WoW: Learn me some hunters

So I started a dwarf hunter last night, liking it so far up to level 7 without a pet. I usually try to play classes with a certain archetype even if that might not be the best way to min/max them, I'm thinking for the hunter I would like to play a gunmaster that can blow things away from afar while my bear goes in and keeps them grounded. I really like the whole vibe put off by the dwarf hunter on the loading page, with the chinked armor, rifle in his hands, spare guns slung across his back and short sword at his side for when things get close.

So, with all that in mind, what do I need to know? I've read a little bit on WoW forums. I do want a strong pet that can tank for me and is difficult to pull aggro from, so should I start down the beast tree? I've read some stuff about pet training points and pet skills, how does all that work?

Some specific questions:

Does the critical strike chance under the Attack skill in your spellbook also apply to ranged attacks?

+Attack power items also apply to ranged attack power right?

I went engineering, is the lowbie ammo good, or is there better vendor bought stuff somewhere?

What sizes are quivers available in?

When track beasts is on and you can see a target on your minimap, is there a way to easily select that target without it being in sight?

>Does the critical strike chance under the Attack skill in your spellbook also apply to ranged attacks?
I think so.

>+Attack power items also apply to ranged attack power right?
I'm pretty sure it does as long as it don't say melee or ranged in it. Like a +40 attack power ring... I think a +40 attack bonus bow only effects said bow..

>I went engineering, is the lowbie ammo good, or is there better vendor bought stuff somewhere?
dunno - I always buy mine from stores... never tried crafted.

>What sizes are quivers available in?
up to 16 that I've seen Send me a /w in game and I can craft them all for ya as Bouncee

>When track beasts is on and you can see a target on your minimap, is there a way to easily select that target without it being in sight?
Nope have to see it... MAYBE with macros... but I don't use macros.

So, with all that in mind, what do I need to know? I've read a little bit on WoW forums. I do want a strong pet that can tank for me and is difficult to pull aggro from, so should I start down the beast tree? I've read some stuff about pet training points and pet skills, how does all that work?

There's guides out there on specific pet benefits. To me, it sounds like you will want a wolf, bear or cat (my personal favorite) pet. I have very few Talent points in the Beast tree and instead focused on the Marksmanship tree to increase my damage dealing and to get the Trueshot Aura.

When you have a pet, as it levels up it gains training points. From Pet Trainers you can learn new abilities like magical resistances, damage improvements, HP bonuses that are ranked like your character's abilities. To move your pet up through the ranks you have to spend training points to buy the improvements instead of spending gold and there's never enough training points to max out everything so you sort of have to pick carefully.

Does the critical strike chance under the Attack skill in your spellbook also apply to ranged attacks?

Yes.

+Attack power items also apply to ranged attack power right?

Yes. And +Att is nice but it's more important to have a higher Agi for critical strikes and dodging.

I

went engineering, is the lowbie ammo good, or is there better vendor bought stuff somewhere?

I've always went vendor but once I reach 58 I believe the best arrows I can find are Thorium tipped instead of the 9s a stack Jagged Arrows. Depends on your level also.

What sizes are quivers available in?

Quivers, like ammo, are limited by your level. Also, there are crafted/magical quivers that will increase your firing speed once you reach later levels.

When track beasts is on and you can see a target on your minimap, is there a way to easily select that target without it being in sight?

Nope

And just let me know if you need anything crafted too. I have more than enough leather lying around to craft whatever you might need.

Do not discount the boar!

The boars new ability is a one second stun with an attack with a huge attack power boost. Combine that with Growl and Bite and your pet will never lose aggro. The boars with the armor buff get up to 41% damage reduction so they can take hits very well.

Of course, I am also going beastmaster spec. If you want a 1.3 attack speed cat pet, beastmaster spec is a sight to behold (on cloth wearers especially). The pet flurry talent is amazing!

The merchant bought ammo is a bit worse than the crafted. The engineering goggles are a nice boost to stats. And of course, the scopes!

I've thought about the boar Fang, but I'm thinking I would like to have a bear, just like the idea better. I see there are a couple of special low-level ones, Bjarn and Mangeclaw in the Dun Morogh area. Is there any advantage to taming one of these over a normal bear?

I'm planning to use guns, but quivers work on those right despite the name? Or can quivers only hold arrows? Assuming they work ok with bullets if someone on Alliance side feels like whipping me up one I can use from 10-20, that would be great. My hunter is named Leaper.

Also, can I respec pet training points like you can respec character talent points? I assume you can and it costs gold?

[quote]I'm planning to use guns, but quivers work on those right despite the name? Or can quivers only hold arrows? [quote]

Quivers are for arrows, ammo pouches are for bullets. You'd probably want to look into getting a 10-slot Hunting Ammo Sack when you get near lvl 15.

http://www.thottbot.com/?i=5888

Also, can I respec pet training points like you can respec character talent points? I assume you can and it costs gold?

I've never tried to... hmmm, that's a good question.

Yes you can respec pet training points. Its also far cheaper IIRC than respecing talent points.

The only reason to tame a special bear or other animal for that matter is that some of them have high attack speeds and pursuit speeds (though pursuit bonuses may have been phased out in recent patches).

There are hunter sites dedicated to pets of each type with 1.2-1.6 attack speeds and where they are found. NE's get a bonus of having one of the most accessible, fastest attacking pets available in their level 10-20 area. Moonstalkers are terrific from the get go.

LeapingGnome wrote:

there are a couple of special low-level ones, Bjarn and Mangeclaw in the Dun Morogh area. Is there any advantage to

Nope. Not after a few patches ago. All speed bonuses are now removed. Like King Bang no longer runs faster etc. They DO have a cooler skin sometimes and might have a better skill (like bite 4 vs bite 3)

LeapingGnome wrote:

I'm planning to use guns, but quivers work on those right despite the name?

No you need ammo pouches which are the exact same thing just for guns.

LeapingGnome wrote:

Also, can I respec pet training points like you can respec character talent points? I assume you can and it costs gold?

Yes you can. It costs money just like character talents.

Thanks guys, sounds like just train any old Bear I like the look of and don't sweat the training points too much because I can always change them. And I'll try to do the Loch Modan lodge quests earlier to get that nice ammo pouch.

At Petopia you can click on the very top left link to see all the pet models in game and what animals use that model. I used the "50 Great Pets" feature to see what I wanted. Doesn't look like he has updated since the last patch or so.

Leap i tamed a bear from near IF and he took me to level 60...they are great tanks and do descent damage with claw and bite. Once i hit 60 I tamed the rare wolf deathmaw Level 53 and he rocks....has a 1.2 attack speed. Its all personal preference too what type of animal you like. I am marksmanship specced and love it...getting 2000 crits from my dwarven hand cannon is a blast.

here is a great hunter link....
http://www.goodintentionsguild.info/...

My recommendation for a pet is a carrion bird or owl, actually. Make sure Screech is up to its highest level and your pet will never, ever lose aggro. I've had my pet sustain aggro after those 1,800-point crits, and that's the first shot of a battle. Plus, Screech is essentially AoE aggro, so it'll hold a bunch of mobs in place. If you're going to get a bear, I can't help you, but there're a few pets out there with very low attack speeds. There's a cat named Broken Tooth in Badlands with a 1.0 attack speed. Downside is, he's an eight-hour rare. Good luck with that!

I could swear the "Attack" crit chance isn't applicable to ranged attacks. I crit far more often than my 5% crit chance tooltip would suggest, and I've got a bunch of ranged critical talents and whatnot. That could be the result of a lot of ranged +attack abilities, though. I mean, with the ranged +crit talent, that should be at least 10% (unless I have a 0% melee crit chance).

The other recommendation I have is to hotkey Pet Attack to Q and Disengage to E (or vice versa). That way, you don't have to move your mouse to tell your pet to attack or your target to back off. This is also helpful if you've got a programmable mouse with beaucoup buttons.

Crafted ammo is better than the shop-made variety until about 40, when it's half a dps worse. Around 250 Engineering, however, you can make Thorium Shells, which are just about the best bullets going (not counting the ones from AV). I will warn you that engineering, just like the other crafting professions, can be incredibly frustrating to skill up after about 150. Make sure you get Dense Dynamite as soon as you can. I ditched Engineering at about 237 because I couldn't skill it without five or six mats per item.

The other hunter advice, of course, is roll on everything. They're all Hunter items.

Only thing I can add to this is raise your cooking and fishing skill. It is much cheaper to catch and cook than to buy food for the pet.

I'm only lvl 29, so I don't have too much experience w/ a hunter, but I found several things that appeal to me more under the lvl 30 cap.

1. I got a leopard right off the bat in Dun Mogh. If you want speed then get the junior leopard (I think) in Dun Mogh. I think attack speed is like 1.6 and they have equal stats commisserate to cats at whatever level you bring it to.

2. Guns are nice, but I prefer the higher dmg of bows. I got a precision bow for like 70s at lvl 20(?) and it's lasted me a good 10 levels... and then you just get an engineer to make you a scope and it'll last a few more at least.

3. Buy at least 1 more space in the stable right off the bat to learn new skills. You can probably afford to get all the stable spots (3rd spot is like 5g) so you can get a bat, cat or bear.

Here is a place to find info on animal skills, types and locations http://wow.tentonhammer.com/index.php?module=ContentExpress&func=display&ceid=110 .

Good Luck

Leap, not sure where it is, but we have a hunter forum thread somewhere here in this forum.

Petopia is a great site, so it contains all the info. Tentonhammer (run by a guy upstairs on the 4th floor - what is it with winnipeg and running the worlds better game info sites?) is another good one.

No advantage for taming Bjorn or the other named other than unique looks sometimes. Very few named have unique aspects (like Broken Tooth? that I got for Adon Jr with his speed.) I too like the image, so go with that. Dwarf/gun/bear - thats why, despite other options, I stuck with night elf/bow/cat - just a nice role image.

Enjoy - I can say, since I've tried them all now, that the Hunter is my favorite. I'll start shooting the Phat loot to you later (just created a bunch for trollslayer, so have more lieing around)

I agree with kiri up to a certain level. Since my cat and I have been level 60, the roasted quail is just about all he'll eat, and it's a lot easier for me to restock 5 or 10 quail every time I'm in IF than it is for me to go out of my way to hunt or fish up a high enough level food for my pet.

I have found that at fishing skill of 300, I can catch the level 45 fish everytime in Alterac Basin. I agree the quail are easier, but I keep giving all my gold away, so it is easier to fish than buy.

LeapingGnome wrote:

Thanks guys, sounds like just train any old Bear I like the look of and don't sweat the training points too much because I can always change them. And I'll try to do the Loch Modan lodge quests earlier to get that nice ammo pouch.

I think you're just looking for a "Bear" you can control. One that will follow your instructions and one that you can starve when you're feeling mean.

Why don't you try taming a Gnome, they're barely humaniod.

Bear wrote:

Why don't you try taming a Gnome, they're barely humaniod.

Thread over. Bear wins.

Gnomes can already pretty much kill anything they want, having one as a pet would just give rise to even more nerf hunters threads. Think about the game balance, people!

We need to have everyone level up a gnome alt. Can you imagine the hilarity of 20-40 gnomes, and ONLY gnomes, ripping through an equal number of Tauren and Orcs?

Anyone ever see the old "Clan of the Duck" Rugrats episode? I can see us all doing a macro that takes off our pants, shouting some vulgar insults, putting our pants back on and charging into the fray.

Ok, maybe that's just funny to me.

duckilama wrote:

We need to have everyone level up a gnome alt. Can you imagine the hilarity of 20-40 gnomes, and ONLY gnomes, ripping through an equal number of Tauren and Orcs?

Anyone ever see the old "Clan of the Duck" Rugrats episode? I can see us all doing a macro that takes off our pants, shouting some vulgar insults, putting our pants back on and charging into the fray.

Ok, maybe that's just funny to me.

It might be. Also, for some reason, I thought that was a reference to Ducktales. I don't really know why.

Gnomes cant be any healer classes can they?

Well warlocks can heal their pets...

Gnomes cant be any healer classes can they?

Anyone can pick up First Aid though, and for a solo-friendly class like Hunter, it's very useful.

Well, I like Duc's idea...so get busy folks!

As for healing...hunters AND warlocks can heal their pets, and maybe we'll let a dwarf or three into the fold...eh?

Plus make em all engineers with jumper cables and you've got any army of ressers

LeapingGnome wrote:

When track beasts is on and you can see a target on your minimap, is there a way to easily select that target without it being in sight?

Using the default interface no. This is where mods come in. I use Tracker Assist. If the target is within visual range but simply obstructed from view (ie targetable) you can simply click on its "blip" and it will target, as well as provide its mob type, race, and faction info. This also works for druids as well. Added bonus is that its configurable to ping the target and announce it in party or raid chat.

TonyBone wrote:
LeapingGnome wrote:

When track beasts is on and you can see a target on your minimap, is there a way to easily select that target without it being in sight?

Using the default interface no. This is where mods come in. I use Tracker Assist. If the target is within visual range but simply obstructed from view (ie targetable) you can simply click on its "blip" and it will target, as well as provide its mob type, race, and faction info. This also works for druids as well. Added bonus is that its configurable to ping the target and announce it in party or raid chat.

I am SO downloading that mod once I get home tonight. Awesome, thanks TonyBone!

See, that sounds like a sexy mod, but as a miner, I don't ever turn tracking on anyway. I don't think I've had a form of tracking on since about 12th level. This is why I say Hunters should be allowed to have one class-based tracking and one non-class tracking (Mining/Herbalism/Treasure) on at the same time.

I have a question.. my hunter has a owl that she got from the NE starting area and it doesnt have screech. now it's 20 lvls higher.. do I have to get it froma trainer, or tame another owl, or what?