Septic you forgot about polymorph. If the mage is looking to restore his cooldown you may get polymorphed. While your a sheep he can re focus the elemental on your pet and drop it. For the BG the max you are sheeped is 12secs but he can just recast it on you as long as he keeps an eye on you. This happened to me in AB. After he droped my pet he bandage and channeled mana. Then made me into an ice cube.
The clothy I hate fighting the most in BG is Locks. I am able to kill them but if I can't sit down to eat or have a potion handy the DoT will kill me. If the spec'ed so they have that warrior pet its that much easier of a fight with Freeze trap.
I tested against both Polymorph as an opener and Polymorph to regain cooldowns. There never really is a good place to slip this in, and I would have to be really off my reaction time not to interrupt it with Feign, Scatter, or Silencing. The majority of the time my opponent tried to cast it instead of doing something else, my interruption threw him off enough for me to get the edge. This mainly would happen because he had to plant his feet for the casting time. The very few times he did get it off to regain cooldowns, I put my pet on his pet, and his went down like a chump (having taken a Multi hit). We were basically reset only I didn't have my trinket, he didn't have Cold Snap, he was in my dead zone, and neither of us had pets. He would pop Frostbolt, Frost Nova, CoC, and then I would Scatter and Freezing Trap. Without Ice Block, I move out to range and end it. Without using Polymorph, he was about 80/20. With Polymorph, slipped in at various times, he was about the opposite. That is, of course, assuming he starts in Blink range.
Septic on
For victory we ride, fury of the storm!
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Lord DaveGrief CauserBitch Free ZoneRegistered Userregular
I'm thinking of switching to this as my new spec.
Questions? Comments?
Pet attack speeds are still getting the nerfbat right? I really want to get one of those spiders with the insane attack speed from ZG but I dont know how long I'll actually get to use it before it becomes just another pet.
Is that for leveling or for theoretical pre-expansion raiding?
Unless you have a giant boner for lightning breath, Serpent's Swiftness and The Beast Within are pretty hard to pass up.
Also, Improved Revive Pet is kind of a waste. Your pet shouldn't be dying, right?
I stay in the top 5 on the Naxx damage meters with this build and my trusty bear Pooh, who I refuse to give up for a pet with useful abilities. And my group loves the 3% damage buff that is up almost non-stop.
I'm thinking of switching to this as my new spec.
Questions? Comments?
Pet attack speeds are still getting the nerfbat right? I really want to get one of those spiders with the insane attack speed from ZG but I dont know how long I'll actually get to use it before it becomes just another pet.
Is that for leveling or for theoretical pre-expansion raiding?
Unless you have a giant boner for lightning breath, Serpent's Swiftness and The Beast Within are pretty hard to pass up.
Also, Improved Revive Pet is kind of a waste. Your pet shouldn't be dying, right?
I stay in the top 5 on the Naxx damage meters with this build and my trusty bear Pooh, who I refuse to give up for a pet with useful abilities. And my group loves the 3% damage buff that is up almost non-stop.
So far I fucking love it. The hyena I'm leveling is only 51 and he holds his own against 59s and 60s in EPL. After 60 levels of marks, (with a few weeks at 60 spent survival), this is a nice change.
I've never cared about the "hot" pets. I've never had a humar, or a broken tooth, or a ZG bat, or any of that shit. I leveled a Raptor for 35 levels. Now I've got my black Hinterlands Troll Worg (weeaboo) whom I love, a ZG tiger named Snarf, and the purple hyena from the Blasted Lands that Dely named when after himself when I let him play my account.
I look forward to the expansion when every jackhole in the outlands has a ravager.
I'm thinking of switching to this as my new spec.
Questions? Comments?
Pet attack speeds are still getting the nerfbat right? I really want to get one of those spiders with the insane attack speed from ZG but I dont know how long I'll actually get to use it before it becomes just another pet.
Is that for leveling or for theoretical pre-expansion raiding?
Unless you have a giant boner for lightning breath, Serpent's Swiftness and The Beast Within are pretty hard to pass up.
Also, Improved Revive Pet is kind of a waste. Your pet shouldn't be dying, right?
I stay in the top 5 on the Naxx damage meters with this build and my trusty bear Pooh, who I refuse to give up for a pet with useful abilities. And my group loves the 3% damage buff that is up almost non-stop.
So far I fucking love it. The hyena I'm leveling is only 51 and he holds his own against 59s and 60s in EPL. After 60 levels of marks, (with a few weeks at 60 spent survival), this is a nice change.
I've never cared about the "hot" pets. I've never had a humar, or a broken tooth, or a ZG bat, or any of that shit. I leveled a Raptor for 35 levels. Now I've got my black Hinterlands Troll Worg (weeaboo) whom I love, a ZG tiger named Snarf, and the purple hyena from the Blasted Lands that Dely named when after himself when I let him play my account.
I look forward to the expansion when every jackhole in the outlands has a ravager.
Manifest, if you're grinding a lot, especially for leveling in the expansion, you may want to give up the 3 points in Hawk Eye and go for either Improved Mark, another point of Improved Mend, or Spirit Bond. I know, I love Hawk Eye too, but I've found it less and less useful these days.
50% of the jackholes in beta seems to have wind serpents.
There's a bug, or at least a wierdness, in how our AP buff works on Wind Serpents. Because their breath attack is basically unlimited with BM talents and they get a nice boost to their RAP, blammo, we have a million wind serpent hunters.
In addendum, don't bother raiding in the 2-3 weeks before BC.
I think everyone's basically just PvPing their asses off right now.
BM looks the best for pure damage.
My real beef with BM for raiding is you're basically always keeping your pet by your side, unless you know the boss or pull doesn't have some sort of Cleave or AoE that'll murderize your dood... and Ferocious Inspiration [what I hear the most hype about when it comes to BM DPS] is dependent upon your pet critting.
It's probably due to plain old ignorance -- I've never raided anything other than MC, Ony, UBRS and the 20-mans -- so I probably don't know if there're lots of pulls/bosses in BWL and beyond where your pet will actually survive in the thick of things to give you your buff and additional DPS.
But having gone from 1-60 as BM with a minor in MM, and having raided as MM/Survival [PRE-2.0] ... I'm very much biased towards MM and Survival for any sort of raiding spec.
In addendum, don't bother raiding in the 2-3 weeks before BC.
I think everyone's basically just PvPing their asses off right now.
BM looks the best for pure damage.
My real beef with BM for raiding is you're basically always keeping your pet by your side, unless you know the boss or pull doesn't have some sort of Cleave or AoE that'll murderize your dood... and Ferocious Inspiration [what I hear the most hype about when it comes to BM DPS] is dependent upon your pet critting.
It's probably due to plain old ignorance -- I've never raided anything other than MC, Ony, UBRS and the 20-mans -- so I probably don't know if there're lots of pulls/bosses in BWL and beyond where your pet will actually survive in the thick of things to give you your buff and additional DPS.
But having gone from 1-60 as BM with a minor in MM, and having raided as MM/Survival [PRE-2.0] ... I'm very much biased towards MM and Survival for any sort of raiding spec.
i've been marks since level 40 and never looked back. Although if you are planning on doing 10 man or heroic shit as a hunter expect to find BM the most useful spec.
In addendum, don't bother raiding in the 2-3 weeks before BC.
I think everyone's basically just PvPing their asses off right now.
BM looks the best for pure damage.
My real beef with BM for raiding is you're basically always keeping your pet by your side, unless you know the boss or pull doesn't have some sort of Cleave or AoE that'll murderize your dood... and Ferocious Inspiration [what I hear the most hype about when it comes to BM DPS] is dependent upon your pet critting.
It's probably due to plain old ignorance -- I've never raided anything other than MC, Ony, UBRS and the 20-mans -- so I probably don't know if there're lots of pulls/bosses in BWL and beyond where your pet will actually survive in the thick of things to give you your buff and additional DPS.
But having gone from 1-60 as BM with a minor in MM, and having raided as MM/Survival [PRE-2.0] ... I'm very much biased towards MM and Survival for any sort of raiding spec.
i've been marks since level 40 and never looked back. Although if you are planning on doing 10 man or heroic shit as a hunter expect to find BM the most useful spec.
I hear CC is crucial in Heroic stuff, and that's basically the only PvE advantage Survival has over the other specs.
My real beef with BM for raiding is you're basically always keeping your pet by your side, unless you know the boss or pull doesn't have some sort of Cleave or AoE that'll murderize your dood... and Ferocious Inspiration [what I hear the most hype about when it comes to BM DPS] is dependent upon your pet critting.
Well that's the thing, it's my understanding that the greater survivability that pets received has made it easier for them(there were already plenty of fights pre-patch where pets could go in).
I mean what, 8k health and 4-5k armor with a high resist of your choosing sounds pretty good to me.
In addendum, don't bother raiding in the 2-3 weeks before BC.
I think everyone's basically just PvPing their asses off right now.
BM looks the best for pure damage.
My real beef with BM for raiding is you're basically always keeping your pet by your side, unless you know the boss or pull doesn't have some sort of Cleave or AoE that'll murderize your dood... and Ferocious Inspiration [what I hear the most hype about when it comes to BM DPS] is dependent upon your pet critting.
It's probably due to plain old ignorance -- I've never raided anything other than MC, Ony, UBRS and the 20-mans -- so I probably don't know if there're lots of pulls/bosses in BWL and beyond where your pet will actually survive in the thick of things to give you your buff and additional DPS.
But having gone from 1-60 as BM with a minor in MM, and having raided as MM/Survival [PRE-2.0] ... I'm very much biased towards MM and Survival for any sort of raiding spec.
I'm pretty sure that a few of the hunters in my raid are doing naxx with their BM builds. Pets are very durable now.
Also, Ferocious Inspiration apparently stacks.
GABBO GABBO GABBO on
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Nova_CI have the needThe need for speedRegistered Userregular
My real beef with BM for raiding is you're basically always keeping your pet by your side, unless you know the boss or pull doesn't have some sort of Cleave or AoE that'll murderize your dood... and Ferocious Inspiration [what I hear the most hype about when it comes to BM DPS] is dependent upon your pet critting.
Well that's the thing, it's my understanding that the greater survivability that pets received has made it easier for them(there were already plenty of fights pre-patch where pets could go in).
I mean what, 8k health and 4-5k armor with a high resist of your choosing sounds pretty good to me.
My Wind Serpent has 4.5K health and 7K armor.
But still. :P He can offtank anything in 20 mans or less. And because of the range attack, I can send him in and pull him back, using just LB on bosses/mobs with stuff like cleave.
So I'm going to play a Hunter again at some point. Since I remember they changed Agility...is it still the top stat to get? Or is raw ATP preferable? Any other stats to worry about?
Agil only gives 1 RAP now, but they changed the formulas for crit and hit and dodge from agil as well, so you get more of each per point.
Focus on +ap, though, yes.
Also, traps are usable in combat, are instant cast, and can't go off before 2 seconds after being placed.
Aimed Shot now resets your auto-shot timer, so no free auto-shot right after an aimed shot.
Arcane shot gets 20% of your RAP added to its damage, and no longer shares a cooldown with Aimed Shot.
And pets scale, getting a portion of your armor and ap and such added to their stats... but don't worry about getting a fast or slow attack speed pet, as patch 2.0.3 is going to normalize attack speeds for pets to 2.0.
Question 1: Can someone tell me why I shouldn't go hunter over a warlock?
Question 2: If pet speeds are all 2.0, does that mean that there's no point camping for rare spawns with faster attack speeds? And does that mean that your cat hits just as hard and just as much auto-attack as a bear, but the only difference is their abilities and armour and the like?
Question 1: Can someone tell me why I shouldn't go hunter over a warlock?
Question 2: If pet speeds are all 2.0, does that mean that there's no point camping for rare spawns with faster attack speeds? And does that mean that your cat hits just as hard and just as much auto-attack as a bear, but the only difference is their abilities and armour and the like?
DPS is independent from attack speed. The cat will still hit for more each swing.
The point in choosing between different pets is:
a) selection of pet-specific abilities
b) different base armoring
c) different base DPS
d) looks
Question 1: Can someone tell me why I shouldn't go hunter over a warlock?
Question 2: If pet speeds are all 2.0, does that mean that there's no point camping for rare spawns with faster attack speeds? And does that mean that your cat hits just as hard and just as much auto-attack as a bear, but the only difference is their abilities and armour and the like?
DPS is independent from attack speed. The cat will still hit for more each swing.
Ah, thanks. Question 1 remains open... and now to question 3...
3. Kiting: Do people really kite using the run/jump/spin 180/spinback/land mechanic? It sounds:
a) a pain in the ass
b) a bit OTT
c) a pain in the ass
The official WoW boards (yeah, I know) also mention what they call "jousting": run at the opponent, wing clip and run out the other end, turn and shoot. That makes way more sense to me, and would definitely be how I play. They say you'd have to go survivalist for that to work, but it sounds the most logical thing to do. I'd be going BM with my hunter.
Question 1: Can someone tell me why I shouldn't go hunter over a warlock?
Question 2: If pet speeds are all 2.0, does that mean that there's no point camping for rare spawns with faster attack speeds? And does that mean that your cat hits just as hard and just as much auto-attack as a bear, but the only difference is their abilities and armour and the like?
Well, my main is a 60 hunter, and I have 41 warlock, and they are both pretty fun. Both can solo any god damn thing 3-4 levels over theirs, and both have pets to tank for you or help kill things. But they are differant in some key ways.
Hunter Pros: No resisting (except traps). Yea you have to deal with missing, but thats a lot easier to deal with than a million fucking resists. And (last I checked) none of that glancing blow crap melee folk have to deal with.
Feign Death, the most awesome skill in the game. Oh shit I pulled 5 mobs? Hit Feign Death and those guys go running back, sure Fluffy might die, but it beats a corpse run.
Not entirely mana dependant Hunters can burn through their mana bar quickly, but even when they do auto shot can hit hard enough to fill in the gaps.
Hunter Cons: Crowd control. Hunters have one CC, granted it is a lot more usable now that traps can be placed in combat, but I found that when I was leveling I could only take two, maybe three mobs, before poor Fluffy got killed and I had to run for the hills.
Ammo and Ammo pouches. Upgrading and filling these damn things can be a bit expensive, not to mention losing a bag slot sucks.
Fluffy eats too god damn much. Feeding my pet sucked, between that and ammo I was often short on cash while leveling.
Mana usage, auto shot is great and all, but being out of mana sucks, this is especially an issue on long boss fights where running out of mana means a nice dps loss. Soloing at 60 I often find myself blowing through my mana bar and then having to prey to god that I tick up to 80 mana so I can Feign Death before some colossal fucking dinosaur eats me alive (this happens less with new and improved growl, but its still a hazard at times), from a pvp perspective, I can kill just about anything in pvp, but I can empty my mana pool killing just one person (or two people in quick succession) and then if someone else runs up with killing on their mind, I'm hard pressed to do well if I dont have a mana pot or enough mana to get off a freezing trap
Warlock Pros: DoTs. Dotting something up and then fearing it while it slowly dies may not be the most mana efficeitn strat, but its fun to watch.
Fear. Fear, combined with just about anything else you do (dots or shadowbolts), is an awesome tool, something gets too close, fear it the hell away, using this my warlock was able to take 4-ish on level mobs just Dotting and fear kiting the little bastards, this becomes a lot easier when you get howl of terror.
Soul shards (and soul shard related products). Soul shard management was never an issue for me, perhaps because it is similar to ammo since it takes up a ton of space, but the things you use soul shards for are tons of fun. Healthstones are useful, soul stones are awesome, summoning, the new spell stone things are good and, of course, pets.
Pets. Warlock pets are better than hunter pets because they level up with you, and you dont have to feed the bastards. Granted they all cost a soul shard and ton-o-mana but that doesnt make them any less useful. Just have to make sure you have the right pet out before you attack.
ife tap (and dark pact if you spec that way). These are very useful spells. If you kill something, but right before it dies, the little fucker calls for help or something, if you only have enough mana left for a fear, you can fear it, life tap back to full (or close to full) dot the guy, bandage and you're back in the game. Dark pact is also fun, because pets tend to regen a fair amount of mana per tick and you can just dark pact it off of them while they are generating it.
Stamina. Warlocks can get a lot of stamina, and they can use it to refill mana, even if you're in cloth, a warlock with 6k health and soul link isn't going to get two shotted by very many things (at least as far as i can tell, have not experimented with this myself, but I've shot a couple soul link locks, they dont go down as quickly as i would like)
Deathcoil. Alternatively known as "lolcoil" and "skill-coil", deathcoil is a badass spell, it can be a nice "fuck you" before you die, or a good tool for in combat, My lock is till half a level away from this spell, but all observed uses of death coil point to it being very awesome.
Warlock Cons: Fucking cloth. Being squishy sucks. leather and mail are a little better. Stamina and spec can help make up for this though.
Resisted messages despite talents to avoid it, you still get resisted a fair amount by higher level mobs, resulting in a waste of mana.
Specialized pets: Warlock pets are good, but they cost a lot of mana, and if in the middle of combat you suddenly need a tank instead of a half naked demon slut with a whip, you may be out of luck, while hunter pets hit hard and they tank well, hunter pets dont have many of the specialized things that warlock pets do (Sacrifice, seduce, that spell lock thingy the felhunter does)
Fear has its risks and downsides, most those are "Oh fuck that raptor just got feared into more raptors, now they all want to come play"
No Feign Death. Warlocks dont seem to have a nice "Oh shit button" like feign death, mind you I'm no expert in the field of warlockery, but thats just what I've seen.
Life tap. Its nice, but in an uncontrolled setting (STV for example) life tapping sometimes results in being a) one shotted by some random player passing by, or b) being one shotted by some stealthed panther in the bush.
As for the pet speed thing, you are correct, there is no longer any reason to camp rare spawns, it is now (or rather, will soon be) all about which abilities you like best, I like being able to shadowmeld in a corner and have my pet stealth too, dont have to worry about any monsters passing by seeing Fluffy, and I dont have to worry about my pet giving away my position in pvp. And I think (but dont know for sure) that all pets have the same DPS currently and to balance it out, slow pets hit harder, and fast pets hit softer, so when the next patch hits, pets will still have the same DPS, but they will also have to same damage range.
Well, shit. I hope that was helpful and I wasnt just stating crap you already knew and had thought about, but they are probably my two favorite classes, and no matter which class you pick you will be making a solid choice. Sorry that doesnt help settle your dilemma, but it just comes down to which class has tools you like more :P
Shit, that took too forver to type and its too fucking long.
The 'oh shit' button for Warlocks is usually sacrificing your Voidwalker. Then run awaaaaayyyy.
except in pvp when it just gets dispelled.
Except he was looking for something to replace feign death. Which doesn't help you get away from players...
then.. then why do I see hunters employ feign death all the time? I always thought it was some clever hunter pvp trick.
Bew! Bew! Bew! on
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KwoaruConfident SmirkFlawless Golden PecsRegistered Userregular
edited January 2007
now to question 3...
3. Kiting: Do people really kite using the run/jump/spin 180/spinback/land mechanic? It sounds:
a) a pain in the ass
b) a bit OTT
c) a pain in the ass
The official WoW boards (yeah, I know) also mention what they call "jousting": run at the opponent, wing clip and run out the other end, turn and shoot. That makes way more sense to me, and would definitely be how I play. They say you'd have to go survivalist for that to work, but it sounds the most logical thing to do. I'd be going BM with my hunter.
Using the jousting method is a good way to get a kite started, it lets you put some distance between you and your target. Another thing that works is strafing, if you strafe you dont have to turn all the way, some times not at all. The jump kite method is not as big a pain in the ass as it sounds, except maybe going up hills. I jump kite things often, using the wing clip jousting to get some intial distance, but its worth it to practice jump kiting so you dont get hit, because the times jump kiting is important is when you're up against something that can't be slowed, and hits like a fucking truck.
(I'm a 60 hunter on a PvE server so most of what I said is PvE related, but whatever)
Kwoaru on
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KwoaruConfident SmirkFlawless Golden PecsRegistered Userregular
The 'oh shit' button for Warlocks is usually sacrificing your Voidwalker. Then run awaaaaayyyy.
except in pvp when it just gets dispelled.
Except he was looking for something to replace feign death. Which doesn't help you get away from players...
then.. then why do I see hunters employ feign death all the time? I always thought it was some clever hunter pvp trick.
When a mage is casting a nice 3k+ fireball, if I hit Feign Death close to the end of the cast (made easier thanks to the new blizzard casting bar) i just bought myself another few seconds to run away, or let a cool down finish, or just mess the mage up in general. Same applies for fear and polymorph and aimedshot.
[edit] The only people fooled by Feign Death in pvp are idiots and new players, of course if I was close to death, Feign Death some times tricks them long enough for me to pop and shoot somebody, but at that point I'm so close to dead I can't get a whole lot accomplished before somebody notices and hits me with a wand or something.
The 'oh shit' button for Warlocks is usually sacrificing your Voidwalker. Then run awaaaaayyyy.
except in pvp when it just gets dispelled.
Except he was looking for something to replace feign death. Which doesn't help you get away from players...
then.. then why do I see hunters employ feign death all the time? I always thought it was some clever hunter pvp trick.
It can potentially get you out of combat and I think it makes them lose their target. If the person is half decent though you should still die. Also a lot of hunters are still doing the feign+trap which as far as I know isn't needed anymore but ...
I've played Warlock to 40ish, and I agreed with pretty much everything you said, Kwoaru. My problem with warlock is that, like hunters, you do generally just cycle abilities: Immolate -> Corruption -> Curse of Something -> Wand and repeat. And that's fine, and the hunter has exactly the same aspect (from what I have seen) with the shot weaving. However, it's not me that I enjoy about the class; it's having pets. I enjoy watching people die from far away, without my help. DoTs do this, but so do the hunters strong pets. Warlock pets are very sweet, but like you confirmed for me, they are a little more situational, and a little weaker than hunter pets.
Levelling my test hunter from 1-10 has been a blast, and when I got my cat to actually keep the mobs off me, I was blown away by how much fun I was having.
I don't mind the idea of feeding or arrow hoarding being any worse off than shard farming, and FD does sound like a godsend. I also will be playing for short bursts of time, so the tracking skills might help me push through a quest a little quicker (which is important to me for keeping off girlfriend aggro).
I don't mind doing less damage than warlock in BGs either, as I naturally prefer flag room defence, so a freezing trap and concussive shot/wing clip would do wonders there.
I think hunter meshes well into the way I want to play, but I was scared off by the idea of spin kiting and jazz like that, when I find fear kiting much simpler and less spastic looking. The seeming reliance on traps looked like it wasted time, but now they are instant-cast (even if they take two seconds to arm) I am much less concerned about that. Also, I looked at Thott and saw the warlock had a shitton of skills, and, just like my shaman, I never really used them all.
I think I will roll a hunter, and hope the kiting thing doesn't prove too off-putting.
I've played Warlock to 40ish, and I agreed with pretty much everything you said. My problem with warlock is that, like hunters, you do generally just cycle abilities: Immolate -> Corruption -> Curse of Something -> Wand and repeat. And that's fine, and the hunter has exactly the same aspect (from what I have seen) with the shot weaving. However, it's not me that I enjoy about the class; it's having pets. I enjoy watching people die from far away, without my help. DoTs do this, but so do the hunters strong pets. Warlock pets are very sweet, but like you confirmed for me, they are a little more situational, and a little weaker than hunter pets.
Levelling my test hunter from 1-10 has been a blast, and when I got my cat to actually keep the mobs off me, I was blown away by how much fun I was having.
I don't mind the idea of feeding or arrow hoarding being any worse off than shard farming, and FD does sound like a godsend. I also will be playing for short bursts of time, so the tracking skills might help me push through a quest a little quicker (which is important to me for keeping off girlfriend aggro).
I don't mind doing less damage than warlock in BGs either, as I naturally prefer flag room defence, so a freezing trap and concussive shot/wing clip would do wonders there.
I think hunter meshes well into the way I want to play, but I was scared off by the idea of spin kiting and jazz like that, when I find fear kiting much simpler and less spastic looking. The seeming reliance on traps looked like it wasted time, but now they are instant-cast (even if they take two seconds to arm) I am much less concerned about that. Also, I looked at Thott and saw the warlock had a shitton of skills, and, just like my shaman, I never really used them all.
I think I will roll a hunter, and hope the kiting thing doesn't prove too off-putting.
Well I'm glad that wall of text wasn't useless, and let me be the first to welcome you to the proud ranks of an excellent class. Ignore the cat calls from the other classes, they're just jealous, and get ready to roll on everything. That magister's staff of healing? Roll need, if no one else can undestand that you need it for mend pet, they're all just nubs :twisted:
Rogues only lose their combo points on a target if they start building combo points on a seperate target. Losing your target then reselecting them doesn't matter. At least in TBC.
It's really situational. If you're in the middle of a large fight, your opponents are going to want to move on to the next target as soon as you die. Choosing to confirm the kill is a risk of a precious few seconds, and Hunters can use any hesitation to buy them time to get away, clear a cooldown, or set a trap to escape.
In addition to possibly tricking a hurried or bad opponent, it interrupts spells being cast on you and makes all opponents lose you as their target. If your attacker is far away or you are in a crowd of people, you can make it difficult for someone to retarget you. Feigning Death has the added benefit of sending pets back to their owners, so you will often see Hunters feigning against Hunter pets, Warlock pets, Treants, Water Elementals, etc.
Septic on
For victory we ride, fury of the storm!
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Lord DaveGrief CauserBitch Free ZoneRegistered Userregular
I'm thinking of switching to this as my new spec.
Questions? Comments?
Pet attack speeds are still getting the nerfbat right? I really want to get one of those spiders with the insane attack speed from ZG but I dont know how long I'll actually get to use it before it becomes just another pet.
Is that for leveling or for theoretical pre-expansion raiding?
Unless you have a giant boner for lightning breath, Serpent's Swiftness and The Beast Within are pretty hard to pass up.
Also, Improved Revive Pet is kind of a waste. Your pet shouldn't be dying, right?
I stay in the top 5 on the Naxx damage meters with this build and my trusty bear Pooh, who I refuse to give up for a pet with useful abilities. And my group loves the 3% damage buff that is up almost non-stop.
So far I fucking love it. The hyena I'm leveling is only 51 and he holds his own against 59s and 60s in EPL. After 60 levels of marks, (with a few weeks at 60 spent survival), this is a nice change.
I've never cared about the "hot" pets. I've never had a humar, or a broken tooth, or a ZG bat, or any of that shit. I leveled a Raptor for 35 levels. Now I've got my black Hinterlands Troll Worg (weeaboo) whom I love, a ZG tiger named Snarf, and the purple hyena from the Blasted Lands that Dely named when after himself when I let him play my account.
I look forward to the expansion when every jackhole in the outlands has a ravager.
This weekend was good to me.
Between Friday and sunday I got, black brood pauldrons, Dragonstalker boots, my devilsaur eye (HOLY SHIT THEY UPPED THE DROP RATE ON WAVETHRASHER SCALES), ancient sinew wrapped lamina, and Don Julio's band.
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The clothy I hate fighting the most in BG is Locks. I am able to kill them but if I can't sit down to eat or have a potion handy the DoT will kill me. If the spec'ed so they have that warrior pet its that much easier of a fight with Freeze trap.
Is that for leveling or for theoretical pre-expansion raiding?
Unless you have a giant boner for lightning breath, Serpent's Swiftness and The Beast Within are pretty hard to pass up.
Also, Improved Revive Pet is kind of a waste. Your pet shouldn't be dying, right?
I stay in the top 5 on the Naxx damage meters with this build and my trusty bear Pooh, who I refuse to give up for a pet with useful abilities. And my group loves the 3% damage buff that is up almost non-stop.
I ended up going with this build.
So far I fucking love it. The hyena I'm leveling is only 51 and he holds his own against 59s and 60s in EPL. After 60 levels of marks, (with a few weeks at 60 spent survival), this is a nice change.
I've never cared about the "hot" pets. I've never had a humar, or a broken tooth, or a ZG bat, or any of that shit. I leveled a Raptor for 35 levels. Now I've got my black Hinterlands Troll Worg (weeaboo) whom I love, a ZG tiger named Snarf, and the purple hyena from the Blasted Lands that Dely named when after himself when I let him play my account.
I look forward to the expansion when every jackhole in the outlands has a ravager.
Manifest, if you're grinding a lot, especially for leveling in the expansion, you may want to give up the 3 points in Hawk Eye and go for either Improved Mark, another point of Improved Mend, or Spirit Bond. I know, I love Hawk Eye too, but I've found it less and less useful these days.
There's a bug, or at least a wierdness, in how our AP buff works on Wind Serpents. Because their breath attack is basically unlimited with BM talents and they get a nice boost to their RAP, blammo, we have a million wind serpent hunters.
My real beef with BM for raiding is you're basically always keeping your pet by your side, unless you know the boss or pull doesn't have some sort of Cleave or AoE that'll murderize your dood... and Ferocious Inspiration [what I hear the most hype about when it comes to BM DPS] is dependent upon your pet critting.
It's probably due to plain old ignorance -- I've never raided anything other than MC, Ony, UBRS and the 20-mans -- so I probably don't know if there're lots of pulls/bosses in BWL and beyond where your pet will actually survive in the thick of things to give you your buff and additional DPS.
But having gone from 1-60 as BM with a minor in MM, and having raided as MM/Survival [PRE-2.0] ... I'm very much biased towards MM and Survival for any sort of raiding spec.
Well that's the thing, it's my understanding that the greater survivability that pets received has made it easier for them(there were already plenty of fights pre-patch where pets could go in).
I mean what, 8k health and 4-5k armor with a high resist of your choosing sounds pretty good to me.
I'm pretty sure that a few of the hunters in my raid are doing naxx with their BM builds. Pets are very durable now.
Also, Ferocious Inspiration apparently stacks.
My Wind Serpent has 4.5K health and 7K armor.
But still. :P He can offtank anything in 20 mans or less. And because of the range attack, I can send him in and pull him back, using just LB on bosses/mobs with stuff like cleave.
Focus on +ap, though, yes.
Also, traps are usable in combat, are instant cast, and can't go off before 2 seconds after being placed.
Aimed Shot now resets your auto-shot timer, so no free auto-shot right after an aimed shot.
Arcane shot gets 20% of your RAP added to its damage, and no longer shares a cooldown with Aimed Shot.
And pets scale, getting a portion of your armor and ap and such added to their stats... but don't worry about getting a fast or slow attack speed pet, as patch 2.0.3 is going to normalize attack speeds for pets to 2.0.
No longer simply +Melee AP!
I croke 2k RAP the other week for the first time.
I was so giddy
A Hunter's point of view of World of Warcraft
Thats because every jackhole was forced to have a bear/cat/wolf/etc for the past 2 years and want something new.
Question 2: If pet speeds are all 2.0, does that mean that there's no point camping for rare spawns with faster attack speeds? And does that mean that your cat hits just as hard and just as much auto-attack as a bear, but the only difference is their abilities and armour and the like?
DPS is independent from attack speed. The cat will still hit for more each swing.
The point in choosing between different pets is:
a) selection of pet-specific abilities
b) different base armoring
c) different base DPS
d) looks
as opposed to (pre-2.0.3):
a) Does it interrupt casters more?
Ah, thanks. Question 1 remains open... and now to question 3...
3. Kiting: Do people really kite using the run/jump/spin 180/spinback/land mechanic? It sounds:
a) a pain in the ass
b) a bit OTT
c) a pain in the ass
The official WoW boards (yeah, I know) also mention what they call "jousting": run at the opponent, wing clip and run out the other end, turn and shoot. That makes way more sense to me, and would definitely be how I play. They say you'd have to go survivalist for that to work, but it sounds the most logical thing to do. I'd be going BM with my hunter.
Hunter Pros:
No resisting (except traps). Yea you have to deal with missing, but thats a lot easier to deal with than a million fucking resists. And (last I checked) none of that glancing blow crap melee folk have to deal with.
Feign Death, the most awesome skill in the game. Oh shit I pulled 5 mobs? Hit Feign Death and those guys go running back, sure Fluffy might die, but it beats a corpse run.
Not entirely mana dependant Hunters can burn through their mana bar quickly, but even when they do auto shot can hit hard enough to fill in the gaps.
Hunter Cons:
Crowd control. Hunters have one CC, granted it is a lot more usable now that traps can be placed in combat, but I found that when I was leveling I could only take two, maybe three mobs, before poor Fluffy got killed and I had to run for the hills.
Ammo and Ammo pouches. Upgrading and filling these damn things can be a bit expensive, not to mention losing a bag slot sucks.
Fluffy eats too god damn much. Feeding my pet sucked, between that and ammo I was often short on cash while leveling.
Mana usage, auto shot is great and all, but being out of mana sucks, this is especially an issue on long boss fights where running out of mana means a nice dps loss. Soloing at 60 I often find myself blowing through my mana bar and then having to prey to god that I tick up to 80 mana so I can Feign Death before some colossal fucking dinosaur eats me alive (this happens less with new and improved growl, but its still a hazard at times), from a pvp perspective, I can kill just about anything in pvp, but I can empty my mana pool killing just one person (or two people in quick succession) and then if someone else runs up with killing on their mind, I'm hard pressed to do well if I dont have a mana pot or enough mana to get off a freezing trap
Warlock Pros:
DoTs. Dotting something up and then fearing it while it slowly dies may not be the most mana efficeitn strat, but its fun to watch.
Fear. Fear, combined with just about anything else you do (dots or shadowbolts), is an awesome tool, something gets too close, fear it the hell away, using this my warlock was able to take 4-ish on level mobs just Dotting and fear kiting the little bastards, this becomes a lot easier when you get howl of terror.
Soul shards (and soul shard related products). Soul shard management was never an issue for me, perhaps because it is similar to ammo since it takes up a ton of space, but the things you use soul shards for are tons of fun. Healthstones are useful, soul stones are awesome, summoning, the new spell stone things are good and, of course, pets.
Pets. Warlock pets are better than hunter pets because they level up with you, and you dont have to feed the bastards. Granted they all cost a soul shard and ton-o-mana but that doesnt make them any less useful. Just have to make sure you have the right pet out before you attack.
ife tap (and dark pact if you spec that way). These are very useful spells. If you kill something, but right before it dies, the little fucker calls for help or something, if you only have enough mana left for a fear, you can fear it, life tap back to full (or close to full) dot the guy, bandage and you're back in the game. Dark pact is also fun, because pets tend to regen a fair amount of mana per tick and you can just dark pact it off of them while they are generating it.
Stamina. Warlocks can get a lot of stamina, and they can use it to refill mana, even if you're in cloth, a warlock with 6k health and soul link isn't going to get two shotted by very many things (at least as far as i can tell, have not experimented with this myself, but I've shot a couple soul link locks, they dont go down as quickly as i would like)
Deathcoil. Alternatively known as "lolcoil" and "skill-coil", deathcoil is a badass spell, it can be a nice "fuck you" before you die, or a good tool for in combat, My lock is till half a level away from this spell, but all observed uses of death coil point to it being very awesome.
Warlock Cons:
Fucking cloth. Being squishy sucks. leather and mail are a little better. Stamina and spec can help make up for this though.
Resisted messages despite talents to avoid it, you still get resisted a fair amount by higher level mobs, resulting in a waste of mana.
Specialized pets: Warlock pets are good, but they cost a lot of mana, and if in the middle of combat you suddenly need a tank instead of a half naked demon slut with a whip, you may be out of luck, while hunter pets hit hard and they tank well, hunter pets dont have many of the specialized things that warlock pets do (Sacrifice, seduce, that spell lock thingy the felhunter does)
Fear has its risks and downsides, most those are "Oh fuck that raptor just got feared into more raptors, now they all want to come play"
No Feign Death. Warlocks dont seem to have a nice "Oh shit button" like feign death, mind you I'm no expert in the field of warlockery, but thats just what I've seen.
Life tap. Its nice, but in an uncontrolled setting (STV for example) life tapping sometimes results in being a) one shotted by some random player passing by, or b) being one shotted by some stealthed panther in the bush.
As for the pet speed thing, you are correct, there is no longer any reason to camp rare spawns, it is now (or rather, will soon be) all about which abilities you like best, I like being able to shadowmeld in a corner and have my pet stealth too, dont have to worry about any monsters passing by seeing Fluffy, and I dont have to worry about my pet giving away my position in pvp. And I think (but dont know for sure) that all pets have the same DPS currently and to balance it out, slow pets hit harder, and fast pets hit softer, so when the next patch hits, pets will still have the same DPS, but they will also have to same damage range.
Well, shit. I hope that was helpful and I wasnt just stating crap you already knew and had thought about, but they are probably my two favorite classes, and no matter which class you pick you will be making a solid choice. Sorry that doesnt help settle your dilemma, but it just comes down to which class has tools you like more :P
Shit, that took too forver to type and its too fucking long.
But I
except in pvp when it just gets dispelled.
Except he was looking for something to replace feign death. Which doesn't help you get away from players...
then.. then why do I see hunters employ feign death all the time? I always thought it was some clever hunter pvp trick.
Using the jousting method is a good way to get a kite started, it lets you put some distance between you and your target. Another thing that works is strafing, if you strafe you dont have to turn all the way, some times not at all. The jump kite method is not as big a pain in the ass as it sounds, except maybe going up hills. I jump kite things often, using the wing clip jousting to get some intial distance, but its worth it to practice jump kiting so you dont get hit, because the times jump kiting is important is when you're up against something that can't be slowed, and hits like a fucking truck.
(I'm a 60 hunter on a PvE server so most of what I said is PvE related, but whatever)
When a mage is casting a nice 3k+ fireball, if I hit Feign Death close to the end of the cast (made easier thanks to the new blizzard casting bar) i just bought myself another few seconds to run away, or let a cool down finish, or just mess the mage up in general. Same applies for fear and polymorph and aimedshot.
[edit] The only people fooled by Feign Death in pvp are idiots and new players, of course if I was close to death, Feign Death some times tricks them long enough for me to pop and shoot somebody, but at that point I'm so close to dead I can't get a whole lot accomplished before somebody notices and hits me with a wand or something.
It can potentially get you out of combat and I think it makes them lose their target. If the person is half decent though you should still die. Also a lot of hunters are still doing the feign+trap which as far as I know isn't needed anymore but ...
I've played Warlock to 40ish, and I agreed with pretty much everything you said, Kwoaru. My problem with warlock is that, like hunters, you do generally just cycle abilities: Immolate -> Corruption -> Curse of Something -> Wand and repeat. And that's fine, and the hunter has exactly the same aspect (from what I have seen) with the shot weaving. However, it's not me that I enjoy about the class; it's having pets. I enjoy watching people die from far away, without my help. DoTs do this, but so do the hunters strong pets. Warlock pets are very sweet, but like you confirmed for me, they are a little more situational, and a little weaker than hunter pets.
Levelling my test hunter from 1-10 has been a blast, and when I got my cat to actually keep the mobs off me, I was blown away by how much fun I was having.
I don't mind the idea of feeding or arrow hoarding being any worse off than shard farming, and FD does sound like a godsend. I also will be playing for short bursts of time, so the tracking skills might help me push through a quest a little quicker (which is important to me for keeping off girlfriend aggro).
I don't mind doing less damage than warlock in BGs either, as I naturally prefer flag room defence, so a freezing trap and concussive shot/wing clip would do wonders there.
I think hunter meshes well into the way I want to play, but I was scared off by the idea of spin kiting and jazz like that, when I find fear kiting much simpler and less spastic looking. The seeming reliance on traps looked like it wasted time, but now they are instant-cast (even if they take two seconds to arm) I am much less concerned about that. Also, I looked at Thott and saw the warlock had a shitton of skills, and, just like my shaman, I never really used them all.
I think I will roll a hunter, and hope the kiting thing doesn't prove too off-putting.
You forget that the majority of the people PvPing get really excited and forget that Hunters can do that.
In addition to possibly tricking a hurried or bad opponent, it interrupts spells being cast on you and makes all opponents lose you as their target. If your attacker is far away or you are in a crowd of people, you can make it difficult for someone to retarget you. Feigning Death has the added benefit of sending pets back to their owners, so you will often see Hunters feigning against Hunter pets, Warlock pets, Treants, Water Elementals, etc.
Good man.
Between Friday and sunday I got, black brood pauldrons, Dragonstalker boots, my devilsaur eye (HOLY SHIT THEY UPPED THE DROP RATE ON WAVETHRASHER SCALES), ancient sinew wrapped lamina, and Don Julio's band.
Go go me.