Grand Master Pet Tamer: Hyuna

NOTE: This was written pre-Patch 5.2. Some elements of this write-up may no longer apply, and my team choice(s) have changed.

I'll finally be covering the Pandaria Grand Masters! I'm not sure if you're supposed to do these battles in a specific order (per zone level?), so I'll be reviewing each one in the order that I complete them each day.

First up, Hyuna!


Hyuna can be found in The Jade Forest, next to the crossroads of the eastern road coming out of the Temple of the Jade Serpent.

Pet Team: Skyshaper (flying), Fangor (beast), Dor the Wall (aquatic)

Team quality and level: Epic (purple), level 25

Notable pets and attacks: Fangor's Burrow, and Dor the Wall's... everything lol.

I find this pet team is pretty straight forward, except for Dor the Wall. The first two pets can be defeated in any fashion, however dealing with Hyuna's turtle is all about endurance. I have yet to find a way to burst this "wall" down.

I go with mechanical to combat beast, ?? to combat flying (I'm still in the process of finding a magical pet or a pet with magical abilities that I feel comfortable using), and humanoid to combat aquatic. If you've been following my other write ups on other Grand Master Tamer battles, I bet you can guess which mechanical and humanoid pets I use. :P

Skyshaper


Skyshaper has two dots and then a main attack. There won't be much burst damage to contend with when up against this companion. That being said, I think any pet that's strong against flying should be able to go head to head with Skyshaper. Of course, self healing abilities will help.

Since I haven't really found a pet that I'm comfortable using against flying, I've been trying out different ones. Normally I use the Wild Crimson Hatchling since it can not only heal itself, but also has an ability that allows it to avoid some damage. Plus flying attacks are weak against it. If I find a pet that I like that's strong against flying, I may update this later. (I'm trying out Shimmering Wyrmling and Sprite Darter Hatchling next!)

Fangor


Unlike Skyshaper, this sly snake does have some burst. Specifically Burrow and Vicious Fang. Although the latter attack may not seem like it, if allowed to ramp up, it can do significant damage. The best thing to do here is defeat Fangor as quickly as possible while avoiding most of its larger hits.

I use the Darkmoon Zeppelin to deal with Fangor. You need to be aware of each round and the possible attacks though, because you don't want to waste any cooldown ability just as the snake burrows. When it does this, any damage will usually miss, and that means an ineffective attack that's now on a cooldown. That dip in damage on Fangor can make or break the battle.

Since Fangor will usually use Hiss first, my zeppelin can use its ramp up ability without fear of wasting the cooldown since it will most likely hit. I deploy Bombing Run during this round.

The next turn is normally when Burrow will happen, and a great time for my zeppelin to set up Decoy. There's a cooldown on it, but it's not a wasted ability since it can't miss. It also provides a way for my pet to avoid the incoming high damage from Burrow in the next round.

After that, it's just a matter of getting constant damage out on the snake before it can Burrow again. In some cases, Bombing Run won't even have time to resolve and hit since Fangor will hopefully be defeated before then. But I still use the bomb just for safe measure, and in case any of my other attacks miss or get dodged. You never know with RNG!

Dor the Wall


Last but not least is Dor the Wall, and let me tell you, his name isn't just for show!

The name of the game is endurance when up against Dor. He can heal, shield himself to reduce a significant amount of damage done to him, and he has a high burst ability that has the potential to stun.

Luckily, he's usually very predictable and will use each ability once it's off cooldown, so you just have to keep track of each turn. You can use an addon that will show you when an ability will be available for use.

As soon as Dor the Wall comes out, depending if my current pet on the battlefield has enough health to withstand the initial Headbutt, I switch to my Flayer Youngling. Any companion that has an avoidance ability will work here, though. The youngling's especially effective, though, since it can avoid the Headbutt and perform back at Dor.

After the first Headbutt, Dor has two options, heal himself or use his Shell Shield. Once he heals himself, though, he'll just spam Shell Shield. All his other abilities will be on cooldown, which means Shell Shield will have 100% up-time. This is pretty annoying since he'll constantly be taking reduced damage, and will be healing himself up periodically. Your only choice is to just chip away at his health, while enduring the Headbutt burst.

My youngling combats this pretty well. I always have Reflect up for every other Headbutt, and my pet has two attacks to choose from to whittle down Dor's health. After using Reflect, I normally go with Rampage since it's higher burst than the main attack. On top of all of that, the Flayer Youngling's family passive allows it to heal itself a little bit each successful attack. It's not much, but considering how long the fight against Dor can take, it's enough!

Once you learn how to deal with Headbutt, it's just outlasting the turtle from then on out. Bursting him down isn't really an option because of his effective defensive abilities... which he has to spam repeatedly since he doesn't have any other attacks!

As always, the pets and tactics mentioned above aren't mandatory. This is just what I've found to be most effective for me. You can definitely beat Hyuna's team with an assortment of other pets and methods; find what works best for you!