Well, I leveled when SV wasn't hot shit, but the plan for me was BM anyway because it's easier to solo group quests. This is what I would start with at 70, filling in Careful Aim first, then dropping a point in Go for the Throat, followed by Sniper Training. After that I'd go with imp. Aspect of the Hawk.
Is it that time again? Should I trot out my BM-vs-MM/SV/hybrid-for-levelling metaphor again?
Levelling as MM or SV is like going off-roading with your Corvette.
BM is like going off-roading with your ATV.
As far as replies that aren't auto-pilot condemnations of alternative levelling specs... SV could be kinda neat for soloing purposes: you get Thrill of the Hunt + Replenishment for mana longevity, substantial AP buffs, the obvious crit chance gains, and a nuke that bypasses armor. My recommended spec differs from Skeith's in that it leaves Mortal Shots for 71-80 talent points, but gains 5/5 Hunting Party and 3/3 Sniper Training. My arguments are: your crit chance, even after all the buffs through talents, will still be low enough that you're not guaranteed to get Replenishment up on ever mob without speccing into it 5/5; I haven't exactly mathed this all out, and 2 points in it at level 80 crit chances get you up to like a 96% uptime, so I won't push it too hard. Also: Sniper Training is, at present, a flat +6% damage increase if you're at max range, which is pretty doable while out soloing, and the more space you put between the mob and you, the better -- your pet will very seldom actually hold aggro, and so the idea is just to kill the mob before it gets to you. Sniper Training becomes an even more attractive option in 3.1.
Mortal Shots will be missed, but you won't have any problems getting mobs down fast even without it. Plus, it's kinda neat to see your crits get that much bigger as you level and start dropping points into it. :P
EDIT: Don't bother with Imp. Hawk, Skeith is dumb. Do 5/5 Mortal Shots, then Focused Aim + Careful Aim. The last few points don't matter, as you'll be hitting 80 soon anyhow.
Hmm? How is running up to the rogue/warrior/DK/paladin/lolshaman beating on your healer and dropping a Frost Trap at their feet to root them for however many seconds not on-demand?
Time spent running into range plus trap activation delay plus opponents being able to simply avoid the trap all strike me as "not on-demand root" compared to actual root abilities.
Hmm? How is running up to the rogue/warrior/DK/paladin/lolshaman beating on your healer and dropping a Frost Trap at their feet to root them for however many seconds not on-demand?
Time spent running into range plus trap activation delay plus opponents being able to simply avoid the trap all strike me as "not on-demand root" compared to actual root abilities.
In my real-world use, both in Arenas and BGs, of Frost Trap + Entrapment as a more or less on-demand snare + proc root, I'd say it's not nearly as hard as you're purporting to use it effectively as a peeling mechanism.
The difference being that the current version tends to root people for more time than the 3.1 version. The 3.1 version also cannot root after the initial activation, making the frosted area much less effective for dragging people through for the remainder of its duration.
The difference being that the current version tends to root people for more time than the 3.1 version. The 3.1 version also cannot root after the initial activation, making the frosted area much less effective for dragging people through for the remainder of its duration.
Again, just based on my personal experience in Arenas and BGs, one Frost Trap and some smart movement and use of your anti-snare abilities on your end will pretty much take a single melee out of the game for a few seconds.
I don't purport to be a 1337 Arena master or anything [just look at my 2s rating, sheesh], but I'm just positing what I've seen to be the case: that Frost Trap + Entrapment is devastating to melee now, and will still be almost as frustrating for them come 3.1.
3.0 frost trap will take a melee out of the game multiple times in 30 seconds, in addition to being able to root others who didn't happen to be in the area of effect after the initial activation. 3.1 frost trap gets one shot. If your healer (or whoever is being focused) is pillar/sarcophagus/whatever humping like a champ with a properly placed frost trap, you can get far more roots out of entrapment now than you will ever hope to in 3.1.
I guess it depends on how you look at it; an on-demand root that you can use to keep someone from LoSing you or from getting/giving heals for a few seconds, or especially to peel melee off your healer > a proc with a 75% chance to do nothing right away, even if said chance increases with the amount of time they spend wading through the trap. I don't really remember if Entrapment procs on everyone in the trap at the same time, but if it didn't before, this becomes a bigger buff.
... and such kind of makes it seem like you are arguing that.
And I didn't make any argument whatsoever about A and B, so that's kind of irrelevant.
I'm more worried about the triggering by immune targets; before, that paladin who wanted to beat your face in would just run over with a BoF and white stuff would still pop up, leaving the chance of tranq shotting it and leave him slowed. Now he can just run over the damned thing without worry.
That as well. (PvP) Hunters are definitely getting control nerfed in 3.1. Not that I really care, since I got sick of arena back in TBC (hunter/priest in season 4 was a horribly disadvantaged comp and really made me sick of the whole thing), and PvP in general in WoW right now is in a terrible state, but I'm just saying.
Yeah, I don't like to bother with PvP much anymore, never really enjoyed arenas. When they first launched I joined a 2s and realized that, even though AV was full of idiots, it was more fun because I could actually kill some of those idiots. Fuck the Blade's Edge arena, by the way.
It wasn't a flip-flop, it was an evolution of my view on the matter. >_>
But yes: Entrapment Nouveau is a nerf overall, but it's not like now being guaranteed that you'll root someone instead of it being a proc isn't still pretty good.
It's not really guaranteed, though, because of the new triggering functionality (hello BoFadins).
Okay, so it's not guaranteed against a Retadin who has preemptively used Blessing of Freedom. I can live with that.
Also: god damnit. Now whenever the server comes back up, I need to spam up a bunch of Heroics to level a gorram bat.
EDIT: They can add new turtles + crabs for lowbie Belfs, but no level 80 versions of the other pets, so that people aren't forced to run a bunch of Heroics just to have a usable pet if they wanna PvP, or switch specs or something?
That new lock and load proc animation is weird... will take some getting used to.
Asuma on
"Extremism is so easy. You've got your position, and that's it. It doesn't take much thought. And when you go far enough to the right, you meet the same idiots coming around from the left." -- Clint Eastwood ***
Noticed today that even though the tooltip for Lock and Load only mentions Freezing Trap, Freezing Arrow, and Frost trap for insta-proc... Explosive trap will insta-proc LnL. Guess the text is incomplete?
Asuma on
"Extremism is so easy. You've got your position, and that's it. It doesn't take much thought. And when you go far enough to the right, you meet the same idiots coming around from the left." -- Clint Eastwood ***
Gentlemen, I am in need of some build/pet advice.
I am leveling my main, who is currently level 66, and am burning as fast as I can through Outlands to get to 70 by the end of next week (this weekend, unfortunately, I will be out of state and will not be able to log on, which is also a bit of a blessing because it will let me build up some rest). I had things pretty well down before the patch hit, specced pure BM and had a gorilla named Upchuck thunderstomping me to victory.
I specced a similar build after the patch and just haven't been able to handle things as well as I thought I would.
So I'm turning to you guys. Really just looking for a good leveling build that will let me kill things as fast as possible and also have my pet handle my aggro pretty well. My heart isn't set on exotic pets so that point (or points, if you include spirit bond) can be spent elsewhere.
I specced a similar build after the patch and just haven't been able to handle things as well as I thought I would.
You should be fine with a BM heavy build. Make sure cower didn't turn itself back on. That bug is still unfixed. :P
Asuma on
"Extremism is so easy. You've got your position, and that's it. It doesn't take much thought. And when you go far enough to the right, you meet the same idiots coming around from the left." -- Clint Eastwood ***
Silly question, but you did remember to spec your pet as well, right?
Of course!
Yeah, still pulling aggro off of Alby the racist Devilsaur (went DPS pet after I got rid of Upchuck). I'm dealing with it, just calling him a silly bitch when I pull aggro off of him. Lots of death feigning, disengaging, and whatnot.
Did you gear improve? Because at 66 or 67, if you've gotten a new gun or bow, that's about when aggro problems show up simply because growl can't keep up.
In any kind of decent gear, no pet is really gonna keep aggro off of you. I haven't had a pet with two points in Imp. Growl for awhile now, but that might change things a little. In any event, aggro is what Intimidation is for.
Did you gear improve? Because at 66 or 67, if you've gotten a new gun or bow, that's about when aggro problems show up simply because growl can't keep up.
Hmm, haven't gotten a new bow since before the patch, though my speed has improved because of the new automatic 15% haste rating (was at about 12% because I switched from guns to bows at around 62 and couldn't be arsed to make a fancy quiver, not knowing whether bows were gonna stick). That could be contributing.
Either way, I'm adjusting to the changes pretty quickly, I've had Feign Death, Disengage, Intimidate, etc. hotkeyed for a long time, I'm just using them for every mob now rather than every dozen or so. Yesterday I was out doing some of the Outland Nesingwary quests and had to answer the phone, so I left it on auto shot and was keeping an eye on it; I even pulled aggro just doing that. Very o_O.
My thoughts on it are: my devilsaur is a good 4 levels below me currently, and also he is a DPS pet. This would have happened before the patch probably anyway.
My main frustration is the nerf to thunderstomp, because there was literally nothing I could do to steal aggro off of my pet unless I turned on Rapid Fire and Aspect of the Hawk and had a few agi or AP buffs. I mean, I had to really be wanting to pump out tons of damage in a short period of time to pull off of him (not something I typically do while questing).
Though I don't know specifically what triggers it, I DO know that it has to do with WoW's in-game threat meter. Pet classes will be hearing a lot more of it than others.
Anyone else post patch have some super annoying loud proc sound effect? I cannot for the life of me figure out what the fuck it is either.
It's the new aggro warning/aggro pulled sound effect. Sounds like a chainsaw.
Worst feature of 3.1.
Asuma on
"Extremism is so easy. You've got your position, and that's it. It doesn't take much thought. And when you go far enough to the right, you meet the same idiots coming around from the left." -- Clint Eastwood ***
So the 3.1 SV rotation is pretty complex. I couldn't really make it work just using my ClassTimers cooldown monitoring addon, so I had to pop on my post-3.0 standby, Cooldown Buttons, for a better graphical representation of what to hit when. Consistently did around 2.7k on the Heroic Training Dummy with no cooldowns and no Kill Shot, even though I'm glyphed for it.
That's about as close as I can guess off the top of my head what the rotation is supposed to look like on paper. Obviously ping and LnL will mess with it some.
Posts
Levelling as MM or SV is like going off-roading with your Corvette.
BM is like going off-roading with your ATV.
As far as replies that aren't auto-pilot condemnations of alternative levelling specs... SV could be kinda neat for soloing purposes: you get Thrill of the Hunt + Replenishment for mana longevity, substantial AP buffs, the obvious crit chance gains, and a nuke that bypasses armor. My recommended spec differs from Skeith's in that it leaves Mortal Shots for 71-80 talent points, but gains 5/5 Hunting Party and 3/3 Sniper Training. My arguments are: your crit chance, even after all the buffs through talents, will still be low enough that you're not guaranteed to get Replenishment up on ever mob without speccing into it 5/5; I haven't exactly mathed this all out, and 2 points in it at level 80 crit chances get you up to like a 96% uptime, so I won't push it too hard. Also: Sniper Training is, at present, a flat +6% damage increase if you're at max range, which is pretty doable while out soloing, and the more space you put between the mob and you, the better -- your pet will very seldom actually hold aggro, and so the idea is just to kill the mob before it gets to you. Sniper Training becomes an even more attractive option in 3.1.
Mortal Shots will be missed, but you won't have any problems getting mobs down fast even without it. Plus, it's kinda neat to see your crits get that much bigger as you level and start dropping points into it. :P
EDIT: Don't bother with Imp. Hawk, Skeith is dumb. Do 5/5 Mortal Shots, then Focused Aim + Careful Aim. The last few points don't matter, as you'll be hitting 80 soon anyhow.
In my real-world use, both in Arenas and BGs, of Frost Trap + Entrapment as a more or less on-demand snare + proc root, I'd say it's not nearly as hard as you're purporting to use it effectively as a peeling mechanism.
Again, just based on my personal experience in Arenas and BGs, one Frost Trap and some smart movement and use of your anti-snare abilities on your end will pretty much take a single melee out of the game for a few seconds.
I don't purport to be a 1337 Arena master or anything [just look at my 2s rating, sheesh], but I'm just positing what I've seen to be the case: that Frost Trap + Entrapment is devastating to melee now, and will still be almost as frustrating for them come 3.1.
Well ... ... and such kind of makes it seem like you are arguing that.
And I didn't make any argument whatsoever about A and B, so that's kind of irrelevant.
But yes: Entrapment Nouveau is a nerf overall, but it's not like now being guaranteed that you'll root someone instead of it being a proc isn't still pretty good.
Okay, so it's not guaranteed against a Retadin who has preemptively used Blessing of Freedom. I can live with that.
Also: god damnit. Now whenever the server comes back up, I need to spam up a bunch of Heroics to level a gorram bat.
EDIT: They can add new turtles + crabs for lowbie Belfs, but no level 80 versions of the other pets, so that people aren't forced to run a bunch of Heroics just to have a usable pet if they wanna PvP, or switch specs or something?
Help?
Laaaame.
Seems like a win to me.
I am leveling my main, who is currently level 66, and am burning as fast as I can through Outlands to get to 70 by the end of next week (this weekend, unfortunately, I will be out of state and will not be able to log on, which is also a bit of a blessing because it will let me build up some rest). I had things pretty well down before the patch hit, specced pure BM and had a gorilla named Upchuck thunderstomping me to victory.
I specced a similar build after the patch and just haven't been able to handle things as well as I thought I would.
So I'm turning to you guys. Really just looking for a good leveling build that will let me kill things as fast as possible and also have my pet handle my aggro pretty well. My heart isn't set on exotic pets so that point (or points, if you include spirit bond) can be spent elsewhere.
Thanks fellows.
You should be fine with a BM heavy build. Make sure cower didn't turn itself back on. That bug is still unfixed. :P
Of course!
Yeah, still pulling aggro off of Alby the racist Devilsaur (went DPS pet after I got rid of Upchuck). I'm dealing with it, just calling him a silly bitch when I pull aggro off of him. Lots of death feigning, disengaging, and whatnot.
Hmm, haven't gotten a new bow since before the patch, though my speed has improved because of the new automatic 15% haste rating (was at about 12% because I switched from guns to bows at around 62 and couldn't be arsed to make a fancy quiver, not knowing whether bows were gonna stick). That could be contributing.
Either way, I'm adjusting to the changes pretty quickly, I've had Feign Death, Disengage, Intimidate, etc. hotkeyed for a long time, I'm just using them for every mob now rather than every dozen or so. Yesterday I was out doing some of the Outland Nesingwary quests and had to answer the phone, so I left it on auto shot and was keeping an eye on it; I even pulled aggro just doing that. Very o_O.
My thoughts on it are: my devilsaur is a good 4 levels below me currently, and also he is a DPS pet. This would have happened before the patch probably anyway.
My main frustration is the nerf to thunderstomp, because there was literally nothing I could do to steal aggro off of my pet unless I turned on Rapid Fire and Aspect of the Hawk and had a few agi or AP buffs. I mean, I had to really be wanting to pump out tons of damage in a short period of time to pull off of him (not something I typically do while questing).
Is it a weird garish sci-fi warping sound? I noticed something like that too, with every pet I had. It's really fucking annoying.
It's the new aggro warning/aggro pulled sound effect. Sounds like a chainsaw.
Worst feature of 3.1.
So the 3.1 SV rotation is pretty complex. I couldn't really make it work just using my ClassTimers cooldown monitoring addon, so I had to pop on my post-3.0 standby, Cooldown Buttons, for a better graphical representation of what to hit when. Consistently did around 2.7k on the Heroic Training Dummy with no cooldowns and no Kill Shot, even though I'm glyphed for it.
BA->SSting->Exp->Multi->Steady->Exp->Steady
Something like that, isn't it? Looks bad, but once you have it down it's cake, at least compared to MM's shot juggling:
SSting->Chimera->Arcane->Aimed/Multi->Steady->Steady->Arcane->Chimera
That's about as close as I can guess off the top of my head what the rotation is supposed to look like on paper. Obviously ping and LnL will mess with it some.
In any event, whaddo you average on the 83 dummy, for reference?