July 5, 2015

Seeking A Third: Golden Dragonhawk & Parched Lizard
S/S Golden Dragonhawk Hatchling (Quills, Conflagrate, Flamethrower)
H/P Parched Lizard (Quick Attack, Conflagrate, Ravage)

My meta has been incredibly calm these past few days. So calm, in fact, that I’ve been able to play a lot of lesser used pets. I suppose that option is always available, so let me rephrase and say I’ve been able to play and have a shot at winning with lesser used pets. I was scrolling through my teams when I saw the lizard and dragonhawk and was reminded of the almost nonexistent Conflagrate stategy.

Conflagrate will hit a second time if the target is burning, so the goal is always to wait until the burning effect is in place. This is accomplished by changing the weather to Scorched Earth, using Flamethrower or through certain DoTs. Since the two pets above already have Conflagrate and only one way to apply burning, the logical choice would be to include another pet that has Flamethrower or Scorched Earth.

Pet 1: H/P Soul Of The Forge (Deep Burn, Extra Plating, Flamethrower)
Deep Burn does double damage against a burning target. When WoD first came out I thought the introduction of this move would make for a Conflagrate/burning renaissance; it never happened.

Battle 1: Spuds McBurnzie (1-1)
vs. Spawn Of G’Nathus, Aqua Strider, Puddle Terror
Three aquatics against my elemental: bad. Three aquatics to stick some quills into: good. I used to run an Aqua Strider in 5.2 until I realized that unless you’re facing a rabbit all that speed is wasted. Due to all this speed and its low power I wasn’t afraid to keep my elemental in against it. Extra Plating helped out enough so that my elemental took out most of the strider and most of the Spawn Of G’Nathus. Quills and the dragonkin racial cleaned it up nicely. The lizard sat this one out.

Pet 2: P/P Sunreaver Micro-Sentry (Fel Immolate, Haywire, Supercharge)
I can’t believe I’m using this pet, it has never performed well against me. It’s one of the few pets that have Fel Immolate, a DoT that applies burning. I thought about taking Call Lightning instead of Supercharge, but I didn’t want to worry about strong lightning ticks to my beast.

Battle 2: Burner Boys (1-0)
vs. Lil’ Bling, Emperor Crab, Emperor Crab
A big problem with Quills is that it’s not very effective against crabs with Surge since it’s a speed based move. These two crabs shut down my dragonhawk. I was hoping to do big burst with my mech, but it got locked into Haywire, Lil’ Bling swapped in to double the damage from a Whirlpool with Inflation. That took out my mech quickly. The lizard didn’t contribute much either. I’m using a pet I don’t like and lost to a pet I don’t like (not you Lil’ Bling!), what a bummer of a battle.

Pet 3: H/P Pocket Reaver (Metal Fist, Quake, Fel Immolation)
Another pet I don’t use much. I suppose if you never try new things you’ll never find the hidden gems.

Battle 3: Quaker Lang (2-0)
vs. vs. Lil’ Bling, Emperor Crab, Emperor Crab
Damn man, I almost lost again. My Parched Lizard survived with 54 health, no thanks to Quick Attack. It was a one on one situation with my beast facing the last crab. All I need to do is get one Quick Attack off and the crab was a goner. Quick Attack states “this ability always goes first”, Surge states “this move always goes first”. The crab’s priority move had priority. I sort of expected as much, but I would have been really annoyed of I lost because of that. I found myself missing avoidance for the second battle in a row.

Pet 4: S/S Sky-Bo (Flamethrower, Sticky Grenade, Decoy)
Some speed, Decoy and the ability to apply burning. I’m not too excited about Sticky Grenade.

Battle 4: Insider Pretty (1-0)
vs. Mechanical Pandaren Dragonling, Rabbit, Feral Vermling
Oh how I love to see an MPD team go down. The rabbit was 322 speed so my Sky-Bo was faster than both it and the MPD. Speed is so important in PvP, the battle would have been very different if I was facing a fast rabbit and Hopling rather than a Feral Vermling. There are many more pets that I would like to try but only have time for one more.

Pet 5: Jadefire Spirit (Jade Claw, Immolate, Fade)
Fade will take care of that avoidance problem that I mentioned above. Seems like a good deal, I cast Immolate then cast Fade to bring in either of the Conflagrate pets.

Battle 5: Crass Fader (0-0)
vs. Lil’ Ragnaros, Alterac Brew Pup, Sunreaver Micro-Sentry
See, Sunreaver Micro-Sentry is lose. Well, it was at a big disadvantage with all of the elemental damage. The ABP started off with Avalanche then spammed Bite. I used Fade when I could have died from a coin toss loss (we were both 289 speed), my dragonhawk came in to finish the dog then hit Lil’ Ragnaros with some Quills enhanced by the dragonkin racial. I had nothing to do while rag was under so I twiddled my thumbs while I waited for the fiery emergence. It took two turns to kill him after he emerged, then the mech killed my dragonhawk, but not before big damage was done. The lizard casually strolled in for the win. Lazy lizard.

I had more ideas for thirds, such as the Fire Beetle, Lava Crab, Sen’Jin Fetish, Fel Flame and Tiny Flamefly. The mask would probably be the best of those choices.