doubt it, the AP gain from CA for three points will end up scaling better and doing more than damage than the four points you spent in imp tracking.

Pretty sure it was confirmed earlier in the thread that improved tracking only affects the hunters damage, not the pets.

Improved Tracking almost certainly doesn't affect your pet--it was an assumption made based on ambiguous wording.

Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

That's my plan for 80 as BM (assuming hit capped, Animal Handler is a useless talent now). I'm still annoyed at the "throw away" point in the upper tiers of BM though. I really wish they'd have shuffled it around a bit so we were just tossing a point into Endurance Training to "waste".

Ok i see, it was a bad assumption from my side then. Its easy to read all damage as hunters and pets damage though. But if its only the hunters damage then its a no go and I would surely agree with the specc posted by Sean above this post.

I am still curious about the usefullness of Aimed Shot though. But on the other hand you wont miss the point in improved mend pet that much anyway so why not take it for pulling indeed.

Given the information I have read here with respect to Rapid Fire and autoshot damage, pet/hunter hit ratings, and also taking into consideration pet survivability, this is the raid spec I am considering at 80: Talent Calculor- World of Warcraft

My raid pet will most likely be a cat, with the following spec:



I feel that the additional 4 points gained by the 51-point BM skill will allow for a more powerful, longer living pet and thus more DPS for the two of us, but I would like to test out the Readiness BM spec as well.

In which case are people thinking about specing their pets so that they skip points in Bloodthirsty, Phoenix, and Lick Wounds?

Skipping bloodthirsty seems foolhardy at best. I'd skip lick wounds, phoenix, and pull 2 pts from Great Stam to fill in Bloodthirsty.

Not so much a single talent point when you have to give up a lot to get there, and go deep into Marksmanship spending many points in not-terribly desirable talents...

I am not buying that an extra BW every 3 minutes is worth it when it's already on a 1.17 minute cooldown with 3/3 Longevity and a Glyph. Not worth giving up all the goodies on the bottom end of the BM tree, anyway, minimizing to 50 points in BM would seem to really hurt you for a not-so-impressive trick.

You can't really "skip" Bloodthirsty and get Phoenix/Lick Your Wounds anyway since it's required for them. I'd still say Pet Calculator - Wowhead is the best Ferocity DPS pet build (for people without the 51 point BM talent), though I guess the point in dash could go to Great Stamina if it's needed.

Why is it that people think that Readiness will remain as it is? There was no indication as such and, seeing as how the Prep is on a 10 min cool down as a 21 point talent and Cold Snap on an 8 min cool down as a 21 point talent, it is highly unlikely that MM will have a 3 minute cool down talent that resets everything when the other two only affect specific talents. IF it stays at 3 minutes, it will reset MM specific cool downs only. On top of that, do you really think that Blizzard, with all that they've said up to this point (and yes, you have to take that with a grain of salt), would find it acceptable for the BM population of the Hunter community skipping their 51 point talent for a 21 point talent?

It wouldn't be the first time that hunters skipped the last talent of a tree. I remember for a while pre-TBC hunter were playing as 0/21/30. Also, Prep does a lot more for a rogue than it does for a hunter.

There is no indication about Readiness nerf either. But I do believe BM+Readiness is more PvP oriented (36 seconds of freedom ). I agree with Steel that in raid environment bottom BM talents seem much better choice than going for Readiness.
Something like this Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft.
Since Serpent sting seems to be marginal dps upgrade (assuming there is MM/SV hunter to keep it on boss) I would rather choose Efficiency. And Animal Handler is not worth it seeing both hunter and his pet will be close to hit cap.

There's been a lot of talk of hunter +hit transferring to the pet. Has anyone on the beta tested if this applies to the +hit gained from surefooted? I'm wondering, if it doesn't, if it will be worth the points when +hit will still have value after gaining +6% to help get your pet to the cap as well.

We're agreeing, there, just badly. The post above mine suggested not taking bloodthirsty, which is what i was disagreeing with. In fact, our suggested specs are identical except you took charge & I took a point in stam, and I think either one would be a valid choice.

Pets gain the 3% hit from Surefooted.

I may be missing something here, but why would anyone even consider BM w/o taking the 51 point talent? Devilsaurs have a 9% damage increase, and considering our pet is 50% of our DPS, that's 1 talent point for a 4.5% increase to our total DPS. If I am missing something though, please tell me.

Seems like all Ferocity pets have a 10% damage increase, not just Devilsaurs (please correct me if I am wrong).

As has probably already been mentioned here, the main draw of the 51pt talent is not in the exotics themselves, but in the 4 extra pet talent points you receive.

Edit: Bellin posted as I was posting, whoops!

What is the point of an exotic pet in the first place then? If they don't have anything special to offer, then there is absolutely no point to them other than looks and 'different' abilities, which don't yield any DPS increase.

They might as well scrap the whole idea of exotic pets and just make the 51 point BM talent 4 extra pet talent points if what you said is correct.

Devilsaurs get monstrous bite, which does damage and increases the pet's damage by 3%, stacking 3 times.

Apologies, I was stupid and forgot the 3 minute cooldown on Readiness. At least no one else noticed and corrected my dps figures...

Talented, BW is every 1.4 minutes (70% x 2 minutes.) Triggering Readiness gives you an extra one every 3 minutes (not every 1.4 minutes as I had before.) Total dps increase is thus (10+50)*18/180/2 = 3% assuming 50/50 split of hunter/pet damage.

Rake is currently ignoring armour and scaling rather ridiculously. Expect it to get changed or at least toned down.

If I were to take the BM 51pt talent it would be for pet survivability for specific fights. An extra 9% damage reduction from magic or more health/armour depending on the fight would be worth it. It allows for flexibility when spec'ing a pet, rather than having to go the straight route and pick all the 'dps' talents.

My take on Blizzard's philosophy regarding exotic pets is twofold: 1) it gives BM hunters something identifiable that sets them apart (or makes them a target, as the case may be) and 2) it gives them access to some pet specials that are slightly better than non-exotic counterparts.

Exotic pets are indeed better than their non-exotic counterparts (putting aside bugged or overtuned abilities from non-exotics), but they aren't designed to be so much better such that it's stupid not to use one if you've specced that far. They want to preserve the ability of 51-point BM hunters to use whatever pet they want, particularly since Blizzard has put so much work into redesigning them all.

For someone new to both these forums and really understanding hunter mechanics, can someone please explain why all the new Wrath builds are speccing 5/5 in IAotH. To me, it seems pretty useless, especially when haste will be so abundant in Wrath. Thanks in advance.