It’s getting patched in 5.2, but at the moment, the Fluxfire Feline (FFF) is the reigning champion for the title Most Overpowered and Broken pet.

Snagging a rare one of these cats, and then leveling it to 20+, grants a pet that on turn 3 can do 1800+ damage with very little drawback. Simply use their level 20 ability, Supercharge, followed by two Wind-Ups. Adding insult to injury, this ability negates resurrection passives as well, so no mechanical pets popping back up, no one turn to get a last shot in for undead. (This may or may not be a bug. Blizzard hasn’t commented on it.)

In 5.2 this combo move will be nerfed. But if we take a minute to look at the math, the nerf may not be enough to bump FFF from the Title. Currently, the Supercharge multiplies damage by 150% then adds that to the base damage. The Wind-up increases damage done by 10% and then on the second hit does ~702 damage. ((702 + (702 x .1)) + (772 x 1.5)) This gives us a base damage of 1930. Ouch. The proposed nerf will make Supercharge only multiply by 125%. (702 + 70 + 965) Giving FFF a base damage of 1737. This is still enough to one shot most pets.

The other change will extend Supercharge’s cooldown to 4 turns, but even so, chances are one pet will die very quickly.

The initial thought is to simply load up Elemental pets and give the FFF a triple fireball to its furry little face. But from my experience, pet battlers have gotten used to that, and so they will have a Magical Crawdad waiting on the sidelines to take out the Elementals. Surge, Shield Shell, and Wish make him a formidable opponent on his own, and versus Elementals, he is nasty.

So how can the FFF be countered?

Shimmering Wyrmling and Mana Wyrmling. They are the same pet. They have the same abilities, and are both magical pets. These two things are important. First, because they are magical pets their passive kicks in and hamstrings the FFF’s one-shot. Magical pets cannot be dealt more than 40% of their total health in one hit. At this point it is actually better for the FFF owner to just use Wind-Up. Second is their exceptionally interesting level 20 ability, Reflection, which reflects the damage back on the attacker, so it’s not only a block, but will one shot the FFF as well. Players tend to focus on rotations. They get in a groove and just let muscle memory take its course. If they do this versus the Wyrmlings, they are going to be on the receiving end of their own hyper boosted Wind-Up.

The Shimmering Wyrmling requires either gold to buy it off the Auction House or doing the Argent Tournament Dailies to the end. The Mana Wyrmling is a mere 40 gold in Netherstorm, but starts off uncommon, so it will require a battlestone to boost it to rare so its stats are competitive. The Wyrmlings are also pretty weak attackers on their own, so once reflection has gone off, it’s best to switch them out with a more tank like pet or a high damage pet.

Swapping the Wyrmlings back in for later parts of the battle to reflect again is just bonus, especially if they use other pets with buildup attacks (Pump for example).

It’s also worth trying to get a Minifernal of any rarity and using a battlestone on him, as he is not only a magical pet, but can use Immolate and Immolation, two Elemental attacks, against the FFF to deal out massive amounts of damage. He is, however, one of the excessively camped pets right now. Additionally a Flayer Youngling is a strong pet, with Reflection, but requires precision timing to get it off to stop the Supercharged Wind-Up.

The FFF is a powerful glass cannon, and well worth the time to tame and level, but is not impervious against a well-planned defense.