“Dear BRK, what is your opinion on wolfs as a pet. Patrick.”

We think wolves are neat, pretty, fluffy, and all-around decent pets. If you’re a min-max’er, i.e. you’ll do anything and everything to buff yourself to own the top of the damage meter, you won’t be choosing one, though.

What’s Great About Wolves

1. They are the most realistic pet in the game. You know someone who owns a dog. You seen dogs attack. You’ve seen dogs attack on command. People actually hunt with dogs. Our own 100lb fluffy puppy, Quattro, would make a great hunter-pet… if he actually had a malevolent bone in his body and didn’t want to lick everybody who comes in the door.

2. Good diet: meat. They don’t eat bread, but they also aren’t restricted to mushrooms or artichokes or something else silly.

3. Good health, good armor, average base-DPS. There’s something sad about a hunter coming to a raid with a pet that does less-than-average base-DPS. With a wolf, at least you’re not in that group.

4. Lots of choices of skins. Variety, thy name is Cat. It’s closest cousin is the wolf. No, we cannot get the spirit wolf any longer, but there’s a long list of pretty wolves available for taming, from your first pet to level sixty-seven.

5. Furious Howl. If you are put in a melee-DPS group, your wolf’s Furious Howl will boost their damage every ten seconds. It’s a party-buff, and the only one a hunter’s pet can learn.

What Stinks About Wolves

1. The most popular wolf is easily attainable. Ironjaw is gorgeous. In our opinion, he’s one of the best-looking pets in the game, regardless of class. But if you have someone in your guild with a wolf, he probably has him already. If you don’t want a cat because “everybody has one”, watch out for Ironjaw; you’ll see lots of them.

2. Low-DPS, regardless of what Petopia says. Furious Howl takes 60 Focus to cast, so your pet can’t be casting any other spells in between Furious Howl-cooldowns. This means no Growl, Bite, etc. To get the most bang out of your wolf-buck, his personal DPS must suffer. He may be an average-DPS pet, but his lack of a Focus-drain will retard his total damage significantly.

3. There are no level-70 wolves available. If you’re a level-capped hunter and want to try a wolf, you’ll have to get a level 67 wolf, because that’s as high as they come. Nobody likes pet-leveling.

4a. Furious Howl’s limited range. Let’s say you’re put in an AoE group to amplifier their DPS. You and the squishie armada stand way back and bomb away. Your wolf charges in and starts casting Furious Howl. Since your party is 30 yards away from the wolf, nobody will benefit from the 15-yard range-limit of Furious Howl. To guarantee effectiveness, your wolf needs to be in a melee-DPS group.

4b. Furious Howl in PvP is even worse than in PvE. In battlegrounds, your party can be miles away. In arenas, you either play a Crush-DPS style or Mana-Drain style. A wolf is beneficial in neither.

5. They yip. Cats “roar” into battle. Wolves “yip”. That’s cr@p on toast, Blizz. Sheesh.

Just to head off an avalanche of “what about X as a pet” emails, let’s cut to the quick. There are only four viable min-max raiding pets: cats, ravagers, wind serpents, and raptors. That’s it, that’s all. Fineto.