Thanks for all the insight and information you toss out here for the community.
I tried out the macro that you suggest, and noticed that I clip alot of shots with it. My hunter is only 66 at the moment, but I went out and messed around at Dr. Boom a little bit to see what worked best. I am using a 2.8 speed bow at the moment. I use my n52 gamepad to spam the macro every tenth of a second.
Any suggestions as to how I may be messing up with this macro would be greatly appreciated.
Due to the nature of the macro, you will have a 3:2 shot rotation until you reach speeds where a 1:1 rotation would be better, and you will switch automatically. With a 3:2 rotation you WILL clip every other auto shot, but it is at an increase in damage. The slower your bow, ie 2.9 and 3.0 the better this shot rotation will be for you. This macro will still work with a faster bow, but the damage increase compared to the mana spent may not be worth it.
PS. Sorry I didn't see this and respond sooner.
Originally Posted by Ato
So how do you Hunters claiming that you use the 3:2 rotation actually maintain this?
I go OOM before the cd on my pot is up.
Example. I begin shooting at Dr Boom with 3:2 rotation. Take first mana pot about once I've used about 2k of my total mana. That brings me back up to approx full mana again, and begins the potion cooldown timer. By the time I go OOM, my pot cd still has about 30-40 seconds left on it.
I dont see how it is possible to use a 3:2 rotation in practice; no mana and all I'll be doing is Autoshotting.
[Recipe: Elixir of Major Mageblood], [Superior Mana Oil] (x2 if possible), [Fel Mana Potion] are all a must. I think most raids will have 3 paladins, so you should have BoW. A good holy paladin can often keep JoW up too depending on the fight. Many raid compositions allow for some kind of shaman in your group, if it's a resto shaman then your mana pool will be better off. If you can't get a shaman then beg for a Spriest.
You don't need all of these to maintain your mana pool, and combination of 4-5 will keep you doing just fine. I use a 3:2 rotation for bear mount ZA runs. I only drink before bosses, and I almost never mana pot unless we're running behind on Lynx trash. It's entirely possible to keep up the rotation with proper planning.
So how do you Hunters claiming that you use the 3:2 rotation actually maintain this?
I go OOM before the cd on my pot is up.
Example. I begin shooting at Dr Boom with 3:2 rotation. Take first mana pot about once I've used about 2k of my total mana. That brings me back up to approx full mana again, and begins the potion cooldown timer. By the time I go OOM, my pot cd still has about 30-40 seconds left on it.
I dont see how it is possible to use a 3:2 rotation in practice; no mana and all I'll be doing is Autoshotting.
As has been said, you just need to use a few consumables, but in all honesty I've never gone to such extremes that have been discussed.
I use Super pots (even the Combat pots) and always have either BoW or Mana Spring.
If we're not learning contnet, I'll throw down Mageblood elixir, if we are, I'll mana oil - but never both.
Also, another nice trick is having 2x1h'ers w/ 30int enchants. Equip them for the start of the fight then burn through that "extra" mana they provide and once the "extra" mana is gone, switch back to your normal weapon.
Make sure you pot early, if you've got 7k mana, you're down to 5k after 30 seconds of the fight, pot then and there. It's all about managing your CDs.
Sometimes on truly mana intensive fights, I whip out [Black Grasp of the Destroyer], but this is on very rare occasions. Not at Illidan yet to get my little mits on the bow!
Thanks for the replies. I guess I should have been more specific.
I certainly use 2XSup Mana Oils, and the top Mageblood Elixir, with FMPs. In addition, I also chew Demonic Runes.
I was thinking about the new Assassins Alchy Stone, as I'm a Herber/Alchy.
Now, in raids, we dont always have 3 Pallies, and I dont always get a Shaman/SPriest. Sometimes I get the SPriest group, sometimes I get the melee group (so Enh shammy), sometimes I get the extra group (so no buffs at all basically). In addition, our Pallies keep JoW when they can, but it cant always be kept up. So when I'm in the dud group, basically it's impossible to keep 3:2 rotation going with just consumeables.
So, let's assume that I'm in the dud group, but I want to keep using the 3:2 rotation. (Obviously it's easy with SPriest or the like. I want to see whether I can keep it up, with no support).
The new AA Stone (AA hehe) gives 108AP. It's roughly equivalent to the Bloodlust Brooch for me (BB normalized is worth 118AP if used everytime the cd is up, but I admit to not using it every single cd due to waiting for boss fights etc). In addition, the Stone gives 40% increase to pots (still wish Blizz made this reduction to pot cd of 1min >_<). So a 3200 FMP would give 4480 mana back. (A Mad Alchy Pot would give back approx 3080 mana & health.)
So with the new Stone as a trinket, if I'm able to keep up the 3:2 rotation without outside support, it may make that trinket incredibly powerful for me.
Note: I dont switch to Viper for regen, as when I'm in the dud group I simply use a 1:1 rotation and dont go OOM. I find this better for DPS/dmg than going OOM with 3:2 then using Viper to regen. In addition, I have 5/5 Imp HM rather than Efficiency. Maybe I could switch to 5/5 Eff and 2/5 Imp HM.
Also I've been using Agi food, I wonder if using the mp5 food instead with all the above would be better?
Kamaa: You said "I use a 3:2 rotation for bear mount ZA runs. I only drink before bosses, and I almost never mana pot unless we're running behind on Lynx trash." Do you switch to Viper at all during your runs? On my runs, I dont switch, but I chain pot. I simply run out of mana even using 1:1. But then we are a t5 group.
Edit: I've been playing around with some numbers on Cheekys SS. I suffer from an incredibly high latency of 500ms+, so it seems that 1:1 is better under pretty much any circumstances anyway. Oh well.
Last edited by Ato : 03/30/08 at 12:48 AM.
It's all fun & games till someone gets a [Hydrocane] in the eye!
I pot at least 2 or 3 times per fight in ZA, do not run Viper at all, but always have either BoW/Mana Spring.
Now, I'm going to nitpick here but it seems like you're inferring that without having 3 Pallies in a raid, you don't get BoW?
To be brutally honest, I find that a bit silly.
In any fight thats going to be lasting from 7-10 minutes, I just couldn't survive without it, probably because I don't like running Viper. I'd prefer to be using iAoTH + BoW rather than Viper + BoM.
For 25man raids, my buff order is always (as BM): BoW > BoM > BoK NB: This is assuming less than 3 Pallies, no Spriest, no Shammy, running a 3:2 rotation.
Generally, I don't make that call, we never have less than 2 Pallies per raid.
I pot at least 2 or 3 times per fight in ZA, do not run Viper at all, but always have either BoW/Mana Spring.
Now, I'm going to nitpick here but it seems like you're inferring that without having 3 Pallies in a raid, you don't get BoW?
To be brutally honest, I find that a bit silly.
In any fight thats going to be lasting from 7-10 minutes, I just couldn't survive without it, probably because I don't like running Viper. I'd prefer to be using iAoTH + BoW rather than Viper + BoM.
For 25man raids, my buff order is always (as BM): BoW > BoM > BoK NB: This is assuming less than 3 Pallies, no Spriest, no Shammy, running a 3:2 rotation.
Generally, I don't make that call, we never have less than 2 Pallies per raid.
I'm pretty surprised about that to be honest. We always Might = Kings > Wisdom = Salv. We would almost always have 2 pallies, so Might/Kings is a given, and then most fights Wisdom would come next, and rarely Salv > Wis (souls, council, illidan)
Especially as BM, the most mana efficient spec by far. The damage you would gain from Might/Kings would be far more than the damage lost from being OOM on any fight I can think of. To be honest, as BM I cant think of ANY fight where you can actually go OOM, unless you're scorpid'ing every 20 sec, mend petting every duration and using arcane/multi, all while in shadow resist gear.
Assuming a nothing but a JoW, a 1:1 could be performed almost indefinately, let alone mana potions, mana tide, and other consumables. 3:2 isnt much of an increase in mana usage, considering you also gain more from JoW when using it (more shots/sec).
You also said:
I'd prefer to be using iAoTH + BoW rather than Viper + BoM.
AoTH = 155 AP
Imp BoW = 49 mp5
plus IAotH haste
vs
imp BoM = 264 AP
Viper, which you would switch to if you actually managed to get below 15% mana = 55% of 300 int = 165mp5
If you did have to choose between those two options you mentioned, the latter seems far superior. Also, you would have the AoTH AP and the haste for most (if not all) of the fight anyway! And only swapping to Viper if needed for the 165 extra mp5.
Sometimes on truly mana intensive fights, I whip out [Black Grasp of the Destroyer], but this is on very rare occasions. Not at Illidan yet to get my little mits on the bow!
~30mp5 is not worth a BC glove slot, ever! Even the gloves off Twin Emps were better for most fights at the time (even for horde hunters with no JoW/BoW). Although I admit I still have mine in the bank.
I'm pretty surprised about that to be honest. We always Might = Kings > Wisdom = Salv. We would almost always have 2 pallies, so Might/Kings is a given, and then most fights Wisdom would come next, and rarely Salv > Wis (souls, council, illidan)
Especially as BM, the most mana efficient spec by far. The damage you would gain from Might/Kings would be far more than the damage lost from being OOM on any fight I can think of. To be honest, as BM I cant think of ANY fight where you can actually go OOM, unless you're scorpid'ing every 20 sec, mend petting every duration and using arcane/multi, all while in shadow resist gear.
Assuming a nothing but a JoW, a 1:1 could be performed almost indefinately, let alone mana potions, mana tide, and other consumables. 3:2 isnt much of an increase in mana usage, considering you also gain more from JoW when using it (more shots/sec).
Unfortunately, I'm using Sunfury and run 3:2, so maybe that sheds more light on why I prefer BoW.
I generally chain pot in any 10 or 25man fight, as soon as my CD is up, down goes another one. We never get any Spriest love, incredibly rarely do we get Mana Spring, so BoW is all about I've got to bank on.
I do use Oils, but generally tend to Flask (so no Mageblood), because our guild is currently going through SSC/TK learning new content....And JoW, heh, boy I'd love to see that. I might get lucky if we have a Prot Pally who isn't needed on a fight then might keep JoW up while he's throwing off-heals, otherwise, no chance.
That being said, I must be doing something right with my choices. Feel free to armory me, you'll see I'm using mostly 115-125 iLevel gear (Kara/S2/Badges) and (raid buffed) quite commonly crack 1200 to 1300 dps. I feel I box above my weight, usually keeping up with or just beating much better geared mages/locks/rogues, who are generally pushing 1400+ with T5/S3/ZA type gear.
You also said:
AoTH = 155 AP
Imp BoW = 49 mp5
plus IAotH haste
vs
imp BoM = 264 AP
Viper, which you would switch to if you actually managed to get below 15% mana = 55% of 300 int = 165mp5
Sadly, we only get vanilla BoM in my guild. Also, I love my haste procs.
In regards to Viper, I think you'll find much has changed since the regen fix and you're giving it far too much credit. I don't have any numbers, but since 2.4, I've found Viper to be incredibly ineffective.
Me guild is progressing through SSC(3/6) & TK (2/4)
I just got the pattern for [Belt of the Black Eagle]
I know i am missing a few gems, which i will get soon.
What i want to know is it worth crafting the belt, breaking my set bonus?
And is T5 worth the time?
I'm not doubting you're doing good dps, after all the main thing that effects dps more so than any gear or buff is the ability of the hunter to perform their shots. These buffs are just a small optimisation.
I suppose I've gotten used to JoW lately. Our paladins have come a LONG way in the last few months, and even when our ret paladin isnt around, JoW/JoL uptime is quite good.
The value I got for Viper I don't think has changed in 2.4. The change was the way 5sec rule mana regens. Viper works on a % of your intellect every 5 seconds, varying on your current % of mana, with a min/max of 10/50% of your intellect per 5 seconds (+5% from 2pc t6). So at roughly 10% mana, you would expect 55% of your intellect (roughly 300 with AI/Kings/GoTW using a few leather items), equalling 165 mp5. I believe 60% mana equates to 25% of your intellect every 5 seconds, and 90% mana would be 10% of your intellect. This is just a vague memory of blue posts.
I dont have time to do the maths now or any time soon.. but I was always under the following train of thought:
AP/crit/armor pen/haste > int and mp5.
Why?
Because, when comparing the same amount of AP/crit/etc to mp5 per item budget points (eg "10 item budget points worth of AP" compared to to "10 item budget points worth of mp5") over a fight with a duration long enough to go out of mana, the damage gained from the AP throughout the fight is higher than the extra shots gained with mp5. The longer the fight goes, the more shots you can potentially gain from mp5, however all those shots (and the shots before it) all still benefit from the AP that you could of had in the first place. Eventually there reaches a point where your oom-time is such a high percentage of the fight that it finally outweighs the AP (eg starting a 20 minute fight on zero mana), however even still, one would need to work out if the AP from all the shots in that 20 minutes would add up to more damage than the extra shots mp5 would give.
Tack on the fact that their are MANY ways to not go oom, but limited ways to gain AP/crit/etc, it's a no brainer why hunters do not value MP5/int and why so many of us wear leather items.
edit: Sorry, I dont want to sound like I'm hammering into you... It's just more the fact like I'm pissed off about how hunters mana works :P Well, I used to be. Now that we have a ret paladin that turns up most the time, I honestly don't care. I only have to bitch about auto-shot mechanics now!
Last edited by Intermission : 03/31/08 at 1:20 AM.
Intermission, I agree wholeheartedly... and you know what, this may be the exact reason why I like BoW so much.
I have a few pieces of leather gear (as I'm sure many people do) and I prefer Agi enchants over Int enchants for the same reason, in short: RAP is life.
I too am currently trying to stack Armor Pen as much as I can, since I'm hit capped, at a good RAP/Crit level (for my gear) and it's the only foreseeable way forward.
As an Oceanic player, Haste is the bane of my existence hence the strong desire for Armor Pen, I have enough trouble with my 400ms trying not to clip my autos.
Intermission, I agree wholeheartedly... and you know what, this may be the exact reason why I like BoW so much.
I have a few pieces of leather gear (as I'm sure many people do) and I prefer Agi enchants over Int enchants for the same reason, in short: RAP is life.
I too am currently trying to stack Armor Pen as much as I can, since I'm hit capped, at a good RAP/Crit level (for my gear) and it's the only foreseeable way forward.
As an Oceanic player, Haste is the bane of my existence hence the strong desire for Armor Pen, I have enough trouble with my 400ms trying not to clip my autos.
Before going balls out stacking Armor Pen, which is really the only way to do it to a degree,
Consider that unlike adding additional crit/ap, Armor pen has no return value for your pet, who as a BM hunter will be doing close to 30% of your dps, It reaches a point where actively pursueing Armor Pen at the cost of other stats is pointless, I don't mean loosing AP/crit from your current value to gain Armor Pen, but also passing up on the possibility of stacking more.
There are may excellent items that are budgetted very well and have armor pen on them, this is fine, But alot of the armor pen gear is also budgetted fairly badly IMO, just be carefull in which pieces you decide to take,
I agree with you 100% on the haste to a point, I aim to get enough haste to bring my 3.0(2.17 after SS) down to ~2.0, this allows for NZ/aus ping but also cuts down the dead time between lag/GCD for a BM 1:1 rotation.
Assuming a nothing but a JoW, a 1:1 could be performed almost indefinately, let alone mana potions, mana tide, and other consumables. 3:2 isnt much of an increase in mana usage, considering you also gain more from JoW when using it (more shots/sec).
Assuming nothing but a JoW is still pretty much assuming everything On the rare occasions (basically PuG gruuls or kara) where we have a ret pally keeping JoW up I have a hard time using mana too, but generally I haven't had a single serious raid in 3 years where JoW was up most of the time. The holy pallies have always been friendly and tossed it up on occasion, but they generally have better things to do than keeping it up all the time.
We just cleared Naj to Mother, with me being in an enhancement shaman + rogue/warrior group most of the night, having BoW, BoM and BoK up. I drank after almost every trash pack (thanks to multishot), and had to carefully plan things out (running 1:1 most of the time, with occasional MD/scorpid/HM) every boss so that using mana pots and dark runes on cooldown I didn't go oom until the boss died (and on mother I still ran out well before she died).
Normally I'd have an spriest, which either keeps me pegged at 95% mana running 3:2, or lets me get away with super mana pots if i'm running 3:2 with multishots and MDs on cooldown, and constant scorpid sting.
I have a nice stash of oils, magebloods and fel mana saved for Brutallus so hopefully that'll be ok, but I'm still pushing hard to get a ret pally so I don't need to demand an spriest (I'm fairly sure even with full mana consumables I can't sustain 3:2-Multishot for 6 minutes, but that arguably not a problem since in theory at least swapping in the multis isn't a dps boost (in practice it seems to be though :S I need to record some good logs and see what's actually happening when I try to slot them in instead of steadies). Especially since getting an Spriest means forgoing better DPS buffs like LotP/BS+UR.
Almost all armor pen gear is itemised well IMO. Mainly because it has been implemented in the second half of the expansion cycle, when itemisation is far better on lower ilvl gear (badge, ZA) to help people catch up.
But yeah, obviously you'd use Quickstrider Moco's over the 1st chest ZA boots.
Also, Marks and Survival make use of Arcane shot, which also slightly devalues armor pen. In my opinion, worrying about pet scaling stats as BM is a bit silly. The benefits are so small that the two items being compared would have to be so similar you'd grab the spreadsheet out anyway (which will calculate your pets dps too).
@Osse:
But thats the beauty of JoW, it negates the terrible hunter itemisation and lets me use more rogue loot! (RAP -> AP not included)
Last edited by Intermission : 03/31/08 at 2:31 AM.
That being said, I must be doing something right with my choices. Feel free to armory me, you'll see I'm using mostly 115-125 iLevel gear (Kara/S2/Badges) and (raid buffed) quite commonly crack 1200 to 1300 dps. I feel I box above my weight, usually keeping up with or just beating much better geared mages/locks/rogues, who are generally pushing 1400+ with T5/S3/ZA type gear.
Mind posting a WWS?
It's all fun & games till someone gets a [Hydrocane] in the eye!
Before going balls out stacking Armor Pen, which is really the only way to do it to a degree,
Consider that unlike adding additional crit/ap, Armor pen has no return value for your pet, who as a BM hunter will be doing close to 30% of your dps, It reaches a point where actively pursueing Armor Pen at the cost of other stats is pointless, I don't mean loosing AP/crit from your current value to gain Armor Pen, but also passing up on the possibility of stacking more.
There are may excellent items that are budgetted very well and have armor pen on them, this is fine, But alot of the armor pen gear is also budgetted fairly badly IMO, just be carefull in which pieces you decide to take,
I agree with you 100% on the haste to a point, I aim to get enough haste to bring my 3.0(2.17 after SS) down to ~2.0, this allows for NZ/aus ping but also cuts down the dead time between lag/GCD for a BM 1:1 rotation.
My guild is currently moving through SSC/TK.
With the help of new badge gear, some quick progression, hopefully we'll be in Hyjal in about a month.
I plan to spec MM at that point, I miss my days as a BWL raider with Ashjre!
That being said, I'm aware of that, so I'd like to reword my comment: please change "stacking" to "collecting", I don't actually wear all of my Armor Pen gear as BM.
In regards to Viper, I think you'll find much has changed since the regen fix and you're giving it far too much credit. I don't have any numbers, but since 2.4, I've found Viper to be incredibly ineffective.
When 2.4 did come out I did test about how effective Viper is. Results where exactly as in tooltip, ~15% in int per 5 seconds when full mana, ~50-55% of int when OOM.
Yes, when I did logged on first time in 2.4 with AoV active, it did not work, but after switching to Hawk and back it begun to work and have not seen it not working again.
I know that using Kill Command in a macro caused some weird issues last patch. Does anyone know if this has been fixed in 2.4?
No, it has not been fixed, and I believe it wasn't just with a macro, nor was it just with Kill Command. A macro with KC was simply the easiest way to trigger it.
So how do you Hunters claiming that you use the 3:2 rotation actually maintain this?
I go OOM before the cd on my pot is up.
Example. I begin shooting at Dr Boom with 3:2 rotation. Take first mana pot about once I've used about 2k of my total mana. That brings me back up to approx full mana again, and begins the potion cooldown timer. By the time I go OOM, my pot cd still has about 30-40 seconds left on it.
I dont see how it is possible to use a 3:2 rotation in practice; no mana and all I'll be doing is Autoshotting.
It works fine, let me break it down, Mana oil,Fel mana potions, (bow/jow where availible) it doesn't take a lot more. I use hawk whenever availible and try to kill a boss with limited viper usage.
Heres a couple WWS shots incase analysis will yield any further answers, The 3:2 (ss:as) is solid dps. Group makeup in these isn't so hot. Wow Web Stats Mother shaz (337 SR) Wow Web Stats Bloodboil
I'll post longer fights if requested, this is just what we did yesterday, I'll throw up todays council/illidan once they're dead if wanted.
Me guild is progressing through SSC(3/6) & TK (2/4)
I just got the pattern for [Belt of the Black Eagle]
I know i am missing a few gems, which i will get soon.
What i want to know is it worth crafting the belt, breaking my set bonus?
And is T5 worth the time?
Adding to this, if i am going to break my set I was looking for some new bracer's and using Cheeky's Spreadsheet [Master Assassin Wristwraps] seem to give me the best DPS better then anything else up to BT, which to me seems a bit ridiculous. any thoughts?
Adding to this, if i am going to break my set I was looking for some new bracer's and using Cheeky's Spreadsheet [Master Assassin Wristwraps] seem to give me the best DPS better then anything else up to BT, which to me seems a bit ridiculous. any thoughts?
It's not ridiculous, it's just the way Blizzard chose to itemize. Yes, that's an excellent bracer for dps (second best in game in fact for me with my current gear.) But we're talking about only 5.3 dps more than [Bands of the Celestial Archer] so I am making the tradeoff of 24 extra int for the 5.3 dps and saving my badges for a 3 times bigger upgrade ([Angelista's Revenge].)
03/29/08, 4:33 PM
On the rare occasions (basically PuG gruuls or kara) where we have a ret pally keeping JoW up I have a hard time using mana too, but generally I haven't had a single serious raid in 3 years where JoW was up most of the time. The holy pallies have always been friendly and tossed it up on occasion, but they generally have better things to do than keeping it up all the time.
