So I've been hankering to play my BM Hunter for some time now, but the urge has been especially strong now, since BM got buffed in 3.3.3. I know it's not much, but I miss my pets, so I started looking into what the best race would be for me to convert my Hunter into, since the Hunter is originally a Dwarf, and I now play Horde. Let's hope this post is elitist enough for EJ.


Problem: Does race make a different in terms of DPS as a BM hunter?

Observations: There are seven hunter races. In addition to the variances in endgame stats, there are four races with racial abilities that provide a direct benefit to their DPS. They are:

Dwarves: 1% extra crit with guns
Draenei: 1% extra Hit
Orcs: 5% extra pet DPS, free 322 AP trinket
Trolls: 20% Haste trinket, 1% bow crit

As the current generation of BiS hunter ranged weapons are bows, Dwarves gain little to no benefit from their racial. Draenei receive a free 32.79 hit rating, which is equivalent to slightly more than 1.5 Rigid King's Amber, allowing stat distribution away from Hit, and towards damage stats, like Agility or AP. While Orcs have a free 322 AP trinket, as well as 5% extra pet DPS, the passive benefit, assuming it is popped every time it is off cooldown, is a very anemic:

322 attack power gain * 15 second up-time / 120 second cooldown = 40.25 average attack power gain.

However, Orcs also have a passive 5% pet damage bonus, which is of particular interest to BM hunters.

Trolls have a 20% haste trinket, which will scale with gear, but only affects the hunter's personal DPS, and 1% bow crit, which is beneficial, again, given that the large number of bows in BiS ranged weapons. However, since Haste is one of the weaker stats for a BM hunter, this likely will likely not have a significant effect.

Blood Elves have no direct damage-increasing racial abilities, instead deriving an instant mana gain effect. Theoretically, this results in additional spent blasting away, and less time spent in Aspect of the Viper compared to the other, effectively trading increased damage for increased throughput.

Night Elves and Tauren gain no DPS benefit from their racial abilities.

Hypothesis: I hypothesize that in order of DPS gained from racials, Dwarves will receive the least benefit from their racial, then Blood Elves, then Trolls, then Draenei, with Orcs receiving the greatest benefit.

Procedure:

We will pick out several BM hunters, and import their gear into Zeherah's DPS analyzer. These BM hunters will be picked by going through this thread and checking the characters of the posters here. If the character is logged out in a BM spec, then they are a valid candidate for this test. As this is a test of the effect of race on BM DPS, we seek only to see how much of a DPS swing that each set of racial abilities and end stats provides, within a set of gear. Selecting a BM hunter ensures that we will at least get a set of gear that is somewhat optimized to the spec. Since we can also import a build, we will import the basic spec, as listed in the first post into the DPS tool. We will also apply the same Major Glyphs, as well: Steady, Hawk, and Serpent Sting. We will ignore Minor Glyphs for the purposes of each test. For each test, we will use a Wolf, using the "Enable common pet spec" setting in the DPS analyzer. We will swap the race of our Frankenhunters, and see which race winds up with the highest DPS. Given a standardized spec, standardized glyphs, standardized pet, and standardized buffs, and only making comparisons between races relative to each other, within a given gear set, the only variables should be the racial stat differences, and the racial abilities.

In the case of the Draenei, if we wind up going over hit cap beyond 11 hit rating, we will attempt to replace hit gems (if there are any) with Agility/AP until we come back down to as close to the cap as possible, and take the better result.

For buffs and debuffs, we will set things to "Enable Best Raid Buffs" and "Enable Best Raid Debuffs". Yes, this means that the Alliance races will get the benefit of the Draenei 1% hit buff.

All other settings will be left as default.

Data:

It should be noted at this point that Wowhead-format talent specs were not properly importing into Zeherah's DPS Analyzer. I suspect this has something to do with how Wowhead has enabled the option to enable five additional talent points, simulating the level cap being raised to 85. Of course, this is not realistic, as the talent trees are undergoing major restructuring for Cataclysm, but hey, it's fun to play with, right? I have instead put together the same spec in the Armory's talent calculator.

Just for a bit of vanity, here's my shitty hunter where the people I started playing with abandoned me before I could get geared, Tornald of Bleeding Hollow. Please note that this character is in no way optimal at all, it totally not hitcapped, and was originally specced to have 3/3 Focused Aim. Remember, these are Frankenhunters that we are putting together here. Remember, given a standardized spec, standardized pet, and standardized buffs, and taking all data isolated within gear sets, the only variables should be the racial stat differences, and the racial abilities.

Well, so far, hypothesis is pretty much gone, except for the hypothesis that Orcs have the highest DPS. The results are likely skewed in favor of the Alliance races, because of not being hitcapped, resulting in Hit providing the greatest DPS boost, but seeing Orc still take the lead is impressive. However, since these tests are performed under *the absolute best raid conditions* the differences between DPS of races is likely much less. It should be noted that out of all the race selections, Orcs are the only one with a greater pet DPS than personal Hunter DPS. So there's our baseline.


Next is Nooska of EU-Argent Dawn, since banned from EJ, but hey, he's got a BM spec, and he logged out in it, which means, hopefully, his gear is BM-optimized.


Dwarf is still in 2nd place, no doubt buoyed by the Gun Specialization racial, although I note that this hunter is using the ilvl264 gun Rowan's Rifle of Silver Bullets, a tank weapon. Maybe the upgrade was *just* that significant that even with the tank stats, the weapon was still an upgrade. Orc is still clearly in first place, although it should be noted that the trend between hunter and pet DPS does not hold true from lower gear levels. Also, yes, running the test as a Blood Elf did, in fact, give me a DPS result box without a "Viper Loss" value or heading. Tauren are still in last place.

Next is Lorelei of US-Gilneas


Two pattens are beginning to form here. Orcs are still at the top of the DPS charts, and Tauren are still at the bottom. It is surprising that Troll does not rank higher, as this hunter's gear uses a bow instead of a gun. Orcs are still far and away the best, offering an extra hypothetical 150 DPS as BM, over the next race.

Next is Brughe of US-Cenarion Circle

Good friggin' god. 10K hypothetical DPS on a BM hunter? *NOW* I've seen everything. Again, Orc on top, Tauren on bottom. Troll probably made it up to 2nd because of the Zod's Repeating Longbow.

Interpretation:

Okay, I've seen enough results to call it already. Race-changing a BM hunter to Orc always results in a DPS increase. This trend continues to hold even at progressively higher gear levels, with the gap in hypothetical DPS a consistent 100+ DPS. Sadly, as much as I love Tauren, they appear to consistently make the worst BM hunters. I suspect that things would be much different for Survival, but that is a different matter altogether.

Conclusion:

Splitting the data sets into two separate categories of Alliance and Horde BM hunters, however, shows a different story. For Alliance, where guns are involved, it appears that the combination of raw stats and +1% crit rating pushes Dwarves to the top, assuming said BM hunter is equipped with a gun. Outside of that, they appear to be the worst BM hunters. In cases where the weapon is not a consideration, Night Elves are the best BM hunters, although admittedly, not by much.

Horde-side, as previously stated, Orcs are the best BM hunters, followed Blood Elves, Trolls and Tauren, except in the case where a Zod's Repeating Longbow is involved, which appears to bump Trolls up to the number two slot, seeing as how the proc crits based on your crit rate.

I'd still like to add more data points, though. If you are a BM hunter, say so, so I can throw your data up here for comparison?

Just seeing the theoretical DPS on the last character there, is inspiring. I suspect that Brughe is sufficiently geared enough to be able to drop Arcane shot from his rotation, which means that the DPS would be even higher. One thing I'd like to do, the next time I am bored out of my skull and decide to do something stupid like this, is to go and find BM hunters with sub-optimal gear, just for kicks, and see if Orcs still reign supreme as BM. But that's hard to do when your pool of potential BM hunters are the people here, since this this is EJ, which sort of sets a higher standard for gear/spec than the random hunter.

Add the gear yourself. Unhide the Gear sheet. Copy paste insert a row where the helms are. Enter all the stats along the row.

You can only equip one DBW. The Unique tag on ICC trinkets includes the normal and heroic versions, so it's not possible to have both on at the same time.

Just for the record, this is not correct (unless something has substantially changed since all the previous times this was tested). Only serpent sting locks in the % damage bonus, Chimera - Serpent still calculates off your current stats and modifiers only.