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GENERALITIES
Introduction
So, you're a hunter who's been happily using his / her pet from levels 10 - 60, all the way from Teldrassil to Upper Blackrock Spire. Suddenly, you're raiding Zul'Gurub or Molten Core and you're told that your pet is useless, does insignificant DPS, and is a liability to the raid. What's a pet lover to do? The fact of the matter is that your pet is useful, does significant DPS, and is an asset. Don't forget - your DPS is balanced around the assumption that you have a pet with you. Making the decision to never use your pet in a raid is purposefully turning your back on a source of extra DPS.
I began raiding with a 31 Beast Mastery spec, and decided I was going to work to find a way to make it work. I don't claim to have all the answers to raiding with a pet (suggestions welcome!), but I believe it would be helpful to provide new hunters with the information I have gleaned from months of raiding.
The Condensed Version: Rules of Thumb
* Follow the rogues and warriors - if you see them running away, your pet likely shouldn't be in melee either.
Expectations
It's important to have the right expectations moving into the raid environment. Otherwise, you may find yourself getting frustrated over things that are largely unavoidable.
* Your pet will die.
It is inevitable that your pet will die in 20 and 40 man raids. Expect it - using your pet is going to require a fair amount of food. I generally use a little under a stack each raid. Avoiding the usages I list as "Suicidal" can significantly pare down this expense.
* Your pet cannot tank very long in 40 man instances.
In Molten Core and higher instances, nothing lasts very long if it has aggro unless it gets heals. Given that your pet does not show up on CT_RaidAssist, it's unlikely a healer is even going to see its health going down. Therefore, your pet will not be able to tank anything for more than a few hits.
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Benefits to using your pet
* Increased DPS
An untalented DPS pet does 54.5 DPS (paperdoll), in addition to DPS from skills and crits. This doesn't seem like much. However, as a point of comparison, Instant Poison IV on a 1.4 speed offhand adds 36.4 DPS. You don't see too many raids telling Rogues not to ever use poisons, because they add an insignificant amount of DPS.
If you are in a group with a hunter with Trueshot Aura, a warrior with Battle Shout, or can manage to get a Paladin to bless your pet with Might, it only gets better. Keep in mind - having a Happy pet means it does 125% of base DPS. Most hunters, myself included, tend to think of this as the actual base, rather than Content (100% DPS). This includes DPS from buffs. Putting 140 AP on a Happy pet does not add 10 DPS, it adds 12.5.
If you have points in Beast Mastery, your pet DPS improves further. Unleashed Fury gives your pet another 20% bonus. With this talent, my Wind Serpent hits 65.5 DPS (paperdoll), in addition to DPS from Lightning Breath. In a raid situation, my pet normally hovers at between 80 - 110 DPS paperdoll.
* Increased Utility
There are a number of situations where using a pet serves a valuable purpose. These vary from fight to fight; some fights, your pet can be used as a failsafe to protect other members. In other cases, your pet is a 'warm body' to take a random hit so that others will not.
* More interactive raiding
Raiding as a hunter is easy. There's really no two ways about it. Using a pet successfully adds a little more to do in a raid to keep you occupied.
Drawbacks
* It might cost you extra money
Given that your pet is going to die, you will need pet food. Unless you have a pet that will eat bread, you will either need to farm for food or buy it from a vendor. This means that raiding with a pet will generally add more expense, much like using poisons or sharpening stones. If this is your only concern, however, consider acquiring a bread-eating pet.
* Your raid will likely be against it
It's rare to find a guild which already has an enlightened policy on pets. You are likely to run into people claiming that it will cause wipes, that it will only add a few DPS, that you are a noob for wanting to use your pet. This is a social issue, and not something that can really be dealt with on a general basis. Feel free to link them to this guide, however!
* You might screw up and cause a problem
There are a few instances where using your pet may actually cause a legitimate issue. I will try to point out these main problem areas as they come up. One general rule is that you should walk in such a way as to keep your pet and yourself as far away from mobs as possible. On narrow paths where there's little / no margin for error in your path, your pet should likely be put away while you are moving. Dismissing your pet incurs a 50 Happiness penalty; this is less than two ticks of Feeding. When it doubt, put it away. This way, you will not draw the ire of your raid and be prevented from further pet use.
Speccing your pet
While, as a hunter, you do not really need a specific spec to raid, your pet will in order to increase its utility. Generally speaking, given the current instances, your priorities are Fire Resistance, Natural Resistance, and armor. If you are focused on Molten Core and Blackwing Lair, however, Shadow Resistance provides a larger benefit than Nature.
What pet to use?
There are a number of pets out there that are useful for raids.
* Any bread-eating pet
Mage food qualifies as "bread," and is therefore edible by any pet which will eat bread. This means that you can ask one of your mages to conjure a stack of Sweet Rolls for you, and you are good for the instance without it costing you a copper. This means that you can send your pet into situations I list as "suicidal" without worrying about it hurting your wallet.
Bread-eating pets are Bears, Boars, Crabs, and Wind Serpents. All of these pets are defensive except for Wind Serpents, which have similar stats to Cats.
* Wolves
Wolves' species skill, Furious Howl, is one of the most common pet skills to come up as a raiding skill. At max rank, it will add 5 dps to any physical damage dealer within range. Worst case scenario, you keep the pet next to you howling to add 5 DPS to your attacks. Best case scenario, you're in a group with nothing but physical DPS classes and they're all using the buff.
* Owls, Carrion Birds, or Bats
Flying pets (minus Wind Serpents) have the best aggro-holding ability in the game, Screech. It stacks with Demoralizing Shout, also reducing the amount of damage the tanks take. Unfortunately, in the "spam healing" culture of raiding, this does not normally make an appreciable difference. However, the aggro-holding is useful on some fights.
* Wind Serpents
When Lightning Breath was announced as a racial, there was a fair amount of discussion about it - Lightning Breath is the first (and currently only) ranged pet ability. However, the AI for it is lacking: Wind Serpents will head to the enemy, breathe until it runs out of focus, and then charge into melee. Therefore, using a Wind Serpent should not be purely on the basis of it being able to attack from range. However, I use one as my raiding pet, primarily because it is the only high DPS pet which also eats bread. And they're pretty.[ post edited by Kiava ]
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