Retro specs, expect the unexpected.

Remember back in the day, when running through your favorite zone with a big black worg was cool? Or how bout that transparent like cat that you ran your short little dwarf legs over to teldrasil to get was the shiz? Or trying to mimic your favorite dwarf hunter from the WoW intro cinimatic with a big white bear?

What happened to these pets that were just so damn cool? Normalization happened. Pet's stopped being specialized for leveling and dpsing (to some extent).

Here's what to expect in WotLK

• Gorriladins. BRK has done a fantastic job explaining the greatness of gorillas.
• Bears, the new personal tank (again?)
• Rhinos - I mean really, who wouldn't?
• Wolves - They actually do damage again.
• Turtles - For more than just novelty?

If you havn't already, go over to wowhead's LK site and check out all of the new pet family spells.

What's nice about pets for leveling in LK is that each pet does something unique, and is good situationally. Gorrials are going to be GREAT for AOE tanking, Bears for single target, Wolves for those melee heavy 5 mans, heck hyenas are even going to be good.

Start evauating how you like to play. Talent points are going to matter (for both player and pet) based on your pet choice and how you play.

Nerfs to survivial, buffs to BM

GOGO NERFBAT!

Explosive shot is nerfed into the ground. The damage modifer that was previsouly 20% of rap, is now 8%.

What's that mean? Explosive shot = arcane shot. They put out almost the same damage now, except one is a skill you get before level 20, the other is a wasted 51 point talent.

LnL did get some changes though, it now procs 15% off of serpent stings PERIODIC damage, instead of 15% off of original application. More up time for LnL.

As for us BM lovers who felt we got screwed, Seperation anxity was replaced with Kindred Spirts. With 5/5 in KS, your pet gets an additional 20% (ZOMG!) and yours and you pets speed is increased by 10%.

Wait, so pets do MOAR DEEPZ now? awesome.

There have been many QQs over the explosive shot nerf, but BM is getting rebuffed to compensate. I'll glady stay with my devilsaur (+9% dmg with his special up) and KS (overall a 29% pet damage boost).

Let's keep these good changes rolling Blizz.


Also, aimed shot is supposed to get buffed. In some future patch its going to be changed to be an insta cast with the same effects and cooldown, oh and damage modifiers stay the same as well. I'll take that with a side of win please.

pets, pets, pets

It seems like everyone is tripping all over themselves trying to get 50 non combat pets for that achievement.

Where's the love for hunter pets?

Here is a short list of pets that I will add to frequently as new beta builds, info, and testing is released.


Tenacity: Lets focus on the DPS pets.

1. Devilsaurs - This is going to be one of the best DPS pets for wrath and 3.0. Why? http://wotlk.wowhead.com/?spell=55499 is why. This buff adds 3% bonus pet damage for each stack. Yes, stack. It stacks 3 times, meaning +9% pet damage every 30 seconds. Combined with Bestial Wrath and talents, (along with the new kill comand) this pet will be ROCKING the house known as recount.
2. Corehounds - Big, drooling, green, flaming, hounds from hell. What more could you ask for? Oh yeah, Lava breath. Lava breath does 86 base damage, but heres the kicker, increases enemy cast time by 50%. Caster mobs? check. Casters in pvp? check. Flaming dog? check plus.

I'll add more later.

PTR frustration

I'm coming out and saying it. BM hunters got hit with the gimp bat pretty bad (in terms of PVP).

Ret pallys and feral/boomkins are pretty much 4 shotting everyone. Rogues actually put up a fight, and warriors just lolspam.

For right now I'll be retired from the PTR until a major update comes out.

What I want:

• Seperation Aneixty - Make this talent useful in pvp please. 20 yards isn't that much, except when you can't kite anything because they all have snare removales.
• Beast Mastery - Exotic pets are cool, but do NOTHING for dps in pvp.
• Give us steady shot as a trainable spell.
• Make Lock and Load proc more off of stings

I really, really, really, really want to continue raiding BM. Pet synergy is what makes this class fun for me. Currently, it's gimped up the butt. The 45-51 point BM talents are pretty crap.

I'm ranting of course, because I havn't actually tested any numbers raiding. But I don't want survival to be blowing the crap out of BM for raiding. If that was the case I'd reroll a mage, warlock, or even rogue.

/endrant

8926 changes

PTRs and Beta realms are both getting this patch, two things worth mentioning.

• Misdirect is now on a 3o sec cooldown (down from 2 mins)

What it means: Misdirect is a free three shot aggro misplacement tool. Currently it's used for opening up damage earlier than other classes, or pulling. It's nice if a healer pulls aggro or a tank goes down and needs to be re-established on the list. With the cooldown change, aggro shouldn't be a problem for hunters AT ALL. Especially survival hunters. If you FD, then 15 secs later MD, you should be 12 shots worth of damage behind the tank at MAX. More aggro dumps = happy hunter deepz.

• Freezing arrow (lvl 80)

What it does: fires a freezing arrow that places a freezing trap on the ground.
What it means: Places a normal freezing trap anywhere within 20 yards of the hunter. Awesome. No more set trap, pull mob, run away, turn, resume dps. Also very handy when chain trapping, or if a trap needs to be placed between another player and the mob.

Good things are a-commin for hunters.

More PTR

...and *gasp* survival.

My true hunter roots go back to Marks. When 1 agi = 2 rap, MM was king.

I fell in love with beast mastery however. My pet was more than just extra hit points, it actually contributed to DPS. The groups buffs were nice (what dps class turns down 3% more damage?).

Ignoring my Pet bias and my want for BM to top meters, survival is pretty damn sweet.

After I respeced (0/10/51) I had a base crit chance of 28% (up from 24 and some change as beast), and 2100 RAP with hawk up. Yummy.

When everything proced (besides my sso trinket for some reason) I had 38% crit chance and 2800 rap. Cherry on top please?

For rotations, I started out on the dummy with explosive. Then proceded to spam steady and rapid fire whenever it was up. Making sure to work in exlposive whenever the cooldown was ready (sadly, shares the cooldown with arcane, with talents however you could therotically hit with both at the same time). Serpent was also pretty easy to work in there, and hunters mark gave me extra rap (now up to 300 base). Overall I had ~ 1200 dps over a 3 min testing period.

Not too shabby for a post - craptastic spec (for the most part anyway).

I had to respec back to BM, 61/10/0, and had my corehound handy. My crit was back down to 24% (28ish with procs), but my sustained dps was up, and mana was also going down slower. I don't need to explain BM here I hope. Anyway, I had ~1200 dps.


Yes, I said it.
1200 as survival
1200 as beast mastery.

Lets look at some different things though
1) Survival has higher base stats, and REALLY nice procs
2) As Survival pet = ~8% of total damage (used a cat, ferocity specced)
3) As BM pet = ~ 24% total damage (corehound)
4) Survival has one more shot to work into rotations
5) BM procs are more controlled, once every 2 mins (less with talents) you get more deepz.
6) Explosive shot hits nearby enemys. Great for boss fights / AOE, not so good on trash pulls with CCed mobs.
7) Pets are basically useless as survival (curious as to how well a bear will work for leveling though)


Final conclusion: Both specs are great. They both do amazing DPS, and they both are insanely fun. BM focuses on the pet, like it should, but provides some nice group buffs and fun abilities. Survival is focused on Hunter buffs with a touch of group ups and is great burst damage.

As for release, I'll be sticking to BM for awhile. I'll switch to survival for some kara runs or heroics, and might level as a survial spec come LK.

So for now, blizzard has accomplished their goal with specs. You can spec how you want, and do equivilant damage. Meaning skill actually matters now. Major thumbs up.

For future hunters - Spec how you want, you're guild will appreciate the sustained DPS either way.

Enjoy.

P:S - My dps was generally low because I wasn't spamming the crap out of buttons, and the lag made CDs and GCDs interfere immensely with testing. Also, the test dummies do not have armor. Testing is skewed.

Wrath to do list

Here's a list of things I want to do before Wrath's release.

• Get my shammy to 70
• Get my shammy epic land, flyer, and epic flyer (lolgoldsink)
• Get my hunter as much badge gear as possible
• Get my rogue (currently 32) to at least 50
• Stockpile herbs for all the inscription band wagoners
• Park my hunter out side of ungoro with a hearth to SMV. Rhinoslolz
• Stock piled gold (my goal is 5-7k for entering northrend)

What's everyone else planning?

11.13.08

Release dates are upon us. November 13th, 08 is the confirmed release date for wrath.

Clear your schedule, it's gonna be a fun day.

More lag yay!

Corehounds are still amazing. After I trained one I didn't have any meat, and looting mobs would lead to server wide lag... However by just attacking my pet ended up with green happiness. Yay for pet talents.

Netherstorm was bugged and I didn't have dps meters installed so DPS shot rotation was out of the question. The pure dps put out by pets now is awesome though.

From playing around spamming steady is pretty much the basic rotation, throwing in a multi or arcane doesn't mess it up anymore though. Viper is great for regenerating mana, especially if you have a haste trinket or haste proc.

Hunter's mark now increases Ranged AP by 300 base. Yay.

Oh and I forgot, there are no rhinos in outlands... so I couldn't train one o dem.

I've tested enough to see pretty much what to expect, so I'll probably stay off of PTRs for awhile. Good luck to those who get on, and don't loot for the love of god.

Loot lag from hell

If you're in the PTR...DO NOT LOOT!

It causes a lag spike that makes lag server wide for that zone. If affects everyone in there.

Notes:
The new calendar system = awesome
Pet talents are amazing
Beast Mastery is amazing
Vipersting works really well

Things to test:
Disengage
Shot rotations
Stings
MM - gasp, I know
Rhinos

I'll report back later on

3.0.2 Goes to the PTR

/cheer!

Thank god for WoWinsider, they're the ones who pointed it to out. The WoW official site and general forums didn't say anything about, heck, even the PTR patch notes are still for 2.4.3. Bounce over to the PTR forums and BOOM! 3.0.2 goes PTR.

Downloading it now, looks like it's gonna be an over night installation. Don't worry though, I'm dedicating sunday to homework and build testing.

And the nerfs be layed upon us...

http://www.wowinsider.com/2008/09/11/things-dont-look-pretty-for-pvp-hunters-in-8926/

Too much wishful thinking of decent mana regne? Check.
Viable magical survivalbility in PVP? Check
More shots that deal extra damage? Check

Oh yeah, the above was all nerfed.

Woot.

:(

Aspect of the Macro

With the recent improvements to Aspect of the Viper (http://wotlk.wowhead.com/?spell=34074), mana regen will become less of a burden to your wallet, and more of a time out from dps.

Basically the changes made will lead to this

/cast Hawk
/shot rotation
/shot rotation
/oom
/cast Viper
/autoshot
/rapid fire
/mana
/cast hawk

At a cost of DPS, your mana bar will basically go in reverse. Right now, I'd be regenerating 150-250 mana per shot. PER SHOT. Although damage is reduced by 50% for the duration of viper, thats not too bad considering it shouldn't be on very long.

I know hunters have been whining for energy since the beginning of (WoW)time, and I used to be all for it. I have changed my stance though. All classes should have energy/rage/runic power. Why? Mana has become obsolete. It's basically just a money sink (chain potting) and a guage for how undergeared you are. If you're too undergeared to heal a tank, you'll be casting more. As a healer that leads to mana depletion and no more heals.

It's a little late in the game to redo the mana pool system. Changing it now would result in a complete reworking of class mechanics across the board. But maybe the introduction of new classes, talents, abilities, and (hopefully) hero classes will change that.

-Huntard out.

Ghostcrawler lays forth a smackdown

http://blue.mmo-champion.com/18/9679739397-nerf-philospohy-gc-can-agree.html

Incase you missed it on MMO champion. A whining thread was posted about the DK nerfs.

Basically ghostcrawler came out and explained how the devs determine what to nerf and how to nerf it.

What was interesting was the numbers and classes he threw out for examples. 2.5-3k dps, hunters dks, warriors, druids, and warlocks. Hmm why are pet classes who are supposed to be DPS grouped in with hybrids? Not to start a hybrid war, but that was interesting to come from a dev.

Does that mean all other dps classes are up around 4k? I surely hope not.

We'll see how it goes.

Auction Housing

Quick post due to lack of content:

I've been playing around more on my Auction mule lately. I've been running auctioneer everyday for a week now to build up a database, and I'm going to start the whole "buy low sell high" reselling strat. Usually I just farm ore, motes, and fish and sell that stuff which works pretty well, but it's also time consuming.

I'll post back and see how it goes.

Been busy

Lack of posting, I know.

Started up school again, been hella busy with that. Trying to make progress in ZA/SSC three nights a week doesn't leave me any less exhausted. I'll try to get some new stuff up this weekend.

In the meantime -
WoWInsider, updated daily and has very interesting articles. A lot of which I'll discuss here.
MMO-Champion, where I get all my Beta info.
BRK, well...you know. It's brk.

Check em out.