A bit of news before I head to work though, It seems that Big Red Kitty, My all time favorite blogger has returned to the hunter scene to guide us through the Cataclysm Alpha, (at least.)

I can’t help but hope that this may turn into a more permanent return!

Happy hunting guys, keep checking in- updates and new guides shall be up within the week!

]]> http://then00bhunter.wordpress.com/2010/05/19/time-to-dust-the-site-off/feed/ 0 Ophe O_o http://then00bhunter.wordpress.com/2010/01/20/fun-with-pugs/ http://then00bhunter.wordpress.com/2010/01/20/fun-with-pugs/#comments Wed, 20 Jan 2010 23:09:53 +0000 Ophe http://then00bhunter.wordpress.com/?p=168 ]]> Sorry it’s been so long between posts, working retail is not condusive to raiding and blogging during the holiday season. Things are mellowing out now, so posts should be weekly once again, my apologies for running so far behind!

How to PuG!

I’ve run many cross-server instances on this point, mostly running with pugs on my alts. I’ve seen alot of interesting things hunters are doing out there, some of them good, some of them very bad, (melee hunter!). So I figured I’d write up a simple guide to making randoms a breeze!

Misdirect is Your Friend

When you hit the LFG system you run the risk of getting an under geared tank, or perhaps someone who is just learning, and despite their best efforts they just cannot hold aggro, thankfully we have a wonderful tool at our disposal to aid them: Misdirect. Misdirect will make your repair bill cheaper, and your healer will rejoice that you are not in-fact tanking things yourself.

Since they changed Misdirect in 3.3 it works alot better now, instead of only having three shots to help your tank with aggro you now have 4 seconds worth of attacks. So be sure to throw it on the tank as much as possible, but especially for boss fights.

If you are new to this spell it works like this:

1) Select the party member you want to receive your aggro

2) Hit the Misdirect Button, you have thirty seconds until it wears off

3) When you begin to shoot you will see the misdirect symbol now pops up over your head.

4) Pump as much aggro as you can into the next four seconds when you begin shooting, pop trinkets and cooldowns.

Oh Dear I still Have Aggro!

You misdirect but you see yourself climbing up the threat meter, it’s time to Feign Death! This is a temperamental spell to begin with, prone to being resisted at the worst possible times, but it is absolutely fabulous when it works, completely dropping all your threat.

In a nutshell you throw yourself on the ground and pretend to be dead.

That alone is a great reason to play a hunter, no other class gets to be classy like that, Paladins get Bubbles, Mages get Iceblock- we get to throw ourselves on the ground like a five year old.

My suggestions for the use of this spell:

1) Don’t wait until the last minute! There’s always the chance it will be resisted.

2) Using it and Misdirecting when you stand back up should solve most of your aggro issues.

3) If you are an engineer and have jumper cables it’s a quite handy tool to use in the event of a wipe,  rezzing the healer can save alot of frustrationin a pug.

4) If you accidentally pull a pat, and the rest of your group is not in combat, Feign Death and wait for them to pat away instead of running to your group and possibly causing a wipe.

A warning though, if your group does enter combat, your best bet is to quickly misdirect the mobs to the tank, and skip Feign Death, as that cold aggro them onto the healer.

WTF!? HOW DID THE BOSS GET PULLED?!

One of the bigger complaints I’m hearing from people is the lack of hunter pet management, or the lack of any pet at all. While I’ve covered what pets you should be bringing into heroics, I have not covered proper pet control.

You Rolled a Pet Class

You should always have a pet in any dps situation.  There is never any reason for a hunter to run without a pet! It’s always a dps loss, as your pet can do 10-13% of your dps, (much more than that if you are BM),  and some even provide you with buffs. No matter what spec you may be you should always have your loyal companion by your side.

Let the Tank Pull, Not Fluffy.

Upon entering a heroic your pet should be set on Passive, you never know what you’ll be walking into.  If you are quick with the passive button Defensive is acceptable,  but Aggressive is never ok! Also make sure that growl is turned off, so that your tank is not fighting with your  pet for aggro.

Fluffy Doesn’t Jump

Pets are not like us, they won’t jump from most ledges, they will instead choose to run around the long way, pulling any mob in their path. Be sure to dismiss your pet before jumping off of any ledge, (this spell is found in the Beat Mastery section of your spell book), calling it back when you jump down.

Be Nice to Your Fellow Puggers

Pugs can be rough, they don’t always go well, but you can also meet alot of great people and learn a few things along the way! I hope my guide has helped you make your pugs a better place.

Remember that in heroics people are still learning  try to make it a good experience for everyone involved!

Working retail, raiding, and social events are killing my blogging time!

Macros, a Tale of Woe!

Back in BC the macro was our primary source of dps. Our old dps”rotation” was spamming the steady shot macro, and hitting the Bestial Wrath button anytime it was off cooldown. There was no shot priority back then, as we didn’t want to waste our mana, even though Aspect of the Viper was very different back then.

Then the Global Cooldown, (commonly referred to as a GCD), was intorduced. You may be wondering what exactly  a Global Cooldown is, it is the time that must pass between actions taken by the player. They put these in the game to protect us from bots, as well as to curb people from spamming one button and ending up at the top of the dps meters, (hunters for example, lol…).

This isn’t to say that all Macro’s are now useless, far from it! There are many useful macros out there, it’s all about what works for you.

So What Can I Macro?

The simple answer to this is anything not on the GCD! As a hunter it means that you can macro these four spells in with other shots:

Deterrence
Kill Command
Readiness
Silencing Shot

Other than that you can macro for mouseovers, modifier macros,  or Aspect toggling. I Personally use very simple macros and in PvE this works just fine.

How to Macro

So you want to start using macros? Here’s a step by step guide!

1) Open your start menu and select the Macros option, this will open the macro window.

2) Pick out an icon and a name for your macro, no one else will see it, so it’s all up to you!

3) If you’ve found a macro on a website that you would like to copy simply select it, right-click and hit copy. (If you’re creating one from scratch skip this step)

4) Window back into WoW,and click your mouse in the Enter Macro Commands window

press the Ctrl button and the V button at the same time, and this should have pasted the macro in to the window.

5) Drag the icon button to your tool bar!

6) Test it out!

Macros I Use

Steady Shot/Kill Command Macro

#showtooltip Steady Shot
/cast Kill Command
/cast Steady Shot
/script UIErrorsFrame:Clear()

This macro triggers Kill Command when you forget it, useful little dps boost, especially for such an easily forgotten spell.

Aspect Macro

#showtooltip
/castsequence Aspect of the Dragonhawk, Aspect of the Viper

I personally like this one, it will automatically toggle you between Aspect of the Dragonhawk, or Aspect of the Viper, at the click of one button!

Silencing Shot Macro (MM Only)

#showtooltip Aimed Shot
/cast Silencing Shot
/cast Aimed Shot
/script UIErrorsFrame:Clear()

If you’re MM the extra dps boost from silencing shot is quite nice, this can be macrod into any, (or all) of your shots.

Master’s Call Macro

/cast [target=mouseover]Master’s Call

This macro is amazingly useful, you just roll your mouse over your target you want to free and hit the key you’ve bound it to. It’s great for any situation where you’re rooted to the ground. Think of Hodir’s Freeze ability, whoever is on dispell duty will love you for freeing yourself, or even on Elder Ironbranch, it instantly gets rid of Iron Roots.

How to NOT Macro

An example of a  consequence macro:

/castsequence reset=8 Chimera Shot, Aimed Shot, Arcane Shot, Steady Shot, Steady Shot

These macros are horrible for your dps, and only the lazy or misguided would ever use them. Please, if you have one of these delete it now, as you are severely jipping yourself out of a large chunk of dps.

What do you stare at raid after raid, besides your toon? Why, your UI of course! This is my introduction to helpful hunter add ons.

Why Should I get Addons?

The original blizzard interface becomes cluttered and messy,  and does not include things such as DBM, or Damage Meters. Taking out the clutter, and adding tools to measure your performance are very big steps on your way to being a successful hunter.

Where do I get Addons?

I go to Curse to get all of my add ons. I strongly suggest downloading the Curse Client, to download your addons automatically. This tool will also run in the background and allow you to easily keep addons updated, and is especially handy after a major patch.

Basic Mods Everyone Should Have!

Deadly Boss Mods

Deadly boss mods is one of the greatest addons ever created! While you should be aware enough to notice when you are standing in fire, this add on is a fail-safe against it. Alerting you to boss special moves, and fight mechanics this is a must have for any raider.

Recount

The joy of being the top dps, or even the failure of a glyph change can be recorded here. Recount is the mod that tells you just how well you’re performing from a dps stand point. However, don’t get dps tunnel vision, and forget to move out of fires,  remember you can’t dps if you’re dead.

Omen

Unless you want to take your chance at hunter tanking, be sure to download a threat meter, omen is my personal favorite. Be sure to Feign Death as your threat inches closer to your tanks.

Personalizing Your UI

Now that you have your basic addons for raiding and running instances, perhaps you want to clean up your UI. Here are my suggestions!

X-Perl

X-Perl is a unit frames mod. This means that when you join a raid group you will be able to see everyone in the raid, and their pets if you so choose. This also will show you when they are in combat, who is taking damage, and who is still alive.

If you have assist you can set your tanks, and see their targets. This feature opens a window for your Main Tanks and their targets, this is insanely helpful for misdirects.

Dominos

This is the mod I use to arrange my action bars. It opens them all up and allows you to place them however you want on your screen, even hiding them until you mouse over  if you so choose. This mod also allows you to easily keybind.

OmniCC and Dominos Buff Times

When used in conjunction with Dominos these show the buff/debuff times for spells that you cast on action buttons as a timer and as a cooldown in addition to coloring the borders of the buttons. Think of it as a bright glaring reminder to get your shots off in time.

Sexy Map

Sexy map is a lovely little addon that will show you who’s pinging the map in your group by name, which is helpful for raid explanations, and lets you edit the appearance and placement of your map in many ways.

FuBar

A smooth little addon, with lots of little plug ins. It’s a small tool bar on the top or bottom of your screen, and here are the plug ins I use:

DurabilityFu Shows your armor and weapon durability at a glance, and will automaticly repair you at any vendor.

TopScoreFu Saves your biggest hits, and keeps track of your top hit for all your shots.  Purely for bragging purposes

RecountFu Pulls up recount whenever you need it, at the click of a button.

OMG! My Screen is a Mess!

So you’ve downloaded a few addons, and now your screen is a jumble of boxes, stats, things are yelling at you and you have no idea why.This means it’s time to step back and start configuring your addons to your personal preferences. This is why UI mods are so great, you get to do whatever you want to your UI!

I do have a few suggestions.

1) Make sure you have plenty of open screen space.

A cluttered UI, where you can’t even see the boss is hurting more than it’s helping, make sure to mess with the scale options if this is an issue.

2)Set things up to the benefit of your play style.

If you never use a certain spell, then there’s no point in letting it take up space on your screen, take the time to evaluate what you actually use.

3)Go to a battle ground and test some things out!

Testing out things in a battleground is alot less costly than possibly wiping a group while fiddling with your settings

If you are just starting off you should not focus on Arp!

Do not even consider gemming for ArP until you are in Ulduar and Trail of the Champion gear, and only then if you have a minimum of 45% crit, 4500 AP without Trueshot Aura or Dragonhawk and 700 ArP strictly from gear.

ArP Trinkets

These trinkets are Grim Toll, which drops off several bosses in 25 man Naxxaramas, Moljnir Runestone, which drops off of 10 man Thorim, hard mode, and Deathbringer’s Will which drops from Deathbringer Saurfang in ICC 25. If you can’t get any of these Banner of Victory, from five man TotC, and the Needle-Encrusted Scorpion, from The Forge of Souls, are both very good alternatives.

Don’t Overdo It!

Assuming you have the correct gear it’s time to start thinking about gemming for ArP, Fractured Cardinal Ruby adds 20 Armor Penetration to your gear, and fills a red socket.

Now before you start shoving ArP gems into every socket you have you should know that there is a cap! If you have Grim Toll, you need 789 additional ArP from gear, gems, food and elixirs, with Moljnir Runestone, you only need  735 additional ArP. At about 900 ArP from gear or gems it’s time to drop any ArP trinkets you may have, and at 1400 it’s time to stop gemming for ArP at all and time to go back to agility gems.

Arcane Shot

Arcane shot is something else effected by ArP, even if you’re not gemming for it, and do not have the trinkets. At around 350 ArP from your gear it becomes more benificial to spec yourself out of improved arcane shot and into improved steady. After this you remove arcane shot from your rotation unless you are moving.

Survival, Beast Mastery, and Armor Penetration

These two specs would never want to gem for ArP, for various reasons. Survival hunters would not benifit from an ArP  set up because explosive shot doesn’t benifit from armor penetartion,  not to mention all the lovely agility they would lose by gemming for it. Any Beastmaster hunters that may gem for ArP are severely nerfing their pets dps by doing so- as pets do not benift from ArP.

This isn’t to say that it is a bad stat for them though! It still effects all the physical damage done, therefore it is still something to look for on gear no matter what spec you may be.

So you got a fancy upgrade, now it’s time to get some gems

Meta Gem:

Relentless Earthsiege Diamond

the 21 agility  and 3% increased Critical strike damage can’t be beat! Not to mention the fact that a single Nightmare tear will fill all gem requirements for it.

Prismatic Gems:

The nightmare tear will fill all your meta gem needs, and will net you a nice socket bonus as well. These wonderful little gems give you +10 to all stats, and will match ANY color socket.

Red Socket:

Agility gems give you crit and attack power, this is the best gem for all specs at this point.

Yellow/Orange Sockets:

If you’re not hit capped by all means go Yellow for hit, but never gem for haste- this stat is not something you want to gem for, it will come naturally on your gear.

Orange is the color I generally fill yellow sockets with, if you are hit capped, go Agility/Crit and Hit/Agility, if you’re under the hit cap.

Blue, Green, and Purple Gems:

You will gain more dps from using a red gem in a blue socket, then going for the measly socket bonus and using a sub-par gem. The only exception to this is your Nightmare tear.

What Pet do I use for Leveling?

I get asked this a lot, and by a lot I mean almost once a day. Personally I prefer an old fashioned Gorilla for leveling, due to the fact that they have Pummel, which interrupts casters. It’s almost like having your own personal warrior tank. Now any tenacity pet will get the job done but there are a couple stand out members of this particular pet tree.

Gorillas: They have pummel they were originally the only pet with thunder stomp, which made leveling a breeze. Just send in your Gorilladin stand back and volley.  I highly suggest this for any starting hunter.

Turtles: These critters gain extra survivability with Shell Shield, so when you pull 1,000 extra mobs with your Volley they’ll still be alive to bail you out and hold aggro.

Please remember though, when you’re in an instance Tenacity pets are a big no-no. They’ll pull aggro with many of their skills even with growl turned off, so be sure to have a ferocity pet in the stables if you decide to run with a group.

What do I raid with?

Preferably a Wolf. These pets were always lack luster until the improvements to Furious Howl when it was revamped to give 320 AP to hunter and pet for 20 seconds.  This stacks with raid buffs and is up for about 50% of the time. If you insist on raiding with another pet, for the sake of being different, Cat or Raptor should set you apart from the crowd without getting you laughed out of a raid. These pets were the preferred dps before the buff to wolves.

If you’re BM Devilsaurs are your best bet, I mean you’re already raiding as BM may as well be raiding with a freaking dinosaur. But seriously, Monstrous Bite is pretty awesome.

I’m so Awesome I want to PvP too!

This admittedly is where my advice is it’s weakest. I personally pvp with my spider. In battlegrounds spiders are preferred because they have a web that will hold your enemy in place up to four seconds.  This comes in pretty handy- as it allows you to shoot a ret pally a couple times before they melt your face!

In arena, from the research I’ve done SV is the premier spec to be, with a crab as your pet. Crabs also have a pin ability to hold your enemy in place, but with this they also have the Roar of Sacrifice, (all tenacity pets have the ability to gain this), which makes them slightly better than spiders for arena. Though this ability was nerfed in patch 3.2, because hunter’s aren’t supposed to win at arena.

Survival or Marksman Pets

Beastmaster Pets
(This spec includes the 4 extra points from taking the Beast Master 51 point talent.)

A warning though this set up is for best dps, not survivability, if you have issues with not moving your pet out of bad things such as Void Zones, Fire, and etc. then you may want to sacrifice something for Heart of the Phoenix.

When Starting out make sure to throw Serpent Sting on the target, and Hunters Mark (before the pull if possible)
Burn rapid fire then readiness as soon as you can on a boss fight- so that the cool down will be up more than once. Now as Marksmen we have the option of macroing in Silencing Shot to our Steadies since it is not on the global cool down, if mana is not an issue for you it’s a nice little dps boost. This works great in 25 mans, but in 10 mans if there’s no mana regen it can be a drain.

Survival
Kill Shot
Explosive Shot
Black Arrow
Serpent Sting
Multi-Shot/Aimed
Steady Shot

Again be sure to Hunters mark your target before the pull if possible. Black arrow is now how we get Lock and Load to proc so be sure to keep it up on your target as much as possible. Depending on spec you may or may not have aimed shot. Pop rapid fire and such so that its cooldown is up more than once per boss fight.

Beastmastery
Kill Shot
Multi-shot
Arcane Shot
Serpent Sting
Steady Shot

Hunters mark the target- pop Beastial wrath asap, then proceed onto rapid fire. Keeping Serpent Sting on the target and popping Beastial Wrath whenever it’s up.