The most powerful PVP team : 244 Valk/341 Snake/325 Qiraji

[Kring]

Why don't you use a [pet]Turkey[/pet] with Food Coma which is faster then the Qiraji because of the flying racial and is strong against aquatic pets?

[3wd]

Why don't you use a [pet]Turkey[/pet] with Food Coma which is faster then the Qiraji because of the flying racial and is strong against aquatic pets?

I actually tried out the turkey in my earlier builds with valk, the problem with food coma is : the sleep will be broken by the dot of the huant. Hence it will not give you the 2 rounds to switch to the snake needed, otherwise it will be the perfect pet.

[Vek]

I can just start out with a sandstorm and then trade fist with you with my guardling or even trade normal attack with my valk and your mongoose will fall quickly.

Of course the 357 speed one, and I would not use it against your guardling, it would rock your Valk and Snake.

I know you will start with a torrent and I usually will start out with a poison fang, blind and puncture and then switch. 3 rounds you will be close to under 20% of HP and I will just take 200+272 = around 500 dmg, still very healthy.

The turret would be up even before you switch in your snake and on top of that you would be Black Clawed. I always love how you assume that people don't know how to find the switch button. Or if they start of from scratch I would easily turret then switch and not miss any attacks while you blind the pet coming in. Your math is off.

As for the raptor, as I said, you have very low HP, and if your speed is not the highest 341, you will still be controlled by the guardling or snake, worst case, if you have very high speed, I can still use my valk to soak the damage to kill you. Valk is undead, so she can counter any speed by her undead racial.

Please soak the damage from the raptor with the Valk... you would be dead in two turns, sorry. You get an extra turn with the racial but again you assume I stay there to die, instead of switching in the mongoose for a weak hit instead. Vs the snake it would be a toss up to see who goes first, same speed, and you would probably have a turret pounding your snake at the same time. Only the guarding with sandstorm would hinder the turret + black claw, but it would still hurt you a lot.

[Yamum]

Only one way to solve this... DUEL!

[Mwebly]

I played this team for a few hours last night and it is very good against a wide range of opponents. As the OP said, it has trouble with strong healers ([pet]Magical Crawdad[/pet] and [pet]Blossoming Ancient[/pet], I am looking at you), some aquatics and the [ability]Minefield[/ability] ability. Other than those specifics and overcoming the learning curve of making the best use of the potential, I found it to be very strong with an excellent balance against a number of popular teams.

I am not sure I can validate the title of the thread, since "most powerful" does not make much sense in the world of unpredictable nerfs, new pets every few months and the endless creativity of pet battlers, but this is a very effective team.

It is not just the power of these pets individually (although the Valk is the current rock star of pvp) but the synergy. It reminds me of the boom-howl team designed for the BoF. If your opponent does not immediately understand what is happening to him and react in the first few moves, he is done. Even if he does react, he may still be done. And for all it's power, this is really just a stall team with very limited healing, so anyone who faces you and loses in 45 rounds is likely to flee when they see you again.

Edit:
Thanks 3wd for bringing this combination to the table. I know many battlers will not discuss their theorycrafting but hide their secret "best teams" and we only see them when we get beat by them. I had never seen this team and followed this discussion closely. I had also been so burned out by pet pvp that I could not bring myself to Q for one with my tired old teams, so thanks for recharging my batteries.

[3wd]

I played this team for a few hours last night and it is very good against a wide range of opponents.

I must admit stating "most powerful" is over the line here, probably just a shameful way to attract people to check out this thread.

As for the tough opponents you mentioned, even against the crawdad and the Blossoming Ancient, this team can still put up a fight. Just remember, elemental pet will not get any benefit from the sandstorm. So target their pet which will use the sunlight wisely, if you can put a huant and COD on them, plus the stun and sandstorm to neutralize their healing, you still will have a decent chance to win.

Against miner, there will be a lot of mind game playing and calculation will be needed, when to scarify your valk to cut down your opponent's HP will be the key. And there is a strange setting that can help you in this kind of situation also : if your valk has very low HP and you expect your opponent will lay a mind, get her to the back row, and when she get up again and will be killed by the mine at that 1 hit, that round will not count and you will still have 2 rounds to play with your valk after she came back from the racial.

As you pointed out, not many normal team can easily beat out this team, and even your opponent will find some counters, your team won't be completely collapsed and you can still put up a hard fight.

[Poofah]

I must admit stating "most powerful" is over the line here, probably just a shameful way to attract people to check out this thread.

Totally agree, and this is probably why people are going out of their way to shoot you down.

I 100% agree that Valk/Death Adder/X is a very strong team. Whether Qiraji is the 'best' 3rd pet is very debatable. I have seen this team many times with different 3rd pets, and I think they all have their situational benefits. Admittedly I haven't seen the Qiraji version, so I can't speak with experience on that. Here are some other pets I've seen in that 3rd slot:

CC version:
Scalded Basilisk Hatchling
Skywisp Moth

Avoidance version:
Bonkers
Rabbits
Chi-Ji

I-hate-crabs version:
Crow/Raven


The Basilisk version I found to be the most annoying, because Crystal Prison+Feign Death gives you 3 turns of control/avoidance instead of 2, and Feign Death can also get the Valk back in the frontline without costing a turn. The tradeoff is 305 vs 325 speed, and you have 2 beasts (and also, when I faced this team, I had Arcane Storm, which would be less trouble for the Qiraji version). But in return, you can do really stupid things like this if your opponent isn't ready for it:

turn 1: Haunt (swap to snake)
turn 2: Blinding Poison (doesn't trigger resilience)
turn 3: swap to Basilisk
turn 4: Crystal Prison
turn 5: Thrash (Valk comes back to life at end of turn)
turn 6: Feign Death
turn 7: if Feign got Valk, then great, you can Haunt or finish off the opponent pet; if it got Snake, then great, Blinding Poison is off cooldown.


The avoidance versions are obviously a joke if you have Emperor Crab, which is something I see often. Clearly you are relying on CC to help burst down a crab or other healer -- Qiraji is pretty good due to the stun, but I think Sandstorm is only marginal, because it has a long cooldown and it gives the crab an extra shield afterward. They are always going to shield first turn, so you are relying on one stun+Sandstorm+Crush to burst them down. That's only ~700 damage with the shield up, and then they heal for 550+. Clearly the Crow/Raven is great against crabs, but you give up a lot versus other matchups. So, I wonder whether you can find another pet with a similar CC, but better damage to burst down the healer.

[Denarian]

I love using CoD > Haunt. I switch to my p/s Fiendish Imp, and Nether Gate. That is usually enough to kill the pet in the back row, where most people seem to forget about their pets.

I think I have maybe had only a handful opponents split the damage between two pets for CoD and Haunt.

Most of the time I use Scourged Whelping as my third, unless I start running in to aquatic pets. If that's the case, I bust out Infinite Whelping. He eases my pain again Magical Crawdad.

[3wd]

CC version:
Scalded Basilisk Hatchling
Skywisp Moth

Avoidance version:
Bonkers
Rabbits
Chi-Ji

I-hate-crabs version:
Crow/Raven

Out of all the above versions you mentioned - being the X 3rd pet in a valk + snake team, I actually tried out most of them and they just don't work as good as the guardling.

In fact, when you mentioned bonkers, this actually is a less effective version than using the netherwhelp (the pet from the collector's version of TBC).

If you have a netherwhelp, it is so powerful just to team it up with the valk itself.

round 1 : huant, 156 dmg
round 2 : netherwhelp avoid/dodge, 156 dmg
round 3 : netherwhelp breath, 350 dmg, 156 dmg
round 4 : netherwhelp (now with racial) soul crush, 430dmg X 1.5 = 645 dmg

4 rounds together 1463 dmg, this combo is very deadly to kill any pets with 1400 HP, less than 305 speed and without any avoidance skills. And Netherwhelp is very strong against flying pets so can also be a good teammate with the snake.

Before I use the Qiraji Guardling, Netherwhelp was actually my go to pet with the valk. Even now it is still in one of my 4-5 favorite team's rotation.

But, as I mentioned above, the difference between the dodge/avoidance or even blind skill as compare to the stun by the guardling is : your opponent can not do anything. This make a huge difference on how do you train them or bait them to counter your moves.

Scalded Basilisk Hatchling has several glaring weakness :

1. the feint death skill will only call up the most HP pet, this could mean you loose control of what do call up.
2. his attack is weak (multiple attack, weak against shield and sandstorm).
3. his speed is 305, not the 325 speed of guardling.
4. he is a beast, team it up with the snake that will make you 2 beats in a team, you basically have no chance against a mech team with a miner.


Skywisp Moth & Chi-ji I do use them in some situation in my valk team, again they are decent, but just not as good as the guardling.

[Kring]

Just got paired against a team with Creepy Crate (BONESTORM), Fossilized Hatchling (BONESTORM) and Mechanical Pandaren Dragonling (Thunderbolt). How do you beat that? The Qiraji and Snake didn't really enjoy the BONESTORMs.

My group really loves BONESTORM und Thunderbolt. And I really want to hear that I suck and these AE spells aren't to strong.

[Jerebear]

I've actually run into a similar themed team. Valk + Basilisk + Fiendish Imp

I won't claim it was as good as the one mentioned here (for reasons 3wd mentioned just above), but if I remember correctly, the team would do the following:

1. Haunt
2. Crystal Prison
3. Thrash
4. Feign
5. Nethergate
6. Immolate
7. Swap in Valk
Repeat

Sometimes he/she would CoD in there as well (fought him/her a few times). I won a few but lost most against this team, mainly because I wanted to figure it out so I didn't swap to a better comp.

[3wd]

Just got paired against a team with Creepy Crate (BONESTORM), Fossilized Hatchling (BONESTORM) and Mechanical Pandaren Dragonling (Thunderbolt). How do you beat that? The Qiraji and Snake didn't really enjoy the BONESTORMs.

My group really loves BONESTORM und Thunderbolt. And I really want to hear that I suck and these AE spells aren't to strong.

you are going to get your valk out no matter what your opponent is going to use.

If they are going to put the dragonling out, don't panic, just keep casting huant to breadk the decoy and whether he stays to cast an aoe or not, it doesn't matter.

You will eventually get your huant in one of his pet in round 3. The breath from the dragonling is a weak attack agains the valk, so just don't panic.

If his dragonling will get the huant, he is basically done.

If he switch to the undead, say the bone raptor, that good also. You get a free huant on him on the 3rd round (assume the dragonling will use aoe on 2nd) and you will just use stun and switch to the snake and stay with snake to kill it. The max the raptor can use the bonestorm will be 1 time only.

Once the raptor is done, switch back to your valk and do it again.

It will be pretty low on HP for all your pets at the end but you can still win this pretty comfortably.

[3wd]

I've actually run into a similar themed team. Valk + Basilisk + Fiendish Imp

I won't claim it was as good as the one mentioned here (for reasons 3wd mentioned just above), but if I remember correctly, the team would do the following:

1. Haunt
2. Crystal Prison
3. Thrash
4. Feign
5. Nethergate
6. Immolate
7. Swap in Valk
Repeat

Sometimes he/she would CoD in there as well (fought him/her a few times). I won a few but lost most against this team, mainly because I wanted to figure it out so I didn't swap to a better comp.

Use a miner will do great against this team, especially the bot with 325 attack and 260 speed, this is perfect.

First round, lay a mine, second round use the -50% dmg shield.

if he will call up the imp to burn you, just hit your missile again him, you have 3 rounds of -50%, you will still get the upper hand, and then if you will have a second pet that can use sandstorm, you basically can not lose this game.

Sandstorm can counter all 3 of your opponent's pets : huant, thrash and immo.

[3wd]

Also,

there is a little trick I want to share regarding using the valk / snake / guardling team.

Say if I will face a 333 imp, its normal for most people to put their 341 snake out first to counter that because of the speed, well, I don't.

If I get my snake out, the best scenario will be I will get a poison fang out but the imp will most likely use the immo and move to the back row, the HP he can recover and also the dot done to my team just don't worth it and it worse scenario, I may even need to use the sandstorm to stop the immo.

So, what will I do?

I normally will just call my valk out to face the imp in the first round, so my opponent will almost 100% for sure to use the gate in the first round. I then will do a switch in the same round to get my guardling / snake out to eat the gate and hehe,

my valk will be facing the imp now.

80% of the time, if your opponent will be smart, he will not use the immo but will just immediately get back and switch a new pet in, now it depends on your opponet's other 2 pets HP, you can decide to get a free huant here or use COD and then huant to start your normal rotation but without the immo from the imp at the back.

for the other 20% of the people that will not get their imp to the back row but rather to face your valk and with the gate on CD? great, he is a dead meat also.

This is how I bait an imp team into failure from the get go.

Of course, if you keep playing with the same opponent with the same team for a while, he will learn and change his moves too.

[Ligre]

Just got paired against a team with Creepy Crate (BONESTORM), Fossilized Hatchling (BONESTORM) and Mechanical Pandaren Dragonling (Thunderbolt). How do you beat that? The Qiraji and Snake didn't really enjoy the BONESTORMs.

My group really loves BONESTORM und Thunderbolt. And I really want to hear that I suck and these AE spells aren't to strong.

Clone Dancer incarnations eat that comp for breakfast.

I 100% agree that Valk/Death Adder/X is a very strong team. Whether Qiraji is the 'best' 3rd pet is very debatable. I have seen this team many times with different 3rd pets, and I think they all have their situational benefits. Admittedly I haven't seen the Qiraji version, so I can't speak with experience on that. Here are some other pets I've seen in that 3rd slot:

CC version:
Scalded Basilisk Hatchling
Skywisp Moth

Avoidance version:
Bonkers
Rabbits
Chi-Ji

I-hate-crabs version:
Crow/Raven

Valk/Frolicker/Adder is also quite vicious. It's a bit feast or famine at times, but if you feast, you REALLY feast. I just find it to be a fun diversion sometimes.

[Nagflar]

AGree this is super strong team. even beat my valk,Blighthawk,Deathadder.

try it using PP emperor crab. but the Qiraji just too strong , sandtrom+damage to aqua, stun , crush. damn i wish i got SS qiraji now .

any one can tell me how to counter this team . been facing this team a lot recently

First, you need to think about an Aqua pet, best counter for this will be the crawdad. Then that's not enough, team him up with a valk preferably. Now use your crawdad to soak the damage from your opponent's valk, and the key is this : bait your opponent's guardling to use the kick the crawdad, when that happens, call up your valk to face the guardling, now you are talking because she has no where to go, use COD, if its on the guardling, that hurts tons, if she will switch to the snake, great also.

on next round, try huant on the snake, if he does not blind you, then his snake will be done, if he blind you, just switch and get something out. eventually his snake will still eat the COD.

repeat the same and watch your opponent when to use the kick is the key here.

enjoy.

try yesterday
Qiraji eat my Crawdad ...zz
sandstrom, crush and stun .
The healing is not fast enough sigh.

[Nagflar]

I must admit stating "most powerful" is over the line here, probably just a shameful way to attract people to check out this thread.

Totally agree, and this is probably why people are going out of their way to shoot you down.

I 100% agree that Valk/Death Adder/X is a very strong team. Whether Qiraji is the 'best' 3rd pet is very debatable. I have seen this team many times with different 3rd pets, and I think they all have their situational benefits. Admittedly I haven't seen the Qiraji version, so I can't speak with experience on that. Here are some other pets I've seen in that 3rd slot:

CC version:
Scalded Basilisk Hatchling
Skywisp Moth

Avoidance version:
Bonkers
Rabbits
Chi-Ji

I-hate-crabs version:
Crow/Raven


The Basilisk version I found to be the most annoying, because Crystal Prison+Feign Death gives you 3 turns of control/avoidance instead of 2, and Feign Death can also get the Valk back in the frontline without costing a turn. The tradeoff is 305 vs 325 speed, and you have 2 beasts (and also, when I faced this team, I had Arcane Storm, which would be less trouble for the Qiraji version). But in return, you can do really stupid things like this if your opponent isn't ready for it:

turn 1: Haunt (swap to snake)
turn 2: Blinding Poison (doesn't trigger resilience)
turn 3: swap to Basilisk
turn 4: Crystal Prison
turn 5: Thrash (Valk comes back to life at end of turn)
turn 6: Feign Death
turn 7: if Feign got Valk, then great, you can Haunt or finish off the opponent pet; if it got Snake, then great, Blinding Poison is off cooldown.


The avoidance versions are obviously a joke if you have Emperor Crab, which is something I see often. Clearly you are relying on CC to help burst down a crab or other healer -- Qiraji is pretty good due to the stun, but I think Sandstorm is only marginal, because it has a long cooldown and it gives the crab an extra shield afterward. They are always going to shield first turn, so you are relying on one stun+Sandstorm+Crush to burst them down. That's only ~700 damage with the shield up, and then they heal for 550+. Clearly the Crow/Raven is great against crabs, but you give up a lot versus other matchups. So, I wonder whether you can find another pet with a similar CC, but better damage to burst down the healer.

there is another version

corpse eater
team with. Blighthawk, Stitched Pup will eat the val's corpse verytime use val' use hunt.

which is quite strong .

[3wd]

try yesterday
Qiraji eat my Crawdad ...zz
sandstrom, crush and stun .
The healing is not fast enough sigh.

Round 1
valk use COD
crawdad normal attack OR to be save in case valk use huant this rund, you use shield

Round 2
valk use huant
crawdad shield

Round 3
Guardling use :

1. stun, perfect, your crawdad got stun, next round you switch to your valk
2. guardling use sandstorm 470 dmg maybe, crawdad use wish, next round guardling use crush, 310 dmg, crawdad use normal hit 310 dmg, wish heal you back to full. Then guardling will stun you, perfect, you switch to valk.

They key in this fight is to bait the guardling to use stun, once that is used, switch to your valk immediately and once the valk will be facing the guardling, use COD or huant directly, do not do any normal attack cause the guardling will switch to the snake, and if you used COD on the snake, make sure you get will not face the snake 2 rounds before the COD will do the dmg as he could blind you.

[Vek]

I mixed in this team while doing some pet battles(I pretty much switch team after each fight to keep things from going stale now that im going on 4k wins). It's a beautiful team when you keep it rolling through all three enemy pets, you hardly get any damage at all yourself. Faced someone who didn't switch their pets and it wasn't pretty.

Also met someone trying change the Guardling with an Anub instead. Could have been difficult, especially if they had used Deflection instead, but they went down.

"Sadly" I haven't faced any opponents with this team while playing one of my other teams.

[Lolfixheal]

For the love of God: Haunt*