2.3 What Does it Mean for Hunter?

So here's my review of our changes on the PTR. I'm also going to go over what I think should have been changed.

• Pets will try to get behind their targets when engaging in melee combat - This change is great for PvE more dps and less parrying for pet dmg. It is also going to remove that threat of resetting the bosses swing timer from a parry. PvP no real worry. It will down warrior and rogue mitigation a bit from the pet but the travel time is going to negate that anyway. In arena your pet is only useful to help you protect your viper sting and often gets gibbed by smart teams. This really isn't going to help me much unless I go into kara/gruuls pugs since I don't raid anymore. HAHA SCREW YOU BLIZ NERF MAI DST I NO GO TO YOUR SSC NEMORE! (lul)
• Aimed Shot (Marksmanship) now reduces healing done to that target by 50% for 10 seconds - Ok first off I l0ve the idea of having more to contribute to a team and this is an awesome tool. Rapid fire and off a fast aimed shot when clear, silence a healer for 3 seconds and drop someone this is great. BUT. Its a copy cat skill. Melee is the healing debuffer right now (warrior and rogue). Shouldn't it stay that way? I'll be happy to use this shot again (I haven't since the ages old nerf to it in 2.0 or so). I think its going to help hunters out tons in getting 5's representation but it isn't a good tool for 2's and doesn't address hunters main issues of having their dps shut down easily and vulnerability to taking a ton of dps with very little mitigation (lol chain mail).
• Arcane Shot (Ranks 6 and above) now dispel 1 Magic effect in addition to their normal damage - Ok this change is AWESOME. For arena. It is going to give hunters in 2v2 a way to beat warrior pally reliably. When the warrior gets BoF... gone! BoP? Ef You BoP!. The problem I see with this? People are going to flip the hell out in BG's. Now BG's aren't arena you don't really need to be intelligent about the use of your abilities. I throw arcane shots out every time its up. I'm marksman, I have a nice stack of AP self buffed and it hits. So lets say I throw out 20 of these per death in a BG. You know that fel armor you just used? Yeah, well don't bother buffing it cause its gonna get reamed. I guarantee it. PWF, or better yet party buff using a reagent? Thanks for spending money so I can pwn your buff for 202 mana. I have a feeling people in BGs are going to freak when this happens. I agree that its going to be a pain. Hunters are going to purge the ever living crap out of you because its our main source of instant dmg especially if you're BM and do not have the multishot improvements.
• Explosive Trap: The initial damage dealt by this trap is now also increased by 10% of your ranged attack power - Cool for being annoying in AV. Cool that now hunters really don't have any reason for saying QQ my abilities don't scale unless I get some random spell DMG buff. This is cool. But I don't use explosive trap in PvP. Often :P
• Immolation Trap: The total damage dealt by this trap is now also increased by 10% of your ranged attack power - Now this is cool. Is there a dispeller alive on the opposing team? No melee so your frost trap isn't that effective. They have AOE to ruin your snake trap push back festival? Drop this 980 DMG will now be roughly 1200-1300 making it semi beneficial to use as extra DPS when your other traps are not benefiting you vs the opposing team.
• Misdirection: This spell will now always be removed correctly if multiple Hunters overwrite each other's Misdirection - Good PvE buff but not really needed 100%. If you're in a raid group and you and your other hunters cant figure out a system to avoid MD overlapping you need to stop raiding. A Tip! /join yourguildhunter (6), /6 misdirecting %T onto %F Do not misdirect for 5 seconds please. /target focus /cast misdirection /targetlasttarget
• Readiness: This talent now finishes the cooldown on Kill Command - Lawl Oh kay so I use my 5 minute 41 point talent to reset the 5s CD on KC. Good fix but utterly useless. I don't know who figured this out I never noticed it.
• Serpent Sting, Immolation Trap and Explosive Trap all gain additional damage based on ranged attack power - Way to double post nubs!
• Trueshot Aura (Marksmanship) no longer costs mana to cast and will last until cancelled - Awesome I may have mana after I die in a BG!
• Wyvern Sting (Survival) is now instant cast and has a maximum duration of 10 seconds in PvP - I still don't think survival will do well in arena but now maybe 0/24/37 or similar can work?
• Last One: Hunter Mele range now 1-4 yards and ranged attacks 5-35(41) IE bye bye dead zone - This removes the 1 way we are shut down. But! Doesn't fix the issue of pillar kiting. I still play like I have a DZ on the PTR so I'll have to adjust to this change.

So whats missing? These are awesome buffs to hunters and hunters will be seen more in 5v5s but! They aren't a good solution for the real issue of hunters. First off hunters can get shut down easily. Our only answer is to patiently wait for a good target to unload into or for mele to force a target into a bad position. The range of 1 yard would be too much but would fix this allowing us to chase around a pillar.

Our other issue is mitigation. Warlocks have their own HOT/Drains as well as SL, mages get ice block, shammys druids pallies and priests can heal, Rogues have CLOS and vanish, warriors have defensive stance shields(when needed) and spell reflect. Hunters have marginal dodge/parry (lul overpower and rogue talents), deterrence (lol overpower) OK armor but not enough to make us a hard target for a warrior to take down and a maximum of 4% reduction to magic dmg taken available only deep into a tree that is ineffective in arena (survival / survival instincts). What would help hunters? A way to avoid magic dmg. Heck leave us as we are for mele we're not that poorly off. My suggestion?

The old rumored Imp Feign Death - (0/2) Survival Requires 15 points in survivalist talents. reduces the chance your FD will be resisted by 2/4% and gives feign death a 50/100% chance to remove all magic debufs and movement impairing effects from the hunter.

Increase the cooldown on Feign Death to 1 Minute. This won't break pve. A smart hunter should be waiting on threat anyway in a raid. This won't break PVP either. Does CLOS break rogues? No its what they need to survive against caster classes that they are supposed to beat.

Other things bliz could do as opposed to mortal strike shot? Give us something unique! Make Tranq shot reduce rogue energy/warrior rage for 10 seconds. Make disengage disarm an opponent. Hunters primary function in pvp is to shut down opponents abilities (drain mana, silence, frost trap kiting) focus on this strength don't make me into a ranged warrior with a purge!

Now don't get me wrong I'm happy we're getting a buff. But I'd rather something unique and something that fits with a hunters bag of tricks. A dispell and a MS are really not it but hey. I feel sorry for you buff classes :P

Read This Blog Now!

So I'm the worst! I read this blog every day. This girl has more 70's than I have braincells.

Out Of Mana

Check here for the best look at Warlock and Paladin PvP you can find. Megan understands pvp like whoah! Plus she's way prettier than the Shifttusk. Check out her most recent post for a funny ass warlock talent tree in response to the upcoming nerfs to aflliction/slsl.

As a side note, I feel your pain I do 3's with an aflic lock and I'm very worried about the changes. Locks Soul Link aside are super squishy and have very few GTFO Me Mele cards. This change is going to make a huge change in 2's and ruin warlocks already poor showing in 5's.

Most Likely Solution?
- Your searing pain now dispels 1 magical effect
- Your shadow burn now reduces healing on the target by 50% for 6 seconds

You too can be a ranged warrior :(

Look forward to a post about hunters and 2.3 and stuff later after I pretend to do my job for a bit!

Lata,
Shift

2's, Priests And A Strategy

First a note incase people check my armory. Yes my current 2v2 is with a warlock friend of mine. Hes undergeared and we're having some fun messing around in 2v2. But! We are looking for a priest to do 2v2s with us particularly me.

So! If you're a priest on mannoroth with 200+ resiliance 2v2 team with warlock and hunter LF yous. Requesting a Disc/Holy spec with imp mana burn although deep disc with pain supression is hot!

So I've been doing the majority of my arena play as Marks. Yes I raid as BM, yes I sometimes arena or BG as BM but if you didn't get it out of my previous post. Marks works better once you take into consideration a competent teamate expecialy a healer. Theres a ton of strategies for hunters in arena for each bracket. Today its time to blab about 2v2 Marks+Disc priest.

Team Composition:
Marksman Hunter (5/5 Imp Stings, Scatter, Silence, Entrapment)
Disc/Holy Priest (this has some more variation with 2x/3x/0 but I've seen alot more 41/20/0 popping up for pain supression which I think is an amazing talent oh ya imp mana burn).

Strategy:
Surving while decreasing the opposing teams resources (mana/rage). Via a few well timed burns and constant viper sting eventualy OOM caster DPS or a healer , shut down another team and drop a target via arc/multi/auto/SW:D.

BM vs Marksmanship vs Survivalism In Arena

So talent specs. I'm not going to go into specifics today just a brief overview of builds and what strengths and weaknesses they have and to some extent their viability. Now note that if your partner is exceptionaly good you can get away with less than optimal specs and the same applies you can be perfectly specced and you and your partner don't work together you won't see >1500 ratings.

So Specs:

BM High DPS (41/20/0)
Key Talents: 5/5 Endurance Training, Intimidate, Serpents Swiftness, Mortal Shots, Frenzy, Bestial Wrath+TBW (spirit bond optional).

Strong: When free 41/20 can sustain a nice load of good dps. Nothing bursty but a nice steady 700dps in arena gear. TBW provides good protection against being stuck in mele as well as dmg from being frozen by mages (a frost mage relies on freezing you not just to avoid dmg but it increases their own dmg ALOT).

Weakness: A big lack is the missing burst damage. You will have far lower attack power than your marksman counterparts in pvp and as such your specials for burst (arcane multi your instants) hit for less. The biggest weakness of this build is utility. While you have tools to get out of hairy situations you lack the big tools to put the opposing team into a hairy situation. 700 dps is great for slowly wearing down a healers mana however a healer can heal through your dps and you lack the tools to shut down a healer or drain him more effectivly (improved stings).

Viability: BM is arguably the best dueling spec. It does well in BGs but BM is hit HARD by resiliance. Pets have a static crit rate aside from talents. Now resiliance cannot push pet crit completely off of the table but the big decrease in crits gimps you dmg against well geared opponents by ALOT. The net result of the resiliance is a lack of frenzy (30% pet dps) and ferocious inspiration uptime (3% dmg for party). The other glaring issue with BM in arena is a lack of shut downs you can't effectivly drain a casters mana and you dont have silence/scatter to help out a teamate. When it comes time to burn an opponent down you'll often find that your dps isn't enough to get through the heals and you lack a way to shut down the heals. A smart priest will be able to assist you via silence or fear but this is a bandaid for the spec.

BM Arena Tank (41/4/16)
Key Talents: 5/5 Endurance Training, 5/5 Survivalist, Deterence, Bestial Wrath, Intimidate, Imp Wingclip, Optional Spirit Bond.

Strong: You have a ton of health, it only gets to be more as you get geared. You have TBW as well as deterence to shut down mele dps on you. You can soak up a rediculous beating for a hunter while you do low dmg and your partner brings the other team down.

Weakness: Your dps is abysmal and you cant use this spec as a pvp/pve spec. In 2v2's you are forced into a 2dps team as well as in 3s. You have no interupts as well aside from a 1 minute cooldown.

Viability: This build somewhat works when undergeared. It helps you live and its less likely teams will realize the "tankhunter" strategy and will still focus on you. As you get more gear and play better teams this build just fails if you are not the focused target. You won't have tools to help your teamate get free and your dps.... SUCKS

Marksmanship (0/42-3/18-19)
Key Talents: Mortal Shots, Improved Stings, Scatter Shot, Silencing Shot, Trueshot Aura, Entrapment, Barrage Talents, Surefooted +++ IN 2.3 Improved Arcane Shot, Aimed Shot

Strong: Utility for assisting teammates in the form of entrapment and scatter allowing you to help focus targets reduce inbound dmg and get free of mele and casters. Good burst dmg from improved multishot allows you to take out a low HP target fast as well as spread a good amount of dps around the opposing team forcing the healer to spread heals and heal more per mana spent. Improved stings is a great tool for OOMing teams who slow play with healer+halfhealer lineups in 2's as well as in 5's and 3's. Silencing shot can help reduce incoming caster dmg and stop heals for a burn down. It also provides more (albeit shitty) dps while on the move. With the 2.3 changes this build will get more tools with the aimed shot change as well as the purge from imp arcane. The deadzone removal will help up the dps of this build making it harder to shut down the dps via positioning.

Weakness: MELE, you're going to be in a way like a warlock. You will HATE making a mistake with a rogue or warrior because it means you're going to get hit more than a few times and will need heals. Dealing with mele is where this build needs skill rather than GOGOLOLWITHIN to get free. Good use of your range to get warriors into combat fast as well as scorpid sting and deterence will help you survive and get free.

Viability: This build is far more popular on top end pvp hunters. For good reason, silencing shot is the easiest to use, shortest cooldown silence in the game. Scatter is great for offensivly dmging and stopping heals as well as helping a teammate get free of mele focus trains. Having been a BM raider I was pvping as BM and found the issues above. I was consistantly playing in the 1400-1550 range and never improving. The respec to 0/43/18 has made a huge improvement for me and will get better as I learn it. The better you get at 5-7 kiting warriors and dealing with mele focus the better you will do. You have alot of strong tools and using them to your advantage is key. Throwing out scorpid on mele, viper on caster dps and good use of frost traps for entrapment are all key. Swapping to this build I've shot up to near 1700s (and they will be 1700 by tuesday :P) within 2 weeks.

Survivalist:
Key Talents: Wyvern Sting, Expose Weakness, Survivalist, Lightening Reflexes, Deterence

Strong: High crit, higher mele dmg reduction via dodge

Weak: Resiliance Owns your buff and overall dps.

Viability: DONT DO EET. I tried it, it worked when noone had resiliance but resiliance OWNS expose weakness and your lack of scatter and silence removes all the good utility of this build. The instant cast wyvern sting my change this but I think that with its long cooldown it will still not be as effective as silence. I have yet to see a team matrix make good use of this build. I'll maybe do an update post 2.3 when the wyvern to instant change goes in perhaps 0/24/37 will make a comeback with good multishot dps and an instant wyvern for burndown.

Random 2.3 Musings: 20&24 Slot Quivers

Ok, So first off this doesn't apply to you silly gun toters. Real hunters use bows!

C'mon our epic quest. Bow. Only weapon to say "Class: Hunter" Bow.

And now if you pvp we're all xbow users. Yup bliz feels the need to make troll racials useless in arenas. But not human rogue/warriors and realy will of the forsake and canabalize are underpowered in pvp really..

Ok /stoprant sorry.

So anyway I just wanted to make a blurb about the new quivers/amo pouches from crafting in the next patch. Now yea 6 more slots for raiding is pretty nice. But I do have other bags to just stash amo in beforehand its not a big deal. But a big deal? Abandoning my Ancient Sinew Wrapped Lamina! Its epic! It says its for a Hunter JUST FOR ME! I got to kill 4 demons that instagib any other freaking class.

Ok /stoprant again sorry!

But seriously I'm not getting a new one I'm keeping my precious. Anyone else feel the same way?

Mondays Hunter PvP Tip: Feign Death

So as an attempt to provide some regular content on here my plan is every Monday to go over a specific hunter ability and how to best use it to help you in pvp.

Today's Feature? Feign Death

"But lewls Shifttusk players dont have agro!! L2 Hunter neub!"

So first what does feign death do?
- If not resisted FD will lower your current threat on a NPC to 0. (Yes no use in pvp)
- If not resisted FD will de-target your character this will break casts. (Aha wait a minute)

So FD for 60 mana can basically waste an opponents time that they spent channeling. It can also be used for some cool but risky tricks on melee opponents. The trick on melee is to FD when your pet or teammate is hitting the melee opponent your FD will have them targeted giving you a tiny time period to trinket off a snare and get to range. Try it its not very effective on a skilled opponent but every tool helps!

So part 1 what in the heck should I FD out of? Here's the Shifttusk recommended eat it or FD it list!
- Polymorph: EAT IT first off polymorph doesn't result in a lot of movement if your healer/teammates are paying attention they wont go out of LOS and you will come out to help. Poly heals you somewhat and if you're dotted it will break.
- Fear: FD IT fear can run you all over the place, it wont break consistently on dmg and you can get yourself feared out of LOS of your healer making you an easy kill.
- Casted DMG (fireball frostbolt immolate shadowbolt): This is a sometimes if you have a healer in LOS of you eat it. If not FD it to save your HP pool.
- Unstable Affliction: FD THIS EVERY FREAKING TIME. UA is like a caster mortal strike it means you are going to take dmg and your healer HAS to heal you. He cant run around it means every dot on you is going to tic. Love dodging mortal strike? FD unstable affliction.

Now there are a ton of other spells but the guidelines above should give you a good idea to judge your FD off of.

Back to work for me! If you guys have any tips on how you use FD in pvp (aside from getting a fast drink in) post them up!

Pookie, Snuggles and Hobbes What Pet Should I Choose and Why?

So when deciding on my first post I tried to think of the most common question I see people ask on forums and blogs about their hunter.

"Hai I just made a NE hunter and am level 10 what pet should I use and why?"

And

"Hai I trained my pet with XxX is this good or is there something else I should use?"

Now while at first these seem like the typical noob questions that everyone flames and makes fun of in reality its probably one of the most important questions faced by a hunter. Possibly the most important. Now you can say questions of how x armor piece is going to improve my DPS or which ranged weapon is better are the most important. Realistically though these questions are answered over and over and can be backed up by statistics and numbers.

Slower weapon for pvp burst, high dps with good attack speed for raiding, more RAP higher crit more Mp5 Etc.

Heck it's been shown time and time again the best DPS by armor piece can be calculated via a spreadsheet taking into account everything from rotation to latency (see cheeky on the US forums). But what these sheets cant calculate is how your pet choice effects your playing. All of that aside your pet can have easily as much of an effect on your performance as you gear so why is asking about pets a bad question? Its not its a great question.

So after all that blah blah here's the Shifttusk take on what works for what situations:

1) Leveling - now its been a while since I leveled my hunter (ages actually) but for me there was one simple answer. BOAR. Boars used to have pretty low DPS but their ability to immobilize and cause high threat give newer hunters a ton of room for error while leveling. And their higher HP reduces downtime. Plus the immobilize isn't a bad deal for pvp at all.

2) Ima PVE Raider! - So this does somewhat fall into the realm of spreadsheets. Basically the rule of thumb is cat/ravager are the best unless the hunter is BM and reaches a gear mark. At around 25-27% unbuffed ranged critical a BM hunter will show a dps boost using a windserpent. Basically due to the fact that they proc enough GFTT to generate the focus to drive lightening breath. LB causes well more than 2x the dmg of claw but sucks up double the focus. Now one thing to note!

Lightening Breath Crit Rate SUCKS!

Claw is much better for maintaining Ferocious Inspiration. Using Cheeky's spreadsheet and a little testing I've seen about 30dps more using LB over claw. BUT my FI went from around 90% up time to about 75%. If you're in a high dps party in a longer fight the lower FI up time could mean an overall loss of raid DPS. Its nitpicking the numbers a bit but in addition to the dps they provide BM hunters are looked at as a party buff and you should pay HUGE attention to your FI. Unlike a mage or priest hunters need to work at keeping their buff up just like sunder armor and FF for druids.

3) Level 70 PvP - So here's my new domain. This is what I've been up to for about a month now and of course can use some tips at points. So what I've found is this:

Scorpions Pwn You!

Now sure did blizard nerf the ridiculously exploitable scorpid poison DPS for raiders? Of Course! Does this make the scorpion a little less effective in PVP. Sure I used to love the additional armor negating dmg on a warrior while kiting them but its not big deal.

So why a scorpion? It has no dash! It has significantly lower dps than a cat. and its UGLY!

Well lets look at a hunters strong points in arena play (arguably the most important pvp venue at 70). Hunter have many issues in arena but lets look at what they are currently good at and how the scorpion assists in this.

• Spreading Dmg and Wasting Healer Mana/GCD's on healing a non focused target or dispelling - So spreading dmg and wasting heals on a non focus can be attained with any pet really and multishot is a great asset for this. DMG spreading is one of the strongest points of a BM specced hunter in 2s/3s. Specced 41/20/0 a BM hunters multishot still packs a decent punch with mortal shots and his pet can be on an off focus target inflicting serious dmg. This forces a healer to split healing, spend more mana and possibly lead to a screw up in which you can drop the focused target or even the healer. I've had many an occasion where my pet has taken a significant chunk out of a healers HP pool where I have beastwrath/rapid fired onto the focus target. At this point he the healer has to heal the focus, drops to 20-30%hp due to the BW'd pet and i quickly hop onto the healer with arc/multi/auto and drop them. The second portion of this is where the scorpion excels. Lets say you put your pet onto a healer. Your pet is killed but his poison is ticking for the next 10 seconds on a close to OOM healer. This healer has to waste his GCDs cleansing the poison so he can get out of combat to drink. If paired with a rogue the opposing healer needs to spend a ton of mana cleansing your scorpid poison stack off a focus target to be able to clear off wound poison so he can heal effectively.
• Viper Sting Insurance - Viper sting, yep you know that spell pve players never use. That one that was never used in pvp at 60? Its one of your best tools in arena. Mana draining a healer means an eventual end to the heals our focus is receiving. But Druids, Paladins and Shamans can dispel viper sting. But since dispel mechanics are random a stack of scorpion poison on a target reduces the chance of dispel from 1/1 (100%) to 1/6(16%). With an only 8 second duration this really helps keep your viper sting effective at draining a caster (even offensive) and locking in a win.
• Keeping Biotches in combat. An OOM healer is far from done if they can get out of combat. Out of combat = time to drink. Drink = 800mp5. Drink = bad. What will end up happening is a healer will call for a ccer to get a pet off them or kill it. With scorpid poison even if your pet is CC'd or killed you have an aditional 15 second (10 sec poison duration plus 5 to get out of combat after last dmg) window to get a shot in on the healer to keep them from drinking. This is invaluable. It also keeps a dpser from being able to bandage for 10 extra seconds.

Now alot of people complain about a lack of dash for getting into combat fast. Heres the problem if your pet goes in without other dps going in. Your pet is going to die. He has 0 resilience and a smaller HP pool. Defend your pet in arena it is one of your most important tools.

Welcome Peoples

Hey everyone,

So I'm sure you knew it was going to happen,

You know... read BRK alot... Comment on BRK alot... Get BRK to go LW for some leet epix!

Make a blog so you don't eat up all of BRK's bandwidth bantering about the Internet maths!

So here goes the start to what I hope will be a good source of information for hunters and I guess people wanting to help their hunters in raids or own hunters in pvp! So as a little background I've been playing wow for a little over a year. I've always played my hunter (troll baby!) and I've experienced level 60 raiding in Molten Core and Blackwing Lair as well as the old level 60 PvP craze. At 70 I raided a decent amount from Kara through to Void Reaver and Lurker below. So one thing I hope to bring to some hunters is good PvE tips and what to expect in some raids. But anyhow after a few months of far too much raiding (unfortunately not a casual guild) I decided to decrease my boss killing and increase my pvping. So as a change up to BRK's blog I'm hoping to provide some good insight into hunter PvP at 70 in BG's, Duels and Arena. This will be mostly as BM (since I find it to do better in 2's which I like) but I also do 5's as Imp Drains + Entrapment Marksmanship.

Now I'm not one of those crazy 2500 in all brackets players but as I develop my pvp (ness) I'm going to try and share some of the tips with you people out there. Hopefully someone else with more experience can point some things out as well.

Some of the ideas I was planning on making posts of soon are:
-Pet Choice (PvP, PvE and dashing good looks!!)
-Hunter PvP Talent Builds (41/17/3, 41/20/0, 41/4/16, 0/42/19)
-5to7: How to kite warriors while your partners bring them down without falling to an intercept+mace stun party
-Pillars: The forums are full of folks crying about them lets learn how to use them.
-Void Reaver: Oh Noes Get Your Balls Away From Meh! From a hunters perspective.

Anyhow hope to see everyone checking in!