Pets

Well, what makes Hercs good tanks is their skills. With Protect and Strong, the Herc wins out in everything except attack value and DPS, where the Walker is slightly better.

Stats of Level 100 Herc with lvl5 skills VS Level 100 Walker without Protect or Strong

BUT, if you were to put Reflect, Protect, and Strong on a walker, the playing field is much more level.

Stats of Level 100 Herc VS Level 100 Walker, both with Protect and Strong 5

Most people that say walkers are better are being preferential. Like: I'm never going to get a herc because they're ugly and I know a bunch of barbarians to come be my meat shields.

And on the "Which one first" question, since Nix's can't enter instances are are typically only used for pvp if at all, I'd go for the herc first.

While you can solo farm squad mode TT with a herc veno and some competence, it takes hours and you'll probably make only a tiny profit from the cost of repairs/subs/time/herc cost. Useful if you don't like squadding and you have plenty of time and want to farm your own gear though.

I think the difference in terms of aggro actually does come down to something negligible, the Herc has actually got a better dps output than the Walker when you factor out Bash. Now, I don't think that I've ever been known as a fan of Hercs, or Walkers for that matter, but ive always tried to be fair. In no way does the Walker outperform the Herc when it comes to tanking, the Herc's base stats alone (leaving out its native skill set) provide an overwhelming advantage even if the Walker does manage to outdamage the Herc using Bash. Which still doesn't account for whatever small difference reflect does provide to the herc, however, meaning that the damage/aggro gap is certainly smaller than it seems. It comes down to HP, for level 100 the Herc gets 1000 more than the Walker.

Now I'm the biggest fan of using rare skills to give more ordinary pets better capacities, but the claims of outperforming legendary pets are nothing but hot air. If you want to come down to minute detail swapping one of the Herc's skills out for Claw will provide you with both much better damage AND much better ressilience than the Walker could ever achieve. If you Claw the Walker you're still not getting the better ressilience of the Herc, and in terms of dps you're not coming close to the Derjan's hatchling, although you would have a good in between amongst the two extremes which could still make it worthwhile. Given that the availability of rare pet skills from faction bases has yet to put any dent on the price of rare skill scrolls from Dragon Temple (in my server getting three of these skills is actually more expensive than buying a herc outright) it is not really worth it to skill a Walker if what you're aiming for is to try to match the Herc's performance.

Now, as has been pointed out, soloing TT is no longer a veno's niche and not even that profitable for any class to attempt. I've got a stock of 2-1 materials I cannot sell even pricing to move as good proof. It has been suggested that Nix can be used for grinding DQs in some areas, but the truth is outside 2x I dread thinking of exactly how long it would take you just to make your investment back using this method. Unfortunately it seems nowadays that only merchanting will allow you to make good profit in any reasonable amount of time, and that is itself a potentially risky and complicated effort. Other than the pack lottery, you'd probably be better off investing on sage amp or rank to farm nirvy than on legendary pets (and you do want both of them if you want to become "the best veno in the world") although it remains to be seen whether the coming expansion will change that.

Whatever claims you may hear to the contrary, success in terms of accumulating in-game wealth is rather elussive and cannot be reduced to a simple, straightforward formula. What some of us would consider unhealthy/obscene ammounts of irl time and/or cash are usually behind most fortunes...

Edited to answer OP's questions (sorry, was in the middle of a phone call while writing my post and missed both Jeremied's post and the response)

a. Ream remains the same, however the availability of better endgame gear has made it much less of a factor. I rarely hear of anyone even bothering with the anti-ream genie skills anymore...

b. Yes

c. Yes

d. Yes, adding that in general terms, pets are apparently much less of an endgame factor because of better gears.

b:dirty HA/AA venos

FCCing is not something you really want to do on a veno anyway, since you still have to grind on mobs for your pets' exp. Sounds like you have the mindset to be an awesome veno.

Jeremied - Sanctuary wrote: »

b:dirty HA/AA venos

FCCing is not something you really want to do on a veno anyway, since you still have to grind on mobs for your pets' exp. Sounds like you have the mindset to be an awesome veno.

Pets require a small fraction of what we need, and as long as you do more than 50% of dmg; your pet gets some xp.

I did the same as Desdi w/ Derjans for 27m, and I'm also PvE only yet still got a Nix. Back in the day I did a lot of grinding especially in VoS. The Phoenix made it fast and easy despite sometimes getting stuck in the ground. I'd say it paid for itself back then but lacks much use anymore.

I can't say Derjan's is a must have, and it doesn't replace a herc. Hercs need less heals and that counts for a lot of dmg. Derjan's also can't fly. 36m for just two skills; I'd probably consider Nix instead. Both will have very limited use depending on play style though.

Derjan's w/ Howl can be fun.

I spent most of my time inside instances so I figured I wouldn't use the Phoenix so much that would be worth the money at the time. As time went by R9 was introduced, APS rose and TT market and other things crashed so I started spending less time instances but I considered it was still not worth it for me. I don't deny the Pheonix's qualities but it just didn't really shine for my needs.

As for the skills, I was just checking AH every time I was online until I found the skills for a reasonable price. I considered 11mil for Claw good and 25mil for Bless (which is like 48mil on Sanctuary last time I checked) to be a good deal. I think 10-15mil should be the price for rare pet skills for the current economy but people still try to sell them for 30mil. I saw the skills in AH many times and looks like nobody seemed to buy them until some of the sellers decided to lower the price.

Kalishana - Archosaur wrote: »

I recently read this and it is kinda disconcerting to me:

" Venomancers are useless, and Venomancer pets are garbage, the nix cant attack anything without getting stuck in the ground, and herc cant compete with a APS anyway, not even be a decent tank with such scrappy HP, Mystic pets are waaaaay better since they get stronger as your char gets stronger and are 100% free. "

I know i'm not supposed to get hyped up by some random person's random rant, but...
What's your opinions about this?
Does the nix really get stuck on the ground that much? and is the Herc really unable to tank at all nowadays (kinda opposite of what MANray suggests)? Are our pets completely scraped by Mystics' and the only reason why anyone still plays a Veno, besides being a veteren and all, to amp and purge?

I thought wizzies were the only underpowered/valued class, but with a lot of comments i see on other class's forums and all that, i feel like Veno is another class that got completely nerfed by the new classes and is now pretty hard to be considered good (no one will squad with you outside your faction mates).

<_< Sounds like someone flirted with a veno, found out they were a guy, and went on the warpath against venos in general.

The Nix DOES kind of get caught in the ground in hilly areas, but so do all flying pets. Just double jumping usually dislodges them, so it's not much of an inconvenience once you learn the signs of a stuck pet.

Herc's can pretty much still tank the same stuff they've been tanking for years, what's changed is the general competence of the person behind the veno. Saving up for and grinding to level that herc used to teach venomancers how to play. Now adays, with fcc being so available and Cube being easy pet leveling, they think "I have herc, it's the best tank evar" and then they DD instead of heal or go try to solo TT3-3 squad mode and then die and rage. (if there is a veno that's solo'd 3-3, speak up! )

Mystics...eh, it's not the same. Mystic's pets aren't really...tanks. Yes, they CAN tank, I've seen them do so, but any character CAN tank when the situation calls for it. Not to mention the mana drain before 75 is just obnoxious.

Venos, with their mana heal, soul transfusion, and very very low cost on pet heals, they seem more of a grinder class, as you literally can keep going forever without pots. In fact, pretty sure they were made to be the grinder class before the tideborn and r9 came along, since that's how you level your pets.

Just a little pumpkin cider induced opinion sharing. b:chuckle

Ehh, there are still uses for pets and so many unused pet skills out there but most people only know about the tanking herc and the QQbird, once those became less useful in squad play people considered the pets to be garbage altogether. Needless to say that genie pulls replaced pet pulls in most situations up to the point that idiots try to pull even in the most "difficult situations" and usually aggro all the mobs instead of just...you know...let the veno in your squad pull.

Since endgame instances are limited to..Nirvana mostly...people only judge venomancers based on amp and purge. Even worse, they judge a venomancer's culti entirely based on Nirvana so to them Sage > Demon. BHs don't really require a particular class besides something that tanks and something that heals.

With that mentality in mind and paired with many incompetent venomancers, people don't even know what the class can do anymore so a lot of people don't even care about having one in squad. I see blademasters or barbarians using their skills to gain chi while making the squad wait and they don't even ask me for chi. I pass them chi and afterwards they tend to ask me when they need. What does that indicate? Venomancers don't even bother to pass chi to people...

Thing is; a incompetent cleric can still get away if they just BB and throw a heal or two. The same applies for other classes but when it comes to venomancers it's somehow much more noticeable when they are incompetent.

Yes, a Venomancer's mistakes do tend to be easier to notice than those of other classes, which isn't to say that venos play any more of a key role to a squad's performance. Bad DD, especially ranged, sort of blends into the background, which is the reason people in these classes who do play to their full potential tend to stand out, many players have unfortunately developed such low expectations for them that it almost seems extraordinary when they go beyond the role of traditional DD spamming damage skills, which they are for the most part more than capable of doing. Which brings me to the issue of "skill", MMORPGs are not twitch based gameplay for the most part, which means competent performance is more about acquiring the proper capacities and having the good sense of knowing when to use them. There really is no skill involved in soloing a boss with a veno (this is basically spam healing) although competence here would be measured by how well prepared a char is for the job (in terms of pet, heals, chan, etc.) and how good you're at gauging the amount of debuffing/DD you can squeeze in between heals.

Now, for those of us who do without the extra capacities of legendary pets many of the complaints about endgame performance do seem to relate to our everyday experience. Yes, pets tank for us but we really can't rely on them as heavily as you could on a herc or phoenix which means we've learned to adjust. My shaodu cub is skilled for backup/tanking (Bash, Roar, Threaten, Tough) which means grinding with it takes some adjustments. Against many mobs i'm forced to use threaten as an aggro skill, and even then i may have to go with DoTs (Blazing, Noxious) to have it keep hate. Yes, fights do take slightly longer although in general terms it only takes me an extra hit to get things done as compared to my attack pet (the effects on mp consumption are not noticeable) now, if you're using a Jones and r9, g16 weps is pretty obvious no pet is going to hold aggro for longer than a couple of hits (which really should be enough to kill same level mobs) so you need to adjust to that in pretty much the same way those of us using pets with sucky dps do. Yes, pets wil not tank for your squad (which was always a bad idea considering it defeated the purpose of other classes maximizing their damage output) and you may have to do without them through some AoEs, but this is pretty much what we lowbie venos using regular pets already do and i don't see any of us complaining about pets being useless. You can still debuff, take on adds, lure, and have a back up tank when things go bad, even if its just to buy your squad a few precious seconds to regroup. You still get good extra DD in many other scenarios.

That you don't get an OP pet doing a job that really belongs to a character class really isn't that big of a loss. And that endgame PvE content seems to be geared towards efficiently farming an instance doesn't make pets obsolete however limited a role they may play on that one scenario. If you PvP Ream will still make a difference. A veno's basic role is support. Amp makes a difference. Full armor break (myriads, demon Ironwood) makes a difference. A veno adds DD on top of this and with triple sparking and a decent wep/chan it makes a difference. Pets bring extra capacities and can potentially save a squad from wiping. The only problem here is buying into the absurd, self defeating and leetish standards of a small group of players that think FCC leveling an aps and investing upwards of a couple of hundred dollars decking it out entitles them to anything.

Sry for the wall of text, and thx for the advice Desdi, I'll try to keep a close eye on AH from now on.