Let’s Pretend That Meters Mean Something

Yesterday I got the chance to enter ICC 10 again-this time, with an MM hunter along as well.  My goal?  To stalk his heels as closely as possible. 

Here’s where we stood after Marrowgar.  I am, of course, Jamethera…and the MM hunter is Dragonstorm.  Looks about how you’d expect-I trail after the MM hunter by a good bit.

…but here’s the meters for Fester.

Notes: Dragonstorm is a main with a GS of around 5700.  Jamethera is an alt with a GS of 5000.  I think I’m allowed to be pleased, don’t you?   I also have a totally wasted trinket, as I’m so far over hit cap that I don’t even know what to do with myself, and a replacementfor Pyrite Infuser hasn’t cared to drop yet.

I should have the logs for the raid, actually, so I might come back later and post them as well.   I’m not feeling the red headed step child vibe so much these days, though.   \o/

Another note: I decided, after playing around during Twilight Sparkle Party attempts, that Spirit Beasts are EXCELLENT beach ball boppers.  The 30 yard range on their Faux Moonfire seems to elimante the problem with pets on stairs.

Baby BM Hunter: 1-10

The first 10 levels are, by far, the worst of them.  I mean you don’t even have a pet or talent points until the very end!

For the most part these levels consist of shooting things from max range, applying serpent sting once you’ve got it, and raptor striking mobs in the face when they get into melee range.

At 10, you get the quest that sends you out to tame 3 different things before you learn to tame pets yourself.   Now I distinctly recall that for night elves this involved a wee bit of running around the zone-but for Tauren they’re all like, across the river. 

Damn moocows.  Anyway.  So you do that quest, run to the city to complete the second part of that quest, and then go tame your first pet.   If you’re me, you chuckle to yourself and go find a pink flamingo.

I’ve done most of my hunter leveling with a DPS pet, and I reccomend this.  Tanking pets can be useful for some situations, and it may be easier these days to keep two pets at your level-but I still reccomend just sticking with one.  I solo’d many an elite thing with a cat. 

My poor moocow was very poor until I sold some Malachite on the AH-now she has a comfortable 2g in her bags, and I can do a few important things like…train weapons so she can use her heirlooms, and pick up less-fail gear, and oh, PROFESSIONS!

Things Young Hunters Apparently Need to Know

I ran a pug with my baby!druid, who is normally a kitty but can pretend to be a bear well enough to tank lower level instances.  In my first ever pug as a bear, I ended up in a group with two lovely huntards and came away from that with some handy tips, because apparently, people don’t know these things…

1) TURN GROWL OFF.
2) Aspect of the Pack causes people to be dazed when hit.  Your tank hates this.  Turn it the fuck off.
3) TURN GROWL OFF.
4) After level 40, you should start switching to mail.  At level 48, taking leather from the druid makes you something of a jerkface.  Leaving the group when you’re questioned about it makes you a definite jerkface.
5) TURN GROWL OFF.
6) Don’t talk about licking someones balls in party chat.  No really.  Don’t.  (Yes, this happened)

Saurfang Adds: A Random Observation

So I was actually standing there on my priest when one of the adds happened to die at my feet, and I briefly moused over it.

“Hey, Hunt?”  I said in Vent to our resident hunter, creatively named Huntres.  “They’re classed as beasts.  You can fear them!”

It was mostly a random thought to tuck away (he tried to fear the second mob right after that and nearly got eaten by the one he was supposed to be kiting-d’oh) but towards the end of an attempt, when our other mob-handler went down?

Hells yeah, he managed to juggle both adds in the bosses last moments!

So here’s a random thought for you: fear the fucking things!

Noooooo, My Glyph!

According to Pike:

See, for a long time, the Holy Trinity of Beast Master glyphs has been Glyph of Steady Shot, Glyph of Serpent Sting, and Glyph of Freakin’ 1.17 Second Cooldown Bestial Wrath.

But guys… we now remove our hats and bow our heads…

Because Glyph of the Hawk is apparently a significant DPS increase over Glyph of Bestial Wrath. (By “significant” I mean “close to 100 DPS”, though whether or not that is truly “significant” is up to you.)

D:

Will I change my glyph?  Probably, yes.  Does it suck on some small level?  Well, yeah.  I mean, RAWR RED PET.  Less rawr = more fail.

QQ, Blizz.

Instance Notes: Krick & Ick

I ran through all of the new heroics over the weekend, and only Krick and Ick gave me any pause as a BM hunter.  His poison nova WILL kill your pet if you don’t make your pet follow you out (ala Aran).   And of course your pet WILL stand in green shit, making this one of the few times in recent memory where I’ve cursed the lack of a point in imp mend pet.

That said, if you hit mend pet a few times and always remember to yank your pet out for poison nova, it’s doable.  Keep an eye on your pet for the trash pulls until the gauntlet, as well-that disease is obnoxious if it hits them.

Specs

This is the spec that I run with Jamethera.  There’s some wiggle room, of course-some people prefer one point in mend pet and one point in spirit bond.  Also, if you need hit, it’s better to yank the points out of the MM tree than the survival tree like this.

Pet specs: here is the one I use, and here is an alternate (with one free point).  I personally wouldn’t run with the second one much, because the charge stun would probably get Cranky Tank yelling at me for screwing up his mob positioning.

…and that’s really all I have to say about specs.  Those are the cookie cutters.  Yup.  Mmhmm.  Have fun.

Managing Cooldowns

The most basic rule of our cooldowns is “use Beastial Wrath every time it is up”.  You can pretty much insert rapid fire into that equation, too, as well as any on use trinkets. 

Of course as with any rule, there are exceptions.

-If you know that Heroism/Blood Lust is going to be used, save BW for that.
-If Heroism is used right off the bat, save Rapid Fire for the second BW.
-Kill Command comes up a little quicker than BW, but I like to bind the two together for the most benefit.
-Don’t be a dork like I am and use stuff on trash right before the boss.  >.>
-Don’t be a dork and never use CDs on trash because you’re afraid it won’t be available for the boss (yes, I’ve done that, too). 

What about pet cooldowns?
I prefer the set ‘em and forget ‘em method.  Some people bind Call of the Wild to a BW/RF macro, and that might work for situations where OMG BURST IS SUPER CRITICAL but I prefer to have it go off at every chance. 

Macro?
If you do like to macro all that stuff into one handy button, here’s one (updated for 3.3!).  The /use 13  /use 14 are for on use trinkets if you have them.
 
#showtooltip Bestial Wrath
/cast [@pettarget, exists] Kill Command
/cast [@pettarget, exists] Call of the Wild
/cast [@pettarget, exists] <other pet special>
/use 13
/use 14
/cast Bestial Wrath

And if you’re me, you tag on /e enrages! for shits and giggles.

Shot “Rotation” for the BM Hunter

BM hunters don’t really shot weave or have a proper rotation-we have a simpler priority system, because our pets are dumb and like to pretend they are fail!DPS who stand in ouchy things.

Kill Shot
Arcane Shot
Multi Shot
Serpent Sting
Steady Shot

Don’t bother with Sting if the mob is almost dead (or will hardly get to live!), and consider dropping Multi-Shot if you’re having mana problems.   Obviously multi-shot is out of the picture if there’s CC (ha, ha).  Hutner’s mark is a given (but I often forget all about it on trash…d’oh).

The trickiest part is not shot clipping.  It can be better to leave off another Steady Shot if Arcane Shot is a breath away from coming off CD.

Pets and How To Pick ‘Em

First off, if you’re still playing as BM hunter these days, you’re probably not obsessed with that #1 DPS slot.  In that case, feel free to ignore whatever the “best DPS pet” is to play whatever you like.

That said…

Which pet is best for you depends, somewhat, on your gear.  I personally grab the spread sheet and test the various pets there  with my current gear.  Last time I tested them the Wolf edged out the Devilsaur slightly, but since I internally protest using “non-BM” pets as a BM hunter, it’s the Devilsaur makes the combat tours.

Here’s my 3.3 test results, with my mediocre ToC10ish gear.  Listed as combined DPS / Pet DPS.

Wolf: 3441.11 / 1132.65
Devilsaur: 3395.12 / 1138.33
Core Hound: 3353.52 / 1096.73
Spirit Beast: 3349.36 / 1092.57
Raptor: 3347.23 / 1090.44
Cat: 3313.44 / 1056.65