With the launch of the Season of Discovery Classic WoW comes a revitalized pet battle metagame. Dozens of new pets are now available, changing the landscape of PvE and PvP pet battles. But which ones rise to the top? Today we will be covering the best hunter pets ranked in Season of Discovery, and covering tips on how to learn new pet battle abilities and ranks in WoW, where to find information on which pets can teach which abilities. 

WoW Season of Discovery Pet Tier List - Best Pets Ranking in SoD Classic WoW

In Classic Season of Discovery, there are a multitude of pets to choose from abilities to learn and also knowing which pet to use based on your own personal situation. It's not as simple as taming any pet you wish and having every ability already known to you, or even every rank learned right away. You must go out into the world and tame specific pets to learn each ability and its different ranks. Let's take a quick look through the tier list of the best hunter pets in WoW Season of Discovery and discuss why they are ranked as such.

S Tier Pet - Scorpid

Starting with the S tier pet, we have the Scorpid, even with the recent nerfs to the interaction between kill command and Scorpid Poison, they're still your best pet option overall. With that said, Scorpid Poison from multiple Hunters does not stack, so the better geared hunter in the rage should be the one running a Scorpid as the Scorpion poison still scales with attack power. Scorpions are also quite tanky, having an armor modifier of 1.10 and in some cases, you can even reliably use your Scorpion pet as a backup tank in Black fathom deeps. Lastly with PvP, your Scorpion is going to absolutely shred through opponents and be a nuisance to deal with. If you're focused specifically on PvP, you could tame the Death Flayer Scorpid from Durar. This rare spawn is ever so slightly better in PvP scenarios due to its 1.6 attack speed which will help you slightly against caster opponents due to the pushback.

A Tier Pets - Wind Serpent, Cats, Raptors, and Wolf

These pets are all viable options and by no means are they bad options. It may even be required in some circumstances such as if your raid has multiple Hunters. Your best choice in this case will be the wind serpent pet. You can also team a Young Pridewing as they share the exact same stats as wind serpents, they'll just reskin for Season of Discovery. A Young Pridewing does not come with lightning breath, so you're going to have to go tame a wind serpent anyways. 

After wind serpents, your 2 options are either Cats or Raptors, both of these pets have a 1.10 damage modifier and can learn both rank 4 claw and rank four bite. The only difference with a Raptor is they slightly lower health modifier of 0.95. From a PvP aspect however, a cat is the best option as you can tame pets such as raluk or the rake. Both of these cats have an attack speed of 1.2 which will help greatly with push back on caster opponents. 

Lastly, we have the Wolf pet to look at, they only have a 1.0 attack damage modifier, and can only learn bite as an offensive ability, but they do come with the ability Furious Howl which can benefit your melee DPS members of the group and raid. 

B Tier Pets - Owl, Bat, Carrion Bird, Spiders, Crocolisk, Hyenas and Tallstriders

Moving on to the B tier pets now, the first 3 pets of this tier being the Owl, Bat, and Carrion Bird are all essentially the same. Owls are the best option of the three as it has the highest damage modifier of 1.07. But the main reason you would run these pets is while leveling they can use the screech ability. Normally, this would be the best pet to level with. But due to the Season of Discovery rune Beast Mastery and it's 3 second taunt function, the original use of these leveling pets and screech has some diminished value.

The rest of the pets in the B tier category such as Spiders, Crocolisk, Hyenas and Tallstriders, all fall short of being meaningful in any regard as they have a normal 1.0 damage modifier except for the spider at 1.07. But they can only learn bite as their offensive ability leaving them short of performing better. 

C Tier Pets - Bear, Turtle, Crab, and Boar

All of these pets such as the Bear, Turtle, Crab and Boar should pretty much never be used as the other pet options are just readily available and easy to tame for both Alliance and horde factions. All of these pets have a damage modifier below 1.0, meaning they will do less damage than other pets, as well as being limited by what offensive abilities they can learn. The only pet worth mentioning in this tier is the Boar. Boars can learn the charger ability which increases the attack power of the next attack, but also has a 1second stun. In the grand scheme of things for PvP, one second stun is quite minor when you look at the big picture and consider how much more effective a scorpion pet will be in PvP.

How & Where to Learn New Pet Abilities in SoD WoW?

Regarding taming pets, here are some tips on how to learn new ranks, and where to find the information regarding which pets can teach which ability and rank.

- Battle Pet Trainers: In all major cities, trainers can teach new abilities up to Rank 3 for a fee. Check their updated ability listings for Season of Discovery additions.

- Defeating Wild Pets: Capturing and battling untamed pets across Azeroth, Outland, Northrend and beyond provides a chance for your pet to learn one of their moves. Pet families have higher chance to learn same-type abilities.

- Rare Spawns: Exotic pets reliably teach Rank 3 abilities and are more likely to share new Season of Discovery additions. Rare spawns have a chance to also teach Rank 4+ abilities. Pay attention to spawn locations.

- Pet Tamer Encounters: Defeating pet tamers throughout the world, including rebuilt menageries on Thelsamar and Astranaar, allows your pet a roll to learn one of their pets' moves.

- World Quests: At max level, daily pet battle quests often reward Ability Tonics which instantly grant a random Rank 2 or 3 ability. Complete these for a chance at new skills.

- Darkmoon Island: The Darkmoon Pet Store sells ability tonics and chance at wild capture pets with rarer skills. Darkmoon Faire is only open certain periods each month.