The Warcraft Hunter

Yes, it’s true…Kill Shot no longer works in macros along with other “main” shots such as Serpent Sting and Steady Shot. Sad, but true. This is because with the 3.10 patch Kill Shot is now on the same Global Cooldown as the other shots, and you cannot combine spells with the same cooldowns in macros.

In fact, I often wondered why it worked in the first place, since Blizzard has never intended macros to be something that decides which spell or shot you should cast, and that is precisely what it was doing before: if your macro included Kill Shot, and Kill Shot was available and not on cooldown, the Kill Shot would be cast instead of whichever other shot was your main one in that macro. If Kill Shot was not available (target over 20%) or was on cooldown, then the main shot would be cast instead.

Fortunately, Kill Command still works in macros, so always include it in your basic shot macros.

Erik Macros Hunter, Macros, Warcraft

When I look at the search terms that have been used to reach my blog, I find myself surprised at the number of players who still want to use macros to control their shot rotation. Here are some of the search terms that have been used: “beastmaster shot macro’s”; “best hunter rotation beastmaster macro”; “warcraft+hunters shot rotation macro”.

Let me state this clearly near the top for all to see: Shot macros are good! Shot Rotation macros are Bad! There! I said it! And before you bounce away to another page to satisfy your desire for an easy fix to your shot rotation, let me also state that I will provide some shot rotation macros at the bottom of this post. But you’re darned well going to get some learnin’ from me first!

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Erik Macros Basics, Hunter, Macros, Warcraft

I checked my traffic today, and found that someone had arrived at my blog with the search “what is faster to lvl for Hunter”. Of course, they most certainly meant “what spec is best for leveling Hunter”, but we get the picture.

Your Talent Tree Spec will be radically different when leveling as compared to when you start instances and raiding. When you get to 80, it will be all about the damage, but prior to that speed and survivability are more important. Even when Dual Spec comes out, it won’t be a simple matter of adding a new spec: both should be entirely replaced.

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Erik Basics, Leveling, Talents Basics, Hunter, Leveling, Talents, Warcraft

At Level 12 you get three new spells. In decreasing order of importance they are Mend Pet, Wing Clip and Distracting Shot.

The first, Mend Pet, was mentioned in my previous post. It does exactly what you would think, which is to mend your pet; in other words, heal it. Since your pet basically acts as your tank, you want to make sure he stays healthy and survives the fight. Normally, when your pet dies, so do you.

What I like to do in fights that I know are going to be close, is to start the mend before the pet even gets to the mob. That way if there is a lot of damage, the heals will hopefully prevent the pet from dying, or at least too quickly.

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Erik Basics, Leveling Basics, Hunter, Leveling, Warcraft

Level 10 is when Huntering gets fun! Not only do you get a couple of new spells, you also get your pet! I won’t describe much of the pet stuff here, as that generally comes out in most of the other posts as part of whatever their topic is, so I concentrate on the two new spells first.

Track Humanoids goes along nicely with Track Beasts, and now you will get to switch back and forth between the two depending on what sort of questing you are doing. These two will cover the majority of mobs you will encounter early on, but you will normally see a new type of mob before you get the Tracking spell for it. In these situations just track whichever mob you might otherwise see around the perimeter of where you are playing.

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Erik Basics, Leveling Basics, Hunter, Leveling, Warcraft

There is only one new spell learned at Level 8, and that is Concussive Shot. This shot is marginally useful, and should only be used situationally. It does no damage, but instead dazes the target, and slows their movement by 50% for 4 seconds.

The first situation in which this is useful is when you are targeting a particularly difficult mob and you want it to take as long as possible to get within melee range. By hitting the target with Concussive right after a Serpent Sting (always put your DoTs up first!), you will increase the amount of time it will take by 2 seconds. This may be enough extra time to allow you to drop the mob before it can do you any serious damage.

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Erik Basics, Leveling Basics, Hunter, Leveling, Warcraft

When a Hunter reaches Level 6, two more spells become available. The first is Hunter’s Mark, which is a “debuff” you place on a mob. This debuff does some interesting things.

The first and most important is that it increases the Ranged Attack Power of everyone attacking that mob. Not just yours; not just your Party’s; everyone’s. This includes players from other factions, apparently. This should be used every time you attack a mob, at least when you have time to set up your attack ahead of time. In fact, I always make this part of a macro that sends my pet in to attack so I never miss a chance to Mark a mob, but at Level 6 you don’t have a pet, so you probably won’t set this up in a macro just yet.

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Erik Basics, Leveling Basics, Hunter, Leveling, Warcraft

If you have never played WoW before, you may not know about training. It took me several levels to figure out that on every even-numbered level I would be able to go to the Hunter Trainer and learn some new stuff! The spells you learn are not only useful, but necessary as you progress. If you were to simply use the same thing over and over again (Auto Shot and Raptor Strike), as you rose in levels you would find yourself unable to cope with mobs the same level as you.

So it is important — nay, essential –  that you learn these spells at your first opportunity whenever you make it to the next even level. Actually, after level 60 you can learn new spells every level. Sometimes the spells you learn are merely higher “ranked” versions of spells you already know, but they are more powerful and should definitely be learned.

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Erik Leveling Basics, Hunter, Leveling, Warcraft

I have been asked by a few players “what is the best food for Hunters?” As with so many other questions in both WoW and life, the answer is “it depends.”

It depends on what level you are, what you are doing, what resources you have, what your stats are and what your skills are. However, it does not need to be complicated. Also, the difference between “good food” and “best food” is a lot smaller than the difference between “good food” and no food at all.

Basic food is food that heals you and does nothing else. You can buy basic food at most inn keepers as well as other vendors, so I will skip over this part. Just bear in mind that it makes sense to have the highest level basic food on you because it will regenerate health faster, thus reducing your down time.

The food I want to talk about is the kind that gives a boost to one or more of your stats. The stats that we Hunters want to see buffed are generally Attack Power, Stamina, Crit Rating, Haste, Armor Penetration, Agility, and to a lesser degree Intellect. Less important, but not useless, are Spirit and Mana per 5 seconds (or Mp5). Strength and Spell Power can be completely ignored, but in some cases they will be part of a package deal with other stats. Which stats you choose to buff will be dependent on what you are doing.

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Erik Uncategorized

When you group with a Paladin, one of the first things they will ask you is whether you want Might or Kings. If you have not had this pleasant experience, let me explain this. Paladins have Blessings spells that they can cast on friendly targets that increase various stats. At the top level, without any Talents to improve them, Blessing of Kings increases all base stats by 10%, and Blessing of Might increases Attack Power by 350.

With my current spec, I get Attack Power from two of my base stats: Agility and Intellect. My Agility is currently at 899, and my Intellect at 379, so this translates to about 126 extra Attack Power. This is nothing to sneeze at, but it is less than 350. So why would any Hunter ever choose Kings over Might?

Under normal circumstances they would not, but there are some situations where it makes sense. First, there are the side-benefits to Kings that you need to look at: extra Mana pool, better Stamina and Health, increases to Armor and Crit Chance from Agility…there may be certain fights where these stats are more important than Attack Power.

Second, and more likely, is when you are also grouped with a Warrior who is using Battle Shout. This spell increases the Attack Power of all party members nearby (20 yards) by a whopping 548! The catch is that this does not stack with Blessing of Might, so it would be wasted on you except when Battle Shout is down or you are out of range. In this situation, you would be better off with Blessing of Kings, as it affects the base stats instead of the secondary stat.

The third situation is when you are grouped with two Paladins. If you ever have this happy experience, then you will note that the Blessings do not stack, so it is best to get one Kings and one Might, and the two Paladins will most likely decide between them which one is doing which blessing.

And if you happen to get a third…ask for Blessing of Wisdom, as it will increase your Mana regeneration — which never hurts during a long boss fight!

Erik Uncategorized