Naturally, the first hunter in a raid should be SV, no doubt about it. Even picking up IHM if there's noone else.

As for GffT.. just how much focus does your pet need? It'll be spamming claw/bite/etc.. for 25 focus ever Pet GCD and you might have an activated ability on a long(ish) CD. GffT was a necessary evil for a Wind Serpent's Lightning Breath, but it'll be less with different pet families.

Edit: according to the spreadsheet 1/2 GffT should be enough for claw spam under current mechanics. With 2/2 Bestial Discipline it'll have left-over focus at the same time so using a long-CD ability shouldn't be a problem. With 0/2 GffT it'll be focus-starved, reducing claw spam rate to once every 2secs instead of 1,5secs.

I'd imagine a non-wind serpent can probably do with 1/2 gftt.

I'm still curious if a WS can compete with some of the lesser ferocity pets simply due to being able to dump focus better than any other pet in the game.

Delay was a bad choice of word from me. Reset swing-timer are better.
The idea that I tried to propose was that we at least should look at Aimed Shot before dismissing it.

Fact, in raids a BM-hunter will have Serpent Swiftness, Quiver haste, WF-totem as default, that's 65,6% haste, gives Aimed Shot a casting time of 1.5097 if it's affected by all mentioned effects.

I will compare SS, Auto and Aimed Shot here, they are all affected by armor the same amount to we can dismiss armor in following statements.

Case 1:
A 2.5 weapon.
As Aimed will delay a auto-shot here with it's full cast-time, we get a 1.51s delay, or in other words, we miss exactly 1 auto-shot, we also take up a GCD that would have used for SS.
As Aimed shot does the damage as a normal auto-shot + 1570 damage, we can dismiss the missed auto-shot and only compare the added 1570 damage to the missed SS.
If SS does less damage then 1570 Aimed Shot are viable, but I guess SS will do a bit more damage then that?


Case 2:
A 3.2 weapon, 1.93 after haste.
Here will Aimed delay Auto with 1.51 seconds and that's 78% of the auto-shot timer, therefor we only loose 78% of a auto-shot, question:
Is Aimed Shot > SS + 0.78*Auto?

Improved Steady Shot are also a thing to consider, 15% extra damage on the next Arcane, Aimed, Kill shot, can Aimed be viable here over the other 2?

Don't rule out Aimed Shot until we get all the facts, we don't know the exact mechanics yet.


On a other thing, I see many dismissing Chimera Shot, but how much do we know about this shot. The 30% weapon damage, will it be physical or magical damage? When consuming a Serpent Sting, will it do Nature damage or Physical damage. Can it crit? what crit-modifier does it have?

Asuming that when we consume a Serpent Sting, the 30% weapon damage are added as nature damage on top on the 40% Serpent damage, with 4000 AP (again, number pulled of nowhere but, just to have something to go on), we get 30% weapon damage plus 644 (0.4* (1210 + 0.1*4000) ), dunno what 30% weapon damage will be, but 0.3*1500 shouldn't be such a bad guess? So 450 + 644 = 1094, as it's nature damage and we are allowing shadow-priests, moonkins and enhancement shamans in the raid we get 1094*1.05*1.06*1.20=1461 damage, hope for a crit and we got a 3360 damage on the target, add another 1288*1.05*1.06*1.20 damage from 4 ticks on the Serpent dot and we get between 3181 to 5080 damage, the cost, 2 GCD, will for example 2 SS do more damage then 3181 after armor mitigation?

Improved stings would give more spicy numbers, but I guess my asumptions on the mechanics might not be valid, so I didn't include it.

I think the problem with chimera shot is you're still required to use serpent sting.

So if you use serpent and then chimera instantly, that's still two GCD's for something like the same damage as just letting the sting tick out. PvE wise I can't see it as beneficial if you're trying to DPS like that. And if you cast serpent and then use chimera at the end of the duration, you certainly get more damage out of it, but it's still two GCDs and a considerable amount more management on your part.

Your logic is flawed, in that you assume only 1 steady will fire during the aimed. All of the haste effects will be applying to Steady and Auto, therefore the cast times will be reduced to match the current ratio. The only way I can see Aimed as being viable is if our GCD mechanics don't change. Even then it is unlikely. You also use several buffs to show that Aimed will do more, but again those buffs will apply to Steady and Auto, and maintain the current ratio (or weight it in favor of Steady and Auto, due to applying twice).

The problem with aimed shot is it totally resets the auto timer so with the 3.0 bow on a 1.93 auto shot time if you start the aimed shot right after an auto you still delay the next auto 1.51(rounded aim shot cast time)+1.93(reset auto shot time)=3.44secs that is pretty big and sucky.

Apologies if this had been posted before, but I was unaware of the RaP scaling and cooldown-less version of volley in WoTLK and explosive shot looks fantastical. (crosilisks too!). Nice little blog someone put together.

Treisk's WotLK Beta Blog

That Volley change is a welcome one, although it seems quite powerful. In the movie it hits for 422 and crits for 722.. every second.

This confirms that blizzard is indeed giving everyone some form of AoE viability. 700 per second really isn't that much when you think about how much level 80 seeds will be hitting for.

You'd need chimera + serpent sting to out damage two steady shots for it to be worth it.

Not sure how it scales, but the base damage for Volley has been upped as well: from 105 at Rank 4 in TBC to 240 at Rank 4 in WotLK (actually all of the ranks have been upgraded).

TBC: Volley - Spell - World of Warcraft
WotLK: Volley - Spell - World of Warcraft

There are no new ranks listed, but I imagine there will be one since they come around about every 10 levels. It will be nice to be able to contribute a little bit more in AOE situations. As it is I find running in and dropping an explosive trap to be more effective than Volley.

Another change I haven't seen noted: Disengage has been buffed!

TBC: Disengage - Spell - World of Warcraft (Threat -545)
WotLK: Disengage - Spell - World of Warcraft (Threat -1090)

I used to like Disengage for Azuregos way back when... brings back memories. It definitely will be nice to contribute more in AOE situations, or at least not fall as far behind warlocks on the meters in these situations.

Edit: I'm a murloc, interesting.

While I don't know I agree exactly with your assessment of cunning -- I don't describe tier 4 as DPS other than Feeding Frenzy -- I do agree that the pet trees are rather muddled. In fairness, there are certain things that need to be available in each tree. I'd be rather upset if my pet couldn't learn to dash/dive. However, I don't think they did an excellent job of arraying these trees. Among raiders, regardless of which tree they're considering, who isn't putting all their tier 3 points into Avoidance? Aside from maybe Intervene, is there anything worth coming back for?

Personally, I don't view there as being two DPS trees. I see a tanking tree, a DPS tree, and a tree put there for the explicit purpose of returning 40% mana to your group. Cunning is good for NOTHING else, as far as I'm concerned. I could understand if it was screwball back-door DPS, but only Feeding Frenzy meets that description. Maybe I'll change my tune when I find out how Wolverine Bite actually works, but as I'm reading the tooltips, cunning is worthless, and -- worse still -- doesn't even seem to have an identity. Survival is our utility tree. I don't see cunning as the pet's.

As others have commented on the lack of percentage points for cunning coefficients, there has got to be something we're missing. It's just simply deficient in every way imaginable. Anemic, even.

And this, of course, is the other apparent failing of the pet trees. If they're going to give us 5 extra points for BM, they need to make there be decisions non-BM's have to make that BM can just say, "eh, I'll get them all." Right now, there isn't that. As a survivalist, I can pick what I want with 16 and be happy. Would I like other shinies? Sure, but I don't need them. Right now, BMT is looking rather superfluous, especially with how poor Aspect Mastery is looking.

Clearcast could free up 2 points in gftt potentially. And I'm pretty sure roar of recovery is hunter-only.

Haven't read all the previous posts, but it seems that Camo is no longer in Beta. Linky.

I don't know about you guys, but this makes me sad. One of the biggest PvP buffs hunters have seen since pre-BC, and they gut it. On top of leaving Scatter a talent, we're once again going to amount to target dummies in the arena.

Where does my logic break?
My logic are based on the assumption that haste will lower casting time while it will not lower GCD as you also states.
All the buffs that I including I also include on Stead and Auto. In fact, one thing that I didn't added was the crit-chance, there are a bigger chance that on shot crits, then two shots crits, including that we get another advantage for Aimed Shot.
With for example 30% crit chance we get that Aimed shot will have a 0.7+0.3*2.3 = 1.39 damage modifier, SS+Auto has a 0.09*2.3+2*0.21*2.3+0.49=1.117 damage modifier if my math is logical, 9% that both crits, 30-9 = 21*2 = 42% that any of them crit and 49% that non of them crit.

Well, I used a 3.2 weapon speed in my seconds example, nvm.
The point being, that while the reset on auto-shot, is only a delay of auto-shot with 1.51s, so you will only 78% of a auto-shot, so the question that comes to me are, will Aimed Shot do more damage then for example a SS + 78% of a Auto Shot? Should also be added that Aimed Shot would be very tricky to get of immediately after a auto-shot so that lower it's chances.

I never stated that Aimed Shot will be supreme to other shots, I just think that it should be considered in future calculation before dismissing it.

I just don't like how underwhelming Aspect Mastery. I mean, true, how many of you guys took improved aspect of the hawk back when it was a RAP increase? But 150 RAP vs 5% extra damage? Especially when its looking like how much RAP we will already have?

If anything, Aspect Mastery should be more like, While you have an Aspect active, you will always gain at least 10%/20%/30%/40%/50% of the effect of Aspect of the Monkey, Hawk and Viper. And make it so that regardless of what aspect you are using, improved aspect of the hawk still works.

That would be useful and more in line with that tier of talent in my opinion.

If aspect mastery isn't changed, I have a feeling it's value might lie in the 10% damage reduction while in aspect of the monkey. Depending on how encounters turn out, it could be beneficial on some gimmic fights.

Bloodboil Fel Rage type fights
Na'jentus Shield damage type fights
Pre-Council 1-shot trash protection (damn those lazy priests)

Although I guess you could also spec into SV and use imp. Feign Death's 30% reduction on top of it.

If that was so then having a MM hunter for Scoprid/Chimera (60/40/20% damage reduction on next three attacks) would be REQUIRED.

BTW About Chimera/Scorpid... anyone test whether or not it is a Physical attack only reduction or would it work to reduce like say a Mage's next three fireballs by 60/40/20% also?

/Offtopic and a pipe dream to boot... how fun would it be if the 51 point BM talent let you MC a druid in cat/bear/travel form? (the talent would have to significatly reduce the cast time of tame beast which i don't understand why it currently isnt already... I mean you ARE a master at beast taming right???)

Cunning is obviously the pvp tree. The 40% mana thing is solely for you and, given how much mana regen is available in pve, only really useful if you've been drained. Not to mention Mobility gives your pet permanent dash/dive, and both Cornered and Feeding Frenzy seem like great pvp talents. Different people want different things, what can I say?

Arcazua - I posted before that I trained up Wolverine Bite on a pet. It read 355 on the tooltip once I trained it.