a dark blue death beetle in Unrest. Pet taunt is on and pet is hasted. I cast no spells on pet or beetle until pet beats mob down to 25%. I cast level 8 fire bolt that drops mob to 4%. Mob immediately locks on me until pet finishes it off.

I don't know how pet classes could survive like this at higher levels as the mobs hit much harder.

Also tried with level 16 fire pet after level up, pretty much same result.