I came across this tidbit from the PTR 3.0.3 patch notes as reported on MMO-champion:

The wording seems a bit vague for a non-english speaker but I interpret it as meaning that thunderstomp will be purely magic damage, meaning no armor mitigation. That would make it even better for threat generation.

Just to further save you from the stereotypical label of "huntard." I suggest you hit the http://elitistjerks.com/f31/t28573-h...es_discussion/ thread for some valuable information on this exact topic. I believe we have even touched on this topic some in this thread. Use the 'Search this Thread" tool.

Presently I’m running with 50/11/0 with a Cat to take advantage of the massive DPS they’re doing until 3.0.3. I’m intent on moving to a Devilsaur for raiding at 80, since GFFT will no longer be mutually exclusive with exotic pets at 71, and I’ve seen what they’re capable of at 80 on the Beta.

I’ve always been a raptor man, and pre-3.0.2 they did really decent DPS compared to the traditional Cats, Ravagers, Wind Serpents. Savage Rend, however, is a rather clunky special, with a significantly longer cooldown (42 seconds with 3/3 Longevity) than other pet specials. But I believe in its potential due to the crit-based proc Savagery adding 10% damage done (even larger than Devilsaur’s fully stacked bonus) for 30 seconds, because the greatest thing about Devilsaurs and Raptors is that the self-buff modifies white damage as well, which is the majority of pet DPS done, and scales very nicely with pet attack speed.

To make ideal usage of Savage Rend, it’s very important to guarantee a crit with it.

I’m thinking of a build like this but I really wish I could put more points in Cobra Strikes. Longevity 3/3 is critical to maximize the uptime of the pet crit proc and sacking points in Kindred Spirits works against the effort of keeping Savage Rend’s damage proc up.

Right now you simply rely on the RNG, because pet crit rating is very high (~40%). Another possibility is to take Savage Rend off auto-cast and force it manually only when Cobra Strikes is active. Kill Command is also a mechanism to buff pet crit chance (thanks to Focused Fire), though it’s not ideal to wait the cooldown difference (42 seconds vs. 1 min for KC) and also not guaranteed.

I know that ‘conditionals’ are not allowed in macros, but I’ve seen workarounds. I recall a script that looped through your buff icons to determine if a specific texture was present, and you could use that to cast an ability.

Does anybody have any ideas on how to make the best use of Savage Rend? It seems without a conditional macro, you'd just have to be on top of it and manually cast it only when Cobra Strikes procs.

Is Cheeky's still applicable in trying to find our current best gear set as of the 3.0 patch? I know raid-wide buffs and new pet types have changed, but I was wondering if anyone had put together something to assemble the best possible gear/pet/spec till the actuall expansion hits. Also now that Moonkin dont have Imp FF is there another class/spec that privides our missing hit% now? Sorry if this has been addressed elsewhere.

In Eye of the storm, i hear it's great fun for elemental shaman to toss opposing players off that center bridge while fighting over the flag. The rhino could possibly allow you to enjoy this feeling as well.

Getting a Gauge.

Hunters,
I have been struggling w/ the changes since 3.0.2 as I work fulltime and then spend eves either raiding or caring for family/cleaning house/other stupid housewife chores. I, thus, haven't had the time I would like to read the entire wotlk thread on these changes. My dps in recent raiding went from a nice 1.8-1.9k pre-patch to 1.3-1.4k while my fellow MM is still up around 1.9-2.1k.

I am requesting some idea of what numbers, pre3.0.3, I *should* be seeing as BM w/ any non-exotic pet, esp. cat. I intend to implement some of the macros mentioned in this new thread [ty btw for creating it, Mattaos!] at our Sunday raid. Please give me a ballpark for right now that I should be hitting using the macros and knowledge gleaned in this thread. I need to get my game back on track, or risk losing a spot in the raids. Thanks ahead of time.

There are not any real "cookie cutter" specs or macros for say at this point. Also, on the first page of this thread is a link to the updated WotLK spreadsheet, which will also help you a lot in determining gear config to max DPS. Do keep in mind that currently MM is a DPS machine along with BM, so a few tweaks in the way your appraching BM 3.0 might pull you back in-line with your hunter counterpart.

EDIT: Just a quick glance at your armory and talents... I would find a way to get yourself to hit capped via gear and drop Focused Aim for now to max Careful Aim 3/3. Drop Animal Handler (currently does nothing for BM) and slide those points into Spirit Bond for pet survivability (not a DPS increase). Pets receive 100% transference of our hit rating. Take your 1 point in Invig and max 5/5 Kindred Spirits. And finally, drop Beast Mastery for now and slide that point into 1/2 GFTT.

You were gimping personal damage potential by not taking 3/3 Careful Aim. The other point re-allocations are to focus as much damage potential into your pet. What other ranged weapons do you have immediate access to in your bank? The badge xbow is too fast for the current raid buff mechanics. Under standard raid haste effects your attack speed is dropping well below 1.5 and wasting any additional haste beyond that point. It is a benefit (atleast until the WF nerf hits next patch) to use a slower 3.0 speed weapon.

I'm not sure where you get the notion that you need a shot rotation at all. At 70, A BM hunter need only mash steady shot as fast as the GCD allows.

Be sure that your talent points are spent properly. 3/3 Careful Aim with 2/5 Mortal Shots is better than 5/5 Mortal Shots, just as Invigoration should not be taken due to being relatively useless (Primarily because JoW is currently powerful enough to keep a hunter at/near 100% mana by itself). If you're not going 2/2 gftt, make sure to fill out 5/5 in kindred spirits instead of spending points in lesser talents. Otherwise 4/5 should be the minimum at present.

Aside from that the only concerns are maximizing dps-time and stacking cooldowns with bloodlust if possible.

I thought haste only hurt if you had more than enough to bring steady shot cast time down to 1.5s OR is 1.5s the fastest our weapons can shoot? (i thought we could go sub 1s)

That xbow has no haste on it, so why does having it auto shoot as fast as possible hurt? I thought they did away with slow bows being all powerful and tried to work towards favoring dps and stats over speed/weapon range.

Tithene, I know this sounds stupid, but did you find out how to assign talent points to your pet?

Skipping that stage can cause you to not see any major difference between pets.
And the bible link at the front, perhaps should have a cookie cutter pet talent layout as well. I'm not saying it's required, but perhaps letting people know what talents to have at 70 without BM is important vs. 80 when they'll have spare points.

You don't have to put

in a macro to use them, unless you really want to. You can keep your character count down by using

which will use whatever trinkets are in your first and second trinket slots, respectively.