Talk:Animal companion/Archive 1

Archive

Experience
"A pet will "never" reach a higher level than its owner."

This is not true. I tamed a Melandru's stalker when I was level 4, the pet started out with level 5. After some time I leveled up to level 5. After some more time, the pet leveled up to level 6 while I was still at level 5.

I guess that pets level up at the same speed as players, and that it just seems that pets never reach higher levels than their owners because most pets, when tamed, have a lower level than their owner. But that's really just guessing. Psyringe 23:28, 18 Sep 2005 (EST)


 * This makes sense, especially if pets don't get quest or mission XP (as stated in the article). As a result, pets would generally lage behind their owners.  But yes, it's very possible to get a level 5 Melandru's Stalker when you are still level 1.  --JoDiamonds 16:41, 24 October 2005 (EST)

Also, my testing indicates that pets gain experience at least twice as fast as players, covering the jumps between levels in many fewer kills than a player would need. This is particularly easy to test with a low level pet. - Epinephrine


 * I highly doubt this. Remember that by default, low level characters/mobs/pets gain exp faster ANYWAYS.  Your theory implies that, if a ranger, right after reaching level 5, tames a level 5 stalker, and the ranger do no missions whatsoever afterwards, the stalker will hit level 6 first.  Unfortunately I don't have the character slots to personally test this right now.
 * Fortunately I do ;) Did some testing, was correct.  Pets level faster than us. see thread here - still doing testing, but it looks like they follow different rules.  http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/showthread.php?t=92406  Assumption is that they cannot pass a player's level, and since they gain less experience than you do if fighting lower level foes you will catch up to your pet's level, at which point it cannot pass yours.  Making a pre-searing character on my other account to test this aspect. --Epinephrine 16:27, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Well, data continues to accumulate at the above link - Given that deolmstead's pet gained it's experience when dead and mine while alive that settles the "gains like a player of the same level" myth. Now we have to figure out how it really does work, but perhaps the reference to experience could be changed to reflect tested facts?  I'm new to editing wikis, but I made a change just now, hopefully it is alright? --Epinephrine 16:33, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Continued testing of pet experience has shown several things: Pets level faster than players both when below or above the owner's level; the rate seems to be roughly double the experience rate.  The test just conducted was on a level 5 Melandru's Stalker, using a level 2 ranger made for this purpose.  I tested in pre searing qualitatively, and showed that the pet can not only be higher level (obviously true, as you can tame it) but also can gain levels while above the player's level.  Re-made, brought the same setup post-searing, and this time killed the devourers outside of Ascalon (level 4) repeatedly, to test experience gain.  This should take ~55 kills for the pet to level from 5->6 if it gains as a player; 27 or so if it gains at double normal rate - unfortunately I didn't realise that the Devourers there sometimes spawn a plague devourer instead - it took ~33 kills to level, the pet had only gained experiece coming through the battle from pre-to post searing and fighting these foes - this is slightly off the 27 kills predicted, but the level 3 Plague Devourers mixed in there may account for the difference.  I'll keep testing, but it is good to know that pets level both below and above a player's level, and at approximately double normal rate. --Epinephrine 12:34, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

General
I'd like to point to the Guide written by Jenosavel and Epinephrine; http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/showthread.php?t=89491 it details many aspects of Animal Companions and shows that many aspects listed here are incorrect; in particular:

- Armour values - Damage types - Pet Evolution Stats

The Pet Evolution Methods list on the wiki lists incorrect causes for evolution changes - Dire is not associated with pet attack skills, nor does Hearty have anything to do with player damage.
 * I would liek to point out that, the article's mention of pet skills are as a mean to affect overall damage done by the pet. Thus, it's completely consistent with your summary of have the pet deal more damage than you to move it towards Dire.  Your own writeup also specificallly mentioned that it's hard to judge whether the damage dealt by the master (in relation to damage dealt by pet) has effect on evolution, and is hard to immediately dismiss.  Thus your comment above seem to imply you have reached furthur conclusion that you did not reach in your original guide.
 * It does make intuitive sense though that damage "tanked" would push a pet towards Hearty. -PanSola 00:17, 8 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Finally, your armor values do make sense. Pet has essentially warrior-class armor without additional bonus to physical attacks.  So it's 20 + 3*Level. -PanSola 00:17, 8 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Also, it's ironic that, much of the "incorrect" info here seems to be derived from the " *Updated* Ultimate Pet Guide" on guildwarsguru where Epinephrine is from ^^" -PanSola 00:59, 8 December 2005 (UTC)


 * How is that irony? There are many uninformed people everywhere.  I didn't write that guide, and in fact the errors present in it spurred Jenosavel and I to do the research.


 * As to the statement about damage - it is clear that in fact your pet taking damage is what needs to be avoided - I have made Dire pets using NO attack skills, thus my claim that attack skills are unecessary. You can evolve a pet that way against the minotaurs outside of the Ice Tooth Caves - since they don't heal they eventually die, you can simply allow your pet to attack the whole time and use Symbiotic Bond/Otyugh's Cry/Call of Protection to keep it from suffering damage, and keep yourself alive.  It will go Dire.  You simply have to let them deal damage - and that is why I objected - it is damage, not pet skills that matter.


 * A correlation is obviously present between damage and pet skills. You _can_ however evolve a Dire pet using 0 beast mastery and 0 pet skills.  In fact, I have evolved wolves in pre-searing to Dire without even taming them - I simply allowed them to kill me 800+ times.  (For your information, I have tested every pet in the game - the pre-searing wolves and bears are the only animals that gain experience from killing a player (outside of PvP) - as they start as enemies they are awarded experience for the kills, no other animal does).  Pre-searing is thus the only place you can level a pet by having it attack you.


 * So to get a Dire pet you do not ever need to have a single skill used, nor a single point of Beast Mastery invested. As for experience, I'll repeat my experiments, but they indicated that the pets gain at roughly 2-3 times the rate of a person.  I did this by counting how many kills were necessary per level of what enemies and comparing it to a chart of experience /level for players.  The factor is hard to determine, as the experience was quantised (on a per creature basis) but was indicating 2-3 times - if I use lower level opponents the resolution will be better, but it will take much longer.


 * You misunderstood me. I totally agree with the data you present above.  My point was that the version of the article you commented upon originally did NOT say skills are REQUIRED.  That version first stated damage dealt by pet is important, then mentioned pet skills as a FACTOR that can affect damage dealt by the pet.  "Pet skills can affect damage dealt by pet, so be mindful of it and make sure your pet deals more/less damage to train in the offensive/defensive direction" was the gist of the prior version. -PanSola 22:16, 8 December 2005 (UTC)


 * The issue of player damage/pet damage IS a tricky one - I suspect that dire evolution in truth has nothing to do with ANY ratio or difference between the damages, but is simply a measure of some TOTAL amount of damage dealt by the pet, with or without skills - possibly a total of damage dealt by the pet at that point, possibly a minimum per level, who knows - but I suspect it has nothing to do with the amount of damage your player deals, save that killing your pets enemies too fast prevents it from dealing enough damage. The fact that I can level a wolf to dire in the wild supports this belief.  The reason that there is a conundrum here is that when a player deals damage it typically reduces the amount of damage that the pet deals; after all, the pet gains experience from the kill but has dealt less damage.  I am proposing to test this theory shortly by raising a wolf to level 9 while allowing it to do all the damage against foes for which it gains experience, but returing and killing hordes of level 3 enemies once the pet is level 9 and no longer gains experience.  In so doing my damage will far outstrip the pets damage, but I suspect that the pet will continue to develop as aggressive/Dire, even if I exceed it's damage output by a factor of 10 with every level.  Of course, it could be measuring damage done per kill worth experience or something.  If I hit problems I may just have to level it to dire more slowly, against foes that offer a better damage/experince ratio (lower level foes) so that I can deliver a substantialy portion of the damage against each foe, while not affecting the total amount of damage my pet has done.


 * I also agree. The Player/Pet damage ratio theory just happened to be the dominent theory on the GWOnline ranger forums when the eariler version on evolution was written (it still is the dominent theory there right now).  That section has been revised so now it list observed correlations with various theories, to emphasis that we don't know the exact mechanism yet. -PanSola 22:16, 8 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Anyway, our testing is not complete, but the due date for guides had come so Jenosavel and I published. There is obviously much more to learn, and the experiments continue.  For example, a method has been suggested to test the non-critical damage of pets by using arranged GvG and the balanced stance skill to cause criticals not to hit for extra damage - this should allow us to tease the true damage range of the pet out, and will allow us to see the critical hit rate as well (by comparison of the damage distributions).  We are still working on various aspects that aren't fully understood, but hopefully have banished many myths about pets.  I have some theories about pet experience, but they are theories, and can't be tested just yet - hopefully soon.  -Epinephrine


 * Hehe the non-critical damage was my suggestion, and I eagerly await a table on pet base damages. Keep up the good work! (-: -PanSola 22:16, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Added a note about changing secondary class away from ranger, as this question seems to come up a great deal on fora; the pet stays linked to the character. --Epinephrine 11:55, 16 January 2006 (UTC)
 * And lovely wording at that (-: -PanSola 12:33, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

Pet Evolution
The main pet evolution research is conducted at Beastmasters: Grand Pet Survey. If you read the last dozen or so pages, you will see strange results that are not entirely explained. We should revert to a version that accurately reflects the state of the pet evolution art, rather than maintain one that is verifiably false. If you think it is well understood, try evolving an Aggressive pet using the described methods on something like Charr outside Piken Square.

--Daulnay 1:20 pm PST, October 24 2005
 * See above "Corrections" section for Epinephrine's research on evolution. I propose a simple theory: Pet damage dealt vs pet damage taken.  Which ever is greater will push evolution in that direction.  Of course this is completely untested whatsoever, but it's simple and elegant and seems to be able to stay consistent with the observations that lead to the development of other theories. -PanSola 00:30, 8 December 2005 (UTC)


 * I am tempted to agree with you PanSola - I suspect it truly is that simple as well, and that it has nothing to do with the master's damage rate at all, only that when the master deals the damage it takes away from the pet's damage output, as the damage dealt/experience point falls. - Epinephrine (who really should bother registering at some point)


 * I tried evolving an aggressive pet and failed. I took my crappiest bow, set my MMS to zero, and boosted the BM to max. Using only BM skills and letting the critter do the most work, I ended up with a playful lizard. I'm pretty sure my damage output was far less compared to the little fella but he died a lot on his way, so I can only side with Daulnay and PanSola about the evolution. --Ishmaeel 04:04, 1 March 2006 (CST)

Category
What can this go under? not skills because it isnt strictly charm animal 04:20, 4 November 2005 (EST)
 * We don't need to put everything in a category... --Rainith 04:31, 4 November 2005 (EST)

Pet Skills
I vote dumping them into a category and just linking to it. I do NOT want to see the current list in the article expanded into a table within this article, though wouldn't mind seeing a separate article containing that table. -PanSola 06:22, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

[OT] Ideas for new "pets" in future expansions...
This might be for Chapter 2 or Chapter 8193.31 or never happen, but a cool idea anyways...


 * Plant companion (you see all those walking trees running around?)
 * Mineral companion (eh, elementals?)
 * Mechanical companion (Mini Iron Forgemen!!!)
 * Candy companion (need I say more?)

Pets might not just be limited to animals in the future! Though the ranger Beastmaster skills will not be able to affect those pets since they aren't "animal" companions.

BTW, are insects animals? how about crabs and spiders? -PanSola 22:31, 8 December 2005 (UTC)


 * I think it'd be cool to be able to tame every non-sentient creature in the game. Shandy 04:08, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

You can tame UW Spiders... Emyrs Myrrdin 17:23, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

And the Moss Spiders in pre-, although I can't remember when you next see spiders (somewhere in Kryta, maybe?) --Nunix 17:28, 13 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Theres those foul poisoning spiders in maguuma 18:08, 13 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Or hydras! It would give my E/R a reason to carry charm animal around - added fire ownage! | Chuiu 20:12, 13 December 2005 (UTC)


 * I'd go for wurms. I have this image in my head of a PVP battle: you have maybe a Necro/Ranger, standing alone all Scar Tattoo'd up, couple of Warriors are coming at him.. *BOOM* Siege Wurm pops up behind our necro hero! Moo hah hah hah! .. hah.. huh.. anywayyyy.. plus, I could could call it a "Spice is Life" build! kekeke --Nunix 20:57, 13 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Every non-sentient creature, Shandy? I'd take Glint then.
 * "Tank this, losers!"
 * I did a lot of damage with candy.
 * &mdash; Lunarbunny 21:04, 13 December 2005 (UTC)


 * You didn't call Glint non-sentient just now, did you? Fortunately your destiny is not ending up dead on the floor of her lair. Whoops, there she comes - gotta go --Ishmaeel 08:11, 24 February 2006 (CST)


 * I'd have to agree with Nunix. Wurms would be cool, and freaky. Imagine 8 primary or secondary rangers with wurms. Talk about complete knock down. And hydras and bone dragons? Wow, the possibilities for "pets" are endless. --TheSpectator 03:26, 17 January 2006 (UTC)


 * PanSola mentioned crabs. I can see the GvG group names now. "We've got Crabs" keeps favor of the gods for America. *rolls eyes* :P --Gares Redstorm 04:04, 24 February 2006 (CST)


 * Ahahaha, laughed my ass of at that one. 69.124.143.230 06:14, 24 February 2006 (CST)

Pet Damage Types
There was an anon edit that said:

''Some recent tests using healing signet, 0 tactics, two shields (a +4 blunt, and a plain shield) have turned some results that hint that Warthogs may actually do blunt damage. [range w/ +4 shield, 10-16 vs lvl 5 Warthog no armor and healing signet. range w/o +4 shield 11-18 same conditions. (test over 100 hits while using signet)].''

Comparing that to the extensiveness of tests performed by Jenosavel and Epinephrine (see footnote #4, I'm more inclined to go with Jenosavel and Epinephrine's results. If the anon user would like to challenge this result, I suggest posting more details of the numbers during the tests. -PanSola 19:04, 18 February 2006 (CST)

[This is another anon edit confirming that Warthog's are not slashing or piercing, although I can't yet specificly say that its blunt damage. Tested on 23 February 2006 (PST)]


 * Eh, can you post details of your test? In the absence of specifics, more people are more inclined to believe the opposite result which HAS provided specifics. -PanSola 04:23, 24 February 2006 (CST)

Ok, here's a new analysis of Jenosavel and Epinephrine's results:
 * 1) Spider and Dune Lizard have damage types that Skeletons are resistent to, and this type of damage is physical (because when Greater Conflagration is on, their damage is increased to normal).
 * 2) The other pets, include warthogs, do NOT deal Blunt damage, since we know Skeletons are weak against Blut, and none of the pets deal extra damage to Skeletons (because Blunt is Physical, and Greater Conflagration would have coverted it to non-blunt, but pet damage do not decrease when Greater Conflagration is on).
 * 3) The only known physical damage that skeletons are resistent to are piercing damage, so from the test results we deduce Spider and Dune Lizard deal piercing damage.
 * 4) The only known physical damage that skeletons are neutral to are slashing damage, so from the test results we deduce that the other pets, including Warthogs, deal slashing damage.

To reconcil the Feb 23rd anon's claims and Jenosavel and Epinephrine's results, it is theoretically possible that there is an additional physical damage type, that is not blunt, piercing, nor slashing. I will call this hypothetical damage type "Biting Damage". If Warthogs deal biting damage, and skeletons are neutral to biting damage, that would explain the conflicting reports we are getting. However I'm still skeptical about the Feb 18th anon claim. +4 AL vs blunt isn't a lot, so 100 trials might not be able to smooth out the statistical variations. -PanSola 04:34, 24 February 2006 (CST)


 * Hmm, without seeing some data I'm not convinced that there's much reason to do more tests, but I could level a warthog quickly on my second account. There are two major problems with his testing though:
 * 1.) 100 hits is nothing in terms of detecting a difference on such a small range - we used hundreds (well, thousands once you pool them) of hits at level 20 with 12 BM to ensure that the damage ranges were large.


 * 2.) he's using a "+4" shield and a "non +4" shield with 0 tactics - however, the AL bonus from an item varies when you don't meet the requirement. If he had a plain white shield and a purple +4 to blunt shield the ALs will be different anyway, since the higher quality item has a higher default AL. This can be seen easily with foci, use several different foci without meeting the requirements and you'll see that they can vary from +3 energy to +6 energy without meeting the requirement; the same is true for shields, they vary in their base values, and that variance could well account for the difference, particularly as the +4 vs blunt is clearly a special item, while the other may be a low-quality white item.


 * Given these variations, I'm not convinced there any merit to his claim, but I can check soonish to see if there's anything to it - I'll need to get my hands on a +vs blunt, a +vs piercing, a +vs slashing and a non-bonus shield, all with the same AL however, as I'll need to meet the requirement to ensure that the AL is correct. Only in that manner can you ensure that the ALs are the same, as it it difficult to tell what the AL is on an item when the requirement is not met. --Epinephrine 05:15, 24 February 2006 (CST)
 * Keep in mind that the two anons were making different claims. The first one, which you refuted and I tend to agree with you, claimed warthog deal blunt.  The second claim, which provided no detail whatsoever, claimed wartnog deal non-slashing.  Of course the lack of any details makes it just as, if not more sketchy than the first.  But that's where I assumed good faith and derived the Biting Damage theory from.  Anyways, you are the guy with PhD in GW Pets, I can't tell you what to do d-:  It might be easier to have the pet hit low level plants (crown of thorns in old ascalon) rather than finding the right shields, if the test is just about slashing-ness. -PanSola 05:20, 24 February 2006 (CST)
 * Well, non-slashing will be easy to check soon-ish; the biting damage theory is possible, as some new form of physical damage, but assassin Saboteur's Armor provides +15 AL against slashing damage - rather than trying to find two shields of the same AL, one with and one without a slashing damage bonus to test with, I could always wait until the rather convenient Assassin armour is available. I'll keep my eyes peeled for +AL slashing shields though, just in case.  Hitting the plants would seem to fall into the same trap that the other testing did, the possibility of a "biting damage" type existing, and that plants are weak against that as they are against slashing - only with a specifically anti-slashing AL can we really determine if it is.  Come to think of it, since there is no assassin head piece with slashing damage reduction it would be a pain to check, as you'd have 1/8 attacks randomly hitting the head.  Shield is the better option, certainly, but will take time to find.--Epinephrine 05:26, 24 February 2006 (CST)
 * Something that helps if testing with Saboteur's Armor is to NOT wear anything on the head. The damage should stand out so much that you can filter it. -PanSola 05:45, 24 February 2006 (CST)
 * Also with plants, if they also take extra damage from pets, that just means results are inconclusive. But if they don't take extra damage from pets' normal physical attack, than we got a conclusive prove of the existence of a different damage type.  Not sure if that'll make you think it's worthwhile to check. -PanSola 05:49, 24 February 2006 (CST)

I took a level 5 warthog, lynx, lizard, and bear, went had them attack a level 3 Hulking Stone Elemental and the fact that the warthog's range of damage is higher against this target is immediately appearent. This lead me to believe that warthogs may in fact do blunt damage. In order to test further I stripped completely naked (including headgear) annoyed a warthog into attacking me and switched between no weapons at all and a chakram (+7 vs. blunt). I didn't do enough trials to satisfy the extreme sticklers but the difference was clear enough to me that I didn't feel the need to do so. I'm the disrespected anon poster of the 23rd. :)
 * Actually you were respectively disregarded. Subtle difference d-: -PanSola 15:17, 24 February 2006 (CST)
 * I did smile when I said it :P I've now done more tests involving a level 20 warthog and stalker (both hearty) and using the same test against Hulking Stone Elementals (weak against blunt) I observed that they both did equivalent damage. All of which leads me to the rather odd conclusion that warthogs start out doing blunt and change to slashing (I didn't do enough to distinguish 'tween slashing/piercing but see no reason to doubt the other testers) by level 20.
 * I would suggest you do more tests at Level 5 to collect a larger data set, or let us know how much testing you originally performed with level 5 pets. -PanSola 18:25, 24 February 2006 (CST)
 * That does look like a reasonable test method, better than I had thought (using a shield, which is prone to errors with the base AL). I suppose it is possible that pets change their damage types as they develop, certainly my (our) testing concentrated at the end-game levels, with little testing of low level pets.  It would be very odd, but it's possible for a carried item to throw your results off, this has been an issue with many tests of pet damage; I frequently have people telling me how they tested such-and-such and that the damaghe range was lower than expected; generally this is caused by an opponent carrying a shield or other protective device - such drops will give the opponent higher armour, which is one good reason to avoid testing vs random opponents, or to kill them and examine the drop after.  Of course, it is unlikely in the extreme that you happened to find a golem carrying a negative armour item, though they do exist and can drop.  It's possible to have several foes with + armour items, and that the warthog's foe didn't, but again, this is unlikely.  Another possibility is that you hasd forgotten to switch armour sets for example, and had different Beast Mastery levels on the different occasions, but I am now interested, as your technique seems sound, so I will have a look.  I just raised a Dire Warthog last night, and can easily test to see if it is dealing blunt damage.  If so the pets have been updated without notice (which is entirely possible); if not then we get into the question of whether the damage type changes or something; I'll do a quick check tonight, to ensure that the skeletons still take extra from blunt (candy cane hammer, yay!), then to check the Warthog's damage output vs them.--Epinephrine 23:19, 27 February 2006 (CST)
 * Well, I don't have a +vs blunt item, so I couldn't confirm that pets deal blunt in a rigorous manner, but the level 20 warthog dealt the same damage range with and without GC up tonight vs the skeletons, so whatever it deals is equivalent to fire and slashing damage (it is physical, as it goes up when under GC vs opponents weak to fire likt the level 10 minotaurs outside the Ice Tooth Cavern). Same damage range, same crits.  Can't confirm whether it is blunt without +AL gear vs blunt of course, but it behaves like slashing at level 20; so no hidden update at least.  I'll try a level 5 pet tonight if I can recruit someone with GC to help me (I don't want to ditch my strider on my main ranger).  --Epinephrine 13:49, 28 February 2006 (CST)

Pet Differences?
Ok, I just came across this ancient article and it says there are inherent differences between pets.

''Zylaar asks: Many of our community members have questions about Ranger pets. We assume - based on the rest of the game - that the pets' abilities are balanced; is there any official information available to help players choose a pet, such as their special attacks, strengths and weaknesses? Any plans to add new and/or elite pets?''

''Gaile Gray: You’re right in noting that pets do have differences. Some have more armor, some attack faster, some have more health, etc. You will note that the specifics are not really called out in the game. That’s because, to some degree, we leave at least some aspects of the game in undisclosed state so that the community can figure things out. ''

''Another example of this would be bows: Some shoot faster, some truer, and some at longer range. At least one has armor piercing, too. If you add elements like bow grips and strings, you have some pretty interesting complexity of stats for these items. The same applies to the many pet-related skills used in conjunction with each pet’s inherent strengths.''

''As for elite pets – none will be coming in the foreseeable future. However, there will definitely be new pets in Chapter 2 and most likely in each subsequent chapter.''

Thoughts? --Karlos 00:15, 4 March 2006 (CST)


 * Jenosavel and Epinephrine concluded in their magnum opus that Gaile Gray was essentially lying in that interview. IIRC. 00:17, 4 March 2006 (CST)
 * Or rather, Gaile was lied to. d-: -PanSola 00:54, 4 March 2006 (CST)
 * Either way, lies were told.
 * There was a post including Gaile's reaction to the Pet Guide in which she explained that it was the information she had been given, and I don't doubt that initially they intended to have all pets behave differently. It was most likely planned and then abandoned in face of the difficulty balancing the pets.  Unfortunately, for whatever reason, Gaile's response was edited out of the forum thread.  I don't believe that anyone was purposefully deceiving anyone however, which makes it a non-lie, as a lie must carry with it intent to deceive.  I'd rather take their word for it, and give the benefit of the doubt than cast further aspesions on Gaile's (or ANet's) character --Epinephrine 22:36, 20 March 2006 (CST)