Unborn Val'kyr Questions and Frustrations

[Mathalor]

Why is the unborn val'kyr the top rated battle pet? I looked through the comments on the pet (I want those two hours of my life back, by the way), and of the 22 pages of comments, there were about 4 posts that seemed to actually deal with ideas on how to use the pet, 2 of them with some specifics, specifically related to haunt. One suggested that haunt was great because it damaged for a lot while avoiding attacks, the other suggesting that haunt wasn't so great because there were so many ways for your pet to be dead for the whole match just for using it (other pet dies before the debuff wears off, or your pet misses the attack). Every now and then someone would ask whether one of the breeds were better than the other, or worth farming for the 2nd breed, only to get down rated without explanation. And a couple of useless posts saying she was overpowered or useless without really explaining why.

So, why is this pet rated #1? Are there powerful uses for it in pve or pvp, or were people just so excited to finally get one that they'd vote it as useful merely out of glee? How would you build a team around this pet? And yeah, is h/h or b/b worth farming for, or not?

[Mathalor]

Okay, after a bit of poking through this forum, I've found a few answers to how to use this pet. Maybe I could change the original post to, why can't comments on pet pages be more useful, but I won't. Still not sure on the whole breed thing, but I'm definitely glad I was able to snag one the other night.

If anyone's wondering, I'm really new to pet battles, having reactivated my account a few weeks ago and leveled to 90. I managed to farm an anubisath idol up and was using it with a magical crawdad I farmed up during wrath, I think, to get past trainers and tame wild pets. I figured I'd focus leveling on anything on the "useful" list. The two I just mentioned are level 23 so far, and I have 5 or so that are about level 20. I can't yet beat the trainer in shadowmoon valley, until I level some more and get more flexible range in my pet choices. My unborn is lvl 20, grey, and h/h.

[Vek]

Ah yes, pet comments. Before there were pet battles you could still collect pets. The comments deal in 99% of the cases on how about to obtain said pet, so that is sadly not a very good place to find actual pve/pvp battle information.

PvE, I use it on one battle in celestial tournament, other than that I really can't see much use for it.

PvP is where it is mostly useful. Why?
Haunt. Uniqe ability. It is, I belive, the most powerful DoT in the game right now. IE most damage per tick. But what really sets it apart from other DoT attacks is that you get a "free" switch. When casting Haunt the Valk will "die" and you get to pick which pet to move to the front next turn.

This is quite a powerful tactical move. You get to put a DoT on your opponent and then you can chose which of your other pets you want to fight with, so you can really pick which one suits best for the current opposing pet. Using other pets with DoT's you have to sacrifice a turn and take a hit if you want to switch your pets. If you use Feign Death you don't chose which pet to switch in, but you know it's the one with highest current health.

The downside to Haunt is that if your other pets get killed while you are "haunting" you will automatically lose since your Valk counts as dead. No other ability has this kind of drawback. Often it is not a problem but you have to keep it in mind.

The other abilities or stats are nothing out of the ordinary or spectacular.

I belive B/B is slightly better at PvP since it is faster than the H/H version and would be able to haunt it's opponent.
H/H version has alot of health and can really go toe to toe with most pets, just banging heads at one another.

Other things why it is top rated. Looks.

[Mathalor]

Thank you very much.

[Jerebear]

To add to the PVE usage:

Unborn valk can play an interesting role in some pve battles. Prior to the Celestial Tournament and an ability nerf, it was a major component to "nuke" teams for the Beast of Fable. The beasts of fable aren't as mainstream anymore and the nerf makes it a bit harder to use it, but if you still try then there are a few strats, most of which are considered support roles and center around either getting Unholy Ascension off or Curse of Doom or both. There are a few ways to go about this now:

1. Shadow Slash/CoD whatever until you have the right turn timing and then Unholy Ascension so you can set up your "nuke". Beasts of Fable like Dos Ryga sometimes need this because they have special abilities (whirlpool in this example) that you want to have your nuke team avoid or at least sync with. Nuke team in this example would be Unborn Valk(CoD, UA), Water Spirit (Geyser, Whirlpool), and Chrominius (Bite, Howl, Surge of Power).

2. If timing isn't as critical and you know the exact number of turns it will take you to die and you are slower than your opponent at the turn you die (Zao in the celestial tournament for example), you can cast UA on the turn you expect to die, get your undead turn and cast CoD on the undead turn, Followed by the rest of your nuke. For this nuke team, I use Unborn Valk (Shadow Slash, CoD, UA), Water Spirit, A flyer with flock/swarm/etc.

3. If it is just too random, either cast UA right off the bat or Shadow Slash away until your undead turn, cast CoD on that turn, then proceed with the rest of your nuke. It just depends on the enemy.

**a nuke team is one that sets up for a 1-2ish round KO on a single opponent (oondasta, Beasts of Fable, Celestials for example). The most common centers around the an undead Curse of Doom pet, a pandaren water spirit, and some pet that provides a double damage debuff (Chrominius is the most popular due to Surge of Power, but for some bosses you have switch up to avoid strengths/weaknesses against opponents). The idea is:
1. On undead turn, cast CoD (or Unholy Ascension if CoD is weak)
2. Bring in Water spirit and use Geyser first
3. User Whirlpool
4. Switch to the debuff pet (or if water spirit dies in round 3, do something other than debuff)
5. Put up the double damage debuff
6. Finish off if necessary, though usually not

Round 5 is the key round as the double damage debuff goes up, all the previous debuffs (CoD, Geyser, and Whirlpool) go off at the end of this round, doing tons of damage). And if the enemy manages to survive and is not a critter, it is stunned. After that, you can finish it off based on the current health.

[Badpathing]

Ah yes, pet comments. Before there were pet battles you could still collect pets. The comments deal in 99% of the cases on how about to obtain said pet, so that is sadly not a very good place to find actual pve/pvp battle information.

PvE, I use it on one battle in celestial tournament, other than that I really can't see much use for it.

PvP is where it is mostly useful. Why?
Haunt. Uniqe ability. It is, I belive, the most powerful DoT in the game right now. IE most damage per tick. But what really sets it apart from other DoT attacks is that you get a "free" switch. When casting Haunt the Valk will "die" and you get to pick which pet to move to the front next turn.

This is quite a powerful tactical move. You get to put a DoT on your opponent and then you can chose which of your other pets you want to fight with, so you can really pick which one suits best for the current opposing pet. Using other pets with DoT's you have to sacrifice a turn and take a hit if you want to switch your pets. If you use Feign Death you don't chose which pet to switch in, but you know it's the one with highest current health.

The downside to Haunt is that if your other pets get killed while you are "haunting" you will automatically lose since your Valk counts as dead. No other ability has this kind of drawback. Often it is not a problem but you have to keep it in mind.

The other abilities or stats are nothing out of the ordinary or spectacular.

I belive B/B is slightly better at PvP since it is faster than the H/H version and would be able to haunt it's opponent.
H/H version has alot of health and can really go toe to toe with most pets, just banging heads at one another.

Other things why it is top rated. Looks.

I would like to add to this list.

1. Since you 'die', you can load up on dots and then haunt (wiping the dots).
2. Since your pet is 'dead', you can use other pets like the Stitched pup to consume and heal, even though the Valk comes back.

[Skavenged]

I use a Valk quite a bit. It's very versatile and has great synergy with lots of other pets. The only flaw I have ever seen isn't actually a flaw, so much as a bug. Sometimes, the Valk just doesn't resurrect after haunt. From my experience, it is very rare but very frustrating.

[Vek]

1. Since you 'die', you can load up on dots and then haunt (wiping the dots).

Buffs, debuffs, dots will be put on hold until the Valk ress. Then they start ticking again while Valk is in back row.

[Badpathing]

1. Since you 'die', you can load up on dots and then haunt (wiping the dots).

Buffs, debuffs, dots will be put on hold until the Valk ress. Then they start ticking again while Valk is in back row.

I know the dots persist, but it does not matter really since you surface the second time usually to Haunt again; meaning, my Valk usually is in a state of 'dead' for most of the fight. Guess I did not word it well, but it is a strength (in my opinion).

[Kendrah]

I still use the Unborn for the fabled dailies, as well as with the DM pet daily and the CT. I really like that damage buff. If I time it right, I can still get the dmg buff plus CoD on it. It was really OP before. The unborn was nerfed. The haunt was good for PVP because your opponents pet died when haunt was over, right? I'm not a PVPer so I'm not certain and it was nice in PVE because the unborn would come back for one round after UA. They switched the two around. You can't come back after UA (unless you die before you cast it but after you select it) and haunt will bring your unborn back after the DoT is finished.

But all that's at the other end of pet battles. I think the Idol and green proto drake are the two best pets for working your way through the dailies.

[Yamum]

So, why is this pet rated #1?

Firstly, opinions are subjective. Celestial Dragon used to be #1 and I don't rate that at all.
Secondly, you are seeing a lot of contradictory information because this pet HAS BEEN CHANGED since it was first introduced. It was partially nerfed and partially buffed. In my opinion it is now much stronger on net.

Are there powerful uses for it in pve or pvp

Yes, see previous posters' comments. In my opinion it is currently the #2 PvP pet in the game.

or were people just so excited to finally get one that they'd vote it as useful merely out of glee?

I think this is a contributing factor. It is a relatively new pet and people get excited about things that are new. Look at the IMDB top 500 movie list.

How would you build a team around this pet?

Anyway you want. Part of the appeal of this pet is that it is absolutely BRAINLESS. To use a neologism it is a complete DERP-FEST. Spam ability #3. If you get bored spam ability #1. It is easy to win with this pet and it doesn't require a lot of forethought or strategy. To answer your question more specifically, it works well with the Consume Corpse ability, notsomuch with Sandstorm.

And yeah, is h/h or b/b worth farming for, or not?

Try them both and see which you like. I currently have H/H but I'd like to try a B/B for faster and more-powerful Haunt.

[Yamum]

PvP is where it is mostly useful. Why?
Haunt. Uniqe ability. It is, I belive, the most powerful DoT in the game right now. IE most damage per tick. But what really sets it apart from other DoT attacks is that you get a "free" switch.

Perfectly said. Haunt is the real strength of this pet. If I may add something here, not only does Haunt give you a free switch, but, if you are faster, it also gives you a FREE HIT. That is: you cast Haunt, you die, opponent's ability is not used because there is nothing to hit. This is where the B/B Valk shines. The exception to this is when your opponent uses an ability that doesn't require a target, such as Sandstorm or Minefield.

The other abilities or stats are nothing out of the ordinary or spectacular.

Agree 100%.

[Yamum]

I know the dots persist, but it does not matter really since you surface the second time usually to Haunt again; meaning, my Valk usually is in a state of 'dead' for most of the fight. Guess I did not word it well, but it is a strength (in my opinion).

If I can add to this conversation, what it really does is puts the DoTs "on hold". They're still there, they've just been paused. This gives you a huge advantage, almost like getting a head start. Haunt is an ability with a lot of subtle nuances and very few drawbacks.

[Vek]

One thing you can do on the Val'kyr if they try to send you off with a CoD is to cast Blinding Poison on them on the undead racial turn. All buffs/debuffs are still active on the dead pet, and they won't "tick" anymore. So CoD will miss whenever it is about to go off.