Pet controls

The #1 problem I have with my pets is getting them to attack a target when I order them to attack. I spent some time last night playing around with the different modes (auto, manual, defend) to figure if there was some sort of pattern or combo I'm missing. I wasn't able to find any.

When your pet is attacking a mob and a second mob joins the fight, I order the pet to attack the second mob. In manual mode this usually seems to work. In auto or defend mode, this only works some of the time. Usually the pet will continue attacking the first mob for several more hits, meanwhile I'm being pummeled, then it will switch. Sometimes it doesn't switch at all - it insists on fighting the first mob until it's dead, then attacks the second mob. Unfortunately, manual mode is the least useful mode because...

Usually your pet kills a mob at the extreme edge of your spellcasting range. Your pet has just killed the first mob, and you see another mob nearby your pet but far away from you, so you order it to attack. Your pet insists on first running all the way back to you, then running all the way back to the new mob. In auto mode you can usually (but not always) short-circuit this by casting a spell at the second mob. In defend mode it'll cut short its trip to visit you if a new mob attacks it. But in manual mode, if you miss that slim window of opportunity right around the time the first mob is killed, you have to wait for the pet to make a long detour to visit you before it will engage the second mob.

Strangely, when I was in the Cube of Fate room 4, I could order the pet to attack different mobs and it would instantly obey. It was heavenly. But it doesn't seem to work like that outside the Cube. Unless you give the pet a new target immediately before or after it kills the current one, it insists on running all the way back to you before running to the new target.

This is especially troublesome when you're trying to run away from a mob and you want a slow pet (e.g. the golem) to engage it. The pet will chase you, never reaching you because you're running away, and thus will never switch to attacking the target you've given it. The only solution I've found is to jump straight up, then head back over the mob and the pet. The pet seems to consider this to be having reached its master, and thus switches to attack the mob.

Finally, have you noticed that sometimes the pet will defend in auto mode? Normally in auto mode, the pet will kill the target, then run back to you. If it gets attacked while it's fighting the first target, after that first mob is killed, it ignores the second mob and continues running back to you. The benefit of auto mode is that when you cast a spell at a target, the pet will automatically attack it.

In defend mode, if the pet is attacked by a second mob while fighting the first, the pet will kill the first target, then immediately attack the second target. However, you have to manually order your pet to attack targets which aren't attacking.

But sometimes auto mode seems to get glitched. The pet will still attack when you cast a spell like with regular auto mode. But if it gets attacked by a second mob, it will turn around and attack it after it's killed the first mob, just like with regular defend mode. IMHO this is the best mode, except I can't figure out how to deliberately cause it to happen.

So has anyone else figured out some sort of pattern to all this? Have any tips on getting the pet to behave the way you want? Why does the pet insist on running back to me after every kill except in the Cube? And how do I get this hybrid auto/defend mode all the time?