Animal companion



An animal companion or pet is a creature that fights alongside a ranger in combat zones. A character's pet appears in explorable areas when they have equipped any of the ranger skills Charm Animal, Comfort Animal (PvE), or Heal as One (PvE). Sometimes, a player using a pet makes it the main part of their strategy.

Like all creatures, pets gain experience, to a maximum level of 20. Their appearance is based on which species of charmable animal they are and their level, which determines their size.

Pets follow their owners and use standard melee attacks. Their AI behavior is similar to that of minions: they attack and move to the owner's target, but have difficulty changing target and are easily bodyblocked. However, like heroes, pets can be directed using the pet interface screen which allows the owner to order their pet to heel, to guard, or to lock target.

Pets move 20% faster than party members by default, but this bonus is not counted against their max speed boost.

The pet's fighting ability is determined by several factors.
 * The pet's evolution and level, as well as the owner's points in the ranger attribute Beast Mastery, determine base damage and health.
 * Some shouts affect the pet's speed, armor, health, or damage.
 * Pet attacks cause the pet to attempt a specific action, usually in the role of a regular character, such as interrupting or inflicting conditions.

A player can release their pet into the Zaishen Menagerie, where all the pets they have released are stored, so they can access and charm them whenever they want.

Acquisition
Lists of charmable animals
 * By capture location
 * By zaishen menagerie location
 * By campaign
 * By damage type

Each character may have only one pet at a time, which belongs to them whether or not they equip one of the three pet-bringing skills. PvP-only characters start already owning a level 20 Elder Wolf (which they can later trade), but PvE characters must charm their own.

You can only charm animals, and only if you do not currently have a pet. After finding one in the wild or in the Zaishen Menagerie, you must cast Charm Animal on it. If the pet is alive when the skill finishes casting, the animal becomes friendly and bound to the character as their companion. That means that the animal will accompany and obey its master whenever they equip any skill that states "your animal companion will travel with you." Heroes can also tame and own pets, if you order them to cast Charm Animal while targeting a valid animal.

Most non-charmed animals spawn as neutral, but will turn hostile if any attacks or offensive skills are activated upon on them, including during the activation of Charm Animal. (Animals wandering in the Zaishen Menagerie and those that spawn as allies, such as the White Moa, are an exception to this.) Friendly AI in the party will attack and possibly kill animals that turn hostile before they can be charmed, so it is advised to set heroes to Avoid and/or flag the AI-controlled party members away while charming.

Some enemy rangers spawn near charmable animals, and will begin charming them when a player comes within aggro range effectively preventing players from charming them. However, flagging heroes and henchmen to engage the enemies before the player is in range causes the foe to attack before charming. As long as the animal is not hit by area of effect damage, it will remain passive and charmable.

Pets can also be unlocked for an entire account at the Zaishen Menagerie, without ever encountering one. All of them can be unlocked by paying with Balthazar Faction or Zaishen Coins, or only the non-prestige ones by purchasing the Pet Unlock Pack. PvP characters can only get a new pet by charming one unlocked in the Zaishen Menagerie.

Changing &#38; retraining pets
Characters (and their heroes) can release their current pet for free at a Pet tamer (and if done with Emyrd, they are unlocked in the Zaishen Menagerie). This allows the character to charm a new pet. If the animal is at level 20 and was charmed outside the Menagerie, tamers will pay 100 for them.

Pets cannot be retrained, but if a player wants a different evolution, they may charm the same one again or request one of a specific evolution at the Zaishen Menagerie.

The Zaishen Menagerie
The Zaishen Menagerie, located on the Battle Isles, is a place where a character can release pets they have charmed, in return for constant availability across the whole account. When you release a pet into the Zaishen Menagerie by talking to Emryd the Tamer, all evolutions equivalent and below become unlocked for that account, and start wandering the grounds. Helena will unlock any pet, and higher evolutions of any pet, for a fee of Zaishen Coins or Balthazar Faction. On request, Wynn will spawn any unlocked pet of any unlocked evolution for the player to charm. Silavor and Salome supply interesting trivia about every animal.

Only one of the Strider or the Moa Bird must be unlocked in order to unlock both of them. The purchasable Pet Unlock Pack automatically unlocks and releases all non-prestige pets into the Menagerie.

Only tier 1 pets wander around the Menagerie; to charm higher tiers, speak to Wynn. She can also spawn level 20 Playful and Aggressive pets, which are hard to get through standard evolution because they usually upgrade to Hearty or Dire by that level.

Mechanics and behavior

 * Skill effects
 * Animal companions are treated as allies, so they are unaffected by skills that affect party members.


 * Experience


 * Animal companions earn experience during combat, even while dead and out of range of the party.
 * Like player characters, their level is capped at level 20.
 * They do not earn the bonus experience from missions, quests, or experience scrolls.
 * Some players believe that pets share experience earned with other pets in the party; however, no one has offered experimental evidence one way or the other.


 * Death and Death Penalty

Like all creatures in the game, animal companions die when they reach 0 health.
 * Dead pets do not leave exploitable corpses and do not appear as grey dots on the compass.
 * After a wipe, dead animal companions resurrect with the party at resurrection shrines. You can manually resurrect them using Comfort Animal, Revive Animal, or Heal as One.
 * Each death earns them a 15% Death Penalty in PvP only.
 * In PvE, the instant a pet dies, their owner's skills are disabled for seconds (depending on their Beast Mastery; see below).

Controls
By default, the animal companion attacks the target that its owner is attacking with a slight delay before it changes to a new target; however, players can control their pets' behavior as detailed below.

The Pet Control panel (pictured) allows a player to control their animal companion. The panel displays a picture of the pet, the pet's health, any skills or effects the pet is under, and the three behavior modes. Unlike heroes and henchmen, pets cannot be controlled using flags.

The panel is off by default when you enter an explorable area; it can be toggled on/off by clicking the number beside the pet's name in the party window.

The three behavior modes are:


 * Attack: When activated, the pet locks onto your target, and will attack it as long as it's in aggro range. If the target dies, moves out of range, or is reselected, the pet returns to Guard or Heel mode, whichever it was in before it entered Attack mode.


 * Guard: The pet moves to and attacks the same target as its owner, when the target is within range. (Casters will find this range is slightly less than casting/wand range, so they might have to take a step or two closer to the target before the pet will engage.)


 * Heel: The pet will not attack in this mode; if it is distant, it will return immediately to the owner's side.

Pet name
Players can name their pet by using a special command: /petname [name] or /namepet [name]. If no name is specified, the name will be reset to the default of the pet's evolution and species (e.g. "Hearty Phoenix"). Pets controlled by your heroes cannot be named. Pet names must be 3-12 characters and may only consist of letters and (non-consecutive) spaces.

Evolution
A pet automatically evolves as it levels up, and its specific evolution depends on the kind of fighting it gains experience from. Average evolutions go from Unevolved to Elder, but pets usually evolve from the defensive Playful to Hearty or from the offensive Aggressive to Dire. Unofficial
 * 1) Evolving an aggressive pet into an elder pet is difficult, and evolving a playful pet into an elder pet is nearly impossible.
 * 2) Extensive research into level 11+ unevolved pets has not been done; however, some reports indicate that it is possible to evolve mid-level pets into Elder pets.
 * Heroes' pets evolve in the same way.
 * The pet's evolution may also be affected by the damage dealt to its owner.

Armor and health
Animals have base armor of level*3+20 and base Health of level*20+80. Thus all level 20 pets have 80 AL. Elder pets have 480 HP and no damage bonus, Hearty Pets have 540 HP (480+60) but deal reduced damage, while Dire Pets have only 420 HP (480-60) but deal increased damage.

Animals are naturally infused against the Mursaat’s Spectral Agony and have a 33% damage reduction in PvE (since the August 6, 2009 update).

Amount of damage
The multiplier for a pet's base damage is determined by its level and its owner's Beast Mastery. Species makes no difference.

Pets can inflict critical hits, but unlike weapons, they do not inflict maximum damage before the multiplier. The damage multiplier for an animal companion's critical hits is not known, but is suspected to be approximately √2 before rounding.

Since the August 6, 2009 update, pets have a +33% damage modifier in PvE on top of the values stated below.


 * 1) Average damage is based on the data in this thread.
 * Note: Damage is calculated for 12 Beast Mastery and a level 20 animal companion

Types of damage
Most pets deal slashing damage, but some deal piercing damage. The White Moa deals piercing damage except when Dire, which deals slashing damage. The following table presents the various types of pets, organized by the type of damage they deal.

NPCs that have pets
Certain NPCs bring their own pets, including:



! NPC !! Pet || Species !! Location(s)
 * - style="background:lightgray;"
 * Aurora || Hector || Crab || Jade Sea
 * Zho || Onyx || Black Moa || Norn Fighting Tournament (despite Zho's unfortunate history with the species)
 * Sujun || Ling Wong || Panda || during The Red Frog
 * Daky || Squeakers || Jahai Rat || Heroes' Ascent
 * }
 * Sujun || Ling Wong || Panda || during The Red Frog
 * Daky || Squeakers || Jahai Rat || Heroes' Ascent
 * }
 * }

NPCs with non-charmable companions
Some NPCs are accompanied by non-charmable animals that follow them like pets, but are simply ally NPCs:

! NPC !! Companion !! Species !! Location(s) Brutus || Wallows || Echovald Forest Nicholas the Traveler || Professor Yakkington || Any Dolyak || Pre-searing Changes weekly
 * - style="background:lightgray;"
 * Old Mac || Joe || Devourer || Kryta
 * Master Seeker Nathaniel || Snow || Snow Wolf  || Griffon's Mouth
 * Cheswick || Oink || Any invincible pig || Gates of Kryta
 * Shadow || Carlotta || Moss Spider || Maguuma Jungle, War in Kryta
 * Danika || Sheena
 * Cheswick || Oink || Any invincible pig || Gates of Kryta
 * Shadow || Carlotta || Moss Spider || Maguuma Jungle, War in Kryta
 * Danika || Sheena
 * Danika || Sheena
 * Danika || Sheena
 * Nehdukah || Pork Chop || the Impressive Warthog  || Plains of Jarin
 * Nicholas Sandford
 * Nicholas Sandford
 * Nicholas Sandford
 * }

Bosses with pets
The following ranger bosses are always accompanied by their pets:



! Boss !! Pet's species Dzabel Land Guardian Tundoss the Destroyer || Crocodile
 * - style="background:lightgray;"
 * Royen Beastkeeper || Crane
 * Ashlyn Spiderfriend || Black Widow
 * Thul The Bull || Wolf
 * Milodestus the Wrangler || Reef Lurker
 * Bolten Largebelly
 * Thul The Bull || Wolf
 * Milodestus the Wrangler || Reef Lurker
 * Bolten Largebelly
 * Bolten Largebelly
 * Bolten Largebelly
 * Salke Fur Friend || White Tiger
 * Sergeant Behnwa || Hyena
 * }
 * Sergeant Behnwa || Hyena
 * }