Jayde

Well, honestly, there is no way this is accurate. A BM Hunter's pet alone does over 300 DPS, which is more than MTs by a considerable margin... and that's not even using a Scorpid.

What I'm trying to say is that, in its basic form, it's always seemed that Hunters are -extremely- noob-friendly. When it comes to leveling, soloing, and showing up they can do quite well with minimal to no real effort. The heavy amount of auto-shot and pet damage that BM Hunters have means that in a crowd of so-so players, even a mediocre Hunter can end up winning damage meters in some situations, and even in harder situations they can get away with a lot before they get noticed as doing something significantly wrong.

Of course, yes.. when you get into high-end raiding, the demands and scrutiny go up considerably. It's at this point when most Hunters either learn the crazy amount of detail they have to go into for "the last mile", or give up. I think the combo of the two elements is a big reason why a lot of Hunters either can't, or won't "get it" in the end.

I've had to teach a lot of new Mages as they come into the guild over the years, and most of them put out significantly less DPS initially than I know many Hunters could do without much effort. Of course, when you're compared to the Mages that really know what they're doing vs. the Hunters that really know what they're doing, there is no question the Hunters have a put way more effort into shot rotations than the Mages to having to watch Quartz latency and time /stopcasting stuff.

 

Ailee

This is untrue for any pet except for the Scorpid and that's having a 550+ tick on Scorpid poison. For a Cat or Ravager, a more accurate number would be 150-200 consistent... unless you're doing Shade of Akama or any other no armor target.

 

Howitzer

My pet on Supremus: 312 DPS, not a scorpid either.
BFG - WWS

My pet on Naj'entus: 284 DPS, a cat.
BFG - WWS

Pets can do great DPS, scorpid or not. It really just depends on if your paladins are lazy to buff them or not and how you manage kill commands and its own DPS time. Fortunately, I've bitched and moaned enough to the point I don't even have to ask for buffs anymore, they just do it! =)

 

Ailee

Cheater...


Couldn't this be related to your gear too? Directly or indirectly. I'd imagine you'd have a good amount of critical hits that your pet almost always has Focus from Go for the Throat. Either way, this won't be something a Karazhan/SSC gear hunter, like myself, could probably accomplish. On average, 150-200 is a safer assumption instead of 300 or higher.

 

Daenerys

Yes, an exageration to make the point, but keep in mind that a pet that isn't tended to will die on most encounters. The more I think about it though, someone with absolutely no clue how to play a Hunter is better off just sending in the pet and Auto-shotting. It's the ones that try but have no clue that are bottom-dwelling on the meters...the only class that you can do *less* DPS with when you just randomly spam your specials. =P

Your experience is different than mine though. When I come across Hunters that don't know what they are doing, their placement on the meters is terrible compared to other classes that just don't get it. But since I haven't seen enough for statistically significant sampling, I'll just chalk it up to bad luck on my part (or good on yours).

 

sovelis41

When the pally buff change goes in, I'll definately be nagging paladins a lot more for pet buffs (especially on bosses!). Looking over some random WWS kills, my pet (Ravager) does from 240-270 dps (no buffs outside 60mins).

 

tyme

Personally I really enjoy the way Hunters work. It requires quite a bit of effort to play well. And that is enjoyable.

However the biggest thing facing Hunters, at least at where my guild is with progress, is gear.

I have been very unlucky with Hunter drops I suppose, but what gear is available is still horrible compared to what was going on at level 60.

For example my guild is currently killing morogrim and void reaver. I have yet to see void reaver drop the hunter shoulders or morgrim for that matter. After dozens of kara clears I have yet to see the hunter bracers drop from the first boss or the tier 4 helm from prince.

Because of my horrible luck with drops and other reasons. I find myself still using 6 parts of level 60 gear. Even this many months after hitting level 70 I am still able to do very competitve DPS using so many pieces of gear 10 levels below my current level.

For example on our last Morogrim kill: Wow Web Stats
I was able to average 1477DPS using a scorpid. Now without doing extensive theory crafting there is no way that would happen. Using speadsheet to min/max gems, what gear I have, etc.

And about how broken our level 70 gear is before BT/Hijal I wonder what other class could still compete on DPS using that many pieces of level 60 gear. Blizzard seemed to actually understand to a small degree how to design hunter gear during naxx.

On that note is anybody else in my boat, still using a ton of level 60 gear even at level 70?

 

Howitzer

I love the fact that the class became more dynamic since the introduction of steady shot. While I may not like the limitations of DPS due to the GCD, it still has added a much needed fun-mechanic to playing the class. Without it, we would just be another button-mashing 2222222 1111111 222222 class.

 

• vank

Untrue. I'm in mostly KZ gear, w/ some quest items. My cat does 275-300 every fight.

WWS from last Mag kill

 

tyme

Using a scorpid pet for hydross, which I will assume most understand is hardly the best pet for that fight. It did 275 DPS on average: Scimitar - WWS

As I posted a little bit a go, I am still using 6 pieces of level 60 gear along with various PVP, kara and quest items. A scorpid without using poison is not exactly a high dps pet. I would think a pet cat with somebody using full kara gear should be able to get better numbers.

 

Ailee

WWS
363.

Of course there will be situations where the pet can exceed 200.. Maybe 200-250 is a better answer.

WWS
Didn't exceed 300...

 

Klauso

I just keep adapting the best I can to the changes in the hunter class. Get King B its fast - ok. Get a wind serp it's lightning breath is great with GFTT - ok. Get a Scorpid for the poison stacks - ok. No idea what it will be tomorrow - maybe a Ravenger.

As the GM of a SSC level guild with only 3 surviving hunters from pre-TBC it's easy to spot the newb hunters. Just one WWS report and I can tell the recruits that have no clue about how to DPS. I teach the best I can but the hunters that are new to the class have a hard time "getting" the shot rotations or at least applying them. A couple months ago I was the only hunter left that logged on for raids. All the others had quit playing or enjoyed their alts etc. With the 41/20/0 build and a scorpid I have shown I can compete for top dps on almost every fight and actually lured a couple old vets back into playing their hunters. It's all about adapting to the changes - annoying but what's the alternative?

 

Daenerys

You're right, and I love that aspect of the class as well, despite what it may appear from my posts and my reroll. The straw that broke the camel's back for me was trying to do top-of-the-chart DPS (I've never been satisfied with being middle of the pack DPS) while still leading the raid. I could do it, and I did do it for months (not to mention years pre-TBC, but rotations were easier back then), but the stress level was high for me and it was burning me out.

If I was just another DPSer in the raid and not a guild officer and raid leader, I think I would enjoy the class more than I was. I can't even count the number of times I was in charge of calling out a raid warning on vent and forgot to because I was so caught up in my shot rotation. >.< On the Druid it is far easier for me to play well and help direct the raid on complicated boss fights.

 

Ailee

Some thoughts I've had, though would probably never be implemented... What ifs:

- They lowered the GCD for hunters to 1.0 much like Rogues. My thought is this could be both positive and negative. Those trying to squeeze out all that extra DPS will still be on constant GCD and actually make the rotations even more problematic. All the same, it could possibly allow the newer players to easily juggle rotations and the gap between mediocre and "hardcore" could decrease.

- Reduce Steady Shot to a 1.0 or less cast time. Still have GCD so I'd think the change would be minimal, however it could allow much easier rotations between Steady cast and the auto shot cast.

 

Glaurong

This thread really is a rehash of the hunting hunters... thread. I agree our core class mechanics are ass backwards, however despite these mechanics we can still be competitive top tier DPS. I think this puts the devs in the "its not broke, don't fix it" mindset.

There are no simple fixes for us.

How do you make the class more accessible to your average player without making theorycrafters overpowered?

How do you include enough complexity so the class is fun and engaging to play without freezing out average players?

How do you balance a ranged, pet class in PvP given the above?

Some of the suggestions in this thread are okay but most would make us overpowered in one way or another and others dumb the class down completely (lowest common denominator).

It appears you pet was attacking from the front in that WWS as his miss rate was over 15%. WWS treats blocks, parries, dodges as misses. Assuming about 5% of that miss rate is parry, your pet was parried about 30-40 times. Which also means your pet hasted about 10% of VRs attacks, don't do that!

If you position your pet behind the boss, properly use KC and are BM, 300 dps is definitely typical for a cat/ravager.

Log Parser for BM Hunters (Right click, save as) - Updated 10/11/2007

 

sasukekun

I usually have my scorpid pet sitting around 2nd-3rd in threat (depending on the fight) and it actually pulled aggro last night in Phase 2 of Essence of Souls. It does about ~650 TPS (Threat per second)

 

majorerror

In terms of a Scorpid's potential high TPS, has anyone done testing on the effects and plausability of Cower in raids? especially ones where the boss allows for pretty much 100% dps time for your pet (ie: Magtheridon and Morogrim). It could be a widely used skill but i'm unaware otherwise, opinions and experences will be greatly appreciated.

 

Kaelvanas

You are QUITE right. One of the core hunter skills is managing early aggro, so that we can time our initial FD (and the second one too) correctly. Do it too soon, and you're threat-capped before your 30 seconds are up. Too late, and you REALLY mess things up. We generally do NOT try to burn all our cooldowns in the first 30 seconds. (Second 30 seconds? possibly, since we're zeroing threat afterwards anyways.) Early on, I know that I tend to be more concerned that (a) the first three shots don't crit, and (b) I am making sure to get Misdirection up. Since I'm the mist crit-happy of our hunters, I like to take first Misdirection, as that really helps even out my overall threat per second early in the fight.

Many (I like to think skilled) hunters prioritize Salvation last, because over the LONG term fight, it's only useful for ~30-45 seconds. Might/Kings/Wisdom, however, are useful the entire time. Without those three, our overall damage is severely hampered, and after two FDs, you're not likely to get anywhere NEAR threat cap until the end of the fight. (If you FD atthe halfway or 2/3 mark, you're pretty much completely set.) When you consider that we will sometimes FD mid-fight to swap trinkets, this means that Salvation is a complete waste later in the fight.

Wisdom is a long-term endurance buff for hunters, as it helps us avoid going OOM. Salvation is a long-term endurance buff for other DPS classes, in that it slows their TPS and prevents them from pulling aggro and dying.

I really like your idea of trading Wis for Salv early on, and then getting buffed mid-fight ... but that would really take some paladin cooperation. Short of a paladin that re-rolled from a hunter, I don't really see that happening. (Similar argument for the shaman threat reduction totem.) I'll have to talk to our Paladins and see if this is viable. Perhaps even buy them a bunch of tokens to use for it. It'd be damned annoying to be clamoring on vent after a minute for Wisdom instead of Kings, though.

 

Howitzer

I absolutely love Salv on several fights specifically while specc'd as Marks in raids. Missing a FD will cripple my DPS like nothing else and having salv is an absolute godsend considering I'm already paired with a shadowpriest and have zero mana issues. Wisdom is icing on the cake but isn't necessary all the time.

 

Jayde

I ran this by one of our Paladins tonight, and he said he really wouldn't mind doing it if the Hunters asked--just that he would have to get reminded and get into a habit of it. Re-blessing all the Hunters is basically just 1 click, and virtually no mana...so I suppose if the Hunter class leader sent a reminder to the appropriate Salv/Wisdom blesser, it would be pretty easy to arrange.

(As for the pet issue, I basically just looked at the DPS of our two main Hunters' pets on last a few Morogrim WWS. They were 270/280 tonight, and 320/319 last night... Both use Claw+Bite Cats.)

 

Glaurong

I was tossing around the idea of writing a program that would give you a guitar hero style interface to your shots (shots you need to fire soon scrolling down from the top of the screen) and getting using a XB360 guitar hero controller to time shots. It wouldn't work very well but the super nerd in me would find it amusing.

I think it would also illustrate very nicely to the community at large how complicated a variable haste rotation can get.

Log Parser for BM Hunters (Right click, save as) - Updated 10/11/2007

 

kenderpl

Hey let's be honest. Exactly how much skill does [mangle, shred to 5cp, wait for energy, rip, goto mangle] require? I would say this is pretty simplistic compared to what hunters need to do

 

Ato

Hang on. I am probably missing something here (pun intended) but how do you get this (that the boss mob parried)?

Attacking a boss mob at +3 levels gives a 17% chance to miss. Assuming the pet was behind the boss mob that leaves miss & dodge (no parries nor blocks behind). As 15.8% is less than 17%, that means all the WWS 'misses' could in fact just be misses & dodges, no?

It's all fun & games till someone gets a [Hydrocane] in the eye!

 

Grogzor

17% is for spells chance to miss. I believe your pets chance to miss is about 8.6% against a mob 3 levels higher.

 

Ato

/facepalm

Yeah, that's what I missed >_>

It's all fun & games till someone gets a [Hydrocane] in the eye!