There's a somewhat informative Marksman thread on the official forums: (1) Ignore the first page until Jormungandr's post near the bottom--for example, the second post is just wrong. (2) Bloodmagic's post on the second page has good info. The other posts contain clarifications here and there.
I haven't heard about totally omitting Arcane Shot except on magic-vulnerable bosses like Hodir, but the relevant posts have rotation info and why, as well as glyph recommendations and why. Didn't really give the builds a look.
EJ disagrees with him on shot priority and glyphs; Kill Shot Glyph will always be the best min/max glyph, period. There's nothing I can say they haven't already said better here, however.
That's pretty damned useful, Anime -- thanks for fishing it out. I wish I were patient enough to find something similar for the other classes I play regularily.
One thing, though: The MM build posted there (you have to click through to find it) presumes that you're raiding. If you're leveling and farming, I'd build the MM portion a little bit differently -- points in Efficiency, for instance -- and re-prioritize the glyphs. (Kill Shot is invaluable in a raid but useless while leveling.)
The shot rotation argument seems to go round and round. All anyone can agree on is that you start with Serpent Sting and hit Chimera Shot at every chance. After that, it seems to be an issue of how you're glyphed and how well you can mash the buttons.
Well, that post, last edited in mid-May, disagrees with the glyphs. In turn, the MM thread first post, edited at the end of July, disagrees with it, so.... Like the shot rotation discussion, the glyph discussion can go round and round. Pick your poison.
After the Hunter talent reset of yesterday I switched back to Beast Master. Now my big question is whether I go with a Tenacity pet or a Ferocity pet. Lately I've been going Tenacity for the sole reason of Thunderstomp for aoe tanking. But any Ferocity pet is so much better at staying alive due to the damage heal they get.
Am I a fool for having a Tenacity pet? A crab for the record since it has that wonderful Pin ability.
Am I a fool for having a Tenacity pet?
Not at all -- they are definitely your best choice for leveling. First, as you mentioned, they can AoE tank (particularly if you get a bear or crocolisk, who have family abilities with AoE effects to stack with thunderstomp). Second, despite the fact that ferocity pets have the small self heal through Bloodthirsty, specced properly your tenacity pet is going to have much better survivability.
There are lots of ways to spec your tenacity pet, but assuming you want him to be mostly for soloing/duoing and don't want the group abilities like taunt or intervene, you have a lot of great options for making him nigh-unkillable. At level 68, you should be able to spec him along these lines and have him be way tougher than your ferocity pet could ever hope for. Really, though, the key element of tenacity survivability is the combo of Blood of the Rhino and Silverback (having Spirit Bond in your talent spec helps a lot too); once you have those two talents, then start playing around with the others until you find a balance of damage output, threat generation, and survivability that works for you.
I had a crab leveling up for a long time. My hunter is 62 now, and for the last... 15 levels or so, she's had a moth. This is mostly for aesthetics, because I run around on my blue draenei with a blue moth and a baby non-combat blue moth.
... I run around on my blue draenei with a blue moth and a baby non-combat blue moth.
That might be the cutest thing ever. 
Strewth wrote:... I run around on my blue draenei with a blue moth and a baby non-combat blue moth.
That might be the cutest thing ever. ;)
Did I mention she's on an RP server?
After the Hunter talent reset of yesterday I switched back to Beast Master. Now my big question is whether I go with a Tenacity pet or a Ferocity pet. Lately I've been going Tenacity for the sole reason of Thunderstomp for aoe tanking. But any Ferocity pet is so much better at staying alive due to the damage heal they get.
Am I a fool for having a Tenacity pet? A crab for the record since it has that wonderful Pin ability.
I have always had a cat for my pet, but recently I picked up a bear so I could tank instances solo easier and I am finding it is working better than my kitty. I have had the same cat since I was level 10 and he was level 9 back in Teldrassil so I feel a little quilty of having a new pet but I think my kitty needs a break and is just not up for the task of tanking.
I think you could correlate that with leveling as well, especially since most mobs you will run into are non-elite.
A 4 year old thread still going...God Bless you all!
Ok, so I used some of my RAF giftable levels to get my hunter up to 58 and promptly went to Outland...
...Where I proceeded to get walked all over by Hellfire mobs. I still need to train up a little, but I'm not THAT far below where I should be in that respect.
I was wondering what the problem was, when I went to Naraud's armory page and saw "UNTALENTED" staring me in the face. Well, shoot. I forgot they got a free respec with 3.2.
I have looked around and can't really find much that's updated for 3.2 as far as leveling specs go. What do you folks recommend?
Oh, and ignore the "Horde" faction on that armory page. It looks like faction change didn't take the armory into account yet.
The free hunter respec with 3.2 was because of a bug in a talent, not because of any significant change to the trees themselves. If you had a spec you were happy with before then it should be fine to go back to it.
If you aren't sure what spec you want, the short of it is that all three hunter trees are fine for leveling. Personally, I'm a fan of survivability and AOE killing ability for leveling/farming, though, so I would recommend following the standard BM leveling build and getting a tenacity pet (preferably a bear or a croc for extra AoE capability) specced into thunderstomp.
(A standard BM leveling build will look a lot like this, give or take a few points here or there to account for your preference in balance between survivability and sheer murderous power. Build the BM tree out all the way, then the MM tree, then SV. When you hit 80, though, you'll want some non-trivial changes to perform better in a group setting, or you might just switch to MM or SV altogether. As for your pet spec, there is a lot more flexibility. For a tenacity pet, get to thunderstomp ASAP and get charge but other than that decide what balance you want between survivability and damage and choose talents to fit that. Something like this should do fine though. )
If you aren't sure what spec you want, the short of it is that all three hunter trees are fine for leveling.
Yep. In my sig, I have what I think is a pretty decent 7/57/7 MM build. If you were to use something like that, make sure to get Chimera Shot as soon as you can (because it rocks) and consider putting 5/5 into Efficiency.
If you're curious, play a bit on all three specs. It might make leveling a little less odious.
So, hunters in patch 3.3.
The new and improved(?) misdirect
I know that functionally the new misdirect gets more threat off of us and onto the tank, but it's still annoying the crap out of me. I liked being able to fire it off and then have a comfortable window in which to start a pull at the exact right time. Of course, for mid-fight misdirects the new method is definitely better, but still, annoying. (Oh, and also annoying is the change to the animation. Why change it from animating over the target's head to over ours? It makes no sense.)
Gear
Also, I finally got around to running some numbers on some of the new gear using the web version of the DPS spreadsheet. (Note: I didn't bother looking at heroic gear since it will be months before we can even start thinking about it.)
Trinkets
Death's Verdict is still king, but if you already have that (*glares at Forshay*) then there are actually two new options to replace your Greatness card with. If you don't have Death's Verdict, one the two new ones are probably going to be your Greatness card's new buddy until you get both of them, and then you can go back to wishing you had Death's Verdict.
Both the new trinkets are available now, too. Whispering Fanged Skull is dropped by Lady Deathwhisper (the second boss) in 10 man, and Deathbringer's Will is dropped by Deathbringer Saurfang (the fourth, and until January, final boss) in 25 man. Deathbringer's Will, if you recall, is the trinket with the proc that randomly changes you into a native Northrend race giving you a huge bonus of one sort or another.
So by my calculations (done for a BM and an SV spec, but not an MM spec) the new trinket rankings for most hunters will be:
Death's Verdict
Deathbringer's Will
Whispering Fanged Skull
Greatness
Wrathstone or Mjolnir Runestone, depending on spec
Tier gear
Did you think the T10 4 piece sounded good? Well, I did, but I was wrong. It doesn't hold a candle to the T9 2 piece for either spec I ran numbers on, even when I ran the numbers with the 264 versions of the T10 gear rather than the 251 stuff. So decide which T9 pieces you want to keep, because you'll be using them for quite a while here.
Personally, I'll be keeping the helm (it's got good stats for any spec, and the the T10 helm graphics are an atrocity against humanity). After that, well, I'm not sure, but definitely not shoulders or gloves. The T10 chest has a very nice stat distribution especially when compared to the T9 chest, so I'll probably be keeping the T9 pants. However, there are some very nice craftable 264 off set pants to be had once leatherworkers rep up with the new raid faction.
Ranged Weapons
Lady Deathwhisper is our pal, here, both in 10 and 25. Either way she drops a bow, but the 25 man version is the real prize, and not just because of it's ilevel granted stat increases. It has a very powerful proc, and early reports say that the proc doesn't have any internal cooldown -- people are seeing it fire once every 10 or 15 seconds. Also, the armory claims a very high drop rate on it, and like the Talonstrike it comes from the second boss in the instance, so mercifully it may not take long for us to all get kitted out with it.
Stat sticks
Other than Quel'delar the picture isn't very rosy here. Loot lists aren't exactly complete yet, but it doesn't look like we'll be seeing anything dropping in either 10 or 25 man until at the earliest bosses that will open up in January. So yeah, time to start farming the new 5 man heroics for the item that starts the Quel'delar quest.
Thanks for posting this, Zero. I've been too busy wrangling with a new UI to do much hunterizing.
I like what you're saying about the trinkets. Maybe that'll drop the price of the Greatness cards to the point I can actually afford one.
Have you thought about how you're going to get your hands on that new 90 DPS ammo?
Have you thought about how you're going to get your hands on that new 90 DPS ammo?
Well, first we need engineers to rep up with Ashen Verdict to honored. Last night we did the first three bosses in 10 man and earned about 1500 rep (or 1700 with the dirty human racial), so I'd say it's going to take maybe a month (give or take) before we get anyone in guild there.
After that, gnome engineering is needed for arrows and goblin engineering for bullets, but I don't know who in our guild is each. As a result it may end up being necessary to buy them off the auction house, but it's still going to be a few weeks before anyone has the rep for it anyway.
Someone's going to make a fortune selling that ammo. Sadly it won't be me.
Someone's going to make a fortune selling that ammo. Sadly it won't be me.
Yeah, it's going to be rare to find someone who can make the specific ammo you need. However, that will be somewhat offset by the incredibly equitable material cost. Two crystalized shadow for 1000 arrows, two crystalized earth for 1000 bullets -- or one or two taps at a saronite node per 1000 ammo.
2,000 rep you can gain fully clearing the first 4 bosses and all the trash in the way. Remember that you also gain rep in 10s and 25s, so that's actually just over 2 weeks when you can gain access as an engineer to these bullets.
Next week I'm sure they'll be on the AH for like 1,000gp per stack. Following weeks it'll drop down significantly.
Oh, for sure. My month estimate is sort of based on the assumption that not everyone will necessarily be running and/or clearing both 10 and 25 every week in December. But yeah, on the AH for crazy prices in two weeks, more easily available in a month.
Pretty sure Kam's goblin, though I'd have to log in to double-check.
I saw OutDPS linked from WoW.com today. New site to me. They have a little discussion on hunter strat in ICC on the front page if you want to take a look.
Also, it just costs 150gp to switch engineering specs, so I will make the change to gnomish. Unless the BRK-1000 appears in my stocking Christmas morning
I saw OutDPS linked from WoW.com today. New site to me. They have a little discussion on hunter strat in ICC on the front page if you want to take a look.
Also, it just costs 150gp to switch engineering specs, so I will make the change to gnomish. Unless the BRK-1000 appears in my stocking Christmas morning ;)
Good stuff. Thanks for the link!
Also, I'm a complete idiot regarding misdirect and setup time. Even though the tooltip doesn't indicate it, there is still a 30 second setup time -- the four second counter starts after your first shot at an enemy. As such, the only thing that is not awesome about the new misdirect is the change to the animation. That part is still stupid as hell.
Yeah, I love the new MD, and even more so for SV. Explosive Shot was dicey because of it's dot nature and a mistimed crit, but no longer. New animation is bewildering.
I can make the Iceblade Arrows now--2 crystallized shadow per stack. You can mail me mats or catch me in game.
There are also Shatter Rounds in the bank, and I also have a bunch floating around in the mail that are available for guild use.
I can make the Iceblade Arrows now--2 crystallized shadow per stack. You can mail me mats or catch me in game.
There are also Shatter Rounds in the bank, and I also have a bunch floating around in the mail that are available for guild use.
Who made the Shatter Rounds? I was under the belief that you could only make one or the other (arrows or rounds). I'll happily keep that person awashed in Eternals Earths.
You can only use one recipe at once due to them being tied to an engineering spec, but you can learn both. I believe that McFinn was kind enough to get both recipes for Forshay and craft up a crapton of bullets before switching to the spec for arrows so that guild hunters with guns will have a supply of the good stuff banked away.
Question for the hunter experts out there. I saw this item linked in that OutDPS that noted that wolves are kind of overpowered versus other pets. Just out of curiosity, is this greater DPS due to their attributes, special attacks, or a particular spec?
Question for the hunter experts out there. I saw this item linked in that OutDPS that noted that wolves are kind of overpowered versus other pets. Just out of curiosity, is this greater DPS due to their attributes, special attacks, or a particular spec?
The wolf's special ability Furious Howl is the reason why.
Currently (as of 3.1, I believe? maybe 3.2?), all pets have the same base stats, and only two things differentiate the pet families. First and most obvious is which talent tree they have. Obviously, the ferocity talent tree is designed to be the DPS spec, and as such a raiding pet should always have that talent tree. Second, each pet family has a unique special ability that they can use on top of the standard skills (bite/claw, growl, etc) and the skills they get from their talent tree (Call of the Wild, Dash/Dive, Charge, Wolverine Bite, etc). Many of the pet specials are simple attacks, but lots of the are designed to bring versions of buffs/debuffs you might be missing in a party or raid -- for example, worms can sunder armor -- or they provide extra CC (spiders can web, crabs can pin), or AoE threat (bears can swipe), some some other kind of interesting utility.
So the wolf family's special ability is a static AP buff for both the hunter and the pet. Originally in 3.0 the ability was designed as a miniature version of Blessing of Might, so if you didn't have a Pally or Warrior you could have a hunter with a wolf, but for various reasons it was changed to just be a personal buff that could start stacking with the similar pally/warrior buff.
Anyway, long story short the AP buff ends up bringing much more DPS than any of the other pet specials in almost all cases. For SV and MM hunters who have weak pets to begin with, wolves will almost certainly remain the best pet for the rest of Wrath. For BM hunters, at high enough gear levels devilsaurs, cats, and raptors begin to compete again (which is better is going to vary with the hunter's gear, raid comp, and the type of fight, although generally devilsaurs will be above the other two). For example, geared as I currently am (average ilevel around 245) devilsaurs are almost neck and neck with wolves for my BM spec in most scenarios.
Edit: Oh, and the problem with spirit beasts is that their special attack is magical rather than physical. There are certainly some scenarios where this is actually beneficial, but most of the time the nature of how pets scale with hunter stats means that it doesn't stack up to some of the better physical special attacks, such as those used by devilsaurs, cats, and raptors.
I went with a wolf on my MM hunter soon after Wrath came out and have been very pleased with the results. When Furious Howl procs, I get an AP buff of just shy of 10 percent. If you're a better hunter with better gear than me, it'll probably work out to 5 percent with Aspect of the Dragonhawk and Trueshot Auru up.
Now that I've upgraded my gear a bit, my wolf is no longer an aggro magnet he has been. But she has been my best pet since my cat I tamed in Dun Morogh some 70 levels ago.
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