WotLK FAQ: Overview
- What is all this WotLK stuff?
- Where can I find official information on WotLK?
- Where can I find patch notes for the beta?
- Where are you getting your information?
- Do you have more information on WotLK hunters in general?
- So what are these big hunter pet changes? Updated
- What if I don't buy WotLK? Will the changes still affect me?
What is all this WotLK/Patch 3.0 stuff?
Wrath of the Lich King (WotLK) is the next expansion to the World of Warcraft. This expansion is currently in beta testing and will probably launch later this year.
WotLK includes some big changes for hunters and hunter pets -- and not just for players who purchase the WotLK expansion! Many of these changes will affect all players.
In fact, at some point before the expansion officially launches Blizzard will be pushing most of the changes to the live realms as Patch 3.0. Patch 3.0 will probably include all of the changes that affect all players regardless of whether or not they purchase the expansion.
This FAQ is an attempt to bring together everything we know from the current state of the beta in order to answer all your questions about the upcoming hunter pet changes.
For the most part, we use the terminology "Wrath", "Wotlk", and "Patch 3.0" interchangeably to mean "the way things will be after Patch 3.0 and/or the Wrath of the Lich King expansion launches".
Please keep in mind that beta testing is a time of changes and balancing and tuning. What we see right now in the beta test will very likely change -- maybe several times! -- before it is finally ready.
Where can I find official information on WotLK?
You can learn more about the expansion in general at Blizzard's Wrath of the Lich King
website.
Blizzard has also opened its WotLK Beta Forums to the public for reading. Only beta testers and Blizzard employees can post, but anyone can read these forums, and they are a great source of additional information.
Where can I find patch notes for the beta?
Complete beta patch notes are available at on the WoW WotLK Beta Forums.
Where are you getting your information?
I'll give a link to official sources whenever I can, but most of the information here is coming straight out of the beta. I was lucky enough to be invited to participate in the beta, so much of this information is first-hand.
In addition, there are a number of other beta testers who have generously volunteered to share the information they have collected. You'll see a special "Thanks!" section on the bottom of many of these pages acknowledging their excellent contributions.
Although we generally try to stick with first- and second-hand information from the beta, we occasionally must fall back on using information that was data-mined from the client files. For example, the exact damage values for mid-level pet skills are no longer easy to determine with a high-level character (since pets and pet skills now auto-level), and so in cases like that we supplement our observations with information from Thottbot, Wowhead, and the WotLK Wiki.
Do you have more information on WotLK hunters in general?
Sorry, we just do pets here! But you can check out Blizzard's WotLK Hunter Talent calculator.
So what are these big hunter pet changes?
The rest of the FAQ will go into these changes (and more!) in excrutiating detail, but to summarize briefly:
- Everything you thought you knew about training your pet has changed.
- Each pet family now has at least one totally unique family skill.
- In addition to skills, pets can also buy talents in one of three pet talent trees.
- Pet family stat modifiers have changed completely.
- Pets that previously has inferior "caster" stats now have perfectly normal stats.
- Pet loyalty no longer exists.
- Hunters now have more stable slots available to keep more pets.
- And of course there are lots of new pets to tame, including new exotic and non-exotic pet families.
What if I don't buy WotLK? Will the changes still affect me?
All of the underlying changes to the hunter class, including the changes to pet skills and the new pet talents, will apply to all hunters regardless of which expansions they do or do not own. These changes aren't just new content for the expansion: they are major changes to the way that the entire hunter class works.
In fact, most of these changes will be launched before the expansion is available in a special content patch for all players, Patch 3.0.
Of course, there is a lot you won't get to do if you don't buy the expansion. If you don't buy WotLK then you cannot enter Northrend to tame the new Northrend pets. Nor can you tame any level 71+ pets since you won't be able to get to that level yourself. But you will be able to:
- Use the new hunter talents, including Beast Mastery (which lets you tame exotic pets).
- Use the new hunter skills (at least up to level 70).
- Benefit from the new pet skill system, including the new unique family skills and auto-leveling of pet skills.
- Buy pet talents for your pets from the pet talent trees.
- Tame pets from the new pet families (so long as they are not level 71+ or in Northrend).
- Put your new pets in your new stable slots (after you buy the slots, of course).
- Ignore pet loyalty because it no longer exists.