Warp Stalker: Is it a good tank?

Hey guys,

My first post here aside from the introduction thread

I've been wondering if anyone has tried pet tanking with the Warp Stalker. They do have the Warp ability, which I'll quote here:

Warp
30 yd range
Instant 15 sec cooldown
Teleports to an enemy up to 30 yards away and gives the pet a 50% chance to avoid the next 3 melee attacks. Lasts 4 sec.

It seems to be a good replacement for Charge (thus freeing up a pet talent point), and since the cooldown can be talented to 10.5 seconds, if put on autocast we get 4 seconds of good melee avoidance every 10.5 seconds, which seems like a good deal to be against melee bosses who wont eat up the 3 charges within 4 seconds.

With this, I was wondering if anyone who has first hand experience with the Warp Stalker can comment on its tanking viability, especially to how it stacks up with against the Turtle, since the Warp Stalker is avoidance based (50% avoidance) and the Turtle is mitigation based (50% less damage).

I briefly ran a warpstalker during BC, and at that time, I would only get the warp ability to activate when initially ordering the warpstalker to engage the targetted mob.

If the ability can be recast during the fight nowadays, then the warpstalker would be a very interesting tank pet indeed

cheers
- ACH

Yes, I love my thunderstomping warpstalker... I just can't say that enough!

Since you'll be using Warp in place of Charge, you do need to give your Warp Stalker one more second to establish aggro. Charge has the advantage of immobilizing the target for one second, but that's the only thing you'll miss without it. I think it's well worth it for the extra pet talent point now that we have more talents to buy.

Yes, Warp does refresh during combat now. It's funny to watch the mobs constantly switch which direction their facing, trying to keep up with the warp stalker that just warped behind them. Now, this may cause issues if you're also working with melee DPSers, such as rogues, who need to be behind the target, but they'll just need to stand to the side or keep moving around to the back.

This is great news indeed! It means that Warp stalkers can fall into the gap between the threat generating tanks and the mitgation of the turtle because that extra point can be spent on Spiked Collar.

So the trade off would look something like this:

Threat- Croc~Bear~Stalker~Turtle -Mitigation

With the the Turtle and Croc standing out prominently in their positions.

Good news indeed. Perhaps something to experiment with. Too bad that 50% avoidance is a bit too random. It could still take a massive couple of blows. While other times take no damage. In that area I like Shell Shield more. But with roughly 35-40% uptime, compared to the Shell Shields ~25% uptime (has to be manually clicked which makes the uptime slightly lower).

Not to mention, mobs hitting the pet from behind will automatically be in front of him every 10 seconds. That's a really nice addition.

However, what should be noted is that the 50% avoidance is only towards melee attacks, not special abilities (unless the ability is a melee attack I guess). And it's only 3 attacks, not 4 seconds granted uptime. If it's only tanking 1 mob, the uptime should be enough, but if tanking trash and it's got 4 mobs hitting it, the uptime will be much lower.

I've been doing a little testing with my turtle trying to find effective health over a minute and came to a rather interesting conclusion which has a bearing on the Warp Stalker question:

My health: ~25k

Pet health 0/2 WH ~18.5k
Yield from 2/2 SB ~555
HOM (Health over a minute) ~27k

Pet Health 2/2 WH ~22k
Yield from 1/2 SB ~341
HOM ~28k

Pet Health 1/2 WH ~20k
Yield from 2/2 SB ~630
HOM ~30K

Pet Health 2/2 WH ~22k
Yield from 2/2 SB ~681
HOM ~34k

This means that, taking 2/2 WH and 2/2 SB the Warp Stalker's talent can equate to about
(3-4k HOM+mitigation from warp misses) - (damage avoided with spell shield)

Alternatively the initial threat loss on charge can be weighed against the overall gain from spiked collar.

I am levelling up Xerxes the Warp stalker now and so far I am very pleased with the results. I am not sure if something untoward is happening but he seems to be alot more resilient than Warp would suggest against the 78 Mammoths (he is 75 still) and a dps spec. At one point I had close to ten Mammoths and Worms (lvl 80) on him and he was barely taking any damage.

Could it be that something like the Explosive Trap MD or Kill Command Thunderstomp is helping out here for larger pulls?

I've actually been using a warp stalker almost exclusively for my bm build while grinding rhinos for leather. His damage does seem to be spikey but if he gets i few misses after a warp it allows his health to jump back up. I've also had him tank Ingvar for about 1/4 of the fight after the tank died and the only healing he recieved was from my mend pet. Then on the first boss of UK he tanked it again after the real tank died and while tanking he was also getting me out of ice tombs since none of the dps could be bothered to do it for me. So atm, my little warp stalker is definately my favorite pet for tanking.

This bit of thread necromancy reminded me this post wa shere. And I'm glad.

I've been changing up my grinding pets, and using a Warp Stalker for this as well. I mostly did it so I could justify to myself why I still had the warp stalker (other than as a 'vanity pet') but have really been surprised at how well Warp can eat damage. Plus, it works as a very nice Intercept if you hold it off, because the CD is so short.

Warning: it doesn't work against spellcasting enemies, as Evasion doesn't help against spells (well d'uh!). I haven't done any hardcore tanking with him, but I do adore using him for grinding. I think they could make fairly solid tanks, especially against two or three opponents. Especially now that all pets have a 'Shell Shield', and with Warp, they can still intercept fairly effectively even without that Shield. Plus, it saves a point on both Intercept *and* Charge, if you want to think about it that way!

Since I tamed my warp stalker back as a 65, it has been my favorite pet. He wasn't a super hard to find pet that everyone was looking for, but for almost anything I ever had a desire to do, he could get the job done. His warp ability helped keep his health high for evasion, but seemed to piss opponents off enough along with his other threat-increasers and his okay dps so that he almost never lost aggro. His warp ability meant he kited targets away, then usually maintained a good ranged distance from me. I ADORED my warp stalker. He absolutely dominated casters, held his own in melee, and always did well with large mobs. And then came cataclysm. Blizzard replaced Warp with Time Warp which is not only nearly the same thing as the crocolisks special ability, but is also on a longer cooldown. This new ability really isn't necessary, considering all hunters have concussive shot, not to mention wing clip and frost trap. Time warp isn't anywhere near as good for pvp, soloing, questing, instances, or anything really. I mean, it's a WARP Stalker for crying out loud, and they took away it's warp. Now it's just a stalker, and that's just creepy. Before cata, I'd have recommended warp stalkers to anyone in a heart beat, especially for tanking. After cata, while I still love my Warp Stalker dearly, and still tank with him successfully, I would no longer say he's the best choice.