I'm curious to see the number of hunters other guilds bring to raids, and why.
My guild does SSC/TK by rotating hunters into one slot, with the exception of Vashj where we take two. We have no done A'lar or Kael yet.
The two hunters who raid are BM and Survival, while a third is perma wait listed because he took a break, even though he is very good.
Is three hunters too many for a raid? Say, if two were BM and one was survival. Could you not make a group of a feral druid, shaman for GoA/SoE, two BM hunters for 2x FI, and the survival hunter? Or would this be a suboptimal use for the druid and shaman?
You could bring 7 hunters, or you could bring 0. Both work, just like with holy priests and rogues.
If the question is their dps, or stackability - it is highly situational.
In many instances you'll find yourself bringing 1 hunter, as bringing a 2nd over a rogue is rarely superior. Then again, bringing a rogue is often not the best choice either...
I'm sure the hunters disagree with their own raid utility - but they do probably play the worst class in TBC raiding (seriously think the classes over a bit, its either hunter or rogue).
3 hunters is probably too many in a raid - but we've done it countless times and still won.
We're up to Kael right now with Vashj down (should have Kael down soon too), and we bring 2-3 hunters every raid. Usually one BM and two MM, just because those are the specs they prefer. The MM hunters range from 3-8 on damage meters depending on the fight, while the BM hunter can come first on some fights but (obviously) doesn't do very well on pet-unfriendly fights.
We don't usually make a specific hunter group even when we have 3, usually the BM one in our best caster DPS group (with shadowpriest), and the two MM ones in the healer group and other caster/healer group (both with shadowpriests as well).
We did an SSC over the weekend where we had 1 mage and a ton of hunters, and it worked fine. Vashj with 4 hunters was easier than ever before.
Hunters do great DPS on fights like Karathress where their pets can work freely for the whole time, and having extra misdirections can allow you to completely lock down Leotheras, Hydross transitions, misdirect+trap every murloc wave onto its intended tank, etc.
So yeah, like Quigon said, you can have zero, or you can have seven, and succeed just fine. as with most classes, 2-3 hunters are what I aim for on most fights. The only class I'd say we ever "stack" is priests, but that's because shadow priests and holy priests are like two completely different classes and I see bringing 3 of one and 2 of the other as ordinary.
If we put an extra hunter in, he'll be taking a warlock, mage, shadow priest or oomkin spot. Never a melee spot. Generally we only use one hunter because ours are generally pretty bad at being hunters, however one of our hunters recently specced beast mastery and is doing some excellent dps.
We typically run 2-3 hunters. While their utility is appreciated (traps for Tidewalker, misdirects everywhere, etc), they are often simply seem to have a lower damage potential than many of our rogues, warlocks and mages, who are all becomming quite competitive as the upgrades are spread out.
Strangely, we too had a hunter spec BM recently, and his performance has nigh-doubled. He also got a new computer, so that might be helping, but it's been a dramatic increase from a previously somewhat lacklustre raider. He's a fine guy, but I used to outdamage him when he was in full T2 (and armed comparitively) when I was on an alt hunter in BWL in near full T1 with a Rhok and some blues filling out any gaps in my gear.
Time will tell at the end, but we're currently looking to possible cut down to 2 hunter spots and up the mages to 3 spots. That's probably our preferred stance anyways, but for a while we had a lot of hunters vying to raid, and not as many consistant mages. That situation has reversed itself through a bit of attrition lately.
At the end of the day, you just have to work with what you have on hand, I suppose.
I'm curious to see the number of hunters other guilds bring to raids, and why.
My guild does SSC/TK by rotating hunters into one slot, with the exception of Vashj where we take two. We have no done A'lar or Kael yet.
The two hunters who raid are BM and Survival, while a third is perma wait listed because he took a break, even though he is very good.
Is three hunters too many for a raid? Say, if two were BM and one was survival. Could you not make a group of a feral druid, shaman for GoA/SoE, two BM hunters for 2x FI, and the survival hunter? Or would this be a suboptimal use for the druid and shaman?
2-3 hunters.
Me as SV + 1-2 BM.
We are allways in odd groups (healing, sp+2xbm+2xdestro lock,...) and we still compete with rogues that allways have enh.shaman+5/5 imp.BS warrior on dps.
There is never to many hunters i say more MD = more raid dps.
We have some severely threat limited folks...
And dont forget on MMORPG rule x.
Todays worst may be tommorows best. You want to have each of classes covered in guild.
By having 0-1 hunter spots you might be undermining your progres in some future patch since you will only have 1 decently geared hunter. EQ Ranger spring to mind...
This rule doesn't apply to hunters. Or rangers for that matter. Took over 2 years to apply to warlocks too!
I don't know. If you seen recent D&T dmg meters, Ravel and dolemite have been kicking peoples ass lately. They are able to put out incredible chart topping dps as BM spec.
This rule doesn't apply to hunters. Or rangers for that matter. Took over 2 years to apply to warlocks too!
Instead of hunter:
Why take more than 1 rogues, 1 mage (ai) and 1 lock (aff/imp) on
Al'ar?
Well desto lock dps with SP support > hunter > mage > rogue.
But saddly it doesn't fare well for him grabbing aggro on embers, nor does he hit both at once. Neither he can fire instants when they spawn and bring them to tanks, then safely drop aggro.
Hydross?
Depends on tactic.
AoE: hunter > rogue
Single/Duo: You need 2x banish, rogues help with stuns, but dps hunter > all.
Hunter = safest dps, and MDed transitions = win.
Lurker?
Yet to see "normal" fight, but 1 destro lock beat me for 700damage total on first kill and we were way ahead 3rd who was BM hunter, who was quite ahead from 4th on dps that was SP.
Tidewalker?
Hunter > rogue both in dps and utility. I even beat some mages and locks in dps that are AoEing the murlocs.
Lord?
You would like to have 1 rogue for kicks, but lately shamans do the job with shocks.
Heh.
From my PoV atm well played hunters are top dps, with more utility than people give them credit for. Either that or whole my guild dps plainly sucks witch i doubt.
People and your damage meters... Damage meters do not exist in a vacuum. They depend on the fight, and the PEOPLE involved, and the gear involved. If a hunter is able to outdps a rogue on a single target fight I would venture to guess the rogue is doing something wrong.
As to Sapa - half those fights a warlock is vastly superior - and getting to those bosses you're going to save more time SHEEPING the trash mobs than you will gain by having 50-100dps more on the boss. 1 rez is a lot of lost dps in terms of time. As to rogues losing on dps meters on Void reaver - I would guess you're using a suboptimal strategy. Rogues should also destroy lurker as well.
We are starting to bring more hunters in now and are not at all regretting the results so far. They still fall in the "ranged damage" category for us though and tend to replace mage slots for the most part although of course it is sometimes a rogue slot instead.
As well, I'm not so sure anymore Quigon. A BM Hunter can provide as much total raid dps (including the group 3% from FI) as a Rogue for most fights and with less need on in-combat support for the most part. A Survival Hunter is still up in the air a bit but for melee-heavy raids they are also a perk not to be ignored. Regardless though, competent Hunters are definitely a raid asset now and I think that is generally a very good thing.
We are starting to bring more hunters in now and are not at all regretting the results so far. They still fall in the "ranged damage" category for us though and tend to replace mage slots for the most part although of course it is sometimes a rogue slot instead.
As well, I'm not so sure anymore Quigon. A BM Hunter can provide as much total raid dps (including the group 3% from FI) as a Rogue for most fights and with less need on in-combat support for the most part. A Survival Hunter is still up in the air a bit but for melee-heavy raids they are also a perk not to be ignored. Regardless though, competent Hunters are definitely a raid asset now and I think that is generally a very good thing.
Yes, they're definitely improved - hence why we bring 3 a night sometimes. But to me I'm not comparing hunter to mage, as much as hunter to warlock or rogue... which is mostly the spots they compete against. I choose mages based on number of sheeps required or as a fill in/situational role.
On many fights AE, and DoT rotting multiple targets is really valuable - hence why warlocks often win out.
But if you're telling me that two equally geared and competent players, sitting on lurker or void reaver - one is a BM hunter, one is a rogue - and the hunter wins, then I am totally wrong in my thinking, and take back what I said. I just haven't experienced that. I've seen good hunter DPS (finally! dramatic improvement from Naxx), but not tops unless something strange is happening.
People and your damage meters... Damage meters do not exist in a vacuum. They depend on the fight, and the PEOPLE involved, and the gear involved. If a hunter is able to outdps a rogue on a single target fight I would venture to guess the rogue is doing something wrong.
As to Sapa - half those fights a warlock is vastly superior - and getting to those bosses you're going to save more time SHEEPING the trash mobs than you will gain by having 50-100dps more on the boss. 1 rez is a lot of lost dps in terms of time. As to rogues losing on dps meters on Void reaver - I would guess you're using a suboptimal strategy. Rogues should also destroy lurker as well.
I don't know what your hunters are doing, but we do 1k dps most of the time and usualy with little or no group dps support.
Allso tell me what your rogues are doing to break 1.1k dps in their perfect groups (with enh.shaman and warrior)
Im trapping those mobs as much as mages are sheeping them or priests MCing.
At Void, melee group (3x rogue, enh.shaman, warrior with imp.bs) are in and dpses 100%.. Chain Heal+JoL ftw?.
Note: im SV in this WWS, that means ~100-200 personal+pet dps less than BM atm (depends on fight, and scorpid abuse).
We usually bring 2 (sometimes 3) hunters to SSC/TK and they almost always get a shadowpriest. This boost their damage by an order of magnitude, because instead of gimping themselves to achieve sustainability they can go full out (influences gear as well).
I don't understand how a rogue loses to a hunter on void reaver. It is quite possible that the rogues in your WWS just simply are undergeared, or not very good. That is why damage meters are so poor.
Just grabbing random void reaver's from a search of the other thread:
I'm not seeing hunters win out, ever. I don't see how a hunter can beat a competent rogue on void reaver. Again, those are totally random samples - I didn't pick and choose them... I searched for void reaver and pasted those in, I have to assume the ones where rogues aren't tops over warlocks they are dodging the pummel - but they epitomize why damage meters are very missleading.
You're a hunter - you're linking damage meters that support your point; but again, damage meters are not in a vacuum.
If BM now allows hunters to beat rogues on lurker, Hydross, morogrim, void reaver, solarian, kael for instance (given equal gear and skill), then yes, start bringing a lot of them.
Instead of hunter:
Why take more than 1 rogues, 1 mage (ai) and 1 lock (aff/imp) on
Al'ar?
Well desto lock dps with SP support > hunter > mage > rogue.
But saddly it doesn't fare well for him grabbing aggro on embers, nor does he hit both at once. Neither he can fire instants when they spawn and bring them to tanks, then safely drop aggro.
Hydross?
Depends on tactic.
AoE: hunter > rogue
Single/Duo: You need 2x banish, rogues help with stuns, but dps hunter > all.
Hunter = safest dps, and MDed transitions = win.
Lurker?
Yet to see "normal" fight, but 1 destro lock beat me for 700damage total on first kill and we were way ahead 3rd who was BM hunter, who was quite ahead from 4th on dps that was SP.
Tidewalker?
Hunter > rogue both in dps and utility. I even beat some mages and locks in dps that are AoEing the murlocs.
Lord?
You would like to have 1 rogue for kicks, but lately shamans do the job with shocks.
Heh.
From my PoV atm well played hunters are top dps, with more utility than people give them credit for. Either that or whole my guild dps plainly sucks witch i doubt.
This is some really bad utilization of your rogues than. There is zero way a hunter should be out DPSing a rogue on Morogrim. Are you taking your rogues off him during murlocs?
Same thing with Hydross. The only time our rogues even DPS adds are on transitions to nature phase and only with BF while attacking hydross. We AoE everything on top of Hydross
Lurker, eh, DPS is a non-issue, the meter from fight to fight changes a lot for us.
Fathom Lord rogues tend to dominate the DPS by a large margin. They don't have to worry about agro except directly in the beginning and just go balls to the wall on the back of a mob that's not going to move. Only thing that causes sub-hunter DPS is being on totem/kick duty.
here's some wow web stats of a morogrim encounter. On the Adds we only have mages/locks/tank:
I've been BM/marks (40/21 or 41/20 depending on the night), and was almost always clearly #1 damage overall. People comment on 'pet unfriendly' fights, but almost always these fight are really 'melee unfriendly'. Pets don't have to deal with the same debuffs as players, talk half the damage of aoes, and can get the most efficient heal, while also getting free dispels.
The biggest reason I've found to not take hunters is not the class itself, but the difficulty of playing it. You need to control your pet as much as a rogue controls himself, but you have less options for doing so. On top of that, your attack cycle is very heavily dependent on timing, so requires paying close attention. I've seen bad hunters with comparable/better gear half my dps in a fight because of poor pet control/choice and bad timing.
Recently, however, I realized that having a Survival hunter in group is very useful in 25mans, and as a result I switch to that spec for almost every 25 man. It lowers me to 2nd-3rd on damage meters, but that's partially b/c of my survival gear. I have mostly blues and socketed items with high agi/agi gems, and I raid buff to over 1000 agility. With a feral in group, I'm over 40% crit, and I basically keep expose weakness on our target. That gives every physical dpser (warriors (tank too), rogues, enhancement shammys, hunters, pets, shadowfiends) +250 attack power, which adds up quickly. In addition, I have improved hunter's mark, so everyone's getting at least 360 attack power.
Don't forget that a good hunter can go all out almost forever with blessing and judgement of wisdom and never pull agro, a feat no other class can do.
In conclusion, always take an agi stacked survival hunter, if you don't have one, have one of your good hunters respec for raids. Unless a specific fight needs a specific class, there's nothing wrong with (and it's often advisable to) pulling in a good hunter over pretty much any dps class, though obviously don't remove any classes entirely. If they're a bad hunter, you may likely find that a bad rogue/lock/warrior/mage will do better.
I would say that a competent and geared BM Hunter should* be able to beat an equivalent rogue in total raid dps produced (including the amounts from FI and Imp Mark if appropriate) at this point on any fight where a pet can be used. A Survival Hunter is a huge contributer as well, presuming you have a fair amount of melee dps. This is going to depend a ton on how you stack your raid groups though of course and since we are not presently fielding an enhancement shaman, I do know our Rogues are suffering. I would note that I am not at all discounting MM hunters at this point but I do not find them to be optimal for raid damage contribution right now.
A lot of this comes down to how you like to attribute damage done though. I don't view personal dps as being terribly important myself and tend to think in terms of the marginal value of a particular class or spec. While Rogues excel at "personal dps", much of that damage is actually attributable to other classes/roles that are supporting the rogue himself. Rogues definitely do bring other abilities to the table though and are certainly excellent at leveraging buffs into damage.
Hell, in the end I think we are approaching a situation where a very balanced raid group (featuring mixed specs for many classes) is the ideal overall with very occasional class-stacking for certain fights. That last bit still annoys me some but such is life.
* - Note: I am not at all saying that I think this is how it should be, only that this is how I see it at present.
Yes, it does come down to an optimally designed raid make up as well. Where there was an entire thread dedicated to this as well recently.
Our guild tends to be running caster heavier raids at the moment, due to the design of most of the fights. Yes, rogues do excel at personal DPS, but there are classes that contribute to the raid DPS via buffs etc, better than hunters.
Like I posted before, it's rare for us to have 2 hunters in our raid, but it's also rare for us have 3+ rogues.
In the primary melee dps group, there is just not room for a hunter.
Ideally, imo, it's:
Rogue
Rogue
MS Warrior w/ Blood Frenzy & imp BS (we usually lack blood frenzy)
Enhancement Shaman
Feral Druid
I'm not seeing hunters win out, ever. I don't see how a hunter can beat a competent rogue on void reaver. Again, those are totally random samples - I didn't pick and choose them... I searched for void reaver and pasted those in, I have to assume the ones where rogues aren't tops over warlocks they are dodging the pummel - but they epitomize why damage meters are very missleading.
You're a hunter - you're linking damage meters that support your point; but again, damage meters are not in a vacuum.
If BM now allows hunters to beat rogues on lurker, Hydross, morogrim, void reaver, solarian, kael for instance (given equal gear and skill), then yes, start bringing a lot of them.
Yeah, I've never really come close to beating a rogue on Void Reaver. One of the very few fights that this is the case.
As for us, we bring two hunters into SSC/TK, but if we had a third solid hunter, we'd probably bring him/her aswell. As said above, it doesn't make much of an impact on the raid itself by bringing/not bringing additional hunters.
Expose Weakness is amazing. Have one of your Hunters spec deep Survival and watch your raid DPS increase. As a whole, at least 2-3 Hunters I'd say is the norm. Any more than 3 and you start digging into Mage/Warlock ranks which really hurts on certain encounters. Tidewalker comes to mind right away.
I am a rogue. I can do 1400+ sustained dps on Tidewalker by using a good rotation. On fights with adds (almost every fight), an equally geared/skilled BM hunter will compete with me in DPS. Thus they are not a waste of a raid spot. Mages generally do less damage than either class, sheeps are not required (you can fear most mobs as long as your warlocks suck less than most), thus more than one mage IS a waste of a raid spot.
Obviously I'm exaggerating as mages still put out decent DPS, but take two raids of equal skill/gear level, and the one with 3 hunters and 1 mage will do better DPS than the one with 3 mages and 1 hunter.
Ideal melee group is 3xrogue/dps warrior/enhancement shaman.
Ideal hunter group is 3xhunter/shadow priest/feral druid.
If you give them equally good group setups, they will trade between who does top damage depending on the fight.
We bring 2 Hunters to most raids, one MM and one Survival. Expose Weakness is awesome, and the MM hunter does solid DPS. Neither of them ever tops damage meters, and if they did I would probably tell our Rogues to stop slacking. Regarding BM, our MM Hunter tried it out for a week and hated it. He basically feels the same way Gonkish does about the spec (see Hunting Hunters thread).
06/18/07, 10:24 AM
more MD = more raid dps.
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